For the two days of April 9 and 10, 2025, Yusuf Lule CTF auditorium, Makerere University was packed to the full as the 8th edition of the Kampala Geopolitics Conference took place with hot debates, exclusive disclosures, fresh learning and unlearning.
With the theme, ‘The African dimensions in international debates’, the conference tackled six topics including peace and development in DR Congo, Africa’s quest for permanent membership at the UN Security Council (UNSC), and the nature and future of peacekeeping in Africa.
Others were artificial intelligence and misinformation as threats to democracy and social cohesion; USA-Africa relations under the second Donald Trump presidency; and the economics, and safety and security at high seas.
Organised and sponsored by a partnership among the French embassy in Uganda, Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, Makerere University and Alliance Francaise de Kampala, the conference was attended by students from many universities, academia and military and security personnel.
It was hosted by the college of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHUSS). Since the African Union’s resolution (the Ezulwini Consensus) to pursue two permanent seats at the UN Security Council in 2005, more water has passed under the bridge than any serious progress in that direction.
It was observed that in addition to many other necessary reforms at the United Nations such as the issue of expanding the veto powers to more than the present Big Five (France, Russia, Britain, USA and China), Africa faces many hurdles.
Moreover, the UN is facing a legitimacy test, with a number of alternatives such as the BRICS coming up to challenge its rationale and structure. While the UN is an organisation constituted of nations (states or countries), Africa is not a nation but a continent.
Vying to join the Security Council are Japan, Germany and India which are states and more organized. Instead, African countries have weak economies and the strength their sovereignty is contested.
Many observed that, rather, Africa should concentrate on ironing out its internal contradictions such as travel and trade connectivity and consolidation of economic muscle, so as to impress other powers to recognize our existence, values and independence.
Otherwise, a continent that permanently depends on begging and donations can only remain an ignored periphery in global geopolitics. It was further observed that Africa suffers from a “crisis of citizenship”; while majority of the world sees Africa as one country, Africa sees herself as 54 countries and a huge alienated diaspora.
This state of affairs keeps Africa unable to confront and outlive the racism and economic structural injustices it has suffered for centuries. Africa dominates UNSC business; with 70 per cent of UNSC resolutions concerning Africa and 40 per cent of UN peacekeepers deployed in Africa. However, it is allocated only three non-permanent seats at UNSC.