Commémoration en l'honneur de Kofi Annan par l'Union Africaine

Dear colleagues and friends,
Excellencies,
Ladies and gentlemen:

We are here to pay tribute to Kofi Annan - to the leader of a generation and a role model to us all; to my friend and trusted mentor; to a citizen of the world, and last but certainly not least, to a true son of Africa.

We know how much he meant to the world. Here and today, we reflect on what he meant to Africa.

His appointment as the first UN Secretary-General from sub-Saharan Africa was a source of immense pride for him and so many on the continent.

Africa was his first home and it is his last resting place. Throughout his life, as he travelled to all corners of the world, it remained his anchor.

Throughout his career, at the UN as much as in later years with the Kofi Annan Foundation, the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, and the Africa Progress Panel, he was a tireless advocate for African leadership, which he once called the “decisive ingredient” for real and meaningful progress, for unity, peace and development.

He had little patience for stereotypes of Africa as a continent riven by conflict, and some of you might remember his often-quoted rebuke that “armed conflict is actually a smaller risk to most Africans than traffic accidents.” Or that the country with the world’s most sustained and strongest economic growth over the last four decades was, in fact, Botswana.

He was sometimes described as a naive idealist by people and pundits far less experienced in the ways of the world. In truth, his sense of realpolitik about how the world works was perhaps his greatest asset.

For he was never blind about the challenges, nor negligent about the gravity of the task at hand. As he told us not long ago, he knew very well what “mountains of human misery” lay behind the euphemism “challenge”. He was on the frontlines as the darkest chapters of humanity’s recent history unfolded. He saw, too, how flagrantly unjust our world still is, marred by inequality and the long shadow of imperialism. He saw development stagnating, deadly conflicts raging, and human rights neglected.

But then there was his experience of how far African countries came in his lifetime alone - the long struggle, one by one, for independence, the defeat of apartheid, and the unwavering and precious belief that the next generation will always have it better than the preceding one. That was I believe one source of his infectious optimism, of his uncanny ability to quietly lead people to achieve what they themselves may never have thought possible.

His fight against HIV/AIDS, his success in placing human rights at the centre of everything we do, his leadership in uniting governments, societies and companies, are all examples of this. And they show that the upshot of his actions was not abstract. It saved millions and millions of lives.

Think also of the Millennium Development Goals, one his proudest achievements. They are enduring testament to his belief that no target is too ambitious so long as you empower people to take ownership and get it done.

His trust and confidence in the young, above all, was boundless. He is gone now, and we are hurting. But I know that it is in the leaders of tomorrow, whom he empowered and inspired, that Kofi Annan’s legacy will be felt for decades to come. In Africa and the world over.

Thank you.