The Africa and African Diaspora, Wits School of Governance, Wits Business School and a host of partners invite you to the African and African Diaspora (AAD) Virtual Conference(link is external) that will take place in October 2021.
Date: 23-29 October 2021
Time: 14h00-17h00 (CAT)
See the #AADConference2021 program here(link is external).
The theme for the conference is “From Manchester 1945 to a Pan-African Renaissance: The Shared Journey – Past, Present and Future”. The Conference will revisit the historical 1945 Manchester Pan-African Conference and critically review progress made since then as well as determine and develop effective global strategies to radically change the lot of Africans and people of African descent globally and thereby defeat the scourge of racism in the world.
The Conference is convened on the backdrop of the 20th Anniversary of the World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerances; the UN International Decade for People of Africa Descent (2015-2024); the AU Constitutive Act which considers Africans in the Diaspora the Sixth Region of the AU; the Quad Centennial of the Transatlantic Slave Trade to Jamestown in Virginia, USA and earlier such acts to Latin America; the “Year of Return’, Ghana, 2019.
Former President Thabo Mbeki is one of the key speakers at the conference. Speakers from across the globe will speak to the following themes:
Our Shared Journey before the Transatlantic Slave trade, Colonisation and Colonial Partitioning of Africa.
Decoloniality, Reparations and Pan-African Spirituality
A Shared Journey with Critical Multilateral International Organisations
Economic Liberation, Climate Change & Justice, and an Equitable International Order
Pan-Africanism with All for All
The Shared Journey: Re-Imagining and Engaging the Future (Rap-up, Agree documents, Action Plan, Conference Declaration & Manifesto)
Other key speakers include Professors Barney Pityana, Cheryl Hendricks, Achille Mbembe and Reverend Angelique Walker. Minister of Arts and Culture, Nathi Mthethwa will send a message of support on behalf of SA President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Reverend Frank Chikane, spokesperson for the conference said, “Although there have been huge achievements in changing the conditions of Africans and Africans in the Diaspora since the 1945 Manchester Pan-African Conference, political developments affecting Africans and people of African descent globally in the last few years suggests that we are not winning the battle against underdevelopment, poverty and the old demon of racism.”
The former civil servant added that the AAD Conference aims to be a working session and platform for open discussion to inform and develop strategies that will radically change the conditions in which Africa and the African Diaspora find themselves in.
“Key to this discussion is the return of Africa and people of African descent back to a competitive leadership position in science and technology, socio-economic, spiritual, and political developments in the world,” he said.
Source: Government of South Africa