The East African Diaspora Media Watch (EADM)

In Summary: The EAC Diaspora is in flax. It’s ready for harvest. The Diaspora outreach forum is timely and of essence. The EAC Diaspora and EAC member states need each other. Meet, engage, learn, understand, and bond. Failure is not an option. The icebreaker? The first cut? This Thursday September 28-Saturday 30, 2023 it will happen. The first-ever international outreach forum for Diaspora communities in the United States hailing from the 7-member East African Community (EAC) countries gets underway in Dallas, Texas. The Doubletree hotel, by the Hilton DFW Airport North, 4441 West John Carpenter Freeway, Irving, TX, 75063 is the rendezvous. Leaders of EAC Diaspora organizations in and outside the  USA, technocrats from the EAC Secretariat and International office on Migration, members of East Africa Legislative Assembly, and bureaucrats from the 7-member EAC countries will grace the maiden event. As Samuel Muwanguzi writes, everything Diaspora is on the table. You cannot not communicate!

Dallas, Texas--The first-ever international outreach forum for Diaspora communities in the United States hailing from the 7-member East African Community (EAC) countries gets underway in Dallas, Texas this Thursday September 28, 2023,  organizers announced here over the weekend. The Diaspora outreach forum will be held at the Doubletree hotel, by the Hilton DFW Airport North, 4441 West John Carpenter Freeway, Irving, TX, 75063. The 3-day Diaspora outreach forum is sponsored by the Arusha-based EAC Secretariat in collaboration with the United Nations’ International Office of Migration (IOM), Mr. Benson Kioko Kasue, the chief coordinator of the forum told the EADM during a phone interview, Monday.

The forum will be headlined by the Secretary General of the East African Community (EAC) Dr. Peter M. Mathuki together with technocrats from the  technical working group (TWG)  charged with the development of the EAC Diaspora Policy and Plan of Action based at the EAC Secretariat in  Arusha, Tanzania, organizers told the EADM. Experts from the UN’s international office of migration (IOC) in New York are also expected to play a leading role during the forum deliberations. Mr. Benson Kioko Kasue, chief coordinator of the event said the Diaspora outreach forum will be attended by representatives from Diaspora  Organizations/Associations/Networks in the USA, Diaspora Members in and outside the USA, representatives from the Dallas-based East African Chamber of Commerce, the East African Business Council, private banks, and the African Union (AU) Citizens and the AU Diaspora organizations directorate. “Others will include officials from the seven embassies representing the EAC in the United States,” Mr. Kasue said.

Other participants are drawn from the East African Legislative Assembly (ELA), the Diaspora focal  points from the EAC partner states’ ministries of foreign affairs, EAC affairs,  investment, and ministries of labor and immigration, central banks, investment promotion agencies, and national tourism boards and the private sector (national chambers of  commerce and business membership organizations). Speaking ahead of the inaugural Diaspora forum in Dallas, Texas, USA, Mr. Benson Kioko Kasue told the EADM that “The Secretary General of the EAC, Dr. Peter Mathuki will lead a team of technocrats from the secretariat in Arusha to consult the Diaspora on how best to address their needs, concerns, and interests in the evolving Diaspora policy for the EAC.” “Since this is the first forum to consult the EAC Diaspora across the world, it demonstrates the extent to which the 7-EAC member governments regard the Diaspora as strong potential business and investment partners,” Mr. Benson Kioko Kasue, the Dallas-based  petroleum  financial expert said in a phone interview.

The Dallas Diaspora outreach forum, the first in a series to be held outside East Africa, will kick-start a sequel of consultative meetings with Diaspora communities around the world to facilitate the formulation of a Diaspora policy for EAC-member countries, a member of the EAC delegation, Mr. Charles Omusana told the EADM over the phone. “The Diaspora policy will aim to develop direct communication channels between the 7-member EAC countries with the Diaspora communities around the world,” he said. Equally, the policy will “seek to promote a conducive business and investment climate within  the 7-EAC member countries to attract Diaspora communities to invest and fully participate in the development of their countries of origin,” Mr. Omusana said.

The East African Community (EAC) is a regional intergovernmental organization of seven partner States comprised of the Republic of Kenya, the Republic of Uganda, the United Republic of Tanzania, the Republic of Rwanda, the Republic of Burundi, the Republic of South Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo(DRC). The Treaty for the Establishment of the East African Community guides the work of the EAC. The treaty to restore the East African Community (EAC) was signed on November 30, 1999 in Arusha, Tanzania by the three original member countries: Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. The new EAC Treaty entered into force on 7 July 2000 following the conclusion of the process of its ratification and deposit of the Instruments of Ratification with the Secretary-General by all the three Partner States. Thus, when the new regional East African Community came into being on November 30, 2001 during the 3rd Summit of EAC held in Arusha, the EAC Heads of State inaugurated the East African Legislative Assembly (ELA) and the East African Court of Justice.

Almost eight years later, on June 18, 2007, the Republic of Rwanda and the Republic of Burundi acceded to the EAC Treaty and became full members of the EAC on July 1, 2007. Meanwhile, on December 3, 2010, the EAC Summit of Heads of State adopted the now 5-member EAC Anthem.

On April 16, 2016, the Republic of South Sudan joined the EAC and became a full member of the EAC on  September 5, 2016. The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the latest entrant into the EAC acceded to the EAC Treaty on April 8, 2022 and became a full member on July 11, 2022. Currently, the 7-member EAC country has an estimated population of 300 million people inhabiting a land area of 4.8 million square kilometers and a combined Gross Domestic Product of US$ 305.3 billion. Clearly, the renewed and reinvigorated EAC holds great strategic and geopolitical significance and prospects for growth and development. The EAC is one of the fastest growing regional economic blocs in the world and is expanding cooperation among the Partner States in various key spheres for their mutual benefit.

The areas of cooperation include political, economic, and social. Presently, the regional integration process is in full swing as reflected by the encouraging progress of the East African Customs Union, the establishment of the Common Market in 2010 and the implementation of the East African Monetary Union Protocol. Currently, the process towards an East African Federation is being fast tracked, underscoring the serious determination of the East African leadership and citizens to construct a powerful and sustainable East African economic and political bloc. In May 2017, the EAC Heads of State adopted the Political Confederation as a transitional model of the East African Political Federation.

Yet, while EAC-member states have deployed resources to harness Diaspora's contribution to the  region's socio-economic development, multiple challenges still remain in their attempt to engage with their diasporas. These challenges include lack of understanding of local systems by the diaspora, lack of policy coordination and implementation due to limited coordination between government departments, failure to adapt programs to diaspora needs and circumstances and lack of data and statistics on the diaspora. Equally, similar challenges are encountered by diaspora organizations and individuals who find their involvement in the development  of their country of origin hindered by a weak or non-existent enabling environment.

Available evidence suggests that while some mechanisms exist at the regional level including the Protocol on Foreign Policy Coordination and East Africa Common Market Protocol, efforts to  coordinate a regional approach to diaspora engagement have had minimal success. However, when the 12th Meeting of the EAC Sectoral Council on Foreign Policy Coordination was held way back on January 7, 2014 and  acknowledged the need to  develop a regional approach to mobilizing the EAC Diaspora to actively participate in the EAC integration process, the EAC Diaspora policy initiative got a shot in the arm. According to a concept paper that informed the onset of the Diaspora outreach forum, in many parts of the world, diaspora resources have been leveraged for development, as seen during the COVID-19 crisis, where remittance flows from migrants greatly complemented government cash transfer programs.

Yet, within the EAC regional block, no coordinated arrangement existed to tap into this potentially transformative Diaspora resource. Moreover, there is also ample evidence indicating that diaspora contribution to the socio-economic development of their countries of origin goes far beyond financial remittances to include transfers of skills and knowledge, entrepreneurship, trade, investments, network building, bridging cultural divides and breaking down gender stereotypes. Given such a background, significant efforts to  foster diaspora contribution to the development of their countries of origin have gained  traction in the recent past.

Particularly, in the East African Community (EAC), diaspora engagement has now been earmarked as one of the priorities that should be pursued in a robust manner. Accordingly, the EAC Protocol on Foreign Policy Coordination  has called for the promotion of the participation of the peoples of the Partner States and the diaspora in the development of the community. Additionally, the EAC Common Market Protocol (EAC CMP) has aimed at facilitating East African Diaspora to take up investment opportunities and establish a presence in any of the EAC Partner States. Furthermore, the EAC CMP has guaranteed citizens of an  EAC Partner State the right to reside in any Partner State along with their spouse, dependents, and children for living, visiting, touring, transit, education, training, working and doing business.

However, this revived EAC treaty, signed 22 years after the collapse of the original East African Community (EAC) in 1977, is keenly cognizant of its history. The defunct EAC lasted only 10 years after it had been inked in 1967 by presidents Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, and Milton Obote of Uganda. At the time of its demise in 1977, both presidents Kenyatta and Nyerere were still in power while Obote of Uganda had been overthrown by General Idi Amin Dada in 1971.

Meanwhile, out of the three presidents who signed the treaty to revive the East African Community in 1999, only president Yoweri Museveni of Uganda is still in power while former president Daniel Arap Moi of Kenya died in 2020 and former president William Benjamin Mkapa of Tanzania also died in 2020.

Despite the turbulent past, the nearly 25-year revived EAC envisions a prosperous, competitive, secure, stable and politically united East Africa and is committed to a mission of widening and deepening economic, political, social, and cultural integration to improve the quality of life of the people of East Africa through increased competitiveness, value added production, and trade and investments.

During the 3-day Diaspora outreach forum in Dallas, participants are expected to reflect on the experiences of diaspora communities and widening the conceptualization of the East African diaspora, engage and allow for a more nuanced understanding of the Diaspora needs, interests, and expectations for an EAC regional diaspora policy and action plan. Also, the Forum will seek to intensify engagement with the diaspora to build trust and relationships between the diaspora and the respective country missions. The EAC technocrats will also endeavor to collect views of the diaspora communities and stakeholders and analyze gaps and needs in regional diaspora engagement; gather inputs on the possible intervention areas and recommendations for an EAC Diaspora Policy and action plan; present to the diaspora business and investment opportunities available in the region ;set a platform for business-to-business engagement between the diaspora and  the private sector from the region; and build a network of an information pool for data collection for the development of an EAC Diaspora Policy.

The EAC Diaspora is in flax. No question about it. It’s ready for harvest. The Diaspora outreach forum is timely and of essence. The EAC Diaspora and EAC member states need each other. Meet, engage, learn, understand, and bond. Failure is not an option. The icebreaker? The first cut? This Thursday September 28-Saturday 30, 2023 it will happen. The Doubletree hotel, by the Hilton DFW Airport North, 4441 West John Carpenter Freeway, Irving, TX, 75063 is the rendezvous. Everything Diaspora is on the table. You cannot not communicate!