Towards a more inclusive diaspora policy orientation in Africa

Since the declaration of the Diaspora as Africa's sixth region, a process that began with the adoption of the Protocol on Amendments to the Constitutive Act of the African Union (3q) in 2003, several African nations have responded by making similar declarations, leading to the formulation, adoption and implementation of individual national diaspora policies. The original declaration by the African Union (AU) appears clear in its definition of the categories of people that constitute the African Diaspora. The apparently all-encompassing definition is meant to serve as a model for the states that make up the African Union. However, interaction with some of the national diaspora policies so far drafted and published, indicates that there is a disjunction between the affirmation of the African Union and the selective orientation of the individual African states. This paper, therefore, critically examines the various contradictions between the AU declaration and the diaspora policy orientation of selected African states. The scrutiny is done with a view to highlighting, analysing and recommending new strategies for diaspora policy formulation and revision towards the full realisation of the mutual developmental potential that the initiative of integrating the Diaspora into the institutional frameworks of African states holds.