President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni has advised countries, organizations and people that are in a culture of fomenting, sponsoring and promoting un-justified, opportunistic wars, terrorism and criminality both on the African continent and in the entire world to stop it because they are wasting their time as history has proved that humanity has overcome all forms of injustices that have come their way over years.
Addressing the first session of the 2nd Russian-Africa summit in the Russian city of Saint Petersburg, President Museveni said that fighting an unjust war is a waste of time and even if the perpetrator comes out victorious, the gains of such a war are likely to be very temporary.
Mr Museveni, therefore, advised that people in modern times should explore dialogue to solve the existing issues in society instead of always looking at violence as the only way to solve human disagreements.
“You cannot win an unjustifiable war and history has proved that. Humanity will overcome it ultimately. Historically the religious wars in Europe and the fight between the feudalists and the emergence of capitalism in Europe are a historic testimony because they were justified and of a right cause; humanity came out victorious beyond all odds,” the President told the delegates.
He castigated forces in Africa and foreign ones that are in a culture of overthrowing legitimate and democratically elected governments in Africa, the recent one having taken place in Niger, an act he said was shameful in the modern era.
President Museveni further used the occasion to call upon Russia and other developed allies of Africa to help the continent do away with the exportation of raw materials by supporting the continent’s industrialization agenda.
He referred to the exportation of raw materials as “modern slavery and the remaining major bottleneck of neo-colonialism”.
The President further explained that whereas the global coffee business annually is 460 billion US dollars, the world coffee-producing countries’ share is only 25 billion US dollars while the entire continent of Africa with many coffee-producing countries gets a mere 2.5 billion US dollars due to the exportation of unprocessed coffee.
He said that African allies can even ban the importation of raw materials from Africa to their countries to encourage industrialists to invest on the continent which he said would boost people’s income, enhance the population’s purchasing power and provide a market for the industrialists.
In his remarks, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia has at all times been an ally of Africa from her independence struggle and is on record to have never attempted to plunder any part of Africa but rather have contributed to the development of the continent.
He added that Russia has at all-time been monitoring with interest the plight of Africa in areas of security, economic exploitation and humanitarian issues and said that the country has always and will continue working with Africa in these areas in line with the United Nations charter.
President Putin added that Russia and Africa are united in the fight against terrorism, climate change and the imposition of unilateral sanctions by self-seeking nations.
“Some countries have become the founders and interpreters of international laws and just use them for their own benefit and this is unacceptable,” President Putin said.
He added that it was time for African countries to fight for their sovereignty and Russia was to back the continent in their quest to have permanent representation on the major United Nations bodies.
“Sovereignty is not something you achieve but it’s something you have fought for, and Africa must continue fighting for its sovereignty.”
He commended the African leaders for their input in trying to find a solution to the conflict in Ukraine and said that Russia attaches a lot of importance to the efforts of the African leaders.
