About 45 African Heads of State, including Uganda’s President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni have bee invited by US President Joseph Biden to attend the second US-Africa Leaders’ Summit which is slated for December 13-15 2022 in Washington, DC USA.
The 49 African leaders, and the African Union Commission chairperson, Mr Moussa Faki Mahamat were all given invitations.
However, African countries where the military seized power through coups have not been invited to attend the summit. These include Mali, Sudan and Burkina Faso which were not invited by President Biden.
The agenda for the second US-Africa summit, US State Department officials will focus on peace and security, climate change and food security on the continent.
“We expect some of the outcomes to be deepening and expanding reflection of our long- term US-Africa partnership while we advance our shared priorities to amplify African voices,” said Mr Robert Scott, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs.
The three-day summit is a follow-up of the first summit in August 2014 convened under the President Barack Obama administration.
Mr. Scott added that the summit is geared at re-calibrating US-Africa relations under the prevailing geo-political conditions.
“We are looking at complementing our relationship. The world we are living in now is different from 2014,” he noted.
The first-day of the summit will include back-to-back forums for different themes from African-diaspora, peace and security, and governance, among others. Day two is scheduled for the US-African business forum to explore investment opportunities on the continent.
Ms Dana Banks, the National Security Council senior adviser for the summit, said they have also invited civil society actors, youth groups and youth leaders, in the back-to-back forums.
Earlier on in March, the chairperson of the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Mr Robert Menendez, and petitioned Mr Biden to lock Mr Museveni out of the meeting on account of the Kampala regime’s deteriorating human rights record.
However, visiting US Permanent Representative to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield revealed in May that they engage with all leaders with whom they differ in opinions.
The United States gives Uganda nearly $1 billion dollars each year, mainly for health and security support.
