First of all I would like, from the bottom of my heart, to greet Africa — all the African peoples, from the north, from the Mediterranean Sea, through these wide central lands, from the east, from the west and from the south of Africa.
I want to pay tribute to Mother Africa. From Latin America, from the Caribbean, we have been strengthening the consciousness of our reality, of our history, of our origins, inspired in Venezuela by the words and the revolutionary ideas of Simón BolÃÂvar, Liberator of the Americas.
Simón BolÃÂvar, while staying in the sister Republic of Jamaica, said in 1815 in his famous Letter from Jamaica that South Americans, Americans of dark skin, Americans from the Caribbean and Latin America, are neither Europeans nor North Americans — we are rather a mixture of Africa and indigenous America. Every day, we are becoming more and more aware of our African roots, of our indigenous roots.
A few days ago, we were sharing with a great friend and brother, the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales. We were there in the Bolivian altiplano (high plateau), in the Tiwanaku, where pre-Columbian culture was settled, where we find the pyramids and the traces of a great civilisation that existed in the American continent before the arrival of conquerors, of colonisers and empires. Civilisations such as the Aymara, Quechua, Inca, Aztec and Maya were prosperous original cultures of the Americas. But then conquest, occupation, colonialism and genocide arrived.
Nevertheless, a mixture with Africa was produced, a mixture with black Africa. And here we are, half indigenous, half Africans. Therefore, I have come to pay a tribute to our Mother Africa.
Many times, during childhood, we were told Spain was our mother country. We acknowledge this, despite the trauma produced by conquest and the abuses of colonialism. But if Spain is our mother, I say Africa is an even greater mother for all of us. Mother Africa.
Precisely, along with Evo Morales, Aymara President of Bolivia, along with millions of indigenous people, mixed race people, black people — and also white people, since we are not racist. We are not against white people, we believe in racial equality, in gender equality; and we proclaim and practice all this. We are deepening the recovery of our roots, of our America’s real meaning.
That is why, Mr President of the African Union, Mr President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, I want to start my speech by paying homage, from the bottom of the heart of my people, to all Africa and, along with it, to our brothers and sisters of this continent.
Secondly, we are grateful and honoured that you have invited Venezuela, a country that is conducting a revolution, a country that got tired of being dominated and exploited by the North American empire, a country that has said ”Enough!” We have broken the chains and we are building a new project. The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is free from all foreign domination!
From Venezuela we bring a message of solidarity with African resistance. Centuries of resistance, since those years when more than 15-million Africans were taken from here to America, aboard the sadly famous slave ships. Since those tragic years Africans have been resisting; first, the old colonialism; and now, a new colonialism. May Africa receive our word of solidarity and our commitment to become closer to this continent, every day, to search for methods of integration, liberation and development.
Africa is not a poor continent. Africa, as a writer said as he was thinking of Africa and the awakening of this giant, is not poor. How can Africa be poor having oil, diamonds, cobalt, wide forests, all kinds of minerals and, above all, the accumulated, deep and millennial wisdom of its people? Africa is not poor. It is just that colonialist nations applied brutal methods of exploitation, domination and looting.
Our Secretary General, Kofi Annan, talked during his wonderful speech about waves. After 300 years of colonialism in America, a wave was unleashed: a wave of revolution, of independence for our nations. This wave started in the 19th century — a century that was one of independence of the peoples, and birth of Latin American and Caribbean republics.
During the 20th century, this wave arrived in Africa. You, Africans, conducted liberation processes through nationalist, revolutionary and independent movements.
Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, we must impel the third wave, and in that third wave we must be together: Latin America and the Caribbean, along with Africa, brother continents, sharing the same roots, magic, music and hope.
Only together will we be able to change the course of the world. This world is threatened by the hegemony of the North American empire. Only together we will achieve what Simón BolÃÂvar, the Liberator, called ”the universal balance”, a pluripolar world.
Africa has everything to become a pole of power in the 21st century. Latin America and the Caribbean have everything to become another pole of power. They have everything to stop being dependent in the future, to stop being underdeveloped, enslaved and colonised. People in the world are rising up. Therefore we express solidarity with the struggle for liberation and dignity anywhere in the world. Our solidarity with Africa. Our solidarity with Iran and the struggle for its independence, against imperialist abuses. Does Iran have the right, or does it not, to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, as it is doing? Certainly the Iranian people have the right!
Our solidarity with the Palestinian people, once again assaulted.
So I believe, Mr President, this century can be the time for true unity of the African peoples, of the Arab peoples, of the Latin American peoples.
From Venezuela we hoist that flag. Latin America is resisting the imperialist project of the United States. Latin America and the Caribbean have woken up. From Cuba, Jamaica, Haiti, Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay, Paraguay and Venezuela the people are rising up. The Afro-descendant peoples, indigenous peoples, are hoisting again the flag of freedom.
The African people are also demonstrating this: they woke up, and their leaders are conducting them through a process that Latin Americans must learn. On the way you moved forward from the Organisation of African Unity to the great experience that the African Union represents. Together, together!
In his speech the (UN) secretary general also said: let’s pass from words to deeds. In Venezuela we are passing from words to deeds, in Latin America we are passing from words to deeds. Because integration and union cannot be built with only words — we have to dare to build unity. In Latin America we are advancing.
In Venezuela, we have designed some ideas that are beginning to be realised. I think these can be applied in the world of the South, in Africa.
For example, Petrosur. We are going to create Petrosur. In Latin America this experience is being given shape. As you know, Venezuela has one of the world’s biggest oil reserves. We got tired of feeding Count Dracula with Venezuelan oil, Count Dracula’s fangs looting Venezuelan riches. Nowadays, Venezuela is free and we have recovered the management of our oil. Oil is a powerful instrument for social development, for education, for health, for employment, for agriculture, for the life of people. As oil was used by others to colonise us, now we are using it to set ourselves free.
Africa has, if I have clear numbers, almost 15% of the world’s oil reserves. Africa has huge oil reserves. I propose that we investigate the African Union and the South American Union that we are creating (soon we will meet with Lula and all our South American and Caribbean compañeros) the designation of a commission to begin studying the co-ordination, research and execution of oil projects.
There are here in Africa, for example, transnational companies that either do not pay oil royalties, or pay very little — 5% or 3%. That is looting! In Venezuela, these companies pay a 30% royalty on each barrel they lift, and 50% income tax. And even in that way, those foreign companies make money! Now Evo has begun to do the same in Bolivia.
How good it would be to create a commission to articulate an energy strategy for oil, gas and petrochemicals. Africa and Latin America are energy powers. Let’s put in motion the Petrosur project and we will experience miracles in the short term. This is about economic independence and the thrust towards development.
Another idea I would like to propose concerns the Television Corporation of the South, Telesur. This already exists in South America, Latin America and the Caribbean. Why could we not link this to Africa? Specific proposals for making progress, strategic projects for real integration and liberation.
My third proposal to this assembly is the Bank of the South. I know the African Union has created the African Development Bank, an African financial fund. I consider it necessary to join efforts between Latin America and Africa and create the Bank of the South. A bank for development, a bank for the poor, a bank for progress.
Petrosur, Telesur, the Bank of the South and University of the South.
The University of the South, a project for development, for training our young people; for preparation; for integrated development; for training physicians, who are so necessary both in Africa and Latin America; for training petroleum engineers and agricultural technicians, so that they can develop irrigation, technology, medicine systems. Simón BolÃÂvar said: ”Nations will march towards greatness at the same pace their education level advances.”
There you have four ideas I have brought to this assembly, seizing the wonderful opportunity of your invitation.
Let’s dry, with the sacred fire of our conscience, the tears of Africa, the tears of Latin America. So Africa can live, so Latin America can live, so Arabia can live, so Iran can live, so the world can live with freedom and equality.
Good afternoon and thank you very much sisters and brothers.
This is an edited translation of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez’s July 1 speech to the African Union summit in Banjul, The Gambia