Thabo Mbeki Quotes

Africa is one continent, one people and one nation

Africa is one continent, one people, and one nation. The notion that in order to have a nation it is necessary for there to be a common language, a common territory and common culture has failed to stand the test of time or the scrutiny of scientific definition of objective reality... The community of economic life is the major feature within a nation, and it is the economy which holds together the people living in a territory. It is on this basis that the new Africans recognise themselves as potentially one nation, whose dominion is the entire African continent.

The independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked-up with the total liberation of the African Continent

Black Power can only exist when there exists a unified socialist Africa.

The achievement of independence for my own country will be fragmentary and incomplete so long as one square inch of African soil remains unfree.

To the Negro People of the World, Greeting: We hereby beg to inform you that acting under instructions from the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League of the World, an international convention of Negroes, representing every country in the world, was called, and said convention was held in New York, United States of America, in sitting from the 1st to the 31st of August, 1920. The purpose of the convention was to elect world leaders for the Negro people of the world. After several weeks of discussion and probing into the merits of the most able representatives of the race, the convention elected the following dignitaries as leaders of the Negro people of the world …. The time has come for the race to establish centralized authority in the control of its own affairs.

Our first sight in Egypt, be it by larceny or be it by preemption, will be the almost certain egg of a North African Empire that will grow and grow until … we finally join hands across the equator with Natal and Cape Town.

Africa for the Africans.

Universal Negro Improvement Association

At the attainment of independence, the British handed over to us a decent system of Government in which everyone had a say. …. Organization of African unity or no Organization of African unity, I will claim my citizenship of Ghana and of the Commonwealth in any part of the world. I have been trained in the United Kingdom as a soldier, and I am ever prepared to fight alongside my friends in the United Kingdom in the same way as Canadians and Australians will do.

Ethiopia is now really stretching forth her hands. This great kingdom of the East has been hidden for many centuries, but gradually she is rising to take a leading place in the world and it is for us of the Negro race to assist in every way to hold up the hand of Emperor Ras Tafari.

No one knows when the hour of Africa's Redemption cometh. It is in the wind. It is coming. One day, like a storm, it will be here. When that day comes all Africa will stand together

Individually, the independent states of Africa, some of them potentially rich, others poor, can do little for their people. Together, by mutual help, they can achieve much. But the economic development of the continent must be planned and pursued as a whole. A loose confederation designed only for economic co-operation would not provide the necessary unity of purpose. Only a strong political union can bring about full and effective development of our natural resources for the benefit of our people.

The commentators of 1963 speak, in discussing Africa, of the Monrovia States, the Brazzaville Group, the Casablanca Powers, of these and many more. Let us put an end to these terms. What we require is a single African organisation through which Africa's single voice may be heard, within which Africa's problems may be studied and resolved.

I changed my name when we became aware of the African revolution and the whole question of our African roots.

One of the greatest things that could really happen to Africa is for us to get rid of the borders and for the leadership not to think that the countries belong to them... We didn't create the borders to start with.

Wakanda, in short, is the Africa of black dreams.

I'm trying to have Wakanda represent all of Africa.

I am part of the pan-African diaspora.

I've always said that even before Cameroon, I belong to Africa.

I like festivals of all kinds: in 1969, I made a film about the first Pan-African festival in Algiers, which celebrated the countries that had been liberated 10 years earlier. There was a tremendous feeling of kinship.

Most people in Uganda have something good to say about Amin - 'He was funny; he gave us pride to be African.'

My dad was very much a Pan-Africanist and instilled in me and my siblings a want for that knowledge.

I was raised with a father who really believed in the bridge between all Africans around the world.

There are some people who are happy to be African writers. They are pan-Africanists. I'm not a pan-Africanist. I think African countries have a lot in common. But we are also very different.