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D.C.-Dakar Chair Shirley Rivens Smith talking with Kenyan President Daniel Arap Moi during a luncheon at The National Summit on Africa hosted by The Corporate Council on Africa. The National Summit on Africa The National Summit on Africa (NSOA) convened here in Washington, D.C. from 16 to 20, February 2000. Joining the 5000 regional delegates and participants were DC-Dakar Chair Shirley Rivens Smith and members James Atwater, Joyce Jayson and Gloria Kirk. In addition representatives from U.S. Africa Sister Cities (USASC) from across the country, including. John & Edna Mosley- Denver, CO, Frankie & Maxwell Gillette- San Francisco, CA, Lorne Johnson - East Orange, NJ and Corrine Kinebrew- Cincinnati, OH. The highlight of the session was the keynote address by U.S. President William Jefferson Clinton, which was characterized by the Summit News, the daily newspaper of the NSOA, as "eloquent and insightful". Vice President Al Gore, Governor of Texas George W. Bush and former U.S. Senator Bill Bradley, all of who are seeking their party’s nomination as candidate for presidency, pledged to build African democracies, forgive some countries’ debts, and finance new programs to combat AIDS. Gore addressed the summit by telephone whereas surrogates for Bush and Bradley delivered their promises to the first-ever U.S. candidate’s forum on U.S. policy in Africa. During the official opening on February 17th in the Washington Convention center, Summit President Leonard Robinson expressed his "gratitude that Africa is finally being discussed and taken seriously by so many policymakers." Among other dignitaries on the dais with President Clinton for that session were Kenyan President Daniel Arap Moi (who hosted the 1999 USASC Conference in Nairobi), Nigerian Vice-president Alhaji Abubakar, |
The Summit News summarized the objectives of the Summit in these terms: Participants from every segment of American society: students, homemakers, clergy, doctors, professors, former Peace Corps volunteers, diplomats, community organizers, local government officials, NGO representatives, business people, academicians, and immigrants from Africa discussed, debated, and learned about Africa. Small conferences and plenary forums offer participants an opportunity to expand their knowledge of Africa and its relations with the United States. To accomplish these tasks they chose from over forty program sessions in five thematic committees on such topics as: ¨ Democracy and Human Rights, Culminating the broad spectrum of deliberations and discussions, the closing banquet celebration at the Kennedy Center on February 20th took participants from the Millennium stage performance of Broadway Director George Faison, singers Angelique Kidjo and Sonia M’Barek, dancer Koffi Koko, the Taite Matine Souiri folk dancers, the children of Uganda Youth Choir, the Ekemini Theatre Troupe, and the Mizizi Cultural Center Maasai Dance Troupe to the top floor for music and dinner. The evening concluded with keynote addresses from General Colin Powell and Denver Mayor Wellington Webb delivering the charge for the future mission of the Summit participants and their supporters. Mayor Webb, invited participants to Denver for the U.S. Africa Sister Cities Conference in June. The approved National Policy of Action to the U.S. Administration, a distillation produced from approximately 700 written amendments considered by the thematic committees in program sessions, was then presented to the audience for its information. |
