Swahili touted as unifying language at Africa integration forum

Swahili as a language has the ability to further strengthen African integration and work as a unifying tool for the continent, according to Yoweri Museveni, Uganda's president, who urged Africans to use Swahili as a way of coming together for the continent.

Museveni made the remarks during a speech he delivered to mark African Integration Day on Wednesday.

"When Europeans decide to unite, they start wondering what language they should use. Should it be Italian, Spanish, English or German? However, in Africa we can use Swahili, which is a neutral language to unite us, it is non-ethnic, belongs to nobody and no country," Museveni said.

Swahili is a widely spoken language of the African Great Lakes region and other parts of East and Southern Africa, including Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Kenya, some parts of Malawi, Somalia, Zambia, Mozambique, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

African Integration Day, which has been marked annually since 2019, aims to celebrate major achievements attained in regional and continental integration process and to deliberate on critical lessons learned.

During this year's commemorations, the African Union, through its Department of Economic Development, Trade and Mining, chose Rwanda as the continental headquarters for the African e-trade Group.

The African e-Trade Group is a social entrepreneurship initiative with the primary aim of providing a comprehensive e-commerce platform to enhance the role of Africa's small and medium enterprises in inter and intra-African trade. It seeks to support 600,000 SMEs in Africa over the next five years.

Museveni reminded African countries that the only way for Africans to prosper is through production. He called on the continent to not only push for African integration but guarantee prosperity through integrating the markets that will consume what is being produced by Africa.

"We were colonized and suffered the slave trade not because our ancestors were weak, but were not well organized. We have got more capacity while operating together, hence the need to develop strategic security for Africa," Museveni said.