Dr. Edward Akuffo at the Foreign Affairs and International Development Committee

On April 15th, 2024. See this statement in context.

April 15th, 2024 / 5:15 p.m.

Associate Professor and Head, Department of Political Science, University of the Fraser Valley, As an Individual

I think that Canada should have a three-level diplomatic engagement with the African continent: with African states, with regional economic communities, and with the African Union.

In my presentation, I've highlighted that Canada needs to establish a permanent diplomatic missions in other regional economic communities. There are regional economic communities in five areas of Africa: east Africa, west Africa, central Africa, north Africa and southern Africa. We need to engage them diplomatically. We also need to expand the number of missions that we have. Currently we have 17 in 54 African countries. I think that is significantly low.

We need to strengthen the relationship with the AU as well.

Thank you so very much.

See context to find out what was said next.