Aug. 16, Omowale Clay and Roger Wareham of the December 12th Movement International Secretariat had the opportunity to pay an official courtesy visit to congratulate H.E. Ambassador Fatima K. Mohammed on her appointment as the new permanent representative of the African Union Observer Mission to the United Nations.
Mohammed, who is from Nigeria, has a career background in the areas of peace and security, as well as in organizational and sustainable economic development. Before her U.N. appointment Mohammed spent a fellowship year traveling to 12 cities around the U.S., a journey that provided her with an important understanding of the current situation facing the African Diaspora.
Our meeting gave us an opportunity to share our political history and, in particular, our relationship to the African Liberation Struggle and African Union. Since July 2000, our International Secretariat has shared a historic and official agreement of cooperation with the African Union and its predecessor, the Organization of African Unity (OAU).
Although this occasion was our first formal meeting with the ambassador, we were not strangers. In July, she gave a powerful and insightful speech at Harlem’s National Black Theatre, where she attended the memorial tribute to Dr. Theo-Ben Gurirab, the late revered Namibian prime minister and foreign minister, an event given by the Elombe Brath Foundation, the Patrice Lumumba Coalition and the December 12th Movement.
The ambassador’s priorities are working with the African Group at the U.N., furthering the mission’s cooperation with the United Nations and aiding the African Diaspora.
As we left the AU headquarters, Mohammed promised to take up our invitation to meet with the Black community at Sistas’ Place once the hectic September of the opening of the U.N. General Assembly has passed