Paper short abstract:

The paper explores the response of African Union in the Libyan uprising. Western influence, indecision and Gaddafi’s meddlesomeness affected AU’s handling of the crisis. Appropriate mechanisms to handle similar situation for the development and integration of African economies should be devised.

Paper long abstract:

The paper explores the response of African Union, AU in the recent Libyan uprising. It notes that though AU has in recent time recorded significant achievements, especially in the area of conflict resolution in Dafur region of Sudan, Cote d' Ivoire among others, it lacked cutting edge in managing effectively the Libyan uprising and was indecisive in relating with the National Transitional Council in Libya. This is because of the overarching influence of the United States, France and NATO-United Nations' backed offensive in Libya. Again, Gaddafi's meddlesomeness in the internal affairs of most African states which left him with little genuine friends among African leaders was implicated in AU's ineffectiveness, this, unmistakably gave rise to the discordant tones with which the African leaders spoke during the uprising in Libya. Data for the paper shall come largely from qualitative method. We shall rely mainly on secondary data sources with institutional and official materials incorporated. The paper is of the view that AU should devise appropriate mechanisms to handle crisis similar to the recent Libyan uprising and intervene proactively in crisis situations in Africa. This is relevant as one of the challenges facing AU is her inability to respond decisively to conflict situations which has retarded economic development and integration of the African continent.