What the All-Africa Students Union is about
AASU is the largest student movement in Africa and a very dominant force on the Continent and beyond. The All-Africa Students Union (AASU) organizes all students in Africa – from the basic level to Institutions of higher learning; in essence, the Union is the umbrella organization for all students of Africa. Since its inception in 1972, AASU now has presence in 54 Countries in Africa. As the Continent’s largest students group, AASU played an important role in the struggle against colonialism and the ending of apartheid. Today, AASU is at the forefront of the fights for equal access to quality education, quality assurance in higher education, harmonization of higher education systems – with key emphasis on mobility of academics and comparability of qualifications, democratic governance, defending students’ rights, promotion of gender and African culture, sustainable development, entrepreneurship, fostering of academic freedom, freedom of research and autonomy of higher institutions of learning, and the promotion of peace and democratic values, and other noteworthy objectives. In the year 2000, the UN awarded AASU a certificate of merit in recognition of the Union’s efforts at advancing students’ rights and championing the democratization of education across the African Continent. See: http://www.un.org/press/en/2000/20000410.dev2241.doc.html
AASU is wholly student-run and student-led, autonomous, representative, democratically elected and operates according to democratic principles. The Union has a democratically elected leadership from the various African countries and the executive structure is representative of all the sub-regions – our structure is very much like that of the African Union. We are in the process of establishing sub-regional offices to decentralize and complement efforts of the Headquarters in Accra-Ghana.
AASU’s key strength lies in its diversity and numerical strength; which it employs as a bargaining tool to speak for the supreme interests of students at all times. The Union is made up of diverse students, regardless of their religion, gender, cultural background, political persuasion, ethnic origin or social standing.
The Union achieves its core mandate through:
24 Years of Experience
Capacity Development
Capacity Building
Gender Advocate
Pan Africanism & African Culture
Migration & Mobility
Environmental & Climate Action
Democracy & Good Governance
Education & Students Right
The History of the All-Africa Students Union
In 1972 the constitutive meeting dubbed the first Congress of the All Africa Students Union (AASU) was held at the then University of Science and Technology (UST) now Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, Ghana. Due to communication, transportation and financial challenges among others at that time, representatives of less than ten (10) countries attended the meeting.
Subsequently the second AASU congress was held in Dares Salam, Tanzania in 1973; the third congress in Alexandria, Egypt in 1974; the fourth congress took place in Accra, Ghana in 1976 by then the majority of the National Student’ Organizations and the Student’s Sections of the then National Liberation Movements notably the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa and the South West African People Organization (SWAPO) have joined the Organization; the sixth congress got off the ground in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in 1982 where the historic decision of declaring June 16 as African Student’s Day was taken.
This was a tribute to all the pupils who were massacred, maimed, displaced during the Soweto uprising in 1976 by the then obnoxious apartheid system in South Africa and to all African students victims of violence and intolerance.
The seventh AASU Congress was in Luanda, Angola in 1987; the eighth was held in Accra, Ghana in 1992; the ninth in Tripoli, Libya in 2000. The last congress was finally held in Accra, Ghana after several attempts due mainly to disputes among the secretariat members.