Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Due to the ACDP having one minute to debate on the unification of Africa, we will use this opportunity to place our comments in the debate in context.
On 31st May this year, the ACDP gave notice that they would move that the House call for a debate on the Pan-African Parliament's discussions on a "United States of Africa". This debate, in our opinion, is long overdue in light of the apparent pressure being exerted in this direction.
The fact that this debate, up till now, has taken place exclusively at the level of heads of state and excludes the people of Africa is of great concern to the ACDP. It is the people of Africa, indeed South Africans, who should be applying their minds rationally to this concept, as it is the people who stand to gain or lose the most.
In July 2006 during the AU Summit in Gambia a report on an AU government towards a "United States of Africa" was presented. Later a decision was taken that this would be discussed at the 2007 Summit in Ghana. The term, "United Nations of Africa", was first used in 1924 and was expanded on in a secret agreement, signed in Accra, on 8 August 1960 by the Prime Minister of Congo, Patrice Lumumba, and the President of Ghana, Dr Nkrumah.
Their vision was for a union of African states with a republican constitution within a federal framework, a single head of state and a parliament responsible for foreign affairs, defence and a common market with a common currency. The present integration of African states resembles the EU rather than the United States of America. That is not much different from the secret Accra agreement in its goal of eliminating tariff barriers. Thank you. [Time expired.]
Your time has expired and you are introducing a very dangerous attitude to the times that people are allocated in that you are using the slot for the statement to anticipate what is going to be happening in a later debate. I think that is actually saying to us that even if you have a minute, you will use other means of Parliament to extend that minute.
Imagine if everybody did that or if the ruling party did that? We would all have to sit here the whole night because everybody was extending his/her time. So, I'm just saying that we allowed the hon member because we thought that it was a statement and we just discovered in the middle of it that she was actually extending the time that she would be given in the later debate.
Deputy Speaker, just on a point of order. We knew immediately that the hon Dudley was in breach of the rules. There is a rule against anticipation. She was talking on a matter which is on the Order Paper for later today. We didn't want to come across as intolerant to their views, but clearly she was out of order and we would ask that you rule accordingly in order that this kind of thing doesn't happen again.