The international organization sees Brazil as a strategic base for promoting further integration with African countries.

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Rio de Janeiro – The Pan-African Council (PAC) launched its first office in Brazil in central Rio de Janeiro on December 4th, 2019. PAC is the premier global leadership organization dedicated to fostering cooperation between Africa and her Diaspora in the political, economic and social spheres.

In the Americas, the Council already has representative offices in Colombia, the Caribbean region (CARICOM), and the United States. According to the organization’s Chairman, Mr. Fabien Anthony, Brazil was chosen because of its strategic influence and for having the largest population of people of African descent residing outside of the African continent. Anthony highlighted that “Brazil prides itself on an increasingly visible and emerging Afro-Brazilian community that is reshaping its own perception and is positively recognizing itself in its ancestry. We believe that Afro-Brazilians hold the key to Brazil’s equitable and sustainable development and should be protagonists in the active development of their political, trade and social relations with the African continent and the Diaspora at large.”

Based on the pan-Africanist perspectives of Marcus Garvey, Abdias do Nascimento and Edward Du Bois, the Pan-African Council has developed a multi-stakeholder strategy to promote the integration of the global African Diaspora while strengthening ties and broadening the meaning of unity between Brazil and African countries.

PAC’s international headquarters are located in Kigali, Rwanda — considered Africa’s technological, educational and innovation capital. “In accordance with the African Union’s Agenda 2063 and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, PAC works diligently to strengthen initiatives that enable people of African origin to be self-sufficient in their strong identity, heritage, culture and common values ​​and contributing to their own human progress, peaceful coexistence and well-being of the planet. Today’s young generation is confident that the fate of Africa and her Diaspora lies in their hands and that they must act now to shape the future they want,” affirmed its Chairman.

The launch of PAC’s Brazilian office will bring together numerous leaders and diplomats from various sectors such as the manufacturing industry, international trade, politics, entrepreneurship and the media.

In a historic day for the empowerment of the African Diaspora in Brazil, a PAC delegation composed of representatives from South Africa, Brazil, Colombia, the United States and the Caribbean (CARICOM member countries) meets with the President of the Legislative Assembly of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and its respective State Deputies.

In a historic day for the empowerment of the African Diaspora in Brazil, a PAC delegation composed of representatives from South Africa, Brazil, Colombia, the United States and the Caribbean (CARICOM member countries) meets with the President of the Legislative Assembly of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and its respective State Deputies.

The parties agreed to begin formulating strategies to bolster technical cooperation, investments, tourism, cultural and educational exchange between regions of the Diaspora, individual African countries and Afro-Brazilians at large.

Members of the Legislative Assembly also expressed their unwavering commitment to support policies that will help combat racial inequality in the state of Rio de Janeiro, with a special focus on youth development and women.

Furthermore, the Pan-African Council committed to sponsoring 15 outstanding young Afro-Brazilians in the year 2020 to join a larger African Diaspora youth delegation to the Republic of Ghana, in support of the country’s Year of Return initiatives.

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PAC Ambassador to Brazil, Mr. Rodrigo Faustino, alongside the special advisor to the Government for the Campos Prefecture in Brazil, Mr. Rogerio Siqueira have established a cooperation framework for educational exchange in the sciences and humanities with the Republic of Colombia.

As reported by the Brazilian newspaper Folha1, the Brazilian delegation lead the negotiation with Senator Murillo Benitez and Cezar Cabezas for the establishment of the Campos-Colombia project with the interchange of universities and the inclusion of scholarships especially focused on the African Diaspora in both Colombia and Brazil.

The cooperative framework will be followed-up in April, with an official visit from the Colombia delegation to the cities of Campos and Río de Janeiro. For the original Portuguese-language publication, click here.

Pan-African Council leaders have been invited by the Government of the State of Minas Gerais in Brazil (Governo do Estado de Minas Gerais) to speak on the social movements of the African Diaspora.

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The state of Minas Gerais maintains strong links to the African continent, as the Brazilian state with the second highest number of people of African descent in the country. The seminar aims to converge ideas and commitments from governmental institutions, corporations, cultural and education institutions alongside civil society to better combat racial discrimination and institutional racism.

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Pan-African Council Ambassadors visit the city of Salvador da Bahia in Brazil to volunteer for a youth development organization inspired by African spiritual and healing tradition:

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In the forgotten outskirts of Brazil’s third largest city, Salvador da Bahia, one can hear the rhythms and laughter of a young generation yearning for their place in the modern world. The visitor would be surprised to encounter a deep intellectual discourse flourishing in an area seemingly plagued by poverty and drug-related violence. It is in this very setting that Joselito Crispim created a nonprofit in 1991 that goes by the name of “Bagunçaço.” At just 21 years old, Joselito embarked on a mission to make the young people of his community proud of their origins. Now, over 20 years later, his organization helps educate young children and adolescents by providing access to a library of books, skill-building classes, film production workshops, physical activities, cultural exchange opportunities, and music education.

Joselito’s Bangunçaço serves a community center, or better yet a training facility, that relies on a team of volunteers and sponsors to run its activities efficiently. Ranging from 6 to 18 years old, the 140 participants are immersed in a community where they are encouraged to treat each other as brothers, sisters, i.e. a unified family. The project aims to strengthen the self-esteem of children and inspire a passion for learning and fraternity. The parents of these children face harsh economic conditions in a hostile environment where the state public school system failed to properly educate or provide for their children. During my first visit to the center I was proudly greeted by the eldest of the children who were eager to show me their latest creation – an independent film, recorded, scripted, and edited by the children themselves. In the room next door, I observed the children giving voice and rhythm to improvised instruments made of old drums and cans that were once considered garbage in the streets. And just outside the center, groups of children were forming to practice Capoeira (an Afro-Brazilian martial art) and others were preparing for a football match. Officially, the center’s closing hour is at 6:00pm sharp; however, the children are often so filled with energy that they perch themselves at the entrance deep into the night to rehearse the things they have learned that very same day.

This month, Joselito invited and accommodated twenty Danish students of the same age group in a weeklong cultural exchange. Despite the cultural and language barriers between these children from two very different parts of the world, they were assigned a clearly defined mission: to prepare a joint musical performance for the community. Joselito is an educator in the purest sense of the word. The guiding principals of the Bangunçaço project are founded in the values he acquired in his practice of Candomblé: an African spiritual and healing tradition that spread to Brazil during the slave trade, where people live in close communities that mutually help each other and develop responsibilities to serve their communities. His philosophy provides a basis for a new social organization, prepared to transform young adults into the future of Brazil, one mind at a time.