African countries, he added, had no choice but to have a union government as championed by Ghana's first president and pan-Africanist, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah.

Speaking at a colloquium in Accra, organised by the Ghana government and the African Union (AU) on the centenary of Dr .Nkrumah, Wade said the union government was the only way African countries could develop their economies and have a heavy presence and influence in international affairs.

"We really do not have the choice," he said. "Our diversity does not preclude that we feel and act differently. But we should have the feeling of Africa because we share the same history of slavery in the past and colonialism."

The three-day colloquium which ended on Tuesday was on the theme "Contemporary relevance of Kwame Nkrumah's contribution to Pan-Africanism and internationalism."

It is part of a year-long centenary celebration of Dr. Nkrumah who was born in 1909.

The fiery leftist won independence for Ghana in 1957 but was ousted in a bloody coup instigated by the US Central Intelligence Agency in February 1966.

President Wade said individual African countries were not strong economically, and that no matter how each of them developed, they could "not go anywhere".

Ghana's president John Evans Atta Mills, at a meeting with several African dignitaries attending the colloquium, assured member States of AU of Ghana's commitment to the ideals of unity, cooperation and strong bilateral ties to improve the living standards of Africans.

At the meetings were President Wade, Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, Former President of Zambia, Mr. Erasmus Mwecha, Deputy Chairperson of AU, and Dr. Henry Odein Ajumogobia, Nigerian Minister of Foreign Affairs, who represented Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan.

Accra - Pana 26/05/2010