Madam President of the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly,

Excellencies Heads of State and Government,

Distinguished heads of delegation,

Mr. Secretary-General of the United Nations,

Ladies and gentlemen,

I would first like, on behalf of the President of the Council of Togo, H.E. Mr. Faure Essozimna GNASSINGBE, the Government and the people of Togo, to extend our warm congratulations to Ms. Annalena BAERBOCK on her election as President of this 80th session of our General Assembly.

Faced with the many challenges confronting our common organization, Madam President, I wish to assure you of my country’s full support and express my deep conviction that your leadership and relational intelligence will enable you to successfully lead the work of this session.

I also wish to pay well-deserved tribute to your predecessor, Mr. Philemon YANG, for the practical wisdom and constant availability he demonstrated in leading the work of the 79th session.

It is also particularly pleasing for me to commend the efforts of the Secretary-General, Mr. António GUTERRES, to revitalize our common institution, whose effectiveness is threatened by the return of unilateralism and the law of force to the detriment of the force of international legality. 

In an international context of extreme confusion, where everything is upside down, it is not easy to be Secretary-General of the United Nations. That is why Togo gives you its full support.

Madam President,

The choice to place this session under the theme “Better together: 80 years and more for peace, development and human rights”, offers us the opportunity not only to highlight the achievements of the past eight decades, but also, and above all, to reflect on the next steps to take in view of the challenges that continue to weigh on our shared vision of a peaceful, just and prosperous world.

Madam President,

Ladies and gentlemen,

How can you talk about world affairs without mentioning the remarkable performance of our country, Togo? Rest assured, Togo is doing well, Togo is even doing better.

For the benefit of our people, my country, Togo, has made significant, widely recognized progress in implementing the Sustainable Development Goals in recent years. The government has made the 2030 Agenda not just a simple framework, but the true compass of public policy.

More than 70% of the SDG targets are now integrated into national strategies, particularly through the government’s 2020-2025 roadmap, which is structured around four essential pillars: social, economic, environmental, and governance.

For example:

1. As part of the reforms related to improving public financial management and public investment steering systems, the government has carried out the following notable actions:

• Digitization and simplification of tax and customs procedures, which have increased the mobilization of tax revenues by the Togolese Revenue Office.
• Operationalization of the one-stop shop for submitting financial statements (GUDEF), which allows for a single submission of digital financial statements.
• Digitization of land title issuance procedures for the production of digital land titles.
• Operationalization of the Tax Policy Unit (UPF), enabling the preparation of the annual report on the evaluation of tax expenditures to be annexed to the draft finance bill.
• Consolidation of the program budget reform and program-based budgeting.
• Strengthening of the legal framework for controlling public financial management, including the creation and operationalization of a framework for consultation among control bodies.
• Strengthening the legal framework for public procurement, including the adoption of laws on public procurement and Public-Private Partnership contracts in 2021 to increase the level of budgetary allocations allocated to investment projects.
• As part of reforms related to improving the business climate,
• Possibility of holding hearings online
• Reduction of delays for legal procedures and documents
• Digitization of case management and referral to the Togolese Court of Arbitration
• Digitization of formalities for company creation, amendment of company statutes, and declaration of beneficial owners
• Digitization of the issuance of building permits
• Complete digitization of the issuance of land titles

These various business climate reforms have enabled Togo to achieve the third-best performance in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

Overall, the various reforms implemented by the Togolese government in its 2025 roadmap have led to several achievements along the defined lines.

• 90.7% geographic accessibility to healthcare by 2023, an increase of 19.3% since 2020.
• Launch of universal health insurance with approximately 3 million people covered (including students covered by School AMU).
• 150 billion invested in the healthcare sector (ELIPSE project, SSECQU, Technology Center).
• 86% access to drinking water by 2024, an increase of 26% since 2020.
• 74.5% access to electricity, with a reduction in external energy dependence from 64% in 2020 to approximately 50% in 2025.
• 24.8% of the population living below the poverty line in 2025, compared to 51.1% in 2020.
• 85.7% financial inclusion with the granting of 197,916 loans (ranging from 30,000 to 50 million CFA francs) worth 18.32 billion CFA francs.
• Increase in agricultural yields (2020-2025) of 11%, 7%, 17%, and 32% respectively for the corn, rice, cassava, and soybean sectors.
• 9.8 billion CFA francs granted to finance 176,000 producers.
• 2,462,995 hectares of cultivated land in 2024, an increase of 12.21% compared to 2020 (2,195,038 hectares).
• 30.6 million tonnes of goods will be handled at the Autonomous Port of Lomé in 2024, compared to 25.9 million tonnes in 2020.
• 4,472 km of rural roads will be developed and 485 km of paved roads will be built and rehabilitated throughout the country by the end of December 2024.
• 1.5 million passengers will be handled at Gnassingbé Eyadéma International Airport in 2024.
• Ten industrial units operationalized following the construction of the Adétikopé Industrial Platform (PIA) covering an area of ​​800 hectares.
• 346 billion FCFA invested by approved projects in free trade zones or under the investment code in Togo.
• 90% fixed and mobile internet coverage (vs. 75% in 2020) and a 20-fold increase in internet network capacity thanks to the Equiano cable.
• +67.6% increase in budget revenue, from 655.2 billion in 2020 to 1,098.1 billion in 2024.
• Recruitment of approximately 25,000 civil servants (health, education, etc.).
• 3.4% of new electric vehicles registered annually in 2025 (vs. 0.003% in 2020). Digitization of nearly 200 public services.
• Increase in the tax revenue-to-GDP ratio from 12.4% in 2020 to 14.4% in 2024.
• 60% of coastline protected against coastal erosion (vs. 44% in 2025) thanks to 18 km of protective structures.
• Planting of 40 million plants on 48,000 hectares of land.

The various achievements made in implementing this roadmap have helped accelerate Togo’s economic growth to 7% by 2025 and bring inflation under control. For example, the UNDP’s 2024/2025 HDI report highlights Togo’s progress on indicators relating to income, education, and life expectancy.

In the WAEMU zone, Togo is one of only two countries classified as “medium human development countries,” ranking second in the HDI rankings. In the ECOWAS zone, Togo ranks fourth in the HDI rankings.

These results demonstrate the Togolese government’s determination to combine economic resilience, social stability, and sustainable development ambitions in a global context marked by multiple challenges.

Madam President,

My country is modernizing and looking confidently toward the future. But these efforts are not immune to the terrorist threats weighing on the Sahel and all of West Africa.

I would like, in this solemn place, to pay heartfelt tribute to all the victims, civilians and military personnel alike, who made the supreme sacrifice in this difficult struggle.

Madam President,

Ladies and gentlemen,

This year, 2025, the United Nations will celebrate its eightieth anniversary, and eighty years is an age of maturity and assessment. We have come a long way together. But, at this stage of our shared journey, we must have the audacity to ask the right questions, those that open the way to truly positive prospects for humanity.

We must regain control of the course of events to steer them toward building a less troubled and more just world. To this end, the world cannot remain inaudible in the face of the voices that are ringing out from all sides to demand a change in the international order that was imposed by a small group of States with sometimes converging and sometimes divergent interests eight decades ago.

Ladies and gentlemen,

As you know, the African Union has chosen as its theme for 2025 “Justice for Africans and People of African Descent through Reparations.” It is in light of this burning thirst for justice that we must understand Africa’s current fight for reparations. Africa demands justice and its counterpart, reparations. Africa demands justice for having been humanely plundered and humiliated through the enslavement of its sons and daughters for more than four centuries. More than 20 million Africans were torn from their families and deported to the Americas, where they were enslaved. The souls of these millions of people are awaiting justice.

Africa demands justice for having been disoriented and deeply disrupted in its historical trajectory by nearly a century of colonialism. Africa demands justice for having paid with its blood and resources for the prosperity of other continents. Africa demands justice because between 80 and 90% of its cultural heritage is today in foreign museums. Africa demands justice because African human remains remain in the hands of foreigners outside the continent in violation of the sacred laws of Humanity. Africa demands justice because its significant contribution to the victory over the darkness of fascism in the 20th century was neglected during the founding of the United Nations in 1945. Africa demands justice because it was excluded for 80 years from the world’s decision-making bodies. Africa demands justice because the Security Council is sitting on the right of its peoples to fair and equitable representation within it.

Africa demands justice because its children continue to be victims of racism and humiliation around the world. Africa demands justice because, as has been said, there exists a unique and unprecedented moral debt toward African peoples which has not yet been paid. Humanity has never been so humiliated as it was through the enslavement of our forebears and the colonization of Africa, the cradle of all human civilization.

Rest assured, Africa is not looking to the past. We do not invoke the memory of slavery and colonization to dwell on the pain. We do so to build a future of justice and equity.

Ladies and gentlemen,

To illustrate my point, I would like to begin by showing you a map of the world. A map we all studied in school. It’s called a planisphere, and in technical terms it’s called the Mercator projection, named after a Flemish cartographer, Gerardus Mercator. And on this map we all use, there’s a big problem.

The Mercator projection, inherited from the 16th century, shrinks the continent by about half while enlarging Europe and North America. Africa covers more than 30 million km², three times the size of the United States. Yet, on our world maps, it appears barely larger.

With an area of ​​approximately 30.3 million km² (11.7 million square miles), including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of the Earth’s land area and 6% of its total land area. With nearly 1.4 billion inhabitants in 2021, it represents approximately 18% of the world’s population.

The size of Africa is intentionally understated. It is tiny, the same size as Greenland or Russia, yet this is false when you consider the true size of the continent and its 54 countries. Africa alone can contain the United States, Russia, India, France, Great Britain, China, etc.

This is why Togo, in support of the African Union, is calling for the correction of the representation of Africa on world maps. With the campaign I am asking the United Nations to support, “Correct the Map,” we must decolonize geography. We need a new political cartography of Africa.

You also understand why, at the second Africa–Caribbean summit held on 7 September in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Africa and the Caribbean reaffirmed their determination to put their fraternal, transcontinental partnership at the service of reparative justice for Africans and people of African descent, and emphasized the need to move toward “the creation of an African Union Decade for justice for Africans and people of African descent (2026 2036) through reparations.

I wish here to salute our brothers and sisters in the Caribbean who have grasped the meaning of this struggle: you have understood that by standing together for the cause of reparations, we will advance it more effectively. This too is the essence of Pan-Africanism, a Pan-Africanism for justice and for the cause of reparations.

It was the same thirst for justice that prompted Togo to submit to the deliberative bodies of the African Union the initiative that led to the decision adopted by the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of our continental organization, on 16 February 2025, to classify slavery, deportation and colonization as crimes against humanity and genocide against the peoples of Africa.

This decision marks a major event for Africa and peoples of African descent, for it counters the logic whereby descendants of perpetrators dictate the terms of the debate and name their crimes, rather than the rightful heirs of the peoples who suffered those crimes in their flesh.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The United Nations must not remain indifferent to restorative justice, since unredressed past crimes and injustices, wherever they may be, fuel the crises and conflicts of our time and will fuel those to come. Current crises are fueled by unresolved past injustices, because people remember their wounds. Reparation for past crimes and injustices is one of the solutions we need to re-establish peace in the world and in relations between civilizations.

Africa, as a continent of resilience and hope, embodies this need for restorative justice. Acknowledging past injustices, particularly through concrete actions for reparations, is an essential step in establishing lasting peace and social cohesion.

This is why, from this rostrum and with gravity, I would like to appeal to universal public opinion on the need to have the courage to confront the issue of reparations.

Today, Africa stands before the world and demands reparations.

To repair the crimes of the past is to repair history. And to repair history is to remove obstacles to greater justice and equity in the world; it is to dismantle systems based on exploitation, which continue to influence and structure the lives of many peoples; it is to save the world from oblivion and perpetuate the memory of millions of people; it is to act in the present to correct the harms of the past; it is to free the world from discrimination and racism; it is to escape the “endless trap” of exclusion and the denial of justice.

Among the reparations that Africa expects from the world, in addition to those for the Atlantic Slave Trade and colonization, there are reparations that must involve a reconfiguration of global trading systems and comprehensive economic and financial reforms, debt restructuring, and structural reparations for fair and equitable representation in international bodies.

Reparations do not consist solely of material compensation. They must also take the form of sustainable investments in education, infrastructure, health, and science and technology, which will enable Africa to make up for its accumulated losses and fully unlock its potential.

In the Pact for the Future Resolution adopted last year by the heads of state and government, representing the peoples of the world, gathered here in New York at the headquarters of our institution, we together emphasized the urgent need to reform the Security Council to make it more representative and relevant to the world as it is today. We must take action. Reforming the Security Council is a matter of redressing a historical wrong done to Africa and other peoples of the world.

Reforming the Security Council, with the granting of permanent seats to Africa, is an imperative of dignity and justice. But this reform must go hand in hand with the recognition that current global inequalities are rooted in historical injustices. Refusing to address them is perpetuating an unfinished multilateralism.

The reform of multilateral institutions that the people of Africa have been demanding for decades, and which is being done insistently and more ardently in these times of great global turmoil, must therefore be understood as a demand for reparation in compensation for the marginalization of Africa within multilateral institutions.

This very specific aspect of reparation, which constitutes one of the essential components of the comprehensive reparation that Africa has the right to expect from the world, will be at the heart of the 9th Pan-African Congress in Lomé, which will focus on “Renewal of Pan-Africanism and Africa’s Role in the Reform of Multilateral Institutions: Mobilizing Resources and Reinventing Ourselves to Act.” I invite the entire African community and its partners, as well as all people of goodwill who cherish justice, to make this meeting a historic success.

Through reparation, we will succeed in renewing people’s trust in multilateral institutions, starting with the United Nations. Reparation will allow us to project ourselves together into a humanity reconciled with itself. Delivering justice to people wounded by historical crimes and injustices contributes to repairing the world, to the great happiness of all.

Madam President,

Ladies and gentlemen,

Africa has been left behind in global governance for the past eighty years. It is high time to right this injustice. Very rarely does history offer such auspicious opportunities as those it offers us today to change the course of the world.

After so many historical injustices against Africa, the time has come to right them, through the lens of an ethic of repentance and the reconstruction of a new relationship. This fight we are waging is not just an African fight. It is a fight for humanity. A fight to ensure that the injustices of the past never again dictate the inequalities of the present.

This is why we are asking the United Nations, in turn and for its credibility, to classify the transatlantic slave trade, colonization, slavery, and deportation as not only crimes against humanity but, above all, GENOCIDE against the peoples of Africa. Genocide, genocide,

Genocide, genocide,

Genocide, genocide.

Thank you.