By Ebuka Onyekwelu, Ph.D
The South African country of Botswana, on Thursday, became the 6th African country to sign the Artemis Accords, behind Nigeria, Rwanda, Angola, Senegal, and Morocco, in that order. The Artemis Accords, established in 2020, received its first African membership, Nigeria, in December 2022. Globally, Nigeria was the 22nd member of the Artemis Accords. Rwanda was Africa’s second state to join and the 23rd member state globally. Today, Botswana has become the 6th African country to join and the 68th member globally.
Artemis Accords is a US-led civil space exploration group that was founded originally by 8 countries in 2020. Its founding members include the US, Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom, and the United Arab Emirates. The group is linked to the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration – NASA, and has undertaken its first space exploration tagged Artemis 1.
The Artemis Accords are, however, non-binding and target civil space exploration in Mars, the Moon, and beyond, as well as act as a part of the global structures for space governance and administration.
According to NASA, the Artemis Accords have ten key priority focuses, which it calls “principles for a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space.” These principles are; peaceful purposes, transparency, interoperability, emergency assistance, registration of space objects, release of scientific data, preserving outer space heritage, space resources, deconfliction of space activities, and orbit debris.
Africa’s growing interest in space exploration and administration might signify the continent’s unwillingness to be isolated in critical global civil space activity, which might have serious consequences in the near future.
