First day for fledgling African unity ends in discord

AFRICA'S new African Union (AU), tasked with ending wars and poverty, spent its first working day on Wednesday with its most powerful nations in disarray over when it would next meet.

The confusion was sown by maverick Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi jockeying for greater influence as he pushed a widely ridiculed proposal to create a single African country and called a special summit to debate it, delegates said.

The mix-up appeared to be resolved at least temporarily by the end of the two-day African summit with new AU chairman President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa overruling oil exporting powerhouse Nigeria - though delegates said this did not signal fundamental discord between Africa’s two strongest nations.