Message to the Addis Ababa Conference of African States on the Development of Education.

IT IS a great pleasure, both personally and officially, to extend the best wishes of the Government and the people of the United States to the Conference of African States on the Development of Education under the auspices of UNESCO and the Economic Commission for Africa.

This conference of African States can perform an important function in establishing an inventory of educational needs and a program to meet those needs. In this endeavor, the United States stands ready to assist wherever it can, if such assistance is desired. For in the monumental task of educational development, there is much to be learned, and I am confident, we can learn it together.

The U.S. Observer Delegation, which we are honored to send, will lay primary stress on the full development of human resources. I believe this general emphasis is sound for our own education as well as for yours. For unless education aims at elevating the motives of men we can find no basic answer to the division and troubles of our times.

We need evaluations and plans, but we need in the planners a passion to create through education what Governor General Azikiwe of Nigeria called for in his Inaugural Address: "a hate-free, fear-free, greed-free world, peopled by free men and women." We seek citizens and statement whose guiding principle is not who is fight but what is right. We seek an education that gives wisdom as well as knowledge.

The American people applaud the leaders of Africa whose vision assigns to education a primary role in the achievement of stability and progress.

It is in this spirit, then, that I wish to express on behalf of the American people and myself our most sincere hope that this Conference bringing together your leaders and educators attains every possible measure of success.