South African jazz legend Hugh Masekela accused African leaders on Thursday of doing nothing to stop killing in Darfur and injustice in Zimbabwe as they prepared to discuss plans for a continental government.

Trumpet player Masekela, who had also campaigned against apartheid in South Africa, joined African civil society groups in calling for action on Darfur and Zimbabwe days before the start of an African Union summit in Accra, Ghana.

The main item on the summit agenda is a proposal to build a United States of Africa and create an executive structure to govern it. Some African rights activists say the meeting should be working instead to end conflicts and abuses on the world’s poorest continent.

Masekela was scathing about what he called the inability of African leaders to tackle problems on their own doorstep, such as the crisis in Sudan’s west Darfur region, where an estimated 200,000 people have been killed in a conflict between government-backed militias and rebels.

"The African Union is not going to do anything, these are people who sit to dinner together, who drink wine together. I won’t say they protect each other but they are not going to do anything," Masekela told reporters.

He was speaking on the sidelines of an NGO event organized to highlight the situation in Zimbabwe, where President Robert Mugabe is accused by critics of repressing opponents and driving the country to the brink of economic collapse.

Advocates of creating a federal African government for the 53-nation AU say it will have the strength and authority to prevent situations like Darfur from occurring, or of intervening to stop them if necessary. Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi is proposing a continental army.

But some countries, like South Africa and Uganda, want a more gradual approach that moves towards greater continental integration through the strengthening of regional economic communities that already exist.