OAU enabled some African states to get independence. Using its Liberation Committee in Dar es Salaam, OAU gave financial and military training to guerilla fighters e.g MPLA FRELIMO, etc.

After several attempts to establish an African Human Rights organ, the OAU finally decided that it was necessary to adopt an African charter on Human Rights and to establish a body for its implementation.

OAU did not keep a deaf ear to the refugee problem. OAU set up a special commission in 1964 to work on refugee problems. In 1965, all member states signed a convention preventing refugee crisis from growing into inter-state conflicts.

The establishment of the African Development bank in 1964 was a big achievement of OAU. The bank was meant to enable the channelling of investment of African capital in a wide variety of enterprises.

OAU promoted culture of Africans. In this respect, it reviewed and preserved African cultural heritage e.g in 1964, it held an all-African cultural festival in Congo Brazzaville, in 1975 in Lagos in order to promote sports, and highlighting cultural unity in Africa.

Promotion of inter-territorial trade was achieved by the OAU. OAU members realised that effective economic cooperation between African states would be a step towards achievement of political union.

Vital to recall about OAU was its promotion of research on Africa's social problems. OAU established a scientific and technical research commission, which encouraged research in medical use, medical herbs, and tropical diseases e.g malaria etc. As a further development the OAU established the African Medical Research Fund to facilitate research in the same field.