Africa - in need of a hero
July 1st 2008 04:00
Africa – in need of a hero
By Ryan Edward Fritz | July 1, 2008
How the continent needs to step away from Nelson Mandela and produce another world-admired statesman, writes Ryan Fritz
IN 2002, Tony Blair commented on the divested state of affairs of Africa as a “scar on the conscience of the world.” With what has happened in Zimbabwe this week, that scar has only split deeper.
When Morgan Tsvangirai pulled out of Zimbabwe’s farcical presidential elections last week, world condemnation was swift. From the United States, President George W. Bush said that the people of Zimbabwe deserved better, that they deserved a right to express themselves at the ballot box. “You can’t have free elections when a candidate is not allowed to campaign without fear of intimidation,” Bush added.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown attacked Robert Mugabe’s “obscene use of power”. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel urged African leaders to “use their influence” in pressing for a resolution over the country’s mounting political crisis.
What was required from Africa, when Tsvangirai pulled out of the election race, was a political voice, what Merkel called an “influential political figure” condemning Mugabe, someone who had the mettle to stand up against such a man who has terrorised most of his people into voting for him. Nevertheless, who in Africa holds such political influence, influence that could sway Mugabe to step back in line?
89-year-old Nelson Mandela was one of the first from South Africa, a nation that holds much influence in the east of the continent, to publicly criticise Mugabe and the Zimbabwean government over its efforts to stump the growth of freedom in the country. According to Mandela there had been a “tragic failure of leadership in our neighbouring Zimbabwe”. Sadly, he was the only political voice from South Africa loud enough for the world to hear, the rest all mumbled their opinions of Mugabe at a mere heeded whisper.
Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the South African 1984 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, during the week favoured the development of international peacekeepers to Zimbabwe to help quell the deadly violence that has since seen the death toll rise into the hundreds. “A government has the obligation to protect its citizens. If it will not protect them then or it is unable to do so then the international community knows now that it has an instrument to intervene to ensure that a situation does not deteriorate further,” he said.
In 1999, Indonesia’s Habibie government decided, under strong international pressure, to hold an independence referendum for East Timor. After the vote in favour for independence in August, Indonesian military-supported militia and Indonesian soldiers violently attacked the people of East Timor, killing 1400 Timorese and forcibly moving 300,000 more into West Timor as refugees.
During the crisis, Australian Prime Minister John Howard publicly damned the attacks, calling the actions “outrageous” and “deplorable”. He pushed for his own peacekeeping troops to be sent to East Timor, and eventually got the okay by the United Nations by the end of September. Had Howard not influenced the push for the need for peacekeeping troops then imagine how many more deaths could there had been in a land that was saturated in brutality.
The power of an influential political voice is priceless for the good of the cause.
The Secretary-General of the Association of African Universities, Professor Akilakpa Sawyerr has described leadership on the continent as deficient, saying that Africa needs new leadership and a new voice to make a case for its development. “Unless we get a new voice in Africa and new interest in the international community, we will never make any progress in the 21st century”.
Forlornly, looking around Africa there aren’t many leaders that fit the mould of an “influential political figure”, barring Thabo Mbeki, President of South Africa, who has decided in his dumbfounding wisdom to still side with Mugabe. What has hurt Mbeki is that he has never publicly criticised the hero-turned-dictator and his policies.
“We could have stepped aside from that task and then shouted (at the Zimbabwean government), and that would have been the end of our (South Africa’s) contribution. They would’ve shouted back at us and that would be the end of the story,” said Mbeki in an interview with South Africa’s Financial Times in February, 2005. Yet, even now as Mugabe is sworn in for a sixth term as president on the back of a campaign that was marred by violence and intimidation, he still seems to be saying nothing out of concern from hurting his neighbour’s sensitive feelings.
There is no doubt Mbeki admires Mugabe in his drawing of the constitution of Zimbabwe when it claimed independence from Britain’s colonial rule in 1980. Mugabe was seen as another Mandela once, when he to spent time wrongly incarcerated for ten years for subversive political speech in the 1960s. “Mugabe could have become a Mandela,” Sir Richard Branson said during the week.
Now though as Mugabe bids to have his re-election regarded as legitimate by the region, Mbeki, who has two years left of his presidency, needs to overtly get tough on his “thugocracy”.
Nigeria, Africa’s largest continent per population, and Equatorial Guinea, the continent’s richest economy, need to be players in the resolution for a free Zimbabwe. Their leaders need to stand-up against Mugabe, as has Nigeria’s president Umaru Yar’Adua. Yet, the effectiveness and authority of Yar’Adua lies in question with his own election last year riddled with rigging allegations.
The African Union needs a resilient voice. Current chairman of the African Union and president of Tanzania, Jakaya Kikwete, hasn’t spoken out on the crisis in Zimbabwe. Kikwete’s silence has been deafening and is contrary to the AU’s principles of respect for human rights and the rule of law. The AU chairman should strongly and openly condemn the human rights violations occurring in Zimbabwe. “Anything less is an abdication of Kikwete’s responsibilities,” Amnesty International said in a statement on Saturday.
Indeed yesterday in Nairobi, Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga has been one of the continents most vocal critics of Mugabe, who has urged the African Union to suspend Mugabe from the body. “The African Union should not accept or entertain Mugabe,” Odinga told reporters Monday. “He should be suspended until he allows the AU to facilitate free and fair elections between him and his opponent.”
Seeing Mugabe sit inside an African Union summit in Egypt yesterday, showed the world that the Union aren’t truly serious enough to see justice done in Zimbabwe.
The AU should not only impose sanctions on Zimbabwe – sanctions that take too long to take effect – but place a force of peacekeepers along with an election envoy to carry out another round of presidential elections that’s controlled by the international community, as the United Nations did with East Timor.
The Union has already 15,000 peacekeepers around the continent, and, with respect, should show the world that it can take care of its own.
Mandela at his ninetieth birthday concert in London’s Hyde Park on Friday said that it was now the time for new hands to lift the burdens that Africa possessed. “It is in your hands now,” he ended with his speech.
True, in the end, it is only Africa’s leaders and people that can address the continents rawest suffering, with hope that one day people such as Morgan Tsvangirai will be given a chance to make their home a better place.
By Ryan Edward Fritz | July 1, 2008
How the continent needs to step away from Nelson Mandela and produce another world-admired statesman, writes Ryan Fritz
Freedom: Mandela after release from prison, February 11, 1990
Image Source: BBC
IN 2002, Tony Blair commented on the divested state of affairs of Africa as a “scar on the conscience of the world.” With what has happened in Zimbabwe this week, that scar has only split deeper.
When Morgan Tsvangirai pulled out of Zimbabwe’s farcical presidential elections last week, world condemnation was swift. From the United States, President George W. Bush said that the people of Zimbabwe deserved better, that they deserved a right to express themselves at the ballot box. “You can’t have free elections when a candidate is not allowed to campaign without fear of intimidation,” Bush added.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown attacked Robert Mugabe’s “obscene use of power”. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel urged African leaders to “use their influence” in pressing for a resolution over the country’s mounting political crisis.
What was required from Africa, when Tsvangirai pulled out of the election race, was a political voice, what Merkel called an “influential political figure” condemning Mugabe, someone who had the mettle to stand up against such a man who has terrorised most of his people into voting for him. Nevertheless, who in Africa holds such political influence, influence that could sway Mugabe to step back in line?
89-year-old Nelson Mandela was one of the first from South Africa, a nation that holds much influence in the east of the continent, to publicly criticise Mugabe and the Zimbabwean government over its efforts to stump the growth of freedom in the country. According to Mandela there had been a “tragic failure of leadership in our neighbouring Zimbabwe”. Sadly, he was the only political voice from South Africa loud enough for the world to hear, the rest all mumbled their opinions of Mugabe at a mere heeded whisper.
Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the South African 1984 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, during the week favoured the development of international peacekeepers to Zimbabwe to help quell the deadly violence that has since seen the death toll rise into the hundreds. “A government has the obligation to protect its citizens. If it will not protect them then or it is unable to do so then the international community knows now that it has an instrument to intervene to ensure that a situation does not deteriorate further,” he said.
In 1999, Indonesia’s Habibie government decided, under strong international pressure, to hold an independence referendum for East Timor. After the vote in favour for independence in August, Indonesian military-supported militia and Indonesian soldiers violently attacked the people of East Timor, killing 1400 Timorese and forcibly moving 300,000 more into West Timor as refugees.
During the crisis, Australian Prime Minister John Howard publicly damned the attacks, calling the actions “outrageous” and “deplorable”. He pushed for his own peacekeeping troops to be sent to East Timor, and eventually got the okay by the United Nations by the end of September. Had Howard not influenced the push for the need for peacekeeping troops then imagine how many more deaths could there had been in a land that was saturated in brutality.
The power of an influential political voice is priceless for the good of the cause.
The Secretary-General of the Association of African Universities, Professor Akilakpa Sawyerr has described leadership on the continent as deficient, saying that Africa needs new leadership and a new voice to make a case for its development. “Unless we get a new voice in Africa and new interest in the international community, we will never make any progress in the 21st century”.
Forlornly, looking around Africa there aren’t many leaders that fit the mould of an “influential political figure”, barring Thabo Mbeki, President of South Africa, who has decided in his dumbfounding wisdom to still side with Mugabe. What has hurt Mbeki is that he has never publicly criticised the hero-turned-dictator and his policies.
“We could have stepped aside from that task and then shouted (at the Zimbabwean government), and that would have been the end of our (South Africa’s) contribution. They would’ve shouted back at us and that would be the end of the story,” said Mbeki in an interview with South Africa’s Financial Times in February, 2005. Yet, even now as Mugabe is sworn in for a sixth term as president on the back of a campaign that was marred by violence and intimidation, he still seems to be saying nothing out of concern from hurting his neighbour’s sensitive feelings.
There is no doubt Mbeki admires Mugabe in his drawing of the constitution of Zimbabwe when it claimed independence from Britain’s colonial rule in 1980. Mugabe was seen as another Mandela once, when he to spent time wrongly incarcerated for ten years for subversive political speech in the 1960s. “Mugabe could have become a Mandela,” Sir Richard Branson said during the week.
Now though as Mugabe bids to have his re-election regarded as legitimate by the region, Mbeki, who has two years left of his presidency, needs to overtly get tough on his “thugocracy”.
Nigeria, Africa’s largest continent per population, and Equatorial Guinea, the continent’s richest economy, need to be players in the resolution for a free Zimbabwe. Their leaders need to stand-up against Mugabe, as has Nigeria’s president Umaru Yar’Adua. Yet, the effectiveness and authority of Yar’Adua lies in question with his own election last year riddled with rigging allegations.
The African Union needs a resilient voice. Current chairman of the African Union and president of Tanzania, Jakaya Kikwete, hasn’t spoken out on the crisis in Zimbabwe. Kikwete’s silence has been deafening and is contrary to the AU’s principles of respect for human rights and the rule of law. The AU chairman should strongly and openly condemn the human rights violations occurring in Zimbabwe. “Anything less is an abdication of Kikwete’s responsibilities,” Amnesty International said in a statement on Saturday.
Indeed yesterday in Nairobi, Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga has been one of the continents most vocal critics of Mugabe, who has urged the African Union to suspend Mugabe from the body. “The African Union should not accept or entertain Mugabe,” Odinga told reporters Monday. “He should be suspended until he allows the AU to facilitate free and fair elections between him and his opponent.”
Seeing Mugabe sit inside an African Union summit in Egypt yesterday, showed the world that the Union aren’t truly serious enough to see justice done in Zimbabwe.
The AU should not only impose sanctions on Zimbabwe – sanctions that take too long to take effect – but place a force of peacekeepers along with an election envoy to carry out another round of presidential elections that’s controlled by the international community, as the United Nations did with East Timor.
The Union has already 15,000 peacekeepers around the continent, and, with respect, should show the world that it can take care of its own.
Mandela at his ninetieth birthday concert in London’s Hyde Park on Friday said that it was now the time for new hands to lift the burdens that Africa possessed. “It is in your hands now,” he ended with his speech.
True, in the end, it is only Africa’s leaders and people that can address the continents rawest suffering, with hope that one day people such as Morgan Tsvangirai will be given a chance to make their home a better place.
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