A coterie of murderers, thieves and human rights abusers gathered in South Africa last week; they assembled in their obligatory gathering to insult Africa and its inhabitants. They convened under the guise of the African Union (AU)), a body that, in all honesty, has pushed back and retarded Africa’s advancement on all fronts. The AU fancies itself Africa’s caretaker while it is, in fact, Africa’s destroyer; it is just a parastatal that only takes without giving anything back. Except for two leaders, I have no use for all of Africa’s leaders. The AU’s chief mission is to force the world to think about Africa as a unit. Their common enemy are former colonial masters whom they attack for committing lesser crimes on African nations than they are themselves committing.
Africa is not united and will never be united until the current crop of leaders is vanquished. The people of Africa know the difference between loyalty and shouting slogans to survive. Yaya Jameh, Joseph Kabila, Isaias Afwerki, Robert Mugabe ÔÇô a Who Is Who in Evil! Yes, Africa’s Heads of State and Government gathered for a tea party in South Africa last week. As usual, they did not care about issues affecting citizens who suffer under their violent, intolerant and misguided rule; they worried about their freedom to abuse people. Of course, they did not admit to destroying their countries’ economies; they did not acknowledge kidnapping journalists nor did they confess to beating up and killing their citizens during elections.
It was nothing more than a photo opportunity for despots to thumb their noses at the international community and at the very people they rob, kill and destroy every day. This obscene, ritualistic and absolute nonsensical tea party was being hosted by their colleague, Jacob Zuma, who is under pressure from his own lawmakers to “pay back the money”. To leave no doubt as to their lack of seriousness, they chose Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe as their Master of Ceremony; this is a man whose achievements are in direct correspondence to Africa’s failure to rise an inch above itself in spite of its wealth and abundance of qualified professionals whose acumen is making other nations roar forward faster than rockets in space.
Mugabe’s chairmanship of the AU turned this gathering into a circus and a citizen-unfriendly summit because Mugabe has done everything that a father never does to his children and that which a leader never ever does to his followers. I do not know how many citizens of Africa applauded, felt encouraged and celebrated that the leaders of their countries were gathering to tackle problems afflicting Africa. This was nothing more than a gathering of members of an exclusive club of people who share an abusive intent on their citizens. Yes, resolutions were debated and passed as always yet none of them have the money to do anything for their countries. Most of these African groupings or unions are duplications of similar groups on the continent and are not effective. Tanzania, for example, is a member of the African Union, of SADC and also belongs to the East African Community.
Does Tanzania prioritise any of these memberships? If yes, why then belong to other groupings where Tanzania would contribute less effort than it should? Libya, Rwanda, Egypt, Burundi and Kenya, for example, are members of COMESA (the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa). Member AU states of Libya, Morocco and Egypt, of course, also belong to the Arab League while Morocco vigorously and desperately tries to be considered for membership of the European Community. Africa and its organisations need a lot of help from foreign governments because without the input from their former colonial masters, they seem unable to wipe their own behinds. At the AU Summit last week, there was talk about launching negotiations about a “Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA)”.
Here we go again! As most of the existing regional trade area organisations are not achieving their stated goals, the morons think another one will do the trick. If the Southern African Development Community starts from the tip of South Africa and goes all the way to the northern most tip of DR Congo and that of Tanzania, why is the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) made up of only five countries (Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, and Swaziland)? Zimbabwe (read Robert Mugabe) single-handedly destroyed the SADC Tribunal because it was giving judgements against it. Now, Mugabe, again, is campaigning for African countries to cease membership of the International Criminal Court because Mugabe is a ripe and deserving candidate for an appearance there. That is why Mugabe admonished Kenya’s Uhuru Kenyatta for appearing before the ICC. There is no doubt that Mugabe influenced the buffoon of the African National Congress to have Al Bashir jet in and out of South Africa, despite a court order to prevent him from leaving.
At their summit last week, they talked about empowering women and adopted the “AU’s commitment to empower women and girls and protect their human rights”. At the moment when AU Chairman Mugabe was banging his gavel, Mugabe’s army was razing down homesteads of people who were suspected of being sympathetic to the opposition and to Mugabe’s former vice president, Joyce Mujuru. Women and children bore the brunt of this military abuse and Mugabe was busy making jokes in South Africa. Is what we see in Zimbabwe Africa’s wish? Is what we see in Uganda Africa’s aim? Why do countries like DR Congo, Lesotho and Swaziland remain politically volatile and unstable?
For all you think, I like Botswana’s lone-wolf approach to Africa’s politics because Botswana does not owe anyone anything from the liberation times which is why Africa needs a new generation of leaders who might make their own mistakes relevant to their times. Botswana said it would have arrested Bashir and Malawi said it will not pull out of its membership of the International Criminal Court as Mugabe wanted. No one should ever cross their nation’s Constitution. In an effort to please Mugabe, Jacob Zuma betrayed his country’s constitution and embarrassed his nation’s judiciary to appease Mugabe who was in defense of Sudan’s Al Bashir for the same reasons of genocide that Mugabe must answer for. Now, if a president defies his own courts, what do we expect to happen?
We have seen it in Zimbabwe; it is still going on and we have no currency of our own. Our President pledged to give 300 cattle to the AU while asking the international community for $300 million to feed the nation, just a few weeks after Mugabe declared that “no one is going to starve”. Our president told the AU that he is against term limits; he is old and has been in power for 35 years yet still rants about former British Prime minister Tony Blair and former US President George W Bush – someone should tell him that those two are no longer leaders of their countries. Our president loves other people’s countries better than his own. The trip to South Africa last week was his 15th foreign trip since January. The biggest tragedy at the AU Summit is that it was clear that Africa deserves better leaders than these mannequins who sat and listened to Mugabe in spite of the fact that he is running a failed state, is abusive and murderous. But South Africa was the biggest loser. There will be consequences for a president who disrespected the country’s court.
