South Africa

Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the main opposition party to Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF, has broken his rceent silence to explain why the increasingly splintered Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) acquiesced to the recent Constitutional changes that Thabo Mbeki helped broker. Speaking in Masvingo at the party’s eighth anniversary celebrations, Tsangirai argued that “The objective of talking to Zanu PF is to create a free and fair election environment in this country.” I still wonder if the MDC compromises qualify as pragmatism, optimism, or desperation and suspect that there is a convergence of the three elements involved. 

The Springboks mashed the USA Eagles 64-15 in each team’s final first round matchup at the Rugby World Cup in France. South Africa finished atop Pool A and will face unfamiliar foe Fiji in theis first knockout round fixture next weekend. The Americans played scrappy, defiant rugby, but were simply outclassed by a South African team that looks determined to hoist the Webb Ellis Cup later this month.

The normally cantankerous Paul Theroux has a glowing review of Tim Jeal’s new biography of Henry Morton Stanley in this week’s New York Times Sunday Book Review. Here is the concluding paragraph:

There have been many biographies of Stanley, but Jeal’s is the most felicitous, the best informed, the most complete and readable and exhaustive, profiting from his access to an immense new trove of Stanley material. In its progress from workhouse to mud hut to baronial mansion, it is like the most vivid sort of Victorian novel, that of a tough little man battling against the odds and ahead of his time in seeing the Congo clearly, its history (in his words) “two centuries of pitiless persecution of black men by sordid whites.”

My students find Stanley and his ilk fascinating and frankly a bit mystifying. Jeal’s biography looks to be a must-read.

Rwanda has joined much of the international community in a call for the end of the death penalty. It’s a pretty compelling argument, all in all: If the Rwandan government can end capital punishment with countless perpetrators of genocide still to be punished, there are not a lot of countries in the world with a compelling argument to continue killing even the most malicious criminals.

(Meanwhile, Josh Ruxin, an Africa expert who contributes to Nicholas Kristof’s blog at The New York Times, is generally optimistic about the direction of Rwanda.)

There is a new story about political intrigue, firings, scandal, corruption, and crime reverberating through South Africa with the issue of an arrest warrant and suspension of National Police Commissioner (and head of Interpol) Jackie Selebi. This might represent Thabo Mbeki’s stiffest political challenge yet, which is in itself saying something. 

The Mail & Guardian editorializes hopefully on the prospects of Africans developing African solutions to African problems, using the Ibrahim Index  as a springboard and less hopefully on the Salebi mess.

Meanwhile, recent data from an internal ANC audit of party membership indicates that Jacob Zuma is the front-runner for the party’s presidency. One wonders if this sort of news might not hasten Cyril Ramaphosa to leave the private sector and return to public service. Ramaphosa, who has remained steadfast that he will not run for the ANC leadership, stands as my (mild) upset candidate to emerge with the party and national presidency. 

What are the odds of reforming Nigeria’s corruption ridden oil industry? The Economist lays out the long odds.

The Boston Globe has an editorial about how scientists increasingly can trace DNA — “genetic markers” – to tell us a great deal about not only the origins but also the movement of human beings from our earliest origins in Africa to today.

Is South Africa indifferent to the Darfur crisis? Pambazuka News believes so. There is little question that the country ought to be doing more to address the situation. Also at PN, Rotimi Sankore presents a rather sophisticated cri de couer about the Zimbabwe situation in which, ultimately, Robert Mugabe’s endless reign of power is the crucial problem.

Well, earlier in the week I predicted it, not because I am especially perspicacious, but because it was so predictable: “Prepare for rhetorical brickbats to come from Zim’s wily tyrant.” And brickbats we have gotten. In his Wednesday address before the United Nations, Mugabe had a field day. His material tends not to vary all that much — accusations of imperialism, neo-colonialism, hypocrisy. He lashed out at President Bush (whose utter mishandling of Iraq and other foreign policy ventures makes him a logical target) and Gordon Brown. Mugabe even savvily praised Thabo Mbeki for Mbeki’s mediation in Zimbabwe. It was atypical Mugabe performance, largely unhinged, not without its rhetorical merits, but largely obfuscatory of the real issues.  The man is certainly a world class demagogue.

Mo Ibrahim, who boldly and controversially is offering a prize to reward good governance in Africa, has released his Ibrahim Index, with the help of Africa specialist Robert Rotberg, ranking African nations based on a host of criteria, including safety and security; rule of law, transparency, and corruption; participation and human rights; sustainable economic opportunity; and human development. Here are the top ten, in order, starting with the country that currently ranks first: Mauritius, Seychelles, Botswana, Cape Verde, South Africa, Gabon, Namibia, Ghana, Senegal, Sao Tome and Principe.  The bottom ten will surprise no one (except perhaps inasmuch as Zimbabwe is not on this list, ranking a somewhat pedestrian 31st overall, which is a sad testament to the state of African leadership south of the Sahara), as starting from the worst of the worst they are: Somalia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Chad, Sudan, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Angola, Central African Republic, Burundi, and Sierra Leone. (See more here.)

The UN recently called for a rare summit on Africa and predictably, promises were made, agendas were set, ideas proposed. While it is good to see Africa on the global agenda in such a visible way, many Africans are rightly skeptical:

“Africa’s agenda will increasingly be defined by the African Union,” said AU chairman Alpha Oumar Konare. “We hope to move beyond words, to move beyond promises because too many promises have already been made to Africa.”

One does, however, wonder if Konare is not whistling past the graveyard. Naturally Africans should set their agenda. But so far, the AU, for example, has shown little capacity for effectiveness in Sudan. So far, SADC has proved loath to intervene in Zimbabwe. Perhaps it is still right that Africa choose to address and not to address these issues. But it seems that if the world wants to help, Africans ought to welcome that help, as long as African leaders make clear that they set the agenda and they provide the leadership and they create the structures in which Europeans, Americans and others might operate. In other words, African solutions for African problems, but with whatever help the West is willing to provide in a subordinate capacity.

Western involvement does not have to mean neocolonialism, though as Thabo Mbeki argued before the General Assembly yesterday, the very structure of that organization does favor rich nations over poor ones. Mbeki further asserted that even with their augmented status, developed nations are failing the developing world.  Perhaps the west is listening (now look who is whistling past the graveyard!) and can come to the conclusion that western help under African control might pave a new road for African relations with Europe, the United States, and elsewhere.

Gordon Brown remains steadfast in his refusal to attend any Europe-Africa summit in which Robert Mugabe is allowed to participate. At least a few African leaders are rallying around Mugabe, who is on his way to New York where he will attend the meeting of the General Assembly. Prepare for rhetorical brickbats to come from Zim’s wily tyrant. Already his sycophants in the press have gone after Brown, with political columnist Nathaniel Manheru writing in Harare’s government mouthpiece The Herald: “Mugabe stands very tall and black. Brown stands white and colonial.”

But keep in mind as the verbs and adjectives fly that not only is Brown on the right side in this debate, but that his view reflects that of masses in Zimbabwe who have been victims of Mugabe’s betrayal of his people for the sake of his own power and aggrandizement. Mugabe will use his bully pulpit. We know this to be true. But the words he speaks will be bitter but empty, sound and fury signifying nothing except his scorn for human rights, democratic processes, and his own people.

It looks as if COSATU has begun to forge its independent path in what is certain to be a rollicking succession battle within the ANC. I have long argued that the ANC will eventually find its greatest challenges from within, and that a viable opposition is most likely to emerge from a division within the tripartite alliance of COSATU, SACP and the ANC qua ANC. The reality is that there is no viable party from the left or right that is going to challenge the ANC’s dominance any time soon, and that a particularly fruitless place to look is from center-right parties led primarily or even substantially from white South Africans, however well intentioned. Demographics and history mean that such a challenge simply has no shot at gaining traction.

COSATU has made their first move a strong one by quite clearly indicating that Jacob Zuma, he of the multiple criminal charges, including rape and various fraud accusations– the results of which are far from certain or complete – is their man. Indeed, in the sort of zealous absurdity that seems most common from political classes worldwide, Cosatu’s general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi recently compared Zuma to Nelson Mandela. Hyperbolic analogies aside, however, there is no doubting that Zuma enjoys tremendous support among many among the masses of the working classes. Similar to Winnie Madikazela Mandela, Zuma seems almost immune to criticism among the COSATU/SACP elements of the ANC alliance who believe that the government attacks them because they speak truth to power that power has no interest in hearing. The ANC, meanwhile, is not thrilled with what the party’s leaders see as COSATU’s presumptuousness.

Almost assuredly Zuma’s very public roller coaster ride will continue, as will the ANC’s in what is shaping up to be the most acrimonious, and maybe the most significant, year in South African politics since the CODESA negotiations. Strap in. It is going to be an exciting but very bumpy ride.