Africa At Mercy of the West

Sudanese President Omer Hassan Al Bashir, right and Zimbabwean Deputy President Joyce Mujuru, left , upon his arrival in the resort town of Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, Saturday, June 6, 2009. (AP), a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.

Africa at mercy of West

Tuesday, 03 May 2011 20:27
Zimbabwe Herald
By Udo W. Froese in Johannesburg, Southern Africa

Some two weeks ago, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced on Cable News Network (CNN) that "there is a lesson for all (African) leaders, who stay in power for too long and they should take notice that there will be consequences for those, who cling to power". She referred to Cote d'Ivoire's recently toppled president Laurent Gbagbo.

South Africa's former colonial-apartheid foreign affairs minister, Roelof (Pik) Botha, commented in an SABC Radio and Television interview in the early 1990s, "Africa will be re-colonised, whether or not it accepts it".

He claimed then, it would be for the better of Africa.

Botha became the first Minister of Mineral and Mining Affairs in the cabinet of the newly, democratically elected South African President Nelson Mandela.

The minister's first trip to a foreign country led him to Moscow, to assist with the establishment of the global diamond industry in the Russian Federation.

Observers point out that the well resourced and organised industry of "civil society" under the flag of "pro-democracy, freedom of association, freedom of expression, media freedom, human rights, rule of law and the independence of the judiciary as well as foreign ownership of major parts of the economy in the form of a free-market economy", is to prepare the ground for global changes.

WikiLeaks focused the final continental preparation for those changes, particularly in Africa, the Mid-East and the Third World.

Even major natural disasters such as the "tsunamis", the latest one having hit Japan, take second place in international news coverage.

It is further observed that sectors of "civil society" had prepared direct and indirect intervention in Swaziland and Zimbabwe for some time. Both countries are exposed to a strategised war of attrition.

This would eventually lead to the formation of the Southern African Development Community by 2018.

The political and economic stability of Angola is closely observed, as discrepancies between the haves and the have-nots seem to widen daily, which would eventually pose a threat to internal stability.

In the case of Swaziland, one man - the young king and his loyal senior government officials - wields too much power and would query the set rules and regulations of these structures.

And, in the case of Zimbabwe, the national armed forces seem to be having too much power, which could upset the balance of power in the new Sadc. The year 2018 is around the corner.

The international West, its "civil society" and its global super-structures such as the Bretton Woods institutions (World Bank, IMF), Nato, the UN, the diplomatic corps and the intelligence community have done their homework over decades particularly on those nation states that are perceived to be a thorn in the flesh.

The international community is thus well informed and even better connected and knows how to manipulate situations to their advantage.

These superpowers are also aware that Africa's structures, such as the African Union, Ecowas and Sadc are no match.

Meanwhile, there seems a push for a "Sadc Tribunal". It is supposed to be an initiative, which makes Sadc-Law to be supreme over those of the member countries.

That lobby intends to make the "Sadc-Community Law" supreme to domestic laws and constitutions.

Member countries would not be allowed to rely on their national laws and norms of constitutional status as protection against a perceived violation of an international obligation.

If the aforementioned becomes reality, it means that Sadc member states have finally given up their independence and sovereignty.

The power of the state and the judiciary would be reduced to a regional umbrella, weakening the state further.

It also means that regional governments' legal interdependence has reduced them to even weaker and less respected states.

Would this not suit foreign interests, particularly when planning to execute "operation final push" in Zimbabwe?

And, the above-mentioned is supposed to be established against a background of a globally already weak and disrespected regional African structure!

Washington's direct interference in the AU decision, which granted Liberia's former head of state, Charles Taylor, exile in Nigeria, to have him extradited to the International Crimes Court in The Hague, Netherlands in Europe, is a case in point.

The signatories of the "exile agreement" for Liberia's Taylor, South Africa's Mbeki, Nigeria's Obasanjo and the AU Secretary-General, to name a few, were simply overruled in one telephone call from then US president George W. Bush Jnr to former Nigerian president Olusegon Obasanjo, already on board the jet on his way to an official state visit to Washington DC.

There are a few more such cases, which will be addressed in up coming articles.

As the Commonwealth membership is mainly African, with Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand being the absolute minority, one would expect that that body would come up in Africa's defence.

The established and prominent Christian churches and the Islamic religious structures have been well set up in Africa. One would expect that these structures would stand by Africa too.

The thundering silence of both aforementioned global political Christian/Islamic structures is disappointing and worrying.

It means Africa and the Third World are on their own. By 2011 they have not outgrown their colonial status in the mindsets of neo-colonial ownership. If "former" colonies try, they get demonised and undermined.

Their economies will be broken like tooth pegs, after having been used to clean one's teeth. Imposed international Western sanctions are lethal, as repeatedly demonstrated.

That is exactly the reason why they are imposed - to bludgeon any government and its country into submission that does not, or cannot kow-tow the international Western line of their narrow definition of "democracy".

For the news and current affairs observer the continuing conflicts in the global trouble spots, with local governments' defence forces (the media defines them now as "regimes") defending their sovereignty against "freedom- and pro-democracy fighters", "terrorists", "Al-Qaeda", foreign "peace forces" and "armed struggles".

It seems rather like an orchestrated global revolution, which seeks to destroy whole communities and sovereign countries with the goal firmly set on a world government.

Worst of all is that a great lot of the world population pays with their lives for it.

Add the global powers of banks and the global economic meltdown. If not countered, such disasters could become the biggest blood-letting in human history.

Finally, who will really benefit?