Is Africa a Cold War Battleground?
by Sam Akaki
This article originally appeared in The African Executive.
"The last Cold War left
Africa on the life-support machine."
Thanks to the dwindling primary
natural resources, oil and gas, the West is hounding Zimbabwe's Robert
Mugabe and Sudan's al-Bashir, and heaping blame on Russia and China for
protecting them; thus setting the stage for a new Cold War to be fought in
Africa.
The last Cold War saw the savage murder or violent overthrow
by the British, Americans, Belgians, French and Portuguese of nationalist
African leaders including Patrice Lumumba, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, Luis Cabral,
Eduardo Mondlane, Samora Marcel, Milton Obote, Hamed Sekou Toure, Gamel Abdel
Nasser and Ahmed Ben Bella who were dubbed terrorists or Russian and Chinese
sympathizers.
The lucky ones - Jomo Kenyatta, Robert Mugabe and Nelson
Mandela were given long prison sentences from which they were never expected to
come out, alive. Today, Mandela's statue stands as a monument of British
cynicism, in Parliament Square, London. The statue stood there for three years
until last week when the USA finally removed Mandela's name from the list of
international terrorists!
The human, social and economic wounds inflicted on Africa
by the last Cold War are still very raw. Mozambique, Angola and Namibia are
littered with millions of land mines and other unexploded military ordinances,
which will kill people for centuries to come. Algeria, Ethiopia, the
Democratic Republic of Congo, Ivory Coast, Chad, Central African Republic,
Nigeria, Sudan and Uganda are fighting self-destruct wars, while Somalia ceased
to be a state in 1992, thanks to western weapons.
"China is financing
infrastructure projects in more than 35 African countries."
Overall, the last Cold War left Africa on the life-support
machine of western food aid administered by the World Food Program, while their
leaders pay lip service to cure the patient.
Recently, the Africa Progress Panel (APP), headed by the
former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, issued a report, "Africa
Progress Panel responds to the G8 Summit in Hokkaido" which said:
"G8 countries have done little to show how they will fund
the shortfall of US$ 40 billion in programmable aid and debt relief identified
by the Africa Progress Panel last month...The G8 has yet to present clear
timetables outlining future aid provision or to provide increased transparency
required to improve the quality of aid."
On "Global food crisis", the report said, "The Panel
welcomes the commitment of US$ 10 billion to support food aid and measures to
increase agricultural input as a necessary first step... More needs to be done,
however, to increase the supply of food to the world's most vulnerable
citizens, and immediate measures must be taken to relax export restrictions on
commodities such as rice"
On trade, it said "The Panel welcomes the G8 leaders'
commitment to the conclusion of an ambitious, balanced and comprehensive Doha
agreement... As WTO negotiations enter this crucial period, all parties need to
understand that the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals rest in
large part on the ability of the continent to trade its way out of poverty."
And in conclusion, Mr. Annan declared "The success in
supporting African development will not only result in tangible benefits for
her people but ensure a more secure and prosperous future for the world. For G8
leaders, helping Africa to help itself is not a question of altruism; it is a
matter of self-interest."
The July 11 UN resolution accused Robert Mugabe of "killing
100 opposition supporters and displacing 2,000", and called for punitive
sanctions including imposing an arms embargo, a clear signal for attacks on
Zimbabwe. Thankfully, China and Russia, which were not at the Berlin
Conference, rejected the resolution, saying it would "open the way for
interference by the Security Council in internal affairs of Members States,
which is a gross violation of the UN Charter."
To disorganize the AU, the International Criminal Court
(ICC), is planning to arrest Sudan's president, Omar al-Bashir, for "leading a
campaign of murder, rape and mass deportation in Darfur". The plan is advancing
despite the AU statement, which "reiterated the AU's concern with the misuse of
indictments against African leaders."
"The Western ruling groups are conceited, full of
themselves, ignorant of our conditions, and they make other people's business
their business."
Incidentally, the conflict in Darfur started 18 years after
the one in northern Uganda which killed over 300,000 civilians, caused the
abduction of 20, 000 children and drove 2 million into concentration
camps. Yet, the ICC never investigated the role of the Ugandan troops in
these attrocities, leave alone issuing an arrest warrant for Museveni.
That is not surprising. The West is less interested in human
rights in Africa than in justifying and setting the stage for a new Cold War.
The BBC reported on 13th July it "has found the first evidence that China is
currently helping Sudan's government militarily in Darfur."
Yet, China's real crime is its dominating investments in
Africa which now exceeds British, USA, European Union, World Bank and IMF aid
budgets, combined.
A recent World Bank confirmed that China is financing
infrastructure projects in more than 35 African countries with Angola, the
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mozambique, Nigeria, the Sudan, Zambia and
Zimbabwe among the biggest recipients. In the DRC, China has agreed to build
thousands of kilometers of roads, several hospitals and three universities.
Unlike the West, China gives Africa quality projects on time and much more
cheaply.
In their most direct statements yet recorded, African
leaders made their views about the West clear during the Chinese Africa summit,
held in Beijing in November 2006. Speaking to Lindsey Hilsum of British Channel
Four television, former president Festus Mogae of Botswana said, "I find
that the Chinese treat us as equals. The West treats us as former subjects
(read slaves). Which is a reality. I prefer the attitude of the Chinese to that
of the West."
For his part, President Museveni who is seen as a darling
of the West said, "The Western ruling groups are conceited, full of themselves,
ignorant of our conditions, and they make other people's business their
business. Whereas the Chinese just deal with you, you represent your country,
they represent their own interests, and you do business."
And Russia is an enemy because it is sitting on huge gas and
oil reserves, and opposing not only the expansion of North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO) to its borders, but also US plans to build Missile Defense
facilities in Poland and the Czech Republic.
Given the devastation of the last Cold War, won't a new one
be a double crime against humanity exceeding not only the massacres by the
Germans of 6 million Jews, but also the genocide committed by Belgians in Congo
in the last centaury, and the slave trade?
Aren't African leaders facing a simple choice:
stand firm and tell the west not to touch al-Bashir, or keep silent and wait to
be picked off one by one?
Sam Akaki is Executive Director, Democratic Institutions for Poverty
Reduction in Africa (DIPRA).
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