TAKE AU TO TIMBUKTU: The best that can be said for the convergence of African leaders on the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa for the 20th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union on Sunday is that it could have been much worse. The Mali conflict topped this week's AU summit agenda. The AU Peace and Security Council focussed almost entirely on Mali. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), a 16-member-state grouping that includes Mali, and its armed wing ECOMOG, last week pledged 3,300 troops, but under pressure from France, ECOWAS has now decided to increase the number of ECOMOG troops deployed in Mali to 6,000. Several key African states are regarding military intervention in Mali with grave reservations. However, a grand bargain was unobtainable given the political reality of a deeply divided AU and the hegemony of former colonial power France and other imperialist powers. On political grounds, the AU got the better of a mediocre bargain in Mali. Going over the Malian and perilous Saharan precipice would have opened 2013 with a dangerous degree of trepidation tantamount to the loss of confidence in the nascent African democratic process and deeply damaging to Africa's credibility. As Africa and the world digest the political ramifications of French military intervention in Mali in the new year with uncertainty, there is a realisation across the continent that the real news is yet to come. Several African leaders, most notably President Mohamed Morsi of Egypt, have warned against the dire consequences of French military intervention in Mali. President Morsi cautioned against what he described as the creation of a “new conflict hotspot” that would further exacerbate tensions between Arab North Africa and African states south of the Sahara. Morsi conceded that he would have preferred to see a “peaceful and developmental” intervention in Mali. The French and ECOWAS — ironically the vast majority of the economic grouping's member states are overwhelmingly Muslim — have consistently insisted that they will not negotiate with the militant Islamist groups over the political future of Mali. The outcome of military intervention in Mali is worryingly unclear. Mali at any rate needs to make headway on its Western-style multi-party democracy. It is a torturous process that entails the incorporation of political Islam in a predominantly Muslim country one way or another. Quite how, or whether, this is a feasible enterprise is impossible to ascertain. It is quite likely that military intervention, with or without AU blessing, will not be enough. The militant Islamists seem bent on taking their revenge for French military intervention in Mali. Unfortunately, the Malian government, French military might and the AU have no way of compelling the militant Islamists' militias to act sanely. “We should do everything possible to help restore constitutional order in Mali, safeguard the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country and address the humanitarian crisis in collaboration with ECOWAS, the United Nations and other international partners,” says Ethiopia's diplomatically dynamic Prime Minister Haile Mariam Desalegn, the newly elected president of the AU Commission. Not to be outdone, AU Chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma urged caution. “Optimists as we are, we are mindful of the enormous challenges that remain. We cannot overemphasise the need for peace and security. Without peace and security, no country or region can expect to achieve prosperity for all of its citizens,” Dlamini-Zuma told participants and delegates at the AU summit in Addis Ababa.
GAO OVERRUN: The northeastern Malian city of Gao, the once proud capital of the Songhai Empire, was captured on Sunday by French troops and ECOMOG forces. The militant Islamist militias that had controlled the city until then fled northwards towards Timbuktu and the Sahara wastelands. Ansar Dine and other militant Islamist militias had instituted strict Islamic Sharia law in the city even though the inhabitants of Gao have long been adherents of the easy-going Sufi Orders. The strategic city of Gao in the far northeast of Mali, near the border of Niger, is home to the Songhai people closely related to the ethnic Djerma of the neighbouring Republic of Niger. Thousands of the city's inhabitants in a jubilant mood welcomed the advancing French forces. “Mali, Mali, France, France,” they chanted exuberantly, dancing and celebrating in scenes of irrepressible festivities. French intervention averts calamity for the secular Malian political establishment for the time being. In the long-term it is, alas, unsustainable without Western powers. The United States is committed to provide mid-air refuelling of French warplanes engaged in “Operation Serval” in Mali. The AU pledged to create a “standby African force” tentatively dubbed AFISMA. Whether the proposed AFISMA will prove to be effective in similar scenarios is still unknown. What is crystal clear is that AFISMA would have to be sheltered under the umbrella of the US-led AFRICOM. The Malian Foreign Minister Tieman Coulibaly was precise and to the point. “This terrorist group intends to spread its criminal purpose over the whole of Mali, and eventually target other countries as well,” Coulibaly extrapolated. His words were a warning to other West African nations. A labyrinth of ancient mosques, Sufi saints' shrines and unique adobe and mud-brick mosques and Muslim monuments, Gao is almost as fabled as Timbuktu, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Gao, not as famous internationally as its sister-city Timbuktu is, nevertheless, the largest, most populous and economic powerhouse of northern Mali. The Ansar Dine and other militant Islamist groups that had occupied Gao and Timbuktu banned music, dance, drumming and much of the cultural specificity of this area of northern Mali on the grounds that they were un-Islamic. Sufi Islam was also frowned upon. The subjugation of the cities of Gao and Timbuktu and the atrocities committed in the name of Islam are egregious, well-documented and encapsulate the darker side of Salafist movements across the Sahelian and Saharan region of Africa. Even now after French military intervention in Mali, the desecration of Sufi saints' shrines and the destruction of priceless Islamic manuscripts by the militant Islamists has attracted much international opprobrium.
KIDAL UNCONTROLLABLE: The militant Islamist militias who fled Gao and Timbuktu have mostly headed for the mountainous arid region in the vicinity of the oasis city of Kidal, a desert stronghold of the Tuareg people. The French intervention in Mali has had many consequences, but few may be as profound as its impact on the likelihood of a backlash against the lighter-skinned Malians, the ethnic Arabs and Tuareg peoples of the country. Why? It has a good deal to do with domestic politics. The Islamist insurrection in northern Mali has unexpectedly opened a Pandora's Box. Understanding colour consciousness requires unpacking layers of controversial historical baggage into its two prerequisite components. The first is that the Islamists are widely viewed as alien aggressors, invaders, ever since the Moroccan invasion of the Songhai Empire, which covered much of present day Mali in 1591. Though vastly outnumbered, the Moroccan forces flushed with a decisive victory over the “infidel” Portuguese in the Battle of Kasr Al-Kabir when the young Portuguese King Sebastian I was slain and his army annihilated, and armed with musketry and artillery, routed the army of Songhai with its cumbersome cavalry. Both Moroccans and the Songhai Empire understood that it was illegal to wage war against another Muslim nation. Yet, the Moroccans doubted the Islam of the Songhai people and that was a pretext to ravage the resource-rich African kingdom. The second dimension is the most dangerous and controversial. Arabs settled the Sahel and engaged in the slave trade. Relations between the indigenous Africans of Mali and the Tuareg and Arab peoples of northern Mali were historically uneasy. They shared the same land for many centuries, even a millennium, and yet a latent animosity prevailed. Race often proved more important to the people of this region than religion. Seen this way, integration between the peoples of Mali is less of a problem than it is a strategic instrument of national reconciliation. International human rights groups cautioned that the Malian military and the inhabitants of the “liberated” towns have embarked on a systematic witch-hunt against Arab and Tuareg and lighter-skinned Malians. Such violations of human rights are bound to compound the crisis in Mali. There is a crisis of confidence among Malians of different ethnic groups at present. Even as Mali grapples with the current predicament, the Malian authorities should prove such assertions of racism wrong. Far more serious is that the AU pussy-footed over this particular controversial issue. Not only should Mali demonstrate that it is ready to defend and project the values upon which the secular state was built, but secure the rights of lighter-skinned Malians who risk being dragged down with the sinister and aggressive militant Islamists. It is a touchy subject, but one that will have to be squarely dealt with.
THE TWO SUDANS: Most of the member states of the AU have been reluctant Africans. Their sense of belonging to the AU has been marked by misguided assumptions and missed opportunities to create a real and meaningful African unity. Sudan is no exception. Just as the breaking up of Sudan into two diametrically opposed states — ideologically and politically — was thought to represent the final straw for Africa, the Mali crisis erupted. Sudan and South Sudan were discussed in detail in Addis Ababa. However, it appears that delegates preferred to keep this twin prickly question under the stewardship of former South African president Thabo Mbeki, the AU special envoy and chief mediator on Sudan. Not so long ago, Sudan was hailed as an African economic success story. Africa's economic advance has not been uniform. Sudan is a case in point. There are indications that South Sudan's economic prospects look promising. The same cannot be said for the North. Sudan is a pariah state precisely because it is an Islamist state. As far as the AU is concerned, Sudan, like the rest of Africa, should champion Western powers as the indispensable referee enforcing the rules of the international world order, just as Mali. Mali is as Muslim as Sudan, but it is far more complacent and compliant when it comes to taking orders from Western powers. The AU has clarified the basic principles at stake — South Sudan should not be stampeded by a bellicose militant Islamist Sudan. Juba should rather strive to achieve the ideal secularist, politically pluralist state. And, above all, South Sudan President Salva Kiir should hold his nerve.
LOST ILLUSIONS ON AFRICA: The New Partnership for African Development has long been regarded with scorn as too narrow a continental goal. The case for a more integrated continental economic government in Africa is now received with wisdom in most African capitals. And yet, the political will to unite is sadly lacking. For the foreseeable future the Pan-Africanist vision of the United States of Africa remains an elusive dream. The resurgence of the old colonial powers, France in Mali for instance, as the dominant actor in African affairs remains a reality. It is against this geopolitical backdrop that the perennial political crises across the African continent continue to fester. The political impasse in the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo cropped up at deliberations in Addis Ababa this week, but they were far from topping the agenda. The delayed delivery of peace between Sudan and South Sudan bears testimony to the complex issues at stake. Somalia, too, is in limbo. So what should Africa do, and, as important, not do? Or what can African leaders do? Above all, African leaders should speak for continent and not necessarily country. AU summits have in recent years been characterised by the participation of “friendly” countries — invariably with economic interests in Africa — as guests of honour. Last year it was China. This year it was Turkey that indicted its intention to participate in AMISOM — the AU Mission to Somalia. Turkish Airlines was the first non-Somali carrier to launch regular flights to the Somali capital Mogadishu. AU Commission Chairperson Dlamini-Zuma summed up NEPAD's and Africa's predicament. “While appreciating support from development partners, we will need to do more about mobilising more domestic resources for NEPAD. [We] would also like to request that the organisational structure approved be implemented. However, in order for us to implement, we need money,” Dlamini-Zuma conceded.
