Africa

So much for optimism. In a move that embodies the man’s hubris, Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party has negotiated a deal with the Movement for Democratic Change. The catch is that he brokered the agreement not with Morgan Tsvangirai’s wing of the MDC, which represents the vast majority of the party (and thus at minimum a significant plurality and probably a majority of the country’s popular support) but rather with Arthur Mutambara’s breakaway MDC faction. As of right now, the terms of the agreement are unknown but they appear to exclude Tsvangirai entirely.

Hints that something along these lines was developing came yesterday in a story (that I posted in my post) about how the negotiations were faltering and speculating that Mutambara might have a voice when all was said and done. The MDC has been wracked by division in recent years, but not many anticipated that Mugabe would be able to exploit that division so skillfully, though few will be surprised at his ability to act so brazenly and cynically.

This story gets worse before it gets better. 

An optimistic narrative seems to have taken over the commentary and reporting on Zimbabwe. The Wall Street Journal, for example, trumpets how Robert Mugabe, Morgan Tsvangirai, and the other participants in the ongoing talks are close to a power-sharing agreement. Some of the hardened cynics writing at The Mail & Guardian have even dared to believe that a deal might be close.

I remain wary. Every time good news leaks out from the negotiations we learn that all that we really know is that more negotiations are scheduled. And while the extensions may well be good news — the sides are still talking, negotiating, and we can hope, hammering out a deal — they also reveal that Mugabe is not exactly sprinting to reach the finish line, even if Tsvangirai’s continuing participation must qualify as an indication that he believed that Mugabe is there in good faith.

But as welcome as ongoing negotiations may be, the latest reports are not good. The talks are faltering. Robert Mugabe, who  spoke ominously yesterday of the opposition not being “used by enemies,” today admitted that the talks are “not exactly” going well. And if Mugabe does not think they are going well, he may well decide to go his own way. Like it or not, lacking moral authority though he might, Mugabe sits in the driver’s seat. It is possible that he has gone through this exercise merely to put forth an image of good faith in order ultimately to withdraw from the talks and restore his own power as the default. One assumes that if he does so, a crackdown on the opposition is sure to follow.

Even if Mugabe has operated earnestly and in good faith, it is easy to think of him doing so because he is aware both of his mortality and of his seriously damaged reputation. One way to restore the latter at the end of his life might be to engage in negotiations that would cede power even as he knows he is prepared to fade from the stage. But Mugabe is nothing if not stubborn. And rather than cede power under conditions other than those he deems appropriate, he’d rather hold on to power. This is, of course, speculation. But it is about the most charitable speculation I can provide in trying to understand Mugabe’s ways.

Is the longstanding animosity between hostile neighbors Ethiopia and Eritrea about to flare again? The Council on Foreign relations fears as much.

Optimists aver that a power sharing agreement might be close in Zimbabwe. I will believe it when I see it. Michael Georgy asks and answers a series of questions speculating about what’s next.

I hope that the participants can reach an agreement, but the questions that Georgy and no one else has answered are what is in it for Mugabe? Why would he yield now? What in Mugabe’s record leads anyone to believe that he is negotiating in good faith? I remain cautiously barely optimistic.

On the 10th anniversary of the embassy bombings in Kenya,  the government has vowed greater vigilance  on the issue of terrorism. Radical Islamist terrorism is likely to be an increasing factor in East African life in the foreseeable future, and it is wise for Kenya to take the issue more seriously, though this heightened awareness should be part of a larger strategic approach to security issues.

The potentially bad news is that there has been a coup in Mauritania. In the country’s capital, Nouakchott, General Mohammad al-Abdul Aziz, the head of the presidential guard, and General Mohammad al-Ghazwani, the army chief-of-staff, both of whom had recently been fired have taken control of the presidential palace. Officers seized President Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi on Wednesday, along with the country’s interior minister and prime minister. Such machinations are nothing new in Mauritania, as the country has seen at least ten coups of coup attempts since 1960.

The potentially good news is that this appears to be a bloodless coup (as was the one in 2005). Even more promising, the military leaders have promised that the country will hold free and transparent democratic elections “as soon as possible.” In the interim, the country will be governed by a council of eleven leaders largely drawn from the military leadership.

On balance, however, the transition of political power by coup is disquieting. The United States, European Union, and African union all condemned the coup. That Mauritania, an exceedingly poor nation, recently discovered small reserves of oil only makes the country’s political situation all the more tenuous. One hopes the promised election materialize, but what is even more necessary for Mauritania’s future success as a nation state is a transformation within the political culture in which coups do not become the de facto default position among those who desire power or change.

The Christian Science Monitor has embarked on a vitally important four-part series on how Kenya stepped back from the brink of catastrophe in the wake of its hotly contested elections in January. The country, which appeared to be a shining example of the successes of liberal democracy in Africa, found itself on the precipice when post-election violence overwhelmed the country. The CSM shows not only the roots of the problem, but also uses first-person accounts to show how Africans, and especially leading elders, played a vital role in avoiding disaster.

The hard work of building peace continues, but Kenya may well provide a model for dealing with conflict. Hopefully, of course, the lessons from Kenya will be applicable without the descent into near-anarchy. The obvious example of a country that will be in need of similar healing will be Zimbabwe, though the dynamic in Zim has been more prolonged than Kenya’s and thus the problems more entrenched, the antagonists less likely to be conciliatory.

(Alongside the articles the CSM provides good multi-media resources and other useful materials, such as an annotated list of the key players in brokering peace and a timeline of events since the 27 December election.)

Zimbabwe ordinarily does not much register on the cultural radar in the United States. But just to show how worthless Zimbabwe’s surrency has become, The Washington Post’s travel section this week wrote the following:

These days, however, frequent-flier miles are looking a lot like Zimbabwean dollars. The currency is being devalued with spirit-crushing regularity. There’s less and less to buy with it now that airlines are slashing their route networks and seating capacity. And today’s frequent-flier program managers have been given a mandate from their C-suite bosses: Generate fast cash by squeezing frequent fliers with a battery of fees — even though the new charges are destroying the long-term allure and profit potential of the plans.

The fact that the Post could make such a reference knowing that it’s audience of people overwhelmingly removed from the Zimbabwe crisis reveals just how much of a punchline Mugabe’s regime has become.

Two stories from IRIN underscore one of the big public health issues in Africa today. Maternal and infant mortality is not just a problem in Congo-Brazzaville and Ghana, though those two countries are attempting, as are so many sub-Saharan African countries, to get to grips with the reality that the birth of a child is not an uncomplicatedly joyous experience given the high death rates for both mother and child.

Well before 9/11 the terrorist bombings in Niarobi and Dar es Salaam gave indications as to the severity of the threat that the then obscure organization al Qaeda posed to the west and its allies. One of the masterminds behind those attacks, Fazul Abdullah, has proven elusive. But Kenyan authorities have arrested members of a family believed to have harbored Abdullah.

Although the targets of the 1998 US Embassy bombings were putatively Americans, the vast majority of victims were Africans. Hopefully those responsible will be brought to justice, using legitimate, legal means, under local control. That the Bush administration has mismanaged the question of terrorism does not invalidate the struggle against it. That struggle will require the help of allies in Africa and elsewhere and will reqire an understanding that al Qaeda is serious in its intent.