This week saw a conference of all the countries united in the African Union, in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt. The selection of the conference’s host country could not be more fitting for a collection of dictators, powermongers and oppressors. After all, Egypt’s president Hosni Mubarak is no more a democrat than the man Mubarak and all the other dictators had come to condemn.
For duration of the meeting, Zimbabwe’s dictator sat back, stared at the ceiling and fidgeted with his translation headphones while his former dictator buddies sat silent.
His former buddies indeed, for dictators and brutal oppressors like Muammar Khadaffi (Libya), Hosni Mubarak (Egypy) and Omar al Bashir (Sudan) until recently openly supported him. Today, it was Kenya’s prime minister Raila Odinga, who openly called upon the African Union to expel Mugabe from its ranks.
Odinga called Mugabe’s reign dictatorial, oppressive, even criminal. There is no doubt about all that. And therefore, Odinga said, Mugabe has no place in the African Union.
A representative of the United Nations said and demanded the same.
One can only wonder what people like Mubarak, Al Bashir, Khadaffi and all those others in the room thought about the comments. They probably smirked.
And one can also question Odinga’s and the UN representative’s intelligence for demanding that only Mugabe is kept out of the African Union until he holds “free and fair elections”.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Beetje onzinnig dude. Mubarak’s Egypte is een oase van rust, welvaart en (relatieve) vrijheid vergeleken met het Zimbabwe van Mugabe. Volgende keer beter.
Niet zo gek. Mubarak heeft zijn tegenstanders in het gevang gegooid. Die ‘rust’ is daarmee logisch.
Maar is Mubarak daarmee een verlichte democratische heerser? Integendeel.
Of kun jij bewijzen dat hij dat wel is? Zo ja, graag hier en nu, dat bewijs.