Transcript CNN International interview with Nigeria's President Obasanjo and USAfricaonline.com Publisher Chido Nwangwu on Democracy and Security Issues

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Mugabe and those Nigerian Elections

Professor Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

Special to USAfrica The Newspaper, Houston
USAfricaonline.com, The Black Business Journal

Contrary to the widespread optimism expressed in southern Africa recently on the eve of the mediation visit to Harare by a trio of African leaders, the acute socio-political crisis in Zimbabwe triggered by last year's highly controversial presidential elections remains unresolved.

The mediatory initiative by the presidents of Malawi, Nigeria and South Africa had been prompted by comments in a press interview early last month in which President Robert Mugabe hinted that he might, despite his insistence to the contrary, be prepared to resign his position as president of Zimbabwe because his "land reform programme was now complete." But to their obvious consternation on arrival in Harare, the mediators found that Mugabe was neither open to any persuasion to quit office nor indeed meet the leaders of Zimbabwe's political opposition for a meaningful dialogue on the future of the country.

Instead, he was in a bullish mood. He reiterated his uncompromising position, stated soon after the 2002 elections, that the only condition for talks with his opponents was that the latter must "recognize" him as "elected president of Zimbabwe" and "withdraw all court proceedings challenging the outcome" of the polls. In re-emphasising this condition which was tactically omitted in his early April statement, and which he himself clearly knows the opposition are most unlikely to concede, Mugabe literally brought that mediation to an abrupt end. In the end, the yearlong impasse that has caused enormous deprivation and disruption to the lives of Zimbabweans and devastated a thriving economy continued unabated.

Mugabe had changed his mind dramatically; or so it appeared! Or, perhaps, he never really intended to set his sights towards quitting as he speculated earlier. Or alternatively, he did, but there had since been other intervening factors that had made him change his mind. If that is the case, these factors must have been totally unforeseen and were surely unavailable to him when he made his early April conciliatory remarks. In other words, if these developments had occurred prior to the beginning of April, it was highly unlikely that Mugabe would have had cause to utter any hints of early retirement, and the London Commonwealth Secretariat and others who consequently arranged for the mediation visit would have been generally more circumspect. In the end, everyone, not least the mediators, were left wondering what had happened to the apparently 'more conciliatory" Mugabe of early April and why the 'more intransigent', Mugabe-"damn the opposition"-posture of late April/early May had resurfaced!

Few would have reckoned that events which would occur in mid-April in Nigeria, 6000 miles away from Zimbabwe, would cause the volte-face that the world would witness in Mugabe's thinking and tactical disposition within a fortnight of high political drama. The outcome of the Nigerian legislative and presidential elections of 12 April and 19 April respectively could not have been a greater boost to morale, a shot in the arm, for Mugabe who for a year had been virtually quarantined by a determined internal political opposition battling against the president's widely reported and rigorously documented rigging of the country's 2002 presidential poll. The sympathy and support that the opposition has since mobilised abroad has ensured that Mugabe and most leading officials of the ruling party and the state are barred from travelling to countries of the European Union and north America, and have had their financial and other assets in these countries sequestrated.

Then, suddenly, the April 2003 Nigerian elections! Or, more appropriately, the aftermath of these elections - particularly the 19th, involving the incumbent president of the country, General Olusegun Obasanjo (in picture) who was standing for re-election. According to widely reported and rigorously documented sets of dossier on this poll, compiled by reputable independent African, European and north American election observers and monitors (including that which was produced a week earlier on the legislature elections), General Obasanjo massively rigged the results of the exercise to claim victory.

Just as in Zimbabwe a year ago, a number of prominent Nigerian opposition party candidates and their supporters were murdered prior to, and during the elections; just as in Zimbabwe, millions of Nigerian registered voters in predominant opposition party districts and regions were disenfranchised by the general and his party organisations; just as in Zimbabwe, the general ordered his military and other Nigerian security apparatus to swamp Nigerian polling stations in predominant opposition party strongholds, unleashing violence and intimidating millions of potential voters from casting their ballot; just as in Zimbabwe, the general's party officials in direct collusion with Nigerian electoral officials (virtually handpicked by the general), liberally stuffed ballot boxes with votes to secure extraordinarily inflated returns for the party; just as in Zimbabwe, extreme political violence, sheer chaos, trauma and acute deprivation have been the definitive feature of life of millions of people in Nigeria in the past four years of the presidency of General Obasanjo.

Unlike Zimbabwe, though, many more Nigerians have been killed in this violence (quite often emanating directly from the state and its agents) during the period: a total of 10000 as against 200 in Zimbabwe. To underscore how really catastrophic the latter component of this comparison with Zimbabwe is for Nigeria, it is important to note that when the difference in the respective populations of the two countries is entered into the computation, the figure of 10000 dead Nigerians during the 4-year period is equivalent to the death of 10 times this number of Zimbabweans or a total of 100000 Zimbabweans at the same given time!

Despite Obasanjo's mutually shared interest with Mugabe in the art of election rigging, and despite having just executed his with dazzling military precision, the very triumphant Nigerian general unabashedly allowed himself unto the 3-person delegation which flew into Harare to ask the Zimbabwean to relinquish power. Understandably, the very erudite Mugabe did not miss the irony.

According to the Zimbabwean media, Mugabe was publicly very effusive whilst welcoming Obasanjo at the Harare airport in contrast to the relatively low-keyed exchange of pleasantries that characterised the arrivals of Thabo Mbeki of South Africa and Bakili Muluzi of Malawi.

From all accounts covering those talks, it is clear that the professor of dialectics in Mugabe had a great day. He dominated the proceedings, hammering away his points by quickly isolating, for sustained analysis, the recent elections in Nigeria and their self-declared victors, with confidence and sagacity. He dared any of his guests to ask him, not to mention pressurise him to quit office! The proceedings must surely have been breathtakingly incredulous!

MUGABE: Brother Segun, thank you very much for your press conference in Abuja the other day. I mean the one you held soon after your landslide. I had to cancel all appointments to watch it live on CNN. It was historic. You know, you told the world that it is our culture, African culture, for the leader to win the election. It is not our culture to have opponents. The muzungus, or oyibo as you call them in Nigeria, can call it "rigging" or whatever they care! But brother, you established this point once and for all. I read the nonsense in the New York Times editorial a day after your great statement, criticising you. The problem with muzungus is that they do not know that we live in a multicultural and multipolar world. They think we should live in the world in the way they wish or have decided to live! But it is important that the leader of the African giant has spoken. The rest of the world can go to hell if they don't like our own way of life!

OBASANJO: Brother Bob, thank you very much for your kind words. You know this democracy business is not really my type! (interruption)

MBEKI: Brother Segun, I love your bluntness! None of us can match this! (chorus of cheers and prolonged laughter) In South Africa, we have to perpetually balance what we say to accommodate the mosaic of races and nations that abound. What an asset you people in west Africa have.

OBASANJO: Well, as I was saying, I know my people! Let's face it, I have been in the army all my life - a General for that matter. I made it clear last January to the country that I wanted to continue in the office and that was that. Why should somebody come up to challenge me? It's definitely not our culture! They should be grateful that I even entertained an election in the first place. For all that I have done for that country, I should have just declared myself unopposed! I just thought of NEPAD and what the oyibos might feel. But you see Brother Bob, and I think this also applies to you Brother Thabo but not Brother Bakili, the presence of muzungus in your countries means that my doctrine on culture would need to be modified in the way it operates here in Zimbabwe and South Africa. The muzungus may have a point that they come from a tradition of democracy and that elections in your countries should be organised as those in England or France or America.

MUGABE: Brother, no concession! No! No!! No!!! This is Africa, right? When in Rome, you do as the Romans. I learnt that aphorism, by the way, whilst I was in infant school - 70 years ago when the muzungus were at the height of their control of our destiny here. You see if I live in England, as some Zimbabweans do currently, I will respect their culture and the derivative feature of democracy and any other associated concepts. When someone lives in Zimbabwe or Nigeria or Zambia or any country in Africa, they must accept our own definitions and the workings of our culture. So, contrary to your earlier assertion, Brother Segun, African culture as elucidated by you in your Abuja historic conference is applicable all over Africa including my dearly beloved Zimbabwe. In fact my war against the muzungu land owners, which I must say I have almost won, was waged with our culture very much in mind.

MULUZI: Brother Bob, it's always a pleasure exchanging ideas with you. I always feel that I'm back in lecture and seminar rooms in university!

MBEKI: I always tell Brother Bob that the University of Zimbabwe would have been Africa's preeminent academy if he had been there instead of the State House!

MUGABE: You mean if I doubled up as professor of History and Political Science and Law and Philosophy and Literature as well as Head of State! (chorus of cheers and prolonged laughter)

MULUZI: Now brothers, back to the mission that brought us to Harare! How do we proceed? I see all these press people outside waiting for a communique! (interrupted)

MUGABE: What do you care about the press? They can go to hell - especially the foreign ones. Did you see how Brother Segun only talked to the Nigerian media - not the foreign media - when he enunciated his great doctrine on African culture? I note that most of the Nigerian press, especially those in western Nigeria are supporting our brother's victory. Moreover, I haven't heard the customary criticism of election results from some of your well-known intellectuals who have made criticising all election results in Nigeria since 1959 part of their global pursuit. I know what I'm talking about because I was working in Ghana then as a teacher and followed all your election dramas with interest. Brother Segun, you have silenced everybody with true African testimony. Our African culture respects authority. For us, authority is incontestable. Away with all the Westminster and Bill of Rights hallucinations!Yours have been the mother of all elections. Well done!

MBEKI: I wish to return briefly to Brother Bob's analysis on the muzungu presence in South Africa and Zimbabwe and how this can often create differing Western attitudes to us in contrast to our brethren in west Africa. I have been studying the EU election monitor's report on Brother Segun's election and I note that it is much harsher in all spheres of the exercise than the one they issued over the Zimbabwean poll last year. Yet, the EU, and even Bush despite the equally damning report put out by the American monitors who went to Nigeria, have recognised Brother Segun's victory and are still fuming over Brother Bob's!

OBASANJO: Don't mind them! I have been inundated by letters of congratulations from EU leaders and you are going to see many of them at my inauguration on the 29th May.

MUGABE: Well, you know brothers that Europe personifies the concept "hypocrisy". I have spent all my life studying them. Pointedly, they don't want to recognise my victory because of their settler cousins. They have no other choice, contrary to the noises of the so-called monitors to recognise Brother Segun. They want your oil and also you"re paying back 1.5 billion dollars per annum on debt servicing. They know that if they say "no" to you, then these funds and the oil could be withheld. In fact you should say "no" and use the money for yourself! Honestly, I wish I didn't have to deal with the muzungu component! (expression of sympathies all around)

MULUZI: Brothers, we still need to tell the world something about our deliberations. We shan't surely be telling them that we spent most of the time talking about culture and Brother Segun's doctrine.

OBASANJO: Just for tactical purposes, as we say in the army, I think Brother Bob should try to talk to Morgan Tsvangirai and the Movement for Democratic Change. I say 'tactical" because it is in our own interest - I'm thinking of our commitments to NEPAD, the West; let's not forget all this talk of "regime change" especially since Iraq. We should try and avoid these people focusing on us because of continuing instability! I think a willingness to talk to the MDP will not in anyway undermine the position of Brother Bob.

MUGABE: Brother, I wish you drop this NEPAD contraption! I've never really liked it. You remembered my position on it last time I was in Abuja. It is indeed our acceptance of the status of "limited sovereignty" vis-ý-vis our relationship with the West. I received a report the other day from our Intelligence people - I think it's from our London desk or is it Paris? - that that boy in London will be asking the other G8 leaders during the forthcoming Lake Geneva summit to insist on a new mandatory article in NEPAD which stipulates that the West will hence run elections in Africa directly or through a stipulated United Nations commission to stop what he terms "age-old institutional malpractice." Can you imagine the insult from this boy? He was born when we were just about going into the forests to begin our liberation struggle!

OBASANJO: To run elections in Africa? This is over my dead body! What do these people think we are? My Intelligence Department has not picked up this insult - you know?

MUGABE: Well, they have been very busy on the ground in recent weeks, Brother Segun, ensuring your great landslide. I will share more of this report when we retire for lunch. What is certain is that the day these muzungus begin running elections here will bring to an end our cultural imperative of landslides. Mark it! Oh yes, you mentioned Tsvangirai earlier! But I can't talk to Tsvangirai when the man does not even recognise me as the President of the Republic. This, for me is the source of indiscipline - not recognising a constitutionally-elected President. You know, Brother Segun, it's just like the situation you"re facing now and I can see that continuing into the future! I mean the position of Buhari and the bearded one, the Biafran chap!His name has just slipped my memory!

MBEKI & MULUZI: Ojukwu!

MUGABE: Yes, Ojukwu! Has he now shaved off his beard?

OBASANJO: Ehm, not really! He just trimmed it!

MUGABE: Oh! That Ojukwu man - he's always not recognising constituted authority! I still remember the situation 37 years ago. This is why Africa is on its knees! Now, Buhari and Ojukwu have made it clear that they will not recognise your great election victory. I also learnt that they are about to launch 'mass action" which they've probably learnt from Tsvangirai and the muzungus here. Brother Segun, will you talk to Buhari and Ojukwu who are not prepared to respect and recognise the constituted constitutional authority duly invested in you by the Nigerian people?

OBASANJO: Of course not! I will crush them! They can't mess with General Olusegun Obasanjo, the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria...

MUGABE: Precisely! Brother Bakili, you are the one interested in a communique! Let's inform the world that I, President Robert Mugabe of the Republic of Zimbabwe and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwean Armed Forces, is willing to consider a meeting with the leaders of the Movement for Democratic Change if they each and collectively recognise me as the duly elected constitutional President of Zimbabwe and also withdraw all proceedings in court against me and my constituted authority forthwith.

(Presidential aides are summoned to begin drafting the communique of the outcome of the mediation visit using Mugabe's last comment as the text of reference. Soon after the communique is released, Presidents Mbeki and Muluzi return to their respective capitals. Instead of returning to Abuja, General Obasanjo heads for Germany in keeping with the most salient feature of his leadership credentials - namely, junketing round the world.)
Professor Ekwe-Ekwe is a contributing editor of USAfricaonline.com and The Black Business Journal and author of several books on the African World which include Conflict and Intervention in Africa (1990), The Biafra War, Nigeria and the Aftermath (1990) and African Literature in Defence of History: An essay on Chinua Achebe (2001).

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