When only one man dared speak

The stench filled the hall but the leaders kept smiling
There were 800 delegates, mainly political and business leaders, to the World Economic Forum for Africa, in Cape Town last week. They included our president and the leaders of many other African states.
All of them knew there was a big stink in the middle of the hall but none would acknowledge it. They walked around it and hoped it would go away. They went for lunch and came back. They had cocktails and came back.
But the stink would not go away. They uttered inanities about trade imbalances and sky-rocketing food prices. They pretended to be engaged with the issues that really affect their world, such as oil prices, but it was no good. The stink got worse.
But still no one would talk about it. After all, if anyone did mention the big stink emanating from right in front of them they would have to examine what caused it.
Then along came Raila Odinga, prime minister of Kenya. He broke the conspiracy of denial and pointed at the stink. And he knew what he was talking about.
It was exactly the same stink that caused Mwai Kibaki, president of Kenya, to steal the election in December . It was Kibaki’s theft that led to the death of 1500 people in the violence that ensued.
So Odinga pointed at the stink while the rest of Africa’s leaders kept quiet. He said Africa should stop using its colonial past as an excuse and accept that “mediocrity” of leadership kept it underdeveloped while Asian countries forged ahead.
“It is unfortunate that, in an African country, elections can be held and no results announced for more than a month, and African leaders are silent about it.
“It would not happen in Europe. Let us say what we mean and mean what we say when we talk about African development,” he said.
“The way it has been ruled is responsible for Africa’s underdevelopment,” he said.
Africa’s leaders had proved unwilling to share power.
Odinga’s words were a welcome diversion from the empty grins, and the niceties the leaders at such meetings like to mouth.
He clearly was not there for the buffet and the free drinks. He had won an election, it had been stolen from him and he had received no support from Africa’s leaders.
The man wanted to speak the truth — and did.
One must hope that the leaders at the economic forum were listening. Odinga’s words should have shamed them all.
In that hall were the African worthies who kept schtum while Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe arrested, tortured and stole from his countrymen.
There too was President Thabo Mbeki, who only six months ago tried to go for a third term as ANC president. One can only hope that Mbeki realises that, when people talk about African leaders who do not want to hand over power, they are talking about people like him.
It is heartening to see that there are South African leaders who agree with Odinga’s no-holds- barred analysis. Businesswoman Wendy Luhabe reportedly echoed his sentiments. She reportedly bemoaned the quality of political leadership on the continent but said that if Odinga represented the new face of Africa there was hope.
“Our leaders are simply not stepping up to the challenge,” she told a workshop at the economic forum. “There is a crisis of leadership in the world and South Africa is no exception.”
She said there was a “conspiracy of silence among African leaders” on critical issues. This, she said, made it difficult for the continent “to translate its challenges into what we would consider to be unprecedented opportunities”.
We ordinary citizens are as much to blame as our leaders for the state we find ourselves in — we let our leaders do these things to us.
South Africans, and Africans in general, must participate more strongly in their democracies. We must not only vote, we must speak up on issues. The best democrats are like the members of the dock workers’ union in Durban who refused to off-load the arms shipment meant for Mugabe’s regime two months ago. They not only spoke up, they acted.
The age of the Big Man in Africa is over. Ordinary citizens must ensure that it never returns.
( Justice Malala, in “ The Times “, 09-06-08 )