The End of the American Era

A lot has been said about the future direction of the world. A lot has been asked about the nature  and the structure of the Post-American world. This article makes great reading.
The End of the American Era | The National Interest

Rush Limbaugh on Lord's Resistance Army: "Obama Invades Uganda, Targets Christians" | FP Passport

Rush Limbaugh on Lord's Resistance Army: "Obama Invades Uganda, Targets Christians" | FP Passport

The god that failed and thirteen million reasons to lie.

Kampala- The Daily Monitor Uganda’s leading broadsheet today carried stunning news, the Catholic Church had come out and admitted the famous Uganda martyrs were not killed for their beliefs. It admitted that the alleged martyrs were actually spies in the pay of the French intelligence service; they had been tasked with undermining the government of Kabaka Muwanga. 

Furthermore, the church acknowledged that the Martyrs were not heroes for the faith as had been previously portrayed; they were agents serving a temporal rather than spiritual power who had reached the end of the line. The decision to portray them as heroes of the heavenly kingdom rather than the earthly kingdom they served was taken at the highest level in a last ditch effort to gain some political capital from the deaths and put a positive spin on what was in essence a catastrophic failure.

The Catholic population in Uganda has been stunned by the revelation; many of them have been seen wandering listlessly at the Martyrs shrine. The family of Mukajjanga, Mwangas chief executioner feel vindicated by the revelation that their forefather was in fact responsible not for the deaths of men of God but of garden variety traitors.

Further afield, in neighboring Kenya a group of men who have made the yearly pilgrimage to Namugongo on June 3^rd every year since 1981 were found hanging in a forest in western Kenya. The suicide notes found at the scene indicated the men were despondent about the revelations and had lost complete faith in the Church and that is the reason they had decided to end it all.

The aforementioned did not actually happen, but something in the same order of magnitude did. The revelation that the National Resistance Movement and its armed wing the National Resistance Army (NRM/A) revolution is in fact not unique in the annals of history; sadly, it is a common, garden variety revolution. The NRM/A which has ruled Uganda since January 1986 shot its way into power and with some messianic zeal proclaimed it had ushered in a fundamental change in Uganda's political life. 

This revelation that there is in fact very little unique about NRM/A  pivots around the story that Uganda had paid Burundi 32 billion Uganda shillings(Thirteen million dollars)  to settle a debt acquired when the present government was nothing more than a rebel outfit. Now, the fact that most of the money seems to have been pilfered by some corrupt officials’ in the ministry of finance is not shocking.  The meaty stuff in this is the official acknowledgement that the NRA/M was in fact the beneficiary of considerable external support to the tune of thirteen million dollars. Thirteen million dollars now is plenty of money, thirteen million dollars three decades ago is a veritable fortune.

The NRM/A has been at pains to portray their revolution as something unique. The official narrative has tended to focus on the brevity of the war, it lasted only five years, it has also tended to focus on the ‘fact’ that they had no external support. Theirs was a popular movement nurtured and nourished by the ambitions of the common man even when many of the rebel movements in that time period relied heavily on whichever side of the cold war divide was willing to provide arms. 

Furthermore, even when the Torah of the revolution ‘Sowing the Mustard Seed’ acknowledges foreign support in the form of a Libyan Arms drop, the author is at pains to explain that the arms drop was not a game changer in anyway. The official narrative has emphasized the ‘fact’ that the largest supplier of arms to the rebel movement was in fact the then national army in the form of arms captured in battle. In fact, nowhere in the official narrative of the events of the struggle is any mention of Burundi’s contribution made.

The NRM/A has been brutal when it comes to any narrative that challenges the official truth, which is what  makes this revelation particularly stunning, the source, it is hard to argue with the official version of events now. In an article years ago Charles Onyango Obbo argued that as long as so much of Uganda’s history remained contested it would carry within it the seeds of future justification for political violence in one form or another. Maybe just maybe now is the time to separate facts from fiction and change the tide of the future.  

Tullow, CNOOC, Total and The Local Content Dilemma.

Kampala. In my post yesterday, the case I made that Ugandan companies would not benefit immediately from the commercial exploitation of oil has been challenged. It has been suggested in private responses to my post that there would be no benefits, irrespective of the time frame and that in fact I was blowing smoke.

First off, I will repeat this here because it bears repeating, the benefits will come, most of them in the long run,  all of them as a result of local companies either through partnerships with international players or on their own initiative ensuring they meet the highest standards be they health and safety, be they accounting standards. The point here is simple; doing business with local companies must not carry with it a liability that extends far beyond any commercial gains. The other side of this argument is, local companies should not expect to benefit simply because they are local companies.

The interconnected nature of international business and the increasing demands being placed on large multinational companies with extended supply chains can best be illustrated by the following story. In 2010, Domini a US based investment firm reached an agreement with Nucor, the largest steel producer in the United States in which the Nucor committed to regular monitoring of its suppliers to ensure that none of its suppliers used slave labor in the process of making pig iron a key component in the manufacture of steel.http://www.ilo.org/sapfl/News/lang--en/WCMS_143438/index.htm

This agreement was brought on by an investigation by Bloomberg Business week Magazine that revealed the use of slave labor in the manufacture of charcoal, a key component in the manufacture of pig iron. The pig iron was sold to Nucor which in turn sold it to car manufactures.  http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a4j1VKZq34TM.

The interest that this issue generated also forced the car manufactures Ford, General Motors, to commit to ensuring they would not source products from vendors who have questionable business practices. The actions of one, maybe more individuals in Brazil had affected decisions in the corporate boardrooms of blue chip companies in New York, and Detroit.
 http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=arPjegyeQ7ik

The foregoing is an illustration of how interconnected the world has become, how what in a past life may have been a local incident now has far reaching consequences. Nucor simply bought goods from its Brazilian suppliers, some may argue Nucor cannot be held responsible or punished for actions of a legal entity it does not control. That may have been true in the past, today that argument holds no water, multinational companies can no longer afford to slack off with respect to their choice of local partner, as the foregoing illustration shows; the costs of local noncompliance can be very steep commercially.

Bringing it home, while there may be a great deal of hoopla about Tullow and their choice of local partner, local businesses need to address themselves to the question of compliance standards across the board. Health and safety, labor, accounting, etc as a lapse in these areas could have deleterious effects on Tullow both commercially and in terms of reputation.   

Tullow, CNOOC, Total are duty bound to enforce their highest group standards with respect to vendors and local partners. They are also required to transfer as much skill and knowledge as they can to the local business community through. For local companies seeking to become regional and maybe even international players  they cannot expect a free ride,  it is important that compliance to the highest standard be they health and safety, be they accounting standards be seen as a requirement rather than an inconvenience. That is the new cost of doing business on the international scene.

Is Tullow Oil Really Bad for Uganda?

Kampala Uganda - Resource rich countries, the world over, with very few exceptions have all been touched by the resource curse. The resource curse for the uninitiated is simply a situation in which the natural resources and the income they generate in no way benefit the majority of the population. 

This ruthless exploitation is the result of amoral international companies, especially those in the mineral sector driven on by the ruthlessness search for market opportunities and profit. Furthermore, these mineral companies collude with local and international elite to malign the interests of the local people through corruption, weak laws and crony capitalism.

No other resource has cursed more nations than oil, from its ability to alter the geopolitical balance in a region, its ability to allow the ruling elite to live in a suspended bubble of luxury and unaccountability over the masses, to its effect on the local and international environment; the oil industry is a relatively easy target for a motley crew of individuals.

However, the resource curse does not occur in isolation; a key facilitator of this curse is an environment of deliberately enfeebled institutions, a political environment in which institutions have no sway over individuals, and an environment in which the office confers no authority. Based on the foregoing, Uganda is a prime candidate for the resource curse and Tullow is being painted as the vessel through which this curse is going to be delivered.

If you are inclined to believe everything you read in the newspapers, then Tullow Oil is the worst thing that has happened to Uganda. The newspapers in the past couple of weeks have painted Tullow as corrupt, the famous or is it infamous bribery scandal. In this way they are perpetuating an inherently unfair political system.

Then they are non-compliant in the manner in which they have let their exploration licenses lapse. On the flipside this can be seen as an attempt by Tullow to take advantage of weak oil laws in Uganda. These weak oil laws further allow the political elite to profit at the expense of the greater masses.

As if that is not bad enough, they have no real interest in developing local talent or local enterprises, the vast majority of the executive positions in this industry are filled by foreigners, and the primary contractors are foreign companies.  In this way, resources will be transferred abroad and there will be very few real benefits to the local economy.

In an earlier post I made the case that the bribery issue is a non-starter. With respect to local companies, that is a complicated issue, complicated in the sense that many of the local companies do not have the required skill set nor do they meet the demanding compliance standards required to be vendors. And no, the standards cannot be lowered; Tullow however is in the process of equipping local companies with the skill set and bringing them up to speed on the compliance front.

With respect to the question of the license, what license? Are we talking about the exploration license or the production license? Logically once Tullow discovered oil it would have applied for a production license, oil was discovered in 2009. According to the Petroleum Production and Exploration act of 1985 section 26 subsection one states A production license shall be granted for the period for which the application has been made but not for a period exceeding 25 years.

A production license is granted for 25 years, assuming the production license are granted at discovery then those licenses are still be valid. I could be wrong but then the article that suggested Tullow had lapsed was very nonspecific as to which license had lapsed.  And again, why would Tullows legal team apply for a one month license when conservative lift estimates put the oil well productivity at 25 years?

International Oil companies are easy targets; in Uganda the interests and personalities that drive politics over and above institutions have Tullow in their sights. Tullow is not the perfect international oil company; those ‘do not exist’. Based on the myriad of interests aimed at the international oil companies satisfying them would be a major miracle. Tullow however is not bad for Uganda; someone is working very hard to make us think so. 

Gadaffi, a not so Greek tragedy.

Kampala, Uganda-  Greek tragedy is something I admittedly have minimal knowledge of, however the one recurrent theme I have picked up in my spasmodic interaction with this form of literature is this, our paths to greatness can be undone by  the interaction between external circumstances and our character flaws.

In the days, weeks and months leading up to the death of Muammar Gadaffi of Libya I can’t help but wonder if his life and times would not have made a great Greek tragedy novel.  The protagonist, full of noble intentions who through a great deal of blood, sweat and tears undertakes Sisyphean labor until he is undone by a character flaw. His path to greatness is blocked by a character flaw and therein is the tragedy.

Like the Persian King Xerxes whose invasion of Greece was ultimately undone by his hubris, Gadaffi may have ultimately been undone by a messianic hubris that did not allow him to see that the ideas he espoused were less relevant in the world today.  A hubris that did not allow him to see that he had become politically isolated, his key allies being Sub Saharan African countries with limited political clout on the international scene. A hubris that did not allow him to see that he had become the very thing he loathed, a man in command of a pseudo monarchy not unlike the one he overthrew.

Like a modern day Okwonkwo the main protagonist in timeless classic Things Fall Apart, mercilessly driven by the demons of his past to the highest station in life, only to be held hostage by them. In the end coming undone by the same resolve that had served him so well in his rise to the top.

In the days leading up to and the days after the death of Gadaffi, the media has been inundated with literally hundreds of analyses all assigning the blame for the fall of Gadaffi to a single cause, oil. I believe without looking critically at the facts with respect to Gadaffi’s life and death the political class may lull themselves into a false sense of safety believing of they have no ‘strategic’ minerals, then they can run their countries as they see fit without fear of ‘imperialism’.

The Sad Bizarre End of a Revolutionary.

I make no bones about the fact that I think Gadaffi’s revolutionary credentials are suspect at best; I also disagree with the anti-imperialist argument because it  has very little resonance with my generation, I/we do not see the west and the ideas it espouses, key idea being a liberal, representative and accountable government as inherently hostile.

My second bone of contention with anti-imperialism is it completely relieves the leadership of any responsibility.  All our problems, all our failings can be and are blamed on external factors that we have no control over. No one asked Mobutu to sell out his country; he did it because it was the best way for him to keep power.

The last words on the life and times of Gadaffi have not been written but what if find most telling is this, in life he deposed a monarchy, a system built not on merit but on blood connections. Throughout his rule, the paths to the highest echelons of power were determined not by merit, but by blood and tribal affiliations to the ‘great leader’. His revolution can be seen as nothing more than a replacement of the Idriss monarchy with the Gadaffi monarchy. For the Libyan people, the rider changed, but they still remained donkeys to the vagaries of a single individual.

At the end of his life this ‘great revolutionary’, and ‘anti-imperialist’ he was defended not by his ‘national army’ but by a Special Forces unit.  Special in the sense that it was tasked with protecting the regime rather than the state, in this role it cannibalized and starved the wider army of valuable resources.

This unit was led by his son, staffed and manned by mercenaries and men from his tribe. The city in which he died was not the most cosmopolitan city in Libya, no, it was his birth place, choke full of fighters loyal not to the idea of Libya, but to him as a fellow kinsman.

The Irrelevance of the Oil argument.

Libya is blessed with forty billion barrels of oil, virtually all of it found in the desert making it easy and cheap to extract. Libyan oil is light sweet, low in sulphur, high in valuable distillates, and because of this Gadaffi was ousted because the west wanted access to his oil, yes his oil.

Let’s look at the facts; Libya’s national oil company has a whole host of relationships with western oil companies.  The EPSA’s negotiated by the national oil company grant access to these resources in some cases till 2047 so the issue of access to these resources is not supported by the evidence. http://www.eni.com/en_IT/eni-world/libya/eni-business/eni-business.shtml http://www.suncor.com/en/about/3986.aspxl.

While it is true that the terms imposed under these EPSA’s are some of the toughest across the Middle East, virtually all the companies accepted lower oil lifts for extended access to this oil. The lower lift matched against much longer access to the oil fields. Considering Libya’s field were practically virginal due to minimal exploitation, the terms negotiated under ESPA IV were reasonable. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wikileaks-files/libya-wikileaks/8294570/FRENCH-TOTAL-LED-CONSORTIUMS-ACCEPT-LOWER-PRODUCTION-SHARES-IN-LIBYA.html

Looking at this from another perspective, Oil contributes 95% of Libya’s export revenue; it also contributes 25% of the GDP and 80% of government revenue. With thirty percent youth unemployment, a heavy subsidy burden, a political system dependent upon patronage, Libya is a classic rentier state, completely dependent on oil; any designs which would affect this position would be political suicide.

Oil is a double edged weapon; it is in the interests if those who have it to do their very best to keep it affordable lest it be substituted. Adel al Jubeir former foreign policy advisor to the Saudi prince Abdullah and present Saudi Ambassador to the United States said of Saudi Arabia ‘We have almost thirty percent of the world’s oil. For us, the objective is to assure that oil remains and economically competitive source of energy. Oil prices that are too high reduce demand growth for oil and encourage the development of alternative sources of energy’. For oil rentier states the energy substitution effect would doom them to failure and political instability so anyone attempting to wield the oil weapon would have to have the dexterity of a bomb disposal expert lest it take him out too.

I come to Bury Gadaffi.

The manner of his death and the macabre display of his decomposing corpse are things I disagree with. Even though at a certain level I understand the desire to have a man who had so dominated life in Libya on display. I sympathize with those who called him father, grandfather, husband, uncle in the same breath my sympathies go out to all those who lost their lives as a result of his actions.

On a wider level Gadaffi’s death represents the end of an era, an era in which we as Africans live in pseudo monarchies dominated by the whims of a single individual. It represents the death of an era in which the political elite who run this continent can no longer sweep their failings under the rug that is imperialism and neocolonialism. For the elite, think long and hard about the lesson of Bouazzizi

Tullow Bribery Saga; Figures over facts, form over substance.

Preliminary musings.

There is an ancient Chinese curse that goes ‘May you live in interesting times’ Forget common usage of the term interesting, it can be translated to mean may trouble never leave your side. This week in Uganda, we lived out that statement, some people more than others.

This week opposition politicians dropped the equivalent of a daisy cutter.             http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLU-82. The allegations that three cabinet ministers had been offered carrots to the tune of twenty three million Euros by Tullow the international oil company for vague services granted, in short a bribe. The media picked up on the figures and run with them, creating a blast wave in which many of us, me included forgot the basic adage, never make important decisions based on first information.

Two of the three ministers were specifically named, Sam Kuteesa Minister of Foreign Affairs and Hillary Onek former minister of Energy, the Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi was named in passing. Kuteesa and Mbabazi are lighting rods, revered and reviled in almost equal measure. Kuteesa has been censured for corruption in the past; against this backdrop it is easy to see how these accusations seem believable.

International oil companies have a torrid reputation with respect to corruption. Furthermore, by virtue of the fact they deal with the government in power it is easy to see how they can be seen as willing allies of the ruling system which makes them an easy target.

Into this mix add the opaque negotiation process associated with Uganda's oil contracts and you have the perfect storm for a political lynching.

I will admit I was dumbfounded by the figures, in economic times when most of us have tightened our belts to the point where they have cut us in half; it beggars belief that there are individuals who may have money we can only dream of in pot induced flights of fancy.

And therein lies the problem, I was so taken up by the figures, stunned into flights of fancy of what those funds could do I did not stop to think that there is a possibility that there is no substance to these allegations. What if these allegations were false? What if the people making these allegations could have discovered the fallacy of their documentation with minimal investigation?

In this week’s edition of The Independent Magazine I had a chance to see reproductions of these documents and the more I read, the less convinced I was that there was truth in all this.

The Power of Attorney Documentation.

Tullow Oil is a limited liability company listed on the London stock exchange. According to information available in the public domain, 26.5% of this company is privately held by different entities the rest is owned by investors through the stock exchange. http://www.tullowoil.com/index.asp?pageid=104. The compliance standards for listed companies are very high, it does not mean they are not and cannot be breached; however, the consequences are normally enough to give one pause.

The first glaring hole that I see, if you ignore the atrocious grammar, is the powers were granted to PAY cash. It would logically consistent assuming Mr. Heavey was indisposed, for him to grant powers to Mr. Glover to DRAW cash against a cheque or any other instrument.

Moreover, addressing this document to the bank is a redundancy. Banks are primarily interested in the persons who DRAW cash; in this case there is no indication as to whether or not Mr. Glover has the power to draw cash. A more relevant document from a banks perspective would have allowed Mr. Glover to DRAW cash which does not seem to be the case here.

Also, I find it very hard to believe that a listed company would on the strength of a letter signed by a single individual transfer power of attorney. Dual control and succession planning are basic tenets of corporate governance, is Mr. Glover, Mr. Heaveys’ designated successor in the event Mr. Heavey is indisposed?  Aidan Heavey may have founded Tullow but I would be hard pressed to believe that he would turn around and run it like a local mom and pop shop in down town Kampala.

Assuming the document in The Independent is accurate; I do not see how it could have passed legal muster. In my experience with such documentation, the drafting is very specific. It would have at the very least identified Brian Glover and specified the duration for which the document had potency.

The third aspect that I find very suspicious is the overt use of the names of Sam Kahamba Kuteesa and his date of birth.  Reading points one and two above in combination, Bank of Valletta had no relationship with East African Development Limited and by extension Sam Kahamba Kuteesa as such it is completely unnecessary for him to be identified to Bank of Valletta.

In addition, a date of birth does not serve to identify anyone, even with entities that have a much lower profile than Tullow the proper positive identification of an agent is never taken for granted.  In my view, the date of birth especially if it is used in combination with other official documentation like a passport or driver’s license number (Banks have a preference for nationally issued ID) would have made the documentation less suspicious.

Tullow Oil operates in one of the most limiting environments with respect to corruption and bribery, the UK Anti-Bribery Act 2010 is easily one of the toughest laws on the books anywhere http://www.cliffordchance.com/publicationviews/publications/2011/03/the_uk_bribery_act2010anendtomixin.html.

Aidan Heavey and the Tullow are aware of the game changing nature of this legislation and have been aware for at least a year. Why would he, assuming he was interested in corrupting the system leave breadcrumbs that could be directly linked to him? An in-depth look at the aforementioned analysis would give you pause or convince you that Tullow is being run by a bunch of mad men. This new law takes no hostages.

Funds Transfer in the Post 9/11 World.

Banking generally speaking is a web, a myriad of interconnected interests. International funds transfer is primarily done through a system called Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT). There is no limit to the amount of funds that can be transferred though it follows, that certain funds attract far more attention than others. In the aftermath of 9/11 as part of the war against terror SWIFT has been cooperating with international intelligence agencies, handing over their transaction database for scrutiny. http://articles.technology.findlaw.com/2006/Jul/18/10162.html. I can categorically state it is impossible to wire ten thousand US dollars or its equivalent without it being flagged. The funds in question could not have been moved without there being an electronic trail.

Bank of Valletta it is the second largest financial institution in Malta with impressive financial figures, in short they are a credible institution with plenty to lose if they engaged in nefarious activity. What's more Bank of Valletta has been certified by the US government with respect to compliance with the relevant provisions of the PATRIOT act relating to foreign banks.

Suspicious transaction monitoring is considered business as usual in all banks, any funds received outside normal account activity would immediately be flagged and the beneficiary would have to provide documentary evidence to support the legitimacy of these funds. Funds of this magnitude would have triggered anti money laundering alarms before they were allowed into the banking system.

East African Development Limited supposedly operates an account with the Dubai branch of EFG Private Bank limited. http://www.efginternational.com/ Private bankers are inherently snobbish; it is an exclusive club where having plenty of money does not guarantee access. How would a company like EADL that has no bona fides get access into this elite world?

The final issue here would be screening system used by banks to deal with politically exposed persons. In banking parlance they are called PEPS and no relationship can be established with PEP unless it has been signed off by the country head in the case of international banks. Assuming Sam Kuteesa is indeed a shareholder in EADL, I doubt it would have been impossible to find any information related to him or this entity because higher than normal standards would have been applied.

If all other factors are excluded.

Sherlock Holmes famously stated, if all other possibilities are eliminated whatever remains however improbable must be the truth. I am unwilling, to convict Tullow on the basis of what the opposition politicians are calling evidence because it would call on me to believe that Sam Kuteesa is clinically insane. As is Aidan Heavey, Brian Glover and the evidence of that is as solid as the power of attorney document provided by the opposition.

So if this is not about the truth, then what is it about? There has been some speculation in the media that this is linked to the succession battles within the NRM, in some quarters it is seen as battle between those who actively fought the bush war and those who were part of the external wing. Some say it is about new NRM versus old NRM. That is beyond the scope of this piece.  I can say is the documentation provided does not meet even the lightest standards of proof. As a Ugandan I take exception politicians’ of any persuasion stirring up the hornets’ nest with allegations which hold no water and serve no purpose other than bad showmanship.

Riposte On Libya

I would like to thank those who have read and responded to my previous post on Libya. In some of the more colorful responses I have been called an apologist for the west, and something of a sell out (not in those exact words but the meaning was clear). 

In all this, I am reminded of a quote that is attributed to Julius Nyerere who when faced with increasing criticism of one of his fellow African leaders is supposed to have said ' I cannot take the sides against my fellow African' or words to that effect. True or not it sheds light on a mindset that is representative of many Africans even those not in positions of leadership.

What is at the heart of this debate?

In the simplest terms, it is about what the citizens of any state can reasonably expect from their governments. Libya was by most standards, indeed looking at the latest  human development indicators, head and shoulders above the world. http://hdrstats.undp.org/en/countries/profiles/LBY.html

The Libyan people were living lives that many African people can only dream about and that is in part the cause of this divide. I would aver that the Libyan people wanted more, much more from their government. While in Uganda, and indeed in most of Africa we may be happy with good schools and hospitals and roads, the Libyan people seemed to argue, what may be a fantasy in the rest of Africa, an inclusive and functional social system is the bare minimum they expect from their government.  

Put differently, does a society that has most of the social support systems most aspire to have the right to revolt against a system that has delivered on these systems? The answer depends on the aspirations of that society. In an earlier post, I alluded to the fact that a liberal political dispensation has become the accepted norm. In light of the demographic structure of Libya, representative and accountable governments, a respect for universal human rights, various freedoms are now considered normal. Gadaffi had clearly delivered on the social front, but the people he ruled over wanted a more open political system.

Gadaffi the revolutionary Pan- Africanist?

A lot has been said about Gadaffi  and his Pan African credentials. He is the prime mover of the United States of Africa idea, a rendition of a debate as old as most African states. It has also been said he wants to be the ruler of this new entity. Libya, until recently has been a key funder of the African Union picking up the tabs of many of Africa's smaller states. There is no doubt that he has made some positive contributions to the African unity project. However there are some nations that look upon Gadaffi's Pan- African credentials and frown.

A key beneficiary of Gadaffi revolutionary zeal was Charles Taylor. The carnage sown by Mr Taylor through out western Africa with the blessing, funding and training of Gadaffi and his security apparatus is almost biblical. Caveat, Liberia had its own internal tensions mainly along the lines of dividing the political spoils between the native Liberians and the descendants of freed slaves who dominated the Liberian  political system, however it was the emergence of Samuel Doe that served as a catalyst for Libya's involvement.

When Doe violently assumed power, he made two decisions that angered Libya, a firm alliance with the United States and a reestablishment of formal diplomatic ties with the state of Israel. It was these decisions, made well within his rights as the leader of the Liberian people which irked Gadaffi who saw himself as a bastion of anti- Imperialism used interchangeably with anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism.

Capitalizing on this, Taylor and Forday Sankoh of Sierra Leone with training and funding from Libya unleashed Hades hounds on west Africa. As a point of his defense, Charles Taylor argued that Gadaffi was at least partly responsible for some of the crimes committed by his men and went on to suggest Gadaffi should be his co-accused.http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/charles-taylor-defense-gadhafi-trial-war-crimes/story?id=13094284 for a Sierra Leonian perspective please see http://www.shout-africa.com/top-story/libya-indict-muammar-gaddafi-now-for-war-crimes-in-sierra-leone/

Whatever Gadaffi's credentials he bears some personal responsibility for some serious crimes against the people of Africa in general and Liberians and Sierra Leonians in particular. His pernicious influence is also felt in Darfur and Chad, and his treatment of the Berber minority within his country.

Bringing it together.

I have never made any secret of  the fact that I supported the decision to oust Gadaffi for the reasons I have stated above and in other places. I am a firm believer in a liberal open and democratic society because I believe that it is the only system that contains within in sufficient safety valves to preclude the violence that serves as a mile marker on this continent.

That said, I believe the Libyan people are the final arbiters in this debate and their position  is,  thank you very much for the schools and the hospitals and the fine roads that the rest of Africa can only dream about, we as a people want state that best represents our aspirations. A genuinely representative state, not a quasi monarchy led by the King of African kings Muammar Gadaffi and his princes and princess. 

‘Odyssey Dawn’ – Beyond Libya

‘Odyssey Dawn’ – Beyond Libya

The Libyan War and the reinterpretation of Sovereignty; Whose sovereignty?

I

The use of force between members of the international community has always been a contentious issue; since the beginning of time, the decision to attack a foreign land has been filtered through lawyers or priests. Maybe in an ode to some memory from our collective unconscious, statesmen have always striven to have right on their side before they deployed their might.

 In ancient Rome, the decision to declare war was shared between the senate and the fetiales, an order of priests. Even after a formal declaration of war by the Roman Senate, it still fell upon the shoulders of the fetiales to sanctify the decision. And if they were in agreement that Rome was indeed justified to seek redress for wrongs through the use of force, it was customary for the most senior of their number, the pater patratus to carry to the enemies' frontiers a blood-smeared spear tipped with iron which he hurled into the enemies territory formally declaring war. As far as Rome was concerned, they were right before the law and before the gods; their cause was just so victory would be theirs.

The Fetiales have long been consigned to the history books, however the principle remains, any decision to use violence to sort out disputes between nations has got to have legal sanction. The Fetiales of today is the Security Council of the United Nations and the pater patratus is the permanent five, the equivalent of the iron tipped spear flung into the territory of the offending power is the resolution assented to by the Security Council under Chapter seven of the UN Charter. 

The decision to use force to bring Gadaffi to heel is not in dispute, in as far as the legal dynamics go, force was sanctioned under the laws that govern the use of force in international relations. The far more contentious issue has been, and continues to be, the interpretation of the ideas of sovereignty and noninterference in the internal affairs of a member state of the international community. Was the issue of egregious human rights violations a colorable pretext for war? Was the initial premise false? Did Gadaffi not have the rights to maintain his grip on power against armed rebels?  Or more concisely, did the actions of the UN and NATO interfere with the internal affairs of the Libyan state and by extension infringe violate the sovereignty of the Libyan State?

II

Did the actions of the UN and NATO violate the sovereignty of the Libyan state? The short answer to this question is NO.

Why do I say no?  Because the concept of sovereignty is a fluid one that by and large reflects the prevailing mood of international politics and international society. At the time sovereignty came into common usage it represented attempts by the European states to limit the interference of the Pope in their internal affairs. In the time leading up to the peace of Westphalia in 1648, wars in Europe were distinctly religious in nature and represented on a micro scale the much larger conflict between the Protestantism and Catholicism.  Thus, a key article feature of the Treaty of the Osnabruck which ended the Wars in Europe was the complete noninterference in the internal affairs of the parties to this treaty.

And with several strokes of several pens, the state system, synonymous with the ideas of sovereignty and noninterference was born. The state system was based on a specific territory in which there is a sovereign who enjoys supreme political authority, and exercises the monopoly over the legitimate use of force within his territory and is recognized by other governments as an independent entity entitled to freedom from external intervention.

The world has changed since 1648 and with it the concept of sovereignty.  A careful analysis of several legal texts the UN charter, the universal declaration of human rights the various conventions against torture, discrimination, the rights of the children and women show there was a strong inclination towards universality of rights, rights not contingent upon the state.

With the end of the cold war and the broadening of the concept of security away from a state-centric model to a more people-centric model brought to the fore the fact that the safety of people was not synonymous with security of the people within the state.

The culmination of this was the fruition of the idea of ‘The Responsibility to Protect’. The result of several years’ work it stated in part;

138. Each individual State has the responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. This responsibility entails the prevention of such crimes, including their incitement, through appropriate and necessary means. We accept that responsibility and will act in accordance with it. The international community should, as appropriate, encourage and help States to exercise this responsibility and support the United Nations in establishing an early warning capability.

139. The international community, through the United Nations, also has the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapters VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.

Perhaps in a break from the past the African Constitutive Act in article 4 subsection h states ‘The right of the union to intervene in a member state pursuant to the decision of the assembly in grave circumstances namely war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity’ The African bloc, one of the strongest proponents of the old definition of sovereignty tacitly agreed that there were situations in which the veil and sovereignty and noninterference would have to be ripped away.

 As has been argued by Anne Marie Slaughter former Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of International Affairs, Princeton University, the first time, international law and the great powers of international politics have recognized both the rights of citizens and a specific relationship between the government and its citizens: a relationship of protection. The nature of sovereignty itself is thus changed: legitimate governments are defined not only by their control of a territory and a population but also by how they exercise that control. If they fail in that obligation, the international community has the responsibility to protect those citizens.

Did the Libyan regimes actions meet the threshold for crimes against humanity? I submit they did as argued in the final text of the Arab league meeting of 12/03/2011 which formalized the Arab position it stated ‘After deliberating the outcome of the dangerous situation in Libya and its implications, and the crimes and violations being perpetrated by the Libyan authorities against the Libyan people, in particular the use of military aircrafts, mortars and heavy weaponry against the civilians’ It further states, the Arab league decides to call on  the Security Council to bear its responsibilities towards the deteriorating situation in Libya, and to take the necessary measures to impose immediately a no-fly zone on Libyan military aviation, and to establish safe areas in places exposed to shelling as a precautionary measure that allows the protection of the Libyan people and foreign nationals residing in Libya, while respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of neighboring States’

III

I do not see the Libyan conflict in terms of imperialist powers versus the rest, nor do I buy into the Oil theory as a wit once put it ‘ Oil producing powers have to sell their oil, they cannot drink it’. In this way the arguments about the need to control Libya’s oil fall flat more so when one considers the fact that Libya had opened up its oil sector to whoever could pay for an exploration bloc.

The animate and changeable nature of sovereignty and the manner in which it reflects the disposition of international politics is a phenomenon that which cannot be ignored. In attacking his citizens, Gadaffi affronted humanity; he could not hide behind the veil of sovereignty because the veil was no longer available to him.

The Fetiales spoke, retribution must be made, the cause was right under the law and just before the god’s, allegorical Rome arose and asked for retribution for wrongs committed against her Pater Patratus  hurled the spear into the Odyssey Dawn. 

                                                                          

Till Death us do part

On the morning of January 5^th, the day after Muhammad Bouazizi died, the bell tolled for three men whose combined term in power was nearly a century. Muammah Gadaffi 42 years and counting, reading the day’s papers in his vast tent probably never gave it more than a passing thought. To the west of Libya , Ben Ali 24 years and counting reading about the events from his palace in Tunis and Mubarak 30 years and counting at the helm of Egypt from his villa in Sharm El Sheikh may have over looked the story entirely.

Completely detached from the ordinary lives of the peoples they ruled it was almost certainly impossible for either of the three minds to conceive the desperation of the ordinary man, the desperation that made a young man choose the unspeakable pain of self-immolation rather than live another day under the yoke of poverty, or the incessant mocking of his dashed aspirations.

Bouazizi lit two fires, the deliberate one which consumed his body and the inadvertent one which consumed the souls of the millions of people in the Maghreb. In the weeks and the months that followed, first Ben Ali, then Mubarak and finally Gadaffi have all gone up in the flames that were lit that day.

As I write this Ben Ali is in exile in Saudi Arabia, Mubarak is undergoing the long drawn out humiliation of a trial and Gadaffi is MIA, AWOL, whereabouts unknown, the only indication he is still alive is the vitriol laden messages he sends out electronically.

What happened?

For the three men, the events of late last year and early this year must have come as a surprise; these men had ruled their countries for longer than many marriages last. To the extent that some wit commented that for many of these leaders, the oath of office did not end so help me God, as much as till death us do part.

In writing about marriage former chief Rabbi of the UK Jonathan Sachs said ‘My marriage is absolute but not necessarily universal’. The point he was making was this, what is accepted in a marriage is what is agreed upon by both partners in the marriage. If an outsider does not agree they should accept the fact that these are the terms that have been agreed upon by the partys to the marriage.

What happens though, when one party to the marriage has their needs transformed and the other party will not change? Will not adapt?  Without adaptation, without an acknowledgement of the other party’s needs, the relationship is heading towards catastrophic rapture.

Ephesians 5: 22-33

For anyone who has been to a Christian wedding, the aforementioned verses will not be alien to them. The love submission dialectic has been focal point of debate between men and women as to who has a greater duty, the one who does the submission or the one who does the loving. Lately that argument has morphed, would a woman be right to stop submitting if her husband stopped loving her?

The aforementioned is akin to the theorizing of the liberal political philosophers like John Locke who posited that political leadership and more importantly political stability rests on the perceived legitimacy of the ruling system, once the ruled decided the rulers no longer possessed this legitimacy it could be withdrawn and the system would become unstable. What is the duty of the rulers vis-à-vis the ruled? Can the ruled withdraw their support if the ruler no longer meets his obligations to them?

In the case of Gadaffi, his legitimacy, his perceived right to rule was anchored on his revolutionary credentials. The coup against King Idriss, the expulsion of American and British forces from the air bases in Libya, the nationalization of Libya’s oil reserves and his association with various shades of revolutionaries around the world were manifestations of his revolutionary ideals.

This may have made sense within the context of the cold war and its sharp ideological divide; however things had changed, dramatically.  After forty two years the number of people who had any real experience of the revolutionary and ideological wars that punctuated the sixties and the seventies and to some extent the eighties were few and far in between.  It follows that the number of people who questioned Gadaffi’s right to rule based on his revolutionary credentials were far more that those who believed in his right to rule based on same said credentials.

Consider this, the median age the Libyan population is twenty four years, the bulk of the population is in an age cohort which has no real experience of the foundation his revolutionary credentials.  Furthermore, with a median age of twenty four, the vast majority of the population would have attained some kind of political awareness in the post-cold war era, a time in which democracy; individual freedom, a marked divergence between regime and state security and a more accountable government were the ideological underpinnings of political discourse. This would have been diametrically opposed to the paternalistic autocratic model along which Gadaffi run Libya.

Revelations 2:4-5

It is a fact that the history of these men will be written largely by those who have deposed them. There were those who were opposed to Gadaffi from the get go, even before it was fashionable to oppose him. As a child many a time we argued with the passion only youth can garner, about the merits of Gadaffi’s rule. Even now, I smile as I think about how we believed his army was capable of taking on the combined armies of sub Saharan Africa and winning.

In the words of St John the Divine, Gadaffi forgot his first love, like a husband or wife who begins to take their partners for granted and begins to take liberties with them Gadaffi seemed to have forgotten the reason he assumed power.

His political reality was formed by four key events; the struggle against Colonialism, the formation of the state of Israel universally referred to as an Nahba the tragedy in Arab social consciousness, Gamal Abdel Nasser and the Suez crisis of 1956 and its effect on Arab nationalism and the 1967 Arab Israeli war referred to as An Naksa in Arab Consciousness.

When he assumed power, Gadaffi’s stated aim was to build an Islamist society with power, wealth and weapons in the hands of the people. In his defense he can always argue he never specified which hands and which people, but what he ended up building was a semi-secular society with power and wealth and weapons concentrated in the hands of a few people.

In verse five St John admonishes and warns, he says Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. 

Gadaffi famously decreed that revolutionaries never retire, true that may be but, there is a distinct possibility that they could have power forcefully taken from them, which is exactly what happened in his case. While there has been a lot of chatter about the role of foreign intervention in the Libya, and our latter day pan Africanists have wheeled out the old and not particularly scary bogey man of neo–colonialism, reminding  us about what Gadaffi has done for Africa (but not what he has done for his people, his cardinal responsibility) they have been unable to address the fact that the internal contradictions of Libyan society were the real cause of the rebellion and  if Gadaffi had not forgotten his first love (his mission to create a more just society)  maybe just maybe I would not be writing this.

A dictators survival guide

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/08/22/the_dictators_survival_guide?page=0,1&wpisrc=obinsite

On draconian Law and development.

Introduction

It is my contention that the modification of the constitution especially in light of the bail debate and the creation of vague nebulous crimes such as economic sabotage will do nothing to make this country more stable. If anything, the closure of political space and the elimination of legitimate avenues for citizens to raise their voices and be heard on issues they consider important could backfire with violence, even extreme violence considered a more viable alternative.  The proposals to my mind are akin to a man who abuses his wife and children at home while disallowing complaints about his behavior and somehow to his mind he believes the absence of complaint somehow makes him a good husband and father.

In an article in the Monitor of July 21st 2011 the president is quoted as saying ‘“We need development in the country which can only be achieved through a stable country. A country that is free from demonstrators,” The premise of these reform measures is political stability which is necessary for development.   In an article in the New Vision of July 28th 2011 Dora Byamukama argued ‘As the debate rages on, what is obvious is that the riots promote a negative image of our country; drive away tourists and investors and thus cause economic sabotage which factors contribute to underdevelopment and scarcity of resources and thus riots’ .

While the pure legal implications are beyond me and have been exhaustively debated elsewhere, proponents of this law are promoting a false nexus between draconian legislation and development. Said nexus does not exist.

Genesis.

When the results of the elections of February 18^th 2011 were announced, that which most people had known for a while was formally declared, president Museveni had won a fourth term. For his perennial opponent Kizza Besigye, political analysts, even those normally sympathetic to him were writing his political obituary. Besigye was finished. For the movement diehards, this was a moment to be savored, that was until Besigyes fortunes were resurrected by the seemingly innocuous walk to work campaigns.

The walk to work campaigns brought to the fore the intellectual poverty of the leaders of this county. While some of them were happy to spout gibberish about the liberal minimalist state, they seemed oblivious to the fact the aforementioned could not be reconciled with the over governed nature of our glorious banana republic.

The campaign zeroed in, uncomfortably so, on the nature and the role of the state. While the government seems happy to extract resources, it shows as much competence as an armless goal keeper when it comes to key service delivery.  The state was manifestly impotent in the wake of the challenges it faced, seemingly wringing its hands like an anxious father outside the labor suite, with one key difference, the father actually cares about what is happening in the labor suite. 

When the government reacted, yes reacted not responded, it was swift and brutal, the brutality was sometimes overshadowed by the comical attempts of the various spokespersons to explain what a genuine and a non-genuine walk was. To borrow the soccer analogy, the government scored so many own goals, it practically ensured it lost the PR battle.  Many a time the government spokeswoman came across as a summa cum laude graduate of the Comical Ali School of public relations. The ministers of internal affairs looked like something out of Didi’s comedy show as they were consistently tied in knots when they tried to explain damning video evidence.

Through it all, even as it shot itself repeatedly in the foot, the government was obsessed with maintaining its external image.  It went ahead to ban live coverage of any of the protests an act that reminds me of a lady of the night, immodestly dressed protecting her face from a prying press camera.

The reaction of the presidency was the announcement of a raft of measures that would form part of his work plan in his new term of office. Among the proposals for constitutional and legal reform are the introduction of new offences such as economic sabotage, the removal of bail for such an offence, as well as many others already in the Penal Code, and a whole raft of suggestions on how to tame the media—both print and electronic.  The stated aim of these measures as alluded to earlier is to create a stable country conducive to development and favorable to investors.

Will Draconian regulation make us more stable, a more favorable destination for investment?

Stability, both political and economic and a stable regulatory framework are key factors that investors factor into their decision making framework. In other words political risk the possibility that shifts in the political landscape will affect the security and or profitability of their investments is something investors’ consider important. 

Amendments to the constitution send the wrong signal. Whatever else, it pays to know that the state plays by the rules.  The constitution is the rule book, analogous to the Biblical God it ensures that the sun shines on the Roman and the Jew. It sets the standard for fairness and sets the benchmark for what justice is.  Changing the rules simply because they are seen to be helpful to your opponents sends the wrong signal.

Amendments to the constitution have no bearing on the external environment in which we find ourselves.  They will not create a more stable Southern Sudan or Eastern Congo nor will they stabilize Somalia all three countries in tandem have the potential to create and arc of instability reaching from the red sea downwards which could deter investment.

The amendments will do nothing to comfort especially long term investors who study the political environment and wonder if God suddenly called the president to his side would there be a peaceful transition of power.  How would a system that is dominated by interests and identity largely unchecked by institutions respond to a sudden drastic change?

For the long term investor the concern could be how environmental degradation and climate change could exacerbate social tensions that exist. Or how the aforementioned if unchecked would affect the nation’s income seeing as virtually all our exports are agricultural in nature and largely dependent on the largesse of nature. The long term investor may be concerned about the influence of environmental degradation on the nation’s ability to generate energy (also dependent on the largesse of nature) and how that would affect their business.

Conclusion.

When the current government chose the option of violence as a means of changing the state of things they did so in part because they believed the law through the petition and or appellate process offered no real solutions to the problems which afflicted Ugandan society then. In contrast Besigyes decision to petition the courts reflected a shift in thinking, a belief that the law could remedy the ills of society, more power to him for accepting the verdict even if it did not go his way entirely.

The aforementioned is the unique function of the law, it mediates social tensions allowing not unlike the valve on a pressure cooker the controlled release of tension and anger. More to the point the law reflects the aspiration of society, through its complex workings ensures that the conglomerated aspirations of all society influence individual behavior.

Let us not be fooled, these laws will have no bearing on development and in their worst form will only increase instability to the extent to which they make the legal system unattractive as an arbiter of societal conflict.