Incessant diplomatic shuffling and economic muscle will make
South Africa the continent's capital this year
South Africa's omnipresence in the continent's diplomatic and economic initiatives in 2005 will be paralleled by the African National Congress's dominance of national politics. This year President
Thabo Mbeki will be involved in critical negotiations in conflicts in Côte d'Ivoire, Sudan, Burundi, Congo-Kinshasa and Rwanda, and Comoros. That is apart from his mediating role in Zimbabwe and Swaziland. Mbeki will face growing criticism that his staggering diplomatic air miles (the substantive negotiations are rarely delegated to Foreign Minister
Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma or officials) and his New Partnership for Africa's Development are little more than political cover for South Africa's commercial ambitions. That view was reinforced during Mbeki's 31 December visit to Sudan when he omitted to make any reference to Khartoum's mass murder in Darfur (AC Vol 45 No 24) and left clutching a batch of oil concessions. Similar realpolitik would seem to govern warming relations with President
Teodoro Obiang's oil-rich dictatorship in Equatorial Guinea. It is also difficult to square with South Africa's sponsorship of NePAD's peer review process, under which African states judge each other's standard of governance.
If peace can be kept on track, six West African countries will be preparing for elections in 2005. Côte d'Ivoire may have to be dragged to the polls under threat of United Na...
If peace is to come to the region, the weak government in Kinshasa must deal with the eastern Congo crisis, then organise elections due in June but likely to be delayed for at leas...