Botswana faults Gaddafi over 'hasty' AU decisions

• Botswana says the just-ended AU summit was a failure
• Botswana: Libya, has no respect for established procedures and processes of the African Union

GABORONE, Tuesday

Botswana has declared the just-ended African Union Summit a failure and slammed Libyan President, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi for lack of respect for established procedures and use of coercion to conduct the affairs of the AU, which he chairs.

“The Summit failed the people of Africa by not dealing with issues that are of immediate concern to their livelihoods such as what may be done to advance investments in agriculture to promote food security,” Botswana vice-president Lt-Gen Mompati Merafhe who attended the Summit on behalf of President Ian Khama said in Gaborone on Monday.

He said that Libya was an excellent host for the summit in Sirte but the same cannot be said about the way the business of the summit was handled. “The Libyans were excellent hosts as far as providing facilities for the visitors was concerned. The same cannot be said with regard to the way the business of presiding over the meeting was handled,” Merafhe said.

“The chair of the African Union, Libya, has no respect for established procedures and processes of the African Union and this may be motivated by his burning desire to coerce everyone into the premature establishment of an African Union Government,” he added.

He said that Libya through Gaddafi bulldozed the summit to pass its proposals without debate. “The two proposals by Libya for the establishment of the African Defence Council and the establishment of the African Agency for the Protection of Territorial and Economic Waters of African countries were adopted by the Summit with no debate allowed by the chair,” he explained.

“In our view, this was a rushed decision because the financial and other resource implications for establishing these bodies were not properly examined. The questions of whether the creation of the Defence Council in particular, will be of benefit to the entire continent or to a specific region as well as its relationship to the existing AU Peace and Security Council were also not examined,” Merafhe added.

He asserted that Botswana is concerned about the proliferation of agencies/structures established by the African Union without capacity to sustain and implement their mandates.

“We will therefore find it difficult to accede to protocols establishing these unless proper consultations are carried out,” he said.

Merafhe told the AU to get its priorities right if it hopes for a functional unity among African countries and peoples.

He warned that the Sirte summit was made to rush the adoption of many commitments, which will be difficult to implement. He said the summit was given little time to debate before the decision was made not to cooperate with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the arrest of Sudan President Omar Al-Bashir for atrocities committed in Darfur.

“The chair did not permit much debate on this matter and we did not get an opportunity to put our opinion across. It is our view that Africa should not try to undermine the work of the ICC simply because one Head of State called Bashir has been indicted by the Court.

“Indeed by doing so we would be, as Kofi Annan recently put it, demeaning ‘the yearning for human dignity that resides in every African heart’. It also represents a step backward in the battle against impunity," Merafhe said.

“Until we can all appreciate what democracy, rule of law, respect for fellow Africans and the dignity of others mean in practice, Africa has a very long way to go before we can truly understand each other and
work towards common continental objectives,” he added.

Merafhe accused Gaddafi of presenting to the summit a different version of what was agreed would form the African Union Authority that is meant to replace the African Union Commission.

“It was anticipated that the AU Authority will comprise a president, vice-president as well as secretaries with portfolios based on areas of shared competence. The understanding from the recommendations of the Ministers (Executive Council) and the February 2009 Assembly was that the Authority will not compromise the sovereignty and independence of member states of the AU.

“The view that we could also live with was that the Authority will remain an inter-governmental body deriving its mandate from the Assembly of the Heads of States and Government.

“However, what was presented at the summit at the insistence of the chair (Libya) was clearly not what everyone expected nor had agreed with. It was also clear that consensus on what the AU Authority will be coordinating was not reached at the level of the Executive Council (the Ministers).

“We had not, for instance, anticipated that the chair will insist on inclusion of areas such as the coordination of a common African Defence and Security Policy and the elaboration of a common African programme of action on the area of foreign trade and foreign policy as well as other areas which were not identified as areas of competence in the earlier deliberations on the matter.

“Neither had we anticipated that the chair will equate the functions of the secretaries (who will replace the current AU
commissioners) to those of eight continental ministers headed by a president and vice president.

“Given the way the meeting was presided over by the chair, Botswana found it fruitless to oppose the adoption of what is essentially the framework of the African Union Government, the issue on which our position is well known. It was clear that the chair was not prepared to entertain opposing views or opinions calling for a gradual approach to continental integration,” Merafhe said.

He explained that it must be understood that while the Sirte Summit was forced to adopt a document most countries did not agree with, the test will be in implementation.