AC Vol 42 No 16

www.africa-confidential.com 10 August 2001 Vol 42 No 16 AFRICA CONFIDENTIAL SUDAN 2 SUDAN Keeping them talking Since its 1989 coup, the NIF has Delusions of peace talked peace and made war against Egypt and Libya intervene to block southern and northern opposition its northern and southern hopes while the NIF plays off everyone against each other opponents. Its tactics are ‘peace- initiative’ shopping – fielding a ‘Egypt possesses cards it has not yet used for preventing the separation of southern Sudan’. Thus spake multitude of plans – to confuse Cairo’s Ambassador to Khartoum, Mohamed Asim Ibrahim, in June 2000. Egypt was ‘determined to foreigners and to wrongfoot the prevent such separation by all means’ (AC Vol 41 No 13). A year later, the ‘Egyptian-Libyan Initiative’ opposition. (ELI) took off. And Egypt played some of those cards. As United States President George W. Bush’s administration searched for a policy and the National ZIMBABWE 4 Islamic Front (aka ‘National Congress’) government in Khartoum used its new oil wealth to stave off the renewal of United Nations’ sanctions, Cairo slid into the gap. Fearing democracy in Khartoum almost Hanging in there as much as Islamism, it devised the Initiative. It began timidly as the ‘Libyan-Egyptian Initiative’ in Tripoli in mid-1999 and was striking by its lack of content – one member of Sudan’s opposition umbrella, President Mugabe’s strategy to win six more years in power claimed a the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which was invited to Libya for the launch, complained that victory at the Bindura by-election there was ‘not even a piece of paper on the table’. It looked like another of Colonel Moammar el last month. The land resettlement Gadaffi’s grandiose projects. scheme is gaining support in the This June, Egypt made the ELI the talk of the town. It even proposes a democratic system, which would countryside but perhaps not enough put the NIF out of power and which Egypt surely would prefer not to see in Khartoum. Yet everyone, to counter three digit inflation and looming food shortages. opposition and diplomats alike, took it seriously. So great is Egypt’s perceived weight that even the leader of the Sudan People’s Liberation Front (SPLA), Col. John Garang de Mabior, made welcoming noises.

SOUTH AFRICA 5 Avoiding the central issues Sell if you can The ELI is low on content (see Box). Its nine points are mere points, starting places for discussion; none are new, all have been debated for many years. ‘Recognition of racial, religious and cultural diversity’ The privatisation plans of the ANC has not stopped genocide. The points are vague and open to interpretation: ‘Citizenship should be the government have been hit by a basis for exercising rights and duties’. They studiously avoid the two issues long agreed as central by all delay in the sale of the state telephone company and a who seriously seek peace: the relationships between north and south and between religion and state. threatened national strike by the The centrality of these questions was recognised in the 1986-89 peace process, when many of those trades union congress in protest now in the NDA (including its Chairperson, Democratic Unionist Party leader Mohamed Osman el against any sale of state assets. Mirghani) made the first serious bid to end the war. The NIF coup of 30 June 1989 was timed to sabotage Even if Mbeki’s privatisers get back the looming treaty. The two issues reappeared centre-stage in the Declaration of Principles (DOP), agreed on track, they face falling international interest in buying into in 1994 in the peace process under the Inter-Government Authority on Development (IGAD). The NDA state conglomerates. endorsed the DOP in its Asmara Declaration of 1995 and reiterated the principles in Tripoli in 1999. IGAD’s Peace Committee consists of Kenya (in the chair) and three other immediate neighbours of Sudan: Eritrea, Ethiopia and Uganda. None of these states is Arab, none has a Muslim majority (though KENYA 7 Ethiopia and Eritrea come close); all give support to the Sudanese opposition. The NIF signed up to the Après Moi, maybe DOP in 1997 to coopt the southern factions led by Riek Machar Teny Dhurgon and Lam Akol Ajawin. However, the NIF government has consistently rejected the heart of the DOP, whose propositions President Moi is trying to secure contradict its raison d’être and threaten its power. The regime has tried to involve those who saw KANU’s future dominance, having themselves as Khartoum’s ‘natural allies’ to the north. El Gadaffi had been typically unpredictable privately assured diplomats and business that he is preparing to towards Khartoum but the NIF knew how to exploit his new thirst for African respectability. Once an quit power next year. However, ardent arms supplier to the SPLA, he announced in Khartoum last month that the NIF’s ideas were the President’s efforts to control ‘mediaeval’ and that there were ‘no issues’ to resolve in the south. He is now a very vocal supporter of constitutional reform and to absorb Sudanese unity – the first and clearest point in the ELI (see Box). Raila Odinga’s NDP in a proposed Egypt staunchly agrees, for complex motives which Sudanese tend to find self-defeating and neo- ‘merger’ look troubled. colonial. Cairo’s conviction that Sudan is its backyard runs deep. The relationship in many ways resembles that between northern and southern Sudan; in each case, the assumption of superiority by the POINTERS 8 dominant (northern) party can lead it to misread the situation. Amid international nervousness about ‘water-wars’, Cairo is trying to protect its majority interest in Gabon, Liberia/ the River Nile. The greatest threat posed to Egypt by Sudan is Islamism, not increased water-use. Cairo Sierra Leone, nonetheless claims a ‘legitimate interest’ in Sudan’s constitutional status – belatedly, since the southern Uganda & Tunisia call for separatism has been heard since before Sudan became a nation in 1956 and was the explicit goal 10 August 2001 Africa Confidential Vol 42 No 16 Keeping them talking Ever since it seized power on 30 June 1989, the National Islamic Front ● September 1993, the Inter-Governmental Authority on Drought and has been declaring its desire for peace while accelerating the war. The Development (IGADD; now IGAD) Peace Committee formed: Kenya first speech by Brigadier General Omer el Beshir after the NIF made (Chair), Eritrea, Ethiopia and Uganda. him President declared that the prime task was to halt the war in the ● March and May, 1994; first and second IGADD sessions; South south; he promised a ‘referendum on self-determination’. This promise African President Nelson Mandela intervened; NIF hyped this up and was repeated in the Khartoum Peace Accords of 1996 and 1997 yet at Mandela withdrew. the same time, Khartoum opposes ‘self-determination’ (undefined) ● July 1994; Declaration of Principles (DOP) said most notably: 3:4: while claiming it already has a federal system, a view which the new ‘A secular and democratic state must be established in Sudan’ and 4: German Ambassador, Mathias Meyer, more outspoken than his ‘In the absence of agreement on the above principles referred to in 3:1 predecessor, vociferously challenged in Sudan’s National Assembly to 3:7 the respective people will have the option to determine their on 24 July. future, including independence, through a referendum’; July and The NIF tactic is to go ‘peace-initiative shopping’ while shutting September 1994: third and fourth IGADD sessions. out the northern opposition. This emphasises the religious divide, ● March 1995; Carter Center Initiative, part of its Africa campaign allowing the NIF to claim a monopoly on Islam while accusing foreign against Guinea worm and river blindness; result – a temporary ceasefire critics of Islamophobia. If anyone takes an initiative seriously, it but no progress. finds a new one. Amid the growing international horror at the ● June 1995; National Democratic Alliance (then including the Umma suffering in the south and ‘peripheral areas’ and amid growing oil Party) endorses DOP in its Asmara Declaration. interest, it is not hard to find aspiring mediators and negotiators, even ● 1996; Khartoum Peace Accord I; called ‘Peace from Within’, this though the overwhelming majority of atrocities are systematically was an NIF bid to bring Riek Machar (Nuer) and Lam Akol (Shilluk) inflicted by the NIF itself. (The United States may endorse plans for on board. a United Nations tribunal on war crimes in Sudan.) When the ● 1997; Khartoum Peace Accord II (the first quietly forgotten) gave Egyptian-Libyan Initiative gained momentum, the NIF announced Riek and Lam token ministries; NIF divides to rule, arming their an ‘Arab-African mini-summit’ to be held in Tripoli in late August. It factions and other militias; ‘ethnic’ fighting accelerates in south. said Egypt, Libya and Kenya would attend; Arab newspapers ● 1997; more rounds of IGAD, continuing today. speculated that Qatar and Saudi Arabia might join them. This began ● August 1998: USA bombs El Shifa factory; NIF gets the message to look like another attempt to neutralise Kenya and Uganda. and embarks on a major charm campaign. ● August 1989, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Mohamed el Amin Khalifa ● June 1999; Libyan proposals which later became the ELI: many led an NIF delegation to meet Lam Akol of the Sudan People’s meetings, little substance, no agreement. Liberation Army; Sharia (Islamic law) was the stumbling block; ● June 1999, Geneva, Switzerland; Hassan el Turabi and El Sadig result – no agreement. el Mahdi (brothers-in-law) meet. ● December 1989, Kenya; Chair: United States ex-President Jimmy ● November 1999; NIF makes Nida el Watan (Call of the Homeland) Carter (now candidate for US Special Envoy). Mohamed el Amin agreement with El Sadig; worded so interpretations vary, a new ploy. again blocked talks with the Sharia argument; result - no agreement. ● December 1999: Assembly suspended and Hassan El Turabi ● 1990; US mediation; result – no agreement. ostensibly removed. ● January 1992, Germany; Frankfurt Agreement between Ali el Haj ● June 2001; ELI relaunched. Mohamed and Lam Akol after SPLA split in 1991; sources close to ● July 2001; Relationships Foundation/African Renaissance Institute Lam told AC the accord was meaningless; agreement but no progress. mediation gathers diverse Sudanese in Britain with Kenyan ex-Finance ● 1992, Abuja I, Nigeria; Mohamed el Amin’s team refused to Minister Washington Okumu in chair (AC Vol 42 No 15); NIF discuss security issues, including ceasefire and foreign monitors; spreads rumour that John Garang will give up central tenets of DOP. result – no agreement. ● 1 August 2001; NIF announces mini-summit in Tripoli; NDA ● 1993, Abuja II; despite detailed Nigerian proposals, three weeks of predicts another spoiler operation. disagreement, with NIF team led by Ali el Haj, then Mohamed el ● 6 August 2001; Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher says he Amin; result – no agreement. has ‘no knowledge’ of any such summit.

of the southern rebel Anyanya movement in the first civil war, 1955-72. Turabi. Apparently believing it faces a choice between Turabi and Egypt wants to lead in Africa and, even more, in the Arab world. President Omer Hassan Ahmed el Beshir, Egypt has chosen ‘the What better arena than ‘Arab-African’ Sudan? If it could settle the military option’ (i.e. Omer, as it did after the NIF’s 1989 coup). Cairo ‘Sudan problem’ while making sure Sudan stayed firmly united within has tackled its own Islamists by killing, torturing and gaoling activists the Arab world, Cairo would be happy. It would also regain influence while attempting to coopt what it perceived as the faint-hearted – a in a continent increasingly dominated by South Africa and Nigeria – dangerous theory given the infiltration tactics of the international both of which Egypt has tried to use to win over the SPLA. Both are Islamist movement. Sudan is dealt with not by the Foreign Ministry countries where political Islamism is an issue and where NIF activists but the Mukhabarat (Security). We hear that on a visit to Cairo in May, are busy – an extra reason for reticence towards Khartoum. Sudanese Vice-President Ali Osman Mohamed Taha was quietly When Sudan’s chief charm campaigner, Foreign Minister Mustafa threatened with his bulging security file. The assassination attempt Osman Ismael (‘Mr Smile’) went to Pretoria seeking oil and other was mentioned. The man who for decades was Turabi’s deputy (and investment late last month, he and his large delegation received a chilly whom many Sudanese still see as such) arrived home visibly agitated reception. His blandishments on the south went down especially and failed to give his usual airport press conference. The government badly, we hear, with Foreign Minister Nkosazana Clarice Dlamini announced that it accepted the ELI. Zuma, a doctor with a humanitarian reputation. On Mustafa’s return On 6 August, Ali Osman struck: ‘Whether through the ELI or to Khartoum, the usually enthusiastic local press was strangely quiet. IGAD, anyone who believes that the government will accept peace Egypt has no such qualms, believing it can keep the NIF in hand that dilutes Islam is deluded... Anyone who understands that the ELI despite the attempt to murder President Hosni Mubarak in June 1995, will give the NDA what they failed to get through the gun is deluded which Mubarak openly blamed on NIF leader Hassan Abdullah el and anyone who thinks that Ingaz [Salvation i.e. the government] will 2 10 August 2001 Africa Confidential Vol 42 No 16 dismantle itself and write its death certificate is deluded’. The NIF is President Ja’afar Mohamed Nimeiri’s overthrow in 1985. Omer, expert at playing for time and will not be pinned down. This year it has whom Egypt sees as representing the army but who in fact has no strengthened in some areas, weakened in others. Most of the weakening constituency of his own, asked for time to consider. Ali Osman, the has been in matters intricately Sudanese, which obviously count most. power behind Omer, refused.

Military NIF internal The SPLA advanced in May and June in western Bahr el Ghazal, The tactic of sidelining El Turabi, which began in December 1999, taking key garrisons in the area’s capital, Raga, and Deim Zubeir backfired as genuine power-struggles were unleashed. The result was (named after slave-trader Zubeir Pasha). This month, it made its first uncertainty and conflict among NIF activists. Though the party leadership attack on the oil-field at Heglig, Southern Kordofan. That surprised can announce reconciliation whenever it chooses, damage has been many, notably the government. done that it did not anticipate. Egypt tries to depict the army (especially Lieutenant General Omer el Beshir) as separate from the NIF but the officer corps was thoroughly Public opinion purged in the NIF’s early years in power. Apolitical officers are The above failures, plus a total inability to put food on tables, have scarce, though southerners and Nuba swell the ranks. Morale is low helped spread a conviction in the north that the NIF is on its last legs. and, after the defeat at Raga, the top brass reportedly told the government The long predicted Intifada (uprising) is delayed by the ubiquitous they might lose the whole south. It seems they proposed a ‘palace security forces, a conviction that the opposition is ineffectual (reinforced coup’ in which the army would take over as Gen. Abdel Rahman by El Sadig Sadeeg el Mahdi’s return to the fold where the NIF keeps Suwar el Dahab (head of Al Da’wa al Islamiyya from 1987) did after him penned and powerless), and a dread of a return to the cycle of rule by El Sadig alternating with rule by the army. In Lagos at the end of Possession in nine points June, El Sadig told the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, ‘Religion should be shut out of political and public life’. Back in On 26 June, the international Arab press began speculating about a new Khartoum, he declared religion was part of politics, even in the West. Egyptian-Libyan Initiative. Ten days later, the nine points emerged and became headline news. Some are reminiscent of the Declaration of Principles (DOP) accepted by all parties (including the Sudan government) NDA opposition in the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development peace process. Despite the NIF’s skill at divide-to-rule, scant political or financial Some hark back to the 1972 Addis Ababa Agreement which ended the first support from foreign governments, extreme Egyptian pressure and its war. However, they omit the most crucial issues: self-determination and own internal contradictions, the NDA has held together. Sadig’s bid to the separation of religion and state. take his Umma Party (also Islamic-based) to the NIF was thwarted by 1. The unity of Sudan should be preserved. (This is in the DOP but his colleagues in the internal Umma leadership; his defection may have qualified by the stipulation of a secular state and other conditions, helped more than hindered the opposition. including the long-promised referendum on self-determination for the Oil gives new strength, enabling the NIF to achieve two main aims: south; without these, it contradicts the DOP and avoids the central issue). 2. Citizenship should be the basis for exercising rights and duties. (A phrase, found also in Nida el Watan agreement with El Sadig el Mahdi, Increasing military capacity used to avoid mention of religion-and-state issue). 1. To acquire new weaponry, including helicopter gunships. It has 3. Recognition of the racial, religious and cultural diversity of the failed to make military advances but has increased its bombardment of Sudanese people. (Genocide continues; slavery thrives; Christians local people in the south and Nuba Mountains: provisional figures for celebrating Easter were beaten up by security this year in Khartoum). July list the bombing of a dozen southern villages. It has expanded its 4. Safeguarding the principle of democratic pluralism and freedom of scorched-earth strategy to clear the way for oil development, scattering expression; separation of legislative, executive and judicial powers. and killing people in its way. Selected northerners are moved in to (None of this exists under National Islamic Front with no sign of change). 5. Guarantees for basic freedoms and observance of human rights. (See replace the former residents in Upper Nile and parts of Southern local and international human rights reports; in the north, several opposition Kordofan. Independent reporters confirm this, among them the new UN leaders are on trial for espionage after meeting a United States’ diplomat). Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Sudan, German former Interior 6. Establishment of a decentralised system of government that will Minister Gerhard Baum, who told a London news conference on 27 achieve balanced development and a just distribution of wealth and June: ‘Human rights violations are increasing in Sudan, with abductions, power. (The NIF already claims government is decentralised. All power arbitrary arrests and the forced displacement of people a daily reality... and most wealth are in NIF hands). The situation now is worse than one year before’. Nevertheless, 7. A foreign policy that observes higher national interests. Talisman boss Jim Buckee is to give a keynote address at a conference 8. Formation of an interim government in which all political forces would on Corporate Social Responsibility at Britain’s Royal Institute of be represented. This government would oversee the implementation of all points laid out in the political agreement and the organisation and International Affairs (Chatham House) on 15-16 October. convening of a national conference to revise the constitution and set a date for general elections. (The NIF initially rejected Point 8 and sent a Engaging the peacemakers delegation to Uganda to prove that Points 1-7 are in the Constitution. It 2. None of this deters European governments from ‘constructive long ago coopted people from all main parties but still rules. Free elections engagement’ or ‘critical dialogue’ with the NIF. Many in Washington would oust the NIF, a point made in the London-based Al Quds newspaper are now also pressing for engagement, with some signs of success. The on 20 March by Abdel Waheb el Effendi, who was the most senior NIF trial opened last week in Khartoum of a Tunisian the NIF said was from diplomat in the London Embassy after 1990 and now criticises both NIF the En Nahda Islamist party and of six Sudanese, accused of fabricating factions while declaring himself still an Islamist. On 7 August, he called for ‘army intervention’ to get the country ‘out of its present impasse’.) reports that Sudan supported terrorism. This looked like another 9. Immediate cessation of hostilities. (An NIF favourite: each ceasefire attempt to muddy the waters and win back US support. – there have been many – has seen the NIF redeploy/bomb civilians.) China, Malaysia and many Arab governments do business with the

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NIF without mentioning human rights or terrorism. European Union would like to stop him. states argue (as the petro-dollars roll in) that they are gaining ‘leverage’ since the NIF is ready to talk to them. The NIF’s skill at manipulating Changing the demographics its interlocutors, whether Sudanese oppositionists or foreign diplomats, The MDC’s core supporters – trades unionists, the jobless, professionals has enabled it to hang on to power without moving an inch on human – are in the towns, where there is little interest in ZANU’s brand of land rights or democracy issues, let alone peace, secularism or self- resettlement. However, 63 per cent of Zimbabwe’s households are determination. The DOP principles go against everything it has rural, according to the 1997 census. ZANU’s election strategy is to planned and fought for; to accept and act on them would be suicide. move tens of thousands of urban voters into the countryside, offering Few of those who hail the ELI as a breakthrough mention that the them plots of land under the ‘fast track’ resettlement scheme. Exploiting NIF accepted the DOP in July 1997 and that its refusal to follow this the land issue, ZANU believes, can win it votes in the countryside and through is the main reason IGAD has made no more progress. The NIF from the urban poor, whose roots are in villages and who want their has persuaded many that ‘IGAD has failed’, a refrain now common own land. among champions of the ELI and of dialogue with the NIF. In the mid- With its mix of urban and rural voters, Bindura was a test run: many 1990s, it was tacitly understood that the IGAD process was establishing of the 4,000 new voters were ZANU loyalists and ‘war veterans’, the principles for serious talks after the NIF had fallen. The NIF hasn’t promised land on outlying farms scheduled for resettlement. The fallen and IGAD is now blamed for the NIF’s refusal to make peace. price, a vote for the ruling party, was duly paid. The outcome will Western business and diplomats seem to believe that external influence several by-elections to be fought in the coming months, engagement and internal verbal skirmishing will cause the NIF to including one in Tsvangirai’s constituency in September. collapse. Yet NIF peace moves have always been tactical and Alongside the so-called war veterans, ZANU has recruited traditional cosmetic. Since the ELI took off last month, Omer el Beshir has chiefs and headmen, who tell opposition supporters to leave their areas constantly repeated the call to Jihad – against his own people. ‘The or face ostracism. Human rights activists reckon that some 200,000 current good omens of peace do not mean a revocation by the Salvation people were displaced in the run-up to last year’s parliamentary [government] of the fundamentals and values of the Sudanese nation’, elections and the tally could be higher ahead of next year’s presidential he said on 21 July, in one of many such speeches. ‘The fundamentals vote. If known opposition supporters will not move on, local youths of Salvation’ (Thawabit el Ingaz) is an NIF slogan that sends shivers and war veterans raid their houses, seize their property and leave it on down Sudanese spines, Muslim and non-Muslim alike. the roadside. Those who alleged irregularities in the 2000 poll and When Mustafa tried to moderate such statements, Omer corrected have successfully petitioned for reruns in several constituencies are a him publicly in a speech to mujahideen: (‘I was not emotional or special target. About 1,000 witnesses and their families have been carried away!’). The public relations-conscious Foreign Minister was chased away from their homes in the countryside. soon echoing the party line. Egypt claims Omer is essentially a soldier ZANU won the Bindura by-election and a previous one in Marondera who can be detached from the NIF. Yet he has no base other than the West, both in its heartland of Mashonaland, which has had most movement, of which he is a lifelong member. If it wishes, the NIF can government investment, produces much of the nation’s food and drop him – not the other way around. The party still rules. musters many war veterans. MDC Secretary General Welshman Ncube admits this leaves no ‘breathing space’ for his party, which has closed its branches in Shamva, Muzarabani and Mutoko. MDC ZIMBABWE militants have been threatened with death. ZANU so far seems to have resisted the temptation to try outright electoral fraud, such as stuffing ballot boxes. The Helen Suzman Hanging in there Foundation has claimed a massive lead for Tsvangirai ahead of next year’s presidential poll but the opposition’s lawyers will have to fight The ruling party is stronger at home than it hard to keep their candidate out of gaol and free of endless court looks from abroad hearings at election time. Tsvangirai is charged with treason, for The strategy to win President Robert Mugabe six more years in arguing that if Mugabe doesn’t go peacefully he will be removed power claimed victory at Bindura, a mining town 60 kilometres north violently. Treason charges may also be laid against Gibson Sibanda, of the capital, in a by-election on 29 July. The ruling Zimbabwe the MDC’s parliamentary leader, formerly a trades union leader. African National Union-Patriotic Front had left nothing to chance. An Inconveniently timed hearings could disrupt the opposition campaign. extra 4,000 voters were registered in the constituency. Opposition So far Zimbabwe’s courts have kept their independence but this year leader Morgan Tsvangirai’s convoy was attacked by ZANU-PF two High Court judges have been replaced, one of them, the Chief militants. The candidate of his Movement for Democratic Change, Justice, Antony Gubbay, under pressure. Three Supreme Court Elliot Pfebve, was arrested on election day. And Bindura voters were judges have been replaced. bombarded with largesse from visiting ZANU barons and relentless The Zimbabwe Congress of Trades Unions, where the MDC had its anti-MDC propaganda on the state-controlled radio and television. origins, organised mass stayaways against the government’s So ZANU-PF’s Elliot Manyika, Governor of Mashonaland Central announcement that it would raise fuel prices by 70 per cent. The strike and a former diplomat, won by more than 5,000 votes. Last year in lost momentum after two days. Then, when opening parliament last Bindura, Pfebve had lost by fewer than 2,000 votes to a more popular week, Mugabe casually announced that government would review the ZANU candidate, Border Gezi. In April, Gezi’s death, followed by fuel price, with no dates or details. ZANU is on a run again. that of Chenjerai ‘Hitler’ Hunzvi in June, damaged the ruling party. In the southern provinces of Matebeleland and Masvingo, the ZANU’s leaders disagree about next year’s presidential election. political scene is quite different. In last year’s general elections there, Some want Mugabe to be ‘led gently’ away but there is no agreement the MDC won 57 of the 120 contested seats, urban and rural. On its on his successor. The most probable is the Speaker of parliament and home turf, MDC activists can tackle ZANU when the politics gets physical. a favourite of Mugabe, Emmerson Mnangagwa, although many Can ZANU resettle enough people to make a political difference 4 10 August 2001 Africa Confidential Vol 42 No 16 and follow resettlement with adequate rural investment? Mugabe Front regime in Sudan (see Feature), presumably breaking its old ties insists that 100,000 families have been resettled since March 2000 with the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, which has had a base in onto four million hectares; the MDC says this is the total since Zimbabwe since the early 1980s. Khartoum’s deputy Ambassador to Independence in 1980. The President of the Commercial Farmers’ Harare, Usama Ahmed Abdel Bari, claims an agreement to sell oil to Union, David Hasluck, says that fewer than 30,000 people have Zimbabwe should be negotiated by December, partly financed from moved onto ‘resettled land’, because of fears about security and lack Gadaffi’s largesse. Sidney Sekeramayi, the Energy Minister and a of infrastructure. Ministers claim they will allocate Z$15 billion former Security Minister, told journalists he knew nothing about the (US$272 mn.) for inputs this year, promising handouts of seeds, negotiations with Sudan. Even if Khartoum can’t sell Mugabe much pesticides, fertilisers and tools, but there is no provision for this in oil, it can advise him on how to survive as an international pariah state. Finance Minister Simba Makoni’s plans and the budget deficit is already well over 10 per cent of gross domestic product. SOUTH AFRICA Crucial agriculture Local Government Minister Ignatius Chombo predicts a sixfold increase in maize production by smallholders on the resettled land, Sell if you can giving a harvest of 4.8 mn. tonnes next season, more than double the Privatisation is obstructed by unions, present record; wheat production, he claims, would increase fivefold communists and world stock markets to 125,000t, cotton production will almost double to 520,000t. On the ground, most signs point the other way. Insecurity among commercial The first few days of August dealt a double blow to South Africa’s farmers means lower maize plantings this year, as ministers privatisation programme, a central part of the government’s economic acknowledge in their quieter moments. The government’s recent strategy. The plan to sell the state telephone company, Telkom, began takeover of maize marketing could create further shortages. to look unrealistic. As communications companies throughout the Millers are already cutting supplies of flour to bakeries by up to 40 world announced huge losses and the prices of their shares were per cent, saying wheat is short. That means less bread at higher prices, indiscriminately marked down, Telkom’s listing on the Johannesburg which further worsens conditions in the towns. There are similar and New York stock exchanges, due in November, was delayed. On worries about meat and milk, also disrupted by forcible resettlement. top of that, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) If agriculture goes down in Zimbabwe it will take the rest of the announced plans for a nationwide strike at the end of August, in protest economy with it. The Economist Intelligence Unit reckons the against the government’s overall privatisation strategy. economy shrank by 6 per cent last year and will shrink again by 5.6 per In July, the government unexpectedly announced that, when Eskom’s cent this year. Inflation is running at 90 per cent. The Zimbabwe dollar monopoly ends, it will license not one but two other fixed-line is trading for less than a fifth of its official rate of Z$55=US$1 on the operators, creating more competition than had previously been parallel market. expected. In 1997, 30 per cent of the Telkom monopoly was sold off Finance Minister Makoni, unlike many of his colleagues, is honest to SBC Communications (of the United States) and Malaysia Telkom; about the economic crisis and the growing numbers of people in abject as part of their joint purchase, they set up a social investment programme poverty. He has been trying to convince foreign donors to relax their called Thintana and are now themselves often known by that name. pressure; he impresses them but their political worries persist. The Their agreement with the government allows them a big say in how government will pull in no new aid, apart from relief aid and cash for and when more Telkom shares are listed, in establishing the percentage anti-AIDS programmes run by non-governmental organisations. of shares that can be sold and in the right to buy shares in that sale. A bill in the United States Congress, the Zimbabwe Democracy The partners in the existing monopoly accept that a second operator and Economic Recovery Act, would ban travel to the USA by Mugabe, will share the financial burden of extending the network to rural areas his ministers, and military officers and their families, and halt all aid but they do not want a third competitor and are threatening to sell some and trade from US organisations and companies. The bill may not pass of their own shares when the government’s shares come on the market. but Mugabe fears similar action by the European Commission. That’s That would both warn other investors that Telkom’s largest private why Foreign Minister Stan Mudenge lobbied African ministers at the shareholder has lost confidence in the firm and, by increasing the Organisation of African Unity summit in Lusaka last month to support, number of shares on offer, would cut the price of the government’s no matter how conditionally, ZANU’s land resettlement strategy. shares. ‘The paradigm outlined by government is unprecedented and Mudenge also persuaded Algeria, Nigeria, South Africa and Zambia untested in any market, much less an emerging one’, says Thintana. to send representatives to accompany Zimbabwe’s negotiators in any The country’s three mobile telephone operators – MTN, Vodacom and political dialogue with the European Union. Cell C – also want only two fixed-line competitors. Last month, China lent $3 mn. to help fund resettlement. In Harare If the government wants to get a good price for Telkom, it must sort last month, Libya’s Colonel Moammar el Gadaffi promised a $360 out Thintana’s problems. The cabinet was supposed to have discussed mn. scheme to end Zimbabwe’s fuel shortages, following a loan of the telecoms policy on 8 August; market sources say the Finance $100 mn. for fuel two years ago. El Gadaffi is said to have given Department, which is banking on the proceeds of the Telkom sale and $500,000 to ZANU, which would break the law (promulgated by has been watching Telkom’s value slide, is unimpressed by how things ZANU only last year) banning foreign funding of political parties. have turned out. If the Initial Public Offering is delayed beyond Gadaffi keenly backs Mugabe’s land policy: ‘The land was taken February 2002, when the current fiscal year ends, it might have to be forcibly, it must be returned forcibly’. Tripoli’s Ambassador in postponed for over a year, with dire effects on the budget. Harare will shortly move into a $20 mn. mansion known as ‘Graceland’ Potential investors regard the government’s record on privatisation in the Borrowdale suburb, and built by a consortium linked to First as weak. So far, its biggest sale has been 20 per cent of South African Lady Grace Marufu and the National Housing Fund. Following Airways (SAA), to Swissair, a company which now turns out to be in Gadaffi’s lead, Harare is improving relations with the National Islamic deep trouble elsewhere. Aeroporti di Roma has bought 20 per cent of 5 10 August 2001 Africa Confidential Vol 42 No 16

the Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) and the idea is to sell off in many countries seem to take longer than planned.’ A leading more of both ACSA and SAA soon. economist says the main flaw in the privatisation programme has been During the African National Congress government’s first term, a ‘lack of institutional coordination’, as in the recent debacle over several would-be buyers of public assets turned out to be duds. In telecoms policy. Raenette Taljaard of the opposition Democratic 1999, the government cancelled the sale of Sun Air, a state-owned Alliance says the government should have installed appropriate domestic airline, to the Rethabile black empowerment consortium, regulatory and legislative frameworks before starting to sell assets. which failed to raise sufficient funds; the airline was then liquidated. The government has been super-cautious about privatisation, which The sale of the state-owned resort group Aventura was stopped after is opposed by its political junior partners in the Tripartite Alliance, the buyer, a trades union group, defaulted on its payment instalments. Cosatu and the SA Communist Party; it has tried to accommodate their Other hiccoughs include the government’s early attempts to establish thinking, which ranges from socialism to Thatcherism. Following his a management contract to run Alexkor, the state diamond company, usual technique for disarming his critics, President Thabo Mbeki has as a first step towards privatisation. The consortium that won the kept a leading Communist, Radebe, in charge of the Public Enterprises contract, Nabera, failed to comply with its obligation to provide a 120 Ministry and so of privatisation. Cosatu’s coordinator for fiscal and million rand ($US14.9 mn.) loan facility for mine development. monetary policy, Neva Makgetla, says that if the government had Mabera was granted several extensions. The Minister in charge was proceeded more slowly ‘instead of trying to restructure everything at Jeff Radebe, at Public Enterprises, and Nabera’s Chairperson was his once’ it would have perhaps managed to build up more internal wife, Bridgette. The management contract is now held by Mintek, a expertise. He believes the government has no clear targets for what state-owned research institute, which may not be the ideal organisation privatisation is to achieve, except that ‘competition will solve everything’. to prepare Alexkor for privatisation. Political insiders say that, although privatisation is central to the SAA has been hit this year by a row over huge payments to its government’s economic strategy, the ANC’s economic thinkers are American former head, Coleman Andrews, who left with a salary and now focussing more on identifying other ways to stimulate domestic severance package totalling R232 mn. ($28.86 mn.). Before he left, industry and employment. Cosatu’s planned political strike (see Box) Swissair’s troubles (notably with the failing Belgian carrier, Sabena) indicates that the tussle within the Alliance over privatisation is had forced it to stop expanding, so it may well not exercise its right to entering a more acute phase. In support of its public-sector members, buy a further stake in SAA. Cosatu claims that the privatisation of public-sector utilities, such as Next on the auction block is state power company Eskom, with the Eskom, will make it impossible to address South Africa’s vast social planned sale of part of its electricity generation operations. In July iniquities effectively. It wants basic services to remain in the hands of BAe Systems (British Aerospace) made a bid for a stake in the state the state. The unions have refused to get involved in privatisation by, arms company, Denel. Tony Twine of Econometrix, a Johannesburg for example, setting up funds to help their members buy shares. consultancy, says the privatisation programme ‘clearly has not gone However, President Mbeki’s government is determined to push ahead well... but it is not entirely the government’s fault... I think that with the sale of its assets; one doubt, in the present state of world government has underestimated the series of mindset changes, which markets, is whether anybody will buy them. Unions fight privatisation ideology For three years, trades union leader Zwelinzima Vavi has marched his Vavi admits that in 1997, Cosatu agreed to limited privatisation but now troops to the top of the hill, then marched them down again. This month the federation will ‘die fighting’ against further privatisation of state Vavi, the General Secretary of the Congress of South African Trade services. The Alliance summit will be ‘make or break’ and the two-day Unions (Cosatu), threatens to take on the government again. In Genoa, national strike at the end of August will be just the beginning. So far, Italy, for the turbulent G-8 meeting, he condemned globalisation as Mbeki has outwitted his opponents in the Alliance by quarantining, causing ‘more misery, more job losses, a widening gap between the poor banishing, ‘redeploying’ or coopting them. and the rich’. Nearer home for Thabo Mbeki, he ruled out the President’s Six members of the SACP’s 25-strong Central Committee are in much-prized African recovery plan (written in cooperation with Algeria, cabinet: Chairperson Charles Nqakula; his deputy, Geraldine Fraser- Nigeria and Senegal) which argued for cooperation with globalisation Moleketi; Jeff Radebe; Essop Pahad (Minister in the Office of the (AC Vol 42 No 14). President and Mbeki’s personal enforcer); Sydney Mufamadi; and Ronnie Mbeki will hear plenty more of such criticism this week when 300 Kasrils. Kasrils and Mufamadi are members of the nine-strong Politbureau. leaders of the Tripartite Alliance – the African National Congress, Cosatu The high-flying Trade and Industry Minister, Alec Erwin, also carries an and the SA Communist Party – meet to discuss the government’s macro- SACP card but has swallowed the global ethos. Another CC member, economic policies, especially privatisation. It will be the biggest Alliance former Cosatu General Secretary Mbhazima (Sam) Shilowa, has been meeting since the ANC took office in 1994. deployed by Mbeki as Premier of Gauteng Province, to help keep the peace Vavi will confront Mbeki not only on privatisation and global economics in SA’s industrial heartland. but also on the practical matter of wage demands. The unions will be Vavi says contemptuously that the spectacle of Communist leaders humiliated if they are again forced into retreat, as in 1999, after Mbeki’s advocating policies hostile to workers will be high on the agenda of this election as President, when 600,000 public servants took to the streets in month’s Alliance summit. A few Communist intellectuals advocate wage disputes. Mbeki emerged unscathed. Even if Cosatu’s stand has quitting the Alliance and founding a party of their own. many sympathisers in the ANC, few of them want to be seen breaking Cosatu, far larger than the tiny SACP, reckons that its anti-privatisation ranks with Mbeki. campaign and its wage demands reinforce each other. It demands a nine Cosatu has 19 affiliated unions with a total of 1.8 million members. Its per cent increase for middle-level workers. NUMSA wants an average 15 shock troops are the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM, 280,000), per cent rise, mostly for garage workers and mechanics. Power and water National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (NEHAWU, cut-offs have enraged people in black townships who have not paid their 235,000), SA Democratic Teachers’ Union (SADTU, 215,000) and the bills. Labour leaders say that privatising Eskom, the Electricity Supply militant National Union of Metalworkers of SA (NUMSA, 200,000). Commission, will hamper new connections to poor areas and increase NUM and NUMSA join for the coming clash with the white, right-wing, tariffs. On such grievances, Cosatu hopes to build a ‘popular front’ of Mineworkers’ Solidarity Union (MWU), whose cause is affirmative action. unions, community organisations, activists and churches.

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national referendum. Meanwhile, KANU is likely to be the butt of KENYA popular anger about deteriorating economic conditions and corruption, rather than constitutional niceties – all before next year’s elections. Alert to these dangers, KANU’s heavy hitters, such as William Ole Ntimama and Sherriff Nassir, are trying to rein in the Commission. Après Moi, maybe Ghai and a handful of commissioners are genuinely independent. The President is on his way out – in his own KANU wants Ghai to lock out hostile non-governmental organisations, time and on his own terms especially the National Council of Churches of Kenya, led by Reverend Mutava Musyimi. The Commission has come under fire for using The fin de siècle has been delayed. Among party hacks, journalists, almost 80 per cent of its budget already on four-wheel-drive cars and and commission agents, the gossip is dominated by Daniel arap ex gratia payments. Much of this spending was authorised not by Ghai Moi’s exit from the all-powerful presidency after 23 years in the job. but through the Finance Ministry, under government control. The same talk haunted Moi during an unhappy visit to Washington last Western diplomats say they have full confidence in Ghai: if the month, when a tidy exit was the unspoken assumption in a 30-minute government cuts off cash for the Commission, they may step in. Some meeting with Vice-President Dick Cheney and a ‘drop-by’ with constitutional lawyers suggest a new law written in two weeks could President George W. Bush. Moi was given no help in persuading the tackle the central issues: reducing the executive’s powers and devolving International Monetary Fund to resume credits to Kenya. more power to provincial and local authorities. ‘It’s more a matter of In private, Moi assures Western officials that he does plan to leave constitutional reform than starting from basics again’, said one. power after the elections due in 2002, carefully explaining that a The Commission could help promote crucial electoral reform. public declaration at this stage would cause political chaos, making Urban constituencies where KANU is unpopular are huge; rural him a lame duck and driving his Kenya African National Union into constituencies in its Rift Valley and Coastal heartland are tiny. faction-fighting. The announcement will be made at the last possible Registration procedures are chaotic and open to fraud, without proper moment. On the way out, he wants to protect his family and friends checking facilities for monitors. Though the Electoral Commission from political enemies. has improved since the 1992 polls, few see it as genuinely independent. On unlucky Friday 13 July, Attorney General Amos Wako published To win a presidential election, a candidate must simply get more an amnesty provision in the Anti-Corruption and Economic Crimes votes than any other and at least 25 per cent of the vote in five of the Bill. The High Court ruled in December that the Kenya Anti- eight provinces. In 1992 and 1997, Moi was elected with, officially, Corruption Authority (KACA), set up under pressure from the IMF, well under 40 per cent of the national vote. Opposition parties want World Bank and sundry opposition politicians, was unconstitutional. success to depend on winning at least half of the vote. This would have The new amnesty stipulates that KACA cannot prosecute new cases forced a second round of voting in 1992 and 1997, and perhaps that happened before 1997, which won’t stop on-going cases, such as persuaded the opposition parties to back a single candidate. the attempted prosecution of officials involved in the Goldenberg President Moi’s other big transition worry is his alliance with Raila scandal but neatly excises queries about KANU fund-raising for the and the NDP. Few in Kenya, other than Raila himself and some 1992 and 1997 elections. Sudanese diplomats trying to sell oil (AC Vol 42 No 15), believe Raila KANU’s anti-corruption record is pitiful. In the eight years since will be president after the 2002 elections. Moi is expected to exploit the first anti-graft measure was passed, not one high-level case has the Luo connection to batter the opposition. Yet the wily Raila could been successfully prosecuted. A case against Water Minister cause trouble. He insisted that his party should attend the KANU Kip’ngeno arap N’geny, under investigation for several years, has delegates’ meeting in Nairobi on 10 August. KANU Secretary been delayed nine times for procedural reasons. Anti-corruption General Joseph Kamotho refused until Moi overruled him and campaigners say the problem is the lack of political will at the top. To sanctioned the NDP’s attendance. be effective, KACA would require a constitutional amendment giving Moi wants Raila and the NDP to merge with KANU. Raila rightly it independence from the executive and from the Attorney General. suspects this could spell political annihilation in the KANU snake-pit. The Economic Crime Bill moves in that direction, affording The marriage negotiations continue, with Raila holding out for the parliament and civil society new powers to scrutinise economic highest bride-price. He plays his cards as astutely as Moi and could management. However, the key is more effort by opposition politicians; damage KANU’s creaky organisation in the process. many members of parliament, paid about 470,000 Kenya Shillings (US$60,000) a year, are worried about life off the gravy train. Visit our website at: www.africa-confidential.com Moreover, there is a high turnover: at least 50 of the 210 elected MPs Published fortnightly (25 issues per year) by Africa Confidential, at have lost their seats in each election since Independence. 73 Farringdon Road, London EC1M 3JQ, England. Moi’s other preparations for the transition were initially thought to Tel: +44 20-7831 3511. Fax: +44 20-7831 6778. be masterstrokes: the appointment of Yash Ghai, a respected academic, Copyright reserved. Edited by Patrick Smith. Deputy: Gillian Lusk. Administration: Clare Tauben. to head the Constitutional Review Commission and the formation of a KANU-National Democratic Party parliamentary alliance. Ghai’s Annual subscriptions including postage, cheques payable to Africa appointment undermined the opposition’s movement for constitutional Confidential in advance: Institutions: Africa £289 – UK/Europe £310 – USA $780 – ROW £404 reform while the ministerial appointments of Raila Odinga and some Corporates: Africa £354 – UK/Europe £373 – USA $864 – ROW £466 of his NDP colleagues delivered the large Luo vote to KANU in Students (with proof): Africa/UK/Europe/ROW £83 or USA $129 parliament, and perhaps at the polls. All prices may be paid in equivalent convertible currency. We accept Those masterstrokes now look problematic for Moi. Ghai works American Express, Diner’s Club, Mastercard and Visa credit cards. seriously, running grassroots civic education classes across Kenya, Subscription enquiries to: Africa Confidential, PO Box 805, Oxford OX4 1FH England. Tel: 44 (0)1865 244083 and Fax: 44 (0)1865 381381 taking soundings from political and civic groups on the way towards Printed in England by Duncan Print and Packaging Ltd, Herts, UK. a constitutional assembly, which would draft a new basic law for a ISSN 0044-6483

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Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. by making 36 billion Uganda shillings (US$21 Pointers Bongo’s big-spending habits Stateside – he bought mn.) of bad loans and engineering its fraudulent four Boeing passenger jets in June – won’t win purchase of 49 per cent of UCB. Greenland bid for him any respite from his legal adversaries there. UCB shares when it was privatised in 1997 but GABON Malaysia’s Westmount Land Asia won. LIBERIA/SIERRA LEONE Four months later, Westmount sold 49 per cent of the equity in UCB to Greenland though Hey big spender Westmount had undertaken not to sell its stake in UCB for three years. Kiggundu says Greenland’s The fuss over how President El Hadj Omar Bongo Fuelling conflict illicit purchase was witnessed by Saleh and came to deposit over US$180 million in three Poisoned by Liberia’s support for the rebel Kainerugba, who had assured him of Museveni’s private Citibank accounts in New York won’t go Revolutionary United Front, relations between approval. Former Attorney General Bert away. First raised in United States Senate hearings President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah’s government Katureebe backs Kiggundu’s story. The case in November 1999 (AC Vol 40 No 23), it is now (AC Vol 42 No 13) and President Charles continues. Now Standard Chartered, which the the subject of an embarrassing law suit against Taylor face a new test. They are set to become government had said was interested in investing Bongo in the US Federal Court, Washington. partners in developing the region’s oil resources. in UCB, has pulled out of negotiations. Bongo’s lawyers are trying to establish diplomatic United States’ sources say there is oil in immunity for him as a serving head of a state ‘commercial quantities’ in a basin which recognised by the US government. stretches across the maritime waters of Sierra TUNISIA Bongo and his government are being sued for Leone and Liberia. breach of contract by a US public affairs company A team of US oil executives was due to meet run by Edward Loyd which Libreville hired in Taylor this week to discuss ‘investment plans’. Ben Ali for a fourth 1999 to counter bad publicity from the US Senate Liberia and Sierra Leone hope to hold Africa’s ‘change the constitution’ movement has Investigation into Bongo’s private US bank conferences in London and Houston, Texas, now crept north to Tunisia, where the ruling accounts. Loyd says he made a verbal agreement early next year to offer offshore acreage for oil Rassemblement Constitutionnel Démocratique with Bongo to undertake the public affairs work and gas exploration. Houston-based promoter wants to ‘persuade’ President Zine el Abidine for $400,000 but he was paid just $30,000. The TGS-NOPEC is confident of finding small Ben Ali to stand for re-election in 2004. That contract was handled by Bongo’s deputy Chef de companies willing to invest. Bigger companies would entail a constitutional change: in 1994, Ben Cabinet, Jean-Marie Azde, tipped to be his next may have problems doing business with Taylor, Ali proposed that presidents should serve no more Ambassador to France. whose regime is under United Nations sanctions. than two five-year terms. Loyd’s lawyer, Edward Murphy, insists a TGS-NOPEC, which works separately with Presidential aides want Ben Ali to win another detailed contract was delivered to Bongo’s palace the two governments, says differences over the term – his fourth, including 1987-94, after he but the Presidency didn’t sign and return a copy. maritime border between the two countries are ousted President-for-Life Habib Bourguiba. Loyd and one of his subcontractors, ABC ‘unlikely to pose a major problem’. Namibia’s President Sam Nujoma changed the information, first lodged their claim in a California Oil development opens up new vistas for constitution once to give him a third term and now court, where the matter could have been settled for Taylor, who was described by a US source as his supporters want to go for a fourth. Frederick perhaps $400,000 – without much publicity. ‘pretty near the top of Washington’s persona Chiluba in Zambia and Bakili Muluzi in Malawi However, Azde advised Bongo to fight the non grata list’. Last week, Taylor announced are following suit. Ben Ali has yet to comment. claims. Libreville’s newly hired attorneys, Arent an amnesty for exiled opposition politicians The RCD machine is working to create the right Fox, have taken the case to the Federal Court, and his presidential rival, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, political environment, on top of the economic where they believe they can quash it. Yet costs are is returning to Monrovia to challenge him in the success which has built the President genuine much higher there, as are the risks of more bad 2003 elections. support. On 31 July, Tunisian television staged a publicity for Bongo. Arent Fox says it wants to Even modest amounts of oil could fuel a human rights debate to discuss taboo issues such counter-claim against ABC and Loyd but the case power station and bring a measure of energy as censorship. This followed an unprecedented could take over a year to resolve. self-sufficiency to offset the effects of sanctions. broadcast on democracy, featuring RCD Secretary Bongo will almost certainly get diplomatic Taylor will personally handle the oil General Ali Chaouch, Ismail Boulehya of the immunity but US law will not grant his government negotiations. This year, Monrovia’s parliament moderate Mouvement des Démocrates Socialistes immunity for commercial disputes. All this will passed the Strategic Commodities Bill, which (MDS) and Hafedh Ben Salah, a jurist. embarrass him again in DC, just weeks after his puts all national mineral assets under the direct Tunisia’s much praised economic success is lengthy meeting with the Assistant Secretary of control of the Presidency. endangered by its poor human rights record. State for African Affairs, Walter Kansteiner III, Having crushed the Islamist opposition, the at the United Nations AIDS summit in New York. UGANDA authorities have focused on their mainstream The US Senate Committee for Investigations opponents and critics. Human-rights campaigners will resume hearings in October on how foreign Moncef Marzouki and Sihem Bensedrine, and politicians have been operating private US Banking blunders former MDS leader Mohamed Moaada are accounts without the receiving banks properly A political row looms after President Yoweri middle-of-the-road politicians who (their checking the sources of funds. We hear Bongo’s Museveni (AC Vol 42 No 7), his son Lieutenant defenders say) have been trampled on by the US accounts will again come under public scrutiny. Muhoozi Kainerugba and his brother Major RCD. In July, a senior judge, Mokhtar Yahyaoui, Bongo has to deal with another US legal suit, General Salim Saleh were accused in court of was suspended after writing Ben Ali an open letter brought by Morningstar, a company which claims being party to the fraudulent sale of the state- criticising the judiciary’s lack of independence. it was contracted to buy scrap metal from Gabon. owned Uganda Commercial Bank (UCB). Just to prove that times may be changing, on 2 It had spent nearly $500,000 in setting up its Museveni said he would respond at ‘the appropriate August Judge Yahyaoui was reinstated and his business in Libreville and was then told the time’ but oppositionists led by former MP Aggrey disciplinary hearing was adjourned. A fourth contract had been ‘re-awarded’ to a rival firm. Awori are demanding his impeachment. term with international approval may convince Morningstar has been pursuing the case at the The allegations were made by Central Bank ex- Ben Ali that Tunisia can afford a functioning International Court in the Hague and is now Governor Sulaiman Kiggundu, once Managing opposition. Marzouki is struggling to have his stepping up legal and lobbying efforts in the USA. Director of the now defunct Greenland Bank, who new Congrès pour la République party legalised Its original lawyer, Arthur Rovine, is close to is charged with having run down Greenland Bank – Ben Ali’s next big test.

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