www.africa-confidential.com 30 May 2003 Vol 44 No 11 AFRICA CONFIDENTIAL USA/LIBYA 2 USA/AFRICA Getting to know the Colonel again Spinning the continent Washington’s political managers believe their Africa policy can win Chester Crocker and oil companies Occidental Oil and ConocoPhillips votes at home and undermine France at the G-8 summit are urging President Bush to start a A standing ovation greeted President George W. Bush as he marched into the State Department rapprochement with Libya. This flies auditorium on 28 May to sign a new bill providing US$15 billion for HIV/AIDS, to be spent mainly in against the tougher line on Tripoli Africa. In a bid for US leadership of the international campaign against HIV/AIDS, Bush called the held by administration hawks. initiative ‘a great mission of rescue’ and urged Europe, Japan and Canada to ‘match their good intentions with real resources.’ With the HIV/AIDS law rushed through Congress, Bush will be able to admonish ZIMBABWE 3 his rich-country counterparts to do more on HIV/AIDS when France hosts the G-8 summit in Evian on 8 June and some of them will hit back with accusations of US unilateralism and hypocrisy on free trade. What’s next? The State Department was packed with well-wishers – foreign policy enthusiasts from the Democrats Opposition MDC leader Morgan and the governing Republicans, former Zambian President and HIV/AIDS campaigner Kenneth Tsvangirai has told Zimbabweans Kaunda, evangelical Christians, health campaigners and Africa advocacy groups which see HIV/AIDS to prepare for a general strike in the as the central issue facing the continent. There are doubts about the new law. Only twelve African first week of June. After three years countries will benefit initially. It merely authorises spending up to $15 bn. over five years. It doesn’t on the defensive, the MDC is resurgent but the response from guarantee that figure will be paid out. Although the act is called an emergency measure to fight HIV/ ZANU is almost certain to be violent. AIDS, there will be no disbursements until 2004, when some $2 bn. in payments are planned rising to $3.8 bn. in 2008 when Bush could be out of power. ZIMBABWE 4 ‘A check without enough money in the bank’ Many believe the funding could be cut when the appropriation bill is debated in Congress as the Pius and power Republicans have imposed a tight ceiling on all foreign aid budgets. Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy Achbishop Ncube is a vocal critic of compared the HIV/AIDS law to ‘writing a check without enough money in the bank’. Leahy added that corruption by government and of its the HIV/AIDS programme was promoted at the cost of cuts in other healthcare and food relief political manipulation of the famine. After many death threats, the programmes. Battles rage on about how to implement the World Trade Organisation’s waiver on patent Vatican has asked President laws to allow poor countries to buy cheaper generic drugs to treat HIV/AIDS. The European Union Mugabe to ensure his safety. proposed that the World Health Organisation should oversee the waiver, allowing African and other poor countries an automatic right to buy the drugs they need at lower prices. But US negotiators at the WTO KENYA 5 insist all applications be assessed on a drug-by-drug and case-by-case basis, so slowing down treatment. Bush’s Africa policy, however ad hoc and spin-doctored, seems to hold up well with domestic voters. NARCotic Polling organisations say that many housewives, evangelical Christians and even African-Americans are sympathetic to his policies on HIV/AIDS and foreign assistance. In its strategy for the next presidential Two sub-groups have emerged in election, the Republican Party aims to boost its share of the African-American vote from 9 per cent in 2000 the Rainbow Coalition: the all party ‘Mount Kenya Mafia’ and a Western to 15 per cent in 2004. A tall order, say Washington commentators, given that meddling with African- Alliance that backs Raila Odinga. American voter registration helped Bush to win vital votes in the disputed election in Florida as well as One wants a strong president, the the strong opposition to the Iraq war among African-Americans. other an executive prime minister. Undaunted, Bush’s team is pushing ahead on Africa. According to one DC analyst, ‘The Africa initiatives are cheap, easy to do and please [Secretary of State] Colin Powell.’ Bush is planning to make TOGO 6 his postponed trip to Africa in mid-July, to Nigeria (where the US business-backed Leon Sullivan Summit is being held on 14-18 July), to South Africa, which is Washington’s most important partner in Five-yearly farce Africa even if the relationship has turned tetchy, and two other states: a Francophone country (most likely Senegal) and perhaps Kenya or Ethiopia, depending on security conditions. June’s presidential election will be no better than the last two, which were Bush’s Africa trip will provide another chance to showcase the HIV/AIDS programme and the new blatantly rigged. And Eyadéma is free Millennium Challenge Account foreign aid initiative. Like the HIV/AIDS initiative (launched for Bush’s to be President for life. planned visit to Africa in January), the MCA was criticised as an ad hoc response to the US need to produce a development finance proposal in time for the development summit in Monterrey, Mexico, in POINTERS 8 March 2002. Unabashedly about picking winners in Africa and other developing regions, money from the MCA will only go to countries Washington judges to be successfully reforming their economies (AC Sierra Leone, Vol 44 No 6). Battles about who will control the MCA funds continue but the basic structure has been agreed: the MCA will be a private company headed by a chief executive from business who will be Congo-Kinshasa & answerable to a board of trustees headed by Colin Powell. Countries receiving funds will have to sign Morocco an MCA contract stating the policy obligations undertaken by the creditor that will be commercially 30 May 2003 Africa Confidential Vol 44 No 11 USA/Libya: Getting to know the Colonel again One-time Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Chester Crocker In an argument that mirrors neo-conservative proposals to boost US and two American oil companies are urging President George W. Bush imports from West Africa, the report argues that access to Libyan crude to start a cautious rapprochement with Libya. Although Crocker remains would enhance US energy security by reducing dependence on Gulf oil. influential on Africa policy, this advice flies against the tougher line on It adds that Tripoli continues to honour previous lease agreements with US Tripoli advocated by Bush government hawks. oil producers despite offers from European and Asian competitors: ‘...at Crocker chaired a group including a former Central Intelligence Agency some point, Libya will probably decide it no longer wants to hold the door analyst, C. Richard Nelson, and representatives from Occidental Oil and open for sanctions-bound US firms.’ That time is fast approaching as ConocoPhillips which produced a report released on 22 May by the Libya’s deadline looms for US companies to return or give up their claim. Atlantic Council, an establishment foreign policy think-tank in Washington, Better US-Libya relations have been blocked by unresolved negotiations calling for an end to the US policy of isolating Libya. over Pan Am flight 103, blown up over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, and Although Libya remains on the State Department’s list of terrorist continuing distrust of Gadaffi in Washington. The Atlantic report argues states, it has not been implicated in a terrorist attack for a decade, Crocker that both sides should take calibrated measures aimed at countering said. According to Crocker, Libyan security is fighting its own war terrorism and ensuring that Tripoli has no stocks of biological, chemical against Islamist terror groups: there is now ‘head-to-head competition or nuclear weapons. The starting point would be an agreement on between the Libyan (intelligence) services and the bad guys,’ he said. The compensation for the families of the Lockerbie victims. Bush government recognised this soon after 11 September 2001, when The report recommends that Washington help negotiate a Libyan Colonel Moammar el Gadaffi shared intelligence, Washington proscribed statement that would satisfy the UN Security Council, prior to a final the Islamist Armed Fighting Group and Libyan activist Anas al Liby was settlement. Once UN sanctions are lifted permanently, the report says that linked to Al Qaida. the State Department should remove Libya from the terrorism list, a step Crocker’s endorsement of a rapprochement is significant. Under that would automatically end several unilateral sanctions against Tripoli. President Ronald Reagan, he presided over a collapse of US-Libya According to the report, this would encourage other states to ‘graduate’ relations; El Gadaffi’s regime sponsored terror attacks on US and other from the US terrorist list. targets and in 1986, Washington bombed one of his houses in Tripoli, Although the report urges Washington to engage Tripoli in a ‘direct killing his daughter. Relations stayed bad under Crocker’s successor as security dialogue’ and to use multilateral agreements on chemical and Assistant Secretary for Africa and current Africa lobbyist, Herman biological weapons to constrain Libya’s military ambitions, it says that Cohen, who has been seeking better relations with Libya for some time. Tripoli has been trying to acquire new weapons technology from Russia Four US oil companies – Conoco, Marathon and Amerada Hess since UN sanctions were suspended in 1999.