US President Donald Trump. AFP PHOTO | JOSE LUIS MAGANA
We end the year and embark on a fresh one with signal actions
that remind us that the world is still very much alive and kicking, and
that life on this our Earth is bound to continue being interesting till
the “last syllable of recorded time.” (Macbeth)
It
is interesting that Arsene Wenger, the embattled and clueless manager
of Arsenal football club, can now ask if anyone of his peers at Chelsea,
Liverpool or Manchester City ever coached a future head of state. The
world will surely pardon him for his impatience when he prematurely
congratulated George Weah after just the first round of the Liberian
election, but he was eventually right on the money.
It
is interesting that Robert Mugabe is no longer president of Zimbabwe and
that he was replaced by Emmerson Mnangagwa, the vice-president he
sacked, in a coup whose military organisers insisted was not one, but
who are now the mainstay of the government set up by said sacked VP.
It
will also be interesting to see what the new top honcho in Harare will
do with his old comrade, seeing as the two are thick as thieves when it
comes to crimes they may or may not have committed against sections of
the Zimbabwean people.
It is definitely interesting
that Aung San Suu Kyi, the once admired icon of Myanmar’s struggle for
democracy, can now be considered fit to stand trial in The Hague for
crimes against humanity regarding her country’s shabby treatment of
Rohingya Muslims, who have been killed, raped and expelled from their
burnt down villages in their thousands, while she watched in silence.
From hero to zero, one might say.
Quite interesting
that South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa managed to defy President Jacob Zuma
and beat the latter’s ex-wife to the presidency of the African National
Congress, thus becoming virtually the country’s president-in-waiting
till 2019.
The question is whether Ramaphosa will sack
Zuma from the presidency (there is a precedent to this, set by Zuma
himself) before he finishes his term, or impeach him, or maybe both?
But
probably the most interesting year-ender is the glaring unpopularity of
the United States of America, newly exposed by the United Nations
General Assembly vote on the illegality of the decision by the Trump
administration to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem from Tel
Aviv.
If anything showed how isolated and friendless
the US and Israel are, it is that vote where only nine countries dared
to openly side with Trump. Interesting also that the countries in
Trump’s corner are Togo, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Marshall Islands,
Guatemala, Honduras and Israel. You could miss most of them on the world
map and still be a good geography student.
The slap
in Trump’s face was self-inflicted, mainly because of his knowledge of
world affairs. Nations do not easily swallow naked threats to their
dignity (unless they are called Togo or Palau, or something), and they
will sometimes want to give you a bloody nose just because you sounded
domineering.
Nikki Haley, the openly arrogant diplomat
representing the Trump administration at the UN, does not even seem to
know the cajoling language that would have saved her a few votes.
And
she didn’t even seem to understand that by threatening US wrath against
those who would vote against Trump, she was at the same time addressing
the poor beggars from Africa as well as Britain, France, Germany,
Norway, Korea, Japan and so on.
Now, the US government
has decided to cut its contributions to the UN by some $285 million.
Which is another move that will send all the right signals that Trump is
angry at the expressed will of the world.
He is apparently cutting himself from any lifeline that would still give him some semblance of relevance.
With
his decision on Jerusalem, he has effectively edited the US out of any
Middle East peace process for the foreseeable future; the financial
pullback will most likely mean America’s pet projects will suffer, but
that will not kill the United Nations.
The world is all
too familiar with the cajoling and threatening of the US government,
from way back during the era of the Truman Doctrine, through the more
recent days of the Bushes and the Gulf wars, to the “America First”
no-brainers of President Trump and Ms Haley.
Jenerali
Ulimwengu is chairman of the board of the Raia Mwema newspaper and an
advocate of the High Court in Dar es Salaam. E-mail: jenerali@gmail.com
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