Chris Louw
WHEN it comes to those Frenchmen, Thabo Mbeki has this … well, jinx.
The deputy president’s mysterious and unexplained absence from a breakfast meeting this week with President Francois Mitterrand was his second social gaffe with the French government.
In 1989, while the African National Congress was still banned, it was arranged that Mbeki would address the French parliament in Paris during the bi-centenary celebrations _ but he failed to turn up, following a late night party with South African exiles.
After an embarrassed roll-call one of his comrades explained weakly: ”He’s sick in bed.” Pallo Jordan was called upon to stand in. While other speakers delivered their good wishes, this former historian wrote out a hasty lecture on the French Revolution.
In August last year, Mbeki was in trouble again. Asked to address a breakfast meeting on ANC foreign policy at the Carlton Hotel, he left thirty-odd guests in the lurch.
It later transpired that he was at Sun City while his high- profile guests waited at the Carlton.
The meeting was rescheduled and this time, the phantom made his appearance.