Howard Barrell
WHO IS … EMEKA ANYAOKU?
Someone as convinced of his own gravity as he is of his sincerity is probably best suited to leading a pack of boy scouts or to another, similarly worthy cause.
We could be forgiven for thinking such a man unlikely to be much good at politics. For, whereas politicians expect the rest of us to believe their claims to sincerity, they are seldom stupid enough, or sincere enough, to share in that belief themselves.
But there are exceptions. Chief Emeka Anyaoku (66), secretary general of the Commonwealth for the past 10 years, is apparently sincere enough to believe his own expressions of sincerity.
He has also been, according to his senior colleagues in the Commonwealth secretariat, a good secretary general. He has made the secretariat – the central co-ordinating body of the 54-nation grouping whose biennial conference South Africa is hosting in Durban and George this weekend – a leaner, fitter organisation.
More important, these colleagues say, he has played an important role in reinventing the strange association of mainly former British colonies that is the Commonwealth.
A year after Anyaoku became secretary general, Commonwealth leaders met in Harare in 1991 and adopted a declaration which set it on a new course for the millennium. Henceforth, the Commonwealth would promote democracy and good governance, respect for human rights and the rule of law, and sustainable economic development.
Of course, the Commonwealth would claim it had always embraced these values. But, partly inspired by the dramatic moves towards democracy in South Africa in the early 1990s, Anyaoku drove attempts to make this commitment explicit. By then, Anyaoku had experienced the kind the influence the Commonwealth could bring to bear on intractable situations. He had been secretary to the Commonwealth Eminent Persons’ Group that visited South Africa in 1985 and 1986 and which had, in many respects, sketched the basis of the negotiated settlement South Africans would later establish for themselves.
In 1995, meeting at Millbrook in New Zealand, with Anyaoku again quietly playing the lead, Commonwealth leaders decided to give themselves a few teeth to deal with serious and persistent violations of the principles outlined in Harare. Under what was called the Millbrook Action Programme, they set up a Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group, comprising the secretary general and between eight and 10 foreign ministers, to take action against offending Commonwealth countries.
The Millbrook decision was largely inspired by events in Nigeria. The Abacha military regime was running amok, looting billions of dollars and suppressing opposition – most infamously by defying international calls for clemency and hanging poet Ken Saro-Wiwa just as the Millbrook conference opened.
Nigeria was suspended from the Commonwealth. This was particularly painful for Anyaoku. He is himself a Nigerian who, in 1983, served a very brief spell as his country’s foreign minister until the civilian government of which he was part was overthrown by the military.
But Anyaoku was emphatic in his support for Nigeria’s isolation. He was determined, according to a senior colleague in the secretariat, to give substance to the Harare principles and to ensure that they were applied consistently.
“This has been the theme of his secretary generalship,” the colleague added. “He has seen virtue in a kind of consistency. He has tried to give substance to its declarations and to make the Commonwealth consistent in applying them.”
The lead the Commonwealth took in isolating Nigeria in 1995 has, evidently, paid off. For, this weekend, Nigeria returns fully to the Commonwealth with a new, democratically elected civilian head of state, Olusegun Obasanjo, the man who co-led the Eminent Persons’ Group mission to South Africa in the mid-1980s. Alongside South Africa’s return to the organisation under a democratic government in 1994, Obasanjo’s presence in Durban represents an emotional triumph for Anyaoku.
In recent months, Anyaoku has been among those pushing for the Commonwealth to make a still more explicit commitment to democracy and good governance, and to develop sharper teeth for dealing with member states who might not comply. Both are major issues before the Durban heads of government meeting.
Anyaoku will be a hard act to follow. Why? If not for his qualities, then because he knows the Commonwealth perhaps better than anyone else. He has served in its secretariat since 1966, when it was first set up by member states.
“He’s an insider,” said one colleague. “He’s our institutional memory,” said another in Durban this week.
HIS COLLEAGUES SAY THEY WILL MISS HIS QUIET CONSIDERATION. SOMETIMES PERHAPS A LITTLE TOO CAUTIOUS, A LITTLE TOO WORTHY, HE NONETHELESS FULFILLED HIS BRIEF WELL. SAID ONE COLLEAGUE OF ANYAOKU’S PREDECESSOR: “SONNY RAMPHAL WAS FLAMBOYANT, A SHOWMAN. ANYAOKU THINKS THINGS THROUGH. RAMPHAL CAME INTO THE SECRETARIAT AS A POLITICIAN. ANYAOKU IS A MACHINE MAN WHO CAME THROUGH THE SYSTEM, WHERE HE KNEW EXACTLY WHAT HE WAS SUPPOSED TO DO.”