The ying and the yang of the African Union (AU) summit are encapsulated in two images: the controlling hand of Thabo Mbeki on the gavel and the robed and ranting Moammar Gadaffi.
Patriotically, the bulk of South African newspapers put our president firmly in the driving seat. Neutral observers would differ. The rivalry between Gadaffi and Mbeki took the shine off this historic gathering of 37 heads of state and government.
Gaddafi more than upstaged Mbeki with antics like his impromptu “freedom and forgiveness” rant to the crowd — and pan-African television audience — at the opening rally for the new union. He also sowed the seeds of destruction of this 53-nation grouping expecting to rise from the ashes of the discredited Organisation of African Unity (OAU).
As delegates went shopping before flying home and Gadaffi’s men fuelled up for the Brother Leader’s motorcade to Mozambique, Libya was confident of becoming the seat of the proposed Pan-African Parliament (PAP).
The final decision awaits ratification of the protocols for the PAP, which had only been signed by four countries, but it does not take an Afro-sceptic to appreciate the irony of having a country without a parliament of its own become the seat of an African parliament.
Libya also seems set to become part of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) implementation committee when it is expanded from 15 to 20 members.
This is a double whammy, despite the insistence of Nigeria’s President Olusegun Obasanjo that Nepad and the AU are part of a whole.
Until now, he, Mbeki and the other members of the Nepad steering committee have sold the recovery programme to potential partners in the developed world on the basis of its selectivity. OAU members automatically became members of the AU, but only those who met certain standards of good governance, financial discipline and respect for the rule of law could be part of Nepad.
This distinction has been blurred as Nepad is collapsed into the AU.
Mbeki’s peers are unhappy with him being portrayed as the driving force of the continent’s rescue programme, and want to fold the secretariat he controls into the AU structure as fast as possible. The key peer review system, on which Nepad will stand or fall, threatens to become a casualty.
The purpose of the review, to scrutinise participants according to internationally accepted norms, has been fudged. Obasanjo is now stressing its voluntary aspect. “It’s like me asking for a doctor’s report before I give you a job and you tell me you don’t have a doctor,” he said of countries that did not submit to review.
Instead of putting a country’s political, social and economic practices under the magnifying glass, the review would be more like offering useful tips on problem areas. This should be of comfort to those unelected leaders who slipped into the AU under the barrier created to bar future despots.
South Africa has emerged top of the class of 23 countries examined by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa.
This went down well with Nepad watchers in the West, but at the summit fuelled the resentment of those who feel that as the only AU member with the economic and democratic ability to do so, South Africa is playing to that audience.