Obama and Africa

[deception]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jul/09/obama-ghana-africa-terror

But as Obama devises US approaches to African challenges, he will face difficulties from an unexpected quarter – the US military. George Bush and his war on terror, and his reliance on force as a first resort, gave the military extraordinary power in shaping African policy – symbolised by Bush's creation of the United States Africa Command (Africom), in the misguided notion that the military approach was the best way to tackle terrorism. Thankfully, African governments overwhelmingly resisted the siting of Africom bases.

Africom apart, a number of Obama's political appointments are also hawkish, among them the Africa specialist who is now a member of his cabinet as the US ambassador to the United Nations – Susan Rice. She is inclined to the use of force, as evidenced by the threatening language she used about Sudan and Eritrea before joining the cabinet. It is this influence that would explain Obama's risky decision two weeks ago to escalate US involvement in Somalia and ship arms to the isolated government – by obtaining a waiver from the longstanding UN embargo. Somalia's tottering government has no public support, and runs just a few blocks of Mogadishu, despite the support of 4,300 Ugandan troops.

This new intervention is a continuation of the ruinous Bush policy in Somalia, which resulted in the militant al-Shabab Islamists – a previously negligible group – emerging as the country's dominant force after large numbers of Somalis were radicalised by US air strikes and the 2007 invasion by Ethiopia, Somalia's arch enemy, to topple the popular and moderate Union of Islamic Courts

One thing he would consistently hear from our civil society leaders would be that good governance – democracy, inclusion, respect for human rights and the rule of law – is non-negotiable. He would also hear that some of the significant gains made in expanding freedoms in multi-party Africa are being rolled back. This is not surprising, as the strategy of the US war on terror reverted to the cold war model of supporting dictatorial allies, which in east Africa included the Ethiopian and Ugandan leaderships.