Every six months there is an African summit. The one that has just ended in the Gambian capital of Banjul was unquestionably a glittering event. In addition to many of the leaders the 53 member states of the African Union, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan was there. Also in attendance were non-Africans: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the foreign minister of Cuba and a top-level Chinese delegation. It was also a worthy affair. There were discussions on AIDS, on Human Rights, on economic development and trade, on African migration to Europe and, of course, the situations in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region, Somalia and the no less troubled Ivory Coast.
Glittering and worthy though this latest African gathering has been, it is a disappointment. Despite the hard work put into it, despite the hopes that it would make progress on the many problems Africa faces, it has been sidetracked into fudge and inconsequence. Plans for an African Union mandate for UN peacekeepers in Darfur after September, when the one for AU forces expires, were dismissed. A plan for Kofi Annan to mediate over Zimbabwe’s political and economic crisis was derailed. About the only glimmer of success on the political front is that Annan is to go to divided Ivory Coast tomorrow to try and ensure that the two sides there keep to their commitment to elections on Oct. 31.
The fudge on Darfur is the most depressing of the summit’s deliberations. Instead of the expected mandate for UN troops, the presence of African forces has been extended till the end of the year. This is what Khartoum wanted, but it is a disaster for the people of Darfur, for Sudan itself, and for Africa.
Despite the best intentions, African Union forces have been wholly unable to end the conflict that over the past three years has killed 180,000 people, mostly by pro-government militias. Two million have been forced into exile, destabilizing neighboring Chad and the Central African Republic as well. The situation is, as Kofi Annan himself described it on Sunday, a “nightmare.” It is going to get worse: The partial peace deal agreed in May is already history. Sudan is incapable of ensuring peace, so too is the African Union force. Many more lives will be lost because of the Banjul decision. And what happens next year? Another extension of the toothless AU mandate? Action, not fudge, is what Darfur needs. It is what Africa needs. What makes it all the worse is that the Union could have insisted on UN peacekeepers: Khartoum would have been forced to swallow the bitter pill. Unlike the continent’s many other problems listed by Annan in his speech to the AU — a growth in extreme poverty, AIDS still outpacing efforts to contain it, rising unemployment, famines, environmental destruction — Darfur could be dealt with relatively easily. All it requires is political will and the dispatch of determined peacekeepers. Fatal compromise stands in the way.
What then, many will ask, is the point of these six-monthly jamborees if all they can come up with is the status quo?
