Maravi

A thief cannot be a pan-Africanist

A thief cannot be a pan-Africanist
By The Post
Tue 31 Aug. 2010, 04:00 CAT

It is said that patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels. Those who abuse the people by stealing from them and looting what could better the lives of so many have no shame about claiming patriotism as a defence for their despicable acts. They have no principle to stand on and no moral high ground to justify their crimes. They try everything in the hope that the same people whose dignity they have abused will be fooled into believing their nonsense.

This is exactly what we are seeing in the behaviour of Frederick Chiluba. Today, Chiluba wants to pretend to be an avid and principled anti-imperialist and yet there is nothing about his actions when he was president and even after he has left which qualifies him to make such a claim. There is no way that somebody who steals from the poorest of his country can ever claim to be anti-imperialist, to be a pan-Africanist. This reminds us of what Samora Machel used to say about thieves. Somora was critical of Mozambicans who called thieves comrades. He used to ask: “How can you say comrade thief has stolen from me? How can a comrade steal from you? One who steals from you is not your comrade.”

The Zambian people, like most Africans – especially those from our southern African region – understand imperialism, colonialism and all these other evils that foreign domination and subjugation bring on the people. And as Nelson Mandela correctly puts it, “Imperialism has been weighed and found wanting.
Imperialism means the denial of political and economic rights and the perpetual subjugation of the people by a foreign power.”

The essence of imperialism is the denial of a people of what truly belongs to them. It does not matter who the perpetrator is. The essence remains the same. Denying people their political and economic rights is the essence of imperialism. When Chiluba and his league steal from our people, they divert resources from our people to their selfish ends.

In essence what Chiluba’s corruption has done to our people is to make them continue to be dependent on donor aid. And we know that dependence is different from independence. A people that is totally dependent on others cannot set themselves a political agenda and, as such, cannot develop in a democratic way. A country that is dependent on another cannot be said to be democratic. What Chiluba’s corruption has done is to reduce the independence of our people so that they can be manipulated by anyone in control of money. Chiluba himself did this when he was in power. He used money to manipulate many weak souls. And his friend Rupiah Banda has continued to do so today. Chiluba and Rupiah cannot be anti-imperialist forces.

Their very existence and survival depend on imperialist tendencies. They do not want our people to be free, to decide their own destinies and to hold their leaders to account. They want to be free to use public resources in any way, and if the donors, from whom they are accustomed to receiving money, raise any questions about accountability, they suddenly become enemies and imperialists.

When Chiluba talks about pan-Africanism, he is not talking about having a high regard for Africa’s peoples and their rights. What Chiluba is saying is that African despots must be above accountability. Those like him that have stolen from their countries must be free to keep their loot while the majority of the people live in abject poverty. And anyone asking questions is going against the ‘freedoms of these pan-Africanists’. This is nonsense. Chiluba as president was determined to ensure that our economy was as dependent as possible on the people that he is today calling imperialists. Any efforts that had been made by his predecessor to make this country self-sufficient in basic necessities were derided as commandist and anti-free market. To this day, this same Chiluba worships Coca-Cola and apples. To him, bringing groceries to sell these items in our country was a great achievement of his presidency. He derides Kenneth Kaunda, a true pan-Africanist who refused to import apples from South Africa in aid of the apartheid regime. The first thing Chiluba, who today claims to be a pan-Africanist, did was to jump into bed with the apartheid regime in South Africa. What can be more shameful than that for a pan-Africanist? Chiluba was comfortable wining and dining with the monstrous apartheid regime that had subjugated our brothers and sisters in South Africa for generations. Today, this thief wants to lecture about pan-Africanism, what pan-Africanism?

Who doesn’t know what Chiluba’s regime was doing in Angola with the imperialist-supported Jonas Savimbi to destabilise that country? And who doesn’t know what he was doing in Zaire? This so-called anti-imperialist ran a regime whose taste for money had no boundaries. Chiluba can’t hide it; he is nothing but a pro-imperialist fellow who is now in trouble because of changed circumstances.

Chiluba is not a pan-Africanist. Chiluba is not even a patriot because for him, everything in his country is for sale. Chiluba doesn’t have the conscience required for one to be a pan-Africanist, a patriot because a pan-Africanist, a patriot isn’t for sale. For Chiluba, money is everything and his country is where he makes the most money. But there is something more troubling about Chiluba which he seems to share in equal measure with Rupiah – it is the lack of the sense of feeling public shame when things go wrong. There is no doctrine – pan-Africanism or otherwise, no principle or proclaimed revolutionary position that can justify the stealing of public funds from one’s poor country.

No stealing of public funds can be committed in the name of pan-Africanism or anti-imperialism. There is no true pan-Africanist, there is no true patriot who can do what Chiluba did. True pan-Africanists don’t steal. And even if by some misfortune a pan-Africanist stole, we do not expect the kind of shamelessness that Chiluba exhibits. This man has shown no remorse for plundering our national resources and running a kleptocracy. Many of the people that served with him were thieves just like him. True pan-Africanists don’t steal from their people or indeed from anyone. Look at our true pan-Africanist – comrade KK – and try to find anything he stole. Not even a book that Chiluba alleged this true patriot had stolen from State House was found to have been stolen by him. Chiluba brought Scotland Yard from the United Kingdom to come and investigate thefts of public funds by KK, and they found nothing. KK never cried that Chiluba had brought imperialists to investigate him. It was okay for Chiluba to bring Scotland Yard because they were not imperialists. But today, a judgment obtained by the Zambian government in a matter they had taken to that country’s courts is being dismissed as an imperialist judgment. Chiluba is also talking about imperialists’ agents.

But he is forgetting that the one who took that matter to the London High Court, George Kunda, is today Rupiah’s Vice-President and justice minister. Is George an imperialist agent? Anyway, Chiluba and Rupiah should know that calling donors and anybody who seeks justice for our people, names, will not take away anything from their disgraceful abuse of power and outright theft of public funds. Chiluba will not be allowed to abuse the concepts of pan-Africanism and anti-imperialism to deny our people the right to get back that which he has stolen from them through the use of all available local and international avenues. Chiluba is simply a thief, and not a pan-Africanist – a thief cannot be a pan-Africanist, an anti-imperialist.

Labels: DONORS, FREDERICK CHILUBA, PANAFRICANISM

posted by MrK @ 4:15 AM