Meles’s friendship with the West – a thing of the past
By Zerihun Tesfaye*
May 17, 2006 — Just as past dictators such as Samoza, Marcos and Noriega had their days of cozy relationship with the West, Meles too had his. Nothing new here. It now appears the West considers him more of a liability than a useful ally.
Nothing new here either. What is new is Meles’s effort in making the rift public, hoping to stop the inevitable, which is equivalent to rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic. The Buddy- Buddy relationship he had thought to have established now seems to be unraveling and in fact might be coming to an end. The West just seems to be having difficulty in finding the right way of dumping him.
It is within this context that we ought to see the recent outburst by Meles against his erstwhile sponsor and protector Tony Blair, who had accorded him a modicum of international respectability by including him in his Commission, and had even paid a visit to Ethiopia to bolster Meles’s standing.
This being the background of their relationship, Meles’ recent outburst as reported by the Times of London accusing,” Mr. Blair …behaving like an old colonial master” is quite telling, of how much their relationship has deteriorated in a very short period of time and a harbinger of things to come.
In a recent article titled, “Coddling monsters has a price’ The Economist talked about the danger that Western policy makers face when they befriend tyrants and how this later complicates things when they want to extricate themselves after the tyrants usefulness has ended.
Though the article was written in connection with the passing away of Milosevic of Serbia and was relating the tortured relation the West had with him, the author could have been talking about many a tyrant that has been accorded friendship by the West due to his/her usefulness as a pawn in a temporary Western game plan. The recent classic case is of course in our part of the world where today despite indisputable evidence of their crass dictatorial rule; the West treats Horn of Africa tyrants as semi-democratic leaders who have just made a bad turn and with certain cajoling will come back onto the right course.
Museveni, Issayas and Meles were accorded the highest form of flattery by
the West, being called Renaissance Men, New Breed of African Leaders,
gorillas turned statesmen. …etc. Like freshly minted MBA graduates of the
80’s who wrecked havoc in many an industry with their new found ?knowledge’
of how to run things, the newly anointed leaders of our region went about
creating havoc in their respective countries. Issayas provoked a war with
Ethiopia that caused the death of 70-100,000 people, more than what was
reportedly killed in the civil war between 1961-1991 that eventually led to
the independence of Eritrea. Smarting from his defeat in the war, he turned
his attention inward, froze the process of ratifying the constitution, and
to tie things together imprisoned his longtime comrades in arm including the
Foreign Minister, the one time security chief and a number of Generals in
undisclosed locations, closed the free press and jailed the journalists.
Mouseveni on the other hand, wanting to pave the road to his life presidency had the constitution amended to allow him to run and win another term, and win he did.
Meles, the wiliest of the group felt he could afford an election and by
?winning ?an election in which foreign observers were present he will
fortify his claim of being a born again democrat, and his friends in the
West will give their re-affirmation. And who knows, he might have even
entertained of being nominated for yet another “International Award”, and
maybe The Nobel Prize, for, such is the delusion that Meles was wallowing by
the adulation he was getting from the sycophants around him and some
foreigners who fell victim to his charm offensive. Unfortunately reality did
not play out as the script, and his declared victory has become a pyrrhic
victory, the country finds itself in deep political crisis, and he
personally has been recognized for the petty tyrant he has always been.
It has now been a full year and everyone knows what happened in between.
Even his sponsors and promoters have realized that Meles is living in
borrowed time. It’s now time that he too should realize that his ?glory’
days are over and long gone and should prepare for the inevitable.
How he is to depart from the scene is dependent upon the moves he makes in
the coming months .He can leave early as Samoza did by going somewhere where
he can find a sponsor, or like Noriega if he stays longer and continues to
misbehave towards his sponsors.
It seems that Meles has indeed made some early preparation to take the
Samoza route by apparently sending his children to the U.S. purportedly for
purposes of higher education. The recent report by the Independent
Newspaper of increased monetary transfer (an increase of 103%) from Ethiopia
to Britain might also be another indicator of such preparation, not only by
Meles but also others in the ruling circle. However, if one is to go by
Meles’s obstinacy, what awaits him will be the fate the”elected” President
Arstide of Haiti, who was whisked away by American Marines for his own
?safety’ in the dead of night to a temporary location somewhere in Africa.
The Marines at Camp Hurso who rescued those endangered cheetahs to safety
will be upto the task of rescuing a beleaguered friend to a safe haven when
called upon by their superiors.
* Zerihun Tesfaye, a retired educator residing in Southern California, he welcomes constructive opinions at [email protected]