The arrogance of South Africans on Africa: where else would Mmusi Maimane try this nonsense?
In Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been accused of a so-called post-coup crackdown that has had opposition leaders and MPs of Turkey’s pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party, including its respected leader Selahattin Demirtas, detained and charged for crimes linked to the so-called “terrorist propaganda”.
It’s a crackdown that happened against a backdrop of rising criticism over Erdogan’s government’s purge, a government that has also issued warrants of arrests against editors and staff of Cumhuriyet, the main opposition newspaper in the country.
In response to these crackdowns, the ANC, in solidarity with the Kurdish members of the Turkish Parliament, has used all diplomatic channels and spoken out for the release of these opposition leaders, demanding equal treatment for all members of the Turkish parliament and for their immunity to be reinstated.
Not a single statement was released by the DA in solidarity with these opposition leaders, much less a call to visit them in prisons or support their trials.
Erdogan has won a referendum making him akin to a king, with powers that no African “so-called dictators” could even dream of. All countries of the world have condemned these changes and continue to push for a more open and democratic Turkey.
The underlying truth, however, is simple: Turkey is a sovereign state and strongman Erdogan is an elected leader of Turkey.
Russia, as with Zambia today, has had a number of opposition leaders and presidential hopefuls who have been arrested and tried on what many observers have said to be politically driven reasons; and some Russian opposition leaders, like Russian statesman and opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, have paid the ultimate price.
On March 6, Russian presidential hopeful Alexia Navalny was released from prison after 15 days’ detention for “handing out leaflets to a rally” that was to be held on March 1. Then on March 26 he was detained again for calling for an anti-corruption march across the cities of Russia.
Governments across the world have condemned these arrests and the US State Department called them “an affront to core democratic values”.
Beyond that, however, the US and other countries “have engaged Russia through its diplomatic channels to end the seeming intimidation of opposition leaders”. The underlying truth, again, is that Russia is a sovereign state and Putin is the elected president.
Due to immaturity and no international diplomatic knowledge, Maimane - an airhead who generally spits unmemorable things and dramatic stunts - is blind to the level of mutual respect that governs all relations between countries.
While on any given day US President Donald Trump (no different to Maimane) could release a huge bomb in Afghanistan or an airstrike in Syria for reasons that range from protecting civilians and so-called democratic values to protecting an opposition that is under threat, when it comes to Russia or other countries with a semblance of balance of power, Trump or any other US president would never go beyond diplomatic channels in dealing with them.
This is a question of balance of power. Mutual respect and balance of power is what governs nation-to-nation relations, unless there is an underlying arrogance and over-
estimation of strength (which is usually accompanied by a sense of high moral ground). International relations dictate that relations among countries must always be understood within the context of sovereignty. Similar opposition leader intimidation and arrests have happened in Cambodia, Bosnia and in other countries.
In all these international opposi-
tion politics, Maimane has not remembered his principles of choosing the right side of history and ensuring we don’t have dictators. So why Zambia?
Why would Maimane, of all the countries in the world with opposi-
tion leaders facing intimidation and harassment, choose Zambia?
Maimane may argue that he is doing this because he is an African and Zambia is in Africa.
Given that he and his DA have been interested in Israel and Palestine (the half-truth they gave us), and Taiwan and other countries on the back of being internationalists, Maimane and the DA’s selective human rights justice and protection of opposition leaders makes them exactly what Zambia calls them, “an extension of colonial conquests”.
The real question though is whether Maimane, by virtue of being South African, thinks he is superior to Zambians and has something to add to their politics that no Zambian can?
What is the source of this arrogance and nerve to go beyond the diplomatic channels into a country to send a symbolic message that seeks to undermine a sitting president? Does Maimane not respect President Edgar Lungu? Does he not see him as a strongman like Erdogan or Putin?
Maimane, as Helen Zille before him and, worst of them all, Tony Leon, have always looked down on black governments, with an undertone that how ever brilliant we can be as Africans, there is always something they can teach us. This is the same colonial mentality that has destroyed Zille’s standing.
Let’s be clear to Maimane and the DA minions. Zambia or any other African country, especially Southern African Development Community countries, are not a 10th province of South Africa.
Columnist and author Ivo Vegter, on the question of why South Africans think they are better than other Africans, has this view: “This is typical of any country that has an economy that dominates its neighbours. The stereotypical example is America. There’s little incentive in such a large, rich country to bother about getting passports, or paying attention to much international news.”
What this means is that, not only is Maimane undermining Zambia, he most likely knows very little about the country or its political dynamic truly lived by Zambians on a daily basis.
South Africans, and black South Africans in particular, have absolutely no reason to undermine Africans. Although we may be more economically active than other Africans, that wealth mostly does not belong to black Africans.
White South Africans still own most of the wealth: “... 60% to 65% of South Africans’ wealth is concentrated in the hands of just 10% of the population this group historically has been predominantly, almost exclusively, white”.
The proximity to white people must be giving Maimane some illusions of grandeur.
What could we be arrogant about towards our fellow Africans? Most are probably better off than us if you took the white wealth average off our colonial brains. Even more painful is that, whenever we have unfortunate xenophobia events the question of arrogance of South Africans always emerges.
The record of South Africa’s diplomatic engagements with African countries has been one of the country’s greatest legacies since Nelson Mandela’s warm and firm authority enabled him to cajole 19 parties into talks between Tutsis and Hutus, ending bloody civil wars across the region.
More importantly, however, something that Maimane’s youthful foolishness cannot comprehend, is the obvious truth that diplomacy does not only seek to respect sovereignty, it also protects the very person you are in solidarity with so that his condition does not worsen, both because there is another country that is not only interested in his well-being, but the well-being of the country at large.
Maimane has single-handedly made things worse for Hichilema and even harder for South Africa to be an unbiased and principled voice in support of Hichilema.
If something happens to Hichilema while in prison, Maimane’s juvenile approach to international diplomacy and to Hichilema’s condition will be responsible.
* Diko is ANC-aligned thought leader and founder of YD Media, a PR firm which seeks to create, improve and expand brand favourability and reputation for its clients.