In 2008, Mahmood Mamdani noted the generally held view in publications ranging from The Economist to The Guardian that Mugabe the Thug reigned.  Yes, he had helped in laying waste to the economy, refusing to share power with a more vocal and present opposition, and created an internal crisis with his land distribution policy.  But this did little to explain his longevity, his recipe of partial coercion and consent, the teacher-visionary and the bribing mob leader.  “In any case, the preoccupation with his character does little to illuminate the socio-historical issues involved.”

The obsession with character – one of Mephistophelian bargain and decay – is found in both the literature and the popular culture depicting Mugabe.  The stock story is this: he taught in Ghana in 1963, a key figure in the nationalist movement split in what was then Rhodesia, becoming secretary general of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU).  The Shona dominated ZANU was formed from the original Ndebele ethnic minority dominated Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU).

Prison followed in 1964; Mugabe fled to Mozambique in 1974 though not before a spell of imprisonment at the hands of Zambia’s Kenneth Kaunda (his escape was probably engineered by Zambians); by 1977, he had assumed control of the organisation, though Mozambique’s President Samora Machel never quite trusted him, taking a leaf out of Kaunda’s book in detailing the mischief maker, albeit briefly.  Military victory was sought against the Smith regime in what was then white-controlled Rhodesia, and it was with some reluctance that Mugabe found himself a signatory to the British-sponsored settlement in 1979, one assisted by Lord Carrington, Kaunda, the Commonwealth Secretary General, Shridath Ramphal, and, ironically enough, white apartheid South Africa.

On becoming leader, he was deliciously accommodating in his rhetoric, despite having entertained the prospect of confiscating land owned by whites a la Marx-Lenin and wishing to hold white leaders to account in war crimes trials.  In his national address in 1980, he spoke of the bonds of amity; he wished for bygones to be bygones.  “If you were my enemy, you are now my friend.  If you hated me, you cannot avoid the love that binds me to you and you to me.”

Initially, Mugabe, the progressive, shone through: healthcare and education programs were expanded; literary rates and living standards rose; white farmers were reassured that mobs would not be knocking on their doors.  Whites were included in a mixed cabinet; heads reappointed in the army, the police and the Central Intelligence Organisation. But he had his eye on dealing with rivals.

In 1983, former members of ZAPU’s military outfit attacked targets in Matabeleland.  The result was uncompromisingly bloody: anywhere upwards of 20,000 civilians killed; many more tortured, maimed, tormented.  In four years, ZAPU had been defeated, absorbed into the ZANU-PF structure.  The extinguishment of such rivalry paved the way for a Mugabe presidency and near-absolute rule.

By the 1990s, economic conditions were biting.  Real wages fell; the International Monetary Fund demanded domestic readjustments to the economy.  Economic stagnation kept company with increasingly repressive policies against journalists, students and opponents.  Calculatingly, Mugabe propitiated war veterans by awarding them generous pensions in 1997.  Then came the next threat: the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) led by Morgan Tsvangirai.

In February 2000, a national vote on a redesigned draft constitution, the progeny of ZANU-PF, proposed British compensation for land; absent that, white farms would be seized without due compensation.  Its defeat by a narrow margin saw Mugabe step up his campaign, featuring farm occupations and the sponsorship of veterans to assist in invasions of farms owned by white farmers.  Mugabe was returning to an old platform.

The prevailing psycho-portraiture for such behaviour is never consistent.  One variant finds its culprit in a decision Mugabe made in 1996.  Secretary Grace Marufu, 41 years Mugabe’s junior, became his wife, considered within certain circles a less than worthy replacement for Sally, who died in 1992.  Wilf Mbanga, editor of The Zimbabwean newspaper spared no punches, seeing in Marufu a lever pulling, power hungry creature akin to Lady Macbeth.  “He changed the moment Sally died, when he married a young gold-digger.”

His former home affairs minister, Dumiso Dabengwa, pinpointed a different year when the great compromiser and negotiator changed: 2000.  There are no gold-digging suggestions, merely political manipulations filtered with a bit of paranoia.  “He held compromising material over several of his colleagues and they knew they would face criminal charges if they opposed him.”

Overwhelmingly, the narrative is of the great hope that failed, the rebel who trips.  This echo of the good man gone bad is detectable in celluloid, with the fictional state of Matobo in The Interpreter, featuring as its political backdrop a bookish schoolteacher who defeated a white-minority regime but fouled up matters by turning into a tyrant.  “The CIA-backed film,” suggested the then acting Minister for Information and Publicity, Chen Chimutengwende, “showed that Zimbabwe’s enemies did not rest.”

Mugabe was every bit the contradiction of the colonial-postcolonial figure, supported one day as the romantic revolutionary to be praised, reviled as the authoritarian figure to condemn, the next.  The revolutionary to be feted was a motif that continued through the 1980s, despite signs that the hero was getting particularly bloodthirsty.  A string of honours were bestowed like floral tributes to a conquering warrior: an honorary doctorate of laws from the University of Massachusetts in 1984, despite the butchering of the Ndebele; an honorary doctorate from the University of Edinburgh (subsequently revoked in July 2007); a knighthood from Queen Elizabeth II in 1994.

Accounts such as Martin Meredith’s Our Guns: Robert Mugabe and the Tragedy of Zimbabwe, point to the aphrodisiac of power, violence as currency, the cultivated links with the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Laurent Kabila, and the creation of a crony state. The DRC connection softened the blows of international sanctions, at least to some extent, keeping rural voters in clover and the security forces content.  Such arrangements, involving a juggling of loot and measuring out the spoils, is rarely indefinite.

The narrative of the power mad creature runs through as a counter to the liberal thesis that Mugabe started with promise, and went sour.  This would have been tantamount to suggesting that Lenin insisted on changing the world through even-tempered tea ceremonies and soft voiced mediation, only to endorse revolutionary violence at a later date.  James Kirchick, oft fascinated by the wiles of demagoguery, saw the strains of brutality early: Mugabe’s time in prison, as with other revolutionaries, led to a certain pupilage with power, a sense of its necessity.  Degrees in law and economics were earned via correspondence from the University of London, a way to pass carceral time for subversive actions against the white Smith regime in 1964.  All that time, he nursed Marxist-Leninist dreams.

As leader of the movement to oust the white regime, Mugabe was not sparing with his use of violence.  In this, he differed from the founder of the ZANU founder Ndabaningi Sithole, who renounced terrorism and subversion after his 1969 sentence for incitement.  Nor was he averse to internal suppression: his cadres had to be trustworthy in the cause.

Over time, the distance between Mugabe the ruler, and the Zimbabwean citizenry, grew.  International sanctions, applied with much callousness, bit.  Hyperinflation set in.  The state was left bankrupt.  Food shortages in 2004 did not sway him.  “We are not hungry,” Mugabe told Sky News.  “Why foist this food upon us?  We don’t want to be choked.  We have enough.”

In November 2017, a coup by senior military personnel was launched in terms that seemed almost polite, a sort of dinner party seizure.  Mugabe was placed under house arrest; his ZANU-PF party had decided that the time had come.  The risk of Marufu coming to power was becoming all too real, though this femme fatale rationale can only be pushed so far.  There were celebrations in the streets.  Thirty-seven years prior, there were similar calls of jubilation for the new leader. Left with his medical ailments, Mugabe died at Gleneagles Hospital, Singapore on Friday, farewelled by his successor President Emmerson Mnangagwa as “an icon of liberation, a pan Africanist who dedicated his life to the emancipation of his people.”  The muse of history can be atrociously fickle.

dissidentvoice.org

In January 2018, when Trump referred to African nations as “shithole countries,” he was relishing the time when apartheid South Africa, Rhodesia, and South-West Africa were considered a pro-US bloc in southern Africa. The links between southern Africa’s exiled black African liberation political parties and movements to Communist- and Marxist-ruled nations, in the minds of Trump and his equally right-wing father, Fred Trump, Sr., made South Africa, Rhodesia, and South-West Africa model nations in the eyes of the Trumps.

Trump’s sympathies for the apartheid countries were crystal clear when, on August 22, 2018, Trump tweeted: “I have asked Secretary of State Pompeo to closely study the South Africa land and farm seizures and expropriations and the large scale killing of farmers. ‘South African Government is now seizing land from white farmers.’”

The South African government was keenly aware that Trump was using a trope from the apartheid era. White South African prime ministers, including John Vorster and P. W. Botha were fond of warning their own constituencies, as well as the West, that if blacks achieved majority rule in South Africa, white farmers would be massacred and their land expropriated. These were fear tactics, pure and simple. Mr. Trump, caught in some sort of time warp, continues to believe the apartheid propaganda.

In response to Trump’s tweet, the government of South African President Cyril Ramaphosa hit back at Trump: “South Africa totally rejects this narrow perception which only seeks to divide our nation and reminds us of our colonial past.” It turns out that Trump got his idea that the South African government was seizing land from white farmers from the disreputable Fox News. As for the claim that white farmers were being killed, that bit of bogus information came from a far-right group called AfriForum, consisting of mainly Afrikaners in South Africa and abroad.

The AfriForum disinformation about white-owned farms and farmers in South Africa was picked up by Trump through Fox News’s Tucker Carlson. Carlson’s father, Dick Carlson, was President Ronald Reagan’s chief propagandist as the director of the US Information Agency (USIA), since closed down. During 1985 and 1986, Dick Carlson ensured that a steady stream of right-wing propaganda emanated from the Voice of America, the anti-Cuban Radio Marti, and other platforms. This included support for apartheid South Africa. Other top Republicans involved in pro-South African propaganda included disgraced Republican Party lobbyist Jack Abramoff and Republican activist Lewis Lehrman. In 1985, USIA and the Voice of America, at Carlson’s direction, highlighted an anti-Communist summit meeting held in Jamba, Angola. The summit, called the “Jamboree in Jamba,” was attended by Abramoff, the Angolan UNITA rebel leader Jonas Savimbi, Nicaraguan Contra leader Adolfo Calero, Laotian Hmong leader Pa Kao Her, and Afghan Mujaheddin leader Abdul Rahim Wardak. Also present was Reagan National Security Council official Marine Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, as well as South African and Israeli representatives. The South African Defense Force provided the security for the summit. Based on the success of the Jamba summit, the Republican right-wing even had hopes of restoring a proto-colonialist administration in Mozambique, the former Portuguese colony. By attempting to create a RENAMO-led government in Mozambique, the right hoped many Portuguese exiles could return to Mozambique to hold key positions in government and commerce. This, of course, was the same thinking behind the right’s support for Savimbi’s UNITA forces in Angola, also a former Portuguese colony.

One of the US groups backing the apartheid South African government was the Committee on the Present Danger, a fervently anti-Communist group. Extinct since the end of the Cold War, the Committee recently enjoyed a resurgence in Washington under the auspices of Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon, Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz, and former US House of Representatives Speaker Newt Gingrich.

In the 1980s, it was clear that far-right elements in the Reagan administration were trying to shore up white-rule in South Africa, prevent total black rule in South-West Africa, and roll back rule by Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe – the former Rhodesia. The racist right-wing in the United States had hoped to prevent Mugabe from coming to power in June 1979 by backing the creation of a post-minority rule country called Zimbabwe Rhodesia. The use of the name Rhodesia was a concession to the white minority in the country, which, upon unilateral independence in 1965, was headed by Prime Minister Ian Smith. Smith was a hero to the far-right elements in the United States, including the Ku Klux Klan. Smith and his allies in South Africa decided the best way to maintain the status quo was to form an alliance with Rhodesian tribes opposed to Mugabe, including Ndebele leaders like Joshua Nkomo.

The first Prime Minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia was Bishop Abel Muzorewa, who, like Mugabe, was a member of the northern Shona tribe. Muzorewa was an opponent of Mugabe as were other officials in the short-lived Zimbabwe Rhodesia, sometimes called “Rhobabwe.” Smith continued in the government as a minister without portfolio. White Rhodesians continued to serve as ministers of finance, justice, agriculture, and finance. When Britain re-established control over Zimbabwe Rhodesia and changed its name to Southern Rhodesia in December 1979 the writing was on the wall for the white-black coalition government. In 1980, Mugabe became prime minister of Zimbabwe. In the subsequent years, many white Rhodesians fled to South Africa, the United States, Canada, and Australia.

In 2015, Dylan Roof, the US white supremacist who massacred African Americans in a Charleston, South Carolina church, appeared on a website called “The Last Rhodesian” wearing a jacket emblazoned with the flags of Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa. Rhodesian expats have also been involved with several racist groups around the world, including Australia, Canada, Britain, and New Zealand. Donald Trump has rekindled hope among these stubborn nostalgists for white rule in southern Africa that what once seemed impossible is now quite thinkable: white-dominated governments in Harare, Pretoria, and Windhoek.

A similar situation was attempted by promoters of white rule in South-West Africa. In 1977, the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance formed a de facto government in Windhoek led by Dirk Mudge. Mudge, an Afrikaner, governed with the support of South Africa and representatives from various ethnic groups, including the Ovaherero, Coloureds (mixed race), Tswana, Damara, a few Ovambo, Caprivians, Nama, Kavango, San, and White Afrikaners and Germans, the latter concentrated on the coast around Swakopmund. The United Nations refused to recognize the Turnhalle government, opting for the exiled South West African People’s Organization (SWAPO) of Sam Nujoma, which was heavily supported by a majority of the Ovambo people. The attempt by whites and their allies to prevent Nujoma from becoming president of independent Namibia ultimately failed.

Thanks to social media, a de facto alliance of exiled white Rhodesians, South Africans, Nyasalanders (now Malawi), and Namibians, along with racists in Europe, North America, and Australia, see – with Trump as president of the United States and the equally racist Jair Bolsonaro as president of Brazil – an opportunity for them to set the calendar back to the 1960s. Just as minority white leaders like Smith, Vorster, Botha, and Mudge attempted to seek alliances of convenience with various African ethnic groups to maintain ascendancy – the Ndebele, Zulu, Venda, Tswana, Damara, and Ndau, among others – Trump, Steve Bannon, former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, and about a dozen hard right Republican members of the US Congress are hoping to restore de facto white rule in southern Africa.

Since Trump’s “Make America Great Again” trope has become a racist mantra, so, too, have merchandise bearing mottos like “Make Zimbabwe Rhodesia Again,” “Make Afrikaners Great Again,” and “Make Namibia German Again.” Some whites with roots in Malawi, where the second largest city is Blantyre – named after the town of Blantyre in South Lanarkshire, Scotland – would not mind it if they again enjoyed high positions of influence in the country formerly known as Nyasaland. Some of the descendants of the 75,000 whites who formerly lived in Northern Rhodesia, now Zambia, also pine for the days when whites ruled the country. Afrikaner nationalists also recall with fondness the desire of apartheid South African Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd wanting to turn Bechuanaland (now Botswana), Basutoland (now Lesotho), and Swaziland (now eSwatini) into South African ruled dominions.

Creation of a South Atlantic Treaty Organization (SATO) has long been a goal of neo-conservatives like John Bolton, Trump’s National Security Adviser, and Elliott Abrams, Trump’s “special envoy” for Venezuela. In March 2019, Trump, restarting this goal of the Reagan and Richard Nixon administrations, said during the visit of Bolsonaro to the White House, “I also intend to designate Brazil as a major non-NATO ally, or even possibly—if you start thinking about it—maybe a NATO ally.”

Pleased with the 1970s success of Operation Condor, an intelligence alliance of Latin American military dictatorships that targeted for assassination and arrest leftists in South America and beyond, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger foresaw a military alliance of the Condor partners of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay, along with apartheid South Africa and the United States, as firmly extending US military control over the south Atlantic region. Kissinger’s plan for a SATO continued under Reagan. One Reagan administration policy paper was titled “The Security of the South Atlantic: Is It a Case for ‘SATO’–South Atlantic Treaty Organization?” Just as with Trump and Bolsonaro today, in 1984, Reagan and Brazilian President João Figueiredo, Brazil’s last military dictator, had talks on the formation of SATO.

Influenced by the neo-cons in his administration, Trump was recently asked about Africa policy. Trump responded, “We’re looking at Zimbabwe right now.” Just as with the right-wingers gathered at the Jamba Jamboree in 1985, Trump and his racist supporters are looking at Zimbabwe in order to restore something akin to Rhodesia and get the ball rolling on the restoral of white rule and privilege throughout southern Africa and forcing many blacks back to their rural tribal kraals. Trump’s neo-con allies may seek to create a SATO, but the racist elements in Washington want it to be a military club for white governments. Those who sacrificed so much to eliminate the scourge of apartheid and colonialism from southern Africa should be on constant guard against the plans of Trump and his southern African and Brazilian allies. The United States under Trump is a distinct neo-colonialist enemy of the black African people.

The implementation of Agenda 2063 (a far-reaching plan indeed!) was a priority topic. (1) This is a program of general development and economic independence. There may be obstacles on the way, but Africa has achieved a big economic success and that’s an undisputable fact. With all hurdles to overcome (1), Africa is certainly outpacing the European Union. 

There were other events to occur this year related to the summit. It all mirrors a certain trend. The NEPAD summit is worth to be mentioned. The abbreviation stands for the New Partnership for Africa's Development, an African Union strategic framework for pan-African socio-economic progress sometimes called the program of African Renaissance. (3) The initiative was put forward by Tabo Mbeki, former South African President, as a plan for social, economic and cultural regeneration of the continent. No doubt the emergence of the program was one of the reasons President Mbeki was dismissed (outside forces played an important role to make him resign). South Africa is involved in the North-South Corridor – a multi-modal and multi-dimensional infrastructure system that includes road, rail, border posts, bridges, ports, energy and other related infrastructure – which passes through 12 countries. The 12 countries include Tanzania, Congo, Malawi, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Zambia, Botswana, Mozambique, Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt.

The June 10 tripartite summit brought together the Southern African Development Community (SADC), The East African Community (EAC) and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA). The parties signed an agreement on trade free zone (TFA). The Tripartite TFA encompassing 26 Member/Partner States from the three organizations with a combined population of 625 million people and a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of USD 1.2 trillion will account for half of the membership of the African Union and 58% of the continent’s GDP. The agreement is one more step on the way of boosting trade and establishing an economic entity. It took four years to form the COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite association. The African Union officially began negotiations on plans to create a continent-wide free trade zone called the new Continental Free Trade Area by 2017. South Africa and 11 other countries signed up for an ambitious proposal of having a single air-transport market on the continent within two years. (4)  Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta urged African countries to end their reliance on foreign aid saying the future of the continent cannot be left to outside forces. In a message posted to his Twitter account on June 12, Kenyatta says foreign aid often carries unacceptable conditions and is not a solid basis for prosperity and freedom in Africa. 

Everything’s not that rosy, there are also hitches on the way. Some issues evoke sharp controversy. One of them is the reform of the United Nations. On the one hand, the African Union is unanimous in its desire to make the United Nations Security Council more democratic. In 2005 the AU reached the Ezulwini Consensus (5), a position on international relations and reform of the UN (6). It calls for a more representative and democratic Security Council, in which Africa, like all other world regions, is represented. The AU put forward a demand for two permanent seats and a total of five non-permanent seats with the African Union to select candidates. Allegedly, an agreement was reached on South Africa and Nigeria to become permanent UN Security Council members. But speaking at the summit Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe blasted the two candidates saying Africa would never agree to them getting permanent seats on the UN Security Council. This was because they both voted for UN Security Council Resolution 1973 in 2011, which authorized military action against the regime of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. According to him, they betrayed the continent which could never trust them. (7)

There is another important issue on the agenda. Since a long time the AU has been unwilling to recognize the governments that came to power through coup, even when a regime was popular and enjoyed political support within the state. Some unconstitutional regimes are subject to collective ostracism while in other cases the AU turns a blind eye on those who evidently come to power as a result of coup. The 2012 coup in Mauritania was quite, but it entailed a wave of indignation to suspend the country’s membership in the Union. In 2010-2011 an internal crisis hit Cote D’Ivoire (Ivory Coast).Alassane Dramme Ouattara, the incumbent «president», came to power with the help of French military. The presidential palace was destroyed. No reaction followed. There are cases of absurd hypocrisy, especially when it comes to the right to re-election. This May the Burundi's constitutional court approved President Pierre Nkurunziza's bid for a third term. The decision provoked a flurry of indignation on the part of African Union though the ruling in no way contradicts the country’s constitution. The African Union openly interferes into the internal affairs of a sovereign state which is its member.

There was a scandal during the event. The International Criminal Court's 2009 quest to arrest Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and genocide took a step closer to reality on June 14 after he arrived at the African Union summit in South Africa. The North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria barred al-Bashir from leaving the country while hearings determine the fate of the ICC arrest warrant. The ICC always closely watches the Sudanese President’s moves when he leaves his country. Local NGOs rushed to court in an effort to have a decision ordering the South African government to arrest the President of Sudan. The court needed just a few hours to hand down the ruling in favor of claimants. It proves the fact that there are instruments to exercise internal leverage upon the country’s government to make it comply with what the global power tells it to do. There was no legal ground for detaining and putting the Sudanese President under arrest. The mantra about the need for South Africa to cooperate with the International Criminal Court is legally groundless. Any young and inexperienced lawyer knows that cooperation and arrest are not the same thing. It’s clear that the judges realized how absurd their ruling was. Even an ordinary person cannot be arrested upon the demand of foreign or international bodies. The case should be studied first before a ruling on extradition or refusal to extradite is handed down. This time in South Africa human rights activists filled TV channels to persuade that it should be done automatically. The judges were confused. Declaring the decision to take the Sudanese President into custody the court said it would submit the legal opinion for the ruling …next week.

The South African government should be given its due. It guaranteed in practice its obligations and respected the immunity of foreign head of state coming to the country upon an invitation to take part in a session of international body. Omar al-Bashir left the country an hour before the ruling was handed down.

All told, the Johannesburg summit showed that there are serious contradictions between the members of the African Union while the West exerts pressure on Africa. No matter that, the AU is moving to economic integration and independence. No doubt, the pressure will grow. It had to fight hard for political independence. Achieving economic independence requires no less effort.

Johannesburg, South Africa

Footnotes:

The fact that the African Union may withdraw from the ICC Statute has attracted attention. The issue was discussed while the ICC tried to prevent the drastic decision. In December 2014 the trial chamber demanded for the process to be started or withdraw all charges in the case of Kenyan President Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta. On December 5, 2014, the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) officially withdrew the charges against the President of the Republic of Kenya. There was no evidence to go upon, as there was no evidence to support accusations in the cases of Libyan Muammar Gaddafi, Laurent Gbagbo, the President of Cote D’Ivoire and Omar – Bashir, the President of Sudan. The purpose of all these lawsuits was not to establish the truth but rather to exert pressure on the heads of state. It’s propitious to remember that when the ICC held its first trial (the case of Thomas Lubanga from the Democratic Republic of the Congo) the first witness to testify confessed right in the court room that he had given false evidence under the pressure of prosecutor’s office. 

Right before the African Union’s summit the International Criminal Court decided to demonstrate its readiness to cooperate with the AU. It used the case of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, the leading opponent of the International Criminal Court, for the purpose. For ten years (1) (!) the Court could not arrest a single person charged in the case of Lord’s Liberation Army. On January 24, Dominic Ongwen, a commander in the Lord's Resistance Army, abruptly decided to surrender and face the trial the day after. (1) This trick proves that the Court can arrest anyone it brings charges against. But it does it only to meet its own purposes. 

The struggle for keeping Africa a party to the International Criminal Court is still ahead. Attempts to find a compromise mixed with muscle flexing will take place till the next AU summit in June 2015. 

The demonstration of force is becoming more visible in Nigeria with its general elections (including presidential election) to take place on February 14. On February 2, Fatou B. Bensouda, an ICC prosecutor, unceremoniously meddled into the pre-election campaign calling on Nigerians to make a right choice. Sounds blur enough, but there is a clear message in this phrase. The fight against the Islamist group Boco Haram is at the top of Nigerian agenda. The group takes active part in the election campaign. Blasts have accompanied the leading candidates rallies. On February 3, a bomb went off just 3 minutes after Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan left an election campaign rally. (3) The Boco Haram’s terrorist activities have been intensified. The ICC prosecutor has said the Nigeria’s government forces have already committed crimes against humanity that fall under the ICC jurisdiction. It’s an unambiguous message to the President of Nigeria. The prosecutor calls on the voters to make a right choice. It constitutes a direct involvement into Nigeria’s internal affairs. The candidate calling for unrelenting fight against Boco Haram has received a «black spot» from the International Criminal Court. (4) 

African states are not alone among those who are disillusioned with the ICC activities. On January 16, the International Criminal Court prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, launched a «preliminary examination into the situation in Palestine». In response Israel started an active campaign to discredit the International Criminal Court. It called on other states to stop funding it. Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on January 18, «We will demand of our friends in Canada, in Australia and in Germany simply to stop funding it», he told Israel Radio. «This body represents no one. It is a political body», he said. «There are a quite a few countries – I've already taken telephone calls about this – that also think there is no justification for this body's existence». Germany, Canada, Australia and Japan are the main ICC donors. There was an interesting reaction to the statement. «The countries that support the court will continue to support the court», said one European diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. «We respect the independence of the court and the prosecutor». (5) «Protecting the judicial and prosecutorial independence of the ICC is critically important», he added. (6) By the way, the investigation may lead to quite opposite results than expected, no matter the picture is clear. The ICC prosecutor may come to a conclusion that Israel is not the only one to commit the crimes. Trying to look «impartial» the ICC’s ruling may say that the «both sides» have done it. Such a verdict would not mean that both – Israel and Palestine – would be made responsible. Israel has not become a party to the ICC Statute (the Rome Statute) and it’s not under the Court’s jurisdiction. Palestine is a signatory to the Rome Statute and its leaders may become defendants. Once Israel is not a party, internal political opponents, like Hamas, for instance, could have been the target for the Palestinian government becoming a signatory to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. It’s not a rare occasion when the International Criminal Court is used as an instrument to fight internal opposition by governments of some states. Here is an example. The government of Uganda became a party to the Statute of ICC hoping the Court will help it to catch the leaders of the Lord's Resistance Army. The same thing has happened in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The government did not dare to bring to court the opposition leaders and transferred them to the ICC. By accepting the case the Court violated its own Statute. Palestine has to take into account that the attempts to transfer cases to the Court may have unexpected consequences. The ICC easily changes targets. The attempts to «outwit» the West may backlash. 

Talking at the final session of the African Union summit, the new African Union chairman Robert Mugabe has recommended that Africa must pull out of the International Criminal Court. «What the West will say or do is not my business», he added. The withdrawal from the International Criminal Court has already been included into the official agenda of the African Union summit to be held in June this year. (7)