Fresh air!

I write this while watching the announcements by Hillary Clinton of George Mitchell and Richard Holbrooke as special envoys for the US to, respectively, the Middle East and Pakistan and Afghanistan. A ‘dream team’ in terms of their combined experience, although Al Jazeera commentators are tonight sounding notes of caution about Clinton’s perceived Zionism. Nonetheless, it is refreshing is to hear a new language coming from the US State Department about peace, and the possibility for peace, and the vital need for intensive processes of diplomacy and development as critical to achieving these goals. The presence of President Obama and Vice President Biden at the event on the second day of the new administration emphasises the momentum and energy behind this new approach.

Without getting starry-eyed about US foreign policy, this marks at least a different articulation from the recent past. A new approach to policy based on diplomacy rather than military strength is consistent with the Open Doors scenario discussed in my recent blogs, and a move away from the more nationalist Flags scenario.

This new wind will hold a mirror to the rest of the world. Can South Africa bring a new and urgent focus to efforts for peace and development in Zimbabwe? Where is our Special Envoy to Harare? We need to be doing much more to address the humanitarian crisis on our northern border.

The inauguration of President Obama leads us to recall the day that Madiba was inaugurated as our first democratic President. The ANC government, in my view, still represents the best continuing hope for peace and development in South Africa. Nonetheless, the ANC needs to retain a sense of humility and humanity in these tasks. It was saddening for me to hear the response of ANC Secretary General Gwede Mantashe to the defection from the ANC of former President Mbeki’s mother to the new COPE political party. He described this as a “non-event”, saying that she had not campaigned for the ANC since the 1950s. The implication is that individuals are not important unless they have power, and that individuals leaving the ANC are of little concern to the party. This is unfortunate for a party that has always been grounded in the people of this country, and I hope does not represent a shift away from the idea that South Africa belongs to all the people who live in it.