One truth born out of Egypt unrest is this: the United States recognizes and helps undemocratic governments, installs dictators as presidents in Africa, then uses these tyrants and dumps them when they get too old – weary of strength to protect U.S. interests in their countries.
Without any second thought, an innocent reader who comes across these opening lines of this article may scream like a pregnant woman would do in the last hours prior to her putting to birth.
But that scream will simply justify how talented the White House is when covertly sponsoring rogue regimes, using puppets as presidents, and allying with these puppets to deny the people of Africa good governance, free and fair elections, and freedom in all its forms – then, using the media as a tool, especially CNN and BBC, White House Officials with their all-time accomplice – the Secretary General at the United Nations (whoever is on seat as SG) – will dish out lessons of good governance, warnings against unfair elections, corruption, extra-judicial killings, and most importantly, sermons on democracy and human rights.
Until the unrest – call it revolution – in Egypt, little or no purposeful attention was given to Hosni Mubarak’s leadership by any person, group, or organization out side Africa. This of course, could be understood because Mubarak whose military receives $1.5 billion aid annually from the U.S. government was a staunch ally to the U.S. and made sure that Israel’s interests are also protected – Israel being a special nation to the U.S. This meant that even as Mubarak stayed in power as president for 30 years, ruling the country under an undemocratic constitution, winning unfair elections, and piloting the people’s destiny with tight fists, he still found favor in the eyes of the U.S., and White House has all along known which U.S. interests were at stake in Egypt and in other spheres where Egypt had played an important role like in the Arab league, and the whole Middle East region. Mubarak therefore comfortably stood as a saint, and so, he ruled for 30 years – protected by the shield of the U.S.
During his 30-year rule, the people of Egypt could only yawn and wait for the day a miracle will take Mubarak out. Press freedom was dead, political opponents jailed, and a 30-year emergency law remained in force, but the U.S. was silent, while CNN distracted the world with reports on how monstrous Robert Mugabe is in Zimbabwe, insinuating that he has been there too long as president, and that only Mugabe’s exit will save the people of the Southern African nation. Economic and travelling ban was slammed on Mugabe by the U.S., Britain, the EU, and other western nations for being a dictator. Out gone British Prime Minister Tony Blair even told journalists he had one regret: that of not taking out Mugabe before the end of his Premier term.
In the meantime, as Hosni Mubarak out lived his useful age, growing grey to 82, it dawn on the U.S. that the old man would no longer be useful in protecting U.S. interest. At 82, nature holds it that no matter how intelligent a person has been all his life, his IQ may begin obeying the law of diminishing returns – this is not to say that at 82, a man is useless, though, but at least, at 82, as president of a nation, the lives of over 80 million people – the case of Egypt will be at stake, while one time friends and allies will become highly skeptical at one’s abilities to function correctly in protecting indispensable interests. And so, after backing a dictator for 30 years, and choosing to ignore the death of democracy, human rights, bad governance, and the non-existence of other fundamental freedoms in Egypt, the U.S. needed to look for a more dynamic puppet who will continue from where Mubarak stopped – in safeguarding U.S. interests.
The only way was to covertly draw the attention of the Egyptians and the outside communities to the sins of their old ally – Mubarak – and inciting the people for mass riots. Then, while covertly pressuring Mubarak to step down, and Mubarak, out of a feeling of disappointment for not being backed by those whose interests he devoted his presidential mandates to – the U.S., Mubarak came out in an outburst on February 11, a day before he left office, castigating foreign pressures on him to resign. But even though Mubarak did not mention any specific nation from where pressures mounted on him to step down, he said he will not bow to foreign dictates to step down.
Feeling the pinch and pains of having been used and dump by Egypt’s key ally – the U.S, Mubarak, like a drowning man said in what later became his last address to the nation:
“Hosni Mubarak who speaks to you today is proud of the long years he spent in the service of Egypt and its people. This dear nation is my country, it is the country of all Egyptians, here I have lived and fought for its sake and I defended its land, its sovereignty and interests and on this land I will die and history will judge me and others for our merits and faults.”
This is indeed a lesson to African leaders who mess up the economies of their countries, allowing their people to live in total fear of tomorrow, that their foreign allies in the West, on whom they lean most for military support and other manipulations, will also dump them.
Just about 24 hours after Mubarak was ousted, the Swiss government announced it is freezing all assets of Mubarak and associates. See how Mubarak has been left at the shores of the ocean, with no boat to ferry him across.
* Photos from search engine: Google