In the Ring by Donald McKinnon

Author:Donald McKinnon
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781908739261
Publisher: Elliott & Thompson

And so it was time for Abuja and the CHOGM – time for much high drama and for a final resolution of the troubled relationship between Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe and the Commonwealth.

On 2 December 2003 I started the day in Abuja with a breakfast meeting with Obasanjo, who was in a good mood and confident he could handle the Zimbabwe issue, even though Mugabe was becoming increasingly belligerent. I told him the media were now interested in only two things – Zimbabwe and the election of the Secretary-General – and said that with the assistance of Professor Adefuye we should get both out of the way early. Although the good professor was on my staff, he had been a strong and active supporter in the campaign to get Obasanjo elected as the UN Secretary-General some years before. So they knew each other very well.

We held a short council of war with key staff who wished to actively support my candidacy, and from them learned that South Africa and Namibia were pressuring all and sundry to vote for the Sri Lankan candidate.

On the job front, some friends were advising me that Kadirgamar would receive seven or eight votes. But the Zimbabweans, who of course were not at the conference but were camped out in various hotels around Abuja to spread their campaign team, were telling people it was all over for me.

On the evening of 4 December South Africa called all the Africans and Caribbeans to a meeting on the Secretary-General vote and on Zimbabwe. This was to be Mbeki’s first strategic failure: the Caribbeans said they would all be supporting me, and would not let Zimbabwe off the hook. Worse still, we heard that a number of African leaders walked out of the meeting, highlighting their dislike for Mbeki’s plan.

The next morning, 5 December, Obasanjo rang at 6.30 a.m. to ask me to meet him at 8.30 a.m. Adefuye reported on the failure of the Mbeki meeting. Obasanjo told me he wanted to deal with Zimbabwe early. He had spoken to Mugabe and had been told he had accepted the original twelve-month suspension. Zimbabwe had even reluctantly gone along with the additional nine months – but any more and Mugabe would walk out of the Commonwealth.

It was always a possibility, but after his government’s behaviour in the past twelve months there was no possibility of him receiving united African support. So a major split in the Commonwealth was unlikely. We then discussed getting a small group of leaders to go off, look carefully and report back on the Zimbabwe issue. We soon agreed that Patterson of Jamaica would be a good chair and added to that South Africa, Mozambique, Australia, Canada and India. It was a good balance of Commonwealth heavyweights and friends of Zimbabwe.

For the formal start of the CHOGM we were greeting all the guest leaders as they arrived at two-minute intervals. Now all except Tony Blair were there. But then there was a little drama over whether Mr Blair would come before or after the Queen.

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