Chege Mbitiru, The Nation (Nairobi)
May 9, 2005

Tony Blair hardly skipped a heartbeat as prime minister last week. A combination of sweet talk, comfortable wallets, and busy cash registers took care of that. Africa got a minuscule gain.

About 10 years ago, Mr Blair transformed the Labour Party into a political bulldozer. It isn’t anymore. Its majority in the House of Commons is just spare parts. Nonetheless, Conservative party leader Michael Howard got a late education. He discovered old age and told the party to find another leader.

“I’ve said that if people don’t deliver, they go. As for me, delivering meant winning the election,” he said. When it comes to delivery, most African Excellencies should go the Howard way. All they have to show are rusty cash registers and millions of people wondering what a wallet is.

Africa had nothing to do with Blair and Howard’s fortunes and misfortunes. The continent and its woes were hardly mentioned during the campaign. Yet the man who described Africa as a scar in the conscience of the world was, for a third time, chasing Britain’s top political office.

That’s not all. Moneyman Gordon Brown, who early this year trotted the continent like Santa Claus, didn’t mention the continent, at least not in any publicly known forum of consequence. When former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw mentioned Africa, a cat brought something in the house.

Africans shouldn’t feel slighted. The Continent, as Britons snobbishly refer to Europe, was hardly mentioned. Yet Britain will hold the European Union and the G8 presidency this year. Moreover, three members of the G8 club, a grouping of the world’s most
industrialised nations, are EU members. Mr Blair’s lady of the manor, Queen Elizabeth, is the head of state in one, Canada. Additionally, Britons will soon vote in a referendum on European Union constitution.

The reality is that elections are won on issues close to voters’ wallets. Mr Blair nearly broke vocal cords praising the robust British economy. He fell short of nominating Mr Brown for a Nobel Prize for fiscal management.

Never mind not so long ago Britons were begging a Chinese company to buy MG Rover. The company makes exhilarating cars. It just can’t exhilarate buyers.

Nonetheless, millions of Britons voted Labour. They were obviously comfortable with their wallets, stomachs, and cash registers. Other than Mr Howard, expelled Labour legislator George Galloway, and their puny supporters, hardly anyone remembered Mr Blair’s Big Lie about Iraq.

Liar! Howard cried into the wilderness. Never mind he was telling a lie, too: Illegal immigrants burden Britain. Other than wearing down sidewalks while dodging overfed bureaucrats, it’s hard to see how. Oh! There are too many asylum seekers in Britain. So what? Albert Einstein sought, and got, asylum. No nation whined. His homeland, Germany, should consider erecting an Einstein Statue of Thought.

On his part, Mr Galloway, who heads the Respect Party, disdainfully called Mr Blair a murderer. “All the people you have killed and all the loss of life have come back to haunt you and the best thing that the Labour Party can do is sack you tomorrow morning.”

How presumptuous? Jolly-good-fellow Blair grinned all the way to 10 Downing Street, later to Buckingham Palace. Whether Her Majesty chastised Mr Blair over the Big Lie, only the two can tell. They aren’t talking.

Warts and all, it’s still a minuscule good for Africa that Mr Blair is on the seat. It may not amount to much, but he is the first Western leader in decades to make Africa a personal agenda. He established a Commission for Africa. It’s his baggage, not Britain’s.

Mr Blair’s commission has been rubbished as just another “Save Africa” jig. Good reasons exist. In 22 years, there have been at least ten such jigs. Yet, other than a small elite that rubs shoulders with the likes of Blair, natives are worse off than 40 years ago.

The significance of Mr Blair’s efforts is that a looter is telling fellow looters: At least let’s get civilised; otherwise there’ll be nothing left. If he wins, lots of wallets in the Western world will be very empty.

That’s why the United States isn’t playing ball. So are Germany and France. Even Canada, which, other than Scandinavian countries is civilised in international issues, has reservations. That’s okay. Even kids are entitled to “When mum says she loves me, I check it out.” What Mr Blair needs in his “Save Africa” jig, and he isn’t getting, is
support from African leaders. This they can do by lobbying undecided nations, especially new EU members. They understand being trodden and breaking shackles.

Mr Blairs’s a half-century African generation peers will sulk over being out smarted. Village elders who stumbled into presidency will resent a descendant of former colonials’ kid meddling in their internal affairs – a perpetual whining. So what? If the kid can sweet-talk away a Big Lie, why not join him in telling the truth