Mugabe flies out again

PRESIDENT ROBERT MUGABE left the country yesterday for Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to attend the 19th Ordinary Session of the African Union General Assembly.

Mugabe was seen off at the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo International Airport in Bulawayo by Vice President Joice Mujuru, Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangwagwa, Chief Secretary to the Presidency and Cabinet Dr Misheck Sibanda, and Government officials.

Vice President Mujuru will be the Acting President during President Mugabe's absence.

The mid-term Summit, which is coinciding with the 10th Anniversary of the formation of the AU from the template of the OAU, was initially slated for Malawi.

It was, however, moved to Addis Ababa following disagreements between the bloc and the host government.

Malawian president Joyce Banda chose to depart from the AU position by refusing to invite Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, owing to the International Criminal Court arrest warrant for alleged genocide charges.

The AU insisted Bashir should be invited as it does not recognise the ICC while the Malawian leader insisted that the Sudanese leader would be arrested on arrival.

She also announced that she would boycott the meeting.

Convening under the theme "Consolidation of intra-African trade", the summit comes at a time member states are at loggerheads over the leadership of the AU Commission amid crises in Mali, Sudan and Somalia.

The AU seeks to create a pan-African trade zone by 2017.  

The AU's failure to prevent the Nato bombardment of Libya that culminated in the assassination of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi is expected to be the elephant in the room.

There are deep divisions in the AU over the ICC that is considered a kangaroo court that targets only developing world leaders.

In its 10-year history, the ICC has only opened investigations into seven countries: the DRC, Uganda, the Central African Republic, Darfur/Sudan, Kenya, Libya and Cote d'Ivoire.

At their meeting in Kampala, Uganda two years ago, AU leaders resolved not to support the Tribunal, whose founding statute was ratified by 33 of the AU's 54 member states among them Malawi, South Africa and Botswana.

The election 'of the AU Commission chair is also expected to hog the limelight in the wake of the deadlock that characterised the 19th Ordinary Session earlier this year when none of the candidates â€" incumbent Jean Ping and Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma of South Africa â€" garnered the required two thirds majority.

The race pits the traditionally dominant Francophone West Africa and Nigeria that is backing Dr Ping and Anglophone Southern Africa that is routing for Dr Dlamini-Zuma.

Analysts contend the race for the AU Commission chair is not a struggle between English-speaking and francophone countries, but a tussle between regional powers with competing interests given that South Africa and Nigeria are rivals even in the envisaged reform of the UN Security Council.  

Apart from the AU Commission leadership, regional crises in West Africa, North Africa and the Horn of Africa are expected to dominate the summit agenda.

Mali, which recently suffered a coup, is expected to top the agenda given that Ecowas wants to intervene militarily while the UN Security Council is refusing to endorse the military option.

The conflict in Sudan is also expected to top the agenda as Khartoum and Juba have been holding AU-sponsored talks for months in Addis Ababa.

The two countries are looking for a political solution to their dispute over oil revenue.

Analysts contend Malawi was abandoned as a venue for the mid-term summit because there can be no solution to the Sudanese conflict without President Bashir's attendance.

Somalia will also be up for discussion given that the mandate from the Transitional Federal Government is set to expire on August 20 when the country is expected to get a new president and government.