Who Will Listen to Asha-Rose Migiro?
- Category: Governance
- Date 13-08-2006
- 322 views
Is Kikwete more of a man than all of us? Or are we less of men than him? Whenever he speaks, it makes headlines - newspapers and broadcasting stations (television and radio) stampede to relay his words as news. You would think he has made an invention of new ideas and words which people should know or perish. If he tours a suburb in Dar es Salaam, his visit would be treated with absolute distinction, even though he might not toss a coin at a beggar or remove a single piece of paper out of his way onto a dustbin.
Interestingly, many of us are always saying things, touring everywhere inside and outside the city, and often doing real practical work but we are rarely lucky to deserve the privilege featuring in the news. Such is the way of the world; all people are equal but some are more equal than others.
It is like our chief diplomat Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro (Tanzania’s Minister for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation). How I whish she was Condoleezza Rice – America’s Secretary of State, therefore the country’s chief diplomat and Asha-Rose’s counterpart. On the scale, Rice is like Kikwete whereas Asha-Rose is like Peering Eye walking on the streets of Dar es Salaam. One matters while another does not.
“Tanzania condemns loss of lives in Israel-Lebanon war”, ran a headline in your paper (see The Citizen Tuesday 1st August 2006, page 1). Dr. Asha-Rose was reported saying that innocent civilians were bearing the brunt of the war between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israel in southern Lebanon. She urged the security council of the United Nations to initiate peace talks between the two parties “as soon as possible”!
This statement was not merely strong; it was also appropriate and desirable. The only problem is that it came from Rose, not Rice. Its effect on the war would have been different if only the name of the person pronouncing the declaration was spelled with the same opening and end letters (R..e); but with “ic”, not “os” in the middle.
Would you scorn my faith, dear Asha-Rose, that you must be profoundly envious of America’s Condoleezza Rice? Consider this: Ms. Rice has flown in and out Israel severally since the commencement of the conflict, her mission being to stamp America’s seal on Israel’s actions in the region, and constantly counselling Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Whenever Condoleezza utters a word, the international media amplifies it, not because she speaks more sense than Migiro but because, like Kikwete is not Peering Eye, she is Rice, not Rose. Period.
Put otherwise, if Dr. Migiro’s powerful pronouncement on the war in Lebanon had instead come from Dr. Rice, the war would have ceased forthwith. One wonders why Rice could not heed the palpable wisdom of Rose’s counsel. The huge war was touched off by an incident in which the Hezbollah captured two miserable Israeli soldiers, and since then Israel has unleashed indiscriminate mayhem on everyone, including Hezbollah fighters, UN officials, and unarmed civilians – many of them children, the elderly, and the infirm.
Thus Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro’s statement was no bolt from the blue; any level-headed foreign minister would have done the same. Yet apart from appearing in the (local) news, who did the minister expect to heed her call for peace talks in the Middle East?
I have always desired an opportunity to watch Condoleezza and Migiro stand face-to-face and differ on a matter of moral principle such as this and here the chance came: Rose urging immediate cessation hostilities, Rice urging a long-term solution to the conflict even if it prolonged the bloodshed.
Put to a world free and fair vote, it is very likely that Asha-Rose would beat Rice hands down, but even then who would dare to openly support the clear winner, risking American benefits? Even in Bongo: none would listen to you Rose if America promised to withdraw aid!
By Venansio Ahabwe
Source: Peering Eye, Sunday Citizen