above. Of course, I do not write to him " Your humble servant" etc. ,
because I am not his humble servant.
I will continue with my commentary and if it is rejected here - again
- then there is no point in me being here, and as I should say to
Gaddafi in the name of the same freedom that I have so too you could
say to me : Good riddance - and that would in no way bother me
whatsoever.
So here' my last try at posting my opinion:
On Mar 22, 9:24 pm, MsJoe2...@aol.com wrote:
> Let Libyans Solve Their Own problems
> By President YOWERI KAGUTA MUSEVENI of Uganda
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------------------------------------------
> By the time Muammar Gaddafi came to power in 1969, I was a Third Year
> university student at Dar es Salaam. We welcomed him because he was in the
> tradition of Col. Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt who had a nationalist and
> pan-Arabist position.Soon, however, problems cropped up with Gaddafi as far as
> Uganda and Black Africa are concerned:
>
> 1. Idi Amin came to power with the support of Britain and Israel because
> they thought he was uneducated enough to be used by them. Amin, however,
> turned against his sponsors when they refused to sell him guns to fight
> Tanzania.
>
> Unfortunately, Gaddafi, without getting enough information about Uganda,
> jumped in to support Amin presumably because Amin was a 'Muslim' and Uganda
> was a 'Muslim country' where Muslims were being "oppressed"' by
> Christians.
>
> Amin executed a lot of people and Gaddafi was identified with these
> mistakes. In 1972 and 1979, Gaddafi sent Libyan troops to defend Amin when we
> attacked him.
>
> 2. The second big mistake was Gaddafi's position vis-à-vis the African
> Union. Since 1999, he has been pushing for a United States of Africa. We tried
> to politely point out to Gaddafi that this was difficult in the short and
> medium term. We should, instead, aim at the Economic Community of Africa
> and, where possible, also aim at regional federations.
>
> Gaddafi would not relent. He would not respect the rules of the AU. He
> would resurrect something that has been covered by previous meetings. He would
> 'overrule' a decision taken by all other African Heads of State. Some of
> us were forced to come out and oppose his wrong position and, working with
> others, we repeatedly defeated his illogical position.
>
> 3. The third mistake has been the tendency by Gaddafi to interfere in the
> internal affairs of many African countries using the little money Libya has
> compared to those countries.
>
> One blatant example was his involvement with cultural leaders of Black
> Africa — kings, chiefs, etc. Since the political leaders of Africa had refused
> to back his project of an African government, Gaddafi, incredibly, thought
> that he could by-pass them and work with these kings to implement his
> wishes.
>
> I warned Gaddafi in Addis Ababa that action would be taken against any
> Ugandan king who involved himself in politics because it was against our
> Constitution. I moved a motion in Addis Ababa to expunge from the records of the
> AU all references to kings who had made speeches in our forum because they
> had been invited there illegally by Gaddafi.
>
> 4. The fourth big mistake was by most of the Arab leaders, including
> Gaddafi, to some extent. This was in connection with the long suffering people
> of Southern Sudan.
>
> Many of the Arab leaders either supported or ignored the suffering of the
> Black people in that country. This unfairness always created tension and
> friction between us and the Arabs, including Gaddafi to some extent.
>
> However, I must salute him and former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak for
> travelling to Khartoum just before the Referendum in Sudan and advising
> President Omar el-Bashir to respect the results of that exercise.
>
> 5. Sometimes, Gaddafi and other Middle Eastern radicals do not distance
> themselves sufficiently from terrorism even when they are fighting for a just
> cause. Terrorism is the use of indiscriminate violence — not
> distinguishing between military and non-military targets.
>
> The Middle Eastern radicals, quite different from the revolutionaries of
> Black Africa, seem to say that any means is acceptable as long as you are
> fighting the enemy. That is why they hijack planes, use assassinations, and
> plant bombs in bars.
>
> Why bomb bars? People who go to bars are normally merry-makers, not
> politically minded people.
>
> We were together with the Arabs in the anti-colonial struggle.
>
> The Black African liberation movements, however, developed differently
> from the Arab ones. Where we used arms, we fought soldiers or sabotaged
> infrastructure, but never targeted non-combatants.
>
> These indiscriminate methods tend to isolate the struggles of the Middle
> East and the Arab world. It would be good if the radicals in these areas
> could streamline their work methods in this area of using violence
> indiscriminately.
>
> These five points above are some of the negatives associated with Gaddafi.
> The positions have been unfortunate and unnecessary.
> Nevertheless, Gaddafi has also had many positive points, objectively
> speaking. These have been in favour of Africa, Libya and the Third World. I will
> deal with them point by point:
>
> 1. Gaddafi has been having an independent foreign policy and, of course,
> also independent internal policies. I am not able to understand the position
> of Western countries, which appear to resent independent-minded leaders
> and seem to prefer puppets.
>
> Puppets are not good for any country. Most of the countries that have
> transitioned from Third World to First World status since 1945 have had
> independent-minded leaders: South Korea (Park Chung-hee), Singapore (Lee Kuan
> Yew), China People's Republic (Mao Zedong, Chou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping, Marshal
> Yang Shangkun, Li Peng, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jing Tao, etc), Malaysia (Dr Mahthir
> Mohamad), Brazil (Lula Da Silva), Iran (the Ayatollahs).
>
> In Africa, we have benefited from a number of independent-minded leaders:
> Col. Nasser of Egypt, Mwalimu Nyerere of Tanzania, and Samora Machel of
> Mozambique. That is how Southern Africa was liberated. That is how we got rid
> of Amin. The stopping of genocide in Rwanda and the overthrow of Mobutu
> were as a result of efforts of independent-minded African leaders.
>
> Gaddafi, whatever his faults, is a true nationalist. I prefer nationalists
> to puppets of foreign interests.
>
> Where have the puppets caused the transformation of countries? I need some
> assistance with information on this from those who are familiar with
> puppetry.
>
> Therefore, the independent-minded Gaddafi had some positive contribution
> to Libya, I believe, as well as Africa and the Third World.
>
> I will take one little example. At the time we were fighting the criminal
> dictatorships in Uganda, we had a problem arising from a complication
> caused by our failure to capture enough guns at Kabamba on the 6th of February,
> 1981.
>
> Gaddafi gave us a small consignment of 96 rifles, 100 anti-tank mines,
> etc., that was very useful. He did not consult Washington or Moscow before he
> did this. This was good for Libya, for Africa and for the Middle East.
>
> 2. Before Gaddafi came to power in 1969, a barrel of oil was 40 American
> cents. He launched a campaign to withhold Arab oil unless the West paid more
> for it. I think the price went up to US$20 per barrel. When the
> Arab-Israel war of 1973 broke out, the barrel of oil went up to US$40.
>
> I am, therefore, surprised to hear that many oil producers in the world,
> including the Gulf countries, do not appreciate the historical role played
> by Gaddafi on this issue. The huge wealth many of these oil producers are
> enjoying was, at least in part, due to Gaddafi's efforts.
> The Western countries have continued to develop in spite of paying more
> for oil. It, therefore, means that the pre-Gaddafi oil situation was
> characterised by super exploitation by Western countries.
>
> 3. I have never taken time to investigate socio-economic conditions within
> Libya. When I was last there, I could see good roads even from the air.
> From the TV pictures, you can even see the rebels zooming up and down in
> pick-up vehicles on very good roads accompanied by Western journalists.
>
> Who built these good roads? Who built the oil refineries in Brega and
> those other places where the fighting has been taking place recently? Were
> these facilities built during the time of the king and his American as well as
> British allies or were they built by Gaddafi?
>
> In Tunisia and Egypt, some youths immolated themselves because they had
> failed to get jobs. Are the Libyans without jobs also? If so, why, then, are
> there hundreds of thousands of foreign workers? Is Libya's policy of
> providing so many jobs to Third World workers bad?
>
> Are all the children going to school in Libya? Was that the case before
> Gaddafi? Is the conflict in Libya economic or purely political?
>
> Possibly Libya could have transitioned more if they encouraged the private
> sector more. However, this is something the Libyans are better placed to
> judge.
>
> As it is, Libya is a middle income country with GDP standing at US$89.03
> billion. This is about the same as the GDP of South Africa at the time
> Mandela took over leadership in 1994 and it about the current size of GDP in
> Spain.
>
> 4. Gaddafi is one of the few secular leaders in the Arab world. He does
> not believe in Islamic fundamentalism, which is why women have been able to
> go to school, to join the Army, etc. This is a positive point on Gaddafi's
> side.
>
> Coming to the present crisis, therefore, we need to point out some issues:
>
> 1. The first is to distinguish between demonstrations and insurrections.
> Peaceful demonstrations should not be fired on with live bullets. Of course,
> even peaceful demonstrations should co-ordinate with the police to ensure
> that they do not interfere with the rights of her citizens.
>
> When rioters are, however, attacking Police stations and Army barracks
> with the aim of taking power, then, they are no longer demonstrators; they are
> insurrectionists. They will have to be treated as such. A responsible
> government would have to use reasonable force to neutralise them.
>
> Of course, the ideal responsible government should also be an
> ...
>
> read more »
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