Re-elections of Bush and Blair (I)

By ISMAILA SADIK
Tuesday, October 4 2005.

I was almost in a state of incommunicado having decided to boycott all the electronic media temporarily, being unable to believe in the telecast that Mr. George Bush was re-elected the President of the United States; I still reflected though on the historical and socio-political circumstances that might have influenced his re-election.

I had thought, as well as the majority of Nigerians including the critics of the war in Iraq from the western and third world countries, that the electorate in the United States would end the war in Iraq by electing John Kerry as the next President of the United States.

I thought also that propaganda or no propaganda, the masses of the United States had earnestly awaited the time for that election to put an end to George Bush arrogant chauvinism on world affairs and in the Middle East in particular which had earned the country very bad image.

The efforts of John Kerry to make the war in Iraq an issue, which he successfully did in all his campaigns, lent credit to the majority opinion, which seemed to have parted company with George Bush and the images of his administration.
I have a feeling that the re-election of George Bush made millions of the Black Americans and the majority of those from the third world countries residing in America disgusted with the result of that election.

I have come to the conclusion that the United States of America and particularly the government of President Bush are more interested in the subjugation of legitimate governments of the Middle East that are unwilling to bow to the dictates of that country.

Even before the U. S. went into the dangerous war with Iraq in 2002, the world opinion was against the decision to wage war on the pretext that Iraq had stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction; one is at a loss over the role of the Security Council and the United Nations General Assembly, on the refusal of George Bush to carry the world organization along on the issue.

The U. N. Secretary General, Mr. Kofi Annan, being an African was rubbed of his executive authority to bring peace to Iraq and the Middle East; his position was played down before the war, though George Bush had alleged that the earlier resolution of the Security Council gave Saddan Hussein the dead line for the destruction of weapons of mass destruction; that his refusal to comply, (in other words to destroy what he did not possess), amounted to violation of that resolution.

Violation could have been inferred if weapons of mass destruction or evidence of chemical weapons were discovered before or after the invasion of Iraq. Failure to find any such weapons shifted the responsibility for the war and all the destructions and loss of thousands of civilian lives on George Bush and his administration.

The war had been on for more than two or three years and yet President Bush is still maintaining that the war was legitimate to protect the civilized world. One would ask, in what way was Iraq involved in September 11, 2001 attack? Up till now, there has not been any evidence in support, or any link, no matter how minor in that direction.

While it is becoming more and more insurgency against the puppet government in Iraq and the U.S. occupation, there is no doubt that those accused of being AI-Qaedas or the Talibans have now moved into Iraq to fight the U. S. and the coalition, but that does not mean that prior to the invasion they were in Iraq; in fact the contrary is the case because, President Saddam was against the Shiites and particularly the Islamic Republic of Iran, it led to the conflict in which the U. S. took side with Iraq; obviously the animosity between the -two countries remained even after the end of Iraq - Iran war.

When Mr. Tateek Aziz, Saddam’s Information Minister, stated that U. S. would be humiliated just a couple of weeks before the Sudden fall of Baghdad and in what he termed “the mother of all wars”, little did President Bush and his coalition realize that his invading troops ‘were being lured in to prepare the ground for a total Guerrilla war- fare which up till now has earned the Iraqis the honour and dignity of a determined people ready to fight the intruders purporting to be the crusaders of democracy in the Middle East.

Therefore it is inconceivable that Saddam who was against wholesome Islamic state would support Osama Bin laden or the Talibans of Afghanistan. Saddam Hussein as the President of Iraq took measures to curb the excesses of the Kurdish insurgents assisted by foreign countries, the same way British Government did against the I. R. A. in Northern Ireland. If the measures taken against the Kurds made Saddam and his administration to be terrorist organisation, the same should apply to Tony Blair and his government.

Secondly if the dialogue with the I.R.A. was an imperative to reduce tension in Northern Ireland, then George Bush and Tony Blair should not refuse dialogue with the dissidents who have taken up arms against their home countries and their western collaborators.

I am of the view that some Arab rulers would have chosen to dialogue with the dissidents in their countries but the fact is that since the imperialists are against it, the rulers have shelved the idea, which I think cannot be avoided if peace should return to the Middle East.

It is known that the U. S. had always supported insurgents in countries not under her influence, it happened in Libya, Iran and Sudan, just to mention a few, and President Bush, has now arrogantly proclaimed it as a policy of his administration.
The suppressed people under some Islamic Kingdoms and assisted by colonial administrations accused the rulers for failing to rule in accordance with the Holy Quran and the traditions of the ‘Holy Prophet’ of Islam.

They maintained that the rulers were more interested in retaining their feudal rules, which the then imperialist administrations condoned because of the advantages, which up till the moment provided good markets for their exports and services in addition to the monopoly they have on oil exploration in the kingdoms.

Those oppressed had to flee from prosecution and either entered Europe or America legally or illegally, the youths among them received western education or trained in some fields a good number of them could not get good jobs and could not go back to their countries for obvious reasons.

The support given to the rulers is bound to generate ill feelings against the imperialists and instead of the western world and America to address the issue positively, they preferred calling the dissidents, terrorists to please the feudal rulers. This is the crux of the conflict in which the U. S. had spearheaded all along which became open after the cold war.

The presence and strength of the then Soviet Union in world affairs, no doubt checkmated the western imperialists on their attitude towards the Middle East; the end of the Chile gave free access to the Western countries and U. S. to actualise their objectives in the Arab affairs.

I have gone this far to indicate how the pressure for a change in governance in the Middle East brought some political awareness in few Arab countries except Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Jordan and Gulf States that are still ruled by kings backed by United States and Britain.

For President Bush to claim that it is the duty of U.S. or the civilized nations to liberate Islamic countries by establishing democratic governance by force, is absolutely ridiculous and absurd; an outrageous aversion in deed.

In less than a year after the presidential election in which the electorate returned George Bush back for the second term, it appears that some electorate are having a re-think which is now gathering momentum in many circles that the war in Iraq was unjustified. The opposing candidate, Mr. John Kerry, did make the Iraq war an issue and yet the majority was said to have voted for continuation of the war. The opportunity, which the U. S. electorate had, was to have elected John Kerry as the saving face for the government measures toward the withdrawal of her forces, and the termination of the coalition for the immediate involvement of the U. N. to embark on the dynamics to end the war in Iraq. Kerry’s election would have soften the temperament for an appeal to the conscience of the people of Iraq to halt the insurgence and allow the U.S. and coalition forces to pull out of Iraq peacefully, as was done in Lebanon when the Syrian troops that had occupied the country for over two decades pulled out with dignity.