An African Story George W. Bush Missed

Mulugta Alemu
26 February 2008

In his one week long, second time itinerary in Africa, US president Gorge W. Bush toured Tanzania, Ghana, Benin, Rwanda and Liberia. His first presidential visit happened during his first tenure in 2003.

George W. Bush’s visit provides a good glimpse as much into the future of US’s strategic relationship with Africa as it does into US’s past imprints during Bush’s eventful eight years in the White House. It is not surprising that an American president whose tenure is so much tainted with myriads of not quite-glorious foreign policy decisions such as the war in Iraq, sought to use his African trip to remind both friends and foes, about the achievement’s of his ‘compassionate conservatism’ which has provided, among others, the Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, a more than 15 billion USD commitment towards eradication and treatment of diseases such as HIV/AIDs and malaria in the continent.

His carefully crafted schedule ensured that no opening is left which will invite a partisan attack in Washington. He has broadly called for solutions in Dartford and Kenya and applauded positive developments in countries which he has visited. Speculations erupted on his decisions leaving out some countries from his visits. For example, the Ethiopian diaspora opposition attempted to make a big deal out of the fact that Ethiopia was not included in Bush’s itinerary. Well big and important African countries such as Nigeria, South Africa were also not included in his visit. It can also not be said that the president only visited Africa’s model democracies. If that was the case, he would not have found himself in Kigali either.

George W. Bush’s visit has carefully ignored many of the countries that are strategically important for the US. The world’s hegemon needs the support of South Africa and Nigeria to aggressively promote its agenda in the continent. Ethiopia, Sub-Saharan Africa’s second most populous country, is the US’s vital partner in the Horn of Africa. More than 1500 US troops are based in Djibouti. More than 15 percent of US oil import comes from oil-producing African countries. Almost all of these countries are not included in the trip. As such it can generally be said that whether a country is included in the official visit can not be used as a bar for measuring the strategic weight of the country concerned.

But what we know is that a possible trip to Ethiopia would have garnered a fitting story to what Bush wanted to highlight. Ethiopia presents a case for how a responsible government can take best advantage of Western commitment to a national effort of eradication of poverty and diseases. Ethiopian economy is Africa’s fastest growing economy among non-oil producing countries. Ethiopia has a government which has already managed to decrease child mortality by over 40 percent in the last one decade. Educational enrolment for children has already leaped into 90 percent, compared to a meagre 40 percent in the early 90s. No other African country has invested so heavily in infrastructure from roads to IT. Ethiopia and Uganda present the two compelling anti-HIV/AIDs national campaigns that have reduced rate of infection, and provides better opportunity for treatment. Ethiopian villages have now schools, clinics, mills and roads. These investments have improved the lives of women and children in Ethiopia’s rural villages. In general, Ethiopian government is disciplined, pro-poor and clean.

On the political front, Ethiopia remains to be the only country struggling to entrench democracy in the Horn of Africa. As much as the post May 2005 elections violence rolled back some of its previous political gains, Ethiopia still has hundreds of opposition MPs in its federal parliament. Several state legislatures accommodate opposition representation. Almost all of the detained opposition party members are released. Despite hiccups, the private press is thriving and growing. The decision of the government to hold a free and fair district election in April 2008 is testament to its faith that democracy is the only viable modicum of governance for the future.

Of course there are some who don’t share such a positive assessment of developments in Ethiopia. Some have legitimate concerns and expectations whereas others such as very few members of the US House of Representatives have a clearly partisan, US-focused position on Ethiopia that is far removed from issues that are of concern to the Ethiopian people. If Bush had visited Ethiopia, he would have been subjected to an undeniable political ordeal in Washington from these very few congressmen. For long, many commentators have rightly pointed out how initiative masquerading as pro-democracy commitments abroad from some legislators are potentially alienating government who are genuinely committed for partnership with the US and its interest in promoting human rights in Africa. Ethiopia provides a stark example of an egregious shortcoming of such naïve policies.

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