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God save Darfur because we
won’t
E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Ghanadot
June 4, 2007
This is not a statement on faith
or a disclaimer of it. Nor is it a claim that God will or won’t
save Darfur. Whether God will or not is beyond my ability to
discern.
But given the situation in Darfur
today, it seems certain to assume that no one would.
As things stand now, the world,
by every definition of it, is a mere bystander in the
affairs of Sudan. And
unfortunate for the people in the Darfur region of Sudan, their
fate will be dictated by the choices of the very leaders of
the world who currently don't seem to care very much for them.
These world leaders have a choice
to make. Either they
intervene forcefully in Sudan or engage in a peaceful dialogue
with the government of Sudan as the only reasonable course left.
In the face of the cruelties that
have transpired in the Darfur region, it shouldn’t be difficult
to assume that one cannot reason with the perpetrators of the
horrendous ethnic cleansing that is ongoing in the region.
To insist on doing so with the
perpetrators, the masters of the diabolical acts in the region,
is to be deliberately cruel to the point of being diabolical.
To start with the conflict in
Darfur is genocide.
It is that plain and simple.
It is easy to know genocide when
it happens. And so
far, very few nations have recognized it as such. Though there
have been some talks about military action to stem the killings,
it would be sane not to hold one's breath for this to happen.
The nations who could likely use
force for the sensible result to happen in Darfur are not likely
do so because of the power Arab oil holds over them.
China, even if it wanted to,
would not because it is enthralled by Sudan as a possible tong
term oil resource country, and, therefore is more likely to be
compliant with Sudan’s wishes.
Africa, perpetually weak, with no
force of her own, will continue to look on to see her sons and
daughters in Darfur mowed down by the unfolding tragedy.
The AU, on the issue of Darfur so
far has called for “dialogue.” Like
the rest of the countries of the world, it is ready to use the
world as a safe-house for non-action.
For the West, a “dialogue” may
seem like a politically profitable posture, or rather as a
knee-jerk reaction to Bush’s interventionist policy on Iraq.
Iraq was too much, so “dialogue” could be a plausible
default mode.
But if even the AU will not see
the genocide as a reason to use force and part ways with Sudan
why should one then not suppose that Europeans might think that
using force in Sudan could only result as a fool’s quest as
happened in Iraq?
But wait till you hear Professor
Jeffrey Sachs, the esteemed economist, join the do-nothing group
on Darfur.
In a statement timed to come soon
after President Bush pronounced his economic sanction on Darfur,
against Sudan, Sachs showed his displeasure.
Sachs claimed that Bush’s
economic sanctions “would do little to address the underlying
causes of the four-year conflict.”
By the way, the same Professor
Sachs was always against war. In Bosina. No?
The professor’s premise on the
cause of the Darfur conflict, as reported on TomPaine.com,
shouldn’t be the ground for disagreement.
But his conclusion
should.
The premise that “Darfur has been
caught in a drought-induced death trap, but nobody has seen fit
to approach the Darfur crisis from the perspective of long-term
development rather than the perspective of war.” should not
cause concern.
But his conclusion that “Darfur
needs a water strategy more than a military strategy” should
serve as a warning for trouble because Sachs, in reality, had no
solution to the problem in the Darfur region.
What should one do about the
ongoing genocide; tell the victims to hold on until the water
problem was fixed?
That Darfur is in the arid region
of Sudan should be a description, but not necessarily a
statement for solution or intervention for peace.
Professor Sachs was described by
BBC's Karen Allen as “professor at Columbia University, an
adviser to the UN secretary-general, (and) a long critic of US
foreign policy."
Any surprise that Sachs should
speak soon after Bush’s pronouncement?
Professor Sachs was asking the
world not to use force in Darfur until “the underlying causes”
were stemmed.
His approach could be likened to
a trauma victim who was being asked by his doctor to wait for a
yet to be manufactured medication.
“Until we face up to the
underlying reality that at the core, Darfur is a hungry,
water-stressed, impoverished area that needs economic
development," solution to the Darfur genocide should wait for
the world to settle on some all agreeably funded heavy
development plan for Sudan first.
Others have strongly condemned
Professor Sachs’ prescription as a mark of impunity.
Sudan to date has waffled from
one agreement to the other and from one dialogue to another.
Meanwhile, the genocide in Darfur has continued.
It will be interesting to know
what Professor Sachs said about Bosnia.
Were economic development plans put in place before the
military intervention and the tribunals?
One should recall that before
anything was done by the West, the cry “genocide” had already
gone up to bring attention to what was happening in Bosnia.
It could be
good to
note that the word “genocide” has
yet to be used to describe what is going on today. And
Professor Sachs’ is yet to use the word or show concern for it
in his perspective on Darfur.
The Bush administration has
maintained, since the days of former Secretary of State Colin
Powell, that Darfur was genocide.
Professor Sachs reputed
opposition to Bush’s foreign policy has been clear for some
time. His silence on
the issue of genocide in Darfur is loud.
But it has still left us confused as to what exactly he
wanted done to save the people of the Darfur region.
In the four years of the Darfur
conflict, according to the BBC, “more than 200,000 people (have)
died …. and 2m have fled their homes.”
The dead could be higher. For,
who could say with certainty that all in the 2 million that fled
from their homes arrived intact and safe at their destinations?
We should also add that the dead
counted were mostly African Sudanese, all victims of the
Janjaweed, Arab Sudanese militants.
The persuasion is there today to
call Darfur a genocide. It
lies in the fact that there are two races involved in the
conflict. All are
Islamic. Religion, therefore, could not be the factor.
We may agree with Professor Sachs
that the conflict can be driven by scarce resources.
But while we wait for
change for new resource formations, we could still agree that
the conflict is being waged on racial lines.
Powerful Arab Janjaweeds are cleansing out feeble
Sudanese Africans.
Professor Sachs’ development plan
alone, no matter how massive, will not help dissuade people of a
race who are hell-bent on wiping out the other.
Again, it will be gratifying to
learn what Professor Sachs said about Bosnia.
But, like it or not, Darfur is “genocide.” It will take a
superior military force to bring the Janjaweed and the
government of Sudan to their senses.
E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Washington
D.C, June 4, 2007
Permission to publish: Please feel free to publish or reproduce,
with credits, unedited. If posted on a website, email a copy of
the web page to publisher@ghanadot.com. Or don't publish at all.
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