I’ve been mainly immersed in matters Mozambican this week. (When I wasn’t doing other bits of work on Palestine or Rwanda…. Tenth anniversary of Rwandan genocide coming up April 7th. Great-sounding ‘Frontline’ special on that subject on April 1st. My contribution to it will be on their website, not on the broadcast.)
So anyway, back to Mozambique. I was writing about the landmark elections they had there in October 1994. Those were the country’s first-ever democratic elections. The commitment to holding them was enshrined in the General Peace Agreement that in October 1992 ended 17 years of truly devastating civil war between the Frelimo government and the Renamo insurrectionists…
There is at least one aspect of those elections that is of direct relevance to the elections hopefully to be planned soon inside Iraq– namely: the key role that the “international community” played not solely in helping to organize the elections but also, crucially, in certifying their outcome.
All of which bears out my theory that the esential “legitimacy” of a sovereign government has much to do with the ability of this government to win the recognition of its legitimacy by other governments, as well as its ability to win the “consent” of those over whom it governs. (Recognition of other beings as fully right-bearing persons also has much to do with the recognition of this status by other persons, as well. But that’s a whole different, though intriguingly parallel, line of enquiry.)
So, in Mozambique in 1994, the elections were due to be held October 27-28. But on October 25 the Renamo chief, Afonso Dhlakama suddenly went into a funk and declared that he and his people would not take part. Yikes! A similar thing had happened with the IFP, in South Africa’s elections just six months earlier–but ended up getting resolved. But in October 1992, in Angola, UNITA’s Jonas Savimbi had contested the results of the UN-sponsored elections immediately after his defeat in them had been announced; and he then reignited his insurgency against the Luanda government… And that horrifying civil war has only recently now been brought toward an end…
So in Mozambique, Dhlakama went to his home city, Beira, and holed up there, and refused to come down to the capital, Maputo.
All the diplomats who were in the country, desperately eager to see the elections work, went into a big tizzy. The South African Ambassador was the only one Dhlakama would talk to. He flew up to Beira and started talking to him. Dhlakama expressed all the complaints he had about Frelimo’s alleged misdeeds in the organization of the election…
Negotiations ensued. In the early morning of October 27, the head of the electoral commission, Brazao Mazula, announced that the two-day-long elections would go ahead as planned… Still no constructive word from Dhlakama… But the negotiations continued round the clock…
In the early morning of the second day of the election, the key foreign diplomats finally told Dhlakama that if he agreed to take part in the elections, they would promise that after the election they would not certify it to have been ‘free and fair’ until after they had had the chance to examine the validity of all his complaints against Frelimo. In fact, they even signed a solemn declaration to that effect, in his presence.
He went on national radio announcing that he and the rest of Renamo would be taking part, and urging people to vote for him.
Electoral commission chief Mazula went on the radio announcing that the polling places would be kept open for an additional day.
The elections continued successfully. It was not till mid-November, however, that the UN secretary-general’s representative declared that he judged that the elections had been free and fair. Mazula then announced the count: Frelimo had won– both the Presidency, and a majority in the parliament. The caucus of foreign ambassadors gave their endorsement to the result; and Dhlakama swallowed it.
And so, that final act in the termination of the 1975-92 civil war ended successfully. Thank G-d! Dhlakama became transformed from being the truculent head of the very violent insurgency into being head of the parliamentary opposition. In 1999, the country had a second election, with more or less the same result.
But in late 1994 the role of the group of foreign ambassadors had been crucial. They gave Dhlakama the confidence he felt he desperately needed, but lacked, in the integrity of the electoral process. (That process, by the way, was controlled by an all-Mozambican election commission, not by the UN, though the UN helped. On the election commission, Renamo had seven seats, Frelimo had ten, and four were held by indepedents, including Mazula.)
And the relevance of all this for Iraq is?
Well, I’m too tired to spell it all out for you all, but I’m sure you JWN readers are smart enough to see some possible parallels there…