Drama hath no boundary like an African leader’s Summit

What is Zambia’s president Michael Sata so suspicious about? How did Rwanda’s president Paul Kagame solve his seating problem? What is the hush-hush talk about Dlamini-Zuma’s second job? And why might the 90 year-old Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe be having the last laugh?

An invite is in the post

Zimbabwe’s Rebort Mugabe is having a very good 90th year. Not only did the leaders of the southern african Development Community endorse his election landslide in July 2013, they appointed him chairman of their organisation. And then in Addis, the leaders elected President Mugabe vice- chairman of the AU: that’s put him in pole position to become its chairman next year. That effectively forced the European Union to invite Mugabe (despite sanctions against him) to its special summit with the au in April. According to Aldo Dell’ariccia, the EU ambassador to Harare, it was always the organisation’s intention to invite Mugabe to the summit… of course it was.

Bald heads will roll

Zambia’s president Michael Sata is a man of decided convictions, as his sobriquet ‘King Cobra’ suggests, and he made this clear at the AU summit. Sata doesn’t trust men with shiny pates. Given that several of Sata’s counterparts are bald, that has triggered some diplomatic awkwardness. Both Presidents Jacob Zuma and Joseph Kabila have been asked by Sata why they shave their heads. The issue proved more serious for ministers John Phiri and Ngosa Simbyakula in Lusaka: they were simply told to choose between their jobs or their shaved heads.

Will she return?

Is Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, fresh from her third summit as African Union Commission chair, looking to return to South African politics? Already she is known as a record-breaking frequent flyer on the addis to Johannesburg route. Talk of such a political move intensified after Dlamini-Zuma’s name appeared among the top 30 on the African National Congress’s list of prospective MPs. And she remains, along with ANC deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa, a frontrunner to succeed her former husband President Jacob Zuma.

When push comes to shove

The soldiers and spooks guarding Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame are not known for their courtesy or sense of humour. When President Kagame arrived at a luncheon hosted by Nigeria’s Olusegun Obasanjo at the AU summit and his name was not on the guest list, the AU security officers had asked them to wait while the matter was resolved. But the men from Kigali pushed the obstructive officials out of the way and, before you could say ‘Mouvement du 23 mars’, President Kagame had swept through the melée and was seated comfortably at the high table.

Copyright The Africa Report 2014