Mandela and Obama: is one a saint and one a sinner?
Author: Prof Adekeye Adebajo
Date: 23 July 2018
Publication: Business Day
Image supplied by: John-Paul Henry via Unsplash
What is often lacking in South Africa’s political discourse is a sense of proportion. Some of the histrionic reactions to former US president, Barack Obama, delivering the centenary Nelson Mandela lecture in Johannesburg last week, were beyond absurd. That the most powerful black man in the history of civilisation could not honour the most famous black man that ever lived, was simply preposterous. Such critics were mute when former US president, Bill Clinton, and former UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan – who had both failed to respond courageously to the 1994 Rwandan genocide – as well as Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the former Liberian president – who had financially supported the warlord, Charles Taylor, at the start of the country’s civil war – delivered the Mandela lecture. Does Clinton really have more legitimacy to deliver such a lecture than Obama?
Both Mandela and Obama were the first black presidents of their countries; both were Nobel peace laureates who admired Gandhi; and both set up foundations named after them. But whereas Mandela was the saint, spending 27 years in jail for his beliefs, before acting as a black Moses in leading his people to the promised land of liberation; Obama, in contrast, was the sinner, the sorcerer and false prophet, Elymas, who led his people into a barren wilderness.
Obama lacked the courage of his conviction and effectively became a servant of Empire: he militarised US policy towards Africa and rendered Libya anarchic in the misguided 2011 NATO intervention. He also unleashed drone warfare in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, and Mali which killed an estimated 3,500 people, including many innocent civilians. Despite claiming to be promoting “strong institutions rather than strong men,” he supported the military autocracy of Egypt’s Abdel Fattah el-Sisi with an annual $1 billion.
More positively, Obama achieved a landmark health-care bill, restored diplomatic relations with Cuba, and reached a historic nuclear deal with Iran: all three achievements that are now being unravelled by his belligerent successor, Donald Trump. Mandela’s saintliness has also sometimes been questioned. As the national high priest of reconciliation, Madiba has recently been accused of failing to address South Africa’s racially-skewed structural inequalities, and of instead forgiving South Africa’s former white oppressors without a proper penance or reparation. Mandela also disastrously linked his name to that of the grotesque imperialist, Cecil Rhodes, in the Mandela Rhodes Foundation of 2002.
Obama had delivered the most eloquent eulogy at Mandela’s memorial service in Johannesburg in December 2013, describing him as “a giant of history, who moved a nation towards justice, and in the process moved billions around the world…the last great liberator of the 20th century.” His Mandela lecture in Johannesburg was, in contrast, disappointingly policy-wonkish and uninspirational. Obama noted that Mandela symbolised the “universal aspirations of dispossessed people all over the world,” acknowledging that Madiba had inspired him to become a political activist to fight against social injustice in the late 1970s. He praised the “grace and generosity” with which Mandela had embraced his former enemies, and the wisdom he demonstrated in stepping down after only one presidential term.
But most of Obama’s speech presented a broad historical sweep of the major developments in world history: democracy, decolonisation, civil rights, globalisation, trans-national terror. His central message was a staunch defence of liberal democracy as the only accountable system, in contrast to zero-sum nationalism, Chinese autocratic mercantilism, and strongman rule in Russia and beyond. He criticised the “politics of populism,” and continuously stressed the need to protect a free press in order to safeguard democracy. Obama also condemned the promotion of anti-intellectualism and a denial of science and facts, in another unsubtle dig at his nativist presidential successor. He was particularly scathing in lambasting the “explosion in economic inequality” and the avaricious perverseness of a few dozen billionaires controlling more wealth than 75% of the global population. He called instead for more human solidarity, and advocated an inclusive market-based system in which wealth was more equitably distributed. He championed Mandela’s lesson in recognising a common humanity in the spirit of Ubuntu.
As the Johannesburg sun set on Obama’s Mandela lecture, it was interesting to contrast the legacies of two of the most powerful and influential black figures in world history: one a saint, the other a sinner.
Professor Adekeye Adebajo is Director of the University of Johannesburg’s Institute for Pan-African Thought and Conversation.
External Article: The Mandela-Obama Legacies In Comparative Perspective And Reflections On Obama’s Commemorative Lecture
Ms Zoliswa Ntsoko (South Africa) is the Institute’s Administrative Assistant who assists with general administration and research. She is a seasoned professional with a background in Disaster Management. She holds an Advanced Diploma in Management from Milpark Business School, and a Post Graduate Diploma in Public Management from Regenesys Business School. She also holds certificates in Project Management, and in Disaster Management. Previously, she has worked as a Disaster Management Specialist at the City of Johannesburg – Disaster Management Centre.
Ms Cecilia Lwiindi Nedziwe-Moyo is the Research Coordinator at the Institute for Pan-African Thought and Conversation. She previously served as a Regional Coordinator at the Centre for Peace Initiatives in Africa (CPIA) in Zimbabwe between 2007 and 2013. She completed her master’s degree in International Studies, Peace, and Conflict Resolution at the University of Queensland in Australia as a Rotary Peace Scholar. She has just completed her doctoral studies at Rhodes University. Her areas of interest include: gender, foreign policy, regional organisations and conflict resolution.
Ms Thembeka Somtseu is a seasoned professional with a background in the textile and construction sectors. She holds a National Diploma in Business Administration from the Durban University of Technology, and studied Development Communication and Media Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand. She worked as a corporate communications specialist for more than ten years, serving in both local and multinational companies.