JOHANNESBURG: On hearing that the United States had brushed aside Iraq’s decision to allow weapons inspectors back in, former South African president Nelson Mandela this week lambasted President George W. Bush’s government.

“What right has Bush to come and say the offer is not genuine,” asked a fuming Mandela, who has kept up a steady barrage of criticism against America for its stance against Iraq for the past three weeks.

“We must condemn that very strongly. That’s why I criticize leaders for keeping quiet when one country wants to bully the whole world,” he added on Tuesday as the world began assimilating the meaning of Iraq’s announcement and the United States and British responses.

South Africa’s foreign affairs department welcomed Iraq’s decision. It hoped that “full compliance by Iraq with this key demand by the international community will pave the way for the easing of the current tensions. It should lead to the lifting of sanctions against Iraq,” said foreign affairs spokesperson Ronnie Mamoepa.

Speaking in her capacity as chair of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), South Africa’s foreign affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma also welcomed Iraq’s decision, saying she hoped it would lead, eventually, to the normalization of relations between the United Nations and Iraq.

“We reaffirm NAM’s position on the need for the respect of Iraq’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and unity and political independence in accordance with the United Nations Charter and International law,” said Dlamini-Zuma.

The Muslim Youth Movement, an influential group of Muslims across the racial spectrum in South Africa was concerned that the US reaction went against the grain. “The imperative now is to prevent a war,” said spokesperson Na’eem Jeenah.

Reports out of America suggested that war strategy was still in top gear, with a base on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia being manned for war. White House spokespersons discounted Iraq’s decision as only a “tactic”. “If war is launched by the US against Iraq, the victims will not be the dictator Saddam Hussein and cronies, but ordinary Iraqi people who have already been battered by a decade of sanctions,” added Jeena.

Voices speaking out against a war in Iraq have been bolstered by that of Mandela. In the middle of the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg this month, Mandela began ramping up the pressure against Bush.

In meetings with a succession of world leaders including French president Jacques Chirac and British prime minister Tony Blair, the elder statesman pleaded for a return to the United Nations and against “unilateralism”. He complained that Bush did not take his calls and revealed that he had tried an old African custom to appeal to the respect for the elders.

While he was not able to speak to the present White House incumbent, he put a similar message of peace and faith in the United Nations to former president George Bush senior. “Talk to your son, I told him,” said Mandela.

Mandela still commands international respect, though the jury’s out on his ability to get the United States to change tack. “I don’t think Madiba’s (Mandela’s) influential enough to dissuade America from its course,” believes Chris Landsberg of the Centre for Africa’s International Relations at the Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg, adding “I think the US is so hell-bent on its course that there’s nothing anybody can do.”

But the old man’s words might have an impact on public opinion - a vital factor in times of war or near war. Says Landsberg: “Where it will have greater impact is that somebody as revered as Mandela is in the US has driven home the message of how other people view the US and that it is running the risk of becoming isolated in world affairs.”

While global debate is often cosseted in the language of diplomacy, Mandela has used his African elder cloak to let rip, most notably in the last edition of Newsweek.

He labelled US vice-president Dick Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld “dinosaurs...misleading the president”, and called the attitude of the United States “a threat to world peace”.

In addition, Mandela accused the United States and Britain of being racist in their dealings with the United Nations. “Why should there be one standard for one country, especially because it is black, and another standard for another country, Israel, that is white?”

Asked why he was still such an activist, when he had announced his intention to retire restfully, Mandela replied: “The problems are such that for anybody with a conscience who can use whatever influence he may have to try to bring about peace, it’s difficult to say no.” —Dawn-Inter Press Service