| 15 September 2004 | Wednesday | 29 Rajab 1425 |
State of college education
Understanding bureaucracy
A blow for private enterprise
It was to have been expected that the Republican convention in New York and the hype and hoopla attached to it would give the Bush re-election campaign a boost. It was known that the Republicans had chosen New York because they hoped that in the city where 9/11 had wreaked the greatest havoc, Bush would be better able to reinforce his image as a strong leader and as the most suitable commander-in-chief to lead the nation in the war on terror.
Democrats and many independent observers, however, believed that this boost would be limited. By their reckoning, the fiasco in Iraq and the less well publicized but almost equally difficult situation in Afghanistan had damaged Bush's standing and reduced his credibility.
He would therefore, not be able to make the case for "strong leadership". The voter's attention all over the United States but particularly in New York would be on the failings of Bush's domestic policies. New York, after all, was the bastion of Democratic voters.
Moreover anti-Bush demonstrators from all over the country had converged on New York and had successfully negotiated with the Republican mayor of New York or obtained through courts the right to hold protest marches and to picket virtually every venue at which Republican delegates were expected to congregate.
They would drive home the message that Bush's conduct of the war against terror had made America "less safe", and had alienated America's traditional allies.
They would highlight the theme that in Bush's America, the rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer, that for the first time in American history more jobs had been lost (about one million) than had been created, that more people were now living below the poverty line and more people were without health care than at any other time in recent American history.
The media, particularly the liberal press believed that "Mr Bush confronts a divided and sceptical electorate, with polls showing a slim majority of voters believing that the country is on the wrong track and in need of a change."
The Washington Post even opined that "What we would hope for from Mr. Bush is not simply chest-thumping about the benefits of dislodging the Taliban and overthrowing Saddam Hussein but a more candid reflection on the ways those campaigns have fallen short: the unanticipated insurgencies, the inadequacy of postwar preparations and the shocking abuses of Iraqi detainees."
Democratic expectations as much as the expectations of leader-page writers were belied. The Republicans weathered successfully the storm of protests and demonstrations with tight security and some legally questionable arrests keeping the impact of the demonstrations within control.
The enthusiasm of the party faithful was kept at a high pitch and there was little evidence of doubts and misgivings as the campaign managers unfolded their game plan of making security the main issue of the election.
Such spokesmen of the moderate wing of the Republican Party as former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Guiliani and Senator McCain, came on to invoke the memory of 9/11 and to extol Bush's outstanding leadership while presenting a plausible if not entirely convincing case for the war in Iraq.
Guiliani carried conviction since New Yorkers and Americans generally had vivid memories of the role he played in holding the city together after the 9/11 while battling cancer.
McCain carried conviction since he was a moderate Republican and a Vietnam War hero and someone that Democrat candidate Kerry had wanted as his running mate.
A dissenting Democrat Senator Zell Miller presented a devastating critique of his own party's nominee accusing him of being soft on defence and of being wishy-washy in his policy formulations, and while the liberal press rightly condemned the speech as an unwarranted "rant" there was no doubt about the enthusiasm with which the delegates welcomed the denunciation of Kerry.
President Bush himself on the last day of the convention reiterated in what was probably one of the finest speeches of his political life the theme of security, "We're staying on the offensive, striking terrorist abroad so we do not have to face them here at home"..."By promoting liberty abroad, we will build a safer world."
He highlighted what he asserted were the successes of his policy recalling, "Pakistan was a transit point for terrorist groups. Saudi Arabia was fertile ground for terrorist fund-raising" and maintaining, that today "Pakistan is capturing terrorist leaders; Saudi Arabia is making raids and arrests."
He claimed that the Taliban had been defeated in Afghanistan and that democracy was taking hold there; that Iraq had been liberated and the outlook for democracy was hopeful; that Libya was dismantling its nuclear weapons programme; and that three-quarters of key Al Qaeda members and associates had been either detained or killed.
In all this, he made little or no mention of the setbacks suffered in Afghanistan or in Iraq or of the heavy casualties the American forces had suffered or inflicted in Iraq or of the expanding insurgency.
He made no mention of the problems he faced in Iran and North Korea let alone of the contribution his policies had made to the creation of these problems. On the domestic front, he laid out a long list of objectives that he intended to pursue but made no mention of how these were to be financed, nor did he care to explain how his assertions, for instance, on providing additional funds for job training were to be reconciled with his budget proposals which called for funding cuts in these programmes.
The glaring omissions of acknowledgement of things that had gone wrong or misstatements on what he could achieve in his domestic agenda, however, mattered far less than the image he was able to project of a strong leader and of a sympathetic personality to whom the American public could relate.
His peroration "Like generations before us, we have a calling from beyond the stars to stand for freedom," invited thunderous applause and suggested that he had struck a responsive chord.
The truth of the matter, however, is that much of what Bush was able to achieve as a result of the convention - going from a possible four per cent disadvantage in the polls to an 11 per cent lead - flowed less from his personal charisma and the appeal of the policies he advocated and more from the failings of his Democratic opponent and the poor handling of his campaign.
To start with, Kerry made the mistake of saying that he would have voted to authorize the president to invade Iraq even if he had known that Saddam Hussein was not armed with unconventional weapons. Bush jumped on what he recognized as a political opening and began hammering Kerry on the issue.
Kerry, too, seemed to feel - as the presence of military people and of Kerry's comrades in arms from the Vietnam era at centre stage in the Democratic convention showed - that security and his credentials as a wartime leader or at least as a military leader would be the main issue in the elections.
After the convention, however, the publicity attracted by an organization called the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" and its allegations that Kerry had lied about the nature of his service in Vietnam and had not earned the medals he was awarded damaged the standing of the Democratic nominee considerably.
Despite the fact that most of the allegations made against Kerry have been disproved, the damage persists and has contributed more than anything else to his current discomfiture.
It is likely, however, that Kerry will recover. For one Bush's own military record is now being subjected to the same sort of scrutiny. What seems to emerge is that Bush managed to evade service in Vietnam and used political influence to be inducted in the air force reserves.
Even in that capacity, he did not fulfil all his obligations. There are questions about whether, in the absence of the political influence of his father, he would even have received an honourable discharge. Vice President Cheney has been having a difficult time explaining why he sought deferment after deferment and thus also evaded service in Vietnam.
Kerry has also taken on board the sagacious political advice that former President Clinton has offered from his hospital bed. More importantly, he has also included in his campaign team many of the stars of Clinton's own political team.
They will now be pushing it, it seems, to ensure that Bush is not able to keep the focus of American attention on security where he seems to have an unbeatable lead while excluding domestic issues which are perceived to be his weak point.
At the same time, Kerry will need to keep hammering away at the fact that he will be a good commander in chief and will protect America's security better than the ill-conceived Bush policies have been able to do.
He will be hoping that the news from Iraq and Afghanistan continues to be bad. American military deaths have now risen beyond 1,000 and more Americans have died since the transfer of power to the Iraqi interim government than were killed during the actual combat operations against Saddam Hussein forces. He will, of course, be hoping that there is no decisive success in the war against terrorism such as the capture of Osama bin Laden.
For us in Pakistan what is important is that whether Kerry wins, as I expect, or Bush is re-elected the preoccupation with terrorism will remain. Kerry may be able to focus greater attention on domestic issues but he will have to promise (because this is the expectation of the American people) that he will, perhaps with greater wisdom but equal determination pursue the war against terror.
It is also unfortunately true that Kerry will do little that is different on tackling the "root causes" of terrorism, specifically on Palestine. That requirement of "enlightened moderation" will be met as little by Kerry as it has been by Bush.
Many in Pakistan have been concerned if not enraged by Kerry's statement that he would seek to exercise greater control over Pakistan's nuclear programme.
They are concerned about the fact that Kerry's prominence in the Senate came in part from the hearings he held on the BCCI scandal and the biases he subsequently acquired towards the Pakistanis involved in the scandal and by extension towards their country of origin. These concerns are justified but they are exaggerated.
We should recognize that the Bush administration too looks askance at Pakistan's nuclear assets, not so much because of the fear of loose controls by the present set-up but because that they may fall into extremist hands.
We must recognize that in part the Bush administration's support for President Musharraf flows from the perception that he is the best safeguard against extremism in Pakistan even while they question his credibility on other issues. Pakistan will continue to be a "frontline state".
It will continue to receive assistance for its social sectors particularly education and to receive such defence assistance as would help it guard its borders against terrorist infiltration.
State of college education
There has been one positive outcome of the so-called college denationalization debate that has raged ever since the Sindh government announced its decision to "transfer" the St Joseph's and St Patrick's colleges to their original owners. Public attention has been focused on the state of college education in the country.
Given the unrealistic nature of some of the claims and allegations made by the parties, which are resisting the transfer of these colleges, it is important to put the issue in correct perspective. The arguments advanced by the critics of denationalization are:
* The nationalized colleges are doing very well under the present management, since their students clinch the top positions in the exams. Hence the arrangement should not be disturbed
* If these colleges are handed back to the private sector, the "poor" of Karachi will be denied access to the two best colleges in the city
* Nationalization was the best solution to the challenge of providing college education to the masses
Even a cursory look at the college education sector should be sufficient to expose the fallacy of these arguments. It is the biggest disservice to the cause of education in Pakistan if we fail to explicitly recognize the falling academic standards in the country. The teachers, by and large, admit that. But they do not see themselves as the basic cause of this problem.
The fact is that when the colleges - 175 in all - were nationalized in September 1972 under MLR 118 the move gave the teachers a security of service unheard of before.
One of the aims of the nationalization policy was said to be to provide better service conditions to the teachers. Fair enough. We know how some unscrupulous private school and college owners exploited and maltreated their teaching staff. They were underpaid, forced to sign receipts for higher payments than they actually received and in some cases are known to have been publicly abused.
In this context, the aim of improving service conditions was a legitimate objective and it was achieved by nationalization. The teachers' salaries went up and they gained state protection against exploitation and maltreatment.
But this security of service was used by a large number of teachers for personal advantage rather than to further the cause of education. It brought in its wake the curse of absenteeism, the tuition syndrome and trade unionism of the worst kind to put pressure on the government. To earn extra money, some teachers opened private tuition centres for the same students they were supposed to be teaching in colleges.
All this affected standards as the rate of expansion of the college network slowed down and overcrowding became the norm. The government, no doubt, reduced the fees to make college education affordable for all, but in the process failed to open as many new colleges as were needed because it didn't have the resources for it.
Some of the statistics taken from government sources are very significant. College education in Pakistan took a downward turn after the colleges were nationalized. In the 10 years before nationalization (1963-1972), 144 new colleges were set up in the country. In the decade after nationalization (1972-1981) only 99 new colleges came up.
In the eighties and nineties, when permission was granted to set up private colleges, 186 and 228 new colleges were established in 1982-91 and 1990-99 respectively.
Making education low cost - but also of a low standard - did not boost enrolment in a massive way as is generally believed. In the 10 years before nationalization, enrolment in colleges had gone up by 58 per cent.
In the nationalization years, the increase slid down to 45 per cent while in 1982-1991 it suddenly jumped up to 128 per cent. In the decade of the nineties it slid to an all time low of 25 per cent and has been falling ever since.
The reason for this decline is mainly the fall in standards. As a result, the pressure has moved to the good private colleges in spite of the fact that they charge higher fees and admit a limited number of students on merit and according to their capacity.
The government colleges have failed to attract a growing number of students despite their being accessible and affordable. The moot question is: why has the government not tried to improve the standards of its own colleges and why has it not opened enough of its own colleges?
Take the case of Karachi. The nazim, Mr Naimutullah Khan, announced the other day that since he has been in office he has opened 30 colleges in the city - an average of 10 per annum.
That would appear to be an impressive performance especially when seen in the broader context of college education in the country. If you look at the ratio of the private and public sector colleges in the city, a significant picture emerges. Today there are 149 private colleges in Karachi as against 110 government colleges. (The figures were given by the Sindh Education Department).
The teachers should not believe that the St Joseph's Government College is doing very well because its students are clinching top positions in the board and university examinations.
Under the centralized admission policy introduced in 1999, the zonal scheme and quota system in admission were abolished and the all-Karachi open merit system was introduced.
That automatically draws the best students of the city to St Joseph's, which continues to live on its past glorious image. Hence the sizable number of position holders who are now sharing the honour with students from private colleges.
It is time the government worked out a rational policy vis-a-vis college education. While it is universally recognized that basic education is the fundamental right of a child and it is the responsibility of the state to provide it, it is unrealistic to expect universal college education as well, which should be the right of those who qualify for it.
The education sector needs to be reformed if it is not to be stratified with the children of the rich getting good education in private institutions and the children of the poor consigned to the public sector institutions which are in a state of decay.
But the solution does not lie in levelling the standards down. It would be more sensible to raise the standards of the government institutions (both schools and colleges) so that they can compete with the best private institutions as they used to do in the good old days.
Since the concept of public-private partnership has come to be accepted, the government cannot shirk its duties and put the load entirely on the private sector. By its very nature, the private sector will seek profits from its investment, unless of course it is a philanthropic trust or an NGO working on a no-profit-no-loss basis.
Hence in the interest of education, the government should hand back all the nationalized college buildings to their rightful owners who wish to take them back on the condition that they will set up a college there.
The existing colleges should be moved to new premises which are available. Thus the number of colleges will multiply. As for the private colleges which are coming up in substantial numbers, rules should be framed to protect the interests of the teachers and the students.
In a white paper that Prof Anita Ghulam Ali and Prof Karrar Husain had prepared on college education before nationalization, it was proposed that the status of the teachers be improved by getting the government to monitor the institutions closely to ensure implementation of the rules.
The authors of this paper had suggested that the colleges be given grants-in-aid and if they were in a deficit, the government should meet part of it to allow them to keep their tuition fees low. Thus through financial strings and auditors, it could exercise some control on these institutions and regulate their fees, teachers' salaries and discipline.
Understanding bureaucracy
Prime minister Shaukat Aziz has announced that in future the performance of federal ministers and their secretaries will be periodically evaluated and assessed for their real worth. This must be the first time in the history of Pakistan that such a test has been laid down.
One hopes the prime minister is serious. He should be since all his administrative training has been in the West where everyone is accountable for what he does or fails to do, and there is no place for deadwood and the good-for-nothing.
I think his one-line motto for ministers should be, "Talk less and do more." Many of them do nothing but talk and inflict their inanities on the poor public, provided the press is present to record their them. Another guideline could be, "Don't say what you are going to do. Confine your utterances to what you have achieved."
Mr Shaukat Aziz would do well to take federal secretaries into confidence in a separate meeting and put the fear of God into them. Things can take a turn for the better if the civil bureaucracy plays its part sincerely.
Because, whatever the innate strength of the ruling political party, and whatever the latent potential of the army in the new circumstances, the bureaucracy remains the most powerful section of the government, being the implementing agency for its plans and projects.
The prime minister must have found out during the last three years that the bureaucracy operates silently and insidiously, and, on the face of it, is at the beck and call of the government in power.
But the stark reality is that most regimes in Pakistan, even martial law, have played into its hands. Only in ZAB's time was it eclipsed for a while, but to its credit it bounced back into the driving seat in his last year.
Many people blame successive regimes for not exercising sufficient control over the bureaucracy. Why have elected governments not been able to do so? What is it that made them so dependent on the bureaucracy that they failed to give practical shape to this desire? Why did they feel handicapped, administratively and even politically, without the crutches provided by senior officers?
The fact is that on becoming a minister, a politician too has to work as an administrator, apart from laying down policy - whatever little there is of that commodity to lay down. But what experience of administration has he? In most cases less than that of an incipient assistant commissioner or a novice of a section officer in the secretariat.
In this situation he starts believing that good administration only means suspending officers or transferring them for being absent from their seat, though never for negligence of their public duty.
This experience can only be acquired over long years if there is uninterrupted democracy in the country and politicians go on getting the opportunity to work as administrators.
Then over the years they become adept in man-management and organization, and come to learn the language and the processes that constitute day-to-day government.
But democracy was not allowed to prevail uninterruptedly in Pakistan, with the result that more books have been written on that subject than on the actual history of Pakistan. So what experience can we expect the politician to have?
Look at it this way. When Mr Bhutto took over in December 1971, elected politicians had not had the chance to participate in proper democracy since October 1958.
Full thirteen years. In these thirteen years a whole generation had come to rule over Pakistan which was not even on nodding terms with democratic practices. Again, from July 1977 to August 1985, another new generation ignorant of democratic traditions had taken over at the base in government and in public institutions. How could you expect this generation to suddenly hold the reins of democracy with confidence?
Naturally these sporadic essays in democracy brought politicians into government who had no idea of how national affairs were to be conducted. Those who became ministers did not exactly know what a secretary was there for and relied on the half-baked briefing provided by self-serving private secretaries who usually played one against the other for selfish motives. On paper ministers were expected to provide "policy guidance" to secretaries when there was hardly a line between policy and implementation.
Personally I am inclined to blame our senior officers of the fifties and sixties for most of the ills of the country. These people were trained by the British, and were, by and large, honest, conscientious and dedicated to their jobs, and had tremendous valuable experience.
Had they stood up with integrity against the wrong and anti-people policies of successive political governments, and the first martial law to begin with, they would have saved the country from incalculable harm.
The service laws gave them full protection against victimisation. That way they wee really privileged as compared to those who followed them. But it is unfortunate, that, for selfish reasons and personal aggrandisement they succumbed to the underhand demands and whims of the politicians in power and failed to stem the rot when it started. After that, of course, it was a snowball effect, and things went on going from bad to worse. It is not easy to stop a snowball and who really wants to?
The bureaucracy is still very powerful and nothing that anybody says is going to diminish its power. Situated as they are, ruling regimes in Pakistan are beset by weaknesses of their own, and cannot do without bureaucrats, especially the police.
The power of the bureaucrats lies in drawing selfish advantage only and not in their undoubted ability. They no longer have the strength and the inclination to face up to corrupt ministers.
Here let me tell you of an incident. Prime minister hardly ever speak out their mind about the bureaucracy, but, I don't know why, PM Benazir Bhutto once did. In a speech in mid-1996, she called senior officers arrogant, mischievous and sycophantic and interested only in their promotions and in postings with a clout.
A grave accusation was that they leaked out confidential information to the secret agencies and foreign bodies like the World Bank in order to curry favour with them. Nobody was able to discover her motive.
Ministers are known to have made frank statements while complaining about their top officers to a prime minister but only when they couldn't get along with them.
In other words these officers were not letting them do as they liked. This will go on under Mr Shaukat Aziz too. He may be able to improve the performance of the ministers, but secretaries are quite another matter.
A blow for private enterprise
No, it doesn't quite match "Small earthquake in Chile - not many dead" (Claud Cockburn's unbeatable entry for a dullest headline competition in the London Times), but it does come close.
"Attempt to overthrow government foiled in Equatorial Guinea" isn't by any standards a hair-raising event, and it's unlikely that it would have garnered more than a couple of centimentres of news space anywhere outside Africa but for the circumstances in which the coup bid unravelled.
Last March, an airliner was impounded in Harare and its nearly 70 passengers taken into custody. It was alleged that they were on their way to Malabo, the capital of Equatorial Guinea, to overthrow the government.
It goes almost without saying that any respectable nation would have required a somewhat larger contingent of opponents. Furthermore, Zimbabwe has been in the West's bad books in recent years, and the pronouncements of Robert Mugabe's government tend not to be taken at face value.
However, in this case Harare wasn't fibbing. And what gave the story legs (albeit not particularly long ones) was the fact that the planeload consisted exclusively of mercenaries.
Eagerly awaiting the contingent's arrival in Harare was a bloke by the name of Simon Mann. The name didn't ring a bell for most of us, although it might have for Omar Kureishi - Simon's father, George, it turns out, was briefly captain of the MCC in the late 1940s: seven matches, two wins, five draws. No losses. Simon obviously wasn't following in dad's footsteps.
He had evidently been trying to buy weapons in Zimbabwe, ostensibly for a mine-guarding operation in the Congo. Arrested alongside the other mercenaries, the Eton and Sandhurst graduate was less than thrilled with Zimbabwean prison conditions.
In a letter from jail, intercepted by the South African authorities, Mann wrote to his wife: "Our situation is not good and it is very urgent. They [the lawyers] get no reply from Smelly, and Scratcher asked them to ring back after the Grand Prix race was over. We need heavy influence of the sort that .... Smelly, Scratcher.... David Hart and it needs to be used heavily, and now."
The South African authorities? Yes, Mann was based in Cape Town, and that's where his wife was when he wrote to her. Scratcher? A nickname, evidently, for a longtime friend who suffered from acne when he was younger. When it became clear who Scratcher was, the story sprouted wings.
It isn't often, after all, that the progeny of First World leaders devote their undivided attention to minor Third World nations. Margaret Thatcher once adoringly said of her son: "Mark could sell snow to the Eskimos and sand to the Arabs." Does it follow that he was also capable of selling coups to Africans?
It's not quite clear whether that is what he was trying to do. But circumstantial evidence of the younger Thatcher's involvement in an African regime-change scheme has steadily been mounting in recent weeks.
Shortly after Mann's letter was made public, South African arms dealer Nick du Toit, who was arrested at the head of an advance party in Equatorial Guinea, named Sir Mark (no, no one knighted him - he inherited the baronetcy when his father, Denis, died last year) as an accomplice.
Thatcher and his family had their bags packed and were apparently planning to leave for the United States when Mark was taken in for questioning by the South African authorities about three weeks ago.
Unsurprisingly, he denied all knowledge of the coup, and was placed under house arrest. Later this month, a South African magistrate will confront him with questions raised by Equatorial Guinean authorities. Troublingly for him, a business partner has turned state witness.
Luckily for Thatcher, Equatorial Guinea has shown little interest in seeking his extradition - not least, presumably, because South Africa is disinclined to hand him over to a country that is no stranger to the death penalty.
Zimbabwe evidently feels the same way. A court in Harare last Friday sentenced Mann to seven years in prison for trying to procure weapons from the nation's state-owned arms manufacturer.
The two crew members of he impounded plane received 16-month terms, while their 66 passengers have been imprisoned for 12 months for relatively minor immigration and aviation violations. But Zimbabwe has turned down extradition requests from Equatorial Guinea.
But hold on - why has Equatorial Guinea hitherto been such a well-kept secret? And what is it about this country that has suddenly attracted the interest of professional fortune-hunters?
Not to be confused with Guinea, Guinea-Bissau or Guyana (the last of which, incidentally, is nowhere near Africa), Equatorial Guinea is a fairly innocuous little dot on the west coast of Africa, with an area of just under 11,000 square miles and a population of about half a million.
A Spanish colony until 1968, it was ruled for the first 11 years after independence by Francisco Macias Nguema, who was killed - and succeeded - by his nephew Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo in 1979. It is Obiang whom Mann and du Toit were hoping to topple, replacing him with Severo Moto, who lives in exile in Spain.
Reports suggest that, back in March, Moto was flown to Mali, ready to take over as soon as his mercenary allies had paved the way for his return. Unfortunately for him, the plot went belly-up in Harare.
Moto is friends with Ely Calil, a British-based tycoon of Lebanese origin. Calil is believed to be the "Smelly" whom Mann referred to in his letter from jail. He has, as one would expect, strenuously denied the charge of being one of the main financiers behind the coup attempt.
So has Jeffrey Archer, the disgraced Tory peer and pulp-fiction writer, who is strongly suspected of having deposited nearly $135,000 into a Guernsey account held by Mann just days before the takeover was supposed to be effected. Tellingly, Archer has denied all knowledge of the coup, but offered no explanation for the deposit.
Archer and Mark Thatcher are not the only Tories whose involvement in Mann's venture has been mooted. And the reason Equatorial Guinea elicited their interest is - surprise, surprise! - the discovery of offshore oil deposits.
As the region's third largest oil producer, the nation has been described as Africa's Kuwait; oil revenue is said to have grown from a paltry $3 million 10 years ago to an estimated $700 million, and Equatorial Guinea's gross domestic product is expanding at the startling rate of 60 per cent.
Moto was clever enough to offer his would-be helpers not just a down payment of a couple of million dollars, but also the prospect of potentially far more lucrative oil concessions.
Small wonder, then, that Mann was so sorely tempted. The seven-year prison term in Zimbabwe implies the end of a colourful career that took him from the playing fields of Eton to Britain's elite SAS force, before he decided to strike out on his own in the 1980s.
Even so, he was summoned back into service for the 1990-91 Gulf war, when he assisted British commander Peter de la Billiere at his Riyadh headquarters. A couple of years after that he set up Executive Outcomes - not a multinational recruitment agency, as its name suggests, but a mercenary firm that went on to make millions during Angola's civil war by providing security for oil installations.
In the mid-1990s, he launched a subsidiary called Sandline International in collaboration with another former Scots Guard, Tim Spicer. Sandline broke a UN embargo on arms shipments to Sierra Leone, and was involved in an even more controversial attempt to quell a rebellion in a province of Papua New Guinea.
Last year, Spicer set up a new company, Aegis Defence Services; earlier this year, what is effectively the world's largest private army was awarded a $293 million contract by the US Defence Department to coordinate security for reconstruction projects in Iraq.
There are several other intriguing aspects to this sordid saga, not the least of which is the insinuation that British and US intelligence agencies were aware of the plot to replace the Obiang regime, and that it was their French counterpart that threw a spanner in the works. Furthermore, Moto is known to have been close to former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar and his Popular Party.
Obiang, meanwhile, is alleged to pocket most of Equatorial Guinea's profits from oil, which would explain why its populace remains mired in poverty despite the national economy's unmatched "growth" rate.
The president, who reputedly thrives on deification, is also rumoured to feast on human body parts. If even half of what's said about him is true, Obiang richly deserves to be overthrown. But not in an operation masterminded by ex-public school boys hungry for money-spinning adventures.
Whether or not Mark Thatcher was an investor in Mann's plan, his reputation for shady business deals stretches back a couple of decades. The two of them are (or at least were) neighbours in a Cape Town enclave stuck in an apartheid-era time warp. Had all the ingredients enumerated above been served up as a work of fiction, it would have stretched credulity.
While Iraq offers incontrovertible proof that colonialism lives on and increased privatization of war means the demand for mercenaries has hardly diminished, the foiling of the Equatorial Guinea coup suggests that the days when "private contractors" could be relied upon to make and break governments on their own may be well and truly over.
Email: mahirali2@netscape.net.