OUSTED President Thabo Mbeki yesterday denied that he interfered with the
National Prosecuting Authority’s decision to charge ANC leader Jacob Zuma, and
he described as "gratuitous" claims that he abused his office.

Bob Dubery <megap... at (no spam) gmail.com> writes:
On Sep 22, 12:17=A0pm, Stephen Adams <ada... at (no spam) no.spam> wrote:
Steve Hayes <hayesm... at (no spam) hotmail.com> writes:
OUSTED President Thabo Mbeki yesterday denied that he interfered with th=
e
National Prosecuting Authority's decision to charge ANC leader Jacob
Zuma, and he described as "gratuitous" claims that he abused his office.

Maybe, maybe not. But it is absolutely certain he aided and abetted
Mugabe, and for that, I'm glad to see him go.

How is that so certain?

What seems clear to me is that Mugabe is a pretty wriggly eel. Both
Mandela and Mbeki had good reason to believe that they had secured
concessions from Mugabe only to find out that they had been duped.

Because, at least according to The Economist & BBC, Mbeki was standing
in the way of the rest of the OAS that wanted Mugabe out. He was, by
insisting on negotiations that would leave Mugabe some power, helping
Mugabe by providing a shelter.
The OAS? Don't you mean the AU?

Personally I think that Mbeki might have been a little more outspoken
about Zimbabwe. He did, on occasion, disagree or expressed
disagreement via the Presidency, but he always did so very quietly.

Not a little more - a lot more. And he should have sided with the
countries that were working to help the real winner of the elections
take office as he should have and put an end to Mugabe's kleptocracy.

Other than saying something like "We consider that actions taken by
President Mugabe are distasteful and certainly do no reflect our own
values" I can't see that he could have done much else.

Agreeing to sanctions and refusing to deal with Mugabe would have been
the correct course of action.

Tony Blair faced similar criticism at one time. He argued against
BRITAIN imposing sanctions Doing that would not have any real effect
and might disadvantage British companies. Agreeing to be party to
sanctions imposed by a broad international community would be a
different proposition. BUT to do that would require legal changes. He
could not just tell British companies to disinvest from Zimbabwe. Much
of this applies to Mbeki. It's not 5 minutes work to impose sanctions
on another country - not if you live in a democracy. And one country
doing this by itself would not achieve much.

If SADEC or the AU had decided to impose sanctions then that would be
a different matter. In any event Mugabe's regime would have had
political and material support from Zaire and Equatorial Guinea in
Africa and also from China.

As far as I'm concerned his going is not a catastrophe. However I
remain concerned despite Zuma's assurances that this is not
unconstitutional. I suspect it is.
Mbeki tendered his resignation - which is allowed for. So on the face

Floor crossing is dead. It was abolished a few months ago.
Unfortunately don't have time right now to look for a good cite.

Correction - weeks, not months, ago

On Sep 26, 6:48 pm, Steve Hayes <hayesm... at (no spam) hotmail.com> wrote:
On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 02:04:37 -0700 (PDT), Gary <LanceG... at (no spam) gmail.com> wrote:

Do you think democracy would be better served if the president were
elected directly by popular vote rather than indirectly by the "robot"
parliament (where the robots are representatives who have to do their
party's bidding)?

Possibly -- I believe some couontries, like France, do it that way.

Zimbabwe too. So does that method promote democracy? Or is it just
another method?

On Mon, 29 Sep 2008 04:04:42 -0700 (PDT), "Peter H.M. Brooks"



Peter.H.M.Bro... at (no spam) gmail.com> wrote:
On Sep 29, 11:21 am, Bob Dubery <megap... at (no spam) gmail.com> wrote:
On Sep 29, 7:32 am, Steve Hayes <hayesm... at (no spam) hotmail.com> wrote:

EG in Britain the Lords, in theory, do not have to worry about re-
election and thus act as a check to the Commons which does. But Labour
have severely reduced the size of the Lords and it's ability to impede
(as some one would see it) Commons in recent years.

It has been, of course, no accident, but a deliberate policy to enable
more state control - the introduction of CCTV cameras, ID cards, ASBOs
and police powers for traffic and litter wardens to persecute people
[whilst diminishing the power of the police to affect the economically
useful criminal sector] has been achieved by preventing the Lords from
opposing all these repressive totalitarian policies so beloved of the
'left'.

ASBOs?

Anti-Social Behaviour Orders - tickets that are handed out to prevent

On Sep 29, 7:32 am, Steve Hayes <hayesm... at (no spam) hotmail.com> wrote:

It's just another method. And whether it promotes democracy or not depends on
how free and fair the elections were -- which, of course, in Zimbabwe they
were not.

Many systems have a concept of two houses and/or centers of power. One
house reflects the popular vote, the other is supposed to be less
subsceptible to sentiment and the need to get re-elected.

EG in Britain the Lords, in theory, do not have to worry about re-
election and thus act as a check to the Commons which does. But Labour
have severely reduced the size of the Lords and it's ability to impede
(as some one would see it) Commons in recent years.

In a system with seperate but simultaneous votes for President and
Parliament, the President does not get appointed directly by the party
with the majority of seats, and so should not be beholding to the
majority (or any other) party for his position.

In this country we used to have seperate PM and State President, with
the State President actual head of state. PW unified the two posts,
and it probably made little practical difference at the time. It might
even have been his undoing as he resigned as head of the NP but not as
President, but found his hand forced by the party in any event.

On Sep 29, 11:21 am, Bob Dubery <megap... at (no spam) gmail.com> wrote:
On Sep 29, 7:32 am, Steve Hayes <hayesm... at (no spam) hotmail.com> wrote:


EG in Britain the Lords, in theory, do not have to worry about re-
election and thus act as a check to the Commons which does. But Labour
have severely reduced the size of the Lords and it's ability to impede
(as some one would see it) Commons in recent years.

It has been, of course, no accident, but a deliberate policy to enable
more state control - the introduction of CCTV cameras, ID cards, ASBOs
and police powers for traffic and litter wardens to persecute people
[whilst diminishing the power of the police to affect the economically
useful criminal sector] has been achieved by preventing the Lords from
opposing all these repressive totalitarian policies so beloved of the
'left'.