Every dog has his day

News coming from the International Criminal Court-ICC in the Hague, a couple of days ago that Sudan’s al-Bashir’s name may soon be removed from the list of “their excellencies” to “wanted, dead or alive” is quite sobering to those who choose to be drunk with illusions of omnipotence and infallibility. The information has sure jolted some mighty goliaths back to their senses recognizing it as a loud and clear signal that being at the helm of state power makes one neither immortal nor omniscient. If the Sudan Czar is indeed arrested and prosecuted, it will be proof beyond reasonable doubt that indeed we all were supposed to be equal under the watchful eye of the law.

Without being privy to the evidence and supporting facts that Moreno-Ocampo has gathered against the Sudan Emir, my humble argument is that individuals who find themselves in the gap should not miss the opportunity to help turn the tide. Against al-Bashir’s loud protests of innocence, one would simply ask why and how as a gardener he allowed the ‘Janjaweed’ (which means devil on horseback in Arabic) to grow in his back yard during his watch; why and how as a steward did he allow the roof of the house to curve in and leak with him in residence?

Media reports are replete with stories of atrocities perpetrated against defenseless women and children by the wild militants in Darfur. If indeed the liberator of Sudan is innocent and has not been party to the various crimes against the Sudanese people, why then do governments exist if it is not to protect their citizens?

The charges by the ICC should remind one and all that leaders who find themselves in decisive moments of history should take the bull by the horns and refuse to ride with the tide. Sudan has defied all manner of intervention to bring peace to Darfur so that the country could move forward. We do not have to go far back in time to find perfect examples of both lost and seized opportunities, acts that left marks in the annals of human history.

Remember the Xhosa boy who grew up to be a lawyer and spent over 25 years in confinement as a nemesis of the white rulers in South Africa? At the peak of his confinement on Robin Island, it dawned on Mandela that he was occupying a very decisive position. He knew it was up to him to keep on fighting the white minority government and die on the island (and probably take his country’s hope for freedom to the grave with him) or open up to dialogue and take South Africa into a new direction. Even more surprising was his voluntary relinquishing of power after serving for a single term as president. I cannot speak as to what gave rise to this kind of decision within the African National Congress but today South Africa is writing a completely new episode to its history because of one leader’s determination to make things right while he could. If there was a man who had all the right to be president as long as he wanted, I think, it was Mandela. After all he risked his career, life and family to fight black repression.

Within the same time span, events in the opposite side of the globe were also taking a dramatic turn. Remember the grey-haired man who standing on top of a military tank single-handedly stopped a coup, voluntarily resigned from office and ushered in one of the greatest events of the epoch? Boris Yeltsin found himself in a similar gap just like Mandela did. Yeltsin will forever remain in the chronicles of human activity as the man who brought down the mighty soviet empire. Yet Yeltsin missed out on the opportunity to effect genuine democratic and economic reforms (I speak of democracy loosely for lack of another word to mean a locally desired way of participatory self governance. I have serious questions on the efficacy of the Jeffersonian liberal polity that African countries have swallowed wholesale). His administration was marked by wanton firing of all voices that did not echo with his own. He miserably failed to utilize Russia’s vast endowment of resources for the country’s socio-economic development. As a legacy of his repressive regime, press freedom in Russia remains elusive with one of the highest numbers in mysterious deaths of journalists and activists.

Our contemporary times feature a number of Yeltsins who are showing signs of refusing to take charge of the fate of their countries. Intoxicated with power and personal idiosyncrasy, they have thrown all caution to the wind and with it respect for human rights and their governments’ responsibility to bring unity and social cohesion vital for economic progress. With al-Bashir’s name now ticked for accountability, the world is waiting as to who will be next.