The Age
Commonwealth throws open its doors
David Blair, Kampala
November 27, 2007
COMMONWEALTH leaders have dropped the requirement for members to be former British colonies.
The decision came on the last day of the Commonwealth summit in Uganda's capital, Kampala.
The Commonwealth's origins were devised at conferences held in the early 20th century by British Empire prime ministers in London, but numerous countries with no links to Britain are expressing an interest in joining. They include Rwanda, colonised by Germany and then Belgium, which dropped French as its official language and will probably be admitted at the next summit in 2009.
Former French colonies such as Algeria and Madagascar have also told outgoing secretary-general Don McKinnon that they would like to join, and so has East Timor, a former Portuguese colony.
In their final communique, Commonwealth leaders said an "applicant country should, as a general rule, have had an historic constitutional association with an existing Commonwealth member". A link with any member — not only Britain — is now sufficient.
But even this watered-down requirement could be overlooked, with leaders adding: "In exceptional circumstances, applications should be considered on a case-by-case basis."
However, all new members must acknowledge the Queen as head of the Commonwealth and use English for all official communications.
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NOTA DE RODAPÉ:
Será que Ramos-Horta conversou sobre este tema com o Presidente Cavaco Silva? E se ainda havia alguma dúvida de que Ramos-Horta quer que o inglês seja língua oficial... aqui está a prova.
sexta-feira, novembro 30, 2007
Timor-Leste pede para fazer parte da Commonwealth
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5 comentários:
Absolutely unbelievable......where will it stop, from Portuguese rule to Indonesian occupation and now part of the commonwealth. Does anyone understand the meaning of Independence..what a disgrace.
Having English as an official language is not a requirement of Commonwealth membership, like having Portuguese as an offical language is for the CPLP - Malaysia is still a member, even though English ceased to be an official language in 1968. "Official communication" refers only to communication with other Commonwealth countries.
You may not be aware that formerly Spanish Equatorial Guinea has adopted Portuguese as an official language, alongside Spanish and French, in order to qualify for full membership of the CPLP.
However, other countries with a stronger case for Commonwealth membership see no advantage, while existing members like Malaysia have considered leaving.
Abuja is a bunfight for kleptomaniacs
By Kevin Myers, Sunday Telegraph
07/12/2003
It could be worse. I could be in Abuja, solemnly reporting on a meeting of criminals as if it were a consistory of saints, rather than being at home in Kildare in Ireland. My country is not part of the Commonwealth, though it was in a sense the founder member of the British Empire. So in what way is it worse off because it is now outside the Commonwealth?
It is certainly better off for not having to engage in the hypocritical folderol of Abuja, with everyone exchanging bright smiles, while keeping one hand on the fob-watch and the other on their credit cards. Nigeria, after all, is the Vatican of the international church of theft and fraud. And Uganda leads a rival church, one dedicated to robbery with violence, as the prostrate and bleeding body of the Congo can testify.
That is before we even get to the star delinquent of the Commonwealth, Zimbabwe, which triumphantly proves the adage, the gaudier the flag, the bloodier the government. Still, Robert Mugabwe must take some comfort from being the only politician alive who has fully lived up to manifesto promises. Alas, the promises were those made by the UDI regime of Ian Smith, who said that if Rhodesia got majority rule, the certain outcome would poverty and murderous anarchy. Well done, Smithy: top of the class.
advertisementZimbabwe, to be sure, is not actually present at Abuja, having been suspended (though not expelled) - presumably because it has exceeded its quota of government-inspired domestic murders (mass murders abroad, as in the Congo, apparently don't count).
Neighbouring Mozambique's President Chissano is demanding that Zimbabwe be re-admitted to full membership of the Commonwealth. Good on Mozambique, whose historic right to be in the Commonwealth is precisely zero. Unlike Ireland, the US, Burma or Sudan, who aren't present in Abuja, Mozambique was never part of the British Empire. But one of the more absurd fictions of the Commonwealth is its denial of its origins: that it is a club of the former ruled and the former ruler. But in an age of post-imperial egalitarianism, the idea of one country governing another makes everyone uncomfortable: so a cosy fiction has been agreed on that the Commonwealth is simply a free association of countries, with nothing more uniting them than a desire to be nice to one another.
That being the case, anyone theoretically - can join. Which doesn't mean the Commonwealth actually expected just anyone would. After all, you don't really expect the nice couple you met in Skegness to take up your invitation to come and stay whenever they liked: and bring all the kids, we're very free and easy.
Years later, the door-bell sounds, and there on the step is the grinning figure of Mozambique. Its many children scamper into the house, sticking their fingers in electric sockets and monopolising the television. Soon Tony Blair finds himself cornered in the kitchen getting a little finger-wagging lecture on white racism from President Chissano; how long before he succumbs to the temptation to take that Mozambican finger and shoves it where only a body-cavity search would find it?
It is not just a matter of the fine gentlemen from Africa, with their hordes of gleaming Mercedes outside the hotels like seals in a zoo waiting to be fed. Malaysia is in the forefront of the international campaign to arm Muslims against "the Jews". Moreover, Malaysia has led the campaign to ensure that a fellow Commonwealth member, Australia, is only accepted as an Asian country when a majority of its population are racially "Asian". Try using the concept of "Europe" and "European" at a Commonwealth conference and see how far you get.
Of course, the Commonwealth is not bound by common values, but by expediency, bad history and an agreed set of political fictions. Accordingly, the Queen is head of the Commonwealth because, well, she just is: that Britain ran an empire which conquered and governed all those places is - goes the lie - a pure coincidence. In Britain itself, the empire has become a sort of Arthurian myth, something that might or might not have happened, and anyway it was all long ago and is irrelevant today.
So all these jovial kleptomaniacs and chuckling killers jostle at the Commonwealth buffet, one hand slipping the silver fish-knives into their waistcoat pockets. Meanwhile they tut-tut about little Robert's exclusion from the bash - heart-broken, the poor lad - just occasionally popping out to make anxious telephone calls home and see whether or not there has been another coup. After all, that's how they came to power, during the last Commonwealth conference.
Are British-Irish or British-American relations made better or worse by their lacking a Commonwealth dimension? Neither. It makes no difference. The only real function of the Commonwealth is to validate the larcenous habits of a bunch of third world crooks, meanwhile giving them the right to buttonhole the Prime Minister as an equal in a union that is utterly valueless without Britain. Your choice, of course; and frankly, I think you're all mad.
NST Online » Columns
2007/11/25
TUNKU ABDUL AZIZ: Commonwealth riding into the sunset?
By : Tunku Abdul Aziz
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AS you read this, the biennial Commonwealth circus, otherwise dignified by the acronym CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting), is ending its three-day performance in Kampala, Uganda.
Every two years, a gaggle of some of the most disagreeably disreputable Third World presidents and prime ministers, ours naturally excluded, gather in some member country or other to talk shop about nothing in particular -- because there is nothing in particular to talk about that would make the slightest bit of difference to the state of the world.
CHOGM is long on pious hopes, high aspirations and grandiose plans, but, as always, woefully short on delivery. The lack of any sense of realism has to be seen to be believed.
As a former director of administration, and co-conference secretary responsible for overseeing the CHOGM arrangements during my time in the Bahamas, Vancouver, Harare and Kuala Lumpur, I write from personal experience.
A new Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Secretariat in London has been elected in Kampala --Kamalesh Sharma, India's high commissioner to Britain -- to replace Don McKinnon, a former New Zealand foreign minister, who has completed his lacklustre tour of duty (two five-year terms).
The post is often erroneously described as "Commonwealth Secretary-General", but the official designation is that of "Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Secretariat", a non-job as international jobs go.
Both Tun Musa Hitam, some years ago, and, more recently, Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim, had the good sense not to allow their names to be put forward for election. It would have been the kiss of death to their reputation and standing.
The position has always been much coveted by Indians, Bangladeshis and other assorted nationals, shades of the United Nations and its agencies. The lobbying can be quite undiplomatic and vicious.
Since 1965, there have been four secretaries-general ensconced in the faded glory of Marlborough House. The most outstanding, without a shadow of a doubt, was Sir Shridath S. Ramphal, a former foreign minister of tiny Guyana.
His 15 years of stewardship was a period marked by remarkable Commonwealth achievements in the economic and social fields. He was a great thinker, a man of ideas and an intellectual giant who was also a man of action. He had no peer. The others were intellectual pygmies by comparison.
Former South African president Nelson Mandela had this to say of him in Abuja, Nigeria, in 1990: "Some men have become famous because of the service they have given to their countries, others have become well known because of the manner in which they have taken up issues affecting their regions, and others have become famous because in their fight for human justice they have chosen the entire world as their theatre. Shridath Ramphal is one of those men."
The Commonwealth, like the Empire it succeeded, is an anachronism in this day and age. It exists for all the wrong reasons and is driven largely by imperial nostalgia.
The historical ties that are supposed to bind us are nothing more than our shared miserable experience of colonial exploitation. This, then, raises the question about the future of this poorly funded and led fringe international organisation that exists only because of the generosity of the governments of the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.
The history of the Commonwealth Secretariat has shown all too clearly that it has never really attempted to define its role seriously and to question the validity or relevance of its policy thrusts in its chosen areas or fields. It does not understand why it exists, and all that the occupants of Marlborough House can be bothered with is protecting their jobs, which come with their many perquisites.
In this respect, of course, they are merely behaving like all good international civil servants -- looking busy and doing as little as they can get away with. Marlborough House has not lost its special flair for reinventing the wheel.
At the time of my service in London, there were 50 members. Today there are 53. While we have a handful of developed economies, the overwhelming majority are desperately poor underdeveloped countries that exist from hand to mouth, relying heavily on foreign aid.
Many cannot even pay the annual agreed assessed contributions, and my job each month as director of administration was to go round to High Commissions that were in arrears, many running into unbelievably large sums of money.
It was, for me, an excruciatingly embarrassing experience because many a time their Excellencies, like the accomplished diplomats they were, would lie through their teeth without a hiss of escaping air.
"We have been in touch with our ministry of finance, and a cheque should be on its way to you soon" was a kind of "you know as well as I do" secret code that I should not entertain the thought of ever seeing the colour of their money.
For all its shortcomings, it must be said that the Commonwealth was at its united best (the British opposition and foot-dragging to economic sanctions notwithstanding) when fighting the Pretoria regime over apartheid.
This one issue, the importance of which I have no wish to deride, gave the Commonwealth Secretariat its only moment of glory in decades. The apartheid regime of the ruling South African National Party was brought to its knees and subsequently saw the release of the world's most famous prisoner of conscience, Mandela, from his years of incarceration.
Former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, at one point in the late 1980s, commissioned a study to determine whether or not Malaysia should remain in the Commonwealth. He always thought that it was a bit of a waste of time, but decided in the end that there were advantages in remaining, although it was very much touch and go.
He had, to the consternation of the secretary-general and the Malaysian high commissioner, said he would not be attending the Bahamas CHOGM after all.
I happened to be sitting in front of the high commissioner in his office when the communication arrived, and he said that he and I should write to Dr Mahathir, independently, urging him to attend because it would not look good for him as prime minister to be misconstrued as "boycotting" the meeting.
Ramphal asked me what we needed to do to get Dr Mahathir to attend. I said: "Give him centre stage, a key role to play, a keynote address on economic development, and he will be there."
So I wrote to our prime minister on Sept 17, 1985, in part, as follows, from Marlborough House:
"I understand perfectly your views on the Commonwealth and the Secretariat as a whole, but I feel nevertheless that your presence (in Nassau) will do enormous good for both Malaysia and the Commonwealth. There is a great deal that can be done ... for the poorer developing countries about which you have shown the greatest concern ... in the field of economic development in particular...."
I felt that if we wanted to reform the Commonwealth, we should do it from inside rather than shouting invectives from outside the castle ramparts.
I do not claim credit, but the great man came to his first CHOGM.
Now, however, is perhaps an opportune time to reassess our Commonwealth membership. It is nothing more than a little British nostalgic hangover from an overdose of the great delusion of the "Empire on which the sun never sets" and of such other sentimental nonsense immortalised in "Rule Britannia, Britannia Rules the Waves".
With more than 100 Malaysian missions overseas, surely it is cheaper and more effective to go bilateral on aid and technical co-operation with other countries rather than through Marlborough House. Let the dreamers dream on while we move into the real world.
The writer is a former director of administration at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London. He can be contacted at tunkua@gmail.com
Tradução:
Timor-Leste pede para fazer parte da Commonwealth
The Age
Commonwealth abre as portas
David Blair, Kampala
Novembro 27, 2007
Líderes da Commonwealth deixaram cair o requiremento de os membros serem antigas colónias Bitânicas.
A decisão saíu no último dia da cimeira da Commonwealth em Kampala, capital do Uganda,.
As origens da Commonwealth foram planeadas em conferências realizadas nos princípio do século 20 por primeiros ministros do Império Britânico em Londres, mas numerosos países sem ligações à Grã-Bretanha estão a expressar interesse para entrarem. Incluem o Ruanda, colonizado pela Alemanha e depois pela Bélgica, que deixou cair o Francês como sua língua oficial e será provavelmente admitida na próxima cimeira em 2009.
Antigas colónias Francesas como Algéria e Madagascar disseram também ao secretário-geral de saída Don McKinnon que gostariam de se juntar, e o mesmo fez Timor-Leste, uma antiga colónia Portuguesa.
No seu comunicado final, os lideres da Commonwealth disseram "um país candidato deve, como regra geral, ter tido uma associação histórica constitucional com um membro existente da Commonwealth". Uma ligação com qualquer membro — não apenas a Grã Bretanha — é agora suficiente.
Mas mesmo este requerimento deslavado pode ser ultrapassado, com os líderes a acrescentar: "Em circunstâncias excepcionais, as candidaturas devem serconsideradas numa base de caso a caso."
Contudo, todos os novos membros devem reconhecer a Rainha como responsável da Commonwealth e usar o inglês para todas as comunicações oficiais.
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NOTA DE RODAPÉ:
Será que Ramos-Horta conversou sobre este tema com o Presidente Cavaco Silva? E se ainda havia alguma dúvida de que Ramos-Horta quer que o inglês seja língua oficial... aqui está a prova.
Margarida
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