W Sahara: Mbeki can help
2002-11-06 15:23
Cape Town - President Thabo Mbeki, as African Union chair, was likely to step in to try and resolve the 27-year-long dispute over the continent's last colony, the Western Sahara, the National Assembly's foreign affairs committee was told on Wednesday.
However, to be regarded an honest broker by all the parties to
the conflict, South Africa would have to hold off diplomatic
recognition of Polisario's Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic
(SADR), acting deputy director-general of Africa, Dr Pandelani
Mathoma, told MPs.
The dispute over the Western Sahara dates to 1975, when Spain
abandoned the territory and Morocco annexed a large part of it and moved settlers in.
More than 200 000 local Saharawi people fled and still live in refugee camps in south-east Algeria, which also hosts SADR's government in exile.
Briefing MPs, Mathoma said: "As part of the president's
programme of chair of the African Union, conflict resolution is one of the fundamental issues that South Africa must deal with ... hence our role in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Burundi.
"If we have peace and stability on the continent then we can
concentrate on issues of development. It is possible for the
president to play that role as we have a good relationship with all three parties, Algeria, Morocco and Polisario."
South Africa would be in a position to help persuade all of them that the only solution was a mutually acceptable negotiated
settlement.
African problem
Mathoma said: "The African Union has really to sort this one out as an African problem.
"We have to find an African solution, because when other powers become interested they have their own interests they have to promote, while us as Africans we really want peace and stability on the continent."
The SARD is a member of the AU and is formally recognised by
many, but not all, of the member states. To complicate matters,
Morocco withdrew from the AU's predecessor, the Organisation of
African Unity (OAU) in 1982 over its recognition of the SARD, and
still refuses to join the AU.
Asked why South Africa would not formally recognise a fellow-AU member state, Mathoma said: "If South Africa has to play a
meaningful role I think it is important for South Africa to keep
the leverage that we have now - which is of good relations with
all three of them - if we do and recognise it might compromise.
"If we do, Morocco might not accept us as an honest broker."
Mathoma said South Africa would use its influence with Algeria
and Polisario to urge a return to the negotiating table, it would
do the same with Morocco.
The United Nation's efforts of the past 11 years to resolve the dispute, including the initiative by UN special envoy James Baker, had failed and a new approach was necessary, Mathoma said.
Recently a top UN refugee official described the lack of
political solution for the thousands of Saharawi refugees living in the Algerian desert as shameful.
Mbeki recently told Parliament he was in contact with Baker and had agreed to work together to speed up the resolution of the
problem.
He had also held talks with Morocco's King Mohamed VI, who
wanted to resolve the matter as soon as possible.
- SAPA