Libya uprising: Presidency's response a tacit admission of wrongdoing

President Zuma needs to state unequivocally to the South African people, and to the international community, that he does not support Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, and does not believe that the pro-democracy uprising in Libya is a "conspiracy", and fuelled by "tendentious reports circulated by foreign media outlets", as he was reported as stating in a telephone conversation with Gaddafi yesterday.

The fact is that the Presidency's response to the DA's call for President Zuma to clarify the rumours is both disingenuous and a tacit admission of wrongdoing.

BBC Monitoring reported yesterday that Libyan TV was quoting President Zuma as "stressing the need not to depend on tendentious reports circulated by foreign media outlets" during the phone call. President Zuma also reportedly called on the African Union to "take decisive action and uncover the conspiracy that Libya is facing".

Had the President not made comments of this nature, the Presidency could quite simply have said so. The Presidency has nothing to gain, and everything to lose, by obfuscating on this matter, if indeed the President had not said what he is alleged to have said. Thus, in stating that it would not be drawn into "rumours and distortions", the Presidency has not only failed to refute the claims made yesterday in the international press, but it has actually further perpetuated the impression that the President has made these comments.

It is difficult, in light of the Presidency's response, to come to any conclusion other than that the content of President Zuma's conversation with Colonel Gaddafi was profoundly problematic. The implications of the President's comments are manifold: first, they imply that President Zuma is unconcerned about the fact that pro-democracy demonstrators are being forcibly and violently suppressed by a dictator who has ruled with an iron fist for more than four decades. It says that our president, in essence, is unconcerned with making the correct decision, and is entirely beholden to his narrow interests.

Secondly, the President's comments suggest he has completely succumbed to a worldview that understands any and all international incidents to be the product of some or other conspiratorial plotting. Finally, the President has made a terrible misjudgment in engaging with Colonel Gaddafi at this time. He ought to have known that Gaddafi's state-run press would use this exchange for propaganda purposes. If it was necessary to engage with the Libyan dictator, he ought to have made it unequivocally clear that South Africa does not support his murderous regime, which he clearly has not done.

The long and the short of it is that the Presidency's tacit admission on this matter has set back South Africa's international standing. President Zuma's long-standing close relationship with Colonel Gaddafi has long been a cause of concern, but his position now appears severely compromised. The Presidency must state how it reconciles this administration's public condemnation of the Libyan authorities' use of violence against its own people, with growing suggestions that President Zuma is backing Gaddafi behind closed doors - that he has supplied this regime with the weapons that are now being used against its citizens, and, now, that he is pledging support to the Libyan dictator.

Statement issued by Athol Trollip MP, DA Parliamentary Leader, March 10 2011

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