Getting Away With Murder
Feb. 3rd, 2010 12:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
danalwynRemember Moussa Dadis Camara? He managed to get himself in trouble lately by, oh, being responsible for the rape and/or murder of hundreds of people, which is the sort of thing that slips out of the media's eye.
Of course, that's not the way he tells it.
According to Captain Camara, the leader of Guinea's National Council for Democracy and Development (CNDD), who seized power in a coup in December of 2008, none of this is his fault. After all, he's a popular leader, mostly because the CNDD a) replaced a corrupt and inefficient dictatorship (even if it was after the dictator died), and b) the CNDD claimed to be a transitional government, and their leaders, in particular Captain Moussa Dadis Camara, would not stand for election once the transition was made to democracy.
So Camara was just walking along one day when he was hit by this revelation that, hey, being leader of Guinea isn't such a bad job. It sure beats doing anything else, especially going back to the army, where he would have to be a Captain again under the control of all the people he was now bossing around. And who expects a politician to keep their campaign promises anyway? So Camara decided that, what the hell, he would run for President in the election.
For some reason, completely unexpectedly (he was shocked, he'll tell you, shocked), people didn't seem to like this, and a whole bunch of ornery protesters started gathering in the capital of Conakry. And, well, darned if this protest didn't get big and threaten the stability of the junta. And, well, darned if some soldiers didn't just happen to show up near the protests, and happen to get angry, and just happened to randomly, and of their own volition, carry out a coordinated and systematic campaign of violence against the protesters, breaking it up in a flurry of incidents that were filed under "The Usual Atrocities".
Of course the rest of the world hardly believed this story. In fact they doubled up laughing, and the only reason the ICC didn't jump on him was because justice had an aneurysm and died on the spot. But Camara, who was at this point taking the "Innocence by Incompetence" strategy to a threshold so high that George W. Bush couldn't have reached it with a stepladder, continued to maintain his innocence in the face of the "bad old protesters". After all, just because he was the leader of the country doesn't mean that he's actually responsible for what happens when his Presidential Guard runs amuck.
He also was astute enough to realize that he needed to blame somebody for this, so he decided to throw his fellow companion Abubakar "Toumba" Diakite, his aide-de-camp, and the man on the street during the protests, under a bus. Diakite, for his part, was pretty emphatic about his desire not to be thrown under a bus, and explained this through the traditional and honored ritual of having his men shoot his boss in the head, which just goes to show you that before promoting someone to Scapegoat-In-Chief you should probably take away their guns.
What happened next was an explanation of why getting news out of Africa can be such a mess. Camara was, according to initial reports, either lightly injured, severely injured, or dead. Diakite, according to the government, was safely in custody, although they warned their troops to look out for him and consider him armed and dangerous, although he was hiding out in another country. Meanwhile the government was either in control, or not in control, it was either a foreign plot or a domestic plot, and generally journalists were encouraged to wait until somebody had their story straight.
Camara, not having the dignity to die, was eventually rushed to Morocco for treatment, avoiding any of those European countries where his ass would have been arrested before he could hand over his passport. Meanwhile, you might think the situation would get better in Guinea, but instead it got worse. Despite having been brought to power via a military coup, the CNDD was not in good odor with the military, who generally seemed to be viewing them as upstarts (Generals hate taking orders from Captains). Of course, the CNDD had their own supporters, none of whom really wanted to be kicked out of power. And the pro-democracy movement wasn't looking kindly on either of them at the moment, so it was a fair bet that they might try something too. To make matters worse, Camara had been training his own private militia, based on his own ethnic group, in the south, who took advantage of the confusion to establish themselves, and possibly invade Sierra Leone (information on this is limited to rumor).
Things got so bad that ECOWAS started talking about intervention, and when things are so bad that the second coming of ECOMOG looks like a positive solution, then your country is pretty much in the crapper. But before anything could happen, the government infighting managed to come to a conclusion. What it appears that happened is that the army managed to mount a behind-the-scenes coup of sorts, persuading the CNDD that they had no future. The new leader of the government, Brigadier General Konaté, who apparently never got along with Camara, managed to come out on top, with the apparent support of the military. Camara, who thought he was coming back from Morocco to Guinea, got derailed to Burkina Faso instead, the government sorted itself out, and the leader of the democratic opposition got put into the Prime Minister's position. Nobody knows what to expect from Konaté, whose primary qualification to office is that he has not had hundreds of people murdered and raped in public, which, given the competition, is a pretty damn good qualification.
But the price of this bloodless second coup was apparently a great deal of leniency to the CNDD, as part of incentive to keep them from fighting. As part of that, the trial held over the protest killings has ruled that Camara is completely innocent. In fact, the only person guilty of any wrongdoing appears to be Diakite, who is still in hiding and not exactly going to be presenting his side at court. It's ironic that Diakite, who shot someone to avoid being the scapegoat, is now still the only scapegoat. It's partially political, I doubt that the new government wants to encourage the idea of social change via the shooting of the head of state, but finding Camara not guilty is probably a sop to the CNDD's remaining power.
Which makes me wonder what kind of power the CNDD still has. What lies up their sleeve? What happened to Camara's militia, what group supports them, and most importantly, how are they going to react to being out of power? Well, now that they're innocent, we'll see if that makes them feel safe enough to let democracy take it's course.
And hopefully the ICC can bust Camara's ass later.
ETA: Where did all my links go?
Of course, that's not the way he tells it.
According to Captain Camara, the leader of Guinea's National Council for Democracy and Development (CNDD), who seized power in a coup in December of 2008, none of this is his fault. After all, he's a popular leader, mostly because the CNDD a) replaced a corrupt and inefficient dictatorship (even if it was after the dictator died), and b) the CNDD claimed to be a transitional government, and their leaders, in particular Captain Moussa Dadis Camara, would not stand for election once the transition was made to democracy.
So Camara was just walking along one day when he was hit by this revelation that, hey, being leader of Guinea isn't such a bad job. It sure beats doing anything else, especially going back to the army, where he would have to be a Captain again under the control of all the people he was now bossing around. And who expects a politician to keep their campaign promises anyway? So Camara decided that, what the hell, he would run for President in the election.
For some reason, completely unexpectedly (he was shocked, he'll tell you, shocked), people didn't seem to like this, and a whole bunch of ornery protesters started gathering in the capital of Conakry. And, well, darned if this protest didn't get big and threaten the stability of the junta. And, well, darned if some soldiers didn't just happen to show up near the protests, and happen to get angry, and just happened to randomly, and of their own volition, carry out a coordinated and systematic campaign of violence against the protesters, breaking it up in a flurry of incidents that were filed under "The Usual Atrocities".
Of course the rest of the world hardly believed this story. In fact they doubled up laughing, and the only reason the ICC didn't jump on him was because justice had an aneurysm and died on the spot. But Camara, who was at this point taking the "Innocence by Incompetence" strategy to a threshold so high that George W. Bush couldn't have reached it with a stepladder, continued to maintain his innocence in the face of the "bad old protesters". After all, just because he was the leader of the country doesn't mean that he's actually responsible for what happens when his Presidential Guard runs amuck.
He also was astute enough to realize that he needed to blame somebody for this, so he decided to throw his fellow companion Abubakar "Toumba" Diakite, his aide-de-camp, and the man on the street during the protests, under a bus. Diakite, for his part, was pretty emphatic about his desire not to be thrown under a bus, and explained this through the traditional and honored ritual of having his men shoot his boss in the head, which just goes to show you that before promoting someone to Scapegoat-In-Chief you should probably take away their guns.
What happened next was an explanation of why getting news out of Africa can be such a mess. Camara was, according to initial reports, either lightly injured, severely injured, or dead. Diakite, according to the government, was safely in custody, although they warned their troops to look out for him and consider him armed and dangerous, although he was hiding out in another country. Meanwhile the government was either in control, or not in control, it was either a foreign plot or a domestic plot, and generally journalists were encouraged to wait until somebody had their story straight.
Camara, not having the dignity to die, was eventually rushed to Morocco for treatment, avoiding any of those European countries where his ass would have been arrested before he could hand over his passport. Meanwhile, you might think the situation would get better in Guinea, but instead it got worse. Despite having been brought to power via a military coup, the CNDD was not in good odor with the military, who generally seemed to be viewing them as upstarts (Generals hate taking orders from Captains). Of course, the CNDD had their own supporters, none of whom really wanted to be kicked out of power. And the pro-democracy movement wasn't looking kindly on either of them at the moment, so it was a fair bet that they might try something too. To make matters worse, Camara had been training his own private militia, based on his own ethnic group, in the south, who took advantage of the confusion to establish themselves, and possibly invade Sierra Leone (information on this is limited to rumor).
Things got so bad that ECOWAS started talking about intervention, and when things are so bad that the second coming of ECOMOG looks like a positive solution, then your country is pretty much in the crapper. But before anything could happen, the government infighting managed to come to a conclusion. What it appears that happened is that the army managed to mount a behind-the-scenes coup of sorts, persuading the CNDD that they had no future. The new leader of the government, Brigadier General Konaté, who apparently never got along with Camara, managed to come out on top, with the apparent support of the military. Camara, who thought he was coming back from Morocco to Guinea, got derailed to Burkina Faso instead, the government sorted itself out, and the leader of the democratic opposition got put into the Prime Minister's position. Nobody knows what to expect from Konaté, whose primary qualification to office is that he has not had hundreds of people murdered and raped in public, which, given the competition, is a pretty damn good qualification.
But the price of this bloodless second coup was apparently a great deal of leniency to the CNDD, as part of incentive to keep them from fighting. As part of that, the trial held over the protest killings has ruled that Camara is completely innocent. In fact, the only person guilty of any wrongdoing appears to be Diakite, who is still in hiding and not exactly going to be presenting his side at court. It's ironic that Diakite, who shot someone to avoid being the scapegoat, is now still the only scapegoat. It's partially political, I doubt that the new government wants to encourage the idea of social change via the shooting of the head of state, but finding Camara not guilty is probably a sop to the CNDD's remaining power.
Which makes me wonder what kind of power the CNDD still has. What lies up their sleeve? What happened to Camara's militia, what group supports them, and most importantly, how are they going to react to being out of power? Well, now that they're innocent, we'll see if that makes them feel safe enough to let democracy take it's course.
And hopefully the ICC can bust Camara's ass later.
ETA: Where did all my links go?