Inter Press Service - June 25, 2001
Paul Stober

While in Washington, he will also have to deal with the HIV and AIDS epidemic in Southern Africa and the ongoing civil wars and political instability that marks the region.

A framework for future diplomatic relations between the US and South Africa and trade and economic issues will also be discussed during Mbeki's brief visit to the United States. Mbeki is scheduled to meet Bush in Washington on Tuesday (Jun 26). He leaves for Germany the next day.

While in the United States, Mbeki is also expected to meet congressional leaders from the US Senate and House of Representatives, in Washington. The South African government had exceptionally good relations with the former Democratic Administration and is trying to maintain a bi-partisan approach in its dealings with the US.

While his visit to the US is scheduled to be brief, Mbeki's skipping of the United Nations Special Session on AIDS - which started on Monday (Jun 25) -- has raised eyebrows.

Mbeki has not been able to shake-off the controversy he started by questioning whether HIV leads directly to AIDS. His government also has not committed itself to supplying the public health system with anti-retrovirals - widely accepted to prevent the transmission of HIV and slow the onset of full-blown AIDS.

The South African health ministry has argued that despite the offer of cheaper medicines, South Africa can still not afford to provide anti-retrovirals to its estimated four million citizens living with HIV and AIDS.

Commenting on why Mbeki will not stop in at the summit - even if only as a public relations exercise - political analyst, Dumisani Hlope, pointed out that: "Public relations is not a priority for him. He is comfortable with his position on HIV and AIDS and his government's policies. He can defend himself fairly well on the issue and at some point decided he has nothing new to say on the debate."

However, Mbeki will be visiting the laboratories of the international drug company, Merck, where they are working on vaccines for several diseases, including the strain of HIV that is infecting South Africa.

South African officials are describing the meeting between the two leaders as an opportunity for Mbeki to win Bush's support for MAP - a plan for the political and economic recovery of Africa.

However, until he finishes consulting with other African leaders about MAP - diplomatic protocol will prevent Mbeki, from revealing too much detail about the plan when he meets with the US president.

While the broad outlines of the programme have encouraged the international community to pin a lot of hope for the recovery of Africa on MAP, little is known about its detail.

And, says South African Institute of International Affairs director, Greg Mills, before the United States gets with the programme they will want to know what concrete projects they will be expected to underwrite and how much it will cost. The US also wants to know how the programme will enforce African countries' commitment to good governance and economic policies.

These are questions that Mbeki cannot answer - at least in public, yet. As much as he has been hard at work lobbying the industrialised countries for their support for the programme, Mbeki must also win the backing of African countries for MAP. While MAP has been developed by the presidents of South Africa, Algeria and Nigeria - with a mandate from the Organisation of African Unity, it still has to be presented to the OAU for further consultation, ratification and adoption.

The three will only have a chance to present the programme to a summit of the OAU in Lusaka, Zambia, in early July. Until then, diplomatic protocol requires that they keep silent on the details until other African leaders first have a chance to discuss them. Mbeki has made it clear that the key difference between MAP and other African recovery plans is that it must be developed and driven by Africans.

So, while Mbeki may take Bush into his confidence about his thoughts on the programme's political and financial structures and investment opportunities in infrastructure, information and communications technology and human resource development projects, among others -- hard details about MAP are unlikely to emerge during his visit.

The African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) - designed to give African countries that meet certain standards of good governance preferential access to the US market - will also be discussed. A ministerial meeting between the US secretaries of State, Commerce and the Treasury and their counterparts from 38 sub-Saharan African countries is scheduled for October, to look at the Act. During Mbeki's visit, some of the preparations for the meeting will come up for discussion.

The US is one of South Africa's key-trading partners and the largest foreign direct investor in the country. Last year South African exports to the US totalled R16.75 billion and imports from the US amounted to R21.93 billion. One US Dollar is equal to 8.12 Rand.

South Africa would like to use the Act to further boost trade relations with the United States.

The US will also want to discuss steps that it and South Africa can take to shore-up peace initiatives in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) - and ensure their success. US secretary of State, Colin Powell committed the US to supporting the peace process in the DRC during his African tour, last month. South African officials are reportedly quietly talking-up the prospects of getting peace talks going in the DRC, Burundi and Angola -- where the government and the formerly US-backed rebel movement, UNITA, are still involved in a 30-year civil war.

Deputy director of the South African Department of Foreign Affairs, Ndumiso Ntshinga, said it was likely that the setting up of a new bi-national commission for South Africa and the US would be discussed.

Initial discussions with the Bush administration indicated that the new commission would not be as high-powered as the first South African-US structure. However, it would continue to provide direct, high-level access between the leaders of the US and South Africa and work to boost trade, development and political relations between the two countries.(END/IPS/AF/IP/ps/mn/01)
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