President Festus Mogae
Yesterday I was fortunate enough to be invited to the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars to a welcome reception for former President of Botswana Festus Mogae, who has joined the center for 4 months as a visiting scholar.
This was pretty exciting for me, given the Botswana connection, though, I didn’t really know what I would say to him other than, “I loved living in Botswana, isn’t it the greatest?” Presumably he would agree, and the conversation would stagnate.
Anyway, I got there early, as I usually do, and stood around trying to identify the other dignitaries and waiting for the family friend that had invited me. President Mogae arrived with a small retinue: the Botswana Ambassador and a couple of handlers, shortly followed by our family friend who works at the Center. I did get to officially meet the President: he couldn’t have been nicer, and said politely, “oh how nice” when I said how much I enjoyed being in Botswana. Awkward, maybe, but still totally cool.
The highlight of the evening was the President’s speech, where he expressed his gratitude for the Center for hosting him and explained a bit about what he has been doing since his retirement in 2008. President Mogae is a member of the group “Champions for an HIV Free Generation” (a group which includes former Presidents Kaunda and Chissano, and Desmond Tutu, among others). This group works with international and local NGOs in Africa to collect data describing the HIV/AIDS situation in various countries and then meets with each country’s leadership to (“carefully and respectfully”, he emphasized) discuss ways to address the crisis. This group has already met with leadership in Mozambique, Namibia, Botswana, Zambia and Swaziland and have a trip planned in October to Lesotho. One of the reasons President Mogae said he appreciated being in Washington, DC was its proximity to the headquarters of PEPFAR and President Obama’s new Global Health Initiative, where he can share his experiences.
The second committee President Mogae is involved in is called the Coalition for Dialogue on Africa (CODA). President Mogae said that the group would have preferred to replace “Dialogue” with “Democracy” but they did not want to appear to be pushing any particular agenda. Many African leaders, he said, have a tendency to “outstay their welcome” in their countries and often end up spoiling their own legacies as a result. As examples, he cited President Traoré of Mali, President Banda of Malawi, “America’s good friend Museveni,” and (after a long, long pause when you could hear a pin drop)…Mugabe. President Mogae says he does his best to convince leadership to have regular elections and hand over power, but the leadership’s response is always, “Mogae, you have been bribed by Mo Ibrahim to come here and tell us to leave! Haha!” (President Mogae won the $5 Million “Mo Ibrahim Prize” for Achievement in African Leadership in 2008).
He closed by saying how much he appreciated the Center for allowing him to make the trips necessary to continue his involvement in these organizations while still remaining “a proud scholar.”
Such a cool speech! Another high point came when President Mogae said when he travels to other countries he feels like “one of those American…what do you call thems?” There was a pause before the Deputy Head of Mission from South Africa called out, “Lobbyists!” and everyone started to laugh.
