September 18, 2006
Guardian Letter - party conferences
The following letter was published in The Guardian on Fri 15th Sept
Dear Editor, Except for big political parties, nearly all democratic organisations hold AGMs and annual elections. Hence the party leadership struggles: Thatcher, Kennedy and now Blair. Is there any chance that the forthcoming annual conferences could turn themselves into proper democratic AGMs?
Yours
September 13, 2006
Darfur
Dear Editor, The 2006 Darfur Peace Agreement outlines a referendum on autonomy in 2010. The 2002 Machakos Protocol for South Sudan promised a similar ballot on independence in six years. So if one part of the country can break away, why not another? And was the latter Protocol for the SPLA/SPLM in Juba a cause of the former conflict by the SLA/SLM in Darfur?
In 1999, Rambouillet proposed a referendum for the independence of Kosovo after three years. Earlier, the 1991 Badinter Commission suggested every ‘people’ aspiring to break away in what was still Yugoslavia should have a referendum. The result was a spate of such polls, because for every majority which wants to opt out, the corresponding minority wants to opt back in again; and to quote Sarajevo’s newspaper Oslobodjenje, “every war in the former Yugoslavia started with a referendum,” (7.2.1999).
Is it not time to question the use of this simplistic and divisive device? After all, it only encourages each ‘people’ to draw its own border in which to (fight and then) vote, while the respective government, not wanting to see the dismemberment of its own country, fights back. So Khartoum blocks any initiative in Darfur (Sudan throws out Darfur peacekeepers - 5th Sept.), while the ‘people’ of Republika Srpska still look to Belgrade (Serb move may trigger new war - 6th Sept.).
Yours