Commentary: The Other Side of the Earth Summit

R.W. Johnson
for United Press International

August 26, 2002

Those who aspire to a career in bomb sniffing or food-tasting will have
opportunities galore this week in Johannesburg, the site of the United Nations'
World Summit on Sustainable Development. The presence of so many
VIPs—some hundred or more heads of state are expected to attend—has
thrown the conference organizers into a frenzy of security measures.

Specialists have been brought in from around the world to deal with worse-case scenarios such as kidnapping, air attacks, chemical bombs, mortar assaults, cyber attacks, and attempts to disrupt power and telecommunications. Cars at summit sites are virtually dismantled in the search for bombs. Food-tasters check for poisoning, and no one is allowed to overfly Johannesburg without 24 hours' notice.

Arguably leading the list of usual suspects is the anti-globalization Social Movements Indaba led by Dennis Brutus, a South African poet who was once imprisoned on Robben Island with anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela and who is now a veteran activist of the street battles of Seattle, Prague, and Genoa.

The SMI points out that "Jo'burg will be the biggest meeting ever of world leaders promising 'people, planet and prosperity.' Their lies cannot be allowed to stand. Join us as we build a new world with our lives and our bodies, as we unmask the W$$D!"

It is no small irony that Brutus will be doing his best to disrupt proceedings in which Mandela, who became president of South Africa after his release from Robben, will play a walk-on role surrounded by glitterati.

Cacophony of Voices

But the SMI is only one voice in a cacophony.

Part of the problem is that this is a summit about everything. According to whom you talk to, it is a meeting about global poverty, trade liberalization, development finance, water supplies, debt forgiveness, housing, health, aid, climate change, alternative technology, AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, education, over-population, wildlife conservation, animal rights, access to affordable medicine, intellectual property rights, the "brain drain" of Third World doctors and nurses to the West, inequality, food security, waste recycling, economic growth, agriculture, energy resources, global emissions and global warming, desertification, sanitation, biodiversity, food security, and the preservation of tropical forests, wetlands and coastal eco-systems—for starters.

Thus the equally far-reaching prospects for fuss and perhaps even trouble. To protests from among the now familiar ranks of anti-globalization and environmental groups one must add shebeen-owners, street-hawkers, anti-privatization trade unionists, and the Free Market Foundation, whose director, Leon Louw, sides with the hawkers who claim they have been "cleaned up like litter."

Louw argues that the summit organizers seem inspired by Verwoerd—the South African prime minister who helped implement apartheid policies—and are trying "to turn Jo'burg into a Disneyland fantasyland. Summit delegates won't realize they are in Africa."

Already the Greenpeace ship Esperanza has been in Cape Town, where it confronted two armed vessels bearing plutonium to Britain. Greenpeace is also present in Johannesburg and hints darkly at other mysterious activities and protests. Already we have the award of ironic "Green Oscars" to companies such as BP and Shell for "greenwashing"—that is, adopting an environmentally friendly image while in fact pillaging natural resources.

(Not surprisingly, the award winners failed to attend the ceremony, which also included awards for "best make-up" and "best supporting government.")

South Africa's National Intelligence Agency has many agents mingling with the activists and is particularly concerned about the somewhat anarchic Landless People's Movement, over 50 of whose activists have already been arrested. The chairman of the South African group, Mangaliso Khubeka, was questioned by the NIA. "They asked me what I want. I want to plough," he said. "How can they say they're having a summit on sustainable development—what development are they talking about? We don't see any. People are hungry. We have no land or jobs."

Commercial Opportunities

For many locals the summit is a commercial opportunity. Astonishingly, many delegates are arriving without accommodation booked. They are being charged exorbitant rates by landlords. Eager sex workers from all over the country have descended on Jo'burg. ("We're hoping for a real bonanza," said Harry Gibbs, who runs a massage parlor called Tigerbelles. "The girls are all pumped up and raring to go.")

Even senior police officers, addressing the vast force brought in to cover the summit, have warned their men to be wary of prostitutes with the injunction, "This is Joburg. Things happen here."

Meanwhile, out at the Global People's Forum—the NGO, or non-governmental organization, conference in the south of the city—you can visit the Karaites Institute of Afrikology and buy herbal remedies alleged to cure HIV, womb cancer, tuberculosis, and much else. African curio sellers are everywhere, as are African National Congress stands selling hammer and sickle t-shirts and caps with Castro and Che Guevara on them.

For the moment, the carnival goes on. Behind the scenes we hear that there is still no agreement on a draft declaration, and the summit may still see a bitter standoff between rich and poor nations. There is almost as much resentment against U.S. President George W. Bush for not coming as there is against Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe because he is coming. The green activists wanted Bush to come so they could protest against him, and they feel cheated of their prey. They would also like to demonstrate against Mugabe but from a distance.

And of course, the summit has no end of extremely serious issues to deal with. The last big United Nations conference South Africa hosted—the World Conference Against Racism a year ago—began in similar carnival style and ended in bitterness, reproach, and shambles. For the moment, it's fun to be at the WSSD and most people seem determined to enjoy it. Whether this mood survives the week ahead is a moot point.

Copyright 2002 by United Press International