Malawi: Caught between two worlds

This year, the 19th African Union summit was to be held in Lilongwe, Malawi, a responsibility that typically rotates among states that are members of the AU. Instead, this summit will be moved to the AU headquarters in Ethiopia. Why? Malawi refused to host the Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir who is wanted for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide

 
President Omar al-Bashir has an outstanding arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court on charges of crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide. For this reason, Malawi had decided to ban him from attending the summit which is to start in July. The government then received a letter from the AU in which it was told that they had no right to dictate who could and could not attend the summit. Malawi was given the choice of allowing President Omar al-Bashir to attend or giving up their position as host country.

President Joyce Banda, the first female president of Malawi

In Malawi, the current President is Joyce Banda who came into power in April when the previous president died while in office. At a May press conference, President Banda said that a visit by the Sudanese President would not be acceptable to Malawi's international donors with whom she has worked to improve relations over the past couple of months. These international relationships had been strained by her predecessor, but she has been experiencing fairly significant success. Within the last month, President Banda has secured deals with the International Monetary Fund and the British government for various aid packages and has also established a relationship with the central bank of Britain to assist with currency devaluation challenges. This newly reacquired support would be lost if Malawi were to host President Omar al-Bashir.

President Banda has had some difficult decisions to make in her first couple of months in office. She has now found herself caught between the ideals of her donors and those of her fellow African Union countries, of whom only South Africa and Zambia have declared that they would arrest President al-Bashir if he were to enter their countries. I, and likely most of the people living in developed countries, would applaud President Banda in her decision. Nevertheless this leaves Malawi experiencing strained relationships with some of their neighbouring countries. This decision also poses huge business losses for Malawians who had invested in improving their hotel and transportation services in anticipation of the summit. Without an influx of people for the AU summit, these business people will have challenges repaying loans and other debts.

What are your thoughts on the African Union summit? Should Malawi still be allowed to ban individuals from attending or is the African Union right in its decision to relocate the summit to Ethiopia?