Ghaddafi has always been an attention-seeking clown on the international stage. The surprise is that some of us are so shocked at his latest statement on Nigeria that we are resorting to denial. It is not the first controversial statement he has made and it will certainly not be the last. That someone like him could rise to be AU head and speak for Africa tells you the least you need to know about the state of leadership in Africa. Nigeria will far more likely 'tear' than 'split', and as bad as things are right now I don't think any of us wants to witness the consequences of such shallow reasoning.
By the way, HUSNAA and IBB, I think you have been unfair in your judgement of the UN's activity in Africa. While the UN's failures and weaknesses are obvious, the efforts of its socio-economic and humanitarian bodies in Africa's disaster areas ought not to be easily dismissed. Yes, these orgs could be more effective, but we would be worse off without them. And since the end of the Cold War, half of its peace-keeping operations have been in Africa. As of 2005, about 50,000 UN troops were involved in Africa, which at the time amounted to 85 % of all active UN peacekeepers worldwide.
Moreover, we should remember that the UN's peacekeeping efforts in Africa include stints in Liberia and Sierra Leone, places where the activity of Libyan-trained 'revolutionaries' resulted in civil war and chaos. The lives of Nigerian soldiers were part of the price paid to clean up the mess in those places. For this reason I cannot applaud Ghaddafi's sanctimonious and hypocritical posturing at the UN meeting last year. Libya has been part of the problem with wars in West Africa and not the solution.
