Rawlings says dialogue with Al-Shabab is a possibility

Accra, Aug. 15, GNA - Former Ghanaian President and African Union High Representative for Somalia, Jerry John Rawlings, has praised African Union troops in Somalia for the efforts they have made in securing Mogadishu to make it possible for the easy transport of relief items to displaced persons in the country.

“I doubt if we would have made any headway with the transport of aid had the troops not been on the ground,” he said.

President Rawlings, however, did not rule out dialoguing with the Al Shabab group.

A statement issued from the Office of the Former President said he was speaking with journalists in Abuja after a meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan on Friday.

He said: “If others on the ground rule that (dialogue) out, I certainly don’t rule that out. I just have to pick my timing carefully and appropriately.”

The AU High Representative, who was in Abuja to brief President Jonathan on the humanitarian situation in the Horn of Africa region, said he travelled to Nigeria in recognition of the important role that country could play in reversing Africa’s declining image.

Former President Rawlings said the inability of the continent to tackle the Darfur humanitarian disaster hurt Africa’s image so badly.

President Rawlings said he had noticed when he attended international forums with some of his peers that failure over Darfur had resulted in a lukewarm response to some African leaders.

“I realised we were being judged by what appeared to be our inability to deal with the Darfur situation. What we can do now is to see the extent to which we can assist the humanitarian situation to reduce the number of lives, especially children, who are dying.”

He discounted an assertion that the AU was a toothless bulldog, explaining that this perception had come about as a result of a new global order, which had assimilated “us and some of our resources”.

President Rawlings said: “A lot of African countries are in a much worse situation than you are in Nigeria. Nigerians are very tenacious when it comes to exploiting and protecting their own resources but one cannot quite say that for many other African countries who are unable to assert themselves politically as a result of which in the so-called new era of globalisation we have ended up ceding power to Western powers.”

In his meeting with President Jonathan, former President Rawlings intimated that the Libyan situation was also a poor reflection on the continent.