Daniel Steinmann
26 June 2009
opinion
Windhoek — When the president of Russia visits you, it is impossible not to take note. When he includes our rather insignificant country on his itinerary of only four countries, it loudly signals the Russians are up to something. Given the fact that he avoids Zuma like the clap also says something of our future role in Russia's new vitality.
If one goes by the stark analysis of economists, there is not much left of the glory of old Russia, the world power. But statistics on paper seldom convey the dynamics of a very large country, especially one that has only recently rebooted itself. Russia is generally classified as an emerging economy, rated in the same quartile where Brazil, China and India find themselves. Yet I have always regarded it as dormant waiting anxiously for its resurgence, which I think actually started in the Putin reign and is still very much driven by him.
In European terms, Russia is what one can call Old Money. True, the communists completely destroyed the feudal legacy but do not forget, - where China is today, Russia was already 50 years ago. So, do not underestimate Russia, neither its national fervour, nor its technological and financial ability. The new Russia is out to prove something, and I think Africa features prominently on their radar.
Recent events in the Caucasus convinced me Russia has drawn the line as far as foreign interference is concerned. This obviously followed a rather dismal track record in Chechnya and the neighbouring 'stans. But with only Georgia and Armenia being Orthodox in that part of the world, and reliving the futile war in Afghanistan against a fundamentally Muslim population, I believe the modern Russia without the Muslim baggage is on its first steps to very quickly take up world power status again. This opens a strategic conundrum for the Russians for they have to tread very carefully where the Americans may interpret their actions as an infringement. And they have to cast a careful sideways glance to the Chinese.
Each of these three have their own Africa agendas, the true content of which I suspect we'll never see. But international politics and strategic ploys are hard to disguise ad infinitum so eventually, as things evolve, patterns start emerging.
I do not think it is our uranium that entices them. They have more than enough of the stuff themselves. Our diamonds can also not be the drawing card since Almay Rossi is rubbing shoulders with De Beers. Oil we do not have - not yet, neither gold nor any other strategic mineral which in any case can be bought anywhere in the world. There must be something else the Russians see in Namibia and I do not think it is us, the people.
There are in my mind only two possibilities. Our location and our control over a rather significant chunk of the southern Atlantic that may still yield a bounty of which currently we are only dreaming. A third rather improbable factor may be territory but I honestly doubt this since they have so much of it themselves. That is the domain of the Chinese. Unless the Russians want to start a string of glass factories and they feel we have dune loads full of just the right silica.
No, I can draw only one conclusion. Our importance to the Russians is strategic and nothing else.
We are the closest one can get to a back door to South Africa; our political squabbles are minor and insignificant, and we are destined to become one of the leading members in the bigger SADC conglomeration. In short: if you are friendly with the Namibians, you are bound to have a very solid access point to the entire southern Africa within a couple of years.
On the seaward side, we are well connected too. We control significant sea territory, which the Russians know only too well since they enthusiastically helped decimate our fish stock before independence. And as our sea-serving ability grows in depth, we shall at one point in the not too distant future, control a very significant traffic between the oil fields of west and west central Africa, and the hungry powerhouse in the south. Our ports are also a natural point of departure for the vast South American continent and the Caribbean, lying by luck comfortably north of the dangerous South Atlantic.
About a year ago I asked the question why are the Russians building a bunker for an embassy in Windhoek. I think I slowly see a picture emerging although I have to admit that I am still in the dark as to their real motives. The Russians can be excellent partners to us. There are many areas where all the bilateral agreements of this week can actually lead to something. We can even be chums at a later stage drinking Vodka and Tafel and fondly remembering all those Russian pilots we captured in Angola.
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