Dar es Salaam-based political and social commentator
Since during the two months or so of the presidential campaign in the US, it was clear Elon Musk was eager to get close to candidate Donald Trump and was doing everything to ingratiate himself to the future president.
There was something about his overstated exuberance and enthusiasm displayed at some of the rallies that some people put down to an understandable juvenile abandon of a young man who had finally found a political cause he could identify with and openly support, wholeheartedly and without reservation.
Yet there were eyebrows raised over a number of issues, such as some kind of lotto Musk organised among Trump supporters that for some observers looked like a brazen interference in the political/voting system, in effect a way of paying off voters who would be voting in a certain way, although this complaint, as far I can remember, doesn’t seem to have gathered traction.
In the days after the electoral results were declared —and Trump had won—a flurry of activity descended on the Mar a Lago residence of the president-elect as many well-wishers, hangers-on and job seekers more or less mobbed the new employer-in-chief, a standard practice in all countries of the world.
Musk all but moved to the vicinity of the Trump resort and was sighted there for a long time before Trump started naming his chosen chief assistants.
Musk’s vigil at Mar-a-Lago finally paid off when the new capo de tutti capi named him to man some hitherto unknown government “efficiency department”. It was not made clear what his title would be, what the staffing details were, whom he was supposed to report to, and such other things.
But soon we started hearing what Musk was supposed to be doing as an assistant to his new boss when he started launching vitriolic attacks on the USAID, a flagship of America’s international cooperation efforts.
Railing against this prime agency, Musk so vilified it and called a pack of “worms”. At some stage, Musk, looking like the Oval Office was his home, with a son on his shoulders, was present as President Trump took swipes at USAID as a corrupt oganisation.
True, a look at some of the programmes highlighted as USAID-supported make laughable viewing, such as one where money given to trans-gender opera performances in some Muslim country, but other funded activities are credible and helpful, such as programmes/projects on HIV/Aids, TB and malaria in the majority of countries where the agency operates.
What is true, what an agency of this kind does will depend for its relevance on the worldview of the paymaster of the moment back in Washington.
One may assume that the furtherance of American foreign policy will be near the top of the concerns addressed by such an agency, so things like putting out clever pro-American material in the papers and on the radios would be seen as sound investment, while anything seemingly injurious to the US interests would be seen as counterproductive.
Sometimes we in the Third World can easily find ourselves at a crossroads of issues that we find really confusing and frightening, and which may increasingly require heightened vigilance on the part of the countries and forces in the Third World.
This would include such projects seemingly designed to recruit young people into transgender influences and so-called “education”, a no-brainer to me. Clearly this is not in any way a priority area for any of our constituents, and may provide an example of what has been termed “cultural imperialism.”
Apart from that, new issues have come up, as they surely would, all the time. Trump has tried to stir up a few of hornet’s nests, and he is not about to hold back yet. For instance, he now says he will “have” Gaza, and then he will clean it up, make it safe, reconstruct it and make it beautiful, without its inhabitants, whom he wants resettled elsewhere. How, he doesn’t seem to know.
Now, Trump and his new friend Elon Musk are taking on the government of South Africa on that country’s timid land reform programme, something the majority people would like to see in earnest—it is the basis on which Apartheid is still based, and on which their government has been overcautious, literally walking on eggshells-- and is only now taking some ginger, reluctant steps, the very baby steps being complained about by Trump and Musk.
Musk has become outspoken. Attacking the limited land reform initiatives, he has made so much noise one may think that historically it was the Whites whose land had been taken over by a minority of Blacks wielding overriding state power, not the other way around.
The spectre of Trump and Musk pouring vitriol on this (as I say, timid) programme, tells me that Apartheid has an ear in the Oval Office, and Musk has acquired that ear, and he will use it to roll back the anti-Apartheid liberation movement.
As for Gaza and Trump’s idea of making it an area of shopping malls, cinema halls, promenades and waterfront recreation facilities, sanitized against the Palestinian people who would be expatriated so they can lead safe lives far from Israeli bombs and bulldozers, that crazy idea needs another week of reflection in which I will seek to understand what Trump is talking about, and whether Musk will go along with his newly acquired asset.
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