A pungent comment by David Smith, director of South Africa-based media firm Okapi Consulting and an expert on the region:
But if history teaches us anything, and it should, then Minusca is likely to be as successful as its numerous predecessors. From the time of Misab and Minurca…through Bonuca, Binuca, Fomuc, Fomac, Micopax, Misca and now Minusca we have, to a large extent, many of the same players trying to do the same thing all over again – stabilise the country and prepare the ground for presidential elections. The big problem is that MINUSCA is preparing the ground for, to a large extent, many of the same people who have been looting and pillaging the CAR for decades to take over once again.

The peacekeeping effort needs drastic surgery that includes a strong and lengthy mandate that help to create a new network of functionaries, politicians and professionals that can start building the institutions any normal country has for running a country and providing the services and infrastructural needs that have yet to be created in this shadow of a state.


My biggest fear concerning MINUSCA is that once the UN containers are packed up in a year, two years, three years from now, the same people, both inside and outside the country who have benefited from a culture of impunity will be free to carry on as they have been since founding father Barthelemy Boganda was killed in a plane crash in 1959. What will the next peacekeeping mission be called?


Link:http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/artic.../#.VBgUvVeRcdV