Re: ugnet_: Interview with Edward S. Marek

[vukoni]

Beware of those who weep louder than the owner of the corpse.  This Marek man isn't who he purports to be.  And there are keywords in this interview that actually blow his cover wide open.
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: ugnet_: Interview with Edward S. Marek
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Tue, January 7, 2003 9:29 am
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

INTERVIEW WITH EDWARD S. MAREK

Edward S. Marek, Founder and President of Your dot com for Africa, a
web-based information services network focused on Africa, talks about
DR.
Congo crisis.

Congo Vision: Let me begin by asking you how a normal US citizen like
yourself becomes interested in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)
and the Great Lakes region of Africa with so much passion and
dedication.

MAREK: In August 1996 a group of us met in Washington with the US
ambassador to Kinshasa, Mr. Simpson. It was my first introduction to
the Zairean scene. He was pressing Mobutu to liberalize and
democratize, and he urged us to help him in any way we could. I had
just begun to convert my defense intelligence consulting business to a
web-based information services business focused on Africa, so I
thought I could lend a helping hand, and I quickly converted my new
web site to �Zaire Watch.�

Just a couple months after that, the �ADFL rebellion� and first
Rwandan invasion began. Before I knew it, we had a full blown war
underway, demanding daily, sometimes hourly reporting. My readership
increased rapidly, very rapidly, and I could see that reporting on
Zaire had a market, one I hoped would support a business endeavor for
me that would also keep the market informed with the most credible,
accurate and responsive reporting I could provide.

Since that time, I quickly learned two crucial lessons. First, I
learned how the Zairean (Congolese) people had never really had a
chance, since before colonialism, to chart their own destiny. I am a
great fan of the �common man� so this angered me.
Second, I saw what a strategic country Zaire-DR Congo was and is. It
is the center of the sub-Saharan Africa universe. It is large, it has
enormous natural and very diverse resources in the vast Congo River
basin and its environs, and it has a large population
that exceeds 50 million people, meaning a potentially interesting
market, far more interesting than any of its neighbors. I also knew
that a strong and economically vibrant Zaire-Congo would brush off on
all the neighbors.

I concluded that Zaire-Congo could be the engine to drive growth for
all of central Africa, perhaps even much of sub-Saharan Africa. I
found all this very new and exciting. I still do. I felt I could build
a commercial information services business as a result.(...)

So I have always had a special place in my heart for the little guy,
the guy who gets the raw deal, the guy who has the least say, the guy
without whom nothing can work, the average citizen. I feel that way
about the Congolese people, men and women. They have gotten a raw deal
for decades and decades, and I don�t like it. It�s not fair. So my
tendency is to stick up for them, just as I would for others in their
boat.

My tendency also is to mistrust the flamboyant, the know-it-alls, the
so-called big-shots who manipulate people to get where they are. There
have been plenty of those in the Congo�s history, and I don�t like
them, and I don�t respect them. (...)

Congo Vision: What are your thoughts about the Congo peace agreement
signed on December 17, 2002 in Pretoria under the leadership of
president Thabo Mbeki? Many experts have given it a cautious welcome.

MAREK: My view is that the Lusaka cease-fire agreement of 1999 and the
Pretoria agreement of 2002 were and are bad for the Congolese people.
I understand why the Congo�s leadership felt compelled to sign these
agreements, but I wish they had not done so and taken greater risks.

My fundamental problem with both agreements is that they legitimize
the Rwandan and Ugandan invasions and occupation, and I find that
unpalatable. These agreements also fail to recognize who the victims
have been in this war. The victims have been the Congolese people and
the sovereign state of the DR Congo. I find that contemptible.

The so-called Congolese rebels are not rebels at all. They are
bureaucrats who have been co-opted by the governments of Rwanda and
Uganda and used as their puppets. They have no political agenda. They
have no political following. They have no popular support in the
Congo. They have done the bidding of Kigali and Kampala. They are, in
my view, traitors and their traitorous activities have caused the
deaths, displacement and agony of millions upon millions of Congolese
people. Their traitorous activities have set the Congo back decades.

I have met many of their leaders, I have heard their explanations of
their �causes,� and to a man I have found their supporting rationales
to be empty and corrupt. It is abominable that anyone recognizes them
as a political force in the Congo, and I greatly resent that they have
found top leadership posts in the new transitional government. I
suspect that�s one reason I did not get funded to continue the
government�s web site through 2003; the rebels who will be in that
government know I have no respect for them at all.

I feel the Congolese people, including the unarmed political
opposition which has fought peacefully for so long to push the country
toward democracy, have been cheated.

With regard to Mr. Mbeki, I have lost respect for his government and
his country as a result of that government�s reaction to this war
since the outset. Let�s be frank. South Africa is the darling of the
West, sub-Saharan Africa�s most advanced economy, a country which the
West believes must succeed. I don�t have any problem with that, and
indeed support helping South Africa succeed.

But the Congo too must succeed. I believe it more important to
sub-Saharan Africa as a whole that the Congo succeed than South
Africa. Why?
Because the Congo has strategic location, a larger population, and
offers greater market potential. A successful Congo can drive growth
in a far larger area of Africa than can South Africa. The Congo is in
the heart of Africa; its pulse will drive Africa more than will South
Africa. And South Africa is still mired in intense racial conflict.
South African leaders understand this, and see the Congo as a
long-term threat.

(keep posted... more to come, Amundala)