After his quest to be the man in the Arab world was frustrated, he turned his attention to Sub-Saharan Africa to achieve his ambitions as a grandiloquent puppet-master.The past few months have undoubtedly brought Gaddafi closer than ever to his cherished dream of being United States of Africa's first president. Last August, Gaddafi pulled a coup against fellow African political leaders when he managed to convene and sponsor a gathering of more than 200 African kings and traditional leaders in Benghazi. The obviously cash-flush kings thanked the Libyan leader by crowning him Africa's King of Kings. Interestingly, His Royal Highness Gaddafi attended last week's AU summit in Ethiopia in that capacity.Having managed to become the top bull of African kings, Gaddafi had his sights set on the continental body, the African Union. He forced his proposal on the AU agenda for the establishment of a single government, the United States of Africa.
This would comprise a single military force, a single currency and a single passport. At some point, he came closer to getting an all-Africa parliament to be established at his desert city of Sirte, his birth-place. In fact, His Royal Highness has for years resolutely pursued this route with passion. His single-mindedness has seen him extracting significant concessions from his presidential colleagues over the years. He is solely credited with changing the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) to the current AU, at Lome (Togo) summit in 2000.This time around, in addition to getting leaders of the 53-nation AU to elect him chairman, the AU Commission was transformed into an AU Authority with attendant broader mandate. It is amazing how the colonel manages to get things moving in Africa!However, the massive petro-dollar at his personal disposal has allegedly played a big role in persuading greedy African leaders to dance along with him. The Libyan leader is known to have often paid-off indebted African states' subscriptions and arrears to the AU. Gaddafi has perfected the time-tested principles of carrot-and-stick approach to his dealings with fellow African leaders.His cheque-book diplomacy has won him crucial support in important African capitals despite clear evidence that a few nuts might be loose in his head. As one of the world's longest serving heads of state, Gadaffi is an old hand in international diplomacy and this perhaps allows him to mesmerise and bamboozle younger leaders with his money, power and influence. He is power-hungry, if not power-drunk, and his desire to rule Africa as the supreme lord master has never been in doubt.
