Nicholas Sarkozy has not ceased to entertain. His visit to Chad and South Africa, much like George W. Bush’s “African Safari,” makes better fodder for political satire and tabloid gossip than what the Western media giants like to consider  respected journalism.

Unfortunately, being entertained by Sarkozy and the French government that has committed grievous atrocities over the past century, and beyond, means that I have to suppress a part of my own humanity. Rather than get angry at the nonsense of the Champs Elysées, morally devastated by the human cost that Africa pays for it and frustrated by intellectuals who gloss over the absurdity with confusing theories rather than call a spade a spade, I make the cowardly choice to laugh bitterly. And after decades of studying the French language and social absurdities, I can accomplish this feat almost instinctively. However, I am aware that the more I stare into the abyss of racism, mediocrity and the inferiority complex that continue to try and drag Africa down, the more likely the abyss will stare back at me. May the ancestors save my soul.

Back to Sarkozy. As many had predicted when the Zoe’s Ark slave ship was prevented from leaving the dock of N’Djamena, Sarkozy did secure the pardon of six criminals from Chadian dictator Idriss Deby, which could not have been difficult since Deby’s moral credentials are not that outstanding anyway, and Deby needed some favors down the line. Zoe’s Ark, by the way, is still in denial. According to its website, the organization is innocent because it was misled by the French government that supported the Deby dictatorship (maybe French law does not know of the adage “ignorance is no defense”). It also claims that it was the real victim of injustice because the Deby regime did not carry out the trial according to law. Never mind that the six were given the privilege of being tried in the capital of N’Djamena rather than the town of Abeche which was the scene of the crime. And never mind that they were given the option to serve their sentences in Paris rather than Chad. In the home of human rights, there’s a word that has no French equivalent: Responsibility.

But I digress. Sarkozy went to white wash the debacle by meeting with “human rights” activists in Chad and asking for the release of kidnapped opposition politicians who include Ngarlejy Yorongar and Ibni Oumar Mahamat Saleh. The activists participated in the farce by asking France not to support Deby, even though Sarkozy’s very presence in Chad was proof of that support. But then again, we live in this age of double-speak in which politicians and their supporters do the opposite of what the politicians are actually saying. I have tried to get used to these contradictions, but the universe stubbornly refuses to allow me to do so.

Sarkozy’s next stop: South Africa, to visit his counterpart Thabo Mbeki, the man who shrugged off Sarkozy’s racist speech of Dakar in July 2007 by saying that maybe there was some truth to Sarkozy’s contention that the African peasant is stuck in the past and needs to be invited to live in the modern era. Sarkozy’s trip was obviously designed to pay back the favor he owed Mbeki, as he did Deby. With South Africa submerged in darkness for lack of electricity – this time Sarkozy was careful not to attribute it to lack of civilization – Mbeki now had a favor to call. Namely, contracts to French companies Rio Tinto, Areva and Eskom to help South Africa with expansion of electricity in the country.

But the comedy gets better, or should I say, the absurdity gets worse. From France, the home of human rights and the home to a humanitarian obsessed public that hates globalization and American corporations, comes a “democratically” elected president with an entourage formed by members of French corporations. I wonder if the humanitarian and oh-so-caring French individual who “loves” Africa is interested to find out whether French taxpayers are picking up the travel and accommodation tab for these companies.

As for Carla Bruni …there’s quite some material for laughing at. Pius Adesanmi [0] has beat me to pointing out that Bruni is the latest wife of a president who is, for all intents and purposes, polygamous. And this president rules a country that blames polygamy for the problems facing African immigrants.

The photographs of the French first couple’s first day in South Africa are more telling. Maybe to compensate for the fact that she was the tallest individual among the French and South African first couples, Bruni lowers her head. However, she also stares at the camera as if she has forgotten that she is no longer on the catwalk or that politics is no fashion show. Or maybe politics of today is a fashion show, but I’m still hallucinating or wishing for the “good old days” when politics was serious business.

And that black short-sleeved dress…was that the best Bruni could do? What was the point of being a model if one cannot figure out which clothes should be worn at which occasion? And has living in the land that made haute couture part of the English dictionary not rubbed off on her? Maybe the French taxpayer should consider providing some contracts to Yves St Laurent and other companies, or buying her some books on Princess Diana so that she can make the fashionable transition between celebrity and political life.

But the best part of Sarkozy’s visit was his speech to South Africa’s parliament (the Reuters version [1] of events is fascinating). Apparently, Sarkozy has decided that France will “renegotiate” the military agreements with its former colonies and which have claimed casualties such as Bourkinabe Thomas Sankara and one million Rwandans. The thing is, there is nothing to “renegotiate” since the agreements were not negotiated in the first place. They were imposed by Charles de Gaulle on France’s proxies who were called to Champs Elysees, presented with “independence” as gifts. Some of the hapless recipients were reluctant, such as Cote d’Ivoire’s Houphouet Boigny who would have preferred to remain a department of France. But after have been kicked out of Vietnam and Algeria, de Gaulle did not want to take the risk of being humiliated once again, this time by Black Africa.

And the signs of imminent disaster were already showing in Guinea, where the “no” vote for cooperation with France, led by Sekou Toure, pushed French nationals to leave in a destructive huff, to the extent of pulling electric poles out of the ground and destroying toilet bowls. In Cameroon during the 1950’s and 60’s, France remote controlled and actively managed the murder of people considered enemies of its economic interests and opponents to its puppet Ahidjo. These included UPC leaders Rueben Um Nyobe and Felix-Roland Moumie, as well as hundreds of thousands of people, mainly of Bamileke origin, who were massacred through overt military campaigns that included the use of the dreaded weapon of Napalm. To add insult to injury, this massacre is yet to figure in more historical manuals of French colonial rule. With such amnesia, it is no wonder that Sarkozy would talk of military pacts being “renegotiated.” Unless he expects us to believe that Africans are the ones who “negotiated” with the French government how they would be killed.

But Sarkozy is not a man to be undone by contradictions. It is not enough for history to contradict him; he must also contradict himself. And so in the same speech about “renegotiating” military agreements, he inadvertently reveals, according to Reuters: “I am not saying that the existing agreements should necessarily be scrapped and that everything should be erased with the stroke of a pen."

He may be clear about what he is “not saying,” but we, his listeners, are clear about what he is saying, which is that nothing will essentially change, except the image, advertisement and the PR package in which the military agreements are currently clothed. Says Sarkozy: "They [the agreements] must reflect Africa as it is today and not as it was yesterday."

Again, there’s a problem – we don’t know which Africa of “today” Sarkozy is talking about. Last July, he was saying that Africa was stuck in the past instead of moving into modernity and getting over colonialism. So if Africa is stuck in its colonial past, then the “new” military agreements will reflect the colonial era that Africa is still stuck in. Which will be good news for Gabon’s Omar Bongo, who at the end of January this year lamented that France was abandoning Francafrique, which in his view was a club of friends rather than a mafia-esque organization that has exploited Africa. On the other hand, Sarkozy may have changed his mind about Africa since last July. But repentance and details of his sudden change of heart on the road to South Africa would have been of more interest to us than his promise to “renegotiate” deadly political deals.

But even as I poke fun at France’s first couple, the universe will not let me forget that the tragedy, the sorrow and the frustration remains reserved for Africa. I find it interesting the African press has called Sarkozy’s journey a “business trip,” yet Africans are quick to throw accusations of corruption at their own leaders who secure contracts for certain companies. The word “corruption” that the West keeps throwing at us is conspicuously absent when its governments overthrow presidents, sponsor civil wars, make campaign contributions, and smear the names of African leaders when their companies were not awarded contracts that are grossly overpriced and are rejected in favor of Chinese, Japanese, South Korean or Indian companies. We need a new definition of what corruption actually is and what it is not, and this definition should not be determined by dubious corruption indexes that emerge from the West and which never feature companies like Total, Elf and Shell-BP.

Secondly, Mbeki has disappointed again, just as he did in July. This time, it is with his commendation of Sarkozy’s announcement as an important step in the “decolonization process.” It is surely a tragedy that in the land of Steve Biko, a man who was killed in the prime of his life for insisting that only Africans can liberate themselves rather than be liberated by “liberals,” a president can expect a former colonial power to be the primary protagonist in the struggle of decolonization.

Thirdly, while Africans pursue the commendable goal of learning and relearning our history, we must also do the same for the history of Western civilization. Not for the purpose of adoring Western culture and imitating it as the missionaries taught us. As Frantz Fanon said in The Wretched of the Earth, “if we want to turn Africa into a new Europe…then let us leave the destiny of our countries to Europeans. They will know how to do it better than the most gifted of us.” Rather, we also have to learn from Europe what NOT to do, rather than always what to do. We have to connect the corruption and immorality that pervades Europe to its actions on our continent, rather than naively believe that Europeans suddenly become angels once they step in Africa simply because they are saying that they “care.” Five centuries down the road, Africa has the right to ask Western Europe by what moral authority it advices or criticizes us, as well as the right to ask if Euro-America really has the moral capacity to “care” for the people it is not diligent enough to respect or humble enough to apologize to.

We will also have to spell out people’s and country’s “interests,” rather than “motivations” behind all actions. For at least 2 centuries, beginning with colonial missionaries and educators, and now with “humanitarian” organizations, we Africans have been coerced and pressured into believing that all that matters is how Europeans FEEL about us, rather than what they actually DO to us.

There is nothing inherently wrong with Euro-American governments, Oxfam, Amnesty International, Madonna and the host of do-gooders coming to Africa’s “rescue”; the problem is that we sometimes accept their stated motives at face value and do not question their interests, or better still, the implications of their actions. And the few times Africans dare to question Western charity, they are branded by their fellow citizens as jealous or too selfish to allow others to enjoy the “fruits” of Western consumerism. We must abandon the theodician mentality of Western Christian secularism that everything that has self-interest is evil and necessarily destructive. As Aminata Sow Fall’s brilliant novel The Beggars’ Strike shows, acknowledging less-flattering realities, such as the need for catharsis and purging of the guilt of the wealthy, is a social tool that has the potential to humble the rich and empower the poor. Most of all, such acknowledgement would bind us to the truth, which is usually the primary casualty of injustice. And this, Africans know well, because it is the racist lies about us that have facilitated most of the injustice that we suffer world wide.

While criticism of Western charity seems selfish, there remains the need for all Africans to remain with the human dignity that binds us regardless of our social status, material wealth and ethnic origins. And our dignity today is rather fragile after centuries of being assaulted through slavery, colonialism, racism and Western consumerism by the same countries that exploit us but which, like Sarkozy did in July 2007, tell us that they do not owe us an apology and further, deride us for wallowing in the past and feign innocence when caught with its pants down, as Zoe’s Ark has done.

And so for now, Sarkozy and the French Republic remain a favorite target for criticism and mockery as I try to hone my skills at satire. But what I really need is a regular ritual to cleanse my soul before each new descent into examining the flawed global context in which Africans live. For while Sarkozy may be entertaining, I cannot laugh too much; otherwise I may start to hallucinate.