Aziz Pahad: the unassuming South African diplomat who skilfully mediated crises in Africa, and beyond
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Friday, September 29, 2023
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Together with a small group of foreign policy analysts, I worked with Aziz over the span of 30 years, shaping the post-apartheid South African government’s approach to international relations and its foreign policy.
Key Points:
- Together with a small group of foreign policy analysts, I worked with Aziz over the span of 30 years, shaping the post-apartheid South African government’s approach to international relations and its foreign policy.
- We spent countless hours debating foreign affairs and the numerous crises and challenges government had to face as a relative “newcomer” in continental African and global affairs.
- Sadly, towards the end of his career as a diplomat he witnessed the slow decline of South Africa’s stature and influence in global affairs.
The Mandela and Mbeki years
- Under presidents Nelson Mandela (1994-1999) and Thabo Mbeki (1999-2008), South African diplomats who’d sharpened their skills during many years of exile became sought-after as facilitators and mediators.
- Under their guidance Africa converted the Organisation of African Unity into the African Union, and reset relations with the international community via the New Partnership for Africa’s Development.
- Neither could it withstand the grand corruption which reached its apogee in South Africa under former president Jacob Zuma (May 2009 - February 2018).
Preparatory years
- The congress became involved in the broader anti-apartheid struggle in later years.
- In 1963, Aziz completed a degree in sociology and Afrikaans at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg.
- It eventually shaped government’s more formal foreign policy of 2011, entitled Building a Better World: The Diplomacy of Ubuntu.
- It lives on as the Institute of Global Dialogue, based at the University of South Africa.
Role in government
- From there, he was appointed by President Mandela as deputy minister of foreign affairs.
- This enabled him to play an unassuming but key mediating and facilitation role dealing with major crises on the continent and beyond.
- Aziz resigned from government and parliament in 2008, shortly after Mbeki was removed as president of the ANC in 2007.
The ‘diplomat-scholar’
- He played a prominent role, with his brother Essop, in a small but influential think-tank, the Concerned Africans Forum.
- In 2015 he headed the short-lived South African Council on International Relations.
- The council was established by the government as a body of experts and a sounding board for senior decision-makers.