 possibly the Permanent Under Secretary at the Foreign Office? Or do you think there were separate drafts that were developed in different camps?
SM: The initiative would have very much come from the Chief himself. It wouldn’t have originated in Political Affairs, though he would have got the Division involved. I certainly remember the drafting of the Millbrook Commonwealth Action Programme. That would have involved Political Affairs as well as the Office of the SG but the specific mechanism was something which I think the Chief kept pretty much under wraps; but he was insistent that the whole furore about Ken Saro-Wiwa and Nigeria’s execution of the Ogoni Eight should be separated out from the question of establishing CMAG. So from my recollection, at the Retreat, first of all the question of the Millbrook Commonwealth Action Programme and the question of CMAG was agreed, and then the issue of Nigeria was addressed. I think that was the sequence.
SO: How much preparatory diplomacy did the Chief embark upon in the run up to Auckland to try and set the stage for the acceptance of a Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group?
SM: I think it was very significant. He always prepared for heads of government meetings very carefully with many bilateral meetings with heads of government. He would have had some of these meetings ‘above the line’, as it were, and some of them would have been tête-à-têtes with the head concerned. It may well have been that he would have reserved something like this for ‘below the line’ discussion which the official record wouldn’t reveal at all. It would be inconceivable for Chief to go to Auckland with a proposal like CMAG and not to have had substantial backing from all the major players. Though it still would not have been a ‘done deal’!
SO: Do you remember any apprehension on his part that he wasn’t going to be able to persuade heads of the need to endorse the CMAG idea?
SM: Yes, absolutely. I know that he felt that he was sailing close to the wind on this, but this is where paradoxically the whole Ken Saro-Wiwa tragedy was a bonus in that regard…
SO: It helped to make sure there was no opposition, but the preparatory ground work beforehand would also have been critical in leading up to heads’ acceptance?
SM: Yes, it was critical, but it wasn’t necessarily decisive and it was actually the behaviour of Chief Tom Ikimi, the Nigerian Foreign Minister, who at the Opening Executive Session behaved so boorishly. That, coupled with the terrible circumstances of the execution, made CMAG much more of a certainty. The execution of Saro-Wiwa was badly bungled.
SO: Yes it was.
SM: It was horrific, coupled with the fact that Ken Saro-Wiwa’s son was present in Auckland and was trying to lobby for his father. As you say, Mandela felt that he had invested personal capital when pleading for Saro-Wiwa’s life and then he felt betrayed. That was the thing I think that pushed heads firmly into the CMAG camp and that’s why Chief’s approach was to say, “Let’s first of all deal with the principle of this mechanism. Then, once we’ve agreed the principle, we move on to how we deal with Nigeria.” Mandela was initially leading the charge for Nigeria’s expulsion, and not for anything short of that. But then heads invoked – I think Chief would have argued for this – the procedures in Millbrook that they’d just adopted and the idea of there being a substantial process of engagement thereafter. I think in the period from Auckland through to the caretaker administration and the return of Nigeria to democracy in 1999, there were something like sixteen missions or meetings. It was an intensive period of activity involving Nigeria. I’m not just talking about SG’s meeting – these were CMAG or CMAG-related. It was a baptism of fire for CMAG, which was set up with Don McKinnon as the Vice Chair and Stan Mudenge as Chair.
SO: He was the Foreign Minister from Zimbabwe?
SM: Yes. That perhaps again is one of the ironies. I think, the work was very positive and of course the military coup in Pakistan was in ’99, wasn’t it?
SO: Yes, it was.
SM: I went on a CMAG mission there to meet Musharraf, the new military leader. Lloyd Axworthy, the Canadian Foreign Minister, was leading the mission, and I was coordinating the Secretariat support team. We produced a report for the Durban CHOGM on Pakistan. There was CMAG engagement with Pakistan, but nonetheless they were immediately suspended.
SO: Yes, they were. The coup took place on 12th October, CMAG suspended Pakistan six days later, on 18th October. That’s pretty prompt.
SM: Yes.
SO: Stuart, I’m going to stop there. Thank you very much indeed. I’m really grateful.
[END OF AUDIOFILE PART TWO]
[1] UNSC 772 “authorised the secretary-general to deploy, as a matter of urgency, UN observers in South Africa to work in coordination with the structures set up under the National Peace Accord. It invited him to assist in the strengthening of those structures in consultation with the relevant parties. It also called upon international organisations such as the OAU, the Commonwealth and the European Community to consider deploying their own observers in South Africa. Angela King, a senior official of the UN from Jamaica, was appointed to head up the UN Observer Mission in South Africa (UNOMSA); she took up her post on 23 September. By the end of October 1992, 50 UNOMSA observers were deployed in all 11 regions of South Africa designated in the National Peace Accord. By 22 December, there were 17 observers from the Commonwealth, 14 from the EC and 11 from the OAU in South Africa. UNOMSA’s deployment was weighted towards the Witwatersrand/Vaal and Natal/KwaZulu regions, where 70 per cent of the political violence had occurred.” Taken from Enuga S Reddy: The United Nations and the Struggle For Liberation in South Africa,p.94, My name is Raghuraman and I am the author of “DNA of a Champion Salesperson”, a popular self-help book for aspiring salespersons and “सेल्स शास्त्र”, one of its kind of self-help book for salespersons in Hindi. While you may be wondering, how a South Indian happened to write a book in Hindi, well let me tell you something. I grew up in Hyderabad and I have been living in Delhi NCR for last two decades. After working in various roles in sales and marketing for close to twenty years, I started my own sales training firm, called Salezart Consulting (www.salezart.com) in 2012. In the last 8 plus years, we have trained over 30000 salespersons in various selling skills. Currently, Salezart is focussed on training salespersons online through its “Salezart Online Learning App” which is available on both Android and iOS.
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Our books, “DNA of a Champion Salesperson” and “सेल्स शास्त्र” have emerged from authors’ real life experiences. Having worked with illustrious colleagues and senior industry leaders and world class companies, we have learnt lots of best practices which have made people and organizations successful. We have shared these success sutras in our books.
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I prefer to write when my mind is focussed and not distracted by day to day business and personal tasks. Most of my writing happens either during my travels or on weekend mornings with my steaming cup of coffee. I travel a lot. So, I ended up writing good amount of the book on my flights. On a lighter note, despite the fact that I wrote parts of the book at 30000 feet altitude, the book has granular details that can be practiced and followed by salespersons. I also love writing on weekends when your mind is feeling peaceful and is able to focus.
When writing non-fiction books, we have to make sure that we don’t preach. We have to write things that the reader can relate to. We have to back theory with real life case study or success story or an anecdote which is based on reality. Best way to explain is to share a story or example that the reader can connect with. Finally, the language has to be simple and smooth flowing. Our objective is to help people transform into champion salespersons and not become proficient in language or grammar. Even in Hindi edition, “सेल्स श