Mbeki slams North African despots

Former president Thabo Mbeki has accused deposed Tunisian and Egyptian leaders, Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali and Hosni Mubarak, of having presided over illegitimate and corrupt governments.

Speaking at a lecture in Stellenbosch on Friday, Mbeki blasted his former counterparts for having led their citizens with an iron fist and having refused them the opportunity to choose leaders through democratic elections.

He said the youth-led uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt demonstrated that regimes could be changed by peaceful means, unlike in Libya where Nato forces assisted rebels in an armed struggle to remove strongman Muammar Gaddafi.

"Both of them (Ben Ali and Mubarak) held onto these positions through what were described as democratic elections," Mbeki said.

"The reality, however, is that these elections were not democratic by any stretch of the imagination, and therefore both presidents and the groups they led clung to power ... resorting to other means which deliberately sought to frustrate the will of the people.

"These were fraudulent elections and the maintenance of an extensive machinery of repression. Many in the Arab world claim that Tunisia had the most repressive state machinery of all countries in the region, making it what is correctly described as a police state," said Mbeki.

He said "credible information" showing how the Mubarak family and their associates plundered state resources at the expense of the country's citizenry would soon emerge.

A bed-ridden Mubarak is on trial on an array of charges which could result in the death penalty.

Ben Ali - who is exiled in Saudi Arabia - is being tried in absentia.

"In addition to the monopolisation of political power by a few, this meant that this tiny minority, as in Egypt, had every possibility to abuse its illegitimate power to enrich itself by corrupt means ...

"At the same time as the ruling groups in Egypt and Tunisia were enriching themselves, millions among their people faced challenging socioeconomic conditions, characterised by high rates of poverty, unemployment, and an unaffordable cost of living.

"This meant that not only were millions languishing in poverty, but also that the situation was made worse by glaring disparities in standards of living between the rich at the top and the poor at the bottom of the proverbial pyramid," said Mbeki.