Tony Blair: "It's about getting things done."

In providing political leadership Tony Blair informs us that his "African Government Initiative" (agi) "draws on his ten years as Prime Minister to offer leaders the kind of advice on reform that only someone who has stood in a leader’s shoes can give."  Well, if we agree with Mr Blair's contention  that "we should support African leaders who improve people's lives, and not simply evaluate systems of transparency and accountability in government", and that "governance is also about effectiveness, the capability to get things done"  we can reasonably conclude that he is indeed the right person to give advice here.

After all, this is the man who used his final weeks as Prime Minister to block the Serious Fraud Office's criminal investigation into the sale of fighter jets and other weapons to Saudi Arabia, who has the extrajudicial execution of his "good friend" Gaddafi to thank for his shady business dealings and secret meetings being kept away from public scrutiny and who ..... but where do you stop? With his involvement in the selling of arms to Tanzania, a country which has problems feeding its own people, or with his support for his new "best friend" the despot, Paul Kagame? Perhaps, we should begin but a look at the organisations that serve to cover the crimes of a man who is there "to get things done."

That though is a problem as we don't even know where to begin before getting sucked into 'Tony Blair Inc.',  "a Byzantine web of highly specialised limited partnerships and parallel companies, is baffling in its structure". However, we don't have to uncover the myriad of crimes and corruption that accompany a man who, in his role as  international Middle East envoy, is biased towards Israel , who a senior Palestinian negotiator, Nabil Shaath, says "sounds like an Israeli diplomat" and who is considered persona non grata in Palestine by the Palestinian leadership. Rather is sufficient to simply consider a fact which is always going to accompany this liar and hypocrite and that is that he is a war criminal.

No ambiguity there;  "the invasion of Iraq was illegal. Every applicable law unequivocally confirms this conclusion. There are no grey areas, no extenuating circumstances. Not according to the law." But  do we really think Tony gives a shit? After all, there is evidence to suggest that he "has been cashing in on his contacts from a conflict that destroyed the lives of millions to make millions of his own and with his latest little partnership with Kazakhstan's dictator, President Nursultan Nazarbayev, in full swing, we can rest assured that Tony is quite sincere when he advises all and sundry that it is about "getting things done" and if that means not only a lack of transparency and accountability in government, but also millions of dead, we shouldn't be too harsh on him. It is, after all, nothing personal, it is just business.