03 Feb, 2011 Yee Ha! – Part 2
Parts of the Middle East are experiencing what is seemingly their “Berlin Wall Moment” and I can’t deny the thrill I feel on seeing people bravely take to the streets, particularly if it successfully results in the humiliating dismissal of a tyrant.
But it was the Berlin Wall that was taking the fall back in the embers of ’89 and naturally it was an event that my generation will never forget. Spending a lot of time in Germany that year I would have loved to be there as history happened, but that was not to be. (I guess lying on a couch within one of Sydney’s finest hotels, as we enjoyed a rare night off from touring Street Fighting Years, and tuning in to events on CNN was almost a decent enough form of compensation.)
As we all know, the domino effect as “the Wall came crashing down”, meant that other countries in what was then known as Eastern Europe were to soon experience a form of democracy for the first time. As a result those parts of the world were changed forever. Yee Ha!
Should events in Egypt lead to a similar sequence then perhaps the blood already shed would not have been wasted. I do hope so.
Yee Ha! also describes the shout of joy that resounded from me just a few months after that night in Berlin, where in another continent altogether, Nelson Mandela walked out of prison, a victoriously free man preparing to lead his own people to power. Many had given their lives to fight apartheid after all; others had sacrificed their precious freedom.
Alternately some had somewhat perversely thrown support behind a system that humiliated an entire nation on the basis of their colour of skin. The then UK Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, was one of those. Resultantly, she was an on going embarrassment. Befriending killers like Pinochet – Chile’s military dictator – made sure she was consistent when it came to taking sides with those dealt in fear and hate.
Strangely I found it difficult to not think of Mrs T a couple of years ago when it seemed like the planet was focused on Hyde Park London as it hosted Mr Mandela’s 90th birthday celebrations.
There he sat, a living inspiration, arguably the most popular man on earth.
The former UK Prime Minister in turn was nowhere to be seen. Pretty much forgotten by the world, not quite forgotten yet by me.
History shows that eventually all bullies and those who support them inevitably get what is coming. When the genie is out the bottle and the people are on the streets in sufficient numbers, it usually means that there is only one outcome: And that means a one-way taxi ride to the nearest helipad for Mr Dictator and family! (If they are exceptionally lucky!)
Yee Ha!
Jim Kerr