WHAT the proxy war between Russia and Ukraine illustrates is that not all lives matter nor is the wellbeing of all nations and countries. The money-making war machines matter the most to preserving human lives.

That the national interests of some countries are a given, and not so with others, is the mother of all hostilities breastfeeding toxicity amongst supposedly free nations of the world to deny them their deserved peace.

This is all because of the Euro-Anglo-American-centric logic fuelling this war. The US logic dictates that siding with Russia is alignment. Siding with Ukraine as the DA does to flagrant disregard of SA’s non-alignment position, is not.

It escapes the media’s manufactured amnesia to deem it odd for France, a G7 and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) member, to hear it requesting South African President Cyril Ramaphosa for a letter of recommendation for BRICS membership. Hear how the headlines read: “France may be the first European country to apply for BRICS membership.”

Here is an example of a curious perspective missed by bandwagoning narrative enforcers. Few remember former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s trip to Ukraine in April 2022 had an inexplicable coincidence with Zelensky thinking otherwise about a peace process he was already involved in.

All points to Zelensky being not his own person, being told to stop the bailout of the peace talks, and if already married to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s peace treaty, finding ground for annulment to the roaring hours of the arms manufacturing industry. Adding insult to injury is Zelensky’s failure to tell the African peace delegation about this peace treaty.

He gushes conditions “for peace” that supplement his reneging to the peace treaty of April 2022 that Putin says Zelensky had signed. Putin’s revelation of the secret peace treaty entered with Ukraine, suggests that the Russians are done talking, leaving little prospect to return to the negotiations table.

No one holds Zelensky’s feet to the fire to account for this. Nor are media pages moved and mics turned on UK/US/NATO to deny or confirm this to be true as that shines a spotlight on the global North West’s desire for the continuation of the war. Peace, it seems, does not pay as yet to consent to. The money-making war machine is still in business to stop the financial flow accumulation demanding a supply of killing hostilities to reap from the Ukrainian-Russian war.

Wars started with lies and avoiding the truth to end them will continue being endless death-generating machines with no escape route until the end is hard and bitter to swallow in fatal capitulation.

In its naked state of failure to contradict Putin’s signed peace treaty, the fig leaf for Zelensky now, the African peace initiative is incompetent to handle a conflict of this magnitude.

The subtext is a giveaway. This is not Ukraine’s war. It is UK/US/NATO’s war and the International Criminal Court (ICC) has allowed itself to be embroiled in it. The less said about the conflicted and embedded media to see this, the better.

On the other hand, Russia believes this is its war to fight and China says as much. Beijing says this is Moscow’s war until further notice. And China further says if this war becomes its own as well God will not help its global North West provocateurs.

Be it in peace or war, few countries have the liberty to exercise choice. All said, done and denied, there are countries to whom the independent exercise of choice is not without a struggle.

South Africa does not walk alone on this path. Even countries within NATO, like Germany and France, are waking up to the reality that being vassals of empire-building propensity the US is exhibiting, is not a pleasant space to be at. 

No longer can it be assumed that the collective national interests of both Germany and France are best served by siding with Ukraine. Germany is feeling pangs of war creeping in.

By membership of two countries to NATO, the exercise of national interest entails the supply of arms, sanctions, trade embargo, diplomatic and cultural isolation of Russia, and fervent amplification of Ukraine’s side of the story to the total eclipse of Russia’s.

The Latin phrase audi alteram, meaning “listen to the other side”, has been tossed out of the window. And so has the journalistic code gone with the bias tilting the scales of balance with the foul stench of partiality.

The lofty wish to hear both sides of the story is a luxury no longer permissible by the logic of US/UK/NATO block, which is colloquially described as the global North West. Hearing one side of the story has become the very scent of the gospel to be preached from the pulpits of Western capitals. Holding that evangelical line stands as the one and only truth to abide by.

There is no more value in striving for nothing less than the whole truth. The beginning and the end of the world’s view no longer enjoy the air to breathe life to media freedom to acknowledge and bolster its state of independence for trustworthiness. Editorial independence is suffocated in the coffin of partiality rendering its credibility lifeless and dying there. Journalism is buried alive.

The catechism of “do as I say and not as I do” is winning the day in the global North West. Not that the global South East is not capable of the same transgressions except that it has been cancelled out of media stakes as exemplified in the removal of the 24-hour Russian news channel, Russia Today (RT), from the DSTV spectrum with no whimper of protest from freedom of expression enthusiasts to afford the public the right to choose what to see and hear.

DSTV has cemented its side in the warring messaging sphere. DSTV bothers less about the non-alignment of the country in the country in which its business is domiciled. The rationale for DSTV’s choice stems from the logic that bills America as the only tree allowed to grow and to cast distinct shade in the forest of human perspectives. Other perspectives can wait.

Any green shoots sprouting from the ground hold the promise to be independent trees in their own, in the forest and to grow outside the shadow of what America desires, to labour under the sway and spread of its overbearing branches, risks being met with the scorching sun of war that withers any vegetation refusing to be leaves clinging to America as the one and only tree as a condition to stay alive. BRICS is such an unwelcomed and intolerable nagging tree in the forest of contending perspectives.

For peace to be everlasting, all that lives in the universe is entreated to solely look up to the Stars and Stripes as the only flag to grace the sky and then bow to the scriptural text pitched in the form of questions and answers used to instruct all that walks under the sun to be converts, and to testify to the faith of what America solely dreams of. While Brazil, India and China are BRICS member states, the guns are deliberately trained on South Africa never to cast a distinct stance outside America’s shadow.

By its own volition, the media has placed itself in the global North West shoes to walk and echo the bias of its narrative war talk. Non-alignment is doing what America desires. SA is inundated not to err on the side of its national interest.

Until when will America learn that the regreening of the path to enriching the atmosphere for the world to be at peace with itself does not solely depend on it being the only tree in the forest? For the world to keep revolving around the sun, all lives, countries, and nations matter.

Oupa Ngwenya is a Corporate Strategist, Writer and Freelance Journalist.