The imperative of a new global order

Former French President, Mr. Giscard D’Estaing, once to the internationalisation of the U.S currency, the ‘Dollar’ an “exorbitant privilege” that is prone to abuse and yes, the U.S hegemonic circles in their desperation to turn the world into a Washington have actually abused the exorbitant privilege. It is no gain saying that all great empires from the Greek, to the Roman, the Spanish and the British have at their heart a dominant means of exchange which is very much part of their political and social hegemony.

In time past, it was once the Roman coinage which was the world’s preeminent currency. In more recent times, it was the British pound. Now, it’s the U.S dollar to which international investors flock as a safe haven for their money. Highly liquid and apparently reliable – until at least recently nothing else comes even remotely close to the greenback’s dominant position in the international trading system.

However that this “exorbitant privilege”, as the farmer French leader referred to it, could be recklessly put at risk by politicians in the white house and the capitol hill, is an extraordinary spectacle that may prelude of a super power already seriously on the wane.

The conflict in Ukraine, in which the western hegemonic political forces fronted the Kiev regime in Ukraine in proxy war with Russia, showed to the considerable extent, the Washington and its NATO allies have rallied the hegemony of the dollar in global financial system to perpetrate brigandage. In an unprecedented theft, the U.S and its allies froze around half of Russia’s gold and foreign exchange reserves that stood nearly 640 billion U.S.D before even the Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine.

Despite that Moscow has warned “of the detrimental consequences of such actions that will permanently damage bilateral relations, which is neither in their own nor in our interest”, the U.S and her allies have gone on asset seizure spree, violating without remorse, a basic cannon of the sanctity of property, an integral of their liberal outlook. The U.S and its European allies have frozen more than 30 billion USD of assets held by wealthy individual claims with spurious claims that such individual have ties to the government in Moscow.

These acts and several others especially on the selective and unilateral applications of sanctions and other politically motivated punitive measures targeted at other countries by the U.S and her European allies demonstrated the urgent imperative to strengthen multilateralism and re engage more broadly the international system to generate and bundle an inclusive global order and create global mechanism that more broadly representative and participatory.

Despite that the gradual erosion of the dollar is inevitable trend to its fate as a tool of political manipulation, a new international financial architecture to generate means of exchange and transactions not beholden to the political whim and caprice national or factions of international oligarchy is an urgent imperative.

Washington politicians and their colleagues in NATO and the EU struggles to convert every international space and processes to their tool of hegemonic practice and even key instructions in the UN are not spared of the toxic effects of their ideological hegemony. Recently the report of the UN human right counted on the Xingjian question has been seized in the west to continue its strategy of seeking to contain China and reverse her contemporary trend of comprehensive development and engagement of the world especially the developing countries in the Global south of her opportunities.

There is no doubt the west’s sense of exceptionalism has fueled multiple aggressive wars over the past decades but as the Russian veteran foreign Minister, Mr. Sergei Lavrov said at the 77th UN General Assembly, the world order is changing, even the ongoing conflict in Ukraine is mostly the result of the inability of the collective west to negotiate with Russia and address its security concerns.

According to the Russian top diplomat all the repeated attempts to establish the rules of coexistence made by Russia was serially rebutted. In his words “we have repeatedly proposed over the years to agree on the rules for coexistence in Europe based on the principle of equal and indivisible security, approved at the highest level of OSCE documents we made our last proposal to the make this principle legally binding in December 2021 to which we received arrogant refusal”.

Speaking further at the UN General Assembly, Mr. Lavrov stated “it is evident to any unbiased observer; for the Anglo – Saxons, who have completely subjugated Europe, Ukraine is simply expendable material in the fight against Russia. NATO declared our country a direct threat on the path of US dominance and named China as a long term strategic challenge”.

In Africa, the west want establish a theater and frontline to contain and confront her declared strategic adversaries – China and Russia. In a new U.S strategy towards sub – Saharan Africa, Washington declared unequivocally it would be rallying Africa to contain the “harmful activities of the people’s Republic of China, Russia and other actors. However, the broadly shared sentiment in Africa was best expressly recently by the President of the Republic of Senegal, the Chairman of the continental body, the Africa Union, AU.

At the 77th UN General Assembly, he has declared, “Africa has suffered enough of the burden of history it does not want to be the breeding ground of a new cold war but rather a pole of stability and opportunity open to all its partners on a mutually beneficial basis”.

While it is well known, that reason and common sense do not sufficiently appeal to the rampaging hegemonic forces to change their course or rethink their search earth strategy, it is for the rest of the world to initiate effective deterrent and build multiple of international financial exchange and creating a multipolar framework of the global order to which the west would be compelled to integrate or risk universal isolation.

Ugwu, a foreign affairs analyst, writes from Abuja