Word: mobutuism
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Outmaneuvering Arum. For this fight, Ali did more than simply agree to appear. He helped arrange the deal. Last February Ali met Zaïre's President, Mobutu Sese Seko, while both were visiting Kuwait. Mobutu proposed the idea of bringing the greatest black American fighters to their ancestral homeland for a championship match. He and Ali parted in agreement that Zaïre should make a bid to have what was then only a potential Foreman-Ali fight...
...Runyonesque New York promoters, King raised start-up cash from Hemdale Leisure, a British show-business production company. The fighters' $10 million was not as easy to find-until Zaïre came through. After a few days of negotiation in Paris between the promoters and a Mobutu emissary, letters of credit were deposited in the boxers' banks...
...will go for naught. Few Americans or Europeans were willing to pay the $2,500 tab that Schwartz originally put on flight-fight packages. Zaïre declined to deal with other tour promoters, and a number of airline charters were canceled. Still, Kinshasa is a prettier place for Mobutu's effort, and he has certainly succeeded in drawing international attention...
...that does not permit officials or their families to accept gifts worth more than $50. The greatest surprise came when Hubert Humphrey turned in a 7.9 carat diamond estimated to be worth more than $100,000. Presented to Muriel Humphrey in 1968 by Zaire's President Mobutu Sese Seko, along with ten leopard skins from a Somalia official, the diamond has been resting in a Minneapolis safe-deposit box. The skins were sold in 1970 for $7,500, which was given to the Louise Whitbeck Fraser School for the mentally retarded in Minneapolis. Pleading ignorance...
...sooner had Mobutu left the country than Amin reneged. He would not be able to attend the conference, he said, because he was "busy commanding the armed forces." As for extending the deadline, he denied that he had ever promised to do so. "I continue to believe, until proved wrong," said Mobutu generously in Kinshasa, "that in Kampala I had talks with a real, conscientious and honest statesman. I would be very disappointed if the facts should prove the contrary." Late last week, however, Amin sent U.N. Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim a message saying that the Asians would be allowed...