It would be unfair and disloyal to reality and to history to claim that former Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein had agreed to give up power in the early nineties, during the crisis of the second Gulf War or that he had accepted the initiative of Zayed Bin Sultan to go into exile. Saddam may have verbally accepted such a proposition; however, such deceit was simply to maneuver and buy time.

Saddam Hussein is not the kind of person who would willingly give up power as his behavior towards opposition and history have indicated. Let us remember the Iraqi health minister during the peak of the Iraq-Iran war, whose body was found hacked in a garbage bag because he dared propose the idea of &#34Saddam”s temporary withdrawal from power&#34 just to end the war. Saddam believed that he would easily defeat the Iranians, confront the Americans and remain in Kuwait whilst everybody knew the reality of the situation.

In his recent trial, Saddam behaved as if he was still president despite all that had happened. Those who suffer from delusions of grandeur believe that they are smarter than everybody else is and that they may force their terms on the rest of the world.

During the Kuwaiti ruler”s last visit to Iraq, Saddam turned to the Qatari leader and said, &#34Should anything happen to me, my children will be left in the care of my brother, Jaber.&#34 A few months later, Saddam”s tanks were in the Kuwaiti ruler”s palace. We vividly remember Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak”s anger due to Saddam”s consistent lies. I listened to late King Hussein of Jordan as he stated that he had received a declaration from Saddam Hussein after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, however matters quickly deteriorated.

All that is said about the former Iraqi president”s willingness to give up power in the early nineties is merely part of the sly attempt to improve his reputation. Saddam Hussein and those like him are unwilling to give up the smallest of privileges, therefore how would he be willing to give up power?