[thistleclub]

Martin Regg Cohn in yesterday's Star:

Born as the British Commonwealth, rebranded to drop its British antecedents, it remains a misnomer in search of a mission — a membership of 54 countries with nothing in common beyond the Commonwealth branding.

Neither democracy nor diversity are prerequisites (homosexuality remains illegal or unaccepted in many member states). A shared history of royalty — which could truly be said, in colonial times, to be the ties that bind (and shackle) — no longer hold true.

Today any country, from any continent, can apply for entry. Which explains how a human rights abuser like Rwanda came to join the club in recent years, proudly claiming the right to host this year’s summit.

Once a creature of the crown, the club purports to be a family of nations — yet without shared parentage or purpose. Queen Elizabeth is nominally head of the Commonwealth by consensus, but in declining health she has essentially handed the reins to her son Prince Charles in the manner of a hereditary reign.

In Rwanda, assorted potentates, presidents and prime ministers listened as the heir to the throne shared his regal vision of world peace and comity. All this against the backdrop of war and aggression in Ukraine, about which the group could not bring itself to pass judgement.…

Why do we maintain the pretence of relevance for so forlorn a footnote to history? The Commonwealth has become a club so convoluted and contrived that almost no one noticed it hadn’t held a summit over the past four years.