KINSHASA, Congo — Hillary Rodham Clinton has a message for the world: It’s not all about Bill.
The secretary of state bristled Monday when — as she heard it — a university student asked what her husband, former President Bill Clinton, thought about an international financial matter.
She abruptly reclaimed the stage for herself.
“My husband is not secretary of state; I am,” she snapped. “I am not going to be channeling my husband.”
Clinton’s presence has sometimes been hard to see in the months she has served as the supposed face and voice of U.S. foreign policy.
President Barack Obama’s travels have overshadowed her, special envoys have been assigned to the world’s critical hot spots, Vice President Joe Biden has taken on assignments abroad — and then last week, her husband succeeded in a mission to free two journalists detained in North Korea just as she landed in Africa on a seven-nation trip.
“You want me to tell you what my husband thinks?” she asked incredulously when the student raised a question about a multibillion-dollar Chinese loan offer to Congo.
“If you want my opinion, I will tell you my opinion,” she said. “I am not going to be channeling my husband.”
The moderator moved on.
State Department officials said the student approached Clinton afterward and told her he had meant to ask what Obama, not Bill Clinton, thought about the Chinese loan offer. A senior Clinton aide said the secretary told the student not to worry about it.
The student’s question, according to the State Department translation, went like this: “Thank you. Mrs. Clinton, we’ve all heard about the Chinese contracts in this country. The interference is from the World Bank against this contract. What does Mr. Clinton think through the mouth of Mrs. Clinton . . .? Thank you very much.”
It was unclear whether the French-speaking student or the translator had erred.
