Dorothy-Grace Guerrero and Firoze Manji (ed) (2008) China’s New Role in Africa and the South: A search for a new perspective. 
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Pambazuka News 343: Crisis in Kenya: Call for justice and peaceful resolution
The authoritative electronic weekly newsletter and platform for social justice in Africa
Pambazuka News (English edition): ISSN 1753-6839
With nearly 500 contributors and an estimated 500,000 readers Pambazuka News is the authoritative pan African electronic weekly newsletter and platform for social justice in Africa providing cutting edge commentary and in-depth analysis on politics and current affairs, development, human rights, refugees, gender issues and culture in Africa.
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CONTENTS: 1. Announcements, 2. Action alerts, 3. Features, 4. Comment & analysis, 5. Pan-African Postcard, 6. Letters, 7. Books & arts, 8. African Writers’ Corner, 9. Blogging Africa, 10. Podcasts, 11. Zimbabwe update, 12. African Union Monitor, 13. Women & gender, 14. Human rights, 15. Refugees & forced migration, 16. Social movements, 17. Elections & governance, 18. Africa & China, 19. Corruption, 20. Development, 21. Health & HIV/AIDS, 22. Education, 23. LGBTI, 24. Environment, 25. Media & freedom of expression, 26. Conflict & emergencies, 27. Internet & technology, 28. Fundraising & useful resources, 29. Courses, seminars, & workshops, 30. Jobs
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Highlights from this issue
FEATURE: Maina Kiai’s statement to the US Senate on the Kenya crisis
COMMENT & ANALYSIS:
- KPTJ responds to the ongoing mediations in Kenya
- Simon Gikandi on intellectuals in a time of crisis
- Francis Nyamjoh on the scholar-revolutionary, Issa Shivji
PAN-AFRICAN POSTCARD: Owen Sichone responds to Pius Adesamni
BOOKS AND ARTS: Francis Nyamjoh reviews The Disillusioned African
AFRICAN WRITER'S CORNER: Stephen Derwent Partington on the grammar of humanity (poem)
LETTERS: Readers' comments and announcements
BLOGGING AFRICA: Dibussi Tande does a round up of African blogs
PODCASTS: Rwanda’s Contact FM radio talks to women in North KivuANNOUNCEMENTS: Walden Bello named 2008 Outstanding Public Scholar
ACTION ALERTS: Global Zimbabwe Forum protest
ZIMBABWE UPDATE: MDC unity pact crumbles
WOMEN AND GENDER: NGOs demand SADC leaders' commitment to equality
CONFLICT AND EMERGENCIES: Chad president calls for EU deployment as rebel regroup
HUMAN RIGHTS: DRC Ex-warlord sent to ICC
REFUGEES AND FORCED MIGRATION: Deal brings little comfort to North Kivu's displaced
ELECTIONS AND GOVERNANCE: Tsvangirai endorsed as MDC candidate
AFRICA AND CHINA: China donates $300,000 to Kenya
CORRUPTION: Tanzania PM tenders resignation
DEVELOPMENT: Commercial overfishing threatens coastal livelihoods in Mozambique
HEALTH AND HIV/Aids: ARV provision could cut transmission by 90%
EDUCATION: School gate close on Swaziland's orphans
LGBTI: Arrests in Senegal
ENVIRONMENT: Poor cleanup endangers Niger Delta communities
MEDIA AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION: Niger journalist to be released
INTERNET AND TECHNOLOGY: Developing nations increase share of tech exports
PLUS: e-newsletters and mailings lists; courses, seminars and workshops, and jobs
*Pambazuka News now has a Del.icio.us page, where you can view the various websites that we visit to keep our fingers on the pulse of Africa! Visit http://del.icio.us/pambazuka_news
Announcements
Walden Bello named 2008 Outstanding Pulbic Scholar
2008-02-05
Filipino academic and activist Walden Bello has been named the Outstanding Public Scholar of 2008 by the International Political Economy section of the International Studies Association (ISA). He will receive the award at the group’s annual convention to be held in San Francisco, California from March 26-29, 2008. Special events honoring Bello include a panel on his work on Thursday March 27, 2008 during the annual meeting. On Friday evening, March 28, Bello will join other scholar activists in speaking at a public event at City Lights Bookstore, 261 Columbus Ave, in San Francisco, co-sponsored by Routledge, Taylor & Francis Press.
Filipino academic and activist Walden Bello has been named the Outstanding Public Scholar of 2008 by the International Political Economy section of the International Studies Association (ISA). He will receive the award at the group’s annual convention to be held in San Francisco, California from March 26-29, 2008. Special events honoring Bello include a panel on his work on Thursday March 27, 2008 during the annual meeting. On Friday evening, March 28, Bello will join other scholar activists in speaking at a public event at City Lights Bookstore, 261 Columbus Ave, in San Francisco, co-sponsored by Routledge, Taylor & Francis Press.
In announcing the award, the committee chair Dr. Barry Gills noted, “Walden Bello has been chosen for this award due to his lifetime contribution to scholarship and activism on the international political economy of development, and his work for global justice. He has consistently demonstrated the highest standards of scholarship, leadership and dedication, and is therefore an example of 'Outstanding Public Scholarship'.” The Belgian newspaper Le Soir has called Bello "the most respected anti-globalization thinker in Asia." Canadian author Naomi Klein has described him as the "world's leading no-nonsense revolutionary." Chalmers Johnson has hailed him as the "world's best guide to American exploitation of the globe's poor and defenseless."
For over 30 years, Bello has been in the forefront of struggles for human rights, social justice, peace, and the environment. In the last five years alone, he has served as a key leader of the global movement against the war in Iraq, played a central role in the effort to roll back the World Trade Organization, led a peace mission to Lebanon during the Israeli invasion in the summer of 2006, and worked to bring a justice and equity dimension to discussions of climate change. His trademark as an activist has been his effort to connect issues and movements. As he told Interpress Service during the international conference on climate change in Bali in December 2007, “We are here because of the broadening character of the climate change crisis and the solutions being proposed at the Bali meeting. It is no more about techno-fixes. It has become a global emergency for which issues such as trade, justice, equity and democracy have to be factored in. And that is where our strengths lie.'' What makes Bello exceptional, however, has been his ability to link his activism on a number of issues with his academic work. His recent writings cover a wide range of topics, including the current conjuncture of global capitalism, the “relief-and-reconstruction-complex,” the developmental state debate, regional economic initiatives, and the awakening of the peasantry as a class. His most recent books are Walden Bello Presents Ho Chi Minh (Verso, 2007), Dilemmas of Domination (Henry Holt, 2005), The Anti-Developmental State (Zed, 2004), and Deglobalization: Ideas for a New World Economy (Zed, 2002). He is an editor of the Review of International Political Economy, the leading journal in a dynamic academic area.
Two earlier works placed Bello at the center of academic and political debate. In the early eighties, Bello and his associates came out with Development Debacle: the World Bank in the Philippines (Institute for Food and Development Policy, 1982), an expose based on 3,000 pages of confidential documents that they had spirited out of the World Bank. The book is said to have played a major role in the unraveling of the Marcos dictatorship. In 1991, he co-authored Dragons in Distress: Asia’s Miracle Economies in Crisis (Penguin), which departed from the usual glorification of East Asia’s “tiger economies” and called attention to their structural problems six years before the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997.
As an activist, Bello helped organize the international network against the Marcos regime, being arrested several times and spending time in an American jail in the process. After Marcos fell, he joined the Institute for Food and Development Policy in San Francisco, later serving as executive director of the organization from 1990 to 1994. In 1995, he co-founded and served as executive director of Focus on the Global South, a research, analysis, and advocacy institute connected with Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University. He joined the University of the Philippines sociology department in 1994, becoming a tenured full professor in 1997.
In December 2003, Bello was presented the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the Alternative Nobel Prize, at the Swedish Parliament for "...for outstanding efforts in educating civil society about the effects of corporate globalization, and how alternatives to it can be implemented." Earlier, in 2001, he was conferred the Suh Sang Don Prize, South Korea’s premier award for work on economic justice.
Aside from teaching at the University of the Philippines, Bello is an adjunct professor of international development studies at St. Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and an adjunct professor in sociology at the State University of New York at Binghamton. He was most recently Distinguished Visiting Professor of International Development Studies at St. Mary’s University. He has taught at the University of California at Berkeley and served as visiting professor at the University of California campuses in Los Angeles, Irvine, and Santa Barbara.
The International Studies Association (ISA), founded in 1959, has over 4,000 members from 80 countries. It is the most respected international studies association in the world. The ISA’s 49th annual conference, under the theme “Bridging Multiple Divides,” will be held from March 26-29, 2008 at the Hilton San Francisco.
The ISA’s International Political Economy (IPE) section is currently chaired by Dr. Ruth Reitan. The IPE annual award, begun in 2007, honors someone who has merged “scholarship” with “active participant in the civil-society, activist community.” Speaking at the ISA event on March 27 will be Dr. Bello, Dr. Barry Gills, Dr. Robin Broad, Dr. Richard Falk, and Dr. Susan George who was the 2007 IPE Outstanding Public Scholar. Further information on the ISA conference can be found at www.isanet.org The March 28 free, public event will feature Dr. Bello, Dr. Kevin Danaher, and Dr. Susan George and will begin at 8 pm. For further information on the evening event, contact Ruth Reitan at r.reitan@miami.edu, or Sian Askew with Routledge Press at sian.askew@tandf.co.uk
* * *
International Political Economy Section International Studies Association
Award for Outstanding Public Scholar – Criteria
In 2006, the IPE section of the ISA created an award for Outstanding Public Scholar. The award was first presented at the 2007 ISA Annual Meeting in Chicago.
In keeping with the criteria established by the IPE’s Outstanding Public Scholar Award Committee in 2006, the award is to be given to a person who has successfully straddled academia and activism:
• The awardee should have a record of writing that is used and recognized within the academic community.
• The awardee should have a record of work that moves beyond academia into activism. The awardee should be an active participant in some civil-society, activist community.
• Activism in this case means active involvement not just through writing. The awardee must be more than just someone whose work is used by activists.
• The award is not meant for someone whose role, however important, is to popularize writings. The awardee must be more than someone whose work reaches a broader, non-academic audience.
• To the extent possible, the award is meant to be given to an Outstanding Public Scholar for whom the award will have meaning and significance. In other words, the goal of the award is to honor someone whose “public scholarship” has not been recognized in public ways by academia.
• The award will be given only when there is a person whom the majority of members of the relevant award committee deem to have met the above criteria. The award does not need to be given annually.
Below is a list of award recipients.
• Dr. Susan George, France (2007)
• Dr. Walden Bello, Philippines, (2008)
More...
Action alerts
Kenya: Strategic highway to west reopens
2008-02-07
http://www.africanews.com/site/list_messages/15565
Normal transportation of goods and people to the west of Kenya resumed last week after days of disruption along the highway from Nairobi to west of the country and Uganda. Armed police cleared the highway of barricades erected by marauding youths in the ongoing post election violence that many people say has now taken a life of it’s own.
Zimbabwe: Global Zimbabwe Forum Protest on Feb 21-22
2008-02-07
http://www.zimaction.com/zimdiaspora/index.htm
The program has now been finalized for the February 21 – 22 protest. The Global Zimbabwe Forum need to contact as many Zimbabweans as we can reach to come to the demonstration. Please contact by email or by phone as many friends as you can reach.
We need to know by Wednesday next week how many people we can expect at the demonstration.
The following have been tasked with coordinating recruitment efforts:
New York.Fungisai and Alice (516) 967 4613/(646) 577 5289
Pennsylvania Nick Mada (610)2469462 nmada@msn.com Stan Mukasa (724) 467 0001 mukasa@iup.edu
Ohio/Michigan Zvidzair Ruzvidzo/Allan Banda Phone :614 622 0427 zvidzair@yahoo.com
Washington DC "Robson Nyereyemhuka"robson55@yahoo.com
Indiana Alan Bako (317) 345 2368
Accommodation arrangements are being made byMaswela at Maswelas@aol.com (513) 410 9495
Scheduled speakers for the protest are Ralph Black Handel Mlilo Ruzvidzo Zvidzair Nassar Rusike
The Event MC and also in charge of publicity will be Briggs Bomba
The next conference call will be on Thursday, February 14, starting at 9 p.m.
Conference details:
Number to Call ---: 1-605-475-6000 Access Code---- : 875057# Time----------:9.00PM (Eastern Time)
Features
The political crisis in Kenya: A call for justice & peaceful resolution
2008-02-07
Maina Kiai
Maina Kiai makes an impassioned plea for seriousness and commitment from all actors in the pursuit for a resolution to Kenya's political crisis
Kenya is at a cross-road that will mean either the complete disintegration of Kenya or the beginning of a new, more democratic, sustainable nation suited to the needs and aspirations of the Kenyan people in the 21st Century. In a deeply painful and costly manner–in terms of lives lost and destruction wrought—the crisis in Kenya has given the country a unique opportunity to move forward in a way that we have been advocating for the last 20 years. In a sense, Kenya is at its "civil war" moment that the US was at in 1861. Just as that war was pivotal in establishing and solidifying the democratic credentials of the US, this moment could lead Kenya to much greater heights if properly handled both domestically and internationally.
In this context, the mediation currently going on under the leadership of Kofi Annan, Graca Machel and Ben Mkapa is the last best chance for Kenya to move forward. Whatever can be done to keep the players at the table, and keep them there in good faith, is critical. And efforts that delay, or subvert the talks—whether through insensitive statements and actions or by trying to prolong the talks through acts of filibustering—must be condemned. Consistent regional and international pressure is necessary especially on the hardliners who think that the crisis will blow over. The consequences of the failure of the mediation efforts are too dire to imagine not just for Kenya but for the region.
What is going on in Kenya is a political crisis with ethnic manifestation because politics in Kenya is organized ethnically. Clearly there are cleavages and differences in Kenyan society that have erupted brutally to the surface. But these have erupted due to the failure of peaceful means of resolving and addressing these differences, including the failure of elections and political reforms promised to Kenya in the 2002 elections.
The crisis in Kenya was foreseeable. In March 2007, the KNCHR submitted a memorandum to President Kibaki urging him to maintain the "gentleman's agreement" that had been in place since 1997 whereby all parliamentary parties made nominations for appointment to the Electoral Commission of Kenya. We argued that unilateral abandonment of the agreement would likely invite chaos and instability were the elections disputed. Moreover, since January 2006 we witnessed consistent attempts by the state to reduce democratic space and instil fear in society.
THE EXTENT OF THE CRISIS
Some 1000 people have been killed in the one month since violence erupted on December 30, 2007. Note that 3000 people were killed between 1992 and 1998 in the state instigated clashes in the country. During that same period, more than 300,000 people were internally displaced, most of whom have not returned to their farms and homes. In the month since the elections, an additional 300,000 people have been internally displaced.
Part of the reason why militia—on both sides—have been so potent and dangerous is that they arose from the earlier violence of the 1990s and were never de-mobilized. Nor was there a process to deal with the root causes of that violence, with the Kibaki government choosing to sweep the matter under the carpet, despite campaign promises to the contrary. With grievances bubbling and fermenting close to the surface, it was relatively easy to reactivate the militia using methods similar to those of the 1990s. Most important, the paymasters and planners of the 1990s clashes were never held accountable.
It is estimated that in the month since the crisis started the Kenyan economy has lost about US $3 billion and about 400,000 jobs. Moreover the crisis has severely affected the economies of Uganda, Rwanda, Eastern DR Congo, and Southern Sudan and could bring them to ruin if not checked. All these nations have a history of conflict and violence that could be reawakened by economic collapse.
We have observed 4 forms of violence:
i) Spontaneous uprisings of mobs protesting the flaws in the presidential elections. These mobs looted, raped and burnt down buildings in an anarchical manner.
ii) Violence organized by ODM-supporting militia in the Rift Valley that was aimed at perceived political opponents. The initial militia action attracted organized counter-violence from PNU supporters especially in Nakuru, Naivasha areas of the Rift Valley, and Nairobi.
iii) Excessive use of force by the police in ways suggesting "shoot to kill" orders against unarmed protesters mainly in ODM strongholds including Kisumu, Kakamega, Migori, and the Kibera slum of Nairobi. Policing has been uneven in its implementation. In some strong ODM areas, the police have been shooting to kill, while when confronted with pro-PNU militia, they have opted to negotiate with the groups. However, in the Eldoret area, the police largely stood by and watched as pro-PNU supporters were killed and their houses burnt.
iv) Local militia in pro-PNU areas, on receiving internally displaced persons (IDPs) from the Rift Valley, have mobilized in sympathy and turned on perceived ODM supporters, killing them, and burning their houses.
The violence is neither genocide nor ethnic cleansing: The root of the problem is not that different ethnic groups decided they could no longer live together. The root of the problem is the inability of peaceful means to address grievances. For this to be genocide there would have to be either state complicity or state collapse and the first obligation would be for the state to provide adequate security for those at risk. Instead we have uneven and selective policing with emphasis on preventing Raila Odinga from holding protests in Nairobi rather than protecting IDPs and others at risk across the country. We therefore believe that the quickest and most effective way to reduce the violence is progress in the current talks.
THE ELECTION TRIGGER
It is clear that the flagrant effort to steal the presidential election was the immediate trigger for the violence. All independent observers have said that the tallying process was so flawed that it is impossible to tell who won the presidential election. Since 1992, Kenya's elections have been progressively better and fairer, culminating in the 2002 elections which were the best ever, and the 2005 constitutional referendum. The effect of this progression is that Kenyans finally believed in the power of the vote as a way of peacefully resolving differences, a fact confirmed by voting trends in the recent parliamentary elections that saw almost 70 percent of incumbents lose their seats. When this sense of empowerment was subverted, and peaceful legal spaces for protests were disallowed, it is not surprising that frustrations boiled over and violence ensued.
We have documented some of the facts and analysis that make clear that the flaws in the tallying of presidential votes rendered untenable the conclusion that Mwai Kibaki was validly elected.
With the benefit of hindsight, there were steps taken that paint a picture of a well orchestrated plan to ensure a pre-determined result. These include:
i) President Kibaki's decision to abrogate the agreement of 1997 on the formula for appointments to the Electoral Commission ensuring that all the Commissioners were appointed by him alone; ii) An administrative decision within the ECK to give responsibility to Commissioners for their home regions, something that had never been done before, meaning that they appointed all the election officials in the constituencies in their home regions, in a manner that created conflicts of interest; iii) The rejection of an offer from IFES to install a computer program that would enable election officials in the constituencies to submit results electronically to Nairobi and then on to a giant screen available to the public making it virtually impossible to change results; iv) A decision to abandon the use of ECK staff in the Verification and Tallying Centre in favour of casual staff provided by the Commissioners directly; and v) A refusal to ensure that election officials in areas with large predictable majorities for any of the candidates came from different areas so as to reduce the likelihood of ballot stuffing.
WAY FORWARD AND ROLE OF US CONGRESS AND GOVERNMENT
At this "constitutional moment" that Kenya has reached, we believe the way forward must be centred on truth and justice as the only sustainable road to peace and development. This is the time for Kenya to end the impunity that has been a feature of our history since independence, and also to end the "winner take all" "first past the post" system. Specifically, we call for:
i) An international independent investigation into the 2007 presidential election process in order to come to closure on the elections, find out who did what and why; who ordered it; and promote accountability; ii) An international independent investigation into the post election violence—from citizens and police–so that there is accountability on all sides.
iii) An interim transitional government to be formed with limited powers of governance and for a limited time–between 1 and 2 years—with Kibaki and Odinga exercising equal powers.
iv) The primary duties of this interim government should be to undertake constitutional reform, and especially explore ways of reforming the current Imperial Presidency; motivate electoral reforms, police reforms, judicial reforms, land reforms, civil service reforms, devolution of power; and conduct new elections at the end of its term.
v) The interim government should also be charged with cooling passions and starting the process of reconciliation through a Truth Justice and Reconciliation Commission that starts operations immediately after the new elections. It is important that presidential elections be held at the end of the interim government to inspire confidence in Kenya's electoral processes, and as a sign of the new Kenya.
vi) It is also important to note that significant work in all of these areas of reform has already been done in various constitutional drafts and also by Government Commissions and Task Forces so Kenya would not be starting from scratch.
To ensure that there is good faith in the mediation it is imperative that the U.S. Government work with the rest of the international community to maintain pressure on Kenya's leaders to treat the mediation with utmost seriousness. To this end, we welcome U.S .leadership in raising the crisis in Kenya at the UN Security Council, and call for pressure at this level to be maintained and increased.
We also urge Congress to request the release of the exit poll conducted by International Republican Institute (IRI) without delay so as to maintain pressure on all sides to negotiate in good faith. In addition, we urge Congress to work with the EU to have the EU Observation Mission Report released immediately.
In case of continued intransigence from any of the parties we call on Congress to impose travel bans on the hardliners on both sides and especially those implicated in instigating violence whether through militia or through the police. These travel bans should extend to hardliners in the civil service and to their immediate families.
Moreover, assets of the hardliners and those involved in violence should be traced and the assets frozen.
Finally, it is important that U.S. military and security assistance be frozen immediately. All US assistance to Kenya should be channelled through non-governmental sources.
* Maina Kiai is the Chairperson of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR), an independent state body charged with protecting and promoting human rights in Kenya. He writes on behalf of the KNCHR, as well as for Kenyans for Peace through Truth and Justice (KPTJ), a coalition bringing together more than 50 human rights, legal and governance groups in Kenya
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
Comment & analysis
PRELIMINARY RESPONSE TO THE MEDIATION PROCESS IN KENYA
2008-02-07
KENYANS FOR PEACE WITH TRUTH AND JUSTICE and THE NATIONAL CIVIL SOCIETY CONGRESS
February 7th 2008
Nairobi
The Kenyans for Peace with Truth and Justice (KPTJ) coalition and the National Civil Society congress (NCSC) wish to reiterate their unequivocal support for the Kofi Annan-led AU and internationally backed mediation process in Kenya. Kenyans are desperate to see an end to the nightmare that the current crisis represents: this process represents an important, and perhaps the only remaining, opportunity to resolve the Kenya crisis. KPTJ and NCSC also wish to restate that real, lasting peace will only be achieved through both truth and justice with regard to the Kenya Presidential Election of 2007, and the violence that followed it.
The mediation process has achieved some success as well as raising significant concerns. It deserves applause that the two major combating political antagonists in this crisis have been brought to the negotiating table. It is also deserving of mention that these two groups have remained at the negotiation table despite the very challenging and sometimes outright traumatic environment they are dialoguing under. We will shortly be addressing the content of some of the interim agreements arrived at including the proposed Truth Justice and Reconciliation Commission announced on February 4, 2008.
There are, however, deep concerns that remain and have been further deepened by unfolding events. The state of insecurity and incalculable losses of life, limb and livelihood in the country is a tragic derogation of all universally accepted norms and standards of human rights. The KPTJ and NCSC support the call contained in the Kenya National Dialogue and Reconciliation documents for the immediate restoration of the fundamental rights and freedoms of Kenyans, including the right of peaceful assembly.
We note that, in the past week or so, two Members of Parliament from one side of the political divide have been murdered in suspicious circumstances and demand the speedy and conclusive clarification of these crimes. Further there have been highly inflammatory and unacceptable statements made by Mediation Parties that trespass on the mediation agenda and undermine the prospects of successful mediation with truth and justice. The pattern of disrespect towards and slighting of international partners- including the African Union and President John Kuffuor -which manifested itself again recently with the rejection of Mr. Cyril Ramaphosa cannot go uncondemned. In this regard, the KPTJ and NCSC express their concern over reports that the hotel room of His Excellency Kofi Annan was bugged. The situation should be investigated and, if the reports are true, those responsible be identified and punished.
Let it be known that ordinary Kenyans reject any slide towards a status as a pariah nation and are pained at the cavalier treatment of those who have tried to assist us out of our present predicament. Kenya must both see and project itself as an accountable and responsible member of the community of nations, in Africa and worldwide. We therefore call on all partners, regional and international, to desist from doing “business as usual” with Kenya: the protagonists must be forced to focus on the mediation process as the most urgent order of business. With regard to this, we reject the presence of IGAD foreign ministers in Kenya at this time and the planned holding of the EAC Summit as detracting from our national focus on the Panel of Eminent Africans (Annan) mediation process.
On the mediation agenda, we note as ordinary Kenyans that both this agenda and the participating parties seem to rotate around the dispute between two contending political sides. This fails to account for the voting and non-voting citizen who will ultimately be affected by the process and resolutions arising. Kenyans are emerging from a history of numerous experiences of failed involvement by competing political protagonists from independence to the IPPG and subsequent attempts at Constitutional Reform. While confidentiality of certain aspects of mediation may be temporarily necessary, the Kenyan people must have ownership of the process and it must be accountable to them. To this end, a mechanism that encourages transparency and includes the views of Kenyans on the process is necessary.
Having benefited from an examination and analysis of the agenda and initial statement as well as the emerging reports from the Kenya National Dialogue and Reconciliation Process, the KPTJ and NCSC wish to recommend as follows:
FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES: That the foundational principles of the Mediation Process be clarified as the acceptance of universally accepted human rights, the protection and promotion of democracy and the rule of law, accountability, transparency, and the achievement of justice for all.
TRANSPARENT GROUND RULES: That the Mediation Process transparently spells out binding rules of engagement as well as attending sanctions in cases where parties are determined to be in violation of those rules. It is important that such rules bind parties to the process to conduct themselves in a manner that builds confidence, cultivates good faith and imposes sanctionable obligations;
LEGITIMACY & ENFORCEABILITY: That the Mediation Process and its outcomes be constitutionally embedded to ensure that it is binding, enforceable and does not suffer from interference from the competing political interests or challenges to its legality or legitimacy; the Mediation outcomes should be reduced to an instrument or instruments that can be deposited in the Parliament of Kenya;
OWNERSHIP & ACCOUNTABILITY: That the Mediation Process be open to receive the views of Kenyans and be bound to give feedback to them promptly. A mechanism should be established that encourages and consolidates the views of Kenyans. This could be in the form of a timely and periodic two-way feedback mechanism into which views of Kenyans are fed and there is dissemination of concrete information to wananchi on how the issues raised are being addressed. KPTJ and NCSC appreciate initial efforts to disseminate information and strongly encourage the mediation team to be proactive and continue to circulate this information more widely so many more Kenyans can be aware of the progress made;
TRIGGERS AND ROOT CAUSES: That the Mediation Process address itself to, and deal with, the context which has precipitated this crisis and in particular the underlying issues of electoral, institutional and constitutional failure, impunity, political corruption and the ethnicization of politics in order to lay the framework for finding a lasting resolution to the Kenya crisis;
ADDRESSING VIOLENCE: That the Mediation Process address all forms of violence that have manifested themselves through this crisis, while appreciating its evolving nature and the real capacity problems inherent in the task of ending widespread violence against Kenyan citizens. KPTJ believes that violence has evolved from the spontaneous post-election protests and organised militia action, to vigilante entrenchment and general banditry and crime. Responses must recognize that resolving violence is no longer just political but must encompass a range of urgent measures such as the enhancement of police capacity, restoring confidence of Kenyans in their security apparatus, and the creation of social safety nets;
TREATMENT OF INTERNALLY DISPLACED KENYAN CITIZENS: That due attention be paid to the safety and rights of the 350- 500,000 Internally Displaced Kenyan citizens so that their freedom to independently choose whether they should move or evacuate from their respective locations is not fettered but rather honored and facilitated. It is callous to compel people to live in places where they feel insecure without providing credible guarantees for their security;
TRUTH JUSTICE AND RECONCILIATION: That discussions on Truth, Justice and Reconciliation must address independent, impartial, effective and expeditious mechanisms of restorative justice for all victims in order to address the self-negating cycles of revenge and violence. Such a process must draw a distinction between historical or communal grievances and contemporary crimes which should be investigated and prosecuted, lest violence end up being rewarded under the guise of addressing historical grievances or exacting revenge for perceived victimisation;
CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM: That Constitutional reform must be fast-tracked into a short-term and medium-term time-frame so as to make it practicable. A comprehensive constitution-making process should be entrenched in the current constitution through a constitutional amendment. Priority should be given to electoral reform, transitional government arrangements, top-level public service reforms, judicial reform and police reform. Immediately thereafter the comprehensive constitutional reforms should be completed.
ADDRESS CAPACITY DEFICITS: That any capacity deficits of the parties to reach and assure agreement be addressed and facilitated by the Parliament of Kenya and if need be the AU and the international community. That the international community continue to take such measures as are necessary to ensure that the Mediation Parties and their respective supporters are held accountable to the Kenyan people and to the principles of truth with justice.
KPTJ and the NCSC salute all Kenyans, such as those in civil society and the business community, who have resolved to work for lasting peace through truth and justice and call on non-violence to achieve these objectives. KPTJ and NCSC also applaud and express full solidarity with the Kofi Annan-led AU mediation process for beginning to craft a way out of this cataclysmic crisis in Kenya. KPTJ and NCSC appreciate the positive contributions of those such as UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon and the African Union Summit. Given the historical failure of many national processes to resolve Kenya’s problems, it behoves all to ensure that there are concerted efforts to work towards the ultimate success of the AU Mediation Process in Kenya.
God/Allah Bless Kenya.
Signed:
The National Civil Society Congress
Africa Centre for Open Governance (AfriCOG)
Awaaz
Bunge la Mwananchi
Centre for Law and Research International (CLARION)
Centre for Multiparty Democracy (CMD)
Centre for Rights, Education and Awareness for Women (CREAW)
The Cradle-the Childrens Foundation
Constitution and Reform Education Consortium (CRECO)
East African Law Society (EALS)
Fahamu
Haki Focus
Hema la Katiba
Independent Medico-Legal Unit (IMLU)
Innovative Lawyering
Institute for Education in Democracy (IED)
International Commission of Jurists (ICJ-Kenya)
International Centre for Policy and Conflict
Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC)
Kenya Leadership Institute (KLI)
Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR)
Kituo cha Sheria
RECESSPA
Law Society of Kenya (LSK)
MARS Group Kenya
Muslim Human Rights Forum
National Convention Executive Council (NCEC)
Society for International Development (SID)
The 4 Cs
Urgent Action Fund (UAF)-Africa
Youth Agenda
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
Intellectuals fail in times of crisis
2008-02-07
Simon Gikandi
Simon Gikandi takes on the role of the intellectual in a time of crisis.
What is the role of the intellectual in times of crisis? Do ideas make any difference in the management of public affairs? Can the imperative to act to change things be reconciled to moral demands?
These are questions that many Kenyans, especially the intellectual and professional classes have been wrestling with in the aftermath of the flawed elections of December 2007 and the wreckage of destruction and death that it has left in its wake.
At the centre of the agonising and hand- wringing that has been evident in the writings of intellectuals responding to the crisis, has been the question of how individuals should respond to a series of events that have broken up families, destroyed old friendships, and turned the very notion of a Kenyan identity into a what Chinua Achebe, writing on Nigeria, once called a convenient fiction.
What now appears to be a moral or ethical gap in the conduct of public affairs in Kenya has tended to be blamed on the political class, its opportunism, and its greed.
What has been missing in this debate, however, is the role of the intellectual class, the one group of people who should have provided us with the theoretical apparatus for managing public affairs without consideration of the demands of power politics and the dangerous cocktail of sectarianism and careerism.
Indeed, since 1982, we Kenyan intellectuals have abrogated our responsibilities as custodians of free thought and willingly supported the antics and policies of the political class.
Now we are in danger of yielding the moral high ground to the most parochial segments of our population. Soon, we will be at the beck and call of the Kenyan equivalent of John Kony or the late Alice Lakwena in northern Uganda.
Intellectuals are not likely to be seen walking across the rural countryside dressed in “tribal” dress, and wielding machetes, but it is a well-known fact that in Kenya some of our best minds have provided the ideas and the idiom that has fuelled communal conflict.
The worst kind of failure has been one of omission: The values we hold and the stories we tell ourselves, has often been distorted by respective governments and their opponents, but intellectuals have not been quick to correct such distortions.
The history books used in Kenyan secondary schools are a glaring example of this failure. They are all written to confirm to a syllabus established by the Ministry of Education and thus, instead of presenting history in a critical version, they rehearse political mythologies in the language of bureaucracy.
The section on political leaders in the New History Syllabus is a glaring example of what happens when the regimen of truth is sacrificed to bureaucratic expediency: it talks about the achievements of Jomo Kenyatta, Tom Mboya, Ronald Ngala, Oginga Odinga, and Daniel arap Moi, without even a hint of their monumental failures, the colossal mistakes that have brought us to the current crisis.
The history books used in our schools do not even pretend to invite critical thinking or to raise basic questions about historical memory, actions, or ideals.
The sections dealing with the structures of government, especially the role of the Electoral Commission of Kenya in governance, are banal recitations of the statutory function of this now disgraced body and others.
And it does not end there: Turning to the subject of “Mau, Mau” is even more troubling. Here, the most contentious event in the modern history of Kenya is represented as a list of causes and results, not conflicts and debates.
Major scholarship has been done on “Mau Mau” in some of the major universities in the world and great advances have been made on the politics of the movement, its causes and its aftermath, but the new history syllabus is not very different from the one in operation 35 years ago when I was a high school student.
Then and now, the education of Kenyan children was organised around a bureaucratic consensus. No wonder many products of our educational system rehearse some of the darkest moments of our cultural history with a bizarre mixture of ignorance and impunity, willing to slaughter their neighbours, friends, and even members of the own family in the name of invented colonial identities.
There is another dimension to the failure of national pedagogy: Why have Kenyan intellectuals failed to rise beyond partisanship to provide the voice of reason when rationality is needed most? I have known some of the intellectuals associated with both the Kibaki and Raila camps since I was an undergraduate at the University of Nairobi in the late 1970s and I worked with many of them in various groups opposed to the last dictatorship.
Yet, the people who should be providing guidance through the crisis, promoting the larger ideals that might still hold the country together, now seem to be functioning as the cold war warriors of the plutocracies.
What happened? It is common knowledge that after the 1982 coup attempt, the Moi government embarked on a systematic destruction of the university as an autonomous unit of knowledge production.
The campaign against the university took two forms: First, there was the imprisonment and forced exile of intellectuals and the wilful emaciation of institutions of higher education which, deprived of essential material resources and overwhelmed with unreasonable demands for admission, were reduced into skeletons of their former selves.
Second, the professorial class was incorporated into the State apparatus. Shuffled between the university and the bureaucracy, professors and lecturers could no longer claim to be custodians of free thinking; instead, they had become workers in the service of power. here were several consequences of the destruction of the university as an autonomous body.
One was the emergence of the Non Governmental Organisation as an alternative sphere of knowledge production. Unable to get jobs or sustain research projects at the university, intellectuals turned to non-governmental organisations, most of them funded by foreign interests.
It is here that some modicum of research was conducted in such areas as the rule of law, democracy, and gender equality. NGOs were crucial in creating a space in which issues that were not part of the state’s agenda for the university could be explored, but NGO knowledge could not provide a real alternative to the university as an autonomous space for disinterested thought.
It is not my intention here to malign NGOs, which I consider crucial in civic education, poverty eradication, and the general business of ensuring good governance, but NGOs are dependent on the interests of their foreign donors who decide research priorities within the larger project of “development.”
Much more seriously, NGO knowledge could not be pure knowledge because it was premised on utilitarian ends and its success was judged on its ability to influence policy. NGO knowledge could not be a substitute for the university as a conduit of pure knowledge.
A final consequence of the destruction of the local university was the expatriation of Kenyan knowledge. Kenyan intellectuals, working in all fields of human knowledge, hold prestigious positions in some of the leading universities in the world. Many of them produce important knowledge on Kenyan issues.
But in relation to the Kenyan polity, this is extroverted knowledge, produced within the confines and privileged spaces of foreign universities, and tied to the institutional needs and desires of foreign audiences and interests.
Research on Africa outside Africa carries the burden of its own alienation in relation to the place that is supposed to be its object of study.
* Prof Gikandi teaches at Princeton University. This article first appeared in the Business Daily Africa.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
Intellectual and Social Responsibility in Scholarship: Lessons from Professor Issa Shivji
2008-02-07
Francis B. Nyamnjoh
Francis B. Nyamnjoh reflects on the central role Issa Shivji has played in the development of African revolutionary scholarship.
It is 15th July 2006 at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Issa G. Shivji, at 60, is giving his valedictory lecture. Titled “Lawyers in Neoliberalism: Authority’s Professional Supplicants or Society’s Amateurish Conscience”, the lecture marks the end of a rich and distinguished 36 year career of selfless service that started as a tutorial assistant in May 1970 and was crowned with full professorship in July 1986. The lecture is on a theme that has been at the centre of Shivji’s humanity and scholarship since his student days in East Africa and the United Kingdom. If neoliberalism cultivates corporate greed and reinforces an elitist order that never tires of globalizing a culture of poverty, Shivji as a lawyer and scholar has positioned himself passionately and selfishly at variance with neoliberalism. He uses changing land and labour regimes in Tanzania to criticize the changing concepts of personhood and human agency that have tended to question cultures and socio-political communities underpinned by collective success where greed is not the creed. Drawing on leading labour cases, Shivji convincingly demonstrates how Tanzania and Africa have jumped “from the frying pan of state nationalism into the fire of corporate neoliberalism”, hence his criticism of lawyers who come across more as technicians oiling the wheels of neoliberalism than as saboteurs to the corporate greed and global consumer culture it champions.
As he argues, neoliberalism generates a transnational legal intelligentsia to serve and oil it. The neoliberal elite globalizes the so-called ‘rule of law’, not as embedded in liberal political values of the Enlightenment period, but rather as “firmly rooted in the exigencies of the ‘rule of capital’ in the service of a corporatocracy.” The result is the global “expansion and protection of property relations and private appropriation of surplus value,” to the detriment of multitudes of poor and ordinary citizens simply seeking to get by. In the valedictory lecture, reproduced in the popular pan-African Pambazuka electronic news bulletin: http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/36468, Shivji is scathing in his criticism of African lawyers and intellectuals at the beg and call of neoliberalism, which privileges profit over people and is interested in development and culture only to the extent that these guarantee profitability. Shivji has remained consistent and uncompromisingly critical over the last forty years.
In 1968, he published “The Educated Barbarians”, an article that was passionately critical by the injustices of unequal encounters that had reduced being cultured to emptying oneself of all meaningful cultural difference vis-à-vis neocolonial forces and its harbingers in Africa. In those days, as today, Shivji was committed to Africans old and young passionate about making the world a better place politically, economically and culturally. In his words, “We discussed Fanon while we worked in cashew nut farms around the University, taught literacy classes in Mlalakuwa based on Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, built our own shelters, called houses, through self-help.” It was an exercise of making both development and culture in tune with the lives and expectations of those called upon to partake of both.
This passionate commitment to challenging the culture of injustice and greed with the culture of equality of humanity and the celebration of difference seems to diminish in Africa by the day. Shivji is worried, and blames the insidiousness of Neo-liberalism, which “has taken its toll and the language of consultancy has displaced and replaced the language of conscience and commitment.” He argues that “corporatisation of the university is part of the neoliberal ideological attack on critical thinking, on intellectuals who would ‘Speak Truth to Power’. It undermines the university as a critical site of knowledge, as a mirror of society. No doubt, temptations are great and none of us is immune.” This recognition, notwithstanding, Shivji is particularly scandalized by the fact that even the committed progressive scholars of yesteryears “can only agonize and gradually forget even to diagnose the ills of our society.”
Professor Issa Shivji has had a rich career as one of Africa’s leading experts on law and development issues. He retires as director of the Department of Constitutional and Administrative Law at the University of Dar es Salaam where he has taught since 1970’s. In Tanzania where he was born in 1946, Shivji has served as advocate of the High Court and the Court of Appeal of Tanzania since 1977 and advocate of High Court in Zanzibar since 1989. He has served as visiting professor in Mexico, Zimbabwe, South Africa, United Kingdom, India, Hong Kong and USA, and has won several awards and distinctions. Shivji’s influence as a lawyer, scholar, professor and public intellectual is global. He has researched, written and published extensively on a broad range of issues including on human rights, land tenure, labour, higher education and the politics of recognition and representation.
He has published 15 books that include his 1989 groundbreaking The Concepts of Human Rights in Africa - a critique of dominant ideologies of human rights that seeks to reconceptualise human rights from the perspective of the working people of Africa, 6 monographs, 33 book chapters, 36 articles in scholarly journals, and over 40 other papers, reports and writings in newspapers, newsletters and bulletins. His most recent book -- Let the People Speak: Tanzania Down the Road to Neoliberalism—published by CODESRIA to coincide with his valedictory lecture, consists of 90 critical and thought-provoking essays selected from over 150 written between 1990 and 2005 in three different newspapers. The book captures the richness of Shivji’s contributions as a public intellectual. It deals with the period when Tanzania under external pressures from donors and financial institutions was forced down the road of neo-liberalism. The local compradorial elites whose economic appetites had been suppressed under Nyerere’s radical nationalism now openly flexed muscles to get a place under the capitalist sun as nationalism, radical or otherwise, was abandoned, and neo-liberalism uncritically embraced.
The essays are on varied subjects ranging from the politics of multi-party, the strains and stresses of the Union with Zanzibar, the deep-seated extra-constitutional behaviour of the ruling elite to the hopes, fears and resistance of the working people. In these essays, contemporary Tanzanian history is recorded in sweeping journalistic strokes without burying the commitment of a critical public intellectual in turgid scholarship. As a warning on the slippery slope that neo-liberalism constitutes, Let the People Speak will echo in many an African country. Hence the salience and relevance of Shivj’s renewed call for the resurrection of a radical, people driven Pan-Africanism. Shivji sees in the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), an institution that epitomizes the Pan-Africanism he would want to resurrect. CODESRIA was created in 1973 with a clear mandate to promote the production and dissemination of multidisciplinary social research by African scholars. It was tasked with the responsibility of doing this simultaneously with an investment of effort in transcending the various barriers of language, geography, discipline, gender and generation that hamper cross-national African networking for the advancement of science.
As a foundation member, Shivji has played important roles in the life of CODESRIA. He has been an authoritative and important voice. His high standing and commitment to intellectual activism have played a pivotal role in CODESRIA’s history. The Social Science community in Africa has benefited enormously from the spread of his ideas and influence, and from the encouragement that he has never relented in giving so many people. Shivji has served CODESRIA in various capacities over the years, including as: Chair person for the Drafting Committee to the 1990 Dar es Salaam Declaration on Academic Freedom & Social Responsibility of Academics; Director of CODESRIA Democratic Governance Institute, July – September 1996; Chairperson, CODESRIA Governance Reform Committee, 2000-2002; and Executive Committee member of CODESRIA, 2002-2005. It is this African and global social science community which Shivji has shaped and been shaped by that reacted with outpours of email messages of congratulations and recognition when Shivji made public his retirement through an open invitation to his valedictory lecture.
Without space to do justice to the scores of testimonies in praise of him, let me refer only to a few: Carlos Lopes, a scholar of Guinea Bissau currently Assistant Secretary General at the UNO, writes:
When I was still a teenager I was already reading Issa Shivji, thanks to my mentor's insistence, the late Mário de Andrade, leading Angolan intellectual and founder of the MPLA. When later I wrote my first book, in 1982, quotes from Shivji were prominent. So despite being from a totally different generation I feel I have been in dialogue with Shivji for decades now; and, as a result, consider his enduring influence on my thinking, very important. However what I really would like to mention is the personality of this scholar that always considered himself an agent of change, a revolutionary, committed to the transformation of our beloved continent. From the Dar School to the activism of AAPS, or CODESRIA, Issa has been a reference figure because of his personality. Bonds were established because of his intellectual honesty. We know what he stands for and we know his personal interests matter little for he is a man of convictions, and his convictions are for the good of the collective. At this moment I would like to pay tribute to him and his colleagues that have put the University of Dar es Salaam in the radar of Africa's transformation. We need you!
Dr. Thandika Mkandawire, former Executive Secretary of CODESRIA, author of African Intellectuals, and currently Director of UNRISD in Geneva, writes: Dear Issa, Thanks for the invitation. I really wish I could attend this event to pay tribute to a courageous and inspiring scholar I hope you realise that your retirement at such an early age simply marks a new beginning. I therefore look forward to more of your seminal work. Warm regards
Dr. Jacques Depelchin, a committed intellectual, academic, and activist for peace, democracy, transparency and pro-people politics in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and author of Silences in African History, writes:
Dear Issa, For your fidelity and commitment to emancipatory politics at all times, we can never thank you enough. However, do not worry, although things might look gloomy, there are unmistakable signs that --to paraphrase Ayi Kwei Armah in his novel KMT-- the people of the Sphere shall prevail over the people of the Pyramid. It is easier to heal than to give into the idea that everything has fallen apart. Do take care
Dr. Jimi Adesina, Professor of Sociology at Rhodes University, South Africa, and co-editor of Africa and Development Challenges in the New Millennium, writes: Mzee: Wished I could be there. Thanks for the years of inspiring intellectual leadership that you given all of us and the space that you continue to provide for the intellectual project at the service of ordinary people, who daily do extraordinary things. I am sure this is only a formal end of employment at UD rather than a retirement. May your cooking place never grow cold!
The President of CODESRIA Teresa Cruz e Silva, a Mozambican Historian, had this, among other things, to say: Professor Issa Shivji is a brother, a friend, and in many ways an inspiration to Africans big and small, an intellectual animated by a passion for freedom, a passion well summed up in the title of his latest book: ‘Let the People Speak’. After such an illustrious academic life rich in contribution to the development of Social Sciences in Africa, Professor Issa Shivji deserves his formal retirement from the University of Dar es Salaam, although I doubt, given his wisdom and generosity of spirit, that he is going to allow himself the rest he needs. On behalf of CODESRIA, also represented today by the eminent Professor Archie Mafeje and two former Presidents of CODESRIA, Professors Zenebeworke Tadesse and Mahmood Mamdani -- all three of them founding members of CODESRIA, allow me Professor Shivji to congratulate you and the University of Dar es Salaam for your outstanding academic production and your contribution to the formation of new generations of African scholars in the last decades. Allow me also, personally, to express my gratitude and my tremendous admiration for your scholarship and integrity, as well as your strong intellectual activism illustrated by your writings on Africa and particularly on contemporary Tanzanian issues, and your consistent and very honest positions concerning world politics.
My first true memory of Issa Shivji´s name come from the mid to the late 70´s, after the independence of my country, Mozambique, when at the very new African Studies Centre at Eduardo Mondlane University and under the leadership of Ruth First and Aquino de Bragança, an uninformed young and enthusiastic group of Mozambicans received all the strong influence of the Dar es Salaam school, particularly the very first contacts with issues related with African development, the new research approaches on African history and for the first time a rare chance to read African authors. For scholars of my generation, Issa Shivji´s name always has been a source of inspiration and an extraordinary example of struggle to build up African universities not only with high standards, but with scholars committed to the development of the continent. The huge range of Issa´s achievements was and is still recognized by successive generations of scholars who have his work and intellectual commitment as a source of inspiration. Today we are here to celebrate a transition from one fruitful stage to another one in the academic life of Professor Issa Shivji. Issa´s energy and commitment have been a vital resource for CODESRIA, and for the social science community in general. We sincerely trust that he will continue to guide the young generations and to give more and more of his commitment to African Development. Which is way I say to him: Issa, for this new phase of your life we wish you happiness and good fortune, but CODESRIA cannot guarantee you the rest you so badly need after working so hard. For we need you even more than ever to mentor the younger generation in whom you have sown the seeds of HOPE in a bright future for Africa.
Professor Issa Shivji has never been a lip service scholar, less still a scholar who pays lip service to social responsibility. He does not thrive in dissemblance, and would state his mind even at the risk of being the only voice who dares to say the king is naked in his new clothes. Not untypical therefore, he found reason to voice his concerns about the the Mo Ibrahim Prize for a retired African president which was awarded to Joachim Chissano of Mozambique. In this commentary titled “Robbing Peter to Pay Paul” (see Pambazuka), Shivji argues that “it is naïve, if not mischievous, to award a person – moreover with a cash prize – for bringing peace or democracy to his country.” He questions the reason for the award – “good governance”, the yardsticks by which this is determined, and the derogatory assumptions vis-à-vis Africa, its humanity and dignity that surround the award. He particularly regrets the “uncritical and unqualified celebration” of the award “by scribes and even academics and intellectuals”.
It is too simplistic, he argues, to assume that African problems are created exclusively by Africans, or that the excesses of the world out there has little bearing on the excesses of the world in here. Not to recognize this especially by scholars is dangerous, as it could easily lead to mistaking villains for heroes, mercenaries for savours, dictators for democrats, exploiters for philanthropists, capitalists for socialists. Only such critical understanding can put in perspective the fact that no one who has “made millions of dollars from the sweat and blood of the African people” can be celebrated when instead of returning “a few million to the people through providing badly needed schools, dispensaries, and water wells, proceeds to “add insult to injury by robbing (poor) Peter to pay (rich) Paul.” As Shahida El-Baz remarked in an email to me and others when she read this piece by Issa Shivji, “This is really refreshing. To read/hear such honest, brilliant and committed analysis is like a glowing light in the middle of darkness, where a great number of those, who used to be called progressive intellectuals, enjoy adopting uncritically the fashionable concepts and policies of imperialist globalization. It is also a typical description of what is happening in all our countries. Thank you Issa for holding the torch so high. Keep going…”
The magnitude of Professor Issa Shivji’s scholarly, legal, political and educational contributions to development and culture in Africa and globally, and his humanity, honesty and generosity of spirit constitute a glowing example worth emulating of intellectual and social responsibility in action and in tune with Africa and its predicaments.
* Francis B. Nyamnjoh is Associate Professor and Head of Publications and Dissemination with the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA). Email: Nyamnjoh@gmail.com, Website: www.nyamnjoh.com
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
Pan-African Postcard
Xenophobia is all of us - a response to Pius Adesanmi
2008-02-07
Owen Sichone
Owen Sichone responds to Pius Adesanmi on the issue of black South Africa's xenophobia towards other Africans
I was quite amazed by Pius Adesanmi's description of South African xenophobia mainly because it was such a non-African perspective. At the end I was left thinking "They've got you my brother, they've got you."
Everyone knows that xenophobia is a problem in South Africa so there is no need to differ with him on that point. However, the Biafran war alone should prove that xenophobia in Nigeria has a presence, even without mentioning the mass expulsion of the Ghanaian teachers and other guest workers once upon a time.
In a paper celebrating the cosmopolitan nationalism of the FRELIMO fighters he had visited in the liberated zones of pre-independence Mozambique, Yoweri Museveni (then a student at the University of Dar es salaam contrasted this revolutionary nationalism with the tribalism of the Ugandan peasants and Makerere intelligentsia:
"The peasants in western region of Uganda, for instance will refer to people from the Northern region of the country as Banyamahanga (foreigners) or as Abadokori (somebody whose language is not intelligible). (Y.T. Museveni 1972. 'Fanon's Theory of Violence: Its Verification in Liberated Mozambique' Department of Political Science, University of Dar es Salaam) so there. It is not only the South Africans who call foreigners babblers or barbaroi. And it is not always an insult either, but that is a topic for another discussion. It does not seem that anyone, either on the street, the taxis or KFC outlet called him Ikwerekwere but he nevertheless describes it quite well:
"… we took a bus and headed back to Georges Hérault's residence. I still don't know what it was about us that gave us away as foreigners but the other passengers, all Blacks, lapsed into an uneasy silence as soon as we entered. I looked at the faces around us and thought I saw hostility." I do not doubt that he saw something that looked like hostility but why didn't he say Sani bonani nonke" and see if anybody would bother to return his greeting? Is that not what we do in Africa?
"The tension was so thick in the air you could cut it with a knife. Harry confirmed my worst fears when we left the bus. I had just experienced, firsthand, South African xenophobia and I was to experience it again and again throughout my three-month sojourn in that country. Harry explained to me – with the coolness of someone used to it - that the Black South African passengers on the bus had identified us as makwerekwere, hence the naked hostility." Yes they have got you. They have got you so bad that you are paranoid. In contrast when Adewale Maja-Pearce came to Johannesburg he was not jumpy and do you know why? Because he was not wearing American blinkers. If he had not been intimidated by Lagos, he reasoned, nothing that Jozi could throw at him would shake him. Oyinbo man needs to look at Africa with the Open Minds that Fela once sang about and not fear his own shadow.
In many accounts of the Rwandan and Burundian genocides, killers have discovered that they killed one of their own would lament: "We thought he was Hutu" or "He looked like a Tutsi" and judging identity by the appearance method is unreliable – to the say the least but so is judging hostility by level of fear felt.
Yes Makwerekwere is the derogatory term used by Black South Africans to describe non-South African blacks but amaXhosa may also call Basotho the same, and vice versa. Yes Black immigrants from the rest of Africa, are called makwerekwere but NOT especially Nigerians who are put both by police and citizens into a special category, one that evokes fear. But judging Nigerians by their appearance (tall and dark) or their favourite activity (419 activities of one sort or another) will invariably yield Cameroonians, Ivorians and Liberians etc.
So why is Pius "confounded by the fact that Black South Africa had begun to manufacture its own kaffirs so soon after apartheid" ? Like the Biafrans, they have been let done by their leaders. Just look at post-elections Kenya and see the petty bourgeois selfishness that Museveni criticised in his own country and you will understand that South African leaders have not just keep silent about the support they received from the Frontline States (including Nigeria) but that they have not shared the national cake equitably. The inherited Brazilian style gap between rich and poor always creates violence in society. There is still apartheid in post apartheid South Africa and it is not just the foreign Africans who suffer. Indeed the Nigerian doctors and other professionals are more likely to be beneficiaries of the end of the apartheid system than the poor workers whose factories closed down because of the flood of cheaper Chinese goods onto a previously protected market and now have no hope of ever earning wages again.
So let us not portray South Africans as ignorant, ungrateful or just bloodthirsty. The only way to reverse xenophobia, whether in Nigeria, Russia or South Africa is by exposing its roots in social inequalities and joining the struggle against social injustice.
* Dr. Owen Sichone is a professor in the Department of Social Anthropology, at the University of Cape Town
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
Letters
Chad is also a story of blood oil
2008-02-07
John DeMarco
Chad is also a story [see Alex De Waal's article at http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/45872 ] of blood oil, in my opinion, and the blood is on the hands of the World Bank and western governments. Recall that in the 1990's the World Bank agressively backed western oil companies to overcome all obstacles and construct the Chad-Cameroon pipeline, delivering Chadian oil to gaping western fuel tanks. (Ironically, at the time the World Bank was running ads on CNN warning us that increasing fossil fuel consumption might contribute to global warming!) The Bank's public justification was that extracting the oil was the only hope for development in Chad. Some of us opposed the pipeline and the World Bank's role, on the grounds that Chad had no effective government and a history of conflict, and that the oil money was unlikely to be of real benefit to Chadians under those conditions. The oil has been in the ground for millions of years; we argued for keeping it there a few more years until we could be sure it would be well used. Obviously the conflict in Chad predates the oil exploitation, but the World Bank literally poured oil on the flames, providing something much more valuable for rival factions to fight over. Now we are seeing the kind of 'development' oil has brought to Chad: more years of civil war and the resulting human suffering. Will we be surprised to see western governments install or prop up whichever 'government' is likely to keep the oil flowing?
Kenya: Solutions
2008-02-07
Michael Baingana
Amate Gaitu Project
A re-run of the elections without fundamentally changing the constitution of Kenya would simply lead to a re-run of violence http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/45900 .
Power sharing among the political elite would not necessarily translate into a resolution of the problems at the grassroots which is where the crisis is.
Kenyans need massive devolution of power (to tax and spend, resolve and control land issues) to the provincial level and even lower levels. This is what would really let off the political steam.
On Chad, world bank and African leader corruption
2008-02-07
Chuck Lee
De Waal [www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/4587] reminds us that Idriss Deby "dismantled a model World Bank program for control of Chad’s oil revenue, which had been intended to ensure that the funds were used for development, rather than patronage and arms purchases. He fixed the elections. He stays in power through intrigue, intimidation and cash." This is an important reminder about how corrupt African leaders themselves play a central role in the immiseration and marginalization of their own people.
Books & arts
The Disillusioned African, by Francis Nyamnjoh
Reviewed br R. E Ekosso
2008-02-05
http://www.ekosso.com/2008/02/the-disillusion.html
I would not call this book a narrative in the conventional sense, but it tells a story nonetheless. It is a story of time, the times we live in. It is also (and this is where then non-narrative part comes in) a story of a man's mind. Charles is this man. His story is an engaging mixture of curiosity, great learning, down-to-earth humour, and social comment. He has left Cameroon for Merrie England to study philosophy, and he compares and contrasts the English society (and to my mind, the entire Western society by extension) with Africa. The hilarity occasioned by some of his observations is alone adequate recompense for buying the book.
Africa: Zamdela Spoken Word festival
2008-02-05
The Zamdela Arts and Culture Center in conjunction with Ditiro Productions and Icebound Projects host the Zamdela Spoken Word Fest from 29 February to 2 March 2008. The festival is aimed at promoting the culture of reading and writing by improving the writing and performance expertise of budding writers and exposing their works to the broader community, and by building relations between emerging and established writers. Organizers hope that the event would boost the morale of writers and artists and open doors for publishing and recording opportunities for them
ZAMDELA SPOKEN WORD FESTIVAL
The Zamdela Arts and Culture Center in conjunction with Ditiro Productions and Icebound Projects host the Zamdela Spoken Word Fest from 29 February to 2 March 2008. The festival is aimed at promoting the culture of reading and writing by improving the writing and performance expertise of budding writers and exposing their works to the broader community, and by building relations between emerging and established writers. Organizers hope that the event would boost the morale of writers and artists and open doors for publishing and recording opportunities for them
The festival will kick-start with a Creative Writing and Spoken Word Workshop for about forty budding and aspirant writers on March 29 at 2pm at the Zamdela Arts and Culture Center. On 1 March at 2pm there will be a launch of the poetry book; “The Heart’s Interpreter” by Mphutlane wa Bofelo. The keynote speaker at the launch will be Allan Kolski Horwitz of Botsotso Publishing and performances will be by Kush Khoza, Botsotso Jesters, Icebound and Slam Master-Mphutlane wa Bofelo.
Kush Khoza is the alter ego of Qalo Gabela, a senior software developer and analyst who designs, develops & maintains the Pan African Culture Websitewww.kush.co.za. The Botsotso Jesters are Allan Kolski Horwitz, Ike Mboneni Muila and Siphiwe ka Ngwenya, a poetry performance collective that also publish the literary magazine, Botsotso. As Botsotso Publishing they publish books of poetry and fiction. The group has performed at many different festivals, schools and universities and are acknowledged as pioneers and innovators in the field of poetry performance. As a collective and as individuals, The Botsotso Jesters have been published in numerous anthologies, magazines and websites, both locally and internationally. As Botstso Jesters they have published We Jive Like This, (Botsotso Publishing, 1996) and Dirty Washing (Botsotso Publishing, 2000) and released the CD,Purple Light Mirror in the Mud (Botsotso Publishing, 2001. Serame wa Makhele popularly known as Icebound is one of the most celebrated Slam Poets and Spoken Word Artists in the Free State at the moment. He was a founder of Soul Poetic, a group in which he was a lead poet and backed up by a guitarist and bongo drummer who were also back up singers and composers. Icebound is also the director of the Events Management Company, Icebound Projects and a freelance journalist. The festival ends with a bang on the 2 March with the Zamdela Slamjam where 12th Slam poets will battle with words, with the audience being the ultimate judge. The Zamdela Slamjam will feature an open mic session to offer a platform to poets, comedians and singers.
Contact:
Mphutlane: 0738698726
Mamiki: 0783284123
ZAMDELA SPOKEN WORD FESTIVAL
29 February
Creative Writing and Slam Poetry Workshop
2pm at Zamdela Arts and Culture Center (Participation is by confirmation and is limited to 40 participants)
1 March
Launch of “The Heart’s Interpreter” by Mphutlane wa Bofelo and performances by Kush Khoza, Botsotso Jesters, Icebound and Farouk Asvat.
Keynote speech by Allan Kolski Horwitz
(Attendance is limited to workshop participants and invited guests)
2 March
Zamdela Slamjam and open mic
2pm at Zamdela Arts and Culture Center9Attendance is free)
Contact: Mamiki (Zamdela Arts and Culture Center) 0783284123
Mphutlane (Ditiro Productions) 0738698726
Icebound (Icebound Projects) 0820429905
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African Writers’ Corner
You, S/He: a Language Test in Time of Strife
2008-02-07
Stephen Derwent Partington
Rewrite this sentence as a question:
I should kill you.
Next, correct this split infinitive:
To clearly know what’s wrong.
Reverse the pronouns in this sentence:
You’ll forgive me.
The infinitive of Love is:
Love; To Love; Be Loved; Despise?
Note down five synonyms for Neighbour
and five antonyms for Hate.
Select a word from those in brackets
and insert it in this sentence:
I _______ my fellow humans
(Murder; Rape; Displace; Respect.)
Last: if a Person is the key to peace
determine if it’s I or You or S/He
(tick any one, or two, or three.)
*Stephen Derwent Partington, is the Kwani? poetry editor and a member of the Concerned Kenyan Writers Initiative.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
Blogging Africa
Review of African Blogs – 02/07/2008
2008-02-07
Dibussi Tande
Ken Opalo comments on the continued inability of the Zimbabwean opposition to join forces in time for the forthcoming presidential elections:
“You would imagine that with a president like one Robert Mugabe the Zimbabwean opposition would do anything in their capacity to have him out of power. But you would be wrong. This power hungry lot (yes, this is what I think of them) has refused to come up with a coalition against Mugabe. Their leaders, Tsvangirai and Mutambara, have confirmed that talks between their rival MDC factions have “broken down irretrievably” - according to the BBC.
A divided MDC almost certainly guarantees the aging Mugabe a win in the March polls. … Tsvangirai and Mutambara owe it to their countrymen and women to form a united front if they really want to unseat Mugabe. They have no business running separate campaigns in March because this will guarantee the presidency to Mugabe.
[…]
Sadly, this is yet another case of African leaders lacking true leadership. It also paints a bad picture of both Tsvangirai and Mutambara and makes one doubt whether these two really want to end the bad governance that we’ve come to associate with Bob or whether they just want to perpetuate the same old practices of rent-seeking, cronyism and over-the-roof inflations rates - but may be with less human rights abuses and the jailing of opposition supporters. Even this is questionable, after seeing what Kenya has turned into following the “bad” years of Moi rule. African leaders just have a way of making you look back and shock yourself by wishing you had the likes of Moi in power.”
No Longer at Ease continues to provide daily updates on the crisis unfolding in Chad:
“The government is in control of the capital N'Djamena for the moment. The rebels are saying they'll return. But the most development has been in the French position: it seems they've made their minds up in supporting president Idris Deby, though few days ago they seemed to be waiting to see who will win. The UN resolution calling on members of the Security Council to lend support to the Chadian president raised the prospect of French intervention. The French defense minister said that their helicopters have been monitoring the Chadian-Sudanese border to expose any foreign intervention.
Thousands of Chadians have crossed over to Cameroon, and hundreds of civilians are reported dead or injured.”
Brenda Zula revisits President Levy Mwanawasa’s firing of Zambia’s Ambassador to Libya, Mbita Chitala.
“According to the Times of Zambia Newspapers, the President’s action was prompted by Mr. Chitala's article in which he was advocating for policies which he termed as being contrary to the Government position on the African Union.
Mr. Chitala was not given any authority by the Zambian government to write what he wrote on in The Tripoli Post.
‘The article has caused untold embarrassment to His Excellency the President and the Government of Zambia, and a Foreign minister of a country whose leader was described in very unkind words has intimated that he will send a note of protest to the Zambian Government.’"
Constitutionally Speaking comments on the strange case of a sex worker who took her employer to the South African Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) after she was fired. The CCMA refused to hear her case on grounds that her contract with her employer was an illegal one, a view not shared by the blogger:
“The criminalisation of sex work unfairly discriminates against woman because women are mostly those arrested and harassed for offering their sexual services to men who, in turn, are mostly not similarly pursued. This infringes on the human dignity of sex workers and, I would argue, all women, because it suggests that those making the laws believe that it is acceptable to have a different standard by which the law could measure male and female sexuality.
Besides, this kind of legal marginalisation - based on the moral views of some in our society - should have no place in a Constitutional state based on the respect for diversity and difference.
[…]
While it is therefore correct to say that the common law prevents the enforcement of illegal contracts, I would argue that as far as the protection of vulnerable groups such as sex workers are concerned, the Bill of Rights now requires us to jettison this principle of the common law. In stead, it requires an expansive interpretation of the definition of employer in the LRA to include protection for vulnerable groups like sex workers who harm no one when they engage in the illegal activity of prostitution.
CNN Lybia one of the rare English language blogs from Lybia writes about deletion of one of the leading Libyan blogs following a campaign by the Libyan Union of Bloggers:
“Those of you who browse the Arabic language sector of the Libyan blogosphere, have definitely come across what used to be the most popular Libyan blog of Tariq Ali, a Libyan guy who confessed frankly that he didn’t believe in any religion… his blog has recently been deleted after [a] message… sent by the Libyan union of bloggers to maktoob, the host of Tariq's blog.
[…]
The other thing that is far beyond me is the reason behind the move of the Libyan union of bloggers against Tariq!! Was it because the guy identified himself as a Libyan? And they think of themselves as our guardians, so they have the right to impose a censorship of what we write? Do we have to be more cautious now, since we have a union that is capable of causing our blogs to be deleted? Are they proud of their union now as its first accomplishment was silencing a Libyan blogger? Has Tariq lost his blog because he doesn’t believe in God, or because he is Libyan??
This so-called union of Libyan bloggers doesn’t actually offer anything to Libyan bloggers, it only speaks in our name to achieve the personal goals of its founders, so "she" can add in her CV that she is the elected boss of all Libyan bloggers.”
Scribbles from the Den has a more upbeat and positive article, originally published in Chicago Tribune, about the increasing political influence of African bloggers:
“But perhaps the most remarkable -- and least appreciated -- novelty in Africa's turbulent political scene is the blossoming of information technology.
The world's poorest continent is, not surprisingly, also its least wired: Only 5 percent of Africans have access to the Internet, compared with the global population's average of 22 percent. But Web use in Africa has exploded almost ninefold since 2000, experts say. And by prying open the stranglehold that repressive regimes once held on the news, it has become, in the hands of ingenious Africans, a powerful tool for democratization and even disaster relief.
[…]
The U.S. should take note. As it prepares to engage with Africa more intensely than at any time since the Cold War, in part by the Pentagon's establishment of a new Africa Command headquarters to coordinate military and security interests, the U.S. will be competing on an increasingly flat information playing field.
Gone are the days when Washington could control its messages in client states. The scruffy cyber cafes of Chad and the man in Congo who rents his cell phone by the minute -- sometimes climbing atop a tree to improve reception -- ensure that Washington's voice will have to vie with those of the resource-hungry Chinese, or with the designs of Al Qaeda recruiters.”
* Dibussi Tande, a writer and activist from Cameroon, produces the blog Scribbles from the Den
Podcasts
Interviews with women in north Kivu
Rwanda’s Contact FM radio talks to women in north Kivu in the forefront of fighting what has been described as “femicide” in eastern DRC.
2008-02-07
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/broadcasts/podcasts.php
In this series of interviews, Rwanda’s Contact FM radio talks to women in north Kivu in the forefront of fighting what has been described as “femicide” in eastern DRC.
The recent peace conference in Goma, north Kivu has raised hopes that a durable solution to the almost decade long conflict in eastern DRC will finally be found. But Congolese women of DRC are paying a huge price as each bout of fighting results in ever more women raped and mutilated. Rape is being used as a weapon of war in what increasingly looks like a no win situation for all parties concerned and Congolese women are upping the ante in the fight to break the silence about the atrocities committed against them for too many years.
Zimbabwe update
MDC unity pact crumbles
2008-02-07
http://www.africanews.com/site/list_messages/15524
The much awaited and celebrated united front of the two Movement for Democratic Change factions that was sealed last Sunday crumbled in the eleventh hour again presenting President Robert Mugabe with chances to win the March 29 election. Arthur Mutambara leader of one MDC faction told the media contingency that the whole deal had been reversed following an impasse over nomination seats.
Support the people of Zimbabwe - London meeting
2008-02-06
The 29 March elections will not solve Zimbabwe's crisis. From 8 - 9 February, nearly 4,000 delegates will attend the Zimbabwe People's Convention in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, to decide how to organise themselves and work together to bring about peace and social justice. The majority of Zimbabwean men, women and children do not have food, clean water, and medical services. Come and hear what they have to say and find out how you can support them.
"A Little Solidarity Goes a Long Way!"
Support the People of Zimbabwe Saturday 23 February; 12.30pm - 5pm Room G2, School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), Thornhaugh St., London, WC1
The 29 March elections will not solve Zimbabwe's crisis. From 8 - 9 February, nearly 4,000 delegates will attend the Zimbabwe People's Convention in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, to decide how to organise themselves and work together to bring about peace and social justice. The majority of Zimbabwean men, women and children do not have food, clean water, and medical services. Come and hear what they have to say and find out how you can support them.
+ FILM OF ZIMBABWE PEOPLE'S CONVENTION
Russell Square tube. Buses - 7, 59, 68, 91, 168, 188
077 899 90 397 or 079 844 05 307
Organised by the African Liberation Support Campatign and Free Zim Youth
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Bulawayo Polytechnic suspends five students
2008-02-06
In a move calculated to instill fear in students, Bulawayo Polytechnic College has suspended five students following a demonstration staged by ZINASU on 23rd of January 2007. The Principal, Mr. T. P. Ndlovu has vowed to deal amply with all those who involved themselves in the demonstration. The suspended students are Melusi Hlambano, Food and Accommodation Secretary 2006, Tinashe Mhlanga, Bothwell Gwature, Brian Sibanda and Tinashe Chichera.
In a move calculated to instill fear in students, Bulawayo Polytechnic College has suspended five students following a demonstration staged by ZINASU on 23rd of January 2007. The Principal, Mr. T. P. Ndlovu has vowed to deal amply with all those who involved themselves in the demonstration. The suspended students are Melusi Hlambano, Food and Accommodation Secretary 2006, Tinashe Mhlanga, Bothwell Gwature, Brian Sibanda and Tinashe Chichera. These students are being accused of inciting other students to revolt against the administration due to poor education delivery system. It is alleged that more students, who are to date evading audience with the Principal, are on the suspension waiting list, and shall be issued with their suspension letters upon having audience with the Principal.
These students, after being issued with their suspension letters on 2nd of February 2008, were immediately escorted by the campus security out of the campus premises. They are stranded right now as some of them come from outside Bulawayo. They are yet to attend a hearing on this matter.
Meanwhile the Vice President, Emmanuel Mabuda is being threatened that if any ZINASU activity is carried out on campus without the knowledge of the administration and the police, he shall be suspended. ZINASU treasurer was also abducted and dumped in Nyamandlovu, 30 kilometers outside Bulawayo.
Students Solidarity Trust
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Police raid youth Forum offices
2008-02-06
In a clear case of the intolerance and partisan nature that continues to characterize the police force, 10 police officers on Saturday 2 February raided the Youth Forum offices in Harare. They arrested Terence Chimhavi the Youth Forum’s Advocacy Officer as well as Farirai Mageza, a member of the Youth Forum in Harare. The two were arrested at around 1600hrs and were detained at Avondale Police Station where they were thoroughly interrogated for more than 8 hours.
POLICE RAID YOUTH FORUM OFFICES
In a clear case of the intolerance and partisan nature that continues to characterize our police force, 10 police officers on Saturday 2 February raided the Youth Forum offices in Harare. They arrested Terence Chimhavi the Youth Forum’s Advocacy Officer as well as Farirai Mageza, a member of the Youth Forum in Harare. The two were arrested at around 1600hrs and were detained at Avondale Police Station where they were thoroughly interrogated for more than 8 hours. The two were accused of being the masterminds behind the spraying of graffiti messages denouncing gross misgovernance on walls around Avondale Shopping Center. The police based their allegation on the fact that they had seen posters of civic society leaders who were brutalized by their colleagues on March 11 2007 and other posters depicting gross human rights violation and the general meltdown of social service delivery in Zimbabwe at Youth Forum offices. The two were released after midnight without any charges leveled against them.
The two had gone to the Youth Forum’s offices to do some office work and were surprised to see ten plain clothes officers from Avondale Police Station from the Police Internal Security Intelligence (PISI) unit. The police officers were in the company of one Mapfumo, a Harare property mogul who owns the premises that house the Youth Forum offices. Apparently Mapfumo who had an axe on his person had led these officers to the offices on the pretext that he wanted to evict the Youth Forum from his property as he felt that he personally did not like the nature of work that the Youth Forum was undertaking. Mapfumo said he wanted to evict the Youth Forum and create space for the Ministry Of Policy Implementation In The Office Of The President. Mapfumo told the two in the presence of the police officers that the Ministry of Policy Implementation in the Office of the President had raised serious concerns with him on the activities of the Youth Forum when they had visited the premises to view them as they wanted to acquire the property as they gear up for the harmonized March 29 elections. Mapfumo further alleged that some of the posters that were in the offices were subversive and denigrated the President whom he personally had no problems with. Mapfumo said he preferred to have more progressive people on the premises rather than the Youth Forum who are into the ‘business of politics’. Mapfumo further gave a directive in front of the police officers that he wanted the Youth Forum out of his premises before Monday the 4th of February, failure of which he promised to take decisive action which he said was not going to be very pleasant for the Youth Forum. He also further threatened to take the case to higher offices.
The behavior exhibited by the police is shocking but not surprising as they temporarily allowed Mapfumo to be above the law. The Youth Forum offices have for the past 5 months been under surveillance by people who are suspected to be from the dreaded Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO). These people who are in the habit of changing vehicles with tinted windows everyday, usually park their vehicles a few meters from the Youth Forum offices, a clear tactic to intimidate the Youth Forum workers and members who frequent the offices.
This case is just but a tip of the iceberg. Cases of harassment of civic rights activists are clearly on the rise, mainly attributed to the impending harmonized elections slated for March 29. The Youth Forum is fully aware of the tactics used to silence pro-democratic institutions by the police as they seek to jealously guard Mugabe’s quest to remain Zimbabwe’s president. The behavior exhibited by police clearly shows their partisan nature. It is quite surprising that the police could not lay any charges against the two despite having detained and interrogated them for such a long period of time. What is also shocking is how the police could tolerate a man wielding an axe, a weapon which is classified as a very dangerous weapon, to execute an eviction. Surely there are legal procedures in place for any evictions to take place.
Such conduct from the Zimbabwe Republic Police deserves condemnation of the highest order and the Youth Forum urges police officers to desist from executing unlawful and illegal arrests lest history will judge them accordingly. How then can we trust such an openly partisan police force to facilitate the holding of free and fair elections? The police force must stop this clear abuse of office and gross violations of constitutional provisions of freedom of association and conscience. The Youth Forum will not tire in its quest to advocate for an election that is free and fair come March 29. The Youth Forum also urges all youths to shun acts of violence and intolerance to diverging views. The Youth Forum urges all the youths of Zimbabwe to vote against this clear abuse of the police by the state. The youths should vote against arbitrary arrests and torture, state sanctioned violence aimed at innocent civilians including women and children, repressive legislation(AIPPA, POSA, BSA etc),poor justice delivery system, state sanctioned impoverishment of the masses by the gluttonous man and women in the ruling regime and unaffordable life.
Youth Forum Information and Publicity
youthforumzim@yahoo.co.uk
+263 11 925 759, +263 23 353 291
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Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights call to voters
2008-02-06
On 29 March 2008 Zimbabwe will be holding its harmonized presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections. Zimbabweans will again be faced with the opportunity to exercise their democratic right and freedom to choose freely, through the ballot box, leaders with the mandate to securing a prosperous, peaceful and democratic Zimbabwe.
4 February 2008
ALERT
On 29 March 2008 Zimbabwe will be holding its harmonized presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections. Zimbabweans will again be faced with the opportunity to exercise their democratic right and freedom to choose freely, through the ballot box, leaders with the mandate to securing a prosperous, peaceful and democratic Zimbabwe.
EXERCISE YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE AND YOUR FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
ZLHR urges anyone who has:-
· been denied the right to register and have their name placed on the voters’ roll;
· found their name missing from the voters’ roll and been denied re-registration (please note that 7 February 2008 is the deadline for registration of names on the voters’ roll);
· been denied the right to inspect the voters’ roll;
· been denied access to information about the constituency and/or ward in which s/he is to vote; or
· in any way been hindered from participating in the forthcoming 29 March 2008 elections to seek legal services to secure their right to political participation as enshrined in the Electoral Act.
ZLHR Contact Details:
Harare - Landline: (04) 251468 or 708118
Cell: 011 619 746; 011 635 451; 0912 789 951; 011 635 448
Bulawayo - Landline: (09) 888371
Cell: 0912 249 436
Mutare - Landline: (020) 60183/4
Cell: 011 210 649; 0912 432 646
Inserted by ZLHR as a public service
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ZESN calls for longer inspection of voters' roll
2008-02-06
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) notes the announcement made by the Registrar General’s office concerning the opening of inspection of the voters’ roll from 1 to 7 February 2008. ZESN is seriously concerned that the time allocated for the inspection of the voters’ roll is far too short considering that there are new constituencies and wards countrywide.
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) notes the announcement made by the Registrar General’s office concerning the opening of inspection of the voters’ roll from 1 to 7 February 2008. ZESN is seriously concerned that the time allocated for the inspection of the voters’ roll is far too short considering that there are new constituencies and wards countrywide.
ZESN believes that this time is inadequate and proposes that it be extended to at least three weeks. ZESN is also deeply concerned that the inspection of the voters’ roll that started today was only announced in the print media. Prior to commencing the exercise it has not been adequately publicized. This might result in most prospective voters not being able to participate in this crucial exercise. ZESN believes that advertisements in the print media are not an appropriate and sufficient medium of communication of this strategic component of the electoral process. This is especially so when considering that a large number of Zimbabweans live in remote areas where they have little, if any, access to newspapers or are too poor to afford them. It is evident that not all eligible voters will get the opportunity to inspect and register if the exercise is to be ‘fast-tracked’, as projected in the announcement by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC).
The SADC Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections recognise the importance of full participation of citizens in the political process. It is with this in mind that ZESN calls on the ZEC to ensure that all eligible Zimbabweans are registered as voters and are aware of their respective new wards and constituencies.
ZESN believes that voter registration processes in particular, inspection should not be a cosmetic exercise but should be a meaningful and all-inclusive electoral process in order that it may amply serve its purpose in the conduct of fair elections. In order for the country to hold truly democratic, free and fair elections it is necessary for these processes to be taken seriously and accorded ample time so as to ensure that an up to date voters’ roll is compiled.
ZESN calls ZEC to immediately launch a massive education campaign on the need to inspect the voters’ roll and reiterates on the need to extend the inspection of the voters’ roll.
ZESN, also still calls on all Zimbabweans to go out in their numbers to inspect the voters’ roll and ensure that they know their constituencies and ward so that they may be able to exercise their right to vote in the 2008 harmonised elections. End//
PROMOTING DEMOCRATIC ELECTIONS IN ZIMBABWE
FOR COMMENTS AND FURTHER DETAILS CONTACT
Zimbabwe Election Support Network
+263 (04) 250735/6 or 703956
zesn@africaonline.co.zw <mailto:zesn@africaonline.co.zw> / info@zesn.org.zw <mailto:info@zesn.org.zw> or visit www.zesn.org.zw <http://www.zesn.org.zw/>
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War vets leader Chinotimba threatens Makoni
2008-02-07
http://www.swradioafrica.com/news060208/warvets060208.htm
Newly announced presidential candidate Simba Makoni had a taste of his own party’s medicine Wednesday when the state machinery against him kicked into gear. Not only was he expelled from Zanu PF but both the government owned media and war veterans took turns slagging him off. A few hundred war veterans demonstrated at the Zanu PF headquarters with deputy leader Joseph Chinotimba warning Makoni against showing up at the building. He called on war vets to take control of the headquarters declaring that Makoni and his followers are now barred from entering the premises; ‘We are now going to campaign vigorously for President Mugabe.
African Union Monitor
AU Monitor: Issue 123, 2008
Weekly Roundup
2008-02-07
http://www.aumonitor.org/
This week’s AU Monitor brings you news and updates from the African Union (AU) summit.
Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete has been elected Chair of the African Union, promising that he will do everything “within his mandate to work towards peace and stability on the continent”. In addition, Jean Ping, Gabonese Foreign Affairs Minister, was elected as the new Chairperson of the African Union Commission (AUC), replacing President Alpha Oumar Konare of Mali. At the close of the AU summit, Mr. Ping stated that the AU should deepen its ties with the Arab world to help end conflicts in Africa where “Arab’s and African’s meet” and to promote economic development. Kenyan Erastus Mwencha, Secretary General of COMESA, was elected as Deputy Chairperson of the Commission while seven Commissioners were also elected to the AUC at this 10th ordinary session.
In an interview with President Mbeki at the close of the AU summit, he noted that progress on industrialization, the theme of the summit, would only occur once Africa became a manufacturing continent rather than simply an exporter of raw materials. Referring to both the decisions relating to the audit report and the union government, President Mbeki stated that they would be effectively postponed until the next summit of the AU in July with further inter-session deliberation. In her analysis, Anita Powell calls the stagnation of the Union Government decision power politics. Notably, the Southern African Development Community’s (SADC) Executive Secretary Tomas Salomao has cautioned the formation of a union government until sub-regional groups increase ties and communication amongst themselves first.
Further, the AU Executive Council made a decision on the Economic Partnership Agreements with the European Union, stating that no region should sign one if it is not discussed at the continental level. The Council said that the signing of any agreement will affect the continent as a whole. Afroflag Youth Vision and Oxfam International have issued a joint statement urging African governments to join forces and block the European Unions proposed economic partnership agreements (EPAs), as they will have a critical negative impact on Africa’s industrial development and economic policies.
The African Commission on Human and People’s Right’s (ACHPR) will hold its fourth extraordinary session in The Gambia this month, addressing, among other matters, the human rights situation in Kenya. ACHPR has also issued a statement on the violence in Kenya, expressing grave concern for the destruction, loss of life, and displacement of civilians; the group has also called upon all those involved to work through differences through dialogue and urges the Kenyan government to protect those at greatest risk.
The Solidarity for African Women’s Rights (SOAWR) coalition issued a communiqué on the situation in Kenya, expressing their concerns over the civil and political unrest following the elections and the violation of human rights that occurred as a result. While the president of the West African Bar Association, Femi Falana, urged the African Union to take proactive steps to limit the violence in Kenya, calling for them to impose sanctions on the Kenyan government for “violating its obligations under the AU Constitutive Act and African Charter as well as promoting unconstitutionalism”.
The media rights group, Committee to Protect Journalists, has called on the AU to “strengthen AU institutions dedicated to supporting press freedom” to help ensure democracy, stability, and freedom of speech throughout the continent. While, a group of civil society organizations (CSO) released a communiqué on a people-centered African Union and the importance of CSO involvement in AU affairs. The communiqué states: “With a commitment from the AU to enhanced engagement of African civilians in the process of uniting the African continent, there