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Xenophobia and the South African working class

Thandokuhle Manzi and Patrick Bond

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/48365

To convey the reasons and effects of xenophobia in South Africa and its effect on the working class, Thandokuhle Manzi and Patrick Bond take a microscopic look at Cato Manor Township, one of the sites where the attacks took place.

The low-income black township here in Durban which suffered more than any other during apartheid, Cato Manor, was the scene of a fanciful test performed on a Mozambican last Wednesday morning.

At 6:45am, in the warmth of a rising subtropical winter sun, two unemployed men strolling on Belair Road approached the middle-aged immigrant. They accosted him and demanded, in the local indigenous language isiZulu, that he say the word meaning “elbow” (this they referred to with their hand).

The man answered “idolo”, which unfortunately means “knee”. The correct answer is “indololwane”. His punishment: being beat up severely, and then told to “go home”.

What was going through those two young thugs' heads? Why did others like them kill more than 50 immigrants in various South African slums last week, leaving tens of thousands more to flee?

Cato Manor has several features that incubate conflict of the type Thando Manzi witnessed – and was powerless to prevent - on his way to high school last Wednesday. The same scene played out dozens if not hundreds of times here in Durban's sprawling townships, where more than 1.5 million people suffer daily indignities.

Indeed, thousands of immigrants were asked such questions by assailants in recent weeks. Many millions heard of the elbow test and saw press coverage of immigrants being burned to death last week in Johannesburg's eastern townships, which ironically house the reserve pools of labour closest to Africa's busiest airport, O.R.Tambo International, the gateway to and from the continent.

Thousands of Zimbabweans and Mozambicans living in Johannesburg and Durban fled to the borders, but most went nearby to police stations, community centres and churches. The notoriously corrupt Cato Manor police station now has several hundred people sheltering in the immediate vicinity, and a large tent was erected for shelter.

A 15-minute drive south of Cato Manor is Chatsworth, whose best known community activist is Orlean Naidoo. She joined Patrick Bond at central Durban's main place of safety, Emmanuel Cathedral, on Thursday night. The Catholic church had taken in 150 terrified Zimbabweans, and that night Naidoo helped rescue another 100 from Chatsworth's Bottlebrush shack settlement. By Sunday that number of refugees at Emmanuel had doubled again.

Our colleague Ashwin Desai documented Chatsworth's role in progressive struggle dating back more than a decade (in his 2002 book We are the Poors). Sadly, last week, a majority of residents voted in a municipal by-election for the welfarist-nationalist Minority Front, with its single-minded emphasis on Indian identity.

And in Bottlebrush, low-income Africans were apparently incited – and immigrants terrorised – by an anonymous pamphlet telling foreigners to leave.

Naidoo notes the rise of racial and class tensions here: “Bottlebrush settlement has never been properly organised,” she says. “It is not an easy thing to do, when people are subject to arrest at any time due to lack of formal documents.”

In every locale, surface stresses that invite bitter residents to cheer on beatings and ethnic cleansing have deep faultlines. Cato Manor violence appears endemic for several reasons that Thando Manzi hears every day in ordinary conversation, to the point of stereotyping.

To illustrate, a taxi war is now underway, as one owners' association whose market has stagnated attempts to invade Cato Manor turf. Taxi lords from nearby Chesterville – a township two kilometers west – apparently instructed their drivers to begin expanding services into the Cato Manor Taxi Association's routes a few weeks ago.

The Manzi household hears gunshots most evenings, and it is sometimes impossible to move around the township due to flying bullets. One taxilord has been killed and quite a few innocent passengers and bystanders – including a schoolchild – were wounded.

Indeed, long-suffering residents know Cato Manor – named after the city's first white settler mayor - as contested terrain following British settlement in 1843 . A century later, Indians and Africans regained occupation rights, but the apartheid regime soon practiced a sophisticated divide-and-conquer that heightened both ethnic and class cleavages.

By 1949, Cato Manor's unequal internal power relations, evident in petty retail trade and landlordism, generated a backlash by Africans against Indians that left 137 residents dead over two days, with thousands more injured. Recovering from this catastrophe, however, the African National Congress began serious organising, and set the stage for women's uprisings against both the state and African men who patronised the local beerhall (where profits financed local apartheid), instead of consuming the women's homebrew.

Combinations of local grievances plus anti-racist macropolitics meant Cato Manor gender relations were as advanced as anywhere in the country. But by 1964, the apartheid regime overwhelmed social resistance, embarking on mass forced removals, leaving the land just below the University of KwaZulu-Natal vacant for a quarter century.

But like so much of our 'planet of slums', as Mike Davis describes these sites, a new generation of shack settlements then emerged in the interstices of working-class Indian and African communities. The post-apartheid government's construction of tiny housing units, half the size of apartheid "matchboxes", did not help. Too many quickly went onto the market and became unaffordable to Cato Manor's lowest-income residents, though immigrants have bought them and are settling in.

The ethnicised political economy of Cato Manor capitalism creates many such tensions. Speaking at a labour-community-refugee forum on Sunday, Timothy Rukombo, a leader of exiled Zimbabweans in Durban, described how microeconomic friction is displaced into hate-filled nationalism: “If you want to go home [to Zimbabwe], you compare prices and you see the large bus is a little cheaper than the minibus kombitaxi. Then when you go to the bus, the taxi driver shouts loudly that you are makwerekwere”, a derogatory term for immigrant just as insulting as “kaffir”.

Rukombo continues, “And when we are beaten, and we call the police, they never come.” In fact, when police do come – as to Johannesburg's Central Methodist Church on January 30, where 1500 Zimbabweans had taken refuge – then their agenda is often pure brutality. Host bishop Paul Verryn was beaten that evening, and all the Zimbabweans were arrested. But no charges stuck.

These sorts of grievances Thando Manzi hears continually, but on the other side of the conflict from Rukombo. At a time of roaring food price inflation – as high as 80% for basics this year - he prioritises a few structural reasons for his neighbours' xenophobia:

* lack of jobs, as formal sector employment dropped by a million after 1994, and declining wage levels as a result of immigrant willingness to work for low pay on a casualised basis;
* immigrant tenacity in finding informal economic opportunities even when these are illegal, such as streetside trading of fruits, vegetables, cigarettes, toys and other small commodities;
* housing pressure which leads many immigrants to overcrowd inner-city flats especially in Durban and Johannesburg, hence driving up rentals of a dwelling unit beyond the ability of locals to afford; * surname identity theft, which can cost an immigrant R3000 by way of a bribe for an ID document and driver's license (including fake marriages to South Africans who only learn much later); and
* increases in local crime blamed on immigrants.

Behind some of this tension is the recent expansion of the hated migrant labour system. We thought in 1994 that the ANC government would slowly but surely rid the economy of migrancy, and turn single-sex migrant hostels into decent family homes. But hostels remain, and in Johannesburg, the ghastly buildings full of unemployed men were the source of many attacks.

And even if racially-defined geographical areas have disappeared from apartheid-era Swiss-cheese maps, the economic logic of drawing inexpensive labour from distant sites is even more extreme (China has also mastered the trick), now that it no longer is stigmatised by apartheid connotations.

Instead of hailing from KwaZulu or Venda or Bophuthatswana or Transkei, the most desperate migrant workers in SA's major cities are from Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia – countries partially deindustrialised by Johannesburg capital's expansion up-continent.

In a brutally frank admission of self-interest regarding these workers, First National Bank chief economist Cees Bruggemann intoned to Business Report last week: "They keep the cost of labour down... Their income gets spent here because they do not send the money back to their countries.”

If many immigrants don't send back remittances (because their wages are wickedly low and the cost of living here has soared), that in turn reminds us of how apartheid drew cheap labour from Bantustans: for many years women were coerced into supplying unpaid services - child-rearing, healthcare and eldercare for retirees - so as to reproduce fit male workers for the mines, factories and plantations.

Apartheid-era superprofits for capital were the result. Now, with more porous borders and the desperate crisis Zimbabweans face (in part because Thabo Mbeki still nurtures the Mugabe dictatorship), SA corporate earnings are roaring. After falling due to overproduction and class struggle during the 1970s-80s, profit rates here rose from 1994-2001 to 9th highest in the world, according to a Bank of England study, while the wage share fell from 5% over the same period.

So notwithstanding SA's national unemployment rate of 40%, a xenophobia-generated bottleneck in the supply of migrant labour could become a crisis for capital, such as occured at Primrose Gold Mine near Johannesburg. The mine's workforce consists nearly entirely of Mozambicans, who much of last week stayed away due to fear, thus shutting the shafts.

On the big plantations, northeast of Johannesburg, men like Paul van der Walt of the Transvaal (sic) Agricultural Union remark upon the danger: "It is not far-fetched that even farmers employing workers lawfully from neighbouring states could experience at first hand that xenophobia is not restricted to metropolitan areas."

What next? If you work for the state to impose neoliberalism on capital's behalf, as does central banker Tito Mboweni, you stick with sadomonetarist policies “come hell or high water”, as he vowed last week, and you maintain fiscal austerity, as finance minister Trevor Manuel also promised.

If you are a ruling party politician, either ignore the problem – like Thabo Mbeki, who didn't even bother visiting the conflict sites – or send in the army (a dangerous new development), or distract attention as much as possible through “Third Force” allegations. To explain xenophobia, minister of national intelligence Ronnie Kasrils harks back to an earlier threat: “We see, on the surface, that there is a duplication of what happened in the early ’90s. We know that there were political elements behind that. Are those same trigger elements in place now? We’d be naive to just write that off.”

And if you are an internationalist activist, like Soweto resident Lindiwe Mazibuko, you address the root of the problem by fighting for access to decent public services for all residents regardless of national origin.

With four other residents, Mazibuko won an historic court case against the Johannesburg Water company on April 30, doubling her free water supply and banning prepayment meters (though the city will appeal). Tragically, she died of cancer last week, but many more activists are inspired by her example.

And if you are a brave immigrant, we must be grateful that you reinvigorate our fights for socio-economic justice and against the new racist xenophobia. In solidarity, several thousand marched in Johannesburg on Saturday.

In contrast, on 25 May 1963, the Organisation of African Unity (now African Union) was founded by nationalist elites to support liberation from colonialism.

It is hard to celebrate Africa Day given that in the meantime, neoliberalism and paranoid nationalism imposed from above have made mockery of Africa's ubuntu philosophy (we are whom we are through others). From below, the thugs who beat up that Mozambican have merely joined a rapidly-growing movement: to barbarism.


*Thandokuhle Manzi lives in Cato Manor. Patrick Bond is an academic at the Centre for Civil Society This article first appeared at http://www.zmag.org

**Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/

Libya and nuclear energy

Mustafa Adam-Noble

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/48374

Libya is getting the backing of Ukraine to build nuclear reactors. Mustafa Adam-Noble looks at the implications of an oil-rich country going nuclear and the possible impact on Libyan people.

A honeymoon is rapidly emerging between Libya and the Ukraine.

Viktor Yushchenko, the Ukrainian President, has declared his intention to help Libya develop its use of “peaceful” nuclear energy. According to Afrique En Ligne, an online African magazine, bilateral economic projects have been emphasised by Yushschenko. They include the granting of a Libyan contract to a Ukrainian oil and gas company in return for the use of Ukrainian agricultural land by Libya. The Ukraine has also offered to build roads and railways in the North African country and has recently supplied Libya with an Antonov AN-124-100, the world’s largest cargo plane.

Such a large scale of political and economic bartering and investment is bound to raise a few eyebrows.

On the one hand, the rush for oil by the Ukrainians makes sense: Moscow’s threat of turning off Russian-Ukranian pipelines is ever-present. Libya’s need for cheaper food amid rising food prices is a very real concern, and Gaddafi can’t seem to fix agriculture domestically. However, this eager international relationship is murky and far from straightforward.

Libya is awash with corruption amongst its officials and desperation within its population. Decades of crippling policies by Gaddafi, and subsequent trade sanctions, have left the country in tatters.

Libya was an active sponsor of terrorism until only recently when, in 2003, Gaddafi admitted to bombing a Pan American flight over Lockerbie in 1998, killing 270 people. The dictator also admitted to bombing the French UTA airliner over Niger in 1989 that killed all 170 civilians on board.

The declaration of his guilt prompted the immediate lifting of UN sanctions imposed on Libya in 1992; Libya promised compensation for the victim’s relatives ($2.7 billion in instalments for those on the Lockerbie flight) and everyone ran to Libya with open arms, embracing the now reformed rogue state.

Congratulating Libya by supplying it with nuclear technology and a gigantic cargo plane hardly seems wise.

The argument for nuclear energy in Libya may not seem to make economic sense. Its population is only 5 million, but it has the largest oil reserves in Africa. However, Alan McDonald, an official with the International Atomic Energy Agency, explains that nuclear energy could be a strategic economic move for oil-rich countries. He said, “they know their oil will only become more valuable as global demand increases […] It may be more cost-effective to sell oil to Americans driving SUVs than to burn it domestically.”

It is likely that Libya has an additional, political motive for developing nuclear technology.

Iran’s uranium enrichment programme has forced the region into nuclear proliferation (recently Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain have also begun planning nuclear plants). According to the Washington Post, 40 developing countries have recently signalled plans to develop nuclear power, which can then lead to the completion of nuclear arsenals.

Algeria and Morocco are also planning the construction of nuclear reactors. This would paint a very different picture to the current nuclear African map, with only two reactors on the whole continent (both in South Africa).

According to Igor Kriponov, writing for Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, “South Africa accounts for 60 percent of all of Africa's energy production. (Africa as a whole generates only 3.1 percent of the world's electricity)”.

Using nuclear energy could help increase both Libya’s and Africa’s electricity generation without immediately polluting the environment. What you do with containers of nuclear waste is another question.

Easing fears of a world armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons, Mohammed ElBaradei, director general of the IAEA, is quoted as saying in the Washington Post, “You don't really even need to have a nuclear weapon. It's enough to buy yourself an insurance policy by developing the capability, and then sit on it. Let's not kid ourselves: Ninety percent of it is insurance, a deterrence.”

Libya’s nuclear programme could thus satisfy both an economic and a political agenda. However, the possibility of an unstable tyrant like Gaddafi attaining nuclear weapons poses a serious threat. Additionally, the Ukraine’s dealings with Libya are unlikely to benefit the general Libyan economy.

Senior British businessmen now working in Libya warn that the agreements with the Ukraine are convoluted and are not based in direct foreign investment procedures. The bartered nature of the agreements decreases transparency and creates a scenario loaded with the potential for theft. Additionally, because there is now so much more money coming into a newly open Libya, corruption is getting worse. The country cannot cope well enough to bear the fruits of investment. There are no institutions or protocol, no free press, very few educated Libyans and an unreliable communications system.

Although Gaddafi has begun to allow the creation of financial institutions, with economic reform gradually building in the banking sector, development in other areas of the economy is simply not happening. Perhaps we must be patient as there are still some positive signs that internal change is possible.

In an address to Libya’s General People’s Committee, Gaddafi stated that the nationalised Libyan economy has been inefficient and wasteful of money. He emphatically said, “The traditional state is over”.

Not so fast.

It would be tempting to think that the bad times of a state-run, isolated Libya have come to an end. While Libya catches up, continued malpractice, corruption and poverty will have long term effects that would be difficult to reverse even if all sectors are eventually reformed and regulated.

Gilbert Achcar, Professor of Development Studies and International Relations at SOAS University in London, argues that the oil deal with the Ukraine suits the Libyans because it offers them better conditions than an agreement with, say, France or Italy. This may be true, but the benefit of working with the Ukrainians in the four very different fields of nuclear technology, oil, roads and railways must be questioned.

One senior businessman likened the Ukraine’s multi-project approach in Libya to an accountant that can provide further services as a lawyer, a writer and an acrobat. It is unlikely that each role can be done sufficiently well by one party.

These deals manifest a special relationship between Libya and the Ukraine based not on economic efficiency and competition but on favouritism.

Pitfalls also arise in the Libyan economy.

According to Eman Wahby in an article published in 2005 by the Carnegie Endowment to International Peace, “[Libya] is the top recipient of foreign investment in Africa.” But unemployment in 2008 is estimated at 30%, and has in fact increased from 25% in 2005.

This shows that the Libyan system does not benefit the masses and, coupled with Libya’s significant growth rate of 9% in 2008, demonstrates that wealth goes only to the few and the powerful.

Wahby mentions that the country had announced plans “to cut $5 billion worth of subsidies”. She adds: “For decades, the state has been subsidizing 93 percent of the value of basic commodities, notably fuel.”

It seems that Libya’s sprint towards reform will leave it out of breath as prices increase, squeezing the population beyond its means. Wahby explains that subsidy cuts in May 2005 increased fuel prices by 30 % and electricity prices by 100%, leading to price rises in other goods and services.

This is simply not sustainable.

In order to be successful, Libya’s development must be gradual, assessed and measured using foresight and rationality - characteristics Gaddafi has consistently lacked throughout his 39 years in power.

It is doubtful that the Libya-Ukraine relationship will be profitable for the Libyan population. Given Libya’s severe economic difficulties as a consequence of a totalitarian system, each decision Gaddafi makes must ultimately be questioned.

Even if Gaddafi does spend his country’s wealth on the things it most needs, it is unlikely that he will be able to improve the lives of the Libyan people.


*Mustafa Adam-Noble is a political commentator.

*Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/

Central African Republic and France’s long hand

Vincent Munié

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/48391

Vincent Munié looks at France's strategies and machinations in the Central African Republic.

Buried deep in the mixed-bag of the November 19 2007 presidential agenda, a meeting took place between Nicolas Sarkozy and Francois Bozizé of the Central African Republic (CAR). The secrecy and brevity of the encounter (27 minutes) belies a certain degree of discomfort. In fact, CAR is by no means an insignificant country to France.

CAR attained independence in 1960 from its former colonial master after decades of exploitation, but this did not diminish France’s political and military influence. Why then, was this meeting so quietly and hurriedly held? It appears that a chasm has opened between France and CAR.

At the beginning of 2007, relations between the two countries seemed normal. In the spring, Birao, the capital city of the Vakaga region which lies in the far north-east on the border with Chad and Sudan’s Darfur, briefly hit the headlines. In the same period, France was in the midst of an electoral campaign period, and consequently, there was little media focus on what role the French military was playing in this strategic region. And yet, on the 4th of March, in the first such campaign since Kolwezi in 1978, the French carried out an aerial assault on Birao, which had been under attack from the rebel Union of Democratic Forces for Unity (UDFU).

This new rebel force was formed in September of 2006 and brought together three armed groups composed of disillusioned ex-comrades of Bozizé, former officers who had served under ex-president Ange-Felix Patassé, and soldiers disgruntled with their pay. The Central African rebellion is a heterogeneous one; The movements oscillate between a Pro-Patassé political stance and a criminal tendency. However in order to understand the attack of 4 March, 2007, one must track back to November 2006, when a force of 50-odd men first seized control of Birao and several other areas of the North-East (Sam Oandja, Ouanda Djalle, etc.).

It took a month for the Central African army, supported by Bangui-based French troops and F1 Mirage fighter jets from N’Djamena to repulse the rebels toward Chad and Sudan. The tension was palpable. This is despite the fact that in February of the same year, a peace accord was signed in Sirte, Libya, between President Bozizé and Abdoulaye Miskine, on behalf of the UDFU. On the ground the rebels under the new leadership of Damane Zacharia dismissed the accord.

SOLDIERS RUNNING AMOK

At the beginning of March, Daman Zacharia announced a second assault on Birao. He declared that he was taking on the French, for what he saw as their interference in national matters. Since November 2006, France had maintained a small Special Force detachment of 128 in Birao. On the night of 3rd March, this force came under heavy artillery fire.

Two Mirage F1 fighter jets dispatched from Chad quickly destroyed the artillery nests. The following night, 50 troops from the 3rd Marine Infantry Parachute Regiment were dispatched form Bangui to a small airstrip 12 km from Birao to setup a launch-point for Transall and Hercules carriers bringing in troops from Central Africa and about one hundred French legionnaires. The Central African Army, with the manpower and logistical support from the French, were thus able to regain control of the town and its surrounds.

Zacharia and his forces were headed for Bangui, and were it not for Paris, the government of Bozizé would have fallen. The Central African conflicts are seen as wars of the poor. The UDFU has never had more than 500 combatants, while the national army has 5000 men, of which the fighting force is less than 2000. For a country size of France, this is very small.

After the March conflagration, Birao was left in ruins: 70% of houses were burnt and looted. There were very few civilian casualties given that all the town’s inhabitants had sought refuge in the bush. However, the destruction of the millet reserves, just before the onset of the rainy season, portends a certain famine for an impoverished population that is totally dependent on its meager agriculture production.

Although all parties deny responsibility, its seems that the national army bears a huge culpability for the pillage. In this forgotten part of a forgotten country the military once again has the dubious distinction of turning on its own citizens. The soldiers in Central Africa seem to be out of control. The terror metered out by the army in the North West is a major cause of the insecurity in the area. Of particular concern is the presence of the ubiquitous dreaded presidential guard – drawn from “ex-freedom fighters who were brought in from Chad to bolster Bozizé’s coup in 2003.

There have been massacres, rape, torture and looting… all perpetrated under the guise of fighting the rebel group Armée Populaire pour la Restauration de la République et de la démocratie (APRD), the country’s second rebellion. The presidential guard has launched several attacks on the civilian population. The national army (formed by France) is responsible for the massive displacement of citizens (200,000 displaced in the North-West).

Clearly, France would not gain from attention on its involvement in CAR. However, the national army has become a dubious ally. There were several calls from the French Foreign Ministry over the summer, urging the CAR government to rebuild confidence between the army and the citizenry. At the beginning of November 2007, Bozizé himself acknowledged the atrocities and took symbolic measures. He invited the rebel groups to the negotiating table. Their demands, put forward primarily by the Central African People’s Liberation Movement (MLPC) of former Prime Minister Martin Ziguélé, revolve around the disputed 2005 elections, army atrocities and the mismanagement of economic reforms.

France still does not seem ready to cut its ex-colony loose. Under a 1960 defence accord, France is obligated to intervene in the event of foreign aggression. The current rebellion is, however, of local origin – and not orchestrated by Khartoum, as has been suggested in official circles. France’s presence in the region has taken on an “unquestionable” character. The March military operation is but a symptom of a much bigger problem.

MUTINIES AND SHENANIGANS

After a brutal colonization of the Oubangi-Chari, the first “French” town, Bangui, was established in 1889. Independence did not end French patronage, making CAR a textbook example of what is referred to as “Franco-Africa”. After the “fortuitous” death of the republic’s founder Barthélémy Boganda, France has always systematically maintained a firm grip on power by propping up and deposing its protégés; David Dacko was twice installed and deposed, Jean-Bedel Bokassa proclaimed himself emperor and was overthrown by France in Operation Barracuda, André Kolingba set up a military regime, Felix Patassé was the first “democratically-elected” president, and the latest in line is Bozizé.

In a review of the cooperation, the two permanent bases of Bouar and Bangui were closed in 1998, following the “mutinies” of 1996 during which French soldiers seized control of the capital. In 2002 an operations centre consisting in part of the Special Operations Command (COS), was set up through Operation Boali… Another sign of France’s continued influence is the presence of General Henri-Alain Guillou as presidential military advisor, along with about 60 other officials in various ministries.

Whereas CAR has been relatively untouched by the systematic industrial depredation suffered by its neighbours, its central position on the continent fits in with France’s political and economic strategy. In the course of the last fifty years, CAR has secretly become a feeding-trough. The sustained lawlessness has favoured the wanton extraction of minerals, precious stones and illegal ivory trade. The 1979 diamond affair is just a tip of the massive iceberg that is the exploitation and expatriation of gold and diamonds by French businessmen. The same has been true for the rapacious exploitation of timber and rubber resources through concessions given to individuals engaged in tropical misadventures. The Kolingba (1982-1993) and Patassé (1993-2003) regimes have followed on in the same style.

France has more or less maintained some military presence in CAR since independence, and at the same time exercises the same political patronage as in the rest of the sub-region. An important part of this presence is France’s ability to monitor the neighbouring countries. In addition, France has always favoured Africa as a military training ground. So far, France has been able to prevail militarily, given that none have taken on a terrorist character as has happened in the Middle East. The hand of France has also been clearly seen in African politics, as was the case in Rwanda and Côte d’Ivoire.

The French media also has a significant part to play: on 14 July 2007, France 2 carried a rare report on CAR that glorified the role of French troops in the Birao rebellion, without addressing the question as to why France was there in the first place, the root causes of the rebellion, the state of the country, or even the atrocities committed by the CAR army.

It is true that the CAR crises do not constitute an all-out war or a humanitarian crisis of the kind that stirs up international attention or emotions. At the same time the country continues to suffer silently in grinding poverty. The Human Development Index list CAR as the 5th –poorest country. The state is practically non-existent outside the capital, hardly giving any assistance to a population left to its devices. In January 2008, civil servants went on strike to demand salary arrears. On 18 January, the prime minister resigned. Since 1960 the country has been yoked with leaders chosen more for their obsequiousness than their managerial acumen. As a result the CAR has been impoverished, hence justifying the need for “aid” – military, economic and political.

Bozizé did however deign to take liberties against his colonial master and protector. In April 2007, the government suddenly decided to nationalize the petroleum sector, in the process excluding Total, which until that point had been the major shareholder in SOGAL, the hydrocarbon management company. Further still, the president’s nephew Sylvain, Ndoutingaye, minister for mines, was given the economy portfolio, against the advice of Sarkozy and the World Bank. Strict financial conditions were also imposed on Areva’s exploitation of the Bakouma mine. Areva had recently acquired Uramin, the Canadian company that held uranium-mining concessions in CAR. The final act of defiance was Bozizé’s visit to Omar El-Bashir, his Sudanese counterpart, despite France’s disapproval.

At the same time France has been accused of ties to a “rogue regime” thanks to its links with the national army. Despite efforts at transparency, the national army remains largely unaccountable, given that officers accused of crimes are simply dismissed without charges. The heralded national dialogue remains an illusory promise. Although diplomatic pressure has been brought to bear, France withdrawing its troops would be the key factor. Only a couple of military advisers were withdrawn this summer. South African diplomats however continue to work in the corridors of power. A peace accord was signed in March when Thabo Mbeki quietly visited Bangui. As a result of this visit, the presidential guard was placed under the tutelage of thirty South African military instructors. At the end of the day, the stakes are rising in the race to take over patronage of CAR.

The CAR revolt is not an isolated case. Chad’s Idriss Déby showed an independent streak in the Zoe’s Arch saga. Niger’s president Mamadou Tandja has been actively seeking out other economic partners. In this context, France’s traditional bilateral ties, the military cooperation and economic networks seem to be on the wane. France has subsequently insisted on the deployment of a European Union force (EUFOR), which will effectively double the number of French troops on the ground in the strategic Chad/CAR area. Their mandate remains unclear as far as Mission “Epervier” or Operation Boali are concerned, raising the likelihood of confusion.

In 2007, however, a mere military presence is not enough to guarantee France’s pre-eminence in the country. As her paratroopers and soldiers descend upon the capital and patrol its streets, they walk past the ruins of the Sports stadium, where Bokassa was enthroned. This gift from the Giscard-d’Estaing regime, continues to crumble and decay by the day, while a mere forty metres away rises the city’s grandest structure: a beautiful thirty-nine thousand-seater stadium. A gift from China.


*Vincent Munie is the director of Survie-France.

*This article appeared in the French edition of Pambazuka News http://www.pambazuka.org/fr/category/features/48282 and was translated by Josh Ogada.

*Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/

Women and scientific experiments: Is informed consent enough?

Jegede Ademola Oluborode

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/48390

Jegede Ademola Oluborode looks at the Protocol on the Rights of Women in relation to medical or scientific experiments and argues that ethical and scientific standards are lowered when it comes to African women and informed consent may not be enough to protect vulnerable African women.


This article is a reflection on the provision of article 4(2)(h) of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa( Protocol on the Rights of Women) which seeks to prohibit all medical and scientific experiments on women without their informed consent. The article argues that the prohibition of all medical or scientific experiments on women without their informed consent, without more, falls short of other ethical requirements for safety in scientific and medical experimentation. This in itself is an expression of the regrettable gap which over the years has existed in major international human rights instruments, to which most African States are signatory. To this end therefore, the article suggests that along with the requirement of consent, there is a need to legally prescribe appropriate human rights standard on the performance of medical and scientific experiments. The article concludes that a re-draft of article 4 (2)(h) of the Protocol on the Rights of Women is imperative to ensure maximum legal protection for women, who by virtue of their role in the society are most vulnerable to medical and scientific exploitation.

INJUSTICES IN MEDICAL OR SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS AND WOMEN [1]

Examples of where women have been victims to medical and scientific exploitation under the pretext of research are not new. Grave atrocities were committed in the process of medical experiments carried out during the Second World War on non-consenting women and children prisoners of Nazi concentration camps [2]. During the same period in history, African women from the German South West Africa, now Namibia, were part of sterilization programmes instituted by Germany without their consent [3]. In more recent times, evidence from Nigeria implicated Pfizer International Incorporated (PII) of fraud and criminal breach of trust of its controversial drug test, popularly known as Trovan Clinical Trials, which it carried out on Nigerian citizens in Kano in 1996, which had fatal results [4].

The burden of disease, generally, including malaria, sickle cell anaemia, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS, weighs heavily on Africa, where these illnesses are most prevalent. In more ways than one, the impact of these diseases has been disproportionately borne by women. While medical and scientific trials and research involving women, holds great prospects for the solution of these problems, researches and pharmaceutical companies who engage in trials can not always be trusted to function with due consideration for ethical requirements, when such requirements are not well specified and projected in the African human rights system.

It is noteworthy that due to low level of literacy in Africa, very few women who are research participants are sufficiently educated to really understand the details of studies and trials in which they are engaged [5]. The poverty and powerlessness of women often lead to their participation in clinical and scientific researches merely for inexpensive inducements, and largely due to less understanding of study risks, or for the pregnant women, under the mistaken belief that such studies will result in care for their unborn children. There are for instance, controversies which have surrounded microbicide trials carried out on women in South Africa which revealed that women in the study developed higher risk of HIV infection [6]. In 2007, the US-based reproductive health research organisation, CONRAD, also announced the premature end of trials of a cellulose sulphate-based microbicide in Nigeria, Benin and Uganda after the data safety and monitoring committee found a higher number of infections in the active group compared to the placebo group [7].

The New England Journal of Medicine carried a comment on 15 on-going clinical trials testing cheaper drug regimens to prevent maternal-foetal transmission of HIV in Africa. Some 16,000 pregnant, HIV-positive women were enrolled in the placebo-controlled trials. The problem with these trials was that it began after Zidovudine (AZT) had been found to prevent such transmission by 50% or more, and is recommended to all HIV-positive pregnant women in western countries. In other words, it was reported that, thousands of women in the trials were getting sugar pills to test the efficacy of the new regimens whereas if they had been enrolled in trials in Europe, they would have received a standard course of AZT [8]. This further underscores the point that the truth in Africa, is that very few women do enjoy the benefits of the research in which they participate.

The survival of women therefore raises the question as to whether international human rights have done enough to protect women in terms of medical and scientific experimentation and if not, whether there is the need for the African human right system to review existing legal framework with the view of addressing such gap.

INTERNATIONAL AND REGIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS INSTRUMENTS ON MEDICAL/ SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS

When international human rights instruments have discussed access to health services, it has been silent on medical and scientific experimentation. This was the case with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which only guarantees in its Article 25(1) the right of everyone to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care. Similarly, subsequent notable instrument such as the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in Article 12(2)(d) only urges the States to take steps to achieve full realization of the right to health by creating conditions which would assure to all medical service and medical attention in the event of sickness [9]. Article 5 (d)(iv) of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination is no different when it provides for the right to public health, medical care, social security and social services [10].

Although, the need to take urgent steps to address the inequality as it affects women on a number of issues led to the adoption of the Convention on Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), [11] the Convention fails to sufficiently address the issues of human rights around medical and scientific experiments in its copious provisions in Article 11(f), 12(1) and 14(2) (b) regarding improvement of access of women to health care services. This is also lacking in the 1999 General Comment of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, which interpreted the right to health under Article 12 of CEDAW as the right of women to be fully informed, by properly trained personnel, of their options in agreeing to treatment or research, including likely benefits and potential adverse effects of proposed procedures and available alternatives [12].

Article 4(2)(h) of the Protocol on the Rights of Women provides that States parties shall take appropriate and effective measures to prohibit all medical or scientific experiments on women without their informed consent. This appears progressive for Africa, considering that, with the exception to South African Constitution which has similar provision; hardly does any other African constitution have a similar provision with such safeguard [13].The Protocol is however merely re-stating article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) which provides that ‘no one shall be subject without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation [14]. The inherent weakness in the foregoing efforts is that the requirement of consent, without more excludes certain elements of ethics which are fundamental in medical and scientific experiments and in so doing, deprives them of being legally determinable.

ELEMENTS AS IMPORTANT AS ‘INFORMED CONSENT’ IN MEDICAL AND SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS

The medical misdeeds at the Second World War led to the Nuremberg code in 1947, a set of principles devised to protect human subjects from unethical experimentation [15]. The Nuremberg code was a part of the judgment delivered in the so-called Doctors’ Trial at Nuremberg following World War II. The principles of the code were based upon the criteria for ethical research that were elucidated by the two expert medical witnesses at the trial if human experimentation was to be justified. These are: informed consent; Results must be for the good of society; and the experiment must be conducted only by scientifically qualified persons [16].

While further reinforcing the principles at Nuremberg, the Declarations of Helsinki (1964 and 1975, with further revisions in 1983, 1989, 1996 and 2000) emphasised that in research involving human beings, the potential benefits must outweigh hazards. The Belmont Report of 1979 projected three ethical principles as relating to research on human subjects namely; respect for persons; beneficence and Justice. The principle of respect to persons connotes that individuals should be treated as autonomous agents. The principle of benevolence indicates that harm must not be occasioned; maximum benefits must be ensured while Justice signifies that there should be fair distribution of burdens and benefits of research [17].

RECENT EFFORTS AT CODIFYING RESEARCH ETHICS

The Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights (the Declaration) which regulates cell research appears to have provided for other requirements apart from informed consent. Article 5 of the Declaration recommends that attention be given to best interest the persons involved in the research, compliance with national and international research standards or guidelines, health benefit, minimal risk and minimal burden, compatibility with the protection of the individual's human rights [18]. Apart from failing to define what the national and international research standards and guidelines are, the Declaration, suffers the same setback with other declarations, which is that generally, they are not binding in international law.

In 1997, Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine was adopted by the Council of Europe (The Convention). The Convention provided extensively for ethics regarding medicine and scientific experiments. Article 16 of the Convention extensively provides for protection of a person undergoing experimentation and accommodates the ethics on Justice, Benevolence and freedom of harm which the Nuremberg Code, Helsinki Declaration Belmont Report have projected. Article 23 of the Convention allows parties to pursue judicial protection to prevent or to put a stop to an unlawful infringement of the rights and principles in the Convention at short notice [19].

Africa may not however benefit from the Convention considering that the only parties to the Convention were members of the Council of Europe. Without regional legal human rights coverage of the subject, it is unlikely that the Convention as it is presently will be of any use on African concerns on the matter of experimentation and exploitation. The need for such coverage is imperative in a globalised world where Africa remains a fertile ground for research and stands the greatest risk to be impacted by medical exploitation. That is more so considering that it is unlikely that free choice and benefits can be enjoyed by women in relation to medical and scientific experiments where standards are absent.

THE WAY FORWARD

From Universal Declaration of Human Rights through CEDAW to the Protocol on Women Rights, international human rights instruments to which most African nations are signatory are inadequate as a standard of regulating scientific and medical experiments. Most importantly, article 4(2)(h) of the Protocol on Women Rights lacks the essential components on ethics required for scientific and medical experimentation. The Protocol on Women Rights, just as the Convention on Human Rights & Biomedicine should accommodate requirements which the Nuremberg Codes, Helsinki Declaration and Belmont Report have projected in terms of respect for persons; beneficence and fairness. Achieving this will be a leap forwards as it will take the principles beyond the realms of mere ethics to the realms of active rights. It is therefore suggested that article 4(2)(h) of the Protocol on Women Rights in addition with the principle of informed consent should include the principles of beneficence and fairness. This is imperative in this age of globalisation where Africa remains a fertile ground for research and its women the most vulnerable.


*Jegede Ademola Oluborode is a legal practitioner and a human rights activist in Nigeria.

*Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/



For further notes, please follow this link:
1. The scope of this article does not examine or undermine the benefits of medical science and scientific progress for Women.

2. M Grodin Historical origins of the Nuremberg code in Nazi doctors and the Nuremberg code, (eds) G Annas and M Grodin (1992) New York: Oxford University Press: 121–48.

3. Hitlers forgotten, Black Victims

4. Criminal Charges Against Pfizer for Illegal Human Experimentation in Africa News Reports July 26, 2007.

5. AG. Falusi Bioethics and Women in Africa, University of Ibadan

6. South Africa: When a Microbicide Trial goes wron

7. http://www.plusnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=74717

8. http://www.issuesinmedicalethics.org/061mi022.html

9. Adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by General Assembly resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966

10. Adopted and opened for signature and ratification by General Assembly resolution 2106 (XX) of 21 December 1965

11. Adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by General Assembly resolution 34/180 of 18 December 1979, entry into force 3 September 1981, in accordance with article 27(1)

12. General Recommendation 24, Women and Health, (Twentieth session, 1999), U.N. Doc. A/54/38 at 5 (1999), also in U.N. Doc. HRI/GEN/1/Rev.6 at 271 (2003).

13. See Section 12(2) of the Constitution of South Africa.

14. Adopted at G.A. res. 2200A (XXI), 21 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 16) at 52, U.N. Doc. A/6316 (1966), 999 U.N.T.S. 171, entered into force Mar. 23, 1976

15. Grodin M. 1992. Historical origins of the Nuremberg code In Nazi doctors and the Nuremberg code, eds G Annas and M Grodin. New York: Oxford University Press: 121–48.

16. Perley S, S Fluss, Z Bankowski and F Simon. 1992. The Nuremberg code: An international overview. In Nazi doctors and the Nuremberg code, eds G Annas and M Grodin, 152. New York: Oxford University Press

17. J Appleyard, The Declaration of Helsinki: The Role of Physicians http://www.urpl.gov.pl/konferencje/konf_20080308/1_3.pdf (accessed 25 April 20008)

19. Adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO at its 29th session on 11 November 1997.

20. Adopted at Oviedo, Spain 4 April 1997

Racialized complexes of xenophobia

Paul T Zeleza

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/panafrican/48366

Amongst other things, Paul T Zeleza argues that in spite of the xenophobic violence being black on black, there is a "bequest of deeply racialized and internalized superiority and inferiority complexes at work."

The Pan-African world has been watching with mounting horror the xenophobic violence that has gripped several South African townships over the past two weeks which has resulted in the wanton destruction of many lives and property. Fifty-six people have been murdered, thousands seek sanctuary in police stations, churches, community halls and 'safe havens' or camps, and many more are fleeing back to their countries of origin as several governments desperately try to repatriate their nationals.

Our horror reflects our immense investment in the success of the rainbow nation born out of our collective abhorrence of apartheid South Africa as the supreme embodiment of the barbaric crimes committed against peoples of African descent over the last half millennium: slavery, colonialism, and racism. It also reflects deep disappointment that migrants from the neighboring countries and the rest of the continent are being treated with such vicious contempt notwithstanding their countries' unwavering support and sacrifices for the liberation of South Africa from the historic nightmares of apartheid.

To date, 35,000 people are internally displaced and more than 26,000 have fled to Mozambique alone, and 25,000 Zimbabweans are fleeing through Zambia. The scale of the violence has shocked South African civil society and humanitarian organizations, pummelled the rand and business confidence, and dented South Africa's image across the continent, shaking the South African state and its embattled lame-duck president out of their stupor of political indifference, policy incoherence, and operational incompetence on migration and the poor.

The current cycle of xenophobic violence--there have been several others--is a depressing testimony to the failures of post-apartheid South Africa to resolve the interconnected challenges inherited from the political and racial economies of apartheid: domestically the deracialization and reduction of social inequalities and externally the reinsertion of South Africa into independent Africa from its apartheid laager of isolation. While South Africa has made remarkable progress since 1994, not least in terms of economic growth, national integration, democratization at home, and reincorporation into African and world affairs abroad, social inequalities persist and are in fact deepening, and the dangerous and occasionally deadly myth of South African exceptionalism endures.

The South African poor are still awaiting the fruits of uhuru as the black middle classes expand and the white rich maintain their monopolies of wealth and privilege even if they are now joined by politically well-connected 'native' beneficiaries of black economic empowerment. In the meantime, South Africa historically constructed as a sub-imperial metropole ever since the mineral revolution of the late nineteenth century continues to attract labor migrants from the subregion and further afield. The postapartheid migrants are no longer chanelled predominantly to the declining mining industry, but find themselves increasingly competing for economic survival with South Africa's poor in the townships.

The demise of apartheid ended internal 'influx' controls into the previously designated 'white' cities and opened South Africa to new waves of African immigrants. Circumscribed by its conformities to neo-liberal economic policies on the one hand and its commitments to a Pan-African agenda on the other, the ANC government has thus far failed to stem domestic racial and social inequalities and develop a sound and sustainable immigration policy. This is the combustible brew that has blown up: the struggle for resources among the disaffected South African poor and the disenfranchised immigrants, whose very social and spatial intimacies engender the violent narcissisms of minor difference.

Whatever their debilitations and marginalizations from the postapartheid dispensation, the township poor have citizenship on their side, which they periodically wield violently to dispossess the immigrants, for petty primitive accumulation (342 foreign-owned businesses have been looted or destroyed), for national attention, to make claims for redress from the neo-liberal state. As is typical in such struggles, the former blame the latter of taking their jobs, opportunities, and women (the gendered inflexion of xenophobic bigotry), and the escalation of crime--never mind that levels of crime in South Africa are much higher than in the countries where most of the immigrants come from, itself another tragic legacy of apartheid.

But there is more to this depressing carnage of xenophobic violence than material conditions. Nor is South Africa unique in its eruptions of xenophobia in the Pan-African world, let alone the world at large. Remember the state-sponsored expulsions of 155,000-213,000 West Africans including 50,000 Nigerians from Ghana in 1969, 1.3 million Ghanaians from Nigeria between 1983-1985, the killings and mass expulsions in Libya in the 1980s and 1990s, the tit-for-tat expulsions of nearly 150,000 people between Eritrea and Ethiopia in the late 1990s as the two countries slid into a senseless war, and of tens of thousands from Cote d'Ivoire during its boom years. The list of xenophobic violence across Africa is a long and depressing one indeed.

One could of course blame the incongruity of Africa's porous national boundaries and the legacies of colonialism, the universal propensity of governments and the media to blame foreigners for domestic economic and social crises, and the rise of chauvinistic and explosive nationalisms in response to the stresses of neo-liberal globalization. In the case of Africa's former settler societies from Algeria to South Africa, via Kenya and Zimbabwe, there is an added dimension: the cruel bequest of deeply racialized and internalized superiority and inferiority complexes. The current xenophobic violence in South Africa is being meted out to what some in the country call "those Africans," or more popularly, the makwerekwere. None of the fifty people who have been killed is white. The anger is intra-racial, directed at other black Africans.

Pius Adesanmi discussed the social pathologization and discursive ridicule of the makwerekwere in an earlier blog on The Zeleza Post. African commentators and visitors to South Africa are often confounded by the pervasive sense of South African difference, of exceptionalism, the lingering racist apartheid myth that South Africa is an outpost of civilization, of modernity, on the 'dark continent'. Ignorance about other African countries is of course not peculiar to South Africa, nor is the sense of misguided national superiority. I have encountered it in many other countries in which I have lived in the Pan-African world from Zimbabwe to Jamaica to Kenya, not to mention Britain, Canada, and the United States. It is the deadly mantra of xenophobic nationalism: 'We are better than you, You are less than us'.

In all these cases, across the Pan-African world, the measures of the 'better than, less than' national discourses mutate and are articulated in peculiar local idioms, but they revolve around two axes: the relative levels of material development and the magnitude of the white presence. Thus, westerness and whiteness remain imprimaturs in the scale of human worthiness in the Pan-African world, the reason why diasporan Africans feel superior to continental Africans, why within the diaspora the light-skinned have historically enjoyed better opportunities than their darker skinned compatriots, why shades of blackness have become a shameful basis for distinguishing African immigrants among black South Africans, why the latter's xenophobic rage is not directed at white immigrants but at 'those Africans', the despised makwerekwere.

This is the racialized devaluation of black lives that we are witnessing in South Africa today in the xenophobic violence against African immigrants perpetrated by fellow Africans whose own lives were devalued during the long horrific days of racial segregation and apartheid. Racialized superiority and inferiority complexes have stalked the Pan-African world for decades, stoking the mistrust that sometimes degenerates into interpersonal and intracial animosity and even violence. This violence is the flipside of the collective Pan-Africanist struggles and ideals for the unity of African peoples and their collective liberation and empowerment. South Africans and all of us could benefit from a more systematic and sustained education about our shared pasts, present, and futures in a world that has devalued and continues to devalue our lives and humanity.


*Paul T Zeleza is editor of The Zeleza Post. This article was first published at http://zeleza.com

*Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org

Inherited prejudices

Hanif Manjoo

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48397

It is unfortunate that innocent people are being caught up in this cycle of violence & nobody wants to objectively address the problem/s; see A drive through a Xenophobic landscape.

Historically, South Africa has a record of ethnic violence; we had the Zulu, Xhosa, Anglo-Boer & other wars; being painted as war mongers. The 1949 riots by Zulus against Indians in Durban is a case in point. The Group Areas contained further outbursts to an extent, but Indians and Coloureds have remained outside the domain of bona fide SA inhabitants. SA African blacks remain subconsciously prejudiced against other groups whilst (by stark contradiction) 'gel' with their former oppressors, the whites.

There are numerous forces at play that have to be identified, eg., Lenasia & Chatsworth for Indians; District Six & Springfield for Coloureds; Soweto, Kwa-Mashu, etc for Blacks (for want of a better term). The ANC has not bothered to address these iniquities which promote tensions & are exarcebrated by cock-eyed BEE and AA- Indians and coloureds are not perceived as 'blacks' & the murdered by-line surfaces like a monotonous refrain; 'During 'apartheid' we were not white enough; now, we are not black enough!' This divide has culminated in an era of entitlement which sees anyone outside this 'black' kraal as threats & dispensable, resulting in the mass, spontaneous 'xenophobic' actions we see. Next? Indians, Chinese, Pakistanis,... but, not whites (Israelis, Russians, Greeks, etc, many of whom are just as much 'foreigners'!)

Yet, on the other side of the coin, many of these foreigners are seen to have contributed towards this xenophobia; arrogance, illegal entries, involvement in scams, hijackings, drug peddling, rape, etc (another topic altogether!) It would serve them if they got together as a representative body to engage the SAPS, Home Affairs, NGO's, CBO's, etc with their problems, and also intervened to expose the bad eggs amongst them. Right now, for many S Africans, Hillbrow is a no-go area- that says a lot! We must consider that during the term of our cadres in exile, they were in camps and conducted themselves with respect; don't we deserve the same?

Solidarity and utopia

Shungu M. Tundanonga-Dikunda

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48399

It is full utopia to pretend, that there is a poor "people" kind of solidarity; see Solidarity with Zimbabwe: Another side to the xenophobia story.

South Africans living in Townships are more close to Mugabe and Zanu-Pf than Tsvangarai and MDC. Nobody can expect social equity in SA as a miracle,it will take time. The Land issue can and will lead a nightmare, if nothing si done. Who talks about lost jobs in South African industrie like in the cande fruit industrie in Cape Province? Who blames the EU for destroying this industrie?

I'm living in a country (Germany), where you have 2% foreigners and no single Black, living in some laender and counties, where xenophobia is extreme (Die Zeit, Nr. 20, 2008, Dossier: pp. 15-20. Mai 8, 2008.) People say "foreigners are taking our jobs, misusing our social facilities etc" and in differents local and regional elections the right wings partis are use to make 12%.

Everyday in Germany, foreigners are beaten somewhere. Many foreigners habe been lunched to death (even in the presence of police officers), houses with foreigners sleeping or living in are use to be put in fire and many Africans haven been burned to death (see http://www.opfer-rechter.gewalt.de )

Township's people are used to seeing pictures from the border to Zimbabwe in Western TV's and to listen different Western Radios, they are use to see pictures of Zimabweans politicla activism in their country: those pictures and reports have manupilated people. This kind of violences happens everywhere in the world and only hypocrites are surprised, that only Africans are victims.

Lost in translation!

Richard Trillo

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48398

I think the article, Mauritania: Between Islamism and terrorism, might have been somewhat mis-translated - "awash with extremists" is not what I understood from the French original, but rather something along the lines of how the West had suddenly become suspicious after the attacks; nor "suspicious of the West" but rather "which worries the West". I'd suggest readers turn to the original French if possible

Who is talking left walking right?

Hans Öhrn

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48396

Mugabe has declared war on the people of the world, writes Grace Kwinjeh. To me it sounds a little bit exaggerated as do other statements in Kwinjeh’s piece.

However, she is right when she writes that the Mugabe government until 1998 was considered amongst the highest-performing of World Bank and International Monetary Fund clients. And the Zimbabwean government did pay back $205 million in hard currency in 2006 to the IMF and more recently $700,000 or so to the African Development Bank. If Mugabe also flirted with the US military for many years, I don’t know. But in that case, this courtship now has been harshly turned down by the attended.

Kwinjeh paints a somber picture of the developments in Zimbabwe but forget to tell us what really happened when this development sat in.

In 1998 Zimbabwe broke with the IMF and Western-sponsored developmental paths, paths apparently spurned by Kwinjeh, and tried to enter a more homemade one. No doubt, it is has been an arduous pathway with a lot of potholes and blemishes but to blame all the present malice in Zimbabwe on the government may be an elopement. T

The introduction of Kwinjeh’s article promises an analysis of Zimbabwe through regional, African and global capitalism. But she fails grossly to tell us about how the forces of global capitalism are working against Zimbabwe today. The West has been heavily investing in regime change in Zimbabwe lately, through sanctions and its docile media, sometimes referred to as the “free press” or “independent media”. In what way FOX, CNN and BBC are independent is beyond me, but those media paint the same one-sided and ominous picture of Zimbabwe as do Kwinjeh.

In my opinion it is Kwinjeh who is “talking ultraleft” while at the same time “walking right” more than the government of Zimbabwe.

What about neocolonialism?

Hamadi Walls

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48392

First of all your premise in Challenges of democratic transition in Africa that the poverty and economic stagnation in African countries is cause by corrupt and incompetent government is a narrow interpretation of the difficulties which beset the African continent. You virtually exclude the impact of neo-colonialism.

And your claims that the land distribution could have been accomplished by legislation in naive. They tried that in South Africa before Mandela left office and big landowner threatened to resist and ignore any such mandate, forcing the government to back down.

Narcissists

Bugsy Dialectics

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48393

Regarding African Liberation Day: the people must prevail . The people of liberation fell narcissistically in love with the works of their hand and became the post-colonial oppressors of the populist, egalitarianism that IS the end of liberation. They have hoarded power and wealth, leaving the people to starve in a spiritual famine that expresses itself in the fratricidal savagery shown with such repulsive inhumanity. A revolution of hope to overthrow these latest "massas" and bring the power in equality and justice to ALL, not the few, the privileged, or the self-appointed entitled.

Worldwide leadership crisis

Indian Savant

2008-05-27

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/48400

This, The Violence in Kenya Must Stop Now, is a very balanced article bringing out the utter despair that the people now face because of their politicians. Isn't it true that almost all forms of political leadership all over the world have failed their people? I wish the people of Kenya all the best. And hope they do not have to see death and destruction due to another civil war

Fahamu