Back Issues

The Ogoni Nine–Shell settlement: Victory, but justice deferred?

Sokari Ekine and Firoze Manji

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56914

With Shell having agreed an out-of-court settlement of $15.5 million with the families of the Ogoni Nine activists killed in 1995, Sokari Ekine and Firoze Manji argue that a victory should not be confused with justice. Though representative of an emerging movement in bringing a multinational to the brink of a trial, the questions over the Niger Delta region and Shell's atrocious environmental and human rights records remain, with the company admitting no liability for its actions. We must continue to support the numerous trials against Shell still carrying on, Ekine and Manji contend, and ensure that widespread discussion helps establish broader justice for the Ogoni people and all those suffering from multinational and governmental exploitation in Nigeria and beyond.

'And as I was going, I was just thinking how the war have spoiled my town Dukana, uselessed many people, killed many others, killed my mama and my wife, Agnes, my beautiful young wife with J.J.C and now it have made me like porson wey get leprosy because I have no town again.

'And I was thinking how I was prouding before to go to soza and call myself Sozaboy. But now if anybody say anything about war or even fight, I will just run and run and run and run and run. Believe me yours sincerely.' Ken Saro-Wiwa, Sozaboy

Thirteen years ago, Ken Saro-Wiwa Jr and the families of the eight other Ogoni men who had been murdered by the Nigerian state in 1995, together with two other Ogonis, began three separate law suits against Royal Dutch Petroleum, Shell Petroleum Development Corporation (SPDC) and Brian Anderson, the former CEO of the SPDC. The plaintiffs accused Shell of human rights abuses against the Ogoni people, of arming the Nigerian army and of being complicit in the extrajudicial killing of the Ogoni Nine in 1995. The trial against Shell was due to start on 26 May, but was then delayed indefinitely. On Tuesday 9 June 2009, we learned that Shell had settled the case out of court for a sum of $15.5 million, which included a $5 million contribution to a trust for the Ogoni people. The settlement was offered with no admission of liability from the defendant. While the settlement is being seen as a victory for human rights, it raises a number of worrying issues in law suits by local indigenous communities against multinationals who are committing human rights violations and environmental crimes.

It is impossible to separate the actions of the oil multinationals operating across the Niger Delta from the actions of the Nigerian government in the region. The relationship between the two, though complex, is based on profit over and above any other consideration. In exchange for the oil removed from the Niger Delta, the oil companies, with the support of the Nigerian state, have left behind an ecological disaster, reducing whole towns and villages to rubble, causing death by fire and pollution, and leaving behind the guns of the Nigerian military. Shell and the other oil companies in the region have one of the worst environmental records in the world. This includes pollution of the air and drinking water, the degradation of farm land, damage to aquatic life, the disruption of drainage systems, and oil fires, which have left people dead and with horrific burn injuries and no medical care. The causes of the damage to the environment are oil spills from pipelines and flow stations – with many of the former running through villages and in front of people's homes – and gas flaring, which produces toxic gases and releases poisons into the atmosphere.

The late Professor Claude Ake, who was killed in a plane crash in 1996, used the term 'the militarisation of commerce' to describe the relationship between Shell and the Nigerian military government. What he was referring to was the unholy alliance which led to the collaboration between Shell and the military in planning the death of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni Nine and thousands of others that have been maimed and killed since 1990. Though Ake was referring to the military government of the late Sani Abacha, little has changed since 1995, despite the country's so-called 'democracy'. On the contrary: more violence has been unleashed under the governments of Olusegun Obasanjo and Umaru Yar’Adua than under military dictatorships. Only a month ago the Joint Task Force for the Niger Delta (JTF) of the Nigerian military, under the pretext of rooting out militants who were supposed to be hiding in the creeks, launched a violent, sustained attack of collective punishment on communities in the region, this time on the Warri South West communities. The numbers of the dead are not yet known, but estimates run between a few hundred and a few thousand, with some 25,000 displaced. Young men are particularly at risk. They are the ones who in the past have being picked up by the JTF on the pretence that they are militants, when in fact their only crime is that they are just young men.

It is in this context that we need to view the settlement agreed between the families of the Ogoni Nine and Shell. The emotional drain on the plaintiffs in this case cannot be underestimated and at some point they all need to be able to rebuild their lives and look to the future. There is also no doubt that this is a victory in that it brought a multinational to the brink of trial. This is no small feat. It is representative of an emerging movement that has successfully called multinationals to account for their actions. The case adds to the legal precedent set by the Bowoto v. Chevron trial last year (the plaintiffs lost the case), and reinforces the fact that US-registered companies who commit atrocities overseas can be brought to trial, even if justice is not meted out in every case. At the same time, we need to be aware that despite the courts in Nigeria awarding $1.5 billion against Shell to the Ijaw Aborigene of Bayelsa State, Shell has so far refused to pay out. This is clearly a reflection of the complete disdain and lack of respect shown by multinational companies towards decisions of the courts in Nigeria.

This case was brought by the families of the Ogoni Nine and not on behalf of the Ogoni people. How much of a victory is this, and what are the implications for the other law suits against Shell and possibly other oil companies operating in Nigeria? The sum of $15.5 million, while constituting a considerable amount to the plaintiffs, is but a drop in the ocean of oil for Shell. Although legally the settlement includes a non-admission of guilt by Shell, there is some grounds for celebration by the Ogoni Nine, since the general public will draw its own conclusions as to the significance of Shell's out-of-court settlement. But the settlement also sends out the message that oil companies can seemingly buy impunity for the price of one day’s worth of Ogoni, Ijaw or Itsekiri oil.

While the families of the Ogoni Nine can celebrate a partial victory and breathe a sigh of relief from the fact that the years of anxiety and hard work in bringing the case to court are now over, it is hard not to think that there will remain a bitter after-taste of polluted waters, poisoned rivers, noxious gases, toxic fumes and destroyed communities living under stress and exploitation – a burden to be borne by the Ogoni people over decades. The destruction of their communities and environment has to be laid at the doors of both multinational corporations like Shell and the Nigerian state.

That Shell were forced to pay – albeit without an admission of guilt – is a victory of sorts. But we should be careful, in the euphoria of the moment, not to confuse that victory with justice. It is justice neither for the families of the Ogoni Nine or for the Ogoni people. That struggle for justice, and the bringing to justice of those who carry out such crimes, remains the task of the day. Like the Ogoni struggle begun by Ken Saro-Wiwa – which became the inspiration for other Niger Delta nationalities to demand justice and equity from the oil companies and Nigerian State – this trial was also an inspiration to others and as such was always bigger than just the plaintiffs' case. We should remember that right now both the military violence and environmental abuse continue to destroy people's lives. The final question is whether Shell, Elf, Mobil and Chevron will now be motivated to clean up their mess, or will things simply remain the same?

There are a number of other outstanding cases against Shell in Nigeria, including a class action suit by the Ogoni people. It is unlikely that they will be offered an out-of-court settlement and we owe a duty to the Ogoni people to ensure that justice is done, and seen to be done, by ensuring widespread public discussion about and support for their struggles for justice.

'Sleep Well, Ken
And smile at your killers
For though a few feet underground
The struggle you started continues'
Danson Kahyana

* Sokari Ekine blogs at Black Looks.
* Firoze Manji is editor in chief of Pambazuka News.
* Details of the trial and settlement can be viewed at wiwavshell.org/wiwa-v-shell-victory-settlement/.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/

Obama in Cairo: Equivalences and silences

PT Zeleza

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56865

cc Soldiers Media CenterPresident Obama’s speech to the Muslim world delivered on 4 June was ‘powerful’ and ‘smart’, but PT Zeleza finds himself most interested in its ‘equivalences and silences’. With reference to media reactions and commentary from different parts of the world, Zeleza looks at Obama’s framing of the relationship between the US and Islam, the parallels Obama draws between the civil rights movement in the United States and Palestinian resistance, and Obama’s failure to ‘fully address one of the fundamental reasons for the estrangement of the so-called Muslim world from the United States: The latter's support for authoritarian regimes’. The United States ‘would do itself a lot of good if it curtailed its propensities for destructive interventions around the world’, says Zeleza, while ‘the so-called Muslim world’ would benefit from building ‘truly democratic developmental states’.

As Obama himself acknowledged, 'no single speech,' however lofty and soaring in its promises, 'can eradicate years of mistrust’ between the United States and the so-called Muslim world or untangle the messy Arab-Israeli conflict which is at the heart of American troubles in the region.

President Obama's much-anticipated speech to the Muslim world delivered on June 4 to 3,500 selected guests in the ornate auditorium of the century-old Cairo University has predictably drawn mixed reactions in different parts of the world including the Middle East itself as noted by some of the major American and British papers such as The New York Times (Varying Responses to Speech in Mideast Highlight Mideast Divisions) and The Financial Times (Caution Tempers Muslim Praise) and evident in commentaries in today's newspapers across the region from Egypt's Al-Ahram to Israel's Haaretzand further afield to Kenya's Daily Nation (Back Words with Action Muslim Leaders Now Tell Obama).

As the President himself acknowledged, 'no single speech,' however lofty and soaring in its promises, 'can eradicate years of mistrust,' repair the awful relations between the United States and the so-called Muslim world, untangle the messy Arab-Israeli conflict which is at the heart of American troubles in the region. The task is daunting if opinion surveys are anything to go by. While Egyptians expressed more confidence in President Obama than his predecessor, the figure was only 35 per cent (8 per cent for President Bush), and their favourable opinion of the United States itself remains low at 22 per cent.

It was indeed a powerful, smart speech. Some have even called it historic, reminiscent of President Kennedy's in Berlin or President Nixon's opening to China. It was delivered with the eloquence and mastery the president has become famous for. It was clearly a hit with the audience of carefully selected functionaries, friends and foes of the American and Egyptian governments, who gave him a standing ovation at the beginning and end of the speech. A remarkable reversal of fortunes for a US President: On his last visit to the Middle East President George Bush was pelted with a volley of shoes by an Iraqi journalist.

Many have remarked on President Obama's captivating charm and the respectful tone of his speech, its judicious invocation of his Muslim background on his father's side, Islamic contributions to world civilisation, the religious discourses and texts of the three great monotheistic religions, even its truthfulness. What caught my attention however, were its equivalences and silences.

He sought to address and diffuse what he called 'tension between the United States and Muslims around the world – tension rooted in historical forces that go beyond any current policy debate.’ Like no other president before him, he outlined some of these forces – colonialism, proxy wars, and western insensitivities. But the very framing of the protagonists is problematic: It is between the United States and Islam, one a political entity, the other a religious community. Notwithstanding his concession that Islam and Muslims have been a part of the United States from the beginning – lest we forget many of the enslaved Africans, some estimates indicate up to a fifth or a quarter, were Muslim and the majority of United States Muslims are African Americans – Islam is presented as an external ‘other'.

In this formulation, observes a perceptive commentator in The Guardian, the United States refers to 'a concrete specific place, and Islam 'a vague construct subsuming peoples, practices, histories and countries more varied than similar. ‘Labelling America's "other" as a nebulous and all-encompassing "Islam" (even while professing rapprochement and respect) is a way to avoid acknowledging what does in fact unite and mobilise people across many Muslim-majority countries: Overwhelming popular opposition to increasingly intrusive and violent American military, political and economic interventions in many of those countries. This opposition – and the resistance it generates – has now become for supporters of those interventions, synonymous with "Islam".'

Another glaring parallel was the one President Obama drew between the lessons of the peaceful civil rights movement in the United States and the violent Palestinian resistance, that one led to progressive change, the other is doomed to failure. But these are two different struggles: One a struggle for civil rights by an oppressed racial minority, the other a struggle for statehood by an occupied nation. As the history of decolonisation shows, in which the Palestinian struggle ought to be placed – and indeed in which America's own struggle for independence belongs – independence struggles involved both peaceful and violent resistances. The nature of the resistance was in large measure determined by the attitudes of the imperial, colonial, or occupying powers.

This was clearly the case in Africa where independence was achieved through peaceful struggles in contexts where the metropolitan colonial power was willing to negotiate, while protracted armed struggles were waged in the more recalcitrant settler states where national freedom for the 'natives' was seen as incompatible with continued settler power and hegemony. We should not forget that in South Africa, which the president referred to as an exhibit of the universality of the American civil rights narrative, the struggle against apartheid involved generations of peaceful protests, armed struggle, and international sanctions which were opposed by much of the West. Historical analogies are always tempting, but when uttered by an American president they betray indifference to historical realities and such false analogies can produce wrong-headed policies with dire political consequences.

The silences were equally telling. The most troubling was the failure to fully address one of the fundamental reasons for the estrangement of the so-called Muslim world from the United States: The latter's support for authoritarian regimes. To be sure, the president talked about democracy, religious freedom, and women's rights, not to mention development, but in vague and bland terms. Indeed, as Heba Moyayef notes, 'Obama's speech essentially failed to address the dismal human rights record of Egypt and its neighbors, beyond generalities. His words, greeted with both rapturous applause and moments of silence, were addressed to the whole Muslim world. But he could and should have alluded in a far more direct way to the repressive practices of Egypt and many of its neighbours. Those troubled by the signs that the Obama administration is downgrading the place of human rights in US foreign policy will have found nothing reassuring in his speech.'

President Obama's rhetorical references to democracy and human rights were a disappointment not because the United States should pursue a democracy crusade as the Bush Administration sought to cover its unadorned imperial belligerence and hubris, but because its policies undermine democracy in many Muslim-majority countries and there was no sign in the speech itself – nor has there been in the new administration's foreign policy agenda as articulated thus far – that these policies are likely to change fundamentally in substance rather than style. The president acknowledged America's role in overthrowing a democratically elected government in Iran in 1953. But American interventions are not confined to the past. Today the United States continues to coddle dictatorships and frustrate democracy across the world where its strategic interests are at stake. The delivery of this very speech in Egypt, a country ruled by the autocratic President Hosni Mubarak for the past twenty-eight years, shows that old habits die hard indeed.

Interestingly, it has been reported that on his second visit to an African country in July – in case people and the press forget Egypt is in Africa – the president will go to Ghana rather than his father's homeland Kenya, because of the latter's troubled politics. Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, was also avoided to the chagrin and even anger of many Nigerian politicians and commentators apparently because of its unsavoury democratic credentials. The comment by the great Nigerian writer and human rights activist, Professor Wole Soyinka, underscores what is at stake for human rights and democracy campaigners in American presidential visits, especially President Obama, in whom much hope has been invested – quite unrealistically in my view – in many part of the world. Professor Soyinka praised the choice of Ghana, a relatively successful democracy, over Nigeria and added with poetic flourish: ‘If Obama decides to grace Nigeria with his presence, I will stone him. The message he is sending by going to Ghana is so obvious, is so brilliant that he must not render it flawed by coming to Nigeria any time soon.’

In the end, as President Obama himself has often stated, he will not be judged on delivering fine speeches, in which he excels, but on the actions taken by his Administration. Much of the world including the so-called Muslim world is used and inured to flowery rhetoric from their own demagogues and visiting western leaders who often preach what they don't practice, who come with promises of change that mask continuity. In essence, the issues are dazzlingly straightforward: The United States would do itself a lot of good if it curtailed its propensities for destructive interventions around the world and the so-called Muslim world would do itself a lot of good if it built truly democratic developmental states. It is only by promoting these mutually desirable conditions that symmetrical relations, principled rather than paternalistic partnerships, between the peoples of different faiths and civilisations in the developed and developing nations can be forged for the good of us all.

* This article first appeared in The Zeleza Post.
* PT Zeleza is editor of The Zeleza Post.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Obama speech omits women and secularists

Cairo speech reinforces presumed religious identities

Marieme Helie Lucas

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56867

cc James StewartFollowing Barack Obama’s 4 June speech in Cairo, Algerian secularist Marieme Helie Lucas doesn’t think the president’s discourse is the new voice of peace. Critical of Obama’s idea of homogenous civilisations and his equating of civilisation with religion, Lucas argues that by essentialising Islam and ignoring the large differences that exist among Muslim believers themselves, Obama feeds into the plans of Muslim fundamentalists who claim that there is one single Islam. Obama does not raise the issue of who defines culture, who defines religion or who speaks for 'the Muslims', says Lucas. Instead, he talks to religions rather than citizens, nations or countries. By assuming that everyone has to have a religion, he leaves no place for those who choose ‘not to have religion as their main marker of identity’ and overlooks the fact that in many instances ‘people are forced into religious identities’, Lucas contends.

It is beyond doubt that many people around the world, of various political opinions and creeds, will feel relieved after the discourse the president of the USA delivered in Cairo today. It is apparently a new voice, a voice of peace, quite far from Bush's clash of civilisations. But is it so?

I presume that political commentators will point at the fact that Obama equates violence on the side of occupied Palestinians to violence on the side of Israeli colonisers, or that he has not abandoned the idea that the USA should tell the world how to behave and fight for their rights, or that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is reduced to a religious conflict, or that he still justifies the war in Afghanistan, etc. All those are important issues that need to be challenged.

However, what affects me most, as an Algerian secularist, is that Obama has not done away with the idea of homogeneous civilisations that was at the heart of the theory of the 'clash of civilisations'. Moreover, his very American idea of civilisation is that it can be equated to religion. He persistently opposes 'Islam and the West' (as two entities or civilisations), 'America and Islam' (a country versus a religion); he claims that 'America is not at war with Islam' (a country versus a religion). In short ' the West' is composed of countries, while ' Islam' is not. Old Jomo Kenyatta used to say of British colonisers: 'When they came, we had the land, they had the Bible; now we have the Bible, they have the land'. Obama's discourse confirms it: Religion is still good enough for us to have, or to be defined by. His concluding compilation of monotheist religious wisdom sounds as if it were the only language that we, barbarians, can understand. These shortcomings have adverse effects on us, citizens of countries where Islam is the predominant, and often the state, religion.

First of all, Obama's discourse is addressed to 'Islam', as if an idea, a concept, a belief, could hear him. As if these were not necessarily mediated by the people who hold these views, ideas, concepts or beliefs. As Soheib Bencheikh, former Great Mufti of Marseilles now director of the Institute of High Islamic Studies in Marseilles, used to say: 'I have never seen a Qur'an walking in the street.'

Can we imagine for one minute that Obama would address himself to 'Christianity' or to 'Buddhism'? No, he would talk to Christians or Buddhists, to real people, keeping in mind all their differences.

Obama is essentialising Islam, ignoring the large differences that exist among Muslim believers themselves, in terms of religious schools of thought and interpretations, cultural differences and political opinions. These differences indeed make it totally irrelevant to speak about 'Islam' in such a totalising way. Obama would not dare essentialise, for instance, Christianity in such a way, ignoring the huge gap between Opus Dei and liberation theology.

Unfortunately, this essentialising Islam feeds into the plans of Muslim fundamentalists whose permanent claim is that there is one single Islam – their version of it – one homogeneous Muslim world, and subsequently one single Islamic law that needs to be respected by all in the name of religious rights.

Any study of the laws in 'Muslim' countries show that these laws are pretty different from one country to the other, deriving not just from different interpretations of religion, but also from the various cultures in which Islam has been spreading on all continents, and that these supposedly Muslim laws reflect as well historical and political factors including colonial sources[1] – obviously not divine .

This is the first adverse consequence of Obama's essentialising of Islam and homogenising of Muslims: As much as he may criticise fundamentalists - which he calls 'a minority of extremists', he is using their language and their concepts. This is unlikely to help the cause of anti fundamentalist forces in Muslim countries.

It follows suit that Obama talks to religions, not to citizens, not to nations or countries. He assumes that anyone has to have a religion, overlooking the fact that in many instances, people are forced into religious identities. In more and more 'Muslim' countries, citizens are forced into religious practice[2], and pay for dissent with their freedom and sometimes with their lives. It is a big blow to them, to their human rights, to freedom of thought and freedom of expression, that the president of the USA publicly comforts the views that citizens of countries where Islam is the main religion are automatically Muslims (unless they belong to religious minority). Regardless of the fact that one is a believer or not, citizens may choose not to have religion as the main marker of their identity. For instance to give priority or prominence to their identity as citizens, many citizens of 'Muslim' countries want to leave religion in its place and delink it from politics. They support secularism and secular laws, i.e. laws democratically voted by the people, changeable by the will and vote of the people; they oppose unchangeable, a-historical, supposedly divine laws, as a process that is alien to democracy. They oppose the political power of clerics.

Obama is claiming to defend democracy, democratic processes, and human rights?

How can this fit with addressing whole nations through their supposed, hence imposed, religious identities?

Where is the place for secularists in Obama's discourse? For their democratic right to vote laws rather than be imposed laws in the name of God? For their human right to believe or not to believe, to practice or not to practice? They simply do not exist. They are ignored. They are made invisible. They are made 'Muslims'. Not just by our oppressive undemocratic governments – by Obama too. And when he talks of his own fellow citizens, these '7 million American Muslims', did he ask them what their faith was, or is he assuming faith on geographical origin?

In this religious straight jacket, women's rights are limited to their right to education – and Obama distances himself from arrogant westerners by making it clear that women's covering is not seen by him as an obstacle to their emancipation. Especially, if it is 'their choice'. Meanwhile, Iran is next door, with its morality police that jails women whose hair slips out of the said-covering in the name of religious laws. And what about Afghanistan or Algeria where women were abducted, tortured, raped, mutilated, burnt alive, killed for not covering?[3]

At no point does he raise the issue of who defines culture, who defines religion, who speaks for 'the Muslims' – and why could not it be defined by individual women themselves – without clerics, without morality police, without self-appointed, old, conservative, male, religious leaders – if their fundamental human rights were to be respected. Obviously, Obama trades women's human rights for political and economic alliances with 'Islam'. 'Islam' definitely owns oil, among other things.

No, this discourse is not such a change for an American president: Obama remains within the boundaries of clashing civilisations and religions. How can this save us from the global rise of religious fundamentalism, which this discourse was supposed to counter? He claims that 'as long as our relationship is defined by differences, this will empower those who sow hatred... /...promote conflict’. But the only thing he finds we have in common is ' to love our families, our communities, our God'... Muslim fundamentalists will not disown such a program. In God we trust...

* Marieme Helie Lucas is an Algerian sociologist, founder and former international coordinator of the (Women living under Muslim laws international solidarity network.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

NOTES
[1] For instance, from 1962 to 1976, the source for Algerian laws on reproductive rights was the 1920 French law; or, in 1947, the source for Pakistani law on inheritance was the Victorian law that the UK itself had already done way with.
[2] One Malaysian state made daily prayers compulsory; Algerian courts condemned to prison non-fasting citizens in 2008; Iranian courts still jail women for 'un-Islamic behaviour'.
[3] Shadow Report on Algeria, (Women living under Muslim laws)

Obama in Cairo: Playing the political game

Nawal El Saadawi

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56868

cc flickr.comUS president Barack Obama might seem more human than his predecessor George W. Bush, cautions Nawal El Saadawi, but in a world ruled by a capitalist patriarchal religious system, politics is 'a game based on how to use beautiful words to cover ugly actions' and has 'nothing to do with humanity'. The real goal of Obama's Cairo speech, says El Saadawi, is 'to mobilise Muslim countries against Islamic extremists', 'to open the markets of Islamic countries to American goods' under the banner of development and partnership, and 'to guarantee Saudi and Gulf oil and other American interests' in the Middle East.

Obama is different as a person from G.W. Bush. Obama looks more human, but politics and economic interests have nothing to do with humanity.

We live in one world ruled by the capitalist patriarchal religious system. Power dominates our whole world (not justice or freedom or peace or ethics or human values ). Politics under such a system is a game based on how to use beautiful words to cover ugly actions, how to use the power of God to dominate your listeners, how to select verses from holy books to hide double standards and contradictions, how to kill people and rob their land and resources and then apologise to them with tears in your eyes. We call them in our Egyptian-Arabic language 'crocodile tears'.

In Cairo (on Thursday 4 June 2009) Barack Obama spoke to 2,500 Egyptian men and women invited by the Egyptian and US governments and allowed to enter the big hall at Cairo University surrounded by 13,000 Egyptian and American police men.

We are 80 million in Egypt, so those 2,500 men and women who applauded passionately 30 times during Obama's 50 minute speech are not the whole of Egypt. They are only 'the chosen people'.

They applauded strongly when he said that Muslim women should wear the veil if they choose to wear it. As if veiling (or nakedness ) is something to be chosen! As lf oppression is something to be chosen by the oppressed.

Like saying girls or boys should be circumcised if they choose to be circumcised (because they do not want to be different from others), or like saying the poor people should be poor if they choose to be poor (because of their laziness or ignorance).

I read during the Gaza Massacre that the Palestinians choose to be killed (or they kill their children) so that they appear as victims and gain sympathy of the world.

I was looking at the TV screen, observing how Obama talks with his hands, eyes and lips . His lips and hands look less cruel than G.W.'s. His colour more attractive, not black not white not yellow, a mixture of human blood and multiple races developed into a more sophisticated human being.

Obama is a creative actor on stage, learned his text by heart to sound as if there is no text at all. He is well trained in being spontaneous.

Egyptians, Americans or others, especially those chosen by governments, are not creative enough to understand this type of creativity: How some political leaders acquire what is called charisma. The Germans passionately applauded Hitler, the Russians loved Stalin, the Americans elected GW more than once. Sadat in Egypt won all elections by not less than 95 per cent of votes.

The most dangerous political leaders are the most charismatic, they make you sing: Kill me softly. You sacrifice your blood for them.

One of the chosen Egyptian men screamed in the hall while Obama was giving his speech: 'I LOVE YOU!' Obama replied: 'Thank you.'

Obama praised the king of Saudi Arabia in his speech, portraying him as a hero of the dialogue between religions! The theocratic kingdom breeding extremism is democratic?

A dictator ally of the US can be transformed to a democratic hero. Sadam Hussein and Bin Laden were freedom fighters at one time.

Obama praised Netanyahu saying he is intelligent. He did not describe any Arab ruler as intelligent, including Mubarak sitting next to him.

He did not mention the name of Mubarak in his whole speech . Did he want to distance himself as a person from himself as the American president?

Did he want to expose or hide his double personality? But he is sophisticated and understands what is called in psychology 'The philosophy of the present moment'. How to leave yourself to the moment but not leave the moment to itself.

Obama`s body language looks natural, he jumps the plane stairs with his hands near his chest, jumping with his body, like a happy school boy going to meet his girlfriend. This is not the American president but Barack Hussein Obama.

I heard his speech through the TV and read it two more times to grasp or detect some improvement in the US policy. General human beautiful words selected from the three holy books. He sounded like the Pope giving his speech in Jordan some months ago, praising the three religions.

He used very well his middle name 'Hussein' to speak to Muslims but he knows also when to hide it as a deformed organ.

Muslims listening to him applauded passionately when he read verses from the Qur’an. They did not notice his mistake in understanding Surat Al Israa. It did not say that the three prophets Moses, Christ and Mohammad prayed together Lilat Al Israa. Egyptian Copts applauded when he spoke about minority rights in Egypt. Israel applauded when he confirmed that USA and Israel are tied eternally by culture (not mutual interests) and when tears appeared in his voice when he spoke about the Holocaust, six million Jews burned in Germany, their eternal sufferings, their right to have a homeland.

He did not say that this homeland should have been in Germany, the country that burned them or in Europe or in the USA or in some other place where there is no people to be killed and robbed of their homes and land by military force. He did not ask Israel to stop its military violence against the Palestinian children . He only asked the Palestinians to stop their violence against Israeli children. He did not mention the number of Palestinians killed and tortured by Israel in the last 60 years till today .

He did not ask Israel to respect previous UN resolutions, he just asked Israel to stop building new settlements. What about old settlements that expelled thousands of Palestinians of their homes? What about settlements to be built under the so called 'natural growth'?

He asked Palestinians to forget the past and look forward. Some days ago in his country he asked people to forget the crimes of torture, to forget the past and look forward.

But what is the function of the law? If it is not used to investigate and punish criminals who killed or tortured?

Obama shifted smoothly from ethics to politics and interests as if there was no contradiction.

He said the USA has no interest in Iraq resources? He ignored or forgot the Law of Oil forced on Iraqi government (which submits the oil of Iraq to the monopoly of American companies for 30 years).

He mentioned the danger of Iran owning nuclear power, he did not mention the danger of the nuclear military power of Israel.

The real goal of Obama speech was to mobilise the Muslim countries against Islamic extremists, to open the markets of Islamic countries to American goods under the so-called development and partnership, to guarantee Saudi and Gulf oil and other American interests in the so-called Middle East.

Egyptian people suffered because of the Obama's visit to Cairo. Thousands of students did not go to their schools or universities and delayed their exams. Those schools and universities were closed by the government for security reasons during the Obama visit. Mrs Obama stayed in US A and did not accompany her husband to Egypt to be with their two daughters during school exams.

Many streets in Cairo were closed by the police and many people could not go to work losing US$20 million.

The Egyptian government spent $500 million for the security of Obama. 10,000 police men and hundreds of police cars. Egyptian people were ordered to stay at home and not to open their windows in all areas visited by Obama, including the Pyramid region, Giza, Ain Shams, Helwan, Cairo University, some ministries, Al Kalaa, Sultan Mosque, Kasr Al Kobbaa, and all streets leading to these areas and more.

The normal life in Cairo stopped. Streets were empty, people were prisoners in their homes, no body was allowed to be near Cairo University while Obama was delivering his speech except 13 American men and women were allowed to make a show of demonstration at the university gate, shouting some slogans asking Obama to visit Gaza. Those 13 Americans were allowed by the police to demonstrate . They are the opposition or the dissidents in democratic Egypt, while the real Egyptian dissidents are in prison or outside Egypt.

But politics is a game to be played by all parties.

Only 30 minutes after Obama`s plane took off, the poor Egyptian workers were in the streets removing the artificial flowers and trees implanted everywhere to welcome the semi god of the world.

* Nawal El Saadawi is a novelist, a psychiatrist, and a writer. She is president of the Arab Women's Solidarity Association.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

What the US wants from Ghana

Asare Otchere-Darko

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56862

cc flickr.comAn understanding of US interests is crucial for Ghana if it is to capitalise on the immense opportunity provided by the President Obama's July visit, writes Asare Otchere-Darko. Following a deepwater oil find in 2007, Ghana's pending oil-rich status has made it the subject of strategic US energy and military interests, and raising the stakes of Ghana–US relations, Otchere-Darko argues. As the US's preferred physical location for the US African Command (AFRICOM) headquarters and with the superpower concerned not to cede strategic ground to China in the region, Ghana has an unprecedented hand to play in this round of international diplomacy. The task of Ghanaians, says Otchere-Darko, is to ensure that Ghana comes away with concrete deliverables that help meet its own strategic goals, rather than simply being the honoured recipients of President Obama's first visit to Africa.

Not since the inauguration of Nelson Mandela as president of a free South Africa has the election of a national leader generated so much global interest and excitement as that of Barack Obama last November. It was therefore predictable that the announcement of President Obama’s trip to Ghana from 10-11 July would attract extensive media coverage as the first state visit by the first ‘black’ president of the United States to any African state.

While cool heads maintain it is a result of Ghana’s enviable role as a beacon of hope in the continent, proving that multiparty democracy can work in Africa, others have added a partisan spin to the visit, alleging it is because President Mills has shown a greater commitment to fighting the drug barons, which has led to cocaine being in short supply.

The US government itself states the purpose of the visit is: 'Strengthening the US relationship with one of our most trusted partners in sub-Saharan Africa, and to highlight the critical role that sound governance and civil society play in promoting lasting development.'

But who is talking about what is in it for America?

US-GHANA RELATIONS

In the past Ghana has enjoyed a strong relationship with the US ever since the first American Peace Corps volunteers came to Ghana in 1961, the same year that President John F. Kennedy created the US Agency for International Development (USAID) to assist the developing world (aside from a blip in the mid-1980s during the Soussoudis spy affair). Indeed, the setting up of the US Department of State's Bureau of African Affairs in 1958 was largely informed by Ghana becoming the first black African nation to gain independence the previous year. But for the next three decades, Africa was little more than a geo-political lebensraum for proxy campaigns of the Cold War. It was not until March 1978 that sub-Saharan Africa witnessed its first ever state visit by an American president, Jimmy Carter, who first met President Olusegun Obasanjo in Lagos, Nigeria, and then President William Tolbert in Monrovia, Liberia, a country the United States established diplomatic relations with 147 years ago for obvious reasons.

Bill Clinton’s visit to sub-Saharan Africa in March 1998 was the first by a US president in 20 years. His successor, President George W. Bush, visited the continent twice in eight years and it was even said that Africa was the place where he felt most comfortable and welcome. He returned this by pushing for the implementation of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), which was passed just a year before his predecessor handed over to him. This was followed by initiatives of his own for Africa that earned him respect in the eyes of millions of Africans, including the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) in 2003 and the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which has thirty-two African countries on its development assistance radar. Under President Bush’s watch American assistance to Africa quadrupled since 2001.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF JULY’S VISIT

Against this backdrop, July’s US state visit is significant for various reasons. It will be President Obama’s first to Africa – a continent that has not only personal significance for Obama the man, but growing political significance for Obama the president – and one that has significant expectations of the first black president to sit in the Oval Office.

For Ghana, Obama will be the third successive American president to have visited in the space of 11 years, confirming the significant position Ghana has assumed as a role model for the continent. That Obama’s first visit is to one of Africa’s unquestioned success stories rather than one of its examples of stalled development or conflict zones, will draw attention to the fact that there is proof right here in Africa that freedom can serve as the means to development and multi-party democracy can work. Ghana’s extraordinarily consistent economic growth pattern for the past seven years (registering a GDP of 7.3 per cent in 2008) offers the best evidential advertisement for the new development paradigm, which seeks to show that not only can freedom and development go hand in hand, but that the former provides a helping hand to the latter.

WHY GHANA?

But we must not ignore America’s interest. After all, whatever his connection to the African continent, Obama is president of America – and acts in the interest of its people at home above all else. So what can Americans hope to gain from President Obama’s trip to Ghana?

First, this trip offers a very compelling platform for America to reaffirm to a significant mass of the world the triumph of its values of liberal democracy, rule of law and freedom. With the US’s failure to impose these in the Middle East, and China’s irksome demonstration that economic progress can be achieved without them, Ghana helps bolster the US’s argument about the centrality of these values to the development process.

But the decision to embark on this trip was also made on the basis of some tangible and concrete opportunities for America in the region.

Top on the list is the United States’ military and energy security agenda. Before the 9/11 bombing in 2001, conventional thinking in Washington perceived no vital strategic interests for the US in sub-Saharan Africa. But this has changed. Today we can see a significant shift away from America’s traditional geopolitical calculations regarding oil production and supply. The US’s National Intelligence Council (NIC) estimates that by 2015, 25 per cent of American oil imports will come from West Africa, compared to 16 per cent today – an estimate even considered as too conservative in some quarters. Already West Africa supplies as much oil to the US as Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, our oil is light and sweet, making it easier and cheaper to refine than Persian oil. Plus its offshore location reduces transportation costs and minimises risk of political violence and terrorist attacks.

This shift in global energy patterns to the Gulf of Guinea has led to a significant re-evaluation of foreign policy focus and global alliances, resulting in a multi-layered engagement with countries such as Ghana, that encompasses military and energy security, and development aid. This trip is thus at the heart of Washington’s strategy of working with its regional allies in West Africa to develop relationships that will secure its energy security in the long term.

The United States, in typical Dick Cheney oilthink, sees the Gulf of Guinea as offering the opportunity to break with the old politics which saw the US at the mercy of the geostrategic pressure of unstable or unfriendly oil-producing states in the ‘old’ Gulf (Persian Gulf) and Venezuela.

The way forward is a pro-active policy to build a new Gulf of energy security and prosperity in a part of the world that is relatively receptive to American presence. With significant discoveries being made in the Gulf of Guinea oil basin, off the coast of Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, Congo and Cote d’Ivoire, according to the Energy Information Administration of the US Department of Energy, the United States will be importing in the year 2020 over 770 million barrels of African oil a year. And Ghana with its stability, notable responsiveness to America, deepening multiparty democracy and promising investment climate is seen as the perfect epicentre for the growth and fulfilment of this interest. In the eyes of America, geography, geology and ideology all favour Ghana as the gem in the crown of this new policy.

WHAT ABOUT CHINA?

But the US is not alone in seeing Africa as a better bet to provide a secure source of energy. There is a new scramble for Africa’s raw materials, especially energy resources, brought on by China’s astonishing industrial growth and its deepening influence in the global economy. It is the second largest consumer of oil in the world behind the United States. Consistently high economic growth rates saw Asia’s formerly largest oil exporter switch to become a net importer of oil since 1993. The International Energy Agency projects China's net oil imports will jump from 3.5 million barrels per day in 2006 to 13.1 million barrels per day by 2030.

In 2006, 9 per cent of Africa’s oil exports went to China (with 60 per cent of Sudan’s oil export China-bound). The US received 33 per cent. Already, China has sped past Britain and France to become Africa’s second-highest trading partner behind the United States.

Though Angola, the second largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa, supplies the US with approximately twice as much oil as it does China, China has outpaced the United States in partnering Angola’s rapid development with its multi-billion dollar investment support in the country’s infrastructure. For example, in 2006, Sinopec, China’s state-owned energy company, bid US$2.2 billion for two deep-water blocks off the Angolan coast. Two years earlier, Beijing softened the ground with a US$2 billion package of loans and aid to Angola, which has Chinese companies building telecommunications infrastructure, roads, railways, bridges, buildings, schools and hospitals.

However, in 2007, Erica Strecker Downs of the Brookings Institute think tank made some headway in calming American anxiety over China and African oil. She wrote that contrary to public opinion, China's NOCs are not 'locking up' the lion's share of African oil as part of a centralised quest for energy. But while China, with a mere 3 per cent of its FDI in Africa and controlling under 2 per cent of oil reserves on the continent, may not be winning the race for oil exploration and production in Africa, there is no question that China is winning more and more of the oil supply produced in Africa.

If the US wants to out-muscle China in the 21st century scramble for Africa, then it will have to show more aggression in investing in the development of infrastructure on the continent, as China is doing. Even if American money comes with job for American companies, Africans are not likely to complain so long as it ends in the brick and mortar of the continent’s infrastructural development. Africans believe they are increasingly feeling more and more the positive might of Beijing in their quest for advancement. Chinese investment deserves a big part of the credit for Africa’s highest ever economic growth rate, 5.8 per cent in 2007. Furthermore, China has cancelled US$10 billion in bilateral debt owed to it by African countries.

Outside of Ghana’s oil exploration and production zone, the US and China’s involvement in Ghana’s development has been most obvious in two major infrastructural projects in the energy sector. The first, the West African Gas Pipeline (WAGP), is 59 per cent owned by Chevron, the US-based oil multinational company and Royal Dutch Shell. This US$700 million onshore-offshore pipeline will run 681 kilometres from the Western Niger Delta of Nigeria via Benin and Togo to Ghana, and was cooperatively underwritten by the World Bank in 2004. The bank, however, refused to underwrite the Bui Dam project designed to generate 400MW of electricity for Ghanaians. It took a 2006 visit to President Hu Jintao of China by President J A Kufuor to secure Chinese support for the dam’s construction (by Sino-Hydro) and funding (Exim Bank) at an estimated cost of US$600 million.

These two projects highlight the masterful diplomacy that the Mills’ administration will need to deploy in the coming years in order to secure optimal benefit for Ghana from its new oil-rich status.

HOW GHANA MUST UTILISE ITS NEW STRATEGIC IMPORTANCE

With the discovery of significant oil potential offshore, Ghana has not only new international importance – we also have cause for greater confidence and strength in our global interactions. The increased interest of both China and the United States in Ghana can add extraordinary oomph to Ghana’s development – but this can only happen if we become smarter, more strategic and more assertive in our dealings with these two powerful nations.

The Obama trip reinforces the extent of US strategic interest in the country. Ghana has become an object of international desire between the two super powers of the 21st century – America and China – and the Americans are in no mood to lose its ‘trusted partner’ to the Chinese.

The Americans know what they want from Ghana. But does Ghana know what it wants from America? The question is: Has the Ghanaian government taken a considered, sober decision on the price to be paid and the prize to be gained for being considered as the serene oasis at the heart of the ‘New Gulf’? President Obama came into office with the strategic objective of 'investing in a shared humanity' with regards to US policy in Africa, listing his three thematic policy areas of focus as:

i. To accelerate Africa's integration into the global economy
ii. To enhance the peace and security of African states
iii. To strengthen relationships with those governments, institutions and civil society organisations committed to deepening democracy, accountability and reducing poverty in Africa.

He may well be the president who can make a bold resourceful contribution to see the realisation of the dream of an African nation breaking though the stigma of underdevelopment to act as a trailblazer for the others. Ghana has the potential to serve as this model – but it will require a wholesale adoption of a new attitude of assertiveness based on a well-founded confidence in what we bring to the table, and a permanent shift from the outdated and counterproductive assumption amongst Ghanaians that our country is simply a geographical mass of humanitarian concerns or a charity case.

But has the mindset of the Ghanaian leadership gravitated towards this new reality?

GLOBAL ECONOMIC POSITIONING

As Ken Ofori-Atta of Databank stated at Chatham House recently, 'We have not seen such massive destruction of wealth in the history of modern civilisation and I might add also such rapid recreation of capital in the past year. Africa is truly astounded at how quickly the West can mobilise to save their companies when a fraction of those amounts could reinstate the impressive growth trajectory which Africa had achieved.' The rich economies are prepared to spend $2 trillion to rescue their financial infrastructure. For nearly a decade now, Africans have been demanding extra funding to the tune of $60 billion a year to accelerate its development – a mere three per cent of what is being pumped into the western financial systems today to maintain socio-corporate standards there.

The UN under-secretary general and executive secretary of the Economic Commission for Africa, Abdoulie Janneh, said the current economic downturn could cost Africa US$251 billion in 2009 and US$277 billion in 2010 in export earnings, despite earlier predictions that the continent would not be hard hit. So whatever is on offer to countries like Ghana by the IMF and World Bank only follows the old pattern of development assistance never matching what is taken out from Africa.

Unfortunately, once again, (a little over a year after Ghana issued its first sovereign bond on the international capital market) we have been forced by exogenous circumstances to make a u-turn to over-dependence on the Bretton Wood institutions for our development spending. And we are being told to adopt a kind of fiscal discipline which the developed world is also finding to be fundamentally contradictory to their programme for stimulating their economies today.

Much noise has been made both in Ghana and elsewhere about Ghana’s ‘extraordinarily huge’ 2008 budget deficit of 11.5 per cent of GDP. Indeed, the Ghanaian government has allowed it to serve as a roadblock in the way of maintaining, let alone increasing, the momentum of development Ghana has experienced in the last seven years. It is worth noting that in America the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the US budget deficit will reach US$1.85 trillion this year, 13.1 per cent of GDP. Furthermore, they project deficits averaging over US$1 trillion a year for the next 10 years, which will raise the US public debt-to-GDP ratio to over 80 per cent by 2019. Ghana’s total public debt stood at US$7,742.4 million in May 2009, representing a debt-to-GDP ratio of 49.2%. Both huge budget deficits were necessary responses to national crisis and imperatives. In Ghana’s case the energy crisis of 2007 and the urgency with which Ghana needs to invest in its infrastructure and respond to a rising cost of living contributed to our unusually high deficit.

In July 2005, when heads of the world’s leading industrialised countries (the G8) pledged to step up development aid by US$50 billion by 2010, with half of the increase going to Africa, African leaders hailed it as a significant high-gear shift in development aid from the developed world. Barely four years later, what we know today is that a lot more money can be found for productive investment to push millions of Africans out of poverty. US development assistance to Ghana in 2007 – about US$55 million – was nowhere near that befitting a nation carrying the kind of strategic weight that contemporary Pentagon thinking suggests.

In real terms it is little improvement on the 1994 assistance of US$38 million, plus US$16 million in food aid. President Bush contributed an extra US$547 million support from the Millennium Challenge Account. But this was given when America’s strategic flirtation with Ghana was purely based on its interests in Ghana as a geographical location for AFRICOM rather than the additional oil value it has today.

What has all this to do with Obama’s trip?

Negotiations are not held in a vacuum. A nation that sits around the table without prior knowledge and appreciation of its own strengths and weaknesses in its counterpart’s mind has provided gaping holes in its negotiation armoury and is bound to come out with a bad deal. A good deal depends on both an understanding of the cards in your hands and your opponent’s, and the skilful and strategic play of these cards. The first of these cards that the Ghanaian government must not fail to appreciate is the fact that Superpower America now sees West Africa as a zone of strategic importance – it is no longer a question of just us needing them, but they now also need us.

Our trump card is of course oil. But if we are to prevent ourselves being played by the US, we must deploy this to maximum benefit: Ultimately it is up to Africans to selfishly see our oil as means to provide energy security to others in exchange for support for more rapid African economic development.

In the words of US Congressman William Jefferson, 'The strategic question is which countries we depend on for this oil. The suggestion that comes out of all of these discussions is our best partners are in West Africa for many of the reasons I’ve mentioned: the commitment to democracy. Though there may be strivings and failings, nonetheless there is a commitment. West Africa is closer, making it easier to move product from there to here; the resources are, in most cases, not landlocked. Things usually work fairly well if you’re out in deep water.'

Since 2007, Washington has become more convinced that the Gulf of Guinea is an area of 'Vital Interest' and Ghana is in prime position to serve as its hub, a point reinforced by the seemingly smooth transition from one democratically elected government to another of a different party.

AFRICOM

Furthermore, the US is, understandably, bent on establishing a regional command for Africa, similar to US Forces Korea, with a homeport situated on the African continent to protect their interests. West Africa is its natural home, given the need to protect energy interests in the Gulf of Guinea. Liberia has offered but simply cannot match the kind of convenience available in Ghana. It can be a win-win situation.

AFRICOM can protect US investments in our region. But, those investments (regardless of our percentage share of ownership) are also fundamentally our investments – and thus the assistance in their protection will be a welcome boon. US military presence can also help improve the level of military professionalism of our already well-respected troops. It is interesting to note that in the six decades since World War II in which America has maintained a military presence in other sovereign nations, none of the host nations has suffered instability or military takeovers, as the presence of US troops helps entrench the subordination of soldiers to civil leadership. Moreover the presence of U.S. troops boosts social and economic activities in the host countries, too.

The loudest argument against Ghana hosting AFRICOM when the possibility first arose was that it would make us a target for anti-American terrorists. But a global examination of the number and location of American military bases overseas vis-à-vis the geographical targets of terrorist attacks, shows that this argument has far greater emotive value than evidential corroboration.

At the moment the Americans say they are happy to keep the US Africa Command headquarters in Germany, to coordinate all US military and security interests throughout the African continent. But any reasonable assessment must conclude that this can be nothing but a temporary address and arrangement. Ghana should welcome that it is thus the target of America’s desire – and we should make the most of this, using it for our own advantage. After all, the process has already started.

The US and Ghanaian militaries have cooperated in numerous joint training exercises, including the African Crisis Response Initiative, an international activity in which the US facilitates the development of an interoperable peacekeeping capacity among African nations. And the head of AFRICOM has already reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to assisting the Ghana Armed Forces 'to become more robust'.

There is also the African Contingency Operations Training and Assistance program. Beyond that, Ghana and the US have an active bilateral International Military Education and Training program.

In 2007, Kwesi Pratt Jnr, the managing editor of The Insight newspaper and the energy behind the pressure group Socialist Forum, warned Ghanaians against what he saw to be the looming danger of a US military base in Ghana. He cited, inter alia, the erection of the huge American Embassy complex in Cantonments as evidence of this. Meanwhile, in August 2007 Major-General Ward, who was later confirmed as AFRICOM’s first commander, visited Accra. He held discussions with President Kufuor on 'ways of strengthening military cooperation.' His high-powered secret meetings with the president, minister of defence and the chief of defence staff triggered huge speculation. Much was made of Maj Gen J B Danquah’s public statement about the visit when he said Maj Gen Ward had ‘done enough to resolve’ Ghana’s concerns about AFRICOM, adding, 'I have had the chance to hear [Ward] explain what is the reasoning behind the command, and it’s all about partnership.'

General T. Hobbins, head of the US Air Forces Europe, has held discussions with his counterparts here on the possibility of establishing 'lily pads', landing and rapid airlift facilities in otherwise deserted terrain in certain strategic sites in Africa. Tamale Airport has come up as one of the 'forward operating sites' targeted. That airport is said to have a runway capacity of accommodating massive US C-3 cargo planes and troop transports.

Ghana is also already the site of a US-European Command-funded Exercise Reception Facility that was established to facilitate troop deployments for exercises or crisis response within the region. The direct link to our oil is only too apparent: The Facility came out of Ghana's partnership with the United States on what is termed a Fuel Hub Initiative. It may sound like a mere gas station for the troops. But the choice of stable, imminently oil-rich Ghana as a Fuel Hub reflects a greater strategic interest in the country than as merely a filling station.

The Americans have not been shy in establishing a clear economic link alongside their military cooperation. Ghana is one of the few African nations, mainly those with oil, selected for the State Partnership Program to promote greater economic ties with US institutions, including the National Guard. Expanding this to deepen our cooperation with the Drugs Enforcement Agency is one other area that President Mills should focus attention on.

GHANA THE ‘NATURAL’ ALLY

This all points to the fact that the United States sees Ghana as having all the vital statistics and morphological features of a ‘natural’ ally. We have the oil reserves, we are in the stable centre of the ‘New Gulf’ and we have the military discipline and stable atmosphere to make us the perfect hosts for America’s first major military migration to our continent. America is strategically placed to maintain and deepen its stronger footing here, ensuring it rather than China becomes our dominant ally. As one analyst confirmed, Washington has no interest in seeing China’s presence in Africa extended to Ghana. The fact, however, is that China is already here and the recent dealings between the Mills administration and the ruling Chinese Communist Party means the US needs to act sooner rather than later.

Obama’s chief policy adviser assured Africans two months before the 2008 presidential race, 'Barack Obama understands Africa, and understands its importance to the United States. Today, in this new century, he understands that to strengthen our common security, we must invest in our common humanity and, in this way, restore American leadership in the world.' Now is the chance for him to seek and effect the real change that will finally show the world that Africans are capable of more than managing their own affairs – but, crucially, Ghana must take up the opportunity provided by the state visit and the US’s burgeoning strategic interest in us, to be the nation that demonstrates this.

* This article first appeared on GhanaWeb.
* Asare Otchere-Darko is executive director of the Danquah Institute, a think-tank based in Accra.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Distorting Darfur: The international media and Sudan

Afshin Rattansi

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56858

cc flickr.comIn an interview with British television producer Colette Valentine and media consultant Ali Gunn following their visit to Sudan, Afshin Rattansi discusses Western media distortions of actual conditions in the Darfur region. Emphasising that they saw no evidence of genocide and were free to talk to whomever they chose within government camps, Valentine and Gunn state that much of the media's reporting on Darfur is 'cheap and lazy'. The interviewees also report that the International Criminal Court's (ICC) indictment of President Omar al-Bashir has actually increased the president's popularity among the electorate, and that they themselves were confronted over the international media's portrayal of Darfur.

George Clooney, Matt Damon, Scarlett Johansson, Cindy Crawford, Bono, Michael Caine, Claudia Schiffer, Bob Geldof, Hugh Grant, Mia Farrow, Mick Jagger and so many others have expressed their solidarity with the people of the oil-rich region of Darfur. A few weeks ago, Democrats John Lewis of Georgia, Keith Ellison of Minnesota, Lynn Woolsey of California, Donna Edwards of Maryland and Jim McGovern of Massachusetts were all arrested as they demonstrated against the Sudanese government. When Colin Powell used the word genocide in 2004, it kicked off a $1 billion-a-year international aid programme, much higher than that afforded Somalia or Congo.

But why?

In the past few months, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has charged Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir with crimes against humanity and war crimes. The ICC’s chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, is appealing the setting aside of genocide charges, claiming that there is 'ongoing genocide' in Darfur. The Sudanese government has expelled some foreign aid groups, accusing them of espionage. They include Oxfam, Save the Children and Médecins Sans Frontières. According to the Save Darfur Campaign, it was the relief organisations that provided clean water, food and medical attention to roughly 1.5 million people. The Sudanese government claims these aid-agencies deliberately exclude Arab Darfuris in their ranks, exacerbating sectarian tensions.

And at the moment, President Obama’s Special Envoy to Sudan Scott Gration is on a diplomatic tour, while Britain is sending $185 million in aid and $140 million in 'peacekeeping' money.

Collette Valentine, a TV producer visiting from the United Kingdom, and Ali Gunn, a British media consultant, last week returned from Darfur, where they attended the first 'International Conference on the Challenge Facing Women in Darfur' in Al-Fasher in the north. Valentine says that articles about Darfur in the international press make her feel as if she visited a completely different region, a completely different country. It all adds weight to the thesis of Columbia University’s Professor Mahmood Mamdani that there is something very murky about Western aid agencies’ insistence that there has been a genocide in Darfur, and that at the heart of the campaigns around Darfur is the culmination of a powerful, imperial desire to suppress citizenry from US high school classrooms to right across the developing world.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: Tell me about your visit and how your experience differed to the portrayal in the corporate media. I understand you went at the invitation of Rajaa Hassan Khalifa from the largest women’s union in conjunction with Bakri O.Saeed from Sudan International University.

COLLETTE VALENTINE: Ali Gunn and myself and a group of journalists were lucky enough to be invited to Sudan by the Sudanese Women General Union. The women’s union in Sudan has got 27,000 branches all over Sudan, including Darfur. They have representatives in all the rural villages, across all different communities consisting of around 80 tribes and clans. The women of Sudan are a real force. Historically, there have been female leaders. They are wives, mothers, farmers; they build, they grow the vegetables and basically run the communities and are respected by their men folk. A third of families in the camps are headed by women. In recent years, some members of the women’s union have been elected as ministers in the Sudanese government and a quarter of the seats in the Sudanese parliament are occupied by women.

They are all members of the union and they have direct links right down from the most educated academic women from the professional classes to grassroots people. This chain of open communication is active and alive from bottom to top and top to bottom. Because the women have such a strong role in the communities, the women themselves have decided to take action for peace and security in Darfur. They have seen the failure of external, international agencies and NGOs and they know that peace can only come from within their own communities via reconciliation talks.

The IDPs (internally displaced persons) in the refugee camps are people who have fled trouble in their own areas of Sudan. They didn’t want to leave, but had no option but to flee. Before the international NGOs got involved, the IDPs were provided with camps by al-Bashir’s government, provided with wells, administrators, bureaucratic structures, materials for shelter and local doctors, clinics, and health services paid for by the Sudanese government. When women fled their villages, active male rebels from every community that were fighting each other remained. Those conflicts rage on even as there is peace and stability in the camps. We saw no evidence of any genocide. We were not embedded by the government nor with any NGO. We had absolute freedom to talk with whomever we wished. And we randomly talked to as many men, women and children as we could.

One man, a village leader who led 4,000 of his community separated in two camps, said he had been there six years. His home was 50km away. We asked about genocide and he said that he wouldn’t have remained in the Sudanese government camps for six years if he hadn’t been looked after. When we asked about the issue of rape, he did not deny there wasn’t an issue. The women we spoke to said that unfortunately, rape exists everywhere in the world and some we spoke to quoted statistics about the prevalence of rape in the US and how in developed nations, women are too frightened to press charges. One woman told me that allegations of wide and systematic rape crimes against Darfur women constitute a type of war against Sudan. Historically, in areas of conflict, they maintained, cases of crime and rape are bound to increase. Rape is not a weapon of the government and women are being told to report instances of rape. But the ICC is using the prevalence of rape and giving it undue importance, helping NGOs fill their coffers.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: Were you concerned about safety in Darfur?

ALI GUNN: I understood the situation had settled and that there was quite a lot of fighting down south but that the situation in Darfur was more stable since the Comprehensive Peace Agreement. However, I had been warned off by expert security consultants, who feared for my safety.

We went to two camps in Darfur and we saw people eking out a simple existence. No bullet holes, no tanks and no fighting. The only military vehicles belonged to the United Nations. We were given carte blanche to wander around the camps as we pleased and talk to anyone we liked. Many spoke English. I was appalled that so much reporting in our newspapers has no basis in reality. Cheap and lazy journalism at its worst.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: What about the United Nations’ presence on the ground?

COLLETTE VALENTINE: When we were actually in one of the two camps, we looked up and saw an American tank approaching, followed by a patrol of around 15 UN vans and two more tanks. They drove up, parked the cars outside the office of the administrator of the camp. We didn’t know what was happening.

We were told that three times day, this happens at the camp and that UN officials come to ask whether everything is alright. Women told us that the camps are peaceful places. While we played football with children in the camp at around 9am, men and women setting out market stalls selling tomatoes and oranges, and as the UN personnel talked to the administrator, the soldiers lined up with guns, five metres apart facing us and the rest of the people in the camps.

It was obvious that the soldiers were protecting UN bosses whilst we kicked a football with the children. It was extraordinary. Women were making yoghurt with goat’s milk even as the UN troops pointed their guns at us. I asked one of the women, Maha Feraigon, why guns were being aimed and whether they were scared that we might throw a tomato at them and she just laughed. As Ali says, quite a few people could speak English. Maha was first assistant to the secretary general of the Sudanese Women General Union, independent of the government. All the people we spoke to were furious about UN personnel arriving in this way and wanted the UN to leave. The UN personnel left their engines running and people resented how much that money for the UN was being wasted in front of their eyes. They asked about what they could be doing with the money. I was disgusted. They asked why these personnel were not in the villages where the fighting continues and their ‘dar’ or land was. People said that NGOs did not want the fighting to stop so that they can continue to be paid. None had seen any money from the Save Darfur campaign and they resented that money was being raised in their names.

ALI GUNN: At the conference, we spoke to opposition leaders and women at the conference. There was no sense of urgency about any 'genocide' in the camps themselves. Our concern for our trip was to look at the living conditions of the people in the camps and look at the future of Darfur and the future for families there. And there was very little evidence of external aid. Darfur is the size of France so we didn’t go to all the camps. We have photographic evidence of families and women making their own bricks. You would have to ask the aid agencies about where their money has been sent.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: What about how the Sudanese perceive outside, external forces?

COLLETTE VALENTINE: I was lucky enough to sit beside Maha on the flight from Khartoum to Darfur. I emphasise that she has no connection to any NGO or the government. She spoke very good English and explained the anger of the people. Her general feeling, having been all over Darfur, speaking to women at all levels from all communities throughout the region, was that they did not want foreign interference because they know that it is all about oil and water – the 'oil of tomorrow'.

She told me about how Sudan was sitting on the biggest underwater lake in Africa, giving rise to the best arable land. Despite the desertification, responsible for so many of the deaths in recent years, the lake holds great promise. She told me about how Chevron was thrown out of the country and how Chevron executives took all their drilling and exploration maps with them. They still believe that the NGOs in concert with the US are only involved because of water and oil. She pointed to Congo, Sierra Leone and other African countries, firmly believing that there were no good intentions when it comes to great power involvement on the continent.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: Not a day goes by without the word genocide being used when Darfur is in the corporate media.

ALI GUNN: The Western media has totally misrepresented the situation subsequent to the Comprehensive Peace Agreement. In Darfur, they are desperate for long-term measures to alleviate the cycle of non-delivery in Darfur. Some believed that there were a significant number of people who would never return to their homeland areas. Living conditions in the camps were spartan but clean and people were very aware of their personal space. There was a market with a butcher, vegetable-sellers, a makeshift restaurant … many different rows of shops. It was very much like a souk you would see in any country of this type, with domestic goods on sale. The people we saw were not starving and pretty healthy.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: Do you see money from oil being used for the benefit of the people?

COLLETTE VALENTINE: Oil is all-important for Sudan and is vital to the infrastructure-building plans of the country. They are planning schools and health centres. Free medical care is available to everybody, but not every village has a clinic so people have to travel to the next village. There is a lot of work to be done in Sudan. This is not a bed of roses, by any means but only oil money is going to be able to change things. I saw in Khartoum how development is beginning. They have big plans for the areas around the Blue Nile in Khartoum and it looks to me like Pudong in Shanghai where I made some documentaries when it was developing, a decade ago.

Maha told me that there was a rail system in Sudan that you could time your watch by, but US sanctions starting in the 1990s destroyed it as parts to fix trains and tracks dried up. Sanctions prevented people being able to travel. But, now the Sudanese government has done a deal with the Chinese, who they feel are completely different to the Americans. I was told that Chinese involvement was trusted where the US wasn’t. The Chinese are not interested in hegemonic power. I could see the development present in Khartoum. When I later met the president, he said that growth should be across Sudan and not just limited to an elite in Khartoum. The work is in progress and the president’s popularity has gone through the roof after the ICC indictments.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: What about signs of corruption?

ALI GUNN: People had told us the president was a humble and modest man and he certainly seemed like that in person. I was very wary of signs of corruption and wealth. The palace looked like any municipal building in a developing nation. The furniture was all very normal. We were told that he was a modest man who had come up the ranks of the army and as such was possibly less concerned about the ICC than about rebuilding his nation. He is much more popular after the ICC indictments.

There was a feeling that the country has been picked on in comparison to what has been happening in surrounding nations. I saw that people were being actively encouraged to vote. I mentioned that I work in the British parliament and stressed the need for people to register to vote and there was certainly no problem in people understanding the importance of voting.

Like people in Britain, many of the people we spoke to had a healthy scepticism about politicians per se. But they did believe that the next elections would be free and fair.

COLLETTE VALENTINE: The president knew that the conference was taking place but he had no knowledge of which camps we were visiting. The women were careful not to tell him because they were aware that we were looking for any signs that we were being embedded in any way.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: And the perception is that the ICC has aided the president of Sudan?

COLLETTE VALENTINE: On the night before we left, we met with President al-Bashir and his advisor, Dr Ghazi Salahuddin Atabani. Everything they said backed up what we heard on the ground. He admitted that the ICC has aided his re-election chances. He admitted that rape was present in Darfur but he blamed outside aid agencies for putting petrol on the fire and he highlighted the external supply of arms. He also blamed the classic British divide-and-rule tactics of colonialism for the roots of trouble in Sudan. Attabani said: 'Sudan is politically isolated and that when the ICC indictment was first raised 4 years ago the president offered to step aside, to abdicate – he said 16 years was too long. Our policy in that the National Congress Party [NCP] is that we don’t believe in "a president for life". They made him look like a villain but internally it boosted his popularity… Now the NCP can’t consider any other candidate.'

From my experience of seeing Western leaders in London, there is a cavalcade of security. Al-Bashir, when he goes from his house to local weddings, funerals and the mosque, seems to have no security at all. One of our delegates went to the mosque and was baffled by the lack of security on seeing him there.

AFSHIN RATTANSI: What about what the president of Sudan expects from the change of administration in Washington?

ALI GUNN: We were attacked about international media coverage of Darfur as the people saw the situation very different to how it is portrayed. They saw the West as patronising the Sudanese people. On Obama, President al-Bashir said: 'He’s much more pragmatic. The old guard from Clinton’s days are still around – in the 1990s they were hostile. They’ve not changed, but they have toned down their rhetoric … we believe that the US has been exploited by certain undercurrents.' I would suggest that people go and see for themselves what is happening.

COLLETTE VALENTINE: Dr Ghazi said that they are hopeful about Obama but they don’t trust the Clinton people, the Susan Rices and Samantha Powers. Continuation of the ICC path would be seen as vindictive and alien and could result in turning Darfur into a real conflict.

The women in the camps are focused on talking to their men, and they believe that the only hope for peace and reconciliation lies with their ability to encourage forgiveness. They believe no international organisations can persuade the men to reconcile with each other. Before this conflict happened, tribal elders would meet to settle conflicts between nomadic and peasant communities. Right across Darfur, women are campaigning on the ground for reconciliation talks. This was the first peace conference. All the women from all the communities are coming together to urge reconciliation talks, with women from each community given their time to speak. Security was on top of the agenda, as well as education and healthcare.

ALI GUNN: After we came back from the camps, we were both shocked about the disparity of what was happening on the ground and what was in the media.

* Afshin Rattansi has worked in journalism for more than two decades, including at the BBC Today programme, CNN International and Al Jazeera Arabic. Rattansi has published a quartet of novels entitled The Dream of the Decade: The London Novels.
* This article was originally published by CounterPunch.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Rwanda's genocide: Justice to spare the powerful?

IBUKA, AVEGA and AERG

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56856

cc D ProfferIn response to a 1 June Human Rights Watch letter calling for the transfer of Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) soldiers to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), the umbrella organisation IBUKA expresses concern over the absence of measures to bring Western parties complicit in Rwanda's 1994 tragedy to task. While broadly applauding Human Rights Watch's commitment to justice, IBUKA and its associates AVEGA and AERG take issue with the letter's suggestions that RPF soldiers should be tried in the same manner as genocidaires. Missing from the discussion, IBUKA contends, is the role of Western governments in the genocide, an omission which needs to be swiftly rectified if rich countries are not simply to be immune from international justice.

As the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) begins to wind down its activities, strident calls have now surfaced that it must not do so before it indicts and tries soldiers of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) 'who committed crimes against humanity and war crimes in Rwanda in 1994'. The latest of these calls is a 1 June letter written by 48 academicians to Ban Ki-moon, secretary general of the UN, President Barack Obama of the United States and Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the United Kingdom. We applaud the commitment of the authors to see justice done. But we are also struck by the fact that in tone, style and language this letter mimics recent letters and press statements released by Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, who during his visit to Rwanda in March 2009 laughably found a 'power of horror', as he put it in his Los Angeles Times article of 11 April 2009. The purpose of this article is to answer this persistent and – as we shall show – diversionary call for the transfer of RPF soldiers to the ICTR.

Our response is in five parts. First, notwithstanding the claims the letter makes, its practical effect is to introduce moral equivalence between the actions of those who committed the genocide and those who fought to stop them. Second, the letter ignores the circumstances of the genocide and of the events surrounding its end. Third, the letter says that Rwanda has not prosecuted RPF soldiers yet the fact is that over 46 trials of soldiers who committed crimes in 1994 have already taken place. Fourth, while there can hardly ever be a justification for the killing of civilians, the tragic history of warfare early in the 20th century and more recently in Afghanistan and Iraq shows that this will always happen, odious and unfortunate as it is. Finally, we are troubled by the selectivity of both Human Rights Watch and its supporters regarding the legal treatment of the events revolving around the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

HOW THE LETTER MAKES THE CRIMES OF RPF SOLDIERS THE MORAL EQUIVALENT OF GENOCIDE

In the third paragraph, the letter glibly states that the authors 'certainly recognize the RPF's crimes against humanity and war crimes are not comparable to the genocide, either in scope or extent'. This legalistic formulation ignores the fact that there has been a strenuous campaign by genocidaires living in exile and their families who use the evidence of crimes committed by RPF soldiers to make the odious claim that the war to stop the 1994 genocide was in effect a reverse genocide. Academicians and human rights activists are, in effect, ignoring this travesty of the truth and indirectly supporting the efforts of the revisionists and genocidaires. Indeed, the transfer of RPF soldiers to the ICTR would be the ultimate diplomatic and moral coup for the historical revisionists and genocide deniers. The trial of those who planned and executed genocide in the same court with those who put their lives in line to stop it but committed crimes in doing so is precisely the moral fillip the killers are looking for.

The real issue for debate here is how to hold everyone to account by: a) giving fair treatment to fundamentally different kind of acts; b) not giving a moral and diplomatic victory to the genocidaires; c) endangering the process of reconciliation; and d) reinforcing the views of the historical revisionists. Genocide is an exceptional crime and its unique moral repugnancy should never ever be softened by spurious comparisons with other crimes.

THE LETTER IGNORES THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE 1994 EVENTS

All historical events belong irreducibly to their time. Once events are removed from their historical context, they cannot be understood or explained. We know this much to be true: Some RPF soldiers committed crimes against humanitarian law. However, every objective account of the 1994 war invariably makes two observations: a) that the RPF was a remarkably disciplined fighting force given the circumstances; and b) the RPF as an organisation never sanctioned either revenge killings or other reprisals against the general population. The killings that occurred were committed by errant elements. Many of those who committed crimes were soldiers who arrived in theirs village and found their families exterminated and neighbours wearing clothes of the deceased, or holding their furniture and other property of the dead in their houses.

But it is also important to understand exactly how the genocide was organised and how it was stopped in order to discuss this matter in a meaningful manner. The genocide was perpetrated by the armed forces, security agencies such as the gendarmerie and the police, political party militias and, critically, a sizeable part of the general population. As studies show – including those by Human Rights Watch – enough machetes were bought to arm nearly one million men. Civilian involvement was central to the ideological and political objectives of the genocide, as well as to its efficient execution.

At the same time one must remember the extraordinary circumstances under which the war to stop the genocide was fought. The urgency of stopping the genocide as fast as possible and the acute asymmetry of means between the genocide forces backed by the government, the French, and Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) soldiers required the latter to take tremendous risks and often fight above their physical and psychological capacities. This war was not fought from the sanitised cockpit of a jet fighter. It was not fought from behind the armour-plate of tanks or armoured personnel carriers. It was fought on foot and through one decimated village after another. There was nothing to shield RPA combatants from the immediacy of the horrors of the genocide. Soldiers were crossing a blood-soaked terrain littered with the defiled and mutilated bodies of children and pregnant women. Toward the end of the war, when professional government soldiers and propagandists had understood the game was almost over, the hardest battles were fought not against soldiers but against militias and armed civilians galvanised by the radio RTLM (Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines), which used to tell them that RPA bullets were nothing but peas or pellets of water. Often individual RPA soldiers were not sure whether the civilians were killers or innocents.

The reality, as we have seen in other war zones, is that individual soldiers whose sense of proportion is cauterised by horrors beyond description often descend into bouts of violence or engage in revenge killings. Of course, they too are wrongdoers, but the burdens and psychological pressures of their personal circumstances are different from the circumstances of the killers who deliberately planned and executed mass murder. On account of these extraordinary circumstances, we categorically oppose prosecution of RPA combatants who halted the genocide and saved us in the same forum that is trying the genocidaires. Some of us do not even understand why those we consider as heroes should be tried at all, considering the sacrifices they made trying to save us while the rest of the world blankly abandoned us.

Reading the letter of the scholars, it is as if not a single RPF soldier to have committed crimes in 1994 has ever been tried. Indeed, the letter makes the patently false claim that the RPF 'never prosecuted any of its soldiers for war crimes in 1994 until this 2008 case'. That there have been over 45 indictments and trials of soldiers accused of crimes in 1994 has been completely ignored, as has the fact that those who have been convicted have actually been handed jail sentences ranging from two to 10 years. It is instructive that in one case the trial court had awarded the sentence of life imprisonment, before it was reduced to six years on appeal.

LESSONS FROM RECENT AND MORE REMOTE WESTERN HISTORY

We keenly support the advancement of international humanitarian law, not only because of its role in rendering justice in the face of gross human rights violations but particularly because it is the basis for prosecuting those who killed our families, friends and community during the 1994 genocide against the Tutsis. However, we firmly reject the formalistic and narrow interpretation favoured by Human Rights Watch and its supporters. This interpretation essentially seeks to turn the liberators and the victims that tried to defend themselves into killers. Further, this interpretation of international humanitarian law is socially and politically concocted; it ignores the utmost importance of physical security in many parts of the world. It stems from a section of Western society that has enjoyed extended economic opulence, political stability and dominance and almost total collective physical security.

Some of the scholars that signed the letter calling for the prosecution of RPA soldiers by the ICTR are known supporters of the genocidaires. Others seem to fall under the intellectual spell cast by those who argue for the unquestioned triumph of Western liberalism, characterised most profoundly by American political philosopher Francis Fukuyama's book, 'The End of History'. The end of the Cold War, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, Fukuyuma famously stated, marked 'the end point of mankind's ideological evolution and universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government'. Less than 10 years later, Fukuyama was proved wrong in a horrible turn of events. On 11 September 2001 – '9/11' – America was attacked by terrorists, the collapse of the Twin Towers claiming the lives of 2,976 innocent people. In the terms of Fukuyama, the US and more generally the Western world re-entered the realm of history; it was the first time homeland America had been attacked since Pearl Harbor. We did not rejoice in this act of terrorism; the horrors of the New York cold-blooded killings painfully reminded us of our own recent experience in the 1994 genocide. Despite the fact that the USA alongside the international community failed us in our time of need, we came to consider the USA as our friend.

But we are interested in what happened subsequently, since it relates to some of the arguments now being made against Rwanda. The 9/11 attacks sparked a security response that came to be known as the 'War on Terror', a 'war' which has allegedly led to human rights abuses under several policies adopted by the US government. These include 'enhanced interrogation techniques', special rendition – described by critics as torture by proxy – the indefinite incarceration of people accused of terrorism, and more recently, thousands of deaths resulting from air strikes by NATO troops in Afghanistan. Few of these alleged abuses have become the subject of legal prosecution under international humanitarian law.

For the sake of this discussion allow us to make comparisons, although this is in no way to seek to trivialise the atrocities of 9/11. The victims of 9/11 were less than 0.001 per cent of the American population; in contrast, in Rwanda, around one million people were killed, about 8 per cent of the total population and 75 per cent of the targeted Tutsi population.

Indeed, in terms of the magnitude and intensity of the existential threat and nature of the enemy, the events of the summer of 1994 in Rwanda could be more appropriately compared with 60 years ago during the Second World War. The war against the Nazis led to, among other outcomes, the Anglo-American bombardment of German cities. After the German bombing of London, Britain responded with an intense bombing campaign between early 1942 and 1945 –approximately 75 per cent of these bombs were dropped in commercial and densely populated residential areas. The result was that most victims were civilians – women, infants and elderly people because the men were away on military duty.

Following suit, the Americans soon abandoned their precision-bombing doctrine, and embraced the British approach toward the end of the war. Some 72 per cent of the bombs that they deployed were dropped in the last 10 months of the war after 1 July 1994, that is to say, after the Luftwaffe was defeated in April 1994 and the German armies were collapsing on all fronts. The most emblematic of these air strikes was the last great raid of the town of Dresden in February 1945 using incendiary bombs.

Another example of the deplorable side effects of warfare is the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 August 1945, which caused the deaths of countless civilians. The role of the bombings in Japan's surrender and the United States' ethical justification for them have been the subject of continuing controversy, with some critics calling the bombings a 'crime of war'. When asked about the bombing of Hiroshima during his first ever press conference in Tokyo in 1975, Emperor Hirohito answered: 'It's very regrettable that nuclear bombs were dropped and I feel sorry for the citizens of Hiroshima but it couldn't be helped because that happened in wartime.'

Finally, one could also cite the fate that befell the French civilians summarily executed (between 10,000 and 40,000; the figures are disputed) for their alleged collaboration with the Nazis during the 'épuration sauvage' phase of the country's liberation.

These figures are cited not to make what would be morally reprehensible comparisons between categories of atrocities against civilians in Europe and in Rwanda, but to underline the fact that these killings were carried out by nations that were heirs to European humanism against civilians who were in many cases certifiable non-combatants. In contrast, many of the civilian deaths that occurred in 1994 occurred in circumstances in which certifiable civilian genocidaires and combatants and militias were mixed with innocent civilians. Indeed, in its 1999 report on the genocide, Human Rights Watch itself observes that: 'It is impossible to say how many of those [killed] were active participants in the genocide or were engaged in any military action against the RPF when they were killed.'

The second lesson that recent history teaches us is that progress in these matters is not in any society a foregone conclusion.

A RACIALLY TAINTED SELECTIVITY

In 2004 the UN proclaimed a responsibility to protect, but in truth that responsibility has always been part of international humanitarian law. If Human Rights Watch and scholars who support its campaign are keen to see to it that all sides are held to account for their role in the genocide as they say, then we should scrutinise all who are in breach of their obligations. Under Article 1 of the Genocide Convention, 'Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.' There is a duty to punish genocide but, more critically, there is a legal – not merely moral – duty to prevent genocide. Indeed, the convention explicitly obliges contracting parties to call upon 'the competent organs of the United Nations to take such action under the Charter of the United Nations as they consider appropriate for the prevention and suppression of acts of genocide.'

From the beginning of 1994, General Roméo Dallaire requested in vain that his UN superiors allow him to take firm action against extremists because he had received evidence of a plot to commit mass murder against the Tutsi and the political opposition. On 21 April 1994 and two weeks after the beginning of the genocide with the killings at their most intense, the very same the UN Security Council the scholars are appealing to indict RPA soldiers shamelessly decided to reduce the UN peacekeeping force from 2,500 men to a purely symbolic 270 soldiers. This event weakened the force at its greatest hour of need and, more importantly, explicitly signalled to the genocidaires that they had the warrant of the international community to do as they wished with their victims without the interference of the UN.

Earlier, on 11 April, one of the most horrible acts of cold abandonment took place at ETO Kicukiro school in the vicinity of Kigali. A well-armed contingent of Belgian UN soldiers were protecting about 5,000 mostly Tutsi residents, who came to take refuge after the genocide began. The Interahamwe militia soon got wind of this and kept a murderous vigil around the school, day and night. On the morning of 11 April, the UN forces informed the refugees that they had orders to withdraw and that they would have to leave that very day. The pleas by the refugees that this would effectively deliver them to the killers were ignored. In an event that will forever shame the uniform of the UN forces, trained soldiers left unarmed civilians at the mercy of killers sworn to exterminate them. In desperation, some of the refugees even flung themselves in front of the moving cars. The UN forces responded to this by shooting in the air to scatter them. The dust had barely settled when the Interahamwe moved in, rounded up the unarmed refugees and marched them to Nyanza Kicukiro, a rubbish dump and start to kill them. Of the 5,000 refugees less than a hundred survived, partly because the killers got tired and a nearby platoon of RPF fighters moved in to rescue them in the night.

Yet this analysis does not even begin to deal with the moral, material and ideological support that the French government continued to give to the genocidal Rwandan government until the very end. Ironically, Human Rights Watch has been instrumental in documenting elements of French complicity in the genocide.

In March 1998 President Bill Clinton in Kigali formally apologised for the conduct of his country during the genocide. In April 2000, Belgian Prime Minster Guy Verhofstadt did the same. Four years later a representative of the UN secretary general read a message expressing Kofi Annan's regrets for the role of his organisation during the genocide.

If Human Rights Watch and the scholars that support its campaign against the RPA want bring to account every party involved in the events revolving around the genocide, why they don't call for France, the UN, Belgium and the USA to account for their deeds, be they actions or omissions?

The selectivity regarding the genocide in Rwanda that is now being pursued by these campaigners mirrors that of the International Criminal Court (ICC), which up to now only seems interested in prosecuting Africans. This selective approach neither advances the application of the international humanitarian law nor encourages poor and weak countries of the world to support any form of international justice. The evidence they see is that international justice is a one-sided affair that spares the wealthy and the powerful.

* IBUKA ('remember') is an umbrella organisation concerned with the rehabilitation of survivors of the Rwandan genocide and Rwandan society in general. AVEGA (Association of widows from the genocide Agahozo) and AERG (Association of student survivors from the genocide) are associations involved in IBUKA.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Who owns the rain on Rodrigues island?

Alain Leveque

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56857

cc BaejaarWith the inhabitants of the island of Rodrigues forced to purchase their water from the Rodrigues Water Company (RWC), Alain Leveque laments the commoditisation of the country's natural resource. The privately-run yet government-owned RWC has installed water meters under a user-pay system without being obliged to consult the Rodriguan population. Leveque argues that not only does the RWC's monopoly inhibit innovation and threaten price hikes, it also indicates a trend towards privatisation in direct opposition to locals' rights and representation.

It’s official. Greed is no longer cool. As turbocharged capitalism implodes and jobless queues swell, sensible governments have had to slip the bonds of laissez faire dogma to prop up their economies. The ‘free-market’ model is on the nose. Unfettered global creditors have plunged much of the developed world into debt-bondage; these days, their enforcers, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank wield the structural readjustment stick with renewed vigour. And it slashes to the bone. Reeling from this brigandage some countries are starting to cut their own cloth to fit their circumstances. Troubled times demand it! But I did say some, not all. Here in the islands of Mauritius and its colonially attached dependency Rodrigues, the enforcers still have the run of the mill and, sometimes, they even get to run the mill.

Inspired by neoliberal overkill, an awestruck local administration has taken to Rodrigues's public sector with a wrecking ball, putting up companies in its stead. Public–private sector partnership and privately-run but government-owned companies now rule the roost. This time, one lucky company has hit the jackpot: our water. That is, Rodrigues's local administration has set it up to sell the people their own water. Mind you, by local administration I really mean the ruling Labour party in Mauritius, from whom the nodding puppets get their orders, and for whom they now spin this anti-human policy.

First some background: Citing a lack of local expertise, and the need for a separate specialist agency to improve efficiency, Rodrigues's chief commissioner disbands the water unit and, amid bitter party in-fighting, shunts the incumbent water commissioner aside and snaps up the commission for himself. The government establishes the privately-run but government-owned Rodrigues Water Company (RWC), effectively outsourcing to itself. Water meters are promptly installed for the user-pay system. And in classic like-it-or-lump-it style, public consultation follows the fait accompli. Rodriguans are reassured that new regulations will safeguard against future water privatisation.

Somehow, I detect a less noble instinct behind this political pantomime. Here’s why: if the government were really serious about keeping water in public hands, why didn’t they simply improve the existing public utility to make it more efficient, to iron out the kinks and, if needed, to bring expert consultants to the commissioner’s table? Incidentally, costly imported experts have been doing their sophisticated rain-dance with negligible results since British rule and what’s more, with all the money thrown at this problem since, we could have built a brand new aircraft carrier. Okay, I exaggerate. The point is, the money is gone but the problem is still here. Why? Evidently, no one could make it rain but they will now! In the crudest monstering of the truth, we are told that this cockamamie scheme will modernise and develop our country. No it won’t. In reality, it will bring grief and misery to the poor, while making those who eventually get to own the company filthy rich.

No matter the slant, when we get to the nitty-gritty, it distils down to a cash grab. Taxpayers paid for water infrastructure, and will continue to pay for major repairs, works and reservoirs. And since the RWC won’t churn out any desalinated water, or treat grey water, or produce a single drop of water that does not fall from the sky, water restrictions will remain. Indeed, in future we may have to pay more for less. The RWC will simply commandeer taxpayer-funded infrastructure, submit an annual uncooked report to the administration, check meters on taps, tip a bit of chlorine in our water and sell it back to us. Oh, and make money in its sleep.

Given that the RWC is in the business of profit and not cost recovery or conservation, won’t it be tempted to sell more instead of less of this scarce resource? More importantly, as Rodrigues's population increases, family-based food production using today’s methods should be supported to boost food-security. Water is what fires up our small agrarian economy, and charging subsistence farmers and no-income families for its use will discourage many from working their land, hence, making the country more dependent on food imports. And expenses passed on from growers to consumers will add to the ever-increasing cost of living.

Also, as water in Rodrigues is a natural monopoly, what incentive will the RWC have to drive up quality and drive down prices? Or what’s to stop it hiking up prices? Here, water companies have form: In South Africa, Ghana and Uruguay, among others, charges have risen from 25 per cent up to 600 per cent since meters were introduced. In Bolivia, families had to pay a third of their income in water rates, until the company was chased out of town. On 1 July this year, Australia’s water rates will go up by 60 per cent over four years.

Yet we are led to believe that our yes-minister administration will keep the lid on greed, and ward off the werewolf lobby too. Buy that? It’s odds-on that Rodriguans will have to pay for water usage and sewerage disposal fees, followed later by water and sewerage service fees. 'Service fee' is shorthand for an ongoing maintenance charge, though most pipes wouldn’t have seen daylight for decades. The tough truth is Rodriguans will be stuck with a regular water bill whether they actually use water or not. And these charges always go up. In desperation, people who can’t pay source polluted water from creeks and faraway boreholes. Without water there’s disease. Sanitation and hygiene of the poor, disabled, elderly, ill and unemployed suffer, and the resultant healthcare cost is borne by taxpayers, not water companies. These companies generally bring in their own people, who have no stake in the community and its environment. And as they can hire and fire with less scrutiny than the public sector, they soon degenerate into closed-shops. Public complaints fall on deaf ears and transparency suffers. Conscious of these facts, the Netherlands recently passed laws banning the privatisation of water.

If indeed the vista for Rodrigues is not to turn the entire island over to private companies, then it’s a no-brainer that in the long term, the true cost of water distribution is always cheaper if funded publicly – and kept public.

At the best of times Rodriguans live wretched lives; the heart-souring suicide rate speaks volumes. According to the World Bank, 37.5 per cent of Rodrigues's population lives below the poverty line. Here there are no lush golf courses, pampered lawns and manicured nature strips, and no irrigation to speak of. Cyclical drought triggers severe and widespread water restriction. Water is scarce, and subsistence farmers depend on it to grow food crops to feed their families and keep livestock. But here, need plays second fiddle to greed. Here’s the go: If at the height of the worst recession in 75 years a supposed workers' party can give the nod to commodify our water and make customers of its citizens, what’s to stop it handballing the health sector and the police over to other companies down the track? Nowhere is the abject failure of representative democracy more apparent than on this small island, among this people born out of fire. Yet again, the unrepresented poor are paying for the sins of others.

Once the dust settles and the RWC becomes commercially attractive, I suspect that it will go to the right bidder quicker than you can say 'paving the road for privatisation'. And here’s the immaculate misconception: Despite the fact that some of the world’s great constitutions are being circumvented with consummate ease, Rodrigues's local regulations will miraculously act as a rigid bulwark against the future privatisation of our water. Cop the ironclad guarantee: Those with the numbers in the regional assembly will have to listen to the concerns of the minority before privatising. Okay they’ll listen, then they’ll privatise.

At any rate it matters not, for when Port Louis decides to privatise, all – and I mean all – members of the regional assembly will put their hands up and baa in unison. And yet our brothers and sisters still tear each other apart along party lines, so that the few can build McMansions and drive cars worth more than houses. How silly are we! We vote; they betray. We forget; they rebuild trust. We vote again; they betray again. And in an orgy of opportunism comes the latest betrayal: The most fundamental of rights, the right to water, thus the right to life, is to be made a commodity. That is, let those who can pay live, and those who cannot die. If we break away from that logic, then the constitutional right-to-life guarantee is not worth the paper it’s written on.

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

AFRICOM to continue under Obama

Daniel Volman

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/56855

cc MateusWith the Obama administration set to oversee significant increases in US security assistance programmes for African countries, Daniel Volman examines the US government's plans for its military operations on the African continent over the coming financial year. Stressing that the US president is essentially continuing the policies outlined under his predecessor George W. Bush, the author considers the proposed funding increases for initiatives like the Foreign Military Financing programme and the International Military Education and Training (IMET) programme. Pointing out that the administration is yet to offer any public explanation of its policy, Volman concludes that it would be a mistake to assume that there will be no US military action if the situation in Somalia deteriorates.

At the beginning of May 2009, President Obama submitted his first budget request to Congress. The Obama administration’s budget for the 2010 financial year proposes significant increases in US security assistance programmes for African countries and for the operations of the new US Africa Command (AFRICOM). This shows that – at least initially – the administration is following the course laid down for AFRICOM by the Bush administration, rather than putting these programmes on hold until it can conduct a serious review of US security policy towards Africa. This article outlines the administration’s plans for Africa in the coming year and the money it intends to spend on military operations on the continent.

FOREIGN MILITARY FINANCING

The Obama administration proposes maintaining or significantly increasing funding for the Foreign Military Financing programme, which provides loans for the sale of weaponry and other military equipment to a number of African countries. The administration’s request raises the total funding for arms sales to Africa from $8.3 million in financial year (FY) 2009 to $25.6 million in FY 2010. The new funding includes funding for arms sales to Chad ($500,000), the Democratic Republic of Congo ($2.5 million), Djibouti ($2.5 million), Ethiopia ($3 million), Kenya ($1 million), Liberia ($9 million), Nigeria ($1.4 million), South Africa ($800,000) and African regional programmes ($2.8 million).

INTERNATIONAL MILITARY EDUCATION AND TRAINING

The Obama administration proposes small increases in the International Military Education and Training (IMET) programmes for African counties, raising the total funding for this programme from $13.8 million in FY 2009 to $16 million in FY 2010. Significant increases in funding are requested for Chad ($400,000), Djibouti ($350,000), Ethiopia ($775,000), Ghana ($850,000), Kenya ($1,050,000), Liberia ($525,000), Mali ($350,000), Niger ($250,000), Nigeria ($1,100,000), Rwanda ($500,000), Senegal ($1,100,000), South Africa ($900,000) and Uganda ($550,000). The United States will continue its major IMET programme in the Democratic Republic of Congo ($500,000), and the Obama administration is proposing to start new IMET programmes in Equatorial Guinea ($40,000), Somalia ($40,000) and Zimbabwe ($40,000).

PEACEKEEPING OPERATIONS

The Obama administration proposes major new funding for security assistance provided through the Peacekeeping Operations programme. The FY 2010 budget proposal includes increasing funding for the Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Partnership – from $15 million in FY 2009 to $20 million in FY 2010 – and for the East Africa Regional Strategic Initiative – from $5 million in FY 2009 to $10 million in FY 2010. It also includes $42 million to continue operations in support of the implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Accords in southern Sudan, $10 million to continue operations to create a professional 2,000-member armed force in Liberia, $21 million to continue operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo to reform the military (including the creation of rapid reaction force for the eastern Congo), and $3.6 million for the Africa Conflict Stabilization and Border Security Program, which will be used to support monitoring teams, advisory assistance, training, infrastructure enhancements, and equipment in the Great Lakes region, the Mano River region, the Horn of Africa, Chad, and the Central African Republic. The budget request also includes $67 million to support the African Union Mission in Somalia. And it contains a request for $96.8 million for the Global Peace Operations Initiative (GPOI). The request for GPOI includes funding for the African Contingency Operations and Training Assistance Program (ACOTA) – which provides training and equipment to African military forces to enhance their peacekeeping capabilities – although the specific amount requested for ACOTA is not provided in the budget summary.

INTERNATIONAL NARCOTICS CONTROL AND LAW ENFORCEMENT

The budget request for International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement (INCLE) programs contains $24 million for Sudan to support implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Accords (CPA) in southern Sudan and to assist programmes to stabilise Darfur by providing technical assistance and training for southern Sudan’s criminal justice sector and law enforcement institutions as well as to contribute to UN civilian police and formed police units in southern Sudan and Darfur. It also includes funds for police reforms in the DRC; for training, infrastructure, and equipment for police units in Liberia; to operate the American-run International Law Academy in Gaborone, Botswana; and to create a Regional Security Training Center for West, Central, and North Africa. The Obama administration is also asking for funding to be provided through the INCLE programmes for the first time to provide security assistance to countries participating in the Trans-Saharan Counter-Terrorism Partnership: Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, Niger, Chad and Nigeria.

NON-PROLIFERATION, ANTI-TERRORISM, DE-MINING AND RELATED PROGRAMMES

The Obama administration proposes to almost double funding for counter-terrorism programmes. These include the Anti-Terrorism Assistance Program, which provides training to countries throughout the world; the Terrorist Interdiction Program/Personal Identification, Secure Comparison, and Evaluation System Program, which supports identification and watch listing systems to 18 countries (including Kenya); the Counterterrorism Financing Program, which helps partner countries throughout the world stop the flow of money to terrorists; and the Counterterrorism Engagement Program, which is intended to strengthen ties with key political leaders throughout the world and 'build political will at senior levels in partner nations for shared counterterrorism challenges'.

AFRICOM

The Obama administration's proposed FY 2010 budget for the Department of Defense requests some $300 million in operation and maintenance funds to cover the cost of AFRICOM operations and Operation Enduring Freedom-Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Partnership operations at the AFRICOM headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany. The administration is also requesting $263 million to provide additional personnel, airlift and communications support to AFRICOM. And the budget includes a request for a total of $451 million to replace or upgrade facilities at enduring CENTCOM and AFRICOM locations, but does not provide a separate figure for AFRICOM. According to the budget, the administration intends to carry out significant investment at Camp Lemonier in FY 2010. In addition, the administration is requesting $30 million to pay the annual lease for the 500-acre base at Camp Lemonier in Djibouti and $170 million to cover the annual operational budget of the base.

The administration is requesting some $400 million for Global Train and Equip (Section 1206) programmes, some $200 million for Security and Stabilization Assistance (Section 1207) programmes, and some $1 million for the Combatant Commander’s Initiative Fund. This money will be used primarily to pay for emergency training and equipment, the services of personnel from the State Department, and humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi and Afghani armed forces, but it will be available for the use of AFRICOM as well. The administration’s budget request also contains $1.9 billion to buy three Littoral Combat Ships and another $373 million to buy two Joint High Speed Vessels, ships that will play a crucial role in US Navy operations off the coast of Africa. It also includes $44 billion to fund US Navy operations throughout the world – of which a significant proportion will be needed to cover the costs of US Navy operations in African waters – but the budget does not provide enough information to estimate these costs.

SECURITY POLICY TOWARD THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO AND SOMALIA

Obama administration officials have not said anything in public to explain why they are proceeding with the Bush administration’s plan to increase US security assistance to African countries and to expand US military activities on the continent. General William Ward, commander of AFRICOM, at a news conference that he held during his visit to Kinshasa in April 2009, provided one of the few pieces of evidence we have about the administration’s thinking. The United States will continue working in training and advising the armed forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo 'to help the host nation build capacity to more effectively conduct its military operations and provide for its own security.' The United States currently has a seven-member mobile training team training Congolese military officers. This training, Ward said at the news conference, is intended 'to support the increased professionalization of the Congolese armed forces as best we can as they work to bring security and stability here in Congo.' This suggests that President Obama – despite his rhetorical commitment to multilateralism and 'soft power' and the abysmal record of military incompetence and human rights violations by the Congolese armed forces – is convinced that unilateral US military involvement can still work and that he can succeed where his predecessor failed.

The only other indication we have about the president’s true intentions is provided by his decision to authorise the use of force to rescue the kidnapped captain of the Maersk Alabama in May 2009. When he was a candidate, President Obama declared that he believed that 'there will be situations that require the United States to work with its partners in Africa to fight terrorism with lethal force.' But his action during the kidnapping episode show that he is also willing to use military force in situations that have nothing to do with terrorism. According to recent news articles, a debate is currently underway within the administration about the wisdom of direct US military intervention against Somali pirates or against the al-Shabaab insurgents. Top administration officials and military officers are convinced that, in the words of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, 'there is no purely military solution' to piracy and political conflict in Somalia. And Johnnie Carson, the president’s new assistant secretary of state for Africa, told the BBC that 'there would be no case of the US re-engaging on the ground with troops' in Somalia. But some in the military and a number of prominent neo-conservative leaders contend that the United States must strike back at the pirates and the insurgents to prevent future acts of piracy and terrorism against Americans. It would be a mistake to assume that Obama will not take further military action if the situation in Somalia escalates.

* Daniel Volman is the director of the African Security Research Project in Washington, DC, and a member of the board of directors of the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars.
* For more information, see the Department of State, Summary and Highlights for International Affairs Function 150: Fiscal Year 2010 Budget Request, and the Department of Defense, Fiscal Year 2010 Budget Request: Summary Justification.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

'Supporting right and opposing wrong'?: Uganda's NRM

Vincent Nuwagaba

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/56905

cc P PriceWhile Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni remains keen to stress his National Resistance Movement (NRM) party's increasing popularity in the country's north, Vincent Nuwagaba decries the deliberate fusing of party and state activities. With the NRM able to command all the financial resources the state's coffers will allow, Nuwagaba laments the discrimination directed at Ugandans supporting opposition parties and stresses the need for the country to become a genuine meritocracy.

The 27 May 2009 lead story in New Vision was entitled 'Museveni vows to win over North'. The headline forced me to read between the lines to find out the reasons advanced. I found however no plausible reason, save the recent performance in the local council by-elections in which according to President Yoweri Museveni the National Resistance Movement (NRM) performed better.

The president reportedly made these remarks as he was opening the NRM National Executive Committee (NEC) which ironically was hosted at the state house using taxpayers’ money. This implies that the NRM and President Museveni have no appreciation of the fact that we are in a multiparty dispensation, or if they do, they have either inadvertently or deliberately continued the fusion of the NRM party with the state. Museveni reportedly said, 'Northern Uganda with proper interaction will become the bedrock for the NRM because of the historical principled stand of the party. The NRM always supports right and opposes wrong'. With these comments in mind, I find it prudent to raise the following critical issues:

- The NRM’S 'good performance' in northern Uganda, as in any other region, is not necessarily as a result of the increasing popularity of the party but a function of multidimensional factors. The NRM has abused the spirit of multi-partyism, whose basic idea is that no party should use state resources to fund its activities. The president has fused party activities with state activities to the extent that even when he is on the prosperity-for-all campaign – or any other national programme – he is at the same time encouraging support for his party. In effect, he uses state resources to run party activities at the expense of other parties. One finds that since the 2006 general elections, opposition parties have hardly managed a tenth of the mobilisation that the NRM has done. Therefore, it is as plain as a pikestaff that the ground is not level.

- Coupled with the above, NRM candidates have unlimited financial resources from state coffers. This money they use to bribe the voters and buy logistics for the electorate. Like the English say, he who pays the piper calls the tune. In my region – western Uganda – I have hardly seen anyone winning without money. It is also true that many people who openly support opposition parties are denied jobs, tenders and contracts, and if in business they are heavily taxed, while open NRM supporters are given tax waivers or even loans from the Bank of Uganda which are later written off. This denies opposition parties the support of sympathetic businesspersons, who fear campaigning for their parties lest they lose their businesses. On the other hand, NRM-leaning business people rigorously, vehemently and strenuously campaign for their party.

The NRM’s support for right and opposition of wrong is highly disputable. As long as one does not threaten the desire of the president to retain power, regardless of what they do, they will always get away with it. In fact, impunity has become the order of the day, with the security forces – notably the military and the police – torturing people while citing orders from above.

I personally have been a victim of such impunity, which has spread throughout our country. Besides, if the NRM genuinely supported right and opposed wrong, we would not have our very few graduates languishing without jobs while people who forge academic documents steal them. The government is yet to put mechanisms in place to track these criminals down.

If the NRM supported right and opposed wrong, the talk of the marginalisation of the people from the north wouldn’t arise; the president wouldn’t run this country through his family, relatives, in-laws and cronies; sectarianism and nepotism would have been destroyed root and branch; we would have an independent judiciary and a functional parliament; we wouldn’t have special interest groups' representatives such as the youth, workers and the Uganda People’s Defence Forces fused with the NRM; we wouldn’t have flagrant and wanton abuse of human rights; torture would be unheard of and the NRM would not bother bribing voters to support it, for their achievements would speak for themselves.

Many voters have told me that they accept bribes, because they know even if they didn’t they would still have to suffer from a lack of drugs in health centres, from potholes, power blackouts, excessive taxes and continued unemployment. We have witnessed a wave of institutional dysfunction as a result of the inadvertent failure or deliberate refusal of the National Resistance Movement to support right and oppose wrong.

Sadly, the government thrives on voter ignorance and poverty, which it exploits to remain in power. This explains why if the NRM is to stay in power for the next 10 years we are likely to have more than 200 districts with around 1000 sub- districts. This the NRM does purely for political expediency. All we want are services, not worthless districts.

A 'good performance' in the recent local council elections is not what people of the north and all well-intentioned Ugandans want. Ugandans want quality services and equal opportunities on the basis of meritocracy, not patron–client relations. I am not from northern Uganda, but I think people from the north and any other region should cast their vote based on serious issues. For instance, if they are assured that they will not be treated as second-rate citizens. Let the president give the northerners jobs, build them roads, hospitals, schools and equip them with drugs and scholastic materials. Let them partake in state house scholarships, which to date have been the preserve of a few people with particular physical features; dark complexion of the gum and pointed noses. I hope I will not be accused of fanning sectarian sentiments, because all I am doing is condemning the practice thereof.

As we talk now, the calls for secession still simmer among the greater north parliamentarians. But I have been told by one member of parliament that the Ugandan media has been barred from debating it. If Museveni genuinely wants to win over the north, let him have a roundtable with the region’s politicians, civil society activists, academics, religious leaders and all other opinion leaders to share with them their demands. After all, it is he who wears the shoe that knows where it pinches.

As regards the historical principled stand of the NRM, I think that would sound like hogwash and an utter insult to the people of northern Uganda. If I were from the north, I would be asking of the historical principled stand of pushing us to the margins where the term 'marginalisation' comes from. Giving us leftovers from the national cake? Calling us derogatory names such as 'anyanya', 'badugudugu' and 'bakooko' (beasts)? Which historical principled stand? In fact, on the basis of that historical principled stand, the north shouldn’t give a single vote to the NRM, because the president seems to insinuate that the status quo will not change. The north wants an equitable distribution of the national cake, not the president's usual platitudes.

The NRM may win the northern vote come 2011, but little will change in the lives of Ugandans from the north. If genuine transformation is to be realised in both northern Uganda and the country as a whole, the solution will be to extricate Uganda from Museveni's clutches. Otherwise, we shall continue witnessing massive wealth alongside massive poverty with those who have primitively accumulated wealth from the top fighting to maintain the status quo.

The president has deliberately decided to swerve from his blueprint, the 10-point programme and his inaugural speech of 29 January 1986. He has broken so many promises that he feels uncomfortable if one reminds him of his manifestoes, his past speeches and his own book, 'What is Africa’s Problem?', because all he castigated therein is what he has wholeheartedly perfected, effected and embraced.

I must however commend the president for conceding corruption as the evil confronting his party. But I am sure he is merely targeting donor funds, especially from the Millennium Challenge Account which promises aid to fight corruption. Otherwise, the president cannot absolve himself from corruption. He has often ordered the Central Bank to bail out pro-NRM businessmen, and there is no proof that the monies lent to them have been recovered.

I disagree with the president’s narrow confinement of corruption to over-invoicing, bribery and people behaving parasitically with regard to investors. We must add nepotism, sectarianism, perjury and all other sorts of aberrations, deviations from the norm, and abuse and misuse of power and office. We have people who print documents and use them to get jobs. We also have people who hire mercenaries to do their coursework and exams and virtually all of them are well-placed. Our dear president doesn’t look at this as corruption. As long as patronage remains the basis for recruiting office bearers, we shall always compromise quality for political expediency. And as I have stated before, if fake people are hired, what would stop them from perpetuating the system that saw them assume office? Corruption will always beget corruption.

* Vincent Nuwagaba is a political scientist cum human rights activist.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

The future of the Kenyan constitution

Kenyans Eyes From The Diaspora Group

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/56897

cc Tom Maruko'It is a practical impossibility to have in place in Kenya a good constitution with the current breed of leaders, because most of them are tainted with corruption and do not have any value for human lives'' Kenyans Eyes From The Diaspora Group has said in an open letter to the Kenyan prime minister and president. The group says that the reason reforms of the country's constitution have taken so long to implement is because those in power fear that amendments would jeopardise their political careers. The letter, which also includes extracts from a draft constitution developed by the group, pleads with the African Union to put in place peacekeeping forces well in advance of Kenyas's 2012 elections.

To:
The UNO
The AU
The Kenya President
The Kenya Prime Minister

RE: THE FUTURE OF KENYANS AND KENYA IN THE CONSTITUTION

The debate about the Kenya constitution dates back in 1989 when a number of high ranking government ministers went all over Kenya collecting views from the public in what was called the Saitoti review commission. Millions of Kenya shillings were spent on that exercise. Up to this day no one knows the fate of all what was done by the commission. It is now 20 years since the first talk about the constitution began. Every time when the elections gets closer the talk about the constitution and other issues which affect Kenyans, are raised by those aspiring to take leadership positions in Kenya. Everything about the constitution, fades soon as elections are over. Today there is an uproar about the constitution review process.

Pressures from all quarters, are being exerted on the Kenyan leadership to implement reforms. What is not exactly clear is the readiness, honesty and genuineness of the current leaders to draft an acceptable competent constitution that will contain and control the corrupt, brutal, arrogant, tyrant and dictatorial Kenya leaders. During the referendum of 2007, the two forms and types of the two constitution drafts did not provide comprehensive safeguards to save Kenyans from tyrants and dictators, who from time to time, have been violating the good sections of the existing Kenya constitution. For example; the protection of Kenyans and their properties and the freedom of ownership of properties anywhere in Kenya by any Kenyan, are enshrined in the current Kenya constitution. This is very well defined in the existing constitution yet Kenyans have continued to lose their lives and their properties every now and then. The Kenyan leaders have continued to violate the exiting constitution with immunity. The unlucky and unfortunate nation of Kenya has been a victim of brutality and arrogance from its own corrupt leaders whose envy is to loot public funds and to enact bad laws which hurt Kenyans.

They have continued to increase their salaries every moment, even when Kenyans are dying of hunger and poverty. In 1980, the Kenya members of parliament kept silent after the former president Moi unconstitutionally invalidated the union for the Kenya civil servants through a dictatorial decree. Following the invalidation, the civil servants lost billions of Kenya shillings in form of assets, properties and a lot of money in various banks all over Kenya estimated to be worth Ksh60 billion, a wealth they had accummulated since 1959. In 1982 the Kenya parliament enacted a law which made Kenya a one political party state. In 1986 the same members of Kenya parliament removed the security of tenure of the offices of the attorney general, the judges, the public service commission , the controller and auditor general. As recently as September 2007, the Kenya members of parliament through an act parliament, pardoned all members of parliament, who committed atrocities and other crimes before 2003.

The same members of parliament, for a number of months, aggressively demanded for blanket amnesty for all those who financed, sponsored and all others who were involved in the post election violence, before the Waki Commission of Inquiry into the post election violence was formed. The members of parliament, also gave Hon. Ruto, who was accused of involvement in the maize scandal, a clean bill of health. Most members of the Kenya parliament cannot be relied upon to draft a good constitution for Kenyans. They have looted so much money from the public offers and they have grabbed so much public land, such that drafting a good constitution for Kenya, is to them committing suicide.

This is what the outside world does not understand. They are already compromised. In order for Kenya to have positive change that can be beneficial to Kenyans and which can enable them to realise good governance, there should be a house clean up or a revolutionary change. It is a practical impossibility to have in place in Kenya a good constitution with the current breed of leaders, because most of them are tainted with corruption and do not have any value for human lives. Those same Kenya leaders have been inciting Kenyans to kill one another and they have been watching Kenyans die from hunger and poverty as they exhorbitantly increase their salaries year after year.

The Kenyans Eyes from the Diaspora Group has a draft constitution which would provide good governance for more than 400 years of comfort and peace for Kenyans. The draft with the Kenyans Eyes from the Diaspora Group has the following areas of concern which form part of the constitution draft:

- Structures which prevent corruption and political murders.
- Structures which fully protect Kenyans and their properties.
- Structures which give the parliament powers to cross examine presidential appointees and approve those capable and/or dismiss those found not capable.
- Structures which redefine the roll of the police in times of internal conflicts, chaos and/or demonstrations.
- Structures which redefine the rolls of mayors, the provincial commissioners, and their junior officers
- Structures which prevent the abuse of powers by the president and the parliament.
- Structures which allow intellectuals and men of integrity to explore the biography and the proven abilities of any would be leader in Kenya in any capacity, with the provision of powers and authority to grill and thoroughly interview those would be leaders to determine their fitness and competence to lead.
- Structures which provide adequate penalties for those who harass, intimidate, suppress or kill others for reasons of election misunderstanding, land disputes or any other disagreements.
- Structures which provide methods and ways of equal distribution of the natural resources including grants and loans given to Kenya.
- Structures which define penalties and the prosecution processes of those who violate any clause in the existing constitution in Kenya.
- Structures which decentralise certain powers for proper and efficient governance at both the district and provincial levels of governance.

The drafting of the new Kenya constitution has taken so long because those involved in the exercise, are the same people who have been looting public funds and have been committing various atrocities which involve among others, political murders, sponsoring and financing mass killing of innocent Kenyans. Over 800 Kenyans were killed in less than a week in 1991 and over 1,200 Kenyans were killed in 2008 in one week.

In both incidents, the Kenya politicians sponsored and financed the killings. So, any constitution drawn by them, will avoid certain important areas which they think, may jeopardise their future political ambitions, because of their past bad records. Going by what happened in January 2008, the ODM (Orange Democratic Movement) leaders and PNU (Party of National Unity) leaders were to blame.

The Kenyans Eyes from the Diaspora Group wish to plead with the UNO and the AU to be prepared enough in 2012. There should be in place a peace keeping force ready four months before Kenyans 2012 elections. The worst may happen especially because most political opportunists and those greedy for leadership in Kenya, now understand that the qualifications and the license for power sharing, is to have a private militia force, strong enough to cause havoc that can command recognition, both locally and internationally.

Sincerely,

Isaac Newton Kinity
Former secretary general, Kenya Civil Servants Union and executive director of Kenyans Eyes from the Diaspora Group

Kimani wa Gachahi
Former health officer, Kenya and secretary/coordinator Kenyans Eyes from the Diaspora Group

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

Tired of 'leaders of the people'

A letter of protest to governments and politicians in Africa

Lord Aikins Adusei

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/56907

cc Tom MarukoIn a lyrical letter of protest to politicians in Africa, Lord Aikins Adusei writes that people are tired of their self-proclaimed leaders. 'You have consistently ignored all our cry for help even though you know our plights very well', Adusei says, chronicling the challenges faced by people across the continent from poor housing and education to torture and war. 'Aren't you ashamed that after all these years of independence your people cannot feed themselves; cannot read and write; rely on handouts from Europe and America; and the youth are in a hurry to leave the continent for you?', Adusei asks, before closing with the words of caution:'We are watching.'

Dear Presidents/Prime ministers,

On behalf of the poor people of Africa, I send you this protest letter. We are angry. Yes we the people are very angry. We have endured your ill conceived, hash and austere economic and social policies for quite too long. We have watched silently to see you and your cronies enjoy while we the masses continue to suffer. We have no jobs, no income, no savings and have no place to lay our heads while you and your selected few live in mansions at the expense of the very poor you are refusing to take care of. You have consistently ignored all our cry for help even though you know our plights very well.

Are you not appalled by the scale of poverty and the living condition of the people? Are you not appalled to see children selling on the street instead of being in the classroom? Are you not appalled to see children sleeping rough on the streets of our capital cities and scavenging for food while you and you cronies frequent between five star hotels? Don't you care about the dignity of the people you claim to be serving? For years you have asked us to sacrifice and even today we are still sacrificing, but anytime we look at you and your circle of friends we see that you are in a different suit, in a different four wheel drive, in a different hotel, and in a company of ladies, surrounded by bodyguards. How many more years should we continue to sacrifice and tighten our belts why you and your cronies enjoy from our sweat? We cannot continue any longer. No we cannot.

We are tired of all of you who call yourself leaders of the people. We are tired of the dictatorships, media censorship, torture, force imprisonment, wars and the instabilities. We are tired of being refugees. We are tired of seeing our children die of common preventable diseases. We are tired of sharing water from the same source with animals, water infested with bacteria and viruses. We are tired of lack of access to education, health, energy, food, medicines, shelter and clothing. We are tired of having to work with cutlasses and hoes in this 21st century. We are tired of having to rely on nature to plant our crops. We are tired of having to plant without fertilizers. We are tired of having to use 18th century seeds that yield next to nothing. We are tired of having to endure poverty, starvation, diseases, humiliation, torture, oppression, in your hands.

Above all, we are tired of your excesses. We are tired of your corrupt practices and the looting of the treasuries. Your foreign bank accounts are swollen with hundreds of millions of dollars, pounds and Euros while hundreds of millions of people live on one dollar a day.

We are tired of you using our money to procure arms for your own protection while children go to school barefooted and on empty stomach; while hospitals are without essential medicines; while factories are folding up for lack of electricity; and while harvested crops remain in the bush for lack of good roads. We are tired of all your inactions, the wait and see and the do nothing approaches to problem solving.

There are many of you that we have not chosen or asked to lead us yet are carrying themselves as our leaders. Such people we demand should retire and allow elections to take place. We demand an end to torture in Egypt and starvation in Ethiopia and Zimbabwe. We demand an end to the dictatorial rule in Libya, Egypt, Cameroon, Gabon, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Uganda and the Gambia. We demand an end to the instabilities in DR. Congo, Sudan, Somalia, Northern Uganda, Chad and Madagascar. We demand an end to the genocide in Darfur and the killing of innocent children, women and civilians.

We demand an end to the official corruption and graft in Nigeria, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Angola, DR. Congo, Chad, South Africa and Guinea. We demand an end to the eroding of democratic values in Ethiopia, Nigeria, Egypt, Mauritania, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon and Gabon. We demand an end to the use of the continent as a hub for cocaine shipment to Europe.

We demand better public services now. We demand better education, health, transport and telecommunication infrastructures now. We demand affordable housing now. We demand irrigation facilities, tractors, equipment and improved seeds for our farmers now. You've asked us to tighten our belts while you have loosened yours. This cannot go on any more. We are starving to death while you are developing protruding bellies. You are having lavish birthday parties when cholera and starvation is threatening us.

We demand a share in the revenue from the sale of oil, gas, gold, diamond, timber, cocoa, coffee, coltan, manganese, copper, bauxite and tin ore. We demand a say in the way your governments are run; a say in the way you and your ministers are selected. We demand a say in the way you spend our money; and a say in the way contracts are awarded. It is not going to be business as usual anymore. We demand change now. We demand probity and accountability now. We demand political action to solve the numerous problems facing we the people.

Look at the world around you. Don't you see or hear what is going in Asia, Latin America, Europe and North America? Can't you see that you and your people are being left behind? When you meet with your colleagues in Africa or sit in your offices, how many of the things you see or use are made here in Africa? Aren't you ashamed that after ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty years in power your people still use hoes and cutlasses for farming, tools their forefathers used before they were colonised? Aren't you ashamed that after all these years of independence your people cannot feed themselves; cannot read and write; rely on handouts from Europe and America; and the youth are in a hurry to leave the continent for you? Can't you see?

Well, a word to the wise is enough but remember that you can fool some of the people all the time and all the people some of the time but you cannot fool all the people all the time. We are watching.

* This article first appeared in Modern Ghana.
* Lord Aikins Adusei is an activist and anti-corruption campaigner. He blogs at www.iloveafrica2.blogspot.com.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Pan-Africanist inspiration: The Julius Nyerere Intellectual Festival Week

Gacheke Gachihi

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/56906

From left, Olivier Fanon, Gacheke Gachihi
and an Algerian diplomat in Tanzania
(cc Gacheke Gachihi)Following his attendance at the Julius Nyerere Intellectual Festival Week from 13 to 17 2009 in Dar es Salaam, Gacheke Gachihi discusses the engaging talks given by speakers like Issa G. Shivji, Oliver Fanon and Adebayo Olukoshi and the inspiration he draws from the Pan-Africanist struggle.

From the 13 to 17 April 2009 the University of Dar es Salaam experienced moments of great reflection and soul searching. Travelling from various parts of Africa and the world to grace this great occasion, comrades, intellectuals, students and members of social movements reflected on the great contribution made by Mwalimu Julius Nyerere and Kwame Nkrumah to Africa's liberation struggle from colonialism and the continent's unity under the banner of Pan-Africanism.

The intellectual festival was organised by the Mwalimu Nyerere chair of Pan-African Studies Issa G. Shivji and the University of Dar es Salaam. As we navigated Dar es Salaam and its main bus terminus Ubungo toward the intellectual hill – as it was commonly known in the famous days of the Guyanese revolutionary Walter Rodney – we had mixed feelings of hope and despair. These are feelings that universities in Africa have undoubtedly suffered in the neoliberal onslaught of the past two decades, but the Mwalimu Nyerere Intellectual Festival inspired us that African universities and progressive, organic intellectuals have continued to resist and advance ideological struggles against neoliberal forces. African universities can recapture the university space as the central battleground of ideas, and revitalise themselves to participate in the continent's liberation project from imperial powers, neocolonial agents and despots that keep the African masses in bondage.

The debates, songs, poems and lectures that took place during these five days were a great eye-opener to many young people, students from Dar es Salaam's university and especially to me and a comrade from Bunge La Mwananchi social movement. We had travelled from Nairobi for some 13 hours by road to make an appointment with this historic moment of remembering Mwalimu Julius Nyerere and Kwame Nkrumah, the father of African unity.

As we entered the historic Nkrumah Hall in the entrance, there was a billboard of Mwalimu Nyerere and Fidel Castro. Engraved on the billboard were the words of a Fidel Castro speech given to South Africa's parliament in Cape Town in 1996 that read: 'An avoidable and deep economic crisis, perhaps the worst in history, is threatening all of us today. I only know that great crises have always delivered great solutions; I have confidence in the intelligence of people and of man. I have confidence in the need for humanity to survive … let there be more generosity, more cooperation and more humanity.'

These words captured a moment when the seeds of humanity's destruction during an economic crisis were manifesting themselves in food, healthcare and education. This was crisis that most of our African countries responded to by faithfully following the footsteps of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

It was the organic intellectual Professor Shivji who with sarcastic remarks welcomed back the neoliberal professors who had become the self-proclaimed think-tankers of neoliberal policies that became the source of poverty in the global South. Mwalimu Shivji said when welcoming back these neoliberal professors at Nkrumah Hall – the central battleground for ideas as the Washington consensus was being buried at the G20 meeting in London in early April 2009 – that the world's capitalist system was in tatters, and that the champions of capitalism in the global North were rewriting the rules of the game to save it. He emphasised that the crisis has created an opening for the global South – and our motherland Africa in particular – to refuse to play the capitalist imperialism game, whatever the rules, and to start to rethink a new alternative for the continent's development in the 21st century.

Mwalimu Nyerere and Kwame Nkrumah's revolutionary work was celebrated by a strong delegation from CODESRIA (Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa), a pan-African research organisation based in Dakar present throughout the five-day festival. A notable lecture was given by Professor Adebayo Olukoshi, who systematically exposed the attacks African universities were subjected to during the era of neoliberal policies. The capturing of African universities by USAID and IMF-sponsored research legitimised the role of imperialist instruments of control in political and economic policy towards Africa.

There was also a memorable moment when Oliver Fanon, son of the great revolutionary Frantz Fanon, revisited the African national liberation movement and the role that peasants and workers – with the support of the petty bourgeoisie – played in shaping the national liberation movements in Africa. Fanon reminded the young generation of the battle waged by African liberation movements during the struggle for independence. He gave the examples of FRELIMO (Frente de Libertação de Moçambique) of Mozambique, the Mau Mau of Kenya, the FNL (Front de Libération Nationale) of Algeria, the MPLA (Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola) of Angola and the great sacrifices that were made to liberate Africa from colonialism.

Mwalimu Nyerere's leadership and passion in South–South cooperation were also revisited, as was the great role he played in the South during his tenure. The festival also noted the challenges the southern countries were facing, which triggered a debate on social struggles in Latin America and what the African continent can learn from the model of the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean (ALBA) in mitigating the impact of the financial crisis and the challenges of neoliberal globalisation.

We left the University of Dar es Salaam to go back to Nairobi to attend the wananchi congress organised by community-based grassroots movements and Bunge La Mwananchi to advance the course of social struggle in Kenya. We left with the message of hope from the Mwalimu Julius Nyerere Intellectual Festival that Africa can unite and take back again the Pan-Africanist road of development and unity and make the dream of Kwame Nkrumah and Mwalimu Nyerere a reality. As Frantz Fanon said in The Wretched of the Earth, 'Each generation must out of relative obscurity discover its mission, fulfil it or betray it.'

* Gacheke Gachihi is a member of Kenya's Bunge La Mwananchi.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

'A new beginning'?: Questioning Obama in Cairo

Mumia Abu-Jamal

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/56908

cc barackobamadotcomFollowing Barack Obama's historic speech in Cairo last week, Mumia Abu-Jamal of San Francisco's Prison Radio [external site] questions Obama's choice of destination. Underlining that Obama 'benefitted more by who he wasn't than who he was', Abu-Jamal acknowledges the US president's success in 'evok[ing] passion' where past presidents would simply have seemed arrogant. But with Egypt 'as far from a democracy as a mouse is from the moon' and benefitting from extensive US aid, America's trust in democracy looks highly dubious when its main allies across the region remain dictatorial regimes, Abu-Jamal contends.

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

Petition: Portugal contest ignores slavery connection

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/advocacy/56915

We are inviting you to sign the online petition in Portuguese, English and French.

THE CONTEST 'THE SEVEN PORTUGUESE WONDERS' IGNORES THE HISTORY OF SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE TRADE

About twenty years ago several European, American and African countries started affirming and promoting the painful memory and heritage of slavery and the Atlantic slave trade. The promotion of the slave past was translated not only by the publication of a large number of historical works but also by the development of projects as the Slave Route Project launched by UNESCO in 1994.

Over the last ten years, despite the difficulties and the fights involving the emergence of the memory of the slave past of European, American and African nations, the memory and the history of the Atlantic slave trade was integrated into the public memory of several countries in the three continents at both sides of the Atlantic. In 2001, through the Law Taubira, France was the first country to recognize slavery and the slave trade as crimes against humanity. Also in France, the May 10th is now the National Day of Commemoration of the Memories of the Slave Trade, Slavery and its Abolitions. In 2001, in Durban, South Africa, the Third Conference of the United Nations Against Racism declared slavery as 'crime against humanity'. In 1992, at the House of Slaves in Gorée Island (Senegal), the Pope John Paul II expressed his apologies for the role played by the Catholic Church in the period of the Atlantic slave trade. Visiting Africa, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and the Brazilian President, Luis Inácio Lula da Silva also condemned the wrongs of the slave past. In 2006, Michaelle Jean, Governor General of Canada, during a visit to Elmina Castle (a site participating in the contest) in Ghana, denounced the Atlantic slavery past. In 2007, during the commemorations of the 200th anniversary of the British abolition of the slave trade, the PM Tony Blair also expressed his deep sorrow for the role played by England in the Atlantic trade of enslaved Africans.

In 2009, the government of Portugal, and several Portuguese institutions as the University of Coimbra, chose the opposite path. During the first semester of this same year, these institutions supported the organization of a contest to choose the Seven Portuguese Wonders in the World. In the list of the sites to be voted by the public on Internet (http://www.7maravilhas.sapo.pt), one can found not only Elmina Castle (or Castle São Jorge da Mina), a slave trading outpost and warehouse, founded by the Portuguese in 1482, but also the old city of Ribeira Grande of Santiago Island in Cape Verde, as well as Luanda and Mozambique Island. When describing these sites, the organization of the contest omitted the history of these places and the use they had during the period of the Atlantic slave trade. In the text describing the Elmina Castle, they affirm that this site served as slaves warehouse only after the Dutch occupation in1637.

In the name of historical accuracy and in order to be morally responsible, we consider that the inclusion of these 'monuments' in such a contest should be followed by the full information about their role during the Atlantic slave trade, and also by an explanation about the present use of these sites. Presently, the Elmina or São Jorge da Mina Castle, is a museum that tries to represent the history of the Atlantic slave trade. Each year, thousands of visitors from the whole world, among them many members of the African Diaspora, visit the castle to honor their ancestors. The Portuguese government, the institutions supporting the contest and its organizers ignored the pain of all those whose ancestors were deported from these sites or those who were raped or died there while waiting to be embarked. Is it possible to separate the architecture of these sites from the role they had in the past and still have in the present, as places of memory of the great tragedy that was slavery and the slave trade to the European colonies? According to recent studies (www.slavevoyages.org), Portugal and later Brazil, its former colony, were responsible for almost the half of the 12 million captives transported through the Atlantic.

In respect to the history and the memory of millions of victims of the Atlantic slave trade, we write this letter to denounce the omission of the role these sites had in the Atlantic slave trade. We invite all those who are concerned by the research on slavery and the Atlantic slave trade to disagree with the attempt to diminish and erase the history of this commerce, in order to exalt a glorious Portuguese past expressed in the architectural 'beauty' of these sites of death and tragedy.

Ana Lucia Araujo, Howard University, Washington, United States
Arlindo Manuel Caldeira, CHAM, Lisboa, Portugal
Mariana Pinho Candido, Princeton University, Princeton, United States
Michel Cahen, Centre d’Études de l’Afrique Noire, CNRS, Bordeaux, France
Christine Chivallon, Centre d’Études de l’Afrique Noire, CNRS, Bordeaux, France
Myriam Cottias, CNRS, Directrice do Centre International de recherches sur les esclavages, Paris, France
Maurice Jackson, Georgetown University, Washington, United States
Hendrik Kraay, University of Calgary, Canada
Jane Landers, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, United States
Jean-Marc Masseaut, Cahiers Anneaux de la Mémoire, Nantes, France
Hebe Mattos, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Claudia Mosquera Rosero-Labbé, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia
João José Reis, Universidade Federal da Bahia, Salvador, Brazil
Anna Seiderer, Royal Museum for Central Africa, Tervuren, Belgium
Simão Souindola, Historien, Luanda, Angola
Jean-Michel Mabeko-Tali, Howard University, Washington, United States

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

Protect Burundian refugees' rights in Tanzania

Mission of US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/advocacy/56916

Dear Friend,

Today, more than 35,000 Burundian refugees in Mtabila refugee camp in Tanzania are threatened with being forced to return to Burundi against their will. They fear they will be persecuted upon their return to Burundi.

Please contact Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete and other world leaders, including Pierre Nkurunziza, President of Burundi, Antonio Gutteres, UN High Commissioner for Refugees , Yacoub El Hillo, Country Representative, UNHCR Tanzania, and Hillary Clinton, U.S. Secretary of State, to stop this inhumane and illegal action from happening. It will take less than five minutes of your time.

Tanzania is a signatory to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and the Organization of African Unity Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa and forced repatriation is a clear violation of both.

The Tanzanian authorities should be ensuring that refugees who are unable to return to Burundi due to fears of persecution are able to retain their refugee status and their basic rights, including their freedom of movement and the right to earn a livelihood in Tanzania while they are refugees.

Yet the Tanzanian Government and UNHCR continue to tell refugees in Mtabila that they must go back to Burundi by June 30, 2009 and that there are no other options. One official suggested that the Government might even force them back at gunpoint.

In addition to these threats, the Tanzanian Government is deliberately creating camp conditions so dire that the choice to repatriate cannot be truly voluntary. The authorities are evicting refugees from their homes and are closing their children’s schools. They have also been told that humanitarian aid will cease on June 30, 2009 and that UNHCR and its implementing partners will hand Mtabila over to the Tanzanian Government.

Please speak up for these vulnerable refugees who have no voice right away.

Take action to prevent this gross violation of refugee rights today.

On behalf of the Burundian refugees that you are helping, I thank you.

Please forward this message to others.

Sincerely, Lavinia Limon
President, USCRI

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

Ghanaians deserve better water services

Africa Water Network

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/advocacy/56909

AVRL MUST GO NOW! SUPPORT GWCL WORKERS!

Water services delivered to the Ghanaian public must be among the worst in the world. Under Aqua Vitens Rand Limited (AVRL), the private company that is being paid millions of dollars of our public resources to ‘manage’ the water service, things are getting worse. In addition to unbelievable scandal of millions of hard currency paid to these most undeserving ‘foreign management experts’, ordinary people’s water charges are going up all the time – water prices for consumers have gone up a MINIMUM of 67 per cent since AVRL took over in 2006. We do not deserve this. AVRL MUST GO NOW!

HUMAN PROBLEM, HUMAN SOLUTION

We should never accept that the situation that is being imposed on us – bad water supplies, bad water quality, rising water tariffs, public health epidemics such as cholera and guinea worm and child mortality, family and community conflicts over water scarcity, etc, etcc. – is normal or natural. These problems are human made. And we know those immediately responsible: the AVRL management!

AVRL is supposed to be a non-profit organisation. Yet they are declaring record profits. Water revenue and company income have gone up by about 80%. Yet AVRL’s own reports show (among others):

- Under-spending on Water Treatment
- Under-spending on Repairs and Maintenance

AVRL spends millions of Ghana cedis more on advertising than on repairs and maintenance. As we have said before: 'The whole operation of AVRL has been reduced to fraudulent media hype at the expense of core expenditures such as repairs and maintenance, the outcome of which is the poor service delivery the country is presently experiencing.' AVRL MUST GO NOW!

*THE SHAMEFUL RECORD OF AVRL MANAGEMENT*

But these show AVRL’s real priorities. It has shown its so-called ‘management expertise’ by re-organising water company operations 'to be commercial and customer focused' (compared to what it believed was previously a mistaken 'engineering emphasis'). Let’s see what great achievements have been attained by this new magic of ‘commercial and customer focus’:

- Customer charges have increased from GHc0.51 to GHc0.94 per litre of water in less than 2 years
- Commercial losses (due to AVRL complete failure to meet its contract target in reducing ‘non-revenue water losses) have increased by almost 100 per cent, from about GHc 51million in 2005 to GHC108million in 2008.
- Controversy and allegations of corruption and dumping of unusable technology and chemicals on Ghanaians (recall the recent outcry over old meters from Netherlands)
- Widespread staff discontent and a regime of divide-and-rule and super-exploitation of Ghanaian water workers.
- Deteriorating water services to the consuming public
- Deterioration of water facilities and infrastructure (see: Insight newspaper, Wednesday 3 June and 5 June 2009)

The Ghanaian public and NCAP members were rightly up in arms against the quality of the old GWCL management. We said that mismanagement was because managers were driven by private interest and private gain (such as corruption), even though there were managing a supposedly public company in the public interest. We predicted that more privatization, such as the private AVRL management will make things much worse. We are sorry to say: we were right then, and we are still right today. We are sorry to have been proven right because this proof has come at the inhuman and intolerable cost of:

'Ghanaians dying of cholera, while communities wallow in thirst, and thousands of children and adults die every year of water-borne diseases, while malaria and other water-related illness cripple our health services and our economic productivity; while water workers, our own home grown experts in the sector are subjected to 'hardship, exploitation and dis-respect” and denied their legal exercise of trade union rights such as negotiating a new Collective Bargaining Agreement – a few expatriates calling themselves AVRL are being paid millions of dollars from public funds'.

THE NEW EVIDENCE FROM ‘INSIDE’: LISTEN TO THE WATER WORKERS’, SUPPORT THE WORKERS

But well-resourced propaganda (the same type of propaganda funded by AVRL’s overblown expenditure on ‘advertising and commercials) led many to believe that a more formal and fully legal privatisation will be better than the backdoor one of previous times (we say ‘all privatisation of water’ is bad for us!). Water workers felt they had no choice; some felt things were so bad already that they couldn’t get any worse under AVRL. Well, they were wrong. And the workers themselves are saying so today. They are saying, as all of us must say: *AVRL MUST GO NOW!*

On 1 May, Labour Day, concerned workers of AVRL issued a strong public protest against AVRL management performance and methods. In particular, they pointed to the discriminatory and illegal practice of hand-picking selected GWCL staff, re-appointing them as ‘AVRL staff’ at pay and salary scales far better than their ‘GWCL counterparts’ doing similar work. But ‘EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK’ is an enshrined constitutional requirement. AVRL divide-and-rule is not only destroying workers’ morale, it is illegal, and it is super-exploitative.

Perhaps AVRL are aware of this illegality. Which is why their annual reports boast of their new ‘commercial and customer focused’ re-organisation, but not a single word about the illegal parallel structure of AVRL employees vrs GWCL employees. In fact, throughout their reports AVRL refer to a single ‘AVRL-operator’ staffed operation.

No wonder the General Secretary of the Public Utilities Workers Union (PUWU, the water workers union) has called for an enquiry by the Public Enterprises Commission into some of AVRL’s apparently illegal appointment practices!

Meanwhile, PUWU and the water workers efforts to exercise their legal right to a new Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) is being illegally thwarted by AVRL. Only a week ago today, Friday 29 May, AVRL boss Andrew Barber failed to attend a scheduled standing committee meeting on the CBA. Instead he chose to take ‘shareholders’ from Netherlands around to inspect part of their ‘empire’ at the Kpong works.

AVRL are cheating Ghanaian water workers and the public. AVRL MUST GO NOW!

THE WAY FORWARD, FIRST STEPS

i. Since the workers and the public alike are victims of AVRL mismanagement and of illegal and legal private interests running roughshod of over the needs and fundamental human rights of Ghanaian workers, taxpayers’ and water consumers, the first step we need is unity. Our unity must be consolidated, first and foremost, around the cry from the workers: 'AVRL MUST GO NOW!'

ii. The workers and their union must now launch a strong campaign among their membership, among water-deprived communities and the public at large about their case, about the overall situation and about alternatives that will truly serve the public. They should work with all willing allies in this important initiative.

iii. All GWCL workers must be immediately put on the same pay scales as their counterparts in AVRL. This must be funded from AVRL ‘profits’ and from penalties and surcharges on the millions of dollars worth of salaries and benefits paid to top AVRL management.

iv. The new CBA must be negotiated and concluded immediately. BUT any new pay must be based on the higher AVRL pay scales.

v. The Mills Government MUST TAKE IMMEDIATE STEPS to put in place an emergency water supply programme, prioritizing distribution and storage to the most-deprived low income communities.

vi. The Mills Government must IMMEDIATELY TERMINATE AVRLs MANAGEMENT CONTRACT and take the water sector back into Public Management. It must set clear and publicised targets and penalties for the newly re-nationalised water management

vii. The Mills Government must simultaneously initiate genuine and open consultations with the water workers and the public for transparent public-community partnership in the water sector. Water & Sanitation boards must be activated at unit committee and other levels of local government. There must be plans to make these committees fully electable as soon as possible, according to a transparent time table.

These first steps will put us on the path to better water services for the public and better employment conditions for Ghanaian water workers. We must re-build on the basis of their expertise at all levels. NCAP is committed to work for increasing participation by ordinary Ghanaians and the public at large to ensure a truly accountable service that delivers what we deserve.

AVRL MUST GO NOW! SUPPORT THE WATER WORKERS! BECOME INVOLVED IN THE STRUGGLE FOR BETTER WATER SERVICES!

BETTER WATER MEANS A BETTER GHANA!

IN UNITY IN ACTION, THERE IS VICTORY FOR US ALL!

Accra, 5 June, 2009

Al-Hassan Adam
Coordinator
Africa Water Network
C/O Civic Response
37 New Town Loop
D.T.D Accra-North
Ghana-W/Africa
Tel: +233-21248745, +233-244208184
Email: alhassan.adam@gmail.com

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

Policymakers should understand economic value of groundwater

Barbara Lopi

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/advocacy/56910

Groundwater scientists in the southern African region have a major role to play to ensure that policy and decision makers especially in non-water sectors understand and appreciate the economic value of using, developing and managing the groundwater resource.

This was one of the issues highlighted at the 3rd Southern African Development Community Multi-stakeholder Water Dialogue held on 27 to 28 May 2009 in Johannesburg, South Africa.

In his welcome remarks to the Dialogue whose theme was ‘Watering Development in SADC: Surfacing of the Hidden Resource – Groundwater’, Director for the Infrastructure and Services Directorate at the SADC Secretariat, Mr. Remigious Makumbe noted that the region faced the challenge of raising the profile of groundwater, its importance and the role it plays in socio-economic development.

About 110 delegates comprising groundwater scientists, representatives from the water, health, mining, economic and planning, tourism, environment and agriculture sectors from the SADC member states, as well as others from donor organizations and national water partnerships participated in the two-day dialogue. The member states of SADC include Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

The Water Dialogue was organized on behalf of SADC by the Global Water Partnership – Southern Africa (GWP-SA) and funded by the government of Denmark under the SADC/DANIDA Regional Water Sector Programme.

The meeting noted that despite the acknowledged potential of groundwater use to improve rural water supply, the real value of groundwater was not visible enough to influence policy decisions and resource allocation that could lead to improved use, development and management of the resource within the region.

A survey conducted by the Groundwater and Drought Management Project of SADC early this year, reveal that there is a great need for groundwater awareness targeting policy and decision makers, including those in non-water sectors on the use, development and management of the groundwater resource.

In her keynote address to the dialogue Ms. Karen Villholth a groundwater expert from the Denmark’s Ministry of Climate and Environment described groundwater 'as a strategic resource of today and tomorrow for SADC', adding that, if properly understood, groundwater can enhance the efforts towards improved water supply, food production, drought proofing, climate adaptation and meeting the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Delegates argued that the extent to which groundwater issues will be placed on the top agendas of policy and decision making to a large extent depended on the extent to which the experts promote the economic good and value in the use, development and management of groundwater.

The delegate from Malawi’s Ministry of Economic Planning, Mr. Yona Kamphale said that in his country, the government was convinced to allocate resources for monitoring of groundwater in the 2009 national budget because the communities and parliamentarians worked with experts to present the case.

At least 70 percent of the 250 million people in the SADC region rely on groundwater as their sole source of water for drinking, domestic use, livestock and irrigation, yet there is little knowledge and appreciation of its potential role to contribute to socio-economic development and poverty alleviation.

According to the groundwater experts at the dialogue, compared to other regions, the use and development of groundwater for agricultural production is underutilized in the southern African region. South Africa is one country in the region where more farmers are using groundwater to irrigate their crops during the dry season.

The inadequate use and development of groundwater in the region is attributed to the widespread lack of understanding of groundwater and its role in national and regional development objectives.

The fact that groundwater is hidden underground, and 'out of the public sight', and little knowledge about its value to economic development and poverty alleviation is known to policy and decision makers, it is often left out in water resources management and other socio-economic development programmes.

There is need for increased awareness on groundwater’s role towards the improvement of water supply in the rural areas of many countries in the region, especially those which currently have to go furthest in meeting the MDGs.

There is need for more people in the policy and decision making positions to understand groundwater and fully integrate it in their planning, management and resource allocation so that the region can benefit from the hidden resource in a sustainable manner.

In the more arid areas of the southern African region where rainfall is low and less predictable, groundwater may be the only source of supply for all types of agricultural activity, including watering livestock.

The following advantages of groundwater were highlighted:

- Groundwater allows people to live in places where surface water is scarce. In much of rural Southern Africa, it is the sole water supply for livestock and domestic purposes.

- Groundwater is also an important ecological resource. It helps keep the rivers and lakes full, and sustains a wealth of plants of animals. Some of the ecosystems in the region are dependent on groundwater for their survival.

- Groundwater is reliable in dry seasons or droughts because of the large storage.

- Groundwater is cheaper to develop, since, unpolluted, it requires little treatment or no treatment before use for domestic
supply.

- Groundwater can often be developed in the vicinity where the water supply is required while; dams can only be constructed in streams with assured flow and may be a long distance from the demand.

- Groundwater resources do not take up valuable agricultural (or other) land.

* Barbara Lopi is communications and events officer for the SADC Groundwater and Drought Management Project.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

A step towards farmers' rights at FAO?

La Via Campesina

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/advocacy/56913

After four days of difficult negotiations among 121 governments at a UN Food and Agricultural Organization Treaty meeting on the use of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture held in Tunisia, a Canadian effort to block progress was overturned. At midnight on Thursday, Brazil read an amended resolution on Farmers' Rights to a tired plenary, shifting the prevailing tension amongst delegates into relief and enthusiasm.

Following corridor negotiation, in which Europe, Latin America and Africa confronted Canada's effort to derail the implementation of Farmers' Rights, governments agreed to:

Encourage member countries to review all measures affecting Farmers' Rights and remove any barriers preventing farmers from saving, exchanging or selling seed;
To involve farmers fully in national and/or regional workshops on the implementation of Farmers' Rights and to report back on the implementation of farmers' rights at the next meeting of the seed treaty in about 18 months;

The plenary resolution broke from conventional UN diplomatic practices by calling for the full involvement of farmers' organizations in every aspect of the Treaty.

Angola, Brazil, Ecuador, The Netherlands, Norway, and Switzerland deserve special thanks for championing farmers' critical role in the conservation and enhancement of plant genetic resources. Honduran farmer, Don Luis Pacheo, summarized the importance of the Treaty when he said, "conserving plant genetic diversity is essential to our ability to adjust agriculture to the new threats of climate change. If we don't get the global system for seed conservation right at this meeting in Tunisia, the Climate Change conference in Copenhagen at the end of this year can't succeed."

As Wilhelmina Pelegrina, Executive Director of SEARICE- a civil society organization that has long lobbied for farmers' rights, who has tracked the negotiations closely, put it: "Although short on firm commitments, and dependent on financing, the resolution is a sizeable step forward in the decades-long struggle to recognize and implement Farmers' Rights at the FAO."

Critical to this growing commitment to farmers' rights during this third meeting of the government body were the many interventions made by representatives of farmers' organizations, such as the world's largest peasants' organizations, La Via Campesina. These spokespersons not only emphasized the central role that small farmers play in the conservation of agricultural biodiversity but also made concrete proposals about the rights and support these farmers, farm communities, indigenous peoples organizations and pastoralists require. Not the least of these rights are access to national and international gene bank materials and the right to financial support for on-farm biodiversity conservation.

The Treaty's emphasis on national sovereignty over the conservation of plant genetic resources and farmer's rights is also of concern. National seeds laws can, for example, prevent farmers from saving, exchanging, and selling their seeds. And as Jorge Stanley, a member of a Panamanian indigenous youth organization and spokesperson for the International Planning Committee on food sovereignty told the plenary earlier in the day: "'Consent' and 'benefit sharing' for farmers who are the key custodians of our genetic crop heritage, maintaining thousands of local varieties of plants within their territories, are not respected in patent laws that allow, for example, farmers' varieties to be pirated".

While the farmer and civil society organizations present are encouraged by this development, discussions and decisions to date fall short of the support required to make the Treaty work. The funding objective of $116 million USD is the bare minimum to sustain it and contributions remain voluntary. Civil society is determined to monitor developments closely and will return to their national homelands with plans to promote the implementation of Farmers' Rights. "We will be back", said Brazilian farmer, Soniamara Maranho, of La Via Campesina.

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

Open letter to IMF: Kenya's odious loans

Partnership for Change

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/advocacy/56912

June 2nd 2009
Mr. Dominique Strauss-Kahn
Managing Director
The International Monetary Fund
700 19th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20431

For the attention of the Board of Directors
Through W. Scott Rogers, IMF Resident Representative to Kenya.

Dear Sir,

RE: IMF’s ODIOUS LOANS ARE IMPOVERISHING KENYA THROUGH COLLUSION WITH CORRUPT AGENTS

“Transparency requires that the Kenyan citizen knows what they owe, to whom
they owe, and for what purpose they have a debt” – Partnership for Change

We refer you to our letter to the IMF dated March 30th 2009 regarding a loan request made by the Kenya Government to the IMF requesting for US$ 100 million. We also refer you to recent statements by your Representative to Kenya, W. Scott Rogers regarding investigations into the Supplementary Budget Estimates made on May 30th 2009. Mr. Rogers has been quoted in the media as saying:

"When the errors contained in the first printed supplementary estimates emerged, the ministry called me in to have a look at their database and talk with their staff and budget supplies to see if we could find out the origin of the problem," he said. "When those codes were correctly put in and the estimates reprinted as far as we can tell the errors went away." - W. Scott Rogers, IMF Resident Representative to Kenya May 31st, 2009 on the occasion of signing a USD 209 million loan for balance of payments support

The Partnership for Change finds the above statement strangely equivocal, especially since the re-submitted Supplementary Estimates still contain errors AND Parliament has authorised an independent forensic audit into the budget going back three years. We are reliably informed by Parliament that the process of procuring the services of an independent auditor is underway.

The Partnership for Change is demanding that Kenyan Members of Parliament, as the representatives of the People, make a stand against this most recent and what the Partnership for Change terms as an odious loan, based on the following arguments:

1. According to the IMF website, the IMF undertakes annual Country surveillances that take the form of regular comprehensive consultations with individual member countries with interim discussions as needed. The consultations are referred to as "Article IV consultations" because they are required by Article IV of the IMF's Articles of Agreement. During an Article IV consultation, an IMF team of economists visits a country to collect economic and financial data and to discuss the country's economic policies with government and central bank officials. IMF staff missions also often reach out beyond their official interlocutors for discussions with parliamentarians and representatives of business, labor unions, and civil society.

a. At no time during their Supplementary Budget investigations did the IMF reach out to the Partnership for Change (originators of the report into the Supplementary Budget Estimate errors), nor any other civil society member whose work concerns Kenya’s national budget-making process. The Partnership for Change can only conclude that the IMF’s findings announced by W. Scott Rogers on May 30th 2009 are invalid as they do not incorporate any views except from the Treasury.

b. Furthermore, the Partnership for Change previously wrote to the IMF on 30th March 2009, requesting the organisation to exercise prudence in respect of the Government of Kenya seeking a US$ 100 million loan. At the time, Partnership for Change urged the IMF’s Board to insist that:

i. The Government of Kenya immediately demonstrates austerity measures, including the reduction of the number of ministries to a reasonable number

ii. An Audit of Kenya’s External Public Debt Register be made and issued to the Public through the National Assembly

iii. A Report on pending legislation and threatened proceedings against the Government of Kenya on the basis of Sovereign debt be made and issued to the Public through the National Assembly

iv. In the Public Interest that the Permanent Secretary, Treasury and the Head
of Debt Management resign.

v. All wasteful expenditure is removed from the National Budget estimates to be presented to Parliament in June 2009 and that the Estimates to reflect 60% in Development expenditure and 40% in recurrent expenditure.

vi. Provision by the Government of Kenya of evidence that it has requested mutual legal assistance for international asset recovery on past corruption cases and has taken action to seize proceeds of corruption in Kenya.

Apart from an acknowledgement of receipt to Mwalimu Mati on behalf of the Partnership for Change from Mr. Scott Rogers and an indication that the same letter was passed onto yourself, the Partnership for Change has never received any other official communication from your organisation. Once again, the Partnership for Change can only conclude that in light of no response from April 2009, that the IMF chose to ignore the high priority matters regarding Kenya’s economic policy, and thus in line with the IMF’s Article IV, recent findings by the IMF on the Treasury do not concur with the IMF’s internal procedures, and thus should be deemed null and void.

We however received a request to unsubscribe Mr. Scott Rogers from our website. This request came when the Partnership for Change began to profile the budget. It is noteworthy to mention that we declined to do so in the public interest and because we expect that this subscription is in effect our voice to the International Monetary Fund Board, and these addresses are in the public domain.

c. The history of the IMF in Kenya has been one where information on loans are only privy to a select few. It is important that those who re-pay these loans, in this case the Kenyan Citizen are consulted and agreeable through Parliament to incurring such debts.

2. The IMF has developed standards and codes of good practice in economic policymaking. It is therefore inconceivable that the same IMF has given a pass grade to the financial impropriety carried out by the Treasury passing it off as a mere “coding” error.

3. It is additionally astounding that the recent events in Kenya concerning the Supplementary Budget Estimates have not been found to fit the IMF’s vulnerability indicators and early warning system models which were developed in the first place to improve the organs ability to identify countries at risk.

4. The IMF has also let itself and its member country contributors down by being lax in its mission to promote good governance, particularly in the public sector. In turn the Treasury has let the IMF down if it has been a recipient of IMF training in fiscal policy and management (specifically budget formulation, expenditure management, design of social safety nets, and management of domestic and foreign debt).

5. The IMF terms as it's “main business” oversight of member countries macroeconomic and financial sector policies. These include oversight of member country policies relating to the government's budget. The Partnership for Change states that in Supplementary Estimates this has not been the case.

6. Supposedly, IMF lending signals that a country's economic policies are on the right track, reassuring foreign investors of the safety of their investment in loanee countries. Thus, IMF financing acts a catalyst for attracting funds from other sources. The Partnership for Change in this case is issuing a caveat emptor for any interested investor, not to take this latest irresponsible injection as an indication that all is well in Kenya.

7. The IMF claims to promote the UN Millennium Development Goals through financial assistance and advice. However its recent actions will not promote:

• Eradication of extreme poverty and hunger
• Achievement of universal primary education
• Promotion of gender equality and women’s empowerment
• Reduction of child mortality
• Improvement of maternal health
• Combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases
• Ensuring environmental sustainability

Lending 16billion shillings to a government where 85% of its budget is spent on recurrent expenditure, and who according to the Supplementary Budget is more interested in budget items such as personal allowances and foreign travel, means that the chances of expenditure on these MDG goals will suffer.

8. The IMF agreed in 1997 to take "a more proactive approach" in trying to "eliminate opportunity for rent seeking, corruption and fraudulent activity." The Supplementary Budget errors were clearly an attempt to defraud the Kenyan populace of its resources yet the IMF was not proactive in this instance.

The Partnership for Change therefore is joining calls for the IMF to immediately do an inventory of loans lost to corruption and public sector financial impropriety GLOBALLY. An independent panel of experts should determine, on a case by case basis, where responsibility lies. If it is found that IMF staff knowingly lent money to regimes who then siphoned it off through corruption, thereby contravening the institutions' fiduciary mandate, negotiations about sharing liability should commence immediately.

Kenya simply cannot afford more of the IMF's loan “medicine”. We as a people are demanding the freedom to follow economic policies that protect the country from more harm.

The IMF is governed by, and is accountable to, its member countries. As we are the ones that elected Kenya’s leadership, in effect it means that the IMF is ultimately beholden to US.

ODIOUS DEBTS

For 65 years, the IMF has loaned billions of dollars to Third World governments without adequate public oversight and in the absence of market discipline. In the process it has financed dictators, spawned corruption, harmed the environment, wrecked economies, and then forced the Third World’s hostage public to pay the money back. In law, these debts are known as “odious”.

Most Third World Countries have very little to show for all IMF debts. Re-payments are in effect "shark fees" paid for funds that have long since vanished and the present value of the debt is even higher. Servicing huge unproductive debts drain the funds needed for education, health care and development.

Economist Henry James argues First World countries also pay a hefty price tag in the form of increased requirements for homeland security and military might, as more and more countries descend into the ranks of the "Fourth World" – failed states that foster transnational corruption, drug running, arms traffic, and terrorism as a result of irresponsible loan making and loan taking.

Apart from their support for corrupt regimes, the IMF’s draconian prescriptive policies that insist on public expenditure cuts and the raising of interest rates have also played a huge role in entrenching poverty.

Today 70% of Africans live on less than two dollars a day meanwhile the IMF continues to loan hundreds of billions of dollars to their corrupt leaders with nothing to show for it.

Ethiopia, one of the poorest countries in the world was forced to hike fuel prices, cut public spending, and reduce its deficit. Ukraine was forced to keep its deficit at zero. Belarus and Latvia had to cut public-sector wages. Pakistan had to raise its electricity taarifs. Hungary suppressed workers’ “13th month” bonus after reducing retirement benefits as part of a previous agreement. The list goes on and on.

In Kenya the effect will be felt when IMF budget and wage caps prevent the government from spending what is needed to hire teachers and medical staff as well as efforts to ensure food security through modernization of the agricultural sector.

KENYANS WILL NOT TAKE IT LYING DOWN

The IMF who made the corrupt loans to Zaire and lent for projects in Africa that failed repeatedly is still in charge of the global economy. Its role has been enhanced because of its success in pushing loans. Can we reasonably trust the IMF to suddenly only lend wisely; to not give loans when the money might be wasted? Joseph Hanlon and Ann Pettifor of Jubilee Research write: 'Preventing new wasted loans and new debt crises, and ensuring that there is not another debt crisis, means that the people who pushed the loans and caused this crisis cannot be left in charge'.

The creditors or loan pushers cannot be left in charge, no matter how heartfelt their protestations that they have changed. Pushers and addicts need to work together, to bring to an end the entire reckless and corrupt lending and borrowing habit.

The IMF potion is so bitter but some governments have stood up against the IMF. The Ukraine declared the conditions imposed by the IMF to be “unacceptable”, especially the gradual raising of the retirement age and increased housing costs.

THE TIME HAS COME TO CHANGE THE IMF’s BAD HISTORY

In 1944 in a town called Bretton Woods in the United States where a group of leaders from 45 countries met to rectify the damage caused by the 1930’s depression on the world economy. A foundling organisation was decided upon, tasked with the mission of fostering free trade and global prosperity….

Read full letter.

Partnership for Change
From Dictatorial Impunity to Democratic Accountability in Kenya
June 2, 2009, Nairobi Kenya

c.c.

Open Copies to

1. All Members of Parliament ( Kenya National Assembly)
2. Bi – Lateral Donors to Kenya
3. The Country Resident Director, the World Bank
4. The Resident Representative, African Development Bank
5. The Resident Representative, International Monetary Fund
6. Media
7. The Board of Directors of the World Bank

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

Learning from Haiti’s spirit of endurance

Fatoumata Toure

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/56921

I beg to differ with my sister Anne Khaminwa on some points. For starters Haitians have their own historical shoes, they don’t need to dream of Kenyan ones!

I am not a cobbler but permit me to state that I am not convinced that Kenyans and Africans cannot learn from the spirit of endurance that has guided the Haitian people over two centuries of struggle. The current situation in the Republic of Haiti has everything to do with its being perhaps not the first – as there are other examples in the Americas – but the first black republic in the diaspora that survived: The Napoleonic wars, wars with the neighbouring Dominican Republic, stifling killer reparations (in 1825 the French who had been defeated in the 1804 Revolution hit back and demanded 150 million francs ‘in exchange for liberty’(see http://www.nathanielturner.com/haitimakescaseforreparations.htm as well as George Padmore’s Pan-Africanism or Communism).

Haiti bore the brunt of the 1915 US occupation and the politics of colourism paving the way for the combine harvester multinationals and to cap it all the Duvalier era of family rule. On banana republics, my dear Anne. Why are they banana republics? Does the name United Fruit or Mama Yunai ring a bell? I will not delve into Marcus Garvey’s UNIA and their chapters in Central/South America in the 1920’s, drawing heavily on banana workers.

Fast forward to the 21st century. Take a glimpse at the works of Paul Farmer: The Uses of Haiti and Pathologies of Power for an alternative view on ‘Western participation’. With all due respect, I do not adopt this portrayal of the western project in our societies as a benevolent undertaking. If anything, far from ‘participation’, it was intrusion, dislocation and in Fanonian terms depersonalisation in terms of our identity and immiseration.

As the Cuban poet Nicolas Guillén put it in his 1934 anthology of protest poetry, the whole the Caribbean/Latin America or what we call the Black Atlantic had been transformed into West Indies Ltd, with ‘dark smiling natives’ at the service of United Fruit plantations, banana steamers chugging away loaded with the sweet fruit and the sweat of overworked underpaid night workers.

Ever heard that famous Belafonte song Day-O? The darkness, I submit, was and is in the callous might of the exploitative forces that have bled Haiti and the rest of the Third World dry, aided and abetted by a complicit and complacent ruling elite. It is not in the psyche of the people of the Americas and by extension the wretched of the earth.

Nothing good about Mungiki

Elliot

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/56918

I find it troubling that [url=http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/56714]
the author tries to suggest[/url] that there is a section of Mungiki out there, the first category, who only want to worship facing Mt Kenya and are ostensibly not involved in the ugly activities associated with Mungiki as we all know it.

Please, if there was such a group, why haven’t they broken off from the Mungiki we know? May be even change their name without appearing to admonish the real Mungiki? Quite frankly, I do not buy this view that there is a peaceful Mungiki out there who just want to worship facing Mt Kenya. By the way, where do they worship from?

The bottom line is that there is nothing good about Mungiki. Mungiki happens to be a Kikuyu outfit and they should be dealt with firmly, regardless whether the president is Kikuyu or not. It is that simple. Mungiki is perhaps the biggest threat to our national (and I mean Kenyan not Kikuyu) security.

Perhaps, you are cobbling a few words suggesting that they are being persecuted so that they can view you as friendly. And if that is what you are doing, please stop it.

Peace comes at a cost and you know it better from Moi's days. It is always better if the bulk of the cost of peace is borne by the aggressor, in this case Mungiki.

Unfortunately, some elements of our police force, just like you, seems sympathetic to Mungiki and that is excatly why Mungiki has not been eliminated. But it can be done with overwhelming force. And that is the only way out.

The problem lies with our leadership

Sibonginkosi Mazibuko

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/56919

This is indeed a sad story of our lives. I however can no longer go on blaming the colonisers and the multi-corporations. The problem lies with our leadership. How does anyone explain the fact that in spite of all the evidence that we have been victims of such a system our leaders still refuse to heed the call for African unity and begin to look up to ourselves for salvation rather than always crying to the west for help.

Why African leaders fail to see what the likes of Kwame Nkrumah told us so long when independence first came to us. Why do we still allow ourselves to be divided by colonial bonds as represented in our dealings with the former colonial powers? Look at the way France threats the former French colonies for example. How does one explain that our leaders go on shopping trips in these countries. No! The problem is not the colonisers any more. The problem is our ourselves.

Zapiro is no enemy of democracy

Shailja Patel

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/56920

The president of South African begins legal proceedings against Zapiro for exercising his constitutional and journalistic rights to freedom of speech and expression. This move should draw universal, unequivocal, international opposition, derision and condemnation. It is a blatant attack on freedom of press, and a heavy-handed attempt to gag South African media - and by extension all African media – from future criticisms of Zuma.

And Pambazuka runs this article by Annar Cassam that suggests Zapiro - and individual cartoonist, doing his job and expressing his personal opinions on matters of the day - is an enemy of "democracy" in South Africa. I had to read the piece twice. Because the first time around, it didn't seem credible that Pambazuka could carry something this disingenous, hypocritical, and outrageously pandering to an agenda of state repression. After the second reading, I am forced to conclude that however incredible it seems, Pambazuka can. And has. I am discouraged and disappointed.

Review: Yasmin Alibhai-Brown's The Settler's Cookbook

A Memoir of Love, Migration and Food

Yash Tandon

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/books/56864

In spite of the beguilingly distractive title, The Settler's Cookbook: A Memoir of Love, Migration and Foodis not essentially about food or gastronomy. The title hides, obscures, its serious political side until you begin reading the book. It is almost a Homeric odyssey of a person whose life began in the periphery of the Empire, in Uganda, to join the flow of the River Nile to the Thames – to the heart of imperial Britain. For this book reviewer, also from Uganda, it is a shared odyssey, a kind of vicarious journey in which the author is in command and the reviewer, reading through, finds himself in a state of melancholic nostalgia. The author finds a home. London is her home, '(T)he city where no one belongs is where I belong'. This is both significant and sad. Her humanity is confirmed only when it is denied a national home. It is where no one belongs. Thus ends this beautifully carved memoir of a brave woman. If the world is unforgiving and hard as the pages of this book shows, so is Alibhai-Brown. She has little time for racists and rascals of this world. But she has a softer side. She has a warm heart and an unwavering belief that no matter what, you can always win the other person’s heart through his or her taste buds. Or the opposite. Talking about her first estranged husband, she says, 'When TL rejected my food, that should have shown me I had lost him forever'. At the other end is her warmest tribute to an African, Japani, 'the family’s loyal servant' whom the police took away because he was alleged to be a Mau Mau agent. 'I refused to believe the liars. I have never forgotten him, my Japani, the sweetest, most loyal man I knew then'. From him she learnt 'Lemon, Chille and Ginger pickle'.

Alibhai-Brown has a delightful way of telling a compelling story. A touch of the bizarre aspects of daily life caught in the maelstrom of national and global politics are recessed, every few pages, with a cornucopia of culinary delights. The East African historian, Charles Miller, in a 600 page book 'The Lunatic Express' (1972), chronicled the building of the East African railways from Mombasa to Uganda. So Alibhai-Brown is not quite right to say that the history of the two million people transported from India by Britain, with their 'tragic experiences', has gone 'unrecorded'. But her brief retelling of the story has certain panache. The evening meal of Indian railway workers, she recounts, consisted of Kichri, 'a mixture of rice and lentils cooked by placing an aluminum pan in a thick turban… in a hole covered with leaves and soil with fire lit on top and cooked slowly'.

Alibhai-Brown draws from forgotten sources a memorabilia of facts and foibles to spin out the multiple contradictions in a country that slowly, but painfully, metamorphosed from a colony to a politically independent neo-colony of Britain. One of these contradictions was between the Asians and the Africans. Following Amin`s expulsion of Asians from Uganda, 'some Asians believed that British citizenship gave them security. Black Africans took this to be a sign of disloyalty'. The author has incredibly candid, sometimes even shocking, accounts of her family and friends, including her intrepid father who floated between London and Kampala as a 'brown sahib' and posed as an 'Edwardian gent' with an unending passion for unworkable projects that perpetually put him into unpayable debts. As for the political leaders of East Africa, she has not many nice things to say. 'Obote was the prototype, the stereotype writ large, of a post-independence African leader who marched his people into the valley of death all too soon after the balloons came down and the flags went up.' She is a bit too harsh here. I knew Obote well. Yes, he did unleash an army against innocent civilians for which he should be judged by history, but he too, like the rest of us, was caught up in the devilishly difficult heritage of class, ethnic, racial and religious contradictions left behind by colonial misrule of which Darfur is the latest horrific manifestation. This excuses nobody of course. There are multiple sinners, among them those that, like Tony Blair who sits on judgment over Mugabe when he should share the responsibility (in may view 60 per cent of it) for the tragedy in Zimbabwe. Alibhai-Brown gets a few historical facts wrong here and there. It is not true, for example, that it was Museveni who 'delivered Uganda from Amin with the help of the Tanzanians'. This credit goes in the main to Tanzania, with the help of the Uganda National Liberation Front. I was, with Museveni and others, among the founding members of the UNLF.

Alibhai-Brown has some very interesting insights of the country that finally becomes her residence, England. She burrows deep into the psyche of the multicultural nation. 'Enoch Powell had entered my subconscious', she says. She recounts the daily, sometimes hourly, often remorseless battles with cultural arrogance and bigotry of a corrupt political elite (now, as we write, visibly displayed as honorable but corrupt members of Parliament, the mother of all parliaments), and all too often misguided press. But England is a nation whose people otherwise are generous and humane. Her favourite author is Shakespeare, she says. But some of her writings remind one, rather, of the English humorist P.G. Wodehouse, whose fictional characters, especially the lower class Jeeves, parodied the British upper class that is portrayed as ignorant buffoons. Alibhai is not a humorist, but like Wodehouse, she parodies the real life (not fictional) characters of the British upper classes that are modern versions of Victorian England.

Her tribulations and challenges as she wades through multiple responsibilities as bread earner, a media person, a wife, and daughter and sometimes as a single parent are described with literary robustness and almost scandalous transparency. She worked for a time with the New Statesman and Society – 'an amalgam that never worked' – whose staff showed 'gross intolerance of Muslims' that were expressing their legitimate opposition to Salman Rushdie`s Satanic Verses.'I came out as a Muslim at this time… It was arguably the worst time to declare such an allegiance…' But for her it was a 'political label, embraced for political reasons'. It was a gesture of defiance in a world where 'We had to surrender totally to the hegemonic West or be damned'. But she is balanced in her views. She is equally damning about the Taliban who 'want to drag us into the Bora Bora caves.' For her views against racism she is pilloried by both sides, by the white racists as well as the extreme Islamists, who accuse her of being an 'Apostate Brown'. She danced in the streets of Covent Garden when Tony Blair ousted Margaret Thatcher but the new Prime Minister was a disappointment; he turned out to be 'the proud son of Thatcher, charming and therefore more effective than she ever was.' She was honored by Her Imperial Majesty with the Order of the British Empire (MBE) which she first turned down ('threw it in the bin'), and later accepted it 'shuffling with embarrassment and shame that I had surrendered to this system.' But in 2003, she returned it, partly in protest at the Labour government, particularly its conduct of the war in Iraq, and has since criticised the British honours system as 'beyond repair'.

From her accounts, she goes back to East Africa whenever she can. But as I and the reviewer have discovered, nostalgia is not an emotion to nurture for too long; it has its rejuvenating and spiritually uplifting moments, but nurtured for too long it has its darker side effects. Some of these effects are visible in the book.This brave indomitable spirit is part of those who defiantly speak up against prejudice, injustice, intolerance and bigotry. Alas, there are too many of these in our blighted world. We do not have to agree with all Alibhai-Brown`s views on politics, race or religion, but one has to admire her courage for daring to speak truth to power. It is a compelling odyssey worth reading, both for its political message and for its gastronomic delights.

* Yash Tandon is former executive director of the South Centre, and chairman of SEATINI (Southern and Eastern African Trade Information and Negotiations Institute).
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Corruption and the World Bank

A review of Steve Berkman's The World Bank and the Gods of Lending

Peter Bossard

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/books/56863

In a major departure from the past, World Bank president James Wolfensohn in 1996 identified corruption as the 'cancer' of development. Wolfensohn promised to take vigorous action to combat bribery, and launched various strategies and action plans. A new book argues that behind the rhetoric of good governance, nothing has changed. In The World Bank and the Gods of Lending, the bank insider and corruption fighter Steve Berkman explains in stunning detail how government officials milk billions of dollars from bank loans and credits every year. The World Bank management, still mainly concerned with pushing money out the door, meanwhile looks the other way.

At International Rivers we have warned that the World Bank encourages corruption by promoting inappropriate, bribery-prone mega projects for many years. We always thought that the bank’s own funds were off limits. After all, the bank insists on strict international procurement, accounting and auditing standards. Steve Berkman’s chilling account, which summarises insights from 16 years spent inside the institution, proves that we were naïve.

The Gods of Lending combines number crunching with vivid detail and moral outrage. Berkman reports how Nigerian officials charged $2,200 for 18 cups of tea and snacks at a roadside stall under a World Bank loan (and got away with it). A project office with eight staff in the same country charged a switchboard for 60 telephones, 48 air conditioners, 14 shredders and 12 refrigerators to the operating expenses of another Bank project – all at prices well above the going market rates. They also claimed expenses for television and video sets at 249,999 Naira apiece – more than ten times the equipment’s street value, but just one Naira less than the amount which triggers stricter controls.

In a gripping chapter, Steve Berkman takes us on a trip to The Gambia, a poor West African country. We travel there to investigate suspicions of corruption in a US$12.3 million agricultural services project in 1998. The very first payment under the project was for four Japanese cars – a transfer of US$95,700 in Danish kroner to a bank account on the Bahamas. The cars are nowhere to be found, and the company that supposedly sold them doesn’t exist. When the ministry responsible for the project finally provides the serial numbers of the cars in question, the Nissan corporation states that such cars were never produced.

Berkman continues his investigation. He comes across a company which supplied goods as varied as computers, textbooks, chickenfeed and cattle scales for a total amount of $430,000 to the project. These guys must be bigger than Wal-Mart, our man in The Gambia thinks, and pays a visit. He finds a small stationery shop in the capital, whose owner is completely unaware of the goods he is supposed to have sold. Needless to say, the equipment is not in the government’s inventory.

Our investigator continues to go through the books and identifies $1.3 million in fraudulent transactions in nine days – roughly 10 per cent of the project amount. A government official admits that under ‘intense pressure’ from higher officials, another 20-25 per cent of the credit was diverted to other government agencies, without documentation to support the claim. We assume the spoils of the project had to be shared. And we suspect the author could have nailed down the full project amount in fraudulent transactions if he had had more time.

Steve Berkman explains some of the countless petty scams by which the World Bank gets milked. In countries such as The Gambia, local traders and government officials commonly work together. The officials will instruct a trader to submit three competing bids for a contract, with his own bid being the lowest. The prices are always well above the market rates, and often dictated by the government officials. The trader doesn’t always know what orders are placed in his name. From time to time he is asked to provide blank invoices. He receives a cheque, cashes it in, hands the cash back to his contact and gets a commission for his service.

Much of this fraud is carried out through so-called special accounts. Such accounts are controlled by project officials for the recurrent expenditures of World Bank projects. Their funds are disbursed against statements of expenditures (SOEs), which require little documentation and are hardly ever reviewed by Bank staff. Government officials do not have to account at all for the interest which these accounts accrue. Consequently, a sizable portion of these accounts lay idle, so that a maximum amount of interest can be siphoned off. When Berkman first warned about the corrupt potential of special accounts and SOEs in 1993, they had risen from 9 per cent to 37 per cent of the World Bank’s disbursement. In 2004 (the latest year for which figures are available), a staggering 60 per cent of project lending was disbursed through these mechanisms.

James Wolfensohn’s war on corruption triggered a flurry of activities by World Bank staff and management. Yet all efforts were hemmed in by the imperative to keep lending irrespective of corruption. ‘We could talk all we wanted’, comments Berkman. ‘We could send letters; we could hold meetings with high-ranking officials; we could conduct financial management, procurement, and disbursement workshops; and we could stand on our heads. But our “partners”, the government officials with whom we were dealing, had no intention of ending this wonderful arrangement by which they were enriching themselves. And the bank had no intention of ending its relationship with these thieves.’

The Gambia project for which Berkman painstakingly documented the machinations of corruption confirms this grim assessment. Even during the Wolfensohn presidency, the author’s findings had no consequences for the government and its corrupt officials. The stolen funds were never returned. No charges were levied. The Bank’s lending continued. The show must go on.

Berkman concludes that not one of the more than 100 projects he worked on 'did not reek of corruption'. He estimates that depending on the country, 15-40 per cent of the World Bank’s disbursements for any given project are lost to corruption. And he quotes a report of the bank’s staff association which comments that 'stealing from bank funds is the rule, not the exception'.

Even with such stunning conclusions, Berkman does not give up all hope. He argues that the World Bank needs to spend less and supervise more. He calls for smaller, simpler projects, which do not create a 'feeding frenzy for corrupt government officials'. He says that the bank needs to insist that borrowing governments prosecute, punish and recover the assets of guilty individuals in the same way they would treat other criminals. And he proposes that the bank fully disclose all anti-corruption investigations, government agencies involved and funds stolen in its annual report.

The World Bank tries to avoid a public debate about this burning problem. It has never formally responded to The Gods of Lending. The bank’s bookshop did not get bank sponsorship to organise an event with the author. Informally, bank representatives argue that the new book presents extreme cases which are not representative for the bank’s portfolio. If this is correct, it is not comprehensible why the institution did not rigorously tackle the fraud Berkman uncovered in Nigeria, The Gambia and other countries.

Bank representatives also argue that the book accurately identifies problems of the past, but that the institution has meanwhile addressed them and moved on. This is the World Bank’s standard response whenever systematic problems in its portfolio are uncovered. Yet only in April 2009, a report by the Independent Evaluation Group gave the bank the lowest possible grade for its anti-corruption measures. The bank’s guidelines for supervision, financial management and procurement don’t address the risk of fraud, and staff who speak out on corruption issues run the risk of reprisals by their managers. As Steve Berkman concludes in his book, 'the bank talks, and the money walks'.

Steve Berkman, The World Bank and the Gods of Lending (2008), is available from Kumarian Press.

* Peter Bosshard is the policy director of International Rivers. He is author of the blog Wet, Wild and Wonky, where this article was first published.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

Review: Brian Chikwava’s Harare North

Stanley Makuwe

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/books/56866

As I a writer myself, I am always looking for new books to read, and my first choice is always African literature. However, I find it not that easy to find a good book. For a few months I had nothing much to write so I thought I'd look for inspiration through reading more and more African books. The ones that fell into my hands came up as too slow or too far-fetched. Not that they were bad books. It was just personal preference. I threw them aside one after the other, until I found one new book that captured my imagination. I am naturally a slow reader, who takes at least two weeks to finish a two hundred page book, but after I read the first paragraph of Caine Prize winner, Brian Chikwava’s debut novel, Harare North, I knew I had found the kind of book I was looking for. It took me a record one week to finish it, and for me to achieve that it takes a very good story.

Harare North is one book that would make one laugh, click their tongue and drop a tear or two at the same time. It’s a book that makes you feel like you know the main character in real life and you met him and spoke to him just a few days ago and you really hate this man and you don’t want to speak to him ever again. It’s a very sad story told in a very funny way, and to this day I wonder how Chikwava managed to create a comedy out of such a chilling story. It is an honest book that you feel the author wrote from his heart and not just from his gift of creativity.

In Shona we say do not expose your armpits to the public because people will not be happy with the smell coming from under there, meaning you can’t let your secrets known to every Jack and Jill, but while reading Harare North I felt like Chikwava had exposed many armpits for the whole world to smell. So many shocking stories are told about life in the diaspora, particularly in the UK, but the stories seem to be told through clenched teeth because people want their families back home to believe that all is well out there, but Chikwava would not have all of that. He brought everything out in the open, exposing the hardships of settling in a new environment, the difficulties of finding decent jobs, proper accommodation, food and just being a normal human being in a foreign land. He touched racism in a 'cunning' way and gave an insight into intercultural day-to-day relationships, including how a simple greeting could mean in the diaspora. He exposed some of the things that you wouldn’t dream fellow Africans would put each other through just for the gain of the British pound. Things like blackmailing one another and leaving a friend to die, only because you don’t want the burden of looking after a dying man. Chikwava also gave the other side of satire that will even make Mugabe himself smile with envy.

The story is about a young die-hard Robert Mugabe supporter who goes to the UK to raise a bribe-price of US$5,000. His past life as a youth militia trained to kill 'enemies of the state' taught him that only the fit survive in the tough foreign world. He moves from the tense home of his cousin to take up residence at a Brixton squat. His mind is so focused on raising the US$5,000 that everything and everyone is meaningless to him, and that is clearly expressed when his close friend, Shingi is stabbed and hospitalised with life-threatening injuries.What I remain unsure with in Chikwava’s novel is the language he used. For me language tells where one is from. As Africans we have 'Africanised' the English language to a stage where one can pick where the other is from through the way they express themselves in English, and Chikwava’s language came out to me as pidgin mostly associated with the Nigerian community, which might give an impression to some readers that that could be the way Zimbabweans speak. The language also reminded me of two Nigerian books I have read in the past, Sozaboy by Ken Saro Wiwa and Beasts of no nation by Uzodinma Iweala. It left me with an impression that the language was inspired by these two novels. But this can never take away the deserved success of one of the greatest upcoming writers to emerge from Zimbabwe. Chikwava is an international award winner and this is clearly another triumph for him. If this comes with another major award, it shouldn’t be a surprise.

* Stanley Makuwe is a New Zealand-based Zimbabwean playwright. He is the author of Under This Tree and Other Stories.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/.

An interview with Henrietta Rose-Innes

Mildred Kiconco Barya

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/African_Writers/56860

Henrietta Rose-Innes a South African author of two novels, Shark’s Egg and The Rock Alphabet (2000 and 2004, Kwela Books). Her short stories and essays have appeared in various South African and international publications, and her writing has been translated into German and Romanian. Her short story Poison won the 2008 Caine Prize, as well as the 2007 Southern African PEN Literary Award. Henrietta is based in Cape Town, but has held writing residencies in Germany, Switzerland, the USA and at the University of Cape Town.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: Why do you write?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: To give shape to my perceptions and to pursue the meaning of those images that compel me.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: At what age did you start writing creatively?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: My first memory of writing purely for myself – not for school – dates from about age 11. It was a poem about a plane crash.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: Describe your writing journey.

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: About 17 steps from bed to coffee machine, then 22 steps from the coffee machine to the computer.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What are the thematic concerns in your writing?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: I am interested in the interactions – physical and psychological – between human beings and the landscapes they inhabit.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What was the inspiration behind your story submitted for Caine?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: The setting was inspired by a particularly bad year for wildfires on Table Mountain, in Cape Town. The sky was covered in clouds of smoke, as in the story, and everyone in the city was watching the sky, united in unease.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: How did you know about the Caine prize?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: I was aware of it through my friends Mary Watson, who won in 2006, and Darryl Bristow-Bovey, who was short-listed that year.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What was your initial response when you won the Caine prize?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: I was mostly concentrating on getting to the podium without tripping on my long, newly bought red dress. I was very happy!

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What has been happening or not happening since winning the Caine?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: I have been working on a number of short stories, as well as the beginnings of a novel.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: If you were to rewrite your submitted story what would you change?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: God, what a terrible thought! I have fiddled with that thing millions of times; now I feel a wave of nausea every time I glance at it. So, actually, nothing. Why? Is there something wrong with it?

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: How often do you revise or redraft your stories?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: Millions. Millions and millions of times.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What’s your take on writing?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: Before or after tax? But seriously, that’s quite a tough question to tackle without either being flippant or going on for pages. And I’m not at all sure that I know the answer.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: How do you deal with a writer’s rejections?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: I’ve never been rejected by a writer, but I imagine it would be most humiliating.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: Apart from writing, what else do you do and why?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: I teach creative writing at the University of Cape Town and online.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: Forty years from now where do you see yourself?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: In a comfy chair, I hope, with a cup of tea. And perhaps an attractive young personal assistant to answer my emails, or their mid-century equivalent.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What’s your best quote?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: 'Oh Lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood.'

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: Which five authors do you admire most and why? List your favourite five books.

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: You know, I’m going to take a pass on these questions because I always feel uncomfortable answering these questions … it always feels so limiting and untrue in a way, to choose only a few, and my choices change all the time.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What’s your vision?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: Short-sighted, slightly astigmatic.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: What genre do you read most and why?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: Apart from literary fiction, I read quite a lot of non-fiction (history, natural sciences), and I read crime to relax.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: If you were to make a wish right now what would it be?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: Actually, my 'forty years from now' scenario sounds pretty good, so maybe I’d wish for that right now.

MILDRED KICONCO BARYA: If you were to have powers of a genie, what two things would you change?

HENRIETTA ROSE-INNES: Cheaper, VAT-free books. More public libraries in South Africa.

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

Africa: Letter from a continent

MarionRick Grammer

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/African_Writers/56861

Born 3,600 million years ago,
I am the oldest and most stable land mass on earth.
I am so large that the mightiest nation on earth
could fit into a desert of mine.
My oldest rocks bequeath such wealth,
I am well-endowed.
Too well-endowed for my own good.
My geology deposited an abundance of riches within my borders,
Beyond imagining.
Gold, diamonds copper, coltan, tin. I can’t remember them all.
I am too old.
Some of you left me 100,000 years ago to colonise other lands.
And yet, when my European descendants first landed on my shores,
you did not know me.
There was no sense of returning home.
I was inhospitable, holding you northerners off for as long as I could,
sensing your white-skinned, thick-blooded rapaciousness.
After stealing quinine from other native peoples to curb malaria.
You enslaved my people, with the help of your African partners,
I’m ashamed to say.
I was deepest darkest Africa, Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’,
but I seduced, beckoning with dreams of rich spoils and lavish booty.

I was depopulated, condemned to apathy,
large areas desolate, deserted;
relations between those left behind poisoned,
propagating hatred, inflaming wars. The strong overpowering the weak,
selling them in the market place and leaving a permanent scar on my
psyche.
An inferiority complex, if you like.
My people were the other, sub-human,
to be exploited for their labour, then disposed of.
The philosophy that inspired Auschwitz and Treblinka was formulated here;
obsessive contempt and brutality, vileness and hatred.
A world-wide enterprise really, for Europe, the Americas and Asia.

I’m told I’m a basket case, my people lazy, a monocultural mess
waiting for Westerners to come and clean up,
when it is with their labour, you laid the foundations for your power-houses.
You in the West assume I carry a disaster gene
when you wallow in your bath of ill-informed nostalgia.
You forget that when you partitioned, you brutally unified my people
with fire and sword.
Ten thousand states, reduced to fifty.
And of course they bickered and fought and sometimes killed,
as large families often do. They were not noble savages.
When your colonial regimes departed, you left me with frontiers ripe
for ethnic cleansing;
with your political engineering that cemented loose ethnic groupings
into fiercely nationalistic tribes;
with vast inequality in land and wealth
that led to instant corruption of political elites that you supported.
Your governments which so often helped them into their palaces,
overlooking their cruelty and corruption for the sake of strategic
economic advantage.
When you were engaged in your Cold War, you waged most of it within my borders;
A not-so-cold war.
You backed one authoritarian monster after another,
Littering my streets with corpses.

Now you want to save me.
Brand new white Land Rovers criss-cross my dusty streets
Bringing your self-serving ‘aid’ to my starving people.
My large scale famines a ‘growth opportunity’ for your charities to
stimulate donations.
Hunger porn.
Your reporters crouch by emaciated babies, cameras zooming in
on victims of ethnic cleaning, hooked, a constant search for tragedy.
Geldoff, Sting, Bono, we’re being Band-aided.
You hold concerts. Forgive their debts, you say.
My people laugh and tears stream down their cheeks.
Even I summon a mirthless rumble.
You in the West, do your accounting. Add up your ledgers, balance your books.
You’ve taken much more from me than we ever need to repay.
My bill is yet to come. YOU OWE ME!

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

ITCH e.04 call for submissions

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/African_Writers/56859

Artists working in any medium and writers expressing themselves in any form or genre are invited to submit work for the fourth issue of ITCH Online. The 'theme' is:

'A moment's expectation, a silent space between the verbal flow... A short row of spots, to be sure... A breath held... Or expelled... Visual space, opened for interpretation... Ellipses eclipsed... Hesitation, uncertainty, the pause prioritised... A confused vagueness... The search for the right... words... or pictures... or sounds... An unwillingness to end a statement with certainty... or commit to a particular and unchangeable position... A soft ending in hard times... An evocative moment unwilling to be crystallised into expression... Three pennies on the floor... A sigh... a logo... dot dot dot...'

You are free to interpret this theme in any way that you wish, to speak to or against it, to explore or ignore it, with words, sounds and/or images. Poetry, prose, essays, book reviews, short stories, unclassifiable writing, photography, graphic design, sound art, visual work, animations, short films, drawings, paintings, and more, are welcomed.

Submissions are open until 28 August 2009.

See www.itch.co.za/submissions for full guidelines.

In the meantime, enjoy reading and viewing ITCH e.03, ITCH e.02 and ITCH e.01 at www.itch.co.za.

Bongo's palace makes White House look quaint

Review of the African Blogosphere – June 10, 2009

Dibussi Tande

2009-06-11

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/blog/56854

Ramblings of a Procrastinator in Accra explains why he is fascinated by the ongoing drama surrounding the death of Gabonese President Omar Bongo:

“Why am I so fascinated? Well, out of all the countries I have visited, my trip to Gabon last year was truly unforgettable. I was there for 2 months and during that time I failed to really understand the country. From the unspoiled beaches to the rich lush equatorial forests, it is still very hard to describe Gabon. A nation full of contradictions; extreme wealth coupled with extreme poverty. The entire nation is adorned with sign-boards with Mr. Bongo's picture, monuments celebrating him and a Presidential palace that makes the White House look like a quaint country club. The Gabonese people were equally fascinating. Customer service has a unique meaning in Gabon and a visit to Libreville is not recommended for someone looking for a budget vacation. Yet, Libreville has an undeniable vibrant pulse. I will never forget the beautiful Italian restaurant we ate in that was literally on water or the wonderfully paved streets. I spent most of my time in the provincial town of Lambaréné which has a strange 1950s colonial feel with great roads, bridges, rivers and fantastic lighting.”

Pen Powder looks back at Omar Bongo’s 42-year rule and the Bongo family’s stranglehold on Gabon:

“During Bongo's long rule, ethnic tensions were subdued and Gabon was generally stable and peaceful. The country benefited from its oil wealth, although most of the population remained impoverished and Bongo and his associates were routinely accused of serious corruption...

So what is wrong with all this? I will not be shaken in my assertion that when it comes to democracy and politics, there is no meaningful contribution that anybody can give after 10 years at the helm. What new ideas will one come up with after having been so used to the system?

Now we are told that the late Bongo’s son who is the Minister of Defence has sealed off the whole country, deployed soldiers, cut off Internet access and ordered state radio to play sorrowful music to mourn the president. Honestly, who do these Bongos think they are?”

Ndagha loudly proclaims that he is proud of his country, Malawi:

“In fact it might be fair to argue that we have one of the best democracies so far...

As I continue living in Malawi and here and there read or visit other countries, I get more and more impressed and proud of my country Malawi.

For some months, there has been general excitement that the country's economic growth is on the right path. Who wouldn't want to be proud of such a country?

Though we have several health, economic and other problems, it is exciting that there is relatively lots of freedom of all forms in Malawi…

I am proud of Malawi because it is still a very closely knit country. When someone tells you that the world is small, you certainly get to agree as soon or later you bump into someone who knows that and that and that one. You cannot get lost...”

Kent’s Diaries comments on the ubiquity of the mobile phone in Africa today:

“Mobile phones are no longer a preserve for the elite class in society. Almost everyone owns one (in Ghana even the poor have two or more). Cell phones are now part of people’s lives. Life without a mobile phone is like life without oxygen, an electrical appliance without electricity, the world without light or a football match without a ball.
The International Telecommunication Union estimated that about four billion cellular phone subscriptions would be recorded at end of 2008 worldwide. About 50 million people own mobile phones in Africa. Out of this number 15 million do not have access to their own television at home.

Mobile phones have shrunk the world into a small village. In the past people had to queue at post offices (at least I know of Africa) to make international calls to friends and relatives abroad. It took days and weeks to travel to family and friends in nearby villages to deliver messages that lasted for less than half an hour when phones were not in existence. Today the situation is totally different. Mobile phones have made it possible to connect to people from anywhere to everywhere.”

Nigerian Curiosity reviews the 4-year old agreement between Microsoft and Nigeria to fight cyber crime:

“Whenever there is a discussion of cyber crimes, the word ‘Nigeria’ will soon be raised. This is the unfortunate reality for the country which has a reputation as the home of many online scammers and other criminals. Yet, Nigeria has been in partnership with Microsoft to combat cyber crime for at least 4 years. Unfortunately, it is not clear whether this partnership has produces significant benefits for the country and its damaging reputation...

In 2005, Nuhu Ribadu said that the EFCC had confiscated at least $100 million from spammers and other defendants and by the time he was 'temporarily removed' from his position in 2008, the EFCC had retrieved a total $600 million in dubiously acquired funds (including stolen public assets). In spite of this, and the fact that Microsoft has been an anti-cyber crime partner, Nigeria's reputation as a haven for scammers and fraudsters has barely improved.

And now, a new report indicates that Nigeria ranks 3rd on a top 10 list of the world's worst online crime countries. This begs the simple question - Why is Nigeria still ranked that high?”

Craig of Capetown writes about a massive ponzi scheme that was recently uncovered in South Africa:

“A while back - last year in fact, I realised that money I had invested in a scheme involving stem-cell regeneration was completely lost. Having had received no feedback from my investment broker for quite some time I tried to contact him and needless to say the company no longer existed and my money was all gone.

However that was small beans compared to those who invested in the Frankel Scheme. Now it has been uncovered that more than R2 billion has gone missing and it is believed that more losses will be uncovered soon.

This was all created by Barry Tannenbaum who it is alleged may have started South Africa's largest Ponzi scheme. This has been uncovered by a Financial Mail investigation that has exposed a trail of deceit that looks as if this might be South Africa's biggest investment disaster.”

* Dibussi Tande, a writer and activist from Cameroon, produces the blog Scribbles from the Den

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

China- Africa watch news roundup

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/africa_china/56959

Sanusha Naidu compiles a list of the top stories on Sino-African relations.
China and the New Africa
Kampala to host Africa - Asia Tourism Meet
China's Experience on Reducing Poverty Opens New Chapter in Sino-Africa Cooperation
BRICs Add $60 Billion Reserves as Zhou Derides Dollar
The grab for Africa’s farmland
China’s Africa Strategy Blossoms as Relationship Develops
[url=http://english.cri.cn/6909/2009/06/09/1321s491473.htm/]Interview: COMESA Customs Union Conducive to Sino-African Cooperation[/url
Tunisian- Chinese trade and investment forum held in Tunis
China urged to invest more in Africa's manufacturing sector
DR Congo to adapt China deal to appease IMF
Deconstructing the Bharti-MTN Deal
Human rights group condemns how China gives aid
Developed nations holding up climate talks, says China
China Forges Strategic Links with Gulf
South- South Cooperation and Trade Relations – the magic bullet for African economies?
African states seek own solutions in world crisis
China is now world No. 2 arms spender, report says
Another Deal Blown, Where Will China Invest Now?
China's Hidden Bankruptcy
China will learn from failed Chinalco-Rio deal/
Africa's largest trade bloc launches customs union
Interview: Zimbabwe ready to co-operate with China
Chinalco ditches $19.5bn Rio deal
Kenya Told to Learn From India About GM Cotton
Brazil, China deals challenge US position in Latin America
Hurt by fake Chinese drugs, India starts drive in Africa
ICBC chief says China to increase investment in Africa
China ministry to push ahead with go abroad policy
Hong Kong lures African traders with incentive packages
Standard Bank lauds cooperation with ICBC
Is Africa Becoming China’s Bread Basket? It Looks Like It
China's Sinopec eyes stake in energy firm Addax: report
China's New Silk Road shines in Africa
While global FDI falls, China ’s outward FDI doubles
China still on the hunt in Africa
Tata-led Neotel denies problems between Indian, South African staff
Brazil eyes trade with Africa
S.Africa Sanlam wants to up stake in India venture
Ghana hosts Brazilian trade delegation
Areva Offers India Stakes in African Mines, Jain Says
Telcos dial Africa for new pastures

Tsvangirai urges US to support inclusive government

2009-06-12

http://zimbabwejournalists.com/story.php?art_id=5684

Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai is urging the United States to support his government despite abuses by his coalition partner, President Robert Mugabe. Tsvangirai plans to make his case Friday in a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama as part of a three week tour of Western countries. He also will meet Thursday with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

DRC: Rape as a weapon of war

2009-06-12

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,629885,00.html

Sexual violence is a brutal reality in the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo: Tens of thousands of women and children were raped in the region last year alone. In a guest editorial, François Grignon of the International Crisis Group urges the West to fight the epidemic before more lives are shattered.

Global: Financial crisis could force more girls into work

2009-06-12

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84817

The financial crisis could force more girls into work as financially squeezed families withdraw their daughters from school to seek jobs, warns the International Labour Organization in a report released on 12 June, World Day Against Child Labour. “The root cause of child labour is poverty”, report author, Patrick Quinn told IRIN. "There is a strong likelihood that girls will be sent into work as families cannot afford school fees and need their children to help support them.”

Zimbabwe: Girls trade sex for food

2009-06-12

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8096874.stm

Growing numbers of children in Zimbabwe are turning to prostitution to survive, the charity Save the Children says. The aid agency says increasing poverty is leading girls as young as 12 to sell their bodies for as little as a packet of biscuits. It also claims that the coming football World Cup in neighbouring South Africa could soon make things worse.

DRC: Warlord loses bid to block ICC trial

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mc4dq5

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has dismissed a bid by Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) ex-militia chief Germain Katanga for his war crimes trial to be thrown out. Judge Bruno Cotte dismissed an argument by Katanga that the case was inadmissible on the basis that legal proceedings had been brought against him before courts in his home country.

Egypt: Arresting simple people because of Obama

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/rights/56943

The Arab Program for Human Rights Activists follows up with deep concern and complete resentment the security procedures' aftermath that accompanied the visit of U.S. President Barak Obama to Cairo on Thursday 04/06/2009. In this regard, the Program purses the serious breaches of citizens' rights that had been conducted between 4th and 6th of June. In addition to the desistance state that took place in Cairo.
Cairo in 4 \ 6 \ 2009
Arresting Simple People Because of Obama
The Arab Program's Campaign over Abuses in El Sharabia Police Station

The Arab Program for Human Rights Activists follows up with deep concern and complete resentment the security procedures' aftermath that accompanied the visit of U.S. President Barak Obama to Cairo on Thursday 04/06/2009. In this regard, the Program purses the serious breaches of citizens' rights that had been conducted since last Thursday and until Saturday evening. In addition to the desistance state that took place in Cairo. Besides, the restricted security instructions to citizens not to open or stand on their home balconies and the mandatory evacuation of the streets due to the security orders from superiors.

Moreover, El Sharabia bureau of investigation led by Major Hisham Farouk arrested a large number of citizens without having any right of detention and without being charged since 03 \06 \ 2009 till Saturday evening in inhuman conditions, where a large number of detainees had been kept in a room that did not exceed an area of 6 × 5 meters. And in spite of having the identity cards and not committing any crime or offense, and force them to clean the Police station's floor many time from the morning of Thursday 04/06 to Saturday 06/06/2009, as if innocent people have become slaves without dignity or rights.

It should be noted that El Sharabia Police Station is consistently arresting citizens under the pretext of inquiry on a weekly basis. Meantime, the Station used to keep citizens in custody for more than 48 hours without being prosecuted, in clear violation of applicable laws and regulations, alleging that it's the instructions of the State Security Investigation Office. Furthermore, the police officers used to take mobile phones from lawyers during their entry into the Police Station. The Arab Program believes that the reason behind this is due to the systematic torture practiced within the Station and the fear of officers from lawyer to catch pictures of what is happening inside.

In this context, The Arab Program for Human Rights Activists calls upon the Minister of Interior Habib Al-Adli to open an urgent and imminent investigation over the Police Officers' acts of violation of the Egyptian Constitution in El Sharabia Police Station, particularly Article 41 which is related to personal freedom, security of persons and the prohibition of arbitrary detention. In addition, the Program considers the officers' actions an absolute violation to all texts of International covenants related to human rights, particularly Article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Moreover, the Program demands the Public Prosecutor to carry out its role in censoring police stations to ensure compliance with the Egyptian laws and regulations in preserving human rights and freedoms to ban such abuses.

Kenya: Government 'must act urgently to end impunity' - AI

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mbh2c2

"Kenya has a long history of serious human rights violations but it now has an opportunity to turn the page," said Irene Khan, Secretary General of Amnesty International, concluding the mission to Kenya. "Successive Kenyan governments have been good at establishing Commissions and Taskforces and poor at implementing their recommendations. This government must not repeat that pattern."

Kenya: The Unseen Majority: Nairobi's 2 million slum dwellers

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/ld4jds

Amnesty International has released its report into the dire conditions and gross human rights abuses endured in Nairobi's informal settlements. The Unseen Majority: Nairobi's Two Million Slum Dwellers describes how half of Nairobi's population live in informal settlements, but are crammed into only 5 per cent of the city’s residential area and just 1 per cent of all land in the city.

Nigeria: Abusers reign at midterm

2009-06-12

http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/06/07/nigeria-abusers-reign-midterm

President Umaru Yar'Adua of Nigeria, halfway through his presidential mandate, has undermined the country's foremost anti-corruption body, done little to rein in an abusive police force, and failed to address the root causes of the escalating crisis in the Niger Delta, Human Rights Watch has said. Human Rights Watch said in a letter to Yar'Adua that there have been serious setbacks during the first two years in addressing Nigeria's chronic human rights problems and endemic corruption.

Nigeria: Settlement reached in human rights cases against Royal Dutch/Shell

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/ndxrv4

The parties in Wiwa v. Shell have agreed to settle human rights claims charging the Royal Dutch/Shell company, its Nigerian subsidiary, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC or Shell Nigeria), and the former head of its Nigerian operation, Brian Anderson, with complicity in the torture, killing, and other abuses of Ogoni leader Ken Saro-Wiwa and other non-violent Nigerian activists in the mid-1990s in the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta.

Somalia: Number of displaced nears 120,000

2009-06-12

http://www.unhcr.org/news/NEWS/4a2e73d92.html

The UN refugee agency has condemned the victimization of Somali civilians in Mogadishu after a weekend spike in the fighting in the capital sent thousands more people fleeing the city. This latest exodus pushed the number of displaced from the capital past the 100,000-mark to 117,000 since street battles erupted on May 8.

Tanzania: Statement of the situation in Mtabila refugee camp

2009-06-12

http://www.refugees.org/article.aspx?id=2314

The encampment of hundreds of thousands of Burundian refugees in Tanzania is coming to an end after more than 20 years. Rather than respecting the safety and dignity of refugees through truly voluntary repatriation or the pursuit of alternative durable solutions, the Tanzanian Government is pressuring refugees to repatriate through intimidation and the denial of basic services in violationof basic international human rights and refugee law.

Burkina Faso: PM urges striking teachers to resume classes

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/nh4r3o

Burkina Faso's Prime Minister, Tertius Zongo, has urged striking national union of teachers and researchers (SYNADEC) to end their two two-month old strike saying government is prepared to dialogue with them. “Government remains sensitive to the material and moral interests of workers and will never stop dialoguing with them through their trade unions,” he told a news conference in the capital, Ouagadougou.

Zimbabwe: ZCTU on privatisation

ZCTU statement

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/labour/56927

It seems government will go ahead with its controversial plans of privatization without employing a holistic, inclusive and participatory approach. The ZCTU believes there is need for genuine social dialogue whereby all stakeholders are consulted before major decisions are made. Social dialogue has been used the world over as a means of decision-making and programme implementation at all levels.
The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) is perturbed by Cabinet’s approval of privatization. Privatization is concerned with maximizing profits ahead of human needs, rights and interests.

It seems government will go ahead with its controversial plans of privatization without employing a holistic, inclusive and participatory approach. The ZCTU believes there is need for genuine social dialogue whereby all stakeholders are consulted before major decisions are made. Social dialogue has been used the world over as a means of decision-making and programme implementation at all levels.

The process of privatization has severe social consequences on labour and consumers in general. It seems government is employing a ‘trial and error’ approach without really considering the implications for other stakeholders, for example job losses or insecurity and poor service delivery. Cabinet has put the goal of profit maximization ahead of human needs, rights and interests.

The ZCTU therefore rejects Cabinet’s approval of privatization of state enterprises as largely a top-down approach has been employed without the involvement of all stakeholders resulting in uncertainty. Labour demands that stakeholders be extensively consulted and a common vision on matters of national interest be developed instead of Cabinet making unilateral decisions.

Gabon: Interim leader sworn in

2009-06-12

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8092713.stm

The speaker of the senate in Gabon has been sworn in as the country's interim head of state, following the recent death of President Omar Bongo. Under the constitution, Rose Francine Rogombe, an ally of Mr Bongo, must organise elections within 45 days. On Thursday, Mr Bongo's body will be repatriated from Spain where he had been undergoing medical treatment.

Madagascar: Armed forces on top alert

2009-06-12

http://af.reuters.com/article/topNews/idAFJOE55B0L720090612

Madagascar's armed forces are on maximum alert, days after African economic bloc COMESA declared military intervention to end the island's political crisis remained an option, the government said on Friday. Armed Forces Minister Noel Rakotonandrasana told Reuters that COMESA's stance, which has drawn criticism from both France and the United Nations, had to be taken seriously.

North Africa: Moroccans go to the polls

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mm3j97

Moroccans began voting on Friday in a local election where the government of conservatives and socialists aims to limit gains by opposition Islamists and a new party formed by staunch backers of King Mohammed. It is the second local election of the reform-minded king's reign. He is widely credited with loosening restrictions on political activity and improving the north African country's human rights record.

Africa: Africa 'not badly hit' despite 16 million poor

2009-06-12

http://www.ipsterraviva.net/europe/article.aspx?id=7463

Former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan believes that Africa has not been affected as "profoundly" by the global economic crisis compared to other regions in the world - despite the number of Africans living in poverty having increased by 16 million in the last year and annual growth dropping from six to one percent. The 2009 annual report of the African Progress Panel (APP), headed by Annan, was launched yesterday on the first day of the 19th World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa meeting currently underway in the South African coastal city of Cape Town.

Africa: COMESA Customs Union

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/n2doqa

The 13th Summit of the COMESA Heads of State and Government which kicked off on Sunday 8th June launched with pomp the COMESA Customs Union in Victoria Falls - Zimbabwe. Zimbabwean President Robert G Mugabe who assumed the Chairmanship of the COMESA Authority for the next one year presided over the launch Ceremony.

Africa: Naive and unfair to cast South Africa as villain in EU-Sacu drama

2009-06-12

http://www.businessday.co.za/Articles/Content.aspx?id=73159

South Africa has been framed as a villain for the woes of the Southern African Customs Union (Sacu ) in the wake of the fallout from the economic partnership agreements (EPAs) between the European Union (EU) and the Southern African Development Community. Reports have cast SA as the bullyboy and have attacked its position as obstructionist. The implication is that it is only the EU that has Africa’s best interests at heart. Nothing can be further from the truth.

Africa: States seek own solutions in world crisis

2009-06-12

http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL7723174

Africa must seek to solve its own problems as the global economic crisis limits the ability of more developed countries to follow through on aid pledges, African ministers told a conference in Cairo. But officials and delegates said international bodies must make good on recent pledges to help Africa, which has been roiled by last year's sharp food price rises and fluctuating commodity markets.

DRC: Govenrment to adapt China deal to appease IMF

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/njm35q

The Democratic Republic of Congo will put part of its $9-billion investment agreement with China on hold to take into account concerns voiced by the International Monetary Fund, said Moise Ekanga, who oversees the accord for Congo. The central African country has put a $3-billion chunk of infrastructure investments by their Chinese partners ”on the back-burner” to satisfy objections by the IMF that the agreement will add to Congo’s $11-billion external debt, said Ekanga, the executive-secretary of the Coordination and Monitoring Office for the Sino-Congolese Program.

East Africa: States outline steps to battle global economic crisis

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mnugng

East African states are seeking modest economic stimulus packages, aimed at steering their countries through the global economic turbulence, and outlining plans to increase agricultural production and increase regional trade. In the fiscal plans unveiled Thursday in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania, the respective finance ministers unveiled plans aimed at steering their economies through the financial crisis and avoiding adverse tax measures likely to create social backlashes.

Africa: Call for leaders to continue funding the fight against HIV & TB

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mwy8r8

African health and human rights activists have called on leaders attending the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting on Africa to “not use the same pie and split it between more people”, but to make the pie bigger. Representing a coalition of African HIV and tuberculosis activists, Paula Akugizibwe of the AIDS and Rights Alliance for Southern Africa spelt out their list of demands which includes a challenge to the region’s leaders to guarantee the right to health, ensure that it is financed as a priority, and mobilise the additional resources needed to secure universal access to TB/HIV prevention, treatment and care.

Global: WHO declares swine flu a pandemic

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mzykra

Swine flu, otherwise known as the H1N1 virus, reached pandemic status, the Geneva-based World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Thursday. The Pan African News Agency (PANA) learnt that more than 27,000 confirmed cases had been confirmed in several continents since the first case in Mexico in April.

South Africa: A mixed bag of new HIV figures

2009-06-12

http://www.plusnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84773

The percentage of people living with HIV in South Africa has barely changed in the last six years, but new data has revealed that between 2002 and 2008 there were many changes in HIV knowledge, risk behaviour and testing habits.

Africa: Report reveals shocking human rights abuses

2009-06-12

http://www.mask.org.za/article.php?cat=AfricaAbroad&id=2159

Amnesty International’s 2009 Report on the state of the world’s human rights has revealed a staggering evidence of human rights violations purported against LGBTI communities in African states. Nigeria, Uganda and Senegal, according to the report are countries that record the most and worst abuses of human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people. It further states that in Nigeria, “human rights abuses against individuals suspected of same-sex sexual conduct continued throughout 2008.”

Kenya: LGBT debate moves to schools

2009-06-12

http://www.mask.org.za/article.php?cat=kenya&id=2161

Learning institutions in the country have been urged by experts to set rules and regulations regarding homosexual behaviour in schools. Kenya Female Advisory Organisation coordinator Dolphin Oketch has said that boarding schools are more prone to witnessing cases of students practicing homosexuality, and thus the need for some set rules. While not expounding on the matter, Oketch however said that these educational institutions should create space for dialogue among students on their sexual lives, and not resort to only discussing the issue when a crisis has occurred.

Global: Geneva 2009 Declaration Against Racism

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/racism/56937

We participants of the Civil Society Forum for the Durban Review Conference 2009 held in Geneva 17 to 19 April strongly welcome the holding of the Durban Review Conference and reaffirm our full and dedicated support for the Durban Declaration and Plan of Action (DDPA) adopted by the 2001 World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.
PEOPLE UNITED AGAINST RACISM

Civil Society Forum 2009 for the Durban Review Conference
17-19 April 2009, Geneva, Switzerland

Geneva 2009 Declaration Against Racism
FROM THE PARTICIPANTS IN THE GENEVA CIVIL SOCIETY FORUM 2009

A Time to Speak Out

We participants of the Civil Society Forum for the Durban Review Conference 2009 held in Geneva 17 to 19 April strongly welcome the holding of the Durban Review Conference and reaffirm our full and dedicated support for the Durban Declaration and Plan of Action (DDPA) adopted by the 2001 World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.
We commit ourselves to renew our efforts and intensify our work for the implementation of the 2001 landmark programme which constitute a solid foundation in the struggle of humankind against racism and racial discrimination.

We express our deep concern over the decision by some powerful countries to boycott this important conference which falls short of their Charter obligations to combat racism and promote human rights for all.
We are appalled by the many obstacles that have been put in the way of preparing and holding of the Durban Review Conference as a result of lack of political will resulting in the erosion of support for the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action among some member states which also has been reflected in the lack of United Nations support and encouragement for Civil Society preparations for the Review Conference.

We strongly believe and insist that the outcome of the 2001 Durban Conference is and must be recognized on an equal level with the outcomes of other major United Nations conferences, Summits and Special sessions and that strong and concerted actions need to be taken by the United Nations, Member States and Civil Society to reinforce its standing and rightful place at the top of the agenda of global priorities.

We must not forget the historical importance of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action in declaring the transatlantic slave trade as a crime against humanity. It also provided an understanding and clear analyses of the emergence of the present day world and the deep roots of racism in the transatlantic slave trade and colonial era. Its remaining legacies are felt throughout the world in terms of situations of profound social and economic inequality, hatred, bigotry, racism and prejudice.

While noting with appreciation all the measures taken since 2001 to combat racism we are alarmed that today we are witnessing an upsurge of racism in many countries as a result of neglect to address root causes and institutionalised racism. This has been further exacerbated by the deepening world economic crisis. Racism is now taking an increasingly violent and aggravated forms in many countries and regions.

We express our concern at the increasing acts of xenophobia against migrants, migrant workers and members of their family, especially by the migration policies of many countries that lead to aggravated forms of discrimination. Migrant workers and their families must be granted residency and equal rights in the countries in which they contribute through their work.

We are equally concerned by the increasing discrimination, violation and exploitation faced by refugees, asylum seekers, stateless persons, internally displaced persons and trafficked persons, including women and children, as this constitute an affront to human rights and human dignity. We seek all the international community to put the responsibility of all violations of their rights and all forms of racism and discriminations against them on the host countries under the international law.

We emphasise the multiple and aggravated forms of discrimination experienced by women globally, at work and at home, especially marginalized and displaced women, which is exacerbated by racism, racial discrimination and related intolerance and leads to the denial of their civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights and call for the full respect and implementation of these rights urgently.

We call on states to adopt strong and effective measures and support initiatives for children and youth relating to work, culture and education so as to eliminate social exclusion and better counter racism, intolerance and conflicts.

We are alarmed by the fact that counterterrorism measures after 9/11 have led to the rise of increased racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, racial intolerance and religious stereotyping as new and contemporary manifestations of racism. We condemn the stereotyping of religious minorities and call for this to be closely monitored and addressed by the United Nations bodies. This includes incitement to hatred based on religious believes, in particular the serious increase in islamophobia. We call for the review of the Anti-terror legislation and measures and actively bring them into accord with international human rights standards.

We will continue our work against all forms of racial and religious discrimination, including afrophobia, anti-Arabism, anti-Ziganism, anti-Semitism, islamophobia, anti-African and Indigenous Peoples ancestral spiritual traditions

We acknowledge that poverty affects the majority of people world-wide who suffer from unequal distribution of wealth and reiterate that the present global finance and trade system must be restructured and reformed in the interest of justice and the equitable sharing of resources at all levels. This is on behalf of the healing of a world still divided by the exploitation of peoples’ resources and the past and continuing legacies of slave trade and colonialism.

We reiterate that the barbarism of the transatlantic slave trade stands out in the history of humanity in terms of its magnitude and organised nature and express our concern over any attempt to revise the verdict of history of this unparalleled crime against humanity. We call for the full implementation of the Durban agreements on the transatlantic slave trade and the full integration of those provisions as well as those of the recent General Assembly resolutions in the work of the United Nations Durban follow up mechanisms. Such an active role for the Durban follow up mechanisms should provide the ground for a collaborative effort to bring the matters of remembrance, identification of legacies, apologies, reparations, repatriation and other forms of remedies forward.

We call on the United Nations to create a Permanent Forum for Peoples of African Descent and African diaspora in order to ensure their visibility in the UN system.

We note the continued failure of the international community to recognize the destruction of many of the worlds indigenous peoples through the impositions of the dominant culture in the countries they live. We call on the international community to renew the attention to this and to recognize the historical debt the world owes to indigenous peoples worldwide.

We are appalled by the ongoing atrocities, extreme forms of institutionalised discrimination and racist colonialist practices committed against the Palestinian People struggling against all odds to achieve their inalienable right to self-determination according to international law. We condemn the continued impunity of the perpetrators and those responsible of these crimes against humanity and war crimes and call for immediate measures to bring them to justice. Our solidarity with the Palestinian People will remain firm and alive until the full achievement of all their rights, including the right to return, under international law enshrined in the resolutions of the United Nations.

We strongly deplore the silence in the official Durban process and documents regarding discrimination based on work and descent, including caste based discrimination, which affect some 260 million people globally, especially women, violating their individual and collective rights and dignity for generations. We call on the United Nations and international community to support their cause for equality and justice.

We express our strong concern about crimes against humanity and war crimes in Darfur with massive violations of human rights of civilian populations, the continuing multiple, racial and discriminatory acts and mass rapes of women. We urge the international community to implement the relevant United Nations resolutions.

We affirm our solidarity with all victims groups and express our concern of over any acts of harassments and intimidation of persons and groups combating racism and racial discrimination. We call for the release of human rights defenders and community and political leaders unjustly imprisoned for their engagement against racism and racial discrimination.

We express our determination to actively use all the relevant instruments and mechanisms for the protection of Human Rights, especially the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all Migrant Workers and Members of their Families, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination of Women, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the UNESCO Convention Against Discrimination in Education and the ILO related conventions. We call for their speedy universal ratification.

The 2001 World Conference Against Racism became a catalyst for networking and activism for anti-racist movements and many victims groups. It allowed them to take their rightful place in partnership with the movements against war and occupation, for human rights, for sustainable development and the quest for social justice, believing that another world is possible and necessary.

Now is the time for a declaration of resolve to be made by Peoples, Governments and the United Nations to safeguard the achievements of the World Conference Against Racism. It is time to provide for the implementation of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action in its entirety.

We call for Governments to decide on a 10-year Summit, a Durban +10, to review the continued implementation of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action.
We declare that irrespective of the decisions of Governments we will join forces with all people of good will to launch our own Durban + 10 process in solidarity with all victims groups in order to ensure that the combat against all forms of racism and racial discrimination is moved forward.

Global: The facts: How Israel orchestrated the real Geneva ‘hate fest’ against Black and Brown people

Arlene Eisen

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/racism/56938

On Saturday, April 18, two days before the United Nations Durban Review Conference (DRC) officially convened, anti-racist demonstrators from every continent and nearly every struggle in the world filled the streets of downtown Geneva. A sea of flags, banners and posters spoke for indigenous people from Bolivia, Mexico and Guatemala, the landless former slaves of Brazil, Tamils struggling for survival in Sri Lanka, a huge contingent of Dalits demanding an end to the caste system, Black delegates from the U.S. and other points in the Diaspora calling for reparations and freedom for political prisoners, Africans from the continent, many European migrants from the third world and their supporters and a variety of groups in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Some had handmade signs: “Zionism equals racism” and “Israel is an Apartheid State.”
On Saturday, April 18, two days before the United Nations Durban Review Conference (DRC) officially convened, anti-racist demonstrators from every continent and nearly every struggle in the world filled the streets of downtown Geneva. A sea of flags, banners and posters spoke for indigenous people from Bolivia, Mexico and Guatemala, the landless former slaves of Brazil, Tamils struggling for survival in Sri Lanka, a huge contingent of Dalits demanding an end to the caste system, Black delegates from the U.S. and other points in the Diaspora calling for reparations and freedom for political prisoners, Africans from the continent, many European migrants from the third world and their supporters and a variety of groups in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Some had handmade signs: “Zionism equals racism” and “Israel is an Apartheid State.”

At the rally, Doudou Diène, “Special Rapporteur on Contemporary forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and related intolerance” and a scholar from Senegal, spoke. He emphasized that racism is rooted in slavery and colonialism, including settler colonialism. He pointed out that the Israeli occupation of Palestine continues a tradition of settler colonialism and racism. The crowd applauded. Not a heckler was in sight.

Most of us at the demonstration had heard the news that the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) - the organizer of the Conference - had attempted to appease the United States and Israel by deleting language supporting reparations for slavery and self determination for the Palestinian people. But the Obama administration’s threat to continue the boycott begun by Bush and Israel in 2001 did not dampen the spirits of the demonstrators that afternoon. After the demonstration, various NGO caucuses met, many for the first time, attempting to prepare position papers that would pressure the DRC to be more responsive to grassroots anti-racist movements. We were about to learn that we had been thoroughly outmaneuvered.

Most were unaware that for nearly two years, hundreds of militant pro-Israeli activists and the Israeli Foreign Ministry had been coordinating their plans to sabotage the DRC. The fiercely pro-Israel NGO-Monitor named at least 17 Zionist organizations that had been “monitoring and protesting” the Durban Review Conference since May 2007 - only a few months after the U.N. General Assembly itself had passed a resolution to convene the Durban Review Conference.

Role of the Israeli Foreign Ministry

On Sunday, Feb. 24, 2008, Israel’s Foreign Minister at the time, Tzipi Livni, announced Israel’s decision to boycott the DRC. On Feb. 25, Haviv Rettig Gur reported in the Jerusalem Post that some 30 Jewish organizations from around the world were scheduled to meet the following day with the Israeli Foreign Ministry “to coordinate efforts at preventing the Durban Review Conference from becoming an anti-Israel and anti-semitic hate fest.” According to the Jerusalem Post, at that meeting, with the guidance of the head of the NGO Unit of the Foreign Ministry, they formed a task force to coordinate efforts for Durban II.”

At the time, Bush was still president and all the 2008 presidential candidates were competing with each other to be recognized as the staunchest Israeli ally. Israel had no reason to doubt U.S. backing when it took the lead in the international campaign to derail the DRC. Through every U.S. presidency, Israel has been the largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid - currently $3.1 billion in military aid and nearly double that in non-military grants. U.S. aid has built and maintained Israel’s army - the fourth most powerful in the world - the same army that has keeps a defenseless Palestinian population under siege, occupied for the last 42 years and expelled and dispossessed for the last 60 years.

Most recently, Israel inflicted 22 days of relentless ‘round-the-clock bombing on the sliver of land of Gaza where 1.5 million Palestinians are caged. That bombing killed some 1,400 people, wounded 4,336 and terrorized the entire population. Israel perpetrated this crime against humanity with impunity, confident of the support of the Obama administration and most European allies.

Israel is aware that as a settler-colonial regime, its power rests on violence underwritten by the U.S. But U.S. support for Israel’s permanent war against the Palestinian people requires perpetuation of the myths: “Israel is a democratic, not apartheid state” and “Israel wants peace and is only defending itself against fanatic Arab terrorists.”

In Durban, the 2001 Worldwide Conference Against Racism (WCAR), sponsored by the U.N., cracked Israel’s hegemonic narrative of the “the Middle East conflict.” The final Durban Declaration and Program of Action (DDPA), signed Sept. 8, 2001, by all U.N. members except the U.S. and Israel, reflected the even-handed diplomacy of the world’s official state representatives.

“We are concerned about the plight of the Palestinian people under foreign occupation. We recognize the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and to the establishment of an independent State and we recognize the right of security for all States in the region, including Israel, and call upon all states to support the peace process and bring it to an early conclusion.” (paragraph 63, http://www.unhchr.ch/pdf/Durban.pdf)

Other paragraphs expressed deep concern regarding anti-semitism and Islamophobia and affirmed that the “Holocaust must never be forgotten.”

Despite the declaration’s moderation, the U.S. and Israel denounced it as “anti-semitic” and walked out. The corporate media echoed the pro-Israeli narrative that demonized the Durban Conference as an “anti-semitic hate fest.” Then, before the U.N. or any of the 150 countries that signed the declaration could defend it, the Twin Towers were bombed.

The Western corporate media sealed the reputation of Durban in a tomb of anti-terror, anti-Muslim hysteria. How convenient for the Zionists to resurrect the misrepresented ghost of WCAR in order to launch their campaign to discredit and derail the 2009 Durban Review Conference.

The Zionists’ comprehensive strategy

Before any reader jumps to the conclusion that this author is resorting to the traditional anti-semitic canard by creating a fictional “Zionist conspiracy,” please note that Michael Jordan, frequent contributor to the pro-Israel online news service JTA, openly bragged about the power of their plot. The cornerstone of the plan was to campaign for an international boycott of the conference and then to accuse any critics of being anti-semitic.

On April 28, 2009, he wrote: “This time, however, the Jews actually did conspire, albeit openly, to sabotage the conference. [my emphasis]

“The World Jewish Congress[1] met with officials from 17 U.N. member states to push for a boycott. Hudson Institute scholar Anne Bayefsky banged the anti-Durban drum for months in the U.S. media, including the National Review, the New York Daily News and Forbes. And Israeli officials pressed their allies that intended to participate in the conference not to tolerate any anti-Israel resolutions.

“But for the most part, Durban II’s organizers and participants did not want to point the finger at the Jews for the anti-Durban effort for fear of being labeled anti-semites.”

The Jerusalem Post, Israel’s newspaper of record, reported frequently on the growing lobbying efforts to render the Durban Review Conference irrelevant by convincing the “world community” - read Europe and the U.S. - to boycott it. A Sept. 28, 2008, article specifically detailed a concerted three-pronged strategy: 1) To call for states to boycott the conference; 2) To urge governments and private donors not to fund either the conference or the NGOs; 3) To organize and galvanize a pro-Israeli presence at the conference. While the article didn’t publicize it, the strategy also involved pressure from inside the U.N. - especially the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights - through staff members who were relatively pro-Israel.

1. Lobbying for boycott

Virtually all pro-Israel forces were mobilized to press for boycott. During the presidential campaign, Obama shamelessly pandered to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) - the influential lobbying organization. Yet he also had a huge political debt to Black voters and had encouraged his candidacy to be used as an anti-racist symbol.

Thus, many of his supporters were shocked Feb. 27, 2009, just five weeks into his presidency, when Obama declared the U.S. would not attend the U.N. Durban Review Conference unless its outcome document were changed to drop all references to Israel, reparations for slavery and the defamation of religion. However, Obama’s spokespeople added that they would be prepared to re-engage if the negotiations brought about a “shortened” text of the document that met their criteria.

AIPAC immediately issued a press release that applauded Obama’s boycott of the U.N.’s “celebration of racism and vile anti-semitic activity.”

Encouraged by the Obama administration’s open endorsement of Israel’s year-old boycott, Zionist forces intensified their campaign to widen the boycott to destroy any possibility of a successful conference. For example, on March 9, 2009, The Jerusalem Post reported that Dr. Moshe Kantor, president of the European Jewish Congress - an umbrella organization for many Zionist organizations - called on the European Union to boycott the conference.

While only a handful of European countries followed the lead of U.S. and Israel, the threat of a wider boycott accomplished another objective. On March 17, conference organizers announced their attempt to appease Israel, the United States and their fence-sitting allies by revising the Draft Outcome Document. They removed all references to Israel as a perpetrator of racial discrimination, cut out any mention of the Palestinians’ right to self determination and also excised all language related to reparations, an acknowledgement that the transatlantic slave trade was a crime against humanity and a proposal to strengthen the Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent. But fearing resistance from the Non-Aligned Countries, African countries and other Islamic countries, conference organizers balked at Obama’s final demand to totally renounce the hard-won Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (DDPA) of 2001.

2. Choking off funding for the conference

In addition to pressure for boycott and weakening the conference’s anti-racist program and documents, the Zionist strategy aimed to withhold funding from the U.N. conference itself and potentially hostile NGOs.

The U.N.’s budget only met part of the conference’s needs. The rest had to be raised from voluntary contributions from states and civil society, including major philanthropists like Ford and Soros Foundations. It is possible that Zionist pressure on the U.S. and other governments to withhold funds from the U.N. backfired. With no funds from the U.S., funds donated by Iran, Libya and others became more significant.

However, the campaign to starve the NGO Forum and any individual NGO that didn’t tow the Israeli line had more success. In October 2008, the NGO Monitor sent an open letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon calling on him to “avoid providing official sponsorship or funding for another NGO Forum that is likely to be a venue used to promote hatred and anti-semitism.” Various other Zionist organizations - including the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the American Jewish Committee and Human Rights First, sent similar letters.

In 2001, the NGO Forum in Durban included 8,000 people and lasted more than a week. U.N. and other financial support enabled many grassroots people to participate and radicalize the process. The forum’s political influence was significantly responsible for the U.N. DDPA’s endorsement of reparations, self-determination for the Palestinian people and generally strong stand against racism. Israel’s strategy for 2009 was to torpedo any NGO Forum with the potential of exerting an anti-Zionist influence.

In preparatory meetings, each time NGOs called for an NGO Forum in Geneva in 2009, Jose Dougan-Beaca, the coordinator of the Anti-Discrimination Unit of the OHCHR, emphasized that an NGO Forum was impossible because of “lack of money and facilities.” Dougan-Beaca was responsible for conveying information in both directions between the NGOs and the OHCHR. But a delegate from Independent Jewish Voices of Canada who attended those meetings reported that he became a partisan advocate for the pro-Israel NGOs.[2]

The pro-Israel Magenta website published detailed reports of those preparatory meetings. Those reports confirm Ralph’s impression. In addition to citing financial constraints, Dougan-Beaca attempted to lower the NGOs sights for the conference by emphasizing the DRC was mandated to be a review conference, not intended to expand on the DDPA. Therefore it would be appropriate for NGO attendance to be much reduced and NGOs should not attempt to strengthen the DDPA.

In the end, rather than a fully funded official NGO Forum, barely 300 NGO representatives straggled into private venues away from the U.N. complex on the weekend before the DRC convened. And fewer than 1,100 authorized NGO delegates were able to come to Geneva at all. During the conference itself, pre-authorized “side events” that featured speakers on approved topics were supposed to meet the NGO need for a political platform. These side events reflected both Israel’s and the U.S. agenda.

Two weeks before the conference began, for example, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights informed a Palestinian Refugee Rights Organization (Badil) that Palestinian-related side events would not be permitted. There was no such restriction on pro-Israel events.

It is important to understand that the campaign continues to financially strangle anti-racist NGOs that may criticize Israel. On April 26, the day after the conference adjourned, in a piece titled, “Geneva Walkout Isn’t Enough” (www.ynetnews.com), Diane Meskin praised the NGO Monitor’s campaign to cut off funding for all anti-Israel NGOs. She wrote, “The EU has much to do if it truly wants to fight anti-semitism, racism and the perpetuation of anti-Israel propaganda on the world stage. It must put its money where its mouth is and stop funding NGOs that use these funds to promote the delegitimization of Israel …” She explicitly named funding organizations that must cut off named grantees - many of whom have supported a diversity of anti-racist causes.

3. Mobilizing a strong pro-Zionist (and disruptive) presence at DRC

Pro-Israel forces at the conference had their marching orders: Protect Israel from criticism of its most recent genocidal blitzkrieg and invasion of Gaza and gag any discussion of the occupation of Palestine itself. Uniformly, pro-Israeli groups worked to keep the focus on Iran, the holocaust, anti-semitism and Muslim complicity in Darfur. They talked about the persecution of the Roma and about Rwanda, but attempted to silence all mention of land seizures, the apartheid wall, separate roads, checkpoints, home demolitions, economic strangulation, mass incarceration, theft of water and all the other racist assaults on the Palestinian people.

Throughout 2008 and during the months of 2009 leading right up to the conference, meetings of the Preparatory Committee in Geneva, Regional Meetings in Latin America, Africa, Europe, Asia and among the Islamic States and Intersessional Meetings all invited input from NGOs. Those NGOs with closer ties to the grassroots were invariably poorly funded and could not afford travel and lodging in Geneva. Thus, NGOs more closely linked to governments - especially pro-Israel NGOs - had a disproportionate presence at the preparatory meetings.

For example, the pro-Israel NGO based in the Netherlands - I-CARE, funded by the Magenta Foundation - attended the preparatory meetings and posted detailed accounts of those meetings on their website. Many of those accounts describe some of the numerous attempts by pro-Israel organizations to sidetrack conference planning. The World Jewish Congress created the highly selective World Jewish Diplomatic Corps - young professionals, an “elite force on the ground to attend the Preparatory Meetings to argue for human rights.”

Reports by I-CARE’s representatives at those meetings reflect Israel’s particular concern with both the influence and composition of the Bureau of the Preparatory Committee that had responsibility to “prepare the agenda and draft decisions for consideration by PrepCom and address all issues pertinent to its work …” Ms. Najat Al-Hajjaji, the permanent ambassador from Libya to the U.N. in Geneva and past chair of the Human Rights Council, chaired the bureau. Bureau “vice chairpersons” from the Global South outnumbered delegates from Europe 11 to 7,[3] and the Cuban ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Resfel Pino Alvarez, who is also the respected chair of the Non-Aligned Movement, was named vice-chairperson-rapporteur.

Two websites central to efforts to implement Israel’s anti-DRC strategy have been thewww.unwatch.org, affiliated with the American Jewish Committee, and the www.ngo-monitor.org, based in Jerusalem. The latter was founded with the objective “to end the practice used by certain self-declared ‘humanitarian NGOs’ of exploiting the label ‘universal human rights values’ to promote politically and ideologically motivated anti-Israel agendas.” They functioned as promoter, clearinghouse and publicist. Some 16 months before the conference, the Dec. 22, 2008, Jerusalem Post reported that the World Union of Jewish Students formed a special task force of 60 students who would travel to Geneva “to defend Israel.”

According to www.unwatch.org, there were a total of 314 newly-registered NGOs with a total of 1,073 delegates at the DRC and some 370 delegates belonged to only two of the Jewish student unions that attended. If the delegates from all the myriad pro-Israel organizations and media are counted,[4] it is likely that more than half those who attended the conference in Geneva came with the sole purpose of building a pro-Israel presence and preventing any anti-Israel expression.

Response to the pro-Israel juggernaut

From the first day of the conference we saw the waves of disruption of Ahmedinejad’s speech - coordinated in both the General Assembly and the NGO auditorium. Some 200 pro-Israel activists then attempted to block the entrance to his press conference. Similar disruptions of side events frustrated attempts to discuss Islamophobia. And large well-publicized panels and carefully-orchestrated rallies that featured famous Zionist celebrities were sympathetically reported by a compliant Western corporate media. Even within the U.N. OHCHR, at least one press officer gave pro-Israel statements to the press.[5] All this made many non-Zionist participants feel that pro-Israel forces had hijacked the conference with military-like planning and precision.

By the second day, NGO advocates for reparations, land for the landless, the rights of Dalits, self-determination for the Palestinian people and a myriad of other anti-racist demands began to regroup. But suddenly, the U.N. OHCHR announced that the “Outcome Document of the DRC” would be approved by consensus before the close of the second day of the five-day conference. There would be no opportunity to repair the damage done by the U.N. OHCHR’s appeasement of the U.S. and Israel’s demands.

Nevertheless, a group of African and African Diaspora NGOs, progressive Islamic NGOs and those in solidarity with the Palestinians, migrants and many others continued to meet informally and strategize. They vowed to continue the struggle for recognition of their demands in other venues - including, perhaps, a Durban 2010. Anti-Zionist Jewish organizations[6] - whose presence at the conference was totally eclipsed by the pro-Israel forces - had met earlier and were heartened by the growing strength of the BDS movement to press for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel.

Setback and encouragement for anti-racist movements

At least 145 U.N. member states endorsed the Outcome Document by consensus. The very first paragraph reaffirmed the Durban Declaration and Program of Action as it was adopted at the World Conference against Racism in 2001. Moreover, delegate after delegate reiterated the praise that the South African Foreign Minister and spokesperson for the Africa Group gave to the DDPA:

“The DDPA is viewed as an inspiration that would define the 21st century as the century that restored to all their human dignity. It provides a solid and concrete basis for every country to develop its own measures to combat all forms of racism, and to strengthen the protection regime for victims of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.”

In the end, only 10 countries - all European or European-settler states - boycotted the DRC. At least 17 state delegates[7] expressed disapproval of the boycott in their official statements. In the language of diplomats, they denounced the boycott as revealing a lack of commitment to overcoming racism. More than 100 remaining delegates implicitly criticized the boycott orchestrated by Israel and the U.S.

Yet, pressure from the U.S. and Israel did succeed in preventing serious strengthening of the 2001 DDPA. For example, most delegations from Africa and the Africa Diaspora had been working for the DRC to adopt measures to provide effective tools for implementing a commitment to reparations[8] and establishing a “racial equality index” and timetables by which specific progress could be assessed. They also called for a Permanent Forum for People of African Descent, not simply a “panel of experts.”

But in the end, perhaps in order to prevent the majority of European countries from following the boycotters, the Outcome Document was silent on these issues. Moreover, Ban Ki-Moon and Navi Pillay explicitly repudiated Ahmedinejad’s speech, which had affirmed Palestine’s right to self-determination. Pillay admitted in her press conference on April 24 that she believed her denunciation of Iran was the price the EU demanded not to join the boycott. Except for Argentina, the 15 countries that explicitly denounced Iran were all European.[9]

Some 18 countries - none of them European - explicitly supported the Palestinian people’s right to self determination and criticized to varying degrees Israel’s denial of Palestinian rights.[10] Most of these, plus Azerbaijan and Pakistan, were among the 15 that called for stronger measures against Islamophobia. Finally, 16 countries - all except Japan from the Global South - expressed concern for protecting migrants against racist attacks and the final Outcome document included protections for migrants that most European countries had opposed.[11] In sum, about half the delegates took definite stands in their speeches on the most controversial issues of the conference. Their stands demonstrate the endurance of North-South oppressor-oppressed relations.

Israel is a bastion of “European civilization,” a settler colonial state, on the edge of the African continent. To survive as a Jewish state - by definition an apartheid state - Israel is perpetually consolidating and expanding its narrative that turns the reality of its racist colonial project on its head. The global hegemony of U.S.-led imperialism is cracking. U.S. and European complicity with Israel demonstrates how white supremacist states will increasingly join forces and circle the wagons when threatened.

The U.N.’s Durban Review Conference once again dramatized a lesson many learned long ago: Appeasing settler colonial, neo-colonial and imperialist powers only emboldens them. The Palestinian Authority and other Muslim States (including Iran) agreed to a “consensus” document that omitted any mention of Israel or Palestine. The African and Caribbean States signed onto a “consensus” document that omitted mention of reparations.

But the U.S. never compromised in its unconditional support for Israel and opposition to reparations. Hopefully those NGOs and others who argued, “Let’s just focus on our issues. The Palestine-Israeli conflict is just a distraction from the real struggle against racism,” learned from Israel’s campaign to destroy the conference. Just as the U.S., Europe and those bribed by them are united in their project to maintain their hegemony, African and African Diaspora people, Asian and indigenous people - all colonized and formerly colonized people - need unity.

Endnotes

[1] www.worldjewishcongress.org identifies the WJC as an international organization which represents organizations in 80 countries from Argentina to Zimbabwe. It has headquarters in New York City, a research institute in Jerusalem and affiliate offices in Brussels, Budapest, Buenos Aires, Geneva, Johannesburg, Moscow, Ottawa, Paris and Sydney. The WJC Office in Geneva hosted the “International Jewish Caucus at the DRC” even though it had called for states to boycott the conference at its January 2009 Plenary.

[2] Diana Ralph. “No Anti-Semitism at Durban II: Canada Should End its Boycott.” Outlook Magazine. Vol 47 #1, Jan/Feb 2007, pp. 17-18.

[3] From Africa, the vice chairs included representatives from Cameroon, South Africa and Senegal; from Asia: India, Indonesia, Iran, Pakistan, Turkey; from South America: Argentina, Brazil, Chile; and from Europe: Armenia, Croatia, Estonia, Russia, Belgium, Greece and Norway.

[4] Some of the Zionists organizations with delegates in Geneva were World Jewish Congress, American Jewish Congress, European Jewish Congress, Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council, Canadian Jewish Congress, International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism, The Simon Wiesenthal Center, B’nai Brith Canada, B’nai Brith International, International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists, Human Rights First, Rabbis for Human Rights, Hadassah, Jewish Council for Public Affairs, Jewish Council for Racial Equity, Union of Jewish Women of South Africa, Institute for Advancement of Human Rights, American Jewish Committee.

[5] Pierre Hazan, a staff member of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, author of a pro-Israel book on the Six Day War and fellow of the Congressionally-funded U.S. Institute of Peace, mocked the DRC as “an immense ritual of collective atonement and social purification.” (quoted by www.news24.com April 17, 2009)

[6] There may have been others, but this author is aware of representatives of Neturei Karta, an Israeli-based group of orthodox Jews who believe Zionism is antithetical to Judaism (seewww.nkusa.org), Independent Jewish Voices based in Canada (ijv@magma.ca) and the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network-IJAN that identifies Israel as a settler colonial state. (http://www.ijsn.net/home/)

[7] Brazil, China, Cuba, Ecuador, Organization of Islamic Councils, Indonesia, Iran, Lesotho, Namibia, Nigeria, Norway, Spain, Sri Lanka, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda and Uruguay. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, U.N. High Commission for Human Rights Navi Pillay and a number of others explicitly criticized the boycott.

[8] Twelve countries explicitly advocated for Reparations: Angola, Barbados, Cuba, Guyana, Haiti, Iran, Jamaica, Libya, Namibia, Suriname, Tanzania and Zimbabwe. Many others suggested that former colonial countries had the responsibility to ease poverty, forgive debt and assist in the economic development of the Global South.

[9] Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Ireland, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and United Kingdom.

[10] Bahrain, Cuba, Egypt, Guyana, Indonesia, Iran, Kuwait, League of Arab States, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Nicaragua, Palestine (PLO), Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, United Arab Emirates

[11] Argentina, Burkina Faso, Cuba, Ecuador, Greece, Haiti, Honduras, Japan, Jordan, Mauritius, Mexico, Nigeria, Philippines, Senegal, Tanzania and Turkey.

* Arlene Eisen is a writer based in San Francisco, who, since the 1960s, has been active in anti-imperialist struggles. Most recently she edited Second Lines, the newsletter of the Peoples’ Hurricane Relief Fund, traveled to South Africa where she joined a project to document the Black Consciousness Movement and participated in the United-Against-Racism-U.S.A. delegation to the U.N. Durban Review Conference in Geneva. She can be reached atarlene_eisen@sbcglobal.net .

Africa: Is large-scale private land acquisition beneficial to Africa?

2009-06-12

http://www.eldis.org/go/country-profiles&id=43607&type=Document

Over 2008 large-scale acquisitions of farmland in Africa, Latin America, Central Asia and Southeast Asia have increased. This report discusses key trends and drivers in land acquisitions, the contractual arrangements underpinning them and the way these are negotiated. It also analyses the early impacts on land access for rural people in recipient countries with a focus on sub-Saharan Africa.

Global: Human Rights principles to discipline "land grabbing"

2009-06-12

http://tinyurl.com/mnm744

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Mr. Olivier De Schutter, has proposed a minimum a set of principles and measures based on human rights in the elaboration of large-scale transnational land acquisitions and leases, more commonly referred to as "land grabbing". His call comes at a time when Governments are preparing to negotiate on responsible investment in agriculture at the forthcoming G8 Summit.

Africa: 2009 World food prize laureate goes to Ethiopian scientist

2009-06-12

http://www.afrol.com/articles/33521

The US State Department has named Dr Gebisa Ejeta of Ethiopia as the winner of the $250,000 World Food Prize for his monumental contributions in the production of sorghum, one of the world’s five principal cereal grains, which have dramatically enhanced the food supply of hundreds of millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa.

Global: WTO and the right to food: public debate

2009-06-12

http://www.wto.org/english/forums_e/debates_e/debate14_e.htm

The City of Geneva and the organization 3D recently organized a public debate between Olivier De Schutter, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, and Pascal Lamy, Director-General of the WTO. The debate, which was opened by the Mayor Manuel Tornare, was held on May 11th and focused on “Trade liberalization: support or impediment to the right to food?"

Gambia: Government raises objection in the trial of tortured journalist

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/56931

The ECOWAS Community Court in Abuja, Nigeria hearing the case of Musa Saidykhan, Gambian journalist allegedly tortured in custody of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) will on June 30, 2009 give its ruling on preliminary objection raised by the Gambian government, the defendant in the case. After boycotting the court on two occasions, the Gambian government in a 20-page document called on the Community Court to dismiss Saidykhan’s case because it has no jurisdiction to hear the matter and that the plaintiff had also not exhausted all the local remedies.
The ECOWAS Community Court in Abuja, Nigeria hearing the case of Musa Saidykhan, Gambian journalist allegedly tortured in custody of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) will on June 30, 2009 give its ruling on preliminary objection raised by the Gambian government, the defendant in the case.
After boycotting the court on two occasions, the Gambian government in a 20-page document called on the Community Court to dismiss Saidykhan’s case because it has no jurisdiction to hear the matter and that the plaintiff had also not exhausted all the local remedies.

“The plaintiffs(Saidykhan ) ... suit is an affront on the Internal Sovereignty of the Defendant/ Applicant and violates Article 39 of the Protocol.... on democracy and good governance as well as Article 26, and 56(5) of the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights”.

On the local remedies, the Gambia government stated that “the Defendant/ Applicant is a sovereign nation operating a democratic Constitution based on the Rule of Law and provides for the protection of her citizens fundamental rights and freedom” and that “the defendant has national courts with jurisdiction over alleged human rights (abuses)”.

But the West African sub-regional court authorised, according to its protocol, to hear cases brought by citizens of member states without having to exhaust remedies in local national courts.

The government had previously shown gross disrespect to the Community court in an earlier case by refusing to implement its order to release Chief Ebrima Manneh, Gambian journalist detained by the notorious National Intelligence Agency (NIA) in 2006. The Court served the government on several occasions in that case but it gleefully refused to make an appearance.

The Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) in November 2007 brought the suit on behalf of Saidykhan in order to seek justice for him and also bring relief to many other Gambian journalists who had suffered similar fate and have escaped into exile for fear of repression.

Saidykhan, editor-in-chief of The Independent, a banned bi-weekly Banjul-based newspaper escaped into exile after he was released from illegal detention. He is among scores of victims who were illegally detained and suffered all manner of cruelty including torture at the hands of President Yahya Jammeh’s security agents in the aftermath of an alleged coup attempt in March 2006.

On the night of March 27, 2006, a combined force of armed soldiers and policemen arrested Saidykhan in his home and took him to the notoriously feared National Intelligence Agency (NIA) headquarters. He was held incommunicado for 22 days without any charge. During this period he was tortured until he became unconscious. The continuous torture left scars on his back, legs, arms, and his right hand which was broken in three places.

“I was stripped naked while live-electric shocks were administered all over my body including my genitals. I was told by my torturers that electric shocks on my genitals were meant to make me impotent,” recalled Saidykhan in the writ.
This preceded the arrest of the entire staff of the newspaper including a receptionist. The Independent’s office was raided and closed down for no apparent reason.

Issued by the MFWA, Accra on June 10, 2009.

Gambia: Jammeh attacks religious leader and threatens the media

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/56930

Baba Leigh, Imam of Kanifing and outspoken critic of the President Yahya Jammeh’s administration was on May 22, 2009 warned by President Jammeh to stop criticizing the administration or risk going to prison. Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) sources reported that President Jammeh, who was addressing a rally in Kanifing castigated Leigh and accused him of misleading his followers and using his position as a religious leader to engage in money making ventures.
Baba Leigh, Imam of Kanifing and outspoken critic of the President Yahya Jammeh’s administration was on May 22, 2009 warned by President Jammeh to stop criticizing the administration or risk going to prison.

Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) sources reported that President Jammeh, who was addressing a rally in Kanifing castigated Leigh and accused him of misleading his followers and using his position as a religious leader to engage in money making ventures.

“As the Minister for Religious Affairs I won’t accept scholars misleading people”, President Jammeh told his party supporters.

He threatened that should Imam Leigh react to these allegations either in his sermons or through the media he would ensure that he goes to prison.

The Gambian President has banned the electronic media from broadcasting any material from the imam, warning of dire consequence, should they disregard his directive.

The sources said Imam Leigh is very popular in Gambia for being among the few outspoken leaders critical of societal injustices and excesses committed by those in authority.

Gloibal: Women speak out at Global Forum on Freedom of Expression

2009-06-12

http://www.ifex.org/international/2009/06/10/silenced_womens_voices/

The thing (the authorities) are most angry about is my voice," says Philo Ikonya, president of PEN Kenya. Ikonya has been involved in a number of protests and political readings recently and was arrested and severely beaten in police custody this past February. Ikonya was one of four extraordinary women who met across a table at a "Silenced Women's Voices" panel on 4 June in Oslo, Norway at the recent Global Forum on Freedom of Expression (GFFE).

Niger: Live discussions on privately-owned media banned

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/56928

Niger’s media regulatory body, the High Communication Council (CSC), on June 8, 2009 banned all live discussions on the prevailing political situation in the country by privately-owned electronic media outlets. The CSC Chairman, Daouda Diallo, who announced the ban, said it has become necessary as it would prevent what he termed as “risk of media excesses”.
Niger’s media regulatory body, the High Communication Council (CSC), on June 8, 2009 banned all live discussions on the prevailing political situation in the country by privately-owned electronic media outlets.

The CSC Chairman, Daouda Diallo, who announced the ban, said it has become necessary as it would prevent what he termed as “risk of media excesses”.

Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)’s correspondent reported that the ban comes in the wake of recent political tensions in the country, following unsuccessful bid by President Mamadou Tandja to prolong his stay in office, which ends in November.

After failing to gain legislative support, President Tandja dissolved the country’s parliament and in an address to the nation on May 29 announced an impending referendum to adopt a new constitution for the country.

The correspondent said the President’s address sparked heated debate spearheaded by the electronic media, giving opportunity for Nigeriens to express diverse opinions on the issue.

MFWA is worried about the tendency of the CSC to ban the media in Niger as this is censorship and undermines media freedom.

Suspensions of the media in Niger have become rampant under the administration of Tandja. Since a Tuareg armed group, Mouvement des Nigériens pour la Justice “MNJ” (the Niger Movement for Justice), launched a rebellion in the northern part of the country in 2007. The government outlawed the group and through the CSC banned the media from covering its activities. Some media houses were closed down and a number of journalists were arrested for flouting the government’s order.

We call on the CSC, as matter of urgency, to lift the ban and allow the media to operate freely without interference from any quarters.

Senegal: Court seizes magazine

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/56941

A magistrate’s court in Dakar, capital of Senegal, on June 3, 2009 suspended the circulation of June 2009 edition of L’Essentiel, a monthly current affairs magazine and ordered its seizure over headlines on the cover-page that the court claimed were an “insult” to President Abdoulaye Wade. According to the presiding magistrate the headlines: “Freemasonry: The Grand Lodge of France Conquers Senegal”, “Nine years after change, the state explodes, The Mourides are in control and Touba in suffering”, were not only insulting to President Wade but also “likely to disturb public order”.
A magistrate’s court in Dakar, capital of Senegal, on June 3, 2009 suspended the circulation of June 2009 edition of L’Essentiel, a monthly current affairs magazine and ordered its seizure over headlines on the cover-page that the court claimed were an “insult” to President Abdoulaye Wade.

According to the presiding magistrate the headlines: “Freemasonry: The Grand Lodge of France Conquers Senegal”, “Nine years after change, the state explodes, The Mourides are in control and Touba in suffering”, were not only insulting to President Wade but also “likely to disturb public order”.

Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)’s correspondent reported that the court said its decision was based on Article 820-1 of the county’s rules of civil procedure, which allows for the “outright suspension” of any publication that has the tendency to “disturb public peace”.

The correspondent said the June edition attracted the attention of the authorities after a teaser had been run in two privately-owned L’ As and L’Observatuer newspapers on May 26 and May 28 respectively.

Following the teaser, the country’s police commissioner requested for a copy of the magazine which was then printing and ordered the printers to halt the publication. Mustapha Sow, managing editor of the Essentiel was subsequently invited and interrogated by the Criminal Investigations Department on May 27.

The Council of Broadcasters and Newspapers Publishers in a communiqué issued on May 29 declared its solidarity with Sow and urged him to formally notify the printers and appeal for the lifting of the suspension.

Somalia: Journalist murdered in Mogadishu

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/56942

Somali Coalition for Freedom of Expression (SOCFEX) has condemned the killing of the director of radio Shabelle Muqtar Mohamed Hirabe who was murdered in Bakare market, Mogadishu by two unknown gunmen. And the journalist Ahmed Omar Hashi who was with Hirabe has been injured and took him to the hospital.
Somali Coalition for Freedom of Expression (SOCFEX) condemned the killing of the director of radio Shabelle Muqtar Mohamed Hirabe who was murdered in Bakare market, Mogadishu by two unknown gunmen.

And the journalist Ahmed Omar Hashi who was with Hirabe has been injured and took him to the hospital.

It is still not known the reasons for his murder but it seems that the journalist has been targeted by the armed militia in the area.

SOCFEX urges all journalists in Somalia particularly those in a hostile and war zone areas in the country to be extremely vigilant.

Africa: Sudan 'allows aid agencies back'

2009-06-12

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8096214.stm

Sudan has authorised four aid agencies expelled from the country in March to return to troubled Darfur, says the UN's humanitarian chief John Holmes. The four groups - named as Care International, Save the Children, Mercy Corps, and Padco - were among 13 organisations expelled in March.

DRC: UN soldiers row over civilian protection

2009-06-12

http://af.reuters.com/article/topNews/idAFJOE55B0K820090612

United Nations peacekeepers are refusing to patrol a zone in eastern Congo, leaving tens of thousands of civilians vulnerable to massacres, rapes and looting by gunmen, officials and witnesses said. The civilians, under attack from Rwandan Hutu rebels, are trapped in a corner of North Kivu province Indian peacekeepers officially operate in but cannot get to due to poor roads, and Pakistani soldiers nearby refuse to enter due to procedures.

Sierra Leone: Efforts to consolidate peace remain fragile

2009-06-12

http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=31091

Despite some impressive gains in rebuilding Sierra Leone seven years after the end of its brutal civil war, the situation in the West African nation remains fragile, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said. “The outbreak of political violence in March of this year was a wake-up call on challenges that require urgent and continued attention,” Mr. Ban told the United Nations Peacebuilding Commission’s high-level meeting on Sierra Leone.

Sudan: UN-African Union envoy meets Darfur rebel leader

2009-06-12

http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=31115

The head of the joint United Nations–African Union mission in Darfur (UNAMID) has reiterated that there is no military solution to the problems facing the strife-torn Sudanese region, as he met with the leader of a major rebel group. The meeting in North Darfur between Joint Special Representative Rodolphe Adada and the Chairman of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), Khalil Ibrahim, was the second of its kind this year and part of a “continued effort to establish a good working relationship with all parties involved in the Darfur conflict,” the mission said in a news release.

Uganda: LRA reprisal attacks increase in the northeast

2009-06-12

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84787

Civilians in northeast Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) villages are continuing to flee repeat reprisal attacks by the Ugandan rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). The attacks have been provoked by ongoing anti-LRA operations by the DRC army in the region, according to locals. "The LRA continues to attack the villages, which they burn and loot, and kidnap civilians," Leandres Bwilu, the administrator of the worst-affected territory of Dungu, in Orientale Province, told IRIN.

Africa: Improving livelihoods with ICTs

2009-06-12

http://www.scidev.net/en/policy-briefs/improving-livelihoods-with-icts.html

This policy brief, published by the International Institute for Economic Development (IIED) outlines how and why information and communication technology (ICT) projects do, or do not, work for development. Rapid growth of ICTs in rural Africa and emerging economies such as Brazil and China is closing the gap in ICTs between North and South. Governments pushing ICT infrastructure projects such as mobile mast networks have successfully reduced access costs for many in the developing world.

Global: Mobile phones: Better learning tools than computers? - Online debate

2009-06-12

http://edutechdebate.org/

Numerous initiatives, most prominently the One Laptop Per Child program, seek to introduce computers to students around the globe. Yet, are computers the right technology for ICT in education? Perhaps mobile phones, of which the ITU estimates there are 4.1 billion subscriptions, would provide a better technology for students? For teachers and policy-makers seeking to increase educational outcomes with inexpensive digital devices, do computers or mobile phones offer a better ICT investment? Come join the conversation! Its already started and will unfold all June with new posts each week by Michael Trucano and Robert Kozma.

Kenya: Pasha Centres initiative seeks a new way to reach out into un-serviced areas

2009-06-12

http://www.balancingact-africa.com/news/back/balancing-act_456.html

Kenya’s ICT Board is in the throes of setting up what it has dubbed Pasha Centres as part of its preparations for the opening of the Seacom cable at the end of next month. Pasha Centres are designed to deliver voice and Internet services out into un-serviced rural areas. Unlike many other African Universal Service initiatives that are delivered by existing companies or donors, these will be set up by local entrepreneurs who will not necessarily have previous experience of ICT.

Kenya: Tax cuts to boost broadband

2009-06-12

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8096730.stm

Tax cuts and incentives have been announced in Kenya intended to boost broadband and mobile take-up as a new fibre optic cable is launched. Kenya's Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta cut the 16% VAT on new phone handsets. He also allowed internet providers to offset the cost of purchasing new fibre optic bandwidth for 20 years.

Kenya: “Cybercafé in a container”: Rural Kenya's mobile internet stations

2009-06-12

http://www.apc.org/en/news/cybercafe-container-rural-kenyas-mobile-internet-s

The lives of Maasai men and women in rural Kenya’s community will never be the same now that they have access to maarifa – knowledge in the Kiswahili language. Launched in April by APC member Arid Lands Information Network (ALIN), the new Community Knowledge Centre commonly referred to as Maarifa centre lies in the heart of Massai country and is the newest of four containerised community knowledge centres in the region.

Africa: Innovative Global Financing

AfricaFocus Bulletin June 8, 2009 (090608)

2009-06-12

http://www.africafocus.org/docs09/tax0906.php

In the course of his May 28 speech to the Leading Group on Innovative Financing for Development, to be chaired by France over the next year, Kouchner went so far as to pledge support for experimentation with a financial transactions tax, a proposal that was quickly dismissed by French Foreign Minister Christine Lagarde. But it is still true that the momentum for new forms of funding, for health, education, and climate change, continues to build, a recognition that financing for such global public goods should not depend on the political fortunes of official aid budgets.

Africa: Call for nominations: "Multiplying faces, amplifying voices"

2009-06-12

http://www.osisa.org/content/call-nominations-multiplying-faces-amplifying-voices

Across the continent, African women play a significant role in improving the quality of life of their communities. From grandmothers to young girls, there are women in each country on the continent whose achievements have been stellar, whether in a small community, in their nation or across the continent. Yet many of these women and their achievements go unrecognised and unlauded. This initiative seeks to change this by highlighting the work of African women who are making a difference in the fields of agriculture, business and science and technology either at local or national level.

Glboal: Champions of Quality Education in Africa - Ashoka

Ashoka's Changemakers competitions

2009-06-12

http://www.changemakers.com/en-us/educationafrica

The close of the entry period for the Champions of Quality Education in Africa competition is just around the corner, so make sure to enter online until June 24th 2009 at http://www.changemakers.com/en-us/educationafrica You can also nominate yourself or someone you know today. We’re looking to schools, teachers and administrators to find the best practices that are changing lives at the local, district or national levels. And with the help of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, we’re going to help them take it to the next level with networking opportunities and chances for funding.

Global: GIGA journals available free-of-charge on the Internet

2009-06-12

http://hup.sub.uni-hamburg.de/giga/

The four renowned academic journals of the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies are now available online and free-of-charge. Every Internet user can now access the full content of the GIGA Journal Family at no cost, which means that the reach of the journals is now significantly greater. Through the Open Access publications, the GIGA is ensuring increased exchange with academics from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East.

Global: Global essay contest

2009-06-12

http://www.wymd.org/contests.html

The World Youth Movement for Democracy (www.wymd.org), a youth network of the World Movement for Democracy (www.wmd.org), is pleased to announce the launch of its Global Essay Contest. Fifteen winners (3 in each region: Asia, Central/Eastern Europe & Eurasia, Middle East & North Africa, Latin America & Caribbean, and Sub-Saharan Africa) will be invited to participate in the upcoming 6th Assembly of the World Movement for Democracy in Jakarta, Indonesia, in April 2010.

Africa: CODESRIA National Working Groups

A Call for Proposals for 2009

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/courses/56958

One of the most important vehicles by which CODESRIA has sought to mobilise national-level research capacities and to channel these into organised reflections has been the National Working Groups (NWGs) which it has encouraged African researchers to organise autonomously on priority themes of their choice. NWGs have been supported by the Council in over forty African countries and have resulted in some of the most interesting studies on politics, economy and society in contemporary Africa.
CODESRIA National Working Groups

A Call for Proposals for 2009

One of the most important vehicles by which CODESRIA has sought to mobilise national-level research capacities and to channel these into organised reflections has been the National Working Groups (NWGs) which it has encouraged African researchers to organise autonomously on priority themes of their choice. NWGs have been supported by the Council in over forty African countries and have resulted in some of the most interesting studies on politics, economy and society in contemporary Africa. Within the framework of the CODESRIA strategic plan for the period 2007 - 2011, it has been decided to retain this vehicle as an important instrument for promoting research into and publications about different national-level experiences pertinent to the pre-occupations of African scholars active in the Social Sciences and Humanities. For this purpose, the Council invites proposals for the constitution of NWGs under the 2009 competition for the research grants that are available.

An innovation which the Council has decided to pursue within the NWG programme is the encouragement of a more systematic anchorage of the projects which it supports within specific departments, faculties, and research centres of African universities or independent and established research networks and centres, as well as the allocation of resources for the dissemination of the results of the work of the NWG to a cross-section of the local research community in the country in which the study was undertaken. All proposals submitted for consideration for support by CODESRIA within this programme have been required since 2007 to demonstrate this institutional anchorage and budget for an end-of-study dissemination workshop.

There is no fixed amount for the grants that are awarded for the constitution of NWGs, although, for indicative purposes only, applicants may wish to note that in the past, awards of between USD7, 500 and USD20, 000 have been made by the Council. Also, no particular format is prescribed for the presentation of the budget of an NWG. However, it is recommended that the budget section of the proposals which are submitted should include allocations for: (i) a methodological workshop to launch the NWG; (ii) a mid-term review workshop to assess the progress of the work of the NWG; (iii) a final/dissemination workshop at which the results of the work of the group will be presented to a wider audience; (iv) the allowance that will be needed for any fieldwork that will be undertaken by the members of the group; (v) the honoraria of the members of the group; and (vi) books which might be purchased by the group and which will be lodged in the departmental or faculty library of a designated African university, or the library of an established research network or centre. The size of an NWG will vary from country to country but on average, most of the groups sponsored by CODESRIA in the past have had between five and seven members. It is advantageous to ensure that a proposed NWG is multidisciplinary in composition, sensitive to gender issues both in its composition and research concerns, and accommodating of younger scholars who might simultaneously benefit from being mentored through their participation in the research project.

Proposals, which could be on any topic relevant for an understanding of the economy, politics, culture, environment and society in any African country, should:

i) indicate clearly the problematic that will be addressed;
ii) should not exceed 12 pages (except for team member’s CVs); Font: Times New Roman; Size: 12; Space: simple;
iii) include a review of the relevant literature, including literature produced by the local research community on the subject;
iv) indicate the methodology which would be employed in undertaking the study;
v) spell out the composition of the working group;
vi) define the time frame for inauguration and finalisation of the work that would be undertaken;
vii) specify strategies for anchoring the activities of the working group within a department or faculty of an African university, or an African research network or centre;
viii) indicate a strategy for the dissemination of the results of the work of the group;
ix) include an outline budget for the realisation of the research project; and
x) indicate the expected final outcome of the project.

Proposals for consideration for possible funding within the framework of the 2009 competition should be sent to CODESRIA by 30 June, 2009 at the latest. All proposals received will undergo an independent review process the outcome of which will be announced by 31 July, 2009. All proposals should be addressed to:

CODESRIA National Working Groups Programme,
CODESRIA,
BP 3304, CP 18524
Dakar, Senegal.
Tel: +221-33 825 98 22/23
Fax: +221-33 824 12 89
E-Mail: nwg@codesria.sn
Website: http://www.codesria.org

East Africa: Sub-regional methodological workshops for social research in Africa

2009 Session for Eastern Africa

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/courses/56935

The 2009 session of the CODESRIA sub-regional methodological workshops will explore the conditions for the employment and validation of qualitative perspectives in African contexts. To this end, the workshops will be open to all the social research disciplines. These disciplines are uniformly confronted with broadly similar difficulties of understanding social reality and the challenges posed by techniques of data collection and analysis, which, on account of their “qualitative” nature, are suspected by some to be seriously lacking in scientific rigour.
CODESRIA
Sub-Regional Methodological Workshops for Social Research in Africa
2009 Session for Eastern Africa
Theme: Fields and Theories of Qualitative Research
Date: 10 – 14 August, 2009
Venue: Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya

Call for Applications

One of the major weaknesses of contemporary social research in and about Africa is its lack of careful attention to epistemological and methodological issues. This weakness has made itself manifest at a time when the increasing complexities of the social dynamics that shape livelihood on the continent and the wider global context call for a greater investment of effort in the refinement of the procedures and instruments of investigation and analyses with a view to achieving a more accurate and holistic assessment of rapidly changing realities. But instead of such an investment of effort, we are increasingly witnessing an astonishing neglect or misapplication of theory and method on a scale and with a frequency that calls for intervention. At one level, the neglect that has taken place has comprised a serious trivialisation of basic research protocols and their reduction to a fetishistic evocation of superficial recommendations thinly disguised with ritualistic appeals to rigour that are not reflected in the analyses undertaken. At another level, methodological issues have simply been instrumentalised in ways that ensure that narrow ideological considerations and pre-determined outcomes take precedence over science. Furthermore, it is not uncommon to come across studies in which methodological questions are outrightly ignored in the name of an alleged specificity or immediacy that amounts to the exclusion of African social realities from universal debates on the validity of scientific frames of analyses. The result is that in those debates, studies produced on Africa come across as a mix of purely literary discourses without an empirical anchorage or anecdotes hidden under a “scholarly” discourse that is not only pretentious but also vacuous. Consequently, the knowledge produced is bereft of heuristic value and simply becomes an element that, wittingly or unwittingly, justifies a predetermined set of economic, political and social policies. This is clearly not an acceptable state of affairs, if only because it impoverishes African social research. It is, therefore, high time that the social research community revisited and discussed the methodological foundations of current knowledge about Africa in order first to put an end to scientific impunity as it manifests itself within and outside Africa, and give a new impulse to the African social sciences through support programmes targeted at younger researchers.

The future of young social researchers begins with an excellent mastery of core research processes and their patient application to concrete situations as demanded by their work in the field, the archives, and the library. Unfortunately, the combination of the prolonged crises in African higher education systems and the poor example set in the writings of an increasing number of Africanists who have succumbed to the temptation to take liberties with methodological rigour mean that younger African researchers are poorly served in matters of training for independent social research. It is for this reason that the CODESRIA Secretariat has decided to convene young African researchers to methodological workshops on epistemological and methodological issues in social research designed to fill the gaps in their formal and informal training. The workshops are meant to serve as a critical space that would offer experience-sharing in the basic epistemological and empirical prerequisites for rigorous scientific imagination. The workshops will not only offer insights into the current state of the art but also provide an occasion for a critical review of contemporary research procedures, tools and theories as seen from an African perspective. The major question which the workshops will address can be summarized as follows: How can the researcher productively establish a link between dominant theoretical approaches and concrete situations in the field whilst simultaneously taking into account the state of knowledge, the techniques to be mobilized, and the evolution of African societies? In answering this question, the workshops will privilege qualitative research methods and tools on the basic premise that the popular tendency to oppose quantitative and qualitative methods is due to a wrong assumption that the former offers an exactness and “hardness” which the latter is supposedly too “soft” and “fickle” to match. Without diminishing the importance of quantitative research and methods, participants in the workshops will be encouraged to explore qualitative methods of capturing African social dynamics which do not always or often find expression, fully or partially, in figures and which are, therefore, lost to those who are wedded to rigid and exclusively quantitative approaches.

The 2009 session of the CODESRIA sub-regional methodological workshops will explore the conditions for the employment and validation of qualitative perspectives in African contexts. To this end, the workshops will be open to all the social research disciplines. These disciplines are uniformly confronted with broadly similar difficulties of understanding social reality and the challenges posed by techniques of data collection and analysis, which, on account of their “qualitative” nature, are suspected by some to be seriously lacking in scientific rigour. Each workshop will have the following concerns at its core:

i) A critical assessment of the distinction between “quantitative” and “qualitative” research with particular attention to the question of measurement in the social sciences. Participants will be taken through presentations and exercises aimed at showing that the mode of processing data that is collected depends both on the field constraints encountered and the paradigmatic options of data interpretation that are available. The procedures for the “quantification” of “qualitative” approaches will also be reviewed through discussions on the distinction between the non-metrical and “comprehensive” presentation of data and the more mathematical renditions favoured by the quantitativists.

ii) A presentation of the methodological principles of “object construction” which enables the researcher to transcend the illusions of immediate knowledge and undertake a hypothetical reconstruction of social reality. This demands that the status of the researcher, as well as the systematic role of theories and tools be subjected to intense epistemological control.

iii) An assessment of various techniques of data collection and “fact-finding” instruments available to the researcher. The usual tools of qualitative research such as interviews, observation, archival studies, and the less usual ones such as photography, will be reviewed, so as to locate their potentiality for construction of successful research projects.

The Eastern Africa edition of the methodological workshops is designed for doctoral students and young, mid-career African researchers resident in East Africa and the Horn. The target countries for the 2009 Eastern Africa session are: Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and The Sudan. The working language to be employed during the workshop will be English. The session will be led by a director who will be assisted by a team of three lecturers, all with an acknowledged expertise in the application of social science research methods. Senior researchers wishing to be considered for a role as resource persons are invited to send an application which indicates their interest and includes their current CV and an outline of issues they would like to cover in four lectures of two hours each. The outline submitted should be detailed enough to enable the director of the workshop compile a syllabus for the guidance of the resource persons and laureates. Apart from the actual preparation of lectures and field visits, the resource persons will also be expected to submit a bibliographic list of texts relevant to the theme of the workshop and which can be made available to the laureates.

As to the advanced postgraduate scholars and younger, mid-career researchers wishing to be considered for participation in the workshop, they are also required to submit an application that should comprise the following:

i) A letter of motivation which should also clearly indicate the area of research or topic on which they are working;

ii) A statement of their research project (maximum of three to five pages) stating clearly the problematic that is being addressed, the kinds of field research to be undertaken, the theoretical and methodological framework being used, as well as the methodological and epistemological problems encountered;

iii) A detailed and up-to-date curriculum vitae;

iv) Two reference letters, one of which must be from the thesis supervisor and the other from the head of the department in which the applicant is registered. The reference letter from the supervisor is expected to address the relevance of the research project, the state of progress of the research and the theoretical and methodological approaches used, as well as the results expected. The reference letter from the head of the department is expected to attest to the qualities and academic potential of the candidate; and

v) A letter confirming the institutional affiliation of the applicant.

Applications will be selected on basis of the innovative nature of the research question being addressed, a commitment to gender balance that is central to CODESRIA’s institutional strategy, and the desire for a geographical diversity that will, in itself, constitute an important aspect of the learning experience at the workshops. Applications must be submitted by 12 June, 2009. They should be sent to:

CODESRIA Sub-Regional Methodological Workshops,
CODESRIA,
P.O. Box: 3304, Dakar, CP 18524 – Senegal.
Tél: +221-33 825.98.22/23 — Fax: +221-33 824.12.89
E-mail: methodological.workshop@codesria.sn
Web Site: http://www.codesria.org

Global: RC-UK Annual Lecture 2009

Foreign Aid - Dead Right or Dead Wrong? 22 June, 6.30pm

2009-06-12

https://www.ircuk.org/lecture

This year’s eighth Annual Lecture welcomes an exciting panel to discuss the topic "Foreign Aid: Dead Right or Dead Wrong?":
* Dambisa Moyo is the author of Dead Aid: Why Aid is Not Working and How There is a Better Way for Africa.
* Yash Tandon published Ending Aid Dependence at the same time last year.
* George Biddle is the IRC's executive vice president.*

Global financial pressures have added new urgency to the well-established debate around issues of aid effectiveness, issues which are particularly critical in the contexts where the IRC works – contexts of extreme vulnerability, war and displacement. What is the appropriate international economic response to these populations in dire need?

South Africa: PPEN launches the Big Read campaign

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/courses/56956

The Big Read is a campaign produced by the Global Campaign for Education and South Africa’s Public Participation in Education Network (PPEN). The movement aims to encourage public participation in education in creative ways, including The Big Read book, which is an exciting book specifically designed to campaign for education and literacy. The Big Read book is a special collection of short stories and poems that contains an amazing array of stories from inspiring people and since April this year has been read by more than 13 million people
around the world.
What? The Public Participation in Education Network (PPEN) launches the Big Read campaign in South Africa

Authors of the Big Read will speak out about education in South Africa and introduce their stories in PPEN’s Big Read.

Who? Rosie Motene, Simpiwe Dana, Mandla Langa, Carol Bouwer, Rev. Ishmael Mkhabela, Salim Vally, and children from Soweto and Alexandra

When? Tuesday 16th June 10.30am – 12.30pm

Where? Xarra Books, Jeppe Street, Newtown, Johannesburg

You are invited to join prominent writers, singers and human rights activists to commemorate June 16th and to launch the Big Read in South Africa.

The Big Read is a campaign produced by the Global Campaign for Education and South Africa’s Public Participation in Education Network (PPEN). The movement aims to encourage public participation in education in creative ways, including The Big Read book, which is an exciting book specifically designed to campaign for education and literacy.

The Big Read book is a special collection of short stories and poems that contains an amazing array of stories from inspiring people and since April this year has been read by more than 13 million people around the world. The short stories tell remarkable tales of education and the struggles overcome to learn, from authors including Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Alice Walker, Lebo Mashile, Gcina Mhlope, Basetsana Kumalo, Simphiwe Dana and many others.

The Big Read authors, along with PPEN members, will come together on June 16 at Newtown’s popular Xarra Books, to launch the campaign and to speak out about the specific needs of education in South Africa today.

“Those who have signed up to PPEN’s recent call to action firmly believe in taking forward the struggle for literacy and quality public education. A struggle so many of our compatriots sacrificed their lives for during the 1976 Uprising”, says Salim Vally from the Education Rights Project.

The Public Participation in Education Network was formed in December last year to bring together numerous organisations and individuals with the aim to re-vitalise the campaign for quality public education. PPEN’s ‘Call to Action’ states: “South Africans face an important moment in our history. Almost fifteen years after our first democratic elections, our education system is in crisis. It is not a technical problem to be solved by experts but a national disaster requiring our collective efforts. The majority of children in South Africa are not learning to read and write with any confidence. Too many schools are bleak and uninspiring places for our children and teachers. If we do not act decisively now, we run the risk as a nation of ‘getting used to this’”.

“South Africa is a one of the countries that is awfully stricken by illiteracy. This initiative by PPEN is a worthwhile contribution towards alleviating the scourge. It is a campaign that should be supported by all South Africans in all their structures from government to civil society,” said the recent winner of Commonwealth Writers Prize for the Africa Region, Mandla Langa.

In support of the Big Read and PPEN Basetsana Kumalo said, “I’ve always been inspired by education because I believe it can change your destiny. Education is a value, the one thing that nobody can ever take away from you. It’s something that opens doors. It is something that creates a platform for greater opportunities. Through education you can be able to debate issues and challenge government and legislation.”

The Big Read book is available to everyone via the website www.ppen.org.za Readers are encouraged to add their name to the call to action at the back of the book, and share the book with others. Only with everyone’s engagement can we bring about relevant, quality education for everyone in South Africa and a genuinely transformed society. We come together to revitalise the vision that the youth of 1976 understood and were prepared to die for, but a goal that we have not yet achieved.

Alex Kent alex@campaignforeducation.org 011 447 4111 or 076 428 5390
Thokozani Ndaba thokozanin@gmail.com 011 447 4111 or 083 536 4447

Public Participation in Education Network (PPEN) is a collection of individuals and organisations in South Africa who believe that South Africa needs to urgently redress the education situation in South Africa and provide everyone, no matter their income or background, with a good quality, corruption‐free education. Anyone can add their name to PPEN’s call to action on www.ppen.org.za

The Global Campaign for Education, founded in 1999, brings together major non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) and teachers’ unions across the world. GCE promotes access to education as a basic human right and raises public awareness to create the political will for governments and other leaders in the international community to fulfill their promises to provide at least a free, public basic education for all children.

Over 13 million people have already take part in the Big Read in over
120 countries www.campaignforeducation.org/bigread

The Big Read is a compilation of short stories about education. The book has something for everyone and is designed to inspire and motivate the reader to campaign for education. After reading the story the reader can sign up to the PPEN call to action, and set up reading clubs. The Big Read has stories from Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, Natalie Portman, Gcina Mhlope, Basetsana Kumalo, George Bizos, Queen Rania or Jordan, Chimananda Ngozi Adichie, Paulo Coelho, Ishmael Beah, Angelique Kidjo, Simphiwe Dana, Mary Robinson, Devli Kumari, Dakota Blue Richards, Michael Morporgo, Rowan Williams, Beverley Naidoo, Eric Miyeni, Karabo Kgomotso Kgoleng, Nomsa Mazwai, Lebo Mashile, Xoliswa Sithole, Karen Press, Siphokazi Maraqana, Rosie Motene and Mandla Langa

Africa: Executive Director - AFRODAD

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/jobs/56934

AFRODAD a pan-African regional organization providing research-based advocacy in issues of Debt, Development Aid and Economic Governance is seeking to recruit an Executive Director to be based in Harare, Zimbabwe. The Executive Director will be accountable to the Board of Directors for planning and implementation of all program activities; sourcing and management of human and financial resources and will among other things represent the organization at high-level meetings.
AFRODAD a pan-African regional organization providing research-based advocacy in issues of Debt, Development Aid and Economic Governance is seeking to recruit an Executive Director to be based in Harare, Zimbabwe. The Executive Director will be accountable to the Board of Directors for planning and implementation of all program activities; sourcing and management of human and financial resources and will among other things represent the organization at high-level meetings,

Qualifications & Experience

Preference will be given to applicants with the following attributes:

* 5-10 years experience in senior executive position.
* Strong development research and policy analysis skills and experience
* Excellent written and spoken English, Knowledge of French and any other African Union official language will be an added advantage.
* Experience in human and financial resources management (Office management)
* Computer literate.
* Planning, Reporting and evaluation skills
* Leadership skills

Qualifications:

Equivalent of a Masters degree in development studies, economics or social studies.

Application Details

Interested applicants to email their application letter, personal statement and CV to afrodad@afrodad.co.zw Not later than 1200noon on Friday, 20 June 2009. Only successful applicants will be conducted for interviews.

Full details relating to AFRODAD and this post is available on our website at www.afrodad.org/vacancies

South Africa: Consultant - Agenda Feminist Media

2009-06-12

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/jobs/56923

Agenda Feminist Media is seeking a consultant to explore options for maximising the reach and effectiveness of its journal. The scope of the research includes evaluating possibilities for maximising the efficiency and effectiveness of the journal, as well as costing the different options. Interested parties should send a CV and statement of interest to tanja.bosch@gmail.com The time frame for completion of the project is until end-July. Further information and full TOR can be provided upon request.

Fahamu