CONTENTS: 1. Features  2. Announcements  
 

Features

“Xenophobia in SA”: A brief attempt to explain what is going on in South Africa

Baba Amani Olubanjo Buntu

Xenophobia is fear of strangers. Afrikans cannot be strangers or “foreigners” in Afrika. What is happening in South Africa is an extreme form of an element we can trace in all Black societies across the world: self-hatred expressed as rage against our own. White Supremacy has disempowered the Afrikan being to such levels that it only reacts with violence.

Afrophobia: Letter to the National Association of Nigerian Students

Lindsay Maasdorp

 “The actions by our siblings here in South Africa, particularly in Pretoria, when they target those black persons who are from other parts of the continent, are anti-black actions stemming from self-hatred caused by white supremacy.”

Xenophobia: South Africa is disgracing itself and its friends

Cameron Duodu

Does the ANC leadership, many of whose members lived in exile in other African countries for many years, bother to tell their stories to the new generation that is growing up in South Africa and who know almost nothing about the role played in the struggle against apartheid by the poor African countries whose people constitute the “immigrants” they now despise and harass?

Sudan’s war criminal: Lessons on how to get away with murder

Osman Nawy

The people of Sudan, victims of one of the most murderous regimes in the world today, appear to have been abandoned to the terror of Omer al-Bashir, an indicted war criminal. The Sudanese despot has taken advantage of the vagaries of geopolitics and the so-called war on terror to consolidate his regime and protect himself from international justice. For how long with the Sudanese suffer?

How inclusive is Rwanda’s reconciliation project?

Filip Reyntjens

Unity in Rwanda is part of a rehearsed consensus. The government has established a monopoly over the country’s history, to the extent that alternative histories cannot be articulated. Debate about the past is actively policed. The regime’s authoritarian approach has prevented the emergence of potentially more complex identities from below that could form the basis for more inclusive forms of citizenship.

Join me in my letter to President Trump

Alemayehu G. Mariam

On January 18, 2017, the regime in Ethiopia signed a Memorandum of Understanding to pay SGR Government Relations, Lobbying (Washington, D.C) $150,000 per month for lobbying services for a total of $1.8 million. Why is the regime in Ethiopia spending so much money to lobby the Trump Administration, when some 20 million Ethiopians are starving?

All Western Sahara wants is freedom from Moroccan occupation

Malainin Mohamed

February 27 was the national day of Western Sahara, Africa’s last colony that is illegally and forcefully occupied by Morocco with the support of France. In this interview, Malainin Mohamed (Lakhal), a Saharawi journalist and translator and a member of Saharawi Natural Resource Watch, reflects on his people’s struggle for freedom and the role that Africans and other people in the world should play in solidarity.

Currency fixing: Africans should rise against robbery by multinationals

Kumi Naidoo and Hilma Mote

South Africa recently discovered that 17 banks were colluding to manipulate the national currency to make super profits. Often, government officials are part of such scandals. What is needed is a unified, Africa-wide solidarity network from below and beyond borders working together to get governments and institutions to ensure that damaging profiteering is stopped.

Collapse of the Soviet block and the revival of Socialism: lessons for the strengthening of Socialism

Bankie Forster Bankie

In Africa the ‘collapse’ of the Soviet block had profound implications. At that time in the late 1980s and early 1990s Africa, and particularly Southern Africa, was involved in a process of decolonization by way of armed struggle, in which the Soviet block played a decisive role.  The contribution of the Soviet block and Cuba to the decolonization of Africa remains a testament to the progress of humankind.

Zimbabwe: Why elections will never work

Tinashe Jakwa

Zimbabwe is heading to elections next year, but anyone who hopes that the polls will translate into a better life for the majority of the people is deluded. Elections are merely contests for state power and never about finding the best vision and leadership for the country. With the ruling ZANU-PF party determined to remain in power, the likelihood of election-related violence in Zimbabwe is high.

Nigeria’s National Assembly as democracy’s poisoned chalice

Godwin Onyeacholem

That a government which vigorously campaigned that it would do things differently and was ushered in on the wings of an ear-splitting mantra of change could not put the slightest dent on the acquisitive and thieving tendencies of federal legislators readily explains how deeply ingrained the culture of corruption is in that parliament.

Mozambique: IMF, austerity and inequality

Joseph Hanlon

As the IMF discusses a new programme with Mozambique, an important debate with and within the IMF becomes relevant. After the secret debt fiasco, the IMF has the upper hand, but donors and civil society will need to monitor the discussions to ensure that a hard-nosed IMF negotiating team actually follows the new guidelines emerging from Washington.

Eight environmental activists on trial in Malawi

Molly Cyr

The Tanzanian activists had entered Malawi legally for a cross-learning trip with Malawian colleagues at the defunct Kayekera uranium mine in the Karonga region. Malawian authorities had approved the mission beforehand. The arrest and detention comes at a critical time during Malawi’s own domestic debates about the harmful impacts of mining on local communities.

The vision and legacy of Berta Cáceres

Beverly Bell

A year ago, one of the world’s boldest and loudest woman voices in defense of the rights of indigenous people against capitalist theft and destruction of Our Planet was assassinated by the government of Honduras and a multinational company, with the support of the US. The daughters of Berta Cáceres speak out about their mother’s glorious legacy.

Amy Ashwood Garvey: A forerunner in Pan-Africanist feminism of the 20th century

Abayomi Azikiwe

Co-founder of the UNIA-ACL, the first wife of Marcus Garvey worked tirelessly for women’s rights and inter-continental unity from the Caribbean and Central America to the United States, Europe and Africa.

Announcements

Now accepting applications for the Rotary Peace Fellowship

The Rotary Foundation

Fellows earn either a master’s degree or a professional development certificate in peace and conflict studies at one of the Rotary Peace Centers, located within seven leading universities around the world. The over 1000 program alumni are working in over 100 countries as leaders in national governments, NGOs, the military, law enforcement, and international organizations.
 

Radical transformations in Africa today: interventions from the left

An opportunity for activists and scholars to contribute to a series of three linked workshops in Africa. Each two-day meeting will debate current challenges and prospects for Left analysis and action. We are seeking both key speakers and offers of papers, with a plan to publish a selection in the Review of African Political Economy.

Deadlines for abstracts:
. Accra meeting – June 2017
. Dar es Salaam – November 2017
. Johannesburg – January 2018.

Pambazuka Android App is now on Google Play Store

As a way to reach more people and to make your experience with Pambazuka News better, we have developed an android app as another tool to create a better reading experience with mobile devices. The app will have periodic updates to cater for changing readers' requirements and experiences.to cater for changing readers' requirements and experiences.
App download Link

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Henry Makori and Tidiane Kasse - Editors, Pambazuka News

Yves Niyiragira - Executive Director, Fahamu