Pambazuka News 405: Hope in USA, despair in Congo
Pambazuka News 405: Hope in USA, despair in Congo
Thanks to some progress in the implementation of the Ouagadougou Peace Accord, internally displaced people (IDPs) in Côte d’Ivoire have continued to return home throughout the second half of 2008. Of over 700,000 counted in just five government-controlled regions in 2005, some 70,000 had returned by the end of September 2008 in the western regions of Moyen Cavally and Dix-Huit Montagnes.
Honorata Kizende looked out at the audience and began with a simple, declarative sentence. “There was no dinner,” she said. “It was me who was dinner. Me, because they kicked me roughly to the ground, and they ripped off all my clothes, and between the two of them, they held my feet. One took my left foot, one took my right, and the same with my arms, and between the two of them they proceeded to rape me. Then all five of them raped me.”
States, while exercising their sovereign right to determine who enters and remains in their territory, have an obligation to protect the human rights of migrants, according to a new report produced by the Global Migration Group, of which UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, is a member. The report was produced to mark this year’s 60th anniversary of the affirmation of universal human rights.
The number of people illegally crossing the Gulf of Aden and the Mediterranean Sea is on the rise, the United Nations refugee agency reported today, as it confirmed that 12 people fleeing Somalia in the past week have been found dead on a beach in Yemen and 28 others remain missing.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has deplored last week’s stoning to death of a 13-year-old Somali girl who was a victim of rape. Aisha Duhulow was stoned to death in a stadium full of spectators in the southern port city of Kismayo on 27 October after authorities found her guilty of adultery.
With regard to what is going on in Eastern DRCongo, it seems that most people, both inside and outside of the country, have come to accept the most horrendous crimes as part of normality. It is difficult not to ask the following question: if these rapes were occurring in G8 countries, wouldn't there be emergency measure to put an end to it? Questions must be addressed to the leadership in the DRC, the African Union leadership: why is everyone waiting for someone else to do something?
A South African government spokesman on Thursday said the country will take a hard line stance during a SADC summit set for Sunday in Johannesburg, to ensure that agreement is reached on Zimbabwe’s cabinet deadlock. Themba Maseko told reporters the impasse ‘is becoming a matter of extreme concern to us and we will be taking quite a hard stance.’ The tough talk is in stark contrast to mediator Thabo Mbeki’s softly soft approach.
Robert Mugabe’s government has effectively been placed on the Global Fund blacklist, after the state’s central bank failed to account for more than US$7 million worth of Global Fund grant money. Global Fund executive director Michel Kazatchkine announced on Monday that the donor group had ordered that funds under its administration in Zimbabwe be placed under the Additional Safeguards Policy (ASP), which aims to ensure that funding is used for its intended purpose and not to benefit the government.
Doctors Without Borders, an international medical humanitarian organization, has deployed its staff into Zimbabwe to help fight the cholera epidemic, an MDC MP disclosed on Thursday. Willas Madzimure, MDC MP for Kambuzuma in Harare, said the organization has brought in badly needed facilities, such as special beds for cholera victims and gloves for medical personnel.
In the latest edition of the World Health Organisation Bulletin health economists explore the extent of fragmentation within the health systems of three African countries. Fragmentation is when there are a large number of separate funding mechanisms (e.g. many small insurance schemes) and a wide range of health-care providers paid from different funding pools which leads to an inequitable system.
Some migrant workers in southern Africa who have been diagnosed with MDR-TB are being deposited at the border of their home country without treatment or referral to care, according to reports at the World Lung Health Conference held in Paris from October 17th-20th. In some cases, it is the migrant’s employer that is sending ill patients back to their home country, usually a mining company .
With the failure of the South African National AIDS Committee (SANAC)’s 1.1-billion Rand (round 8) application to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM) and the ongoing political uncertainty with a “caretaker” government until the 2009 elections, South African delegates attending the World Lung Health conference in Paris last week expressed fears that many long awaited activities to scale-up TB and TB/HIV services will be placed on hold for some time to come.
How can we address the issue of the information and knowledge society without first dealing with the fact that almost a sixth of the world's population remains illiterate, and thus excluded from the possibility of effectively participating in a knowledge-driven society? What good are the advantages afforded by the new ICTs for the more than 860 million who cannot read and write?
Organizations representing Caribbean civil society organizations and social movements have written to G8 finance ministers, the World Bank, and the IMF, to demand an immediate and unconditional cancellation of Haiti's external debt.
As a massive food distribution got under way Wednesday in six UNHCR-run camps for tens of thousands of internally displaced Congolese in North Kivu, the UN refugee agency prepared to hand out tonnes of shelter and household items. A four-truck UNHCR convoy carrying 33 tonnes of various aid items, including plastic sheeting, blankets, kitchen sets and jerry cans crossed Wednesday from Rwanda into Goma, the capital of the conflict-hit province in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
Portuguese banks that received transfers of money to Angolan politicians implicated in illegal arms sales have kept mum after the Lisbon paper Público reported their involvement. The Banco de Portugal, the country’s central bank, has remained silent, and the banks mentioned by the newspaper declined to comment in response to queries from IPS Monday, invoking the law on bank secrecy.
On the fifth day of every month a group of women entrepreneurs gather to share their experiences and discuss matters of trade. What makes this exceptional is that the women are from south-central Somalia and they meet in Mogadishu, one of the world's most devastated and dangerous cities.
It has become increasingly common in Namibian society for children to head their own households and take care of other relatives, due to the death or illness of their parents and guardians, or because their parents live far away. This handbook provides guidance on how to run a child headed household. It is intended for children and youth who shoulder the responsibility of managing a home and caring for others as well as community caregivers, volunteers and relatives who provide some form of support to these households.
In Africa, as elsewhere, the path or paths to development and modernity are dependent on historical institutional context, and cannot be imposed from outside. The paper first compares Africa with five alternative models of how development occurred elsewhere.It is argued that African states are ‘outliers’ in that the legacy of recent colonialism and the dominance of external forces have created a peculiar mixture of ‘informal’ values and behaviours with formal institutions, in which the informal are dominant in power relations but not recognised or understood. Hence development policies lack any real traction.
Following the disappointing results of the Good Governance agenda, this paper explores the idea of working "with the grain" of African societies. It identifies a core set of beliefs and values – concerning power, accountability and social morality – that are widely observed across sub-Saharan Africa, have proven extremely durable and remain powerful drivers of behaviour.
The fight for rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people in the Indian Ocean’s small island of Mauritius is finally bearing fruits. The country’s government has, for the first time, included sexual orientation in its discrimination bill.Employment Rights Bill, as it is known, states that nobody should be discriminated against based on sexual orientation while applying for a job.
Michael Sata, leader of Zambia's opposition Patriotic Front party, said he will launch legal proceedings challenging the result of the country's presidential election held last week. Sata alleges vote-rigging and voter intimidation and on Tuesday demanded a recount after losing to centrist politician Rupiah Banda, who was sworn in as president on Sunday.
Reporters Without Borders condemns a violent attack on leading journalist Amare Aregawi on 31 October in Addis Ababa, in which he sustained serious head injuries. Aregawi edits The Reporter, a big-circulation newspaper published in Amharic and English-language versions.
Reporters Without Borders has condemned the arrest of online journalist Emmanuel Emeka Asiwe, a US national, at the Muritala Muhammed international airport on his arrival from the United States on 28 October to visit his sick mother and attend to family matters. He is currently being held at the headquarters of the internal intelligence service, the State Security Service (SSS) in the capital Aubuja. He is the second blogger to be arrested in Nigeria within a week.
Daniel Kibrom, a journalist employed by Eritrea’s state-owned Eri TV, has been held since October 2006 in a prison camp in the south of the country, where he is serving a sentence of five years of forced labour for trying to cross the border into Ethiopia, Reporters Without Borders has learned from a former prison interrogator who fled the country a year ago.
Global TV studio manager Daudet Lukombo was acquitted by a local magistrate’s court in Kinshasa/Gombe and was released from Kinshasa penitentiary at around 4 p.m., ending 41 days in detention. He was arrested during a police raid on the privately-owned TV station on the night of 11 September, after it broadcast a news conference by opposition legislator Ne Muanda Semi, the head of the controversial Bundu dia Kongo movement.
In the 1995 constitution, the government of Uganda vests land in its citizens. This it sets out to strengthen by decentralizing land administration and management as per the Land Act 1998. It is almost 10 years now down the road, but to many the policy doesn't seem to exist. What has or has not changed for women and land: A case of Lira district.
Following the initial rush of Information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) projects in rural Africa, many did not yield the anticipated outcomes, and interest has been dying down. People then began talking about “sustainable ICT” projects, in which it was understood that projects would become self-sufficient after their initial donor-led investment and set-up period.
Over 500 women and men, citizens, representing people’s organisations from 41 countries across Asia and Europe joined together in Beijing between the 13th and 15th October 2008 at the 7th Asia Europe People’s Forum to work ‘For Social and Ecological Justice.’ We focussed on developing strategies and recommendations to our elected representatives, and to ourselves, as active citizens, for ‘Peace and Security,’ ‘Social and Economic Rights, and Environmental Justice’ and ‘Participatory Democracy and Human Rights.’
Egyptian protestors have torched headquarters of most prominent opposition politician in clashes between rival factions, eyewitnesses and police said. Police official said seven people sustained minor injuries as rival groups threw stones and bottles at each other at downtown Cairo headquarters of al-Ghad party.
The future of Zimbabwe's AIDS programmes hangs in the balance after the government failed to meet the deadline of Thursday 6 November to return over US$7 million to the Geneva-based Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
In one of the many backyard taverns selling chang'aa (illicit brew) in the Korogocho informal settlement of Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, two women desperately try to get patrons to listen to their lecture about HIV; many are too drunk to care, but others are more attentive.
While neighbouring countries struggle to get pregnant women to visit antenatal centres, women in Rwanda seem to be flocking to them. Rwanda manages to reach 72 percent of pregnant women with HIV testing and counselling and other prevention of mother-to-child services (PMTCT), but fewer than 20 percent of Burundi's health centres offer PMTCT services, while Kenya is reaching half its pregnant women.
Pambazuka News 404: Weeping for Angola
Pambazuka News 404: Weeping for Angola
Elisio Macamo - 2008-10-26
Reflecting on social spaces and politics within Mozambican cities and the legacy of the colonial period, Elisio Macamo calls for greater study of the role of urban environments in the development of local political cultures. Citing the example of protestant churches of various denominations in the creation of local responsibilities and identities, the author contrasts this process of self-determination with the ‘culture of dependency’ underpinned by the continual support of the development industry.
Some four years after delegates met at Bomas to discuss Kenya’s constitutional review, the country’s National Youth Convention descended upon the very same location for the purpose of discussing Kenyan youth’s role and opportunities within the Kenyan state. As in other African countries, the NYC argues, young people in Kenya constitute a majority and deserve greater scope for influencing the direction of their nation and setting the agendas it follows.
http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/404/Mine_Zimbabwe_tmb.jpgReflec... on an Institut Panos Afrique de l’Ouest (IPAO) training workshop for West African journalists held at beginning of October, Tidiane Kassé provides an introduction to the murky world of extractive industry in the region and the role of the media in informing public opinion.
Underlining the fundamental absence of an effective legal framework around the mining sector’s increasing presence and power in the West African region, Moussa K. Traoré assesses the social and economic impacts of an industry that has uncovered riches for countries’ leaders while leaving local populations excluded and deprived. Concluding that far greater information and dialogue are needed between the companies, authorities, and local stakeholders, the author argues for an increased role for civil society as a means of ensuring industry benefits become more widespread.
http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/404/China_businesses_lesotho_tm... an engaging piece highlighting the inherent one-sidedness of Western media coverage of China’s presence in Africa, Stephen Marks explores the extent to which the Asian giant’s presence on the continent is primarily visible in its economic and diplomatic links rather than any military presence. While concerns over a so-called ‘Yellow Peril’ are scarcely predominant within US policy circles, the author argues, the Chinese presence on the African continent is primarily characterised as military, a characterisation that belies the essentially economic basis of the country’s relations with African countries. But with Chinese military expenditure now conspicuously on the increase, what will be the consequences for a changing relationship with Africa?
In his work on the Sidis of India, Abdulaziz Y. Lodhi discusses the historical experiences of a group of prominent East African ancestry in the Indian sub-continent. Exploring linguistic developments and the role of Islam in their broader integration, the author discusses the new championing of the Swahili language of a group keen to revitalise their cultural links to Africa and reconstruct their heritage. With the group gaining wider scholarly and public recognition in recent years, Lodhi also reflects on Bantu linguistic data observable in contemporary Sidi speech and the effect of new efforts at cultural revival spearheaded by touring Sidi musical performers.
Drawing a broad contrast with South Africa’s anti-apartheid movement, Margot Bokanga argues that the crisis in the DR Congo will only be overcome through effective engagement between regional stakeholders, governmental authorities, international organisations, and national civil society groups. Harnessing the momentum behind campaigns such as the recent , the author hopes the current struggles may one day prove a mere story of the triumph of civil activism for future Congolese generations.
Questioning the validity of a description suggestive of an unpreventable natural phenomenon, Astrid von Kotze explores the factors behind the onset of an ostensible ‘silent tsunami’ driving the world food crisis. Addressing core issues around global disparities in consumption and problematising received Malthusian wisdoms, the author argues that food encompasses far more than the purchase of mere commodities, reflecting social relations, use of the environment, and control of resources.
When capitalism fails the rich
(it always fails the poor), a jism
reinvigorates the corporate bitch:
let’s call it bow-wow socialism.
Good ol’ Uncle Sam, he saves the big banks
with tax-payers’ money, tax-payers’ sweat;
Wall Street billionaires, give him thanks
for winkling you fraudsters out of debt!
Dogknot socialism for plutocrats,
the broker-dealers’ contingency plan;
ill-gotten gains made by ill-gotten brats
devilling themselves in the frying pan.
Where Bob’s your uncle, the Reserve Bank feeds
cronyism, and the First Lady’s needs.
* John Eppel is a poet, novelist, and short-story writer from Zimbabwe. He won the MNet Prize in 1994 for his novel, D.G.G. Berry’s Great North Road (1992).
* Please send comments to or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/
Member States from the East African Community (EAC), Southern African Development Community (SADC), and Common Markets of Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) met in Uganda to discuss the merger of the three economic blocs and the current financial crisis. Leaders of the three communities signed an agreement defining the roadmap for the project that seeks to create Africa’s largest trading bloc with a combined population of over 527 million people and a combined gross domestic product of $624 billion. The plan will be implemented with the signing of a comprehensive accord within six months. Within a year, the three regional communities will develop a legal framework and measures to facilitate the movement of business people, will have a single airspace and an inter-regional broadband Internet network, and will coordinate regional transportation and energy.
Meanwhile, military and defense officials from the EAC member states attended a seminar in Rwanda, the fourth of the five regional series, to discuss strategies on managing defense and sustainable peace in a democratic society and to formulate the East African defense protocol to further the political integration agenda. Meanwhile, climate experts and ministers of the Economic Community of West African States have committed to coordinate their national efforts to combat climate change as a new report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns that ‘warming global temperatures can cut West African agricultural production by up to 50 percent by the year 2020’. SADC, one of many regional and sub-regional organisations invited by Zambia to observe this month’s presidential elections, has sent its electoral observer mission to ensure the promotion of common political values and to observe the management and conduct of the elections.
African ministers responsible for mineral resources met to discuss how African mineral exporting countries can gain optimum benefits from increasing exports and the price boom. They have adopted the ‘Africa Mining Vision 2050’, a document prepared by the African Union (AU) to provide a credible scheme for addressing the various challenges crippling the mining sector. The AU Commission chairperson, while addressing the 9th meeting of the Regional Consultation Mechanisms of the United Nations agencies and organisations working in Africa on food crisis and climate change, called for an urgent review of African agricultural policies to prioritise and better integrate them in national budgets and development interventions. In addition, the department of trade and industry of the AU Commission in collaboration with the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation and the government of South Africa organised the Conference of African Ministers of Industry (CAMI-18) under the theme ‘the Acceleration of Industrial Development of Africa - the need for Value Addition and Industrial Transformation’.
The African Development Bank in partnership with the AU Commission will organise a conference of Africa’s finance ministers and central bank governors to examine the effects of the global financial crisis on African economies and how to mobilise a common response to the crisis. African ministers in charge of public service, at their sixth conference, adopted, among other resolutions, the draft of the African Public Service charter with the amendments for presentation to the assembly of heads of state and government of the AU. African heads of state and government who are members of the African Peer Review Mechanism attended their first extraordinary summit in Benin to further look at the review report on the Federal Republic of Nigeria and to begin examining the report on Burkina Faso. In his introductory statement, the president of South Africa Kgalema Motlanthe, recognising that the land issue ‘represents a harsh manifestation of the colonial legacy and the gross historical injustices that shape land ownership patterns in Africa today’, addressed the topic in the context of resource control and management.
Meanwhile, the European Union Commission has expressed their willingness to work with China to develop African infrastructure and to ensure that its natural resources are well managed while identifying and addressing other areas for trilateral cooperation. African Development Bank Group President, Donald Kaberuka, while meeting with non governmental organisations, focused on the impact of Bank operations on the lives of small-scale farmers and rural populations in accessing drinking water, sanitation and electricity.
In peace and security related news, the AU Panel of the Wise welcomed resolutions adopted by the Peace and Security Council of the AU to balance the fight against impunity and the promotion of reconciliation in the Sudanese region of Darfur. The Panel further called on Sudanese parties to extend their full cooperation to the AU, the United Nations and the League of Arab States efforts to restore lasting peace in the region. The organ Troika of SADC heads of State and government met in the Kingdom of Swaziland in an extra-ordinary summit to review and consult on the political and security situation in Zimbabwe, the Kingdom of Lesotho and in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. In the meantime, SADC postponed a crisis meeting on the political instability in Zimbabwe after the government refused to renew the passport of Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai for him to travel to Swaziland. However, crisis talks continued in Zimbabwe in a bid to save the Kenya-style power-sharing deal in danger of collapse over cabinet-sharing disagreements between President Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai. A spokesperson for Somali insurgents admitted responsibility for attacks on AU forces, telling local media that they have killed at least seven soldiers, but, the Somali military deny the claim. During a round table discussion of the AU-UN panel on the support of regional peacekeeping operations, the AU was urged to find sustainable mechanisms to support Africa’s mediation, peacemaking and peacekeeping efforts.
The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights will hold the 44th ordinary session in Abuja, Nigeria from November 10-24, and the Forum on the Participation of NGOs in the Ordinary Sessions of the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights will be held from the 7-9 of November. In other news, former president Festus Gontebanye Mogae of Botswana is the winner of the 2008 Mo Ibrahim Prize for good governance in Africa. The annual award is given to former sub-Sahara African heads of state or government who were democratically elected and demonstrated good governance.
Finally, a report presented to the second session of the conference of African ministers of culture announced that the great museum of Africa will be built in Algeria and must express the present and the future of Africa’s freedom from colonialism and racism as well as the characteristics that realise African unity.
By coincidence last weekend saw a long-planned Asian-European economic summit in Beijing, at a time when many world leaders were looking to China to play a key role in .
Thailand’s Premier even called for the Chinese Yuan to be the world’s new reserve currency.
Much mainstream expert comment, while not going that far, nonetheless agreed that China had a key role to play.
‘In many ways, US and European policymakers are doing the opposite of what they advised Asian policymakers to do in 1997-98: do not rescue failing banks, raise interest rates, balance your budget. Millions of Indonesians and Thais would have been better off if their governments had been permitted to do what western governments are doing now. An apology from the west to Asia would not be inappropriate’ said Kishore Mahbubani, Dean of Singapore University’s Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.
In his view the Chinese and Indian contributions to the Beijing summit set an example of maturity and calm. Asian governments had lost confidence in western models of good governance. ‘Asian minds have never been captured by the strange ideological belief that markets know best and government should step aside.’
George Soros agreed that ‘the financial authorities of the developed countries are in charge and they will do whatever it takes to prevent the system from collapsing. They are, however, less concerned with the fate of countries at the periphery. ... The so-called Washington consensus imposed strict market discipline on other countries but the US was exempt from it’.
Countries with large foreign currency reserves, including China, should contribute to a special fund to assist peripheral and emerging economies. ‘The US must show the way in protecting the peripheral countries against a storm that has originated in the US, if it does not want to forfeit its claim to the leadership position’.
Gerard Lyons, chief economist and group head of global research at Standard Chartered Bank , agreed that a statement launched by the Trans National Institute and Focus on the Global South.
CHINA AND THE CRISIS
Although China is not itself directly caught up in the credit crunch its export industries are already suffering from the resulting recession along with the rest of the ‘Asian tiger’ economies.
From China to Africa the financial crisis is also labour unrest continues to mount. In response, local party bosses are said to be considering special measures to assist laid-off workers.
DARFUR KILLINGS
China condemned the killing of a shift in policy.
Earlier Liu Guijin, the special Chinese envoy on Darfur said he was continuing to work with Western powers to lessen the fallout from the war crimes charges filed against Sudan's President Omar al Bashir.
ELSEWHERE IN AFRICA
A joint venture company including China Railway Construction Corp was falsely labelled fake Nigerian textiles.
But in a new twist, as Zambia goes to the polls in its Presidential election both parties are putting out the welcome mat to Chinese investment - a change of heart for the previously anti-Chinese opposition leader Michael Sata.
In response to: : On the eve of the emergence of South Africa as an independent country, Mr. Mandela was summoned to the US embassy where he met with a representaive of the US Chamber of Commerce who instructed him that the US was opposed to the nationalization policy of the ANC. Indeed, the ANC abandoned the principles for which so many paid with their lives.
The ANC government adopted the IMF and World Bank favoured neoliberal economic principles which advocate for privatization, austerity and deregulation of the so-called "free market". These policies have, indeed widened the gap between the rich and poor in the country.
The process of "manufacturing" millionaires was expedited in order to dangle phony possibilities and opportunities to a people emerging from a brutal system that had dehumanized them and systemically ensured that only white people were entitled to citizenship and all the rights that accrue thereof.
The "cadre deployment" system allowed the ANC to appoint only its members to plump positions in the public and private sectors of the economy. This has resulted in the creation of oligarchs who, a decade ago were "revolutionaries" purporting to fight for the "masses". Go figure!
The author neglects this critical and significant development which has resulted in the paralysis of initiative in favor of mediocrity and incompetence. The so-called masses have no jobs, no means of survival while the ANC leadrship swims in milk and honey. Tokyo Sexwale and Cyril Ramaphosa have joined the ranks of the filthy rich in a country that can't afford to feed all its people or adequately take care of its guests and neighbours. I am referring to the xenophobic insanity that targeted fellow African brothers and sisters while the richest immigrants, who come from the west were sipping champagne in the rich white suburbs.
The deposition of Mbeki and the formation of the new party by followers of Terror Lekota, former minister of Defence, will not give rise to any palatable and meaningful change. The squabble among the factions within the ANC is in keeping with the Stalinist tendencies of the organization which have been widely documented. The prospect of senseless violence is looming in the horizon as the fight for the wealth that belongs to all South Africans threatens to engulf the entire country.
One of the major stumbling blocks towards progressive governance is the existence of two constitutions and two constituencies. The ANC abides by, and is loyal to its constitution. Everyone else clings to the hope that the constitution of the country is the supreme document that everyone has pledged allegiance to. Not so! Policies that have national implications are passed during ANC conventions and end up as laws arising from such a charade.
Mr Zuma is not supposed to be under consideration for any national office given his history of breaking the laws of the land. Let's remember that he was fired for corruption by Mbeki. Contrary to what Mr Gumede has stated, Mr Zuma was not exonerated by judge Nicholson. The issue before the judge was whether Mr. Zuma's rights were violated by not allowing him to make representations to the National Prosecuting Authority as required by the constitution in instances where an accused has been previously informed that he would not be prosecuted. Why the judge veered into the internicine strife within the ANC by implicating Mbeki in some conspiracy to have Zuma prosecuted is ludicrous and ridiculous.
South Africa is on an irreversible path to anarchy and self-destruction. The ANC has made sure that it does, so to speak!
Thank you for profiling my blog, . You're right, Cairo isn't the best place to find anything even vaguely resembling sanity. LOL I have lived here the sum total of two and a half months and was in Kenya and India prior to that. Sadly my sanity was not to be found in either of those places either.
I have chosen not to comment on the political situation here until I am more familiar with it. Any thoughts I chose to share at this early juncture would not be sufficiently informed by my own observations and experiences as opposed to those fed me by various media outlets. I hope you will check back with me in the future.
The entire world is in crisis, a crisis with multiple dimensions. There is a food crisis, an energy crisis, a climate crisis and a financial crisis. The solutions put forth by Power – more free trade, more GMOs, etc. – purposefully ignore the fact that the crisis is a product of the capitalist system and of neoliberalism, and they will only worsen its impacts. To find real solutions, in this open letter argues we need to look toward Food Sovereignty.
Dibussi Tande reviews the following from the African blogoshphere:
Grandiose Parlor
Ayobami Ojebode
Chris Blattman’s Blog
The Road to the Horizon
Aloysius Agenda
The Coalition for an Effective African Court was registered in 2007 as an NGO under the laws of the Republic of Tanzania. To continue the success achieved to date, the Coalition is recruiting an Executive Secretary to provide strategic and operational leadership for this newly registered organisation in Tanzania.
The Coalition for an Effective African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights will be holding its General Assembly during the 44th session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights on 11 November 2008 at, Abuja, Nigeria. The closing date for nominations is 31 October 2008.
Namibia’s National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) strongly condemns the extraterritorial hate expression attributed to African National Congress (ANC) Gauteng Province Youth Leader Jacob Kawe over the weekend.
Moremi Initiative for Women's Leadership in Africa (Moremi Initiative) recently launched its website as part of a re-introduction to partners and supporters. The new website provides an opportunity for visitors and users to learn more about our programs, partnership opportunities and critical issues affecting African women and girls as well as to get involved. Moremi Initiative was launched in 2004, with a mission to engage, inspire and equip young African women and girls to become the next generation of leading politicians, activists, social entrepreneurs and change agents.
Some 40 Somalis staying illegally in Nepal for the past three years have demonstrated outside District Administration Office (DAO) Kathmandu Wednesday seeking attention from the government to provide them the status of refugees. The UN refugee agency in Kathmandu has already registered them as refugees and has been extending financial assistance. However, government has not accepted them as refugees.
"The trustworthiness and reputation of the world's entire diamond industry should not depend on the willingness of NGOs to act as its watchdog." That is the key message in this year's Diamonds and Human Security Annual Review from Partnership Africa Canada. PAC, an NGO leader in the campaign against conflict diamonds, has turned its attention to evidence of a large and growing trade in illicit rough diamonds, running in parallel with the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme that is supposed to eliminate the practice.
cc The ‘competent’ authorities of the government of José Eduardo dos Santos recently authorised the demolition of the Kinaxixe market. This architectural landmark in the centre of Luanda was an icon of Angolan urbanisation. Thus the government of this man destroyed the African patrimony inherited through the process of European colonisation, a patrimony with which we helped co-create this nation. The Kinaxixe market represented the cultural process that gave birth to our identity, as well as that of the leader of this government that destroyed it.
The Kanaxixe market was reduced to rubble by the new civil war underway in Angolan territory. This attack on the market is part of the war against all men and women in Angola carried out by agents wielding power promiscuously, and who conduct personal deals to amass fortunes through the use and abuse of this power and the property of the nation. This is a ‘pacific civil war’, as some think based on a lack of information, but one which at various times has been marked with the blood of the many victims of this attack on personal property, mostly urban land, and especially in Luanda. This war is a successor to that which took place between the ‘national liberation movements’, initiated to seize control of the state, which the Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola – Partido do Trabalho (MPLA) was able to achieve in 1975.
Few are aware of this land war since up to now only one side has resorted to violence, the plunderers who make use of the authority and arms of the state against the people. The victims have not yet responded by using violence. Their only defence has been public denunciations of these attacks through national and international organisations. The organisation which I lead, SOS Habitat, has been one of the protagonists of this pacific approach to defence resulting, among other things, in defusing the potential for spontaneous violence by the many victims of land grabbing. Despite this, those responsible for these attacks are systematically guaranteed impunity.
Do not forget that the civil war in Angola was based on the legitimacy of a revolution, led by the MPLA, which proposed the end of capitalism in Angola. Long before the Kinaxixe market debacle, the ideals of this revolution had been thrown on the garbage heap of our history by the ex-‘revolutionaries’ who, despite this change in ideology, continue to rule via the domination of state administration by the MPLA. They are unwilling to abandon this inherited one-party dictatorship, despite the fact that it has been unconstitutional since 1991.
The government of José Eduardo dos Santos has destroyed and thrown away the material and cultural wealth of our country. In order to generate wealth for a few individuals, part of the collective memory of Luanda and the entire country has been transformed into historical ruins. Some rich individual or government insider will probably cover the land of the Kinaxixe market with a modern shopping centre.
Before this perpetration, this same government ordered the demolition of the Palace of Dona Ana Joaquina, building in its place a replica of the same building. In indignation over this crime, the MPLA Deputy Lúcio Lara took a piece of rubble from this landmark building into the National Assembly where, in the name of all of us – the millions of victims of this senseless act – he wept. It was a bold form of protest which (from my point of view) contested the actions of the head of his party (the MPLA) and of the dos Santos government. Dos Santos is the individual who is ultimately responsible for the decisions of the government and the state of Angola. He must necessarily be aware of this crime and the impunity with which it took place. But the gesture of the deputy, despite the seriousness it represented, had little impact on the continued impunity with which these types of malfeasances are carried out.
Following this, many houses of the poor were demolished in various Luanda shantytowns and their inhabitants abandoned among the remaining rubble or, under threat of arms of the state, dumped in ‘warehouses of the poor’ such as those the government of the MPLA has erected in Calemba, Zango, and Panguila. These new and emblematic colonial ‘native quarters’ have, paradoxically, been built in Angola following independence. The musical tradition of the common people, which the MPLA used extensively to mobilise the population against Portuguese colonialism has a line that says, ‘they rounded us up in corrals as if we were cattle.’ And now the government of the MPLA, led by José Eduardo dos Santos, is doing exactly the same thing as Portuguese colonialism. These ‘warehouses of the poor’ are a direct manifestation of endo-colonialism (internal colonialism) and the paradigm of urbanisation of the suburbs of Luanda adopted by this MPLA government, to expel the majority of the poor and marginalised population presently living in the capital from the city and outside the reach of basic government services and gainful employment. The phase of planned social apartheid, used by José Eduardo dos Santos to strengthen his regime of endo-colonialism, is now taking form.
At any time other public spaces and many of our homes already marked for demolition may be levelled, with our expulsion serving the private interests of a few. These same few amassed fortunes during the war, even as the war blocked most attempts to promote the general well-being of the population.
Many of our public and private spaces are about to be razed in order to serve or become the property of others for the development – as they see fit – of private projects, allegedly with some public utility, but in the planning of which we have not participated nor have we designated others to participate for us. It is evident that commercial enterprises serve the public in some way and depend on the public for their market. But is it necessary that this ‘public service’ provided by the private sector has to be based on the destruction of our collective property and the expulsion of the rest of us, as is presently taking place?
Various buildings in the city become the object of private appropriation following a predatory stage of negligent and rudderless ‘government management’, leaving them ready to be gutted and turned over to private interests.
The rights and aspirations of all of society are being extinguished in order to build the property base and illicit wealth of the ‘land lords.’ To the detriment of all (but a few), this process makes José Eduardo dos Santos, his agents and clients, co-proprietors of our country (without legal title), transforming it into an immense ‘Fazenda [plantation] Angola,’ which is becoming our collective space of suffering and death. Despite this, it is amazing that this fazenda is still being referred to by these same predacious individuals as a country and state enjoying democracy and the rule of law.
The international community – for whom human rights, the rule of law and democracy are considered essential for human development – is silent in the face of this endo-colonialism. It has become an accomplice rather than run the risk of losing business opportunities with Fazenda Angola. It fears the cooling of relations with the government of José Eduardo dos Santos if it were to contest the predatory crimes that are so abundantly evident. It shamelessly ignores the acts committed against us, as is evident in the praise which it continues to heap on the government of the MPLA led by José Eduardo dos Santos, as the prime minister of Portugal, José Sócrates, recently did at the International Exhibition of Luanda (FILDA). For the representatives of these countries – themselves historical predators of humanity on an international scale – everything is reduced to a question of economic opportunities and modernisation of the market, even claiming it to be a ‘well intentioned’ urban renewal, conveniently ‘understanding’ and accepting the justifications presented publicly to them.
Obviously for those intent on appropriating the state of Angola, the preservation of historical landmarks in the development of Luanda – of its physical configuration, its ancestral buildings and culture as foundations of the Angolan nation – have little interest for the ‘headmen’ of the Angolan ‘democratic market economy,’ presently being built in the mould of colonial economics.
As the history of humanity has long shown, the (persistence of) identifiable values of a dominated society always represent a danger for any dictatorship. These values keep the collective memory of communities alive, sustaining their cohesion and capacity for resistance. Thus in the case of Angola, these values are being erased in order to consequently erase our citizenship, transforming us into zero value in the account ledgers of a political economy which reserves for us a future of docile servitude within a dictatorship of endo-colonialism. This project of endo-colonialism seeks to reproduce in each of us the colonial slave (monangabê) which, in the absence of an irreverent poet like Jacinto, evokes neither lament of the situation nor the rebellion that the process threatens to generate.
If we continue in this direction all we will remember in the future is the work of ‘headman’ José Eduardo dos Santos and of ‘his’ party, the MPLA. The MPLA is the first and principal hostage of the personal hegemony that he exerts over the state and the country. We run the risk of getting to the point where available information will suggest that nothing existed before him and that all that we become, as individuals and as a country, we owe to his predatory saga of material and cultural possessions of the Angolan community. We will thus have the perception that Angola is the invention of José Eduardo dos Santos, which history (if written accurately) will show to be the destroyer of the patrimony and the collective memory of Angola.
If will permits this strategy to be carried to its final consequences by dos Santos and by his principal hostage, the MPLA – once our collective memory has been totally erased – all that will be left of our citizenship will be a shell. We will then, as citizens, be nothing more than an empty casing. Our loss of political space will have reduced us all to the mere appearance of citizens, a state, in fact, in which the majority of us live in the present context. Our situation as citizens, which at the present time is precarious, will, in the gloomy future that the endo-colonialism of José Eduardo dos Santos offers, be one that could result in our being abandoned in ‘warehouses of the poor’ amidst material and cultural rubble. In this Eduardian social apartheid our citizenship will wither away, under guard of a variety of mercenaries using against us the arms of the ‘state’ and Fazenda Angola, despoiled as the land has been and reduced to useless gente gentia, held hostage by the outlaw bands of this dictator.
In response to the invitation of endo-colonialism to develop its project, competent foreign predators have already formed partnerships with Angolan predators by creating companies claiming to be ‘nationalist’, where by co-ownership arrangements the Angolan economic agents own more than 50% of the respective capital. Paraphrasing the Angolan nicknamed the ‘great poet,’ we are objectively faced with the ‘scavenging of the lifeless African corpse’ which denounced the crime, except in this case the scavenging is taking place remorselessly under the direction of José Eduardo dos Santos, heir to the sceptre of Agostinho Neto – poet, physician and the first president of Angola.
If we all cease to struggle, if we anesthetise ourselves with the crumbs that are left on the palace table of the endo-colonial headman or from the fear of seeking freedom, the perverse economic, political and cultural project of endo-colonialism which will restructure the very essence of Angola will be concluded as an extreme but very successful and ‘refined’ violation of our natural condition as humans, free and endowed with basic rights, (theoretically) ‘respected’ in the Eduardian ‘democracy.’
Thus Angola will continue, endo-colonial in nature, to be a great place to live for everyone except Angolans, as denounced by the Angolan singer Dog Murras. As witnessed by its complicity, this situation is not a concern for the ‘democratic humanists’ of the international community, especially in its Angolan manifestation. In particular it does not bother the European states and their commission, whose agents and investors in the Eduardian endo-colonial economy long ago chose to close their eyes in order to satisfy their appetite for petroleum, the expansion of their markets, and the exploitation of other Angolan natural resources. They only see Angola as an el dorado where they can quickly ‘make a killing’ instead of, above all else, seeing our country as a place of human beings equal to themselves.
It seems to me that this will continue until, in another February, we write the names of new heroes in the history of the liberation of Angola. Unfortunately I have a few doubts about this, because our honest and fearless peaceful protests have been of little use. And of even less use still will be, following every new attack, to continue to ‘angelically’ carry to the National Assembly (as did Deputy Lúcio Lara of the MPLA) parts of our demolished lives and soak them with our tears in this ‘cathedral of appearances’ where they present the fantasy of ‘democracy to satisfy the foreigners.’ Mister José Eduardo has declared to us and the world, in all seriousness, that democracy and human rights won’t reduce hunger. Thus in his actions he is being coherent with what he believes.
Having arrived at this point of endo-colonial violence, we can only remind Mr. dos Santos, the headman of Fazenda Angola, along with his employees and the clients of his endo-colonialist project, that they who sow the wind will reap the whirlwind. But I also wish, from the depth of my heart, that this harvest will take place through a September of voters rather than a February of heroes which, in reality, is what is being sown by dos Santos’s predatory. Free us, with urgency.
* Luiz Araujo is the director of SOS Habitat, an Angolan NGO.
* Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/
Reviewing the entrenched state of crisis engulfing the eastern DR Congo, Joseph Yav Katshung argues that it is only through strong political will that the conflict will begin to stem. As the author underlines, this is will on the part of a range of domestic and international actors, whose ability to articulate a clear strategy for enhanced civilian protection will ultimately determine whether vulnerable populations see the consequences of armed conflict reduced. Only on the strength of sustained political commitment, Katshung emphasises, can rhetoric translate into reality.
Mamadou Koulibaly 2008-10-28
Mamadou Koulibaly, president of Côte d’Ivoire’s national assembly takes issue with France’s reticence in confronting the ills of its African colonial past. Unlike other western democracies that have by and large acknowledged their culpability, France continues to fall short of doing this. In July of 2007, Sarkozy gave a speech in Dakar that embodies this inability to speak frankly about France’s African past.
We are men and women of the earth, we are those who produce food for the world. We have the right to continue being peasants and family farmers, and to shoulder the responsibility of continuing to feed our peoples. We care for seeds, which are life, and for us the act of producing food is an act of love. Humanity depends on us, and we refuse to disappear.
Reflecting on the fifth International Via Campesina Conference held in Maputo, Mozambique, on 19 October, John E. Peck examines the ongoing struggle around ‘biofuels’ and unpacks the extent to which global discourses on solutions climate change have been commandeered by multinational corporations. With a particular focus on Jatropha, the author explores the crop’s likely impact in Mozambique and the consequences for food sovereignty, land use, and contested resources, and argues that true progress towards sustainable agriculture will only be attained once governments cease to emphasise agro-fuel subsidies.
The African Women’s Development and Communication Network (FEMNET) condemns in the strongest term the stoning to death of Aisho Ibrahim Dhuhulow a Somalian woman after an Islamic Sharia law court found her guilty of adultery.
Speaker: Yash Tandon, Executive Director, South Centre
Yash Tandon explores the possibilities for change in the architecture of aid in his new book ‘Ending Aid Dependence’. Developing countries reliant on aid want to escape dependence, and yet appear unable to do so. This book proposes ways developing countries can free themselves from aid that has had varying degrees of success. Tandon argues in his book that exiting aid dependence should be at the top of the political agenda of all developing countries.
Tuesday 4 November 2008, 17:00-18:00
At: Chatham House, 10 St James's Square, London, SW1Y 4LE
The book is available from
The Southern Refugee Legal Aid Network is seeking contributors for its series of reviews of domestic refugee law in countries of the 'global south'. More detail and a list of Southern states with domestic refugee legislation can be found in the attached terms of reference. If you are interested in being a volunteer contributor, please e-mail your CV to [email][email protected]
HAI has been working in Sudan for over 20 years and has provided essential support and services to vulnerable older people and their dependants. HAI is committed to providing a community based approach to address the most pressing needs. As Programme Director, you will be responsible for the development, management and administration of HAI’s programme in Sudan and promote the development of a national capacity to meet the needs of older people. Please email your applications by the closing date of 17 November 2008.
According to the newly-released State of the World's Cities report, South African cities top the list of the world’s most unqual cities, followed by Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Guatemala and Mexico. Urban inequalities in this highly unequal region are not only increasing, but are becoming more entrenched, which suggests that failures in wealth distribution are largely the result of structural or systemic flaws.
Zambia’s government has announced plans to get its people a greater share of the country’s vast copper wealth. But with its proposals still in the balance, action is still needed. These plans could provide an extra $415 million of copper revenue, allowing it to triple expenditure on health in a country where average life expectancy is 37. The proposals could net Zambia an extra $415 million in 2008 alone. Add your voice and call on Zambia's biggest copper company, KCM, not to undermine Zambia’s development – and abide by the government’s decision. Email them now!http://www.christianaid.org.uk/issues/powercorruption/actions/zambia.aspx .
The North-South Institute is pleased to invite applications for its annual Visiting Researcher position. The Fellowship is named after Professor Emeritus G.K. Helleiner, one of Canada's leading academics on international development issues, who has dedicated many years to working in Africa and other developing countries and is a founding member and former Chair of the North-South Institute.
A woman in Somalia has been stoned to death after an Islamic Sharia law court found her guilty of adultery. The woman was buried up to her neck and then pelted to death with stones in front of a large crowd in Kismayo.
In light of the 8th anniversary of the adoption of UN- Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security; on the second of November, a three-week virtual discussion on "Planning for Action: Good Practices on Implementing UNSCR 1325 on a National Level" will be held. Policy makers, governmental representatives and civil society actors from all over the world are invited to participate and exchange experiences, good practices and lessons learned on implementing UNSCR 1325.
The course is aimed at those who want to learn how to use a project management tool such as Open Workbench (which is the same type of program such as MS Project) to create project plans on the computer. Delegates will be provided with the Open Workbench program on CD. Visit for more information about the program.
The Visiting Fellows Programme has been established to further the ARSRC’s commitment to increase Africa-focused research and publications on sexuality, issues, as well as, build links between scholars and practitioners working in this area in Africa. ARSRC is offering one (1) residential fellowship to a suitable candidate from the southern Africa countries. The fellowships of 1 to 4 months long will be based at the ARSRC’s office in Lagos, Nigeria.
The Skills Building Project Leader is responsible for the day-to-day project management of Tactical Tech's Skills Building projects, including the development of our toolkits, guides and training for advocates (see for details of these). Duties include planning, managing finances and negotiating supplier contracts. The role also involves supporting fundraising for future project development and providing strategic input on the application of digital advocacy tools to the broader fields in which Tactical Tech is working.
Pamoja Africa is a loose Network (Meta Network) of National chapters (Networks), which in turn consist of Organizations that practice Reflect and other participatory methods in the conduct of their development work. Pamoja requires the services of a competent and visionary person to fill the position of a network facilitator
A cholera outbreak has claimed its first victim in Zimbabwe's capital after causing death and illness elsewhere in a country too poor to provide clean water or clear garbage from the streets. Health authorities reported the death in Harare Thursday and said 20 other people had been hospitalized.
The United States says it regrets that the six-week impasse over implementation of a power-sharing agreement for Zimbabwe was not resolved at the recent Southern African Development Community-hosted talks. White House spokesman, Sean McCormack, said the US administration said it was unhappy with President Mugabe’s government for its refusal to implement a genuine and equitable power-sharing deal.
African leaders must take "decisive" action to end the deadlock between Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said on Wednesday. Both men remained deadlocked over who will control Zimbabwe's powerful home affairs ministry, which oversees the police, despite efforts to end the crisis early this week in a high-level security meeting.
An Anglican bishop from Zimbabwe was Tuesday named winner of a Swedish human rights prize for 'having given voice to the fight against oppression.' Bishop Sebastian Bakare was also cited for his work to promote 'freedom of speech and of opinion in a difficult political situation.' He was due to accept the 2008 Per Anger prize at a ceremony in Stockholm on November 10, Johan Perwe of the government agency Living History Forum told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
Southern African leaders meeting in Harare on Monday have failed to get Morgan Tsvangirai and Robert Mugabe to agree on who controls the home affairs ministry which has the police and the registrar general's office under its control. Mugabe and Tsvangirai's failure to agree means there is no cabinet deal yet with a Sadc troika comminque expected to be released in the next few hours. A full Sadc summit will be called soon.
Bowoto v Chevron is likely to test how the American legal system can be applied to human rights in other countries. The civil suit is being brought under the 1789 Alien Tort Claims Act, one of America’s oldest laws (it was signed by George Washington). The act allows foreigners to bring civil cases before American courts arising from violations of law or treaty anywhere in the world. It was invoked just twice before 1980, when it was used by a victim of state repression in Paraguay.
French foreign minister Bernard Kouchner has suggested the EU should do more to help UN peacekeepers in Congo, but there is not enough political will among member states to send an EU battlegroup to the conflict-struck African region. "It's very difficult to say what we can do outside of diplomatic efforts, efforts at persuasion, and efforts so that peace can be achieved by leaning on the two countries, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda," Mr Kouchner said on Wednesday (29 October).
Fierce fighting between government and rebel forces in the Democratic Republic of Congo has caused a humanitarian catastrophe, the Red Cross has said. It said the number of displaced people was growing by the hour and that the precarious security situation was making it difficult to deliver aid. Intense diplomatic efforts are under way to end the crisis, which has displaced a total of 250,000 people.