Pambazuka News 722: When the state fails the people
Pambazuka News 722: When the state fails the people
While the proposed law is relevant to provide for and harmonize the process of collecting identification information, there are a number of loopholes around data protection and requirements for registration that arguably render it unconstitutional in its current state.
The attacks on African migrants in South Africa are connected to oppression of poor black people in general. To prevent the poor from organizing and standing up to their real enemies, the state is tacitly encouraging violence against foreigners.
Despite widespread condemnation of the abduction, tremendous support and assistance by the international community; despite renewed efforts by the Nigerian Army to root out Boko haram from Nigeria; despite the relentless efforts by advocacy groups, media, concerned individuals and celebrities around the world; the Chibok Girls still remain in captivity.
The newly elected President of Nigeria, H.E. Muhammadu Buhari, should act expeditiously to #bringbackourgirls and enforce security to ensure women and girls are no longer subjected to abductions, sexual violence and loss of life.
Is the end of global capitalism starting from South Africa? With its high rates of protest and record strike levels by global standards over the past decade, South Africa is a weak link in the global capitalist chain. A national organisation to harness this revolutionary fervour could change the world.
The mere fact that a US leader - the first in 11 consecutive presidents - should condescend to shake the hand of the Cuban head of state is not really anything to get too excited about.
A huge global coalition is calling on the UN Security Council to make sure that no oil drilling takes place in Western Sahara until the Saharawi people have had the chance to exercise their right to self-determination and have freely and fairly decided the political status of their homeland.
The captured young Chibok women do not only belong to Nigeria; they belong to the Afrikan continent. So it is the responsibility of every Afrikan to work for their safe return and reintegration into their community.
Over 2,000 lives have been violently lost, yet Africa has not got angry enough to question whence we are headed should this trend continue. These unpunished killings are a recipe for impunity.
MUHURI and Haki Africa amongst 85 individuals and institutions that are to be notified of the intention to list them as a ''terrorist entity'' under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2012.
The publication of the list raises serious concerns for due process, including proper time and opportunity to contest the designation and the right to be informed.
The feminist organization expresses deep concern about the rising levels of fundamentalisms that continue to oppress women and girls and relegate the gains made in the women’s rights struggle. The kidnap of the girls reinforces the notion of using women’s bodies as weapons of war.
The whole world should today, now, register their unqualified outrage in response to this call by the Lagos hereditary monarch to murder the Igbo, based on the latter’s exercise of their choice in a seemingly democratic contest.
Torture, murder, arbitrary arrests, and violence. During the last year, 256 reports of human rights violations have been reported in the occupied territory of Western Sahara.
The donation follows an invitation to several institutions in Africa and elsewhere to express an interest in acquiring the collection, and submit a plan for the continuation and hosting of the database. After careful review of all submissions, Kwara State University Library in Malete, Ilorin, Nigeria, was chosen.
The writer asks the commission to uphold the independence of the judiciary in Kenya and fight the continuous undermining of the constitution and the judiciary by president Kenyatta, the executive and the parliament.
Nonviolence or armed uprising? The question about which approach is the best path to liberation from oppression remains ever-pertinent in social movements struggles; and the two paths are often intertwined. The thoughts of Frantz Fanon and Paulo Freire shed some light on the debate.
South African universities are a microcosm of the society. Recent events at these institutions are symptomatic of a wider social malaise deriving from failure of social transformation and incomplete reconciliation and restorative post-apartheid justice.
Across Africa, there is often the argument by regime supporters that the constitution should be amended to extend the rule of the incumbent because he is doing a splendid job. Of course opponents of the regime reject this. But, objectively, should “successful” leaders continue in office indefinitely for the good of the people?
Employers taking advantage of legal loopholes has resulted in a workforce that is so desperate to earn money they are taking on part-time and temporary jobs with no benefits.
In the months prior to his abduction, Dzamara had led a number of peaceful protests against the deteriorating political and economic environment in Zimbabwe, demanding the resignation of President Mugabe.
When Barack Obama visits Kenya in July, he will no doubt mention Garissa and condemn Al-Shabaab as evil cowards who have no regard for human life. But he won’t mention how the United States has helped to kill up to 1 million people in Somalia through war and starvation – with the help of Kenya.
The decision of attackers to target institutions of learning where tolerance, co-existence and unity are fostered is both frightening and enraging. Together, we must strive to keep at bay these forces that endanger our dreams of a strong, educated and sustainable world for young people.
It was 'good morning' the usual way
sounded just the same
full of energy
of life's promises
nothing could be guessed on that 14th day 2014.
You downed your cup of tea
your piece of yam
you kept some
knowing tomorrow was yet to come
you smiled your see-you-later smile.
Evening came
you did not return
a day passed, days
months
Today 14th April 2015 makes it a year.
The yam has grown moulds
like the waiting in our hearts and longing in our eyes
as we reach for a flicker of possibility
buried under the silence that surrounds your disappearance
we refuse the moulds to cover it...
Today we light a candle
not in memory my sisters - no
we light this candle to stand with you
we light this candle to keep the flicker brighter
we light this candle to evoke spirits of resilience and justice.
(My heart goes out to each single girl,
to each single parent of these girls and
their entire families.)
* Hilda Twongyeirwe is Executive Director, Uganda Women Writers Association - FEMRITE.
They didn’t ask my creed
Even though waging a war against my God.
They didn’t ask my village
Even though waging a war against my tongue.
I have breasts
That was all they asked.
They didn’t ask about my dreams
Even though I was taken from my school.
They didn’t ask about my crush
Though that would have been my grave.
I am a lost girl
Is anyone looking for me?
We are the lost girls
Will we once again be forgotten?
Like those blasted into smithereens or
Those butchered daily while the nation looks on.
We are not some cheap disposable tissue papers
Born to be tortured into submission.
We are not animals
For man to do with as he pleases.
While you watch
We are raped, brainwashed and blamed.
While you watch
We get passed around and tossed away.
We are the lost girls
Soon you’d be late and in this cave
We shall soon lose hope
Spawning children of the devil.
And while you watch
Our devil children shall return
To vanquish your own children.
We are the lost girls
Is anyone looking for us?
Health difficulties did not deter Blaauw from pursuing basic rights for all fishers. Despite his persistent efforts to advance the fishers’ struggle, Blaauw himself was a struggling fisherman at the time of his death.
OAKLAND, CA - As the World Bank prepares for its annual Spring Meetings, members of , a campaign of over 260 NGOs, farmer groups and trade unions from around the world, are publically posing three questions about the Bank’s role in land grabbing, climate destruction and the corporatization of agriculture.
Pambazuka News 721: Terrorism: Beyond treating the symptoms
Pambazuka News 721: Terrorism: Beyond treating the symptoms
Glebelands is an African National Congress stronghold. But the cost of the ruling party’s dogged determination to entrench one man’s position in the face of years of community struggle for his redeployment has been incalculable and utterly iniquitous.
In the recent elections, citizens posted results from location almost simultaneously with the counting, making it impossible for unscrupulous players to attempt to tamper with the outcomes. Social media is now a powerful tool to protect democracy.
Attempts by regional states to hijack this unique political gathering again expose how governments seek to co-opt the global justice movement.
The Agreement reached between Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan over the use of the Nile waters has sparked furious debate within and outside these countries. Overall the treaty is lopsided in favour of Egypt and is unlikely to resolve once and for all the fierce competition for the Nile.
Cecil John Rhodes was a most odious and obnoxious man who held Black people in extreme contempt. He epitomised white racism, capitalist greed and imperialism. The university named after him should instead be dedicated to Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe, a man of unparalleled integrity and a consummate intellectual who devoted his entire life to Black freedom.
Millions of people around the world are burning with outrage under imperialist oppression. Islamic fundamentalism tragically channels this explosive discontent into mindless violence that offers nothing positive. This nightmare will only get worse, unless people fight to take their societies on a radically different path.
Kenya’s counter-terrorism strategies are woefully ineffective and counterproductive, as the repeated murderous attacks show. Only sound approaches and implementation of long-delayed security sector reforms will protect the people from the al-Shabaab menace.
The Islamic militant group Boko haram, which has wreaked havoc in parts of Nigeria, influenced the outcome of this year’s presidential election. These terrorists must be eliminated as the first priority of the new administration, along with other urgent scourges such as endemic corruption.
Nigerian elections are always marred by logistical problems, poor policing and episodes of violence. But by far the biggest failure is that of the police. Future election planning should exclude the police and instead deploy the defence forces.
Ahead of the next BRICS summit this July, the bloc is considering establishing a parliamentary group. Russia is pushing this project, together with plans to promote cooperation among trade unions, civil society organizations and youth movements.
In the absence of representation of the Repatriate Diasporan Community at the 8th PAC in Accra, Ghana, last month, the cry for a ‘law of return’ was successfully side-stepped and instead plans were proposed to restrict involvement of repatriates to certain organisations only, thereby facilitating infiltration, manipulation and sabotage.
Writer and human rights activist Valentina A. Mmaka tries to put into words the utterly hearbreaking massacre of young lives – real human beings, not just numbers - at Garissa University College in Kenya last week. Irritatingly, mass murders are a part of Kenya’s history.
Even though there have been monumental changes within the political and economic system within the U.S. and the world since the slave period, fundamentally the U.S. is still a class dominated society with the corporations and banks controlling all social institutions.
Celebrated Kenyan poet Shailja Patel captures the disturbing reality of a country where violent bloodletting has become normal. Everyone is momentarily paralysed with shock; next, state terror targets the vulnerable; but soon life goes on. Yet the nation is scarred forever.
Unions must link with people and organisations beyond the formal workplace to become the voice of the excluded.
MINURSO, the Western Sahara mission, is the only UN peacekeeping mission established since 1978 not to have a human rights mandate, although UN Security Council Resolution 1979 recommends the establishment of such a mission. Horrendous human rights violations by the occupying power Morocco are widespread.
Pambazuka News 723: Afrophobia: A shame!
Pambazuka News 723: Afrophobia: A shame!
The conference aims to examine the past and current approaches to peace, security and development in Africa in light of confronting the new challenges and the opportunities offered. Key themes focus on the emerging security challenges, technology and innovative approaches to peace and security and celebrating African successes and development.
The law that attempts to address a serious human rights abuse like child and forced marriage would then also target Malawians for discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
Since 2012, an average of three bombs a day have been dropped indiscriminately by the government of Sudan onto civilians living in rebel held areas. With humanitarian access denied by the government and increasing numbers being displaced, people’s ability to survive grows more precarious by the day.
Often, it is the economic and environmental conditions that too many people are living in that fuel frustration, anger and intolerance.
It is truly sad to see brothers and sisters from Africa living in fear of their lives and desperate as they watch their homes and livelihoods destroyed by misguided and violent groups and individuals.
His arrest reportedly followed an interview he gave to the BBC on 16th April 2015, during which he discussed recent executions by Somaliland authorities, and the need for judicial reforms in the de facto autonomous state.
All those years when South African freedom fighters crisscrossed the continent in search of support for the anti-apartheid struggle, they received only unstinting hospitality and solidarity. Have South Africans forgotten this? What do they teach their children about Africa?
Nelson Mandela was welcomed to Ethiopia with open arms during his time in exile. He was given a handgun, a gift that meant a great deal to him and which may have been the ANC military wing Umkhonto we Sizwe's first weapon. Now Ethiopians and other Africans are being murdered by the liberated South Africans.
The United Nations is notorious for not protecting whistleblowers, despite a 2005 whistleblower protection policy, and rarely, if ever, takes disciplinary action against corrupt individuals.
The life expectancy of Zambians is between 48 and 56 years. So it doesn't make sense to raise retirement age to 65. Importantly, a law should be passed to enable retirees to get their pensions fast and easily.
There are no consequences for the woman who could be the next leader of the “free world” for the deadly chaos she is responsible for in Libya. It is all part of America’s doctrine of humanitarian anarchy.
Many black South Africans are yet to enjoy the freedom dividend. This is the primary source of their frustration that needs to be addressed urgently. As one of Africa’s leading nations, the country should also intensify its efforts to realize the dream of pan-Africanism.
The xenophobic attacks in South Africa reveal the relics of apartheid, colonialism and imperialism; but they are also a starting point for Africans all over to re-think nationalism, being African and black consciousness in the context of enduring inequalities.
The organisation says that it considers the use of speech by the Zulu King to promote hatred and/or incite violence against non-nationals such as Nigerians as a clear violation of the provisions of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
Durban has made a bid to host the 2022 Commonwealth Games. However, the city is built on a foundation of race and class inequality, leading to xenophobic attacks and unrest. Before Durban is ready to host any international events, it must become the strong African citizen it has promised to be by treating all of its citizens equally.
The xenophobia – better called Afrophobia – which broke out in South Africa in 2008 and again in 2015 is a sign of the continued existence of a deep-seated colonial mentality in this country. The ideas of pan-Africanism and the vision of a United States of Africa need to be embraced by the masses. Only by uniting the false borders will we be able to liberate ourselves for the benefit of all African people.
While plenty of anger has been targeted at South Africa, in Kenya the Uhuru Kenyatta administration’s reactions to Al Shabaab attacks have resulted in deepening anti-Somali and anti-Islam sentiments, thereby weakening the nation’s ability to build a united and effective response to the terror group.
In the land that ended apartheid two decades ago, violence against other Africans has been on the rise. What has gone wrong and what is to be done?
We have seen our fellow women in South Africa take part in the looting and killing of helpless fellow Africans. What example are they setting for the South African girl-child?
Pambazuka News 719: State capture: Men of power above the law
Pambazuka News 719: State capture: Men of power above the law
The apparent calm in the West African nation is deceptive. Many unresolved issues have created seething tensions that make the likelihood of renewed violence real. A transitional phase is required, for all actors to prioritize the birth of a new contract and prepare a new electoral cycle by building on past failures.
The tactics that the once revered liberation party ruthlessly deploys to protect its corrupt bigwigs and their business associates from justice are simply shameful. President Zuma and allies have now become fully untouchable by anti-graft prosecutors and investigators.
There is no legal instrument or method to circumvent the presidential terms limit under Article 101 of Rwanda’s constitution, save for a coup which would suspend or abrogate the constitution in its entirety. By the letter and spirit of the 2003 constitution, while the length of a presidential term may be decreased or increased from the current seven years, the two terms limit cannot be legally lifted.
Ethiopia’s rich heritage in music immortalized in vinyl records is vanishing into the international collector scene alongside other artifacts. There is a need to reclaim and honor the vinyl classics as part of the ancient nation’s cultural memory.
Tanzanians will go into an election likely to be very competitive this October. One key concern is that the top political parties keep well-trained militias, despite the law prohibiting this. This has caused security fears around the election.
Working towards a radical way of relating to each other, men and women traverse spaces of war as well as of pastoral, agricultural and domestic care - learning with and from each other whether in the battlefields or making food.
The intervention by President Mugabe’s wife in vendors’ clashes with the police is just talk. Vendors have become the vanguard of Zimbabwe's informal economy, but they lack recognition, support or protection from a State that disproportionately invests more in the formal economy and draws resources away from the poor.
Obama is wrong to say that the country must remain united at any cost because he does not understand that underlying the fear of violence is the fact that Nigeria is a failed colonial fiction. Break up is the only way.
A third woman has reported Standard Group journalist and PEN Kenya Secretary General Tony Mochama to Nairobi's Central Police Station for alleged sexual assault. The alleged assault occurred on September 21st 2014, at the National Museum, during the Westgate Memorial Service of Storymoja Hay Festival. The OB Number is 74/17/3/2015.
Human rights groups in Kenya are conducting their own investigation into the mysterious disappearance and death of a man linked to the crimes against humanity trial of Deputy President William Ruto at the International Criminal Court. In their preliminary findings, the groups say Meshack Yebei was murdered in a carefully planned scheme to obstruct justice in the Ruto case.
The EU along with NATO and led by the US are responsible for the current chaos in Libya. This pattern of sanctions, massive bombings, ground interventions through direct occupation or proxy forces have failed throughout the entire region of North Africa and the Middle East.
In spite of communities such as Jane-Finch being in the low-to-medium range for violence-related requests for law enforcement’s intervention, they are targeted and over-policed by the cops, especially the Toronto Anti-Violence Intervention Strategy police division, an occupation army-like formation.
The development of South Africa’s renewable energy sector provides a case study for understanding the inter-relationship that exists between social and economic development.
Russia is looking to extend its footprint in Africa by supporting the construction of a huge nuclear power plant in Egypt. Nuclear energy is seen as a viable option for African economies.
A petition has been launched demanding that French universities not succumb to pressure to ban anti-apartheid activist and scholar Prof Farid Esack.
By Dhiru Soni, Ahmed Shaikh, Anis Karodia and Joseph David
2015-03-16, Issue 718
Nigerians are already looking beyond the March 28 presidential election, which the opposition All Peoples’ Congress and its presidential candidate General Muhammadu Buhari are expected to win.
The South African police force still carries with it the brutally violent culture and practices which characterised apartheid policing. These trends are unlikely to be reigned in by a government that is progressively paranoid of people power, leaving the boys in blue to become further removed from the law that they are supposed to uphold.