Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana 1 Jul 2007 - 6 Jul 2007. The conference aims "To provide an intellectual forum to debate Nkrumah's socio-political philosophy and action that changed the political landscape of Africa , as his geo-political paradigm altered the balance of power in global diplomacy."

China said on Thursday it remained fully committed to investing in Africa, despite a recent spate of violence against Chinese interests there, including the deaths of nine Chinese among the slaughter of 77 people in Ethiopia. "China supports trans-national trade and investment between China and other countries, including those in Africa. This is our set policy, it will not change," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Liu Jianchao told reporters.

Much of the growth in the telecommunications industry is coming from emerging markets - places like India and Africa and for many new consumers their first mobile phone experience is a shared one. This essay by Jan Chipchase uses the term sharing in the sense of primary usage orientated around borrowing and lending rather than 'let me show you the photos I took at last night's party'.

Pastor Peter Omoragbon is a Nigerian working on disaster management and ICT. Saloman Kebede interviewed him on the upcoming “Grand Debate on the Union Government” to be held at the June 2007 summit of the African Union. The interview is part of a series of interviews, to be published in AU-Monitor, of African citizens and civil society leaders on the AU proposal for Continental Government. The interviews were conducted by the Pan Africa Programme of Oxfam in the corridors of a civil society meeting organized by UN-CONGO and FEMNET in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in the week of the 13th March 2007. Emily Mghanga of Oxfam’s Pan Africa Programme edited this interview.

Saloman Kebede: What are the strengths and weaknesses of the current proposal?

Pastor Peter Omoragbon: It is a workable proposal. A United States of Africa will mean Africa standing together with one voice, strength and unity. However, let us not have the United States of Africa in name only but in practice as well.

Saloman Kebede: Should it be adopted in Accra in July 2007, what would you like to see the African Union Commission achieve within the first phase (2007-2009)?

Pastor Peter Omoragbon: I would like to see all the structures and regulations set up and all heads of states fully committed to this process.

Saloman Kebede: And why would this form of continental union be important to African citizens, particularly the poor and marginalized?

Pastor Peter Omoragbon: It is an attempt to bring us together despite the existence of diverse backgrounds across the continent. There will be greater unity when we capitalize on what unites us other than our differences. It will allow us to eliminate the mind-set that other countries are better or lesser than others. All African countries will stand with one voice!

Saloman Kebede: How could states and non-states ensure that continental union efforts are transparent, participatory and driven by an appreciation of political and economic rights?

Pastor Peter Omoragbon: That is the work of the civil society. We need to monitor and keep the governments accountable to this and other commitments.

Saloman Kebede: What obstacles must the AU overcome for the continental union to be successful?

Pastor Peter Omoragbon: There is the need to put an end to internal conflicts within member-states. We also need to overcome bad policies that do not make decisions in the interests of marginalized people in every African country.

The views expressed here are the perspectives of the interviewee. Pastor Peter Omoragbon can be reached at Email: nursesacrosstheborders at yahoo.com

Roselynn Musa is Nigerian based in Kenya working with African Women’s Development and Communications Network, FEMNET. In March, Saloman Kebede interviewed her on the upcoming “Grand Debate on the Union Government” to be held at the June 2007 summit of the African Union. This interview is part of a series of interviews, to be published in AU-Monitor, of African citizens and civil society leaders on the AU proposal for Continental Government. Emily Mghanga of Oxfam’s Pan Africa Programme edited this interview.

Saloman Kebede: Why is continental integration important to African Citizens?

Roselynn Musa: In unity lies strength! Continental Union will allow greater coordination and mobilization of our resources, which is fundamental for growth and development in Africa. It also gives better opportunities for economy of scale.

Saloman Kebede: Should it be adopted in Accra in July 2007, what would you like to see the African Union Commission achieve within the first phase (2007-2009)?

Roselynn Musa: The most pressing needs in Africa are the issues of peace and security as well as HIV/AIDS and malaria. Women and children are the most affected. It is crucial that they focus on the economic empowerment of women as a way of addressing most of our societal ills. Let the AU commission set priorities in these areas.

Saloman Kebede: How could states and non-states ensure that continental union efforts are transparent, participatory and driven by an appreciation of political and economic rights?

Roselynn Musa: The AU-NEPAD peer review mechanism is an important tool for transparency if implemented as planned. We need to put our own house in order so as to be able to hold others accountable. We should practice what we preach.

Saloman Kebede: What obstacle must the AU overcome for the continental union to be successful?

Roselynn Musa: Conflict and human insecurity. If there is no peace, it is difficult to unite either individually or continentally. A positive way to start could be to address those issues that have been generating conflict in our continent.

Development and Communications Network, FEMNET. In March, Saloman Kebede interviewed her on the upcoming “Grand Debate on the Union Government” to be held at the June 2007 summit of the African Union. This interview is part of a series of interviews, to be published in AU-Monitor, of African citizens and civil society leaders on the AU proposal for Continental Government. Emily Mghanga of Oxfam’s Pan Africa Programme edited this interview.

Saloman Kebede: Why is continental integration important to African Citizens?

Roselynn Musa: In unity lies strength! Continental Union will allow greater coordination and mobilization of our resources, which is fundamental for growth and development in Africa. It also gives better opportunities for economy of scale.

Saloman Kebede: Should it be adopted in Accra in July 2007, what would you like to see the African Union Commission achieve within the first phase (2007-2009)?

Roselynn Musa: The most pressing needs in Africa are the issues of peace and security as well as HIV/AIDS and malaria. Women and children are the most affected. It is crucial that they focus on the economic empowerment of women as a way of addressing most of our societal ills. Let the AU commission set priorities in these areas.

Saloman Kebede: How could states and non-states ensure that continental union efforts are transparent, participatory and driven by an appreciation of political and economic rights?

Roselynn Musa: The AU-NEPAD peer review mechanism is an important tool for transparency if implemented as planned. We need to put our own house in order so as to be able to hold others accountable. We should practice what we preach.

Saloman Kebede: In what policy area, would you like to see greater convergence and unity across Africa and why?

Roselynn Musa: Peace and security, but also health and women’s economic empowerment.

The views expressed here are the perspectives of the interviewee. Roselynn Musa can be reached at: advocacy at femnet.or.ke or musarose_ng at yahoo.com

A deadly attack by rebels on a Chinese-run oil field in Ethiopia that left more than 70 dead is the latest example of the human and political cost of China’s growing energy interests in Africa. Tuesday’s attack by rebel gunmen on the facility left 65 Ethiopians dead as well as nine workers from China, making it the deadliest in a recent spate of killings and kidnappings aimed at Chinese firms in Africa.

When you seek to find a gliche in the system
When you feel al l the time that there’s something missing
When you turn around and the doors closed
and your belligerence shows
cause the politicians wearing emporer’s clothes

I’ve got news for you, you’re here too.

When we do the ‘they’
When we call it black or white or grey
When the headlines scream another dead child,
another oil slick,
another hard crime somebody else is doing the time
When you say your life depends on the other man’s outcome
oh there’s so much degradation
the government’s put us in this situation
It’s a black dream you scheme

I’ve got news for you, you’re here too.

When your sister’s raped and your brother’s drugged and the
streets aren’t clean and you look at it all and say, “We’re all headed for a hard fall.”
When you speak of lies
but don’t speak you truth
when can’t make it to the top
and it’s always somebody else’s fault that the ball’s dropped.

I’ve got news for you, you’re here too.

When your agitation is all you can spare
and your rhetoric’s got you all in a rage
when you can’t hold yourself when you fall
and you lay down love and pick up arms
and the silence cries
but your lips – still – don’t – move –
yet in your own living room you’re a prophet of doom

I’ve got news for you, you’re here too.

We tick the minutes spill the seconds
tick the minutes spill the seconds
talk judgement, economics and acid rain.

We tick the minutes spill the seconds
tick the minutes spill the seconds
talk memory, talk more pain.

We tick the minutes spill the seconds
talk of God
talk more, talk more
talk
more
we’re keeping score
and love a waiting at the door

When you move to Australia cause the countries a failure
when mending the situation calls for a band aid solution to put us in line with our constitution
when you can’t understand how ten years of democracy didn’t make it all fit
when you feel the urge to shout “Get over it!”
as if something outside yourself requires the shift
remember people we’re all in the same damn lift!
“Going up orrrrrr down!”

we tick the minutes spill the seconds
tick the minutes spill the seconds
time is a wasting while we’re cutting and pasting
and life is elsewhere
here or there?
outside’s a good place to count the cost
when you’re running that race from the inside
It’s better than dealing with the feeling of being lost,
displaced in your space…

I’ve got news for you
It doesn’t take an apocalypse to mend a century
It doesn’t take blame to alleviate pain
A simple step to the mirror is all it’ll take
A reflection on the reflection is the only thing that can free the present
from hate

Soooo put on your parachute, or strap on a seatbelt
the ride’s scary or sacred
could be heaven’s door or hell’s gate
all depends on your internal state
but unless you’re late, deceased or carried off in a crate
don’t berate the psychosis and add to the neurosis
simply take a look in the mirror at your own thriller
dispense with the polyfiller

I’ve got news for you
you’re here too.

Khadija-Tracey Heeger

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/firestone-child-labourers.j... England celebrates its 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade, plantation workers in Liberia are trapped in a time warp of monumental proportions. They exist in the parallel universe of multinational corporate checkmate, where the prize goes to the highest exploiter. Robtel Neajai Pailey exposes the plantations of Firestone Rubber Company in Liberia.

Emmanuel B. is 30, a slender five foot three, and a slave whose piercing brown eyes tell unspeakable truths. He’s not the kind of slave we’ve seen in the collective imagination of 19th century plantations in the deep South of the United States. No, Emmanuel is a modern slave in 21st century post-conflict Liberia, and Firestone Rubber Company his unyielding master.

Like many workers on Firestone’s largest rubber plantation, Emmanuel was born in Harbel, has lived in Harbel all his life, and will most likely waste away in Harbel. Previously a student in Gbarnga, Emmanuel has ambitions to return to school, but those are pie in the sky dreams considering his family has no means of supporting him. As Westerners drive around in their heavy-duty SUVs propelled by another type of black gold—Firestone tires—Emmanuel wakes up at the crack of dawn to tap raw latex from 800 rubber trees daily. His clothes are tattered, and his shoulders covered in red puss-infected blisters from carrying buckets full of raw latex suspended from an iron pole to the Firestone processing plant two miles from his tapping site. For Emmanuel and his fellow tappers, a 5 a.m. start is the only means of filling their daily quota. Some have even begun to use their children to complete the herculean task.

Emmanuel sat perched like a statue, surrounded by green shrubbery and tall eerie splotched rubber trees one afternoon last December. He was taking a break, and had just finished tapping a record 800 trees when I spotted him while driving on a winding road on the Firestone plantation. He was gracious enough to demonstrate what a tapper does from sun-up to mid-morning. With a pitchfork suspended in the air, Emmanuel extended his long wiry arms to ease the raw latex out of the trees and into small red cups that catch the white liquid. The drip drip drip of the white coated liquid was almost as laborious to witness as Emmanuel’s daily task...another 799 trees to go and only five hours left. If workers don’t fill their quotas, their wages are reduced by half.

I visited the Firestone Rubber plantation for the very first time in December 2006 while on a research fact-finding mission for my dissertation. I decided to take a break from high browed academic work, and visit the sprawling modern day encampment I had heard so many horror stories about. It’s what I imagined the South to look like during the centuries of chattel slavery in the United States, with the hustle bustle activity of plantation life and the accompanying strokes of exploitation. As my brother-in-law, Christopher Pabai, and I pulled into the one million acre—and constantly expanding—plantation, we were welcomed by an ungodly stench, a stench I can only compare to the smell of rotten cheese. Not just ordinary rotten cheese, but the kind that has been drenched in burning oil, steamrolled on a conveyor belt, and neatly packaged for non-human consumption. That’s what raw latex smells like when it’s being processed. Rather than wearing masks to protect their noses from the assault, the plantation workers ingest the foul stench day in and day out. It took all my willpower not to retch all over Firestone’s perfectly manicured lawn or lush green golf course that senior management frequents while on hiatus from their back-breaking overseeing.

Believe it or not, the foul stench is the least of the workers’ worries.

While England celebrates its 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade, plantation workers in Liberia are trapped in a time warp of monumental proportions. They exist in the parallel universe of multinational corporate checkmate, where the prize goes to the highest exploiter. Firestone has been playing the chess pieces of Liberia’s rubber slaves since the company signed a concession agreement with the Liberian government in 1926 to lease one million acres of land for six cents per acre—an abominable exchange given the astronomical dividends garnered from rubber sales then and now. In 2005, Liberia’s transitional government signed another concession agreement for an extra 37 years of rubber slavery. Rubber is Liberia’s largest export, and Firestone its largest international corporate exploiter, I mean employer, to date. The country and its people have paid a high price for the asymmetrical relationship.

In March 2007, the Firestone Rubber Company, a subsidiary of the Japan-based Bridgestone Corporation, won the Public Eye Global Ward for its social and ecological sins which demonstrate the shady side of pure profit-oriented globalization. The award was bestowed upon Firestone precisely because of the slave-like conditions on the plantation in Liberia. Workers live in dilapidated mud huts and are forced to seek the aid of their children in the strenuous and dangerous task of extracting latex from rubber trees. The deliberate and strategic use of children is against international laws including ILO Conventions, American and Liberian labour laws.

Since the plantation opened in 1926, company housing, mainly single room mud huts with no electricity, running water, or toilet facilities, has never been refurbished and updated to modern safety standards. Firestone’s plantation workers and their children toil under the same slave-like conditions they have endured for the past 80 years. The children’s labour usually includes cutting trees with sharp tools, applying pesticides by hand, and hauling two buckets on a pole, each filled with more than 30 kg of latex. Every day, these child laborers have to work long hours and are thus denied the right to basic education. Access to the company run schools is further impeded as parents must present a costly birth certificate in order to register their children.

Violation of child labour laws is only one among a long list of indictments against Firestone. According to Friends of the Earth USA, discharge from the company’s rubber processing plant has contaminated the adjacent Farmington River and other waterways, killing once vibrant ecosystems and polluting communities that depend on river water for drinking, bathing, and fishing. Furthermore, plantation workers are exposed to toxic chemicals and compounds on a daily basis while tapping. The merciless exploitation of Liberia’s people and natural resources by Firestone is directly linked to the nation’s impoverishment as the raw materials produced in Liberia are sent elsewhere for processing, thereby shutting out the possibility of added value. If a processing plant is built in Liberia, it could revolutionize the way rubber is used within a continent in dire need of manufactured goods such as condoms in the heyday of Bush’s conservative AIDS funding policies.

Clear violations of the law prompted a legal complaint filed in November 2005 against Bridgestone Corporation and Bridgestone Firestone North American Tire, LLC by the International labour Rights Fund (ILRF), a member of the Stop Firestone Campaign which is an advocacy coalition launched in 2005 to highlight Firestone’s exploitative undermining of Liberian labour laws. The 35 plaintiffs either have been or are currently child labourers on the company’s rubber plantation in Liberia. They describe their lives as “trapped in poverty and coercion.” The plaintiffs have brought their case to a U.S. court since Liberia’s legal system eroded during 15 + years of civil war and strife. The case is currently ongoing.

The ILRF, along with its Stop Firestone Coalition partners, demands that Firestone:
- provides workers with basic rights, including a living wage and the freedom of association;
- ends all child and forced labour and assigns achievable quotas;
- adopts health and safety standards; stops exposing workers to toxic compounds and chemicals;
- improves housing, schools, and health care centres to provide safe and comfortable facilities;
- ensures public disclosure of revenue and all types of foreign investment contracts;
- stops releasing chemicals into the environment and redresses all environmental damage; and
-publicly discloses the identity and quantity of all toxic compounds that it releases or transports.

Liberia’s Minister of Labour, Kofi Woods, a long-time human rights activist/lawyer and a major catalyst for the Stop Firestone Campaign, has been in rounds of renegotiation sessions with Firestone representatives recently in Washington, D.C. Because of his list of demands—which are reminiscent of the Stop Firestone Coalition demands—Firestone representatives stormed out of the meetings in March 2007. Go figure. Woods and his cohorts are what I imagine African legislators should be like, uncompromising and unyielding when it comes to corporate social and ethical responsibility. Liberia’s post-conflict reconstruction agenda will be null and void without a reconfiguration of the concession agreement with Firestone. After all, any post-war scheme involves a drastic revving up of the national economy, and given Firestone’s economic entrenchment in Liberia, it will need to refashion how it deals with Liberian workers, thereby increasing employee profit margins.

History challenges us to stay on a forward moving dialectic of change. The Firestone example shows us that an ironic distortion of that dialectic is taking place right under our noses. Slavery ain’t dead, it’s manufactured in the rubber we use daily. We owe it to Emmanuel and his comrades on the Firestone Rubber plantation to change the course of history, to make a clean break from modern-day slavery and its peculiar 21st century manifestations. We owe it to ourselves.

For more information on the Stop Firestone Campaign, visit

Listen to Robtel Pailey's interview with Liberian Minister of Labour Kofi Woods and activist Ezekiel Pajibo about the role of Firestone tyre company in Liberia in this weeks [email protected]

China is now the biggest investor in Zimbabwe with at least 35 companies operating in the southern African country and more investors eyeing opportunities there, according to a top ruling party official.

The first global consultation on HIV and internally displaced people started Tuesday in Geneva bringing together some 45 experts from governments, United Nations agencies, non-governmental organizations and the academic world, to discuss ways of addressing the effects of HIV on internally displaced populations.

When Malians queue to cast ballots in presidential elections Sunday, they will be participating in a poll with a difference: for the first time ever, a woman will be amongst the candidates.

While South Africa's "homelands" -- areas formerly set aside for blacks -- have been relegated to the dustbin of history for more than a decade, their legacy lives on in the form of land degradation, and even desertification in northern and eastern parts of the country.

Fears are high among Kenyan farmers that a new trade regime following a forthcoming deal between developing countries and the European Union (EU) may drive them deeper into poverty. The deal, expected to kick in at the beginning of next year, is one of six economic partnership agreements (EPAs) between the EU and the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries.

While South Africa is planning on increasing bio-fuels production some experts warn the move may hurt subsistence farmers and cause more hunger in impoverished areas of the country. Proponents in the United States and Brazil say bio-fuels such as maize-based ethanol is a clean energy alternative that comes from resources that are renewable.

In responding to nationwide demonstrations, Guinean security forces murdered, assaulted, and robbed the citizens they are entrusted to protect, Human Rights Watch has said in a new report. The new government must take concrete measures to hold those responsible to account.

While gays have been accepted in many countries, like South Africa which legalised same-sex marriages recently, homosexuals are still frowned upon in Ugandan society. However, a Ugandan lesbian is making news around the continent for being outspoken about her sexuality and other people like her. She was among the delegates who discussed gay issues at the recent World Social Forum in Nairobi, Kenya.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_liquidplastic.gif Tanzanian blogger, Nasra Al Adawi who has been working with breast cancer survivors in Southern Africa posts an interview with “An Everyday Heroine” Rebecca Musi from Soweto, Johannesburg.

“When Rebecca was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of forty-nine, her mother became ill at the same time. “I never got a chance to tell her as I did not want to upset her”, said Rebecca. “This was just before I started my treatment, so I suspended treatment and looked after her.” Ironically her mother died four months later. She was ninety-five years old.

Today, Rebecca Musi is a breast cancer survivor, and she travels around the world supporting other breast cancer survivors. She works for Breast Health Foundation (BHF) in Johannesburg. She is also a participant in the Avon Foundation initiatives for cancer awareness. Avon has launched a campaign called the “Global Connection Ribbon Tour”. This tour links survivors from one country to another.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_dibussi.gifScribbles from a Den comments on the first round of the French elections in which right wing candidate, Nicholas Sarkozy is ahead with 31% of the vote. In the Cinq estates around Paris there was an incredible 80%+ turn out of voters against Sarkozy. Sarkozy is not good for the non-white population of France as Dubussi writes…

“Sarkozy's own pronouncements about minority groups are provocative to say the least. Any French president whose right-wing policies promise the perpetual maltreatment of a section of the population, should be rejected. He cannot be a president that unites the present deeply fragmented society.
Ségolène must win this decisive second ballot. She needs only appeal to the centrist voters of François Bayrou to give her about 43.57% over Sarkozy and his racist votes from the Nationalists of 41.75%. If she could manage to mop up the votes of the undecided voter, she will emerge the winner.

France needs a political ideology which favours social responsibility. There is a culture of contempt from the immigrant population due to the institutionalized discrimination that continuously keep them out of the concours of national issues. The only way individuals could become responsible would be by giving them the power to control their own lives, by a widespread socialist agenda. This means jobs and social integration. That is what their so-called NATIONAL IDENTITY IS, a gateway to economic revolution”

One good thing is that the far right party of Le Pen has been completely ignored but that could be partly because of the centre right choice of Sarkozy rather than a rejection of the far right itself knowing that Sarkozy has a far better chance of winning that Le Pen ever would.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_addax.gifAddax reports on the attack on Spanish patrol boats in the waters just off the coast of Mauritania by prospective immigrants to spain.
“African would-be immigrants travelling to Spain by boat attacked a Spanish police vessel with petrol bombs, preventing the officers on board from detaining them, the daily El Pais reported Tuesday.

"The boat was taking 57 migrants from Mauritania in West Africa to the Canary Islands, when a Spanish patrol boat based in Mauritania attempted to intercept it.The immigrants hurled petrol bombs and other objects at the vessel and tried to puncture a rubber dinghy which was sent to accost it.”

Some months ago the Senegalese government agreed to allow the Spanish navy coastal guard to patrol Senegalese waters in the hope of stemming the flow of immigrants to Spain and Europe but clearly the boats are still managing to get through and people are finding different routes by sea and by land to reach Europe such is the desperation for a better life and the ability to support families back home.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_dramatikpsychology.gifThoughts from Southern Nigeria reports from Southern Nigeria on last weekends Nigerian elections.

“For this reporter and other journalists who went round the state on the Election Day, it was war that was fought on that day and not an election. The trip was without hitches from the INEC office in Warri South local government, where people thronged the office as early as 8.30 am, creating an atmosphere of insecurity for officials of the Commission. Between 9.00 am and 9.30 am, voting materials had not left the office but some people alleged that the ballot papers had been thumb-printed the night before. It was difficult to confirm the allegation but the same chaotic situation prevailed as we passed through Effurun, Enerhen and Ovwian-Aladja areas. According to reports, voting materials came later in the day but while some voted, others could not. ..At the Uvwie local government secretariat, some people were already spitting fire, threatening to go on rampage, as at 10.00 am, saying that there was no voting, but as it was later learnt, the INEC encountered some logistic problems earlier in the day, and so materials could not be distributed as scheduled in some areas. However, as far as the groups of protesters, mainly DPP members were concerned, there was no logistic problem; it was a calculated design by the PDP and their collaborators in INEC. There were pockets of demonstrations and bonfires everywhere, forcing the state government to slam a curfew on the local government.......The situation was not different same at Otu-Jeremi in Ughelli South local government, where a presiding officer told Sunday Vanguard that the voting materials were hijacked earlier in the day by thugs but another source said the INEC officials were working out the distribution arrangement in the office and that voting would commence after the distribution.”

In many parts of the Niger Delta especially in Bayelsa and Rivers State, voting did not take place at all. Polling booths were closed and even the few that did open had a very low turn out of voters.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_ethiopundit.gifEthiopundit explains how “How Meles, Museveni, the Donors Group, the IMF, the World Bank, and even North Korea, all got together to create The Greater East Africa Co-Prosperity Sphere”

“In a dictatorship, however, getting along with the natives means getting along with the government, however nasty and brutish it may be. Getting along with the government in the guise of the people then takes on a life of its own and become is own justification. We are not talking about appreciating foreign cultures here or respecting other ways of life.

What we are talking about is convincing oneself to appreciate foreign dictatorships and to respect the ways of dictators because without some measure of approval by the regime there is always the threat of expulsion, rejection of projects or paperwork and bad reviews from one’s superiors back in Washington or Brussels or any media HQ etc. Occasionally when it happens, rebellious ferenjis can feel justifiably brave and good but ultimately for national or international or N.G.O. bureaucrats or reporters it is not a realistic agenda to follow.

Not getting along with the native thugs is career suicide and even institutional suicide because whoever is paying for it all wants something or the appearance of something in exchange for all those dollars, euros and yen. Part of that approval has to come from the native thugs who might not get with the program if their own despotic interests are threatened - no matter what harm comes to the people themselves.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_laila.gifMoroccan literary blogger, Laila Lalami comments on the racialisation and Islamisation of the Virginia Tech massacre.

“The focus on the murderer's background was not restricted to his nationality; there was also the religious angle. The New York Post quickly speculated that the words "Ismail Ax," which were scrawled on the gunman's arm, were a reference to the Qur'anic account of Abraham's sacrifice of Ismail, or possibly also to Abraham's destruction of pagan idols, also in the Qur'anic tradition. The fact that the document sent by Cho to NBC contained such bizarre claims as "Thanks to you I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people" did not seem to merit the kind of religious exegesis that the New York Post was so keen on doing earlier in the week. People look for intrinsic reasons for Cho's acts, when the simpler explanation--to the extent that such a horrendous act can ever be explained--is that Cho was a mentally ill young man, who should never have had access to guns.”

Whilst I agree with Laila on the racialisation of the act, I do believe it is too easy to dismiss the murders as simply an act of a “mentally ill young man”. Surely there must have been something that drove this young man to madness? Could it have been racism? Bullying? Exclusion that his classmates because he was “un-cool”, different? It is important to ask these questions and find answers rather than simply say he was a coward and mad.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/301/blogs_gukira.gif[email protected]

A car bomb killed four civilians in Mogadishu and a suicide attacker struck at Ethiopian soldiers on Tuesday as battles between government forces and Islamist insurgents raged for a seventh day.Nearly 300 people have died in the week of artillery duels and gun battles between allied Somali-Ethiopian forces and rebels frustrating the government's bid to restore central rule in the Horn of Africa country for the first time in 16 years.

Africa has had a troubled relationship with global migrations rooted in the horrific memories of the Atlantic slave trade, which set the foundations of the asymmetrical relations between the continent and Euroamerica subsequently reproduced and reinforced by colonialism and neocolonialism. Today, many worry about the brain drain, how Africa is apparently losing its best and brightest to the global North, a phenomenon that has accelerated since the lost developmental decades of the 1980s and 1990s.

Al-Jazeera reports that Nigeria's political opposition is preparing for mass protests against flawed elections that gave the ruling party a landslide win.Rights groups called the vote that saw Umaru Yar'Adua of the People's Democratic party (PDP) declared president-elect a "charade", asking for the result to be cancelled and new elections to be held.

On April 18, politician Moustapha Cissé Lô burst into the studios of radio Disso FM, accompanied by thugs, and threatened to kill the station’s staff because his inclusion on the ruling party’s parliamentary candidate list had just been criticised on the air by a listener.

Following the successful run of its first ever gender and media literacy course that took place in June-August 2006, Gender Links will be conducting another Media Literacy Training Course from 3 May - 2 August 2007. The course material has been developed by Gender Links (GL), a Southern African NGO that specialises in gender, governance and communication. The tool kit being used draws from research and training material developed over a number of years on gender and the Southern African media.

Senegalese authorities had agreed to allow a Spanish hospital ship, Esperanza del Mar, which has 91 illegal African migrants on borad, to disembark in the port of the capital Dakar on Thursday. Mauritanian authorities had earlier refused the Spanish request to allow the ship to disembark in their country on humanitarian grounds, arguing that the rescue mission took place within the maritime area of Senegal.

A new comprehensive report by the the International Organization for Migration (IOM)has established that carriers of HIV/AIDS in Uganda’s northern war zone are facing significant difficulties in accessing assistance such as counselling, treatment and support.

It seems like yesterday, that I discovered Pambazuka News. Since then, I've joined the family actively, met Patrick Burnett on several occasions in Cape Town (- actually: not only at Greenmarket Square but also in the coastal 'dorpies' Muizenberg and Fish Hoek, to be exact, since this makes a hell of a difference for a Kapie!), watched his family growing and himself developing further. Now he has matured to the extent that he is leaving the electronic periodical, to which he contributed so much, to pursue his own way further. - Have a good and safe journey, Patrick, and stay on track (I'm sure you will)… At the same time Pambazuka News presents its 300th issue, and again it seems like yesterday, that this weekly turned into a regular source of information, in the meantime even in an expanded version of two separate parts. Politically spot on analyses (though luckily not always 'politically correct'), stimulating and thought provoking debate articles and viewpoints and a wealth of further links to factual information and additional opinions - what asks one more, who has the African people and their struggle for dignity and survival against all odds at his/her heart? Pambazuka News has established itself as an authoritative source of information and remains at the same time an active and central part of a social movement, which mobilizes, reinforces and promotes commitments. It is an inspiration. To Firoze and his Fahamu team my best wishes for many more rewarding years with this project, which hopefully keep them as young and enthusiastic in their hearts and minds as they are!

Henning Melber, Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, Uppsala

Dear comrades, Thank you very much to all of you from Firoze, whom I have met on a few occasions to all I have not met, but without whom the 300 mark might not have been reached, or might have been reached with greater pains and greater costs.

What could I say that you already do not know?

Pushing the enveloppe all the time, moving away from the pyramidal figure of the global society toward the sphere as suggested in Ayi Kwei Armah's KMT novel.

From now till 2011 there will be several 50th anniversaries. It is easy to be satisfied, but one should above all think, it seems to me, of the largest majorities and minorities on the Continent who have not benefitted anything, except for more suffering, more misery, more poverty from 50 years of so-called independent rule.

How does one combat a mindset which has treated our Continent and its people as ready made for any resources, physical and psychic, from human to natural, needed by the forces, internal and external, which have run our countries to where we are today.

In the face of the slogan :"globalize or else..." there is surely room for battling for something else. Why is it that we find it difficult to carry on from where, say, the resisters of the past (wherever they have given it all and all the way) had reached. Following in the footsteps of Haiti (1804) and Cuba (1959), is it not time to relink those who have been divided, split, tribalized, atomized ad infinitum?

Is it not time to think of Africa, its histories, its cultures beyond the geographical borders? Is it not time to move away from fission toward fusion? It is not difficult to talk about the (African) diaspora, but it is more difficult to connect with the diaspora of those who, like Africans (before and after slavery, colonial and post-colonial occupations), have resisted the imposition of the genocidal system on all sentient beings.

From the history of Africa, we have the unusual privilege of seeing things from, so to speak, the bottom. For lack of a better way of saying it, should we not, in the name of democratizing our history, share that privilege and not be afraid of saying what we see? For example, do we not see Hiroshima/Nagasaki as the modernization of Auschwitz? In evolutionary terms, the mindset (of discovery/oppression/exploitation/repression) which was born in 1492 has been confronted with resisters to it. Isn't there a link between the Palestinians, the Haitians, the Africans, the Native Americans, in short between all of the wretched of this world, who have been battling, generations after generations, against political and economic structures, leaders at the service of a genocidal system? A system which has now been scientifically described as on its way of making the inhabitants of the Planet globally homeless.

Ku-fahamisha. Sharing knowledge while producing and reproducing it. Yes, let people hear, in their own voices, for example, someone like Aristide, like So Ann, like Wamba dia Wamba converse on the Congolese who "were separated at birth". Get So Ann (from Haiti) to go and sing in South Africa and the Congo, along with Myriam Makeba.

Pambazuka News could explode, most peacefully indeed, the blinders which prevent us from seeing ourselves completely free from the shackling mindset. Of that I am confident Fahamu shall pambazuka us to a really different world.

Commemorating the 300th Issue of Pambazuka News I first came across Pambazuka News in/around 2003 when I was a graduate student in Boston, Massachusetts. After reading the first issue, I immediately subscribed and forwarded the web link to all students and scholars of Africa at my school. From time to time, I continue to forward specific articles to various people that I know are interested in listening to an African voice published in an African platform. I have never turned back since then.

Pambazuka News has given me a voice, a home, a reflection point and a reaffirmation that my thoughts and believes are not crazy but shared by many individuals in our world. The weekly articles give us a visual picture of “the African” activist through the style of communication that reflects expressions of reality rather than abstract or theoretical imagination of issues concerning civil society in Africa.

Occasionally, other social activists from outside Africa contribute to our discussions on international justice and its impact on Africa and other marginalized groups.

Indeed, Pambazuka News has established itself as an African mouthpiece for social justice for all of civil society. As we move toward the 301st issue, I ask Pambazuka News to help us begin a conversation with our national, sub-regional and regional political leaders. Civil society tends to monopolize concerns for social justice in Africa in Pambazuka News and the current publications in Pambazuka News tend to affirm this trend.

Most of the contributions are from people (myself without exemption) decrying or rebuking the government without an opportunity given to the government to respond in this forum. It cannot be true that there are no individuals within our national, sub-regional and African Union concerned about social justice in Africa. We in civil society do not hold a monopoly of concern for the welfare of Africa. We, therefore, need to make a concerted effort in working with our governments, providing them our ideas and accepting that them and us can richly contribute to shaping the growth and health of Africa and African Unity.

As my friend Chidi Odinkalu once said to me, “If Oxfam has an African Union Representative in Ethiopia, why not us, African organizations and civil society?” I fully agree that, rather than disengaging with our governments, this kind of engagement will help us achieve the transformations for Africa we expect from our leaders.

Politicians come from among civil society, some of whom have been activists before they are transformed into government officials. Let us, therefore, begin a conversation with our governments through Pambazuka News, and if possible, let Pambazuka News establish a regional desk in Ethiopia to capture proceedings as they unfold.

Thank you for the great service Pambazuka News and may you keep it up and strong!

CONGRATULATIONS --- Pambazuka is now a well established newsletter - always very informative and to the point - unbiased and it seems well researched. Keep up the excellent work. It is information worthwhile - seeing it covers the whole continent which is otherwise almost impossible. You - the editor and each and everyone contributing to the newsletter - can be proud of your achievements.
Kind regards

Waltraut Trümper - Namibia.

"Women in South African History by Nomboniso Gasa (Ed) published by HSRC Press, 2007.

Women in South African History traces the lives of South African women from the pre-colonial, pre-union period (mid 18th century) through to the post-apartheid beginnings and present day South Africa. It is written in four thematic parts: Women in the pre-colonial and pre-union periods; Women in early to mid-twentieth century South Africa; War: armed and mass struggle as gendered experiences; The 1990s and beyond: new identities, new victories, new struggles.

The book is a radical departure from the traditional history texts in that it uses a feminist analysis rather than the “more acceptable gender analysis” in it’s approach by examining “the ways in which gender intersects with race, culture, class and other forms of identity and location in South African history“. By including the present as part of history the book shows how the past and present are inextricably linked and thus better examines women’s experiences over the past 300 years. The experiences of women’s struggle and their continuing hazardous journeys towards liberation are expressed through the dual metaphors of “they move boulders” - challenges; and “they cross rivers” - dangers.

Women in South African History goes far beyond the many well known events and periods by feminizing those events and periods where women’s participation has never been acknowledged. In the chapter “Like three tongues in one mouth”: Tracing the elusive lives of slave women in (slavocratic) South Africa, Pumla Dineo Gqola, brings to life the slave women brought to South Africa from South East Asia, East Africa and Southern Africa. Despite the scarcity of historical and biographical narratives, Pumla is still able to document the lives of some slave women and more importantly the ways in which they resisted and revolted against their enslavement and their central role “to the historical constitution of Afrikaner society“. Other examples are women’s mass protests against carrying of passes in Bloemfontein and Potchefstroom in 1913; women’s involvement in the trade union movement during the 1930s; the participation of women in the ANC underground and military wing in the 1950s; township uprisings in the Eastern Cape in the 1970s and 1980s; naked women protests against lack of housing in Soweto in 1990; migrant women in Johannesburg and women learning to live with HIV/AIDS in present day South Africa.

The book concludes with a powerful essay by Yvette Abrahams in which she chronicles her experience of researching and writing on Sarah Bartman. Or rather searching for the REAL Sarah Bartman not the racialised sexualised object constructed by white male fantasies …

“a living specimen of barbaric savage races” one who according to Lindfors [Courting the Hottentot Venus] was willing to collaborate in her own degradation in order to earn more money… she allowed herself to be exhibited indecently to the European public, and she persisted in this tawdy occupation for more than five years….. She may have been the victim of the cruelist kind of predatory ruthlessness, but her collusion in her own victimisation was unmistakeable…."

he concludes

"To put it plainly, she may have engaged in prostitution as well as exhibitionism. Her degradation may have been complete.."

Abrahams tears these racist, sexist texts to pieces written not in the 1800s but in the 1980s. Men such as Lindfors were able to pass these lies off as academic text by so called intellectuals. Abrahams leads us through to the convincing conclusion that Sarah Bartman was a slave - a Khoekhoe slave woman. She does this by connecting her own personal herstory to that of the Khoekhoe. Born in the pre-colonial period of the 1780s, she must have had a Khoekhoe name and the only way she could have lost that name at that time was through slavery. Also the only way for her to move from her home in the Western Cape to England was as a slave. Sarah Bartman lied (that she willingly exhibited herself) because she was a slave and knew very well that her words would not be believed over that of a white man and the consequences of her telling the truth would have been too horrible to contemplate such as life imprisonment and even more degradation and abuse.

Abrahams again makes the absolute convincing statement without any hesitation or qualification that the “abuse and degradation” of Sarah Bartman was rape. Rape not only of Sarah but of the whole Khoekhoe nation. The white male racist, sexist texts she quotes in her essay are a form of “surrogate violence” against African women, Black women, Khoekhoe women and Sarah Bartman.

“Was it not rape of a symbolic sort to parade the degradation ad humiliation of auntie Sarah before me? Was it not a sexually violent act which expressed male power and my vulnerability to pain? Has not each male author I have brought before you been unable to resist the temptation of demonstrating their psychosexual power and auntie Sarah’s inability to resist?"

"In the place of false witness it is time to speak the truth. I name the posthumous abuse and degradation of auntie Sarah’s body, rape. The rape of her body is a rape of my mind."

As Abrahams writes, Sarah Bartman whose real name, real self was stolen like that of millions of other slaves and their descendants, is dead and therefore can no longer feel the pain. But she (Abrahams) feels it - I feel it and Black women throughout the world feel it. Every racist, sexist, misogynist text by whiteness against Black women is felt by me, by all of us. The symbolism of this sexual violence is explained by a more “refined and broader” definition of rape.

"…the element of sexual abuse are the violation of a person’s integrity by force and/or threat of physical violence, dishonouring the ethic of mutuality and care in relationships of domination, and an infraction of one’s psycho-spiritual-sexual integrity. Sexual abuse is sacrilege of God’s spirit in each of us [Eugene, TM “If you get there before I do: A womanist ethical response to sexual violence and abuse. In J Grant (ed) Perspectives on womanist theology”

In reviewing South African Women in History, I chose to focus on Yvette Abrahams essay because the story of Sarah Bartman speaks to the book as a whole and speaks to me personally. It is both the beginning - pre-colonial and the present, continued racism but always resistance. Sarah Bartman’s agency was expressed in her act of survival against all odds. For me Sarah Bartman, Khoekhoe woman represents the loss that came with slavery and colonialism as well as the struggle for liberation and emancipation.

Women in South African History is a “transdisciplinary” interrogation of events and periods in the history of South Africa from a feminist perspective. The narratives bring to life the daughters of Africa in their quest for emancipation, sometimes at great cost to themselves and their families, particularly their children. But always there is an unflinching determination - choices are laid bare and the choice is still emancipation.

Arnold Tsunga is a lawyer based in Harare Zimbabwe and working on human rights law in Zimbabwe. In March, Saloman Kebede interviewed him on the upcoming Grand Debate on Continental Government during the next African Union Summit, June – July 2007. The full proposal being considered by the Heads of States can be viewed at

SK: What are the strengths and weaknesses of the current proposal for Continental Union?

AT: The recommendations in the Study for Continental Government are not currently binding. Our leaders will end up doing what favours their governments as opposed to what would be of benefit to Africa as a whole. This weakens proposal. The appalling state of leadership is a great misfortune in Africa and has victimized citizens through the violation of human rights in Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and Rwanda and elsewhere. The strength of this proposal shall lie in its ability to uphold the status of human rights in Africa and address situations in particular countries where democracy has been abused.

SK: Should it be adopted in Accra in July 2007, what would you like to see the African Union Commission achieve within the first phase (2007-2009)?

AT: Enable Africa meet the Millennium Development Goals. As the African Union is still a growing institution, civil society organizations can assist to ensure good political leadership and the governance that will guarantee that Africa meets the MDGs.

SK: And why would this form of continental union be important to African citizens & particular the poor and marginalized?

AT: It is important for Africa to have a unified focus and accountability as a continent.

SK: How could states and non-states ensure that continental union efforts are transparent, participatory and driven by an appreciation of political and economic rights?

AT: The effective involvement of grass root communities is central to its success. We must consider the power of civil society actors, the power of human right defenders and the power of political activists on the ground. We must take into account what they say and try to implement.

SK: What obstacles must the AU overcome for the continental union to be successful?

AT: The AU should do away with the culture of a leadership uniting against its own people. They instead must empower the people to facilitate development.

SK: In what policy area, would you like to see greater convergence and unity across Africa and why?

Economic integration.

This interview is the first of several interviews with African citizens and CSO leaders on the AU proposal for Continental Government. Emily Mghanga of Pan Africa Programme Oxfam edited this interview. The views expressed here are the perspectives of the interviewee. Arnold Tsunga can be reached at Email: [email][email protected]

* Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

The UN refugee agency has sent two truckloads of much-needed relief and medical supplies from Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya to the Somali town of Dobley, which is struggling to cope with an influx of 4,000 displaced Somalis and an outbreak of diarrhoea. The outbreak of diarrhoea in the small town, 18 km from the Kenyan border, has so far claimed the lives of six children.

The World Bank's board on Friday delayed a final decision on bank chief Paul Wolfowitz's role in a promotion he arranged for his girlfriend and referred some issues to a committee for further investigation. After a late-hour meeting, the 24-nation board said it had agreed on a procedure to deal quickly with the issue.

Nigeria holds a presidential election on Saturday that is widely seen as a democratic watershed for this country and the whole of Africa. But two days before the vote there are serious doubts over whether it will be seen as a valid, democratic election. The vote in Africa's most populous state should usher in the first handover from one civilian president to another in a nation deeply scarred by three decades of military rule.

Zimbabwe is reeling under a legacy of a racially skewed pattern of land ownership and access. The injustice harks back to Cecil John Rhodes, whose British South African Company "successfully" shut blacks in "native reserves" and placed three-quarters of the land in the hands of white farmers. At independence in 1980, 42% of the territory was owned by 6 000 white commercial farmers -- less than 1% of the population. As Mugabe later remarked: "The land question was at the centre of the factors that propelled us to launch our war of national liberation."

Despite a multi-faceted awareness campaign involving the media focusing on AIDS, the campaign appears to have fallen on deaf ears as HIV prevalence ratio among pregnant women in Namibia has increased slightly, a new report has revealed. The 2006 National Sentinel Survey among pregnant women reveals that the overal HIV prevalence from the 2006 survey was 19.9 percent representing an increase of 0.02 percent compared to 2004, which recorded a prevalence rate of 19.7 percent.

Education delivery in Zimbabwe's rural communities has all but disintegrated and experts warn that any gains made after independence are rapidly being reversed in the continuing economic meltdown. "Evidence on the ground shows that the standards of education among rural communities are falling sharply, and one does not rule out the possibility of a collapse if there is no active campaign to revitalise schools in these areas," Gordon Chavhunduka, former vice-chancellor of the University of Zimbabwe, told IRIN.

The Kenya government has with immediate effect suspended the controversial land allocations at the troubled Chepyuk settlement scheme in Mt Elgon district, in an effort to end land clashes. At the same time, a committee of 60 elders drawn from the two warring clans of the Soy and the Dorobo (Mosop) was appointed to help vet all squatters before new allocation exercise was put in place.

Kenyans are now faced with the fact that ‘tomorrow’ is bleak, writes Alex Owiti. They no longer want to think about the so called ‘leaders of tomorrow’. But are at the same time confronted with the urgency to elect leaders who will relieve them from the bondage of corruption, tribalism and other injustices.

The World Bank will work with the United Nations and other agencies in a global drive to help developing countries recover assets stolen by corrupt leaders, the Bank has said, estimating that the extent of graft in poor states could reach $800 billion a year.

The recently concluded International Conference on Women and Law issued a declaration dubbed "Tripoli Declaration to Ensure the Women's Rights". The document stresses the role of women as essential in societies of today since women represent "half the world and a mother of the second half."

The University of Pittsburgh, in collaboration with KEMRI has an on-going research study at the Siaya District Hospital and the surrounding community that is investigating severe malarial anaemia and malaria/HIV co-infections in infants and young children. Due to its continued growth in research, a vacancy has arisen for the position of Data Specialist II. Deadline for applications is 18 May 2007.

Merlin IEC seeks to recruit a field officer who will design and organise IEC/BCC materials including newsletter publication. S/he will also be responsible for Merlin IEC material stock in addition to supporting IEC campaigns in the field, focusing on malaria. Closing date: 20th April 2007.

The Danish Refugee Council (DRC) invites applications for the position as Programme Manager (PM) for its program dealing with population displacement in Mogadishu, Somalia. Interviews are expected to take place in Nairobi during the last 2 weeks of May 2007.

ILRI seeks to recruit a Project Leader to lead its multi-disciplinary project on Livestock Systems Evolution within Targeting Research & Developing Opportunities Theme. This research area examines socio-economic and natural resource drivers of livestock system evolution as a basis for setting priorities and targeting livestock-based interventions to alleviate poverty while protecting the environment. The application deadline is 11th May 2007.

ICNL is an international organization whose mission is to facilitate and support the development of civil society and the freedom of association on a global basis. ICNL maintains a documentation center for laws, regulations, self-regulatory materials, and other relevant documents, it provides relevant training and education, and it conducts research relevant to strengthening and improving laws affecting the NGO sector.

Though the emergence of technology has disrupted the relationship between organizations and funders, nonprofit leaders and grant makers alike are coming to understand the importance of technology and how hardware and software in good running order are essential components to success. On this site, read about ways to fund your technology needs.

Africa is taking steps to strengthen cooperation in energy initiatives as generation capacity fails to keep pace with demand and unstable international oil prices cause havoc to economies. In many countries on the continent, energy programmes have been in the hands of foreigners. Until recently, for example, the management structure of the Cahora Bassa Dam in Mozambique was controlled by former colonial power, Portugal.

Tunisia’s first privately owned radio station, Radio Mosaique, has been in operation for just under four years, yet its open discussion of sensitive subjects important to Tunisians has caused its popularity to soar,reports Magahrebia news.