The World Bank said Tuesday it has withdrawn financing of a Chad-Cameroon pipeline because the Chadian government failed to honor an agreement to use some oil revenues for poverty reduction. The Chadian government "fully" prepaid the loan as of Sept. 5, the development lender said in a statement.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has called on the Senegalese judiciary to investigate and prosecute the persons responsible for ordering the ransacking of two Senegalese newspapers after 12 members of the gang were convicted. Among those convicted were relatives of the former Minister for the Craft Industry and Air Transports.

The Security Council has voiced serious concern at the recent fighting between Government forces and rebel groups in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), some of the worst violence since the signing of a January peace deal. The Council stressed that the clashes that broke out in North Kivu on 28 August between the country’s armed forces (FARDC) and the National Congress for People’s Defense, known by its French acronym CNDP, are a violation of the Actes d’Engagement signed by both parties earlier this year.

Hundreds of Zambian men are enthusiastically queuing to be circumcised as part of measures to curb HIV/AIDS in that country. Reports say men are put on waiting lists for close to four months or more and are sometimes turned away due to lack of doctors and inadequate health centers for such cases.

A senior advisor to Morgan Tsvangirai on Friday said that they expect the country’s service chiefs to follow the laws of the country and support the government of the day and the new political dispensation, or resign. The heads of the country’s army, police, air force, CIO and prison services have often repeated statements that they will not salute the MDC leader. Tsvangirai is expected to be confirmed next week as the new Prime Minister of the country.

A rate of adverse events, infections and delayed healing described as ‘shocking’ and ‘unacceptable’ by the investigators has been revealed by a survey of both traditional and medically performed circumcisions amongst a traditionally-circumcised ethnic group in Kenya.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/395/50528NigeriaNollywood_l.jpg"I don't sell cocaine," says the video vendor in Kano's Rimi market when I ask for Adam Zango's music video CD Bahaushiya. He is not referring to the white powder, but instead a new illegal substance -- Hausa films that have not passed through the Kano State Censors Board. The video CD in question is an especially hot drug: a series of six music videos satirising corrupt old men, lamenting fickle girlfriends, and featuring dancing Hausa girls.

“I do not find religious arguments against homosexuality persuasive because I have come to learn that historically religion has been manipulated and misinterpreted to oppose the rights of various minority groups such as women, slaves, etc.” So said Reverend John Makokha of the United Methodist Church of Kenya in his August 16 open-letter to Bishop Daniel Wandabula who is allegedly silent, after numerous complaints by Makokha that he is getting hateful messages from the church, based on his positive views on homosexuality.

Cape Town residents are using micro-blogging and instant messaging technology to fight drug addiction among township youth. Speaking during a Digital Citizen’s workshop, Marlon Parker, a lecturer at Cape Peninsula University of Technology, said parents can now smile knowing that their children are now protected from drugs.

Dunga Beach, along the shores of Lake Victoria in Kenya's western city of Kisumu, erupts into activity when the boats bring in their catch. Female fishmongers scramble along the beach to buy fish, shouting themselves hoarse to get the attention of the fishermen and middlemen, who control whether or not the women will have anything to sell that day. Mingling with the jostling fishmongers is 19-year-old Lillian Onoka; stylishly dressed and with neatly plaited hair, she is easily noticed. "I do not sell fish but my aunt does, and she brings me along with her. I just help her get the fish without her

The relationship between development, trade and climate change has come under the spotlight as leaders seek practical ways to move rapidly towards a low-carbon world economy. Experts from Africa, the Caribbean, Pacific and Indian Ocean are examining key issues in order to suggest steps that policy-makers can take to start the process of adapting their economies to climate change.

Over the past week, there has been a renewed Government proposal, seemingly in response to public comments by ex-PS John Githongo, to grant conditional amnesties for corruption as a means of dealing with the past. Githongo’s proposal seems to be based on one of the elements of the Usawa Programme an election manifesto proposal of the Orange Democratic Movement – Mr. Githongo is associated with authorship of Usawa’s anti-corruption aspects.

Pandemonium broke out in Igueben Local Government Council of Edo State when a widow and mother of three, Patience Iyah was set ablaze by her uncle, Ahmed Okoro Evbohon over her refusal to take to prostitution abroad. The attack which took place when the widow arrived her village for the burial ceremony of a late relation created confusion in the community as the villagers wondered whether all was well with him.

People who practise female circumcision should be jailed for life, a Cabinet minister has proposed. The practice, according to Gender and Children Affairs minister Esther Murugi, was entrenched in all but four communities in Kenya and the prevalence was alarming. Ms Murugi said previous attempts by the Government as well as local and international organisations bore little success, going by the number of incidents reported.

Camfed Zambia this year launched an ambitious child abuse prevention initiative, funded by Irish Aid. Camfed’s Zero Tolerance to Child Abuse Campaign breaks through the culture of silence surrounding child abuse, and calls on all sectors of Zambian society to put an end to it.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/395/50481cocoafruit_l.jpgThe World Bank has ordered Ivory Coast to tackle "serious corruption" in its lucrative cocoa industry, saying it will not lend money to the country unless it sees better governance of the sector. Obiageli Ezekwesili, World Bank vice president for the Africa region, said it would be "absolutely unacceptable" to support reducing poverty while the poor were being denied adequate reward for their work.

Conectas Human Rights, Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA), Open Society Initiative for Western Africa (OSIWA) and Open Society Justice Initiative (the Justice Initiative) are pleased to invite applications for the Human Rights Fellowship Program for the year 2009. The Fellowship Program is 21 months in duration and involves both academic study and practical experience in human rights/public interest advocacy. Human rights activists and lawyers from Angola, Mozambique, Guinea Bissau and Cape Verde will be selected to participate in the program.

The EU is to help African countries expand their electricity networks and promote energy interconnections between Africa and the EU, such as a Trans-Saharan gas pipeline. The EU aid will amount to €1 billion for a period of two years, the European Commission and the African Union announced in a joint statement on Monday (8 September).

The OSCE Special Representative for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings, Eva Biaudet, has urged OSCE participating States to put victims' rights at the centre when investigating and prosecuting human trafficking cases. "The victim-centred approach means taking the needs of the trafficking victim to be protected, assisted and ultimately empowered to live a dignified life, as the fundamental starting point during all phases of criminal proceedings," Biaudet said at the opening of a high-level conference in Helsinki.

There are indications that after so many false starts, grand standing, braggadocio and unrealistic demands, both sides in the Zimbabwe conflict are finally negotiating genuinely and a deal may be reached soon. It will be a tribute to the much criticised President Thabo Mbeki's tenacity but also a final realisation by the hawks on both sides that neither can finish the other without finishing the country.

One recalls a statement I made at a public meeting in Harare in 2000 soon after the unexpected defeat of Mugabe and ZANU PF in the referendum on the constitution. The Public Forum at Hotel Monomopata was organised by SARIPS (a formidable institute then, under the leadership of Prof Sam Moyo). The CDD Observer Group was led by Former President of Liberia, Prof Amos Sawyer, who also spoke at the forum. One of the speakers, Dr Ibbo Mandaza was booed because of his pro-Zanu PF stance.

My key contribution in that Forum was that the government was not prepared for defeat while the opposition was not prepared for victory. My conclusion was based on extensive conversations we had with different groups and leading figures on both sides. When we met Prof Jonathan Moyo, one of the key figures propelling the government proposals, at his Sheraton residence and office the day before the referendum, I asked him what will happen if they were defeated. His answer was that there was no way they could be defeated and if it happened, there was going to be chaos. When the delegation met Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, the same day, his response when I asked him what would happen if they won, was that there was no way Mugabe would allow it. He was convinced that the government would jail all opposition leaders.

At the first sound of nighttime rain on the scrap-metal roof of her shack, Ines Monteiro wakes her husband and four children. She hustles them from the two beds they share, out into their metre-wide yard. And they stand there, for as long as the rain falls – sometimes as many seven hours. In daytime rains, they stand out, too: their house is perched on the sideof a mountain of garbage – of plastic bags, empty bottles, crushed boxes, scraps of food.

It's been three months since I sent out an email appealing for your help as the xenophobic crisis hit Khayelitsha. Your response was overwhelmingly rapid and generous, and has enabled us help the people who ended up living at the Desmond Tutu hall. (By now, most have re-integrated into the community, and about 30 of the original Desmond Tutu hall dwellers are now in the nearby Solomon Mahlangu hall).

The Third EQUINET Regional Conference on Equity in Health in east and southern Africa will be held at Munyonyo, Kampala, Uganda September 23rd-25th 2009 with the theme Reclaiming the Resources for Health: Building Universal People Centred Health Systems in East and Southern Africa. Welcome to the site where you will find latest updates on the conference,opportunities for participation and pre and post conference activities. Please let us know if you have any problems or feedback in using the site.... and welcome to Uganda in 2009!

While formal publishing companies in Nigeria languished through the economic crises that accompanied the structural adjustment programmes of the late 1980s and early 1990s, young Hausa writers began writing about their lives and contemporary problems they faced. Bypassing formal publishers, they self-published their novels, often with the help of a writers' cooperative.

Although the books were dubbed ‘littattafan soyayya’ (romance novels) for the predominant themes of love and marriage, the novels -- written in colloquial Hausa that reflects the rhythms of everyday speech -- also serve as muckraking critiques of a corrupt elite and the failures of the older generation.

Women writers dominate the field, perhaps because of the large female readership; their work explores the daily life and tensions of women’s lives in contemporary Northern Nigeria. According to Balaraba Ramat Yakubu, the head of Kallabi Writer’s Association, a group of women writers, there are over 300 Hausa women publishing novels in Northern Nigeria.

The large female readership has caused anxiety, mostly from male authority figures, about a supposed negative effect the novels have on young girls. In May 2007, A Daidaita Sahu, the Kano state agency for the ‘reorientation’ of society, organized a book and film burning at a local girl’s school.

That book burning, however, was a tame threat compared to the new requirements that the Kano State Censorship Board, under the leadership of Director General Abubakar Rabo Abdulkarim, is seeking to impose on writers. In a letter to Kano's five writers' organisations dated Aug. 12, the board confirmed that it wanted each writer in the state to register individually before they can publish or distribute writing.

At 25, Sa'adatu Baba has twenty-three books in print and another twenty that are not yet published. She is also an executive committee member of the Association of Nigerian Authors and a student of Languages at Bayero University.

She spoke with IPS writer Amina Koki Gizo in Kano on 16 August about her writing and the current crisis Hausa writers are facing.

The following is taken from the introduction to Biko Lives! Contesting the Legacies of Steve Biko is edited by Andile Mngxitama, Amanda Alexander and Nigel C Gibson and published by Palgrave Macmillan.

"This is one country where it would be possible to create a capitalist black society, if whites were intelligent, if the nationalists were intelligent. And that capitalist black society, black middle class, would be very effective … South Africa could succeed in putting across to the world a pretty convincing, integrated picture, with still 70 percent of the population being underdogs." - Steve Biko (1972)

The 30th anniversary of Steve Biko's murder in police custody (on September 12 1977) comes almost 15 years after the formal ending of apartheid in South Africa. This fact alone raises several fundamental questions: how do we remember Biko? What contributions did the black consciousness movement make to the course of black liberation in South Africa and the world? How does the conception of black liberation, as enunciated by Biko and his colleagues, square up against the realities of post-apartheid South Africa?

Indeed, Biko lives today in South Africa, but so do the material outcomes of colonialism, segregation, apartheid and - most recently - neo-liberal economic policies. South Africa continues to be characterised by sharply contrasting realities.

This week, ministers from over 100 countries, heads of donor agencies and representatives of civil society organisations are gathering in Accra, Ghana, for a meeting to discuss ways in which rich nations can help “developing countries and marginalised people in their fight against poverty by making aid more transparent, accountable and results-oriented”.

“Aid Effectiveness”, the main theme of this high-level meeting, has, however, come under severe criticism from the most unlikely quarters – the recipients of aid themselves. A leading voice is Benjamin Mkapa, former president of Tanzania, who in a foreword in the just released book, Ending Aid Dependence, by Yash Tandon, urges developing countries to formulate strategies to exit from the aid dependence bandwagon.

Mkapa argues that aid subjects recipient countries to “a discipline of collective control by donors right down to the village level” and that some of the most successful emerging economies, such as China, India, Brazil and Malaysia, developed not through aid, but through strong nationally-oriented investment and trade policies. (Mkapa’s own country, ironically, is one of the most aid-dependant countries in the world.)

The idea that aid is a bad idea has been around at least since the 1980s, when academics and activists began questioning the effectiveness of World Bank-IMF prescriptions, such as Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs), which increased poverty levels in almost every country where they were implemented.

In his book, Tandon, the executive director of the South Centre in Geneva, argues that there needs to be a “radical restructuring of the institutional aid architecture” but falls short of calling for a total ban on aid. Aid that imposes ideological positions on countries, for instance, should be shunned completely, according to Tandon, but aid that supports struggles for social justice in the international community is acceptable as long as it is people-centred.

by Yash Tandon is published by Publisher: Fahamu and the South Centre 160pp.

The question of ethnic identities in Kenya is intricately tied up with the country's politics and influences to a greater or lesser degree the class cleavages in ways which often defy orthodox analyses from the right or the left.

But if you ask Kenyans across the political, ethnic, racial and religious divide what is the cause of major political problems in Kenya, many of them will, without hesitation, cite "tribalism" as the number one problem. Depending on who you are talking to, it will be either those "Kikuyus"and their determination to hog all political and economic power to themselves. Or it will be those "Luos" who are perennial trouble makers and stone throwers not content with accepting the status quo. If you go down to the Coast, you may hear people grumbling about those upcountry "Wabara" people who have consciously marginalized the Coastals. A good friend of mine argued in a national newspaper column a few days ago that the "small tribes" have really been left out by the dogfights between the "major tribes". And on and on it goes with outbursts against those "Indians" when it comes to looking for a convenient scapegoat to explain away our economic woes.

Quite frankly these perceptions are naïve, shallow, ahistorical and dangerous.

There is no doubt that certain elites in Kenya converge around and along narrow ethnic or even sub-ethnic agendas that are detrimental to the national good. It is true that what passes for political parties in this country are frequently nothing more than vehicles of political expediency fueled by tribal agendas and tribal constituencies. It is also a fact that political elites have hijacked the neo-colonial state to divvy out economic goodies based on a system of ethnic and regional patronage. As someone who argues from socialist positions, I am also aware of the reductionism of certain doctrinaire approaches which reduces everything in society to class, overlooking gender, racial, religious, generational and other specificities. In other words, nobody in their right mind can downplay the corrosive and debilitating effects of what some observers call “negative ethnicity” in Kenya.

When I assert that using a broad ethnic brush to explain away our national problems is naïve, shallow, dangerous and ahistorical, I am merely pleading for a sober, scientific deconstruction of ethnic identities in Kenya based on our collectively lived historical experience.

THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ETHNIC IDENTITIES IN KENYA

The entity we now know as Kenya is a product of the historical interaction between diverse African peoples in this particular patch of the eastern part of our great continent with the forces of world monopoly capitalism. A version of the many anecdotes about the origin of the name Kenya has it that in the mid 1840s when a couple of German missionaries were busy exploring and “discovering” Africa they ran into a bunch of locals in the Mount Kenya region. Depending on whether it a Mgikuyu or a Mkamba retelling the story, Herr Krapf (or was it his counterpart Rebmann?) pointed to the snowy peaks of our tallest mountain and inquired via their guide about the name. He was allegedly told “ Kirinyaga” or “the place where God lives”. To his Teutonic ears, the German visitor heard and contracted it to “Kenya”, leaving us stuck with a distortion which ended up being the name of the country famous for its long distance runners, stunning environment and exotic wild life.

In a sense, our national identity was built on a stencil cut out by a clueless European traveler almost two hundred years ago.

More fundamentally, the process of “becoming Kenyan” was directly connected with the imperialist incursion at the tail end of the 19th century- from the ravenous carving up of the African continent at the 1884 Berlin Conference to the annexation of our country by the British, first by the Imperial British East Africa Company in 1888 to the formal declaration of Kenya as a British Protectorate in 1895 to the promulgamation of Kenya as a British Colony in 1920.

What hitherto had been a conglomeration of diverse Kenyan peoples at various stages of socio-economic development from the autonomous semi-feudal kingdom of Wanga in the west to the Ismalized coastal city states of Mombasa, Malindi, Lamu etc and the myriad communal, largely egalitarian communities among the Mijikenda, Luo, Agikuyu, Maasai and the like were now transformed into a territorially distinct “country” where each and every one of these diverse Kenyan people were considered “British subjects” subservient to the Crown in the UK; a colony where the best land was grabbed by racist British settlers; a missionary lab where Christian ideologues attempted to wipe out all vestiges of the indigenous traditional cultures; a tea, coffee and wheat plantation dotted with vast ranches- with most of the proceeds destined for the so called “mother country”.

The British foreign domination was of course resisted by communities all over Kenya. In 1895-96 Mbaruk al Amin Mazrui led a valiant guerrilla war against the invaders along the Kenyan coast. In 1913-15, Me Katilili, an octogenarian grandmother emerged as a leader of the Giriama people in Kilifi mobilizing local peasants to resist forced labour and compulsory taxation. For her efforts she earned herself the title of Kenya’s first political prisoner- forcibly exiled hundreds of miles away from her community but heroically escaping from custody to continue her fight. Among the Dawida, Mwangeka also led and inspired an uprising. At around the same time in central Kenya Waiyaki wa Hinga was leading the charge against the British- he was later buried alive in Kibwezi. Among the Nandi, Koitalel arap Samoei was conducting a ten year armed resistance to the incursion of British imperialism, symbolized by the Kenya-Uganda Railway. Other stalwarts of these early resistance movements include women like Syotuna among the Akamba and Moraa wa Ngiti among the Gusii- not to speak of later nationalist heroes like Harry Thuku, Mary Nyanjiru, James Beuttah, Makhan Singh, Elijah Masinde, Oginga Odinga, Chege wa Kibacia, Muindi Mbingu, JD Kali, Pio da Gama Pinto, Achieng’ Oneko, Fred Kubai and others.

In the end, to paraphrase Rudyard Kipling, the British had the Maxim gun and we did not.

One of the immediate consequences of the brutal British take over was the question of entrenching tribal identities at the expense of more nationwide agendas. First and foremost, even the question of who were and how we called ourselves was mediated by the British colonial state. A colonial bureaucrat had in 1917 written a memo cited by Professor Al Amin Mazrui in his book on the history and identity of the Swahili peoples stressing the urgency of enforcing tribal identities as a bulwark against growing national consciousness. It is for this reason that the colonialists outlawed nationwide social and political organizations, restricting people to such outfits like the Kikuyu Central Association, the Ukambani Members Association, the Kavirondo Tax Payers Association, the Taita Hills Association and so on. This did not prevent these associations from collaborating together in a joint anti-imperialist project for national independence.

The other noxious by-product of British colonialism was the phenomenon of being "named" and identified by our oppressors. For instance upto this day in 2008 it is standard practice to talk of the "Kikuyus" even though the proper name is the Agikuyu; people refer to the “Taitas” even though they call themselves the Dawida. Fortunately slurs like “Kavirondo” for the Luos; “Suk” for the Pokot and “Kitosh” for the Bukusu have long since been abandoned. In the 1930s the colonialists robbed the Yiaku people of the Mukogodo forest in Laikipia District just north of Nanyuki of their identity by forcibly merging them with the Maasai. One of the consequences of that is that today, among the 4,000 remnants of the Yiaku, LESS THAN TEN can still remember and speak of their mother tongue and the majority are in their eighties and nineties dying out by the year. Similarly, the original indigenous hunter-gatherer communities of Kenya like the Ogieks, the Njemps and others are often arbitrarily “absorbed” into more dominant ethnic groups.

Also in the colonial period certain artificial clusters were baptized “tribes” even though it was often a convenient fiction to suit certain political agendas. An example is the appellation, “Abaluhyia” to refer to several distinct linguistic groups (Samia, Abakhayo, Marachi, Manyala, Wanyore, Ikhisa, Tiriki, Maragoli, Bukusu, Isukha, Idakho, Marama) as one tribe. The same goes with the “Kalenjin” cluster which brings together the Kipsigis, Nandi, Tugen, Keiyo, Marakwet, Pokot and other communities. One can make a similar argument that there are no such group as the Meru, but rather it has to be broken down to the Tharaka, Chuka, Tigania, Imenti and Egoji people. Until recently the Mbeere people were lumped together with the Embu. And in the 1960s, for political hegemonic reasons the larger “Meru” and “Embu” communities were cynically appended to the Agikuyu.

That is why it is bizarre to see, read and hear of violent evictions of so called “enemy tribes” in the 21st century- killed and displaced using the spurious and specious excuse of “ethnic purity”- when no such purity existed in the first place and even if it did has been thoroughly eroded through inter-marriage, urbanization and resettlements across the country.

THE MYTH OF ETHNIC PURITY IN KENYA

Here is my theory about so called "Pure" Ethnic Identities in Kenya:

By and large, these are historically determined, socially constructed CONVENIENT community MYTHS.

Some years ago- 2005 to be exact- when I was still residing in the west end of Toronto, Canada, I ran into a middle aged Southern Sudanese who happened to be a Dinka. He had also lived in Kenya for over a decade and he told me his version of how the Southern Luos ended up in Kenya. He said that in Sudan they have another name for the Luos which means that this appellation came later in the history of this community.

My uncle, the veteran historian Prof. B.A. Ogot has documented in his seminal text on the Southern Luos how many Luhyia clans in Gem (Siaya District) were assimilated as Luos. And he should know- this grandson of Agina the son of Paulo Opiche and grandson of Ayieko. His grandfather is my father’s grandfather and my father told me that this polygamous ancestor of Onyango Oloo had both Luo and Luhyia wives. Ogot’s grandmother was a co-wife of my father’s paternal grandmother (who I was told by my own paternal grandmother was another Luhyia who did not speak a word of Luo. Interestingly enough my own “Luhyia” grandmother from Emanyulia- who spoke BETTER Dholuo than her sons and daughters- in law from Karachuonyo, Oyugis and Seme- startled me when she revealed to me sometime in 1972 or 1973 that her folks had actually been “Luos from Alego” who had resettled in Emanyulia near the Butere-Yala train tracks.

Quite frankly I never believed her- until over thirty years later, when a Kenyan woman born and raised in Emanyulia writing online from southern France repeated this story in a certain Kenyan cyberforum almost word for word- yes, indeed there was actually a Luhyia clan in Emanyulia who were originally Luos from Alego! She herself was quite conversant with the Luo language and had relatives from Anyiko on the outskirts of Yala Township.

When I once argued that many Kisiis are former Luos and many Luos are ex-Kisiis I was virtually slapped by tribal venom from Luo and Abagusii friends and colleagues of mine. But I was right: the Luos know it and the Kisiis know it.

It is just that our accumulated, largely mythological creation stories have encouraged us to imagine the "ethnic jirani other" as the enemy who stole our land, raped our grandmothers and placed a multi-generational pox on us.

I should have added that there are similar kinship ties among the Luos and the neighbouring Kalenjin communities. For instance, one of my sisters has a kid whose name is Samoei- even though the kid’s father is a Luo. But guess what, his grandmother is a Nandi. Back in my Luanda Dudi village in Kisa West, Khwisero, Western Province there was this old pint sized cattle-herd who never ever married. And he used to tell us that he was a Meru. Again, how far fetched that story is I am not sure.

What I am saying about Luos can be extended to the Agikuyu and the Maasai; the Akamba and Meru; the Waswahili na Mijikenda and even many Kenyans who imagine they are pure Wahindis. How many people know for instance that Kenya’s SECOND Vice President Joseph Murumbi was part Mhindi and part Maasai? How many people know that Najib Balala is part Mhindi and part Mwarabu (with probably some Mijikenda relatives somewhere down his lineage)? How many people know that John Keen’s father was of European descent? How about Kariuki Chotara? His last name is often a pejorative equivalent to the equally derogatory “Point Five” slur used to describe Kenyans of mixed race.

In my own immediate family I have cousins who have Swedish mothers; nephews who have Tanzanian fathers; in laws who are from Nanyuki. My own son has two Meru grandparents on one side- apart from the whole mchuzi mix on his father’s side.

Who knows what Kenyan communities and the attendant ethnic identities would have emerged had the British colonialists not invaded and occupied our lands?

Is it possible that over time, the Luos, the Luhyias and the Abagusii would have merged into a synthesized ethnic group called the Abagusiluohyias? Think of the stranglehold they would have on the Soccer Championships!

Could we be talking about the Maagikumerumbians?

Or the Akamboranas?

Or perhaps the Turkopokotomarkweiyo?

How about the Gujarasomalis or the Arabogiriamas?

The possibilities are just endless.

What happened in Kenya instead is the REALITY of historical colonial oppression.

About thirteen years ago I read a book called The Swahili: Idiom and Identity of an African People by author/activist/scholar Alamin Mazrui and Ibrahim Noor Shariff. Somewhere in the pages of that book I recall a passage about a 1917 letter from some colonial DC instructing other functionaries to do everything they can to foster tribal identities among the Kenyan nationalities as a way of thwarting the growth of a collective national consciousness.

This is one of the reasons why the first nationalist organizations had names like the Kikuyu Central Association, the Taita Hills Association; the Kavirondo Tax Payers Association, the Ukambani Members Association and so on and so forth. It is not that Kenyans back then were so tribal that they could only form “tribal bodies” - on the contrary - they wanted to form nationwide patriotic formations but this was considered a grave threat to the colonial status quo.

For evidence, you will find out that all these organizations collaborated and worked together and had a common anti-imperialist objective of fighting for Kenyan independence. As early as 1923 Kenyans of Indian descent defied the attempt to segregate them from their African brothers and sisters by leading the fight which led to the defeat of the White Paper which wanted to transform Kenya into an apartheid state like South Africa or the former Rhodesia.

When we pick up this multi-ethnic patriotic thread in 1990 when Kenneth Matiba and Charles Rubia and to a certain extent the Reverend Timothy Njoya went public with their agitation for multiparty democracy we should not forget the very important 1981 to 1990 chunk of underground anti-imperialist organizing featuring patriotic and again multi-ethnic formations like Second of March Movement, Cheche Kenya, the December Twelve Movement, the Kenya Anti-Imperialist Front, Harakati ya Kupambania Demokrasia Kenya, Upande Mwingine, the Kenya Socialist Alliance, Chama Cha Ukombozi, the Kenya National Front, the Kenya Revolutionary Movement, Ukenya, Umoja, Mwakenya, the Me Katilili Revolutionary Movement, the Kenya Patriotic Front, the Muungano wa Kupambania Demokrasia Kenya, the Organization for Democracy in Kenya, UWAKE, the Februray 18th Movement and many others that have slipped my mind.

As a rule all of the above formations were multiethnic, multiracial NATIONAL progressive and patriotic formations something that can be gauged by some of the insiders and foot soldiers- Ngugi wa Thiongo, Koigi wa Wamwere, Willy Mutunga, Alamin Mazrui, Abdilatif Abdalla, Shadrack Gutto, Micere Mugo, Edward Oyugi, John Munuve, Rubiik, Odindo Opiata, Adanje, Shadrack Mwarigha, Kathini Maloba, Maina wa Kinyatti, Ngugi wa Mirii, Kaara wa Macharia, Omondi K'Abir, Njuguna Mutahi, Wahu Kaara, Wang'ondu wa Kariuki, Mwandawiro Mghangha, Wafula Buke, John Odongo, Zarina Patel, Shiraz Durrani, Sultan Somji, Irung'u Houghton, Njeri Kabeberi, Jembe Mwakalu, Oduor Ongwen, Odenda Lumumba, the Mungai Brothers, Tirop arap Kitur, Onyango Oloo, Adongo Ogony, Kishushe Mzirai, Mwangi wa Githinji, Chitechi Osundwa, Karimi Nduthu, Yusuf Hassan, the late Mwakdua wa Mwachofi, and a whole bunch of other people some of whom are alive and some who have passed away.

Ironically, some of the "Young Turks" veterans were much, much older than the patriotic comrades that I have name-checked in the preceding paragraph. But again, you see them continuing the very same multi-ethnic NON-TRIBAL national tradition of political mobilization- FORD’s founders like the late Jaramogi and the late Mzee Muliro and Martin Shikuku, Jaduong’ George Nthenge, Kenneth Matiba and Shahib Bamhariz liaised with younger firebrands like Wamalwa Kijana, Raila Odinga, Paul Muite, Gitobu Imanyara, Anyang Nyongo, James Orengo, Murtaza Jaffer, Kiraitu Murungi and other patriots to create the massive opposition that would have surely toppled Moi in 1992-were it not for the artificially created schisms imported from without.

The period between 1992 and 1997 again exhibited yet another multi-ethnic phase of popular mobilization with the likes of Dr. Willy Mutunga, Njeri Kabeberi, Kivutha Kibwana, Timothy Njoya and Davinder Lamba forging the NCEC into the most militant and progressive political machine agitating for democratic reforms and constitutional change.

The period between 1998 and 2002 we saw the faith communities led by stalwarts like Ndingi Mwana Nzeki, David Gitari, Timothy Njoya and Reverend Mutava Musyimi picking up the thread from fiery clerics of an earlier era like Bishop Alexander Kipsang Muge and Henry Okullu to lead the fight for democratic reforms.

And of course we see the Unbwogable Eruption of 2002 leading to this massive anti-KANU pan Kenyan coalition umbrella group bringing together Charity Ngilu, Mwai Kibaki, Anyang Nyongo, Wamalwa Kijana, Raila Odinga, Najib Balala, Kipruto Kirwa, Mukhisa Kituyi, Kivutha Kibwana etc to confront and defeat the Moi-KANU dictatorship. Again we see that Kenyans coming together as Kenyans- not as Luos, Gikuyus, Kalenjins etc.

In summary, my argument in this section is that contrary to mainstream clichés, Kenyan politics has NOT always been dominated by narrow ethnicity as the driving force.

[To be continued]

* Onyango Oloo is Secretary General Social Democratic Party of Kenya Nairobi. This paper was delivered at the Goethe Institute, Nairobi on June 18, 2008. Be sure to look for Parts II and III in the next two issues of Pambazuka News.

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

Have no doubt. Only one party can win Angola's parliamentary elections next Friday and that is the MPLA, the party of government since independence in 1975. More difficult to predict is whether or not it will win an absolute majority and, even harder, how the remainder of the vote will split. Beyond the MPLA's former civil-war enemy Unita, the Angolan opposition tends to be ignored as small parties only in the game for money and prestige.

Men and women of African descent wanted from across the African diaspora to Judge essays written by children aged 8 to 16 years for "The Annual Essay Contest for Children of African Descent". Essays will be submitted in both English and French. Schools in English- and French-speaking Africa and the diaspora are invited to indicate their interest in participating in this contest. Visit: for previous years' winners. [email][email protected]

The Socialist Student Movement (SSM) is making a call to action for free education against the background of a year of protests at institutions of higher learning, culminating at the closure and beginning of the academic year. Financial exclusions, triggered by exorbitant annual fee increments, academic exclusions, shortages of accommodation, of resources necessary for learning and teaching and of qualified educators have pushed students into battles where they have been faced with brutal state repression, with shootings at for example Wits and the University of Johannesburg.

Western companies are pushing to acquire vast stretches of African land to meet the world's biofuel needs. Local farmers and governments are being showered with promises. But is this just another form of economic colonialism?

In 1968 the BBC's Africa Editor Martin Plaut was one of 600 students at the University of Cape Town protesting because black lecturer Archie Mafeje had been denied a teaching post there. Returning to Cape Town 40 years later for a reunion of campus rebels, he discovered the real reason for the university's stance.

The first edition of this publication was based on the proceedings of the 17th All African Students’ Conference (AASC) held in 2005 in Windhoek, Namibia, which series began in 1988. It covered the major issues arising for the unity movement from the 2005 conference, with diverse contributions from a broad range of participants, including a head of state, the head of a liberation movement, youth, students and various other concerned social groups and individuals.

On the occasion of this year’s International Day of the Disappeared Persons -30th August- International Center for Policy and Conflict [ICPC] express its solidarity with families of all those who suffer from enforced disappearance in Kenya and internationally and pays special tribute to the selfless efforts of human rights defenders working for enforced or involuntary disappeared persons and their relatives.

The sixth African Development Forum (ADF VI) will be convened on the theme " Action on gender equality, empowerment and ending violence against women in Africa " from 19 to 21 November 2008 at the United Nations Conference Centre in Addis Ababa , Ethiopia. The Forum, one of the principal events of the Economic Commission for Africa 's 50 th Anniversary celebrations, is being jointly held with the African Union (AU) and the African Development Bank (AfDB).

Pamberi Trust and African Synergy are independent registered charitable trusts, governed by constitution, and under authority of Board of Trustees.

Today free expression in Zimbabwe is bloodied and torn. Crisis and repression have trampled basic tenets of our social and cultural life. Some of us inside the country have decided to create the kind of life we wish to live; our chosen power is the arts. The humanity and freedom of African arts and its role in fostering social cohesion, is upheld at Book Café in Harare.

At Book Café we have created a place of beauty, joy, togetherness and tolerance; an arts centre that celebrates free expression, where artists work with dignity and audiences appreciate a diverse multitude of perspectives.

Since 1982, IDRC has assisted Canadian graduate students to undertake their thesis research in the field of international development. IDRC Doctoral Research Awards are intended to promote the growth of Canadian capacity in research on sustainable and equitable development from an international perspective. Normally, such research is conducted in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East or Asia.

During my studies, I went to one of the local courts to attend a proceeding for the seizure of a widow’s property. Seated in one of the benches was a frail looking woman whom I could tell had been sobbing. When the court house was empty, as the matters for the day had been completed, I passed her on my way out; she did not even noticed my presence until I tapped her shoulder, then without lifting her bowed head she said, “I don’t have anywhere to go; they should have dug a grave for me also.”

Chinese dam companies and financial institutions are outpacing their competitors in overseas dam contracts. China's overseas dam industry is building hundreds of dams around the world, particularly in Southeast Asia and Africa, but also in countries like Pakistan and Albania. What can communities impacted by these projects do to protect their rights and advocate for rivers targeted for dams built by China? This new guide provides useful information for groups concerned about dam projects in which Chinese companies and financiers are involved, including:

The Panos Institute West Africa (PIWA) is seeking a determined and dynamic collaborator (male or female) to fill the position of Information Pluralism and Média Development Programmme Coordinator. The Panos Institute West Africa (PIWA) is a Regional Non Governmental Organization based in Dakar (Senegal) and operating in West Africa. PIWA has as mission to contribute to the construction of a democratic space of communication for change and social justice in Africa. PIWA. The deadline for application is October, 03rd 2008

The late Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has been buried at a sombre ceremony in the capital, Lusaka. There was a 21-gun salute as his body was lowered into the ground in a copper-plated coffin - Zambia is Africa's biggest copper producer.

Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has said the opposition MDC has until Thursday to agree a power-sharing deal, or he will form his own government. "We feel frozen at the moment [without a government]," he told state media. The MDC has rejected the ultimatum and says it will not be "bullied" into signing a deal.

Following the election of the African National Congress to government in South Africa in 1994, there was great hope and expectation that finally the inequalities that had existed for so long along racial lines would be redressed and black people would see marked improvements in their standard of living and better access to public services such as housing, water and electricity.

Pick up the promotional brochure of any government, NGO or corporate social investment programme and you will read that poor women are an important beneficiary group – if not the most important target of social relief and investment programmes. Many millions of Rand are raised and spent in the name of alleviating the plight of poor black women, particularly those living in rural South Africa.

The Security Council working group on children and armed conflict should urge Chad to take measurable, concrete steps to demobilize children from its armed forces and stop continued recruitment, Human Rights Watch has said in a letter. On September 5, 2008, the working group will discuss violations of children’s rights in Chad. The working group asked Chad to take steps to bring an end to the recruitment and use of child soldiers a year earlier, in September 2007, but government efforts to comply have been largely ineffective.

Are supply-driven or demand-led approaches to employment generation more successful in reaching poor women? This chapter in the Commonwealth Secretariat’s publication Mainstreaming Gender in Social Protection for the Informal Economy examines social protection schemes in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

A new United Nations report on the outlook for the global economy over the next few months indicates that the robust growth seen in developing countries could be checked by the slowdown in the industrialised world. "This is really a downturn after four blessed years of relatively strong growth," said Supachai Panitchpakdi, secretary general of UNCTAD (UN Conference on Trade and Development), which put out its annual report Thursday.