http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_01_wahdah.gif discusses the Arabic language and how it influences “Arabic political and cultural discourse” and considers whether the “explosiveness and poetic” nature of the language leads to “radical Islam”.
..... This [those educated in classical Arabic] in no way led to the creation of radical ideologies or ideologies; but it did influence the way in which those ideologues express themselves. And the themes expressed in much classical literature likely make it all the more unacceptable for such a set to accept being ruled by aliens (or those under alien influence).

This is my thinking. I could be reaching too far back, as is Dr. Lewis when he explains that the roots of modern terrorism lay in some back room Anglo-Ottoman-French-Austrian-Icelandic treaty or in the conduct of the 18th and 19th century corsairs. Or when someone tells us that the the Arabic language itself leads to "radical Islam".

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_02_wordsbody.gifWordsbody comments on Obamamania and takes us through his celebrtory supporters and detractors from Spike Lee and Toni Morrison on the one hand and Maya Angelou and Whoopie Goldberg on the other. The split within the Black community is obvious – one of the choices being do you vote on racial lines or because you sincerely think Obama is the man?
“Uncomfortable as I am with the role of the great O in this campaign, I actually welcomed her statement above. Because the converse is also true. I am free as a black person to support Hillary Clinton if I want.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_03_psycherevolution…African Renaissance: A Revolution of the Mind? poses some thoughts on the question of borders in Africa which cut through linguistic and ethnic groups as a way of controlling the “natives”.
“This got me wondering about how borders have exclusified languages or dialects...I hope there is such a word as exclusify, but what I mean is if a Shona person spoke Kalanga with a Shona accent in Botswana they would probably get flak for it, and if I as a Kalanga speaker have taken flak for speaking Shona ''funny.'' Shona and Kalanga are in some respects like Texan English and the English one would find in Wales, so they are not completely dissimilar. Once upon a time, they were the same language but a border ran through it and now it lives between them.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_04_chippla.gif Chippla’s Weblog reports on recent talks between the Russian gas multinational, Gazprom and the Nigerian government on the development of gas fields.

“What about Gazprom? What does it have to offer? The Financial Times report (referred to in the first paragraph of this write up) provides next to nothing on this, though it quotes a Nigerian government official as saying:
"What Gazprom is proposing is mind boggling. They are talking tough and saying the west has taken advantage of us in the last 50 years and they're offering us a better deal."
Until such a deal is made public (should the talks between Gazprom and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation bear fruit) this blogger remains deeply skeptical. Gazprom, like any other energy conglomerate, is simply strategically positioning itself for global growth beyond the shores of Eurasia. Already a key player in the European gas market, in addition to being 'the' key player in the Russian gas market, it now has its eyes set on a region of the world in need of exponential growth”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_05_sotho.gifSotho links to the 25 most important films on race and the lack of recognition of Black actors by Hollywood.
“Look around, and you’ll see how African Americans have emerged as the big screen’s most reliable stars. Will Smith is the one demonstrable megastar. Morgan Freeman’s quiet dignity gets him designated as the face of God and the soul of humanity. ...........And the achievements of blacks are regularly honored by Hollywood. In the past seven years, blacks have won Academy Awards in every acting category. Halle Berry took Best Actress for Monster’s Ball, Freeman Best Supporting Actor for Million Dollar Baby, Jennifer Hudson for Dreamgirls.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_06_cairofreeze.gifCairo Freeze, an Egyptian weekly cartoon editorial, posts a cartoon on the Archbishop of Canterbury’s recent speech suggesting that aspects of the Sharia Law to be officially recognised in the UK.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_07_civilexpression.g… No Longer At Ease has an excellent series of updates on the fighting in Chad between the government and rebels. The updates are very informative in this very difficult to understand conflict.
“The rebels took off just five days ago from the East of the country, near the Sudanese borders. Chad and Sudan have been exchanging accusations that each is supporting the others' rebels. Chad supported and armed rebels in Darfur and so did Sudan with Chadian rebels. In 2006, the rebels reached the outskirts of the capital N'Djamena but they were pushed back with the help of the French troops. There is no doubt that Sudan will be delighted with a change of leadership in Chad.

It also seems that the EU, and particularly France, sees president Idris Deby as a liability; he has presided over fraudulent elections and changed the constitution so he can have a third term. His ongoing rivalry with the Sudanese government is also making the deployment of UN troops in Eastern Chad and Darfur much more difficult.

The African Union, already overloaded with the crisis in Kenya, Darfur and Somalia, has said that Chad will be suspended from the organization if president Deby is deposed and "until normalcy and democratic rule is restored in that country".

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_08_kubatanablogs.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/345/blogs_09_blacklooks.gifBlack Looks reports on the link between the Israeli billionaire and settlement magnate, Lev Leviev’s diamond mining in Angola and building of illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
“New York and Londoner’s campaign to boycott the jewellery stores of Israeli billionaire and settlement magnate, Lev Leviev on Madison Ave and Bond Street. Leviev is a major constructor of Israeli settlements on Occupied Palestinian land in violation of international law. He owns Alluvial diamond mines in Angola where thousands work in dangerous conditions, largely unregulated and often digging with their bare hands standing in dirty muddy water. [Alluvial diamonds are cheap to mine because the diamonds are just below the surface. ]”

* Sokari Ekine blogs at Black Looks and http://www.africanwomenblogs.com

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_01_kayodeogundamisi…
Nigerian political activist Kayode Ogundamisi finally makes it to the blogging world in his blog Kenerry Bird! In this post Kayode is critical of religion as it is played out in Nigeria, particularly the “partnership between Pastors, Imams and other religious leaders with the corrupt people in government.” To get an understanding of the relationship between religion, the religious in Nigeria and corruption he points out some interesting facts:
“We do have the highest growth in Christianity and Islam in the world nonetheless remains one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
It is high time we start probing the finances of those who hide under the banner of religion to steal and deceive the people.........
A Pastor in the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Joseph Itegbe, was on Tuesday arraigned at Tapa Magistrate’s Court in Lagos for allegedly stealing N5.7 million tithe belonging to the church.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_02_afrigadget.gifAfrican Gadget
African Gadget a blog about local alternative technology solutions has launched a new site and a new online project called “Grassroots Reporting”. The idea is to recruit volunteer contributors from across the continent to report on local technologies. Anyone interested should please leave a comment on the blog with your email address (which will not be published). In this way the blog will be able to spread the word about the huge range of local technologies and innovations being developed and used by Africans for Africans.
“One of the big goals here is to create a service that doesn’t just publish interesting stories about African micro-entrepreneurs, though we do plan on continuing that, but to also explore ways that we can be a conduit back to those very same people. This redesign already has our future plans for dealing with entrepreneurs built into it. Part of that is the future phases of the AfriGadget store, but we’re also looking at ways to partner with others and encourage direct investment into worthy entrepreneurs businesses.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_03_sociolingo.gifSociolingo
Sociolingo reports on a project from North Western University in the US which is publishing ancient African maps online. The maps date from the 16th to the 20th century. An excellent project.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_04_theconcoction.gifThe Concoction
Concoction complains about the lack of news on Africa from all sections of the US mainstream media. 45,000 people die each month in the DRC but this is not reported instead one death of a Hollywood start is at the center of the evening news.
“You read about 45,000 people dying each month in DRC online while the death of some young actor found dead in his NY apartment dominates the evening news on major news channels - even BBC world had to say something about it. Although I liked Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain and it's sad he died so young..., still I can't help wondering when 45,000 people dying each month would get the same attention?”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_05_thinkersroom.gifThinkers Room
From Kenya,Thinkers Room asks a series of questions and posts a list of ”shattered myths” about Kenya. Here are some snippets.
Questions:
Where is the President? Mr Kibaki cannot have it both ways. If he insists he is the duly elected president then it is incumbent upon him to act accordingly. He must not only do something, he must be seen to be doing something................. Where is the Church? I’m not impressed at all by any of the churches in Kenya. The Catholic Church, The Anglican Church, the Islamic community and the Independent churches have been very lethargic indeed.
Shattered Myths:
Kenya is an oasis of peace. Is it now?........... Kenya believes in the right of law. The ODM refuses to challenge the elections in court. While I understand their reluctance,”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_06_kumekucha.gifYou Missed This
Also from Kenya,You Missed This believes the Annan talks are “doomed to fail” due to pettiness on both sides and the fact Annan and his team really do not have any powers to influence the present stalemate.
“Even before the nominated teams begin negotiations, signs are already emerging that the Annan led mediation talks are doomed to fail. Yesterday, the talks were nearly sabotaged by Office of the President protocol officers who were insisting that Kibaki sits alone on the ‘high table’ because he is the ‘supreme presidential authority’. The ODM and Mr. Annan on the other hand, would hear none of it and in the end, Raila and Kibaki occupied the same ‘high table’ flanking Annan on both sides as equals. This was after Annan and the Speaker of the National Assembly as the convener of the meeting over-ruled the OP protocol officials. Such pettiness, emanating from the PNU side, clearly shows that they are treating their political adversaries as junior partners.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_07_grandioseparlor.g…Grandiose Parlor
Grandiose Parlor reports that $10 billion has been spent on Nigeria’s electricity infrastructure between 1997 and 2007. Despite this, the majority of citizens still do not have a regular electricity supply. An excellent example of corruption and mismanagement!

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_08_kameelahwrites.gifKameelah Writes
Kameelah Writes comments cynically on the Obama fever presently sweeping across America.
“As my little imagination works, Obama will continue to pander to everybody and their mama until he becomes president. At night he sneaks to chat with his daughters about the end of the Gaza Blockade . Shortly after Obama is inaugurated, Obama and I are going to meet on U street in D.C. to jointly craft his inaugural speech. In the speech he will say all the things that he was previously far to smart to publicly assert.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/341/blogs_09_blacklooks.gifBlack Looks
Black Looks publishes a video “fire in the delta” together with the response of a group of civil society organisations to the Nigerian government’s postponement (yet again) of the end of gas flaring by the multinational oil companies.
“In 2005, the High Court declared gas flaring illegal yet both the Nigerian government and oil multinationals have ignored the court ruling. Last year the Nigerian government once again promised to stop all gas flaring on the 1st January this year - a promise that goes back nearly 40 years. Companies defying the order were to be shut down. Once again the government has shown complete disregard and insensitivity to the communities in the Niger Delta and given into pressure from Shell, Chevron, Elf etc. The date has now been set for the end of the year but no one really believes that the government will once again bow to the oil multinationals.”

* Sokari Ekine blogs at Black Looks http://www.blacklooks.org and http://www.africanwomenblogs.com

Kenya continues to dominate the African blogosphere as the ODM opposition begin three days of protests against the election.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_01_kenyanpundit.gif continues to publish her diary of events and thoughts around the election and post election. Her latest post is a piece by Kenyan Mariposa “I am a lesbian.
A queer.
A shoga.
A dyke.
An ‘ abboration’ of nature.
Mariposa writes that she left Kenya when she was 24 years old “burdened” by the choice she had to make. She finds herself far away from friends, family and country in this time of crisis and violence but is not surprised
“Yet, in the stillness of my heart, I am not surprised. I am not at all surprised that underneath the veil of calmness lies intolerance. We are as a nation and as individuals are not sentries of peace, we would like to believe that we have no strong affiliations to the groups that we belong to. However, I ask, take a moment to ask, who do you consider your friends, your crew, are they born from the same background, do they look like you, what are their professional and personal affiliations, are they in synch with yours?”
Yet despite the chaos and violence, the corruption and intolerance she remains hopeful in that the Kenyan people have an opportunity to become more mindful and compassionate about others and end the “vicious cycles of hate”.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_02_mentalacrobatics…Mental Acrobatics considers the possibility of a “silver lining” in the midst of dark clouds over Kenya when Parliament convened “and no punches were thrown”. Nonetheless the situation has reached the levels of farce as the President appears to have dug his head in sand whilst the opposition have their man elected as Speaker of the House.

“ODM controlling parliament sets up some very interesting and indeed ridiculous scenarios. Kibaki gets to appoint a cabinet and that cabinet has to work through parliament. Yet the majority in parliament is completely opposed to Kibaki’s policies and will do whatever it can to wreck them. Kibaki, if he was thinking straight, could have overcome this by appointing ODM MPs to key cabinet positions. Instead he chose to ignore ODM all together in a move that made no political sense. ODM due to their strength in numbers will control all parliamentary committees. In another ridiculous scenario, some powerful parliamentary committees have a majority of seats reserved for the opposition in an attempt to prevent the largest political party in parliament from dominating all proceedings.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_03_potashke.gifKenyan Urban Narrative revisits his “Kikuyuness” and discovers that all Kenyans are equal but some are more equal than others – those who stole the truth and with it took the land.

“They told me that Red was for the blood that was shed and green was for the land that was won. I grew up and then I realised: red was for those who died fighting and green was for those who lived- to reap matunda ya uhuru. My ancestor inherited the red, your ancestor inherited the red; so why do we have to die that those that inherited the land may stay ever green?”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_04_charlestaylortria…The Trial of Charles Taylor provides a detailed day to day report on the trial of Charles Taylor which for the past week has seen the defence cross examine one Denis koker, a Mende from Sierra Leone and former member of the AFRC who were aligned to the RUC. Koker provided security for an advisor to the President. His evidence is a detailed and chilling witness to the violence wielded by
Taylor and the RUF as he describes what was called “Operation No Living Thing”.

“He said it was an order from Mosquito–that we are burning houses so that if ECOMOG or government soldiers come, they cannot stay in Kono. He said we will take the zinc roofs and build other houses. Then the RUF and Juntas would completely control Kono. I saw them shooting civilians in Kono. I saw them capture civilians in Koidu Town and surrounding villages, looting property, capturing kids–boys and girls, they shot civilians who were unwilling to carry loads. In Koidu, they captured civilians and forcefully initiated them into the force. Many women and children were captured. Those who weren’t captured ran away toward Guinea as refugees. In Koidu, women were captured and made into wives. It was like serving yourself tea to drink. It was very common wherever we went–in Freetown, Masiaka, Kono, and all along the way there. I saw it myself. Operation No Living Thing went on every day and every night, burning houses all over Kono. They burned mud houses and even concrete houses. In Koidu Town, there were more houses burned down than I could count. There were more than 100 and I couldn’t count them anymore. I wanted to find a way to reach Kailahun because that was my mother land. The group was moving towards Kailahun anyway. RUF and AFRC fighters had broken into a bank in Koidu and taken money and diamonds. They wanted to use this to open a route to Kailahun. Eldred Collins handed us over to be security for this together with Staff Sargeant Saliu Kanneh, who was Julius Maada Bio’s bodyguard. I saw the money myself in big bags. I became frightened because I had taken a military oath. We had no respect. In the military I had taken some courses and learned how to fight a war. I saw that the money was looted and thought it would be a disgrace to my family.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_05_akin.gif
Nigerian blogger, Akin reports on the “shame and scandal in the family” surrounding former President Obasanjo who is accused by his son, Gbenga, of having an affair with his wife and far worse, his father-in-law for having an incestuous relationship with his daughter.

My grandfather is my father
There appears to be two children in the marriage and their supposed father casts doubt on their paternity by seeking a DNA test that brings in his father and father-in-law – how reprobate can this get?.............Some matters need to handled with discretion especially where children are involved though this matter of a seemingly seriously wronged man by his wife, his father and his father-in-law is a powder-keg ready to shake Nigerian societal values to its core – this case cannot be an exception..............But this can almost be too reckless on the part of the petitioner, representing the very ugly face of acrimonious divorces – if the children were to find out that their father is either of their grandfathers rather than the husband of their mother – how damaging would that be for the children and to what end?

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_06_orenotes.gifOre of Ore’s Notes reports on her recent trip to the island of Zanibar and her final stop in the “Spice Tour” where she visits a slave chamber.

“Slaves were hidden in here after trade in slaves was abolished. The cave is a dank pit, which appeared to spiral into the ground. After taking about 20 steps down, the daylight was already being subsumed by the underground darkness. I climbed down as far as my slippers would allow me to on the slippery and damp ground. Our lone torch gave out and my camera battery, which I had been carefully nursing all through the trip (not having a battery charger with me) eventually failed. It was time to call it a day and head back.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/337/blogs_07_blacklooks.gifBlack Looks publishes messages from members of Kenya’s Nabuur community in towns and villages across the country. The messages were sent my email and sms to each other and to their volunteer supports.

“04 jan: “Hi Pelle! It’s terrible here! No phone cards. Pple dying esp. children of disease. Hunger biting. More police shooting. Trying to raise some support to assist people.”
01 jan: “Security situation is getting worse! over 300 ppl killed - one being my cousin. Gun shots everywhere. The impact is real - no basic needs available.”
30 dec: “Kibaki declared Presidential winner though opposition won. He’s just been sworn in 15 minutes after. There’s bloodshed in Kenya. Police kills over 50 ppl.”

* Sokari Ekine the Community Coordinator for Kabissa.org and is author of Black Looks

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_01_whiteafrican.gif comments that sometimes the only thing you can do in a crisis is report what you see. Using technology from google maps he takes Kenyan Pundit’s (see below) suggestion and creates a mashup of incidents reported by citizens.

“Basically, let’s create a mashup that people can report into on incidences of violence that they see.........Basically, you have an incident - that hopefully someone gets a picture or video of. A report on what happened and who was involved, and a location. That information is submitted and then populated into a map-based view that is easy to search by location and/or category. “

The idea for the site was first suggested on Saturday and by Wednesday due to sheer hard work and collaboration the site Ushahidi (meaning Witness) was up and running http://www.ushahidi.com/. The next step is to integrate an SMS messaging function which would enable anyone with access to a mobile phone to send in reports. A brilliant idea and example of how technology can be implemented in a short time when there is a crisis.
http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_03_kenyanpundit.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_04_geraldbaraza.gifGerald Baraza is critical of the newly announced “illegitimate cabinet” announced by Mwai Kibaki which he describes as “Total Greed and Madness” and shows Kibaki has no regard for Kenyans, the democratic process or Kenya’s future. Baraza lists some of the possible outcomes of Kibaki’s announcement and makes some suggestions to the international community on how they can “save Kenya”...

“1. Tribal tensions will escalate to levels never witnessed before.
2. Feelings by majority of the Kenyan ethnic groups, especially the Luo, that Kibaki's dominant Kikuyu tribe has always given them a raw deal when it comes to the management, distribution, and utilization of resources and opportunities, will reach unparalled levels.

3.Violence is going to tripple in the country!
4. Guerilla warfare will become an option for many who feel cheated, frustrated and oppressed by an illegitimate regime.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_05_mentalacrobatics…Mental Acrobatics shares a report on two grassroots taking initiatives taking place which provide encouragement.

Nafsi Afrika is a team of acrobats formed in 2000. Its acrobats come mainly from the Kawangware and Kibera slums in Nairobi. These two areas have been rocked by the violence of the past few days. Later on today this team of acrobats will build a human pyramid of acrobats from different tribes in a show of unity................AND
REPACTED is a community based youth-to-youth organization. They are based in Nakuru. In the Free Area part of Nakuru most of the landlords are Kikuyu and most of the tenants are Luo they managed to get both groups together in a forum.
http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_08_shailja.gifShajila Patel writes an open letter to Samuel Kivuitu (Chair of the Electorial Commission of Kenya) accusing him of betraying the people of Kenya and pointing our the consequences of his failure to act honourably and truthfully in the election process.

“You betrayed us. Perhaps we'll never know when, or why, you made that decision. One rumor claims you were threatened with the execution of your entire family if you did not name Kibaki as presidential victor. When I heard it, I hoped it was true. Because at least then I could understand why you chose instead to plunge our country into civil war.................... Do you think of the 300,000 Kenyans displaced from their homes, their lives? Of the thousands still trapped in police stations, churches, any refuge they can find, across the country? Without food, water, toilets, blankets? Of fields ready for harvest, razed to the ground? Of granaries filled with rotting grain, because no one can get to them? Of the Nairobi slum residents of Kibera, Mathare, Huruma, Dandora, ringed by GSU and police, denied exit, or access to medical treatment and emergency relief, for the crime of being poor in Kenya?”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_09_gukira.gifGukira confesses that despite watching the events unfold, reading and listening, writing has not been easy as he imagines that at least
“Somewhere, in this mess, someone I know, someone I love, someone I respect, has raised a hand in anger and frustration.”

Nonetheless he see the events of the past two weeks as either extraordinary or unexpected.

“It would be a mistake to view the events of the past week as entirely singular, extraordinary, or unexpected. Instead, they dramatize that for too long many Kenyans have been closing their eyes and blocking their ears to the ordinary suffering and frustration of fellow citizens. If what we have seen was an eruption, it was fed, in part, by our easy smiles and tolerance of inequality. Perhaps the sad truth is that we have all been living in a horror movie and we just awoke to that fact..................Unlike most horror movies, which end in total destruction or in some kind of redemption, the way ahead for us is not as scripted. It’s clear that we cannot simply assume we share the same values. Instead, we must cultivate shared values. We cannot rely on our leaders to heal our wounds. Instead, we must take responsibility for wounding each other. We can no longer live within purely ethnic enclaves. Instead, we must begin to bridge cultural and geographic differences.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_10_hokmah.gifAfrican Rhetoric is critical of the claim by many Kenyans and observers that both Mawi Kibaki and Raila Odinga are equally responsible for the post election violence.

“The problem, though, is that such a claim is not accurate. It is not true that Kibaki and Raila are to blame in equal measure for Kenya’s current predicament. It shouldn’t need saying that Kibaki stole the election; that the violence that erupted is a reaction to a coup. Attempts to bracket Kibaki’s wrongdoing in the name of focusing on ending the violence simply echoes Kibaki’s own vacuous talking point that he will only engage in dialogue once there is peace. It just so happens, though, that the violence stems from a dispute which must be resolved in order to bring about peace. Moreover, Kibaki and Raila do not occupy symmetrical positions of power. Kibaki, having seized the presidency, has the entire military-police apparatus at his command. He has far more resources, albeit illegitimately expropriated, and far more direct command over his forces than Raila does over the crazed mobs carrying out the ethnic cleansing of Kikuyus. A case in point: Kibaki’s internal security minister, John “Rasputin” Michuki, has converted Kisumu into a human abbatoir.”
Diary of a Mad Kenyan Woman

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/335/blogs_11_madkenyanwoman.gifDiary of a Mad Kenyan Woman posts a daming essay on the election fraud, violence and those wishing to maintain the “feudal principlality of Kikuyustan”.

“How have we produced this population of Kenyans so estranged, so alienated from a sense of collective hope and a progressive trajectory that they are willing to burn to the ground this national edifice we call our home? I begin to suspect that it might have something to do with the ways in which we treat our people as if they are disposable nappies....first we crap all over them and then we throw them away. Or, first we work them up with visions and dreams of a utopia denied them only by the holding of office by the ‘the other side’ then we slyly make insinuations of how much easier life would be without ‘them’ and then we give them a little nudge and say “oh look, there goes one of them now. And who left this panga lying about in the open like that, all nice and shiny and sharp?”

And then we exclaim in shocked horror: oh goodness, me! However could this have happened? Oh please, please, well, gracious me, whatever shall we do?

On the other hand, whatever can Kikuyus think we are about, saying complacently that “we” won the election when even Europeans who can count are quite able to figure out the implications of votes which add up to fifty thousand and are transmuted into seventy thousand by some mysterious Kikuyu alchemy? It boggles the mind, the sheer bare-faced effrontery of fraud meant to thwart the popular will and carried out in naked defiance of international observers and Kenyan media. We may not have universal education yet, but a good number of Kenyans can count for themselves with a fair degree of confidence in their own tallies. What on earth do the people of Central Province mean, dancing about in the streets like that with joy, when it is evident to anyone who believes in this country that uchawi numbers are self-evidently not a cause for celebration? There’s hubris, and then there’s Central Province. I am fairly sure that it didn’t help matters. No one has won here, folks. We are all our own victims and our own oppressors—and some of us are guiltier than others.”

On Facebook

* Sokari Ekine is author of Black Looks blog [www.blacklooks.org">

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

This weeks roundup will focus on some of the new African blog portals, aggregators, social bookmarking and technology blogs.

Portals

The two main blog portals are African Path and African Loft. Both portals have a list of regular authors some of whom are bloggers and both syndicate content from select blogs.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_01_africanpath.gif includes a news feed of African news, a blog written by selected authors, an Directory section with a list of African related businesses many in the Diaspora.

“African Path is the premier online channel for reaching affluent Africans in America, Africa, Europe, China, and elsewhere in the world, providing daily breaking news and discussions on issues affecting Africans and Africa.

With an engaging mix of breaking news in Africa, blogs, biographical profiles, thoughtful discussion and an international community calendar, African Path connects Africans across the world with informed dialogue that leads to progress and growth on the African continent and its contribution to world culture.

To fill the void left by big media in covering information on Africa, African Path provides a forum for Africans anywhere in the world to discuss important issues affecting Africans within and outside the African continent.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_02_africanloft.gifAfrican Loft similar to African Path except it also includes a social networking community feature with a growing community. The “chatterbox” feature acts as an aggregator of the “top 50” African blogs though it is not clear how these are selected and for some reason also includes mainstream media sites such as Bua and the BBC. The “discussion forum” seems to be just an extension of the blog area and again the purpose of this section is not clear. One useful addition is the Job Board with a list of both non-profit and corporate jobs.

Both African Path (created by Joshua Wanyama) and African Loft created by blogger Grandiose Parlor provide excellent up to date content on Africa and the Diaspora. Technorati rates African Path with an authority of 236 (22,775) and African Loft an authority of 103 (63,934)

Aggregators

Aggregators are sites that auto collect posts from registered blogs which can by region, country or content.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_03_afrigator.gifAfrigator aggregates blogs from across the continent and the Diaspora and divides them into channels, best rated posts and new members as well as the real time updates of all registered blogs. Afrigator is described as

“Afrigator is a social media aggregator and directory built especially for African digital citizens who publish and consume content on the Web......You can use Afrigator to index your blog, podcast, videocast or news site (i.e. any site that publishes an RSS feed) and market it to the rest of Africa and the world. You can also use it to discover new sites in the Afrosphere.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_04_kenyaunlimited.gifKenya Unlimited incorporates an aggregator and a webring of Kenyan bloggers. KU also includes an annual set of blog awards to it’s members who must be Kenyan or invited by a Kenyan.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_05_nigerianbloggers…Nigerian Blog Aggreator is as the name suggests an aggregator of blogs by Nigerian bloggers at home and in the Diaspora. Unlike Kenya Unlimited, the NBA only provides feeds from Nigerian blogs in real time and is undated hourly.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_06_amatomu.gifAmatomu is an aggregator of South African blogs started by SA newspaper the Mail and Guardian. Unlike Kenya Unlimited and Nigerian Blogs Aggregator, Amatomu is more of a social media aggregator similar to Afrigator.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_africanwomenblogs.gifAfrican Women’s Blogs is an aggregator of blogs by African women on the continent and in the Diaspora

Social Bookmarks

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_07_muti.gifMuti is a social bookmarking site similar to Digg but with African content. Muti enables users to submit links to posts and media stories and then these can be voted on by other users. There are also “hot”, “new” “most viewed” and “stats” features.

Technology Blogs and Websites

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_08_whiteafrican.gifWhite African writes about technology and how it impacts and can change, Africa. Erik is also a web developer and is presently working on a number of African related projects including Zangu News “ a new way to handle news in Africa” and “List’d Express” an easy eBay listing tool. He is also a contributing author to AfricanGadget.com.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_09_kiwanja.gifKiwanja.net with the tag line “Where technology meets anthropology, conservation and development” is a blog by Frontline SMS (software to manage sms) creator, Ken Banks and is largely dedicated to the opportunities provided by mobile phone technology in Africa and other parts of the global South.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/328/blogs_opencafe.gifOpen Cafe is a non-profit internet café specialising in the usage, distribution, training and technical support for open source software and open content materials. It is based in Potchefstroom, South Africa.

* Sokari Ekine is online editor of Pambazuka News and author of Blacklooks [www.blacklooks.org"> and African Women's Blogs [www.africanwomensblogs.com">

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_01_gbengasesan.gif, Gbenga Sesan’s blog reports from the Africa Connect conference behind held in Kigali Rwanda. The statistics on Africa’s internet usage and broadband take up is clearly depressing and there is an urgent need for governments to take action as Gbenga writes:

“the two-day event has the opportunity of bringing to the fore, the need for urgent action in meeting Africa’s connectivity needs. The present story is clearly sad — less thank 4% of Africans currently use the internet, and broadband penetration is below 1%! — but with some political will from the governments, innovative business models from the private sector, sustainable and bottom-up action from the civil society, targeted and collaborative research by the academia, news emphasis on the urgency of the task by the media and cooperation (the sincere form, not the usual pity party) from the international community, Africa will be well on its way out of this embarrassing situation”
$3billion has been pledged so far towards connectivity in Africa but as Gbenga states, will he and others walk away from this conference like all the others only to repeat the same words 6 months down the line in yet another conference?

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_02_bintalshamsa.gifMy Private Cashbah writes in favour of socialised medical care in the United States. She compares her medical situation to that of fellow New Orleans blogger who also has cancer. Unlike Bint who has the benefit of medical insurance, “As the Tumor Turns” does not and relies on the public hospital system.

“I'm privileged. I have healthcare coverage. I've had it for several years now. Lymphopo does not. So, while I am able to go to whatever hospital I need in order to get prompt treatment, she has to wait months just to have a basic mammogram at the local public (i.e. free) hospital. I go to see my doctors and if they want me to be seen by another doc or have some kind of test done, as long as it's fairly early in the day, all they have to do is make a single phone call and the hospital will have that other department squeeze me in that day so that I don't have to make a second trip.

At the public hospital, even if she has had all of her tests done by the time her next doctor's appointment is scheduled, if for some reason the test results aren't back or have been misplaced (something that happens with frightening frequency), she can sit there for the hours it takes to go through the check-in procedure only to be told that there isn't anything they can do about it except reschedule her appointment--for another few months later. I know. I've been a patient there.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_03_madkenyanwoman.gifDiary of a Mad Kenyan Woman find herself between a rock and hard place as on the one hand she is tired of “being from the begging bowl people” and the “peculiarly distorting effects of the aid industry”. However as she clearly points out. The “rock” - Kenya is on the verge of elections yet
“our considered response is to regress into ethnic factions whose rhetoric is so predictable as to be actively boring”

On the other hand – the hard place....

“Here’s the problem, though. The part of me that dearly wants to tell the patronising, condescending, pitying, self-indulgent, largely ignorant and frankly annoying western do-gooders that they can shove their plans and projects up the nearest sweet-spot is forced to stop and recognise that I am not about to go and build a school in any rural community anywhere in Africa anytime soon. There we have it: I am not about to do it, and I am not planning on doing it, and they—aforementioned condescending, pitying, etc.-- are. Were I a mother with school-age children in one of these communities targeted by the aid industry, then, what would be more compelling for me—a principled objection by a fellow-African who makes much more money than me but isn’t inclined to share it, or a scheme to build clinics, schools and etc. proposed by foreigners who moreover have the money to back it up? This is not rocket science: principled objections do not pay rents or school feels, ever. Choosing between my principled zero dollars, and the patronising million dollars doesn’t even take a second’s thought—Show Me The Money.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_04_egyptianchronicle…Egyptian Chronicles takes issue with this year’s annual celebration of the Battle of Alamein as all the “usual representatives of Allies and axis countries” attended the event. She is more concerned with those people living today that are suffering from the consequences of WWII namely the landmine victims

“Yes I am talking about the Land Mines victims in Egypt specifically the victims of land mines in the western desert , the place of Alamein battle.
Both parties in the war planted thousands even millions of land mines in our desert during the great war after all it is not there land and it did not and it does still cost anything , you can plant a land mine for 100 $ but if you want to demine a land mine from a specific area you have to pay thousand of dollars , the thing that would be very costly to a country like Egypt , not to mention the advance equipments for demining may not be available to us.
For decades now Egypt has paid a lot from these land mines alone and she has paid heavily till now for decades whether from humanly or economic
Hundred thousands of Egyptians who live in the western desert were either killed or injured badly and suffered till the end of their lives and nobody cared for them ,generations after generations suffered and are still suffering from those hell pieces under their own land.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_05_ecwaevangel.gifKid’s Doc in Jos comments on the BBC report “HIV Treatment Failing in Africa” and asks readers if they agree pointing out some facts about HIV treatment
“is it a “failure” that 61% of patients are alive and continuing treatment after two years in a program taking antiretroviral (anti-HIV) drugs?

“The study includes reports published between 2000 and 2007. Do the results take into account any changes in during that time? That is, are programs more or less effective now than they were 10 years ago? Is there enough information to know? Again, I haven’t read it yet but it’s a good question to consider as you read.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_06_civilexpression.g…No Longer At Ease is furious over the report that a French charity took it upon themselves to kidnap 100 children from Darfur and hand them over to French families.

“The people who did this will eventually be freed, France will interfere on their behalf saying that the whole thing was a well intentioned misunderstanding (and perhaps pay some money). The "charity" will also have many chances to repeat the same in other poor African countries. This what the French human rights minister had to say about:
I can understand the families, the French families who wanted to save children. But I don't understand why an association decided, alone, to bring them to Paris. That's why we completely disapprove of this initiative.
What? this is not an "initiative" and the French families didn't want save the children, this is simply criminal. This time they caught it, but I can help but wonder if there has been successful attempts before.

The kids were obviously Muslims but were going to be sold to non-Muslim families, adding to the gravity of what might have been waiting for these poor kids.This is a sad, but expected, climax to the "adopting an African child" fashion in the West.”

One does wonder if this is a first or something that has been taking place over the past months or even years. The audacity and arrogance not to speak of the illegality of removing children against their will and their community. The charity in question should have its status removed and surely there has been a crime committed here that the French courts can prosecute?

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/326/nov01_07_blacklooks.gifAnd… Mngxitama writing on Black Looks considers how important and significant the recent world cup victory by the South African Rugby team the Springboks. Looking at the victory, Andile sees it as a victory against transformation, and a victory of the acceptance of the abnormal as normal in South Africa.

"The national rugby team in its compositions and victories is a perfect metaphor for our country and the place of blacks in it. We cheer for our defeat from the touchlines. Imagine if you knew nothing about SA and watched the world cup on TV, you would be forgiven for thinking that actually we are a white country which has the accident of having a smiling black president.
“South Africa is a white country populated a by an impotent invisible black majority. I wonder what other African countries think about us? And the black Diaspora? What do they think about it? Since 1994, our Rugby team could only produce two black players for the national team. Incredible!
But there is also another element in the picture which can be now be more clearly seen, ours is a country which thrives on superficiality and a devastating lack of a perspective which is centred on the valorisation and well being of blacks. Blacks in this country want to celebrates their “own goals”, to borrow from a sporting metaphor. We are perhaps one of the few peoples on earth who believe we can derive freedom from placating those who stubbornly refuse to give up any of their ill begotten privileges and power. Are we blacks not asking for the contempt of whites, when we fail to exercise the massive political power we currently wield to change things around? But more importantly are we doing posterity a favour?

Just how superficial our so called commitment to transformation is was displayed in the build up to the finals when the Bokke victory was almost certain. Our president apparently told Jake White “forget the politics and win it”, White says that was a “big statement”. Hereby a mandate was given against transformation. The Young Communist League an outfit which purports to be pro poor, also wanted a piece of the cake, they simply anointed the team “Comrade Bokke”.

* Sokari Ekine is online editor of Pambzuka News and author of Black Looks blog: www.blacklooks.org

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_01_afrigadget.gif World junk – Africa recycles! I find my more and more of my friends are recycling household waste including food for fertilizer but there is still a lack of imagination in using junk as art or simply repairing a consumer item such as phones, computers, cameras etc. In Africa and other parts of the Global South it’s a different story. African Gadget presents a short photo essay of sculpture, Simon Mwangi who

“calls himself a mabati (sheet metal) blacksmith. He takes junk and creates beautiful metal animal sculptures. If you happen by his roadside shop on Ngong Road in Nairobi, you’ll see a number of crocodiles and if you’re lucky, a full sized giraffe”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_02_kameelah.gifKameelah Writes along with thousands of other bloggers, participates in the “National Day of Panhandling for Reparations” across the United States.

“I am participating in this performance because I believe that a conversation about reparations has been pushed aside for way too long. This country has paid reparations for some of its past injustices, but not for slavery. Why not? I am sitting with this sign to show that I want reparations for American Slavery to move forward.

You can participate too. Bloggers- spread this post to any and all blogs that you belong to. This performance is a great way to generate dialogue and re-energize the stalled conversation about reparations, and a great way to show the power of blogs for connecting people, art, social issues and dialogue!”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_03_olawunmi.gifSilent Storms in an Ocean of One comments on the recent attack by armed robbers on Nigerian rapper 2face idibia

“this was an act of needless violence, but who protects us? where do we get justice when the people charged with protecting the nation are among the very rank of murderers and thieves? last year my dad got robbed at a chackpoint by men he was certain to be policemen. his car was taken and he was left on the streets with no means of contacting his family. at least he was unharmed. most people are not so blessed.

2face idibia has struggled all his life to get where he has. what he really needs to do is be allowed to enjoy the success that his God-given talent has brought him. but to some people he's just another wealthy mark to be robed and harmed for loot. but why did they have to shoot him? at least if you leave the victim alone they have their lives to live, and with time they will replace what was taken. but how do you replace a life, or a limb? and how do you console a family whose joy has been stolen by a random act of violence?”

As usual in Nigeria there are rumors surrounding the attack such as it was not random but someone or group attacked him out of jealousy, he is dead, he is not dead, he was robbed, he was not robbed and so on. Whatever happened armed robbery such as this is endemic in the country and has been for the past 30 years. Members of my own family have been victims as have friends and friends of friends.. Who in Nigeria does not know someone who has been a victim of this type of crime?

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_04_ajao.gifOluniyi David Ajao comments on why paypal and other electronic payment systems are not available in Nigeria and has started an online campaign to try to rectify the situation and ask for PayPal to be available in the country.

“Whatever their reasons are, I am using this blog post to agitate that full Paypal services be made available to residents of Nigeria so they can fully partake in global e-commerce.

Are you a Nigerian resident in Nigeria? Do you agree that Paypal services should be available to Nigeria? Share your thoughts here and now by posting your comment”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_05_curiosity.gifNigerian Curiosity writes on the failure of Bill Gates to obtain a Nigerian visa.

“Apparently, Mr. Gates recently needed a visa for a planned visit to Nigeria. He was initially refused said visa on the premise that the authorities required proof he would not reside in Nigeria indefinitely, which would cause a strain on social services.

Eventually, the situation was cleared and Mr. Gates received a tourist visa to travel to the country of my fathers. He had to get a letter from his bank, though.” Hilarious!

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_06_ntwiga.gifSome music for a change.Steve Ntwiga is my favourite blog for African music. He specialises in seeking out old tunes and bands from the 60s and 70s. Everything here is wonderful and I only wish I knew where he found these gems.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_07_bennloxo.gifStayi… with the music theme – Benn Loxo is the next best African music blog to Steve’s and in this post he features some rumba music from Tanzania

“There’s something really sexy about the word ‘rumba’. It’s also a bit of a misnomer in that over the years it came to represent a variety of Cuban-influenced musical styles popular across Africa, not all of them ‘rumba’ in its original sense.

While the heart of rumba was in the country-formerly-known-as-Zaire, there were many great groups in other countries as well. One reason is the civil war that erupted in Belgium Congo during the 1960s. It forced many Congolese musicians out of the country, a bunch of whom ended up in Tanzania”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/324/blogs_08_bl.gifBlack Looks comments on the findings by the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission that the US government has been funding anti-gay and lesbian organisations in Uganda as well as supporting Iran and Cameroon in preventing gay rights groups from having consultative status at the UN.

"The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) has published a disturbing story reporting that the US Government has been funding anti gay and lesbian groups in Uganda such as the Makerere University Community Church and the Ugandan Muslim Tabliqh Women’s Desk who have said they will form an “anti-gay squad to fight homosexuality.”

“The US has also supported Cameroon and Iran in preventing gay rights groups from having consultative status at the UN. At the same time that the US government is funding anti gay and lesbian organisations, it’s own State Department has issued a report on human rights giving details of abuses by some governments based on “sexual orientation and gender identity”. Not surprisingly the report failed to include the US government’s own human rights record in the report.”

* Sokari Ekine is Online Editor for Pambazuka News

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_01_africanloft.gifOl… Akindutire of celebrates Nigeria’s 47th year of independence and asks “Nigeria at 47: Who are our heroes?” and lists 10 of his. A somewhat strange list that includes, Mungo Park, four head’s of state (3 rolled into one) and possibly the strangest of all “the British business men called colonialists”!

He does however include Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka but what about Fela and his mother Mrs Fumilayo Ransom Kuti who fought throughout her life for women’s rights? At number 10, Akindutire remembers the real heroes, those

“unsung or sometimes popular heroes who for one reason or the other became victims of the failed Nigerian project, the millions who died in the civil war and other religious or political riots in Nigeria; those felled by armed robber’s, militant’s, (occultist’s) and or assassin’s bullets; those felled by accidental discharges at check points and those who died as a result of extra-judicial killings or from political scheming and schisms; those who died because of inadequate, unavailable, unaffordable or untimely medical care; those whose careers were either truncated or compromised as a result of inefficient systems or parastatals”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_02_blogazette.gifThe Blogazette has a more interesting question of Nigeria’s 47th anniversary – “Nigeria must stop killing poets and other citizens”

“On October 1, 2007, Nigeria celebrates 47 years of independence from British rule. Many in Nigeria and elsewhere will be asking themselves what the independence has been all about. If Nigeria were a man who had set forth from home at the age of twenty-one to lead an independent life, should he, forty-seven years later appear unable to function with maturity, certainty and fairness? More importantly, should he have the blood of his offspring on his hands?”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_03_bwie.gifWomen in Europe report back on the Black Women in Europe Congress being held in Vienna last week. From her account the conference was a success with much bonding of women and also the fact that the event was reported in the local Austrian press.

“Emotions ran high as discussions and debates revealed our deep desire to participate in a dialogue about what it means to be a Black Women in Europe. I wept because I was so overwhelmed at the amount of abounding love, and the intense feeling of belonging. This is something Black Women in Europe seldom feel.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_04_sociolingo.gifSociolingo reports from Namibia and Senegal on indigenous language policies in schools. In Namibia children will be taught in their mother tongue from Grade 1-3 and from there on English classes will be taught in English but mother tongue languages will continue to be taught as a subject. In Senegal no decisions have been taken as yet except to say that children should “be able to learn in their own languages”.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_05_sasucks.gifWhy South Africa Sucks . For those who doubt there are still left over racists lurking on the streets (well behind their 10ft fences in urbanland or in other shady places – this blogger reminds us of the myth rainbow nation/people in post oops – apartheid South Africa.

“Ever so often, we get comments from readers of this blog, who froth at the mouth because we are so "racist". A friend of mine wrote the following piece and he emailed it to me today.....I reckon he succinctly sums up the bottom line. To those bleeding hearts who flatly refuse to acknowledge the hard facts about SA - take note. Thanks Fred.

Everything in South Africa is so politically correct, that very few Whites want to face up to the fact of what is really happening in our beloved country!
Answer the following questions and you will realise why South Africa is fast becoming another African basket case country.”

His solution? “If each of us must seize the opportunity to take active steps to make the necessary changes, we are all destined to be slaves under depraved politicians in our own fatherland.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_06_kubatana.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_07_youmissed.gifKumaKucha – You’ve Missed This reports on the outcome of an election rally in Uhuru Park, Nairobi following which violence erupted in the informal settlement of Kibera.

“I was very disappointed with the violence that erupted again in Kibera when Mr. Money bags Livondo decided to move with his entourage of vijana na Kibaki to Kibera after holding a rally at Uhuru Park…..I do not support political violence in any form or from supporters of anyone even my favorite Presidential candidate. I also agree that it is every ones constitutional right to vie for a civic or parliamentary seat anywhere in this Country. Freedom of movement is also every Citizen’s right.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_08_sudanese.gifSudanese Thinker links to “two new excellent blogs on Sudan”.

“Anyways, today I want to bring your attention to two excellent blogs which don’t contain the usual and annoying inaccuracies you see elsewhere.
Andrew Heavens, a journalist, has been writing a nice series of short posts at his blog. He’s now based in Sudan. Rob Crilly is also a journalist who travels to Sudan quite often. In fact he just returned from Darfur back to Nairobi recently. They’ve got some good stuff and by going through their posts, one can observe they have a deep understanding of what’s happening.”

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/322/blogs_09_committee.gifCommittee To Protect Bloggers has been reactivated after a year’s hiatus due to lack of funds. The aim of the CTPC is

“devoted to the protection of bloggers worldwide with a focus on highlighting the plight of bloggers threatened and imprisoned by their government. We support the right of bloggers, regardless of professional status or engagement in activism, to speak and we do so regardless of their ethnicity, national origin, religion or political beliefs.”

The CTPC can also be found on Face Book causes at http://www.blacklooks.org

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

In the early hours of February 29th 2004, democratically elected President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his wife Mildred were forced to leave their home under escort of US military and summarily marched onto an unmarked plane whose destination they did not know and were not told.

An Unbroken Agony presents a detailed day by day and hour by hour account of the immediate events leading to the kidnapping and removal of President Aristide. Noted activist and one of the few truly progressive African American voices, Randall Robinson, sets down the facts of the Coup D’Etat, side by side with his own commentary. He provides the evidence that the US was actively involved while France was directly complicit in the Coup that ousted Aristide and saw him flown, along with his with wife to the Central African Republic. Once there, they were literally dumped off the plane and for all intense and purposes held prisoner.

Robinson begins with an historical overview of Haiti from “the most fateful of days” in 1492 when Christopher Columbus landed on the shores of the island he named Hispaniola but which the indigenous people called Ayiti to the only successful slave revolt in history which led to an independent nation in 1804. The struggle for emancipation by the Black Jacobins was led by Toussaint L’Ouverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines and denied France the most profitable slave economy in the world. Not only was Haiti the most profitable, it was also arguably the most cruel. For example slaves were slaughtered for the amusement of their French masters and on one occasion, men were bayoneted and then dogs were let loose to rip them to shreds and devour them.

The history of Haiti is often a tale of history repeating itself. In response to the creation of the “first free republic in the Americas” the US and Europe imposed a global embargo and France demanded that Haiti pay $21 billion (in today’s dollars) as compensation for loss of it’s slaves and territory. Thus right from the beginning the new country found itself in a debt which it has never recovered from. In 1915 the US occupied Haiti for 19 years and, despite independence, the wealth of the country was held in the hands of a tiny minority and remains so till today. Robinson spends a whole chapter discussing class and caste in Haiti from it’s historical roots to the present. A society that saw itself as almost “a race apart from the large majority of Haitian people”.
“In Haiti today color remains as insuperable a barrier to social progress as ever”. ….Not even the least controversial of President Aristide’s proposed social reforms were conceded by his lighter-skinned and more privileged fellow citizens. Not even his proposal to strike the word peasant as a category of citizenship from the national birth certificate for that all rural blacks bore.”

He continues with a quote from Langston Hughes:

“It was in Haiti that I first realised how class lines may cut across color lines within a race, and how dark people of the same nationality may scorn those below them”.

Robinson chronicles the rise to power of Aristide from his early days during the Duvalier years, as a young priest in La Saline, a poor neighbourhood of Port-au-Prince to the populist and much loved leader of the Lavalas family. He details the actions of the various rebel groups supported by the Haitian moneyed classes and businesses and trained and armed by the US.

“Over the course of 2003, the Bush administration broadened its assault on Haiti into a crippling, multipronged campaign. In addition to arming the Duvalierist insurgents and organising Haiti’s tiny, splintered political opposition, the administration moved apace to strangle Haiti, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, into a state of economic, social and political collapse.”

President and Mrs Aristide’s last 24 hours in Haiti are detailed hour by hour moving back and forth between their activities and the whereabouts and manoeuvring of the rebels 100km from Port-au-Prince. Robinson goes into great detail to show that neither President Aristide nor his wife changed their routine or cancelled scheduled appointments including an interview with US radio journalist Tavis Smiley. That they were under great pressure during that period is a fact but until the early hours of the morning of the 29th both insisted they were not leaving Haiti. He also shows that despite warnings from the US that Aristide was going to be shot and the rebels were on their way to Port-au-Prince, they were in fact in the area of Gonaives and not moving.

Robinson’s presentation of Aristide is almost saintly. He does not try to hide his unwavering support of Aristide and his Lavalas party. I’ve read criticisms that Robinson does not address Aristide’s governance and there is only one good guy here and that is Aristide. Whilst I agree he does not cover Aristide’s governance and that the book is partisan, I do not take that as a failing as some have said. Randall Robinson, Maxine Waters and Amy Goodman have time and time again proved their honesty and determination to see justice done. The US on the other hand has a record of lies, deceit, assassinations and attempted assassinations of leaders it does not like, support of rebels against governments it doesn’t like whether they are elected democratically or not. The US has a record of supporting undemocratic oligarchies, monarchies and dictatorships when it suits them.

Randall Robinson set out to write about the history, oppression and punishment of a nation of Black people who dared to resist White Supremacist hegemony and in this he succeeded. The purpose of the book is to chronicle the US government’s actions in the support and removal of a democratically elected President. One who was escorted in the dead of night on a US military plane by US military personnel and unceremoniously dumped in Central Africa. As Robinson points out, the irony was that his host/jailer in the Central African Republic was an unelected ruler who came to power via a coup but who was supported financially by the US and whose country was and remains under French ownership.

The book sets the record straight and acts as a counter balance to the wall of untruths and misinformation presented by the US, other Western governments and the media which continues to present the Bush government’s version of events without question.

* An Unbroken Agony: Haiti, From Revolution to the Kidnapping of a President” Basic Civitas Books, New York, 280 pages, USD $26.
* Randall Robinson: http://www.randallrobinson.com/
* Sokari Ekine is online news editor of Pambazuka News
* Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/

Last week Atlanta, Georgia hosted the first US Social Forum. Sokari Ekine provides some reflective thoughts on the gathering.

10,000 people came together last week in Atlanta to celebrate grassroots activism across the United States (US). This was the first social forum to be held in the US. That it was held in Atlanta Georgia, home of the Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King was not lost on many participants. On the downside, there was the overbearing presence of the Market Place; exclusion of some citizens; over-representation of the Latino community and under-representation of other immigrant communities. However as good opportunities to network and some valuable issues emerged, such and the need to be less self-congratulatory and more reflective.

The opening march was attended by about 10,000 people. It was an uplifting experience to be amongst so many mainly African American and Latino activists from across the US. The main focuses were Katrina/the Gulf Coast, immigration, sexuality and social justice. In contrast to the World Social Forum (WSF), the US forum was not hijacked by the large NGOs, though there were a fair number of smaller US based ones present. Still, the majority of participants appeared to be from truly grassroots community organisations.

Logistically the forum was spread out across various hotels as well as the main Civic Center. This made it difficult to move from one workshop to another, with only a 30 minute break allocated between each one. It also felt very strange to be discussing neoliberalism and anti-imperialism in downtown Atlanta hotels, such as the massive phallic design of the Westin, where the only food available was provided by Starbucks. Atlanta is a city dominated by Coca Cola, the headquarters of Coca Cola with its own museum round the corner from the downtown hotels. Similar to the WSF, the issue of exclusion, cost of hiring space for organisational tents (as high as US$1000), exorbitant cost of food and the excessive Forum Marketplace were all features of the USSF. To enter the Civic Center you had to pass through not one, but a group of ‘guards’ who demanded to see your pass, thus preventing local Atlanta citizens, including a large homeless population, many of whom where just round the corner, from participating. Rumour had it that there had been a discussion over searching people’s bags but fortunately this idea was abandoned.

The $15 minimum entry fee also added to the exclusion of the homeless. You had the ironic situation of activists supposedly working with the marginalised communities having to walk past the homeless everyday as if they were a group of invisible men and women. Close by there was a sign reading ‘Commercial solicitation prohibited. No direct verbal address allowed’, presumably aimed at preventing the homeless from engaging with the rest of the public.

Three notable sessions were the on Gulf Coast reconstruction in the post-Katrina era, ‘Race and Immigration – Immigration Rights’, and from the Africa Tent, ‘Zimbabwe: The Way Forward?’. The Gulf Coast panel brought the house down with reports and moving testimonies from all the activists working on the ground. The main issue was that of the ‘Right to Return’, the right to land and housing as per pre-Katrina, and the struggle against developers and forced removal of local people.

Like the Gulf Coast session, these sessions were well attended. However it was clear that the US immigration activists’ movement is very Latino-centric and even within the Latinos it is very ‘Mexican’ centric. This is something that seriously needs to be addressed, as large numbers of immigrants are being marginalised and made invisible within the movement. African Latinos from across South America, people from all parts of the Caribbean, African and Arab immigrants were very much under-represented. A number of participants felt they had no voice whatsoever. Despite their speaking out, one still left wondering whether or not there needs would be addressed.

The discussion on Zimbabwe was excellent, though very polarised between those who supported the Mugabe regime and those that felt Africans and African Americans needed to condemn Mugabe and other dictators across the continent and work towards democracy and human rights, with social movements and civil society groups taking a lead. There was an assumption amongst some people that because Mugabe was condemned by America and the West that Mugabe himself was the victim; rather than of the reality, which is that the ordinary people of Zimbabwe are the victims of Mugabe’s repression and face resultant daily economic misery.

I missed the People’s Movement Assembly but attended the closing ceremony which was basically a couple of hours of self-congratulatory speeches around the forum with very little reflection and self-critique. I spoke with many participants. There were complaints that too many of the workshops were like lectures with short question and answer sessions and not solution orientated and participatory enough. The real success of the forum was outside the workshops, and the networking that took place between groups and individuals. For many grassroots groups this was the first opportunity to meet with people from other parts of the US working on similar issues. If contact between the various movements can be maintained, then there is hope that the forum will be the beginnings of a strong grassroots opposition to mainstream America, neoliberalism, racial oppression and criminalisation of the poor and immigrant population.

Future social forums must seriously address the issue of exclusion whether through the cost of participation, or as in Nairobi and Atlanta, the physical prevention of sections of the local community being refused entry and by virtue of being economically challenged, prevented from eating, let alone having access to water. Water was being sold outside the Civic Center at the USSF for $1 for a small bottle of water – people would not have had to buy this if sufficient water barrels were available. Two friends of mine who had applied for ‘camping space’ from the list of accommodation provided by the USSF website. On arriving they were told by the ‘commune’ that they had to pay $10 each per night – an amount they could not afford. They were then in the position of having to look for alternative space to stay. Eventually they found a household that agreed for them to stay in their backyard but refused them the use of any of their facilities. Thus to use the toilet they had to sneak into the ‘commune’ and use the bathrooms in the Civic Center. This is not acceptable at a social forum whereby so called progressive peoples take advantage of their comrades by adopting the very same market principles that they claim to object to.

Despite all this, I did however feel privileged to have met many US grassroots activists working on a range of issues and from across the country. It is important to know that there are people living in the ‘belly of the beast’ that are fighting from within and are aware of the impact of that beast on the people of the global South.

* Sokari Ekine is online editor of Pambazuka News

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/309/blogs_01_kush.gif An uplifting short piece from the Sudan. Kush reports on a huge animal migration (to rival that of Serengeti) in Southern Sudan:

'Many people have thought that twenty years of war may have devastated the vast animal resource in South Sudan. But lo, and behold: they have survived! See the pictures for yourself.'

Looks like elephants, ostriches, and possibly wilder beasts running free on the plains.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/309/blogs_02_johnakec.gifJohnAkecSouthSudan comments on a recent statement by the new Sudanese ambassador to the US whose response to US sanctions was to threaten to block the export of 'gum arabic' used in the production of coca-cola...

'...asserted that there is no genocide in Darfur, and called Darfur’s armed groups 'terrorists'. He then issued a thin veiled threat that his country could retaliate by blocking the exports of Gum Arabic to the US. Gum Arabic, the Ambassador declared, is indispensable ingredient of Coca-Cola. Washington Post’s Dana Milbank coined the term "Khartoum Karl" to describe the ambassador.'

The surprise is not that Sudan should respond in this way but that the ambassador who is from the South should so easily and willingly parrot the words of the Khartoum regime.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/309/blogs_03_waridaad.gifVoice of Somaliland Diaspora-Ottawa writes on the new Scramble for African oil and the strategic preparations of the US which will become increasingly dependent on African oil.

'The Pentagon is to reorganise its military command structure in response to growing fears that the United States is seriously ill-equipped to fight the war against terrorism in Africa. It is a dramatic move, and an admission that the US must reshape its whole military policy if it is to maintain control of Africa for the duration of what Donald Rumsfeld has called "the long war". Suddenly the world's most neglected continent is assuming an increasing global importance as the international oil industry begins to exploit more and more of the west coast of Africa's abundant reserves.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/309/blogs_04_civilexp.gifNo Longer at Ease reports on Ethiopian brutality in the Ogaden region of Western Somalia. Abdulrahman also provides a brief background to the conflict which is one of those that receives little coverage in the press.

'In recent years Ethiopian troops increased their brutality of jailing, torturing and killing young Ogaden men suspected of being ONLF members. Their families have also been punished as well but worst of all is the rape of the rape of women by Ethiopian soldiers...In village after village, people said they had been brutalized by government troops. They described a widespread and longstanding reign of terror, with Ethiopian soldiers gang-raping women, burning down huts and killing civilians at will. It is the same military that the American government helps train and equip — and provides with prized intelligence.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/309/blogs_05_ethio.gifEthiopundit comments an article by Christopher Hitchens on the fall of ex-head of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz.

'He begins a customary flurry of blows to the heads and necks of assorted pundits (sadly, not all are as committed to truth and justice as we are) whose "eagerness for prurience, the readiness for slander, and the utter want of fact-checking" would have us believe that Paul Wolfowitz and Shaha Riza were financing some sort of "shameless lasciviousness out of the public purse and the begging bowls of the wretched of the earth.'

Hitchens states that it is hardly Riza's fault (no relation to THE RZA mind you) that she was working at a senior position at the World Bank when Wolfowitz, with whom she had a private adult consenting relationship, was appointed to head up the whole thing ALL THE WAY BACK in 2005. He told the Bank up front and the 'ethics committee' at the Bank decided she had to leave. The committtee suggested that any disruption to her career could be made up with a salary increase at her new job.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/309/blogs_06_filweha.gifFilwehapundit on ceremonial coffee drinking in the Semein Mountains in Ethiopia (a World Heritage site and National Park) which apparently is being discouraged in some local area by priests.

'Sometimes this country is as much amazing to me as it is to a foreigner. The Church banning coffee is unheard of- so far as I know. I do not really know how it works in remote rural places. As far as I know and as it is written elsewhere in the report, coffee-drinking is a ceremonial culture of the society. I guess this should be a local thing.'

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http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/308/blogs_01_tumwine.gif blogs primarily about the tobacco industry. An excellent resource as she monitors and reports on tobacco related issues from across the continent. In this piece she reports on the plight of tobacco farmers in Uganda’s West Nile region

'It reiterates Uganda’s Vice President’s recent plea for alternative crops to tobacco and highlights the fact that tobacco is labour intensive, environmentally destructive and impoverishes the tobacco farmer.'

One noteworthy mention is that the 'WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC),” supports the development of alternatives for tobacco farmers and the report will be ready in July 2007 so check back on Jackie’s blog for more news.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/308/blogs_02_countryboyi.gifCountry Boyi tells us why Idi Amin is his hero. Growing up he was repulsed by an Idi Amin presented as a wicked, torturing, human flesh eating dictator. Boyi takes issue with these stories of Amin and finds justification for making him a hero because he encouraged Ugandans to work with determination and there were more women managers in the country than elsewhere in Africa.

'He wanted Africa for Africans...He sent a telegram to Julius Nyerere that said, 'I want to assure you that I love you very much, that if you were a woman I would have considered marrying you'. Long after his death (2003), Uganda continues to reap big from his friendship with Libyan leader Muammad Gaddafi.

Further, he gave full economic independence to the people of Uganda after expelling 80.000 Asians. His attempted Islamisation of the country was aimed at uniting a citizenry that are known to tear each other on religious grounds.'

I think you need to find another hero Boyi!

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/308/blogs_03_afromusing.gifAfro Musing was one of the African bloggers present at the recent TED-Africa held in Arusha, Tanzania.

'How to help Africa? Do business there TED Global felt like a seminal moment in Africa. I may have said this already but i will say it again. It was unlike any conference i have ever attended. Stupendous, challenging, interesting, eye-opening, heart-opening literally with Dr. Seyi Olesola and figuratively with Binyavanga Wainaina, Chris Abani and the music of Vusi Mahlasela. It was not uncommon to see people quietly wiping away tears during some of the talks. I would be curious as to the psychology behind the organization of the conference, it literally does something to your brain, sort of like neuron shock-therapy. By this i mean the speed, content, superb production, entertaining ‘mental breaks’ and the mix of amazing people. Its like being given knowledge speed in an engaging syringe with extra tablets of wonderful food.'

Sounds pretty grim, like a revival meeting of entrepreneurial evangelists using sleek media and marketing presentation – Who is the 'God' here? I just hope its not catching via cyberspace. For sure it is the talk of the African blogosphere everyone that attended has nothing but praise – my only regret is missing Vusi Mahlasela who would bring tears to my eyes!

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/308/blogs_04_mental.gifMental Acrobatics raises an interesting set of questions around the responsibilities of bloggers in reporting news events. In reporting the bombing in Nairobi this week he like other bloggers is full of qualifiers as the news is updated by the hour via Reuters and other news sources. Mental argues that this is an example of why blogs are an important news source

'I would argue that it is stories like this that rather than showing the danger of blogs, HIGHLIGHT the importance of blogs and other citizen media. While the MSM was stuck in its procedures, bloggers wrote about what they had heard, seen or were told. There is nothing wrong with quoting primary sources. The historians amongst us can confirm the importance with which primary sources are regarded on any historical event. The eyewitness account, the man on the street as it were. If you wanted to know what Kenyans were thinking and feeling at the time the blogs were a very good place to start...As for waiting for an official police statement before commenting on this blast, to that I would ask: where is the lengthy police statement on the Mungiki crisis? Where is the lengthy police statement on the Mount Elgon clashes? Both were major incidents in the past month which claimed more lives that the blast this morning, yet we haven’t seen the same coordinated response to dishing out information as we have on this blast. Are we to await the official statement on those events as well before stepping in with our take on events? How long are you prepared to wait?'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/308/blogs_05_mettyz.gifMetty'z Reflections - Tanzania in Focus comments on Tanzania and globalisation and refuses to attribute blame for Tanzania’s debt or lack of development to globalisation. His post is in response to comments on globalisation and that 'industrial countries impose barriers on agricultural products from Africa' and he concludes he is not 'willing to jump on the ‘we are not developing because of the West’ bandwagon'. Much easier to blame Tanzania’s and Africa’s 'bad attitude' whatever that is.

'With regards to ballooning of the African debt, we can’t simply run and attribute that to globalization. First of all, how that does globalization, which is pretty much a free market concept, cause African countries to acquire more debt? I would seriously need more education on that. As far as I know, the expansion of debt is an outcome of strategies, vision and policies. Case in point: the United States’ debt , which has grown over time, but has increased or decreased based on whether Democrats of Republicans are in power. All that happens when the country is a capitalist country. So why would one tell us the African debt has grown because of globalization?'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/308/blogs_06_bl.gifBlack Looks writes on World Walls – apartheid walls of segregation built to keep out the unwanted and protect the wanted internally and externally.

'Insiders, outsiders anyone from a different world or who is trying to make a different world. Will you be inside the wall living as a caged animal or outside, excluded and destitute? The G8 wall has shown that WALL BUILDERS are capable of constructing internal walls - walls that criminalise the poor, migrants, unwanted people and to keep them away from the the acceptable amongst their nations. The walls are symbols of a concrete and metal apartheid as nation after nation seeks to divide those who are legal and those who are illegal; those who are the right religion, colour, class, gender, have the right sexual preference. For the preferred insiders there is the superiority of knowing you are inside looking out. You have what THEY, the other, want as in Castillo’s diagram. The newer walls include sophisticated surveillance technology that can sense people approaching the fence/wall and prepare for attack. One wonders if the Spanish walls in Ceuta and Melilla will be able to pick up the colour of the approaching people and trigger some sort of automated reaction of bullets to shoot would be wall jumpers.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_01_koranteng.gif publishes his letter to the UK Daily Telegraph complaining about plagiarism from excellent blog post 'Bags and Stamps'. Bags and Stamps is not about the plastic shopping mall type of bag but the ubiquitous 'plaid' plastic bags that can be seen from London to Joburg and from New York to Manila. Telegraph writer, Liz Hunt obviously came across his post and chose to blatantly steal Koranteng’s words and those of another blogger and blog comments. He provides a comparison table between his post and the Telegraph piece – incidentally she didn’t even bother to match the correct spelling and missed the nuances left by various comments.

'Do note that the author completely misses Georgia's nuance by transposing Trinidad to Guyana. The point is that the naming is done by the natives - looking down onto the teeming masses of refugee or downtrodden immigrant Others. Thus Nigerians named the bags Ghana must go, Germans named it Tuekenoffer, and so forth. Thus this is not a simple copying and pasting, there was reordering and some conscious editing done in the article and perhaps the immigrants coalesced into one indistinguishable mass. This is of a piece with the general disdain for said immigrants that the rest of the author's commentary indicates. We can also skip over how Boston becomes America in the coining of "Chinatown tote". The rest of the article I'll suggest is equally enlightening.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_02_dibussi.gifDibussi’s Den on 'Europe’s Shame' as African immigrants are left in the sea for three days and nights holding on to a tuna fishing net. The captain of the tug towing the net refused to allow them on board his ship. One of the comments left on the post expresses the disinterest of African leaders in the constant outward flow of the continent’s skills, knowledge and workforce.

'I saw this dramatic rescue on TV and melted at the desperation of fellow Africans.This is so sad. I continue to be amazed at the nonchalance of our African rulers. They have no shame and seem not to be bound by any impulse of collective responsibility to do something about the continuous haemorrhaging of the continent’s very best. Soon, Africa is going to skip a whole generation as the gap widens with the young all fleeing the sinking ship.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_03_ekosso.gifRosemary Ekosso describes the last weeks of former World Bank head, Paul Wolfowitz as being like an animal holding on to grass to 'avoid being washed away by water'.

'We all saw how Mr. Paul Wolfowitz, (now, thankfully, former) head of the World Bank, held grass for weeks after it was brought to public notice that he was embroiled in a sordid scandal involving a female companion. Well, Mr. Wolfowitz was swept away by the flood of public opinion. And now the US government is offering to replace him with someone who is, as evidenced by the article below, even worse, especially for the Third World.'

Any relief at Wolfowitz departure is offset by the possibility of an even worse replacement, Robert Zoellick of WTO fame. Jubilee Research describes him as 'the tireless champion of free trade, but Robert Zoellick the promoter of American interests by any means and at any cost – especially to developing countries'.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_04_chipla.gifChippla's Weblog posts an interesting piece on the recent Kenya Airways crash in Cameroons. A reader of his blog, Bert, speculates that the Captain was under pressure from his superiors to get the plane back to Nairobi as soon as possible. Whether the newly qualified 1st officer disagreed with the Captains decision to fly may never been known but even if he did, what chance did he have of questioning the authority of the Captain and the higher echelons of KA? A similar situation happened in 1977.

'Bert also made mention of the worst aviation disaster in history—the 1977 Tenerife disaster between two Boeing 747s belonging to KLM and Pan Am—and how the unchallenged faulty decision of the KLM flight captain resulted in the death of almost 600 people. Voice transcript of this incident (as made available on Wikipedia) shows how foggy weather and the misinterpretation of communication with the control tower led the seasoned KLM flight captain to initiate take off despite questions from his flight engineer.'

Chippla’s point is that we live in a 'world where authority is recognised' but how do we challenge that authority in cases like these crashes? Should we have any influence as passengers/consumers on the Captains or any authorities decisions?

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_05_david.gifDavid Ajao’s Blog is excited by the entry into the African blogosphere of Black South African blogger - Israel Mlambo. The fact that such an entry is worthy of it’s own post and celebration says it all.

'it is with pleasure that I introduce to you, a black South African blogger, Israel Mlambo. He blogs at http://izzonline.blogspot.com * You should read another of his blog post 'The SA blogosphere is ‘entirely’ white' to understand why I emphasised the word “black”.' – More on Israel in the Southern African review.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_06_wordsbody.gifWordsbody celebrates this year’s Orange Prize to be announced on the 6th June. Here she goes back to 2004 when Andrea Levy won the prize for a novel 'Small Island' and Nigeria's Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie had been shortlisted for her debut novel, Purple Hibiscus. This year Adichie is once again a nominee for her latest novel Half of a Yellow Sun. Excellent write up and I look forward to this year's edition.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/307/blogs_07_blacklooks.gifBlack Looks listens to a speech by Nigeria’s former finance minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala – part of the TED Africa hooray taking place this week in Arusha, Tanzania. A gathering of technologists, entertainers and designers (TED!) from across Africa and beyond with the hope of creating a 'A Different Africa'. No AIDS, poverty, shackdwellers, conflict, human rights violations or limits on press freedom, here. The focus is on business and 'doing it for ourselves'. BL comments

'One thing I do agree with is “We have to do it for ourselves”. The Abahlali baseMjondolo shack dwellers have shown us and proved that a social movement can engage in real participatory democracy and stand up to oppression, elitism, BEE (Black Economic Empowerment) for the few, racism and economic apartheid. People get very excited when talking about this “other Africa” - the one of growth in telecoms and of course huge profits, most of which are made from the poor subsidising the rich (cheaper tariffs and better deals for contract versus “pay as you go”). Privatisation policies which include privatisation of basic needs such as water, and electricity and again the poor subsidising the rich who pay less for their electricity than the poor and commercial enterprises being subsidised by consumers. And the big wow - Nigeria now has a shopping mall where businesses are turning over 4 times more than projected. Hows that for progress? Especially when it runs on its own private set of generators and God knows where it gets its water from? And even more exciting is the new “mining code” legislation which would be a great leap forward except it has somehow now reached the oil industry. But with all these great leaps forward where is the money going - not into social programmes, not in constructing an electric power system and running water.'

The review of African blogs has been running in Pambazuka News for almost two years. I believe the reviews form an important part of Pambazuka News as they provide readers with a 'third voice' within the mediascape. From time to time, I would like to open up the weekly reviews to other African bloggers either on the continent or in the diaspora to contribute as guest reviewers. If you are interested in being a guest reviewer please contact me by email:

with BLOG REVIEW in the subject line.

Sokari Ekine - online editor.

Over the coming weeks we will be focusing on regional coverage, starting this week with North Africa.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_01_nefertiti.gif comments on a new law which she states reflects Egypt’s religious intolerance. She reports on a new law that forbids Christians who have converted to Islam from reverting to Christianity however Muslims who covert to Christianity then wish to revert back to Islam are free to do so.

According to Neferteeti, there is resentment from the Christian community who say the law is a 'step backwards' as the constitution gives freedom of religion.

'Meanwhile, Christian clergy have also voiced their concern over the new law, saying that Christians must take a serious stand against the law and object to the oppression of the government.

Morqous Aziz, a Coptic priest, recently told reporters that there would be an appeal of the ruling.

'This is...oppression against all religions and the [Egyptian] Constitution. The Pope will do something about the matter.'

Maybe people should study the religion they want to convert to a little more deeply then they wouldn’t have to go back and forth between religions.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_02_snefru.gifFellow Egyptian blogger – Faisal's Tobril takes issue with Neferteeti’s comment stating that she 'has got things wrong' about Islam and in particular her statement about Islam being too afraid to let people choose. He goes on to say:

'Do we blame Christianity, or the Aryan race, for Hitler’s mass murder of European Jews? Or do we blame one man, Hitler himself, for the actions taken by members of the Nazi party and the army of the Third Reich?

I should think the answers to the question would be: The men themselves (and not Christianity) as well as Hitler (and not Christianity nor the Aryan race).

It does not require a religious scholar nor a person of astounding knowledge to realize that the application of the different supposed rules of different religions are carried out differently from region to region and country to country. Compare Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Morrocco, Turkey and Egypt, if you need facts.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_03_mahgrebism.gifMaghrebism is one of many North African blogs commenting on President Nicolas Sarkozy’s appointment of Rachida Dati (of Moroccan and Algerian parentage) as the new justice minister. He does not say whether he supports the appointment but responds to those people that criticise the appointment such as Morocco Time (see below).

'You know, I’ve seen this happen a lot. Apparently, we Moroccans/North Africans in Europe, are subjected to an invisible law that states that we can only be government members if that government is “leftist”.

Apparently there is also another invisible law that states that North Africans have to have the same view on immigration and integration as the “leftists”.

And if we don’t share the same views, we’re bigots, traitors and Uncle Toms.
Why can’t an immigrant child share the same views as Sarkozy? (or any other rightist politician for that matter).'

No there is no law but as Morocco Time points out there is considerable hypocrisy around Ms Dati’s support of Sarkozy…

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_04_liosliath.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_05_blacklooks.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_06_septic.gifSeptiC asks us to sign a petition against the proposed concert by the Rolling Stones in Israel. He received one comment saying that no one gave 'a rat's ass' about boycotting and responded as follows:

'In the eyes of the uneducated and unwilling to learn, maybe. But that only applies if your expectations are very low. Mine aren't.

Some people know damn well what's going on. A good example that I came across a couple of weeks ago is Alan Rickman of Die Hard, Galaxy Quest, and the Potter movies. Rickman directed a play based on the diaries of Rachel Corrie - the 23 year old American woman who was killed on March 16, 2003 by an Israeli Army bulldozer while she was protesting against the demolition of Palestinian civilian homes.

I wouldn't for a second think that Alan Rickman, for instance, didn't give a "rat's ass".

Artists who choose to inform themselves of the realities of the situation should act responsibly. And in this day and age, not informing yourself is simply irresponsible.

If the Rolling Stones don't, as you say, "give a rat's ass" - then we should make it clear to them that we, in turn, won't give a rat's ass about them. It's that simple.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_07_altmuslim.gif • Ensure transparency and accountability on both ends. Nobody expects the US government to simply take the word of Muslim institutions and community leaders when they say they will take the necessary steps to prevent extremism from taking root.
• Give Muslims the freedom to fight extremism on the front lines. The main place that extremism thrives is not your local mosque, but on the Internet…'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_08_progmuslima.gifProgressive Muslima News points to a BBC report on French rapper of Congolese parentage, Abd Al Malik who performs at France’s 'Metisses Music Festival'.

'His latest album Gibraltar has already won four awards, including the prestigious Victoire de la Musique. It’s an original mix of hip-hop, slam poetry and French philosophy. He sees Gibraltar as the symbolic meeting point of Africa and Europe.

The reason I called it Gibraltar was to use music to try and link our different cultures and people together…'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_09_laila.gif
Moroccan literary blogger, http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/305/blogs_10_egyptian.gifEgyptian Chronicle writes about an advert in an Egyptian newspaper by Animal Rights activists attacking 'officials for the ill-treatment of street dogs'. This is serious as the President has ordered an investigation being that this ill treatment of dogs could affect the country’s tourist industry. Her comment:

'I don't know really which is bad or can affect the repetition of Egypt abroad photos of a dead pregnant street dog or video clips from humans sexually and physically abused in the police stations.

When the humans take their right first we can speak about other creatures' right because don't expect an oppressed human will treat others which are weaker from him or her fairly.

It seems the President is right – when it comes to tourism and the country’s reputation more people care about the dogs than Egypt’s human rights abuses.'

* Sokari Ekine is online editor of Pambazuka News and editor of the Black Looks blog

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_01_zeleza.gifPius Adesanmi of writes an open letter to France’s new president, Sarkozy with particular reference to the commonalities i.e. both share 'common roots in immigration'. However unlike Pius, Sarkozy goes to 'inhuman lengths to deny his origin'.

'These differences in our attitudes to our mutual roots in the third world notwithstanding, I am saying that we understand each other not because as Minister of the Interior, you rampaged and hounded Arab and Black African immigrants with unequaled inhumanity; not because you abused them from the roof tops; not because you are one of the most hated “westerners” in the communities of dregs from the global south who litter the beautiful metropoles you are trying to keep spick and span; we understand each other because you are one of us! We understand each other because, every time you see your Dad or your brothers and sisters, the mirror shows you the immigrants you just hounded off the streets of Paris for the day. Your visceral hatred of the very conditions of your own emergence is not something we should discuss here.'

Pius goes on to warn Sarkozy not to get ahead of himself over the congratulatory messages from various right wing leaders and politicians around the world and end up a poodle of George Bush. Because unlike Sarkozy’s France – in the US you cannot go around calling

'predominantly hopeless Arab and Black African youths “racaille” (scum), no problem! Since race, racism, and discrimination are not allowed to exist in the République, no one can be injured! Call Azouz Begag, novelist, public intellectual of Algerian origin, and until recently your fellow minister, a “sale connard” (stupid idiot), no problem! There is no discrimination in the République. Call Africans moving to France “toute la misere du monde” (all the world’s misery), no problem. There can be no injury. Call gays and lesbians names that my North American context of political correctness won’t allow me to repeat here, no problem. There can be no harm done on account of things that do not exist. Call Arabs dirty people who keep “moutons dans la baignoire” (sheep in the bath tub), no problem. Again there can be no injury.'

Cairo Freeze posts a cartoon showing Sarkozy’s support for Israel.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_02_africamedia.gifAfrica Media reports on a study that says African women are portrayed more positively in the magazine Marie Claire. However AM writes:

'Despite certain positive images, the study confirms that the magazine does include some stereotypical portraits of suffering of African women. In addition, the magazine also infrequently includes coverage of visits to the continent by movie stars such as Drew Barrymore who sobs over the horrors of Africa. (What, she couldn't find a baby to take home as a souvenir?)'

The full report will be published later this month but it sounds more of the same sobs over the horrors of Africa.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_03_timbuktu.gifTimbuktu Chronicles has report on the construction of a wind pump in rural Kenya made from “old bicycle parts and roofing materials” which is being used to power the water supply from wells.

'Evidence suggests that in rural development, initiatives often take a stronger root when they have been “discovered” locally, rather than introduced from elsewhere. That shouldn’t mean an end to the propagation of sustainable technologies, but it does perhaps suggest that stimulating people to solve their own problems may lead to more lasting solutions.'

It also shows what can be done with a creative mind and using recyclable materials, one more thing that the West can learn from Africa.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_04_kubatana.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_06_jontyfisher.gifThe Fishbowl comments on the latest addition to the list of potential ANC presidents in 'The big men roll in'.

'As we near the ANC AGM, the big guns are starting to roll into town. Tokyo Sexwale has officially "announced" his arrival on the presidential nominations board...expect more to follow...Cyril Ramaphosa, paging Cyril Ramaphosa.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_07_ekbensahinghana.g…Trials and Tribulations of a Freshly-Arrived Denizen..of Ghana asks why 'Ecowas officals lost their lives' on the Trans West African Highway which is fast becoming the Trans West African road to death.

'In effect, the so-called Trans-West African Highway Network has been comprehensively completed since last week, prompting joys that the ECOWAS link-up is becoming more of a reality.

Sadly, it's coming at a cost, as exemplified by last Thursday's eerie accident that involved two articulators travelling at top speed in opposite directions; the helping of Ghanaian motorists of passengers of an overturned bus (comprising West Africans from Cote d' Ivoire, Liberia, Benin, Nigeria and Togo) resulting in their deaths as the second articulator hit them at top speed (after having lost control). Altogether, seven vehicles were involved in the very sad loss of lives that claimed 40 people.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_08_blackstar.gifBlack Star Journal is one of the few bloggers to consistently report on the conflict in Guinea (Conakry)

'Disaffected soldiers in Guinea have erupted in an orgy of rioting and looting in recent weeks…Soldiers claim that wages have been withheld since 1996, when an army mutiny-cum-attempted coup costs hundreds of lives, and wants the re-integration of troops who were sacked after those events…Over the weekend, soldiers went on the rampage in Conakry, causing panic in the capital…The head of state, Gen. Lansana Conté, conceded to the demands of the mutineers by sacking the army chief and the defense minister. But troops continued to run amock.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_09_sokwanele.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_10_sudanreeves.gifSudan Reeves writes an open letter to Darfur activists and advocates on China and the 2008 olympic games.

'The full-scale launch of a large, organized campaign to highlight China's complicity in the Darfur genocide appears likely to begin soon. But it's past time to start thinking about how to tap the creative power of students and other Darfur advocates in this critical initiative. Enough of selling green bracelets and writing letters to those who are content with posturing or avoiding the central challenge of the moment: changing the international diplomatic dynamic in ways that will result in deployment of an international peace-support operation to Darfur, one that can provide adequate protection to civilians and humanitarians.

It's time, now, to begin shaming China-demanding that if the Beijing government is going to host the premier international event, the Summer Olympic Games of 2008, they must be responsible international partners. China's slogan for these Olympic Games- 'One world, one dream'-is a ghastly irony, given Beijing's complicity in the Darfur genocide (see the website for China's hosting of the Olympic Games at http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/304/blogs_11_naijaman.gifIjebuman's Diary More excellent satire from ID. This week it’s 'Naija DemoCrazy for DUMMIES'.

'A friend wanted to know about naija's democracy, so i've decided to do a dummies style tongue-in-cheek explanation of democracy naija style.

According to the 1999 constitution (which is sometimes used as a "guide" and is probably used as a door stopper in the presidential villa) Nigeria is a "democracy" and operates a presidential system of government where there's a true separation of powers (i.e Executive, Legislature and the Judiciary)...'

* Sokari Ekine is online editor of Pambazuka News and author of Black Looks blog (on a recess).

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

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_01_tambour.gif by Guy Angrand interviews Raoul Peck the director of Lumumba: The death of a Prophet. Like Guy, Raoul is Haitan but grew up in the DRC.

(Raoul Peck) His family was displaced to Kinshasa by the Duvalier regime in the early 1960s where his family, among 600 others, sought asylum. He went to school in Kinshasa, Brooklyn, France, and then finally Germany where he got his degree in engineering. He then came to New York where he became a cab driver as he awaited acceptance into film school in Germany in 1984.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_02_mental.gifFollowi… the recent crash of Kenyan Airlines, Kenyan blogger MentalAcrobtics asks 'how safe are African skies and how safe are African airlines'. He presents some facts about both Kenyan airways and the plane that crashed.

The airline
IOSA is the global benchmark for airline safety management. It is designed to assess airline operational management and control systems based on internationally recognised standards. Any airline wishing to join IATA must be IOSA registered. By the end of 2007, all IATA members must successfully undergo the IOSA audit in order to retain IATA membership. Carriers must achieve registration by the end of 2008. IOSA is open to all airlines. Four African airlines already have IOSA registration; South African Airways, Kenya Airways, Comair, Royal Air Maroc and Egyptair. Kenya Airways is a safe airline.

The plane
The plane involved in the incident today was a brand new Boeing 737-800. The plane was collected from Boeing in October 2006 and went into service in November 2006. No ramshackle plane this.
On African skies in general – the continenet has the second worse accident record in the world – second only to the CIS.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_03_thinkers.gifThinkers Room also comments on the crash in particular the way it was reported in some sections of the international media.

'They were energetic enough to say five Brits, one Swiss and one Swede, but could not be bothered to break down the African casulaties, settling for “The remainder were Africans”. Why then did they not say some Europeans as well? Are we second class human beings? I guess I should not be surprised to expect a myopic news organization is unable to live up to its “International” tag.
Granted, there is no formula as to how to handle such tragic events, but I’m sure if we followed the simple parameters of treating them with the seriousness they deserve and utmost respect to the affected family and friends, we should be OK………But that’s just me.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_04_nigeria.gifFor Nigeria Politricks he is glad Obasanjo is leaving but for the people the 'struggle continues'.

'We are glad OBJ is going to retire in ignominy back to Otta farm come 29 May – good riddance! For the rest of the ordinary Nigerians, the struggle continues! We strongly believe there was no election and the so-called president-elect Yar’Adua was borne out of illegality and his regime will be a charade; the continued entrenchment of the wanton destruction of the Nigerian social, economic and political lives!'

He goes on to write about the silence around the rape of Nigerian women in the country which is according to Amnesty International, epidemic. Definitely a need to write more about this issue.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_05_pumlagqola.gifNew South African blogger, Loudrastress posts a comment one the anniversary of the Zuma rape trial decision.

'I do know that the rape case of the former national vice president turned the volume up on gender based violence, not just in relation to the case itself, but also generally why we live in the siege we do as women. I have been called melodramatic when I’ve used “siege” to describe the state in which women live within the borders of the South African nation state. I stand by my words. Anybody with a cursory appreciation of how likely each woman is to be subjected to different forms of gender based violence (sexual harassment, physical abuse, psychological battery, financial abuse, forced subjection to the witness of degradation and violence metted out to others, etc) knows that I am being far from melodramatic.

The case brought us face to face to the widespread nature of South African hypocrisy on the subject of gender anything. On the one hand, it is about as hard to find someone who supports violence against women in SA as it is to find a white person who voted for apartheid. Yet, we did not imagine apartheid and we are not imagining the rampant abuse of women today. Just as systems of institutionalised violence like apartheid need complicit Blacks to assist with the deepening of with white supremacist work, patriarchy needs violent women. And we saw many of them outside the court a year ago: burning pictures of the complainant and acting out similar intimidation of her supporters. Many more were apologists for a whole range of other linked forms of misogyny.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_06_sudanese.gifSudanese Thinker is furious with a report that the US State Dept report that stated the Sudanese Government was “strong partner in the War on Terror”. ST comments:

'Interesting, so now Darfur is both genocide and terrorism but that’s not the main point... Maybe it is a reason, maybe not, I don’t know, but I do know one thing for sure. Bush has been very patient. And no, unlike previously I don’t think it’s because he’s too busy with Iraq. After all we did witness the United States assisting the Ethiopian army in the bombing raids conducted against suspected al-Qaeda fighters in Somalia recently. It didn’t require much effort or resources and surely conducting one in Darfur won’t be different. So why didn’t it happen until now? The “he’s too busy with Iraq” idea doesn’t make much sense to me now. I guess the janjaweed and suspected al-Qaeda fighters are classified very differently from one another. At least he thinks so too.'

So what is going on here – clearly as ST states there are two forces at work. Those that believe Sudan is a partner against the war on terror and those that believe they are committing genocide in Darfur. Either way they need to make their minds up as you cannot have the President on one side and the State Dept on the other and expect anything meaningful to happen in the near future.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_07_harowo.gifSomali blog, Harowo.com explains some of what is happening in Mogadishu – the installation of two American backed new warlords of the city, Mohammed Dheere and Chief Awale. Quoting McClatchy Newspapers he writes:

'Mohamed Dheere is very much in the classic "strongman" mode so beloved by America's dispensers of liberation and democracy over the past century. He comes to his new post from his former gangland turf in the northern town of Jowhar, "where he presided over a famously ruthless extortion network.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_08_whiteafrican.gifhttp://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_09_freedom.gifFreedom for Egyptians is one of the few non Francophone bloggers to report on the French elections.

'Sarkozy’s victory will signal a new balance of powers in Europe and worldwide. Following the war on Iraq, most of the European governments that took over were leftists or center left as the case with Spain and Italy. Sarkozy who made it clear that he is against the war on Iraq, is a right wing pro-American French politician however. Sarkozy's victory in a world charged against right wing governments that supported the war in Iraq, says something about France’s domestic affairs and the French people’s new orientation.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_10_mzalendo.gifMzalendo: Eye on Kenyan Parliament have created yet another brilliant idea - they are in the process of building a searchable database of 'parliamentary aspirants'.

'Why? So you can know them:
• Who they are
• Where they are standing
• Their background and history
• What they stand for: their vision
We’re still iroing out rough edges but we think it is stable enough for you to use.'

This site is something other African blogging communities should build on and create for their own respective countries which along with Pambazuka’s African Union Monitor will keep an eye on what are leaders and parliamentarians are up to and hopefully make them more accountable and us as citizens more able to call them to account.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/303/blogs_11_sandmonkey.gifFin…, Egyptian blogger, Rantings of a Sandmonkey lays down his blogger tools and says goodbye to the blogosphere. Well he had already said goodbye and received over 500 farewell messages and then decided he needed to further clarify his reasons for leaving – which are still unclear to me. Apparently he feels insecure about blogging from Egypt but has since left Egypt for the US. He feels the Egyptian blogosphere has been largely uncritical and insufficiently active against the government and finally he wants to see a community of activists bloggers from around the Middle East come together to fight freedom of press in general and the blogosphere in particular. So why are you leaving?

'Pursuing such an organization this would be the logical next step, for me, for us, to take. This will be my focus in the few remaining days I have here in DC: How to make such an organization real. If you are interested, if you think this is a good idea and would like to help, or have suggestions or ideas or input to help improve or facilitate this, please contact me and let me know. I am all ears, and open to all suggestions……….To risk sounding cliché and trite, let's light and candle instead of cursing the darkness………We can do this!....The Sandmonkey.'

I never did like the name 'Sandmonkey'!

* Sokari Ekine is online editor of Pambazuka News and blogs at http://www.blacklooks.org/

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_crytonchikoko.gif
Malawian blogger writes that Malawi is 'going through a period of change' one of which is the increase in 'clean' uranium production.

'Just to put you in the picture. Currently, Malawi produces 275 megawatts of hydro-powered electricity every year. However from next year we will be producing up to 3.3 million pounds of uranium oxide every year. Converted into electricity production, 3.3 million pounds of uranium is enough to produce more than 6,000 megawatts of electricity each year. This is projected to earn the country about 200 million U.S. dollars every year for the mining life span! This is unprecedented for our country. I can't stop thinking of what we could do with electricity generated from the uranium...a stop to the constant power cuts, a huge surge of power into our manufacturing industry, what about a good electricity powered transportation system (don't stop me dreaming) may be thus a possibility?'

So what's the catch? The benefits of the mining goes to the multinationals who have exclusive rights over the Kayalekera mines; questions about the environmental cost of the mining uranium? will the electricity generated reach the Malawian people? What if any will be the impact on unemployment and for the few that do manage to get jobs – how will their salaries relate to the profits of the mining companies and to the salaries of expatriates employed by the MNC.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_grandioseparlour.gif… blogger, Grandiose Parlor comments on a post by Dare Obasanjo's blog (son of President) on the occasion of his father's 70th birthday. GP takes particular offence over a photograph and the word 'servant' - the caption reads:

'One of the servants sitting down on the bed of his one room apartment. You can see the entire apartment in this shot.'

All but one of the comments support GP's position on the use of the word 'servant' except for one commenter who writes:

'Oh come on. You guys are too far removed from the realities in Nigeria. In Nigeria its all in a days job for a grown man to receive a slap from the madam. Who amongst you have not used the label “house boy” in the past.'

Well I for one have never used that expression – we were brought up to be respectful to those employed by our parents and not to expect them to work for us as children. The comment is a reflection of the whole lack of respect for people and an acceptance that the status quo is fixed in stone. With that kind of attitude it is no wonder we continue to have such useless and corrupt leadership and a dismissal human rights record in areas such as child labour and child abuse.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_entrepreneur.gifCame… blogger, The Entrepreneur considers the debate around the proposed African Union Government or Union of African States. Two meetings will be held, one in May and one in July to discuss the proposal.

'The purpose of the two exercises is to undertake in-depth discussions on the nature of the continent’s integration agenda in order to determine where we are, where we are going, when and how to get there. The need for such an exercise at this point in time, arose from a proposal considered by the Assembly at its 4th ordinary session in Abuja in January, 2005, on the creation of certain ministerial portfolios for the African Union. The Assembly accepted that the proposal was pertinent and forward looking and also in line with the vision of the African Union. It therefore, decided to set up a Committee of seven Heads of State under President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda to examine the proposal in all its ramifications.'

For further information on the Union debate see Pambazuka News and the African Union Monitor (accessed from Pambazuka's website)

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_roundtable.gif
Sub-Saharan African Roundtable publishes a disturbing piece on 'Congo's forgotten women'. Women who were taken to Uganda from the Congo by Ugandan armed forces and then left to fend for themselves.

'In 2001, after a disastrous misadventure in the Congo, Ugandan troops trekked back home with a cargo of hundreds of Congolese women they had “married” while fighting in that country. Most of them ended up in northern Uganda where their men had been hastily taken to continue the seemingly endless fight against the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army. But it wasn’t long before the rosy picture the Congolese women had of Uganda turned rough. They were quickly abandoned by their “husbands” who, unknown to most of them, had wives back home. Without anywhere to stay, many turned to prostitution; others joined the nearly two million internally displaced people in northern Uganda, existing in cramped and dingy camps.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_southerncameroon.gifSouthern Cameroons Interim Goverment-in-Exile is a blog dedicated to the liberation of Southern Cameroons – their mission statement reads:

'The Southern Cameroons Interim Government-in-Exile (IG) is dedicated to the liberation of the people of the Southern Cameroons from the brutal colonial control of France masquerading as La Republique du Cameroun. After more than a century of colonization and the failure of Great Britain and the United Nations (UN) to perform their sacred duty and obligation of guiding the people of the Southern Cameroon to “self-government and/or independence," the IG is resolved to return to Southern Cameroonians their humanity and their God given right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.'

In 2003 the group filed a complainant with the Africa Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights against the Republic of Cameroon for violating the rights of hundreds of citizens of Southern Cameroon. The aim of the Southern Cameroon National Council (SCNC) and Southern Cameroon Peoples Organisation (SCAPO) is independence from the Republic of Cameroon by peaceful means.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_vaw.gifViolence Against Women: Do Something is a blog created by Ethiopian blogger Concoction to specifically highlight the global violence against women and to encourage everyone to 'do something' to end the violence. In this latest post she reports that the progress made by VAW activists is being hampered by President Bush's lack of commitment to act on the issue.

'If the Office on Violence Against Women in the Department of Justice, then...critics fear the administration would eliminate or de-emphasize certain anti-violence programs and add funding for new, untested programs. That, in turn, could deny victims access to what advocates say is a "well-rounded" menu of programs that was carefully considered by Congress and signed into law by the president.”... The other issue is funding problem. The Bush administration has not funded some programs at all while severely under fund others.'

Although this post is US specific, VAW is a global issue. One of the barriers to stopping VAW lies with those of us who have been victims of violence – we all need to speak out and testify to our own experiences and that of others we know. Another is families and communities that remain silent even when the violence is staring at them in the face. We all must try to speak out and shame those that commit acts of violence against women and children.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_fiyanda.gif
New Nigerian blogger, Funmi Iyanda's Blog posts on an interview she had with Nigerian actress, Shan George who spoke about the marital violence she experienced.

'At 15 she was married off to a much older man on the promise that he'll educate her. 2 children, six years and many beatings later and the promise of education looked like a mirage. At each beating, she runs to her mother, her only relative who sternly orders her back to her husband and who informs her that if she leaves the marriage she had no home with her.'

In an act of great courage at the age of 21, Shan walks out on the man even though she has no where to go and ends up on the streets of Lagos until she is helped by another woman who takes her into her home. Sounds like a Nollywood movie but this is real life fact. A great post.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_olawunmi.gifSilent Storms in an ocean of one gets the feeling of power from holding a shotgun – ok he was clay pigeon shooting. Personally I cant see the attraction but I guess it is fairly harmless. At least he wasn't out shooting birds or animals. But then he goes on to analyse his own feelings around holding a gun and the potential of using it as a weapon of power- fortunately not a feeling he is at all comfortable with.

'...because i am still struggling to understand the Virginia Tech tragedy, I wanted to take a few moments to appreciate what holding that gun in my hands felt like. there was a sense of power, reinforced by the kick in my right shoulder as the rifle spit flames; it was a feeling which became a light-headed thrill as each clay-disc disc shattered before my eyes, each hit punctuated by the excited cheering of my friends. .in a flash i understood the attraction that guns have for some people. its a feeling of power, something close to omnipotence. that steel tube feeds the bearer with an assurance that he can exert some control over his own destiny - that i can defend myself and my family if needs be, ensuring that nothing is taken from us without the usurper paying some sort of price. its not even necessarily an aggressive assurance, it could be more passive than that, but its strength nonetheless. the second amendment makes sense when that firearm is within reach, it just does...I was also aware of the menace, the sense that the gun could so easily be used as an instrument of oppression was there. that power that made me feel at ease could also be the tool with which a malevolent nature manifested itself on the world around it. if a man wanted, he could get people to submit, and that is power indeed - just wave the gun and bark a few instructions, and you're the almighty. at least until a more determined person turned up.'

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/302/blogs_blacklooks.gif
Black Looks comments on the Imus 'nappy headed ho' incident and the overall trend of blaming it all on “hip hop”. Kameelah writes:

'...first, the language of mainstream hip hop cannot be excused under any circumstances. but, this is really a question of diverting attention from imus to hip-hop culture. imus acts as if he is a 8 year old child who heard a bad word in the school yard and innocently repeated it and as such should carry no responsibility. everyone responds and jumps on the bandwagon on blame hip hop and imus in chilling in the background laughing at critics black and white alike who have completely moved the center and have allowed him to blend into the background as just another victim of the hypnotizing trance of hip hop and its predatory tentacles. let’s play history correctly and remind ourselves that the images of black women did not ORIGINATE within hip hop, rather these images originated in scientific discourse and white racism hundreds of years ago and are often punctuated by the capturing and carnavalizing of difference and inferiority most notably with sara baartman (otherwise known as the hottentot venus). as william jelani cobb says.'

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.g…Thoughts 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]

"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.