Two former Nigerian governors, Orji Kalu and Saminu Turaki, have landed in trouble over their failure honour an invitation by the officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). They waited to be arrested over indictments relating to corruption. Turaki and Kalu were governors of Jigawa and Abia states respectively.

The United Nations Security Council has applauded the resumption of talks between Morocco and the Polisario Front in Western Sahara. The next month's talks will include the stakeholders and neighbours, Algeria and Mauritania. A statement read by the Security Council President, Wang Guangya of China, the council expressed delight over the resumption of talks.

Sbu Xaba’s frustration and despair is understandable. After the end of apartheid there was genuine hope that the lives of the poor would improve. This is what the incoming ANC government had promised. But as more than a decade passed, hope turned to frustration, despair and anger. Those most effected by these broken promises, the ‘poors’, have not been silent. In 2005 alone there were 6000 protests in South Africa.

Yesterday morning news of our current difficulties was injudiciously leaked to international media by a former associate. We had hoped to keep the wraps on this for some time while we tried to mobilise support with the Communist Party and Government of China; but now, alas the news is out, and we are not sure what the result will be.

Leeds University Centre for African Studies will host a conference on The State, Mining and Development in Africa from 13-14 September, 2007. Africa has a long history of mining. It remains a continent with some of the richest world reserves of minerals and its oil is earmarked by the US and other western consumers. The mining sector is recognised by many international institutions and policy groups as a vehicle for promoting growth and development in the 21st Century.

Leeds University Centre for African Studies will host a conference on The State, Mining and Development in Africa from 13-14 September, 2007. Africa has a long history of mining. It remains a continent with some of the richest world reserves of minerals and its oil is earmarked by the US and other western consumers. The mining sector is recognised by many international institutions and policy groups as a vehicle for promoting growth and development in the 21st Century.

A new paper published by the African Centre for Constructive Resolution of Disputes takes a look at formal and informal leadership in Africa in light of leaders’ pivotal role in setting political agendas, distributing resources and political action. The author argues that the international perception of Africa as a continent of endemic conflict largely overshadows the significant progress made towards more stable, accountable and open political systems.

This latest International Crisis Group report from the International Crisis Group, examines the strains emerging prior to presidential and legislative elections and the impact they will have on the country’s delicate peace-building. Sierra Leone is still a fragile state in which peace will not be consolidated unless the new authorities tackle sources of popular discontent such as corruption, chiefs’ abuse of power and youth unemployment.

US Social Forum - Excellent commentary.

Thanks for publishing.

Horrific acts of violence were committed against women and children during and after the wars in the Great Lakes region. Dieu-Donné Wedi Djamba points to the pain and other injustices experienced by survivors in order to sensitise the regional communities and authorities to become involved with the healing process of the thousands of women and children 'so the words "never again" can have a meaning.

We want our dignity back! Time to wipe tears and heal wounds of women and girls, victims of wars in the Great Lakes region.

All societies that have faced mass trauma and violence have certain things in common, including the matter of perpetrators, bystanders and victims. Perpetrators usually argue that they obeyed orders; and that their actions were not of their own volition. Bystanders usually claim ignorance; that they did not know these things were happening; that they were not given proper information; and therefore, that they are not accountable. Most important are the victims, most of whom want to heal; and some of whom may even be prepared to forgive. [1] In brief, all three groups need a space in the new post-conflict era, in order to live peacefully vis-à-vis society and their own consciences.

But in the Great Lakes region, while the perpetrators and bystanders are living peacefully and comfortably, [2] [3] the victims, particularly women and girls, continue to experience the same nightmares. They have paid a heavy price for the deadly wars, which have caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, refugees and displacements, mass human rights violations such as rape, torture, and other atrocities, burning of houses and the looting of national resources by the different armed groups. [4] An aftermath does not seem to exist for them. Indeed, the post-conflict period is the equivalent of the period of the actual conflict.

This paper highlights the pain and other injustices experienced by women and girls during and after the wars in the Great Lakes region. The aim is to sensitise the Great Lakes region community as a whole and the region’s authorities in particular to be involved in the healing process of the thousands of women and girl victims of wars in the region; so that the words ‘never again’ can have a meaning.

The time of hurt

Although having different roots in each Great Lakes country, wars are the main time during which women and girls have been deeply hurt. Indeed, rapes, abductions, tortures, mutilations or burying women and girls alive were different strategies used by belligerents in the different wars which have affected the Great Lakes region over decades.

Protected as a weak sex, women and girls become a weapon for belligerents to destroy both enemy groups and civilians. In this regard, Amnesty International USA [5] has pointed out that rape, sometimes by groups as large as 20 men, has become a hallmark of the conflict, with armed factions often using it as part of a calculated strategy to destabilise opposition groups, undermine fundamental community values, humiliate the victims and witnesses, and secure control through fear and intimidation.

Louise Nzigire, a social worker, at Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, stated that rape has been a cheap and simple weapon for all parties in the war, more easily obtainable than bullets or bombs: ‘This violence was designed to exterminate the population’, [6] she added. Juliane Kippenberg, co-author of a 2002 Human Rights Watch report The War within the War on sexual violence against women and girls in the eastern DRC, told IRIN: ‘A lot of women [in eastern DRC] were raped in front of their children. They will be affected.’[7]

Moreover, some survivors of genocide in Rwanda grieve that the rapists told them that they had been allowed to live, but only to die of sadness.[8] But rape is not the only component of the nightmare experienced by women and girls in the region. Sexual slavery, [9] abductions, mutilations, [10] tortures and killings [11] number among this macabre series.

The post-conflict situation

After being deeply affected by several years of conflicts, the Great Lakes region is moving towards peace. There are signs such as the elections in the DRC [12], the peace talks between Ugandan government and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) [13], the peace talks in Burundi between government and the Forces for National Liberation (FNL), the last Hutu rebel group which refused to be involved to the peace process [14]and the Pact on Security, Stability and Development in the Great Lakes region, signed in December in Nairobi by 12 countries of the Great Lakes region.[15]

The end of every conflict is the beginning of a new life and a moment of rising hope for many victims of the conflicts. But while others are celebrating the new beginning, women and girls are still carrying the heavy weight of tears, sadness and sorrow. A rape victim in the eastern DRC town of Goma told IRIN [16] how she and her eight-year old daughter were raped by ‘military men’ in front of her husband. The husband later rejected the woman, leaving her deal with her trauma alone.

Jeannette Umurerwa, a widow survivor of genocide in Rwanda said ‘… our past is so sad. We are not understood by society...We are not protected against anything… Widows are without their own families, no homes, or money. We become crazy. We aggravate people with our problems. We are the living dead’.[17]

Furthermore, Consolata, 38, also a genocide survivor and widow says that re-marrying would be impossible for as long as she lives. ‘I was raped several times during the 1994 genocide and I contracted HIV/Aids’, she added.[18]

Moreover, while some are carrying physical and psychological wounds of conflicts, others are experiencing violence in their daily life. Many cases of rape and other violence committed by militia and national army or police against women and girls are reported.

In this regard, Monuc (United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo/Mission des Nations Unies en République Démocratique du Congo), the UN peacekeeping mission in the DRC [19], reported that the human rights situation in the country continues to deteriorate, as the army and police perpetrate acts of violence against civilians, and the number of reported rapes surges. Monuc also stated that there have been numerous cases in which Congolese soldiers and police have summarily executed and raped civilians, in some cases with apparent impunity. In western Bandundu Province, a policeman with the National Congolese Police reportedly shot a 60-year old woman when delivering a summons to her daughter who had been raped by another policeman.

Other victims are facing stigmatisation in their society. Human Rights Watch [20] has pointed out that the situation of rape victims is made worse by the stigma that is attached to such violence. In many cases these women and girls are ostracised to the margins of society. In some cases husbands have rejected their wives on learning they had been raped, sometimes on the pretext that the woman must have consented to the sexual relations. Thus the word ‘aftermath’ is an empty one for these victims.

The healing process

The pain and sorrow ruining the daily life of the women and girl victims of wars in the Great Lakes region push them to scream bitterly ’we want our dignity back!’ – the dignity which was taken away from them by rapists, tortures, killers, stigmatisation or insults.

It is time to wipe away the tears and heal the wounds. All those injustices women and girls in the Great Lakes region suffer must be corrected so that the long mourning they bear can end. To do this, those responsible for the mass abuses have to be held accountable in order to break the cycle of violence against women and girls, to send a deterrent message to the potential perpetrators, and to heal the wounds of victims. The second step will be the granting of reparations to the women and girl victims of wars.

Accountability for the perpetrators

Accountability for human rights violations is an important instrument in breaking the cycle of violence and impunity. It is an indispensable component of the process of healing the wounds.[21] In this regard, Alex Boraine argues that legal prosecutions have at least three additional advantages: firstly, prosecutions in most cases prevent high-ranking perpetrators from returning to positions of authority; secondly, tribunals and special courts aim to punish those who bear the greatest responsibility for human rights violations and thus assist in breaking the cycle of collective reprisals; and thirdly, due process avoids summary justice.[22]

In the post-conflict era, accountability for mass human rights abuses can be held through a judicial and a non-judicial process. Indeed, mass human rights violation occurred with the involvement of numerous of individuals. Thus it becomes almost impossible to set a trial for all those who were involved. Only those who bear heavy responsibility can stand trial. But still, it is possible to hold all perpetrators accountable by pressing them to recognise their wrongdoing and to show remorse. This can be done through a non-judicial forum, such as a truth and reconciliation commission.

Through a legacy of conflicts and repressive regimes, the Great Lakes region countries are characterised by a judicial system which is in a state of disarray,[23] or which does not guarantee a fair trial. Meanwhile in many of the countries where truth and reconciliation has not already completely failed, as it has in the DRC,[24] truth commission forums are still debatable.

However, the presence of a special tribune such as the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and the last decision taken by Rwandan government to abolish the death penalty [25] are strong signs of the fight against impunity. Indeed, the abolition of the death penalty from its judiciary arsenal will enable Rwanda to capitalise on the fight against impunity. Countries that reject the death penalty will be able to extradite to Rwanda exiles responsible for genocide and also to carry on with the trial after the ICTR ends in 2010.

But if a step is made in the fight against impunity through the Rwandan case, the Great Lakes region still has a long way to go to end impunity. Indeed, in the DRC, despite the mass human rights violations committed during and after the wars, only some isolated cases of trials are mentioned, while many accused of mass human right abuse are awarded in name of peace.[26] In Uganda, the population is waiting for the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate abuses in the government army[27], which is accused of having committed many atrocities in northern Uganda. While in Burundi, an agreement about creating a special criminal tribunal [28] for mass human rights violations was reached, though more still has to be done to establish it. A boost to the fight against violence against women and girls may be expected from the UN, which chose the end of impunity for violence against women and girls as theme for the International Women Day 2007.[29]

Reparations

Granting reparations for past abuses will not bring the dead back to life. Nor will it cancel out the harm already suffered by victims. But it will provide them with some relief.

In this regard, Margaret Mathew[30] argues that reparations should be paid to victims as a form of redress to demonstrate that the state recognises the harm done against them. She has argued for broader rehabilitation programme dedicated to healing communities and strengthening the nation’s social-political fabric.

Indeed, women and girls who have been raped and otherwise sexually abused have been psychologically damaged as well as physically injured by these crimes. Many will never fully recover. A significant number of women and girls have become pregnant as a result of being raped. An unknown number have been infected with HIV, dramatically altering their future lives, livelihoods and prospects.[31]

Therefore, the granting of reparations to those who suffered from past abuses boosts the healing process of their wounds. But to be efficient, the reparation process for women and girls victims of violence in the Great Lakes region must be made at two levels: direct and indirect reparations.

Direct reparations will include the granting of money or rebuilding of housing as compensation, and free medical treatment for those who suffer by trauma or any disease such as HIV/Aids. In this regard, the establishment of a special fund by the Great Lakes region countries is a step to be applauded. This fund can be used to pay compensation to the victims of wars. Indirect reparations will include capacity building for all the victims to empower them to face many challenges arising in their post-conflict life.

Furthermore, there is a need for the Great Lakes region countries to work together in policy making around gender issues. A common policy for all violence against women and girls will show real political will not only to end the current and prevent future violence. This step can also boost the healing process of current victims by seeing through the words ‘never again’ to violence against women and girls.

Conclusion

After being a war torn and deeply devastated region through several years of conflicts, the Great Lakes region is moving towards peace. But while others are celebrating the new beginning, women and girls are still carrying the heavy weight of tears and sadness.

It is time to heal their wounds and to wipe away their tears. The long mourning must end. To do so, those responsible for violence against women girls have to be held accountable. Reparations have to be granted to those who have experienced harm.

Thus the word ‘aftermath’ may have a meaning for all the women and girl victims of war in the Great Lakes region.

* Dieu-Donné Wedi Djamba is a lawyer (advocate) at the Lubumbashi Bar association in the DRC, an independent consultant in transitional justice, a human rights activist, an assistant lecturer in a college of law in Lubumbashi in the DRC and a writer.

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

References: see link below.

Sierra Leone hankers for a transformation most nations in the West enjoy in this modern era: a liberalized and technologically advanced economy within an established democratic order. It is foolish to ignore the notion that development interests and democratic principles are uneasily aligned in Sierra Leone today.

Away with Libya and its leader Muammar Gaddafi’s incessant reminders and a now a concerted call for USA! Unless he can expressly stand up and tell us, I do not see a thing that can bring Africans together, now or even in 50 years to come. There is absolutely nothing, save for our skin colour, which in various cases differs.

In Africa, while some countries are busy perpetuating corruption, others busy themselves with civil wars and murders of innocent civilians. At the same time some leaders infringe on the very rights that Gaddafi and his fellow unionists go about in Africa seeking to ‘protect’.

How would you unite Sudan and Zimbabwe when their own respective people cannot unite, do not speak the same language of peace and development and suffer from irreparable corruption, human rights abuse and corruption occasioned by dictatorial governments of Omar el Bashir and Robert Mugabe respectively?

What do Kenya and Western Sahara share in common, for instance? Or, what similarities does Rwanda and Morocco have? Someone tell us and other like-minded Kenyans like me will no doubt support Gaddafi’s efforts at uniting Africa.

Our economies are weak and with a plethora of other unions in existence such as EAC, COMESA, ECOWAS and SADDC among others, more funds will be needed to fund the common army, presidency, government and other necessities of the USA. Where do the African governments get the extra funds when their own national budgets have massive shortfalls? Is Gaddafi proposing that we run back to the West and China even after uniting Africa?

The whole idea of USA is Gaddafi’s way of taking the leadership of Africa which he tried through the African Union and failed. He wants Libya to dominate African affairs albeit through the wrong door. Be wary of Gaddafi and his antics. Away with the US of Gaddafi (USG)!

The recent national strike in Nigeria ended after only four days. Femi Aborisade argues that despite the sudden surrender of the unions, working class people have shown that they are a force to reckon in the process of policy formulation and implementation.

The four-day general strike in Nigeria has once again demonstrated the potentials of the working class to influence the course of history. President Umaru Yar’Adua admitted this much when he said the strike ‘wreaked havoc on economy and our people’ (24 June 2007). Government offices, private companies, petrol stations, ports, airports, schools and hospitals closed down. Commercial vehicles were off the road and major highways became football pitches for youths. Oil exports in all terminals except one were prevented. In short, the strike ‘paralysed’ Nigeria.

While President Umaru mourned the paralysing effects of the strike on crude oil exports, ordinary people saw in the strike an opportunity to express a striving to free themselves from the shackles of poverty. Over 70 per cent of Nigerians, about 98,000,000 people of a population of 140,000,000, live in extreme poverty, with less than a dollar a day. In the midst of pervasive poverty, former President Obasanjo, in the twilight of his tenure, took the following actions: The prices of petrol, kerosene and diesel per litre were increased by ten Naira (^10.00); petrol (PMS) was raised from ^65 to ^75, kerosene (DPK) from ^54 to ^64 and diesel (AGO) from ^54 to ^64. This amounted to an increase of over 15 per cent in the price of petrol/litre, and about 19 per cent increase in the prices of diesel and kerosene. VAT rate was raised by 100 per cent, from 5-10 per cent. In addition, six companies, including the Port Harcourt Refining Company Ltd (PHRC) and Kaduna Refining and Petrolchemical Company Limited were sold to foreign and local private companies without resolving labour concerns. Public sector employees were also agitating for payment of 15 per cent increase in basic pay, which the former President had granted but never implemented.

The poor perceived government actions as punitive measures to compound their agony. The payroll tax, called PAYE (Pay-As-You-Earn) has recently been changed to 10 per cent of gross pay instead of the previous policy of taxing only basic pay, after making allowances for dependants, children and the aged, etc. There are also the following taxes: National Housing Fund (NHF), 2.5 per cent of salary; Pension deductions, 7.5 per cent; National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), 5 per cent. These add up to 25 per cent of the employee’s pay. Workers earning poverty pay would be hard hit by the increase in VAT because they spend the bulk of their earnings on consumption items. Increases in the prices of petroleum products automatically cause increases in the prices of all other goods and services.

The process of increasing the prices of petroleum products was illegal. The Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPRA) was established by the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPRA) Act No. 8 of 2003. Section 2 of the Act provides for the membership of the PPRA Governing Board, which includes representatives of organized labour. Section 7 empowers the Board to determine the pricing policy of petroleum products. Paragraph 1 of the 1st Schedule to the Act prescribes that the Board shall take decisions by majority support. The Board never met. It was the Secretariat of the PPRA that unilaterally increased the prices of petroleum products. The increases were therefore illegal.

Besides, there was no economic rationale for the price increases. Nigeria currently produces an average of about 2.6 mbd (of crude oil) and exports about 2.3mbd. (Udo, 2007: C7). The 2007 budget was prepared on the basis of a benchmark value price of US$30 per barrel. With the price in the international market hovering between US$65 and US$70 per barrel, this translates to between US$35 and US$40 per barrel going into the excess crude oil account.

The privatisation of public enterprises, including the sale of refineries, violates the current Constitution of Nigeria, which provides that wealth shall not be concentrated in a few hands and that the State, not the private sector, shall manage the major sectors of the economy. [Section 16 (4)].

The strike was therefore declared to achieve the following: reversal of the N10 increases in the prices of petrol, diesel and kerosene; removal of 100 per cent increase in VAT, from 5-10 per cent; payment of 15 per cent increase in basic pay for public sector workers, and review of the sale of refineries and power generating plants.

The labour movement gave a 14-day ultimatum, which government treated with levity. In fact, spokespersons of the regime threatened that even if labour embarked on strikes and mass protests for ten years nothing would change (The Guardian, 19 June 2007: 2). The Government declared the strike illegal following the judgment of the Court of Appeal in an earlier case where the court held that the Nigeria Labour Congress had no right to call out workers on strike against general economic and political decisions of the Federal Government because such have nothing to do with breach of individual contracts of employment with various employers as envisaged in the Trade Disputes Act.

While the Nigerian labour law restricts the right to strike and the judiciary goes ahead to declare strike action against general economic and political policies illegal, Nigeria is a member of the International Labour Organization, which recognises the right to strike as a fundamental right. The Abolition of Forced Labour Convention No. 105 of 1957 prohibits the use of forced or compulsory labour ‘as a punishment for having participated in strikes’ (Article 1 sub-paragraph [d]). Also, the Voluntary Conciliation and Arbitration Recommendation No. 92 of 1951 states in paragraph 7 that no provision of the Recommendation ‘may be interpreted as limiting, in any way whatsoever, the right to strike’. As a member of the international community, it is incumbent on any country that seeks to acquire the status of a civilised state to give effect to resolutions emanating from an organisation to which it belongs.

In spite of all the pre-strike arrogance of government officials and spokespersons, less than 24 hours to the strike, in a desperate effort to avert the strike, government offered the following concessions: increase in VAT rate from 5-10 per cent was revoked; 15 per cent salary increase to be effected for federal employees with effect from 1 January 2007; the N10 per litre increase on the prices of kerosene and diesel was reversed and reduction of the N10 per litre increase in the pump head price of petrol to N5 per litre.

Labour accepted all the concessions but one, insisting on reversal of the price of petrol/litre to the old rate of N65. The strike then continued until it was called off suddenly with effect from the midnight of 23 June 2007, without winning the demand. Labour capitulated on the basis of a letter by President Umaru Yar’Adua promising not to increase the price of petrol for the next one year. In effect, petrol will continue to sell at N70 per litre. The other concessions contained in President Yar’Adua’s letter included an undertaking to set up expert committees, which would include representatives of labour to examine the issues of petroleum pricing mechanism as well as sale of refineries and power generating plants. Government also undertook not to take any disciplinary action against any worker participating in the strike.

Daily Sun (25 June 2007: 6) explains that the role of traditional rulers, particularly the Sultan of Sokoto, was decisive in the sudden capitulation by the top labour leadership. However, there was a division even within the top leadership. As Sunday Punch (24 June 2007:13) reported, a section of the TUC leadership had threatened to call a Press Conference ‘to express a few reservations on the agreement labour reached with government’. Working class youths were angry about the sudden back down by labour leadership: ‘why embark on strike by rejecting the N70/litre price of petrol which government had offered in the bid to prevent the strike taking off, only to turn round to accept what had been rejected?, they questioned.

Dress Rehearsal Strikes

The anger of working class youths against the sudden surrender by national labour leadership is understandable. Weeks and months preceding the strike, there had been series of threats of strike and actual strikes, as dress rehearsals, preparatory to the nationwide strike. These included strikes by Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) workers, Electricity workers, Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASSU), and protests against the controversial 2007 general elections organized by the Labour and Civil Society Coalition (LASCO). There were also sabotage activities, bombings and kidnappings by militant groups and mass protests in the Niger Delta against exploitative oil companies as well as threats by self determination groups in the South Eastern part of Nigeria to disrupt the hand over program to a new President if key self determination leaders were not released from detention.

What the foregoing shows is that the working class, in several sectors, had been infuriated and imbued with a fighting spirit to protect jobs and improve their overall living standards. That opportunity to express their anger and reverse the privatization process has temporarily been botched by the shocking compromise and sudden strike call off. But it would be a temporary set back. On the basis of a system of exporting crude oil and importing refined products, we do not need a soothsayer to predict that crises lie ahead.

Gains

Regardless of the weaknesses of the strike, the working class has shown that based on a united force of organisations of the poor, it is a force to reckon with in the process of policy formulation and implementation. The strike represents a message to the ruling class that labour will not just slavishly accept attacks on its rights without a fight. No matter how marginal, the reductions in VAT and prices of petroleum products are gains that could not have been won without a fight. Also, contrary to the threat of applying the ‘no work no pay’ rule, one of the agreements in ending the strike was that no worker would be penalized for having participated in the strike.

Weaknesses

However, the basis of the united platform upon which the strike was called was not brought to bear on the strike sufficiently. Whereas the Federal Government made a concession to implement the 15 per cent increase in basic pay, similar commitment was not extracted from the state Governments. This resulted in the continuation of the strike by State organs of the unions in states like Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, etc - after the nationwide action had been called off (See for example Nigerian Tribune, 26 June 2007: 5). Similarly, ASUU, which had started its strike three months before the nationwide strike, had to continue its strike until 1 July because the agreements reached did not touch on their concerns. In the same vein, though workers in the Niger Delta participated in the strike, some militant groups in the sub region openly dissociated themselves from the nationwide strike on the ground that the plight of the Niger Delta people had never been the concern of organized labour.

Reactive or Proactive Struggles?

The 20 -23 June general strike was a defensive strike. Rather than being proactive, the leadership of the strike was reactive and predominantly economistic. The strike was not aimed at bringing about fundamental changes to the root cause of the problems. Instead of addressing the root cause, the strike was essentially about the effects of government policies.

The behaviour of the leadership of the strike fits into Marx description of non-forward looking trade union leadership:

Trade Unions work well as centres of resistance against the encroachments of capital. They fail partially from an injudicious use of their power. They fail generally from limiting themselves to a guerilla war against the effects of the existing system, instead of simultaneously trying to change it, instead of using their organised forces as a lever for the final emancipation of the working class. (Marx, 1958: 447, cited in Hyman, 1975: 98)

A more pro-active approach would require challenging the policy of reliance on private importation of petroleum products, insistence on investigation of corruption in the management of existing refineries, and advocating local refining through existing and new state-owned refineries.

Central to the fuel crisis in Nigeria is the government commitment to the neoliberal principle of disengaging from economic activity and promoting the private sector in the supply of critical goods. The idea of promoting the private sector, combined with stupendous financial corruption involving about US$550 million in the Turn Around Maintenance (TAMs) of the refineries, results in crippling the state owned refineries, in order to justify reliance on the private sector for importation of petroleum products and sale of the refineries under the guise of inefficiency of state enterprises.

Who Should Control Industries?

As the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW, 2001: 7-9) has pointedly posited, the big question for today is: how is industry to be controlled? Given the subsisting capitalist economic structure, the challenge is to interrogate managerial control with a view to accommodating a role for workers who work in each industry, and in the cases of mineral producing areas, the communities, in managing the enterprises. This suggests that working class organizations must reflect and advocate comprehensive solutions to issues regarding production, pricing and distribution of goods in an equitable and ecologically sustainable manner through advocacy of involvement of the trade unions and communities in the running of industries.

Mode of Strike Action and Process of Strike Call Off

That the strike was called off without resorting to the members, organs, and groups that sustained the strike for the period it lasted raises the issue of industrial/trade union democracy. Working class organizations must provide efficient democratic structure and process for carrying on daily struggles for better conditions and pay. The organs that take the decision to embark on strike must also be the ones to decide to call it off. With that kind of perspective, the need for mass protests and rallies rather than a-stay-at-home strike action will be seen.

The stay-at-home strike action renders the rank and file passive participants in the strike process and deprives the strike of the inputs and influence of the members from below in determining the direction of the strike, leaving the decision to call off or continue strike actions to the whims and caprices of the few leaders. In this regard, the Nigerian labour movement has a lot to learn from its South African counterparts that subjected government offers of wage increases to discussions at mass meetings of individual affiliate unions, during a strike that was taking place simultaneously in the two countries.

Indefinite or Limited Strike Action?

The strike also revealed the weakness of ‘indefinite’ strike action. Indefinite strike action is applicable in a situation in which the objective and subjective conditions point to the possibility of the working class taking over political power. Without such a revolutionary situation in existence, the state cannot tolerate ‘indefinite’ action. The situation will have to be resolved one way or the other, in revolutionary change or restoration of political control by the capitalist ruling class. For a working class leadership that completely lacks the perspective of the working class taking power, ‘indefinite’ form of action is a recipe for sudden back down. Therefore, it would be better to base actions on defined, limited number of days or weeks, continuation or discontinuation of action being determined by the mood and preparedness of the working class and the other poor strata, expressed at mass meetings. In other words, an attempt should be made to distinguish the Gramscian moments of ‘war of movement’ (when the actual revolution is ongoing) from moments of ‘war of position’ (when slow but steady preparatory revolutionary work is taking place).

Conclusion

The importance of drawing out lessons of struggles is implicit in a statement by Marx: ‘Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted by the past’ (Marx, 1958: 247). It is hoped the lessons discussed in this paper will benefit future struggles.

* Femi Aborisade is a lecturer at The Polytechnic, Ibadan. He is the coordinator of the Centre for Labour Studies (CLS) & an Associate of the Centre for Civil Society, University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa.

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

For references, see link below.

'...we have to show these people, these abids (slaves, blacks) who is the master here.' Eva Dadrian on the Arabisation of Darfur by Khartoum with a great deal of help from 'the brother from the North, Gadaffi'.

Since 2003, the international community, African heads of states, the African Union, the Arab League, the United Nations, numerous humanitarian organisations and a number of African or non-African 'intellectuals' have debated the meaning of the word genocide, and whether it can be applied 'accurately' to the tragedy that was taking place in Darfur. Whether there were 200,000 killed, or only 20,000, or whether the rebellion or the Sudanese army or the government-backed Janjaweed militias perpetrated the crimes, this kind of debate could go on ad infinitum as Kwesi Kwaa Prah rightly says (Pambazuka News 305).

But as these 'good wishers' were debating, the tragedy of Darfur was unfolding in front of their eyes. Tens of thousands of innocent civilians were killed, raped and uprooted from their homes and villages. Despite a ban on the media, despite the pressure on aid workers, the conflict in Darfur is very well documented, showing how entire communities were wiped out, how more than 800 villages were burnt to the ground and thousands of wells poisoned, mosques desecrated, schools destroyed, cattle slaughtered and crops ruined…

And the debate is still continuing while the people of Darfur are left in hellish IDP camps, in the middle of the desert, struggling to keep their children alive who are subjected not only to hunger, thirst, violence and diseases but also to humiliation for being destitute in their own homeland and having nothing to go back to.

Let’s not re-open this kind of discourse and 'indulge in technicist sophistry, tip-toeing nimbly around the real issues in Darfur' that may again provide 'solace to the Khartoum regime' (Kwesi Kwaa Prah, Pambazuka 305) and to others who persist to view the deployment of an AU-UN peacekeeping force as 'an invasion'. Darfur is neither Afghanistan nor Iraq, nor as a matter of fact Somalia.

Having said that I should emphasise also that Darfur is the microcosm of all the ills that mar the continent: Arab in the north versus Africa in the south. We could of course continue to blame the 'colonial borders' for these problems, but as Africans we had more than 50 years to solve our differences.

From the very beginning of the Darfur crisis, the government of Sudan proved time and again its unwillingness to look 'seriously and genuinely' into the demands of the people of Darfur. The numerous ceasefire agreements have collapsed for the very reason that the government of Khartoum has not kept its part of the deal, i.e. stop all its military operations and especially put an end to the crimes committed by the Janjaweed against the civilian population. The Janjaweed, the government-backed Arab militias, still roam free in Darfur. Driving pick-up trucks with mounted guns, they are 'not being arrested' according to AU commanders. The Abuja peace agreement signed between the government and one faction only of the Darfur rebel movement is not worth the paper it is written on.

Only recently, a small light has appeared at the end of the tunnel for Darfur. In mid-June, the Sudanese government announced its acceptance of the proposal for a hybrid United Nations-African Union peacekeeping operation to be deployed in Darfur. Under the new revised plan, the AU will run day-to-day operations while the UN will have overall control of some 20,000 peacekeepers, mostly from Africa. Currently, as we all know it, the 7,000 ill equipped AU troops are overwhelmed by the sheer vastness of the region, the complexity of the conflict and the limitations of their mandate.

'The UN and AU have outlined two options for the size of the force's military component: under one plan, there would be 19,555 troops and under the other there would be 17,605 troops. The police component would require 3,772 officers. The hybrid operation is the third phase of a three-step process to replace the existing but under-resourced AU Mission in the Sudan (AMIS), which has been unable to end the fighting in Darfur.'

Ten days later, Lam Akol, the former southern Sudanese rebel leader turned minister of foreign affairs declared that his government was in complete agreement with the composition of the peacekeeping force, the nature of its operation, its mission and its command 'We are ready to have the force deployed at any time'.

Khartoum’s acceptance for the deployment of this hybrid peacekeeping force is a welcome step but it requires immediate and rigorous pressure from the international community and from Africans in particular, to make it happen.

So far, so familiar. Since the beginning of the conflict (February 2003) Omar el Beshir has disputed accusations, played for time, promised but never delivered and broke more agreements that he honoured. Khartoum has accused everybody except the Janjaweed militias. General Omar el Beshir had until the end of 2006 to disarm the Janjaweed, accept a hybrid AU-UN peacekeeping force in Darfur or face the consequences.

Taking the Almighty as witness, El Beshir has vowed, time and again, he will not allow any UN peacekeeping force to be deployed in Darfur. A year ago, he announced that the situation in Darfur was 'under control'. But the sad reality is that the situation is far from being 'under control'. The same scenario is being repeated again as Omar el Beshir, who has skipped this year’s AU Summit in Accra, not only warned the West, and Washington in particular, not to mess up the handling of the crisis in Darfur, but also declared that calm has returned to Darfur and the IDPs are already going back to their villages 'We can say that most of Darfur's region is safe', and 'The situation on the ground in Darfur is improving. Now IDPs are voluntarily returning to their villages'. In fact, according to witnesses, villages are being repopulated indeed but not by their very former legal owners.

The old ambition of Khartoum successive governments to Arabise Darfur is being fulfilled. The so-called returnees are in fact entire families of the nomadic people who have for so long aimed at taking over the 'green pastures' and the fields of Southern Darfur and Gebel Marra. Not only, the long dream of Khartoum is being fulfilled but also that of Brother Gaddafi, the man with the floating robes and a fat chequebook. Indeed, back in the 1980s our Brother from the North planned to rid Darfur of its African population and replace them by Arabs. As Kwesi Kwa Prah points out the dear colonel while attending an Arab League summit meeting (Amman, October 2000) showed his true colours when he declared that 'two-thirds of Arabs live in Africa and the remaining third must join the other two in Africa...'

Needless to point out that those who refuse to recognise the genocidal plans of the Khartoum regime have neither seen nor heard of the Black Book. Secretly circulating in the late 1990s and very early 2000s, this infamous blueprint provides all the details of the soon-to-happen Darfur tragedy.

Just for information, I myself have seen the Black Book. Back in 1987, I also witnessed the destruction of the Fur villages in Gebel Marra. I have seen the horsemen of the apocalypse armed by Brother Gaddafi, who spread terror and destruction among the Fur community. I have also recorded Fadlallah Burma, Sadiq el Mahdy’s security suprimo, in those days, admitting that the government was arming 'the Arab tribes' and in addition I have also recorded a government official in Nyala telling me 'we have to show these people, these abids (slaves, blacks) who is the master here...'

'The international community simply cannot continue to sit by', said Condoleezza Rice at the end of an international conference in Paris about Darfur (June 2007). Of course this statement comes from a secretary of state who cannot claim to have a clear conscious when it comes to conflicts such as Palestine, Iraq, Lebanon, to name just a few. But as Africans we cannot continue to sit by and allow rogue governments to send their troops to kill us, their planes to bomb us, their bulldozers to demolish our homes and their henchmen to intimidate us for the simple reason that we oppose their rule.

* Eva Dadrian is an independent broadcaster and Political and Country Risk Analyst for print and broadcast media.

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

The U.N. Security Council is expected to authorize up to 26,000 troops and police for Darfur but implementation will take months providing the world body finds enough personnel and Sudan cooperates. On Wednesday, Britain, France and Ghana circulated a draft resolution for a joint African Union-U.N. force, which also threatened force against those who attack civilians, relief workers and obstruct peace efforts.

Vancouver-based Lundin for Africa, the philanthropic arm of the Lundin Group of Companies, has pledged $100 million to the Clinton Foundation's recently announced Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative (CGSGI), which is aimed at alleviating poverty and building sustainable local economies in developing countries. The Lundin for Africa commitment will be aimed, in large part, at approved projects in Africa, where the Lundin Group has significant mining, oil and gas interests.

The absence of competitive-democratic patterns in North Africa cannot be ascribed solely to the actions of the undemocratic regimes of the region. The latter have certainly done very little to strengthen brittle governance structures, deepen government accountability and widen the scope of participatory politics, say Anwar Boukhars.

GCAP coalitions from across Africa will join other African Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in calling for the African Heads of States to put development challenges and people's welfare at the centre of their discussions as they prepare to meet in Accra, Ghana, in July to debate the feasibility of an African Union (AU) government. African civil society should ensure that such a new government must focus on overcoming poverty, the respect for human rights, education and conflict eradication.

Thank you for that most informative report on the USSFORUM 2007 that was held in Atlanta recently. Your intense comments were motivating and thought provoking. I commend you for your unique method.

I am sorry that your facilities and the water situation was not adequate. Perhaps learning from this, in good weather maybe the events could be better handled in the public parks as we often do when we have concerts and picnics.

By the way, the US$15 was supposed to be for the sandwiches they gave to the participants who registered for the forum. US$15 wasn't to exclude the the homeless individuals.

Because of undocumented, non-citizen latinos, there has been a conflict between Mexicans and African Americans because of job competition in the USA. Non-citizen Mexicans (Latinos) have come to America illegally and taken jobs, ruined our health care system and flooded our welfare offices.

And speaking of Africans, and the term, 'African-Latinos', there is no such terminology. Even if we Africans are speaking Spanish, and live in South America, we are NOT 'Latinos'. MEXICANS are the only 'Latinos'. Those are fighting words.

I'm an African American living in the USA. There are NO 'Spanish' Africans. WE are plain 'Africans'.
'Latino' is a Spanish LANGUAGE, and not the NAME to be added of our African people.

Please make a note of this. Thanks again for your comments.

comments on a disturbing report from the Times (UK) on Phillip Morris and British American Tabacco (BAT) targeting yourng and children in Nigeria to become smokers.

'Lawyers for Nigeria’s largest state, Kano, will argue today that the tobacco companies sponsored pop concerts and sporting events and, in some instances, gave away free cigarettes, to recruit minors to smoking.'

Nthambazale.blogspot.com reports on new developments in the use of alternative technologies in Malawi.

'In an effort to make engineering relevant to the society, the Electrical Engineering department at the Malawi Polytechnic, has been running the Wireless Network for Health Applications project since mid 2006. This work is being done with collaboration from the Radio Communications Unit, Aeronomy and Radio Propagation Laboratory, Abdus Salam ICTP, Trieste, Italy. The goal of this project is to improve the delivery of health services by improving access to information and timely communication through low cost wireless-based communication network and basic telemedicine applications in the city of Blantyre.'

The Concoction - Apparently the US Army and George Bush have been studying the film “Battle of Algiers” to try and find some answers to Iraq – A slight relief in that at least they have moved from the Hollywood film model to something more realistic. However as Concoction states that it’s not as funny as it sounds if one looks at some of the film’s depictions

'...the film opens with a scene in which "Paras" (French paratroopers) brutally torture an old Arab man. The information they get from him will lead them to the hide-out of Ali la Pointe, the last remaining leader (so they hope) of the FLN, the movement they are determined to crush. As they close in on the hide-out, the film retraces how the Algerian revolutionary movement began, showing us some of the routine indignities visited on Arabs by French colonials: a bunch of young French punks trip Ali just for the fun of seeing him take a fall... As the Arabs begin to demand an independent Algerian state and terrorist cells begin to leave bombs in places frequented by the French (the race-track, bars, the Air France office) the colonists (many of them called pieds-noirs because they were born in Algeria) become more and more enraged, attacking even small Arab children trying to sell candy on the street.'

I am not quite sure of the point of this study except possibly that Bush et al are seriously concerned about loosing all control of Iraq and having to do a runner similar to Vietnam.

Nigerian Curiosity comments on a recent interview by former Biafrian leader, Emeka Ojukwu in which he claimed that Igbo’s were not equally Nigerians. Curiosity wonders whether he is once again leading towards the idea of sessession and states:

'In the BBC interview, despite suggesting a separate state for Igbos, he also mentioned that Nigeria could still remain a united nation. These two statements seem contradictory and the article does not elucidate further. Unfortunately, I neither have access to the entire interview and cannot speculate on the intentions behind Ojukwu's statements, nor am I knowledgeable about the context within which they were made. It would be interesting to have a broader understanding of where he is coming from. Nevertheless, I must wonder whether Igbo people feel like second-class citizens in their own country. If so, how is that possible? The Igbo people that I know are successful, industrious, hard working and extremely driven in business, education and any other area where I have had the opportunity to get to know them. I find it hard to believe that in this day and age, Igbos are relegated to second-class status.'

The comments give further insight into the feelings of Igbo people but for many of the civil war generation, there has never been any recognition of the pain and suffering of ordinary Igbo's during the 3 year period.

Voice of Somaliland contends that the root of African problems today ly with the manipulation of the different ethnic peoples of Africa, by African leaders and gives Ethiopia’s Meles Zenawi as a prime example.

'Whether we like it or not and whether elected or a despot, a nation has just one leader. In diverse ethnic settings, this person belongs to just one ethnic group. In particular, when the power is snatched by guns, the leader’s fighters are pre-dominantly from his/her ethnic groups. This is the most widely observed scenario in Africa. The worst case is when the ethnic group constitutes the minority group. Since democracy is a majority rule, this minority class will never allow a functioning democracy; always sabotage the interests of the majority, and most importantly always believe in the gun since that is the only way for them to be able to rule. This is the scenario in Ethiopia.'

Rosemary Ekosso comments that the British government’s actions in the Chagos islands as an example of colonial dehumanisation and racism.

'Landgrabbing
A god complex.
Method
Start in 17th and 18th century
First, uproot people from their homeland
Enslave them or otherwise press them into demeaning service
Then ignore them until a rich and powerful country wants their land
Next, turn your beady eye on this land, viewing the human inhabitants as an inconvenient weed on potentially lucrative real estate
Weed the natives out, referring to them as “Tarzan and Man Friday" , thus playing up racist stereotypes of savages who should be divested of their land because you are better at exploiting it.
Then lease the island to the rich and powerful nation in exchange for an 11 million pound discount on Polaris missiles.'