Like the I-phone of the consumer telecommunications industry, Biofuels are the most talked about and most anticipated development in the energy sector. The increased attention on the production and development of Biofuels can be attributed to an international convergence of ecological, political, economic and social factors. Biofuels are not new, they have been used since World War II, but the recent biofuel-convergence has led to a boom in investment; over the past three years alone venture capital investment in Biofuels increased 800%. Moreover, the International Energy Agency predicts that biofuel production would double by 2011.

Biofuels help reduce carbon monoxide emissions, can replace the lead addictives used to increase the octane levels of gasoline and are sulfur free. The two most widely used Biofuels today are ethanol and biodeisel. Ethanol is basically an alcohol derived from the fermentation sugarcane or maize and can be used by itself or blended with petroleum. Biodiesel on the other hand is derived from rapeseed, soybean, jatropha, palm oil and other vegetable oils and can be used directly in diesel engines or blended as well.

Africa is usually last on the list of receiving cutting edge technological investments but in the case of Biofuels, Africa is leading the charge.

Africa

Africa increased ethanol production from 100 million gallons in 2006 to already over 160 million gallons in 2007. The Mozambique Petroleum Company (Petromoc) is partnering with Brazil based INM International to raise over $400 million to invest in biofuel production. In October, fuel stations in Addis Ababa will begin to sell blended fuel, of which 5% will be ethanol. British based Sun Biofuels Plc has invested $20 million in a 9,000 hectare jatropha biofuel project in Tanzania. In Zambia BP is keen to invest in the emerging Biofuels industry and two other companies have already invested 200 million in the sector, according to the Government. The Indian Government has given $250 million to the West African Development Bank for investment in biofuel production and Nigeria plans to build over two dozen ethanol plants with assistance from Brazil by 2010. As Rachel Slater of the Overseas Development Institute has suggested “Africa's biomass production potential is five times higher then that of the UK” and “massive potential is coming out of South Africa”.

South Africa

South Africa's gasoline consumption accounts for 80% of the entire southern Africa region hence is will be a key entrepôt for the development of Biofuels in Africa. South Africa's Biofuels strategy hopes to achieve a market penetration of 4.5% of liquid road transport fuels by 2013.

Ethanol Africa planes to open eight maize supplied ethanol plants in South Africa; the first has already been commissioned in Bothaville and the last will be commissioned in 2012. According to Ethanol Africa, the typical Bothaville style plant “will displace 987,500 barrels of oil. At a price of $70/bb, this equates to about R500 million and of wealth that will not leave the country”. South Africa has great potential for energy crop production such as maize because of the large tracks of arable land and suitable climate, but it is not all good news.

According to Mathabo Le Roux writing in Business Day; in South Africa only 10% of the land is irrigated yet it takes up 65% of total water use, so any increase in large scale maize production would affect South Africa's water supply. Moreover, the head of South Africa's Central Bank Tito Mboweni, questioned the wisdom of using maize as the main feedstock for ethanol production in South Africa “That's a doubt in our case because we suddenly have a shortage of maize … also pushing the food prices because or production of ethanol from maize.” There is an overall fear that the increased use of maize based ethanol feedstock will cause a price increase; putting maize beyond the reach of Sub-Saharan Africa's poor, but as Slater suggests “the world maize price does not correlate well with local prices especially in SSA”. For example, according to the United Nations Integrated regional Information Network “South African maize prices have stayed near R600 ($85) per tonne, but in March 2007 increased to R2,000 ($285), still less then the world price of R2,500 ($352).” Although there is a difference between international and South African maize prices, this does not discount the food price inflation.

The Regional Hunger and Vulnerability Program suggested that “In the 12 months between January 2006 and January 2007, the food costs of very poor rural dwellers rose by 9.6% and the very poor urban dwellers by 8.3%. Foodstuffs linked to biofuel production rose by 10.7% (grain), 11.8% (oils) and 12.8% (sugar) in rural areas.” Africa is not alone in dealing with the affects of increase biofuel production.

United States

The US government wants to reduce gasoline demand by 20% by 2010 and biofuel use is a key strategy for achieving the goal. Since 2001 the amount of maize used to produce ethanol has increase 300%. According to the Regional Hunger and Vulnerability Program there are presently 78 biofuel refineries under construction; but biofuel production is not the panacea for an environmentally friendly energy consumption strategy for future.

Professor M.A Altieri estimates that dedicating all USA corn and soybean production to biofuel production would only meet 12% of gasoline and 6% of US diesel demand. Moreover, Cornell University professor in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences David Pimentel, states that “The average U.S. automobile, traveling 10,000 miles a year on pure ethanol (not a gasoline-ethanol mix) would need about 852 gallons of the corn-based fuel. This would take 11 acres to grow, based on net ethanol production. This is the same amount of cropland required to feed seven Americans.” The Other Factors There are other factors at play in the debate about Biofuels such as the refining process. Ethanol attracts water much easier then petroleum therefore the same infrastructure used by petrol refineries cannot be used. Hence Biofuels are usually blended near the end of the supply chain. This means that for Biofuels to become widely available a well developed and efficient downstream petroleum sector must exist which may not be the case in many Sub-Saharan African countries.

The environmental questions cannot be ignores either. Although Biofuels produce less carbon monoxide emissions, replace the lead addictives and are sulfur free, there is a loss in fuel economy. According to F. William Engdahl, ethanol contains at least 30% less energy per gallon then normal gasoline translating into a fuel economy loss of 25% per gallon. Food security is the most controversial issue in the biofuel development debate. In short it is the idea of “food versus fuel” or the competition between the world's one billion drivers and the world's two billion poor. As Slater suggests “filling a petrol tank of a Range Rover will require enough grain to feed one person for one year”.

As the cost per barrel of oil increases the demand for alternative energy source will increase; and biofuel development from crops such as maize, soybeans and sugar are seen as a viable solution. Hence a situation is rapidly developing whereby the price inflation of the world's key food crops will be pegged to the price of oil, and because Biofuels will continue to be an insignificant source of energy when compare to diesel or gasoline we can expect a continue increase in food prices for the foreseeable future, as biofuel refineries absorb the world's surplus grain production.

This year increased maize demand for ethanol was partly to blame for the increase in price of Mexico's basic food: corn flour. In February 2007 thousands of Mexicans marched in Mexico City to protest the 400% increase in Tortilla prices. The key cost in ethanol production is the price of feedstock such as maize and sugar; hence there will be a move towards economies of scale to improve margins and yields which will favour large scale farmers over small growers, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Moreover, large scale maize and sugar farming will lead increased use of water, fertilizer, chemical, pesticides and petroleum which may adversely impact production systems, fertility and biodiversity. Hence what really needs to happen is that we must find a cheap, non-food crop or waste product that is easier to turn into biofuel and blends well with petroleum or diesel.

Conclusion

There remains ample room for debate on the future of Biofuels, especially in relation to Africa. If we look at what is happening in Africa with a historical understanding it is clear that Africa is entering yet another cash crop boom, except this time it is not tea, coffee or cocoa, but maize - food! If selling tea, coffee and Cocoa for the past 50 years has not lifted Africa out of the development quagmire how will placing her food at mercy of commodity traders in Chicago, New York and London be any different?

* Mark J. Sorbara is a freelance writer and researcher on Africa issue.
* Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at

The internationally renowned African scholar Mahmood Mamdani is said to hold the view that the only feature of post-colonialism he is aware of is the post office. He tries to suggest that true Independence as liberation from the structures, contents and ideologies of the colonial era remains a remote goal.

Decolonisation was more so a hand-over of formal political power, while social structures and hierarchies - as well as mindsets - remained largely intact.

Little has changed in terms of a shift in power relations or alternative concepts of power. This includes the political sphere with regard to the character of political dominance. Looking back at the 17 years since Namibia's formal Independence one is tempted to agree with Mamdani's sobering conclusion.
As if to make a point, the current political culture is a far cry from the liberating gospel originally preached. Not that there was - realistically and in retrospective - much to be expected (although we did). After all, more than a century of colonial occupation took its toll. Apartheid was anything but a fertile ground to socialize democrats and to allow for the internalization of fundamental respect for human rights and differing opinions. Nor was the authoritarian organization of the exile situation under the liberation movement Swapo an alternative to repressive control.

The movement's recognition as the sole and authentic representative of the Namibian people by the General Assembly of the United Nations in the mid-1970s was a celebrated diplomatic victory in our ranks and within the supporting solidarity movement. What we then did not realize: it was also a very undemocratic notion, based on exclusion. It handed over the sole power of definition of legitimate Namibian identity to the leadership of one (admittedly by far most relevant) among several organizations. Those not members or followers of Swapo were not entitled to any representation to shape the guiding principles leading into Namibian nationhood.

Despite a constitutional framework, which laid the foundation for a pluralist, human rights oriented and democratic society (as a result also of the international - meaning Western - desire to control and limit social change), Namibia since then became neither more tolerant nor more democratic. Nor did the majority of the formerly colonized population reap any meaningful material benefits from the shift in political power (forget about the fat cats). Poverty remained chronic, so did other forms of destitution. Violence against women and children has abhorrent dimensions, and the self-enrichment by members of the new elite seems to have no limit. Educational services and health provisions deteriorate, and Namibia's rank in international standardized surveys (as problematic and dubious as some of these might be) did not improve. Instead, we are campaigning for a status as an “as if Least Developed Country (LDC)”. What a shame.

Namibia started under a United Nations supervised transition to a sovereign state as the darling of the international community. In the meantime it has become - in the words of Joe Diescho - just another African country; which, of course, it is. The way Diescho uses the image, plays with the existing Eurocentric stereotypes, that this is nothing to be proud of. But did we not have the opportunity to build a society offering reasons for pride, self-respect and confidence as an African country, which used its opportunity to present evidence that this is nothing to be ashamed of or associated with negative stereotypes?

The honeymoon is long over. Hardly noticed, all Nordic states - once the pioneers among the Western countries, which supported Swapo and the Namibian people for the right to self-determination - have reduced diplomatic representation below the rank of ambassadors or even closed their embassies. Their bilateral development cooperation is shrinking continuously. Norway has withdrawn years ago, and Sweden will be closing its offices next year. Finland's ambassador - who dared to publicly share criticism over the government's dubious priorities to engage in a war in the Congo instead of reducing poverty at home - was requested a decade into Independence not to return from his annual leave at home. He was never replaced on an ambassadorial level, nor was the Swedish ambassador whose term ended shortly afterwards. The government seemed not to be bothered by such visible loss of legitimacy among these good friends. Instead, other alliances were consolidated with countries such as Zimbabwe, China, North Korea, Russia and other states hardly known as welfare societies or for their democratic achievements.

Looking at the hype of the last few weeks and months, one has no reasons for optimism. John Makumbe, who was denied to deliver his lecture on Zimbabwe as originally announced on the campus of UNAM, sees the writing on the wall. Let's hope he is wrong. Students only a few weeks earlier felt a need to demonstrate in support of the University's chancellor and Founding Father of the Republic in a political and legal dispute not related to the university at all. Sadly enough, they did not come out as forcefully to defend academic freedom, which was so blatantly violated by the same person, when intervening to prevent the internationally well known Zimbabwean academic from presenting his lecture, thereby making a mockery of the country's highest research and teaching institution's autonomy.

Interesting too is that almost everyone - despite controversial views - seems to accept that the NSHR submission to the ICC touches upon the (undefined) notion of national reconciliation. It does not. It seeks to hold high-ranking office bearers in the former liberation movement accountable for human rights violations within its own ranks. This addresses issues of internal oppression against own members, including rape, torture, execution and murder by neglect. That some among the many victims were suspected to be spies is not the point.

The point is, that many were not, and that the treatment as such violated any minimum standards of a human rights based culture, as the kind of injustice practiced under the Apartheid regime against which we were actually fighting.

Those few hundred who survived the ordeal (while most others did not) have ever since their return in mid-1989 asked for an admission that Swapo did wrong and should deal with the issue instead of sweeping it under the carpet. Seeking to enforce such demands after painful 18 years of denial by trying to use international legal options at hand (even though the effort is doomed to fail for formal reasons) is declared an act of national betrayal and heresy. This merely confirms the misperception among the political rulers that their party organization is in their eyes identical with the nation and the state. They are untouchable and above the law. - Instead of hiding behind such a misleading smokescreen, they should regain legitimacy and moral commanding heights by dealing with the failures if not within the national judicial system then by an honest and fact seeking investigation initiated by themselves. Otherwise the rule of law will soon end as law of the rulers.

Instead, once again, it's the old game of blaming and accusing the messenger for disclosing the worrying moral decay when it comes to the state of the nation. The so-called misguided elements allegedly seeking to orchestrate a vendetta for merely personal frustrations (which these victims undoubtedly and understandably also have) are singled out and blamed. So are those media, which dare to make it a public affair and provide a platform for the dissenting voices in civil society. Far from dealing with the matter, it is dealt with those who dare to join the demands for transparency and accountability through efforts to limit their rights to do so. It is about getting rid of inconvenient truths and their advocates, not about addressing the root causes of the affairs.

Just as with John Makumbe and the likes: prevent them from speaking out, as if this would allow ignoring what is going on. At the end, we might indeed end in a similar state of affairs as his home country, in which so many dedicated citizens were forced into exile once again. This time by those who claimed to have liberated the people. So far, differences do however still remain: Namibia's head of state generously offers one-way tickets to unwanted dissenting voices. They are neither arrested nor killed. Not yet. But his softer approach is already another form of liquidation.

Namibia lacks civility defined as an agreement to disagree agreeably. But Independence is something to fight for, daily and always. Solidarity should be with them, who dare to do so and challenge the sell-outs to individual privilege, who are occupying state power and shy away from taking responsibility in the public interest. Their duty would instead require acting not only in their own interest, but in the interest of all they claim to have liberated. Like in so many other societies, however, those will ultimately have to accept and execute such responsibility themselves, guided by their own convictions and values, against all odds. The fight for ownership over the definition of what is supposed to be acceptable and what not is far from over. It has just started.

* Henning Melber joined Swapo as a son of German immigrants in 1974. He was director of The Namibian Economic Policy Research Unit (NEPRU) between 1992 and 2000 and is currently the executive director of the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation in Uppsala/Sweden.

* Please send comments to or comment online at

As the parties to the conflict in Darfur meet in Libya for peace talks, the Peace and Security Council of the African Union issues a communiqué on the implementation process of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed between the Government of the Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army. The communiqué encourages the African Union Ministerial Committee on the Post-Conflict Reconstruction of the Sudan to intensify its efforts by, without delay, visiting the Sudan, issue recommendations on how African Union member States could contribute more significantly to the post-conflict reconstruction and to convene a conference on African involvement in the reconstruction. The communiqué also requests the Commission to appoint a new Special Envoy and to open an African Union Liaison Office in Khartoum, with an office in Juba.

Also in peace and security news, experts have suggested that ECOWAS amend existing instruments for promoting peace and security in West Africa so that they address the realities of the region. Further in regional news, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) is developing a food reserve facility to address the food emergencies of the region. Further in SADC news, Munetsi Madakufamba writes about the SADC Free Trade Area (FTA) which is to be launched next year with the hope of removing barriers on all intra-regional trade. The target is to ensure that 85 percent of most intraregional trade is at zero tariffs by 2008. The programme aims to create the FTA in 2008, a customs union by 2010, a common market by 2015 and a Monetary Union by 2018. The author highlights the impetus and challenges of the programme including multiple membership of some States to Regional Economic Communities that are working towards creating, or already have, customs unions.

Moreover in financial news, the African Development Bank (AfDB) approved a US $25 million equity investment to create a fund to develop local currency products. This Currency Exchange (TCX) will be established with a transaction capacity of US $ 1.2 billion. According to the Bank, they will be able to use it as a funding alternative to finance its projects in local currencies and will provide local entrepreneurs with funding in local currency, thereby eliminating the currency mismatches that are typically created between local-currency revenues and foreign-currency liabilities.

In civil society news, the Solidarity for African Women’s Rights, together with the Coalition on Violence Against Women, Kenya, organized a public forum in Nairobi titled “Politically and Powerfully Participating in Elections: Women’s Strategies for change in Kenya, South Africa and Liberia”. Faith Kasiva, the Coordinator for the Coalition of Violence Against Women (COVAW), noted that this public forum comes at an opportune time in Kenya as the elections near and in the wake of a defeated constitutional amendment bill that proposed 50 special seats for women in parliament. Kenya has also not ratified the protocol to the African charter of Human and people’s rights on the rights of women. Commenting on the South African experience, Delphine Serumaga noted that the increased participation by women in decision-making during apartheid forced the government to take the decision on proportional representation. It was observed that women in South Africa are more aware of their rights partly because of the struggle against apartheid where women played an equal role as men. Sharing the Liberia experience, Una Thompson noted that the role of women in the election of the 1st female president in Africa began during the turbulence of the war. Despite the strong party alliances in Liberia, there was national solidarity and more specifically women solidarity and responsibility with an increased percentage of women voting which led to the election of the 1st woman candidate, who is now the president of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. Speaking on Kenya, Jane Onyango, noted that Kenya has struggled with the affirmative action bill since the early 1990s after the Beijing Women’s conference. The affirmative action bill was shot down in parliament, then came the constitutional amendment bill that proposed 50 special seats for women in parliament and was recently shot down by a male dominated parliament. The bill received opposition from both sides of the house.

As AfriMAP launches reports on the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) in Ghana and Mauritius, Gawaya Tegulle writes that the APRM “is a way of having African leaders compare notes and ensure that they are steering their nations according to a set standard, whose aim is to ensure a democratic, free, prosperous and peaceful continent”, but, argues that the mechanism comes at the wrong time. With African leaders who are intent on consolidating power funding and controlling the process and the review’s methodology being so dense that “by the time a review is completed and implemented, so much water would have passed under the bridge”, the author argues that only a new breed of African leaders will create a successful review.

Lastly, Joan Gathoni writes of the launch of the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB) held in Nairobi during which Chief Executives from media companies across Africa deliberated on common issues and ways of addressing them. The President of the new Broadcasting Union, Ben Egbuna, says the organization “project the true image of Africa”.

The AU Monitor also brings you the agenda of the sixth session of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights as well as the African Union web page on Economic Partnership Agreements.

I have just read the account by Sokari about Randall Robinson's book: Unbroken Agony and I cannot help but wonder how does one collectively keep walking away from one of the most exemplary rupture with dehumanization. The Africans who had been enslaved simply said: NO MORE. Yet, 200 years later, it seems easier to find excuses about why one keeps treating the people of Haiti as if they were not worth anything. Peter Hallward wrote an essay about how the media decide who counts and who does not: almost on the same night Maddie (the child who disappeared while her parents were having dinner) disappeared, a boatload of Haitians on its way to the Turks and Caicos Island capsized. Close to 100 people lost their lives, but, for the international media which decide what is news worthy and what is not, it was as if those lives never even existed. That was at the beginning of May this year. As Peter Hallward points out, quoting from survivors, the boat did not capsize on its own: a coast guard boat did everything to prevent it from getting on shore. I do not think ev en Pbn carried that story at the time. I hope a correction will be made.

I am not saying here that the life of a 3 year old white English child is not as precious as the life of Haitians trying to find a way of making a living in a world context which is dictating that they do not count. In fact, it now turns out, that Maddie may have been the victim of one or both of her parents. One should stop speculations on this particular case right here for the time being, since examples of how uncaring the system has become can be seen everywhere, every day. The tragedy is the extent to which people who see themselves as good people keep acting against their own conscience, whether in relation to one Maddie or to one Haitian.

The way Aristide has been denounced is not unlike the way Lumumba was denounced in the DRCongo, back in 1960-61. Then, too, it was easy, given the media context. In fact, the so-called elite of the Congo did its best NOT to save Lumumba's life, but to make sure that even his body leaves no trace. Today, with Aristide, the denunciation was as virulent and vicious. Someone (from the group of 184) going as far as saying that he is not a Mandela. To which one should say: and a good thing too. There has been one Lumumba, there has been one Mandela, one Aristide. Each one has and is carrying the torch of emancipation as far as he could/can. Isn't the collective task one of making sure that the torch stays alive? Isn't the task one of never letting go of the objective of complete emancipation? What would be the ethical equivalent, in today's world, of what the Africans did in Haiti, from 1791 through 1804? Shouldn't one ask oneself if what kept Aristide going beyond the formalities of being a catholic priest, was a call which has continued to vibrate in Haiti to this day, namely to bring to an end a mentality which continues to rationalize, with impunity, that some lives do not count as much as others.

Thank you Sokari for bringing attention to this unbroken agony.

Zimbabwe's failing economy and collapsing services have provided an environment ripe for graft, with the impoverished country's woes facilitating an ever-worsening slide towards corruption. Despite setting up a local graft-busting body in 2004, Zimbabwe appears to be losing the battle against corruption, with President Robert Mugabe's economic policies seen to promote corrupt behaviour, according to a leading watchdog.

A joint project by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the Malawian government is helping small-scale farmers to expand into commercial food production. Initially, 50 "lead farmers" from around the country will receive training in business management skills and planning. "The project intends to equip farmers with knowledge that would enable them to take farming as business," said Mazlan Jusoh, the FAO's country representative in Malawi.

The World Bank Group committed a record $5.8 billion in International Development Association (IDA) resources to Sub-Saharan Africa in the last fiscal year, $1 billion more than in the previous year. In addition, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Bank Group’s private sector arm, provided $1.38 billion in financing for its own account and mobilized an additional $261 million in financing through syndications.

For the sixth consecutive year, Dignity is proud to invite applications to the Annual Global Linking and Learning Programme to be held from 30 November to 11 December 2007. This programme will build on the successes of the previous learning programmes on “Human Rights in Development”, and on “Economic Social and Cultural Rights” organised by Dignity International with a range of national, regional and international partners including the International Human Rights Internship Program and the International Network on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ESCR-Net), People’s Movement for Human Rights Learning, Forum Asia, Hakijamii Trust, Kenya, and Tanzania Council on Social Development.

Predicting what the ballot boxes may yield at the closing of the September 7th elections is near impossible. Opinions vary, and citizens are split between optimists with a bright outlook on the country’s future and pessimists who refuse to engage in politics at all. One Democratic Social Movement candidate said it is truly difficult to know the coming political map in any way. "The method of voting, the abundance of political parties and the multiplicity of election symbols, in addition to the similarity between the platforms of some parties … make it difficult to predict any result."

For the past 6 weeks I have been travelling in the West, East and Southern parts of Africa. The mission (as these trips are grandiosely described in UN vocabulary) has been to assess situations on the ground with regards to the implementation and achievement of the Millennium Development Goals in the various countries.

This being the mid year in the 15-year terminal date set for the achievement of the goals. The other and more immediate reason for the travels is to see what preparations are being made by various partners of the UN Millennium Campaign for this year’s Guinness Challenge to beat the record set last year for Standing Up against poverty.

The UN Millennium Campaign’s Global Director, Salil Shetty, led the missions. It involved meeting with various UN country teams, Government officials, National Coalitions for the Global Call Against Poverty (GCAP) / MDG campaigners, Local and International NGOs, Other CSOs, Media, other opinion moulders, etc. We have been in Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya,Tanzania, Zambia and Malawi.

There have been a number of activities; reports and media focus during July (the exact midpoint of the MDGs being, July 7 2007, i.e. 777) in many countries indicating slow progress on a number of the goals. But there is a general pessimistic consensus that on current pace most of our countries may not achieve the goals by 2015.

A disproportionate focus on what has not been achieved may actually make one lose sight of the progress being made and what more could be done. For instance all the countries we visited have made tremendous progress in the area of increasing access to education for both Boys and girls. Millions of children who could not have passed by the gates of a school are now in School. In some countries they are moving access beyond Primary school to secondary school.

While it is true that there are issues about retention and quality the minimum threshold is being pushed. It is now up to citizens to press harder for better education through a general improvement in teaching and learning conditions. In a country like Kenya the provision of Mosquito nets has dramatically brought down the number of people especially children dying from Malaria. Malawi today is only second to Peru globally in the most dramatic reduction of infant mortality. In the past four years infant mortality has come down by more than 1/3.

In Ghana and Malawi the interlink age between poverty and lack of access to education even when it is officially free and universal has led to complimentary programmes including giving children from poorer homes a decent meal in school and also providing transport. These successful initiatives proof the integrated nature of the MDGs. They are not cocktails that states and communities can cherry pick as they go along. Progress in one goal must demand progress in others if the success is to be sustainable. In all the countries there are sad paradoxes that both governments and campaigners have to focus upon. As infant mortality is coming down maternal mortality remain scandalously high. In Zambia, Nigeria, Malawi and Tanzania, they are so high that it is really amazing that there is no public outrage about them. If our children are living longer why are our mothers dying often so young? Who is going to look after these children? How can we achieve the lofty goals on Gender and women empowerment if so many women continue to die in childbirth?

While we welcome the patchy and slow progress that has been made so far it is important to use this mid point year to realign our national priorities to ensure that the MDGs are met and even surpassed. As a foot ball supporter and a life long Liverpool one, at that, the analogy I can draw is that of the European finals of 2005. At half time Liverpool was trailing AC Milan 3:0. As the whistle was blown both managers went into the dug out. Liverpool Manager was furious and he read out the riot act to his players. On resumption we saw a changed team who had levelled the scores by full time and refused to concede any even at the extra time. Finally in the Shoot out Liverpool won.

We should use the same tactics for our governments. The fact that they are making uneven progress at mid point should not mean that the outcome is necessarily doomed. More can be done. One of our Key partners, The Micah Challenge (a global group of ecumenical churches campaigning on MDGs) has dubbed their campaign: blowing the Whistle. We need to blow the whistle on our political leaders at local, national, Pan African and globally that they fulfil the commitments made under the MDGs.

There is no point in being cynical. 7 years may be short but it is long enough for all states to meet these goals if citizens insist and continue to put pressure on the policy makers whether government or parliamentarians or politicians at all levels. Indifference is the enemy of delivery and a great ally of insensitive politicians.

On October 16/17 every one of us will have the opportunity to show we care about the poor and support the MDGs by helping to beat the Guinness record that we set last year. Over 23.5 millions of people around the world stood up against poverty in support of the MDGs. You can do so anywhere you are. Look at or www.millenniumcampaign.org for details.

* Tajudeen Abdul Raheem is the Deputy Director for the UN Millennium Campaign in Africa, based in Nairobi, Kenya. He writes this article in a personal capacity as a concerned pan-Africanist.

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

Those predicting a free and fair election next year were left re-evaluating their optimism after an opposition candidate was stabbed to death last Friday. Jabulani Chiwoka, an MDC candidate in next year’s rural district council elections, died from stab wounds after suspected Zanu PF thugs attacked him at a beerhall in the Svosve communal area of Marondera. Another party activist, Tafiranyika Ndoro, is in a Marondera hospital recovering from stab wounds.

Unequal trade and investment relationships are nothing new for Africa, although beginning in 2005 the world’s attention was drawn to Africa’s plight as never before. However, in contrast to the neo-orthodox strategy implied by Gordon Brown, Bono, Bob Geldoff and other mainstream campaigners, Africa’s deepening integration into the world economy has typically generated not wealth but the outflow of wealth, says Patrick Bond.

Development efforts are not fulfilling the promises made in the Millennium Development Goals, to reduce poverty and improve poor people’s lives. Why not? One fundamental reason is that policymakers and development experts do not recognise the essential role that information and communication play in development. In this landmark publication commissioned by the UK Department for International Development, Panos London sets out what it believes should be the role of communication in long-term, sustainable development.

In this week's AU Monitor, we bring you news and documentation for forthcoming AU meetings on children, industry and of the Economic, Social and Cultural Council. In addition, the AU Monitor features interviews from the African Development Bank (AfDB) with resource mobilization lead expert, Boubacar Traoré, who sheds light on the Multilateral Development Banks’ meeting on debt-related issues held at the World Bank and with Ms Motselisi Lebesa, Principal Public Utilities Economist at NEPAD’s Regional Integration and Trade Department, who talks of Africa's infrastructure deficit and the approaches developed by NEPAD and AfDB in two recent studies. Also at the African Union, the President of the African Union, Ghana’s Head of State, John Kufuor, has appointed Cameroonian Vice President of Transparency International, Barrister Akere Tabeng Muna, as a member of the African Union Audit Commission, in conformity with the Accra Declaration in which Heads of States and Government agreed that, in order to attain the Union Government, "an Audit of the Executive Council in terms of Article 10 of the Constitutive Act, the Commission as well as the other organs of the African Union" be conducted prior to the January summit of the African Union in Addis Ababa.

In Asian-African news, the AU Monitor brings you an important article by Mills Soko on African and Indian economic ties, enunciating the potential for lessons and skills sharing, Dr. Soko states: "Africa has become the emerging market for Indian products and enterprises and an alternative source of energy for India, while African exports, including natural resources, agricultural goods and household consumer items, have grown exponentially." Further, in Sino-African relations, the African Union announced this week the donation of $300,000 by the Chinese government for peacekeepers in Somalia. Also in peace and security news, the AU Mission in the Sudan has condemned an attack by the Justice and Equality Movement and the Unity faction of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA-Unity) on a Sudanese army base in Kordofan while the United Nations Secretary General also condemned the government bombings on Southern Darfur on Tuesday.

In regional news, President of the ECOWAS Commission, Dr Mohamed Ibn Chambas, urged the European Union to show understanding and flexibility in the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) negotiations, while, in a communiqué of the SADC Civil Society forum on “Ensuring Effective Civic Participation in Development and Democratic Governance”, Southern African civil society call upon heads of states and government to institutionalize and operationalize the participation of civil society in decision making at the national and regional levels; take concrete and urgent action related to the violations of human rights in Zimbabwe and Lesotho; and to enter trade negotiations, particularly with the EU, as a united bloc for the benefit of the region.

Ningefurahi kama baadhi ya mawazo ya wasomaji katika baadhi ya hizi makala zinazohusu Afrika mashariki zingetafsiriwa kwa lugha ya kiswahili kama jina la jarida lilivyo. Hii inasaidia "Kuwezesha Sauti yako Kusikika" kwa usahihi na kwa watu wengi zaidi.

I like the story about governments and restaurants. The question is, Are the fcustomers including the frogs any better than the managers of the restaurants?

From what the article says, it seems that the customers, even though complaining are still content with the culture of managers. It is suprising that it is the managers who are expected change, and actually some have changed and are working hard. What about the people themselves, those who are hungry and angry? Why dont they just stop paying the bribes so that there is no incentive for the bad managers? Why dont they just boycot eating as it has been the cases where people felt the need to do so in past? A few deaths? Yes, malnutrition? that is also obvious and innevitable but a worth price to pay for the future generations. Why dont these people remember the few brave customers who refused the promises and even boycotted to eat bad and smelling food in South Africa, Angola, Liberia, Zaire and other palces?

I think the customers, especially those making the loudest noises in the media, workshop and seminars, and the frogs at the edge of the restaurant have found an alternative to get better food. That is why they have the energy to make the noises about the poor quality of food. I feel some go to neighbouring restaurants for better services for their children. I do not blame them, as one of them once retorted "..... You are right my friend, but I cannot dare see my child just about to be eaten by a greedy crocodile and do nothing, just because I am a believer in the rights of animals!

In my opinion, I may not want to continue blaming the managers and waiters at the restaurant, but the customers.......... amka kumekucha is the right slogan then. and then tuache kupiga kelele kwa kiingereza kwa vile siyo wengi wataamka, na wale watakaosikia wamekwisha amka lakini wanaenda kwenye migahawa mbadala.

Japhet Makongo Is an Independent Consultant, Ubunifu Associates, Dar es Salaam

When will we Africans get over this "blame the colonizers" culture for everything that is wrong with Africa?

The inability for the security guard mentioned below to effectively deal with the situation is an educational matter that has nothing to do with Zambia's colonization, which ended 43 years ago. This man is uneducated because for 43 years successive inept regimes have seen this country's educational system all but collapse. Do you honestly expect him to know better or have the ability to distinguish between various cultural attires and fashion statements?

For your information I was preventing from entering the same establishment for wearing a wooly hat. I explained that this was a physical requirement as it was June and I am naturally "follically challenged". However, I did not ridicule the guard nor blame colonizers for the event. I simply referred the decision to a level where it could be dealt with effectively.

My Zambian people remain poor and uneducated, even more so than when we were colonized, because we have condoned incompetent leadership. Donor agencies, including the UN, must shoulder some of these responsibilities because they seem to not want to tackle the real issues driving Africa backwards.

The root cause of the problem remains our inability to add value to the opportunities we have as a country. Donors continue to treat the symptoms – mopping the floor when someone should be asking why the tap isn't being turned off. The "value" of being African is being diminished by ourselves – not by anyone else. We accept our politicians being late for every function they attend, we don't complain when our whole cabinet waits in the baking sun for the presidential jet to arrive for hours on end. It is this mindset that keeps us poor and the "butt" of every joke.

My success as a man of colour from Africa (I made my first million dollars by the age of 31 and never looked back) was achieved by replicating work ethics and disciplines engrained in other cultures. I create my own destiny as a person and certainly do not but myself in a box with a label. Nobody is "anti-African" as the author makes out – they just play on stereotypes we create for ourselves. Malaysia certainly doesn't wallow in self pity point a finger at anything and everything being the reason for their failure.

Food for thought I hope!

Mahmood Mamdani writes about the dangers of the UN’s new role in Darfur. The balance between the military and political dimensions is crucial, and the UN tends to privilege the military dimension.

Significant changes are currently taking place on the ground in Darfur. The peacekeeping forces of the African Union (AU) are being replaced by a hybrid AU-UN force under overall UN control. The assumption is that the change will be for the better, but this is questionable. The balance between the military and political dimensions of peacekeeping is crucial. Once it had overcome its teething problems – and before it ran into major funding difficulties – the AU got this relationship right: it privileged the politics, where the UN has tended to privilege the military dimension, which is why the UN-controlled hybrid force runs the risk of becoming an occupation force.

The AU’s involvement in Darfur began a year after the start of the insurgency, when in April 2004 it brokered the N’djamena Humanitarian Ceasefire Agreement between the Sudanese government and the rebel movements. The result was the setting up of the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), which started with a group of 60 observers in June 2004, and expanded to 3605 by the end of the year: 450 observers, 2341 soldiers and 814 police officers. The troops came from six countries – Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Senegal, Gambia and Kenya – and the police from Ghana. There were also military observers from Egypt and Libya, among others. A Joint Assessment Mission, led by the AU with participants from the UN, the EU and Canada, followed in March 2005. It called for an increase in the numbers of soldiers and police to a total of roughly eight thousand, and for civilians to be brought in as humanitarian officers.

One member of the assessment team was Major General Henry Anyidoho from Ghana, who was UN deputy force commander in Rwanda at the time of the genocide. I met him in Khartoum in May this year, and asked what he thought of AMIS. ‘I got to Darfur in January 2005,’ he said. ‘I found out they were doing an incredibly good job. First, the rebel movements were still intact, so it was easy to deal with the government and the two rebel movements. Second, the Janjawiid were pretty well under control. Third, the ceasefire agreement was being observed.’ This positive view was shared by Refugees International, which reported in November 2005 that earlier in the year, AMIS had been able to provide some security and deterrence. Displaced persons were congregating near AMIS bases, the UN World Food Programme started parking its vehicles at AMIS sites, AMIS escorted humanitarian convoys, and helped victims of attacks get to hospitals. The round-the-clock presence of civilian police in some IDP [Internally Displaced Person] camps has provided a greater sense of security to a population that is distrustful of the Sudanese police. AMIS forces have helped to restore order and provide security during the very difficult IDP re-registration process.[1]

By the time the Refugees International report appeared, however, it was clear that the rebel movements were beginning to split. AMIS had succeeded – and this was a major political achievement – in negotiating a Declaration of Principles and getting all the insurgent factions and the government of Sudan to sign it on 5 July 2005 in Abuja. That declaration remains the only political basis for peace in Darfur. But only three months later, when the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) held its conference in Darfur, Abdel Wahid, its leader, anticipated problems and did not attend. His suspicions proved justified when Minni Minawi, the commander of the movement’s field forces, was elected to replace him. The AU decided to invite both men to peace talks in Abuja, where Minawi signed the Darfur Peace Agreement in May 2006. But the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), the other original rebel movement, refused to sign, as did 19 representatives of the SLM, who defected to follow Abdel Wahid.[2] The so-called Group of 19 wielded a lot of influence among the fighters, who soon began to degenerate into tribal groupings. The difficulty for the AU now was how to get all these groups together, but it remained committed to a political solution, knowing that only a renegotiated ceasefire would provide protection for civilians in Darfur.

Another unfortunate development was that support for AMIS from Western donor countries began to weaken just as the going got rough. The N’djamena Ceasefire Agreement had involved a formal collaboration between the AU, the UN and leading Western powers. According to Anyidoho, ‘Canada was to provide aircraft and maintenance, the UK vehicles, the US camps, and the EU soldiers and police.’ Donors eager to be seen to pledge money early in 2005 were reluctant to release it once the mission ran into difficulties. The US had promised $50 million to support AMIS at the donors’ conference in May 2005, but didn’t deliver. By November the following year, Congress had removed the funds from the 2006 Foreign Operations Appropriations Bill. Around the same time, the EU announced that salary payments would be made only on a quarterly basis and demanded proper financial accountability before releasing funds for the next quarter. When the paperwork didn’t arrive, the EU suspended the provision of funds.

‘Donors call the shots,’ Anyidoho told me. ‘When donor fatigue set in, the world began calling for UN forces. The AU force has not been paid since January 2007. It is short of aviation fuel from time to time. Donors have provided the AU with commercial, not military, helicopters, so the pilots must decide whether or not to go to an area.’ In July, when I made my second visit this year to Sudan, the AU force still hadn’t been paid. AMIS has faced a series of problems of this sort. As early as 2005, when Refugees International sent a mission to assist AMIS in North Darfur, it noted that ‘all of AMIS’s local interpreters were on strike because their salaries had been cut in half following a restructuring of salaries . . . for all AMIS personnel.’

The AU had assumed that the ceasefire would be observed by all parties, and expected that its mission would be needed for only a short time. As the rebels began to split, and the political agreement underlying the ceasefire to unravel, fighting resumed and the inadequacy of AMIS’s mandate became apparent. There were demands that it be expanded so that the armed peacekeepers could protect not only the unarmed observers, who were supposed to monitor the ceasefire, but also the civilian victims of the conflict.

The AU itself had quickly become a target both for the belligerents and for anybody agitated by the conflict – including the media, the international NGOs (INGOs) and the IDPs they had come to ‘save’. Throughout the second half of 2005, there were attempts by all sides to murder or kidnap AU soldiers. According to Refugees International, Janjawiid attacks on villages in North Darfur, which killed ten people and displaced nearly seven thousand more, also wounded three members of an AMIS patrol; a rebel splinter group kidnapped nearly forty AMIS troops in West Darfur; four Nigerian AMIS troops and two of its civilian contractors were killed when they intervened in an attack, reportedly by the SLA, on another contractor; the next day, a JEM splinter group kidnapped an entire AMIS patrol of 18, including its American monitor, in Nana, near Tine in West Darfur.

There were other problems too. In September 2005, two AMIS soldiers died of Aids-related illnesses, sparking public anxieties. In March 2006, Channel 4 reported that women and girls as young as 11 at the Gereida IDP camp in South Darfur were claiming that AU soldiers had offered them money in exchange for sex. The AU set up a committee to inquire into alleged ‘sexual misconduct including rape and child abuse’ carried out by its forces.

AMIS has responded ineptly to such problems. It has almost no appreciation of the critical role of spin in shaping public opinion in modern Western democracies and has neither a public relations office nor a legal department. Instead of releasing its version of events in a convincing way, it always communicates in the form of a short press release. Refugees International reported incredulously that when they asked for ‘a brochure describing their mission, officers handed RI a printed copy in English and Arabic of the Declaration of Principles . . . with photos of the signatories’.

The powerful, usually well-intentioned INGO community in Darfur has added its voice to those who see the presence of the UN, and of the Western powers in particular, as the only viable solution to the crisis. Refugees International wants the UN to take charge of African peacekeepers, on the grounds that ‘“blue-hatting” a mission . . . has worked in the past in such places as Burundi and Liberia, where the AU or Economic Community of West African States, after providing initial stability, handed over a mission to the UN.’ They argue, above all, that the UN has the resources to support more troops on the ground, and to furnish them with superior weaponry. RI has even called on the UN Security Council to establish a no-fly zone over Darfur and on Nato and other forces to assist AMIS in enforcing it. There are concerns, naturally, that such measures would ratchet up the military element of the ‘humanitarian intervention’, but there has been hardly any discussion of their potential political consequences. It is this tension between the military and political aspects of intervention that explains the contradictions in Security Council Resolution 1769 of 31 July on the United Nations African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID).

Resolution 1769 begins by affirming that this ‘hybrid operation should have a predominantly African character and the troops should, as far as possible, be sourced from African countries’. It calls on the secretary-general to ‘immediately begin deployment of the command and control structures and systems necessary to ensure a seamless transfer of authority from AMIS to UNAMID’, and leaves no doubt about the meaning of ‘immediately’: ‘as soon as possible and no later than 31 December 2007’. At the same time, the resolution ‘emphasises there can be no military solution to the conflict in Darfur’ and stresses the importance of the Darfur Peace Agreement as the basis for a ‘lasting political solution and sustained security in Darfur’. It deplores the fact that ‘the Agreement has not been fully implemented by the signatories and not signed by all parties to the conflict,’ and calls for an immediate ceasefire, including a stop to the government’s aerial bombings. Here, then, is the contradiction at the heart of Resolution 1769: it aims to enforce a ceasefire that does not exist. It sets a firm deadline for the transfer of authority to UNAMID, but suggests no deadline for either a ceasefire or a political agreement to be reached by the warring parties. An external force can monitor a ceasefire agreed by belligerents, but only if such an agreement exists. The collapse of a ceasefire is evidence that there is no agreement. It was, after all, the breakdown of the N’djamena ceasefire that reversed the fortunes of AMIS.

‘The AU has become part of the conflict,’ Mohamed Saley, the leader of the JEM splinter group that allegedly abducted the AMIS patrol in October 2005, told Reuters at the time. ‘We want the AU to leave and we have warned them not to travel to our areas.’ Trying to keep the peace in the absence of a peace agreement made the AU ‘part of the conflict’. There is no reason to believe that the fate of the UN will be any different. To strengthen the mandate in the absence of a political agreement is more likely to deepen than to solve the dilemma. To enforce the ceasefire will mean taking on the role of an invading – and not a peacekeeping – force. Darfur, which is a bit smaller than France – and larger than Iraq – will surely require a force of more than the 26,000 currently planned by the UN.

Abdu Katuntu was chair of the African Union Parliament’s Select Committee on Darfur between 2004 and 2006, during which time he made six lengthy visits to Darfur, including stays in IDP camps. I met him in Kampala a few weeks ago and asked him why the UN could not have given AMIS more resources and made its mandate more robust, instead of ‘blue-hatting’ it. ‘It would have rendered them irrelevant,’ he answered, ‘because the international community would have said the Africans have sorted out their own problem.’ I have also spoken to UN personnel who are puzzled by the organisation’s focus on only one set of belligerents. ‘There is something wrong with the UN Mission,’ an Afghan security officer in the UN’s Department of Safety and Security reflected. ‘Everyone knows that for the UN the problem is only the government and the Janjawiid. They are here to disarm them and not the rebel forces. How then can you get a political solution between them?’

The AU’s political vision is encapsulated in a provision in the Darfur Peace Agreement that calls for a Darfur-Darfur Dialogue and Consultation (DDDC). The AU distinguishes between the processes of dialogue and consultation: although the formal dialogue can begin only after a comprehensive peace agreement is in place, the AU is committed to an informal consultation intended to pave the way to such an agreement. The consultations began in July last year. The first meetings were held in cities in each of the three states of Darfur: Nyala in the south, Zalingei in the west and El Fasher in the north. They brought together grassroots activists and leaders representing many different groups: the Native Administration regime in the rural areas that was displaced (into the towns and cities) by the 2003 insurgency, local voluntary organisations, political parties (both government and opposition), intellectuals and academics (each of the three states has a university), and the more than two million displaced people living in camps in Darfur.

The first rounds of discussion in Nyala and Zalingei had produced a consensus on one issue: the DDDC should not be a top-down affair but should rather include all political and tribal affiliations (even those implicated in providing recruits for the Janjawiid). It would have to be independent of any political party or group (including the government). But the consultations produced a double shock for the African Union. A large majority at the El Fasher meeting in July this year called for an intervention by forces who would not only be ‘external’ but non-African. Most participants identified the AU as the root of their problems and the UN as the most likely source of an effective solution. ‘The AU is like the Arab League,’ the representative from El Fasher Call, a voluntary organisation, explained. ‘It responds to governments, not public pressure. All African governments are dictatorships, which is why people look at the AU with suspicion. The UN also represents governments, but most states in the UN are democratic.’ ‘We want the UN to come,’ the sultan of El Fasher added. ‘It has mercy.’

The naivety of these assumptions was typical of the discussions at El Fasher. Just as they identified the UN with Western democracies, and talked as if democracies cannot be empires, every speaker who called for UN intervention seemed to assume that UN forces – unlike those of AMIS – would be white. They did not appear to have grasped that what will change in the transition from AMIS to UNAMID is the command much more than the troops on the ground.
The discussion on UN intervention ended in a cul-de-sac. On the one hand, the call for external intervention was backed up by a strong feeling that all internal avenues (national and African) were exhausted. On the other hand, those most vociferously calling for external intervention seemed to see the UN as a benign agency without any political agenda of its own – even though it is clear that a UN intervention would be guided by the big powers of the Security Council. Many supporters of external intervention saw it as an extension of a local practice, ‘ajawiid’, whereby a third party intervenes in a conflict that cannot be resolved. But the lesson of ‘ajawiid’ is that the intervention can only be credible and effective if the third party’s interests are compatible with those of the belligerents. In El Fasher no one questioned the politics of an intervention driven by the major powers.

Local voluntary organisations were critical of the growing dependency of IDPs on international NGOs. The representative from El Fasher Call made the point with some bitterness: ‘IDPs are trying to endear themselves to international NGOs but don’t want to deal with national NGOs.’ ‘IDPs don’t believe in anything Sudanese any more,’ a representative from a Fur charity added. One participant from a construction NGO observed that the war had made people adopt a ‘consumer mentality’. The disaffection with INGOs was shared by all local voluntary organisations, regardless of their ethnic affiliation or political inclination. ‘National NGOs lack the capacity to provide necessary services,’ a representative of Sudan Development Organisation explained, not least because they are excluded by INGOs: ‘They make no attempt to acknowledge that we know the ground better, and also the demands of the people. No wonder most national NGOs have been rejected by the IDPs. If international NGOs gave us a chance, people might appreciate us more.’ One participant, however, reminded his colleagues that, without the INGOs, ‘you would not have found any IDP alive in Darfur.’ As he saw it, the problem was twofold. First, the INGOs have a short-term perspective: they may leave after peace is established, and national NGOs should be ready to fill the gap. Second, each INGO has its own agenda that limits its perspective: ‘Every organisation has its own programme for each place. There should be a dialogue among organisations to co-ordinate a programme.’

Summing up the discussions at El Fasher, the AU mediator, Salim Ahmed Salim, made the crucial point that for external intervention to work it would have to reinforce an internal process, not be a substitute for it. What matters, he argued, is ‘not how large a force it is but what they have come to defend’, since ‘without an agreement on peace, even a force of fifty thousand can’t change the situation here radically.’ He meant to caution Darfurians that to pin all hopes on the hybrid force would be tantamount to abdicating their own responsibility. But he was in a minority.

Salim reflected more widespread agreement when he remarked: ‘Even if those who have taken up arms have a cause, it is important to consult those who have not taken up arms, the civilian population.’ The point of the consultations should be ‘to show them an alternative to armed struggle: dialogue, persuasion, organisation’. Earlier negotiations, he argued, should have involved more civilians. But if civil society is to be more than a mere appendage to the second round of negotiations involving armed groups, the DDDC talks will need to be the beginning of a far more ambitious process.

No internal force appears capable of effective leadership. Even the SPLA, which is in political control of the South of Sudan and has been guaranteed, under the terms of the separate Comprehensive Peace Agreement of January 2005, 10 per cent representation in every parliament in the northern states, doesn’t have the human resources necessary for effective leadership. Like the UN, the INGOs seem to have no patience with an internal political process. For them, the people of Darfur are not citizens in a sovereign political process so much as wards in an international rescue operation with no end in sight. They are there to ‘save’ Darfur, not to ‘empower’ it. This is why many of the big INGOs and some of the American and British staff at the UN offices in Khartoum are sceptical about the DDDC. They worry that bringing together political figures and representatives of civil society for an open discussion risks conveying a feeling that normality is returning to Darfur, when it is actually the depth of the crisis that should be emphasised. The ‘humanitarian’ effort is itself based on the conviction that both the crisis and its solution are military, not political; accordingly, there is little appetite for an internal political process designed to strengthen democratic citizenship.

‘What is the solution?’ I asked General Anyidoho, who has recently been appointed joint deputy special representative for the hybrid force. ‘Threefold,’ he replied, military fashion. ‘First, a complete ceasefire.’ (This would require a political agreement among all the fighting forces.) ‘Second, talks involving a cross-section of Darfurians. They must agree. And third, the government has a big role to play. This is not a failed state; there is a sitting government.’ What about the Janjawiid? ‘They are nomadic forces on horseback; they have always been there. They are spread across Sahelian Africa: Niger, Sudan, Chad, the Central African Republic. The problem is that the AK-47 has replaced the bow and arrow. The Janjawiid should be disarmed before the rebels turn in their arms.’

What about the camps? ‘The camps are becoming militarised. Women go out to collect firewood and they are raped. Rape has become a weapon of war. It is meant to destroy a people’s moral fabric: in an Islamic society, rape is a big blemish. The AU police used to provide firewood patrols and they were successful. But if there is security in future, men will join their women in going to collect firewood. The objective should be to close the IDP camps.’

What about the American threat to ‘take steps’ – a no-fly zone, sanctions? ‘It is not the way to go. Americans give deadlines all the time. The threat of sanctions is also not enough. They have lived under these for so long that they have become normal. They are used to living in seclusion. Now, they have oil and a friend in the Security Council . . . We can’t solve these problems through weapons. We have to sit and talk, which is why it is important to look at how Côte d’Ivoire was solved after four years of fighting. Outsiders can never solve the problem for us. It’s a distant misery for them. We have to do it for ourselves.’

Footnotes
1. No Power to Protect: The African Union Mission in Sudan by Sally Chin and Jonathan Morgenstein (Refugees International, November 2005).
2. Alex de Waal wrote about this in the LRB of 30 November 2006.

* This article first appeared in the London Review of Books vol. 29, no. 17, 6 September 2007 and reproduced here with the permission of the author.

* Mahmood Mamdani is the Herbert Lehman Professor of Government in the Departments of Anthropology and Political Science at Columbia University in the United States. He is also the Director of Columbia's Institute of African Studies.[ He is also the current President of the Council for Development of Social Research in Africa (CODESRIA) Dakar, Senegal.

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

Democracy has many different meanings. To Philani Zungu, a shackdweller in Durban, democracy means “accepting the unacceptable”.

People have different definitions of democracy. Some people say that democracy means freeing everyone to do whatever they want, regardless of rule or controls, with no instructions or boundaries, no importance to whether what is done is wrong or right.

Some people say democracy is the power of the state to decide things, acting in the interests of those who hold state power, its behaviour designed to suit their demands. In this vision, society is always in a position of compliance with orders from the state.

Some people say democracy is about rights. After the Freedom Charter was created, people came to know about their particular rights. The more they understood their rights, the freer they became. We never expected to be disappointed in turning these rights into reality. But we were.

Some people say democracy is for all of us - as society. They say it is a reason to improve and protect our lives. It is equality, whereby all should participate in building a better society and achieving a better life for all.

Let me share my experience of democracy since 1994 as a shackdweller in Durban.

I stayed with my mother, step- father and my younger brother in a small house, four by four meters. We were tightly squeezed up. The eThekwini Department of Housing decided that we could no longer build or extend shack structures. We had no choice. If we built, they would come and demolish the same day, or soon after.

I also felt the shame of women giving birth in the shacks. This they did after not attending clinic for a long time, because nurses shout at them, and when they are admitted, are not being attended to in good faith.

New to unemployment, my parents had no finance to support us; so I had to come from school and look for work, such as car washing and gardening.

I had to stop school at grade 9. When I was 20 years old, I needed to be independent, so I tried to build a house. It was demolished, and inside it was everything I owned. I was was assaulted by the land invasion unit, and had to be admitted to Addington Hospital. I was denied a right to housing.

This happened purely because it was already decided for me, in advance,without any redress or consultation, how I could live.

I was arrested for demonstrating against the lack of delivery, and lack of of consultation in 2005.

In 2006, I was arrested again. This time, I was being searched by a police officer on the way to a radio interview. I asked why I was being searched. It was a relevant question to ask, in case I might have some information to assist on a particular case. But the policeman replied that a black man is always a suspect. And then they arrested me. This time I was arrested for asking why I could not be treated like a human being, with rights, in a democracy. Once again I was assaulted, this time in the Sydenham Police station.

In 2007 I was arrested for not agreeing to be treated like an animal by the police. The police had come to my home and demanded to search me after I had built myself a new home so that I and my wife and child could move out of my mothers' house where I had lived for 16 years. I had nothing to hide. I had written a letter to the Land Invasions Unit and the Housing Department telling them that I was going to build my own house and why. I just asked the police why they wanted to search me and their response was arrest. Formal warnings were issued by the Sydenham police Station.

I can see that in the future, I'm expected to accept the unacceptable. That is the reality of democracy of the state and democracy of human rights in my experience. My only remaining hope for an acceptable future is hope in the democracy of society.

* Philani Zungu is Deputy President of Abahlali baseMjondolo, the shack dwellers' movement with members in almost 40 settlements in South Africa.

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

Underneath signs of economic progress in Tanzania, religious tensions persist, which threaten social cohesion and the political stability of the nation.

It was a case of petty arson turned media spectacle. Amidst the violence of the 2005 Zanzibar elections, the Janjaweed militia— loyalists to the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi party—were charged with vandalizing and setting fire to a Kinuni residence by Civic United Front sympathizers. As cyberspace is a preferred platform for political protest throughout East Africa, one need look no further than the message boards of CUF activists to gauge the tone of this ideological duel. Speaking about the fire, one impassioned commentator writes, “Even the Holy Quran was not spared” beneath the image of a few charred pages.

Through a broader lens, coverage of the event serves the CUF in an effort to redress voting irregularities they claim have kept them from power since the introduction of multiparty democracy in the early 1990’s. Religious references add another layer of meaning. With Muslims accounting for 98% of Zanzibar’s population, this is not a typical case of Muslims vs. Non-Muslims. This is a case of secular Muslims against their radical brethren. Despite a shared creed, religion remains the symbolic fault line of Zanzibar’s political fallout expressed through CUF suspicions around of CCM pieties.

The religious dimension of politics in Zanzibar and throughout Tanzania cannot be overstated. A general survey of Tanzanian politics airs a religious subtext that, in the light of recent provocations, inches into the foreground, posing a significant challenge to the long-term stability of the nation. More specifically, the grievances not only of the CUF but of groups throughout the country are reaching a crescendo as many assert their rights as Muslims.

These tensions are not a recent apparition, but have grown steadily over decades. British colonial rule, in its support of Christian mission schools, impaired Muslim access to educational opportunities. Muslim apologists cite this as resulting not only in the under-representation of Muslims among Tanzanian’s educated elite, but also within the civil service and parastatal institutions. This process was cemented with the undoing political ties between Muslim organizations and the government under Nyerere. More recently, the participation of Tanzania in the US-led war on terror is interpreted as a means to suppress the political opposition by linking would-be competitors with terrorist activities.

While this substantiates perceived discrimination, there is much concrete evidence to support these suspicions. In 1992, the Tanzanian government acknowledged after many years the educational disparities between Christians and Muslims. Years later, only 20% of secondary school students in Dar es Salaam—a city where 80% of inhabitants claim Islam as their religion-- are Muslim.

The perceived marginalization of Muslims in Tanzanian can be juxtaposed with the enabling of other special interest groups. The multiplication in number and grandeur of churches in Dar Es Salaam occurs within the bounds of religious freedoms granted by the constitution. However, when read against the 2004 closure of the renowned al-Furquan Islamic Primary School and the suspension of the Islamic press, a confounding portrait of the “secular” state comes into focus. It is difficult to refute that a special brand of discrimination preoccupied with the habits of Muslims forms the crux of religious tension in Tanzania.

In the grand scheme, with macroeconomic indicators suggesting upward turn in the country’s fortunes, Tanzania appears to be doing well. While we can all look with pride on its successes, enthusiasm over recent advances in Tanzania must be read cautiously against religious tensions percolating beneath. The consolidation of economic gains in the long term will require serious efforts to redress persisting disparities.
Aaliyah Bilal

* Aaliyah Bilal is a masters student at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.

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

Western visual paradigms are obsessed with the body. Annwen Bates asserts that in the imagery of the “Black African other” and HIV/AIDS, this translates into a mixture of “ghoulish fasincation and horror when confronted with the body’s demise”

“There are only two kinds of people in Africa: those infected with HIV, and those affected by it.”
These are the words of dedication in a booklet entitled Positive Health, which is filled with practical hints and tips for living with HIV. The dedication continues, “If you are infected, this book is for you. If you are not infected, this book is for a friend, a loved one or a colleague.” Even within our own ranks, we have become a continent defined by a virus.

This definition of Africa and Africans worries me, a lot. Partially because the reality is that many people are both infected and affected by the virus, but also because HIV and AIDS are the reductionist buzz words that have settled on this continent. To define a whole continent and its people by a virus and a body degenerating, immune-depleting virus, recalls the whispers of Africa/ns ever lacking. There are many mental and physical health conditions affecting our communities: various depressions, cancers, organ malfunctions and failures, STDs, common colds and ‘flu that get out of hand. All our bodies are affected in sickness and health by poetics and politics. When last was there a global outcry over the limited availability of donor organs in Africa, or the exorbitant immuno-suppressant drugs necessary for transplants? (It is ironic that this goes out in the wake of the recent Tshabalala-Msimang debacle. Perhaps organ donations will become a hot topic.)

Maybe these medical conditions don’t make for good photo-journalism stories. In the discourse of Western visual paradigms, there is an affinity with the body. This affinity turns into ghoulish fascination and horror when confronted with the body’s demise. In imagery of the Black African Other in a state of decay (and our 21st century world is far from cutting the ties of these stereotypes), affinity and horror mingle into grand humanitarian urges. This, I propose, has given the HIV/AIDS ravaged body great visual – and media- currency in the West. Not to undermine the suffering of those who have died AIDS-related deaths or are still suffering. The medical reality is that with the compromised immune system, AIDS does spiral often curable conditions out of the control of modern doctors, drugs and solutions. And it is control of life itself that is the ultimate frontier.

The West may no longer be political colonial masters, but there is a territory they claim to know well: science, medicine and the ‘able-body’. It is not surprising that in visual images of Africa, the potential of science, medicine and the ‘able-body’ seldom feature. The image canon of Africa as lacking still fuels Afro-pessimism, in the West and elsewhere. Over the last three years, I have collected posters, brochures, comic books, leaflets – any printed public health material to do with HIV/AIDS in my home corner of the world, Cape Town. I have come developed an interpretation that South African organisations are attempting to tackle what one might suggest as a ‘counter-narrative’ of the HIV/AIDS situation. My point of departure is the poetics of the situation: how the hopes, realities, concerns and underpinning ideologies spill into public health material (both from government and NGOs) in language and particularly images. It is particularly interesting to look at this material in it's visualising of action: informing, preventing, supporting and acting.

The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) provides a fine case study of an organisation that visualizes this counter-discourse of Afro-empowerment. Moreover, this visualization is intentional. Like any brand-name campaign, they have recognised the value of a good image. A picture is worth a 1000 words, if not a $1000. On their website they acknowledge the power of visual images in furthering their cause by offering free use of their images, as long as the organisation is acknowledged. This is (South) Africans doing it for themselves. Such is one of the narratives around the materiality of the wider HIV/AIDS situation in South Africa. Indeed, there are more; some hopeful, others heartbreaking.

Visual representations of (South) Africans active in the face of a destructive virus delineate a social psyche trying to move forward. It is not a luxurious or distracting social dream, but part of a very real and hopeful social truth. Like the truth of fighting for political freedom that fuelled so many movements on our continent.

What the HIV/AIDS situation has brought to our attention is the politics of health- and consequently, the very politics of life. In our increasingly visual age, we reflect these politics in the subtle meanings invested in images. For a long time, post-colonial studies have lobbied for previously silenced voices to be heard. I propose the image as the new voice, so that it might be said: there are two types of people in Africa, those who are represented by others and those who choose how they represent themselves.

* Annwen E. Bates is a visiting lecturer in Art History and Visual Culture at Rhodes University. She holds degrees from UCT and the University of Oxford. With regret she writes above about ‘Africa’ as a cohesive whole, a strategy she often criticises, and is open to invitations that will guide more

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