Celebrity Madness

While it was hardly a surprise to read this account of Pitt and Jolie's stay in Namibia a couple years ago, the minutiae are still a bit mind boggling. Truly ironic that one of the UN's 'goodwill ambassadors' had no hesitation about controlling who received visas to enter the country during her stay and who did not. Wealthy whites have long manipulated African countries to arrange themselves according to what is most accommodating for those bringing in massive amounts of foreign currency and a media circus, to boot. Ministers trip over each other praising the visitors for even knowing that their country exists; it's hard not to see this as analogous to selling one's soul to the devil. It might have been worthwhile if the touted couple had later promoted Namibia in a respectful, positive way, yet underlying Jolie's comments in a post-natal interview is an attitude of such gross paternalism that, if nothing else, one can't but wonder why she wanted to go there in the first place.

“The borders were drawn in Africa not that long ago,” Angelina explained. “These people are tribal people. We colonised them . . . They have just recently learnt to govern themselves . . . And we need to be there to really support them at that time, to help them to understand how better to govern.”

i can only hope that her next mission doesn't take her to Eastern Europe.

Fair Trade gets a boost in Britain

It's a start. Cadbury has announced it is now going to buy fair trade chocolate from Ghanaian farmers for its Dairy Milk bars, apparently the top selling chocolate bar in the UK (according to this, that translates into 300 million bars a year in UK and Ireland). Why is this such good news? Two reasons. First, the cocoa fields of Ghana produce 40% of the country's total export revenues, yet cocoa farmers are living in abject poverty because most of the production occurs on plantations (you remember that word, right? one step below sharecropper) and individual, low volume producers are not able to get high enough prices to make their (very basic) bare essentials meet. Second, child labor on cocoa farms in West Africa is an enormous human rights problem. According to the International Institute on Tropical Agriculture, cited here:

An estimated 284,000 children are working on cocoa farms in hazardous tasks such as using machetes and applying pesticides and insecticides without the necessary protective equipment. Many of these children work on family farms, the children of cocoa farmers who are so trapped in poverty they have to make the hard choice to keep their children out of school to work. The IITA also reported that about 12,500 children working on cocoa farms had no relatives in the area, a warning sign for trafficking.

Robert Beckford has done an excellent -even highly entertaining - documentary that explores cocoa as well as rice and gold production in Ghana, The Great African Scandal. The kids working at fair trade farms do so after school, not in place of it; the difference this affects in the kids themselves is striking, on top of the fact that these farms are part of a community coop with all the atmospheric contrasts one might expect under that framework.

The fair trade farmers Beckford visits say that by the time it gets to the market, only 3-4% of all fair trade cocoa is actually sold at fair trade prices. The rest gets dumped together with 'regular' cocoa, sold at typical slave trade prices. Another victory for SAP (the IMF's Structural Adjustment Programs): liberalize the market but don't regulate the price structure. However, opening things up did create a situation in which daring farmers could take more control of their fate, which led eventually to the establishment of Divine Ltd in the UK, Ghana's first fair trade, coop-owned, cocoa company. Their products look a lot more appealing than Cadbury's, and the company now has a US section as well, but the idea here isn't that fair trade companies outcompete each other. The point is that ALL cocoa should be sold at fair trade prices, so kudos to Cadbury for taking this step and let's hope that more chocolatiers follow suit.

Mabuto Revisited. Times UK is reporting that the Mugabes have paid 4 million sterling for a private home in Hong Kong. This is just disgusting beyond words, and unfortunately shows how little things have changed when it comes to African leaders moving money out of the country for their own gluttonous benefit while starving out their fellow countrymen. Grace Mugabe is paying for her house furnishings with buckets of cash, which appears to verify my theory that a direct correlation exists between runaway inflation and runaway thievery.

In Algeria, islamicist anti-americans have been handed another recruitment gift by US intelligence [sic] as the digital files of the CIA station chief come to light. This guy was drugging and raping algerian women, and further explored his macho dimentia by documenting it all with photos and video. Obama may talk a good talk about restoring America's reputation around the world, but he might consider more seriously whether it is a reputation worth restoring. This kind of stuff is hardly new.

An African perspective on Bush's reign

Two of the students in my friday evening class were comparing notes on how high their fevers were earlier in the week, and i guess osmosis rules in the classroom because saturday afternoon i came in at 101.6F. The benefit of being sick on a rainy day is that i felt absolved of guilt at being totally unproductive and catching up on episodes of The Daily Show. John Oliver did a segment on Kenya, 'whose chief exports in 2008 were coffee, tea and american heads of state.' You can watch the whole piece here; it's a bit disrespectful (?) but true to form.

Most of it was an interview with the Kenyan Ambassador to the UN, who clearly did not understand Oliver works for a comedy show. When asked to name 3 non-gloomy facts of the Bush administration, the Ambassor pointed out (1) the US didn't break out into a civil war, and (2) there is no state that seceded (sidetracked, we never heard #3). Although Oliver chided him for being historically inappropriate, i thought it was a poignant reminder of the level of both state and personal insecurity that exists today for a sizable portion of Africans.

Based on my knowledge of Africa - feel free to fact check - i came up with this list of countries which are either having a civil war or significant ethnic/religious violence, have recently had a coup and it's hard to say how long things will remain 'stable', or have experienced measurable political unrest in the past, let's say 2-3, years.

Central African Republic
Nigeria
Chad
Sudan
Angola
Rwanda
Uganda
Somalia
Eritrea
Zimbabwe
Democratic Republic of Congo
Kenya
Western Sahara
Mauritania
Algeria
Cote d'Ivoire
Guineau-Bissau
Liberia
Madagascar

It's worth noting that 3 of these countries share a border with Kenya, so on top of having to deal with up to 300.000 of its own internally displaced people, Kenya is also providing a haven for 265.000 refugees (2007 figures from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, Norwegian Refugee Council). Large numbers of refugees of course contribute to any political instability already fomenting. For those of us living in countries with at least moderate functionality and security, the comparison to Africa should have a calming effect even if it's not enough to keep you from running to the prescription counter every time the price of fuel or fajitas goes up.

Going back to the Ambassador's comments, it's hard to say whether acceptance of Bush for a full 8 years is a sign of national stability or national apathy. i'm going for Door #2 on this, as i think that while there is a rich and colorful history of protest movements in the US, there isn't much of a revolutionary history (and no, don't say the War Between the States was an attempted revolution because it wasn't; it was a war of secession that accepted the US government for what it was). It's hard to imagine the Congress and White House being stripped of their powers by anyone other than the US military; i can't think of anyone i've personally known who would torch the US Constitution, and i've met some pretty anti-government kinds of people. American Indians - probably the most likely candidates for wanting to see the US govt dissolved - are well-versed in treay law and continue to demand the US be respectful of the same, as is required by.... its constitution.

Well, now there's Obama and a new day is a-dawnin' - however poorly stimulated. Where i live, people are a lot happier thinking about President Barack (translated into hungarian, the name with this spelling means 'peach') than their own no-win elections coming up in 2010. Contemplating the Congo is not going to make them feel lucky - not by a long shot. Thankfully, there is now a Comedy Central/Hungary to help ease both disgust and apathy.

Quickie World Round-up

The Thai PM is resigning, stranded air travellers finally free to fly home. One small step for tourism, one large step for ousting leaders by popular revolt. In Zimbabwe, soldiers attempting to violate the 18p bank withdrawal limit are now fighting against Harare police; this cannot be good for Mugabe, whose military supporters were key to his election fraud earlier this year. Christians and Muslims have agreed to stop killing each other in Nigeria, while Nkunda's "negotiations or war" ultimatum to Kabile's govt in Kinshasa fell off the media's radar in the wake of the attacks in Mumbia. Bahrain just celebrated its first National Women's Day and the Saudi govt has decreed that volatile books must be removed from circulation. Hillary and Gates are in, respectively replacing change and hope as cornerstones of the incoming administration. Condi Rice serenaded the Queen while W spent his list bit of Presidential Mastercard (TM) credit on the new Hank Williams 10 CD Deluxe BoxSet and is now wandering the White House humming the refrain from My Main Trial Is Yet To Come. Fidel meanwhile has been blogging about the collapse of capitalismo as his amigo on the continent makes another push for indefinite presidential terms in Venezuela. The american consumer subconscious is contending with death by shoppers; the Italians continue to contend with their garbage. Picture of the day comes from TimesOnline, taken by Antony Crossfield, winner of the 2008 Terry O'Neill Award.

Sorting out the mess in Congo

After confessing to my lack of understanding re the recent explosion of violence in eastern Congo (DRC), i've been reading through article threads on the Mail & Guardian and elsewhere, getting the situation sorted out historically and otherwise in my under-fired cerebral cortex. i recall a retired government bureaucrat in Dar es-Salaam telling me "there is no tragedy like an African tragedy," and what's happening in Congo now unfortunately seems to confirm this. From what i've been able to digest, here are the main issues being grappled with, all very intertwined so the order i'm presenting them in is irrelevant.

* Kabile's government (DRC) has been harboring Hutus (the FDLR) who fled after the massacres in Rwanda and continued to attack Tutsis in eastern Congo. Protecting his people from them has been one of the rationales given by Nkunda for pursuing this sweep of the region. A lot of Africans seem to view this conflict as the ultimate call for addressing the rampant racism that continues to plague the continent.

* Foreign countries are intent of stripping the resources from this area, signing agreements in Kinshasa without giving the inhabitants a voice and supporting violence against them for refusing to have their territory sold to the highest bidder. China is a main player on this stage. This is Nkunda's other rationale, and he says he's willing to march all the way to Kinshasa if that's what it takes to stop the resource rape.

* The UN needs to broker a cease fire in order to get the refugees out, and thought they had done so but no dice. Peacekeeping troops come from a variety of countries and are not operating under a unified command, so they can't stop the fighting any more than they can protect the civilians caught in it. Nkunda now says he won't deal with the UN until they set up a joint meeting with Kabile.

* President Kagame of Rwanda claims the UN's mission in DRC has been supporting Kabile's support of the FDLR, and there is some speculation that Rwanda is aiding Nkunda in an act of tribal solidarity. The consensus among African commentators is that racism is a major element driving the conflict and needs to be tackled on the broadest level possible within the entire continent.

* The African Union, which has essentially blown off the conflicts in Somalia, Darfur and Zimbabwe, is not seen as having any chance of being effective in this even more complex conflict. This is particularly true with respect to its younger partner/offshoot, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) which is discredited with having done nothing to force Mugabe out of power. Since some SADC members, e.g. Angola, have an apparent interest in seeing Kabile stay in power, the credibility of this organization - which the world community would love to see solve this whole business so they don't have to - is next to nil in the eyes of just about every african writing about it.

* The EU is prepared to send forces into the region, yet without a coordinated mission, what they can accomplish in terms of securing a long-term peace is unclear. There are some who see the entire mess, going back to the uprising in Rwanda, as the responsibility of francophone europe; ergo, opinions as to whether the fox can be trusted and effective in really cleaning out the henhouse are extremely varied and contentious.

There's no question that nearly all of the problems found in sub-saharan africa converge in the DRC: lots of horses, lots of carts, i'm not sure that the world can rise to the occasion when it comes to ironing them all out... at least in the near-term, it's clear that's impossible. The question of respecting national sovereignty seems to be used here as an excuse for non-aggressive intervention, just as it always is when it comes to Africans raping and killing each other with all those non-interventionists' arms. Staying out of your neighbor's business is a value highly espoused in the US and, in my experience, most of the rest of the world as well, perhaps excluding arabs. With all the fanfare internationally about Savior Obama coming to set the world right (liberal rapture is truly without comparison in its naivety), there is a chance that this sovereignty-intervention question will start to be addressed. Start - and that's a start. In the meantime, more tragedy in equatorial Africa - prophesy or proverb? Take your pick.

Mama Africa passes into eternity

"What I have seen here, I will tell the world in words and in songs." Mariam Makeba

Primate Hell

It had been my plan to totally switch gears and report on some newly identified co-inhabitants of our shrinking blue planet, including a legless lizard, a Borneo fox and a new species of mouse lemur, Microcebus macarthurii, named for the foundation which funded the research into these svelte Madagascar petits (photo by Dr. Blanchard Randrianambinina). In eastern Ecuador, 7 new species of Glassfrogs have been found. but like nearly all these new discoveries - mostly occurring in the tropics, i.e. RAINFORESTS - habitat loss is growing by the day and unless humans ship out to colonize Mars sooner rather than later, biologists aren't all that optimistic about how much longer into the future many of these creatures will survive. Every new species comes with increasingly frantic calls for habitat conservation.

Another spectacular novelty is a newly identified species of manta ray, found in Mozambiquan waters. Here's a super cool photo taken by Andrea Mitchell, an aussie doing her PhD research down there. These animals are certainly otherworldly enough to satisfy my sci-fi challenged imagination. The main threats to their survival are reportedly sharks, the asian medicinal industry and getting caught in seine nets, though not necessarily in that order. Elasmobranchii species feeding on each other may represent a sort of fundamentalist inter-special approach to survival of the fittest, but nothing Mother Nature's delivered on her own has come close to the destruction power of Homo sapiens sapiens. i have nothing against natural remedies and i've always loved my acupuncturists, but with so many of us and so very few of them, can't we find some chamomile blend that will offer up the same health benefits?

As i said, i'd planned to do a "New Non-Voter Roster" or something clever like that with these nocto-marino-primatological species types, but after reading about the crisis in Congo, i just couldn't bring myself to being completely light and airheady. According to lastest reports, dozens of park rangers from Virungi are still missing after the lot of them had to flee from the crossfire between Congolese (DRC) troops and (presumably) Nkunde's crazed hooligan soldados. This is the largest silverback gorilla reserve in Africa, in terms of sq kilometers, and they are now are greater risk than before. The rebels have reportedly taken over the park now.

This is from a year before, thought to be the act of Goma charcoal gangs:

If quasi-local poachers were doing this when there were park rangers around working to protect the gorillas, what should we expect to happen now that these protectors have fled? Can someone tell me what this war is the Congo is really about? What the purpose is? Just a bunch of wild men using territorial conquest as a reason to rape and pillage; the Tutsi position of protecting themselves from Hutu extremists doesn't cut water, given the extremism of Nkunde's forces. Yet even if there was a political justification, do they really need to be disturbing a primate reserve??? There doesn't seem much point in trying to take over territory whose value is destroyed in the process. But i'm sure they don't look at it that way. i'm a member of the vanishing eco-anarcho-liberal species, crying over dead gorillas - for god's sake! Primate hell, no matter which lens we apply.

Musical Interlude from Malawi

Some hip hop from the Real Elements

Le Cannabis dans La Maroc

Africa: Cyclones, Energy and Elections

Madagascar has long been at the top of my list of places to experience, so it's been quite upsetting to read the news about what's going on there now. Cyclone Ivan hit earlier this week and has left the country in shambles. AP is reporting 145,000 are now homeless, and UN OCHA is saying that 30% (18.000 hectares) of the country's rice fields have been totally flooded out. Evidently Cyclone Hondo is now about 1500 km off the coast and a month ago Cyclone Fame hit, leaving about 5000 people homeless. This is not good, i mean how much crazy climate phenomenon can one country take?? In addition to the tragedy of human suffering, Madagascar's many environmental programs have got to be taking a real beating now and this is also tragic, because the island is an amazing place in terms of biodiversity: essentially, the Galapagos of the Indian Ocean. While most people think of it as the land of lemurs, the Giant Boababs are truly amazing trees, which also have been losing habitat though much work has been done to protect them. So, just wanted to say something about this, as it ties into the many dreadful impacts of the climate crisis, as well as issues of food scarcity and importance of UN relief missions.

Segueing directly into my next heads-up item, the balancing act between food production and production of crops for bio-fuels. FAO and various European universities have come up with an analytical model for countries to use in determining the food scarcity impacts that could ensue relative to increasing bio-fuel production. Obviously, this question is important to consider before we all start buying up seats on Virgin Airlines. This article discusses the model, and i'm just going to stick in this one quote to give you an idea of what some are projecting:

... the increase in crop prices resulting from expanded biofuel production is also accompanied by a net decrease in availability and access to food. "Food-calorie consumption decreases the most in sub-Saharan Africa, where calorie availability is projected to fall by more than eight percent if biofuels expand drastically," said the IFPRI paper, The World Food Situation: New Driving Forces and Required Actions, by Joachim von Braun.

George Monbiot has been covering this issue from day one, here's his latest, in which he again points out the food-fuel connection (in his typically stark terms). i don't know enough about this issue to claim to have the right answer or best alternative solution... but i'm trying to understand what's being (im)balanced and how the rapid growth of consumerism, especially in populous Asian countries, is driving the demand for industrial fuel up and hence, putting nutritional food supplies at greater risk. It is a complex. vicious circle.

Lastly, this has been a month of important elections globally, but the season continues into March, with voting in Zimbabwe scheduled for 29.03. Monster Mugabe just had a birthday party, which was crashed by 120o demonstrators. Here's a great photo from the demo [note: the only way i could get into into the blog was by saving and pasting, it comes courtesy of allafrica.com] and you can read more about what's going on with these elections and the country in general at SW Radio Africa. Bush's recent statements about Mugabe during his and Laura's little Africa jaunt could just as easily been said about himself:

"In Zimbabwe, a discredited dictator presides over food shortages, staggering inflation, and harsh repression," he said. "The decent and talented people of that country deserve much better."

i know i'm hardly alone is saying it will be good to see both of them gone before this year is over, and then see them again in the defendant's box at The Hague. (ok, not holding my breath on that, but i'm allowed to wish, am i not?)