Africa: Leveraging Remittances

Globally remittances top $300 billion per year, outstripping foreign direct investment and development assistance combined. But while transfer costs have declined significantly in Latin America and in Asia, sending money home to Africa is still expensive. Within Africa, costs can be as high as 25 per cent of the sum.

African workers, according to the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), "send home more than US$40 billion to the region each year," but IFAD thinks "restrictive laws and costly fees hamper the power of remittances to lift people out of poverty, according to a new report by the UN’s rural poverty agency." In this just released paper Sending Money Home to Africa: Remittance Markets, Enabling Environments and Prospects, IFAD proposes:

The majority of remittances to Africa are used to purchase daily necessities. Yet a significant amount is available for savings or investment (around US$5-10 billion). This study reports that remittance recipients do save, but often do not use the formal channels. Bringing these funds into the formal financial system can increase their impact dramatically. The rapid rise of MFIs (Micro Finance Institutions) is a powerful testimony to the ability of the underserved to mobilize their resources in a way that stimulates local development. When remittances are deposited at a financial institution,

they can benefit both the individual and the community. With better financial education and a broader range of financial services to choose from, remittance recipients are empowered to make the financial choices that can advance them towards financial independence. The ability to expand these kinds of services, however, depends on institutions’ capacity, their willingness to offer services to people with a low income, and on a regulatory framework that encourages them to do so.

And till now I thought the threat to the Western Union and Moneygram hegemony was the rapidly expanding ways to send money to Africa via mobile phones.

Comics: Superman's Powers

Megan threw up this link to an "academic paper" by Ben Tippett, which offers a unified theory for superman's powers:

In this paper we propose a new unified theory for the source of Superman's powers; that is to say, all of Superman's extraordinary powers are manifestation of one supernatural ability, rather than a host. It is our opinion that all of Superman's recognized powers can be unified if His power is the ability to manipulate, from atomic to kilometer length scales, the inertia of His own and any matter with which He is in contact.

Huh?

Television: Drug War - Redefinition

At the start of this episode of the journal, Bill Moyers goes, "What Edward Gibbon was to the decline and fall of the Roman Empire or Charles Dickens was to the streets of Victorian London, David Simon is to America today."

DAVID SIMON: And it always will be. I don't think we have the stomach to actually evaluate this. And--

BILL MOYERS: What do you mean?

DAVID SIMON: Well--

BILL MOYERS: We don't have the stomach?

DAVID SIMON: Again, we would have to ask ourselves a lot of hard questions. The people most affected by this are black and brown and poor. It's the abandoned inner cores of our urban areas. And we don't, as we said before, economically, we don't need those people. The American economy doesn't need them. So, as long as they stay in their ghettos, and they only kill each other, we're willing to pay a police presence to keep them out of our America. And to let them fight over scraps, which is what the drug war, effectively, is. I don't think-- since we basically have become a market-based culture and it's what we know, and it's what's led us to this sad denouement, I think we're going to follow market-based logic, right to the bitter end.

BILL MOYERS: Which says?

DAVID SIMON: If you don't need 'em, why extend yourself? Why seriously assess what you're doing to your poorest and most vulnerable citizens? There's no profit to be had in doing anything other than marginalizing them and discarding them.

David Harvey would love this.

Update: And reports now say The Wire will soon be taught as a class at Harvard. 

Bangladesh: "Waterworld"

Emily Wax wrote in WaPo back in 2007, "The boats plying the rivers and canals here in northeastern Bangladesh are school bus and schoolhouse in one, part of a 45-vessel fleet that includes library boats. There are plans for floating villages, floating gardens and floating hospitals as well, in case more of this region finds itself under water. Like a scene out of the 1995 post-apocalyptic movie "Waterworld," in which the continents are submerged after the polar ice caps melt and the survivors live out at sea, the boat schools and libraries are a creative response to flooding that scientists largely agree has been worsened by global warming." IRIN shows us how:



By 2050, 17% of Bangladesh land will be under seawater. So it is better for us to adapt to the situation -- Abul Hasanat Mohammed Rezwan

South Africa: "Superhero"

Everyone--by that I mean me, myself, I and some others out there--want to see this short film by Hanneke Schutte, which has been winning some praise along the way.



synopsis: A white amnesiac finds himself stranded in the middle of an arid landscape dressed as a superhero. He is assisted and spurred on by a young black boy who wholeheartedly believes that he is a superhero. But as the man's memory returns he discovers that hes been anything but a hero.


H/T: Black Superhero Blog

Africa: Onioned -- A Golden Onion Oldie for Dambisa Moyo

"Nation Of Andorra Not In Africa, Shocked U.S. State Dept. Reports"... from the Onion archives.

Anchor: How did this happen?

Deputy Sec: Someone said Andorra was in Africa, it sounded right, we just kept sending them money.....

Anchor:Whose going to take the blame for this?

Deputy Sec: Well, the Andorra people should take the blame for this; they know exactly where they are, they should have told us.

lofl... I'd pay an arm and leg to see the blooper reel for this one.

South Africa: Early Word on Clint Eastwood's "Invictus"

Eastwood and Damon on the "Invictus" set

Because it's a Clint Eastwood helmed pic about Mandela some already think it's a lock for an oscar. Please! Alyssa thinks they should have gone for someone who could inhabit Mandela; their decision to go for a facsimile of Madiba underscores their casting of Morgan Freeman in the role. Sean over at Africa is a Country wasn't too impressed either (with the  trailer or book) and gives the South African take.

But one of Sean's readers points out why it will be hard to tell this rugby story to a universal audience in a way that would impress any South African:

I have a slightly different take as an Aussie who has just moved to South Africa. I believe the book opens up the Apartheid story to a broader base for understanding given it is written in a very easy to read format and combines sport with politics... Also a movie with Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon trying out South African accents is never going to appeal to all South Africans (and probably very few) I am heavily reminded of Meryl Streep trying an Aussie accent ‘A dingo ate my baby’ but it will most likely be seen by many people outside South Africa and may give them a better understanding of the South African story and some positive thoughts on the country and where it is trying to go. I imagine only South Africans themselves who have lived through the last 20,30,40 + years can really understand what has happened but sometimes an American feel good movie can help with the rest of the world.

Hollywood is tourism.

South Africa: "Absolutely Another Science Fiction Film, Quite Different from 'District 9'" -- Neill Blomkamp

Photo: Eduardo Parra/WireImage/Life/Sep 10, 2009

Variety's Michael Fleming reports Neill Blomkamp, the South African born director of this summer's sleeper hit "District 9,"just got his "Steven Soderbergh Pass":

Media Rights Capital has committed to the next film by “District 9” writer/director Neill Blomkamp. The untitled science fiction pic will begin production by mid-2010. Bill Block will produce. MRC’s CEO Modi Wiczyk and MRC Films president Tory Metzger committed to the new project on the basis of Blomkamp’s pitch. MRC is giving Blomkamp creative freedom and a production commitment that isn’t contingent on domestic distribution. The director and Block will get an ownership stake in the finished product.

Blomkamp will immediately start writing and preparing the visual effects. The film will be modest by sci-fi standards, but it will certainly cost more than “District 9,” the under-$30 million budget film that grossed more than $184 million worldwide. MRC will engage distributors around the time the picture goes into production.

“MRC is letting me make the film I want to make and that is by far the most important thing here,” Blomkamp said. “The film will hopefully be commercial, but it is very much a singular film, that comes directly from me.

Very few directors get the "Soderbergh Pass." It's a situation where, as a director, your name ends up carrying some weight because of a definitive yet commercially successful movie you made. As a result, you now get the chance to always do something commercial for the studios (i.e. an expensive, perhaps mindless, blockbuster which will make the studio tons of money - e.g: Oceans 11-13, Erin Bronkovich, Traffic...) and inbetween these tentpoles the studios will let you do one for yourself (i.e. something artistic and personal which may or maynot make them lots of money - e.g: The Good German, Solaris, Full Frontal).

H/T: Alyssa Rossenberg

Kenya: John Mugane and Harvard's African Language Program

The current issue of Havard Magazine has an interesting brief on the school's African language program and the work of its director, John Mugane:

[He] soon noticed a category of students who picked up one tongue after another without much difficulty, traipsing glibly among language families, from Nilotic to Bantu to Khoisan. After keeping a close eye on these polyglot students for several years, Mugane is writing a set of annotated language-learning textbooks based on their habits. (Igbo, spoken in Nigeria, is the first test case.)

The skills, which he will summarize in a separate book, Learning How to Learn Languages, include repetition, note-taking (particularly writing down new phrases one hears in conversation), listening for idiomatic turns of phrase, and focusing on utility rather than flawless grammar. A capacity for independent learning is particularly handy with African languages: because many have no formal written grammars or textbooks; because it can be hard to find fluent speakers in the Boston area to hire as teachers; and because unrelated languages so commonly exist in close proximity on the continent.

Senegal: This Revolution Will Be YouTubed

Television by Baaba Maal. Album: Television. Label: Indie Europe/Zoom, 2009.

Kenya: Elderly Women Get Their Kung Fu On, Pt 2

AlJazeera already covered this. CNN digs up some more details.

South Africa: Dollar Brand at 75

CNN's Inside Africa recaps MAMA and catches up with Abdullah Ibrahim who has turned 75. The Jazz maestro formerly known as Dollar Brand talks about the life long lesson of how to play not any note, but the right note; "the importance of putting all your life and experience into that one note."



I recall Miles Davis, who was in a habit of missing out notes, once said, in reference to the track "Red" from his album Aura:

Sometimes you run out of notes, (they) just disappear and you have to play a sound...

Ethiopia: And the World Food Prize Went to...

... professor Gebisa Ejeta at Purdue University for work dating back 30 years in developing sorghum hybrids resistant to drought and the devastating Striga weed. The hybrids have dramatically increased the production and availability of one of the world’s five principal grains and enhanced the food supply of hundreds of millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa.



He is only the second African to ever win the prize. The first was Sierra Leonian Monty Jones. CNN has a shorter report.

Guinea Bissau: "3 Years Ago, Nobody Here Knew What Crack Was"

An international network led by Latin American drug cartels and the Lebanese Islamist group Hezbollah, according to Italian photojournalist Marco Vernaschi, chose Guinea Bissua partly because it has as no navy to patrol its Bijagos Archipelago , consisting of 18 major islands and a dozen smaller ones: ideal ports and air fields for ships and planes to smuggle in drugs from Latin America bound for Europe.

Global Post has the slideshow and essay.

Africa: "... A Fault Line Running from Nigeria to Sudan"

Even Sandra Bullock's can't-go-below-50 miles-per-hour-bus couldn't make the jumps in logic apparent in Ross Douthat's NYT column yesterday.

From some "worldwide phenomenon" hype attached by the Vatican to its appeal to bring Anglicans into the fold, Douthat, to the amazement of even a Dan Brown character, is able to read in that appeal the "deeper conflict" in Pope Benedict's mind and his agenda for "Christianity’s global encounter with a resurgent Islam." Thankfully the blogosphere's bum rush was anything but tepid and I particularly liked this take from the folks at cogitanus:

Douthat has, again, just written a bunch of gibberish, words that seem to make sense when put in connection with one another, but which, after a second or so of rational reflection, fail to make any coherent point whatsoever.

Over at The Arabist:

... Ross Douthat in a NYT op-ed on Anglican-Catholic reconciliation finds an occasion to allude to appeasement of Islamofascists, the Eurabia idiocy, and the idea of some epic Christian-Muslim battle being played out... My question is: would the NYT tolerate an op-ed describing any other religion like this? Would it not condemn, say, a Christian who describes Judaism’s as Christianity’s foe because of the old “Jews-killed-Jesus” trope some anti-Semites and Christian ultra-conservatives like to dish out?

And while Douthat is drawing his line in the sand between Africa's "entrenched Islamic presence across a fault line running from Nigeria to Sudan" and Benedict's impending crusade, perhaps he should stop reading the Vatican wire and pick up some local Catholic news once in a while. He just might, for a change, find a Catholic-Islamic story like this.

Morocco: This Revolution Will Be YouTubed

Karima Skalli and the Mesto: Multi-Ethnic Star Orchestra at the Detroit Max Fisher Music Center for the Arab American National Museum 6th Annual Gala. Conductor: Nabil Azzam. Songs of Umm Kulthum, Fairouz, Asmahan, Abd al-Wahhab and Sayyid Darwish



Moving... in seismic proportions.

Morocco: On Press Freedom - "We Will Fight to the Last InkJet..."

More press freedom news, this time out of Morocco. AFP reports, "A Moroccan court on Monday sentenced the editor of the daily Al Jarida Al Oula, Ali Anouzla, to one year's suspended jail term for having published "falsehoods" about the health of Morocco's king King Mohammed VI."



Well, with all due respect King VI, if you don't want to be made fun of, then, please, don't do absurd things like this.

On the other hand, it's hard to tell in many of these cases where small minded government repression ends and the yellow journalism urge to sell newspapers begins. But then, like a bad mother, it's not the CPJ's job to monitor the ethics of the journalists they are sworn to protect.

And if you were thinking there should be a court of arbitration and mediation where journalists and governments can go to air their grievances and seek redress, too late. A toothless version of something along those lines--i.e. a "Pan African Media Observatory"--was proposed a while back by the AU. All the journalists turned it down.

Mozambique: The Uphill Battle of Daviz Simago, Cont'd

Ahead of Mozambique's election on wednesday, NYT's Barry Bearak digs up the tragic origins of the upstart M.D.M and Daviz Simango:

... and the expectation this year had been a second term for President Armando E. Guebuza and a larger Frelimo majority in Parliament. But then came an abrupt plot twist, the creation in March of the Mozambique Democratic Movement, or M.D.M., by Daviz Simango, mayor of the seaport Beira. He had taken office in 2003 as a Renamo candidate and won re-election last November as an independent, becoming the only non-Frelimo mayor in the nation. Mr. Simango appeared to be that rare upstart who might one day be hard to stop.

Mr. Simango, a 45-year-old civil engineer, has a personal story as compelling as a Shakespearean tragedy. His father was a founder of Frelimo who split with the organization toward the end of the liberation struggle. Mr. Simango’s parents were considered traitors, and, according to various historical accounts, were clandestinely executed.

Re:

Kind words (and this one too) from The Atlantic's Alyssa Rosenberg. Hope me talk (and write) pretty like her one day about all things pop culture.

Senegal: "Grocery Journalists" -- President Wade's Letter to the CPJ

Surprise, surprise... Senegal's president James Carville Abdoulaye Wade doesn't take matters of press freedom lightly. He personally penned a candid reply to the CPJ's letter of protest about the treatment of journalists in Senegal. The president makes the point that the Senegalese press isn't entirely blameless in these matters and offers his personal diagnosis. The sweet spot (click to enlarge):

CPJ's defense.

Kenya: Anti-Reform Visa Ban in Effect

The Nation quotes Kenya's Foreign Affairs minister Moses Wetang’ula, describing the refusal of U.S visas to certain government officials has “megaphone diplomacy” and adds the U.S. is:

...conducting our affairs from rooftops.

Western Sahara: Aminatou Haidar -- Awards and Visibility

Aminatou Haidar, the courageous campaigner for self-determination of Western Sahara from its occupation by Morocco, was in New York last week (Oct 20) to receive the 2009 Civil Courage Prize awarded by the Train Foundation.

The award, according to the foundation, "arose from its founder's long association with Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Through inflexible public resistance, in spite of imprisonment and exile, to the nightmare of Stalinist tyranny, Solzhenitsyn was central to its overthrow."

However, on occasions like Haider receiving an award, the battle between Western Sahara/ Algeria and Morocco over the sovereignty of the Saharawis can become who gets much valued international visibility, hence the upper hand in framing how the other is perceived. To illustrate how every opportunity to control information is contested, check out the video below, prepared by the Morocco Board News Service, of Aminatou Haider winning the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award last year.



The Moroccans' side of the fracas was:

...There were very few independent Moroccan Activists in the premises who distributed literature to explain the Moroccan position and try to contact some key people. But Mouloud Said, the Polisario representative in Washington, D.C. was acting as a head of ceremonies and also as a gate keeper, he was stopping the Moroccan activists from approaching the RFK widow, Ethel Kennedy.

South Africa: "Kissing Jessica Stern"... or Charlize Theron

South African Charlize Theron found out last thursday at the OneXOne auction gala in San Francisco that no one wanted to pay a cent more than $37,000 for a "2010 trip to South Africa that included World Cup tickets, a safari and a meet-and-greet with Nelson Mandela."

Credit: Charley Gallay/Getty Images for OneXOne.org

Her celebrity ego somewhat bruised, she decided to sweeten the deal by adding an on stage 7 seconds kiss to the package, and, lo and behold, a lady stepped up and outbidded all the males. US Magazine has the blow by blow and TMZ has what looks like cellphone camera coverage below:



What do you mean the lady isn't really interested in South Africa or World Cup tickets?

Sudan: "Our Strategy Has Three Principal Objectives..." -- The Rehash, Pt. 2

AlJazeera's Inside Edition brings together Bona Malwal (Sudanese Govt adviser), Abdelwahab Al-Affendi and Mr.--I told you so--Alex de Waal to discuss the United States policy shift on Sudan.

De Waal says Foggy Bottom's new phrasing, "a definitive end to genocide," will now shift the focus away from a politics of stopping atrocities to a politics of finding the conclusive political solution of moving Sudan forward.

South Africa: "Vagina Monologues for Breasts"

One of the plays at South Africa's national arts festival earlier this year took up the double D issue of breasts and some of the socio-cultural ramifications of having them. The play is written by Cecil Rautenbach and directed by Victor Grondel.

Some plucky acting to say the least.

Madagascar/ Russia: The International Correspondent's #1 Fear -- Flying

International correspondent Robyn Dixon writes about the irresistible allure of far-flung locations and the fear of getting there:

Accelerating down the runway on our flight from Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, the thundering momentum should be exhilarating. But for me it defines phobia: fear of flying. Odd sounds send that fear soaring, like the midair thunking sound on a flight out of Liberia in 2005. Thunnnnk. Thunnnnk. Thunnnnk. I asked the flight attendant what was thunking. "It's nothing. Just the air-conditioning compressor"....

Couldn't help laughing while reading Dixon's story. All the time, my mind kept going back to this...

Quotes of the Past Week

For fuck sake! You can do better... There is no way I am leaving here with Jeremy Piven getting a higher bid. I've got tits for God's sake.

-- Charlize Theron at OnexOne auction gala last Thursday in San Francisco after Jeremy Piven raised $137,000 for his auction, but bidding on her auction of a trip to South Africa, tickets to the 2010 World Cup, and a meet and greet with Nelson Mandela stalled at $37,000.

By contrast, Iraq had a relatively educated, pro-Western populace, but was ruled by a brutal third-world despot. It's always something with the Muslims. You either have mostly sane people governed by a crazy dictator -- Iraq, Iran and Syria (also California and Michigan) -- or a crazy people governed by relatively sane leaders -- Pakistan and Afghanistan, post-U.S. invasion (also Vermont and Minnesota). There are also insane people ruled by insane leaders (but enough about the House Democratic Caucus). Sane people with sane rulers has not been fully tried yet

-- Ann Coulter on President Obama's hesitancy in sending more troops into Afghanistan.

Sudan: "Our Strategy Has Three Principal Objectives..." -- The Rehash

American Prospect's Mark Goldberg asks GI Net's Sam Bell for his thoughts on last monday's rollout of the United State's "new" policy on tackling the crisis in Sudan.

Goldberg and Bell also discuss why Bell and other Dafur advocates were disappointed the president wasn't there with Rice, Gration and Clinton that morning.

Benin: The Art of Romuald Hazoumé

Romuald Hazoumé Wax Bandana, 2009. 

(detail) Found objects, 27 x 12 x 27cm

BBC's Bola Mosuro talks to Beninois artist, Romuald Hazoume.

His new exhibition, "Made in Porto Norvo," feels not only like a meditation on the precarious existence of Porto Novo's small time petrol importers/smugglers--who make a living bringing huge jerry-cans of fuel over the Nigerian border into Benin's capital--but it is also a reassemblage of their reality into commentary on a lot of other things.

What he said about George Bush in relation to the phone and the toaster was hilarious. Online exhibition - here.

Somalia: Hmm... Maybe Al-Shabaab Have Already Seen 2 Minutes 17 Seconds Into their Futures

ABC's Flash Foward, the show where everyone in the world blacks out for 2 minutes and 17 seconds and in that duration catch a glimpse of their futures, finally revealed this week what the whole dead crows falling over Somalia connection means. No, it's not the title of a Sting song. Rather, it seems whoever is behind the blackouts--many "suspect zeroes," I assume--had tried this before in Somalia. Running with that logic, perhaps, the Al-Shaabab were the first to have suffered the blackouts back then when those crows fell, and in their flash forwards they saw themselves as the rulers of Somalia, which will explain a lot.

But if the fancy towers revealed in those satellite pics taken over Somalia in the last episode is not a red herring and are indeed what was used to cause the flashforward blackout, does that mean the show will stay faithful to the book? In the book, author Robert J. Sawyer already revealed this was all caused by the large Hadron atom collider.

South Africa: Grannies Utd.

From Ndundu Sithole's article:

World Cup fever has spread to South African grannies, with hundreds of poor, elderly women in aprons and skirts fighting for the ball in township games. Twice a week they swap domestic chores for football, donning soccer boots instead of their usual rubber sandals to play in local matches.

The 35 women on the Vakhegula Vakhegula squad – meaning ‘Grannies’ in the local Xitsonga dialect – range from 40 to more than 80 years old and live in a township near Tzaneen, 600 km north of Johannesburg. Competition is fierce among the eight teams in the region and the women say soccer is the best exercise, much better than their usual manual work at home and in the fields...

Community worker Beka Ntsanwisi said she started the team three years ago to help older women exercise all their limbs and to give them a new purpose in life. ‘Some of them couldn’t even walk properly and if they did something in their free time they would be knitting or sewing and sitting all the time...here they run, shout, fight with you...it keeps them young,’ she said...Dozens of local fans support the grannies’ games, cheering and blowing vuvuzelas – noisy, plastic trumpets that create a cacophony of noise that is unique to South African soccer.

South Africa: Casting Winnie

1961: Mandela and his then wife, Winnie, show off their firstborn daughter, Zindzi, at their home in Soweto. Mandela fled into exile overseas as the political situation in South Africa worsened, returning only to be arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment in what became known as the Rivonia trial/ Photo: Alf Khumalo /AP/ Guardian

Hollywood Reporter's Roger Friedman starts the rumor that Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls) might be in talks for an indie biopic about South African leader Winnie Mandela. Either Derek Luke (Antwone Fisher) or Idris Elba (The Wire) may star along side as Nelson Mandela.

Alyssa suspects "Hudson can show some genuine emotional range when it comes to heartbreak," but:

... I have no idea if she's able to embody someone who is viewed as both a national liberator, and as the woman who cheated on Nelson Mandela, and as someone who was was accused of involvement in 18 human rights abuses including eight murders. That's multitudes for an actress to take on: she'd have to be convincing in all those dimensions for that portrayal to be as powerful as it deserves to me.

Stringer Bell is definitely a heavy but a heavy with the chops to play Mandela. However, I think we've all been wired--honestly, no pun intended--to think Mandela will be a Sidney Poitier-esque kind of role and, thus, all of Elba's fine attributes become weaknesses. If they want a cute, young idealistic lawyer that will bowl a Winnie off her feet because the movie says so, then Derek Luke (Antwone Fisher) should get the job done. But if they want the audience to get bowled over by what Winnie sees, they should cast TV On Radio's Tunde Adebimpe (Rachel Gets Married and Jump Tomorrow) and pay him to get in touch with his inner rebel.

Hudson definitely has an emotional range, especially if she's singing the emotion. Can she nail all the dimensions there are to Winnie? Na, but neither will Sophie Okonedo. But I think Hudson's chances are astronomically improved if a director makes her realize she can't cruise through this on the power of African American sass and verve alone; she's going to need a few other layers and she's going to have to dig for this emotional oil in some unfamiliar places.

South Africa: 2010 Damage Control

Apparently, the Germans think their players are going to need bullet proof vests come 2010 World Cup in Joburg. The LOC pushes back.

Friday

Dance Tonight by Lucy Pearl. Album: Lucy Pearl. Label: Beyond, 2000.

hip hop's Velvet Revolver. One album... Then phtttt...

Botswana: Alexander McCall's "Okavango Macbeth" -- A Baboon Opera

I have a feeling the more press Alexandra McCall's foray into opera gets, the more the compliants will flow in. They will be understandable gripes about why McCall's adaptation of the iconic roles in Shakespere's Macbeth to an African milieu insists the Batswana play them as baboons.



For McCall, it's about the baboons themselves:

...McCall Smith said [...] The idea came to me during a wildlife safari in Botswana's Okavango Delta. I had been reading Baboon Metaphysics [byDorothy Cheney and Robert Seyfarth] and I was struck by two odd things – that baboons are matrilineal and they're the only animals we know where status is conferred from one generation to the next."...The Okavango Macbeth transfers the plot of Shakespeare's tragedy to a troupe of baboons; their hierarchical tussling transfers well to the opera. Three primatologists observe but cannot intervene as the baboon version of Lady Macbeth encourages her mate to kill the troupe leader and take power for himself.

And this article on baboons agrees with McCall's call. "The performers replicate the movements of baboons by thrusting out their backsides, letting their arms swing by their sides and barking and hissing," according to the article in Earth Times. But, again, as obvious as the stereotypes might seem, same article also alludes to Batswana reality -- "a real monkey - a black-faced vervet monkey - [could be] spotted swinging by Thursday's rehearsals [for the play]." Stereotypes or not, out there, the Okavango Delta is definitely baboon/monkey reality.

Friday

The blowback current against Buchanan at the Dish is busy digging up the mestizaje origins and reality of America, and the readers have unearthed some fine gems. I can't stop listening to the track below. Thanks Pat.

My White Friends by Duece Poppi. Single: My White Friends. Label: Slip n Slide Records, 2009.

I love my white friends. They've got the best grass.

So true -- lol.

Botswana: No Matter Where, Nerds Will Be Nerds

I like that they are calling it a "strange hangover of colonialism."

According to this AFP report: "Botswana, which gained its independence from Britain 40 years ago, still shows its attachment to the old motherland in one unusual way: its love of bridge."



I would expect bridge would be what one would see characters playing on sitcoms like Keeping Up Appearances or As Time Goes By. But "the card game is so popular with Botswana's younger set that some teachers have even warned it is disrupting their studies." Make no mistake. Batswana teenagers and young adults mean bridge business.

Gambia: Debating Jammeh

Background: Remember Jammeh tortured the elderly in Gambia based on his belief that witches killed his aunt and he may have had a hand in what happened to Deyda Hydara, not to mention a habit for always jailing journalists.

But, according to the recently released World Economic Forum Global Competitiveness Report: 2009-2010, Gambia moves up in the rankings to #81 ahead of Ukraine (82), Algerian (83) and Argentina (85). And in Sub-Saharan Africa, Gambia is ahead of Senegal (92), Kenya (98), Nigeria (99) and Ghana (114).

The BBC's Umaru Fofana brought together Wally Tamba, a known supporter of the Gambia's president Yahya Jammeh, and Dudu Kassa Jarta, a youth activist of the opposition United Democratic Party, to discuss 15 years of Jammeh's rule.


That said, strap on your seat belts. It's war:

Uganda: Gay Crimes Punishable by Death, Cont'd

Box Turtle Bulletine's Jim Burroway relays that delibrations on Uganda’s new "Anti-Homosexuality Bill"--or the Bahati Bill--has been put off until 2010. "Parliament was too busy, just now, to handle it."

Meanwhile a coalition of twenty-two Ugandan professional and civil rights advocacy groups came together not only to denounce (PDF) the bill but to describe what the bill intends to do:

1. Reaffirm the lifetime sentence currently provided upon conviction of homosexuality, and extends the definition from sexual activity to merely “touch[ing] another person with the intention of committing the act of homosexuality.”
2. Create a new category of “aggravated homosexuality” which provides for the death penalty for “repeat offenders” and for cases where the individual is HIV-positive.
3. Criminalizes all speech and peaceful assembly for those who advocate on behalf of LGBT citizens in Uganda with fines and imprisonment of between five and seven years.
4. Criminalizes the act of obtaining a same-sex marriage abroad with lifetime imprisonment.
5. Adds a clause which forces friends or family members to report LGBT persons to police within 24-hours of learning about that individual’s homosexuality or face fines or imprisonment of up to three years.
6. Adds an extra-territorial and extradition provisions, allowing Uganda to prosecute LGBT Ugandans living abroad.

The--whether you are straight or gay--conclusion: "...the Bahati Bill is profoundly unconstitutional."

H/T: Daily Dish

Mozambique: The Uphill Battle for Daviz Simago

Official campaigning ends tomorrow ahead of Mozambique's general election scheduled for Wednesday. VOA Peter Clottey reports that:

In the presidential vote, main opposition RENAMO candidate Afonso Dlhakama and Daviz Simago of the new Mozambique Democratic Movement will challenge incumbent President Armando Guebuza of the ruling FRELIMO party. Political observers say despite a stiff challenge from the opposition, the ruling party could win by a landslide.

The AFP report below paints a rosy picture of Simago's chances:



But the landslide prediction for FRELIMO makes sense since Daviz Simago, by breaking ranks with the opposition, also splits the vote.

Sudan: Miss Earth South Sudan 2009 -- "Tallest Documented Beauty Queen Ever"?

For all intents and purposes, South Sudan is an autonomous state even though the scheduled referendum vote on its sovereignty and secession from Sudan isn't till 2011. In the meantime, it appears nothing stops   South Sudan from having its own beauty queen.

Photo Credit (C) Beauties of Africa inc

Aheu Kidum Deng (18)  towers at a staggering 6 feet 4.8 inches and was earlier this year crowned "Miss South Sudan 2009" in Juba, the capital of South Sudan. "She will be representing the Autonomous Government of South Sudan, says "Beauties of Africa." In the "environmentally-conscious" International Miss Earth 2009 beauty pageant.

According to Beauties of Africa, she:

...deserves to be in the Guinness Book of World Records for being the tallest documented beauty queen ever to take part in any international beauty pageant ... and we have contacted Guinness Book of World Records to see what we need to do to get her awarded the Official record

Beauties of Africa have been receiving requests for numerous television show appearances by Aheu Deng from all corners of the globe, after bagging the Miss Earth South Sudan title 2009. In 2010, she will begin a proposed special world tour covering Asia, Europe, and South America as an official spokesperson for South Sudan, following the Miss Earth 2009 pageant.

She's one tall glass pitcher of water.

Africa: The Photography of JR

Taking time to look back at the French photog JR's 28 millimeters/"Women are Heroes" project, which in contrast to the usual images of grief and despair, takes pictures of local African women appearing happy and playful and pastes those images all over their communities and around the world. Its like some massive rehumanization effort via graffiti. Kinda like Banksy on steroids.

...and children too...

...and many of the collages are still there...

Nigeria: "Super Villains of the Modern Age" Cont'd -- Rebranding Nigeria

This much awaited BBC World Service documentary, "Rebranding Nigeria," just aired.



BBC's Henry Bonsu starts with the "District 9" fallout (all blogged here) and goes ahead to look at Nigeria's image crisis, its roots in a widely shared "reputation [that the country is] a corrupt, fraudulent and ungovernable" collection of people, and if in fact the country's image can be re-branded as its current information minister Dora--"Madam Rebranding"--Akunyili seems intent on doing.

The minister has a good case when she argues that Nigeria is overlooking a lot of positives, has not been telling her stories and is making the mistake of letting the world define her image based on its notoriety alone. And she has some good examples of the positives. But the BBC sought out a few PR and branding experts who counter by saying, if the country wants to rebrand itself, it needs to give any PR team a lot more to build on. Those interviewed said, consistent power supply and an end to a diesel generator economy will make rebranding Nigeria "effortless." And to prove their point, 13:40 mins into the program... well, you don't need to be a Nigerian to figure out what happened.

Comics: A History of Comic Book Heroines

Mike Madrid --editor for Exterminating Angel Press and the creator of www.heaven4heroes.com--takes us through a slideshow for his book, The Supergirls: Fashion, Feminism, Fantasy, and the History of Comic Book Heroines.

Many works like Madris's tackle superheroes in general or deal with, when it comes to women, the usual suspects -- supergirl or wonder woman.

I may be wrong, but Madrid's book might be the only one that looks at the history of female superheroes (Trina Robbins has done the female creators) and does a good job of threading it, like the other general

Ghana: This Revolution will be YouTubed

Zingolo by Tinny (Nii Addo Quaynor). Album: Zingolo. Label: Glass & A Half Full Records, 2009.



The music video attempts to "celebrate Cadbury Dairy Milk’s Fairtrade certification and Ghana, the heart of Fairtrade cocoa, in a unique way." More at  inspiration room.

Africa: Reconsidering U.S. Military Options Regarding Genocide

Sarah Sewall's essay in The Boston Review is one part the political history of the term "genocide" --a word coined by Raphael Lemkin after WWII, I gather--and it's also 2 parts analysis of coming up with what's even harder -- grounds for the United States to harness the political will to contain genocides.

The 2007 Genocide Prevention Task Force (chaired by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Secretary of Defense William Cohen) has drawn up a guidebook for using the blunt tool of U.S. leadership in addressing the surgical precision needs of preventing mass killings, and its report, Sewall writes, "has become the go-to guide for genocide prevention."

Sewall argues that the report's abrogation of full scale military intervention for, instead, the political pragmatism of focusing on prevention, which makes it easier to galvanize international political will, maintains a "deeper dysfunction haunting both the Report and U.S. policy":

Narrowly interpreting a prevention mandate allows the Task Force to sidestep the most controversial and challenging aspect of dealing with genocide: the use of military power to halt or contain mass killings once they have begun. The Task Force acknowledges that

Nigeria: Nuhu Ribadu and the "Corruption Hunters"

A high profile panel aptly titled "Corruption Hunters," answered questions about international corruption and the role of the media during the 3rd Annual Logan Symposium on Investigative Reporting back in April.



The panel consists of Tom Fuentes, former Assistant Director of FBI's Office of International operations from 2004 until Nov 2008; Helen Garlick, formerly of the Serious Fraud Office (UK); Mark Mendelsohn, the Deputy Chief of the Fraud Section in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ); Mark Pieth, Professor of Criminal Law at Basel University and Chairman of the OECD Working Group on Bribery in International Business Transactions(Switzerland); and Nuhu Ribadu, former head of Nigeria's Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). Asuncion Hostin, CNN, and Brian Ross, ABC News, moderate.

It feels like the Justice League International of Criminal and Corruption Prosecutors. I think the highlight was Helen Garlick's story (10:30 mins in) which gave a glimpse of how an arbitrary and needless instance of corruption by the late Benazir Bhutto involving a tractor made specifically for Pakistan's mountainous, rugged terrain could have such unforeseeable ripple effects.

Africa: Covering the "Dark Continent" -- How the BBC Does It

As part of its special focus on the fibre-optic connectivity in Africa back in September, BBC's "Focus on Africa" featured this short film that follows a typical day at Bush house and how the news is compiled.



VOA, your turn.

Chad: Idriss Deby's Nobel Prize?

See what happens when you give the Nobel Peace Prize to potential. Apparently, some sycophants in Chad think their president Idriss Deby, too, should have won the Peace Prize for his work on the environment.

When Innocent Ebode, editor-in-chief of the weekly La Voix du Tchad, laughed at their nomination of Deby in his colunm, CPJ reports that he was picked up by Deby's security forces and...

Uganda: Gay Crimes Punishable by Death

BBC talks to SMUG's Frank Magisha, a Ugandan gay rights activist:



Over at Black Looks, Sokari is all over this. She adds that the proposed law also goes after:

Any NGO or organization which supports LGBTI people will have it’s license revoked and the director would be liable to 7 years in prison. In short the Bill not only criminalizes same sex relations but also advocacy and public discussion in any arena whether the media, public institutions and even in the private sphere of one’s own home. There is no protection for any LGBTI person against any member of the public physically attacking them, evicting them from their home or firing them from their work. Activists with SMUG – Sexual Minorities Uganda report that already there has been increases in violence against LGBTI.

Hmm... maybe this is partly why president M7 is especially intent on bringing back Uganda's monarchy. Remember what he said kings were suppose to be doing.

USA: Race, Class and Obesity -- Our Black Failing Bodies

Usually, what you see on the bus or train heading downtown stays on the bus or train. But yesterday Ta-nehisi sorta snapped, gets in touch with his inner civil rights "Howard Beale" and pulls off a "Bill Cosby" critique of African America that's uniquely his own:

...The buses in Harlem heave under the weight of wrecked bodies. New York will not super-size itself, so you'll see whole rows in which one person is taking up two seats and aisles in which people strain to squeeze past each other. And then there are the middle-age amputees in wheelchairs who've lost a leg or two way before their time. When I lived in Brooklyn, the most depressing aspect of my day was the commute back home. The deeper the five train wended into Brooklyn, the blacker it became, and the blacker it became, the fatter it got.

Tanzania: On the Albino Murder Trail (IV)

BBC's Erick David Nampesya writes about Mariam Staford Bandaba, an Albino who lost her arms to a machete-wielding gang that tried to kill her and sell her remains for witchcraft.

After identifying and testifying against her attackers, and helping to put some of them behind bars, the government, writes Nampesya, is now rescinding her protective custody and implicitly returning her to her village to face a sympathetic community or the vengeful relatives of her assailants?

Uganda: The King of the Mountains of the Moon

This blog needs to add an "African monarchs in exile" tag.

Xan Rice writes  another monarch in exile story, this time about a nurse's assistant in Pennsylvania. Charles Wesley Mumbere has returned to Uganda and is officially now the crowned head of the 300,000 strong Rwenzururu kingdom in western Uganda, a monarchy abolished in 1967 along with the country's other kingdoms by the then president Milton Obote.

Surprised president M7 is still restoring monarchies considering all the problems (here and here) he had with the Buganda last month?

South Africa: The Case Against Jackie Selabi and the Growing Affluence of Public Officers

Jackie Selebi, former international interpol chief and police commissioner from 2000 to 2008, is on trial for corruption. In a trial that has suffered from delays, recently a rumored video of an "interrogation," taken in the office of intelligence chief Mulangi Mphego, asking questions about the "consultancy fee" drug dealer Glenn Agliotti, Selabi's friend, received for providing access to the police commish has irritated the judge and thrown a spanner into the proceedings. Today, reports say Selabi's lawyers will go ahead and ask for the judge's removal.

But as Agliotti continues to spill the beans (for clemency) on Selabi's weakness for "Canali ties, Hugo Boss

Nigeria: Kleptomania

Sola Odunfa's elaboration on Economic and Financial Crimes Commission czar Farida Waziri's comments that the "extent of aggrandisement and gluttonous accumulation of wealth" has led her to believe some Nigerians might be "psychologically unsuitable for public office," is even more danming when read out loud:

Madagascar: "...It Would Not be Surprising to See Falstaff Emptying a Bucket Out of a Window"

Tana Highlands, Madagascar/ photo: Cedarberg

Below, the Guardian's David Smith talks (article) about the chaotic and fascinating mix of shanty-town, Indonesian ancestry, French-colonial architecture, Chinese built modernity and development problems that is Madagascar:

Congo-Brazaville/ Cote d'Ivoire: The Cartoon Art of Bob Kanza

From his bio: "Bob Kanza was born Bob Destin in the Republic of Congo in 1977. In 1995, he decided to study natural sciences, then changed direction and transferred to the study of medicine, only to have this interrupted by the civil war of 1997. He immigrated to Ivory Coast to study Information Science. He graduated in 1999 but did not succeed in finding a job in the ICT sector in the capital city of Abidjan. He did, however, come into contact with Ivory Coasters Zohoré Lassane and Illary Simplice, both political illustrators."

"They saw talent in his drawing and made him one of the editorial staff at 'Gbich!', their brand-new comic magazine. In his new job, Kanza was taught to draw comics, caricatures and political cartoons. At the same time, he learned how to work with graphic design programmes such as FreeHand, Xpress and Photoshop. In April 2000, Kanza's popular comic character Sergent Deutogo was born; a corrupt police officer who offers his services in return for two coins ('deux togos')."

"'Gbich!' magazine developed into a much-read online magazine, boasting heroes like Cauphy Gombo, Jo Bleck, Gnamankoudji Zekinan and Tommy Lapoasse."

"Because of yet another civil war in September 2002, Kanza moved to France. He briefly worked for the weekly magazine Jeune Afrique l'Intelligent in Paris but has been mainly working as a freelance illustrator and web designer since 2003. A first album of his comic, "Sergent Deutogo" was recently published."

Sites: here and here. Bio: here and here.

Nigeria: Children are Defenseless

From Katharine Houreld's AP story about small time pastors steeped in the business of scapegoating children as witches in order to perform exorcisms for which they milk the parents for cash:

Poverty, conflict and poor education lay the foundation for accusations, which are then triggered by the death of a relative, the loss of a job or the denunciation of a pastor on the make, said Martin Dawes, a spokesman for the United Nations Children's Fund. "When communities come under pressure, they look for scapegoats," he said. "It plays into traditional beliefs that someone is responsible for a negative change ... and children are defenseless."

Like with the case of Albino killings in Tanzania, the quote below from Mumbi Ngugi, a Tanzania high court lawyer, gets to the bottom of the con:

..an unholy marriage between capitalism--where you want to get very rich--and tradition. So you borrow from your traditions and your cultural beliefs, you mix it up with the greed to get rich, to get powerful, and then you basically have an unholy mess.

Zimbabwe: Official Divorce Papers

Tsvangarai and the MDC served Zanu-PF divorce papers on Friday. In it, they did well to remind everyone:

The truth of the matter is that it is the MDC that won the election of 29 March 2008. It is the MDC that has the mandate of the people to govern this country. It is the MDC that has strategically compromised on that mandate by executing the GPA and by entering into the transitional government. It is the MDC upon which the hope and future of millions of Zimbabweans is deposited.

However, it is now time for us to assert and take our position as the dominant party in Zimbabwe. In taking this path, we are guided by the fact that we are the trustees of the people's mandate and therefore the only one with the mandate to remain in government.

Sudan: "Our Strategy Has Three Principal Objectives..."

This morning Foggy Bottom said:

Our strategy has three principal objectives: First, an end to conflict, gross human rights abuses, war crimes, and genocide in Darfur; second, implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that results in a united and peaceful Sudan after 2011, or an orderly path toward two separate and viable states at peace with each other; and third, a Sudan that does not provide a safe haven for terrorists. In the past, the United States’s approach too often has focused narrowly on emerging crises. This is no longer the case. Our effort sets forth a comprehensive U.S. policy toward Sudan.

Concerns that goals 2 and 3 will be pursued by Gration in detriment to goal 1 is countered, according to Barron YoungSmith,  by the policy's:

...the stark language it uses regarding President Omar Al Bashir's indictment by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The policy

Nigeria: Achebe -- Revisiting Joseph Conrad's "Heart"

In a prelude to his new book of stories, this session on NPR's "All Things Considered" asks the author of "Things Fall Apart" to revisit is long held critique of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness":


A commenter wrote:

While Mr. Achebe's distaste for the poor manners and name calling inherent in Conrad's novel is completely understandable, I have always thought that the true heart of darkness lay in the patronizing attitudes of the station manager and Kurtz, and I feel this was Conrad's intent all along. Even "Apocolypse Now" (based on [Heart of Darkness]) painted Kurtz's demeaningly patriarchal attitudes towards his "children" in a dim light. Considering the milieu and it's particular POV, I found [Heart of Darkness] to be a condemnation of colonialism and it's inherent prejudices and damages rather than supportive of such thinking. I hope that Mr. Achebe can view them in this more historical light; while I do not condone the abhorrent nomenclature I can contextualize it.

That's one way to see it, I guess. But judging from what Achebe pointed to back then--and still maintains now--as Joseph Conrad's "seduction" in connection to the fact that in reading the book, an African subjectivity is never really on Marlow's ship traveling up the river to retrieve Kurtz. Rather, it is on the river bank as one with the ooga, booga savages. I think what Achebe was pointing to then--and still concerned about now--has to do with a "seduction" that is less Conrad's making but has more to do with the inability to escape being fixed by a perception or POV triggered and fueled by the framework of reasoning about blackness or the African Conrad has employed in the pursuit of his narrative goals. Again, I concede to Fanon on this, since it is apparent he and Achebe are saying the same thing:

We recommend the following experiment for those who are not convinced: Attend a showing of a Tarzan film in the Antilles and in Europe. In the Antilles the young black man identifies himself de facto with Tarzan versus the Blacks. In a movie house in Europe things are not so clear cut, for the white movie goers automatically place him among the savages on the screen. This experiment is conclusive. The black man senses he cannot get away with being black. (p. 131)

I'd say what Fanon and Achbe find so disconcerting here is simply the power of the window--for lack of a better metaphor--through which their black subjectivities are being perceived; for no matter what the black subject does there is simply no room to maneuver or escape from the lack of comprehensiveness, lack of alternate history, lack of complexity, lack of multidimensionality, lack of contrasting viewpoints--ie. as in lack of contrasting stories--which all combine to render him or her, through the window's smudged pane, a pigeonholed blackness.