Ghana/Haiti: Ghanaian Pledge

Interesting visualizations. The one above shows that relative to per capita GDP (annual economic output compensated for population growth), Ghana is the single most significant pledger of aid to Haiti. They even gave cocoa.

H/T: Daily Dish via Marginal Revolution

Friday

Toxic by Yael Naim. Album: Yael Naim. Label: BMG, 2007.



The de-Brittney-ing of Toxic

South Africa: "It Wasn't Food that Made Me Fat..." - Julius Malema

Sounds like this December 09 interview between TV anchor and Third Degree host, Debora Patta, and ANC bruiser and youth league president, Julius Malema, had been a long time coming. Patta didn't flinch and adorable Malema--though he sounds like a clown off his meds--is no slouch either.



They talk about, amongst other things, race, the ANC and Caster Semenyer... From the get go, Patta came to confront Malema with the contradiction embodied by someone who claims to be fighting on behalf of the poor and who ensconces himself in the trappings of wealth. But Malema holds on to his "I'm the victim here" cards and plays them well.

If nothing else, the interview it is a fascinating peek at tired white guilt and anti-colonialism apologetics both finally getting all dirty in the awkward mud of race relations. It's also a candid exploration of revolutionary struggle and revolutionaries--genuine and false-- in the age of celebrity.

Part Two and Three.

Friday

Elephants by Warpaint. Album: Exquisite Corpse. Label: Manimal Vinyl, 2009

South Africa: A Play and a Springboard

Time's Zanele Sabela talks to Refiloe Lepere about her play "Speaking in Tongues," which is said to "explore the black experience in post apartheid South Africa" in relation to "opportunities, unemployment and other issues affecting South African youth today."

From the little I can make out from her talk with Sabela, it sounds like she has directed a play about a talented and aspiring actor who speaks 5 languages fluently but can't speak English well enough, therefore, within the parameters of the prevailing standard, cannot be deemed a good actor. Using Lepere's play as a springboard, President Barack Obama, on the other hand, and to the relief of aspiring blacks worldwide, does measure up to prevailing standards and in fact measures up so well that MSNBC host Chris Matthews after the State of the Union speech on Wednesday night said he "forgot [president Obama] was black for an hour":



Like the character in Lepere's play, Africans, like other races, speak many languages well and are gifted in so many other things which are irrelevant in the framework of a post-industrial age. I like to think of it as being stuck with a lot of betamax tapes and three-pin plug appliances in a two-pin socket-DVD world. In effect, Africans' ineffectiveness becomes aspects of them that fail to measure up to standard, accumulating into a synecdoche that's automatically misconstrued for all they are. Hence it is that  aspect overblown--like a wall-to-wall coverage of a Haiti earthquake--that's presumed as blackness and is what Chris Matthews--God bless him--forgot for an hour while the president was addressing a joint session of congress 2 days ago.

So it boils and simmers down to this: while whites, due to no fault of theirs I might add, enjoy the unconscious luxury of being persons first and negative aspects of themselves that do not conform to standard, second. Blacks, on the other hand, "enjoy" the conscious struggle of becoming persons only after they disprove or have made Chris Matthews forget that overblown aspect--overblown because economic disincentive fuels a lack of counter narratives--of themselves for at least an hour - not to mention they have to do all this disproving in a world that's not really offering a clearance sale on grand scale opportunities to do so. There are only so many black U.S presidents and state of the union speeches to go round.

South Africa: David Tlale @ Audi Joburg Fashion Week

David Tlala's recent showing at the SA's Audi Fashion Week left the SA fashion world all abuzz with pride:



It seems fitting when the catwalk is turned off, models turn mannequins. I can't shake the feeling this is what a party held in Yinka Shonibare's basement would look like.

Friday

Grains de Beauté by CeU. Album: Vagarosa. Label: Six Degrees, 2009.



careful... this song will do a broken record on your brain.

Africa: Ushahidi

Back in Dec, American Prospect's Mark Leon Goldberg and  Patrick Meier (Tuft University) talk about new media technologies employed in the service of humanitarian efforts, referencing this UN Foundation report Meier co-authored and his dissertation work. Below they spend some time talking about Ushahidi:

Egypt: God has Picked Sides...

... writes Mark Starr in Global Post and the Almighty, if Egyptian coach Hassan Sheheta has anything to do with it, is on the side of the pharaohs. Starr calls out FIFA's failure to address Egypt's religious "litmus test" in picking its players and what stinks of a double standard, judging from the backlash other religions would receive if they did the same:

Egypt has always been a particularly reverent team, with its players praying together before games for God’s intervention on the field and offering up prayers of thanks along the way for goals and victories. But Egyptian coach Hassan Sheheta has now boosted the requisite religious devotion for his all-Muslim squad. During the African Cup, Cairo newspapers have quoted his explanations that all players must pass a religious litmus test and that "pious behavior" rather than soccer skills is the primary criterion for making the team. "Without it, we will never select any player regardless of his potential," the coach said. "I always strive to make sure that those who wear the Egypt jersey are on good terms with God." He was not posturing, as he had already dumped a talented striker who, while playing in England, gained a reputation for greater attendance at nightclubs than mosques.

Many Americans will likely applaud the Egyptian coach for the logical extension of his faith, especially those who encourage Christian prayer in football locker rooms. Still, try to imagine the outrage if other national teams followed suit: if England insisted that its players worship in the Church of England; if Italy made Catholicism the team’s central tenet; if Germany booted all Turkish Muslims off the field; if Japan played only Buddhists; or if Israel declared itself a Jewish team for a Jewish state and exiled its Arab players.

This is easy. I have Egypt's response to Starr right here. But on a more serious note, until some Egyptian Christian or Buddhist, or what have you, with mad national team soccer skills and who really wants to play for his country, goes ahead and sues Sheheta's ass, it's going to be kind of tricky coming from the outside to tell an Islamic state how it should pick its players.

South Africa: The Making of ZA News, Pt.2

Finally came round to seeing the acting feat Sam Rockwell pulled off in one of 2009's underrated films, Moon. In "the making of..." feature, Rockwell mentions how so much of of what he did had to do with timing and it appears to me the same issue of bulls-eying the timing applies to puppeteers. But unlike the actor, you have to add 8 or 10 more balls to the body language juggling act the puppeteer has to do in order to make a character hit his or her marks and pull off that feat of perfect timing:

Ghana: The Brazil of Africa

Recall the BBC audio of the jubilation in Ghana's streets and of the fan who summed up Ghana's victory in last year's FIFA Under-20 World Cup with the emphatic cry, "This is Ghana, This is Ghana"?

Well, with their moving on into the semi finals of the ongoing African Cup of Nations, this really is Ghana:

South Africa: Za'-Zu'

At Davos, president Jacob Zuma took some time off for a photo op with Zakumi and to address fears that the whole of Africa is a country called "Cabinda":

Ghana: A Headline for the Lactose Tolerant

"Breast sucker gets 15yrs
… For robbery and indecent assault"

You can't make this stuff up, but this particular story from the Ghanian Chronicle belies all ability to suspend disbelief. There is nothing funny about what the moron tried to do, but someone with his name should know he'll be the first on any list of kinky suspects -- read on if you dare.

United Kingdom/ Nigeria: Sade - "The Making of ..."

We rarely get to see the British-Nigerian singer, Sade, in her element. A rather interesting look behind the scenes of the "soldier of love" video shoot with members of the band revealing how the single (audio/video)got made and its integral role in how the rest of the album came together:

South Africa: Mrs. Mandela - Casting Winnie, Cont'd

If you recall the series of "Casting Winnie" posts on this blog, then you might recall the mention of the BBC's made for TV Mrs. Mandela bio-pic, starring Sophie Okonedo as Winnie (and David Harewood as Nelson Mandela). It has finally aired on BBC-4. The trailer:



Hannah Pool's review at the Guardian, however, asks:

And while it's great to see filmmakers waking up the idea that the lives of real black people are worth dramatising, one can't help feeling the Mandelas are a bit of a safe subject choice. Winnie might arguably be a more challenging character than Nelson, but why not make a biopic of Angela Davis? Or a Crimean War costume drama about Mary Seacole ("the black Florence Nightingale"); a steamy bonnet buster about Queen Charlotte Sophia ("the Black Queen")? Come on writers – show some imagination.

This  post, looking at the casting of Winnie from producer/audience view points, might have already answered Pool's question. Anyhow, in addition to imagination, it will take one hell of a writer--and one hell of a story-- to resist the choice of black story or character that appeals more to film producers seeking returns on investment and an audience more inclined to see a story about something they are vaguely familiar with played by someone they are hugely familiar with.

United Kingdom/Nigeria: Intro to Chris Ofili (101)

The "most comprehensive exhibition" of works from British artist of Nigerian descent, Chris Ofili, opens at the Tate Britain galleries today. Creative Review as a preview; Guardian has slides.

Below, courtesy of the Artlyst, Tate Britain's Chief Curator Judith Nesbitt gives an intro course on Ofili and his art at the press preview of the exhibition on Monday:



Notice she takes a dig at New Yorkers and former mayor Rudy Giuliani when she mentions Ofili's Holy Virgin Mary painting was shown at Britain's Royal Academy in 1997 as part of the Saatchi collection without causing any controversy whatsoever, which is backhanded reference to the American uproar to the painting's use of cow dung in the depiction of the Virgin Mary back when it was shown at the Brooklyn museum of art in 1999.

Africa: Davos 2010

Reuters is doing some pretty positive special reporting on the African economy in anticipation of the rich and powerful meeting up this week at Davos for their annual gab/snooze fest.



For example, Ed Cropley asks what the billionth African born in 2008, according to World Bank figures,  means:

From 2003 to 2008, Africa experienced an unprecedented boom due to a mixture of debt forgiveness, free market reforms and soaring commodity prices that lifted annual output by five percent or more -- crucially outpacing population growth. That came to a juddering halt with this year's global economic slump, but the International Monetary Fund is forecasting African growth at 4.0 percent for 2010, against 1.7 percent for 2009. If it can sustain this, and consolidate its patchwork of small countries and 30 overlapping trade blocs into a single, huge market, Africa has a chance of unlocking the 'demographic dividend' that sucked investment into India and China, analysts say.

The Economist took a look at this "demographic dividend" claim last year - here.

China/India: These Children will Blow You Away - Differently

At France 24's "the Observers," WHO's Sarah England throws the spotlight on the fact that many schools in China are sponsored by private enterprises - many of them tobacco companies. To explain the danger of such an arrangement, she points to this video:



And at France 24's "Reporters," I met twelve-year-old Rekha Kalindi, whose struggle against forced marriage (a practice banned in India since 1978) has inspired a nation...



... not to mention other child brides.

Tunisia: This Revolution Will Be YouTubed

Falaises... by Wajdi Cherif. Album: Jasmine. Label: Wech, 2005.Personnel: Mourad Benhammou (drums), Yoni Zelnik (bass), David Sauzay (sax), Hamdi Makhlouf (Oud).

Liberia: Ellen - Season 2

BBC digs up the clip of president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf promising in 2005 not to seek re-election. Listen to the president's press secretary, Cyrus Badio, spin the president's U-turn on monday, promising to be a "formidable"candidate--she's 71--in the 2011 elections.



But after listening to the opposition's tin ear case about her age and the law of diminishing returns setting in, you end up, instead, empathizing with Sirleaf and hoping she wins a new term. They should know better than to talk about a woman's age. Sheesh!

North Africa/ France: The Real Debate

AFP already spoke to Sub-Saharan African immigrants in France about Sarkozy's whole debate over French nationality.

France 24 speaks to France's North African immigrants, some of whom feel the debate's tongue-in-cheek  title is deceptive and a waste of time, because what the debate is really about is how to integrate Islam into Europe and Western culture - "that's the real debate."

West Africa: Foie gras

National Geographic "Taboo" program takes a look at a practice in Mauritania that has long outlived its logic and usefulness - "gavage" or the act of force-feeding young girls so they fit the ideal of beauty in places where fatness, voluminousness, voluptuousness is still considered a marriage asset in women and the voluptuous figure is still perceived as an indicator of wealth:



Pressured by the same rotund, curvaceous and functional ideal of beauty, a distant cousin to the Mauritanian "gavage" would be the Calabar tradition in Eastern Nigeria of sending girls in anticipation of their wedding day to "fattening rooms" so they emerge all round and glowing. Pockets of the tradition still exist as featured below in a clip from Ngozi Onwurah's 1993 documentary, Monday Girls:



Voluntary gavage if you will. In both cases the indirect hand "waterboarding" a young girl with food is that of the community and the pressure tradition brings to bear. Ironically (or unfortunately), the fastest way to change such attitudes might be via television; as in screens pouring out images of an idealized Caucasian body type embedded in all kinds of narratives of self transformation, advancement, determination, and, um, eating disorders.

The excerpt below comes from a Anne Becker's study, Television Disordered Eating and Young women in Fiji, which looks at rural Western Fiji, 3 years after Western television images and commercials were first broadcast to the region:

Fijian girls have not conventionally been motivated to reshape their bodies through diet or exercise (Becker 1995; Becker and Hamburg 1996). Possibly more protective against eating disorders than the absence of social pressure to be thin in Fiji was the fact that Fijians traditionally were not motivated to reshape their bodies. That is, whereas they expressed admiration for the aesthetic appeal of certain body features (most notably, large calves and a body that is jubu vina, or robust), they did not typically express interest in nor focus efforts toward attaining the culturally ideal shape (Becker 1995; Becker and Hamburg 1996).

... Televised imagery appears to have engaged the imagination of Fijian youth at multiple levels, apparently operating synergistically with the sweeping and rapid social changes taking place in Fiji over the past two decades. The ensuing changes in self and body image were multifaceted. On the most superficial and concrete level, television appeared to redefine local aesthetic ideals for bodily appearance and presentation.

Television scenarios also appeared to stimulate desire to acquire elements of the lifestyles portrayed, including the body shape perceived to be best suited for obtaining a job. Subjects explicitly reported modeling behavior and appearance on television characters. Indeed, role modeling of television characters appeared to conflate moral virtues, success in job opportunities, and appearance. On a subtle but palpable level, study subjects indicated that television characters, appearances, and values portrayed on television provided an anchor for identity as well as competitive social positioning in a rapidly evolving social landscape. For some of the subjects, the newly introduced pressures to reshape their bodies and compete for employment appear to have fostered disordered eating.

Kenya: Kahiu & Pumzi @ Sundance

The short film Pumzi (2009)--or Kenya's first sci-fi film--has been getting a lot of positive Sundance Festival buzz. Below, director Wanuri Kahiu, along with other film directors at the ongoing Sundance fest, talk about their works:

Africa: Little Bronxes

Spain: A fascinating story about the community of Cruz de Humilladero in Malega, Spain, and how cultural tensions between African immigrants and the host community led to a reach out effort spear-headed by Hakima Soudani, a Moroccan of mixed race, to get both communities speaking and it seems to have worked:



If the above video reveals anything, it maybe that every community takes a lot of pride in what they cook, thus,  cultural melting pots, quite literally, are in our kitchens.

China: Remember Evan Osnos New Yorker article about "Chocolate City": Guangzhou’s Canaan market on China's southern coast, where merchants from Mali, Ghana, and mostly Nigerians have been arriving and settling down in large numbers? Ana Fuentes and Angel Villarino at VJ Movement have the update:



That bit about who showers and who does not is hilarious! More about Chinese attitudes towards Africans as opposed to African-Americans - here.

(update)

France: Another success story of an African immigrant-host community integration, this time from Collinée, France, a village of fewer than 1000 inhabitants. According to France 24 "Reporters," thirty years ago the local slaughterhouse had a severe staff shortage and a dozen Malians were brought to Collinee to work and were later joined by their wives and children. Today, one inhabitant in ten is Malian and the slaughter house is still booming, ready to employ a second generation of Malians.

Watch -- here. Immigrants finding steady employment within the host community therefore increases the chances of absorption and integration. And I picked that thumbnail to show, once again, the role cooking and kitchens can play in racial-immigration melting pots.

Kenya: "Path of Least Resistance" - The Nairobi Drug Scene

We've already blogged about Taliban heroin being routed through Kenya. At the VJ Movement, Stephen Digges has a report (and reenactments) on the drug scene in Nairobi, as seen through the eyes of one of the city's drug dealers:

Egypt: Cartoon Exhibit

Over at Al-Masary Al-Youm, Bassam Mortada covers an end of 2009 exhibit of the work of Al-Masary Al-youm cartoonists (and maybe others) and paints a rough picture of the economics and overall state of cartooning in Egypt:

South Africa/ Kenya/ Senegal: New African Cinema - 2010 Sundance Selections

The Sundance short film selection committee went with 3 shorts from 3 African women directors, all coming out of the Focus Pictures "African First" short film program.

South Africa:

The Tunnel (2009) - A short film written , directed & produced by Jenna Bass, who "draws from ancient mythological storytelling traditions to create a kind of historical magical realism in relating a modern-day tale of warfare in Zimbabwe."



It stars Sibulele Mlumbi , Patricia Matongo , Chediza Mhende, Ncebakazi Pilingane... Synopsis: the story, set in 1980s Zimbabwe during the 5th Brigade massacres, follows young Elizabeth as she uses her skills as a storyteller to save her village and solve the mystery of her father’s disappearance. It not only aims to raise awareness about the human rights abuses inflicted by Robert Mugabe at the time but, through the medium of cinema, provide a way to confront the suffering of the past so relevant to many African people. Trailer - here.

Kenya:

Kenyan filmmaker Wanuri Kahiu creates a brightly original science-fiction vision in her short film Pumzi (2009), a 20 min Sc-Fi film about futuristic Africa set 35 years after World War III “The Water War,” focusing on a botanist who risks everything to nurture a plant.



Synopsis: Nature is extinct. The outside is dead. Asha lives and works as a museum curator in one of the indoor communities set up by the Maitu Council. When she receives a box in the mail containing soil, she plants an old seed in it and the seed starts to germinate instantly. Asha appeals to the Council to grant her permission to investigate the possibility of life on the outside but the Council denies her exit visa. Asha breaks out of the inside community to go into the dead and derelict outside to plant the growing seedling and possibly find life on the outside.

Wired blog, Underwire, has a beautiful write up of Wanuri's short - here. Grace Kerongo blogs about the film's reception at the Kenyan International Film festival where Wanuri was compared toKenyan Nobel prize winner, Wangari Mathai.

Senegal:

Gaye Dayana'a Saint Louis Blues (2009)

"Senegalese filmmaker Dyana Gaye draws from the fifties- and sixties-style French musicals to breathe fresh air into Saint Louis Blues, a buoyant road-trip tale set in the clogged urban streets and dusty roads of Senegal" - in other words, a cross-country trip through Senegal, from Dakar to Saint Louis in a battered taxi, as passengers sing their stories:

Zimbabwe: Designing Shingai Shoniwa

New Yorker's Sasha Frere-Jones once wrote that Shingai Shoniwa, the lead singer of Zimbabwean descent for the British Indy band, the Noisettes, looks like a "supermodel" and it appears the British high street store, Topshop, concurs - below are the label's designs for Shingai's performance last year at the V festival in  Hylands Park, Chelmsford:

Noisette's Live at the V festival, Hylands Park, Chelmsford, August, 2009:

Maybe it is the whole Brit-thing, but Shingai  reminds me of two black women from back in the day who kicked James Bond's ass. Grace Jones in a View to a Kill back in 1985 and a bad ass, bikini clad Trina Parks who played "Thumper" in Diamonds Are Forever, 1971.

Kenya: Coffee Reform

Late to the branding game, the coffee board of Kenya have been at the whole coffee reform thing for a while now. Reuters spotlights one of the major reforms to go with the moves being made to brand the coffee Kenya exports:

One of the reforms instituted in the sector, which accounts for 3.5 percent of Kenya's gross domestic product, allowed farmers to sell their produce directly to buyers overseas without offering it at a central auction. [Loise] Njeru [chief executive at the Coffee Board of Kenya] said the brand would help the increasing number of people globally that are demanding pure Kenyan coffee to pick it out from other coffees and blends. "With the opening up of direct sales and the growing niche markets in the U.S. and other high end markets, we are seeing relationship buying coming in place where buyers and consumers recognise that pure Kenyan coffee is far much better or superior than what they have been getting," Njeru said.

But in this IPS article from '08, Njeru also explains why branding and direct sales might not translate into added revenue for Kenyan coffee growers:

However, the CBK says that insignificant quantities are preventing farmers from benefiting from the price increase associated with branded coffee. "Even if farmers are paid well, the quantities they produce are not substantial and they are not benefitting fully since the costs of production remains high," Njeru pointed out. The board’s technical services manager, Benard Gichovi, explained that farmers are producing an average of three kilograms per tree, which is very low compared to the potential. "If farmers can produce 15 kgs per tree, then they could feel the effect of the increased prices but currently they cannot see the changes yet,’’ according to Gichovi . Njeru agrees that increasing production is the only way to help farmers increase revenue.

But how do you increase production when "the returns you get from a hectare of coffee as compared to real estate are smaller..." and you need more land amongst other things to boost coffee production, right?Feels like a catch-22.

United States: Slavery and Corporate-Personhood

In the case, Citizens United v. FEC, the United States' Supreme Court last Friday, in a 5-4 decision, declared unconstitutional the government's restriction of the ability of corporations and unions to use funds from their general treasury for "electioneering" purposes, prompting many to fear the Supreme Court has officially opened the floodgates for corporate money in election campaigns.

When it comes to the silly constitutional equation of a corporation to a person, which was what so much of Supreme Court's argument for the 1st amendment rights of corporations was based, Ruth Marcus wrote in WaPo:

... in the face of logic and history, the majority acted as if there could be no constitutional distinction between a corporation and a human being. Untrue. The Supreme Court has long held that corporations are considered "persons" under the Constitution and are therefore entitled to its protections. For more than a century, Congress has barred corporations from making direct

Burkina Faso: The Green Brigade

In Ouagadougou, taxpayers funds go to pay for a green brigade that employs single mothers and widowed women:

New York: The Photography of Kwesi Abbensetts

From the blog and website of New York photog Kwesi Abbensett.

He has a thing for image manipulation and an eye for arresting females.

Mali: Cinema Paradiso - Bamako Style

Mauritanian/Malian auteur Abderrahmane Sissako in this episode of BBC's The Strand--listen here--is campaigning to re-open some of Africa's closed up cinema houses, places which no doubt carry for his generation a nostalgia for their childhood and how they fell in love with the cinema in those now dilapidated buildings. Thus, he comes across as the grown up Toto from Cinema Paradiso whose flashbacks to such a childhood we get to enjoy upon his return to his hometown on learning of the death of Alfredo the projectionist.

In The Strand report, Sissako and the BBC's Martin Vogle explore a run down cinema house in Bamako, which Sissako is trying to resurrect and they come across evidence of porn films shown towards the end of that cinema's life. It recalls for me that last scene in Cinema Paradiso where older Toto finds out the late Alfredo had left him a montage of all the kissing or explicit scenes they had been cutting out of film reels during his childhood:



On the other hand, in an Africa that cannot afford the upkeep of cinema houses and has moved on to the conveniences of home-video production and exhibition, Pierre Barrot in the anthology of essays titled Nollywood: The Video Phenomenon in Nigeria, writes about the stubbornness of Francophone film directors and their unwillingness to let go off all the trappings that come with shooting and exhibiting their work on film:

It could be said that cinema in the Niger, as in many other African countries, had been killed off by video, the virus identified by Jean Rouch... it is also true that the public has got out of the habit of watching films on the big screen in the darkened halls of picture houses, which is not surprising given the dilapidated state of the cinemas, the general wear and tear on the fittings that has turned the cinema experience into something of an ordeal. Looking bck to the screening of a film in a commerical cinema in Niamey in 1992, the building itself hadn't quite hit its all time low, but even then the audience had to strain to make out the pale image on the dusty screen, tolerate the interferance from the dusty sound projection and put up with frequent breaks when the film reel snapped...

At the Niamey gathering in Feb 2004, Djingarey Maiga was very critical of video as a medium, despite his frustrations with 16mm film: the acrobatics he had to go through to get hold of film stock, the miracles needed in order to start filmming and eventually to be able to release the work... However noble and determined this battle cry might sound, the result has been that Niger no longer produces films and its intransigent filmmakers have decided not to take advantage of video technology as an alternative...

Between the filmmaker from Niger, who had to wait 8 to 10 year between making each new feature film and the Nigerian "home-video" craftsman, prolific and frenetic in his serial approach to shooting films, there is common ground, both visually on the screen and above all in their shared concern for the audience. ...Maiga may have made a tactical error in denouncing video - this might well prevent him from making the many other films he has in his head and that will never come to light if he continues to burdened with traditional filmmaking techniques.

Uganda: How to Save Face

Like Val Kalende, Pepper, another Ugandan gay activist, agrees to go on camera in this new Reuters' piece on Uganda's draconian anti-homosexual bill.



In the UTV update below, what is becoming apparent is Uganda's parliamentarians not wanting to lose face don't know how to walk away from this bill:

Egypt/ United States: The Naga Hammadi Incident

Text of the letter from Democratic and Republican members of the U.S. House and Senate to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, concerning the six Coptic Christians and one Muslim security guard (not to mention this) who were tragically killed following a Christmas Eve service in the town of Naga Hamady in Qena province of Egypt.

The Arabist parses the epistle, concludes this kind of diplomatic airing of Egypt's human right abuses in the open could be productive, but remains skeptical that it's all a little too late considering the bigger picture:

The Naga Hammadi incident was a very serious and troubling event, and Posner raised some of the right questions about it (notably who ordered the hit on Bishop Kirollos, which will be the topic of a later post.) And the arrest of the bloggers was absurd and definitely worth condemning.

But let us stick to the context of US-Egypt relations, and ask: is this a turning point for the Obama administration, which chose Cairo for its (now increasingly irrelevant) speech and worked overtime (particularly [US Ambassador to Egypt] Scobey) to repair the damage done to the bilateral relationship by the Bush administration? Or is it just a question of timing, since [US Assistant Secretary for Human Rights] Posner happened to be on a regional tour?

Because while I might approve of the above statements, I am also moved to ask: where have you been all this time? Posner for instance was supposed to come to Cairo over a month ago;

Kenya: A Long Walk Down Kitengela Road, Langata, Nairobi -- The Photography of Steve Bloom

South African photog Steve Bloom captures the urban too, though it's his amazing rural/wildlife images of Africa that ensures his fame in the West. With this new collection, featuring the merchants in the Langata area of Nairobi, he, perhaps, will now also be famous for the longest picture ever printed?

How "the longest photograph in print" was taken - here.

That said, what really blew me away: more of his urban portfolio and his newly resurrected images of the 70's and the "first ...cracks in the apartheid system" - here.

Friday

Ha-He by Just A Band (JaB). Album: 82. Label:Rauka Music, 2009.

...these are stories of charity, charity
never wings, make defy... gravity, gravity... 

Ethiopia: The Making of Aldewolem - Yetnayet Bahru Gessesse Interview

Over at ArtMatters.Info, Ogova Ondego talks to 25-year-old Yetnayet Bahru Gessesse, director of Aldewolem [He Didn’t Call Me] (2008),"a US$13,000 romantic comedy on the games that young, single, city-dwelling African women and men play but find they cannot extricate themselves from what they began as innocuous practical jokes using the now common cell phone."

Scripted, directed and produced after Gessesse graduated from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, when she was 23, Aldewolem has since been nominated for "best story," "best director," "best actress" and "best supp. actress" at the Ethiopian International Film Festival (more)....

Nigeria: This Revolution Will Be YouTubed

Lagos Town by Afrikan Boy, featuring Cherry B. Single from Album: "1444 Musik." Video Director - Lilly Smith.

Visas and these passports
We don't need them here
We're all super eagles
From Lagos town

(lol)

H/T: Africa is a Country

South Africa: The Making of ZA News, Pt.1

season 2 confirmed. Yes!!!

Africa: Tajudeen Abdulraheem - "African of the Year for 2009"

photo: The Independent

Nigerian newspaper, Daily Trust, picks the late activist, scholar, newspaper columnist, social campaigner and exemplary Pan Africanist Dr. Tajudeen Abdulraheem as its African of the Year for 2009.

Director of the Royal African Society, Richard Dowden, wrote Tajudeen Abdulraheem 's obit in The Independent last year:

Tajudeen AbdulRaheem's Marxism was dressed in stupendous African colours and laced with jokes and laughter. If imperialism and capitalism could have been overthrown by hilarity, Taj would have been master of the universe. He once addressed a meeting at Parliament for African diaspora leaders to meet MPs. Dressed in African robes, he stunned his audience by praising the City of London: "the richest square mile on the planet" full of wealth, banks and trading houses. But, he said, with a wonderful roll of those eyes, "at night you leave, and WE move in and take over". A frisson passed through the gathering. He went on, "We guard it for you, clean it for you, ready for your return in the morning." The point was brilliantly, gently made; Africans are here, please acknowledge us, and respect us.

DRC: Onioned

Another addition to the Onion's Africa greatest hits - here.

H/T: Africa is a Country via TiA

Ghana: "Football Fables" - A Documentary

CNN's Monita Rajpal sits down with Baff Akoto, director of the award winning documentary "Football Fables," which follows the life of a young Ghanaian footballer on the cusp of signing with an European side.

More on Ghanian football obssessions - here

South Africa: This Revolution Will Be YouTubed

Cruising Through by Goldfish, featuring Sakhile Moleshe. Album: Perceptions of Pacha. Label: Pacha Spain, 2009.

Nigeria/ United States: "Nigerian Zionists for Coakley" - "Super Villains of the Modern Age" - Cont'd

Earlier this week as Republican Scott Brown was set to trounce the Democrat Martha Coakley in the bluest of blue states for the senate seat of the Democrat god, Ted Kennedy, Michael C. Moynihan writes in Reason of trying to figure out why things in Massachusetts all of a sudden made no sense and on stepping outside a bar, lo and behold, he runs into:

Outside, a Nigerian man in a red, white, and blue vest and holding a Coakley sign patiently explained to me that Israel was his “favorite country in the world”; that African-Americans need lessons in entrepreneurship from Nigerians; and that because of a Muslim student in the chemistry department at his local university, he received an unfair C+ on a recent exam. “I am the American dream,” he proclaimed.

Nigerian Zionists for Coakley. Irish Republicans for Brown. It is becoming increasingly difficult to make sense of any of this.

(lol). It's also interesting how in the Western imaginary the Nigerian stereotype and notoriety, by default, makes a Nigerian, in the midst of norms, a great signifier for the absurd or utterly ridiculous concept.

Egypt: Cairo on Second Life

David Denton has completed the first phase of conceptual design of a major mixed-use project--Location: Sixth of October City; Shopping Center: 300,000 SM; Hotel: 400 rooms; Office Building: 20 stories; Parking: 3000 spaces--to be built in Cairo, Egypt. The project may be the first of this scale to be created initially in in the Internet accessible virtual world of Second Life, where everyone's avatar can do whatever.



H/T: The Arabist

Africa: Obama Administration's First Year - Africa Report Card

Photo: Pete Souza

Global Post puts together a list of key Africa related moments for Obama’s first year in office and ....

Kenya: S-B-A Technologies Heads for the NASDAQ

Julius Mwale's S-B-A technologies, which specializes in banking mobile solutions (but also has patents up the gazoo for biometric security software for mobile transfer and banking), is set to list 10 percent of its stock on the NASDAQ later in the year:



From Mwale's interview with Capital FM Kenya:

Out of other options I sought asylum in the U.S, which is how I ended up in New York at the Charles Gay Homless Shelter where I stayed for about a year before my application for asylum could be approved... I had my laptop with me so I did most of my research from my quarters. The laptop was however soon stolen and I had to go to the public libraries where I would be allowed thirty minutes on the computer, but this was too little.I tried to volunteer with limited success at the libraries to get extra time for my research... My work was centered on two things: creating a technology that would guarantee secure mobile money transfer and mobile commerce while the other was biometrics system to control access to computer systems... Luckily for me, word of my research had gotten out to technology circles through my asylum lawyers for and I was able to be admitted into Columbia University for a Masters in Electrical Engineering as a special admit. This was however more of a way to boost my credibility as well as source for partners I could work with.

Africa: The Man with the (Marshall) Plan

More on dean of Columbia Business School Glenn Hubbard's Marshall Plan as a prototype for restarting Africa's once vibrant local business culturem - here...

Oh, and seeing how Fed Chair, Ben Bernanke, was FP's and Time Magazine's person of the year, the parody (below) of Hubbard by students at the Columbia Business School (CBS) is a gift that just keeps giving and, in my opinion, the number one reason to take Hubbard's Marshall Plan idea seriously. But, alas, the Chinese got there first.

Kenya: Kiswahili - Optional

Kenya has made a decision that appears to downgrade the importance of Kiswahili at a time when East Africa’s lingua franca is expected to play a bigger role in regional integration. The subject will no longer be a compulsory paper in the Standard Eight national examinations, according to a new government policy. Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examination candidates can forgo Kiswahili and instead be tested in Kenyan Sign Language, which will be examined for the first time this year ... more

Update: government tries to clarify confusion over Kiswahili

Nigeria: "The Last Tactical Mile" - Excuse Me Stewardess! The Gentleman in 19A... His Balls Are On Fire, Cont'd

Statement read by Dennis C. Blair, Director of National Intelligence, and Michael E. Leiter, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, 20 January 2010. Excerpt:

As I have noted, despite our successes in identifying the overall themes that described the plot we failed to make the final connections—the “last tactical mile”—linking Abdulmutallab’s identity to the plot. We had the information that came from his father that he was concerned about his son going to Yemen, coming under the influence of unknown religious extremists, and that he was not going to return home. We also had other streams of information coming from intelligence channels that provided pieces of the story. We had a partial name, an indication of a Nigerian, but there was nothing that brought it all together—nor did we do so in our analysis....

In hindsight, the intelligence we had can be assessed with a high degree of confidence to describe Mr. Abdulmutallab as a likely operative of AQAP [al Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula]. But without making excuses for what we did not do, I think it critical that we at least note the context in which this failure occurred: Each day NCTC receives literally thousands of pieces of intelligence information from around the world, reviews literally thousands of different names, and places more than 350 people a day on the watchlist—virtually all based on far more damning information than that associated with Mr. Abdulutallab prior to Christmas Day. Although we must and will do better, we must also recognize that not all of the pieces rise above the noise level.

I miss guillotines.

West Africa: Punctured Film

Apparently director Bruno Pischiutta's film about the custom of Trokosi in Ghana and some parts of West Africa is so bad that Variety film critic Robert Koehler calls it out:

The outrageous and under-reported practice of trokosi, a religion-based form of justice-by-slavery still practiced in Ghana and other West African nations, is hardly given the dramatic treatment it deserves in the woefully conceived (and titled) "Punctured Hope: A Story About Trokosi and Young Girls' Slavery in Today's West Africa." Casting actual trokosi victim Belinda Siamey as a girl punished for the supposed crimes of her male relative, director/co-writer Bruno Pischiutta flubs the opportunity to insert nonfiction into a drama. All-English dialogue track isn't enough to raise commercial prospects for a film brought down by lumbering pacing and rampant overacting.

South Africa/ USA: Obama-Mandela - The Inevitable Withdrawal of High Expectations

Breyten Breytenbach essay, delivered in January at the Gorée Institute in Senegal and published in March 2009 issue of Harper’s Magazine, is high as a kite no doubt from all the legalized Obamarijuana leftover from the '08 campaign. Like with the Obama-Lincoln parallel, the essay tries every way possible to find Obama-Mandela parallels. But in light of the current Obama hangover after his remarkable first year in office, the essay's final paragraphs do stand out:

Are Mandela and Obama tragic figures who can’t possibly live up to mankind’s exaggerated expectations? However different they may be from those around them because of their destinies, surely they are only human, and politicians at that, which means that they are expressing a constrained and specific evolution of humanity. “If the nose didn’t have nostrils, how would you blow it?” This is a Toucouleur saying. With cosmic “luck” and application—for it is a discipline—Obama may get to the point where he realizes part of the secret of Mandela’s moral longevity: a shedding of self, i.e., that the only way to be replenished is to give. But does this make for feasible politics, that “art of the possible”?

...I warn that the proof is still to come, that the man may fail because the challenges are too overwhelming, because the people around him have too powerfully entrenched views and strategies different from his (I mention the Israel conundrum). “Even so,” Ka’afir says, “even if he fails, which is likely, the historic fact still remains that the American people grew beyond their fears and prejudices. Their hearts expanded.”

Africa/Europe/Israel: Exchanging Nationalisms for "Europeanism"

A new generation of claustrophobic Israelis, shackled less by their Jewishness and a Holocaust heritage, see no problem leaving behind what they term a "suffocating" Middle East for a future in a vibrant Berlin - or what used to be the heart of Nazism. In addition, David Goessmann, the reporter interviewed in the report, points out something else about the new generation of Germans:

...they think internationally and see themselves as European. It's not so much about nationality anymore.

Meanwhile, France, whose burden of a Vichy past, unlike Germany, doesn't connect to its national identity, feels very nationalistic, clinging to Frenchness and not ready to embrace a mitigating "Europeanism". For example, in response to president Nicolas Sarkozy's pander to the conservatives via the decision to stage a major public debate on France's "national identity," AFP asks Africans in France what it means to be French or--if one reads between the lines--what makes them think they are French:



Ronald Beiner's thoughts from Theorizing Nationalism (p. 9) on the liberalization of immigration and assimilation policies versus national identity:

In pursuing my critique of nationalism as an alternative to liberalism, let me focus on what I see as the decisive problem; if this problem is as intractable as I think it is, then any attempt to synthesize liberalism and nationalism theoretically will be forced to drop either the liberalism or the nationalism when it comes to the crunch (or at least a serious philosophical wedge will be placd between one's liberalism and one's nationalism). The problem, in a nutshell, is how to priviledge the majority cultural identity in defining civic membership without consigning cultural minorities to second-class citizenship

The way I figure, having a growing regional state like Europe seems to provide that alternate cultural identity that provides the wiggle room for the theoretical synthesis of liberalism and nationalism; in other words, a European country priviledging its majority cultural identity will be like serving food to a select few at an all you can eat buffet. Because being European, if a growing Europe economically continues to kick ass, also comes with priviledges and as long as there are incentives to both identities, the borders between being, for example, German and being European remains porous and negotiable.

Nigeria: When the President Calls In Sick, Do You Fire Him? Cont'd

Martins Oloja, Abuja Bureau Chief of Guardian Newspapers, briefs ABNDigital on the "pervasive" power the constitution gives a Nigerian president and why the void left by the absence of a president is just as powerful:



A treat to hear from Nigeria's Guardian Newspapers :-)

South Africa: 2010 Damage Control, Cont'd

As the world cup nears, the hosting committee's PR dept will be working overtime to push back on every absurd claim feeding off the world's perception of the dark continent - even if just to point out that South Africa is like anywhere else in the world where any number of random things can happen, like a shark biting your ass. Case in point, recent shark attacks South of Cape Town. Nic Bothma explains:

So why, you might ask, did I take my wife and two daughters, along with our two friends from Britain and their two daughters and baby son, to Fish Hoek for a swim just four days before the latest attack? For that matter, why did much of Cape Town? ....What kind of maniacs are we? Answer: We're incorrigible gamblers. Addicts, to judge by the frequency with which we go. But judge for yourself whether you think we're being reckless with the odds we're playing with. The chances of being attacked by a shark while swimming in the ocean, according to the International Shark Attack File at the Florida Museum of Natural History, are 1 in 11.5 million. The chances of a fatal attack are 1 in 264.1 million. Both odds decrease somewhat if you are bleeding or, it turns out, peeing.

And then there is Sascha Cutura, the founder of Protektorvest, who read this, and thought he could make money by doing this:

A British company is cashing in on security concerns around the World Cup and is marketing "stab proof" vests branded with the flags of competing countries, to soccer fans heading for South Africa in June... a solution for people who feel they need extra protection," Cutura said in an email interview.

And it gets worse:

Part of the company's marketing pitch includes publishing a copy of the SAPS's official crime statistics for 2008/2009 on its website, as well as highlighting extracts relating directly to knife crimes. "During 2008/2009 a total of 72,194 (59.5%) of all aggravated robberies were street/public robberies. In 38% of street robberies, knives were used," reads one quote, while another extract quotes the fact that "knives and other sharp objects were the most common instruments used to kill victims (52, 2%)". But Cutura says he is not using scare tactics to push up sales. "If we didn't publish these figures people would think we're creating a situation which doesn't exist," he says. "By publishing an official report that shows the real crime statistics, we give people just an objective overview of the situation. This will help them make up their own minds, and if they need extra protection they can get it from us."

"But Cutura says he is not using scare tactics to push up sales.... We give people an objective view of the situation"? Opportunist, please!!!

Kenya: Obama Hangover is Global

The false choice between the bigotry of low expectations or the inevitable withdrawal from high ones.

Ghana: For the Love of Non-Taxable Money Streams

With illicit flow of money out of Africa at double or four times (around USD 100 billion annually) the amount of aid that flows in, FT reports the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is warning Ghana's finance minister, as the country as been trying to move into offshore finance, "that the last thing Africa needs is tax havens within the centre of Africa" and "has written to warn of the risks of a failure to comply with international standards."

Nick Mathiason, at The Guardian, has the rest. But the author of Tax Havens: How Globalization Really Works, Richard Murphy, thinks this has less to do with Ghana and more to do with influence from the international banks:

... But Barclays [said to be advising Ghana] are backing it anyway. And you want a better example than that of the complete and utter social irresponsibility of banks in the face of the risk of corruption, fraud and social breakdown? It would be hard to find unless it is PricewaterhouseCoopers’ support for the development of a tax haven in Jamaica. This is the financial services industry pursuing profit at cost to society at large. There’s nothing new about that. But the time has come to stop it.