AfricaWatch

2010-06-23T07:39:00.000-07:00

Israel’s Secret Relationship With The South African Apartheid Regime

Most don’t realize the similarities between Israel’s ties to “Africa’s anti-colonial revolutions,” and the developing new African nations of the late 1950’s that continued into the 1960’s, and the development of Jewish relationships with the Civil Rights movement. Jews recognized, as Jonathan Kaufman writes in his book Broken Alliance: the Turbulent Times Between Blacks and Jews in America, that they “recognized in the Black struggle for rights there were elements that could benefit them and conditions with which they could sympathize.”

Israel’s “charm offensive in Africa” developed a similar outlook, writes Sasha Polasko-Suranski. In his new book, The Unspoken Alliance: Israel’s Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa Polasko-Suranski, compares Jewish involvement in the Civil Rights movement within this “alliance of the periphery” as the Mossad brainchild was called. Close ties were developed with African nations, not only as a counter balance “to (the) Arab states surrounding it,” but as Prime Minister Golda Meir writes in her autobiography, this new found relationship served to emphasize how like the newly formed independent African nations, the budding land of Israel, “like them we had to learn for ourselves how to reclaim the land… how to live together and how to defend ourselves.”

And though I would agree the primary focus of the new book pertains to Israel’s assistance in developing the apartheid regimes military, the dual purpose of helping each other facilitate its nuclear weapons program, and its blatant violation of anti-apartheid sanctions, to say the least - all gleaned from documents declassified by the new South African government. The most intriguing aspect of “The Unspoken Alliance” for this writer however, is the fact that the Jewish states foreign policy initiatives were reduced to keeping its own Foreign Ministry in the dark.

“Malcolm Ferguson, South Africa’s ambassador to Israel at the time, was stunned to learn that Israel’s South Africa policy was not only self-contradictory, but that the diplomats and defense officials at the Israeli embassy had no idea what their colleagues were doing. A key advisor to Prime Minister Rabin had told Ferguson that the Foreign Ministry was deliberately kept in the dark about the nature of military relations between the two countries for fear that its liberal employees would leak information to the media.”

To add insult to injury, the Israeli embassy in “Pretoria was divided by a wall.” In the chapter entitled, “Forked Tongues,” the author reveals, “a barrier that separated the Foreign Ministry from those working at the Defense Ministry mission, and the two sides carried out diametrically opposed polices,” that included the development of its multibillion-dollar military industry and developing a relationship with up and coming anti-apartheid Black leaders respectfully.

So on the one hand you have, the budding Jewish state claiming commonality with the newly forming African nations, only to be eventually superseded by Israel’s defense needs, and the $10 billion in military hardware, training, and the selling of its technology spanning its relationship with the apartheid regime.

This symbiotic relationship included the simultaneous development of the mutual partners’ nuclear weapons program. That relationship included the selling of ‘yellow cake’ or uranium to Israel, and the Jewish state developing a delivery system for South Africa’s growing nuclear arsenal.

More than anything, this sounds like the precursor to Africom – the Pentagon’s current command in Africa, where the U.S. military appears to preempt its own State Department. And because the military is such a growth industry says former Secretary of State Colin Powell’s chief of staff Larry Wilkinson, “how do you find a voice that equals or exceeds the voice of the Pentagon,” with it’s “nearly quarter of a trillion dollar” budge as compared to the State Department’s “$30 billion budget.” As the former military man said, “That kind of money interests every congressman, every senator, every military contractor, from Haliburton to Lockweed.”

So when the world community began to clamor against Israel’s unholy alliance with the apartheid regime, she viewed her strategic interest and her economic well being that were both tied to her relationship with South Africa as more important.

But with the October 1986 passage of the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act forced “(Yitzak) Rabin to reconsider the Defense Ministry’s approach to South Africa”, and helped those inside the diplomatic core make their case against supporting the apartheid regime.

In April of 1987 a congressional report was released accusing the Israeli government of being “fully aware of most or all of the (military) trade (with South Africa).” Now according to Polakow-Suransky, whose parents are from South Africa, Israel’s secret alliance with the apartheid regime, “that for years leaked out in bits and pieces was now finally out in the open, and this time came from a source that was difficult for Israel and its allies (mainly the Jewish states self-proclaimed protector AIPAC) in Washington to dismiss or ignore.”

But even though Jerusalem’s sanctions, according to the book, received in depth coverage in the Israeli and American media, “in practice it amounted to little more than a cosmetic gesture.” The sanctions had minimal “impact on the flourishing trade between the two countries, especially in the defense sector, where multibillion-dollar contracts signed before 1987 remained in effect.”

Though The Unspoken Alliance is filled with the contradictions of the Israeli government’s foreign policy, and its double standards, the book sheds light on how Jews in America have a ‘mother protecting her son’ policy, when it comes to Israel’s historically ‘I’m above international law’ behavior.

There were the “feuds” that “loomed on the horizon – pitting Blacks who vehemently condemned Israel’s relationship with South Africa against Jews who opposed apartheid but denied or downplayed the Israeli connection,” writes Polakow-Suransky.

In a March 1986 PBS debate a leading member of the Jewish Reform movement Rabbi David Saperstein, an outspoken opponent of apartheid claimed Israel involvement with South Africa was negligible.

And then the Anti Defamation League (ADL) “entered the propaganda fray, publicly attacking Nelson Mandela’s ANC with arguments that mirrored those of the hard-line security officials in Pretoria.”

This sounds like shades of the recent American Jewish response to the Gaza embargo, and the justification made by some members of the Jewish community for the deadly raid on the flotilla convoy. The raid resulted in the murder of nine Turkish citizens in international waters, while in the process of delivering humanitarian aid, by Israeli commandos.

That this new book gives insight into the historical internal workings of the Israel government is important. This is especially relevant given individuals historical inability to criticize Israel’s foreign policy without being labeled an anti-Semite.

Jehron can be reached at Africawatch53@gmail.com

2010-05-25T03:49:00.000-07:00

Sudan election puts checks and balances on ruling party; Al Qaeda is blown out of proportion; & Farrakhan “knows Quran better than many Islamic Scholars,” says Sheik Hassan Turabi

One of the few journalist to interview Dr. Hassan Al-Turabi before his most recent arrest, I discovered this constitutional scholar, Islamist, member of previous Sudan administrations, former advisor of President Omar Al-Bashir, and also Speaker of the House under the National Congress Party (NCP) willing to openly and frankly speak his mind, not caring about possible consequences.

It seems that the Secretary General of the Popular Congress Party (PCP), and Sudan’s former Attorney General under the Nimeiri administration, Dr. Turabi has made antagonizing Sudan’s ruling NCP his life’s work. The Government’s latest arrest – he’s been arrested at least five times since his break off from the NCP - on May 15 seems to coincide with the closure of the PCP affiliated daily Rai Al-Shaab (The People’s Viewpoint).

According to published reports this most recent jailing was in response to the publication of a report alleging the Islamic Republic of Iran constructed a “weapons factory” somewhere in Sudan, with the aim of supplying “Islamists insurgents in Somalia and Yemeni… as well as (the) Islamist Palestinian movement Hamas. This might have been enough to spook the ruling NCP, who remember clearly President Bill Clinton’s 1998 bombing of a pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum that Clinton alleged was hiding behind the manufacture of “weapons of mass destruction.”

The day after the arrest - speaking from the Sudan Radio Service - Dr. Turabi’s wife, Wisal Al-Turabi said, she feels “the government is thinking we are helping our brothers in Darfur….” as the apparent reason for Turabi’s arrest. She went on to state, “Nobody has managed to resolve this issue because they don’t want a peaceful solution – just military solutions. But they didn’t succeed because the International Criminal Court has been monitoring them.”

What she was really saying was he was arrested and being accused of being in cahoots with the Darfur rebel group Justice and Equality Movement (JEM). Two months ago JEM and Khartoum signed a Framework agreement in Doha, paving the way for a final resolution of the conflict.

In recent weeks JEM suspended its participation in the talks due to alleged “violations of the ceasefire agreement and attacked Government positions and commercial truck convoys,” the United Nations reported.

Speaking about everything, including: Al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden, the impossibility of America winning the war in Afghanistan, the importance of the recent Sudanese elections, and Nation of Islam (NOI) leader Minister Louis Farrakhan knowing “the Quran better than many (Islamic) scholars that speak Arabic,” Dr. Turabi, during the one-hour interview pulled no punches.

In response to a question about Bin Laden, he back dropped his answer explaining how “silly” the Western media is in framing anything that Muslims do as somehow connected to violence, and the waging of some kind of war against the West.

They called, according to Turabi, the “Pakistani (nuclear) bomb is an Islamic bomb. The Indian bomb is all right. That is silly,” he said. He went on to explain that a “bomb is something chemical or physical, it’s not Islamic…. “Islam,” he explained is a human being that adopts one faith rather than another. I don’t know why they exaggerate, why the media takes up that line.”

Concerning Al Qaeda he said, “It’s a silly word, (and it’s actually makes the user) a laughing stock.” Turabi said, “Qaeda only means a base. It doesn’t mean an organization or an association in Arabic.”

Turning to Bin Laden the Islamic scholar said, “He (initially) wasn’t known in the press. He was building roads (in Sudan) and trying to invest in agriculture for Saudi Arabia – his family is a (Saudi) construction family.” He said what everyone fails to realize is Bin Laden “was sent to… (Afghanistan to fight the Russians) by the Americans.” Turabi said, “After the Russians withdrew automatically he’s a potential terrorist.” He said. They eventually go after him “until they forced him back to the mountains” of Afghanistan. Turabi feels Bin Ladin never had any power to mount any kind of campaign against the West while in hiding in the Mountains of Afghanistan.

In fact, while in Sudan the Clinton administration blew an opportunity to capture Bin Laden. According to a 2001 La Times article, “Realizing Bin Laden” was a “growing problem”. President Bashir of Sudan offered to detain him. The Clinton administration never responded, so he was allowed to leave and travel to Afghanistan.

Responding to a question concerning President Obama’s war in Afghanistan Turabi said, “(The United States) they’ll never beat the Afghanis,” Turabi said convincingly. “The British tried them. They conquered the whole of India for 300 years… but they couldn’t conquer the Afghanis. They are mountain people (and) mountain people are like rocks. You cannot beat them. You just waist your time, your blood and their blood.”

The opposition leader responding to a question concerning Sudan’s first election in 24 years - held in April of this year - said, it “was a good thing.” This he told me two days before holding a press conference condemning the elections. He also said the above after losing in his bid for a congressional seat. Whether one has anything to do with the other is anyone’s guess. One thing for sure, Turabi feels the election was a paradigm swing. He said what comes after the race, that not only included the election of the president, but also of governors and members of parliament as well, would mean there are now “checks and balances and controls” on the presidency. He said prior to the election those positions were “appointed.”

In fact, the most “exciting and untold story” of the election is indeed the “power shifts occurring” in this vast country. According to Feisal Abdul Rauf, who led the first ever international, independent, Muslim-led election observation mission, “the Sudanese people elected all 25 governors in all 25 states, all 450 members of the National Assembly and members of all 25 state assemblies – previously all appointed by Khartoum.” In addition, 25 percent of the seats in the new parliament were set-aside for women who voted in large numbers.

Though Turabi’s answer concerning the election was an eye opener, his response to a question concerning NOI leader Minister Louis Farrakhan was also as insightful. Revealing that he met with Minister Farrakhan on three different occasions, the Muslim scholar said, Farrakhan “is a proper Muslim just like me and everybody else.” Explaining his take on why Minister Farrakhan has taught blacks much about their racial identity, when he said Islam is “non-racial” is because “blacks have a complex of inferiority.” He said Minister Farrakhan had “to little bit overload them so they have a sense of equality to others.” In addition, Turabi said he once saw Minister Farrakhan “answer questions” in Sudan “to the press and to others better than many so-called scholars of Quran.”

Responding to a question concerning the pros and cons of Sudan’s oil economy, Turabi said from the beginning “we said it (oil wealth) had to be focused on infrastructure (development).” This included making sure that the personal needs of the people were met, meaning “(sufficient) electricity, drinking water, basic education, health and nothing more than that,” he stressed.

He said, while using the example of oil producing countries like Saudi Arabia and Nigeria, “People abandoned agriculture, abandoned industry, and just waited for the (Chevron’s or British Petroleum’s of the world) to come and prospect (for oil) and pull it out (of the ground) and transport it (abroad) and bring us this easy money.” He called oil wealth “like inherited money from my rich father.” Turabi says many of these oil-producing nations “want to live just like that… with no other resources. Turabi said, “That is how we (Sudan) lost much of our agricultural schemes, they (just) collapsed, (because of the focus on oil production).”

Currently based on a recent estimate oil makes up over half of the Government of National Unity of Sudan, and over 95 percent of the Government of Southern Sudan’s revenue.

An agricultural disaster case in point is a 2008 Sudan Tribune report noting that even though this region has some of the most fertile lands in Africa, “you hardly see a tractor… let alone harvesters, irrigation systems and modern machineries that you would expect to see in territories (as fertilely rich) as Southern Sudan.”

These shortcomings have morphed into an insult. So instead of Southern Sudan using its substantial oil revenue to feed its people by developing an agricultural economy as Dr Turabi suggests, the U.S. has to lead the charge and come in and start a “$55 million program (as they recently did ), in Southern Sudan to help improve the ability of small farmers to grow stable crops, the U.S Agency for International Development said.

Turning into a cynic Turabi said, “We don’t want to go and get into agriculture, or why should,” because of oil revenues, the Sudanese “work at all.”

The 77 year-old Turabi stressed if oil wealth was used properly, “it should have been used to build more roads, and then farmers can grow their crops and reach the market, otherwise you can’t.”

Jehron Muhammad can be reached at Africawatch53@gmail.com

2010-04-07T04:33:00.000-07:00

Rising Dissatisfaction Among Post Apartheid Blacks. Is South Africa On The Brink Of A Bloodbath?

Julius Malema, the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) leader, and the recent brutal murder of the African Resistance Movement (AWB) creator Eugen Terreblanche may be the spark that lights the fuse of dissatisfaction at the limited gains received by blacks in post apartheid South Africa.

First Terreblanche is a white racist Afrikaner whose viciousness and brutality toward the killing of unarmed black South Africans came to light under the Truth and Reconciliation Commission – he confessed his sins and walked away a free man.

Malema has received much scrutiny in the South African and British press lately, for, among other things, calling for the nationalization of South Africa’s mining industry, the singing and then banning by the courts of the song that includes the lyrics “shoot the boer,” and traveling to Zimbabwe and being met at the airport by 500 Zanu-PF youth members singing the above song, as well as being received on the tarmac by Zimbabwe’s president Robert Mugabe.

The AWB (at their height they claimed a membership of 70,000) or what is left of it vowed to avenge Terreblanche, as the group has since toned down their call for revenge. According to news reports, “fear of growing racial tensions and polarization grew as condolences streamed in,” and the General-Secretary of the AWB blamed Malema. During a phone interview, he said to expect “revenge.” We are going to finish with funeral arrangements and thereafter have a summit conference on May one in Pretoria, where all of our leaders and members of the AWB will come together and decide on what actions we will take to revenge Terreblanche’s death.” He then linked the song with the lyrics “shoot the boer” reported News24.com, sung until recently banned by Malema as directly responsible for the killing.

“There were mixed reactions from political parties,” reported News24.com. Those included the Azanian People’s Organization (Azapo) that said Terreblanche died in a similar manner in which he murdered blacks. We are sad that Mr. Terreblanche died in the manner in which he died, murdered in cold blood. Sadly, this is how he killed black defenseless farm workers in Venterdorp.”

The Afrikaner author and political commentator Dr. Dan Roodt accused the ANC youth wing of creating “a crime of hatred towards Afrikaners” which, reported News24.com, could lead to “anarchy (and) Zimbabwean-style land evasions.”

In addition, the country is at the crossroad, he said, and appealed to the international community, including the European Union, the United States, and the United Nations to intervene and stop the potential for a bloodbath in South Africa.

But all of this talk of a blood bath fails to consider that in post apartheid South Africa, the economy including 87 percent of the productive farmland, continues to be in the hands of whites. So Terreblanche might be the spark that lights the fuse, but the powder keg representing the unmet needs of black South Africans has been simmering for some time.

Then there is the land question, and all of the ink being abused in order to discuss white fear of a black takeover of the economy.

This question prompted then President Mandela to say in 1997 that: “Their task is to spread messages about an impending economic collapse, escalating corruption in the public service, rampant and uncontrollable crime, a massive loss of skills through white emigration and mass demoralization among the people... because they are white and therefore threatened by the ANC and its policies which favor black people.”

The current public discussion appears to be geared toward masking “racist narratives,” with a tendency to portray black wealth as something to be regarded with suspension, said Black Management Forman deputy president Tembakazi Mnyaka.

This is being couched in calls for “lifestyle audits,” which is a “smokescreen,” that Mnyaka claims, “the purveyors of this narrative seek to silence the emerging black economic elite and middle class, lest they are blackmailed by the now exposed banner that says: blacks cannot be wealthy.”

Mnyaka believes those that support calls for lifestyle audits “manipulate” and “de-historize the context.”

He also says, “We are made to question whether apartheid and its attendant policies that dehumanized blacks and created the most unequal society in the world really happened: and if the conclusion is that it did, we are made to feel guilty about correcting its wrongs.”

This narrative includes post apartheid blacks being made to feel guilty for desiring ownership of productive farmland 87 percent of which is in the hands of white South Africans.

President Zuma has promised to overhaul the governments’ land reform program, as a government minister said, “one of the most visible legacies of apartheid that has failed.”

This land distribution program to date, according to land reform minister Gugile Nkwinti, has not been “sustainable and has not provided the anticipated benefits to the recipients.” In addition, Nkwinti says, of the 15 million acres that has been distributed, most of which is non-productive land, and “has been transferred through restitution and redistribution… and has not created any economic benefit for many of the new owners.”

So this doomed from the beginning - failure at the redistribution of land stolen by whites under the 1913 Natives Land Act called, “the original political sin” by many, has no chance of meeting its mark. And at market prices, repurchasing one-third of that land and resettling black farmers by 2014 at a rate of $9.6 billion, is all but out of the question.

So maybe, ANCYL leader Julius Malema, with all his flaws, “is in fact the most appropriate leader,” according to South Africa’s Politicsweb, “for the moment.” Since he is unlike “the passive (Bantustan leaders) to the apologetic (liberal reformists like Desmond Tutu and Memphela Ramphela), the time has come for an explosive and radical character who will advocated for social equality without compromise.”

So the Youth League leader hits a nerve for his willingness to speak his mind regardless of the consequences. His criticism of the Zuma administration for under-resourcing of the National Youth Development Agency when President Zuma said he would support the NYDA during his State of the Nation speech shows why he has mass appeal among blacks and why whites fear his brand of leadership.

And then there is last week’s trip to Zimbabwe and his most recent call for he nationalization of South Africa’s mines. “We hear you are going straight for the mines, he said during a rally in Harare organized by the youth component of the Zanu-PF, “That is what we are gong to do in South Africa.”

“They have exploited our minerals for a very long time. We want the mines, now it’s our turn,” he said. The Sunday Times reported, Zimbabwe last month put in operation a law that requires foreign companies valued at over 500,000 US dollars to divest 51 percent of shares to non-white locals within five years.”

Malema apparently is taking his show on he road. In a tour designed to look at “nationalization programs,” the ANC Youth League leader will also visit Brazil, China, Chile, Cuba and Venezuela.

But of all the things, Malema has been criticized in the South African press, it is the media coverage of the “shoot the boar” song, the subsequent connection of the song to Terreblance killing, that has received the most ink. Malema’s singing of the song last month, according to published reports, in front of college students sparked a legal battle in which the ruling ANC challenged “a high court that ruled the lyrics as unconstitutional.” Boar means farmer in Afrikaners, and has negative connotations referencing white Afrikaners.

The killing of Terrblance appears to be in response to his unwillingness to pay two of his black farm workers, not motivated by listening to a song.

Jehron Muhammad can be reached at: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2010-01-29T06:51:00.000-08:00

Africa Opens Its Heart to Earthquake Victims In Haiti

Africa’s connection with Haiti is unprecedented, and retains “a special place in… (the) hearts and minds,” of all Africans, former South African president Thabo Mbeki recently penned. “This is because it has the indestructible distinction that 206 years ago, in 1804, it emerged as the very First Black Republic in the world.”

And more than that, Mbeki who is being globally applauded for his work chairing the African Union High-Level Panel On Darfur (AUDP), expressed the sentiments of informed Africans everywhere, when he sited Haiti’s “extraordinary uprising which led to” Haitian independence and “could not but serve as an unequalled inspiration to those engaged in struggle to achieve their own liberation.”

The resulting debt of gratitude displayed by Africans may be unprecedented. Africans everywhere are getting involved in Haitian relief efforts, a direct response to the Island nations devastation brought on by the recent earthquake.

In Ethiopia, Chairperson of the African Union commission, Mr. Jean Ping, addressed the 14^th African Union Assembly in Addis Ababa calling for strong African solidarity with the people of Haiti. Already Mr. Ping disclosed, “a special account to collect funds from… African countries and free donors has been opened at the African Development Bank in order to ensure transparency in the channeling of the funds to the victims.”

But before the above, many African nations have already responded and sent their support and contributions including Botswana who pledged $1 million, and Ghana who donated $3 million and a quantity of relief items, including plastics, medications and cocoa products. Africa’s most populous nation, Nigeria responded to the global appeal and launched a donation fund with $1 million. According to Governor Babatunde Fashola of the Lagos State region, “the fund will be lodged at the Skye Bank… for subsequent transmission to the ongoing aid program in Haiti” with individual State Executive Council members making personal contributions.

Not only is Africa sending money, the South African charity, Gift of the Givers sent their second rescue team. The SA team, according to press reports, “led by Durban University of Technology emergency rescue lecturer Sageshin Naguran and consisting of six advanced life support paramedics and four doctors, will join the first group in Port-au-Prince.

Then there is Rwanda, whose United States ambassador Stuart Symington called on the global community to join the Haitian relief effort.

“We have a choice,” he said. “We either will live in the shadow of this tragedy, or walk forward in the light of the heroism, the strength and the nobility both of the Haitian people and the world’s response.”

Also raising her voice during the same fundraiser for Haitian relief, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health, Dr Agness Binagwaho thanking Partners of Health stated, “We will together restore this originally strong country of innovation, liberty and vision.” The amount raised at the fundraiser and a silent auction occurring simultaneously, at press time had yet to be calculated.

This is just a small taste of African relief efforts. All across Africa, government, church, business and civil society leaders are lending a helping hand to Haiti.

One coordinating body of African efforts in South Africa is the NEPAD Business Foundation and the African Women’s Foresight Network that have joined together and created what is being called the “Africa for Haiti Campaign.” The campaign has the support of church, business and civil society leaders including Mrs. Graca Machel and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Showing a debt of gratitude for the international community supporting South Africa’s struggle against apartheid Archbishop Tutu said, “Today the people of Haiti, struck twice by the earthquake, are in a worse predicament than we were. As South Africans, we especially cannot but want to do our bit to alleviate the immense suffering of our sisters and brothers in Haiti. I welcome the initiative… It deserves our wholehearted and very generous support.”

But maybe the most creative initiative thus far came from President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal. While being interviewed on France Info radio he called for Africa to “make room” for the victims of Haiti’s earthquake, and for them to “restart” their lives on the continent of their forefathers.

“The repeated calamities that befall Haiti prompt me to propose a radical solution – to take measures to create somewhere in Africa… the conditions for Haitians to return,” he said. This return according to the president’s spokesman Manadou Bamba Ndiaye will include “a roof and a patch of land, he told the radio station. “If they come in large numbers, (we) will give them a whole region.”

“Now the problem is,” said President Wade, “who will bear the cost.”

According to the former South African president Thabo Mbeki, that cost could be born by both France and the United States.

Currently in the works, “aided by U.S. and French lawyers,” Mbeki wrote, “the Haitian government is preparing a legal brief demanding nearly $22-billion in ‘restitution’ for what it regards as an act of gunboat diplomacy.”

Haitian history is both inspiring and tragic. During a “sustained military and political struggle” that ended with the birth of the Haitian republic but almost in the same instance a 122 year “reparations” payment to France and then the U.S.

France in 1825 demanded 150 million gold francs in exchange for recognizing the new republic. “The implicit alternative, wrote Mbeki, “was invasion and re-enslavement.”

So this debt initiated by the French and later purchased by the U.S. – calculated to be worth $20 billion - is owed the Haitian people. “Haiti,” Mbeki wrote, “wants its money back – with interest.”

As poet and lyricist Oscar Brown Jr. sang: “I’ll buy my own swimming pool, just give me my 40 acres and a mule.”

Jehron Muhammad can be reached at: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2010-01-21T02:51:00.000-08:00

Western Press Claims Africa Unworthy Of Hosting World Cup

Two commentaries concerning the killing of footballers in Cabinda (Angola), appearing back-to-back in Africa’s Business Daily and UK’s Guardian entitled: “Attack exposes Western bias” and “Africa remains shrouded in myth” respectfully, reveals how the Western press paints with a broad brush; how historically bias rules; and how objective reporting is always left on the cutting room floor.

But let’s not stop there. Hollywood is also a carrier of this disease. Take for instance the recent sci-fi movie District 9. This film is about an alien colony reduced to South African Bantustan existence with Nigerians, who are the purveyors of the community’s corrupt and vicious underground black market, is a case in point. Then there is Blood Diamonds, with its transformative racist and depiction of black insurgents being beastlike in their willingness to shed the blood of their African brothers.

An interesting segue is the Clint Eastwood movie Invictus. The film stars Morgan Freeman, who is also its producer. The film tells the story of Mandela using the country’s 99 percent white Rugby team to unify South Africa’s racial diversity, but more than that, to allay the fear of whites, who as Morgan’s Mandela explains - control the economy.

This in itself is okay; I’m not one to tell Mr. Freeman what aspect of South Africa’s past to bring to light. But the film, like the ad-hoc media created spokesman for black Africa, Manchester City’s Emmanuel Adebayo’s celebrity being used to validate a biased position, and the selling of a theme where films about blacks only work with a white protagonist, or at least a strong white presence, says it all.

Soon after the recent Cambinda attack in Angola, where members of Togo’s football team were killed, a microphone was thrust into the face of footballer Adebayo, and European validation for what ails Africa all of a sudden had an African face.

According to the Op-Ed in Business Daily, after being savaged in the not to distant past by the British media for “taunting” an opposing teams fans following his “rather disreputable celebration of a goal against his former club,” Adebayo then becomes “the most sought-after face for remarks after the shooting,” wrote Professor George Ogala. And while he may have condemned the attack, he “overreached” his bounds arguing – as though Cabinda represented the entire continent - “Africa must do something about its image considering it was about to host the World Cup,” he said. And if these comments weren’t bad enough, Adebayo’s words took on ominous propositions becoming media gospel, as they received attribution from London to Paris and were broadcast on radio stations across Europe. The footballer in effect had become the “legitimizing voice,” wrote Ogala, the media monster needed to satisfy its appetite for negative African depiction, and to say to the world, our worst fears concerning a South African hosted World Cup had finally been realized.

And then there was the always-objective BBC broadcasting its Cabinda report - of course interspersed with Adebayo quotes - outside of Soccer City in Soweto, South Africa. Had the ghost of the BBC being once prevented from reporting in Zimbabwe been given new life? Had the media giant not been issued a visa so it could report from the 2010 African Cup of Nations in Angola? Had the Angolan government simply said, “No comment”, and then failed to provide the BBC with a political analyst familiar with Cabiinda?

According to the William Gumede’s commentary published in the British Guardian, by the western press portrayal of “the attack by separatists in Angola on the Togolese football team as if it happened in South Africa is typical of prejudice against the continent. Stereotyping,” he wrote, “of Africa, its problems and solutions, has devastating consequences.”

And check this out: If the Cabinda killing hadn’t occurred, “the African Nations Cup would have been” a mere “footnote in most reports,” wrote Gumede.

To contextualize the above, one has to remember football, said the BBC’ voice of African Sport Farayi Mungazi, “is after all that rare thing, a chance to genuinely compete with the rest of the world.” In Mungazi’s January 8^th report on the history of African football, a Nigerian explains football in his country is described as “the third religion after Christianity and Islam.” A South African describes it as “a way of life – a rallying point for a whole nation.”

In addition, football has served African leaders including Ghana’s first president Kwame Nkrumah, who used it as an “essential tool in projecting Pan African identity.” And then there is the revisiting of the great Brazilian footballer Pele having said, Africa would win the World Cup by 2000 being given new impetus in 2010, after the world game arrived in South Africa.

African passion for the sport led to the establishment of the African Cup of Nations in 1957 in Sudan, and is now a source of much African pride and inspiration - where Africans, after elimination, compete against each other, similarly the way the NBA competes during playoffs.

The sad story discussed in Mungazi’s report, is there isn’t a source where you can go to access Africa’s contribution to the world’s number one sport. And as Gumede wrote, “Africa is still often only in the news because of war, as a development ‘burden’ or as a humanitarian crisis. The western media too often see the whole continent of Africa as one country rife with corruption ‘tribal’ conflicts, natural and humanitarian disasters.”

But to taint the continent as not worthy of the World Cup because of an isolated incident “is just wrong”, said the authors Ivory Coast born brother-in-law Edja Kouassi. “Politics entering sports is not unprecedented.”

Kouassa who works in Pennsylvania as a chemist and has a passion for sports said, you could go back to Jesse Owens overcoming Hitler’s master race objective, or the staying out of the “Basque Separatist area during the playing of the European Cup in Spain,” or how America boycotted the Olympics in Moscow and the Soviets returning the favor when the Olympics were held in Los Angeles. And then, he said, there was the fact that the UK would never hold a sporting event in Northern Ireland “while the British were in conflict with the IRA.”

Picking up the argument Ogala wrote, “that conflict in Kosovo did not mean Germany was unsafe to host the last World Cup,” or the Chinese relationship with Sudan did not lead to European or American boycotting the recent Olympics held in Beijing.

The west should be reminded of its not so pristine history, and take the tree out of its own eyes, before revealing the splinters in others. And Africa for its part should get busy recording how football has given the continent a competitive spirit, a sense of hope and aspiration, or be left to the Clint Eastwoods and Morgan Freemans of the world to tell its story.

Jehron Muhammad can be reached at: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2010-01-09T19:51:00.000-08:00

Africa in 2009 Sets Stage For 2010 & Beyond
“Anticipation” and “making you wait,” popular themes in American TV product placement could also be used to describe events unfolding on the African continent.
Whether it was the International Criminal Courts indictment of Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir in March 2009; the election of Jacob Zuma to South Africa’s top political office; the discovery of oil off Ghana’s coast; Dambisa Moya’s book “Dead Aid” or former South African President Thabo Mbeki’s African Union High-Level Panel On Darfur report and its comprehensive assessment on what plagues Darfur/Sudan, this year was an historic one. (Oh yeah, and did I fail to mention former Liberian President Charles Taylor’s trial currently happening in The Hague, and Rwandan president Paul Kagame and that countries Phoenix Bird rise?)
There was also Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi’s assumption of the chair of the African Union and almost immediately pushing for a United States of Africa. That was only outdone by his October speech at the United Nations, where he called for ending the veto stranglehold permanent members of the Security Council have on the world body.
President Obama’s address via Egypt to the Muslim world and critique of African leaders’ behavior while in Ghana might have received more fanfare than Gadhafi’s call for Africa to have a permanent seat on the Security Council, but that Gadhafi idea is gaining momentum.
For policy initiatives, one cannot discount Obama, whose “carrot and stick” policy approach directed at Sudan and his Special Envoy to Africa’s largest country Scott Gration, were significant changes. Gration has been given the responsibility of pushing the new approach—to the chagrin of some American advocacy groups—as part of efforts to make Sudan’s upcoming 2010 elections possible.
But how can you mention 2009 and not include China, the 800-pound gorilla on the African continent? That would be a mistake. China has not only shown a significant interest in African oil, but also displayed little let up in its push for African minerals—including the July signing of a $3.6 billion copper agreement with Zambia.
The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China is working on at least 60 financial deals with Africa’s “biggest bank by assets,” Standard Bank, in which it recently bought a 20 percent stake for $5.6 billion.
In contrast, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 2009 seven African country tour, beginning in Kenya revealed a U.S. Bureau of African Affairs in disarray while the Defense Department’s U.S. African Command, or AFRICOM, gained influence.
If Clinton, during her tour, was concerned about China, she didn’t let on. Instead while in Angola, she chose to play down any U.S. concerns about Beijing. “I am not looking at what anyone else does in Angola,” she said. “I am looking at what the U.S. can do to further … deepen our relationship and provide assistance and support for the changes the Angolan government is undertaking.”
In June AP reported, “Angola surpassed Nigeria as Africa’s largest petroleum producer and overtook Saudi Arabia as China’s leading source of crude oil.”
To act as though U.S. economic and foreign policy interest hasn’t been affected by China’s incursion in Africa is suspect. In fact, the “reality” of the situation is sinking in, stated Martyn Davies of the Johannesburg-based regional investment consultancy Frontier Advisory. The U.S. and European economic crisis “is accelerating the geo-economic shift of Africa towards Asia, centered largely around China,” he said.
When citing trade with Africa, according to Africa’s Business Daily, U.S. officials “are keen” to “trumpet a 28 percent jump in 2008 in trade with sub-Saharan Africa to $104 billion, even if the increase is attributable mainly to the high price of oil, which accounts for more than 80 percent of U.S. imports from Africa.”
And though Clinton’s trip would “help train gynecologists, supply rape victims with video cameras to document violence and dispatch military engineers to help train Congolese police officers to crack down on rapists,” a report released by the State Department’s Inspector General suggested other than quick fixes, the African Affairs bureau was lacking.
The bureau suffered from “significant morale, performance, or leadership issues,” according to Acting Inspector General Harold W. Geisel. “They were doing a good job of fighting fires … but it was too much time being spent on the crisis of the moment and not enough time being spent on our strategy.”
“There is no bureau that is more difficult to staff overseas then AF,” the report added.
The problems, the IG said, were perceptions concerning the poor quality of life abroad and “insufficient hardship or danger pay.” The bottom line is positions in “Africa often remain vacant or are filled with candidates without the necessary experiences,” the report noted.
Also, embassy platforms were collapsing as the result of weighty “new programs and staffing without corresponding resources to provide the services required,” the report said.
Add Africom and another thorny issue is raised. The relationship between personnel from embassies and the Department of Defense’s relatively new command for Africa has been antagonistic, said Foreign Policy. Embassy staff “receive little instruction as to how they should integrate and work with Africom officials,” the journal reported.
Limited resources may be enough to generate low morale in any organization, but when the State Department budgets stand next to military allocations, there is no comparison.
According to Geisel, “the military deals in resources the State Department can only dream about.”
In one instance, “a military information support team (the military equivalent to an embassy’s public affairs staff) was funded with $600,000 for their campaign in Somalia while the SD had to make do with a mere $30,000,” reported Foreign Policy.
While the State Department struggles to maintain a sense of relevancy, flying under the radar is corporate and global government investment in Africa, more commonly called land grabs, “strongly reminiscent” of the continent’s colonial past. The most “scandalous case,” according to Inter Press Service, was U.S. investment banker Philippe Heilberg, who closed a deal with Paulino Matip, a warlord in South Sudan, to lease 4,000 square kilometers. “He (Matip) is one of the profiteers of a dubious 2005 peace agreement,” reported IPS, “after which he became deputy commander of the army in the autonomous southern region.”
Heilberg a former employee of the insurance giant American International Group (AIG), is the CEO of the New York-based investment fund Jarch Capital. He is reported to have said several African states are likely to break apart in the coming years and his political and legal risks “will be amply rewarded.” Let’s hope that this thief and his compensation will soon depart.
On matters of stability in Africa, the award for where the continent could benefit goes to Mbeki’s new lease on life for Sudan. After being defrocked by the ANC, he has brought hope to Sudan’s Darfur region and his work in progress might help bring stability for all of the country. His call for an African solution and "stakeholder" engagement and uprooting the colonial roots of the conflict while moving for a political resolution offered hope, especially when he outlined the strategy in a speech before the UN Security Council. Though much of Africa’s advancement is still unfolding, the African Union’s strength is increasing and African peacekeepers are principle reason for stability gained in Darfur, suggesting African solutions do work. Africa has showed it could speak largely with a single voice when leaders joined the African Union’s call to disregard the ICC’s insistence that Sudanese President Bashir be arrested.
Meanwhile Ghana believes it can learn from Nigeria’s oil nightmare and not allow newfound oil wealth to become an albatross around her neck as President Paul Kagame of Rwanda becomes one of The Financial Times 50 most influential individuals. According to the much respected financial daily, with Kagame at the helm, "in barely 15 years, the country has transformed from a failed state to one of the fastest growing economies on the (African) continent."
And if failing to learn the lessons of history and being doomed to repeat them has been Africa’s norm, Dambisa Moya’s book “Dead Aid” spells out how attempts by outsiders always seem to do more damage than good. What Africa needs is to break free of foreign assistance, according to the Zambian native. Dependency means no incentive to grow past your next handout, she argues.
We will see what President Zuma does on South Africa’s land question, which was bubbling up as we left 2009, given the West’s contention that President Robert Mugabe’s handling of land reform was the source of much of Zimbabwe’s woes. With the world’s economic bust sending Whites back to South Africa and White farmers leaving to farm elsewhere on the continent for fear their ill gotten gain has finally caught up with them—what is a minerally rich and potentially agriculturally unequalled continent to do? First Africa’s most populous nation (Nigeria) needs to resolve its current political crises, remove an apparently incapacitated president (Umaru Yar’Adua), and support the late Ghanaian President Kwame Nkrumah’s vision of a United States of Africa.
Jehron Muhammad can be reached at Africawatch53@gmail.com.

2009-12-07T22:19:00.000-08:00

African Union High Level Panel on Darfur - A Blueprint For What Plagues Africa

While my mind focuses on the billions of dollars the Obama administration and its so-called allies will have to somehow cough up to “secure” Afghanistan, I begin to wonder why the world community couldn’t apply the same math to the nearly two-year-old promise of the UN Security Council to supply the African Union/United Nations Hybrid operations in Darfur (UNAMID) with its request for helicopters to secure Darfur?

In the recently released findings of the African Union High Level Panel On Darfur (AUPD) chaired by the former South African president Thabo Mbeki and commissioned by the African Union, I discover that the 24-helicopters promised nearly two years ago and lobbied for by then Senator Joe Biden have never seen the light of day. And this from an administration that accuses the Sudanese government of “genocide,” refuses to assist UNAMID in acquiring helicopters to secure the region. I guess Vice President Biden, who could be seen on morning news programs capitulating on his anti sending of more troops to Afghanistan position, must of been also required to forgo the security of Darfur. Contrary to public opinion, Darfur, according to the Mbeki report, has depended upon much of its support from the African Union – thus it seems only fitting that the AU’s home base country of Ethiopia is sending five much needed helicopters to patrol the vast area that Darfur encompasses.

To add insult to injury reported the Sudan Tribune, “Mbeki expressed disappointment with what he suggested to be a non-endorsement by the UN Security Council (UNSC) to the AUPD report with an implicit criticism” by Western Security Council members.

“They’re (UNSC) extremely upset,” said Mbeki, “because we didn’t deliver a report stating that a bloody war was taking place. There is still a low-intensity war going on, since there has been no peace agreement yet. People who allege otherwise, are creating their own convenient and self-justifying reality,” he said at an address recently at the University of Pretoria’s Faculty of Law.

Others see the 126-page report as a way to bypass the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) indictment of Sudan President Omar Al-Bashir.

News reports suggest that the timing of the formulation of the AUPD just weeks ahead of the ICC indictment against Bashir has fueled speculation of a kind of preemptive strike by the AU. On top of that, AUPD member and former Egyptian foreign minister Ahmed Maher El Sayed remarks in support of Bashir didn’t help.

“Incriminating the president is out of the question and fundamentally unacceptable” he said while being interviewed by the Egyptian based Al-Masry Al-Youm newspaper.

“Our goal was to find a way out (for Bashir) from the dilemma of the ICC that sparked a great deal of controversy,” Maher said.

The AUPD chair was reported to be furious. Mbeki’s response included a strongly worded letter protesting Maher’s remarks.

Sudanese political analyst Abdel-Wahab El-Effendi who traveled with the panel and Dr. Alex De Waal one of the panel’s advisors both corroborated the above with the later writing that people “should examine the record of Minister Maher’s participation in the activities of the Panel. I did not see him a single time in Darfur or Khartoum.”

Richard Dicker, International Justice Program director at Human Rights Watch also weighed in suggesting that the AUPD’s call for “a hybrid court and national law reforms could potentially help,” and at the same time all but dismissingly warning that this could “not substitute the ICC’s cases.” This is actually a misrepresentation of the AUPD report. Seems misrepresentation of the AUPD is a common theme. Another distortion is in the Dec 7 edition of Voice of America saying Mbeki’s panel “issued a report endorsing the ICC’s work” when in fact the AUPD only mentions the courts limited capacity.

What the report actually states, and is confirmed by its chair, is that in order to facilitate the establishment of a hybrid court, the Government of Sudan “should take immediate steps to introduce legislation to allow legally qualified non-nationals to serve in the judiciary of Sudan.”

Concerning the ICC, Mbeki emphasized that it “is a court of last resort, which compliments the national judicial systems. It is also a court of limited capacity. This means that even when deploying its full resources (the ICC) can only deal with a few individuals out of any situation of which it is seized. It follows that where widespread crimes have been committed, the overwhelming majority of potential criminal cases must be dealt with by the national system.”

He went on to state the fact that, “This is simply a reflection of the functional limitations of the ICC. It is important that all stakeholders should realize this and therefore focus on the vital importance of strengthening national legal systems.”

But to prominence the ICC in the AUPD report – as many have done - and not give it a possible equal footing, along with the consideration of a creation of a Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation Commission and the formation of a Hybrid Court, “as part of a broad agenda of items to be negotiated in a round table process of hammering out a Global Political Agreement,” as highlighted by De Waal of the Social Sciences Research Council is to bypass the mandate that generated the panels final report.

According to the panel’s chair, Darfur is “a manifestation of a broader crisis affecting the whole of Sudan. This larger problem was described as the consequence of the development of colonial and post-colonial social-economic system in which a minority of the population, concentrated in and around Khartoum, maintained a stranglehold over political power and economic resources.”

As a result, the chair states in the reports preface that “the millions of Sudanese who reside” in the greater geography of the largest country in Africa “have been condemned to political disempowerment and domination, economic underdevelopment and marginalization.”

With the above as the backdrop the report says De Waal, first shifts “the center of political attention away from responding to immediate human rights violations and humanitarian concerns, to addressing the underlying political malaise in Sudan that gives rise to such violations.”

Second, he highlights, the report “puts the Sudanese people back (where they belong) at the center of the process, which according to De Waal, has “already” been set in “motion.” He says, “The challenge is to sustain and accelerate that process.”

That is already occurring. Mbeki’s Panel has begun by injecting itself into Sudan’s first elections in 24 years. According to the Dec. 4 edition of Voice of America (VOA) the Panel chair said, “There is an immediate objective in front of us, Sudan is going to have elections in April 2010, what we must do is to assist everybody involved in that to ensure they actually have democratic elections. Successful democratic elections,” he emphasized.

Saying in words that getting the people of Darfur to participate in upcoming elections is a work in progress, Mbeki is faced with the sizable challenge of “persuading the people of Darfur to participate, and have faith in the electoral process,” reports the VOA.

“It is important that the people of Darfur are involved in those elections, Mbeki said. “Otherwise you (have) this sense of exclusion and marginalization if the whole country goes to election to choose a president, a national parliament and so on, and the people of Darfur are not part of that process,” he said.

According to De Waal “any number of think tanks could have articulated” the AUPD’s argument “in making the case that there needs to be an inclusive political solution leading to democratization within an ‘all Sudan’ framework.” Where the Panels innovative approach differs says De Waal, and is not following the previous flawed “international engagements of this kind on Sudan (which) have operated through expert consultations in high-class hotels, with chiefly symbolic trips to the Darfur’s displace camps to shake hands and have photographs taken,” similar to the co-founder of the Center for American Progress’ Enough Project John Prendergast, and his much reported celebrity trips to that region.

Following those trips like his most recent appearance before the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health, he called for a delay in the upcoming elections and that the “Sanctions on the Sudanese government should be ratcheted up, including enforcement of the arms embargo, denial of debt relief, and greater support for further International Criminal Court investigations and indictments.”

Unlike Prendergast and his ilk’s pressure tactics to meet international obligations, Mbeki and the former Presidents of Nigeria and Burundi, Addusalami Abubakare and Pierre Buyoya respectively spent over three months on the ground mostly in Darfur conducting town hall meetings, and “well-prepared consultations in which” Darfurians systematically were able to speak about their “fears and hopes (for the future).” In tandem with the Darfur-Darfur Dialogue and Consultation (DDDC), they not only enhanced this group’s role, but also gave stakeholders in Darfur immediate importance.

According to De Waal, “… in long meetings with refuges and displaced persons, tribal leaders, women, civil society activists, and nomads, all these groups… (were able to insist) they should be directly represented at future peace talks. They were not content for the armed movements to represent them-all felt that the rebel leaders had been a disappointment. The Panel reflects this unanimous demand with its round table formula for political negotiations.”

Contrast the above - that also included discussions with Pres. Bashir, the ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo and the U.S. special envoy to Sudan Scott Gration - with the pressure tactics of the advocacy groups and the Obama administrations yet to be fully realized “carrot and stick” approach to Sudan.

In fact, that approach received a serious reprimand during the beginning of December talks on Capital Hill that included advocacy groups and Obama’s special envoy.

To give some background, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, reported AllAfrica.com, in October spoke of a “classified annex” that included “incentives that would be on the table for Khartoum.”

Gration speaking before members of Congress revealed, “There is no annex… I’m telling you that I’ve never seen one.”

Obama’s special envoy who has been repeatedly hammered by advocacy groups for his willingness to sit down and negotiate with the Sudanese received special attention during the Congressional hearings. “The big surprise was there is not a classified annex,” said Jerry Fowler, president of the Save Darfur Coalition. “And that suggests there is a big hole at the center of the administration’s strategy. They haven’t clearly articulated for themselves, international partners, Khartoum and other actors what the benchmarks are for progress.”

Prendergast might be right in his call for a delay in elections, especially as Gration said if “violence” escalates “ahead of the votes” and “procedural disagreements” aren’t resolved. This could give impetus to the secession as an option call for Southern Sudan in the 2011 referendum.

This heightens the relevancy of Mbeki’s AUPD and the AU, who’ve not only been accepted in Sudan as honest brokers, but have been in Darfur practically since day one of the conflict respectively.

And as De Waal points out since the AUPD’s “recommendations already have the broad support of the Darfurian population,” it makes sound and perfect sense for the world community to back up Mbeki’s proposal and for the Panel to broaden its focus. De Waal also says the “Sudan Government will protest,” but already, at least in concept, they have accepted the idea of a hybrid court. If the world community assisted by putting real meat on the bone of the AUPD who says this African solution for what troubles the continents largest country couldn’t also become the blueprint for what plagues Africa.

Jehron Muhammad can be reached at: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2009-10-23T23:54:00.000-07:00

Sudan: Southern Succession Or Destabilizing Africa

President Obama’s recently released Sudan strategy that attempts to be 'all things, to all people,' succeeds in America, and with its interest groups need for instant gratification. Unfortunately, it fails in addressing the instability that a divided Sudan would engender, and the destabilization of a region that continues to be a non-issue.

Is this the process towards peace that Obama is trying to justify the Noble Peace Prize he recently received? Is he keeping a campaign promise and appeasing the Darfur advocacy groups? Or is he finally reigning in his special envoy to Sudan and beginning to recognize the clearance of the cloud that is Dafur is giving way to the monster being unearthed inside the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA)?

The Western press appears to be gearing for a secession of Southern and Northern Sudan regardless of the destabilizing effect such a divide would trigger. But as the West sees the succession as inevitable, earlier this month SPLM (Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement) chairman, who is also the first Vice President of Sudan and President of the semi-autonomous Southern Sudan Salva Kiir Mayardit, “urged delegates from over 20 political parties… to faithfully stand behind the implementation of the CPA, saying the CPA is no longer the Agreement signed between SPLM and the ruling NCP (National Congress Party), but rather the current constitution of the Sudan, being the only opportunity for lasting peace and stability in Sudan,” according to the GOSS (Government Of Southern Sudan) official website.

“The CPA provides us with a golden opportunity to heal the wounds, address the grievances of the past and start building a New Sudan based on citizenship, respect of people’s basic rights, equality, freedom and justice for all,” the former general affirmed.

Unlike movies, golden opportunities rarely have sequels, and if the historically “dangerous divisions” that have plagued Sudan and prevented the peace process from going forward are not adhered to; the only theater may be the one of war, the only consequence will make the strife that has been Darfur appear insignificant.

In 2007, while sitting in the courtyard outside my hotel room in Khartoum, this author was warned of the very dangerous divisions within the SPLM.

During an exclusive interview with Dr. Wani Tombe, CEO of the political daily, Advocate Newspaper, that is distributed in North and South Sudan warned, if the South succeeds “there will be a civil war,” and not just a war between the North and South. Dr. Tombe, who is from the southern-region in Juba suggested, “there is going to be a very bloody civil war between the Southern Sudanese themselves.”

And then in what could be called reading future events, including Obama’s new policy on sanctions, and at the same time showing his chagrin he said, “imposing sanctions”(he was actually referencing Bush) on Sudan “exempting the Southern Sudan is internationally unworkable.” He went on to suggest that this historically is the Western method of divide and conquer. Dr. Tombe, who is Christian continued, “We find it very difficult, because it is trying to pit us against one another. We don’t want that kind of role that Washington wants to play in our country. If it wants to support succession in Southern Sudan it must come out very openly that it is supporting succession. It cannot do things, which contribute to the fragmentation of this country, and at the same time they tell us that they are for (a) united Sudan, because their actions actually do not indicate that kind of intention,” he said.

Though the jury is out on whether destabilization is an intention, one thing for sure the possibility is not an agenda item. This view is shared by Sudan analyst with the Social Science Research Council Alex de Waal, who recently blogged that “the referendum on self-determination in southern Sudan, which if indications of southern opinion are reliable, will lead to a decisive vote for secession. With all the attention on ‘CPA implementation’ – which consists of safely getting to the point of the referendum – there has been far too little attention to what happens afterwards.” According to the Washington Post, “If that deal – brokered by the Bush administration in 2005 – collapses, officials and analysts (including de Waal) say, then hope will be lost for a solution to Darfur.”

Several years ago in Khartoum while addressing the National Assembly (NA), the former Sudanese ambassador to the U.S. who is a member of the NA, Mahdi Ibrahim Muhammad said, the U.S. and English governments “external involvement” in his country’s affairs is a major “source of difficulties.”

According to Muhammad, “Western press reports that oversimplify Sudan’s problem as good guys verses bad guys, without looking at its history of foreign interventions and viewing Sudan as a microcosm of Africa, are problematic,” said the former ambassador, during a two-hour session that included legislators from all parts of Sudan. “Such reporting fails to take into account the complexity faced by the government in Sudan and other governments in Africa,” he said.

He then explained how integral Sudan is to the region and the importance of maintaining and stabilizing that portion of Africa. Sudan is the largest country on the continent, and is neighbor to nine nations with shared ethnic groups and open borders. It has over 400 dialects and 573 ethnic groups practicing Islam, Christianity and African animist religions. “It is an enormous responsibility on any government to be able to deal with such a country with such diversity,” stressed Ambassador Muhammad.

For Obama not to take into consideration the ramifications of the destabilization of the region is a major flaw in his new policy.

What is a special envoy to do?

U.S. special envoy to Sudan, Major General Scott Gration has been like a man with only a year to live. More than anyone in the Obama administration he has logged more “Sudan miles” and has probably the largest imprint on Obama’s Sudan policy.

The energetic Gration whose first language was Ki-Swahili was born in Illinois, but raised with his parents who became missionaries in what is now Conga in the early 1950s before being forced to flee a decade later and settling in Kenya. He later moved back to the U.S. where he received a degree in mechanical engineering at Rutgers and then enlisted in the Air Force, where he served with distinction, flying nearly 300 missions over Iraq and then commanded a unit in Saudi Arabia. According to reports, aides said that he was a “Republican, but that he bonded with Mr. Obama” in 2006, when they traveled together across Africa, beginning at Robben Island off the Cape of South Africa.

According to various reports, although he never held elected office or served as a diplomat, Gration gave credibility to an Obama candidacy that had no military experience.

And then on July 30th, during his testimony before Sen. John Kerry’s Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he shakes up Washington, including U.S. Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice, and ruffles the feathers of the Darfur advocacy groups. According to EIR, after “declaring there was no ongoing genocide in Darfur, he identified for the committee that it was entirely for political reasons that Sudan has been kept on the list of state sponsors of terrorism since 1993, emphasizing that there was no evidence from the U.S. intelligence community to support such a claim.”

Gration has since back tracked (“but the cat is out of the bag,” as one U.S. policy critic wrote) and the new “carrot and stick approach” concerning Sudan that takes into account the general’s willingness to negotiate with Sudan, and Rice’s more hawkish position, that includes the implementation of sanctions approach appears to be the result.

Not only that, but in the most recent Economist, in a piece entitled: “The generals have got it right”, the commander of the UN-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur (UNAMID), Gen. Martin Luther Agwai explained that during the last three years, the nature of the fighting (in Darfur) has dramatically changed (for the better).” The piece takes pains - without quoting the general - to say that Agwai in no way suggested the end of the war in Darfur.

What on August 26 the Nigerian general actually said, and the Economist should be ashamed for its apparent unwillingness to quote him is, “As of today, I would not say there is a war going on in Darfur… What you have is security issues more now. Banditry, … people trying to resolve issues over water and land at the local level. But real war as such – I think we are over that. Agwai, who just finished his tour of duty, insists that “the real problem is political.”

The real problem again that too few are actually willing to discuss, as the cloud that is Darfur dissipates, is a policy that would allow the breaking up of a nation birthed from former British colonial masters and shaped by the afterbirth they left behind.

So according to Columbia professor Dr. Mahmood Mandani’s book Saviors and Survivors, the CPA is drawn from the “southern Sudan elite” desire to not “remain beholden to the northern elite at the center,” who the British at least left with infrastructure and resources, and the south they left with none.

So a “power sharing with wealth sharing, whose terms would be guaranteed by the big powers internationally” is created, and – at least initially – “both leaderships decided against any internal reform, including a process of democratization,” wrote Mamdani.

So enter Save Darfur and John Prendergast’s Darfur advocacy group Enough, who according to Darfur researcher Bec Hamilton have given a “positive but cautious” response to Obama’s new Sudan policy. Hamilton writes this “verify then trust” approach is what Gration has been saying from the beginning. He also supports Gration receiving the necessary support from Obama and Secretary of State Clinton, and the resources necessary for the new policies implementation.

Gration appears to be an honest broker, but pressure sometimes makes you do strange things. Obama obviously among other things choose Gration for his knowledge and love of Africa, lets hope the presidents African side takes Gration’s commitment to heart, and the continents future to resolution.

At posting time, Save Darfur and Enough had not responded to an interview request.

Jehron can be reached at: africawatch53@gmail.com

2009-10-14T00:08:00.000-07:00

Africom: President Obama’s Bush Inheritance.

Among the many things the Obama administration has inherited from Bush II is an unwieldy colonialist-lite intervention mechanism, masquerading as a protectionist-like called Africom. The fact that the Noble Peace Prize winner known for his candor and willingness to discuss complex issues has never ever even mentioned this behemoth is telling.

Africom the answer, according to the four part series, “Africom or Africon?: A Reorganization Of The U.S. Command Structure & Another Military Imposition,” by The Real News Network, opening salvo that this unwieldy, without State Department input, contingency plan, “… is (now) the frontline for dealing with any threat to the USA,” says it all. Diplomacy, at least in Africa, has been benched, and the same forces are alive and well in Michael Moore’s new movie, “Capitalism A Love Story,” have taken their show on the road.

Did I mention the devastating effects of mixing crude oil with the world’s water supply? Well what about Vice President Dick Cheney and Africa? Hold that point.

Africom overseen by General William (Kip) Ward, the Army’s highest-ranking African-American, is the sixth U.S. geographic combatant command. Prior to Africom, the Pentagon’s presence in Africa involved three geographic commands. Created in February of 2007 and launched in October of 2008 and headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany because it couldn’t find a home base in Africa to protect U.S. interest abroad, this mechanism has been “charged with supporting U.S. military partners in Africa.”

Sounds more like the premier of the sequel to Ollie North and the boys Central American insurgency. According to Colin Powell’s former chief of Staff during the Bush administration, Larry Wilkinson that might not be far from the truth. “You have an enormous constituency for war, you have an enormous constituency for the instruments for war,” he told “Africom or Africon?” host/narrator Ragel Omar. Without skipping a beat, Wilkinson then raises the, “What constituency does the State Department have?” question before the career soldier drops a bunker buster saying: “To find a voice that equals or exceeds the voice of the Pentagon is virtually impossible. How do you put up $30 billion,” that Wilkinson suggest is State Department’s budget and calls, “chump change,” against “nearly a quart of a trillion dollars,” which he estimates is the Pentagon’s annual budget.” Also, showing that he knows how to make politicians and special interest groups ‘lie down and roll over,’ Wilkinson goes on to say, “That kind of money interests every congressman, every senator, every military contractor, from Haliburton to Lockweed.”

And now a word from Africom’s sponsor:

According to the four-part series, when Bush came into office he had a series of meetings with oil executives. Wilkinson’s “educated surmise” suggests they discussed “ensuring American’s way of life,” and getting “our hands” on a “substantial” amount of oil to guarantee the continuance of the above.

Then 9/11 happened, “and added a new urgency to this debate.” With U.S security fears at an all time high, suddenly Africa a continent “slipping off the radar,” becomes center stage.

So Vice President Cheney, the Pentagon, and his neo-conservative “cheerleaders” frame the war against terrorism as a war against Islam and jeopardize America’s Middle East oil supply. They enlist the assistance of the conservative Heritage Foundation, with the focus on substantially increasing America’s access to African oil reserves in October of 2003. This think-tank then produces a document entitled, “U.S. Military Assistance For Africa: A Better Solution.”

The document specifies among other things a need to “coordinate security measures with African countries” at risk from terrorism, and suggesting the best way to bring this about is by creating “a dedicated military command for Africa.” In addition, they were very clear as to why - “Africa,” according to the report, “has vast natural and mineral resource.” The document also states, “America should not be afraid to employ its forces decisively when vital national interest are threatened.”

I guess selective amnesia is when you forget you just went war with Iraq for control over the world’s second largest oil reserves. I also guess always getting your way without consulting the recipients of your polices is how Africom was created.

And to add insult to injury, “U.S. foreign policy led by warriors (don’t forget this is a Pentagon operation) essentially is a disastrous scenario,” according to Emina Woods of the Washington D.C. based Institute for Foreign Policy Studies. “U.S. foreign policy,” she tells Omar, “led by warriors essentially is a disastrous scenario. It's clear you can’t have warriors who are also diplomats, warriors who are also humanitarian.” She then stressed, “Those lines cannot be combined.”

Obviously, Woods has never had her cake and eaten it too. She also wasn’t aware that maintaining the American way of life trumps all rational thinking.

Take for example the relationship that General Kip Ward’s command has developed with the Rwandan military. In the series, Omar travels to Rwanda with the General. While in the East African country, he interviews the Information Minister, Louise Mushlklwabo who states they are under “no allusion,” concerning U.S. presence in Rwanda. She says for its part Rwanda receives training assistance for its military from Africom, the U.S. gets to be strategically located next to two unstable countries (Democratic Republic of Congo & Uganda), countries rich in mineral resources. I guess that’s a far cry from the Clinton administration not giving a shigdigity when over a million or so Tutsis and their Hutu sympathizers were massacred in 1994. Remember the U.S. battle cry - and confirmed by Shyaka Kanuma, editor of the Rwanda Focus - if there is no economic or strategic interest… and it rhymes with suck-em.

Obama said in his maiden July 2009 sub-Saharan African speech, “History is on the side of those brave Africans, not with those who use coups or change constitutions to stay in power.” Africa according to Obama, “doesn’t need strong, men, it needs strong institutions.”

Maybe Africom didn’t get the memo. Or maybe Obama is saying what people want to hear – you know talking loud and saying nothing. With U.S. policy in Uganda backing the private army of President Yoweri Museveni, it stands to reason that in the U.S. strategic and economic interest always triumph over political discourse. According to Dr. James Barya of Uganda’s Makerere University, the Ugandan Peoples Defense Force (UPDF) is an arm of the National Resistance Movement, which is Museveni’s political party. “It’s a partisan army… It is run only to protect the (current) regime.”

This reminds me of something Nation of Islam leader, Minister Louis Farrakhan once said. It had something to do with becoming president and the revealing of the un-glorious past and present secrets of U.S. foreign and domestic policy initiatives, and the fact that this is the president’s inheritance. What would you do if faced with such a behemoth?

Jehron can be reached at: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2009-09-23T04:38:00.000-07:00

While World Leaders Convene At The UN US Media Has Tizzy-fits Over Gaddafi

“Proportionality in the media seems to be lost. Responsibility for the impact of what is reported is not assumed. The overall shaping of attitudes of viewers and readers of the news is, at best, disregarded.” Make the story sizzle, get people going, making a splash, these are the apparent “goals.”

Though the above was included in the introduction of a study done on the negative media portrayal of Nation of Islam leader, the Hon. Min. Louis Farrakhan’s 1995 Million Man March by Dr. William E. Alberts, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s visit to New York is ‘open season’ for the same.

As Deborah Tannen says in her book, “The Argument Culture,” the culture of argument “limits our knowledge rather than expanding it,” and that “divisive issues has increased the alienation and driven us further apart.” If you don’t believe, check out the health care debate.

That the Western press is not attempting to actually discuss the reasons for Gaddafi’s apparent transformation from the “mad dog of the Middle East” to the darling business partner of European Union members and the USA is telling.

Right now Gaddafi is at the peak of his power. Not only does the current head of the African Union “for the first time in his 40 year reign” as leader of the Libyan Jamahiriya enjoy “diplomatic relations with all countries including the United States,” settled colonial disputes with Italy (witness the $5 billion reparations agreement that was signed), and become the darling of Western capitals apparently for relinquishing his questionable Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), according to assistant editor of the North African Journal Alexandro Bruno, this week he is scheduled for the first time to visit the U.S. and address the United Nations.

So how is all of the above possible, while at the same time Gaddafi is being vilified in the Western press? Is the Western media like a dog looking for the next place to deposit its business?

According to Sunday’s New York Post, “A politically incorrect pooch delivered a stream of consciousness protest Saturday as Libyan officials rolled out the red carpet (at the Libyan Mission) for dictator Muammar Gaddafi.” The story even included a photo of the shameless K-9.

Now check this shadigity out. Obama refused to invite the head of the African Union to a luncheon for sub-Saharan African leaders and a “traditional” welcoming party for visiting heads of state because of the hero’s welcome Libyans gave the convicted Lockerbie bomber Al-Megrahi, not taking into consideration that many Libyans and some Lockerbie family members feel that Megrahi was wrongfully convicted. Also not considered was the fact that most Libyans saw Megrahi as worthy of receiving a hero’s return from his “wrongful” imprisonment.

On the other hand Bibi Netanyahu this week is given a sit down with the U.S. president even though the Israeli prime minister refused Obama’s request to stop the illegal building of settlements on Palestinian land, the greatest hindrance right now to peace deal negotiations with the Palestinians. And to add insult to injury, the graduate of Cheltenham High in Philadelphia sends Obama’s envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell home, with nothing more than a handshake and a smile.

Even though this week there’ll be many opportunities for Obama and Gaddafi to meet, the fact that so much ink has been wasted reporting on the effort to keep them apart suggests that the media is more interested in symbol and not substantive issues.

And then there’s the foreign affairs analyst Nile Gardiner taking up space in the British Telegraph bitching about an upcoming meeting between Gordon Brown and Gaddafi.

What’s a prime minister to do Mr. Gardner? Gaddafi is not only the head of the African Union, his country currently holds the presidency of the UN General Assembly, and Libya is taking its turn as one of the 10 non-permanent members of the Security Council. On top of that – and this might be the crux of the matter - Libya has some of the best sulfur removed crude on the planet, coupled with this northern most African country being situated on the coast of the Mediterranean, accessing this “black gold” is as easy as we found watching the former republican majority leader Tom DeLay shaking his money maker this week on Dancing With the Stars difficult.

I don’t see British Petroleum complaining. It’s more like back room lobbying to get its politicians to figure out of the way to keep what they’re doing from ever seeing the light of day. Check out Foreign Policy’s “Don’t Be Crude” by Turki al-Faisal, who calls all of this energy independence talk while the West, like an animal in heat, searches the world, especially Africa, for its next oil ejaculation, “political posturing at its worst.”

So to excoriate Gaddafi in the press while he does big business with the West is hypocritical.

And while world leaders are convening at the UN the US media is having incessant tizzy-fits, over Gaddafis, apparent problems finding adequate accommodations as was done by Reuters, NPR, MSNBC - name your pick - for a tent being pitched by the Libyan leader’s people on suburban New York land owned by Donald Trump. All I got to say is thank God for C-SPAN, BBC, The Amsterdam News, and The Final Call.

To contact Jehron go to: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2009-09-12T02:08:00.000-07:00

Ramadan In Africa, More than Just A Fast

Islam is Africa’s fastest growing religion. It represents nearly 60 percent of the continent and a third of the world’s Muslim population. With all North African countries predominantly Islamic and Muslim majority countries in East and West Africa including Somalia, Mali, Nigeria and Senegal, no wonder Ramadan in Africa is such an overwhelming event.

To discover this author’s meaning book reservations at the Lagos Airport Hotel in Nigeria. Each year, the hotel offers a “Ramadan Booster” that includes a 20 percent discount on hotel accommodations, a free assortment of fruits for the breaking of your fast, and cuisine specially prepared just for the occasion.

An “important lesson,” as reported in the Nigerian Daily Trust, “from the manner the Muslims in Nigeria commenced this year’s Ramadan is that acquiescence to the guidance of religious leaders and scholars in such manners, and by whose announcement began the fast, makes the Ummah (Muslim community in Africa’s most populous country) more unified, and therefore stronger.”

In Rome, related a non-Muslim foreign exchange student studying in Senegal, “you do as the Romans do, when in Senegal (during the Month of Ramadan) you fast.”

According to this unnamed student’s blog-post, “While not a Muslim myself, this time last year found me in Senegal, the westernmost country in Africa, whose population is 90 percent Muslim. Given that just about everyone I knew was Muslim and would be fasting during Ramadan, I decided rather reluctantly, to fast as well.”

I figured, (if my friends were prepared to embark on this journey), the least I could do was try it for myself to better sympathize with what they were going through.”

“What they were going through” refers to the ninth month of the Muslim calendar. During this time, every Muslim is expected to fast during the day for the entire lunar month. About.com’s Guide to Islam states that, “During the blessed month of Ramadan, Muslims all over the world abstain from food, drink, and other physical needs during the daylight hours. As a time to purify the soul, refocus attention on God, “through prayer and reading the Holy Quran), and practice self-sacrifice. Ramadan is much more than just not eating and drinking.”

Ramadan is also a celebration, especially the concluding three-days, which in Libya is an official holiday. Each night of the month, said Sabah Haroun from her office in Tripoli, Muslims prepare “elaborate meals” for family and friends and during the last days of the fast they knock on “their neighbors doors” to acknowledge and give thanks for a successful conclusion to this spiritual journey.

Haroun, while talking on the phone from Tripoli, also said that during the month, many Muslims spend their time in prayer at the Mosque. She said there is such a large turnout that “adjourning tents” are put up to accommodate the overflow crowds of the faithful.

Obviously this is a reference to the nighttime taraweeh prayers.

According to Magharebia, which covers North African news, “thousands from nearby towns converge after iftar (breaking of the fast) at the Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca, (Morocco) alone, to hear Omar Qazabri, a young Imam known for his recitations’ power and precision.”

“I feel my whole body vibrating with the power of his voice, said Rabat resident Hakim Bembaroudi, who this year plans to visit Casablanca at least five times to pray at the Hassan II Mosque. “He creates an atmosphere of holiness, while other Imams don’t manage to create this feeling.”

The reasons for the “massive turn-out for some and not for others,” said Professor Lahcen Moudaoui, who teaches Islamic studies, “lies in their voice and their excellent declamation, since there’s no preaching (only the recitation of the Quran) during the taraweeh.”

In Tunisia, a vacation spot frequented by both North African Muslims and Europeans, “many Tunisians,” according to Magharebia, “who are not strictly religious make use of the month of fasting to pray and attend seminars moderated by Imams and specialized scholars.”

“I don’t know what pushes me to pray during the month of Ramadan when I don’t’ pray during the rest of the year,” said Fares, a schoolteacher. There is an atmosphere of piety and submission that we see in this month and that makes me do what my neighbors and friends do.”

“When you pray in Ramadan, its better than not praying at all,” said Ziad, whose father at one time taught Quran in Southern Tunisia, “God may guide you in the future.”

Sabah Haroun compared Ramadan to Christmas. She said all the feasting and gift giving and visiting of friends and family is the similarity. Also similar as published in many dailies across Africa is the spiking of prices during this month that is supposed to symbolize sacrifice.

In one such editorial published in the Pambazuka News last year takes Tanzanian merchants to task.

According to Zanzibar attorney Salma Maoulid food prices during the “onset of Ramadan” are almost guaranteed to “soar… effectively making this month the most expensive of the year in household food budgets.”

Yet wrote “Maoulid, “local incomes are well below a living wage and it is difficult to see how in these circumstances a believer can honestly and adequately provide for his or her family during this month.” She goes on to state, “In much of the same vein, it is not clear how one can extend a sense of generosity to others when their own personal needs are far from being met.”

Sabah Haroun whose Chadian husband works in Darfur said she is “exhausted,” with working a full time job, shopping, and preparing an elaborate feast every night during the month of Ramadan no wonder.

In fact, as Maoulid stated in her editorial Tanzanian for that matter, African Muslim women in general during Ramadan, are in service to men who reap the benefit of their sacrifice.

“Most people thus spend their time attending religious forums or in deep meditation,” she wrote. “In addition to the fast and giving alms others perform supplementary prayers performed mainly at night. However, it is clear that only men have exclusive privilege to this spiritual connection as if both men and women were to partake in the same then there would be no meal at sunset.”

She went on to write, “To allow ample time for the gender division of labor and duties during Ramadan the work day in Zanzibar has been reduced by one full hour.” (And) Most men, she claims, clean up after work and attend religious forums that begin after lunch and go on until late afternoon just before the sunset prayer. When they come home they expect food to be on the table. They eat first and hurriedly race against time for the announcement of the last prayer of the day. After the prayer they may stay on for additional Ramadan prayer (taraweeh), after which they may remain outside fraternizing with friends and colleagues before retiring for the day,” she explained.

Maoulid who in her commentary claims her purpose is to “draw attention to the stark contrast between what fasting should attempt to achieve and what (in Africa it) actually is.” She believes that to have “meaning fasting should not solely be approached as a ritual but as a political statement of the values” the faithful “propound and promote as believers, as humans, as citizens.”

The issues that she addressed included and demanded that believers “go beyond understanding one’s engagement with faith or religion as only a matter confined to those purporting to intervene at an individual level devoid of social realities and experiences.” Rather Maoulid explained, “religious experience should also speak to larger social issues and causes beyond the promise of scriptural salvation and rituals (and) should form the basis of a movement for transformation in a manner conceived by social justice advocacy as a driving ideology.”

If you travel to a Muslim country during Ramadan what should you expect?

Observing Ramadan is strictly adhered too in countries where there are large Muslim populations. In North Africa according to about.com “the vast majority of the population will fast, this includes Morocco, Western Sahara, Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, and Libya.” In “East and West Africa the predominantly Islamic countries include Djibouti, Sudan, Gambia, Guinea, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal and Somalia. Zanzibar (Tanzania), and Kenya’s coastal towns (Mombasa, Mallindi, Lamu), also have large Islamic populations.

In 28 countries including Nigeria and Ethiopia Muslims account for over half the population. And given the “predominance of Church’s everywhere,” says about.com “you’d traditionally” think of these as Christian nations.

Does Ramadan affect tourist in Africa?

“Non-Muslim tourist are not expected to fast even if the country they are visiting is predominantly Islamic,” explains about.com. But non-Muslims have to be aware that life changes significantly in Islamic countries during Ramadan. Public consumption should be kept to a minimum especially in “non-touristy” areas. It is also a good idea to dress modestly in Islamic countries especially during Ramadan.

Jehron can be contacted at: Africawatch53@gmail.com

2009-08-24T04:39:00.000-07:00

Release Of Al-Megrahi, The Cost Of Doing Business With Libya

The release of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the only person convicted of the Lockerbie bombing, by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskil was a back room deal with MacAskil as the fall guy. It had already been confirmed and MacAskill's interviews with CNN and other media outlets - as this deal unravels - is just one spin of a Western public relations fiasco. Obviously, the powers that be are now publicly condemning MacAskil - the fall guy - when the fact of the matter is that they already knew of his intentions.

What is not being aired is why many in Scotland believed al-Megrahi's imprisonment for the Lockerbie bombing, according to members of Scotland's own justice system, and some Lockerbie family members, was a travesty of justice. They suggested they had convicted an innocent man.

So when Megrahi appealed his conviction, the Scots honoring the appeal and felt finally justice would be served, (or at least what really occurred would finally see the light of day), only to be hand-tied with Magrahi requesting to be released on humanitarian grounds because of his terminal cancer. So after the Scots got a wink and a nod from their U.S. and British masters, and the Libyans got an informal agreement, the cost the British and Americans felt of doing business with Tripoli, Megrahi was released on humanitarian grounds. What they hadn't planned on was the very public Libyan homecoming followed by the U.S. and British public outrage - not taking into consideration in Libya people saw Megrahi as a national hero, and that many in the UK (United Kingdom) felt they had convicted an innocent man.

Questions that should arise have to do with why isn't the U.S. corporate press publishing the information that has led many in Europe, including Scotland and Great Britain not only to believe in Megrahi's innocence, but that his release was tied to British and U.S. business interest. I was appalled at CNN's Wolf Blitzer's interview of MacAskill conducted to serve the Lockerbie family members and not in the interest of putting all the known facts of the case on the table in order for the public to make their own judgment.

According to Scotland's Sunday Herald: "Suspicions that a UK issue of trade and international commerce is being dressed up to resemble a Scottish legal decision to release Megrahi on "compassionate grounds" appeared to be confirmed by Gaddafi's son, who said (UK prime minister) Blair's visit in 2007 had laid the foundation of Megrahi's release. He told the Al Mutawassit television channel that: 'in all commercial contracts with Britain for Libyan oil and gas, Megrahi was an issue always on the negotiating table.' "

The way the deal worked.

British Petroleum has plans for a $20 billion oil and gas investment program in both off and onshore Libyan fields still to be fully explored, read the Sunday Herald, with "more than $1 billion having already been spent." The release of Megrahi will see petroleum investment accelerate with other UK 'blue chip' companies now expecting business opportunities to increase. Had the release of Megrahi been a Westminster decision, (UK Foreign Secretary) Miliband's denial would not have been enough to keep the allegations of political collusion from increasing. But Holyrood (Scottish Parliament), and the powers of the devolved parliament, have been convenient. Kenny MacAskill, the Scottish justice secretary, who has little experience in international affairs, is said to have constantly tried to involve Westminster in his decision. Regular contact with the FCO (British Foreign and Commonwealth Office) was made by MacAskill and his advisers since Libya first approached the Scottish government in May (of) this year with a request for Megrahi's release on medical grounds. But both Downing Street and the FCO have kept their distance, with the prime minister's continued silence now an issue he will have to address before the end of the summer break," suggested the Scottish weekly.

While the U.S. and Britain protesting the release of the only person convicted of the death of 269, there have been fresh calls for Gordon Brown to order an inquire into the Lockerbie atrocity. Those calls included Barrie and Jean Berkley, according to Mirror.com, "whose son Alistar" perished in the 1988 pre-Christmas bombing. And like other "relatives of Pam Am … victims," said the Mirror, he (Barrie) stated, "it was the last chance to discover the truth about whether Megrahi, 57, was really guilty."

The possibility of another backlash has created a new fall guy in the FBI director.

FBI director Mueller has written a highly critical letter to Scotland’s Justice Secretary MacAskill for releasing A-Megrahi. He says according to the “Independent,” the decision makes “a mockery of justice and gives comfort to terrorists around the world.” The letter continued: “I am outraged at your decision, blithely defended on the grounds of ‘compassion.’ Your action in releasing Megrahi is an inexplicable as it is detrimental to the cause of justice. Your action gives comfort to terrorists around the word who now believe that regardless of the quality of the investigation, the conviction by jury after the defendant is given all due process, and sentence appropriate to the crime, the terrorist will be freed by one man’s exercise of ‘compassion.’ Your action makes a mockery of the emotions, passions and pathos of all those affected by the Lockerbie tragedy … But most importantly, your action makes a mockery of the grief of the families who lost their own on December 21, 1988.”

Mueller’s letter is a “damning response” to the most controversial decision made by a Scottish Minister since “devolution.” It is improbable, according to the Herald, “that the FBI director wrote the letter without the implicit support of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Barack Obama," who in Mueller created their own fall guy in case U.S. complicity in this matter like in the United Kingdom receives similar headlines. With Obama falling in the polls, the result of his health care initiative, creating a back door becomes a necessity.

So stayed tuned it ain’t over till the fat oil conglomerates and their deal making sing. Or should I say, it ain’t over until Gaddafi addresses the United Nations in September. Not only do the Lockerbie families plan to picket the Libyan leader’s arrival, President Obama is scheduled to address the UN before or after Gaddafi. With Gaddafi planning on pitching a tent in Central Park, all I can say is New York may never be the same.

Jehron can be reached at Africawatch@gmail.com

2009-08-18T19:14:00.000-07:00

Bureau of African Affairs, AFRICOM, China & Clinton’s African Tour

The U.S. State Department’s (SD) poorly funded and inadequately staffed Bureau of African Affairs, AFRICOM’s desire to infringe “militarily” upon African soil, and in the process usurp SD authority, while simultaneously, China is damaging the U.S. super power status and becoming Africa’s number one trading partner. This really dampened Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 7-country 11-day African tour.

Not to take anything away from Obama’s top diplomat, as she didn’t waste time or words getting down to the business of criticizing Kenya’s flawed coalition government, highlighting the “wide-divide between Nigeria’s rich and poor… because,” she emphasized “(the governments) failures at the federal, state and local level.” Not only that during a historic session in the DR Congo’s war-torn Goma region she announced a $17 million “dollar plan to assist survivors of sexual violence.”

According to the New York Times, she said, “the American government would help train gynecologists, supply rape victims with video cameras to document violence and dispatch military engineers to help train Congolese police officers to crack down on rapists.”

Taken into account all of what this trip may appear to represent to the Obama administration and its relationship with Africa, a telling report recently released by the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) suggests that other than quick fixes, or putting out fires, long term planning for the Bureau of African Affairs (“AF” in bureaucratic parlance) might just be a pipe dream.

Along with “significant morale, performance, or leadership issues,” according to Acting Inspector General Harold W. Geisel during a recent interview appearing in Foreign Policy, “They were doing a good job of fighting fires … but it was too much time being spent on the crisis of the moment and not enough time being spent on our strategy.”

To add insult to injury the report also states, “There is no bureau that is more difficult to staff overseas than AF.” This is attributed, the OIG says to the perceptions concerning the poor quality of living abroad and “insufficient hardship or danger pay.” The bottom line is that positions in “Africa often remain vacant or are filled with candidates without the necessary experiences.” Also, with embassy platforms collapsing as the result of weighty “new programs and staffing without corresponding resources to provide the services required,” the report adds.

Enter AFRICOM and another thorny issue is raised. Not only has the relationship between personnel from embassies and the Department of Defense’s new military command for Africa been antagonistic, “embassy staff,” says FP, “receive little instruction as to how they should integrate and work with AFRICOM officials.”

Having limited resources may be enough to generate low morale in any organization, but when the State Department stands next to the military there is no comparison. According to Geisel, “the military deals in resources the State Department can only dream about.” In one instance, “a military information support team (the military equivalent to an embassy’s public affairs staff), was funded with $600,000 for their campaign in Somalia while the State Dept. had to make do with a mere $30,000,” says FP.

There is more. In July of 2008 according to Stars and Stripes, Refugees International released a report called U.S. Civil-Military Imbalance for Global Engagement: Lessons from the Operational Level in Africa, detailing policy and funding disparities between the Defense Department and the State Department. “The report argued that the Pentagon controls an increasing share of foreign aid that used to be directed by civilian agencies and that priorities on the African continent do not reflect need.”

And because of the above the suggestion has been raised that AF should relinquish some of its commitments to AFRICOM.

China completes the picture.

Not only, according to the BBC, has “African countries found a ready economic and political partner in Beijing and an ally that does not ask awkward questions about governance standards and corruption,” a key component of Clinton’s African tour, Beijing’s growing influence is one of the “driving forces” behind AFRICOM’s creation.

If Clinton was concerned about China she didn’t let on. Instead, while in Angola, she chose to play down any U.S. concerns about Beijing. “I am not looking at what anyone else does in Angola,” she said. “I am looking at what the U.S. can do to further and deepen our relationship and provide assistance and support for the changes the Angolan government is undertaking.”

In June, reported AP, “Angola surpassed Nigeria as Africa’s largest petroleum producer and overtook Saudi Arabia as China’s leading source of crude oil.”

To act as though U.S. economic and foreign policy interest hasn’t been affected by China’s incursion in Africa is suspect. In fact, the “reality” of the situation is sinking states Martyn Davies of the Johannesburg-based regional investment consultancy Frontier Advisory. The U.S. and European economic crises “is accelerating the geo-economic shift of Africa towards Asia, centered largely around China,” he said.

And when citing trade with Africa, U.S. officials “are keen, according to Africa’s Business Daily, to “trumpet a 28 percent jump in 2008 in trade with sub-Saharan Africa to $104 billion, even if the increase is attributable mainly to the high price of oil, which accounts for more than 80 percent of U.S. imports from Africa.”

In contrast, BD reported Chinese companies have shown not only interest in African oil, but have also “shown little let up in their push for African minerals” an example is the Zonghui Mining Group in July signing a 3.6 billion copper agreement with Zambia.

In addition, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China is currently “working on” at least 60 financial deals with Africa’s “biggest bank by assets, Standard Bank, in which it bought a 20 percent stake for $5.6 billion in 2008.

Proving that there is tension, the week prior to Clinton’s visit to Nigeria China’s top diplomat and special envoy to Africa, Liu Guijin visited Africa’s most populous nation.

Making Beijing’s case during a press briefing in the Chinese embassy in Abuja he said, Nigeria ranks as number four in bilateral trade with China, which stood at over $7 billion last year.”

He highlighted, according to allAfrica.com, the distinction between the “Western community and international community, he made (it) clear that what is largely referred to as international community in the press is actually Western community.”

Guijin, who served as ambassador to Zimbabwe and South Africa respectfully, and also as China’s chief interlocutor on Darfur said the “proper definition of international community should include the African Union members, the Organization of Islamic Conference, (the) Arab League, China, (and) the Non Aligned Movement.”

He took exception with the Western “hostile” position on Zimbabwe and Sudan. He said because of the Western powers “loud voice and political muscle”, their position is mistakenly taken as the stance of the world community; a position that the U.S. Secretary of State obviously takes exception.

But with the dysfunctional state of the Bureau of African Affairs AFRICOM muscle might be Clinton’s only hope.

Jehron can be reached at: africanwatch53@gmail.com