Black Looks
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How to create safer communities & stop making spectacles of LGBTIQ people
Posted: April 28, 2011, 6:08 pm by Sokari
Yesterday I posted about the brutal rape and murder of Noxola Nogwaza in South Africa. A week ago a transgender woman, Chrissy Lee Polis was viciously beaten outside a Baltimore MacDonalds by two teenage girls after Ms Polis tried to use the women’s toilet. The beating was video taped and showed only one person tried to help. The rest did nothing and in some cases stood by and laughed. This is how Ms Polis described what happened.
“I wanted to go use the bathroom and the guy told me that I needed to order something before I had to use the bathroom. Well, by the time I got there I was really needing to use the bathroom. So a guy approached me and asked me how I was doing, so I said ‘not now.’ I went to go use the bathroom. Come back out and the girl spit in my face and she approached me, she said, ‘Are you trying to talk to my man?’ I said, ‘No, I didn’t even know that was your man at all. So the other girl came up and spit in my face and they started ripping my hair, throwing me on the floor, kicking me in my face.”
Activists in the US have been holding discussions on how to create safer communities for LGBTIQ; the role of the police and criminal justice system in combatting the violence; and aggressive policing in communities of colour. I tried to take their responses to see how they would work in a South African context. Obviously they cannot be packaged and flown across the Atlantic, but I do think the thought process behind the suggestions are worth following especially in prevention and working with communities. In the case of young Black lesbians, working with young boys in their early teens and feminist men to somehow try to break the cycle of violence before it reaches yet another generation.
This requires resources and collaboration between different groups as well as the government addressing issues such as housing, employment and health care – all of which were part of the press statement issued by Abahlali Shackdwellers on the 17th anniversary of South Africa’s independence. Its worth asking, if the girls and women who were being murdered and raped with such frequency were middle class Blacks or whites, would the criminal justice system, the government, the politicians react any differently?
It is so sad to still hear and see that seventeen years after the end of apartheid there are millions of people who are ‘forgotten’ and yet they are being told that they are free. They are being told that they must go to the stadiums on an empty stomach to listen to politicians tell them how far they have come and then go home to a shack.
Is it true that people are free if they are still living under the fear of being evicted? Are people free if they are still living under the fear of dying in shack fires because authorities deny them their basic right to have access to electricity? Are people free if they must still fear rape? Are people free if their children are still dying from diarrhoea? Are people free if they are still living in shacks? Are people free when they are being forced into transit camps or tiny badly made houses out in the human dumping grounds?
Are people free when they vote for councillors that never come to speak to them again till the next election? Is democracy really supposed to be a system for the politicians to use the poor as ladders?One of the issues which came out of the discussion and which stands out for me is the media coverage. Too often only the violence against LGBTIQ people is reported and hardly ever the acts of resistance and the loving communities we share. Instead we are seen as either passive survivors or after death, become the media spectacle of some horrendous act of violence. The person is then turned into an icon for a “campaign” to raise money or publicity for some cause or other that has nothing to do with their life. Suddenly they have become an object of commodification to belong to whoever desires their name. It’s sickening.
On media coverage of transgender people:
“So often our struggles aren’t covered unless we’re attacked or harmed. So it’s also really important to highlight the ways that trans people aren’t victims. We’re also resisting and fighting back and we’re building strong communities.” Continue reading
Links: Make it Happen, Bathroom Predators [via Femme Fluff]
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The Daily Chalkboard – Monrovia News
Posted: April 27, 2011, 7:40 pm by Sokari
When we talk about Internet and mobile communications, we should always keep in mind that in many parts of the world these technologies just don’t compute.
The Daily Talk via Chalkboard blogger, Alfred Sirleaf provides daily news to Monrovians. In his newsroom he gathers the news of the day then transfers it in short form to his chalkboard. He has five reporters and helpers on his staff. News is organised into “hot” and “soft” and is weighted according to its importance or interest. The news is also written in vernacular which again increases the accessibility.
What I love about the Daily Talk is the interaction generated by having the news displayed publicly in this way. Its a kind of participatory information sharing where the news is discussed as it’s being read. Participatory blogging. Street blogging. Chalkboard blogging.
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24 yr old lesbian, Noxola Nogwaza found raped & murdered in Gauteng
Posted: April 27, 2011, 5:51 pm by Sokari
Today is the 17th anniversary of South Africa’s independence but for Black lesbians there is little to celebrate as today we learn of the rape and murder of yet another young sister. The Constitution debated and formed to protect all South Africans has failed the majority of South Africans. It has shamefully failed the most vulnerable people in the country and in particular young Black lesbians. The body of Noxola Nogwaza was found on Sunday morning. This is just 4 weeks after the body of 20 years old Nokuthula Radebe was discovered and which has not even been reported in the media. The pain of these brutal attacks grows and my heart goes out to their family and friends. May both Nogwaza and Nokuthula Rest in Peace
Statement from EPOC and the Coalition of African Lesbians
Ekurhuleni Pride Organizing Committee (EPOC), the key LGBTI organization in the township of Kwa-Thema, Gauteng, South Africa, and the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL,) condemn the brutal rape and murder, in cold blood, of a member of EPOC. Noxola Nogwaza is believed to have been murdered in the early hours of Sunday, AprilThe body of Noxolo Nogwaza, a 24 year old lesbian, was found lying in an alley in Kwa-Thema at about 9am on Sunday, April 24 2011. Noxola’s head was completely deformed, her eyes out of the sockets, her brain spilt, teeth scattered all around and face crashed beyond recognition. Witnesses say that an empty beer bottle and a used condom were stack up her genitals. Parts of the rest of her body had been stabbed with glass. A large pavement brick that is believed to have been used to crash her head was found by her side.
Noxola was raped and murdered in a similar manner as that in which another member of EPOC was murdered almost three years ago (April 28, 2008). Eudy Simelane’s body was also found in an open field in Kwa-Thema. It was clear that she had been raped and murdered afterwards, crimes that the perpetrators confessed to. Just last year, a gay man in the same township was attacked by eight men, who attempted to rape him. Luckily, he escaped the vultures. The men, as they attempted to rape him, were heard saying, “We are determined to kill all gay people in this area and we will do it.”
“It is very clear that these rapists are on a mission. We will however not rest until justice prevails. Eudy’s case was not recognized as a hate crime against a lesbian and the same is not done in the cases of many other people who have been raped and/or murdered on the basis of their sexual orientation and gender identity/expression in South Africa. EPOC is determined to get to the bottom of the Noxola case and push for justice. It was definitely a hate crime.” said Ntsupe, Chairperson of EPOC.
“I am so disturbed by this horrific action. It is the responsibility of the South African Government to protect all its citizens. Hate crimes against LGBT people in this country are on the rise and the government should come out openly against these actions. Protection of individuals who are vulnerable because of their sexual orientation and or gender identity is something provided for in the Constitution of South Africa and should be put in practice. As a regional advocacy organization, CAL will work with EPOC and others to ensure that the perpetrators are brought to book.”EPOC and CAL call on the Tsakane Police Station, where the case has been reported, to carry out a quick and thorough investigation into the murder of Noxolo and deal with the perpetrators accordingly.
Noxola will be laid to rest at a cemetery in Kwa-Thema on Saturday, April 30, 2011. EPOC and CAL call on all your support in this time of grief and horror. Details of the burial will be sent out shortly. Please come and stand with us.
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No jobs, no house, no freedom
Posted: April 27, 2011, 5:16 pm by Sokari
The shackdweller movement in South Africa questions 17 years of “freedom”. The struggle was to ensure there would be land, housing and jobs for all and that South Africa really belongs to all who live in it. It was not to simply replace one group of oppressors with another which is what is happening.
On the 27th April the whole country will be asked to commemorate the seventeenth year of so called “Freedom”.
We cannot forget that many people died and fought hard and with courage and determination to gain this freedom from apartheid. We honour those people all the time. Many of our members struggled in trade unions and in community organisations. We have members whose ancestors fought in the war fought from the Nkandla forest and in the rebellion on Nguza Hill. The struggle against apartheid is our struggle.
But we have a clear understanding of what that struggle was for and it was not just to replace white politicians with black politicians. That struggle was not just to force white business to take on some black partners. That struggle was to ensure that South Africa belongs, really belongs, to all who live in it. That struggle was to ensure that there would be land and housing for all, that the doors of learning and culture would be opened to all and that there would be work for all. That struggle was for equality, to ensure that every person counts and that every person counts the same.
It is so sad to still hear and see that seventeen years after the end of apartheid there are millions of people who are ‘forgotten’ and yet they are being told that they are free. They are being told that they must go to the stadiums on an empty stomach to listen to politicians tell them how far they have come and then go home to a shack.
We are told every day that freedom means voting plus service delivery. We do not accept this definition and we will not be intimidated by all those who say that our refusal to accept this definition means that we are immature and unprofessional. As a movement of the forgotten it is our duty to continually ask ourselves what freedom really means. Freedom is always something that should be defined by the people.
Is it true that people are free if they are still living under the fear of being evicted? Are people free if they are still living under the fear of dying in shack fires because authorities deny them their basic right to have access to electricity? Are people free if they must still fear rape? Are people free if their children are still dying from diarrhoea? Are people free if they are still living in shacks? Are people free when they are being forced into transit camps or tiny badly made houses out in the human dumping grounds?
Are people free when they vote for councillors that never come to speak to them again till the next election? Is democracy really supposed to be a system for the politicians to use the poor as ladders? Continued -
War photos
Posted: April 26, 2011, 9:12 pm by Sokari
Tim Hetherington’s photographs of war: – a truly outstanding photo journalist. I have no idea whether he saw himself as an anti-war activist or anything other than a photographer and documenter but his photographs, as seen in these two below, speak to the horrific truth of the nature of war and its impact on soldiers and civilians.
Careful not to be pigeonholed as a photographer or a film-maker, Hetherington worked across different, mixed visual media. His interest lay in creating diverse forms of visual communication and his work ranged from multi-screen installations, to fly-poster exhibitions, to handheld device downloads. Known for his long-term documentary work, Tim lived and worked in west Africa for eight years, reporting on social and political issues worldwide.
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“Give women a chance”
Posted: April 26, 2011, 5:23 pm by Sokari
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Nigerian women protest in Abuja
Posted: April 26, 2011, 4:45 am by Sokari
Nigerian women in Abuja protesting against the post election violence in the north of the country. Nigerian women have always at the forefront of anti-violence protest in the country. Last year hundreds women from the Jos region gathered in Abuja in a day of mass mourning to protest against the violence in Plateau State and criticise the governments failure to protect them.
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Black is Black
Posted: April 25, 2011, 9:01 pm by Mia Nikasimo
I am proud to be on the margin of gender identity as black is black,
I am compassionate in the face of abuse & black is black,
I will rise to the occasion of living a fuller life as black is black,
I do not know how to bury my head in shame as black is black,
I will not want in the face of wild threats as black is black,
I will not kowtow to gain anyone’s approval as black is black,
I will go wherever I must with head held high as black is black,
I am a civilian, I fight to maintain the underdog’s decorum as black is black,
I am not judgemental of your foibles; do not question mine as black is black,
I was born free and do not go every where in chains as black is black,
I am a Grace Jones look alike I am told; strong, as black is black,
I will own my own in front of sad ingrained hatred as black is black,
I am prove that no one condition is an island as black is black,
Whatever you think is immaterial as black is black is black is black.Mia Nikasimo ©2011
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Death on a cross
Posted: April 24, 2011, 7:50 pm by Sokari
I have no religious beliefs but I am very familiar with the rituals of Catholicism and fascinated with the visual expression of these rituals and biblical references.
Even though crucifixions were common place in Roman occupied Palestine, this scene of Jesus supporters alongside his killers might have been different to the usual scenes accompanying crucifixions. There is so much activity, women and men weeping, the crucifiers busy trying to tie down the ropes of the cross, Roman soldiers silently overseeing the execution, both inside the scene yet outside sitting above the crowds. One of the two thieves is shown lying down on the cross prior to being nailed and raised to stand next to Jesus.
How different is this public execution, which is seen as barbaric, to executions today which take place in secret rooms behind glass panels where families seeking vengeance sit and watch alongside those who have given themselves the right and power to kill in the name of justice? Is something more barbaric if it is done behind closed doors?
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Aid travels with a bomb
Posted: April 22, 2011, 7:12 pm by Sokari
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Vague statements on ‘Asian’ xxx and ‘African’ xxx
Posted: April 21, 2011, 8:48 pm by Sokari
How vague do statements about “an African language” become when we consider the fact that Africa is a continent and there are like fifteen hundred languages spoken on it. People say things like “indigenous African music”, but how much less likely we would be to introduce a Bach cantata as “from Europe”. Similarly, does “Asian food” mean Japanese, Indian, Russian, Georgian, or Pakistani food? When someone says “I want to serve God in Africa”, do they want to travel to Cairo, which is predominately Muslim, or South Africa, with 75% of its population professing Christianity (about as much as the US)?
Continued……Racism, Ignorance and Western Vocabulary
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Mother Africa
Posted: April 20, 2011, 7:35 pm by Mia Nikasimo
Mother Africa isn’t the hen that lays eggs only to feed on them:
Cast in innumerable tongues as she is the picture of oneness; whole!Yoruba against Yoruba wrangling over space for homeland, for den,
Hutu against Tutsi: an orgy of ethnic cleansing for an overlord role,
Xhosa against Zulu to what effect with the red man’s cracking truncheon,
In the red people’s world of Europe Africans forget home life; strife,
For their worth they start other fracas beating each other up on streets,
For their worth they start mayhem to fall sick for becoming wretched,
For their worth even more wretched than the wretched; their colonisers,
Wounds of old are festering in misrule, independent mutants to no where!Mother Africa isn’t the hen that lays eggs only to feed on them:
Cast in innumerable tongues as she is the picture of oneness; whole!Some scrape phlegm from the walls of their congealed throat walls
An almighty guttural oration and splat on the pavement or whatever!
Some gain more degrees for a bigger share of their national cakes
They go back home to indulge their skills of embezzlement if need be!
Some watch day in, day out like neighbourhood watch away from home,
Take the wrong step and the kiss their teeth at you in a display of contempt!Some will go down traditional routes with high embellishment to ruin,
Some will sleep at night and work at night for madam’s burgeoning empire!Mother Africa isn’t the hen that lays eggs only to feed on them:
Cast in innumerable tongues as she is the picture of oneness; whole!
Others will be programme analysts, doctors, lawyers, engineers and accountants,
Promising everything when they go back to endless personal entertainment!
Others will go back to muddy the political climate up that bit more for a piece,
Promising the world and offering vacuous gifts bought from cuts of
already low wages!
Others will worship endlessly awaiting the father of all fathers to
bring them peace,
Boasting of the promises their almighty father has promised them in
the hereafter!
Others will slovenly descend into alcoholism bearing rotting teeth of
tar; enjoyment?
Promising to be there again tomorrow for a top up of owed debts carelessly!
Others will not write a single letter home to say hello for fear of
financial help,
Promising everything and not sending a single thing home to suffering parents!
Others will try their best only to find their best is never enough:
send this or that,
Promising haven and earth and never making enough to live up to their promises!
Others will merry go round for the sheer pleasure of spraying pounds
upon pounds,
Promising stories of exploits and victories to tell friend and
siblings unable to pay their ways!
Others will just beg on the way side from the brothers, sisters and
significant others,
Promising to go home rich and actually achieving their goal to the fullest!When we finish avoiding the issue let us not blame mother Africa
Mother Africa isn’t the hen that lays eggs only to feed on them:
Cast in innumerable tongues as she is the picture of oneness; whole!
We do mother Africa enough damage in our conservative self-righteousness.Mia Nikasimo © 2011
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Media reform-”Trickle up journalism”
Posted: April 19, 2011, 4:41 pm by Sokari
Highlights from the “National Conference on Media Reform” –
Words for thought:
We need to see “the view from the top” to understand the depth and extent of events but also we need the “view from the bottom” -those personal stories with which we can all relate – “Trickle up journalism, Amy Goodman, Democracy Now
“Objectivity in journalism” – is a myth spread by corporate interests, there is no such thing. Don Rojas of Free Speech TV
“My cellphone is political” – in some places and in some moments it is blocked, in others I can use it to expose the “blockers” Tim Karr, Free Press
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Gaystation Exhibition African LGBTI
Posted: April 18, 2011, 6:22 pm by Sokari
In August of last year, Zanele Muholi [Faces and Phases] and Gabrielle Le Roux [Proudly African & Transgender] shared an exhibition of their work in Amsterdam.
So proud to see my portrait was one of those chosen by Zanele for this exhibition.
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“In Search of Fatima” Ghada Karmi
Posted: April 16, 2011, 4:19 am by Sokari
“In Search of Fatima: A Palestinian Story”Ghada Karmi, Verso 2002.
In Search of Fatima is a story of displacement and loss. A yearning for that place in one’s mind that can never be reclaimed. It is a yearning known to the displaced and the refugee, a yearning for their childhood and that place called home which is forever lost.
In Search of Fatima provides us with a personal and political history of Palestine from 1939. The suffering and injustice endured by the Palestinians from the time of the British mandate to the present is reinforced by Karmi’s personal account. In 1880 there was a Jewish population of 3000, in 1948 it was 806,000 and in 2003 it was 5.4 million counting for 38% of the world’s Jews.
We discover that the state of Israel was built on British betrayal , at the very least complacency by surrounding Arab states and terror by the invading Jews of Europe – the Haganah Irgun Zvei Leumi and Lehi or Stern Gang, Menachem Begin and David Ben Gurion (all long before Hamas and Islamic Jihad were ever dreamed of). Reading the activities of these terror groups you begin to see the irony of Israel’s insolent denunciation of “Palestinian terrorists”. In Karmi’s words the Irgun Zvei and Lehi or Stern Gang
“were known in Palestine as the terrorists and were responsible for a spectacular campaign of violence against anyone who stood in the way of their aims. It is ironic to think that the term “terrorist” which has now become virtually synonymous with Arabs, especially Muslims, started life as an appellation for Jewish groups in Palestine.”
Their activities consisted of bombing, blowing up buildings, drive by shootings, threats of destruction of property (loudspeakers telling you to leave your property or it would be blown up), snipers murdering individuals going about their business.We are reminded that it was the British who allowed the Jews into Palestine, invaders from Russia, Poland, Germany, from Europe. So through a systematic campaign of terror the Jews of Europe drove out the Palestinians, the indigenous people from Palestine.
Reading “In Search of Fatima” leaves one feeling desolate. The Palestinians just could not believe that they would be abandoned by Britain, by the UN by the Arab states that surrounded them. They believed that the ultimate aim of the Jews was to have Palestine to themselves. There was still a certain amount of hope that at in the end the British and other Arabs would come to their rescue.
“How could I or you have known that they would do this to us? How could anyone imagine that they would want to give half of our country to immigrants?”
On May 14th 1948 the British mandate over Palestine ended and the state of Israel was born. Arab village after village was conquered by the Jews and the people made refugees. Palestinians fled to Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt and eventually some to Europe and the US. Their lands and homes appropriated by the Jewish immigrants to Palestine.
Karmi’s family fled one afternoon to Damascus where her mother’s family lived. They stayed there for 18 months. Her father hoped to get work either in Syria or Jordan but there were just too many other Palestinians all looking for work. Eventually he was offered a job with the BBC in London and the family moved there in 1949.
Alongside the political we get an insight into different levels of Palestinian day to day life in Qatamon, a middle class district of West Jerusalem, and Tulkarm, her father’s home town and from which her family name derives. Fatima al-Basha, the family maid lived in a village called al-Maliha, 3 miles out of Jerusalem but eventually because of the political crises she moved into the family home when it became too dangerous for her to travel back and forth to her village due to the presence of Jewish snipers.
Fatima’s story gives us an insight into peasant life, dress, food and cultural practices. Interestingly it is these aspects of Palestinian life that are appropriated as identity markers by middle class Palestinians especially those living in the Diaspora. Karmi herself is the youngest of three children and her childhood life is very much centered around Fatima, her brother Ziyad and Rex their pet dog.
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Social media in Nigeria’s 2011 elections
Posted: April 15, 2011, 5:00 pm by Sokari
Rosemary A Ajayi has been directly involved with the monitoring of social media during Nigeria’s elections. She sent this report last evening.
Nigeria’s 2011 general elections are high up on the list of my ‘most anticipated events’. For the first time in Nigeria’s history, twenty- and thirty- year old Nigerians across the world have been granted an opportunity to take active roles in the conduct, reporting, monitoring, scrutinising and documentation of the elections.
I am one of many who have been afforded the chance to be more than just a voter in these elections; I am actively involved in EiE Nigeria, a project to mobilise and empower young Nigerians to participate positively in the upcoming elections. I am also involved in a study which tracks and analyses the impact of social media on the Nigerian elections. The Social Media Tracking Centre is supported by EiE Nigeria , the International Republican Institute, the International Foundation for Electoral Systems and the Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Foundation
Despite recording only 44 million Nigerians (out of an estimated 150 million) as having access to the internet, it is impossible to imagine elections in Nigeria without tools such as Facebook, Twitter, SMS, mobile phones, mobile apps or cameras. These have fast become the weapons of choice for the Nigerian revolution.
Some interesting observations on the use of social media by key stakeholders include:Use by independent observers: reporting and investigating electoral malpractice
On the eve of the parliamentary elections, US-based Nigerian and international observer, MsChika411 received local reports of misconduct in Owerri, Imo State and published them on twitter. She received over 200 retweets and mentions, including abuse and praise. This led to the deployment of CSOs to the area to investigate. A national newspaper also tailed, Kema Chikwe, the alleged offender. Reports from these additional sources supported MsChika411’s claims.
Use by INEC: recruiting and empowering citizen monitorsThe Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, made up for its absence from Facebook and Twitter during the voter registration and verification stages by recruiting 4 social media interns.
On the afternoon of April 9, when I relayed questions from twitterers to IFES asking if voters could tweet results from their polling units, I would never have imagined that within hours INEC would be asking Nigerians to tweets results as well as photographs of the result sheets.
Use by voters: protecting their votes and collecting documentary evidenceOrdinary citizens like Ibrahim Lawal were empowered by INEC’s directive to remain behind and send in photographs of results.
Abuse by candidates: declaring false victories and causing confusionProf Dora Akunyili, the past Minister for Information & Communication, used her Facebook and Twitter (no longer available) accounts to announce her victory over her rival in the Anambra Central senatorial district, Chris Ngige. INEC would later announce Dr Ngige as the winner.
To report voter rigging at polling stationsThe following video was filmed using a mobile phone at a polling station in Rivers State.
Despite being marred by logistical challenges, bomb blasts killing at least 13 election personnel, violence, ballot snatching, bribes, Nigerians generally feel that the process so far has been fairly transparent, whether this translates into credible elections, only time will tell.
There is one thing that is certain – Nigerians are watching!
Rosemary A Ajayi – Nigeria ©
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Love, Against Homophobia
Posted: April 12, 2011, 6:23 pm by Sokari
Ugandan writer and poet, Musa Okwonga adds music and video to his poem “My Love Against Homophobia”
“My Love (for Eudy Simelane)”
To some people
My love is somewhat alien;
When he comes up, they start subject-changing, and
In some states he’s seen as some contagion -
In those zones, he stays subterranean;
Some love my love; they run parades for him:
Liberal citizens lead the way for him:
Concurrent with some countries embracing him,
Whole faiths and nations seem ashamed of him:
Some tried banning him,
God-damning him,
Toe-tagging him,
Prayed that he stayed in the cabinet,
But my love kicked in the panelling, ran for it –
My love! Can’t be trapping him in labyrinths! -
Maverick, my love is; thwarts challenges;
Cleverest geneticists can’t fathom him,
Priests can’t defeat him with venomous rhetoric;
They’d better quit; my love’s too competitive:
Still here, despite the Taliban, Vatican,
And rap, ragga in their anger and arrogance,
Calling on my love with lit matches and paraffin -
Despite the fistfights and midnight batterings -
Despite the dislike by Anglican Africans
And sly comparisons with those mishandling
Small kids, and his morbid inner chattering
My love’s still here and fiercely battling,
Parenting, marrying, somehow managing;
My love comes through anything -
“You Would Have to Put Your Hand on My Heart” President Aristide
Posted: April 11, 2011, 5:25 pm by Sokari
Activist and writer, Laura Flynn is on the board of the Aristide Foundation for Democracy. She traveled to Haiti to welcome back President and Mrs Aristide after seven years in exile. Here she writes of her experience of the homecoming.
Two weeks ago, on the morning of March 18, I was in Haiti to witness the return of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Haiti’s twice democratically elected, former president, who was coming home after seven years in exile in South Africa. I waited in the courtyard of his home in Tabarre, along with friends and supporters mostly Haitian, a few foreigners like myself who had come to celebrate. When word came that the plane had landed, a hush fell among us.
Twenty minutes or so later, Aristide’s voice came over the radio; the country fell silent. I leaned into the open window of friend’s car to listen. In Les Cayes, and Cap Haitian, in Gonaives, and Petit Goaves, in Jeremie people who’d gathered in the streets to celebrate the return stopped and held up their radios. Tout moun Fremi, said my friend Jorge later, shaking with emotion as they heard Aristide’s voice come over the radio from Haitian soil for the first time in seven years. Haitian TV later showed scenes of young people, market women, people in tent camps, crying as they listened.
“My sisters and brothers,” Aristide said, “you would have to put your hand on my heart to feel how fast and strongly it is beating right now.”
In fact, the emotion was clear in his voice, the relief, the joy, the warmth, as he sent greetings out to his people. The country breathed a collective sigh of relief; the weight of a seven-year stone lifted. The plane had landed safely, Aristide was on Haitian soil, and he had not changed. “When you hear Aristide’s voice on the radio,” someone once told me, “it is like he’s pouring honey in your ear.”
After the earthquake, after the cholera, after the November 28th elections, which made a mockery of democracy, after the unimaginable suffering the Haitian people have endured this last most terrible year of Haitian history, a little honey in the ear was desperately needed.
“Since the earthquake,” Aristide said, “Since the goudougoudou (an onomatopoeic Creole term for the earthquake), I’ve felt that if I could, I would transform the chambers of my heart into the chambers of a house, where each victim would find a home and no longer have to sleep in the streets, in the mud, under these torn and tattered, scraps of plastic, sheets, or cardboard of humiliation.”
When the speech ended, the car carrying President Aristide and his family left the airport amid a crush of gathering crowds who filled the roads, mobbed the car, slowed the motorcade to a crawl. At a construction site in Port-au-Prince workers were filmed throwing down their tools and running in the direction of the airport to see with their own eyes.
No one got hurt, and no one broke into the house itself, though certainly they could have. An American friend of mine lost his wallet in the crowd, and hours later, someone he knew came running after him to say he had it, someone had given it to someone who had given it to someone else until they found him. The money was gone, but everything else was still there. A Haitian friend lost his cell phone in the melee. Later he got a call from someone who’d found it, taken it home and charged it, then called him to say come get it.
Eventually, when they’d had their sit on the roof and eaten their mangos, and peered in the windows, when it became clear Titid would not speak, the crowd slowly and peacefully dispersed.
A rather disheveled press core remained, sitting on the thoroughly trampled grass in in front of the house, still fixated on the idea that Aristide would make a statement about the elections, call for a boycott or endorse a candidate, or otherwise “destabilize” the country as the Americans had insisted he would. They begged to know when he would appear in public, where would he vote, when they could get a photo op. Photo op? How about the moment he stepped from the plane, both hands in the air? Or the crowds dancing on the road? Or the house covered with people? Alas, joy in Haiti is not newsworthy. Aristide’s triumphant return garnered almost no news coverage in the mainstream media in the US.
Which does not alter one bit what Haitians experienced on March 18. As someone said to me late that day: The New York Times does not make Haitian history.
Aristide’s return to Haiti changes nothing. Aristide’s return changes everything.
A million or so Haitians are still without homes. The latest study now predicts over 800,000 Haitians will be infected with cholera before the disease runs its course. And eleven thousand more will die. Haiti is still occupied by a UN force, which brought cholera to the country, which consumes half a billion dollars a year, yet has not built a single school or hospital, and which is not even able to contribute adequately for the care of those it has infected. The international community, headed by the US government, has now carried out a “selection” as Haitians call the recent elections. Voter turnout for the first round was 22%, the second round turnout appeared to be even lower. A perilously weak government will emerge, one disconnected from its people, unable to mobilize or even communicate with them.
And yet, for those who were asking just two months ago if they could possibly go on struggling for change, Aristide’s return is, at last, a taste of justice. For those sweltering in tents in the hot sun, this is a breath of hope. Yes, I know, people cannot eat hope. But they also cannot rebuild a country without it. And for everyone in Haiti and abroad, who worked for this return, it is proof that the US government does not control every last inch of this earth. A plane can take off from South Africa and land in Haiti without their consent. A person can scale a thirteen-foot wall and land on their feet on the other side.
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Uprising, imperialism and uncertainty
Posted: April 9, 2011, 3:55 am by Sokari
First published in Pambazuka News – Issue 524
Will the protests across Africa result in real social and political reform, or just a changing of the guard, asks Sokari Ekine.
In addition to the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya – all of which remain in various revolutionary stages – protestors have taken to the streets in Zimbabwe, Senegal, Gabon, Sudan, Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria, Benin, Cameroon, Djibouti, Cote d’Ivoire and most recently in Burkina Faso and Swaziland. Some protests have been single ‘days of rage’, others have lasted a few days or weeks. There are many similarities between the uprisings but also differences, often related the level of organising prior to the uprisings, for example the strength of trades union and student movements, political activism and so on; levels of repression and overall frustration of youth in particular with high unemployment and lack of freedom; the belief that civil disobedience can work; and the willingness to persevere not for days but for weeks on end.
Social movement scholar George Katsiaficas describes the mass movement of citizens uprising against their governments as ‘the eros affect’ – people coming together out of solidarity and revolutionary love for one another with a shared self-understanding. This contrasts with the enemy – authoritarian regimes which act out of hate, fear and repression of the masses. Katsiaficas points out that uprisings like the ones taking place in Africa at the moment often take place regionally, such as in Asia in the 1980s and 1990s – in Bangladesh, Taiwan, Indonesia, South Korea, Nepal, the Philippines, Burma, Thailand – and in Eastern Europe. It is also worthwhile considering the outcomes of these previous waves. How different are these countries today? In most cases there has been little real change in the power structures – different faces, same people. The post Tahrir Square uprisings in Egypt speak to the complexities and difficulties in achieving real social and political change and it is a long way from clear how Egypt or Tunisia will look in one, two, five years time.
In [/url=http://www.africavenir.org/news-archive/newsdetails/datum/2011/03/31/democratic-uprisings-brutally-suppressed-in-many-african-countries-interview-with-firoze-manji-pa.html?tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=12&cHash=0002b1f1368d68974db63ec0f3f3d579]an interview with The Real News[/url], Pambazuka editor-in-chief Firoze Manji made the important point that there is far more to the uprisings than just the removal of dictators – there is collective discontent with the whole post-colonial project. Independence and democracy have in reality proved to be myths in the minds of the people:‘But the real, real thing is and real common thing that everyone faces has been 30 years of structural adjustment programs, 30 years where all social services have been privatized, 30 years where there has been massive accumulation by dispossession. You have the peasantry losing land. You have people migrating to the cities. You have a huge decline in income. And what we have most seriously is not just dispossession of land and of resources and services, but also a dispossession politically.’
I think we have reached a point now when political activists from across the continent and allies need to ask how can we support each other in these uprisings – crossing regions and national borders? How can we in the diaspora support our sisters and brothers at home? How do we create a Pan-African network of solidarity – students, workers, trade unionists, queers, land rights activists and civil society in general which can give support to national movements, possibly in the same way that leaders of the 1950s and 60s independent movements supported each other in their struggles.
COTE D’IVOIRE
Last Wednesday the UN Security Council unanimously passed a resolution ordering sanctions against Laurent Gbagbo, which would impose a travel ban and the freezing of his assets. As the week progressed, the battle between Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara became more entrenched whilst UN [UNIC] and French Special Forces, in a similar move to those in Libya, went from protecting civilians to actively engaging forces loyal to Gbagbo and in the process killing civilians.
Nearly a week after the UN resolution, Gbagbo who has stubbornly refused to accept defeat is on the verge of surrendering as he is surrounded by Ouattara forces with no way out. According to Reuters, Gbagbo is negotiating his departure with the UN and by the time this is published this may have been agreed. I hope he will be arrested and called to account for his actions. At this juncture it is highly unlikely that his surrender alone will end the conflict. Just a few days ago the bodies of 800 people were discovered in a mass grave and thousands had fled the town of Duekoue. It is not yet clear whether Ouattara or Gbagbo forces are responsible for the massacre.
Although the Obama administration response to Cote d’Ivoire has been relatively muted, the US president has openly supported Ouattara as the rightful winner of the elections. However, blogger Bombastic Element reports that some US Republicans are openly supporting Gbagbo in what appears to be motivated by Islamophobia.
‘First it was Pat Robertson, now Republican senator James Inhofe took the senate floor yesterday, pleading Gbagbo’s case and presenting his version of Cote d’Ivoire’s rigged election math to CSPAN cameras.
‘We are no fans of Quattara, but in pitching their buddy Gbagbo and his line about rigged election results, Robertson and Inhofe, blinded by Christian camaraderie and the fact that Quattara is a Muslim, are selling snake oil to a Libya fatigued American public, who is just now tuning in to watch.’
Whether Gbagbo leaves or not, Cote d’Ivoire has been thrown over the precipice. Thousands of civilians have been killed, in protests, crossfire or purposefully hunted down and massacred. Hundreds of thousands more have been internally displaced or fled as refugees to neighboring countries. ECOWAS and the African Union have failed the Ivorian people – in the end they did nothing of substance and should be thoroughly ashamed. As for French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, he is turning out to be a prime war-monger.
BURKINA FASO
Street protests across Burkina Faso began in February following the death of a student in police custody:
‘Unprepared for the scale of public protest which had spread throughout the country and involved all sectors of society, the regime began to waver and the country saw one of its most serious crises since the revolution. Thousands of people came out in the streets of Ougadougou and the provinces when news came that Norbert Zongo had died in a car “accident”. People attacked symbols of state, including the headquarters of the presidential party, the Congress for Democracy and Progress (CDP). More than 20,000 people turned out for the funeral of the slain journalist on 16 December and public emotions ran high for several months after his death.’
But President Blaise Compaore, whom it is believed was complicit in theassassination of revolutionary leader, Thomas Sankara, is also having to deal with a rebellion by his own army officers.
SWAZILAND
Radical Africa blog reports that students in Swaziland are planning a ‘North Africa’ style uprising beginning on 12 April. The announcement was made by student leader and exile, Pias Vilakati. Swaziland Coalition of Concerned Civic Organisations (SCCCO) and Swaziland National Union of Students (Snus) will lead the protests. Thegovernment of Swaziland has learned nothing from its counterparts in Tunisia and Egypt instead they have threatened to arrest online activists who set up a Facebook page in support of their actions. Swaziland reports:
‘The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA), the premiere media freedom organisation in Swaziland, has criticised the Swazi Government’s attempts to censor free speech on the Internet, in particular in Facebook groups.
‘MISA says, ‘Such threats only serve to instil further fear among citizens who are already constrained and unable to express themselves freely through the traditional media, which is heavily censored by the government.’
Apart from the attempts at censorship, this is such a ludicrous action by the government to prevent people from organizing, as it assumes that without social media uprising cannot or will not take place. It goes hand in hand with the ‘technoholics’ who continue to attribute revolutionary actions with social media – Twitter, Facebook and blogs. The blog also reports on the Swazi Observer’s ‘trying to instill fear’ by reporting the government will deploy security forces across the country’s schools on 12 April to ‘protect teachers and pupils’.
LIBYA
As the US announces it is withdrawing from the bombing campaign, many believe they are simply switching their intervention to supplying the rebels with arms and training on the ground. For many though, the Libyan rebels are fast loosing credibility. Lenin’s Tomb writes:
‘Can I just risk a modest proposition? NATO, the CIA and the special forces belonging to the world’s imperialist states are not forces of progress in this world. Does anyone disagree with that? If not, then it follows as surely as night follows day that the successful cooptation of the Libyan revolution by NATO, the CIA and special forces is a victory for reaction. It’s no good hoping that the small, poorly armed, poorly trained militias of the east of Libya, who are now utterly dependent on external support, will somehow shake themselves free of such constraints once – if – they take power. Even if they eventually get some of the Libyan money that has been frozen by international banks, as UN Resolution 1973 promises, it will have come all too late to have been decisive.’
The Angry Arab has given up on the Libyan rebels altogether:
‘It is no more a Libyan uprising I was as excited as anyone to see the Libyan people revolt against the lousy dictator, Qadhdhafi: a tyrant who one should hate with an extra measure of eccentricity because–like Saddam–he is particularly obnoxious and repugnant as far as tyrants are concerned. But I can’t say now that I support the Libyan uprising: it is no more a Libyan uprising. The uprising has been hijacked by Qadhdhafi henchmen, Qatar foreign policy agenda, and the agenda of Western government. Count me out.’
In response to an Al Jazeera report that Libyan rebels are receiving covert training from the US, Arabawy echoes the Angry Arab in this post on the hijacking of the Libyan revolution by western imperialist forces. [Video]
‘This is catastrophic. The biggest imperialist force on the planet, NATO, is bombing Libya “in the name of revolution,” CIA operatives are active on the ground, Western“military advisers” become visible in Benghazi, as US and Egyptian military specialists are reported by Al-Jazeera to be training the revolutionaries.
‘The Libyan revolution is being hijacked in front of our eyes… This is counterrevolution…’
DJIBOUTI
The president of Djibouti, Omar Gelleh, changed the Constitution so he could run for a third term in the 8 April elections. This has been followed by an increase in repression with dozens of arrests of opposition leaders and human rights activists.
The government of Djibouti has refused to allow peaceful protest and continues to silence critics and political opposition. A Human Rights Watch reports on the crackdowns:
‘The Djibouti government has repeatedly prevented protest rallies since it violently dispersed a peaceful demonstration on February 18 and arrested scores of demonstrators and bystanders. The security forces responded with violence and arrests after demonstrators left the area designated for the rally, and marched to the national stadium.
‘The February 18 rally was called to protest an amendment to the Djibouti constitution that allows the President Ismael Omar Guelleh to run for a third term on April 8. Opposition parties also object to an opaque election system they believe unfairly benefits the president and his party.’
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Queer struggles in Uganda: No longer a silence
Posted: April 8, 2011, 5:43 pm by Sokari
Kasha Jacqueline presenting on the Uganda Anti-Homosexuality Bill to the UN Summit for Human Rights and Democracy. Kasha discusses the substance of the AHB, the implications for LGBTI persons and the rights of all Ugandans. Most importantly she speaks of the many and continuing acts of resistance and legal successes by LGBTI activists in Uganda. This is evident by the fact that more and more LGBTIQ people are visible today, that discussions ARE taking place and there is no longer a silence.
Part 1 – Uganda
In Part 2 – UN: Giving with one hand and taking with the other
Kasha calls the UN to account for its failure to call those countries which violate the many Rights based treaties. Specifically the failure to recognise LGBTI crimes as hate crimes.
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Free Gender: supporting older lesbians
Posted: April 6, 2011, 6:48 pm by Sokari
We often forget about older lesbians many of whom have never been able to come out and even now find it much more difficult than younger sisters. So it is great that Free Gender, a group of young Queer sisters based in Khayelitsha township, Cape Town, have chosen to acknowledge and celebrate “older and wise lesbians”
they are invisible, yet so present
speaking in tongues only few can
understand
they dance to the rhythms of drums
they awaken to the beat
of my feet
touching the soil
I call them my spirits
their voices cannot be ignored
they are calling my name. -
Manning Marable: 1950-2011 R.I.P.
Posted: April 2, 2011, 6:01 pm by Sokari
I really dont have much to say but I would like to acknowledge the life of scholar and activist, Dr Manning Marable particularly his work on the Malcolm X project, ”Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention” which will be published on Monday – so sad that he missed his life’s work by three days. Manning Marable – you always knew he was there but quiet humble and well he just seemed like a really likable ordinary extraordinary person.
Dedicated to Malcolm X: Malcolmology – Part 1, Part II, Part III
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50 Inspirational African Feminists
Posted: April 1, 2011, 3:12 pm by Sokari
A belated post but I completely missed this. AWDF – has put together a list of 50 Inspirational African Feminists for International Women’s Day 2011. I am bowled over seeing my name amongst this amazing group of AFRICAN SHEROES – what company – to be listed with Nawal El-Saddawi – Wow!
The full list is here -
International Women’s Day: Celebrating 50 Inspirational African Feminists -
Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt and Libya: Contested battles for support and attention
Posted: April 1, 2011, 3:52 am by Sokari
First published in Pambazuka News – Issue 523
cc AzlsDrawing upon a range of online reflections and social media activity, Sokari Ekine underlines the high stakes and contested understandings around the ongoing crises in Côte d’Ivoire and Libya and Egypt’s ‘post-revolution’ experience.CÔTE D’IVOIRE – STILL ON THE BRINK OF CIVIL WAR
According to the UN spokesperson in Abidjan, Hamadoun Toure, 1 million people have fled the capital, many of them migrant workers from other countries in West Africa. In addition, there are 90,000 Ivorian refugees in Liberia, putting pressure on a country which is itself still in recovery from war. The danger of the conflict spreading to Liberia is made clear in this tweet by Alain Logbognon on pro-Laurent Gbagbo elements taken hostage by Liberian mercenaries.
@ ALAINLOBOG #civ2010 Guiglo : les éléments Fanci pro-LMP pris en otage par les mercenaires libériens qui menacent de les exécuter en cas d’assaut FRCI.
While criticisms of the West’s intervention policy in Libya continues from the left and the right of the political spectrum, lawyers for Alassane Ouattara complained of double standards in the international response to the two countries while Laurent Gbagbo continues to murder civilians. The two sides remain intransigent, with President Ouattara refusing the proposed AU mediator, José Brito, on the grounds that he was not a head of state and has close connections with Laurent Gbagbo, who still refuses to step down.
‘“J`ai l`impression que la Côte d`Ivoire devient le drame oublié ou occulté. On a lancé une opération en Libye craignant que Kadhafi (…) assassine des gens à Benghazi, alors que (le président sortant de la Côte d`Ivoire) Laurent Gbagbo a déjà commencé à assassiner des gens et continue”, a déclaré Me Jean-Paul Benoit lors d`une conférence de presse, estimant qu`il y avait “deux poids, deux mesures dans la mobilisation internationale”. “La Côte d`Ivoire mérite un intérêt public international” et les populations du pays “une sollicitude au moins égale à celle dont bénéficie le malheureux peuple libyen”, a ajouté Me Jean-Pierre Mignard. Les deux avocats de “la République de Côte d`Ivoire” demandent à la communauté internationale “l`usage de la force légitime”, comme “on l`a fait en Libye”.’
The question of media coverage of Côte d’Ivoire is taken up by the US blog, AfroSphere but the criticism is of the black media rather than the mainstream media. It’s important to note that there are a group of Ivorians tweeting up-to-date accounts on the crisis in their country and these can be found under #civ2010 and #cotedivoire. Unlike in Libya, Tunisia and Egypt, these appear to be ignored.
‘In the wake of the enormous media coverage of the uprisings and so-defined “revolutions” in North Africa and the Middle East, I am hard pressed to find any media coverage of the escalating atrocities and impending civil war in Cote d’Ivoire. The “blackout” of this media coverage I am referring to is not within the mainstream media… which is understandable… it’s within the AfroSphere itself. One can read more on Chris Brown… even on Charlie Sheen… on blogs, news sites and webzines within the Black/African blogosphere, than on Cote d’Ivoire.
The sad thing about this is that in this age of the power of social media within the creation of communities of interest, the recent histories of Liberia, Sierra Leone, Rwanda and Kenya are being repeated today in Cote d’Ivoire (here)… and we don’t care. It’s an indictment on all of us, from President Obama … “a son of Africa” … to those of African descent within the continent, the Diaspora and the AfroSphere. We do nothing, then we get pissed and question the motives and sincerity of the Bono’s, George Clooney’s and Mia Farrow’s of the (white) world when they take up the causes of African people.’
Africa News (a news site by African citizen journalists) reports on the growing medical emergency as the country runs out of drugs for the treatment of cholera and HIV.‘This is a consequence of the EU embargo on the country’s ports. Ivory Coast’s supply of medicines and other products is in serious trouble. Support from key donors like the World Bank, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria took a serious knock by the crisis which arose from the controversial November 2010 presidential elections. These three major donors approved funding worth several millions of dollars towards the fight against AIDS in Ivory Coast. They have even closed their offices in Abidjan.’
African Arguments publishes some background opinion on the back-story to the present crisis in Côte d’Ivoire which speaks to citizenship rights and xenophobia.
‘The anti-Ouattara ball was set rolling after the death in 1993 of Ivorian president and founding father Felix Houphouët-Boigny. Ouattara, then Prime Minister, squared off against parliamentary Speaker Henri Konan Bédié for the succession. Bédié, a southerner from Houphouët-Boigny’s Baoulé ethnic group, won out – thanks partly to backing from former colonial master France – but he was determined that Ouattara should never pose a threat to his position again.
‘To this end, Bédié nurtured a philosophy called ivoirité or “Ivorianness” – the slippery idea of what it means to be Ivorian. Bédié used this murky notion to harness support for a change in the electoral code he had pushed through parliament a few months earlier, with the aim of making Ouattara ineligible for the presidency. A new clause stated that no one with a parent who was not “of Ivorian origin” could stand for president. Bédié and his supporters advanced an array of arguments to prove that Ouattara’s parents were both foreign, and that Ouattara himself was from Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast’s poorer northern neighbour. Ivoirité became central to the anti-Ouattara propaganda campaign. Bédié built nationalist fervour around the concept, loudly stating that people should be proud to be Ivorian and should not allow foreigners to rule over them.’
On Wednesday 30 March, the UN passed a unanimous resolution demanding an end to the violence in Cote d’Ivoire and issued a travel ban and freeze of assets on Laurent Gbagbo, his wife and three aides. Whether this will finally force Gbagbo to stand down remains to be seen. President Alassane Ouattara has already requested he be charged to the International Criminal Court [ICC] for his crimes against the Ivorian people and it is hard to see him standing down without giving safe passage. On the other hand it is equally hard to imagine him walking away a free man after committing murderous crimes against his own people.
EGYPT – POST-REVOLUTION
One of the main demands of the Egyptian revolutionaries was the call for changes in the constitution and on 19 March Egyptians were able to vote on a range of amendments. Maha al Aswad is highly critical of both the amendment process and the amendments themselves, such as the lack of ‘gender neutral language’, the criteria for president by default implies it can only be a man because “he shouldn’t be married to a foreign wife”, while the drafting committee did not include a single woman.
‘The process of amending the constitution generally was wrong. We made a revolution. Revolutions make constitutions fall along with all the regime! Maybe the problem is that the regime didn’t fully fall. What happened is a big joke. Before the referendum, we took to streets and distributed fliers and talked with people not only to convince them that the amendments are discriminative and violate the principle of citizenship rights and equality between all Egyptians, but also to say that the whole referendum thing is not correct. As the Higher Council for Armed Forces, I don’t have to go and ask the people if they still want the constitution from which they suffered for the past 40 years!’
The Egyptian Army [AFC] now has an official Facebook page in Arabic which it is using to send out messages to Egyptians. The latest is published by Egyptian Chronicles. President Hosni Mubarak is still in Egypt under house arrest, and the AFC is going to review the case of Egyptian protestor Mohammed Adel Mohammed Ali Fawzy, who was arrested by the military police during the revolution and sentenced to five years in prison, while the council will investigate the incidents of torture of women during the last Tahrir Square sit-in.
Sandmonkey gives a quick breakdown of some leading presidential candidates.
‘One thing to be sure of, the next election in Egypt will be incredibly fun, due to the fact that many US election campaign operatives are now offering their services to the highest bidder, and the egyptian election is a very sexy and important election for them.’
Being politically astute he is in favour of the revolutionaries ending their protests.
“The roof of street legitimacy just got raised. Public Opinion went 14 million for a YES vote and 4 million for a no vote, which means that in order to show we represent the majority we need 14 million to join us, which we won’t be able to produce. Hell, if we manage to produce 1 million protesters, people can dismiss us claiming we were only able to turn out 1/4 of our base. It’s not that impressive anymore, and going every friday to Tahrir means we have totally or about to burn that card. But if some feel the need to still protest, that’s fine, but let’s do it right.”
Jadaliyya, a scholarly e-zine produced by the Arab Studies Institute (ASI) Middle East/North Africa uprisings, broadcasts an interview with one of the leading Egyptian revolutionaries, Hossam El-Hamalawy (Arabawy). They discuss the background to the political and economic elite and how they are trying to reframe themselves, the position of other leading protesters and the alliances the different interest groups are trying to build.
LIBYA – SAVING LIBYA WHILE KILLING IN AFGHANISTAN – WHOSE WAR IS THIS?
Last week US drones killed 40 people on the Pakistan Afghan border. No one is talking about this!
Many of us remain conflicted trying to make sense of Libya. Grand narratives like imperialism, Pan-Africanism, Pan-Arabism and Marxism are being discussed, burning up hours of email time and with no end in sight. There are those on the left who are buying into the ‘humanitarian’ justification for the no-drive no-fly zone military campaign. But I don’t hear these same voices speak about Côte d’Ivoire or question how an empire which regularly kills civilians in Afghanistan can be trusted to protect civilians elsewhere.
The empires and wannabe empires are busy bickering with each other as they all try to predict the outcome and hope they end up on the right side! There’s the battle of the ‘hypocrites’, with Germany (which abstained from the UN vote) and its allies accusing each other of hypocrisy. Then there’s the battle of ‘NATO’, which is mostly between French President Nicolas Sarkozy – who seems bent on fulfilling his ‘crusade’ fantasies through a massive bombing campaign – and the Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is trying to take the lead in brokering peace (though there are different ideas on his motives).
Ali Abunimah [@Avinunu] of Electronic Intifada makes some excellent criticisms of the pro-interventionists and the lack of foresight of both the US and the UK.
‘Alarming that there seem to be absolutely no internal checks and balances preventing US launching ill-conceived, open-ended wars.
‘In this case it seems Pentagon didn’t want Libya war, but Obama-Hillary insisted.
‘In UK there was public dispute between PM and Chief of Defence Staff over scope of mission in Libya. Very chaotic and amateurish.
‘If it’s assumed rebels couldn’t defend Benghazi against massacres without air support, who could possibly think they could take Tripoli?
‘Arguments “there was no alternative” are therefore very illogical.
‘Another fundamental flaw in pro-intervention arguments is assumption that they work as advertised. Recent history shows they rarely do.’
Trying to work through the confusion of the left on who is who in this war, Yoshie Furuhashi [Critical Montages] asks if the Libyan rebels are ‘for us or against us’.
‘Neither side of the Libyan conflict was actually looking for any real solidarity with leftists (least of all Marxists), but somehow one side (the regime) got a lot of gratuitous, undeserved Latin American leftist support and the other side (the rebels) got a lot of gratuitous, undeserved Western leftist as well as (both secular and religious) Arab and Iranian support.
‘As a matter of fact, both the regime and the rebels were looking for Western imperialist support, and they didn’t hide it either. The Western imperialists — unlike the world Left, the Arabs, and the Iranians, who all jumped into the Libyan fray without examining what they were jumping into — first took a good, hard look at both sides and then decided to back the rebels.
‘The rebels got what they wanted, and that’s that.’
Left-Flank is also critical of the pro-interventionist position and again returns to the ‘double standard’ argument put forth by many ‘anti and not so sure interventionists’.
“The disturbing thing for pro-interventionists is that the West’s war effort has so far not produced anything resembling a clear cut advantage for the rebels, apart from obligatory TV footage of them welcoming the fighter jets with cheers. A detailed report from Time suggests that Gaddafi has so far made substantial advances even while the no-fly zone operates, and that cracks are opening inside the revolutionary camp between more grassroots activists and ex-regime leaders.”
So what possible alternatives are there to the no-fly and no-drive zone?
‘How might an anti-imperialist Left define some things “our” governments could do that would really help the rebellion? We could start with the TNC requests that the West refused, but Jamie Allinson has some other suggestions that I thought we should be raising.
‘Release the Gaddafi regime funds to the revolutionaries and allow them to buy weapons…
‘Condemn the Saudi (GCC) invasion of Bahrain, cut ties with both regimes and with Yemen’s Ali Abdallah Saleh — removing also the military aid to his regime. Cancel all military contracts with them.
‘Allow Benghazi to become an open port for Arab — or other — revolutionary volunteers to join the fight.
‘Of course these won’t satisfy those on the Left who equate “doing something” with raining death and destruction on MENA countries, but they would be far more useful to both the Libyan rebels and the Arab revolutions more generally.’
Left or right, pro- or anti-intervention, the bottom line is the ‘moral high ground” taken by the empires is inconsistent, and inconsistency cannot be trusted. We don’t have to look far because the empires have chosen two very different responses to two countries on the same continent and in the same moment. Even the elite of the left spend their time obsessing over Libya, oil and intervention, writing page after page of opinion and analysis whilst Côte d’Ivoire remains on the margins of their consciousness.
Blah blah blah
Fish cakes
Alas a fish cake.
Yet more fish cakes
Guess what ... yeah ... fish cakes.
The end of the fish cakes
