Items by Sokari

Black Looks

• Poem for Zoliswa

  Posted: December 19, 2011, 4:19 pm by Sokari

  On December 19th, those guilty of Zoliswa’s murder will be sentenced. This is a poem for Zoliswa by Elsbeth Engelbrecht © Dear Zoliswa; The undecided meaning of your life were impenetrable on the day your mother turned into a melting grief After so many years Her heart must have been surprised by an uninvited confirmation [...]

• For lovers who dance – Cesaria Evora: RIP

  Posted: December 18, 2011, 2:14 pm by Sokari

  A voice which spoke to us all – women, lovers, activists. Sensual and evocative, Cesaria you and your beauty are eternal. Thank you for giving meaning to romance, to dance.

• Nollywood: Nkiru

  Posted: December 16, 2011, 6:10 pm by Sokari

  I have habitually shied away from Nollywood except when forced by by my niece who is an obsessive Nollier and must have the largest collection ever. Now I have an assignment to watch Nollywood movies. This is the first of many! Nkiru, is 12 minute supernatural thriller premiering on the 18th December. Here’s the blurb [...]

• Will the real Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Bill stand up

  Posted: December 12, 2011, 10:05 pm by Sokari

  Since the passing of the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Bill 2011 [SSMB] by the Nigerian Senate hundreds of online and twitter comments have been made supporting the Bill. By far the majority of these comments have defended the Bill on the basis that it only concerns marriage between two people identifying as the same sex; [...]

• Thierry Henry and nostalgic memories

  Posted: December 10, 2011, 5:38 pm by Sokari

  I brought myself to tears this morning [I cry a lot these days, more than before] seeing the statue of Thierry Henry at the Emirates alongside Tony Adams. Henry was brought to tears by the honour and the memories of the Highbury days. My memories of the bi-weekly trips to the family enclosure with my [...]

• “God is a game” a load of money, miracles and hate!

  Posted: December 9, 2011, 5:18 pm by Sokari

  Nigeria is now trending as ” a very religious country” and Nigerians as “a very religious people”. Well if one meausres religious by the numbers who attend churches and mosques then it must be true! The business of church and religion is probably the most competitive business in the country so competition for new bodies [...]

• Beyond COP17 – language and grassroots realities

  Posted: December 7, 2011, 5:16 pm by Sokari

  A clip from a roundtable discussion on the South African media’s reporting on Climate Change which has failed to amplify the voices of those most affected.

• Heteropatriarcial recolonisation

  Posted: December 5, 2011, 8:15 pm by Sokari

  On hearing the news of the passing of the Nigerian “Same Sex Marriage Bill 2011, my reaction was, I was too numb to even have a reaction at the miserable state of my country. Did I really expect anything different? Chude Jideonwo “Why the Nigeria’s Anti-Gay Bill Sickens Me alludes to the real purpose of [...]

• Excuse me while I die

  Posted: November 28, 2011, 11:13 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  We are 4 days into the 16 Days of Activist Against Violence Against Women which dates back to 1999. Fourteen years of days and weeks where the world supposedly focuses on violence against women will end on Human Rights Day, the 10th December. In Durban the 17th UN Climate Change conference begins today and continues until 9th December. So much activity!

  The campaign to end violence against women hardly mentions [here I think I am being generous] the violence unleashed by changes in climate and environmental degradation; land grab by investment bankers in New York and London; the purchase of large tracks of land by governments such as Saudi Arabia Kuwait; gentrification or rather ethnic and class cleansing of urban spaces. Is it really that difficult to make the connections by providing a broader more realistic interpretation of violence against women? Abahlali baseMjondolo go some way to doing this
  

  We are in the middle of the Sixteen Days of Activism to end violence against women and children. Many conferences are being held. There are many discussions on television. Yet who will stand with the poor, with poor women and their children, when the state or private landowners send out the police or security guards to evict them, demolish their homes and steal their building materials? We do not see or hear from all these NGOs that are talking about the rights of women and children when the state and private landowners use violence to deny poor women and their children the right to a home.

  and speaking to the Climate Change gathering..

  Last night after heavy rain some of our shack settlements were flooded leaving shack dwellers, stranded, hopeless and with all their belonging swept away through floods. We have had enough shack fires already. We have had enough rat bites. We have had enough electricity disconnection. We have had enough of being excluded from the rest of our society and today the storm, the full force of what extreme weather does to the poor, proves itself to the world during the first day of the Conference of the Parties.

  Whose interests will this Conference of the Parties serve if the poor are outside busy dealing with effect of the floods which are the direct result of our vulnerability to bad weather in the shacks? How can the world begin these talks without going and experiencing the effect and the reality of how the change in climate will affect the people in Durban whose lives are already most precarious? This morning the rich woke up in their houses dry and safe while many poor people faced more disaster. Today it is clear that these talks will take us no where if they ignores the reality that those who will suffer the consequences of the change in climate the most are the poor. So, excluding the poor in these talks will not help any of us.

  Worth reading on environment and violence is a Social Text interview with Rob Nixon on his book “Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor”.

  There are other voices excluded from the 16 Days and Climate Change – lesbian voices, queer voices, gender non-conforming voices, transgender voices. The 16 Days is turning out to having very normative notions of gender mixed with mainstreaming of particular types of violence now normalised violence. So here we sit / stand with on the one side violence normalised and on the other a violence that is invisible.

  My dear friend Mia who contributes regularly to this blog is at this very moment hiding in the hell hole that is East London [West, North, South London, its all a hell hole if you dont walk the acceptable face of gayness, blackness or any other 'ness' you care to come up with] imprisoned in her home – well its not a home since a home is supposed to be a place of safety and sanctuary. The daily assault of transphobia as it intersects with misogyny and racism, have infiltrated her private space to the point where it is not safe to turn off the lights and snuggle in a duvet to try and get some much needed sleep after the transphobic racist violence of London bus journeys. On top of this betrayals by people [I wont refer to them as friends] who dont dont want to be involved. So why are you even there if you are incapable of speaking? Mia writes that silence speaks a different language in this case a language of lies and betrayal. Do you think your silence will protect you when I’m gone? Dont you realise on that day they will come for you too? The next step is the madness diagnosis and being clamped in a racialised transphobic straightjacket with a direct route to the Maudsley, and dont think you are immune from this ending either.

• Normalisation of violence against women

  Posted: November 28, 2011, 6:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  From Witness – how militarism, masculinity and the media contribute and facilitate the normalization of violence against women..

  Images of masculinity and militarism pervade mass media across the world, with aggressive male behavior, sexually exploited feminine bodies, and pictures of conflict saturating visual culture. These images contribute to the normalization of violence in our everyday lives. The 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence Campaign seeks to highlight the links between the culture of militarism and gender-based violence through our 2011 Campaign theme, “From Peace in the Home to Peace in the World: Let’s Challenge Militarism and End Violence Against Women!”
  
  This theme emerged from a strategic conversation on militarism and violence against women among thirty feminist activists, academics, and experts, hosted by the Center for Women’s Global Leadership, the home of the 16 Days Campaign. The participants identified five key areas of intersection between gender-based violence and militarism, which are priority areas for this year’s theme: (i) political violence against women; (ii) the proliferation of small arms and their role in domestic violence; (iii) sexual violence during and post-conflict; (iv) the role of state actors as perpetrators of sexual and gender-based violence; and (v) the roles of women, peace, and human rights movements in challenging the links between militarism and violence against women. Learn more about these priority areas by reading our report. Watch this video from our campaign last year for some insight into these priorities: …..Continued

• Imagine Futures: Egyptian Body Politic – Remix Tahrir

  Posted: November 27, 2011, 6:41 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  AN ANIMATED ADAPTATION OF “The Dream” by Alaa Abd El-Fattah,translated by Lina Attalah, 2011. Voice narration by VJ Um Amel.

  A SOUNDTRACK REMIX OF “Immortal Egypt Revolution Dub” by DJ Zhao, “Amble ambience” by VJ Um Amel, KPCC radio interview of VJ Um Amel on November 23, 2011, and voice overs.

  A VISUAL REMIX OF YouTube videos, Twitter data R-Shief’s visualizations of 1.25 million tweets on #Tahrir over 23 days in November, and 1.23 million tweets on #NOSCAF over the same date range. Cartoon by Carlos Latuff, “in honour of martyr Shehab Ahmed, killed by SCAF forces in #Nov20″

  This is the first in a series of cinematic media that will be used in an upcoming, performative installation.

  Egyptian Body Politic: a 2-min remix adaptation #Tahrir from VJ Um Amel on Vimeo.

  Via @Kawlture AND Veilotics

• Bleeding in progress – making public the violence of rape

  Posted: November 25, 2011, 6:39 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Visual activist, Zanele Muholi discusses her most recent photographic installation “Isilumo Siyaluma”

• Proudly Transgender in Turkey.

  Posted: November 24, 2011, 6:39 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Portrait: Ebru Kırancı by Gabrielle Le Roux
  quote: “Hayatı seviyoruz, Bizi öldürmeyin” – “We love life, Dont kill us”

  Proudly Transgender in Turkey is a social justice project and cultural intervention designed by South African artist Gabrielle Le Roux. The aim of the project is to draw attention to the human rights violations faced by transgender people and transgender activists in Turkey. The project is a collaboration between Gabrielle Le Roux, Amnesty Turkey, and two Turkish trans orgs LGBTT Istanbul and Pembe Hayat. It includes portraits and interviews with participants some of which are presented in the video below.

  As in many other parts in the world, transgender, intersex and gender variant people in Turkey face high levels of discrimination and violence. In 2010 the number of hate crimes rose and Turkey had a striking number in trans murders. Meanwhile a strong trans movement is emerging with courageous activists putting their lives on the line. These are the people who have chosen to collaborate with South African artist and activist for social justice, Gabrielle Le Roux, in the creation of the multimedia exhibition “Proudly Transgender in Turkey”.

  “Proudly Transgender in Turkey” is a project of portraits and stories. The portraits are drawn from life by Gabrielle Le Roux, and each person writes directly onto their own portrait whatever they wish to say.

  The participants in this cultural intervention want their faces to be seen and their voices heard around the world.

  How Old Are You? – Trans, Onurlu ve Türkiyeli Sergisi from Amnesty International Turkey on Vimeo.

  The project opened in Istanbul on the 11th November 2011 and in Ankara on

• Egypt: More on the Free Alaa & no military trials campaign

  Posted: November 8, 2011, 6:13 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The Free Alaa campaign which works side by side with the No Military Trials for Civilians campaign [Alaa has refused to recognise the military court and continues to insist on being questioned and or tried by a civilian court] are organizing a day of action on Wednesday 9th November “Global Online Protest Against Military Trials in Egypt” [there are various actions taking place and suggestions on what to do so please visit the website].

  “A letter from Cairo to the Occupy/Decolonize movements & other solidarity movements” gives detail background information on the Egyptian movement since January, the removal of Mubarak and the take over by the military Junta – since then at least 12,000 people have been tried by military courts including minors serving time in adult prisons [see Alaa's description of the horrific conditions in prison].

  On October 9th, the Army massacred 28 of us at Maspero; they ran us over with tanks and shot us down in the street while manipulating state media to try and incite sectarian violence. The story has been censored. The military is investigating itself. They are systematically targeting those of us who speak out. This Sunday, our comrade and blogger Alaa Abd El Fattah was imprisoned on trumped-up charges. He spends another night in an unlit cell tonight.

  All this from the military that supposedly will ensure a transition to democracy, that claimed to defend the revolution, and seemingly convinced many within Egypt and internationally that it was doing so. The official line has been one of ensuring “stability”, with empty assurances that the Army is only creating a proper environment for the upcoming elections. But even once a new parliament is elected, we will still live under a junta that holds legislative, executive, and judicial authority, with no guarantee that this will end. Those who challenge this scheme are harassed, arrested, and tortured; military trials of civilians are the primary tool of this repression. The prisons are full of casualties of this “transition”.

  We now refuse to co-operate with military trials and prosecutions. We will not hand ourselves in, we will not submit ourselves to questioning. If they want us, they can take us from our homes and workplaces.

  Nine months into our new military repression, we are still fighting for our revolution. We are marching, occupying, striking, shutting things down. And you, too, are marching, occupying, striking, shutting things down. We know from the outpouring of support we received in January that the world was watching us closely and even inspired by our revolution. We felt closer to you than ever before. And now, it’s your turn to inspire us as we watch the struggles of your movements. We marched to the US Embassy in Cairo to protest the violent eviction of the occupation in Oscar Grant Plaza in Oakland. Our strength is in our shared struggle. If they stifle our resistance, the 1% will win – in Cairo, New York, London, Rome – everywhere. But while the revolution lives our imaginations knows no bounds. We can still create a world worth living.

  Links: Banners and stickers

  US citizens can sign petition here

  TWITTER:
  ———
  Please use the hashtags #NoMilTrials and/or #FreeAlaa and mention
  @manal @monasosh so that we can help spread your action, post or event.

• Egypt: Alaa Abdel Fattah blogs from detention

  Posted: November 5, 2011, 11:47 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Last Sunday 30th October, one of Egypt’s most prominent activists and blogger, Alaa Abdel Fattah was detained by the Egyptian military for 15 day. Alaa refused to recognise the military court taking the brave stand of insisting on a civilian prosecutor – arguing civilians cannot be tried in military courts. He was called by the military investigators to answer to charges of “inciting violence” during the 9th October Maspero clashes between Coptic-Christian protesters and the military which led to 26 deaths and in which he had consistently maintained the army were involved in the violence. This is the second time Alaa has been arrested and detained – ironically the first was under Hosni Mubarak in 2006 when he spent 45 days in prison.

  Rumbidzai who has recently spent 6 months in Egypt and is a friend of Alaa and his wife Manal will be writing a more detailed post on Alaa. However I wanted to re post the following moving and courageous blog post was published by his wife Manal Hassan in Arabic and translated by Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi . Here Alaa speaks of horrors of sleeping with cockroaches crawling over his body, the filth and not being able to cope with the toilets. He chastises himself for not being strong enough to deal with the conditions and having to make a request to move to a “softer” prison. In doing so he swaps the “youthful convicts” and their stories for the embezzlers and boredom. Alaa takes this as a weakness and even dismisses the courage of the stand to refuse to be tried in a military court. I and I am sure everyone of his family and friends and anyone who has met him has no doubt of his courage. We all have our limits and we must not chastise ourselves for not being able to move beyond those limits. His stand is without doubt courageous as is his wife’s and his family.

  Writing in colloquial Egyptian Arabic from detention Alaa Abdel Fattah:

  I am writing this blog while being ashamed of myself, I was moved to Tora Investigative [jail] on my insistence and nagging because I could not take the difficult circumstances of the appeal detention, the darkness, the filth, the cockroaches that crawl over my body day and night, there is no break and we don’t see the sun, darkness again, but the issue that bothered me most was the toilet, I don’t know how to handle the filth of the toilets and the absence of doors and stayed five days fasting, binded binded binded.

  I was confounded by Nawarah (Negm)’s article in which she spoke of my manliness, but Naglaa Budeir’s article reminded me of my previous detention where the blog was my refuge and where I was honest with myself.

  I didn’t know how to man-up and take (the conditions), even though thousands are bearing such conditions and worse, even though I haven’t experienced the agonies of a military jail and wasn’t tortured like other colleagues of military trials.

  I have let down my colleagues of the Maspero (incident) detention and that of the Ministry of Defense along with other politicians, I have let down the convicts who were moved by the commotion that was created for me and decided to tell me about the atrocities of the Interior (Ministry) so I can tell the people, they were happy that someone could tell of the baltagiya (thugs) and the organized gangs, and yet I fled for the toilets.
  
  I have exchanged the youthful company of the convicts that was filled with happiness & joy with that of the (ones accused of embezzling) public funds that is full of geezers, depression and boredom. During the appeal (prison time) I was daily discovering stories of those who were wronged and (other) important cases, the low ranked police officers who were detained after their first protest and were accused of burning the ministry. I didn’t believe that there was something genuine amongst their ranks until I had met them. Tamer Rashwan, whose case is very ambiguous makes us doubt that the State Security is developing new discreet tools instead of detention, torture and neglect that I have witnessed in front of my eyes that I was memorizing so I can tell you about them when I get out.

  It’s not the convicts only who felt that I can play a role from the inside, the detectives were also harassing and inspecting whoever was conversing with me and the large number of informants and all what I said found its way to the administration.

  I left all that for a more spacious, cleaner and brighter cell, and because I couldn’t man up and withstand the toilets of the appeal (prison). This is my capability, these are my limits and this is my weakness.

  Even the decision of rejecting being investigated in front of a military prosecution that you are celebrating has an element of cowardice, the day we gathered to take the decision I did not have any courage to listen to (my wife) Manal’s opinion whom I will leave alone in the last days of her pregnancy and will leave her alone to oversee the workers who are preparing Khaled’s room, I who shall be detained and she who shall be burdened while she is running around for my demands, my sustenance and my visitation permits as well as the campaign that was founded for my case.

  I took the decision in a meeting with colleagues from the revolution and got her stuck and didn’t listen to my wife and depended only on the certainty that she will back me up in all my choices.

  And yet I am proud, it’s true I am not the macho that Nawara (Negm) thinks I am but I am not a coward either, I was offered by an important person from the revolution a plea that allows me a swift exit, get out but refrain from insulting the General (Tantawi), only that, a small sacrifice was asked but I rejected it, how would I have faced my family if I had accepted?

  Let’s begin from the start: How are you? I am Alaa, a foot soldier in the revolution, there are those who sacrificed more than me, those who are much more courageous than me, and those whose role is much more important than mine.

  I am Alaa, proud that I am doing what I can and sometimes surprise myself with what I am capable of. And I know myself and what I am not capable of. I try never to fail my commitments, I try to overcome fear always and I constantly try to be in the front lines at all times.

  If you see in me any magnanimity, courage or bravery know that I draw them from my mom, my younger sisters and my wife (who being separated from is the hardest part of detention).

  The Fifth Day and the First Night in Cell 1/6, Ward 4, Tora Investigative (Prison)
  3-November-2011
  Alaa Abdel Fattah
  @Alaa

  Translation by Mina Naguib in Stockholm, Sweden and Sultan Al Qassemi in Sharjah, UAE. Original Arabic post can be found here.

  For more on Alaa see the following:

  You Tube – Technology and Human Rights

  Alaa’s letter from prison published in the Guardian

  Reuters report

  Protests on behalf of Alaa

• Normalisation of oil pollution and violence in the Niger Delta

  Posted: November 4, 2011, 8:36 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  A new series of photos from Nigerian photo activist George Osodi presented at Bamako 2011. The series shows “the duality of life” in the Niger Delta where oil pollution and violence have become a normalised everyday part of life

  
   

• Conversation at the kitchen table

  Posted: October 29, 2011, 6:26 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Words are in the face, the eyes, the smile, the hand…….

  “Danger has been a part of my life ever since I picked up a pen and wrote. Nothing is more perilous than truth in a world that lies.”

  Via Guerilla Mama

• Statement of African social justice activists on the decision of the British government to “cut aid” to African countries that violate the rights of LGBTI people in Africa

  Posted: October 28, 2011, 3:25 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  British Prime Minister, David Cameron has warned his country would cut aid to countries in the global south that persecute LGBTI persons. Many of us believe this is an inappropriate response as stated in the statement below. ……

  We, the undersigned African social justice activists, working to advance societies that affirm peoples’ differences, choice and agency throughout Africa, express the following concerns about the use of aid conditionality as an incentive for increasing the protection of the rights of LGBTI people on the continent.

  It was widely reported, earlier this month, that the British Government has threatened to cut aid to governments of “countries that persecute homosexuals” unless they stop punishing people in same-sex relationships. These threats follow similar decisions that have been taken by a number of other donor countries against countries such as Uganda and Malawi. While the intention may well be to protect the rights of LGBTI people on the continent, the decision to cut aid disregards the role of the LGBTI and broader social justice movement on the continent and creates the real risk of a serious backlash against LGBTI people.

  A vibrant social justice movement within African civil society is working to ensure the visibility of – and enjoyment of rights by – LGBTI people. This movement is made up of people from all walks of life, both identifying and non-identifying as part of the LGBTI community. It has been working through a number of strategies to entrench LGBTI issues into broader civil society issues, to shift the same-sex sexuality discourse from the morality debate to a human rights debate, and to build relationships with governments for greater protection of LGBTI people. These objectives cannot be met when donor countries threaten to withhold aid.

  The imposition of donor sanctions may be one way of seeking to improve the human rights situation in a country but does not, in and of itself, result in the improved protection of the rights of LGBTI people. Donor sanctions are by their nature coercive and reinforce the disproportionate power dynamics between donor countries and recipients. They are often based on assumptions about African sexualities and the needs of African LGBTI people. They disregard the agency of African civil society movements and political leadership. They also tend, as has been evidenced in Malawi, to exacerbate the environment of intolerance in which political leadership scapegoat LGBTI people for donor sanctions in an attempt to retain and reinforce national state sovereignty.

  Further, the sanctions sustain the divide between the LGBTI and the broader civil society movement. In a context of general human rights violations, where heterosexual women are almost as vulnerable as LGBTI people, or where health and food security are not guaranteed for anyone, singling out LGBTI issues emphasizes the idea that LGBTI rights are special rights and hierarchically more important than other rights. It also supports the commonly held notion that homosexuality is ‘unAfrican’ and a western-sponsored ‘idea’ and that countries like the UK will only act when ‘their interests’ have been threatened.

  An effective response to the violations of the rights of LBGTI people has to be more nuanced than the mere imposition of donor sanctions. The history of colonialism and sexuality cannot be overlooked when seeking solutions to this issue. The colonial legacy of the British Empire in the form of laws that criminalize same-sex sex continues to serve as the legal foundation for the persecution of LGBTI people throughout the Commonwealth. In seeking solutions to the multi-faceted violations facing LGBTI people across Africa, old approaches and ways of engaging our continent have to be stopped. New ways of engaging that have the protection of human rights at their core have to recognize the importance of consulting the affected.

  Furthermore, aid cuts also affect LGBTI people. Aid received from donor countries is often used to fund education, health and broader development. LGBTI people are part of the social fabric, and thus part of the population that benefit from the funding. A cut in aid will have an impact on everyone, and more so on the populations that are already vulnerable and whose access to health and other services are already limited, such as LGBTI people.,

  To adequately address the human rights of LGBTI people in Africa, the undersigned social justice activists call on the British government to:

  · Review its decision to cut aid to countries that do not protect LGBTI rights

  · Expand its aid to community based and lead LGBTI programmes aimed at fostering dialogue and tolerance.

  · Support national and regional human rights mechanisms to ensure the inclusiveness of LGBTI issues in their protective and promotional mandates

  · Support the entrenchment of LGBTI issues into broader social justice issues through the financing of community lead and nationally owned projects

  Contact Persons

  Joel Gustave Nana, +27735045420, joel@amsher.net

  SIGNATORIES

  1. Organizations

  ActionAid (Liberia)

  African Men for Sexual Health and Rights – AMSHeR (Regional)

  AIDS Legal Network (South Africa)

  ARC EN CIEL + (Cote d’Ivoire)

  Arc en Ciel d’Afrique (Canada)

  Centre for Popular Education and human Rights – CEPEHRG (Ghana)

  Coalition Against Homophobia in Ghana (Ghana)

  Coalition of African Lesbians- CAL (Regional)

  Engender (South Africa)

  Evolve (Cameroon)

  Face AIDS Ghana (Ghana)

  Fahamu (Regional)

  Freedom and Roam Uganda (Uganda)

  Gay and Lesbian of Zimbabwe – GALZ (Zimbabwe)

  Horizons Community Association (Rwanda)

  House of Rainbow Fellowship – (Nigeria)

  ICHANGE CI (Cote d’Ivoire)

  Identity Magazine (Kenya)

  IGLHRC Africa (Regional)

  Ishtar MSM (Kenya)

  Justice for Gay Africans (Diaspora)

  LEGABIBO (Botswana)

  Let Good Be Told In us (LGBTI) Nyanza and Western coalition of Kenya (Kenya)

  Most at Risk Populations’ Society In Uganda (UGANDA)

  Mouvement pour les Libertes Individuelles – MOLI (Burundi)

  My Rights (Rwanda)

  Network against violence, abuse, discrimination and stigma-Africa (Regional)

  Nyanza and Western LGBTI Coalition of Kenya (Kenya)

  Other Sheep Afrika (Kenya)

  Outright Namibia

  Pan Africa ILGA (Regional)

  PEMA Kenya

  Queer African Youth Center Network QAYN – (Sub-regional – West Africa)

  Rainbow Candle Light (Burundi)

  Reseau Camerounais des Personnes Vivant avec le VIH – Recap+ (Cameroon)

  Riruta United Women Empowerment Programme (Kenya)

  Sexual Minorities Uganda (Uganda)

  Si Jeunesse Savait (Democratic Republic of Congo)

  South African National AIDS Council – LGBT sector

  Spectrum Uganda Initiatives – (Uganda)

  Stay Alive Self Help Group (Kenya)

  Stop Aids In Liberia

  The Initiative for Equal Rights (TIER) – Nigeria

  The International Center for Advocacy on the Rights to Health -ICARH (Nigeria)

  The Lesbian and Gay Equality Project (South Africa)

  Together for Women’s Rights ASBL (Burundi)

  Treatment Action Campaign (South Africa)

  Triangle Project (South Africa)

  UHAI-the East African Sexual Health and Rights Initiative (Sub-regional -East Africa)

  Vision Spring Initiatives

  West African Treatment Action Group (Sub-regional – West Africa)

  Women Working with Women (Kenya)

  Youth Focus (Uganda)

  2. Individuals

  Angus Parkinson (British Citizen, Kenyan Resident)

  Anne Baraza (Kenya

  Anthony Adero (Kenya)

  Ayesha Imam (Nigeria)

  Barbra Muruga (Kenya)

  Bernedette Muthien (South Africa)

  Blessed B Rwomushana(Uganda)

  Blessol gathoni (Kenya)

  Brian Kanyemba (Zimbabwe)

  Carine Geoffrion (Ghana)

  Carlos Idibouo (Cote d’Ivoire)

  Charles Gueboguo (Cameroon)

  Chesterfield Samba (Zimbabwe)

  Christian Rumu – (Burundi)

  Cynthia Ndikumana (Burundi)

  Cyriaque Ako (Cote d’Ivoire)

  Daniel Peter Onyango (Kenya)

  Daniel Peter Onyango (Kenya)

  Danilo da Silva (Mozambique)

  Denis Nzioka (Kenya)

  Desire Kavutse (Rwanda)

  Douglas Masinde (Kenya)

  Esther Adhiambo(Kenya)

  Francoise Mukuku (DRC)

  Frank Mugisha (Uganda)

  Friedel Dausab (Namibia)

  Gathoni Blessol (Kenya)

  Geogina Adhiambi (Kenya)

  Hakima Abbas (UK/Egypt)

  Hameeda Deedat (South Africa)

  Happy Kinyili (Kenya)

  Ifeany Orazulike (Nigeria)

  Jacqueline N Mulucha (Uganda)

  Jane Bennett (Cape Town)

  Jayne Annot (South Africa)

  Jessica Horn (Uganda/UK)

  Joel Gustave Nana – (Cameroon)

  Johanna Kehler (South Africa)

  Joseph Sewedo Akoro (Nigeria)

  Julius Kaggwa (Uganda)

  Julius Kyaruzi (Tanzania)

  Kamariza Sandrine (Burundi)

  Kasha Jacqueline (Uganda)

  Keguro Macharia (Kenya)

  Kene Esom (Nigeria)

  Korto Williams – Liberia

  Lillian Kwagala (Uganda)

  Linda Baumann (Namibia)

  Lourence Misedah (Kenya)

  Mariam Armisen (Burkina Faso)

  Marieme Helie-Lucas (Algeria)

  Mia Nikasimo (African Diaspora)

  Mmapaseka Steve Letsike (South Africa)

  Mombo Ngua (Kenya)

  Mwangi Forsyth-Githahu (Kenya)

  Ndifuna Ukwazi (South Africa)

  Ndikumana Pierre Celestin (Rwanda)

  Ngozi Nwosu – Juba (Nigeria)

  Nguru Karugu (Kenya)

  Nicholas Mutisya Muema (Kenya)

  Nicole Khanali (Kenya)

  Olivier Irogo (Cameroon)

  Paden Edmund (Tanzania)

  Peter Wanyama (Kenya)

  Phumi Mtetwa (South Africa)

  Pouline kimani,Udada kenya

  Prof J Oloka-Onyango (Uganda)

  Prof Sylvia Tamale (Uganda)

  Rena Otieno (Kenya)

  Rowland Jide Macaulay (Nigeria)

  Samuel Ganafa (Uganda)

  Samuel Matsikure (Zimbabwe)

  Sandrine Kamariza (Burundi)

  Sibongile Ndashe (South Africa)

  Sokari Ekine (Nigeria)

  Solomon Wambua

  Sserwanga James (Uganda)

  Stanley Muiga Wangari (Kenya)

  Steave Nemande (Cameroon)

  Stephen McGill (Liberia)

  Thomas Mukasa (Uganda)

  Tony Gatore (Burundi)

  Wanja Muguongo (Kenya)

  Wendy Isaack (South Africa)

  Zawadi Nyong’o (Kenya)

  Zeitun Mohamed Haret

• Japan to donate food from Fukushima region to global south countries

  Posted: October 24, 2011, 3:07 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  NHK [Japan National Broadcasting] reported that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is proposing to purchase industrial and canned fish products from disaster hit areas, Fukushima, Miyagi, Iwate as “a means to tackle harmful rumor against their products”. The Ministry applied for a budget $65 million for this purpose under overseas development aid[ODA]. These products have a high risk of being contaminated yet the Japanese government are intending to send them to countries in the global south! Not done with killing their own people they now want to spread their nuclear death under the disguise of aid – in other words kill and make even more people really sick!

  Six days after the Fukushima diaster the Japanese government increased the allowable limit of radiation for water and other drinks to 200Bq/cesium. In the US the limit is 0.111 Bq/litre and the WHO standard 10 Bq/L – I dont know what these figures mean but there is a huge gap between 200 and 10 and 0.11. In addition families who wish to evacuate from outside of the supposedly safe area have to finance themselves and since most cannot afford to do so they are forced to remain. Karori Izumi of “Shut Tomari” and “Save Fukushima Children – Hokkaido” comments on the present state of the Fukushima region and demands that children be allowed to evacuate the contaminated areas plus the shut down of all 10 nuclear power plants…

  Our country and we are are contaminated with fallouts , nuclear waste, contaminated water and food, and now our government is trying to contaminate people in developing countries under a name of “developing aid”. Please note that 3400 teraBq contaminated water was discharged from Fukushima Daiichi to the sea by the end of May, affecting all living creatures in the sea. Radiation does not respect national boundaries.

  Our government does not let Fukushima children evacuate, exposing them to high level of radiation, and furthermore they are now trying to contaminate people and children in developing countries with contaminated food and industrial goods under ODA, using Japanese tax payers money. This is totally unacceptable. There are several specific claims and petitions to be put forward and separate actions to be taken during the sit in. Stop sending contaminated food under ODA is one of them.

  For more on the contamination of food see here.

• Jean Binta Breeze – for the women who didn’t make it

  Posted: October 22, 2011, 12:14 am by Sokari

  
  
  

   

   

  Jamaican British dub poet Jean Binta Breeze –  from “The THIRD WORLD GIRL: SELECTED POEMS”, a book with DVD published by Bloodaxe Books

   

  Via Travelling Light

• A woman who walks through the yam field

  Posted: October 22, 2011, 6:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I just discovered poems and short stories on Guernica – here is one from Chinua Achebe which he adapted from Chike and the River. Like many of Achebe’s stories it has the usual assortment of Igbo proverbs. This one ends with the saying….

  A man who can walk through the Nkisa with his bare feet should not be afraid to sail the Niger in a boat.

  So I came up with my own equivalent after imagining myself walking through the forest.

  “A woman who walks through the yam field at night should not fear the tall grass in the day “

  Those who answered to Abraham

  After the incident of the leopard skin Chike lost some of his eagerness for crossing the Niger. He did not see how he could obtain one shilling without stealing or begging. His only hope now was that some kind benefactor might give him a present of one shilling without his begging for it. But where was such a man, he wondered. Perhaps the best thing was to take his mind off the River Niger altogether; but it was not easy.
  On the last day of term, all the pupils were tidying up the school premises. The boys cut the grass in the playing fields and the girls washed the classrooms. Chike’s class was working near the mango tree with all the tempting ripe fruit which they were forbidden to pick. They sang an old prisoners’ work song and swung their blades to its beat. The last day of term was always a happy, carefree day; but it was also a day of anxiety because the results of the term’s examination would be announced. Still an examination was an examination and nobody liked to fail….The story continues

• Evelyn Apoko, LRA survivor bears witness

  Posted: October 20, 2011, 1:07 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Evelyn Apoko survived the Lords Resistance Army [LRA]. Here she responds to those who are stupidly misinformed and who have criticised President Obama’s decision to deploy 100 US troops to try to end the LRA’s war and capture Joseph Kony.    Whatever we may think about foreign military interventions and in this case what could turn out to be yet  another US execution on foreign soil, Evelyn’s testimony and  pleas for help in ending the 23 year old war in which thousands upon thousands of children have been abducted and tortured, villages ransacked and women raped and people killed, cannot and should not be ignored. The LRA’s war takes place in Uganda and crosses borders into Southern Sudan, the Central African Republic [where Kony is suspected as hiding] and the DRC. The most recent deployment of troops by Obama is not the first US involvement in the war. In 2008 the US have provided intelligence and logistical support in the DRC and though this officially ended in 2009 it is believed the support continued unofficially. Though from time to time there are short reports on the LRA the war takes place outside of the media limelight and it is hard to believe that any serious effort has ever been made on the part of Uganda, the DRC, the AU or the UN to protect civilians and put an end to the war. Increased militarisation may have some short term impact however as this statement by “Defence Professionals” shows it is doubtful that this latest US intervention will be any more successful than the last.

  The task will not be easy. One of the consequences of Operation Lightning Thunder was that the LRA scattered into smaller groups, making them much more difficult to track down. Kony himself is believed to be operating in the Central African Republic. The groups have discarded any communication equipment that would allow them to be traced and instead rely on runners to relay messages. In addition, the LRA is a hardened guerilla force used to operating in difficult terrain. It has survived against the odds for a quarter of a century. U.S. policymakers and military planners emphasize that there is no quick fix to ending the scourge of the LRA and that even the death or capture of Kony and his senior commanders may not be sufficient to finish off the group unless broader efforts are made to address the grievances that caused it to form in the first place.

  New strategies have to be found starting above all else with increased efforts to protect civilians and to engage more forcefully with local religious leaders, civil society organisations and traditional leaders including the voices of survivors like Evelyn Apoko.

  Evelyn Apoko is 22 years old, but she was only a child when the Lord’s Resistance Army came into her home late one night and dragged her out into the jungle. The LRA, a bizarre and violent cult that emerged out of Uganda’s 1986 civil war, enslaved Evelyn as they had the 66,000 children that came before and after her.

  Most children who are abducted by the LRA are forced to either fight, aid in fighting, or serve as concubines. Evelyn does not say what happened during her years of enslavement with the LRA, but, one day, a bomb went off near her during one of the battles that are a regular part of the group’s life. She attempted to protect an infant that was with the group, in the process exposing her face to the blast, which disfigured her. Denied medical care and fearing that she would be killed for her unattractive appearance, Evelyn escaped, miraculously making it through the jungle on foot and alone.

  Today she is a fellow with a Liberia-based non-profit called the Strongheart Fellowship Program, which rehabilitates young people from what it calls “extremely challenging circumstances.” Last year, she was honored on the floor of the Canadian parliament for her work.

  Dear Mr. Limbaugh: Evelyn’s Appeal from Strongheart on Vimeo.

• Johnson Sirleaf and Gbowee represent the resilience of Liberian women, of African women, of women the world

  Posted: October 12, 2011, 1:58 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I doubt many are surprised that Leymah Gbowee has won the Nobel Peace Prize. The same cannot be said of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. Accusations range from corruption to mismanagement – nothing new for political leaders. What stands out for me is Johnson Sirleaf remains the only African leader to agree to hosting the US High Command in Africa – AFRICOM. This is not really surprising given Liberia’s historic connection with the US [Leymah speaks of this unpleasant relationship in her Google interview] Nonetheless the two women are connected – Leymah Gbowee and the women of Liberia were influential in Johnson Sirleaf becoming the first woman president in Africa.

  Johnson Sirleaf and Gbowee represent the resilience of Liberian women, of African women, of women the world over who thirst for an end to militarism, gender-based violence, death, destruction, war, and missile strikes in the name of “liberation”.

  How can this be when Johnson Sirleaf offers to host AFRICOM and the support the militarisation of the continent?

  Liberian Robtel Pailey, who up until recently worked at the ” Executive Mansion” under President Johnson Sirleaf, examines their similarities.

  Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and peace activist Leymah Gbowee, also from Liberia, became the second and third African women to be awarded the Nobel peace prize on 7 October.

  Gbowee and Johnson Sirleaf have forever transformed the image of Liberia, from a pariah nation of warlords and gun-slinging, drug-induced prepubescent boys, to a country clawing its way back to civility and normality.

  Their journeys to this prestigious award, announced just four days ahead of Liberia’s high-stakes presidential and legislative elections – elections that will determine the country’s development trajectory and democratic consolidation – signify Liberia’s journey to consciousness.

  As someone who most recently worked in the Liberian Executive Mansion under Johnson Sirleaf’s tutelage for four years, I know that she and Gbowee, whom I interviewed earlier in the year, represent the ethos of our nation.

• 4 convicted for the murder of Zoliswa Nkonyana in Khayelitsha

  Posted: October 10, 2011, 1:00 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Finally after five years of postponements 4 men were convicted of the murder of Zoliswa Nkonyana. 3 others were acquitted of the original 9 arrested.

  This is the first case in South Africa to recognise sexual orientation and lesbians as a motive for murder and violent crimes. Zoliswa, 19, was murdered on the 4th February 2006 after being chased by a group of men because of being a lesbian. She was beaten, stabbed and strangled. It has taken five years of constant delays which meant two of the witnesses were only able to testify years after the murder. Nonetheless the consistent dedicated campaigning of many activists across the country ensured the case was not forgotten and that it was recognised as a hate crime.

  The Magistrate delivered her verdict yesterday in Zoliswa’s case. At the beginning of the case, over 5 years ago, there were 9 men accused of one count of murder and two counts of attempted murder. Two of the accused, #3 and #6, were acquitted on all charges in September, and the remaining 7 accused were acquitted of the charges of attempted murder. The Magistrate reviewed the entire case, including the three ‘trials within trials’ regarding the confession of Accused #4, the DNA evidence taken from blood found on Accused #5′s tekkies, and the police statements made by other accused. The confession and the DNA, which demonstrated that the blood on the shoes belonged to Zoliswa, were found admissible into evidence. However, the police statements made by the other accused were not. The Magistrate stated that on this point that the statements were not admitted because of the “sloppy manner” in which those statements were taken by police….. Continued at Free Gender

• Leymah Gbowee – militant pacifist!

  Posted: October 10, 2011, 5:59 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  One of three 2011 Noble Peace Prize winners, Leymah Gbowee interviewed by Megan Smith. What makes this interview particularly interesting is through Leymah own personal history we begin to understand her journey from childhood to the strong powerful woman she is today – through domestic violence, being ostracized by her father and raising four children and the struggle for peace against the warlords of Liberia. She also puts the Liberian war into historical context, something which is often missing from news reports.

  “Where do we start talking about the atrocities? We need to go back to 1822 and start that conversation because thats where everything started”

  I have to say that I am proud to have met Leymah in Accra in 2010 at a workshop on militarisation in which the film Pray the Devil Back to Hell was screened. She is one hell of a special woman, none of the forked tongues of politicians and opportunitists. Leymah is real – a strong and powerful African woman. If you havent seen the film it will be showing on PBS on 18th October.

  Who is Leymah Gbowee ?

  Leymah Gbowee is a “militant pacifist”, a “peace activist”, and a real mover and shaker. She is a woman who recognized that women had to organize, across all barriers and across all divisions, that women had to transform themselves and one another if they wanted to change the world. They had to learn to participate in peace negotiations, for example, by refusing the symbolic chairs and other morsels offered them, by confronting the materiel of war and violence with the human force of peace, compassion, and love. When the Big Men of Liberia met in Accra to negotiate “peace”, Gbowee and her sisters in white t-shirts raised a ruckus outside, and just about held the delegates hostage.
  From the outset, Leymah Gbowee identified humanity as the site of her struggles and organizing. That means organizing structures, such as the Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace, followed by the Women In Peacebuilding Network, or WIPNET. From there, she has gone on to organize the Women Peace and Security Network Africa, based in Ghana. Gbowee’s vision of women is African, from Cape to Cairo, and from coast to coast.
  Peace and justice, child by child, person by person, space by space, and beyond. That’s what Leymah Gbowee has been organizing. That’s what is so difficult, if not impossible, to represent. That’s what The New York Times missed. But you don’t have to. On Tuesday, October 18, in the United States, PBS will broadcast the documentary, Pray the Devil Back to Hell, about the work of Leymah Gbowee. Don’t miss it. It’s inspiring, as is its subject.

• Lagos Photo Fest

  Posted: October 6, 2011, 8:41 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The Lagos Photo Festival starts this Sunday with the theme “What Next Africa…..The Hidden Stories”. An impressive list of photographers and I am glad to see George Osodi is amongst! The exhibition will take place in various outdoor venues such as Muri Okunola Park, Victoria Island; Falomo Underpass, Ikoyi and MKO Abiola Park,

• Report finds Shell complicit in human rights abuses & payments to militants

  Posted: October 3, 2011, 9:54 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  A new report has found that Shell fuelled human rights abuses in Nigeria by paying huge contracts to armed militants. The report, called Counting the Cost, is published by Platform and a coalition of NGOs and featured in todays UK Guardian.

  The report, uncovers how Shell’s routine payments to armed militants exacerbated conflicts, in one case leading to the destruction of Rumuekpe town. There are four oil companies operating in Rumuekpe including Shell. In July this year I visited Rumuekpe and spoke with a large group of women activists from the town. The women explained how the towns people were terrorised by competing militants which led to the estimated deaths of 60 people. Eventually the whole population had to run from the town leaving behind their homes, properties and farms. What is left is a ghost town and on the day we visited, the women and ourselves were fearful that we were being watched and it was too dangerous for us to stay for any length of time or walk through the town center.

  Shell also continues to rely on Nigerian government forces who have perpetrated systematic human rights abuses against local residents, including unlawful killings, torture and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment. This has been further exacerbated in recent years by war lordism across the region which has particularly led to violence against women, rape and forced prostitution. The women of Rumuekpe and Okrika Town pointed out that those towns where there were no oil companies were free of militarised and environmental violence and people were able to live in peace.

  What writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa dubbed the “slick alliance” between oil multinationals and the Nigerian military is alive and harmful as ever. Shell’s operations remain inextricably linked to human rights violations committed by government forces. The Nigerian government, driven to keep oil revenues flowing and working in close partnership with oil multinationals, has heavily militarised the Delta. Shell alone has hired over 1,300 government forces as armed guards. For communities, the impacts have been devastating and are in addition to ongoing environmental damage from oil spills and gas flaring.
  
  Commenting on the report, Nnimmo Bassey of Friends of the Earth International said:

  “Shell’s obligations are clear: it must clean up after decades of devastating oil spills, end the illegal practice of gas flaring and compensate the victims of human rights abuses in Nigeria. It is unacceptable that Shell continues to deny responsibility, while pushing communities deeper into poverty and fuelling destructive conflicts.”

  “Shell’s divisive practices have led to daily human rights violations in the Niger Delta,” added Geert Ritsema from Friends of the Earth Netherlands. “Many of the victims have no access to justice and cannot afford to take the oil giant to court. Lawsuits in Nigeria can take decades to resolve and the remedies are often inadequate. Yet Shell must be held accountable for its environmental destruction and complicity in human rights abuses in Nigeria, and home governments like the UK and Netherlands must ensure that remedies are available and accessible to the victims.”

• Elder’s Corner: A Social history of Nigeria through music

  Posted: October 1, 2011, 6:00 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Elder’s Corner: Another awesome project by musical innovator, Siji which traces the history of music in Nigeria through interviews with our country’s musical giants – Please support the project – no amount is too small.

  
   

  SYNOPSIS

  Elder’s Corner is musical journey through pivotal moments in the colorful history of Nigeria as told through the lives and careers of the nations foremost music legends. It is a story about the eroding effects of colonialism, bitter ethnic clashes, politics, oil, power, money and their combined effects on a nation that recently celebrated its 50th year of self rule.

  THE FILM

  Shot against the colorful and gritty backdrop of some of Nigeria’s urban cities particularly Lagos and through the clever use of extensive in depth interviews, archival footage and still photographs, Elder’s Corner will take viewers on a musical journey through the country’s turbulent and colorful history. It will chronicle and showcase the lives and work of some of the leading exponents of the various musical movements that spawned Afrobeat, Juju, Apala, Highlife and Fuji music.

• Nigeria ‘celebrates’ 51 years of Independence with new anti-homosexuality bill

  Posted: September 30, 2011, 3:22 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Nigeria is to mark it’s 51st anniversary of nationhood with the introduction of yet another anti-homosexuality bill. – two previous Bills in 2006 and 2009 were abandoned. The present Bill [Same Gender Marriage Prohibition Bill 2011 - the Bill is published below] seeks to further criminalise anyone who either enters into a same sex marriage or witnesses, supports, aids, a same gender marriage. The penalties are three years imprisonment for entering into a marriage and five years or a fine of N2,000, for witnessing, supporting, aiding such a marriage. For a group witnessing, supporting or aiding there is a fine of N50,000.

  The previous two Bills were abandoned following the statements at a public hearing, of Nigerian human rights activists and their allies, that the Bill was a violation of the rights of individuals and as such not appropriate in a modern democracy. The sponsors of the two previous Bills were never able to explain why they wish to criminalise that which is already criminalised and that explanation is still absent from this bill. Though the 2011 Bill has been watered down it still reinforces the criminalisation of same sex / gender relationships.

  Nigerian human rights activists have come together quickly and published a strong statement condemning the Bill and pointing out the rights of Nigerians as stated in Chapter IV of the Nigerian Constitution and Article 7 of The United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Defenders.

  Already, in 2006, the Special Representative condemned the previous version of this bill in a letter to the Nigerian government. This bill would increase the risk to human rights defenders, and would violate Nigeria’s human rights obligations.

  As citizens and human rights defenders, we demand our rights. As tax-paying Nigerians, we demand the efficient use of our financial resources. We request the Senate to disregard this ominous bill, and consider instead discussing life saving legislation, including the Anti-Stigmatization bill and National Health Insurance bill.

  Statement by

  NIGERIA HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS CONDEMN 2011 SAME GENDER MARRIAGE PROHIBITION BILL

  We, the Coalition for the Defense of Sexual Rights were shocked and deeply concerned by the news published in the Nigerian press about the re-introduction of “A bill for an act to prohibition marriage between persons of same gender, solemisation of same and for other matters related therewith”

  Similar bills appeared before the House in 2006 and 2008 and were critically analysed both times by human rights activists, who articulated the dangers of the bills to a democratic society.

  We wish to remind the parliament that Nigeria is a secular state. This means that the laws of our land cannot and should not be drafted and/or enacted on the basis of a particular religious and cultural value. These values already indicate the diversity of Nigeria as a heterogeneous society–hence our federal system of government.
  
  We as human rights defenders are aware that not a single gay group has asked for the right to marry. Our advocacy is not directed at that. We are advocating for tolerance and respect for everyone irrespective of his or her sex, gender, age, ethnicity, race, sexual orientation and gender identity, etc. These rights are not illusionary. They are rights that Nigeria’s same –sex loving people derive from Chapter IV of the Nigerian constitution, which lists the fundamental rights enjoyed by all Nigerians, including the rights to freedom from discrimination, to personal liberty, to human dignity, and to private life.

  Furthermore, we feel deeply threatened by the proposed paragraph 4(2) of the bill, which provides greater criminal liability to anyone who abets and aids same-sex marriage. An individual would face up to five years’ imprisonment.

  This provision clearly targets the activities of human right defenders, who have a mandate, without limitation, to defend the rights of people regardless of their sexual orientation and gender identity/expression.

  The United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, in its Article 7, specifically provides that “everyone has the right, individually and in association with others to develop and discuss new human rights ideas and principles and to advocate their acceptance.”

  The UN Secretary General’s Special Representative on the Rights of Human Rights Defenders has repeatedly expressed concern over attacks on defenders “who are at particular risk, namely those who defend the rights of indigenous people and minorities [and] lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) persons and women human rights defenders.” (UN Doc A/HRC/4/37, January 24, 2007, at 55).

  Already, in 2006, the Special Representative condemned the previous version of this bill in a letter to the Nigerian government. This bill would increase the risk to human rights defenders, and would violate Nigeria’s human rights obligations.

  As citizens and human rights defenders, we demand our rights. As tax-paying Nigerians, we demand the efficient use of our financial resources. We request the Senate to disregard this ominous bill, and consider instead discussing life saving legislation, including the Anti-Stigmatization bill and National Health Insurance bill.

  Dorothy Aken’Ova:
  darlyndotty@yahoo.co.uk
  +2348034500714

  Akoro Joseph Sewedo:
  sakoro@initiative4equality.org
  +2347066622191

  The Same Gender Marriage Bill [Prohibition] 2011
  An Act To Prohibit Marriage Between Persons Of Same Gender, Solemnization Of Same And For Other Matters Related Therewith
  Sponsors:
  Senator Domingo Obende
  Senator Ehigie Edobor Uzamere
  Senator Adegbenga Seflu Kaka
  Senator Borrofice Robert A.
  Senator Pius Ewherido
  Senator Yusuf Musa Nagogo
  Senator Mohammed Magoro
  Senator Emmanuel Paulker
  Senator George Sekibo
  Senator Eyinnaya Abarbe
  Senator Nenadi E. Usman
  Senator Helen Esuene
  Senator Babafemi Oiudu
  Senator Owremi Tinubu
  Senator Owgbenga Ashafa
  Senator Obadara Owgbenga
  Senator Joshua Dariye
  Senator Saleh Mohammed Sani
  Senator Hope Uzodinma
  Senator Ayogu Eze
  Senator Smart Adeyemi
  Senator Ahmad Lawan
  Senator Igwe Paulinus Nwagu
  Senator Mohammed D. Goje
  Senator Barnabas Gemade
  Senator Boluwaji Kunlere

  BE IT ENACTED by the National Assembly of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as follows:
  1.–(1) Marriage Contract entered between persons of same Gender is hereby prohibited in Nigeria.
  (2) Marriages Contract entered between persons of same gender are invalid and shall not be recognized as entitled to the benefits of a valid marriage.
  (3) Marriage Contract entered between persons of same gender by virtue a certificate issued by a foreign country shall be void in Nigeria, and any benefits accruing there from by virtue of the certificate shall not be enforced by any court of law in Nigeria.
  2.–(1) Marriage entered between persons of same Gender shall not be solemnized in any place of worship either Church or Mosque in Nigeria.
  (2) No marriage certificate issued to parties of same sex marriage in Nigeria.
  3. Only marriage contracted between a man and a woman either under Islamic Law, Customary Law and Marriage Act is recognized as valid in Nigeria.
  4.–(1) Persons that entered into a same gender marriage contract commit an offence and are jointly liable on conviction to a term of 3 years imprisonment each.
  (2) Any persons or group of persons that witnesses, abet and aids the solemnization of a same gender marriage contract commits an offence and liable on conviction to –
  (a) if an individual to a term of 5 years imprisonment or a group of persons to a fine of ₦2,000 or both,
  (b) if a group of persons to a fine of ₦50,000 only.
  5. The High Court of a State shall have jurisdiction to entertain matter arising from the breach of the provisions of this Bill.
  6. In this Bill, unless the context otherwise requires–
  “Marriage” here relates to a legal union entered between persons of opposite sex in accordance with the Marriage Act, Islamic and Customary Laws.
  “High Court” to include High Court of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
  “Same Gender Marriage” means the coming together of persons of the same sex with the purpose of leaving together as husband and wife or for other purposes of same sexual relationship.
  7. This Bill may be cited as Same Gender Marriage (Prohibition) Bill, 2011.
  Explanatory Note:
  This Bill seeks to prohibit marriage between persons of same gender, and witnessing same, and provided appropriate solemnization of the marriage penalties thereof.

• Visionary and extraordinary woman: RIP Wangari Maathai

  Posted: September 26, 2011, 4:17 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  In her honour let us continue to plant trees, plant seeds of life, plant good governance, plant love of each other

   

  Gukira has an excellent post honouring Wangari Maathai “Wangari’s Daughters”

  Over the past few years, it has been my immense privilege to meet and come to know women I now think of as Wangari Maathai’s daughters: Sitawa Namwalie, Wambui Mwangi, Shailja Patel, Njeri Wangari, Muthoni Garland, Mshai Mwangola—there are many others. I mean daughters in a sense perhaps best expressed in the founding Gikuyu myth: women of consequence who have the power to move and shape nations. Women for whom nations will be named and re-named.

  I think of these women today on learning that Wangari Maathai has died. I think of them not only because of the sense of loss they must be experiencing, but because they are, to my mind, one of Wangari’s most precious legacies to Kenya and to the world. These are, I confess, overly bold claims to make for my friends. But they are claims that need to be made.

• Tabloid bloggers, online vigilantes & sexual violence

  Posted: September 24, 2011, 6:50 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  On Saturday 17th Nigerian blogger Linda Ikeji reported the “gang rape of a young woman of Abia State University” which had been videoed, circulated and broadcast over the internet and is apparently on multiple sites together with an audio version. Linda Ikeji states that she has a one hour video on her laptop plus a 10 minute version on  her phone. She also states that  uploading it on the internet is not an option.

  In the one week since the announcement of the gang rape, under the guise of outrage and desires for justice, the case has become a spectacle played out on Twitter, Facebook and blogs.

  In a recent blog post critiquing the 419 Reasons to Like Nigeria, I made the point that what is often most important in revealing who we are as a nation and people, is how we respond to our realities.  How do we respond to the gang rape of a young woman and one which is subsequently broadcast on various online sites?  Linda Ikeji gave enough graphic detail for all of us to know how the rape scene played out.   Yet some people continue watching and or listening to the video and reporting details of what was said and done?   To do this they would need to search online or ask someone privately for a copy to be sent by email or through their phone or for a link online.    These are not small acts – they are calculated decisions to seek out a video of a gang rape.   Unless you are in a position to possibly identify the rapists and take that information to someone who can act on it then what is your purpose in watching the video other than for self-gratification? Each time the video is watched or listened to or the text read it is a repeat of the rape,  which is exactly the purpose of the video – to continue the humiliation, the subjugation and to relive the rape over and over.

  It is not normal for women to be treated in this way.  The way the video is being circulated is a way of normalising watching violence and playing it out as if it’s some kind of reality show whereby everyone can participate by absorbing and gorging on detail without any sense of social or ethical responsibility.    I am not saying people are not genuinely outraged by the gang rape, they most certainly are but its  a pretense to equate outrage with a justification for watching the video.  This pornographic video has been downloaded 7000+  times from a Nigerian online site and was available until this morning.  How about some outrage against this and the money that is being made from it?   The site has be taken down but those downloads remain.

  Calls through various social media and politicians for the young victim of this heinous act, to come forward and present herself are equally alarming and lack any understanding of the depth of trauma experienced by rape victims as made clear by  Modupe Debbie Aryio of Africans United Against Child Abuse [AFRUCA]

  AS A MENTAL HEALTH PRACTITIONER, PSYCHOTHERAPIST/COUNSELLOR WHO HAS WORK FOR OVER 20YRS WITH TRAUMA VICTIMS, VICTIMS OF SEXUAL VIOLENCE, DV AND RAPE VICTIMS, I THINK IT IS IMPORTANT NOT TO PUT UNDUE PRESSURE ON THIS YOUNG LADY SO SHE DOES FEEL ADDITIONALLY ‘RAPED’ AGAIN BY ALL THE FURORE THAT SURROUNDS HER. THE MOST IMPORTANT THING AT THIS TIME FOR HER IS TO BE ABLE TO GET THE PSYCHOLOGICAL,EMOTIONAL AND ANY OTHER MEDICAL SUPPORT SHE MAY NEED AS A RESULT OF THIS HORRENDOUS ACT PERPETRATED ON HER. WHILE THE ANGER AND INSTINCTUAL CRY FOR JUSTICE ON HER BEHALF IS
  
  NEEDS TO TAKE PLACE, WE MUST REMEMBER THAT THE MAJORITY OF US ARE COMING FROM A PLACE OF STRENGTH AND WELL BEING. HER EXTREME VULNERABILITY, SHOCK AND FEAR MUST BE RECOGNISED AND UNDERSTOOD. EVEN IN THE WEST WHERE THERE ARE ALL THE SYSTEMS IN PLACE TO PROTECT AND CARE FOR ‘VICTIMS’, THERE IS STILL A LOT OF STIGMA PLACED ON RAPE VICTIMS, WHICH IS WHY MANY OF THEM DO NOT REPORT IT. AND FOR SOME THEY ARE SIMPLY UNABLE TO DEAL WITH THE PSYCHOLOGICAL WEIGHT OF THE EXPERIENCE AND HAVE TAKEN SEVERAL YEARS BEFORE THEY CAN COME TO TERMS WITH IT.

  From the place of strength I considered myself to be in, I cannot imagine myself being able to speak of this publicly, certainly not at this point and certainly not in Nigeria.   There are very few support systems in place, if any  and even if there were it would take exceptional strength to speak.  No woman should be pressured into doing this.  And to come out to what?    Who is she supposed to present herself too? The police who only began to investigate the gang rape after it was taken up by a Member of the Federal House of Representatives, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, who presented the case to the House.  The police with a reputation for corruption, ineptitude, extra-judicial murder, misogyny, rape and torture?  The Abia State government which is led by a Governor and his wife who have repeatedly dismissed the case and refused to take any action other than making ridiculous statements such as the rape is the work of political protractors and his wife waffling on about the “good” work she is doing for women in her state?  The Abia State university authorities who claim the rapists are not students and do not appear to have done anything to move the case forward?   Even the Member of the House of Representatives, who has offered to protect her [how she will do this?] does not seem to recognise the trauma involved here.

  On Wednesday tweeps began to appear about outing the rapists.  I watched with horror as very soon three names were retweeted from a Nigerian blog  including one photograph taken from a Facebook page. Sometime later  two of those  who had  published the name, clearly realising what they had set in motion,  began to retract by  first deleting the names and sending out panic messages not to harm the men.  Statements such as

   

  “Please do not retweet the names of the ‘suspects’ for the safety of the victim” and “No harassing the suspects until we’ve got double confirmations.  Until then, use these names to try and FIND THE OTHERS!!!!!” “Names are for investigation not lynching. RESTRAIN YOURSELVES PEOPLE!! NO LYNCHING!! LYNCHING IS WRONG!! OBEY THE LAW!! @Sugabelly

  “What’s done is, now we need to make the best of it and refocus on the need for justice for all concerned” , For all the indignation and concern people might have, the best concerted appeal to all should be – No resorting to mob action” @Forakin

  Statements such as “Again, the issue of instant justice stems from the fact that our society does not help guarantee justice when sought” and “if the police & ABSU authorizes had been proactive  rather than in denial the names could have gone straight to them” @Forakin

   

  Fortunately there was some sanity in all the madness  and wise words emerged from the occasional person.

   

  The consequences of irresponsibly rushing to be  social media vigilantes – “cops, judge and jury via social media” slowly became evident as  it  turns out that one of the named men, whose photo was also published,  has been wrongly identified.  The ‘mistake” has been repeatedly tweeted and an apology given by @Sugabelly who had tweeted his name, though not the only one.  And yes men are quick to slag off women  and could care less about our reputations whilst screaming at the first hint of any slight against them. However I dont wish to follow their standards  of conduct and mistaking someone for a rapist is not a small matter.

  We should not forget  too the video has a history  and has been uploaded 7000+ times, passing from computer to phone.  As far as I am concerned they too are complicit in the rape and should face criminal charges. We can start with the  @9jaonline videos, the site which up till early this morning continued to make the video available for download as if this was some make believe Nollywood movie which is vile enough in itself.  [The site and their Twitter account have been removed in the past 6 hours]   It cannot be that difficult to trace the origins and those who have participated in watching it.  @Sugabelly tweeted for them and others to stop posting the video…

  @9janonlinevideos STOP THIS!! STOP posting this video!! Stop trying to profit from the #ABSURape #ABSU @Sugabelly

  “I am so disgusted and horrified by people who are actually trying to PROFIT from the #ABSU rape video by using it too…. @Sugabelly

  The blogger who, as far as I am aware, originally published the names made the ill-considered  decision to publish further photographs, along with Sahara Reporters,  from Facebook pages with the comment:

  Could the photos below be innocent people who have been wrongly accused for the Abia State University (ABSU) gang of 5? If they are, could they report to the nearest police station or better still engage the services of lawyers to file for libel.

  On Wednesday, 21st September, 2011, I took a risk to take this scandalous case to another level by publishing the names as well as the photos taken from Face Book. I was blasted by an aggrieved lady blogger who thought only her had the exclusive right to publish or write or investigate this case. I had made my point. I chose to withdraw the post. I will now go back to remove the password to enable viewers read and properly view these SUSPECTS. Of course, they are alleged rapists. They are only Suspects. And the blogger (whom I had adjudged on her post when she recently celebrated her birthday as the Nigeria’s no 1 blogger) had the unprofessional act to paste a comment on this blog calling me irresponsible. Well,I rest my case. But has the blogger and her fans ever bothered while these suspected rapists haven’t made any statement via their lawyers?

  The justification is about “exposing Nigeria in a bad light” as if such horrendous crimes only take place in Nigeria.  It’s responses like this that “put the country in bad light” not the crimes themselves.    The questions that come to mind are how do we differentiate between playing out a reality show and genuine search for the truth and subsequently justice? What are our responsibilities in our online presence?  How do we stop at crossing the line between sensationalist reporting, self aggrandisement and socially responsible actions?

  Blame the technology?  The templates are technical, the substance is of our own creation whether original or otherwise which in this case is a series of collision movements pushing one force against another.  Social Media as a functional space is  self-censored and self-regulated and with that comes social and ethical responsibilities as reputations are at risk here.  Acting as online vigilantes and challenging people to sue you for libel is just plain wrong. When the vigilantism falls under the headlines “Exclusive” it is not surprising one would be accused of “driving traffic to your blog” – it almost feels like an act of desperation!   Whatever the failings of  the Nigerian police a choice could have been made to pass this information to them or to those House Members who have expressed a willingness to take the case on board.  Alternatively pass the information on to a media network who have the resources and trust to carry out a proper investigation.   This is not withstanding the fact that these exposes may themselves hamper or end up being prejudicial to the case..

  Perhaps thought and a great deal of it should be given to the young woman at the center of this crime and those  insisting on perpetuating the repetitive tabloid outrage need ask themselves whether this is really about her or themselves.  A coalition of groups have announced this morning  that they have found the young woman.  What right do they have to go in search of the young woman and then present us with more lurid  of  details on her emotional and psychological state. If they really wanted to protect her they would have kept their actions quiet instead of adding to the media circus.

  Thoughts on how we as a nation can begin to create safe and supportive spaces for victims of sexual violence and how we can begin to counteract the stigma associated with rape.  So many of us have been raped, sexually abused, fought off numerous attempted rapes and have been subjected to continuous sexual harassment which is normalised to the point that we are not even supposed to speak of it –  at home, at work, at college and in social spaces.

  So perhaps those men so outraged by this awful crime could  look too themselves and begin to address their belief  they have an entitlement to our bodies and the daily sexual harassment  and sexist, misogynist attitudes they have towards women which takes place off and online.   We all  need to call out these acts of online sexual harassment, every time they happen from NOW!

  UPDATE

  Police in Abia State have arrested two alleged rapists “one Zaki and his roommate last night”

• Blue, Black & White: Solo performance on the life of Sir Seretse Khama

  Posted: September 24, 2011, 2:28 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Blue Black and White: If you are in New York or nearby check and want to give support to a young actor from Botswana then please do check out this solo performance by Donald Molosi of the story of Sir Seretse Khama, the first prime minister of independent Botswana.   There are two shows –  Sun, Oct 23 at 5:00pm & Sat, Nov 19 at 7:30pm [Details here]

   

• links for 2011-09-23

  Posted: September 23, 2011, 5:03 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Trend Lines | Africom's Message Evolving, but Mission Unchanged (tags: africa africom militarism)
  • ISLAMIC Supposedly Boko Haram website -  (tags: Nigeria BokoHaram)
  • U.S. building secret drone bases in Africa, Arabian Peninsula, officials say – The Washington Post (tags: militarism africa africom middle_east)
  • President Obama’s Very Own ‘War on Terror,’ Continued | NationofChange (tags: militarism africa)

• The Hypocrisy of the UN and US on human rights & social justice

  Posted: September 23, 2011, 4:12 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Ugandan LGBTI activist, Kasha Jacqueline speaks at the “UN Summit on Discrimination and Persecution”. – Through her own personal experience as an activist in Uganda, Kasha speaks about the war against the LGBTI community in her country and the hypocrisy and failure of the UN to protect anyone – at least anyone outside of the interest of oil and nuclear weapons.

  Kasha is highly critical of the UN, the invasion of Libya, saying it does not care about her and other activists. Whilst at the conferences she was harassed at the UN building by members of her country. She asks, where was the UN in protecting her and others who are been victimized in the their countries? Where was the UN in the war in northern Uganda? Why does the UN continue to talk about human rights but at the same time happily sit next to world leaders and their governments who are torturing and persecuting their own people [and I would add make selective choices on where to intervene, who to topple based on nothing more than self-interest and greed]. Who holds the UN accountable? She concludes the UN does not care about human rights. She is right and neither does the US.

  What is missing from the Summit are the voices of Americans and people living in the US who have suffered discrimination and persecution, torture and detention, and the many people killed by the state when there is reasonable and in the case of Troy Davis substantial doubt as to his guilt. Kasha speaks of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill which may or may not be dead and buried. The Bill originally called for the death penalty for repeated homosexual offenses but was dropped following outrage from the global community. The US was highly vocal in condemning the possibility of death penalty in Uganda yet the US is one of the few countries along with Saudi Arabia [its ally] Iran[its enemy] China [its competitor in the global market] in the world that continues to issue death warrants EVEN where there is reasonable and substantial doubt. The murder of Troy Davis was the the worst human rights violation – a legalised murder committed by the United States Government – an obscene baying for blood, an act of vengeance against the innocent.

• 419 Reasons

  Posted: September 20, 2011, 9:25 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  In two weeks Nigeria will attempt yet another deception by claiming to “celebrate’ 51 years of independence.  There will be the usual speeches, parades and flag waving by undignified dignitaries.  Bloggers and Tweeps will simultaneously rubbish the country, ask for God’s salvation, pray and claim its not really that bad and continue the search for 419 Reasons to Like Nigeria.  Growth is at 7% but there is no national grid and everyone relies on generators; billions have been made from oil yet the region where it is produced is impoverished.

  Today the country is faced with daily attacks by Boko Haram; religious and ethnic violence in Plateau State; rumblings from ex militants in the Niger Delta; political assassinations and increasing number of kidnappings; the labeling and abuse of children as witches.   Encircling all of  these is the ongoing corruption and here I am not only referring to politicians and civil servants but religious institutions and just about every aspect of life; the persistent decades long crisis in education, health, infrastructure, environmental destruction and the violence of poverty.  Of course none of these are peculiar to Nigeria and there are countries where corruption, poverty levels and violence are far far worse. But I dont want to get into the trap of comparisons. The point is how do we as citizens respond to our realities?  How do we respond to the gang rape of a young woman which is subsequently broadcast on YouTube or the extrajudicial murder of a young man also broadcast on YouTube?

  By launching a campaign on 419 Reasons to Like Nigeria and Nigerians? The campaign takes its name “419” from the financial scams originally associated with Nigeria but copied by fraudsters throughout the world.  The first initiative to “like Nigeria” was the ‘The 419Positive Project’ which invited Nigerians and their friends to come up with “419 positive attributes of Nigerians”.  The “419 Reasons to Like ……..” follows on from this by asking bloggers and tweepers to write positive things about Nigeria which seems to me to be not only a thankless task but given the serious failings and present crises, wholly misdirected.   The energy spent in trying to come up with positive reasons to like a country would be better spent in organising and campaigning around the many problems which are being neglected.    The “419 positives”so far listed such as a Nigerian winning political office in Poland or winning a sporting event, though wonderful personal accomplishments, have no bearing on the shaping of political and economic forces in the country.    There is a political immaturity about the 419 Reasons……. which is little more than a tabloid gimmick with minimal substance in a country which is addicted to corruption, to militarism, to individualism, to religion and hypocrisy.   Though I fully respect her decision to stop writing, how I miss the insight and critical thinking of one of the very few serious Nigerian political blogs, Nigerian Curiosity.

  Nigerian leaders have always viewed criticism as unpatriotic or even treason and many a journalist has paid the price for daring to speak out.   We as citizens should not fall into the same stupor of denial.  To be critical is not a betrayal rather it is our duty as citizens to raise the national consciousness and seriously engage with political processes.

  Take the gang rape of the young woman and incidentally four weeks on and people continue to watch the video.  Abia State University deny the rapists are students. Neither the police nor the State government officials have come out to even make a statement let alone investigate and hopefully arrest the rapists.  Many of the comments on the Facebook page “Nigerians Against Rape” are voyeuristic as people go into detailed discussion on the video – who said what and did what and when and so the rape goes on and on.

  Of course there are positives for instance resistance to violence and militarism or searching for ways to ensure that when women are raped they can expect to receive justice.  Here we can turn to the numerous examples of women who historically have been at the forefront of struggles for social and economic justice such as the market women of Aba and Egbaland,  Ogoni and Ijaw women. But these are not individual achievements they are actions by communities. What would they have achieved by trying to come up with 419 positives instead of facing the colonial state or an occupying army?

  There is something disturbing whereby people feel the need to be liked because of their nationality or person which assumes one can be disliked for the same reason – neither is rational.  419 Reasons….. is an obsession with the self – please please like me because I am a really nice person and I can prove it.  It’s the encounters with people and communities and how we experience each other that influences the way we feel about particular people or groups of people.

   

• “Our Africa” – New critical thinking by African women

  Posted: September 20, 2011, 4:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  “Our Africa” is a series of “critical analysis and fresh thinking” by African Women. The essays highlight the key issues facing African women and “the economic and political forces shaping” the continent. The series is edited by Jessica Horn, Jane Gabriel, and Amel Gorani.

  On the launch of the series Mariame Toure Quattara writes on women farmers organising to denounce agricultural policies in Burkina Faso; Amina Mama on how women must and can respond to the impact of growing militarism on our lives; and Jessica Horn reflects on the lives of two African feminists, Kenya’s Wambui Otieno Mbugua and Nigeria’s Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti

  On 30 August 2011 Wambui Otieno Mbugua passed away in her home country Kenya, after a life of dedicated and fearless activism. She may not have been a household name of the variety beamed through our television sets across the globe, although she certainly was a household name in the hearts of many an African activist. And yet the landscape of the battles that she fought and the issues she fought for are now given audience in mainstream policy forums. As a young leader in the Mau Mau rebellion against British colonial rule she risked her life in the name of her people’s freedom, facing sexual violation at the hands of a British colonial officer. She was adamant that silence was not an option, and called for her rapist to be prosecuted. Throughout her life Wambui Otieno continued to question the masculist pen in which the rules of society were written – choosing against the logic of ethnic nationalism to marry a man of a different ethnic group, challenging customary rules that deemed her without a right as a woman to decide on where her dead husband would be buried, and later withstanding public criticism at her decision to choose a second husband decades younger than her. Eulogies by contemporary African activists such as Muthoni Wanyeki – former director of the Kenyan Human Rights Commission – attest to brightness of the flame that Wambui Otieno lit.

  The figure of Wambui Otieno Mbugua evokes the memory of another trailblazer, Nigerian Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti. As discussion on the legacy of musician/activist Fela Kuti is revived through the Broadway musical about his life, we are also reminded that it was his mother, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti who laid the foundations of much of his resistance politics. Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti was an indefatigable voice against the injustices of her time. In the 1940s she successfully organised the market women of Abeokuta, the city in which she lived, against a tax levied on them by the colonial-backed traditional ruler of Abeokuta (an event framed as the Egba Women’s War). In the same collectivist spirit she co-founded a number of mass-based women’s organisations in Nigeria. In a literal embrace of freedom of movement, she was the first Nigerian woman to drive a car.

• links for 2011-09-19

  Posted: September 19, 2011, 5:11 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • On Racial Literacy: "A White Side of Black Britain" Twine shows that living in transracial spaces does not necessarily provide a greater understanding of race and racism. (tags: britain racism Class Gender White_Britain Black_Britain)
  • Difficult love, difficult truth – Mail & Guardian Online: The smart news source Interview with Zanele Muholi on her photography and activism (tags: Queer southafrica photography Lesbian transgender)

• Troy Davis: 14 Days in May – The execution of Edward Earl Johnson

  Posted: September 16, 2011, 1:05 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  This was the third time I watched this documentary on the last 14 days in the life of Edward Earl Johnson who was executed in Mississippi’s gas chamber on May 20, 1987. This is a horrific act of cruel and inhumane punishment that has everything to do with vengeance and little to do with justice. The evidence against Edward Earl Johnson was weak and tenuous and further investigation after his execution revealed it was highly unlikely Earl Johnson was guilty. In less than a week a similar fate awaits Troy Davis. To try to stop his execution please sign the many petitions, write emails whatever you can to stop this from happening OR just write to Troy that you care, that he is loved whatever happens! Let this not be the last five days of Troy Davis’s life.

  In this Follow up to 14 days in May – Johnson’s lawyer, Stafford Smith [Reprieve] searches for the truth behind Johnson’s arrest, trial and execution.

  Troy Anthony Davis, his family’s website
  [troyanthonydavis.org]
  NAACP Too Much Doubt Campaign    [www.naacp.org]
  Amnesty International Too Much Doubt Campaign    [www.amnestyusa.org]
  Educators for Troy `Teach Troy Davis’ Emergency
  Curriculum for Educators
  [troydaviseducation.wordpress.com]
  Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
  [www.gfadp.org]
  National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty
  [www.ncadp.org]
  Campaign to End the Death Penalty
  [www.nodeathpenalty.org]

  Write to Troy: Send our brother Troy some love and light.
  Troy Anthony Davis, 41, has been on death row in Georgia for
  more than 19 years: Troy A. Davis, 657378, GDCP G-3-79, P.O.
  Box 3877, Jackson GA 30233.

• I Am: When being one’s self is enough – A film by Sonali Gulati

  Posted: September 15, 2011, 8:24 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The journey home is always fraught with contradictions. The longing for the place you left and the realisation that your imagination was far from the reality; the joy of the familiar and remembrance; the realisation that possibly your home is now somewhere else and breaking away is as difficult as coming home. I Am is a journey home but one which is compounded by the loss of a mother and coming out.

  Trailer for I AM (documentary film by sonali gulati) from Sonali Gulati on Vimeo.

  DIRECTOR’S NOTES

  I started making I Am in 2005. My personal experience of leading a closeted life and my inability to come out to my mother before she died, serves as not only the motivation, but also the starting point for the film. As I began to come out to some of my friends, I noticed that this was not as muted, or invisible, or shameful a subject as I had perceived it to be. I managed to connect with a community of people who were out to their parents, some of whom were even very accepting and understanding. As a departure from my own story, I Am became a portrait of various Indian families, living in India, dealing with having a gay or lesbian family member.

  I knew that I wanted to focus on people living in India, because at the time, lawyers in favor of keeping Section 377 (the law that criminalized homosexuality in India) argued that homosexuality was a western import and that it was not part of Indian culture and history. What was ironic was that they were fighting to keep in place a British law that was exactly that.

  I Am is an innovative film that takes more than simply creative risks. The experience of making this film has shown me the power in representing one’s self and one’s community from the inside, striking a balance between the need to inform and the need to maintain privacy.

• links for 2011-09-15

  Posted: September 15, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Cameras Everywhere: Current Challenges and Opportunities at the Intersection of Human Rights, Video and Technology – Global Voices Advocacy (tags: Advocacy Witness humanrights)
  • The railroading of Troy Davis (tags: Troy_Davis Georgia Capital_Punishment)
  • African & Caribbean Filmmakers To Gather In Cuba To Talk Collaborating (Danny Glover Leads Charge) > Shadow and Act | Cinema of the African Diaspora September 12,2011. U.S. actor Danny Glover will lead a large delegation of filmmakers from Africa and the Caribbean to participate in a meeting in Havana on audiovisual production in those regions and their cultural ties and identity. Organized by the Office of the Traveling Caribbean Film Festival, the event will meet next week at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba, with debates, panel discussions and presentations on the aesthetic and narrative components of the films in both territories. (tags: Caribbean Arica Film Cuba)

• The beauty of revolution – Steve Biko lives!

  Posted: September 14, 2011, 5:15 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Two interesing and not unrelated blog posts to mark the 34th anniversary of Steve Biko‘ death. In the first Khadija Patel interviews Andile Mngxitama, South African Black consciousness activists and co-editor of “Biko Lives!” – the mistake is to have believed he died on that day 34 years ago. It is much harder to kill an idea than a person as Andile points out.

  “Steve Biko… we say Biko lives. Steve Biko lives,” insists Mngxitama, “The biggest mistake of the apartheid regime was to think they could kill him and his ideas.” Mngxitama believes Biko himself understood the need for longevity in his ideas when he wrote, “It is better to die for an idea that will live than to live for an idea that will die.” Steve Biko is certainly more than a T-shirt. His were ideas that galvanised the struggle against the apartheid and a realisation of self-worth among black people themselves.

  “Today we see young people outside of the political formation trying to read and understand Biko, try to make sense of Steve Biko in a country which remains basically anti-black. So, from this point of view, it is very clear that Biko lives,” – Read the full interview here

  The second post is less an idea and more a reality is a speech given by Abhalali baseMjondolo President, S’bu Zikode on the progress of post-apartheid south Africa. [A discussion between Zikode and Andile would be an interesting one and I wonder why this has not happened to date especially since Abhalali is a breathing revolution] Much of what Zikode speaks confirms Andile’s comment that South Africa is anti-black – “a white country under black management”
  

  Land has not been fairly redistributed. The economy continues to exclude and to exploit. Millions are without work and millions are working but still poor and without security. Most of the land and the economy remains in the hands of rich whites. They have been joined by some rich blacks but the poor, the majority, remain locked out. The great change we have seen over the past seventeen years has been the change from a white government to a black government but this black government is not a government of the people. It is led by a few wealthy individuals who continue to enrich themselves in the name of democracy. Corruption in governance has become the norm. Politics has become a new economic path and a career for the young members of the ruling party. Politics means access to tenders, access to wealth and control. Politics is not about serving the people.

  We had thought that the new government would replace a system of exclusion and inequality with a just society. But what they have actually done is to simply take their place in that system of exclusion and inequality. They have not tried to transform that system. We are told that now that the system is under black management we are free. We have refused to accept this. When the government celebrates Freedom Day in the stadiums every year we mourn unFreedom Day in the shacks.

• links for 2011-09-14

  Posted: September 14, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Robert Fisk – The Age of the Warrior (tags: Terrorism War USA Torture)
  • Stop Sept 21 Execution of Troy Davis! Campaign Just a week to the state murder of Troy Davis - AND NOW HIS EXECUTION HAS BEEN SET FOR WEDNESDAY, SEPTMEBER 21!. 
    TELL THE GEORGIA GOV., LEGISLATURE, PRESIDENT OBAMA, ATTORNEY GENERAL HOLDEN, CONGRESS AND THE MEDIA: STOP THE EXECUTION OF TROY DAVIS! (tags: Troy_Davis Capital_Punishment State_Murder Georgia)
  • The march of the neoliberals | Politics | The Guardian Neoliberalism is grounded in the "free, possessive individual", with the state cast as tyrannical and oppressive. The welfare state, in particular, is the arch enemy of freedom. The state must never govern society, dictate to free individuals how to dispose of their private property, regulate a free-market economy or interfere with the God-given right to make profits and amass personal wealth. State-led "social engineering" must never prevail over corporate and private interests. It must not intervene in the "natural" mechanisms of the free market, or take as its objective the amelioration of free-market capitalism's propensity to create inequality. (tags: Neo-liberal UK Politics)

• links for 2011-09-08

  Posted: September 8, 2011, 5:12 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Discovered Files Show U.S., Britain Had Extensive Ties with Gaddafi Regime on Rendition, Torture If ever there was a moment for a revolution in our thinking, this is it. We have not understood, for 10 years, much of what the world has been about. We have waged war, and we are continuing to wage endless war in simplistic terms, domestically against our own Muslim citizens, against others, and against huge swaths of countries, now moving, for instance, to the Horn of Africa. We cannot continue in this permanence of combative aggression in our thinking, let alone our actions. And this is an opportunity, I would have thought, that Libya, in what’s being found there, which is essential historic documentation of how we arrived at this pass—it’s essential it be grappled with. (tags: War+Terror Rendition Imperialism revolution)
  • UK aided rendition of Libyan rebel – FT.com High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/821092cc-d713-11e0-bc73-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1XJFPbZ9s
    Britain’s intelligence services are under pressure to spell out the full extent of their links with Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s former regime in Libya after it emerged that the UK was complicit in a successful US plot to transfer an Islamist terror suspect to Tripoli seven years ago. (tags: Libya War+Terror Rendition)
  • Perpetual War » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names And today while the majority of Euro-American citizens flounder in a moral desert, now unhappy with the wars, now resigned, now propagandized into differentiating what is, in effect, an overarching imperial strategy into good/bad wars, the US General Petraeus (currently commanding  the CIA) tells us: “You have to recognize also that I don’t think you win this war (tags: 9/11 War+Terror imperialism)

• Interview with Yaba Badoe – Its so easy to be called a witch

  Posted: September 6, 2011, 5:15 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

   

  Ghanaian writer “True Murder” and filmmaker “The Witches of Gambaga“, Yaba Badoe is interviewed by Beti Ellison  [African Women in Cinema Blog].  Yaba discusses how she first visited the village of Gambaga and the long journey to gain the trust of the women and their “protector” and ultimately complete the film.

   

  I first heard about the Witches’ camp at Gambaga in January 1995 when I was covering a story in Tamale for the BBC World Service. I was working as a stringer for the BBC’s Network Africa back then. I returned to Tamale in March of the same year, hoping to make a day trip to Gambaga to interview some of the women living at the camp. It took me a lot longer to gain access to them than I’d anticipated. When I eventually got to interview three of the women’s representatives, I was shocked to discover that two of them actually believed they were ‘witches’. Tia, who told me she’d been wrongly accused of witchcraft, was quickly forced to retract her statement. I was horrified to find that women accused of witchcraft were forced to undergo a trial by ordeal. Depending on how a chicken died – with its wings facing the sky or the ground – you were either a witch or not. I had to spend the night in Gambaga. I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking what would happen to me if I was accused of witchcraft and the chicken test went against me. How would I let my family down south know? It was then, I suspect, that alleged witches became more than objects of my curiosity. Instead they became women I identified with, because I could see that but for an accident of birth, I could easily be one of them…...Continue here

   

   

• links for 2011-09-04

  Posted: September 4, 2011, 5:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • The meaning of 9/11's most controversial photo | Jonathan Jones | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk In the photograph Thomas Hoepker took on 11 September 2001, a group of New Yorkers sit chatting in the sun in a park in Brooklyn. Behind them, across brilliant blue water, in an azure sky, a terrible cloud of smoke and dust rises above lower Manhattan from the place where two towers were struck by hijacked airliners this same morning and have collapsed, killing, by fire, smoke, falling or jumping or crushing and tearing and fragmentation in the buildings' final fall, nearly 3,000 people (tags: 9/11 photography history)
  • Is this Minustah's 'Abu Ghraib moment' in Haiti? | Mark Weisbrot | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk The video is profoundly disturbing. It shows four men, identified as Uruguayan troops from the UN mission in Haiti (Minustah), seemingly in the act of raping an 18-year-old Haitian youth. Two have the victim pinned down on a mattress, with his hands twisted high up his back so that he cannot move. Perhaps the most unnerving part of the video is the constant chorus of laughter from the alleged perpetrators; to them, apparently, it's just a drunken party (tags: Haiti Rape UN Minustah)

• links for 2011-09-02

  Posted: September 2, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Former freedom fighter Wambui dies in Nairobi She first rose to prominence in 1986 following the death of her husband and prominent criminal lawyer SM Otieno when she waged a court battle against the Umira Kager clan over Mr Otieno's final resting place.
    She claimed that he had wanted to be buried at his farm at Ngong on the outskirts of Nairobi but the Umira Kager clan, represented by retired Appeal Court judge Justice Richard Kwach citing longstanding tribal traditions claimed the body. (tags: Kenya FreedomFighter Women)
  • Qwelane Hate Speech Verdict Set Aside for Now | African Activist The South African Equality Court judgement against Jon Qwelane for hate speech against the LGBTI community has been thrown out. According to the ruling, Qwelane gave a reasonable explanation for his absence from the original court proceedings.  (tags: HateSpeech southafrica homophobia)
  • Libyan opposition jails blacks and migrants on suspicion of working for Gaddafi – YouTube (tags: libya Racism AfricanMigrants)
  • Somalia: Global war on terror and the humanitarian crisis The US government’s counterterrorism activities and ‘humanitarian’ assistance in Somalia and the Horn of Africa go a long way towards explaining the region’s entrenched problems, writes Horace Campbell. (tags: somalia famine conflict)
  • To Avert A Bloodbath – Libya And The Press Naturally it is the role of the enlightened West to steer Libya towards democracy. Editors working for the media conglomerate at the heart of the phone hacking police/political corruption scandal – a major attack on democracy and civil rights – presumably perceived no irony in their preaching of 'democracy, and legal freedoms'. Words that should send a shudder down the spines of any Libyan readers. (tags: Libya Media)
  • DSK and the Help We Don't Want to See The implications of Vance's decision are staggering. Are we to understand that even in the face of corroborating DNA evidence, a woman who has lied about being raped in another country can never be the victim of a rape in this country? Is this limited to rape? If Diallo had lied about being robbed in another country, would this make it impossible for a jury to believe that she'd been mugged on a street in New York? (tags: DSK Rape USA)
  • 10 Black Women Making Moves In Film Over the last few months, I’ve read countless critiques of Kathryn Stockett’s The Help, a creative work that falls short of providing an authentic black female voice. But unlike many of my peers, I never got upset. Stockett is a white woman, she can only write fantasies of black women’s truth. She owes us nothing. She’s a writer, and she can write as she sees fit.  (tags: blackwomen film)

• “Reflections Unheard”: Black women, Black nationalism and the origins of womanism

  Posted: September 2, 2011, 4:17 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The clip below is from a documentary in the making on the origins of” womanism” as a result of tensions between Black feminism and Black Power ideologies in the United States. The project will soon launch a Kickstarter campaign but meanwhile donations to help complete the documentary can be made to YelloKat Productions.

  Should African feminists be having similar discussions – many already believe we should! Whilst the issues raised in the documentary are familiar to many of us, African feminisms are rooted in different political and social contexts and different understandings of feminism. I use the plural “African feminisms” to emphaise that the identity “African” outside of a geographical context is problematic. Simidele Dosekun discusses “the discourse of African authenticity” in her essay “Defending Feminism in Africa”

  However for African feminists like their sisters of colour elsewhere, the focus is on challenging the existing power structures [Western imperial and corporate domination as well as national ones] and local patriarchies which lead to the marginalisation and socio political exclusion of women, LGBTI people, shackdwellers, rural communities and migrant workers to name a few.

• SOPUDEP [Haiti] Scholarship Programme needs your support

  Posted: August 29, 2011, 6:25 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

   

  While SOPUDEP School provides accessible education from kindergarten to grade 12, Director Réa Dol often expresses the frustration she feels when her students simply have no means to continue their studies, in hopes of finding better work or a career. In a rural setting, the pursuit of higher education may not be as vital, with substantial energies focused on agriculture production and selling their bounty at the local markets – although make no mistake, that due to the continual destabilization of their agro-business by foreign powers, the rural population have their own set of problems and life is very hard. But in an urban setting, there aren’t many means for self sufficiency. This means that the poor class, whether uneducated, or those with some primary and even secondary education, are more at risk for unemployment, or to suffer at the hands of employers that can easily exploit them. Therefor, trade skill training and University can help give these poorer cast youth a substantial leg up. It may also serve to quiet the voice that says that higher education belongs almost exclusively to the rich.

  For these bright young people, extended education means that they will have an opportunity to better serve their country and their fellow citizen’s. A career for them is not isn’t a means to an end, but a way for them to affect change.

  For this first year, we have posted only three of SOPUDEP’s star students. We hope that all three will be able to attend the school of their choice for the duration of their studies. The following is a short introduction to each of these students, including school, program and cost. Links to the Schools websites have also been provided.

  Name: Sauvelyne Louis Jean
  Birthday: 07/07/ 1989
  From: Jacmel
  School: Quisqueya University, Port-au-Prince
  Option chosen: Education science
  Years: 4
  Price per trimester: $619 US
  Price per  year: $1857  US + cost of textbooks and basic supplies

   

  Name: Kervens Jean Noël
  Birthday: 11/06/1987
  From: Pétion-ville
  School: Institut Supérieur Technique d’Haiti, Port-au-Prince
  Option chosen: Civil Engineering
  Years: 4
  Price per Year: $1471.25 US + cost of textbooks and basic supplies
  Price per quadmester: $367.82 US
  

   

  Name: Marie Trainne Charles
  Birthday: 09/27/1991
  From: Jérémie
  School: University of Notre Dame d’Haiti, Port-au-Prince
  Option chosen: Nursing science
  Years: 4
  Price per year: $1400 US + cost of textbooks and basic supplies
  Price per month: $140 US

   

  As there is a substantial commitment involved in seeing that one of these students can finish their studies, it might be something that an individual, family, group of friends, or a single organization would take on as a project.

  If one decides to help put one of these students through school, they will receive regular updates of that student, including pertinent information on their scholastics.

   

  More information on how you can support the students.

   

• Changing relationship between “information and power”

  Posted: August 25, 2011, 1:16 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Last week Paul Gilroy spoke at a meeting in Tottenham on the recent riots in London and elsewhere. Gilroy makes some insightful observations on the differences between the 1980s and 2011 for example the relationship between information and power has changed along with the way we as a nation are “managed”…

  The difference between 1981 and now is that the relationship between information and power has been changed, and our tactics for understanding our defence of our communities have to take those changes into account. And that means that we have to think very carefully about how we engage with the media. I’m very happy that there are people here who are independent distributors of information and news, who are circulating what goes on here and circulating interpretations of what’s happened in this country. We have to get it to people outside of our country–we have to internationalize it. We have to think about how technology can work for us. And media is not something transparent.

  Because what happens in the digitalization of media and privatization is the contraction and the impoverishment of our media. People talk about “dumbing down”–it’s not just about dumbing down–it’s something different than that. And that means that there’s a much tighter control over what can be said.

  And that technology which is so different from in 1981 is also part of what I’d like to call, tonight, a securitocracy, ruling us through security. And that means the DNA in your bodies, in your mouths, in DNA swabs, the CCTV cameras that are all around us here…And, and this is another interesting feature of last week, the way the spin operation works. The media, owned by people like Murdoch, have a ‘golden hour’ after the story breaks, in which they can fix the story, and then that fixed story grows, like a snowball rolling downhill.

  What is amazing is that the police admit to 100,000 searches under the terrorist legislation yet not one of these has led to an arrest – so the question is on what basis, what intelligence were these searches carried out and in what manner? One observation Gilroy makes which stands out for me is the “privatisation of the movement” or the “consultariat”. This is something which is also happening across countries in Africa with the NGO-isation of activism and movements and no doubt is happening elsewhere across the world – which leads to a loss of imagination but I think that is the point. It’s happening in Nigeria right now with activists abandoning movement building in exchange for contract building in Abuja.

  When you look at the layer of political leaders from our communities, the generation who came of age during that time thirty years ago, many of those people have accepted the logic of privatization. They’ve privatized that movement, and they’ve sold their services as consultants and managers and diversity trainers. They’ve sold their services to the police, they’ve sold them to the army, they’ve sold them to the corporate world…go to some of their websites and you’ll see how proud they are of their clients. And that means that, in many areas, the loss of experience, the loss of the imagination is a massive phenomenon. So that the young people in the courts today don’t have a defence campaign. They don’t have one yet, but I hope that one will develop.

  So a lot of that leadership has been channeled into the local government, and has formed a kind of “consultariat.” And if you want to understand what that means, you have to look at places like South Africa, where, in the process after the end of apartheid, a whole layer of militants, a whole layer of people went over, and they got their pensions, and they sold this, and they sold that, because the government, in changing that society, thought that having a Black middle class was going to be the way to do it. Well, that’s not the way it’s going to work here. [applause] Continue reading ……..

• “Looking for Kato” by Kenne Mwikya & Amil Khassim

  Posted: August 12, 2011, 4:32 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Kenne and a friend, Amil Khassim discuss the death of David Kato and what it means to for queer rights and queer activists in East Africa.  Some six months on David has been forgotten in the frenzied media which hops from story to story like kangaroos on a mission to nowhere.    For the queer community particularly in Uganda and the wider East African region, David’s death was a shock not just for it’s brutality but the reality of hate expressed.   The conversation is moving and honourable.  Thank you Kenne and Amil for this  thoughtful piece……

  Amil

  Then, I met up with another friend in town who said he’d been to the burial; that gay men wore rainbow shirts, and there was quite the fight for his body by them. His neighbours abandoned his corpse, but the gay men were persistent in claiming it and eventually burying him.

  It made me think about honour.

  He was honourable, you know?

  The fact that death has been much of a theme in my poetry, and in a way, much of the philosophy I’ve read, I take a more critical approach to his death. The man’s death was quite mysterious. For crying out loud, people just said he was beaten up to death.

  No one publicly, was arrested or charged for murder.

  Indeed, many have forgotten who David was.

  Whereas, for many queer men, his death was a shocking revelation of their fate. I’m sort of ambiguous about this, because I felt that visibility was important, and as such projects like these curated by the Makerere University have emerged. I think death has a way of bridging meaning with nonsensical aggression. Trust me, I’m not one for war and clamour, but people always find themselves seeing a person at death.

  If they’ve forgotten him, they won’t forget other homosexual men. If they’ve been trying to kill someone else, all that has been blown by the death of David Kato. Even, the tabloids that had printed lists and lists of queers couldn’t laugh at his death, you know?

  Kenne

  How was his death perceived by Ugandans in general? I come back to this question because it is so integral to what we have come to see as East Africa’s activist culture. In extension, the question would maybe be “how does the public come to terms with activists and activism in general”?

  I don’t want to believe that we have come to the end of the discussion because I think that talking about Kato’s influence on where today’s politics are moving is something that must be addressed before we move on. Underneath a huge overlay of invocations of his death linked with the “hopeless” situation in Uganda are people, like the organisers of this project, who are genuinely concerned with his legacy, want to take issue with this notion that his demise as another mantle upon which the pathologisation of queer/homophobic Uganda takes place. Sokari Ekine said that Makerere University has a lot of progressives and thus the possibility and actualisation of this project, could there be more to this? All this in light of the fact that you didn’t study at Makerere, of course.

  …. Continue reading.

   

   

   

• links for 2011-08-11

  Posted: August 11, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Pambazuka – Famine by man not drought (tags: famine somalia)
  • Pambazuka – No easy path through the embers (tags: shackdwellers, southafrica)
  • There is a context to London's riots that can't be ignored | Nina Power | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk (tags: LondonRiots London UK Poverty Racism)
  • Rosa Parks Rape Attempt: Politics of Resistance (tags: CivilRights Racism)
  • Why Crisis Maps Can Be Risky When There's Political Unrest – Technology Review (tags: mapping crisis maptivism)

• I’m money and I rule

  Posted: July 31, 2011, 4:10 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Via Musa Okwonga – The Kings Will series

• A comic called 100 Butches

  Posted: July 26, 2011, 1:00 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  New Art Everyday – Elisha Lim’s illustrations called 100 Butches.

  
  

  You can buy these awesome prints, sketches and originals at Etsy.com

• Freedom Sudan

  Posted: July 21, 2011, 4:09 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Last week South Sudan became the world’s newest country and rather than take the opportunity to move in new transformational directions chose to announce that “equality would not be extended to gay and lesbians.”

  South Sudan was formerly subject to the Sudanese interpretation of Sharia law, under which homosexual activity was illegal, with punishments ranging from lashes to the death penalty. In 2003 the government of what was then called “New Sudan” adopted its own penal code, and in 2008 the autonomous Government of Southern Sudan adopted a replacement penal code. Both codes prohibited sodomy.

  In May 2010 Mayardit spoke of a New Sudan where “all citizens” enjoy “equal rights” in a country based on “democracy, equality and justice”. But Mayardit said that LGBT recognition was “not in our character.”
  “It is not even something that anybody can talk about here in southern Sudan in particular. It is not there and if anybody wants to import or to export it to Sudan, I will not get the support and it will always be condemned by everybody.”

  In short the usual boring predictable statements about “it” doesnt exist here – New Sudan, Sudan or anywhere else on the continent. But there is a Sudanese LGBTI movement, Freedom Sudan which has been in active since 2006 and based in Sudan.

  Freedom Sudan is the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) organization in Sudan. Our organization has been formed in December 2006. Our status is illegal. Homosexual behavior is illegal in Sudan and homosexuals facing the death penalty. That’s why our organization was formed in secret and all our activities are carried out secretly, hoping that one day we will get accepted in our communities and even in our families, and hope that we can be FREE to be the way we are. Freedom Sudan is an organization run by volunteers only.

  Our main goals are:

  Recognition of homosexuality in Sudan.
  Social acceptance of homosexuality and acceptance of the rights of homosexuals in Sudan.
  Abrogation of the death penalty for homosexuals (Articles 148,151, 316 and 318).
  Work together with other LGBT organizations in the world for a better LGBT rights.

• The blood that feeds the heart of DRC’s conflict.

  Posted: July 21, 2011, 2:46 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Two films from the DRC

  “There is a global consensus that exists that says it is OK for nearly six million black people to die in the heart of Africa and for us to be silent”

  Blood in the Mobile is an exceptionally well produced documentary which traces the mobile phone [Nokia] to it’s source in the eastern DRC. The clip doesnt do the film justice. The film maker is painstaking in his pursuit to arrive at the Walikili mining camp – a place of violence and exploitation where the miners live in makeshift tents with no amenities, no regulation and are at the mercy of attacks by the ever changing militias and collapsing mines. The cassiterite is mined in deep holes by men and boys and is then transported by foot through dense wet forests for two days before reaching the nearest town. Here the mineral is loaded on to planes which land on the dirt tract that runs through the town. At each point in this perilous journey, the various operating militas collect “taxes”.

  All attempts to illicit a response from Nokia which claims to be a “responsible corporation” proof fruitless. Everyday we read new reports on the innovative uses of mobile phones in Africa and elsewhere in the global south – the endless production and consumption of newer models of Nokia, Samsung and iPhones. Mining of cassiterite and other minerals may be just one of the many contributing factors to the war in the DRC but Walikili and other similar camps are central to it’s sustenance.

  The second film, “Crisis in Congo” traces Congo’s history through coloniasation and focuses on the role played by the US, Britain and their allies, Uganda and Rwanda who act as proxy protection outfits, have played in the greatest humanitarian crisis of the 21st century. Protection of western economic, political and corporate interests, military support of Uganda and Rwanda in the invasion of the Congo and maintenance of successive dictatorships and perpetuation of tyranny against people. One example is a US law [109-456 - sponsored by senator Obama and signed into law in 2006] which “outlines a comprehensive strategy for the Congo to realise justice” but its no surprise that it is yet to be adequately implemented. The law states

  that the US Secretary of State has the power to revoke aid to any nation deemed to be destabilising the Congo if she has sufficient evidence that a country is doing so. We have so much evidence on Rwanda and Uganda and we even have a leaked UN report that states all the Secretary of State has to do is read it and say OK now we are going to support. But since 2000 the US has given Rwanda $1 billion. The leaked UN report is calling this government a genocidal government. Why is the US government supporting a genocidal government?”

  Congo concerns all of us.

• Blogging for TB: Real stories of people living with tuberculosis

  Posted: July 19, 2011, 9:29 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

   

   

   

  TB&ME [multidrug-resistant tuberculosis]  it is a collaborative blogging project supported by Medecins Sans Frontieres is designed to give multidrug-resistant TB (MDR TB) sufferers a platform where they can share their experiences.   Over the coming months and years MSF will be conducting advocacy around TB and MDR-TB  with the aim and hope that through the project, they will learn what issues affect the patients most, where they are lacking in terms of treatment, diagnosis and services, and what MSF can offer in future.  MSF also hope that the personal voices will  help the wider public understand TB and the devastating  impact on  millions of sufferers worldwide.

  The blog post are are either written or spoken directly by the patients from Uganda, India, Philippines and Swaziland . …See here for a selection of blog posts.

   

   

   

   

   

   

• Mandela Day: Revolutionary radicals will not, cannot celebrate

  Posted: July 18, 2011, 1:18 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Happy 92nd birthday to Nelson Mandela, I celebrate your life and your sacrifice. I honour you for your commitment and steadfastness over 27 years. But for many South Africans there is no reason to celebrate Freedom Justice and Democracy because it’s not a reality. From the Shackdwellers and Rural Network South Africa...

  Revolutionary radicals recalcitrant in their reflective refusal to revere “freedom days” are dubbed as reactionaries by our “democratic state”.

  The South African calendar is full of days on which we are asked to celebrate our freedom. There is Human Rights Day, Freedom Day, Worker’s Day, Youth Day, Mandela Day, Women’s Day and Heritage Day. These days are turned to months. Those of us who refuse to celebrate these days and months as if the struggle is over and who insist that the struggle goes on are called reactionaries.

  Tomorrow, on the 18th of July, on Mandela Day, Abahlali baseMjondolo will be in court for the Kennedy 12 case. We as the Rural Network will be in court in Utrecht for the case of Mr. Mdlalose who was assaulted by a farmer. In Motala Heights Shamita Naidoo is organising an event for all the children.

  On Mandela Day we will still be struggling. We are saying to people that, yes, it is good to give 67 minutes on Mandela Day. But we should give that 67 minutes in struggle. This South Africa is not the country that Tata Mandela and his comrades fought for. The only real way to honour Tata Mandela is to work to complete the struggle of Mandela. This means that the struggle continues. It also means that those who tell us that the struggle is over dishonour the spirit of Mandela.

  We are looking forward to the 26th to the 29th of July when Dear Mandela, a powerful film about the struggle of Abahlali baseMjondolo, will be released in Durban. This film is clearly saying that Mandela’s struggle is not completed.

• Gigi [Ejigayehu Shibabaw]

  Posted: July 18, 2011, 3:34 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Gigi Shibabaw

  If you like this check out Gigi with Tabla Beat Science [ Midival Punditz, Karsh Kale, Zakir Hussain, Sultan Khan - awesome]

• links for 2011-07-14

  Posted: July 14, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Israel Passes Anti-Boycott Law: This Week in Online Tyranny Israel makes boycotts illegal. One of the time-tested, non-violent ways in which people have attempted to force grass-roots change is by boycotting the products or services of an entity whose actions they dislike. Now, Israel made such boycotts illegal.
    Given how deeply social media is twined into contemporary political action, this makes certain types of online actions as illegal in Israel as they are in non-democratic countries. (tags: Israel censorship boycott Palestine socialmedia)
  • Violence Against Migrant Women Won’t End After DSK Case The narrative of the immigrant housekeeper assaulted by a European official perfectly illustrates an axiom of violence and power: the wider the gap between genders and races, the greater the latitude of injustice.
    Yet the same story plays out every day on an endless loop around the globe: a retaliatory rape against a young girl sends a warning to the enemy militia; a wife is pummeled into bloody silence, her bedroom beyond the purview of traditional local courts; a daughter is married off to pay down a farm debt. The stories weave into a pattern that a media-fatigued public has come to normalize. (tags: DSK Rape)
  • South African Artists Against Apartheid: LEGAL VICTORY In a bold ruling defending the right to freedom of expression and political speech, the South African media watchdog, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), unequivocally dismissed all complaints relating to the  SA Artists Against Apartheid radio advert that called for the boycott of Israel and compared Israel to Apartheid South Africa (tags: palestine israel apartheid southafrica)
  • Venezuela Rocked By 7.2 Magnitude Rumor! (BoRev.Net) Hey here is something that only happens every other week or so! The news is reporting on something maddeningly crazy that Hugo Chavez has said, only when you conduct your own independent investigation involving sophisticated journalistic techniques (Google) you find out that it is all, in fact, complete bullshit. Here's how it worked this time, pretty much exactly like it works every other time: (tags: Haiti Rumours venezuela Chavis)
  • The Shelters That Clinton Built Shabby Toxic shelters built by Bill Clinton in Haiti - But headaches were not the only health problems students, staff and parents at the Institut Haitiano-Caribbean (INHAC) told us they've suffered from since the inauguration of the classrooms. Innocent Sylvain, a shy janitor who looks much older than his 41 years, spends more time than anyone in the new trailer classrooms, with the inglorious task of mopping up the water that leaks through the doors and windows each time it rains. He has felt a burning sensation in his eyes ever since he began working long hours in the trailers. One of his eyes is completely bloodshot, and he said, "They itch and burn." He'd previously been sensitive to eye irritation, but he says he's had worse "problems since the month of January"—when the schoolrooms opened their doors. (tags: haiti earthquake BillClinton)
  • After witnessing Palestine's apartheid, Indigenous and Women of Color feminists endorse BDS A group of Indigenous and Women of Color feminists who recently returned from a visit to Palestine has issued a strong statement endorsing the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement. Explaining their decision to travel to Palestine, the group wrote: (tags: pinkwashing BDS palestine Occupation)
  • Palestine – Resisting homophobia and occupation Haneen Maikey from the Palestinian queer group Al Qaws was in Amsterdam in June talking about their struggles for sexual emancipation and against the Israeli occupation (tags: homonationalism homophobia pinkwashing palestine israel LGBTIQ)

• “Shedding light on sexuality and gender”

  Posted: July 13, 2011, 3:24 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  A review by Lerato Dumse of Zanele Muholi’s solo exhibition which opened in Joburg last Thursday.

  Lerato is part of the Free Gender collective. Free Gender will be hosting the first lesbian conference in the township on the 5/6 August 2011. This is a wholly local initiative and is self-financed. They need your help to make their conference successful. We are not funded by any organization. We will be making history be part of that history by assisting the organization financially. See Below to support Free Gender

  The opening of Zanele Muholi’s Inkanyiso exhibition pulled the crowed in Johannesburg, at the Stevenson gallery on Thursday 7 July 2011.Faces and Phases is about preserving the histories and showing the struggles faced by black lesbians, and Zanele has added 66 new portraits in the ongoing series.

  Inkanyiso means light, and Muholi; a visual activist aims to shed light into the “viewer’s understanding of sexuality and gender”. Other works available during the exhibition is Beulahs (2007-10) and Transfigures (2010-11), as well as the award winning documentary Difficult Love (2010) showing in film festivals around the world. Tumi Nkopane 24 is on the series and says: “Zanele’s work is part of politics because these portraits fight discrimination”. Nkopane believes that people’s ignorance causes them to be intolerant against lesbians, “Faces and Phases can help break the Ice; by showing that we are part of society”. Now based in Cape Town, Muholi was born in Umlazi (Durban) in 1972. She studied photography at the Market Photo Workshop in Newtown, Johannesburg. Mbali Zulu says she wants to send a message that hate crime must end through photography, because people are lazy to read. The 22 year old thinks: “Zanele’s work makes a huge difference in our community; I love her work and hope she continues for future generations”. Addressing the crowed at the gallery; Zanele thanked everyone for their support, especially those who participated in the series. “Faces is also about the face-to-face confrontation between myself as a photographer/activist and the many lesbians, woman and transmen I have interacted with from different places”.23 year old Matshidiso Nofokeng is honored to be part of Faces and Phases as it represents her as a whole, she said. “I was not out; and I want people to know who I am, Zanele is giving young black lesbians an opportunity to express who they are”. Nofokeng met Muholi in 2007 “she helped me accept myself and be proud of my body” she concluded. Photographs from the series were shot in Gauteng, Cape Town, Mafikeng and Botswana.

  To support Free Gender and the lesbian conference see here

   

• links for 2011-07-12

  Posted: July 12, 2011, 5:03 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Monsanto in Haiti Last spring, Haiti’s minister of agriculture gave agribusiness giant Monsanto permission to ‘donate’ 505 tonnes of seeds to Haiti ‘to support the reconstruction effort’. A year later, Beverly Bell asks what has become of the seeds that Monsanto gave, and ‘how real was the fear of Haitian farmer organizations that the donation was a Trojan horse?’ (tags: Monsanto Haiti)
  • Unpackaging the LGBTI communities Being rooted in sexuality rather than gender, the issues of lesbian, gay and bisexual people are completely different from those of transgender people, writes Audrey Mbugua. (tags: transgender lgbti+africa)
  • A People's History of the Egyptian Revolution | Left Turn – Notes from the Global Intifada Millions of Egyptians brought down one of the world’s most repressive regimes, that of the US-backed Hosni Mubarak, in just 18 days. Their bravery, perseverance, and tactfulness in the face of the regime’s brutal crackdown not only triggered uprisings across the Arab world but inspired and influenced protests against government austerity in the US, Spain, Portugal, and Greece. Despite the fact that it is only a few months old, it’s important to begin piecing together a people’s history of the revolution to convey what happened and how it happened so that the lessons from this critical struggle can be disseminated. (tags: Egypt uprising)
  • Africa: Exploitation and resistance – Audio Bankers are speculating on food in global markets, causing price spikes and real hardship for millions. ‘Land grabs’ in Africa are seeing more farmland transferred into corporate hands. Over one billion people in the world are hungry despite decades of ‘development’. Our food system is in crisis, but a global movement of small producers is fighting for an alternative – food sovereignty. This session will explore the problems of, and possible solutions to, the global food crisis (tags: Food_Insecurity landgrab landrights)
  • Land 'investment' deals in Africa: Say ‘no way!’ Food insecurity, loss of food sovereignty, the displacement of small farmers, conflict, environmental devastation, water loss, and the further impoverishment and political instability of African nations – these are among the consequences of large-scale investments in land in Africa, a special investigation by the Oakland Institute has revealed. Pambazuka News spoke to Anuradha Mittal, Jeff Furman and Frederic Mousseau about what prompted their research and what they discovered. (tags: Food_Insecurity africa landgrab landrights)

• Eating the other: “Our voices must be respected”

  Posted: July 10, 2011, 9:17 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  You have no right to speak of my story.
  You have no right to publish my story in the press
  Because I did not give you authorization.
  You have no right. I did not speak to you.
  You have said things you should not have said.
  Thank you

  Haitian American writer Edwidge Danticat responds to the rape story “How Violent Sex Helped Ease My PTSD” by Mac McClelland. A classic case of appropriating someone else’s suffering as an atonement for not suffering, a phenomena Bell Hooks describes as “Eating the Other” [Black Looks: Race and Representation]. As a way of deflecting the guilt of white privilege the subject both desires “blackness” and “constructs a social framework of sameness, a homogeneity of experience.”

  The desire to make contact with those bodies deemed other, with no apparent will to dominate, assuages the guilt of the past, even takes the form of a defiant gesture where one denies accountability and historical connection” . Most importantly, it establishes a contemporary narrative where the suffering imposed by structures of domination on those designated other is deflected by an emphasis on seduction and longing where the desire is not to make the other over in one’s image but to become the other”.

  In this essay Danticat recounts her meeting with the Haitian woman McClelland called both Sybille and K* in her writings and her request that McClelland not write about her. A breach of trust, a disregard for the voices of Haitian women and their right to ownership of their stories.

  >I met her at a meeting for rape survivors in Port-au-Prince. She is a 25-year-old mother of three children. She has a beautiful singing voice and often sings in talent shows to inspire other rape survivors.

  This incredibly brave and talented woman speaks Creole, French and Spanish. She learned Spanish while traveling between Haiti and the Dominican Republic to buy grocery items, toiletries and non-perishables that she would then resell in Port-au-Prince.

  She lost the father of her older children to illness before the earthquake and lost the father of her youngest child on January 2010, during the earthquake. She also lost her home, which is how she ended up living in the camp where she was raped.

  In her essay, Ms. McClelland writes that K*’s trauma led in part to her own breakdown. Nevertheless, during Ms. McClelland’s ride along with K*, on a visit to a doctor, Ms. McClelland, as has been reported elsewhere, live-tweeted K*’s horrific experiences. The tweets put K*’s life in danger because they identified the displacement camp where K* was living–with details of landmarks added–her specific injury, her real name, and suggest that she is a drug user.

  When K* found out about Ms. McClelland’s tweets, even before Ms. McClelland’s original Mother Jones article was published, K* wrote a letter to Ms. McClelland and Mother Jones magazine asking that Ms. McClelland not write about her. Her lawyer emailed the letter to them on November 2, 2010…[see above]

  Ms. McClelland has stated on this same twitter account that she had K*’s permission and K*’s mother’s permission to ride along with them, but she certainly–according to K*’s lawyer, and the driver on the ride along, and K* herself–did not have K*’s permission to tweet personal and confidential information about her. And even if Ms. McClelland in some way thought she had K*’s consent, the attached letter should have made it clear that it was withdrawn and that she had, as the letter states, “no right” to write about K* anymore, especially in ways that her previous tweets had made K*’s and her location easily identifiable.

  I have K*’s permission to publish this letter and to talk about K* because she is angry at the way Ms. McClelland has portrayed her in the tweets, has ignored the wishes of her letter and continues to make K* part of her story.

  This week, K* wrote me an e-mail from Port-au-Prince saying, “I want victims in Haiti to know that they can be strong and stand up for their rights and have a voice. Our choices about when and how our story is told must be respected.”
  Continue

  H/T Eccentric Yoruba

• Photographic experiences

  Posted: July 8, 2011, 6:49 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  “No More Pot Lucks” – an interview with Zanele Muholi by Michelle Pearson Clarke – a friend for Faces and Fazes. Michelle starts with her own story which is as it should be because Zanele’s work is about the women and transmen she photographs. It never was and never is about Zanele. Her photographs are conversations between her and her friends. Every 150 plus portraits is a friend. Not an acquaintance but a relationship of two or three or four.

  I won’t write about my own experience of being photographed by Zanele because this is not my time. That will come later and requires a renewed inspiration which I am still seeking out.

  This is a very different introduction to this interview than I had planned. As I write this, my mother is undergoing surgery to remove cancerous tumours from her brain. We are nearing the end of a 14-year battle with pancreatic cancer and I am reminded yet again of her inordinate reserves of grace and resilience. And as I write this, I am reminded yet again of all that she will leave behind with me.

  It’s a lot. I’m lucky, I know. I love my black queer self because she loved me. She was the first person to see me as I am. Her seeing me meant that she cut my plaits off when I asked at age six and it meant that she made me a bowtie and cummerbund for my graduation dance at age 16 and it meant that she danced with me and my friends at Pride at age 33. She saw me right into my current existence.

  This is what it’s like to have Zanele Muholi take your photograph. It is the experience of being seen. A South African artist, Zanele has been documenting black queer women and transmen in her ongoing series of black and white portraits, Faces and Phases, since 2006. She began the project as a commemoration and a celebration of the lives of the black lesbians that she met in her journeys through the townships of Johannesburg. I met Zanele in 2008 while she was in Toronto studying in the Documentary Media MFA Program at Ryerson University. By then she had expanded the project to include people that she met in her travels from Cape Town to London to Toronto.

  Zanele took my photograph on July 28, 2009. She met me at work and we walked down Sherbourne Street and we talked about life and photography and Joburg and Port-of-Spain. Every so often, she stopped me and took another shot with her film-loaded SLR camera. We had become friends and it was quick and casual. Months later, she sent me a single digital image. For a long time, I found it difficult to look at that photo. It was taken two days before a very painful transition in my life. When I looked at that picture, it was almost unbearable to look at the sadness in my eyes. That was all I could see and I knew why it was there. The bathroom mirror had mounted a long and spirited defense but here was undeniable evidence of loss and grief…..Continued

• links for 2011-07-08

  Posted: July 8, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Dread Scott / "Make revolutionary art to propel history forward … confront the world as it is and radically dream about how it could be different." His most recent work is Burning of the U.S. Constitution. A suite of three prints, it is a documentation of his burning of the U.S. constitution. Performed in February 2011, it was inspired by the recently released, but previously disappeared Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. Ai Weiwei's 2010 performance piece Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn as Scott described, addressed, the "fetishization of the ancient things" and the way we make sense of sacred objects in the contemporary context. Likewise, in Burning of the U.S. Constitution, Scott, in a similar manner as What is the Proper Way to Display the American Flag? sought to call into question sacred national symbols of freedom. (tags: Art_Justice art activism)
  • HAITI, Land of Freedom: Wikileaks: US Embassy Requests Funding for Anti-Chavez Groups The latest Wikileaks releases include cables sent from the US Embassy in Caracas to the State Department, Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Council, and other US entities, indicating requests for additional US government funding for opposition groups in Venezuela. The cables corroborate documents previously obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) that evidence ongoing US funding to support anti-Chavez groups and political parties in Venezuela actively working to destabilize and overthrow the South American government. (tags: haiti wikileaks)
  • Trikster Blog » Blog Archive » We Who Feel Differently queer activism and the question of alternative thinking, centered around numerous interviews with activists in Colombia, USA, South Korea and Norway.  (tags: Queer Activism)
  • Who Says Media Is Dead? 5 Takeaways From Progressive Journalists and Activists at the Allied Media Conference | Activism & Vision | AlterNet As I walked into “Stories That Feed Our Bodies and Communities: Media Tools for Healing,” radical woman of color blogger brownfemipower finished her thought by saying, “Not being a burden on society means being invisible.” She condemned the self-destructive patterns of “good” activists who “give so much to activism without activism giving in return,” thereby becoming martyrs for the so-called greater good. She also encouraged people who work for social justice to consider whether they are well-suited to change the world if they are not able to give themselves, their families and their communities what they need. (tags: Self_Healing Media SocialJustice Healing_Justice)

• “They have killed Sizakele”

  Posted: July 7, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  “They have killed Sizakele”
  For Sizakele Sigasa, AIDS and lesbian activist, murdered with Salome Massoa, 7 July 2007, Soweto

  Where is she
  in this land of crushed stone?
  Where is she
  as morning dresses the day
  in the dirtied lace of tired gospels

  Where is she
  our sister Sizakele
  in this brittle dawn?

  White powdered faces
  ululate against an unremarkable sky
  as bullets tip the minute hand
  …one, two, three…
  collarbones crumble
  …four, five, six…

  Here where sun chases starlight
  here in heartbreak’s wilderness
  here she is
  embroidering morning dew
  beading our memories
  in the red and rainbows of militancy

  Here in this theatre of slaughter
  she is clearing a round of clay earth
  intoning a litany
  calling for a witness

  You say: it is not our tradition
  She says: is this your tradition
  to rip the pulse from my chest
  to deny a mother the dignity of dying first?

  You say: in the name of the father and the son
  She says: in the name of my sisters
  slain in meaningless massacres
  for loving their own skin

  A people do not survive
  monsoons of oppression
  only to savage their own kin.

  Jessica Horn: from Intersectionality and Sexuality in Africa.

• links for 2011-07-05

  Posted: July 5, 2011, 5:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • No justice, no food, no 4th of July celebration They are also celebrating the massacre of millions of Native people who inhabited the lands we call USA. They are celebrating the kidnapping of millions of Africans from their homeland and their transportation throughout the world, but particularly to the land we now call America, into a life of slavery.
    They are celebrating the decimation of culture, tradition and people in countries throughout the world where America and its military troops have transcended upon and unleashed their genocidal practices upon the people of those lands.  (tags: 4thJuly USA IndigenousPeople FoodJustice)
  • Repressing Support For Palestine’s Basic Human Rights: A Brief Examination of The Long Reach of Israel’s Invasive Propaganda Lobby | APNS American citizens participating in the current peace mission to bring pacifist humanitarian aid to the people of The Gaza via another international convoy of ships from several countries is being threatened by the Israeli security state and told in no uncertain terms that they cannot expect any assistance from their governments in the event of an international crisis. It was well-known that we were seeking to connect with international representatives participating in the action to forward us audio reports via Skype from the peace flotilla and we now believe that our ‘cancelling’ was enacted to prevent these communications from happening. (tags: Gaza israel Flowtilla apartheid occupation)
  • Blog | The Kuyu Project The Kuyu Project is a digital literacy initiative aimed at teaching African youth how to fully utilize social media and other digital tools to effect social change in their communities to achieve their goals and objectives. (tags: technology socialmedia storytelling africa)
  • Is the ‘mobile phone revolution’ in Africa really for everybody? – Global Dashboard – Blog covering International affairs and global risks The many technology divides in Africa:  The literacy divide.  I’ve blogged here before about the fact that slowly growing rates of literacy and rapidly growing rates of mobile internet access might mean that inability to read, rather than lack of access to the technology,will soon become the key barrier to accessing the internet.  There’s lots of great examples of how mobile communications can be used to promote literacy, but the point still stands.  And again, it’s largely up to governments to make sure that literacy expands fast enough to keep up. (tags: mobilephones africa socialmedia technology)

• People worth listening to: Grace Lee Boggs

  Posted: July 4, 2011, 6:16 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  95 – wonderful inspirational beautiful woman – community, oneness, commitment and love

  Listen here

• We are women and we play drums which makes us happy

  Posted: July 3, 2011, 7:09 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I want to be a part of this…..

  More drumming and icecream from Rwanda here – this is the formal one
  Via ukweliwetu256

• links for 2011-07-03

  Posted: July 3, 2011, 5:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Bring Back the Truth and Dignity from 1976 We are the future of the nation. We are the driving force of this nation. But because we are still unrecognized, we are still unemployed, poor, and living in shacks we are still going to fight for our dignity. This is our lives; our future. If we do not fight for ourselves, for our generation, no one else will do it. Those youth of June 16, 1976 died for the truth and yet it is not revealed. We will carry on from where the 1976 youth left off. (tags: Abahlali shackdwellers, southafrica)
  • Alice Walker: Why I'm joining the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza | World news | The Guardian There is a scene in the movie Gandhi that is very moving to me: it is when the unarmed Indian protesters line up to confront the armed forces of the British Empire. The soldiers beat them unmercifully, but the Indians, their broken and dead lifted tenderly out of the fray, keep coming. (tags: israel gaza alicewalker flowtila)
  • War on Terror & War on Trafficking: A Sex Worker Activist Confronts the Anti-Trafficking Movement « INCITE! Blog This booklet is a product of two years of research into the state of the anti-trafficking movement in the United States. I went to dozens of events, lectures, and conferences, and spoke with many wonderful but misguided people who take part in this movement. I have also had opportunities to hear many stories of surviving forced labor and prostitution, some of which were not so dissimilar to my own experiences in the sex trade in one point or another. I do not wish to negate their authority to speak about their own experiences and how they wished things were different, but I am deeply troubled by the cherry-picking of survivor stories and experiences that support the anti-trafficking trope equating all prostitution with trafficking and all trafficking with slavery, while all other voices are dismissed as “exceptions” (or “the top 2% elite,” as one anti-prostitution researcher said). (tags: trafficking sexwork terrorism War+Terror)
  • Africa Gathering London: Putting the social in media Throughout the Arab Spring, Al Jazeera has used social media both to distribute its journalism but also as a source for their journalism. As we’ve seen in Syria and Libya, the story of the Arab Spring would be almost impossible to tell without the help of social media. Al Jazeera has developed a sophisticated way to engage with and evaluate social media. (tags: africa technology socialmedia)

• Taiye Selasi and some of the horrific things going on

  Posted: July 2, 2011, 7:53 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Taiye Selasi is interviewed by Granta and on NPR’s Tell Me More and  speaks about  her debut novel “Ghana Must Go” [see my collection here] and now infamous short story “The Sex Lives of African Girls” [which I have not read].  Its not difficult to figure out why this has become so popular.   Neither of the interviews are that great though no fault of Taiye’s, so this is just me following the hype – with Granta she talks briefly about her novel

  YI: Your story takes places in a rich household in Accra. Even though many of the characters are leading comfortable lives, a sense of menace runs beneath the surface. I was scared for all the women, especially the young narrator. Did you mean to paint the sex lives of African girls as dangerous and doomed?

  TS: It’s hard to say what I meant, but that’s certainly what I’ve done. To be honest, I was rather surprised to discover that I’d painted such a devastating portrait. It was only months and months after I’d finished editing – focusing narrowly on rhythm, image, pacing, form – that I noticed how dark the content was, how fundamentally damning the comment.

  This piece is told from the perspective of a girl who is just starting to grasp the sexual dynamics at play among the adults around her. It’s interesting that you chose to inhabit her limited point of view. Was it hard to get this narrator’s voice right – to figure out what she does and doesn’t understand?

  I suspect the second person helped a great deal. This ‘you’ voice appeared in my head from the beginning and guided me through the text, limiting my view of things to her view: I rarely looked where she wasn’t looking. In the first draft I’d included a passage alluding to the nature of Uncle’s work in Ghana’s oil extraction industry – but omitted it when it became clear that the narrator wouldn’t (couldn’t possibly) understand such politics. I’d slipped for a moment into an ‘I’ voice, an ‘I’ mind, and it showed.

   

  Tell me More with Michelle Martin is slightly crass in parts with  the usual stereotyping questions on “Africa” and writings by writers from various parts of the continent. It makes no sense to be talking to a writer from say, Ghana about  African writing.  Would she be asking a British writer about European writing  or an Indian about Asian writings? Why are writers from Africa expected to speak for the continent and  deal with “issues” for example,  ”some of the horrific things going on on the continent right now”.   Hmm there are some pretty amazing things going on on the continent right now – uprisings in Senegal, Swaziland, Mauritania to name a few.   The truth is there are horrific things happening and the truth is there are some amazing people responding to these horrors. Not just the big names, high profile movement people but people on the ground in their every day lives refusing the violence being thrown at them.

  A reminder there are some pretty horrific things going on in the US right now for Black women, women of colour, immigrant woman – there is a woman in New York from Guinea who had the courage to speak about being raped by a powerful white man – Dominique Strauss-Kahn.  The problem is most people dont believe her.  Its hard to be believed when you are a black woman, a poor woman, an immigrant woman.  People dont believe you because you dont have papers or you told some untruths to get your papers – that means you must be telling a lie about being raped.   It means you are not credible. Who on this planet has never told a lie, or misinformed someone about something – does this mean if I am raped and its discovered that I committed some fraud x years ago that I am lying about being raped?  What is the connection except to deny me my truth?   The system is set up so people have no choice if they are to survive and its damn arrogant and inhumane to condemn people for trying to survive.   This is obscene.  Other obscenities are  the sly comments on black woman and sexuality, on poor women being “greedy bitches” – being made on Twitter by men including black men and by some women.  People are so conditioned to believe  powerful white men in grey suits even though this group have proved time and time again to be the biggest liars, the biggest cheats, the biggest violators throughout our world history.   Eve Ensler has written an excellent essay on what we can learn from this tragic story

  This is a stream of the questions running in my head all morning.

  How do you fight a rape case if you have lied in your past? How do you fight a rape case if you have been sexually active? How do you fight a rape case as a woman who wants a future in journalism, politics, banking, international affairs? How do you fight a rape case and ever hope to be taken seriously again or be perceived as anything other than a raped victim?

  How do you fight a rape case as a woman in places like Congo where there are no real courts and no one is held accountable? How do you fight a rape case as an illegal immigrant with no rights in that country?

  How do you fight a rape case if you still believe rape is your fault, if you don’t even know what rape is, if you are afraid of upsetting your boyfriend/husband, or afraid of getting him in trouble because he will be more violent to you?

  To return to Taiye Selasi.  Much has been written on the duty or responsibility of the writer.  In response to a question on this, Selasi speaks about the need for the truth to be told.   I agree with her on that but I dont see it as the artist’s responsibility – I see it as a responsibility of humanity .  Does the fact someone chooses to write or paint or take photographs mean they now have a responsibility to everyone – why?   Personally I dont see that the writer has a responsibility to anyone but themselves.   Notwithstanding that there are many truths and we, as part of humanity, have a responsibility to be true to ourselves and take responsibility for our actions, words, and mess ups.

  And the thing that frustrates me the most when I think about the countries from which I come, Nigeria and Ghana, is the sense that the lives of millions of women and children and young men should somehow be held hostage to the ego-maniacal ambitions of a few middle-aged men. I think this idea is obscene and I think it needs to be discussed. I think it must be discussed. And I think literature that ignores this truth isn’t telling the truth. That hasn’t been said.

  To leave out the other stories or to let them sort of lie under the rubble of things having fallen apart is incomplete. And so as a writer I think I’m always sort of seeking to excavate human narrative from underneath all of that and hold it up to the light of universal experience. And to say as the highbrow social magazine Us Weekly says: Africans, they’re just like us. We’re living the lives that everyone in the world is living. And when that happens and only when that happens, I think does it start to seem obscene. Does it start to seem absurd? Does it start to make you crazy to think that teenagers using Facebook, dating, breaking up, mothers wanting the best for their children, fathers finding work, losing work, pursuing dreams. The whole panoply of human experience, to think that that is being pressed down, limited and curtailed by these really limited and in many ways outdated political squabbles, that becomes absurd.

  Only when we can see that human beings being limited, being fundamentally limited by that are exactly the same as human beings everywhere else.

  It’s a question of whether you feel the rain or just go through life getting wet!

• My African Mind: How ignorance did become history

  Posted: July 1, 2011, 6:19 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Healthy black monsters come in all shapes and sizes:

  ‘Fornication under the consent of the pope’ – opened the season of rape of black women from then till now – of no consequence.

  MY AFRICAN MIND from BOFADACARA on Vimeo.

• Marcus and the Amazons: Book Trailer

  Posted: June 30, 2011, 1:02 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Marcus and the Amazons – a children’s story by Geoffrey Philp

   

  I believe Marcus and the Amazons is worthwhile, especially because…

  1. It’s a great little story that will stimulate all kinds of duscussions
  2. Marcus is respectful of others even when he disagrees with their actions
  3. The story dramatizes the values of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
  and the Civil Rights movement by placing the events in a different context.
  4. Marcus resolves conflict without resorting to violence
  5. The story shows that actions/motives are not always as simple as they may seem.

  Did I mention its a great little story?

   

  After traveling through the forest, Marcus returns to his home and discovers that Amazons have enslaved his colony and imprisoned Princess Amy, his bride-to-be.

  With the help of his friends from the forest, Marcus must save Princess Amy and rally his colony to stand against the Amazons. But during his stay in the forest,

  Marcus has also renounced violence. Will Marcus succeed?

  
  

   

  You can buy a copy of Marcus and the Amazons from SmashWords

• Nigerian German writer, Olumide Popoola “This is not about sadness”

  Posted: June 27, 2011, 8:23 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Nigerian German writer and performance poet, Olumide Popoola, discusses “multiculturalism” and the differences between Germany and Britain. She also reads from her new novella, “This is not about sadness” which is at the top of my “to read” list for the August.

  Via Kalamu

• links for 2011-06-27

  Posted: June 27, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Nigeria: Boko Haram – a Small Group Becomes a Deadly Scourge Prior to the events of July 2009 when the sect's notoriety waxed strong, its members had been involved in dastardly incidents in Yobe in 2003 and in Kano in 2004. In April 2007, 10 policemen and a divisional commander's wife were killed in an attack on the police headquarters in Kano.
    On November 13, 2008, Muhammed Yusuf was arrested following an attack on a police station in Maiduguri, in which, 17 of his followers were killed. On January 20, 2009, he was granted bail by a High Court judge in Abuja. This was to be an error.
    On October 7, 2010, the members stormed a federal prison in Bauchi and set free hundreds of their members as well as other inmates and threatened reprisals against those they accused of persecuting their members. Obviously, the military did not defeat Boko Haram last year when a five-day long clash ended with the alleged extrajudicial execution, in police custody, of Ustaz Yusuf. (tags: nigeria BokoHaram)
  • Beyond Abolition: Ending Slavery in Mauritania « Reclaiming The Narrative: Making History (& Writing It Too!) The Mauritanian government, under President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, has recently announced measures to regulate the working conditions of domestic servants and workers within the country‘s borders. However, approximately 20 percent (well over half a million) of Mauritania‘s population remains enslaved particularly in the domestic and agricultural sectors. Mauritania has failed to fully abolish slavery within its borders, in spite of repeated passages of laws abolishing the slave trade in the years 1905, 1981 and 2007. The August 2007 law finally made owning slaves a criminal offense. (tags: mauritania slavery)
  • SONS OF MALCOLM: MORE FROM RESPECTED SISTER CYNTHIA MCKINNEY ON HER LIBYA MISSION Cynthia McKinney's "Eye Witness" Reports from Libya [Video] (tags: Libya)
  • Environmental Migrants in Africa: A Pan-African Solution A legal settlement for Africans by Africans would recognise that most environmentally induced migration is likely to take place within the territorial borders of the African continent. Herein lies a key difference between political and environmental migration. A refugee fleeing persecution by definition finds herself outside the country of her nationality. Unable to avail herself of the protection of her home country, she can only fall back upon international law. (tags: Environment refugees migration)
  • Food Insecurity Seizes East Africa | Think Africa Press Severe drought continues to plague East Africa, with Ethiopia, Kenya, Somaliland and eastern Uganda being areas of particular concern. The drought has intensified fears over food security in the region, as rising global food prices increase pressure on the poor. Famine Early Warning Systems Network (Fewsnet), a US agency,  says the drought is “the most severe food security emergency in the world today”, with more than 7 million people in the region in need of humanitarian assistance (tags: EastAfrica Food_Insecurity Drought)

• links for 2011-06-26

  Posted: June 26, 2011, 5:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Pro-Zionist LGBT organizing PinkWashing (tags: GME Israel lgbtME)

• For insomniacs everywhere – freeing yourself from the tyranny of sleep.

  Posted: June 26, 2011, 10:04 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  I wonder whether there was ever a time when I slept. When my children were young I used to dream of when they were old enough to wake, go to the loo and get their own cereal and plonk themselves QUIETLY in front of the telly and I would sleep and sleep. It never happened and I still cannot sleep and even when I do its such a light sleep that the most slightest of noises or movement and I am awake. When desperate I take one tablet of Valerian but even though this is supposed to be half the dose, it completely knocks me out and I wake up feeling lethargic.

  A couple of nights ago I came across this essay by Aminatta Forno on insomnia. Two things really stood out. First her comment on our obsession with sleep which is probably a good part of the reason we cannot sleep. By 2am I am in a panic because now there are only 5 hours left for me to get the sleep I need to function the next day – this totalitarian sleep control and guaranteed to extend the insomnia into the early hours of the morning. Some nights I function perfectly OK with only 2, 3 hours. Others, I can do nothing not even sleep maybe for two three days. The other point she makes is – sleep time somehow feels like wasted time. There is so much to do, how irritating that we have to take 7/8 hours a day to sleep! The crazy thing about sleep, a point also made by Aminatta, is that I never feel rested afterwards. Just groggy and exhausted from dreams, nightmares and anxieties over all the little things that for those hours became monumental hills which could not possibly be climbed.

  After reading this I no longer feel so bad about my insomnia – its peaceful at night and yes if you do go out at 2 / 3am the roads are clear, and every once in a while you come across a cafe or bar where other late nighters and insomniacs are gathered – free of the tyranny of sleep!

  Ten years ago I lost the gift of sleep. I had left my full-time job and begun work on a difficult memoir, one that involved going to and from a war zone. I was under stress. I went to the doctor, who prescribed Zopiclone. But the sleeping pills didn’t work, so I stopped taking them. I assumed that sleep would return in its own time, but it never did.
  
  Last night I slept in a new place and, as usual with new places, woke at four in the morning. The night before I had slept even less. I had a flight to catch the next day. I went to bed at midnight and at 3.30 I was awake and staring at the thin strip of street light between the curtains. I was anxious about the flight. Then I remembered that I had left a sentence unfinished in a piece of writing. Small anxieties stretched into long worms, burrowing through the brain. As the hours passed I began to feel the sensation with which I’ve become familiar: a nervous tension, a rising nausea. The more I chase sleep, the more it hides from me. Sleep is a temperamental creature: quicksilver, quixotic, stubborn and seductive.

  Yes, those are bad nights.

  Then there are the good nights. I don’t mean the nights when sleep comes and stays with me, though those are good, too. I mean the nights when insomnia feels like something special. One night in December as I prepared for bed I opened the curtain and saw the first flakes of snow float down. At four o’clock I was awake. I left my bed, pulled on some jeans and a coat and stepped out into the street. Thick snow reflected the light of a bright Moon. I walked up to a park at the top of the hill. Ahead, a vixen ploughed the same path and turned to look at me every few seconds. She was watching me, working out my intentions, keeping a distance between us. But that night, the only two creatures in a whitened world, it looked like something else, as though she wanted me to follow her.

  In the decade during which I searched for my lost gift, I wandered out into the night on many occasions. There I met other insomniacs in parks and open spaces across London. Sometimes I drove through the streets, saw the single light burning in a row of darkened houses and recognised the lonely beacon of the insomniac. I practised something called “good sleep hygiene”, bathed in lavender baths and drank tisanes of valerian. I abandoned coffee after midday, bought earplugs. I became intensely aware how obsessed we are with sleep. We tell each other to sleep well and in the morning ask: “How did you sleep?” We all, not just insomniacs, count the number of hours we’ve had as obsessively as an anorexic counting calories. Parents suffer sleep deprivation, buy books and train their children to sleep alone, in the dark and on command.

  The truth is that I never did much care for sleep. It feels like time wasted. When I do sleep, I dream intensely. I have sometimes been able to stop and start dreams, to think “oh, hell, it’s just a dream” and skydive from a light aircraft. If that sounds fun, it is. But if the dreams are vivid, so are the nightmares. Sleep leaves me exhausted as often as it leaves me rested.

  Yet I envy sleepers. In Sam Kiley’s book about the war in Afghanistan, Desperate Glory, he writes about sleep the night before a battle, the “lucky ones” who manage it, and everyone else. In the middle of the book I came across a photograph of a soldier in full battledress, holding a rifle, head propped against a wall — asleep. What I felt in that moment — hugely and with a surge of hot shame — was envy. In the end, Kiley writes, sleep is learnt, you catch it when you can — because your life depends on it. ………Continue reading

• Kafayat Quadri Rawks!

  Posted: June 25, 2011, 6:48 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Kafayat Quadri – Nigeria

  
  

• links for 2011-06-25

  Posted: June 25, 2011, 5:03 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • TRANSPHOBIA « The Anti-Intellect Blog I’m sick of gay men harassing trans people. It’s not for us to tell trans person’s what their sexual orientation is.So many hateful and ignorant people hide behind “it’s just an opinion.” It’s not just an opinion. It’s someone’s life at stake! Transphobia is not cool. Not from gay men with trans friends. Not from trans people. Not from anyone!It’s funny how a person claims to not be transphobic BUT they “just” know that when trans women have sex with straight men it’s “gay.” Saying “I have a trans friend,” “My best friend is trans and they don’t care,” “I’m just giving my opinion” does not justify transphobia. (tags: Transphobia)
  • Is Apple Creating Technology That Will Block You From Creating and Sharing Cell Phone Video? | Movements.org I hope Apple has the guts and good sense never to deploy this technology, and instead uses the patent to prevent it being implemented by others. Yeah, right! If it were Google, that might be more than a vain hope…When we look back on the history of media in our era, we will see how, bit by bit, we gutted one of the engines of democracy in the interest of protecting and enlarging media industry profits. A very poor trade indeed. (tags: technology Apple mobilephones video)

• links for 2011-06-24

  Posted: June 24, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Has Technology Changed Organizing? A Conversation with Movement Scholar Marshall Ganz | Movements.org In 1848, every country in Europe had a revolution. And they happened very quickly one upon the other. People were riding on horses with broadsides to the next town. It’s not like social contagion is a brand new thing. And I’m not saying that to minimize the significance of the new things, but just to put them into context to appreciate what they enable us to do and what they do not. (tags: newmedia cyberactivism socialmovements)
  • Pambazuka – Senegal: Violent uprising in Dakar 'There is a violent uprising happening now here. In the city center of Dakar, in the suburbs and in the provincial areas. A lot of demonstrations and riots are happening,' writes Tidiane Kassé, as Senegalese people take to the streets to oppose a new law being discussed in parliament, which would allow a presidential candidate to take power with just 25% of the vote. Meanwhile, as a Yellitaare statement calls on the Senegalese government to ensure the safety of human rights activist Alioune Tine, reports from Dakar suggest that Tine is 'seriously wounded', after being hit on the head by attackers alleged to be the body guards of a minister close to President Abdoulaye Wade. (tags: senegal uprising protests)
  • …My heart’s in Accra » Four Questions about Civic Media My hope is that understanding who speaks, who amplifies and who listens will help us address the second question I’m obsessed with: “How do we help marginal and rarely-heard voices find an audience?” While the promise of digital media is that everyone can share their story, we’re a long way from realizing that potential. Projects like Charlie deTar’s Between the Bars, which invites the roughly 1% of Americans who are incarcerated to blog by sending paper letters which are scanned and posted online, or Sasha Costanza-Chock’s VozMob, which allows immigrant and low wage workers to blog from mobile phones, invite us to pay attention to communities we rarely encounter in new or old media. Bringing people into the conversation sometimes requires new tools, like Leo Burd’s VoIPDrupal, which brings the power of Voice over IP – critical to reaching populations who don’t have regular internet access – into the participatory media conversation. (tags: activism journalism civicmedia blogs socialmedia)

• links for 2011-06-23

  Posted: June 24, 2011, 2:49 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Women in Politics: Planning ahead of 2015 elections

  The role of money in political pariticpations especially for the female politicians was so glaring in the just concluded 2011 elections. The lack of strong financial based for many female politicians hindered the large coverage of campaign and their popularity. No one is advocating for blood money or fraudulent resources but hard earned money or support from credible sources to do the necessary public awareness, campaign and rallies.

  There is no denying the fact that there are many other obstacles alienating women from political participations and offices. Patriarchy is a key factor, violent and unsafe political landscape as well as parties’ discrimination and unfair selections have tremendous roles to play but with these many obstacles, if women do not have money for their campaign and to start early will these not be a double tragedy?

  Roy and Lahiri: India, home and diaspora

  ‘They are trying to keep me destabilised- so begins a recent interview with Arundhati Roy, published in the UK Guardian on the eve of the release of ‘Broken Republic’, the latest in an ever elongating list of non-fiction books by the author of the great Booker Prize winning novel, ‘The God of Small Things’

  With Arundhati Roy, we’ve waited for a second novel for over a decade, in vain. In 2007 the author announced she was writing it but has failed to deliver the goods. She keeps churning out polemics instead. The novelist has given way to an outspoken critic of the Indian government on Deforestation, globalisation, Kashmir and so on. Like Hill, Roy’s detractors paint her as shrill, a loony, even her interviewer in The Guardian could hardly keep such insinuations from his text of the interview. In this part of the world, we’ve never had problems with our writers being activists as long as they remain faithful to the calling that gave them a platform and a listening/reading public in the first place. After buying Roy’s ‘An Ordinary Person’s Guide to Empire’ years ago, I’m refraining from buying any more of her non-fiction work (and this, from a committed reader and writer of non-fiction!) in the hope she gets that damned second novel out already.

  South Africa: Bring back the truth and dignity from 1976

  On Youth Day this year the nation will be celebrating 35 years since the struggle of the youth that died for Freedom, Democracy, Justice and Equality in 1976. We as Abahlali youth agree that the courage of the youth of 1976 must be celebrated. But we also wish to bring back the truth and the dignity of those youth that sacrificed with their lives in 1976. We need to make that truth and dignity a living force now. The struggles of the past must not be misused to silence the struggle of the present. The struggles of the past must be used to support the struggles of the present. Every generation must be free to take their own struggle forward.

  Wikileaked Cable Describes How State Department Influenced Aljazeera’s Post-Quake Coverage of Relief Effort

  Department cables Wikileaked last year revealed a State offensive against unfavorable media coverage of the U.S. role in the aid effort, with Hillary Clinton instructing all embassies to “push back” against “inaccurate and unfavorable international media coverage of America’s role and intentions in Haiti.”

  A newly released cable, made available through Wikileaks’ partnership with Haiti Liberté and The Nation, reveals in detail how such “push back” worked, in one case at least.

  Frantz Fanon 50 years on

  Fanon would certainly not have wanted to be canonised as an authority outside of the context in which he wrote and struggled. On the contrary he constantly stressed, from his first book to his last, that a living thought must always be an engagement with a particular situation.

  But 50 years after his death our world is both strikingly similar and strikingly different to the world in which Fanon lived and struggled with such an incandescent passion. His remarks about the oil of Iraq having ‘removed all prohibitions and made concrete the true problems’ and the ‘marines who periodically are send to re-establish “order” in Haiti’ are hardly strange words from another time. His account of the degeneration of national liberation struggles into organised plunder is routinely described as prophetic by new readers in Southern Africa.

• Shady politics of GayMiddleEast

  Posted: June 24, 2011, 8:02 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Last March, Pink Watching Israel published an article in which they exposed the website Gay Middle East as having “shady politics” with close Zionist connections and “who has never carried any of the anti-apartheid statements by LGBT groups in the region. ”

  That the largest Middle East LGBT (well, G mostly)”grassroots news” website is run by British Israeli Zionist Dan Littauer is already cause for concern. The fact that GME regularly collaborates with neo-colonialist Islamophobes such as Peter Tatchell [See Out of Place, Out of Print] (the guy with a penchant for threatening lawsuits against those who don’t think he is god’s gift to oppressed gay people) doesn’t help his credentials much. Bizarrely, he is also the human rights and press officer for the Association of British Muslims. Barring the logic of such a position, Littauer is also quite friendly with Islamophobic pornographer Michael Lucas, whose recent campaign against Siegebusters, a NY-based anti-apartheid group, successfully got them banned from meeting at the NY LGBT center. Lucas, by the way, is making a name for himself uttering such gems as “Muslims have not contributed to civilization in any way”. He is also famous for making gay porn film “Men of Israel”, which had its setting on the ruins of homes of Palestinians displaced in 1948.

  There is a degree of deceptiveness about Gay Middle East which Mideast Youth in a post “Que(e)rying the Israel-linked GayMiddleEast.com: a statement by Arab queers” compares to Tom MacMaster’s “Amina”.

  MacMaster’s deception brought many issues to the fore, and the least interesting are the stories GayMiddleEast.com has been plugging about how, contrary to what MacMaster has portrayed, gays are actually really oppressed. Perhaps more relevant in this context is an honest discussion about how to do solidarity work in a way that is respectful of people’s lived realities. That includes knowing what the limits of solidarity are, especially when you are outside the community you claim to care about, and when you occupy a position of privilege.

  Both MacMaster and Littauer have chosen the wrong path; they have both put themselves front and center, the former by actually deceptively adopting the persona of a queer Arab woman, and the latter by acting as a spokesperson and gatekeeper for queer Arab voices with a direct line to the Western media.

  The statement by Queer Arabs reminds me of the “Statement of Warning” made by African LGBTI activists to Peter Tatchell and Outrage in February 2007…

  In order to prevent Peter Tatchell and Outrage! from causing further damage through their unfounded campaigns and press releases, we issue this public statement of warning.

  As Human Rights Defenders from across Africa, we strongly discourage the public from taking part in any LGBTI campaigns or calls to action concerning Africa that are led by Peter Tatchell or Outrage!

  Collaboration across continents is both important and valuable. We are willing to work with those who respect our advice and expertise regarding our continent.

  However, Outrage! has been acting in contempt and disregard of the wishes and lives of African Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Intersex (LGBTI) Human Rights Defenders. We have made every attempt to address this matter with Outrage!, personally, and they have refused to listen. We now take this matter to the public, requesting you not to take part in any of Peter Tatchell or Outrage!’s campaigns regarding Africa, as they are not factually-based and are harmful to African activists.

  In both cases Queer Arab and African voices are being co-opted by white men. With the help of a handfull of collaborators both on the continent and in the Diaspora they continually attempt to discredit our voices but worse grossly undermine grassroots struggles and take credit for any successes and acts of resistance. Queer African voices like our Queer Arab sisters and brothers..

  “are not victims in need of a white saviour working in London, nor do we need a conduit for our poor brown oppressed voices to be heard in the West, which seems to be GayMiddleEast.com’s intended audience.

  Links: Arab activists question Gay Middle East.com

  LGBT racism and transnational resistance: A short timeline
  Summer 2010:

  - In Toronto, Queers Against Israeli Apartheid is banned from marching at Pride. After massive protests against the censorship, the group is allowed back into the march.

  - In Berlin, Judith Butler, a BDS supporter, refuses to accept the Pride award for
  civil courage in response to the racist enmeshments of the Pride organizers, and instead passes the award on to anti-racist organizations in Berlin

  - In Oslo, there are discussions if Pride should for the first time start in the “homophobic” neighbourhood Grønland, popularly imagined as Muslim.

  Spring 2011:
  - In London, gay activists linked to the neo-fascist English Defense League organize the East End Gay Pride march through Tower Hamlets, an inner-city areas constructed as Muslim. The official march is stopped after resistance from queer Muslims, other queers of colour, and their allies .

  - In Brussels, there are discussions if the Pride parade should this year start in the migrant neighbourhood, and if it should be headed by LGBT-asylum seekers carrying posters that thank the Belgian nation.

  - The NYC LGBT Community Center cancels Israeli Apartheid Week and denies the organizers access to the space.

  - In Paris, Inter-Pride uses a gallic cock in tricolore to advertise an event (in imitation of a Front National image). Following a spontanous anti-racist coalition, the image is withdrawn.

  - In Lyon, a queer kiss-in in front of a Mosque is narrowly prevented.

  Madrid 2010:
  In response to the attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, where 9 people were killed by the Israeli Army, the state-sponsored Israeli delegation is excluded from taking part in the Pride.

• Emmanuel Iduma: Ikhide’s Complaint ["The Caine Prize and Unintended Consequences"]

  Posted: June 23, 2011, 5:52 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Guest blog post by Emmanuel Iduma, co-founder and co-editor of Saraba Magazine.

  Emmanuel responds to Nigerian writer and critic, Ikhide Ikheloa’s essay “Email from America: The Caine Prize and Unintended Consequences”. The essay which one website described as ” Wainainaesque” after Binyavanga Wainaina’s satirical “How to Write About Africa” and together with Chimamanda Adichie’s   “The danger of a single story”, is fast becoming the third part of a trilogy of African intellectual criticism of Western literary imposition.

  The Caine Prize for African Writing has been great for African literature by showcasing some truly good works by African writers. The good news is that the Caine Prize is here to stay. The bad news is that someone is going to win the Caine Prize this year. This is a shame; having read the stories on the shortlist, I conclude that a successful African writer must be clinically depressed, chronicling in excruciating detail every open sore of Africa. Apologies to Wole Soyinka. The creation of a prize for “African writing” may have created the unintended effect of breeding writers willing to stereotype Africa for glory.
  The mostly lazy, predictable stories that made the 2011 shortlist celebrate orthodoxy and mediocrity. They are a riot of exhausted clichés even as ancient conflicts and anxieties fade into the past tense: huts, moons, rapes, wars, and poverty. The monotony of misery simply overwhelms the reader. Fiammetta Rocco, the Economist’s literary editor who chaired last year’s judges, crows that the stories are “uniquely powerful.” The stories are uniquely wretched. The chair of this year’s judges Hisham Matar declares presumptuously that the stories “represent a portrait of today’s African short story: its wit and intelligence, its concerns and preoccupations.” Really? Is this the sum total of our experience, this humourless, tasteless canvas of shiftless Stepin Fetchit suffering?

  Ikhide Ikheloa made it a point to diss the shortlisted stories for the 2011 Caine Prize, which, by the way, is not the first time we have been served with his opinionated criticism. In response, I intend to make the case that there are deeper concerns than the sweeping conclusions he makes in his short essays, “How not to Write about Africa” and The Caine Prize and Unintended Consequences.” He complains that, “The creation of a Prize for ‘African Writing’ may have created the unintended effect of breeding writers writing to stereotype Africa for glory.” And he goes further to assert that the stories “celebrate orthodoxy and mediocrity,” that “they are a riot of exhausted clichés even as ancient conflicts and anxieties fade into the past tense: huts, moons, rapes, wars and poverty.” Then he praises Medalie’s “The Mistress’s Dog” because it narrates an “Africa without kwashiorkor.” The imagery he presents is stimulating, pitching Medalie’s ‘Africa without kwashiorkor’ against NoViolet Bulawayo’s “sniffing around Africa’s sewers.” This “sniffing” is by “good writers showcasing good prose and great dialogue” stuck in the “fog of stereotypes.” I implore the reader to take a look at those essays. I am more concerned about the implications of Mr. Ikheloa’s complaint(s) than about his affronts to the “good writers” and the Caine Prize which “has come to stay.” I will, however, return a few more times to his considerations.

  The dilemma we face is the challenge of distinguishing between writing a “story” and writing “stereotypes.” It is clear that the divide, and the constructs, exist. It is also clear that both merge and are almost inseparable. For instance, I might decide to write a story about incest and child witch-hunt in Esit Eket, thereby writing an African “stereotype” or I might decide to tell a story of a deaf man who hears a single song, thereby writing a “story.” This is a fashionable divide, sometimes bedevilling, other times accommodating. But I consider this divide more intricate than superficial.

  Let me make assumptions for what it takes to write stereotypes, and write a story. To write a stereotype, one mixes fact with fiction – narrating, on the one hand, a considerable navigation of the known world and on the other creatively repeating that known world. This is perhaps an art in itself, and essentially accommodating, I think. Or perhaps stereotypes get their essentials from “political correctness” – which suggests that “stereotypes” can fall within the category that encompasses the media, Westernization, Neo-colonialism, and whatnot. The other realm, of stories, demands extended imagination – we find ourselves making our special known worlds, giving no quarter to political correctness, living in a (re)imagined state. This second realm, unlike the first, becomes celebrated only because those who read us find in it an escape from “reality.”
  
  But would I be wrong to ask which of these realms demands greater guts? How fearless must we be to write a stereotype into a story? Is the necessity for fearlessness greater in the first realm and lesser in the second? Put more succinctly, how much guts did it take Rushdie to write “The Satanic Verses”, and how did that differ from, say the stories of Graham Greene or Raymond Chandler? Unfortunately, I find it increasingly difficult to defer to this divide because I do not know if there are stories which purely narrate “issues” and those that purely function in the field of the imaginative. Perhaps, this is one difficulty with Ben Okri; how there is the impossibility of establishing a definite realm for his stories.

  I think it is a very complex problem, because I live on Earth and not on Mars and I cannot imagine something out of the known world. I create faces from faces that appear in my head after I have seen a face, and a leg and a table too. And perhaps it is not as easy as I have been made to believe, that it is possible to write a story that is a story and has no trace of the issues that bedevil humanity. But maybe our conception of “stereotypes” is stuck in a slot in a negative contraption. We have learnt Chimamanda Adichie that there are “dangers of a single story.” We know how important it is that Africa is not thought of as a country, but as a continent. And we know how important it is to tell stories that do not convey the “dark” side of Africa, stories that do well with a “Western audience”; or to avoid stories that portray Africa as an “issue-laden continent.” Then, these issues that we talk about are issues of negativity and not, well, rich ethnicity and functioning social life. These stories, that are only stories, are those that tell of “normal” lives, that are not clichés. It is safe to assume that stories that are issue-laden are those that explore the details of a much-talked about negative life, a portrayal that is both politically and socio-culturally incorrect, though demeaning.

  But whose story are we supposed to write? The stories in our head? The stories that we imagine are in the heads of our countrymen? The story of the town our parents were born in, or our country, or where we have lived? Three words, then, appear relevant – memory, fraternity and essence. Memory because I think I am a collage of what I was yesterday; of places, people and things I engaged with in the past (incidentally there is an essay by celebrated atheist Sam Harris, “Morality without Freewill” that navigates the proposition that our actions, intentions, beliefs and desires arise not from freewill but from prior-causes). Fraternity because I do not live alone, and I do not exist in a space void of community, language, ethnicity and social structure. And essence because I think I belong to a larger scheme of things, because I am fool to think I exist only within a sphere that is self-attributive. This, then, can mark the intersection between the private and the public, that arena where I think I am writing for myself and others tell me my work appeals to them. I tell myself that I must not set out with the objective to tell another’s story, but I find that when I tell the story that seems individual, others say I tell their stories too. I like to call this subconscious fraternity, and it is not impossible that there is a single thread of (un)conscious memory and essence that runs through all of us.

  I must digress. When we speak of telling stories that are not stereotypes, or when we address Ikhide’s complaint, we are faced with the question of whether NoViolet Bulawayo’s “Hitting Budapest” is a story that is as much hers as it is Africa’s. We know that the Caine Prize is the “African Booker,” and so it must represent, essentially, what is “African” about Africa. Good, then. Did Bulawayo write a story that was in her head which found an intersection with what was ‘real’ about Africa? Or did she tell another story, one that is real to the West, one that the West believes as their “African” story? Mr. Ikheloa further complains that “the West is now busily forcing our stories into a particularly obnoxious trajectory.”

  I am simply asking: How real can we be about Africa? And how real can we be to Africa? Now, I am careful to use ‘Africa’ because we are a set of 54 countries with different histories and fractured perspectives. I am also careful because I suppose I am as strange to a Tunisian as that Tunisian is to a Canadian. So if we are speaking of Africa’s tale, we are in the danger of writing the tale of say Darfur or Uganda or Rwanda and not that of Bauchi, Afikpo or Ile-Ife. Africa seems to be a generalized word, a permissible one, and I am wary of the associations that have come off it. Thus, I fall back to the assumption that issues are only issues in a generalized sense used for defining Africa as ‘the sick baby of the world.’ But it is dangerous to conclusively assume that these cliché stories (issue-laden stories) are written because “needy African writers” are hungry. Perhaps they are written in the voice of a writer for whom the generalized Africa is a particularized one. Ikhide complains that there is a lot of lamentation in supposedly contemporary African narratives. Thus, I am wont to question the relevance and expedience of these cliché stories – is there a purpose to stereotype-stories, even in the long term? I hate, however, to be a judge of these things.

  We know from Granta that “How to Write about Africa” ranks amongst the most popular of all their online essays. It is understandable that Binyavanga Wainaina feeds into the essay sarcastic details of an Africa that resonates in Western-controlled media (and we know that he who controls the media controls perception). I am fine with the contents of the essay, and I have been a fan of it since 2007. Yet I think it must count for something that the essay is very popular on the Granta site. I want to think that a new stereotype is emerging – a stereotype that wants to address “Africa” in the way it should be addressed; because we are angry, perhaps ashamed, of the manner in which Africa has been written about. I assume this because this generation of writers did not invent this stereotype. We are affected by the Achebe-Conrad war. Agreed, our claims are justifiable, as we do not want to be defined, or as Mr. Ikheloa wrote once, we do not want to be italicized. We do not want our language explained at the back of a book that purportedly celebrates us. Yet, is this not going to become what we are avoiding? Is our definition of ourselves by ourselves not going to become a stereotype? Is the story we are going to tell that is pleasing, and acceptable, and real, not going to become a cliché story too? I believe this must be considered urgently, because “screwing” boundaries and prizes and “just writing” suggests that there is another story we are not telling. One pointer we get to this other story – this emerging stereotype – is the fact that (as Ikhide writes), “outside of the destructive force of organized religion, wars and diseases, the internet and cell phone technology are the most powerful forces in the ongoing restructuring of African communities.” Then if we move from this destructive telling, we are yet to find a template to build our efforts at telling stories upon, a template that screws boundaries and prizes. Even Mr. Ikheloa does not provide such template. Except, of course, he suggests that good writing about Africa is writing that addresses the forces of the internet and cell phone technology – and this would be suicidal because Ivor Hartman (in One Ghana One Voice’s Roundtable Discussion #6) states that “up to 89.1% of Africa do not have online access.”

  The problem is that, as my friend Adebiyi Olusolape muses, our collective view is influenced more by sensational media coverage than by anything else. Of Zadie Smith’s “White Teeth”, in relation to her treatment of an Islamic subject, Olusolape notes that “It’s always the Muslims. But was this the case at the time the book was being written, pre-9/11, before it became “official” that Muslims be made the handy bogeymen?” In essence, assuming there was no 9/11, terrorism might be defined differently and “terrorists” accorded less bogeyness. So, put in perspective, assuming we had the pre-colonial opportunity to define ourselves, there might be little clamour, as there now is, for self-definition and narratives that sing the collective song of the people. This, however, was not the case. We were defined against our wish. My fear is that in an attempt to re-define and assert ourselves, despite our pitfalls and failures, we would lose fluidity and individualization.

  Chris Abani says the story is fluid and belongs to no one person. This is important in his contemplation of what I think of as the “human narrative” – an attempt to universalize the human condition into any narrative, but essentially within an ethnic context. So I write a story from an Igbo viewpoint, questioning my Igboness, because I know someone would question his Giyukuness. Abani writes, “This sometimes happens to us, that we write the song that sings our mother across to the other side. That the narrative is beyond even the ethical work we wanted it to be. That it is sometimes a good yarn, that it sometimes brings comfort to others, that it sometimes makes our people proud of us.” I will return to a consideration of this.

  Does the story of the real Africa belong to only one person? If we choose to write a story about Darfur, does it mean we have told a story that should not be told because it affirms a skewed Western thought or affords a validation of Western-stereotypic consciousness? I remember someone saying that “Jimmy Carter’s Eyes” was a better story than “Waiting.” And that Osondu wrote the latter to “win” the Caine. Good, agreed. He won the Caine. He wrote a story. Perhaps one is more important than the other (or perhaps the decision of the Judges is most important). I am thinking this could be equated with what Emeka Okereke, Nigerian photographer, blogs about in relation to a project organized by an organization named AECID affiliated with the Spanish Ministry of Culture: “You have what I want, you want what I have.” Thus, I give the Caine people what they “want” in exchange for the prestige and literary stardom that comes with the prize. Yet, it appears that it is increasingly difficult to draw a line between the stories that should be told and the stories that should not, because we are a set of generalized people that are finding their voice; of course I disagree with Mr. Ikheloa because he seems to think this line is easily discernable. Is this not a case for saying that we must explore all options, all alternatives to narration?

  I believe what is more important is the objective of the story. I assume it is unhelpful to draw a line on what a writer’s process/objective is by his story. Granted, critics do this continuously – yet in the final analysis if we can define a “grand” objective of “the story” we can go past these questions of stories that dance to a Western tune. And what is the West, anyway? And what is even human? So our grand objective must transcend western lines, become human, and take a more particularized stance. Can this grand objective be grasped? I propose that memory, fraternity and essence are merged, so that every writer, of whatever African descent, plugs his narrative into this fusion. Hopefully.

  Directly connected to this is whether the generation of writers I belong to could either conform to standards set by post-colonial writers or choose to be dissident. This is interesting for me because I grew up in post-postcolonial Nigeria, at the dusk of the military regime. So what I know is not a Nigeria just off colonialism, and therefore I cannot tell the politics that was evident in that time or become a social-critic as was the praiseworthy fashion of that time. I have grappled with the question of how socially active my writing must be, how protestant and dissident. Essentially, I find that if I confine myself to telling “activism” in my writing, I could be telling the story of another, confronting another’s reality, as I have never been imprisoned, brutalized or assaulted (perhaps an experience of any of this would change me?) What bothers me is not necessarily how failed the system is, but how this system has stripped us of some of our humanity or how we are human despite the system.

  Since I have raised the question of political relevance, it is appropriate to consider the extent to which such relevance is useful. Is this relevance a clamour for anti-Government (protest) writing? As we know, in Nigeria for instance, a civilian government has not shown a greater zeal for the Nigerian people than their military counterpart. And so, we have enough reason to display dissidence, ‘incorruptible dissidence’ like Soyinka. We have the option to write “politically,” fight the government of our time. Yet, there appears to be an over-documentation of protest. As such, there could (or should) be a different slant in my head aside “the prejudice of colonialism, racism, anxieties about postcolonial life and the painful alienation of exile.” However, I am making the case that what I feel in my head could be anything from the preoccupations of the older writers to the reality of an internet age, and my choice of either should not invalidate my writing.

  I return to Emeka Okereke because he makes a case for “the concept of freedom of manoeuvre within the volatile abundance of the creative magnetic field.” What does this imply? Does it suggest that our freedom as writers, or artists, extends to the need to deal with matters we find ‘fulfilling’ (in terms of Caine prestige and monetarily)? Or does it start and end at questioning personal and collective unrest in a manner that is not ‘politically’ correct? Indeed, where does that “manoeuvre” begin, and end? What are the parameters of our artistic freedom? How right can my story be? And how wrong? Which is wrong – my story or me? As we see, this is an open-ended conundrum.

  A simpler knot might be a question of style, and if I may be preposterous, “individual artistic libertarianism.” Raymond Carver’s “Principles of a Story” is a fine masterpiece on the art of short story writing. He notes: “It’s akin to style, what I’m talking about, but it isn’t style alone. It is the writer’s particular and unmistakable signature on everything he writes. It is his world and no other. This is one of the things that distinguishes one writer from another. Not talent. There’s plenty of that around. But a writer who has some special way of looking at things and who gives artistic expression to that way of looking: that writer may be around for a time.” Here we find that he makes a distinction between ‘style’ and ‘signature.’ He goes further to consider that a writer, with a unique lasting signature, has a way of looking at his world. Just as it is that a myopic sprinter cannot see the finish line the way non-myopic sprinters can. And it is amazing that, using this analogy, we might have difficulties judging the view of that myopic sprinter by that of his fellows. Put more contextually, how do we judge a writer if we cannot place a thumb on his ‘signature’ and how he looks at the world? A friend told me that being a Christian would blur the range of my fiction. I laughed because I could not imagine how being a believer in a “non-Christian God,” as he claimed he was, would broaden the range of my fiction.

  My contemplation of individual artistic vision could be dangerous. I would have wished that we look at the world the way we wish to, and not be judged on the question of whether our view represents “a true and collective African voice” (who even defines this?) But we understand that if this is the case we would have no complaint from Ikhide, and we do need him to complain (?) Yet we also need to, as writers, find a way to speak. I care less if I am accused of making a case for “writing to please the West.” For me, it is more dangerous to make a case for “African writing” when being an artist begins from an individual standpoint than from the collective. As such, it is arguable that Adichie corroborates this in “The Thing around Your Neck” and “Half of a Yellow Sun” and Habila in his short story “The Immigrant” and Evans in “26a.” Important, then, is the subject of identity. Identity is often an imagined state, so it gives room for very innovative ways to look at Self. We agree that we are who we are different from others because, for instance, we have the same language, live within each other, have knowledge that our parents and their parents before them lived in the place we now live or the place we call “home.” This is changing very much. For instance, I speak the Igbo language badly, although I hail from Afikpo. I have lived in up to seven cities, and my parents visit our hometown irregularly. Does this make me fractured? Yes, I think, very much. I agree that there is every need to locate myself within an ethnic space and maybe speak from that space, but I disagree that I must be more conscious of a collective identity than my fractured self.

  How then does this resolve? First, this does not resolve, and it should not. An artistic life as individual as mine cannot be explained collectively, neither can a creative process be ascertained with mathematical precision. So I am thinking that Arundhati Roy is right when she speaks of “deploying a private language.” In her Guernica interview she suggests that it is interesting to try walking the path between honing language to make it as private as possible, and looking around, seeing what is happening to millions, and deploying that private language to speak from the heart of a crowd. And I add that this private language could then become public, spoken by the crowd to the crowd and for the crowd. There can be (and should be) attempts to judge the deployment of my private language. But whoever is interested in judging must give room for his (blissful) ignorance, for even the Devil, as I was told in my undergraduate law class, does not know the mind of a man.

  Second, I agree that there can be the “ethics of narrative.” Abani makes this case in his essay in Witness Magazine – “Ethics and Narrative: the Human and Other” – which suggests that we must find the intersection between our capacity as artists and our capacity as humans (that is, I should write the story that leads your mother to the other side). If this can be incorporated in our grand objective of story-telling or Caine Prize-writing, whether or not there are Ikhide Complaints, I trust we would be fine. More so, it is very human and ethical for the narrative to be true to itself – If we go to the places described in the story, in Beatrice Lamwaka’s Uganda for instance, would we find characters as those she created in “Butterfly Dreams”? And third, this funnels into the idea that I am first human before anything else, towering above every other purpose. Therefore I am content with finding it difficult to define this humanness, because I am always groping for who I am and how best to narrate who I am within a fraternal space.

  _

  Emmanuel Iduma holds a degree in Law, and has been published online and in print. He co-publishes Saraba Magazine.

• links for 2011-06-23

  Posted: June 23, 2011, 5:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Egypt: A Multi-Generational Revolt
  • Why Egypt’s Nonviolent Victory Is a Win for Us All : Nonviolent Action Network

• Aminatta Forna “The Memory of Love”

  Posted: June 22, 2011, 5:39 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Aminatta Forna discusses her new book “The Memory of Love” with BBC Africa’s Bola Mosuru

  Part 2

  Links:
  Reviews

  The Devil Danced on the Water

• links for 2011-06-22

  Posted: June 22, 2011, 5:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Haiti: what WikiLeaks' US embassy cables reveal Conditioned by a century of superpower status, the US still acts as if it may dispose of Haiti as it chooses: as colonial dominion (tags: wikileaks Haiti)
  • Wikileaked Cable Describes How State Department Influenced Aljazeera's Post-Quake Coverage of Relief Effort Diligently following up on Secretary Clinton’s instructions, the U.S. Embassy in Doha, Qatar noticed that “On Sunday, January 17, Al Jazeera's English (AJE) news channel, headquartered in Doha, began running inaccurate coverage of U.S. and international relief efforts in Haiti.” In response, the Embassy took actions resulting in a State Department spokesperson appearing on Aljazeera English in Washington “within hours”; called Aljazeera English Director Tony Burman ahead of another call by Judith A. McHale, Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, and made sure Burman  “understood the serious concerns that the Undersecretary would convey” (tags: Haiti earthquake wikileaks AlJazeera)
  • On 60th Anniversary of Refugee Convention States Failing Refugees Today, this critical and life-saving convention turns 60 years-old. As a result of its existence tens of thousands of lives, if not more, have been saved, and nations have absorbed new cultures, languages and food, adding to the richness of those societies.
    At the same time, unfortunately, the last decade has seen governments pay lip service to the rights of refugees while in practice devoting their energies to keeping refugees away from their borders so that they do not have to honor their obligations. (tags: humanrights refugees)

• Links for 2011-06-21

  Posted: June 21, 2011, 4:06 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  By Boat to Lampedusa and a New Life

  Johnson left on a boat with 110 other migrants, among them several women and children, at 4am on 11 June. After being tracked by Lampedusa’s coastguards, the boat was escorted into port at midday the following day. “The sea was a little bit rough,” he said. “But I believed we would arrive.”
  “Johnson paid US$800. The boat captains are usually also migrants who have paid a slightly reduced rate to agents who ask them to operate the boats. Often they have limited experience at sea and are treated like the other migrants. The boats are often impounded and a “boat graveyard” is appearing by the port.”

  North African Dispatches Sarkozy and Africa: a matter of (dis)respect
  

  A short article on Sarkozy’s imperialist fantasies in North Africa. “Nicolas Sarkozy, often said to be the European George Bush (W. evidently), is also considered to be an indelicate and brash statesman. His self-aggrandizing visits to former French colonies throughout his first term have done little to help the country’s increasingly tarnished image abroad.”

  DRC: Angola’s `sans papiers’ violently deported in latest wave of expulsions

  Angola deports thousands back to the DRC – many who are women who were tortured by the Angolan police. A truly shameful act on the part of Angola. As usual it is the most vulnerable who are victimised for inter government disputes and selfish greed by politicians …

  “The women in Luiza said they were forced not to wear underwear by the Angolan military. You can obviously understand what their intention was. African women are reluctant to say they have been raped and so they need psycho-social support. Very few of the women can say they have not been assaulted by the military,” said Clovis Buala, regional coordinator for CISP in Kasai Occidental. He added that Congolese inmates at a prison in the region of Lunda Norte, Angola, had medication added to their food to make them tired in order to prevent them from escaping and to facilitate their transport en masse to the border. “

  Nollywood for Human Rights

  Nigeria’s filmmaking industry, Nollywood, takes on the issue of children’s rights and witchcraft

  Monsanto Out to Monopolize African Agriculture

  While Monsanto touts itself as an agricultural company whose aim to help farmers produce more while conserving more through their Genetically Modified (GM) seeds, the reality is that it’s all about the bottom line for Monsanto. The company simply wants to monopolize the seed market in the world and make the highest profits it can, with no concern for the adverse effects their actions have on the livelihood of farmers. In other words, it’s all about greed.

• Putting risk and sexual assault in context – #EndSH

  Posted: June 20, 2011, 6:40 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  This is a blog post is in solidarity with the “Blogging and tweeting Day Against Sexual Harassment and Gender Violence in Egypt.”

  I joined Facebook sometime in 2008 and  I have been sexually harassed a number of times but two were particularly horrible. In one I was sent pornographic photos and the other, what I thought was a fairly banal and short conversation ended with an abrupt verbal assault. I didnt report the first one – it completely freaked me out and I just deleted everything but the second I did report. FB’s response was because I had engaged with the person there was nothing I could do. This felt to me like because the guy [a gay identified man] knocked on my door and I had invited him into my space for a chat, I had no defense against being raped. In other words it was my fault. Even though the second incident was relatively mild compared to the first, I felt horrible and turned off my FB for a couple of days. Once I had recovered from feeling shit and blaming myself  because I had been careless about people wanting to add me to their “friend” list, I started to feel really angry. What makes men think they can violate you and walk away and say its a joke.

  I remembered a comment left here a couple of weeks ago in response to a statement on “corrective rape” in South Africa in which the man described rape as “a bit over the top” but he could understand the reasoning behind the barbaric acts.

  Men from Africa are seeing what is happening to men in North America and Europe. We are second class citizens. We are being turfed from the classroom and workplace at an alarming rate. There is no wonder African men feel defensive. While rape is a bit over-the-top, I can understand the reasoning behind their barbaric acts (though I do not condone violence).

  I thought of not publishing but changed my mind even though the comment itself acted as a violent trigger. I seriously believe that the vast majority of women in this world face some kind of sexual assault on a daily basis. And I seriously believe that the majority of men in this world are with their silence complicit in these assaults even when they are not the direct perpetrator. I have been subjected to racist and homophobic abuse on this blog and there are male bloggers who should know better but remained silent and unsupportive. Yet these men do not think of themselves as abusers.

  Sometime ago I read this article by Amanda Taub at Wronging Rights. who puts “risk” and sexual assault in context. Just by the fact we are women we are always at risk – always.

  And second of all, guess what? If women never went anywhere where we risked being sexually assaulted, we’d never go anywhere, period. We certainly couldn’t go to work on foreign aid projects. Or to U.S. military academies. Not to college. Not on dates. Not to parties. Not to bars. Or on cruises. Not to work as models. Or security contractors. Except that even if we never went any of those places, we’d still be screwed (pun intended) because of course a high percentage of rapes happen in the home, committed by perpetrators whom the victims know. Putting the responsibility on women to prevent sexual assault by restricting their own behavior – or on their employers to limit it for them – won’t actually solve the problem, it will just reinforce gendered norms about what “good” women “should” do.

  Links:

  Harass Map = Facebook - Website - Map

• Maghreb uprisings: Truth is ‘impossible to find’

  Posted: June 13, 2011, 6:14 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  This post was first published in Pambazuka News 534

  LIBYA

  With all the analysis and news on Libya, we still do not know very much about who the rebels are and where their support comes from. This week I try to shed some light on anti-Gaddafi supporters as presented by Libyan bloggers and Tweeters as well as the highlight the humanitarian crisis which has developed as a result of the intervention. Twitter accounts by far outnumber blogs and many of these consist of photo and video dairies.

  FEBRUARY 17TH

  
  Feb 17

  By far the most informative and interesting site is Feb 17: The Libyan Youth Movement (@Feb17Libya) which has live stream updates from a huge bank of sources – western and Arab media, tweets, personal videos and photos. This report by Ayesha Daya for Bloomberg on who in OPEC and the Middle East is supporting the rebels and how the cartel plan to offset the loss of Libyan oil production – a mix of “personal politics and economic reasoning”.

  ‘OPEC’s decision on production quotas this week may be complicated by hostilities inLibya as members meeting in Vienna find themselves supporting opposing camps of a military conflict for the first time in 21 years…Not since Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990 has the producer group gathered with some nations giving financial and military support to a movement seeking to topple the government of a fellow member.

  ‘The main regional supporters of the rebels, at least those who admit to doing so, are Qatar, the U.A.E., Kuwait whilst Algeria is the lone Gaddafi sympathizer which seems to contrary to the African Union position. President Ould Abdel Aziz of Mauritania who heads the AU panel trying to find a resolution has also called for Gaddafi to go whilst at the same time condemning NATO bombing. Other countries which have formally recognised the rebel led National Transitional Council are Senegal and Gambia and of course, the US, UK, Canada, Spain, Portugal, France and Italy. Russia not willing to commit to either Gaddafi or the rebels has taken the position of supporting both sides. On Tuesday Russia special envoy to Africa made the following statement on a visit to Benghazi.

  ‘“Russia has a unique situation in Libya now: We did not sever relations with Tripoli, we have established relations with Benghazi,” Margelov told Russia’s state-run Rossiya-24 television upon arrival in Benghazi.

  ‘“We are ready, if it’s possible, to act as middlemen in establishing an internal Libyan political dialogue. Russia is ready to help politically, economically and in any possible way.”’

  YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU!

  
  Enough Gaddafi

  Enough Gaddafi by blogger and tweeter, Sofiyan Amry (@enoughgaddafi) writes a mix of personal accounts, rebel reports and criticism of Gaddafi and any one who continues to support his regime. Here he reports on one reasons Gaddafi must go, the oppression of the Amazigh (Berbers) by Gaddafi (and elsewhere in the Maghreb):

  ‘For the past 42 years, the Libyan government has participated in a deliberate movement to erase the Amazigh from Libyan history and to assign them an Arab identity in order to justify nationalist ideological claims, despite long-lasting exchange between ethnic groups. The “Arabicization” of Amazigh history began with the onset of Gaddafi’s 1969 revolution, declaring Libya as an Arab state, naming Arabic as Libya’s only language and ignoring the 10 percent of Libya’s population that identifies as Amazigh. Their indigenous language, Tamazight, was outlawed, and those who were found speaking it were punished.

  ‘In Gaddafi’s Libya, Amazigh names were also banned, and Amazigh history was excluded from school books. Amazigh Islamic religious practices, based on the Ibadi School of jurisprudence, were rejected by the regime. Even Amazigh cities, primarily located in the region west of Tripoli called the Nafusa Mountains, have been stripped of their Amazigh names and replaced with Arabic monikers.’

  Who are the rebels? Gaddafi’s claim that the rebels are part of al Qaeda is refuted by Najla Abdurrahman:

  ‘Although Libya is in some ways a traditional society, al Qaeda remains deeply unpopular among its people, many of whom have been keen to stress that this uprising is in no way connected to the terrorist organization. Indeed, they have repeatedly scoffed at Qaddafi’s absurd accusations to the contrary. The Libyan revolution is a decidedly nationalist, democratic movement, two characteristics that render it fatally incompatible with al Qaeda’s delusional goal of resurrecting a pan-Islamic caliphate; the Libyan people have no intention of allowing their movement to be hijacked by al Qaeda. That a handful of rebel fighters may have a history with the LIFG does not mean that the Transitional National Council or the pro-democracy fighters are connected to al Qaeda, yet this is precisely what the Qaddafi regime would have the international community believe. Indeed, the council just released astatement refuting allegations aimed at associating al Qaeda with the revolutionists in Libya, and affirming its commitment to combating terrorism and implementing Security Council resolutions on counterterrorism.”

  Mistaken ideals? Cythnia McKinney, ‘deluded and ill informed’ is taken to task for her continued support of Gaddafi as ‘NATO and the international community continue their efforts to force Gaddafi from power.’

  ‘What a triumph for the sinking ship that is the Gaddafi regime—as Here is their shiny white knight: an American diplomat who’s willing to defend them against the Western-Imperialist-Al Qaeda-rats. Mckinney continues to defend Gaddafi as a ‘hero’ of African rights and refuses to acknowledge the crimes of his regime’.

  ‘In this narrative NATO’s imperialist forces have become the savior of liberation struggles for democracy – not bothering to recognise the increasing removal of democratic rights and freedoms from their own citizens. But thats another story, one not told here. This is a highly competitive and bloody game of propaganda – if it’s on Sky News then it must be true!

  ‘Cynthia Mckinney says she’s in Tripoli because she wants to “understand the truth.” And yet professional journalists who’ve been stationed there for months say that the truth, in Tripoli, is impossible to find. “If there is a hell for journalists,” wrote Sky News’ Emma Hurd, “It will probably be a lot like the Rixos Hotel in Tripoli.”’

  There is truth in some of the reasons presented by the writer: Gaddafi’s support ofCharles Taylor and Fonday Sankoh; his war against Chad; acting as Europe’s proxy border control by imprisoning of thousands of African migrants in the most terrible conditions, to name a few. He also refutes claims about Libya’s subsidized “healthcare and education and housing”:

  ‘Again, these are not state secrets. A cursory Google search would’ve led Mckinney to the truth. Instead, Mckinney stews in conspiracy and panders to the Libyan government, disseminating their lies and perpetuating a Gaddafi-approved narrative. Mckinney freely lambasts Obama and NATO— who are in no way above criticism—but refuses to acknowledge the irrefutable war crimes of the Gaddafi regime. She would rather not acquaint herself with the truth, it seems—instead, she’d prefer to rub elbows with known war criminals and mass murderers on Libyan State TV.’

  Sofi misses the point and is so taken with his own position and propaganda that he cannot or does not want to acknowledge McKinney’s position – which is against UN/NATO imperialism and the bombing campaign. Opposing these is not the same as supporting Gaddafi, though in McKinney’s case she does state her support for him and his regime.

  Other Libyan blogs such as Feb17th Tripoli (in Arabic), Epic Libyan, Libyan Thinkerand Rubicon Libya, use photo and video to report on the conflict and some of the many Libyan Tweets @Libyan4life, @ShababLibya, @ArabRevolution, @LibyaAlHurra and @LibyansRevolt who also blogs at the comprehensive Libya 17th February. See here for a list of Libyan social media sites.

  LIBYA AND AFRICA

  The refugee crisis in Tunisian camps and on the Mediterranean continues as thousands and thousands of migrant workers and Libyans flee the conflict. There are reports of an increasing number of migrants escaping in flimsy boats and drowning at sea. It seems to me that this humanitarian crisis is not only being ignored by NATO countries but they are in fact making the situation worse as their concern does not extend to helping the most vulnerable. At the very least providing safe passage and properly equipped boats to evacuate refugees. Last month the Telegraph reported that 800 refugees had drowned whilst trying to escape. Mayibuye Blog by Priority African Network has a series of reports on the fate of refugees. Pan African Newswire reports on the latest deaths of 150 African migrants found of the Tunisian coast last Tuesday.

  ‘“Up to now 150 bodies of refugees have been found off the shores of Kerkennah,” Carole Laleve, an official with the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR, told Reuters. She added: “Search operations are continuing.”

  ‘The boats encountered problems on Tuesday about 12 miles off Kerkennah as they headed for Italy, Tunisia’s state news agency TAP reported.

  ‘Tunisian coastguards and military rescued 570 people, but many others went into the water when a stampede to get off the small fishing boats – combined with the effect of rough seas – capsized some of the vessels, an official said.’

  To put the Libyan rebels’ view in perspective, Glen Ford of the Black Agenda Report, makes the important point that everyone was consulted before the Libyan attacks except Africans ‘whose latest peace plan has been rejected’. He also comments on the rebels:

  ‘These rebels have lost all legitimacy in deciding to become the ground troops for an invasion of neo-colonial North Africa.’ As subordinates, they will only obey orders……The U.S. and Europe consider that Africans have no say in what happens in Africa. The President of South Africa, Jacob Zuma , made a second trip to Libya this week on behalf of the African Union to negotiate a diplomatic end to NATO’s war against the government of Muammar Gaddafi. Colonel Qaddafi has accepted the peace plan just as he had agreed that a peacekeeping mission last of the African Union in early April. And exactly the same way, the so-called rebels and their U.S. and European bosses have refused to even consider a ceasefire. It is obvious from the beginning of this farce “humanitarian” than white European moguls and “Mascot Wall Street” as the U.S. called on Obama, want a regime change in Libya and nothing else-and the devil Africans and their ideas on the issue!’

  Two activists from ‘Global Peace for Civilians in Libya’ send a number of informative video reports from Tripoli. Lizzie Cocker’s report counters much of the West/NATO/Libyan rebel propaganda. There is very little security in Tripoli, business is as usual. There is a shortage of labour as many Black Africans have fled not least because of attacks against them due to the stories of ‘Black mercenaries’. (It would be interesting to try to find out where Black Africans were fleeing from and specific reasons!).

  In a second video Cocker interviews the general secretary of the Pan African Democratic Movement on the lynching of Black Libyans and migrants in the East of the country – rebel-held areas. None of this has been reported. To return to the point made by Enough Gaddafi, the interview mentions nothing about Gaddafi’s imprisonment of thousands of black migrants in the south of the country and insists there is no racism in Libya.

  Sukant Chandan, who blogs on Sons of Malcolm, interviews a hospital worker in Tripoli on the large numbers of people dying from NATO bombs. In a personal videocast, Sukant is highly critical of the anti-war movement in the West, which has been silent on Libya. He goes on to comment on Human Rights Watch report, which states that the cluster bombs found in Misrata are NATO’s not Gaddafi’s and that there are no black African mercenaries. Unfortunately CNN, BBC and Al Jazeera – which is itself so much part of the North African/Middle East uprisings, but which is becoming more like CNN everyday – simply unquestionably repeat NATO/UN statements.

  MOROCCO: JOINING THE CLUB OF KINGS

  Morocco has been invited by Saudi Arabia to ‘join the club of kings’ -

  the Gulf Cooperation Council, intended to protect the interests of monarchs against the ‘Arab Spring’ uprisings in the region’

  Promises for constitutional reform have not taken place instead there has been abrutal crackdown against dissent.

  ‘The wave of demonstrations rumbling through the main streets of many Moroccan cities today indicates that the woes of Moroccans are deep and intractable and the government and the political parties are dispassionate and guileful; now that the stone wall of fear has tumbled down, grievances that have long been stifled are bubbling at the surface. Resentment against a government no longer trusted, nor feared by the people, runs high. Most see the King ‘speech and government officials’ promises for the soon-to-be-implemented reforms as nothing more than temporizing.’

  Last month Maghreb Blog commented on the international news media’s lack of interest in the ‘Moroccan spring’ and increasing police brutality against the pro democracy movement:

  ‘It is apparent that early statements on reforms were mere strategies to diffuse a rapidly contagious and popular movement for change in Morocco. That early tactical retreat by the regime was meant to allay the Feb 20 movement, riding high on the wave of Arab spring. However, the plight of the Moroccan spring is in tatters as the little media attention it once garnered has virtually faded, especially with atrocities committed in Syria, Bahrain, ongoing conflict in Libya and shaky post-revolt tumult in Tunisia and Egypt. The regime is betting on this “quiet repression” of the protests, while engaging in rhetorical support for clichéd talking points of democratic change.’

  On 29 May a member of the country’s main opposition group, Kamal Amari was killed in the city of Safi, allegedly at the hands of the police which led to thousands protesting across the country this past Sunday. Journalists have been beaten and arrested and there have been reports of Moroccan security forces harassing activists in their homes.

  ‘Following Amari’s death, Safi witnessed massive demonstrations on Sunday, with people calling for political reforms, an end to corruption and a democratic constitution with credible elections. Meanwhile in Rabat, thousands marched in defiance of a protest ban. Casablanca, Fez, Tangier, Marrakech and other cities also saw reform rallies.

  ‘Demonstrators held up black flags and banners to express their grief. Some also carried coffins to symbolise Amari’s funeral. Others chanted slogans demanding the trial of his alleged killers, while condemning authorities for using violence against peaceful protestors.’

  Lastly Slate Afrique publishes a list of the top ten African dictators addicted to powerwith their name, country, age and number of years in power: Muammar el-Qaddafi, Libya, 69, 42 years in power; Teodoro Obiang Nguema, Equatorial Guinea, 69, 32 years; Jose Eduardo dos Santos of Angola, 69, 32 years; Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe, 87, 31 years; Paul Biya, Cameroon, 78, 29 years; Yoweri Museveni, Uganda, 67, 25 years; Blaise Compaore, Burkina Faso, 60. 24 years; Omar el-Bashir, Sudan, 67, 22 years; Idriss Deby, Chad, 59, 21 years; and Isaias Afewerki, Eritrea, 65, 18 years.

  Libya, Uganda, Burkina Faso and Cameroon have all seen uprisings to some degree. Africans wait for them and the rest to fall. Yemen has shown us all that with perseverance and conviction the house of cards will fall – eventually.

  ‘“En Afrique, on ne peut pas désigner quelqu’un du doigt en disant qu’il est un ancien chef.” Cette phrase qu’aimait répéter l’Ivoirien Félix Houphouët-Boigny explique que l’alternance politique ne soit pas la valeur la mieux partagée en Afrique. Quand on a du mal à transmettre à ses enfants le sceptre presidential, on s’y accroche d’années en décennies. Le Nigérien Mamadou Tandja aura payé de sa réputation cet appétit insatiable. Mais son expérience ne semble guère servir de leçon.’

• Turning pain to power: City of Joy in Bukavu

  Posted: June 8, 2011, 5:05 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Eve Ensler [V-Day founder] and Congolese Activist Christine Schuler Deschryver [director of V-Day Congo] discuss with Amy Goodman, the opening of the City of Joy in Bukavu which will be run by survivors of rape in the eastern Congo. The American Journal of Public Health published a report this month which estimates more than two million women have been raped in the DRC since 2006.

  CHRISTINE SCHULER DESCHRYVER: The City of Joy is really like a dream that is coming true, because it was something that was created by the Congolese women. And at the beginning, it was just like a dream. And thanks to V-Day, who was like the wind behind our back, it becomes a reality. And we started receiving the first women like two weeks ago. So we are in the process. And it’s all amazing. I left Congo like two weeks ago. And every time I’m with them on the phone, they have new things. It’s like it really belongs to the Congolese women. So I just told them, “As long as we respect, you know, our budget and the program, just go on.”

  Last December in Walikale between 400 and 500 women were raped despite the presence of UN forces. Eve Ensler made a number of points on the failure of the UN forces to protect women: economic and corporate interests and the merging of these with those of governments, both foreign and the DRC; most of all a lack of will and intention to protect women against sexual violence.
  

  And I think until we really understand what sexual violence does, what one rape does to a woman’s life, how it determines the rest of her existence, how her whole life will be shaped by that and robbed by that, how it will determine her self-esteem, her ability to be intimate, her ability to connect, her ability to have a job, her confidence, her ability to—the way she treats her boy children—until we understand the magnitude of one rape, there will really be no—because I think it’s all about intention in the end. I really do.

  Similar to Haiti, millions and millions of $US are being spent but never reach the people – where does the money go? And like Haiti the DRC is full of NGOs feeding off the poor to pay their salaries and keep them in comfort to “take care of the Congolese” people. Millions of $US are spent on UN ‘peacekeepers’ and support personnel but no one knows what they do for Haiti or the DRC. Christine Schuler Deschryver calls for an audit of the DRC and accountability of NGOs working in the region.

  CHRISTINE SCHULER DESCHRYVER: An expat, that means they decided to bring, like, people from outside to take care of the Congolese. So all the monies go to the salaries, to their comfort, to their cars and everything. And at the end, you just have few parts left for the Congolese. They don’t even give enough jobs. And when they have jobs, they are not paid……….And I think, slowly, you know, that the Congolese have to take their power back and decide how the money has to be used, because all this money goes to the outside debt from Congo. And they are not—they don’t even take benefit of that money. And that’s something that really gets me so mad, because it’s like everyone has his conscience and say, “We gave this amount of millions to Congolese. But what for?” You know, it’s like for the U.N. What for? What are they really doing for the Congolese?

• Uprisings: East and Southern Africa

  Posted: June 6, 2011, 7:06 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  This post was first published in Pambazuka News “Defiant in the face of brutality”

  Recently the Dar es Salaam, Citizen published  an OpEd piece, “News is not coming out of Africa” in which it criticised African media for the focus on reporting “events” and failure to follow through with informative opinion and commentary.  Instead African media continues to rely on western media for in depth analysis of African affairs.  Events such as the Nigerian elections, the political crisis and conflict in Cote d’Ivoire, uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya and the International Criminal Court hearings on Kenya’s 2008 post election violence were reported only as “news events”.

  “I could cite other examples to make the point that our media has such an event focus that it fails to follow developments in ways that would make Africans knowledgeable and interested about Africa as Africans.   In this it fails its core mission of educating Africans about their own contexts and situations. A major reason for this apparent amnesia and what comes across as disjointed coverage is the fact that most South African media do not have sustained coverage of the continent of their own. For a start, South African media houses have no regional bureaus of their own with journalists conversant in languages other than English.
  
  When the international media cease or reduce coverage there is an automatic effect on our own media even if we might still be interested in the issue. In this regard it could be said that our media are an appendage of Western media.”

  The article highlights the importance of Pambazuka News in providing exactly what the rest of Africa’s media is either ill equipped or just too lazy to do.  The purpose of the “uprising” reports is not just to inform readers of events as they happen but also to give a sense of the continuing struggle and a broader view of the continental wide discontent with the status quo regards democracy, the lack of adherence to all areas of human rights and the primacy of western governments and corporate interests over that of African people.

  Uganda – Lets shoot the people!

  In February’s elections President Museveni’s 25 year rule was extended for a further 5 years, amidst accusations of widespread fraud.  Why bother to vote when the outcome has already been arranged!   Makerere University law professor Joe Oloka-Onyango, described Uganda’s political system as “yet to become a functioning multiparty democracy” and

  “the fact of incumbency guaranteed President Museveni unfettered access to state coffers, such that the NRM reportedly spent $350 million in the campaign. Whether or not this is true, we have not yet received a proper accounting of how much the NRM [or indeed any other party] spent and from where they received this money; already, this means that we are being held hostage to the lack of transparency and the underhand nature of politics that we thought we had long left behind.

  Indeed, the enduring image of the past several months has been that of the President handing out brown envelopes stashed with cash for various women, youth and other types of civic groupings. I don’t know if religious leaders were also beneficiaries of this largesse. If you were, then you must acknowledge that you have become part of the problem. For in those envelopes lies a key aspect of the problem: the phenomenon of institutionalized corruption that has become the hallmark of this regime.’

  Whilst voters may have been apathetic during the elections, they have shown their dissatisfaction with the government and it’s policies in the Walk to Work [#walk2work] protests which started on the 11th April following the arrest of  a group of opposition leaders including, Dr. Kizza Besigye and his supporters, for inciting violence as they walked to work in protest against rising prices and job losses.  Although the protests have met with a violent response from the security forces as one Ugandan reporter pointed out

  “many Ugandans are now aware of their rights to speak out. This right is provided by the state through the constitution that guarantees freedom of speech. So this time many Ugandans are supporting what the opposition is doing because they want the government to listen to their pleas.”

  The government has blamed inflation on external factors out of their control obviously believing Ugandans are so ill informed as to not make the connection between the $740 million spent on fighter jets and tanks plus of course the maintenance costs – ‘to protect oil….territorial integrity and wealth”   and the price of bread and fuel.   Even Nigeria – another highly militarised state, with nearly 20 years of conflict over oil in the Niger Delta has thankfully, not deployed fighter jets to bomb militants in the forests and rivers of oil production!

  Musoveni who in a show of militarism, chose to wear military fatigues during the recent swearing in of MPs complained that  his guests, President Kabila of the DRC and Goodluck Jonathan of Nigeria were pelted with stones by people.  In typical dictator fashion,  which tends to be accompanied by a good helping of paranoia,  Musoveni went on to describe the local and international media as “enemies of Uganda”.   Possibly he has been too busy brutalising Ugandans to watch much TV and hasn’t seen what is happening  in other parts of  Africa and the Middle East.

  Rosebelle Kagumire described the protests of 29th April in her blog as follows:

  “In today’s protests the police used live bullets again leaving horrific pictures for the media. One of man was lying down with a bullet hole right through his eye. Reports say about four people died today, over 100 were injured and over 300 were arrested. Since the election campaigns and the North Africa protests, the government here has grown intolerant to criticism……….In many areas there were reports of abuses against journalists mainly by forces. TVs and Radios have been threatened over live broadcasts and today they obliged……….. Besigye’s health is still not good but whatever happens, Ugandans are becoming more and more defiant in the face of brutality and his homecoming will probably see us go into another protest..”

  Rosebelle also discussed the ongoing protests on Al Jazeera’s stream on 23rd May [http://bit.ly/mfZNlK].   The strategy behind the “#Hoot4Change” in which people honked and hooted in support of “Walk2Work”, is to widen the protests.  She made the point that whilst food prices had risen locally Ugandan farmers were getting very good prices for their food being sold in south Sudan and the DRC.

  Echwalu Photography has an excellent photo essay of the protests and subsequent arrests and violence on the streets.

  Finally a report by Julius Barigaba in the East African on the deployment of tanks around Kampala’s Constitutional Square.  According to Barigaba, this is not because there might be another “Tahrir Square” but more like a Tiananmen Square

  “Tahrir collected a million anti-Mubarak protestors over three weeks, leading to the dictator’s fall in February this year. In Beijing, however, Tiananmen was the scene of a massacre by a military whose mindset is that of anarchy, akin to that of Uganda’s armed forces, according to political analyst Mwambutsya Ndebesa, professor of history at Makerere University.”

  The Square has become a no-go area, barricaded by blue Mamba APCs, tear gas trucks and anti-riot police. To dare to go there is to court arrest, unlimited doses of teargas, gunshot wounds, and possibly, death.

  On May 10, former presidential candidates Norbert Mao, Olara Otunnu, Sam Lubega and Mohammad Kibirige Mayanja attempted to access Constitution Square and stage a rally there. Somewhat Mao and Mayanja sneaked through the first line of police cordon but could not go past the next.

  “We want to hold a rally in the Square that is named after our (1995) Constitution. It is our right,” Mao yelled at the police as they pushed him back.

  But Otunnu, Lubega and others were not lucky. A police truck spewing pink liquid pushed them 200 metres away, bathing them in a deluge of crimson — police’s latest anti-riot innovation.

  That is the norm in Kampala these days — people wake up to a menu of live bullets and teargas. Access to some roads is blocked, as boda boda cyclists, unemployed youths and Kisekka Market traders engage the military and police in running battles. Occasionally, a military chopper eerily monitors the action. Files of military men, with guns held combat style, patrol the streets; APCs are at entry points into the city.”

  Kenya – Revolutionary ideals over narrow nationalisms!

  Back in February while Tunisia was celebrating the removal of Ben Ali and Egypt was bathing in the warmth of Tahrir Square revolutionary love, a group of online Kenyans decided to celebrate “Kenyan nationalism” day on February 28th.   Along with a show of badges and 12 reasons to be “proud”,  Kenyans were asked to stand united and speak with one voice at 1pm on the day….

  “wherever you are, at work, in the supermarket, in traffic, in school, on campus, in hospitals, in churches, in mosques, in temples, in synagogues, on sports pitches, in court, on your farm, at police stations, at armed forces barracks, in matatus, in buses, on the beach, in the game parks, at the airport, in parliament, in State House, in your homes…”

  The hope was the “world would watch” but in the end, the world was too busy watching and tweeting the televised revolutions to care much about Kenyans saluting flags.

  Wambui Mwangi didn’t feel there was  much to be proud about and as inspiring as these declarations might be they are hardly transformational.  Nationalism, patriotism and notions of rule based belongings are exclusionary and counter-revolutionary.

  “Six of our leading representatives and public figures are under grave suspicion by the International Criminal Court of crimes against humanity, but this apparently does not perturb us.  Our internally displaced citizens continue to languish in refugee camps, which disturbs our comfort not at all.  Millions of young people are unemployed and frustrated but we would rather not discuss it.  Ethnic militias gather force and virulence: still, we are content.  A vulgar misogyny accompanied by a homophobia as vile as it is pervasive finds extensive purchase in our collective psyche: we are unflappable.  We seem to enjoy all these, or at least not to mind them enough to engage with their implications.”

  Instead of the call for a nationalism based on denial Wambui suggests “singing” to remember those “collective issues waiting for our attention”, and to re-organise, “align principles with practice”…….and

  “We should sing to acknowledge that we are responsible not only for the current state of affairs but also for its multiple necessary modes of resolution.  As we sing, ‘we the people’ should remember that sovereignty comes with responsibilities as well as rights, obligations as well as freedoms.”

  The beauty of these songs is they are not just for Kenyans but for every African and recently her final two questions 1] So What? 2] Now what?   have been answered in what appears to be a new awakening in Kenya.  Grassroots movements such as  Bunge La Mwananchi” [the people’s parliament], the “Unga Revolution” [a collection of civil society groups including Bunge La Mwananchi] campaigning for economic and social rights have been formed in response to the rising cost of living and loss of social benefits.   On May 1st a planned rally organised by Unga Revolution was illegally cancelled by the Kenyan police which the organising committee described as

  “This action is a relic of the old constitution and reminiscent of the dark days when peaceful gatherings were violently dispersed. It can also set a bad precedence for future engagements between peaceful citizens and law enforcement officers; in as far as exercising of democratic rights is concerned.

  Since our campaign to petition the government to implement article 43 is nationwide in scope and grassroots in nature, we are hoping that your forces will allow Kenyans all over the country to assemble, discuss and push for the implementation of their rights and that you will accord them ample security as we all strive to work within our rights and responsibilities as set out in the supreme law of the land.”

  Swaziland

  The Swazi pro democracy uprisings which began on April 12th were met with beatings, teargas and hundreds of arrests.  Many of the protesters were driven 100 miles into the country where they were dumbed by the police.   Student leader Maxwell Dlamini  and Musa Ngubeni of the  SWAYOCO movement were  arrested, tortured and remain in detention.  The National Coordinator of the International Research Academy for Labour and Education (IRALE), Percy  Masuklu was one of those driven and dumped in the countryside.  He gives his account below

  “On 12 April 2011 leaders of the labour movement, political formations, youth and student organisations, civil society organisations like the Swaziland Democracy Campaign and ordinary Swazis were all arrested and treated to the ‘hospitality’ of the police of the ruling royal Swazi regime by means of torture and other dehumanizing elements characteristic of this corrupt regime.

  There were running battles between the various organisations and the police and armed forces in which the forces prohibited the workers, students, youth, democracy activists, faith-based organisations and women’s organisations from marching into the city centre in Manzini. The main intention of the march was to raise high the issues that the government of Swaziland has failed to deliver; these demands had been raised earlier by, largely, the labour formations. The city centre was turned into a battle field where workers were tear gassed, baton-charged and pursued into various directions by the heavy-handed police who understood nothing but the language of violence”.

  Six weeks on from April 12th and the Swazi pro democracy activists and their supporters continue to protest in the capital, Mbabane, South Africa and the UK.

  “The recent spate of pro-democracy demonstrations against the regime in Swaziland, which so far culminated in the mass demonstrations in March and April of this year, shows the increasing willingness of Swazis to face intimidation and police brutality to demonstrate their dissatisfaction with the regime.   The reason for this dissatisfaction, says Sikelela Dlamini, is the monarch’s spending on prestige projects and personal luxuries, and the regime’s financial mismanagement and corruption. “Mswati III’s major handicap has to be his continuously lavish lifestyle when the majority of his people languish in untold suffering.”

  On June 1st hundreds of members of  The Swaziland Teachers Association closed schools and marched through the capital to the South African and US embassies demanding the latter freeze the Kings assets.  Some of the tweets of the day were in response to a SABC2 Special Assignment on Swaziland…..showing both the hope and frustration amongst Swazi people.

  @msi_001: The people of Swaziland will be liberated sooner or later…….AMANDLA to my jailed comrades

  @presciousestevao:  please focus and try to create some sort of movement when it comes to our comrades being killed in Swaziland.

  @specialassign: Swaziland is under financial struggles, who funds the monarchy? Since many people there are living below the poverty line.”

  @SpecialAssign: Democracy in Africa’s last standing monarchy? Political prisoners or criminal terrorists in Swaziland’s jails? Watch tonight 21h30 on SABC3

  Countries to watch:

  Botswana

  In neighbouring Botswana  much revered in the west as “Africa’s success story”, public sector workers – transport, schools, clinics and government staff, began striking on April 18th.  The ruling party has been in power for 45 years and people are calling for a change. The leader of the opposition, Duma Boko has called for an “Egypt’ style uprising, though I doubt this will happen.  The strikes and protests have been peaceful with none of the violence seen in neighboring countries.

  “There are different ways to take over governance, and that includes by force,” he said at a recent press conference in support of the strike held by the opposition parties….“If we can come together we can take our government as it happened in Egypt and Tunisia.” For the Botswana Movement for Democracy, a breakaway party from the BDP, the strike undermines the ruling party’s contention that Botswana is a model democracy………“This is clear from the government’s refusal to accept workers’ demands for a pay hike, under the pretext that the economy has not yet recovered from the recession,” said its leader, Gomolemo Motswaledi.

  The government has now ordered the some 90,000 workers back to work after offering a 3% pay rise rather than the 16% demanded.

  Ethiopia

  Pro democracy activists had called for a “Day of Rage” on Saturday 28th May.  An online campaign “Beka” meaning Enough in Amharic had hoped to mobilize thousands. In the end it was Meles Zenawi’s supporters who turned out in their thousands.

  Like uprisings taking place in other parts of the continent, Uganda, Swaziland,  Kenya, and Botswana actions are in response to concerns over food security, rising unemployment particularly amongst youth, political marginalisation, corruption of government officials and a push back against the entrenched leadership of  the circle of ‘rulers for life’.   Military dictators have been replaced by democracy dictatorships under militarised states.   Despite the transformational actions taking place across the country, one particularly marginalised group remains invisible.   The LGBTIQ movement continues to be largely isolated and it remains to be seen if the new struggles for social justice will be wholly inclusive.  At the same time it is up to the the LGBTIQ movement itself to grow in visibility and to enter into dialogue with other movements at the crucial time of change.  This is especially true in countries such as Kenya, Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa where established LGBTIQ groups have existed for many years.

  More articles by me on Pambazuka can be found here

• Pink Washing the Middle East

  Posted: June 2, 2011, 7:31 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  An excellent example of “Pink Washing” written by Amina Abdallah on “A Gay Gal in Damascus”.  She refers to a CNN article on the position of LGBTI people in the Middle East uprisings.  The article “Will gays be ’sacrificial lambs’ in Arab Spring?” repeats the usual “homophobic” homonationalist Arabs/Muslims spiel used to demonize Islam which we are used to hearing in the west.

  Thankfully, I don’t regret what I myself am quoted as saying. But the others … well, they provide the sort of pinkwashing that the enemies of Arab freedom have come to rely on increasingly in recent years. We’ve gotten used to being used rhetorically by the advocates of war, occupation, dispossession, and apartheid as ‘evidence’ that the primitive sand-people don’t deserve anything other than killing by the enlightened children of the West; we’ve seen this story used to advocate murder of Afghan villagers, Palestinian refugees, Iraqis and so on. It’s given as justification for genocide by the ranting bleach-blond buffoon in the Dutch parliament and as reason for reviving the worst of the Third Reich by neo-fascists across Europe and America. Now, it’s being used as an argument against democracy.

  It is so impossible for people in the west to believe that Queers in the Middle East, Africa or anywhere outside of AmerEuroland do not walk around bent over with the weight of homophobic hostility like iron bars on their shoulders, shuttling around in corners fearful for every minute of their days.

  I recently spent a week in Jamaica described in that much loved western media designation as the “worst place to be….” [fill in the gap] gay in this case. I spent much of my time at a LGBTIQGNC community space which was full up every evening with loving sisterly and brotherly people. It was not a “hidden” space but in a residential area where all the neighbours had been contacted and informed of the space and no one had objected. I also met a number of out lesbians. This is not to say that there is no homophobic abuse and violence in Jamaica – but to put it into a reality of people’s every day lives. Amina Abdallah explains her reality…

  ” Reality, of course, is different. Having lived in both worlds, I can tell you this in all honesty; I have never once encountered any problem here on account of my sexuality that I would not have encountered were I straight as an arrow. I have never once been attacked or beaten or even screamed at for being a lesbian in an Arab land. On the other hand, I have had dung thrown at me in America for wearing a hijab, been attacked and struck by strangers for being an Arab …
  So why pinkwashing? Others have brilliantly dissected the way this rhetoric has been used to turn gay rights into a weapon of imperialism, specifically in Palestine.

  Continue reading here

• Jon Qwelane guilty of hate speech

  Posted: May 31, 2011, 6:01 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Jon Qwelane who published the article “Call me names but gay is NOT OK” in the South African Sunday Sun in July 2008 has been convicted of hate speech by the Johannesburg Equality Court.

  The article by Jon Qwelane – which includes a despicable cartoon equating same sex relationships with bestiality, calls for a rewriting of the SA constitution and the criminalisation of same-sex relationships.   Despite facing charges of “hate speech” Qwelane was appointed in January 2010 as South African ambassador to Uganda – an openly homophobic man being appointed to a country which was considering the death penalty and long term prison sentencing for same sex relationships.   It remains to be seen whether the South African government will do the right thing and relieve him of his position.  This report from the South African Mail and Guardian…… UPDATE - the Dept of International Relations and Cooperation has stated this is a “personal” matter for Qwelane, meaning government officials, are free to make disgusting homophobic statements,  be found guilty of hate crimes but remain in their positions.   A clear message that homophobic statements and actions are acceptable on the basis of small monetary penalty.

  “We are quite pleased that the court has found in our favour … R100 000 is quite a reasonable amount,” said SAHRC spokesperson Vincent Moaga.

  “The focus is not on the money, but the message coming out of this. With recent hate speech and crimes against the community, the court is sending positive messages,” he said.

  The SAHRC initiated court proceedings in terms of the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act.

  Qwelane did not make much of an appearance in the course of the trial. He failed to sign court papers presented to him by a clerk and did not file responding papers.

  The court ruled that, as it had only one version of the story, the SAHRC’s argument would be accepted.

• African Sexualities

  Posted: May 30, 2011, 9:13 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  African Sexualities’ is a groundbreaking new volume, forthcoming from Pambazuka Press. As well as using popular culture to help address the ‘what, why, how, when and where’ questions, the book’s contributors provide a critical mapping of African sexualities that informs readers about the plurality and complexities of sexualities on the continent – desires, practices, fantasies, identities, taboos, abuses, violations, stigmas, transgressions and sanctions. At the same time, the contributors pose gender-sensitive and politically aware questions that challenge the reader to interrogate assumptions and hegemonic sexuality discourses, thereby unmapping the intricate and complex terrain of African sexualities.

  Continue reading introductory chapter by editor, Sylvia Tamale.

• Free Gender

  Posted: May 30, 2011, 7:17 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Updates on hate crimes -

• is long time poets a write, a write, a write, a write..” – Cherry Natural

  Posted: May 29, 2011, 9:49 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I spent last Saturday in Kingston with Cherry Natural – “reasoning” about poetry, consciousness and Jamaican music. Words to remember:

  reasonings, genetic bleaching, innerviews, verbal labour…… and much more

  ‎”poets write inna han miggle, poets write pan leaf, poets write inna dem head, is long time poets a write, a write, a write, a write..” – Cherry Natural

  Selected poems “Earth Woman”

• Silent, hidden and prevalent – obstetric fistula

  Posted: May 27, 2011, 6:33 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  A Walk to Beautiful tells the stories of five Ethiopian women who suffer from devastating childbirth injuries and embark on a journey to reclaim their lost dignity. Rejected by their husbands and ostracized by their communities, these women are left to spend the rest of their lives in loneliness and shame. They make the choice to take the long and arduous journey to the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital in search of a cure and a new life.

  Click here to support the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital  featured in the film and watch the trailer here.

  Obstetric Fistula is it’s demeaning, it’s painful and wholly preventable and in many cases there is the additional pain of loosing ones child.   FGM and forced child marriages contribute to obstetric  fistula in women and girls for example in Northern Nigeria where it is estimated some 800,000 women are suffering.  MSF produced the video below on the work of a hospital in Jahun, Nigeria which provides free surgery and treatment for women.

• Tweets Week

  Posted: May 21, 2011, 9:00 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @dominique_e_ @gabblog @themoornextdoor @tommymiles #
  • Photo: Alice Walker: Beauty in Truth” – A film by Pratibha Parmar [tumblr.com] #
  • RT @blacklooks #MalcolmX sisters in struggle #BlackCanada [bit.ly] #
  • Photo: How Africans Want to Be Seen (SOURCE: The Wall Street Journal) A new exhibit at Li-Space in Beijing’s… [tumblr.com] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @ezilidanto @saratu #
  • "Alice Walker beauty in truth" film by @kalifilms @alicewalkerfilm [bit.ly] #
  • Photographic documentary of South African – [weblog.liberatormagazine.com] #
  • RT @blacklooks In praise of older women and stories yet untold [bit.ly] #
  • "When we reveal ourselves to our partner and find that this brings healing rather than harm, we make an…" [tumblr.com] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @gabblog @dominique_e_ @crisismappers @amphitrit @jadaliyya #
  • "The Book of Jobs" – Cult Fiction [bit.ly] #
  • RT @Amphitrit: Photo: vizionheiry: [bit.ly] #ToniMorrison beauty is ageless #
  • #Nigeria has anyone flown on #Arik London 2 Lagos recently – they used to be OK with 60k luggage thanks #
  • RT @blacklooks #African #LGBTI Manifesto/Declaration [bit.ly] #
  • RT @blacklooks #DifficultLove #SouthAfrica @Queer Stories #LGBTI [bit.ly] #IDAHO #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @dominique_e_ @zohramoosa @weddady @forakin @thefworduk #
  • "Here’s a little thought experiment. Imagine that, on September 11, 2001, when the Twin Towers came…" [tumblr.com] #
  • [www.insideout.ca] [tumblr.com] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @haitiinfoproj @colorlines @booksa @blacklooks #
  • #Africa #039;s cascade of #Internet #censorship – [t.co] via @ajenglish #
  • The #Long Island women's real killer – price for criminalising #sexworkers [t.co] via @guardian #
  • RT @blacklooks Me’shell Ndegeocello – Redefining what it means to be free [bit.ly] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @mydakaronline @weddady #
  • #Uganda Women's groups, lawyers join Walk to Work protests [t.co] via @globalvoices #
  • Photo: borninflames: [tumblr.com] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @saharareporters @amphitrit #
  • Photo: globalvoices: [tumblr.com] #

• Malika Zarra – just so cool melody from Morocco

  Posted: May 21, 2011, 7:25 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Malika Zarra

  When it came time to make this recording, I chose to continue to explore my Moroccan musical heritage in more depth, and especially my Berber (Amazigh) roots. The themes of travel and tradition inspired me to call the CD Berber Taxi. It’s also the title of a traditional song that my mother taught me, on e that spoke about the hope of finding love in distant places. Berber Taxi perfectly ties together my experiences in Morocco, France, and New York City – more on SoundRoots

• Malcolm X: sisters in struggle

  Posted: May 19, 2011, 7:54 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Remembering Malcolm X – Black Canadian women discussing the racism they experience in Canada – Sisters in the Struggle: Dionne Brand & Ginny Stikeman, 1991
  

• In praise of older women and stories yet untold

  Posted: May 18, 2011, 7:03 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I’ve been scrolling through Tumblr over the past few weeks and noticed so many Tumblrs posting photos of young  Black women – which is great and they are all beautiful but I got to wanting to see ME. Some layers, some texture and depth,  some life lines.  So it was a breath of fresh air to come across this photo of Toni Morrison on Amphitrit accompanied by some incredibly wise words….. I keep looking and looking at this photo –  Morrison beauty is holistic, complete, breathtaking and alive.

  “I know that happiness has been the real, if covert, goal of your labors here. I know that it informs your choice of companions, the profession you will enter, but I urge you, please don’t settle for happiness. It’s not good enough. Of course, you deserve it. But if that is all you have in mind—happiness—I want to suggest to you that personal success devoid of meaningfulness, free of a steady commitment to social justice, that’s more than a barren life, it is a trivial one. It is looking good, instead of doing good.” – Toni Morrison

  Thoughtfully & Expertly Transcribed by @llapen Follow her!

  Some more Tumbling and I came across this post on the Black Lesbian Elder Project - Via GAQ – who also found it a “breath of fresh air”.

  In a youth obsessed culture, and a queer scene where you often have to dig to find good representations of people of color, here’s a breath of fresh air: The Untitled Black Lesbian Elder Project. This new film collaboration is exactly what it sounds like — a feature length documentary on the lives of several black lesbian women in their 60s, 70s and 80s, talking about their experiences in politically important times.

  Older and elderly Black lesbian gay and trans people are one of the most invisible group of people world wide which makes this a hugely important documentary.  The two women behind the project bring even more kudos to the film – Tiona McClodden who was  behind the 2009 documentary black./womyn.: conversations with lesbians of African descent is directly involved with the project and Lisa C Moore of Red Bone Press.

• African LGBTI Manifesto/Declaration

  Posted: May 17, 2011, 9:48 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The African LGBTI manifesto came out of a roundtable session held in Nairobi in April 2010. It is an important document which sets out clearly the foundation of the LGBTI movement and it’s connection to the broader Pan-African struggle for African liberation.

  As Africans, we all have infinite potential. We stand for an African revolution which encompasses the demand for a re-imagination of our lives outside neo-colonial categories of identity and power. For centuries, we have faced control through structures, systems and individuals who disappear our existence as people with agency, courage, creativity, and economic and political authority.

  As Africans, we stand for the celebration of our complexities and we are committed to ways of being which allow for self-determination at all levels of our sexual, social, political and economic lives. The possibilities are endless. We need economic justice; we need to claim and redistribute power; we need to eradicate violence; we need to redistribute land; we need gender justice; we need environmental justice; we need erotic justice; we need racial and ethnic justice; we need rightful access to affirming and responsive institutions, services and spaces; overall we need total liberation.

  We are specifically committed to the transformation of the politics of sexuality in our contexts. As long as African LGBTI people are oppressed, the whole of Africa is oppressed.

  This vision demands that we commit ourselves to:

  Reclaiming and sharing our stories (past and present), our lived realities, our contributions to society and our hopes for the future;

  Strengthening ourselves and our organizations, deepening our links and understanding of our communities, building principled alliances, and actively contributing towards the revolution.

  Challenging all legal systems and practices which either currently criminalize or seek to reinforce the criminalization of LGBTI people, organizations, knowledge creation, sexual self expression, and movement building.

  Challenging state support for oppressive sexual, gendered, discriminatory norms, legal and political structures and cultural systems.

  Strengthening the bonds of respect, cooperation, passion, and solidarity between LGBTI people, in our complexities, differences and diverse contexts. This includes respecting and celebrating our multiple ways of being, self expression, and languages.

  Contributing to the social and political recognition that sexuality, pleasure, and the erotic are part of our common humanity.

  Placing ourselves proactively within all movement building supportive of our vision.

  End!

• Difficult Love

  Posted: May 17, 2011, 6:07 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Difficult Love will be showing at the Toronto LGBT Film Festival

  Review of Difficult Love by Nadia Sanger

  Difficult Love and Faces and Phases do more than merely sketch Muholi’s life, however, or document the existence of black queer people – it can be read as a practice in post-colonial feminist research methodology. In Difficult Love, the centering of Zanele’s role as the viewer/ the gazer, disturbs the often invisible and ‘objective’ role of the producer of images. Through zoning in on Zanele – her words and experiences – we see how power is distorted. Her attempt to channel power to those who make her images possible, who tell their stories through her photography, visibilises black queer people, and turns on its head false ideas of the objective position of the photographer/filmmaker. Zanele’s focus on subverting power and disrupting norms around gender and sexuality is clear throughout the book and film. Principles of reflexivity, located-ness, being-in-the-world, the complex, but often ignored relationships between the ‘viewer’ and the ‘viewed’ are central to Zanele’s work. The ‘owning’ of an image, and the ‘owning’ of a life, which Zanele refers to in the film, is clearly articulated in the black and white photographs in Faces and Phases. The portraits reveal that a life cannot be owned by anyone other than oneself. The expressions on the faces of the individuals in the photographs express pain, frustration, happiness, arrogance, sadness and joy. These photographs reveal diverse and complex human expressions that scream ‘we are here to stay’ in a social and political context that is unkind to gender and sexual non-normativity
  
  In the film, Difficult Love, notions of ‘race’ are dismantled, while the material ways in which ‘class’ works are highlighted. In the current South African context, ‘race’ still matters, and ‘blackness’ and poverty are often simplistically aligned in ways that might exclude those who continue to exist marginally in South Africa’s townships. Through conversations with Petra Brink and Pra-line Hendricks – a couple living under a bridge in Cape Town, and rejected by the shelter because they are openly lesbian – Difficult Love explores how class and sexuality are linked, and how they work to ensure the marginalisation of nonconforming ‘coloured’ women. This is significant because it reveals the specific moments in current South Africa where the materiality of socio-economic realities and gender non-conformity intertwine.

  Petra and Pra-line’s lives expose how sexual difference is mediated by class, and class mediated by sexual difference – their lives embody the feminist theoretical position that argues for intersections and context as significant in people’s daily lives. Similarly, the viewer’s glimpse into Zanele’s relationship with her partner, Liesl Theron, allows us to see the ways that racialisation, class, gender, sexuality, and slavery intersect. It is clear from this glimpse that the dissection of power relationships is central to Zanele’s work – her 2008 Massa and Mina(h) project referred to in the film, is grounded in the life of her mother, Bester Muholi, who served as a domestic worker to a supportive ‘white’ family for forty-two years. Through this project, Moholi queers the master-slave relationship and reveals how power works in complex ways.

• African migrant workers: trafficked, trapped & left to die on the high seas

  Posted: May 16, 2011, 7:08 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I wrote this post in July 2006 but the thousands of African migrant workers who have been displaced and left to die on the high seas after fleeing Libya, reminded me that this is not a new story.

  I read a report yesterday that there are thousands of African and South Asian migrants amongst the displaced in Lebanon. Unlike other foreign nationals from the Middle East and the West, who have been evacuated by their respective governments, this group have largely been left to fend for themselves without money or papers. Many of them at the lowest strata of society and in a foreign land – part of the millions of Africans trafficked within the continent and beyond to Europe and the Middle East – are the most vulnerable group. It is estimated that there are some 20,000 Ethiopians as well as Nigerians, Ghanaians, Sudanese, Somalis, Sri Lankans and the largest group (90,000) Filipinos working in domestic servitude, as migrant or forced labour and the sex industry in Lebanon. The IOM has been asked to assist in helping some 10,000 migrants from these nations.

  I took a closer look at trafficking across the world and discovered that every country is either a source, a transit or a destination and many are all three (only a few countries in the West are strictly destination countries serviced by the majority world). Looking at Africa specifically there are a number of common trends.
  
  The first is that every country is involved with the possible exception of Lesotho and the Kingdom of Swaziland although “the existence of significant trafficking in persons” is suspected. Secondly the majority of countries do not even reach the “minimum standards for elimination of trafficking”. Recently there have been a number of cross country initiatives in West Africa to try to address the problem but as far as I can gather nothing has yet impacted on trafficking. Thirdly in most cases, trafficking takes place internally and generally between neighbouring countries which leads to clusters or regions of trafficking roughly as follows: West Africa, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Central Africa and Southern Africa. Fourthly women and girls are the largest group of trafficked followed by young boys. Fifthly, most trafficking is either for sexual exploitation and forced labour followed by domestic servitude, agricultural labour, child soldiers, street vendors and begging. Finally most countries are source, transit and destination zones meaning that people are trafficked to,from and within those countries. The four main trafficking countries on the continent are Nigeria, South Africa, Morocco (source transit and destination) and Ethiopia (source only).

  In Africa as elsewhere in the South, the majority poor and dispossessed subsidise the lifestyle of the minority world enabled by a system of dehumanization based on cultural, religious, ethnic and racial difference. Psychologically it is easier to oppress someone who is regarded as different and with whom you can distance yourself. In this way, Nigerian children are taken to Senegal to work in domestic servitude and Senegalese children are taken to Ghana. One ethnic group becomes forced labour or sexual slaves for another in a tit for tat series of exchanges that encompasses the whole world. Going outside one’s own community also makes it more difficult for those trafficked to escape. The further you take someone away from their home the more difficult it is for them to find their way back – trapped in distance, language, culture, bonded-debt and in the case of Lebanon abandoned in a war zone thousands of miles from home.

  Source, transit and destination countries in Africa

  Benin: Mainly children for sexual exploitation, forced labour. Internally and to other West African (WA) countries

  Burkina Faso: Women and children for sexual exploitation, forced labour. Other WA countries and a few to Europe.

  Cameroon: Women and children for sexual exploitation, forced labour (domestic servitude; tea, banana and cocoa plantations)

  Chad: Mainly children for sexual exploitation, forced labour. Internally and to other WA countries, some possibly to Saudi Arabia.

  Djibouti: Mainly women and children for sex mostly to neighbouring countries.

  The Gambia: Women and girls for sex within the country, across the region and internationally. Also a source country for European sex tourism. Boys for forced labour.

  Ghana: For sex, domestic servitude, agricultural labour. Internally and throughout WA.

  Guinea: For sex and domestic servitude. Throughout WA, South Africa and to Europe (Spain, Greece)

  Kenya: For sex and forced labour. Internally, the Middle East, Western Europe and a few in America. Also a transit centre for Chinese and Bangladeshi women in transit to Europe.

  Liberia: Sex industry and forced labour. Mainly across WA.

  Mali: Sex industry and forced labour. Across WA, Libya and Europe

  Morocco: A huge centre for trafficking – gateway to Europe and the Middle East. Major source of women and young girls from rural communities for sexual exploitation in Moroccan cities, the Middle East and Europe. Migrants from SSA and Asia trying to reach Europe are caught by traffickers and sent to Europe and Middle east.

  Niger: Caste based slavery, forced labour and sex industry. The first two within Niger and across the region and women and girls for the sex industry as far as Europe and the Middle East.

  Nigeria: Forced labour and the sex industry. Throughout WA, Saudi Arabia and the main country for supplying Europe with women and girls for the sex industry.

  Senegal: Forced labour and sex industry. Internally and across WA. Supplying women and children for the sex industry in the Middle East and Europe. A few to the US.

  Sierra Leone: Similar to Senegal.

  South Africa: Forced labour and the sex industry. Women and girls for sex industry within the country and also to the Europe and across Asia. A main transit centre for sex trafficking. Also receives Thai, Chinese and Eastern European women for “debt-bonded” sexual exploitation.

  Togo: Forced labour and sex trade. Mostly children within the country, but also across WA and to Lebanon and Europe as domestic labour. Some women to Europe for sex industry.

  Zimbabwe: Forced labour and sex trade. Children are trafficked internally for labour and sex. Women and girls traded to China, SA, Egypt for sex industry

  Please sign the petition to demand accountability from NATO for the death of 61 African migrant workers fleeing from Libya

• Me’shell Ndegeocello – Redefining what it means to be free

  Posted: May 15, 2011, 7:19 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Today is Nakba Day – –

  MeShell Ndegeocello – D.N.B. from Souls Survivor on Vimeo.

  Interview with Me’shell Ndegeocello on Women’s Magazine -

• Kwa-Thema Praying for homophobic victims.

  Posted: May 13, 2011, 6:46 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  From Free Gender – remembering our sisters who died because they dared to be free.

  Noxolo Nogwaza, Nokuthula Radebe, Xolani, Gairly Nkosi, and Eudy Simelane all died by the hands of homophobes around Ekurhuleni. A prayer was held on Wednesday 11 May at the spot were 24 year old Nogwaza was killed two weeks ago in a horrific manner. In tears, Noxolo’s Aunt Nomalwe Dlomo thanked people for their support, she also asked Noxolo’s blood to “speak and reveal her killers”.

  Relatives of the five victims of Gender Based Violence lit candles to honour their lives. The LGBTI community, various ANC members, human rights organisations, Pastors, Kwa-Thema residents and Executive Mayor Clr Mondli Gungubele attended the event to show solidarity in the fight against hate crime. Traditional incense was burned by traditional healers who appealed to those who’ve been killed to speak for themselves. Speaking to the media, Clr Gungubele said our constitution promotes tolerance and people have a right to be whoever they wish as enshrined in our constitution. “Noxolo’s murder is a demonstration of deepest level of sickness. Perpetrators need help but must face the might of the law. Unless society comes together and condemns this act, they risk being misunderstood as accepting” concluded Gungubele.

  Gender Links delivered a message of awareness. “Corrective rape is a crime and lesbians have rights as well, women must be free to walk at night” said the representative. Ward councillor Dorah Mlambo appealed to the community to be understanding of LGBTI people, “they are our families” she added. Gauteng Premier Nomvula Makonyane was expected to deliver the keynote address, but did not make it to the event, as well as the Police who were supposed to give a message of support.

  “As a young woman I am very sad, today brings pain to all affected people” said Nokhwezi from the Treatment Action Campaign. The TAC activist also said that politicians talk after these events, and then nothing else happens, “are you going to put pressure on the police and judicial system to solve this case?” Nokhwezi asked the Executive Mayor Gungubele. The young woman who had a lot of questions asked why the community was shielding the killers, and where are spaces for LGBTI people created by government. “Police brutality on homosexuals must stop, where must we go?” added Nokhwezi.

  Hamba Kahle (go well) a popular struggle song was sung by a local choir, who declared that they are taking a stand against violence and intolerance. From the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL) Fikile Vilakazi said “we are very angry and willing to work with the government, we have been talking for long and not being heard. We understand that the government is setting up a task team to deal with hate crimes starting in July, but how many people are going to die before that time?” Clr Mondli Gungubele reminded everyone that humans will always be different and that the constitution comes from the people but the behaviour says otherwise. “Those harbouring information are no different from the killers, South Africa is an angry society” concluded Clr Mondli.

  By Lerato Dumse – Free Gender

• Helsinki African Film Festival

  Posted: May 13, 2011, 6:04 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Wanjiku wa Ngugi is the founder of the  Helsinki African Film Festival. Here she talks about Africa in Finland and this year’s theme “Women’s Voices and Visions”.

  Wanjiku, please talk a bit about yourself and the creation of the Helsinki African Film Festival.

  I was born and raised in Kenya. After high school, I attended New York University (NYU) where I studied Sociology and Political Science. It was actually here that I first met Dr. Manthia Diawara, a film-maker and critic, who was also the head of the Institute of African-American Affairs at NYU. I got a job assisting in his office and thus begun my introduction to African films. Growing up in Kenya, all we got to watch were Hollywood films and seeing black people on the big screen was a very rare occasion if ever. Anyway, a few years back I moved to Helsinki and was surprised at the level of misinformation about African people, both in the continent and the Diaspora. Even Finland has not escaped the Hollywood machine and the chronically negative representation of Africa in the News, so information about Africans is largely informed through the same narrow prisms. Hollywood has not exactly done any justice to the story of Africans, as most of their films—I am thinking here of popular films such as The Last King of Scotland or Blood Diamonds for example, are replete with stereotypes about Africa and Africans. And basically this is how HAFF was born—out of this need to deconstruct the depiction of Africa as this Dark Continent that only produces dark images, one-sided stories, and dehumanised people who should be pitied. Africa is not a country; I want to repeat this over and over again! We wanted to show the diversity of this continent, and begin a different conversation, one informed by a more realistic view as told by the Africans themselves…… Continue reading here.

• “Indio” being not-black in Dominican Republic

  Posted: May 12, 2011, 6:28 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  An interesting look at the construction of race through the island of Hispaniola – In the Dominican Republic, there is Cristóbal Colón, Black is Indio and Spain is homeland. In Haiti, there are revolutionaries – Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Henri Christophe, Black is Black and Africa is where I came from. Ok its a bit more complex than that but the point remains and try to ignore the irritating narration by Henry Louis Gates!

  Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

• Uganda uses Anti-Homosexuality Bill as a political diversion

  Posted: May 10, 2011, 5:33 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The Anti-Homosexuality Bill could be passed in the next 24 hours. After two years of off and on the AHB will be presented at tomorrows parliamentary session. For the past three weeks Uganda has been in the midst of it’s own uprising against the Museveni government – the peaceful “Walk to Work” protests against rising prices and described by blogger Angie Kintu as a protest

  about reality, frustration and desperate times. I am buying a litre of Ugandan made and grown cooking oil for sh6,500. I am paying sh3,600 for a litre of fuel. A tomato has gone up to sh300 at the very least.

  Led by opposition leader Kissa Besigyne, protestors have been shot, killed and arrested including Besignyne. Whilst the AHB is being used to distract protestors away from violence of poverty both The Anti-Homosexuality Bill and the attacks against the “Walk to Work” protestors are interconnected – both are violations of human rights against Ugandan. There is not a huge amount to say that has not already been said except to say its WRONG WRONG WRONG – more here on Gay Uganda

  Two other closely related Bills are also due for discussion tomorrow – the Marriage and Divorce Bill 2009 which also includes a ban against Same Sex Marriages, has a second reading and the HIV and AIDS Prevention and Control Bill 2010 which will criminalise “intentional transmission of AIDS virus, has a third reading. For more explanation on the implications and commentary on the HIV & AIDs Bill see here

  Tomorrow will be a shameful day for human rights in Uganda.

  There is a petition to try to stop the AHB being passed – see here

• Tweets Week

  Posted: May 7, 2011, 9:00 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  • #Uganda #Anti_Homosexuality Bill May Become Fast Tracked Into Law [t.co] #
  • Thousands Of Women Voters Stage Protest In Oguta Over Conduct Of Supplementary Elections #NigeriaDecides [t.co] via @AddThis #
  • Photo: [tumblr.com] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @eggheader @khadijapatel @africanwriters @nighealthwatch #
  • Video: Freedom Riders [tumblr.com] #
  • Sharing Knowledge about Caribbean Sexualities [conscious vibrations] – crankyskirt: [tumblr.com] #
  • Why uprisings in #BurkinaFaso are under the media radar [t.co] via @AddThis @pambazukanews #
  • #humanrights abuses makes #Eritrea top on the human tsunamis global refugee system [t.co] via @AddThis @pambazukanews #
  • Kameelah R. Artist Blog //: The Ladies of Meadowlands, Soweto – kameelahwrites: [tumblr.com] #
  • #FeministAfrica 14 Rethinking #Gender & #Violence [bit.ly] #
  • Patrick Vieira shocked by 'scandalous' #France race quota allegations [t.co] #racistthugs #FFF #EuropeanCup #
  • #Nigeria Religious tensions put taxi drivers in Jos at a deadly crossroads [t.co] via @guardian #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @kifkifgroup @usarmyafrica @mwistar #
  • Kameelah R. Artist Blog //: Arriving in/Leaving South Africa–Lagos Transit – kameelahwrites: [tumblr.com] #
  • RT @danwibg: #Haiti Bringing back the army – Just When You Think It Can't Get Worse [j.mp] #
  • Freedom from connectivity [bit.ly] #
  • "One of the reasons, for example, I think that our youth is so badly educated—and it is inconceivably…" [tumblr.com] #
  • Must see project about #Nairobi Daily Dispatches [j.mp] via @AddToAny #
  • Video: Lagos Jump [tumblr.com] #
  • RT @blacklooks #Transgender dreams #Botswana [bit.ly] #
  • Kickstarter – Help us edit CALL ME KUCHU, a film about #LGBT Ugandans: [kck.st] #Uganda #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @colorlines @thefworduk @swazimedia @spectraspeaks #
  • Good News – lawsuit against #Shell – blamed for #Nigeria oil spills [t.co] #ShellGuilty #Chevron #NigerDelta #
  • RT @TheIndyNews Robert Fisk: Was he betrayed? Of course. Pakistan knew #BinLaden #039;s hiding place al.. [ind.pn] #
  • #LGBTI youth of #Kwa Thema say they do not see the freedom that everyone is celebrating. #Noxolo_Nogwaza #SouthAfrica [bit.ly] #
  • #Dakan – A coming out story from #Guinea #LGBTI [bit.ly] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @saratu @eggheader @mambubadu #
  • NEW #photography journal from @mambubadu! Wonderful images amazing women [bit.ly] #
  • #LGBTI NGO STATEMENT: TO THE HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL ON HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS FACING LGBTI PEOPLE – [www.awdf.org] #
  • Black Looks Daily is out! [bit.ly] ▸ Top stories today via @colorlines #
  • RT @public_archive: Twitter really exists for these moments. And that's pretty pathetic. #meaculpa #
  • Can this also be the end of Mr Trump fixation pleasse ppl #
  • Woken from sleep to be told Osama is dead, thought he died yrs ago. end of roayal wedding blitz #
  • Video: thesaurusrexx: [tumblr.com] #
  • Photo: sexuality-space: [tumblr.com] #
  • Photo: hystericalblackness: [tumblr.com] #

• Funky music – Nigeria sweet times

  Posted: May 6, 2011, 7:02 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  The Don Isaac Ezekiel Combination – Ire by Strut

  Via SoundRoots

• Transgender dreams

  Posted: May 4, 2011, 6:25 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Via Gender Dynamix and Things I feel Strongly About

• LGBTI youth of Kwa-Thema say they do not see the freedom that everyone is celebrating

  Posted: May 3, 2011, 10:15 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Black Easters for Lesbian Community

  “As South Africa celebrates 17 Years of independence – Freedom day on Wednesday, 27th April, the LGBTI community of South Africa and beyond, especially black lesbians in Kwa-Thema mourns the death of the latest hate crime victim Noxolo Nogwaza. She was brutally killed on Sunday, 24th April in what her family describe as a horrific murder.

  Nogwaza (24) was the mother of two, a 7 years old boy and 4 year old girl. What makes her murder even more ironic is that she was killed on the same weekend that former Banyana Banyana player Eudy Simelane,was murdered in the same community in 2008 under similar circumstances. LGBTI youth of Kwa-Thema say they do not see the freedom that everyone is celebrating, activist Khanyi Mtungwa said: “We are fighting for our rights as lesbians, the way Noxolo was killed is not right they must stop killing us”. The Ekurhuleni Pride Organising Committee (EPOC) held a meeting on Freedomday, to discuss amongst other things how to fight homophobia as well as hate crime in townships especially in KwaThema where curative rapes and murders of lesbian have become a norm. Four lesbians have been murdered since 2008 in KwaThema township only. This murder happened less than a month after Nokuthula Radebe’s body was found murdered in Thokoza township in March.

  The main point or on top of EPOC’s agenda was Nogwaza’s killing. EPOC’s public relation’s officer Bontle Khalo said: “ as an organisation that fights for the rights of homosexuals, we are not going to take this lying down. We will ensure that justice prevails. A murder case has been opened and the police are investigating, marches will take place before and after the funeral. We are appealing to the community to assist in sending messages to the killers”. Noxolo’s body was found by construction workers in a ditch on Sunday 24 April. It is alleged that her pants were pulled down with several used condoms around her, a beer bottle was inserted into her vagina and a concrete block/ bricks were used to smash her head and left face deformed. In relating the story Nogwaza’s uncle explained how, he picked up several parts of her face which were splattered around the gruesome scene. Speaking for the police Captain Petros Mabuza said: “Our people don’t have humanity anymore, how can someone kill another human being like that? You wouldn’t even kill an animal in that way. Perpetrators must be brought to book, no one should take someone’s life just because they dont like the way that person lives.

  The funeral took place on Saturday, 30th April 2011 where hundreds of people – LGBTI members and organisations such as Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), FreeGender, POWA, 1 in 9, Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL), Treatment Action Campaign(TAC) and many respected individuals and concerned citizens across South Africa came to pay their respects and show their support to the Nogwaza family. Speaking during the service Noxolo’s aunt Nyaniso Nogwaza thanked the LGBTI community for their support “I am strong because of you guys, I wonder what message the killers were trying to send by this senseless killing. If we had all accepted her choice to be lesbian, who are they to find anything wrong with that”. The crowd chanted struggle songs and vented their anger towards the killers and the community for being silent on the matter.”

  Via Free Gender

• Dakan – A coming out story

  Posted: May 2, 2011, 6:45 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Dakan begins with the most sexually explicit opening scene in African cinema. Rather than the usual rural landscape or urban panorama locating the characters in a recognizable social or geographical context, the camera focuses on an isolated couple locked in a clandestine embrace in a sports car at night. The shot becomes even more transgressive when we recognize the couple are two young men. When one of them later tells his mother he’s attracted to another man, she replies: “Since time began, it’s never happened. Boy’s don’t do that. That’s all there is to it.” Dakan thus becomes the story of two men who by “coming out” disappear, become invisible to their families and society, because their society has no language which recognizes their love.

• 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]

• 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.

  Via Future Journalism Project

• 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, April

  The 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.

• 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.

  Tim Hetherington – Obituary

  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.

• “Give women a chance”

  Posted: April 26, 2011, 5:23 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  This poster from Nigeria’s 2007 election asks voters to support women in leadership roles. Women are still very under represented at all levels of Nigeria’s political landscape and governance.

  George Oshodi, [Panos Photos]

• 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.
  

  Photos via Sahara Reporters.

• 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?

  Via the Independent

• Aid travels with a bomb

  Posted: April 22, 2011, 7:12 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

• 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

  Via Exiled Soul, Via Iberations

• 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

• 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.

• “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.

• 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 monitors

  The 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 evidence

  Ordinary 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 confusion

  Prof 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 stations

  The 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 ©

• 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.

  Source

• Uprising, imperialism and uncertainty

  Posted: April 9, 2011, 3:55 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  First published in Pambazuka News – Issue 524

  
  cc Filq

  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.’

• 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.

• 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.

  Support Free Gender and continue reading here.

• 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

• 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.

• “The last word has not been spoken” – Beah Richards

  Posted: March 31, 2011, 7:06 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I’ve watched Beah Richards in many films and I remember reading somewhere about her poetry. But I never knew she was a feminist, wrote powerful political poetry speaking truth to power; was a playwright, a strong fiercely political, inspirationally powerful Black woman. Richards had no fear of speaking out at on her commitment to truth and freedom at political rallies. What frightened her was fascism not communism, after all as she said “I grew up in Mississippi and lived with it every day”. In an interview with the director and co-producer, LisaGay Hamilton – who herself must be congratulated for such a selfless work of art – Ann Marie Offer, described Beah Richards as a “Minister of Human Dignity.” what an apt obituary for such a great woman.

  Like most life stories the film is full of those joys and sadnesses we all pass through – some better and worse than others. At the time of the interviews, Beah was suffering from the last stages of emphysema and was on oxygen 24 hours a day. Her next to last journey, back home to Mississippi, in which she leaves her home of 25 years, is one of those indescribable painful sadnesses which sap your strength leaving you weak and utterly forelorn.

  3 months later, Beah Richards received an Emmy Award for her role in the series, “Practice” and soon after she passed away. Her last request was that her ashes be scattered on the confederate graveyard in Mississippi – even death was to be made an act of struggle.

  Her life story is told in the film “Beah: A Black Woman Speaks” a documentary film by LisaGay Hamiliton. As a young woman trying to be an actress and dancer in Hollywood in the 1950s and facing the proverbial slammed door, Beah decided to go to New York. She was penniless and hearing about a peace conference in Chicago with a prize for the poem which best expressed peace, she decided to enter her poem “A Black Woman Speaks……” Beah entered a poetry competition. I never heard of this poem yet it’s at least as powerful as Sojourner Truth’s’ “Aint I a Woman“. The poem speaks to the primordial memory of pre-Americas, slavery, rape, imprisonment, racism,humiliation, lynchings and centuries of dehumanization of Black peoples. The poem though it speaks to these vile memories and realities, is a poem of resistance. An act of survival and despite the terrible hardships of the journey from there to here, I, we remain standing our pride in tact.

  I kept your sons and daughters alive.

  But when they grew strong in blood and bone
  that was of my milk
  you
  taught them to hate me.
  PUt your decay in their hearts and upon their lips
  so that strength that was of myself
  turned and spat upon me,
  despoiled my daughters, and killed my sons.
  You know I speak true.
  Though this is not true for all of you

  A BLACK WOMEN SPEAKS…
  OF WHITE WOMANHOOD
  OF WHITE SUPREMACY
  OF PEACE
  
  A poem by BEAULA RICHARDSON

  Read by Beaula Richardson at the Women’s Workshop at the American People’s Peace Congress held in Chicago on June 29, 30 and July 1, 1951 bringing a standing ovation from all 500 women attending.

  It is right that I a woman
  black,
  should speak of white womanhood.
  my fathers
  my brothers
  my husbands
  my sons
  die for it: because of it.
  and their blood
  chilled in electric chairs,
  stopped by hangman’s noose,
  cooked by lynch mobs’ fire,
  spilled by white supremacist mad desire to kill
  give me that right

  I would that I could speak of white womanhood
  as it will and should be
  when it stands tall in full equality.
  but then, womanhood will be womanhood.
  Void of color and of class,
  And all necessity for my speaking thus will be past.
  Gladly past.

  But now, since ‘tis deemed a thing apart
  Supreme,
  I must in searching honesty report
  How it seems to me.
  White womanhood stands in bloodied skirt
  and willing slavery
  reaching out adulterous hand
  killing mine and crushing me.
  What then is the superior thing
  That in order to be sustained must needs feed upon my flesh?
  Let’s look to history.

  They said, the white supremacist said
  that you were better than me,
  that your fair brow would never know the sweat of slavery.
  They lied
  White womanhood to is enslaved,
  The difference is degree.

  They brought me here in chains.
  They brought you here willing slaves to man.
  You, shiploads of women each filled with hope
  That she might win with ruby lip and saucy curl
  And bright and flashing eyes
  Him to wife who had the largest tender.
  Remember?
  And they sold you here even as they sold me.
  
  My sisters, there is no room for mockery.
  If they counted my teeth
  They did appraise your thigh
  And sold you to the highest bidder
  The same as I.

  And you did not fight for your right to choose
  Whom you would wed
  But for whatever bartered price
  That was the legal tender
  You were sold to a stranger’s bed
  In a stranger land
  Remember?
  And you did not fight.
  Mind you, I speak not mockingly
  But I fought for freedom,
  I’m fighting now for our unity.
  We are women all.
  And what wrongs you murders me
  And eventually marks your grave
  So we share a mutual death at the hand of tyranny.

  They trapped me with the chain and gun.
  They trapped you with lying tongue.
  For, ‘less you see that fault—
  That male villainy
  That robbed you of name, voice and authority,
  That murderous greed that wasted you and me,
  He, the white supremacist, fixed your minds with poisonous thought:
  “white skin is supreme.”
  And there with bought that monstrous change
  exiling you to things.
  Changed all that nature had in you wrought of gentle usefulness, abolishing your spring.
  Tore out your heart,
  set your good apart from all that you could say,
  think,
  feel,
  know to be right.
  And you did not fight,
  but set your minds fast on my slavery
  the better to endure your own.

  ‘Tis true
  my pearls were beads of sweat
  wrung from weary bodies’ pain,
  instead of rings upon my hands
  I wore swollen, bursting veins.
  My ornaments were the wipe-lash’s scar
  my diamond, perhaps, a tear.
  Instead of paint and powder on my face
  I wore a solid mask of fear to see my blood so spilled.
  And you, women seeing
  spoke no protest
  but cuddled down in your pink slavery
  and thought somehow my wasted blood
  confirmed your superiority.

  Because your necklace was of gold
  you did not notice that it throttled speech.
  Because diamond rings bedecked your hands
  you did not regret their dictated idleness.
  Nor could you see that the platinum bracelets which graced your wrists were chains
  binding you fast to economic slavery
  And though you claimed your husband’s name
  still could not command his fidelity.

  You bore him sons.
  I bore him sons.
  No, not willingly.
  He purchase you.
  He raped me,
  I fought!
  But you fought neither for yourselves nor me.
  Sat trapped in your superiority
  and spoke no reproach.
  Consoled your outrage with an added diamond brooch.
  Oh, God, how great is a woman’s fear
  who for a stone, a cold, cold stone
  would not defend honor, love or dignity!

  Your bore the damning mockery of your marriage
  and heaped your hate on me,
  a woman too,
  a slave more so.
  And when your husband disowned his seed
  that was my son
  and sold him apart from me
  you felt avenged.
  Understand:
  I was not your enemy in this,
  I was not the source of your distress.
  I was your friend, I fought.
  But you would not help me fight
  thinking you helped only me.
  Your deceived eyes seeing only my slavery
  aided your own decay.
  Yes, they condemned me to death
  and they condemned you to decay.
  Your heart whisked away,
  consumed in hate,
  used up in idleness
  playing yet the lady’s part
  estranged to vanity.
  It is justice to you to say your fear equaled your tyranny.

  You were afraid to nurse your young
  lest fallen breast offend your master’s sight
  and he should flee to firmer loveliness.
  And so you passed them, your children, on to me.
  Flesh that was your flesh and blood that was your blood
  drank the sustenance of life from me.
  And as I gave suckle I knew I nursed my own child’s enemy.
  I could have lied,
  told you your child was fed till it was dead of hunger.
  But I could not find the heart to kill orphaned innocence.
  For as it fed, it smiled and burped and gurgled with content
  and as for color knew no difference.
  Yes, in that first while
  I kept your sons and daughters alive.

  But when they grew strong in blood and bone
  that was of my milk
  you
  taught them to hate me.
  PUt your decay in their hearts and upon their lips
  so that strength that was of myself
  turned and spat upon me,
  despoiled my daughters, and killed my sons.
  You know I speak true.
  Though this is not true for all of you

  When I bestirred myself for freedom
  and brave Harriet led the way
  some of you found heart and played a part
  in aiding my escape.
  And when I made my big push for freedom
  your sons fought at my sons’ side.
  Your husbands and brothers too fell in that battle
  when Crispus Attucks died.
  It’s unfortunate that you acted not in the way of justice
  but to preserve the Union
  and for dear sweet pity’s sake;
  Else how came it to be with me as it is today?
  You abhorred slavery
  yet loathed equality.

  I would that the poor among you could have seen
  through the scheme
  and joined hands with me.
  Then, we being the majority, could long ago have recued
  our wasted lives.
  But no.
  The rich, becoming richer, could be content
  while yet the poor had only the pretense of superiority
  and sought through murderous brutality
  to convince themselves that what was false was true.

  So with KKK and fiery cross
  and bloodied appetites
  set about to prove that “white is right”
  forgetting their poverty.
  Thus the white supremacist used your skins
  to perpetuate slavery.
  And woe to me.
  Woe to Willie McGee.
  Woe to the seven men of Martinsville.
  And woe to you.
  It was no mistake that your naked body on an Esquire calendar
  announced the date, May Eighth.
  This is your fate if you do not wake to fight.
  They will use your naked bodies to sell their wares
  though it be hate, Coca Cola or rape.

  When a white mother disdained to teach her children
  this doctrine of hate,
  but taught them instead of peace
  and respect for all men’s dignity
  the courts of law did legislate
  that they be taken from her
  and sent to another state.
  To make a Troy Hawkins of the little girl
  and a killer of the little boy!

  No, it was not for the womanhood of this mother
  that Willie McBee died
  but for the depraved, enslaved, adulterous woman
  whose lustful demands denied,
  lied and killed what she could not possess.
  Only three months before another such woman lied
  and seven black men shuddered and gave up their lives.
  These women were upheld in these bloody deeds
  by the president of this nation,
  thus putting the official seal on the fate
  of white womanhood with in these United States.
  This is what they plan for you.
  This is the depravity they would reduce you to.
  Death for me
  and worse than death for you.

  What will you do?
  Will you fight with me?
  White supremacy is your enemy and mine.
  So be careful when you talk with me.
  Remind me not of my slavery, I know it will
  but rather tell me of your own.
  Remember, you have never known me.
  You’ve been busy seeing me
  as white supremacist would have me be,
  and I will be myself.
  Free!
  My aim is full equality.
  I would usurp their plan!
  Justice
  peace
  and plenty
  for every man, woman and child
  who walks the earth.
  This is my fight!

  If you will fight with me then take my hand
  and the hand of Rosa Ingram, and Rosalee McGee,
  and as we set about our plan
  let our Wholehearted fight be:
  PEACE IN A WORLD WHERE THERE IS EQUALITY.

  Thanks to @llapen who tweeted about the film – as Beah Richards said – “The last word has not been spoken”.

• Community guide for Nigeria elections

  Posted: March 29, 2011, 7:38 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Stakeholders Democracy have published this excellent guide to monitoring the April elections. The guide can be downloaded here.

  We have prepared a community guide to the 2011 elections which we hope will be shared and adapted by all of those who hope to promote better elections in their communities. It was drafted with the Niger Delta in mind but we are hopeful that communities in other parts of Nigeria will also find it useful.

  Via Naijablog

• Notin’ Do U [Nothing Worries You]

  Posted: March 29, 2011, 3:49 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Notin’ Do U [Nothing Worries You]
  your mind is philosophy.
  your loyalty epically stays in love
  and you love me in a way that
  safely feels something like ‘prophetic’;
  you see things in my soul
  that elude my ordinary eyes
  and i can feel it deeply when we talk.
  it is in the way you casually lean your body
  towards mine and then talk half-asleep,
  it is in that unutterable way you look at me when no one is around,
  it is in the sweetly serious way you say we should
  talk a lot so that we don’t float past each other like space men
  but rather grow together entwined.
  i like it when we talk and your delightful mind
  sparkles in conversation and your short white teeth
  reveal a sweet, rare smile behind full, dark lips because simply put,
  when we are together, notin’ do u.
  …you are now pressing hard against me.
  and in your face i see
  a fineness raw, exciting yet gentle.
  all in one deliciously dark, square-jawed face…
  …for there’s a fluid storm rising and billowing like harmattan
  behind your pair of marble eyes.

  © Donald Molosi Nov. 30, 2010

• SIJI: ‘Ijo’ – Brilliance

  Posted: March 28, 2011, 9:44 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  SIJIMusic sent me this – I love! Brilliance!

  SIJI – ‘Ijo’(Official Video) from SIJI on Vimeo.

• Reflections on David Kato

  Posted: March 25, 2011, 4:24 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Mixed news is coming from Uganda on the Anti-Homosexuality Bill [AHB] David fought so hard against. On the one hand its been said the Bill is dead and on the other it will still be debated in Parliament.

  It is very possible that the Ugandan Anti-Homosexuality Bill will be shelved once and for all. Frank Mugisha of SMUG wrote

  Anti homosexuality bill should not be discussed, not needed redundant and unnecessary says Ugandan Government…. “the bill is shelved…the govt has stopped it.”

  The Ugandan Minister of Information also said the Bill would be shelved, saying it is unnecessary and should not be considered and will not be supported by government.

  However even if the AHB is abandoned, a new Bill, the Sexual Offences Bill [OB] is likely to include similar anti-homosexuality legislation so the struggle very much continues.

  African Perspectives invited me to talk about the life and work of Uganda, LGBTI activist, David Kato who was murdered on 26th January 2011. It was a very personal interview and I speak for no one but myself. I was very nervous doing the interview. I was not sure I was the “right” person; would say the “right” things – whatever they are; I was grieving and my confidence was at a low. So I asked Kagendo Murungi whose work I respect and love. I asked her to be objective and frank. I expected a couple of lines at the most but she gave far more and I thank her for this.

  I just finished listening to your interview for a second time today and I wanted to let you know that I really appreciate your voice. The information you shared and the analysis that you gave about the media’s treatment of David’s death was invaluable because it changes the experience of the events of the past weeks even in hindsight.

  Your voice bridges the difference between our trusting that there are more complex voices on the situation in Uganda and in Africa and that there is a critical analysis of homophobic violence in a longer and more complex historical continental context AND witnessing that testament.

  It was really saddening to hear about the exploitation of this tragedy in various ways because I was really shocked and appalled to hear about the fundraising scams!

  I think there was obviously a lot of sadness in your voice but the way in which you framed your responses to the questions really created a tone of respect and a space for listeners to pause and reflect on a personal level on their own intentions, analysis and preconceived notions about what is happening in Uganda and throughout Africa.

  I really felt that your interview humanized David in a whole different way than I’ve seen or heard. Perhaps its because your comments are not in a context that can be turned into a spectacle or exploited by any outside parties because it is a personal reflection from a friend and colleague as well as a voice from the inside-out.

  If the radio button doesnt work click here to listen to the podcast:

• Sharpeville

  Posted: March 24, 2011, 3:15 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Somehow, between the requirements of summer
  and winter, we went forth holding above our heads
  souls that death comes in, like Moses scurrying
  down the mountain side with tablets scratched
  with scripture; like a lamp blinding the damp dark
  of mines our fathers walked in search of food.
  We raised them and held them like sacrifices
  to specific gods, trophies of a triumphant day,
  and kept them, self-evident, lifted above the world
  with a purpose. Our souls, glowing like headlights
  at a storm as if they knew what hardship meant.
  In our hands they were the day’s newborn child:
  behold, we cried, lifting them with hands callous
  from scraping, as we approached the charge office,
  behold, the only thing greater than yourself! It was
  breath held in anticipation, though some were candles
  that lit our way to freedom, others hammers
  and others scythes, nailing in planks and reaping
  the full grass. And others going to their graves
  alone, though their heads still scream in the night
  like trees that were felled before their season.

  © Rethabile Masilo

• The US has no right to impose their political processes on others

  Posted: March 23, 2011, 6:17 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Amy Goodman interviewed Mildred Aristide just before they landed in Haiti.  Mrs Aristide rarely speaks in public so I was very interested to hear what she had to say.  She spoke of her time in South Africa and learning about the connections between Africa and Haiti – learning about Africa and teaching about Haiti. In answer to the US government’s statement to President Aristide not to look to the past but to the future she quoted Barthélemy Boganda of the Central Africa Republic [CAR] response to the French colonial government who made a similar statement ”I would stop talking about the past, if it weren’t so present”.     It is convenient and in the US’s interest for Haitians and any of us for that matter to forget the past. The past is full of betrayals, violence and exploitation carried out by the US so no wonder they would prefer we all forget it.

  And I think that what I’ve learned from Africa is how much Africans carry the past with them, and the past being lessons from their ancestors, the lessons of their culture, all of which happens in time, in a time space. So it’s not that you live in the past, but you carry with you the lessons and the good and the experiences of the past.

  I think it’s—it’s an inability, maybe, by the American political process to understand the kind of relation that Titide has with the Haitian people, and it doesn’t fit within the kind of policy frameworks that perhaps they have of—and so, it’s an unwillingness to see beyond that. I’ll attribute it to that.

  I think that the United States and a lot of those western European countries see politics a certain way, and I think that they have no right to impose that on other peoples.

• Euphoria and the struggle to come: Return of Jean-Bertrand Aristide

  Posted: March 22, 2011, 4:24 pm by Sokari

  Tags:   

  
  
  

  Walter Turner of Africa Today interviews Pierre Labossiere and Robert Roth both of of Haiti Action Committee.  Both Pierre and Robert were in Haiti to welcome back President Aristide and here they both speak of their joy and excitement and that of the Haitian people at his return. Everyone was busy cleaning the streets, making posters and hanging posters so there was a huge amount of activity. Nonetheless there was a certain amount of anxiety right up to the moment he arrived – wondering if it would really happen.

  What happens next when the euphoria settles.   The  February 2004 coup was a double one.  To remove President Aristide and also to destroy Lavalas – the movement of the people.   The last 7 years has seen an increase in poverty and hardship irrespective of the earthquake which made the situation worse.  Now the struggle will go on.  This is a new beginning and a long road ahead.  Each experience is a learning one on which to build and move forward.   The forces against change are powerful so the people need to be mindful and focused but it is achievable.   A new Lavalas starts from now – Manigat, Martelly are not important.  The people have the consciousness and the power.   Listen to the people – always!

  Africa Today – March 21, 2011 at 7:00pm
  
  Click to listen (or download)

• Free Gender

  Posted: March 18, 2011, 5:11 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Free Gender is a blog by a group of 14 young Black Queer South Africans, living in Khayelitsha, Cape Town.  The group was started by Funeka Soldaat in 2008.   One of the main focuses of the group is to campaign for justice for  Zoliswa Nkonyana who was brutally murdered on February 4th 2006 by a gang of 20 men and Millicent Gaika who was beaten and raped on the 6th April 2010.

  With the support of Funeka and visual activist,  Zanele Muholi, the group started the blog as a way of documenting their lives, their challenges and hopes.   The group have no funding but still their vision is to build a supportive community for themselves based on mutual teaching and learning.   Through the blog they are developing their writing, journalistic and photographic skills.   The next step is the young women want to extend their community to include  young queer women of colour in Europe and America with the aim of building alliances and learning from each other.

  Last Monday the group held a rally outside the parliamentary building in Cape Town to demand the government take concrete and meaningful action against the rape of Black lesbians in the Townships.

  Held in their left hands were wooden crosses that symbolize crucifixion – brutal killings that our lesbians friends have encountered at the hands of perpetrators and further face revictimization at the hands of police who often stall the cases.
  Speaking to one supporter who said that “We are here because want our parliament to recognize ‘us’ and our needs”. Another speaker spoke of …

  Unlike other previous protests that took place in the past at various places like Khayelitsha Magistrate court (for Zoliswa Nkonyana’s case) and Wynberg Magistrate court (in support of Millicent Gaika) who survived curative rape in 2010, the rally was a silent one. No struggle songs sung which suggests anger, pain, irritation and impatience cause by several delays, lost cases, worsened by lost cases and other matters thrown out of court due to what justice system call ‘lack of evidence.’

• East End White Pride Cancelled

  Posted: March 17, 2011, 2:09 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  On 2nd April a group under the name of “East End Gay Pride” [EEGP] planned to  march through the Shoreditch and Whitechapel districts of Tower Hamlets, London.  The march which was promoted as “united against homophobia and all prejudice” claimed to be in response to a homophobic sticker campaign in East London – a campaign which has questionable origins and has been condemned by both the East End Mosque and the Association of British Muslims.

  The EEGP is part of a growing and mainstreaming of Islamophobia as Muslims are painted as the face of homophobia in Britain and Europe.   Left-leaning liberal journalist, Johann Hari who is known for his internationalist reporting on Palestine and Congo, recently published a piece “Can we talk about Muslim homophobia now” in which he claimed

  “East London has seen the highest increase in homophobic attacks anywhere in Britain. Everybody knows why, and nobody wants to say it. It is because East London has the highest Muslim population in Britain, and we have allowed a fanatically intolerant attitude towards gay people to incubate there, in the name of ‘tolerance’.”

  Hari’s assertions have been challenged by a number of Queer and non-Queer journalists and bloggers.  For example, Patrick Lilly of UK Black Pride, writes an open letter response pointing out Hari’s figures are not consistent with those of the Metropolitan police

  “There are however huge variations in totals of reported Homophobic Crimes: some Boroughs rise by 60% others decline by the same amount. I don’t know what may affect reporting of homophobic crime but on the basis of the information available from the Met your claims that East London has the highest increase in homophobic crime is TOTALLY inaccurate (and inflammatory).’

  Lenin’s Tomb goes further to expose scaremongering in the media particularly when journalists like Johann Hari who writes in the Independent, do not take the time to check their statistics and sources before publishing inflammatory remarks based on distortions of facts and anecdotal evidence.

  “A typical scaremongering poll appeared in The Sunday Times in 2008. It dealt with Muslim students, and it alleged a series of nasty attitudes on their part. Among other things, it said: “Homophobia was rife, with 25% saying they had little or no respect for gays.” What it meant to say, of course, was that acceptance of gays was rife, with 75% of Muslim students having some or much respect for gays. There was also a famously distorted study for the right-wing Policy Exchange in 2007, which claimed that only 30% of British Muslims disagreed with the claim that homosexuality is morally wrong and should be illegal.”

  To return to the EEGP,  there are a number disturbing aspects of the organisation and the now cancelled march namely that it had anti-Muslim and anti-Islam agendas.

  Opponents of the EEGP have been concerned over the possible involvement of the far-right English Defense League.  This has been confirmed as one of the EEGP’s founding organisers, Raymond Berry, turned out to be a founding member of the EDL as well as involved with “Stop the Islamification of Europe” group whose tagline is “Racism is the lowest form of stupidity! Islamophobia is the height of common sense!”  Since being exposed, Berry has resigned from the EEGP.

  The EEGP site specifically states that anti-facist groups are not welcome and if they do come they  will not be allowed to carry placards at the march which is being presented,  ridiculously, as  non-political.  Homophobia, Islamophobia, racism,  facism, the EDL, Gay Pride – all of these are political.

  The Queer Muslim organisation, the Safra Project made the following statement against the EEGP.

  “This not only disregards the history of embedded racism that our communities have suffered in the area and more generally but also, as Queer Muslims, we feel that there are more productive ways to address the concerns that the East End Gay Pride march organisers have raised. For example by getting involved with the important cross-community projects that are ongoing in East London.

  Therefore, we, as Queer Muslims who are most likely to suffer the fall out of this march, ask:

  •The organisers to cancel this march on all of our communities, neighbours and families in East London.

  •The local Queer people in the East End of London to engage with the wider local community in collaboration to better understand and work productively on all forms of prejudice.

  •For everyone to voice their opposition to overt and covert racism and Islamophobia especially in the name of gay rights. All forms of prejudice must be understood in their overlapping ways and to ignore this lived reality, particularly that of Queer Muslims, is to avoid engaging with underlying issues of social, economic and political injustice and disadvantage.”

  Safra’s statement differs greatly from the EEGP in that it both claims a Muslim Queer space and brings home the need to discuss the impact of queer gentrification on communities of colour and working class people.

  Despite all the claims of being “a political”  there is no evidence of inclusiveness on their site where everything is white,  English and homonormative including the repeated use of  the descriptive “gay” which erases people who self-identify as lesbian, bi-sexual, queer, queer trans, transgender, intersex and gender non-conforming.

  The call out to Johann Hari via Twitter is further evidence of the agenda of this event -

  In another Tweet EEGP linked to the Joel Kafetz show and his interview with  Raymond Berry [the day before his EDL connections were exposed]. Since then they have removed his  photo from his site but no statement on his EDL fascist connections.

  Other groups who have stated their disgust with the growing Islamophobia and the casting of Muslims as the “face” of homophobia and hate in Britain and across Europe,  are Bent Bars, Imaan and Decolonizing Queer whose statement reads…

  “Despite negotiations with the local council by a few determined individuals, the Pride march will likely go ahead. The far right have thus been given the pink light to an area which has already been deeply traumatized. Besides successive fascist and neo-fascist attempts to march through the East End, the area has long been a hub of police racism, and has one of the highest rates of stop and search.   Then there is the staggering number of racist attacks, which according to police statistics are almost five times as high as the number of homophobic hate crimes.”

  The cancellation of the East End Gay Pride was announced on Wednesday [16th March 2011] and is a clear victory for Queer Muslim individuals, organisations and their allies, who have borne the risk but who are now being sidelined by the same gay imperialists who paved the way for neo-facists to organise this event in the first place.

  The Decolonize Queer statement

  LGBT rights marches, too, are travelling across European borders. Besides East London, which last summer saw its first queer ‘march on Hackney’, marches have been organized in several inner-city migrant neighbourhoods across West Europe, including in Oslo, Berlin and Brussels – all entirely new sites for queer marching. Not all of these marches are right-wing, some in fact identify as anti-racist. They come from various political places, including conservative and left-wing, gay identitarian, radical queer, and genderqueer.

  Clearly, these mobilizations cannot be equated and reduced to a far-right agenda. What nevertheless unites them is their shared setting, in an inner city which is cast as Muslim, recognized through a growing archive of deficiency (including hate, sexism, homophobia and criminality), and thereby prepared for intervention and control. What further unites these settings is that the first gentrifiers often include gay, queer and trans people with race and class privileges, who in some contexts of urban planning are greeted, in settler colonial manner, as ‘pioneers’ who will ‘break in’ these hitherto ‘ungentrifiable’ areas. In the East London homophobia debate, too, gay, queer and trans people with race and class privileges, including those who recently arrived from other parts of Europe, North America, and all over the Global North, are addressed as ‘residents’ whose interests must be protected by the police and the wider community. While (some) gay, queer and trans people are, for the first time, treated as colourful symbols of life, love and revitalization, those who have been there much longer, and who have few other places to go, become recast as sources of death whose lives do not matter, and who are ultimately disposable.

  As transnational activists and intellectuals, we call on gay, queer and trans people with race and class privileges, which also include some of us, to refuse our/their role in politically correcting racist agendas of policing and gentrification. To think about what our/their presence means for those who have been there, often longer, sometimes for generations, including racialized and working-class families who cannot afford rents which rise with the arrival of young upwardly mobile people. To think about what it means to move into an area marked for population exchange, and paint it as a dangerous territory of terror and insecurity which requires greater policing. We support the Safra Project in asking how these mobilizations will impact queer and trans people from Muslim and other criminalized communities, who beyond periodical references to ‘my LGBT Muslim friends’ have been completely sidelined: What are the effects of revanchist gentrification on racialized and working-class people, including and especially those whose gender and sexual expressions invite police harassment rather than protection, and who need affordable housing in areas that are both sexually and racially diverse? What would an anti-violence activism look like that does not lend force to these deadly processes, but fights violence in its many faces, interpersonal and institutional, spectacular and banal, including where ‘the perpetrator’ is the market or the state? If you are going to claim an area as ‘your neighbourhood’, how can you, at the very least, start contributing to it, rather than taking away from it? Read in full here

  
  

  
  

  First published on New Internationalist

• Port-au-Prince preparing for the return of Aristide

  Posted: March 17, 2011, 6:05 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Aristide and the endless revolution
  
  

• Zimbabwean 6 released on bail – support needed

  Posted: March 16, 2011, 12:17 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  The International Socialist Organisation [ISO] have announced the remaining 6 “Egypt video” Zimbabweans have been released on $2,000 bail each.

  The sum to be deposited with the clerk of the court as bail sum is
  US$2 000.00 for each person. Of the six therefore the total will be 12
  thousand dollars.

  the other conditions are that the comrades reside at specified
  addresses, surrender passports and travelling documents, not to
  interfere with the evidence and to report on Mondays, Wednesdays and
  Fridays to the CID Law and Order Harare

  Our appeal now is that we do not have sufficient funds to secure the
  release of the comrades if any one is willing to assist please let us
  know as soon as possible in order for us to secure the liberty of our
  comrades

  Contact ISO via their website for details on how to donate.

• Reflections on the self: portraits by five African photographers

  Posted: March 16, 2011, 5:05 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  Reflections on the Self is curated by Christine Eyene and will be shown at the Royal Festival Hall from 8 March – 3 April 2011.

  Reflections on the Self presents women’s visual narratives, as told through self-portraits and portraits of other women. The photographers are women whose views of the world have been shaped by their own experiences in Africa and the diaspora.

  Hélène Amouzou (Togo; lives and works Belgium); Majida Khattari (Morocco; lives and works France); Zanele Muholi (South Africa); Senayt Samuel (Eritrea, lives and works in the UK); Nontsikelelo Veleko (South Africa). These five photographers engage with issues such as identity, sexuality and displacement, and their work often overturns stereotypical expectations. …..Continued

• South African victory on lesbian rape

  Posted: March 15, 2011, 4:35 am by Sokari

  
  
  

  Free Gender is a Black lesbian group from Khayelitsha in Cape Town.   The group organised a rally in protest against the lack of government and political  response to ” corrective rape”.

  One should ask questions how can people whose rights are infringed vote to the upcoming elections when they are repeatedly victimized and killed in their townships. Let alone being refused citizenship when they report those crimes.

  It is clearly true that victims like Zoliswa Nkonyana, whose case is still unresolved. Zoliswa was stoned to death in February 2006, Khayelitsha. Sizakele Sigasa & Salome Masooa callously murdered in 2007, Meadowlands, Soweto. Eudy Simelane who was brutally murdered in April 2008 in KwaThema, Springs. Maduo Mafubedu who was killed in April 2007, Alexandra township. There are unfortunate cases like those of Millicent Gaika, survivor of curative rape that happened in April 2010, Gugulethu. Gaika became the face of survivors, which is one of the major cases that led to the parliament meeting and rally today.

  The march coincides with a successful meeting between anti-rape groups – Luleki Sizwe,  Women’s Legal Center, Rape Crisis project, and the South African government to specifically discuss the rape of lesbians, and were able to obtain an agreement for a

  “long term sustained engagement of various government arms and civil society groups to research, develop and implement a national action plan to tackle ‘corrective rape’ and the intersecting issues of gender-based violence, anti-LGBTI violence and hate crimes……………

  Various representatives of different activist groups and coalitions then went into Parliament for the long promised first meeting with senior officials at the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Development, who flew to Cape Town for the meeting.

  Ndumie Funda, the one-woman founder of Luleki Sizwe who started the campaign, began by delivering the record-breaking170,000 signatures of support from people in 163 countriesaround the world. She then presented a written statement calling on the ministry to embark on an inclusive, long term and sustained process of taking action against ‘corrective’ rape, exactly what they ended up agreeing to.

  The Triangle Project, Rape Crises Trust Cape Town and Women’s Legal Centre, three local groups, then presented another statement calling on the ministry to take a series of specific, immediate steps to address the intersecting issues of gender-based violence, anti-LGBTI violence and hate crimes.

  More photos from the march here

• Kinky Salon: Calling out and remixing racism

  Posted: March 14, 2011, 4:49 pm by Sokari

  
  
  

  I am compelled to republishing this brilliant response to Kinky Salon’s public apology. A little back story… Kinky Salon organised a spring “sex-positive”  party in London with a “jungle theme”.  In addition to the apology Kinky Salon published their summary of criticisms……[these are also dealt with by Racism Remixed.]

  That the connection of a party that pertains to be sex-positive to tribal costumes, apes and so on, carries with it a subtext of racism and imperialism, and therefore fails to be sex-positive for everyone.

  - That the way we presented this particular jungle-themed party, with a title parodying The Jungle Book, drew upon a text that is often interpreted as imperialist and racist. See: [movies.dowse.com]

  - That the dress-up suggestions, referencing books/films like Heart of Darkness, The African Queen, and Tarzan drew upon texts containing narratives that are often interpreted as racist – see Wikipedia.

  On the basis of the above, Kinky Salon offered an apology -see here and below is one response to that apology by Racism Remixed….

  Dear Kinky Salon Friends,

  We’d like to take a moment to “apologise” to anyone who we upset or offended in the presentation of our Spring party and to thank them for providing Kinky Salon London with the opportunity for growth and improvement.Isn’t it great how life furnishes white people with so many opportunities? Thanks guys!

  For those members of our community who might be unaware of this, some visitors to our Facebook event page raised objections to aspects of the jungle theme that we originally put forward. The arguments are summarised here. Although only a small number of the people who objected have ever been to a Kinky Salon party (and let’s face it: people of colour who haven’t attended a Kinky Salon party have no worthwhile life experiences and don’t know what they’re talking about when it comes to racism), we take all feedback into consideration and have written to each of our critics personally(with a generic message). We acknowledge that some people found our literary references particularly careless (and we do admit that we can be careless – the other day we put milk in the cupboard instead of the fridge. Imagine!) and that for others a jungle theme itself is uncomfortable. By others we mean the other, as in, people of colour, and by uncomfortable, we mean the kind of feeling you get when you wear trousers that are too tight. In failing to take these perspectives into account, aspects of our original theme were interpreted by some as naive and insensitive to issues of race and imperialism (sorry if this sentence is a little long – it’s the result of an informal contest we held to see who could talk the longest about racism without using the actual word racism). We are grateful to those who have opened our eyes to this. We could have gone to Specsavers but we opted to get this kind of eye care for free, from people of colour.  Continue reading …….

  
  

Blah blah blah

Fish cakes

Alas a fish cake.

Yet more fish cakes

Guess what ... yeah ... fish cakes.

The end of the fish cakes