Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is currently saying that Dick Cheney’s vision of policy towards the Middle East after 9/11 was to re-draw the map:Vice-President Dick Cheney’s vision of completely redrawing the map of the Middle East following…
Posts Tagged ‘East Africa’
With Tharoor’s resignation, Africa loses an ardent friend
April 19th, 2010 |
No Comments
With the resignation of Shashi Tharoor as minister of state for external affairs, India’s Africa policy has lost an ardent advocate who was an eloquent supporter of the country’s renewed engagement with the 54-nation African continent.
Tharoor, a former United Nations diplomat, stepped down Sunday night ending a weeklong political drama surrounding a controversial financial deal [...]
Outsourcing to Africa: The world economy calls
March 25th, 2010 |
No Comments
Will improved communications attract call centres to Africa?
THE arrival of three international fibre-optic cables in Kenya in the past six months, the most recent this week, has sparked hopes of an information-technology boom. The Kenyan government reckons that business-process outsourcing (BPO) can provide work for the country’s many unemployed graduates. As established outsourcing companies in India take on ever more complex and lucrative work, firms elsewhere spy an opportunity at the lower end of the BPO market, in prosaic jobs such as operating call centres and keying in data. Can Kenya win some of that business?
Four undersea cables will have made landfall in east Africa by the end of the year, enormously increasing the availability and reducing the cost of telecoms links with the rest of the world. Kenya also boasts a decent workforce: educated, hard-working, closer to customers in Europe and America than Asian call-centre workers, and, some say, more comprehensible too. High unemployment should help limit turnover of workers—a big headache for outsourcing firms elsewhere. One of the government’s advisers, Gilda Odera, who runs a school to train call-centre employees, says warm customer service will also give Kenya an edge: “It’s the way Kenyans deal with people, the tone, the manner.” …
Krishna jazz from faraway Congo
March 23rd, 2010 |
No Comments
The tall dark African servitor from Congo spreads the gospel of Hindu god Krishna on the east coast of Africa with a saxophone, guitar and jazz.
“Hare Rama, Hare Krishna, Rama Rama, Hare Hare…”, his gentle baritone fills the air as he plucks a plaintive riff — in the American bluegrass tradition — on his guitar.
The [...]
Dave Matthews, Tim Reynolds: Benefit Show For Goodall Institute
December 7th, 2009 |
No Comments
DAVE MATTHEWS AND TIM REYNOLDS TO PERFORM BENEFIT SHOW
FOR THE JANE GOODALL INSTITUTE IN WASHINGTON, D.C., MAY 20, 2010
 Matthews & Reynolds |
Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds will perform A Benefit for the Jane Goodall Institute on Thursday, May 20, 2010 at D.A.R. Constitution Hall in Washington D.C. The benefit concert is part of a year-long celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Dr. Jane Goodall’s work. Throughout the 50th anniversary year, the Jane Goodall Institute will celebrate Dr. Goodall’s illustrious career, the rich legacy of the Gombe research in Tanzania, East Africa and the many answers Gombe has yet to reveal.
In the 50 years since Dr. Jane Goodall first set foot on the shores of Lake Tanganyika in what is now Tanzania’s Gombe National Park, the research she pioneered there has produced a font of scientific discovery. The impact of the Gombe research spans the globe and covers a wide range of scientific disciplines, including human evolution, ethology, anthropology, behavioral psychology, sociology, conservation, disease transmission (including HIV-AIDS), aging, and geospatial mapping. Additional information on the work of the Jane Goodall Institute may be found here.
Tickets for the Benefit for the Jane Goodall Institute are $95 plus a $1.50 facility fee and applicable convenience, handling, and shipping.
Public On Sale through Ticketmaster.com begins December 11, 2009 at 10:00 a.m. ET.
What Empires Have Said Throughout History: “One More Surge”
December 2nd, 2009 |
No Comments
A leading advisor to the U.S. military, the Rand Corporation, released a study in 2008 called “How Terrorist Groups End: Lessons for Countering al Qa’ida”. The report confirms what experts have been saying for years: the war on terror is actu…
The War Against Muslim Extremists is Wholly Unnecessary for Our National Security
November 30th, 2009 |
No Comments
In response to my essays documenting that war is harmful to the American economy and produces a huge carbon footprint, some commentators have argued that the Afghanistan and Iraq wars are necessary to combat Muslim extremists.Even putting aside the fac…
Piracy and private enterprise: Splashing, and clashing, in murky waters
August 20th, 2009 |
No Comments
Private security firms are increasingly involved in the fight against pirates. The allocation of tasks between them and navies needs some thought
OF THE dozens of ships recently captured by pirates off east Africa, few stirred so much interest in their home country as a German freighter, the Hansa Stavanger, seized by Somalis in April. As its captivity wore on, the crew of 24 was reported in Germany’s media to be ailing and in need of medicine and water.
At one point, German police commandos were training on board an American navy ship, hoping to storm the vessel, until America’s national security adviser, James Jones, said it was too dangerous. At last, on August 3rd, the saga ended after negotiations between the ship’s Hamburg-based owners and the pirates, who boasted that they had netted $2.75m in ransom. …
Forgotten heroes
August 14th, 2009 |
No Comments
British documentary makers Robin Forestier-Walker and Oliver Owen have been tracing Nigerians who fought against the Japanese in Burma during World War II.
On VJ Day, the anniversary of victory over Japan, they tell the veterans’ story.
Mohammed was just 16 when he was pressed into British military service in northern Nigeria against his will.
Now, almost 70 years on, the old war veteran claims he hid his true identity from the recruiting officer.
It was as Private African Banana that he went on to travel 6,300 miles (10,100km) to the jungles of Burma in the Royal West African Frontier Force.
And he has been known as African Banana ever since.
The contribution of West Africans was played down in official versions of the Allied war in Asia, and until now, few have had an opportunity to tell their tale.
In fact, only two in 10 of the soldiers who fought in Burma were white.
The role of Indians and Gurkhas is known. But when Allied commander General William Slim thanked his 14th army at the end of the campaign, he did not even mention the Africans.
Jungle warfare
Nigerians made up more than half of the total force of 90,000 West African soldiers deployed to South East Asia after 1943 as part of the British Army’s 81st and 82nd (West Africa) Divisions.
Although the Burma campaign ended 64 years ago, many remain bitter that their contribution was never adequately recognised.
"Initially I saw the white man as someone better than me. But after the war, I considered him an equal"
Former infantryman Dauda Kafanchan
They were central to the push to clear Japanese forces out of the jungle and mountain ranges of Burma, from where they threatened British India.
This was achieved through a gruelling campaign of jungle marches, battles and ambushes, in which supplies were delivered entirely by air.
Usman Katsina remembers it well.
"Everything that was meant to be used – your food, your clothes, everything – was given to you and you were required to carry it, on your head and back. Some even died from exhaustion, from travelling long distances, with a heavy load," he says.
Some of those who earned the coveted Burma Star had already fought against Mussolini’s forces in East Africa.
West Africans also joined special Chindit units under the command of General Orde Wingate.
The Chindits fought deep inside Japanese-held territory to disrupt lines of communication.
Their enemy was an extremely dangerous opponent. Japanese soldiers were trained well in the art of jungle warfare, where the first rule was concealment.
It was a skill the Nigerian troops had to learn too.
"The Japanese in the jungle were just like snakes – they hid before you could see them, it was very hard," recalls 97-year-old Hassan Sokoto.
‘Lack of recognition’
Umaru Yola fought in the 4th Battalion, Nigeria Regiment. He described how he was hit in the head with a piece of shrapnel that left him with a hole in his skull.
"I didn’t die, so God must have decided to give me a long life," he says.
African recruits served as drivers, artillerymen, engineers, medics and clerks, as well as infantrymen and carriers.
Officer positions were reserved for white expatriates from Britain and other parts of the empire, with only one notable exception: Lieutenant Seth Anthony from the Gold Coast was the British Army’s first African officer.
Despite the hierarchy, the war in Burma played some part in breaking down the race barriers of the era.
"Initially I saw the white man as someone better than me. But after the war, I considered him an equal," recalls former infantryman Dauda Kafanchan.
In post-war Nigeria, the colonial government gave some veterans land to begin new lives as farmers. The project was also a scheme to reduce their potential impact as a new political force.
"We wanted work. But what could we do We were under colonial rule and we couldn’t change anything," said veteran Dangombe, who found himself without prospects at the war’s end.
Nigerian soldiers who chose to continue their military careers went on to form the core of independent Nigeria’s national army, which retains the 81st and 82nd Divisions to this day.
Private Banana later served as a peacekeeper in the Congo and Chad. And he returned to the frontline alongside many of his former comrades in Nigeria’s bloody 1967-1970 civil war.
But many of his former comrades feel the British abandoned their responsibilities to their former servicemen.
Although they were paid off for their service, some claim they were promised allowances which were never paid, despite their repeated efforts over the years.
And it is not only the money – some veterans are still bitter over what they see as a lack of recognition.
"We were supposed to get Long Service and British Empire Medals" says Dangombe.
"But up until now – nothing."
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Hunt on for ‘hijacked cargo ship’
August 12th, 2009 |
No Comments
A cargo ship may have travelled through the English Channel after being hijacked by pirates, coastguards say.
A search has begun to find the 15 Russian crew of the Maltese-flagged Arctic Sea, which reports say was boarded by hijackers in the Baltic sea.
UK authorities made contact before it entered the Strait of Dover but the Russian navy told the Itar-Tass agency it was now looking for the ship.
The Maritime and Coastguard Agency said the situation was "bizarre".
Spokesman Mark Clark said: "Who would think that a hijacked ship could pass through one of the most policed and concentrated waters in the world
"It seems strange to think that a ship which had been hijacked was passing along the channel along with ships carrying day-trippers going over to Calais for the day."
‘Extremely curious’
Hijackers may have been coercing the ship’s crew when they made radio contact with coastguards at Dover on 28 July, the MCA fears.
Reports say Swedish authorities were told by the Finnish shipping line operating the 3,988-tonne ship that it was boarded by up to 10 armed men claiming to be anti-drugs police as it sailed through the Baltic sea on July 24.
"It could well be that a crew member had a gun put to his head"
Mark Clark
Maritime and Coastguard Agency
The intruders apparently left the vessel – which was carrying about £1m worth of sawn timber from Finland to Algeria – 12 hours later on an inflatable boat after damaging the Arctic Sea’s communications equipment.
But on 3 August, Interpol told Dover Coastguard that the crew had been hijacked in the Baltic Sea and asked UK authorities to be alert as the vessel passed through the channel.
By then the ship had already left the Strait of Dover and was last recorded off the coast of Brest, northern France, just before 0130 BST on 30 July.
The MCA said it was told the vessel had seemingly been spotted subsequently by a Portuguese coastal patrol aircraft but its current location was unknown.
Mr Clark said the person on board whom coastguards had spoken to had told them the ship was due to arrive in Bejaia, northern Algeria, on 4 August at 2300 BST.
He added: "There is no coastguard I know who can remember anything like this happening.
"There didn’t seem anything suspicious when contact was made. It could well be that a crew member had a gun put to his head by a hijacker when contact was made but who knows
"We are extremely curious to find out what could have happened to this vessel."
‘No different’
World leaders have become increasingly concerned about pirates operating off the coast of Somalia.
But Nick Davis, who runs the private security firm Anti-Piracy Maritime Security Solutions, told the BBC’s Today programme that the relatively low value of the cargo suggested this was a different kind of piracy to that seen off the coast of East Africa.
He said: "Piracy is piracy – if someone’s wanting to take that vessel, and they’re not authorised, and they use a speedboat to go and get it, then it’s no different to what the Somalis do.
"However, I don’t believe they would have boarded that vessel firing weapons in the air, and threatening to kill the crew.
"Whilst it is piracy, it’s not like what we know in Somalia."
Russian authorities have said they have been assessing the situation and Navy vessels have been notified, according to Itar-Tass.
Vladimir Kochurov, deputy head of the Arkhangelsk regional administration’s transport department, told the agency that there was "scarce information" about the Arctic Sea.
He added: "Security services are holding the investigation.
"Meanwhile, the regional administration is ready for rapid reaction in case the situation clarifies. We will give assistance to the crew."
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Clinton appeal on Congo conflict
August 11th, 2009 |
No Comments
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is heading to the Democratic Republic Of Congo, where she will speak out on the country’s deadly civil conflict.
Mrs Clinton is expected to call for an end to rights abuses, including mass rapes reportedly carried out by rebels and government troops.
Violence flared in the country’s mineral-rich east last year, raising fears of a return to civil war.
Mrs Clinton, on a seven-nation tour of Africa, was in Angola earlier.
She urged the oil-rich nation to hold credible elections and also promised US oil firms would give greater help to Angola’s other sectors, such as agriculture.
Basketball philanthropy
On her arrival in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, Mrs Clinton is set to visit a newly-built hospital.
The BBC’s East Africa correspondent Will Ross says the modern facility is in stark contrast to the rest of the country’s dilapidated health system.
But the hospital was not built by the government – its construction was paid for by Dikembe Mutombo, a Congolese basketball star who made his name in the US.
On Tuesday Mrs Clinton will meet President Joseph Kabila in the eastern town of Goma, where the focus will be on ending human rights atrocities including mass rape.
CLINTON’S AFRICAN TOUR- Kenya
- South Africa
- Nigeria
- Angola
- Liberia
- Democratic Republic of Congo
- Cape Verde
Our correspondent says the US and the rest of the international community realise that if stability can be brought to DR Congo it could have a positive impact on a vast swathe of Africa.
The country borders eight other nations, and its conflicts have frequently spilled over its borders.
The US is a major aid donor and has helped the country in some of its recent successes like the elections of 2006 and the thawing of relations with Rwanda.
Mrs Clinton has already visited South Africa and Kenya as part of the trip – her longest foreign tour since taking office.
She is also due to visit Nigeria, Liberia and Cape Verde.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Hard road
August 1st, 2009 |
No Comments
By Brian Hungwe
Harare
Human smugglers are running a complex multi-million dollar network, fleecing distressed Somalis seeking a way out of their war-torn country and desperate Ethiopians caught up in vicious cycles of hunger, floods and political repression.
Thousands of people leave their countries every year, trekking thousands of miles through eight countries from the Horn of Africa, via East Africa down to South Africa.
Bribes oil their journeys across the region by air, overland and sea.
And immigration and police are complicit. The state of the airports and the corruption that goes on there mirrors the body politic of the countries involved. And this has security implications for the countries involved.
"The next five to 10 years, Somalia will have nobody there"
Ismail, Somali truck driver in Malawi
In a recent report on smuggling in the region, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) noted that "guardians of national border integrity… are deeply compromised, creating a threat to national security".
It says their complicity is keeping the smuggling business afloat and that they "should be considered part of the illegal and abusive enterprise" where "cupidity appears to be the foremost and only visible motivation".
Huge sums
IOM’s Tal Raviv, based in Nairobi, acknowledges that the smuggling ring is "sophisticated."
"Tens of thousands of people are able to move from Somalia and Ethiopia, all the way down to South Africa, and they arrive successfully," she said.
"All the borders are porous, it’s just that," points out Mokotedi Mpshe, who heads South Africa’s National Prosecuting Authority.
Mr Mpshe knows the extent to which corruption has permeated his society.
"Some government officials can let you down. We may try to fight human trafficking, but at the same time there may be elements amongst ourselves that are working against us," he said.
Cash-strapped governments can’t match the huge sums smugglers pay immigration and police officers to ease the path of illegal immigrants en route to South Africa.
Expanding business
I found that immigrants pay smugglers on average $1,500 – $2,000 before the journey begins.
The IOM also estimates the smuggling business generates annual revenue of about $40m. Along the way the immigrants lose much more to robberies.
And rape and other abuse is common.
Over the years, the flow of Somalis has been growing, and thus, according to the IOM, "providing smugglers an expanding and lucrative business opportunity".
"The next five to 10 years, Somalia will have nobody there," said Ismail, a Somali truck driver living in Malawi.
"There is no peace which is coming, there is nobody who is fighting for Somalia."
Lions and snakes
Salma left Somalia with her son Nasir, 3, six years ago, when she was 23. She left her mother and brother behind, and has no clue where they are.
"Sometimes [smugglers] ask the women to sleep with them. You sleep with them, otherwise they leave you behind"
Salma, Somali migrant
From her flat in Cape Town, South Africa, she says that everyone in Somalia is trying to flee the fighting there.
She says she walked on foot for 24 days during the journey.
In Kenya, Salma met Amina, a smuggler linked into a network that carried her across several countries.
Nairobi’s Eastleigh district is, according to IOM, the smuggling hub of the region.
It is a little Mogadishu in the heart of Nairobi, whose life runs 24 hours, hosting a close-knit Somali community that keeps itself to itself.
Money transfers are done with ease, and anything goes. Vehicles with tinted windows are a common sight, and haulage trucks move goods in and out every hour.
It is here that Salma gave $1,000 to the smuggler, Amina, who accompanied her and a small party of migrants on the first half of their journey.
Police bribed
In Tanzania, six members of the party were arrested.
Salma says the smuggler bribed the police to secure their freedom.
She says they had similar experiences in Zambia and Zimbabwe.
"[Smuggler] paid some money and we came out."
Six years later, Salma’s journey is still vivid for her, as she recounts how she was terrified of lions and snakes as she trudged through the bush.
"Sometimes [smugglers], they ask the women to sleep with them," Salma remembers.
"You sleep with them, otherwise they leave you behind… they do that."
The IOM’s Tal Raviv confirmed that almost all smuggled women get raped, and her organisation has also received reports of the same thing happening to men.
Salma’s journey was even tougher than usual because she was travelling with a child, so the smugglers told her they could not give her accommodation.
"I was struggling too much," she remembers.
Nasir, now nine, vividly recalls sleeping in the forest, his mother walking long distances, and sometimes going for days without food.
"I never ever, I don’t want to do again that journey."
To listen to Brian Hungwe’s full investigation, tune in to African Perspectiveon the BBC World Service.The program is first broadcast on Saturday 1 August at 1106 GMT. It will be available online from 2106 GMT, for one week.</p
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Dutch held ‘heading for Somalia’
July 30th, 2009 |
No Comments
Four Dutch nationals have been arrested in Kenya on suspicion of aiding insurgents in Somalia.
The four 21-year-olds, three born in Morocco, the other in Somalia, were stopped by Kenyan police as they were heading for the border.
The local police were not satisfied with their claims to be tourists.
There have been a series of recent reports that young men from the US, Europe and South Asia have joined the Somali insurgents in a "holy war".
Lamu District Commissioner Stephen Ikua told the BBC the four had travelled by boat from Lamu island before hiring a tractor.
He said it was possible they were headed to Somalia to assist one of the insurgent groups there and they would be interrogated in Nairobi.
The Kenyan authorities say they have arrested and deported several other young men from Tanzania and the United States in the same area for the same reason.
BBC East Africa correspondent Will Ross says in recent months eyewitnesses in Somalia have reported seeing foreigners amongst the insurgent fighters known as al-Shabab.
Al-Shabab wants to overthrow the UN-backed transitional government in Somalia and put in place strict Islamic law.
The hardline Islamists control much of southern Somalia.
Foreigners have headed to Somalia to take part in what they consider a holy war or jihad.
The authorities in Minnesota in the United States are investigating claims that several young men were lured to Somalia to fight.
Since early May, the fighting between the insurgents and the forces loyal to Somalia’s government has displaced nearly 250,000 people.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Hunger bites back
July 27th, 2009 |
No Comments
If the news that for the first time more than a billion people are classified as chronically hungry doesn’t completely kill your appetite for eating out, there is a way to assuage the guilt
As the invitations for the autumn celebrity cook book launches pile up – the latest is Tamasin Day-Lewis‘s Supper for a Song – you realise that the publishing world has cottoned onto the fact that people are finding it tougher to feed themselves in their usual manner. Clever! “In tough times we still always crave good food, even if we have to cut down (or give up) eating out … ” runs the blurb for Tamasin (sister of Daniel).
I can’t help wondering about the people who are having to give up eating entirely. Any top tips for them? Their numbers are up more sharply than those of British shoppers forced by the recession to slum it at Lidl. For the first time over a billion people, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation, are chronically hungry. Nearly half of them are children.
Climate change and the renewed rise in the price of staple food commodities now ensure that more people than ever before in history are going to bed hungry. There’s a good analysis in the Economist of what is happening, and what the future holds. Part of the problem, of course, is that we’re still turning poor people’s cereals into ethanol for our green cars. Here’s me banging on about the effect of this in Cambodia for OFM last year.
It is the height of the cyclical famine season in east Africa – but, as the Guardian reported yesterday, the financial crisis means that rich countries are cutting their aid budgets. The shortfall means that emergency feeding programmes in Uganda, Somalia and Kenya may soon have to stop. The money missing amounts to $4.8 billion – easy to find for a bank that’s got itself in a mess, but not for millions of people in east Africa.
Still reading? If you are, you may be wondering what we can do, The most food-head-friendly aid agency working on global famine is Action Against Hunger – who have teamed up with Carluccio’s, Oliver Rowe, Fergus Henderson, Giorgio Locatelli and Michel Roux to help you feel a little less guilty while you guzzle courtesy of their pleasingly counterintuitive Fight Hunger, Eat Out scheme. So – eat, drink and be generous. A song for these hungry times.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Hunger bites back
July 27th, 2009 |
No Comments
If the news that for the first time more than a billion people are classified as chronically hungry doesn’t completely kill your appetite for eating out, there is a way to assuage the guilt
As the invitations for the autumn celebrity cook book launches pile up – the latest is Tamasin Day-Lewis‘s Supper for a Song – you realise that the publishing world has cottoned onto the fact that people are finding it tougher to feed themselves in their usual manner. Clever! “In tough times we still always crave good food, even if we have to cut down (or give up) eating out … ” runs the blurb for Tamasin (sister of Daniel).
I can’t help wondering about the people who are having to give up eating entirely. Any top tips for them? Their numbers are up more sharply than those of British shoppers forced by the recession to slum it at Lidl. For the first time over a billion people, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation, are chronically hungry. Nearly half of them are children.
Climate change and the renewed rise in the price of staple food commodities now ensure that more people than ever before in history are going to bed hungry. There’s a good analysis in the Economist of what is happening, and what the future holds. Part of the problem, of course, is that we’re still turning poor people’s cereals into ethanol for our green cars. Here’s me banging on about the effect of this in Cambodia for OFM last year.
It is the height of the cyclical famine season in east Africa – but, as the Guardian reported yesterday, the financial crisis means that rich countries are cutting their aid budgets. The shortfall means that emergency feeding programmes in Uganda, Somalia and Kenya may soon have to stop. The money missing amounts to $4.8 billion – easy to find for a bank that’s got itself in a mess, but not for millions of people in east Africa.
Still reading? If you are, you may be wondering what we can do, The most food-head-friendly aid agency working on global famine is Action Against Hunger – who have teamed up with Carluccio’s, Oliver Rowe, Fergus Henderson, Giorgio Locatelli and Michel Roux to help you feel a little less guilty while you guzzle courtesy of their pleasingly counterintuitive Fight Hunger, Eat Out scheme. So – eat, drink and be generous. A song for these hungry times.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Hidden wounds
July 25th, 2009 |
No Comments
By Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
Zanzibar
I often went to Zanzibar as a child, with my mother, who was born in Dar es Salaam.
We would take a crowded ferry and stay at a hostel for poor women and their kids, who wanted a subsidised break by the sea.
The women in the local mosque provided lunch and we had a wonderful time.
The island, a fabulous mix of Arab, African, Indian and Persian cultures and peoples, was utterly unlike my racially-divided hometown, Kampala, in Uganda.
Abomination
Then, one day, my mother told me about the thousands of black slaves who had been captured in the hinterlands and brought to the island to be sold.
She took me to Bagamoyo, the slave port on the mainland: the word means "lay down your heart".
That trade went on from the Seventh Century until – it is claimed – the beginning of the 20th Century.
Throughout early history, enslavement was common around the world, and East Africa was just one more lucrative location.
But here, the abomination went on longer than at any other time or place.
The traders were mostly Arab, though some Indian merchants were actively involved.
"My grandmother had a baby, and the baby was still feeding – but the traders said this would delay the journey so they just threw the baby away"
Leila, whose grandparents were slaves
Those who captured and sold humans to the businessmen were local African chiefs and henchmen.
A febrile young child, I was distraught when I learned that Muslims had perpetuated this evil. How could it be
The Prophet Mohammed had freed Bilal, a black slave, and asked him to make the first-ever call to prayer. Surely that meant something
And, as the years went on and we learned to look back with abhorrence at the practice of owning and exploiting humans, how come there was no acknowledgement of this injustice in Zanzibar
The questions circled around in my head obsessively when I was a young teen.
Revolution
Then came 1964, and the island detonated.
A revolution led by African soldiers deposed the constitutional monarch, Sultan Seyyid Bin Abdullah.
It was, in part, retaliation for slavery – by people, and upon people, who were not responsible.
It felt as if some ancient God of vengeance had risen from the sea.
They slaughtered anyone who looked Arab, and some Indians too. They took their daughters to rape, confiscated their properties and banished many.
To this day there is no list of the dead – those tortured and dumped into the sea – the disappeared and the exiles.
My mother and I never went back to our favourite place, but for years I have wanted to reveal these veiled stories.
Returning for the first time in more than 40 years for the BBC World Service’s Heart and Soul strand, I interviewed Leila, 99, whose grandparents were enslaved.
"My grandmother had a baby, and the baby was still feeding – but the traders said this would delay the journey so they just threw the baby away," she said.
"My father was also thrown away but the missionaries took him in and looked after him here."
Leila became very emotional.
"It is very painful – so many cruel people," she said.
"It’s very hard because we can’t remember our home, can’t see or know our relatives. We are cut off from our history."
When we turned the tape recorder off, her eyes glazed over and she threw up blood all over her lovely satin dress – and me.
Then there were those I talked to about the revolution in 1964.
"We are called Arabs, but I don’t even speak a word of Arabic"
Suleman Hamed, whose relatives were killed
Those who knew the violated and stolen girls cried as they spoke. They were taking risks talking to us, but it was time to do so, they said.
On a secluded beach away from the main town, Suleman Hamed told me how his uncle, sister and brother-in-law were killed.
"People were killed in the streets and houses, and the revolutionaries take your wife and daughters – for raping. That was a horrible time. We think as if it was yesterday. And all because their ancestors were Arabs. We are called Arabs, but I don’t even speak a word of Arabic."
The historian Maalim Idris says he witnessed the gutters running with Arab and Indian blood.
He showed me photographs of mass graves and of trucks piled high with corpses being driven through the main street.
He believes no fewer than 3,000 Arabs and Indians were killed during the revolution, but there is no official figure.
No healing
Going back to Zanzibar was a life lesson in the potency of the whole historical truth.
Those of Arab descent feel too defensive about the slave trade and focus on the revolution; Africans dwell on the trade and expect no mention of the barbaric acts of the revolutionaries.
There will not be real, deep healing between the citizens of various ethnicities until everyone talks more honestly about past injustices.
Without that, paradise is but an illusion.
An earlier version of this piece appeared in Yasmin Alibhai-Brown’s column in the Independent newspaper. Her radio documentaries can be heard via the Heart and Soul website.</p
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Jail over Burundi albino murders
July 23rd, 2009 |
No Comments
One person has been sentenced to life in prison and eight others to jail in Burundi over the murder of albinos whose remains were sold for witchcraft.
Three other suspects were acquitted by the court in Ruyigi province over the the killings of at least 12 albinos.
The victims were mutilated and their body parts sold in neighbouring Tanzania for use in potions.
In addition to the killing of albinos in Burundi, more than 40 have been killed in Tanzania.
In addition to the life sentence, those convicted were jailed for between one and 15 years.
The trial is believed to be the first linked to a spate of albino killings in East Africa since 2007.
Witchdoctors in the region claim potions made with albino body parts will bring those who use them luck in love, life and business.
An association campaigning for the rights of albinos in Burundi says the authorities are now taking the killings seriously, but more needs to be done.
At least 200 people have been arrested over the trade in Tanzania, but none has been convicted.</p
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
East Africa gets high-speed web
July 23rd, 2009 |
No Comments
The first undersea cable to bring high-speed internet access to East Africa is going live.
The fibre-optic cable, operated by African-owned firm Seacom, will connect South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda and Mozambique to Europe and Asia.
The firm says the cable will help to boost the prospects of the region’s industry and commerce.
The cable – which is 17,000km long – took two years to lay and cost more than $650m.
Seacom said in a statement the launch of the cable marked the "dawn of a new era for communications" between Africa and the rest of the world.
The services are being unveiled in ceremonies in the Kenyan port of Mombasa and the Tanzanian city of Dar es Salaam.
School benefits
The cable was due to be launched in June but was delayed by pirate activity off the coast of Somalia.
The BBC’s Will Ross in Nairobi says the internet revolution trumpeted by Seacom largely depends how well the service is rolled out across the region.
To the disappointment of many consumers, our correspondent says some ISPs (internet service providers) are not planning to lower the cost of the internet, but instead will offer increased bandwidth.
But businesses, which have been paying around $3,000 a month for 1MB through a satellite link, will now pay considerably less – about $600 a month.
The Kenyan government has been laying a network of cables to all of the country’s major towns and says the fibre-optic links will also enable schools nationwide to link into high quality educational resources.
But our correspondent says it is not clear whether the internet revolution will reach the villages, many of which still struggle to access reliable electricity.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Radio propaganda: Crackles of hatred
July 23rd, 2009 |
No Comments
Silencing murderous messages is not as easy as it sounds
LAST year, as Kenya slid into mayhem, the words that sputtered forth from crude transmitters were cryptic but, to those in the know, horrifying. “People of the milk”, a reference to the cattle-owning Kalenjin people, were urged to “take out the weeds in our midst”— in other words, the Kikuyus. Meanwhile Kikuyu broadcasters inveighed against the peril posed by “animals from the west”: this meant the rival Luo (from which Barack Obama originates) and Kalenjins.
In East Africa this use of radio to incite ethnic slaughter recalled an even darker episode: the Rwandan genocide of 1994, in which a station called Radio Mille Collines (Thousand Hills Radio) seemed to be directing the massacres. It not only poisoned the general atmosphere but urged on the killers, with phrases like “cutting the tall trees” and “killing the cockroaches”. …