Ten years ago, the debate over whether condoms should be used during intercourse was still raging; the Kenyan society had been rocked by HIV/AIDS and was looking for ways to stem the rising infection rates.

Men argued that they could not use condoms because it diminished the sex experience. It was argued that it was like eating a banana with the outer skin or taking a candy with the wrap on.

Being a patriarchal society, women were disadvantaged because they could not insist on condom use, even when the risk was manifest. Trust issues were raised and infection rates rose like bush fire.

Then the prevention campaigns went on the over drive, people started accepting condoms and women became empowered to demand for condoms.

That is why the announcement by the Kenyan government that it will purchase 100 million condoms did not merit much debate; it has become part of our lifestyle. If it was in 1999, the news would have had some space on the front page and radio stations would have made it part of the debate for a day or two.

Now the news was in the inside pages, which is probably a testimony of how the times have changed.

I once participated in a very interesting debate between men and women discussing why condoms are now acceptable more than before. The men argued that it has become hard to trust the women and the same argument was advanced by the women. So, infidelity that goes both ways has led to some form of empowerment because we have all realized that we are all at risk and no one is a victim of the other.

The stories of how the community has struggled with supporting the sick members. How grand mothers have been forced to learn how to change nappies because they can not even provide food let alone afford diapers.

The main question then becomes; would you ensure that you have condoms in the pocket/bag? Just in case you never know when the craving strikes.

I've been meaning to check out the San Francisco Film Festival since I moved to this city, so what a better opportunity to finally do it than the movie Soul Power. It's a documentary about the African music festival organized in Kinshasa in 1974 to coincide with the famous boxing championship fight between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman known as Rumble in the Jungle. The idea behind the festival, which became known as Zaire '74 (Zaire is now the Democratic Republic of Congo, in case you're confused), was to connect African-American musicians with their African roots, and through a creative dialogue with local African musicians to rediscover their common heritage. The list of participating musicians included legends like James Brown, BB King, Miriam Makeba, Bill Withers, Celia Cruz and the Fania All-Stars, Franco or Tabu Ley. Basically, everyone that was someone at the time was invited to perform.

The promoters of the event, that was funded by a a Liberian businessman, had planned a movie about it. But when the businessman in question died in an accident about a month later the different parties involved started suing each other for the rights, preventing the footage from seeing the light for more than 20 years. Some of it was finally put together in 1996 in the documentary When we were kings, that was widely acclaimed and even won an Academy award. When we were kings focused on fight between Ali and Foreman and the buiding up to it, relegating the music festival to a small, supporting role. Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, the editor of the film, became increasingly interested in using that unused extensive footage of the concerts that he thought was amazing. He thought that it was a shame that the world was being deprived of enjoying all that great music, but it didn't seem like a good idea to release two films about the same events. So he thought about releasing the footage as a concert DVD, but somehow 14 more years had to pass until a project materialized.

Levy-Hinte, who answered some questions at the end of the screening, explained that his wake up call was the James Brown's death at the end of 2006. On the first days of 2007 he started making phone calls to access the reels, stored in a warehouse in Jersey. He said it took him six months to transfer all the footage for editing and to synchronize it with the sound, which had been recorded separately by a professional recording studio from LA that was moved to Kinshasa for the event. It was a painful process, but also cathartic.

The result is the outcome of a long labor of love and patience with the piles of material, and of a lot of back and forth editing. About half of the film is made of raw musical performance, while the rest shows the process of organizing the festival, behind the scenes reflections and anecdotes, and some minimal context scenes around the city that I thoroughly enjoyed. Here's a little trailer of the movie:

Soul Power is an extremely fun movie to watch for anyone that loves music, but also for many other reasons. I particularly enjoyed one of several monologues by Muhammand Ali right after landing in Kinshasa, in which he says that he expected Africa to be jungle and mud huts, but instead he found a big city with clean, paved streets and nice cars and businesses and hotels. He said that people in America think that in Africa they are savages, but the real savages are in New York city where every minute there are rapes, armed robberies and assaults. While he was saying all this the audience was laughing like it was a joke, but I really think that most of the musicians and boxing professionals on that trip were surprised by what they found. The fact that they were all staying at the best hotel in Kinshasa, the Intercontinental (today the Grand Hotel), probably helped.

The other famous upscale hotel in Kinshasa, the Memling, also makes a brief appearance in the movie, as the backdrop for some unidentified talented street musicians orderly playing while everybody politely stands around them. How different from today's Memling street, which seems to have become the favorite spot for all sorts of overpriced street vendors, hawkers and beggars.

Another gossipy anecdote from the director that I enjoyed was how Etta James threw a tantrum because the performance preceding hers by Fania All-Stars kept on going much longer than expected making her wait until 2 or 3 am, and so she decided not to perform out of spite. Yes, that's a woman with a temper, traveling all the way to Kinshasa to end up not performing.

Speaking of Fania All-Stars, in the movie they gave me the impression to be having the time of their lives and to be the ones more at ease in Zaïre. This was confirmed by the director after somebody asked him about how they regarded their Afro-Caribbean identity compared to their colleagues from the US. He said they didn't say anything specific on film, but that in every scene they were in they appeared extremely comfortable with their surrounding and feeling the most connected with the local musicians. Actually, some of my favorite scenes in the movie are with them: at the beginning, when all the musicians are traveling from New York to Kinshasa they start playing and singing inside the plane, and at one point Celia Cruz accompanies BB King's guitar drumming with her shoe on the ceiling of the plane. In another scene, the whole Fania crew goes to the art market (the famous marché des valeurs or voleurs, depending on your experiences), and they improvise an amazing drumming jam session with the vendors.

But beyond all these great music scenes and human details, I really enjoyed this movie for obvious reasons: because it captured an era that no longer exists. An era of dreams and hopes by African Americans reconnecting with their roots, and by Africans still fresh out of independence. An era in which Kinshasa looked like a paradise city of manicured white buildings and perfectly blue swimming pools, and in which it hosted world entertainment events that brought stars from far away lands.

James Brown performing at the Zaïre 74 music festival (promotional picture from the film website)

We're happy to announce that we have now deployed a version of the Creative Commons license for use across Maneno. While all aspects of www.maneno.org are covered in the license, individual blogs have the choice of using the license or not which is controllable in the blog admin section for users who are logged in.

Let's back up a couple of steps though and talk about why this is important by first asking: What is Creative Commons? Creative Commons (or CC) is born of the "copy left" movement which means that they work to release broad copyright licenses focused more on providing replicable access to works as opposed to shutting them off to replication as previous copyright laws did. Basically, instead of having to write up a legal agreement for everything you do, you can apply a CC license based on how many rights you wish to retain and how many you wish to release. In a nutshell, these are licenses for the digital age where everything is infinitely reproducible.

These licenses are a great thing to come about, but they have a couple of problems which we are working with at Maneno and I talked about at the Creative Commons Salon. The first is the linguistic problem. As you can see, this license exists in a great many languages. We are working to have more translations based on the African languages that Maneno has available. That problem is the easy one and should be dealt with in time.

The bigger problem is that for these licenses to be enforceable, they have to have be legally ported for each country in the world as each country has different laws. Given this map, you can see the problem we face given the geographic focus of Maneno. With the exception of South Africa, there are no other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa with a CC agreement in place. So, technically there would seem to be no point in having these licenses on Maneno. Why did we do this then?

We did this to try and spread CC licenses to more languages so that not only do these languages have more traction on the internet, but so that CC also has more traction in these languages. We are hoping that this will then lead to the more important step of these licenses being ported to these countries. It's a chicken and egg problem wherein we're hoping that the more exposure Maneno gets in these countries, the more exposure CC will get, and both will gain a gradual foothold for the blogging communities of Sub-Saharan Africa.

The primary agreement we have deployed with links to the various translations of it is the Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 Unported. We chose this license as it is a very protective one once implemented in a country. Also, as far as we know, specific country licenses supersede the unported version, so even though someone in say Zambia opts to use this license on their Maneno blog, their works are protected in a full legal sense in somewhere like the United States which has ported the license to the country properly. The license we chose is one of many options that CC offers. If people wish to choose others, let us know and we'll see what we can do to make this happen.

In the end, it's all about creating better access for Maneno bloggers to tools which should be shared globally.

Article published April 24th (not updated) on Global Voices:

http://globalvoicesonline.org/2009/04/25/mexico-concern-over-swine-flu-outbreak/

Mexican health officials have become concerned with an outbreak of swine flu, which has caused the deaths of 68 in Mexico City, and another 1,000 have fallen ill. What makes this flu particularly worrisome is that the deaths involved young people, and not those from vulnerable demographics. On the streets of the capital, residents are taking precautions to avoid the virus and others are waiting to see if it spreads.

The outbreak prompted the closure of museums [es] and schools, as well as the cancellation of cultural events [es], and even many football matches over the weekend.

Defeña Salerosa of Esta Maraña de Contradicciones [es] summarizes the reactions of Mexicans during this outbreak:

Those who think that this is a governmental measure to cover up something “like the chupacabras” - “smoke screen”, and that something, who knows what it could be: narcotrafficking threats, stock market scams, etc. There are those who think that we are surely reaching a pandemic. Those who think that the measures from the health sector and presidential cabinet to be exaggerated and extreme. Those that are truly scared and don't want to leave the house, and when they do use facemasks and scarves (yes, with this heat I saw two people with scarves!) Those that already feel mucous in their respiratory tracts. Those that try really hard trying to find the most sarcastic and humorous comment/phrase about the matter.

From Mexico City, Daniel Hernandez of Intersections provides regular updates on his blog and a look at the scene on the streets of Mexico City on Friday night:

But what are things like on the street right now? People are out and about, only every other pedestrian is wearing a surgical mask. Some arty party events tonight have been canceled, but otherwise, D.F. life as normal, if just a bit more surreal than usual.

Flickr-user Victoria , a teacher in Mexico City commented on Hernandez' post about arriving to her school on Friday morning:

As I walked in, I immediately noticed that i I didn't see any students.

Then they told me, oh, it's because of the outbreak of influenza, and then I vaguely remembered recieving at text message from UNONOTICIAS at midnight.

Then I hung out and listened to all my Mexican colleagues talk about how this is the first time this has ever happened, and speculate about how bad the situation truly might be, for these measures to be taken. Then I went home, on the metro, with my blue face mask on.

Some bloggers are providing tips about how the flu is contracted, such as Ana Maria Salazar writes that despite the name of the flu, one cannot contract it from eating pork.

The government has planned to administer the flu vaccine to health workers, but there are none available for the general public. Right now, they are recommending that people wash their hands frequently and to cover their mouths when they cough or sneeze, among other measures.

Il y a un an disparaissait le Nègre fondamental, laissant le pays et son peuple orphelins et livrés à leurs propres choix.

The “Nègre fondamental” passed away one year ago, leaving his country and his people, orphans and the only actors of their own choices.”

This is how Martinican blogger Imaniyé introduced her homage-post to the late Aimé Césaire [Fr]. It is indeed with great reverence that Martinicans celebrated the first anniversary of the death of Aimé Césaire, who passed away on April 17th 2008.

Last week's posts in the Martinican blogosphere said a lot about how much people felt - and still feel - about this great man. It is with a huge picture and a very brief quotation from one of Césaire's works that Bondamanjak paid homage to him on April 16th [Fr]; but the solemnity of the post does not hide the strength of its title: “AC pléré an nou lité” [Fr Creole], which means “Let's stop crying, let's fight now”. As a matter of fact, Aimé Césaire was one of the precursors to the ideals behind the popular movement which took place from February to March 2009 on the island, as he was a staunch defender of Négritude and “self-governance”.

The multiplicity of the causes defended by Césaire is clearly shown in the huge number of contributions and comments sparked by the anniversary of his death - especially on the blog Montray Kréyol: since April 16th, Montray Kréyol has published an average of fifteen posts about the man himself, his achievements or tangible ways in which to honor Césaire today. Indeed, one of the first posts on Montray Kréyol (published the day before the official anniversary) deals with the decision of the French national postal service to honor Aimé Césaire with a stamp. This decision triggers a very ironical comment from the author [Fr]:

Le nègre vous emmerde, et maintenant va falloir le lécher…

Il n’a pas l’air de plaisanter, M. Césaire, sur ce timbre-poste qui doit sortir le 17 avril en métropole, mais également les 17 et 18 à Fort-de-France, en Martinique. Et pourtant, c’est l’image de lui choisie par La Poste, qui a tout à y gagner, pour rendre hommage à celui qui élabora entre autres le concept de la négritude.

This Negro is getting on your nerves, but now you will have to lick…

He doesn't look that nice, Mr Césaire, on this stamp which will be issued on April 17th in Continental France, but also on April 17th and 18th in Fort-de-France, in Martinique. However, that is the picture which has been picked up by La Poste, which is making a good deal with this homage paid to the man, who created with others, the concept of Négritude”.

Martinican blogger Imaniyé also posted a message to Aimé Césaire, which she has chosen to call “Bélya Aimé Césaire” [Fr Creole], referring to a traditional Afro-Caribbean funeral wake dance and music, which also focus on the stamp.

In the blog Negritude, named after the concept Césaire founded, readers can have a look at a re-published post by Alain Nicolas, who has established a lineage between the recent social events in the French West Indies and Césaire's ideas [Fr]:

Un an après, au moment où se sont fait massivement entendre les voix des Guadeloupéens, Martiniquais, Guyanais, Réunionnais, aspirant à plus de décence et plus de dignité, le verbe du « Nègre vertical » résonne, étrangement prophétique.

One year later, at the time when Guadeloupean, Martinican, French Guianese and Reunionese voices made themselves heard, as they are yearning for more decency and more dignity, the words of the ‘Nègre vertical' ring out as a surprising prophecy.

Negritude also shares different initiatives that are being staged to celebrate the late poet and politician:

- plays in Paris and in Benin.

- official celebrations in Martinique.

- the renaming of a university faculty after him in Haiti.

See post by Fabienne Flessel with links on Global Voices.

(x-posted at The Salon)

This was bound to happen eventually.

BBC NEWS | Africa | Rwanda bans BBC local broadcasts:

"Rwanda has suspended BBC broadcasts in the local language Kinyarwanda because of what it says is bias in BBC reports concerning the 1994 genocide."

I always find it very interesting to see how quickly the Rwandan regime retreats to a defensive posture whenever the issue of further openness about everybody's role in the terrible - and very real - 1994 genocide comes up...

I have never been a fan of historical fundamentalism. For instance, I believe the Holocaust did occur, because every evidence that has been offered to me tells me it did. And until proven otherwise, I will try to debate down anybody that says otherwise. But that, there, is the key, see. I will debate them, allowing them to offer up whatever evidence they claim to have. I will not validate their paranoia, and/or their conspiracy theories by trying to silence them. I believe that when something is factually true - like I believe the Holocaust is - the facts should be my tools, not dismissal. It is not always easy, of course, but that is the true genius of freedom of speech.

This, in my view, applies equally to the genocide in Rwanda. I was there. People died. Hundreds of thousands of people in fact. And the facts accumulated so far seem to show that these people were quite disproportionately from the Tutsi ethnic group, and were - at least partly - the result of the coordinated actions of people in power in Rwanda at the time, who were overwhelmingly from the Hutu ethnic group; actions targeted primarily (and quite explicitly) towards Tustis. Thus, the intent of genocide behind the killings seems quite clear to me. So, just like for the Holocaust, I will debate anybody, any "negationist" that thinks the Rwandan genocide did not occur, or was not a genocide, etc, etc.

That is, unless someone can prove me wrong. Because although the genocide is a fact, it is not the whole story. There are holes of astronomical proportions in the narrative of the causes, masterminds, genesis and aftermath of the genocide, that need to be addressed if we want to ever have peace in the Great Lakes region. That is a fact, and I challenge anyone to prove me otherwise. Just as an example, I, for one would like all the light to be shed on the assassination of the late Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana, and late Burundi president Cyprien Ntaryamira. I, for two, would like the broadcasting content of Radio Muhabura (the radio of the Rwandan Patriotic Front) to be as scrutinized as the broadcasts of Radio Mille Collines was (and rightly so). I, for three, would like to see more scrutiny of the actions of the RPF towards Hutus, in the north of Rwanda between 1990 and 1993, and in my native Democratic Republic of the Congo since 1996.

This is not to deny the genocide. I was in Rwanda in April 1994. My family and I lost close friends in the genocide. Two friends of mine ran away from their home after seeing their Hutu father kill their Tutsi mother by decapitation with a machete. So the genocide happened. There is no doubt in my mind about that. There is however a doubt in my mind about the liberator status of Paul Kagame and the RPF. I have doubts about the cleanliness of the RPF's hands in the whole matter. After all, the RPF was the biggest... "winner" of the genocide. And I cannot help but noticing that as long as the path to power was murky, the Tutsi-leader Kagame hid behind Hutu figureheads (Alexis Kanyarengwe, Pasteur Bizimungu), while pulling the strings in the background... And I cannot help but to notice that Kagame - admittedly and unsuccesfully - tried to pull a similar trick with Laurent Desire Kabila in the Congo...

Something simply seems fishy. But that, once again, is just my perspective. I am a great fan of freedom of expression, so I welcome anybody who can talk me down on this. That, President Kagame, is what freedom of expression is. That is how we eventually manage to find the truth, the WHOLE truth. So, if you have nothing to hide, I do not see what benefit you could possibly garner from hindering the free flow of information. Debate these negationists. Prove them that you have the higher moral ground, and prove them wrong, publicly and openly.

The Holocaust of the Jews (and the concurrent massacre of gypsies, communists, homosexuals, etc) by the NSDAP was - and still is - one of the dirtiest stains on humanity's consciousness, but it does not even begin to justify - in my view - the dispossession, mistreatment, massacres and pogroms of the Palestinians. Saying so is not, nor should it be considered, antisemitic. Similarly, scrutinizing, questioning and criticizing the actions of the RPF, or Paul Kagame, and the current Rwandan leadership, is not, and should never be considered anti-Tutsi, nor anti-Rwandan. The fact that the Kagame regime has been trying to conflate all the above, in order to maintain the sympathy of the world, and maintain zones of secrecy and opacity about its own actions, appalling, and quite telling... As I said in the title, I am not surprised. I mean, what else can one expect from a military leader that has used the plight of the Tutsi people to justify maintaining an unshakable grip on power in Rwanda for 15 years, and wrecking havoc in the entire Great Lakes region?

I wonder...

(x-posted at The Salon, and published on Black Commentator, and allafrica.com)

The case FOR the Congo

A response to There is No Congo, by Jeffrey Herbst and Greg Mills, posted March 2009, Web Exclusive, http://www.foreignpolicy.com

by Ali M. Mamina

Foreign Policy magazine recently published a rather disturbing article on the Congo (There is No Congo, posted March 2009, Web Exclusive, http://www.foreignpolicy.com), by Jeffrey Herbst of Miami University of Ohio, and Greg Mills who directs the Johannesburg-based Brenthurst Foundation. The article makes a case against Congo as a unified entity. As a Congolese citizen, I could not disagree more with their arguments, and I believe they warrant an appropriate rebuttal. Their article is a perfect illustration of the flawed approach with which much of the so-called international community, and some scholars on Africa, have analyzed the situation in the Congo since its nominal independence in 1960, and frankly, part of the reason why they never get it right. It is often not due to inaccurate facts, or lack of knowledge on the region, but more due to inadequate prisms molded in the inside-think of Western-world-centric academia. In my view, and to illustrate some of the points I am rebutting, the article boils down to the following citations:

" … And indeed, for centuries, this is precisely what Congo's colonial occupiers, its neighbors, and even some of its people have done: eaten away at Congo's vast mineral wealth with little concern for the coherency of the country left behind. Congo has none of the things that make a nation-state: interconnectedness, a government that is able to exert authority consistently in territory beyond the capital, a shared culture that promotes national unity, or a common language. Instead, Congo has become a collection of peoples, groups, interests, and pillagers who coexist at best."

"The very concept of a Congolese state has outlived its usefulness. For an international community that has far too long made wishful thinking the enemy of pragmatism, acting on reality rather than diplomatic theory would be a good start."

There is one general sense in this article that is right: the Congo has been a disappointment. With the vast swathes of fauna, flora, mineral, agricultural, hydroelectric, and human resources it inherited at its independence, one would expect the Congo today to rival if not exceed such rising powers as South Africa, Brazil, India, China, Korea, Singapore, Saudi Arabia or the UAE. Instead, as the article justly points out, the level of deliquescence in Congo today is almost unprecedented; not acknowledging that reality would be intellectually dubious.

Nevertheless, what is equally dubious, is the misdiagnosis of the root causes of the current situation. The authors of this article repeatedly, and I believe questionably, confuse causes and consequences, to support and justify a desire, long-held in certain circles, for the balkanization of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The authors point out the weakness of the Congolese central state in governing the vast country, without fully and honestly addressing the international geo-strategic reasons why that reality came to be. The authors point out the various secessions and minor uprisings during the past 40+ years to justify their diagnosis of the Congo. Yet they fail to shine a light on the multiple foreign state and corporate backers that participated in those early attempts at derailing the Congo. The authors claim that " the Congolese government's inability to control its territory has resulted in one of the world's longest and most violent wars", without actually addressing the reasons why the government was - and still is - not able to control its territory in the first place.

My contention is quite simple. The current conflict(s) in the Congo, the deliquescence of the state, the lack of infrastructures and "interconnectedness", are not merely unforeseen, pathological consequences of bad colonial and/or cold war policy gone awry. The current situation is a direct, calculated, and progressively manufactured result of a long-standing operation by Western nations to maintain a weak state in this vast mineral rich swath of land in the heart of Africa and perpetuate the systematic plunder of Congo's resources by various foreign interests, and their proxies in the local elite.

Seems far-fetched? Let us consider that, until proven otherwise, the Congo is a sovereign country, recognized as such by International law, the United Nations, and, in theory, every country on the planet. Yet despite that, over the past five decades, these very countries, (including supposed champions of the rule of law like The United States, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Belgium, France and South Africa), have allowed their mining companies (like Banro, Freeport-McMoran, Anglo American, DeBeers, and others) to enter into odious contracts with corrupt elements of the leadership in Kinshasa, and worse, with murderous warlords, and near-genocidal militias, unhindered, and unpunished. Furthermore, several of these very countries and their corporations have provided the military, logistical and ideological support to the secessionist regimes in the 60's and 70's, Rwanda, Uganda, Angola, their proxy militias AND/OR their rival militias, thus destabilizing and creating a de facto partition of the country, and further guaranteeing maximized profits through cheap/slave/child labor under warlords. That is not happenstance, but cold, calculated, predatory business planning. In fact, one only has to examine the history of the ties between the Oppenheimer mining magnate family of South Africa - which founded, and finances, the Brenthurst foundation that one of the authors of There is No Congo, Greg Mills, leads - and the various regimes and rebellions we have seen in the Congo, to understand how integral these foreign corporate and state interests are to the conduct of ANY business in the Congo.

I contend that it is not so much that there is No Congo; nor is it that the Congo as a country is not possible. I contend that since 1959, it was deemed too much of a potential threat to several world and regional powers, and to the coffers of their corporate acolytes, to allow the rise of a strong, large, potential Brazil-type power, in the heart of Africa. And we can see why. Let us consider the Congo today. Despite being one of the poorest, badly-managed countries in the world, by virtue of its position and of its potential, the country is poised - should there be a great deal of change in leadership - to be a major guarantor of the development of a truly functional African continent, and African Union. As Herbst and Mills themselves justly point out, "the country is the region's vortex". Former South African President, Thabo Mbeki notes “There cannot be a new Africa without a new Congo.” President Barack Obama himself rightly notes “If Africa is to achieve its promise resolving the problem in the Congo will be critical.”

Over the years, despite all the adversity the Congo faces, and despite the desires they secretly harbor to see the Congo disintegrate to begin annexing its pieces, its neighbors in the region were forced to recognize its central and crucial position for the advent of further economic development for the entire continent. As a result, despite currently being, admittedly, an economic drag on all of them, the countries of Southern, Central, and Eastern Africa have all secured some form of regional economic/political supranational alliance with the Congo, whether through SADC, CEPGL, CEEAC or COMESA (all groups that constitute regional clusters in the building of the larger African Union).

There lies the issue for this country. Left to its own devices, a big, strong, unified Congo would be a powerful engine for the development, and the industrialization of the entire continent. Herbst and Mills, I believe justly state that "economically, the various outlying parts of Congo are better integrated with their neighbors than with the rest of the country." But that is not in Congo's disfavor. Whether in terms of its abundant precious and strategic minerals, the tremendous amount of renewable energy that could be generated by the Inga dam project on the Congo river, the natural gas in Lake Kivu or the geo-thermal potential of the volcanic mountains in the east, the second lung of our planet that is its rainforest, or the extraordinary - and exhaustively demonstrated - resilience of its people, the Congo has everything to be the central pillar around which Africa rises. Should the people of the Congo find a way to build the infrastructure to interconnect its outlying parts, the country would instantly become the key piece in regional development. That prospect has always unsettled many, whose interests might not be as well served should there be a strong government, a functioning army and police, and rule of law.

Herbst and Mills claim that "the very concept of a Congolese state has outlived its usefulness." When was it ever truly - and democratically - implemented, I ask? When, since 1885, have the affairs of the Congo ever truly been left to the Congolese people? See, I contend that the Congo has, intentionally, never even been given a fighting chance to live up to its potential. Its challenge since 1885 has been both an internal and external one. Under colonial rule, the people were voluntarily under-educated, and the infrastructure built was limited to basic transportation needs for minerals, and the comfort of colons. Under Mobutu, the regime, backed by Western powers, ruled with an iron fist, promoted corruption, allowed the deliquescence of the already meager infrastructure and mining industry, and progressively engineered a weakening of the state apparatus, the army and the police, in order to strengthen and impose Mobutu's personal rule, and better protect the mechanisms of the systematic plundering of the country's resources. The Congo today is the result of a systematic, documented, and fully reversible process of manufactured under-development, with roots in colonial and neo-colonial policies, but more importantly, in greed. Fomenting and perpetuating misery, turmoil, tribalism, destructive autocratic rule, and angling for the "Somalization" of the Congo, was more profitable to key greedy domestic elites and foreign groups, and more dependable for key foreign powers, than actually allowing this country to build the infrastructure it needed - and still needs - to succeed.

That is a far more accurate prism to consider the events that have befallen the Congo over the decades. It explains the secession of Katanga, the mineral rich southern province, only 7 days after independence in 1960, with the help of Belgium, the very colonial power the people of the entire country had just successfully sought to get rid of. It also explains the assassination of the first democratically elected Prime Minister, Patrice E. Lumumba, with, at the very least, the tacit backing of Belgium and the United States. It explains, for instance, the documented contacts between the Oppenheimer family of South Africa and Albert Kalonji Mulopwe, the "Emperor" of the secessionist South-Kasai, Moise Tshombe, leader of the Katanga secession, and rebel groups of more recent years. Finally, and most tragically, it explains how the Congo's neighbors - Rwanda, Uganda, and to some degree Angola, their proxy militias, their rival militias, and corrupt elements of the so-called leadership of the Congo and their militias, have been not only allowed by the international community, but backed and supported primarily by the United States and Britain:

• to systematically destroy, ransack and plunder an entire country, unhindered and unpunished;
• to brutally rape and sexually terrorize tens of thousands of women in front of their sons, fathers and husbands, unhindered and unpunished;
• to turn children into soldiers, unhindered and unpunished;
• and to cause the death of nearly 6 million people - a scale for another century - to this day, seamlessly, unhindered and unpunished.

All the above has been accomplished in blatant violation of every principle of International Law, and every principle of human decency, and in full view of the inadequately-led, inadequately-sized, ineffective, inept, overhyped, overpriced and overpaid so-called "largest United Nations peacekeeping force" (MONUC), and with logistical support from Western powers, and recently, the dreaded AFRICOM of the United States. Herbst and Mills argue that "the international community does not have the will or the resources to construct a functional Congo"? It seems more accurate to say that over the years, the international community has been - more or less intentionally - actively, and systematically undermining a functional Congo. It is for this reason that Antonio Guterres, High-commissioner of the UNCHR reminded us in his interview with the Financial Times, in January 2008, that we must not forget that “the international community has systematically looted the Congo” and that is a far different and, in my opinion, far more easily remediable problem.

The ultimate solution to the Congolese situation lies in investing on a key element that Herbst and Mills discount too quickly, and wrongly so: the Congolese people, its sense of citizenship, and its resilience. Through all the humiliations of colonialism and dictatorships, the scheming, the gaming, the profiteering, the raping, the oppression, the daily humiliations of poverty, the hunger, the injustice, the corruption, the tribalism and the morbid reality of living in a needlessly war-torn country, the Congolese people have emerged as quite the resilient people, AND quite the cohesive people; at least as cohesive as can be expected for any multi-cultural people, whether in the Congo, in South Africa, or in the United States. Congo may yet have "none of the things that make a nation-state", but I contend that you would be hard-pressed to find a Congolese citizen, rural or urban, who does not identify with the Congolese nation, and the "boundaries that the king of Belgium helped establish in 1885 ".

Yes, the lack of infrastructures makes the task to establish and solidify the regal functions of a strong, centralized state on the entire territory, unusually daunting. But the Congo is not the first, and will certainly not be the last, multi-cultural nation, that has to, in its formative years, struggle with translating their sense of national identity into stable, and accepted state institutions. It may be hard, but the argument that it is not worth thriving for, fighting for, and supporting, is simply untenable; especially coming from two scholars from the two countries in the world - the United States and South Africa - that symbolize the most (and I admire them for that) the possibility of overcoming tremendous and varying odds to build united and strong countries, that combine multi-cultural peoples, and effective, democratic states. Maybe the Congolese can learn from them, and Brazil, and India, and establish a strong, but truly federal state. When the Congo's affairs are left to the Congolese people, the possibilities are endless.

Now, that is definitely not to say it will be a cakewalk. The Congo we envision, thrive and advocate for is possible, but it will entail a great deal of work and investment from the Congolese people. Those in the “learned class” – economists, agronomists, engineers, teachers, doctors, etc - that have managed to maintain their integrity by not partaking in the plunder of the Congo, will have to outgrow this sense of cynicism, hopelessness and apathy that has seeped into their consciousness due to years of despair and lack of prospects for change, and roll-up their sleeves. The Congolese will need to revitalize the education sector, so as to ensure that the coming generations have access to the knowledge they need to continue the task of rebuilding their country. They will also need to organize education/training initiatives for urban and rural adults, in various fields, among which – and most importantly – sustainable agriculture, construction, urbanization, sanitation, and salubrity. They will need to reinforce notions of civics, citizenship, human rights, civil and civic rights, law and order, and respect for women, which years of oppression and mis-education, of Leopoldism, colonialism, Mobutism and other -isms have caused to somewhat crumble away in the general consciousness. Finally, on a national level, they will need to seek worthy partners to do all the above, and also begin the work of reconnecting the Congo to the main grids of modern technology, starting with the electrification of the country, through the rehabilitation and completion of the Inga hydroelectric complex. The task is not complex for the Congolese people; it is simply tedious. The prescriptions we put forth imply a laborious, time-consuming but necessary grassroots work, that needs to start yesterday, but is absolutely achievable. And given a true opportunity, I believe the Congolese people are up to the task.

So, instead of giving up on the Congo, and dismissing it as an irredeemable failure, I say let the Congo and its people truly amaze you. Give the Congo a fighting chance. It is quite simple, really. Intel, Nokia, Dell, T-Mobile, IBM, Banro, Freeport-McMoran, Anglo American, Chevron, Tullow and all the other companies identified in the Financial Times and United Nations Reports from 2001 – 2003, that romp through Congo for coltan, cassiterite, tin cobalt, gold, diamonds, oil, etc, should cease and desist from buying minerals illegally from warlords, from neighboring countries that have looted our resources, or through odious or illegal contracts. By all means, invest in Congo, but be deliberate and intentional about doing it through the proper channels. Stop financing and arming warlords. All people of goodwill should discourage the Congo's neighbors from meddling in its affairs and support and finance education and healthcare institutions. Support local institutions, and help the civil society hold the central government, the provincial governments and the security forces truly accountable.

And finally this time, this time, help the Congolese ensure that they conduct truly free, fair, transparent and democratic elections in 2011. The International Crisis Group's 2007 report "Congo: Consolidating the Peace", shows quite clearly that the last time around, the International community was more concerned about access to lucrative mining contracts as opposed to a democratic process that would reflect the interests of the people. Let us all thrive to prevent a repetition of that. The Congolese have an imperfect constitution, with imperfect prescriptions, and imperfect institutions, but they are all theirs to perfect. Let the Congolese people choose its own leaders, and manage its own territory. Give them the chance they have never had: to demonstrate their capacity to be a viable nation, and establish for themselves a state that helps their country live up to its full potential. Is that really a concept that has outlived its usefulness? I dare think not.

Ali Mamina is a Congolese Political Sciences graduate with an international focus from Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, and an adviser to The Friends of the Congo

Most anyone who follows what is happening with Twitter has undoubtedly heard about the whole stunt wherein Ashton Kutcher was vying to get one million followers before CNN. In the end, he won and in winning he vowed to donate 10,000 mosquito nets to Malaria No More, an NGO that shows no shame in using the helpless African child model for its revenue model. I'm not joking, look at the site, there are five of them on the front page alone.

For Kutcher's part, it's a cheap shot, but at the same time, it's an ingenious shot because in this mad, mad race towards this ultimate pointless goal, he has made everyone feel like they've been part of this. The phrase, "it's for a good cause" has come up on many a website as a reason to support Kutcher in this. Americans love this phrase as it's so much easier to contribute funds to somewhere else in order to help people rather than to actually do it yourself. Does this make Kutcher a "social media expert" (see # 4)? No, not at all. He's just a celebrity riding a wave of popularity for his perceived generosity. The donation of mosquito nets along with his new accessibility on Twitter only give him more "real cred" in the eyes of his fans. And who knows, maybe this will lead to his acting in a movie that doesn't go straight to video someday.

I'm saying little new here and it's obvious that I'm not a fan of this stunt, just as I'm not a fan of any of these celebrity stunts. The main reason I bring it up was because of this article on TechCrunch where they were under the impression that Kutcher's Twitter stunt would improve knowledge of malaria. The net result remains to be seen in that, but even on this site, where there are in theory, intelligent people in technology, the comments were littered with the "it's for a good cause" and people are now "armed with information" crap.

Thankfully, TMS Ruge, whose name I don't know how to say right, but can be followed on Twitter in all his shirtless glory, chimed in. Thankfully, being that he is an African from Africa, people actually listened to him and don't immediately write off his comments with the, "Oh yeah, what are you doing?!!" idiocy. I happen to like what TMS writes a good deal and most of what he says here is part of a quite excellent, larger article that addresses not only the Kutcher stunt, but also celebrity charity stunts in general. While I think it's a great read overall, one particular paragraph really stands out:

The solution to malaria, much like varied solutions to ending our addiction to aid, can be found within Africa. My problem with the strategy of dealing with malaria employed by Malaria No More, Nothing but Nets, et al is that it erodes the ability of local capacity to deal with this problem. It is also not infinitely sustainable, and dare I say it, smacks of paternalistic ethos. It’s a band-aid on a gashing wound. It’s the “fly-to-Africa-and-adopt-a-brown-baby-instead-of-investing-in-a-sustainable-business-that-can-help-the-entire-family” syndrome.

It really is a shame that celebrities have decided that they need to invest themselves in new forms of technology to spread their supposed giving to Africa. Hugh Jackman has done this as well although it was leagues less annoying probably just because it's Hugh Jackman. Obviously, this move was inevitable given that newspapers are dying off and that was the main place a celeb could flash their "amazingness" to the world. I'm sure that iPhone apps are next and I'm already cringing that one with Beyonce patting the head of a poor African child will soon be available for download; with all the proceeds from purchases going to charity of her choosing of course (charity: water get on that now!) This app won't do anything I might add other than show that picture with Single Ladies playing in the background. It will just loop constantly so that you can be warmed by Beyonce's giving all through your otherwise dreary workday.

Kutcher in the days of more 70's attire.

A couple of weeks ago I attended a panel discussion at the Human Rights Center of UC Berkeley titled "Giving Voice to the Voiceless: Bringing Stories of Atrocities to the World" that was part of a two-day symposium on international criminal justice funded by the MacArtur Foundation. In the panel there were two journalists from conflict areas in Africa, Bill Oketch from Northern Uganda and Jack Kahorha from the Eastern DRC, as well as the regional director for Sub-Saharan Africa for the Global Fund for Women, Muadi Mukenge, who is also originally from the DRC. The moderator was Peter Eichstaedt, the Africa editor for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) who is also the author of the book "First Kill Your Family: Child Soldiers of Uganda and the Lord's Resistance Army".

The panel was supposed to focus on reporting about the International Criminal Court (ICC) in Central Africa, but they ended up talking about a lot of different things regarding their countries. It was inevitable for an audience of academics to ask about the solutions to the ongoing conflicts in Eastern Congo and Northern Uganda and about the politics of the region. Here are a few notes I took of the two-hour talk.

Peter Eichstaedt opened the session saying that international criminal justice is the only piece of good news that we get from Central Africa, where for example the LRA has been fighting for 20 years and has abducted about 40,000 children to become soldiers. The two African journalists said that most people in their home countries don't really understand why the ICC was created and why it was created so far away from the cases it judges. Jack Kahorha said, there have been so many criminal warlords in the DRC (and there still are) but only three of them have been sent to The Hague, so Congolese people are wondering why only three and why those three while others were reintegrated into the national Congolese army. Some people are also wondering why Presidential candidate JP Bemba was sent to The Hague but current President Joseph Kabila wasn't. The way the ICC justice works seems very confusing.

Muadi Mukenge said that although her first career of choice had been journalism, she is now working in women's rights because women are always the most affected by poverty and conflict. The moderator of course had to ask about sexual violence, and Kahorha said that the main problem in the DRC is corruption in the judiciary and the time prosecution takes. Mukenge agreed that access to justice and to the rule of law is a big problem for victims of rape in such countries, and that's why her organization is funding NGOs that pay the legal fees for women to seek trial, and also groups that provide economic empowerment through vocational training, for example. Mukenge also emphasized the importance of addressing not only the humanitarian issues, but also its roots so that need for assistance is not perpetuated. For her one of the big problems in the DRC is the politization of ethnicity by certain groups for their own gain, since nobody is born resenting another ethnicity, as well as arms proliferation.

Bill Oketch, who is only 26 and is based in the town of Lira in Northern Uganda, explained that he became a journalist to help end the conflict in his region after his brothers were killed by the LRA. He said he wanted to use the media to tell the world about the atrocities committed in Northern Uganda. However, he said that war is only one problem, but rebuilding the region is another problem. The ongoing cause of the conflict in Uganda is the disenfranchisement of the North, a long-time divide that has caused the population's resentment since 1986. So far the government has done nothing to end the conflict, which means rebuilding the North because if they don't the resentment will still be there and other people will pick up the fight even if the LRA disappeared.

Bill Oketch also talked about the problem of corruption in Uganda, an issue he has been researching quite a bit recently especially regarding the disappearance of World Bank funds that were supposed to be for Northern Uganda. But such stories are not so easy to publish because of government threats, abuse of power, absence of a system of checks and balances, etc. He also said that sometimes he gets a really good story from sources that put themselves in danger, and he uses his own money to research it and get to an internet cafe to send it, but then the media is not interested in publishing it because of legal implications of uncovering corruption scandals. The main problem for journalists in the DRC and Uganda is security, theirs and that of their sources. But another problem is that they often work at a loss.

Jack Kahorha is a very experienced journalist based in Goma, the capital of North Kivu, that has been in the profession for 13 years since the First Congo War, and who says that he gets arrested "all the time" for his reporting. But he quotes a Congolese saying that can be roughly translated as "the fly that dies on a wound can be proud", meaning that a journalist who dies while reporting does it with honor. Kahorha often works as a fixer for all types of foreign journalists, from freelancers to big names in large outlets such as Andersoon Cooper of the CNN. He said that most of these journalists never stay long enough to really have a full understanding of the ongoing situation, and that their stories tend to focus on the dead, but what about the survivors? What about life in Africa, not just death?

Update

I just found out that the UC Berkeley Human Rights Center has uploaded an audio file of the whole discussion, which you can find here.

The full discussion panel 'Giving Voice to the Voiceless'. From left to right: Muadi Mukenge of the Global Fund for Women, Peter Eichstaedt of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Jack Kahorha from the DRC and Bill Oketch from Uganda.