The Sham Of Elections In Ethiopia

According to the National Election Board of Ethiopia, the result of last week’s national election is that the EPRDF (Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front) has achieved a complete victory by grabbing all the parliamentary seats. The same board and the Ethiopian government qualified the result as a triumph of democracy, which leads one to assume that in today’s Ethiopia the progress of democracy is measured by the size of exclusion of opposition parties from parliamentary participation. In 1995, the process resulted in 75 seats to various opposition parties; then it evolved to one representative in 2010; until it has reached the present stage of advanced democracy with zero representative from the opposition. Bravo to the EPRDF! Be it noted that this novel interpretation of democracy seems to be endorsed by the American government through the authoritative voice of Wendy Sherman, the Under Secretary for Political Affairs (go to http://www.diretube.com/ethiopia/under-secretary-of-state-wendy-sherman-talking-about-ethiopia-video_851c48f3b.html) The only step remaining to achieve the apex of democracy is the banning of opposition parties, obvious as it is that they have become obsolete.
 
On a serious note, last week’s election appears very enigmatic to many observers. For one thing, in view of the creeping discontent in the country, which is even expressed outwardly here and there, in view also of the paranoia of the regime showing an unprecedented level of mobilization of its repressive forces to intimidate voters and stifle dissenting voices, a complete parliamentary victory strikes by its utter impossibility. There is only one possible conclusion: not only the election was not free and fair, but it was also subjected to fraudulent practices, such as stealing or eliminating votes supporting the opposition.
 
The question that comes to mind is the following: if neither the people and opposition parties give an iota of credibility to the official result, nor for that matter the officials and the cadres of the ruling party themselves––since they used all repressive and fraudulent means to eliminate the opposition––in a word, if nobody lends any credibility to the official outcome, why is the ruling party going through such a costly, time-consuming, and utterly useless exercise? What is the expected gain?
 
Can we say that the election serves the purpose of renewing legitimacy? But how can a government renew legitimacy by claiming an unbelievable victory? Who falls for a score of 100 percent? What about the international community? Perhaps, but again provided that you come up with something believable, and 100 percent is not believable. Accordingly, such a score defeats its purpose, if it is legitimacy.
 
This is what is most perplexing: a lesser score (say, for example, of 80 percent) would have gained some credibility without, however, endangering the hegemony of the ruling party. Indeed, why not leave some seats to the opposition? So long as the ruling party retains an overwhelming majority, the opposition does not present any risk. What is more, the presence of the opposition, however negligible, would give some sense to the voting process in the parliament.
 
There is more: in turning the election into a process of elimination of the opposition by all means necessary, the government and the ruling party are loudly telling the Ethiopian people that any hope of change through peaceful means is just an illusion. This is none other than forcing the people to seek other means, namely, violent forms of struggle, such as uprisings and armed struggle. It is hard to understand why a government would push its own people to violent methods.
 
If, instead of renewing legitimacy, a score of 100 percent only succeeds in cornering people to violent means, why on earth would a government adopt such a detrimental policy? We only saw negative sides. Where is the gain? The huge enigma here is that, unlike most dictatorial states, the regime in Ethiopia has recognized multiple opposition parties, even if it has restricted their activities to what it deems tolerable. While the general rule for dictatorial regimes is to ban opposition parties altogether, the Ethiopian regime recognizes them except that it does not want them in parliament. Since in both cases the result is the same, the behavior of the Ethiopian regime may become intelligible if we get hold of the reason why even dictatorial regimes that ban opposition parties organize elections.
 
Where no opposition parties exist, the purpose of election cannot be the achievement of victory. As there is no contest, the claim of victory would be simply surreal. By contrast, single-party regimes are concerned with the number of people who come out to vote, the issue being to get out the maximum number of voters by all means necessary. Clearly, the objective is not to gain the majority of votes; rather, it is to demonstrate force. Elections are meant to show the extent of the control of the government and the ruling party over the people. The less the people like the regime, the higher is its need to show the maximum electoral score, thereby displaying its invincibility. The message is then clear enough: even if you do not like the regime, there is nothing you can do about it. As such, it is a celebration of defiance, a parade, a showoff of political force.
 
It seems to me that the dominant party in the governmental coalition, the TPLF (Tigrayan People's Liberation Front), has perfected the meaning of election under dictatorial rule: unlike one-party dictatorships, it recognizes opposition parties, allows them some freedom of maneuver, only to deprive them of even one seat in the parliament as a manifestation of its absolute hegemony. This is none other than an extreme form of political bullying, as in the case when a child donates his toy to another child and takes it back after some time as a way of showing his dominance by aggravating the frustration of the other child.
 
The ultimate goal of this political bullying is, of course, the inculcation of submission through the sense of hopelessness. While in democratic countries, elections establish the legitimacy of states through the exercise of popular sovereignty, in dictatorial regimes, like that of the TPLF, they are periodical rituals displaying the submission of the people. To the extent that these elections raise and then dash hopes for change, they renew the sense of hopelessness of the people, and so deepen their resignation.
  
by Messay Kebede from here

The origin of apartheid

From the June 1965 issue of the Socialist Standard

In spite of world wide condemnation of the policies of the South African Government, the Nationalist Party, particularly since the end of the last world war, have gone from strength to strength, crowning success with their own bigoted brand of success. This consolidation of the political power of the Afrikaaner pays a perverted tribute to his fanaticism. The Afrikaaner has at last won the Boer War. The tribal complexity of the Afrikaaner, his aggressive unity, his hatred of the Uitlander, must be seen against the economic history of the Boers in South Africa.

From the very first days of landing on the shores of Africa in 1652, the mainly Dutch settlers were an oppressed colonial minority. After having established a strictly Calvinist peasant community at the Cape, they were forbidden by the Dutch Government to allow its use to any ship of a nationality other than Dutch, a restriction that brought them economic hardship. Also, the Dutch Government enforced enactments and imposed taxes that rarely took local conditions into account. With the weakening of the Dutch Government in 1795, the colonists took over the Cape and proclaimed their right to own slaves. This autonomy was short lived, for in 1806 the colony was seized by the British.

During the first years of the 19th century, the Bantu tribesmen began infiltrating into South Africa, and clashes took place between the Boers and the Bantu which led to the first Kaffir War of 1834 in which many Boers were massacred. Also, during this first year, the British Government forbade the Boers to own  the slaves, most of whom they had taken from Asia.

In an effort to once again regain their autonomy, between the years 1834 and 1840 the Boers trekked north and established the Republics of Transvaal and the Orange Free State. But still they had to carry on the wars with the Bantu, and now at the same time they had to fight the British who had declared their occupation of the interior "illegal". Eventually, the British came to the view that the cost of coercive forces was too high in relation to the return, and in 1852-53, they granted sovereignty to the Transvaal and Orange Free State.

The British Government immediately regretted their decision, for in 1853 gold and diamonds were discovered in the Boer Republics as well as great quantities of other minerals including coal, copper, manganese, chromite and asbestos. The friction between the British and the Boers was again renewed and culminated in the outbreak of the Boer War in which the Boers were "temporarily" defeated. 

This is the legacy of violence that history has bequeathed to the modern political situation in South Africa, a tri-partite enmity between Boer, Bantu and British. Its framework was that of economic rivalry and material struggle, the southward expansion of the bantu, the attempts of the Boers to maintain a mainly peasant community, the arrogant imperialism of British commerce. The social cohesion of the Boers, expressed in terms of religion, language and so-called race, became their mode of survival. This was the basis of Afrikaaner nationalism.

But Afrikaaner nationalism is no longer supported by a peasant economy struggling for survival. The Boers themselves are now integrated into capitalist farming, and distribute their products through both national and world markets. Increasingly, this capitalist form of agriculture uses mechanised techniques as well as the technology of a large canning industry. As well as this, Afrikaaners are increasingly involved in industrial capitalism. The further South Africa's economy develops, the more does Afrikaaner nationalism and apartheid become removed from the economic and historical background in which it was nurtured. Nevertheless, this body of prejudice is established as an ideological force in itself, impinging on the policies of the South African Government, even at a time when it can be shown—especially from the point of view of industry—that it is hindering development.

Apartheid or "separate development" is a bogus and hypocritical political contrivance. It caters for the emotionalism of nationalist nostalgia and is an electoral plank which covers the fears of most white workers. Most of the legislation brought in by the Nationalist Government in the name of "apartheid" is outrightly repressive and in defence of farming interests.

The battle that African workers wage in South Africa is beset by the most intimidating difficulties imaginable. They have no long-standing tradition of organisation. They suffer the "legal" hooliganism of police brutality, even to the extent of being shot down. There is a plentiful supply of cheap labour, making industrial pressure almost impossible, Even those who are employed live so near the borderline of starvation that strike action invokes the greatest hardship. The layout and siting of African townships is arranged to facilitate swift police or military reprisal. The machine gun or even air attack can be easily used without interference to the "white" population. Saracen armoured cars are frequently used to break up assemblies of African workers.

Ironically, the electoral support that maintains nationalist political power is what can only be regarded by tradition as an unholy alliance between voters of both Afrikaaner and British origin. It is political support that arises from the irrational fear of three and a quarter million Europeans in a country which also includes nearly fourteen million Bantu, Asiatics and Coloureds. Just as they were in the past, economic struggles in South Africa continue to be confused by and expressed in terms of "race" and "culture".

The tortured situation in South Africa is a direct product of its tortured past, but men should learn from their history, not continue to be burdened by it.

Pieter Lawrence 

"Exploitation of a Higher Kind" - G7 In Africa

Under the specious claim of delivering "aid to Africa," western governments are backing an initiative—described by some as another form of "colonialism"—that is effectively enabling the corporate takeover of African nations by some of the world’s biggest food and agriculture companies.
On Wednesday, as corporate executives, politicians, and G7 officials assembled in Cape Town, South Africa for a closed-door meeting of the G7’s New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, a coalition of small scale farmers, unions, workers, and food sovereignty groups released a statement condemning the program.
Though the public-private initiative has been championed by U.S. President Barack Obama, among others, as a means to combat poverty in Africa by bolstering "sustained, inclusive, agriculture-led" growth with the goal of raising "50 million people out of poverty over the next 10 years," its critics say the New Alliance actually undermines the rights and food security of citizens of its partner nations.
In fact, some suggest, the rise of such programs signals a shift in the way the world is governed.

'Colonialism' continued

Under the New Alliance, ten African governments—Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal, and Tanzania—have "committed to develop or revise policies that will facilitate responsible private investment in agriculture in support of smallholder farmers." However, the opposition coalition says, since its inception in 2012, there is little evidence of any positive impact. Instead, the policy changes have paved the way for corporate exploitation of local land and people.
According to the coalition statement, the New Alliance policies "facilitate the grabbing of land and other natural resources, further marginalize small-scale producers, and undermine the right to adequate food and nutrition"—all in the interest of courting large multi-nationals.
For example, at the urging of the New Alliance, a bill often referred to as the "Monsanto law," which criminalizes the saving and swapping of seeds, is poised for passage by the parliament of Ghana. A recent report put forth by international peasant farmer and food justice groups La Via Campesina and Grain notes that students and union groups who have been fighting the bill say it is a "precondition sought by transnational corporations as a requirement for operating in Africa."

Also, under commitments made by the governments of Malawi, Nigeria, Senegal and Tanzania, a seperate report (pdf) published on Wednesday by the international NGO ActionAid USA found that small farmers are being forced off their property as 1.8 million hectares of the countries' most desirable farmland has been offered to foreign investors, amounting to little more than what they call a corporate land-grab.
And in Tanzania, a New Alliance initiative threatens (pdf) to displace more than 1,300 people as the government works to recategorize village land to make it available for a Swedish-owned EcoEnergy sugarcane plantation.
While the benefits of such "investment" are tempting at first, many on the ground are now realizing what's at stake.

Josaphat Mshighati, head of programs and policy for ActionAid Tanzania, told Common Dreams that instead of increasing food security, farmers are losing access to the land in exchange for jobs laboring at an industrial agriculture plantation, whose sole crop is being raised for export.
"It is a form of colonialism," Mshighati said. "Small holder farmers are turned into labourers serving in big, private agriculture investments and some of them totally lose their access to productive land. Hence, they become much more dependent."
Further, he added that African governments including Tanzania are "being pushed to change their seed policies to allow for 'more modern seeds' that will definitely be supplied by big private companies. Thus, the indigenous seeds will perish in few years and all farmers will have to rely on seeds from the western companies."
Finally, the government policy changes that are forcing people off their land, he said, will ultimately "create disharmony between citizens and the government." All of these impacts, Mshighati concluded, "can be related to the previous history between Africa and the west—exploitation of a higher kind."
Doug Hertzler, senior policy analyst with ActionAid USA, also told Common Dreams: "Unfortunately G7 governments policies seem to be more about increasing corporate profits through access to African land and labor, and opening markets to sell patented seeds and pesticides rather than realizing the right to food."

On the other side of the New Alliance arrangement, private sector companies—which include some of the world’s biggest food and biotechnology corporations—have described through Letters of Intent how they plan to pursue allegedly "responsible investments in African agriculture and food security through models that maximize benefits to smallholder farmers."
These commitments have been made by food and agriculture giants including Syngenta, Monsanto, Nestle, Bayer CropScience, and Coca-Cola, among many others.

A model of corporate governance

After initially participating in the New Alliance Leadership Council, last year Oxfam International announced it was pulling out.
"The voices of farmer’s organizations, women’s producer groups and civil society organizations and CSO groups have, on the whole, been ad hoc and inadequately integrated into this policy planning," explained Tim Gore, head of policy, advocacy and research for Oxfam International's GROW campaign. This has lead to "serious concerns that the priorities of the Alliance reflect the interests of its more powerful members."
The New Alliance-backed changes in government policy have created an environment that threatens to "'tip the balance' of investment towards larger players, rather than small-scale producers and family farmers, and could harm the environment through the industrial, high-input model of agriculture," Gore said.
Finally, he warned, "this creates an acute risk that the members of the Alliance have created a form of global governance which is exclusive and potentially self-serving."

As critics note, the New Alliance model adheres to the same neoliberal ideology as 'trickle-down' economics, which has been increasingly discredited. 
Dan Iles, food sovereignty campaigner with Global Justice Now, described the New Alliance as "a branding exercise," under which western governments have funneled aid money previously committed to alleviating poverty in Africa and essentially channeled it into the pockets of big, international agriculture corporations.

The U.S. alone has committed at least $2 billion dollars for the effort.
Similarly, an August 2014 report (pdf) by the Global Policy Forum describes the New Alliance as "a political process designed to reserve corporate actors a seat at the table," where business is giving a role "almost equal to governments." The initiative, the report continues, "serves as an excellent example of a form of governance that is increasingly gaining importance on a global scale."
As writer and activist Martin Kirk explained to Common Dreams, while the New Alliance puts on a "very humanitarian face" it is part of a trend that is "actually shifting how we govern the world." The model, Kirk says, is also being followed by the World Bank, the United Nations, and the World Economic Forum.
"In the public imagination, nation states are the main actors, when actually the corporate interests—which are not connected to the public world and whose primary purpose is to maximize profit—are now given equal weight," continued Kirk, who is a member of The Rules, a global network dedicated to tackling root causes of inequality and poverty.
The danger, Kirk continues, is that the New Alliance promotes this corporate concept as the only solution to overcoming hunger, when it fact it is "far from the only one."

A local answer

While most of the small scale farmers, villagers and other individuals directly impacted by the New Alliance initiative are unaware of upper-level mechanisms behind their forced relocation or intrusive growing restrictions, there are tremors of resistance.
Nearly 100 farmers organizations, social movements, and civil society groups from around the world endorsed the statement on Wednesday. Meanwhile, growing protests against pending policy changes, such as the "Monsanto law" in Ghana, are further spreading the word.

If outside actors want to help strengthen food security in Africa, advocates say that the solution must lift up the local community.
Small-scale farmers are currently producing 70 percent of the food in Africa, according to the coalition statement. "Addressing food and nutrition insecurity on the continent requires the full participation of those who are already producing, and promoting an agricultural system based on human rights and food sovereignty through local control over natural resources, seeds, land, water, forests, knowledge and technology."
Josaphat Mshighati said that the biggest hurdle for small farmers is a lack of rain, so directing funds to nation-based agricultural development programs, such as small and medium irrigation projects, would provide a huge boost for the local economy.
And Dan Iles added: "What small scale farmers need is investment in infrastructure that links them more locally and regionally...Where control and ownership over the means of farming, buying and selling food and the culture of food is held by farmers (and people)—not outside elites."  

from here

Nigerians Demand End To Military Impunity

An Amnesty International report accusing the Nigerian military of the murder of thousands, and demanding the investigation of senior commanders for war crimes, has been welcomed by Nigerian pro-democracy activists.

“Stars on their shoulders. Blood on their hands: War crimes committed by the Nigerian military,” says more than 7,000 young men and boys were starved, suffocated and tortured to death in military detention from 2011 in the war against the Boko Haram insurgency.

The report, based on hundreds of interviews and leaked military documents, said since 2012 more than 1,200 people have been extrajudicially executed by the military and the vigilante Civilian Joint Task Force in the three conflict-affected states of the northeast.
“The report outlines the roles and possible criminal responsibilities of those along the chain of command – up to the Chief of Defence Staff and Chief of Army Staff – and names nine senior Nigerian military figures who should be investigated for command and individual responsibility for the crimes committed,” Amnesty said.
The accusations in the report will be an early test for Nigeria’s new president, Muhammadu Buhari, who on his swearing-in last week stressed that the military – which has a history of abuse – must be committed to human rights in its battle against the jihadist insurgency.
Nigerian civil society activists have been quick to comment on the report. Here is what they told IRIN:
Jibrin Ibrahim, fellow at Centre for Democracy and Development:

“I think it’s appropriate that people are charged for their crimes whoever they are. Numerous reports over the years have shown these crimes have been committed in a systematic manner. Impunity has always been a problem in the war against Boko Haram.

“The problem is we train the army for a war where you kill the enemy that you can see. But [in this insurgency] you are fighting an unknown enemy – the army don’t have the intelligence to know who-is-who.

“We need a completely new philosophy and doctrine. It’s not just in the northeast. The army is deployed in 32 out of 36 states in the country. The first thing is we need human rights training, and much greater focus on intelligence. Now Boko Haram is cornered, it is returning to asymmetrical warfare where the military has always struggled.”
  Clement Nwankwo, executive director at Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre:

“The level of abuse is shocking. It certainly necessitates a judicial commission of inquiry. It is important that the government takes the initiative to investigate, but that doesn’t necessarily preclude a role for the International Criminal Court.

I think it’s a test for Buhari’s ability to bring the military to account and under his control. He said in his inaugural speech that issues of human rights would be a priority for him. Nigeria’s human rights community has consistently raised concern over the magnitude of violations the military has committed.  They can’t be allowed to go scot free.”
  Idayat Hassan, director at Centre for Democracy and Development:

“This report cannot be swept under the carpet if this new government wants to end the insurgency – it must take cognisance of the human rights violations by the security forces since the start of the insurgency. Mass atrocities have been committed in the northeast.

“It’s very obvious the service chiefs will have to go. The defining character of the Amnesty report is that they have been able to name and shame – which hasn’t been done before.

“The insurgency has been seen as northerners killing northerners. [Buhari] has promised a Marshall Plan for the northeast in his first 100 days. That expenditure must be seen [by Nigerians] as in the national interest. Everyone should be concerned – this conflict in the northeast affects us all, and impacts on the development of the country as a whole.”
  Chidi Odinkalu, chairman, Governing Council, National Human Rights Commission:

“Have there been atrocities on the side of the Armed Forces? Absolutely, I think so. But I don’t want to get caught up on numbers.

“There has been an attempt by the Nigerian army to seek accountability over those accused of atrocities. I’m not saying that this is adequate or sufficient.

“There has been a build-up of trauma in the military, with men serving on the frontlines not properly equipped or relieved. No human being is constructed to take that amount of trauma without dealing some back. We need programmes that provide treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.”

from here

The Farmers Revolution?

Small-scale agricultural producers are estimated to provide 70 percent of the world's food supply. The United Nations has said that traditional agroecological farming practices and small-scale agriculture are key to feeding the world in the face of global climate crisis. From Nigeria to Tanzania and many points in between, small-scale farmers say they have not been consulted when big agribusiness, working under the G8’s New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition come to push farmers off their land.

Farmers in rural Bagamoyo district in Tanzania have been ordered off their land after EcoEnergy, a Swedish-owned company, leased more than 20,000 hectares from the government to produce sugar cane. They were not consulted, says says Josephat Mshigati, the head of programmes and policy for Action Aid in Tanzania. Those who were ordered off the land were taken to another area, which created more problems, he says. “They were settled in areas that are not really productive, so for them to invest in producing food, that is another challenge we see. They could be offered all kinds of jobs, there are jobs in the factories,” he says.“But the salaries of those people are very low. So that is another vulnerability… the salary you get, it is hard to buy food,” he adds. 

A coalition of almost 100 social movements, grassroots groups, and civil society organizations are raising alarm about the New Alliance on Food Security and Nutrition meeting secretively in Cape Town, South Africa, and are calling for governments to withdraw support for initiative. The G8-led, agribusiness-funded New Alliance is pushing for the approval of laws in 10 African countries that favor agricultural giants like Monsanto at the expense of small farmers and local food security. According to a statement by the civil society coalition Wednesday, policies supported by the New Alliance “facilitate the grabbing of land and other natural resources, further marginalize small-scale producers, and undermine the right to adequate food and nutrition.”

An example of New Alliance's corporate-friendly policy is Ghana's proposed Plant Breeders Bill, or so-called “Monsanto Law,” which would effectively tighten the corporate control of seeds and limit the traditional ability of small farmers to save and share seeds. Other New Alliance-backed proposals in Nigeria and Tanzania threaten to displace thousands of small farmers in massive agribusiness landgrabs to make way for foreign-owned corporate plantations.

Despite the New Alliance claiming a commitment to “reducing poverty and hunger,” its policies actually exacerbate hunger by slashing the rights and access to resources of Africa's small-scale producers for the benefit of foreign agribusiness corporations since it was launched in 2012.

The problem of the New Alliance way is that it does not reflect the ideology of the small-holder farmer, says Nick Dearden, the head of Global Justice Now, a natural resources campaigner, where there’s little or no role for small farmers. “What it’s about is that you’ve got to scale up technological input, you’ve got to allow big corporations, mostly based here in the west, into your countries, and you’ve got to start exporting more food to the west, and richer parts of the world, rather than protecting small farmers,” he says. Dearden says that most food produced for Africans is grown by small-scale farmers. “We know it’s possible. For me the interest of those pushing New Alliance isn’t really in eradicating hunger. It’s in the profit margin of the companies that happen to be headquartered in their countries.” Dearden says that countries need to protect small farmers with regulatory frameworks within the country to prevent more land grab problems throughout the continent, and not rely on a small handful of companies to be able to provide the needs of everybody globally. “I just don’t think it’s feasible in a world where you have such massive inequality as we see today for a company to make profit by feeding those who are most in need of food, that’s to say, the poorest,” he adds.

“The New Alliance is not addressing hunger or food security, but it is providing huge opportunities for big agribusiness companies to restructure food production across Africa to their own advantage,” said African Center for Biosafety Director Mariam Mayet in statement. “Countries in Africa need to develop their own agricultural policies that are effective in meeting the needs of small scale farmers and food sovereignty, rather than being cajoled into having big industrialized agriculture imposed on them through coercive aid mechanisms like the New Alliance.” Mayet added. 

Last month, an independent audit on U.K. foreign aid slammed the New Alliance, characterizing it as “little more than a means of promotion for the companies involved and a chance to increase their influence in policy debates.” In 2013, over 100 African civil society groups called the New Alliance a “new wave of colonialism” opening African markets to transfer agricultural control away from local farmers into the hands of transnational corporations.

Raymond Enoch, the chairman of the Centre for Environmental Education and Development in Jalingo, Taraba state in Nigeria explained “For you to just come into my community and say you want to do something that will change my life, you really need to discuss with me and convince me that what you want to do is to my own benefit…better than what I am doing now… Farmers can freely produce their food, and freely produce their food for domestic market consumption. At least to some extent now, farmers are free to embark on farming without being molested by agribusiness.”

http://www.english.rfi.fr/africa/20150603-where-s-farmer-s-consent-g8-new-alliance-hurts-africa-says-activists

Sharing Africa or owning shares in Africa?

Despite the Ebola epidemic in West Africa and ongoing terrorism business consistently express strong interest in African assets. Foreign investments hit a record $80 billion in 2014, with emerging market countries continuing to show a strong interest in African assets.

Investors from the U.S., the United Kingdom and France hold the biggest share of African investments: $178 billion in 2012, the latest data available. Chinese investors held nearly $28 billion in assets, a trend likely to continue as Chinese labor gets more expensive for manufacturers; investors from Brazil, Russia, India and South Africa also hold large portions of the foreign-investment total.

The majority of investments flow into six African nations that represent a third of the continent's population. The two largest destinations for investors are South Africa and Nigeria, which have the two largest economies.

Just as countries such as China were the low-cost producers for many large international conglomerates in the 1980s, more once-emerging nations are exploring setting up shop in Africa. The stubborn global recession prompts many manufacturers to look for even lower cost producers; Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania are all trying to attract these jobs. These countries must of course deal with the same issues that other emerging-market nations dealt with 30 years ago: training the workforce, establishing reliable energy supplies and upgrading necessary infrastructure to transport manufactured goods.

http://www.nasdaq.com/article/africa-untapped-potential-cm482141

The Bounty of the African Diaspora

The 30 million strong African diaspora fuels the continents’ budget to the tune of 5% of its total GDP. The International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD) estimates the African remittance flows to and within the continent reach $40 billion per year. Because about 75% of all transfers are informal and, therefore, impossible to track, diaspora remittances would be up four times bigger bringing the actual figure anywhere between $120 billion and $160 billion.

Breaking down the official numbers indicates that the remittances received on per capita basis equal about $40. Since not every person is lucky enough to have a diaspora friend or relative, the actual average estimated remittance value sent by a migrant equals $1,177 yearly. This is most often shared by a number of relatives.

Morocco tops the chart at over $6 billion. In second place is Algeria with $5.4 billion then Nigeria with $5.39 billion and Egypt with $3.6 billion. However, if one looks at the percentage of a country’s GDP that is supplied through remittance, it is the poorest and relatively smaller countries that show the highest dependence on foreign transfers: Eritrea (38%), Cape Verde (34%), Liberia (26%) and Burundi (23%).

Somalia, which receives approximately $1 billion worth of diaspora transfers every year, is not listed on percentage terms because its GDP is unclear. Using the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) economic estimates, however, shows that the country’s remittance could be approximately 40% of its total domestic product. Placing Somalia at the top of relative remittance value. In Somalia, a country with diaspora spanning all continents, money is spent less eagerly on health and education simply because these facilities aren’t commonly available and, if they are, reflect poor quality.

In Eritrea, where ¼ of population lives abroad, about one in three households depends on remittance income, while 75% of all survey respondents receive at least one form of remittance. A study by Temesgen Kifle from the University of Queensland noted, “it is evident that remittances receiving households in Eritrea spend part of the remittances on child education …’. Kifle’s regression analysis shows that a 1% increase in household income (including both formal earning and remittance) increases the education ratio by around 0.04 percentage points.

A World Bank paper titled: “Remittances, Consumption and Investment in Ghana” concludes that remittances do affect marginal spending behaviour of households. Most significant findings show that households receiving remittance spend less at the margin on food by as much as 14%, and more at the margin on education by as much as 33%.

Another study focusing on Nigeria and Kenya published by the World Bank in 2011, revealed that more than half of total remittance spending is invested in home-building, land purchases and farm improvements.

Donna Clifton, in an article in the Population Reference Bureau, concludes that countries’ economic growth can be directly affected by remittance levels through consumption and investment patterns. Clifton points to an important fact related to migration: As the overwhelming majority of workers living abroad are male, a significantly higher number of female-headed households emerge in the country of origin. In Ghana, for example, 52% of households with migrant workers were female headed, compared with only 25% for households with no migrant workers. It has been empirically proven, many times over, that female-headed households have a considerably higher inclination to invest in health care and education – the core sectors of human capital – as well as having a higher propensity to saving.

http://mgafrica.com/article/2015-05-29-remittance-in-africa-where-does-it-go

Public Money Into Private Pockets - The Congo

European and US development finance is bankrolling a new round of colonialism in the Congo

The CDC Group Plc, the French Agency for Development (AFD) and several other development finance institutions (DFIs) are funding Feronia, a Canadian agribusiness company accused of land grabbing and human rights abuses in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

Communities living within the more than 100,000 hectares covered by Feronia Inc's Lokutu and Boteka oil palm concession areas say the land was taken from them illegally and that they never gave their consent for Feronia to operate there.

DFIs together own more than 80 percent of Feronia's shares, even though the company is flagrantly violating policies that should prevent DFIs' public money from being invested in companies that grab land, violate labour rights or engage in corrupt practices.

A new report from GRAIN and RIAO-RDC exposes Feronia's involvement in a massive land grab as well as operating a brutal system of labour exploitation and community harassment and making corrupt payouts to politically-connected individuals in the DRC.

"Community leaders from the areas where Feronia has its plantations have had enough of this company," says Jean-François Mombia Atuku of RIAO-RDC. "They want Feronia to give them back the lands, so that they can once again benefit from the use of their forests and farms."

Read more: grain.org/e/5220

South Sudan: Food Crisis and Refugees

Almost 700,000 South Sudanese now live as refugees in neighbouring countries. The vast majority fled their homes since civil broke out in December 2013

 

Through 17 months of conflict, tens of thousands of people have been killed in South Sudan and two million more displaced. Schools, health centres and markets have been looted and destroyed. It took a $1.8 billion humanitarian response last year for the country to avoid a famine.
And it’s about to get even worse.
At least 40 percent of the country’s population – 4.6 million people – faces acute food insecurity within the next three months, according to a new analysis. While the most severe shortages are predicted for the country’s northeast where the fighting has centred, the hunger belt now spreads across much of the country’s northern half.
At the same time, economists are warning that the combination of conflict and a global downturn in oil prices – the country’s main source of revenue – has brought South Sudan’s economy to the brink of collapse. Skyrocketing costs and a tanking currency are especially threatening to urban communities where people must buy most of their food. Some can already not afford to eat.
“All of this means a crisis is arriving very, very quickly,” said Shaun Hughes, the head of programme for the World Food Programme in South Sudan – and on a scale the already suffering country has not yet seen.
 
On the move
 
Ramsey Bol Lang is twice displaced. In December 2013, the 20-year-old was going to secondary school in Juba when fighting broke out. His neighborhood, on the capital’s outskirts, was the scene of door-to-door killings allegedly perpetrated by troops loyal to President Salva Kiir.
Three days later, Lang took advantage of a lull in the shooting to flee across the city. Though the fighting in the capital ended as rebel soldiers backing former vice president Riek Machar retreated into the country’s northeast, Lang decided it wasn’t safe to return to his home and rented a new place.
Months later, his mother, seven siblings and two cousins arrived in Juba to live with him. There had been protracted fighting near their home in northern Unity state and a brother and an uncle had been killed. Lang’s father had decided it was best to send the rest of the family to Juba.

 Except now, a steep rise in prices means they can longer afford to live in the capital. “Everything has become expensive there,” Lang said. “If you want to rent a home, even, it’s too expensive.” Which is why, in late April, they gathered their belongings and hired a minibus for the hour-and-a-half drive to the Ugandan border. They were met by officials from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), who then took them on to a transit camp. Within a few weeks, they will be permanently resettled in Uganda.
Lang did not want to see his family become refugees. “That is our homeland,” he said, pointing to South Sudan, its border with Uganda visible from the Nyumanzi Transit Camp. “I don’t have a home here.” But at least he will have something to eat.
To stay in Juba was financially impossible. And to move back to the family’s village in Unity state’s Pariang County meant dealing with food shortages, in addition to the threat of violence. In the newly released Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), which measures food security and nutrition, Pariang is predicted to reach “crisis” level as early as this month. And a cluster of counties to its south will likely hit the “emergency” threshold before the end of July – one level below famine. “The situation of Juba right now, all over South Sudan, even, it is not good for us,” Lang said.
 
Draku Godfrey Uhuru is the centre supervisor at Nyumanzi. Over the past few weeks, officials have been registering an average of 70 new arrivals to the camp each day. A month ago it was only 30 or 40.
Uhuru said most of the new refugees have fled from fighting in Unity and Upper Nile states. But for the first time, a noticeable number are not on the run from recent battles. Instead, they tell Uhuru, “It is hunger that is now attacking them.” 
 
A predictable crisis
 
The figures in the new IPC report are jarring. Nearly 70 percent of the country will not get enough to eat through July. At least 80 percent of the counties across the country’s north are at a critical level of malnutrition, which is particularly dangerous for pregnant women and children. And the report does not even fully account for the people who might be in the worst position of all – stuck in the midst of ongoing fighting in Unity and Upper Nile states. Until the clashes stop, it is impossible for humanitarians to reach them – or even gauge the extent of their need. 

WFP’s Hughes said the current situation was sadly predictable. In the early days of the conflict, if South Sudanese did not have enough to eat, they could sell livestock or barter supplies for food. “As the crisis goes on, those coping strategies become increasingly depleted,” he said. “They have nothing left to rely on, no assets left to sell.”
 
With the arrival of the lean season – the months when people are planting for August and September harvests – South Sudanese would usually supplement what food they were able to store from the previous year with goods from the markets. Except tens of thousands of people were unable to plant last year because of the fighting. And prices in the market – where markets even still exist – have shot up.
Barack Kinanga, the International Rescue Committee’s economic recovery and development coordinator, has seen the price for maize in some parts of the country surge 70 percent higher than it was at the same time last year. And he warns, “The prices are likely to rise further and even peak at unprecedented levels.”
The search for food is driving people across borders, he said. UNHCR has recorded more than 9,000  new arrivals in both Sudan and Ethiopia over the past month. Uganda received around 7,000 South Sudanese in May – the most of any month this year.
Nyankuch Akuma is one of them. Her husband, a soldier, was shot and killed and she was left on her own outside Bentiu, the capital of Unity state. “It was so bad. Up to now there was no planting,” which is why she decided to leave and travel to Uganda. Even before she was placed in a permanent settlement, Akuma had decided, “I will stay here forever.”
 
Economic collapse

South Sudan’s unprecedented level of hunger is the most alarming signal of the country’s larger economic collapse. South Sudan’s currency, the pound, is trading in Juba’s black markets at nine and a half to every dollar – less than half of its value a year ago. Fuel is scarce. And the casual jobs that many people rely on for income are disappearing as the currency depreciates.
It is against that backdrop that the food insecurity has spread beyond the country’s northeast. The rest of the country also depends on markets during the lean season, Kinanga said, and “steepening commodity prices are having a far-reaching effect for the communities not directly affected by the conflict.”


This includes as many as 600,000 people living in urban areas. And a sudden rise in food insecurity in towns will force overstretched humanitarian agencies – now largely focused on rural communities – to recalibrate their response.
 
The fighting is the obvious culprit for the country’s economic spiral, said Dr. Kenyi Spencer, a South Sudanese economist. The government is spending much-needed reserves on “the war, hardware, this and that. It has displaced the local economy.” And with long-term consequences.
“There is a real risk the economic choices the government is making now will destabilize the country for generations to come,” said Emma Vickers, a campaigner with the corruption watchdog group, Global Witness. “If, when the conflict ends, there is no money left for infrastructure projects, education or job creation, South Sudan faces a future where the only choice for its youth is to pick up arms again.”
 
At the same time, the country’s oil fields have suffered repeated attacks, forcing production cuts that the country – which is almost completely dependent on revenue from oil sales – can ill afford. And international conditions – including a strengthening dollar and a global drop in oil prices – are hastening South Sudan’s economic collapse, Spencer said. “All these have really arrived to put the economy in a bad place right now. In the next two to three weeks, if nothing happens to change the situation, it could be catastrophic.”
It already is for the hundreds of thousands of people who are now all but guaranteed to face some level of food insecurity in the coming months. The IPC projection that 4.6 million people will see severe food shortages takes into account the ongoing humanitarian response.
And if the warring parties continue to limit access, as they currently are in parts of Unity and Upper Nile states, or if requested funding doesn’t come through, then “the number of people we’ll be able to assist will be vastly diminished,” Hughes said. WFP, alone, is currently looking at a $230 million funding shortfall. Unless the money comes through, “we simply won’t have the resources to be able to provide assistance on the scale that’s required.”

from here

The Land-Grab

Too Late for Many

When Oupa Sonopi started working in the mine at the age of 25, he was never informed of the high risk of contracting tuberculosis (TB). "Although we would hear about colleagues in the mines being treated for TB, I was not aware that the environment we worked under could be a huge contributor to me getting TB. We were not informed when we were recruited," he says.

According to Sonopi, most of his colleagues who work at the gold mines in Carletonville, a small gold-mining town 86 kilometres west of Johannesburg, suffer from airborne diseases such as silicosis, pulmonary TB and other lung infections such as chronic obstructive airways disease and lung cancer. 

Data from the Department of Health indicates that about half-a-million mineworkers in South Africa and about two million former mineworkers, spread across Mozambique, South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland, are at a high risk of contracting TB, just like Sonopi. They are vulnerable to lung disease because of their exposure to multiple risk factors, including their overcrowded living settlements, which usually increases the risk of infection with airborne diseases. The high rates of HIV infection as well as their exposure to silica dust in the deep mine shafts - which are often poorly ventilated - also increase the risks.

Project Ku-Riha (Ku-Riha, a Xitsonga word for compensation), is being implemented by the Medical Bureau for Occupational Diseases and the Compensation Commission for Occupational Diseases (CCOD) of the Department of Health. According to Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi,  "The department has identified 103 000 active and ex-miners with compensable claims for the pneumoconiosis which includes silicosis asbestosis, TB, chronic obstructive airways disease, progressive systematic sclerosis and lung cancer among others." Authorities have set aside R1.5-billion that will go towards compensation. Migrant workers from other countries who have worked in South African mines and who account for around a third of the South African mining work force are also eligible to apply for the fund. The minister said thousands of people had died without ever receiving or even being aware of the country's Benefit Medical Examination and the autopsies their families were entitled to under the Occupational Diseases in Mines and Works Act of 1973. However, the CCOD has such a huge backlog of claims from mine workers with lung disease that it will take years to process. 200 000 claims had been checked while about 500 000 were yet to be touched. A preliminary analysis of the claims held by the CCOD showed that more than half (56%) were for TB and 17% for silicosis.

Motsoaledi acknowledged that compensation could never be enough to address the difficulties that the affected miners faced. "Compensation will never be enough. We need to change the laws to ensure that our miners are protected," he said.

The fund derives its income from levies paid by mines themselves. Claims are assessed by the Medical Bureau for Occupational Diseases' certification committee, which determines whether or not they qualify for pay-outs, which usually range from R3 000 to R100 000. Other work-related injuries and diseases, such as loss of limb or finger, are dealt with by the Department of Labour.

The Royal Purse

The bill for South Africa’s royal families and traditional leaders, cost the country in excess of R650 million a year.

As of 2010, South Africa recognizes seven royal families in the country, after a recommendation by a traditional leadership commission that South Africa lose six of its kings and queens. Of the 13 recognized traditional kingdoms recognized previously, only seven will remain once the current incumbent rulers of the identified kingdoms have passed away.

Traditional kings and senior leaders are symbolic figureheads in the country with little political power. However, these rulers play an important role in local disputes as well as in playing advisory roles to government – as well as in the lives of the traditional rural populations. Approximately 20 million South Africans live in areas ruled by kings or traditional leaders. In addition to the ruling monarchs, the country also has a reported 800 senior traditional leaders and over 5,300 chiefs and headmen/women, who serve as leaders of tribes and clans within a kingdom.

All these traditional leaders are paid by the South African government – and at 2014’s published remuneration rates cost the country well over R575 million. The South African government pays each king a salary of R1.03 million a year, while senior traditional leaders get R188,424 and headsmen/women receive R79,364. Additionally, the National House of Traditional Leaders (NHTL), with 23 members, pays salaries in excess of R20 million to support the traditional leadership structures in the country on a national and provincial level. Despite the multi-million budget assigned to traditional leaders in the country, the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa (Contralesa) believes that they should be paid more. The group said that kings were on par with the president, and should therefore draw a similar salary (R2.75 million), and so, too, should chiefs and headmen/women be paid on the same level as their political counterparts.

Assuming that senior traditional leaders are akin to mayors (R1.1 million per annum) and headsmen/women fulfill the roles of councillors (R400,000 per annum), Contralesa would see the traditional leadership salary bill shoot to over R3 billion a year.

Beyond salaries paid by government, the ruling monarchs in the country also benefit from provincial spending, which is discretionary. Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini and a number of other South African royals have been the center of controversy over the years, with reports of exorbitant spending on luxury vehicles, chartered flights and lavish lifestyles.

In KwaZulu Natal, the provincial government even places a budget vote for the Department of Royal Affairs, specifically dedicated to the Zulu Royal Family and the upkeep of King Zwelithini’s palaces. In its 2014/15 budget, the department received R54.2 million for the king, which was reportedly swallowed up within months, used to purchase new vehicles for the king’s eight wives. The king then requested a further R10 million bailout from government, and was awarded R5 million. In previous years, the Zulu King’s expenses extended beyond R60 million.

Tax Evasion Revealed

Oxfam found companies based in the G7 nations made big profits from African operations and are fleecing Africa for nearly £4 billion a year in taxes, their report claims. They use a dodge called mispricing to shift profits to low-tax countries like the UK and Luxembourg to avoid higher local levies.

The money avoided in tax is three times the amount needed to plug the healthcare funding gap in the Ebola-hit states of Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea and Guinea Bissau.

Oxfam’s Nick Bryer, said: “Multinational companies, many with headquarters in the UK and other G7 countries, are cheating African countries out of billions of dollars in vital tax revenues that could help vulnerable people get decent healthcare and send their children to school.”

One quarter of South Africans go to bed hungry each night and a further 25 percent are at risk of missing a meal, said Malcolm Damon, director of Economic Justice Network for southern Africa. Governments need resources to reduce poverty, Malcolm Damon, director of Economic Justice Network for southern Africa said. "Though it is legal what transnational corporations are doing in transferring profits, the fact is that it is an immoral situation,"  in a telephone interview. 

Sadly, the best Oxfam came up with is a proposal for an international organization on taxes. But even economically sophisticated nations with complex rules and laws on taxes cannot stop the export of profits by off-shore accounting and tax havens.

Against Homophobia

Homophobia is on the rise across much of Africa and remains illegal across much of the continent. In conservative Christian and Muslim countries in Africa homophobia is a vote-winner.

The movement against LGBT rights in Africa has brought together very strange bedfellows, African Muslim and Christian preachers with strong backing from right-wing American Christian organisations. As they lose ground at home, where public opinion and law are rapidly shifting in favor of gay equality, American religious conservatives have increasingly turned their attention to Africa.  ‘African’ ideas about homosexuality are often those spread by American Evangelicals, out to ‘colonise’ Africa spiritually. American pastor Lou Engle, who leads a big Christian right group called The Call, said, ‘This is ground zero of the great war with homosexuality.’ Apologists for the Christian Right deny their goal is of creating Christian theocracies but that is the message they send to Africa.

 Bans against homosexuality go back as far as the colonial governments, which was guided heavily on social issues by Christian missionaries. A few African countries, such as South Africa, have done away colonial-era prohibitions against homosexuality, but other countries are moving in the opposite direction, imposing heavier penalties to the laws that currently exist. Pre-colonial African sex traditions varied widely. Over 20 cultural varieties of indigenous African same-sex intimacy have been recorded by anthropologists. There are Bushmen paintings of men having sex with one another. There are countless examples of cross-dressing and cross-gender behavior. There are instances of female warriors marrying other female warriors, such as in the kingdom of Dahomey, in present-day Benin—unsurprisingly, the Europeans called them ‘Amazons.’  There are even cases of male homosexuality being seen as possessing magical properties, such as the transmission of wealth from one person to another. And, like the hijras of India, there are examples in several ethnic groups of men who took on women’s roles and dress to have sex with men. These people were not ‘gay’ or ‘homosexual.’ Those are Western terms, laden with connotations of culture and medicalization. They had names of their own: Chibadi (Southern Africa), Mukodo Dako (Uganda), and many others.

President Robert Mugabe is particularly derisive of the gay community. He urged young Zimbabweans to shun homosexuality as an abomination of humankind ‘that destroys nations, apart from it being a filthy, filthy disease’. That speech relied on an unhealthy dose of homophobia, effectively using existing public disdain for homosexuality as a means to delegitimise the political opposition - with its liberal economics and politics - as part of the evidence that it was merely a puppet of the West.

But Mugabe is certainly not alone in abusing the gay community for political gain.

Gambia’s president Yahya Jammeh has a history of making unbelievable homophobic comments. Jammeh said gay people ‘destroy culture and would doom the world He has described gay people as ‘vermin.’ He said that homosexuality was ‘more deadly than all natural disasters put together’. He said that LGBT stood for ‘Leprosy, Gonorrhoea, Bacteria and Tuberculosis’.

 Kenya’s deputy president, William Ruto, has told church worshippers that homosexuality had no place in the nation. A Kenyan cross-party parliamentary group is seeking stricter application of existing anti-gay legislation. ‘We will not allow homosexuality in our society as it violates our religious and cultural beliefs,’ Ruto was quoted as telling a cheering congregation at the Jesus Winner Ministry Church on the outskirts of the capital. ‘We will stand with religious leaders to defend our faith and our beliefs.’ The Jesus Winner Ministry Church specialises in prophecies and describes itself as ‘an oasis’ for people ‘under the yoke of curses, witchcraft, stagnation, ancestral spirits and other evils brought by Satan.’

Nigeria’s ex-president Goodluck Jonathan signed a law criminalising homosexuality which contains harsh penalties for homosexual activity and membership in gay rights groups. “Persons who enter into a same-sex marriage contract or civil union commit an offence and are each liable on conviction to a term of 14 years in prison,” the law says. “Any person who registers, operates or participates in gay clubs, societies and organizations or directly or indirectly makes public show of same-sex amorous relationship in Nigeria commits an offence and shall each be liable on conviction to a term of 10 years in prison.”

The position of the World Socialist Movement is that capitalism thrives on scapegoats because they absorb the blame for the poverty, stress and insecurity that the system cause and divert the pressure for change into other channels. Socialists hold that sexual activity between consenting adults which gives pleasure to the participants and does not harm anybody should be entirely their own affair. But to end the persecution of the LGBT communities we must tackle cause and not effects. 

When enough is not enough

Nigeria was nearly brought to its knees by a crippling fuel shortage following a long-running quarrel over contested subsidy payments. The West African country is Africa’s biggest oil producer, but imports all its processed fuel because it does not have domestic refineries. Nigeria is not the only African country that produces a lot of a resource internally, only to struggle to meet domestic market needs.

South Africa’s power utility Eskom produces about 95% of the country’s electricity, and nearly half (45%) of Africa’s capacity, but locals have had to contend with rolling blackouts, with the load shedding programme to stay for the next few years, officials say.

The largest global gas finds of the last two decades have been made in Mozambique, but the country continues to grapple with significant electricity shortages. Just 18% of the population have online access to the national grid, with the infrastructure a major problem—power from the CahoraBossa plant in the north to the capital Maputo first has to pass through South Africa. The country also imports the majority of its cooking gas needs, and has thus been hit by market practices such as speculation. Deals in the pipeline are expected to make the country the biggest LNG supplier after Qatar and Australia in the next decade, but gas-fired power-plants remain years away from being a reality, meaning the electricity deficits will only deepen as domestic demand rises. The irony is that such a plant would make Mozambique a net export of power—with countries like South Africa next door potential beneficiaries.

One of copper’s biggest uses is in power generation and transmission, but for the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), electricity shortages are a norm. Less than 10% of the population are connected to the national grid, with the little that is connected ironically going largely to multinational miners. Two dams on the Inga Falls produce about 1,500MW.  This is in a country that is Africa’s biggest export of copper.

In 2008 Botswana accounted for three of the 13 billion carats of rough diamonds that were on the world market. But when it comes to the finished polished product, one of the world’s largest producers of the gems accounts for less than 5% of the globe’s estimated $20 billion worth of product. The country earns more from the regional customs union, than from diamonds. This is because most of the cutting and polishing is done outside Botswana. And even of those located domestically, just one company has local shareholding, the rest being dominated by outsiders. The country has also been recently losing thousands of cutting jobs.

Burkina Faso is the fourth largest producer of gold on the continent after the likes of South Africa and Mali, but with one of the highest poverty rates in the region, the ensuing gold rush has pulled children out of school—for a commodity they may not expect to buy locally at current income rates. Three of every four Burkinabes are unemployed, and the country consistently ranks among the bottom 10 in the annual Human Development Index. The western African country therefore exports nearly all of it, with proceeds usually dominated by the multinationals

The world’s largest producer of cocoa only inaugurated its first chocolate factory two weeks ago (although French-owned). Cocoa, the “brown gold” for Ivory Coast, accounts for 22% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), more than half of its exports and two-thirds of people’s jobs and incomes, according to the World Bank. While cocoa earned the country $2.1 billion last year, earnings from chocolate in the global market were nearly 60 times more. In 2014, journalist Richard Quest travelled to Ivory Coast and encountered cocoa farmers who had neither tasted, let alone seen, chocolate. It is not uncommon though, as in some African countries rural communities that grow coffee have never seen or tasted it in refined form, either.

The economic benefits of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project to the tiny kingdom are immense, earning it at least $45 million annually for hundreds of milions of litres. South Africa is the major beneficiary, with the exports seen as an example of economic integration. Many argue it is an arrangement that benefits only one country, and the elites in the other. But Lesotho, despite being mountainous, struggles with drought and unreliable rainfall, while thousands of its people go without reliable access to water.

Egypt has consistently topped the wheat production tables in Africa—it is projected to grow 8.5 million tonnes this year, at least two million above the nearest challenger, Morocco, according to the FAO. But even this is not enough—it will import nearly four million tonnes more than Algeria going into 2016, and a third more than it grows, with not even a bushel as surplus, and shortages are not unheard of. Wheat subsidies are a matter of life and death in the country.

http://mgafrica.com/article/2015-05-31-these-african-countries-produce-lots-of-this-but-the-locals-think-its-a-rumour

Time for revolution

A few years ago South Africa overtook Brazil as the most unequal society on Earth. This week Statistics South Africa’s quarterly labour force survey reported that South Africa’s unemployment rate in the first quarter of 2015 was at 26.4 percent, the highest level since 2003, when it hit 30 percent.

What is politically significant is the increasing inequality between rich and poor blacks. Before 1994, the majority of blacks saw other blacks, with exceptions, as mostly equally poor. The ANC’s coming to power in 1994 brought advancement in the private sector for the educated, and fabulous wealth to the small group of politically connected through “narrow” black economic empowerment (BEE).

There is a rising perception that key ANC political leaders in charge are uncaring, dismissive and arrogant of the struggles of their poor black brothers, sisters and cousins while at the same time living a nauseatingly bling lifestyle. There is a rising perception that black people in political and business leadership who are doing well have little understanding of the harsh realities of their poorer cousins.

Young black people who have been unemployed for extended periods are increasingly unable to identify with the ANC. The majority of black youth, poorly educated at government schools, often have very little relevant skills, social capital or political connections, with little prospect for gainful employment. Yet they can see a connected small black elite getting fabulously rich, with little effort, through their political connections – and flaunting it, and the old white elite continuing to prosper.

Not surprisingly, this section of black youth is increasingly outraged, resentful and open to populist messages. The ANC breakaways – whether they were politically effective or not – from the Congress of the People (Cope) to the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have made it increasingly socially and politically “acceptable” for many black people not to show allegiance to the ANC. In the past many black ANC voters, whether young or black middle class members who were unhappy with the party, stayed away from elections rather than vote for another party. For example, if all ANC supporters eligible for voting, but who stayed away from last year’s national elections, had voted for another party, that party would have won the elections by a clear margin. It is no surprise that the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa), are mulling over the possibility of breaking away to form a new trade union federation and possibly a new worker-based political party. If the Numsa group form their own political party, it will mean significant sections of the black working class will also turn their back on the ANC.

The black working class is equally under financial distress. They have suffered the brunt of all the big waves of job retrenchments in the past three decades. Many are low skilled or unskilled and as South Africa’s economy changes from manufacturing, some face the prospect of never getting a job in their lifetimes again. They, in most cases, did not and do not have access to opportunities to upgrade their skills, whether from their employers or the state.

The struggle continues. Time for revolution

Hunger persists

According to the 2015 report on the State of Food Insecurityin the World released Friday by Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, hunger remains an every-day challenge for 10m Ugandans. 

The experts argue that this figure of under-fed or malnourished people indicates that the country has scored dismally on the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) one—eradication of extreme poverty and hunger.

For instance, the report shows that the prevalence of undernourishment in Uganda has been increasing from 4.2m in 1990 to 10.3m in 2015 up from 8.7m people in 2010.

“Eastern Africa remains the subregion with the biggest hunger problem in absolute terms, being home to 124 million undernourished people,” the report states.

In east Africa, Tanzania has the worst undernourishment figures (16.8m), while Kenya comes third (9.9m) and Rwanda register a minimal 3.9m people, who are under-fed. Uganda is second.