Cameroon Chaos

Prospects for talks between authorities and separatist movements to end escalating violence in Cameroon's English-speaking region are slim, a senior human rights official said on Friday.

"There is no desire for dialogue...The abuses are coming from both sides and the civilians are finding themselves in the middle," Ilaria Allegrozzi, Senior Central Africa Researcher at Human Rights Watch, told reporters in Paris. "The position of the government is an almost complete denial ... and there is total impunity for the violence." Allegrozzi said separatists were not in denial of the scale of the crisis, but of human rights abuses by their fighters. She cited an International Crisis Group report putting the number of separatists fighters at about 2,000-4,000 fighters and there was evidence that they were acquiring more sophisticated weaponry. Allegrozzi said the Anglophone population was increasingly in tune with idea of independence. "There is a growing feeling of support towards the separatists and secession."

The United Nations estimates that, since 2017, about 1,800 people have been killed and more than 530,000 displaced with 1.3 million in need. The crisis has tended to slip beneath the international radar given President Paul Biya's close cooperation with Western states in the fight against Islamist militant group Boko Haram in West and central Africa.

Togo and child slavery

Child labour is still widely accepted in Togo and the government is not doing enough to stop it, said the U.N. Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery in an interview on Friday. In a practice known as "confiage", parents send their children to live with relatives who promise to send them to school in exchange for helping with housework, she said. But this is rarely what happens. "It really results in extreme exploitation.

Many children in the West African country are forced into domestic servitude or hard labour at a young age, driven by poverty and cultural tradition, said Urmila Bhoola following a visit to Togo to assess the situation. "There is a complete lack of data, but it seems this practice mainly affects girls and some are sent abroad," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. "It is very much entrenched in cultural practices and tradition." School is free in Togo but remains out of reach for families who cannot afford books and uniforms, said Bhoola.

The worst forms of child labour include slavery, trafficking, sexual exploitation and more, as defined by the International Labour Organization. The Modern Slavery Index published by the Walk Free Foundation, estimates that 50,000 people are slaves in the country of 7.4 million.

Madagascar's Misery

Recurring drought in Madagascar's south has left more than 360,000 people on the brink of famine, a top United Nations official warned on Thursday, urging donors to do more to help people prepare for climate shocks.

Ursula Mueller, U.N. deputy humanitarian chief, said the impoverished Indian Ocean island was witnessing more frequent and severe weather events, such as droughts and cyclones, which were pushing already extremely vulnerable people to the edge.

"There is a need for immediate humanitarian assistance to save the lives of 366,000 people that are in emergency levels of food insecurity - which is one step away from famine," she said following a three-day visit to Madagascar. "We need to build their resilience so that they can withstand the next shocks of drought, flood, cyclones and epidemics, and improve their lives," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview. Mueller said the south of the island - known as the Grand Sud - was severely underdeveloped and people were facing and high levels of malnutrition. "During my three days in Madagascar, I saw the impact of climate change - with the poorest and most vulnerable people bearing the brunt of a phenomenon that they had no hand in creating," said Mueller. "With every new shock, people's resilience is eroded. The country has severe needs - yet all too often the world has focused elsewhere."

Madagascar is one of Africa's poorest countries. A lack of basic services - from health and education to employment opportunities - as well as poverty and climate change have exposed many of its 26 million people to natural disasters.

About nine in 10 people live on less than $2 a day, more than 50% of children under five are chronically malnourished, and access to clean water is the fourth lowest in the continent, according to U.N. data.

In the last two decades, the country has been struck by 35 cyclones, eight floods and five periods of severe drought - a three-fold rise over the previous 20 years.

A drought caused by two years of erratic rainfall between 2015 and 2017, aggravated by the El Nino phenomenon, has left about 1.3 million people short of food.

Western nations provided about 60% of the funds needed for emergency food aid last year, but an appeal by the U.N. and the Malagasy government for $190 million to help them bounce back from the crisis was only 1.5% funded, she said.

Funding could support school feeding programs, boost health care and provide alternative incomes when disasters strike.

"It's very important that the international community steps up for recovery and resilience building projects. It's a good investment to invest in preventing major events linked to climate change," Mueller said.

Climate Change hits Somalia

By September, 2.2 million people will face hunger so severe that it threatens their lives or livelihoods. A further 3.2 million people – around one-fifth of Somalia’s population – will be uncertain of their next meal, unless there are urgent efforts to respond to the drought in Somalia.

Mark Lowcock, the UN’s humanitarian chief, said the country is facing one of the driest rainy seasons in more than three decades, and a “rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation”.

“We were caught by surprise at just how quickly this drought has returned,” said Nasra Ismail, director of the Somalia NGO Consortium. “The time for people to recover has been halved and has been continuing to decrease every single season,” she said. “Ultimately, it’s climate crisis.”

The April to June period, initially forecast as an average rainy season, is now thought to be one of the driest on record in more than 35 years. The failed rainy season was partly caused by cyclones in the southern Indian Ocean, including Cyclone Idai in March, which stopped rains from moving north. This has come on top of abnormally hot and dry conditions between January and March, and a poor “deyr” season, between October and December last year.While there has been some rainfall in recent weeks, it is still well below what is needed, leading to the devastation of crops and death of livestock.

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/jun/06/two-million-people-at-risk-of-starvation-as-drought-returns-to-somalia

Sudan Security Force Crack-Down

The Sudanese military ousted Bashir in April after months of protests against his 30 years in office. Thousands of protesters camped outside the ministry, first demanding that military rulers oust Bashir and then that they hand over power to civilians. The sit-in has been the centre of a campaign to bring democratic reform to Sudan, which has been ruled by a military committee since the fall of the dictator Omar al-Bashir in April.

Security forces have used live ammunition in a major operation to disperse protestors in central Khartoum. At least five people had been killed and up to 60 injured in the attack on a sit-in in the city. Other estimates put the death toll at ten.

Witnesses reported that security forces belonging to the feared Rapid Support Forces (RSF) had surrounded and entered hospitals, firing weapons, beating medical staff and injuring protesters. The paramilitary RSF, which have been accused of systematic human rights abuses. They are led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, who also serves as deputy head of the transitional military council, the country’s governing committee. By mid-morning there were reports that RSF units had taken up positions throughout the Khartoum. It is unclear if the regular military had backed the crackdown raising the prospect of a dangerous split within security forces. Experts have previously warned of a “nightmare scenario” in which infighting among militia and soldiers led to to a complete collapse of the state.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jun/03/sudan-khartoum-protest-gunfire-explosions-heard

Lagos - a mega city

Lagos is home to 22 million people and counting, more than double New York and London's tally. 

The city's population grows by 77 people every hour as Nigerians from less industrialised regions seek jobs. And as the city grows, so too does demand for housing.

An estimated two-thirds of people in the Lagos metropolis live in informal accommodation or slums. Some jostle for space in crowded shanties, often built on stilts in water communities where residents live under the threat of eviction or in dilapidated buildings prone to collapse.

In a country where the minimum wage is about $80 a month and where graduates earn an average of 80,000 naira ($222) a month, renting in Lagos is an expensive exercise.

The housing shortage is also exacerbated by unoccupied luxury apartments in wealthy Lagos suburbs, including Ikoyi and Victoria Island where rent typically begins from $20,000 a year, in a country where almost half of its citizens live on less than $2 daily

The Eko Atlantic project aims to solve the dual problem of job and housing shortages in Lagos. It is currently being built on 10 million square metres of land reclaimed from the Atlantic Ocean and protected from rising sea tides by an 8.5km wall dubbed the Great Wall of Lagos. Once complete, it will comprise housing blocks for 250,000 people, a financial district, and private water and power. The project envisions itself to be the size of Manhattan's skyscraper district and there have been suggestions it will only cater to Lagos's ultrarich, a tag developers are trying to shake. There are concerns over the project's potential effect on surrounding communities, particularly how the low-lying areas will cope in the event of a storm surge.

Nnimmo Bassey, an environmentalist and activist, describes the project as "climate change apartheid", telling Al Jazeera it further deepens the economic divide "between the filthy rich and the rest of the people struggling for survival". Bassey believes claiming marine land has destroyed ecosystems and could lead to the extinction of some species. "It swallowed up public beaches and deflected coastal erosion to other communities. Some communities are getting hit by coastal erosion pushed their way by this project and they require heightened levels of investment to secure them."

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/lagos-finding-home-rent-impossible-mission-190529102749112.html

Sudan's Army Strong-armed Tactics

A UN human rights expert has condemned reports of "excessive use of force" by Sudanese security forces against protesters demanding the country's military rulers cede power to a civilian-led administration.

Aristide Nononsi, the United Nations independent expert on human rights in Sudan, called on Friday for Sudan's Transitional Military Council (TMC) to "exercise the utmost restraint" to avoid further violence after at least four people were killed and several others wounded earlier this week at protest sites in the capital, Khartoum. 

"I strongly urge the Sudanese military and security forces to ... take immediate measures to protect the constitutional rights of the Sudanese people," Nononsi said in a UN statement.

At least four people were killed on Monday, according to protesters, when
 troops in military vehicles using the logo of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) fired live ammunition as they tried to clear demonstrators from an avenue near Sudan's foreign ministry.
Two days later, at least 14 people were wounded, some from gunfire, when the RSF again tried to remove demonstrators from central Khartoum.

The Central Committee of Sudanese Doctors said last week that at least 90 people have been killed by government forces since the demonstrations began. Last month, the Human Rights Watch put the death toll at 70.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/05/human-rights-expert-denounces-attacks-sudan-protesters-190517164758383.html

When conservation is colonialism

In the name of "conservation," thousands of families, tribes and communities in Africa and Asia have had their land stolen and been forced into destitution and despair.

It is claimed, the local people don’t know how to look after their own land and care for its wildlife, so they should get off it and let “the real experts” manage it instead.

The reason outsiders are so keen to get their hands on this land is that these areas are very rich in biodiversity. Though indigenous territories make up only 22% of the world’s land, they hold 80% of Earth’s biodiversity. The fact that endangered species still survive on their land yet have been wiped out elsewhere should speak for itself: the truth is that tribal people are the best conservationists and understand their environment better than anyone else.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) is working with the Congolese government to create a protected conservation zone in Congo, known as Messok Dja. This land is home to the Baka people, one of the "Pygmy" tribes of central Africa, who rely on these forests for survival. Already, even though the park is not yet established, rangers funded and supported by WWF have stolen the Baka’s possessions, burnt their camps and clothes, beaten and tortured them.

Survival International is campaigning with the Baka against the establishment of Messok Dja protected area. In December 2018, Survival released letters signed by over a hundred people from six villages outlining their objections to the Messok Dja project and the abuse they have suffered at the hands of WWF-supported eco-guards. These objections, and many others, have been largely ignored.

The WWF should actually be talking to these communities, because they know better than anyone else how their ecosystem works and how to protect this forest. Its reply was simple: no, you’re wrong, they don’t know better, an opinion  born of prejudice, not fact. WWF would never impugn the Baka’s knowledge like this publicly however, as global powers now have to at least pretend they respect indigenous peoples. International law says that the Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) of indigenous and tribal inhabitants must be obtained before such projects take place on their land. The fact that the Baka do not consent means that WWF forcing through the demarcation of Messok Dja is not only unjust, it is actually illegal. In the case of Messok Dja, WWF has outright lied about getting FPIC from the Baka, but produces a lot of warm-sounding words to justify their land grab.

Consultation is not consent. WWF has been working on this project since 2005, but only began the consultation process with local communities at the start of 2019  Consent means you have the right to say no and have that "no" respected, but the only thing conservationists are granting the Baka apparently have is "the opportunity to express their opinions to decision-makers and managers;" they can voice their objections, but, on their own land, the Baka are not the decision-makers. As long as communities associate WWF with violence and oppression, “free” consent is impossible.

The Baka and their neighbors have lived as hunter-gatherers for generations, which means that their day-to-day survival depends entirely on their profound understanding of their environment, and the ability to maintain healthy wildlife populations. The Baka play as vital a role in maintaining the ecosystem as any apex predator. For example, it is well known that elephants and other large mammals in these forests spread seeds, trample paths, and perform other roles which facilitate the growth and flourishing of other species. Likewise, Baka forest camps create clearings, which, well fertilized by ashes and organic material, result in more food and better habitats for gorillas.

"Conservation is actually worse than colonization. It’s about slavery." explained one Baka.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/05/24/colonialist-land-grab-happening-right-now-congo

Neo-Colonialist Corporations

Though Ghana won its independence in 1957, the vestiges of colonialism and underdevelopment did not end. It has continued in neocolonialist forms, that deprive the Ghanaian people of the right to process, develop, and manage their natural wealth and to be the drivers of their own policies—in other words, their right to national sovereignty. It is transnational corporations, the stand-ins of yesterday’s British empire—often aided by an enthusiastic national bourgeoisie—that have robbed the Ghanaian people of sovereignty over their resources, their wealth, and their future

Every year, the vast majority of Ghana’s natural wealth is stolen. The country is among the largest exporters of gold in the world, yet—according to a study by the Bank of Ghana—less than 1.7 percent of global returns from its gold make their way back to the Ghanaian government. This means that the remaining 98.3 percent is managed by outside entities—mainly multinational corporations, who keep the lion’s share of the profits. In other words, of the US$5.2 billion of gold produced from 1990 to 2002, the government received only US$87.3 million in corporate income taxes and royalty payments.

Of the ten top multinational firms that operate on the African continent, only one (Vale, of Brazil) is located in the Global South. Of the remaining nine, three are United States corporations, three are Canadian, two are Australian, and one is British. All are private transnational corporations. In other words, the gold that is extracted from Ghanaian soil (like the natural wealth extracted from across the African continent and Global South) is immediately handed over to multinational corporations—almost entirely based in and controlled by the Global North (or, at best, by the national elite)—to be processed, refined, and distributed.

https://www.alternet.org/2019/05/heres-how-multinational-corporations-steal-the-vast-majority-of-ghanas-natural-wealth-every-year/

Cameroon Spiralling Out of Control

What started as protests against the growing dominance of the French language in anglophone regions in 2016 has turned into a conflict between the government and English-speaking separatists who demand a new independent state of “Ambazonia.” 

Since 2016, worsening violence in Cameroon’s Northwest and Southwest regions has killed almost 2,000 people and displaced over 430,000 people.In the past three years, at least 70 schools have been destroyed and over 80 percent of schools remain closed, leaving more than 600,000 children out of school in the country’s English-speaking regions.  The number of people in need of humanitarian assistance has increased 30 percent since 2018 to 4.3 million people today. This means one in six Cameroonians need aid, more than half of whom are children. In the anglophone Northwest and Southwest regions alone, there are more than 1.3 million people that need aid, eight times as many as the year before. At the same time, Cameroon’s East and North regions are hosting refugees who fled violence from the neighbouring countries of Nigeria and Central African Republic.

Norwegian Refugee Council’s (NRC) Secretary-General Jan Egeland made similar comments to the Security Council, lamenting on the lack of attention and humanitarian response: “When brutal fighting displaces hundreds of thousands of civilians, it usually sets international alarm bells ringing. But, the shocking unmet needs of tens of thousands of people fleeing violence in South-West and North-West Cameroon has resulted in no systematic mediation efforts, no large relief programme, little media interest and too little pressure on the parties to stop attacking civilians. The collective silence surrounding the atrocities is as shocking as the untold stories are heart-breaking,” he added.

As Cameroon becomes one of the fastest-growing displacement and humanitarian crisis in Africa, the UN humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock noted that the level of the crisis is “more alarming than ever.”

“Both the humanitarian and the security situation continue to deteriorate and run the risk of spiralling out of control,” Lowcock told the UN Security Council. Among the biggest challenges is the lack of funding, Lowcock noted. In 2018, Cameroon’s humanitarian response plan was just 44 percent funded. This year, only 13 percent of its appeal is funded.

Egeland echoed the humanitarian chief’s sentiments, stating: “A group of displaced and disillusioned women I met told me that they felt abandoned by the international community, as well as by the conflict parties. They asked me, where is international solidarity? Where are the African organisations, the donor nations? Where is Europe? This conflict has roots in generations of interference from European powers.”

“The absence of a humanitarian response commensurate to the hundreds of thousands of people in great and unmet need is striking. We are too few humanitarian actors on the ground, and we are gravely underfunded,” he added, noting that the UN country team should be given the necessary financial and human resources.

Security Council members should call on the government of Cameroon and leaders of armed separatist groups to end abuses against civilians in the Anglophone regions and hold those responsible for abuse accountable,” said Human Rights Watch’s (HRW) Central Africa director Lewis Mudge. “This is an opportunity to remind abusers that the world is watching,” he added. Mudge also pointed to the need for the country to allow access and cooperate with international human rights organisations. In April, the Cameroon government denied a HRW researcher entry into the country after documenting a deadly attack by security forces in the Northwest region.

“Cameroon’s move to block a human rights researcher and observers shows its determination to conceal its brutality…the UN Security Council should encourage the country to allow access to international human rights organisations and cooperate with them,” Mudge said.

http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/05/cameroon-crisis-alarming-ever/

Evicted from Eden

Further confirmation and evidence for this article

https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2015/2010s/no-1334-october-2015/material-world-exiled-gardens-eden/

"We are being persecuted and threatened," a woman of the Baka ethnic group in the Congo Basin region of central Africa told the human rights organization Survival International. The organization has been collecting similar testimonies for years and compiles critical reports about human rights violations against indigenous peoples in nature reserves or national parks. In recent years, the complaints of the Baka people have become louder and louder. The area where they live, the forests of Messok Dja in the Congo Basin, is being transformed into a national park under the direction of the WWF, the World Wide Fund for Nature. The project is financed by Europe.

The Baka feel harassed by the gamekeepers in the future national park. They have lived in the forests of Messok Dja for generations. "I am Baka, my father is Baka, my mother is Baka. Our ancestors entrusted this forest to us. Our food comes from the forest. When we are sick, we go there and collect our medicine," says a Baka woman. One day her children should also look for food in the forest. But now the forest is out of bounds, she says. The Baka people have been deprived of their habitat.

According to Survival International, more and more indigenous communities in Africa are becoming victims of an unscrupulous conservation industry. In recent years, the organization has repeatedly published photos, videos and testimonies of serious human rights violations by WWF-funded gamekeepers in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon and the Central African Republic. The accusations range from arbitrary arrests to torture and even targeted killings.  One of the main accusations: gamekeepers or rangers receive a bonus for every poacher they arrest. This motivates the rangers to arrest as many people as possible - whether they are guilty or not.

 "With this system of premiums, more and more incentives are being created to arbitrarily arrest people and for violence to escalate further," Linda Poppe from the Berlin office of Survival International said in an interview with DW. 

The money for the premiums comes from the European Union, while the German government also finances so-called "performance-related payments" for rangers, which includes bonus payments, in the Salonga National Park in the Congo Basin, Poppe said. The WWF also pays bonuses to rangers there.

Linda Poppe says. "You should rely on the indigenous people who live in these areas and who are often driven out to make way for nature reserves but who are actually the best allies of conservationists," she said. They were the ones being punished.  In her view, the system contains the wrong incentives.