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Fendika cultural hub in Addis Ababa wins major cultural prize · Global Voices
Amanda Lichtenstein

Fendika is an Ethiopian music group based in Addis Ababa. Led by dancer/choreographer Melaku Belay, they operate a venue, tour, record, and perform under the name Fendika. Photo by Ninara from Helsinki, Finland, via Wikimedia Commons CC BY 2.0.
In the bustling city of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, visitors flock to Fendika cultural hub to listen to live Ethiopian music. Nestled away in the Kazanchis neighborhood, stepping into this azmari bet (Amharic for a traditional music house) feels like a family reunion. The cozy, sprawling complex of rooms hosts a music space, an art gallery and an Ethiopian eatery and coffeehouse, welcoming travelers and locals to revel in the joy of live music and poetry since the 1990s — when azmari bets were still abundant.
Today, due to rapid development and expansion in Addis Ababa, Fendika remains one of the only traditional music houses in Kazanchis. When Melaku Belay, a traditional dancer and musician, began managing Fendika in 2008, he transformed Fendika into a more comprehensive performing arts space, setting up systems to ensure that all 33 Fendika staff and performing artists receive salaries instead of tips. His vision led to the establishment of the Fendika Cultural Center in 2016.
This month, Fendika accepted a prestigious Prince Claus Award from the Netherlands’ Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development, in recognition of their groundbreaking work in the advancement of culture and development within Ethiopia. Fendika is one of only seven 2020 Prince Claus Laureates announced in an online ceremony on December 2.
“Being connected to our identity helps us move forward,” Belay told Prince Claus. “What makes our work unique is that we keep our traditions alive through art. …Deep human connection can only be forged through art,” he continued.
The award recognizes Fendika as a “catalyst” that inspires and supports creative expression — from traditional to contemporary — within Ethiopia, and through its many global partnerships and collaborations.
According to Fendika's website, the Ethiocolor Traditional Band has been performing at Fendika every other Friday since 2009, “drawing standing-room-only crowds,” while maintaining a robust touring schedule around the world, from France to Israel, the USA to Zanzibar.
During the pandemic, Fendika has been hit like so many other public gathering spaces in Ethiopia. Their touring schedule was halted and they decided to shut down Fendika in Addis Ababa, on March 16, just a few days before the government issued a shutdown of all live performance venues, only to shift online with engaging YouTube and Facebook-based live performances. Belay never skips a beat when it comes to staying connected through the arts and he and his team managed to pull off live performance online despite endless challenges with a lack of steady internet connectivity and internet shutdowns due to political instability in Ethiopia.
Fendika's shows always come with a message of love, justice and unity, and these values permeate and shape all of its programs, as seen here in this live show streamed online on May 28.
Founding president of the Ethiopian Dance Association, Belay wows audiences with his high-energy, entrancing interpretations of eskista, the Amhara traditional cultural dance that focuses on rapid shoulder-shaking. His mastery of this dance form “earned him the nicknames of ‘walking earthquake’ and ‘King of Eskista,'” according to Fendika's website. Belay is self-taught, learning most of Ethiopia's traditional dances while growing up as a street kid in the 80s in Addis Ababa.
An avid music lover, Belay has won numerous awards for his arts advocacy and leadership while remaining down to earth in his love for sharing music, including fantastic sessions as “DJ Melaku” featuring Ethiopian jazz legends.
As Addis continues to change and azmaris disappear in the name of development, Belay and the Fendika community continues to fight for the preservation and development of Ethiopian performance culture and heritage — especially azmari heritage.

author: Amanda Lichtenstein


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In Kyrgyzstan, social media hate goes unchecked · Global Voices
Joldon Kutmanaliev

Sadyr Japarov, November 2020 | Source: President of Kyrgyzstan
This article originally appeared at oDR, openDemocracy's section on Russia and the post-Soviet space. It is republished here with permission, and has been edited for style and brevity.
Oljobai Shakir is a popular blogger and political activist in Kyrgyzstan. But his popularity has come at a cost. Since the country’s contested election in October, Shakir, an LGBTQ activist, has started receiving threatening comments, including those directly against him. Oljobai is not alone in receiving politically-motivated threats. Civic activist Ulan Usoiun reports that he sometimes receives up to 40 or 50 threats a day. Unidentified people have also attempted to assault Usoiun in person several times.
In the aftermath of Kyrgyzstan’s October election, social media posts and videos of public events featuring politicians and activists, who criticise Sadyr Japarov — who became interim prime minister and president in the post-election crisis — for his constitutional reform and other initiatives, immediately gather hundreds of comments. Japarov is currently running for president in elections set for January 10.
As we have previously reported, the combination of support for Japarov in Kyrgyz-language social media and the merciless trolling of his opponents online was crucial to the politician’s meteoric rise to power in the chaotic post-election environment, a pattern that has only escalated in the weeks since.
Currently, the overwhelming majority of comments contain hate speech and death threats against opposition figures, as well as explicit threats of sexual violence against female activists. Indeed, according to activists who have been subjected to this kind of trolling, it is public comments by Japarov himself that have provided a clear signal to his supporters and social media trolls to openly harass and threaten his opponents, as well as independent media. “Go to hell those [opponents of the new constitution] who cry out for their own interests,” he said in a Facebook post on November 19.
Such threats aren’t exclusive to Kyrgyzstan. In the US, for instance, female activists with the Black Lives Matter movement have received thousands of racist comments including death threats. What differs is that in Kyrgyzstan these threats go unchecked. Essentially, the Kyrgyz segment of social media — whether Facebook, YouTube or Instagram — is a fully unregulated domain where users are able to express the most virulent threats without any consequences.
Especially well-known political activists fall target to organised trolls and it is often the political elites who instigate hate speech. Rita Karasartova, a prominent human rights activist, emphasises that “the divisive language – anti-western, anti-NGO rhetoric – always comes from the president first. [Former presidents] Bakiyev and Atambayev, and now Japarov”.
During his presidency between 2011 and 2017, Almazbek Atambayev regularly incited the Kyrgyz public against independent mass media, opposition leaders and NGOs by labelling them “traitors”, “westerners” and “spies”, reproducing conspiracy theories similar to those fomented by the Kremlin against dissidents in Russia.
Now, Japarov is taking a leaf out of Atambayev’s playbook. Pro-Japarov trolls “have the president’s full support,” Karasartova continues. “They call us ‘enemies’, ‘spies’. They accuse us of being ‘traitors who sell national interests’. This rhetoric is projected by the president himself. [Trolls] fully reproduce the president’s discourse,” she says.
A Facebook post by Melis Aspekov, a close associate of Japarov and admin of one his Facebook groups, in which he claims that Japarov's opponents simulate troll activity and denies that Japarov supporters produce the kind of attack posters featured below | Source: Facebook
Since the parliamentary election, Karasartova admits, the intensity of online attacks and threats has significantly increased. If previously she used to receive threats mainly from anonymous or fake accounts, now she says she gets death threats from ordinary social media users via private messages in Facebook Messenger, in addition to public comments on online platforms and media websites. For example, we found one user who made a death threat against Karasartova via private message under their real account on Facebook.
Presidential candidate Klara Sooronkulova, a leader with opposition party Reforma and former constitutional chamber judge, has received messages in Facebook and Instagram that threaten her with rape or death, mostly from male users. “Usually threats come in relation to my critical opinion and comments regarding Sadyr Japarov,” she says.
According to Sooronkulova, political trolling is well organised, with trolls attacking their victims in groups. These accounts are usually fake and linked to Japarov-related groups and supporters. In a video aired on independent media NextTV, Sooronkulova discusses Japarov’s “gangster-style methods” in politics. We found eight open death threats among more than 1,000 hateful comments addressed to the opposition politician.
One indirect indication of how well-orchestrated extremist attacks on social media platforms have been is the manner in which they have shifted along with the political positions of those under attack.
Elvira Surabaldieva and Tilek Toktogaziev were leading critics of Japarov in the aftermath of the rigged elections this past October. Representing a new wave of young politicians and activists, Surabaldieva and Toktogaziev were extremely popular among Kyrgyzstan’s urban middle-class and were a focal point of liberal youth mobilisation during the struggle for power that emerged following the election. As such, they were frequent targets of attacks from pro-Japarov’s trolls. Both were physically attacked during the clash on the central square on 9 October, with Surabaldieva being hit in the face by a pro-Japarov supporter and Toktogaziev being heavily injured in the head by a thrown stone. According to our monitoring of social media, however, ever since they accepted high-profile ministerial positions in the Japarov-led government, the vitriol of online attacks against them significantly decreased.
Bolot Temirov, the founder of FactCheck — an online anti-corruption investigative resource — highlights the link between Japarov’s speeches and online activity, and the intensity of online attacks. “The inaction of government agencies indicate that these things are happening with the complacency of the authorities,” he says.
Generally, pro-Japarov’s trolls quickly share links among each other, leaving hate-filled comments under posts containing opinions about Japarov's planned constitutional changes. Attacks and threats against activists take place in the context of Sadyr Japarov’s divisive language.
Saniya Toktogazieva, a constitutional law expert, believes that “Japarov’s words are very divisive. Not only do his supporters write hate speech about political opponents, but Sadyr Japarov himself mentioned several times in his speech that everyone who is going against the constitutional reforms are akmaktar [bastards]”.
Toktogazieva continues: “Essentially, Japarov is dividing Kyrgyz citizens between those who are loyal to him and the rest who are actively against the constitutional reforms, labelling the latter ‘enemies of the people.’”
Omurbek Tekebaev, a leading opposition politician who is considered the father of Kyrgyzstan’s current constitution, agrees that Japarov himself initiates hate speech by directing his followers against his opponents. “They are trying to create an atmosphere of political terror, radicalism, and aggression. This is identical to what happened under [former President] Bakiyev. The only difference is that now political intimidation extends to social media. ”.
In his recent Facebook post, Melis Aspekov, one of Japarov’s closest associates and the administrator of his public Facebook group, has denied allegations of attacks claiming that it is actually “Japarov’s opponents who simulate trolling in order to attack their own opponents”.
The administrators of pro-Japarov Facebook groups, who include Japarov himself, turn a blind eye to the instigation of hate and the intimidation of opponents. Instead, they appear to tacitly encourage both via thousands of extremist comments in order to promote political and social polarisation, which increases tensions between various segments of Kyrgyz society, particularly between a more conservative (and largely rural) population and a more liberal (and largely urban) class.
With this combination of populist language and a climate of impunity, the obvious risk is that a dangerous dynamic may be set into motion, resulting in extremist social media users carrying out their online threats offline.

source: news-globalvoices

license: Creative Commons - Attribution - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

author: Joldon Kutmanaliev


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Two years after Sudan’s revolution, demonstrators march with demands for change · Global Voices
Khattab Hamad

On the 2nd anniversary of revolution in Sudan, demonstrators demand more rapid change from the transitional government. Photo taken in Khartoum, Sudan, December 19, 2020, by Mohammed Abdelmonim Hashim, used with permission.
December 19 marked the second anniversary of the Sudanese revolution, when protests first erupted in the city of Atbara, and spread throughout the country with demands for freedom, peace and justice — and the end to the 30-year rule of Omar al-Bashir. Bashir was eventually deposed on April 11, 2019, after months of deadly demonstrations and protests.
Under the Bashir regime, Sudanese citizens experienced war, poverty, economic sieges and sanctions. Bashir's actions landed Sudan on the US terrorism list, making it difficult to conduct business or diplomacy around the world.
This year, Sudanese citizens in Khartoum, the capital, braved the threat of the coronavirus to demonstrate and demand more rapid change. While citizens have celebrated many milestones and achievements of the transitional government over the last two years, citizens still lack basic needs such as health care and medication.
The US State Department announced the removal of Sudan's name from the list of countries sponsoring terrorism — an achievement floating in a sea of other major tasks of the transitional government, such as restructuring the economy and establishing long-term peace in northern Darfur.
Despite the latest peace agreement signed in Juba, it is an incomplete peace. The two largest rebel movements, Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) and the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM/A-al-Nur) did not sign it.
The second-anniversary demonstrators who gathered in Khartoum, on December 19, have diverse demands. Some are calling for faster reforms by the government. Others are calling for justice, and a few are calling for the bringing down of the government for allegedly “stealing” the revolution.
The peaceful marchers gathered at the Republican Palace and in front of the Parliament building. Some tried to hold a sit-in in front of Parliament to expedite the formation of the Transitional Legislative Council, and another in front of the palace, to demand the bringing down of the government.
On the 2nd anniversary of revolution in Sudan, marchers demonstrate and demand changes from the transitional government. Photo taken on December 19, 2020, in Khartoum, Sudan, by Mohammed Abdelmonim Hashim, used with permission.
However, police dispersed the protesters with tear gas and sound bombs, with only one reported injury by an individual who allegedly tried to grab a sound bomb to return it to the police and it exploded in his hand, severing it.
There were many reported cases of suffocation with tear gas, according to a report of the Sudanese Doctors Central Committee.
Hussam Abu-Alfath, a member of the Sudanese Congress party, uploaded this photo without any comment which circulated on Sudanese social media showing cooperation between police and protesters — a hopeful symbol of a new Sudan.
Some marchers denounced Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdock's travel to Djibouti on the anniversary of the revolution that brought him into power, but others claim he traveled on important business. He is presiding over the IGAD summit at a time when the East African region is witnessing instability and imminent crises.
Later, Hamdok commented on the anniversary of the revolution, tweeting:
أتقدم بالتحية للشعب السوداني العظيم بمناسبة حلول الذكرى الثانية لثورة ديسمبر المجيدة، متمنياً الرفعة للوطن والخلود للشهداء، والعودة للمفقودين، وتحقيق تطلعات بنات وأبناء شعبنا وبتمام الحرية والسلام والعدالة، الشعارات التي سالت من ورائها الدماء وبذلت في سبيلها الأرواح والمهج.
— Abdalla Hamdok (@SudanPMHamdok) December 19, 2020
I salute the great Sudanese people on the occasion of the second anniversary of the glorious December revolution, wishing prosperity to the homeland and eternity for the martyrs, the return of the missing, and the fulfillment of the aspirations of our daughters and sons and in the fullness of freedom, peace and justice, slogans that flowed from behind them blood and spent their lives and joy for it.
SLMA leader Mini Minawi commented on the marches, saying:
التحرير في الخطوط الامامية لدعم السلام والحفاظ علي سلمية التاسع عشر من ديسمبر . لسنا ضد احد ولكنا ضد الاقصاء . pic.twitter.com/Zyy3xtbB9t
— Mini Arko Minawi. | مني اركو مناوي (@ArkoMinawi) December 19, 2020
Our supporters are on the front lines to support peace and maintain the peaceful of the nineteenth of December march. We are not against anyone, but we are against exclusion.

author: Khattab Hamad


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Uruguay’s new government is prioritising security, but is it at the cost of free speech? · Global Voices
Juan Manuel Montoro

Photo of Luis Lacalle Pou during his inauguration ceremony on 1st March 2020. Photo by Alan Santos/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
Uruguay, a country known throughout Latin America for its left-wing leadership, took a swerve to the right in 2020. After 15 years of coalition governments comprised of left-wing political parties united under the Frente Amplio (Broad Front), the conservative Luis Lacalle Pou took office as the country’s new president in March 2020. In July, with a centre-right and right-wing coalition in power, Pou's new government introduced the controversial ‘Law for Urgent Consideration’.
This legislation intends to set the pace of an agenda focused on public security, fiscal austerity and investment gains. However, critics believe that this could be at the expense of basic freedoms and rights. The law aims to reform a wide range of issues, including broadening the power given to the police force during public demonstrations.
El proyecto que presenta el gobierno es un proyecto ómnibus que cuenta con más de 500 artículos. No es una ley ordinaria sino un paquete de leyes que aborda mas de 30 políticas públicas.
1/6 pic.twitter.com/mGfWeq4pGF
— Daniel Chasquetti (@Chasquetti) April 9, 2020
The bill proposed by the government is an omnibus bill with more than 500 articles. It is not an ordinary law but a package of laws that addresses more than 30 public policies.
The proposed bill, which was announced during the electoral campaign by then-candidate Lacalle Pou, was put to a debate where it drew enthusiasm from some and fear from others due to the potential depth and scope of these changes. The initial draft bill had 501 articles, but following weeks of negotiations between the coalition partners and objections over its unconstitutionality, the final document was reduced to 476 articles.
According to figures from the Uruguayan daily newspaper El País, the country’s murder rate rose by 46 percent and robberies increased by 53 percent from 2014 to 2019. In recent years, security has become the main source of concern amongst the general population. This only changed after the start of the pandemic, when health and unemployment became more important issues.
With this in mind, the controversial law’s proposed changes regarding security were one of the central pillars of the governing party’s election campaign. These changes include longer prison sentences for adults and young offenders and increased powers for the state security forces. For instance, the new law allows retired police and military officers to carry weapons, and the authorities can disband street demonstrations and remove people who are attempting to camp out overnight in public spaces. These reforms attracted criticism from experts and academics who consider the new public security policies to be regressive.
In addition to the above-mentioned changes to the country’s security policy, the law also sets out reforms relating to financial inclusion, education, health, and the economy.
On July 8, the Chamber of Senators approved the final bill by 18 votes out of 31 following a debate that had officially begun on April 23 during the most uncertain weeks of the pandemic. The law came into force on July 24 and some of its legal precepts began to take effect, although there are still doubts among law enforcers and some points have still not been put into practice.
Criticism of the new law can be split into two different categories. On the one hand, the law’s detractors have voiced disapproval at the entire process due to its lack of transparency and its ‘constitutional weaknesses’. People have also condemned the urgency of the draft bill in the midst of the COVID-19 outbreak and the hurried parliamentary approval, which took place within a total of 90 days across both Chambers. This did not allow enough time for an in-depth debate on the issues involved.
Secondly, critics also focused on the content of the law and paid particular attention to certain restrictions imposed on free speech. The Uruguayan NGO CAinfo (Centre for Archives and Access to Public Information) published a report in May challenging six articles that give the police greater discretion to dissolve peaceful protests and to access private information without a court order in cases of suspected criminal activity.
Similarly, Edison Lanza, who until October of this year was Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, sent a letter to the Uruguayan government in April criticising the articles related to restrictions on peaceful protests. He also pointed out that the articles relating to the ‘right to be forgotten’ could be used as an indirect method of censorship, given that private individuals and companies would be able to remove information posted on the Internet that is damaging to their reputation.
For example, a journalistic investigation could be published that may harm the interests of a private individual. A link to that article could appear following a web search of that individual. In time, that private individual could ask a judge to remove that information or to order the search engine to remove that link because that news could have a negative effect. In this case, the right to be forgotten does not have so much to do with the protection of privacy and personal data, but rather with the right to one’s image or reputation. It can also come into conflict with the right of access to information since that person who is written about may be of public interest.
Edison Lanza spoke at a virtual forum in June that was organised by Uruguay's University of the Republic. During the forum, Lanza expressed his concerns “that Uruguay, as one of the few countries in the region that is ranked among the world’s 20 “full democracies”, is putting some of its citizens’ freedoms at risk with this reform.”
Following both chambers’ approval of the law in July, the Broad Front’s Political Bureau, alongside groups such as the Intersocial Feminista and the PIT-CNT trade union, spurred a signature collection campaign in October. They aim to hold a referendum to repeal certain articles of the Urgent Consideration Law, primarily those that give greater powers to the police force. In order to hold this referendum and to set a date, the organisers need to gather a number of signatures equal to 25 percent of the voting population, which amounts to around 550,000 eligible voters.
In any case, the Urgent Consideration Law marks a turning point in Uruguay. While voices of support for the ruling party are using the law as a way to increase the effectiveness of the government and reflect a legitimate change in the country’s new political landscape, many in the opposition see it as a reversal of the progress that had been made by the Broad Front.

author: Juan Manuel Montoro


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COVID-19 infects Japan’s ‘kanji of the year’ · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

The Chinese character (kanji) “mitsu” (密) has been named the kanji that best symbolizes the year 2020 for Japan. The kanji is unveiled each year at historic Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto. Screencap from FNN official YouTube channel.
After a year dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic, Japan has chosen 密 (mitsu) as the kanji (Chinese character) of the year.
While literally translated as “secret,” the character 密, in this case, can mean “close, crowded or confined,” and refers to the “three mitsus” (三密) that make up the basic public health response to COVID-19 in Japan.
The “3 Cs” (三密) that have guided Japan's basic public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Image by the Government of Japan, CC-BY 4.0.
In English, the three mitsus are known as the “three Cs”, meaning “crowded places,” “closed spaces” and “close-contact settings” — the three things people are advised to avoid in order to contain the spread of COVID-19.
Every year, the Japanese Kanji Proficiency Society (財団法人日本漢字能力検定協会) designates a kanji of the year based on the results of a nationwide poll. More than 208,000 people from around Japan voted on a list of kanji, and mitsu ranked first, with 28,401 ballots.
As translator Richard Medhurst notes, the character 密 appears in a variety of compound words that are related to “secrecy”:
So 密 is the kanji of the year. 3 mitsu aside, it's pretty versatile – here's a “secrecy”-related selection.
密輸（みつゆ）= smuggling
密猟（みつりょう） = poaching
密航者（みっこうしゃ）= stowaway
密教（みっきょう）= esoteric Buddhism
— Richard Medhurst ? ?? (@RichardMedh) December 14, 2020
[How each word is pronounced]
密輸（mitsuyu) = smuggling
密猟（mitsuryu) = poaching
密航者（mikkosha) = stowaway
密教（mikkyo) = esoteric Buddhism
Other popular kanji nominees included 禍 (ka, calamity), 病 (yamai, sickness) and 新 (shin, new, as in “new coronavirus”).
Not everyone was focused on the negative parts of 2020 when selecting a representative kanji for the year. In a separate survey, Japanese elementary school students chose characters that represented the positive aspects of the past year, such as being able to attend school or spend time with friends when early quarantine efforts were relaxed in Japan in late spring.
Japanese elementary school students picked 笑 (shō/warau), meaning “laugh” or “smile,” as the top kanji of 2020.https://t.co/CnIOhNumEc
— Nippon.com (@nippon_en) December 21, 2020
Compared to other countries, Japan has generally been considered to have kept COVID-19 under control this year, in part due to the community response. However, in late fall and early winter, COVID-19 cases have risen and have remained stubbornly high in some parts of Japan, leading some medical groups to declare an unofficial “state of emergency” in December as hospital capacity has become stretched.
In mid-December, the Japanese central government announced plans to suspend a popular program that boosted tourism by subsidizing travel and accommodations in Japan. The plan will be suspended from December 28 to January 11, when millions of Japanese people typically travel from major cities back to their regional and rural hometowns.
Japanese prime minister Suga Yoshihide also implored people to avoid close contact with others — in other words “mind the 3 Cs.” However, Suga, whose popularity had already plummeted since succeeding Abe Shinzo as prime minister in September, received even more criticism in December after it was discovered he enjoyed a steak dinner with other politicians.
The meal directly contradicted the government's instructions to avoid gathering in small groups, and Suga was forced to respond to critics and explain himself.
Writing for Bloomberg, Japan correspondent Gearoid Reidy shared his own take on what words best express how the year 2020 is ending for the Japanese prime minister.
Will the prime minister prove to be FLASH IN THE PAN and end up with his goose COOKED as he faces a GRILLING over this HALF-BAKED dinner party? Is the HEAT ABOUT TO BE TURNED UP or will things SIMMER DOWN?https://t.co/Yd6G9VcXWu
— Gearoid Reidy (@GearoidReidy) December 16, 2020

author: Nevin Thompson


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Crackdown against journalist and activists mars Human Rights Day in the Philippines · Global Voices
Karlo Mongaya

Journalist Lady Ann Salem, who was arrested by police along with six other activists on Human Rights Day. Photo by Manila Today, a content partner of Global Voices, used with permission.
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has repeatedly expressed his scorn for human rights in his public speeches, calling rights activists ‘enemies of the state’ and threatening to allow the police to shoot them dead. As if to stress the Duterte government’s utter contempt for human rights, on International Human Rights Day, police operatives arrested a journalist and six labor union activists in their Metro Manila homes on allegedly trumped-up charges of possessing weapons.
At about 3:00 AM on December 10, activist Diane Zapata issued an alert on Facebook about an ongoing police raid on her home in Quezon City by the police. She said her partner Denisse Velasco, a labor union organizer for Defend Jobs Philippines, was being accosted by police.
Later, at around 9:00 AM, Manila Today editor Lady Ann “Icy” Salem and Rodrigo Esparago, an organizer of contractual workers under the Sandigang Manggagawa ng Quezon City (SMQC) were arrested by police in Salem’s condo unit in Mandaluyong City. Salem is a member of independent media network Altermidya and the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, which have both been red-tagged by authorities. She is also a communications officer for the International Association of Women in Radio and Television.
WATCH: “Isang oras kami nakatalikod habang tinatanim ang ebidensya”. Journalist Lady Ann Salem speaks to reporters after her inquest proceeding at the Mandaluyong RTC. pic.twitter.com/8xcxVHSCWh
— AlterMidya (@altermidya) December 11, 2020
“We were forced to turn our backs for one hour while evidence was being planted.”
Unionists Romina Astudillo, Jaymie Gregorio, and Mark Ryan Cruz were also arrested in their residence in Quezon City. The three are labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno-Metro Manila's Regional Council members with Astudillo serving as the group’s Deputy Secretary. As the day wore on, information about the 2:00 AM arrest of Solidarity for Labor Rights and Welfare organizer Joel Demate also surfaced.
The seven have since been referred to collectively by rights advocates and civil society organizations as the “Human Rights Day 7” and the hashtag #FreeHRDay7 has been used to call for their immediate release from detention.
The Human Rights Day protest, traditionally held every December 10 to commemorate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, became an occasion to condemn the latest round of arrests. Braving threats of violent police dispersal, thousands joined a protest march to the gates of the Presidential Palace on the historic Mendiola bridge on Human Rights Day to condemn the Duterte government’s demonization and trampling of human rights.
Protesters poke Duterte's effigy pic.twitter.com/lxceSVuNY8
— Bulatlat (@bulatlat) December 10, 2020
According to authorities, the seven were arrested as part of concerted operations by the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group to clampdown on loose firearms and criminal gangs. Police claim to have found assorted guns, explosives, and ammunition in their homes. But a few days later, authorities pivoted as the National Task Force to End the Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) accused the seven of being top armed communist cadres that have infiltrated the national capital. The NTF-ELCAC is a body created by virtue of Duterte’s 2018 Executive Order 70 to coordinate the efforts of government agencies for its counterinsurgency campaign against a now 52-year-old communist rebellion.
All seven, however, contend that the firearms, explosives, and ammunition were planted by the authorities to justify their arrest. They assert being denied legal counsel during their arrest and being forced to turn their backs while the police searched their residences. A lawyer group has observed a pattern of authorities charging activists with illegal possession of weapons, noting that these are “easy to plant” and are in fact “monopolized by the police and military.”
For example, peasant organizer Amanda Echanis was arrested on December 2 with her 1-month-old child in Baggao, Cagayan Valley in the Northern Philippines on the same manufactured charges of weapons possession. The same happened to Frenchie Cumpio, Executive Director of independent news site Eastern Vista based in the Central Philippine island of Leyte, who was arrested along with four other rights activists on February 7.
An important backdrop to the arrests is the practice by the Duterte government of “red-tagging” or the branding of dissenters and activists as “communist-terrorists” to justify their suppression through arrests or extrajudicial killing. Political repression not only puts some of the most vocal critics of the government on the defensive but is also seen as a diversion of public attention away from the worsening economic crisis and the government's incompetent pandemic and disaster responses. The drastic narrowing of democratic spaces in the Philippines is underscored by the recent passage of a draconian anti-terror law, assaults on media freedom, and an overall climate of impunity.
In his first United Nations General Assembly appearance on September 23, Duterte delivered a 20-minute speech where he vowed to uphold human rights while in the same breath condemning those he claims have been “weaponizing” human rights against his administration. But the unprecedented crackdown on activists belie this as mere lip service and have spurred widespread condemnation and calls for the release of political prisoners under Duterte.
Duterte, you left us for dead during the storms. So now, we have come to storm the palace.#FreeHRDay7#StopTheAttacks
Today is International Human Rights Day, and despite the people's strong pushback — the State has arrested seven activists and planted firearms, explosives, pic.twitter.com/Re5yQOWXMJ
— Mitzi Jonelle Tan ? #FightClimateInjustice (@mitzijonelle) December 10, 2020
Why would any of them, living and working in Manila, Mandaluyong & Quezon City, have guns & grenades in their homes or offices?
Can’t recall the last time unionists & journalists staged an armed uprising in Metro Manila.
Oh… never.#FREEHRDAY7#STOPTHEATTACKS pic.twitter.com/RtAwX74xui
— Sonny Africa (@sonnyafrica) December 12, 2020
This youth rep joins the Global Day of Action calling for #FreeHRDay7! Stop the attacks against trade union organizers, human rights defenders, and journalists! Defend our right to speak out and demand accountability. WE DESERVE BETTER! #StopTheKillingsPH #StopTheAttacks pic.twitter.com/Q9QV7KfGIB
— Sarah Elago (@sarahelago) December 21, 2020
TINGNAN: Nagsasama-sama ang iba't ibang progresibong grupo ngayon sa Commission on Human Rights upang ipanawagan ang agad na pagpapalaya sa pitong inaresto noong Human Rights Day. #FreeHRDay7 #FreeAllPoliticalPrisoners
Mga larawan mula sa @kilusangmayouno pic.twitter.com/YGkqBbYrec
— Philippine Collegian (@phkule) December 21, 2020
LOOK: Various progressive groups are at the Commission on Human Rights [on December 21] to call for the immediate release of the seven arrested on Human Rights Day. Photos from Kilusang Mayo Uno.

author: Karlo Mongaya


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New height of Mount Everest announced just as Nepal reopens its tourism sector · Global Voices
Benju Lwagun

Mount Everest. Image from Flickr by Christopher Michel. CC BY 2.0
After more than a decade of dispute and controversy over the true height of Mount Everest, the world's tallest mountain has a new official elevation: 8,848.86 metres, or 86 centimeters taller than previously thought.
The new measurement was jointly announced by Nepal and China, the two countries that abut its tallest ridge, via a virtual press conference on December 8. Teams from both countries carried out the measurement exercise.
Geologists had previously speculated that Nepal's 2015 earthquake could have caused Everest to shrink, which is now confirmed to have not been the case.
Given that the COVID-19 pandemic has shut down tourism in Nepal since March, the announcement was timely, as the country is slowly beginning to reopen to tourists.
Over 16 percent of Nepal's visitors come for the purpose of mountaineering since the country boasts eight of the ten highest mountains in the world.
The national survey departments of Nepal and China began the Everest height measurement project in 2017. Measuring a mountain is not easy as it requires state-of-the-art instruments and appropriate survey techniques. The exercise took three years to complete, as there are many factors that impact upon measurement efforts, including adverse weather, the elevations of rocks at the summit, ice levels and other environmental challenges.
Prior to this collaboration, height measurement tasks were typically conducted by teams from other countries, including Italy, New Zealand, India, and the United States.
It is a proud moment for Nepal. As soon as the news was announced, Nepalese netizens and mountain lovers expressed their happiness on social media:
Mount Everest’s new height is 8848.86 meters, announced by the authorities. May the aspiration of every Nepali grow to excel as the height of the majestic Everest! pic.twitter.com/Eb6c32j9Li
— muksam labung (@Muksam1) December 10, 2020
Twitter user Love Joshi, a teacher from Kathmandu, saw parallels between the mountain's new height and the need to uplift the people of the country:
My. Everest New-height is 8848.86 meters. Now we need to increase the height of Nepal and her people. pic.twitter.com/fvzgjPwmqE
— Love Joshi (@love_joshi25) December 9, 2020
Deependra Shah, a Nepali expat living in Italy, joked about the 86-centimeter increase:
Person who climb the Mount Everest will be climbing new height at 8848.46m breaking old record at 8848m.
— Deependra Shah (@Adinfinitumz) December 9, 2020
This recent collaboration has strengthened ties between China and Nepal. In 2019, China's president Xi Jinping visited Nepal, 23 years after the former president had paid the last state visit. The two governments have since signed 18 Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) and two letters of exchange for various sectors, including agriculture, commerce, manufacturing, and transport.
Nepal shares borders with both India and China, so many social media users have been observing its relationship with both countries, which is widely held to have strategic importance.
Over the years, India's increasing interference in Nepal has been criticized widely. The differences between the two countries further widened when Nepal's cabinet released a new map in May 2020 placing Limpiyadhura-Kalapani-Lipulekh within its border. The consequent border disputes created a rift between the countries as both claimed the territory as their own.
In recent times, India has made some efforts towards reconciliation. Some experts believe that this is a deliberate effort of India in order to prevent the closeness between Nepal and China.
One Twitter user noted:
The geopolitical significance of Everest’s change in height
China & Nepal ended a dispute and bolstered ties by adding 86cm to the height of the world’s highest peak
But India is unlikely to be happy about Beijing cozying up to another of its neighbors https://t.co/FlQmFZsMII
— Saul of United (@Viatcheslavsos3) December 13, 2020
From trekking in the Himalayas to cultural attractions, Nepal offers a wide range of thrilling experiences for tourists.
As many as 1.17 million international travelers visited the country in 2019. Earlier this year, Nepal ran several promotional campaigns around the world to encourage tourism, which came to naught because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The country's tourism industry has been one of the hardest-hit sectors, as people limit their outdoor activities and cancel their travel plans. These restrictions have led to massive layoffs in Nepal's tourism industry.
To help it recover, the government of Nepal is gearing up to welcome tourists once again. Although the country has eased some travel restrictions — visitors must have a valid visa and a negative COVID-19 report obtained no more than 72 hours prior to entry, and follow all health and security protocols advised by the government — the land borders remain closed.
Still, tour operators are welcoming the opportunity:
8 Everest Mountain flight today. #hopeful #nepaltourism
— Aroma Nepal Treks (@AromaNepalTreks) December 19, 2020
In anticipation of new tourist arrivals, the infrastructure of many destinations has been upgraded, and new projects are being planned. Some, however, were quick to remind social media users of the positive impacts of the COVID-19 travel restrictions.
The blog Everest Today tweeted:
Remember that viral picture of Mt Everest during lockdown? Once again, today, crystal clear sky makes Everest visible from Kathmandu. More: https://t.co/Bku12KOA8S pic.twitter.com/EjsOWZrL4n
— Everest Today (@EverestToday) October 30, 2020
The anticipated increase in tourists is expected to boost the Nepali economy and help the country recover from the pandemic-induced economic downturn. Perhaps Everest's additional 86 centimeters will help push the destination to the top of travelers’ bucket lists.

author: Benju Lwagun


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European NGO uncovers 15-year Indian disinformation campaign · Global Voices
Annam Lodhi

Photo by Tim Samuel from Pexels, used under a Pexels license.
A group has been propagating pro-India disinformation through 750 media sites across 550 domain names for the past 15 years, according to a new report by Brussels-based NGO EU Disinfo Lab.
The report uncovered the activities of a Delhi-based network called Srivastava Group. Led by Ankit Srivatsava, the group was involved in the purchase of more than 400 domain names using his private or organisational email addresses. The report also claims the group has also been impersonating prominent NGOs and scholars.
The report alleges that Indian news agency Asian News International (ANI) has been playing a massive role in disseminating the disinformation network's material. The articles published on the dummy news websites were quoted as credible reports by ANI from the European media, and were picked and reproduced without fact-checking by Indian media and news channels.
[..]The coverage—and often distortion—by ANI of the content produced in Brussels and Geneva led us to the Big News Network and the World News Network—an entire network of 500+ fake local media in 95 countries that have helped reproduce negative iterations about Pakistan (or China)[..]
Asian News International is considered one of the biggest news agencies in India and the largest television agency of India and it allegedly has close ties with the Indian government. The Caravan magazine reports that in recent times, Smita Prakash, the editor of ANI, has been praised by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s leaders and supporters as a beacon of hope for independent journalism.
In 2019, EU Disinfo Lab had already uncovered over 265 pro-India sites operating across 65 countries. These sites that are collectively named as “Indian Chronicles” by EU DisInfo Lab have been primarily used to produce and catalyse content to undermine Pakistan and other countries, and serve Indian interests on an international level.
EU Disinfo Lab says this is the “largest network” of disinformation they have ever uncovered.
According to the newest report, these think tanks and NGOs linked with the Srivatsava Group lobbied and spoke during UN side events in Geneva and even organized protests. The network was also allegedly used to spread rhetoric against China and influence decision-making at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and the European Parliament.
Screenshot from the EU Disinfo Lab report, used under Fair Use.
The news has unleashed a new war of narratives between India and Pakistan.
Srivastava Group is the same conglomerate that had arranged, with support from a dubious NGO Women’s Economic and Social Think-Tank (WESTT), a visit of far-right Members of the European Parliament to the Indian-administered Kashmir last year after it was put under a lockdown.
Meanwhile, ANI's editor Smita Prakash tweeted accusing Pakistan and its “proxies” of trying to discredit ANI's credibility:
An attempt has been made by Pakistan & its proxies to hurt ANI's credibility by hurling wild accusations of fake news. Our partners and subscribers fully understand the politics that is behind all this, and continue to repose faith in the depth reach & credibility of our coverage
— Smita Prakash (@smitaprakash) December 11, 2020
The researchers concluded that their findings “should serve as a call to action for decision-makers to put in place a relevant framework to sanction actors abusing international institutions”.
No evidence was provided of whether the network was linked to the Indian government. Though the investigation has not provided any direct evidence of the role of Indian intelligence, an investigative report by Indian news outlet The Caravan has hinted at this.
The report uncovered an entire network of coordinated UN-accredited NGOs promoting Indian interests and criticising Pakistan repeatedly. We could tie at least 10 of them directly to the Srivastava family, with several other dubious NGOs pushing the same messages. (…)
(…) Indian Chronicles effectively benefited from the track record of these organisations while pursuing their own agenda: discrediting Pakistan and promoting Indian interests at UN conferences and hearings. (…)
Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan was quick to comment on Twitter after the report's release:
Pakistan has consistently drawn attention of int community to India's subversive activities to undermine democracies in the region; & export/fund extremism through structures of fake news orgs & “think tanks”. Recently GoP provided dossier to UN of India's state terrorism in Pak
— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) December 10, 2020
Khan asserted that the international community needs to “take notice of a rogue Indian regime” that now threatens “the stability of the global system.”
On December 12, Pakistan called upon the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to immediately begin “investigation and delisting of the 10 fake NGOs created by India to malign Pakistan”.
Pakistan’s Foreign Affairs Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi told reporters in a press conference that they have called upon the UN to create processes that ensure that the international system is not manipulated through such influence operations.
India, on the other hand, has slammed the report. Nasir Aziz Khan, central spokesperson of the United Kashmir People’s National Party (UKPNP) claimed that the reports are being used by Pakistan to divert attention from real issues. In a media briefing, Anurag Srivastava, a spokesperson of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) accused Pakistan of circulating fabricated dossiers:
In fact, if you are looking at disinformation, the best example is the country next door which is circulating fictional and fabricated dossiers and purveys a regular stream of fake news.
On November 23, India provided a dossier accusing fighters from Pakistan of attempting an attack in the disputed Kashmir region to some UN Security Council (UNSC) members.
A day later, Pakistan responded by sending their own dossier to the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres accusing India of stoking “terrorism” in Pakistan.

author: Annam Lodhi


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Why Macron’s tweet on the Serbian Patriarch’s death angered so many people in the Balkans · Global Voices
Mirza Hota

Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić holding a speech at the funeral of Serbian Patriarch Irinej in Belgrade on November 22, 2020. Publicity photo by Presidency of Serbia/Dimitrije Goll. Use permitted.
French President Emmanuel Macron´s tweet expressing his condolences to Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić “and all Serbs” upon hearing of the death of Serbian Orthodox Church Patriarch Irinej because of COVID-19, set off an online backlash.
Позвао сам председника Александра Вучића да му изразим саучешће по сазнању тужне вести о одласку патријарха Иринеја. Француска се придружује свим Србима у жалости.
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) November 20, 2020
I phoned president Aleksandar Vucic to express condolences after I received the grave news about the departure of Patriarch Irinej. France joins all Serbs in their mourning.
His critics demanded consistency with Macron's openly stated positions against religious extremism which is known to fuel hatred and if unchecked, leads to violence, as shown by the Yugoslav Wars in the 1990s.
People in the Western Balkans and beyond were perplexed as to how was it possible for someone who claimed to defend secular, enlightened values in Europe to invest France's institutional political capital into association with a figure who, along with the Serbian Orthodox Church, had come to symbolize everything that is backwards, deeply socially conservative and racist about Serbian society.
Today, thousands gathered in Belgrade to pay their final respects to Serbian Patriarch Irinej, who succumbed to COVID-19 on Friday. His casket was covered in plexiglass and occasionally sprayed with disinfectant.
Here's a ?on his controversial legacy.https://t.co/xuo2Rcrw1A
— Una Hajdari (@UnaHajdari) November 21, 2020
A large number of Bosniaks, Albanians, Croats and even some Serbs on Twitter also pointed to the fact that Patriarch Irinej was a notorious genocide denier, a supporter of convicted war criminals army general Ratko Mladić and former president of Republika Srpska Radovan Karadžić, and had claimed that the 2017 genocide verdict for the Serb general was “the devil´s work, by the world´s powerful.” Mladić was found to be guilty of—among other things—the crime of genocide, for ordering the execution of over 8,000 Bosniak civilians, mostly men and boys, after the fall of Srebrenica.
concept: maybe a president who considers himself liberal shouldn't mourn an assadist, a homophobe, and a man who refused to take action against pedophilia in his church https://t.co/WHVJgSEzbN
— Oskar ???? (@bmfhnoenb) November 24, 2020
While Patriarch Irinej´s rhetoric was not as bellicose as that of his war-time predecessor Patriarch Pavle, he was a clear supporter of Greater Serbian nationalism and irredentism. It was evident that the Serbian Orthodox Church during his time in power did nothing to distance itself from the Greater Serbia ideology. The Patriarch himself repeated publicly the mantra that “wherever Serbs lived, be it in Serbia, Bosnia, Vojvodina or Montenegro, or other places, that is Serbia.”
The Serbian Orthodox Church has a long history of supporting Greater Serbian ideology. Irinej´s predecessor openly supported the Serb war effort in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Kosovo. As well as giving shelter to, and promoting war criminals like Milan Lukić, one of the most notorious mass murderers during the Bosnian genocide. In 2011, the Serbian Orthodox Church held a book launch in Belgrade´s biggest church, the Cathedral of St Sava to promote Lukić´s book. In 2012, Lukić was sentenced to life in prison for his role in massacres that had resulted in the deaths of over 100 people.
In fact, the role of the Serbian Orthodox Church in fanning the flames of nationalism and ethnic hatred was so transparent that in 1995 it sued three French newspapers; Libération, Le Monde and Le Figaro for articles accusing the Orthodox Church of supporting ethnic cleansing, war crimes and genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Church lost its case in the French court. Serbian-American historian and religious scholar Michael A. Sells wrote in his 1998 book: The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and Genocide in Bosnia:
“The violence in Bosnia was a religious genocide in several senses: the people destroyed were chosen on the basis of their religious identity; those carrying out the killings acted with the blessing and support of Christian church leaders, the violence was grounded in a religious mythology that characterised the targeted people as race traitors and the extermination of them as a sacred act.”
In June 2019, the Patriarch met with Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. According to Balkan Insight Irinej praised Bashar al-Assad on his “principled stand” of refusing to recognize the independence of Kosovo, as well as Assad comparing Syria to Serbia, claiming that what both countries “have been exposed to in terms of foreign interference and attempts to undermine their sovereignty and undermine their social fabric” constitute good reasons for their relationship and co-operation.
The Patriarch, of course, did not mention the well-documented industrial-scale mass atrocities committed by Bashir al-Assad's army as well as Russian and Iranian forces, including chemical weapons attacks on civilians, carpet bombing of cities, barrel bombs, and concentration camps. He also failed to mention the presence of Serb mercenaries and volunteers fighting for Assad. As was reported by Balkan Insight in 2016, many Serb fighters were simply transferred from Ukraine, where they fought against the Ukrainian government, to Syria.
In 2014, Patriarch Irinej also weighed in on the then-upcoming Belgrade Pride parade as “the tip of the immoral iceberg” by saying that he “felt sorry for those people who belong to the so-called gay population.” He promoted discrimination and disinformation that dehumanizes LGBTQ people by adding:
“It is a disorder or deviation of human nature. I can understand them, as well as their problem, but I cannot understand why they impose this problem unto us or try to show it off publicly.”
Irinej was also opposed to stricter rules for churchgoers during the outbreak of COVID-19. He is on record as saying that he believed that the methods used as liturgical instruments to distribute Holy Communion in Eastern Orthodoxy, including glasses and spoons needing to be cleaned after each person, were not in line with Church tradition, that it was something new that was not compatible with the faith. That led to footage of Serb Orthodox faithful across the Western Balkans receiving Holy Communion with the priests using a single spoon or glass, and this was at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak.
This prompted some commentators to point out that the Serbian Orthodox Church was above the law of the land and was risking the lives of its followers and everyone else who came into contact with them, simply because of their unwillingness to break with tradition even when faced with a pandemic.
That unwillingness killed Irinej as well as his counterpart in Montenegro, Metropolitan Amfilohije Radović who also died from COVID-19. Patriarch Irinej attended the open-casket funeral of Metropolitan Radović along with a large crowd inside the church, with almost nobody wearing masks and with mourners kissing the deceased cleric's hands and forehead, according to custom.
Likely reasons for Macron´s gesture include appeasing Russia, which is often promoted in the Balkans as chief ally and protector of Serbia and the Orthodox Christianity among the Slavs. Analysts examining his new approach to Russia, the so-called reset, inaugurated in July 2020, expressed concern that it might involve abandoning the Western Balkans to Russia, as it traditionally views the Balkans as its sphere of influence. The Serbian Orthodox Church is a key element in facilitating Russian influence in the Balkans with its long history of supporting the Kremlin agenda.
That notion also explains Macron's interview with The Economist last year and his outrageous and debunked comments about Bosnia and Herzegovina as a jihadist “ticking time bomb” in the Balkans, which drew criticism about structural Islamophobia. Added to that were his comments about Albania and North Macedonia and his subsequent veto against EU accession negotiations for the two Western Balkan countries.
Another reason might be appeasing the French right and far-right voters. As CNN pointed out at the end of November, “Macron is following a well worn path of French presidents.” Their skepticism about EU expansion through admitting countries from Eastern Europe, particularly those with large Muslim populations, dovetail with Macron´s desire to appease Russia and be re-elected with the support of domestic right-leaning voters.

author: Mirza Hota


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From COVID-19 to Caribbean literature, this is what the region looked like in 2020 · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

COVID-19 illustration by Prachatai on Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
COVID-19 was undoubtedly the topic that dominated news headlines this year. In the Caribbean, however, the pandemic served to exacerbate already existing issues, including societal inequities and gender-based violence — but it also allowed regional netizens the space to create and reimagine their collective future.
Here's a recap of some of our most engaging stories of 2020…
From travel bans to declining tourism, the Caribbean — like the rest of the world — was forced to readjust in an attempt to stay safe from the virus.
Several Caribbean countries initially closed their borders (some, like Trinidad and Tobago's, remain closed), and regional governments began imposing quarantine restrictions.
Behavioural changes were slow to take hold, however. Jamaica encountered problems with overcrowding in public shopping areas, and there were several reports of the police breaking up parties in Trinidad and Tobago, even as public health regulations limited congregating in large numbers. The inconsistencies guiding such police actions contributed to online discourse questioning whether there was a double standard at play in the enforcement of COVID-19 protocols.
The ripple effects of COVID-19 restrictions — economic and otherwise — soon began to take effect. Trinidad and Tobago, for instance, experienced a rise in reports of domestic violence during the country's initial lockdown period, and the economic gap seemed all the wider once school went online, leaving many students without access.
Just as in a war, the battle against COVID-19 was full of advances and retreats, including the early cancellation of Trinidad and Tobago Carnival 2021.
The pandemic also brought out people's creativity, however, both in the kitchen and via an online extempo initiative in which singers and musicians sent messages of safety and solidarity. One regional netizen even began applying design thinking to the question of how the Caribbean can best prepare for a post-COVID-19 world.
Following the May 25 murder of George Floyd, an African-American man, at the hands of police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the United States-based Black Lives Matter movement was thrust into the global spotlight.
In the Caribbean, Floyd's death raised important questions of the region's own deeply-rooted racism and colonial legacy.
The #BLM movement inspired — across the region — calls to remove statuary that many felt robbed Caribbean people of the right to tell their own history. In Barbados, these efforts culminated in the official removal of a statue of British naval officer Horatio Nelson for his role in the transatlantic slave trade.
From Jamaica to the north of the archipelago to Trinidad and Tobago at the south, there were also calls for greater police accountability and prison reform.
While there were several missteps with businesses trying to capitalise on the public interest created around the #BLM movement, there were also attempts at discussion around race.
In Guyana, however, after a long and drawn-out elections impasse, in which the incumbent government, predominantly appealing to Afro-Guyanese voters, was accused of trying to rig the results in its favour and keep out the opposition People's Progressive Party (PPP) — which has a primarily Indo-Guyanese support base — from office, ethnic tensions were rife, culminating with the brutal murder of two young men.
After its own bitterly contested election, many social media users suggested that Trinidad and Tobago's own racist underbelly was on display.
#BlackLivesMatter also helped catapult the region's right to slavery reparations into the international spotlight. Buoyed by the success of The University of the West Indies signing a historic GBP 20 million ($24,308,500 United States dollars) reparations agreement with the University of Glasgow in 2019, the Caribbean continued to make its case for why reparations are necessary.
As the pandemic put regional concerns into sharper focus, one of the most pressing continues to be the environment. It is a cause regional social media users rallied around this year, from the celebration of Earth Day to the recognition of World Environment Day.
There were several encouraging milestones when it came to championing the environment, from the passing of Belize's Fisheries Resources Bill, hailed as “a model for how to manage marine resources,” to the vibrant youth activism against proposed limestone quarrying in an ecologically sensitive area of Jamaica.
Activism also triumphed when it came to raising public awareness about the environmental threat posed by a listing Venezuelan oil tanker anchored in the Caribbean Sea.
Even as Jamaican environmentalist and author Diana McCaulay's wrote a dystopian novel that warned of what the region, and the world, may look like in the future as a result of the climate crisis, there were glimmers of hope that the Caribbean could help to overcome such a fate.
Violence against women and children continued to plague the headlines from the start of 2020.
Some activists made the link between violence and how Caribbean cultures regard and treat women, calling sexism “one of the most dangerous biases.”
Trinidadian comedian Simmy De Trini used online platforms like Facebook to turn such gender bias on its head, while writer and university lecturer Amilcar Sanatan drilled down into the ways in which Caribbean men are socialised and how they can help end the violence.
The region's literary talent was a bright spot in 2020 — the year that the Bocas Lit Fest, well regarded as the Caribbean's premier literary festival, celebrated its tenth anniversary. Just as the pandemic hit, Bocas published its longlist for the 2020 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, and also kept cooped-up netizens occupied by crowdsourcing “the 100 Caribbean books that made us.”
Founder of the Bocas Lit Fest, Marina Salandy-Brown, was also awarded an honorary fellowship of the Royal Society of Literature for helping to bring Caribbean literature to the world.
Caribbean authors experienced great successes this year too, with many of them being nominated for — and winning — international literary prizes.
Global Voices had the pleasure of featuring quite a few of them, including Roger Robinson, Ingrid Persaud, and Brian Heap.
Finally, the Caribbean bade farewell to many of its greats this year.
Barbados lost three major luminaries, each in different fields of endeavour: poet Kamau Bathwaite, cricketing legend Everton Weekes and former prime minister Owen Arthur.
Within just five months of each other, Trinidad and Tobago lost the cultural bastions of brothers Tony and Dennis Hall, and Jamaica mourned the passing of pioneering reggae singer/songwriter “Toots” Hibbert, whose death was widely reported as being COVID-19 related.

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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Is the honeymoon over for Beijing and Hong Kong’s Carrie Lam? · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Screen capture from RTHK's video report on HK senior officials’ allegiance pledge led by Chief Executive Carrie Lam
Hong Kong’s pro-Beijing camp is revolting against Chief Executive Carrie Lam, using the city’s failure to contain the COVID-19 outbreak as a pretext.
As of December 22, Hong Kong, a city of 7 million people, has had 8,238 confirmed COVID-19 cases since March and 132 deaths. Since mid-November, the city has seen an increase in daily cases from an average of 10 to about 100.
When compared with cities such as London, New York, and Tokyo, the control of the outbreak could be considered outstanding, but Beijing expects to see a “zero case” victory, similar to what has been achieved in mainland Chinese cities.
On December 16, the former Chief Executive and current vice-chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (NCPPC) Leung Chun-Ying, slammed the inadequacy of Hong Kong's current anti-pandemic measures on his Facebook page, and argued that the city needed to conduct another universal testing program.
In September, the Hong Kong government spent about half a billion Hong Kong dollars on universal COVID-19 testing of the city's population. But the program was voluntary and fewer than 2 million people turned up for the screening which, in turn, identified only three dozen positive cases.
Pro-Beijing lawmakers echoed Leung's demand in the Legislature. However, Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan argues that universal COVID-19 testing, even if compulsory, can only be effective with stay-at-home orders, which is what has been done in China's cities. Chan also said that it is “just logically impossible” to lock up 7.5 million people for two to three weeks.
In a December 17 editorial, pro-Beijing newspaper Wen Wei Po also advocated for the importation of the China model to suppress Hong Kong's rising cases:
進行強制全民檢測、強制追蹤及對高風險區域進行封閉式隔離，在內地一再證明是有效控疫必不可缺的手段，但在本港始終不能落實，這些強制措施仍停留在探討階段，有專家至今還認為強制措施不可行…在香港的老辦法長期無效、內地清零全面成功的背景下，香港社會在特區政府領導下，要下定決心，堅定信心，定下清零目標，集中力量辦大事，將全民檢測的種種不可行變成可行。
Compulsory universal screening, compulsory tracking of people’s movement and lockdown of high-risk districts have been proven to be effective and inevitable measures to control the epidemic. After all this time, Hong Kong is still at the stage of exploring such compulsory measures and some experts still consider them inapplicable… [CY Leung pointed out] that the pandemic control measures in Hong Kong are inadequate, while the mainland has achieved a “zero-case” victory. The Hong Kong government should lead society to hit the “zero-case” target as well. Unite all the social and political forces and turn the inapplicable into applicable.
Meanwhile, the pro-democracy sector sees the criticisms about pandemic control directed at the Hong Kong government as a pretext to squeeze Carrie Lam out of the Chief Executive race in 2022.
Ngan Shu-kau, a current affair critic, is among them:
中共要求林鄭以大陸的野蠻抗疫為師，分明是強林鄭之所難。香港能像大陸那樣，發現一單新症，就封鎖整個小區嗎？比如說太古城有一宗個案，馬上四面八方路口都堵死，住客不准出入，外人不准來訪，每家限定一人一星期買一次菜，再不聽話，就把大廈門口用鋼板焊死，每家用竹籃垂吊來買餸？
首先，政府一時之間，不可能動員那麼多閒人來做這麼多額外的行政事務？就算請人，也未必請到這麼多人。其次，涉及這麼多家庭的生計和安全，政府有沒有法定權力去剝奪市民的自由？再次，封鎖會造成很多次生災難，有長期病患者失救，或加重封鎖區內的感染等等，政府會不會被追究法律責任？最後，若疫情不斷擴大，全香港停擺，造成的社會混亂經濟損失，又如何面對？…不幸的是，林鄭的權力來源正是中共，她聽話做不得，不聽話又不行，林鄭之死期近，理由在此。
看這形勢，從中央到香港本土，推倒林鄭之勢已成，大凡留一點情面，有事都會在內部解決，不會公諸於眾連一點顏面都不留給她。既然不惜大動員大批判，就是趕她走人的意思了。
The CCP’s demands of Carrie Lam, that she should adopt mainland China's barbaric control measures, has placed her in a difficult situation. Can Hong Kong follow mainland China’s practice to lockdown a residential district once it discovers a single case? For example, if Tai Koo City has one confirmed case, can the government block all the roads and forbid all residents from stepping out and visitors from stepping in? Can it demand all its residents to buy food and daily necessities once a week? And if they resist, will the authorities seal people's doors and ask them to pick up from baskets hanging in front of their apartments’ windows?
Can the government mobilise so many people to carry out the measures? Does the government have legitimate power to restrict people’s freedom? How about the collateral damage caused by the lockdown? Will the government be liable if someone dies during lockdown? How about the social chaos and the economic damage? (…) Unfortunately, Carrie Lam's power comes from the CCP—it is impossible for her to follow such orders in Hong Kong, but if she disobeys, she won’t be blessed. That’s why either way, she is doomed.
Considering the current circumstances, Carrie Lam will lose power. The problem could have been solved internally to save her face. Now that there is such coordinated public criticism, this is another way of forcing her to leave her position.
Speculations about Beijing’s loss of confidence in the Hong Kong leader emerged in mid-October after she abruptly deferred her policy address, reportedly because Beijing wanted to revise its content.
A month later, Beijing unseated four pro-democracy legislators, which triggered the collective resignation of all pro-democracy representatives from Hong Kong's Legislative Council—where Carrie Lam’s policy address was finally delivered, in a legislature with then no opposition voices.
In a late November interview with the South China Morning Post, Lam claimed that she had “regained her confidence” and was “back to her old self” to implement stricter anti-pandemic measures.
Two weeks later, amid the new round of the COVID-19 outbreak, Xi Jinping postponed his annual year-end meeting with Lam. She was the first Chief Executive since the handover of Hong Kong to China in 1997 to have this official trip canceled.
In an editorial on December 15, pro-Beijing online media outlet HK01, which had been questioning Lam's ability to run Hong Kong, interpreted Beijing’s unprecedented gesture as a sign of lost trust in Lam, suggesting that her failure to control the pandemic could have political consequences.

author: Oiwan Lam


text:
2020 round-up: How the tragedy of COVID-19 became a success story for the China model · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

The year 2020 began with the outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan and throughout most of it, the new disease was a widely discussed topic on Chinese social media. While critical and nuanced voices dominated the online discussion in the first two months of the pandemic, the discussion quickly gave way to a debate about the origin of the virus and positive narratives about China’s success in epidemic control.
A spoof image from the Stand News of Chinese vice premier Sun Chunlan's visit to a residential district in Wuhan during which residents yelled out from their apartment windows: “Fake, it is all fake,” “It is all formalistic [performance].”
When the unknown SARS-like virus was identified in Wuhan on December 8, 2019, Chinese authorities suppressed coverage of it, claiming that the disease provoked by it was non-transmissible among humans, and flagging any contradictory claims as fake news. The lunar new year celebrations, which usually involve big family gatherings, took place as scheduled until January 20, when Dr Zhong Nanshan, a prominent Chinese pulmonologist who discovered the first SARS coronavirus in 2003, spoke on China Central Television confirming that 14 medical workers in Wuhan were infected with the new virus.
Three days later, on January 23, Beijing announced the shutdown of the city of Wuhan. But it was too late, as more than five million Wuhan residents had left the city since early January.
Hong Kong was among the first regions outside mainland China to be affected by the outbreak. The public became frustrated with the government’s hesitation to block mainland visitors from travelling to Hong Kong. Still, the city's experience with the 2003 SARS outbreak, along with people's strict adherence to social distancing and semi-quarantine measures, have managed to successfully keep the epidemic under control throughout 2020.
As Wuhan was under complete lockdown and the majority of state-affiliated media outlets only reported on positive news about governments’ effort to control the spread of the epidemic, citizen reporters such as Chen Qiushi, diary writers such as feminist activists Guo Jing and Ai Xiaoming became the main sources for people to learn about the grassroots situation within the city.
Chinese social media was flooded with critical voices. A number of investigative reports from finance news outlet Caixin revealed that authorities had suppressed coverage of the outbreak, arrested whistleblowers, banned the disclosure of COVID-19 genome sequencing for at least two weeks, and censored related online discussions for more than one month.
The cover-up misled the World Health Organization, which delayed recommending countries worldwide ban travel from China—something that could have prevented the global spread of the outbreak.
The news about the death, by COVID-19, of Dr Li Wenliang, a frontline doctor who had been arrested by the Wuhan police and forced to sign a statement of regret for “spreading rumors” about the virus’ human transmissibility, set Chinese public opinion on fire. Many criticized the political system that suppressed freedom of the press and speech. Some even described the public awakening to the catastrophe as “China’s Chernobyl moment.”
But the upheaval was short-lived. All critical opinions questioning the authority of the Chinese Communist Party were deleted from social media. A massive number of social media groups and user accounts were removed. Citizen journalists, including Chen Qiushi, Fan Bing and Zhang Zhan were arrested. Diary writers such as prominent Chinese novelist Fang Fang were attacked by online patriots.
At the same time, positive energy was injected into social media, which was quickly taken over by stories about the failure of other countries to control the pandemic. State-owned news agency Xinhua went as far as to call for the world to thank China for its achievements in the fight against the novel coronavirus. Disinformation that claimed the new virus originated in countries other than China, such as the USA and Italy, also went viral on Chinese social media, in particular after the spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry endorsed the conspiracy theory.
Since then, successful stories about China’s medical assistance to other countries, economic growth and leading development of COVID-19 vaccines took over both mainstream and social media around the world. But some of those stories are false, including the distortion of a WHO scientist's remarks on the development of Chinese vaccines.
In Hong Kong, pro-Beijing politicians have been advocating for the implementation of a mandatory health code system similar to the mainland Chinese system which restricts individual access to public services according to a three-colored code. So far, a voluntary health code system has been implemented for the purpose of recording individual movement in public spaces, but it has not been used to restrict individual movement.
More recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping defended the adaptation of the Chinese health code system to restrict and monitor global travel, and many are worried that the normalization of epidemic surveillance measures will undermine human rights and eventually liberal and democratic culture.
It is worth noting that the most successful anti-pandemic story has come from Taiwan—a de-facto separate state from China after the civil war when the Kuomingtang was defeated by the Chinese Communist Party in the Chinese Civil War (1945-1950). While there are about 1-2 million Taiwanese living in China for business, work, and education purposes, the country had started taking preventive border control measures and alerted the public about the outbreak since early January, as its government had spotted the “rumors” circulating in China about the outbreak in December. After a small outbreak in spring, without tracking and restricting citizens’ health condition and movement, the country had zero local transmission cases for more than 250 days until a case was spotted on December 22.
Thus far, the country only has 749 recorded cases, and the majority have been imported cases. Yet, the WHO has continued to refuse to integrate Taiwan in its global fight against and prevention of the epidemic due to pressure from Beijing.
The China model of public health emergency response has successfully contained the outbreak, yet the massive tracking and restriction of people's movement has human rights consequences. Hence, many see the Taiwan model a more valuable reference to epidemic control.


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‘How do you live here?’ A local podcaster takes on misconceptions about eastern Ukraine · Global Voices
Maxim Edwards

Local administrative building in Slavyansk, eastern Ukraine. Photo (c): Nika Perepelitsa. Used with permission.
For the people of Slavyansk, “How do you live here?” is not an uncommon question.
Given the tragedies this eastern Ukrainian city has endured — economic collapse and occupation by pro-Russia separatists in 2014 — you can't blame those who ask it. But that they still do so in 2020 betrays some ignorance: life can be hard, but Slavyansk is no longer a warzone. While hardships endure, its residents have rebuilt a semblance of normal lives. Those young people who remain in Slavyansk are eager for their city to thrive, setting up several new cultural and civic initiatives in recent years. One of them is Nika Perepelitsa, the communications specialist for the civil society centre Drukarnia.
Perepelitsa saw this question as an opportunity to change outsiders’ narratives about her home town. It has become the title of her podcast, Как ты здесь живешь?, which she launched in February. Perepelitsa has since released eight episodes, in which she interviews residents of government-controlled eastern Ukraine — from young people at the forefront of its cultural life to foreigners who have unexpectedly made it their home.
Her interviews paint a picture of a region which is far from monochrome and passive. Her interviewees are those might answer that question, perhaps cautiously, with the words “with hope”.
I interviewed Perepelitsa about her inspiration for the podcast and her plans for its future. The interview has been edited for brevity.
Maxim Edwards (ME): Why did you choose such a striking name for your podcast? Have you been asked this question often?
Nika Perepelitsa (NP): The idea to name the podcast ‘How do you live here?’ did not come at random. For the past few years, people I met from other countries and other regions of Ukraine have always asked me that question upon finding out where I live. At some point, I heard the question so often that I could see the misunderstandings in their eyes — the misunderstandings of people who only know about Slavyansk from news reports of 2014 and continue to associate it with the war. But six years has already passed since the liberation of the city. Despite the fact that armed conflict still continues in other cities in eastern Ukraine, Slavyansk has changed for the better since 2014. That's how this project was born; the podcast unfolds around this very question. I speak with people from cities across eastern Ukraine about their life before and after 2014, asking why they planned to stay on, or whether they plan to return to their homeland.
ME: And what are the biggest misconceptions and prejudices about Slavyansk and eastern Ukraine in general? What hope is there that they can be changed?
NP: People don't fully know what the situation here is right now. Many are still too scared to travel to Slavyansk, where I live, or to Kramatorsk or Severodonetsk, believing all belong to a single, unsafe region, without looking more deeply into the local context. Everybody is used to hearing “Donbas” and thinking of war and danger. But that's not the case. There's a lot of prejudice: this is a depressed region whose people are unfriendly and never smile. I'm trying to shatter those stereotypes with my podcast, so I talk with engaged young people who work and live here, living by changing their city and other people's ideas of it. It's important for me to show that side of the city, focusing on its history (in Slavyansk there are many 19th century buildings; the city has always been mercantile rather than industrial, as people often assume about cities in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions). There are no mines here, there is no heavy industry. But there is a wonderful lakeside resort in Slavyansk which, sadly, is inoperative right now. So how can these stereotypes be fought? By saying more about the good things happening here, the initiatives which are underway, helping develop cultural life in Slavyansk and other cities in eastern Ukraine to national standards (that potential certainly exists).
Nika Perepelitsa in her hometown of Slavyansk, eastern Ukraine. Photo (c): Nika Perepelitsa, used with permission.
NP: I produce stories about people, about their personal journeys and experiences in these cities. That's why somebody's personal outlook is important to me — why exactly he or she moves here or comes back. And that's why I find artists and cultural figures the most interesting; they take a clear position and are very proactive and open to new things (as opposed to the stereotype that people here are largely passive).
The problem of active young people leaving for the big cities or heading overseas is no less relevant now than it was before 2014. Therefore, by finding such people I can show that not everything here is so awful, that there are those who really love their city and their region and are seized with desire to be here.
For example, in the second episode I interviewed a German who moved to Slavyansk from Berlin and founded an NGO here (Igor Mitchnik from the Drukarnya civil society centre). Before moving here he lived, worked and studied in very different countries and cities: Great Britain, Estonia and Kyrgyzstan. I wondered what prompted a person like Igor to move to eastern Ukraine, how he finds life here and why he decided to become an activist in Slavyansk. Or there's the 19-year old girl who opened her own printing house in Kramatorsk while travelling the world and keeping up her civil society activism. Nobody would be surprised to meet these people in a big city, but for small towns, stories like theirs are new and unusual.
NP: You're right there. The voices of ordinary citizens, who are in the majority, are less likely to be heard. But it is precisely those people who actively vote in elections. Young people are in the minority at the polls. When it comes to industry, Slavyansk is famous for its ceramic workshops. Many more people run their own small businesses. But of course, that's not enough to live on. On the whole, Slavyansk has always faced problems with employment, a lack of workplaces, particularly for those aged 45 or above. That's why so many people leave. But I must say that, at least according to my acquaintances, it has become easier to find a job in Slavyansk since 2014. Society is gradually changing on all levels. It can be said that people are no longer afraid to launch their own initiatives or business at any age.
ME: Notwithstanding the many specific dynamics in the Donbas — first and foremost the armed conflict — your podcast deals with issues which would be familiar to the residents of many small towns across eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. Will you expand the scope of your podcast?
НП: По фидбеку на подкаст я все еще вижу, что эти проблемы известны не многим, тем более, в восточной Европе. Это и понятно, вооруженный конфликт и жизнь после него – специфическая тема. Один из недавних эпизодов я записывала с парнем из Словакии, мы сравнивали жизнь в Славянске и жизнь в маленьких городах Словакии. И здесь я увидела много похожего и поняла, что мы ментально также очень похожи с людьми из Центральной Европы. Я вижу потенциал, ведь маленькие города есть везде и интересные люди в них. Хочу расширять рамки на Центральную и Западную Европу, также меня очень интересует Центральная Азия. Пандемия останавливает в этом плане, ведь все выпуски я записываю только офлайн, это мой принцип, поэтому будем ждать и надеяться на скорейшую стабилизацию ситуации в мире и открытии границ.
NP: The feedback I've received suggests that many are still not aware of these problems, particularly in eastern Europe. That's understandable — after all, an armed conflict and life after it is a particular experience. In one of my recent episodes I interviewed a guy from Slovakia; we compared life in Slavyansk with life in small towns in his country. And there I did see many similarities and realised how much we have in common with people from central Europe. So I see potential, because there are small towns everywhere inhabited by interesting people with a lot to say. I want to expand the podcast's scope to central and western Europe, and am also very interested in central Asia. The pandemic has stopped those plans for the time being, because I record all episodes in person. That's a matter of principle for me, but it means that we will have to wait until the situation stabilises and international borders open.
ME: How popular are podcasts in Ukraine? Why did you choose this format for your project?
NP: The popularity of podcasts has grown exponentially over the past year alone. I launched mine in February 2020 after attending the international podcast school in Tbilisi, organised by the Prague Civil Society Centre. When reading the latest statistics, I was surprised to learn that there are now more than 200 podcasts in Ukraine and their number is only growing. There are those founded by big lifestyle publications (such as The Village or Radio Aristocrats) but many more created independently, from home, by people with no relation to the media sector whatsoever. As it happens, people like me. The main problem I see with podcasting in Ukraine is that people don't know about the format and they're not used to it. Everybody knows about YouTube videos, but when the word ‘podcast’ is used they often ask ‘What's this?’ or ‘How do I listen to it?’. This isn't a media product which promises quick success, easy money, and guaranteed popularity. Especially not in Ukraine.
I produce podcasts because I've always loved the radio and have long dreamed of working there someday. But our city doesn't have a radio station where I can realise that aspiration. So I started listening to podcasts four years ago and they captivated me. Now I can't imagine any other format where I could tell these stories.

author: Maxim Edwards


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Iconic House of Wonders collapse leaves Zanzibaris wondering about fate of cultural heritage · Global Voices
Amanda Lichtenstein

The Beit al Ajaib (House of Wonders) is a landmark building in Stone Town. It is the largest and tallest building of Stone Town, prominently faces Forodhani Gardens on the old town's seafront, in Mizingani Road, June 4, 2012. Photo by Harvey Barrison via Wikimedia CC BY 2.0.
The Beit al-Ajaib, or House of Wonders — the palatial home of Omani sultans in Stone Town, Zanzibar — partially collapsed on December 25, according to video footage and photographs circulated widely online.
The collapse reportedly killed two people and injured several others.
صور چوية تظهر حجم الدمار الكبير الذي لحق بمبنى #بيت_العجائب بالمدينة الحجرية بأنجوچا، زنجبار.
ويظهر من هذه الصور انهيار البوابة الرئيسية للبيت و تدمر المنارة التاريخية بأكملها. #انهيار_بيت_العجائب #BaitAlAjaib #زنجبار #Zanzibar #Tanzania #Oman pic.twitter.com/5YPiqrjiTE
— محمد الرحبي Mohammed Al Rahbi I (@MohammedAlRahbi) December 25, 2020
Photographs showing the large scale of damage to a building #بيت_العجائب In the stone city of Unguja, Zanzibar. These pictures show the collapse of the main gate of the house and the destruction of the entire historical lighthouse.
The collapse came as a shock and disappointment as hundreds crowded near the destruction with concern for those trapped in the rubble. The sad scene also left many wondering about the fate of Zanzibar's cultural heritage.
The House of Wonders clocktower comes down after a partial collapse on December 25, 2020. Photo by Caroline Langervoord via Facebook, used with permission.
The building, a vestige of Zanzibar’s Omani cultural heritage and history, had been under rehabilitation in a major $6 million rehabilitation effort to restore the building to its former palatial glory — after years of neglect — and transform it into a museum and cultural center.
“We are very concerned about the news but are still committed to the renovation of the House of Wonders,” a statement from Oman’s Ministry of Heritage and Tourism said on Saturday, vowing to send investigators to Zanzibar to look into reasons behind the collapse.
Omani officials strongly denied claims circulating on social media that the collapse occurred during an active restoration:
False information is circulating about the partial collapse of the House of Wonders in Zanzibar stating that the collapse took place after the restoration and the truth is that the restoration was not completed but stopped since the beginning of the year due to the pandemic.
The Omani government also pledged an additional $600 million toward further repairs to achieve full restoration of the House of Wonders.
Oman, after being saddened by the collapse of the Beit Al Ajaib Building, built by Zanzibar's second King Sayyid Barghash, the Oman government has also decided to provide $ 600 million in support for repairs and restoration. pic.twitter.com/mXWDcalKAA
— MAN W (@MANW13005197) December 27, 2020
Lela Mohamed Mussa, Zanzibari tourism and antiquities minister, also announced plans for an open investigation into the reasons behind the partial collapse.
Constructed in 1883, for Sultan Barghash bin Said, the spectacular building with seafront views of the Indian Ocean, was the first to have electricity and a working elevator in Zanzibar. The sultans of Oman held their seat of power in Zanzibar for over 200 years until a violent revolution overthrew the sultanate in 1964.
FACT: The House of Wonders in Zanzibar, Tanzania was the first building in East Africa to have an elevator. It was also the first building in Zanzibar to have electricity.
The House of Wonders suffered minor damages during the Anglo-Zanzibar War of 1896. pic.twitter.com/umGDX3ajWp
— Facts East Africa (@east_facts) October 13, 2020
Many also took to social media to mourn the potential loss of this historical heritage site and share their frustrations with the building's decades of neglect and disrepair.
Alama ya Zanzibar, Beit Al Ajaib, House of Wonders (Jumba la Maajabu) limeporomoka tena. Dola milioni 5 zilotolewa na Serikali ya Oman kwa ajili ya ukarabati zimeliwa.#UrithiWetu#SaveZanzibarHeritage pic.twitter.com/onHJSDW3SM
— Hilmi Hilal (@HilmiHilal88) December 25, 2020
The Zanzibar symbol, Beit al-Ajaib, House of Wonders has collapsed again. $5 million was provided by the government of Oman for rehabilitation has been spent. #OurHeritage #SaveZanzibarHeritage
On Twitter, Maria Sarungi Tsehai blamed the United Nations Education Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for allowing the House of Wonders — a building that helps define Stone Town as a World Heritage city since 2000 — to fall into such a state of disrepair.
So @UNESCO why did you stand by as House of Wonders in #zanzibar which is part of the World Heritage Site Centre collapse?? Where were YOU?
Cc @bbcswahili @BBCAfrica @VOAAfrica @UN_News_Centre ??
Follow this up! Why was UNESCO quietly watching this decay? #Tanzania pic.twitter.com/9obBLyEdDL
— Maria Sarungi Tsehai (@MariaSTsehai) December 25, 2020
On December 26, the cultural agency expressed “regret and sadness” over the partial collapse. “We are in contact with the Stone Town Conservation and Development Authority (STCDA) which is currently carrying rescue operation and will soon be starting a preliminary assessment of the damage caused by the collapse,” said Mechtild Rössler, UNSECO World Heritage Center director, in a statement on its website on Friday, according to the Oman Observer.
The late Sultan Qaboos bin Said left $15 million in his will to ensure the restoration of the landmark House of Wonders to its former glory. Just this month, the two governments of Zanzibar and Oman signed foundational documents to confirm the renovation plans.
قام وفد من وزارة التراث والسياحة زيارة زنجبار برئاسة سعادة المهندس ابراهيم بن سعيد الخروصي وكيل الوزارة للتراث للوقوف ومتابعة مشروع تأهيل وترميم بيت العجائب بمرافقة معالي ليلى محمد موسى وزيرة السياحة والتراث الزنجبارية. pic.twitter.com/Is5N5cCajN
— قنصلية سلطنة عمان – زنجبار (@OmanZanzibar) December 18, 2020
A delegation from the Ministry of Heritage and Tourism visited Zanzibar headed by His Excellency Eng. Ibrahim bin Saeed al-Kharousi, undersecretary of the Ministry for Heritage, to follow up the project of rehabilitation and restoration of the House of Wonders, accompanied by His Excellency Laila Muhammad Musa, minister of tourism and heritage of Zanzibar.
The House of Wonders overlooks Forodhani Gardens in Stone Town, Zanzibar. Photo taken by Amanda Leigh Lichtenstein, used with permission, May 3, 2010.
The House of Wonders, with its epic, carved wooden doors and winding interior staircases, has been a major tourist attraction for decades, as travelers and locals alike come to learn about Zanzibar's historical links with the sultans of Oman.
To many, the building represents Zanizbar's rich Arab cultural heritage and tradition. The building, however, is also a reminder of a Zanzibar's colonial, slave-trading past.
Reports of the House of Wonders collapsing go back at least nine years, to 2012, when parts of the roof fell off and several pillars crumbled.
للمرة الثانية منذ عام 2012، انهيار جزء آخر من بيت العجائب بالمدينة الحجرية بأنجوچا، زنجبار.
الانهيار الأول بعام 2012 كان من الجهة الشرقية (الخلفية) للبيت،وهذه المرة (اليوم) من جهة المدخل الرئيسي. https://t.co/Sn3yoe2xZW
— محمد الرحبي Mohammed Al Rahbi I (@MohammedAlRahbi) December 25, 2020
For the second time since 2012, another part of the House of Wonders has collapsed in Stone Town, Unguja, Zanzibar. The first collapse in 2012 was from the eastern (back) side of the house, and this time (today) from the main entrance.
Talks to restore the famed building have been ongoing as Zanzibar and Oman engage in a series of reconciliatory actions to enhance and strengthen ties. In 2011, after 50 years, Omani Air resumed flights to and from the archipelago.
But it wasn't until 2019 that Oman officially signed agreements with Zanzibar to begin the 15-month rehabilitation project, slated for completion in 2021.
Last year, Oman hired Italian architects to help with the restoration, who have yet to release a statement on the most recent collapse:
Italian Company to Rehabilitate House of Wonders.
Costruzioni Generali Gilardi of Turin won the 6-million-dollar tender to rehabilitate the most important palace in Stonetown, the House of Wonders or Beit-el-Ajaib thanks to a grant from the Sultanate of Oman. pic.twitter.com/jCCqGm6QVp
— Embassy of Italy TZ (@ItalyinTanzania) October 24, 2019