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Latin America’s World Cup Lessons · Global Voices
Javiera Munoz

The Olympic Stadium in Mexico City, where the World Cup was held in 1970 and 1986. Photograph by Flickr user djmfuentes (CC BY-NC 2.0).
Wherever the World Cup has traveled in Latin America, various kinds of social unrest has followed. This article is the second installment in a series that studies at the relationship between the world's largest football contest and political turmoil. You can read the first part here.
The blog El Universal looks at how crowds heckled the country's then-president, Miguel de la Madrid, during the opening ceremony of the 1986 World Cup. More than 90,000 spectators shouted over the president's speech, infuriated that the country went ahead with hosting the games, just eight months after a major earthquake hit Mexico City on September 19, 1985.
Mexico took responsibility for organizing the 1986 World Cup after Colombia lost the opportunity to host in 1982, after FIFA determined that Columbia did not meet the tournament's host requirements. At the time, Rafael Castillo, then president of the Mexican Futbol Federation, argued that the country's stadiums “only need a bucket of paint and a brush” and they'd be ready for fans and players, as the infrastructure was only 16-years-old (built for Mexico's 1970 World Cup).
In 1956, FIFA held a summit to determine the 1962 World Cup's host country. In a brilliant speech, Chile's sports director, Carlos Dittborn, won his country the honor. “Because we have nothing, Dittborn promised, “we want to do everything.”
Just as in Mexico more than 20 years later, however, a devastating earthquake hit Chile two years before its World Cup. Italian journalists Antonio Ghirelli and Corrado Pizzinibelli, writing for the newspaper “Il Resti del Carlino,” said of Chile's travails:
[Chile] es el símbolo triste de uno de los países subdesarrollados del mundo y afligido por todos los males posibles: desnutrición, prostitución, analfabetismo, alcoholismo, miseria… Bajo estos aspectos Chile es terrible y Santiago su más doliente expresión, tan doliente que pierde en ello sus características de ciudad anónima.
[Chile] is a sad example of one of the world's underdeveloped countries afflicted by everything that can go wrong: malnutrition, prostitution, illiteracy, alcoholism, misery… Considering these aspects, Chile is in a terrible state and Santiago is suffering the most of all, so much that it lost it's the characteristics of a city.
Ghirelli and Pizzinibelli left Chile before the World Cup even began, fearing for their own safety. Indeed, a few days before the opening match, an Argentinian journalist, mistaken for an Italian, was beaten up in a bar in Santiago.
History's first World Cup took place in an era with no shortage of political and social trauma. In 1930, the tournament was sent to Uruguay, to take the game far away from Europe, which was still dealing with the fallout of World War I. When the U.S. stock market crashed in 1929, European countries suddenly worried that transportation costs might make it too expensive to send their teams to the Western Hemisphere. The World Cup's “story” began then, when Uruguay offer to pay the transportation fees of participating teams.
The blog del29alneobatillismo argues that Uruguay's organization of the soccer championship destabilized the country's social environment by declining commercial activity and leading to currency devaluation, unemployment, and a drop in wages. These World-Cup-created problems exacerbated an internal political crisis, precipitating a coup d'état three years after the tournament.
Given the high economic demands placed on World Cup host countries, Latin America has not always been the most suitable place to hold the event. Of course, for all their social unrest, the Latin American people have been some of the World Cup's most hospitable hosts. True fans of football, it is the allocation of scare resources to a nonessential game that disturbs the public.
FIFA, for its part, recently determined that countries with large disruptive social movements and high levels of inequality should not host the tournament. Sports journalist Francisco Sagredo (@panchosagredo) reiterated this in the magazine article in Qué pasa:
Tras #Brasil2014, la FIFA evitará países con movimientos sociales y altos niveles de desigualdad. Por @panchosagredo http://t.co/hw1MM6MYUO
— Revista Qué Pasa (@revistaQP) July 18, 2014
After #Brasil2014, Fifa will avoid countries experiencing various social movements and high levels of inequality.
This spurred questions and reactions on Twitter. From La Serena, in northern Chile, Roberto Peralta tweeted:
@revistaQP @panchosagredo / Entonces no habrá más mundiales. Ni menos en Sudamérica.
— Roberto Peralta (@cahuescar) July 18, 2014
So, there won't be any more World Cups. Let alone in South America.
Típico Chileno argued that countries without social movements don't even exist.
@revistaQP @panchosagredo todos los países tienen movimientos sociales… Russia no?
— Típico chileno (@juancarlostopo) July 18, 2014
All countries experience social movements… What about Russia?
Even so, according to Sagredo, FIFA believes that Russia and Qatar, the Cup's next two hosts, do not present any serious problems. Whatever one thinks about the modern state of social movements and inequality, however, everyone can benefit from studying the long history of hosting the World Cup in struggling societies battling troubling times. The lessons of Latin America are a good place to begin.

author: Javiera Munoz


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Malaysian Government Threatens to Block Facebook Over “Abuse” Reports · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

The Malaysian government is studying a proposal to ban Facebook in response to the rising number of alleged abuses of the popular social network. Officials have promised to ask for public feedback before acting on the proposed Facebook ban.
Facebook thumbs down. Image via Wikimedia Commons, licensed to public domain.
Communication and Multimedia Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek made the announcement after a Facebook user named Chandra Lawan Tetap Lawan posted a doctored photograph of a car crash that authorities deemed insulting to Malaysian King Yang di-Pertuan Agong Tuanku Abdul Halim Mu'adzam Shah. The original image showed a gory road accident with the King's image inserted into the frame. The Facebook user claimed that his account was hacked and the photo has since been removed from the site.
Shabery says his department has received 2,000 claims of abuses committed by Facebook users. Although he did not specify if these reports of abuse came from local police records or from Facebook itself, his comments suggest that these claims mainly concern hate speech and threats issued on the site.
He added that the government will listen if the people favor closing Facebook:
If the people are of the opinion that Facebook should be closed, we are prepared to look into the matter.
But Shabery himself acknowledged that blocking Facebook is “radical and quite impossible” considering there are more than 15 million Facebook users in Malaysia.
Netizens quickly lambasted the Ministry for contemplating the closure of Facebook. Twitter users called the proposal “irrational“:
Just because of 2k complaints about Facebook, you want to ban in Malaysia? 2k are not representing 25 million Malaysians..
— Ng Yuen Heng (@denixng) August 9, 2014
So Malaysia gov is considering to ban Facebook. Why not start with banning cigarettes selling in Malaysia first? — Mahira Duralim (@mayraduralim) August 9, 2014
; IMO government should not ban Facebook in Malaysia. Majority uses it for school, college, university and work purposes. — Gan Nicholas (@GanNicholas) August 9, 2014
As an alternative to closing Facebook, some have suggested the registration of Facebook accounts with the government and an amendment to the Sedition Act to cover those who use social media to spread religious hate speech. But while these proposals do not advocate the absolute censorship of Facebook, they still pose a threat to free speech.
Meanwhile, national police forces report that they have formed a task force to monitor and take action against those who use social media to spread racist and hateful remarks.
Many reminded the government about the overall positive impact of Facebook in society. Aside from providing a great platform for youth interaction, Facebook has also boosted business opportunities in Malaysia. For free speech advocate Masjaliza Hamzah, the proposal to ban Facebook is another proof of the government’s distorted view of the Internet:
The fact that this (proposal) comes from the same Ministry (Communications and Multimedia) that a few years ago proposed that a social media council be set up, shows a misunderstanding of what it is and how difficult it is to control.
A few weeks ago, Malaysia’s former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad called for the censorship of the Internet to protect public morality.
Writing for alternative media site Malaysiakini, Mariam Mokhtar warned that a Facebook closure could trigger the defeat of the ruling party, which has been in power since the 1950s:
Take away Facebook and face the wrath of the people. Ban Facebook and the government will risk losing Putrajaya at GE14.
Putrajaya is the nation’s capital. GE14 refers to the 14th General Elections.
Woon King Chai of the Centre For A Better Tomorrow, a Malaysian NGO, wrote that it is unnecessary to censor Facebook since majority of users behave responsibly:
Information control, which is ultimately practised only in closed regimes, goes against transparency and accountability.
The minister himself admitted that there are only some 2,000 complaints. The overwhelming majority of them do not break the law.
Is the minister also suggesting that cars should be banned in Malaysia too because they cause road accidents and fatalities?
Social media strategist Yeo Bee Yin asserted the need to defend a free and open Internet since mainstream media is already heavily regulated by the state:
With the mainstream media freedom being restricted by Printing Presses and Publication Act 1984, internet freedom becomes an important arm in protecting and promoting democracy and freedom of expression in Malaysia.
Therefore, we’ll not give an inch on any attempt by Putrajaya to limit internet freedom. Putrajaya should stop dreaming about it.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has repeatedly assured the public that online free speech will never be curtailed but he should advise the government’s ministers, retired politicians, and other influential authorities to refrain from making direct and indirect threats about undermining Internet freedom.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Mong Palatino


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Crimea’s One-Woman Resistance to Russian Occupation · Global Voices
Daniel Alan Kennedy

Daria Karpenko. Photo via Facebook.
This article is part of an extensive RuNet Echo study of Russian-language blogosphere in Eastern Ukraine. Explore the complete interview series on the Eastern Ukraine Unfiltered page.
Officially, the March 16 referendums in Sevastopol and the Autonomous Republic of Crimea showed that the peninsula's inhabitants favor—almost unanimously—joining the Russian Federation. Over 95% of the population allegedly voted in favor of “reunification,” with turnouts of 83.1% in the Autonomous Republic and 86.1% in Sevastopol, home of Russia's Black Sea Fleet.
Some in the West greeted these figures with disbelief, not least when a report from Russia's own Human Rights Council seemed to indicate the real turnout was much lower (around 30%-50%) and support for annexation a much more lukewarm 50-60 percent. Russia's media have been keen to portray Crimea's “return” to Russia as not only the undoing of a grave historical injustice, but as the result of the unanimous democratic choice of the region's inhabitants.
Whatever the veracity of the March referendums, it's impossible to deny that Crimean bloggers have generally supported their incorporation into the Russian Federation, citing a mixture of affinity for Russia and its culture, the economic benefits of joining Ukraine's far wealthier neighbor, and fear of what many view as a hostile ethno-nationalist junta in Kyiv. Against this background, Daria Karpenko, who blogs on LiveJournal as Kelpai and also manages a Facebook page, stands out as a Crimean blogger deeply opposed to the annexation. Karpenko, who's been writing online for almost 10 years, became a star of the blogosphere for her posts from Simferopol when Russian soldiers seized the peninsula in the guise of “polite people.”
Мой блог всегда был личным, я писала о своей (довольно рядовой) жизни, о смешных и грустных ситуациях, каких мне казалось, что меня читает много народу. Еще в январе “много народу” означало 30 человек. Теперь у меня почти в сто раз больше подписчиков только в жж… Я решила писать каждый день, суммируя новости и слухи, просто чтобы озвучить альтернативный голос…Постепенно я нашла свой формат и стала писать о развитии ситуации в Крыму регулярно.
My blog was always personal. I wrote about my (relatively ordinary) life, about funny or sad situations. It seemed like a lot of people read me. Even back in January, “a lot of people” meant 30. Now I have over 100 times more subscribers on LiveJournal alone… I decided to write every day, summing up news and rumors, just to put forward an alternative voice… gradually I found my own format and began writing regularly about developments in the situation in Crimea.
Karpenko describes her main aim in writing as “voicing the point of view of Crimeans who aren't happy that Russia suddenly came to our door.” When asked if she had received any messages of support from her fellow Crimeans, Karpenko replies that
Очень часто люди пишут мне в блоге и в фейсбуке, что они счастливы читать то, что я пишу, ведь им казалось, что они абсолютно одиноки в своей любви к Украине. Таких людей много.
People often write to me on my blog or on facebook, that they're happy to read what I write, as it seemed to them that they were absolutely alone in their own love for Ukraine. There are many such people.
Karpenko adds that she also gets messages of support from Ukrainians outside Crimea.
А еще мне часто пишут украинцы, которые рады видеть, что не все их бывшие соотечественники оказались предателями и “23 года страдали от украинского ига”, мой блог помогает им помнить о том, что Крым – это масса различных мнений и людей, никто из которых не заслуживает однозначного приговора или ненависти.
Other Ukrainians often write to me as well, those who are pleased to see that not all of their former compatriots are traitors and “suffered 23 years under the Ukrainian yoke.” My blog helps remind them that Crimea is a mass of differing opinions and people, none of whom deserve to be judged collectively or hated.
Not everyone is so supportive of her actions. Karpenko also receives a large amount of abuse and trolling. She says “paid trolls who live off payments from the Russian government” are her most active haters. Karpenko also has to deal with concerns about breaking the Russian Federation's restrictive new laws on blogging.
Я регулярно получаю угрозы. Стараюсь не провоцировать лишний раз, потому что судьба политических активистов в России незавидна. На данный момент я стараюсь следовать (абсурдным) законам о поведении в интернете, которые российская Дума приняла в начале лета.
I regularly receive threats. I try not to provoke excessively, as the fate of political activists in Russia isn't enviable. I'm currently trying to follow the (absurd) laws on behavior on the Internet, which the Russian Duma introduced at the beginning of the summer.
Karpenko is now a dissenting voice in a country where dissent is more and more considered synonymous with treason, where the president openly makes references to a “fifth column” and “national traitors,” and where “online extremism” carries the threat of imprisonment. When asked if she has any plans to leave Crimea, Karpenko admits she hasn't yet been able to decide. She says she is determined to stay in Crimea and report the realities of life on the ground, but some of those realities are deeply unpalatable to her personally.
Я безумно люблю Крым и Украину, хочу помогать им расцветать и развиваться. Но у меня растет маленькая дочь. Я очень боюсь, что когда она пойдет в садик и в школу, она попадет в машину российской пропаганды.
I love Crimea and Ukraine madly. I want to help them blossom and develop. But I'm bringing up a small daughter. I'm very afraid that when she goes to kindergarten and school, she'll end up in the Russian propaganda machine.

author: Daniel Alan Kennedy


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Have you Ever Shared a Football Match with Cows? Some Peruvian Fans Did · Global Voices
Gabriela García Calderón Orbe

Image on Flickr by user grahamjpierce (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0).
The Peru Tournament is a promotional football event where several teams from all around the country take part, aiming pass to first and second divisions. The champion earns a place in first division and the runner-up moves forward to second.
On a match played on August 10 during 2014 tournament between Minsa FBC and Expreso Inambari in the Peruvian departmento of Madre de Dios, several cows interrumpted the game. This unsual incident shows the pitiful condition of an event that doesn't have the most elementary safety measures, which is especially regrettable in a country where football is king of sports, in spite of the poor results.
Twitter users couldn't wait to express themselves:
Vacas interrumpen partido de Copa Perú http://t.co/Damp1R7LXN vía @elcomercio jajajajaaaaaaaaaaa
— Mojigata (@Moji_gata) agosto 13, 2014
Cows interrumpt a Peru Tournament match LOL!
Vamos al mundial @tuteve Insólito: Vacas invaden campo en pleno partido de la Copa Perú http://t.co/A5d5MXUPfj pic.twitter.com/aZSLbdYFqI
— FPietro Vidella (@Underground_Vip) agosto 13, 2014
On our way to World Cup. Unheard of: cows invade the field during a Peru Tournament match.
Manada de vacunos invade cancha en Copa Perú. En este caso, “el equipo sigue con vida” tiene sentido literal. https://t.co/OOEXK17ajf
— Juan Carlos Ortecho (@jcortecho) agosto 13, 2014
Bovines invade field on Peru Tournament. On this case, “the team is still alive” has literal meaning.
Journalist Henry Panduro posted a video on YouTube:

author: Gabriela García Calderón Orbe


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How Kenyans Can Lead a Double Life in the US · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Danstan Obara shows how Kenyans can lead a double life in the US:
The American double life starts by making sure that your social security card does not have the stamp that says “Valid for work only with INS authorization”. The things that people do to get rid of this stamp are amazing. I will not go into those details here.
The next step is to walk into an organization or business and apply for a job. You will have to pretend that you are an American, born and raised in America. This can be a very dumb thing to say sometimes because in many cases when you are fresh out of Kenya, it is difficult for anybody to miss the accent. Amazingly almost everybody I know has always gotten away with it. There is a law against racial and ethnic profiling in America so, employers would rather go with the information they are provided with and stick with what they can prove.
Individuals with visiting visas, who opt to extend there stay do not even get the social security cards. What this means is that they cannot legally work anywhere. The things they do are even more hilarious. It is a psychological fact that white people cannot easily differentiate black people. So people simply share identification documents. Imagine of a guy walking into an office to apply for a job with an identification card that has someone else’s photo on it.  Once again, not even one person I know has ever been caught.

author: Ndesanjo Macha


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Hundreds Join a Grieving Father’s Silent Protest of Slow Hit-and-Run Investigation in Serbia · Global Voices
Danica Radisic

Bojan Jovanović, father of 21-year-old hit and run victim Luka Jovanović, in one of his “silent” protests on Branko Bridge in Belgrade. Photo courtesy of Telegraf.rs© 2014, used with permission.
Bojan Jovanović, father of a young hit-and-run victim from Belgrade, has been standing for 40 minutes every afternoon since Aug. 3, 2014 beside the place his son was hit just several nights before by a driver in a Mini Morris Countryman vehicle on Branko Bridge in Belgrade. Luka Jovanović, 21, was fixing his own car on Branko Bridge with several friends, when a car coming from the opposite direction ran over him, leaving him in a coma for two days, after which he died from the injuries.
The grieving father has stated that he will continue to stand from 4:30 p.m. every day for 40 minutes until the driver of the Mini Morris, who fled the scene after hitting young Jovanović, was identified and arrested. Bojan Jovanović was surprised to see 350 other Serbian residents join him on Branko Bridge on Sunday, Aug. 10, in a show of support. He told Serbian online news site Telegraf.rs, which also called on the public to support the protest, that he had seen the call for joining his protest on social networks but did not expect that many people to show up.
The image calling people to join the protest being spread by social media users throughout Serbia reads: “Let's take away their right to our lives!; BRANKO BRIDGE; every day at 4:30 p.m..” Image by unknown author, widely circulated online.
Jovanović also stated that he had nothing to do with promoting the protest on social networks or inviting others to join him, adding that his family had a good ongoing relationship with police officials investigating his son's death and that he believed authorities were doing all they could. “I am here today to prevail, not for my Luka, because he is gone, but for all our children,” Jovanović told Telegraf.rs.
Some, however, including Director of the Committee for Traffic Safety Damir Okanović, believe that authorities are not doing enough to find the hit-and-run driver and vehicle. Okanović stated for Serbian B92 network:
On je istakao da je teško prihvatljivo da policija već 15 dana nije identifikovala vozilo, a prema snimcima s kamera koji su objavljeni u beogradskim medijima, reč je o automobilu “mini moris”.
“Nisu kamere jedini trag, tu su i podaci sa baznih stanica mobilne telefonije i delovi vozila zatečeni na licu mesta. Kada se ukrste ti tragovi, može da se suzi sumnja na određen broj ljudi, a onda operativnim radom može da se utvrdi da li je neko od tih ljudi umešan u ovo krivično delo”, ocenio je Okanović.
Komentarišući izjave policijskih zvaničnika da su pojedine kamere u Beogradu neupotrebljive i zastarele, on je istakao da je onda vreme da se to promeni i da postoje sredstva za to.
“Osam miliona evra izdvojeno je u proteklih pet godina po Zakonu o osiguranju u saobraćaju. U poseban Fond za video-nadzor od tih osam miliona evra, prema našim podacima, nijedna kamera nije kupljena u Srbiji. A sa druge strane, ne zna se šta je sa tim novcem”, naveo je Okanović.
On je rekao da se u slučaju stradanja 21-godišnjeg mladića može postaviti pitanje da li je od samog početka reakcija policije bila odgovarajuća.
[Okanović] stressed that it is difficult to accept that police have not identified the vehicle in 15 days [since the hit and run], while the video footage that [police] provided Belgrade media clearly shows that it was a “mini morris” vehicle [which are fairly rare in Belgrade].
“Cameras are not the only lead, there is also data from mobile telephone base stations and parts of the vehicle found at the scene. When those leads are crossed, suspicion can be narrowed down to a certain number of people, allowing operative work to confirm whether any of those people were involved in this crime,” Okanović assessed.
Commenting on statements made by police officials that individual cameras in Belgrade were useless and out-dated, he emphasized that it must be time to replace them and that there are funds available for that.
“Eight million euros have been allocated in the last five years according to the Law on Traffic Insurance. With the particular Fund for Video Surveillance, of those eight million euro, according to our data, no cameras have been purchased in Serbia. On the other hand, no one knows what is happening with that money,” Okanović stated.
He said that in the case of the death of the 21-year-old young man, questions could be asked as to whether the reaction of police was adequate from the very beginning.
Groups of citizens, like the Blog Open association of Serbian bloggers, seem to agree with Okanović's assessment of those like Okanović. Blog Open also joined in the protest of Bojan Jovanović, promoting the protest on social media and their blog, saying:
Budući da su očevici naveli da je reč o vozilu mini moris „Countryman“ kakvih ima veoma malo u Srbiji i Beogradu, i imajući u vidu činjenicu da svi mediji u Srbiji, osim Politike, danima prećutkuju ovaj slučaj uz sasvim moguću preporuku da se tako ponašaju, sumnja i strepnja da neko štiti ovog hit and run vozača, izazvala je burne reakcije na mrežama, koje su konačno proizvele da građani sa klikova i fejvova, izađu na mostove i podrže oca.
Na Brankovom mostu se okupilo oko 350 Beograđana sa istim pitanjem: Ko je vozač iz Kantrimena? Koga štitite?
U nekoliko drugih gradova pojedinci su izašli na mostove u svojim gradovima, s istim pitanjem.
Okupljeni tviteraši su poručili nadležnima u MUP-u da Bojan Jovanović nije sam u svom tihom protestu i da je neophodno da hitno pronađu vozača crnog mini morisa koji je udario mladića i pobegao sa lica mesta.
Considering that witnesses claim that this was a Mini Morris “Countryman” vehicle, of which there are very few in Serbia and Belgrade, and taking into account that all media in Serbia, except [state-owned] Politika, have been silent about this matter with the very plausible recommendation to do so, suspicion and fear that someone is protecting this hit-and-run driver has caused tempestuous reactions on [social] networks, which has finally led citizens, from clicks and faves, to go out on the bridges and support the father.
About 350 Belgraders gathered on Branko Bridge with the same question: Who was the driver in the Countryman? Who are you protecting?
The gathered Twitter users let officials from the Ministry of Internal Affairs know that Bojan Jovanović is not alone in his silent protest and that it is imperative that the driver of the black Mini Morris who hit the young man and fled the scene be found immediately.

author: Danica Radisic


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Investors Should Explore Nigeria Despite Negative Reports · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Chris Akor's investors’ guide to Nigeria intends to demonstrate how the negatives reports about Nigeria have no basis in reality and that investors who have ignored the reports have been making huge returns on their investments:
Undue clatter has trailed the release of Nigeria’s rebased GDP figures – a purely technical matter devoid of politics – from some groups in Nigeria. These groups are mainly opposition politicians, whose electoral appeal hinges on their ability to paint a grim and gloomy picture of abject poverty, underdevelopment, helplessness and the current government’s culpability in bringing about such a situation. Some civil society groups, who have been making a living from the ‘poverty status’ of Nigeria and who’s survival and funding are now threatened by Nigeria exiting the lower-income category. Ignorant social media activists, whose popularity come from insulting the government and the establishment and putting their country down, and some so-called experts on Nigeria, who make a living out of the ills of the Nigerian society and have been cleverly feeding and sustaining the ‘corrupt, fraudster, never-do-wells’ image of the country in the international community and discouraging well-meaning investors from coming to do business in Nigeria.


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Islamabad on Lockdown as Politicians Launch Massive Anti-Government Marches on Pakistan’s Independence Day  · Global Voices
Faisal Kapadia

Activists of the PML-N, the party in power, chant slogans against the Inquilab (Revolution) March and Azadi (Freedom) March during a protest demonstration in Karachi. Image by ppiimages. Copyright Demotix (12/8/2014)
The Pakistani government led by Prime Minster Nawaz Sharif and his party PML-N are taking extraordinary measures to prevent two opposition parties, led by populist politicians Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri, from launching massive anti-government marches to the capital on Pakistan's independence day August 14.
The government claims to be acting upon intelligence reports that the protests could turn bloody.
Despite the Lahore High Court's short order that the marches should not proceed because of “independence day and the chaotic and uncertain situation prevailing in the country”, both parties — Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf (PTI) and Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) — are determined to march to the capital.
Popular cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan leads PTI, and PAT is led by a Sufi scholar-turned-politician and recently returned expat from Canada Tahirul Qadri. Both allege that the May 2013 general election, which brought Sharif's party to power in a landslide victory, was rigged. They are marching to the capital to demand that the prime minister step down.
Since the evening of August 13, parts of capital city Islamabad and Pakistan's second largest city Lahore have been blocked off with shipping containers to restrict movement. Some areas are expected to be without cellular services for the duration of the marches.
If the PMLN doesn't remove containers in Lahore, then it will be a serious contempt of court #IKonARY
— PTI (@PTIofficial) August 13, 2014
In the days leading up to August 14, the government acquired hundreds of shipping containers to be used as hurdles along the streets and highways between Islamabad and Lahore, where many protesters are launching their march from. The journey between both cities is nearly 400 kilmeters (250 miles).
Popular Islamabad-based TV news host Moeed Pirzada tweeted:
#Islamabad again being sealed? Nawaz Govt has been changing it's position so frequently that it is impossible now to trust whatever they say
— Moeed Pirzada (@MoeedNj) August 13, 2014
The government has rejected allegations that the election was rigged and says their security measures are a response to reports that there will be blood if the protests advance. Intelligence reports suggest that “some hired-guns have infiltrated into the PAT ranks and they would initiate a clash with law-enforcement personnel (who will then) resort to firing on the workers.”
According to the latest reports, police will allow PTI workers to continue their march while PAT workers will be stopped.
The BBC's Ilyas Khan has taken these reports a step further in his analysis “The threat of Pakistan's angry young marchers“:
Neither of them began life as career politicians, but they now command vocal support and their angry rhetoric has the power to marshal equally angry crowds. Analysts say these young people are Mr Qadri's captive audience, and can be as militant or as docile as the words he employs to motivate them.
The parties have been planning their marches for weeks. PTI and PAT are social media savvy and are led by charismatic leaders who have proven to have street appeal attracting thousands in previous marches.
Nawaz Sharif acting like Hosni Mubarak in cracking down on r democratic right to protest. But we r resolved to undertake r Azadi March.
— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) August 9, 2014
The marches on social media
Both parties are marching under different banners and agendas. PTI's march has been branded azadi or freedom, and PAT's march is being called inquilab or revolution.
PAT has been promoting their march through their Facebook page which has close to 150,000 followers and Tahirul Qadri's Twitter account which has 114,000 followers.
Meme shared on PAT's official Facebook Page.
PTI has been promoting their azadi march through their party's official Facebook page's close to 1.5 million fans, their party's official Twitter account‘s 424K followers and Imran Khan's official Twitter account's 1.9 million followers.
PTI has launched a “Real People, Real Sentiments” campaign featuring protesters and children.
Stop rigging Pakistan's future! #AzadiMarchPTI pic.twitter.com/KWf2mW9srf
— PTI (@PTIofficial) August 13, 2014
From PTI's official Facebook page.
Containers blocking roads
According to Newstribe, the police has blocked off most entry points into Islamabad with 400 shipping containers.
Shahzad Ahmed, the Pakistan director for Bytes for All, posted this on his Facebook:
Probably I was the last person to exit #Islamabad from Kashmir Highway. Then, I had whole motorway for myself It was a bit frightening experience Capital is sealed now from KPK side!
The parties have posted pictures of various roads dug up in Islamabad as an attempt to hinder the protests. An Islamabad-based security analyst posted this map showing the different points containers have been placed in Islamabad:
Image courtesy Arslan Akbar, security analyst, Islamabad
Karachi-based journalist Omar Quraishi tweeted:
PTI's been circulating this pic on Twitter of a barricaded Isb – I also tweeted it assuming its today – its from 2013 pic.twitter.com/8p3RslQJfu
— omar r quraishi (@omar_quraishi) August 13, 2014
PAT's troubles with PML-N in Lahore
PAT's head offices are in Model Town, Lahore. PAT workers clashed with police there earlier this week and in June. The June clashes left dozens injured and killed eight people. The area around PAT's head office has been blocked by shipping containers since the clashes earlier this week.
Due to Model Town siege, another PAT activist has sadly passed away as containers didn't allow him to be hospitalized. #BrutalityofPMLN
— Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri (@TahirulQadri) August 12, 2014
Lahore is the capital of Punjab province, and political violence here is rare. It is also the home city of the country's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif; his brother Shahbaz Sharif is the province's chief minister.
Election rigging allegations
On Wednesday, a day before the marches, the government asked the Supreme Court to set up a panel of judges to investigate claims of rigging in last year's general election, a move announced by Sharif late on Tuesday night in an attempt to ease the brewing political tension. The judicial probe was a key demand of Khan but he rejected Sharif's proposal and demanded he step down.
Leading the marches
Both leaders are considered Pakistan's next generation of politicians.
Cricketer-turned-popular politician Imran Khan is the chairman of the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf. Imran Khan's party emerged as the second largest in terms of votes won in the 2013 elections, though it finished in third place in terms of the tally of parliament seats. Khan's party commands a great strength amongst Pakistan's youth and has sizable street power as well.
Dr. Tahirul Qadri is a politician and a religious scholar of Sufism, who has written several books and leads the Canada-based Islamic studies organization “Minhajul Quran international organization”. He lived primarily in Canada up until recently. Dr. Qadri first protested with a mass following in 2012 against the corruption of the PPP's government led by Asif Ali Zardari, Benazir Bhutto's widower. He registered his political party Pakistan Awame-e-Tehrik in Pakistan in 1989, but it was largely dormant for many years. His party's sudden street power in the 2012 protest took many political analysts by surprise.
PTI has successfully used digital medium in the past and this time around deployed an Ushahidi based platform to  track reports on the march as well. It also publicizes the use of #AzadiMarchPTI hashtag extensively.
Currently, public opinion is severely polarized in Pakistan with people living in Islamabad fearful of what will happen August 14:
Beena Sarwar, a Pakistani journalist and documentary filmmaker based in Boston, tweets a petition asking the PAT chief's other home country Canada to intervene:
#Canada! Stop #TUQ from inciting hatred, chaos, violence and bloodshed in #Pakistan https://t.co/rPKFKFgmqZ v @DiepSaeeda
— Beena Sarwar (@beenasarwar) August 9, 2014
Nadeem Farooq Paracha, a satirist and columnist, recalls the days of politician Shahbaz sharif's protest against past president Asif Zardari:
Shahbaz Sharif wanted to hang Zardari from a pole in Lahore. Now he is himself hanging by a thread. Karmic irony.
— Nadeem F. Paracha (@NadeemfParacha) August 11, 2014
Bina Shah, a writer and New York Times columnist, quips:
So TUQ and Imran Khan in a container? What if Nawaz Sharif drives a crane to pick up the container and ship it to China?
— Bina Shah (@BinaShah) August 12, 2014
Awab Alvi, blogger and part of PTI's social media team, reports on Facebook:
Sindh Punjab border sealed by Sharif – what an amazing 14th Aug celebration by PM of Pakistan #AzadiMarchPTI
CSS point Blog reiterates that the government is not in the mood for confrontation:
The prime minister rejected a proposal to take the leadership of PTI and PAT into custody. “There is no question of arresting the leaders. Rather, we’ll see to what extent they may go,” Mr Sharif was quoted as saying.
He also rejected a proposal to bring PML-N workers on the road as a measure to counter the protests. “A clash between parties should be avoided at all cost,” he said, stressing the use of only administrative measures to keep the situation under control.
For now, it seems this year Pakistanis will cautiously be celebrating their independence day.
This is a developing story. Watch this space for updates.
Sahar Habib Ghazi contributed to this report.

author: Faisal Kapadia


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Palestinians Tweet Tips to Ferguson Protesters Dodging Tear Gas, Rubber Bullets & Police Aggression in Missouri, USA · Global Voices
Elia J. Ayoub

Photos tweeted by Missouri based journalist @CassFM “Police fire tear gas near Al Jazeera crew, then disassemble the gear after they flee. #Ferguson”
The murder of unarmed 18-year-old African-American Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri by a yet-to-be-named police officer has sparked days of unrest in the small St. Louis suburb with local police forces sending officers in military-grade riot gear to ‘pacify’ protesters.
Reports of police abuse towards protesters and journalists in the central US state of Missouri, have surfaced in the past few days as well. Ferguson's population is nearly 70% black, yet the local police force is predominantly white. Rights activists say Americans of color, particularly young black men, are disproportionately targeted and accused of wrongdoing by law enforcement officials.
As reports made it to social media that police in Ferguson were using teargas and rubber bullets on protesters, Palestinians immediately responded with advice on how to deal with it, citing their experience with Israel's occupation forces.
Palestinian activist and Birzeit University student Mariam Barghouti reminded Ferguson protesters that the pain will pass. She also tweeted on how to minimize the pain once teargassed:
Solidarity with #Ferguson. Remember to not touch your face when teargassed or put water on it. Instead use milk or coke!
— مريم البرغوثي (@MariamBarghouti) August 14, 2014
Always make sure to run against the wind /to keep calm when you're teargassed, the pain will pass, don't rub your eyes! #Ferguson Solidarity
— مريم البرغوثي (@MariamBarghouti) August 14, 2014
I remember when I used to get teargassed, I used to just remind myself this pain will pass as to not collapse.It helps! #Palestine #Ferguson
— مريم البرغوثي (@MariamBarghouti) August 14, 2014
Rajai Abu Khalil, a Palestinian Doctor and Co-founder of Physicians for Palestine tweeted:
Dear #Ferguson. The Tear Gas used against you was probably tested on us first by Israel. No worries, Stay Strong. Love, #Palestine
— Rajai abuKhalilرجائي (@Rajaiabukhalil) August 14, 2014
Don't Keep much distance from the Police, if you're close to them they can't tear Gas. To #Ferguson from #Palestine
— Rajai abuKhalilرجائي (@Rajaiabukhalil) August 14, 2014
It is always, the oppressed caring for the oppressed. No matter where in the world. #Palestine stands with #Ferguson
— Rajai abuKhalilرجائي (@Rajaiabukhalil) August 14, 2014
Al-Jazeera Host Wajahat Ali views Palestinian solidarity as proof that the situation in Ferguson is troubling.
You know it's a bad situation when the people of #Gaza are empathizing with you and seeing parallels. #Ferguson
— Wajahat Ali (@WajahatAli) August 14, 2014
The connection to Palestine is indeed an eerie one. Iranian-American activist and author, Trita Parsi, leader of the National Iranian American Council, shared a statement released by Ferguson's Chief of Police announcing that he had been trained on how to ‘prevent terror attacks’ in Israel.
Wondering why the excessive police violence? Here's a guess: #Ferguson police chief got training in Israel… #Gaza pic.twitter.com/RxEznr8cGP
— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) August 14, 2014
Palestinian solidarity with the people of Ferguson hasn't gone unnoticed. American Twitter activist ‘Faithful Black Man’ tweeted two images showing the similarity between protesters in Gaza and Ferguson. He then expressed joy in hearing a Ferguson crowd chanting “Free Gaza”.
Ferguson and Gaza pic.twitter.com/VyoOMH6jtH
— Faithful Black Man (@CountOnRodney) August 14, 2014
The fact Gaza tweeting to the people in Ferguson how to stop tear gas and Ferguson crowd chanting “Free Gaza” is amazing
— Faithful Black Man (@CountOnRodney) August 14, 2014
Palestine-based journalist Dalia Hatuqa tweeted a video of a Ferguson supporter shouting “You gonna shoot us? Is this the Gaza strip?”
Protester in #Ferguson shouts out to cops, “You gonna shoot us? Is this the #Gaza Strip?” http://http://t.co/xeSxege6rU (via @mattdpearce)
— Dalia Hatuqa (@DaliaHatuqa) August 14, 2014
We should note that many of the images supposedly showing Gazans throwing teargas canisters back at the police/occupying army are actually taken in the West Bank. As Al Jazeera correspondent Mohammad Alsaafin noted, teargas cannisters are usually the least of Gazans’ problems:
I doubt anyone in Gaza is tweeting Ferguson how to deal w teargas. More likely in West Bank. Gazans can give you advice on F16s & artillery.
— Mohammad Alsaafin (@malsaafin) August 14, 2014

author: Elia J. Ayoub


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Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev’s Twitter Account Hacked · Global Voices
Kevin Rothrock

Dmitry Medvedev's Twitter snafu. Images mixed by Kevin Rothrock.
Earlier today, hackers briefly took control of the Russian prime minister's Twitter account. The group Anonymous International (which RuNet Echo profiled in June) later claimed responsibility. As president and especially as prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev has been the butt of many jokes in Russia, where political observers have predicted his resignation since he took office. Medvedev has a reputation for clumsy, sometimes even foolish public appearances.
Presumably chosen as Vladimir Putin's second-in-command because he is so unimposing, Medvedev occupied the Kremlin from 2008 to 2012, when his interest in blogs and social media helped, rather than hindered, the development of the Russian Internet. Since Putin's return to the presidency and Medvedev's demotion to the prime minister's office, faith in Medvedev has dwindled to the frail hope that he's secretly opposed to Putin's “turning of the screws.” When Anonymous International hijacked Medvedev's Twitter account, it lampooned precisely this pipe dream.
RuNet Echo has translated some of the most amusing hacked Medvedev tweets, which were deleted the moment Twitter recaptured the account from Anonymous International.
I am resigning. I'm ashamed of this government's actions. Forgive me.
Other hacked tweets satirized the Russian government's expected decision to abolish individual savings accounts in the country's pension program. One high-ranking official, Sergei Belyakov, already lost his job, when he dared to apologize for the decision on Facebook. Anonymous International also jokes that Medvedev opposes Russia's annexation of Crimea, an acquisition that Russians have christened simply “KrymNash,” or “Crimea is ours.” Just this week, Medvedev was photographed in Crimea signing a map with this slogan.
And we've come to nothing with the pension system. Only Belyakov spoke out. Everyone else chickened out.
Finally we're thinking about banning electricity. It's more fool-proof.
#CrimeaIsntOurs Please retweet.
Some of Anonymous International's tweets through Medvedev's account addressed the prime minister's recent government order imposing new regulations on public wireless Internet access, including the need to supply Internet providers with passport information.
Despite our efforts, certain online hooligans still sh!t on needing to provide their passport number for Wi-Fi access. :( :( :(
And, by the way, concerning “Wi-Fi by passport” and other initiatives my government's led to regulate the Internet. We were forced to do this [by the Kremlin].
Many of the hacked tweets simply criticized Russia's leadership—particularly Russia's recent craze for banning things.
Russian citizens shouldn't have to suffer because their leaders have problems with common sense.
We might return to the 1980s. This is sad. If this is the goal of my colleagues in the Kremlin, then they'll soon achieve it.
You think anyone in Yalta today will say something important? I doubt it. I'm sitting here and thinking to myself, what's the f*cking point?
Maybe it would be better to ban electricity? I promise that the government will consider such action in the near future. But it will do so without me.
And Anonymous International would be nothing if it didn't allude to Medvedev's foolish reputation. This tweet refers to Medvedev's infatuation with photography, perhaps alluding to his infamously embarrassing elevator selfie.
I will become a free photographer. I've dreamed about it for some time.

author: Kevin Rothrock


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The Crisis of Small-Scale Fishing in Latin America · Global Voices
NACLA

Image by Alejandro Camargo.
This article, written by Alejandro Camargo, was originally published on the NACLA (North American Congress on Latin America) website. Alejandro Camargo is a Ph.D. candidate in geography at Syracuse University and an external researcher at the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History.
Fishing is a risky activity per se. Hurricanes, storms, and rough waters are a constant hazard for the thousands of men and women whose livelihoods depend on the water. Yet political and economic forces on different levels currently present a more dramatic and far-reaching threat to small-scale fishing in the Global South. These forces constantly provoke territorial conflicts that make fishing water a politically and ecologically turbulent terrain upon which multiple interests and actors collide.
On January 27, 2014, artisanal fishers and residents of the Chilean city of Arica waved black flags and marched throughout the city. They were “mourning the sea” after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague redrew the Chile-Peru maritime border. After six years of dispute between these two countries over their maritime boundaries, the ICJ ruled in favor of Peru and granted it about 21,000 square kilometers of ocean territory formerly claimed by Chile. The ICJ’s decision, however, was followed by political turmoil that made visible other problems artisanal fishers face today such as the monopoly of fishing companies, the scarcity of fish, and the precariousness of the labor conditions. As a result, the situation of Arica’s fishers has become illustrative of a broader crisis that also impairs artisanal fishing throughout Latin America.
For the fishers of Arica, the ICJ’s decision meant what many are referring to as the “death” of the sea, given that part of the maritime territory where hundreds of men and women subsisted for decades will no longer be available to them. Yet this geopolitical dispute was not the only cause of the general discontent in Arica. In an interview for Radio Universidad de Chile, Nelson Estrada, a member of Consejo Nacional de Defensa de la Pesca, pointed out that the real concern beyond the loss of maritime territory is the so called “Ley Longueira” — a recently approved law that favors the monopoly of large-scale fishing companies. According to Estrada, the fishing communities of Arica are subordinated to the monopoly and control of prices established by the Angelini Group, a very powerful company that also invests largely in mining, timber, and natural gas.
This type of conflict between artisanal fishers and large-scale fishing companies has provoked multiple protests well beyond Chile. In February 2014, artisanal fishers of Bahía Blanca, Argentina, denounced the critical effects of fishing trawlers — large commercial fishing vessels that drag nets through the water, known for disrupting the ecosystems on the ocean floor — on small-scale fisheries and the sustainability of fish fauna. The Argentinian state ruled in favor of artisanal fishers by revoking the license of two major fishing trawlers. Yet in doing so, the state unleashed a new strike on the part of local workers and unions whose livelihoods rely on the resource extraction of fishing trawlers.
The unbalanced and unfair competition between artisanal fishers and large-scale extractive companies is a part of a complex crisis in which the ecological sustainability of water is also at stake. The expansion of large-scale industries such as oil exploitation, for instance, is becoming a major source of water contamination in fishing territories. That is the case of the Argentine oil firm Pluspetrol, which is responsible for the contamination of rivers and the dramatic pollution of the Shanshacocha lake in the Peruvian Amazon.
Amazonian fishing waters in Peru are also suffering the environmental consequences of climate change, deforestation, and chemical contamination related to narcotrafficking. As a consequence of this, fish captures have decreased by almost 50 percent in the Peruvian Amazon. This situation is particularly alarming, considering the Amazonian region reports the highest inland capture fisheries yield in Latin America.
The expansion of large-scale industries in fishing territories and the ecological deterioration of water have triggered intense conflicts among industries, fishing communities, and the state. Fishers from the Bio Bio region in Southern Chile have fought a legal battle with Endesa — the largest electric utility company in the country. For the fishers of Bio Bio, the operations of Endesa in the area have caused considerable harm to marine ecosystems and ocean water. The Chilean state intervened and ruled in favor of the fishing communities. But local fishers still await redress for the socio-environmental crisis they experienced on account of Endesa.
The economic, political, and ecological crisis that artisanal fishers face today is aggravated when fishing territories become scenes of violence and fear. A number of grassroots organizations have publicized the disappearance, torture, and mistreatment of poor fishers on the part of U.S. warships in search of drugs and illegal immigrants in Ecuador. According to these denouncements, the international war on drugs and illegal immigration waged by the United States has extended to the oceanic territories, thus creating a situation of insecurity for many small-scale fishers. In an interview for Ecuadoradio, a fisherman recounted:
While fishing, my ship was destroyed by a North American frigate. Their intention was to destroy my ship. They said they were authorized to thoroughly inspect my ship. After six hours of inspection and destruction, they found nothing that can implicate me as the owner of the ship… they destroyed my boat, and we were in Ecuadorian waters! … and they found nothing. Many fishers have lost their boats…[while others have disappeared]… mothers and widows are suffering… we claim justice.
The reproduction of violence and fear in fishing territories has also been the consequence of geopolitical conflicts over maritime boundaries. In November 2012, the ICJ ruled in favor of Nicaragua, granting it about 75,000 square kilometers of sea formerly owned by Colombia. Since that time, small-scale fishers from the San Andrés and Providencia Archipelago in Colombia live in constant fear of trouble when fishing in some areas close to the new maritime border. According to some fishermen, Nicaraguan divers steal the nets and catch of Colombian fishers, and also create an environment of hostility and intimidation. As a consequence of this, some Colombian fishers have given up working in those areas fraught with fear and bewilderment.
Recognizing this multidimensional crisis that small-scale fishers face today in Latin America has implications for the way policy makers, activists, and academics understand the fishing sector. First, the crisis of fishing is usually depicted through figures and statistics that highlight declining captures and overfishing. A closer examination of the economic, political, and environmental forces that lie behind these numbers will provide a more critical and comprehensive analysis of the current state of world fisheries.
Second, advocates of a socio-ecologically minded consumption of food usually see fish as an alternative to the “destructive” consumption of beef and chicken. Yet fishing has its own politics, which are also shaped by injustice, violence, and inequality.
And third, fishing is usually seen as an independent and self-contained economic activity. But water is intimately connected with land, which means that many fishing communities also grow crops and farm animals.
From this perspective, we can better examine the connections between the increasing pressure on aquatic resources and the deterioration of land rights, and the ways in which the crisis of fishing aggravates the problem of food sovereignty in rural areas of Latin America. This will provide a more nuanced understanding of the place of fishers in the transformation of agrarian societies, and a more critical approach to the political economy of fish and maritime resources.

author: NACLA


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The Day More Than 800 Egyptian Protesters Died: One Year on, Remembering the Horrific Raba’a Massacre · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

A young Egyptian flees from the horror of the Rabaa Massacre. By Mosa'ab Elshamy. From his Flickr Account. Taken on August 14, 2013. Used with Permission.
One year ago today, the world watched in horror as one the single bloodiest days in modern protest history took place in Cairo, Egypt.
On August 14, 2013 Egyptian security forces opened fire at a sit-in protest in Rabaa Al Adawiya Square, killing more than 800 people opposed to the ousting of Egypt's first democratically-elected president Mohamed Morsi.
A few weeks earlier the reign of Morsi, a senior Muslim Brotherhood member, was cut short after only one year in power. Morsi's ouster was announced on July 3 2013 by the head of the Egyptian Armed Forces Abdel Fattah El Sisi, who later became the president of Egypt.
Al Jazeera Plus shared this 23-second video, featuring photographs taken by Award-winning Egyptian photojournalist Mosaab Elshamy touching on the scale of the catastrophe.
Elshamy shares an extensive gallery of photographs from the Rabaa massacre and its aftermath on Flickr. [Warning: Some pictures, particularly of corpses in the morgue, are graphic]. His gallery of 184 photographs have had almost 363K views to-date.
Raba'a's victims. By Mosa'ab Elshamy. From his Flickr Account. Taken on August 14, 2013. Used with Permission.
In a series of tweets on August 14 last year, he describes how he dodged bullets:
Literally felt a bullet pass over my shoulder. Heard a buzz similar to that of a gigantic mosquito traveling at the speed of light. Eerie.
— Mosa'ab Elshamy (@mosaaberizing) August 14, 2013
Today he writes:
A year later the magnitude of killing in Rabaa is more realised and the mourning & condemnation seems louder. Not in vain.
— Mosa'ab Elshamy (@mosaaberizing) August 14, 2014
And like many, ElShamy wonders if justice will ever be served. He notes:
A year later a monument honouring police and military stands in the same place where hundreds of civilians were massacred.
— Mosa'ab Elshamy (@mosaaberizing) August 14, 2014
Remembering the Raba'a massacre
While many Egyptians were happy with the overthrow of Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood junta, others were upset that Egypt's first democratically elected president had to go following a “coup.” What followed next, particularly the Raba'a massacre, changed the euphoria many had earlier expressed.
Basil Dabh sums up the sentiments many feel in less than 140 characters:
I hope we never see another day as dark as August 14, 2013. Over a thousand killed, dozens of churches burned, people cheering loss of life.
— Basil الضبع (@basildabh) August 14, 2014
Egyptian Hatem wonders:
حد يفهمني كده : ازاي الاف الأسر و الاهالي هيعيشوا و يتعاملوا مع دولة جيشها و امنها قتل اولادها و افراد من عائلاتها ؟؟؟
— Hatem (@QALAWA) August 14, 2014
Can someone explain to me how thousands of families and relatives can live with and interact with a country whose army and security forces have killed their children and members of their families??
Mayhem at Rabaa. By Mosa'ab Elshamy. From his Flickr Account. Taken on August 14, 2013. Used with Permission.
HRW report on Raba'a
According to Human Rights Watch, the massacre was “all according to plan.” A 188-page report released to mark the anniversary “documents the way the Egyptian police and army methodically opened fire with live ammunition on crowds of demonstrators opposed to the military’s July 3 ouster of Mohamed Morsy, Egypt’s first elected civilian president, at six demonstrations between July 5 and August 17, 2013. While there is also evidence that some protesters used firearms during several of these demonstrations, Human Rights Watch was able to confirm their use in only a few instances, which do not justify the grossly disproportionate and premeditated lethal attacks on overwhelmingly peaceful protesters.”
The report, which took one year to investigate, describes the killing of at least 1,150 demonstrators by Egyptian security forces in July and August last year as “systematic and widespread” saying that the killings “probably amount to crimes against humanity.”
HRW adds:
In the August 14 dispersal of the Rab’a al-Adawiya sit-in alone, security forces, following a plan that envisioned several thousand deaths, killed a minimum of 817 people and more likely at least 1,000.
“In Rab'a Square, Egyptian security forces carried out one of the world’s largest killings of demonstrators in a single day in recent history,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “This wasn’t merely a case of excessive force or poor training. It was a violent crackdown planned at the highest levels of the Egyptian government. Many of the same officials are still in power in Egypt, and have a lot to answer for.”
By Mosa'ab Elshamy. From his Flickr Account. Taken on August 14, 2013. Used with Permission.
A year later, HRW says “the authorities have failed to hold even a single low-level police or army officer accountable for any of the killings, much less any official responsible for ordering them, and continue to brutally suppress dissent.”
The report adds:
While there is also evidence that some protesters used firearms during several of these demonstrations, Human Rights Watch was able to confirm their use in only a few instances, which do not justify the grossly disproportionate and premeditated lethal attacks on overwhelmingly peaceful protesters.
In an open-ed in Foreign Policy, Roth explains:
Early in the morning of Aug. 14, 2013, security forces launched their operation: Within minutes, security forces — advancing on crowds of protesters with bulldozers, armed personnel carriers, and hundreds of ground forces — were already firing live ammunition, sometimes in intense fusillades.
Protesters immediately began falling. The promised safe exits never materialized until the final minutes of the dispersal, causing protesters to cower in an ever-shrinking area as snipers picked off people from rooftops and ground-level police fired indiscriminately into the crowd. Snipers even targeted the entrance to Rabaa Hospital, which became known as “Sniper's Alley.”
Omar Shakir, a HRW fellow, “still can't process the savagery” of the Rabaa attack, after spending a year investigating it. He tweets:
I spent a yr investigating #Rabaa, but still can't process the savagery. @hrw produced a video to give you a flavor https://t.co/5zWXqwPEeW
— Omar Shakir (@OmarSShakir) August 14, 2014
One year on
In Egypt, today witnessed clashes between protestors and the police, leaving about half a dozen people dead.
Egyptian blogger Zeinobia, who maintains a live blog here, reports that six people, including a policeman, were killed today.
The 6 victims are 5 protesters and one policeman. Four protesters were killed in Giza while the fifth was killed in Southern Cairo. The policeman was killed in Helwan which witnessed huge action.
Zeinobia describes the violent dispersal of Rabaa as “the day that changed Egypt forever unfortunately.”
She added:
The Pro-Morsi supporters started their day of commemoration earlier since dawn blocking traffic and major highways in Cairo and Giza. It is going to be a long day
Fatima Said reports on protests in Matriya, and how they were attacked by police.
Rabaa commemoration protest in Matriya being attacked now by police using birdshot+tear gas. Injuries reported #Egypt pic.twitter.com/9CpHsaqQLq
— Fatima Said (@fattysaid) August 14, 2014
While Alshimaa M. shares a photograph of protests in Giza:
Marches in Haram #Giza today on the anniversary of the massacre in #Rabaa مظاهرات ذكرى المجزرة في الهرم #مصر #رابعة pic.twitter.com/lJZZihmXNQ
— Alshimaa M. (@Agenda_kid) August 14, 2014
And netizens are also reporting solidarity protests around the world. From Washington DC, real-time news DJ Andy Carvin tells his 103K followers on Twitter:
Must be a #rabaa protest in DC today; my train is full of Egyptian American kids in yellow tshirts with the four-finger salute. #Aug14 — Andy Carvin (@acarvin) August 14, 2014
And befroggled reports on support coming from Idlib, Syria, with a sign which reads: “Our pain is one.”
From the city of Idlib in #Syria, in memory of those massacred in Rabaa. Our pain is one. #RememberRabaa pic.twitter.com/brUjpKC7HF
— B (@befroggled) August 14, 2014
And in Istanbul, protesters remembered those killed in Rabaa:
Hundreds of activists march in #istanbul to mark the anniversary of the #Rabaa Massacre. #WorldR4biaDay pic.twitter.com/cCVc8rtVBl
— Humanitarian Relief (@IHHen) August 14, 2014
In addition to those killed after Morsi's ousting and the period following the Rabaa massacre, many churches of Egyptian Copts came under attacks by extremists.
Blogger Mina Feyek reminds his 5,488 followers on Twitter:
On this day too, Egypt saw one of the largest set of sectarian attacks on Christian institutions by extremists, security forces were absent.
— Mina Fayek (@minafayek) August 14, 2014

author: Amira Al Hussaini


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The Worst Explosion in Taiwan’s History Has Set Off a Major Political Debate · Global Voices
Sophie Hsu

Gas-line explosion killed 30 people in Kaohsiung. Image from NGO, Citizen of the Earth's Facebook.
A recent gas-line explosion killed 30 people in Kaohsiung, Taiwan’s second largest city, setting off a debate about the underground pipelines that serve the nation's petrochemical industry. The blast on July 31 demolished streets stretching across two of Kaohsiung's city districts, causing some of the worst destruction in Taiwan's history.
The damage is more easily seen than described, but even the helicopter footage is hard to believe. The devastation, as captured in the video below, was extreme.
Investigators blame the explosion on a faulty underground gas-line, which the state-run China Petroleum Corporation installed in the 1990s. By the time the gas-line blew last month, LCY Corporation, a petrochemical company, was responsible for managing and maintaining some of these gas-lines, sharing the role with the China Petrochemical Development Corporation (CPDC). LCY Corporation and CPDC used the pipes to transport propane, which is a necessary component for the manufacturing of plastics and other similar products.
The inquiry into what caused the explosion has implicated LCY Corporation in failing to maintain the gas-lines.
The leak started approximately three hours before the explosion, instantly killing 30 people. Those with severe and minor injuries rose above 300 in the ensuing chaos. The disaster also claimed the lives of several firefighters and police officers, who were already on the scene responding to complaints about a smell of gas.
Firefighters responded to the leak by dousing the gas-line in water, which it seems only helped spread the draining propane.
On August 6, Citizen of the Earth Taiwan, an environmental NGO, staged a protest in front of the national government's executive building in Taipei, urging officials to adopt stricter regulations on petrochemical companies and underground gas-lines. On Facebook, the group explained its campaign:
高雄人已經退無可退，幾百萬高雄人不可能繼續生活在這個超大工業區！亡者不能白白犧牲，傷者不能白白受苦，當權者應還給高雄人民和土地應有的正義，給子孫一個生存發展的機會。
There is no turning back for the people of Kaohsiung. It is impossible for millions of Kaohsiung residents to continue living in this gigantic industrial zone! Victims should not have died in vain and those injured should not be suffering in vain. Those who hold power must return justice to the land and to the residents of Kaohsiung. We must give our grandchildren the chance to live better.
Citizen of Earth also demands that Taiwan relocate Kaohsiung's petrochemical companies to more remote locations by next year.
Kaohsiung's deadly incident has united academic experts calling for tighter national controls on the industry and improvements to the management of information surrounding safety and disaster prevention.
An investigative report by the online media outlet Awakening News Networks recently concluded:
此次高雄氣爆事件因政府缺乏防災概念與管線資料，造成史上最嚴重工安意外。學者孫志鴻受訪時歎道，儘管學界多次建議，但政府始終忽略基礎地理資料的重要性，他建議經濟部進行全台管線普查，並建置「共同管線地理資訊系統」和危險氣體預警系統；另外，為避免地下管線混雜造成管理問題，學者劉俊秀建議打造「共同管溝」，另闢地下空間整理管線走向，以便維修與災害監控。
The government’s unpreparedness for such a disaster and the absence of gas-line data were the causes of the Kaohsiung gas explosion, which resulted in the worst accident in [Taiwan's] history of industrial safety. In an interview, Sun Chih-Hong, an academic, said the government ignored the need to create a basic geographic information system (GIS), despite numerous warnings from scholars. Sun Chih-Hong suggested that the Ministry of Economic Affairs should conduct a general revision of the country’s entire gas-line infrastructure and establish a joint GIS pipeline system that includes early warnings for hazardous materials. Another academic, Liou Gin-Show, suggested that authorities establish a joint piping channel to manage materials for transportation, repairs, and disaster-monitoring separately, in order to prevent a repeat of the confusion and management issues in Kaohsiung.

author: Sophie Hsu


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In the Fight Against Russia, Ukraine Flirts with Kremlinesque Internet Censorship · Global Voices
Tanya Lokot

A new Ukrainian law was supposed to allow the government to shut down media and block websites without a court order. Images mixed by author.
A new draft law in Ukraine threatened to empower the government to shut down media outlets and block websites in the name of national security. The law, which passed its first reading in parliament yesterday, has exasperated local journalists, civil society figures, and the international community. The outrage grew so loud that today deputies agreed to remove and soften most of the censorship measures, but proposed moving some of them to existing media laws to achieve some measure of control over dissenting media outlets.
Russia's relentless campaign to restrict media freedom and introduce extensive controls on the Internet is well publicized, but it looks like Ukraine will soon be catching up. The Ukrainian government, which has endured Russia's domination of the media landscape in the east, intended to use the new law “On Sanctions” to crack down on rogue news outlets and websites that supposedly undermine national defense efforts.
The law (in its initial form) gave the president and the National Security and Defense Council extraordinary powers to protect Ukraine’s interests and security. Under the law, authorities would be allowed to block or shut down any television or radio station, or any website, without a court order. Any kind of media or business activity, including Internet activity, would be vulnerable to restrictions or termination. The law would permit the state to sanction both organizations and individuals, domestic or foreign.
Responding to the parliament's approval of the law's first reading, journalists were among the first to express their outrage and shock. Hromadske TV reporter Nastya Stanko immediately drew a comparison with former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych:
Закон 4553а. Навіть Янукович так не чудив
— Nastya Stanko (@StankoNastya) August 12, 2014
Law 4553a [sic]. Even Yanukovych hadn't managed to pull stuff like this.
Ian Bateson, a newly minted journalist of the Ukrainian English-language outlet KyivPost, was one of many who saw eery parallels with what Russia has been doing to its own media:
Copying Russian Internet blacklist & then some RT @MaximEristavi Ukraine approves law threatening free speech http://t.co/njGqpcV52c
— Ian Bateson (@ianbateson) August 12, 2014
International press freedom organizations have called the draft law “draconian” and a “major setback for freedom of information in Ukraine,” and local media activists have echoed these criticisms. Ukrainian journalist unions have condemned the initiative, accusing the government of exploiting concerns about national security, in order to introduce censorship. Oksana Romanyuk, director of the Institute of Mass Information, argued the law was well-intentioned, but could have dangerous consequences:
У ВР щойно прийняли у першому читанні відверто сирий законопроект 4453а – стосовно санкцій. Мета благородна, давно пора була, так? АЛЕ, прикриваючись цією метою нам навязують ту ж саму януковську диктатуру – згідно цього законопроекту, президент або РНБО можуть просто своїм рішенням обмежити або заборонити діяльність будь-якого ЗМІ в Україні. Ось так, без рішення суду, без визначення якихось рамок чи чітких категорій.
The Parliament has just passed in first reading a frankly unfinished draft of bill 4453a—regarding the sanctions. The aim seems noble, [they] should have done this sooner, right? BUT, by hiding behind this aim, they are imposing on us a Yanukovych-style dictatorship—according to the law, the President or NSDC can just decide to limit the activity of any media in Ukraine. Just like that—no court order, no defined limits or clear categories.
Others complained that the sanctions, which are ostensibly aimed at silencing hostile voices based outside Ukraine, instead limited the rights and freedoms of Ukraine's own citizens. Viktoria Syumar, former deputy secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, said the law grants excessive powers and would make Ukraine more like Russia:
Это приведет, к сожалению, к плохим последствиям. Если принять формулу, что мы любого, кто посмеет критиковать власть, будем закрывать, простите, нас это приведет в Россию.
This will, unfortunately, lead to bad consequences. If we accept the formula that we can shut down anyone who dares to criticize the authorities, I'm sorry, but that will lead us into Russia.
Syumar conceded that officials would be unlikely to enforce the law widely, if it is eventually adopted. Authorities would probably impose the new regulations selectively, flaunting targeted cases to scare the larger public.
Принятие такой нормы совершенно не означает ее использование, но означает вполне конкретный намек собственникам СМИ в случае их неподдержки государственной линии в тяжелый для страны период.
Adopting such a norm does not necessarily mean it will be used, but it does mean quite a heavy hint to mass media owners about what might happen to them if they choose not to support the state line during a difficult period for the country.
Ukraine has struggled, to put it mildly, in the information war against Russia, leaving little mystery about Kyiv's motivation for boosting control over the country's media outlets and opinion-makers. Does this excuse the country's apparent decision to duplicate Russia's crackdown on Internet and media freedom? Blacklisting media websites, blocking critical bloggers and whistleblower accounts on the grounds of “extremism,” and closing independent TV shows—all of this is old news in Russia. It might be coming to Ukraine, soon.
Ukraine, for its part, boasts a far more vibrant civil society than Russia, with many of the activists still raw and angry after the Euromaidan protests and the slow-moving anti-corruption investigations that followed.
Ukraine's new draft law brought to mind the ill-advised anti-protest law that Yanukovych and his parliament adopted in January 2014, which also mimicked oppressive legal restrictions and regulations devised in Russia. Officials rolled back the anti-protest law less than two weeks after passing it, but the political damage to the Yanukovych regime proved irreparable.
Evidently in quick reaction to the indignation of media and civil society, parliamentary deputy Mykola Tomenko, head of the parliament's committee on freedom of speech, told the press this morning that they were working to exclude the media censorship norms from the draft law. Recognizing the measures as undemocratic, the committee instead proposed to amend the existing dedicated media laws to allow for sanctions against newsrooms propagating separatism and terrorism.
Amendments to those laws would still simplify imposing bans or limiting media activity. For TV channels, the National Security and Defense Council would consider the case for three days, then block the broadcaster temporarily while they took the case to court. The court would then also take up to three days to make a decision about the final ban. For press, a similar process would apply, but the State Committee on TV and Radio or the Justice Ministry would take offenders to court.
Later this morning Ukrainian parliament voted to adopt the national security law that has lost some its teeth. But although these amendments seem like improvements, the slightly less offending parts have been reshuffled to other laws, and they are still aimed at making it easier to shut down media outlets with inconvenient agendas.
With Ukraine in turmoil and many Ukrainians skeptical of the new government's ability to act on its promises of transparency and democratic governance, the government will face increasing scrutiny any time it tries to push through restrictive Internet and media regulations. The authorities in Kyiv are caught trying to appease Western demands for greater media freedom, while simultaneously resisting Russia's onslaught in the east and on the airwaves.

author: Tanya Lokot


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Why Brazilian Authorities’ Case Against 23 Anti-World Cup Activists Reads Like a Soap Opera · Global Voices
Raphael Tsavkko Garcia

Facebook campaign calling for the release of jailed activists as a preventive anti-protests measure.
Photo: Frente Independente Popular/Facebook
On the eve of the final World Cup match in Brazil, Rio de Janeiro police “preemptively” arrested dozens of activists opposed to hosting the tournament because authorities suspected they would engage in violent acts during a demonstration scheduled during the final. Charges of forming an armed gang were filed against 23 of them, prompting three to unsuccessfully ask for political asylum from Uruguay.
The accused only gained access to the 8,000-page complaint on July 24 days after their arrest, and to their surprise, the case against them is one seemingly based on betrayal, jealousy and revenge.
The complaint includes statements from three witnesses who had personal disputes with some of the activists. Initially, the press reported that the entire complaint was based solely on the testimony of Felipe Braz, a former member of the far-left-wing organization Independent People's Front (FIP). Independent journalist Collective Mariachi described Braz:
Chegou a agredir fisicamente uma companheira no Ocupa Cabral, de onde foi expulso pelos ativistas e motivo pelo qual foi “escrachado” pelas feministas, começando assim um histórico de desavenças com os manifestantes
[Braz] even physically assaulted a comrade at Occupy Cabral, from which he was expelled by activists and why he was named and shamed by feminists, thus beginning a history of disagreements with the protesters
On the same day that the complaint became public, Braz gave an interview to the newspaper O Dia from Rio de Janeiro, boasting about having given testimony against activist Elisa Quadros, known as Sininho (Tinkerbell). His cynicism dismayed many activists. On Facebook, activist and professor Henrique Antoun commented:
Polícia, promotor, juiz, Globo e quase toda a impren$a massacram 23 pessoas com base no depoimento de um canalha inclassificável, capaz de dizer as coisas mais escabrosas e rir sadicamente do sofrimento e da humilhação alheias.
Police, prosecutor, judge, Globo and almost the entire pre$$ massacre 23 people based on the testimony of a unclassifiable scoundrel, able to tell the most scabrous things and laugh sadistically at the suffering and humiliation of others.
The second witness is Anne Marie Josephine Louise Rosencrantz, who told police that Sininho wanted to burn down the Rio de Janeiro city council. Rosencrantz is the ex-girlfriend of activist Game Over, and she accuses Sininho of “stealing” him from her. In posts on her Google Plus account seven months ago, Rosencrantz insults Sininho, calling her manipulative. Game Over was one of those arrested the day before the World Cup final.
The third person whose statements appear in the complaint is Cleyton “Joker” Silbernagel, a candidate for state representative for the Brazilian Socialist Party (PSB) who declared his love for Sininho in videos posted on YouTube and said that he regretted informing on her to police. The Collective Mariachi described him as a young man with “mental problems, [who] has over 10 fake Facebook profiles” and who poses for photos alongside controversial political figures. Cleyton “calls himself ‘a former Black Bloc’ and one of his promises in his bid for State Representative (this is true) in the upcoming elections is to institute the ‘Day of the Black Bloc’ holiday,” according to the collective.
Black Bloc is a protest tactic of wearing black clothing and covering the face with a mask or bandanna that has been used at demonstrations since 2013. Some protesters dressed this way have vandalized property or committed arson.
The 23 activists charged with forming an armed gang deny planning any violence.
Sininho has accused them of “disgusting manipulation” and trying to frame the activists. Lawyer Eloisa Samy, one of activists who sought asylum at the Consulate of Uruguay, said the complaint was based on “pathetic” accusations.
Authorities, who said they had been investigating the activists since September 2013, also wiretapped phone calls of lawyers and the Institute of Human Rights Defenders during their investigation.
In light of the complaint, some have criticised the arrests as attempts to persecute social movements with the support of various mainstream media outlets. Several activists and even groups of lawyers have accused the coverage of the country's biggest media outlet, Rede Globo, of manipulation, censorship and lies.
Collective Rio na Rua denounced on Facebook that at least 73 organized groups, social movements and collectives were nominally cited by the police investigation and are listed in the case against the 23 activists as “susceptible to extremist ideas and political manipulations that are co-opted and exploited to act as pressure forces transiting the realm of deliberate violence.”
Historian and journalist Marco Morel wrote:
O que o episódio traz de novidade na conjuntura não é a repressão de caráter social contra os de baixo na hierarquia social, que é traço estrutural na sociedade brasileira (ver o cotidiano das favelas), mas a tentativa de se punir e refrear as liberdades de expressão e manifestação, orquestrada por governos que se afirmam democráticos e, aparentemente, adeptos das regras do liberalismo formal. Mas quando a ordem é ameaçada ou somente incomodada…
What the episode brings as a novelty in the conjuncture is not the repression against those of the lowest social hierarchy, which is a structural feature in Brazilian society (see the daily life of the slums), but the attempt to punish and curb the freedoms of expression and protest, orchestrated by governments that claim to be democratic and, apparently, supporters of the rules of formal liberalism. But when the order is threatened or just disturbed …
Activists Elisa Quadros (Sininho), Eloisa Samy and Camila Jourdan. Photo by Silnei L Andrade / Mariachi Collective. Used with permission.
Academic and activist Bruno Cava commented:
O noticiário hoje sobre o inquérito do ativismo carioca lembra aqueles tabloides expostos nas bancas de jornais em que os episódios da novela são relatados como notícias reais. O objetivo é levantar uma cortina de fumaça, fazendo-nos discutir heróis, vilões, golpes sórdidos, facadas nas costas e triângulos amorosos.
The news today about the case against Rio activism recalls those tabloids displayed on newsstands in which soap opera episodes are reported as actual news. The goal is to raise a smokescreen, making us discuss heroes, villains, nasty blows, stabs in the back and love triangles.
The judge responsible for freeing the 23 arrested, Siro Darlan, criticised on his Facebook profile the “culture of imprisonment that led Brazil to the third place in number of incarcerations in the world” and the media:
No caso concreto a denúncia do Ministério Público, embora as mídias interessadas em enganar seus leitores, tenham noticiado incêndios, lesões corporais, danos ao patrimônio público, porte de explosivos, dentre outros, é exclusivamente o delito de quadrilha armada – artigo 288, parágrafo único do Código Penal, cuja pena pode variar entre um e três anos de reclusão, podendo ser dobrada.
Ora, ainda que os acusados venham a ser condenados, na pior das hipóteses a pena não ultrapassará dois anos por serem réus primários e de bons antecedentes. Sabe-se que pela nossa legislação a condenação até quatro anos pode e deve ser substituída por penas alternativas em liberdade.
Assim sendo o que justifica manter presas pessoas que ainda que condenados, permanecerão em liberdade?
The complaint of the prosecution, although the media interested in deceiving their readers have reported fires, personal injury, damage to public property, possession of explosives, among others, contains only the offense of forming an armed gang – article 288, sole paragraph of the Penal Code, the penalty for which can vary between one and three years of imprisonment, and may be double.
Now, even though the accused may be convicted, at worst the sentence will not exceed two years for being primary defendants and having good backgrounds. It is known that by our law sentencing up to four years may be replaced by alternative sentences in freedom.
So what justifies keeping prisoners that even if convicted, will remain free?
A humorous meme of the activists’ drama. It reads, “She faced the ones in power, but her worst enemies were an abuser of women and a betrayed girlfriend. You will be thrilled with Globo's soap opera: The Handcuffs of Passion.” Image created and published by “Be an activist and get rich” profile on Facebook
For professor Idelber Avelar, the legal process was driven by prejudice and attempts to criminalise activists and protests:
Depois de passar alguns dias lendo matérias, “denúncias”, depoimentos e documentos relacionados às prisões arbitrárias de manifestantes no Rio de Janeiro, eu não tenho mais dúvidas: no coração do processo de criminalização dos protestos políticos, estão o machismo, a homofobia e uma profunda, visceral, violenta misoginia.
After spending a few days reading material, “complaints”, testimonies and documents related to the arbitrary arrests of protesters in Rio de Janeiro, I have no doubts: in the heart of the criminalisation of political protest proceedings is sexism, homophobia and deep, visceral, violent misogyny.
Activist Marcelo Castañeda called for a boycott of “all media outlets that had any role of judge in this novelistic plot established by the authorities against the right to protest in Rio de Janeiro.” Pablo Ortellado, a leading figure within many social movements in Brazil, summarized the complaint:
Vinte e três pessoas presas com base em fofocas, conversas entre adolescentes e textos de sites de extrema direita.
Twenty-three people arrested based on gossip, conversations between teens and texts of far-right websites.

author: Raphael Tsavkko Garcia


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Zambia’s Cabinet Should Probe President’s Health · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

In view of widespread rumors regarding the health of Zambia's president, Michael Sata, Gershom Ndhlovu argues that the constitution mandates the cabinet to probe his health:
The last time Zambia’s President Michael Sata was seen publicly was on or around June 20 when he hosted a Chinese government delegation led by Vice President Li Yuanchao at the Presidential Palace. At that time, Sata’s appearance was that of an ailing man, a confirmation of his scraggy appearance at the High Court a couple of weeks earlier.
When pictures of a seemingly sick Sata went viral on social media, one online publication, the Zambian Watchdog, reported that the President had been evacuated to Israel for treatment.
Obviously, the expose did not go down very well with government whose senior officials at the level of vice president and ministers issued all manner of statements ranging from the president being on a working holiday to wooing investors and meeting that country’s President Shimon Perez.
Upon his return to Lusaka, the president’s office tried to show him as working normally and even posted pictures of him chairing a Cabinet meeting. The people were not convinced and called of the bluff, alleging that the pictures were photoshopped.
However, the most disastrous public relations stunt that spectacularly backfired was the picture of President Sata swearing in then Solicitor General Musa Mwenye who had been ratified by parliament for the position of Attorney-General but had been unsworn for weeks on end. There had been concerns that Mwenye would not perform in his new role without being sworn in.
The picture which was published on the Presidential Palace Facebook page, supposedly with the aim of showing that Mwenye had been sworn in as Attorney-General, had in it a deceased individual and another one who had been posted to the diplomatic service two years earlier.


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An American Bluegrass Band Woos Nigerian Audiences With Their Rendition of P-Square’s Chop My Money · Global Voices
Ethan Zuckerman

A week ago, a friend sent me a YouTube video that I've felt compelled to share with anyone and everyone who's come into my presence. In the corner of someone's living room, four American bluegrass musicians in black suits bang out a cover of “Chop My Money”, a huge hit for Nigerian R&B duo P-Square, on banjo, fiddle, guitar and upright bass.
As the members of the band, the Henhouse Prowlers, wend their way through verses in Nigerian pidgin and Yoruba, the Nigerian guests, sitting on sofas for the house concert, pull out their phones to record the sight.
When the band finishes by chanting “Plenty dollars in my name, plenty naira in my name”, one of the audience members presses a 500-naira note to the chest of the banjo player, a gesture common throughout West Africa to congratulate musicians for a superlative performance.
It's hard to appreciate the audience's reaction without knowing a bit more about P-Square. Twin brothers Paul and Peter Okoye founded the group in 2000 and have been a dominant presence on the west African music charts ever since. Their lavishly produced music videos garner millions of views and top YouTube's charts across the African continent and, frequently, in the UK and the US. “Chop My Money” may be the catchiest of their hits, and it features Senegalese-American rap star, Akon, whose Konvict record label now distributes P-Square's music. If you wanted to pick a song that would bring Nigerian audiences to their feet, “Chop My Money” is an awfully good choice.
I had to know how this video came about, so I called Ben Wright, the banjo player and co-founder of the Henhouse Prowlers to learn how a Chicago bluegrass band that plays bars and festivals in the U.S. 220 days a year found itself performing in the living room of the US deputy consul in Abuja, Nigeria. The answer is both simple and remarkable: the US State Department's American Music Abroad program.
Sixty years ago, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., proposed that the US could one-up the Soviet Union in a cold war contest of culture by matching the Bolshoi Ballet with America's most powerful cultural export: jazz. Under the auspices of the “Jazz Ambassador” program, the US State Department sent Dizzy Gillespie to Iran and Louis Armstrong to the Congo, giving international audiences music that was livelier than Soviet symphony orchestras, and conveying a complex political message. The touring bands were racially integrated – a potent counterweight to international news stories about segregation in the US south – and the very structure of jazz, with the soloist's freedom within the structure of the chord changes, contrasted with the rigid classical music brought abroad by the Soviets.
The State Department no longer sends artists with the visibility of an Armstrong or a Gillespie abroad. Instead, they offer ten “American roots music groups” multi-nation tours to perform and conduct workshops with local musicians. The definition of “roots music” is admirably wide: “The diversity of traditional American genres we are seeking, includes, but is not limited to Contemporary Urban , Hip Hop, Rock & Roll, Punk, Heavy Metal, Indie Rock, R&B, Jazz, Blues, Country, Broadway Musical Theater and American roots music genres like Country, Gospel, Soul, Bluegrass, Zydeco, Cajun, Afro-Caribbean, Tejano, Southwestern American Conjunto, Native-American and Folk.” (I have high hopes that Indonesia's election of metalhead Joko Widodo to the presidency means that a diplomatic tour featuring Megadeth is in the cards.)
Ben explains, “The Prowlers have been doing educational outreach, performing and teaching in US schools for years. We figured that might give us an edge.” The Prowlers were one of forty bands selected to audition and won one of the ten slots for 2013, leading to a tour of Congo Brazzaville, Liberia, Mauritania and Niger. Bands have no say over where the State Department will send them, but Ben could not have been more thrilled to travel to West Africa. His father is African historian Donald Wright, who specializes in The Gambia, and he'd traveled with his father almost two decades earlier. “When I heard about the trip, I called my father, who basically lost his mind. I was getting the chance to travel to places he'd dreamed of going, Mauritania and Niger especially.”
Ben and the band discovered that touring West Africa had unexpected joys and challenges. “You spend six hours cramped in a car, traveling through the Liberian jungle over terrible roads. But when you get there and put on a show, collaborating with local musicians, it's always worth it.” His instrument of choice helped build connections as well. In Niamey, Ben found the Henhouse Prowlers paired with a Nigerien band fronted by a man playing the Akonting, the “great-great grandfather of the banjo.” While traveling bands don't have much time to bond with the local players – only two hours to meet, set up and soundcheck – he and the Akonting player bonded immediately. “I tuned my banjo down two steps and suddenly we were in key trading licks back and forth. It's hard to know how well you're connecting, given the language and cultural barriers, but he was smiling and I was too.”
The chief lesson Ben took from the Prowler's first African tour – play recognizable music. So when they got a request from the US embassy in Nigeria to play an Independence Day concert in Abuja, Ben asked what songs were popular in Nigeria. His embassy contact sent him a list of YouTube links, including a number of P-Square songs.
“We picked ‘Chop Your Money’ almost at random, not realizing how popular it was,” Ben told me. “It was no small undertaking to learn it.” The song has four verses and each member took responsibility for memorizing one, an especially tricky task with the verses in pidgin English and Yoruba. The band's relentless touring means there's little time to rehearse, so the song came together, in part, on stage as the Prowlers tried it out in front of polite, but confused, US crowds.
The reaction in Nigeria was significantly warmer. “When Jon (Goldfine) started singing in Yoruba, people lost their shit.” In the audience in the deputy consul's living room was a Nigerian parliamentarian, who called Peter Okoye of P-Square to tell him about the bluegrass cover of his song. A few days later, Okoye met the Prowlers backstage before their Independence Day show in Abuja and told them, “I'm here, and you know what I'm here for.” They didn't realize Okoye's plan was to join them onstage, and you can see the shock on their faces as the singer sidled to the stage and took the mic from fiddle player Dan Andree.
After receiving P-Square's blessing, the Prowlers set out on a tour of radio stations and live performances in Lagos. “We'd walk into these radio stations and the host would be deeply skeptical, not knowing what these white boys in suits were doing here,” Ben recalled. “We'd play ‘Chop My Money’, the phones and Twitter would light up, and by the time we left, they'd be asking for autographs and putting photos of us on the wall. Then we'd leave the station and cars would honk at us because they'd heard the song on the radio.”
A little pidgin goes a long way. The US ambassador to Nigeria – who has a front-row couch seat in the video I was sent – James Entwistle got a warm response when he answered a question on Wazobia FM Lagos about the US's position on Nigerian's approach to gay rights in pidgin, telling the audience “The U.S. government no say sanction go dey for Nigeria, because of same-sex palava-o.” The ambassador won kudos in Nigeria and abroad for making the effort to learn Nigerian culture and connect directly with ordinary Nigerians outside of diplomatic circles, much as the Prowlers did by incorporating P-Square into their repertoire.
If the Jazz Ambassadors of the 1950s and 60s used soft power to export American culture and values to the wider world, the message from American Music Abroad is more subtle and humble: we're listening. Many of the performances the State Department has made possible feature American performers learning from local masters, and showing how the musical encounter is changing both participants.
The Nigerian experience has certainly changed the Henhouse Prowlers. “Chop My Money” is now part of the band's regular set. “We like to tell stories as well as play songs, and the stories associated with this song are some of the best I've got,” says Ben. Soon, it may not be their only Nigerian tune. “We're talking about going into a studio and recording an EP of Nigerian music which we can send to the radio stations that played us in Lagos. I'd like to see us take on some Fela, to look into the past as well as the future of Nigerian music.” As video of their Nigerian performance has spread online, the band has received some unexpected invitations. “We got invited to Calgary, Alberta to play a Nigerian cultural festival. A Nigerian couple in Atlanta asked if we'd play their wedding.”
Whether or not the State Department is covering the bill, Ben is determined to bring bluegrass back to West Africa. “I know why my father kept coming back to West Africa. I've caught the bug.”

author: Ethan Zuckerman


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Defending Human Rights in Jamaica · Global Voices
Matthew Hunte

When JFJ [Jamaicans For Justice] began, extra-judicial killings by police were commonplace. Yet, not a single police officer had ever – not in the entire history of Jamaica – been ever held accountable for one of these murders. It was a matter that desperately needed addressing. The death of Mario Deane on Jamaica’s Independence Day, while in police custody for having a spliff [a small amount of marijuana] in his possession, is a stark reminder of why we simply cannot afford to silence or sideline people like Carolyn Gomes.
Writer Kei Miller praises Jamaican human rights activist Carolyn Gomes.

author: Matthew Hunte