Sean Jacobs's Blog, page 292

Congo President’s embarrassing attempt to ingratiate himself to Donald Trump

Congolese President Denis Sassou Nguesso. Image credit: Thierry Charlier (AFP/Getty Images)

On December 26, 2016, President Denis Sassou Nguesso left Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, for Miami, Florida, accompanied by his foreign minister and a team of aides. In power since 1979 for all but five years, Sassou Nguesso has acquired a reputation for gross corruption and equally gross human rights abuses. Despite these credentials, he was reportedly scheduled to meet US President-Elect Donald Trump at a charity dinner on the evening of December 27.

Sassou Nguesso publicized the meeting widely. Thierry Moungalla, his Communications Minister, announced it on Twitter on December 26, along with a memo signed by Firmin Ayessa, Sassou Nguesso’s longtime aide. The meeting was announced on Sassou Nguesso’s official website; in Les Dépêches de Brazzaville, his propaganda newspaper; and on Télé-Congo, the state-run television station, which even published a doctored photograph of Trump and Sassou Nguesso embracing, with the latter standing slightly taller. Trump’s necktie ultimately belied the photograph’s origins. It was taken after a meeting between Trump and Mitt Romney, with Sassou Nguesso now in Romney’s stead.

News of the meeting – which would have been Trump’s first with an African head of state since his election – went viral on social media. Apparently embarrassed, Trump’s spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, denied it had ever been scheduled. Details of the meeting remain hazy. It is unclear who issued Sassou Nguesso’s invitation, what was to be discussed, and in what context the meeting would occur. What is clear, however, is that the meeting was to occur at the charity dinner in Palm Beach, Florida, and possibly at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

The meeting, according to the Congolese government, would ostensibly focus on the humanitarian crisis in Libya. Sassou Nguesso’s real agenda had four points. First, Sassou Nguesso and other African autocrats perceived NATO’s intervention in Libya as a threat. If, following the Arab Spring, western governments proved willing to intervene on behalf of democracy activists, Africa’s autocrats would lose the ability to employ violence against citizens. This threat was particularly acute after the Burkinabé Revolution of 2014, which forced President Blaise Compaoré from power after 27 years and emboldened activists across the region. “African problems,” Sassou Nguesso planned to tell Trump, “require African solutions.” The principle is eminently reasonable, almost indisputable. For Sassou Nguesso and other autocrats, however, it is a license for repression.

Second, Sassou Nguesso is enmeshed in corruption scandals in Australia, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland. Earlier this year, during trips to Washington, Sassou Nguesso’s wife, son, and finance minister were served with subpoenas, which require them to disclose the sources and locations of Sassou Nguesso’s wealth. The subpoenas were delivered as part of Commisimpex SA’s effort to collect a $1 billion arbitration award, which stemmed from Sassou Nguesso’s refusal to pay infrastructure invoices some 30 years ago. Sassou Nguesso routinely uses official meetings with French presidents to elicit guarantees of immunity from prosecution. He is seeking similar assurances from Trump.

Third, Sassou Nguesso has long had a strained relationship with ExxonMobil, and its CEO Rex Tillerson, who was recently named Trump’s nominee as secretary of state. The strained relationship dates from the late 1980s, when ExxonMobil played a central role in offshore exploration. According to Elie Smith, a leading journalist in Central Africa, Sassou Nguesso awarded French corporations Elf and Total the most lucrative production permits – essentially snubbing Exon Mobil. Given Sassou Nguesso’s protracted centrality in FrançAfrique corruption networks, his decision was no surprise. Still, he is keen to repair his relationship with Tillerson.

Finally, the meeting underscores how Africa’s autocrats seek foreign cover for domestic troubles. Sassou Nguesso routinely leads mediation efforts across francophone Africa: in Cote d’Ivoire in 2006, in the Central African Republic in 2015, and in Libya since 2011. In 2006, his efforts helped secure an Oval Office meeting with then president George W. Bush, during which Sassou Nguesso pressed for relief from a debt crisis caused by his own mismanagement. In 2015, Sassou Nguesso sought French President Francois Hollande’s implicit approval for a constitutional revision, which enabled him to stand for “reelection” in March 2016. Now, Sassou Nguesso seeks cover for his ongoing military campaign in the Pool region, which ostensibly targets a rebel group that no longer exists. In reality, the campaign is designed to threaten citizens who might otherwise protest his fraudulent “reelection.”

As Sassou Nguesso waited for the meeting in Palm Beach, his aides attempted to mitigate his humiliation. His Foreign Minister, Jean-Claude Gakosso, attributed the delay to “diplomatic time.” Thierry Moungalla admonished the Congolese press to “be patient.” But he was excoriated in the African press, on social media, and at home. One Ouagadougou newspaper, Le Pays, mocked his presumption: “What does he think he can teach the new American president about Libya?” One commentator suggested that Sassou Nguesso “should stage a sit-in at Trump Tower.” Paul Marie Mpouélé, a Brazzaville activist, called the episode “a national shame.”

The domestic repercussions have already begun. As his military campaign in Pool makes clear, Sassou Nguesso routinely employs violence against civilians to preempt dissent. Fearing that the Trump debacle could provide a focal point for frustrated citizens to protest, Sassou Nguesso again threatened repression. On December 29, the regime’s security services opened fire at a Brazzaville prison, where Paulin Makaya, a leading democracy activist, is incarcerated. At least three were killed and several arrested. Expect more repression in the short-term.

Some expect the charade in Miami to further strain relations with Washington. It will not. Many of Africa’s autocrats welcomed Trump’s election. Burundi’s Pierre Nkurunziza congratulated Trump minutes after his election, as did Rwanda’s Paul Kagame and Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni. “Your victory,” Nkurunziza declared, “is the victory of all Americans.” Sassou Nguesso welcomed Trump as a “pragmatist.” They believe Trump will prioritize America’s economic interests over its democratic ideals. Sassou Nguesso’s personal affection for Trump might be diminished after the Miami incident, but this will in no way dent his enthusiasm for a Trump presidency.

Congo President Denis Sassou Nguesso’s embarrassing attempt to ingratiate himself to Donald Trump

Congolese President Denis Sassou Nguesso. Image credit: Thierry Charlier (AFP/Getty Images)

On December 26, 2016, President Denis Sassou Nguesso left Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, for Miami, Florida, accompanied by his foreign minister and a team of aides. In power since 1979 for all but five years, Sassou Nguesso has acquired a reputation for gross corruption and equally gross human rights abuses. Despite these credentials, he was reportedly scheduled to meet US President-Elect Donald Trump at a charity dinner on the evening of December 27.

Sassou Nguesso publicized the meeting widely. Thierry Moungalla, his Communications Minister, announced it on Twitter on December 26, along with a memo signed by Firmin Ayessa, Sassou Nguesso’s longtime aide. The meeting was announced on Sassou Nguesso’s official website; in Les Dépêches de Brazzaville, his propaganda newspaper; and on Télé-Congo, the state-run television station, which even published a doctored photograph of Trump and Sassou Nguesso embracing, with the latter standing slightly taller. Trump’s necktie ultimately belied the photograph’s origins. It was taken after a meeting between Trump and Mitt Romney, with Sassou Nguesso now in Romney’s stead.

News of the meeting – which would have been Trump’s first with an African head of state since his election – went viral on social media. Apparently embarrassed, Trump’s spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, denied it had ever been scheduled. Details of the meeting remain hazy. It is unclear who issued Sassou Nguesso’s invitation, what was to be discussed, and in what context the meeting would occur. What is clear, however, is that the meeting was to occur at the charity dinner in Palm Beach, Florida, and possibly at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

The meeting, according to the Congolese government, would ostensibly focus on the humanitarian crisis in Libya. Sassou Nguesso’s real agenda had four points. First, Sassou Nguesso and other African autocrats perceived NATO’s intervention in Libya as a threat. If, following the Arab Spring, western governments proved willing to intervene on behalf of democracy activists, Africa’s autocrats would lose the ability to employ violence against citizens. This threat was particularly acute after the Burkinabé Revolution of 2014, which forced President Blaise Compaoré from power after 27 years and emboldened activists across the region. “African problems,” Sassou Nguesso planned to tell Trump, “require African solutions.” The principle is eminently reasonable, almost indisputable. For Sassou Nguesso and other autocrats, however, it is a license for repression.

Second, Sassou Nguesso is enmeshed in corruption scandals in Australia, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland. Earlier this year, during trips to Washington, Sassou Nguesso’s wife, son, and finance minister were served with subpoenas, which require them to disclose the sources and locations of Sassou Nguesso’s wealth. The subpoenas were delivered as part of Commisimpex SA’s effort to collect a $1 billion arbitration award, which stemmed from Sassou Nguesso’s refusal to pay infrastructure invoices some 30 years ago. Sassou Nguesso routinely uses official meetings with French presidents to elicit guarantees of immunity from prosecution. He is seeking similar assurances from Trump.

Third, Sassou Nguesso has long had a strained relationship with ExxonMobil, and its CEO Rex Tillerson, who was recently named Trump’s nominee as secretary of state. The strained relationship dates from the late 1980s, when ExxonMobil played a central role in offshore exploration. According to Elie Smith, a leading journalist in Central Africa, Sassou Nguesso awarded French corporations Elf and Total the most lucrative production permits – essentially snubbing Exon Mobil. Given Sassou Nguesso’s protracted centrality in FrançAfrique corruption networks, his decision was no surprise. Still, he is keen to repair his relationship with Tillerson.

Finally, the meeting underscores how Africa’s autocrats seek foreign cover for domestic troubles. Sassou Nguesso routinely leads mediation efforts across francophone Africa: in Cote d’Ivoire in 2006, in the Central African Republic in 2015, and in Libya since 2011. In 2006, his efforts helped secure an Oval Office meeting with then president George W. Bush, during which Sassou Nguesso pressed for relief from a debt crisis caused by his own mismanagement. In 2015, Sassou Nguesso sought French President Francois Hollande’s implicit approval for a constitutional revision, which enabled him to stand for “reelection” in March 2016. Now, Sassou Nguesso seeks cover for his ongoing military campaign in the Pool region, which ostensibly targets a rebel group that no longer exists. In reality, the campaign is designed to threaten citizens who might otherwise protest his fraudulent “reelection.”

As Sassou Nguesso waited for the meeting in Palm Beach, his aides attempted to mitigate his humiliation. His Foreign Minister, Jean-Claude Gakosso, attributed the delay to “diplomatic time.” Thierry Moungalla admonished the Congolese press to “be patient.” But he was excoriated in the African press, on social media, and at home. One Ouagadougou newspaper, Le Pays, mocked his presumption: “What does he think he can teach the new American president about Libya?” One commentator suggested that Sassou Nguesso “should stage a sit-in at Trump Tower.” Paul Marie Mpouélé, a Brazzaville activist, called the episode “a national shame.”

The domestic repercussions have already begun. As his military campaign in Pool makes clear, Sassou Nguesso routinely employs violence against civilians to preempt dissent. Fearing that the Trump debacle could provide a focal point for frustrated citizens to protest, Sassou Nguesso again threatened repression. On December 29, the regime’s security services opened fire at a Brazzaville prison, where Paulin Makaya, a leading democracy activist, is incarcerated. At least three were killed and several arrested. Expect more repression in the short-term.

Some expect the charade in Miami to further strain relations with Washington. It will not. Many of Africa’s autocrats welcomed Trump’s election. Burundi’s Pierre Nkurunziza congratulated Trump minutes after his election, as did Rwanda’s Paul Kagame and Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni. “Your victory,” Nkurunziza declared, “is the victory of all Americans.” Sassou Nguesso welcomed Trump as a “pragmatist.” They believe Trump will prioritize America’s economic interests over its democratic ideals. Sassou Nguesso’s personal affection for Trump might be diminished after the Miami incident, but this will in no way dent his enthusiasm for a Trump presidency.

The year of Elaine Salo

Elaine Salo, on the right, in conversation with Zackie Achmat, in Muizenberg, Cape Town, circa 2003. Photo: Sean Jacobs

It is very difficult to write about Elaine Salo in the past tense.

I first met Elaine in the mid-1990s.  I’ve gone back and forth in my mind about how we met, but I can’t quite recall when and where. In retrospect I’m surprised we had not met earlier. As someone else wrote about her: “It is only a little hyperbole to say that Elaine knew everyone and everyone knows her.”

We had both studied at the University of Cape Town, though she preceded me by several years. She was born in Kimberley in the Northern Cape, but for me she was so much a representative of Cape Town, the city of my birth, it was like we knew each other all along. The familiarity came from the cadences in her voice, her smatterings of Afrikaans, how she reminded me of my five sisters, or her research on Manenberg where one of my grandmothers briefly lived after being forcibly removed from Kirstenbosch below Table Mountain.

An outstanding quality of Elaine was that she was unapologetic about the people and places where she was from, those she studied.

I still remember once, in the early 2000s, while I was still a graduate student, recording a conversation between Elaine and the gay rights and AIDS activist Zackie Achmat, about sexual politics in Southern Africa for the Cape Town arts and politics journal, Chimurenga. The interview happened at Zackie’s house in Muizenberg and was later published as “Black Gays and Mugabes.” I was supposed to interview them, but ended up mostly watching and listening as these two intellectuals sparred effortlessly, mixing humor, insight, history, cultural politics and solidarity.

It was a lesson in political engagement.

But I should have known: Elaine came from that generation of activists who had done the hard work of liberation, but now didn’t shy away from engaging head-on with the limitations and promises of the new South Africa.

At the turn of the century, I moved away from South Africa to New York City, so I saw less of Elaine. When we did see each other however– at conferences mostly, or when I visited Cape Town — our conversations picked up where we had last left off. Elaine still had so many plans for research she wanted to do: on water politics, sanitation, the racial geography of Cape Town, the moral economy of Manenberg (the coloured township which was the subject of her doctoral research). She talked about books she wanted to edit, articles she wanted to write and conferences she still had to go to.

The last time I saw her was last January at an outdoors restaurant in Plumstead, a suburb to the south of the city. We met for breakfast. Her husband Colin was there too, along with their daughter Jessica. They were visiting with family. Elaine insisted my then-10 year-old daughter Rosa — curious, a tween, bookworm, fidgety, bright, and anxious at all the unfamiliarity of the city — should meet Jessica. She thought that they would immediately recognize one another. She was right. She knew people.

I grew up in one of the dormitory townships of the Cape Flats and it is around that world — one where Elaine cut her teeth as an activist and later as an academic, that we connected the most: The politics, the hypocrisy of the city’s governing and middle classes, and the potential — hidden in plain sight — of Cape Town’s very poor black and coloured residents. Elaine’s work was a model of how to treat the people in that region with respect.

The historian Terri Barnes best characterized Elaine’s work on Cape Town: “Her passion was to clothe the experiences of women and men on the Cape Flats in the dignity they deserved. Not god’s stepchildren, not tattooed gangsters, not gap-toothed drunks on street corners, not child-women shouting at dirty urchins. No. People with histories, communities and choices who deserved respect and careful theorizing.”

One of my favorite memories of Elaine is from the early 2000’s in Cape Town. Then in conversations with my now wife, also Jessica, I lamented a lot about what the city had lost with segregation — in terms of the rich cultural life of the world around the mountain — and could never recover again. Things that my father would talk about. I felt that I could never adequately capture that world or experience it. Then Elaine invited us to a party at her her house in Woodstock. As we walked through the door and settled in, a jazz band was jamming in the middle of the living room. I think Colin was on guitar, and the late Vincent Kolbe on piano. I turned to Jessica and didn’t have to say anything. This is what I had been talking about.

A few years ago I posted a picture on social media of my dad and myself as a child at his work. He was a gardener in a rich, white suburb in Cape Town for 40 years, a quick walk from where he was born in Newlands and grew up in Kirstenbosch. He worked for a white Supreme Court Judge. I wrote about how as a child I accompanied my dad when he would go to work on Saturdays and how I didn’t do much work, but ran around the large estate chasing tennis balls, or read from the large pile of newspapers and magazines in the servant’s quarters or badgered his boss with questions.

Elaine wrote to me: “My hope for you is that you can make a thousand flowers bloom just like your dad. The beauty of gardeners like musicians is that they share the fruits of their labor freely … Sight and sound cannot be contained.”

That is how I remember her.

*This is an edited version of remarks first made at a memorial for Elaine Salo this summer in Newark, Delaware. Elaine died on August 13, 2016. She was 54. 

Made-in-China: The lives and times of Africans in Guangzhou

Still from film Guangzhou Dream Factory.

Guangzhou, in Southern China, has a long tradition as a trading port. More recently, in the wake of the Chinese state’s aggressive foreign and trade policies to Africa, the city is also home to a growing community of migrants and businesspeople from that continent. The latter buy goods in bulk in Guangzhou to sell back in Africa. Some have decided to stay.

In 2009, The New Yorker published, “The Promised Land,” by Evan Osnos “… which looks at the wave of African traders moving to China. The largest group has settled in the city of Guangzhou, where Chinese neighbors have named the community Qiao-ke-li Cheng—Chocolate City.” Though Osnos’s article wasn’t the first in-depth look at African migrants in China — Osnos’s account was predated by the work of academics like Heidi Østbø Haugen, Adams Bodomo, and Roberto Castillo — however, Osnos’s article certainly mainstreamed the broad outlines of these African migrants’ experiences in China and launched an intense focus on the community of Africans in China.

African migrants’ contemporary presence in China dates back to the late 1990s when the financial crisis in Thailand and Indonesia pushed Africans (among other migrants) to look for opportunities elsewhere. To date, it is hard to find reliable information on the numbers and nationalities of the Africans in China. Academic scholarship as well as media reports estimate the numbers to be anywhere between 20,000 and 100,000. However, during the last few years, there has been a trend of African migrants leaving China to go back to their home countries after encountering hardships and disappointments. Heidi Østbø Haugen and Manon Diederich, for example, document Gambian migrants’ stories about life in China and their decision to return home. The new film, Guangzhou Dream Factory directed by Christiane Badgley and Erica Marcus, thus adds a rich account of the complexities of living in China as an African migrant.

From the very beginning, Guangzhou Dream Factory exhibits a major strength: in a break with tradition, Africans are not just objects of the camera, but subjects who represent their own stories and experiences. Through talking to expatriates of various backgrounds (and entanglements with China, including wives and children), a complex story of aspirations, deceptions, challenges, and opportunities is woven. Some of the migrants have been very successful, others disappointed, and a few have become activists in helping other Africans who have settled in the community.

For example, Rahima is an Ugandan migrant who runs an East African food service (a sort of meals-on-wheels). She is also the president of an association to look after Ugandans in Guangzhou. Rahima shares stories of broken dreams and scammed migrants who sell all what they own back home in search of dreams made in China. Many young women, she recounts, are brought to China with promises to be employed as teachers or factory workers only to find themselves forced into a choice between prostitution jobs or unbearable debt.

Rahima is filmed carrying a baby who she found in a shop near his mom’s corpse. We don’t know who the dead mom is or what part of Africa she was from. But, we do know of Eva, a Kenyan young mother who falls victim to visa-cons, quits her job in Kenya and flies to China chasing a mirage. Upon landing in China, she immediately finds out that the employment agency that she had paid was fraudulent. The only positive part about Eva’s story is that she finally manages to get back to Kenya, “jobless and indebted, but at least she was safe.”

Yet the picture is far from being all bleakness. The filmmakers talk to young African entrepreneurs who are making strong steps towards achieving their made-in-China dreams. Both Emy, a restaurateur, who aspires to makes movies in China, and the Cameroonian self-made “King of Suits,” Kingsley Azieh Che — who claims to supply about 80% of the suit whole-sale businesses in his country — are examples of the kind of opportunities that many young Africans aspire to when they think of what China means for their futures. These success stories are, unfortunately, not possible for the average African migrant to China. In an email exchange, Christiane explains that most Africans who end up doing well in China are urban, middle class. They are “people who have enough money to pay for travel, visas, accommodation, goods, etcetera. And you know that in most African countries, that is a fairly small segment of the population.”

The documentary film also raises the very poignant and pressing questions about the future of children of mixed marriages, or of those who were born to African parents but only see China to be their home. The film shows the story of a Nigerian woman, Favor, and her daughter Cherich who was born in China and speaks fluent Chinese. We learn that a few weeks after the film was finished, the immigration police caught the mom and jailed her, and that she was sent back to Nigeria with her daughter. Christiane noted that the film has opened an opportunity to voice questions of responsibility towards this generation of African children born in China, the status of their parents, and the roles that can and must be assumed by African and Chinese authorities alike.

It is true that one could simply say that these stories are no different than any typical immigrant stories, full of hope and delusion, success and disappointment. But the overall sentiment of the documentary is that African migrants in China are skilled entrepreneurs, creative business-owners, risk-takers, and resilient strong individuals. This is a contrast to the images that the “Jungle” of Calais leaves in our minds, the capsizing boats in the Mediterranean, or the bare-life camps on the fringes of the EU.

If you want to see “Guangzou Dream Factory,” it is available for educational use only. For more information and screening events check the film’s website.

The armed conflict lurking in the countryside

Congolese Army. Image via Wikipedia.

*Africa is a Country is currently fundraising for a website relaunch as part of the Jacobin Family of publications. Head here to read up on the transition and to donate!

The protests against Congolese President Joseph Kabila in cities like Kinshasa and Lubumbashi, only reveal part of the crisis the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is currently facing. In the wake of the end of the constitutional mandate for Kabila’s presidency, sporadic fighting has sprung up in the Eastern part of the country, centered around historical grievances, and unresolved local tensions. For many years these tensions have gone unnoticed by international observers, however they can tell us more about fundamental divisions in Congolese society than the protests in cities can.

Behind the explicit aim to chase out a regime that is no longer considered legitimate, armed groups from across various swaths of the country have used the current political crisis as an opportunity to redress political marginalization, or to act on aspirations to rule over territories, populations and resources. The current fragmentation of authority in rural Eastern Congo is the outcome of a constant reconstitution of local political order, largely based on exclusivist and ethnic claims.

That the aspirations over territorial control are largely translated into identity discourses comes as no surprise. A gradual loss of capacity of the Congolese state to impose its rule, provide security and promote local development since the early 1990s has created the necessary space for armed groups to become brokers in local power games. It remains unclear where this armed group activity will lead us, but the first indications tell us we are gradually moving towards more violence, and to further political and military fragmentation and confusion.

One of the regions with a risk of new rounds of violence is the nexus connecting the Rutshuru-Lubero-Masisi-Walikale territories (North Kivu). The area around the rural agglomeration of Kitchanga, for example, has seen recent and isolated cases of violence against local villages. Moreover, tit-for-tat confrontations between several armed factions of Hutu and Hunde descent have caused a generalised context of fear among the population. Rumours about a larger attack of militias against Kitchanga have created a generalised psychosis. In this context, a minor incident might spark off large-scale violence. Recent attacks by armed groups against civilians causing numerous victims in Luhanga, Bwalanda, and Nyanzale, indeed indicate that violence again is becoming more recurrent on the axis Rutshuru-Lubero-Masisi-Walikale.

This situation, linked to the Congolese Army’s campaigns to track one of the armed groups in the region, is not necessarily new. However, today’s tensions are amplified by the larger crisis at the political center. This crisis has reinforced the image of a state lacking capacity and legitimacy. It also paves the way for armed groups to reposition themselves and revise their strategies with the aim to impose their rule.

In South Kivu’s Kalehe territory, Raya Mutomboki factions of Tembo origin, have tried to forge new armed coalitions, not only to put pressure on Kabila to leave office but also to consolidate more localized claims of self-governance. After December 19th, main roads in Tembo areas have been under control of these Raya Mutomboki factions who believe Congolese state services should be pushed out of the area because they are no longer legitimate. They are also motivated by the ambition to set up roadblocks preventing the return to the region of over 40,000 Congolese Tutsi who fled during the fighting of the 90s, protect their community against Hutu militias, as well as fight for the recognition of the territorial claims of the Tembo.

These developments in the Kivu Provinces, as well as other areas in Eastern Congo, echo larger dynamics of inter and intra-ethnic competition over resources and political representation across the country. These issues remain unresolved since earlier rounds of violence in the 90s, mainly because of the lack of commitment and capacity of the Congolese state. The absence of protection mechanisms for local communities, and a governance context which is organized ethnically or through patronage networks, has prevented a coherent and effective response from the Congolese state, and have facilitated a proliferation of armed groups.

Although it is too soon to make any clear predictions, the political crisis resulting from Kabila’s refusal to leave office risks pushing these rural zones through new rounds of violence. This crisis provides armed groups with the perfect incentive to revive their local claims to rule, risks reinforcing their links with disgruntled or radicalized anti-Kabila forces, and could even turn some of these groups into attractive allies of the regime’s strategies to stay in power. It is even questionable if a potential agreement between Kabila’s regime and the political opposition about a transition of power at the state level, will have any effect on these simmering dynamics.

*Africa is a Country is currently fundraising for a website relaunch as part of the Jacobin Family of publications. Head here to read up on the transition and to donate!

Africa makes us* look better

Image via Pexels

*Africa is a Country is currently fundraising for a website relaunch as part of the Jacobin Family of publications. Head here to read up on the transition and to donate!

Africa makes us look better. Just by stepping off a plane we get richer, more interesting and prettier. In most cases our lighter skin and straighter hair earns us a special place in society. We receive a lot of attention, wanted or not, and feel like minor celebrities. When we are invited to sit at the high table, between a priest and the headmaster of a school, or when a police officer stops traffic for us so we can cross the highway safely we become special. It doesn´t matter if we feel uncomfortable or if we think, like our ancestors, that we deserve to be treated differently, the outcome is the same. By accepting this position of privilege we somehow validate it. We contribute to the perpetuation of a centuries-old system of superiority and subordination.

However, maybe exactly this feeling of being special and superior is one of the reasons why so many of us “fall in love with Africa.” Maybe we are craving a level of attention Europe cannot give us. And Africa can and does. Here we belong to the cosmopolitan circle; we go to cocktail parties at embassies and discuss world politics and the problems of African countries as if we are experts. We surround ourselves with allegedly sophisticated people, who have Master´s degrees in politics, law, or international relations.We complain about our housekeeper or watchman; about how we need to explain some things ten times and they still don´t do it in the way they are “supposed” to. We seem to know why African countries are still not at the same level as others and what the solutions for the problems of African people are. And, as part of the elite we feel very important.

In Kenya, sometimes you can also find a few Kenyans at those fancy dinner parties, but in general they are quite rare in the world of expats. However, even if Kenyans are present, we tend to think of them as the exception rather than the rule. The existence of a Kenyan middle class is still quite hard for us to accept as part of the reality. This growing group of Kenyans with university degrees, good jobs and an interest in enjoying the sweet urban life as we do confuses our polarized image of African societies – where people are either ultra-rich politicians and businessmen or living in slums. Having two or three Kenyans as friends is something desirable, no matter how close you actually are to them. We mention these marafiki wa Kenya (Kenyan friends) in conversation to show our opposite that we are integrated in Kenyan society. We think this makes us “one of the good ones.”  We say sawa sawa (It’s ok.), habari (How are you?) or asante rafiki (Thank you, my friend.) to feel like a local, neglecting the fact that these are the only words we know in Swahili.

We feel good belonging to a secret club, with its own language and codes. The entrance fee is being an expat, not to be confused with being an ordinary immigrant, like, for instance, people from Uganda or South Sudan. We feel comfortable surrounded by people with similar backgrounds but we don’t have to deal with the thoughts, dreams and challenges of ordinary Kenyans.

If we engaged in more genuine conversations with Kenyans, we would have to recognize the hypocrisy of our existence as expats. We would be thrown out of our convenient little bubble full of Java House coffees, safaris to the Masai Mara and weekends at Diani Beach. Once the bubble popped, we would have to ask ourselves how we can justify our continued existence here? And this we try to prevent, by all means.

*By us and we I refer to the thousands of expats in Kenya, predominantly from the US or a European country (including me), who come to Kenya in search of a reputable job position, a high salary, meaningful work or simply a bit of adventure.

*Africa is a Country is currently fundraising for a website relaunch as part of the Jacobin Family of publications. Head here to read up on the transition and to donate!

Yahya Jammeh’s tribalism

The Jammehs with the Obamas. Image Credit the US Department of State via Flickr.

*Africa is a Country is currently fundraising for a website relaunch as part of the Jacobin Family of publications. Head here to read up on the transition and to donate!

The Gambia’s outgoing President, Yahya Jammeh, appears to be going nowhere slowly. After conceding defeat in the December 1 presidential election, Jammeh – who has held power for the past 22 years – made a U-turn. In spite of the country’s electoral commission confirming opposition candidate Adama Barrow’s victory, Jammeh filed a petition with the Supreme Court, asking it to void the entire election result. A pattern of rule through continuous firing and rehiring has come back to haunt Jammeh, however, as the Supreme Court has not been able to hold a sitting since May 2015, when Jammeh sacked two of its justices. The countdown has started to January 19, when the constitution requires Jammeh to hand over power.

Outside The  Gambia, Jammeh faces widespread opposition to his latest power grab. ECOWAS, the AU and UN issued a joint statement calling for Jammeh to step down. ECOWAS Commissioner Marcel de Souza asserts that a military intervention may be considered, and neighboring Senegal has indicated that it is willing to take part in military action to secure the transition to democracy. On December 16, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation issued a statement calling Jammeh to accept the results of the election, and many African heads of state have confirmed they will attend the inauguration of Barrow.

Inside The Gambia, Jammeh has held a tight grip on power and the citizenry, and has done his best to gag both the press and the opposition. His government is widely criticized for human rights abuses, torture, disappearances and extrajudicial killings.

After Barrow’s victory, and Jammeh’s conceding defeat, however, there’s a marked change in the political tone inside the country. Jammeh has never been more isolated. A range of civil society organizations – including the Gambian Bar Association, the Chamber of Commerce, the Student Association, the Teacher’s Union, and lately, the Islamic Council – have asked Jammeh to accept the voice of the people. Eleven of The Gambia’s ambassadors abroad have done the same. The question is not whether Jammeh’s era is coming to end, but whether it comes to end with or without bloodshed.

The insistence on bringing a valid election result before a non-functioning Supreme Court is not the incumbent’s only impasse. Another, more dangerous gambit has been Jammeh’s repeated invocation of “tribe” in politics. Jammeh has made rule by division his trademark – and he has made identity issues, ethnicity and religion in particular – relevant in politics in ways they were not before.

Gambians are used to Jammeh’s predictable unpredictability. It has played out in a variety of bizarre, discredited and violent proclamations, including on state religion (declaring Gambia an Islamic state through a unilateral presidential decree in 2015), medicine (claiming to be able to cure AIDS with herbal medicines), gays (“vermin” whose throats should be slit), and women’s dress codes (skinny jeans causing infertility in women).

Jammeh’s spin on tribalism has been to accuse members of the country’s largest ethnic group, the Mandinka, of tribalism. In continued attacks on Mandinkas, he has made criticism against his rule by decree and human rights record into an ethnic issue. He has threatened the Mandinka with extinction (“I will kill you like ants and nothing will come out of it”). In June 2016, Jammeh spoke in a rally in Tallinding and asserted that “since 1994 all the trouble makers have been Mandinkas. If you don’t behave I will bury you nine feet deep.” The speech led to condemnation by the UN’s special advisor on the Prevention of Genocide.

Jammeh’s singling out of the Mandinka is partly related to the ethnic belonging of his predecessor, Dawda Jawara, President of The Gambia from independence in 1965 and ousted by Jammeh in a coup in 1994. The Mandinka make up about 40 percent of the Gambian population. Yet, “tribe” has not been a basis for collective action. In fact, ethnicity in The Gambia is far from a categorical label of personal belonging which such numbers would imply.

Three years of living in The Gambia have taught me that questions about personal “origin” always unleash stories of migration, change and interchange: “We who are surnamed Kebbeh were Fulbe while living in Senegal five generations ago but are now Wolof”; “the families surnamed Cham are Wolof or Mandinka now but were originally Fulbe from Futa Toro”; or, “My father is Mandinka but I moved to my Serahuli grandmother and was raised by her so I guess I am Serahuli now”, and so forth. When Gambians talk about their background in ethnic terms, the stories they tell reveal layers upon layers of social integration across differences of language and tradition. Marriage across ethnic lines is more a rule than an exception. Social mechanisms for integration across “tribe” are everywhere, in notions of equivalent surnames (Juawara and Mbow, Willan and Fofana, Tunkara and Kanteh, Nyang and Sanyang) and in humor.

It is no small irony that Jammeh’s spin on tribalism echoes colonial techniques of divide and rule. The British operated with a split between the tiny colony in today’s urban Banjul (and Kombo St. Mary’s) and the remaining rural area of the protectorate. Administrative positions were located in the colony and dominated by urban Wolof and Aku. Former President Jawara represented a political voice from the countryside. Mandinko-speakers were in majority in the rural areas, a demographic reality that was reflected in Jawara’s political party. His task following independence was to integrate the interests of the protectorate with those of the urban elites. His government did not play on Mandinko dominance. On the contrary, Jawara’s strategy to keep political legitimacy was to incorporate newcomers into government, from both the former colony and the protectorate, of all ethnic affiliations, a strategy disliked by many older members of the party that took part in the independence movement.

Jammeh’s rhetoric has unleashed rumors about his privileging of his Jola ethnic minority, for instance about the channeling of development resources, schooling in particular, to his own southern areas. It is difficult to verify these rumors, or tell them apart from Jammeh’s overall strategy of rewarding those who are loyal, regardless of ethnicity. There is also widespread speculation about his preference for Jolas in government positions and over the existence of an armed “Jola militia” in the south toward the areas of the Jola separatist movement in Senegalese Casamance. This fuels fear of a future rebel Jola movement loyal to Jammeh that will create a merged conflict area across the southern Gambia-Senegal border.

The rhetoric on “tribe” does not seem to have convinced the majority of Gambians. Today, social media are peppered with slogans that counter Jammeh’s spin: “My tribe is Gambia,” “Tribalism has no place in our nation,” and “To hell with tribalism” – the latter version also a subtle reference to president Jammeh’s reply when the UN Secretary General criticized human rights abuses in The Gambia (“Go to hell”). Nonetheless, any attempt to understand the dynamics at work in The Gambia’s crisis will have to take into account two decades of “tribal” discourse by the country’s president.

Barrow won the election, but Jammeh got nearly 40 percent of the vote countrywide. Reconciliation efforts must address the traffic in ethnic stereotypes, about Mandinka, Jola, the diaspora, and all groups that have been subject of libel. The most acute task for the new government is to address the economic disenfranchisement that gives fertile ground for demagogues who seek power by portraying valid grievances as tribal conflicts.

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Can African states offer new approaches to refugee asylum?

Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya. Image Credit: Anouk Delafortrie (European Union/ECHO)

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In 2007, Tanzania did something radical: it promised a pathway to citizenship for over 162,000 refugees from Burundi who had settled in the country in the early 1970s. No one took much notice when the Tanzanian government, with little international fanfare, began to systematically carry out this process. As Al Jazeera reporter Mehdi Hasan has recently highlighted, a double standard influences reporting on the global refugee crisis. The media has trained its attention on asylum seekers in Europe, but has largely ignored the plight of the estimated 4.4 million refugees living in Sub-Saharan Africa — a silence he deems “white privilege at work.”

Asylum seekers in many parts of the continent also face problems of xenophobia similar to those plaguing the US and Europe. Take, for example, the case of Somali refugees in Kenya. As Abdi Latif Ega has pointed out, Somali citizens and refugees alike face routine forms of harassment and racial profiling at the hands of Kenyan state agents and foreign counterterrorist operatives. In addition, the Kenyan government is threatening once again to close Dadaab, the world’s largest refugee camp, and (in ways that echo Trump’s call for a wall on the US/Mexican frontier) officials also claim to be constructing a security barrier on the Kenyan/Somali border.

In many ways, the Kenyan refugee crisis highlights both the challenges faced by asylum seekers worldwide and the potential for a more tolerant approach to asylum. While Kenya is hardly a paragon for progressive refugee policy, for decades, hundreds of thousands of refugees have gained sanctuary in the country. From a certain vantage point, Kenya can provide a ground upon which to envision less restrictive types of registration and border controls and more flexible models of sovereignty.

According to normative theories of statecraft, governments should monitor and protect their borders. For a number of reasons, the Kenyan state has been unable (and at times unwilling) to carefully regulate international immigration. The boundaries between Somalia, Ethiopia, and Kenya have historically been extremely permeable. Due to a long history of political and economic marginalization, many citizens from Northern Kenya lack national identification documents. Denied basic services, some have registered as refugees in order to access water, schools, and health care from UNHCR-funded refugee camps. Refugees and migrants are also able to change their status by illegally purchasing Kenyan ID cards (thanks to the collusion of civil servants) or simply moving in with relatives across the border. In the absence of proper registration mechanisms or accurate demographic data, the Kenyan government is frequently unable to distinguish between “citizen” and “alien.”

Such conditions have undoubtedly caused problems, but they have also created spaces where refugee and citizen can coexist and where distinctions between illegality and legality can blur. In spite of discriminatory state policy, Kenya has hosted well over half a million Somali refugees. Despite recent crackdowns by police and security forces (including indiscriminate anti-terror operations and increasingly routine deportations), Nairobi remains a space of asylum for undocumented and unauthorized migrants from Somalia, South Sudan, and other neighboring countries.

In many ways, Nairobi provides an extra-legal model for a city of refuge. The Kenyan government simply cannot deport the tens of thousands of asylum seekers who have integrated themselves into the social and economic fabric of the city. In lieu of settling in overcrowded refugee camps, many have found work in the “informal” urban economy and have come to see the country as their primary or secondary homeland. The lives of asylum seekers in Nairobi and other urban areas are, of course, not easy. Those living outside of refugee camps cannot access certain state and UNHCR services. However, in many cases, such basic welfare provisions are also out of the reach of ordinary Kenyan citizens.

It is also questionable whether Kenya’s porous borders are an inherent security threat, as state officials and foreign observers often assume (al-Shabaab’s attacks in the country only escalated after Kenya invaded Somalia in 2011). Moreover, such permeability is essential to nomads, traders, and asylum seekers, many of whom must cross international boundaries for basic survival. Like the US/Mexican frontier, the Somali/Kenyan border cuts across social and political networks that long predated the advent of the state.

What might appear to be a government “failure” has, in fact, led many policy makers to rethink refugee encampment and advocate for the urban integration of asylum seekers. There is also a growing awareness of the contributions that immigrants make to their host country’s economy. Such policy shifts do not prefigure a complete disregard for nation-state borders. However, they do suggest the need for formal systems of inclusion and recognition that de-privilege the distinction between “citizen” and “alien.”

With the resurgence of xenophobic and nativist politics in the US and Europe (as evidenced by the election of Donald Trump and the surging popularity of Marine Le Pen), it is time for policymakers and social scientists to look outside of the Global North for political solutions. In a number of less-resourced countries, migrants, refugees, and citizens are developing innovative strategies and government officials are implementing more humane policies to cope with the global refugee crisis.

Even states deemed “weak” according to the norms of international law and social scientific theory may, in fact, inspire us to push beyond the horizons of the nation-state and point us towards a future less tethered to the constraints of territorial borders. What many international observers deem Kenya’s biggest “failure” is, from another vantage point, one of its greatest virtues: namely, its porous international boundaries.

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Joseph Kabila knows young people in Congo want him gone

It is time. Image via Jean-Marie Kalonji Twitter (@jeanmariekalon1).

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One year ago, on December 15, 2015 in the capital Kinshasa, the president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Joseph Kabila’s security forces kidnapped youth activist Jean-Marie Kalonji, the coordinator of “Quatrième Voie” (the Fourth Way in English) and “Il Est Temps” (The Time is Now). Kalonji was detained for 134 days during which time he was held in a hole and tortured. He did not know whether he would live or die.

Youth leaders inside and outside of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) quickly mobilized to call attention to the capture and disappearance of Kalonji. After months of pressure, in the wake of rumors of his death, the government finally produced Kalonji and transferred him from the personal prison of Congo’s National Intelligence Agency (ANR in French) to the general prison of Makala. When he arrived at Makala, he joined fellow youth activists who had been imprisoned for almost a year. They were all eventually released during Spring and Summer of 2016.

Kalonji’s case represents the crux of what is Kabila greatest challenge: courageous, educated, Congolese youth who are willing to put their lives on the line to fundamentally transform the DRC. Jean-Marie Kalonji is only 29 years old, works as a human rights activist and holds a degree in International Law from Université Libre de Kinshasa. He was part of the January 2015 #Telema uprisings that openly challenged the attempt by Kabila to extend his stay in power via a change in the electoral law.

At that time, human rights groups allege that security forces killed 42 people and injured and arrested hundreds. Friends of the Congo visited a number of the injured youth at the hospital of the University of Kinshasa. The youth were riddled with bullets. One young woman had a bullet wound in her groin and a young man had a bullet penetrate his back and exited through his chest. Despite the fact that they were suffering from serious injuries, these young people were resolute about getting back in the streets, once healed, so they could continue pressuring President Kabila to step down.

Although respect for the constitution is a critical aim of the youth and others in civil society, it is not their entire pursuit. Most Congolese do not know what a constitution is, what is in it and certainly did not read its tenets before voting for it in 2006. What people know is that there was an agreement for President Kabila to leave on a particular date and he is refusing to relinquish power. The Congolese people have suffered under his regime from negligence, disdain, contempt, corruption and the usual coterie of horrid social ills that leave the DRC at the bottom of the United Nations Human Development Index.

Jean-Marie Kalonji and a significant segment of Congolese youth believe that Kabila was imposed on them, first by a war of aggression by Congo’s neighbors, and subsequently through policies from Europe and the United States. When Joseph Kabila stole the 2011 elections and still received the backing of Western nations, it sent a signal that they were complicit in the continued suffering of the Congolese people. When the-then United States Ambassador to the DR Congo, James Entwistle, announced on February 15, 2012, that the US would endorse the stolen elections, it sent a clear signal to the Congolese people that they would have to contend with the tyrannical regime for yet another half decade, backed by internationally legitimacy.  

The path forward for many Congolese youth is clear. They want to be free from tyranny more than the Kabila regime wants to repress them and deprive them from living life fully. Although there is much ado about sanctions and pressure from the European Union and the United States, the youth do not hold out hope for an external solution. They see the ultimate solution coming from their own agency as social justice advocates and an informed Congolese citizenry who seek to fundamentally and radically transform their society.

Should Washington or London seek to bring support, young people are clear the policy of supporting tyrants in the region must end. US support of authoritarian regimes in Rwanda and Uganda has undermined democracy in the Great Lakes Region of Africa. Representative Ed Royce’s letter to President Obama should inspire a fundamental change in US policy not only towards Rwanda but other “friendly tyrants” that the US support in Africa.

In the Congo, the youth are prepared for a sustained civil disobedience undertaking to cripple and ultimately remove an oppressive system that not only kills them but also squelches their aspirations and hopes for a dignified life.

Ultimately, it is through the agency of the Congolese youth and their vision for a new society, a new Congo that lasting change will happen. The youth have been engaged in a beautiful and sublime struggle for peace, justice and human dignity that will not only have an impact on a region encircled by strongmen but it will reverberate throughout the entire African continent.

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Give us your money

Image via Playboy.

With all the excitement around us joining Jacobin, we were a bit worried that the fundraising part might have gotten a lost in the shuffle.

So with that we just wanted to make a reminder post for you to donate to Africa Is a Country! It will help us with our relaunch effort on the new platform covering operational costs, including paying up and coming African writers, photographers, and video makers, as well as expanding towards a print issue.

Africa Is a Country still a truly independent media platform that has largely been volunteer run. Over the years we’ve made a lot of effort to keep the site free from ad driven content, and corporate sponsors. That can only continue with help from our dear readers!

So please take some time to donate. You can do it by visiting this link: paypal.me/africasacountry — or by sending a check to: Jacobin Foundation, 388 Atlantic Avenue, Brooklyn NY 11217 (including “Africa Is a Country” in the memo line if mailing in your contribution).

Small donations can make a big impact! If you can only donate $5, $10, or $15 we would be grateful. Even more helpful would be to also share your favorite Africa is a Country article with a friend, and ask them to donate to support independent media!

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