Sean Jacobs's Blog, page 328

Open Stellenbosch aims to move its fight beyond campus boundaries

Over the last few months students in South Africa have called for the decolonisation of institutions of higher learning. While much of the focus has been on the experiences of students on campuses, there have also been attempts to articulate how the failures of transformation at universities can be linked to broader struggles against social injustice. Much of this has taken the form of imagining different universities, spaces that are not exclusionary, and that seek to truly engage with the contexts in which they are situated.

Confronting white supremacy and challenging it in the form of changing the curriculum is a critical step in bringing about transformation at universities, but it will hardly revolutionise South African society. Through more or less spontaneous organising, students have become sensitized to a range of issues, and have drawn attention to a range of issues, such as the outsourcing of workers on campus (something the UCT students of the Left movement have been doing for several years now). The question of how to bring about social justice beyond campus borders has not been at the centre of debates so far, partly because many of the students involved in these movements are deeply invested in what one activist named ‘economic liberation’. By this she did not mean freedom from the exploitative ravages of capitalism, but the rather the right to participate equally within the capitalist economy and to benefit from it, much as white people did under apartheid.

What is the relation between ideological replication, educational institutions (particularly universities) and the persistence of inequality and violence in the post-apartheid order? Framing the debate in this way brings a phrase like ‘economic liberation’ to a crisis point in that it forces us to confront the forms of collusion and betrayal that are necessary to attain ‘liberation’ of this sort. If we are to realise social justice, there is a great deal about how we think about knowledge reproduction and the uses to which it is put that needs to be radically transformed. Working towards social justice requires contesting and uprooting the structural legacy of apartheid, during which time the white minority accrued massive economic, military and cultural power. That power did not evaporate as a result of the legislative end of apartheid, and is evident, for instance, in an analysis of the socio-spatial geography of the town of Stellenbosch, where the wealthy elite have created spaces that resemble ethnically cleansed European cities and black people move cautiously around the edges, and work as security guards, cleaning staff and as administrators. Those who hold the power in the university and the town are the same people who held power under apartheid. These continuities extend from the Chancellor of the University, Johann Rupert, whose family amassed their fortune through the exploitative labour practices that began with slavery and continue into the present, to those who form part of the university establishment who previously held positions in the South African Defence Force or the so-called Civil Co-operation Bureau, an ominous misnomer for the apartheid regime’s death squads.

In 2009 the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation was commissioned by the post-apartheid state to conduct a study on the question of why South Africa has such high levels of violence. The researchers note that “South Africa has been distinguished by high levels of violence for most of the last century” and, drawing on the work of Gary Kynoch on colonial cities, trace the “serious problem of violent crime [to]… as early as the 1920s”. Kynoch argues that colonial and apartheid-era oppressive state practices and policies created “conditions, unique to South Africa, [that] nurtured a culture of violence that has reproduced itself ever since” (6). Critical here is the question of how such a culture ‘reproduces’ itself. What are the modes and mechanisms of such reproduction?

One answer to this question lies in the way universities and the knowledge they produced has historically been directed in the service of the apartheid state. It is no secret that university workers played a key part in the development of ideology under apartheid and provided the pseudo-science to support theories of white racial superiority. We also know that humanities scholars provided justifications for the banning and censorship of books and through their teaching shaped generations of young people who saw no wrong in apartheid. There were, of course, also those thinkers, students and faculty, who sought to resist the violence of the apartheid regime, just as there are those who have stood with the students calling for the decolonisation of universities in the present. To change what we are taught and how we are taught it is a critical step in bringing about transformation. Unless this is linked to a radical transformation of the structures which finally seize upon the knowledge we produce and either neutralise it or use it for iniquitous ends, nothing will really change. This is to recognise that university councils, such as that which governs Stellenbosch University, remain impervious to the presence of post-colonial, intersectional feminist and critical race scholars and their carefully argued critiques. The dismissive response of Stellenbosch University to the demands of students who are refusing to be taught in Afrikaans is a telling sign of just how sure the university management is of their intractable hold over the institution. The arrogant positions of the white men who continue to rule the university may have been forged under apartheid, but it is how that power remains unquestioned that continues to protect them in the present.

It is necessary to ask why the list of members of the Stellenbosch University Council largely consists of an old boy’s network of billionaire business associates and why these are the people who decide how the university is run. It is also important to ask why so many council members are on the boards of companies that are linked to Reunert, and its Stellenbosch-based subsidiary, Reutech, one of the largest air, sea and land defence companies in South Africa. Incidentally, Reutech was founded by council member and extraordinary Professor of Engineering at Stellenbosch University, PW van der Walt, and is named as one of the companies that benefited from the Strategic Defence Procurement Packages, better known as the arms deal. We know that throughout its history the university has been used to generate income for a small minority. The fact that this wealth has been amassed through the production and sale of arms and other forms of military technology that have been used to commit human rights abuses makes this all the more reprehensible.

It would be naïve to think, in the age of capitalist hegemony and the corporatisation of universities, and in the aftermath of apartheid, that corruption would not be a feature of institutions of higher learning. But to those who wish to argue that this is just the way things work and that we have to accept the status quo, there is a new generation of young people who are rising up and refusing what too many people have considered inevitable and impossible to change. There is a way in which the new student movements can be understood as having arisen in the aftermath of the Marikana massacre, and as a result of the widespread disillusion with the post-apartheid state. These movements represent great potential and at the same time they face an enormous challenge in identifying exactly what it is that needs to be changed. Some of the work that has to be done may entail giving up on aspirations for excessive material wealth that we have for too long been taught to think of as freedom.

Here are some images by Nigel Zhuwaki from a demonstration calling for the dissolution of the Stellenbosch University council, held by Open Stellenbosch yesterday:

Come ride with Malitia Malimob

Africa is a Country ran a profile on Somalia-via-Seattle rap duo Malitia Malimob two years ago. On the heals of the release of their latest album, Seattle-based journalist Devon Leger sat down with rapper Chino’o, touching on everything from immigration to police brutality in the U.S., and the future of Somalia.

It’s a two-story blue house tucked back from the street in the South end of Seattle, in the kind of neighborhood that tourists don’t go, and locals from the more affluent North end avoid. There’s a busted car out front, a cluster of taxicabs on their off hours, and groups of Somali men scattered about talking and laughing. Grills on the windows, and inside the only menu in the place is above the counter and reads simply “Welcome to Paradise restaurant. We have all food and juice.”

Standing outside the restaurant, young Somali rapper Guled Diriye (aka Chino’o Capo Gaddafi) looks out proudly as he declares, “This is our street. We eat our food at this restaurant. That car wash is where we wash our cars.” For Somalis in Seattle, there aren’t many welcomes to be had outside of their own community. No matter how liberal Seattle may think it is, seeing 3-4 Muslim men together is cause to look twice. “In general, being Muslim, we’re looked down on at any cost. We’re Muslim, we’re black, and even being African, we’re not accepted in the African-American community. We have nowhere to run to. You ask yourself, ‘Why are Somalians on the news? Why violent? Why this?’ What other choice? We’re the bottom of the bottom. We get treated like shit. These people, they push us.”

That’s why “Perception”, one of the latest releases from Chino’o’s hip hop duo Malitia Malimob, takes aim at the hypocrisy that sidelines Somalian communities in one of the most liberal cities in America. “Come smoke with us, come ride with us, come chill with us, instead of sittin’ there just judging us” goes the refrain of the song, and we’re here at this Somali restaurant to meet up with Chino’o and his friends and do just that. And does Chino’o ever have a story to tell! He doesn’t stop talking from the moment he sits down, excitedly spinning stories about life on the streets in Seattle and Somalia, all with a noticeable hopefulness that is perhaps the mark of a true survivor. “We try to not let it affect us,” Chino’o explains, talking about the psychological damage of surviving a war zone, “…we hold ourselves down in the culture and in the way we grew up. Like in America, people will be like, ‘I did this and I did that because my parents divorced at a young age.’ But man, that pisses me off. My friend’s dad was bodied up. Cut up in bags and delivered to his house. His mom is psychologically messed up [from this]. We go through so much shit and we come here and it’s no luck. I’m tough on the interior but when I speak about my people, my religion, and the concept of what we speak about, it’s not just rap… It’s not all ‘bitch nigga’ and ‘trick nigga’, it’s deeper than that. I’m trying to let you know what’s going on and pay attention to what’s really happening here: what’s happening to our people, what’s happening to our culture… When me and J [J. Krown, the other half of Malitia Malimob] are rapping about this, we’re on stage and we’ve got the Somali flag. We come in with the cultural thing to let you know, ‘Yes, it’s a part of who we are. We’re going to stick to being who we are regardless you all like us or don’t like us. We’re good people.’”

A week before our restaurant meeting, I’m in the basement of Neumo’s in Seattle, watching Chino’o stalk the stage with the Somali flag waving behind him. I go outside after his set to get some air and meet Mohamed aka “Magic,” a diehard fan of Malitia Malimob who’s stationed outside the venue on the street, bumping Malimob music out of his car stereo. He can’t get in the venue since he doesn’t have any ID. So he’s missing the show, but sharing this music and sharing his culture with anyone who’ll stop to listen, even for a moment. He’s got the same kind of desperate hopefulness that Chino’o does, this burning need to tell his story and this underlying frustration that no one seems to want to listen.  He shares with me a Somali proverb that translates to “When milk spills, grab what’s left.” Meaning, life pours out fast, so grab what you can when you can.

It’s a mentality that Chino’o echoes later during our interview. “This is survival,” he says, leaning forward. “At the end of the day, it’s survival. One thing that we’re good at is surviving. You can take a Somalian anywhere. He’ll adapt because that’s what we’re used to. Straight A, straight adapt. When I first came to America [as a kid], I was dressed in all pink. Light up pink Lisa Simpson shoes and all that. I swear to God. We don’t know. I’m coming up, I think I’m fresh as shit. I go to school and they make fun of me and shit. The next day, I wear my green outfit and no one fucks with me. I’m like, ‘Alright, man, what the fuck’s going on here?’ I figured it out. I figured out the whole thing. I figured out the codes… I remember when we first came to America, my mom and I were at the welfare place. We were trying to apply for welfare. Mom’s over there; they give me a little note pad to draw with. So, I start drawing. There’s other kids that are drawing. So, the lady calls me up and she’s like, ‘Let me see what you guys are drawing.’ So, she looks around everywhere. The girls draw a princess and the kids draw something and then, they come to me and you see a guy with a Toyota truck with a big gun on him. Wild shit! We’re young. But it’s what I see. What I’m coming from is what I see.”

We’re back inside the restaurant and we’re all splitting a heaping plate of delicious Somali food. Amidst the spicy roast chicken and goat dishes you might expect from the cuisine of the Horn of Africa, there’s also a bewildering mound of curried spaghetti, a throwback to the Italian colonization of Somalia. We grab handfuls of food, dripping onto the floor, eating without utensils as is the tradition in Somali, all of us brought together by the universal act of breaking bread. And though there’s a unity to the group, throughout the interview, there’s a presence missing, a voice missing. That’s Mohamed Jurato (aka J Krown), the other half of the Malitia Malimob duo. Krown’s not on the new album from the group, and he’s not at the interview and he’s not at the table with us. Because he’s in jail. Shot in the back in the streets of Seattle by cops just about a year before the protests in Ferguson and the shooting death of Michael Brown changed everything. Back then no one in the media gave a shit about a black man shot down by police. So now he’s cooling his heels in jail in Walla Walla, WA, communicating only occasionally by phone with his longtime friend and musical partner. “With him being locked up, I try to keep his name alive,” Chino’o says, “try to keep his picture up, like he’s still here. We could put out music–we had a lot of music to put out–but I want him to be here. It’s something between me and him. It’s ours.”

Chino’o relates the story of how Krown was shot in the back by Seattle cops. “We were at a club; everybody was just hanging out. It was right before the NFC Championship game when we beat San Francisco. J. Krown was wearing all red, he just happened to be. He’s not a 49ers fan. He was just wearing red and we were all hanging out. We come out of the club and as soon as we come out of the club, smoking a cigarette, usually we sip [lean] a lot. That day I didn’t sip; I was chilling. He was like, ‘Oh, I love you like this. You’re sober as shit.” I say, ‘Yeah, I’m chilling.’ He’s kicking it. We were smoking a cigarette, and he’s like, ‘I’m going to get a hot dog and I’ll come right back.’ I was like, ‘Alright, go ahead, bro.’ While we were standing outside, in a matter of seconds, all we hear is POP, bam, bam, bam, bam. Within 5 minutes, 10 minutes. What happened was…. I guess there was an altercation with some other people and Krown just happened to be there. He just happened to be in that situation. When the guns went off, everybody ran their way. When everybody ran their way, there was a lot of people in red. Krown was wearing red. As Krown was running, he was shot. He was shot in the lower leg, a little bit lower than the buttocks, in the upper thigh. It hit and then, it went down. When he got shot, they took him in and they charged him with a pistol charge.”

Whether or not Krown had a weapon on him is a point of contention. He was found with a weapon, but one never knows in this era of police brutality and there’s certainly no trust for the cops in Chino’o’s community. Talking about Krown’s shooting, Chino’o confesses that he was recently picked up for a suspended license and was abused by the cops while in custody (they stomped on his back). He’s got a guy to help sue them, but is thinking twice about it. “We get out and it’s like, ‘Is it really worth it? We ain’t gonna get nothing out of these motherfuckers. We’re not going to win. We’re never gonna win.’ That’s what it comes down to. You can’t fight them. What can you do?”

Krown is in jail now, but he’s slated for release next summer, though there’s hope of an early work release. “I’d love to have my boy with me,” Chino’o says, “but, since he’s not here with me, when he comes out, I want to give him freedom. I want him to express himself for all the time he’s been inside because that’s what I would want to do. I’d say, ‘Go ahead. Pick on the topics you want to speak about, what’s in your heart. What do you feel? He’s in there right now, he’s writing, he’s working, so he’s got all these ideas for us, he says ‘Man, we’re going to do this, Chino’o, and I’m gonna spit this and as soon as I spit this, you get on this and you start spitting this and you talk back to me.’ I’m like, ‘C’mon bro, you’re going to do all of that shit. Whatever you want to do, we’re going to do.’”

Talking with Chino’o, you can sense there’s a multitude of stories he carries underneath the surface, but the wounds of his past are hard to bring up. Even within the first five minutes of our interview he pulls back, realizing the emotional toll our conversation has started to take on him. And whenever he pulls back to cover up a story (how he himself got shot on the streets of Seattle, how he left Somalia with AK-47 rifle shots echoing after him), he pushes forward with a kind of survivor hopefulness, that hard-won hope so few people in the West understand that comes from beating the odds.

Finally, after a bit of coaxing, Chino’o opens up about his childhood in Somalia. He came to America at 7 years old, a refugee child. But in Somalia, in the capital of Mogadishu, before war broke out, his family was powerful. “My parents were successful, very successful… They lived in a fat mansion. Life was good. I had the best life in the world that any kid could ask for. I’d get toys sent from America. Life was great! Then, all of a sudden, [clap, clap, he claps]–in a matter of a second, everything went boom, boom, boom! ‘It’s time to go, hit the road.’ I went from the mansion to living in a hut with no shoes. I got no shoes, nothing to play with. I remember playing in a broken down tank.” I ask him what caused this, and he replies a “clash of power. Us Somalians, we’re very, very hard headed. It was a clash for power. Everybody wanted power because… if me and you are related and come from the same tribe, if you have power, it’s good for me. I’ll be in a good place. But if you’re not, you’re going to give it to your people. Everybody wanted to be chiefs.”

Chino’o’s mom and dad came from two different tribes that wanted nothing to do with each other, a kind of Romeo and Juliet story. I ask him which tribes they were and he pushes back, “I don’t like to talk about it. That’s the thing that kills us. I don’t even like to consider myself as a part of a tribe. I’m an American, I’m a Somalian, I’m an African. It’s a movement where we try to put that behind. I don’t want people to be focused on what I am, I want them rather to be focused on what we’re trying to do.” Later, we loop back on his childhood and he opens up about living in Kenyan refugee camps, the next step for his family after fleeing Somalia’s fighting. “When the war struck everything, we found routes [out of Somalia]. Some take trucks, a boat. Go that way, whatever way you can to try to make it out and try to go to Kenya. We lived in Kenya; we lived in a refugee camp, me and Krown. We both lived there. I lived in Utanga [a well-known Kenyan refugee camp]. Like I said, we went from having a good life to coming there with nothing. In a hut, living in a hut.”

The hut brings to mind Malitia Malimob’s song “Perception,” where Chino’o raps hard “Man, I came from the slums, bottom of the bottom, bitch, I came from the slums. Lived in the huts and I played in the mud. Ran from a war we was born in, nigga.” “Yeah, we lived in a mud hut,” Chino’o explains when I express surprise. “I got pictures… You’ll see me, like a little kid, I’m sitting right behind the hut where I sleep. I got no shoes, no nothing. You go walk around; you get these worm thingies that get in your feet and you go get a little metal thing to try to poke them out. That would be fun, believe it or not, that would be our source of fun. You take your big toe; you put it on your knee; you poke it out. Make sure it comes out because all you do is itch. Ain’t nothing to do. We’d go to the mosque and eat some food. After we eat some food, go read the Koran, go run around. Even over there, we weren’t wanted.”

That’s another key to Chino’o’s worldview, the shame of fleeing a place where they lived like nobles, and ending up scattered across the world and unwanted by their new communities. He turns his gaze inwards for this, blaming Somalians themselves for these predicaments. “We put ourselves in this predicament. We come from a great country; we should’ve stuck to each other and now, everywhere we go, we get massacred… At the end of the day, when you look at it, we did this to ourselves…. Us going through this shit, J. being booked [in jail] and all this other shit, we did this to ourselves. We could’ve been back in our own country, just living life and being comfortable.” That’s a heavy weight to bear, and you can see it in his face as he talks about this, but much of the weight to be born falls on the shoulders of his parents, Chino’o says. They’re the ones that started the conflict, and they’re the ones keeping it going. “I feel like their feuds and their fights and their bullshit, this is what did this to us. Why the fuck do I have to come over here and be a second class citizen when I could have been back home and been regular and been good?” Now, young Somalis wait for the older generation to die off, for the old grudges to be forgotten before they can hope to return home. Chino’o believes it’s the melting pot effect of living abroad that will bring Somalis together. Overseas, they’re all one, there’s no differentiating between tribes or clans. When young Somalis in Somalia start seeing that historical enemies are joined together in friendship overseas, there’s hope it might show them another way, a different way from the way of their parents. “But it’s taking too much time,” Chino’o says, “and time is what we do not have.”

Still, these quotes are some of the very few complaints that Chino’o voices. There’s a positivity to his speech that’s catching, and it’s grounded in a very Muslim idea. The idea of “imam”, or having fulfillment. “I’m sitting here, my life is not bad,” Chino’o explains. “My life is good. Even if I was living here [homeless] and I lived under them stairwells right there, and I didn’t have nothing in my life, it would still be a lot better than a billion people back home. We’re blessed, for us to be here eating this meal, me drinking this bottle of soda, this is a big deal. That’s another thing that I’m always going to say, “I’m blessed.” For example, my mama, she always says, “Imam?” Imam, in Muslim, means having fulfillment, being able to say, “I’m blessed,” even though you’re not. You are really. What’s blessed? You’re alive, you got a meal, you sleep, you wake up, so, for that, it builds your imam. My mom will tell you, “Pray, so your imam can be built.” It comes from all the shit we went through, you build your imam, meaning you accept whatever situation that God throws at you. You’re able to sit back and say, ‘I’m blessed’…We’re living, we’re breathing, we’re together, we’re good. That’s really a big thing to us. In Somalia, our parents weren’t really big on religion like they are now, ‘til all those bodies started dropping and the war… Back then, they were chilling, that’s why the way they talk to us now is crazy…. Back then, it was chilling, wearing bikinis and shit. Everybody was chilling: white folks, everybody from different worlds. It was nice!”

I interject that Mogadishu must have been an amazing city before the war. “Yeah,” Chino’o agrees. “But then, it all changed. When the people started dying and all the death toll… people really started sticking to their religion. That was really big. When everything goes ugly and everything is dark, you turn your faith to God. If you have nothing to that, you have nothing to live. You gotta have something to fall back on. It could be religion; it could be family… You gotta have something that grounds you; it holds you; it tells you, “You’re going to make it through.” That’s why religion is so big to us in Somalia. Just being Muslim in general, is big to us. It got big, big, big to us after what we have seen.” Despite this, there are many challenges to being Muslim in America. Coming from a country and a religion that forebade alcohol, Chino’o says, the bottle to Somalis is a new world. A place to lose themselves. And America itself puts forth a very different set of values from the predominantly Muslim world they came from. “[In Somalia,] if you’re outside and everybody’s at the mosque praying, and they see you outside, you’re in some shit. They grab you by your ear, ‘What’s you doing?’ Then a smack. ‘You better get your ass in the mosque.’ It’s not like that here. No one expects it. Everybody was so confused, so we end up being confused on life and what is our role and God… We get confused on these things. Then we just want money. We come to America, it’s money. Money is power. You forget about the bigger things in life: family, spending time with family, spending time with loved ones.”

Africa is a Country is happy to premiere the latest video from Malitia Malimob, “1350 Without Liberty”, directed by Seattle filmmaker Futsum Tsegai, and shot both in Seattle and in Chino’o’s childhood neighborhood Capitol Park in Columbus, Ohio.

Colombia, the peace process and a historic handshake

Some handshakes, either famously or infamously, have sealed an inflection point in the narrative course of history. Mandela and Frederik de Klerk, Pinochet and Kissinger, Raúl Castro and Obama. Last week in Havana, Cuba, it was Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos and Farc guerrilla leader Timoleón Jiménez, a.k.a. “Timochenko,” in a handshake that symbolizes that the end of the Colombian armed conflict is near.

The handshake took place after a meeting in which it was revealed that an agreement had been reached on the issue of victim reparation and transitional justice. Though the details are still to be defined, the agreement will be novel in that the victimizers will also contribute in the reparation of the victims. Rather than a completely punitive approach, to the disappointment of some, this is going to be the first time in the history of humankind in which reparations and trials will be interlinked at such a big scale.

Afterwards, the spokespersons also announced that the peace treaty will be signed in no more than six months (subject to a popular referendum), and that Farc’s disarment will be completed in the two months after that.

This transition from conflict to post-conflict represents, beyond the end of military combat between the government and the Farc guerrilla, a different approach to solve the underlying causes that gave raise to the country’s violence.

For example, Colombia’s indexes of both wealth and land inequality are still some of the worst in the world. The state has privileged a few certain urban centers with infrastructure and basic public services, while some other places in the country are still ridden with crime, disease, and malnutrition.

The proposed solution is a collaboration between the soon-to-be former guerrilleros and the government, accompanied by mediation and enforcement by civil society. The goal is still to tackle the aforementioned issues, along with the new ones caused by the war—forced displacement, land usurpation and drug-related violence—with debate and dialogue.

The proposed peace is still a fragile one, where both parties are going to have to learn to trust each other. Opponents of the peace negotiations have been bombarding the process, calling for more bloodshed, an indefinite war, while being unabashed by the toll of death and harm this conflict has produced.

Opponents of the settlement   point to the lax punitive measures proposed as transitional justice. It is true that, as we say in Colombia, we are “going to have to swallow a lot of toads” (i.e. ignore certain incidents and accept peace despite not agreeing with all of its components). But if the direct victims of the conflict can find solace on the announcement, their voices should matter more than those who have not put their lives, and those of their relatives, on the front line.

We cannot forget that the  previous attempt at peace with Farc, which wound up with the institution of the political party Unión Patriótica, was followed by the massacre of their members by right-wing extremists. We can’t forget that the radical right-wing has contributed just as much to the violence of the country, to the extent that both extremisms end up resembling their ideological opposite.

Another massacre  must be prevented at all costs. One of the most important projects of this transition phase is to ensure Colombians trust each other again. As Thabo Mbeki, ex-president of South Africa and political scientist Mahmood Mamdani argue, there is no point in dividing society into winners and losers.

In post-conflict Colombia, both former-warring parties are going to have to share the land, that is a condition of the negotiated way out. It is a fair demand to allow the former guerrillas to run for office (obviously, after first paying their dues with society), and to allow the democratic constituents to vote (or not) for their agendas, all within institutional frameworks. If not, systematic exclusion from the decision-making process can cause the violent spiral to continue.

The process of the post-conflict is going to be definitely harder to achieve than one of mindless hostilities. Coordination of the entire society is going to be needed, not just for the end of the armed conflict, but more importantly to oversee the institution of the truth, reparation and reconciliation processes. To tackle the true root causes of the conflict, instead of the punishment of the war actors, is the only way to guarantee the no-repetition of violence.

The handshake and the negotiation in Havana show that there is political will from both parts to reach the agreement. A necessary component, but not a sufficient one.

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The World Bank has a terrible memory

I am currently working on a small project with some colleagues on the economic impact of natural resources in developing countries. Most of my reading and interest in working on this project has drifted towards understanding the history of the copper industry in my native Zambia. I recently encountered this set of sentences in the background section of a World Bank and UK Aid document on the copper industry in Zambia [my emphasis]:

The history of Zambia’s copper mining industry is one of decline followed by revival. From around 700,000 tonnes in the 1970s, copper production fell to just 255,000 tonnes in 1998 as nationalization of the mines proved counter-productive. However, since the mines were privatized in the 2000s, investment and output have revived, and Zambia is regaining its world market share.

This is what happens when you write from afar in addition to writing with sunglasses that are heavily tainted with ideology: 30 to 40 years of history is condensed into three short sentences making sweeping statements.

So only nationalization, which, by the way, happened in 1969, explains the nose-dive in output at the end of a 30 year period? What about the role of the collapse in copper prices in the intervening period? In the decade before nationalization (1960 to 1968), real (inflation-adjusted) copper prices increased by 69%. In the three decades after nationalization but before privatization, copper prices performed as follows: a 45% decline in the 70s, a 7% increase in the 80s and a 39% decline in the 90s. Over the entire period 1970 to 1999, the real (inflation-adjusted) price of copper declined by an incredible 70%! Shouldn’t such a substantial reversal of fortunes feature prominently in any historical assessment of the performance of Zambia’s copper industry? (Ironically, the World Bank maintains a database of historical commodity prices from which these numbers were sourced).

And what about the role of the oil price shocks in the 1970s which led to a build-up of debt and certainly an increase in production costs? Between 1970 and 1979, the real (inflation-adjusted) price of crude oil rose by 900%! In the decade before nationalization, the real price of crude actually declined by 25%. (These numbers are from the World Bank price database linked to above). Imagine if you will, the double challenge of maintaining profitability and production in the face of declining output prices and increasing production costs.

What about the fact that Zambia, in nationalizing the mines, had to issue expensive bonds so as to compensate the previous mine owners? (This point is covered in vivid and heartbreaking detail by Andrew Sardanis in his book Zambia: The First 50 Years. Sardanis speaks from first-hand experience as he was at the time of nationalization part and parcel of Dr. Kenneth Kaunda’s administration). And what about the role played by Structural Adjustment Policies (SAPs), which, by the way, the World Bank has admitted were largely counterproductive (see, for example, this World Bank study)? A defining feature of SAPs was the reduction of production subsidies to state-run enterprises.

And privatization is the only factor explaining the revival? What about the disasters during the early days of privatization of the mines? For example, Binani which bought Baluba and Roan Mines in Luanshya and later stripped these two mines of their assets? This was no small issue – people lost their jobs and died from depression since Binani were not interested in production. Girls in Luanshya town were forced into prostitution to make ends meet. An entire town, whose social and economic life was previously buttressed by the state-run copper company, almost collapsed under the new private owners. And what about Anglo American’s sudden withdrawal in 2002 from Konkola and Nchanga mines and the uncertainty this wrought on the country? This sudden withdrawal sent the Zambian government into a tailspin that culminated in the selling of the mines that Anglo left behind for a song.

And surely the historic recovery in the market for copper in the last decade must have played a big role in the recovery of production? Between 2000 and 2010, real (inflation-adjusted) copper prices increased by a whopping 230%! Anybody, be it a state-run or private entity, would have responded to this incredible rise in copper prices by producing more.

Writing from afar plus writing with sun glasses that are heavily tainted with ideology is dangerous.

How to make sense of … the short-lived coup in Burkina Faso

The short-lived coup in Burkina Faso may be one of the quickest in the history of African military coups.  It merely lasted a week.  So, if you are still trying to make sense of what happened, how it unfolded, and what’s next, we’ve got you covered.

For an AIAC on the ground analysis of the events as they unfolded, see here. And read this piece for an overview of what’s coming next, after President Kafando was restored as head of the transitional government. For more daily observation from direct from Ouagadougou read Daniel Eizenga’s guest series on the Sahel Blog.

BBC provides a crash course on the seven lessons learned from the Burkina Faso’s seven-day coup.

As the leader of the coup, General Diendere himself confessed, “this coup was the biggest mistake”, and with all the democratic progress that has been made, “one should not have taken such action.”  Le Monde recounts the fall from grace of the man who was well placed to become the leader of a multinational counter-terrorism contingent in the Sahel.

But Diendere is no newbie to backroom dealings in Burkina Faso and beyond.  He has been omnipresent in all major events of Burkina’s political and military history for the past 30 years.  Diendere was there when a group a young officers led by Thomas Sankara seized power in 1983.  He was implicated – at least as a commanding officer—in the assassination of Sankara four years later.  Last year, as Compaore’s military chief of staff, he coordinated the exfiltration of Compaore and his family, and helped prop up his former protégé, Isaac Zida as the de facto leader of the transition.

This portrait of Diendere, published last year after President Compaore fled, sheds light on the obscure trajectory of the man.

One of the main reasons that thwarted the latest military takeover in Burkina is that the Burkinabe streets mobilize at a level and with an urgency rarely matched in West Africa.  In other words, Burkinabe citizens and civil society groups just won’t take any BS from their leaders anymore. During this latest attempted coup demonstrations erupted in cities throughout the country and as Eloïse Bertrand points out protests outside of the capital played a crucial role in demonstrating the people’s rejection of the coup.

This level of mobilization is far from new in Burkina Faso. Massive demonstrations, analyzed by Sten Hagberg in this article, challenged Blaise Compaore’s regime following the death of Norbert Zongo, starting the movement ‘Trop C’est Trop’ in Burkina. Not to mention, the popular movement that precipitated the fall of the Compaore regime only last year, chronicled here and covered with time stamped updates from RFI here.

The Burkinabe women’s spatula uprising and Le Balai Citoyen –  AIAC interviewed Smokey, one of leaders of Le Balai Citoyen last year – are  all part of a call for a new political and social contract in Burkina that draws from the Sankara legacy. Of course, there are challenges to being the figureheads of such powerful movements. Read Smockey’s interview with Le Monde to learn how he and the leaders of Le Balai Citoyen became targets of the presidential guard while the RSP held the country hostage.

In this article, Lila Chouli reminds us that in fact, popular uprisings have a long history in Burkina because they also toppled the government of Upper Volta in 1966, ending its First Republic. Charles Kabeya Muase also reminds of the labor movement’s importance in his detailed account of how unions emerged in Burkina Faso. The general strike launched by Burkina’s contemporary unions played a crucial role in pressuring the coup-makers to back down.

With the presidential elections expected to take place later this year, Burkina Faso will probably enter a new phase of democratic governance.  How that will translate into fundamental changes for the lives of the Burkinabe remains to be seen. But, if like us, you are hoping and waiting for a new Sankara to rise again somewhere in Africa, you should pick up Thomas Sankara Speaks in the meantime.

For quick updates on the situation in Burkina Faso, #Lwili is the hashtag.

You can also follow: Le Balai Citoyen @Le_BalaiCitoyen ; Joe Penney @joepenney ; Thierry Hot @Hotthierry1 ; Olivier Monnier @OlivMon

 

How to make sense of … political developments in Burkina Faso

The short-lived coup in Burkina Faso may be one of the quickest in the history of African military coups.  It merely lasted a week.  So, if you are still trying to make sense of what happened, how it unfolded, and what’s next, we’ve got you covered.

For an AIAC on the ground analysis of the events as they unfolded, see here. And read this piece for an overview of what’s coming next, after President Kafando was restored as head of the transitional government. For more daily observation from direct from Ouagadougou read Daniel Eizenga’s guest series on the Sahel Blog.

BBC provides a crash course on the seven lessons learned from the Burkina Faso’s seven-day coup.

As the leader of the coup, General Diendere himself confessed, “this coup was the biggest mistake”, and with all the democratic progress that has been made, “one should not have taken such action.”  Le Monde recounts the fall from grace of the man who was well placed to become the leader of a multinational counter-terrorism contingent in the Sahel.

But Diendere is no newbie to backroom dealings in Burkina Faso and beyond.  He has been omnipresent in all major events of Burkina’s political and military history for the past 30 years.  Diendere was there when a group a young officers led by Thomas Sankara seized power in 1983.  He was implicated – at least as a commanding officer—in the assassination of Sankara four years later.  Last year, as Compaore’s military chief of staff, he coordinated the exfiltration of Compaore and his family, and helped prop up his former protégé, Isaac Zida as the de facto leader of the transition.

This portrait of Diendere, published last year after President Compaore fled, sheds light on the obscure trajectory of the man.

One of the main reasons that thwarted the latest military takeover in Burkina is that the Burkinabe streets mobilize at a level and with an urgency rarely matched in West Africa.  In other words, Burkinabe citizens and civil society groups just won’t take any BS from their leaders anymore. During this latest attempted coup demonstrations erupted in cities throughout the country and as Eloïse Bertrand points out protests outside of the capital played a crucial role in demonstrating the people’s rejection of the coup.

This level of mobilization is far from new in Burkina Faso. Massive demonstrations, analyzed by Sten Hagberg in this article, challenged Blaise Compaore’s regime following the death of Norbert Zongo, starting the movement ‘Trop C’est Trop’ in Burkina. Not to mention, the popular movement that precipitated the fall of the Compaore regime only last year, chronicled here and covered with time stamped updates from RFI here.

The Burkinabe women’s spatula uprising and Le Balai Citoyen –  AIAC interviewed Smokey, one of leaders of Le Balai Citoyen last year – are  all part of a call for a new political and social contract in Burkina that draws from the Sankara legacy. Of course, there are challenges to being the figureheads of such powerful movements. Read Smockey’s interview with Le Monde to learn how he and the leaders of Le Balai Citoyen became targets of the presidential guard while the RSP held the country hostage.

In this article, Lila Chouli reminds us that in fact, popular uprisings have a long history in Burkina because they also toppled the government of Upper Volta in 1966, ending its First Republic. Charles Kabeya Muase also reminds of the labor movement’s importance in his detailed account of how unions emerged in Burkina Faso. The general strike launched by Burkina’s contemporary unions played a crucial role in pressuring the coup-makers to back down.

With the presidential elections expected to take place later this year, Burkina Faso will probably enter a new phase of democratic governance.  How that will translate into fundamental changes for the lives of the Burkinabe remains to be seen. But, if like us, you are hoping and waiting for a new Sankara to rise again somewhere in Africa, you should pick up Thomas Sankara Speaks in the meantime.

For quick updates on the situation in Burkina Faso, #Lwili is the hashtag.

You can also follow: Le Balai Citoyen @Le_BalaiCitoyen ; Joe Penney @joepenney ; Thierry Hot @Hotthierry1 ; Olivier Monnier @OlivMon

 

 

Weekend Music Break No.84

Whether you’re watching a game, having a drink with friends, or even getting some work in, we’ve got your weekend soundtrack covered! Here is your Music Break for the last weekend of September in 2015:

We kick it off with dark hip hop vibes from a super roster of African rappers assembled by DJ Xclusive; Continuing in that vibe Mashayabhuqe KaMamba and Okmalumkoolkat release the long anticipated video for “Shandarabaa, Ekhelemendeh”; With a lot of carbon copycat beats still lingering out of the West African Afrobeats scene, it’s nice to come across some real beat constructed innovation–VVIP and Sena Dagudu don’t disappoint in that vein; In a more “traditional”, but no less infectious Afrobeats vibe, Mazi Chuzk out of the UK turns in the video for his track “Hustle”; Yudi Fox and Big Nelo only want to slow wine with someone… Here’s their ode to the sensual dance “So Quero Tarrachar”; Fresh off a successful appearance at Harlem’s Apollo Theater, Sarkodie releases his latest album, surprisingly with a bit more vintage highlife sound; Daby Touré also released an album this past week, this is the video for the lead single “Oma”; Amerigo Gazeway has been doing some interesting re-imaginings of Soul and Hip Hop classics through his match-up mash-up series–he wins again with the best of two legends in their own game Pimp C and B.B. King; Keeping the spirit of B.B. King alive we move over to Mali’s Songhoy Blues and their recent appearance at NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series; and finally, Orlando Julius takes us out with some real funk backed by the UK-based band The Heliocentrics.

Burkina Faso: President Kafando is back in charge, but now what?

Almost exactly one week after being taken hostage by his own presidential guard (the RPS), President Michel Kafando has been reinstated. Kafando and the international community declared on Wednesday (23 September) that the military coup led by Gen. Gilbert Diendéré failed. This comes after a special ECOWAS mediation team met with Diendéré to negotiate a peaceful conclusion to the political crisis. The ECOWAS team, led by Senegalese and Beninois presidents Macky Sall and Thomas Boni Yayi, identified thirteen points for a proposed peace agreement, first presented at a Special ECOWAS Summit this past Tuesday (September 22) in Abuja.

When the thirteen propositions outlined by Sall and Yayi became public here in Ouagadougou, the population was shocked and dismayed. The RSP and Diendéré appeared to have won their every demand. Among the most contentious proposed points were: amnesty for the coup perpetrators, an agreement to leave any future reform of the RSP to the next elected president of the country thereby temporarily guaranteeing an objective the RSP; it’s self-preservation, the restoration of the political transition’s institutions, but the removal of their ability to accomplish anything other than organize elections, and finally the inclusion in upcoming elections of political party members regardless of past political allegiances. This last point remains crucial, since the Burkinabè Constitutional Court recently ruled to exclude politicians who had supported former president Blaise Compaoré’s bid to change presidential term limits in 2014. In short, if accepted, the proposed points would have completely changed the trajectory of Burkina Faso’s political transition.

The proposal was summarily shot down by nearly all segments of Burkinabè civil and political society, ultimately motivating the country’s regular army to intervene. Cherif Sy, president of the Transition’s Parliament, immediately rejected the ECOWAS proposal, President Kafando announced that he held significant reservations regarding the proposal, and civil society leaders deplored the proposal as shameful support for the ‘domestic terrorism’ which instigated this political crisis. The popular rejection of the ECOWAS mediation attempt led the national army to descend on the capital, Ouagadougou. During the morning of Tuesday, September 22nd, the Chief of Staff of the army issued an ultimatum to the presidential guard to return to their barracks and disarm. The RSP refused in an effort to buy time while the special ECOWAS summit in Abuja concluded. Just as the national military began to mobilize in order to disarm the RSP, the summit closed and its leaders called on the RSP to lay down their weapons and the national military to avoid violent confrontation at all costs.

So, what happened with all of the contentious points in the original proposal? Nothing.

Demonstrations throughout the country insured that the Burkinabé people and the President of their Transition were heard. The controversial points originally laid out by the ECOWAS mediators were left completely unaddressed. Diendéré and the RSP lost their only potential ally in what now seems to be a catastrophe for the elite military unit. Indeed, after sidelining President Kafando in the original mediation efforts, ECOWAS has now thrown their full support behind him.

Despite a highly publicized and ceremonious reinstatement of Kafando and the transition, much remains unanswered. Surely, the first order of business will be rescheduling presidential and legislative elections to bring the political transition to a close. Yet, while the coup can been seen as failure, it nevertheless reignited divisive political debates which beforehand the transition considered resolved.

The segments of Burkianbè society in support of inclusive elections are even farther from accepting the decision to exclude their candidates. A decision which never received the support of ECOWAS and has now resurfaced under the spotlight of the international community. Meanwhile, the segments in support of exclusion have never been so adamant that it’s upheld as inclusion is now synonymous with supporting Diendéré’s coup. What does the future hold for the former political supporters of Blaise Compaoré? Will the transition be able to lead the country through an electoral process without dividing society?

Then there’s the RSP. Previously and reintegrated into the regular army, the future of this elite unit seems almost certainly finished. As I’ve noted elsewhere, taking the president you’re charged with protecting hostage, is far from the best approach to instill confidence in the president’s successor. And yet, in the current context of the national military demanding the RSP disarm, it’s even more difficult to envision the integration of the RSP into the regular army. Moreover, who within the presidential guard will be held responsible for those civilians who were wounded or lost their lives in defense of the country’s transition? What possible role could any of the coup-leaders play in future of Burkina Faso?

And there we have it. The military coup is over and pronounced a failure. President Kafando and the transitional government in Burkina Faso are back on track. But the trajectory of the political transition will face perhaps its greatest challenges in the coming weeks as the unity of this country hinges on the decisions of its leaders.

The Young Lords In New York Exhibit: A timely and provocative look at a political movement

In 1970, a young man of color who was a member of a radical group was sent to prison; shortly thereafter, he was found dead under suspicious circumstances, and his death ruled a suicide. The group he was a part of, the Young Lords, then marched the streets in a funeral procession style protest.

This narrative sounds eerily familiar to current instances of racism and the headlines we’ve been reading in present day America. The issues about which The Young Lords organized and mobilized themselves, and the climate they sought to change back in the 1960s, clearly impact us even today.

Yet those who are now involved in the Black Lives Matter movement and those engaging in hashtag activism against police brutality towards people of color, and in fighting for visibility for the underserved, underrepresented and underfunded, may not know about the Young Lords. We are much more familiar with groups like the Black Panthers, who the Young Lords modeled themselves after. But we should know about both groups.

Perhaps we could borrow a page or two from the Lords. After all, the Young Lords faced just as much resistance from local and state government, as well as criticism from within its own group and the general public. However, they were still able to create an enduring legacy, model how to protest injustices, and demand change.

The Young Lords were a group opposed to racism who demanded equality in healthcare, increased access to services for the poor working class and better education, fought police injustice, advocated for attainable food and child care options.

Like the Panthers, they demanded and were successful in implementing a free children’s breakfast program. Members of the group ranged in age from 18 to 25 and were diverse, but mainly of Puerto Rican descent.

Their movement had an expansive—some would say idealistic—agenda, focusing on equality in all its forms, self-liberation for the island, gender equality, and opposition to the American army, all outlined in their 13 Point Program and Platform.

In New York, its primary purpose was to fight for the daily injustices faced by the Puerto Rican community, a community which at the time (and to a lesser degree today) faced a myriad of socio-economic adversities and who were largely ignored by local city government. Initially, the group’s organizing began in Chicago, but they formed a chapter in New York City and a few other cities around the country that had concentrated groups of Puerto Ricans.

In their political ideology, they were modeled after the Black Panthers—the Black Nationalist group founded in the mid 1960’s who used militancy as a means of demanding justice. The Lords’ style choices reflected the Panther’s codes of dress, including the use of combat boots, berets and army style fatigues. While they paid homage to the Panthers, they extended the quest for justice to the Puerto Rican community.

Decades after they were active, how can we remember and memorialize the Lords, and their achievements? The challenge for museums and present day sites of memorialization is to capture a political movement through aesthetic symbols that best communicate their message and their activism without reducing them to a fashion statement.

This is one of the many challenges that The Bronx Museum of the Arts (who organized the project), El Museo del Barrio (The Museum of El Barrio) and the Loisaida Center faced when they curated a tri-part exhibition that simultaneously documents and honors the legacy of the Young Lords.

¡Presente! The Young Lords in New York, exhibition, currently on display in New York City, vividly captures the scope of The Young Lords movement while avoiding the trap of romanticizing them or minimizing their relevance.

The exhibition spans across three cultural centers in neighborhoods where the Young Lords were most active in the New York City area: one on the lower East side, a second in East Harlem, and the third in The Bronx.

Each exhibit uniquely highlights some of the group’s actions, and complements each other—even as they overlap in places. These three areas are the site of the Young Lords’ most visible actions and some of their most important work.

On the Lower East Side, where the group was founded, The Loisaida Center pays particular attention to the art created while the group was active. The Lords recognized that art was an important part of the process of community-making; they knew that taking ownership of, and having pride in one’s history and culture was a way of occupying spaces in which they were regarded as “foreign” and “other.”

Much of this exhibit is focused not just on the social activism, but also on the effects of that activism on artists, reflected in photographs and videos on display there, including the work of photographers like Hiram Maristany and Máximo Colón.

The curators also draw attention to the group’s communal art history by recreating makeshift tents, which served as homes and villages for some artists. The group once turned a building in that area into an artist space known as the New Rican Village, where they used theatre and art as part of their political arsenal. The exhibit at that location also pays close attention to the role of gays and lesbians in the movement, as that neighborhood was the site of the Young Lords Gay and Lesbian Caucus.

A video plays on the wall with footage of transgender activist Sylvia Rivera demanding respect and visibility from her peers. For me, looking at all this as someone born long after the Lords were active, the footage is equal parts moving and revelatory. It feels, as does the rest of the exhibit, way ahead of its time.

The exhibit in The Bronx Museum of the Arts highlights, among other things, the group’s takeover of Lincoln hospital in that very neighborhood, after children were poisoned from lead exposure upon being admitted to the hospital.

One installation there focuses on the women in the Young Lords and members of the Young Lords Women’s Caucus, a group demanding equal treatment within its members and with regards to women’s issues.

Similarly, a few pieces of art in the museum also focus on the Young Lords call for an end to the forced sterilization of Puerto Rican women on and off the island. In the middle of the gallery is a pair of Nike Air Force One Sneakers designed by Young Lords member Felipe Luciano, where the infamous Nike swoosh is changed into a machete. Young urban communities, like the ones in the Bronx, place a high level of interest and value on sneakers so the inclusion is startling in its level of cultural resonance, and for its ability to comment on both deadening consumer practices and—contradictorily—the possibility of revolution.

The final location of the exhibit at El Museo del Barrio is located where the Young Lord’s garbage-dumping protests and their peaceful occupation of the First People’s Church occurred. Puerto Rican Obituary, a poem by Lords member and poet Pedro Pietri, plays on a loop in the museum on one wall directly across from another wall adorned with four semi-automatic weapons.

Each weapon is emblazoned with one of the following words: “Health,” “Food,” “Housing” and “Education.” Both pieces—the poem and the weapons painted with slogans—illustrate that what was at stake was literally the life and death of the Puerto Rican people; without the mobilization and awareness that the Young Lords brought, local officials would have continued to view this community as invisible, and pretend they didn’t need basic services that were available to their more affluent, white neighbors.

The three exhibits are striking for many reasons but one in particular: the photographs and art are filled with black and brown faces, reflecting that Puerto Ricans are comprised of mixed and multiethnic lineage.

Often, in Latino communities, the darker you are, the less stature you have, the less beautiful you are, the less you matter. Those who are “dark” are excised from the albums of family history, and even national history. But those faces—which could have once again been erased from memory—are on full display here, on the frontlines of this movement.

It’s no coincidence that the Young Lords aligned with the Black Panthers. In New York City, Blacks and Latinos live amongst each other, face the same injustices and endure the same hardships. For all intents and purposes, the two groups are the same. The interests that the Black Lives Movement is attempting to foreground are important for Latinos too, no matter how distant some of us might think we are from African Americans.

It’s impossible to overstate just how relevant a group like the Young Lords feels in today’s political and social landscape. The group’s rallying call—which was also the name of their organizational newsletter (also on display in all exhibits)—was “P’alante.” “P’alante” is a shortened version of the Spanish phrase “para adelante,” which means “moving forward.” In 2015, Americans are still looking to do the same.

An exhibit like ¡Presente! The Young Lords in New York allows us a moment to look back at how far we have come. Or how far we haven’t.

Borderlines: The tale of a state in limbo

Borderlines (2015) is Michela Wrong’s debut novel. Taking the perspective of a British narrator named Paula, it tells the tale of a newly-independent fictitious African nation named North Darra, which relapses into border conflict with its neighbour. Although the country is never mentioned, Wrong’s North Darrar looks very much like the real African nation of Eritrea. The story very much seems like a fictionalized account of events and anecdotes that took place in Eritrea in the last decade, events which Wrong has written extensively on in other publications.

In this well-written novel, Wrong weaves the picture of a curious and naive British lawyer who lands in Africa for the first time, carrying with her all the stereotypical images of the continent. And, at least initially, the bond between North Darra and Paula, seems driven by her career more than anything else. As the story unfolds, Wrong depicts a country encapsulated in an early decolonizing process, trying to present itself to the world amid acute shortages of skilled human power, resources, and paranoid political leadership. Paula encounters a society that is generous, simple, hopeful, and yet ruled by a culture of pervasive paranoia. The paranoid culture, as the narrator Paula eventually understands, results from the long years of colonial rule, isolation, and political corruption. The commingling of seclusion, detachment, and inwardly looking culture further reinforce, according to one of the characters in the novel, the trauma and mutual distrust in the society:

Half the residents are related to each other and the other half fought alongside one another during the liberation struggle. They loathe or love each other, often simultaneously (102).

The story is roughly divided into three parts. The first section is where the narrator lands in a country that is yet going through the early steps of decolonization. Described in vivid detail are: impressive and ruined buildings; hope and anxiety; sense of loss and victory; as well as the seemingly monotonous life of the diplomatic and expatriate communities. In the second part, Paula and her team collect facts and evidence about the border conflict, as part of her preparation to represent the country in the international court of justice in The Hague. The third part chronicles hopeful stories of citizens who are gradually zombified. Paula also gets involved in the internal affairs of the country, campaigning against the political system’s corruption, which effectively ends the job that sent her there in the first place.

What is interesting is that Wrong’s writing avoids a simplistic over-generalization about the population of North Darra, that reduces a people’s complexity into one-dimensional stereotypes. Different characters such as Dawit, who doubles as operations and opposition; the truly devoted yet ambitious revolutionary character of Dr. Berhane; and the pleasant personality of a government agent named Abraham all help paint the book’s multi-faceted landscape. The descriptions of a monotonous and slow daily life, the wearisome entrances into the world of international law where time is jagged into an eternity, punctuated by a sudden course of actions that result in unexpected outcomes, are symbolic representations of the country and its fate. Although at times the narrative seems extended, the story also benefits from the author’s wonderful curiosity for detail. This allows the author to create an interesting picture of the country by intertwining small stories into a bigger image of a state in limbo.