Sean Jacobs's Blog, page 606
October 9, 2011
Independence Day in Uganda
Today's Ugandan Independence Day. Over to the very popular Radio and Weasel and "Toko Toko" (Talk And Talk). Sample lyric: "They can do thee talk / But I will do thee walk." Not sure if they're talking politics as people–well opponents of Life President Yoweri Museveni have been walking a lot in Uganda these days. As for Radio and Weasel, by the end of the video they fly:
No celebration happens without Bobi Wine. Here he has a verse on Wilson Bugembe's latest.
Angella Kalule is an exponent of the breezy style that Ugandan musicians own. Here's her tune "Katikitiki":
And so is Iryn Namubiru. The video is a bit ridiculous:
BTW, what's with the overwhelming pop (and bling) sensitivity of Ugandan hip hop music? It's like Puffy took his shiny suits and migrated to Kampala. Anyway first up Mun J's "Gira Tugire," above.
Finally, more hip hop courtesy of Baboon Forrest (yeh, that's the group's name) with "Sesetula"
Cameroon and the President
Cameroonians went to the polls today. In an interview with SlateAfrique, Achille Mbembe (b. 1957, Cameroon ) explains why no one else but the 78-year-old incumbent Paul Biya stands a chance to win. "Having stripped society of all security, [the current regime] now holds the entire population by the balls":
SlateAfrique: Can they hope for regime change?
Achille Mbembe: Under the current circumstance, regime change is not possible through the ballot box. Change in this country will come through an armed rebellion spearheaded or not by a political organization or by foreign forces (as was the case in Cote d'Ivoire); through the natural death or assassination of the autocrat; or even through a coup de force by dissident elements within the army. Beyond that, all paths to a peaceful change initiated by Cameroonians themselves are blocked. From this perspective, the forthcoming election is a non-event.
SA: How do you explain Paul Biya's longevity at the helm of the state for 29 years?
AM: Having understood very early on that in order to stay as long as possible in power, one had to do nothing, Biya put in place a new system of government which I call government by inaction. Biya studied Machiavelli a lot, and successfully adapted his lessons to a typically African situation. Paul Biya's genius is to have discovered that power has no objective other than power itself. The goal of those in power is not to accomplish any grandiose project whatsoever. It is simply to hold on to power. Thus, to govern is to not govern.
SA: At 78 years of age, is Biya still capable of governing?
AM: Definitely, even though he is senile. But he invented this masterful formula, that of the spectral or ghostly government. It is a formula which always succeeds. He doesn't even need to be alive to govern. Since it is all about transforming power into the power to do nothing, I bet that he will still be able to govern even from the grave.
Read the rest of the interview here (in French) or here (in English).
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October 8, 2011
Weekend Special
We didn't have time to give proper attention to these posts. So we do them this way. First up, fresh from bringing young couples together in Kenya and leading the revolution down on Wall Street, Nicholas Kristof is now in Sierra Leone. As he informed his fans on Facebook,
I'm in Sierra Leone partly to shoot the Half the Sky PBS documentary, along with the actress Eva Mendes. Here we're in a village in eastern Sierra Leone with some of the awesome kids. I'm going to have to search Eva's luggage as we leave to make sure she doesn't abduct one or two of them!
* On April 4, 2004, musician Gito Baloi, was walking, on his way back from a concert, on the corner of Kerk and Nugget Streets in Doornfontein, Johannesburg when he was gunned down. One of Baloi's popular songs was called "No Ku Ranza." Until recentl the phrase "GITO BALOI NA KU RANZA" was spray painted on a wall at the spot where he was murdered. The area is favored by Southern African migrants (buses leave from there to Lusaka) and it's seen its fair share of xenophobic violence. Now a group of artist–coordinated by the Center for Historical Reenactments in Johannesburg has embarked on an arts project on the site. In the video we get a sense of the project. That's CHR's Gabi Ngcobo (she studied at Bard College) holding forth in the video.
* They even got the accents of the South African mercenaries in this 'short film' to promote video game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare right. Though at times it sounds like the accents in Lethal Weapon 2:
* Now every foreign journalist visiting South Africa has to stop in Diepsloot, a massive squatter camp in Soweto, after the The New York Times went there. (There's also a book by a South African journalist about the area.) Now it's then turn of the British Channel 4. Anybody seen it? It's been broadcast this weekend.
* Toronto's imagineNATIVE film and media arts festival (October 19-23) has a focus on "the Khoi-San," basically films about coloured life worlds in South Africa. Films like "Ongeriewe" (trailer here), "The Fashion Gap," and "Jitsvinger: Maak it Aan, about the Cape Town rapper. They're also screening "The Uprising of Hangberg" and "Shirley Adams." I'll unpack the whole Khoi-San thing another time. Here's a link to the full schedule.
* Beautiful short video profile of the Malian singer Boubacar Traoré by New York Times music writer Jon Pareles.
* Photographer Brent Stirton's "Timbuktu Today" series. Example:
* This summer Neelika interviewed Riason Naidoo, the director the South African National Gallery, about his work on recovering the popular history of Indians in South Africa. She was then ask by Indian magazine Caravan to write about Naidoo's work. Here's the link and here's a taste:
When the judge at Shabir Shaik's trial had described Shaik's relationship with South African President Jacob Zuma—when Zuma was deputy president (1995-2005)—as "shady", other South Africans had just shaken their heads and repeated an old racist trope: "Everyone has their Indian."
Shaik, a Durban businessman of Indian origin, had linked himself to the African National Congress's (ANC) power structures through Zuma, the party's unlikely rising star. Zuma, in the meantime, was covering his business assets using Shaik's financial advice—until, that is, Shaik was convicted in 2005 of corruption and fraud related to arms deals. While Shaik was reviled for having paid 'retainers' (in the form of unspecified loans) to Zuma as investments in the political influence the businessman hoped to wield, Zuma—who had been dismissed from his position two weeks after Shaik's conviction, went on to become president in 2009.
The saga of this odd couple shed light on the dubious deals that prospered when ANC members established semi-official relationships with local business tycoons.
But it was also a story that, more significantly, revealed the theatrical puppetry involved in the uneasy marriage between the Zulus and Indians of KwaZulu Natal—it furthered the stereotype of 'the Indian' in the South African imagination. So when many South Africans responded to the Zuma-Shaik tangle by saying, "Everyone has their Indian," it was nothing new. The journalist and historian RW Johnson (the London Review of Books' go-to guy for all things 'African') and certain factions who lost to capable Indian leaders in United Democratic Front (one of the most important non-racial anti-apartheid organisations of the 1980s) had long been fond of using this phrase when they spoke of the impenetrability of the 'Indian cabal'. "Everyone has their Indian" expresses the fear of, necessity for and, ultimately, the disposability of the Indian; it says that African hustlers, big and small, all have their set-up man, their palm-greaser, their apologist, their go-between. But that ugly phrase also conveys something more: that the man to whom one swore brotherhood in the thick of plotting and hangover would inevitably be disowned and discarded.
The full piece is here.
* I recently came across the series of photographs by Swedish photographer Elisabeth Ohlson Wallin. She had made portraits of a group of HIV positive South Africans entitled "Via Dolorossa," imitating Christ's walk to his execution by the Romans, to depict "suffering, endeavour and love in a South Africa afflicted with HIV and Aids":
* I've praised Kenya's NTV here before for archiving all its reports on its Youtube channel, including the excellent Red Eye. Now I discovered Zambia's Muvi TV (on Youtube) but also on its site with its own video player. The production values are not as slick as the Kenyans, but it's worth a regular check-in.
* Alec Russell, a former Financial Times "man in South Africa" had an op-ed in the paper on Monday about Julius Malema is the biggest threat to investment in South Africa. It's really how Malema will spoil Russell's annual trek down to the Cape Town Mining Indaba held every February in that city. A time for deals to be struck, Cape wines to be consumed, "all in a Mediterranean summer climate." He also mentions a new book, Inconvenient Youth, by a South African journalist, Fiona Forde, on Malema. They churn out books in South Africa like newspapers.
* This weekend–or sometime soon–I hope to catch the "Heroic Africans: Legendary Leaders, Iconic Sculptures" exhibit at The Metropolitan Museum in New York City. On show are 100 sculptures representing "eight landmark sculptural traditions from West and Central Africa created between the twelfth and early twentieth centuries" and a glimpse into the world of power before European colonialism. It's showing till January 22, 2012. If it matters, The New York Times' art critic strongly recommend it on the front page of the Arts Section.
* If you care about theoretical debates about media practices, I'd strongly recommend FLOW TV, "… a critical forum on television and media culture" published the University of Texas' Department of Radio, Television, and Film. It features a lot of work of media studies graduate students around the US. Like this piece by Daniel Munro on the media of the Libyan rebel movement. Munro argues that global TV news (including Al Jazeera English) hardly engaged with locals beyond "major moments of violence or celebration." Digging through online video sharing sites and search engines, he finds "imagery of amateur footage [that] offers views of the revolution between battles that are not typically televised." Unfortunately few people get to watch these. Mauro also finds that the most active and expansive set of amateur videos of rebel activity is the work of an American computer technician, Humphrey Cheung, who infiltrated with rebels from Tunisia. Here's a link to the article. And here's a link to Cheung's set of videos. (BTW, this is not the "clueless" American student who thought it was cool to buy a one-way plane ticket to Cairo and sneaked into Libya to join the rebels because it would make for a cool summer break.)
* Remember when famed photographer Roy Zipstein traveled to Durban before the 2010 World Cup and shot a spread for a design magazine on the new Moses Mabhida stadium? And you marveled? Here's two shots to refresh your memory:
Well, the stadium runs at a lost. If you want to read more about the politics of stadium construction in South Africa, I'd suggest checking out the work of historian Peter Alegi: his academic research here (on stadium construction in Cape Town and Durban) and on his blog, here. Oh, and what about Soccer City?
* This video's been around for a while. Check out the contestants in last year's Miss West Africa eating crabs:
* Finally, the Big Weekend Music Break.
First some political music: David Patrick Lane introduced me to British post-punk band, The Three Johns, this week (we were talking football), especially to the group's 1982 single, "English White Boy Engineer" which attacked hypocritical attitudes towards South Africa and Apartheid in the UK. Salute.
Now back to your regular programming.
I can dig this Kenyan music everyday. The video for Redrepublik's "Skamaress":
And occasionally HHP's rap pop
The beautiful video for Baltimore's Future Islands' "Balance" from their new EP:
Some pop. Roff, the French rapper of Cape Verdean descent, has a dream of throwing a "Thug Marriage" somewhere in a Gulf state:
More pop. This time Ghanaians Scorpy Sekelism, Skrew Face, Old Sodja and D-Flex with "Georgina Remix":
Speeding things up with French DJ Frederic Galliano and Kuduro Sound System's "1,2,3 sempre tabater" from this past summer:
Zambians Zone Fam with "Mbama":
More fast music. Nigerian Tipsy with "Ching Chong":
And even more. Stella Mwangi was born in Kenya and grew up Norway.
If Kenyans have Stella (well, more liek Stella wants Kenya to notice her), Mozambique has Lizha James. You can hear the South African influences:
Slowing things down the Cuban-born, Cape Verdean singer Mayra Andrade:
Corneille is Rwandan-German crooner. This is "Le jour après la fin du Monde":
Rotterdam-based Cape Verdean-Dutch rapper Gary Mendes decided to turn his haircut into a music video from late last year:
I really feel the German Youtube channel, TV Noir, a collection of live acoustic performances. Like "Railway" by BOY:
October 7, 2011
Not the Music Break
Cape Town's answer to Vanilla Ice . Only in Cape Town. Quite a White Ou (that's his name) even translates his lyrics for you. Could be a performance piece.
Seems there is an obvious obsession with Vanilla Ice as performance art in South Africa. Here's comedian Deep Fried Man:
H/T: Tony Karon, Stephen Coplan
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Beyoncé does it again
You think Beyoncé flew in Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa De Keersmaker and her dance company Rosas for the second part of her new video 'Countdown' (watch the video on her website – starting around 2:30)? We know she can. Ask Tofo Tofo. But she didn't.
The Belgian choreographer was surprised when she first saw the video. In an interview with Belgian radio station Studio Brussel today she said: "I didn't know anything about this. I'm not mad, but this is plagiarism. This is stealing. They took pieces from Achterland and Rosas danst Rosas. Including the dresses and a remake of the school of [architect Henry] Van de Velde [which served as the set for the original recording of Rosas danst Rosas by director Thierry De Mey]. It's a bit rude, I must say. (…) What's rude about it is that they don't even bother about hiding it. They seem to think they could do it because it's a famous work. (…) Am I honoured? Look, I've seen local school kids doing this. That's a lot more beautiful." That's pop for you. The dance company said they'd contact Beyoncé's lawyers.
Amber Rose went to Ghana
Who? Why? She is described as a model and an actress. But her real claim to fame is that she was until recently Kanye West's girlfriend. Her current fame is tied to her dating another rapper Whiz Khalifa. Who? "Black and Yellow" Whiz. (While you're at it, the remix with Snoop Dogg is even better.) Bear with me. Amber was invited by a British mobile phone company to promote its brand (which is already dominant) in Ghana. I know. Like any visitor to Africa she danced. She also made some comments about the lack of a middle class (she only saw or met very poor or very rich people), and, most importantly, she lectured young, most Muslim, schoolgirls in Nima, a very poor part of the capital Accra (they do offer walking tours though), to stay in school and about women's empowerment.
When she was ridiculed, she responded on her blog:
Why wouldn't I speak to those girls? I AM West African [her mother is Cape Verdean] just like them, I grew up poor just like them, most of those girls quit school to take care of their families JUST LIKE I DID. So how the hell do they not relate to my life and I theirs??? Talking to those young girls wasn't a job for me feeding those kids wasn't a job for me it wasn't for publicity and I didn't get paid to do it. I went there cuz I LOVE to help ppl. I DON'T want a pat on the back for shit that I do from my heart or even a thank u it was my blessing to go out to Ghana it is a second home for me now and it changed my life FOREVER!
Anyway, all of this–in this case where celebrity means humanitarianism and Africa usually stands in as backdrop–gets recounted regularly on "The Side Eye," a weekly column over at Okayafrica by AIAC alum Allison Swank. Irreverent, funny and definitely the kind of thing you need on once a week. Go check it out.
Who is Leymah Gbowee
By Dan Moshenberg
I once heard the photographer Harry Mattison discuss the difficulty, the near impossibility, of photographing peace. For Mattison, an award winning photographer of conflict, this was an epiphany. Peace is difficult, representing peace is near impossible.
The Nobel Prize Committee today awarded the Peace Prize to three women, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, of Liberia; Leymah Gbowee, from Liberia and currently based in Ghana; and Tawakul Karman, of Yemen. First, congratulations to all (although the wisdom of giving the unpopular Johnson Sirleaf such an award as she battles re-election is questioned back in Liberia), and thanks to the Nobel Committee for not repeating the mistakes of recent Peace Prize recipients (Barack Obama, the proponent of "just war", for example). Thanks to the Nobel Committee for increasing the pool of living women Nobel Peace Prize winners by a whopping 50%. Where there were six, now there are nine. Good news, hopefully, for the Nobel Women's Initiative and the world. (Since its inception, in 1901, only 15 women have won the Peace Prize.)
The New York Times coverage of the announcement, and its implications, suggests the truth of Mattison's epiphany. The Times devotes 33 paragraphs to the news, a substantial article. Johnson Sirleaf gets eleven paragraphs, large chunks early on and then again at the end. Karman receives five paragraphs, which begin about a third of the way into the piece. Gbowee receives a scant three paragraphs, and they don't show up until the 24th paragraph. You have to want to read the whole article to find out who Leymah Gbowee is.
Leymah Gbowee is a "militant pacifist", a "peace activist", and a real mover and shaker. She is a woman who recognized that women had to organize, across all barriers and across all divisions, that women had to transform themselves and one another if they wanted to change the world. They had to learn to participate in peace negotiations, for example, by refusing the symbolic chairs and other morsels offered them, by confronting the materiel of war and violence with the human force of peace, compassion, and love. When the Big Men of Liberia met in Accra to negotiate "peace", Gbowee and her sisters in white t-shirts raised a ruckus outside, and just about held the delegates hostage.
From the outset, Leymah Gbowee identified humanity as the site of her struggles and organizing. That means organizing structures, such as the Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace, followed by the Women In Peacebuilding Network, or WIPNET. From there, she has gone on to organize the Women Peace and Security Network Africa, based in Ghana. Gbowee's vision of women is African, from Cape to Cairo, and from coast to coast.
Peace and justice, child by child, person by person, space by space, and beyond. That's what Leymah Gbowee has been organizing. That's what is so difficult, if not impossible, to represent. That's what The New York Times missed. But you don't have to. On Tuesday, October 18, in the United States, PBS will broadcast the documentary, Pray the Devil Back to Hell, about the work of Leymah Gbowee. Don't miss it. It's inspiring, as is its subject.
The Nobel Peace Prize's Kanye Moment
"Hey Liberian people, I know you got an election going on and all, and I'm gonna let you finish, but Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was one of the best presidents of ALL TIME…"
That's the message sent to Liberia by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee today. If you weren't aware, Liberians are headed to the polls next week for the second election since the end of 23 years of social upheaval.
As Liberia expert Michael Keating puts it today over at Foreign Policy:
I think it is fair to question the Nobel's Committee judgement in awarding this prize in a situation where its announcement might be construed as a full-throated endorsement of President Sirleaf's reelection on the part of the international community. The situation on the ground in Monrovia is much more nuanced than Madame Sirleaf's coterie of uncritical foreign fans would have us believe. Many of the gains she takes credit for are real but they are still only benefiting a very small group of Liberian citizens.
In a recent Newsweek article, Prue Clarke and Emily Schmall, highlight amongst other specks on the presidents spotless international image, the situation of average Liberians in a country where 9 out of 10 live on less than $1.25 a day, high levels of corruption in the current regime, the inability of the president to deal with social problems such as high levels of rape in the country, and the recommendation by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission she set-up that she should not be involved in politics for 30 years. The article also points out that while the Unity Party is able to hold rallies of 40,000 people, some of her former supporters, especially women, are starting to rethink their stance on the President.
The problem that arises is that the President's local support is just not as strong as the international community would like to believe. This is probably because the international community has invested a lot in the technocratic peace-building development scheme they've deployed from Afrghanistan to Sierra Leone. While the international community encourages the integration into the global economy, and the holding of free-elections, many Liberians have been led to believe that a vote for the status-quo will be a vote to maintain a fragile peace.
It was in the midst of this environment in which I was able to visit Monrovia this summer. In July, when George Weah's CDC rolled into town young people swarmed the streets bringing daily operations in the city to a halt (and they are repeating the same feat today). You don't get a feeling unlike Occupy Wall Street or what was depicted of Tahrir Square. While the CDC supporters are unfortunately engaged in a game of politics that will ultimately benefit the few leaders of the party, the sentiment that the current leadership has not helped them was not lost on me.
Monrovia is a city in which foreigners have taken over to dominate all aspects of the local economy, culture, and daily realities. The entertainment industry exemplifies this. When you go out to the big nightclubs, the scene is dominated by ex-pats and the children of the country's elite. The music reflects their foreign-oriented tastes. In my desire to get familiar with the local youth culture, I was introduced to the Hipco movement.
The Hipco movement is full of talented artists who are finally able to speak their mind against the inequalities and injustices imbedded in Liberian society. The sentiments of young people who have been manipulated, abused, and ignored by ruling politicians over the years, can be heard in songs like, "They Coming Again" by So Fresh. What the artists lacked was support and resources to sustain a living from their work, and retain an independent voice away from the political parties. While their music wasn't played in the city's fancy nightclubs, it was used to rally the poorer youth of the country amongst whom the local music is immensely popular. One afternoon I sat in on a meeting between some of the country's most popular artists and one of the political parties. That party's campaign organizers attempted to conscript them into their ranks in the hopes to catch more of the youth vote. While several artists went along with it, not able to resist the large sums of money offered that would support large extended families, some refused out of both principle and fear of retaliation from opposing parties.
In trying to support the Liberian artists, Akwaaba Music and I teamed up to try and release some of their music to expose it to an international audience. The guiding philosophy is based on the idea that sometimes in order to be appreciated at home you have to have some recognition from abroad. Since today most of that recognition is going to the head of state, it's time to shift the focus to its people.
That compilation will be out in two weeks, but you can get a preview right now through a mix I put together, along with the track list and my personal perspective on each song at AkwaabaMusic.com.
You can also listen to the mixtape here.
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'The Invader'
The opening scene of Belgian filmmaker and artist Nicolas Provost's new feature film, "The Invader," set on one of the beaches of the Italian resort island Lampedusa, which has become a primary European entry point for undocumented African migrants into Europe. (Halfway into this video interview at the Venice film festival, Provost talks about why he opens the film with this scene — "I wanted it to be like a superficial commercial for Europe"). Here's The Hollywood Reporter's review of the film which focuses on the travails of an African migrant in Brussels:
Slickly accomplished and anchored by an outstanding central performance by the imposing Issaka Sawadogo, this offbeat picture will be a surefire talking point at festivals (…). Art-house play in Francophone territories beckons for this film punctuated with frank nudity and resolutely unglamorized violence.
Much of the latter is meted out protagonist Amadou (Sawadogo), a swaggering bull of a man who makes his way from an unspecified African country to work illegally in Europe. He finds a tough construction job in Brussels, which involves wielding an enormous drill, the first of several instances where Provost deploys overt phallic imagery with semi-ironic directness.
Amadou is a man on the make, both financial and sexually, so it isn't long before he's engaged in a steamy affair with a sophisticated, white European woman – Stefania Rocca's Agnès. When this liaison turns sour, Amadou's fortunes quickly deteriorate. A chap who has previously been a potentially model EU citizen – hard-working, caring, conscientious, intelligent, resourceful – spirals into bloodshed and murder. Whether this change involves some revelation of Amadou's true savagery, or whether he is haplessly driven to desperate acts by capitalist Europe's callous cruelty, is a matter for debate."
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