subSahara AFRICA

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HR 2269 bipartisan McKinney- Rohrabacher Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers takes U.S. weapons from hands of dictators & human rights abusers

HR 2415 HRts commitments

"One other new front for fruitful agitation was opened this summer. Two members of Congress, Rep. Cynthia McKinney and Bernie Sanders, introduced parallel measures to impose new standards on the global system and accountability on US multinationals in their behavior overseas.

McKinney's HR 4596, with Sanders and a handful of others as co-sponsors, describes a "corporate code of conduct" that would be enforceable by US law and through civil-damage lawsuits in federal courts. Sanders's "Global Sustainable Development Resolution" H.Res. 479 speaks more broadly to reforming the international institutions and trade agreements, as well as to corporate accountability. Naturally, it's a long slog ahead for either proposal to be taken seriously in Washington, but both represent a promising starting point. The next time you hear a US Representative uttering the usual bromides about globalization, interrupt to ask where he or she stands on McKinney-Sanders.": "Waking up the global elite" Wm Greider The Nation 9/18/00
Activism in the streets led to platitudes in the suites

Ever since Kwame Nkrumah advocated an African High Command to implement conflict resolution, the Organization of African Unity has been wrestling with the question of whether conflict has to be a recurring fact of life in Africa. South Africa's military and economic strength could be the engine for promoting stability and growth in the region.: da Costa, Peter. "Keeping the peace." Africa Report May 1995, v40n3, p. 26- 29

On Goree Island, Bush visit sparks anger
7.8.03 Clar Ni Chonghaile

Reuters

Goree Island, Senegal Pres. GWBush made an eloquent speech but did not win many friends during his brief visit to Goree Island off Senegal on Tuesday. "We are very angry. We didn't even see him," said Fatou N'diaye, a necklace seller watching dignitaries file past to return to the mainland at the end of Bush's tour. N'diaye and other residents of Goree, site of a famous slave trading station, said they had been taken to a football ground on the other side of the quaint island at 6 a.m. and told to wait there until Bush had departed, around midday.
Bush came to Goree to tour the red-brick Slave House, where Africans were kept in shackles before being shipped across a perilous sea to a lifetime of servitude. He then gave an eloquent speech about the horrors of slavery, standing at a podium under a sizzling sun near a red-stone museum, topped by cannon pointing out to the sea.

The cooped-up residents were not impressed. "It's slavery all over again," fumed one father of 4, who did not want to give his name. "It's humiliating. The island was deserted." White House officials said the decision to remove the locals was taken by Senegalese authorities. But there was no doubt who the residents blamed.
"We never want to see him come here again," said N'diaye, hiking her loose gown onto her shoulders with a frown. As the sun rose over Goree before Bush's arrival, the only people to be seen on the main beach were U.S. officials & secret service agents. Frogmen swam through the shallows and hoisted themselves up to peer into brightly painted pirogues.

Normally, the island teems with tourists, Senegal's ubiquitous traders, hawkers of cheap African art, photographers offering to take pictures and all the expected trappings of a tourist hot-spot in one of the world's poorest countries. On Tuesday, shutters on yellow & red colonial-style houses remained shut. The cafes were closed and the narrow pier deserted, apart from security agents manning a metal detector, near the sandy beach. A gunship patrolled offshore.
"We understand that you have to have security measures since 9.11.01, but to dump us in another place? We had to leave at 6 a.m. I didn't have time to bathe, and the bread did not arrive," the father of 4 said. "We were shut up like sheep," said 15- year-old Mamadou. Many residents compared Bush's hour-long visit unfavorably to the island tour by former President Bill Clinton in 1998. "When Clinton came, he shook hands, people danced," said former Mayor Urbain Alexandre Diagne.
As the Bush roadtrip moved on, Goree was returning to normal with children once again diving into the shallows and clambering over the now inoffensive pirogues.

Q. "You wrote about Doug Wilder and Louis Sullivan and Jesse Jackson and Ben Chavis. Why ? "
Mr. RICHBURG: "I was writing about black American leaders, prominent people, people I admire and respect, who, basically, rose to prominence in this country because they were the champions of civil rights. They were the champions of democracy. They were the champion of expanding Americans' rights and liberties to the downtrodden and standing up against repression. I was disillusioned and depressed and angry to see these same prominent figures when they go to Africa not standing up on the side of the people being repressed, standing up on the side of expanding democracy, standing up on the side of liberty, but instead, dining with dictators.

That's not their place. That's not where I wanted to see them. I remember these were the people who largely pushed American policy in favor of the black majority in South Africa. These were people whose demonstrations in front of the South African Embassy largely mobilized American opinion against that horrible apartheid regime in South Africa. Yet, when the repression was on the other side, when it was black govts repressing black people, I didn't see the outrage from these great moral leaders. I didn't see the indignity. I didn't see them out standing up against this kind of repression. And that angered me because I wanted to see them on the correct side, and they were on the wrong side. I wanted to point it out. I asked them when they came out to Africa, `Where is the outrage? Why aren't you out here pushing for more democracy?' I wasn't satisfied with the answers I got, and I quoted them in the book. " Q: "Why do you think they do it, then ? "
Mr. RICHBURG: "A variety of reasons. In some cases, there's not a lot of knowledge about the internal workings of a lot of these African countries. I was on the ground there, could spend some time, figure out there are opposition movements here; this president is actually controlling the media repressing free speech. On the other hand, I also think that there's a feeling that you don't want to talk about these things publicly; you want to keep it in the family. Black people, obviously, would like to see black government succeed. It's a source of pride.

I think there is a feeling blacks have an obligation to support, not condemn, black govts. With some black dictatorships, it's embarrassing to talk about this stuff, to air dirty laundry. But I think that's wrong and I think black American leaders would find that there is a constituency in the U.S. and a constituency among the black community if they stand up for what's right, if they stand up against repression, if they stand up for fairness, if they stand up for free press in Africa, independent judiciaries, and if they get on the right side, if they get on the side of these people power movements springing up now. "
Keith Richburg, author Out Of America