Mandela, Mobutu & Me

In this stunning memoir, veteran Washington Post correspondent Lynne Duke takes readers on a wrenching but riveting journey through Africa during the pivotal 1990s and brilliantly illuminates a continent where hope and humanity thrive amid unimaginable depredation and horrors.

For four years as her newspaper's Johannesburg bureau chief, Lynne Duke cut a rare figure as a black American woman foreign correspondent as she raced from story to story in numerous countries of central and southern Africa. From the battle zones of Congo-Zaire to the quest for truth and reconciliation in South Africa; from the teeming displaced person’s camps of Angola and the killing field of the Rwanda genocide to the calming Indian Ocean shores of Mozambique.

She interviewed heads of state, captains of industry, activists, tribal leaders, medicine men and women, mercenaries, rebels, refugees, and ordinary, hardworking people. And it is they, the ordinary people of Africa, who fueled the hope and affection that drove Duke’s reporting. The nobility of the ordinary African struggles, so often absent from accounts of the continent, is at the heart of Duke’s searing story.

[from the hardcover edition]

Duke covered southern Africa as Johannesburg bureau chief for The Washington Post from 1995 to 1999. Her engaging memoir provides a close-up look at the fall of Mobutu Sese Seko in the former Zaire, the ascendance of Nelson Mandela in South Africa, dramatic high points of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and many poignant vignettes of everyday African life from Cape Town to Kigali. "Armed with attitude and ready for anything," she finds that being black and female is sometimes, but not always, an occupational asset. Knowing that her dispatches will help shape American perceptions of a region she cares deeply about, she works hard to balance her anger at the brutality and venality of "ugly Africa" against her admiration for Mandela and for the fortitude and ingenuity of ordinary Africans. Equally deft at presenting vivid eyewitness descriptions and concise evaluations of failed policies, whether African or American, Duke has given us a glimpse of what first-rate reporting on Africa can be.

[from Foreign Affairs]

Pictures: Mandela's 1997 mediation efforts between Mobutu and Laurent Kabila
[That's Afrika and That's Madiba For You!]

In this stunning memoir, veteran Washington Post correspondent Lynne Duke takes readers on a wrenching but riveting journey through Africa during the pivotal 1990s and brilliantly illuminates a continent where hope and humanity thrive amid unimaginable depredation and horrors.

For four years as her newspaper's Johannesburg bureau chief, Lynne Duke cut a rare figure as a black American woman foreign correspondent as she raced from story to story in numerous countries of central and southern Africa. From the battle zones of Congo-Zaire to the quest for truth and reconciliation in South Africa; from the teeming displaced person’s camps of Angola and the killing field of the Rwanda genocide to the calming Indian Ocean shores of Mozambique.

She interviewed heads of state, captains of industry, activists, tribal leaders, medicine men and women, mercenaries, rebels, refugees, and ordinary, hardworking people. And it is they, the ordinary people of Africa, who fueled the hope and affection that drove Duke’s reporting. The nobility of the ordinary African struggles, so often absent from accounts of the continent, is at the heart of Duke’s searing story.

[from the hardcover edition]

Duke covered southern Africa as Johannesburg bureau chief for The Washington Post from 1995 to 1999. Her engaging memoir provides a close-up look at the fall of Mobutu Sese Seko in the former Zaire, the ascendance of Nelson Mandela in South Africa, dramatic high points of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and many poignant vignettes of everyday African life from Cape Town to Kigali. "Armed with attitude and ready for anything," she finds that being black and female is sometimes, but not always, an occupational asset. Knowing that her dispatches will help shape American perceptions of a region she cares deeply about, she works hard to balance her anger at the brutality and venality of "ugly Africa" against her admiration for Mandela and for the fortitude and ingenuity of ordinary Africans. Equally deft at presenting vivid eyewitness descriptions and concise evaluations of failed policies, whether African or American, Duke has given us a glimpse of what first-rate reporting on Africa can be.

[from Foreign Affairs]

Pictures: Mandela's 1997 mediation efforts between Mobutu and Laurent Kabila
[That's Afrika and That's Madiba For You!]

"Segundo um Novo Relatorio do Banco Mundial"...

Nao e’ por nada (... certamente nao pela minha alegada “mania do sabetudismo”!...), mas...



Este novo relatorio do Banco Mundial lancado ontem – “De-fragmentando o Comercio Africano”: Aprofundando a Integracao Regional do Comercio de Bens e Servicos – levou-me de volta a esta “revisitacao da SADC”, porque diz fundamentalmente o seguinte (minha traducao livre):

“Os paises Africanos teem vindo a perder bilioes de dolares por ano em potenciais ganhos do comercio devido as elevadas barreiras comerciais com os paises vizinhos, sendo-lhes mais facil comerciar com o resto do mundo do que entre si.

A existente fragmentacao regional priva o continente de novas fontes de crescimento economico, novos empregos e diminuicao acentuada da pobreza – factores que acompanharam a significativa integracao do comercio na Asia Oriental e outras regioes. As redes de producao trans-fronteirica que activaram o dinamismo economico noutras regioes, especialmente na Asia Oriental, ainda teem que se materializar em Africa.”


- Capitulos de especial interesse para a regiao da SADC:

6. Facilitating Cross-border Mobile Banking in Southern Africa

7. Why Trade Facilitation Is Important for Africa

8. Deepening Regional Integration to Eliminate the Fragmented
Goods Market in Southern Africa

11. The Business Environment in Southern Africa: Issues in Trade
and Market Integration

12. Africa’s Trade in Services and the Opportunities and Risks of Economic
Partnership Agreements

13. Developing Professional Services in Africa

[Relatorio integral aqui]


QUESTAO: sera’ que ainda “vamos” a tempo de recuperar o tempo perdido, dada a ‘deadline’ de 2017 para a criacao de uma Area de Comercio Livre no continente estabelecida pela Uniao Africana, para fomentar o comercio intra e inter-regional?


POSTS RELACIONADOS:

SADC: Trade Facilitation Issues

SADC: Protocol & Policy Implementation Issues

The EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreements

The East-Asian Tigers Model in Africa?

Nao e’ por nada (... certamente nao pela minha alegada “mania do sabetudismo”!...), mas...



Este novo relatorio do Banco Mundial lancado ontem – “De-fragmentando o Comercio Africano”: Aprofundando a Integracao Regional do Comercio de Bens e Servicos – levou-me de volta a esta “revisitacao da SADC”, porque diz fundamentalmente o seguinte (minha traducao livre):

“Os paises Africanos teem vindo a perder bilioes de dolares por ano em potenciais ganhos do comercio devido as elevadas barreiras comerciais com os paises vizinhos, sendo-lhes mais facil comerciar com o resto do mundo do que entre si.

A existente fragmentacao regional priva o continente de novas fontes de crescimento economico, novos empregos e diminuicao acentuada da pobreza – factores que acompanharam a significativa integracao do comercio na Asia Oriental e outras regioes. As redes de producao trans-fronteirica que activaram o dinamismo economico noutras regioes, especialmente na Asia Oriental, ainda teem que se materializar em Africa.”


- Capitulos de especial interesse para a regiao da SADC:

6. Facilitating Cross-border Mobile Banking in Southern Africa

7. Why Trade Facilitation Is Important for Africa

8. Deepening Regional Integration to Eliminate the Fragmented
Goods Market in Southern Africa

11. The Business Environment in Southern Africa: Issues in Trade
and Market Integration

12. Africa’s Trade in Services and the Opportunities and Risks of Economic
Partnership Agreements

13. Developing Professional Services in Africa

[Relatorio integral aqui]


QUESTAO: sera’ que ainda “vamos” a tempo de recuperar o tempo perdido, dada a ‘deadline’ de 2017 para a criacao de uma Area de Comercio Livre no continente estabelecida pela Uniao Africana, para fomentar o comercio intra e inter-regional?


POSTS RELACIONADOS:

SADC: Trade Facilitation Issues

SADC: Protocol & Policy Implementation Issues

The EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreements

The East-Asian Tigers Model in Africa?

About the 'Kony 2012' Phenomenon [Updated]*

As I was musing about the issue of “child soldiers” in the Angolan context – first here some weeks ago and here in the last few days – I was totally unaware of the global phenomenon the video below by charity Invisible Children (IC) on Joseph Kony and the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Uganda has recently become, first on the social media and then on mainstream media, rising up the the American Congress and the Internacional Criminal Court.

I heard about it for the first time yesterday on this programme at BBC Radio 3, where a Ugandan journalist made a number of critical points to dispel the prevailing notion that this is a one-dimensional problem and urged the IC campaigners to dig deeper in their research and place the blame where it really belongs (if not entirely, at least shared with Joseph Kony and the LRA): on Yoweri Museveni and the Ugandan Army.

He also brought to the fore the ethnic dimensions of the problem, e.g. how the North of the country, where the LRA has its stronghold, has been historically ‘segregated’ from the rest of the country. That ‘segregationism’, he argued, takes such forms as naming a so far unexplained disease that has been ravaging the country “the Northern disease” for no other reason than that there is no known cure for it. Which led me to draw a parallel to the ‘stigma’ attached to the North of Angola over the past decade for a number of outbreaks of strange or unexplained diseases in that part of the country and also to the ethnic dimension of the Angolan war – something strongly dismissed by the official line, as recently stressed by President Jose’ Eduardo dos Santos and an Angolan journalist, both quoted here .

But the controversy sparked by the IC video and ongoing campaign doesn’t stop there and I am just catching up with it – a particularly interesting article on the issue can be found here .

Also of not are Mahmood Mamdani's views on the issue:

"The 70 million plus who have watched the Invisible Children video need to realise that the LRA – both the leaders and the children pressed into their service – are not an alien force but sons and daughters of the soil. The solution is not to eliminate them physically, but to find ways of integrating them into (Ugandan) society.
Those in the Ugandan and the US governments – and now apparently the owners of Invisible Children – must bear responsibility for regionalising the problem as the LRA and, in its tow, the Ugandan army and US advisors criss-cross the region, from Uganda to DRC to CAR. Yet, at its core the LRA remains a Ugandan problem calling for a Ugandan political solution."
[Here]

KONY 2012 from INVISIBLE CHILDREN on Vimeo.

*Update - 17/03/2012


After catching up with the full story, pondering all the arguments and balancing out the pros and cons, I decided to support the 'Kony 2012' campaign. It became, over and above its political dimensions, a matter of conscience for me.

As I was musing about the issue of “child soldiers” in the Angolan context – first here some weeks ago and here in the last few days – I was totally unaware of the global phenomenon the video below by charity Invisible Children (IC) on Joseph Kony and the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Uganda has recently become, first on the social media and then on mainstream media, rising up the the American Congress and the Internacional Criminal Court.

I heard about it for the first time yesterday on this programme at BBC Radio 3, where a Ugandan journalist made a number of critical points to dispel the prevailing notion that this is a one-dimensional problem and urged the IC campaigners to dig deeper in their research and place the blame where it really belongs (if not entirely, at least shared with Joseph Kony and the LRA): on Yoweri Museveni and the Ugandan Army.

He also brought to the fore the ethnic dimensions of the problem, e.g. how the North of the country, where the LRA has its stronghold, has been historically ‘segregated’ from the rest of the country. That ‘segregationism’, he argued, takes such forms as naming a so far unexplained disease that has been ravaging the country “the Northern disease” for no other reason than that there is no known cure for it. Which led me to draw a parallel to the ‘stigma’ attached to the North of Angola over the past decade for a number of outbreaks of strange or unexplained diseases in that part of the country and also to the ethnic dimension of the Angolan war – something strongly dismissed by the official line, as recently stressed by President Jose’ Eduardo dos Santos and an Angolan journalist, both quoted here .

But the controversy sparked by the IC video and ongoing campaign doesn’t stop there and I am just catching up with it – a particularly interesting article on the issue can be found here .

Also of not are Mahmood Mamdani's views on the issue:

"The 70 million plus who have watched the Invisible Children video need to realise that the LRA – both the leaders and the children pressed into their service – are not an alien force but sons and daughters of the soil. The solution is not to eliminate them physically, but to find ways of integrating them into (Ugandan) society.
Those in the Ugandan and the US governments – and now apparently the owners of Invisible Children – must bear responsibility for regionalising the problem as the LRA and, in its tow, the Ugandan army and US advisors criss-cross the region, from Uganda to DRC to CAR. Yet, at its core the LRA remains a Ugandan problem calling for a Ugandan political solution."
[Here]

KONY 2012 from INVISIBLE CHILDREN on Vimeo.

*Update - 17/03/2012


After catching up with the full story, pondering all the arguments and balancing out the pros and cons, I decided to support the 'Kony 2012' campaign. It became, over and above its political dimensions, a matter of conscience for me.

The Oxford Companion to The Economics of Africa

DETAILS HERE

[Related Post]

DETAILS HERE

[Related Post]

Dilemas da Extrema Pobreza...

(...)
como te atreves a querer
que te dê a mão
se ainda agora
a ofereci em troca de pão?
(...)

[A.S. - extracto de "Ralhete" in S.O.S. - lembro-me de, pelos dias em que escrevi esse poema, em tempos de guerra e escassez generalizada em Luanda, uma vez ter perguntado ao meu filho, entao com dois/tres anitos de idade, se "a barriga dele estava cheia", ele respondeu-me que "sim", perguntei-lhe "de que?" e ele: "a barriga esta' cheia de fome"...]




Esta e' uma imagem aterradora e revoltante, que ha' varios anos vem ilustrando as recorrentes fomes em Africa, e especialmente no 'seu Corno' - como ESTA, que actualmente vem mobilizando as atencoes e doacoes de todo o mundo face aquela que e' considerada a pior seca na regiao nos ultimos 60 anos.

Trata-se de uma imagem que tem sido igualmente politicamente manipulada pelas piores razoes e para as mais duvidosas causas possiveis. Por essa razao, apenas muito relutantemente me decidiria a posta-la neste blog. Mas, perante a noticia que abaixo se pode ler, ocorre-me que ela pode ilustrar tambem da forma mais macabra possivel os absurdos, dramas, traumas e dilemas com que as maes em condicoes de extrema pobreza frequentemente se teem que confrontar, e.g.: "matar a crianca, ou deixa-la morrer viva 'as garras dos abutres"?!...

Nao que a mae em questao na noticia seja 'desculpavel', mesmo porque nada faz supor que ela estaria no mesmo estado de extrema pobreza que a mae da crianca na imagem - a qual, muito provavelmente estaria ja' ela propria morta -, mas o seu acto ilustra bem os extremos a que os disturbios mentais associados a tais condicoes podem conduzir e que nenhuma imagem sera' capaz de retratar...


Mas, em qualquer dos casos, a dura, nua e crua realidade da sad bottom line da extrema pobreza e' bem retratada por esta imagem:





Criança Morre por Pedir Comida a Mãe

Uma criança de apenas 2 anos de idade perdeu a vida quando este chorava, queixando-se a sua mãe de fome. A mãe, agastada, pega nela e sufoca-a até à morte. A horrível cena ocorreu na localidade fronteiriça de Santa Clara, na província de Cunene, 40 km a Sul de Ondjiva, segundo fonte policial que não especificou a data.

“O facto ocorreu quando o menor queixava-se de fome e a mãe, na impossibilidade de suprir a necessidade do seu filho, entendeu sufoca-lo de forma a fazer com que se calasse, tendo assim provocado a morte imediata da criança’’, contou o porta-voz do comando provincial da Polícia naquela província, Carlos dos Santos.

O oficial disse ainda que a mãe, interrogada, «alegou que praticou tal acção, porque o pai não comparticipava nas despesas para sustentar o seu filho».

Com dois anos de idade, a criança em vida chamava-se Daniel Pena Elias Satoca.


[aqui]


Posts relacionados:

Ambiente vs. Pobreza?

SADC: Meeting the Millennium Development Goals?

O Desespero e a Tragedia de Uma Mae Solteira

Mais de 90% dos Angolanos sao Doentes

Love and Liberation

(...)
como te atreves a querer
que te dê a mão
se ainda agora
a ofereci em troca de pão?
(...)

[A.S. - extracto de "Ralhete" in S.O.S. - lembro-me de, pelos dias em que escrevi esse poema, em tempos de guerra e escassez generalizada em Luanda, uma vez ter perguntado ao meu filho, entao com dois/tres anitos de idade, se "a barriga dele estava cheia", ele respondeu-me que "sim", perguntei-lhe "de que?" e ele: "a barriga esta' cheia de fome"...]




Esta e' uma imagem aterradora e revoltante, que ha' varios anos vem ilustrando as recorrentes fomes em Africa, e especialmente no 'seu Corno' - como ESTA, que actualmente vem mobilizando as atencoes e doacoes de todo o mundo face aquela que e' considerada a pior seca na regiao nos ultimos 60 anos.

Trata-se de uma imagem que tem sido igualmente politicamente manipulada pelas piores razoes e para as mais duvidosas causas possiveis. Por essa razao, apenas muito relutantemente me decidiria a posta-la neste blog. Mas, perante a noticia que abaixo se pode ler, ocorre-me que ela pode ilustrar tambem da forma mais macabra possivel os absurdos, dramas, traumas e dilemas com que as maes em condicoes de extrema pobreza frequentemente se teem que confrontar, e.g.: "matar a crianca, ou deixa-la morrer viva 'as garras dos abutres"?!...

Nao que a mae em questao na noticia seja 'desculpavel', mesmo porque nada faz supor que ela estaria no mesmo estado de extrema pobreza que a mae da crianca na imagem - a qual, muito provavelmente estaria ja' ela propria morta -, mas o seu acto ilustra bem os extremos a que os disturbios mentais associados a tais condicoes podem conduzir e que nenhuma imagem sera' capaz de retratar...


Mas, em qualquer dos casos, a dura, nua e crua realidade da sad bottom line da extrema pobreza e' bem retratada por esta imagem:





Criança Morre por Pedir Comida a Mãe

Uma criança de apenas 2 anos de idade perdeu a vida quando este chorava, queixando-se a sua mãe de fome. A mãe, agastada, pega nela e sufoca-a até à morte. A horrível cena ocorreu na localidade fronteiriça de Santa Clara, na província de Cunene, 40 km a Sul de Ondjiva, segundo fonte policial que não especificou a data.

“O facto ocorreu quando o menor queixava-se de fome e a mãe, na impossibilidade de suprir a necessidade do seu filho, entendeu sufoca-lo de forma a fazer com que se calasse, tendo assim provocado a morte imediata da criança’’, contou o porta-voz do comando provincial da Polícia naquela província, Carlos dos Santos.

O oficial disse ainda que a mãe, interrogada, «alegou que praticou tal acção, porque o pai não comparticipava nas despesas para sustentar o seu filho».

Com dois anos de idade, a criança em vida chamava-se Daniel Pena Elias Satoca.


[aqui]


Posts relacionados:

Ambiente vs. Pobreza?

SADC: Meeting the Millennium Development Goals?

O Desespero e a Tragedia de Uma Mae Solteira

Mais de 90% dos Angolanos sao Doentes

Love and Liberation

SADC: Trade Facilitation Issues

Goodbye Brother Gaddafi!

It is a shame that it should be in this way…
It is even more shameful that your demise could be associated with a deep blow on the ideals of Panafricanism – which you have so forcefully tried to personify, especially in as far as they relate to a genuine alliance between Northern and Sub-Saharan Africa, which you have championed…



However, the Panafricanist ideals can only be incorporated by the peoples of Africa. They cannot be hijacked by one leader, or even a group of leaders under our African Union banner. They cannot be dispensed through a top-down prescription. They can only be achieved if lived from a truly bottom-up experience:



- when free movement of people across borders becomes a reality;

- when the peoples of the continent can really know, respect, enjoy and appreciate their common ancestry and each other’s cultures and identities so as to avoid our recurrent inter-ethnic conflicts;

- when the immense riches of our motherland are effectively and fairly distributed and shared among all its sons and daughters so that our chronic poverty and human underdevelopment records can be definitively overcome…

And all that cannot be achieved under dictatorial and/or corrupt regimes and life-long rulers!



So, it is indeed regrettable that it had to be in this way – especially to the extent that you gave foreign powers a “good excuse” to intervene and interfere in what should/could have been a normal, peaceful and democratic process!

But…



Brother Gaddafi is down – Long live the Brotherhood (and the Sisterhood) of Panafricanism and the African Union of and for the peoples of the Continent and its Diaspora!


[Related Posts]

It is a shame that it should be in this way…
It is even more shameful that your demise could be associated with a deep blow on the ideals of Panafricanism – which you have so forcefully tried to personify, especially in as far as they relate to a genuine alliance between Northern and Sub-Saharan Africa, which you have championed…



However, the Panafricanist ideals can only be incorporated by the peoples of Africa. They cannot be hijacked by one leader, or even a group of leaders under our African Union banner. They cannot be dispensed through a top-down prescription. They can only be achieved if lived from a truly bottom-up experience:



- when free movement of people across borders becomes a reality;

- when the peoples of the continent can really know, respect, enjoy and appreciate their common ancestry and each other’s cultures and identities so as to avoid our recurrent inter-ethnic conflicts;

- when the immense riches of our motherland are effectively and fairly distributed and shared among all its sons and daughters so that our chronic poverty and human underdevelopment records can be definitively overcome…

And all that cannot be achieved under dictatorial and/or corrupt regimes and life-long rulers!



So, it is indeed regrettable that it had to be in this way – especially to the extent that you gave foreign powers a “good excuse” to intervene and interfere in what should/could have been a normal, peaceful and democratic process!

But…



Brother Gaddafi is down – Long live the Brotherhood (and the Sisterhood) of Panafricanism and the African Union of and for the peoples of the Continent and its Diaspora!


[Related Posts]

Revisitando a SADC (Parte II)

[Yinka Shonibare - La Meduse]


[Continuacao daqui]


Mas, porque volto entao a este tema quando ele se tem demonstrado de tao dificil abordagem?

Fundamentalmente porque, apesar de formalmente afastada profissionalmente dessa area, continuo a sentir algo como um certo “sentido de dever” de sobre ela emitir a minha opiniao sempre que tal se me afigure relevante.

Nao me proponho, no entanto, debrucar-me sobre as questoes de fundo que a problematica do engajamento de Angola no comercio intra e inter-regional suscitam – tal requereria uma abordagem eminentemente tecnica que, manifestamente, nao cabe no espirito informal deste blog (por vezes permito-me quebrar esse espirito, como aqui, ou aqui, mas apenas quando se trate de artigos ja’ escritos num contexto academico e/ou profissional). Limitar-me-ei, portanto, a alinhavar aqui algumas notas que gostaria de sugerir para a reflexao de quem, porventura, possa nelas estar interessado:

Geografia e Historia

- ‘As afirmacoes do Prof. Mourao ocorre-me apenas reafirmar algo que ja’ aqui, entre outros lugares referi: a mais antiga Uniao Aduaneira (UA) do mundo, a SACU (Southern Africa Customs Union, integrada por Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, e Swazilandia), foi criada na Africa Austral, em 1910 - tendo, portanto, celebrado o seu primeiro centenario no ano passado. Avaliar, criticar e ate’ mesmo condenar (!) a sua estrutura, economia politica e modus operandi desde a sua criacao ate’ aos dias de hoje e’ um exercicio a que tambem ja’ me dediquei extensivamente em outras ocasioes e que aqui me escusarei de repetir.

O que aqui importara’, sobretudo, notar e’ que nao so’ a criacao de uma UA na Africa Austral e’ possivel e tem precedentes historicos originais (dos quais a regiao pode colher importantes licoes, tanto no sentido positivo como no negativo), como tambem a criacao de uma UA mais ampla no quadro do Protocolo de Comercio da SADC esta’ definida nesse mesmo Protocolo, no Tratado da organizacao, na sua Agenda Comum e, entre outros dos seus instrumentos de politica, no seu Plano Indicativo Estrategico Regional, nao como “um objectivo imediato”, mas como uma meta a atingir-se gradualmente no quadro de uma estrategia de integracao regional com base no principio da "geometria assimetrica" (cuja aplicacao pratica no ambito das metas de convergencia macroeconomica da regiao podera' ser encontrada aqui) que contempla os diferentes estagios de desenvolvimento dos paises membros.

Apenas acrescentaria algo que nao pode deixar de ser referido neste contexto e que tambem ja’ referi noutras ocasioes: o comercio internacional de Angola (‘a parte a exportacao de petroleo e diamantes) e’ dominado por tres paises: Portugal, Brasil e China. Nao pretendendo aqui acusar o Prof. Mourao de estar a “tentar puxar a brasa para a sua sardinha (Brasil)”, pergunto-me se sera’ “politica e diplomaticamente sensivel” (ainda que, porventura, “culturalmente defensavel” - embora este argumento cada vez mais se venha desvanescendo perante a contemporanea "invasao chinesa"...) pretender-se escamotear o facto de os fluxos comerciais de Angola estarem historica e estruturalmente “voltados de frente para o Atlantico” (e, mais recentemente, para a Asia) e “de costas” para o hinterland Africano – facto que, admitidamente, estara’ na base de uma certa relutancia (generalisada?) em relacao a ideia de um maior envolvimento do pais nos esforcos de intensificacao do comercio intra-regional?

E, nao sera’ esse, tambem, um problema historico e estrutural com que virtualmente todas as economias africanas estao confrontadas, em resultado da heranca de relacoes de dependencia criadas pela colonizacao e que a OUA/UA, atraves de varias iniciativas regionais e continentais (das quais se destaca mais recentemente a NEPAD - Nova Parceria para o Desenvolvimento de Africa) ao longo das decadas desde as independencias, cujo jubileu se celebrou no ano passado, tem tentado reverter a favor do desenvolvimento endogeno, sustentado e sustentavel do continente?

Comercio e Desenvolvimento

- Uma outra nota que se me afigura premente, apesar de aparentemente obvia, e’ que se vem notando alguma dificuldade por parte dos sectores de opiniao a que me referia na primeira parte deste artigo em conciliar o(s) conceito(s) de ‘comercio’ e ‘desenvolvimento’. Foi, alias, essa dificuldade que esteve na base da controversia que se instalou entre mim e um dos membros do painel de que fiz parte neste evento...

No entanto, o facto incontornavel e’ que o comercio (internacional) nao e’ a antitese do desenvolvimento (economico). O objectivo da SADC, tal como o de organizacoes internacionais como a Conferencia das Nacoes Unidas para o Comercio e o Desenvolvimento (CNUCED/ UNCTAD), e’ precisamente colocar o comercio como alavanca ao servico do desenvolvimento economico nacional, regional e internacional - ou seja, o objectivo e' promover o comercio para o desenvolvimento.

Como atingir-se tal objectivo e’ a grande questao com que essas organizacoes, em associacao com o mundo academico e profissional especializado, se veem debatendo na teoria e na pratica, pelo menos desde as teorias das vantagens absolutas e comparativas de Smith e Ricardo, respectivamente.

[Continua]

[Yinka Shonibare - La Meduse]


[Continuacao daqui]


Mas, porque volto entao a este tema quando ele se tem demonstrado de tao dificil abordagem?

Fundamentalmente porque, apesar de formalmente afastada profissionalmente dessa area, continuo a sentir algo como um certo “sentido de dever” de sobre ela emitir a minha opiniao sempre que tal se me afigure relevante.

Nao me proponho, no entanto, debrucar-me sobre as questoes de fundo que a problematica do engajamento de Angola no comercio intra e inter-regional suscitam – tal requereria uma abordagem eminentemente tecnica que, manifestamente, nao cabe no espirito informal deste blog (por vezes permito-me quebrar esse espirito, como aqui, ou aqui, mas apenas quando se trate de artigos ja’ escritos num contexto academico e/ou profissional). Limitar-me-ei, portanto, a alinhavar aqui algumas notas que gostaria de sugerir para a reflexao de quem, porventura, possa nelas estar interessado:

Geografia e Historia

- ‘As afirmacoes do Prof. Mourao ocorre-me apenas reafirmar algo que ja’ aqui, entre outros lugares referi: a mais antiga Uniao Aduaneira (UA) do mundo, a SACU (Southern Africa Customs Union, integrada por Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, e Swazilandia), foi criada na Africa Austral, em 1910 - tendo, portanto, celebrado o seu primeiro centenario no ano passado. Avaliar, criticar e ate’ mesmo condenar (!) a sua estrutura, economia politica e modus operandi desde a sua criacao ate’ aos dias de hoje e’ um exercicio a que tambem ja’ me dediquei extensivamente em outras ocasioes e que aqui me escusarei de repetir.

O que aqui importara’, sobretudo, notar e’ que nao so’ a criacao de uma UA na Africa Austral e’ possivel e tem precedentes historicos originais (dos quais a regiao pode colher importantes licoes, tanto no sentido positivo como no negativo), como tambem a criacao de uma UA mais ampla no quadro do Protocolo de Comercio da SADC esta’ definida nesse mesmo Protocolo, no Tratado da organizacao, na sua Agenda Comum e, entre outros dos seus instrumentos de politica, no seu Plano Indicativo Estrategico Regional, nao como “um objectivo imediato”, mas como uma meta a atingir-se gradualmente no quadro de uma estrategia de integracao regional com base no principio da "geometria assimetrica" (cuja aplicacao pratica no ambito das metas de convergencia macroeconomica da regiao podera' ser encontrada aqui) que contempla os diferentes estagios de desenvolvimento dos paises membros.

Apenas acrescentaria algo que nao pode deixar de ser referido neste contexto e que tambem ja’ referi noutras ocasioes: o comercio internacional de Angola (‘a parte a exportacao de petroleo e diamantes) e’ dominado por tres paises: Portugal, Brasil e China. Nao pretendendo aqui acusar o Prof. Mourao de estar a “tentar puxar a brasa para a sua sardinha (Brasil)”, pergunto-me se sera’ “politica e diplomaticamente sensivel” (ainda que, porventura, “culturalmente defensavel” - embora este argumento cada vez mais se venha desvanescendo perante a contemporanea "invasao chinesa"...) pretender-se escamotear o facto de os fluxos comerciais de Angola estarem historica e estruturalmente “voltados de frente para o Atlantico” (e, mais recentemente, para a Asia) e “de costas” para o hinterland Africano – facto que, admitidamente, estara’ na base de uma certa relutancia (generalisada?) em relacao a ideia de um maior envolvimento do pais nos esforcos de intensificacao do comercio intra-regional?

E, nao sera’ esse, tambem, um problema historico e estrutural com que virtualmente todas as economias africanas estao confrontadas, em resultado da heranca de relacoes de dependencia criadas pela colonizacao e que a OUA/UA, atraves de varias iniciativas regionais e continentais (das quais se destaca mais recentemente a NEPAD - Nova Parceria para o Desenvolvimento de Africa) ao longo das decadas desde as independencias, cujo jubileu se celebrou no ano passado, tem tentado reverter a favor do desenvolvimento endogeno, sustentado e sustentavel do continente?

Comercio e Desenvolvimento

- Uma outra nota que se me afigura premente, apesar de aparentemente obvia, e’ que se vem notando alguma dificuldade por parte dos sectores de opiniao a que me referia na primeira parte deste artigo em conciliar o(s) conceito(s) de ‘comercio’ e ‘desenvolvimento’. Foi, alias, essa dificuldade que esteve na base da controversia que se instalou entre mim e um dos membros do painel de que fiz parte neste evento...

No entanto, o facto incontornavel e’ que o comercio (internacional) nao e’ a antitese do desenvolvimento (economico). O objectivo da SADC, tal como o de organizacoes internacionais como a Conferencia das Nacoes Unidas para o Comercio e o Desenvolvimento (CNUCED/ UNCTAD), e’ precisamente colocar o comercio como alavanca ao servico do desenvolvimento economico nacional, regional e internacional - ou seja, o objectivo e' promover o comercio para o desenvolvimento.

Como atingir-se tal objectivo e’ a grande questao com que essas organizacoes, em associacao com o mundo academico e profissional especializado, se veem debatendo na teoria e na pratica, pelo menos desde as teorias das vantagens absolutas e comparativas de Smith e Ricardo, respectivamente.

[Continua]

Mandela International Day

We can change the world and make it a better place. It is in your hands to make a difference.
- Nelson Mandela

The overarching objective of Mandela Day is to inspire individuals to take action to help change the world for the better, and in doing so build a global movement for good. Ultimately it seeks to empower communities everywhere. “Take Action; Inspire Change; Make Every Day a Mandela Day.”
Individuals and organisations are free to participate in Mandela Day as they wish. We do however urge everyone to adhere to the ethical framework of “service to one’s fellow human”.


[More details here]

"Winnie Madikizela-Mandela did her field work in Johannesburg’s Alexandra Townships at Entokozweni Family Health and Welfare Centre under the watchful eye of my mother Polina, who was the head Social worker there. This exercise brought Winnie close to my family. In 1984 when she was banished to the remote town of Brandfort, my father Selema Thomas went to visit her against the wishes of the government of Apartheid. He paid for it later with the endless interrogations and raids on his house.

However, when Mrs. Mandela went on her routine visits to her husband who was at the Pollsmoor Prison, she told him about my father’s visits and what he had told her about my sister Barbara and I. On my 46th Birthday April 4th 1985, Nelson Mandela sent me a letter that was smuggled out of prison wishing me good luck with the recording projects and the School of Music we had started in Botswana. He conveyed warm wishes to my family and greetings to the Kalahari Band I was working with, plus many more good tidings.

I was intensely moved by the fact that a man who has been imprisoned for over twenty years could have so much passion and regard for the work that was being done by some musicians in a small town in Botswana. It brought tears to my eyes. His confidence about our imminent liberation was overwhelming. His dedication humbled me and the letter was most flattering.

This song came to me there and then and remains a classic forever, just like the man. We recorded it with Kalahari in 1986 in London as part of the album called “Tomorrow”. When Mandela was released in 1990, the song became a reality and was played as background music on many of his visits to the large cities of America during television broadcasts. It remains a favourite with American and European audiences."

Hugh Masekela



Bring Him Back Home (Nelson Mandela)

We can change the world and make it a better place. It is in your hands to make a difference.
- Nelson Mandela

The overarching objective of Mandela Day is to inspire individuals to take action to help change the world for the better, and in doing so build a global movement for good. Ultimately it seeks to empower communities everywhere. “Take Action; Inspire Change; Make Every Day a Mandela Day.”
Individuals and organisations are free to participate in Mandela Day as they wish. We do however urge everyone to adhere to the ethical framework of “service to one’s fellow human”.


[More details here]

"Winnie Madikizela-Mandela did her field work in Johannesburg’s Alexandra Townships at Entokozweni Family Health and Welfare Centre under the watchful eye of my mother Polina, who was the head Social worker there. This exercise brought Winnie close to my family. In 1984 when she was banished to the remote town of Brandfort, my father Selema Thomas went to visit her against the wishes of the government of Apartheid. He paid for it later with the endless interrogations and raids on his house.

However, when Mrs. Mandela went on her routine visits to her husband who was at the Pollsmoor Prison, she told him about my father’s visits and what he had told her about my sister Barbara and I. On my 46th Birthday April 4th 1985, Nelson Mandela sent me a letter that was smuggled out of prison wishing me good luck with the recording projects and the School of Music we had started in Botswana. He conveyed warm wishes to my family and greetings to the Kalahari Band I was working with, plus many more good tidings.

I was intensely moved by the fact that a man who has been imprisoned for over twenty years could have so much passion and regard for the work that was being done by some musicians in a small town in Botswana. It brought tears to my eyes. His confidence about our imminent liberation was overwhelming. His dedication humbled me and the letter was most flattering.

This song came to me there and then and remains a classic forever, just like the man. We recorded it with Kalahari in 1986 in London as part of the album called “Tomorrow”. When Mandela was released in 1990, the song became a reality and was played as background music on many of his visits to the large cities of America during television broadcasts. It remains a favourite with American and European audiences."

Hugh Masekela



Bring Him Back Home (Nelson Mandela)

South Sudan: A New African Nation Is Born

"We, the democratically elected representatives of the people, hereby declare Southern Sudan to be an independent and sovereign state," speaker James Wani Igga said, splitting Africa's largest country in two.
The declaration of independence affirmed the new state's democratic and multi-ethnic and multi-confessional character, and its commitment to friendly relations with all countries "including the Republic of Sudan", Mr Igga said.
The parliament speaker said as a "strategic priority," South Sudan would seek admission to the United Nations, the African Union, the east African bloc IGAD and other international bodies.
South Sudan's Salva Kiir was sworn in as president.



South Sudan's independence comes exactly six months after a referendum saw southerners vote almost unanimously to split with their former civil war enemies in the north.
For decades, until a peace agreement was signed in 2005, southern rebels fought successive wars with the north, leaving the region in ruins, millions of people dead and a legacy of mutual mistrust.
The independence ceremony is being held at the mausoleum of the late rebel leader John Garang, who died just months after signing the peace accord that ended Africa's longest-running conflict and opened the door to nationhood.



[More details here and here ]

"We, the democratically elected representatives of the people, hereby declare Southern Sudan to be an independent and sovereign state," speaker James Wani Igga said, splitting Africa's largest country in two.
The declaration of independence affirmed the new state's democratic and multi-ethnic and multi-confessional character, and its commitment to friendly relations with all countries "including the Republic of Sudan", Mr Igga said.
The parliament speaker said as a "strategic priority," South Sudan would seek admission to the United Nations, the African Union, the east African bloc IGAD and other international bodies.
South Sudan's Salva Kiir was sworn in as president.



South Sudan's independence comes exactly six months after a referendum saw southerners vote almost unanimously to split with their former civil war enemies in the north.
For decades, until a peace agreement was signed in 2005, southern rebels fought successive wars with the north, leaving the region in ruins, millions of people dead and a legacy of mutual mistrust.
The independence ceremony is being held at the mausoleum of the late rebel leader John Garang, who died just months after signing the peace accord that ended Africa's longest-running conflict and opened the door to nationhood.



[More details here and here ]

Gbagbo's Arrest: "When Dictatorship Falls From Grace"

"Stripped of Dignity, Stripped of Power"

[Details Here]


Related Post:

Africa and the (digital) Democratic Revolution

"Stripped of Dignity, Stripped of Power"

[Details Here]


Related Post:

Africa and the (digital) Democratic Revolution

The Gender Debate: Reality Bites From The Youth* [R]

RECONCILE:


THE GENDER DEBATE


By Siphiwe Mpye

A female friend remembers with much disdain a column that appeared in this magazine aeons ago. It was an Off Ramp about the virtues of the independent black woman. The acerbic tone of the piece – which in parts ridiculed gold-diggers and gung-ho feminists – was unintended and in no way represented what I feel about all women. I only intended to highlight stereotypes that we perpetuate and the existence of a minority of women with ill intentions.

For example, there are men out there who still believe that women are out to get their money; that they have no place in serious business environments and are better suited to “lighter” pursuits such as public relations and so on. By the same token there are women who believe that the measure of success is showing off a R70 000 engagement extravagance from her “tycoon” fiancé and driving around in a BMW X5 paid for by the said banker, consortium chairman or newly moneyed cat with buddies in the government. I used these and other examples but my explanation was nonetheless lost on my friend who felt I had insulted women and was not sure if I was the man she has always known me to be. Whenever this pops up in conversation I maintain my stance and attempt to elaborate further in the hope of one day being understood. The importance of my resilience in this pursuit cannot be underplayed because there is a war going on out there and it is icier than the White House and the Kremlin in the days of the war that never was. It is the war between black men and black women.

(...)

I’m a journalist, my middle name is cynical – but some sort of platform for dialogue between black men and black women is urgently required if we are to unite to uplift a nation that was built on sacrifices by both sexes.

We need to start talking about our differences, and I speak not of the usual directionless, rowdy debates that end up creating more of a rift than effecting change. Both sides of the debate offer valid points but also present plenty of hogwash born from lack of understanding. Such a debate would strip down the clutter and hone in on the appropriate areas.

[***]

love not hate.

peace not war.

sister not slave.

“Who doesn’t want to be validated and respected by other human beings? Some men think the answer to that is: ‘WOMEN, OF COURSE’.


By Yazeed Kamaldien


I’m starting to wonder why men hate women so much. You see, the more I read newspapers and monitor what’s happening in our country, the more I feel that men must have something against women. If they don’t then why are they constantly abusing, raping or dehumanising women? Of course it’s not every man who behaves like this. But statistics are scary enough to make one wonder…

The government-funded Medical Research Council (MRC) released research findings earlier this year indicating that at least one South African woman is killed by her intimate partner every six hours. It also found that coloured women have twice the risk of being killed than other racial groups in our land with its brilliant and much hyped about constitution. Now that’s scary. Last year the MRC also found that women in abusive relationships with intimate sexual partners are more likely to get HIV from these men who deny them the right to be happy by instead making them their physical and emotional punch bags. This research study was done in Johannesburg’s biggest township, Soweto. The MRC found that half of 1 395 women interviewed experienced physical violence from their partners while 20 percent also experienced sexual abuse. A third of these women were HIV-positive and reported sexual violence more than others interviewed.

Okay, numbers aside, the bottom-line is that women are getting a double blow from men. Not only are they being abused but they’re also being infected with the incurable HIV-virus. Something seems rather unfair about all of this, don’t you think? It seems we are burying women alive in South Africa. It’s like we have no issues simply shoving them around. Sure, there are some shining examples of women who have made it in a seemingly man’s world. But that’s not the face of the majority of women, who live normal lives outside the bright lights, and who don’t have much.

By now we have to be asking ourselves some serious questions. Why are we allowing young girls and women to be raped in this country every day? Why are we allowing men to continue abusing women? What is it that we need to do to ensure women break free from oppressive men and stand on an equal footing as male counterparts?

(...)

And yes, you’ve already heard that old saying that respect is a two way street. Men demand respect and a platform and recognition and support not because they are men, but because they are human beings. And they get what they want because, unlike women, they automatically feel entitled to privileges – a right that society seems to bestow upon them from day one. But who doesn’t want to be validated by other human beings? Who doesn’t want to be respected? Who doesn’t want to feel that they are worthy of life? Some men clearly believe the answer to that is, ‘WOMEN, OF COURSE’.

And clearly it’s time we change the way some men think. So roll up those sleeves. We have work to do.

[***]

*These articles by two young South Africans were widely publicised in the local press during the first part of this decade. Revisiting them now (as South Africa prepares for the yearly August Women's Day celebrations) revealed to me just how much they are still factual and relevant not only to South African society but also to other countries in Africa (e.g. Angola!...) and elsewhere in the world.


[Full articles here]

First posted 28/07/10

RECONCILE:


THE GENDER DEBATE


By Siphiwe Mpye

A female friend remembers with much disdain a column that appeared in this magazine aeons ago. It was an Off Ramp about the virtues of the independent black woman. The acerbic tone of the piece – which in parts ridiculed gold-diggers and gung-ho feminists – was unintended and in no way represented what I feel about all women. I only intended to highlight stereotypes that we perpetuate and the existence of a minority of women with ill intentions.

For example, there are men out there who still believe that women are out to get their money; that they have no place in serious business environments and are better suited to “lighter” pursuits such as public relations and so on. By the same token there are women who believe that the measure of success is showing off a R70 000 engagement extravagance from her “tycoon” fiancé and driving around in a BMW X5 paid for by the said banker, consortium chairman or newly moneyed cat with buddies in the government. I used these and other examples but my explanation was nonetheless lost on my friend who felt I had insulted women and was not sure if I was the man she has always known me to be. Whenever this pops up in conversation I maintain my stance and attempt to elaborate further in the hope of one day being understood. The importance of my resilience in this pursuit cannot be underplayed because there is a war going on out there and it is icier than the White House and the Kremlin in the days of the war that never was. It is the war between black men and black women.

(...)

I’m a journalist, my middle name is cynical – but some sort of platform for dialogue between black men and black women is urgently required if we are to unite to uplift a nation that was built on sacrifices by both sexes.

We need to start talking about our differences, and I speak not of the usual directionless, rowdy debates that end up creating more of a rift than effecting change. Both sides of the debate offer valid points but also present plenty of hogwash born from lack of understanding. Such a debate would strip down the clutter and hone in on the appropriate areas.

[***]

love not hate.

peace not war.

sister not slave.

“Who doesn’t want to be validated and respected by other human beings? Some men think the answer to that is: ‘WOMEN, OF COURSE’.


By Yazeed Kamaldien


I’m starting to wonder why men hate women so much. You see, the more I read newspapers and monitor what’s happening in our country, the more I feel that men must have something against women. If they don’t then why are they constantly abusing, raping or dehumanising women? Of course it’s not every man who behaves like this. But statistics are scary enough to make one wonder…

The government-funded Medical Research Council (MRC) released research findings earlier this year indicating that at least one South African woman is killed by her intimate partner every six hours. It also found that coloured women have twice the risk of being killed than other racial groups in our land with its brilliant and much hyped about constitution. Now that’s scary. Last year the MRC also found that women in abusive relationships with intimate sexual partners are more likely to get HIV from these men who deny them the right to be happy by instead making them their physical and emotional punch bags. This research study was done in Johannesburg’s biggest township, Soweto. The MRC found that half of 1 395 women interviewed experienced physical violence from their partners while 20 percent also experienced sexual abuse. A third of these women were HIV-positive and reported sexual violence more than others interviewed.

Okay, numbers aside, the bottom-line is that women are getting a double blow from men. Not only are they being abused but they’re also being infected with the incurable HIV-virus. Something seems rather unfair about all of this, don’t you think? It seems we are burying women alive in South Africa. It’s like we have no issues simply shoving them around. Sure, there are some shining examples of women who have made it in a seemingly man’s world. But that’s not the face of the majority of women, who live normal lives outside the bright lights, and who don’t have much.

By now we have to be asking ourselves some serious questions. Why are we allowing young girls and women to be raped in this country every day? Why are we allowing men to continue abusing women? What is it that we need to do to ensure women break free from oppressive men and stand on an equal footing as male counterparts?

(...)

And yes, you’ve already heard that old saying that respect is a two way street. Men demand respect and a platform and recognition and support not because they are men, but because they are human beings. And they get what they want because, unlike women, they automatically feel entitled to privileges – a right that society seems to bestow upon them from day one. But who doesn’t want to be validated by other human beings? Who doesn’t want to be respected? Who doesn’t want to feel that they are worthy of life? Some men clearly believe the answer to that is, ‘WOMEN, OF COURSE’.

And clearly it’s time we change the way some men think. So roll up those sleeves. We have work to do.

[***]

*These articles by two young South Africans were widely publicised in the local press during the first part of this decade. Revisiting them now (as South Africa prepares for the yearly August Women's Day celebrations) revealed to me just how much they are still factual and relevant not only to South African society but also to other countries in Africa (e.g. Angola!...) and elsewhere in the world.


[Full articles here]

First posted 28/07/10

A Irresponsabilidade do Vazio* [Revisto e Actualizado]

[Ou, Ignorancia Ou ... O Insustentavel Peso do ‘Nao Ser’]

"(...) Age was respected among his people, but achievement was revered. As the elders said, if a child washed his hands he could eat with kings. Okonkwo had clearly washed his hands and so he ate with kings and elders."
Biyi Bandele [in Introduction to Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart - Penguim, 2001 edition]

N.B.: Chinua Achebe started writing Things Fall Apart, his magnum opus published three years later, in 1958, which has earned him the title of 'The Grandfather of African Literature', at the age of 25.

Olhamos para os cantos
Buscando um espaço
Anunciado tempo de sonho
Em espiral
No percurso das veias
Já corroídas pelo vazio, raiz da loucura
Se não preenchido a tempo.

[Extracto de Canto dos Olhos – A.S. in S.O.S.]

Juro por Deus [e desde ja’ Lhe peco perdao por invocar assim o Seu nome em vao – e’ que, cada vez mais, vou dando por mim regressando ‘a minha fe’ em Deus (ou, mais precisamente, em Jesus, meu xara’), dos meus tempos de infancia e adolescencia: quanto menos vou acreditando nos homens (e mulheres) deste mundo, mais necessidade vou sentindo de ter Alguem em quem acreditar!... Embora continue a detestar homilias!...] que tinha decidido ha’ ja’ bastante tempo nao voltar a deixar-me arrastar em discussoes inocuas com “surdos-mudos”, especialmente os do tipo arrogante ignorante e/ou intelectualmente desonesto. De facto, comecei a implementar essa decisao de forma efectiva no inicio deste ano com este "Thought for the Year" e, em seguida, ao longo das ultimas semanas, com a retirada progressiva de todos os posts real ou potencialmente polemicos que neste blog publiquei, em particular os relacionados com uma certa tristemente celebre campanha…

Neles se incluiam os que escrevi, ainda nos primordios deste blog, sob o titulo generico “Makas na Sanzala”, sobre algumas das “homilias” de Mia Couto (MC). Nao e’, portanto, sem alguma relutancia que me sinto compelida a voltar a escrever a proposito de mais uma delas – o que, muito a contragosto, me levou a ter que ‘repostar’ alguns dos posts relacionados que ja’ havia retirado. Ja’ ha’ muito nao recebia, por email, tais “homilias” – mais precisamente desde a que ficou mais conhecida pelo “sejamos claros” –, pelo que me desgostou sobremaneira voltar agora a receber mais uma dessas missivas em forma de “arma de arremesso” (transcrita no final deste texto)…

E’ entitulada “O Peso do Vazio” (o que me recorda uma outra, de Pepetela, entitulada “O Horror do Vazio” – e’, o vazio parece estar na moda!… Ja' agora, um outro 'tipo de vazio', o do bolso, pode ser encontrado aqui) e, de tao aparentemente aimless, soou-me, recorrendo ao rico vocabulario do seu mui distinto e consagrado autor, oca, bacoca, vazia e… irresponsavel!

[Kant - by Yinka Shonibare]

[Continua aqui]


Posts relacionados:

Vultures

Falando do Homem Novo

Falando de Intelectualismo(s)

African Intellectuals in the Belly of the Beast

*Aparentemente, esta foi a "resposta" de Mia Couto a este post: "Os Falsaportes" - o qual, por sua vez, podera' ser lido em referencia a este.

[Ou, Ignorancia Ou ... O Insustentavel Peso do ‘Nao Ser’]

"(...) Age was respected among his people, but achievement was revered. As the elders said, if a child washed his hands he could eat with kings. Okonkwo had clearly washed his hands and so he ate with kings and elders."
Biyi Bandele [in Introduction to Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart - Penguim, 2001 edition]

N.B.: Chinua Achebe started writing Things Fall Apart, his magnum opus published three years later, in 1958, which has earned him the title of 'The Grandfather of African Literature', at the age of 25.

Olhamos para os cantos
Buscando um espaço
Anunciado tempo de sonho
Em espiral
No percurso das veias
Já corroídas pelo vazio, raiz da loucura
Se não preenchido a tempo.

[Extracto de Canto dos Olhos – A.S. in S.O.S.]

Juro por Deus [e desde ja’ Lhe peco perdao por invocar assim o Seu nome em vao – e’ que, cada vez mais, vou dando por mim regressando ‘a minha fe’ em Deus (ou, mais precisamente, em Jesus, meu xara’), dos meus tempos de infancia e adolescencia: quanto menos vou acreditando nos homens (e mulheres) deste mundo, mais necessidade vou sentindo de ter Alguem em quem acreditar!... Embora continue a detestar homilias!...] que tinha decidido ha’ ja’ bastante tempo nao voltar a deixar-me arrastar em discussoes inocuas com “surdos-mudos”, especialmente os do tipo arrogante ignorante e/ou intelectualmente desonesto. De facto, comecei a implementar essa decisao de forma efectiva no inicio deste ano com este "Thought for the Year" e, em seguida, ao longo das ultimas semanas, com a retirada progressiva de todos os posts real ou potencialmente polemicos que neste blog publiquei, em particular os relacionados com uma certa tristemente celebre campanha…

Neles se incluiam os que escrevi, ainda nos primordios deste blog, sob o titulo generico “Makas na Sanzala”, sobre algumas das “homilias” de Mia Couto (MC). Nao e’, portanto, sem alguma relutancia que me sinto compelida a voltar a escrever a proposito de mais uma delas – o que, muito a contragosto, me levou a ter que ‘repostar’ alguns dos posts relacionados que ja’ havia retirado. Ja’ ha’ muito nao recebia, por email, tais “homilias” – mais precisamente desde a que ficou mais conhecida pelo “sejamos claros” –, pelo que me desgostou sobremaneira voltar agora a receber mais uma dessas missivas em forma de “arma de arremesso” (transcrita no final deste texto)…

E’ entitulada “O Peso do Vazio” (o que me recorda uma outra, de Pepetela, entitulada “O Horror do Vazio” – e’, o vazio parece estar na moda!… Ja' agora, um outro 'tipo de vazio', o do bolso, pode ser encontrado aqui) e, de tao aparentemente aimless, soou-me, recorrendo ao rico vocabulario do seu mui distinto e consagrado autor, oca, bacoca, vazia e… irresponsavel!

[Kant - by Yinka Shonibare]

[Continua aqui]


Posts relacionados:

Vultures

Falando do Homem Novo

Falando de Intelectualismo(s)

African Intellectuals in the Belly of the Beast

*Aparentemente, esta foi a "resposta" de Mia Couto a este post: "Os Falsaportes" - o qual, por sua vez, podera' ser lido em referencia a este.

Global Elites: Do they serve the masses?

There's an interesting live debate on the subject (now about to close) being held by The Economist here.




Some previous Economist Debates with specific interest to Africa:


Egypt


A debate is raging not just in Arab countries but all over the world about whether democracy in Egypt is possible or even desirable. Will Egypt embrace democracy in the next year? Will autocracy prevail? Or will Egypt descend into chaos?

[here]


China's growing involvement in Africa


What is China doing for Africa? The Asian giant is hungry for resources—oil, notably, but minerals and land too—that are abundant on the continent. China also wants strong political ties, for example to build alliances at the United Nations and at global summits. Increasingly, too, Chinese are migrating to Africa. The result is increased trade and investment and a powerful counterweight to Western and former colonial interest in Africa. But there is a downside too. Alliances with China help to protect undemocratic and repressive African governments. China's presence in Zambia, for example, has stirred fierce resentment and accusations of neo-colonial meddling. Lack of concern for human rights or transparency risks bringing just the wrong sort of development to parts of Africa. Chinese imports are helping to smash Africa's putative manufacturing sector to bits. For the average African, might the presence of China be a mixed blessing?

[here]


Cities



Just over half the world's population now call cities home. Soon some 500 cities around the world will have more than 1m people each. Within a couple of decades, says the UN, 5 billion people will live in cities, with the most rapid rise in the number of urban dwellers coming in Asia and Africa. Urbanisation typically comes, in the long term, with great gains to human development: it helps to create wealth, spur innovation, encourage freedom and improve the education of those who make it to town. But the rapid spread of sprawling, ill-planned mega cities, the rise of slums that are home to millions of the poor, the dreadful pollution and congestion common to many fast-growing cities, the rising power of urban gangs and even paramilitary forces in some countries, all suggest that too-rapid growth can harm, as well as improve, the residents' quality of life. So should, and could, the growth of cities be restricted, and by whom? Would restrictions improve the lives of city dwellers—and what of the lives of those left outside the city walls?

[here]


International Trade


Driven in part by a progressive lowering of barriers to trade in both rich and developing countries, global trade expanded faster in the decades leading up to the crisis than the global economy grew. Economists argue that free trade makes everyone better off, allowing more, and more varied, goods, and lower prices, than would otherwise be possible. Some also argue that it leads to faster economic growth and less poverty.

Some critics of free trade argue, however, that its supposed benefits for poor people and developing countries are illusory. Trade, they say, benefits rich countries at the expense of poor ones, increasing inequality between nations. Others say that it hurts rich-country workers, particularly the less skilled, thus increasing economic equality within rich countries. All would rather that the world concentrate its efforts on making trade "fairer" rather than further attempt to reduce trade barriers.

What does the balance of the evidence say? What does it actually mean to make trade fairer? Fairer for whom? Must the two goals be mutually exclusive?

[here]


Language


The idea that language influences thought is a profound, exciting and possibly disturbing one. It has often been used to exoticise other languages: in the 1930s, Benjamin Lee Whorf wrote that Hopi had no words for time (like days and months), and therefore perceived time far differently than European-language speakers do. The belief that language shapes thought also has political implications: in "Nineteen Eighty-Four", George Orwell imagined a dystopia in which government banned subversive words, making the associated thoughts unthinkable. Even in this decade, a group of French activists have proposed making French the sole language of European law, because of its purported great "rigour" and "precision". Does the language we speak shape how we think?

[here]

There's an interesting live debate on the subject (now about to close) being held by The Economist here.




Some previous Economist Debates with specific interest to Africa:


Egypt


A debate is raging not just in Arab countries but all over the world about whether democracy in Egypt is possible or even desirable. Will Egypt embrace democracy in the next year? Will autocracy prevail? Or will Egypt descend into chaos?

[here]


China's growing involvement in Africa


What is China doing for Africa? The Asian giant is hungry for resources—oil, notably, but minerals and land too—that are abundant on the continent. China also wants strong political ties, for example to build alliances at the United Nations and at global summits. Increasingly, too, Chinese are migrating to Africa. The result is increased trade and investment and a powerful counterweight to Western and former colonial interest in Africa. But there is a downside too. Alliances with China help to protect undemocratic and repressive African governments. China's presence in Zambia, for example, has stirred fierce resentment and accusations of neo-colonial meddling. Lack of concern for human rights or transparency risks bringing just the wrong sort of development to parts of Africa. Chinese imports are helping to smash Africa's putative manufacturing sector to bits. For the average African, might the presence of China be a mixed blessing?

[here]


Cities



Just over half the world's population now call cities home. Soon some 500 cities around the world will have more than 1m people each. Within a couple of decades, says the UN, 5 billion people will live in cities, with the most rapid rise in the number of urban dwellers coming in Asia and Africa. Urbanisation typically comes, in the long term, with great gains to human development: it helps to create wealth, spur innovation, encourage freedom and improve the education of those who make it to town. But the rapid spread of sprawling, ill-planned mega cities, the rise of slums that are home to millions of the poor, the dreadful pollution and congestion common to many fast-growing cities, the rising power of urban gangs and even paramilitary forces in some countries, all suggest that too-rapid growth can harm, as well as improve, the residents' quality of life. So should, and could, the growth of cities be restricted, and by whom? Would restrictions improve the lives of city dwellers—and what of the lives of those left outside the city walls?

[here]


International Trade


Driven in part by a progressive lowering of barriers to trade in both rich and developing countries, global trade expanded faster in the decades leading up to the crisis than the global economy grew. Economists argue that free trade makes everyone better off, allowing more, and more varied, goods, and lower prices, than would otherwise be possible. Some also argue that it leads to faster economic growth and less poverty.

Some critics of free trade argue, however, that its supposed benefits for poor people and developing countries are illusory. Trade, they say, benefits rich countries at the expense of poor ones, increasing inequality between nations. Others say that it hurts rich-country workers, particularly the less skilled, thus increasing economic equality within rich countries. All would rather that the world concentrate its efforts on making trade "fairer" rather than further attempt to reduce trade barriers.

What does the balance of the evidence say? What does it actually mean to make trade fairer? Fairer for whom? Must the two goals be mutually exclusive?

[here]


Language


The idea that language influences thought is a profound, exciting and possibly disturbing one. It has often been used to exoticise other languages: in the 1930s, Benjamin Lee Whorf wrote that Hopi had no words for time (like days and months), and therefore perceived time far differently than European-language speakers do. The belief that language shapes thought also has political implications: in "Nineteen Eighty-Four", George Orwell imagined a dystopia in which government banned subversive words, making the associated thoughts unthinkable. Even in this decade, a group of French activists have proposed making French the sole language of European law, because of its purported great "rigour" and "precision". Does the language we speak shape how we think?

[here]

Egypt's Mubarak: Another One Bites the Dust... [Updated]*

[images from Al Jazeera]





Related post:

Tweeting, Blogging, Leaking... Revolution!


*[First posted 02/02/11]

UPDATE








And as Mubarak finally leaves...





[Details here]

[images from Al Jazeera]





Related post:

Tweeting, Blogging, Leaking... Revolution!


*[First posted 02/02/11]

UPDATE








And as Mubarak finally leaves...





[Details here]

Thirst for African Oil

[Details here]

[Details here]

Portugal’s Colonial Complex ...

... From Colonial Lusotropicalism to Postcolonial Lusophony


[Miguel Vale de Almeida]


Lusotropicalism was the invention of a Brazilian author, Gilberto Freyre. Although he is widely known as the author of Casa Grande e Senzala (The Masters and the Slaves, in the English translation), he did not explicitly use the concept in that major work of his, written in the 1930s. The underlying notions – that the Portuguese, due to historical and cultural reasons had an inclination towards adaptation and miscegenation – were there, but the term was not branded until the 1950s in books that he wrote on the aftermath of his journeys throughout the Portuguese colonial empire.

It is therefore significant to note that we are dealing with a theory that has a complex colonial and postcolonial history: a Brazilian author, involved in the intellectual struggles about the representations of the national identity of his country (independent since the 19th century) proposes an historical interpretation of Brazil’s formation in which the Portuguese play a major role; he is then invited to visit the Portuguese colonies in Africa and India and, by means of comparison and analogy between Brazil and Africa, he develops the notion of Lusotropicalism as a special kind of inclination or capacity for miscegenation that the Portuguese were supposed to have; this interpretation is then used by the Portuguese colonial regime to legitimize its claims in Africa against growing anticolonial pressure as of the late 1950s and until the demise of the colonial and dictatorial regime in the early 1970s.

[...]

Portugal had no economic, military or demographic power – after the demise of the first and second empires, respectively in India and the East in the 16th and 17th centuries, and in Brazil in the 17th and 18th centuries – to effectively occupy its historical territories in Africa. It was not until Salazar’s regime that an actual colonial enterprise in Africa was set up (that is, a colonial regime, with proper institutions and knowledge systems). Portugal lived under a dictatorship from 1926 to 1974 and throughout this period the African colonies were to occupy a major and central role not only in the economy but also in the official representations of national identity. How was this done?

[...]

That is probably why the effective occupation of the African colonies, which took place as of the 1940s and 1950s was done on the basis of different “Constitutions” – i.e., sets of rules for politically administering the populations, based on specific representations of difference and sameness. One the one hand, some territories were classified as not quite colonies. Cape Verde and India were seen as products of an on-going miscegenation, for different reasons. Cape Verde was the outcome of a mix between Portuguese colonials and slaves from the African mainland imported to a deserted archipelago. And India was seen as a civilization in its own right, a civilization that had met another, that of European Christianity.

Cape Verdean culture was classified as regional, not as colonial, and its population – its elites – had special rights, one of which was their recruitment as colonial middlemen in the African mainland. Other colonies, like Angola and Mozambique, were clearly seen as African and there a different “constitution” was established. With an economy based on forced labor, people were divided into three legal categories: citizens, i.e. the Portuguese; indigenous or native; and “assimilated”. The assimilated were indigenous people who had to undergo a probation period and exams in order to prove that they were Christian, that they dressed in European fashion, that they were monogamous, and that they spoke Portuguese (bear this in mind). They never amounted to more than 1% of the colonial population.

[...]

It was at that juncture that, in the 1950s, Freyre was invited by the Minister of the Overseas to visit and write on the colonies. His ideas were already being received and discussed in the stifling intellectual circles of Lisbon. They fitted nicely with the vague humanistic perspectives of the traditional Left, but they fit even more nicely with the regime’s growing strategy toward presenting the Portuguese empire as a multiracial and multi-continental nation.

[...]

Both the Portuguese state and the population had their representations challenged by the flux of migrants that started in the late 1980s and is still going on. These were initially (and still are) from ex-colonies in Africa and then from Brazil and Eastern European countries. The immigration of Africans faced the Portuguese with their own representations of colonial miscegenation, tolerance and exceptionalism.

This resulted in a cognitive tension that social scientists have identified in studies on blatant and covert racism: statements on the non-racist character of Portuguese society are hegemonic and are usually justified with the example of Portuguese expansion and colonialism as exceptionally tolerant, in what could be labeled as a form of popular lusotropicalism (and an evidence of how hegemonic that discourse became); but they are confronted with the social exclusion of immigrants, their geographical ascription to the worse neighborhoods, the exploitation of their labor and the difficulties they face when applying for citizenship or to access rights of all sorts.

[...]

This I call postlusotropicalism, playing with the similarity with the notion of post
colonialism, as the study of colonial continuations in the present. That is also why one cannot just denounce the colonial in the postcolonial. One should also acknowledge that, for better or worse, the colonial experience did create a common world of reference for many people. What we should do is work on this basic statement and set out to identify the intricate relations between power and emancipation, violence and pleasure in which such a forced commonality became a lived commonality.

It is as if we were all still caught in Freyre’s erotically charged vignette (because terrifying and pleasurable) describing sexual relations between a Portuguese male slave owner and his female black slave in 16th century Northeastern Brazil. This image still haunts us today, with its contradictions of power and intimacy, connecting the ambiguities of Lusotropicalism with those of Lusophony. That is why I have used the expression “Complex” in the title: both in the sense of “intricate” or “complicated”, and in the psychoanalytical sense.


[Extracts from here]


Related posts:


"Complexo de Colonizado"

Parafraseando

Feminismo Negro Brasileiro

Lusofonia e Antropologia

Lusofonia: Cultura ou Ideologia?

Conferencia Internacional sobre Cultura Tchokwe'

... From Colonial Lusotropicalism to Postcolonial Lusophony


[Miguel Vale de Almeida]


Lusotropicalism was the invention of a Brazilian author, Gilberto Freyre. Although he is widely known as the author of Casa Grande e Senzala (The Masters and the Slaves, in the English translation), he did not explicitly use the concept in that major work of his, written in the 1930s. The underlying notions – that the Portuguese, due to historical and cultural reasons had an inclination towards adaptation and miscegenation – were there, but the term was not branded until the 1950s in books that he wrote on the aftermath of his journeys throughout the Portuguese colonial empire.

It is therefore significant to note that we are dealing with a theory that has a complex colonial and postcolonial history: a Brazilian author, involved in the intellectual struggles about the representations of the national identity of his country (independent since the 19th century) proposes an historical interpretation of Brazil’s formation in which the Portuguese play a major role; he is then invited to visit the Portuguese colonies in Africa and India and, by means of comparison and analogy between Brazil and Africa, he develops the notion of Lusotropicalism as a special kind of inclination or capacity for miscegenation that the Portuguese were supposed to have; this interpretation is then used by the Portuguese colonial regime to legitimize its claims in Africa against growing anticolonial pressure as of the late 1950s and until the demise of the colonial and dictatorial regime in the early 1970s.

[...]

Portugal had no economic, military or demographic power – after the demise of the first and second empires, respectively in India and the East in the 16th and 17th centuries, and in Brazil in the 17th and 18th centuries – to effectively occupy its historical territories in Africa. It was not until Salazar’s regime that an actual colonial enterprise in Africa was set up (that is, a colonial regime, with proper institutions and knowledge systems). Portugal lived under a dictatorship from 1926 to 1974 and throughout this period the African colonies were to occupy a major and central role not only in the economy but also in the official representations of national identity. How was this done?

[...]

That is probably why the effective occupation of the African colonies, which took place as of the 1940s and 1950s was done on the basis of different “Constitutions” – i.e., sets of rules for politically administering the populations, based on specific representations of difference and sameness. One the one hand, some territories were classified as not quite colonies. Cape Verde and India were seen as products of an on-going miscegenation, for different reasons. Cape Verde was the outcome of a mix between Portuguese colonials and slaves from the African mainland imported to a deserted archipelago. And India was seen as a civilization in its own right, a civilization that had met another, that of European Christianity.

Cape Verdean culture was classified as regional, not as colonial, and its population – its elites – had special rights, one of which was their recruitment as colonial middlemen in the African mainland. Other colonies, like Angola and Mozambique, were clearly seen as African and there a different “constitution” was established. With an economy based on forced labor, people were divided into three legal categories: citizens, i.e. the Portuguese; indigenous or native; and “assimilated”. The assimilated were indigenous people who had to undergo a probation period and exams in order to prove that they were Christian, that they dressed in European fashion, that they were monogamous, and that they spoke Portuguese (bear this in mind). They never amounted to more than 1% of the colonial population.

[...]

It was at that juncture that, in the 1950s, Freyre was invited by the Minister of the Overseas to visit and write on the colonies. His ideas were already being received and discussed in the stifling intellectual circles of Lisbon. They fitted nicely with the vague humanistic perspectives of the traditional Left, but they fit even more nicely with the regime’s growing strategy toward presenting the Portuguese empire as a multiracial and multi-continental nation.

[...]

Both the Portuguese state and the population had their representations challenged by the flux of migrants that started in the late 1980s and is still going on. These were initially (and still are) from ex-colonies in Africa and then from Brazil and Eastern European countries. The immigration of Africans faced the Portuguese with their own representations of colonial miscegenation, tolerance and exceptionalism.

This resulted in a cognitive tension that social scientists have identified in studies on blatant and covert racism: statements on the non-racist character of Portuguese society are hegemonic and are usually justified with the example of Portuguese expansion and colonialism as exceptionally tolerant, in what could be labeled as a form of popular lusotropicalism (and an evidence of how hegemonic that discourse became); but they are confronted with the social exclusion of immigrants, their geographical ascription to the worse neighborhoods, the exploitation of their labor and the difficulties they face when applying for citizenship or to access rights of all sorts.

[...]

This I call postlusotropicalism, playing with the similarity with the notion of post
colonialism, as the study of colonial continuations in the present. That is also why one cannot just denounce the colonial in the postcolonial. One should also acknowledge that, for better or worse, the colonial experience did create a common world of reference for many people. What we should do is work on this basic statement and set out to identify the intricate relations between power and emancipation, violence and pleasure in which such a forced commonality became a lived commonality.

It is as if we were all still caught in Freyre’s erotically charged vignette (because terrifying and pleasurable) describing sexual relations between a Portuguese male slave owner and his female black slave in 16th century Northeastern Brazil. This image still haunts us today, with its contradictions of power and intimacy, connecting the ambiguities of Lusotropicalism with those of Lusophony. That is why I have used the expression “Complex” in the title: both in the sense of “intricate” or “complicated”, and in the psychoanalytical sense.


[Extracts from here]


Related posts:


"Complexo de Colonizado"

Parafraseando

Feminismo Negro Brasileiro

Lusofonia e Antropologia

Lusofonia: Cultura ou Ideologia?

Conferencia Internacional sobre Cultura Tchokwe'

Tweeting, Blogging, Leaking... Revolution!

1960-2010: "The Year of Afrika" 50 Years on [Revised]

Closing the “Year of Afrika”: The East Asian ‘Tigers’ Model in Africa? – An Appraisal

To mark the end of this year of “The African Jubilee” I bring this article in which I try to evaluate the extent to which the “most successful” economic development models followed in other parts of the developing world at the time of the first African independences – namely by the East Asian (in particular Taiwan and South Korea) and the Latin American (in particular Mexico and Brazil) Newly Industrialised Countries (NICs) - could successfully be applied by any poor nation, specifically in Africa.

[You can find the article here]

Closing the “Year of Afrika”: The East Asian ‘Tigers’ Model in Africa? – An Appraisal

To mark the end of this year of “The African Jubilee” I bring this article in which I try to evaluate the extent to which the “most successful” economic development models followed in other parts of the developing world at the time of the first African independences – namely by the East Asian (in particular Taiwan and South Korea) and the Latin American (in particular Mexico and Brazil) Newly Industrialised Countries (NICs) - could successfully be applied by any poor nation, specifically in Africa.

[You can find the article here]

General History of Africa Collection in Portuguese

História Geral da África em Português

Publicada em oito volumes, a coleção História Geral da África está agora também disponível em português. A edição completa da coleção já foi publicada em árabe, inglês e francês; e sua versão condensada está editada em inglês, francês e em várias outras línguas, incluindo hausa, peul e swahili. Um dos projetos editoriais mais importantes da UNESCO nos últimos trinta anos, a coleção História Geral da África é um grande marco no processo de reconhecimento do patrimônio cultural da África, pois ela permite compreender o desenvolvimento histórico dos povos africanos e sua relação com outras civilizações a partir de uma visão panorâmica, diacrônica e objetiva, obtida de dentro do continente. A coleção foi produzida por mais de 350 especialistas das mais variadas áreas do conhecimento, sob a direção de um Comitê Científico Internacional formado por 39 intelectuais, dos quais dois terços eram africanos.


[Detalhes Aqui]

General History of Africa Collection in Portuguese

Published in eight volumes, the General History of Africa is now issued in Portuguese. Its complete edition is also available in Arabic, English and French, and its abridged edition is available in English, French and in several other languages including Hausa, Peul and Swahili. One of UNESCO's most important publishing projects in the last thirty years, the General History of Africa marks a major breakthrough in the recognition of Africa's cultural heritage for it allows the understanding of a historical development of the African people and its relationship with other civilizations from a broad, diachronic, and objective perspective obtained from the inside of theof the continent. The collection has been produced by more than 350 specialists of various areas under the coordination of the International Scientific Committee composed by 39 intellectuals, of which two thirds were African.

[Details Here]


Post relacionado:

A Quand L'Afrique: Joseph Ki-Zerbo

História Geral da África em Português

Publicada em oito volumes, a coleção História Geral da África está agora também disponível em português. A edição completa da coleção já foi publicada em árabe, inglês e francês; e sua versão condensada está editada em inglês, francês e em várias outras línguas, incluindo hausa, peul e swahili. Um dos projetos editoriais mais importantes da UNESCO nos últimos trinta anos, a coleção História Geral da África é um grande marco no processo de reconhecimento do patrimônio cultural da África, pois ela permite compreender o desenvolvimento histórico dos povos africanos e sua relação com outras civilizações a partir de uma visão panorâmica, diacrônica e objetiva, obtida de dentro do continente. A coleção foi produzida por mais de 350 especialistas das mais variadas áreas do conhecimento, sob a direção de um Comitê Científico Internacional formado por 39 intelectuais, dos quais dois terços eram africanos.


[Detalhes Aqui]

General History of Africa Collection in Portuguese

Published in eight volumes, the General History of Africa is now issued in Portuguese. Its complete edition is also available in Arabic, English and French, and its abridged edition is available in English, French and in several other languages including Hausa, Peul and Swahili. One of UNESCO's most important publishing projects in the last thirty years, the General History of Africa marks a major breakthrough in the recognition of Africa's cultural heritage for it allows the understanding of a historical development of the African people and its relationship with other civilizations from a broad, diachronic, and objective perspective obtained from the inside of theof the continent. The collection has been produced by more than 350 specialists of various areas under the coordination of the International Scientific Committee composed by 39 intellectuals, of which two thirds were African.

[Details Here]


Post relacionado:

A Quand L'Afrique: Joseph Ki-Zerbo