All goes on it: Inducements, Blackmails and Inordinate Promises
Britain's minister of state for Africa, Baroness Amos, is on her tour this week to secure the votes of Africa's three wavering UN Security Council members. Ditto the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, Walter Kansteiner, who this week completed his round of contacts with Paul Biya of Cameroon, Lansana Conte of Guinea, and Eduardo dos Santos of Angola.
All three countries are officially on the fence and the US and British administrations desperately need their support to pass a resolution giving them a quietus for war in Iraq. Without this UN resolution the British administration may not be allowed to join a US unilaterally led war and the Tony Blair administration may face a huge and deadly political misfortune. We should therefore understand that this resolution is a question of life or death for many. Read more.
Former Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun, the first black woman elected to the U.S. Senate, said Wednesday 02/18 that a woman president could move the nation "toward peace, prosperity and progress," especially in an era of provoked trouble.
Moseley-Braun said she planned to file papers for an exploratory presidential exploratory committee later in the day.
She described herself as a "peace dove and budget hawk." She criticized the Bush administration for its push for war against Iraq, arguing that the policy had alienated allies and "frittered away" the goodwill that the nation had engendered abroad after the Sept. 11 attacks. Read more
Mandela Accuses Bush's Inner Circle of Racism
Gbagbo: A Stone in the Shoe?
The attitude of president Laurent Gbagbo following the Paris agreements, signed by himself, the political parties, the insurgent militaries of September 19, 2002, and by representatives of the international community, carry heavy consequences, not only for the future of the Ivory Coast, but especially for his own political future. That Gbagbo signed the agreements of Marcoussis, immediately named from Paris a Prime Minister in the person of moderate Saidou Diarra, and then retracts thereafter once returned to the country, is an attitude that will remove any national and international credibility with the person of Gbagbo. The question arises then if his departure from the capacity is not the best solution to the Ivory Coast crisis. Read more
et Forked-Tongue Laurent Gbagbo
Economic and Social Rights Prevailed in the Ogoni Case
Eyadema s'accroche par tous les moyens
The boundaries of present day Africa were largely determined at the Congress of Berlin.
God helps those who help themselves. Complete text of the Africa Action Plan
Businesses and chaos
It is necessary to remove the businesses from the political management of the city if we want the American system to be democratic. Nevertheless, the experiences from the practice of business could usefully help us to reinforce the American democracy. Some examples: 1) Our system requires any 18 year old individual to gain the means of her/his own existence. The system should also oblige any citizen to fulfill his political expression obligation, which is the vote. 2) We developed rigorous criteria for the choice of mutual funds during our investment decisions. We must also establish rigorous criteria for the choice of the person who must sit at the White House, the Senate, the Congress, federal or local. Read more
It is easy for an individual, in a Washington’s beautiful morning, to wake up with the brilliant idea to change the world by spreading democracy. The idea rests on the following assumption: anywhere in the world, when a human being tastes freedom, rights and money, she would absolutely adopt them as irreplaceable values. However it is even more difficult, if not impossible, to carry out such a dream because, beneath other skies, people’ imaginary is comprised of values more significant than the Western democracy and capitalism. Read more
A Bleeding on a Continental Scale
The main weakness of Africa, in terms of the necessary move towards the economic development, is lack of a strong manpower of local, highly qualified individuals, engineers and academics. Read more
©2003 The African Independent, Inc. All rights to republication are reserved