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May 10

2012

2

Non-Profit Industrial Complex

Africa Christian Democratic International Center Colonialism Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Imperialism International Republican Institute Konrad Adenauer Stiftung National Democratic Institute National Democratic institute (NDI) PYPA RYPLA Swedish Christian Democratic International Center

THE NEXT PUPPETS: How NGOs are Indoctrinating Young African Politicians to Serve Western Interests

E.Africa

10 May 2012

“In the three module-training of one week each conducted in some of the best hotels in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, participants are introduced to western ways of thinking and living. Like the media propaganda that was called Development Communication, this indoctrination is not called by its real name; it is described using innocent phrases like capacity building, value-based leadership, gender mainstreaming, and others.”


Image: East African political youth leaders pose for a photo after attending a workshop organized in 2009 by NDI and KIC at Kunduchi Beach Resort in Dar-es-Salaam.

By YAHYA SSEREMBA

In a 2010 science fiction action film, Inception, Leonardo DiCaprio plays an exceptional thief whose specialty is to extract valuable commercial information from the minds of tycoons. Like a hacker who penetrates computer systems and secretly accesses data, DiCaprio enters into the subconscious of his targets and digs out their secrets as they dream. His excellent espionage skill prompts a wealthy businessman to use him to bring down the business empire of a competitor.

Thus DiCaprio embarks on his toughest mission ever, this time not to steal an idea, but to plant one in the mind of the competitor that should drive the target to destroy his own business empire. In real life and in Africa particularly, western organizations are busy playing DiCaprio by indoctrinating whoever they expect to gain political influence sooner or later. Their goal is to make the next generation of African leaders receptive to western whims and caprice.

Prominent among such organizations is the International Republican Institute, National Democratic Institute, Christian Democratic International Center, Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, and Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung. These organizations, ideologically dissimilar as they may claim to be, have a common agenda of entrenching and perpetuating western subjugation of Africa.

Their capacity to posture as innocent apostles of good governance, democracy and human rights – concepts that the West defines and twists according to its interests – makes them the least suspected of Euro-American strategies for global dominance.

The quest by the West and the rest for dominating Africa is not new. Through the millennia of known history Africa has suffered intrusion after intrusion, invasion after invasion, occupation after occupation. This recurrent violation of the continent’s self-determination was once perpetrated by races claiming biological superiority that granted them the right to rule over “biologically inferior” Africans.  It is this illusion that the Blacks are intrinsically inferior that motivated Europeans to enslave Africans en masse – first in the New World and later in Africa during colonialism. →

Apr 26

2012

0

Humanitarian Agencies, Imperialist Wars/Occupations

Algeria British Geological Survey British Government’s Department for International Development Chad Climate Egypt Libya Mozambique Sudan Water Water Crisis

IMPERIALIST NGO’S EYE AFRICA’S MASSIVE UNDERGROUND WATER RESERVES

April 20, 2012

Libya360


Researchers have found that Africa has huge reserves of water underground, which they estimate are more than a hundred times the annual renewable freshwater resources.

Their findings, published in the academic journal Environment Research Letters, show that the largest reserves are in aquifers in the north African countries of Libya, Algeria, Egypt, Chad and Sudan.

The scientists used existing data, but for the first time this data was collated to give a continent-wide picture. They estimate that there are 0.66 million cubic kilometres of groundwater storage under Africa. →

Apr 12

2012

0

Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund (WWF)

Africa African Wildlife Foundation (AWF) Ecotourism World Wildlife Fund (WWF)

Failed Saviors | NGOs & Ecotourism [Africa, WWF, Nature Conservancy]

Source

Are ecotourism and wildlife conservation in Africa so sacrosanct in the minds of their supporters that they’ve dodged proper regulation or perhaps even swerved off moral pathways?

I obtained with pride a Conde Nast ecotourism award in 2004 for my client, Hoopoe Safaris of Tanzania. But in the decade since then my own ideas about ecotourism and NGO involvement in African conservation have changed.

There are two issues, here. The first is that “ecotourism” is no longer a legitimate marker for good tourism practices in Africa. The second is that wildlife NGOs have grown increasingly callous of the priorities of local populations. So the two are related. Both discount the preeminent interests of local people in the areas where their interests are pursued.

The common thread that I’ve watch develop over the last decade is that western-driven “charity” or “aid” or “consultation” or “community based tourism” has grown increasingly isolated from the people who theoretically will benefit from those foreign efforts.

Even if there aren’t contextual conflicts, disputes about goals or methodology, the ignoring of the local populations’ interests spawns conflict. Imagine what you might feel if a Chinese NGO came into your suburban neighborhood and began research then implementation of plans to cultivate an herbal remedy … like garlic mustard… in the city parks. You would at least expect participation in the discussion, and you would become infuriated if you weren’t consulted.

In the last decade local people throughout Africa have increased substantially in numbers and in education levels as well. Most parts of Africa have become well linked to the outside world through increased internet and cell phone access. This empowers the local communities to better scrutinize their so-called foreign benefactors.

ECOTOURISM IS A SHAM

The academic community has always been skeptical of ecotourism. A 2007 Harvard study of Tanzania ecotourism concluded that while most such projects seemed legitimate, there was a substantial percentage that weren’t. An analysis by Ohio State University in 2011 of Tanzania ecotourism was much more damning. The report actually named (accused) specific Tanzanian operators that were scamming tourists with the ploy of arguing their products were ecotouristic when they were anything but.

The above studies, and many more referenced within them, are convincing documents that ecotourism if not an out and out scam is a very poorly formed idea. The initial theories might be good, but implementation seems impossible. And the Ohio State study in particular described why self-appointed certification authorities weren’t working, either, so that the notion of creating some universal standard is mute.

The UN initially thought otherwise. It promoted ecotourism but has since backed away from the idea. Almost a year ago exactly I posted several blogs citing the growing skepticism with ecotourism throughout the world. Nothing has changed; ecotourism as commonly applied in the marketing of travel is neither honest or good.

Khadija Sharife in the Africa Report summed it perfectly last week in the post’s title, “The Drunken Logic of Ecotourism.”

WILDLIFE NGO ARROGANCE

But in the year since I and many, many others pointed out the disservice that foreign marketing ploys like “ecotourism” do to local peoples, another foreign fixture of African life has emerged as equally unfair and misleading: wildlife NGOs.

It will be harder to convince you of this, I know. The loyalty that the world’s great animal savior organizations command is legend. It’s one thing to suggest that a relatively small foreign-controlled tour company in Tanzania is not serving the local populations well. It’s another to make this claim against the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) or the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF).

WWF’s long involvement in Africa stands mostly as a fabulous contribution to baseline research and good management of threatened and endangered species. But as with the morphing of the idea of ecotourism into a marketing scam, it could be that the long involvement developed a sense of propriety WWF should not have presumed.

Its most serious conflict is in Tanzania in the Rufiji delta, the outskirts of the great Selous game reserve, which has come under increasing scrutiny because of its enormous hydroelectric potential. A much greater controversy actually than the WWF one I describe below is the World Bank decision to support a hydroelectric dam that could seriously disrupt The Selous and Rufiji delta basin.

But the World Bank’s mission to help developed countries grow and prosper is contextually proper in weighing the consequences of a dam draining a game reserve. The debate is heated and ongoing, and everyone accepts one important debate: who should make the decision? Professionals weighing the overall value to Tanzanian society, or local people immediately impacted?

Quite unlike the World Bank, WWF skipped this important step when it began programs to inhibit rice farming on the outskirts of The Selous. Local rice farmers were obviously the first to be impacted, but they had no input into the decisions regarding the project and WWF sought none from them.

The project mission was always suspect to me, but the rapid implementation without adequate consultation with the local population reeks of arrogance. The entire project has now devolved into all sorts of criminal and unethical consequences. Eight WWF employees have resigned, plus the Tanzania country director, Stephen Mariki.

WWF should be complemented for trying to right this wrong, but the culture that led to their presumption of determining the life ways of local Tanzanian people is the real problem. And that will be a much harder thing to remedy than just abandoning the rice project.

The current most egregious wildlife NGO controversy, however, is on no path to reconciliation because the organization, the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), continues to defend its position.

AWF encapsulates its overall mission in the phrase “heartlands.” Over the last several decades, AWF has created heartland areas throughout sub-Saharan Africa in which it concentrates its research and assistance. An essential purpose is to create wildlife corridors between established nationally gazetted protected wildlife areas like national parks to increase the potential for biodiversity and reduce the inbreeding that could otherwise effect large wild animal populations.

Noble. The problem for some time has been to create these corridors, land must be acquired from private holdings. This may have something to do with AWF’s close partnership with the Nature Conservancy in 2007.

But what happens when farmers or other landholders don’t want to sell? AWF’s response has been high-handed and now, it appears, infuriated local populations are gaining the initiative.

In and around their large Manyara ranch holding in Tanzania, AWF has negotiated versions of eminent domain with the Tanzanian government that caused enormous friction locally. And now in Kenya, their acquisition of land (which they subsequently tried to deed over to a new Kenyan Laikipia National Park) is on track to totally cripple all their good efforts in East Africa.

AWF insists it has been playing by the rules. But two thousand Samburu people don’t care if they were playing by the rules or not; they insist with credibility that they have been displaced illegally from their traditional lands by AWF’s high-handed moves.

Unlike WWF, AWF seems to be digging in its heels for a fight that will emasculate it. And if it goes down as I expect it will, so will the reputation and memories of good work that wildlife NGOs have been undertaking for decades in Africa.

Why is AWF resisting an acceptable settlement? AWF is a much younger organization than WWF, and its donor base is much smaller than WWF, much less publicly than individually endowed.

Nature Conservancy is itself a less publicly endowed organization limited to wealthy landowners mostly in Illinois. It could be that these two closely held NGOs feel less vulnerable to public opinion than a more globally funded organization like WWF.

Both these situations, with ecotourism and wildlife NGOs, represent not just outside interference, but outside indifference to the preeminent rights of local people. And because that indifference has been so arrogant – dare one say “racist”? – it led these otherwise noble organizations into presumptions of their legitimacy that denied the preeminent legitimacy of local peoples.

It led tourist companies to scam local peoples with ecotourism; and it led wildlife NGOs to become deluged by the power of their previous successes. It led both types of organizations to ignore the legitimate and preeminent needs of the local populations.

Africa is developing so rapidly I can see incidents of polite refusal, so to speak, of tourist projects and foreign wildlife programs that are put to bed rather easily. The recent controversy in the Kenyan Wildlife Service (KWS) involving the translocation of rhino is a good example of “local populations” politely indicting foreign organizations trying to tell them what to do.

But in heated political arenas, this politeness will be lost. WWF had to back down altogether, fire staff and refund grants. AWF should do the same. When sensibilities are exchanged for political control, foreign tour companies and foreign wildlife NGOs have no hope of prevailing.

Beware, guys. A lot of good has come from your work in the last half century. Don’t blow it.

Apr 06

2012

0

Imperialist Wars/Occupations

Africa ASI ECOWAS Imperialism Libya Mali Neocolonialism TSCTI Tuareg UN

Coup in Mali Exposes All Opportunists Which Feed Off African Resources

Apr 6, 2012
What began as a mutiny on March 22, 2012 at Kati’s army barracks near Bamako quickly became a coup against the former general, Amadou Toumani Touré.

Public speculation has it that the reason for the overthrow was Touré’s incompetence. Captain Amadou Sanogo, a coup leader, argued that the ousted government had failed to provide the national army with adequate means to defeat the rebellion against the Taureg people in the north of Mali.

At no point have coup leaders spoken out against imperialism or neocolonialism. History has shown us that military coups are a quick way for elements of the military sector of the African petty bourgeoisie to seize power and secure large chunks of resources for themselves.

Touré himself came into power in a coup against the former neocolonial dictator, Moussa Traore, in March 1991.

Today, the constitution of Mali has been suspended, its borders closed, and several ministers arrested.

The deposed president is currently in hiding.

Neocolonialism benefits only the parasitic imperialists in Mali

The neocolonial state was created to repress the toiling masses, for the benefit of parasitic French rulers and black collaborators.

The country of Mali is a former French colony landlocked between Algeria, Guinea, Niger, Senegal, Côte D’ivoire, Burkina Faso and Mauritania — artificial borders created by white rulers at the 1884-85 Berlin Conference, with neither the consent nor the participation of African people.

Some observers feel there is evidence of a U.S.-led white imperialist scheme to carve up Africa and recolonize it at the expense of Africans.

Mali is vulnerable to severe drought conditions and hunger. Its most important mineral export is gold, but the reality is that Mali cannot develop economically within its present context, which is determined by imperial powers that are lining up to exploit its vast resources, including increasing U.S. influence.

The U.S. provides “military and economic aid of $70 million each year and another $70 million for food and other humanitarian needs.”

As a result of this U.S. intrusion, Mali has now been brought into a U.S.-led military program known as the Trans-Saharan Counter Terrorism Initiative (TSCTI).

Colonial borders represent the status quo: tear them down!

Despite the coup, power remains in the hands of the African petty bourgeois, class-enemy-from-within that rules at the expense the African working class and the poor peasantry.

The liberal democratic rights that we saw in Mali were actually a political space for sectors of the African petty bourgeoisie to compete for access to State power — not a space where imperialism could be fought.

We must turn our backs on both coup leaders and the deposed government.

We need a transformation of Mali — powered by the people — to satisfy the material needs and legitimate aspirations of the people of Mali.

Workers, peasants and honest progressive forces, including progressives in the armed forces in Mali, must fight for a people’s State.

The people’s State must be based on struggle for a revolutionary national democratic program that will sweep away all remnants of the neocolonial State, which is rotten to the core.

This type of State, created to repress the toiling masses for the benefit of parasitic French rulers and black collaborators, must go.

The democratization of Mali must mean that the people come to power anchored around a new revolutionary State, which must be born against parasitic capitalism and Berlin conference-created nationality, which does not serve the African working class in Mali or anywhere else.

Any news or “aid” coming from the African Union, Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), United Nations or coup leaders represents the status quo. →

Apr 06

2012

0

Avaaz, Humanitarian Agencies, MoveOn.org, Non-Profit Industrial Complex

Africa Avaaz Center For American Progress Darfur MoveOn NED | National Endowment for Democracy OSI R2P Racism

Keith Harmon Snow Discussing Western NGOs and Africa

Human rights investigator and award-winning journalist Keith Harmon Snow, detailing the corrupt NGOs and their portrayal of Africa in order to illicit funds. Snow must be considered one of our finest Western reporters for obtaining true independent grassroots news from the continent of Africa.

Within the lecture, Snow discusses the psyops/propaganda strategically orchestrated behind the “Save Darfur” campaigns/movements which, in 2004, began to saturate the populace. At the helm of this “movement” was “The Center for American Progress”.

The Center for American Progress, is closely connected with the same players that founded and financed Avaaz. Today, with Avaaz at the forefront, the non-profit industrial complex has been appointed trusted messenger of a grotesque and disturbing ideology; nothing less than a complete reflection and validation of the U.S. administration’s rhetoric intended to justify the annihilation and occupation of sovereign states under the false pretense of “humanitarian intervention” and “responsibility to protect”. →

Mar 29

2012

3

Avaaz, Humanitarian Agencies, Non-Profit Industrial Complex

Avaaz Capitalism Center For American Progress Darfur DarfurGenocide.org Darfurian Voices Kony Politics of Genocide Res Publica U.N. White Supremacy Ideology

Must Watch: The Plunder and Depopulation of Central Africa [Darfur, Avaaz, U.N., Kony]

The Politics of Genocide: White Supremacy Ideology and Corporate Control

 A brilliant lecture by independent journalist/ human rights investigator, Keith Harmon Snow

Within the lecture (14:05 in) independent journalist Keith Harmon Snow discusses the psyops/propaganda strategically orchestrated behind the “Save Darfur” campaigns/movements which, in 2004, began to saturate the populace. At the helm of this “movement” was “The Center for American Progress“.

The Center for American Progress, is closely connected with the same players that founded/funded Avaaz. Today, with Avaaz at the forefront, the non-profit industrial complex has been appointed trusted messenger of a grotesque and disturbing ideology; nothing less than a complete reflection and validation of the U.S. administration’s rhetoric intended to justify the annihilation and occupation of sovereign states under the false pretense of “humanitarian intervention” and “responsibility to protect”.

December 29, 2004: “Over two days in early December approximately three-dozen religious activists met at the Washington office of the Center for American Progress, a recently formed think tank headed by former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta. The Res Publica-driven agenda for the closed-door gathering included sessions on “building the movement infrastructure” and “objectives, strategies and core issues.”

Res Publica was founded by Tom Perriello, Ricken Patel and Tom Pravda.

Avaaz was founded by Res Publica, MoveOn.org, Executive Director Ricken Patel, Tom Perriello, Tom Pravda, Eli Pariser (MoveOn Executive Director), Andrea Woodhouse (consultant to the World Bank) Jeremy Heimans (co-founder of GetUp! and Purpose), and Australian entrepreneur David Madden (co-founder of GetUp and Purpose).

Avaaz co-founder Tom Perriello is now President and CEO of Center for American Progress.

Perriello and Patel also co-founded and co-directed DarfurGenocide.org which officially launched in 2004. “DarfurGenocide.org is a project of Res Publica, a group of public sector professionals dedicated to promoting good governance and virtuous civic cultures.” Today, this organization is now known as “Darfurian Voices”: “Darfurian Voices is a project of 24 Hours for Darfur.” The U.S. Department of State and the Open Society Institute were just two of the organizations funders and collaborating partners. Other Darfurian Voices partners include Avaaz, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), International Centre for Transitional Justice, Darfur Rehabilitation Project, Humanity United, Darfur People’s Association of New York, Genocide Intervention, Witness, Yale Law School, The Sigrid Rausing Trust and the Bridgeway Foundation.

Despite the carefully crafted language and images that tug at your emotions, such NGOs were created for and exist for one primary purpose – to protect and further American policy and interests, under the guise of philanthropy and humanitarianism. Of all the listed partners of DarfurGenocide.org, with exception of one located in London England, all of the entities involved are American and based on US soil.

Mar 15

2012

2

Human Rights Watch, Non-Profit Industrial Complex, Oxfam, USAID

Africa Apartheid Christian Aid Colonialism Congo Neo-liberalism Oxfam Save the Children UN USAID World Bank

FLASHBACK: The Missionary Position – NGOs and Development in Africa

 

Firoze Manji
Fahamu – learning for change
14 Standingford House, Oxford OX4 1BA
Carl O’Coill

Hull School of Architecture, University
of Lincoln, George Street, Hull HU1 3BW
Published in International Affairs 78 3 (2002) 567-83

 

NGOs face a stark choice. If they stand in favour of the emancipation of humankind (whether at home or abroad), then the focus of their work has inevitably to be in the political domain, supporting those social movements that seek to challenge a social system that benefits a few and impoverishes the many. The closing years of apartheid in Africa were illustrative of the choice that NGOs face today: either they supported the emerging popular movements (in South Africa and internationally) that supported the overthrow of a brutal system of exploitation, or they stayed silent and continued their philanthropic work, and became thereby complicit in the crimes of the system of apartheid.

 

Africa in the closing years of the 20th Century will be remembered for two historic events. One was the rise of the popular movements that led to the end of the colonial empire and the downfall of apartheid; the other, a human catastrophe of immense proportions involving the massacre of nearly a million people in Rwanda. If the one was achieved through the mobilisation of the majority for the goal of emancipation, the other was fuelled by pressures to comply with an externally defined agenda for social development. These events represent the
extremes of hope and despair that came to characterise much of the continent in the closing years of the millennium. Every country in the region contains, albeit to varying degrees, the mixture of factors that can lead to either outcome – a future built on respect for human dignity, or one torn apart by conflicts such as those seen in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Angola and in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Development, it seems, has failed. In many post-colonial countries real per capita GDP has fallen and welfare gains achieved since independence in areas like food consumption health and education have been reversed. The statistics are
disturbing. In Sub-Saharan Africa as a whole per-capita incomes dropped by 21% in real terms between 1981 and 1989.1 Madagascar and Mali now have per capita incomes of $799 and $753 down from $1,258 and $898 25 years ago. In 16 other Sub-Saharan countries per capita incomes were also lower in 1999 than in 1975.2 Nearly one quarter of the world’s population, but nearly 42% of the population of sub-Saharan Africa, live on less than $1 a day. Levels of inequality have also increased dramatically but worldwide. In 1960 the average income of the top 20% of the world’s population was 30 times that of the bottom 20%. By 1990 it was 60 times, and by 1997, 74 times that of the lowest fifth. Today “the assets of the top three billionaires are more than the combined GNP of all least developed countries and their 600 million people”.3

This has been the context in which there has been an explosive growth in the presence of Western as well as local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Africa. NGOs today form a prominent part of the “development machine”, a vast institutional and disciplinary nexus of official agencies, practitioners, consultants, scholars, and other miscellaneous experts producing and consuming knowledge about the “developing world”.4 According to recent estimates, there are as many as three thousand development NGOs in OECD countries as a whole.5 In Britain alone, there are well over one hundred voluntary groups claiming some specialism in the field. →

Jan 11

2012

0

Amnesty International, Humanitarian Agencies, The War on Libya - There Was No Evidence

Amnesty International Imperialism Libya

The Gaddafi Mercenaries and the Division of Africa | Amnesty International

Exposing the lies of the use of ‘African mercenaries’ in Libya

Via Global Civilians for Peace: “Amnesty International was well aware of the false accusations of the use of ‘African mercenaries’ in Libya. It was a lie used by NATO and their mouthpieces in the mainstream media to de-legitimise and demonise the Libyan government and cover up the mass racist lynchings, torture and imprisonment of black Libyans and migrant workers by the ‘rebels’. Surely as a self-proclaimed human rights organisation Amnesty International should have exposed these heinous ‘rebel’ crimes to the world, condemned the mainstream media’s complicity and campaigned on behalf of the black communities in Libya facing this racist onslaught.”

For more information on the ‘rebels’ relentless racist campaign of mass detention, lynchings and atrocities see the following compilation of articles and videos:

http://globalciviliansforpeace.com/2011/11/22/rebel-racism-compilation-of-articles-and-videos/

For more information on the truth behind the Imperialist war on Libya visit www.thehumanitarianwar.com.

Dec 16

2011

0

Nature Conservancy

Africa African Wildlife Foundation (U.S.) Corruption Exploitation Kenya Nature Conservancy Samburu Peoples

Kenya’s Samburu People ‘Violently Evicted’ after US Charities (Nature Conservancy & African Wildlife Foundation) Buy Land

Around 2,000 Samburu families have stayed squatting on edge of disputed territory, says NGO Survival International

“Members of the Samburu people in Kenya have been abused, beaten and raped by police after the land they lived on for two decades was sold to two US-based wildlife charities, a rights group and community leader have alleged. … The London-based NGO Survival International said the Samburu were evicted following the purchase of the land by two American-based charities, the Nature Conservancy and the African Wildlife Foundation. The groups subsequently gifted the land to Kenya for a national park, to be called Laikipia National Park.”

The pastoralist Samburu have reported constant harassment from police with women allegedly raped and animals seized. Photograph: Zhao Yingquan/Xinhua

Members of the Samburu people in Kenya have been abused, beaten and raped by police after the land they lived on for two decades was sold to two US-based wildlife charities, a rights group and community leader have alleged.

The dispute centres on Eland Downs in Laikipia, a lush area near Mount Kenya. At least three people are said to have died during the row, including a child who was eaten by a lion after the Samburu were violently evicted in November last year.

The London-based NGO Survival International said the Samburu were evicted following the purchase of the land by two American-based charities, the Nature Conservancy and the African Wildlife Foundation.

The groups subsequently gifted the land to Kenya for a national park, to be called Laikipia National Park.

Survival International said the land was officially owned by former president Daniel arap Moi, although AWF simply said it bought it from a private landowner.

With nowhere to go, around 2,000 Samburu families stayed on the edge of the disputed territory, living in makeshift squats, while 1,000 others were forced to relocate, Survival said.

Jo Woodman, a campaigner for Survival, said the pastoralist Samburu had reported constant harassment from police with women allegedly raped, animals seized and an elder shot as recently as last month.

“There has been an ongoing, constant level of fear, intimidation and violence towards the community, which has been devastating,” Woodman said.

A community leader, who did not wish to be named, described police harassment as enormous. He said police beat people, burned manyattas or traditional homesteads and carried out arbitrary arrests during the period leading up to and including the eviction last year. He said they also confiscated many animals and the intimidation has continued.

“The situation has been really bad for a long time,” he said. “[The Samburu] have nothing. Things like bedding and utensils were burned.”

Kenyan police were not available on Wednesday to comment on the allegations.

Survival has written to the UN appealing for urgent action to put an end to the violence and provide assistance to the Samburu, who have gone to court to establish their right to the land.

“In one incident, a Samburu elder was shot dead by paramilitaries,” the group said in its letter to the UN committee on the elimination of racial discrimination, dated 7 December.

“The displaced community has nothing but their livestock, thousands of which were impounded – with no reason given – on 25 November 2011. This is an urgent and serious violation of the rights of this community, which has been left squatting beside its land with no amenities,” Survival’s letter said.

The two conservation groups gifted the 17,100 acres to Kenya’s government in November to create a national park to be run by the Kenya Wildlife Service.

However, since then a court has banned the KWS from proceeding with the conservation project until a ruling on the Samburus’ legal case.

Both US-based charities indicated they were watching the situation with concern but were unable to comment for legal reasons.

John Butler, director of marketing for the AWF, said: “The African Wildlife Foundation does not condone violence. AWF has a longstanding history of working closely with local communities to ensure that conservation solutions benefit both people and wildlife. Unfortunately, we cannot comment at length on this issue due to a pending court case in Kenya.”

Blythe Thomas, a spokeswoman for the Nature Conservancy, said: “The conflict over natural resources across Africa is a serious issue. Everywhere we work in Africa, we’re working with local communities to address natural resource issues. We’re closely monitoring this situation; unfortunately we can’t comment at length due to a pending court case in Kenya.”

Kenya has a history of land-grabbing by senior government officials, particularly during Daniel arap Moi’s time in power. Land disputes are common as legal documents of ownership are often missing or have been forged.

A request for comment from Kenya’s Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife went unanswered. However the minister, Dr Noah Wekesa, was quoted as telling parliament last month that KWS had ceased all activity on the land, which would not be gazetted as a national park until the other legal case was resolved.

The Samburu’s legal case was heard in the town of Nyeri on Wednesday and lawyer Korir Sing’Oei said the court confirmed that the KWS had secured registration of the land.

“The court has turned a blind eye to the pleas of the Samburu community and allowed these illegalities to subsist,” he said. “The transfer [of the land to the KWS] is totally unlawful and it’s in flagrant violation of the interests of the Samburu community.”

The court had agreed to give further direction on the matter in January.

Korir Sing’Oei said he intended to address the violations of rights in a separate case.

“Last year, when the community was forcefully evicted from the land … their homes were burnt down and livestock confiscated in their hundreds and lots of their women were violated,” he said.

“Given the powerful actors who have vested interests in the land, this issue has been really hushed up in the local media,” he added.

The lawyer said the evicted Samburu had no intention of leaving Laikipia, a popular destination for wildlife-loving tourists and the area where Prince William proposed to Kate Middleton in a rustic lodge.

“Where would they go to? They have absolutely nowhere else to go,” he said.

The community elder said running away was not an option.

“That’s the place you call your home … it’s where you were brought up and where your children call home. It’s an ancestral land.”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/14/kenya-samburu-people-evicted-land

Aug 25

2010

0

350.org / 1Sky

1C 350.org / 1Sky Co-opted NGOs Corporate Greens Non-profit Industrial Complex

Why Does 350.org Not Fight for the People of Africa & Small Island States? 350.org Cop15 video shows Africans Demand that the World Not Exceed 1C

350.org claims to ‘be building a movement to unite the world around solutions to the climate crisis – the solutions that science and justice demand’ yet, their organization, sister organizations, partners and ‘green friends’ continue to fight for and support grossly inadequate legislation that condemns Africans and those on Small Island States to certain death. How is this climate justice?

They do not educate nor support the core cause of climate change, that of our current economic system. This system is absolutely dependent on economic growth, overconsumption and cheap energy in the Global North.  System change, massive reduction and conservation are absolutely essential, yet these most critical issues are conspicuously absent.

Why does Bill McKibben give accolades to NRDC, who under their USCAP partnership supports 450-550ppm? Referring to the failed cap & trade bill (cap & trade – a known false solution) McKibben stated: “The Washington environmental community did absolutely everything they possibly could,” “All the rest of us owe them a great debt of gratitude.” See article: http://bit.ly/a2jhWe

Why does 350.org not promote and stand behind The People’s Agreement, from Cochabamba, Bolivia, April, 2010 which demands 1C not be exceeded and a return to 300 ppm down to pre-industrial levels? (read agreement here: http://bit.ly/9PLNsY) Why do they continue to undermine this agreement, even in Bonn? See 350.org / TckTckTck.org Bonn coverage here:http://bit.ly/bJNTl9. At COP 15, a representative from the IPCC stated that at 2 degrees rise, the poor, the disenfranchised and the vulnerable would not survive, and at 1.5 degrees rise, they might survive, yet, 350.org pushes for the brand ‘350’ as the target rather than the 1C small island states need simply to survive.  At COP15, Evo Morales on behalf of the Bolivian people stated: “Our objective is to save humanity and not just half of humanity. We are here to save mother earth. Our objective is to reduce climate change to [under] 1C. [above this] many islands will disappear and Africa will suffer a holocaust,” he said. Limiting warming to 1C would need an end to all emissions and billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide to be sucked from the air and stored.  Why is a government leading the way for a real climate change movement instead of 350.org & friends? More on 350.org partner TckTckTck: http://bit.ly/4s9zjC & http://bit.ly/am8qX1.  At Cop15, the G77 called for targets of 1C, 52% by 2017, 65% by 2020, 80% by 2030 & well above 100 by 2050. There can be no denying of what targets those most vulnerable have asked the NGOs to support.  Watch this incredible outreach to NGOs by Ambassador Lumumba Stanislaus-Kaw Di-Aping of the G77: http://youtu.be/s0_wvZw0fOU

Why does 350.org not educate supporters on false solutions which mean ‘business as usual’? See ‘Hoodwinked in the Hothouse – False Solutions’ here: http://bit.ly/cWlmRN Why does 350.org not inform supporters that the not only do the wealthy countries have less than ten years left before their carbon budgets are exhausted (just to keep under catastrophic 2C!). See carbon budget for 2010-2050: http://bit.ly/81riGq & http://bit.ly/cy2dEG.

What no big green wants to talk about is the fact that our planet will never stabilize until we reach virtual ZERO. The single most important and definite conclusion of the entire 2007 IPCC assessment is being ignored. The IPCC states that only zero carbon emissions could stabilize atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.  From the IPCC report:: “In fact, only in the case of essentially complete elimination of emissions can the atmospheric concentration of CO2 ultimately be stabilized at a constant level.”  We don’t need small steps, not incremental progress, not doing less bad: zero. Zero emissions is the only way we can save human civilization. Learn what no big greens are telling you about the climate change science: http://bit.ly/9sYOE8

Civil society must stop supporting corporate green organizations who are dependent and heavily funded by foundations. We must choose to support those groups who are independent of powerful foundations and special interests.  Examples of such uncompromised groups are Via Campesina, Climate SOS, Rising Tides North America, Mobilization for Climate Justice, etc. etc.  Not certain? Just ask grassroots climate justice groups exactly who funds them in order to make an informed decision.  Simply UNSUBSCRIBE from the strategically crafted rhetoric. Foundations are simply assets of the dirty oil industry. Many ENGO’s have maintained unaccountability through a major funding disparity with grassroots and community led resistance, and protect that massive funding disparity through a lack of accountability. Whether directly or indirectly, industry and foundations that are linked to industry steer ENGO politics away from grassroots movements and create an elite structured caviar class of environmentalist that is tied to ‘business as usual’ solutions.

Support the real grassroots climate activist groups – they need you. The window is closing. Symbolic campaigns are meaningless in the face of catastrophe. Last chance to save humanity. More on ‘big greens’ here: http://bit.ly/djA4Se

On October 12, 2010: Change the system, not the climate! Call for a global day of direct action for climate justice: http://bit.ly/aD8Sza

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