Tag: Africa

Chief Justice wants white males out

South Africa’s black Chief Justice berated the government and corporations for hiring white males to defend them in courts.

Speaking at a Durban Chamber of Commerce and Industry luncheon, Mogoeng Mogoeng said: “There’s still a lot to be done to empower women, especially black women [in the judiciary].

“But the big challenge is that whenever big business has a matter before our court they brief white male lawyers.

“The same goes for the government: It briefs white males,” he said.

Mogoeng urged businesses to support young black student lawyers at universities and called on white male lawyers, to stop paying lip service to transformation in the legal sector.

Mogoeng, without irony, called on South Africa to follow the example of countries like South Korea and Singapore. They had succeeded, he said, due to good governance, unified purpose and a strong emphasis on education.

Both countries are listed among the worst in the world for black people.

“I cannot stress this too much, we need to embrace education aggressively,” Mogoeng said.

Mauritius appoints first female president

Mauritius appointed Ameenah Firdaus Gurib-Fakim as its first woman president on Thursday after her predecessor stepped down from the the ceremonial position last week.

“It is the first time in the history of Mauritius that a woman has acceded to this post,” parliament speaker Santi Bai Hanoomanjee said after lawmakers approved Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth’s motion proposing Gurib-Fakim.

Jugnauth’s ruling coalition said during last December’s electoral campaign it would nominate Gurib-Fakim (55) a chemistry professor.

“I take it with humility. I feel there is a consensus among members of parliament and also among the population,” she was quoted as saying in L’Express, the leading daily on the Indian Ocean island.

Rajkeswar Purryag stepped down on May 29, saying he had agreed with Jugnauth to resign in May.

Source: Reuters

Blast kills dozens in Nigeria

A bomb blast hit a busy meat market in Nigeria’s northeastern city of Maiduguri on Tuesday, killing as many as 50 people, an eyewitness and a hospital source told Reuters.

The bomb which was concealed under a butcher’s table in the market went off at around 1pm local time, killing shoppers and travellers, a military source said.

Nobody has claimed responsibility for the latest explosion, which follows two bomb attacks over the weekend that killed at least 30 people and bore the hallmarks of militant Islamist group Boko Haram.

The group, which new President Muhammadu Buhari has vowed to crush, has killed thousands of people and displaced around 1.5 million in its bid to establish an Islamic caliphate in the northeast of Africa’s biggest economy and top oil exporter.

Lawal Kawu, a paramedic, said 31 charred bodies had been evacuated to the teaching hospital in Maiduguri, and several other people were brought in with severe injuries.

Witnesses said they heard a loud explosion.

Source: Reuters

Clintons could face criminal enquiry say defense lawyers

Top criminal defense lawyers in Washington say Democratic presidential front runner Hillary Clinton could face scrutiny, amid mounting disclosures about the tangled finances of her family’s foundation.

The new book “Clinton Cash” by Peter Schweizer, an investigative reporter affiliated with the right-wing Hoover Institution, has unleashed a torrent of conflict-of-interest allegations relating to the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation and Hillary Clinton’s own conduct during her tenure, from 2009 to 2013, as secretary of state.

Caleb Burns, a partner at the Washington law firm Wiley Rein LLC, who has long experience handling financial and public integrity cases. “The question’s going to be whether or not she took any official action in exchange for those donations. If she did, I think there is going to be a high, high likelihood of additional scrutiny, either from Capitol Hill or from the Department of Justice itself.”

Burns likened the known fact setting in the Clinton controversies to that which led to the federal indictment, earlier this month, of Sen. Robert Menendez, D-NJ, who stands accused of performing favors for a well-connected Democratic donor in exchange for pricey gifts. Menendez has pleaded not guilty and denied any wrongdoing.

“If the facts suggest that there was a linkage between what Secretary Clinton did in her official capacity and the money that was coming into the Clinton Foundation,” Burns said, “this would fall under 18 U.S.C. 201 as a potential bribery violation.”

That statute provides that a bribe has occurred, among other circumstances, whenever “a public official directly or indirectly demands, seeks, receives, accepts, or agrees to receive or accept anything of value personally for or because of any official act performed or to be performed by such official.”

C. Boyden Gray, who served as White House counsel to President George H.W. Bush, told Fox News that Clinton is “not protected by the fact that her husband may have taken money … spouses’ interests are attributed to each other and that is no excuse or defense.”

In the tangle of cases brought to light by the book “Clinton Cash,” no one associated with the Clinton Foundation has been formally accused of wrongdoing.

The Clintons, at any rate, are veterans of this terrain. In addition to her husband becoming the first president to be impeached – and ultimately acquitted – in over a century, in 1996 Hillary Clinton became the First Lady to testify before a grand jury.

An unbroken pattern of overtly corrupt behavior trading half-million-dollar speaking fees and multi-million-dollar payoffs to the Clintons’ foundation in return for billion-dollar mining concessions and corporate takeovers were staged in the jungle of Third World governance.

As Schweizer reports, America’s favorite power couple made millions from Kazakhstan dictator Nazarbayev.

In 2005 Bill came to the homeland of Borat with Canadian penny-stock speculator Frank Giustra. Giustra’s shell company UrAsia Energy, a paper entity with no track record, beat out bigger competition to scupper Kazakhstan”s uranium mining concession.

Bill endorsed Nazarbayev’s bid to head the Organization for Security and Cooperation Europe, a human rights organization founded by the 1975 Helsinki Accords, despite Nazarbeayev’s execrable human rights record. Senator Hillary Clinton lifted her previous objection to Kazakhstan’s chairmanship of the organization.

Schweizer reports in the months that followed, Giustra gave the Clinton Foundation $31.3 million.

At the time of Clinton’s visit, Kazakhstan was on the verge of a national election. Days after Clinton departed, the opposition party’s campaign headquarters were ravaged by fire in an arson attack. On October 12 heavily armed policy temporarily arrested the opposition party’s leader….In December 2005 Nazarbayev won reelection with more than 90 percent of the vote. Bill sent him a note of congratulations.

Bill Clinton does his act in front of any gangster who will pay him–including two in Lagos, Nigeria for $700,000 each, in return for evident favors to unspeakably corrupt Nigerian “businessmen”.

Will the American people have the moral fibre to extirpate corruption on the Clinton scale?

Source: Fox News

Africa Day fizzles out

There was no celebrations to mark Africa Day in Kenya, but the country’s President Uhuru Kenyatta is urging the continent to work together to fight extremism.

Africa has 54 countries, but only six; Ghana, Mali, Namibia, Zambia, Lesotho and Zimbabwe observe the day with a public holiday. Celebrations in these countries began early.

Africa Day is celebrated annually within the African continent to mark the formation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) on 25 May 1963 and the African Union in 2002.

Nobel peace prize winner and Egyptian scholar Mohamed ElBaradei said on Africa Day it is generally good to celebrate, but not in Africa right now.

ElBaradei told journalists in Pretoria today that there were still too many problems in Africa, and even the world, and reflection was needed instead.

“It is good to celebrate, but it is also good to say we have a lot of problems on our hands. I don’t think it will suffice to celebrate now. I think it is time for reflection and to say we have a lot of problems on our hands. We owe our people a lot in terms of governance, and governance continues to be a major issue in Africa,” he said.

He said countries had to ask themselves if military intervention was the only way or whether there was another way to address the issues.

Elbaradei used to head the International Nuclear Atomic Agency.

Thousands sign petition to return to Europe

The petition on the website www.change.org, had about 15000 signatures last night.

It calls for the EU to allow white South Africans, Namibians and Zimbabweans to be given automatic European citizenship.

The petition has over 15000 signatures.

Rodrigo de Campos, a Brazilian, is behind the campaign and his motivation is that “the white South African population currently faces ethnic cleansing and persecutions at the hands of the ANC government, the Economic Freedom Fighters and various individual anti-white aggressors. Over 4000 white farmers have been brutally murdered, often including torture, rape and mutilation.”

Neither the ANC nor the EFF could be reached for comment last night.

His rationale, he said, was “based on the Israeli government’s policy of allowing all Jews the right to return to Israel”.

“We believe it is not only advisable but morally obligatory that Europe should allow all white South Africans the right to return,” he said.

It is not clear from De Campos’s Facebook profile why he would campaign for white South Africans.

Some of those in support of the petition have given their reasons on his page.

Susan Mulder wrote: “My life and the lives of my children are at risk daily. We love SA but are no longer welcome in the country our ancestors built. We have no option but to ask for your help.”

“I am a naturalised British citizen yet my mom is stuck on her own in South Africa. She should be growing old with her daughter and granddaughter. She has been attacked. An AK47 has been held to her head. She is alone and traumatised. She deserves to be free from living in fear,” said Marischka Davies.

Presidency spokesman Harold Maloka declined to comment. So did cabinet spokesman Phumla Williams and Clayson Monyela of the Department of International Relations and Co-operation.

Black political analyst Shadrack Gutto sneered at the petition and said whites needed to be “educated”, also globally.

Blue chip companies pull back from Clintons

An Exxon Mobil spokesman said this week that the company has decided not to be involved in the Clinton Global Initiative this year. The oil company said its decision was unrelated to recent scrutiny of the foundation, but this is the first year it has not been a sponsor since 2009. Other sponsors, including Monsanto, are reevaluating their partnerships.

Some blue-chip companies that have long provided large donations to the Clinton Foundation are pulling back or reassessing their support.

Bill and Chelsea Clinton are convening foreign leaders here at a lush golf resort set in a palm grove this week to showcase their foundation’s charitable work. But the conference also highlights new controversies engulfing the Clinton family’s vast philanthropic enterprises as Hillary Rodham Clinton begins her presidential campaign.

A liberal human rights organization and several Republican lawmakers, for instance, are criticizing the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation for accepting donations from a Moroccan government-owned mining company, whose seven-figure sponsorship of this week’s gathering came amid growing scrutiny of foreign-government contributions to the charity.

This week’s flashy Morocco conference — a first-ever Africa and Middle East spinoff of the flagship CGI held each September in New York — underscores the foundation’s controversial fundraising practices, which have become a potential anchor on Hillary Clinton’s nascent campaign.

Source: Washington Post

Kenyan deputy president riles against homosexuality

Kenya’s deputy president, William Ruto, has told worshippers at a church service in Nairobi that homosexuality is not welcome in the east African nation.

Ruto’s comments came on the day US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Kenya promoting rights, alongside discussions on security and terrorism.

“We will not allow homosexuality in our society as it violates our religious and cultural beliefs,” Ruto reportedly told a cheering congregation at the Jesus Winner Ministry Church near the capital.

“We will stand with religious leaders to defend our faith and our beliefs,” he said. “There’s no room for homosexuality in this country. That one I can assure you.”

Homosexuality remains illegal in many countries, including Kenya where it was outlawed under British colonial legislation.

Ruto, who is on trial at the International Criminal in The Hague accused of crimes against humanity, said his stance was about morality not politics.

“When we say this, we are not saying so as to get votes but to protect what we all believe is right,” he said, according to The Star newspaper.

Conservative Christian and Muslim countries in Africa reject open homosexuality.

In Uganda the anti-gay bill has been watered down and in Nigeria and Gambia tough new anti-gay laws have been introduced, with Gambia’s President Yahya Jammeh, calling homosexuals “ungodly, Satanic… vermins [sic]” in a speech last year.

Homosexuality is illegal in 36 out of 54 African countries and punishable by death in four, according to human rights group Amnesty International.

In Kenya, too, a cross-party parliamentary group is seeking stricter application of existing anti-gay legislation.

Mobile app to keep borders open

Science and Technology Minister Naledi Pandor recently launched the “We are Africa mobile app” which is an online platform in which the public can pledge their support against xenophobia.

The application’s creators embody the very message of the anti-xenophobia campaign that is unity amongst Africans, as the application was a collaborative effort between three South Africans along with Angolan and Congolese team members.

The application allows people to pledge their support against xenophobia as well as alert officials on any looming cases of xenophobia.

Pandor believes that this is an innovative way to fight a challenge which is facing South Africa.

She has praised the inventiveness and committed support of young people to fight this challenge and believes that the application is an accessible way for everyone to join the fight against xenophobia.

The first version of the application can be accessed through any device capable of Internet connection – such as. PCs, laptops, tablets, cellphones – by visiting www.weareafrica.mobi.

The app will be available through Android, Apple and Windows stores within the next five days.

Major oil companies withdrawing from Southern Africa

BP is no longer trading in Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Namibia, Swaziland, Lesotho, Botswana or Malawi.

In some of these countries had a BP presence for almost a century. Were all these BP associate companies suddenly unprofitable or was something deeper at work?

The sub-Saharan oil industry has registered the withdrawal from the region of major oil companies.

A clue could be the recent spat between Chevron and a new oil industry entrant in Cape Town in the shape of a black economic empowerment company called Burgan. Chevron claims it threatens the viability of their refinery with its ability to import, store and sell motor fuels.

Chevron’s complaints go further. Probably speaking for the other South African crude oil refiners, it points bitterly to the refusal or delay, by the government, to allow a “cost recovery mechanism” to make it worthwhile to upgrade local refineries to produce the higher quality fuels demanded by motor manufacturers.

Chevron argues that our regulated oil industry is a strategic asset with sacred status. It believes nothing should be changed without industry approval.

A more powerful reason for a reluctance to invest in new plant without a sweetener from the Treasury may be found in what has been happening in Saudi Arabia and India. In both countries there are now new and massive crude oil refineries producing, and selling to all comers, large volumes of motor fuels and other petroleum products.

The nearest customers for production surpluses of these huge refineries are in Africa, particularly those on its eastern seaboard – South Africa being the biggest.

The economies of scale is deadly. Saudi Arabia can undercut any refinery far from crude oil sources – such as those in Durban, Cape Town, and Gauteng. It can also produce the new higher quality fuel. Local refineries cannot do so.

South Africa’s crude oil refining capacity is 553 000 barrels a day. Saudi Arabia production is huge by comparison. Estimates are 3 million barrels a day and upwards. Some analysts (The Wall Street Journal) expect Saudi Arabian refining capacity to rise to 8 million barrels a day within a decade. Others predict 12 million barrels a day within 10 years.

Not only Saudi refineries pose a severe threat to our local ones. There are large ones in India too. In particularly the one recently completed by Reliance. It alone can produce more that all six of our refineries (including Sasol) combined. It has a reported capacity of 1.2 million barrels a day. It is the world’s largest.

Source: IOL

Rising US black population foreign born

Rapidly growing numbers of black immigrants have reshaped the overall black population in the United States in recent decades, particularly in Washington and other cities with large U.S.-born African American communities, a new report says.

A record 3.8 million foreign-born blacks now live in the United States, the Pew Research Center reported Thursday. The influx means that the share of foreign-born blacks, largely from Africa and the Caribbean, has grown from 3.1 percent of the black population in 1980 to 8.7 percent in 2013. By 2060, 16.5 percent of the U.S. black population will be foreign-born, the report says.

The report highlights the degree to which America’s black population is less homogenous than in previous generations, experts said.

“I think when you’re talking about the black population, it’s increasingly important to be able to pull apart the distinctions between U.S.-born blacks of several generations compared to the new immigrants,” said William H. Frey, a demographer and senior fellow with the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution.

“Just because they’re new immigrants,” Frey added, “they have different needs and patterns, probably in terms of language in many cases, in terms of assimilation. And so they probably shouldn’t be confused with native-born blacks in lots of ways, who have their own needs to be addressed.”

Frey, in his 2014 book “Diversity Explosion,” estimated that black immigrants made up about 10 percent of all blacks and differed from U.S.-born blacks in important socioeconomic respects. That was also reflected in the Pew report, which said black immigrants tend to be older, more likely to have a higher education and a higher income, and less likely to live in poverty.

The impact of black immigration has been particularly strong in cities that already had some of the nation’s largest black populations. For instance, in the District, 15 percent of the black population was born outside the United States. In Miami, 34 percent of the black community was born elsewhere. In New York’s metro area, that figure is 28 percent. Nearly half of the influx has occurred since 2000, the report says.

Most of the nation’s 40 million U.S.-born blacks trace their heritage to African ancestors who were brought here as slaves. The report also notes that blacks accounted for nearly one-fifth of the U.S. population at the end of the 18th century.

The most recent wave of black immigration began in the 1960s after U.S. immigration laws were changed. In recent years, the pace has increased. The most recent Census Bureau estimates show that immigration accounted for 25 percent of the growth in the U.S. black population between 2010 and July 2013, Frey said.

Half of the black immigrants arrived from the Caribbean, the Pew report says. The largest source is Jamaica, with 682,000, followed by Haiti, with 586,000. Jamaican immigrants make up 18 percent of the black population in the United States; those from Haiti represent about 15 percent of the U.S. black population.

But a rapidly growing proportion of foreign-born blacks who arrived in the United States in recent years came from Africa, led almost entirely by immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa, the report says. Nigeria and Ethiopia rank first and second, respectively, in the number of African immigrants in the United States. Many sub-Saharan immigrants — 28 percent — were refugees or others seeking asylum.

Source: Washington Post

Nigeria elects Muslim president

Former military dictator Muhammadu Buhari defeated incumbent Goodluck Jonathan in Nigeria’s presidential poll by 2.57 million votes, the country’s electoral commission announced on Wednesday, ending Jonathan’s rule of Africa’s most populous nation.

Three decades after seizing power in a military coup, Buhari became the first Nigerian to oust a president through the ballot box, putting him in charge of Africa’s biggest economy.

The Independent National Electoral Commission said the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate won 15,424,921 votes, or 53.95 percent of the 28,587,564 total valid votes cast.

Jonathan, of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), won 12,853,162 (44.96 percent).

As the scale of this weekend’s electoral landslide became clear, Jonathan called Buhari on Tuesday to concede defeat to the opposition leader, an unprecedented step that should help to defuse anger among Jonathan’s supporters.

Jonathan’s quick concession could help alleviate fears of a repeat of post-election violence that saw 1,000 killed after Jonathan defeated Buhari in 2011.

As vote counts rolled in and Buhari’s victory looked ever more assured, thousands of people spilled into the streets of northern Nigeria’s biggest city Kano to celebrate.

For Buhari, 72, it has been a long road back to the pinnacle of Nigerian politics. A former army general, Buhari overthrew president Shehu Shagari – widely seen as inept and corrupt – in a military coup in 1983. As the head of a military government in the 1980s, he earned a reputation for his tough stance against nepotism and fraud.

Voter dissatisfaction with Jonathan – whose time in office has been marked by the rise of militant Islamist group Boko Haram and allegations of failing to tackle endemic corruption in the oil-rich country.

He also promised to stamp out Boko Haram’s insurgency in the north, which has claimed the lives of more than 13,000 people and left some 1.5 million homeless.

Buhari has also managed to bridge the traditional ethnic and religious fault lines of Nigerian politics – typically divided between the mainly Christian south and Muslim north.

As a Muslim from the north, Buhari for the first time won states in the southwest and even took one-third of votes in a southeastern state – an unprecedented development that some say reflects voter dissatisfaction with Jonathan more than it does enthusiasm for Buhari.

Upcoming African technology takes tech world by storm

During a time when the gaze of the world’s technology lovers is firmly on technologically developed areas such as North America, East Asia and Europe, the notion that one of the least developed areas on the planet, Africa, could soon be producing some of the hottest upcoming technology and gadgets is a rather strange thought. The fact is, however, that there are a variety of new and upcoming African additions to the technology market that are going to change the face of the continent, and perhaps beyond.

Jumia

OLPC_HaitiOn a continent where the vast majority of transactions are completed via cash or mobile phone, the idea of Amazon-like delivery services seems a distant possibility. Despite the lack of credit and debit card capacity in African countries, however, companies are stepping in to the online realm, taking advantage of the current climate. Jumia is akin to Amazon, yet delivers good within the Nigerian cities Lagos and Abuja via motorcycle to customers, payments being made with cash on delivery.

mPawa

There are an estimated 750,000,000 SIM cards in Africa, many African people having their own mobile phones with call and SMS capacity. mPawa takes advantage of the current state of the African telecoms market, matching employers with potential employees that have the correct skill set. The service does work via online, but can also be used via SMS.

Mint Smartphone

South African technology companies Mint and CZ Electronics have teamed together recently, aiming to produce Africa’s first smartphone. The company, once a subsidiary of Alcatel, is aiming to produce an affordable, top-quality smartphone that will contain a dual core processor, camera, HD screen and Wi-Fi/3G/4G connections. Soon, Africans everywhere will be able to watch videos on Youtube, acess and get involved with social networks such as Facebook, and play online games on providers such as Springbokcasino in complete security. It’s likely all of these sites will be poised for a huge amount of growth as the African online market booms.

Kopo Kopo

In countries where the majority of payments are made via mobiles, shop owners everywhere are cottoning on to the trend and the possibilities that go with being able to conduct payments in a mobile manner. Kopo Kopo is a Kenyan start-up that allows consumers to make payments via their mobile phones at any store or merchant who has signed up to the service.

The mortal danger of being white in Africa

A lucrative black market exists for the body parts of albinos, who are believed by some to possess magical powers that can bring good luck. But as police in Tanzania crack down on the grisly trade, activists in neighbouring Malawi say attacks have spiked.

Albinos are living in fear of being killed in Malawi, where their body parts are increasingly being sold for use in traditional rituals that promise to deliver wealth and power.

Three albinos – people born without pigmentation – have been killed and mutilated in the southern African country in the first two months of the year, the Association of Persons with Albinism in Malawi (APAM) reported.

There were two albino killings in all of 2014 and one in 2013.

One woman was found in January with her head, arms and legs cut off, the government said. Police are also searching for several individuals reported missing.

“We are hunted like animals,” said APAM president Boniface Massah, who campaigns for the rights of Malawi’s 10,000 albinos.

The body parts are often believed to be sold in neighbouring Tanzania, where more than 70 albinos have been killed since 2000.

Tanzanian authorities announced in January that they would crack down on the gruesome trade. They banned the activities of witch doctors who promise to bring clients good luck and fortune to prevent them from making ritual use of albino body parts.

While the practice is condemned by the overwhelming majority of traditional healers, a lucrative black market exists for the body parts said to possess magical powers.

A set of albino body parts – including hands and feet, genitals, ears, tongue and nose – sold for $75,000 in Dar es Salaam recently, according to Tanzanian police.

But after Tanzania began its efforts to curb the practice, activists say the criminals moved to Malawi.

“Those who are in the business of selling body parts of albinos … have established a market in Malawi, because it has become tougher to do business in Tanzania,” Massah said.

Police have not commented on the matter. Several people have been arrested in connection with the recent killings of albinos but they do not include any foreigners.

The spike in the number of slayings has scared many parents of albino children to such an extent that they have taken them out of school, the activist said.

“You are no longer sure you can trust even friends or relatives,” Massah added.

Albinos face threat in many African countries, ranging from Kenya and Burundi to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Senegal.

The rights group Under The Same Sun (UTSS) lists 140 killings, as well as 219 mutilations and other attacks, against albinos in 25 African countries between 1998 and 2015.

The belief in the magical powers of albinos is based on the idea that the birth of a white child to black parents is a supernatural event.

Such a birth can be seen as a curse from the ancestors, and some east African ethnic groups – such as the Sukuma or the Maasai – traditionally killed albino children at birth, according to UTSS.

Among other African ethnic groups, however, albinos enjoy respect.

The Yoruba of Nigeria and Benin believe albinos are under the protection of the god Obatala, who is believed to have created them and to like the colour white.

Belief in magic is widespread in sub-Saharan Africa. Malawian newspapers, for instance, frequently run articles on villagers being accused of witchcraft. It is not uncommon to hear stories of politicians or businessmen having accumulated wealth and power through magical means.

Being an albino was difficult in Malawi even before the killings increased. “Being white in a society where the majority is black is not easy,” said Massah, 32, who recalls being called names at school.

Many children have worse experiences, with their fathers abandoning the family because they suspect their wives of cheating on them with a white man, he said.

There have been no known convictions in Malawi for murders or other attacks against albinos in the past four years, according to Massah. In Tanzania, only about 10 people were convicted since 2000, local media reported.

“I am a teacher. I am contributing to the development of Malawi like any other person,” said Emmanuel Mkwapatira, a 43-year-old albino who lives in the southern town of Balaka.

“Is this not enough evidence that people with albinism are also human?”

Source: timeslive