Egypt: The Ballot must be Sacrosanct

The military intervention in Egypt and the ousting of the democratically elected Islamist regime has been hailed by some as a victory of a popular revolution. Amidst the euphoria, however, we must ponder the larger implication of this trend for the future of liberal democracy in the Middle East.

It is true that the Islamist regime of Mohammed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood promoted an exclusive Islamic agenda at the expense of a more secular and liberal agenda. It alienated many constituencies within Egyptian society.

However, the unilateral ousting of the regime by the military sets a dangerous precedence that may return to hunt the country. Democracy cannot be agreeable only when the “good guys” win. The ballot must be sacrosanct. Impeach the president; recall the parliamentarians through constitutional means rather than the barrel of the gun.

The so-called “doctrine of necessity” which some have invoked to justify the military coup is a slippery slope. Anyone can invoke it. Today it is the “good guys” but tomorrow it may be the “bad guys.”

As one commentator put it, the greatest danger is that the military coup will be interpreted by many political Islamists as sending a blunt message: it doesn't pay to choose the ballot over the bullet. More may now turn to the bullet with grave consequences for the fragile political order. Democracy is a messy business but to endue and thrive it must be founded on principles not the politics of convenience.

Egypt: The Ballot must be Sacrosanct

7/05/2013 01:35:00 AM africa, politics, world

No one is born hating...

No one is born hating...

7/02/2013 11:51:00 PM reflections, Tributes

Colonial Brutality Revisited: "Atoning for the Sins of Empire"

In this insightful New York Times op-ed, the historian of Africa David Anderson, reflects on the historic decision by the British government to pay compensation to Africans who suffered torture in the hands of British colonial officials in Kenya. Anderson cautions today's political leaders that with the passage of time, today's human rights violations will have to be paid for in the future.

Anderson asks: "Would the United States be so accommodating to a similar claim? In the current political climate, probably not. But times change. Fifty years from now, will Americans face claims from Guantánamo survivors? You might, and perhaps you should."

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Atoning for the Sins of Empire

By David M. Anderson 

THE British do not torture. At least, that is what we in Britain have always liked to think. But not anymore. In a historic decision last week, the British government agreed to compensate 5,228 Kenyans who were tortured and abused while detained during the Mau Mau rebellion of the 1950s. Each claimant will receive around £2,670 (about $4,000).

The money is paltry. But the principle it establishes, and the history it rewrites, are both profound. This is the first historical claim for compensation that the British government has accepted. It has never before admitted to committing torture in any part of its former empire.

In recent years there has been a clamor for official apologies. In 2010, Britain formally apologized for its army’s conduct in the infamous “Bloody Sunday” killings in Northern Ireland in 1972, and earlier this year Prime Minister David Cameron visited Amritsar, India, the site of a 1919 massacre, and expressed “regret for the loss of life.”

The Kenyan case has been in process for a decade in London’s High Court. The British fought to avoid paying reparations, so the decision to settle is a significant change of direction. The decision comes months ahead of the 50th anniversary of the British departure from Kenya — once thought of as the “white man’s country” in East Africa.

The Kenya case turned on the evidence of historians, including my own role as an expert witness. I identified a large tranche of documents that the British government smuggled out of Kenya in 1963 and brought back to London. The judge ordered the release of this long-hidden “secret” cache, some 1,500 files.

The evidence of torture revealed in these documents was devastating. In the detention camps of colonial Kenya, a tough regime of physical and mental abuse of suspects was implemented from 1957 onward, as part of a government policy to induce detainees to obey orders or to make confessions.

The documents showed that responsibility for torture went right to the top — sanctioned by Kenya’s governor, Evelyn Baring, and authorized at cabinet level in London by Alan Lennox-Boyd, then secretary of state for the colonies in Harold Macmillan’s Conservative government.

Colonial Brutality Revisited: "Atoning for the Sins of Empire"

6/14/2013 04:48:00 PM africa, history, human rights, war and peace

Pondering Mandela's Legacies

As concerns about Mandela's health make news around the world, it seems appropriate to begin a reflection on the life and legacies of the man and the icon.

Pondering Mandela's Legacies

6/13/2013 12:14:00 AM africa, human rights, Tributes, world

Wars Do End: Why Conflict In Africa Is Falling – By Scott Straus

In this eye-opening article in African Arguments, Prof. Scott Straus challenges our conventional wisdom about "wars in Africa." Even in the face of the facts, the media-sustained image of Africa as "war-prone" and a conflict afflicted region may be difficult if not impossible to shake.

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Recent events in Mali, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Sudan seem to confirm one of the most durable stereotypes of Africa, namely that the continent is unstable and uniquely prone to nasty political violence.

Writing in Foreign Policy two years ago, New York Times East Africa correspondent and Pulitzer Prize winner Jeffrey Gettleman espoused this view. He painted a dismal picture of pointless wars waged by brutes and criminals “spreading across Africa like a viral pandemic.”

Gettleman is right that warfare and political violence are changing on the continent, but he is wrong to portray that change as one of brutal violence increasing out of control.

In fact, as I show in a recent piece in African Affairs, looked at since the end of the Cold War, wars are not becoming more frequent in Sub-Saharan Africa. To the contrary: according to the Uppsala Armed Conflict Data Program, the preeminent tracker of warfare worldwide, wars in the 2000s are substantially down from their peak in the early 1990s. Even if one counts an uptick during the past two years, there were about one-third fewer wars in Sub-Saharan Africa in the period compared to the early-to-mid 1990s.

Another prevailing view is that Sub-Saharan Africa is the most war-endemic region. Not so, especially if one looks at the continent’s history since 1960. Wars in Sub-Saharan Africa (compared to other world regions) are not longer or more frequent on a wars-per-country basis. Those distinctions effectively go to Asia, where between wars in India, Afghanistan, the Philippines, and Vietnam, among others, wars are more frequent and longer lasting.

Wars Do End: Why Conflict In Africa Is Falling – By Scott Straus

6/10/2013 03:20:00 AM africa, war and peace

Africa’s spreading extremism concerns experts, expatriates

The Diamondback, Thu May 30, 2013.

As the U.S. continues to focus most of its military efforts on fighting extremist groups in the Middle East, university students from Africa know this is a battle playing out on a much broader stage.

Countries such as Somalia and Sudan have long struggled against radical Islam, and only in the past decade has the U.S. been active against the problem of extremism — albeit in a different region — a fact that irritates Nana Asare, a graduate electrical engineering student, because he sees the U.S. putting its economic interests over its expressed goals of fighting terrorism on a global scale.

“I do think it has to do with the U.S. interests, of course oil comes to mind,” Asare said, adding that while a native of Ghana, a more stable state in the region, those close to the violence across the continent are “fellow Africans — African brothers and sisters.”

The issue has come more into the spotlight in the past year as radical Islam has found a new home: Mali. Mali has long been the site of separatist movements against the Malian government, such as a coup in 2012 that ousted a sitting president. But a new influx of rebels fighting under the banner of radical Islam has changed the scope of the conflict.

After an uprising in nearby Libya led to former ruler Moammar Gadhafi’s ouster and assassination in 2011, forces loyal to him, including the nomadic Tuareg people, took weapons and ammunition from the fallen regime and moved westward to Mali.

“Over the years, [Gadhafi] built a band of very loyal militias,” said Bonny Ibhawoh, an professor of African, Global and Human Rights History at McMaster University in Ontario, Canada. “He did have a lot of military and political influence beyond Libya, so that once Libya [collapsed] and Libya became less hospitable for these foreign troops … they had to find refuge elsewhere.”

The episode in Mali illustrates how a country the U.S. once considered an emerging civil society could become an unstable piece in a volatile region, Ibhawoh said.

Africa’s spreading extremism concerns experts, expatriates

6/01/2013 03:04:00 PM africa, politics, war and peace

"I'm a Human Being"

Every city in the world has its share of the urban homeless. Like many people, I am sometimes guilty of assuming that all urban homelessness is self-inflicted. "They just don’t want to work", "He must be on drugs", "She should go find a shelter."

In this gut-wrenching video, Ronald Davis, a homeless man in Chicago, forces us to rethink our assumptions about the homeless. He says: “It's really humiliating to be shaking a cup 24 hours a day, and people just look at you're like some kind of little bum,” Davis goes on to tell stories of how passers-by call him a bum and yell at him to "get a job." He also tells of his struggles to get a job and leave the streets.

"I'm not a bum," Davis says, "I'm a human being."

Come to think of it, if Jesus lived in any urban city today, he would be labelled a bum. He was itinerant, had no visible means of livelihood and relied on the charity and good will of others. He also had "no place to lay his head."

Luke 9:58: "And Jesus said unto him, Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head."

Lesson: We must strive to be less judgement of others and see the above all else, our collective humanity.

"I'm a Human Being"

4/28/2013 11:16:00 PM human rights, reflections, world

Knowledge Mobilization: Enriching our Comunities

Academics are constantly being asked to produce knowledge that enrich their communities and serve the greater common good. Lately, in Canada, the preferred term for this is "Knowledge Mobilization." There have been varied and sometime conflicting interpretations of what exactly this means. In this workshop, we hope to raise critical questions about the meaning and practice of "knowledge mobilization" as defined by scholars, practitioners and funding agencies. Join us. Registration required.

Knowledge Mobilization: Enriching our Comunities

4/26/2013 01:30:00 PM education

Letter to a Christian friend on the subject of Gay Marriage

I sent the letter below to a good friend who I have known since childhood. He is one of the most decent people I know. A morally upright and devout Christian, a hard-working professional and a devoted father and husband, he has been an inspiration to me and many others over the years.

Lately however, I have been concerned, even disturbed, by some of his tweeter rants and Facebook postings on the subject of gays and gay marriage. Yesterday, I felt compelled to send him the message below:

Dear xxxxxx

I have followed your comments on gays and gay marriage on twitter and Facebook. They have not taken the usually measured tone that I have come to expect of you. I understand that as a Christian, you have a right to express the values of your faith. I feel that need too. However, we must do so with caution, tolerance and sensitivity.

The line between homophobia and professing one's faith can be a thin one. The language I hear today from you is eerily similar to the language of a bygone era. As a friend with whom I share the Christian faith, I feel compelled to send you the quote below as a reminder of the need for us to tread cautiously. The more things change, it seems, the more they remain the same:

"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that He separated the races show that he did not intend for the races to mix."  -- Judge Leon Bazile, an “upright Christian” judge in a judgement upholding Virginia’s segregation law against interracial marriage in the case of Loving v. Virginia (United States, 1959).

History has not been kind to those who spoke like this. Let's learn from the judgement of history.

Your friend,

Bonny

Letter to a Christian friend on the subject of Gay Marriage

4/23/2013 09:31:00 PM human rights, reflections

Quote of the Week

"A peace of no choice must be approached with the same determination and creativity as one approaches a war of no choice." 
- David Grossman as quoted by President Barack Obama in a speech on the Palestinian Israeli conflict in Jerusalem 2013

Quote of the Week

3/23/2013 05:16:00 PM reflections, war and peace