For the past several weeks we have been examining African cosmology in a general observation and overview. At its core African cosmology, regardless of the tribal or ethnic origin, is based upon the belief the universe is both SPIRITUAL and physical in nature. Africans’ perception of reality posits our physical reality is interpenetrated by an omnipresent spiritual reality that impacts and influences our lives and environment all the time.

            For Africans and indigenous people who see themselves as an integral part of a vast spiritual universe, SPIRIT provides additional means of knowing as well as providing insight, information and guidance to help address life’s vicissitudes. When one’s reality is a spiritually dynamic universe, one employs spiritual means to discern the invisible causes behind life’s happenings and also to glean insight and direction for important decisions and courses of action.

Indigenous people routinely call on the spirits, ancestors, healers and diviners to help them unravel life’s challenges and to provide wisdom and information. Divination, contrary to popular misconception, is a universal tool used by most of humanity in some form or another.

            In Africa, divination is a universal method of learning and discerning. “In Africa, divination sessions are instances of consulting the Gods or the ancestors. These are not metaphysical constructs, but real living beings that interact with the living. As a means of communication with the village of the ancestors, divination reinforces the belief in the reality of the world of the spirits and the ancestors. Indeed, in African worldview, ‘the Dead are not dead.’” Encyclopedia of African Religion page 206

            Divination is an essential source of knowledge and makes absolute sense in cultures who believe energies, spirits; forces and intelligences are omnipresent and play a vital role in community and personal life.

 But because most of what we know about Africa was given to us by non-Africans who disparaged Africa and Africans, we too denigrate and disparage our cosmological heritage and roots. We were conditioned to be ashamed of our African heritage and we were taught to hate everything African! As Malcolm X said “We didn’t want anyone to tell us anything about Africa, much less call us an African and in hating the African and hating Africa we ended up hating ourselves without even realizing it because you can’t hate the roots of a tree and not hate the tree. You can’t hate your origin and not end up hating yourself.” Malcolm X, The Roots of Black self-hatred.  But that is changing now.

            Many different forms of divination exist and we are familiar with them such as: crystal ball gazing, tarot cards, the I Ching, fortune telling as well as occult (hidden or secret) practices like palmistry, numerology and astrology.

Africans have been using rituals and varying forms of divination for eons. In his book Of Water and the Spirit Malidoma Patrice Some’ shares the details of a ritual that takes place a few months prior to the birth of a child to determine why this particular child is incarnating at this time.

“The pregnant mother, her brothers, the grandfather and the officiating priest are the participants. The child’s father is not present for the ritual but merely prepares the space. Afterward he is informed about what happened. During the ritual, the incoming soul takes the voice of the mother (some say the soul takes the whole body of the mother, which is why the mother falls into trance and does not remember anything afterward) and answers every question the priest asks. The living must know who is being reborn, where the soul is from, why it chose to come here and what gender it has chosen. Sometime, based on the mission of the incoming soul, the living object to the choice of gender and suggest that the opposite will better accommodate the role the unborn child has chosen for him or herself. Some souls ask that specific things be made ready before their arrival-talismanic power objects, medicine bags, metal objects in the form of rings for the ankle or the wrist…” ibid page 20

Some’ is sharing Dagara ideas about reincarnation, destiny, life mission, spiritual protection, spiritual power and the purpose of being. All of this is consistent with African cosmology, philosophy and the idea that knowledge about the unseen and unknown can and must be obtained from SPIRIT since SPIRIT is the parent reality.

A vast reservoir of information is available to us via SPIRIT. We can access it through prayer, meditation, divination and ritual. This is the African/indigenous way. It is part of aboriginal people’s genius now  called Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) by the West. The more we learn about African cosmology the more profound, powerful and practical it becomes.

Columnist; Junious Ricardo Stanton

Official website; https://fromtheramparts.blogspot.com/

Profundity: A statement or idea that shows great knowledge or insight.

We find ourselves in a protracted life and death struggle grappling with a massive mind control and socialization infrastructure designed to destroy our minds, further desecrate us as spiritual being of African descent, dehumanize us and recast us as fiendish caricatures created by psychopaths. Every day we are confronted with a challenge: being our true profound selves or being profane buffoons and degenerates. Because we do not know our history, who we are, what our ancestors accomplished before the coming of the invaders, we know nothing of our people’s resilience, resourcefulness and strength in the face of centuries of ruthless relentless assault, degradation and oppression and our acquiescence to the psychological domination of the oppressor we are rapidly allowing them to reshape our consciousness and behavior.

We are the victims of societal and institutionally induced amnesia and psychosis; what Edward Wilmot Blyden called the “slavery of the mind”, Dr. W.E.B. Dubois called it “the double consciousness”, Dr. Bobby Wright called it “menticide” and Dr Amos N. Wilson referred to as the falsification of African consciousness.

Every day we see our maladaptive responses to this amnesia/psychosis in our collective disunity, our failure to act based upon our enemies overt and covert assaults on our being; but more importantly we have abandoned our eons old history and pattern of what our venerated warrior scholar/ancestor Mzee Jedi Shemsu Jehewty, (Dr. Jacob H. Carruthers) called African Deep Thought.

Africans created and developed philosophies, cosmologies, strategies for living, human organization and governance thousand of years before there were Europeans. Ancient Africans postulated the nature of the universe, the nature of being even down to the mundane aspects of living in harmony with the environment and society. Africans understood the power of sounds, words, language and speech. To them speech was divine part of our innate spiritual being.

Our only hope to save the planet, ourselves and humanity is returning to our ancient ways, the process the Akan people of West Africacall Sankofa “to go back and fetch”. What does that mean? It means to rediscover our history, our legacy and our traditions. It means to relearn and reconnect with our ancient wisdom and power. We have to return to seeing ourselves as offshoots of the CREATOR with latent skills, powers and an unbreakable link/connection to the UNIVERSE. We have to rediscover what it really means to be in the image of God. We must relearn what Ubuntu and Ma’at mean; those profound ideas about being and living that are thousands of years old.

All indigenous African people have a rich legacy of spiritual awareness, metaphysics and practical application of our ancient wisdom and knowledge. One of the oldest and rudimentary notions of ancient Kemet (Egypt) was the divinity of man, the need and responsibility of society to teach, cultivate and actualize the essence of our inner self. The so called coffin texts and the Kemetian Mystery System reiterate this notion of godly potential and possibilities. (Read Stolen Legacy by George G.M. James, The Book of Coming Forth By Day interpreted by Maulana Karenga, Mdw Nter Divine Speech by Jacob H. Carruthers, Nuk Au Neter by Ra Un Nefer Amen and A Life Centered Life Living MAAT by Rkhty Amen to grasp how deep our African ancestors were/are)

Cultivating our divine potential is a profound idea. These ideas seem strange and blasphemous to people indoctrinated into Eurocentric religious, cultural and historical beliefs; nevertheless they are African and true. We must also realize these ancient African ideas were plagiarized, distorted and perverted by the Eurasians and used against us in their megalomaniacal quest for domination, empire and hegemony whether they were Greeks, Persians, Romans, Arabs or Europeans.

The invaders, usurpers, occupiers and oppressors deliberately and forcibly suppressed our profound knowledge and wisdom (spiritual science, mathematics, philosophy, metaphysics and healing) and replaced them with aspiritual, profane and distorted notions about the nature of the universe, man and the meaning of life itself. The Eurasians never developed nor do they fully resonate with the profound African concept of Ubuntu, “I am because we are, we are because I am”. It means I exist because the universe exists; the universe exists because I exist, we are one, inseparable and interdependent.

The Europeans’ alienated notions of self are best summarized in the adage “I think therefore I am”. Once their barbarian minds could grasp a limited comprehension of African profundity (for example the principles of energy making up matter and the power of vibration) they began using them against us and the planet.  The Eurasian ruling class can fathom neither Ma’at, nor Mdw Nter (Divine Speech) so chaos, violence, war, disruption, lies and deceit form the ethos of their tribal culture and their driving MO for cultural imperialism.  Their language reeks of violence and domination.

To save ourselves and the world we have to return to our African Deep Thought, African profundity. We must reject our oppressors’ profane, vulgar values and anti-life “lifestyles”. It all comes down to profundity vs. profanity.

Columnist; Junious Ricardo Stanton

Official website; https://fromtheramparts.blogspot.com/

PRINCIPLES DO NOT ALWAYS WORK : HABYARIMANA’S BIGGEST MISTAKE.

Prior to the arrival of Europeans, Rwanda was a feudal kingdom ruled by a Tutsi minority over a Hutu majority.

Following the Berlin Conference of 1885 Rwanda came under the suzerainty of Germany which was, itself, replaced as colonial overlord following WW1, by Belgium.

Rwanda’s feudal order remained intact, however, until 1956 when the Belgians finally organized elections.

Then, in November 1959, the Hutu majority overthrew the Tutsi monarchy. Many Tutsis fled, the majority ending up, significantly, in Uganda.

It was from this perch in Uganda that the exiled Tutsi aristocracy launched, between 1960 and 1973, a series of violent attacks against the Rwandan regime.

These were repulsed and for the next decade and a half Rwanda enjoyed a period of relative peace.

It is worth noting at this juncture that, though much of the Tutsi aristocracy fled in 1960, those Tutsis who remained were well integrated into Rwandan society and body politic. Thus, both the government and army contained significant numbers of Tutsi personnel even through the height of the crisis in April 1994.

In fact, the Rwandan Army (FAR) continued as a multi-ethnic organization even as it was forced to retreat into the forests of the Congo in July of 1994; this after having run out of ammunition due to a Western embargo on arms supplies – an embargo not applied to the RPF.

Up until 1990 there was no further interference in Rwanda from Uganda.

Nevertheless, by then the Tutsis exiles living there had become one of the main elements of the Ugandan Army.

As such, when Museveni came to power – having been handpicked by the US and Britain to oust the socialist, Milton Obote – a third or more of his army consisted of Tutsis. Many of these held high office, including Paul Kagame.

Kagame had been (and remains) an erstwhile client of Washington from well before he claimed to have ‘saved Rwanda from further genocide’ in 1994. Not only had he served as director of Ugandan military intelligence in the 1980s, but he had also received training at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and had been the beneficiary of constant US material and diplomatic support from the moment he assumed control of the RPF.

Upon the collapse of the USSR in 1989/90 the US and the UK began a general militarist expansion which included the targeting of Yugoslavia and Rwanda; Yugoslavia as it was the last real bastion of working socialism in Europe, and Rwanda as it was a working model of socialist development in Africa.

In addition, the US had turned against Mobutu (of Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) as he was beginning to ally himself politically with China.

The Rwandan president, Habyarimana, was subsequently approached by Washington to allow his country to be used as a staging ground for an attack on Zaire (to this day, a cornucopia of precious resources prized by the West).

His refusal caused the US to look to other agents in furthering its strategic interests. They found the Tutsis in Uganda, ever thirsting for restoration of their hegemony in Rwanda.

Furthermore, Museveni had begun to feel uneasy about the numbers of Tutsis in his ranks and was looking to be rid of them. The opportunity to satisfy these disparate desires soon came.

WHY RWANDAN OPPOSITION PARTIES HAVE FAILED.

FDLR.

The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda was created for a very good cause-to liberate Rwandans from the tyranny they have been subjected to by the RPF.

However,the FDLR has remained a partisan party which cannot command any legitimacy beyond the Hutu clan.

I for one am a Hutu and would love to join the FDLR but the problem with the FDLR leadership is that they are not ready to welcome new ideas.

They think that they know better than everybody else.

We have to give them credit for saving the lives of thousands of Hutu refugees but is Rwanda only made up of HUTU?

Another flow is their resistance to the new wave-youths are not represented as they should be.

They still sell the same old ideology when in fact what Paul Kagame needs right now is a war with people he cannot accuse of genocide and who do you think those are?

RNC.

The Rwanda National Congress is a predominantly Tutsi political group established in the United States on 12 December 2010 that represents the Tutsi exiled opposition to the government of Rwandan President Paul Kagame.

Unlike the FDLR,the RNC has one objective only-put an end to Paul Kagame’s rule.

These Tutsi brothers mean business.

They are not beating about the bush.

They want Paul Kagame gone and that is it.

However,what will happen after Paul Kagame is no more?

AN OPPOSITION WITHOUT ANY AGENDA.

I won’t dwelve too much into Faustin Twagiramungu and Paul Rusesabagina’s political parties because these two gentlemen are a disgrace to Rwandan politics but what I will do is to analyse Thomas Nahimana’s political career.

THOMAS NAHIMANA-IS HE A PROPHET OF DOOM?

It is clear that Paul Kagame will be President for life after the Senate’s vote that paved way for him to override his constitutional mandate by standing for the third term.

As for our dear Padiri-why give legitimacy to a flawed process?

Is it really necessary for Padiri Thomas Nahimana to contest in the upcoming Rwandan elections?

What signal will he be sending to the international community?

CONCLUSION.

People take Paul Kagame for God.

They cannot speak ill of him or simply put-criticise him.

The FDLR lacks diplomacy and international credibility.

The RNC lacks a military clout but has connections in the international circles.

Rwandans are tired of opportunists like Thomas Nahimana,Faustin Twagiramungu and Paul Rusesabagina.

Why not join our forces?

Why not inspire the youths not to fear Paul Kagame?

Why not see past whatever happened  before 1994?

Why not reconcile?

It is the fear of the unknown that will always hunt us.

We are a people who live in a fantasy-we believe in rumours more than anything else.

We fear not because there is a threat but because we are too naïve to trust eachother.

The time has come for us to put Rwanda first and man up.

Stop being cowards and let us combine our efforts in liberating Rwandans from the KAGAME DYNASTY.

Columnist; Lionel Nishimwe

Official website; http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lionel-Nishimwe-Ngandu-Consultancy/1529677940632724

We grew up hearing stories of how Paul Kagame used the likes of PASTEUR BIZIMUNGU and FAUSTIN TWAGIRAMUNGU(both being Highly Educated and Respected Hutu Intellectuals) to achieve his goal which is evidently none other than turning Rwanda into a KAGAME DYNASTY.

DOES KAGAME HAVE FRIENDS OR ALLIES?

Paul Kagame is not your ordinary Dictator.

He has learnt very well from his Masters over the years.

In 1994-It was clear that only a HUTU could command the legitimacy of the general Rwandan populace.Besides,most Rwandans saw the RPF as a foreign force to which they owed no loyalty to.

Therefore,it was imperative to create a facade where HUTU Politicians will seem to have DE JURE powers when in the actual sense the real DE FACTO powers over the state were in Military hands-Kagame’s hands.

WHY I DO NOT FEEL SORRY FOR PEOPLE WHO WORKED WITH PAUL KAGAME.

AN UNNECESSARY WAR.

On October 1, 1990 the self-styled Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) launched a surprise attack from Uganda. Though calling themselves a force of ‘liberation’ the offensive was a thinly disguised invasion by Uganda itself. Initially, the justification for the invasion put out by the RPF was that of attaining the right of return of Tutsi refugees. This claim, however, was belied by the fact that Rwanda had, under UN auspices, already agreed a few weeks earlier to the return of all Tutsis who wished to do so. That accord required Tutsi representatives to travel to Kigali to determine both the logistics of that population movement and their subsequent accommodation within Rwanda. The delegation was expected at the end of September, 1990. They never arrived.

The attack killed tens of thousands of Rwandan civilians. These crimes, though well documented, have never been accounted for, nor did the UN or ‘international community’ ever seek to account for them. Indeed, there was not even a shred of condemnation of the Ugandan/RPF  invasion, this despite the clamour raised only two months earlier with regard to the advance of Iraqi forces into Kuwait. In point of fact, the US and its allies supported the aggression against Rwanda and US Special Forces operated alongside the RPF from the beginning. This support notwithstanding, the small Rwandan army (with some help from a Congolese battalion) was eventually able to repel the invading forces.

Following this attempt using a proxy force to overthrow the state, the United States brought political and economic pressure to bear upon Rwanda’s one-party socialist state (MRND). The President, Juvenal Habyarimana, instead of resisting, agreed to alter the constitution and in 1991 Rwanda became a multi-party democracy. Though the Rwandan government effected this as an offer of peace, what followed was anything but peace. Thus, rather than work towards reconciliation, the RPF turned from the tactics of open warfare to those of guerrilla terrorism.

In 1992, and whilst RPF forces were busy planting mines, assassinating politicians and blaming it on the MRND, a coalition government was formed with the front parties of the RPF. These agents, with US backing, quickly seized control of key ministries and succeeded in appointing the Prime Minister. They also gained control of the intelligence services which they then began to dismantle. In essence, the ‘power sharing’ arrangement had largely given over control of the country to the very forces long bent on its destruction.

The RPF itself, meanwhile, engaged in a ‘talk and fight’ strategy; always agreeing to a ceasefire, pressing for more power, then launching new attacks on the civilian population. The most egregious of these assaults was their breaking of the ceasefire and the launching of a major offensive in February of 1993. Seizing the town of Ruhengeri, RPF forces murdered some 40,000, mostly Hutu, civilians. Once again, the ‘international community’ remained dutifully silent.

The Rwandan army, though hamstrung by the civilian ministries, managed to repulse the RPF attack. Finally, in August of 1993, the Arusha Accords were signed under pressure from the United States and its allies, and from which the RPF obtained major concessions. The Accords dictated the formation of a broad-based transition government to be followed by general elections.

But for the RPF – as for the United States – there was a fatal fly in the electoral ointment. To wit, the RPF knew that they could not win such elections; this not only because they were unpopular with the majority (85%) Hutu population, but also because they had precious little support amongst many of Rwanda’s internal Tutsis whose lives and businesses they had destroyed. Rather than prepare for elections, the RPF prepared for something different.

UN reports document the massive build-up of men and weapons coming in from Uganda during this period. In fact, the UN force (UNAMIR) supposedly deployed to ensure a peaceful transition acted, instead, as a cover for the US and its allies, i.e. Britain, Belgium, Canada, to assist the illegal build-up. General Romeo Dallaire, the Canadian general in charge of the UN force, hid this build-up not only from the Rwandan Army and the President, but also from his immediate superiors, Jacques-Roger Booh-Booh and UN Secretary General Boutros Ghali. These machinations were accompanied by death threats against Habyarimana, threats made all the more significant by the murder of the first Hutu president of neighbouring Burundi, Melchior Ndadaye, by Tutsi officers in October 1993.

The result of the 1993 RPF offensive was the forced migration of hundreds of thousands of Hutus from northern Rwanda towards Kigali so that by April, 1994 over a million refugees were encamped close to the capital and hundreds of thousands more in camps to the south. The RPF, meanwhile, did all it could to paralyze the functioning of the government, to exacerbate racial tensions, and to prepare for war.

2. KAGAME’S FRIENDS ARE PARTLY RESPONSIBLE.

Dr. Léopold Munyakazi ‘s case

Dr. Léopold Munyakazi is in the custody of ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, in Miami, Florida, where he is on the verge of being extradited to Rwanda for alleged crimes related to the 1994 massacres that came to be known as the Rwandan Genocide.

This Hutu fellow worked with and for Paul Kagame for many years.

He helped Paul Kagame and his friends to create an atmosphere that Rwandans are experiencing today.

He left Rwanda merely because he had fallen out with his Boss.

He knew that sooner or later he was going to answer for his participation in various crimes against humanity.

CONCLUSION.

We are called to be compassionate with those in need of help but let others who have created their misfortunes suffer the consequences.

All those who worked for and with Paul Kagame will one day pay the price.

DR. LÉOPOLD MUNYAKAZI should have learnt from his HUTU predecessors that Paul Kagame only has allies,not friends.

As soon as one becomes expendable-they either get accused of genocide if fortunate or be assassinated in the worst case scenario.

Columnist; Lionel Nishimwe

Official website; http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lionel-Nishimwe-Ngandu-Consultancy/1529677940632724

The U.N. military spokesman said he had no information about mass killings in Duekoue, though he confirmed there are nearly 1,000 peacekeepers based there.

Spokesman Patrick Nicholson of the Roman Catholic charity Caritas said workers visited Duekoue on Wednesday and found hundreds of bodies of civilians killed by bullets from small-arms fire and hacked to death with machetes.

He said they estimated that more than 1,000 civilians were killed.

The International Federation of the Red Cross put the death toll at Duekoue at about 800, in separate and independent visits Thursday and Friday.

Nicholson, the Caritas spokesman, said the killings occurred over three days in a neighborhood controlled by fighters loyal to internationally recognized President Alassane Ouattara, though it was not clear who the perpetrators were.

“The massacre took place in the ‘Carrefour’ quarter of town, controlled by pro-Ouattara forces, during clashes on Sunday 27 March to Tuesday 29 March,” Nicholson said. “Caritas does not know who was responsible for the killing, but says a proper investigation must take place to establish the truth.”

He said the victims included many refugees from fighting elsewhere in the country, where rival forces had been battling over a disputed November election.

Caritas’ investigation would indicate that people were killed at close quarters in a small neighborhood of a town of just 50,000 people as pro-Ouattara fighters began a two-pronged assault that brought them swiftly to Abidjan, the commercial capital and seat of power, within days.

// The charges would be a strong blow to the embattled government of Ouattara, who is calling for entrenched incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo to cede power after losing November’s poll.

Ouattara’s camp denied forces fighting for it were involved in any atrocities including in western Ivory Coast, but did not refer to the latest allegations. Efforts to reach Ouattara’s spokesman Saturday were unsuccessful. He did not respond to calls to his cell phone.

Previously, the United Nations put the death toll at 492 from four months of fighting to install rival leaders following disputed November elections.

Col. Chaib Rais, the U.N. military spokesman, told The Associated Press that nearly 1,000 peacekeepers at Duekoue “are protecting the Catholic Church with more than 10,000 (refugees) inside, and we have military camps in the area.”

But he said “I have no special report of (mass killings). There was fighting two days before, on Sunday, and people were killed, but I cannot confirm those numbers.”

Rais said there was fighting in and around the town on Sunday and Monday, between forces loyal to the rival leaders.

On Monday, fighters loyal to Ouattara said they took Duekoue. But Nicholson said interviews with survivors indicated pro-Ouattara forces had control of Carrefour neighborhood from Sunday.

ICRC spokeswoman Dorothea Krimitsas said “inter-communal violence” erupted there, apparently on Tuesday.

International and Ivorian Red Cross teams visited Duekoue Friday and saw a “huge number of bodies,” estimated at more than 800, she said.

“We think there is a risk that this kind of event can happen again and hope that by calling today again for protection for the civilian population, we hope that such events can be avoided in the future,” Krimitsas told The Associated Press by phone from Geneva.

The area has been a hotbed for conflict between two tribes that support rival leaders vying for power in Ivory Coast, the democratically elected Ouattara and Gbagbo, who refuses to accept his election defeat.

The International Organization of Migration said Friday that tens of thousands of refugees have overcrowded Duekoue and that others who had fled the violence in Duekoue “are now stranded along the route, in fear for their lives.”

It said some of those slaughtered apparently were killed by “mercenaries” from nearby Liberia. Liberian mercenaries have been reported to be fighting for both Gbagbo and Ouattara.

The Roman Catholic bishop for the area, the Right Rev. Gaspard Beby Gneba of Man, said he was called by a priest from Guiglo, a town near Duekoue that also is sheltering refugees. He said the priest told him refugees were dying and that they were burying two people on Saturday.

Gneba said tensions in the area are a mixture of political, ethnic and land rivalry, aggravated by the influx of tens of thousands of new Ivorian refugees and long-established refugees from neighboring Liberia. In January, an unknown number of people were killed in violence in which some homes were torched and others looted, he said.

Gneba said more than 30,000 refugees had flooded the town of about 50,000 since January. Many are being sheltered at the Salesian priests’ Mission of St. Theresa of the Baby Jesus.

“There’s a traumatic humanitarian situation there,” Gneba said. “They need everything: food, medicine, water, sanitation. People have lost everything, houses, clothes, they do not even have a mat to sleep on.”

Rais, the U.N. colonel, said there are nearly 400 peacekeepers based at Guiglo who were doing what they could to help with water and food.

Ouattara’s government, in a general statement Friday responding to allegations of abuses by Amnesty International, blamed any killings on Gbagbo forces acting as they retreated.

Ouattara had long tried to distance himself from the northern-based fighters taking up his cause who fought in a brief civil war almost a decade ago that left the country split in two. Those fighters were accused of many atrocities at the time.

But Ouattara’s repeated calls for an international military intervention to force out Gbagbo and end the violence have gone unheeded. This week he appeared to change tack as the fighters began a swift advance on Abidjan, calling the rebels the “Republican Forces.”

“The government firmly rejects these accusations and denies all implication of the Republican Forces of Ivory Coast in any possible violations,” said Friday’s statement.

Human Rights Watch issued a statement Saturday saying it had documented abuses, with the vast majority perpetrated by forces loyal to Gbagbo against real or perceived Ouattara supporters, as well as against West African immigrants and Muslims.

“The documented abuses include targeted killings, enforced disappearances, politically motivated rapes, and unlawful use of lethal force against unarmed demonstrators,” the statement said. “These abuses, committed over a four-month period by security forces under the control of Gbagbo and militias loyal to him, may rise to the level of crimes against humanity.”

It was not immediately possible to reach Gbagbo or his ministers.

But the New York-based organization said atrocities committed by pro-Ouattara forces also could amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, including three detainees burned alive and four whose throats were slit, all in Abidjan.

“Human Rights Watch has also received credible reports of abuses committed when Ouattara’s forces took control of several towns in western (Ivory Coast),” it said.

In one village near Abidjan, the statement said, at least nine civilians were killed “in an apparent case of collective punishment against alleged civilian supporters of Gbagbo.”

It added, “The killing of civilians by pro-Ouattara forces, at times with apparent ethnic or political motivation, also risks becoming a crime against humanity should it become widespread or systematic.”

The free texts from South Africa’s largest HIV treatment site are part of a push in Africa to boost health by targeting the continent’s 624 million mobile phone subscribers.

“I check my cellphone all the time — I think that’s why it [the drug regimen] is working so well,” said patient Emily Moletsane, 40, in a queue at Johannesburg’s Themba Lethu clinic which averages more than 450 people a day.

About 10,000 people have opted for the txtAlert reminders, which have proven a stunning success. Missed appointments at the centre from 15 percent fell from in mid-2007 to just four percent today.

“When I started seeing this, I was also impressed,” said medical manager Thapelo Maotoe.

Africa is poor in landlines and hospital beds but rich in cellphones, which is why mobile health — mHealth — offers opportunities for providing care at a low cost, say experts.

In west Africa, 2,200 doctors in Ghana and all of Liberia’s 143 doctors have signed on to anti-poverty group Africa Aid’s MDNet network, allowing then to call or text other physicians for free. In Ghana, a national directory helps find the number to call.

Ghanian paediatrician Frank Serebour recently used the system to find a specialist in the capital Accra for emergency surgery on a newborn baby who had been brought to his hospital in Kumasi, 270 kilometres (170 miles) away.

“All I did was pick up the directory, found the relevant specialist, arrangements were made and when the ambulance arrived they were waiting for the patient,” he said.

More than 2.5 million calls have been made so far on the network, which partners with major mobile operators.

“I wish it could be duplicated in every African country. If only they could hook up every single health worker — nurse, midwife — onto the system,” said Serebour.

With the value of the mHealth sector estimated at up to 60 billion dollars, mHealth companies are on the rise, said Adele Waugaman, who manages a partnership between the UN Foundation and Vodafone.

“The opportunities for mHealth in Africa are nearly limitless. The continent carries a disproportionate share of the world’s disease burden, and some of the lowest per capita doctor to patient ratios,” she said.

“Mobile phones are now being looked to as a tool to help overcome some of these entrenched global health challenges.”

Seventeen years after being torn apart by genocide, Rwanda is trailblazing the use of technology to overcome challenges in a country with one doctor for every 18,000 people.

“These tools solve problems specific to developing countries, such as a lack of specialists and specialized services in rural areas that are only be available in urban areas,” Rwanda’s eHealth coordinator, Richard Gakuba, told AFP.

“Investment is still needed because this technology does not come cheaply and we still face infrastructure challenges.”

One project is TRACnet, developed by American firm Voxiva, which tracks HIV data but also sends reminders for reports to be filed, monitors drug stocks and delivers test results.

Diagnosis of HIV in babies has been slashed from four months to two weeks.

TRACnet, used in 450 Rwandan health centres, “is the only tool we have for tracking this data,” said Christian Munyaburanga, an e-Health trainer.

“Most of these centres do not have Internet connections and many do not have electricity.”

The explosion of phones in Africa is being used for applications from quizzes promoting good behaviour in Uganda to coordinating health workers in Senegal.

But scaling up these projects remains a challenge and many governments don’t have eHealth policies yet.

Marcha Neethling of the Praekelt Foundation in South Africa, which developed txtAlert, says it costs roughly 14 US cents per patient per month to receive the reminders.

“There is no other technology that can reach people in such masses. For the bang for your buck — the amount that you would spend to reach one person — it is by far the cheapest technology,” she said.

“It’s so obvious to us that it’s making a massive impact.”

Written By Justine Gerardy

John McWhorter is not buying the romanticism of sharing the pain of “fellow Africans.” But that doesn’t prevent him from sympathizing with their struggle.

Only now am I becoming able to make peace with something that has nagged at me lately: I don’t think of the protesters in Egypt as my brothers and sisters.

There, I said it.

I am heartened daily by their victories. If someone asked me to help in some way, I would do all I could. But I do not see the people in those streets as “my people.”

Some would say that I am supposed to. But here’s why I, at least, am no longer feeling a pang of guilt when I see photos of Tahrir Square and do not see the faces as comrades of mine.

Reason 1: We are to perceive the Egyptians as fellow “Africans,” but designating people as culturally united simply because they share a landmass is dicey. Imagine the newspaper headline “Asians Found Adrift on Raft.” We would be properly horrified at Chinese, Vietnamese and Sri Lankans being lumped together as one entity. Calling an Egyptian, a Senegalese and a Malagasy all one thing suffers from a similar problem. Spontaneously, most of us process Egypt as culturally a part of the Middle East — because it is.

Oh, but “black” Egypt was the source of the ancient Greeks’ intellectual legacy? Well, for one thing, it wasn’t (try here or here). And besides, the arrival of Islam in the seventh century made Egypt a culturally and demographically distinct place from the land of the pharaohs.

And the problem only gets worse when you really think about what it means to treat an Egyptian, a Senegalese, a Malagasy and a black man from Detroit all as one thing. Black Americans are descended from Africans, but my, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

Some passages stick with you. In The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks, Randall Robinson described the media’s downplaying of a pipeline explosion in Nigeria and despaired, “We don’t know what happened to us and no one will tell us.” “Us,” says this black American writer from Virginia. It struck me: I am to sense the plight of Nigerians as immediately as I do the plight of black schoolchildren in Oakland, Calif.

My circle of empathy certainly has room for Nigerians and other people I don’t know and have not lived among or even near. But I cannot pretend that they occupy the same inner circle of my empathy as do the people I have spent my life knowing — any more than a woman in Lagos is expected to be as starkly committed to what happens in Atlanta as she is to what happens in her own country.

In the same way, I cannot honestly process the Egyptians as “us.” I doubt that most black Americans can, and I’m not sure there is anything wrong with that …

… or is there? Others remind us that Egypt was once a hub of anti-colonialism in the name of struggling peoples worldwide. There was an intoxicating sense of potential in the idea of all the world’s peoples who are struggling under the colonialist yoke banding together to bring on a new day.

Another passage that sticks with me: Maya Angelou, in the fourth installment of her autobiography series, The Heart of a Woman, being whisked into Cairo in a cab with her son at the height of the pan-Third World ideology. Maya and Guy are so elated to be there that they look out the windows and just laugh and laugh. I love that scene — and instances of black Americans of that era regularly lending support to people of color resisting oppression. Another good scene: Adam Clayton Powell Jr. at the Third World Conference in Bandung, Indonesia, in 1955, schooling pro-colonialist reporters on how the oppression in places like India was as unforgivable as what was then happening in the American South (he describes it best in this book).

What happened to that sentiment? Well, we know, don’t we?

Reason 2: Black America overcame. Wait, wait — I know, not completely, by any means. But when Egyptians tell the press that an educated middle-class person has no significant chances in life there, who among us can say that this is the black American plight today — as opposed to what it was for all but a sliver in 1955?

Who can honestly say that poor black people are poor because of efforts as nakedly oppressive as those of the Mubarak regime? Inevitably, then, black Americans’ sense of solidarity with those suffering from concrete, brutal subjugation — rather than the more abstract bugbear of “institutional racism” — will not be as immediate and spontaneous as it was more than half a century ago.

Will we have no interest at all in what is going on in Egypt? Of course not. But we return to that circle of empathy. Its expansion is a mark of human advancement — from family, to city, to nation — but extending it beyond national or cultural boundaries is a stretch.

Philosophers have torn their hair out for centuries trying to figure out how we will achieve a pan-human commitment, and upon what basis. We pull it off for a spell, but it’s awfully hard to sustain. Just ask international aid agencies after tragedies such as the earthquake in Haiti.

As such, the question with Egypt becomes, can we extend our circle of empathy to the past? Maybe we can teach ourselves to acknowledge that black Americans once suffered the same way that Egyptians do now, and that we were once comrades with them in a very concrete way. But can we feel this, intimately and open-endedly, as human beings leading busy lives in conjunction with our nearest and dearest? Especially when, for that matter, even in the present, Egyptians — Arabic-speaking Muslims of the Middle Eastern orbit — are so culturally distant from black Americans as well as from our sub-Saharan ancestors?

I feel them, the Egyptians throwing off the yoke. But I feel them just as I felt the protesters in Iran two summers ago, or the ones in Thailand last year. Or as I would feel the Solidarnosc protesters in Poland if that were happening now.

But are the Egyptians my brothers? That I do not feel. They are, to me, people. I don’t think it’s wrong for me or any other black person to feel that way.

Written By CTA

Some black writers have suggested African-Americans don’t have a special responsibility to pay attention to Egypt’s political turmoil because Egyptians aren’t culturally or politically connected with us. I disagree. While Egypt is culturally more part of the Middle East than Africa, Egyptians are a genetically a mix of Arab/Berber and sub-Saharan African. There’s so much to know about Egypt and its ancient roots, Give Me History has some great articles explaining a lot about its past if you want to learn more. They are also drawing some inspiration and tactical ideas from the Civil Rights Movement in the U.S.

More importantly, Egypt is one of Africa’s most populous nations. As one of the “Next Eleven” emerging economies, it’s also a regional economic powerhouse. Now that Mubarak has been deposed, the fallout could have domino-like ramifications throughout Africa. Many of the issues playing out in North Africa are also happening elsewhere on the continent, including the West African region.

Last year, Africa surpassed the one billion population mark. The continent has the world’s fastest growing youth population, and almost two-thirds of unemployed Africans are under the age of 25. Thus, authoritarian sub-Saharan leaders are also on a ticking time bomb. Quite a few sub-Saharan African leaders have been in power for 20 years or more. Corruption costs Africa more than $300 billion a year, which is six times higher than the foreign aid that it annually receives. Africa’s youth are growing less tolerant of scenarios where they suffer while leaders entrusted with national treasuries choose to plunder them. They increasingly look West and East, and wonder why their countries can’t have economic prosperity, genuine democratic rule, and human rights as well.

Andrew Mwenda is a Ugandan journalist who often challenges Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni’s policies, even to the point of going to jail on sedition charges (Uganda’s courts later ruled in his favor). Mwenda writes in his newspaper Independent that the factors which led to Tunisian President Ben Ali’s downfall — increasingly educated and tech-savvy youth population, coupled with high unemployment and insufficient economic growth to meet educated youth’s rising aspirations — face Uganda’s 25-year ruler:

As Tunisians celebrated the downfall of Ben Ali, Daily Monitor of January 19 reported that Uganda is producing 400,000 graduates from tertiary institutions every year. Only 20,000 are getting jobs in the public sector. Even counting the private and informal sectors, Uganda is unlikely to be creating more than 150,000 jobs every year. Over the next five years, this country may have more than a million unemployed graduates,” he writes. “These unemployed graduates are not going to sit around and passively watch the kinds of institutionalised corruption, incompetence and nepotism that we see in Uganda. They will begin to question the existing political order.

Another authoritarian leader on the watch list is Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, who has been in power for 30 years. Zimbabwe’s relatively educated population has fled to South Africa and Botswana after the country’s hyperinflation woes. Also, land-reform policies against white minority farmers ostensibly designed to help level the playing field from the colonial era have instead been used to enrich political cronies, turning what used to be Africa’s breadbasket into a food desert.

Equatorial Guinea President Teodoro Obiang — who has been in power for 31 years — is another longtime authoritarian ruler to watch. Although oil wealth in the country of 700,000 people gives it a per capita income of $32,000 a year (which ranks it 28th in the world), 60 percent of Equatoguinean live on less than $1 a day due to massive corruption involving the ruling family.

South African commentator Sentletse Diakanyo is hopeful that the events going on in North Africa challenging authoritarian rule will spread throughout the continent. “The recent revolutions across the Arab world, from Tunisia to Jordan, Yemen, Algeria, Egypt and Syria should serve as an inspiration to Africans whose existence is at the mercy of kleptomaniacs and despots,” he writes in his column in the Mail & Guardian.

“The African Union has become a club of despots, most of whom have been in power for over 30 years. They have plundered the resources of their own countries with no meaningful economic development and social progress of their people. The people of Libya, Equatorial Guinea, Zimbabwe, Angola, Swaziland and other parts of Africa, w[h]ere despots refuse to yield to meaningful political and economic reforms, must rise to defend their own countries and install governments they deserve.”

Written By Shamara Riley

Africa: Guinea Bissau, Ghana, Gambia, Senegal, Kenya, Zimbabwe
Europe: London
Caribbean: St. Thomas
Canada: Toronto
U.S.A.: Southern Region-Atlanta; Midwest Region-Illinois;
Northeast Region-Washington DC; Western Region-California

On behalf of the All-African People’s Revolutionary Party (A-APRP) and its women’s wing, the All-African Women’s Revolutionary Union (A-AWRU), we are issuing this press release to announce the commemoration of African Liberation Day (ALD), 2010.

African Liberation Day was first observed In 1958 on the occasion of the First Conference of Independent African States held in Accra, Ghana. At that time, the 15th of April was declared Africa Freedom Day, “...to symbolize the determination of the people of Africa to free themselves from foreign domination and exploitation”. Later in 1963, upon the founding of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), 31 Heads of African states declared May 25th as African Liberation Day. This important, historic event has been observed and institutionalized in various places worldwide, every year since its inception.

African Liberation Day provides a forum for us to become more aware of the history and current reality of Africa, and the world. It is a chance to hear directly from women, men and youth who are on the frontline of struggle for Pan-Africanism, and other struggles for justice. It allows us to engage interactively with others who are dedicated and committed to the creation of Pan-Africanism.

The program will feature dynamic panel presentations, cultural performances, solidarity statements, vendors, food, leaflets and a rare opportunity to build and strengthen the international Pan-African network of organizations.

This year’s ALD theme is “Celebrating African Women’s Contribution to African Liberation and Unity“. Historically, African women have played a crucial role in the struggle against oppression. They have actively fought for justice for African women, their families and their nation. We will salute the countless women who participated in the defeat of colonialism and slavery; who continue to struggle against marginalization and all forms of oppression. We will celebrate the sacrifice, the fortitude and the determination of African women, wherever in the world we were born or live.

We urge you to join us at this historic event. For further information about ALD commemorations being organized by the AAPRP in Africa, Europe and the United States please,

visit our websites at:
http://africanliberationday.net/
http://www.aaprp-intl.org/

See us on facebook at:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/African-Liberation-Day/168255935370