Britain Intervenes in Saudi Arabia’s “Internal Affairs”
By Tanya Cariina Hsu
Global Research, October 20, 2012
Last month, the British government opened an inquiry to re-examine relations with Saudi Arabia and Bahrain in the aftermath of last years’ Arab Spring protests. The UK Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee (FAC) will examine Britain’s multiple trade, defence, security, counter-terrorism and human rights interests in the two countries, and one of the most important questions examined will be, “how the UK can encourage democratic and liberalising reforms in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, including its power to effect improvements”.
To repeat, the inquiry will ask how the UK can “encourage democratic and liberalising reforms in Saudi Arabia”.
Prompted in part by complaints from Bahrain’s Shi’ia opposition activists, the inquiry results are to be published next year. Concurrently, the Bahrain Federation of Expatriate Associations (BFEA)—which represents half of the population of 600,000 ex-pats—made a statement charging the opposition of systemic abuses against their community, property, schools, places of worship and security forces. The Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI) report last year indeed found evidence in Bahrain of abuses, and King Hamed bin Isa al-Khalifa immediately promised reforms and an end to any such injustices.
The image of security forces travelling into Bahrain in armoured vehicles became, in Western parlance, ‘soldiers in tanks’—not the requested security units per rules of co-operation and protection between the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council member states. Saudi Arabia led the convoy with 1,000 men on March 13th 2011 in response to the unrest, and the United Arab Emirates dispatched 500 police to Bahrain’s streets to quell the crowds. The situation was unique in the Arab Spring uprisings in that Bahrain was the only Gulf State to experience significant protests, the other GCC members (Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, the UAE and Saudi Arabia) having witnessed no uprisings and barely a protest.
The issue at the heart of the British inquiry is simple: How can the UK support democratic change in the region but not risk the multi-billion pound bilateral defence and trade partnership contracts? Can the UK afford upsetting one of her largest defence importers—the world’s largest oil producer and traditional ally—whilst at the same time criticise Saudi Arabia for protection of Bahrain, home to the US Navy’s 5th Fleet?
There is a bigger problem, however. It is a matter of what is already legally established, rules of diplomacy in foreign relations not tossed aside arbitrarily.
Interference in another states’ domestic policies is prohibited and is expressly codified in diplomatic law, and the reciprocity of this moral obligation is fully expected. Such interference has led the US, Britain and others to increasingly persuade states in the Middle East and North Africa to sign agreements with one hand whilst extracting conditions on the other.
Professor G.R. Berridge, a leading authority on contemporary diplomatic practice, explained, “Non-intervention in ‘domestic affairs’ is perhaps the most basic rule of a system of states because it is the other side of the coin of ‘sovereignty’.” Article 2(7) of the United Nations Charter states the rule “baldly”, with the 1961 Vienna Convention of Diplomatic Relations taking non-interference in the matters of other states as an action diplomatically assumed, he said.
Complexities become more acute in relation to human rights but nevertheless “the rule has been weakened by the Western campaign for such rights” and has been thus subject to notorious difficulties. Although there are certain circumstances where interference can occur from an outside state, it must be authorised by the UN Security Council, should be deemed “the only means of ending massive and sustained abuse of human rights”, or is considered so essential to self-defence that it would “pre-empt imminent and devastating aggression,” Dr. Berridge stated. As he wrote in his book ‘Diplomacy: Theory and Practice’, intervention from outside risks being viewed “with the immediate intention either of influencing some aspect of its domestic policy or of changing its regime”.
On October 15th, Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the UK Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf al-Saud said the Kingdom would “not tolerate or accept any foreign interference in the workings” of the GCC, and “Saudi Arabia’s relations with the GCC is an internal matter”. Saudi officials said that the Kingdom is now “re-evaluating their country’s historic relations with Britain” and that “all options will be looked at”.
Separate to whether or not Bahrain insufficiently meets democratic standards, one wonders what, precisely, Britain hopes to achieve with this inquiry.
British intervention in matters involving Saudi Arabia and Bahrain do not meet the diplomatic criteria surrounding interference: the reason behind the inquiry appears a cost-benefit analysis between human rights at the expense of trade.
More specifically, the element of contractual coercion is outlined in UN Resolution 2526 (Declaration on Principles of International Law Concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation Among States): “No State may use or encourage the use of economic, political or any other type of measures to coerce another State in order to obtain from it the subordination of the exercise of its sovereign rights and to secure from it advantages of any kind.”
The West has for decades routinely accused Saudi Arabia and other nations of all forms of human rights’ abuses whilst brushing its own under the carpet. By contrast, Saudi Arabia issues no such reports in condemnation of abuses in America, Britain or Europe, despite the high domestic homicide rates, rapes, drug use, and international human trafficking or hate crimes. The Kingdom issued no formal declarations of complaint when the Irish Republican Army bombed, killed, terrorised and maimed British subjects in London in the 1970s and 80s. Saudi Arabia did not attempt to intervene when Civil Rights protestors were brutalised, burnt and beaten by US forces in Alabama in the 60s. The Kingdom adheres to the non-interference policy as set forth in the Vienna Conventions: ‘hands off other states’ domestic affairs’.
Having left a terrible legacy of betrayal in the region post World War I in partnership with France and the United States, Britain risks reverting to Imperial-type in the desire for change in the Middle East. As we witness the 21st century carnage in the region and the lessons failed to be learnt, this inquiry—despite honest intentions in human rights—might reconsider the rule of diplomatic law established half a century ago.
Tanya Cariina Hsu is a British political analyst specializing in US-Saudi foreign policy.
Articles by: Tanya Cariina Hsu
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According to Saudi ex-Spy Prince Turki al-Faisal’s at a conference in Bahrain (January 17, 2012) , “Saudi Arabia will use “all available options” to defend itself against Iranian “threats” that might trigger “unwanted military confrontation”. (quoted in AFP, January 18, 2012)
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Copyright © Tanya Cariina Hsu, Arab News, 2012
Labels: AL-QAEDA, BAHRAIN, SAUDI ARABIA, TERRORISM
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Besieged Gaddafi Stronghold Bani Walid Under Attack
By Stephen Lendman
Global Research, October 20, 2012
Region: Middle East & North Africa
Washington’s war on Libya rages. Fighting didn’t stop after NATO said its seven-month 2011 “mission” ended. Ravaging a nonbelligerent country wasn’t good enough.
Occupation harshness inflicts more pain. Jamahiriya Green Resistance is strong. Its struggle continues. It won’t stop until Libya regains freedom. Loyalists want no part of NATO control, puppet leaders, imperial plundering, and ordinary Libyans used and abused.
Frequent freedom fights erupt. Tribes are involved. Local militias have their own agenda. Insurgents battle each other and Green Resistance for control. Government forces serve Washington and key NATO partners.
Since early October, Bani Walid’s been besieged. Thousands of militiamen are involved. Food, medical supplies, fuel and other essentials are in short supply. Armed men block vehicles with medical and other essential supplies from entering.
Residential neighborhoods are attacked. Nearby villages were looted and burned. Libya’s so-called General National Congress (GNC) approved the assault.
Puppet rulers want residents to hand over individuals allegedly responsible for killing Omran Shaaban. He’s an insurgent involved in Gaddafi’s capture and death.
Last fall, NATO ravaged Bani Walid. For weeks, terror bombing, indiscriminate shelling, and ground attacks left it looking like a ghost town. It was one of Libya’s last cities to fall. It’s home to over 80,000 residents.
They paid a huge price. Casualties were high. Many died or were wounded. Thousands were displaced. Hundreds were arrested and imprisoned. Their crime was wanting to live free.
Bani Walid residents again are under attack. So far they’re holding out valiantly. Last fall, NATO and insurgent forces used chemical and other illegal weapons. Reports suggest they’re used now.
Injuries are unrelated to conventional weapons. Israel does the same thing to Gazans. So do US forces in Pentagon war theaters.
Mathaba reported that hospitalized residents have severe burns, “hallucinations, muscle spasms, foaming at the mouth, coughing, eye irritations, dizziness, breathing difficulties, and loss of consciousness.”
NATO and enlisted proxy forces fight all their wars dirty. Civilians suffer most. Media scoundrels suppress what they should headline.
Mathaba quoted Dr. Taha Muhammad saying:
“(W)e started receiving patients with strange symptoms that I have not seen before. Those affected were having difficulty breathing, reported dizziness and were coughing.”
“Not everybody displayed the same symptoms, but some were also suffering from hallucinations, foaming at the mouth and loss of consciousness. We believe they had been exposed to some sort of gas.”
Available medical facilities and equipment can’t properly diagnose or treat victims. Doctors cope best they can. Patients suffer. Human rights abuses continue daily.
On October 19, Reuters headlined “Libyan army to head to Bani Walid after clashes,” saying:
Army head Yussef al-Mangoush said troops are “ready to enter Bani Walid, and we expect (it to go) peacefully. The army is going to take control of the security situation.”
Resistance fighter Col. Salem al-Wa’er said “Bani Walid has been shelled since this morning from three sides – the south, the east and southeast.”
City residents say shelling continues. Commerce is shut down. Essentials are running out. Tensions are high.
On October 18, Russia Today headlined “Eleven killed as Libyan militia shell Gaddafi stronghold,” saying:
“Libyan authorities continue to struggle against multiple militia groups in the midst of growing political disarray.”
On October 19, AFP headlined “Fighting keeps mediator out of Libya’s Bani Walid,” saying:
Pro-regime militia fighters pound the city. So far, resistance fighters kept them from entering and gaining control. GNC president Mohammed Megarief promised to come, but fighting kept him away.
Earlier he founded the National Front for the Salvation of Libya (NFSL). It’s a CIA/Saudi financed anti-Jamahiriya group. It operated from October 1981 – May 2012. It actively opposed Gaddafi.
Several times it tried to oust him by coup d’etats and failed. After his demise, it transformed itself into the National Front Party. It won three of 59 seats in the July 2012 GNC election. Mahmoud Jabril’s National Forces Alliance (NFA) got 39 seats.
On October 18, the London Guardian headlined “Confusion rife as Libyan army storms town of Bani Walid.”
So far, army units hadn’t succeeded as planned. Fierce fighting continues. “We started to enter Bani Walid. We are not far away from the center,” said army spokesman Mohammed al-Gandus. “There was a big battle between Bani Walid people and our army.”
Gaddafi supporters are “hiding” there, he added. “They are fighting very well because they know they are going to die soon.”
Reports of their demise may turn out exaggerated. Last fall, NATO said Bani Walid resistance was defeated. A year later, their struggle continues. Millions of Libyans want freedom, not repressive occupation under puppet pro-Western rule.
They haven’t quit fighting and won’t throughout the country. Bani Walid is one of many battlegrounds. Eruptions can break out anywhere anytime. They won’t stop until freedom is won.
At the same time, daily violence causes so much harm to so many. So-called NATO liberation delivers living hell. Mass killing, destruction, and human misery accompany every NATO campaign and remain when they end.
Bani Walid lies 180 km southwest of Tripoli. It’s home base for Libya’s largest Warfalla tribe. It remained loyal to Gaddafi during fighting last year.
Bani Walid fighters are resisting best they can. At least 10 deaths are confirmed and dozens of injuries. The Al-Mardoum valley is most affected. It’s being defended valiantly.
Two earlier attempts this year to take over the city failed. For months it was independent and militia free. Residents assumed responsibility for local security. They’re battling to keep what militias and GNC officials want to destroy.
On October 19, Mathaba headlined “Full Assault on Bani Walid Underway,” saying:
GNC Resolution No. 7 enacted on September 27 calls for army units to arrest those responsible for Omran Shaban’s death. Ground forces attacked the city. Numerous casualties were reported on both sides.
Army commander al-Gandus claimed his troops began entering Bani Walid. They’re heading for the center of town, he said. He claimed winning this fight will free Libya. Residents know he has something else in mind.
Regime officials are largely silent. They said little about their belligerent plans. Expect illegal chemical use again on city residents.
Around 2,000 army forces are involved. Militia fighters supplement their numbers. Casualties on both sides could be high. Bani Walid resident Ibrahim Warfalli denied official reports.
He said resistance fighters maintain airport control and prevented army units from entering the city. At stake is freedom or imperial occupation and control.
Fighting is intense. Army spokesman said he doesn’t know how long it will take to control Bani Walid. “Maybe it will take some days,” he said
“Maybe something unexpected will happen. It will take time if the people supporting Bani Walid use civilians as a shield. We do not want to kill civilians.’ ”
In fact, they’re willfully targeted. During last year’s siege and this year’s, indiscriminate bombing, shelling, and toxic gases caused horrific injuries and many deaths.
Videos and other images show badly wounded children. Some remain on life support. Others succumbed to fighting.
While Bani Walid remains besieged and assaulted, resistance continues elsewhere across Libya. Expect protracted struggle until Jamahiriya triumphs over tyranny. Courageous freedom fighters won’t settle for less.
A Final Comment
On October 17, Human Rights Watch (HRW) headlined “Libya: New Proof of Mass Killings at Gaddafi Death Site. A Year On, No Progress on Inquiry Into Deaths.”
Evidence implicates Misrata-based insurgents. They severely beat and murdered dozens of Gaddafi loyalists they captured. Libyan authorities promised to investigate and did nothing.
According to HRW’s Peter Bouchaert:
“The evidence suggests that opposition militias summarily executed at least 66 captured members of Gaddafi’s convoy in Sirte.”
“It also looks as if they took Mutassim Gaddafi, who had been wounded, to Misrata and killed him there. Our findings call into question the assertion by Libyan authorities that Muammar Gaddafi was killed in crossfire, and not after his capture.”
International law is clear. “Under the laws of war, the killing of captured combatants is a war crime, and Libyan civilian and military authorities have an obligation to investigate war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law.”
Instead of investigating and prosecuting those responsible, Libyan authorities whitewashed their crimes. Washington, NATO partners, and complicit regional allies bear full responsibility. Their installed Libyan stooges do as they’re told.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book is titled “How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion and Class War”
http://www.claritypress.com/Lendman.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.
http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour
Labels: GREEN RESISTANCE (LIBYA), MUAMMAR AL-GADDAFI, NATO, WAR CRIMES
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Mbeki troubled by SA's 'unguided national drift'
20/10/2012 00:00:00
by Sapa
THE African National Congress current leadership is losing its ability to provide direction to South Africa,
former President Thabo Mbeki said.
"I... [am] deeply troubled by a feeling of great unease that our beloved motherland is losing its sense of direction, and that we are allowing ourselves to progress towards a costly disaster," he said, delivering
the Oliver Tambo memorial lecture at
the University of Fort Hare, Eastern Cape.
"Today... I am not certain about where our country and nation will be tomorrow, and what I should do in this regard, to respond to what is obviously a dangerous and unacceptable situation of directionless and unguided national drift."
Mbeki challenged African National Congress leaders to follow Tambo's example. He described the former ANC president as a revolutionary leader who fought for South Africa's liberation without expecting anything in return.
Mbeki said the shooting at Lonmin's Marikana mine in the North West had signalled "a radical weakening of the national labour relations system", which had been one of the most important victories in the struggle for democracy.
On August 16, 34 striking Lonmin workers were shot dead in a confrontation with police, during a strike for a monthly wage of R12,500.
Mbeki criticised those in the party who were using state resources to advance personal interests.
"We have an obligation to ensure that our continuing... struggle is led by people who never, in any way, abuse state power to advance their personal interests."
He admitted that during his tenure as ANC president he did not help foster an environment to create new leaders for the party.
"I must accept that during the years when I served in the leadership of the ANC, we failed to achieve the objective of sustaining the calibre of a membership made up of politically mature and committed cadres."
He said the ANC should have been insulated from those who used the party to abuse state power.
"The real and hard truth is that, in this regard, the current leadership of the ANC and the broad democratic movement, at all levels, have inherited this failure, which lies at the base of much that is going wrong in our country."
Labels: ANC, THABO MBEKI
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COMMENT - MDC mouthpiece Nelson Chamisa on how Liberation was just not quite right. Here Nelson Chamisa is trying to re-invent the MDC as a 'liberation movement' that is 'somehow' better than the real liberation movements.
Samora Machel: bullets yet to flower
20/10/2012 00:00:00
by Nelson Chamisa MP
MDC-T organising secretary and Information Technology Minister Nelson Chamisa was a guest at
the Harare Quill Club on Friday, October 19, 2012, at which he spoke about the legacy of former Mozambican leader Samora Machel, and the contemporary challenges of Southern Africa. Here is the speech in full:
“The struggle in Zimbabwe is our Struggle... Aluta Continua!”
These were the words of the African giant, Samora Machel, in 1975 in the context of the noble liberation project and agenda in Zimbabwe and Africa.
As a favoured African and proud Zimbabwean, I am greatly excited to have the historical opportunity to share my thoughts and cross-pollinate ideas on the legacy of an icon, a champion and indeed a luminary African son of the soil, Samora Machel.
I am extremely humbled to be given the platform to unpack and interrogate the contemporary challenges of the region, in the process, examining to what extent the liberation struggle has realised its ideals, fulfilled or betrayed them.
On Friday, October 19, 1986, I was at Vumba, my primary school in Gutu. Aged 8 and in Grade 3, I received the news of the tragic and untimely departure of Cde Samora Machel in a plane crash. We had lost a brother, a father, a Cde, a leader, a freedom fighter and indeed an African giant.
At this stage, I was armed with the scant consciousness that the definition of an African was not geography, language, pigment but the heart and the mind.
Cde Machel represented timeless ideas – the idea of total liberation, and freedom; the idea of peace and liberty; the idea of the pursuit of happiness and justice; the idea of sovereignty of the people; the idea of internal solutions to African problems and the idea of servant leadership and serving the people.
Cde Machel’s struggle was a struggle for a better life for all, a struggle for self-determination; a struggle for a prosperous Africa and a struggle for dignity (ubuntu). This was Sankara’s struggle, Steve Biko’s ideals, Nelson Mandela’s hope and walk, Kimathi’s aspirations, Tongogara’s yearning, Chitepo’s vision and Nkrumah’s dream and struggle.
A legacy of hope, a legacy of victory, a legacy of struggle is what we were bequeathed and inherited from the principled and exemplary leadership of Cde Machel.
Democracy is a journey and a destination, one generation starts the journey, the other finishes it. Our generation has a duty and obligation to fulfil the aspirations of our founding fathers and complete the great journey that they started.
I look to the future. I gaze at tomorrow, I see a great Africa, a great Zimbabwe. I sense and feel the great capacity deep within and among us to complete the glorious journey and reach the promised and promising land.
As Cde Machel said, “The struggle in Zimbabwe is our struggle... Aluta Continua!”
It is important to pose hard and penetrating questions about the import and connotation of these great words from a giant.What was the struggle and why should the struggle continue?
The struggle was one against imperialism and subjugation; a struggle against hunger and deprivation; a struggle against tribalism and balkanisation of the African people; a struggle against hopelessness and marginalisation. Indeed, a struggle to end all struggles.
The struggle was for equality, freedom, prosperity, development, plenty and happiness. Cde Machel was a grassroots politician who believed that the African and indeed the Zimbabwean struggle was a struggle against a system and not an individual; a struggle against a mindset and heart-set and not just a mere group-set.
The fight was to end hardship and not massage it. True, the fight was to vanquish all forms of apartheid and not co-exist with them.
Why should this struggle continue, even beyond paper and flag independence or any assumed arrival point? Precisely because leaders are mortals and it is the habit and character of mortals to be fallible. Leaders sometimes betray struggles, leaders can mislead the masses, leaders can hijack revolutions instead of being hijacked by them and of course, leaders grow old.
A struggle is a project for all, by all and to all. It is for the led and not the leader. A cursory audit and helicopter assessment of post-colonial Africa paints a sordid and gory picture. Taking a balance sheet of the liberation ideals against the post-colonial reality leaves us with a catalogue of deficits – the deficit of performance in all corridors and institutions of the State, a deficit of democracy, statecraft and craft competency and literacy, a deficit of freedom and the oxygen of liberty. It is a deficit of vision and leadership.
Experience has taught me that wherever there is a deficit, it is a deficit of love. Wherever there is a shortage, it starts with a shortage of love. Cde Machel was an epitome of love, its very embodiment and constitution. That is why the struggle in Zimbabwe is our struggle.
Cde Machel hosted our liberators in the liberation agenda at a time when he was grappling with other pressing domestic national exigencies You cannot host without love. Hosting is evidence of the existence of love.
Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara said this about revolutionaries: "At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. We must strive every day so that this love of living humanity will be transformed into actual deeds, into acts that serve as examples, as a moving force."
This is precisely why from the remote village of Gutu at the age of eight, and only in the third grade, I experienced and felt the loss of that love although I had never met this giant. This is what true leadership does. True leadership must inspire, not perspire or conspire.
In our own case, who are we hosting? Playing host to Cde Mengistu?
Cde Machel believed in the people, had conviction in the spirit of sacrifice and was a reservoir of giving and selflessness, a true calabash of justice and an oasis of hope.
The tragedy of post-colonial Africa is a tragedy of lack of love. It is a crisis of love – the love of the people, the love of our countries, the love of our economies and the love of our future generations. And this is why Cde Machel said, “The struggle in Zimbabwe is our struggle.”
Tragically, in our own case, we seem to have defeated that which we admire, we fought that which we continue to mimick; we dislike that which we like. Evidently, we defeated white colonialists only to replace them with colonialism of a different pigment.
We vanquished the white settler colonialst, but not colonialism. We kicked out Smith, yet kicking in and entrenching Smithism. Literally copying, pasting, editing and perfecting the Rhodesian template of repression and autocracy.
Suddenly, we see false enemies, define fictitious saboteurs, behave like a leopard that accuses its young ones of smelling like goats to justify cannibalism and misguided infanticide.
[Huh? - MrK]
We continue to ask wrong questions and give wrong answers, parroting and sloganeering, ranting and raving about imaginary enemies at the border when we are our own worst enemy.
[Certainly the MDC is the enemy within. - MrK]
Our conduct continues to provide fuel to our naysayers, cynics and doomsayers from the citadels of capital who justify their Afro-pessimism. Remember van der Byl, Desmond Ladner-Burke and Ken Flower? Remember the Special Branch, the Law and Order Maintenance Act, the Selous Scouts, the colour bar policies? Juxtapose these with our own post-colonial realities.
[Whitey might say something bad about us. See here the slave mentality of the MDC. - MrK]
Laws are meant to make people happy and not withdraw from them divine providence and God-given nuggets of freedom.
Our post-colonial story is a sad story of false starts or dawns, unfulfilled promises, missed opportunities, neglected advantages, hanging and suspended aspirations, betrayed people and disappointed ideals.
[Really? How about the highest literacy rate on the African continent? How about the effective redistribution of land, something South Africa, Namibia and Kenya can only look at in envy. - MrK]
Did Machel ever imagine an African leadership that would turn against its people? Did Machel ever entertain the idea of an African leadership that would turn parasitic and predatory? The Piranha State?
We are legendary on minoring in majors and majoring in minors, arguing about who should count people in a census. If we can’t count ourselves, what else can we count? We can’t even distinguish between the bullet and the ballot, a Constitution and an institution? Zanu PF is an institution and not a Constitution!
[Whatever. - MrK]
We remain saddled with calamities and ailments of State capture by a predatory elite practising pre-bentalism and neo-patrimonialism, being obsessed with a redistributive rather than a productive paradigm, the departure lounge mentality, the last supper mentality.
[The 'win at all cost', even when it kills the people in cholera epidemics, after their sanctions destroy the national currency. That is the MDC. - MrK]
Neo-colonialism is upon us (centre-periphery dynamics), the changing of the rider. The centre has shifted from the West to the East with dire consequences to sustainable development and achievement of MDGs. There is a palpable absence of a matrix of leadership regeneration in most liberation movements.
[China did it. Not the IMF and World Bank, which the MDC venerate as their true masters, it is China. - MrK]
We seem to enjoy more dreaming than envisioning. When we got our independence in 1980, the elite then never imagined 2012 would be upon us. That is why they had highsounding nothings like “Health for all by 2000”.
[These 'highsounding nothings' as Nelson Chamisa puts it, saved the lives of thousands of Zimbabweans, including pregnant women. The ZANU-PF put a clinic within walking distance of every Zimbabwean, and life expectancy improved drastically. Until the IMF got hold of government policy from 1991 to 1996, and banned subsidies for health and education, as they always do anywhere on the planet. Read:
The Tragic Tale of the IMF in Zimbabwe.
by Antonia Juhasz, The Daily Mirror of Zimbabwe
March 7th, 2004
- MrK
We must begin to build and emphasise institutions rather than personalities. Having a vision of the future, for example getting to 2030 before 2030 gets to us! We have moved from Great Zimbabwe to Zimbabwe Ruins.
[Wow, that's clever. So tell us all Nelson Chamisa, what was the role and effect of the Zimbabwe Dollar by ZDERA in all of this? And by the way, what is your party's real policy on healthcare, and how are you going to pay for it - without taxing or owning the mines, of course. - MrK]
We must smash neo-colonialism, liquidate exploitation, crash corruption and punish incompetence. All wise and always. We must preserve Samora Machel the idea as much as we celebrate Samora Machel the legacy. Our cousins in the other party must desist from falling in love with Machel the person, and not Machel the idea.
[The MDC doesn't have what it takes to start giving advice to any liberation movement. They are the enemy within, representatives of the same Anglo-American De Beers /NM Rothschild/JP Morgan mining interests that financed colonialism, Apartheid/UDI and now neocolonialism. - MrK]
It is our duty to rebuild from the Zimbabwe Ruins to a Great Zimbabwe, realising our moment of glory. So unless and until the bullets have flowered, the struggle in Zimbabwe is our struggle. The bullets should flower through creation of jobs. The bullets should flower through happiness in our homes and communities. The bullets should flower through producing more and better – a surplus in everything.
Zimbabwe should be the head and not the tail. Africa should be the head and not the tail. Our natural position is a leadership position.We must make good the Great Zimbabwe and the United Africa promise.
I believe in this great and beautiful country. Remember the Mutapa Empire, the Great Zimbabwe, the Rozvi dynasty, King Mzilikazi and King Lobengula, Ambuya Nehanda and Sekuru Kaguvi and the great Mkwati. I have studied the roots of this country. They have the capacity to sustain a great flower that will be the envy of every eye in the world.
I have glorified in the wisdom of its great heritage, tradition and its inimitable history. I marvel at the wisdom of our founding fathers and mothers. I am moved by the narrative of their sacrifice, givenness and fortitude.
As a generation and as a people, our cause may be misunderstood, our punchline disputed, our intentions questioned. The fundamental truth is that the struggle in Zimbabwe is our struggle.
We are in the last mile towards real transformation. It is 3AM in Zimbabwe. Dawn is upon us. A New Zimbabwe, a new beginning.
Aluta continua!
God bless you.
God bless Zimbabwe.
God bless Africa.
Let there be love!
Labels: LIBERATION, NELSON CHAMISA, NEOCOLONIALISM, SAMORA MACHEL
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Paying lip service to UN reform
20/10/2012 00:00:00
by Dancase B. Gideon
AS WELL as making a compulsive statement that the United Nations must be reformed today, the 67th UN General Assembly leaves no one under the illusion that member state speechifying in New York will one day somehow cause the needed UN reform.
Someone once said “repeating the same thing and expecting different results is insanity”. This observation could be applicable to the UN member states' repeated use of the New York podium as a reform tool.
The immediate challenge to UN member states advocating the reform of the UN is to conceive, assess and skilfully use new but appropriate reform methods.
The New York podium is useless as a reform tool to make the UN capable of responding effectively to the pressing 21st century global challenges.Member state delivery of speeches as a method calculated at reforming the United Nations has proved to be useless especially because the veto-power wielding member states in the UN Security Council listen to, but ignore, those speeches on purpose.
It appears member states with veto powers use the UN General Assembly podium essentially as a formal listening post while UN member states without veto powers use it as a podium for catharsis. This drama is inimical to world peace and security, it must be stopped forthwith.
The point which is not appropriately emphasised on the UN reform question is that it is not a right for America, Britain, Russia, France and China to have some veto powers; it is actually a privilege that can be withdrawn, or be shared among other UN member states.
The veto power wielding countries are acutely aware of their privileged position and judging by their everyday deeds, they seem to feel threatened by the call for the UN reform. They are bound to block or slow the reform process in one way, or the other. Who wants to give up power willingly?
Another option member states can pursue to their own peril is inaction, state member vegetation, when the need for UN reform is a matter of life and death given Libya, Syria, Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian question, the question of who should possess and use nuclear power, Afghanistan, Somalia, the Sudanese crisis, Mali, DRC, global climate issues and many other challenges.
Vegetation, or inaction, of all UN member states without veto powers to exercise in the United Nations Security Council is as good and useless today as seeking to reform the UN through the use of the United Nations General Assembly podium.
The pressing challenge today to reform the UN yesterday is inescapable. In particular, the UN Security Council, as currently constituted, is anachronistic in the 21st century; it is failing to justify why it should exist in that form in the face of democratic dictates and the flagrant abuse of international law emanating from certain state member hubris and the deplorable superpower mentality in certain member states.
In fact, inaction and member state speechifying at the UN headquarters constitute an endorsement of the current make-up of the UN Security Council. This is an unfortunate consequence, though unintended.
It is instructive to note that over the course of the existence of the UN, some veto wielding powers have perfected the skill of buying some non-veto wielding member states into contrived inaction to engender disunity among member states calling for the UN reform.
Engagement in vigorous UN reform activism by non-veto power wielding member states, supported by institutions and private citizens advocating democracy, good governance and justice is one method which when appropriately used is mostly likely to cause the reform of the United Nations sooner, rather than later.
For example, non-veto power wielding member states could resolve to boycott the 68th UN General Assembly unless the UN calls for an emergency meeting, before the 68th General Assembly is held, where the UN reform programme should be clearly discussed, formulated and adopted.
It should be emphasised that the UN member states should have a clear and common definition of the reform they plan the UN to undergo. Shall it be the increase in the number of veto power wielding countries only? Shall it be the abandonment of the Security Council as a UN institution? Will member states hold veto power on a termly or rotation basis? Will the UN be discarded altogether and a new truly democratic global institution formed in its place...?
The reform options are many, but global consensus on a single option is paramount as it attracts member states' dedicated participation in actualizing the UN reform blueprint. However, a piecemeal UN reform process will be as ineffective and offensive as not reforming the UN at all.
As part of activism, the non-veto wielding UN member states can decide to fly their national flags at half-mast whenever the UN Security Council deliberates on any matter. Flying national flags at half-mast should convey the message that the world is grieving over the lack of democracy at the UN.
Private citizens and institutions which fervently advocate the reform of the UN could keep a vigil at the United Nations Headquarters in New York until concrete steps, including the setting up of a timeframe, are made towards the reform of the UN.
The point the writer is making clear here is that there are many peaceful activist programmes which when used effectively, will definitely result in the much-needed reform of the United Nations. So far, there is a glaring and embarrassing lack of democracy in the United Nations Security Council to the extent that morally forbids veto-wielding powers to advocate democracy in any part of the globe.
Dancase Gideon is a freelance writer. E-mail him: dancasebisiwasigideon@gmail.com
Labels: UN
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MDC-T fights over candidate imposition
20/10/2012 00:00:00
by Chengetai Zvauya I Daily News
THE race for Parliament and council seats ahead of the forthcoming general elections has ripped Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC-T apart, with factions fighting for supremacy.
Factionalism in the party has resurfaced as jockeying intensifies with different camps, fighting for supremacy. There is a camp which is fielding young cadres and academics, which enjoys the support of younger leaders like Tendai Biti while Tsvangirai is using his former trade union colleagues to continue with his hold on the party, sources close to the ground say.
Women and youth assembly members are being roped in the factionalism.
According to sources, the factions have been fighting for turf for months, as evidenced by the splits and violent clashes that characterised provinces such as Bulawayo, Masvingo, Manicaland and Mashonaland East.
The party is yet to firmly deal with the issue of internal violence driven by factionalism despite public promises to do so.
Sources said the infighting had intensified across provinces in recent weeks due to the race to get the party ticket for next year’s elections.
A new front in the war has been opened as well.
A directive from the MDC-T’s national executive that incumbent councillors and MPs will not be contested in primary elections to choose party candidates ahead of the watershed polls that could be held in June 2013 has raffled feathers in the young party.
Aspiring candidates are uncomfortable with the directive barring them from contesting sitting MPs and councillors as they feel it protects failed and corrupt office bearers.
They feel Tsvangirai’s band of top leaders is abusing high office to protect themselves from internal democracy.
MDC-T deputy spokesperson Joel Gabbuza confirmed that sitting MPs will walk to the general elections unopposed.
“In the constituencies where we have incumbent MPs and councillors, we will delay the process of primary elections because we already have persons elected by the electorate,” said Gabbuza.
“We do not want to disrupt the work they have done. So we are going to be starting in the constituencies where we do not have representatives. In those constituencies people can start running around canvassing for support,” said Gabuzza.
The MDC-T’s decision not to hold primary elections has left the party that was formed in 1999 deeply divided with some people who have been in the trenches for the past 13 years feeling that this is a form of candidate imposition — a phenomenon copied from Zanu PF.
Zanu PF, however, appears to be changing tact and has announced that apart from President Robert Mugabe, every other official will have to fight it out.
The move by the MDC-T not to hold primary elections in more than 90 constituencies has been picked by the party rivals as undemocratic but Gabbuza said the party will not deviate from its “democratic” practices.
“We are not going to impose candidates on our supporters. What is happening at the moment is that our election directorate is working on the procedure to elect candidates. They are fine-tuning the resolution of our congress on elections,” said Gabbuza.
Aspiring candidates say the majority of sitting MDC-T MPs and councillors have failed to deliver and have joined the gravy train and therefore should make way for fresh blood.
Even though Tsvangirai’s party has taken steps to bring sanity to towns it leads by expelling councillors deemed to be corrupt, many feel the action is incomplete and should net all councillors who are enjoying a rags-to-riches lifestyle and targeting the small fish.
Gabbuza, who also has been an MP for more than a decade now, defended the decision by his colleagues not to step down and allow others to take over.
“There is no provision in our party constitution which says a member should have served a certain number of years for him to step down from being a councillor or MP,” said Gabbuza.
Labels: MDC FACTIONS
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COMMENT - This could be an interesting model to study for the copper part of the economy (although SMEs should be the mainstay of a diversified economy), and this should be a great opportunity to discuss the concept of Chaebol (business associations) and Keiretsu (the original Japanese model).
The likes of Samsung are large corporations which were created through heavy state support, and were always completely locally owned. In fact the government at all times has their back and ensures they have no competition from foreign corporations.
It is impossible for a non-Japanese car manufacturer to set up a car factory in Japan. What they did, was 'steal' foreign ideas to set up their own industries. This is what Zambia must do, instead of going abroad for foreign investors to take ownership of Zambia, the government must levy taxes from the mines and use the money to create Zambian Chaebols. And the state owned corporations still exist, whether it is NCZ Chemicals or even ZCCM. And ZCCM should be Zambia's 'competetitive advantage', with complete control of the copper mines in the national interest, and spawning copper product manufacturing centers left and right. When Zambia a) receives all the profits from copper and b) only exports copper products, the jobs will start showing up. Saying 'foreigners will bring jobs' is an insult to the intelligence of every aware Zambian. It is saying - all you can hope for is to serve some foreign factory owner, who will pay you whenever and whatever they deem fit. Where is the national pride? Where is the pride in the creation of uniquely Zambian products?
From Thayer Watkins' post: THE CHAEBOL OF SOUTH KOREA:
There were family-owned enterprises in Korea in the period before 1961 but the particular state-corporate alliance came into being with the regime of Park Chung Hee (1961-1979).
Park modeled this arrangement on the zaibatsu system which developed in Japan during the Meiji Era. There were significant differences between the zaibatsu and the chaebol, the most significant of which was the source of capital.
The zaibatsu were organized around a bank for their source of capital. The chaebol in contrast were prohibited from owning a bank. The Park regime nationalized the banks of South Korea and could channel scarce capital to industries and firms it saw as necessary for achieving national objectives.
Clearly, this is not how the World Bank or IMF want Zambia to develop, and why Zambia has no Chaebol 'business associations'.
From: Korea, South The Origins and Development of Chaebol:
The chaebol were often compared with Japanese keiretsu (the successor of the zaibatsu), but as David I. Steinberg has noted, there were at least three major differences.
First, the chaebol were family dominated. In 1990, for example, in most cases the family that founded the major business in the chaebol remained in control, while in Japan the keiretsu were controlled by professional corporate management.
Second, individual chaebol were prevented from buying controlling shares of banks, and in 1990 government regulations made it difficult for a chaebol to develop an exclusive banking relationship. The keiretsu usually worked with an affiliated bank and had almost unlimited access to credit.
Third, the chaebol often formed subsidiaries to produce components for exports, while large Japanese corporations often employed outside contractors.
Without Samsung, there would be no Korea - Sata
By Joan Chirwa-Ngoma in Suwon, South Korea
Fri 19 Oct. 2012, 14:00 CAT
PRESIDENT Michael Sata says there would be no Korea without Samsung as the electronics giant has more money than the Asian country. And President Sata was elated when he discovered that a Zambian, Weston Chirwa, is part of Samsung Electronics' management and described him as "industrious".
President Sata took time to meet several Korean investors with the aim of luring them to invest in Zambia. Yesterday, the President, in the company of ministers Sylvia Masebo, Given Lubinda, Bob Sichinga and Emmanuel Chenda, visited Samsung City, the home of Samsung Electronics where he pleaded with them to set up a factory in Zambia.
President Sata said Zambia's central location and its land-linked status provides an opportunity for the country to become a major supplier of Samsung products and the company's business growth.
"I can see that there is a problem with organisation here…Korea is Samsung, without Samsung, there would be no Korea today. Samsung has more money than Korea," he said.
Samsung Electronics currently has a workforce of around 200,000 employees in 72 countries where it has a presence, with its operating profit hitting US $14.7 billion in 2011 (around K77 trillion), more than double Zambia's 2012 annual budget.
Earlier, Samsung Electronics president and chief financial officer Ju-Hwa Yoon said his company, now ranked 9th among the top 100 global brands in 2012, goes where the market exists for its wide range of products, hinting that they were in a process of setting up a plant in Egypt.
But President Sata objected and argued that Zambia had a much bigger market and presented attractive opportunities for business growth than Egypt.
"You will make more money in Zambia and you will see that for yourself…Instead of going to Egypt, come to Zambia because it has the largest market than Egypt," he said. "In Zambia and many other countries in Africa, Samsung is appreciated. Having known Samsung myself for more than 20 years, I have not been impressed with your development in Zambia.
I am told you are building another factory here; why not build in Zambia? And don't blame us if other Korean companies come and we give them incentives for investing in Zambia. So my main request to you is to come and open a factory in Zambia. When you do, you will have the entire central African market.
Zambia is surrounded by countries like Democratic Republic of Congo, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana…"
And President Sata was delighted when Chirwa was among top Samsung officials who welcomed him at the Samsung City.
"…There is a Tumbuka who is working here, he is very industrious," he said, jokingly adding, "As you come to Zambia, bring him (Chirwa) along so that he can take you to Lundazi for you to see how backward they are."
Ju-Hwa also said his company, through the existing bilateral ties between Zambia and Korea, would find ways to increase its presence in the southern African country following President Sata's appeal.
After a tour of the Samsung City, Lubinda and Sichinga laid a foundation stone at a construction site for Is Dingseo - a Korean company that is seeking opportunities to invest in Zambia - on behalf of President Sata.
Sichinga said the government was looking for credible companies that could invest in low-cost housing for a majority of Zambians owing to the current housing deficit in the country.
"And I invite you to come and be part of the Investment Summit which will be held from November 26-30. Please be part of that," said Sichinga.
Labels: CHAEBOL, MICHAEL SATA, NEOLIBERALISM, SOUTH KOREA
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What type of political parties should we have?
By The Post
Fri 19 Oct. 2012, 17:00 CAT
Clement Andeleki, the Chief Registrar of Societies, says political parties that fail to gain political ground within two years will be deregistered. He further warns that political parties that do not actively participate in elections but only endorse others would also be deregistered once the amendment of the societies Act is done.
According to the Chief Registrar of Societies, political parties were supposed to take part in elections instead of just endorsing, ratifying other political parties during elections.
We disagree with chief Registrar of Societies. Direct participation in elections should not be a condition for the continued existence of a political party. It is not necessary for every political party to have its name and candidates on ballot papers at election time. There are many examples in the world of very important political parties that do not directly participate in elections.
In South Africa, the South African Communist Party, which has been in existence since 1921, does not directly field candidates in elections. But its members participate in elections under the African National Congress. Not directly fielding candidates in elections cannot reduce the importance of the South African Communist Party's participation in the politics and governance of that country. This is a party whose members and leaders made gigantic sacrifices in the struggle against Apartheid.
Its members and leaders displayed heroism, an incredible sense of discipline and a capacity for selflessness, as well as a quiet determination not to bend the knee to the dictates of tyrants. This was not done in pursuit of political positions through participation in elections.
This party is a product of, and is propelled by, a willingness to make sacrifices for a loftier purpose than just by participating in elections. There is a recognition, among those who struggle for loftier purposes, of the need for a united front and of the fact that no struggle can be waged effectively in isolation.
And as Nelson Mandela once noted, "For many decades, communists were the only political group in South Africa who were prepared to treat Africans as human beings and their equals; who were prepared to eat with us; talk with us, live with us and work with us".
There are many political parties in other parts of the world that have subordinated themselves to broader movements and do not directly participate in elections, but have continued to legally maintain their independent existence, identity and character. For instance, there may be no need for a green party to directly participate in elections when it can easily support a more broad-based party that is willing to embrace its agenda if elected into power.
Endorsing a candidate of another political party and campaigning for that candidate is, and should be, an acceptable and important form of political participation. In the 2008 presidential elections, FDD under the leadership of Edith Nawakwi and Sakwiba Sikota's United Liberal Party decided to support the candidature of Rupiah Banda and went all over the country campaigning for him. Can one say that was not meaningful political participation on the part of FDD and United Liberal Party?
Political parties do not need to be deregistered or to disband themselves simply because they cannot directly field candidates in an election. There is nothing wrong in a political party identifying itself with another political party that is probably bigger or more popular than itself.
Political parties are not there just to participate in elections. They can participate in elections if they want to, but there are also many other important and necessary political activities that they can engage in outside elections.
Political parties can be as varied as the societies in which they function. And their function, in whichever way they choose to participate, is dead serious: to provide a peaceful and fair method by which the citizens of a democracy can select their leaders and have a meaningful role in determining their own destiny.
We know that democracies make several assumptions about human nature. One is that, given the chance, people are generally capable of governing themselves in a manner that is fair and free. Another is that any society comprises a great diversity of interests and individuals who deserve to have their voices heard and their views respected. As a result, one thing is true of all healthy democracies: they have many political parties or groupings.
And all should be free to raise their voices and participate in the democratic political process. In this way, democratic politics acts as a filter through which the vocal demands of a diverse populace pass on the way to becoming public policy.
Clearly, the right to participation in governance requires participatory democracy. Participatory democracy requires, not only democratic structures, but also the reign of democratic values in the hearts and minds of the people. Democratic structures without the corresponding democratic values in the hearts and minds of the people are rootless. There is need for a democratic culture characterised by the respect for the constitutional rights of the people. Our Constitution gives our people the right to form political parties of their own choice.
And it doesn't say that these political parties have to gain ground within a specified time through participation in elections for them to remain legally in existence. Imposing such a requirement would amount to taking away an important constitutional right of our people. But the question is: for what? What is troubling the Chief Registrar of Societies on this issue? What is really his problem?
We should be more interested in a lively spirit of democracy that will give full meaning to the political rights of our people as provided for in our Constitution and ensure success in fostering the welfare and progress of our country.
In any true democracy, more is needed than political institutions and practices such as voting and representation in Parliament. We must hold on to some values and norms, some expectations and aspirations. This is the environment, the atmosphere, that makes democracy work. This is the so-called "political culture" which we feel is so necessary in Zambia today if multiparty democracy is to succeed.
The fundamental value we must have is a respect for diversity and acceptance of pluralism. Gone are the days when everyone was supposed to think the same way, belong to the same party, and support the same programme.
A fundamental condition for the establishment of democracy is, therefore, the recognition of the rights of the person and social groups without any discrimination. A real democracy has to be built on the basis of justice, moral values and has to look to the common good. Democracy rests upon human rights. And these rights are not endowments of our governments, but the gifts of our Creator, and are enshrined in our Constitution.
There is no perfect form of human government. Abuses can take place in every system, but the fundamental value of democracy is to allow the participation of citizens in the government of their country. In this regard, democracy as a system of government is consonant with human rights and the respect of human dignity and freedom.
In fact, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is explicit in affirming the value of political participation: "Everyone has the right to take part in the government of one's own country, directly or through freely chosen representatives."
Trying to put too many and unnecessary qualifications on the rights of political parties to legally exist violates the political rights of our people as provided for in the Constitution. And this being the case, what the Chief Registrar of Societies is proposing should not be allowed to be taken to Parliament and be made law. It should be opposed rigorously.
And it would seem the Chief Registrar wants to exercise a lot of power over political parties. This shouldn't be allowed. His role should be limited to the orderly facilitation of the work of political parties and not to be prescribing criteria for their existence.
Labels: CLEMENT ANDELEKI, PARTIES
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Andeleki seeks to deregister inactive political parties
By Fridah Nkonde
Fri 19 Oct. 2012, 14:00 CAT
REGISTRAR of Societies chief registrar Clement Andeleki says political parties that fail to gain political ground within two years will be deregistered.
In an interview yesterday, Andeleki said parties that did not actively participate in elections but only endorse others would be deregistered once amendment of the societies Act chapter 119 of the Laws of Zambia was done.
"This is the view that we are going to take after amending the act. We have been consulting with stakeholders and we will even be presenting the amended Act to Parliament very soon," he said.
Andeleki said it was unfortunate that most political parties in Zambia were just there to endorse other parties when it was election time and also gain donor funds.
He said there were 47 political parties in Zambia but only about six participated in elections.
Andeleki said deregistering political parties that did not actively participate in elections would prevent most other parties from using politics as a business.
He said people were supposed to use politics to benefit the whole country and not just to satisfy their desires.
"One thing I know for sure is that when a political party starts, it obviously starts from one town, say Lusaka and later on grow into a fully fledged political party with physical presence in all the provinces. That political party should be able to take part in elections instead of just endorsing other political parties. We are trying to bring sanity in the manner in which societies are being operated in the country," he said.
He said his department would not allow other political parties endorsing and ratifying other political parties during elections because all parties were supposed to take part in elections.
And Andeleki said his department would engage church mother bodies to come up with a code of conduct for all church leaders.
The Council of Churches in Zambia in a Communiqué from the CCZ 29th general conference stated that the church mother body was looking forward to engaging with the Registrar of Societies to iron out problematic issues in the Act.
But Andeleki said the Church in Zambia was facing a lot of problems because the Act did not make provisions for the regulations of church leaders.
He said the Act only concentrated on the Church and not the individual.
"How do we discipline church leaders when the Act does not make provisions for such regulations? These are some of the grey areas that are found in the Act. There are a lot of people who are claiming to be pastors and bishops. Some even go as far as preaching in the buses and collecting offering…it is not right," he said.
Labels: CLEMENT ANDELEKI, PARTIES
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GBM supporters storm Post, threaten to burn newspapers
By Roy Habaalu in Lusaka and Royce Phiri in Kasama
Fri 19 Oct. 2012, 14:00 CAT
SYLVIA Masebo has replaced Geoffrey Bwalya Mwamba as PF chairperson for elections. And Mwamba's supporters yesterday stormed The Post newspapers offices and wanted to block the newspaper from being sold in Kasama while some of them wanted to confiscate copies and burn them.
PF secretary general Wynter Kabimba said Masebo took up the role of chairperson after the last central committee meeting.
"Yes she's the new chairperson for the elections committee of the central committee," said Kabimba.
Mwamba relinquished his position as chairperson for election after temporarily resigning as Kasama member of parliament after beating up his wife Chama.
"It's in public domain that GBM resigned on his own after press reports condemned him for battering his wife. He said he was no longer interested in politics but surprising he's been coming from the back door to lobby for the position," a source said.
The sources said Mwamba had been carrying himself as the chairperson for elections and the party even tolerated him as such.
"But the PF thought that the position was a serious one and needed to be filled. So the one in charge of elections is Masebo and not GBM," said the sources.
And Mwamba's supporters that stormed The Post Newspaper offices presented a petition against the paper's coverage on Mwamba.
The group, who displayed banners denouncing both The Post and the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) chanted "No more Post" slogans and shouted at The Post employees, who were locked up in the office, to tell their superiors that they should leave GBM alone.
The protestors, some of them high on alcohol early in the morning, nearly turned violent but for quick action by police.
The cadres warned Post staff at Kasama office that they should stop writing bad stories about GBM who is also Kasama Central member of parliament.
Meanwhile Kasama police officer in-charge Darius Kakompe assured the staff that police would do whatever they could to protect them and that they would see to it that a police officer was assigned at the office for some days until the situation was calm.
Northern Province permanent secretary Emmanuel Mwamba said Mwamba's campaign manager Nathan Ilunga in the 2011 election led the protestors.
"As soon as we heard that Mr Mwamba's supporters were protesting and went to your offices in Kasama, I directed the commissioner of police to send police officers and ensure they kept peace and that life and property was protected. They were led by Mr. Mwamba's campaign manager Nathan Ilunga because they were displeased about your reporting," said
Mwamba in an interview.
"They handed over the petition to the manager in which they accused Mr Fred M'membe of siding with the minister of Justice Mr Wynter Kabimba and writing bad about Mr Mwamba. Police went there and advised them to disperse and the situation right now is normal," he said.
Kasama Post customer account executive Chitalu Musonda said one of the PF cadres called him shortly before the group arrived at the newspaper offices and informed him that they were about to attack.
"He called me to say 'boss lock yourselves, we are almost there and we are coming to attack your office," Musonda said. "Within two minutes of receiving the call, we saw the cadres and when we closed the door they rushed quickly and one of them shouted 'look they are closing the door. Just open the door, we want to sort you out.'"
He narrated that the situation calmed down after the police officers arrived on the scene but that he has since warned newspaper vendors to be extra careful in view of the incident.
Labels: FRED M'MEMBE, GBM, SYLVIA MASEBO, THE POST, WYNTER KABIMBA
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Opposition walkout not appropriate - Matibini
By Mwala Kalaluka and Mukosha Funga
Fri 19 Oct. 2012, 14:00 CAT
SPEAKER of the National Assembly Dr Patrick Matibini said it is not appropriate for legislators to abdicate their function.
Only two opposition members of parliament and MMD parliamentarians appointed into the PF cabinet remained in their seats after a bulk of legislators from the MMD and the UPND walked out of the House over finance minister Alexander Chikwanda's absence.
During resumption of debate on the 2013 national budget in the House on Wednesday afternoon, Nalikwanda MMD member of parliament Professor Geoffrey Lungwangwa asked whether it was in order for Chikwanda, who is also acting President, to be absent from the chamber when the motion he had moved was under debate.
Prof Lungwangwa, who earlier addressed a caucus of MMD members of parliament on the balcony at Parliament building during the 16:15 tea break, said Chikwanda should have been present in the House to take note of the pertinent issues raised by the legislators during the debate.
"We have not been informed as to who is the Minister of Finance in this House," said Prof Lungwangwa. "Is it in order for the procedure of the House to be handled in this manner, which to a large extent is highly unsatisfactory?"
In his ruling, Speaker Matibini said the subject had been raised the previous day but he reiterated that issues of government portfolios in the House were a preserve of the leader of government business, the Vice-President.
"There is no requirement to announce the various changes," Speaker Matibini said. "As far as the Office of the Speaker is concerned, no such changes have been made and notified...So on that premise, I shall proceed on the basis that the substantive holder is still performing that portfolio as Minister of Finance."
Speaker Matibini said apart from the leader of government business, all ministers had deputies.
"Since yesterday (Tuesday) the deputy minister of finance has been present and I certainly believe and I don't have the slightest doubt that he has the ability to follow through the debate," Speaker Matibini said. "As far as I see it, there is no lacuna in terms of functioning of the House. I empathise that obviously the presence of the Minister of Finance is quite inspiring in the House, very reassuring but there is no dysfunctionality here at all."
Speaker Matibini said he did not see any constitutional crisis arising from Chikwanda's absence and he ordered that the debate on the budget should proceed upon which the opposition legislators stood from their various vantages on the left side and left the House.
Ruling on another point of order raised by deputy minister in the Office of the Vice-President Harry Kalaba over the opposition's walk out, Speaker Matibini said it was inappropriate for parliamentarians to abdicate their function.
"Is it in order for all those on your left to continue at government cost... and receiving allowances from taxpayer's money to come here and not doing the business they are supposed to? Not representing the people they should?" Kalaba asked Speaker Matibini who responded:
"We will continue doing our business in the manner we are. It is not clear why they left but it might be because of the ruling I have rendered that the debate should go on even in the absence of the finance minister. No dysfunctionality and once the ruling is made, it should be respected. I expect all Members of Parliament on the left and on the right to attend to the business of the House. It is not appropriate to abdicate that function."
But Nangoma UPND member of parliament Boyd Hamusonde and his Kabompo East MMD counterpart Danny Chingimbu remained in the House.
Outside the debating chamber, Chadiza MMD member of parliament Allan Mbewe loudly complained that whatever issues the opposition legislators raised before the Speaker were regarded as nonsense.
Other opposition members of parliament converged in the car park on the eastern side of the building before driving away from the premises.
Meanwhile, contributing to the 2013 budget debate, Kamfinsa member of parliament Moses Chishimba said the opposition had nothing to say over the budget hence their resolve to stage walk outs whenever the issue was tabled.
"The reason why my colleagues left, they knew I would be hammering them," said Chishimba. "They are not only punishing the PF government but they are also punishing their relatives."
Labels: BOYD HAMUSONDE, MMD, OPPOSITION, PATRICK MATIBINI, UPND
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BoZ finalises legal protection to guide currency rebasing
By Kabanda Chulu
Thu 18 Oct. 2012, 12:30 CAT
A BILL to give legitimacy and legal protection to guide the currency rebasing exercise has been finalised and will be taken to Parliament, says a senior Bank of Zambia official.
And Standard Chartered Bank is spending K5 billion on upgrading of equipment and software including training of staff and customers to ensure smooth transition to the use of new currency.
Officiating at the StanChart-organised forum for customers on the rebasing of the kwacha yesterday in Lusaka, Bank of Zambia currency rebasing project manager Morris Mulomba said technical guidelines had been issued to ensure the exercise was undertaken smoothly.
"Everything has to change and banks, including the public, they have to adjust to the system. So software, computers and various equipment will have to be calibrated to suit the rebasing of the kwacha," Mulomba said.
"To make things clear because there might be disputes on contracts, for example, if you pay rentals for K4,000,000, you will now pay K4,000, so a misunderstanding can arise but to give legitimacy and legal protection, we shall introduce the currency redenomination Act which the finance minister will be taking soon to Parliament since the Act has to be in place before January 2013."
He said the rebasing exercise had received positive response from people across the country.
"People now understand that this will be for their benefit, of course, there are concerns like people in rural areas will be defrauded during the changing exercise but we are still carrying awareness messages. And banks also complained that they didn't plan for calibration of equipment, but we have told them it is a minimal cost and it is a requirement to adjust."
And StanChart acting managing director Kelvin Musana said the bank was ready to support various policy measures that would translate into increased economic activity
"We have taken this initiative to host a series of workshops aimed at educating our clients, members of staff and the public on currency rebasing and we have set K5 billion for this project," said Musana.
Labels: BOZ, KWACHA, STANCHART
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Anglogold miners throw stones at Vavi
19 Oct 2012 16:12 - Kwanele Sosibo
NUM officials and Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi were pelted with stones by some protesters at AngloGold Ashanti's mine near Orkney. Zwelinzima Vavi (Madelene Cronje, M&G)
"These hooligans threw stones at us," National Union of Mineworkers regional coordinator Madoda Sambatha said.
Sambatha said earlier on Friday their entourage had travelled to two other mines. At Kopanong workers told them they were going back to work on Monday and at the other, Vaal reefs number eight, they said they would not.
Both meetings were peaceful.
"We [then] went to Vaal reefs Moab Khotsong and were told that before we arrived, this woman from the Socialist Democratic Movement had already addressed those workers, and said they must not listen to the general secretary of Cosatu."
However, they went ahead and spoke to them. They left their cars and walked in on foot. As they approached they saw two groups – a NUM group waiting for Vavi, and a second group "who are the permanent disrupters", said Sambatha.
"We were on foot. As we were advancing, these hooligans threw stones at us. We retreated."
They drove back to the union's regional offices.
"We are okay. The car was not damaged," he said.
Detained and interrogated
Earlier, the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM), a Trotskyist organisation that helped form the joint strike coordinating committee across many of the mines beset by strikes say they were detained and interrogated after addressing a crowd of over 1 500 striking workers.
Liv Shange, an executive member of the organisation, said the group had been invited by the mine's strike committee and began addressing workers by midday. Following the address, they met with committee members at one of the mine's hostels.
As they left, Shange said four members of the organisation who were travelling together in a car were followed by mine security vehicles, about five police vans and what appeared to be a security helicopter belonging to the mine. After being stopped, she said they were taken to mine offices where they were interrogated by a team led by a policeman who identified himself as Lieutenant Colonel Pretorius.
"We were stopped aggressively and taken to mine security offices at about 2.30pm and interrogated one by one by a group of 10 men," said Shange. "He said we could only meet with workers if we were a recognised union. I told him we were not a union and had the right to assemble and associate with the workers."
Shange, a Swedish expatriate, said she was also threatened with deportation and asked questions about her family and children.
The DSM, which is part of the UK-based committee for Workers' International, has chapters in over 40 countries. It has been upfront about its role in the ongoing mine strikes which have affected the platinum, gold and diamond sectors. It is also affiliated to the Democratic Left Front, a coalition of leftist organisations. Police have cracked down on the campaign waged in unison with the joint strike coordinating committee by arresting hundreds of striking workers.
The mines have responded by issuing ultimatums to striking workers. Strikes continue however, with workers in many cases disregarding the ultimatums.
George Ntsane, a strike committee member at Anglogold Ashanti said six workers had been arrested for public violence at the mine and that the underground workers would not return to work until their demand of R16 000 salary had been met. – additional reporting by Sapa
Labels: ANGLO-AMERICAN, MINING, NUM (SA), STRIKE, ZWELINZIMA VAVI
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COMMENT - This is from the Voice Of America, so of course the Black Empowerment Program is 'controversial' and 'some people say...', etc.
Mugabe launches Matabeleland North community share trust
18/10/2012 00:00:00
by Sandra Nyaira I VOA
RESIDENT Robert Mugabe on Thursday launched
community share ownership trusts in Hwange, Matabeleland North Province, amid reports that some of the funds raised under the
controversial black economic empowerment programme have allegedly been looted in some regions.
The scheme covering Hwange, Umguza, Bubi, Binga, Tsholotsho, Nkayi and Lupane was launched at the Hwange Colliery Stadium and is worth $14.5 million – a contribution from foreign-owned mining firms operating in the districts.
Government ministers, chiefs and the local communities attended the launch where Mugabe urged communities to safeguard their resources and use them for their benefit.
The president said his party and government will continue to champion the broad-based empowerment of ordinary Zimbabweans and blasted international firms he claimed are only interested in taking resources from the country without improving the lives of people at the grassroots level.
Mugabe said despite coal being discovered in Hwange over 100 years ago, local communities have only benefited as workers.
“Indigenisation is one such deliberate intervention that seeks to economically empower previously disadvantaged Zimbabweans and create conditions that enhance their economic status, democratise ownership of productive assets of the country and promote development of a competitive domestic private sector that will spearhead economic growth and development,” Mugabe said.
“Employee and community share ownership schemes are key strategies which will expose both the employee and communities into the mainstream economy and partake in benefits accruing from the exploitation of their God-given resources.”
But there have been concerns that some chiefs have been looting the community share trust funds at the expense of ordinary people, with growing calls for the trusts to publish details of how the money is spent.
Under the community trust scheme, the Matabeleland North districts will get 10 percent equity in businesses exploiting natural resources in their area.
The qualifying businesses are bringing in a cumulative sum of US$4 million in seed capital to the trusts.
Other trusts launched so far are Mhondoro-Ngezi-Zvimba; Tongogara; Matabeleland South; Mimosa and Marange-Zimunya.
Labels: MATABELELAND NORTH, ROBERT MUGABE
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Sata is a hostage president-Tayali
TIME PUBLISHED - Thursday, October 18, 2012, 3:55 pm
A local Non-Governmental Organisation, Zambia Voice has charged that President Michael Sata is finding it hard to fight corruption because he is surrounded by corrupt officials. In a statement, Zambian Voice Executive Director Chilufya Tayali stated that there is no doubt that President Sata has a genuine zeal to fight corruption.
“We have no doubt that President Michael Sata mean to fight corruption but he is surrounded by corrupt people,” Mr. Tayali said. “For whatever alliances they signed for him to go to Plot One, President Sata appears like he is now held hostage in State House by these thieves, crooks, schemas who steal in broad day light while the Zambian people are watching,” he said.
Mr. Tayali observed that while other corruption investigations are still pending while others are still being investigated by compromised officers from ACC and the Task force while other cases are being discussed in the public domain and nothing is being done about.
“Let me hasten to point out here that we have very good junior offices in our Police and ACC but as they say, “The fish start rotting from the head”, the top people in these institutions are the ones who are corrupt more because they are brought in by these thieves and schemas who are holding our President at ransom for helping him to get into power.”
Mr. Tayali reminded President Sata that he was not put in State House by the thieving party and government officials.
“Mr. Sata don’t bow to any these opportunists who will destroy your legacy as a no nonsense man, hard worker and Christian. Look how these people have started fighting for Presidency as if we have one more year to elections and yet it’s only a year since we changed Govt,” he said.
He said it is regrettable that the same people already started scheming so that they can position their own to be next President using their usual tricks.
Labels: CHILUFYA TAYALI, CORRUPTION, MICHAEL SATA, PF
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COMMENT - In case anyone has forgotten what the impact of economic sanctions on the civilian populations of Iraq, Zimbabwe, North Korea or Iran looks like,
a reminder from 60 Minutes. And
here she's again on Iran. Why are 'Democrats' advocating for war? And what is 'The System' the Iranians are outside of?
Financial Warfare against Iran: Devastating Social Impacts of Sanctions
Carnage or Sanctions? Six Million Iranian Lives at Stake
By Dr. Ismail Salami
Global Research, October 18, 2012
Region: Middle East & North Africa
Theme: Global Economy, US NATO War Agenda
In-depth Report: IRAN: THE NEXT WAR?
The US-led sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran which directly and painfully target the population have created an inconceivable situation for those whose very lives depend on the medicine adversely affected by these barbaric sanctions.
The West is sharply aware of the devastating inhuman effects of the sanctions on the sick people. On September 4, the Washington Post published an article titled In Iran, Sanctions Take Toll On The Sick, which details how dug shortages are particularly affecting “cancer patients and those being treated for complex disorders such as hemophilia, multiple sclerosis and Thalassemia, as well as transplant and kidney dialysis patients.”
Fatemeh Hashemi, Head of Iran’s Charity Institute for Special Diseases, has voiced grave concern for the six million patients suffering from special diseases and their families who are desperately wrestling with the problems originating therefrom. In fact, the US-led sanctions are exacting their deadly toll on the terminally ailing patients.
“We feel the shortage mainly for cancer and MS drugs. Of course, Thalassemia and dialysis patients are also the targets of these hardships. All these problems stem from the sanctions the US has imposed on the banking sector and the difficulties in transferring foreign currency,” Hashemi said.
The bitter question is: Is the West taking sadistic pleasure in incurring genocidal deaths or does the West naively believe that they are achieving their fiendish goals in the Muslim country?
Bitterly exasperated by the fact that a large multitude of patients are on the brink of death on account of the US-led sanctions, Fatemeh Hashemi wrote a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon two months ago. Part of the letter which was sent through the Iranian Foreign Ministry reads: “Although medicine is not included in the list of the sanctions, the aftermaths of the sanctions, the impossibility of transferring money through the banks as well as the appalling atmosphere created thus has cast its cumbersome shadow upon medicine and healthcare in Iran and has austerely affected the import of medicines in the country. As the head of an institute dealing with the lives of six million patients, I hereby implore you to exert all your endeavors to champion human rights in lifting the sanctions as they are political in nature and prove to the inexcusable detriment of the patients in Iran.”
Many of the Thalassemia patients in Iran are threatened by death due to the paucity of Desferrioxamine or Desferal, a medicine which helps keep their blood iron at a safe level in the body. Thalassemia patients keep having blood transfusions which cause extra iron in the body. When blood transfusions are regular, iron gathers in the body and is amassed in some organs such as the liver, the heart, and the endocrine glands. Functioning as a foreign body, the iron eventually damages the organs. One of the main drugs which helps keep the blood iron at a safe level is desferrioxamine or ‘Desferal’.
In a recent speech, the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has blasted the illogical western sanctions as ‘barbaric’ and described them as a war against a nation.
“The West is angry and they have used Iran’s nuclear energy program as a pretext [to impose sanctions]. They claim that they will lift the sanctions if Iran backs down on its right to nuclear energy. They are lying. Out of spite and revenge, they decide to impose illogical sanctions against Iran.”
As the leader says, the nuclear energy program is only an excuse for the West.
To be precise, the West is well aware that Iran has never sought a nuclear weapons program nor does it ever wish to do so. However they appear to be incapable of finding a better excuse than Iran’s nuclear energy program to go ahead with their barbaric sanctions with the ultimate goal of installing a US-friendly regime in the country. A recent article by David Frum reveals how Washington uses the sanctions as a strategy to bring about regime change in Iran. He says, “The U.S. has three goals vis-a-vis Iran: minimalist, maximalist and in-between. The minimalist goal is to compel Iran to surrender its nuclear ambitions and submit fully to international monitoring. The in-between goal is more generally to moderate Iran’s obnoxious behavior, including state sponsorship of terrorist outrages such as the recent attempt to murder the Saudi ambassador to Washington. The maximalist goal is to apply enough economic pressure to incite domestic revolution and the fall of the regime.”
Apart from his naïve perception of the status quo in Iran, he touches on a very important issue which tops the US agenda: regime change in Iran. Parenthetically, Frum used to be Bush’s speech writer and was well connected to the White House. His unconscious confession to this grand delusion entertained by the US officials indicates how very removed from reality the Washington officials are and how infernally adamant they are on bringing about this change at whatever cost, even the lives of millions of people.
The sheer idea of imposing illegal sanctions against the Islamic Republic and jeopardizing the lives of millions of patients is indeed an act of brutality which runs counter to the very true spirit of humanity as well as to international humanitarian laws.
Since when has the act of endangering the lives of the ailing people become part of a dirty political game played by the West?
What a shame!
In cahoots with the US, the West is willingly or unwillingly exterminating the Iranian patients through these illegal sanctions. Indeed, they will be held accountable for the human loss they are inflicting upon the Iranian nation: surely, the eyes of God are watching them and they are held in divine abhorrence.
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Articles by: Dr. Ismail Salami
Related content:
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iranmap
Violation of Human Rights: Devastating Impacts of Iran Sanctions Regime
The fact that the inhumane sanctions of the United States and its European allies against Iran are taking a heavy toll on the ordinary Iranians is still hard to believe for many Western citizens who suppose that their governments are sincere in their claims of being concerned for human rights and freedom.…
2.
The Devastating Impacts of Economic Sanctions on the People of Iran
The Devastating Impacts of Economic Sanctions on the People of Iran
While the United States and European Union are vehemently competing with each other in the seemingly endless race of imposing sanctions on Iran, the ordinary Iranian citizens are experiencing the most breathtaking, agonizing impacts of the crippling embargoes.
On July 31, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) sent a letter to all members of the U.S.…
3.
The "Israeli Regime": The Hand That Spurs Iran Sanctions
The “Israeli Regime”: The Hand That Spurs Iran Sanctions
The illegal oil embargoes against Iran have begun to take effect; a precocious smile of satisfaction breaks upon the ugly face of Zionism; and the US once again proves its lapdog fidelity to the Israeli regime.
That’s not all, though. Israel craves for more and Washington has no choice but to cater to the wanton demands of a decadent colonizing regime.…
4.
Iran: Sanctions against Iran are also Sanctions against Russia
“If Russia were to vote in favor of a draft UN Security Council resolution on sanctions against Iran, in its current form, it would be backing sanctions against itself.”
5.
Fending For Themselves: Devastating Social and Environmental Impacts of BP Oil Spill
Fending For Themselves: Devastating Social and Environmental Impacts of BP Oil Spill
Photo by Erika Blumenfeld © 2010
We drive south on Louisiana Highway 55 towards Pointe-au-Chien. The two-lane road hugs a bayou, like most of the roads leading south into the marsh areas. Incredibly green, lush forest gives way to increasing areas of water the further south we venture, until the very road feels as though it is floating.…
Labels: GENOCIDE, IRAN, SANCTIONS, WAR CRIMES
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Rockefeller Global Tentacles Exposed in 1959 by the Soviet Union
By Wayne Madsen
Global Research, October 18, 2012
Strategic Culture Foundation
The Rockefeller global oil and banking empire has been the subject of much critical commentary on the Internet. However, the Rockefeller Octopus’s tentacles into every facet of America’s banking, oil (through their control of Standard Oil), military, educational, and foreign policy apparatus was exposed in a monograph prepared by the Soviet Union in 1959. An English translation of the Soviet article prepared by the Central Intelligence Agency’s Foreign Documents Division and dated December 16, 1959, was uncovered from the CIA’s archives. The paper is titled: “About Those Who Are Against Peace.”
The arguments in the Soviet paper generally concur with President Dwight Eisenhower’s Farewell Address to the American people shortly before the inauguration of President Kennedy in January 1961. In his speech, Eisenhower warned the American people about the dangers posed to America’s democracy by the “military-industrial complex.”
There is nothing in the Soviet paper that rings false about the Rockefellers… The oligarchic family has exercised control over America’s foreign policy through their part-sponsorship of the Council on Foreign Relations, Trilateral Commission, and Bilderberg Group – all three shadowy organizations of the world’s elite class who determine monetary, foreign, and military policies behind closed doors. Rockefeller funding of Columbia University and the University of Chicago have helped inflict on the United States some of the most brazen neo-conservatives serving inside and outside of government.
The paper states “In 1957, the Rockefeller oligarchy of American oil industrialists controlled a capital of 61.4 billion dollars. The precise size of the Rockefeller fortune is a state secret in America: the American press noted at one time that special measures are taken so that data concerning the largest fortunes of the U.S. are not published.”
Fifty-three years later, the fortunes of America’s elite are still secret as can be seen with the secrecy surrounding Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s taxes and his offshore financial holdings in such locations as the Cayman Islands, Switzerland, Bermuda, and, according to some reports, the British Virgin Islands.
But the Rockefellers wrote the book on hiding their immense fortune in corporate contrivances and secret bank accounts, an easy task considering they own Chase Manhattan Bank, which is now known as J P Morgan Chase.
The Soviet article also exposed the Rockefellers’ much-ballyhooed “philanthropy” and “work ethic.” The article revealed: “The Rockefellers do not buy yachts worth many millions, like the Vanderbilt magnates; they do not install doorknobs and water fountains of pure gold in their palaces. But love for luxury is not alien to them. The play house where the children of the Rockefellers frolic cost a half million dollars. Bourgeois newspapers, willingly ‘forgetting’ about such ‘trifles,’ relate with tears of sympathy how the children of the billionaires earn pocket money by raising rabbits, cleaning boots, and even destroying flies at ten cents per hundred.”
Today, the successors of the same “bourgeois” media of 1959 prattle on about how Mitt and Ann Romney had it so “tough” after graduating from college. CNN’s Anderson Cooper, the son of billionaire heiress Gloria Vanderbilt, goes on about how tough it was for him to break into the news media, as if his mother had nothing to do with his rapid ascension in the corporate media.
The Soviet paper paints a picture of the Rockefellers that is similar to today’s Romney family: “The people want to know the truth. And the truth about the wealth of the Rockefellers consists of dark deeds, thousands of ruined families, hundreds of thousands of workers in many countries of the world tormented by work beyond their strength. The truth is the concealed history of many wars – it is oil stained with blood.” Of course, today the same can be said about the Rockefeller-linked Bush family, as well as Dick Cheney, George Soros, Rupert Murdoch, and the Rothschild family.
The article identifies the Rockefeller clan members in 1959: “John D. Rockefeller II does not direct his wide empire alone. He has five sons – John D. III, Laurance, David, Winthrop, and Nelson. They are all large capitalists. Each has his role, his department. Only Winthrop has not become famous for anything, unless one counts a scandalous divorce.” In fact, Winthrop became famous later when he was elected governor of Arkansas in 1966. His brother Nelson had served as Governor of New York since 1959.
David is the only survivor among John D. II’s sons and he has been a major player in secret organizations like the Bilderbergs and Trilateralists. David Rockefeller’s off demeanor is described in the Soviet article: “The bourgeois press advertises him as the owner of the best collection of insects in the world, and as possessing extremely gentlemanly manners. But when he enters the office of the bank [Chase Manhattan] and the steel doors close behind his back, the lover of butterflies turns into a greedy seeker after dollars. The hired biographers have every basis for calling him ‘the personification of the virtues of Wall Street.’”
Nelson Rockefeller, who, in 1975, would have become President of the United States had two attempted assassins’ bullets hit their target – President Gerald Ford – is recognized in the Soviet article for his scheming in Latin America, scheming that was supplemented by Richard Nixon and Ford Secretary of State and Rockefeller consigliore Henry Kissinger. The article states: “The Rockefellers have long nourished an irresistible attraction for the countries in Latin America: the provocatory smell of oil reaches them from the South American continent. Therefore, Nelson Rockefeller, who had long been trying to turn South America into his family estate, was at one time placed at the head of the so-called “Bureau of Inter-American Affairs.”
The article quotes the left-wing newspaper the Daily Compass, which once published the muckraking columns of investigative journalist I. F. Stone, in describing the Rockefellers’ stranglehold over the U.S. State Department: “The policy of the State Department is born in the offices of Standard Oil. From there it is transmitted to the Department of Defense, where the heads of the Army and Navy approve it. When this policy gets to the State Department, it becomes the policy of the government and is supposed to be confirmed by Congress quickly and without any changes whatever. When an order for laws designed to protect the interests of the oil kings comes from the Rockefeller dynasty itself, the entire Congress – from the small to the great – comes to ‘attention’ and does what the bosses order it to do.”
Considering the recent U.S. and NATO intervention in Libya and Syria, countries where oil is key, little has changed in how U.S. foreign and war policy is manufactured.
The Rockefellers ties to the CIA and Israel’s Mossad are also laid out in the Soviet monograph. The article reveals that the Rockefellers supplied a U.S. intelligence “cut out” – the School of Eastern Studies in Jerusalem – with money from the Arabian-American oil company (ARAMCO). The school, which operated with the full knowledge of the Mossad, trained American officers to conduct espionage throughout the Middle East.
There was a time when the U.S. government and the corporate (bourgeois) press dismissed such articles as the Soviet monograph on the Rockefellers as pure propaganda. In retrospect, the Soviet authors of the article understood in 1959 what many Americans have come late to fathoming: that the United States is being destroyed by a mega-wealthy elite intent on preying on the United States like a swarm of locusts.
1.
VIDEO: David Rockefeller behind SPP and North American Union (NAU)
A Rockefeller sponsored network is behind the process of “deap integration”
TO VIEW VIDEO CLICK HERE…
2.
The Rockefeller Boys
The Rockefeller Boys
Bichler, Shimshon and Nitzan, Jonathan. (2007). Science & Society. Vol. 71. No. 2. April. pp. 243-249.
Full Text Available As:PDF (File size: 92 KB) – Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader or other PDF viewer.
Abstract
Rockefeller’s global reach — from the University of Chicago to the Holy Land.…
3.
Rockefeller Center Continues to Support the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya...
Rockefeller Center Continues to Support the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya…
At New York’s Rockefeller Center, named after John D. Rockefeller Jr., the Green flag of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya continues to fly … Below the Green Flag is the golden statue of Prometheus, which constitutes a mysterious symbol of imperial power.
The Rockefeller Center symbolizes the US Financial establishment.…
4.
Development of US Military Facilities in Former Soviet Union: U.S. To Build Training Center In Tajikistan
Development of US Military Facilities in Former Soviet Union: U.S. To Build Training Center In Tajikistan
The United States has in past years built training facilities, financed military programs and established airbases in a handful of strategic ex-Soviet republics in Central Asia.
These include Georgia and Azerbaijan in the Caucasus as well as Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia.…
5.
Vaccinate the World: Gates, Rockefeller Seek Global Population Reduction
Vaccinate the World: Gates, Rockefeller Seek Global Population Reduction
The global elite has launched a world-wide operation against an unaware population to reduce and control fertility. Vaccines and even staple food crops have been modified to achieve these goals.
If you can’t seem to bring yourself to believe that such an undertaking is possible, or that there are human beings willing and capable; Look back in time, this kind of conspiracy isn’t new, in fact this kind of control was idealized by Plato some 2,300 years ago in his momentous work The Republic.…
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Labels: GLOBALISATION, NEOCOLONIALISM, ROCKEFELLER
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