Guinea Conakry and the Meaning of Democratic Reform

The colonially engineered nation-state of Guinea in West Africa has faced decades of authoritarian leadership and ethnic conflict ever since independence from French-rule in 1958. After a coup led by Moussa Dadis Camara in 2008, there was much enthusiasm about a break with that past. Then, on a day which will live in infamy, September 28, 2009, a protest against Camara's military junta turned violent when at least a hundred and fifty-six people were shot dead and women gang-raped in the streets. You can see and hear an audio slide-show in the New Yorker on the history. A video of the ensuing political crisis is below.

Today, Guinea is headed for a reportedly "free, transparent and credible" election on June 27, 2010, that will usher in a civilian controlled government. A list of presidential front-runners in the election are already announced. The Guinean military has sworn that it will not interfere in the election process. A Guinean diplomat happily told Reuters,"for now, the army has remained out of the political process."

But is it really possible? Has Guinea, after years of brutal dictatorship finally entered into the paradise of a Western approved multiparty democracy? A timely analysis in Foreign Policy magazine warns that transition from military to civilian rule will in no way challenge Guinea's kleptocracy (rule by thieves)---a system in which multinationals and elites work with the military behind the scenes to ensure the safe extraction of resources.

"No one doubts that the military, through its affiliated networks of businessmen and political allies, will continue to overshadow the running of any elected regime. Guinea is the world's largest bauxite exporter and home to vast iron ore deposits, and possibly even oil reserves -- all of which the military is keenly aware."

The challenge therefore is to understand just how much democracy Guineans can expect after the polls on the 27th? If a sign of democracy is how much Guinea's people directly share in the fruits of the nation's wealth, signs are so far not looking positive. After all, the free-flow of Guinea's mineral resources in past have not in anyway improved the social and economic lives of the country's majority poor population. According to U.S. sources, when economic growth rose slightly in 2006-08, due to increases in global demand and commodity prices on world markets the standard of living fell. Guinea remains among the poorest countries in the world despite its rich natural resources.

Another historical problem in Guinea is the habit among the state to utilize political violence against opposition movements and political parties (often along ethnic-lines). And while a transition to a nominally civilian government represents the opportunity for a serious change, the amount continuing military intrusion in economic and political affairs is a warning sign. The Foreign Policy article lists the continuing influence of the military as a warning sign for future violence along ethnic or religious lines.

"Most alarmingly, serious splits have emerged within military circles. Last year, Camara brought in Israeli mercenaries to train as many as 10,000 new recruits for the army. They came mostly from Camara's ethnic Geurzé tribe in the isolated Forestiere region....Over the last few weeks, ethno-religious clashes have killed several people in Forestiere amid fears that Camara may be stirring up trouble ahead of the polls."

I recently listened to a piercing analysis in a Brecht forum podcast on Western military and judicial influence in the African continent. One speaker noted toward the end of the discussion the fact that forms of natural resource extraction conspicuously match political structures in Africa. Guinea is a text-book case of this phenomena even during significant moments of regime change as we are about to witness later this month. What does democratic reform mean in a state like Guinea where the political structure is configured for the cheap extraction of the country's mineral resources rather than endogenous social development of its citizens?

Elections Without Democracy in Ethiopia?

Ethiopians have recently finished voting at the electoral polls in a parliamentary election that was widely held as a test of the country's multiparty democracy. Despite ethnic violence, conflicts with neighboring Somalia and Eritrea and accusations of political repression, the ruling Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front and Menes Zelawi, the current prime minister, are expected to win big in the election. Zelawi is one of the U.S.'s closest allies in the 'War on Terrorism'. In keeping with the norm of African elections, the ballot box will not likely deliver any sweeping political changes internally or in foreign relations.

Was the election a sign of internal political legitimacy for the EPRD and continuity?

Opposition parties are claiming foul play but the alternatives are either addressing grievances through the courts or violent confrontation with the ruling party. Have things become some bad here that a peaceful but flawed election is the most one can hope for? As usual Al Jazeera has had great coverage of the electoral proceedings and their implications.

The U.S. Military Drags West Africa into 'War on Terror'

After decades of CIA assassinations, U.S.-supported coups and subversive interference during the Cold War in Africa, one would think that West African political leaders would run at the thought of another geo-political chess match in their own territories. But slowly and gracefully, the U.S. 'War on Terrorism', has been able to submit the continent to yet another round of imperial strategem with very little organized internal political opposition.

The U.S. military is training soldiers in West Africa for a potential confrontation with "jihadists" under the new U.S. Africa Command. The stated objective of the recent mobilizations is to prepare for confrontation with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. The group is unlikely an existential threat to West African governments, is small in number compared to other violent criminal organizations and has so far only managed to kidnap foreigners and extort money. Partly due to the aggressive and often draconian work of their security forces, Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco, have already prevented the organization from operating in their territories. There is also no public evidence to suggest the group serves as a direct threat to the U.S.

Despite their infamous name and the constant fear-mongering in the Western press, the organization likely uses the name al-Qaeda for recruiting and fundraising purposes only as opposed to having any lasting ties with cells in Afghanistan/Pakistan. Nevertheless, the U.S. is mobilizing the armies of Mauritania, Mali, Senegal, Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger and Nigeria for a protracted conflict with the organization.

Political leaders in West Africa are probably doing more harm than good by accepting the U.S. label of the region as a wellspring of jihadist terrorism. As we have seen in Iraq and Somalia, U.S.-backed military operations are often the principal cause of violent political terrorism and recruiting activity rather than a force for peace and social justice. In regions with large conservative Muslim populations the influx of America forces and assistance is among the top recruiting tools for new converts to the cause of political Islam. Certainly, an objective assessment of the American track record in the aforementioned cases among others should have caused alarm among government's participating in AFRICOM'S recent mobilizations. However, political elites in this region draw their legitimacy among top the military brass and petty-bourgeois intellectuals from receiving external aid from the United States and European Union. With the incoming military and financial support elites are able to crack down on internal opposition movements and consolidate their own political authority regardless of the long-term consequences.

Armed robbery and kidnapping conducted to extract ransom is not unique to al-Qaeda in West Africa. There are any number of violent drug cartels, rebel groups and other criminals in the region who exploit the vacuum of political legitimacy, and grinding poverty in order to advance this or that cause. The ideals of regional autonomy and national sovereignty have suffered so much in West Africa that because the least organized of such groups happens to be a potential threat to U.S. interests, government's are responding as if preparing for a full-scale war.

It was not long ago that the United States utilized political Islam and al-Qaeda extremists in a struggle against the Soviet Union and secular nationalists movements in North Africa and the Middle-East. The same networks and ideologies that West African governments are being paid to chase throughout the Saharan desert, were empowered in the first place by the U.S. State Department, CIA and Pentagon. Unfortunately, for the majority of the poor and formally unemployed people in West Africa the region is once again employed in another of the U.S.'s adventures.

Whereas China and other countries have sought to increase their influence in Africa through mainly political and economic means, the United States and European Union have estimated that their strategic advantage lies in a combination of economic assistance and military strength as it did during the Cold War. The clear parallel between the current U.S. strategy of establishing client-states today to the Cold War in the 20th century were outlined by U.S. Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates who argued in a recent article in Foreign Affairs that American military and economic assistance rather than full-scale invasions is the most effective way to expand its strategic influence.

"Building up the military and security forces of key allies and local partners was also a major component of U.S. strategy in the Cold War, first in Western Europe, then in Greece, South Korea, and elsewhere."

The triumph of AFRICOM in West Africa is perhaps one of the most striking indicators that the independence movements of 50 years ago achieved little to nothing in the area of self-government or regional autonomy. The so called independent democratic regimes in this region have literally become client-states of the United States and European Union completely dependent on the economic and military support of their patrons. There remains hope that a growing social and political movement can challenge the attempt to drag the poor into another U.S.-conflict and put the region on an endogenous path of social development against poverty, hunger, and disease.

In Africa, the Hypocrisy of the Obama Administration is Inexcusable

The United States fears Africa is becoming a place of increasing competition from China mostly, but also Brazil, Russia, and the European Union. African countries like Angola or Zimbabwe who were once forced to depend on the patronage of the IMF and World Bank are less dependent on America's hegemonic financial institutions than anytime in the last 20 years. The growing complexity of actors has opened the possibility of greater independence in national economic and social policy-making in African countries from the dictates of Washington D.C. With the threat of increased competition and the level of oil imports from Africa going up as much 20 percent, the U.S. is engaging in its most extensive imperial quests in Africa since the end of the Cold War.Ironically, this assault is advancing under the leadership of one of Africa's own "sons", U.S. President Barack Obama.

Hiding behind the rhetoric of limited government and individual liberties, the United States is protecting some of the most repressive regimes in the world. The Obama administration is intensifying President Bush's plan to militarily support anti-democratic regimes throughout the continent. These regimes are responsible for grave human rights violations and widespread persecution of political and national minorities according to prominent Western human rights organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.

The ridiculous level of hypocrisy in U.S. foreign policy proves that the Obama administration is concerned neither with human rights or participatory democracy but stability against any actor that could potentially threaten their perceived political and economic interests. Eritrea, a small East African nation that shares a contentious border with Ethiopia, has refused to support a U.S. war in the Horn of Africa and reportedly rejected a demand from the U.S. military to host a U.S. base in the Red Sea port of Assab off its coast. Eritrea's intransigence earned it a spot on the U.S. terrorist list. The Obama administration froze existing ties with Eritrea and claimed that the "government acted as a principal source and conduit for arms to antigovernment, extremist, and insurgent groups in Somalia." The Eritrean government vehemently denies supporting such groups. Meanwhile, the same Obama administration has increased military funding by more than 300 per cent for African countries that support its foreign policy aims including Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Djibouti, Ethiopia, Equitorial Guinea, Algeria and Nigeria. Each of these governments are infamously known for exceptional corruption and state repression against political opponents.

The hypocrisy of the Obama administration does not end with military intervention. The administration has also teamed up with billionaires Bill and Melinda Gates to extend U.S. influence and guarantee multinational corporate access to African agricultural markets. Their strategy is to maintain leverage in African affairs by creating new systems of aid dependency for U.S. technical and financial support in the area of food production. In this way the administration approaches aid as an issue of national security. The interests of the U.S. military, multinational corporations and aid NGO's intersect as the three groups meet to share talking points and communication strategies. Their latest gimmick is $408 million for a World Bank fund to encourage "good" farming practices in the developing world. However, as Mukoma Wa Ngugi of Pambazuka news points out, the reason why so many African's go hungry in a global economy of abundance is not for a lack of "free" markets or U.S. aid but the existing neo-colonial models of political economy in African countries that maintain unequal social relations.

"Hunger in Africa is mostly a political and economic disparity problem. To end hunger, political stability, proper distribution of food and land within nations, and less emphasis on cash-crop farming and more on food- crop farming will be more effective, friendlier to the environment and less costly than the super-seeds that will require tons of pesticides - and eventually, cost a lot of money."

With Barack Obama as the chief spokesman, the U.S. government is in the midst of a major public relations campaign to re-brand themselves as a partner of African countries rather than an imperial power. This shift is mostly in response to the failures of the World Bank and IMF's unpopular structural adjustment programs that imposed ruthless neo-liberal conditions on the re-payment of loans and led to a backlash in the form of renewed calls for national sovereignty. However, this new American re-branding effort should not be confused with a genuine attempt to re-start U.S.-Africa relations on equal terms. The conditions of U.S. bilateral partnership in the form of technical and financial assistance are not limited to specific development projects but amount to a sophisticated form of blackmail with the U.S. interfering in the way government's run their internal politics and manage their economies.

The most notorious example of this form of blackmail is no where more obvious than through a bilateral development fund known as the Millennium Challenge Account. The completely biased conditions for financial support from the account include "economic freedom" and "civil liberties" as defined by far right-wing think tanks like the U.S. Heritage Foundation. Smaller, cash-strapped African countries like Senegal, are particularly vulnerable to this scheme being forced to 'behave' in a manner that is acceptable to conservatives in the U.S. in exchange for aid.

In the final analysis, U.S. strategists fear that the further waning of their exclusive post-Cold War influence will impinge on long-term economic and political "interests" in Africa, which include unlimited access to natural resources and markets for U.S. goods. Therefore, the Obama administration is determined to put more financial resources into promoting a balance of power more favorable to its interests with proxy military initiatives and Trojan Horse development aid designed to promote dependency on the U.S. At the same time, the administration is deceptively using the rhetoric of partnership and mutuality to provide cover for African elites allied with the interests of the U.S. military, foreign investors and multinational corporations. There is no amount of Kenyan heritage that should absolve Barack Obama and his administration of responsibility for intensifying the scourge of U.S. imperialism in Africa. For a man who is quick to preach personal responsibility in front of large audiences of black Americans and continental Africans, Obama should hold himself accountable for the actions of his administration under his watch.

The Fascinating Internal Politics and History of Yemen

The U.S. is waging two major wars at once (one is the longest war in U.S. history) and indirectly managing conflicts in several other countries in central asia and the middle-east. Need I not mention here how tragically dismissive of human life these extended campaigns have been, even to the point of jeopardizing the imperial mission its self. After the attempted bombing of a U.S. flight into Detroit, Yemen received a lot of press attention for allegedly providing the safe haven where a Nigerian attempted underwear bomber was armed. Since then, one can scarcely find a mention of the vitally important country of Yemen and the U.S. military's support for an immoral counter-insurgency campaign that is destroying the lives of countless people whose only crime is an unyielding desire for survival. Not only is Yemen's government committing violent atrocities against its own people and denying basic civil liberties, but it is doing so with military weapons and money from that eternal beacon of liberty and hope known as the U.S. government.

Beyond the external geopolitics of Yemen is a really interesting story of internal conflict and struggles for self-determination and social justice. These internal dramas are often sucked-up by global struggles for hegemony, but remain important to the fate of the middle-east region as a whole. Author and activist Tariq Ali recently wrote an amazing narrative of his recent trip to Yemen and a brief history of its politics. I'm sharing it here because his piece is a rare opportunity to put a human face on a country that has become another chess piece in America's wasted march for "victory".

Yemen is a proper country, unlike the imperial petrol stations dotted across other parts of the Arabian Peninsula, where the ruling elites live in hurriedly constructed skyscrapers designed by celebrity architects, flanked by shopping malls displaying every Western brand, and serviced by wage-slaves from South Asia and the Philippines. Sana’a, Yemen’s capital, was founded when the Old Testament was still being written, edited and collated. It’s true that the new Mövenpick hotel in the heart of the city’s diplomatic enclave is reminiscent of Dubai at its worst – when I was there it was pushing its Valentine’s Day Dinner Menu – but in Yemen the elite is careful and doesn’t flaunt its wealth. Click here to read the rest of Ali's article in the London Review of Books.

Sudan and Democratization in Africa

If you randomly drew a name of an African country from a hat and chose Sudan, you would have a pretty decent sample of the issues facing other large countries in the continent. Sudan is representative of the ethnic/ religious conflicts, natural resource dependency, and immense divide between urban and rural areas that make the process of democratization, as defined by the West, onerous if not inconceivable. This week, Sudan is in the process of voting in multi-party national elections for the first time in more than 20 years. Two of the major opposition parties have dropped out of the race, but outside election observers like former U.S. President Jimmy Carter think the vote can be free and fair.

However, underlying questions remain about the election process and the expected results. Al Jazeera reported on irregularities at several polling stations and the perception among opposition parties that the outcome will be illegitimate in the final analysis. Furthermore, the National Electoral Commission in Sudan has undermined the credibility of the entire process by breaching the standards of Sudan's own election Act. Hafiz Mohammed from Making Sense of Sudan, writes the following list to spell out the faults of the NEC to date,

- By bringing forward the date at which any candidate supposed to withdraw his/her candidateship by one month from the 12 of March to the 12 of April without any justification.

- The accepted back the candidateships of SPLM candidates for the National Assembly from South Kordofan , after they withdraw them within the legal time frame, which was because the NCP and SPLM agreed to that, although it was a clear breach of the law.

- Many of the polling station staff are members of the NCP, and some are from the neighbourhood popular committees which are totally controlled by the NCP.

- Allowing the certificates from the popular committee to be used as source of identification for voters, without using any extra document, has been common. That a clear breach of their own rules, and opens the gate to frauds. That is clear in many polling stations, in the first day of voting as, some NCP members are sitting near to the polling station issuing certificate to allow people to vote without any further checks.

- Most of the people chosen as local observers are members of the NCP, and that also clear violation of the rules as people are not allowed to be monitors if they are member of a political party or support any candidate election campaign.

- The language the NEC is using to respond to any complaint from other political parties is just an imitation of the NCP leaders’ language, so that they are seen as taking sides in the ongoing political dispute between the NCP and other political parties. That led other political parties passing a vote of no confidence on it.

What the elections in Sudan teach us is that procedural democracy is not a magic bullet. Elections alone can't resolve all of the historical and institutional contradictions facing territorially large African nations like Sudan. And while we may hope otherwise, there is no evidence that democracy with African characteristics can ever flourish without striking at the roots of internal conflict. That being said, the elections at hand are vital for short-term peace and reconciliation in Sudan. Though imperfect, the elections are a first step toward the necessary "deracializing civil society, detribalizing the Native Authority, and developing the economy in the context of unequal international relations", which Sudan and other large African countries have so far failed to accomplish.

For the first time in 25 years, there are enough Sudanese power brokers and citizens who are ready to give peace a chance.

Will the Real Pan-Africanists Please Stand-Up?

Senegal's president Abdoulaye Wade calls him self a Pan-Africanist. He offered to give land to Haitians who lost their homes in the recent earth quake. In April, he will unveil a new statue dedicated to what he calls the "African Renaissance". However, Wade's policies of neo-liberal privatization, demagoguery against his political opponents and his outrageous attempts to win the favor of foreign investors and Western presidents are the polar opposite of what revolutionary leaders discussed at the 6th Pan-African Congress, when the last wave of African liberation movements were struggling against neo-colonialism. Wade, and the other presidents who share similarly right-wing visions for Africa, are impotent against ramped corruption and extreme ethnic and religious violence happening in Africa today. The major reason why is that their visions of Pan-Africanism or African Renaissance draw their strength from the institutional foundations of neo-colonialism.

During European colonialism, traditional or customary ethnic and religious identities were politically exaggerated by racists to legitimize their own dominance in Africa. Colonizers realized early on that by capitalizing on the cultural and historical Native Authorities of rural Africa they could put a local face on external domination and pit traditional factions against one another. This system of indirect rule thrived in an atmosphere of "divide and conquer" where ruthless competition between identities for a piece of the pie kept colonialism in tact. Even after the European powers, exhausted by World War II, decided to grant political independence to their colonies, many African countries chose to maintain the same colonial-type institutions that politicized ethnic and religious differences.

Today, ethnic and religious groups in rural Africa desperately jostle for political authority or economic gains from mineral riches, fertile lands, and increasingly scarce water resources. Far from the romanticized conceptions of African Renaissance with aborigines beating tom-toms, dancing half-naked, and eating mangos, over half of rural Africa is consumed by ruthless competitions between extremely poor people organizing on essentialist conceptions of their identities. Armed with automatic machine guns, machetes, or voting ballots these groups fight to protect the interests of the friends who worship as they worship or the distant cousins who can their bio-cultural origins to a common ancestor, all while working to eliminate competitors. These remarkably static conceptions of identity are not natural but the result of very specific political cultures that emerged as a result of Western social engineering.

The current un-governability and divisiveness of much of rural Africa plays directly into the hands of Western economic powers who take more than their fair share of Africa's wealth. On the one hand, the historical fragmentation of the post-colonial state along ethnic or religious lines has prevented the emergence of national, broad-based political and social movements that can demand fast-track redistribution of lands and mineral wealth to the countryside. As we have seen in the unfolding "Bolivarian Revolution" in Latin America, the U.S. government believes that the ultimate challenge to domination of its "own backyard" is national democratic and popular alliances organized around distributional rather than nativist political cultures.

More importantly, in keeping with classical liberal economics, imperialists (governments who actively support or practice the act of imperalism) benefit from a central government that is too weak to regulate multinational corporations in remote areas where the raw mineral resources being extracted or to ensure the revenues from the resources are being taxed to fund public services. A central African government that is constantly threatened by ego-tripping rebels scrambling for power or working to satisfy the interests of religious brotherhoods is an enthusiastic customer for military weapons sales or potential dependent on aid.

There were radical nationalists like Julius Nyere, Kwame Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral and Samora Machel who explicitly attempted to de-legitimize Native Authority and unite the most oppressed sectors of their countries under national liberation movements for social and economic justice. These leaders originally mobilized heterogeneous movements in solidarity that could dismantle the institutions of colonial rule and isolate traditional African elites who empowered them. Furthermore, they advocated the direct takeover of the commanding heights of the economy including the technologies responsible for the extraction of strategic natural resources and agricultural production---a step taken to ensure as broad a program of poverty eradication as possible. The combination of these two events resulted in direct confrontations with the combined forces of Western military might and economic isolation but also internal opposition from conservative Native Authorities. After the implosion of the Soviet Union and de-radicalization of Communist China these rebellious African regimes lost their main sources of technical and financial assistance.

Despite their eventual defeat, radical nationalists in Africa did leave behind one major victory---national political identity. For example, Tanzania is among the few territorially large African countries that has not seen essentialist identity politics spill-over into extreme violent conflict. Ugandan political scientist Mahmood Mamdani has spoken about the nationalist legacy of Julius Nyere in Tanzania pointing out, "the success of Tanzania as a nation that is getting it right the continent is because the nation's erstwhile leader, Julius Nyerere, during his tenure dismantled the customary law, thereby making every one a Tanzanian citizen." Radical nationalism sought to do the very difficult task of changing rural dwellers perceptions about political legitimacy.

The demonization of African leaders who supported "left-wing" political views and policies that emphasized economic sovereignty and sweeping agrarian transformation of society always takes outside of the context of contemporary African politics where genocide and religious fundamentalism exist side-by-side with crippling social injustices. And when discussing genocide and religious fundamentalism, the exact inverse is true. Commentary on violent ethnic or religious factions are taken out of the context of a documented imperialist strategy of neutralizing any political movement that sought to unite citizens under bold agendas for radical social change.

I am involved with the Pan-African Youth Summit 2010 in Dakar that is trying to organize a new coalition of grassroots "left" organizations united in the reconstruction of a legitimate Pan-African movement. The term "left" is necessary in this case to distinguish between Pan-Africanists who believe the driving force of progressive change is the most oppressed and exploited members of society from those who believe traditional elites and politicians can deliver that change. Without the emergence of broad-based popular alliances organized around agrarian reform and a government that can provide widespread social protections, Africa will likely continue to have scenes of discriminate carnage and extreme poverty. I hope that my African friends and allies will answer the challenge. Africa is in need of a revolution, not a renaissance.

REFERENCES

1. Mahmood Mamdani. Citizen and Subject- Chapter Eight Conclusion: Linking the Urban and the Rural

2. Sam Moyo and Paris Yoros. The Resurgence of Radical Nationalism in the South Atlantic