By Essa Bokarr Sey
This past week, we all have been reading through stories related to The Gambian authorities refusing the flight from Switzerland that was carrying people being deported from the same country, landing rights! In my book that was accurate for the Banjul International Airport to do once again. A similar incident took place years in a different form. The whole situation matches the meaning of the following proverbs! “What is good for the goose is also good for the gander” Or the African one which says “Any person who prefers eating pepper-soup should also be ready to do so with a runny nose!”.
Let us start with the three "buts" of Switzerland when it comes to their past and present HARSH actions against African Immigrants and their misplaced blames!
1) Switzerland cannot stop African Immigrants from crossing their borders, as far as they have chosen to continue receiving and keeping stolen monies from African heads of state in their banks!
2) Switzerland should help Internal Non violent resistance groups inside our countries fight against capital flight from corrupt African leaders first!
3) Refusing Swiss flights that are carrying African deportees landing rights, is a good "tit-for-tat!" for selfish government like Switzerland itself!
By Essa Bokarr Sey.
This past week, we all have been reading through stories related to The Gambian authorities refusing the flight from Switzerland that was carrying people being deported from the same country, landing rights! In my book that was accurate for the Banjul International Airport to do once again. A similar incident took place years in a different form.
The whole situation matches the meaning of the following proverbs! “What is good for the goose is also good for the gander” Or the African one which says “Any person who prefers eating pepper-soup should also be ready to do so with a runny nose!”.
Let us run through a synopsis of past and present stories that are linked to Switzerland itself when it comes to them the Swiss entertaining the idea of receiving, keeping and helping conceal stolen monies from African leaders especially despots. To be candid Switzerland has so far helped ruin Africa economically. They really have because their country is where most of the monies our despots siphon are kept in bank accounts! Akk because this hypocritical term called “laws of secrecy” within the banking industry inside Switzerland itself! That has to stop my fellow Africans!
When Mobutu Seseseko was deposed all those of “us” who lived in Europe at the time still remember the shameful way an aerial view was showing us the properties he owned in Switzerland itself! Yes the archives are there to speak for themselves. We also remember the sad stories which were attached to the ill-gotten wealth from Nigeria’s former (deceased) dictator with an iron fist, in the name of Sanni Abacha. A greater part of his wealth was traced to Switzerland folks! That story is still not over! All Switzerland uses or refers to as cover in a simplistic way is “Bank secrecy laws!” That is the most ridiculous excuse one can ever see where helping to keep money that has been stolen from Africa by harmful and corrupt leaders is concerned. That is not good to say the least!
I am one person who is speaking from experience in this case. Of course my experience is coming from a higher echelon because I did meet and speak with some senior Swiss officials along these lines almost a decade ago! In the past the same Swiss went head on disregarding all plausible reasons therefore thought forcefully deporting some Gambians with cellulose tapes on their mouths and stiff hand cuffs on their wrists was the answer! They know what protest notes officials like myself and other young African diplomats sent to them along those lines at the material time. What happened when they did not BUGDE and wanted to continue using those INHUMANE ways of deporting our brothers and sisters back home? At some point Swiss personnel were detained in Banjul in retaliation(the archives are there to speak for themselves). We also remember when Malian immigrants who were forcefully deported to Bamako. Upon arrival they became unruly therefore went on the rampage. They broke one of the wings of the plane AIRFRANCE which took them home without even considering that some of them lost all their life savings in European banks! Well if the authorities in those EU countries do not need anything to do with these people they call “African intruders searching for greener pastures” why would they keep the little monies those “intruders” had worked for and kept European banks in the first place? Why would they also help keep monies which African despots steal from those poor immigrants and their families back home(tax payers) as well? The latter is not meant to justify illegal immigration but those EU Member states especially countries like Switzerland have to know that, by them simply trying to stop African immigrants from entering their borders in a unilateral and callous approach is unsavory and very unfair. These Swiss draconian immigration laws that are not taking into consideration the real CAUSES AND CURSES which are behind this “surge” from Africa especially the West coast towards Europe shall never bear sweet fruits for both ends! Those EU members states especially countries like Switzerland must sit down and look into the issue of immigration from a deeper and wider perspective. Their approach should be an all inclusive one and nothing less than that! They must attend ECOWAS meetings with a comprehensive and strategic package that will be based on FRANK TALK! They must address the issue by telling themselves the truth likewise tell those African leaders who steal then run to keep monies in Swiss banks the hard facts! Switzerland has to know that the new breed of African leaders who are emerging will definitely use all legal measures to make sure that any stolen monies from Africa is accounted for. Any properties or other products that have been taken away and kept in Swiss banks and the like will be followed and tracked where the need arises! These DOUBLE STANDARDS of receiving the money but rejecting the source of wealth(in this case our own sweat) has to stop forthwith.
Switzerland cannot stay indifferent in this case. Be it for the case of an asylum seeker or not we as Africans who want to see to it that WE NO LONGER cross the borders only to go and stay away in foreign lands are ready to stand up against this hypocrisy once and for all. Countries like Switzerland must share the blame with those corrupt African despots whose monies they help keep in their banks. INFACT LOANS FROM COUNTRIES LIKE SWITZERLAND MUST BE REVISITED WITH A MICROSCOPIC APPROACH. We as a new breed in Africa want to make sure that those loans are attached to the interest accrued from the monies that have been stolen by our corrupt and saved in Swiss banks over the years! Yes this may sound surreal but with time it can be achieved. In my book we do not owe countries like this anything within a moral point of view to start with! Switzerland’s case is not a separate one. Other EU member states have to get ready for stiff resistance from us Africans from now onwards. You cannot get the stolen money from despotic leaders only to “mildly” condemn “dictatorship” only to turn around giggling at us. Worst of continue using that stolen money within those banks as revolving funds which will never benefit the suffering masses in Africa(West to be more specific) in this case. NO! WE SAY NO TO THAT FROM TODAY! If you care about the welfare of the average African on the ground please join us and help STOP CAPITAL flight and money laundering. Likewise stop facilitating it or encouraging our corrupt leaders to buy properties in Europe when they kill and steal from us the suffering masses! If the Swiss and other EU member states do not stop doing so it means irony at the base or hypocrisy at the farthest! How long shall our people continue being treated like loaves of bread in an oven? We cannot continue feeling the heat while being baked to feed the hungry bellies of intercontinental greed! That cannot continue! It has to stop or be stopped!
Who does not remember former dictator Jean Bedel Bokasa of Central Africa? Who does not remember his chateau or castle in France? Who does not remember how he was disowned in that very country when his funds were depleted? If the EU can promulgate laws which can be used to help countries like Switzerland fight against immigrants, what is stopping the same EU from introducing stiffer laws against African despots who steal and keep their stolen wealth in their banking industry? Why are the very EU member states helping African despots teal and kill our people simply because they need the money? Why do they add insult to injury by forcefully deporting those very “victims” back to their countries even whereas some have genuine reasons to flee(within a political context)? I have lived in Europe officially and I know what I am exactly talking or writing about here!
The way the Swiss immigration(particularly) handles African immigrants is so inhumane and very wrong that is where one is to say the least. I have seen firsthand some of these things and my protest notes against the latter are on record! This idea of using any kind of force when deporting African immigrants cannot and should not continue unchallenged! The pictures with a Gambians’ mouth being gagged with cellulose tape in a plane from Geneva to Banjul are still there in the archives. Why treat those people like that after all? Why not use the same strength against the despots who steal and keep money in Swiss banks then? Or is this trying to get the MILK WHILE DISOWNING THE COW? That is hypocritical. No diplomacy needed in this case STRAIGHT-TALKING is the only answer here!
Hereunder is a story about Switzerland sponsoring an advert on African TVs trying to show how African immigrants suffer in Europe or to be more specific Switzerland itself! On the other hand I do concur with the ideas a Senegalese intellectual has expressed therein to help challenge the approach from the authorities in BERNE Switzerland and or other EU member states. He is right! The African Immigrant’s issue is far beyond the simplistic ways these Swiss are trying to portray in that advert! It is wider, deeper, worse and more challenging!
Please read below and see how Switzerland is being caution against its ways of sponsoring A BLEAK ANTI-IMMIGRATION TELEVISION CAMPAIGN IN AFRICA!
This is so “cheap” and hypocritical to say the least! See below and be your own judges!!!
(Source…swissinfo, Simon Bradley with agencies)
Advert aims to deter African immigrants
Switzerland is funding a bleak anti-migration television campaign in Africa to discourage would-be migrants from trying to seek their fortunes in Europe.
The hard-hitting advert, which has been aired on prime-time television in Cameroon and Nigeria, depicts the life of freshly arrived migrants in Europe as one fraught with problems and dangers.
In the film an African migrant phones his father from somewhere in Europe in the pouring rain and assures him that all is well while in reality he is living on the street, being chased by the police and having to beg for a living.
"Don't believe everything you hear. Leaving is not always living," is the final message of the film, which the SonntagsBlick newspaper said was broadcast on Nigerian state television at half-time during a friendly football match between Switzerland and Nigeria last week.
The advert is part of a television, radio and poster campaign by the Geneva-based International Organization for Migration (IOM), funded by Switzerland and the European Commission.
"We have the duty to show these people what the consequences of fleeing their country might be for them," Eduard Gnesa, head of the Federal Migration Office, told the SonntagsBlick.
"Refugees should not have any false illusions about Switzerland. We have no work for these people," he added.
In most cases immigrants from Cameroon and Nigeria can no longer claim they have been politically persecuted and therefore normally do not receive asylum status in Switzerland.
Not a paradise
IOM spokesman Jean-Philippe Chauzy said the aim of the campaign was to "inform would-be migrants of the dangers of using smuggling networks and the realities of life as an undocumented migrant in Europe".
The IOM has produced similar adverts in Senegal and Niger, funded by Spain and the European Union, Chauzy confirmed.
Swiss Justice Minister Christoph Blocher, whose ministry controls the Migration Office, said he supported the adverts.
"We must show Africans that Switzerland is not a paradise," he said.
Blocher's rightwing Swiss People's Party emerged as the biggest winner in the October parliamentary elections on the back of an anti-immigration campaign.
The short film is part of an awareness campaign that the Migration Office launched in early 2006 in Nigeria and Cameroon to dissuade economic migrants from trying their luck in Europe. It is considering a similar campaign in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other African nations.
Too simplistic
But Pape Ndiaye Diouf, a professor at Geneva's Institute of Development Studies, felt the campaign gave a "too simplistic response to a very complex problem".
He said more rigorous and responsible solutions were needed to tackle the issue than simply saying: "Don't come as there's no work".
"It's important to correctly inform people in those countries about what the situation is like [in Europe] but it should go much further. It has to be accompanied with development and job creation opportunities on the spot so young people have alternatives and don't think they absolutely have to go abroad," he told swissinfo.
"The adverts are basically well intended," noted Jürg Krummenacher, director of Caritas Switzerland. "But people in Nigeria or Cameroon can constantly see on TV what it looks like in Europe. I don't think the advert offers very much."
So far this year only 105 people from Cameroon and 246 from Nigeria have requested asylum status in Switzerland.
"Hundreds of thousands of people from both countries dream about it but only a small number actually flee," he added.
swissinfo, Simon Bradley with agencies
END
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Protest links seminar to Eritrean terrorists
Organizers deny funnelling cash to terror groups
By: Matt Preprost
Posted: 23/08/2010 1:00 AM
Posted: 23/08/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 4
A handful of human rights activists gathered outside the University of Winnipeg Sunday afternoon to protest an Eritrean community event, charging its purpose was to fundraise money that would eventually be funnelled into the hands of terrorists.
A group of about 10 people alleged the Eritrea consulate in Toronto held a seminar at the university, disguised as a cultural event, to stoke support for the African nation's notoriously corrupt and tyrannical government.
"This is a disguise, it's not a public event," said protester organizer Ghezae Hagos Berhe, himself an Eritrean refugee. "We believe it was about giving the government more money so they can support more terrorists."
Berhe alleged the seminar's purpose was to raise money for the Eritrean government, which is known to support Al-Shabab, a Somalian militant group that has been recruiting Canadian youth. The group is linked to Al-Qaeda.
Berhe tried to get the event cancelled by University of Winnipeg President Lloyd Axworthy, who Berhe said was unaware the event was taking place on campus. Axworthy sent in security guards to monitor the meeting.
Similar protests have happened in Toronto and Edmonton in recent weeks, Berhe said.
Eritrea, sandwiched between Ethiopia and Sudan along the Red Sea, has been subject to hot debate by human rights activists and the United Nations, facing strict sanctions by Western countries, including Canada.
Most recently, Canada banned weapons sales, and ordered Canadian banks to freeze any assets of Eritrean political leaders and military officials.
Organizers inside Sunday's meeting said they were simply discussing the state of their fragile home country, which has been wrapped in multiple wars with Ethiopia.
"People here are ordinary and want first-hand information on what's happening back home," said organizer Lambrose Kyriakakos. "This is about the safety and well-being of our relatives back home."
A staff member from the Eritrean consulate who was at the meeting was not available for comment.
Outside the event, books and CDs were available for sale to guests, who had to sign in.
There are about 3,000 Eritreans in Winnipeg.
matt.preprost@freepress.mb.ca
By: Matt Preprost
Posted: 23/08/2010 1:00 AM
Posted: 23/08/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 4
A handful of human rights activists gathered outside the University of Winnipeg Sunday afternoon to protest an Eritrean community event, charging its purpose was to fundraise money that would eventually be funnelled into the hands of terrorists.
A group of about 10 people alleged the Eritrea consulate in Toronto held a seminar at the university, disguised as a cultural event, to stoke support for the African nation's notoriously corrupt and tyrannical government.
"This is a disguise, it's not a public event," said protester organizer Ghezae Hagos Berhe, himself an Eritrean refugee. "We believe it was about giving the government more money so they can support more terrorists."
Berhe alleged the seminar's purpose was to raise money for the Eritrean government, which is known to support Al-Shabab, a Somalian militant group that has been recruiting Canadian youth. The group is linked to Al-Qaeda.
Berhe tried to get the event cancelled by University of Winnipeg President Lloyd Axworthy, who Berhe said was unaware the event was taking place on campus. Axworthy sent in security guards to monitor the meeting.
Similar protests have happened in Toronto and Edmonton in recent weeks, Berhe said.
Eritrea, sandwiched between Ethiopia and Sudan along the Red Sea, has been subject to hot debate by human rights activists and the United Nations, facing strict sanctions by Western countries, including Canada.
Most recently, Canada banned weapons sales, and ordered Canadian banks to freeze any assets of Eritrean political leaders and military officials.
Organizers inside Sunday's meeting said they were simply discussing the state of their fragile home country, which has been wrapped in multiple wars with Ethiopia.
"People here are ordinary and want first-hand information on what's happening back home," said organizer Lambrose Kyriakakos. "This is about the safety and well-being of our relatives back home."
A staff member from the Eritrean consulate who was at the meeting was not available for comment.
Outside the event, books and CDs were available for sale to guests, who had to sign in.
There are about 3,000 Eritreans in Winnipeg.
matt.preprost@freepress.mb.ca
Saturday, August 21, 2010
20,000 Zimbabweans Face Deportations From Britain
---
Mosi A. Ifatunji, Ph.D. Candidate
ASA Pre-Doctoral Fellow
University of Illinois at Chicago
Department of Sociology (MC 312)
1007 West Harrison Street
Chicago, Illinois 60607-7140
Call/Text: (312) 607-2825
Email: mosi@Ifatunji.com
Twitter: @ifatunji
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
West African immigrant gets 26 months in prison for role in N.J. human trafficking ring
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Joe Ryan/The Star-Ledger
A West African immigrant was sentenced to two years and two months in prison today for visa fraud in connection to a human-trafficking ring that smuggled girls and women into New Jersey to work at hair-braiding salons.
Geoffry Kouevi is the third defendant imprisoned in connection to the operation, which authorities say targeted victims from impoverished African villages, some just 10 years old. He stood shacked in green jail garb in federal court in Newark as Judge Jose L. Linares said his crime posed a threat to America’s system of safeguarding its ports of entry.
“It impacts the security of our borders when people violate our immigration laws,” Linares said.
Kouevi was convicted last year of conspiracy and visa fraud for helping coach the victims to pose as wives and children of lawful immigrants and forging documents used to bring them from Togo and Ghana.
Kouevi is a legal permanent resident of the United States and could face deportation after completing his sentence. He faced up to two-and-a-half years under federal sentencing guidelines.
The ring was run by Akouavi Kpade Afolabi, a once-prosperous jewelry and textile merchant from Togo. She was convicted last year and is scheduled to be sentenced in September.
Authorities say she recruited more than 20 girls and young women from impoverished African villages with the promise of a better life in America.
But once the women arrived, Afolabi forced them to braid hair for up to 14 hours a day at salons in Newark and East Orange in a case investigators equated with modern-day slavery.
“But for the visa fraud there would have been no ability to smuggle these women,” said Shana W. Chen, an assistant U.S. attorney.
Afolabi’s ex-husband, Lassissi Afolabi, was sentenced last month to 24 years in prison for his role in the crime. Her son, Dereck Hounakey, was sentenced in June to 4½ years.
Joe Ryan/The Star-Ledger
A West African immigrant was sentenced to two years and two months in prison today for visa fraud in connection to a human-trafficking ring that smuggled girls and women into New Jersey to work at hair-braiding salons.
Geoffry Kouevi is the third defendant imprisoned in connection to the operation, which authorities say targeted victims from impoverished African villages, some just 10 years old. He stood shacked in green jail garb in federal court in Newark as Judge Jose L. Linares said his crime posed a threat to America’s system of safeguarding its ports of entry.
“It impacts the security of our borders when people violate our immigration laws,” Linares said.
Kouevi was convicted last year of conspiracy and visa fraud for helping coach the victims to pose as wives and children of lawful immigrants and forging documents used to bring them from Togo and Ghana.
Kouevi is a legal permanent resident of the United States and could face deportation after completing his sentence. He faced up to two-and-a-half years under federal sentencing guidelines.
The ring was run by Akouavi Kpade Afolabi, a once-prosperous jewelry and textile merchant from Togo. She was convicted last year and is scheduled to be sentenced in September.
Authorities say she recruited more than 20 girls and young women from impoverished African villages with the promise of a better life in America.
But once the women arrived, Afolabi forced them to braid hair for up to 14 hours a day at salons in Newark and East Orange in a case investigators equated with modern-day slavery.
“But for the visa fraud there would have been no ability to smuggle these women,” said Shana W. Chen, an assistant U.S. attorney.
Afolabi’s ex-husband, Lassissi Afolabi, was sentenced last month to 24 years in prison for his role in the crime. Her son, Dereck Hounakey, was sentenced in June to 4½ years.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
France urged to repay Haiti debt
MONDAY, AUGUST 16, 2010
17:43 MECCA TIME, 14:43 GMT
A group of activists is calling on France to repay a 200-year-old "independence debt," now valued at $22bn, to Haiti in a bid to help rebuild the earthquake-ravaged country.
In an open letter to Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, intellectuals and politicians said the money would cover construction costs and a shortfall in cash promised by international donors.
France imposed a debt of 150m gold francs on Haiti in return for recognition of the colony's independence, following a successful slave revolt in 1791.
Although the original sum, equivalent to 10 times Haiti's annual revenue, was reduced, the country was still paying it off in 1947.
Haiti was hit by a devastating earthquake in January this year that killed more than 250,000 people and left much of the country in ruins.
'Patently illegal'
Campaigners, including Noam Chomsky, the US linguist, and Naomi Klein, the Canadian author, described the debt as "patently illegitimate ... and illegal".
"The 'independence debt', which is today valued at over 17bn euros illegitimately forced a people who had won their independence in a successful slave revolt, to pay again for the freedom," the letter, published in Britain's Guardian and France's Liberation on Sunday, said.
Haiti launched a lawsuit in 2004 to recover the money, but it was abandoned after France backed the overthrow of Haiti's government.
The letter said such actions were "inappropriate responses to a demand that is morally, economically, and legally unassailable".
"In light of the urgent financial need in the country in the wake of the devastating earthquake of January 12, 2010, we urge you to pay Haiti, the world's first black republic, the restitution it is due," it said.
Haiti, then St Dominique, was France's most profitable colony due to the slave trade.
In 1791 the slaves revolted, and in 1804, after defeating Napoleon's armies, the world's first black republic was founded.
France subsequently demanded the independence debt to compensate former colonists for the slaves who had won their freedom, and threatened a military invasion if the money was not paid.
Sunday's letter has also been signed by members of parliament from Europe, Canada and the Philippines, along with scholars, journalists and activists in France, Haiti, the US, Canada, the UK, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Germany.
17:43 MECCA TIME, 14:43 GMT
A group of activists is calling on France to repay a 200-year-old "independence debt," now valued at $22bn, to Haiti in a bid to help rebuild the earthquake-ravaged country.
In an open letter to Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, intellectuals and politicians said the money would cover construction costs and a shortfall in cash promised by international donors.
France imposed a debt of 150m gold francs on Haiti in return for recognition of the colony's independence, following a successful slave revolt in 1791.
Although the original sum, equivalent to 10 times Haiti's annual revenue, was reduced, the country was still paying it off in 1947.
Haiti was hit by a devastating earthquake in January this year that killed more than 250,000 people and left much of the country in ruins.
'Patently illegal'
Campaigners, including Noam Chomsky, the US linguist, and Naomi Klein, the Canadian author, described the debt as "patently illegitimate ... and illegal".
"The 'independence debt', which is today valued at over 17bn euros illegitimately forced a people who had won their independence in a successful slave revolt, to pay again for the freedom," the letter, published in Britain's Guardian and France's Liberation on Sunday, said.
Haiti launched a lawsuit in 2004 to recover the money, but it was abandoned after France backed the overthrow of Haiti's government.
The letter said such actions were "inappropriate responses to a demand that is morally, economically, and legally unassailable".
"In light of the urgent financial need in the country in the wake of the devastating earthquake of January 12, 2010, we urge you to pay Haiti, the world's first black republic, the restitution it is due," it said.
Haiti, then St Dominique, was France's most profitable colony due to the slave trade.
In 1791 the slaves revolted, and in 1804, after defeating Napoleon's armies, the world's first black republic was founded.
France subsequently demanded the independence debt to compensate former colonists for the slaves who had won their freedom, and threatened a military invasion if the money was not paid.
Sunday's letter has also been signed by members of parliament from Europe, Canada and the Philippines, along with scholars, journalists and activists in France, Haiti, the US, Canada, the UK, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Germany.
Six African migrants killed near Egypt-Israel border
14 August 2010
Six African migrants trying to cross into Israel from Egypt's Sinai desert have been killed.
Egyptian security officials said four of the migrants were killed in a dispute with the people smugglers taking them to Israel.
The other two were killed by Egyptian border guards as they tried to cross into Israel.
Human rights activists have criticised Egypt for killing dozens of migrants at the border in the last few years.
Many of the migrants, seeking work or political asylum in Israel, come from Sudan and the Horn of Africa.
An Egyptian security official told the AFP news agency that the six Africans killed on Friday were from Eritrea.
The migrants' dispute with the people traffickers broke out after the smugglers demanded more money for taking them into Israel, the migrants told Egyptian police.
Some of the migrants seized weapons from the smugglers and a gunfight broke out in which four of them were killed.
The group of migrants scattered and two were later shot at the border.
At least 17 of the migrants were arrested by Egyptian police, officials said.
Six African migrants trying to cross into Israel from Egypt's Sinai desert have been killed.
Egyptian security officials said four of the migrants were killed in a dispute with the people smugglers taking them to Israel.
The other two were killed by Egyptian border guards as they tried to cross into Israel.
Human rights activists have criticised Egypt for killing dozens of migrants at the border in the last few years.
Many of the migrants, seeking work or political asylum in Israel, come from Sudan and the Horn of Africa.
An Egyptian security official told the AFP news agency that the six Africans killed on Friday were from Eritrea.
The migrants' dispute with the people traffickers broke out after the smugglers demanded more money for taking them into Israel, the migrants told Egyptian police.
Some of the migrants seized weapons from the smugglers and a gunfight broke out in which four of them were killed.
The group of migrants scattered and two were later shot at the border.
At least 17 of the migrants were arrested by Egyptian police, officials said.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Black Politician Elected in Russia
---
Mosi A. Ifatunji, Ph.D. Candidate
ASA Pre-Doctoral Fellow
University of Illinois at Chicago
Department of Sociology (MC 312)
1007 West Harrison Street
Chicago, Illinois 60607-7140
Call/Text: (312) 607-2825
Email: mosi@Ifatunji.com
Twitter: @ifatunji
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Black, But Not Like Me: African-Americans and African Immigrants Sometimes Share Uneasy Bond
By GABRIELLE M. BLUE
Medill News Service
A civil rights activist contends it's not the job of black people to stop white people from being racist. That, she argues, is the responsibility mostly of whites.
Hannah Jacoby, a founding member of the Chicago Alliance for Racial Equity (CARE), argues that point. Last, month, her organization hosted its first Anti-Racism Workshop for White Allies to train Caucasians to work better with minority groups in combating racism.
"Everything we try to do here is with the intention of movement building," said Jacoby, a special project's coordinator for the alliance. "It shouldn't always be the work of people of color to stop white people from being racist or to inform white people that they are being racist."
The organization was created by white staff members and supporters of the Chicago Freedom School to teach members of the white community how to be effective allies with minorities.
The nonprofit Freedom School is located at 719 S. State. It provides a place for adults and youth to come together to learn about social movements, and teaches young people to be social activists.
To break the racial barriers that often hinder the community, the alliance, Jacoby explains, felt the need to take part in encouraging positive social movements in Chicago. They look to enlighten the white community, she says, by having them examine their own attitudes. Their comments and treatment of minorities, she argues, can create a negative relationship between them and other races.
"We all have a lot of intersecting identities that make the experience of being white, or the experience of any race, different for everyone, depending on your sexuality, your gender, your class," Jacoby said. "But there are certain things about being white that bring privileges, even if you happened to also be queer or poor-and you have to acknowledge those."
After six months of developing the material, knowledge and support needed for the workshop, the alliance opened the class to those interested-more than a dozen attended.
"We really want people to be doing a lot of sharing and talking about their experience and if it gets bigger than that it just gets hard to have everyone share without having it taking a really long time," Jacoby said.
She worked closely with several of her black and Hispanic colleagues at the Freedom School, garnering a great deal of support for the initiative. The three-hour workshop was open to anyone interested in participating-white people primarily signed up for it.
Jacoby said that while the workshop was created to target white people, she welcomed attendance from any person of color.
"One the points that we want to get across from the training is that we, as white people, have to get to a point where it doesn't matter if a person of color is in the room for us to be doing this work-we have to be doing this work all the time." By MARIANA MORA
Medill News Service
Girmai Lemma is from Ethiopia but has lived in Chicago for many years.
He does not consider himself to be African-American- Lemma says he is African. And he's not alone in saying so. Constant tensions between African-Americans and non U.S.-born Africans refute the notion that the term "African-American" is interchangeable with black. In the eyes of many native-born blacks and African immigrants, it isn't.
"It would have been nice if we had a good relationship with African-Americans, but we don't," Lemma said.
How Lemma defines himself may be irrelevant to the larger American society. But within the black community, less than 2 percent are Africans. Lemma said that in the United States all black people are put in the same group.
"When we came from Ethiopia, we never thought we would be discriminated here," Lemma recalled. "[The police] follow you all the way until your house. It is a suburb; not too many blacks living there. When they see you, what is black is black, until they hear your accent."
While that might make police look favorably on African immigrants, it also cuts the other way.
Eugene Peba, originally from Nigeria, believes his accent causes African-Americans to look down upon him.
"We don't sound like they sound," he said. "It is a little bit weird. We think that they would say, 'This is my brother,' but there is a little bit of resentment."
Garrard McClendon, who hosts a show on CLTV that often focuses on African-American issues, said those feelings of resentment go both ways. African Americans, he noted, can feel disrespected by immigrants, "because immigrants don't see us taking advantage of the [opportunities] we already have."
McClendon blames the media for perpetuating stereotypical images of black people as criminals, underemployed or womanizers. And African immigrants, noted a Chicago educator, pick up on those cues.
David Stovall, who teaches African-American and education studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, agrees that Africans have preconceived notions of African-Americans-some positive, some negative. "When people come to the states they already have an image of what black life is," Stovall said.
He adds that some African immigrants see black people in the United States as a source of community. Others, however, wish to distance themselves from them.
The source of the tension, Stovall said, is that Africans don't understand the history of oppression black people faced in American. Additionally, there are those American blacks who are unaware of the turmoil that Africans faced in their homeland. According to Stovall, the problem stems from an inability on both sides to communicate and engage each other's history.
Though both groups have roots in the same continent, their histories and experiences differ significantly. To some, the American black community and the African immigrant community sometimes segregate themselves.
"Most of the African people seem to group among themselves," said Alice Ogbarmey-Tetteh, a Ghanaian who has been living in Chicago for more than 30 years. "They have to learn how to socialize outside their community. If you want to survive in America you have to learn the system."
A 'different America'
From a sociological point of view, it is not simply a matter of integration between both groups. Mosi Ifatunji, race and ethnicity professor at UIC, explained African immigrants are unable to understand why African-Americans are still upset about racial discrimination-the immigrants arrived at a point when it was formally over.
"African immigrants are seeing a different America, and therefore have a different set of expectations," Ifatunji said. "African immigrants are not upset with American whites about slavery."
For many black Americans, it is still hard to not have resentment against whites," the professor noted.
"To simply forget about the past for African-Americans is sort of to throw their ancestors under the bus," Ifatunji said.
As for the children of African immigrants who were raised in the United States, they too may feel distanced from the African-American community.
"When you come from Africa to United States, your identity is formed by the African-American experience," said Oluwabukola Adeyinka, who arrived from Nigeria when she was 5. "But I'm African. I have been my entire life."
Adeyinka explained that older generations of Nigerians, like her father, have stereotypes of African-Americans as lazy and dangerous, despite having lived in the U.S. for years. The distance between the American black and African immigrant communities is particularly apparent for immigrants during the census count. Although they may not identify themselves as "African-Americans," they have only a single choice on the census form to identify their race: "Black," "African-American" or "Negro."
Other races and ethnicities, though, have several categories from which to choose.
This category is particularly troubling for Africans who don't consider themselves "black." "Ethiopians are a little lighter-skinned than black," Lemma said.
Despite the tensions, there are some-like United African Organization Director Alie Kabba-who think both groups should unite as minorities in the United States.
"I think that in terms of electoral processes, Africans and African-Americans can generally work together," Kabba said. "The same issues that [affect] the African community, also have an impact on the African-American community."
Ifatunji thinks the discussion shouldn't be whether black groups could merge culturally, but rather can they enhance common political interest.
"Your cultural traditions-let it be your cultural traditions. Your history-let it be your history," he said. "But political, if nothing else, we have a common interest across all lines of color against white supremacy."
Medill News Service
A civil rights activist contends it's not the job of black people to stop white people from being racist. That, she argues, is the responsibility mostly of whites.
Hannah Jacoby, a founding member of the Chicago Alliance for Racial Equity (CARE), argues that point. Last, month, her organization hosted its first Anti-Racism Workshop for White Allies to train Caucasians to work better with minority groups in combating racism.
"Everything we try to do here is with the intention of movement building," said Jacoby, a special project's coordinator for the alliance. "It shouldn't always be the work of people of color to stop white people from being racist or to inform white people that they are being racist."
The organization was created by white staff members and supporters of the Chicago Freedom School to teach members of the white community how to be effective allies with minorities.
The nonprofit Freedom School is located at 719 S. State. It provides a place for adults and youth to come together to learn about social movements, and teaches young people to be social activists.
To break the racial barriers that often hinder the community, the alliance, Jacoby explains, felt the need to take part in encouraging positive social movements in Chicago. They look to enlighten the white community, she says, by having them examine their own attitudes. Their comments and treatment of minorities, she argues, can create a negative relationship between them and other races.
"We all have a lot of intersecting identities that make the experience of being white, or the experience of any race, different for everyone, depending on your sexuality, your gender, your class," Jacoby said. "But there are certain things about being white that bring privileges, even if you happened to also be queer or poor-and you have to acknowledge those."
After six months of developing the material, knowledge and support needed for the workshop, the alliance opened the class to those interested-more than a dozen attended.
"We really want people to be doing a lot of sharing and talking about their experience and if it gets bigger than that it just gets hard to have everyone share without having it taking a really long time," Jacoby said.
She worked closely with several of her black and Hispanic colleagues at the Freedom School, garnering a great deal of support for the initiative. The three-hour workshop was open to anyone interested in participating-white people primarily signed up for it.
Jacoby said that while the workshop was created to target white people, she welcomed attendance from any person of color.
"One the points that we want to get across from the training is that we, as white people, have to get to a point where it doesn't matter if a person of color is in the room for us to be doing this work-we have to be doing this work all the time." By MARIANA MORA
Medill News Service
Girmai Lemma is from Ethiopia but has lived in Chicago for many years.
He does not consider himself to be African-American- Lemma says he is African. And he's not alone in saying so. Constant tensions between African-Americans and non U.S.-born Africans refute the notion that the term "African-American" is interchangeable with black. In the eyes of many native-born blacks and African immigrants, it isn't.
"It would have been nice if we had a good relationship with African-Americans, but we don't," Lemma said.
How Lemma defines himself may be irrelevant to the larger American society. But within the black community, less than 2 percent are Africans. Lemma said that in the United States all black people are put in the same group.
"When we came from Ethiopia, we never thought we would be discriminated here," Lemma recalled. "[The police] follow you all the way until your house. It is a suburb; not too many blacks living there. When they see you, what is black is black, until they hear your accent."
While that might make police look favorably on African immigrants, it also cuts the other way.
Eugene Peba, originally from Nigeria, believes his accent causes African-Americans to look down upon him.
"We don't sound like they sound," he said. "It is a little bit weird. We think that they would say, 'This is my brother,' but there is a little bit of resentment."
Garrard McClendon, who hosts a show on CLTV that often focuses on African-American issues, said those feelings of resentment go both ways. African Americans, he noted, can feel disrespected by immigrants, "because immigrants don't see us taking advantage of the [opportunities] we already have."
McClendon blames the media for perpetuating stereotypical images of black people as criminals, underemployed or womanizers. And African immigrants, noted a Chicago educator, pick up on those cues.
David Stovall, who teaches African-American and education studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, agrees that Africans have preconceived notions of African-Americans-some positive, some negative. "When people come to the states they already have an image of what black life is," Stovall said.
He adds that some African immigrants see black people in the United States as a source of community. Others, however, wish to distance themselves from them.
The source of the tension, Stovall said, is that Africans don't understand the history of oppression black people faced in American. Additionally, there are those American blacks who are unaware of the turmoil that Africans faced in their homeland. According to Stovall, the problem stems from an inability on both sides to communicate and engage each other's history.
Though both groups have roots in the same continent, their histories and experiences differ significantly. To some, the American black community and the African immigrant community sometimes segregate themselves.
"Most of the African people seem to group among themselves," said Alice Ogbarmey-Tetteh, a Ghanaian who has been living in Chicago for more than 30 years. "They have to learn how to socialize outside their community. If you want to survive in America you have to learn the system."
A 'different America'
From a sociological point of view, it is not simply a matter of integration between both groups. Mosi Ifatunji, race and ethnicity professor at UIC, explained African immigrants are unable to understand why African-Americans are still upset about racial discrimination-the immigrants arrived at a point when it was formally over.
"African immigrants are seeing a different America, and therefore have a different set of expectations," Ifatunji said. "African immigrants are not upset with American whites about slavery."
For many black Americans, it is still hard to not have resentment against whites," the professor noted.
"To simply forget about the past for African-Americans is sort of to throw their ancestors under the bus," Ifatunji said.
As for the children of African immigrants who were raised in the United States, they too may feel distanced from the African-American community.
"When you come from Africa to United States, your identity is formed by the African-American experience," said Oluwabukola Adeyinka, who arrived from Nigeria when she was 5. "But I'm African. I have been my entire life."
Adeyinka explained that older generations of Nigerians, like her father, have stereotypes of African-Americans as lazy and dangerous, despite having lived in the U.S. for years. The distance between the American black and African immigrant communities is particularly apparent for immigrants during the census count. Although they may not identify themselves as "African-Americans," they have only a single choice on the census form to identify their race: "Black," "African-American" or "Negro."
Other races and ethnicities, though, have several categories from which to choose.
This category is particularly troubling for Africans who don't consider themselves "black." "Ethiopians are a little lighter-skinned than black," Lemma said.
Despite the tensions, there are some-like United African Organization Director Alie Kabba-who think both groups should unite as minorities in the United States.
"I think that in terms of electoral processes, Africans and African-Americans can generally work together," Kabba said. "The same issues that [affect] the African community, also have an impact on the African-American community."
Ifatunji thinks the discussion shouldn't be whether black groups could merge culturally, but rather can they enhance common political interest.
"Your cultural traditions-let it be your cultural traditions. Your history-let it be your history," he said. "But political, if nothing else, we have a common interest across all lines of color against white supremacy."
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Bill Clinton gets tough as donors fail to honour $5bn Haiti pledge
---
Mosi A. Ifatunji, Ph.D. Candidate
ASA Pre-Doctoral Fellow
University of Illinois at Chicago
Department of Sociology (MC 312)
1007 West Harrison Street
Chicago, Illinois 60607-7140
Call/Text: (312) 607-2825
Email: mosi@Ifatunji.com
Twitter: @ifatunji
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Arizona’s Other Immigrant Conflict: African Americans vs. Africans
DaVaun Sanders, Posted: Jul 19, 2010
Abdulmajeed Dere expressed frustration with trying to interact with African Americans since he arrived in the metropolitan Phoenix area from his native Somalia in 1996.
“When I came to the country, I saw African Americans as my brothers,” said Dere, a small-business owner. “I was laughing with joy to see them. But every time I talk to them, rejection, rejection—every time. After awhile I felt like, why should I even talk to them?”
Dere is resigned to the cultural split, but is also frustrated by it. As a middle-aged member of the sandwich generation, attending both to children in high school and college and to his elderly mother, he feels he has much to share with his American brothers. A former community case worker, he is deeply familiar with the strain black families face, especially in this recession, squeezed by household demands from both ends of the age scale.
He believes, though, that his accent and a sense of superiority among some African Americans erect barriers to communication and undermine the potential for mutual support. Research published by Arizona State University (ASU) reinforces and echoes Dere's experience.
Two Different Paths
Africans make up a small but growing part of the black population in metro-Phoenix, which limits opportunities for interaction. According to the 2008 American Community Survey, "foreign-born Africans" number around 18,500 in Maricopa County, or 10.8 percent of the area’s black population. The refugee population in Arizona is much smaller, although that figure more than doubled from 2006 to 2009, to 4,327, according to the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement.
In a 2008 supplemental report entitled “The State of Black Arizona, Volume I,” ASU associate professor Lisa Aubrey and colleagues found that many African Americans hold new arrivals “responsible” for their ancestral enslavement and “correlate Africa . . . with poverty and feel ashamed.” Aubrey and her coauthors call today’s African Americans “old diasporans,” descendants of slaves and other earlier African arrivals. The scholars refer to modern continental Africans, including refugees who fled strife in their countries, as “new diasporans.”
Extremely different paths to settlement in Arizona, combined with dissonance within each group, pose challenges for African Americans seeking to build bridges between old diasporan and new diasporan communities. New diasporans in metro Phoenix hail from many parts of Africa, including Liberia, Somalia, Rwanda and Sudan.
Elders from both old and new diasporan communities confront complex issues that will impact their quality of life and that of their descendants for generations to come. While African Americans face myriad health challenges, African immigrants also run into barriers of transportation and isolation, which impede their social and emotional health.
“People are too busy with life, no one is interested in reaching out to African communities,” said Abraham Reech, a senior case manager at Lutheran Social Ministries, a Phoenix area refugee resettlement agency. “There is no reason, no incentive.”
“There is a lack of communication,” said Tap Dak, outreach coordinator for the AZ Lost Boys Center, which serves the Sudanese community of metro Phoenix. He said differences in religion, ideology and politics among African immigrants and refugees often lead to misconceptions between different ethnicities, despite their similar experience and mutual concerns.
Dak added, “The (African) community doesn't have dialogue within itself.”
Recent African arrivals in Arizona’s Valley of the Sun often possess starkly different experiences, expectations and outlooks on America—and on each other, ASU’s Aubrey noted, Along with refugees seeking political asylum, the immigrants include “some of the most highly educated, professionally skilled and accomplished Africans from the continent,” she said.
Preconceived ideas about other ethnic groups often lead to rifts.
Reech, who is Sudanese, recalled an instance when African neighbor—like Reech, a recent immigrant—forbade his son to associate with Reech's son. Reech believes that the father didn't want his son to associate with black people, whether African or African American -- even though he was also black. He said this is a common reaction among immigrants, who wish to avoid negative associations with African Americans.
“My son was on the principal’s list,” Reech said, shaking his head in exasperation. “What would make the father think that way?”
Little Interaction Among Immigrants
Charles Shipman, Arizona’s refugee coordinator, acknowledged that there is little interaction among the newer African immigrant groups. He attributes the problem less to outright antagonism than to a sense of competition.
During his eight years of working with refugees, Shipman said, he has seen collaborative efforts between African immigrant groups quickly collapse when discussions turn to pursuing funds.
But the situation is improving, Shipman added. “Organizations are starting to understand that mutual assistance is about mutual assistance. They are starting to come together,” he said.
African Americans around Phoenix also constitute a diverse population, including Valley natives and recent arrivals from other states. In many instances, a shared ancestry with African immigrants is not enough to promote intercultural connections.
Outreach Efforts
“Refugee assistance is all about outreach, and there is not a lot of outreach from the African American community,” noted Eman Yarrow, a community and economic development manager for the Arizona Refugee Resettlement Program.
Yarrow cited First Institutional Baptist Church and the Light of Hope Institute as faith-based organizations particularly committed to aiding refugee families. “Resettlement agencies need to do a better job—talk to larger churches about supporting smaller immigrant churches.”
For example, First Institutional invited Kigabo Mbazumutima, a doctor from Benin, to speak at its 2010 Community Health Forum and share his experiences growing up in the Congo.
Mbazumutima is working with ASU faculty to improve health care access to the Great Lakes region of Africa, and the mostly African American attendees at the forum showed interest in volunteering and making donations. He and event organizers hope that by providing access to resources, such as the church facility, established groups in the African American community in Phoenix will foster cultural understanding and the greater acceptance that new diasporan communities need to flourish in this desert region.
Abdulmajeed Dere expressed frustration with trying to interact with African Americans since he arrived in the metropolitan Phoenix area from his native Somalia in 1996.
“When I came to the country, I saw African Americans as my brothers,” said Dere, a small-business owner. “I was laughing with joy to see them. But every time I talk to them, rejection, rejection—every time. After awhile I felt like, why should I even talk to them?”
Dere is resigned to the cultural split, but is also frustrated by it. As a middle-aged member of the sandwich generation, attending both to children in high school and college and to his elderly mother, he feels he has much to share with his American brothers. A former community case worker, he is deeply familiar with the strain black families face, especially in this recession, squeezed by household demands from both ends of the age scale.
He believes, though, that his accent and a sense of superiority among some African Americans erect barriers to communication and undermine the potential for mutual support. Research published by Arizona State University (ASU) reinforces and echoes Dere's experience.
Two Different Paths
Africans make up a small but growing part of the black population in metro-Phoenix, which limits opportunities for interaction. According to the 2008 American Community Survey, "foreign-born Africans" number around 18,500 in Maricopa County, or 10.8 percent of the area’s black population. The refugee population in Arizona is much smaller, although that figure more than doubled from 2006 to 2009, to 4,327, according to the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement.
In a 2008 supplemental report entitled “The State of Black Arizona, Volume I,” ASU associate professor Lisa Aubrey and colleagues found that many African Americans hold new arrivals “responsible” for their ancestral enslavement and “correlate Africa . . . with poverty and feel ashamed.” Aubrey and her coauthors call today’s African Americans “old diasporans,” descendants of slaves and other earlier African arrivals. The scholars refer to modern continental Africans, including refugees who fled strife in their countries, as “new diasporans.”
Extremely different paths to settlement in Arizona, combined with dissonance within each group, pose challenges for African Americans seeking to build bridges between old diasporan and new diasporan communities. New diasporans in metro Phoenix hail from many parts of Africa, including Liberia, Somalia, Rwanda and Sudan.
Elders from both old and new diasporan communities confront complex issues that will impact their quality of life and that of their descendants for generations to come. While African Americans face myriad health challenges, African immigrants also run into barriers of transportation and isolation, which impede their social and emotional health.
“People are too busy with life, no one is interested in reaching out to African communities,” said Abraham Reech, a senior case manager at Lutheran Social Ministries, a Phoenix area refugee resettlement agency. “There is no reason, no incentive.”
“There is a lack of communication,” said Tap Dak, outreach coordinator for the AZ Lost Boys Center, which serves the Sudanese community of metro Phoenix. He said differences in religion, ideology and politics among African immigrants and refugees often lead to misconceptions between different ethnicities, despite their similar experience and mutual concerns.
Dak added, “The (African) community doesn't have dialogue within itself.”
Recent African arrivals in Arizona’s Valley of the Sun often possess starkly different experiences, expectations and outlooks on America—and on each other, ASU’s Aubrey noted, Along with refugees seeking political asylum, the immigrants include “some of the most highly educated, professionally skilled and accomplished Africans from the continent,” she said.
Preconceived ideas about other ethnic groups often lead to rifts.
Reech, who is Sudanese, recalled an instance when African neighbor—like Reech, a recent immigrant—forbade his son to associate with Reech's son. Reech believes that the father didn't want his son to associate with black people, whether African or African American -- even though he was also black. He said this is a common reaction among immigrants, who wish to avoid negative associations with African Americans.
“My son was on the principal’s list,” Reech said, shaking his head in exasperation. “What would make the father think that way?”
Little Interaction Among Immigrants
Charles Shipman, Arizona’s refugee coordinator, acknowledged that there is little interaction among the newer African immigrant groups. He attributes the problem less to outright antagonism than to a sense of competition.
During his eight years of working with refugees, Shipman said, he has seen collaborative efforts between African immigrant groups quickly collapse when discussions turn to pursuing funds.
But the situation is improving, Shipman added. “Organizations are starting to understand that mutual assistance is about mutual assistance. They are starting to come together,” he said.
African Americans around Phoenix also constitute a diverse population, including Valley natives and recent arrivals from other states. In many instances, a shared ancestry with African immigrants is not enough to promote intercultural connections.
Outreach Efforts
“Refugee assistance is all about outreach, and there is not a lot of outreach from the African American community,” noted Eman Yarrow, a community and economic development manager for the Arizona Refugee Resettlement Program.
Yarrow cited First Institutional Baptist Church and the Light of Hope Institute as faith-based organizations particularly committed to aiding refugee families. “Resettlement agencies need to do a better job—talk to larger churches about supporting smaller immigrant churches.”
For example, First Institutional invited Kigabo Mbazumutima, a doctor from Benin, to speak at its 2010 Community Health Forum and share his experiences growing up in the Congo.
Mbazumutima is working with ASU faculty to improve health care access to the Great Lakes region of Africa, and the mostly African American attendees at the forum showed interest in volunteering and making donations. He and event organizers hope that by providing access to resources, such as the church facility, established groups in the African American community in Phoenix will foster cultural understanding and the greater acceptance that new diasporan communities need to flourish in this desert region.
Arizona's Neglected Immigrants - African Elders
DaVaun Sanders, Posted: Jun 14, 2010
While Arizona is a hotbed for immigration issues, concerns about aging African immigrants and refugees in Phoenix don’t always garner the same attention as the much larger Latino population.
This article is the first of two articles for PhxSoul.com conceived and produced as a project for New America Media’s Ethnic Elders News Fellowship, supported by The Atlantic Philanthropies.
While Arizona continues to make headlines as a hotbed for immigration issues, concerns about African immigrants in Phoenix do not always garner the same attention afforded to the larger Latino population, or the predominant African American community.
African immigrants residing in the Metropolitan Phoenix—many of them refugees resettled here by the U.S. government--are a compact pan-African group of less than 20,000, according to the 2008 American Community Survey. They enrich Phoenix culture from an impressive array of nations, from West Africa (Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria to East (Sudan, Somalia and Ethiopia), and from the central continent (Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Tanzania), to South Africa—plus many other countries.
Life in this arid new land is especially trying for many older African immigrants. They find themselves far from often strife-ridden homelands, unable to find work and facing barriers of language and mobility. Adding to their stress are daily confrontations with a generation of Americanized children, who seem to turn traditional values upside down.
Although immigrants constitute an underwhelming 4.3 percent portion of the total black population of the Valley of the Sun region, they continue to raise families, start businesses and establish themselves in Phoenix. They also face the daunting challenges of transportation, language and eldercare.
Among the African immigrants in the Valley, the main population increase has come from refugees escaping brutal circumstances at home. According to the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement, the overall refugee population in Arizona more than doubled from 2006 to 2009 to 4,327.
Refugees resettled in the Phoenix area are not only from multiple African countries, but include large numbers from Iraq and Burma, as well as other strife-torn nations.
Jobs Are Scarce
The recession is having a strong impact on employment for Arizona’s refugees. Finding jobs for immigrants is a primary concern for the state-contracted refugee resettlement agencies, which bring a large portion of Africans to the Valley.
Only one in three of people in the refugee caseload entered the workforce in 2009, the lowest level in three years for the Office for Refugee Resettlement. Those who landed work received an average hourly wage of $7.17.
Job placement was particularly tough for non-English speakers. At the AZ Lost Boys Center, outreach coordinator Tap Dak said the program is developing English as a second language (ESL) classes for the organization’s service population of Sudanese immigrants.
“Lost Boys” is the term for the generation of Sudanese refugees orphaned and dislocated by religious and ethnic conflict since the mid-1980s. Since 2001, the U.S government has resettled many of them to Phoenix and other American cities.
Dak said the center is examining whether to start a training program for stay-at-home seniors. “We want to get elders a daycare worker's license, but with state requirements and liability, we're still looking at how that will work,” he explained.
Transportation Barrier Isolate Many
High unemployment among African immigrants and refugees also reflects their difficulty getting to and from work.
“Transportation definitely impacts a lot of people here,” acknowledges Lorraine Stewart, chief operating officer of the Maricopa County Area Agency on Aging.
Stewart states that there have been great strides in affordable housing and that support for elders is particularly strong within the religious community. She stressed, “But without transportation, elders can become extremely isolated.”
The Phoenix Valley Metro light rail system, a positive step toward public transportation access, began in 2008, and is a positive step. But many Valley residents require two or three transfers to reach work or school.
For African elders struggling to learn English and faced with the prospect of waiting for buses during triple-digit summer temperatures, the simplest errand in Phoenix can be daunting.
The urban sprawl of Phoenix can intensify elders’ isolation, leading to discouraging circumstances and depression among older Africans. “Elders need a place to gather,” says Abdulmajeed Dere, a Somali businessman and former caseworker of 10 years in the Valley.
Seniors often find themselves relying on case workers, volunteers and their working adult children for tasks ranging from the mundane to the essential, Dere said. This creates considerable strain on families with a dependent elder in the household, he added.
“They want to visit each other,” Dere said of Somali elders. “The [culture] they come from is about sitting together. When they have to stay at home because their young don't have time to take them back and forth, stress builds up.”
Dere knows of this stress first hand. His grown children attend Arizona State University and high school, while he and his wife manage a cafe in a plaza and a driving school. His typical work day, which runs from early morning until 8 p.m., leaves his mother, who is approaching her 70s, long periods to occupy herself.
The Somali community is concentrated on Phoenix’s east side, but Dere’s home is in Glendale, a long ride to the west.
Also, the strained economy in Phoenix has forced several potential gathering places to close. For example, the Somali Association of Arizona's Hope Center offered a score of services ranging from job training to citizenship classes, until it closed its doors in 2006, due to a lack of funding.
Generational Conflicts
When asked if elders are valued in the Somali community, Dere shrugged, calling the subject “a big challenge and messy.”
Often, he said, Africans recently immigrated to the United States discover that authority in the household is turned upside-down, in part, because of language difficulties.
Children, he said, usually adapt to American culture and learn English more quickly than their parents and grandparents. In a city with poor translation services in hospitals and schools, Dere continued, young family translators effectively become gatekeepers for their elders in accessing medical, legal or other services.
The result, Dere said, is to leave generations on either side of a widening cultural and digital divide. “Yes they can translate, but still a child doesn't know about legal things or immigration law,” he noted.
Despite the difficulty for African elders, English classes could provide the positive community space older adults long for, if done the right way.
“Elders want to see people they are close to,” Dere said. He stated that while volunteer agencies and community colleges provide ESL classes, they design them for the whole community. Many older immigrants find those environments intimidating.
Dere emphasized, “Remember these are people who have never attended formal school.”
Besides needing more training capacity in ESL and other skills, older Africans could benefit from fewer barriers to become childcare workers. Arizona requires those qualifying for a daycare worker's license to know English and be certified in cardio-pulmonary resuscitation.
Dak described the potential benefits of teaching a certification program to Sudanese elders that takes into account their learning styles. They would gain a greater sense of purpose, and relieve economic pressures on parents in their community struggling to make ends meet. “Do you know the (daycare) fees, if children are not picked up on time?” Dak laughs, shaking his head.
There are no easy answers for African elders in the Valley of the Sun, but efforts to meet the needs of this community group still persist despite the demanding economic obligations of working adults, and the dearth of funding available on the state level.
While Arizona is a hotbed for immigration issues, concerns about aging African immigrants and refugees in Phoenix don’t always garner the same attention as the much larger Latino population.
This article is the first of two articles for PhxSoul.com conceived and produced as a project for New America Media’s Ethnic Elders News Fellowship, supported by The Atlantic Philanthropies.
While Arizona continues to make headlines as a hotbed for immigration issues, concerns about African immigrants in Phoenix do not always garner the same attention afforded to the larger Latino population, or the predominant African American community.
African immigrants residing in the Metropolitan Phoenix—many of them refugees resettled here by the U.S. government--are a compact pan-African group of less than 20,000, according to the 2008 American Community Survey. They enrich Phoenix culture from an impressive array of nations, from West Africa (Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria to East (Sudan, Somalia and Ethiopia), and from the central continent (Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Tanzania), to South Africa—plus many other countries.
Life in this arid new land is especially trying for many older African immigrants. They find themselves far from often strife-ridden homelands, unable to find work and facing barriers of language and mobility. Adding to their stress are daily confrontations with a generation of Americanized children, who seem to turn traditional values upside down.
Although immigrants constitute an underwhelming 4.3 percent portion of the total black population of the Valley of the Sun region, they continue to raise families, start businesses and establish themselves in Phoenix. They also face the daunting challenges of transportation, language and eldercare.
Among the African immigrants in the Valley, the main population increase has come from refugees escaping brutal circumstances at home. According to the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement, the overall refugee population in Arizona more than doubled from 2006 to 2009 to 4,327.
Refugees resettled in the Phoenix area are not only from multiple African countries, but include large numbers from Iraq and Burma, as well as other strife-torn nations.
Jobs Are Scarce
The recession is having a strong impact on employment for Arizona’s refugees. Finding jobs for immigrants is a primary concern for the state-contracted refugee resettlement agencies, which bring a large portion of Africans to the Valley.
Only one in three of people in the refugee caseload entered the workforce in 2009, the lowest level in three years for the Office for Refugee Resettlement. Those who landed work received an average hourly wage of $7.17.
Job placement was particularly tough for non-English speakers. At the AZ Lost Boys Center, outreach coordinator Tap Dak said the program is developing English as a second language (ESL) classes for the organization’s service population of Sudanese immigrants.
“Lost Boys” is the term for the generation of Sudanese refugees orphaned and dislocated by religious and ethnic conflict since the mid-1980s. Since 2001, the U.S government has resettled many of them to Phoenix and other American cities.
Dak said the center is examining whether to start a training program for stay-at-home seniors. “We want to get elders a daycare worker's license, but with state requirements and liability, we're still looking at how that will work,” he explained.
Transportation Barrier Isolate Many
High unemployment among African immigrants and refugees also reflects their difficulty getting to and from work.
“Transportation definitely impacts a lot of people here,” acknowledges Lorraine Stewart, chief operating officer of the Maricopa County Area Agency on Aging.
Stewart states that there have been great strides in affordable housing and that support for elders is particularly strong within the religious community. She stressed, “But without transportation, elders can become extremely isolated.”
The Phoenix Valley Metro light rail system, a positive step toward public transportation access, began in 2008, and is a positive step. But many Valley residents require two or three transfers to reach work or school.
For African elders struggling to learn English and faced with the prospect of waiting for buses during triple-digit summer temperatures, the simplest errand in Phoenix can be daunting.
The urban sprawl of Phoenix can intensify elders’ isolation, leading to discouraging circumstances and depression among older Africans. “Elders need a place to gather,” says Abdulmajeed Dere, a Somali businessman and former caseworker of 10 years in the Valley.
Seniors often find themselves relying on case workers, volunteers and their working adult children for tasks ranging from the mundane to the essential, Dere said. This creates considerable strain on families with a dependent elder in the household, he added.
“They want to visit each other,” Dere said of Somali elders. “The [culture] they come from is about sitting together. When they have to stay at home because their young don't have time to take them back and forth, stress builds up.”
Dere knows of this stress first hand. His grown children attend Arizona State University and high school, while he and his wife manage a cafe in a plaza and a driving school. His typical work day, which runs from early morning until 8 p.m., leaves his mother, who is approaching her 70s, long periods to occupy herself.
The Somali community is concentrated on Phoenix’s east side, but Dere’s home is in Glendale, a long ride to the west.
Also, the strained economy in Phoenix has forced several potential gathering places to close. For example, the Somali Association of Arizona's Hope Center offered a score of services ranging from job training to citizenship classes, until it closed its doors in 2006, due to a lack of funding.
Generational Conflicts
When asked if elders are valued in the Somali community, Dere shrugged, calling the subject “a big challenge and messy.”
Often, he said, Africans recently immigrated to the United States discover that authority in the household is turned upside-down, in part, because of language difficulties.
Children, he said, usually adapt to American culture and learn English more quickly than their parents and grandparents. In a city with poor translation services in hospitals and schools, Dere continued, young family translators effectively become gatekeepers for their elders in accessing medical, legal or other services.
The result, Dere said, is to leave generations on either side of a widening cultural and digital divide. “Yes they can translate, but still a child doesn't know about legal things or immigration law,” he noted.
Despite the difficulty for African elders, English classes could provide the positive community space older adults long for, if done the right way.
“Elders want to see people they are close to,” Dere said. He stated that while volunteer agencies and community colleges provide ESL classes, they design them for the whole community. Many older immigrants find those environments intimidating.
Dere emphasized, “Remember these are people who have never attended formal school.”
Besides needing more training capacity in ESL and other skills, older Africans could benefit from fewer barriers to become childcare workers. Arizona requires those qualifying for a daycare worker's license to know English and be certified in cardio-pulmonary resuscitation.
Dak described the potential benefits of teaching a certification program to Sudanese elders that takes into account their learning styles. They would gain a greater sense of purpose, and relieve economic pressures on parents in their community struggling to make ends meet. “Do you know the (daycare) fees, if children are not picked up on time?” Dak laughs, shaking his head.
There are no easy answers for African elders in the Valley of the Sun, but efforts to meet the needs of this community group still persist despite the demanding economic obligations of working adults, and the dearth of funding available on the state level.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
North Miami mayor invites Haitian immigrants
By Lee Hockstader
June 30, 2010
I recently had a conversation with the mayor of North Miami, Andre Pierre, who has the distinction of having invited thousands of generally low-skilled immigrants with an imperfect command of English to come settle in his city.
Pierre was chief sponsor of a resolution, passed without dissent by the U.S. Conference of Mayors a few weeks ago at its annual meeting. The resolution urged the Obama administration to accelerate entry for 55,000 Haitians whose petitions to immigrate to the United States have been accepted but who are languishing on waiting lists that could last up to 11 years. The conference justified its demand as a means to provide relief for the earthquake-battered nation and increase cash transfers from Haitians working in the U.S. back to their relatives at home. The 55,000 Haitians in question have relatives who are either American citizens or permanent legal residents living in the U.S.
Probably no city in America would be more affected than North Miami if the administration moved the Haitians up to the front of the visa line. According to Pierre, about a third of his 60,000-plus constituents are of Haitian descent, meaning that thousands more would be likely to settle in the city if the administration opened the doors to the Haitians. But he said his town is prepared.
“These are folks with family members who are U.S. citizens and residents who want to be reunited with their families,” he told us. “The U.S. has really nothing to lose by [allowing] them in -- the government wouldn’t be paying for their travel, passports, airfare, or to go to eat or live in a home or take a shower.”
As it happens, Pierre, 41 years old, is himself a Haitian immigrant; he arrived in New York as a teenager and, before attending college and law school, made his way by cutting grass, pumping gas and delivering newspapers. And he has a further personal interest: his brother-in-law and teenage nephew and niece, whose applications to immigrate to the U.S. were accepted in 2002, are still awaiting visas; they’ve been living in a tent since the Jan. 12 earthquake.
The proportion of this country’s foreign-born population is near historic highs, and unemployment is edging 10 percent. Many Americans are hostile to the idea of new immigration -- particularly if it involves low-skilled newcomers with rudimentary English. But the fact is that America has absorbed great waves of immigrants in the past, and most have become productive, patriotic citizens.
If tens of thousands of Haitians were admitted from the wait list, the burden would fall heavily on a handful of places -- cities such as Miami, New York and Boston. Those three cities owe much of their texture and flavor to immigrants from Haiti and elsewhere; they tend not to look at newly-arrived Haitians as a foreign element, but as part of the fabric of their communities. The most venomous grousing about the Haitians would be likely to come from elsewhere -- from Americans far from the cities that would actually feel the arrival of a new influx of immigrants. It certainly won’t come from Mayor Pierre.
June 30, 2010
I recently had a conversation with the mayor of North Miami, Andre Pierre, who has the distinction of having invited thousands of generally low-skilled immigrants with an imperfect command of English to come settle in his city.
Pierre was chief sponsor of a resolution, passed without dissent by the U.S. Conference of Mayors a few weeks ago at its annual meeting. The resolution urged the Obama administration to accelerate entry for 55,000 Haitians whose petitions to immigrate to the United States have been accepted but who are languishing on waiting lists that could last up to 11 years. The conference justified its demand as a means to provide relief for the earthquake-battered nation and increase cash transfers from Haitians working in the U.S. back to their relatives at home. The 55,000 Haitians in question have relatives who are either American citizens or permanent legal residents living in the U.S.
Probably no city in America would be more affected than North Miami if the administration moved the Haitians up to the front of the visa line. According to Pierre, about a third of his 60,000-plus constituents are of Haitian descent, meaning that thousands more would be likely to settle in the city if the administration opened the doors to the Haitians. But he said his town is prepared.
“These are folks with family members who are U.S. citizens and residents who want to be reunited with their families,” he told us. “The U.S. has really nothing to lose by [allowing] them in -- the government wouldn’t be paying for their travel, passports, airfare, or to go to eat or live in a home or take a shower.”
As it happens, Pierre, 41 years old, is himself a Haitian immigrant; he arrived in New York as a teenager and, before attending college and law school, made his way by cutting grass, pumping gas and delivering newspapers. And he has a further personal interest: his brother-in-law and teenage nephew and niece, whose applications to immigrate to the U.S. were accepted in 2002, are still awaiting visas; they’ve been living in a tent since the Jan. 12 earthquake.
The proportion of this country’s foreign-born population is near historic highs, and unemployment is edging 10 percent. Many Americans are hostile to the idea of new immigration -- particularly if it involves low-skilled newcomers with rudimentary English. But the fact is that America has absorbed great waves of immigrants in the past, and most have become productive, patriotic citizens.
If tens of thousands of Haitians were admitted from the wait list, the burden would fall heavily on a handful of places -- cities such as Miami, New York and Boston. Those three cities owe much of their texture and flavor to immigrants from Haiti and elsewhere; they tend not to look at newly-arrived Haitians as a foreign element, but as part of the fabric of their communities. The most venomous grousing about the Haitians would be likely to come from elsewhere -- from Americans far from the cities that would actually feel the arrival of a new influx of immigrants. It certainly won’t come from Mayor Pierre.
Utah Group Sends 1,300 Immigrant Names, Personal Info to Press
---
Mosi A. Ifatunji, Ph.D. Candidate
ASA Pre-Doctoral Fellow
University of Illinois at Chicago
Department of Sociology (MC 312)
1007 West Harrison Street
Chicago, Illinois 60607-7140
Call/Text: (312) 607-2825
Email: mosi@Ifatunji.com
Twitter: @ifatunji
Monday, July 12, 2010
Pursuing AFRICOM: Obama shouldn't get too close to Goodluck Jonathan
Funmi Feyide John
guardian.co.uk
Friday 9 July 2010 14.30 BST
Nigeria is the largest black nation, with approximately 150 million people. So it was little surprise that when Barack Obama became the first black president of the US, Nigeria's then-president, Umar Yar'Adua, attempted to visit him. A visit with Obama, arguably the most popular man on the planet at the time, would have benefited Yar'Adua, who faced questions about his health and competence as a leader.
That visit never happened and instead the public relationship between Yar'Adua and Obama was practically nonexistent. A Nigerian news outlet indicated that Obama was unwilling to meet with the Nigerian leader because of a lack of democratic and human rights progress in the country. Instead, the American president chose Ghana as his first stop in sub-Saharan Africa, where he spoke sternly about democracy, good governance and leadership in a speech that was interpreted as a condemnation of Nigeria's leadership.
Tensions were further inflamed when Yar'Adua's political party accused Obama of seeking to destabilise the then-president's government. Flash forward a year and, following Yar'Adua's death in May, the Obama administration has chosen to be very vocal in its support for Nigeria's new president, Goodluck Jonathan. On his first day in office, Jonathan was visited by the American undersecretary of state in what can only be interpreted as a show of support. America quickly signed a bi-national agreement with Nigeria, the first with an African nation in decades.
Jonathan was also invited by Obama to attend a nuclear summit in Washington, DC, where he was heralded as an example of African democracy at work. Even the "terror prone" classification afforded to Nigeria after a citizen attempted to blow up a plane was soon scrapped, and Nigeria went from being on a list with the likes of Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Yemen, to being touted as an example of countries with US-approved enhanced screening technology. Unfortunately, America's support for Jonathan risks sabotaging him and even creating problems for the US and President Obama.
While oil remains an important factor in the Nigeria-US relationship, America's military aspirations are equally a reason for the change in America's tune. In 2007, Yar'Adua had formally rejected a request by the Bush administration to house United States Africa Command (Africom) in Nigeria. However, now that Yar'Adua is no longer in power, the US has another opportunity to reintroduce Africom to the African audience. If Nigeria were to get on board, there is the likelihood that other countries will view the military command more favourably, thus paving the way for an Africa-based Africom headquarters. This could also prove beneficial to American private military companies that are expanding their presence in the region, and especially in the oil-rich Gulf of Guinea.
These possibilities are even more likely now that the US has a black president. Although his popularity ratings have slipped in the US, Obama remains a very popular figure on the African continent. This popularity, coupled with the new treatment being meted out to Nigeria and its president, could increase the chance of a public declaration of support by the Nigerian government.
It would be detrimental for Jonathan to be seen as an American puppet, a perception that has already taken root. In early 2010, American officials insisted on a change in the leadership of the Nigerian electoral body and its controversial chair, Maurice Iwu, was soon removed, fuelling concerns that the removal was at America's request.
America has also proclaimed its support for a 2011 Jonathan ticket. If indeed Jonathan runs for president and wins, the credibility of this win will be diminished and America will be accused of tampering in the domestic elections of an independent nation. This would be detrimental not only to the resulting Nigerian administration but also to the credibility of the American government, which asserts that it hopes for true democracy in Nigeria and the region.
In addition, obvious American support for Jonathan, a southern Christian, could reinforce negative religious and tribal divisions. Considering that many believe Yar'Adua, a northern Muslim, was snubbed by Obama, the new attitude towards Jonathan could foster the already widely held belief that America is anti-Muslim. Such an attitude, if further entrenched by opportunists, would destabilise any future Nigerian government and encourage intertribal friction in a country with over 250 different languages and groups. In 2010, a North African al-Qaida group offered to train Nigerian Muslims to kill Christians. This was during a period when socioeconomic, religious and ethnic tensions fuelled repeated fighting in the country's middle belt.
If these and other negative possibilities were to come to pass, America's support could be interpreted as a failure of its Africa policy. This would not only weaken the African belief in Obama's leadership and vision for the continent, but make him prey to further foreign policy criticism by opponents at home.
America's carefully crafted but public preference for Jonathan could very well serve to complicate Jonathan's position as president and even the possibility of him running again. It could also have repercussions for President Obama who can hardly afford more missteps considering the challenges he already faces at home. And, most significantly, such support could create more problems for Nigeria, a country recently listed as the 14th most failed state in the world, and, undoubtedly, with enough issues to deal with.
guardian.co.uk
Friday 9 July 2010 14.30 BST
Nigeria is the largest black nation, with approximately 150 million people. So it was little surprise that when Barack Obama became the first black president of the US, Nigeria's then-president, Umar Yar'Adua, attempted to visit him. A visit with Obama, arguably the most popular man on the planet at the time, would have benefited Yar'Adua, who faced questions about his health and competence as a leader.
That visit never happened and instead the public relationship between Yar'Adua and Obama was practically nonexistent. A Nigerian news outlet indicated that Obama was unwilling to meet with the Nigerian leader because of a lack of democratic and human rights progress in the country. Instead, the American president chose Ghana as his first stop in sub-Saharan Africa, where he spoke sternly about democracy, good governance and leadership in a speech that was interpreted as a condemnation of Nigeria's leadership.
Tensions were further inflamed when Yar'Adua's political party accused Obama of seeking to destabilise the then-president's government. Flash forward a year and, following Yar'Adua's death in May, the Obama administration has chosen to be very vocal in its support for Nigeria's new president, Goodluck Jonathan. On his first day in office, Jonathan was visited by the American undersecretary of state in what can only be interpreted as a show of support. America quickly signed a bi-national agreement with Nigeria, the first with an African nation in decades.
Jonathan was also invited by Obama to attend a nuclear summit in Washington, DC, where he was heralded as an example of African democracy at work. Even the "terror prone" classification afforded to Nigeria after a citizen attempted to blow up a plane was soon scrapped, and Nigeria went from being on a list with the likes of Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Yemen, to being touted as an example of countries with US-approved enhanced screening technology. Unfortunately, America's support for Jonathan risks sabotaging him and even creating problems for the US and President Obama.
While oil remains an important factor in the Nigeria-US relationship, America's military aspirations are equally a reason for the change in America's tune. In 2007, Yar'Adua had formally rejected a request by the Bush administration to house United States Africa Command (Africom) in Nigeria. However, now that Yar'Adua is no longer in power, the US has another opportunity to reintroduce Africom to the African audience. If Nigeria were to get on board, there is the likelihood that other countries will view the military command more favourably, thus paving the way for an Africa-based Africom headquarters. This could also prove beneficial to American private military companies that are expanding their presence in the region, and especially in the oil-rich Gulf of Guinea.
These possibilities are even more likely now that the US has a black president. Although his popularity ratings have slipped in the US, Obama remains a very popular figure on the African continent. This popularity, coupled with the new treatment being meted out to Nigeria and its president, could increase the chance of a public declaration of support by the Nigerian government.
It would be detrimental for Jonathan to be seen as an American puppet, a perception that has already taken root. In early 2010, American officials insisted on a change in the leadership of the Nigerian electoral body and its controversial chair, Maurice Iwu, was soon removed, fuelling concerns that the removal was at America's request.
America has also proclaimed its support for a 2011 Jonathan ticket. If indeed Jonathan runs for president and wins, the credibility of this win will be diminished and America will be accused of tampering in the domestic elections of an independent nation. This would be detrimental not only to the resulting Nigerian administration but also to the credibility of the American government, which asserts that it hopes for true democracy in Nigeria and the region.
In addition, obvious American support for Jonathan, a southern Christian, could reinforce negative religious and tribal divisions. Considering that many believe Yar'Adua, a northern Muslim, was snubbed by Obama, the new attitude towards Jonathan could foster the already widely held belief that America is anti-Muslim. Such an attitude, if further entrenched by opportunists, would destabilise any future Nigerian government and encourage intertribal friction in a country with over 250 different languages and groups. In 2010, a North African al-Qaida group offered to train Nigerian Muslims to kill Christians. This was during a period when socioeconomic, religious and ethnic tensions fuelled repeated fighting in the country's middle belt.
If these and other negative possibilities were to come to pass, America's support could be interpreted as a failure of its Africa policy. This would not only weaken the African belief in Obama's leadership and vision for the continent, but make him prey to further foreign policy criticism by opponents at home.
America's carefully crafted but public preference for Jonathan could very well serve to complicate Jonathan's position as president and even the possibility of him running again. It could also have repercussions for President Obama who can hardly afford more missteps considering the challenges he already faces at home. And, most significantly, such support could create more problems for Nigeria, a country recently listed as the 14th most failed state in the world, and, undoubtedly, with enough issues to deal with.
Brazilians Debate New Racial Equality Law
SATURDAY, 10 JULY 2010 11:37
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jul 9 (IPS) - The Statute of Racial Equality, soon to be signed into law in Brazil, is at the centre of a controversy between those who consider it a historical achievement, like the abolition of slavery in 1888, and those who see it as failing to satisfy the demands of the black movement.
The ceremony at which Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will sign the statute into law, scheduled for Jul. 20, will not be the brilliant occasion hoped for by the government's Special Secretariat for the Promotion of Racial Equality (SEPPIR).
After nearly two decades of debate, the statute approved by Congress on Jun. 16 has not left everyone happy.
It is ”a watered-down text that does not include some of the major demands of the social movements linked to the cause of black people” and also ”waters down political aspects,” the Collective of Black Entities (CEN) said in a declaration.
CEN, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), was referring to the suppression of clauses recognising the nature and origins of racism, which it regards as decisive for ”properly overcoming it.”
According to the state Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), 50.6 percent of Brazil's population describes itself as black. In spite of this, the term ”race” was expunged from most of the text, Marcos Rezende, general coordinator of CEN, told IPS.
Senator Demóstenes Torres of the rightwing Democrats Party, who steered the statute through Congress, amended terms in the text like ”racism” and ”racial inequality” to expressions like ”ethnic differences or discrimination.”
The senator said the reason for the changes was that the concept of ”race” is outdated, because genetic research shows there is only one human race.
Rezende pointed out that sections of the statute establishing racial quotas for university admissions and political parties, and tax breaks for companies with over 20 percent of black employees, had also been eliminated.
”They want to deny that skin colour affects access to certain positions,” he complained.
In 2004, barely two percent of university students were black, but in 2006, after quotas were adopted at some universities, the proportion of black students increased to 12.5 percent, he said.
In Rezende's view, other education and public health statistics also ”show that black people receive a different, and lower, standard of care.” In the state Unified Health System (SUS), black and mulatto women are given less anaesthesia during normal childbirth, he said.
The SUS is free to the entire population of 190 million Brazilians, and is used by 80 percent of them.
In the labour market, the same situation occurs. Black people with the same qualifications are paid less than their white colleagues for doing the same job.
And in the political arena, black people are under-represented in the circles of power, Rezende said.
The lower house of Congress, for instance, is made up of 513 lawmakers of whom 10 percent are self-declared black and 33 percent mulatto. Out of 81 senators, only one is self-declared black, he said.
”Discrimination against black people in Brazil is the result of the racist structure of our society, which preserves privileges for some and excludes others,” the activist said.
”Black people have greater difficulty in obtaining public goods and services, entering the labour market and higher education, getting access to land, and securing rights, even when they are guaranteed by the constitution,” he complained.
According to IBGE, two-thirds of poor people in Brazil are black, half the Afro-descendant population live below the poverty line, and a white youngster is three times more likely to go to university than a black one.
”This is the friendly Brazilian form of racism. No one is racist, but the statistics confirm what we say,” he said.
In the view of Ivanir dos Santos, the head of the Centro de Articulação de Populações Marginalizadas (CEAP), an NGO working with marginalised people, although the statute is silent about many of the black movement's demands, it does address important issues.
The statute reaffirms freedom of religion, already enshrined in the constitution, and so guarantees the right to practise religions of African origin, he told IPS. Dos Santos emphasised that this is the first time this has been acknowledged in an official document.
Other criticisms refer to the elimination from the text of the need to make reparations for slavery, and of the description of the slave trade as a crime against humanity, with no period of limitation.
On the other hand, the non-governmental National Afro-Brazilian Congress, which works to raise black consciousness in the black movement, said the statute is ”the most significant political event in recent centuries.”
Among other gains, they highlight the reaffirmation of compulsory teaching of the history of African people and their descendants, as is already provided by law.
They also celebrate the document's reaffirmation that the black population's rights to health, housing, culture and so on, must be guaranteed by federal, provincial and municipal authorities by means of social and economic policies.
The minister in charge of SEPPIR, Eloi Ferreira de Araujo, said the statute is ”a diploma in its own right, an affirmative action law.”
”This is an extraordinary victory, 122 years after the abolition of slavery,” he said.
In Ferreira de Araujo's view, criticism about the elimination of racial quotas from the text is baseless. The statute stipulates that the government shall adopt affirmative action programmes to reduce ethnic inequalities, which will include quotas, he said.
He also downplayed the elimination of the terms ”racism” and ”racial discrimination”, on the grounds that the concepts of race and racism are defined in several parts of the text, and the term is included in the statute's title.
Certain sectors of the black movement also complain that the text does not adequately define the modern remnants of the ”quilombos”, free communities originally founded by runaway slaves.
The government has recognised 1,345 such communities, and will now proceed to demarcate and register their land.
Proposals for the social integration of these communities, and for providing credit, health care and housing, will now be examined, the minister said.
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jul 9 (IPS) - The Statute of Racial Equality, soon to be signed into law in Brazil, is at the centre of a controversy between those who consider it a historical achievement, like the abolition of slavery in 1888, and those who see it as failing to satisfy the demands of the black movement.
The ceremony at which Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will sign the statute into law, scheduled for Jul. 20, will not be the brilliant occasion hoped for by the government's Special Secretariat for the Promotion of Racial Equality (SEPPIR).
After nearly two decades of debate, the statute approved by Congress on Jun. 16 has not left everyone happy.
It is ”a watered-down text that does not include some of the major demands of the social movements linked to the cause of black people” and also ”waters down political aspects,” the Collective of Black Entities (CEN) said in a declaration.
CEN, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), was referring to the suppression of clauses recognising the nature and origins of racism, which it regards as decisive for ”properly overcoming it.”
According to the state Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), 50.6 percent of Brazil's population describes itself as black. In spite of this, the term ”race” was expunged from most of the text, Marcos Rezende, general coordinator of CEN, told IPS.
Senator Demóstenes Torres of the rightwing Democrats Party, who steered the statute through Congress, amended terms in the text like ”racism” and ”racial inequality” to expressions like ”ethnic differences or discrimination.”
The senator said the reason for the changes was that the concept of ”race” is outdated, because genetic research shows there is only one human race.
Rezende pointed out that sections of the statute establishing racial quotas for university admissions and political parties, and tax breaks for companies with over 20 percent of black employees, had also been eliminated.
”They want to deny that skin colour affects access to certain positions,” he complained.
In 2004, barely two percent of university students were black, but in 2006, after quotas were adopted at some universities, the proportion of black students increased to 12.5 percent, he said.
In Rezende's view, other education and public health statistics also ”show that black people receive a different, and lower, standard of care.” In the state Unified Health System (SUS), black and mulatto women are given less anaesthesia during normal childbirth, he said.
The SUS is free to the entire population of 190 million Brazilians, and is used by 80 percent of them.
In the labour market, the same situation occurs. Black people with the same qualifications are paid less than their white colleagues for doing the same job.
And in the political arena, black people are under-represented in the circles of power, Rezende said.
The lower house of Congress, for instance, is made up of 513 lawmakers of whom 10 percent are self-declared black and 33 percent mulatto. Out of 81 senators, only one is self-declared black, he said.
”Discrimination against black people in Brazil is the result of the racist structure of our society, which preserves privileges for some and excludes others,” the activist said.
”Black people have greater difficulty in obtaining public goods and services, entering the labour market and higher education, getting access to land, and securing rights, even when they are guaranteed by the constitution,” he complained.
According to IBGE, two-thirds of poor people in Brazil are black, half the Afro-descendant population live below the poverty line, and a white youngster is three times more likely to go to university than a black one.
”This is the friendly Brazilian form of racism. No one is racist, but the statistics confirm what we say,” he said.
In the view of Ivanir dos Santos, the head of the Centro de Articulação de Populações Marginalizadas (CEAP), an NGO working with marginalised people, although the statute is silent about many of the black movement's demands, it does address important issues.
The statute reaffirms freedom of religion, already enshrined in the constitution, and so guarantees the right to practise religions of African origin, he told IPS. Dos Santos emphasised that this is the first time this has been acknowledged in an official document.
Other criticisms refer to the elimination from the text of the need to make reparations for slavery, and of the description of the slave trade as a crime against humanity, with no period of limitation.
On the other hand, the non-governmental National Afro-Brazilian Congress, which works to raise black consciousness in the black movement, said the statute is ”the most significant political event in recent centuries.”
Among other gains, they highlight the reaffirmation of compulsory teaching of the history of African people and their descendants, as is already provided by law.
They also celebrate the document's reaffirmation that the black population's rights to health, housing, culture and so on, must be guaranteed by federal, provincial and municipal authorities by means of social and economic policies.
The minister in charge of SEPPIR, Eloi Ferreira de Araujo, said the statute is ”a diploma in its own right, an affirmative action law.”
”This is an extraordinary victory, 122 years after the abolition of slavery,” he said.
In Ferreira de Araujo's view, criticism about the elimination of racial quotas from the text is baseless. The statute stipulates that the government shall adopt affirmative action programmes to reduce ethnic inequalities, which will include quotas, he said.
He also downplayed the elimination of the terms ”racism” and ”racial discrimination”, on the grounds that the concepts of race and racism are defined in several parts of the text, and the term is included in the statute's title.
Certain sectors of the black movement also complain that the text does not adequately define the modern remnants of the ”quilombos”, free communities originally founded by runaway slaves.
The government has recognised 1,345 such communities, and will now proceed to demarcate and register their land.
Proposals for the social integration of these communities, and for providing credit, health care and housing, will now be examined, the minister said.
Monday, July 5, 2010
Arizona's Africans Wonder What Immigration Law Means For Them
by DANA FARRINGTON
A small, but rapidly growing, community of African immigrants has its own concerns about Arizona's controversial immigration law. And organizations that assist the community face their own challenges of how to educate their members about their rights.
The majority of this primarily East African community entered the United States as refugees. The total population of Africans in the United States increased 40-fold between 1960 and 2006, with most of the growth coming after 1990 (as violence grew in the region). That influx is reflected in Arizona as well — Africans now comprise about 2.6 percent of the state's foreign-born population, more than twice the percentage in 1990. (For more background on Africans in Arizona, read this series at Phxsoul.com.)
Arizona's new law will go into effect later this month — unless stopped by a preliminary injunction. It requires law enforcement officials to ask for documentation if, after they have lawfully stopped someone, there is "reasonable suspicion" that the person is in the country illegally. Officers "may not solely consider race, color or national origin" to determine suspicion.
Mursal Ali, who helps with immigration services for the Somali Bantu Association of Tuscon, says that while most Africans in Arizona have documentation, there are exceptions.
Most Africans enter the United States on a refugee visa and have one year from arrival to apply for permanent residency. Ali says that some never actually applied for a Green Card, and some of those who did have lost their cards. Others cannot afford the $390 application fee.
A number of the organization's members are now going through the process to apply for permanent residency because of the changes in the law, a process that Ali says can take about four to five months. In the meantime, applicants get documentation proving they have started the process.
With or without paperwork, Africans have raised questions about how the law will impact them.
Ali says immigrants wonder what would happen if they were to call 911 in an emergency. Before, he said, if you were in a car accident, police only asked for a driver's license. "But now, if you need a police to help you, you have to prove that you are a legal immigrant," Ali believes.
That may be one example of the change in the law leading to a misconception. The Arizona Republic has been looking at hypothetical situations like that car accident scenario. In such a case as that, there generally would not be enough evidence to suspect the driver is in the country illegally — even if he or she didn't have a driver's license to show.
At the Arizona Lost Boys Center, Executive Director Kuol Awan says members have been briefed on how to respond to police.
"We try to tell people that you don't have to react differently. Just give the police what they want," Awan says. He says he does not want the community, particularly young men, to get defensive about inquiries into their immigration status.
Though some African immigrants fear they may get swept up in the wide net of enforcement, Arizona State University Professor Matthew Whitaker says their presence is not always noticed by the larger Arizona community.
"To many folks in Arizona, Africa might as well be Neptune," Whitaker says. "It's just not on their radar screen."
The invisibility of the African community is partially due to its small size. But Whitaker says it also has to do with the fact that they tend to live in the same area, even in the same apartment complexes. Still, Whitaker says Africans could eventually draw more attention.
"If the percentages hold, and the immigration continues, and they continue to increase, that's going to be interesting," says Whitaker. "What you're going to hear from folks is, 'When did they get here?' "
(Dana Farrington is a Digital News intern with NPR.)
A small, but rapidly growing, community of African immigrants has its own concerns about Arizona's controversial immigration law. And organizations that assist the community face their own challenges of how to educate their members about their rights.
The majority of this primarily East African community entered the United States as refugees. The total population of Africans in the United States increased 40-fold between 1960 and 2006, with most of the growth coming after 1990 (as violence grew in the region). That influx is reflected in Arizona as well — Africans now comprise about 2.6 percent of the state's foreign-born population, more than twice the percentage in 1990. (For more background on Africans in Arizona, read this series at Phxsoul.com.)
Arizona's new law will go into effect later this month — unless stopped by a preliminary injunction. It requires law enforcement officials to ask for documentation if, after they have lawfully stopped someone, there is "reasonable suspicion" that the person is in the country illegally. Officers "may not solely consider race, color or national origin" to determine suspicion.
Mursal Ali, who helps with immigration services for the Somali Bantu Association of Tuscon, says that while most Africans in Arizona have documentation, there are exceptions.
Most Africans enter the United States on a refugee visa and have one year from arrival to apply for permanent residency. Ali says that some never actually applied for a Green Card, and some of those who did have lost their cards. Others cannot afford the $390 application fee.
A number of the organization's members are now going through the process to apply for permanent residency because of the changes in the law, a process that Ali says can take about four to five months. In the meantime, applicants get documentation proving they have started the process.
With or without paperwork, Africans have raised questions about how the law will impact them.
Ali says immigrants wonder what would happen if they were to call 911 in an emergency. Before, he said, if you were in a car accident, police only asked for a driver's license. "But now, if you need a police to help you, you have to prove that you are a legal immigrant," Ali believes.
That may be one example of the change in the law leading to a misconception. The Arizona Republic has been looking at hypothetical situations like that car accident scenario. In such a case as that, there generally would not be enough evidence to suspect the driver is in the country illegally — even if he or she didn't have a driver's license to show.
At the Arizona Lost Boys Center, Executive Director Kuol Awan says members have been briefed on how to respond to police.
"We try to tell people that you don't have to react differently. Just give the police what they want," Awan says. He says he does not want the community, particularly young men, to get defensive about inquiries into their immigration status.
Though some African immigrants fear they may get swept up in the wide net of enforcement, Arizona State University Professor Matthew Whitaker says their presence is not always noticed by the larger Arizona community.
"To many folks in Arizona, Africa might as well be Neptune," Whitaker says. "It's just not on their radar screen."
The invisibility of the African community is partially due to its small size. But Whitaker says it also has to do with the fact that they tend to live in the same area, even in the same apartment complexes. Still, Whitaker says Africans could eventually draw more attention.
"If the percentages hold, and the immigration continues, and they continue to increase, that's going to be interesting," says Whitaker. "What you're going to hear from folks is, 'When did they get here?' "
(Dana Farrington is a Digital News intern with NPR.)
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Senegal Offers Visa Free Status to Members of the African Diaspora
WRITTEN BY BY WI STAFF WRITER
THURSDAY, 03 JUNE 2010 10:02
At the conclusion of an official visit to the Republic of Ghana by invitation of Ghana’s Head of State John Atta Mills, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade announced his intention to introduce legislation allowing members of the global African Diaspora community to visit Senegal without need of a visa. The Senegalese leader was in Accra to participate in an International Colloquium honoring the legacy of Ghana’s first President Kwame Nkrumah. In addition, this historic legislation would include a provision allowing members of the Diaspora to acquire a special passport.
This is the first time any African head of state has offered “Visa Free Status” to members of the African Diaspora.
This historic initiative by President Wade results from discussions with Her Excellency, Ambassador Dr. Erieka Bennett, Founder and Head of Mission of the Diaspora African Forum, based at the W.E.B. DuBois Center in Accra. Recognized by the African Union, the Diaspora African Forum holds diplomatic status granted by Ghana and is the first diplomatic mission in the world dedicated to the African Diaspora.
While in Accra, President Wade visited the Diaspora African Forum, where he met with the Head of Mission, H.E. Dr. Erieka Bennett, and invited her to open the forum’s second mission in Senegal’s capital Dakar.
“The president asked me to lead a Diaspora delegation to Senegal to work out the modalities for the new mission,” Ambassador Bennett stated. "This is an important, transformational moment in the history of Africa and especially for the political and economic evolution of African and African Diaspora affairs,” she concluded.
The distinguished and renowned, ninety-three year old Jamaican diplomat, Ambassador Dudley Thompson, represented the African Diaspora community at the International Colloquium, which also celebrated Kwame Nkrumah’s 100th birthday.
Ambassador Thompson applauded Senegalese President Wade’s leadership on Diaspora affairs, adding that he was delighted to see such a breathtaking development in his life time. “This decision represents a giant step in helping to unite Africa and the Diaspora, and demonstrates in a most meaningful way the visionary leadership of President Wade and importance of the African Diaspora to 21st century Africa."
In a related development, President Wade also announced that in honor of the works and legacy of Kwame Nkrumah, the Republic of Senegal would create a Chair on Pan Africanism at Dakar’s Cheikh Anta Diop University, and further proposed in addition to the establishment of the Diaspora African Forum mission in Dakar, that a permanent Pan African Secretariat also be established in the capital city.
For additional information - and to obtain interviews with H.E. Dr. Erieka Bennett, Founder and Head of Mission of the Diaspora African Forum, news media are invited to contact: by email, or by telephone at Division 12 Media in Washington, DC at: (202) 587-5648.
THURSDAY, 03 JUNE 2010 10:02
At the conclusion of an official visit to the Republic of Ghana by invitation of Ghana’s Head of State John Atta Mills, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade announced his intention to introduce legislation allowing members of the global African Diaspora community to visit Senegal without need of a visa. The Senegalese leader was in Accra to participate in an International Colloquium honoring the legacy of Ghana’s first President Kwame Nkrumah. In addition, this historic legislation would include a provision allowing members of the Diaspora to acquire a special passport.
This is the first time any African head of state has offered “Visa Free Status” to members of the African Diaspora.
This historic initiative by President Wade results from discussions with Her Excellency, Ambassador Dr. Erieka Bennett, Founder and Head of Mission of the Diaspora African Forum, based at the W.E.B. DuBois Center in Accra. Recognized by the African Union, the Diaspora African Forum holds diplomatic status granted by Ghana and is the first diplomatic mission in the world dedicated to the African Diaspora.
While in Accra, President Wade visited the Diaspora African Forum, where he met with the Head of Mission, H.E. Dr. Erieka Bennett, and invited her to open the forum’s second mission in Senegal’s capital Dakar.
“The president asked me to lead a Diaspora delegation to Senegal to work out the modalities for the new mission,” Ambassador Bennett stated. "This is an important, transformational moment in the history of Africa and especially for the political and economic evolution of African and African Diaspora affairs,” she concluded.
The distinguished and renowned, ninety-three year old Jamaican diplomat, Ambassador Dudley Thompson, represented the African Diaspora community at the International Colloquium, which also celebrated Kwame Nkrumah’s 100th birthday.
Ambassador Thompson applauded Senegalese President Wade’s leadership on Diaspora affairs, adding that he was delighted to see such a breathtaking development in his life time. “This decision represents a giant step in helping to unite Africa and the Diaspora, and demonstrates in a most meaningful way the visionary leadership of President Wade and importance of the African Diaspora to 21st century Africa."
In a related development, President Wade also announced that in honor of the works and legacy of Kwame Nkrumah, the Republic of Senegal would create a Chair on Pan Africanism at Dakar’s Cheikh Anta Diop University, and further proposed in addition to the establishment of the Diaspora African Forum mission in Dakar, that a permanent Pan African Secretariat also be established in the capital city.
For additional information - and to obtain interviews with H.E. Dr. Erieka Bennett, Founder and Head of Mission of the Diaspora African Forum, news media are invited to contact: by email, or by telephone at Division 12 Media in Washington, DC at: (202) 587-5648.
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