Yesterday we received an email addressing the exclusion of Sister Mohau Pheko from the WTO Cancun meeting. The email read as follows:
"This deliberate silencing of women's voices is worrying. What could Mohau possibly do which would threaten the WTO meeting really?"
from "RE: Mohau Pheko in Mexican gov't leaked "enemies list" of activists toward Cancun", by Sister Bookie Kethusegile of the SADC
It is our opinion that she was excluded because she is an articulate champion/advocate of Africa, African people; and in general Pan-Africanism. Such capabilities make her anathema to the powers that actually "own" and control the WTO and similar institutions. They have no interest in African people achieving a better quality of life, and their only goal is to continue us in a state of abject poverty and misery.
Perhaps this excerpt from a recent article on Africa and the WTO by Apuko Nyandolo will put it in sharper context:
"First, the WTO has not facilitated a level trading field as touted upon its formation. There is a clear imbalance in the trading system, where the developed world have employed the use of agricultural subsidies, thus putting at disadvantage, commodities from Africa, where such subsidies have been discouraged by World Bank and IMF policies."
"While in Kenya alone, where about 60 percent of the population live on less than a dollar a day, in Europe, each cow receives US$ 2 a day in the form of subsidy, says Oduor Ong'wen of EcoNews Africa, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), and chairman of the NGO Council in Kenya . He alleges that half of European budget goes toward subsidies."
"Under such circumstance, Africa, whose many countries depend on agriculture for economic growth, has as a result continued to experience devastating socio-economic crises."
"Living conditions of its people have deteriorated dramatically, in spite of its nations being members of the so-called supranational institutions like WTO, among others. According to World Bank projection, about 30 percent of the poor in the world by the turn of the century was African."
"Yet the continent is potentially the richest in the world. Diamond from Sierra Leone alone, earns the US and Europe US$50 billion a year. It is Africa that produces coltan, a mineral that is used for making parts of computers and cell phones. The same Africa produces uranium that US relies on to build its a military might.
Clearly, the rules by WTO are unfavourable to Africa. One condition is that countries of the continent have to export goods in their raw form, and not as manufactured goods. That is why Ghana has to continue exporting cocoa and import chocolate, a product of cocoa."
"Economic analysts question how Germany has become the leading exporter of manufactured coffee, yet the crop is not grown in the country."
"Belgium is the leading exporter of diamond, which is not available in its land.
The African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) which is marketed as an institution meant to offer opportunities to developing countries to access the United States markets in a bid to promote Africa-US trade relations, is beginning to raise suspicion.
Analysts argue that AGOA has political strings attached to it. Countries enlisted under this privilege must align themselves toward US political interest."
"For this reason, organisations sympathetic to the plight of Africa feel that the continent needs a revolution of perception, and build a strategy of collective self-reliance. This calls for a new way of doing things, which must be people driven, since government representatives appear to have failed championing the interest of their countries."
"It is for this reason that Heinrich Boll Foundation, Oxfam Great Britain, and EcoNews Africa, resorted to creating awareness amongst the ordinary public on the goings on at the international institutions. At a workshop they organised in Kenya recently, they revealed how the WTO rules are designed and made by the rich countries, noting that the interest of the developing countries was not a priority at the institution."
"For example, when a trade dispute occurs, not every member is involved.
The powerful nations resort to the Green House, an inner unit within WTO, where only the privileged are allowed participation. This breeds suspicion among many members, but then, they are coerced into accepting the decisions made in the Green House.
"`While lack of staff, capacity, and financial resources is a factor for many developing countries, the primary reason for this system of exclusionary consensus making is that the Quad countries assume that, as the main forces in the global economy, they have the right to formulate its rules,` says Aileen Kwa, a policy analyst with Focus on Global South, a Bankok-based policy and activist institute."
"The scenario described indicates that the rule-based system of WTO is in fact based more on power than on rules, so that the powerful nations make the rules at the WTO, just as they do at the IMF and World Bank, argues Ongwen.
Organisations like the Heinrich Boll Foundation are urging the public to join the big noise to demand that trade be made fair. On the same wavelength, the public have been prevailed upon not to buy foreign products if the same can be produced locally.
`Kenya is not for sale` was their rallying slogan at the workshop, held to stir the public into action."
from "Uproar Against WTO Begins to Ring Across Africa" by Apuko Nyandolo
Posted to the web August 25, 2003
Nairobi
http://allafrica.com/stories/200308250759.html
To get a capsule glimpse of Mohau and her comrades' perspective on the micro, mezzo and macro economic condition of Africans, we need go no further than what PAC says about itself relative to the other parties in Azania/South Africa:
"PAC will bring about a caring Africanist government, which will introduce an UNEMPLOYMENT ALLOWANCE for the unemployed and reverse the present ANC policy of privatisation and sale of state assets to the rich and the foreigners. Privatisation of state assets has created massive unemployment and loss of jobs."
"The PAC will also introduce FREE EDUCATION for our children and increase the pension for the old, the disabled and increase the children's allowance. MORE LAND will be given to the landless so that they can build themselves decent houses. Homelessness and "mikuku' will be a thing of the past. TRADITIONAL LEADERS shall have their powers clearly stated in the constitution. The WEALTH of the country including MINERAL WEALTH and LAND shall be SHARED equitably and distributed equitably."
from "THE TRUTH ABOUT THE PAC NATIONAL CONGRESS AND ELECTIONS HELD -- 14th-15th JUNE 2003, AT VISTA UNIVERSITY SOWETO."
PAN AFRICANIST CONGRESS OF AZANIA (PAC)
OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY GENERAL
Clearly the PAC-Azania logic is not one that is endorsed by the "owners" and managers of institutions such as the WTO. It is to aligned with the thinking of other greater Pan-Africanists, such as Dr. Kwame Nkrumah who observed:
"The foreign firms who exploit our resources long ago saw the strength to be
gained from acting on a Pan-African scale. By means of interlocking
directorships, cross-shareholdings and other devices, groups of apparently
different companies have formed, in fact, one enormous capitalist monopoly.
The only effective way to challenge this economic empire and to recover
possession of our heritage, is for us also to act on a Pan-African basis,
through a Union Government."
"No one would suggest that if all the peoples of Africa combined to establish
their unity their decision could be revoked by the forces of neo-colonialism.
On the contrary, faced with a new situation, those who practice
neo-colonialism would adjust themselves to this new balance of world forces
in exactly the same way as the capitalist world has in the past adjusted
itself to any other change in the balance of power."
p. 259, "Neo-Colonialism The Last Stage of Imperialism," Dr. Kwame Nkrumah
and,
"It is said, of course that we have no capital, no industrial skill, no communications, no internal markets, and that we cannot even agree among ourselves how best to utilize our resources for our own social needs."
"Yet all the stock exchanges in the world are pre-occupied with Africa's gold, diamonds, uranium, platinum, copper and iron ores. Our capital flows out in streams to irrigate the whole system of Western economy. Fifty-two per cent of the gold in Fort Knox at this moment, where the USA stores its bullion, is believed to have originated from our shores. Africa provides more than 60 per cent of the world's gold. A great deal of the uranium for nuclear power, of copper for electronics, of titanium for supersonic projectiles, of iron and steel for heavy industries, of other minerals and raw materials for lighter industries the basic economic might of the foreign Powers comes from our continent."
"Experts have estimated that the Congo Basin alone can produce enough food crops to satisfy the requirements of nearly half the population of the whole world and here we sit talking about regionalism, talking about gradualism, talking about step by step. Are you afraid to tackle the bull by the horn?"
from Address to the Conference of African Heads of State and Government, May 24, 63
Thus we restate our thesis that Sister Pheko was placed excluded from attendance at the WTO meeting because she stood for the right of Africa and Africans. Because she is a dedicated Pan-Africanist, as is her party.
