I spent this weekend reading through Beyond Kony2012 Atrocity, Awareness, & Activism in the Internet Age. It was compiled and edited by Amanda Taub of Wronging Rights fame. Below are some excerpts from the authors (including yours truly) that contributed to the book. If you are interested in going beyond the slick simplicity of the video that kick-started the international kerfuffle, and getting a history of the LRA and Joseph Kony, grab yourself a copy.

How Civilians Became Targets: A Short History of the War in Northern Uganda
Adam Branch

These lines describing the horrors of war in Acholiland, familiar as they may sound today, were not written five or ten years ago. Rather, they were written 150 years ago by Samuel Baker, and the war 1 How Civilians Became Targets: A Short History of the War in Northern Uganda 2 was not that of the government and the LRA, but that of the slave traders, Egyptian administrators, and rival Acholi clans. Indeed, massive violence is no stranger to Acholiland, and forms of violence even seem to repeat themselves. The raids by slave traders of the 19th century are reminiscent of the attacks by the LRA; the British so-called pacification effort involved huge levels of forced population displacement, mirroring the mass forced displacement of recent decades; and rumors that outsiders were going to grab Acholi land have swirled for over a century.

Kony2012: Treat the Political Causes of the LRA, Not Just Its Violent Symptoms
Daniel Kalinaki

This history, simplified as it might be, is important if we are to understand the contemporary narrative of Joseph Kony and make informed decisions about it. Because of that history of rebellion, reprisal, and ethnic exclusion, several Acholi elders gave tacit support to Kony’s rebellion and encouraged their Children and relatives to join him. To them, military power was not an end in itself. Rather, it was the means to the material gains that came with being in power.

Entering the Humanitarian Aid Zone
Ayesha Nibbe

Both Jan Egeland and Invisible Children generated a huge buzz about the night commuter phenomenon
in the international press. In response, shelters were set up for the Children by UNICEF and their partner
organizations. Unfortunately, the shelters became a major destination for what was termed disaster
tourism by ACholi leaders. Every evening, when the night commuters were going to sleep, delegations of
journalists, donor reps, movie stars, UN officials, and other voyeurs stomped through the shelters to gawk
at the Children…

While it is clear that donor nations have political aims in mind, it is less clear why non-governmental and multilateral humanitarian organizations that aim to alleviate suffering cultivate a narrative that exacerbated the crisis in the North? One answer to this question came from the top UN official in Gulu: “Humanitarian aid is a business.” Is there an element of self-interest that encourages humanitarian agents to Choose narratives that perpetuate their “business”?

Three Strikes and Kony’s Still There: What I Learned from Negotiations with Joseph Kony and the International Criminal Court’s Efforts to Indict Him
Alex Little

Peace is good politics. Whether you’re an elected official, an undemocratic despot, or a rebel in the bush, you make more friends talking about peace and prosperity than giving speeches about death and destruction. Unfortunately, death and destruction also have proven lucrative to many of the same people. As a result, government officials and rebel leaders often pursue a path that affords them an opportunity to fight and talk…

In the end, wanting an agreement and coming to an agreement were two very different things. The actual doing of peace_ – reaching a deal to stop the fighting – proved too difficult.

Can a military intervention stop the Lord’s Resistance Army?
Patrick Wegner

In 2002, Uganda received permission from the Government of Sudan to pursue the LRA to its bases in southern Sudan, which was not an independent state at that point in time. The attack, called ‘Operation Iron Fist’, destroyed many LRA bases in southern Sudan. The rebels reacted by outflanking the Ugandan army and returning to northern Uganda, attacking areas that had so far been untouched by the war. The LRA abducted more and more people to compensate for the losses they suffered from Operation Iron Fist. At the end of the operation the whole of northern Uganda was a warzone and 90 per-cent of the population lived in the ‘protected camps’ under grievous conditions.

These are two reasons why the current US initiative to catch Joseph Kony is likely to lead to more civilian casualties while the prospects of catching Kony remain uncertain at best. We have to understand that the local population will suffer the consequences if a military intervention fails, while the advocates of the intervention will at most witness them on the news. In order to avoid negative consequences for the civilians, a military approach must be combined with efforts to develop the region and improve the local armies and police forces in charge of protecting them.

Ethical or Exploitative?: Stories, Advocacy and Suffering
Jina Moore

Storytellers aren’t experts in trauma psychology, and I don’t think they have to be. I do believe, however, that interviewing trauma survivors requires extra preparation. When it comes to telling stories of trauma, empathy alone is not enough to make our practice ethical.

Trauma stories need trust. The subjects must trust the storyteller – and so must the audience of the story.

But there are also fundamental problems with the storytelling building blocks that are there. The footage in KONY2012 isn’t dated. When Jacob, an escaped child soldier and a key character in the KONY2012 narrative, sobs on camera, we don’t know if that happened nine days ago or nine years ago. That matters. It matters as a point of fact: As critics have pointed out, the story of the LRA and its abuse of children has changed over time. Offering viewers the illusion that Jacob’s story is also the story of the present skews the facts. It also matters because dateless footage of a sobbing African child reinforces media stereotypes about Africa as a place of unending violence, static and senseless.

The Power of Images: Who Gets Made Visible?
Glenna Gordon

And I stood back a few feet, uncomfortably taking photographs of their hijinks. I took the photographs because I saw a situation I thought worthy of photographing. I was predisposed to doubt Invisible Children – they don’t have a good reputation in Uganda, where I lived at the time – and these antics seemed like confirmation of my worst fears about their motivations.

I stood back, and to the left – not wanting to interrupt their activities, nor wanting to endorse them through participating. I was documenting, I told myself, showcasing their bad behavior. It was the kind of thing you wouldn’t believe unless you were there. Or unless there were photos…

The narrative presented by Invisible Children continues this trajectory of meaning: Invisible Children offers American youth the chance to save Africans. We can change things, the video promises. We can fix Africa’s problems. In fact, we not only can, we must, because Ugandans are faceless, passive victims, just waiting for us to act. The steps to do this are simple, Invisible Children says: sign the petition, buy our action kit, donate money, and share this video online.

Learning From Save Darfur
Rebecca Hamilton

Today it remains true that public awareness can keep an otherwise obscure foreign policy issue on the radar of busy government officials in the U.S., and indeed other democratic states. But if concern by an American audience was the only ingredient needed to stop the world’s worst crimes, millions of Darfuris should have been able to return safely to their homes years ago. The real question is: What happens after awareness has been raised?

It seems like a distant memory now, but back in 2006, the Save Darfur movement, with its signature green wristbands, buzzed through college campuses the way Kony2012 has done this month. The campaign turned tens of thousands out to rally on the National Mall, its posters were plastered throughout the New York subway, and it secured primetime spots on television.

Avoiding “Badvocacy”: How to Do No Harm While Doing Good
Laura Seay

The hero of Kony 2012 is, without question, filmmaker Jason Russell. It is Russell who is fighting the bad guys, as his son puts it. It was Russell who, along with two of his friends, “discovered” the LRA crisis on a trip to northern Uganda a decade ago. And it was Russell who promised a young Ugandan boy that he would fix this conflict and make things better. If film viewers join in Invisible Children’s awarenessraising efforts, Russell promises, they can also be part of saving people from the horrors of the LRA…

These subtexts could not be farther from the truth. Ugandans and Congolese in LRA-affected areas have been engaged in efforts to stop the violence and build the peace for years, and, in Uganda, for decades. Groups like the Acholi Religious Leaders’ Peace Initiative have engaged in peace building activities, working to end the fighting and keep children safe. Other community-based organizations help ex-child soldiers reintegrate into their families and communities, provide health care to those hurt in the war, and assist displaced persons who had to flee their homes. Africans in these communities are anything but passive victims. They are leaders.

What Have They Got to Lose?
Alanna Shaikh

Poor people’s time is actually more valuable than other people’s. If you’re wealthy and you waste some time, it’s probably leisure time anyway. If you do lose time you would have spent earning money, you can cut back on luxuries to compensate. When you are poor, the opportunity costs are far greater. Leisure time is almost non-existent. There are no luxuries to give up if income is lost. There is no room for waste. Wasting poor people’s time can cause significant harm. In practical terms, that sets a high bar for aid projects. You can’t just say, “It’s better than nothing.” “Nothing” is not your baseline. Your baseline is “will this improve an already complicated life full of responsibilities, social ties, and (yes) material possessions?”

Armchair Critics Respond
Kate Cronin-Furman and Amanda Taub

One particular insult kept popping up: that those who questioned the campaign were just “armchair critics,” inferior to the brave activists who were taking “real” action and raising awareness of a serious problem. The most prominent articulations of the argument appeared in the New York Times opinion pages. On March 12th, Roger Cohen wrote that he backed Invisible Children co-founder Jason Russell over his “armchair critics,” because “he’s put his boots on the ground and he’s doing something.” Two days later, Cohen’s colleague Nicholas Kristof echoed his thoughts, referring to criticism of the Kony 2012 campaign as “the sneering scorn of do-nothing armchair cynics.” Similar sentiments could be found across the internet, on blogs, and in the comments sections of Kony-related articles.

Africa’s New Status Quo: Connected, Bold and Vocal
Teddy Ruge

As it always does, the internet exhaled as quickly as it inhaled, and the world returned to its tepid state of being. The normalcy of global injustice; the calculated, unabated global spread of the cavern between privilege and want; the cries for freedom almost matched in octave with the inanity and fervor for the latest gadgetry. In a heart beat, we are back to the bitter sweet symphony of humanity’s march through time and space. Except that this time, there is a wrinkle  in the fabric of normalcy. African agency is alive, and self-aware. The new normal is an Africa shaped and built by the new storytellers, the technically savvy youth bulge, and the uncompromising entrepreneurs. The new normal is an Africa embracing its role as a global partner worthy of respect and not just a perennial recipient. The question is, did the world recognize what just happened?

Beyond Kony2012 – Reasserting the Transformative Power of Youth Activism
Sam Menefee-Libey

We received this urgent and sad request to help find the family of Ugandan who passed away in Texas this month. Any information you could provide to help identify her family in Uganda would be greatly helpful. Please leave any information in the comments

~ To the Ugandan Diaspora Community,
My dear friend and sister Suzan Kideni “Shiellah Nabweteme” passed away in the city of Dallas, Texas. Police believe she has been dead for 14 days I am unable to contact her family in Uganda through the numbers I have. Her body is at the Medical Examiner’s office in Dallas.

She was a registered nurse who lived at Carrollton community, Hillside Texas. She had lived in the US for 17 years, the final 6 years of which were lived in Dallas, Texas.

If any body has a good contact number of her family in Uganda please reach out to:

Captain Lukiah Mulumba at:
Phone: 210-842-4287 or
Email: nlukiah@yahoo.com

I believe her friends in places she previously lived like Virginia, Dallas and Maryland can help us locate her family in Uganda.

Updates:
Burial place: Her soul will be put to rest at Kiboga
Family: She has never been married, has no children, survived by 6 siblings, and both parents are deceased.
Cause of death: Brain aneurysm (abnormal bulging or ballooning of brain vessel) leading to brain hemorrhagic stroke.

Age: 39 years
Death arrangements:
Medical examiner will give us the name of the Funeral Home where her body has been moved on Monday.

Bank:
Bank of America
Lucky L Mulumba FUND
A/c: 0837570788
Routing: 121000358

Preparations are underway Account number has been set up, contact has been established with the family.

Sincerely,
Captain Lukiah Mulumba,
Cell: 210-842-4287
Email: nlukiah@yahoo.com

Yesterday, I had the pleasure being invited to sit on the famous orange sofa so familiar with The Stream’s audience. The topic of discussion was ‘African aid: helpful or hazardous.’ I was joined by Joel R. Charny, Vice President of Humanitarian Policy and Practice at InterAction, and a cast of supporting commentators who joined us via Twitter, Google Hangout and Skype. My Twitter pals Dr. Laura Seay and Karen Attiah (whom I have yet to actually meet in person) were a pleasant surprise and provided some great questions to further the discussion.

There’s not much more to add that wasn’t in the show above, or hasn’t been said over the last two months of discussions regarding ethical social engagement. I’ll leave you with a comment that Joel contributed to the conversation. What do we do with all this good will that truly, genuinely wants to help the right way but don’t have resources available to them? How can we better mobilize their efforts more positively? Furthermore, for those that want to help, how can we provide them resources on how to help ethically?

For whatever reason, the start of Spring season lately has signaled an emergence of chaos in the world of international development communications. For the past few years, the February – May time frame unveiled the development community’s worst ideas. In 2009, it was Ashton Kutcher and Malaria No More, in 2010 it was Jason Sadler and 1 Million T-shirts. Last year was graced with World Vision and TOMS Shoes.

By now you have witnessed 2012′s installment of what’s becoming an annual exercise of righting the development ship. Invisible Children’s Kony 2012 video created a mother of a storm in the development industry. At this rate, I shudder to think what 2013 holds in store, but almost a year away. Until then, we have what we hope is something all of you can participate in.

With each passing year, smart aid’s toughest critics have raised the stakes on the importance of doing development the right way. The status quo and acceptance of age-old ineffective practices is under increasing scrutiny. Debates over poverty porn, respect to agency, and even the recipient/partner nomenclature has been fodder for the richest conversations in the development sphere.

Last year, in response, to TOMS Shoes’, A Day Without Shoes campaign, a few of us launched A Day Without Dignity, as a collective response by the development community to TOMS BOGO shoe idea. Saundra, at Good Intents compiled a list of over 70 blog posts all of you wrote in response. This year we are opening it up even further to let you participate in any which way you want.

The discussion that raged last month mainly centered around dignity and agency, cornerstones of good development work. The Kony 2012 video showed what can happen when you take the Whites in Shining Amour motif a little too far. For once, we’d like to take the opportunity to put Local Heroes in the spotlight. So here’s the deal on this year’s campaign:

For this year’s event, we are seeking blog posts and articles on:

• Locally led development projects and stories of local action working successfully to address local needs.
• Advice on how to work as partners rather than as a savior.
• Suggestions or examples on how to support and champion those who are innovating in their own communities.
• Discussions on how to best represent the people we’re trying to help to our donors.
• How to help without expecting to “Save the World”
• And we’d love it if some of the Western bloggers would invite people with local voices to share their perspectives in guest post on their blog.

In addition to these blog posts, we’ll also create a simple Day Without Dignity curriculum and discussion points.

AND we’ll be hosting a t-shirt design competition. The winning designs will available for sale – proceeds will benefit Villages in Action.

1. Send links to blog posts and articles to Saundra at Saundra[at]goodintents.org
2. Send curriculum suggestions/ideas to Tom at Murph[at]aviewfromthecave.com
3. Send t-shirt entries to TMS Ruge at Teddy[at]projectdiaspora.org

Wendy Lee,  a graduate student at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, sent us the following notice about an upcoming forum dubbed “Africa Reclaiming Africa: Changing the Rules of Engagement“ taking place on the same campus on April 13-14, 2012. This is the 9th Economic Forum held by Columbia University focused on Africa. Make sure not to miss it.

I am not an African, but in the two years of my Peace Corps service in Cameroon, I had fallen in love with the African people. Like most naive twenty-somethings who set out to go “change the world”, I was humbled by my time in Cameroon. The country changed me in more ways than one. I barely made a dent in changing my village, much less the world. I discovered Africa beyond the mainstream portrait of the continent. Africa is a massive place, and while civil wars, famines, and the like do still exist in parts of the continent, the Western media somehow rarely highlights the incredible growth that is taking place in this part of the world. In working with the Cameroonian people, they taught me the realities of African life. Western solutions to problems often do not align with these African realities. Western perceptions of Africans often belittle the incredible motivation, pride, and ingenuity that many Africans possess.

I taught business classes to my villagers. Sure, a little accounting and marketing skills are helpful, but my villagers know the landscape of operating business in Cameroon far beyond my knowledge. At the end of the day, they know what works. Africans know what they need to fix their problems. That’s not to say that problems are easy to fix and foreigners should back off completely. But it is time for the world to give Africans a lot more credit and recognize their own power to develop their own countries.

Articles like The Hopeful Continent: Africa Rising in The Economist gives me hope that the international community is finally recognizing the many positive aspects of African growth. But what will it take for Africa to reclaim its on power? And what is the role of the international community in this process?

Columbia University’s 2012 African Economic Forum will address exactly these questions. The theme this year is Africa Reclaiming Africa: Changing the Rules of Engagement. I hope you will join us in this discussion and network with the Continent’s finest at our formal gala on April 13-14th, 2012.

For more information and to register, visit http://www.aef2012.com.

Wendy Lee is a graduate student at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. She was born and raised in Taiwan and obtained secondary education in the US. Wendy served as a Small Enterprise Development Peace Corps Volunteer in Cameroon from 2008 to 2010. She plans to continue her work in Africa and international development after Columbia SIPA.

Invisible Children has issued a statement calling for a meeting with Ugandan Diaspora tomorrow, March 24th. No doubt the agenda at said meeting is going to be about the controversy surrounding the recent viral success of the Kony 2012 video. I think this is the least that the organization can do. Dialogue is always a good start. In hind sight, this probably should have happened prior to the release of the video, but I suppose, better to engage Ugandan now than than never.

The meeting notice is rather sudden and I am not sure how long the request has been out, but I am publishing this within the same hour as I received it. Nonetheless, if you do happen to be a Ugandan within driving distance of IC’s San Diego offices, please do make a point to get in touch with Sean Poole to make arrangements for attendance. Full announcement below:

Invisible Children would like to invite all members of the Ugandan diaspora to attend a meeting on Saturday, March 24th 31st at 11am in San Diego where members of the Invisible Children team would like to listen to insight from the Ugandan diaspora and discuss the recent Kony 2012 campaign and its impact. Please RSVP to spoole@invisiblechildren.com so we can ensure their is sufficient space for all to participate. While we realize it is not possible for many members from across the US to participate in a meeting with such short notice, we would like this just to be the beginning of engagement with the diaspora on this issue.

Update 1:
Sean Poole, IC’s Programs Coordinator, has issued a correction. The meeting is actually scheduled for Saturday, March 31. This gives everyone a week to make travel arrangements. If you are available, please get in touch with Sean to make arrangements.

One of the positive unintended consequences of the Kony debate was the rise of the African voices coming to the microphone. This conversation was of particular concern for me because it hit home. Unlike other do-gooder debates (1 million t-shirts, Sevenly, SWEDOW and malaria) I’ve contributed to, which were about Africa in general, the Kony 2012 debate featured Uganda heavily.

Apart from my initial response that I penned and published before our site went down due to a merciless hacking job last week (sorry about that), I was fortunate enough to be invited to publish op-eds for CNN and the New York Times. My piece at CNN covered some of the reasons I thought the video created the wrong buzz:

What does it say about our capacity to care when we are barely moved by video shot on shaky cellphone cameras of innocent people being slaughtered, but we suddenly get a collective conscious because of a slick Hollywood production documenting a 25-year-old issue on the decline.

More children die of malaria, diarrhea, and nodding disease in northern Uganda on a daily basis than the monthly average of Kony’s 25 years of killing. Where’s the slick viral video for those children?

Over at the New York Times, I was extremely thrilled to join eight other voices in a global debate published in the NYT’s Room for Debate portal. My concise contribution covered the need to use our social media clout to elevate the voices of those we want to help:

The takeaway for me is that social media is a powerful tool for flattening the conversational landscape. It is imperative that we don’t hijack the voice and agency of the actors we are trying to help. Instead we should use our social clout to help them realize they have a voice, and we shouldn’t dare assume we know what’s best for them.

Additionally, I took part in an emergency panel discussion at SXSW convened by Sam Gregory from witness.org. The conversation attempted to look at the meta lessons we can take away from the buzz that the video created. What can we as a society take away from a phenomenon where 70 million people engaged with one video? An archive of notes from the conversation can be found here [PDF].

Finally, I doubt I will ever have have time to respond to the more than 400 comments around the 3 posts that I published. Even if I did, I doubt I could ever do justice to that many voices engaging this African in conversation if I tried to synthesize what it all means. Instead I will say thank you everyone for taking the time to consider another perspective in to the debate and conversation. This is also a thank you to all those who engaged in a respectful manner, even if you didn’t agree with what I had to say, or how I said it.

The development communications landscape is changing, and I think that is good for those of us classified as recipients by the development aid complex. The rise of our voices is going to be something the world isn’t ready to accept. But I think it a necessary and urgent tool central to our development. We have a right for our voices to be heard. And we have a right to be partners and contributors to our own rescue. I, for one welcome louder, deeper voices, cogent voices rising from the lower pyramid. Let’s flatten the development paradigm by becoming equal partners and not just the perennially down-trodden.

If you have been under a rock for the last week, you probably didn’t spend 29 minutes to see this video about Joseph Kony, dubbed Kony 2012. But if you did, then you have to take 19 minutes to watch the above video by Hope North.

Hope North, “is a 40-acre campus in northern Uganda where refugees, orphans and former child soldiers find a place to call home. It is a living and learning community with an accredited secondary school, vocational training center and full time Ugandan staff of fifteen.”

There’s a clear difference in these two videos that are both have the intended purpose of raising awareness, but the primary difference is that this film pays masterful respect to the agency of the subjects who are both the narrators and the subjects of the story. This combination results in a heart-tugging emotional journey into the tragic circumstances that necessitated the existence of Hope North.

Two films. Two very different narratives. A singular purpose.

I wish there was more I could say about this film, but there isn’t anything else to add. The film speaks for itself. I’d love to hear your views. But more importantly, I’d love for us to support this organization as well. Watch it, tweet it, Facebook it. Blog it.

While African women are not to be represented as a close-knit homogenous group of people who are jointly oppressed and subdued, they are a very important foreground of any African landscape. Thus, as we celebrate small and monumental successes on the continent, we would do well to also celebrate the successes of women and acknowledge challenges on the gender front. As far back as the days of anti-colonial struggle – and even farther back – women played a key role in the enhancement of African societies, showing their strength and resilience. Today, in light of post-colonial disappointment and setbacks, they continue to strengthen their resolve.

In 2005, the African Women’s Movement launched a campaign titled Gender is My Agenda as a follow-up to the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa (SDGEA) which was adopted by the African Union at its Summit meeting in Addis Ababa. The purpose of this agenda was to rally both civil society and the national and regional communities towards a recognition, understanding and  implementation of the declaration. The movement has since spawned and strengthened women-focused initiatives across the continent and has led to gender politicking in many countries. Past widely-circulated myths that women roles and responsibilities are rooted exclusively at home have now been debunked, paving way for the known fact that women contribute significantly and often majorly to the development of many African economies especially in the field of agriculture.

One of such civil-society movements is the Femmes Africa Solidarité movement which for the past two decades has worked tirelessly to empower African women and, following the ratification of the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women Peace and Security, lobbied actors to increase the participation of women in peace and security efforts. Tostan, another pan-African initiative predominantly based in Senegal has, through its community-led strategies, worked to protect and promote the dignity of women. In addition, the Mano River Women’s Peace Network a regional network of women in the ECOWAS and Mano River region works to promote women’s participation in peace building and conflict resolution. Elsewhere on the continent, many other women-focused groups have joined in the race towards equality.

In spite of these efforts, women continue to be disproportionately affected by poverty and especially in the agricultural sector, continue to have poor access to credit. They produce 80% of the food but still own only 1% of the agricultural land. Furthermore, pursuant to MDG 3, much is left to be desired in terms of educating girls and ensuring that their educational achievements translate into an ability to enjoy employment opportunities commensurate with their level of skill. Perhaps the biggest challenge lies in the issue of healthcare as indicators continue to show high rates of maternal and child mortality and poor access to reproductive healthcare. In the social sphere, women continue to fall victim to corrupt practices in administrative, religious, economic and academic spheres where sexual favours are demanded in exchange for legal and technical assistance. In many parts of the continent, domestic violence is still an under-discussed issue. Female Genital Cutting is another area on which we would need to tread softly, contextually, and respectfully but surely. Last week, as I listened to Monique Kandé from the DRC at the UN Commission on the Status of Women argue that rape in Congo was not just Congo’s problem, but the problem of international peace keepers and the problem of Central Africa and the Great Lakes Region, and indeed the problem of all Africans and African women, I knew she was right.

Today, we celebrate another International Women’s Day. Between last year’s celebration and now, I have become more of a womanist, understanding the uniqueness of that being that is called woman and understanding the various lens through which she is viewed in societies. I have penned pieces and read books on gender-based discrimination. Recently, I watched Moolaadé a beautiful film about local women’s agency set in Burkina Faso and directed by Senegalese Ousmane Sembene. As I fight all traces of discrimination in my daily life, I am empowered by these experiences and the tenacity and sheer intelligence of women in my various familial and non-familial networks. One of these networks is the very resourceful Diaspora African Women’s Network (DAWN), whose founder was recently recognized as a White House Agent of Change. Two others, based in Ghana, are the Network of Women in Growth and the Women’s Initiative for Self-Empowerment which are both involved in advocacy work to end violence against women and to promote economic initiatives that financially empower women. Women of Kireka, based in Uganda, is another emerging women-focused enterprise. In my immediate life, role models in the person of mother, aunties, friends and mentors have made this day a cause for celebration.

Last week, I also got the chance to meet the next generation of African women leaders all under 25 who had masterminded initiatives for the enhancement of women in their community or the improvement of gender relations. They were all past fellows at the Moremi Initiative for Women’s Leadership in Africa, a fellowship program which helps young African women leaders to exploit their passions, leverage their interests and fully develop their skills. As they shared their life stories and passions, from working internally displaced women to empowering mothers with albino children in Kenya, I was infused with a renewed sense of hope and challenged to continue trudging along this path to justice and equality. Today, I also celebrate these daring women and the many feats they will accomplish in their lifetime.

Between now and next year’s celebration, many steps will be taken in the right direction and discriminatory norms and practices will continue to come under attack. As policies continue to target and include women, there remains cause for hope. Years ago, the great Burkinabe revolutionary Thomas Sankara said, “I can hear the roar of women’s silence”. Today, it is their rude awakening, the sound of their thunderous march that is clearly audible.

Happy International Women’s Day!

I have had roughly 24 hours to gather my thoughts about the latest fund-raising stunt undertaken by the long-in-the-tooth Invisible Children (IC) organization. In that time, I have had an opportunity to think and ruminate over exactly what to say, what the right order of the words should be coming out of my soul to address yet another travesty in shepherd’s clothing befalling my country and my continent.  Usually I would fly off the handle and let passion fly, but I have grown a little since this and this and this. Addressing the complexity that is Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA)’s reign of terror in northern Uganda; what with the sheer volume of victims, the survivors, the horrific examples of humanity at its worst, and the lingering ghosts of family members behind the survivors’ eyes begs a momentary pause, if but to respect the gravity of it all. I do that. I pause. I reflect and I toil with the thought that something is not right in the world that IC is still grasping at relevancy all these years after their “night walkers” campaign.

There is no easy way of saying what I feel right now, except a deep hurt and gnawing urgency to bang my head against my desk as a prescriptive to make the dumb-assery stop.  Sure, Joseph Kony and his counterpart of yesteryear, Idi Amin, have largely been responsible for the single story of Uganda. I have a hard time shaking it from the lips of strangers I meet. That’s all they know or seem to want to listen to. They dismissively glaze over my breathless exultations of the great promise in our youth, our technology, our agriculture, and our women.

“Sooo, Idi Amin, huh? That was terrible. Is he still alive?”

It is a slap in the face to so many of us who want to rise from the ashes of our tumultuous past and the noose of benevolent, paternalistic, aid-driven development memes. We, Africans, are sandwiched between our historically factual imperfections and well-intentioned, road-to-hell-building-do-gooders. It is a suffocating state of existence. To be properly heard, we must ride the coattails of self-righteous idiocy train. Even then, we have to fight for our voices to be respected.

The latest IC fund-raising cum “awareness-raising” is an insult to my identity and my intellectual capacity to reasonably defend its existence as beneficial to any Ugandan. The video project is so devoid of nuance, utility and respect for agency that it is appallingly hard to contextualize. I won’t even try. Katrin Skaya said all that could have been said, “rarely seen something this stunningly, insidiously, clever crazy. Amazing case study.”

@tmsruge @texasinafrica @lksriv. Have rarely seen something this stunningly, insidiously, clever crazy. Amazing case study. #Kony2012

— Elasti Girl (@Katrinskaya) March 7, 2012

Indeed it is. But not for the reasons you would think. This IC campaign is a perfect example of how fund-sucking NGO’s survive. “Raising awareness” (as vapid an exercise as it is) on the level that IC does, costs money. Loads and loads of money. Someone has to pay for the executive staff, fancy offices, and well, that 30-minute grand-savior, self-crowning exercise in ego stroking—in HD—wasn’t free. In all this kerfuffle, I am afraid everyone is missing the true aim of IC’s brilliant marketing strategy. They are not selling justice, democracy, or restoration of anyone’s dignity. This is a self-aware machine that must continually find a reason to be relevant. They are, in actuality, selling themselves as the issue, as the subject, as the panacea for everything that ails me as the agency-devoid African. All I have to do is show up in my broken English, look pathetic and wanting. You, my dear social media savvy click-activist, will shed a tear, exhaust Facebook’s like button, mobilize your cadre of equally ill-uninformed netizens to throw money at the problem.

Cause, you know, that works so well in the first world.

I would love nothing more than to be telling you the small victories we experience working with the very scarred survivors of Kony’s atrocities. The Women of Kireka are the most resilient group of individuals that I know. Spend a day with them and you will wonder how they manage to so calmly describe to you watching their entire families burned alive, their husbands and children hacked to death, in front of them. They do it so calmly, methodically, with such articulate prose that it leaves your soul victimized for it’s privilege. Yet they don’t pause from rolling a perfectly crafted paper bead for a beautiful necklace. They don’t waste their time lamenting the lack of justice for the fallen or the abducted. Why? Because it doesn’t bring back the dead, it doesn’t dissolve the horrific images of their huts burning, or ease the scars borne of running scared into the night.

Instead, they want work and respect and business to be able to make decisions that move their lives along. They want desperately to forget and rebuild anew; thankful for their lives. They want radios and cell phones and grasp at any semblance of normalcy. They cuddle and nurse their newborns like delicate, cherished gifts. What they don’t talk about is justice. They talk about how to forgive and move on.

But I can’t tell you their story. Why? Someone else has taken over their part in this complex saga, simplified it, branded it, packaged it and is reselling it as an Action Kit. For as little as $30 and up to $500, you get your very own pimplicious t-shirt (that was made somewhere other than Uganda or Africa) and various assortments of SWEDOW you won’t care about in a month. But hey! At least you did something!

The academics have weighed in on this debate here, and here, and here and will continue to do elsewhere in the coming days. The click-activists, denied context and nuance, have spewed their ignorance all over the comments section in self-righteous indignation for all the world to see. They have whipped out their wallets and bought their very own Super Hero activist action kits. They have bombarded their friend’s Facebook wall with ignominious updates.

“You must watch this! I already ordered my action kit!”

If we all start from the premise that Kony’s actions over the last 25 years in East and Central Africa are atrocious and he should be stopped, we would be cut of the same moral cloth. Evil is something that is easy to point out from afar. But if we conclude that any one individual/organization/group has the right to hijack the voice of so many in the name of good, then I have a common sense pill to sell you.

Let me be honest. Africa is not short of problems, epidemics and atrocities. But it is also true that it is not short of miracles, ingenuity, and a proclivity to surprise. We as Africans, especially the Diaspora, are waking to the idea that our agency has been hijacked for far too long by well-meaning Western do-gooders with a guilty conscious, sold on the idea that Africa’s ills are their responsibility. This particular affliction is called “white man’s burden” in some circles. Please don’t buy into this. Africa’s problems are our own. I asserted as much almost 5 years ago when I started Project Diaspora.

And so to you we send this solemn pledge. No longer are we satisfied with the status quo. No longer will we look to the West and the East for a saviour to come. We here claim our political struggles as our own; our short comings as our own; our unrest as our own; our dissidence as our own; our broken infrastructure as our own; our diseases as our own; our uneducated as our own; our corruption as our own; our unfed children as our own.

We have to be given due courtesy to at least try to develop capacities adequate enough to address our issues. We will never develop that capacity to do so if IC and others think selling Action Kits delivers utopia. It didn’t change our way of life when IC started, and it certainly isn’t going to change our reality when the clock expires on December 31^st.

I am coherent enough to realize when someone is trying to genuinely do good. At the surface, there’s nothing wrong with that. There is something wrong with assuming that the people who you are trying to help 1) need help, 2) want your help, or 3) can’t help themselves. IC and this video assumes all the above. Before anyone says ‘why haven’t you done anything to stop Kony?’, may I point out that it took the world’s most sophisticated army over a decade and billions of dollars to catch Osama bin Laden. Kony has been on the run for 25+ years. On a continent 3 times the size of America. Catching & stopping him is not a priority of immediate concern. You know what is? Finding a bed net so that millions of kids don’t die every day from malaria. How many of you know that more Ugandans died in road accidents last year (2838) than have died in the past 3 years from LRA attacks in whole of central Africa(2400)? We’ve picked our battles and we chose to simply try to live. And the world should be helping us live on our own terms, by respecting our agency to choose which battles to put capacity towards.

I’ve never heard of Germans running NGOs in [the United States of] America to try and fix the economy or Swedish NGOs in America trying to fix the declining standard of living. Africa is our problem, we hereby respectfully request you let us handle our own matters. We will make mistakes here and there, sure. That is expected. But the trade-off of writing our own destiny far outweighs the self-assigned guilt the world assigned to us. If you really want to help, keep the guilt and charity in your backyard. Bring instead, respect, and the humility to let us determine our destiny.

Many of us were shocked to hear about Muammar Gaddafi’s death two months ago. None of us expected the events in Libya to take such a drastic turn. Irrefutably, change was inevitable, and sooner or later the revolution was bound to come to a head, but the violent murder of a president regardless of his autocracy, leaves a sour tone. A lot of people have clearly shown delight in the fact that the former Libyan leader is now dead, while others are distraught. Let’s examine both ends of the spectrum.

The revolution showed its initial signs early in February 2011. Following the protests in neighboring nations of Egypt and Tunisia, the people of Libya decided they had had enough of Gaddafi’s despotism. Despite having been in power since 1969, Gaddafi was unwilling to relinquish his hold on power and adamantly refused to step down. The people decided to take matters into their own hands and an opposition rebel group was formed. Their mandate seemed pretty simple; take down Gaddafi or force him to leave power and allow for a more liberal Libya. Peaceful measures failed to get Gaddafi to see reason, and hence the commencement of what turned out to be one of the most unpredictable revolutions in Africa. The revolution attracted international attention from Europe and North America, and military forces came together to aid rebel groups in Libya and put an end to Gaddafi’s reign.

Gaddafi was a ruthless despotic leader who had been in power for over 30 years. Most of his supporters stood by him through the revolution and fought for him with their every breath. The fall of their hero is undeniably devastating, and in light of his accomplishments, its understandable why they would cling on to the very end. His contributions to the nation of Libya cannot be ignored:
1. Gaddafi turned Libya from an exploited and underdeveloped nation, into a robust oil exporting nation. The economy of Libya is stronger than most of the other African states, primarily due to their oil export industry. Gaddafi raised prices of oil and extraction in Libya, thus increasing Libya’s revenues. Libya exports just about as much oil as the Middle East.
2. As a result of the oil industry and export, Libya has no debts. This is a great accomplishment since several developing and developed countries have accumulated a lot of debt, and some economies are on the brink of bankruptcy.
3. Gaddafi decreased the threat of neocolonialism in Libya by requesting western oil companies in Libya to increase Libya’s share in revenues, or risk expulsion from the nation.
4. Literacy rates rose from 10 to 90%, government support provided for university scholarships and employment opportunities.
5. He also developed infrastructure like buildings, roads, schools, hospitals which all contributed to the growth of the economy. Note should be made though that most of these developments were favoured in Gaddafi’s own hometowns; Subha and Surt.

It’s been said that it’s not how you start that matters, but rather how you finish. This statement rings true in Gaddafi’s life. Despite all his contributions to Libya, the last couple years reflect a great leader gone rogue. What should have been a great finish for him, turned out to be a tragic one. Not only were people aggravated by his long stay in power, but also by his ruthlessness. How can one reconcile the last couple months of his life with everything else that he did for Libya? Some of his tremendous contributions pale in comparison to the various human rights violations in Libya, notably:
1. Gaddafi abolished the Libyan constitution of 1951, and replaced it with laws based on political ideology. It is almost impossible for a country to survive without a constitution. A constitution is a binding legal document that shows a government’s commitment to uphold justice and also outlines every citizen’s guarantee to personal rights and freedoms. Absence of a constitution naturally leads to injustice and violation of human rights and freedoms. As a result of such a catastrophic move, all Libyans have been denied basic rights, like the right to equality, and security, freedom of speech, association .
2. Gaddafi abolished Christian calendar holidays, and replaced them with a Muslim calendar, making it the nation’s official calendar. This is a violation of the right to free worship, and undermines the right of equality.
3. Gaddafi viewed all forms of political parties as dictatorships. He instead advocated for direct rule by people’s committees according to Islamic law. This is ironic considering that it’s the direct rule of the people that led to his demise. The right to form political parties is another right that citizens are entitled to, and absence of a constitution to protect this right consequently leads to human rights violation.
4. Gaddafi used a large part of the nation’s revenues and profits to boost the wellbeing of his family and close elites. He only structurally developed his hometowns, while certain cities and towns were extremely underdeveloped.
5. The rates of corruption in Libya are disturbingly high, primarily because Gaddafi turned a blind eye to his close allies and government officials who inappropriately administrated the nation’s funds, and exploited the working class and poor.
6. We also cannot ignore the various human rights violations by the militia and government – arbitrary arrests, execution and mutilations of political opponents; recruitment and employment of hit squads to murder critics abroad, were all actions that Gaddafi let slide.
7. Gaddafi was also determined to eliminate all dark skinned people from migrating into Europe. He referred them as “barbaric, ignorant and starving Africans” who would deter the development of Europe. His statements were not only racially discriminatory, but a backward move that undermines the progression of equality of all human beings.
8. Gaddafi admitted to having sponsored the bombing of the Pan AM flight 103 plane which exploded in Scotland, killing 270 people.
9. Gaddafi sponsored and armed other African dictators in central, northern and eastern Africa.
10. When the revolution initially started, Gaddafi referred to the rebels and his opposition as “rats” and “cockroaches”, whom he would fight until the last drop of blood had been shed. He wasn’t in the least concerned about the demands of the people or the need for basic rights and freedoms.

History shows that the fate of most despotic leaders whom revolutionaries seek to remove never have a happy ending and it certainly wouldn’t have been different in this case. The intensity of the revolution in Libya however dictated a profound difference and proved that we were about to witness something new. It is tragic to witness a promising political leader adopt a despotic mindset, and deliberately violate the rights of the very people that he should be defending and protecting. The last couple of years of Gaddafi’s reign were characterized by unarrest, violence, unlawful arrests and killing of innocent civilians, actions that cannot easily be swept under the rug. So what went wrong? Is it possible at all that the tragic events of Libya could have been prevented?

Now that the revolution is over, and Gaddafi’s government has been overthrown, it is imperative that the people of Libya unite and form one democratic government with a constitution to protect the rights of all citizens. To date, the ex-rebels who aided in the overthrow of Gaddafi still haven’t been disarmed, and all efforts to do so have been futile. It is naïve to expect a seamless transition from a bloody revolution to a peaceful democratic, human rights respecting nation. However, in order for this nation to move forward,and become a constitutional state, the rebels have to surrender their arms and concede to forming a military coalition with the aim of defending and protecting Libyan citizens. Anything short of this would render all their efforts leading to this point in time, useless.

Dear baby Seven,

Your first breath of life on Earth is being celebrated as a milestone. On this October 31, 2010, we welcomed you to this rock of blue azure, your new home. It is the 3^rd planet from the sun, and the only one inhabited by life in the entire solar system. There are many species that live on this planet, but none quite as unique as the one you were born into today. You see, you are human, the seven-billionth being alive.

It took thousands of years for our population to reach one billion. Since then, our numbers have grown faster and faster. By the time you are 13, baby number 8 billion will join you on this planet.

Unfortunately, the more we grow, the less resources we have access to. As the world gets more crowded, you will have to fight for everything. One thing about being human: we know how to fight. We fight just as fiercely for the wrong things as we do for the right things. We fight for land, clean water, food, fossil fuels, and nonessential natural resources. We point guns and throw bombs, spears and arrows at each other recklessly. We pillage and furiously flex our muscles at anything that stands in the way of what we desire. We are so relentless in our pursuit that we forget how to be hospitable to each other and our environment.

So far, we have not been very good stewards of our home. We are the only species on this planet that requires such enormous amounts of energy. Energy powers everything about us. It defines our very identity. It feeds us, clothes us, and propels us from here to there. It powers our curiosity, and emboldens our greed. Mind you there’s nothing wrong with energy, just how we access it.

Humans rule supreme with unrivaled intelligence, zeal, ambition, and drive.

That intelligence and ambition drives us to invent and reinvent. We are destructively creative beings by nature; never satisfied with the status quo. “Out with the old and in with the new,” is a motto you will hear a lot in your lifetime. We create to destroy.

This is the world you are born into, but it is not a world you have to accept. Another thing about being human is that each of us has the inherent ability to be great, the capability to so greatly influence the world we live in that one person may inspire a change in how all others relate to each other and the environment. These influences come can be anywhere from inventions to social movements sparked by a single action.

Look at your hands. You have an opposable thumb. Believe it or not, it is very important. In a few years, I am sure you will be using that thumb to tap away at some piece of electronic glass to expand your knowledge. I am sure you won’t know what a keyboard is yet, but that’s what I am using to type this letter to you. Thanks to human intelligence, we are able to invent things; wonderful, delightful things that allow us to share knowledge and experiences and stretch our natural resources so that we fight just a little less.

But I wonder if you will have access to these wonderful inventions. You see, we may celebrate your birth today, but we still have no idea where you are on this rock. And where you are makes all the difference in determining what kind of life you will live, how hard you will have to work just to enjoy your short time here. If your first breath of life is in Africa, chances are you will have better access to information technology than the most basic of inventions, such as running water and waste management systems. In fact, today there are more mobile phones on the continent than there are toilets. By the time you are a teenager, there will be more internet enabled smart phones than toilets and households with electricity access on the continent. If you are in Europe or America, there is a much better chance that you will have access to any and all of the above.

But again, despair not. This reality may be what you inherit today, but it does not have to be the future you live in. I write this letter to you to give you hope, that between the great milestones of your life will be days filled with opportunity and hope. Here’s to wishing that you grab every available opportunity to succeed. Here’s to wishing you beat the odds and become great. Here’s to a dream of you rising one day to be the bright light the world needs to see. Here’s to being the difference maker. Here’s to the responsible choices that you will make in your life time. Here’s to wishing that one day you will write a letter, very much like this one but with more wisdom and guidance, to welcome baby number ten billion. For now, please enjoy sucking on that opposable thumb. It just maybe the secret to your future success.

The word “diaspora” is fraught with contested connotations. It is a condition to which some of a country’s most wretched and disillusioned citizens have aspired to, consoled by the thought of escape, of healthier grass in greener territory.  And yet in analyses of the state of affairs in their country, many citizens are quick to mention the role the emigrating population has played in the “brain drain”. While the system is usually blamed for driving this skilled class away , many times, this group has been accused of contributing to the problem by leaving the system more and more bereft. To the people in question, the relationship with the homeland is always complex.  Life in the diaspora is often coloured by nostalgic memories of childhood, a conscious feeling of distinctness in a foreign territory and despite sometimes high levels of comfort, a constant yearning to connect with the homeland.

Since the talk about Africa’s renaissance surfaced on the scene, the atmosphere has changed and many diasporic individuals have braced themselves for the new dawn and packed their bags for home. And those at home have found themselves in that state of ambivalence; sometimes rejoicing and anticipating a reversal of national fortunes in this classic brain gain fairytale and sometimes, resenting the pompous stuck up group of people who have taken their jobs and their place in the limelight. At other times, this reaspora class has turned out to be the disappointment of the century as they continue to deliver less and less, sometime perpetuating the corrupt system in spite of their training and “exposure” abroad.

But in the diaspora, hearts and consciences will continue to be tugged at as people remain torn between doing the “honourable thing” and going back and being a sellout by enjoying the comfort of the diasporic life. The judgmental voices of certain co-nationals at home constantly haunt them and they are immediately shut down whenever they denounce, from their “their comfort zone”, a new law or an outrageous development back home.

Consider the statements made by a resident of Nigeria on an online platform:

“Going to America is for the selfish and irresponsible. A responsible Nigerian will stay in Nigeria thru thick and thin to contribute to [its] development. After all what is a lifetime of one person in history ? Only 60 or 70 years and I would rather contribute mine to Nigeria than to America. Life is not about 70 years of contort and enjoyment , but about the satisfaction that you too have contributed. You can chose who to contribute to[:] America or Nigeria. We de kamke and we talk as equal stakeholders here and not as parasites”

To cosign that statement, a fellow resident said:

“All the selfish ones can go to America. They will live for 60 years in “comfort” and die in [their seventies or eighties] and so what? I will stay in Nigeria and and try my best and die here. I will urge and advice  my children to do the same. In that way my own country will one day develop. I am not a quitter and not a coward. I will sacrifice my lifetime for Nigeria and not for America.”

A few things can be surmised from the above comments:

1. One can only contribute to the homeland by staying in the homeland
2. Anyone who leaves the homeland for whatever purpose is a traitor and a coward
3. By extension of this simple logic, people who stay are contributing whereas people who leave are not. The latter are irresponsible for “enjoying in the new territory” and “contributing instead to the development of that territory.“

While this generalization reeks of bitter self-righteousness and hypocrisy, it is also largely simplistic and false. To unpack the falsities behind these statements, I urge the reader to consider the term engagement. It is a term I have used in a previous, more personal reflection. It refers to an attachment of sorts to a particular entity- an attachment characterized by interest, passion and an active growing process. Engagement can occur anywhere, in the homeland as much as in the diaspora .

At the same time, the opposite process – disengagement- can occur. In the diaspora, it is a process whereby the individual shuts himself/herself off from anything concerning the homeland (because of painful memories and permanent grievances or  general apathy) in order to begin anew, as it were. In the homeland, it is a process whereby the individual sees himself/herself only as a consumer- never as a creator. He/she stays in the system and contributes nothing to the development of his/her community. At the end of the engagement- disengagement continuum is what I call destructive engagement. To shed light on this, I juxtapose below, clear instances of engagement and destructive engagement while posing some questions to consider:

(1) A citizen stays in the system for many years but contributes nothing to the system. Instead of creating wealth, once in public office, she multiplies offices that add no value to the system; she continues to rob the state and amass wealth at the expense of development. Furthermore, in order to secure her position within the system, she masterminds several criminal activities to silence or weaken competitors.

Meanwhile,

Another citizen moves out of the system to take advantage of better career opportunities. Based on the wealth she has acquired in the diaspora, she is  better able to improve things back home on micro and macro levels. She is able to see more siblings through school and set up enterprises for her parents and relatives. She uses some of her diaspora-earned wealth to invest in a burgeoning venture which will create more jobs in one sector or another and improve the national economy as a whole.

 Which of the two individuals shall we call patriotic?

(2) A citizen moves abroad for educational prospects and has the opportunity to attend some of the finest institutions in the world. Based on the skills he acquires, he is able to leverage various resources (such as the internet) to improve the practices of people back home. He collaborates with local organizations to engage in capacity-building. Sometimes, he is able to return home (alone or with a team of experts) to conduct seminars, workshops etc thus equipping people at home with the skills they need to thrive in the system or take advantage of opportunities elsewhere.

At the same time,

A lecturer remains in the system but does not push for innovation in the classrooms and libraries. He does not seek out ways to improve teaching and learning methods nor does he actively engage students within and beyond the classroom. However, he remains an avid innovator in hotels and bedrooms.

 Which of these individuals is selfless? 

( 3 ) Certain terrorist groups bomb public spaces while their counterparts terrorize students on campuses, gang-rape innocent girls, and deface public property. They remain in the system and contribute to its rot. But they have not stepped foot outside the country and have thus not enjoyed the comfort of Western development.

Their co-nationals, on the other hand, have been more fortunate. They have lived in Western systems and have benefitted from countless opportunities. As a result of their excellence, they have found themselves in positions of power and have been able to enjoy international credibility. They then spin this fame and reputation into genuine noise for the homeland. They create awareness about issues back home; they influence policy makers to change certain greedy practices and craft better polices. They tell the story of their land in a way that only they can because they have walked those paths before and will not stand and watch the media portray their people in an undignified light.

 Which of these groups is cowardly? 

An honest answer to these questions will reveal that the honourable-dishonourable dichotomies do not overlap with the already blurry homeland-diaspora ones. Thus, in the final analysis, as progress continues and interests and identities continue to be negotiated and renegotiated, as people on ground work hard to effect change or struggle to physically escape their present realities, one thing is certain: one can be honourable at home and abroad. It is my hope that as diaspora and homeland networks and resources continue to be leveraged for the good of the continent, the question will no longer be “should I go hither or thither?” but “how can I make positive engagement central to my lifestyle in any environment I find myself?”

Fellow Ugandans,

As a creative consultant, it is not often that I get to work on a project that both pays me and also contributes to the development and well-being of Uganda. I would like to introduce you to such a project.

I met Pratheepan “Deep” Gulasekaram in DC at the Clinton Global Diaspora Forum. He, along with a crew of determined colleagues put their skills together in the wake of the Asian tsunami and built a fully functioning hospital in Sri Lanka. They successfully negotiated a public-private partnership with the Sri Lankan Ministry of Health to complete and ensure the long-term success of the newly constructed Matara Children’s Hospital.

After the completion and hand over of the project that was recognized by Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr., they have set out to build a children’s hospital in Uganda. “Project Heart: Uganda” has already broken ground. The walls and roof are already up and completion is in sight.

After a long talk with Deep last month, I agreed to assist their efforts to connect to members of the East African Diaspora that would bring value to their initiative. Not because they are my clients, but because it is a much needed initiative that will bring value to Uganda’s medical system. Additionally, I wanted to share this project with you as a plea for all of us to help support this initiative to make sure it is successfully launched with as much of our buy-in as possible. After all, it will be our family members that will benefit in the long run. The above video of one such child who was helped by these very same doctors to repair her heart

Here is a project that is reaching out directly for us to be part of its success and the re-invention of Uganda’s medical services & facilities. For once, it is not another aid project that FAILS to request to partner with us. It is a project that we all know could save the life of one of our family members.

On Sept. 24th, “Project Heart: Uganda” is having a fund-raising event in Los Angeles. If you are in California and are interested in meeting Deep and his inspiring colleagues, I am sure they won’t fail to inspire you with the vision that they have for the hospital.

Here are some things you can do to help this project:

I look forward to seeing us all rise to the occasion for this initiative. Even if all you do is  donate $1.00 (though I secretly hope it is more than that, nearly $3 billion in remittances is sent to East Africa annually-let’s put some of it towards a sustainability initiative). If you’d like more information, I’d be happy to put you in touch with Deep and his team. A new web site with more information is in the works that will keep all of you updated on the project.

My new position at World Bank: Lead Social Media Strategist for Connect4Climate

I have been hoarding this news for a few weeks now. Earlier this month I accepted a consultancy at the World Bank to help launch and maintain their soon-to-launch ‘Connect4Climate’ campaign. Connect4Climate will be a campaign, a competition, and an community of individuals and global partners that care about climate change.

As many of you know, I am passionate about photography, a die-hard enthusiast of Africa’s mobile promise and the continent’s youth. That is why I was immediately drawn to the climate change photography and video competition component of this initiative. This position combines all of my passions into one fantastic opportunity. I look forward to hearing to the many emerging youth voices on the continent and in the Diaspora. If those voices are as passionate as our very own Teejay, then you know this is going to be good.

As the Lead Social Media Strategist – Connect4Climate, my job will be to get as many youth voices on the continent to engage in the conversation about climate change at the local and international level through the C4C competition. We all know that climate change affect all of us. That is why I will be reaching out to all of you reading this to engage with us to share your stories, links, data, and interesting anecdotes that will broaden the baseline of this very critical topic of discussion.

So while I am busy working with the team on launching the new site later this month, please make sure to connect with us on our Facebook page. Invite your friends, colleagues, enthusiasts, fans, supporters, (and climate change “doubters” are welcome too). Let’s get the conversation started. You can find me on Twitter @tmsruge. The C4C Twitter account will be open sometime this week. I will update this post with the new account once that goes live.

So let the conversation begin!

Why You Should Vote for Africa, Tech & Women SXSW Panel

I decided to write this blog post as a way to help prospective voters and supporters to understand the thinking and passion behind our Africa, Tech & Women: The New Faces of Development SXSW panel submission.  We believe this panel will help to change the conversation on Africa, about whom most people have a limited negative perception; its women, who are often depicted as helpless, uneducated and unproductive; and dispel the myth that there isn’t much technological development taking place in Africa.

When TMS Ruge and I embarked upon this SXSW journey together, we decided we would create a panel building upon his successful SXSW 2009 presentation, Africa 3.0.  We knew that with the 2012 panel, we wanted to add a new dimension and feature multiple voices.  After a lot of research and brainstorming, we discovered that the African Union declared 2010-2020: The African Woman Decade and decided it would be a source of inspiration for us.  Additionally, we’re both very passionate about gender rights issues, publicizing the greatness of Africa and its Diaspora and are tech enthusiasts — and as such, we decided on the title: Africa, Tech & Women.

The subtitle: The New Faces of Development came about after lots of trial and error.  We finally agreed to it, given that it encompasses the areas we want to cover and from a new perspective: (1) Economic, (2) Technological, (3) Philanthropic, and (4) Community.

We then decided we should showcase the different ways in which a cross-section of African women based in the Diaspora and on the continent are impacting Africa’s development through technology.  We were able to identify three incredible African women who leverage use technology in very significant ways to affect change on the continent and beyond.  They also helped us to flesh out the panel topics, so that the description you read below is representative of what we all want to share, in the limited time available on a panel.  Additionally,

Africa, Tech & Women SXSW Panelists

1. Isis Nyong’o – InMobi (Kenya)

Isis joined InMobi in February 2011 to lead business expansion in Africa. With over nine years of business development, marketing and sales experience, Isis is responsible for the overall growth on the continent.  Isis joins InMobi from Google where she led the company’s business development efforts in Africa. She specialized in mobile partnerships and developed Google’s content strategy to bring more African content online. She brings extensive media and tech experience to InMobi and drove the launch of MTV Networks in Africa where she was responsible for commercial relationships including distribution and sales. She developed the marketing strategy for Kenya’s first online recruitment service, MyJobsEye and holds degrees from Stanford University and Harvard Business School where she was president of the Africa Business Club. Isis has been named by Forbes as one of The 20 Youngest Power Women in Africa, is one of the ‘Top 40 Women under 40″ in Kenya, and is frequently featured by the Africa media including, Al Jazeera, BBC, Nation Newspaper, NTV, Standard Newspaper and UP Magazine, among others.

2. Ebele Okobi-Harris – Yahoo! (USA)

Ebele Okobi-Harris is Director of Yahoo!’s Business and Human Rights Program, leading Yahoo!’s efforts to promote privacy and free expression on the Internet. Before joining Yahoo!, Ebele was a corporate securities and mergers & acquisitions attorney at Davis Polk & Wardwell in New York, Paris and London, an attorney fellow at Consumers Union (a consumer rights advocacy non-profit) in San Francisco, a director of Advisory Services at Catalyst (a non-profit with the mission of advancing women in business) in San Jose and Amsterdam and at Nike’s EMEA headquarters as an MDP focused on marketing and business development in Africa.

Ms. Okobi-Harris earned a BA in Psychology from the University of Southern California, a JD from Columbia Law School and an MBA Certificat des Études from Hautes Études Commerciales de Paris.

3. Milly Businge – Kikuube Village Council (Uganda)

Milly Businge is a respected village elder and mother of eight children in the small village of Kikuube. She serves as the Local Chairperson (LC1) of her village, representing a population of nearly 1000 residents. She has been unanimously re-elected to this position by the residents of Kikuube because her work representing them at the government level. She has often wanted to retire and refused to stand for the position during elections, but the villagers always rally and vote for her anyway. That’s the mark of a great leader.  Mrs. Businge was also recently officially ordained as a minister and serves as the pastor of the small but growing community church.

In November 2010, Mrs. Businge delivered the keynote speech during the “Villages in Action” conference that was hosted in Kikuube.  The conference was broadcast live over the internet and proved to be a very successful initiative — giving the poor an opportunity to be heard in the global conversation about the United Nations Millennium Development Goals.

When she is not managing domestic disputes, land wrangles, and community health awareness campaigns in her community, she spends her time reading. She is also an enthusiastic user of mobile technologies as they help her connect with her constituency and connect globally to her son (TMS Ruge) in America.

4. Liz Ngonzi – New York University Heyman Center for Philanthropy and Fundraising (USA)

Born in Uganda and “raised” at the United Nations, Liz Ngonzi is an international educator, speaker and consultant, who has since 2009, been on Adjunct Faculty at New York University’s Heyman Center for Philanthropy & Fundraising – for which she has developed and taught courses on online and mobile fundraising, and where she is one of four noted social media experts.

Liz is a recognized authority on ICT for development, the African Diaspora market, hospitality / service management, women in business, and social entrepreneurship.  She’s a frequent conference speaker, including as a panelist during the Entrepreneurship@Cornell Celebration, in the spring of 2007; as a featured international speaker at the May 2011 Southern Africa Institute of Fundraising’s 10th Biennial Convention in South Africa; and as a panelist for New York University’s Philanthropy 3.0 Speaker Series: Mobile in Advocacy The Next Frontier.  In September, she will speak in the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s 41^st Annual Legislative Conference and will chair the 2^nd Annual ICT Women Empowerment Africa Summit in South Africa.

A committed volunteer, Liz has held several board positions, including currently serving as a member of the President’s Council of Cornell Women (for which she is a Vice Chair of its Communications Committee); the Advisory Board to the Cornell University Pillsbury Institute for Hospitality Entrepreneurship; and the United Nations International School’s Council for Alumni Affairs.

Media outlets in which Liz has been featured, include: CBS’ The Early Show, Crain’s New York Business, New Jersey Jewish News, Successful Meetings Magazine, The New York Times, The Nonprofit Times and ZambiaBlogTalkRadio.

Liz founded and runs Amazing Taste, LLC., a values-led boutique consulting firm that connects NGOs with philanthropists and corporations, to achieve strategic objectives through fundraising events, marketing campaigns, along with educational activities.   Amazing Taste has worked with or advised domestic and international educational institutions, gender rights organizations, healthcare foundations, political campaigns, and youth development organizations.

Liz spent her 10-year corporate career in marketing, sales and business consulting at Digital Equipment Corporation, MICROS Systems, Inc. and Arthur Andersen, respectively.  She obtained her Master of Management in Hospitality degree from Cornell University and a Bachelor of Science in Information Systems degree (with a concentration in Telecommunications Systems) from Syracuse University.  Additionally, she graduated from the United Nations International School.

5. TMS Ruge (moderator and “token male”) – Project Diaspora (USA)

TMS Ruge was born in Masindi, Uganda and grew up in Uganda, Kenya and the United States. Capitalizing on his understanding of different cultures and markets, Ruge has become a successful global social entrepreneur.

In 2007 he co-founded Project Diaspora — to motivate, engage and mobilize the African Diaspora to take an active role in Africa’s development. Following his passion to engage the continent, he has invested his time and money in a number of development initiatives including Uganda Medicinal Plants Grower’s ltd. – an indigenous farmers’ business specializing in the export of value-added medicinal plants, and Women of Kireka – a women’s jewelry making cooperative.

A technology enthusiast, Ruge writes and speaks extensively on Africa’s current renaissance driven by technology, youth and the Diaspora. He is a frequent contributor to several online publications including CNN, PopTech, The Globe and Mail, and The Guardian, and the Project Diaspora blog. He is also the host of The Digital Continent Podcast, a weekly technology podcast for people who believe that Africa is full of innovation and opportunity. Ruge is also a founding board member of Hive Colab – an open, collaborative, community-owned, work environment for young Ugandan tech entrepreneurs to focus on projects..

Ruge also serves as an advisor for ?OpenAction.org – an online platform that allows development organizations to richly engage their online audience.

He graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Communication Design from the University of North Texas.

Description of the Proposed SXSW Africa, Tech Women: The New Faces of Development Panel:

This panel provides a rare glimpse into the multitude of ways African women are applying technology to advance Africa’s development. The panel aims to dispel the myths about African women as breeders and victims — incapable of participating in their own continent’s development, by: (1) showcasing contributions they are making in the technology field – through entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and community leadership; and (2) providing insights into how they are using technology to raise awareness about, mobilize campaigns against and address human rights violations.

The panel will specifically explore how African women are using technology to make an impact through: – Digital advocacy to protect people’s rights – Social media to help grassroots organizations engage new supporters worldwide – Mobile advertising to enable small businesses to access new markets – Internet connectivity to integrate the often unheard community voices into the global conversation on development

Throughout the discussion, panelists will provide anecdotes on how the resulting increased access to information, is altering the role of women in African society.

Questions our panel aims to answer are:

1. What is the role of women in Africa’s fast emerging digital landscape and what types of contributions are they making?
2. How is technology improving the everyday lives of women on the continent?
3. What is the negative impact of increased access to information, on the role of the African woman in her society?
4. What are the opportunities and connections technology is facilitating between women in the Diaspora and on the continent?
5. Given the increased adoption of mobile phones in Africa and the rise of its middle class, what opportunities exist for marketers interested in targeting African women?

Please help us to amplify the voices of African women in the global discussion on development.

Vote for Africa, Tech & Women: The New Faces of Development and tell your friends to do the same.

Thank you

Follow us on Twitter: Liz Ngonzi @LizNgonzi | Isis  Nyongy’o @Inyongyo | TMS Ruge @TMSruge

We got this notice for an exciting new web series that will be shot on the East Coast and in Ghana. If you have acting chops or think you fit the roles, then download the PDF with character breakdown. Prepare your strong monologues now, I have a feeling these are going to be very sought-after roles for African actors and entertainers.

The creators of ‘The Other City’ (a working title) are casting for a pilot for a web series to be shot this fall/winter.  ‘The Other City’ is the African version of ‘Sex and the City,’ based in Accra, Ghana.  We are looking for women from the African Diaspora between the ages of 20 and 35, as well as male models of African descent between the ages of 20 and 40.

Date:  Thursday, August 25
Time:  3pm – 7pm
Address:  420 W. 118th street – 118th and Amsterdam (Columbia University)

Prior to the audition, please email to theothercity233@gmail.com a professional resume, headshot, and video link. Most importantly, please email a time you expect to arrive at the auditions. Shooting will take place in October/November in Washington DC (2 days) as well as next year in Accra, Ghana (2 weeks).

Download the call sheet »

For our fellow Diasporans in the UK, you might be interested in checking this out. We got word that FELA! is coming to Sadler’s Wells for a few weeks (July 20 – Aug 28 to be exact). Here’s more information below:

FELA!
Sadler’s Wells
Wednesday 20 July – Sunday 28 August 2011
Performances: Tue – Sun at 7.30pm, Sat & Sun mats at 2.30pm
Tickets: £15 – £50
Ticket Office: 0844 412 4300
www.sadlerswells.com

“There should be dancing in the streets. There has never been anything like this.”
- New York Times

Sadler’s Wells’ summer show for 2011 is the Tony Award-winning Broadway dance musical FELA!. A provocative hybrid of dance, theatre and music, exploring the extravagant, decadent and rebellious world of Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti, the production runs at Sadler’s Wells from 20 July to 28 August 2011.

Leading the cast is Olivier Award-nominated Sahr Ngaujah, who returns to the title role, having garnered acclaim for his portrayal of Kuti in New York and London. Featuring many of Fela Kuti’s most captivating songs and Bill T Jones’s visionary staging, FELA! reveals Kuti’s controversial life as an artist and political activist and celebrates his pioneering music.

Recognised as an icon in the international world of rock and roll, soul, jazz and hip-hop, Fela Kuti combined elements of traditional Yoruba, high life and jazz, giving rise to “Afrobeat”. Through his music he condemned military regimes in Nigeria. He was arrested more than 200 times and beaten savagely on many occasions. Despite this he continued to live in Nigeria and produced more than 70 albums during his career.

FELA! was choreographed, directed and co-written (with lyricist Jim Lewis) by Bill T. Jones, a leading light in American contemporary dance. Jones choreographed and performed worldwide as a soloist and duet company with his late partner, Arnie Zane, before forming the Bill T. Jones / Arnie Zane Dance Company in 1982. The company last performed at Sadler’s Wells in 2004.

Jones’ awards include the 2007 Tony Award, the 2007 Obie Award and 2006 Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation Callaway Award for his choreography for Spring Awakening and the 2006 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Choreography for The Seven.

FELA! received its world premiere Off-Broadway in September 2008, where it won the Lucille Lortel Award for Best Musical, before transferring to Broadway’s Eugene O’Neill Theatre in November 2009 where its accolades included three 2010 Tony Awards®, for Best Choreography, Best Costume Design, Best Sound Design, and an Astaire Award for Bill T. Jones’ choreography.

FELA! is directed and choreographed by Bill T. Jones, with a book by Jim Lewis and Bill T. Jones, and music and lyrics by Fela Anikulapo-Kuti. Conceived by Bill T. Jones, Jim Lewis and Stephen Hendel, the design and Tony Award winning costumes are by Marina Draghici, lighting design by Robert Wierzel and the Tony Award winning sound design by Robert Kaplowitz.

FELA! is produced in association with Shawn ‘Jay-Z’ Carter, Will & Jada Pinkett Smith, Ruth & Stephen Hendel, Roy Gabay, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Edward Tyler Nahem, Slava Smolokowski, Chip Meyrelles/Ken Greiner, Douglas G. Smith, Steve Semlitz/Cathy Glazer, Daryl Roth/True Love Productions, Susan Dietz/Mort Swinsky, Knitting Factory Entertainment and with Ahmir ‘Questlove’ Thompson.

“The dancing is ecstatic, the music lifts the spirits and the stage is alive with movement”
- The Guardian

Additional Notes on Fela Kuti and Bill T Jones:

Fela Anikulapo-Kuti was born in Abeokuta, Nigeria, north of Lagos in 1938. His father was a Christian schoolmaster, minister and master pianist and his mother was a world-recognised feminist leader, who was very active in the anti-colonial Nigerian women’s movement during the struggle for independence. Educated in Nigeria, and later in London where he studied music, Fela Kuti found his authentic musical voice adding elements of traditional Yoruba, high life and jazz, giving rise to “Afrobeat”. Through his music he condemned military regimes in Nigeria for their mismanagement, and marginalization of the underprivileged. He was subsequently constantly harassed, arrested more than 200 times and beaten savagely on many occasions. Despite this he continued to live in Nigeria and produced in excess of 70 albums of music during his career. He toured the United States and Europe with an entourage of 80 people to public and critical acclaim. He died in August 1997 at the age of 58 from an AIDS-related illness. In Nigeria one million people attended his funeral.

Bill T. Jones won the 2007 Tony Award, the 2007 Obie Award and 2006 Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation Callaway Award for his choreography for Spring Awakening. His many awards also include the 2007 USA Eileen Harris Norton Fellowship, the 2006 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Choreography for The Seven, the 2005 Samuel H. Scripps American Dance Festival Award for Lifetime Achievement, the 2005 Wexner Prize, and the Aaron Davis Hall Harlem Renaissance Award. Before forming Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company in 1982, Bill T. Jones choreographed and performed nationally and internationally worldwide as a soloist and duet company with his late partner, Arnie Zane. Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company last appeared at Sadler’s Wells in June 2004.

From time to time, my inbox is graced with a link someone came across and thought I’d be interested in checking out. More often than not, the sender is seeking my opinion on the contents of the link. I guess myself and the smartaid crew on Twitter have kind of gotten a reputation for not slacking on criticizing bad aid practices. Guess I am guilty as charged. When I read this piece on Mashable, I did a double-take before pulling out my tried and true aid-snark criticism.

But before I do that, let me first ask a question. What separates us from our money on our way to doing something charitable? Is it because we love the product or because we love the cause that the product’s proceeds support? I took part in criticizing TOMS’ ‘buy one, give one’ campaign earlier this year. I’ve generally not agreed with any initiative that falsely claims that giving things for free solves endemic problems. I think this is a fairly elementary understanding of good development.

So why am I pausing before I criticize Sevenly’s new t-shirt initiative? At first glance, I thought, ‘now here is something that I can get behind.’ But the more I think about it, the more I am torn about this little variation to the status quo.

Sevenly stretches its gimmicky name to it’s logical conclusion. It partners with a deserving non-profit organization. They design a shirt, and put in on sell for seven days. Seven dollars from each sale goes to support the partner organization. This is a little different twist from the TOMS Shoes BOGO model in that it is a strictly financial donation to a non-profit organization on the sale of a T-shirt (see also (Product) RED).

Again with my question: What separates us from our money? Surely you can find a T-shirt at your nearest Banana Republic or Old Navy for the same amount. It is also reasonable to assume that you can find a charity as the recipient of your hard-earned $24. Apparently, the problem is that we are doing more of the latter and very little of the former. Here’s why Sevenly was founded:

Co-founders Dale Partridge and Aaron Chavez were motivated to create the site after seeing the amount of worthy non-profits that shut down within their first year open. The problem isn’t apathy so much as a lack of following, funding and awareness.

Sevenly is attempting to address donor apathy by rolling charitable giving into consumer habits. As I write this, a ‘poverty-porn’-laced video from World Relief highlighting rape in Congo is playing on the home page. I am left asking myself exactly how giving $7 to World Relief is going to stop that little boy in the video from getting raped. At this question I am lifting my hands off the keyboard asking myself why I would be so heartless as to question World Relief’s efforts to stop(?) rape in Congo?* But really, how is selling a shirt going to stop the rape of over 1000 men, women, and children today? How much of that $7 is actually reaching the ground? Do you really really care when you hit the buy button?

Like TOMS, Sevenly has simply figured out a better way to sell shirts and make a profit, not a better way to help non-profits stay sustainably relevant. Which is another way of arranging a mutually-beneficial backscratching. The non-profits are just a beneficiary cog in the marketing machine. By targeting your heart strings, philanthropic e-commerce has found a new way to separate you from your hard-earned money and leave you that much more separated from the cause du jour. If this strategy had any merit at all as a philanthropic initiative, Sevenly should have reversed its share of the piece of the pie by giving away 2/3 and finding a way to operate on 1/3. Any initiative that leans heavy in favor of self-sustanability is just pulling your chain. I’d be impressed if the company designing and manufacturing the shirts for this week actually employed a subset of the recipients in the Congo. I highly doubt any of that is happening.

Sigh. So much for thinking there was something to like about Sevenly. Seems to me it is just a continuation of the status quo. Yes, yes
I know what you are going to say:

“At least it is better than nothing.”

That, my friend, does not make it right, now does it?

*For more nuanced analysis of the complexity in Congo (and to put into context why a $7 donation isn’t going to help rape victims), please start reading Dr. Laura Seay’s excellent ‘Texas in Africa‘ blog.

My dear sister, I have started this letter only about a million times. And a million times I have crumbled it up and thrown it away. As the years have passed the pile of words and paragraphs have sat in the hollow chambers of my heart; collecting layers of regret and sorrow. I have tried to make keys and lock them away in darkness, but the doors never seem to lock. The letters unfinished beckon incessantly to be put to their final purpose, haunting me with your face alight with that smile so seared in my memory. It’s all I had and it is all I have now. But the memory of you is a weight I can no longer carry. Life, my dear sister, it marches on you see. I fear I must heed its calling, lest my days in the sun pass me by. And so this I must say to you. This I must reveal to you. This I must unchain from my soul. This I must retire to the depth our past. These words to you my dear, on this most auspicious of times, must be set to light on this brand new day.

How do I even pretend to imagine your pain, your hurt, your loneliness? How do I erase it all away with words that come a little too late? Time I can not reverse, but the future awaits me to shape her. I must not wallow in my own regret. Even you wouldn’t have me drown in the shallows of what I cannot change.

You have waited for me I know, to say something, to say anything. I have tried so many times to come and failed. I have known the way and yet I continue to hesitate. At the fork, I stare down the meandering road until it disappeared in the distance. For these many years, I have been turning left for home, wishing I had had the strength to do otherwise. For these many years, you have waited to no avail. For this I am truly sorry.

You see, mother has been afraid of me leaving. She thinks I won’t come back either. She too misses you terribly. It is a sort of sadness written on her soul. No prayer goes without a wish that the truth wasn’t the truth; that there was still chance; that this cruelty of fate wasn’t woven in the fabric of our lives. I sat once in the garden with her, seeing if she would change her mind about letting me come. A few billowing clouds wafted across a plate of glassy blue sky. The wind was ushering in the season’s daily rains. The flowers she tended to so lovingly seemed to bow in resignation, as she looked at me with tears in her eyes.

“You must not go,” she said, “she’s no longer there.”

I remember thinking of this truth, and wanting to fight it once more, shove it back with the words unsent and the memories lost. I wanted the news that I received almost three years earlier not to be true. You were no longer there but yet I knew I had to come and do something. What, I did not know.

You see, the day we separated in Nairobi — you heading to see grandmother in Juba and me going to see grandfather in Masindi — almost felt like it was normal. I was never supposed to lose you for good. Perhaps I should have cried or protested more to stop it. I wish I had known more at the age of four. Or maybe you should have done something since you were older.

Oh, how I have lamented the sorrow you must have felt from not knowing where I was. I was told a terrible war waged the minute you reached grandmother. I waited for you to come, not understanding why you wouldn’t leave and just come, not understanding what war was. I wrote letters that never seemed to come back. I prayed prayers that never seemed to reach you. The seasons passed and the winds blew and the stars shimmered and the sun rose and set and the moon glowed and our reality became clear. You were not coming for me, nor would I ever reach you in time.

The call shook me from a deep night’s slumber. It was Uncle Joshua.

“I have news, are you awake?” he asked.

You had passed away a year before I started looking for you. I was at university and hoping to find you before I graduated so you could attend. I know you would have been proud of me. Mother came to watch me give the graduation speech. Father made a big meal for our party. I felt empty and guilty. I remember spending that summer so gutted, hollowed and haunted. I slept in fathers bed crying for days. I’d never been closer to him.

I have been so gutted in my soul for over a decade now. I think it is time I forgave myself. What do you think? Can I truly forgive myself if I don’t know if you forgave me? I will never know if you did or not. So I must make this choice to do so, because at the very least you would have wanted me to be OK. You always tried to make sure I was ok. So on this day I vow to make the best me that I can be, because of you. On this day I vow not to be sad but optimistic and hopeful that a new future is possible.

Wherever you may lay, know that on this very morning, a new kind of day is dawning. One that I think you and so many of us paid the ultimate price for. Please tell whoever is laying next to you that today a nation is born. The winds sway the tall grasses above you, shaking the morning’s dew from their sinewy leaves as they reach for the new morning sun. Today we awake to a new future full of possibilities, full of promise and hope. I hope you can see us celebrate, I hope you can hear the drums in the distance. I hope you can feel the stomping feet. I hope you can feel the joyous sound. I hope you can see our new flag shimmering in the morning sun. And I hope that you know, I wish you were here to celebrate with me.

Happy birthday Lucy, this is our day in the sun.

Two years ago, I traveled with a group of about fifteen students from across Europe and North America to a small village in the Dominican Republic. We stayed in the community for two weeks trying to finish up a school building, building a public bathroom and organizing educational programs for the children. The villagers were very happy to see us and thanked us for coming to help them. In turn, they cooked for us for the duration of our stay.  But every day- or other day- when we had meetings and reflections, no villager was present. We talked about communication, respect, the economy, the needs of the community, and a host of other things. However, our reflections were held in exclusion. Sometimes, the village head came to talk to us- but with the help of an interpreter because they spoke Spanish and we spoke English. But besides the dances and games and during the construction process, we never had villagers come to us to share their experiences and teach us about leadership or values. When we were leaving the village, we were very sad.  We thought about the children and how helpless they were. But we were convinced that we had done something commendable and that we were to continue to have hope in the world.

Upon my return to Canada, I became very interested in the study of international development and development practices. As I started reading development blogs and about the complexities of the development industry, I began to learn about the harmful effects of patronizing projects, those save-them-they-are-helpless projects, those I-know-what’s-best-for-them projects and those I’m-a-good-person-helping-humanity projects. As I read and interacted with people in the industry, I learnt that the development approach matters, that good intentions are not enough and that local voices need to be heard.  I have since written about awareness campaigns that rob people of their dignity, development projects that harm stifle local initiative, the harmful effects of going to build schools overseas, the importance of Africa’s youth population and  the notion of “help” and  the importance of Diaspora engagement in African affairs. I tried to promote better practices in NGOs and have facilitated training programs on development practices but only recently have I been able to connect the dots….

How about Diasporans leading typical international development projects but making sure that the projects promote local initiative and build local capacity while protecting people’s dignity and promoting local leadership in development affairs?  Eureka!

It sounds good in principle but upon meeting Thato Makgolane, I found that it also looks good in practice. In 2010, when Thato took some students from the Sauder Business School at the University of British Columbia to his hometown of Phalaborwa, South Africa under the Arc Initiative Project, he made it clear that this was not a “save-Africa” project. “If you’re looking for one of those, look elsewhere”, he said to the team; “[My] people should not be perceived as purely just been poor people…and incapable… we are vibrant and given opportunity, we have some amazing skills and abilities.” The Arc Initiative project was structured in such a way that both UBC students and Phaloborwa students and residents were given a platform to share information about their cultures and practices. At any given time, there were people from both countries giving opinions about a subject. Business and management professionals in the Vancouver area were also brought on the project to share skills and best practices in business alongside local business owners in the area.

The focus of the three-day workshop was on financial management, leadership, strategy and marketing with small business owners and people in the financial sector.  At the end of the workshop, the participants were presented with a case analysis which they had to solve thus ensuring that they had learnt something from the workshop. Some students from UBC were placed to work in local cooperatives and business enterprises as interns for six-weeks thus assuming an apprentice role and contributing to the enterprise when their skills were needed.  The project ended with a business ideas competition and the competing projects were not only reviewed by the students but by the local business people. The winners of the competition were then given funds to launch their sustainable business projects.

The “arc” in the name “Arc Initiative Project” signifies bridge-building across people and nationalities and a two-way-street philosophy. Thato believes that partnerships of this nature should be visible not only in the implementation of projects but also in their design. In other words, as he has done, Africans need to play an active part in birthing ideas that will lead to their growth instead of waiting for Westerners or Easterners to come up with ideas and simply partnering with them to implement those ideas.

Arc Initiative: The CMAs from WardenFilms | Ryan Warden on Vimeo.

And he is right. At the end of the day, one thing is evident: as international development projects continue to remain on the development scene, African Diasporans must step in and lead the way, designing the very plot of these projects, encouraging dialogue among Western and African students and individuals, facilitating knowledge transfer across continents, protecting and promoting local enterprise, destroying stereotypes and proving to the world, that indeed, Africa does not need to be saved.

For more about Thato and the Arc Initiative Project, visit their website

Helen, Jennifer and Grace at the Stone Cold movie screening. Read more here!

It’s that time of the year again – marathon training time! I started training for the Marathon de Montréal 2011 in May just as my first year law exams began. For the rest of the summer, I will be training in Phnom Penh, Cambodia where I am working with LICADHO, a human rights organization. Eventually, I will make my way back to Montreal for September and a final month of running around Mont-Royal.

Last year, a number of you helped donate to Women of Kireka’s School Fundraiser. We have since phased out that program as the women are increasingly able to make ends meet through Women of Kireka’s jewelry sales. We are now hoping to start combining new materials in our jewelry and we are looking for two kinds of generous support: either a donation through ChipIn, which will go directly into buying new jewelry-making tools or materials OR a purchase from the Women of Kireka shop.

Thank-you again to everyone who helped us out last year!