Conscious Rasta Rant April 8, 2008 / 6248 - Remembering the Rwanda Genocide

It was in April 1994 that I sat leading an African Study Long Beach class, the subject at hand was population issues, and I remember telling the audience that we should be watching closely affairs that affect Rwanda. At an average fertility of 8.2 childbirths per woman in the early '90s, Rwanda had the highest national fertility in the world. My warning became all the more prophetic within 24 hours when the plane carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi was shot down returning from a peace conference in Tanzania.
Within hours of that assassination, a conflagration began that would last for 100 days. On average 8000 Rwandan children, women, men and elders were hacked, clubbed, shot, burned and blown up every day for 100 days. When one considers the numbers that were similarly killed in Eastern Congo and other surrounding countries as a direct result of the genocide, the number is most likely 1 million.

While the world's press showed graphic images of the horrible slaughter, and a number of well-place voices from within Rwanda told of the horrible affairs wrought by the then-government and their agents of genocide, nonetheless the U.N., U.S., France, Belgium, U.K. and other governments closely involved in the affairs all pulled back and tolerated Blacks killing Blacks at a rate unseen in the world since the height of WWII.

Blacks in the United States did little or nothing to force this government and their darling President Bill Clinton to bring pressure to end the crisis. Clinton would not allow his State Department officials and White House spokeswoman to use the word "genocide" to describe what was taking place. Had the word been officially used, he would have been forced by international treaty to do something.

Today, because all of us did not properly integrate the lessons from the Rwandan genocide, we are similarly witnessing the same process, albeit on a much smaller scale in most instances, in places like Kenya, Sudan, Somalia, Uganda and Congo. The Congo crisis has resulted in the deaths of over 4 million in the 14 years since Rwanda's crisis.

Until all of us truly sees the value of all of us as Africans; until we stop tolerating the meddling and mayhem that Western powers bring upon our home continent in pursuit of their material exploitation; and until we develop the mechanisms by which our psychological attachments to our own cultures is greater than our wish to assimilate into foreign civilizations -- until these processes turn around and infuse Africans around the world with an undying spirit of fighting for our collective selves, the the lessons of the Rwanda genocide will escape us.

When will we begin to care as much about the lives of African in our homeland as much as we care about the culture and lives of our former enslavers?

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.

INTELLECTUAL WARFARE WITH AN UNARMED CRACKER

The Conscious Rasta Rant March 27, 2008 / 6248

The following is an exchange I had with a woman (Euro-American I presume) in which I responded to her insulting criticism on a message board. There are a couple of preliminary comments before she inserts herself into the message thread. Yeah, this type of discourse really doesn't contribute a whole lot to the long term vision of Afrikan empowerment. Still, it is fun to engage in "Intellectual Warfare" from time to time with an arrogant cracker. Check it out.

Keidi wrote:
IT AIN'T ABOUT OBAMA: AN AMERICAN DILEMMA
A Response to Christopher Hitchens on Slate.com 03/27/2008

After reading the vitriol spewed by Once again another media appointed journalist darling piles on the heap of crap slung at Blacks across the social economic spectrum within America. It is of course ironic that this son of the British Empire, the most racist and genocidal governance in modern history, would be standing on top his heap of moral superiority in order to condemn two black men.

With regard to Hitchens' dismissal of the research that has been accumulated that there have been numerous conspiracies involving a spectrum of government and law enforcement agencies involved in drug trafficking and condemnable medical research, to which one could add a long list of worse racist policies including assassination, I would challenge Sir Hitchens to a public debate on the subjects. To make the exchange even fairer, I would tie half my brain behind my back. The evidence is overwhelming and spans over a century.

BLACKMOSES wrote:

Good post.

Keidi wrote:
Let me quote once again from one of my most referenced books on the status of Africans within America, An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy (1944, Gunner Myrdal):

If we forget about the means, for the moment, and consider only the quantitative goal for Negro population policy, there is no doubt that the overwhelming majority of white Americans desire that there be as few Negroes as possible in America. If the Negroes could be eliminated from America or greatly decreased in numbers, this would meet the whites' approval—provided that it could be accomplished by means which are also approved. Correspondingly, an increase of the proportion of Negroes in the American population is commonly looked upon as undesirable. (from page 167)

Keidi wrote:
Last peice on Sir Christopher Hitchen's vile condemnations:

The fervor that arose over the association of Candidate Obama with his former Pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright has brought the national dialog once again to a fevered pitch over racial antagonism. From high-brow mainstream media pundits such as Patrick J. Buchanan and Ben Wattenberg, through numerous respected blogs, from the bitter vitriol of working class Whites on web forums and YouTube comments, to the blatant ranting of Nazi sympathizers, we can observe a consistency: Blacks, as a distinct and empowered group, are no long wanted in America.

So at this point, I see the whole Obama campaign in a new light. Now I see why the Democratic Leadership Council handpicked him in 2004 to elevate to national prominence above many others with more measurable records and equal competence. Yes, I am crying conspiracy once again.

Vivian Darkbloom wrote:
you're insane. just thought i'd let you know...

Keidi wrote:
Of course I must challenge your determination. Please, expand your knowledge and take some time to reference the following:

An American Dillemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy, by Gunnar Myrdal

Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, by James H. Jones

Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans, by Harriet Washington

Excessive Force: Power, Politics and Population Control by Information Project for Africa

Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras and the Crack Cocaine Explosion, by Gary Webb

Inventing the AIDS Virus, by Dr. Peter Duesberg

A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, by Samantha Power

International Aspects of Overpopulation, edited by John Barratta and Michael Luow

The COINTELPRO Papers: Documents from the FBI's Secret Wars Against Dissent in the United States by Ward Churchill

Racial Matters: The FBI's Secret File on Black America by Kenneth O'Reilly

High Crimes of Murder, by Keidi Awadu (my own 17th book)

I could suggest to you dozens if not hundreds of other references to support my positions. Beyond your embarrassing one-line personal attack, we would all perhaps be more impressed with a substantial refutal worthy of signing one's name to.

Note that most of the references listed above were from "good white sources." I trust that will make you feel more confortable.

Vivian Darkbloom wrote:
alrighty, i'll be sure to read some book written 70 years ago about our collective "Negro Problem" to gain much needed insight into 21st century America... i'll follow that up with "Mein Kampf" to understand contemporary German society...

like i said... Cuckoo!

Keidi wrote:
You make my very point, thank you. I gave you a list of some 11 books spanning 70 years and you refute the entire list because of the publication date of the largest published study of Blacks in America by the Swedish Nobel Prize winning economist; the work commissioned by the Carnegie Institute and presented to Rosevelt during WWII.

This type of ignorance-based castigation is typical of what has kept black intellectuals from the mainstream of thought in America. I suggest that continuance of intellectual xenophobia will only hasten the downfall of this society.

But, I suppose that within a nation that can sustain the Bush/Cheney regime as primary leadership for 8 years, one should not expect too much brilliance amongs a mass of its citizens.

And yes, I did read "Mein Kampf" and do believe it gave me a insightful grounding into the evolution of fascism and European racism; but I didn't stop reading there.

Vivian wrote:

Mein Kampf was the delusional rantings of a lunatic, nothing more, nothing less; i'm not terribly suprised you found it insightful. perhaps inspiring, too?

Keidi wrote:
Thou dost make many spacious presumptions Mrs. Dark Bloom. The thing that I did, which I don't expect you to comprehend, I KEPT READING. Your lack of depth would indicate to me that perrusing blogs is about the hight of your literary engagement. What a pity. I do hope you can cook better than you can critique. Luckily for your family, there's a Burger King down the block. I can see that cheesy grease running down your chin now...

Vivian wrote:
wow, many thanks for your kind words, Adol- i mean Keidi... did you mean "specious" as regard to my presumptions, or are you satisfied with "spacious" as being the proper adjective there. no big deal, just carious. <cough>. i meant curious.

as Hitchens so masterfully puts it "the sick cults of paranoia and victimhood" has really done a number on your psyche! and your writing comes across as very stilted; where are you from, btw, perhaps you could give me cooking lessons? i'm so sick of that stupid BK!

i hate to break it to you, but you're really not as intelligent nor learned as the voices in your head tell you you are. i suggest reading more Hitchens, with a smattering of David Bohm, Richard Rorty, and, of course, Vladimir Nabokov!

Vivian wrote:
mmmmm, cheesy grease... that's my cue. lunch! i'll be back...

Keidi wrote:
You were right about the typo. Generally I'll edit my writings several times before publication. In blogs and forums, even a person too dysfunctional to hit the caps key from time to time can be a literary critic.

You have not given me reason to study your reading list (which values Nabokov's child pornography as well as Rorty's concepts on your religion of "Relativism" - I am an Afrikan and such a concept is culturally foreign.)

You are the very type of cultural supremacist (your racial background irrelevant) that believes you and you alone can determine whose contributions to social discourse have public merit. They used to call people like you McCarthy-ites and book burners. Had you not introduced your exclusionary mindset into a legitimate critique of Hitchens' piece, I would not be forced to engage in intellectual warfare with you; even though I wish you would arm yourself with more than a twig.

You seem to be out of your league here. A wise person once said, "If you're gonna climb into the ring with Muhammed Ali, don't start talking shit before the fight."

I can credit 18 published books, 80+ published research reports, numerous lectures, debates and presentations on college campuses across America as part of my credentials, for which I am quite proud. I am a full time professional journalist, among other things. If this indicates lack of intelligence according to your criteria then this country is in bigger intellectual trouble then I perceived.

Snuggle up tonight with your copy of Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita." Perhaps it helps you to recall those lovely days when you were a desirable young maiden. Make sure you wash your hands when you're finished. You so nasty!

Vivian wrote:
yes, so true... but you're retarded!

i'm guessing your psychological problems are hopelessly irreversible... you'll be taking them to the grave, i'm afraid. very sad for you, huh?

oh well, there's always the next life... ;)

Keidi wrote:
Thank you for the material which served me well in an article I just published entitled "Intellectual Warfare With An Unarmed Cracker." Please don't fault me for using you and then just discarding you in the trash like a condom which you have undoubtedly felt too many times throughout your life. Actually, I woke up this morning praying that some dim-witted airhead would prod me into a battle of intellects.

Whatever psychological problems you perceive within myself won't matter much according to your Relativist religion, right? Seems fitting when, according to your moral values, child porn merits recommended literature.

No, what I gained from this discourse with you was empowering and fortifies my own perception of my skills at intellectual warfare. I challenged you from the beginning to step up your game and the best you could confront was typos?

As a black man growing up in rural America, being called "insane", "Cuckoo" and "retarded" has no impact. I remember nearly knocking out a cracker out over calling me, a second grader, a "nigger." That word doesn't affect me today because I realize the depravity of the culture which spawns the cracker mindset and created the concept of a so-called "nigger." But perhaps according to your Relativist viewpoint such insults have a valued place.

For those who can rise above such xenophobic and sophomoric name calling, we still have to battle over what type of society we want to live in. I'll be honest with you: Your religion of Relativism and cultural supremacy are at the core of why the rest of the world, including much of Europe, has problems with "the Ugly American."

Lastly, speaking of psychology, your reference to "the grave" blatantly reveals that, in the face of someone who has demonstrated intellectual superiority over you, your only retreat suggests mortality...Over a damn message board debate? That's sick and I will add necrophilia to your menu of personality shortcomings. This probably ties in with your moniker of Mrs. Dark Bloom.

Goodbye Mrs. Dark Bloom. I'll be sure to mention you on my next broadcast. Thanks for the material; I couldn't have paid someone to have taken your place. Your reading suggestions were priceless.

P.S. To make an uppercase letter, use the key found at the bottom of your keyboard, on both the left and the right.

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.

Conscious Rasta Rant March 24, 2008 / 6248 – IT AIN’T ABOUT OBAMA

As we witness the myriad of details and complex intrigues that are emerging from this current political campaign for the White House, I've concluded that I need to step back from responding to the news crisis of the day. In the aftermath of the victories of a number of Democratic Party members in the 2006 congressional races with their subsequent majorities in both houses of congress, I, along with others, forecast a new era of heightened racial polarization within this country.

We predicted that emphasis on U.S. foreign policy would diminish; economic woes would continue to worsen to the point of crisis; there would be a heightened focus on domestic issues, driving by shrinking opportunities within the domestic economy; and that the Democrat-dominated government would be enacting a spectrum of social legislation that would take more and more control over our individual lives.

Amongst the most notable of these predictions was that the crises between ethnic groups within America would become more acute. Specifically I emphasized that there has been a cover strategy, going on for a half a century, to lower the fertility rate among African Americans. That this policy had been advocated in a number of position papers, books, within the eugenics movement (which had not died with the Nazis, but mere had been driven deep underground) and as a subconscious motivation for the majority of white Americans, the dominant ethnic group in the country.

I have pointed this population control imperative out in a series of research reports and books over two decades. I have cited newspaper headlines, population studies, position papers from policy institutes, books, government officials and conspiracy researchers to point out the urgency of this genocidal agenda. I have assembled and demonstrated graphs and charts showing comparative rates of fertility, abortion, teenage pregnancy, STD's, marriage and gender confusion; all to bolster my argument that Blacks are being systematically removed out of the U.S. population. I have cited the year 2065 as a point at which that which is regarded as an African American community will no longer be identifiable.

Then along comes the presidential candidacy of Barack Obama. In his campaign his handlers and himself have done the best they can to suppress any notion of the continuity and continuance of a distinct African American community. This is one of the reasons that I became hostile to The Candidate.

The fervor that arose over the association of Candidate Obama with his former Pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright has brought the national dialog once again to a fevered pitch over racial antagonism. From high-brow mainstream media pundits such as Patrick J. Buchanan and Ben Wattenberg, through numerous respected blogs, from the bitter vitriol of working class Whites on web forums and YouTube comments, to the blatant ranting of Nazi sympathizers, we can observe a consistency: Blacks, as a distinct and empowered group, are no long wanted in America.

So at this point, I see the whole Obama campaign in a new light. Now I see why the Democratic Leadership Council handpicked him in 2004 to elevate to national prominence above many others with more measurable records and equal competence. Yes, I am crying conspiracy once again.

Let me quote once again from one of my most referenced books on the status of Africans within America, An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy (1944, Gunner Myrdal):

If we forget about the means, for the moment, and consider only the quantitative goal for Negro population
policy, there is no doubt that the overwhelming majority of white Americans desire that there be as few Negroes as possible in America. If the Negroes could be eliminated from America or greatly decreased in numbers, this would meet the whites' approval—provided that it could be accomplished by means which are also approved. Correspondingly, an increase of the proportion of Negroes in the American population is commonly looked upon as undesirable. (from page 167)

It ain't about Obama; it's about The American Dilemma. It is about racial polarization and isolating Blacks within the perceptions of this country as not socialized, incompetent, uneducated, economically nonviable, overly emotional, sexually unbridled and unfit as a community to live within a so-called "civilized" society. It's about putting more black males in prison and assaulting black women and children.

So try as we may to seek justice and fairness; try all we might to convince the "majority of white Americans" of our worthiness as individuals; explain all we want about the merits of "liberation theology"; do what we may – the die has been cast. Our true challenge is survival of the fittest. Whether we choose to do this as individuals, each cutting his or her deal with the empowered majority at whatever sacrifice the majority demands, or as a group strengthening the means by which our ethnic group will be respected and feared just as are other empowered minority ethnic groups in America; or whether we choose en masse to just close our accounts with America and look for a permanent home in another geography – I am forecasting that we don't have a lot of time to make a firm commitment.

Perhaps the candidacy of Sen. Barack Obama for the U.S. presidency will have a silver lining after all.

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.

Conscious Rasta Rant – In Consideration of the Economy

I am presently reading a fascinating book on finance and economics entitled Up To Our Eyeballs: How Shady Lenders and Failed Economic Policies are Drowning Americans in Debt, by authors Jose Garcia, James Lardner and Cindy Zeldin. I find it to be a compelling and most informative read.

The authors trace the evolution of the debt economy from the days of American prosperity emanating from the post-war industrial boom through the era of financial restructuring growing out of banking deregulation during the Reagan era, and then bring the conversation up to date with the current spectrum of economic woes resultant of shady lending practices and runaway debt from unmanageable interest obligations.

It is a complex tale and much of the change and subsequent decline can be traced to a chronology of deregulation measures beginning in the early 1980's, along with consolidation of the various lending markets into a relatively narrow lending cartel with deep tentacles into legislative bodies across the country and propped up by endless paper printing by the Federal Bank.

Much of the current sorry state of financial health within America owes its due to a string of banking deregulations that allowed the larger financial institutions to operate across state borders using the most favorable conditions that they have been able to convince certain states to tolerate. Thus, while a state like California may enact laws to make lending practices more transparent, a large transnational corporation can utilize friendlier laws in South Dakota or Delaware to bypass these regulations and get right at the citizens of California, right under the nose of state regulations.

Where then does this leave the little guy; the struggling middle class family; or the student just entering the workforce? In the nicest language that can be brought to the response: We're screwed! Despite constant dismissal of personal debt as failings of intelligent choice, self-discipline and the likes, the structure of the society is set up so that even in the most disciplined households, we still keep losing ground decade after decade to the rising cost of home loans, energy costs, utilities, food and transportation. All the while big, greedy, bloodsucking corporations have woven their excesses into the very fabric of the economy and we might expect little relief from the politicians, nearly all of whom are in on the trick with the wealthy class and subject to the same fiduciary bonanza as their fat cat sponsors.

Yet, whatever hope we can bring to secure the fate of our selves, family and community, will be grounded in the mechanisms that we can control and the actions we take today and every day. The wisest counselors who have made themselves available to me are currently alarmed that the worst economic conditions of the past half century or more are at hand: a perfect economic storm.

The following are a few recommendations that can bring some measure of positive effect on our financial status:

• We spend too much money on housing. Our houses are too big for the number of people living in them. Young people should stay longer in their parents' home or take on roommates; elders should take on boarders after their children have moved out; extended families should share the same roof with Grandma taking on some of the childcare duties; and many who are saddled with outrageous mortgage notes should be renting instead.
  
• We spend too much money on food. We should bring back the predominance of the backyard garden; stop eating out so often and filling up on empty calories at fast food restaurants; most people eat too much; shop at farmers' markets; and form a community co-op to purchase items in bulk.
  
• We must curtail our lust for the latest and the newest luxuries. Americans spend too much on flashy cars (auto interest is seriously injuring many families' financial health), clothes, designer appliances, electronic gadgets and home entertainment. Too much of this stuff is being bought on high interest credit. A perfectly good automobile that has many more miles left to go is traded in because slick advertising has convinced many that their ego will only be served continuous upgrading.
  
• We occupy our spare time in non-productive or indulgent activities. Watching television, listening to music, playing video games, going out clubbing or indulging in substance consumption are all activities that cost money, take up our time yet generally leave us empty handed after all our time has been invested. These activities could be replaced in handcrafts such as sewing, wood crafting, gardening, writing, photography, artwork, making music or spending time studying a course that could enhance our career potential.
  
• Too few of us develop and maintain personal and household budgets. We are thus prone to impulse spending, unplanned expenses, we fail to save for future commitments and too often get penalized for late payments and punishing interest payments on overdue accounts. There is a large segment of the society that doesn't even balance their checkbooks each month and may not know how much cash they have on hand at any particular time.
  
• Credit cards have replaced savings and emergency funds. In an ideal situation we would have the credit cards but never use them, or at worst pay off the debt at the end of every billing cycle. But many people are now using the credit card for consumable items that don't even last as long as the debt. Holidays, vacations and nights out on the town are being paid for with credit cards and the debt lingers on and adds to our increasing deficit.
  

There are numerous points that can be made that will contribute to a more stable economic outlook for the individual and the family. In the long run, there is some major restructuring necessary in a country that is saddled with some $80 trillion of personal and public debt. This has never existed in history and common sense would indicate that this cannot go on indefinitely without the promise that our children and their children will have security in employment and that prices would stabilize; there is no guarantee for these favorable conditions so we'd all better sober up as soon as possible and begin to back away from the abyss of mounting debt and unwise consumerism

Let's all get to work right now. Where's that household budget?

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.

The New Scramble for Africa

The following Rant is a response to a challenging email I received from an LIBRadio listener:
Greetings Sister Gwen

You sent me some wonderfully challenging questions and I am excited to respond. You wrote:

How do you intend to stop the re-colonization of Africa both by the Indians and Chinese only by moving to Africa if you do not make the policy? Please explain to the listeners how persons moving back to Africa can stop the Chinese,, if the leaders in the African countries are very content to allow this economic colonization.

By the way, you never mentioned the below article about the Ghana highway being named after Bush. I sent it during you show last week.

Thanks for your inquiry. We actually did cover the naming of the Mallan-Tetteh Quarshie Road in Accra after George Bush with our brother Kwame Osei, who reports for us regularly from Ghana. It was a partial highway, the other end of it named after President Kuffour's other friend Olusegun Obasango, former president of Nigeria. While we, Africans in America, should be rightly insulted, it is rather common practice to reward those who donate large sums of money, to rename something that their money has financed. There is no denying that the U.S. government has sent millions of dollars of "aid" to Ghana during the era of Kuffour and Bush, and it is true that a portion of that development aid went into transportation improvements (the aforementioned road cost $100 million and opens up the Tema seaports to Accra through a 6-lane highway). In 2006, under the Millennium Challenge Act (MCA) program, the U.S. gave $547 million to Ghana, the largest aid deal to date between the two nations, the bulk of which was earmarked for agriculture and transportation, such as the new George Bush Highway, constructed with MCA funds. I contend that this is aid money that African Americans should have been supplying.

In contrast, in 2006, African Americans spent $55 billion extra for Christmas, a significant portion of which spent on Chinese manufactured consumer goods. I don’t have any figures on the 2006 contributions to Ghana by African Americans. In 2003 some 10,000 African Americans participated in Ghana’s important tourism sector which, according to my estimation, would have contributed less than $5 million to the Ghanaian economy.

You are right: I cannot stop Indians, Chinese and Arabs from moving to Africa in large numbers; yet, WE can slow down and eventually halt the practice. There are as many as 300 million people of African descent outside of the continent. Africans in North America are the wealthiest with as much as a Trillion dollars of household income, 98% of which is disposed of. One of the ways that Asians are migrating into the continent is coming in to build and service their massive construction projects like the new Bui Dam in Ghana. China’s investment in this dam is a 90% stake, with 10% being invested by the Ghanaian government. China's contribution is about $600 million. In 2007, African Americans spent about 8o times that amount above and beyond their normal yearly spending during the three months of the Christmas shopping season.

China has opened 11 business development centers on the African continent and is sponsoring university education for 10's of thousands of Africans in Chinese schools. They are also making trade deals that offer the African economies better terms than those from Europe and America. It is only natural that African leaders, whether corrupt or merely pragmatic, would engage in these trade deals. Least we should not be conscious of the fact, most of the African countries are under populated, thus the building of large construction and development projects such as hospitals, communications, electrification, dams, highways, railways, airports, seaports and the like require large numbers of both highly skilled and lesser skilled labor.

Had African Americans taken on the responsibility of building just 5 dams in Africa instead of chasing fake holidays (with the same 90%/10% ratio), we could have created jobs to have employed 90% African-born (with a salary of $10,200 per year) and 10% African Americans (with a salary of $48,500 per year). Thus for an investment by these rich African Americans of $3 billion we could have created jobs for nearly 200,000 African-born and over 21,000 African Americans. This level of cooperative partnership would encourage a lot of us from the Diaspora to migrate to the continent, especially when one considers' the upgrade in lifestyle such an income level in places like Ghana, Senegal and other stable countries would support.

In so far as the possibility of us making policy in Africa, policymaking in Ghana, Senegal and other African democratic/parliamentary governments is done through political parties. Thus we are familiar with the way that money, development and familiarity affect policy. I have personally met with government officials from several African countries. I have been wonderfully surprised at the cordial response that they have afforded me and the personal audience I have enjoyed. They are highly desirous of us to come home with resources, skills, and with the aim of developing our true homeland to the extent that we have become comfortable within the West.

I completely agree that the issue of "tribes" in Africa is continuing to be problematic. Even Africans from the Diaspora who migrate to the continent still hang out with each other, do business together, socialize and strategize in tandem. I think that this is to some extent a natural process of familiarity. The places where I have seen tribalism superseded is when there is a great level of productive collaboration. In areas of collective security, political transcendence, construction and development, health policies and resisting external exploitation, tribalism becomes less a driving consideration than mutual self interest.

Thus I propose that the greatest antidote to the debilitating effect of tribalism is uniting the populations toward the achievement of greater goals. I can think of no greater goals for the 54 African countries than electrification, health care delivery, indigenous production of manufactured goods, raising standards of housing, collective security, resolving foreign debt, turning back foreign exploitation and repatriating millions of wealthy and skilled Africans from the Diaspora. I suggest that determined achievement of these strategic aims will neutralize the debilitating effect of tribalism while we make effort to preserve and market the rich cultural and historical legacy of the distinct regional contributions to civilization and development. So-called tribalism does after all spark creative diversity in art, fashion, music, dance, language and pageantry, all of which contribute greatly to Africa’s cultural tourism industries.

I invite every one of us to dream the big dream. Don't think for a minute that these things we discuss during these Pan African forums are not within the realm of accomplishment. If you convince yourself that they are not doable, then it is all too likely that you will subconsciously try to prove yourself right by doing nothing or, worse yet, thwarting the efforts of those of us who have plans to make a difference. Africans have built great nations since the dawn of human history. We are not done building great nations. In fact, I am absolutely convinced that all the efforts we have contributed to the growth and development of great nations, including much of contemporary Western wealth and military might, has merely been practice as we now prepare to restore one unified African continent to the absolute pinnacle of world prestige, wealth, security and self-sufficiency.

This goal; this mission; this vision has motivated vast numbers of us for generations to the highest level of competency that can be achieved. Our success in developing Africa will be a direct consequence of our investments in Africa. Thus, us moving to the continent is direct proof of our investment.

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.

Who's Migrating to Africa Today?

It is indeed great recent news that the overwhelming majority of the African governments rejected the presence of U.S. military on their soil and saw through the ploy to retain disproportionate control over these vast natural resources as well as drag various populations into the so-called "war on terrorism", which would have been as disastrous as the so-called "Cold War."

Nonetheless, we cannot relax our guard for even a minute. The next Great Threat to our homeland is inward migration from China, Lebanon, India and other crowded territories. I suggest that we all begin to look much closer at the rates of migration to Africa. Ultimately, I am convinced that these immigrants are taking land, skills-based tasks and credibility that is rightfully due the hundreds of millions of Diasporic Africans.

Yet, this will not be resolved without our commitment to move to our own homeland and to provide the critical skills and services necessary to keep our people independent. There is no greater concern that global Africans should be attending to right now then who will control African soil, coastal properties, resources and development over the next 20 to 100 years.

I am going home in the coming years and a great number of the most insightful Africans I know are going to repatriate. When we consider the rate at which non-Africans are migrating to our homeland, sooner will be much better than later.

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.

The Arrest of Ogoniland Rebel Leader Henry Okah

Today, March 5, 2008 / 6248, The Nigerian government announced that they were filing charges of treason, terrorism and other offenses against Henry Okah, 42, and Edward Atatah, 43. These two leaders of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) were arrested in Luanda, Angola, in September 2007, charged there with illegal possession of, and trafficking in firearms. Family members and attorneys have expressed their concern that the two detained had not been seen since being taken into custody by the Abuja government. Rumors had circulated that Okah had been shot during interrogation, possibly tortured and perhaps even killed. In February a Nigerian court ordered authorities to allow the two to receive visits from attorneys, family and doctors, but the order has apparently not been obeyed.

Nigeria is America's largest trading partner in Africa, based upon the oil extraction, and Africa now supplies more oil to the U.S. than Saudi Arabia. Over $50 billion in oil investments is being spent in Africa over the next three years. Companies such as Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell and Hercules Offshore are the main foreign-owned beneficiaries of Nigeria's oil production. The Ogoniland region of the Niger River Delta produces over 2 million barrels of oil per day, which trades on the current market of over $100-a-barrel, thus adding 10's of billions of dollars into the Nigerian national economy.

Yet, in Ogoniland the profits are not only not being equitably distributed among the local population, but the impact upon the environment has been absolutely devastating. Emanuel Nnadozie, writing about the oil contribution to the national economy, wrote: "Oil is a curse which means only poverty, hunger disease and exploitation" for the local residents. Once pristine rivers flowing through the delta have been devastated since Shell began drilling for oil in 1958. Pipelines now cross peoples farmlands and the flaring (burning) of natural gas into the air is occurring at the rate of 70 million cubic meters a day, "the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions on the planet." Once pristine lands teaming with fishing and farming communities are now subject to contaminated water, acid rain, fish kill offs, and increase sickness. Shell, claiming that it cleans up its oil spills, used "techniques like burning the crude which results in a permanent layer of crusted oil meters thick and scooping oil into holes dug in surrounding earth", which reportedly flows right back out during the next bout of rain.

I implore us all to raise our consciousness of the issues that have forced these "reluctant rebels" of the Ogani and Ijaw ethnic groups to rise to arms and fight against their fellow Nigerians over the oil economy and it's disruption to the livelihood of the Delta inhabitants. Despite the incredible wealth which comes from Nigeria's exporting of 2.2 million barrels of oil daily, the people of the region producing the oil lack clean water, electricity, adequate healthcare and few jobs for displaced fishermen and agricultural workers. As well, the people are subject to abuses on a daily basis from the machinations of foreign extractors of oil such as Chevron, Shell and Hercules Offshore.

In 1995 author and human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and 8 others from the Movement for the Survival of the Ogani People were executed by the Nigerian strongman Gen. Sani Abacha. In honor of this award-winning brother, current movement organizers and those that have been forced to turn to arms to bring justice and equity to the Niger River Delta, we must bring these critical issues to greater awareness.

Keidi Obi Awadu is the founder of Black Star Media. He is the host of a talk radio show on www.LIBRadio.com and shares his video documentaries on www.LIBtv.com. Contact Keidi at keidi@libradio.net.