Sunday, November 27, 2005
Canadians in Harms Way: And the Dangers of Humanitarian Work
The news of two Canadian humanitarian workers being taken hostage in Iraq highlights the dangers that are often associated with humanitarian work around the world. The truth of the matter being that the pursuit of a just, harmonious and sustainable planet often requires one to meet those elements that are preventing it head on. This often means working in dangerous settings and Iraq is probably the most dangerous.
According to the statistics humanitarian work is becoming increasingly more dangerous. The United Nations reports that between 1992 and 1998, 158 humanitarian workers were killed and 43 kidnapped. Between 1998 and 2001, 198 aid workers were killed and 240 more kidnapped. Increasingly, humanitarian workers are being openly targeted.
Dan McTeague, the parliamentary secretary to the minister of foreign affairs, made clear that, “Under no circumstances should Canadians be there," and that, "The situation remains very unstable ... and continues to be a danger for all foreign travellers." However, what most people don’t realize is that it is often humanitarian workers that are the first in a conflict zone and the last to leave. A friend of mine once reminded me that, “the marines were not the first ones in Afghanistan…it was Oxfam,” a British based non-governmental organization.
In fact, if it were not for humanitarian workers, the global response to crisis, from famine and AIDS to refugees would be much slower or perhaps even non-existent. While the United Nations and our governments work at the speed of frozen molasses, humanitarian workers are on the ground forging relationships with local communities and organizations, documenting and reporting the crisis.
Humanitarian workers monitor the pulse of our planet, warning us of coming crisis so it can be mitigated. If the United Nations and Western governments would pay more attention to this vanguard of humanity and act more swiftly on the warnings of humanitarian workers such shameful scars on our conscience, like that of the genocides in Rwanda and Sudan, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, or the massive drought in Western Africa (just to touch the tip of the ice burg), could have been avoided.
Canada has a long history of global good will. After all, peace keeping, Green Peace and Doctors Without Borders are products of conscientious and ambitious Canadians. So as we pray for the safe return of the two Canadian hostages, let us also give praise to them and all humanitarian workers who often work carry out their work in insecure conditions. They are, After all, our greatest ambassadors.
According to the statistics humanitarian work is becoming increasingly more dangerous. The United Nations reports that between 1992 and 1998, 158 humanitarian workers were killed and 43 kidnapped. Between 1998 and 2001, 198 aid workers were killed and 240 more kidnapped. Increasingly, humanitarian workers are being openly targeted.
Dan McTeague, the parliamentary secretary to the minister of foreign affairs, made clear that, “Under no circumstances should Canadians be there," and that, "The situation remains very unstable ... and continues to be a danger for all foreign travellers." However, what most people don’t realize is that it is often humanitarian workers that are the first in a conflict zone and the last to leave. A friend of mine once reminded me that, “the marines were not the first ones in Afghanistan…it was Oxfam,” a British based non-governmental organization.
In fact, if it were not for humanitarian workers, the global response to crisis, from famine and AIDS to refugees would be much slower or perhaps even non-existent. While the United Nations and our governments work at the speed of frozen molasses, humanitarian workers are on the ground forging relationships with local communities and organizations, documenting and reporting the crisis.
Humanitarian workers monitor the pulse of our planet, warning us of coming crisis so it can be mitigated. If the United Nations and Western governments would pay more attention to this vanguard of humanity and act more swiftly on the warnings of humanitarian workers such shameful scars on our conscience, like that of the genocides in Rwanda and Sudan, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, or the massive drought in Western Africa (just to touch the tip of the ice burg), could have been avoided.
Canada has a long history of global good will. After all, peace keeping, Green Peace and Doctors Without Borders are products of conscientious and ambitious Canadians. So as we pray for the safe return of the two Canadian hostages, let us also give praise to them and all humanitarian workers who often work carry out their work in insecure conditions. They are, After all, our greatest ambassadors.
Sunday, November 13, 2005
Two Terrorisms, Only One Real solution
When I was a Masters student in Development Studies and the Foreign Student Representative at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, I had had the opportunity to meet many people from Tanzania, East Africa and Europe.
One such person goes by the name Christopher. On exchange with his university in Austria, Christopher decided to study one semester in Tanzania as a part of his programme. With his average height, short hair and pale skin, Christopher passes as the average “mzungu,” or European. Well almost – his mustache and unusually long goatee bares similarities at a certain international terrorist mastermind that goes by the name of Osama Bin Laden.
Actually, besides the goatee Christopher looks nothing like Bin Laden, but nonetheless, whenever he got off the daladala (local transport) and walked through the bus stand he was sure to receive the cheers, “Osama! Osama!, Osama!”
One could come up with many reasons why someone that looks like Osama Bin Laden would be cheered on by a crowed of commuters at a Tanzanian bus stand. Perhaps its because Osama is Muslim and 35 percent of Tanzania’s population is Muslim? Osama is fighting America and America is viewed as the enemy of the Muslim world. Maybe it comes down to the fact that Tanzanians are uneducated and thus ignorant to what is right and what is wrong? Or, maybe Tanzanians are too far removed from the war on terrorism to have any grasp of the gravity of such actions? All of these reasons could be argued and perhaps in a few cases may be true, however, they fail to explain the widespread cheering of Bin Laden in a place like Tanzania.
I remember a trip I took by bus from Arusha to Dar es Salaam a month ago. The journey was rather long (8hrs) so they played a movie to pass the time. On this particular trip they played a movie called “Savior”. The film is set in the middle of the Balkans war and depicts horrible acts of violence. Ten minutes after the film had started the bus erupted in protest in response to a scene portraying a soldier kicking a pregnant woman in the abdomen. For anyone familiar with Tanzania, children are considered a national asset and every member of society is responsible for raising the nations youth. I cannot count the number of times I have been on the bus and been put in charge of looking after a child I don’t know while the mother tends to other business. The sight of a pregnant woman being beaten to death was simply too much for the audience to take.
The film was finally turned off after a man yelled, “Tanzanians are peace loving people, why would you play a movie like that with children on the bus?” The fact of the matter is that Tanzanians are peace-loving people. So why would some of them support a murderer like Bin Laden? Perhaps it’s the fault of the media. Is the media in East Africa biased towards Bin Laden, glorifying his violence while demonizing the West? The answer to this is NO. Of the major news channels in Tanzania, CNN and the BBC rank in the top three and there exists a (arguably) free press that is read by a large proportion of the population. Furthermore, Tanzania has strong ties with Western governments, including the United States and Great Britain. This includes student exchange programmes. The American Colleges of the Mid West (ACM) has strong ties with the University of Dar es Salaam with over 40 students coming every year, as does Carlton University in Ottawa and Canada World Youth (CWY) has several youth exchange programmes operating in the country, and there still are many more from Europe.
The most important thing to remember is that in this “War on Terrorism” Osama Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network, not George Bush and America, have been the only group to murder Tanzanians. The 1998 attack against the United States embassy killed 268 Tanzanians (no American’s died in Tanzania). This not only disrupted Tanzanians sense of security, but also resulted in the country being put on the terrorisms watch list, which has major economic implications considering the economy heavily depends on tourism.
The real reasons why some people in Tanzania and much of the rest of the world are cheering on Bin Laden and not George Bush has nothing to do with Muslim solidarity, a deep hatred for America, ignorance or even a biased media – it’s poverty. Simply put, in the Third World, America and the policies of industrialized nations are blamed for exacerbating global poverty while Osama is seen as a liberator that is fighting to break those neo-colonial chains (or at least strengthen non-Western voices). It is a matter of survival. This is not to say that people don’t recognize that Osama Bin Laden is a murderer. Virtually every adult on the face of the globe witnessed, or has been exposed to, September 11th and its aftermath. It is not uncommon to see people wearing t-shirts and prints depicting the planes crashing into the twin towers. However, poverty is the terrorism of the Third World and for many every day is September 11th. The saying, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” somehow becomes clearer in this context.
If you ask the average person what the difference between “Americanization” and “Globalization” half would say the part in front of the “ization” and half would say they’re synonymous. Americanization is seen as the spread of American culture around the globe. McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Britney Spears, Microsoft and CNN are merely the products of Americanization. What Americanization is about is business and the consumer culture. It is based on the American dream that requires one to break the backs of others so one can make lots of money to buy all those things one does not need.
Terrorism by Numbers – Tanzania
268---------Tanzanians killed in the 1998 bombing in Dar es Salaam.
1,600,000 or 8.8% of Tanzanians living with HIV/AIDS.
160,000 ----------deaths annually from AIDS (Average of 438/day).
77,566 ----------deaths annually from TB (Average of 213/day).
47,000 ----------deaths annually from Malaria (Average 130/day).
19.9% ---------------of Tanzanians live on less than $1 US per day.
59.7% ---------------of Tanzanians live on less than $2 US per day.
$6.549 ---------------billion US in Debt.
Sources: www.adl.org, www.undp.org, www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook.
Most see Globalization in the same light, but from a more a more operational level. First there is the global culture fuelled by the media and the Internet, but that is where it stops because rich countries don’t want immigrants stealing their jobs. Second, there is trade liberalization, which means rich countries have access to Third World markets while they hide behind their protective subsidies and intellectual property rights. Third, there is democracy, not forgetting the dictatorships of Pinochet, Hussein, Samoza, Noriega, Suharto, Amin, Abacha, Mussaraf, and the authoritarian governments of China and Saudi Arabia who have all been either directly installed, supported by Western governments, or just merely tolerated in order to maintain friendly business relations.
The simple fact of the matter is that while the world leaders manipulate economic indicators, such as the GDP, the speed of a countries internet connection, the veneer of democracy, or the ethnic diversity of a primary school in downtown Toronto to boast about how globalization is the best vehicle for international development, the reality on the ground is much different.
Tanzania is a country with a gross domestic product (GDP) of less than $300 US per, but for most Tanzanians, earning 300 dollars a year would be equivalent to winning the lottery. Outside of Dar es Salaam and the tourist rich areas of Zanzibar and Kilimanjaro, many people living in villages consider themselves lucky to make a third of that amount. For those coming to visit Tanzania, don’t worry; there are still plenty of people living on less than a dollar a day in the tourist areas as well. You can see them through the window of your Land Cruiser or visit them in a village with a cultural tourism programme. All Al Qaeda needs to offer a man is food for his family and a purpose in life and it has another foot soldier for his global terrorist army
So what is stopping people from escaping their poverty? Maybe they are “too lazy” or (I like this one) “they fail to define themselves” (whatever that means). No, the real reasons are as follows:
Trade. Rich countries wave the flag of free trade but hide behind heavy subsidies to protect their industries and block out Third World nations from global trade. Unfair trade means no money for development.
Debt. Tanzania is a heavily indebted poor country (HIPC), which means it has no chance in hell of ever repaying its debt and the World Bank and IMF will not let them declare bankruptcy (Mexico already tried that).
As a result of its debt, Tanzania has been forced to accept International Monetary Fund (IMF) designed structural adjustment policies (SAPs) that removes the social safety net (healthcare, education, sanitation etc.) and opens the doors for cheap imports and transnational corporations looking for resources at rock bottom prices. Tanzania is capable of producing its own food, but cannot compete with international food prices and the nation has vast mineral resources, including diamonds, gold and gems.
Leadership. According to the 1998 Corruption Perception Index Tanzania ranks as the fourth most corrupt country on the face of the globe. Corrupt leaders are sucking the remaining life out of their nations to ensure their own economic and political survival. Corrupt leaders are also responsible for much of the debt that that causes so much grief today. The reason why they are accepted by Western governments is because they play by their game.
What Does Poverty Mean?
No Money – Vital government revenues, revenues needed for education, healthcare and infrastructure, are sucked away in an endless cycle of debt and debt repayment.
No Access – To Western markets protected by subsidies.
No Leadership – Leaders line their pockets with public money and/or play by the IMF/WB/WTO game to avoided international isolation.
So how does one convince impoverished Tanzanians that they should not cheer for Bin Laden and start cheering for the “good” side? The first thing is to stop pretending to be what we say we are and start being what we say we are.
What should these children fear more, Osama Bin Laden or the IMF, World Bank and World Trade Organization?Right now the world is caught up between two terrorisms and Tanzanians die in far larger numbers from the economic terrorism that is perpetrated by Western governments than do by a Bin Laden bomb. To win the war on terrorism, Western Governments need to bring the majority of the world’s population on board by giving them the tools and allowing them to use the tools they already possess that are required to bring themselves out of poverty. Tanzanians don’t need the hope or the motivation that so many church groups and development practitioners are willing to spend so much money disbursing (they have plenty of spirituality and perseverance), Tanzanians need to be free from debt, free from the shark infested waters of the “free market” and free from corrupt leaders. Then and only then will Bin Laden lose his power base and the world will have the largest army to fight any war – including the war on terrorism.
One such person goes by the name Christopher. On exchange with his university in Austria, Christopher decided to study one semester in Tanzania as a part of his programme. With his average height, short hair and pale skin, Christopher passes as the average “mzungu,” or European. Well almost – his mustache and unusually long goatee bares similarities at a certain international terrorist mastermind that goes by the name of Osama Bin Laden.
Actually, besides the goatee Christopher looks nothing like Bin Laden, but nonetheless, whenever he got off the daladala (local transport) and walked through the bus stand he was sure to receive the cheers, “Osama! Osama!, Osama!”
One could come up with many reasons why someone that looks like Osama Bin Laden would be cheered on by a crowed of commuters at a Tanzanian bus stand. Perhaps its because Osama is Muslim and 35 percent of Tanzania’s population is Muslim? Osama is fighting America and America is viewed as the enemy of the Muslim world. Maybe it comes down to the fact that Tanzanians are uneducated and thus ignorant to what is right and what is wrong? Or, maybe Tanzanians are too far removed from the war on terrorism to have any grasp of the gravity of such actions? All of these reasons could be argued and perhaps in a few cases may be true, however, they fail to explain the widespread cheering of Bin Laden in a place like Tanzania.
I remember a trip I took by bus from Arusha to Dar es Salaam a month ago. The journey was rather long (8hrs) so they played a movie to pass the time. On this particular trip they played a movie called “Savior”. The film is set in the middle of the Balkans war and depicts horrible acts of violence. Ten minutes after the film had started the bus erupted in protest in response to a scene portraying a soldier kicking a pregnant woman in the abdomen. For anyone familiar with Tanzania, children are considered a national asset and every member of society is responsible for raising the nations youth. I cannot count the number of times I have been on the bus and been put in charge of looking after a child I don’t know while the mother tends to other business. The sight of a pregnant woman being beaten to death was simply too much for the audience to take.
The film was finally turned off after a man yelled, “Tanzanians are peace loving people, why would you play a movie like that with children on the bus?” The fact of the matter is that Tanzanians are peace-loving people. So why would some of them support a murderer like Bin Laden? Perhaps it’s the fault of the media. Is the media in East Africa biased towards Bin Laden, glorifying his violence while demonizing the West? The answer to this is NO. Of the major news channels in Tanzania, CNN and the BBC rank in the top three and there exists a (arguably) free press that is read by a large proportion of the population. Furthermore, Tanzania has strong ties with Western governments, including the United States and Great Britain. This includes student exchange programmes. The American Colleges of the Mid West (ACM) has strong ties with the University of Dar es Salaam with over 40 students coming every year, as does Carlton University in Ottawa and Canada World Youth (CWY) has several youth exchange programmes operating in the country, and there still are many more from Europe.
The most important thing to remember is that in this “War on Terrorism” Osama Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network, not George Bush and America, have been the only group to murder Tanzanians. The 1998 attack against the United States embassy killed 268 Tanzanians (no American’s died in Tanzania). This not only disrupted Tanzanians sense of security, but also resulted in the country being put on the terrorisms watch list, which has major economic implications considering the economy heavily depends on tourism.
The real reasons why some people in Tanzania and much of the rest of the world are cheering on Bin Laden and not George Bush has nothing to do with Muslim solidarity, a deep hatred for America, ignorance or even a biased media – it’s poverty. Simply put, in the Third World, America and the policies of industrialized nations are blamed for exacerbating global poverty while Osama is seen as a liberator that is fighting to break those neo-colonial chains (or at least strengthen non-Western voices). It is a matter of survival. This is not to say that people don’t recognize that Osama Bin Laden is a murderer. Virtually every adult on the face of the globe witnessed, or has been exposed to, September 11th and its aftermath. It is not uncommon to see people wearing t-shirts and prints depicting the planes crashing into the twin towers. However, poverty is the terrorism of the Third World and for many every day is September 11th. The saying, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” somehow becomes clearer in this context.
If you ask the average person what the difference between “Americanization” and “Globalization” half would say the part in front of the “ization” and half would say they’re synonymous. Americanization is seen as the spread of American culture around the globe. McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Britney Spears, Microsoft and CNN are merely the products of Americanization. What Americanization is about is business and the consumer culture. It is based on the American dream that requires one to break the backs of others so one can make lots of money to buy all those things one does not need.
Terrorism by Numbers – Tanzania
268---------Tanzanians killed in the 1998 bombing in Dar es Salaam.
1,600,000 or 8.8% of Tanzanians living with HIV/AIDS.
160,000 ----------deaths annually from AIDS (Average of 438/day).
77,566 ----------deaths annually from TB (Average of 213/day).
47,000 ----------deaths annually from Malaria (Average 130/day).
19.9% ---------------of Tanzanians live on less than $1 US per day.
59.7% ---------------of Tanzanians live on less than $2 US per day.
$6.549 ---------------billion US in Debt.
Sources: www.adl.org, www.undp.org, www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook.
Most see Globalization in the same light, but from a more a more operational level. First there is the global culture fuelled by the media and the Internet, but that is where it stops because rich countries don’t want immigrants stealing their jobs. Second, there is trade liberalization, which means rich countries have access to Third World markets while they hide behind their protective subsidies and intellectual property rights. Third, there is democracy, not forgetting the dictatorships of Pinochet, Hussein, Samoza, Noriega, Suharto, Amin, Abacha, Mussaraf, and the authoritarian governments of China and Saudi Arabia who have all been either directly installed, supported by Western governments, or just merely tolerated in order to maintain friendly business relations.
The simple fact of the matter is that while the world leaders manipulate economic indicators, such as the GDP, the speed of a countries internet connection, the veneer of democracy, or the ethnic diversity of a primary school in downtown Toronto to boast about how globalization is the best vehicle for international development, the reality on the ground is much different.
Tanzania is a country with a gross domestic product (GDP) of less than $300 US per, but for most Tanzanians, earning 300 dollars a year would be equivalent to winning the lottery. Outside of Dar es Salaam and the tourist rich areas of Zanzibar and Kilimanjaro, many people living in villages consider themselves lucky to make a third of that amount. For those coming to visit Tanzania, don’t worry; there are still plenty of people living on less than a dollar a day in the tourist areas as well. You can see them through the window of your Land Cruiser or visit them in a village with a cultural tourism programme. All Al Qaeda needs to offer a man is food for his family and a purpose in life and it has another foot soldier for his global terrorist army
So what is stopping people from escaping their poverty? Maybe they are “too lazy” or (I like this one) “they fail to define themselves” (whatever that means). No, the real reasons are as follows:
Trade. Rich countries wave the flag of free trade but hide behind heavy subsidies to protect their industries and block out Third World nations from global trade. Unfair trade means no money for development.
Debt. Tanzania is a heavily indebted poor country (HIPC), which means it has no chance in hell of ever repaying its debt and the World Bank and IMF will not let them declare bankruptcy (Mexico already tried that).
As a result of its debt, Tanzania has been forced to accept International Monetary Fund (IMF) designed structural adjustment policies (SAPs) that removes the social safety net (healthcare, education, sanitation etc.) and opens the doors for cheap imports and transnational corporations looking for resources at rock bottom prices. Tanzania is capable of producing its own food, but cannot compete with international food prices and the nation has vast mineral resources, including diamonds, gold and gems.
Leadership. According to the 1998 Corruption Perception Index Tanzania ranks as the fourth most corrupt country on the face of the globe. Corrupt leaders are sucking the remaining life out of their nations to ensure their own economic and political survival. Corrupt leaders are also responsible for much of the debt that that causes so much grief today. The reason why they are accepted by Western governments is because they play by their game.
What Does Poverty Mean?
No Money – Vital government revenues, revenues needed for education, healthcare and infrastructure, are sucked away in an endless cycle of debt and debt repayment.
No Access – To Western markets protected by subsidies.
No Leadership – Leaders line their pockets with public money and/or play by the IMF/WB/WTO game to avoided international isolation.
So how does one convince impoverished Tanzanians that they should not cheer for Bin Laden and start cheering for the “good” side? The first thing is to stop pretending to be what we say we are and start being what we say we are.
What should these children fear more, Osama Bin Laden or the IMF, World Bank and World Trade Organization?Right now the world is caught up between two terrorisms and Tanzanians die in far larger numbers from the economic terrorism that is perpetrated by Western governments than do by a Bin Laden bomb. To win the war on terrorism, Western Governments need to bring the majority of the world’s population on board by giving them the tools and allowing them to use the tools they already possess that are required to bring themselves out of poverty. Tanzanians don’t need the hope or the motivation that so many church groups and development practitioners are willing to spend so much money disbursing (they have plenty of spirituality and perseverance), Tanzanians need to be free from debt, free from the shark infested waters of the “free market” and free from corrupt leaders. Then and only then will Bin Laden lose his power base and the world will have the largest army to fight any war – including the war on terrorism.
