Open City by Teju Cole:A Review

In the Daily Beast Taylor Antrim reviews Teju Cole's Open City:

Want to write a breakout first novel? The conventional wisdom says ingratiate yourself (Everything Is Illuminated), grab the reader by the lapels (The Lovely Bones), or put on an antic show (Special Topics in Calamity Physics). Teju Cole's disquietingly powerful debut Open City does none of the above. It's light on plot. It's exquisitely written, but quiet; the sentences don't call attention to themselves. The narrator, a Nigerian psychiatry student, is emotionally distant, ruminative, and intellectual. His account of a year spent walking around New York, encountering immigrants of all kinds, listening to their stories and recalling his own African boyhood, achieves its resonance obliquely, through inference—meaning you have to pay attention. But Open City is worth the effort...[continue reading]

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• The Best Debut of 2011 (thedailybeast.com)

Western Sahara: The last colony in Africa

In Pambazuka:

In the following interview, Radhi S. Bachir talks about Western Sahara [mp3], which the delegation of Saharawis to the World Social Forum calls ‘the last colony of Africa.’ He says Western Sahara is the only territory on the continent that had not been truly decolonised and where people have not been able to exercise their right to self-determination.

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• Morocco fears Algeria may stir Western Sahara unrest (reuters.com)
• Terrorism Arrests: More Turmoil in Western Sahara (nytimes.com)

The Revival of Theatre

In Bombastic Elements:

Nothing says middle class aspirations like a theatre audience and signs of a re-emerging and expanding African middle class suggest theater revivals. Reuters' African Journal recently took a closer look at the re-surging Ghanaian theater scene...[continue reading]

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• Ghana's Middle Income Status - the Con (grahamghana.wordpress.com)

Ivorians Should Fight it Out-Andrew Mwenda

Andrew Mwenda advocates a military solution between Ivorians:

I see no better way to destroy the entrenched corrupt elite interests in the body politic of the Ivorian state other than a protracted civil war. For war destroys old centres of power, discredits old forms of social control, undermines the legitimacy of old politics, etc. All these processes allow new and more enlightened forces to emerge and gain control. The most successful nations in Africa today – Ghana, Ethiopia, Rwanda and to an extent the early Uganda under Museveni – had all gone through this process of social shredding. It is this social shredding that Ivory Coast desperately needs.
Neither UN nor AU intervention is good for Ivory Coast. The best solution for that country is to allow Ouattara and Gbagbo to contest in the real court of effective state formation – the military. The winner will have to be the one who is able to organise people and mobilize resources to secure victory. Only an organisation with such capacity can reconstruct the Ivorian state. The UN and AU intervention may achieve short term humanitarian objectives. But this will most likely be at the price of disabling the mechanisms, however destructive in the short term, that can produce a durable solution.

More here

Related articles

• Lesson for Uganda from Tunisia's crisis (africaunchained.blogspot.com)
• Ivorian state to take control of banks - decree (reuters.com)
• Africans and Revolutions (africaunchained.blogspot.com)
• Unity plea over Ivorian crisis (bbc.co.uk)

Information will always defeat authoritarian states

Walter Pike writing in Free African Media:

What scares those in power most about the Internet and social media is that they don’t have control in those spheres anymore. And how do you maintain power if you no longer have control?...It is possible to keep people ignorant, by controlling the spread of knowledge, but this was far easier when you could control the pathways down which it spreads. How do you do it when every citizen, every customer, every consumer is a publisher?
When everyone has his or her own independent network of connections, when you don’t dare switch off the technology that drives these connections for more than a very short time for fear of destroying your economy and competitiveness...[continue reading]

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• Talkin 'bout a Revolution (broadstuff.com)
• Free African Media (africaunchained.blogspot.com)
• The African Tech Community Consists Primarily Of Two Generations (techmasai.com)

Nigeria:Coding Voters Registration

Al Jazeera reports on Nyimbi Odero and others who coded a solution for Nigeria's voter registration database:

Fellows Friday with Chikwe Ihekweazu

TED Fellow Chikwe Ihekweazu interviewed on the TED Blog:

There are many aspiring social entrepreneurs out there who are trying to take their passion and ideas to the next level. What is one piece of advice you would give to them based on your own experiences and successes? Learn more about how to become a great social entrepreneur from all of the TED Fellows on the Case Foundation blog.

That’s an interesting question because I’m just at the point of trying to realize our dreams. The Nigeria Health Watch blog, FGCE Project Hope, TEDxEuston … we do it alongside what we do to earn a living. We’re just at the point of thinking now, “How can we actually earn a living by doing what we really want to do?” That’s a huge, huge challenge, especially if you’re in a field or profession that you like and pays relatively well, and you’re comfortable. I don’t think I’m in a position to give very good advice, because I’m in the process of finding that myself..
However, to offer a small piece of advice I give myself all the time. I think you’ve got a small window in a life time , when you have the most energy, exposure, experience and competence. So there’s not really that much time. The earlier you do start with something you really like doing, the better.

More here

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Covering Revolutions-The African Egypt versus the Arab Egypt

In Al Jazeera:

"Egypt is in Africa. We should not fool about with the attempts of the North to segregate the countries of North Africa from the rest of the continent," says Firoze Manji, the editor of Pambazuka Online, an advocacy website for social justice in Africa. "Their histories have been intertwined for millennia. Some Egyptians may not feel they are Africans, but that is neither here nor there. They are part of the heritage of the continent."
And, just like much of the rest of the world, Africans watched events unfold in Cairo with great interest. "There is little doubt that people [in Africa] are watching with enthusiasm what is going on in the Middle East, and drawing inspiration from that for their own struggles," says Manji.
He argues that globalisation and the accompanying economic liberalisation has created circumstances in which the people of the global South share very similar experiences: "Increasing pauperisation, growing unemployment, declining power to hold their governments to account, declining income from agricultural production, increasing accumulation by dispossession - something that is growing on a vast scale - and increasing willingness of governments to comply with the political and economic wishes of the North.

More here

Related articles

• Will Africa's next revolution be in Cameroon? (thegrio.com)
• The staying power of sub-Saharan strongmen (theglobeandmail.com)
• A Self-Immolation in Senegal (sahelblog.wordpress.com)

Caletous Juma on Innovation

Calestous Juma speaks with Scidev on what he thinks is impeding innovation in Africa:

So what's holding back all these African innovations?
One thing is ideology. There is a general assumption, mostly informed by some economic theories, that, if the market is right, innovations will simply emerge and diffuse without requiring government support. And so the focus has been on liberalising economic systems and markets in the hope that innovations would just emerge on their own.
But we know, in fact, that innovations don't just emerge — they are a product of deliberate private and public support systems which help them to move from the lab to the market place. They include institutions such as venture capital, technology development agencies to improve the technologies, and institutions that guarantee that those innovations are safe.

Continuing:

Who should be creating those institutions? 

That's something that has to be done by African governments themselves by legislation...We wanted to promote a culture of creativity so young people could see what had been patented and be inspired to develop their own ideas.

More here
A number of important points are made here however the creation of innovation nurturing institutions cannot be the sole preserve of governments. The Next Einstein colleges and Ashesi University were not initiated by bureaucrats nor were the hubs within the Afrilab network. Governments do have have a role as partners and in fashioning enabling legislation but we cannot overstate their importance when it come to the nourishing of invention.

Egyptian and Tunisian How To's on Overthrowing your Government

African activists should pick up some tips from this. In the NYTimes:

Young Egyptian and Tunisian activists brainstormed on the use of technology to evade surveillance, commiserated about torture and traded practical tips on how to stand up to rubber bullets and organize barricades.
They fused their secular expertise in social networks with a discipline culled from religious movements and combined the energy of soccer fans with the sophistication of surgeons. Breaking free from older veterans of the Arab political opposition, they relied on tactics of nonviolent resistance channeled from an American scholar through a Serbian youth brigade — but also on marketing tactics borrowed from Silicon Valley.

More here

Related articles

• Wikileaks' Julian Assange takes credit for Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions (dailymail.co.uk)
• Social Media Gets Credit For Tunisian Overthrow (npr.org)
• Iran Isn't Egypt? (andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com)

Tomás Ávila Laurel vs Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea

Parvati Nair writing in the Guardian:

On 11 February in Equatorial Guinea, a writer by the name of Juan Tomás Ávila Laurel embarked on a hunger strike to claim justice and democracy for his people, too. The despotic ruler of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang, has been in power since seizing it from his uncle Francisco Macías, another dictator who took power after the country gained independence from Spain. Massively rich in crude oil, the wealth of the nation lies in the hands of a minority elite while most Guineans suffer the indignities of hardship, repression and an appalling record on human rights – not to mention one of the lowest levels of development in Africa. Oil companies do business with the likes of Obiang and family, who are well served by the income generated from the country's rich natural resources. To quote Human Rights Watch, the "dictatorship under President Obiang has used an oil boom to entrench and enrich itself further at the expense of the country's people''.

More here

Related articles

• Leaders pick dictator Obiang to head African Union (sfgate.com)
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Ethiopia's Heroic Journalist-Dawit Kebede

Over at Free African Media Mandy De Waal writes:

Courtesy of Free African Media

The 21 months that Dawit Kebede spent in a jail cell with 350 other prisoners in Ethiopia is a stark reminder of that country’s assault on press freedoms. Kebede’s crime was that he wrote an editorial criticising his government following the post-election violence that swept Ethiopia in 2005. Many journalists were detained at that time and some chose exile after being freed, but not Kebede. When the editor-in-chief of Ethiopia’s only independent, political newspaper was released he waited two days and then petitioned the federal government headed by Meles Zenawi for a license to continue running his newspaper.

More here

Related articles

• Alemayehu G. Mariam: Ethiopia: Profiles in Journalistic Courage (huffingtonpost.com)
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Learn Igbo Online

"...Learn Igbo Now (LIN) specializes in teaching “lovers of all things Igbo” how to speak Igbo language quickly and easily. No need to attend a classroom lesson: just use Learn Igbo Now (LIN) to learn Igbo when and where it is most convenient for you. Listen or watch the lessons on your media device (iPod, MP3 player, computer, etc)..."-site
via CP Africa

Dr. Hawa Abdi & Her Daughters

At TED Hawa Abdi and Deqo Mohamed describe their work as doctors in Somalia:

The Quest for Architectural Excellence in non-Western Societies

In Architects for Peace, Ashraf M. Salama writing about the Aga Khan Award for Architecture in its 11th Cycle

Revitalisation of the Recent Heritage of Tunis

Repeatedly, in non-Western societies, successes and failures of designed environments go un-noticed. Opportunities for discussing lessons learned from intervening in natural or built environments are missed. Initiating change in the physical environment takes place in many cases as if there was no history or past to learn from. Frequently, gaps in knowledge transmission do exist because of the lack of rigorous documentation, especially give that assessment studies and critical writings have not matured in many parts of those societies. One way to bridge knowledge transmission gaps is to unveil merits of best practices through critical assessment of projects with the ultimate goal of creating a sharper public awareness of the role of architecture in enhancing and celebrating human activities, of its socio-cultural, environmental, and aesthetic qualities.

More here

Sudan Radio

Mobile Active profiles Sudan Radio:

courtesy of Sudan Radio

The Sudan Radio Service, which has been operating since 2006, recently began incorporating mobile technology into its work to both monitor the reach of its broadcasts and to solicit reader feedback...Jacob Korenblum of SoukTel, the company that designed both mobile services, explains that the radio service, which is based out of Nairobi, Kenya and Juba, Sudan, wanted to make sure that the broadcasts were being heard by its target audience. He explains, “The power of radio is that it can reach millions of people; the challenge of radio is that you don't know if people are listening. […] So I think that there was a big need for ways to get feedback from listeners across southern Sudan."

Elusive dream of media freedom in Swaziland

Manqoba Nxumalo over at Free African Media:

King Mswati III courtesy of Free African Media

The media in Swaziland operate under difficult conditions characterised by state-induced fear and censorship by a government that tolerates neither criticism nor different political ideologies. Although the constitution provides for freedom of speech and of the press, these rights may be waived by the king at any time. In addition, while there are no laws banning or restricting criticism of the monarchy or other officials, journalists have been warned that publishing any such criticism could be construed as treason, terrorism, sedition or fall foul of the many laws that govern the media environment in Swaziland.

Lesson for Uganda from Tunisia’s crisis

Andrew Mwenda writing in the Independent:

...the Museveni administration is nourishing the social forces that have the potential to bring it down. Economic growth has led to an education explosion and rapid urbanisation. Add liberalisation of the economy which is spreading new communication technologies to the far reaches of the country. The mobile phone has penetrated every village; our country has over 200 private FM radio stations, 20 private television stations and 2.5 million people use the internet.
These developments are putting increasing strains on our body politic. As people get more educated and urbanised, they get more access to mass media. This expands their horizons. Yet the rate of economic growth is outpaced by growth in aspirations. The mismatch between expectations and opportunities breeds social frustration – hence the growth of militancy. The structural and technological foundations for democratic politics are therefore being laid; and the struggle for participation is only going to intensify.

More here

Related articles

• Will Egypt's protests have a domino effect in Africa? (thegrio.com)
• Africans and Revolutions (africaunchained.blogspot.com)
• Tunisia, Egypt, Uganda? (3quarksdaily.com)
• Uganda opposition threatens Egypt-style protests (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• The luckiest dictator in Africa (independent.co.uk)
• Urbanisation is inevitable. Public health must embrace this fact | Sir George Alleyne (guardian.co.uk)

Stories We Tell About Africa (And Those We Don\'t)

G. Pascal Zachary in Fanzine:

"“The first step to understanding African difference is to ‘listen’ to African cultures and attempt to discover Africa in its own words and in its own context. We should work at understanding how Africans conceive of reality and how that reality has been shaped by their environments and histories. In other words, we must allow Africans to be our teachers.”
To learn from Africans, in ways devoid of romanticism and the insidious projections that dominate the meta-narratives described in this essay, is serious work. For such a learning journey unites the personal and the political, the spiritual and the artistic, and is specific in its character. Such learning defies easy generalizations and categories. Inevitably, true stories about Africa are about individuals acting autonomously, standing outside of the stereotypes and pre-conceptions that even their own societies promote and protect. Only out of a heightened awareness of difference and a fidelity to the autonomy of Africans and their admirers alike can arise the raw material out of which new and necessary narratives about Africa."

More here

Christopher Fomunyoh on the Cote d'Ivoire Crisis

In Scribbles from the Den, Christopher Fomunyoh on the Cote d'Ivoire crisis:

A couple of years ago, another African leader, former President Ket Masire of Botswana told me that from his experience in office, many problems on our continent stem from our collective reluctance to call a spade a spade. We would rather use euphemisms and call a spade 'an agricultural tool', hoping some people would understand we are referring to a spade. In my professional life, I have seen people react to difficult problems in two ways: some people make the problems more complicated and intractable by piling on pre-existing grievances and other externalities; others break down the issues into easily solvable chunks or bits, and then aggregate the small solutions from each of the chunks into a comprehensive big solution. I belong to the second school of thought. Points about nationalism, sovereignty, the colonial heritage and neo-colonialism, the CFA franc and the stranglehold on our economies, the role of the French and the international community, are all legitimate, but should be debated on a separate track; because, in my view, these are externalities to the key question of who had the most legitimate votes and therefore won the second round of the Ivorian presidential election of November 28, 2010.

More here

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Gabon confronts its Dictator

Drew Hinshaw reporting in Christian Science Monitor:

The revolutionary protests in Tunisia and Egypt weren't supposed to spread south to sub-Saharan Africa. But Gabonese protesters are aiming to oust President Ali Bongo... But for weeks, while scenes of Egyptians overtaking their capital have mesmerized global TV audiences -- and brought the world's most recognized names in TV news to Cairo -- Gabonese protesters have been facing death and imprisonment in a series of anti-repression demonstrations consciously modeled off the Tunisian example.

More here

Related articles

• Tunisia, Egypt, Gabon (hellonearth.wordpress.com)
• Who is covering the Gabon uprising? (africaunchained.blogspot.com)
• Tunisia, Ivory Coast fire up opposition in Gabon (reuters.com)
• Protesters clash with police in Gabon (cbc.ca)

Political Entrepreneurs vs Entrepreneurs who Create

Over at TechDirt:

While entrepreneurs are out there busting their humps, making something cheaper, expanding its usage, increasing productivity, fending off fierce competition, and hoping to turn a profit along the way, there are those who, through the stroke of a pen, make a killing doing absolutely nothing of value. These "political entrepreneurs" leverage their political power to own something and then overcharge or tax the crap out of the rest of us to use it. Political power instead of competition.
Carlos Slim Helu comes to mind who briefly passed Bill Gates in 2007 and 2010 to become the richest man in the word. He controls 90% of the phone lines in Mexico and 80% of cellular customers. He didn't invent anything. He doesn't drive down prices. There is little innovation. And why should there be? He is milking this franchise for all it's worth.

More here

Voices of Uganda

Independent Global Citizen reports:

photo courtesy of voice of Uganda

In many emerging democracies, election violence has become a familiar occurrence to citizens choosing leadership. The violence, sometimes justified, is usually due to the grievances of unfair processes during the election period compounded with other real or perceived violations that have accumulated over time...Voices of Uganda is an initiative conceived by Ugandan photographer Andrew Agaba to create a peaceful dialogue between the citizens of Uganda leading up to the election. It is not intended as a promotional campaign for any particular presidential candidate. It was simply designed to generate meaningful discussion and debate in Uganda regarding the issues that its citizens wish to address with their leaders and fellow citizens.

More here

Taking the Stage in London

The prominence of theatrical work derived from the continent continues,Reuters reports:

Lynn Nottage courtesy of Reuters

Africa is providing a lot of fine material for the London theatre these days.A rare outing for Wole Soyinka’s Death and the King’s Horseman was a highlight at the National last year. This was followed, also at the National, by Matt Charman’s The Observer, which unpicked preparations for an election in an unnamed African nation.More recently, Lynn Nottage’s excellent Ruined, which dealt with tough themes relating to women’s lives in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has just finished an acclaimed run at the Almeida in Islington...[continue reading]

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Who is covering the Gabon uprising?

Ethan Zuckerman on news and what gets coverage:

Protest in Meyo-Kyé, a small city in northern Gabon, 2 February, 2011. The banner reads: “In Tunisia, Ben Ali left. In Gabon, Ali Ben out.” From Global Voices’s coverage of the Gabon protests

The danger of ignoring Gabon’s revolution isn’t just that opposition forces will be arrested or worse. It’s that we fail to understand the profound shifts underway across the world that change the nature of popular revolution. The wave of protests that swelled in Tunisia may not break just in the Arab world, but across a much larger swath of the planet. The brave actions of ordinary Tunisians didn’t just capture the imagination of subjugated people in the Arab world – they were an inspiration to disempowered people everywhere. Social media gives a voice not just to protesters in Sidi Bouzid and Alexandria, but in Libreville and Port-Gentil. And as audiences around the world watch in wonder as Christian and Muslim protesters pray together in Tahrir Square, they wonder why struggles in Gabon can’t command at least a fraction of this attention.

More here

Related articles

• UPDATE 1-Tunisia, Ivory Coast fire up opposition in Gabon (reuters.com)
• Gabon police tear gas protesters, tensions rise (reuters.com)
• Gabon opposition leader declares himself president (foxnews.com)
• Gabon politician seeks UN refuge (bbc.co.uk)
• Gabon opposition leader declares himself president (sfgate.com)

African Music Invades Indie Rock

The NYTimes reports:

Blk Jks Courtesy of Demonica Orozco

Everywhere you turn these days, it seems that the indie rock world is exploring African sounds. Labels like Dead Oceans, Secretly Canadian and True Panther have also begun releasing new recordings by African musicians, those acts have begun playing American gigs, and African music regularly gets attention on the indie-minded Web sites of Pitchfork, Mojo and The Fader...Part of the joy of discovery for such music fans is the sheer variety of styles to be found on a continent that has a billion people living in more than 50 countries and is the ancestral home of American genres like jazz and the blues. The South African quartet known as Blk Jks favors a heavy rock sound, at times reminiscent of King Crimson, while the music of the Good Ones, whose “Kigali Y’ Izahabu” has just been released on Dead Oceans, is simplicity itself: voices and unamplified guitars, singing and playing in tuneful harmony.

More here

No more excuses, let’s save Nigeria

In CP-Africa Chude Jideonwo (of enough is enough) on the need for change:

Our revolution does not have to be bloody if we all combine the clinking of champagne glasses with the rolling up of our sleeves. Find a way to get involved. Stop sitting in your house and complaining – do something, put your hands on the plough, add your quota. If you don’t know how to do your part then ask the many people doing real work, making real impact, adding real value, who actually understand the issues, understand the youths, and own that future. Ask us. There is no longer any excuse. It is no longer cool to be disinterested.All of us must work together and take active steps to safeguard this future in the NOW! We have no choice. We have no choice.

More here

Free African Media

"...With free, quality media and freedom of expression under attack from just about every corner of African reality, it becomes more and more obvious that a concentrated, Africa-wide effort is needed to help the fight. Free African Media aims to be just that. The publication will function as a platform dedicated to freedom of expression throughout the continent, as well to helping improve the overall quality of reporting, analysis and opinion Africa-wide..."-website

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Herbalism:Open Source medicine

Thierry Gagnon writing in Webstyle Mag:

Herbalism tends to be a low-key, low-cost medical solution. Because of this, herbalism is not a very lucrative business model compared to the pharmaceutical industry. This is in part why herbalism struggles to promote itself efficiently and fight the pressures applied from the closed-source world...Herbalism offers a simple, open, low-cost, accessible medical solution that is worth using and protecting. It’s one of humanity’s greatest treasures and heritages and should continue to be shared and practiced freely as we continue to reap the benefits of pharmaceutical medicine. At first glance, herbalism and software development would seem to be at opposite ends of the spectrum. In fact these people have a lot in common and would benefit from each other’s expertise.Herbalism ties into the values and vision behind the open-source ideology and definitely ties into the “self-reliance” and “community” aspects of its movement. The ability to grow, process and use natural ingredients with freely accessible medical knowledge applicable in every day life should be appealing to the mindset of open-source enthusiasts.

More here
via P2P foundation

Scientific Historians and Timbuktu

John H. Lienhard on the city of Timbuktu:

Image by Aluka Digital Library via Flickr

Today, this remote and impoverished city is rich in some 14,000 old books that've literally come out of its woodwork. Scientific historians who converge upon Timbuktu have only dented the task of translating the old science texts from Arabic and other less know languages. They find that Timbuktu's medieval and renaissance scholars followed a path separated from Europe.
Their astronomers didn't follow the European leap to a sun-centered solar system, but they sprang far ahead in the mathematics of calendar writing -- far ahead in trigonometry. The writings detail astronomic events six hundred years ago. Scholars, racing to translate this huge trove of literature, now wonder what these ancients knew of medicine, botany, chemistry and climatology. How did the knowledge of other regions flow through this glittering outpost? How much new science did it create?

More here

Buala “Giving Voice”

Global Voices speaks with the founders of Buala which is described as:

“An interdisciplinary web portal for reflection, critique and documenting contemporary Portuguese-speaking African cultures” is how Buala is introduced. In an interview with Global Voices, Buala’s creators Marta Lança and Francisca Bagulho discuss the grounds and justification for a space that grapples with culture, history, politics, the arts in general and the city – the space par excellence of “constant change,” the living stage for playing out contemporary culture..."

They perceive it as platform and:

a “place for long, in-depth articles that focus on serious, complex works that do not dispense with irony and with the urban cultures of African youth in the Diaspora that has much to say, with people who study Africa without historic blind folly and fantasy, who wish to contribute to reflections on (and with) the continent.”

More here

Ivory Coast, the war against civilians

In the FP an Open Letter:

The Gbagbo mafia is struggling first and foremost for power; for an exclusive hold on power, for the very enjoyment of power, with all its attendant material benefits. How, one might ask, can civilians freely and openly express dissent when the thugs of the outgoing regime exact merciless reprisals against anyone expressing overt opposition or who is even suspected of voting for the wrong candidate?

More here

Related articles

• Ivory Coast Gbagbo backers protest against African Union (reuters.com)
• Ivory Coast: civilians flee post-election chaos (guardian.co.uk)
• Shootings in Ivory Coast; AU mediator stays (ctv.ca)
• Gbagbo is pushing Ivory Coast to the brink of war (africaunchained.blogspot.com)

Africa's informal economy can boost innovation

Over SciDev Steve Daniels writes:

For half a century, science and technology (S&T) have promised to bring prosperity to Sub-Saharan Africa, but little progress has been made. This is in part because the African way of making and trading is largely informal, and Western industrialisation has failed to respect informality.

On traditional science parks:

Western science and economics can drive technological advances in the developing world but work better in a system where processes are formalised. What happens, for example, when governments or multilateral institutions introduce factories and corporate parks?
Not much. A factory might employ a dozen skilled workers, but the investment rarely trickles down to the 'indigenous' economy. And enterprises may only import raw materials and export the resulting goods, creating a closed loop with no links to domestic industry.

More here

Related articles

• Remittances to sub-Saharan Africa exceed US$21 billion (vanguardngr.com)
• Why Tunisia's winds of change aren't blowing south to sub-Saharan Africa (csmonitor.com)

'Dynsaty-sation' of Africa's Democracies and Autocracies

In ImageNations:

When Gnassingbé Eyadéma (of Togo) died, a constitutional coup took place and his son Faure became the president. There was a lot of hullabaloo about the whole situation because the military prevented the speaker, who is to become the president, from entering the country, parliament gathered, made Faure the speaker and subsequently the president. The AU bared their infant teeth and spoke against it. An election was organised and Faure became the president; from father to son.

More here

The "As it Is!" Contemporary Art Exhibition

The National  Dubai reports on the Mojo Gallery "As it Is" show curated by Annabelle Nwankwo-Mu'azu.

Not For Export – Blacksmiths by Uche James Iroha

...a four-part exhibition that draws in some of Africa's most dynamic artists working today... At its root, this series of shows, running monthly until then, may only tease at the breadth of expression coming out of the continent, but it does offer an inroad to a scene that can often appear too vast and diverse to penetrate for newcomers...[continue reading]

.

Related articles

• Global Africa Project contd (africaunchained.blogspot.com)
• African Christmas Decorations from the African Art Centre (awesomesa.co.za)
• Senegalese artist Viyé Diba At Columbia (harlemworldblog.wordpress.com)

A Former "Lost Boy" Turns Entrepreneur

Fast Company profiles Nico Ajak Bior:

"My idea is to start vegetable farming through the use of greenhouses in Juba and my hometown of Bior in Jonglei state," Bior tells Fast Company. "This was inspired by the lack of fresh vegetables in my country--currently Southern Sudan imports all the vegetables and fruit from neighbouring countries and this makes it expensive for the local population to get them. I'm determined to make vegetables available throughout most parts of Sudan in the next few years."

On what equipped him:

Last year he participated in a fellow Lost Boy's startup incubator program, New Scholars, and has since been nurturing his vision of kick-starting a local farming and vegetable industry in South Sudan, as decades of civil war destroyed what industry thrived prior to the war. And now that the referendum has finally taken place, his vision is set to become reality.

More here

Related articles

• South Sudan sees overwhelming yes vote in independence referendum (guardian.co.uk)
• 'What Is The What' Lost Boy Casts Sudan Vote - NPR (news.google.com)
• 'I'm ready to go back': South Sudan exiles cast ballots - Globe and Mail (news.google.com)
• Sudan statement - Obama praises Sudan on referendum (politico.com)

Africans and Revolutions

Events in the Maghreb and Middle East are focusing attention on similarly moribund regimes and ruling classes south of the Sahara.We start with Akin who contends that "We are not suited for the usual revolutions":

Nigeria is by no means ripe for a revolution, there are no components in place to make it the success we desire with blind optimism, we can do well to educate ourselves, participate fully in the democratic process we have, deign to hold the elected accountable and become better and coherent activists that demand positive action or expect the said leaders to resign in disgrace.

Over to the CS Monitor where they pose the question "Why Tunisia's winds of change aren't blowing south to sub-Saharan Africa?".Reasons given include,weakness of civil society:

“In the absence of strong class identities, many African oppositions fail,” says Professor Mbembe of Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg. “If people identified as dispossessed and poor, then of course the majority would rebel against many nations of Africa. But people identify with ethnic affiliation, and so they remain quiet, or they rebel on a smaller scale and are easily dealt with.”

While over at 3QuarksDaily Robert P. Bair titles his post "TUNISIA, EGYPT, UGANDA?". Drawing upon a thread that paints a different picture to the seemingly placid societal dynamics in that east African country:

Andrew Mwenda and Charles Onyango-Obbo, two respected political commentators here, have both suggested that Museveni has already constructed the same kind of economic-demographic trap that brought down Ben Ali. They argue that too many educated youth, not enough jobs, and an environment of thoroughgoing corruption have set the stage for a revolutionary aggregate of dissatisfaction.

Africa's youth bulge

The primed powder keg that just exploded in the MENA region had an attribute that a good portion of Africa shares,a rapidly urbanizing, growing, increasingly educated and restive youth bulge.Furthermore this largely under/unemployed population is experiencing one of the fastest mobile communication growth rates in the world.In other words they arent as isolated from the news as some would like to think.Add these points up plus the fact that up until Tunisia and Egypt, passivity and apathy were considered unique to Arabic speaking countries. One would hope that for the sake of misgoverned African populations those perceiving innate inertness are wrong again.
Update: The Arab to Africa revolt meme continues with Tristan McConnell's piece "African leaders are warily watching Egypt"
Update 2 World bank "Africa has the largest share of young people" invest in them or reap the whirlwind:

Update 3 Meanwhile inhabiting a parallel universe "Far from revolts, African leaders talk shared values"
Update 4 Why Some African leaders are smiling at the storm in North Africa
Update 5 Young Sudanese Start Protest Movement
Update 5 Gabon: The Invisible Revolt
Update 6 A revolution is Coming-The Book
Update 7 Now that Egypt's Mubarak is out, could Gabon's Bongo be next?