30 000 Students Marching On the Streets of London & the Protests Have Been Reduced to These Images?

Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state

- Noam Chomsky

Old Song. New Video

This is a track by Comrade Fatso and Outspoken ft Chabvondoka which came out over a year ago and last month the official video was released. I posted the live version of this video some months ago ( iCan't hyperlink) and I still prefer it to this one. This is more sanitized and clean whereas the other one was much more potent because it was live, but still this is a nice video, some cool graphix. I don't know why the Shona translations are wrong - maybe not wholly wrong but they are incorrect in several places, these are just a few: hapana chakanaka means there is nothing good and toonana kuma streets means we'll meet in the streets, at 1:29 ivovanoenda kustars isusu tino atengesa means they go to stars (the night club) and we sell them (a play on the club name and the poor selling stars). Not nitpicking but #justsaying.

If you would like to know more about these guys checkout www.comradefatso.com. 

Zuma and the World Bank

S.A comedian Trevor Noah kills it! This was filmed earlier this year, but I only saw it few weeks ago so for those who haven't seen it, get your giggles on. 

For those who don't understand the Zulu/Ndebele:

at 1:19 did you give it to me in my hand?

at 1:27 you're crazy, I'll beat you up French! I'll beat you do you hear me?

at 1:37 hey Julius [Malema] bring my machine, bring it.

Copyright Ghensel, www.ghensel.preposterous.com

Worth A Thousand Words

Boy, Haiti: Haiti is a tragic place in need of help. This image was taken before the recent earthquake. I hope this young boy was unharmed, although I can't help feeling that his life may be full of struggle

Mursi Woman and child, Ethiopia: It is traditional with the Mursi tribe for women to insert a clay dish in the lower lip from an early age. Around six to 12 months before marriage, the woman's lip is pierced by one of her kinswomen, usually at around the age of 15 to 18

Hamer girl in the Omo Valley, Ethiopia: I spent three weeks journeying through Ethiopia to record the faces if its various tribes

Maasai bride, Kenya: I stumbled across this young bride while photographing a wildlife story in the Amboseli National Park. This was a brief moment of calm reflection before the ceremony

Sacred Waterfall, India: Local people flock to stand beneath this sacred waterfall in Kerala. I love the serenity of these women lost in thought

From the series:  Travelling Light: an exhibition of recent works by Philip Lee Harvey showcased in London earlier this year.

All jacked from The Graun. 

Dear ...

...from Saul Williams

Dear ....

As the media sways between reporting on the huge disservice Julian Assange has done to government secrecy and posting the secrets, as Interpol tries it's hardest to track him, as the American government places him on the top of their most wanted list, and as the barefoot bandit sits alone in a cell awaiting trial- I would like to take a moment to admit that these guys are pretty much heroes in my book... and I don't think I'm alone. The hacker is the digital dignitary of the i-generation. These are the same guys I seek out to help me burn hard to find dvds onto my hardrive, the same guys who help me get music off of my ipod and into my itunes. They save me from waiting lists and long lines at the genius bar and overpriced software, they help me replace lost and mistakenly deleted files, and if I had the savvy they did, if I could prove that the government was lying about the number of civilian casualties during a seven year war that I thought was wrong from the start, if I could help make this “Age of Transparency” a bit more transparent, I would gladly play my part. I'm not an anarchist. I shy away from most labels, yet register as a democrat when it means I can vote for someone I believe in. I've got my own set of contradictions. I'm also a musician and know damn well that I wouldn't like someone breaking into my computer and leaking my music before I decided it was time. But I have also celebrated the fact that I could now give away music for free by doing just that. And that freedom is the result of the hard work of people I do not know: programmers, engineers, fellow makers and creators, artists of the wire who dabble between worlds and understand codes where I see chaos. I respect them. Those that can capitalize on it and use it to their advantage are the pioneers of our time and those that would use it for the greater benefit of humanity, are the heroes.

Most of my heroes have been arrested. Many have stood on the wrong side of the law. And the law has not always stood for truth. The law has stood for control, dominance, and sometimes even manipulation. Law, at it's best, has served to protect. Yet it has also served as a means of restricting growth and has not always seemed to change at the rate of human consciousness. Some laws have some catching up to do. So do some governments. So do some people. And I'm sure that in some regards I am also one of those people. If I was in the military and believed I was protecting and serving my country by fighting in a war and some hacker gave away the correspondents to our barracks or fire-power, I imagine, I'd be pretty upset. Yet, I find it hard to be upset when I think the best support for our troops would be sending them home and enlisting them in college. If you want to help rebuild the infrastructure of a country send engineers, send teachers, build hospitals (no preachers).

But I digress. And who says I understand how to fight disingenuous governance, poverty or hate? I'm just saying I understand the importance of counterculture, of those who prefer boom over pop. Hardcore. Underground. The ones who dare to question and expose, who put their lives at risk, like soldiers fastened to their beliefs, but who fight alone or in small packs of the daring and courageous, Those who stand up and speak out even when the masses seem apathetically addicted to the status quo, which is probably good for business. And I'm not anti-good business. I'm just for new business models. And new fashion models, while you're at it. They don't have to be so skinny!

But the reason that I'm writing you Santa is because Kanye already rocked a red suit, I wanted to suggest a yellow cape, something with fringes, maybe a few feathers or ornaments. It's not like you have any connection to Jesus so you might as well change your shit up and get on some newness. The way I see it, you're another one of them do-gooders. You give kids something fun to dream about while we adults scramble the meaning of things. Things like the meaning of power, or the role of responsibility within it. Things like the power of the imagination and the beauty that can come about when you engage it. Anyway, it's nice to have someone to write to sometimes and I thought you might like a letter that wasn't asking you for anything. Do your thing, big guy, my son is counting on you.

My love to the Mrs.

xxx

shamelessly jacked from Saul Williams' Facebook Notes

4 December 2010.

99 Lines For Hillary's Spies

I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.
I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats. I must not spy on other diplomats.

'Pappa Wag Vir Jou'

I came across this anti-drunk driving advert yesterday while browsing the
Mail and Guardian pages and was a little amused on seeing this and wondered whether the advertisting had gone all fashionably retro and decided to put on it's 1980s apartheid garb. Didn't brandhouse get the memo??? Race stereotypes of fierce Black and Coloured men does not mean fierce as in stylish or hard used in the lingo of 2010. Go back to the drawing board guys, you've utterly failed at conveying what could have been a good message by basically saying White men don't go to jail because there are big Black men and Coloured gangsters all tatted up n toothless waiting for you.  From the  first Black man saying  "These hands will NEVER let you go in English to the last man saying "Pappa wag vir jou" (Daddy is waiting for you) in Afrikaans, it is evident that this advert is playing on body, language and identity and race stereotypes. On language English translates to master's language, civilized tongue and the switch to Afrikaans act as the oppositional 'other' lingua franca - a bastard, uncivilized tongue spoken by Coloureds, one of the common stereotypes about Afrikaans particularly in the Western Cape with it's history as the 'language of brutality' in tow.

 In addition, on race and sex/homophobic stereotypes this advert is wrong - there's something uncomfortable about a Public Service Announcement saying 'don't go drinking and driving or you'll get raped in jail' as though either all prisoners in jail were the raped or the rapists and those doing the raping were men of colour as suggested by those playing the role of prisoner in this advert as well as that homosexual prisoners are rapists. It also implies that  the image of jail rape can be peddled at the expense of some of those who are forced/choose to be homosexuals in prison as a means of survival.
While most S.A prisons are in and of themselves inhumane places because of the poor conditions, it does not naturally follow that all prison inhabitants are savages who ravage every fresh bum upon it's arrival in the cells. If the fear of being raped in jail  is supposed to act as a deterrent, are we also subliminally being told that rape in jail will not be acted on? That it is a natural consequence of going to jail? There's got to be an extension of that section of the narrative, even if it were just a phrase, because as it stands it suggests that in addition to a jail term, anal rape by big Black and Coloured men is the state-perceived discipline drunk drivers will suffer. And what happens to Blacks, Coloureds and Asians (yea they forgot to throw that stereotype in the mix (curry anyone?)) who are arrested on the same charge? They become the rapists, eh? 

Uh, huh. *SMH*

P.S Apart from the excellent M&G article linked above, also read Africas A Country's
 (link to come later, sorry tech issues, please Google it or ask me 4 link)
brilliant take on it, I just realised they did a li'l crit too - more on race than sexuality.

postcard from gaza...

Jabalia, Gaza: Palestinian children peek from windows 

to watch the funeral procession of militant Jalal Nasr

FotoCred: Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images

Zanele Muholi: I Am Just Doing My Job

When multimillionaire businessmen like Kenny Kunene spend hundreds of thousands of rands on lavish birthday parties, where sushi is served from the half-naked torsos of compliant (and hopefully well-paid) models, they would probably expect criticism, and this is just what South African artist, Zanele Muholi (pictured lying on the table) has done.  The self portrait shows Muholi laid out on a table, representing one of the models at the party, while two women eat boerewors and offal off her naked torso. It is titled "I am just doing my job,"  after the response given by one of the models (and sushi servers) when asked what she thought about the whole event. In a macabre twist, the meat is placed on Muholi's body in such a way that it seems the women are eating her internal organs. 

This exhibition will be shown at the Michael Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town, S.A. as from Thursday 3 December 2010.

jacked from mg.co.za

foto credit: Robert Hamblin

Lhola Amira: The Harlot's Feet

Lhola Amira is one of the most in demand high end call girls in the country. She has a uniquely intimate perspective on the state of the nation given her select client base (including a host of government officials, a Provincial MEC, business leaders, and one or two key players in the tri-partite alliance). She writes exclusively for Mahala. These are her thoughts.

The jury's still out on whether Lhola's real or not, but Mahala swear she is. This is her second piece and I like this better than her first, so I jacked it without permission, coz Mahala's cool like that. 

FotoCred: Lhola Amira/Mahala  

Jesus is my first encounter with a socialist revolutionaire, but his bible troubles me – it rejects me completely. As a woman, a black person. At least he washed the harlot’s feet. He washed her feet. Which kills me. Naturally I inspect history.

The condition of blackness is serious. Post-1994 has changed nothing for most of us.
This is where I am at: lynched. I’m in a dire space, the illusion of the Rainbow Nation has dissolved. The truth is painful. Out of black suffering I’m at black depression.

The burden of womanhood. The intensity of being black. The mirror lies to me and says, “you’re fine, Lhola, everything is fine.” I walk streets and hear them echo, “no need for your volatile blackness here!” My anger mutates. I seek solace in books at home alone about ‘revolutionary men’. Can they free me from the echoes?

I write my own way out. On hotel stationary. When he’s washing up. When he’s done. These after moments in hotel rooms. These songs of myself. His money in my hands.

My body is written by unknown authors
My limbs are parted by faceless men.
My thighs are gutted ghetto streets.
What more can you take from me?
You pollute my insides. Yet you scramble for me still,
Drawing lines like veins.

Can the revolution still-to-come save me? When my own black skin yearns for whiteness. How weird is that? How sad. Would that ease the pain? Was Fanon right? Was Biko? Is our contemporary Black Wash working? Illusions of whiteness. So many traps. But I’ll write my way out. On hotel stationary. When he’s washing up. When he’s done. These songs of myself. His money in my hands.

I’m the dark cannibalistic sister
Of your fever dreams, your Tarzan dreams.
I am the slave, cotton weaving the modern age.
Made from the core of a universe. I’m black.
Even my words are not my own. In your tongue.
I am a coconut. I’m waiting to evolve. Waiting to take on my white self.
But my black body denies me.
Lynched, my feet dangle, swaying, after this beautiful violence.
My womb sings its painful symphony
My womb’s a commodity
And my eyes look upon your whiteness John, trick, stud
And I smile with dry lips dry, cracked lips that say
Am I white yet? Have I suffered enough?

This is it. Tomorrow I stop. No more. I’ll awaken and wash my own feet. But right now I’m in-between spaces where nothing exists. Until he comes back for more.

Coming Soon to a Cinema Near You, The Christmas Tree Bomber

...And this time the leading star is a Huey Freeman (Boondocks) look-alike and he's a cutie! That was my first thought when I saw Mohamed Osman Mohamud's face headlining as the latest casualty of the West's war against terrorist bombers. While this latest production may not be not quite as funny as the Underpants bomber but it does stink.

 The U.S Feds followed this Somali hottie for months and they put him in jail??? They were undecided whether he fit the profile of a would-be terrorist so they baited him by selling him fake explosives. Is that fair, why didn't they just call me? I'd've been happy to stalk him for a year and suss out his terrorist street cred. 

But really tho' is it legitimate to provoke someone into action then arrest them when they act? Isn't this what the Feds used to do to the Black Panthers way back when? And COINTELPRO still does today? Mohamed was charged with attempted use of a 'weapon of mass destruction.' (notice the way Saddam/Iraq war type language slips into domestic security lexicon to create a threat-of-terrorism-is-very-real effect) Surely that bogus bogus bogus charge should read: attempted use of a dummy 'weapon of mass destruction'?

Having been successful in their mission the Feds were close at hand to drum the reality of the fake threat into the public's head as Special FBI agent Arthur Balizan told the press yesterday: 

"The threat was very real. Our investigation shows that Mohamed Osman Mohamud was absolutely committed to carrying out an attack on a very grand scale. I want to reassure the people of this community that, at every turn, we denied him the ability to actually carry out the attack"

While the Feds pat themselves on the back and the public gets all shook up about this latest Al Qaeda threat and bay for Mohamed's execution on live t.v, I'm still confused as to what opportunity exactly, the Feds were denying this man. Selling ineffective explosives to a wannabe jihadi rapper and fitness guru is a very, very cruel joke, especially when that state-managed joke carries a possible life imprisonment conviction. Do The Feds really get their kicks from playing tircks on youngsters in uneventful Oregon and Dallas, are the ones in Washington or NYC too street-wise to fall for this? 

At least the Times Square and Underpants bombers had intent to carry out workable plans, but they failed - but this dude was possibly unstable and he was tricked. I'm not so sure where trickery rates on the jihadist scale but sending Mohamed to prison may actually radicalise him and turn him against the state even more than he is now as a African immigrant and a Muslim - not exactly the most liked group in American society. But that's a just a small issue right? The important thing is this year the Feds have done a cracking job and arrested almost twenty would-be terrorists in the U.S, now TSA can happily roll out naked scanners at airports, malls, schools and office buildings to catch even more would-be terrorists - real or imagined, catch them in the terror, boys! As with all American cop movies, the Feds win in The Christmas Tree Bomber, and nobody, least of all the lapdog media, seem to mind that federal attempts at terrorist' honeytrapping mean the further curtailment of civil liberties, more mass disruption of public travel, encourages richter-scale levels of Islamophobia and justifies sending more troops to kill or be killed.

....one small step in Oregon, one giant step closer to war on Yemen.

p.s All bets are on for Obama issuing an amended waiver on the use of child soldiers in Somalia to fight terrorism by January.

Scenes From Another Day

Whitehall Mounted Charging

Guardian Video

Well done to all the students who turned out for this! If school children in South Africa were willing to fight for their futures there is no reason why people are outraged that on Wednesday, school children and university students all over the UK, left their classrooms to march for their own futures. The protests in the UK in 2010 are nothing compared to what Black students in South Africa faced in 1976, there were no live rounds being fired, no country exile orders to be issued, but as the videos show, there were pigs on horseback blindly charging through the crowds one knocking over a pregnant woman, another grabbing  a protester's purse and many more pigs on horseback leaving hoof prints on the bodies of students. Personally have no problem with 13 years olds being involved in protest, what I do have a problem with is the disproportionate use of force by the police in response to the protests and that is what people should be talking about, not that children were 'coerced' into marching for their education. 
Up top is the footage that police commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson wants to deny stating there was 'no record' of police charging and defended the police's actions saying:"I think our officiers did an extraordinarily good job yesterday... Our job is to facilitate peaceful protests But we have to get the message out that when it does beyond the peaceful that it is criminal. It is quite clear that criminal acts took place." 
Note that 'facilitate peaceful protests' actually means kettle (containment of groups of people using iron barriers) young people for nine and a half hours in the freezing cold without food or water. Also note that the police policy of kettling is meant to be under review after the G20 protests of April 2009 in which Ian Tomlinson was killed by the police.
It couldn't have been more ironic, yet fitting that this march took place the day after Deputy PM, Nick Clegg gave the Hugo Young Lecture in which he said:
"Hugo was a passionate believer that open politics, a politics based on faith in people, rather than institutions, was the generator of real social progress. I agree, and I think that among the many extraordinary changes of 2010, one of the most important will prove to be a watershed in the development of progressive politics."
Progressive politics to Mr Clegg means being deceitful, like in April this year when he signed a pledge not to raise student fees yet in his heart he knew, he and the Lib Dems had long abandoned that promise and it had become a campaign strategy to garner the student vote. Nothing more.
 Thus it comes as no surprise that those who voted for Clegg, turned out in their thousands on Wednesday to express their discontent, burning effigies of the man and chanting against Clegg, Osbourne and Cameron's ideas of cuts for a Fairer Britain. 
The truth is, the UK has a government bent on creating an unFairer Britain. In my view, ConDem have a skewed approach to fairness and a twisted sense of priorities: they are making cuts to education, but they can find £2 million to fund a happiness index, they can find £4.2 million per year to send young people to the killing fields of Afghanistan, they will find £20 billion+ to keep Trident, but they can cut university funding, free school meals and educational allowances, they can do away with the Foods Standards Agency, but they invite Pepsi and McDonalds to sit on the health policy panel - the same companies that sell profit from an unhealthy nation are now the architects of healthy eating. ??? None of these things make sense and the students and trade unions can at least be commended for having the moral and political courage to show people will not sit back any longer. 

Welcome to the Winter of Discontent people of Britain, it's about to get heated up. 
#demo2010

The Most Beautiful, The Most Moving, The Most Truthful, The Most Relevant Video of All Time for All Young People Everywhere

fisttap africasacountry

This video is truth. Accept no substitutes. It is a truth that applies to every single person out there, not just in Kenya but in every country in the world. The more apathetic and indifferent we are as tenant citizens, waiting for freedom to fall as manna from the heavens, the more leaders will abuse power and steal from the country in any way they can whether it's bad investments (Iceland), overspending (Ireland), cooking the books (Greece), containing people within a small territory (Israel), clan wars (Somalia), imprisoning the most number of young people in the world (America), fighting illegal wars (NATO), interfering with broadcasting services and scrambling messages (Argentina, China) or imperialistically funding military ventures while public health services and education grants are cut (UK). All of these actions impact on us, and this video touches on how how our inaction, as tomorrow's generation of leaders allows evil to continue. Although this video was made by young Kenyans to encourage other young Kenyans to vote, the genius of this message is that it is universal and it is timeless. It is not only about putting or not putting an 'x' on a piece of paper, it's about actively taking responsibility for the future, particularly for apathetic educated, younger generation who see politics as nothing to do with them or are so disillusioned with the state of things that they don't care any more. 
#deathtoapathy
#deathtorunningaway
#deathtoarmchairpolitics

From Kuweni Serious:

Featuring a random sampling of Kenyans. Directed by Mbithi Masya and Jim Chuchu for Kuweni Serious. Edited by Mbithi Masya. Narration by Bill Sellanga, words and music by Jim Chuchu.

There is a difference between the one who rents a house, and the one who owns a house. The one who rents a house doesn’t care if the walls crack and crumble, they can always move to another house.

The one who owns a house knows that no one else will take care of it, thus they paint the walls and mend the cracks. More than 60% of Kenya’s population consists of young men and women like us.

The problem is that we behave like tenants of Kenya. We have let the older generation tear this country apart. We have let them use us to fight their battles. We have let them loot this country. We have let them fool us into thinking that we’re not fit to run this country ourselves.

So we hide in our alcohol, in our religions and on the Internet as if there is some other Kenya out there that we shall move to when this one crumbles. We sit at home and wait for others to fight for us on the streets.

We want green cards instead of voter’s cards. We are angry, but we are too scared to do anything about it. It is not Obama’s job to save this country. It is not the donors’ job, and the government has shown that it is not their job, either. Responsibility is not shared, it is earned.

Freedom is not given, it is taken. When we decide we want freedom, we will have to get it ourselves.

Because if this country burns, we burn with it.

Limbe, Haiti: The body of a woman who died from cholera lies on the ground next to a man receiving treatment at a local hospital 

Foto Cred: Emilio Morenatti/AP

postcard from gateshead...

Gateshead, UK: Snow covers trees near the Angel of the North statue after the earliest significant snowfall to hit the UK since 1993

Foto Credit: Scott Heppell/AP

Zuma's Bastard: Encounters With a Desktop Terrorist

Azad Essa is a journalist, columnist and aspiring filmmaker and Zuma's Bastard is his debut novel. Originally from Durban, he is currently based in Doha, Qatar where he works for Al Jazeera as a journalist. Zuma's Bastard is based on the politics of South Africa and the World in the post-Mandela era. 

With chapters like  ‘Was Eugene Terre Blanche a Muslim?’, ‘Blue Julius (and Pink Floyd), ‘Let’s jerk off to Climate Change’ and ‘Nobel Obama Trumps Superman’, no political figure is safe from his satire, even if they dip in their walk. Part of his writing is from the Thought Leader blog run by the Mail and Guardian and his column provides a platform upon which he unrelentingly questions populist rhetoric and asks, at times provocatively, South Africans how bad does it get before we sit up and take notice? As Ferial Haffajee puts it, Essa is of a “generation of South Africans who reached political maturity in the era of Polokwane – the quintessential voice of the Born Frees”

Describing the book, Professor Ari Sitas Head of Sociology at UCT writes:

‘Zuma's Bastard is the new generation's arrogant and self-critical voice about Durban, South Africa and Africa in the world. Azad Essa, a Bollywood-soaked, Indian-battered, black South African-tinged, accidental academic and incidental journalist - who has seen India and Kashmir, India better, in Kashmir, Pakistan, the so-called Middle East and Europe - leaves no holy cows untaunted – nay he even imagines them as beefburgers…His popularity is catching but the moral questions he asks of us cannot be sidestepped. Read this book, buy the T-shirt, be with it and get angry because the author takes his jokes (often us) seriously.’

In an interview with the Daily Maverick he explains his choice of title as thus:

The title is not completely legitimate, but there’s good justification for it. Without giving too much away, the book is made up of two headers: “Zuma’s Bastard” and “Encounters with a desktop terrorist”. They are equally important because they collectively introduce readers to the central theme of the book: a rabid Indian bastard on the loose under Zuma’s watch.

I don’t know what it means to fight for freedom. And in many ways, the title locates me as a child of the Zuma presidency. I was too young during the honeymoon Mandela period to engage in the new democracy and so it doesn’t count. Zuma, touted as the man to lead us away from tendered one-night stands and deliver on promises to the people, capital and who-ever-else he conned, has created a nation of bastards, trying to make sense of it all.

At the same time, I have straight hair, “Indian” skin and go to mosque; I am a desktop terrorist with views of the world that are politically incorrect, sometimes blasphemous and incongruent with the good Indian muslim boy who must open a shop, play the system, marry a virgin and look forward to more in heaven.

If anything, the book is about the coming-of-age of a generation of South Africans who want to finally fight for their freedom.

The book is definitely not anti-Zuma, despite the flattering title. That would be far too easy. The book, like the blog, addresses a variety of themes relevant to South Africans, the usual suspects included, but written from a fresh and humorous perspective. It’s a bludgeoning view of the world from an Indian perspective. And my cousins aren’t going to be thrilled.

Of course the title is meant to create a stir, but we also think it’s the character of the writing (rather than a shocking title for kicks). And about the press material; they probably sent you the polite version.

This book is available in South Africa and will shortly be released in other parts of the world.

Breakdance Uganda

BOUNCING CATS film trailer from nabil elderkin on Vimeo.

Bouncing Cats is the inspiring story of one man’s attempt to create a better life for the children of Uganda using the unlikely tool of hip-hop with a focus on b-boy culture and breakdance. In 2006, Abraham “Abramz” Tekya, a Ugandan b-boy and A.I.D.S. orphan created Breakdance Project Uganda (B.P.U.). The dream was to establish a free workshop that would empower, rehabilitate and heal the community by teaching youth about b-boy culture. Based in Kampala, Uganda, B.P.U. has recently expanded to include permanent classes in Gulu, Northern Uganda. Abramz teaches classes three times a week to more than 300 kids from all parts of the country. Many of the children are homeless, victims of war and poverty, and few can afford proper schooling yet they walk from miles away to attend the B.P.U. classes. As Abramz says, "This is where many people’s pride is. It’s a skill that no one can take away from us."

Read more at The Liberator

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Breakdance Project Uganda (BPU) started in February 2006 out of the belief that hip hop can be used as a tool to engage and empower disadvantaged youth in Kampala and other areas of Uganda. Its mission is to engage young people in elements of the hip hop culture to build leadership skills and promote social responsibility. The Project has attracted people from every walk of life and acts as a catalyst for building mutually beneficial relationships between people of different social status across Uganda and the rest of the world. It serves to teach people breakdancing and how to pass on those skills to others, as well as promoting leadership skills, social responsibility and positive change to members and local communities.

Read more at Bouncing Cats.

From Our Kenyan Brother in The White House

The White House

Office of the Press Secretary

For Immediate Release

October 25, 2010

Presidential Memorandum--Child Soldiers Prevention Act

Presidential Determination
No.       2011-4

MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF STATE

SUBJECT:    Presidential Determination with Respect to Section 404(c) of the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2008

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, pursuant to section 404(c) of the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2008 (CSPA), title IV of the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 (Public Law 110 457), I hereby determine that it is in the national interest of the United States to waive the application to Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, and Yemen of the prohibition in section 404(a) of the CSPA.

You are authorized and directed to submit this determination to the Congress, along with the accompanying memorandum of justification, and to publish it in the Federal Register.

                        BARACK OBAMA

The above is waiver issued by President Obama casting a blind eye to four countries that use child soldiers in conflict because it is in America's 'national interest'. Chad, Yemen, Sudan and the Congo will continue to receive military assistance and aid from the U.S because these are allegedly terrorist hotspots where child soldiers might benefit America as snitches and such. LOL. Seriously, my Kenyan brother Barack WTF is this? Because America is fighting some imaginary war against terrorism and has taken it upon itself to 'reform' the armies of these troubled nations, it's now okay to encourage the military conscription of children. Really??? Where is the evidence showing that child soldiers are a neccessary force in fighting 'terrorism' directly linked to the U.S?  If people in the UK are unneccessarily shrieking over children being involved in student protests what makes it okay for children in the Congo to be forcefully drafted as soldiers? Would it be okay if kids from Texas or Ohio or California were drafted into an anti-terrorist army to snuff out Osama bin Laden from his cave - that is if bin Laden actually exists? Would that be alright Mr President?

Whilst I stand firmly against U.S sanctions against any nation and am highly critical of U.S 'military dictatorship assistance' to other nations, the logic for issuing this waiver on child soldiers is downright ridiculous. It is never okay for young boys to be conscripted to fight or for young girls  to be drafted in as fighters, bait or sex pleasures for the older soldiers. Barack Hussein Obama (insert all totemic titles, family lineages and praise names here), adults start wars, not children and it is governments like yours and the dysfunctional, power hungry leaders in conflict countries that create situations like this. Sod national interest, this is a selfish, heartless move that reflects yet again the U.S's two-faced attitude on children's rights. While there are U.S-inititated global policies to help combat child poverty, the U.S has not ratified human rights protocols like the Convention on the Rights of the Child - only Somalia and the U.S have not ratified this treaty. While it can legitimately be said that Somalia has no functioning government, the U.S does have a government and as a state, boldly proclaims itself as 'the home of the free and the brave', so what gives? 

Somalia is one of the countries not on the US waiver list, but both the U.S and Somalia refuse to ratify the same international law. Under the Child Soldier Prevention law Somalia which currently receives help, will no longer get assistance, while the U.S continues to support and fund Ethiopian invasions into Somalia that have left over 300 000 homeless refugees in the past.  Cue Crickets at their loudest. (KMT) OTOH Burma, receives no military aid from the U.S so the law does not make iota of difference, so the Child Soldier Prevention law is ineffective.  A very roundabout laughable way of doing things, isn't it? Obama would rather have just scrapped the whole thing instead of indulging in more lily livered bureaucracy and waste of tax payer funds. It might not be obvious to Obama, but its plain as day clear to me that stopping U.S aid will not stop child soldiers, neither is issuing waivers in the name of national interest effective in fighting 'terrorism', it's just more of the same ol' faffing from the U.S and this latest faff has our Nobel Peace Prize winning, Kenyan Brother in the White House's signature all over it. Change WE can believe in, yeh?