Dilip Simeon's blog

Only breaking at midday to refuel on peanuts and palm wine, the village works methodically as a unit to grow fonio – a precious grain crucial to their diets that only takes days to germinate and can be harvested in as little as six weeks. Though laborious, growing fonio, one of Africa’s oldest cultivated grains, is simple and reliable, say Kamara’s Bedik people. It grows naturally, they insist, where mainstream crops such as wheat and rice are harder to cultivate. It is also well adapted to the climate, nutritious, tastes good and can be stored far longer than other grains. “If you put in front of me some fonio and also something made of maize, I’ll push aside the other because the fonio is much healthier. There are no chemicals used; it just grows naturally and then we harvest it. We don’t add anything,” says Kamara... https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/jul/07/fonio-indigenous-crops-africa-food-security NORMAN MILLER: The forgotten foods that could excite our...

Two wealthy Indian-born business brothers who were allegedly at the centre of a massive web of state corruption in South Africa have been arrested in Dubai, Pretoria announced on Monday. The arrests came as an investigation was concluded into massive plundering of state institutions during former president Jacob Zuma ’s era. South Africa’s justice ministry “confirms that it has received information from law enforcement authorities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that fugitives of justice, namely, Rajesh and Atul Gupta have been arrested,” it said. The brothers are allegedly at the centre of a corruption scandal that dogged Zuma’s nine-year administration until 2018. They were accused of paying bribes in exchange for lucrative state contracts and influence over ministerial appointments.... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/06/gupta-brothers-arrested-in-dubai-over-alleged-corruption-in-south-africa Book Review: The Republic of Gupta - post-apartheid South Africa S...

The African continent is responsible for only 2–3% of the world’s  carbon dioxide emissions  from energy and industrial sources. But it’s alarmingly suffering from the effects of the climate crisis, as  reports  from the UN and  others  show. On the positive side, Africa has a huge potential for climate mitigation, especially thanks to its tropical rainforests. The  Congo Basin’s  rainforests in central Africa are sometimes called Earth’s  second lungs  (after the Amazon) because of its ability to store carbon. In addition to the forest trees, the basin has  the world’s largest tropical peatlands , discovered in 2017. Scientists estimate that these peatlands store carbon worth  about 20 years  of the fossil fuel emissions of the US. The Congo Basin is also rich in biodiversity and in minerals. As long as this strategically important and rich region is not destroyed, Africa can help  fight global climate change . T...

Early in the morning of 17 December 2004, I woke up to a phone call from a Western diplomat. She asked me what I had heard about Deyda Hydara, a journalist and a mutual friend. “No, I am just back from an overseas trip and I have not yet spoken to him,” I replied. “Anything the matter with him?” She just told me to find out and get back to her. I called Pap Saine, Deyda’s colleague and childhood friend. He said: “They shot him dead last night.” I jumped out of bed, hastily dressed and rushed to the mortuary at the Royal Victoria Teaching Hospital in Banjul where his body lay. Assembled there were several people – mainly journalists, his friends and family – nearly all confused as to who would kill such a friendly and peaceful soul, and why. At the time of his death, Deyda was managing editor of The Point, one of The Gambia’s leading independent daily newspapers, which he had founded on 16 December 1991 together with Pap Saine and Baboucarr Gaye. It was therefore on th...

It’s been 27 years since geologist David Roberts identified some of  the oldest footprints of our species ever discovered . The trackway of three footprints was found on the surface of a cemented sand dune (called an aeolianite) near Langebaan on South Africa’s west coast. The tracks were later dated to 117,000 years and were attributed to  Homo sapiens ; they became popularly known as “ Eve’s footprints ”. They were airlifted to Cape Town, where they are housed in the  Iziko South Africa Museum . A replica is on exhibit at the Geelbek Visitor Centre in the  West Coast National Park . There has been international debate since then about whether or not “Eve’s footprints” really were human tracks, due to their relatively poor level of preservation. No further fossilised human tracks have been discovered in the area since then – but a  recent find  by our research team, also near Langebaan, changes this.  These two tracks, discovered in what is today th...

Journalist, photographer, author and professor Howard W. French’s  Born in Blackness : Africa, Africans, and the Making of the Modern World, 1471 to the Second World War , is the most recent in a long career of thoughtful and significant literary and journalistic interventions. It demands an account of modernity that reckons with Africa as central to the making of the modern world. The book’s main aim, French explains early on, is to restore those key chapters which articulate Africa’s significance to our common narrative of modernity to their proper place of prominence. Reviewer:  Lauren van der Rede French intricately traces, from the early 15th century through the Second World War, the encounters between African and European civilisations. These, he argues, were motivated by Europe’s desire to trade with West Africa’s rich, Black  civilisations . These included the  Ghanaian  and  Malian  empires. The ancient West African region was perceived as an...

Tomdispatch.com   - If you are  neutral  in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality - Archbishop Desmond Tutu     The world lost a great moral leader this Christmas when Archbishop Desmond Tutu  passed away  at the age of 90. I had the honor of meeting him a few times as a child. I was raised by a family dedicated to doing the work of justice, grounded in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and also sacred texts and traditions. We hosted the archbishop on several occasions when he visited  Milwaukee  - both before the end of apartheid and after South Africa’s  Truth and Reconciliation Commission  was formed in 1996. In the wake of one visit, he sent a small postcard that my mom framed and placed on the bookcase near our front door. Every morning before sc...

In my first class on an archaeology course at Lund University in Sweden, I stood out more than usual. It was not just that it was full of blond and blue-eyed students, more than in any other class I had ever attended – it was that archaeology is not a field that many migrants study. My teacher and classmates were lovely, yet I still had this feeling of “What am I, a Somali refugee, doing here?” Furthermore, I had never even seen an archaeologist before, or held an archaeological object. But I had read a sentence in a book (Africa: history of a continent, by  Basil Davidson ) which said that to write African history we need to do archaeological research…. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jan/03/africa-humanity-heritage-archaeologist Dag Herbjørnsrud - The African Enlightenment Beginnings and Endings David Foster Wallace - This Is Water

The Arch is dead. Desmond Mpilo Tutu, archbishop emeritus of the Anglican church and Nobel Peace Prize winner who fought a long battle with cancer died on December 26 , 11 weeks after his 90Ath birthday.  His work within and after South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) reinforced his position as an international icon, alongside the likes of Gandhi, Martin Luther King and Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela. Yet, in 1995 when the idea of a TRC was being widely debated, Desmond Tutu was 64 and planning a quiet, devotional retirement.  He had achieved so much, often in extremely fraught circumstances, and had risen to the highest position in his church.  His campaigning against apartheid on the basis of peace and justice had also earned him the Nobel prize in 1984, the Albert Schweitzer prize for humanitarianism in 1986 and, a year later, the Roman Catholic Peace on Earth award. Time, he thought, as he neared 65, to take things a little easier, to read, write and c...

Desmond Tutu, the cleric and social activist who was a giant of the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, has died aged 90.  Desmond Tutu, giant in fight against apartheid South Africa, dies at 90 Desmond Tutu: A life in pictures Desmond Tutu, the first Black archbishop of Cape Town, South Africa, and who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for his efforts to end apartheid, has died at the age of 90.  In a statement confirming his death on Sunday, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa expressed his condolences to Tutu's family and friends, calling him "a patriot without equal." Tutu played a key role in South Africa's transition from the apartheid era, including serving as chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission at the direction of then-President Nelson Mandela.  In his later years, he remained active with the Desmond Tutu Peace Foundation and other organizations. ‘A patriot without equal’: world mourns after death of Desmond Tutu https://ww...

The advent of the Omicron variant has given us a glimpse of an alternative future in which, had the Sars-CoV-2 virus been initially identified in  Africa  in early 2020, the world would have maybe locked Africa away. There would have been no emergency funding for vaccine development, limited global attention, and Africa would have become known as the continent of Covid. We may never know the origins of Omicron, but there is now evidence that this variant was  circulating in the Netherlands  before it was officially identified in South Africa. African scientists’ superior level of pandemic preparedness is what has enabled the world to quickly respond to this new threat. However, the response has entailed the imposition of travel bans – shutting out southern African countries, as well as Nigeria and Egypt, who have now had to pay a heavy price in trade and tourism for identifying this variant in such an expeditious manner… https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/20...

NB : History has always been a battleground, for a s Orwell’s Big Brother reminds us: ' Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past' (1984). The search for the truth about the past is as difficult as it is inevitable. DS Had justice and the rule of law prevailed in South Africa in 1993, Frederick Willem de Klerk, the last apartheid president, would have been in jail and not flying to Oslo to be jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with Nelson Mandela. He, alongside a number of other ministerial securocrats, would have faced charges of mass. murder.  But 1993 was a time of compromises, of mutual back-scratching and the launch of the era of rainbow nation myths. Such myths are starting to wear thin, but continue to be promoted, under-standably by remnants of the old regime and, sadly, by senior figures in government and the ANC. The prime myth in this regard is that FW de Klerk was the individual responsible for bringing about the end of...

The events of recent weeks have once again highlighted the gross inequalities and the legacy of apartheid geography that remain South African realities.  They also revealed that the poison of ethnic nationalism continues to course through parts of the body politic. As a result, there are many lessons to be learned, some of which, although vital, will remain on the margins.  Because the loudest cry now is for a return to normalcy, to get back to life as it was, albeit with a few adjustments along the way.  But it was the very conditions that existed - the “normal” now apparently called for - that created the conditions for the death and destruction in KZN and Gauteng.  Yet an explosion of this kind - or even worse - was warned about by the labour movement in this column more than a decade ago. And, after all, regular, but largely isolated, incidents of burning tyres, barricades and looting have, for years, been part of daily life, not generally reported on ...

The political elite elected ostensibly to represent the majority, is effectively — and often all too obviously -  under the influence, if not direct control, of elements of the monied minority. It is a classic case of who pays the piper invariably calling the tune. If the “tune” - the policies and decisions affecting the majority  -is not under the control of the majority, then the system is not democratic. At best it should be regarded as a flawed form of of democracy. Terry Bell's Blog So how did this come about? South Africa’s colonial history, linked and influenced in large part by avaricious British imperialism and the so-called “Mother of Parliaments” in Westminster, provides an ethnically distorted example that is as good as any. As in Britain, all literate men of property initially qualified for the vote on a common voters’ roll, subsequently skewed on an ethnic/racial basis. In 1930, in the wake of an international women’s suffrage movement, women classified “white”...

How racism, the media and local realities could shape the future of migration between China and Africa    From the landmark  $200m African Union secretariat building  in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, which is the meeting place of African leaders, which was a gift in 2012, to the roads, airports, railways,  universities  and libraries , China’s visibility in Africa’s infrastructural landscape is clear.  Africa-China trade  galloped from around $10bn in early 2000 to $200bn in 2014, dropping slightly below $200bn in 2019.  Chinese investment in Africa  increased from around $75m in 2003 to $2.7bn in 2019.  Africa has also served as a market for Chinese manufacturing and as a source of raw materials, as well as providing political support in the UN – namely over Taiwan.  In fact, Africa-China relations have evolved from fringe contacts preceding the 1950s into a series of complex interactions that continues to attract both  optimist...

Many people got their first taste of South African dance music this year via six Angolans dancing in their backyard, dinner plates in hand. Their viral video, with casual but masterful moves set to Jerusalema by South African producer Master KG, created a global dance craze; the track ended up all over Radio 1 this autumn and topped streaming charts across Europe. Jerusalema is just one track amid what has now become arguably the most vibrant and innovative dance music culture on the planet. In South Africa, dance music is pop music, from townships like Soweto and KwaDabeka to cities like Durban and Cape Town. The country has 11 official languages, each with their own cultural practices, and even the national anthem of the so-called Rainbow Nation is comprised of the country’s five most commonly spoken: Xhosa, Zulu, Sesotho, Afrikaans and English. Out of this rich cultural heritage, and in a country that has long had distinct dance styles like jaiva, marabi, kwela and mbaqanga, has co...

In age of pandemic, the song and its accompanying dance have lit up social media with videos of medical workers, soldiers, clergymen and many more sharing its message of hope. A gospel-influenced house song about Jerusalem and faith has become a global phenomenon over the past year, received over 260 million views on YouTube (and counting), and inspired a viral social media challenge for decidedly viral times. Jerusalema - Master KG | Jerusalema Dance Challenge | @Danceinspire | 2020 10 Best Jerusalema dance moves ||WORLDWIDE Master KG - Jerusalema [Feat. Nomcebo] (Official Music Video) Jerusalema Dance Challenge New York Times Square JERUSALEMA Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra & Jazzart Dance Theatre How viral song Jerusalema joined the ranks of South Africa’s  greatest hits “Jerusalema,” by South African artists Master KG and Nomcebo Zikode, features Zulu lyrics and speaks of salvation, home and togetherness, with Jerusalem as an embodiment of such yearnings. The song lifted ...

Sometime after midnight on October 21, Elisha Sunday Ibanga answered a phone call from his older brother's number. The person on the other end of the line -- a stranger -- broke the news that Ibanga's brother, Victor, had been shot dead at the Lekki toll gate, in Lagos, Nigeria, where he had been peacefully protesting against police brutality earlier that night. "The person told me that the police took his body away," Ibanga, 24, told CNN. An eyewitness to Victor Sunday Ibanga's death told CNN the 27-year-old entrepreneur was shot in the head during the protest. CNN has obtained and geolocated a photograph of Victor's body lying in a pool of blood and wrapped in the white and green of the Nigerian standard -- one of the same flags gripped by fellow protesters earlier in the evening as they sang the country's national anthem. Ibanga confirmed the photograph is of his brother. The Ibangas are one of several families yet to locate the bodies of their missin...

After E.S. Reddy died on November 1, I wrote an  obituary  in the  Financial Times , covering the major aspects of his life and work. In this column I offer a more personal tribute, of what he meant to me and to other scholars of Gandhi like myself..    I first met Enuga Sreenivasulu Reddy in New York in 1994. I was carrying an introduction from Gopalkrishna Gandhi, who had described him to me as a “great Gandhi-reservoir”. For the next 25 years I was witness to the truth of that appellation, some of the evidence contained in my desktop computer in Bengaluru, which has three large folders entitled: “ES Reddy Material, Instalment I, II and III”. These house hundreds of files, gifted to me over the years by Gopal Gandhi’s friend (now also mine), sometimes as attachments to emails, at other times through CDs sent by courier. The material my benefactor so generously shared includes newspaper and magazine articles in half-a-dozen languages, profiles of Gandhi’s ass...

Sudan’s transitional government has been praised for  its latest  reforms , which decriminalise apostasy, ban female genital mutilation (FGM) and end the requirement for women to get travel permits. The legislation makes major strides in pushing back against discrimination faced by women and minorities during the 30-year rule of  Omar al-Bashir  that came to an end in 2019, according to equality advocates. The anti-torture charity  Redress  and the Sudan-based  African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies  said the measures “move Sudan a step closer towards eliminating structural violence against women and minorities”. “We encourage the new government to continue making domestic law and policy reforms until systematic torture is eradicated from the country and justice and reparations are fully realised for victims,” said Charlie Loudon, Redress’s international legal adviser. Justice Minister Nasredeen Abdulbari announced last week that apostas...