Posted on 02/08/2002 2:05:56 PM PST by AdrianZ
Africa's coming hunger
By Robert I. Rotberg
ZOMBA, MALAWI
Hunger is again stalking Southern Africa. Throughout the length of the already-impoverished nation of Malawi, there is no maize, the staple food. Cassava, a substitute stomach filler, is also hard to find. So are yams. Moreover, no one seems to be doing anything to avert the coming starvation. Officials deny the seriousness of the situation.
Here, on the rainy slopes of towering Mt. Zomba in Malawi, I purchased small white potatoes and could have bought dead and live animals that were dangled from outstretched arms, a scattering of vegetables, and a variety of herbs and charms. But nothing was on sale to fill the belly in the local African manner.
Neighboring Zambia is also bereft of maize and cassava. So is Zimbabwe, traditionally a much wealthier land that usually exports maize and whose people disdain cassava and yams. In Zimbabwe, too, cooking oil and sugar (both of which Zimbabwe usually provides in abundance) are hard to find. Bread was unavailable last week.
In these three countries, up to 30 million people are at risk of going hungry by July, and millions of children are certain to become even more malnourished than they already are.
The shortages have three causes: a severe drought in the 2001 growing season, heavy rains that destroyed crops, and official mismanagement and inattention. Despite independent warnings, governments in two countries, Malawi and Zambia, have been slow to accept the extent of the maize and cassava shortfalls. Both countries have also lacked the foreign exchange with which to purchase maize from South Africa or more distant exporters.
The growing hunger in Zimbabwe has more directly man-made causes. By attacking commercial farmers steadily since 2000, President Mugabe has destroyed agricultural productivity. In recent months, too, Mugabe's thugs have confiscated maize being stored on farms to feed loyal farm workers, adding to the spread of rural famine. Despite forecasted maize shortfalls, the government sold its existing inventory of maize to the Congo and Kenya in October. High-placed individuals profited.
In order to feed Zimbabwe from February to July, when this year's maize crop will have been harvested, transported, and milled, the country will have to import about 750,000 metric tons of maize. That means moving 150,000 tons a month along congested rail lines from South Africa, or receiving the equivalent in US surplus maize directly or from the UN World Food Program via Dar es Salaam in distant Tanzania.
All of this is tortuous, late, expensive (if purchased from South Africa), and politically volatile. Yet Zimbabwe, unlike Zambia and Malawi, is virtually bankrupt because of Mugabe's troops in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and official corruption. Zambia and Malawi are poor and lack funds to invest in their people's welfare.
Indeed, Zambia's long-nationalized, mismanaged, and patronage-ridden copper industry, which provides 75 percent of the nation's export earnings, is about to collapse. By the end of 2002, Zambia may lose its main source of employment.
Malnutrition will hardly help the millions who are HIV-positive fight off AIDS. All three countries have adult HIV-positive rates approaching 30 percent. Malawi, with one physician per 60,000 persons, has the weakest health- care system, but the other two, especially cash-starved Zimbabwe, are also desperate.
Zambia has a new government, but the recent regime of President Frederick Chiluba was notoriously corrupt and magnificently neglectful of its people's welfare.
Once-tranquil Malawi has also been going through a crisis of governance and alleged corruption. Judges have been impeached, a tough and honest finance minister sacked, university students shot, and democracy made more precarious.
In a country where donors provide up to 15 percent of the annual gross domestic product, Denmark has recently withdrawn its mission in disgust, Britain is withholding balance of payments support, and the US has reduced aid.
Even if Mugabe is ousted in next month's election in Zimbabwe and President Levy Mwanawasa of Zambia revamps his predecessor's policies, the specter of hunger will still hang over their two countries, and even more unfortunate and beleaguered Malawi. Massive outside humanitarian aid is required immediately. It should be coupled with outside insistence on governmental probity, but that may be asking a lot.
• Robert I. Rotberg directs Harvard's Program on Intrastate Conflict and is president of the World Peace Foundation.
The Race Hustlers and Afrocentrists make a HUGE deal, about being " Afro-Americans "; but don't really give a rat's rear about Africa ... all the while claiming such things as : " Africans had a superior culture, which whites stole " ( a lie ) ," All American blacks are descended from Kings & Queens from Africa " ( another whopper ) , " Cleopatrat was a Negress/ part Negress " ( yet another damned lie ) , " Black African peoples , are better than White Europeans " ( in NO known universe ) , eyc. etc., etc. ! This is simply a black con-job. All talk and proaganda. And , the people who spew this crapola, don't give a damn about their " African brothers "; no matter how much kinte clothe they wear, nor how many phoney, let's pretend Kwanzaas they celebrate.
The truth is, that BEFORE whites settled Soth Adrica, for example, well over 300 years ago, that part of Africa hadn't advanced much beyond Neolirgic times. The same CAN be said about other colonized areas ; though, the Benins were bronze workers.
"Eat all you want. We'll make more."
Ananova:
Boy turned into a yam by witchdoctor
Nigerian police are investigating a bizarre claim that a boy has been turned into a yam by a witchdoctor.
Officers have even taken a large yam -- a staple of African diet -- into custody.
Three schoolboys in Maiduguri told their headteacher their friend had been transformed into a vegetable in front of their eyes after accepting a sweet from a mysterious stranger.
The teacher called police who came to the school to 'rescue' the boy, reports The Daily Star.
Now police are trying to track down the man who gave the boy the sweet, according to Divisional Police Officer Amamu Tukur.
As word spread about the schoolboy yam, hundreds of curious people began flocking to the police station to catch a glimpse of it.
Mala Kachalla, an official from the governor's office in Borno state, Nigeria, said: "There has been a mysterious incident here."
Story filed: 09:49 Monday 1st January 2001
--Boris
Otherwise, the Jesse Jackson's of our society who continue to promote racism, should go back to Africa, their beloved homeland that their ancestors were kidnapped from (with the aid of other black Africans, BTW). Perhaps then these people would figure out that they are better off than they would have been if their ancestors had never been forced to leave Africa.
And yes, a small degree of racism still exists, but look how far our nation has come in 50 years. Even Martin Luther King would have acknowledged that change would not come over-night.
Any 'Afro-Americans' who find our society so intolerable should feel to go to Africa and get a glimpse of what their life could have been. Maybe they would be hoping that aid from the US would arrive the next day so that their families would not starve. Maybe they would be hoping that they had the means to overthrow their oppresive goverment. Or maybe they would be hungry enough to wish that their racist government had not murdered or run off the white farmers who might have provided them food.
These dictatorships carry out their policies of destruction, then look for handouts from benevolent countries such as the US so that they can continue in power.
The neglect by "high-placed officials" (but not of their own selfenrichment) is nothing less than murder for profit. I'd say that's a capital offense.
africawatch:
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Pinko NY Transfer/Radio Havana source, translated:
ROBERT MUGABE SPEAKS IN PRAISE OF The WORK OF The CUBAN DOCTORS IN ZIMBABWE
President Robert Mugabe spoke in praise of the work which the cuban doctors in Zimbabwe complete.
In declarations with cuban television, the President of Zimbabwe announced, "As regards the cuban doctors who came to Zimbabwe we are very content because they are a good example of devotion and love of their work. They are specialists in great quality who place their work above all.
"They are not interested at all by comfort as it goes from there for some of our doctors who seek the luxury and who want comfort and pleasure.
"For the Cubans, work passes above all and little imports to them where they are affected that it is downtown or in the countryside. They will lend their services anywhere and they are thus an example for our doctors and the doctors of other countries. They do an impeccable work. They are very close to people and do not spare their efforts. They do not stop on their statute. They are not limited either to do their work and to leave. They want to see how people live. They are a very great example and we can only hope that it will be followed by all the doctors of our country."
The presence of these cuban experts in Zimbawue enters within the framework of the total program of cuban medical aid.
piasa, I'm an old cold warrior, long opposed to "Pappa Fidel"- here are some links:
the shortages have one cause. which none may call ...
kill the whites, starve to death. does seem to be a pattern?
The African Culture, or the lack thereof has managed to create a society of dependents, whose needs are growing daily. They are a people who aren't being educated, nor are they producing. It has nothing to do with weather, as here in America, when we have a drought, or flood, there's still plenty of food. We have plenty of farmers, and educated people in our country that make sure that we always have enough food in our country for the people. In Africa, there are more people than food, and rampant ignorance has produced a surplus population that cannot whose needs cannot be met due to a lack of resources, farm equipment, education, population controls, despotic governments, and the constant aid that is constantly supplied. By giving these people aid all the time, they have no reason to create their own self sustaining countries. Not to mention the constant tribal battles that happen there, along with the aids epidemic.
The thing that irritated me the most was seeing these people wearing Tommy Hilfiger jackets, Levis Jeans on TV when the volcano erupted, and the first thing these people said, is Where is the United States with our AID???? Tell me that these people want to create their own countries, and have their own version of the American way of life, and not have it be at the expense of others. The best thing we can do for Africa, is let it fend for itself. There are people in our country who say it's a strong country, well it's time for them to prove it. Let them create their country, on their own. Of course we all know that if they were left to their own devices, they'd regress back to the days before the British started to colonize it. Some people aren't ready for civilization. No better example of that is the Native American people. Being part Native American, I think I can say it without being called a racist.
Hypocriting??? Is that a new verb? Is it like Getting Orvillized??? Before you go off on someone make sure you've read all they've posted.
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