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Marian Shrines in Africa. The Great Devotion.

Many shrines and pilgrimage sites in honour of the Virgin Mary have sprung up throughout the African continent. Seven cases of Marian apparitions have been reported, the most famous and officially recognised is that of Kibeho in Rwanda. An introduction to the main centres of Marian worship in Africa.

To date, seven cases of Marian apparitions in Africa have been reported: in 1980 in Ede-Oballa (Nigeria); in 1982 in Kibeho (Rwanda); in 1984 in Mushasa (Burundi); in 1984 again in Rwanda, in Mubuga; in 1985 in Yagma and Louda (Burkina Faso); in 1987 in Muleva (Mozambique); and in 1998 in Tseviè (Togo).
There are few testimonies about these appearances, except for those that took place in Kibeho, a small town in south Rwanda, which were officially recognised and which received canonical approval by the Holy See, on 29 June 2001, after Augustin Misago, the Bishop of Gikongoro, approved public devotion linked to the apparitions that took place in the small town of Kibeho between 1981 and 1983. He recognised as authentic the testimonies of the three visionaries Alphonsine Mumureke, Nathalie Mukamazimpaka and Marie Claire Mukangango, who were 16, 17 and 21 years old, respectively. The Virgin Mary appeared to them dedicated as ‘Nynia wa Jambo’, meaning ‘Mother of the Word’.

Rwanda. Sanctuary of Our Lady of Kibeho. The only approved Marian apparition in Africa. (CAN)

The three girls said that the colour of her skin was black. The Virgin invited them to conversion, prayer and fasting. Once, on 15 August 1982, the Virgin showed them gruesome scenes: “A river of blood, massacres, corpses lying abandoned”. It was the announcement of what would happen in 1994, a genocide with almost a million dead.
In the meantime, Kibeho has become a place of interest as a pilgrimage destination. The Kibeho shrine is dedicated to Our Lady of Sorrows. Rwandans consider it a pilgrimage destination and meeting point for those who seek God and wish to pray. According to the Rwandan bishops, “Kibeho is a place of conversion, of reconciliation and reparation for the sins of the world; a meeting point for those who were lost, for those who are passionate about the values ​​of compassion and brotherhood without borders. For this reason, the Church must become a place of reconciliation for all. Our Lady has come to speak to her young children to begin the second phase of evangelization, at the end of the second millennium and at the beginning of the third”.

Burkina Faso. The Yagma shrine is dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes.

In 1966, the then Archbishop of Ouagadougou, in Burkina Faso, Cardinal Paul Cardinal Zoungrana, urged Christians who wanted a place to worship Mary: “Find the place you like, prepare it and then we will come to build a church”. Therefore, the site of Yagma, a few miles from Ouagadougou, was especially chosen in 1967 for the purpose of building a Marian shrine. On that small hill a replica of the Lourdes grotto was built out of lateritic stone. The site of Yagma hosted the first pilgrimage in 1968 and in 1971 the place was officially recognised by Cardinal Zoungrana as a pilgrimage destination. In 1985 a young woman claimed that the Virgin had appeared to her several times, although these appearances were never officially confirmed by the ecclesiastical hierarchy, the number of pilgrims has been constantly increasing. Twenty-nine January 1990
was a historical day.
The site of Yagma welcomed Pope John Paul II that day. More than 600,000 people attended the Eucharist, as the Pope blessed an image of Our Lady of Lourdes that he gave as a gift for the site of Yagma.
Other Marian places are Our Lady in the town of Dingasso, in Bobo-Diulaso; Our Lady of Peace, in Diébougou; Our Lady of Louda, in Kaya; Our Lady of Reconciliation, in Koudougou; and Our Lady of Lake Bam,
in Ouahigouya.
The shrine of Notre Dame de la Délivrande (‘Our Lady of Salvation’) in the town of Popenguine, Senegal, was established in the 1800s by a Catholic bishop named Mathurin Picarda.
In May 1888, Monsignor Picarda, led the first Marian pilgrimage to the shrine in Popenguine. In 1891 a small stone basilica was built to replace the previous wooden one. In 1988 a new larger church with a greater capacity was inaugurated.

Senegal. The shrine of Notre Dame de la Délivrande (‘Our Lady of Salvation’) in the town of Popenguine. (Photo: Ji-Elle)

Since then, Popenguine has become a place of pilgrimage and Marian worship for Senegalese people. In 1991, at the request of Cardinal Hyacinthe Thiamdoum, a native of Popenguine, a new church was built and dedicated to the Immaculate Conception of the Most Holy Virgin Mary, and it was named a minor basilica in 1991. This marked the beginning of a new life for the church and the community.
On February 20, 1992, Pope John Paul II, paid a visit to the shrine and crowned the statue of Our Lady of Deliverance before a crowd of thousands of people. Since then, the sanctuary has been the destination of many pilgrims. Currently more than 100,000 people annually visit this great Senegalese Marian shrine.
The Marian shrines of Egypt, besides having a special importance for the memory of the historical presence of the Holy Family in this land, have always been of special interest from the ecumenical point of view. Some, among the 160 churches dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the country, are considered authentic ‘Marian places’ or real sanctuaries.
Among them are the monastery of Santa Catalina, in Sinai; the Cathedral of Our Lady of Egypt; the sanctuary of the Virgin of Zeitoun; the Al-Muallaka Church (‘the Hanging Church’), in the area of Al-Fustat in Cairo; and the Saint Mary Church, in Maadi. The Feast of the Assumption is one of the most popular feasts in Egypt. The faithful of Egypt’s Coptic Church simply call it the ‘feast’ of the Virgin. The fidelity with which the Coptic Church has venerated Mary has been unceasing. The icon of the Virgin found in the famous Al-Mou’allaqa church is highly revered. Saint Catherine’s Monastery is an Eastern Orthodox monastery located on the Sinai Peninsula, at the mouth of a gorge at the foot of Mount Sinai, near the town of Saint Catherine.

Cathedral of Our Lady of Egypt. CC BY-SA 3.0/ Hierarchicus

It is the most important Marian sanctuary in the Sinai Peninsula, and the traditional site of the Burning Bush, the symbol of the divine motherhood of Mary. The monastery is visited by thousands of pilgrims every year.
Despite the fact that there are not many important sanctuaries in Ethiopia, due to the little importance that the Coptic Church gives to images, the Virgin Mary, known as ‘Waladita Amlâk’, the Virgin Mother of God, has a very special place in the Ethiopian cult, and the devotion to her holds the highest place. Ethiopia is known as the country of Mary, its protectress. The name Mary is very common among Christians, both women and men, in Ethiopia, and many churches carved out of the rocks are dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
On the 10th of February the Ethiopian Church celebrates the feast of Our Lady of the Covenant of Mercy (Kidama Mehret). It refers to the Ethiopic tradition that Jesus promised his mother that he would forgive the sins of those who sought her intercession.
Every year in November, thousands of Malians and Christians from all over West Africa gather in the small town of Kita, about 150 kilometres west of Bamako, Mali’s capital. They go on pilgrimage to pay homage to Our Lady of Kita. The clay image of the Virgin Mother was made by a lay brother who collaborated with the first missionaries in the country.
The pilgrimages to venerate Our Lady of Kita began in 1970 and take place every year in the last week of November.
These events have always been moments of dialogue and brotherhood between Christians and Muslims in Mali.

Ivory Coast. The Basilica of Our Lady of Peace in Yamoussoukro, CC BY-SA 2.0/ Felix Krohn –

Located on the west coast of Africa, Ivory Coast was evangelized in the last decade of the 19th century. The Basilica of Our Lady of Peace in Yamoussoukro, the administrative capital of Ivory Coast, is considered the ‘Palace of Our Lady’. Consecrated by John Paul II in 1990, it is known as the ‘Saint Peter’s Basilica of Africa’. The design of the dome and encyclical plaza are clearly inspired by those of the Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican City, although it is not an outright replica. It is the largest church in the world. Every year thousands of pilgrims arrive in Yamoussoukro from all over the continent to venerate Our Lady of Peace.
However, the national Marian shrine in Africa is that of Our Lady of Africa, located in Abidjan and dedicated to Our Lady of All Graces.
Other places of Marian pilgrimage are the Shrine of Our Lady of Liberation, in Issia, in the Diocese of Daloa, and the Shrine of Ferké, in the Diocese of Katiola.
The first missionaries, who arrived in Angola in 1491, built a church dedicated to ‘Our Lady Saint Mary’. Today, there are more than one hundred churches and chapels dedicated to the Mother of God in Angola. The Shrine of Our Lady of Muxima is located 130 kilometres from Luanda, Angolan capital, and it is considered by many to be the most popular place of pilgrimage and worship in Angola.
The festival in honour of Our Lady of Muxima – which in the Kimbundu language means ‘heart’ – has been celebrated since 1833. Due to its importance and historical significance, the church, built at the end of the 16th century, was declared a national monument in 1924.

Benin. The Grotto of Our Lady of Arigbo in Dassa-Zoume,

In Benin, the Grotto of Our Lady of Arigbo in Dassa-Zoume, was blessed in 1954, and it has gradually become an international pilgrimage centre. Every year on 15 August this place is the pilgrimage destination of people arriving from Benin, Togo, Niger, and Burkina Faso. The shrine of the Divine Mercy of Aliada is also another popular pilgrimage centre where faithful gather to ask the Mother of God for protection and mercy.
In Linzolo, a few kilometres from Brazaville, capital of the Republic of Congo, one of the first missions founded by the Spiritan Missionaries in 1883, there is a gigantic grotto dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes at the bottom of a magnificent valley. Every year, since the Marian Year of 1987, flocks of faithful have reached this site, which is the most important Marian meeting place in the country.
In 1952, during a Marian congress that took place in Durban in South Africa to celebrate the centenary of the arrival of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in South Africa, Archbishop Martin H. Lucas proclaimed, ‘Mary Queen Assumed into Heaven’ Patroness of the South African Church.
Our Lady of Ngomé is one of the best-known Marian shrines in South Africa. It is located in the diocese of Eshowe, in the heart of the Zulu region, where it is said that the Virgin manifested herself to a Benedictine nun named Reinolda, who died in 1981. Mary is venerated in this place with the title of ‘Mary, Tabernacle of the Most High’. In Uganda, in the diocese of Arua, in Lagonda, in the north of the country, is the sanctuary of Mary Mediatrix of all Graces, where the Virgin is also called ‘Our Lady Sultana of Africa’.

Ismael Piñón

Internal Conflicts.

Once again, on May 9, the Filipinos will also bring persistent situations to the polls which, although less relevant than in the past, contribute to keeping a substantial part of the archipelago in uncertainty, starting with the communist and Islamist guerrillas
and the response of the authorities.

Despite various rounds of talks with the mediation of Norway and an effective reduction in military activities, the conflict between the government and armed militants of the New People’s Army (NPA), represented in the talks by the National Democratic Front, the political reference of the communist guerrilla active from decades in the north of the country, remains heated. The longest-running armed rebellion in Asia, the one led by the New People’s Army, has cost at least 30,000 victims since 1968.

Members of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines held a lightning rally at Mendiola (Photo Manila Today)

The weakening of the NPA, which saw its numbers drop from 26,000 at the peak of its military capacity in the 1980s to an estimated 4,000 at present, rather than continuing to guarantee its role and territorial control, seems to have continued to guarantee the security forces an important and profitable role, as well as having allowed Duterte to ask for the country’s trust even when repeatedly accused. A similar situation occurs in the south of the Philippines where, for some time, and even more so since the start of the presidency now coming to an end, military pressure has been intensified against the Muslim guerrillas of the Abu Sayyaf group in the Basilan and Jolo islands and against other groups who claim links with global Jihadist movements such as Isis and Al Qaeda and which aim to impose at the same time an area of militant Islamism in a crucial and sensitive area of Asia.
The peace treaty of 2014 that, in 2019, led to the birth by a referendum of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) for whose security and control the former guerrilla movement, Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) was called, was not the end of all the conflict. But it has started with a certain consistency on a path of peace and normalization in Mindanao and in the archipelagos that extend towards Malaysia, rekindling the hope that the violence that cost the lives of at least 120,000 Filipinos will end and ignite the progress long denied to the region.

The House of Representatives of the Philippines. Photo: congress.gov.ph

A scenario in chiaroscuro is the legacy of 77-year-old Duterte who tried, unsuccessfully, to have the constitutional provision that precludes a second term cancelled. His handling of the pandemic, in particular, has aroused discontent over the choices considered uneconomic and contrary to the most basic rights of the population. However, most Filipinos continued to confirm their support and trust, albeit with many exceptions. These include: the attacks of critics and opponents inside and outside Parliament; the summary killings; and the apparent insensitivity to the chains that keep his country in widespread poverty, despite the sustained development of recent decades, have characterized a presidency that has repeatedly ended up on a collision course with the Catholic hierarchy on ethical and moral issues, rights, and democracy.
This tension involved the laity and clergy, most recently in the battle to prevent the extension of the law that provided for the classification as ‘terrorists’ or ‘communists’ of individuals and organizations critical of the Duterte administration. An arbitrary initiative that also affected the Benedictine nun Mary John Mananzan, strongly hostile to the ‘war on drugs’ and who was, therefore, indicated in June 2020 by a government official as a supporter of a communist terrorist organization. The law did not pass through the commitment of ecclesial representatives and the faithful, but the controversy has further strained relations between the presidency and the Church.
The situation marked the Duterte presidency right up to last year when the 500th anniversary of evangelization began.
The celebrations were initiated on March 14, 2021, with a ceremony attended by Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Basilica. The story began with the landing of Ferdinand Magellan on the island of Mactan near Cebu, today the fifth Philippine city in terms of population, and an essential tourist, commercial and logistic centre.

Traffic on bridge and boats crossing at Mactan Bridge Cebu. Photo: 123rf.com

It was an event in Asian history and European colonialism that was to found a Church that gave a national identity to the archipelago and made it the cornerstone of Catholicism in Asia. Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, former Archbishop of Manila and second-term president of Caritas Internationalis, Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples since December 2019, concelebrated the Holy Mass which kicked off the celebrations of the 500th anniversary.
Less than two weeks after that suggestive and evocative ceremony, the Pope announced the appointment of 69-year-old Cardinal Jose Fuerte Advincula, former Bishop of the diocese of Capiz, as titular of the archdiocese of the capital, certainly not an easy role for the new archbishop, in a situation like the current one that associates the already heated conflict between the Filipino Church and the current presidency of Rodrigo Duterte with the enormous difficulties that are emerging from the pandemic crisis. All this must be taken into account to relaunch the Catholic identity of the archipelago which is losing momentum in the face of the multiplicity of challenges it faces.

(S.V.)

 

Namibia. Namib, the Living Desert.

The oldest desert in the world: a sea of sand caressed by ubiquitous fog. It seems to be desolate and unfit for human habitation. Appearances may be deceptive. Hidden in the heart of the Namib are incredible gems of life, plants and animals that have adapted to the most extreme conditions. A world still to be discovered.

The term nama, which gives this desert its name, means ‘a vast place’ and it may be used to describe a 1,300 km belt of sand, the oldest in the world according to the geologists and among the highest: an imposing bulwark against the Atlantic Ocean. A vast bed of schist, metamorphic rock surmounted by a more recent layer of limestone, it contains a sea of dunes, the largest in Africa – apart from the Sahara Desert, obviously.
It is the dunes that perform the role of absolute leadership, especially those facing the ocean between Walvis Bay and Swakopmund.
These are dunes of sand with their colours, dimensions and steep sides that challenge the viewer and his desire to climb them. They each have a name and even a voice.

A large part of the desert is located within a park called the Namib Naukluft Park, the largest reserve in Southern Africa. Starting in the early 1900s, in the area of the Swakop River, the protected area was gradually extended and today it covers almost 50,000 square kilometres. It is an enormous ancient desert that derives from two factors: almost permanent high pressure and freezing cold oceanic currents.
The first of these causes such low rainfall that there is almost no surface water. In fact, the few existing wadis (riverbeds) are almost always dry and even when it rains, their way is blocked by the dunes giving rise to the use of the term temporary oasis; they are formed by the waters of rivers in flood after infrequent rains and are unable to break through the barriers of sand and find a way to the sea.

Life-giving haze
The interaction between the cold, damp oceanic winds deriving from the cold Benguela Current which comes from the Arctic regions and the warm, dry air of the desert causes thick fog to form, especially in the early hours of the day. It is this fog that makes the Namib what it is.
The same winds that drive away the rains create the conditions for the formation of fog which it drives for tens of kilometres towards the interior enabling various species of plants and animals to capture the microscopic droplets of humidity using refined methods of relating
to the environment.

Among the unusual plants, it is worth mentioning is the Welwitschia mirabilis whose leaves are like green ribbons that grow continually from the base, up to five metres long, twisted together and resting on the ground. The ends continually become frayed, turn a brown colour, and die. It is a strange sort of plant with some characteristics of the gymnosperms which produce cones, but it also has some similarities with the angiosperms which have flowers. It is, in brief, a sort of very ancient ring in the chain of botanic conjunction. Nevertheless, what makes these plants truly exceptional is their venerable age which, in many cases, exceeds a thousand years.

The Ibex of the dunes
While the botanical plants are noted for their great age, zoology has a surprising array of specimens of rare beauty and an extraordinary way of using strategies of adaptation and not just of survival such that, if they were removed from the desert they would die. Among the foxes and black-backed jackals, it is also possible to spot one of the most elegant gazelles of Africa: the Oryx. It has an incredible way of living in harmony with the desert: it eats mostly at night to capture the moisture contained and deposited on the surface of the plants.

The silhouette of its head and long, straight diverging horns makes it a symbol not only of the Namib but of the spirit of all of Africa.
Due to its bodily structure and its large shoulder muscles, it is able to run for long distances over the sand. Its body shape, and the colour of its fur, enable the Oryx to expose a smaller surface area to the rays of the sun at its highest point.
Not even the white stains on the face and legs are accidental in that the opposite reaction to heat facilitates the circulation of the blood. The Oryx is often sighted wherever a blade of grass happens to sprout on the surface of the dunes.

Nature without borders
That same fog, so precious for the life of many living species, following its more insidious characteristics, has led to the shipwreck of many vessels. The numerous remains of shipwrecks have given the coastal area the name of Skeleton Coast, sinister both in name and appearance: it is a coastal area where ancient hulls mark the graves of a watery cemetery among the crashing of the waves and the creaking of decayed and water-logged timbers.

Some of the wrecks are to be found just a few metres from the coast, witnessing the fact that the desert is slowly expanding towards the west where the sea once was. In this African country, it is nature, not man, that reigns supreme. It supports very little agriculture and demands the importation of massive amounts of essential goods from South Africa. It is a concentration of free apices and vastness.
The beauty of this country may be appreciated in all its dimensions by flying over Namibia in a light aeroplane. Once the fog has dispersed, it is possible to follow the dividing line between the foam and the sand, looking down upon chalky white rocks that look like snow, and lines of dunes twisting like serpent tails. The best way to view the Namib is from above. Looking down, one can really appreciate the gulfs of dunes as they meet the sky, and the endless escarpment flanked by a sea of dunes and the foaming crests of an unstoppable sequence of waves.

Fossil forests
The simplicity of its etymology expresses more than many words in the nama language: sossus means ‘the place where the water collects’, and vlei is a South African term that means ‘a hollow place that fills with water during the rainy season’. The area of Sossusvlei opens up among the dunes and gives one to understand that, in the past, the area was regularly flooded with water, the reason why in some areas deposits of silt have accumulated which gave their origin to the gleaming white pans (saline pools). In the course of time, the dunes invaded much of the base, leaving some areas uncovered that remained miraculously free, though surrounded by mountains of sand, due to the favourable winds.

Among the many, the one that leaves one breathless is the Daedvlei. The name refers to the acacia trunks that dot the landscape, the remains of an epoch when water was plentiful, and vegetation flourished. They are, as it were, petrified and stand out against the white of the ground and the dark red of the sand in the background. Contemplation is the only suitable way to react to this place which the soft winds, the dry air and the absence of insects and microorganisms have kept intact for at least six hundred years. Looking at the forms of the bare trees, it would seem the called-for rains ought to pour down at any moment.

Elena Dak/Africa

 

Sierra Leone. Improving the Quality of Life.

Making the most populous city in the country an example of urban planning and environmental balance. To improve the quality of life for all. This is the challenge that Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, as the Mayor of Freetown, has been undertaking for over four years. We met her.

With a Master’s degree from the London School of Economics, she worked in the UK in the financial sector. In 2014 Aki-Sawyerr returned to Sierra Leone together with an operational unit in the fight against Ebola. In 2018, with the opposition party to the current government All People’s Congress, she won the elections for mayor of the capital.

Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr. The Mayor of Freetown.

Immediately after she took office, she launched the Transform Freetown project. For Aki-Sawyerr, the Transform Freetown project tries to respond with a holistic approach, which is divided into four points: resilience, human development, a healthy city, and mobility.
A strategy that is based on public intervention, on private investments (while also seeking funds from foundations and international organizations)
and on the direct participation of the citizens.

At the heart of its political agenda is climate change. What impact does the latter have on the city and the country?
From my point of view, we must try to break down the question and try to identify the factors that lead to deforestation, the consequent loss of biodiversity and climate change.
The latter actually works like a circle. For example, the increasingly frequent irregularities of meteorological phenomena have an impact on agricultural communities, which are unable to cultivate and are forced to migrate to the urban area, in search of a better life. In the case of Freetown, this has resulted in massive deforestation of the hilly areas, where newly arrived migrants build their homes.

Freetown. ©robertonencini/123RF.COM

So, we see that some actions, caused by climate change, end up exacerbating climate change itself. The loss of forests and biodiversity, in fact, has an impact on the food supply chain, on the collection and availability of water and on the acceleration of natural disasters such as landslides and floods that Freetown has suffered. Another driver of deforestation is government policy. In this country, for example, a logging license was granted to a single operator and, as far as we know as citizens, it imposes no restrictions. In fact, the export of timber exceeds that of any other raw material in terms of volume.

How does the Transform Freetown project intervene in the environmental question?
In designing the Transform Freetown project, we went through a process of identifying the biggest challenges in the city, identifying 11 priority sectors and 19 objectives.

Freetown. View of the city from the university. ©robertonencini/123RF.COM

As far as environmental management is concerned, we have aimed to increase vegetation by at least 50%. Freetown the Tree Town, which aims to plant a million trees, is an initiative that is part of this goal.
Last season we planted 257,000 trees and this year we intend to plant 350,000, despite the government’s delays in providing funding from the World Bank. In addition to planting trees, it is important to make them grow and for this, we have created an application with which everyone can take care of a tree and track its growth. We rely upon community commitment and involvement.

Is it possible, regarding Freetown (which has one million inhabitants) and African cities in general, to speak of what the urban planner Henri Lefebvre called the “right to the city”?
We need to think first of all about the definition and raison d’être of this right, which is based on the premise of the city as a space of opportunity, in which you can have access to a decent home and public space. The fact that, on the contrary, we have a city that grows in an unstructured, sporadic and chaotic way, poses a challenge that makes the concept of the right to the city less applicable.

Freetown. Pedestrians at intersection to the market. ©robertonencini/123RF.COM

This is really a different concept of a city because the city Lefebvre spoke of was the consequence of a sort of urbanization that brought with it an expectation and the right to the improvement of living conditions. This is because we can only really talk about rights when we talk about values. In the context of Freetown, on the other hand, we have a situation where there is a deterioration in the quality of life, the level of economic activity and productivity, the availability and accessibility of services. We see the number of people growing, while the ability to meet that growth decreases. Therefore, it would be necessary to be able to intervene on the lack of urban planning and on the absence of the building permit scheme, essential for improving the quality of life of residents. It is precisely on these two points that the action of the City Council wants to focus. (Open Photo: Freetown.123rf.com)

Luca Onesti

The Catholic Church.

The motto of the 500th anniversary year was ‘Missio ad Gentes’, to show that the story that began with the arrival of Magellan is the epic of a Church which, originally foreign, was able to define the physiognomy of an entire Asian nation and make it
a missionary community, with an important role entrusted
to the large community of migrants.

This aspect was also underlined by the Filipino bishops who, in the message sent to the Holy Father on the occasion, emphasised “The filial love of the Filipinos in the 7,641 islands of our country. There are more than 10 million Filipinos who have emigrated to nearly 100 countries around the world. This morning they join with us”.
In this electoral round, too, indeed perhaps more than in others, the Church presents itself united with a strong moral solicitation for good governance but also divided on the concrete policies proposed by the main candidates. A division that is first of all spread within the episcopal conference, as demonstrated by Duterte’s different positions on ‘legality’ policies, has also been opposed step by step with regard to demographic policies, the lowering of the age for the incarceration of minors, and the persecution of opponents which involved, even with lethal effects, men and women of the Church.

As the elections neared, various pastors took a stand for the different parties involved: in some cases allowing and in others, forbidding, priests to indicate a preference regarding candidates and programs. The archbishop of Cebu, Jose Palma, intervened to remind his clergy that a pulpit is not the place to ‘campaign for any candidate’ and a few days later a homily by Archbishop Socrates Villegas challenged the clergy to take a stand against ‘opportunism and family dynasties’ that pursue ‘sinful politics’. The situation is one that many see as recalling the different visions during the martial law regime imposed by Ferdinand Marcos and, with a singular somersault in history, the most politically accredited heir of the Marcos family, the son ‘Bombong’ Marcos, is today the candidate more likely to win the presidential elections. It is no coincidence that Duterte also rehabilitated the figure of his father, who died in exile in Hawaii in 1989, three years after the ‘Revolution of Flowers and Rosaries’ with which the Filipinos freed themselves from the dictatorship in a non-bloody way.

Bishop Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan visits prisoners at the Caloocan City Jail. (Photo CBCP)

In a different, unitary way, the Philippine Church has taken a position on the situation created by the Russian aggression against Ukraine and has taken action in solidarity with the Ukrainian people and in welcoming refugees. After the appeal of the Philippine Catholic Bishops’ Conference (CBCP) to stop the weapons and start a dialogue between the parties, the vice-president of the Commission for Migrants and Itinerant People, Msgr. Ruperto Cruz Santos, expressed the Church’s support for concrete hospitality initiatives, indicating the Executive Order 163 signed by President Rodrigo Duterte for the reception of Ukrainian refugees, as ‘our gift to the whole world’ that the Bishops’ Conference and the Stella Maris Centre are committed to supporting.
However, even in the Ukrainian ‘case,’ the country’s contradictions in foreign policy emerged. The former Supreme Court judge, Antonio Carpio, urged the government to join the international pressure against Moscow, believing that ‘a mutual defence policy with other states to allow a balance of forces’ is ‘the only antidote that a weak state can use against invasion or annexation by a powerful neighbouring state’.
The closest reference is to China with which Manila has a long-running dispute over home seas. On the other hand, Richard Heydarian, a geopolitical expert and government advisor, spoke of Manila’s ‘deplorable case of toxic neutrality’. Under fire is the policy of non-interference confirmed by President Rodrigo Duterte, who is also hostile to closer strategic relations with his traditional US ally.

A boat sails through the South China Sea. Photo: 123rf.com

Heydarian called for greater involvement that starts with ‘a moral stance’ on the invasion suggested by many, and opens the Philippine territory to hospitality to refugees from the conflict, as it has been in the past for large numbers of people on the run from the Indochinese conflict. Even on this front, however, the president has shown that ‘only Filipinos count’ and that the policy of violent eradication of crime ‘will continue as long as there is even just one drug dealer alive’, reiterating that the international community must keep away from ‘His’ match.
The diplomatic inability that is part of the Duterte character has threatened to isolate the country. The need to confirm his leadership has made the outgoing president blind to the consequences of his attitude abroad, consequences that could have an economic and strategic impact on the whole nation. This begins with the problematic relations with Beijing which, in the South China Sea, pursues a policy of territorial control over large areas also claimed by Manila. Despite the sometimes-tense relations, the country has so far enjoyed military support from the United States.

Stefano Vecchia

 

Archaeology and History in the Sahara / A Journey to Tadmekka.

In Mali seeking the ancient capital of the Tuareg. It was once one of the most populated and richest of the trans-Sahara cities
in West Africa.

Tuareg: the mythical name means ‘abandoned by God’, the name which the medieval Arab conquerors gave to the nomads of the desert. However, the local name of these people is Kel Tamacheq, those who speak tamacheq, an ancient Saharan language with its own script called Tifinagh. Their continual movement from north to south and back again, with the dry and wet seasons, in search of the meagre pastures to be found in the desert, led them to be known as ‘sons of the clouds’. In Malian Sahara, on the border with Algeria, there is a mountainous massif 1,000 metres high and made of basaltic rock and stone: the Adrar des Ifoghas. On this massif, whose capital is Kidal, we find four-thousand-year-old cave paintings due to the place having been crossed by the most frequented trans-Saharan trade routes.

In the Middle Ages, along one of the now-extinct waterways (wadi), a group of Tuareg from Hoggar (Algeria), founded Tadmekka, a rich acculturated city, mentioned and magnified in many of the accounts of medieval Arab travellers. As the centre of trans-Saharan commerce, it was called es-Souk (the market), and its magnificence only began to wane with the emergence of Timbuktu at the end of the Middle Ages.
In 1640, Tadmekka was destroyed by a faction of Tuareg enemies, and the city was forgotten until the 1800s, when a French archaeological expedition reached the ruins of that city in the middle of the desert.
A further two expeditions went to es-Souk in 1935 and 1952. In 1960, when Mali became independent, Adrar was declared a military site and inaccessible to foreigners.

Es-Souk was explored for the first time only at the start of the 2000s, much later than the other trans-Saharan commercial cities, partly due to the civil disorder in Mali in the nineties. The digging began exactly in 2005, guided by the Missione Culturelle Es-Souk, Malian Institut des Sciences Humaines, and Direction Nationale du Patrimoine Culturel. Over the years, there was a series of archaeological expeditions that sought to discover the historical roots of the Tuareg people. Today, due to the instability of the place, archaeological research has been halted.

Es-Souk — The market
As regards Tadmekka, there are various Arabic sources that mention it. This city is spoken of by the Arab historian Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) and by the more ancient Arab geographer el-Bekri (1028-94) who says that, on the Niger, (in an unspecified city of Tiracca) there was an exchange of products coming from Ghana and Tadmekka, in the Adrar des Ifoghas. El-Bekri describes Tadmekka as “Of all the cities in the world, it most resembles Mecca”. Tadmekka was on a route leading, after forty days, from Ghadames (Libya) to Gao (Mali), and the inhabitants of the time used to buy millet in Gao.The origin of this city (whose ruins are close to the present-day site of es-Souk, to the north-west of Kidal) predates the arrival of the Arabs and originates probably from the middle of the first millennium of our era.

View of the Essouk Valley, the location of the Tadmekka ruins. (Photo: Sam Nixon).

The urban criteria followed in its development lead to the idea of sedentary populations. The presence of a river and a commercial route between the markets of the Mediterranean coast and the River Niger rendered the area most favourable. Given that the derivation of the appellative Tadmekka predates the Islamisation of the area, the name does not derive from that of Mecca to which the geographer el-Bekri renders it similar but derives from an ancient Berber tribe, the Tademkiun, and the city may have previously had a different name.
In the late Middle Ages, some of the inhabitants of Tadmekka moved southwards towards the bend of the Niger and, in the XII century, founded Timbuktu. The commercial importance of Timbuktu to Tuareg trade led to it eclipsing Tadmekka and it was finally destroyed by the Iullimmiden Tuareg.
The position of Tadmekka, apart from its commercial value, was strategic from the morphological point of view: the city developed in a valley with steep sides some tens of metres high that provided sound defence and observation points.

The ruins of the necropolis
Along the banks of the es-Souk wadi, a river once navigable and with plenty of fish, there is a vast array of stone blocks. From above, however, one may make out geometric shapes with ancient pathways and house foundations. The ruins are one kilometre long.
The simple structure of the quarters farthest from the river indicates that they were inhabited by the poorer classes, and it is here that the lodgings are found where passing merchants and their dromedaries could rest and quench their thirst.

The base of the walls. (Photo: Sam Nixon).

In the centre of the wadi, there is a former island; here the constructions are in a better state of preservation, the houses are spacious with communicating courtyards in what was probably an area inhabited by the noble classes. Along the bank of the island, a low wall was built in stone blocks to protect the houses from river floods.
The few investigations carried out by archaeologists in the inhabited area did not lead to the discovery of the emporiums, the forges, or the industries renowned throughout the Sahara, or the mint that once struck famous gold coins. These ruins, which perhaps lie under the sand, would enable the reconstruction of the appearance of the city just as the medieval Arab travellers saw it.

The whispering harmattan leads the imagination to clearly hear the rushing waters of the river and the cries of the fishermen, the clanging of the blacksmiths, the chattering of the market and the laughter of children – sounds that, centuries ago, filled the clear air of a more moderate climate and the days of this opulent city – at the crossroads of one of the most important trans-Saharan merchant routes.
In Tadmekka, there are six cemeteries, generally within enclosed areas. Most of the tombs are Islamic and only a few predate the Islamic period. The inscriptions on the tombstones are written in Arabic script and the tombs are made of circles of stones within which, when the skeleton of the dead person emerges from the sand, the face can be seen pointing towards the east.
On the higher areas in the north-west (which dominate one of the cemeteries), Tifinagh inscriptions can be seen as well as paintings of domestic and wild animals such as dromedaries, giraffes, and fish, that testify to a once moderate climate and abundant fauna that ensured the wellbeing and tranquillity of the inhabitants. (View across the central area of Tadmekka/Essouk, showing extensive stone ruins on the surface. Photo: CC BY 3.0/Journal of Archaeological Science.)

Gian Andrea Pagnoni

 

 

“Islam Needs Illuminism”.

Islam must rediscover the tools of reason and the tolerance of origins. Thus, reopening the minds of Muslims on human rights, women, and religious freedom. And updating jurisprudence, says Turkish intellectual Mustafa Akyol.

It all began with his arrest at Kuala Lumpur Airport, a modern Malaysian city where, even today, they have religious police.  Mustafa Akyol, a Turkish intellectual, forced to reside in the United States, landed there in 2017 to attend a conference, but was arrested for suspected apostasy for having declared, in fact, that the religious police should not exist because ‘faith cannot be imposed by the police’.

He would get off with a night in his cell because the former Turkish president Abdullah Gül, still influential within the Malaysian monarchy, intervened on his behalf. But it is from this event that Akyol begins his reflection in his book: ‘Reopening Muslim Minds: A Return to Reason, Freedom and Tolerance’. Explaining complex ideas with engaging prose, Akyol borrows lost visions from medieval thinkers to offer a new vision of the Muslim world on a range of sensitive issues: human rights, women, religion, and religious freedom. Akyol offers a hopeful vision for the future. A third way that is widely discussed in religious and intellectual circles throughout the region, after the advance of the self-styled ‘Islamic state’ catalyzed the debate, clouding the most tolerant views.

How do you view Islamic civilisation?
Islamic civilization has been a crisis civilization for decades. Historian Arnold Toynbee (1889-1975) argued that the Islamic world in the modern era can be compared to that of the Jews of the first centuries, during the epoch of Jesus Christ. The Jews had a very high opinion of themselves, but they had to deal with the occupation and government of the Roman Empire.

Turkish intellectual Mustafa Akyol. CC BY-SA 4.0/ Malaoffice

That Roman challenge can be compared to the Western challenge faced by Muslims today. The Jews at the time developed two different reactions: those who imitated the Romans and were co-opted, and those who opposed them. Toynbee saw twentieth-century Muslims at a similar crossroads. In the 21st century, there are regimes that show their modern face, but make use of internal repression, and others that totally reject modernity. These are antithetical positions that are also found in the academic world.
If I, a Muslim, criticize even just some legal interpretations, I am accused of being an orientalist, that is, of seeing my own culture with a distorted lens. This is an anachronistic and obtuse view.

Is there a third way?
Of course. It consists of recognizing this crisis and making progress. I am convinced that the first Islamic interpretations must be recovered, such as those of the Arab theologian of Islamic Spain, Ibn Tufayl (better known as Abubacer Aben Tofai, author of ‘The Self-Taught Philosopher’ and Ibn Rushd (better known as Averroè, ed.). According to all of them, Muslims have every right to study religion, using the tools of reason, because Islam does not forbid it.

Muslim people in mosque reading Quran together. 123rf.com

Theories like these are the oldest, the most open and tolerant. Although less known, they are often forgotten. In the first centuries of Islam, there was much more diversity and intellectual vivacity, especially in the more cosmopolitan centres such as Iraq, where Sunnism and Shiism coexisted side by side with Christianity. It was the most prosperous and glorious era of Islam. But then, those who have managed power over the centuries have considered them uncomfortable theories and labelled them as heretical and giving them a bad name.

Are some reformist interpretations of Islam condemned today?
I am thinking of Nasr Abu Zayd (1943-2010), in Egypt. Convicted of apostasy, he had his marriage annulled because of his liberal views. He was a great defender of religious freedom, convinced that individual freedom is an essential requirement of faith. So, it’s not just me working on this project to reopen Muslim minds. The Islamic Modernist movement has been calling for a reform of the shari’a since 1800. And Islamic feminists have played a decisive role in women’s emancipation, re-reading the scriptures hitherto interpreted only by men.

You are hoping for a new illuminism in Islam. What do you have
in mind?
The illuminism I have in mind is purely religious. Islam must embark on a process similar to that already experienced by Christianity and Judaism. When Christianity had its crisis, it sought a solution internally, questioning some doctrines, attitudes, rediscovering its roots in the
first age of Christianity.

Quran, The Holy Book of Muslims around the world. 123rf.com

There have been Christian and Jewish philosophers and intellectuals who over the years have reinterpreted these religions with a view to tolerance. Now it’s up to Islam to take this path.

Nevertheless, even today people are condemned for blasphemy and apostasy…
There are those who think that Islam is the only source of wisdom and morality, that those who are strangers to it live in a state of ‘jahiliya’ (ignorance of the pre-Islamic era, ed.) and therefore cannot contribute to the development of society with their thinking.
Originally, Islam had a much more universal vision and today we know that there has also been an accumulation of wisdom brought by Christians, Jews, and atheists. When this view becomes prevalent, the condemnation of apostasy will lose its value.

Must there be, then, a strategy of tolerance to reopen Muslim minds?
I prefer to speak of a theology of tolerance. Reading ‘Dabiq’, the magazine of the followers of the self-styled Islamic state, I realized that the worst heresy for them is that of the ‘murji’ah’, a sect known for its tolerance and support for the idea that judgement belongs only to God and not to other Muslims. The theology of tolerance dates back to the first era of Islam: we can go back to cultivating it and even globalizing it. This tolerance must be applied both inside and outside Islam.

Has this phase of illuminism already begun?
Yes. And not just in terms of reflection. There are Muslim communities living in a context where this process is taking place. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, there is no reference to ‘shari’a’ in the Constitution.
In Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country, non-Muslims cannot be called ‘khafir’, infidels.
It is true that there are still radical fringes who want to apply certain rules of Islamic law to the letter, such as cutting off hands.

Arabic Lantern. 123rf.com

The spectrum of Muslims, however, is much broader and many are convinced that there are no longer the conditions to implement those rules. I think that these radical measures should be renounced in principle: not only because they are not applicable in many contexts today, but because the original teachings of Islam did not foresee them. The jurisprudence that has established itself was built up in an era of empires and conquest when the norm was not peace, but war; whoever believed in another religion was considered an enemy. An era that we are happy to have left behind. Now we need to update our case laws. (Open Photo: The Blue Mosque in Istanbul. 123rf.com)

Azzurra Meringolo

 

Bolivia. Socavon, Life is a Joyful Dance.

The pilgrimage to the shrine of the Virgin of Socavon, in Bolivia, is a process of conversion and a desire for intimacy with God.

The celebration of the Oruro Carnival is an expression of popular religiosity that intertwines Christian feeling with that of all the Andean people. It expresses the relationship of closeness and respect towards the Virgin Mary, in addition to the invocations in the rites of Candelaria and the Virgin of Socavon linked to the mining area.
On Carnival Saturday, the pilgrimage-dance takes place to the Sanctuary of Socavon. Thousands of dancers dance eighteen different types of dances for five kilometres, making their lives a dance offered with great joy. One dance that symbolizes this Andean festival is called Morenada.
In it the search for the freedom of human beings is expressed. This dance dates back to the time when Africans who were taken into slavery in the mines of Bolivia fled to the tropics and integrated into local indigenous cultures in search of freedom.
The Central Morenada, created by the Cocani community, is one of the reference points of this dance and is so called because whoever started it was connected to the production and trade of cocaine leaves, a ritual element that invites dialogue.

©jeremyrichards/123RF.COM

This population, the Cocani in fact, is characterized by making its pilgrimage singing and dancing until it reaches ‘the feet of Mamita Candila’, the loving way of calling the Virgin. Their songs communicate messages of resistance and hope to the participants in the carnival because the words raise questions of life and the rhythmic rhythm is appreciated by both locals and strangers who participate in the pilgrimage. In this sense, there is the song ‘Sombrerito’, composed by Christian Lopez Alarcon and interpreted by the Doble Via group. The verse ‘I dance to my Madonnina in the Carnival … to my Mamita Candila, with Faith and Devotion, I make my pilgrimage without fatigue nor pain until Socavon … ‘, evokes the traditional sense of pilgrimage seen as a duty and with a profound sense of suffering, as appears in the refrain of another popular song, by an anonymous author, which is often heard in the Sanctuary: ‘At your feet, Mother, an unhappy burden of anguish and a thousand pains are laid’.

©rchphoto/123RF.COM

At the same time, this verse of the song ‘Sombrerito’ indicates the pilgrimage as an experience in which each pilgrim becomes aware of his or her promises and sets out on a journey overcoming fatigue and pain. With the rhythm and dance, she expresses her faith and devotion to the maternal and close image of Mary, ‘my Mamita Candila’ with whom she dances familiarly, evoking both an interior and material pilgrimage.
This vision of the pilgrimage is in tune with the document on pilgrimages made in the great Jubilee of the year 2000, where it said that a pilgrimage is a process of conversion, a desire for intimacy with God and a confident plea for material needs to be met.
Each dancer, in fact, while dancing calls to mind their own life, welcoming lights and shadows in the hope of being able to transform and heal negative situations and so live in harmony and equilibrium. (Open Photo: ©rchphoto/123RF.COM)

Tania Ávila Meneses

Climate Change and armed conflict.

Fighting climate change requires a basic condition: peace. Before the Russian invasion, Ukraine’s decarbonization efforts had progressed in the context of COP 26 as it submitted its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) with a target of a 65% reduction below 1990 levels by 2030, a net-zero targets by 2060 and an anticipated coal phase-out from 2050 to 2035.

As of now, as the country faces war and a humanitarian crisis governance is no longer possible. The longer any aggression havocs, the worse will be the environmental degradation and the more challenging the battle against climate change.

Political, economic, and social stability are decisive factors for successfully mitigating climate change in the crucial coming decades – they are a climate solution. That said, the impact of both global warming and armed conflict limits the capacity to deal with the changing climate conditions and environmental disasters caused by war.
This is particularly severe in the context of the recently launched IPCC Sixth Assessment Report alerting those political efforts are
advancing too slow.

The world’s ecosystem is deteriorating, and climate risks are among the most pervasive risks of this next decade. The COP 26 illustrated the historical moment and the need to make structural decisions for the future of mankind and reduce the carbon footprint.

And yet, military action is exempted from the Kyoto Protocol – even though according to Scientists for Global Responsibility (SGR), globally, the military, and the weapon supplying industry, are responsible for 6% of all global GHG emissions. Conflicts, their preparation and aftermath, cause environmental impact and require high intensity of energy use. The entire cycle of warfare has intense carbon footprints.

In 2020, there were more than 56 state-based conflicts globally, according to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program.
Many of the countries facing armed disputes, most of them are developing countries, are simultaneously global warming “hotspots” – facing high exposure to climate-risks and low levels of resilience, as shown by the ND-Gain index.

This is specifically dramatic because apart from the humanitarian crisis already in course, they are less prepared to deal with the side effects of emissions or environmental impacts.Conflict severely impedes the ability of a nation to implement governance mechanisms and deal with the direct or indirect consequences during or in the aftermath of a conflict.

Armed conflict leaves no room for climate change adaption and environmental protection. According to the IRCC, the Gorongosa National Park lost over 90% of its wildlife throughout Mozambique’s 15-year civil war.  Adding to the severe damage to biodiversity, water resources are already under threat due to climate change, but in the situation of conflict are either object of dispute or victim of pollution.

An OCHA report identified water as a determinant factor in conflicts in over 45 countries. Its pollution creates wide-scale impact on agriculture and food security amongst others. Urban areas with interconnected services any sort of water pollution can have extensive health impact.

Maritime pollution, either as direct or indirect consequence of a conflict can be devastating. For example, warnings of an imminent environmental catastrophe concerning the deserted and uninsured oil storage tanker FSO Safer, which is anchored off the Red Sea coast of Yemen with over a million barrels of crude oil, has been repeatedly issued by NGOs and the media.

Due to the Yemen conflict, the vessel remains uninspected, posing a significant danger of catastrophic damage in the region in the near future. More than that, maritime security in the context of military and naval activities must consider the fragility of maritime ecosystems and their interconnectedness.

The case of air pollution shows that the destruction of ecological resilience is not limited to borders or bound to the geographical scope of the conflict. In the context of the Ukraine crisis, the Conflict and Environment Observatory (CEOBS) points out that Multiple Launch Rocket Systems have been employed to attack urban areas, and beyond the essential threat to human lives, have been causing pollutions due to their composition of asbestos and combustion material.

Attacks on physical infrastructure of a country, its power grids, and transportation can be disastrous. Again, in Ukraine, the Russian invasion is the first time a military conflict has erupted in the midst in nuclear energy facilities of that scale. Any escalation evolving these facilities can cause severe damage, able to cause devastating long-term impacts.

Long-term consequences will also be felt in the context of the European dependency on Russian gas. Global energy price fluctuations could reinforce the reliance on fossil fuels for heating, transportation, industry, and electricity generation – until decarbonizing sources and technologies, renewables and energy storage are more available.

Climate change and environmental pollution are impacting the nature and contributes severity of humanitarian crises – take human displacement. It dramatically perpetuates already existing vulnerabilities and disparities, particularly in armed conflict.

One must only take a glimpse at the Sahel region with its rapidly spreading displacement within and across the borders and the track record of environmental and climate change-related crises, with crisis with temperatures in the region rising 1.5 times faster than the global average, according to UNHCR – the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. As another indirect consequence of the Ukraine war, that increased fertiliser, food and fuel prices hit developing countries with a high risk of climate change exposure, reinforcing interruptions in food supply for example.

How to address harm to ecosystems and people? Countries have protected the natural environment against long-term, and severe destruction since 1977, thanks to Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions. It safeguards natural resources from extra conflict-related violence by forbidding assaults on resources essential to the civilian survival, such as agricultural lands and drinking water.

There are currently doubts, however, until which extend these safeguarding measures provide accountability of state and actors. For years, the UN’s International Law Commission has been elaborating a legal framework that safeguards the environment in the context of armed conflicts containing 28 draft principles, published in 2019. Nations will have the possibility to adopt the draft principles at the UN General Assembly in Autumn 2022.

With new types of active warfare, including cybersecurity, new layers of complexity are added. Targeted cyber-attacks carry the capacity to unable energy systems, for example electrical grids, and other systems in place for environmental and resource protection. Compared to other weapons, cyber-attacks are low-cost and easier to employ.

On top of that, other than nuclear energy, there is no centralized controlling mechanism available for cybercrimes and attacks. Such novel relationships between conflict and climate change crisis are only beginning to emerge and will require a targeted strategy, knowledge and joined efforts respond. (Open Photo: Damaged residential buildings in the aftermath of a shelling in Podilskyi district of Kyiv. ©palinchak/123RF.COM)

Alena Profit/Modern Diplomacy

 

Saudi Arabia vs United Arab Emirates. A geopolitical and economic competition.

For more than two decades, the Gulf monarchies have found themselves at the centre of countless geopolitical, economic, and strategic challenges at the regional level.

Among these, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have emerged as pivotal actors in the climate of strong transformations taking place in the whole MENA area.This trend has often led them to act and move in coordination but has also sometimes caused noisy and unthinkable misalignments.

One of the most remarkable occurred in July during the summit of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which was also extended to include international players who are not part of the world energy cartel.
The reason for tension concerned the proposal – mainly supported by Saudi Arabia and Russia – to increase oil production to 400,000 barrels a day from August, combined with the idea of extending the agreement on production cuts (signed in April 2020) until the end of 2022.

These two solutions would avoid large fluctuations in crude oil prices and keep them relatively high for the coming year, but they have been firmly rejected by the UAE.
Indeed, Abu Dhabi is less dependent on oil revenues than its Saudi counterpart – the sector accounts for 42% of Riyadh’s gross domestic product (GDP), compared to 30% of Abu Dhabi’s GDP – and intends to use the discussion to achieve better terms within OPEC+.

These frictions appeared as unprecedented within the energy consensus, immediately driving up the price of oil to $81.13 a barrel (because the war in Ukraine in now at $100)  and prompting its members to quickly seek a compromise. Most importantly, the dispute also revealed different visions between the two major Gulf monarchies. Contrary to popular opinion over the years, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have not always pursued similar objectives, both within OPEC+ and at the local and regional diplomatic levels.

Conversely, the two monarchies have often found themselves in dissonance and competition, which have caused difficulties in finding common solutions to shared problems. While initially, these distinctions stood out above all on a historical-political level – with repercussions on the geopolitical strategies pursued in the regional chessboard – the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has strongly sharpened the economic problems of the two Countries, unravelling their rivalry, especially on this aspect. Consequently, it is important to understand which are the major elements of discontinuity and economic-energy tension between the two Gulf monarchies, to analyse the repercussions and resonances also on the other countries of the region.

The arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic has left indelible furrows for the economic setup of Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Looking at today’s data, Saudi GDP has fallen to $677 billion from $708 billion in 2019, an aspect that is also reflected in a loss of outbound foreign direct investment (FDI) of $7,722 million, as well as the unemployment rate, to date at 12.2% (for a population of almost 36 million).

The UAE’s current economic figures are also less than comforting, with GDP dropping to $354 billion (compared to $373 billion in 2019), a loss of inward FDI of $1,764 million, and an unemployment rate stuck at 2.6% (still a considerable figure considering the small Emirati population, which reaches only 10 million inhabitants). Furthermore, the general constraints imposed by the pandemic on a global scale – above all the halt to international trade and the strict imposition of lockdowns – have strongly highlighted the economic-structural problems already partly existing in the two Arab Monarchies, such as the need to free themselves from dependence on oil.

The collapse in crude oil prices, accompanied by the changes that the two countries have had to undertake in the domestic labour market, have forced Riyadh and Abu Dhabi to strengthen the ambitious programs of structural reforms already launched in recent years, so as to diversify their economies in the shortest possible time and adapt them to a future less dependent on hydrocarbons (the peak of the oil demand is
looming around 2030).

These adjustments will lead the two countries to find themselves increasingly in competition, having to reconfigure an entire labor market by competing for a scarce resource. A first sign of change emerged last February 16, when Saudi Arabia asked its companies to relocate regional headquarters within the Kingdom’s territory, a move to reduce the UAE’s dominance as a commercial and tertiary hub within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries.

The Saudi goal is to attract up to 500 multinationals to its territory within a decade, thus attempting to rival the UAE, which holds the record on a regional scale by hosting around 140 companies. Despite the short time, the effects of this measure are beginning to be seen – twenty-four large international companies have already announced their intention to transfer their regional offices to Riyadh – and they are not the only wake-up call for the UAE.

In fact, last July, Saudi authorities announced their intention to end preferential tariffs for Gulf states which purchase products in the region’s free zones, stating that all goods manufactured in those areas would no longer be considered as locally produced. Given their significant fiscal advantages, free zones abound on Emirati territories (to date, there are about fifty, the main ones being Ajman, Dubai, Ras al-Khaimah, and Sharjah) and are one of the drivers of the UAE’s economy, as evidenced by the case of Dubai, where these areas contributed 31.9% of the emirate’s GDP in 2018 (according to the Dubai Free Zones Council). Moreover, these areas have helped the Emirates become Saudi Arabia’s second-largest trading partner after China in terms of imports, a position that is now, however, severely compromised by Riyadh’s
new trade policy.

The assertiveness of the new Saudi measures thus seems to bring concrete risks to the UAE’s economic superiority, prompting them to respond immediately with several policies benefiting foreign companies. Prominent among these is the UAE’s intention to reduce taxes by up to 94% for companies wishing to open an office in the Federation and invest there, proving how the UAE wants to focus on facilitation in the investment sector in order not to lose the comparative advantage it has held so far over its Saudi counterpart.

To make itself attractive to global investment, up to now the Emirates have put an effort above all on guaranteeing a solid and coordinated supply of essential services for major centres, excellent communication systems, and a financial sector that is well structured and almost free from currency exchange constraints.

Today, however, the government of Abu Dhabi wants to go further, aiming at the development of the real estate and infrastructural sectors – above all transport – in a sustainable manner (this aim clearly emerges with Expo 2020, through which Dubai aims to project a technological and sustainable image of itself). At the same time, also Saudi Arabia considers the attraction of international investors as a priority. However, Riyadh is still far behind Abu Dhabi, given that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman announced the ambitious plan “Vision 2030” – which includes a willingness to boost the global investment market and an economic diversification strategy – in 2016 only. Nevertheless, Saudi authorities hope to catch up with the delay soon, also planning to implement new legal reforms based on credit structures.

At the same time, several other sectors could be subjected to the KSA-UAE economic competition. The first one is the touristic sector, where Saudi Arabia hopes to strategically insert itself. With its skyscrapers and luxury resorts, Dubai holds the regional record in the tourism industry (especially in the luxury sector), but many of the Emirate’s main attractions are beginning to be outdated, requiring costly renovations that would also involve foreign capital.

Consequently, Riyadh would like to take advantage of this aspect to “steal” tourists from the UAE, also aiming at non-religious forms of tourism. Even though the Hajj and the Umrah, the famous pilgrimages to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, continue to be a preferential channel for Riyadh (attracting in the per-Covid period up to 19 million pilgrims each year for a value of 12 billion dollars, 7% of the Kingdom’s GDP) the country has many natural sites in which to potentially invest and adapt to mass tourism.

Many of these are located in the Aseer region, on the Saudi Red Sea coast, where the Kingdom has already started implementing high-profile financial infrastructure plans. Specifically, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) has already launched a $3 billion investment project in February 2020, aiming to build 2,700 hotel rooms, 1,300 residential units, and 30 commercial and entertainment attractions in the region by 2030.

In addition, on September 28, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman declared his intention to expand this project by injecting liquidity into the local market of up to 12 trillion riyals (approximately $3 trillion). Not to mention that, if the construction of the Jeddah Tower is completed in the short term, Saudi Arabia will possess the tallest tower in the world, a clear sign of its ambitions to become competitive in the luxury tourism sector as well.

In this regard, another remarkable example can be found by looking at the case of al-Ula, a city in the northwest of the Kingdom. With more than 27,000 archaeological sites dating back to the Nabatean era, this city carved in stone was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2008. That is why, to increase its notoriety, Riyad is planning to build a luxury tourist resort within the site itself by 2024, with forty suites, three villas, a conference centre, and fourteen private pavilions.

Furthermore, the defense system constitutes another sector Saudi Arabia wants to invest in, modernizing the Saudi Arabian Military Industries (SAMI) to compete with the Emirates Defense Industries Company (EDIC). Certainly, this sector has huge potential for the kingdom, but the UAE may still have a comparative advantage in it thanks to the Abraham agreements, which could give them the possibility to use Israeli military technologies that Saudi Arabia may not have direct access to.

Finally, it is impossible to omit the rising rivalry in attracting highly skilled foreign labour, needed by both countries to fill domestic labour and skill gaps. Indeed, the Gulf countries have always heavily relied on migrant labour to drive their economic systems forward. These migrants mostly come from the Middle East region (Egypt and Jordan mostly), South Asia (Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, and Sri Lanka), and Southeast Asia (Indonesia and the Philippines above all) but constitute essentially low-cost and low-skilled labour.

In contrast, the ambitious economic diversification programs to which the petro-monarchies now aspire require cutting-edge skills, an aspect that compels both countries to seek strategies to attract qualified professionals with high skills. To date, both the UAE and Saudi Arabia have already issued special visas to this specific category of workers, and the Emirates have even considered offering them citizenship, a very rare concession in all GCC countries. These two decisions suggest that both Gulf Monarchies may continue to introduce such measures to facilitate the entry of foreign workers and advance their development models.

In conclusion, the highly evolving climate experienced in the Gulf area is spurring Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to undertake increasingly autonomous paths at an economic level. These discontinuities have been further accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic, which has inaugurated an unprecedented climate of economic rivalry between the two main Arab members of OPEC+.

The new commercial competition touches multiple sectors (tax system, business locations, investments, tourism, defence, labour) and seems destined to last, given the need for the two monarchies to readjust their economies to a post-hydrocarbon future. In this scenario, it is therefore foreseeable that the two countries will continue to undertake increasingly assertive economic strategies, which will also affect a growing number of labour and production sectors. Thus, all these elements could bring significant changes to the commercial and financial balance that the two Arab Monarchies have held so far, with repercussions throughout the entire Gulf region. (Open Photo: Aerial view oil storage tank with oil refinery factory industrial. ©artitcom/123RF.COM)

Angela Ziccardi/ISPI

Colombia. Afro Centre. A Place of Sharing.

In Tumaco, Colombia, a decade ago, the Afro Youth Centre was established to enable young people to work for social transformation using art, culture, group work and a communitarian experience
of faith.

Tumaco is located in the extreme southwest of Colombia, in the Pacific region bordering Ecuador, far from the political and economic centres of the country. The city has reached only a very low level of development with regard to health, education and quality of life, and at the same time occupies one of the first positions in national statistics regarding violence and drug trafficking. The murder rate is extremely high and most of the victims are young people with more than half of the people murdered in the city aged between 15 and 29.
Of the 217,000 inhabitants of Tumaco, 45% are under the age of 20.  School and work opportunities are scarce. Only six out of ten young people finish secondary school and of these, few manage to enter university or get a decent job. The unemployment rate is 88%.

To respond especially to the needs of young people, the Comboni missionaries present in Tumaco since 2014, along with their other activities, decided to open an Afro Centre, bearing in mind that the majority of the population was of Afro origin. Since its inception, the Afro Centre has seen the growth of various groups for children and the youth, including art and sports groups.
Once a week, the Descuádrate youth group meets to discuss different topics and social activities.
On the basis of an embodied faith and with an open and critical spirit, the members analyse the reality of the city and the country and organize days of cleaning, help to the needy, symbolic acts of resistance, as well as recreational activities with other young people.
In addition to its youth groups, the Afro Centre promotes art as a tool for social transformation. More than 40 girls form the Naidí group, which is dedicated to traditional and contemporary dance. Thanks to a very disciplined education, they have achieved a high artistic level and also a deep sense of belonging to their Afro-Colombian roots. In addition, their collective bodily work has a wonderful healing power, which strengthens them against the many painful realities of their lives.

Six years ago, the rap music group AfroMiTu was born. Its critical sense and the vigour of its songs are impressive. Young people compose their own music and write the lyrics in a collective process based on their experiences and life realities. Under the motto ‘Generating awareness’, their songs are dedicated to the defence of human rights, the promotion of non-violence and peace, respect for women, and care for nature.  Last year, the musicians took advantage of their Covid-19 lockdown to build their own recording studio, which attracts new young people and is used to produce podcasts and radio programs on the pedagogy of peace.
The Afro Centre also uses different circus acts as a pedagogical strategy to get teenagers to use their energy and leisure time for creative fun and teamwork. The Talento Renaciente group began with stilts, something that requires courage, agility, and physical endurance from the children. Today, there is no peace march in Tumaco that is not led by the marchers of the Afro Centre. They have also learned juggling, basic acrobatic techniques, how to ride unicycles, and even fire shows.

In addition to the different groups of children and young people, the Afro Centre also has a library equipped with an internet room.  There is also a group of women who meet weekly at the Afro Centre to spend time happily together making bags, handbags, earrings and, of course, weaving bonds of trust. In the absence of a community hall in the neighbourhood, the Afro Centre also hosts many meetings of the Community Action Board, the Neighbourhood Health Committee, Community Mothers, and other initiatives.
It is because of this open attitude, as well as its ongoing commitment to peace and its neutrality towards controversial issues that the Afro Centre has earned the respect and trust of many organizations.
All the work of the Afro Centre is based on the skills and human resources of the children and young people themselves. They are the ones who keep the place clean, collect rubbish, paint the walls, and help maintain equipment. It’s their home, so they have to take care of it. It is not a service-providing institution, but rather a large family whose members walk hand in hand.

This way of working makes the process a little slower than other better-equipped projects, but at the same time, it is taking decisive and lasting steps. Each member contributes their time, knowledge, and resources; in this way, a truly community process is being built up.
A particularly interesting effort in view of the sustainability of the Centre is a small business organized by the young people themselves under the name of Piqueteadero Centro Afro. Every afternoon, young people prepare cakes, hot dogs, kebabs, and sandwiches that are sold at affordable prices for the neighbourhood and generate funds for the basic expenses of the youth centre.
Finally, what binds and sustains this whole collective process is a deep missionary spirituality.
This means walking in an organized way, sharing dreams and sorrows, recognizing the abilities of others, and learning from each other, forgiving each other, and building a true community of faith.
At the Centre, during the week, the young people of the confirmation catechesis group and the large group of Missionary Childhood meet.
On Sundays, the Centre is transformed into a chapel, both for First Communion catechesis and for the celebration of the community Eucharist.

Ulrike Purrer

 

 

Mission. Life is a gift.

Three young Comboni Sisters talk about their missionary experience.

My name is Sr. Carla Mora from Costa Rica. I have been in Mozambique for almost fifteen years.  I have to say that embracing the missionary life has not been easy, because it implies renunciation, adherence, fidelity and, above all, much faith in the One who has called you.

Today I live my vocation in total availability to Jesus Christ, despite my frailties and weaknesses, letting myself be guided by what he wants from me.It is an inner strength that is difficult to explain, but that helps me, every day, to give myself generously with joy and love.

The fulfillment of my vocation as a Comboni Missionary in Mozambique has been marked by several moments, some good, some not so good. I currently work at Mangunde Hospital, in the centre of the country, not far from the coastal city of Beira. I also collaborate in the parish, accompanying the young students of a college.

I am a nurse and a trained midwife.  Through my profession, I can go where I never imagined going and do things, I never thought I could do. Helping other people makes me happy, especially the patients I meet every day. In them, I see the hope and resilience of these people.

Every day, I discover how great and wonderful Mozambicans are. I admire their strength, their tenacity and their ability to face life, which in these lands is not easy, and I recognize in them the presence of God. The work I do focuses, in most cases, on accompanying women during pregnancy and, above all, during childbirth, so that their babies can be born in the best possible conditions.

Sometimes we witness real miracles! In our hospital, we do not have the medical facilities to help all the children and their mothers and sometimes the situations become dramatic.

Because of the coronavirus, in the last two years, we have been busy with all the Covid patients coming here to the hospital but also with conducting a vast hygiene awareness campaign that involved visiting a number of villages.

That was an impressive experience and I must say that seeing so many women whom I had helped to give birth at the hospital and their children growing up healthy, gives a new meaning to my missionary life. Life is beautiful and it is worth living it helping the poorest and most abandoned.

There was still something missing
I am Sr. Anita C. Concepcion from Binmaley, Pangasinan in the Philippines. I believe God began to form me and slowly plant in my heart the seeds of the religious life long before I was aware of it.
From primary school, I was attracted by the beauty of the church and the singing of the choirs. I joined the Children of Mary, then the Legion of Mary in my Parish.

After I became a midwife, I applied for work in the United Arab Emirates in 1989, first in Abu Dhabi, then in Ras Al Khaimah. The latter is about 115 km. from Dubai where the community of Comboni Missionary Sisters is located. I was happy working abroad and helping my family but I felt something was still missing in my life.

A friend who wanted to become a Comboni Sister invited me to accompany her to the convent of the Comboni Missionary Sisters.
I cannot forget the peace and joy I felt the moment I entered the convent for the first time.

While I was waiting for my friend, a Sister gave me a book about the experiences of the Comboni Sisters in Sudan during the Islamic Fundamentalist Mahdi uprising.
I was touched by the fidelity of the Sisters in that difficult situation. The book also inspired me to learn more about God’s merciful love and the desire to dedicate my life to the mission.

After my experience of discernment, I left my work as a midwife. I was sent to Jerusalem to do my first year of religious formation then to Rome for the second year. I continued my Novitiate for two years in Brescia (Italy) and made my first religious profession on 14th September 2003.

My first mission was in Amman (Jordan) after which I went to Virginia (USA) and then to Uganda, Africa from 2008 to February 2021. I worked as a Health Tutor at the Matany School of Nursing and Midwifery in Karamoja (Uganda). I felt fortunate to be training future optimal health care staff.  Through these years, I have come to believe that my call to religious life is a gift that calls me to be more open to the mission.

Saying “yes” to God is not always easy but with His Grace everything is possible. With this awareness, I look towards the future with a willing spirit, believing that God will always be with me especially in my new assignment as I go back to the Middle East.

To find what is truly necessary.
My name is Sr Beatriz Galán Domingo from Spain. I have been living in Talawakelle in the Central Province of Sri Lanka for five years.  The majority of our population depend on the tea industry, either for harvesting or further processing.

Behind every cup enjoyed in the Western world are the lives of thousands of women. Sunburned and anaemic, women bear the brunt of the tea plantation work under the scorching sun. Humidity favours the presence of animals. Simply out of greed for profit, the tea industry pays three Euros at best for twelve kilos of tea leaves.

With eyes wide open to that reality in which life, especially that of women, is exploited, our mission unfolds. We share the joy of working in a diocesan school where Christians and Hindus (students and teachers) try to form good people and honest citizens.

Education is the most powerful tool to break the cycle of poverty and the stigma of slavery. In addition, it is the appropriate place to discover that ethnic and religious differences, rather than being a threat, can be a mirror of the wealth and plurality of the country.

The other pillar of our presence is the parish. More than 1,500 Christian families spread over 60 communities belong to the parish of St. Patrick. There is a variety of groups: more than 300 kids in catechesis; the Legion of Mary; the Divine Mercy group; the group of San José Vaz; and a group of youngsters.

We work in collaboration with two diocesan priests of our parish, and with the Sisters of the Holy Family of Bordeaux. Our Christian community looks like a mustard seed.
Despite being the smallest of the religious presences in the country, it has within itself the vocation and the strength to become a tree capable of providing shelter and bearing good fruit.

I thank God and our people. The constant prayer of Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, and Christians has strengthened my prayer life. The priority accorded to the family in Sri Lankan society has made me value my own even more. The simplicity and poverty with which my neighbours live have led me to try to find what is truly necessary.

The solemnity of some celebrations, the symbolism, the colours, and the smells have made me understand infinite Beauty. The serene joy of seeing the shyness that quickly turns to confidence and many chats with a thousand questions have taught me to appreciate the importance of stopping and talking with people. The life of suffering endured by these people who were once slaves reinforces the promise of Christ: “I have come so that they may have life, and have it in abundance.”

The unshakeable faith of a minority, sometimes persecuted or even massacred, confirms that the Church is mother and body; that she is called to come out of the temples and break the barriers of fear and privilege; that even if it is persecuted, is called to be the announcement of the fullness of  Life in Christ. (C.C.)

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