TwitterFacebookInstagram

Sara Raymi. Feast of the Sun, Andean New Year’s Day.

On 21 June, the winter solstice in the southern hemisphere, Andean cultures celebrate the new year. Fire, music, fruit and corn are the symbols. And open palms to thank and welcome.

On 21 June, the winter solstice, Andean cultures celebrate the beginning of a new year, 5531. In Cochabamba-Bolivia, in the province of Quillacollo, the celebration has a particular meaning, because it recalls the festival of corn, Sara Raymi and dates back to pre-colonial-Inca times. On the rocky hill, there are the Qolcas, built of mud with a thatched roof whose shape and position made it possible to preserve cereals, mainly corn, for a long time in order to guarantee food for the population. The hill is, therefore, the ritual space where the preciousness of the sun is celebrated and thanks are rendered to Tayta Dios, God the Father, for the renewal of the energy it releases.
The ritual begins on the night of June 20, when different groups of people gather to accompany the dawn and ends when the sun shines its first rays at the dawn of the new day. There are numerous components of the ritual but we mention only five: bonfires, music, fruit offerings, hands with open palms and corn.

123rf

The night of June 20 is considered the coldest of the year and, the people gathered on the hill light bonfires to warm themselves and, at the same time, to protect the sun that is rising with the new day and fight against the intense cold. The musical groups, mainly sikuris, with their wind instruments, accompany the people who dance around the bonfires in an atmosphere of expectation reminiscent of the Easter vigil.
When the colours of the sky announce that the sun is about to rise, someplace on the bonfire their offerings of apples, pears, honey, flowers, grapes accompanied by coca leaves and a few drops of alcohol poured on the ground. In this way, they give thanks for what they received the previous year, ask forgiveness from the earth and welcome the return of the sun.
When the cold and the colours of the sky intensify, the noise and the music cease and a contemplative silence fall: all eyes are turned to the east where the sun rises and the participants stretch out their hands with open palms to receive the energy of the first rays while, with strongly beating hearts, they beg for health for their bodies and an abundance of food for the community.

Women in traditional clothes in the square San Francisco in La Paz, Bolivia. 123rf

This divine time of encounter between the human being and the cosmos expressed by the rays of the rising sun closes with embraces and good wishes, while the music of the sikuris becomes stronger and more joyful. With the light of day, stalls offering food based on ancestral corn recipes appear, while some elderly women offer other varieties of corn not present in the market.
Thus, with the experience of co-care between human beings, the cosmos and the simplicity of corn, which reminds us that we are seeds to blossom and bear fruit in this life and a new year begins. (Photo 123rf)

Tania Ávila Meneses

 

 

Rare Earths: four recipes for safe supply chains.

The growing demand for Rare Earths for energy transition requires more resilient supply chains. Are stockpiling and recycling
part of the solution?

In the coming years, energy transition and the progressive electrification of our economies will increase the consumption of Rare Earths and other elements, such as lithium, cobalt, nickel, and copper collectively indicated as critical raw materials. The growth in demand for critical raw materials, coupled with their production concentrated in a few countries, raises concerns about the security of their supply.

Rare Earths, despite their name, are not earths and are not rare, but a group of 17 elements of the periodic table: yttrium and scandium to which is added the lanthanide family. Elements such as praseodymium, neodymium, gadolinium, and holmium belong to the lanthanides, generally unknown to non-adepts of Mendeleev’s periodic table.

However, although little known, Rare Earths are needed for the construction of wind turbines, electric motors, magnets and electronic equipment, such as our smartphones. According to the American Chemical Society, an iPhone contains 16 Rare Earths even if, in total, they do not exceed 1% of the weight of a mobile phone.

The relative chemical similarity of the lanthanides makes them not easily separable from each other and consequently expensive to produce. The term rare, therefore, does not derive from the rarity of the earth, but from the complexity of the extraction process of the specific element from the mineral that contains it.

Then there are other critical raw materials such as lithium, cobalt, nickel and copper that do not belong to the Rare Earths, but whose demand will grow in an economy that will become increasingly electrified
and decarbonized.

For example, lithium-ion batteries, used in most electric cars, need around 10 kilograms of this element per battery. The manufacture of an electric car also requires tens of kilograms of copper. According to the International Energy Agency, the demand for lithium together with that of copper is destined to double between now and 2040.

More than 60% of Rare Earths are produced by China, but if we include refining processes, the percentage controlled by that country reaches almost 90%, generating concerns about our dependence on a substantial monopolist. It can be anecdotally recalled that in the 1980s the Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping clairvoyantly stated: “the Middle East has oil and we have Rare Earths”.

For other critical raw materials, the centre of gravity is located in Latin America, which has 50% of lithium reserves, 40% of copper and a quarter of nickel. Lithium, in particular, is concentrated in Argentina, Chile, Bolivia and Brazil and these countries are discussing the creation of a lithium cartel modelled on the OPEC oil cartel.

It is therefore vital that our energy security mechanisms, designed for hydrocarbon supplies, are modernized considering the new risks of a more electrified, more decarbonised society with an increasingly important role for critical raw materials. In this regard, it may be useful to analyze similarities and differences between the market dynamics of oil, the strategic commodity par excellence, and critical raw materials, the new commodities of the energy transition.

Firstly, as with oil, reserves and production of critical raw materials are concentrated in a limited number of countries. However, while for oil OPEC, a cartel of 13 countries, controls only a third of global production, for some critical commodities production is concentrated in a smaller number of countries. For lithium, cobalt and Rare Earths, the three largest producers control three-quarters of global production.

Secondly, both critical raw materials and oil require more than a decade between the discovery and the start of production in new fields. This dynamic can trigger the so-called commodity supercycle whereby the price of raw material continues to increase due to growing demand and a supply that is unable to satisfy it in the short term.
One example of a supercycle was the rise in the price of oil from $10 to $140 a barrel between 1999 and 2008 as a result of growing demand and supply that could not keep up.

A third analogy is the decline in the quality of resources and reserves which can in some cases, but not always, be compensated for by technological developments. For example, at the end of the 19th century in Andalusia, the Rio Tinto company produced copper from rocks with a percentage amount of copper in the rock mass, the so-called “tenor”, of 15%. In current mines, the content is less than 1% and to obtain a few kilos of copper it is necessary to process a ton of rock, with significantly high cost and environmental

However, there are also differences between oil and critical raw materials. Petroleum is not recyclable, except for a percentage of about 10% used for plastic materials. The remaining 90% is burned in various forms and therefore cannot be reused. For critical raw materials, however, in many cases, there is the possibility of recycling.

Finally, the dynamics of use are different: if the oil supply were to be interrupted, our transport and therefore our economies would immediately be blocked.
In the case of critical raw materials, only new productions would be interrupted, but the already existing fleet of wind turbines and electric motors, to cite two examples, would continue to operate.

Considering the similarities between oil and critical raw materials, we could take as a model the policies implemented after the oil shocks of the 1970s to increase the security of supplies of these materials.

In the 1970s when oil soared from $3 to $40 a barrel, new fields were brought into production in the North Sea, Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. These fields put 6 million barrels of non-OPEC oil on the market, helping to push the price of crude below $10. Similarly, the production of critical raw materials in the European Union should be encouraged in the coming years. The discovery of significant quantities of lithium in the Czech Republic, estimated at 3% of global deposits, was recently announced. If these resources are not available in Europe, it will be necessary to ensure diversified supplies from reliable third countries.

Another policy from the 1970s aimed at reducing oil consumption by replacing it with other sources of energy and implementing energy-saving initiatives.
In the case of critical raw materials, efforts should be made to use them more efficiently and to recycle them in a circular economy perspective, consequently reducing imports from third countries.

Furthermore, in the 1970s strategic oil stocks were created with which importing countries acquired sufficient resources to compensate for a 90-day import cancellation.
Consideration should be given to building strategic stockpiles of critical raw materials both in the EU and in OECD countries, modelled on the oil stockpiles created in the 1970s.

Finally, it may be recalled that on 16 March 2023, as part of the Green Deal industrial plan, the European Commission adopted a legislative package on critical raw materials. The package includes initiatives to ensure secure, diversified, affordable and sustainable access to the critical raw materials needed precisely for the energy transition. (Photo:123rf)

Massimo Lombardini
ISPI

Rajagopal. Towards a dignified life.

As Gandhi’s heir, he brought the method of non-violence to the conflicts of youth gangs and peasant marches for land rights. In May he was awarded the 2023 Niwano Prize.

He has himself called just by his first name to avoid being identified with a caste. And for fifty years in India – following the example of Mahatma Gandhi – he has been fighting with non-violent methods for the rights of the poorest and most marginalized populations.

Rajagopal P.V., is the 74-year-old Indian activist chosen for the 2023 Niwano Prize, the prestigious award for his commitment to peace awarded every year by the foundation of the same name.

Considered the “Nobel of Religions”, the prize – which commemorates the figure of Nikkyo Niwano, first president of the Buddhist organization Rissho Kosei-kat – was officially presented in Tokyo on 11 May at the end of a selection process that involves 600 people and organizations representing 125 countries and many faiths.

Originally from Kerala, Rajagopal began his social activism in the Chambal valley, in Madhya Pradesh, dedicating himself to the boys of the dacoits, the violent youth gangs of the most marginalized sections
of the population.

The culmination of these efforts was the foundation in 1991 of the Ekta Parrshad (the “Forum of Unity”), a coordination of realities that proposes to promote the right through non-violent methods to land and dignified life for the most marginalized communities.

In collaboration with other groups, this movement has managed to ensure property rights on the land for about 500,000 families and to get the Forest Rights Act approved, the most important law on the rights of tribal populations in India.

In 2019 he launched the Global Peace Yatra with the aim of walking from New Delhi to the UN headquarters in Geneva to relaunch the Sustainable Development Goals; however, the pandemic stopped him when he arrived in Armenia.
Rajagopal and his association then diverted their commitment to actions to alleviate the consequences of Covid-19 in India.

Regarding the motivation for the award, the Niwano Foundation speaks of Rajagopal’s struggle “for the recognition of the equal human dignity of every man and woman, regardless of caste or sex, which arouses great admiration. Among the particular results of his action are the negotiation of surrender and the rehabilitation of gangs, the education of young people to serve the needy and, in the awareness that the basic needs of the poor are water, land and forests and its commitment to caring for the environment.”

The Niwano Peace Foundation was chartered in 1978 to contribute to the realization of world peace and the enhancement of a culture of peace, promoting research and other activities based on the spirit of religious principles and serves the cause of peace in such fields as education, science, religion and philosophy.

Former recipients of the Prize include Lutheran Bishop Dr. Munib A. Younan, late Brazilian Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns, Anglican missionary priest and anti-apartheid activist Michael Lapsley, and the Community of Sant’Egidio. (G.B.)

 

 

 

Netflix. African Folktales, Reimagined.

It is a series of six short films produced by Netflix made by young directors of the Continent. The project, supported by UNESCO, aims to enhance African cultural wealth.

The young African cinema grows and develops in a feminine way. Netflix has produced six short films shot by six young male and female directors from the continent, under the title African Folktales Reimagined.The chosen ones were selected from 2,000 participants in a competition organized on a continental scale by UNESCO to showcase the richness of African cultural heritage through the presentation of local stories told by a new generation of filmmakers.

The six winners of the Netflix-Unesco film competition. Photo: Netflix

The six short films of about 15-20 minutes each are surprising for their work with images, music and light and for the creation of the magical atmospheres within which the characters move.
The stories are told by new voices from sub-Saharan Africa, all inspired by the local culture and set in villages and cities or in nature, but in order to connect with the rest of the world.

Stories of women and more besides
The stories created by young directors – three out of six are women – often have female protagonists at the centre of the action, almost like a new gender awareness that is advancing.
The young Nigerian author Korede Azeez has decided to evoke a female story in Hausa: in her short film, Halima’s Choice, she touches on the fantastic by filming a girl from an isolated Fulani village, the victim of a forced marriage from which she flees by seeking for help from a stranger and the virtual world.

A scene from the Kenyan film Anyango and The Ogre. Photo: Netflix

The Kenyan Voline Ogutu, with Anyango and the Ogre  tells the story of three children and their mother, who, through transmigration in a popular fairy tale, try to escape from an abusive father.
The South African director Gcobisa Yako, on the other hand, with MaMlambo, takes us into the mystical world of river creatures, who watch over women in difficulty.
The work of Ugandan director Loukman Ali with Katera of the Punishment Islandal centres on a woman who is abandoned on an island for having conceived outside of marriage, but who will manage to take revenge on the powerful man who kidnapped her by transforming into a kind Wonder Woman.
She is an elderly woman grappling with a djinn – a supernatural entity in the pre-Islamic and Muslim religions – the protagonist of the short film by the Mauritanian director Mohamed Echkouna, in Enmity Djinn, reinvented the stories that she heard as a child from her grandmother and her uncles. Finally, a story with an environmental aspect, that of the Tanzanian director Walt Mzengi, with Katope whose protagonist is a little girl born on the arrival of a wave of drought who meets
a mysterious rainbird.

UNESCO, Africa as a priority.

Tendeka Matatu, Netflix’s Director of Film in Africa said: “We are excited to bring this anthology of short films created by the next generation of African storytellers to Netflix members around the world.
This initiative is a testament to our ongoing efforts to strengthen the pipeline of African storytelling and to include voices from underrepresented communities.”
Ernesto Ottone R., the UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Culture, pointed out:  “UNESCO is proud to present the tales of Africa, reimagined by its emerging, homegrown talents. At the crossroads of tradition, innovation, heritage and creativity, African expressions in the twenty-first century are as diverse and dynamic as its people. The UNESCO-Netflix partnership represents our shared commitment to the audiovisual industries of Africa, which have the potential to generate US$20 billion in revenues annually. African creativity is a force for sustainable development, and we cannot wait for the audiences around the world to feel its unstoppable energy.”

Adam Garba and Habiba Ummi Mohammed in Halima’s Choice. Photo: Netflix

Each winner received a $25,000 prize and a grant to produce the short film. The works were officially put online on March 29 on the Netflix paid platform, on the occasion of the sixth edition of the Kalasha International Film & TV Festival in Kenya. UNESCO, wants to make Africa one of its priorities, with particular attention to cinema.
Among other things, UNESCO itself has published on its website the first report dedicated to the trends and possibilities of this industry, stating that it would have the potential to create 20 million jobs and generate 20 billion dollars in revenue for the continent. Not bad, and these short films seem to go in the desired direction, presenting themselves as the cultural expression of 21st– century Africa, as diverse and dynamic as its population. (Photo: Netflix)

Milena Nebbia & John Mutesa

Ecuador. June Festivals.

During the month of June, various traditional festivals are celebrated, including Inti Raymi, thanksgiving to the sun and the earth, for the abundance of crops.

The history of these festivals dates back to the Inca empire when they were established to venerate the Sun King and Mother Earth (Pachamama) for the favours received in the harvests. The ritual has remained in force despite the strong Spanish colonization and the imposition of their Catholic religion in these lands.
Faithful to their ancestors, every June 21 Ecuadorians, and in particular the indigenous communities of Kichua origin, dance and go to rivers and waterfalls to purify the human spirit, recover energy and renew their commitment to the land that provides their livelihood.
These events start the national festivities, which last until 1 July and cover the whole territory with traditional dances and music, danced and performed in traditional costumes and accompanied by shared food, including mote, cheese, meat and drinks such as the chicha.

123rf

One of the first rites is the Intiwatana ceremony, with various offerings such as grains, flowers, fruits, spices and musical instruments, which are then brought to be blessed on the altar and seek, as the name suggests, watana and Inti (sun).
The Inti Raymi, on the other hand, is the beginning of the summer solstice, which represents the end of one cycle and the beginning of another, but always with the recognition of father sun and mother earth. Over the years, the Inti Raymi commemoration has also incorporated traditional Andean games, involving everyone present.
Music, dance and ritual acts filled the ceremonial and sacred places, located along the inter-Andean Road because it was believed that in these places the energy of the gods and nature come together to energize those who participate in this celebration.
Traditionally on these dates, different Andean communities get together and prepare different activities and rituals to honour Taita Inti; an example is the Cotacachi, where the spiritual and symbolic ritual of taking over the square summons dancers and musicians, who turn in a circle with strength and courage to keep the earth awake and to receive the offerings of human beings.

123rf

Another important activity on this date is the purification and energy renewal bath, guided by the shamans. Inti Raymi also includes the traditional pampamesa, an ancestral ritual in which typical Andean foods are shared, such as corn, potatoes, malloc, beans and others, combined with different meats, especially that of the guinea pig. The food reflects the togetherness of the community.
The festival has a main character, the Aya Uma (devil’s head), who has important spiritual significance for indigenous communities.
The Inti Raymi shows the syncretism of Andean and Western culture, and the Aya Uma is an example of this. The name of the devil was assigned in the process of the Spanish conquest to sow fear in the indigenous culture, for the celebration of festivals in honour of the divinities of nature such as the Sun, the Moon and the Earth. Over the centuries its name has been handed down as Diablo Huma, but its meaning transcends the evil connotation of the Spanish religion because its function on the day of maximum celebration (June 22) is to gather good energy and to be the connection between the cosmos and earthly life.

Inti Raymi indigenous celebration in Cayambe, Ecuador.123rf

During the festival, the Diablo Huma dances in three tempos to connect with the Earth, the Sun, and the Moon. The man who represents him becomes a spiritual being who breaks the myth to transcend reality and embodies the energies of the deities.
His costume consists of a colourful mask with two faces. He shows the duality of the cosmos (good and evil, sun and moon, day and night, future and present, north and south). He also has hair that symbolizes wisdom and a wheat flower. His mask also has four types of ears which refer to the four directions and four elements of nature: air, water, fire, and earth. His clothing also consists of a whip, a symbol of power and authority. His legs are covered with a zamarro (a garment made of different animal skins) to guide those attending the Inti Raymi festival. In some indigenous communities, the Diablo Huma plays wind instruments while dancing to the rhythm of drums, guitars and the songs of indigenous women.
Over time, many of these festivals have become tourist attractions, with music, dance and the sale of handicrafts and local gastronomy. Despite the changes, the initial goal is always to thank the Earth and the Sun for having blessed and allowed an abundant harvest.(Photo: 123rf)

Pedro Santacruz

 

Benin. The Artists of Abomey. ‘The Oral Historians’.

Between 1600 and 1900 the city of Abomey was the pride of the kingdom of Dahomey (today’s Benin). Court art developed there, in which genius, talent, and inspiration served above all to exalt the figure of the king.

Dahomey, also known as the kingdom of Abomey, after the capital, occupied the south-central part of what is now Benin. Founded in 1625 by the Fon ethnic group, it lasted until November 1892 when Gbéhanzin, the last king, was defeated by French colonial forces.
The solidity of the kingdom of Adomey, its social and political organization and the richness of its culture made it one of the most famous realities of the Gulf of Guinea. From the frescoes to the tapestries celebrating the war exploits of the sovereigns, the art of the palace in Abomey was an exceptional witness to the history of the kingdom which nourished and enlivened it.

Royal statues from Benin’s historic Kingdom of Dahomey. Quai Branly museum in Paris.

If in other kingdoms it was the griots, or official narrators, who praised the feats of the kings, in Abomey this task fell to the court artists. In this they can be considered authentic ‘oral historians’, as they created allegorical figures that transmitted messages intended to impress the visitor to the palace, to be disseminated throughout the kingdom and to intimidate enemies on the battlefield.
Each object was made by a family of artists, whose knowledge was passed down from father to son, and was ‘signed’.
From the foundation of Abomey to its fall, 15 kings succeeded each other on the throne and all, with no exceptions, surrounded themselves with artists of different origins: Yoruba, Fon, Mahi, Haussa. Once the genius and talent of an artist were recognized by the king, he then hurried to set up a workshop for him near the palace and to provide him with the materials for the work, helpers, some wives and a piece of land to cultivate. This proximity to the royal palace facilitated contacts, more or less discreet, between the king and the artist for commissions of works to be created.

Half-man, half-fish statue (called bochio), Fon style. Provenance : Abomey, ancient kingdom of Dahomey. This statue would represent Béhanzin, the last king of Dahomey. Quai Branly museum in Paris.

The artist was known by the name of adawunzowato (Fon language: ‘one who makes beautiful works’) and was believed to be ‘possessed’ by Aziza, the spirit responsible for creation. However, although he enjoyed great freedom in the execution of his work, once he became court, he was subservient to the monarchy: each of his works – bas-relief, tapestry or sculpture – was intended to glorify the king.
He never resorted to a real portrait. The representations of the monarchs did not have human form, but rather alluded to the animal world since, according to tradition, the Abomey dynasty descended from Agassou, the son that Princess Aligbonon, daughter of the king of Tado, had given birth to after being fertilized by a leopard.

Showcase of the Kingdom
From the time of Aho Houégbadja, believed to be the true founder of the kingdom of Abomey (actually, he was the third king and reigned from 1645 to 1685), up to the reign of Agoli-Agbo (1894-1900), as many as 10 royal palaces were built. Of these, only those of King Guézo (1818-1958) and King Glèlè (1858-1889) remain, which since 1944 have become the headquarters of the Abomey Historical Museum. Authentic ‘kingdoms within the kingdom’, the royal palaces were forts, universes jealously protected from prying eyes and from enemy attacks. Centres of political life, they embodied both the power and stability of the kingdom and its immutable and sacred character. Emblematic in this regard are the access doors to the adjalala (the reception hall) of King Glèlè. Sculpted by the Sossa Dede family, they depict elephants, horses, dogs, rifles, sabres, eyes, and toads – symbols of the strength, safety and peace that characterized the kingdom.

A wooden door from the king’s palace Gele of the Dahomey kingdom, dated 19th century, displayed at Quai Branly museum in Paris, France

Even the walls of Abomey’s buildings have stories to tell. The facades are adorned with magnificent earthenware bas-reliefs, authentic visual chronicles of Dahomey. The technique is that of sunken relief: the artists carved out a square or rectangular niche in a very thick wall inside which they modelled the desired shape with clay. Once completed, this assumed the appearance of a half-round figure, protected from the rain and perfectly integrated into the structure. Works mostly by artists of the Houndo and Assobakpé families contain all the memory of the Dahomean dynasty and today offer it to the enchanted eye of the visitor. One can admire the silhouette of a buffalo, the emblem of King Guézo, proud to equate his strength to that of the mighty animal, or of a lion, as a disguised message from King Glèlè to enemies intending to attack his kingdom.But the genius of the artists is best seen in the creation of some hieroglyph-like signs. In them we distinguish the furious Amazons (women who formed the army of Dahomey) and war trophies, such as chameleons brandishing a sword or pine cones coming out of the sun. They are probably well-known graphically depicted proverbs, full of political and moralizing messages.

Chronicles on cloth
Tapestries were widely used in the Abomey kingdom, first to make military maps, then to celebrate friendship or to convey the titles of kings.They were also used in religious centres and places of worship, where they served as skirts for voodoo adepts. The masters of tapestry art were members of the Hantan, Zinflou and Yémadjé families, who became famous for the technique used: they inserted pieces of cut-out fabric of different colours into a single-colour canvas, so as to allow the tapestry to be admired from both sides.

Fon banner from the Kingdom of Dahomey.

The results were amazing. It depicted scenes of war or the simple meaning of the king’s nickname. For the most part, the sovereign was exalted in an allegorical form: he was represented as a man out of the ordinary, capable of killing a buffalo by the horns or in the act of subduing enemies with weapons and handcuffing them. Salpata, the voodoo of smallpox, which sows death among the population, is on the scene in a tapestry. In another, against a black background, there are scenes of war between the Fon and the Yoruba. In a third, with a certain amount of macabre in some details, we see people defeated and torn apart, victims of the glorious army of the Amazons.
Unlike metalworking, tapestry-making was not a Dahomean art. It is thought to have been introduced during the reign of King Agadja (1711-1740), who captured two master craftsmen of the Hantan and Zinflou lineages in the Avrankou region, north of Porto-Novo.

Glory to the King
The term ‘regalia’ meant all the precious objects intended to glorify the sovereigns and court dignitaries. Chairs and thrones, batons, decorations, musical instruments, sandals, caps and fans. Nothing escaped the cult of appearances.
Also exceptional is the statue of the god Gou, made by Ekplékendo Akati, a prisoner of war and certainly an adept of Gou. Life sized, the figure appears dressed in a soldier’s tunic and wears a hat, resembling an asen (portable altar), which allows him to receive libations and sacrifices.Combining human and animal forms, the court artists of King Guézo and King Glélé sculpted statues depicting the moral and physical qualities attributed to their rulers. Placed in front of troops during battles, these effigies also served as a bogeyman against enemies.

Benin Bronzes were taken from the ancient city in Nigeria by the British army. British Museum

Very well-known is the asen of king Gbéhanzin, made by Vincent Lanmandoucelo Aissi, of the Hountondji family: it represents the meaning of the name of the last king, Gbéhanzin, (‘the universe has the egg that the earth desires’): it alludes to fragility of the kingdom and the diplomacy with which a king must reign. Also beautiful are the royal drums, the akatahounto, specialties of the well-known families of artists Houeglo, Djotohou and Hountonvo.
Artists also worked for court dignitaries (especially the prime minister) and soldiers (the Amazons). Owning works from royal workshops was a privilege. The king’s soothsayers also used tools prepared by the court artists. The polychrome trays and ivory hammers carved by a Yoruba craftsman, of the Houndo family, for the soothsayer Guedegbe are beautiful. On the edge of the tray, the face of a legba (intermediary between gods and men) is reproduced 16 times. 16 is a magical figure: in addition to being quadruple of 4, multiplied by itself it gives 256, which is the number of ‘signs of divination’ (fa), which collect all the myths and traditional knowledge.

The Return of the Treasures of Abomey
The history of the ‘Treasures of Abomey’ is as dramatic as their sculpted forms. In November 1892, the French general Alfred Amédée Dodds entered Abomey, the capital of the Danxomè kingdom, after two years of ruthless warfare. French troops sacked the palaces and the city. Dodds and his troops seized important royal objects, including the 26 artefacts that Dodds donated to the Musée d’Ethnographie du Trocadéro in Paris in the 1890s. Since the 2000s, the objects have been kept at the Musée du quai Branly-Jacques Chirac.

Over the years, the Benin government demanded the return of the items. Only in 2016 did France admit that the Beninese government’s request for President Patrice Talon was legitimate, although restitution remained legally impossible under French property law. In November 2017, President Emmanuel Macron affirmed in his speech at the University of Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso) the French willingness to undertake restitutions. The return process finally began.
On December 24, 2020, the law relating to the restitution of 26 cultural assets to Benin was promulgated in France, in derogation from the principle of inalienability of French public collections. On November 9, 2021, the deed of physical transfer of ownership of these 26 assets to the Republic of Benin by the French Republic was signed at the Elysee Palace, in the presence of President Patrice Talon and President Emmanuel Macron. The following day, the 26 works of the royal treasury of Abomey were transported to Cotonou. It took 130 years for the Abomey Treasury to be returned to the homeland. (Open Photo:King Behanzin of Dahomey and his household. New World Encyclopedia.)

Flavien Amouro

 

 

 

 

DRC – China. The honeymoon is over.

The honeymoon is over between the World’s first cobalt producer, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the main consumer and producer of batteries for electric vehicles, China. The terms of the existing infrastructure-for-minerals deals may change but both countries need badly each other.

For about a year, a major conflict opposes the two main players in the world cobalt market: the DRC which provides about 70% of the world production and China, its main client which not only absorbs 80% of all Congolese mineral exports, whose companies dominate the Congolese mining scene. A new peak was reached on 11 April 2023, when the DRC’s National Assembly called for a review of the mining agreements with China. The Assembly Speaker, Christophe Mboso, claimed that certain partners such as the Chinese, were not paying their fair share.
Mboso was referring especially to the mining contract signed between the Congolese government in 2008 and the Sicomines joint-venture which is 68% controlled by a Chinese consortium including China Railways and Sinohydro, with the Congolese state-owned company Gécamines holding the remaining 32% stake.

China is everywhere in Congo. Photo: Simon Kupferschmied/Missio

This contract gave the Sino-Congolese joint venture access to 10.6 million tons of copper and to 630,000 tons of cobalt, worth $ 90 billion against the construction by the Chinese firms of 3,500 km of roads, 3,500 km of the railway infrastructure, 31 hospitals, 145 health centres and hydropower plants. The investments foreseen by the contract referred to as the “contract of the century” were initially worth $9 billion but the amount was reduced to $ 6.5 billion after the International Monetary Fund expressed its opposition to the deal because it could accordingly generate too much debts for the Congo.
According to a report from the Congolese Inspectorate General of Finance, released in February, the dividends were not shared evenly. The Chinese companies cashed at least $10 billion from the contracts over the last decade while they built a total amount of infrastructure for only $822 million. Yet, the IGF admitted that none of the parties did violate the Congolese Mining Code.
According to the Finance Minister, Nicolas Kazadi, Sicomines is failing to pay a tax of $ 200 million on super profits revealed by an audit from the Inspectorate General of Finance (IGF) last February 2023. The Congolese authorities claim that the joint venture has to pay such a sum since this tax is not one of those exempted in the 2008 contract, including customs duties, direct and indirect taxes. The Minister also stated that this contract signed under the Joseph Kabila presidency was biased in favour of Chinese interests.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s President Felix Tshisekedi. Photo: Congo gov.

Furthermore, the IGF director Jules Alingete revealed “an imbroglio” in the repayment periods of the investments which served to reduce the number of infrastructure investments from $6.5 billion to $3 billion”. Owing to the wide gap between the revenues of the Chinese consortium and the benefits for the DRC, President Tshisekedi pushed for negotiations on a new settlement, with an aim to increase the investments from $ 3 billion to $20bn.Clearly, the Congolese president considers that his predecessor and his staff did not serve properly national interests. On 7 April 2023, three executives of the state-run Agence Congolaise des Grands Travaux (ACGT), which was created by the Congolese government to manage the transport and health programmes financed by the 2008 deal, were arrested on charges of embezzlement.
Furthermore, the Public Debt Expenditure Observatory (ODEP) civil society organisation accused on 12 April in a communiqué the Group of Chinese Enterprises of having tried to bribe its president, Florimond Muteba, by offering him the job of representative of its interests in the DRC. The China Embassy rejected the IGF report allegations. In a communiqué released on 17 February 2023, it termed them as “unfounded” and claimed that they did not correspond to reality. The Embassy also stressed that the contract provided a good example of a win-win partnership. It mentioned a list of projects including the 240 MW Busanga power dam, which represents an investment of $ 660 million, inaugurated in January 2022.

Kolwezi sits atop some of the world’s richest mineral reserves. Photo: CGTN

The Chinese government said it would defend the rights and interests of the Chinese companies of the Sicomines joint venture. Sicomines questioned the competence of the IGF and deplored that the IGF ignored the dispute resolution mechanism created to settle conflicts between the members of the joint venture and deplored that Sicomines was not even heard by the authors of the report. In a statement, Sicomines said that the “unjustified measures” would harm the operations of the company and thereby damage the interests of the DRC and its people.
Unsurprisingly, the coordinator of the Office for the Monitoring of the Sino-Congolese contract, Senator Moise Ekanga, appointed when it was signed by Kabila, claimed that it was a win-win deal.
“We did not negotiate on our knees”, told Ekanga to the Kinshasa-based Top Congo FM Radio. “We didn’t sell out our mining reserves to the Chinese companies. We made them available for common exploitation”, he argued.The Chinese corporations consider that the dissatisfaction on the Congolese side is largely owed to the lack of governance in the sharing of the funds they paid to the DRC state. They consider indeed that the AGCT and Ekanga are to blame after the Congolese State Control Technical Office revealed by the end of March 2023 that out of the $ 822 million released by Sicomines to finance infrastructures, only 300 million could be tracked, whereas the rest appears to have vanished.
Yet, in order to ease tensions with the Congolese authorities, China Railways accepted to disburse an additional amount of $ 500 million
said Congolese officials.

Sicomines General Manager Li Sheng posing with DRC Minister of Infrastructure and Public Works, Alexis Gisaro, in Kinshasa. Image via Sicomines.

Observers stress as well that tensions between the DRC and China over the infrastructures for minerals deal have been encouraged by the United States. In September 2021, the former US Special Envoy to the Great Lakes and Sahel, Peter Pham, endorsed President Tshisekedi’s plan to renegotiate the infrastructure-for-minerals deal. “Non-transparent agreements that swap real mineral resources for inferior or non-existent infrastructure are not in the interests of society even if they benefit those who signed the contracts,” says Pham, now a fellow at the Washington-based think tank the Atlantic Council.
Although Pham did not hold anymore any official position in the US administration when he made this statement, the Paris-based Africa Intelligence newsletter reported that the US government did put pressure on the DRC to revise the Chinese contracts. The Congolese Mining and Policy analyst, Christian-Geraud Neema, said that the review of the Chinese contracts was an unofficial condition for the US backing of an IMF financial support of $ 1.5 billion to the DRC, in July 2021.

Yet, it is not certain the tug of war will go on indefinitely. The DRC and the Chinese find themselves indeed in a catch-22 position. They need each other as the first global supplier and first global client respectively. The Congolese Finance Minister declared on 20 February 2023, that China remained an important partner for the DRC and
would remain one for a long time.
Should the dispute continue, the consequences could inevitably affect world markets. In September 2022, the Kinshasa government suspended contractual tax exemptions on Sicomines imports. This might impact negatively Sicomines’ production levels which reached 155,000 tons of copper and 886 tons of cobalt in 2020 while the financing of infrastructures could decrease substantially and the business climate could further deteriorate, warns the Chinese consortium.
Now, the dispute with Sicomines is not the only one between the DRC and large Chinese companies.
For months, there has been another row over the payment of royalties to Gécamines with the China Molybdenum Company (CMOC), its partner in the copper and cobalt Tenke Fungurume Mining company (TFM).

The Tenke Fungurume copper/cobalt mine. Photo: Lundin Mining

On  the 19 April 2023, a deal on this issue was signed, reported a Hong-Kong Stock Exchange filing. Such an arrangement should pave the way for the release of a $ 1.5 billion stockpile of battery metals which had been blocked since July 2022 because of this dispute. The issue was followed closely on world markets since TFM accounts for some 15% of the global production of cobalt.
In such a context, the revision of the Congolese contracts with Chinese corporations could backfire and push cobalt and batteries prices upward. Even if eventually, Australian, Canadian and South African competitors acquire stakes in the Congolese mines at the expense of Chinese miners, it is unlikely that the world batteries market structure will change significantly. Indeed, the minerals are sold anyway eventually to China which represented in 2022, 77% of the global supply and produces them at lower costs than in the US or in Europe. (Illustration: 123rf)

François Misser

 

Brazil. Manaus. Sister Liliana and children of the favelas.

On the outskirts of the capital of the state of Amazonas, the Casa Mamãe Margarida school helps vulnerable girls to find hope and the concreteness of the Gospel in education and training. Sr. Liliana Daou Lindoso, the Salesian Sister in charge of the house, tells us about it.

St. Joseph the Worker is a dormitory neighbourhood of Manaus, capital of the Brazilian state of Amazonas. In the morning, many men from the favela go to work in the industrial district, leaving the women and children in the shanty town where people live in extremely poor conditions. In the factory, you earn very little, not even enough to make ends meet. And the little money raised is often spent on drink, so much so that alcoholism is a widespread scourge here.

“Many of them were on the street, abandoned to a life full of all kinds of dangers.” Photo: William Costa/Portal Amazônia

“When I came in 1987, the situation was bleak with families in difficulty, people suffering from mental illnesses, the lack of food and malnourishment among children. Many of them were on the street, abandoned to a life full of all kinds of dangers.” The story of Sr. Liliana Daou Lindoso, a member of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, also known as Salesians, who manages the Casa Mamãe Margarida in Manaus, is a journey into juvenile distress seen through the lens of reception facilities and the Santa Maria Mazzarello school opened in 1997. This suburb sprang up in a hurry and social problems have multiplied together with the inhabitants: dilapidated housing, poverty, hunger, petty crime and drug trafficking are the reality in which young people grow up. “Our girls are children who belong to a reality of material and also spiritual poverty – says Sister Liliana -. They are people who have no basis of faith, no moral structure. Many are weak and influenced by superstition: they range from attendance at sects to spiritism and the macumba.”

Poverty and Violence
The children “need lots of love – explains the Salesian -. They need time to open up and talk about their problems. They must believe in God and be able to distinguish God the Father the Creator from the flesh and blood father who hurts and uses them. For them, we are sowers of hope in building a life project that will make them protagonists of their own history. Our service was born for children and has developed to fit families. The community asked us to help young people with serious existing problems and difficulties in attending school. Girls on the margins, poor, from the countryside, without documents: truly an educational challenge.”

“I was already back on the street when three young girls told me about a place where they had been welcomed and respected”. Photo: William Costa/Portal Amazônia

Maria was one of them. She is now a psychologist and coordinator of school activities, where she trained herself. She tells us: “I arrived at Casa Mamãe Margarida at the age of nine, after running away from a state kindergarten where I ended up because I lived on the street. I suffered all sorts of violence but I had to survive. At home, my mother and stepfather treated me badly. I then ran away to the centre of Manaus, to the port on the Rio Negro River where there were boats. Every now and then I would get into one and set off not knowing where I was going.”
She continues: “Every time I came home it was worse, for seven years I suffered physical violence from my mother’s man and she would beat me with a piece of wood for not taking care of my siblings. I was already back on the street when three young girls told me about a place where they had been welcomed and respected. At first, I didn’t believe it, but then I decided to give it a try.”
“When I arrived at Casa Mamãe Margarida, I was in a terrible state, without hope. But there, for the first time in my life I felt loved and had the opportunity to become the protagonist of my life. I learned to read and write at the age of 10 and I never stopped learning.”

Photo: William Costa/Portal Amazônia

Like Maria, many little girls are the protagonists of Sister Liliana’s testimony. “From 14-year-old girls with a child in their arms to the teenager who comes to us with self-harm problems”. Sister Liliana’s voice slows down, her tone is lower. She sighs and then concludes: “But we are daughters of dreamers and so we carry on our work with great faith in providence. And in the human person’s ability to recover.” (Sr. Sister Liliana with children of the favelas – Photo: William Costa/Portal Amazônia)

Miela Fagiolo D’Attilia/PM

 

Chad. Promoting Integral Health.

At St Michael’s Hospital in Donomanga, Chad, a team of health professionals, co-ordinated by the Mexican Comboni Missionary Brother and medical doctor, Juan Carlos Salgado, does everything possible to ensure that patients are treated with respect and professionalism, healing them and helping them to have hope. We went to visit the Hospital.

We left Laï, in the south of Chad, at six o’clock in the morning, while it was still dawn. We were travelling to Donomanga, a small town 80 km away, where we were going to see the work done at St Michael’s Hospital. The institution belongs to the diocese of Laï and is part of the network of health services run by the local Caritas.
Along the roadside, villagers, mostly women and children, carry buckets and basins with water that they collect from the communal well and the firewood they use for cooking. Some children walk to school, under a scorching sun, as the temperature starts to rise and soon exceeds 35°C.

Serving the sick with joy
After a bumpy three-hour drive, we pass through the main gate of St Michael’s hospital. The first thing we see are groups of people sitting in the shade under leafy trees. Others occupy the corridors outside the various wards. “It is the patients’ families who take care of them. Each family takes responsibility for their patient, cooks for them and keeps a close eye on their health,” explains Brother Juan Carlos Salgado, a Comboni missionary and the only doctor practicing in these facilities.

Each family takes responsibility for their patient, cooks for them and keeps a close eye on their health.

Sister Angela, a Mexican nurse who has been in Chad since 2008, belongs to the congregation of the Daughters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. She collaborates with the administration of the hospital and takes us on a tour of the facilities. She tells us that the hospital has a capacity for 70 inpatients, divided between paediatrics, maternity, general medicine and infectious diseases. The hospital is the only one for more than one hundred thousand inhabitants of the Donomanga district. Sister Maria Oralia, also Mexican and who arrived in Chad just over a year ago, tells us that the logistics of storing the medicines were demanding and complicated, as there is no public electricity service and they had to use a diesel generator and batteries. However, “this task is now easier – she says with a smile -, because a few days ago 24 solar panels were installed and guarantee energy throughout the day and allow us, for example, to preserve medicines which need low temperatures for storage.” Bro. Juan Carlos adds that it can be difficult to understand how a hospital can function without energy, but “they have adapted to working with scarce resources”. He says they can now “have a blood bank, keep basic services running for 24 hours and even perform some operations with more peace of mind in case of emergency”.

Daily challenges
The hospital does not have many staff members, since, including all the employees, only 38 people work there. When we arrived, Bro. Juan Carlos was in his consulting room attending to the outpatients arriving that day. He says that many people arrive at the hospital already very sick, because “first they resort to local medicines and healers and only after that, if there are no positive results, they come to the hospital”. Many patients arrive already very ill, for example, with major infections resulting from accidents or injuries with knives, machetes or weapons, or very advanced diseases. The most common diseases in the region are infectious diseases, namely tuberculosis and malaria, child malnutrition and respiratory diseases. During the rainy season from May to September, malaria frequently affects children and the recovery process is more complicated, as many suffer from severe anaemia.

Sister Maria Oralia in charge of the logistics of storing the medicines.

The missionary doctor’s working day starts early with visits to patients in the different wards; it continues with outpatient consultations, ultrasound scans and minor surgeries. “The more complex and time-consuming surgeries are scheduled for Thursday and Friday each week. However, in case of emergency, they are done at any time, even during the night,” explains the missionary. For this, there are two operating theatres, equipped with the essential equipment. Before coming to Chad, Bro. Juan Carlos worked in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
For the past two years, he has been carrying out a difficult service, but one that fulfils him as a person, as a missionary brother and as a doctor. “I am happy to be here. I like the quiet life of the countryside better than the stress and hustle and bustle of the big cities,” he explains. However, working in this remote location has its limitations, drawbacks and challenges. The biggest challenge he faces as a doctor “is the lack of support from other experienced colleagues, with whom I could talk and discuss the more complicated clinical cases”. Nevertheless, he says that over the years of practice, he has gained “confidence to make decisions” and, whenever possible, he has tried to consult “friendly colleagues using communication platforms, as new technologies allow this teamwork”. He adds that, despite being in a remote location, this does not prevent solidarity. There is a group of Spanish ophthalmologists who come every year to work, with great dedication, for two weeks as volunteers at the hospital. His dream is to have teams of volunteer doctors from other specialties, especially in oral health, as “this service is practically non-existent in this country”.

He says that when he first arrived in Chad, he had difficulty adjusting to the climate and the extreme temperatures. With such an intense workload, it is easy to become dehydrated in this climate, so “I often suffer from kidney stones”. As malaria is endemic, he is also recurrently infected, and this year he has already suffered three characteristic bouts of the disease. Helping hands of brotherhood and solidarity due to the limited resources of the people in the region—most of them are engaged in subsistence farming—consultations and hospitalization cost very little. As the hospital receives no state funding, finding the funds to keep it running is always a major challenge, requiring ‘creativity and budgetary discipline’. Among the most urgent needs, Bro. Juan Carlos mentions are an X-ray machine; a unit for sterilizing clothes and surgical instruments; a new refrigerator for the blood bank; and a repair of the leaking water tank. He adds that “working with limited resources is not easy,” but they have learned to manage them so that “everything works well”.

In addition, everyone at the hospital is aware of recycling and minimizing waste as much as possible. Bro. Juan Carlos has many projects in mind for the future of the hospital, especially those aimed at ensuring its sustainability. Among these, he mentions the planting of cashew nuts to sell the fruit and the purchase of a tractor to till and cultivate the land owned by the hospital. Bro. Juan Carlos’ face shows the serene joy of a life given out of love for God and our most vulnerable brothers and sisters. “With my service, I do everything I can to make people healthy and happy. Everyone is treated with the respect and dignity they deserve. My greatest joy is to see patients going home cured,” he confesses shyly.
The missionary doctor ends his days tired and often stays at the hospital even at night because he has to perform urgent operations. Despite the difficulties, Bro. Juan Carlos is a happy person, for the mission he carries out with his competent, fraternal and supportive hands, which help to give life and hope to the inhabitants of this remote village in Chad.(Open Photo: Br. Juan Carlos with two hospital nurses.)

Bernardino Frutuoso

A Journey through the Kunama Culture.

The Kunama ethnic group resides mainly in the Gash-Barka region of Eritrea, between the Gash and Setit rivers, in the western and north-western regions of Tigray and in small areas of Sudan. There are an estimated 260,000 Kunama, most of whom live in Eritrea. They represent about 2% of the Eritrean population.

The history of the Kunama is largely unknown. Most of what is known has been passed down through oral traditions. These oral traditions indicate that the Kunama lived in Axum and surrounding areas as nomads. A king named Baden or Bazen and his wife Kuname ruled Axum around 8 BC. and nomads began to consider themselves and call themselves Kunama only during their rule.
Many Kunama believe they originated from King Baden (Bazen) and call themselves Kunama after his wife. Under the reign of King Baden (Bazen) and the Kunama, a common identity began to form among the Kunama.

According to tradition, when the king died in battle, neighbouring peoples killed many Kunama and pushed the Kunama from the Axum area to northern and north-western Tigray. Some Kunama crossed the Mereb River and migrated to present-day Eritrea, while others remained in Tigray.Others argue that the Kunama are a Nilotic ethnic group and that they originated on the border between Ethiopia and Sudan before migrating and settling in Tigray and Eritrea.
One of the earliest written records of the Kunama comes from an Arab traveller who visited Alwa (near Khartoum, Sudan) in AD 872. He mentioned that the ‘Barya’ and ‘Cunama’ tribes lived on the borders of the Kingdom of Alwa (now Sudan central and southern).
A 10th-century Arab geographer, Ibn Hawqal, wrote that the Kunama lived in the Baraka Valley in Eritrea.

One of the earliest written records of the Kunama comes from an Arab traveller who visited Alwa (near Khartoum, Sudan) in AD 872.

Many gaps have been filled in by using myths and legends. After the flood, one of them says, Ham, one of Noah’s sons, crossed the land of Egypt with his family and settled in the Eritrean highlands. Many scholars consider them to be the first colonizers of this part of Africa, even before the populations who came from Arabia or Yemen after crossing the warm waters of the Red Sea.

Matrilineal society
The Kunama language belongs to the Nilo-Saharan language family. The Kunama are a matrilineal society. They are a people devoted almost exclusively to agriculture. Kina or sorghum is the most traditional crop, along with burta, a cereal similar to millet, and also of great importance to livestock farming. This interest in breeding has its roots in tradition. Livestock and its products (milk and butter) were and are their greatest wealth, their well-being, and their very life. And it is perhaps for this reason that even today, in language, in etiquette (greetings and good wishes) and in tribal rites, the Kunama people gladly have recourse to ausa (milk), elevating it to a symbol of all good and prosperity, and, in the celebrations that they accompany its existence from birth to death, to the source of the ausa, that is, to the breasts (cuta).

The Kunama ethnic group resides mainly in the Gash-Barka region of Eritrea.

Some Kunama expressions of greetings or good wishes are worth noting: Ausa-si goda (literally: sit in milk), take care; Ausa-si gada (go into the milk), have a good trip; Ausa-si ningida (sleep in milk), good night; Ausa-si feda (wake up in milk), good morning; Ausa-si (in milk), wishes for all good things; Ausabarakata (milk and blessing), all good and happiness; Ausa-nasoke (I give you, I wish you milk), wish of wealth (it is the blessing of the elderly).
Formulas and ceremonies indicating the source of the milk – that is, the udder – return, as mentioned above, also in the celebration of some very important rites for the existence of the Kunama, so much so as to give life to two extremely significant expressions: Aira-cuta (udder of the cow) and Lasha-cuta (udder of the goat). Two expressions, among other things, which give a very particular imprint to the various ceremonies. And, to use one or the other, one must belong to one of the lineages or clans on which the social life of the tribe is organized: namely, Serma, Gumma, Shua, or Karawa.

The Serma and Gumma have the aira-cuta as their distinctive feature and in the celebrations of the various ceremonies, they perform or, rather, repeat certain gestures four times, because the cow’s udder has four teats. The Shua and the Karawa have lasha-cuta as their distinctive feature and in the ceremonies, they repeat certain gestures twice, since the goat has only two nipples.
According to the Kunama, the traditional rites of aira-cuta and lasha-cuta essentially represent means available to the Kunama man to ward off the various ailments that surround him. Their celebration, in fact, seals the nine most significant circumstances of an individual’s existence: birth, circumcision, initiation, engagement, marriage, childbirth out of wedlock, illness, death, and revenge against an enemy.

Four great families
The Kunama are divided into four great families: the Shua, the rhino tribe; the Gurma, the tribe of elephants; the Caraua, the tribe of the moon; and the Serma, the buffalo tribe. These four groups live indistinctly mixed, but each Kunama knows from childhood to which family or group he belongs. In some areas, they are even distinguished by the way they build their huts or the way they comb their hair. Thus, the Serma finish the construction of their huts with two raised horns, while the Gurma finish their huts with a tip bent like an elephant’s trunk.

Some of these groups maintain a special relationship with a particular group. The Serma and the Gurma, for example, are related to each other through marriages, while the Caraua are related to the Shua. Although the first two are perhaps more numerous, the latter two enjoy greater influence within the tribe, as the Sanganena or chief judge of the tribe belongs to the great Caraua family.
Being a matriarchal tribe, they enter one of these four families through their motherhood. Even if the father belongs to a particular group or family, the children belong to the mother’s family group. They explain this reality with this saying: ‘The earth (the mother) gave birth to a tree; the tree raised his arms to heaven (the father), but the earth grabbed him by the feet and said: ‘the children belong to the mother’ ‘.

The Kunama are a matrilineal society.

These main clans are then divided into sub-clans (formed by locality). From a geographical point of view, a different division can be proposed, but not everyone agrees on the number of groups that deserve this distinction. The Aymasa live in the homonymous plain, west of Barentu, the capital of the Gash-Barka region. This first group shows a strong Sudanese influence. The Barka or River People live in the Gash basin to the southwest. They have their epicentre in Fode; in addition to being the largest group, they are the ones that retain the purest language. The Tika, which literally means south, live on the banks of this river, from which they take their name. The Marda or Itana live north-east of Barentu. The Taguda or Tauda are a small group bordering the Aymasa. The Sokodas live in the Guluyi or Afir area. The Anal form a wedge between the Barka and the Tica. The Sasal live in the area between Ugaro, Guluyi and Aimasa. Finally, the Ilit (tamarind) and Bitama (new water) live not far from the city of Haikota. (A.F.M.)

 

 

The Philippines. Taking Different Paths.

The many challenges of Monsignor Pablo Virgilio David, bishop of the diocese of Kalookan, on the outskirts of Manila, and also president of the Philippine Bishops’ Conference.

His pastoral and charitable commitment led him to take sides against all forms of injustice and violence to the extent that, during the presidency of Rodrigo Duterte, he was accused of sedition and threatened with death, for having denounced violations of human rights and extra-judicial executions. He says: “I denounced the fact that the so-called war against drug traffickers was immoral, illegal, and essentially against the poor. The government must fight crime, but it cannot do it
with arbitrary and violent methods leading to Caloocan the systematic
killing of alleged criminals”.

Mons. David: “I denounced the fact that the so-called war against drug traffickers was immoral, illegal and essentially against the poor.”

He continues: “I supported the efforts of courageous journalists who irrefutably documented the abuses. Many of the people killed were not armed and did not resist the intervention of the police. After our complaints, they changed tactics: the executions were no longer carried out by uniformed policemen but by masked vigilantes and were classified as ‘cases under investigation’, but in reality, then, there was no investigation. The government officially declares six thousand ‘victims of the war on drugs’. But there are many more: we think that the people killed by the vigilantes, and not declared by the government, number more than twenty thousand”.
Faced with these complaints, the bishop has met with accusations and intimidation. “I received five charges of sedition and other trumped-up charges from the National Police, based on the testimony of an unknown person. They had a clear intimidating purpose. I was defended by my lawyer brother. Three other bishops were charged, but then the charges were dropped by the prosecutor before going to court”.

Creating communities
Monsignor Pablo Virgilio David, 62, was born in Betis in the province of Pampanga. He studied in Manila, Louvain, and Jerusalem, and taught biblical theology. In 2006 he became auxiliary bishop of San Fernando and since 2016 he has been bishop of Kalookan. Since 2021 he has been president of the Philippine Bishops’ Conference.
The diocese of Kalookan is located on the outskirts of the metropolitan area of Manila, an area where many people live on the margins of society. Speaking of his diocese, he says:

Slums on the outskirts of Manila. “Give what you can, take what you need”. Photo 123rf

“The diocese of Kalookan has 1 million 800 thousand inhabitants, of whom almost 90% are Catholics. Only 10% are reached by our parishes. When I became bishop, I immediately looked for those who remained on the margins of traditional pastoral care. Most of them are people from other provinces who don’t even have a residence. They live in slums, without adequate services and housing. I was shocked to learn that many children don’t even have birth certificates. For the state, they do not exist, and they do not go to school or hospital. Babies born at home are not registered to avoid paying the certificate fee, albeit minimal. The consequences are terrible. I have tasked a nun to work full-time and go out of her way to register the undocumented children of the diocese”.
“One of my priorities is to create ‘mission stations’ – continues the bishop – Today we have 18 and about 120 leaders between lay people, religious and priests. We are creating grassroots communities that are more agile and open than traditional parishes. In any case, we do not have the land, the resources, or the staff. The laity and nuns can be excellent leaders. There are also 35 diocesan priests”.

The local street in a small Philippine town. Photo: 123rf

The Coronavirus pandemic has had a heavy impact on the country. Many families have been affected. Mons. David had a brother of his who died of Covid. “A tragedy for my family: he was cremated within 24 hours; we weren’t even able to celebrate the funeral. And it was the same for many other families. The economic impact has also been dramatic. During the lockdown, there were people on the verge of starvation. Government aid has not been timely. But there have also been very consoling and effective acts of solidarity. For example, the ‘community food banks’ were started, i.e., public tables where people bring what they can and take only what they need, especially food. The initiative arose spontaneously, and the Church made it her own, extending it to the whole country. I think of it as the miracle of the multiplication of loaves and fishes. A slogan that has become popular goes: ‘Give what you can, take what you need’”.
However, the churches were closed. “We didn’t want to do it, but the government imposed it. We have strengthened the social communications service, thanks to the help of many young volunteers and digital technology experts. We stood by people with online meetings and celebrations. We have thus reached people who did not attend church and now do. Furthermore, despite the difficulties, we have not fired anyone who works in our facilities”.

The document of Bangkok
Looking at his commitment as president of the episcopal conference of the Philippines which has a current structure of 16 archdioceses, 74 dioceses, 7 apostolic vicariates, 4 territorial prelatures, and a military ordinariate. “It is a role that promotes the collegiality affirmed by the Council. It’s a challenge. It is not easy to build consensus: we Filipino bishops come from very different contexts which lead to different points of view. There is a need for a lot of interaction and commitment to converge on common pastoral positions that meet today’s challenges. In particular, the first is to combine faith with social, political life and ethical choices. Catholics, for example, see no connection between faith and political choices. They experience them as two parallel things. This is a defeat. We must encourage the laity to engage in politics starting from their faith. We bishops have a spiritual and moral role, but the commitment to politics belongs to the laity”.

123rf

“We must humbly admit – says the bishop – that many faithful do not make choices based on what they have learned in church. This may be because we are absolutely unable to offer valid pastoral care to everyone. At best we reach 20% of Catholics. And so, it is already a huge challenge. Our priests can do no more. The Philippines is a country with a Catholic majority, the churches are always full and the Masses numerous. Yet the majority of Catholics do not participate in any way in ecclesial and social life”.
Last October, the assembly of bishops was held in Bangkok, Thailand, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (FABC). The Assembly gave rise to the ‘Bangkok Document’ which, for the Burmese cardinal, Charles Bo, president of the FABC, constitutes “the watershed for the progress of the churches in Asia”.

Archbishop David was among the protagonists of the Assembly. He tells us: “It is an important document: it celebrates the 50th anniversary of the FABC and outlines its future lines. We have chosen an evangelical icon: the story of the Magi for the five sections. In the first, entitled ‘Observe’ and inspired by the Magi who scan the stars, we describe the realities of Asia, especially those of the poor, young people, and women. The second, ‘Walking Together’, refers to the journey of the Magi who leave their safety zone to follow a goal. We ask ourselves: which common path? The third, ‘Discernment’, refers to the reaction against the words of Herod and the high priests. We bishops also have to deal with political and religious authorities, and we must practice discernment. The fourth is ‘Offering one’s gifts’. Finally, ‘New paths’: like the Magi, blocked by Herod, the Churches of Asia are also called to take new paths to respond to new obstacles and challenges”.(Photo: Monsignor Pablo Virgilio David, bishop of the diocese of Kalookan, on the outskirts of Manila with children of the slam.)
Gianni Criveller/MM

Do Sanctions work?

We think of sanctions as an alternative to war.  They are also a projection of power.   States, corporations, and recently, individual citizens, are punished economically.

The aim is to stop or curtail actions which are inimical to the interests or values of the sanctioning State or contrary to international law, or to both.  In the long term the economic impact of sanctions may erode a belligerent State’s will or ability to wage war.  So far so theoretical.

But after reading Agathe Demarais’ recent Backfire: How Sanctions Reshape the World Against US Interests, Columbia University Press, 2022, you might be surprised how little practice fits theory.   Demarais recounts how sanctions have evolved since the 1950s including the variety of things that can go wrong and backfire on those who have imposed them.

President Eisenhower, with the creation in 1950 of the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), instituted the use of trade sanctions as a way of achieving foreign policy goals.   The first target was North Korea, a legacy of the Korean war.  North Korea’s economic links with the USA were tenuous.
The approach had to be multilateral: a UN embargo on oil imports
and coal exports.

After the revolution in 1959, Cuba was always a particularly American concern. 73% of Cuba’s exports went to the USA and 70% of its imports came from the USA.  Yet Eisenhower’s embargo imposed in 1960 failed to achieve its goals.  Despite an estimated loss over $130 billion in income, Castro died with his regime intact and was succeeded by his brother Raul.
The Kim dynasty in North Korea survives.  There are always ways of getting round trade embargoes.

Fast forward thirty years to Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait, the lessons of Cuba and North Korea hadn’t been learned or were just ignored.  Only a few days after Operation Desert Shield destroyed Saddam Hussein’s retreating army, comprehensive international sanctions were imposed on Iraq.  They lasted from 1990 to 1995 cutting off medical supplies and food imports.  Estimates of Iraqi children dying of preventable diseases and malnutrition vary from tens to hundreds of thousands.  An ‘oil for goods’ provision in 1995 permitted some humanitarian aid to enter the country. But Saddam Hussein was hanged in December 2006 as a consequence of military defeat.

Inflation is the most immediate result of even partial enforced economic isolation.  It powerfully affects the poorest.  According to Demarais writing in Backfire, American OFAC sanctions on Venezuela in 2018 caused the price of a roll of toilet paper to jump “to nearly 3 million bolivars, requiring a three-kilogram stack of 1,000 bank notes to pay for it”. Mass emigration followed.  The regime survived.

American companies shared a lot of the resultant pain from US sanctions while non-American companies were able to profit by filling the gaps created.  Congress dealt with growing complaints from US business by legislation subjecting foreign companies to the same penalties for trading with Cuba.

In a second 1996 Act, sanctions on Iran’s – and Libya’s – energy sectors were extended to include and enforce compliance by all international companies. This was the beginning of highly contentious ‘extraterritorial’ ‘secondary’ sanctions. The European Union, coerced by the Americans, had enough clout to stand up to them.
It warned that they would initiate a dispute procedure in the WTO (World Trade Organisation) which most believed the EU would win.  Clinton backed down.

By the turn of the century, OFAC, without abandoning the blunt weapon of embargoes, was moving on to sectoral sanctions, focusing on technology and finance, applied now to Iran.
The US was playing to its strengths, in particular the dominant role of the dollar in global financial services.

Companies and individuals in pariah countries were put on a Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list barring them from doing business – in dollars – with the USA.  Information on banks’ customers and networks became critical.  In 2012, under strong US pressure, SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications), the over 11,000 strong cooperative network for international payments with its – today’s – $5 trillion worth of transactions daily, 40% conducted in dollars, cut off Iranian banks.

But come the Russian invasion of eastern Ukraine in 2014 and China’s increasingly autocratic behaviour both nationally and internationally, the USA – and European Union – squared up to two significantly more formidable targets.  A second phase in the sanctions saga opened up.  The Peoples’ Bank of China immediately began developing its own financial service, CIPS (Cross-Border Interbank Payment System), for international payments in renminbi.

After its launch in 2015, CIPS attracted not only HSBC and Standard Chartered but also Deutsche Bank, Citi and BNP Paribas, the French investment banking group.   In January 2023 Russia and Iran joined up to create their own payments network after SWIFT excluded some important Russian banks.  The sanctioned targets were hitting back.

Agathe Demarais indicates in Backfire that the growth of cryptocurrencies is providing sanctions-proof banking.  China issued its own state-backed cryptocurrency in 2019, the digital renminbi.  Today some 300 million Chinese citizens use mobile phones for such accounts, thus creating another doorway to comprehensive government surveillance.  The Communist Party leadership now appear to be aiming at total control of the country’s financial system by displacing its two big tech firms, Alibaba and WePay, in the field of digital payments.

So, the not-so hidden logic of sanctions is the ‘decoupling’ of the world’s major economies, the fracturing of the global economy into competing economic blocs.  China’s Belt and Road Initiative, its extensive investment in trade and infrastructure in Africa, its role in the global South’s association of big economies, BRICS, leaves little doubt which bloc will eventually incorporate the most States.  One brake on such ‘decoupling’ is the crucial role of semiconductors and microchips in all economies and in military-industrial complexes.  Put crudely ‘it’s the supply-chain stupid’.

A key feature of decoupling is a policy of beggar – your- economic- neighbour (and rival) in microchip production.  China controls 80% of the production/refining of the world’s vital rare earths used in semi-conductors present in a vast array of modern appliances.   A F-35 fighter requires 417 kilos of these metals.  But the USA predominates in the equipment, software and design of semi-conductors.  A handful of such high-tech firms are collectively worth over $1 trillion.  The bulk of mass microchip manufacture takes place in Taiwan and South Korea.  In 2020 Chinese legislation restricted the export of 17 rare earths and Trump banned all microchip sales to Huawei and other Chinese companies.   Skirmishes in a future economic war?

Geopolitics are changing.  A multipolar world is emerging.  Sanctions have helped shape the present contours of international economic relations.  Yet on the whole sanctions don’t achieve their goals, often harming those they are not aimed at and bringing about unintended consequences.  States with a powerful coercive apparatus and a cohesive military show considerable durability.  Even weak States like Cuba and Venezuela resist successfully.  The most that can be said is that war, the alternative to sanctions, is far worse.

Backfire is a fascinating must-read for those who contribute to making foreign policy, for those who suffer from it, and for us baffled onlookers who fear for our grandchildren’s future. (Open Photo: 123rf)

Ian Linden
Professor at St Mary’s University,
Strawberry Hill, London.

Photo Gallery – Comboni Youth Movement at World Youth Day

Advocacy

Adenike Oladosu. Climate Change: Time to Act.

Nigerian ecofeminist Adenike Titilope Oladosu is the founder of   I Lead Climate Action, an initiative aimed at empowering women and youth to combat climate change.…

Read more

Baobab

The Crocodile and the Cockerel.

Once upon a time, the crocodile was king of the animals. He was holding court one day. He sat majestically on his throne as he received…

Read more

Youth & Mission

Jubilee of the Youth: An Unforgettable Journey of Hope.

Coming from five continents, 270 young people belonging to the Comboni Youth Movement gathered in Rome (24th July – 4th August 2025) to celebrate the Jubilee.…

Read more