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Peru. Birth among the Asheninka. An Offer to the Big River.

The Asheninka live in the central forest of the Ucayali district in the Atalaya province, in eastern Peru. Their culture is characterised by their coexistence with nature where life develops in its integrity.  The sorala, the Asheninka’s birth rites.

The Asheninka future mothers follow a special diet during pregnancy. They do not eat some foods which are believed to be dangerous for the baby, such as turtle meat, which according to the Asheninka could be responsible for some kinds of deformities, or other foods that could affect the duration of delivery.
The gestation period is calculated according to the phases of the moon. During this period, the future mother and father prepare for the baby’s arrival, and make sure they have all the essential things a newborn baby needs, such as clothes, or the aparina (garment to carry the newborn baby). All family members are very attentive to the symptoms and signs regarding the pregnancy of the future mother. If the pregnant woman is away from her family or community, for work or other reasons, a month before the delivery she comes back to her husband’s house where she can feel safer and supported by her relatives.

Besides, there are no hospitals where women can have their labour and delivery in the Amazon region, therefore pregnant women can just get the help of their relatives, especially of their husbands and mothers. That is why pregnant women in the Amazon region have to be very attentive to recognise the signs of labour and immediately inform the relatives living with them, so that they can prepare everything for the delivery.
As soon as a pregnant woman realises that the labour may be starting, she informs her husband and her mother; they call one of their neighbours with experience in childbirth, or a midwife, to help the future mother to deliver her baby. When the labour pains begin, the future mother holds onto a trunk or a branch of a tree.
That will help her during the expulsion stage. The pregnant woman waits, sitting crouched on a mat until the moment of delivery.  After the child is born, the midwife uses cotton tape to clamp the umbilical cord and then cuts it with a reed or bamboo leaf.

Soon after delivery, newborn babies are bathed in warm water into which some aromatic and medicinal herbs have been poured.
Then babies are dried and wrapped in a cotton towel and laid down next to their mother, so that the skin-to-skin contact continues and improves the attachment between the mother and the newborn.
The offering of the placenta to the land or to the big river represents the second important moment of the birth ritual. If it is decided to offer the placenta to Mother Earth, the new mother and her family look for a suitable place where the placenta is buried as an offering to Mother Earth, so that the newborn baby can receive the welcome, the blessing, and the fruits and goods that Mother Nature can offer. Or else the baby’s family can decide to offer the placenta to Yaku Mama, ‘Mother of the Waters’, which is one of the three ancient snake mothers of the Peruvian Amazon, and which is represented as an anaconda that, when happy, blesses people with plentiful rain and abundant fish.

123rf.com

The river is essential to the life of this indigenous population, because it is a means of transportation and communication between different communities and provides fish which is one of the staple foods among these communities. The placenta is offered to the river also to get protection for the baby from accidents when navigating the river. At the end of the ritual, the midwife gives some advice to the new parents, who should not leave their home and even less their community until the baby’s navel dries up, in order to avoid infections. The parents thank the midwife, who has finished her work, and assure her that they will always be willing to help her with whatever she might need in order to show her their gratefulness. Then in the following days after the big event, family life gradually returns to normal. (Photo: 123rf.com)

Jhonny Mancilla Pérez

U.S. Bill brings back cold war to Africa.

A new American bill is bringing back the cold war in Africa by summoning African states to take their sides in the war against the Kremlin. It targets countries which have close ties with Moscow. But it could accelerate the trend of United States waning presence on the African continent.

On the last 27 April, the U.S. House of Representatives adopted the “Countering Malign Russian Activities in Africa Act” by a large bipartisan majority. It is therefore certain that the new law will be passed by the Senate as well. It will direct the Secretary of State “to develop and submit to Congress a strategy and implementation plan outlining United States efforts to counter the malign influence and activities of the Russian Federation and its proxies in Africa”.
According to Peter Fabricius, from the Johannesburg-based Institute of Security Studies, this legislation aims at punishing African states which have close relations with Russia. The bill broadly describes the so-called “malign activities” as those which “undermine United States objectives and interests”. The U.S. Secretary of State will have to monitor the actions of Russia’s government and its ‘proxies’ including private military companies such as the Wagner Group. The State Department has 90 days to develop a plan to counter Russia in Africa, targeting particularly its “disinformation activities”. The bill reflects a carrot and stick policy since US aid programs will be part of its instruments and reminds of the cold war rhetoric.

In eastern Ukraine, Donetsk airport ruins through broken glass after massive artillery shelling. 123rf.com

According to the Democrat chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Gregory Meeks, the bill was introduced as a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and is designed to counter Vladimir Putin’s efforts to “pilfer, manipulate and exploit resources in parts of Africa to evade sanctions and undermine U.S. interests”.  The legislation urges the U.S. government to strengthen democratic institutions, improve government transparency and improve standards related to human rights, labour, good governance and monitor natural resources and extractive industries. Furthermore, it aims at countering Russian efforts to invest or otherwise control strategic sectors in Africa, such as mining and other forms of natural resource extraction and exploitation, defence and security, and information and communications technology. In short, doing business with Russia becomes tantamount to a criminal activity.

Pick a side or face consequences
The aim is to force Africans to pick a side. Michael McCaul, Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who co-sponsored the bill, told on the 4 May to a congressional committee: “We must make every state choose between doing business with the free world or with
the war criminal.”

Results of the United Nations’ vote on Russian aggression. (Photo: UN Media)

But why is Africa being targeted? One of the elements, according to African officials, is the huge frustration of American diplomats after the African vote at the U.N. General Assembly on the resolution, condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, on the last 2 March. Only one country, Eritrea, which is openly hostile to Western interference, voted against it. But 17 countries abstained and 8 did not participate to the vote. Eventually, nearly half of all African states reflected a non-aligned position, meaning a loss of diplomatic influence by Washington and by the U.S.’s main western ally in Africa, France: five French former colonies abstained, another member of the French-speaking club did the same and five former French colonies didn’t cast their vote.
Uganda abstained to show neutrality as the incoming chair of the Non – aligned Movement, explained its Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador, Adonia Ayebare. Algeria, another non-aligned pioneer abstained as well. Most former front-line states during the period of apartheid adopted a similar position. That was the case of Tanzania and Zimbabwe. Namibia, Angola, Mozambique and post-apartheid South Africa also abstained, refraining to condemn Russia as the heir of the only super-power which backed the Southern African liberation movements. In South Africa’s case, other reasons may explain the abstention. Peter Fabricius stresses business links between Putin’s oligarch chum, Viktor Vekselberg and the ruling African National Congress which own together shares of the United Manganese
of Kalahari mine.

Contractors from Wagner Group in Central Africa

The African Union chair, Senegal, also abstained. The war between Russia and Ukraine should not be Africa’s first concern since it reminds a lot of the East-West confrontation, say sources at the president’s office. Other abstentionists were Sudan, which ignored pressures by the EU to condemn the Russian invasion and South Sudan. The tiny Burundi’s abstention aimed at avoiding to choose between jeopardizing its relationship with Russia which blocked at the U.N. Security Council several resolutions which intended to condemn the country for its violation of human rights and of the rule of law, and damaging the links which were recently re-established with the E.U. after it lifted its sanctions. Former Soviet Union allies, Congo-Brazzaville and Madagascar, abstained as well. So did Equatorial Guinea.
Among the eight African countries which did not participate to the vote, was Ethiopia, former traditional partner of the Soviet Union which is upset by United States’ decision to withdraw it from the list of beneficiaries of the AGOA trade regime in retaliation for alleged war crimes in the Tigray. Cameroon which is also deprived of the AGOA trade benefits because of human rights violations in the Western English-Speaking area of the country, didn’t cast its vote either.

Morocco’s King Mohamed VI.

Morocco took a similar stand despite the U.S. support to its sovereignty claim over Western Sahara. Observers provide two explanations. On the one hand, since the U.N. resolution was sponsored by the E.U, Rabat sent the message that it was upset by the lack of enthusiasm of most European states in backing its claim over the Sahara. On the other hand, Rabat expressed its gratitude to the Kremlin which abstained to vote resolutions backing the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic at the UN. Guinea-Bissau, Eswatini, Burkina-Faso, Togo and Guinea-Conakry are the other countries which did not participate to the vote.

US concerns over Russia’s growing influence in Africa
Yet, according to Fabricius, Washington is not targeting Africa so much because of anything Africans have done but because Russia is perceived to be very active in Africa. In his opinion, the authors of the bill have in mind efforts by alleged Russian government proxies to bribe candidates in the last Madagascar elections for instance, and activities of the Association for Free Research and International Cooperation (Afric), a Russian election observation organisation, run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, who is known as Putin’s chef and believed to run Wagner.

Russia has signed over 20 bilateral military cooperation agreements with African states.

The U.S. are also concerned that Russia has turned into Africa’s first supplier of weapons. According to the Stockholm International Peace Institute, over the 2014-2019 period, Russia accounted for 49 percent of all arms sales to Africa, over three times more than the second supplier (the US with 14 percent) and the third, (China with 13 percent). According to Russian Defence Ministry sources, total annual sales reached US $ 15 billion in 2019. Algeria, Egypt, Angola and Nigeria are the main clients. And Russia’s market share is expanding. In 2000, 16 African countries were purchasing weapons to Russia. Now, the number is 21. This is partly because of Russia’s financial techniques to secure its markets. In 2006, Putin wrote off Algeria’s military debt which by then reached US 4.5 bn in return for its commitment to order $ 7.5 bn of new weapons. A similar deal was struck with Angola.
According to the Swedish Defence Research Agency, since 2015, Russia signed over 20 bilateral military cooperation agreements with African states. The last was signed in April 2022 with Cameroon, a few weeks after the launch of the attack on Ukraine. The deal encompasses exchanges of information on defence matters, national security, training of troops and support to U.N. peacekeeping operations. In February, Madagascar signed a cooperation agreement with Russia concerning the training of army officers and arms supplies.

The Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov (L) with the number two of Khartoum, Dagalo “Hemeti”

Besides, Russia is busy offering private security services for counterinsurgency training and advisory to African armies, namely through the Wagner Group of mercenaries, which in recent years has been deployed in Libya, Sudan, Mozambique, Madagascar, the Central African Republic, and Mali. Wagner suffered a setback in Mozambique where it failed to score a success in front of the jihadists in the Cabo Delgado province in 2020 and had to withdraw. Wagner was also accused of perpetrating human rights violations in Mali and in the CAR, where its arrival coincided with a linked Russian company being awarded diamond and gold mining licenses.
Yet, in a context of expanding jihadism and bad governance, inefficiency of UN peacekeeping missions and waning French influence, the Wagner Group feels a vacuum and is likely to stay in Africa. Sanctions are unlikely to change that, foresee military experts.
Russia is also far more present than the U.S. on the nuclear front. It has developed over the last decade a nuclear diplomacy which paves the way for the construction of nuclear plants, even though few African countries have gone beyond conducting feasibility studies, project costing and financing models. A few years ago, Russia and South Africa concluded an agreement which provided for the construction of eight nuclear power plants. In March 2018, the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov revealed that Rosatom was considering nuclear research and technology centers in Zambia and in Nigeria, beside plans to build four nuclear plants in Egypt. Accordingly, there are prospects for cooperation with Ghana, Tanzania and Ethiopia. Rosatom signed also MOUs with Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.

Catoca diamond mine in northeast Angola is the country’s largest diamond mine. Alrosa, the Russian miner is partner with Catoca Mining.

Owing to the importance of Russia’s interests in Africa, U.S. sanctions may have to target a number of African countries where Russian state-owned companies from the extractive sector such as Rosneft, Lukoil, Alrosa, Rusal, Gazprom and Nordgold have invested.
Angola is already suffering indirectly from U.S. sanctions because the main diamond projects of the country depend from the supply of Russian equipment and spare parts by the main shareholder, the Russian company, Alrosa which has difficult access to dollars. Other mining companies in Zimbabwe, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo risk to be affected as well.
Yet, United States has not so much leverage on its African partners. On the economic front, America has become a marginal partner, accounting for only 6% of the bilateral trade with the continent as against 30% for the EU and 13 % for China. The U.S. is still an important donor with 20 percent of all ODA to Africa but less than the EU (30%). In such context, there is a risk that US sanctions maybe counterproductive and incite countries such as Ethiopia and Cameroon, already under sanctions anyway to turn increasingly towards other partners including China. (Open Photo: Chamber of the U.S. House of Representatives during speech by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. (Photo: Congress Press)

François Misser

The Church Raises the Voice.

Since independence, the Church has been somewhat close to the MPLA, although it has always opposed civil war and worked for reconciliation.

A turning point in relations between the Church and the MPLA took place in 2015 when protesters who supported the activists of the Angolan Political Prisoner Support Group tried to gather on the square and inside some churches of Luanda (Sagrada Família, São Domingos and the churches of the Upper Town).
The Church was divided, but in the end decided to support the activists, while the security forces decided to intervene, entering the places of worship. This gesture marked a division in the relationship between the Church and the government.
Over the years, the Catholic Church has intervened in the main problems that affect the lives of Angolans. It had its say on poverty, hunger, inequality, natural resources and environmental protection, violence and lack of freedom. In this sense, it has played and continues to play a prominent role both nationally and continentally.

Archbishop emeritus of Lubango, Zacarias Kamwenho,

Relations with the MPLA are well exemplified by the interventions of the archbishop emeritus of Luanda, Bishop Zacarias Kamwenho (Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in 2001) and the bishop of Cabinda, Bishop Chissengueti, current spokesman of the Episcopal Conference of Angola and of São Tomé and Príncipe (CEAST).
Last December, Bishop Dom Zacaria Kamwenho criticized President João Lourenço, arguing that he is making Angola ‘his private constituency’ and that ‘Angola is tired of being a constituency deprived of its party’. And he did not limit himself to this. He asked for changes: an end to illusions related to the fight against corruption, a profound transformation of the MPLA, a solution to the discontent that is stealthily entering the population and respect for the Constitution. It is possible to look at this intervention as representative of the Church’s position and a response to the hostility, on the part of some members of the MPLA, towards bishops who raise their voices and demand the rule of law.

The Bishop of Cabinda, Belmiro Chissengueti

As for the new bishop of the exclave of Cabinda (a territory of northern Angola that borders the Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo and separates it to the south from the rest of Angola with a narrow strip of land), Bishop Chissengueti pacified the Catholic community of the exclave, known for its opposition to the central power. While, on the one hand, the Bishop of Cabinda constitutes a factor of unity in the Church and of closeness to the rest of Angolan society, on the other, he does not limit himself to dialogue, but also raises issues. Aware of the social problems (poverty, hunger, and youth unemployment) of a territory that is the largest oil producer in the country, Bishop Chissengueti argued that ‘the Church must not be afraid to get her hands dirty to defend her brothers and sisters’ and must make her voice heard not only to spread the Gospel but also to denounce social problems. On the regional question, Bishop Chissengueti raised two questions: Cabinda continues to have a poor population with few educational and health care opportunities, while the territory produces crude oil that amounts to 80% of the GDP.

There is poverty in the villages while investments are concentrated in the cities where the institutions are located; this causes internal migration to urban centres and the consequent desertification of rural areas. Meanwhile, the Episcopal Conference of Angola and Sao Tome (CEAST) has expressed itself several times on issues that have to do with the ‘state of health’ of the country, such as freedom, the right to vote, the rule of law, democracy, the good functioning of the institutions (also with reference to the recent decision of the Constitutional Tribunal to annul the internal election of the president of Unita, a historic opposition party) and on balanced regional development.  The Church’s vision is based on human development, communities, and essential goods, very different from the extractivist model that exploits oil reserves without the slightest concern for generalized poverty and future challenges. The Church echoes the discontent coming from all the provinces, especially from young people: its position is increasingly aligned with the sentiments of civil society.

Last February, in a statement on the occasion of the first Plenary Assembly of the Conference, in view of the general elections, the bishops stressed that ‘a strengthened democracy, by its nature, undoubtedly contributes to the affirmation of human dignity, to the strengthening of justice, peace and the well-being of citizens’.
For this reason, they invite ‘Catholics to avoid abstention’ and ‘to renew their electoral cards’. ‘The elections will take place according to our hopes if they are well prepared in truth, transparency, honesty and justice’. For this reason, the CEAST hopes for the promotion of ‘civic education of citizens’ so that ‘education for democracy is cultivated’.
The episcopate also invites the political parties to observe mutual respect during the electoral campaign, because the vote will be truly free only if the electoral campaign ‘is based on mutual respect and if all recognized subjects have the right and the possibility to express their opinions’. (Photo: The Catholic cathedral in Luanda. CC BY-SA 3.0/Fabio Vanin)

Marc Jacquinet and Ufulo Mbanza

 

 

Guatemala. Tana’s Sandals.

She never once bought an ice cream. She never had a day off. She has always worked. But she wants to celebrate her birthday. A Guatemalan migrant struggles to live and survive.

She looks at her fingers and hands chapped by 24 years spent cleaning restaurants and shopping malls with chemical cleaners. Originally from Camotán, Chiquimula, Guatemala, Tana left her indigenous clothes, her Maya Ch ‘orti’ gods, and wearing canvas trousers, a t-shirt and tennis shoes, she emigrated along with fifteen other girls from her community. Her home country, now a dry strip of land, has ceased to be the fertile ground that once fed the roots of crops decades ago. Without water and without food, both Tana and hundreds of residents have been forced to emigrate, some to the capital, others to Honduras but the majority determined to take the road to the United States. Some left with the financial help of relatives who were already in the country and others with just a one-way ticket to the capital and with the belief that the Lord of Esquipulas will open the way for them.

That is how Tana decided to emigrate, like most of her fellow villagers with nothing but the clothes on her back. She is the eldest of 11 siblings, her parents are farmers who plough the dry land that has stopped producing. She was sixteen when she left, at dawn, telling them she would go to the capital to find domestic work, but plans had already been made and there were 55 others from Camotán and Jocotán who made their way together, most of them under 18 years of age. Wandering among the hundreds of migrants who were found on the Tapachula side, they managed to reach Naco, Sonora, riding on the top of the Train of Flies, which in southern Mexico is known as La Bestia (the Beast). When they passed through Veracruz, they had some food that Las Patronas throw to the migrants on the train. That was one of the few times they had anything to eat as they travelled with a gallon of water to drink, some oranges and some cold bread they bought in bags in Tapachula.
The 55 who left Camotán and Jocotán crossed the Sonoran Desert without incident and were picked up in Arizona by relatives and coyotes who allegedly transported them to the different states of the country. Tana stayed there in Arizona with the relatives of someone she knew from Jocotán who gave them accommodation and found them work. Since then, Tana has lived in a community, with people moving in and out of their rented house; she has met people of every religion and region of Mexico and Central America. On one occasion, there were two men from India and one from Mauritania staying with them.
They could only greet them using signs because neither they nor she spoke English or French. They stayed for two months and then moved on to Chicago and New York.

Migrants cross the Suchiare river between Guatemala and Mexico. (Photo AP)

Tana cleans restaurants from 2am to 5am and at 7am she goes to her other job cleaning shopping centres until 6pm. When there is extra work, she goes to clean offices after her second job. On those days she gets only about three hours of sleep. At 1:45 am, she is already at the office, waiting in line with the other undocumented immigrants, from where they are taken by car to the different workplaces. They will be picked up later by those same cars. Tana works in a group; she doesn’t have a car but travels by train or bus.
Invariably, every week on Sunday morning, she will send money to the family in Guatemala. She has been following the same ritual for 24 years. With her remittances, her parents have managed to build a cement-block house with a terrace and are now adding a second floor. They have also opened a shop and built a cistern to store water when it arrives. They have enrolled her brothers in school. They all go to school because Tana made that a condition when she called them from the US two months after she left. All three of them simply must succeed in their studies.
Tana hasn’t eaten ice cream for 24 years; she doesn’t have a day off, working seven days a week. She buys all her clothes at a thrift store so as not to upset the remittances. She sometimes goes to her colleagues’ birthdays, but there is little money left for herself. She knows nothing of the parks, museums, swimming pools, cinemas or theatres and has never left Phoenix, where she lives.

People shopping at the Great Mall©unitysphere/123RF.COM

But that day is her birthday, and she wants to celebrate it for the first time. She doesn’t want to go to work and wonders what it would be like not to turn up for work. She wants to put on a dress like the ones she wore in her native Camotán. She takes a deep breath, reaches out, fills herself with courage, and for the first time in 24 years she postpones sending her remittance. She has breakfast and goes to buy some material. She starts walking around the mall looking at the shelves; she had never seen so many things in the years she was cleaning. It is lunchtime and, for the first time, she buys herself a plate of Chinese food and then some pistachio ice cream. Walking on, she stops in front of a shoe shop. She enters and starts looking at the shoes. She never before bought herself new shoes, but always second-hand, like her clothes from the second-hand stores. She has never worn sandals because she saw them as a luxury to which she is not entitled. After walking around the store for three hours and battling feelings of guilt over spending the money on herself instead of sending it to Guatemala, she buys two pairs of shoes and a pair of sandals. So many doubts and feelings of guilt. Suddenly, she thinks that for her next birthday, her fortieth, she will also learn how to cook the cherry pies she sees in restaurant patisseries because from then on, she plans to always celebrate her birthday.

Ilka Oliva Corado

 

Unpredictable Elections.

The result of next August’s elections cannot be taken for granted. About 14 million Angolans will be called to choose the president of the republic and their parliamentary representatives
for the next five years.

It is estimated that at least a fifth of the young voters will go to the polls for the first time; also, citizens living abroad, for the first time, may vote at the embassies in their countries of residence.
The political scenario is entirely new. On the one hand, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola is seeking election by proposing the old logic of the single party that has always been in power and its candidate, the outgoing president, João Lourenço. The opposition seeks to join together in a coalition called the United Patriotic Front (UPF), headed by the National Union for the Total Liberation of Angola and its leader Adalberto Costa Júnior.

Expectation of the opposition
Today, the Front enjoys a degree of popularity unseen in post-war Angola. In particular, on the individual level Costa Júnior, with a degree in electronic engineering and public ethics, seems to have no rivals on the Angolan political scene. But, beyond the individual image, the United Patriotic Front represents a significant novelty as an attempt to transcend political divisions and to combat the dispersion of votes, looking to the future, especially of the young.

Adalberto Costa Júnior. Leader of the National Union for the Total Liberation of Angola. CC BY-SA 4.0/Lwenapithekus Samussuku

In fact, they have but a distant memory of the war, and they are more concerned with the present and the future than with the past. Forged in a materialistic context of access to goods and services, as well as of awareness of the mechanisms of exclusion, it was they who organized the numerous street demonstrations that the country recorded in 2021 against bad government, poverty, and unemployment. For the opposition, therefore, winning their support may not be so difficult despite the clear possibility of fraud that the new electoral law – approved at the end of 2021 in parliament, with the favourable vote only of the MPLA – portends, attributing to the president’s security body, the Military House, the powers of coordination of the National Electoral Commission.

Lourenço, the reformer
As the candidate of the MPLA, João Lourenço stands in the elections in the guise of the reformist who consolidated the process of peace and national reconciliation that began with the end of the war in 2002. International recognition was also gained by its fight against corruption and the recovery of large capital, as demonstrated by the dismantling of the oligarchy of the family of his predecessor, José Eduardo dos Santos.

João Lourenço, President of the Republic of Angola.

João Lourenço has ousted the Santos family from the leadership of Sonangol, the parastate oil and gas company, the economic backbone of the MPLA. The judicial trials and the subsequent imprisonment of personages of the elite of the Dos Santos era is a further concrete sign of this presidential commitment. On the political level, last year in May, Lourenço publicly apologized to the victims of the massacres of May 27, 1977. The president then strengthened dialogue with civil society, inviting and receiving, at the presidential palace, representatives of independent communication and social movements. This was the case of journalist Rafael Marques and activist Luaty Beirão, long outraged and imprisoned by the regime of dos Santos, on charges of defamation and subversive acts and summary judicial trials.
At the international level, the free movement agreement with South Africa, which exempts citizens of both countries from visas for entry into the territory of the other, has been far from negligible. This last measure is attributable to a broader political-administrative project to streamline bureaucracy, which resulted in the presidential decree ‘Simplifica’, launched towards the end of the year.

Young voters
This progress would point to a comfortable victory for Lourenço. However, the vote of young people from large urban and suburban centres could make a difference and determine future political scenarios. In fact, although urban youth express discontent more, they, more than any other group of the population, suffer from ‘immediatism’ and relativism, so that any means is Machiavellian perceived as justified by the need and desire to climb the social ladder. It is clear that the quickest way to climb is to stay in or at least close to the ‘system’.

Populist promises or the activation of typical patronage mechanisms, such as free motorcycles, would be a strong attraction for young people to get closer to the MPLA. The youth vote in favour of the opposition is, therefore, an unknown. Another social stratum that could tip the scales is the educated middle class. ‘Immediatism’ and materialistic values could overlap with ideals of good governance and the need to address endemic problems related to the economy and work, health, education, the environment, transport, and security.
Precisely on the internal security front, a tragedy marked the morning of the first day of 2022 in the heart of Luanda, involving police officers on duty at the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior: a double murder of policemen, the wounding of a passing civilian, and the suicide of the killer. Official data show that the tragedy resulted from a brawl that developed following the theft, on that tragic morning, of the gun of one of the victims by the suicidal killer.
Whatever the motive, it was a tragedy of very serious proportions which points to serious problems within the police force, which represent another crucial element for the 2022 elections.

The National Assembly building in Luanda. CC BY 2.0/David Stanley

Faced with such a complex and uncertain picture, everything seems to demand a rebalancing of the parliament, in numerical terms, with the downsizing of the MPLA group and the strengthening of the opposition, especially the United Patriotic Front. As a corollary to this change, there could be a considerable break in the power structure of the MPLA, in proportion to its possible defeat or loss of seats in parliament. Whatever the electoral outcome, the unsustainability, in the long run, of the total hegemony of the party-state, mostly built on a fragile economic production, that of oil, unregulated capitalism, international alliances, mostly with China, whose intervention in public housing has little impact on the labour growth of a fast-growing population, has become openly apparent. The elections of next August, therefore, will be competitive, at least as compared with the last two, provided that the iron-clad alliance of the opposition is not dissolved by bureaucratic quibbles, as was attempted at the last Congress of the United Patriotic Front. (Photo: 123rf.com)

José Katito

Algeria. Brotherhood Is the New Frontier of Humanity.

The Mediterranean as a meeting place. Brotherhood as a sign of life. The canonization of Charles de Foucauld. The new archbishop of Algiers, Msgr. Jean-Paul Vesco speaks to us.

From the terrace of his office, he sees this large blue expanse where one’s gaze is lost in the distance. This great sea, the Mediterranean. He thinks of his church that lies between the Mediterranean coast and the Sahara. He tells us: “From our perspective, the Mediterranean is not a border. From the historical, cultural, and geographical points of view but also for the fauna and flora, the peoples that overlook this sea have many things in common. We share the same climate and often the same traditions. These common traits represent the roots on which our Christian and Muslim faiths rest today. We are the ones who have created the borders, those between different religions, between the West and the Muslim Arab world and between the North and the South”.

Msgr. Jean-Paul Vesco, took office only on 11 February as the new Archbishop of Algiers, until then he had been Bishop of Oran.
Born in Lyon in 1962, Jean-Paul Vesco joined the Dominican order in 1995 after studying law and working as a lawyer. He was ordained a priest in 2001. His first contact with Algeria came a year later when he moved to the Dominican convent of Tlemcen, in the diocese of Oran. He became Vicar General in 2005 and treasurer in 2007. He returned to France at the end of 2010 after being elected Prior Provincial of the Province of France. He held this office for a few months before being appointed by Benedict XVI as head of the diocese of Oran on 1 December 2012. On 8 December 2018, Archbishop Vesco hosted the beatification of the 19 martyrs of Algeria in his diocese, including Bishop Pierre Claverie, the former bishop of Oran assassinated in 1996, and the monks of Tibhirine.
Remembering these martyrs, he says: “The testimony of the martyrs in Algeria is that life is stronger than death and that fraternity will win. There is no other choice. There is no other option. As Pope Francis says, fraternity is the new frontier of humanity. Discovering ourselves as brothers and respecting each other in our differences. The alternative to brotherhood is destruction”.
Describing the Catholic Church in Algeria he points out: “Our Church is fraternal. Although from the inside we often see the reverse of the canvas, with its knots and threads that seem to go in all directions, it is the image we give, and this image is not only true but also an important part of our testimony”.

According to statistics, Catholics number about 5,000, less than 0.01% of the population, the overwhelming majority are Muslims. Msgr. Vesco adds “We live this brotherhood in our parish communities, with our migrant brothers and sisters, especially when we visit them in prison. We live it with the inhabitants of this country. It is the particular vocation of our Church, as Christians and as a Church with Muslim men and women. It is a brotherhood that reaches out beyond religious prejudices and the wounds of history. Our Church is constantly being questioned, and in turn wondering why it is present here, in a country practically without Christians”.And it is in this context of brotherhood that the canonization of Charles de Foucauld celebrated on May 15th must be seen.
“In his search for universal brotherhood, Charles de Foucauld never stopped going further and further, to prove what it really means to be a ‘universal brother’.
“Charles de Foucauld – reflects the archbishop of Algiers – came to be a universal brother, not by proclaiming the Gospel as he had imagined at the beginning, but by becoming passionate about the language and culture of the Tuareg peoples to the point of drawing up the first dictionary of the Tamasheq language and to transcribe an entire poem transmitted orally from generation to generation. It is in taking seriously the ‘we’ of his Tuareg brothers that he becomes even more a universal brother, and not starting from an abstract ideal of brotherhood that he had in mind. It takes two to be brothers”.

Tassili desert landscape, sahara desert.123rf.com

The other, in Algeria, is necessarily the Muslim brother, in a country where almost all of its inhabitants profess the religion of Mohammed. And it is precisely for this reason, Msgr. Vesco continues, that it is in the DNA of our Church that we do not limit the horizon of brotherhood to the Christian community. Almost all our actions, individual and collective, not only do not take into account religious affiliation but are all aimed at the Muslim context in which we live and which we are given to love. For us, this is evidence, but such evidence is not taken for granted. Because the stabbing question always arises: “But why do they do it?”. It is in this forever open question that the strength of our testimony resides, more than in the words we use in trying to answer it”.
And finally, we ask Monsignor Vesco what he expects from Christians in Algeria. “My deepest expectation is that religious difference is no longer so structuring in the life of a society, that it cannot be lived with respect and profound acceptance of the other, even in the diversity of his religious faith. As a Church and as Christians, we are still regarded as foreigners. We would like to be recognized as human beings, brothers and sisters of this people, citizens of this country.
The recognition of our citizenship is not for us a political claim but the conviction that society is strong when it has the ability to accept and open up to differences and this is true for all societies in the world because everywhere we are witnessing a generalized fear of others and the temptation to close ranks”.

Cécile Avril

Herbs & Plants. Cola Acuminata. The Beverage Flavouring Plant.

It is an evergreen tree, native to tropical Africa especially West Africa. It usually grows to an average of about 13-20 meters in height with a diameter of about 50 cm.

The plant produces a star-shaped fruit which contains between 2-5 kola nuts. About the size of a chestnut, this little fruit is packed with caffeine, tannin, and theobromine phytochemicals.
The tree is seen as a symbol of hospitality, cultural beliefs, social ceremonies and, as well, is grown as an ornamental.
In West African countries, Cola acuminata is prized for its effects as a central nervous system stimulant.
Cola acuminata nuts have a bitter taste when chewed fresh but the taste becomes milder in dry nuts. The nuts can be roasted, pounded, or chewed, and can be added to drinks, such as tea, milk, or porridge.
In traditional medicine, the Cola acuminata plant is used against numerous diseases including atonic diarrhoea, dysentery, vomiting, high fever, piles, stomach ulcers, depression, chronic fatigue syndrome, melancholy, lack of normal muscle tone, exhaustion, constipation, and migraine headaches.

CC BY 2.0/Dick Culbert

Cola nut is used for the treatment of whooping cough, malaria, asthma, and acts as a bronchodilator due to the caffeine in it. The nuts are known to have antimicrobial, analeptic and lipolytic properties and can stimulate gastric juice secretion as well. Traditionally, the leaves, twigs, bark, fruit follicles, and flowers are used in the treatment of dysentery, diarrhoea, coughs, vomiting, and chest complaints. Cola nuts have been linked with natural fertility regulation.
The plant is also used in treatment and management of cancer, as an antidote for poisoning, increasing alertness, and motion sickness. It is used by native people as a stimulant, chewed to alleviate fatigue, hunger, and thirst, especially when on long hunting trips. Due to its astringent properties, Cola acuminata is used as a non-addictive stimulant in the treatment of diarrhoea and dysentery and to prevent vomiting in cases of high fever. It has also been used in the treatment of headaches and migraine.

Cola nuts on the central market of Ouagadougou. Burkina Faso. CC BY-SA 3.0/Marco Schmid

In some communities, Cola acuminata has been used in folk medicine as an aphrodisiac, an appetite suppressant, to treat morning sickness, and indigestion. It is applied directly to the skin to treat wounds and inflammations. The tree’s bitter twig has been used for cleaning the teeth and gums.
The fruits are used as tonics, stimulants and concoction from the fruits used for the treatment of fever, dysentery, and exhaustion.
Cola nuts contain caffeine and hence believed to counteract overstrain and depression thus improving the physical and mental state when taken. The crushed nuts may be boiled together with the leaves of Moringa lucida and the resultant infusion taken internally to cure piles. The nuts ground to a fine paste, together with the leaves of Scoparia dulce, are dissolved in a little water and a few drops are administered orally to babies for treatment of headache. An infusion of the bark mixed with ginger and a little pepper is taken internally to cure stomach ulcers.

Dried kola nuts and chewing sticks harvested from Cola acuminata. CC BY-SA 4.0/T.K. Naliaka

Apart from its medicinal activities, Cola acuminata aromatic seed is rich in caffeine and is often chewed or ground into a powder and made into a drink and taken to give energy, increase alertness, retard hunger and fatigue, aid digestion and increase stamina. When the whole nuts are chewed, they taste bitter at first, but they leave a sweet taste in the mouth later that affects other foods or drinks that are consumed.
Thus, chewing Cola nuts before drinking water helps to render the water sweeter. An extract, prepared from the dried kernels is used to flavour non-alcoholic soft drinks, ice cream, candy, and baked goods among others. The kernels can be red, white, or pink. In fact, the red kernels can be used as a natural food colorant. Its usefulness for traditional purposes especially in West Africa span from social life and religious events, to sealing business contracts.
The chemical contained in Cola acuminata including catechin-caffeine, theobromine and kolatin may explain the numerous uses of this plant throughout its distribution range. (Photo: CC BY-SA 4.0/ Scamperdale)

 

Richard Komakech

 

Africa. “Our social commitment”.

Three young African women from different backgrounds recount the story of their social commitment as they become a reference point for many African women.

The personal and professional future of Kamil Ahmed, born in Somalia in 1999, depends on the government of Kenya, which announced the closure by 2022 of the refugee camps of Kakuma and Dadaab, where about 420,000 people, mainly Somalis, live.
Dadaab is one of the oldest refugee camps on the continent and has long been the largest in the world. There is a great deal of excitement among the people, some are thinking of returning to Somalia while others are preparing to emigrate to a neighbouring country.
Among the thousands of people facing this dilemma is Ahmed, who arrived there with her mother in 2008 after her father was killed in Mogadishu. “I lost my father, I had to leave my village and my school”, recalls Ahmed, who adds that she, however, had managed to find “peace and hope in Dadaab”.

From the age of nine, all that Kamil heard while listening to the modulated frequency of the small radios that accompanied countless families to Dadaab, was just a strange and foreign soundtrack. That sequence of words and music was Star FM Radio Gargaar, the only radio station in the camp.
Day by day, those words and music began to bring the girl closer to the world of radio. When Ahmed finished primary school, she enrolled “in a year-long youth program offered by the Norwegian Refugee Council”. There she learned the basics of journalism. And soon after she began her connection with Radio Gargaar, which in Somali means ‘Help’. The station programs, in which service information predominates, did justice to the name they broadcast every day. A container became an unattractive but effective study. It is from there that Ahmed addresses an audience that now exceeds 200,000 potential listeners every day.

The young Somali woman has long been the only woman on Radio Gargaar, which at first was not well received by the people in the refugee camp. They said she should leave the radio and get married. In this regard, the Somali presenter said: “I am proud of my work, for which many people respect me. But there are other people who don’t like what I do. They put a lot of pressure on me, but when they insist on getting married, I laugh and pay them no attention”.
Her voice, together with those of her colleagues at the station, seems to be essential in the coming months, in which the future of Dadaab is at stake and, above all, that of the thousands of people who live there. “The imminent closure of the camp – she said – has affected everything, our business, our livelihood…. The radio is important to keep an eye on the changing political decisions of the Kenyan government”. However, she seems to have clear ideas. She is considering and wants a future life in Somalia. She wants to study and practice journalism in her homeland, despite the dangers that her colleagues run in the country. “I know how dangerous it is for someone like me to go back and be a journalist in my country. But my future will be Somalia”. The present, here and now, is called the Star FM Radio Gargaar.

 Mércia Viriato: “I am not different”

The ninth legislature began in Mozambique on 13 January 2020 and the 250 elected deputies took possession of their seats. Everything happened as usual except for a young deputy: Mércia Viriato Licá. At just 24, this young law graduate from Maputo’s Pedagogical University has become the youngest parliamentarian in the country’s history.
Her attention was not focused only on her because of her young age but also because of a congenital disability; she was born with no arms. She writes, uses the computer, or turns on the light in the room at home with her feet. Despite everything, she insists on acknowledging that she does not feel different “and much less special”.

The strength she has shown throughout her life has made her a point of reference for people who, like her, suffer from a physical disability. When Mércia Viriato took office, Mozambican activist Benilde Mourana said she hoped she “would not be just another MP, but would bring the real concerns of people with disabilities to Parliament and that this wave of inclusion would spread in other key sectors in the area of ​​disability”.
For now, the MP has already stated that her priority for the legislature will be education. After collecting the minutes of her seat, the Mozambican woman expressed the hope that she may contribute to the development of the country “through education. I want to encourage young people to never stop studying because education is the way to real life”.
The day after the parliament opened, a local newspaper entitled: “Mércia, de menina renegada a deputada” (Mércia, from rebellious girl to parliamentarian) and a photo of eight-year-old Mércia sitting on the school floor, together with her companions, bending over some half-written pages and clutching a blue pen with the tip of her right foot.
In 2003, when her mother went to enrol her in elementary school, the leaders of the centre advised her to find a special school. But her mother did not have the money to enrol her in a special school and so after much insistence, she was accepted into the school like any other pupil. She began to write with her foot. Years later, in an interview, she acknowledged that “Even now, I still wonder why I should have gone to a special school”. Abandoned by her father when she was just a child, Mércia grew up under the exclusive tutelage of her mother, with whom she still lives today.
However, as she herself points out, she wanted every difficulty to become an opportunity and an obstacle to be overcome.

National Assembly of Mozambique.

If there is anything that explains her presence in the House of Representatives, it is her tenacity, which led her to address the country’s president, Filipe Nyusi. Through social media, she asked him to do everything possible to facilitate living conditions and access to education for people with disabilities. President Nyusi has invited her to carry on her battles in defence of the disabled through politics. Mércia took up the challenge; she stood as a candidate for the province of Téte and succeeded in reaching her goal.

 Ndeye, dancing to the rhythm of the yembé

Imagine people in a circle looking into each other’s eyes and gesticulating as they follow the frantic pace of their yembé, an African percussion instrument that has its origins in the Mandingo empire. Tradition has it that it was played by the numus, the blacksmiths, who were attributed extraordinary powers and who participated in the initiation ceremonies into adulthood.
Often, one of the drummers would stand out from the others by playing a solo with which he challenged the others. Such solos are a display of power and endurance.
Ndeye Cissé, born in Senegal, began to play the yembé professionally at the age of 18. “There are men who feel intimidated and embarrassed when they see a woman playing the yembé; I understand them because this instrument is always linked to male strength. After all, they feel inferior when they see a woman who sounds as good as they do”, explains Ndeye.

Ndeye Cissé. (Photo: Alicia Justo)

She started playing the yembé at the age of 8, supported by the figure of her brother who had never seen a woman play that instrument like any of the musicians. The male environment marked her childhood, in which in addition to watching her brother making music she also joined the fans of a football team in the Las Palmas de Dakar district, becoming the only girl to be considered the best fan of the team. “In the beginning, we had to animate our fans during matches, but when we saw that it could be a job, we started a professional music group, and that’s how Djembe Rythme was born”.
Her debut on international tours was accompanying the Senegalese football team (at the World Cup in South Korea and Japan).
Later she was part of the musicians who accompanied Youssou n’Dour, a popular singer and composer of mbalax music, in which traditional and European instruments are mixed.
A feminist without having to proclaim it, Cissé is convinced that “at some point, there will be a change and women and men will share the zone of success”. Meanwhile, she is proud to belong to Jigeen Ñi, the first Senegalese group made up entirely of women. The messages of their songs have already become a reference point in the national awareness of gender equality.
Cissé is an example for young women who shyly and fearfully approach a yembé or a sabar. For this, she decided to live in her own country with her mother, and to give percussion lessons to a group of students with whom she hopes that, little by little, it will become normal for a woman “to have a love and passion for these instruments”. She advises them to “believe in themselves and be aware that it is a job that involves sacrifice”, without losing the smile and the innate rhythm that spreads with their yembé. (Open Drawings: Tina Ramos Ekongo.

Carla Fibla García-Sala  – Javier Fariñas Martín

Africa. African Art. Recovering Its Own Story.

At least 90% of African cultural heritage is currently outside the continent, mainly in European museums. But a recent campaign for the repatriation of African art is helping to make restitution of looted artefacts a reality and finally restore heritage to the African cultures that made them.

The debate about the return of valuable historical cultural artefacts that were smuggled out of the African continent during colonial rule is not new, but the discussion has increased over the last four years.  At the end of November 2017, in a speech delivered on a visit to the West African republic of Burkina Faso, French president Emmanuel Macron, addressing a large audience – mainly made up of students, promised to make the restitution of French-owned African heritage a priority over the following five years. France is estimated to hold at least 90,000 African artefacts in its museums and galleries, as many as 70,000 alone in the Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac Museum in Paris. Within a few months President Macron commissioned Senegalese economist Felwine Sarr and Parisian art historian Benedicte Savoy to prepare a report on the very sensitive issue of renditions of works of art to the countries of sub-Saharan Africa and how this goal should be accomplished.

According to the authors of the report ‘All transfers of art, the building of the art market, inheritance, donations to museums – are based directly on immoral seizures and continuing exploitation’. Sarr and Savoy also point out in the report that Western museums have a highly disproportionate number of sub-Saharan African objects compared to collections left in Africa. The Sarr-Savoy Report sparked a heated public debate. Sarr and Savoy suggested that Macron return permanently and gradually the African artefacts: starting with the restitution of some 46,000 pieces looted until 1960, the beginning of the era of African independence. The authors of the report also suggested a reproduction of the returned works in order not to suddenly empty the French museums. The restitution modality outlined in the document provided for the signing of bilateral agreements between France and each requesting country.

Advances and more claims
The plan began to move forward. Senegal, a former French colony, signed agreements with Paris for the restitution of works that were looted during the colonial era. In November 2020, the French Senate approved the commitment to return two objects, which were exhibited at the Army Museum in Paris: the saber and scabbard belonging to El Hadj OumarTall, the 19th century Islamic leader and founder of the Tuculor Empire in West Africa. He was a key figure in the resistance against the French colonization. In 2021 another West African country, Benin, the former colonial Dahomey, also made a request for the restitution of part of the well-known Béhanzin Treasure, 26 relics, looted from the Royal Palaces of Abomey in 1892, which were held at the Musée du Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac. The restitution of artefacts to both African countries was supposed to be accomplished within one year from the signing of the agreements.

The Tervuren Museum in Belgium, on the outskirts of Brussels houses one of the largest collections of African artefacts in the world.

The official announcement of the return of the aforementioned Benin treasures was made at the end of October last year. Macron’s words and deeds encouraged other former French colonies in Africa to ask for the repatriation of looted artefacts. Chad has requested the restitution of some 10,000 objects.  Algeria, which was a French department and part of metropolitan France until its independence in 1962, also signed agreements with Paris for the restitution of looted works and, in October 2020, the Government of Paris announced the restitution to Algeria of a bronze cannon, of 12 tons, which was taken by the French in 1830, at the beginning of the colonial occupation. According to some information, the Macron administration was interested in trying to rebuild relations with a country with which France had been at war for almost a decade. This and the other examples show a profound revision of the French colonial role during the19th and 20th centuries.

Other countries
The request for the restitution of looted artefacts by former African colonies does not involve only France but also several other countries, since the Savoy-Sarr Report made it possible to update inventories and figures of artistic heritage held outside of Africa, such as those in the Tervuren Museum in Belgium, on the outskirts of Brussels, which houses one of the largest collections of African artefacts in the world. The museum, in fact, holds a collection of 180,000 African artefacts, while the Humboldt Forum in Berlin displays 75,000 African artefacts, the Quai Branly some 70,000, and the British Museum 69,000. Even museums in countries outside of Europe that did not colonize Africa, such as Russia and the US house African looted artefacts.

The French example has been followed by other countries. European museums have long been reluctant to restitute African heritage objects but now they are under mounting pressure to return the irreplaceable artefacts plundered during colonial times. Ethiopia has urged the return of some 3,000 pieces. Some objects, such as a bible and several crosses, among others, seized in 1868 by British troops, were returned last September. Much earlier, in 2005, the famous obelisk of Aksum, taken away from Ethiopia in 1937, during the occupation by fascist Italy, was repatriated.
Angola also joined the list of requesting countries, urging Portugal to return several artefacts. Portugal committed itself to helping to return its former colonies not only the African artefacts held in the Portuguese museums but also other objects housed outside the country: in the USA, Germany, France or Brazil. The Portuguese initiative sparked a new debate. This year, Germany, whose colonial empire did not survive the First World War, has proposed the return of hundreds of cultural artefacts that were smuggled out of Nigeria in 1897 by British troops, and which are currently held in German museums, the famous ‘Benin bronzes’, one of the most valuable among African art collections.
In May 2019, following the 2017 request of Namibia, Germany announced it would restitute a centuries-old stone cross. The limestone cross bearing the Portuguese coat-of-arms was erected in 1486 on the coast of today’s Namibia to assert the country’s territorial claim. It was taken to Germany in 1893 when the area was part of the German colonial empire, and it was held in the German Historical Museum in Berlin.
At the end of October 2021, the University of Cambridge returned a looted bronze rooster to Nigeria. The statue, known as Okukur, was looted by British colonial forces in 1897. Cambridge University was the first British institution to return African cultural pieces; the initiative marked a very valuable precedent.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

In June 2021, the Met, New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, announced it would return three works of art that were looted in the 19th century from Nigeria. The two 16th-century brass plaques and a 14th-century brass head from the Kingdom of Benin — part of modern-day Nigeria — were taken from the Nigerian Royal Palace during British military occupation in 1897, and moved to the British Museum in London until 1950 when the UK repatriated them. After their return to the National Museum in Lagos, they re-entered the art market and ended up in the hands of a private investor who donated them to the MET in 1991, where they were exhibited for years.
At the end of November 2020, the Netherlands returned a 600-year-old terracotta to the Nigerian Government. The terracotta was smuggled through Ghana in 2019 to Holland. In November 2020, it was officially announced that a new museum would be built in Benin City, Nigeria. The museum is intended as a place for the most comprehensive display in the world of Benin bronzes, including the collection to which the aforementioned bronze rooster belongs. The Benin bronzes were looted by British soldiers and sailors in 1897 and are mostly in western museums and private collections. The British Museum has more than 900 bronzes and has long faced calls for them to be returned. Details have been announced of important steps towards these treasures being loaned or given back with the creation of the EDO Museum of West African Art in Benin City.

Doubts
There are also arguments against the repatriation of African stolen art, many of which appear to suffer from a ‘colonialist mindset’. One of the most patronizing arguments used by supporters to defend museums’ rights to keep such artefacts is that, due to lack of resources and infrastructures, there are not the minimum conditions for the preservation of cultural heritage in many African states. Another argument is: if colonial powers had not taken these objects, they would have been destroyed in the conflicts and disasters that subsequently erupted in several African regions. And since these institutions preserved them, they have the right to keep them. This is a simplistic and distorted way to tackle the issue of the African reality. However, the two examples cited of Dakar and Kinshasa are an antidote to these pessimistic objections.

However, there are institutions that are reluctant to the restitution and/or loan of looted African artefacts, such as the British Museum. They insist on the fact that the artefacts legitimately belong to their current owners, since many of the goods were acquired through legal means, so there would not be sufficient reasons to restitute them. Another argument against repatriation is that the issue should be tackled from a global perspective. Besides African art, the process of restitution of stolen art would force a complete review of universal history, which documents multiple examples of illegal appropriation and looting of cultural pieces in many regions of the planet. However, the restitution of African art is an essential step towards the recovery of historicity and subjugated dignity. Repatriation of stolen art is also a tool for improving relations between African countries and their old metropolises and other countries. That is why the process should be accelerated, since much still remains to be returned. (Open Photo. The Rosetta Stone is one of the most famous objects in the British Museum).

Omer Freixa

Mission. Our Life with Our People.

Three Comboni Missionaries talk about their missionary experience.

My name is Gédéon Ngunza Mboma from Democratic Republic of Congo. For the last eleven years, as a missionary Brother I have been working with young people at Comboni Technical College (CTC) in Malawi. The CTC is a Catholic technical school open to young people of all religious denominations, created, developed, organised, and managed by the Comboni Missionaries, in collaboration with local staff.

It is a non-profit organisation, which aims at building a better future for the youth of Malawi, by offering them training in technical and human skills. Malawi is one of the poorest countries in southern Africa. Economic hardship has a serious impact on the majority of Malawians who are low-income earners. One of the most negative effects of this is the inability of many families to educate their children.

The Comboni Technical Centre was created precisely to try to respond to this situation, through an integral education capable of helping young people to become leaders and agents of transformation in their families, communities, and workplaces, thus contributing to the development
of their country.

The CTC aims at providing the young people who come to us, with high quality and practical training in welding and manufacturing end products, carpentry, and electrical installation, leading up to the government exams for the Craft and Advanced Craft Certificate.

We also provide them with human skills, in view of their personal growth that leads to true maturity, so that they become good and responsible citizens. But this is not enough. We also think about their future.

We offer courses that provide them with entrepreneurial knowledge and skills to start businesses once they leave the CTC. Moreover, we make sure that they will not think only of themselves; that would
not be a Christian training.

We want our young people to feel they have a duty to take an active part in building their communities. To support them in this, we promote Gospel values, which motivate them to commit themselves with all their talents to promoting the Kingdom of God.

I have now lived for 11 years together with 150-180 youth, to whom I teach entrepreneurship, basic accounting, and human development. Being a member of the administration, I spend most of my time with them, trying to get to know them better and to establish a relationship of trust between them and me.

I am happy to be here, and I wish heaven would allow me to stay here for many more years, because, in this fantastic place of youth formation, I feel totally fulfilled as a Comboni Brother.

Fr. Justin, “I consider myself a ‘gardener of the Word’ ”

I am Fr. Justin Martinez, from Spain. When I was asked to work in the city of Manaus, capital of the Brazilian state of Amazonas, I remember saying “I view Manaus favourably!” Later, I had the opportunity to get to know the city, and on my return, they asked me what I thought. I answered a bit metaphorically: “Here the challenges are few and small. Few like its rivers and small like the Amazon. We will need five or six generations to solve them”.

Since 2019 I have lived in Manaus and despite the pandemic that we are experiencing, my conviction has not changed: I view Manaus favourably! Before arriving here, I spent ten years in Salvador de Bahia working with Afro-descendants and in dialogue with the Afro-Brazilian religion of Candomble. I also spent nine years in Fortaleza located in North-eastern Brazil and between these two Brazilian presences, eleven years in Spain. The challenges I have encountered were not on my agenda, but I am not changing Manaus for anything.

I consider myself a ‘gardener of the Word’ because my presence in the heart of Brazil has as its main purpose biblical and theological formation at the Institute of Theology, Pastoral and Higher Education of the Amazon (ITEPES), where seminarians, permanent deacons and lay people receive some of their formation. I also teach biblical subjects in a Pauline Centre and in various parishes, in addition to participating in radio programs and other pastoral activities. It is a joy to share the Word of God with multicultural communities.

This was not always the case during my years in Salvador de Bahia, because many times my listeners were all of African descent. I remember a meeting of black consciousness and awareness with about 70 adolescents in Salvador in which I was the only non-Afro. We were all in a circle and Raquel, one of the animators, asked: “Here, are we all black?” “Everyone”, the adolescents answered unanimously.  Raquel repeated the question and the answer was the same.

The young woman pointed at me. “Justino is black too?”  There was silence in the room. Anderson got up and said: “Yes, he is black!”  But she did not give up: “Anderson, is Justino also black?” Anderson then responded with ease: “Sure, if he behaves like us, Justino is also black”.  I always remember that anecdote with great joy.

Following Pope Francis in his encyclical Querida Amazonia, I try to motivate children, youth, and the elderly to become passionate about the Word of God and discover that it is a mine that must be explored with love, passion and competence.

This is my dream and what keeps me happy: to take the Word of God to the heart of all Christian communities of the world.  Animation and missionary biblical formation are the way, taking into account that it is not about ‘knowing’ but about ‘savouring’.

It is necessary to provoke a thirst for the Word, to quench it and that is something that requires passion, time, and dedication, as with Jesus towards Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman, the blind man from birth or his disciples. It is hard work, but it’s worth it.

Among those who speak about the Bible in Manaus there are charlatans who conquer multitudes of people with sweet words that do not give life, joy, or hope, and who do not help to face the innumerable mourning of this pandemic that is leaving so many people injured, without
comfort and hope.

We see and feel all this and it hurts to see so much indifference and arrogance by government officials who have not fulfilled their obligations. The consequences translate into suffering and death. Therefore, maintaining or regenerating hope thanks to the Word of God in the midst of this situation is a missionary duty.

Fr. Francesco. A Heart for the Pygmies

My name is Fr. Francesco Laudani from Italy. I arrived in Africa fifty years ago in 1972. I was assigned to what was then Zaire,
now the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and more precisely to the mission of Mungbere, a community in the middle of the jungle in the north-east of the country.

A year later, purely by chance, I saw, for the first time, groups of pygmies on the streets of Moley, Dodi and Dingbo. I also witnessed the baptism of the first pygmies in the parish.

Two years later, I was assigned to the parish of Nangazizi and then to that of Rungu, where I spent most of my time in the bush visiting the 95 Christian communities of this huge parish; the furthest chapel was 110 kilometres from the central church. In 1984, I was assigned to the parish of Gombari, where the Comboni community was engaged in pastoral work with the Pygmies.

From 1984 until 2018, my missionary life was centred upon this village. For ten years I was the diocesan head of Pygmy pastoral care. Our work with the Pygmies focused on two fundamental and complementary areas: evangelization and education, although there were also health support programs and more specific training in agriculture and other fields.

The forest is the natural habitat of the Pygmies. As they are often on the move, one of our commitments has been to set up small schools near the larger camps so that, for at least a few months, the pygmy children could study alongside other children to help them integrate. We felt that this was the only way to enable Pygmies to go to secondary school.

The Pygmies are the poorest people in Congolese society, but the school has allowed them to better themselves. Many have learned to read and write; some have been able to go to college and now work as midwives or teachers. I am very happy with the progress the Pygmies are making.

One of the highlights of our work was when we organized a march in 2005 to demand respect for the rights of the Pygmies. About 2,500 people started out and travelled, in some cases, up to 300 kilometres, to the city of Isiro. Despite this, difficulties remain and much remains to be done to ensure that the Pygmies may be Congolese citizens with the same rights as everyone else.

As for myself, it takes much more than a lifetime to accompany these people who, being one of the poorest and most abandoned, are a priority within the Comboni charism. My memories are of thanksgiving to God because I have never felt alone.

The people, especially the Pygmies, welcomed me very warmly. God has been with us in all circumstances, even during the war, when I was taken prisoner and held for 14 days; I never felt abandoned. The Pygmy people always protected us and took care of us. I keep in my heart the love for Africa and the love of Africans for us missionaries. (C.C.)

 

 

Mexico. The people of the sacred rains.

The people of the rain, Ñuu Savi, in the Nahuati language of the Mestizos, live in the states of Oaxaca, Puebla and Guerrero in central-southern Mexico. To the present day, they have persisted with their daily practices, their forms of social organisation, their language, health system, respect for nature and their religiosity in
their view of the world.

One of the most important aspects of these people is their view of the world that consists in thoughts, ideas and concepts that are transformed into words, actions and practices which earn them the name of men and women of the rain, as a people and a culture, and enables them to establish accords and respect, to reaffirm the ties of the community and with nature. This philosophy also gives meaning to life, to time and to the expectations in the Ñuu Yivi, the world and the practices
that are followed.

The people of the rain, Ñuu Savi, are closely correlated to the sacred divinity Savi which means ‘rain’ but which, in terms of sacredness, acquires the meaning of ‘sacred rain’. The mother tongue is Tu’un Savi, Word of the rain.
The people of the rain live in three states: Oaxaca (Ñuu Nduva), Puebla (Ñuu Ita Ndio´o) and Guerrero (Ñuu Koatyi). Some of the places where the members of the people of the rain are found are: in Kiu’un (the mountain), Ñu’u Ñi’ni (warm country), Ñuu Ndivi (coast) and in the diverse geography of the vast territory where they coexist and which they share with other indigenous populations, the Mestizos and people of African descent.

Social and ritual organisation
The word Mestizos is of Nahua origin and refers to ‘the people of the place of the clouds’. Since the coming of the Spaniards, this term has been used by other peoples and cultures to refer to the Ñuu Savi people and the cultural region known as Mixtec. The people of the rain, Ñuu Savi, today number about half a million.The identity of the Ñuu Savi is based upon their language, history, vision of the world and community ties. For centuries they have kept their system of social and ritual organisation that reaffirms their identity with such sacred entities as rain (savi), lightening (taxa), wind (tatyi), hills (yuku), clouds (viko), plants and trees, animals (kiti), caves (kahua), rivers (yita), the earth (ñu´u), the dead (ndií), seeds and cereals such as maize (nuní), beans (nduchi), pumpkins (yikin), the spirits of the mountain and other divinities.

The symbolic nucleus of their identity is rooted in the rain. Yoko Savi is the spirit of the sacred rain who is invoked during the month of April, provides water, food and blessings, ensures life and makes seed germinate so that life may be born in the world.Feasts and rituals rotate around two centres: the dry season and the rainy season. In October and November, the feast of the dead, Viko Ndii, is held. This feast involves the meeting of neighbours in various places and is the day on which the authorities are chosen since it is a propitious moment that has the spirits of the ancestors as guests of honour. These acts revitalise and reinforce the collective historical memory expressed in the assumption of community mandates. The authorities must carry out their duties; otherwise, the spirits of the ancestors will bring justice to the community by conceding harmony or inflicting punishment. In religious life, Catholic saints have been reworked to adapt them to their system and their own calendar of feasts Ñuu Savi. Thus we have Saint Mark connected to Yoko Savi, the entity and the spirit of the rain and Saint Michael with that of fertility.

Our land, Ñu´u yo
As the symbolic and sacred character of the relationship between earth, nature and the people of the rain, Ñuu Savi is demonstrated through various ritual or ceremonial practices. The land and the territory have a symbolic and sacred meaning in the world view. For this reason, people, land and territory are closely intertwined with their understanding of the universe. At the origin of the world, it is precisely in the caves that the original myth is created and, according to the elders, where water, wind, fire, the land and the mountains are articulated, as well as the grains of maize and other divinities to give food to the Ñuu Savi villages.

In line with their world vision, the cult of the Savi, the rain divinity, is carried out in the open, on top of the highest hills and in the caves from where new water springs, the original water that rises from the depths through subterranean infiltrations and springs. Thus, the rain is initially born of the earth to which it is closely tied since both together constitute the germinal force par excellence. On the other hand, this same germinal power present in the caves is the element that sacred Mestizo history is described as that which gave life force to the founders of their more important lineages. Therefore, both vegetative life and human lineages have their origin in the sacred caves that exist in the Ñu’u Savi.
Ñu´u is the concept that refers to the earth, the material space in which we find ourselves. Thus, in line with the linguistic root: Ñuu yo is the people and what encloses the earth and the material elements in which we find ourselves, but refers to our land as the collective space where life is lived. Therefore, Ñuu yo is our people and also our earth. Then we have the Gnu Yivi: the People of the People, but the connotation is that it refers to the world, the place where living people, humanity, dwell. Then there is the Ñuu Ndii, the place of the dead.

The hills are the places where the divinities and spirits live and they are considered sacred and to be respected. In the geography of the Mountain, there are many places of this sort. The population go to the tops of the more important mountains to carry out prayers and invocations. There are encounters with spirits and the forces of nature.
The struggle for the defence and re-claiming of the land means fighting against aggression towards the land and the plundering of natural resources. For the people of the rain, Na Savi, is a matter of: Na kundoyo, na ku taku yo va´a xiin na ntaan yo, xiin na vee yo, which means ‘Living well and getting along with our brothers and those of our house or family’.
‘Living well’ means living together in a social or territorial space in personal and collective harmony and having the resources necessary to live with justice.
Kuu taku yo refers to existence, to germination as Na yivi, people and human beings in their own land. This is why it is commonly said: An sivi ta yivi kuun?, ‘Are you not people?’ Therefore, to be a people means having a name, a place, a sense of attribution, and a land.

Pedro Santacruz

Angola. A Country and Its Contradictions.

In the African context, Angola, a country with a population of over 33 million inhabitants, has always represented in one a mirage and a contradiction: the mirage of overflowing riches from oil and diamonds but also a contradiction due to the poverty of its peoples.

War has always been the master: from 1961 to 1975 to free itself from the Portuguese colonial yoke; from 1975 to 2002, the year of the death of the leader of the main opposition party-army, Jonas Savimbi of Unita, in the form of civil conflict. Internal conflicts were already the order of the day before gaining independence. Suffice it to say that the liberation movements – MPLA (Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola), FLNA (National Front for the Liberation of Angola) and Unita (National Union for the Total Independence of Angola) – simultaneously declared independence, on November 11, 1975, in three different points of the country. This was the premise of the long civil conflict that sorely tried the country for so long. Tensions only relaxed when, at the international level, the People’s Republic of Angola was recognized. Led by Agostinho Neto of the MPLA, the new republic was supported politically and militarily by the Soviet Union and Cuba. The United States did not officially recognize the former Marxist-Leninist Angolan government until 1993, after the constitutional change the previous year.

The Angolan contradictions are all to be found in this long conflict, the result, in large part, of the Cold War, but also of the thirst for personal power of its different protagonists. The main interpreter of the civil war, Jonas Malheiro Savimbi, leader of Unita and a great admirer of Che Guevara, found himself forced into accepting the embarrassing help of the racist South African regime and, in the background, that of America.
With the fall of the Berlin Wall, the international picture changed dramatically, and at the end of 1999 the British Foreign Secretary, Peter Hain, declared that Savimbi was one of the main British targets, similar to Saddam Hussein or the Serbian Slobodan Miloševic. In short, a war criminal.

Jonas Savimbi, leader of Unita. He was killed in a clash with government troops in 2002.

The MPLA, with Soviet protection, had established a climate of terror, symbolized by the tragic events of May 27, 1977, when Agostinho Neto and his closest collaborators ordered the capture, torture, deportation, and immediate shooting of a number of people ranging between 40 thousand and 50 thousand. The reason? The alleged support of the victims for the policy of the Minister of the Interior, Nito Alves, expelled from the MPLA and the government with the infamous accusation of ‘factionalism’. This dramatic page in Angolan history led to the hardening of the regime of Agostinho Neto and his successor, José Eduardo dos Santos (in power from 1979 to 2017).
The latter established a model of state now seen as an example of kleptocracy, neopatrimonialism and corruption for all of Africa. Even today, under the presidency of João Lourenço, the harmful effects of that model for the population are being felt. Economically, this meant privileging in public policies two fundamental axes: oil, as the driving force of the economy, and defence, as a crucial sector.

A moving picture
Angola is making a transition from a personalistic and familial regime – centred on the figure of José Eduardo dos Santos and his closest family members, his daughter Isabel in the first place – towards a system in which the party is trying to take back the reins of power for too many years monopolized by the ‘emperor’ dos Santos.
However, the contradictions are exploding, leaving, for the first time, ample and interesting room for manoeuvre for the opposition, in view of the next elections this year. The main contradiction concerns precisely the first term of the Lourenço presidency. Started under the best auspices, with the attempt of a fight without quarter to corruption, also with trials moved by the Angolan judiciary with a high symbolic value against the children of the former ‘emperor’ – Zenu and Isabel dos Santos  – the fight against corruption quickly lost its effectiveness. The party and state apparatus, accustomed to lavish prebends, ‘extra’ emoluments deriving from widespread and profound corruptive practices, have in fact stopped the action of Lourenço, also involved, recently, in some financial scandals that have tarnished his image.

The former Angolan President, Eduardo dos Santos.

Together with his wife, Ana Dias Lourenço, and other senior Angolan officials, he is in fact being investigated by the American justice system – according to Pangea Risk –  for corruption, illegal banking practices, bank fraud linked to the purchase of real estate in the United States, and an attempt to defraud the US Department of Justice. If all this were to be proved, then Angola would no longer have access to the more than 2 billion euros already agreed with the World Bank, within the debt suspension program. A figure that represents 4.3% of Angola’s GDP, and that would give breathing space to the coffers of a state that no longer has the wealth of the past and to a public budget whose debt has now exceeded 135% of gross domestic product. The opposition – led by Unita and its leader, Alberto Costa Júnior – united under an electoral cartel, the United Patriotic Front (FPU), are entering into this political crisis of the MPLA and the government. On the other hand, popular discontent – which has repeatedly resulted in strikes and public demonstrations, including violent ones, against MPLA and the government, as well as in very critical positions by several local rappers – have helped to increase awareness of the need for greater civic consciousness and changes in the politicians’ approach to public affairs.
All these movements that intersect civil society and political opposition would like to reverse a situation that sees Angola as a country classified by Freedom House as ‘not free’, with a score of indicators related to its democracy of just 31 points out of 100, and a result on the transparency of electoral processes of 0 out of 4.

The end of oil as the only resource
José Eduardo dos Santos’ system of power was based, in large part, on the exploitation of oil. To date, the latter contributes 50% to the country’s GDP, and almost 90% of exports. However, this model, in fact monocultural, has long since entered into crisis, and a rethink is necessary.  Angola’s largest oil company, Sonangol, reduced its earnings by more than half in 2020, from a capital gain of more than $17 billion in 2017 to just $6 billion in 2020. This is due, to a large extent, to the decrease in the price of crude oil, while Fitch’s forecasts point to a steady fall in oil revenues, due to the government’s inability to invest heavily in the sector.
Faced with this picture, the only possible choice is the reconversion and diversification of the economy: a very complex process that will take time and require the political and technical skills to bring the country out of dependence on oil. But it is an inevitable process, if we consider that Angola has recorded negative growth of its GDP since 2016, accentuated by the pandemic (-4% in 2020).

Angola’s greatest contradiction is that, despite being the third-largest oil producer in Africa after Libya and Nigeria, its population is still in sometimes extreme poverty. About half of Angolans are considered poor, with a high concentration in inland regions. Cunene, Bié, Luanda Norte, and Huíla are considered the poorest regions, according to official data published in 2020 by the government. That year is considered catastrophic for the south of the country, with Huíla as the most affected territory. Here, the drought that has continued since 2012 has led to a drastic reduction in food supplies, and several humanitarian organizations have repeatedly denounced the absolute lack of initiatives on the part of the government.  Strategic sectors, on the other hand, have traditionally been marginalized by government policies. The most obvious example of this is agriculture.

As confirmed by the same words of the former Minister of Agriculture and Forestry himself, Marcos Nhunga, this sector is far from receiving – as established by the Malambo Declaration of 2014 – at least 10% of the public investments established by the financial institution. On the other hand, the defence sector continues to absorb many public resources. While, in 2016, it absorbed 13% of public spending, today the figure is close to 8%, and still very high, considering that education receives just 5.3%, health 5%, and social protection 3.27% of the budget. The path towards a more balanced and equitable model of development, in short, is still a utopia, given that the oil-defence pairing continues to monopolize the Angolan government agenda.
The transition that has begun seems to be proceeding at a pace and timing that is far too slow for people who continue to live in miserable conditions, with no concrete prospects for any immediate improvement in their lives.

Luca Bussotti

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