ethiopia – Citizen Reporter

Jillo Katelo: Empowering Indigenous Communities in Northern Kenya

There is a force referred to as development that has arrived in Northern Kenya. It brings highways, wind farms, pipelines, cables, standardized education, and new towns where the government wants people to live and work. What it also brings is pollution, inequality, disappearing cultures and languages, an end to nomadic lifestyles that have existed for hundreds of years. While all this is happening, extreme weather has also arrived, taking people who have long known how to live in balance with the environment and thrusting them into the uncertainty and destruction climate change leaves in its wake.
Amidst all this struggle there is also hope. Communities have become aware of what development can do to them. They have become concious of the need to preserve knowledge and restore culture. And this is all being done not in isolation, but through sharing of experiences and strategies with communities facing the same circumstances throughout the continent and the world.
My guest today, Jillo Katelo of the Kivulini Trust, speaks of a childhood where there was balance and joy in his community. Only to be replaced nowadays by an erosion of that way of life as it increasingly under attack in the name of development and so-called economic progress. But the story doesn’t end here, listen in as Jillo talks about his home, how it is changed, and what he is doing empower communities and challenge the modern-day religion that places profit margins above humanity.

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Voices 4 Change: Indigenous Activists and Friends in Africa

This month I had the great honor of being present at the Video 4 Change gathering in South Africa. This meeting brought together indigenous activists from different parts of the continent, as well as allies and friends from the rest of the world. The topic: the struggle for indigenous rights in a globalized world where in the name of profit and development, people who have long lived in harmony with their environment are being forced to discard their identity and physically pulled from their ancestral land. How is this happening in an era of sustainable development goals and human rights? What can be done to help communities defend themselves and be heard on a national and international scale?

One Year Ago Somalia

Greetings from Amsterdam, where winter has set in nicely.

While I have a tremendous amount of love for independent podcasters out there, I still look to many alternative and even get what I get from mainstream media podcasts as part of the quest to piece together what is really happening in our world. One of my favorites for this purpose is the Guardian’s daily podcast. The program is actually an excellent example of how newspapers and magazines could create an original podcast that makes use of, and even promotes, the material in their newspaper. I get an excellent overview of the Guardian each day when I tune into this podcast.

Recently, in their Friday edition, they had a guest on who’s been writing about the one year anniversary of the invasion of Somalia by Ethiopia. Of course, always one of those regions of the world that is under-reported and in fact, quite difficult to get reports from, Ethiopia invaded after so-called Islamists took over Mogadishu and intended to form some kind of fundamentalist state in Somalia. At least that’s what the few reports making the rounds taught us last year.

The reporter spoke about how when Ethiopia invaded to prevent that government from exercizing power , they were successful in that mission. However, in a familiar turn of events, after being there one year they are finding themselves the targets of frequent attacks and in desperate need of help.

It brings me back to what has become a classic question. To do or not to do, and if to do… then how? If your neighboring country is being taken over by an extremist group, do you try to stop them? Do you use a military to do so? My initial answer, and even more after seeing what happens, is NO. Yet, I don’t believe in isolation. I don’t believe you ignore suffering when you know full well what is happening next door or anywhere in the world. Then what to do? What kind of engagement? What kind of action or dialog?

As I biked down to frisbee practice, re-listening to this report, I could not think of an answer. I know I believe in nonviolence. I know there is plenty of evidence that this method of occupying a country by force is not only wrong but also disastrous. So what then? The only thing that comes to mind is to understand the problem before it happens. To look at the ingredients that lead to such a government taking power, that drive people to support such groups or policies, and work at an international level to alleviate these symptoms before they result in what we’ve seen in place like Somalia.

Zimbabwe Has No Oil

My good friend and longtime reader Jack wrote to me earlier in the day saying hello and asking if I’d address the forgotten issue of Zimbabwe. And he’s not the first to have done that, BadHAreDay in Lisbon has often asked me to talk more about the country-turned-tragedy.

Now I haven’t taken my eye off the sadness, mind you, Im still a devoted reader of “This Is Zimbabwe”. But it is true I haven’t produced anything on the subject in quite some time.

The numbers have grown worse in the last few years; one figure reads that 80% of the population now live in poverty. In what sounds like a story from 300 years ago, numerous people in the capitol have died of cholera! Life expectancy has dropped to 34. The list of horrors goes on and on… read more over TIZ’s retrospective of 2006.

And yet, Iraq gets billions upon billions of dollars for their so-called democracy thing. Somalia gets invaded by Ethiopia in the blink of an eye. Brazilian UN troops still occupy chunks of Haiti. And Palestine gets all its money frozen for electing a new government. Meanwhile in Zimbabwe.. nothing. Time keeps passing, people keep dying and suffering, and the world closes its eyes.

Which actually brings up a bigger question; above I seem to suggest that the international community should act. But I actually am not completely sure about that. Instead I wanted to point out the situations where the world gets involved either financially, politically, or militarily, while one of the most tragic crimes continues to go on in Zimbabwe. Somehow it doesn’t qualify. Maybe it lacks some alleged AlQaeda links or a profitable fossil fuel for exploration.

In fact, what I would rather have seen.. or see in the present.. is an internal change. Revolution from within for the country. I say that because I think it would be more sustainable and legitimate, rather than installed by an outside force. But still, if the population is starved, imprisoned and murdered… it may just require some type of intervention. And nevermind how I like or dislike intervention, with all the actions they’ve taken for different reasons, in different corners of the world. Surely Zimbabwe qualifies for immediate attention… and action.

Or maybe not… just go back to talking about dead models.

Powerpoint Karaoke Or Somalia

When you’re dealing with a conference that completely engulfs your days and nights, it becomes hard to focus on anything in particular.

I would like to tell you about my evening in the Turkish neighborhood Kreuzeberg, as I sat down with my dear friend blueberry girl who only takes me to the funnest of places. I’d also like to tell you about the talk I saw today on porn and technology, or even better.. Powerpoint Karaoke which had me laughing for a good hour, distracted from my presentation that I’ll be making in a few hours.

But the fact is my attention is always on world events, especially those that so effect people’s lives. Or deaths, as the case so often is.

Since arriving in Berlin I’ve been watching and listening as the reports come out of Somalia. As you know, I fear the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia will be one of those acts of violence that will have reprocussions for a long time. Listening to the Ethiopian leader talk about how his army will go in, boot the islamists out of power, and get out.. I got chills. Then of course he got the blessing of the United States government and I got angry. Giving the green light for more invasions in the world.

This can’t be the way.

Somalia and Ethiopia, Looming Disaster

If you don’t care about news regarding Somalia or Ethiopia, you suck.

I had to start with that, because a little bird friend of mine at a powerful network just told me that his Atlanta based network doesn’t care about news from Africa. Which is shameful and well, pisses me off.

Why should you care about what is happening or about to happen between Somalia and Ethiopia? It’s pretty pathetic that one has to sell the idea about being concerned for humans wherever they may live, who may face great suffering and death on a mass and unecessary scale.

But I’ll do it anyway. Because after watching the preludes and advances toward conflict between the two countries in the last 6 months, today’s announcement of a holy war against Ethiopia by the Somali Islamists, who control much of the country, sounds like confirmation that a terrible battle has begun and will rage for who knows how long. Hundreds of thousands of refugees… people.. who find themselves in the middle of these armies as they try to murder each other, will lose what little they have and possibly their lives.

A pending disaster that can be stopped.

Ethiopia, for its part, has a very large military (we’re talking several hundred thousand according to the worldfactbook) and have long said they won’t allow the Islamists to take over their neighboring country. They already have what they call, military advisors in the country, which is the cute way the US invented during the cold war to talk about troops that are illegally and covertly fighting in another country.

Anyway I’d rather keep this to one basic point. The signs are already here; an emerging and serious conflict has taken root and now is the time to get involved from an international community position, apply pressure and find creative solutions BEFORE this war escalates. If not.. it will escalate, and a year from now people will ask how this happened, and remark how terrible it all is.