Wednesday 31 March 2010

JOIN THE: Federation Against Mind Control Europe (and the Globe)



JOIN THE
Federation Against Mind Control Europe
(and the Globe)
Victims in Europe get together (different languages), talk about how to organize and help each other, and fight the worldwide abuse of technological means on humans. Site: www.mindcontrol-victims.eu
  http://www.fedame.org/phpBB2/index.php?sid=1ca6aa34f028a33ded30ede995ffb3f7


Our philosophic experiment:
INVISIBILITY - INVULNERABILITY - INVINCIBILITY
AGAINST BODY, MIND AND THOUGHT CONTROL
CREATIVE TRIALECTICS

  

OBJECT - SUBJECT - TRANSJECT
PRAXIS - THEORY - EMANCIPATION 

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Monday 29 March 2010

Africa: since ages living in the racist abyss of capitalist barbarism

Africa:  since ages living in the racist abyss of capitalist barbarism

By Franz J. T. Lee

Book banned in Apartheid South Africa.

To read in english, click on the image

When we are sitting at the foot of the lighthouse, we can barely see its warning lights of imminent approximating danger. Currently our global ship of State, our Titanic, is steering directly towards the huge rocks of disaster. No great god, no great idea, no great man, no Herrenvolk, can and will save us from this man-made self-destruction. Of course, we will remain on collision track unless we ourselves, ... global Society in relation to galactic Nature ... get rid of the current 'democratic-republican' Janus-faced barbarism on a world scale: exploited Labor versus exploiting Capital. At this moment the 'great powers' are activating their mortal arms of mass destruction, they are launching the Goebbels generation of diatribal, fascist, political propaganda and they are going for 'total war' (Hitler), total body, mind and thought control.

Furthermore, HAARP, dangerous geo-engineering, transgenetic fiddling with Nature and geophysical warfare are playing havoc with our planet. Unnoticed by the general public, ... by the consumer bees, the victims of pan et circenses ...  all these Orwellian measures have been implemented since ages already. At breath-taking speed we surpassed the pre-Orwellian age to the post-'Big Brother' era. This has nothing to do with 'post-modernity' or 'transitional governments'. It is the inherent dialectical logic of a closed world order of a closed globalized system.


All over, in Africa, America, Asia and elsewhere, we can notice the devastating effects of what we have determined as a 'Mental Holocaust'. Even here in Venezuela, the Bolivarian Revolution has great difficulty to differentiate between praxis and practice, between theory and ideology, between disalienation and religion.

The global truth stares at us straight in our bewildered faces, but very few brains are left, especially in metropolitan countries,  to know the truth, to become free, to liberate ourselves from the chains of illusion, to evade the epicenter of vandalism in the sky, of full spectrum dominance, of solar barbarism. The billions of workers, the 'wretched of the earth', are victims of centuries of economic  exploitation, political domination and social discrimination, of racism. Especially the latter has taken its toll, mainly in Africa, but also here in Venezuela. There is no modern racism without capitalism, and vice versa. To eradicate racism, is to annihilate capitalism; here we have barely introduced some necessary social 'missions' against capitalist racism, but not yet a real, true anti-capitalism project.

In this brief commentary, we will demonstrate the pharisaic hypocrisy of the ruling classes, what they say, their big lies, and what they do, have in mind to do very soon. For example, according to Bill Gates of Microsoft, and others, the idea is to reduce world poverty, by reducing the poor to only two billions. This is not conspiracy theory, antisemitism or 'communism' jargon.

Bill Gates of Microsoft, in a presentation at the February 2010 TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Conference, spoke about the Global Warming Challenge and effective means to confront it, like drastically reducing the world's population with aggressive population control measures such as vaccines and "reproductive  health services".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhwN6H8h_SY&feature=related


In Venezuela or Africa, it is not the choice of socialism or barbarism. Billions have 'Hobson's choice', it is a matter of immediate world socialism or to perish within the 21st century! The 'miserables' of Africa and of all Humania South, came into being, lived and died in barbarism since the Neolithic Revolution, since the division of labor, since the capitalist world market, since indentured labor and chattel slavery.


Not only were our countries in Humania South classified by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in the 'Manifesto of the Communist Party' as "barbarian and semi-barbarian countries", ever since our 'discovery' by the European feudal and capitalist ruling classes we lived and died in perpetual violence, in barbarism, especially in Africa where this exploitative vandalism lasts till this very second.

The only real and true modern barbarism, ranging from 'democracy' to fascism,  is capitalism, is globalization.

In colonial bondage, in domination by the Dutch East India Company in the South, by Cecil John Rhodes ('I would annex the planets if I could.') in the Rhodesias, by Ultra-Portuguese colonialism in Guinea Bissau, by genocidal annihilation in the 'Belgian Congo' and by French 'assimilation' in the North, Africa was forced into infra-human existence, into open vegetating barbarism. Added to this economic and political subjugation was a social, intellectual holocaust, an 'education for barbarism' (Isaac B. Tabata). Till this day, Africa is experiencing global and globalized educational barbarism.

Never any 'bill of rights', any 'magna carta' or 'human rights' ever were declared for Africa, no reparation will ever be given, no truth commission organized, no human dignity nurtured; except lip service at summit conferences; concretely none of these ever were applied. More and more Africa is sinking into the quagmire of imperialism, of land-grabbing, of robbery of all its human and natural resources, and some African elites participate in this imperialist barbarism.

For whom the following declarations were made?
 
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

(Declaration of Independence, 1776.)

"Every political association has as its goal the preservation of the natural and inprescriptible rights of men. These rights are liberty, property, security and resistance to oppression."

(Art. 11, Declaration of Rights of Man and the Citizen, 1789.)


Definitely, African students have to study the 'Politeia', which states that they, the slaves, are “Speaking Tools” (Aristotle). They do not form part of the famous "Zoon Politikon". They are only barbaric, banausian "Speaking Tools".

We would like to hear what the President of the United States thinks about the following statements of the famous Prussian State philosopher, G. W. F. Hegel, of Montesquieu and Voltaire, of bourgeois, capitalist Enlightenment.

"Characteristic of the Negro (of Africa) is, that his world outlook didn't reach any definite objectivity as yet, e.g., God, Law, which would reflect a human will, and in which he could experience his essence. ... The Negro represents the natural human being still in a state of total savageness and wildness. ... The Negro displays a total disrespect, a contempt  towards humanity. ... For him, humanity is worthless, this takes on incredible forms; for him, tyranny is not injustice, and a generally accepted and sanctioned custom is to devour human flesh. ... Another characteristic of Negroes is slavery. ... On their own continent the Negroes experience a slavery worse than European enslavement of Negroes. ... The fundamental expression of slavery is precisely that man is not yet conscious of his freedom, hence he degenerates into a thing, into something without any human value. ... We leave Africa, not to mention it anymore, because it is not a historic continent, because it lacks motion and development, ... it is just appearing vaguely on the dark threshold of world history. "

(G. W. F. Hegel, Excerpts from: LECTURES ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF
HISTORY. (My free translation, exhibiting  "racist" arrogance.)
 
Montesquieu was very clear about who has a soul, a white soul:

"It is almost unthinkable that God, who is all goodness itself, could have determined to place a soul -- let alone a good soul -- in a body as black and repulsive as that of a Negro."

(Montesquieu, "Esprit des Lois", Livre XV, Chapter 5.)
 
This was the racist, ideological justification for exploitation, domination and social discrimination, this is pure barbarism till this very day. For the military invasion of Arab or Latin American territories similar racist justifications are being given by the current metropolitan powers.

Venezuela is extending friendly foreign and diplomatic relations towards Africa. What do Mitsubishi, Repsol, Exxon Mobil and Chevron-Texaco think about the billion Africans?

We really should investigate, what they did and are doing to us here, to nature, to the indigenous peoples.

Voltaire, himself involved in the late slave trade told us what a 'corporate' capitalist thinks about an African:

"The Negro race is a species of men as different from ours as the breed of spaniels is from that of greyhounds. ... If their understanding is not of a different nature from ours, it is at least greatly inferior. They are not capable of any great application or association of ideas, and seem formed neither for the advantages nor the abuses of philosophy."
(Voltaire, Works.)

Montesquieu stated this as follows:

"It is impossible for us to suppose these creatures to be men!"

Yes, in case that we have not noticed it as yet, there are two different species of Man on planet Earth: 'homo worker' and 'homo capitalist', the slave and the master, living in global class struggle.

There we have the only true 'white ruling class man' speaking, whilst his 'burden', the Africans, 'Latinos' and others are the "non-men", the "non-human beings", --- yet, it is all that difficult to explain this to so many of us, already brain-washed and brain-laundered to a large extent, as this kind of ideology has messed up our thinking capacities..
This racist manipulation continues in our big mass media against the Arabs, Chinese, Africans, 'Latinos' and other 'Children of Ham'.

A century later, in 1953, the architect of apartheid, Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd clearly described the fascist views of the South African Herrenvolk with reference to the  'human rights' of black 'Non-Europeans'.

In a speech in parliament in 1953, Verwoerd stated:

"There is no place for (the native) in the European community, above the level of certain forms of labor... Until now he has been subjected to a school system which drew him away from his own community and misled him by showing him the green pastures of European society in which he was not allowed to graze."

(Quoted from African Nationalism by N. Sithole, 1961. See: Franz J. T. Lee, The Anatomy of Apartheid in Southern Africa, Alexander Defense Committee Publication, New York, 1966. For more information, also see:
http://www.franz-lee.org/files/anatapar.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hendrik_Verwoerd)

  In picturing the 'blacks' as animals grazing in the 'white' fields, Verwoerd was only using the accepted language of the master race in Southern Africa.

In "Bantu Education, Policy for the Immediate Future"(1954), Verwoerd wrote:

"(Bantu) education should stand with both feet in the reserves and have its roots in the spirit and being of Bantu society... Their education should not clash with Government policy... If the native in South Africa today... is being taught to expect that he will live his adult life under a policy of equal rights, he is making a big mistake."(Ibid)

 J. G. Strijdom, who succeeded Malan as prime minister, described baasskap as follows: "Our policy is that the Europeans must stand their ground and must remain Baas (overlord) in South Africa. If we reject the Herrenvolk (master race) idea and the principle that the white man can remain Baas, if the franchise is to be extended to the non-Europeans, and if the non-Europeans are given representation and the vote and the non-Europeans are developed on the same basis as the Europeans, how can the Europeans remain Baas? Our view is that in every sphere the European must retain the right to rule the country and to keep it white man’s country."(Ibid)

International 'baasskap', apartheid, ideology and racism are more virulent than ever. They will only disappear when their radix, master and slave relations, that is, when global capitalism, will fade into galactic oblivion. This, our international heroes, even Nelson Mandela, and the 'African National Congress of South Africa' never will understand. Frantz Fanon and Kwame Nkrumah knew that the historic objective, radical emancipation, is the only true serpentine road towards total freedom. The appearance forms of apartheid have changed, its exploitative quintessence is more virulent than ever across whole Africa.

franz@franzlee.org.ve
http://www.franzlee.org.ve 

....

Saturday 27 March 2010

(DVD)Venezuela: Revolution from the Inside Out


(DVD)Venezuela: Revolution from the Inside Out

FILM By CLIF ROSS
 WITH PARTICIPATION OF JUTTA SCHMITT


Amazon.Com
Venezuela: Revolution from the Inside Out (DVD)
A film by Clif Ross


TO PURCHASE: Click on the Image

JUTTA BLOG

ENGLISH

SPANISH

Thursday 25 March 2010

Messing with Disaster: International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies - By Jutta Schmitt


Messing with Disaster: International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies 

By Jutta Schmitt




This week, from March 22nd  to March 26th, the 'Asilomar* International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies', hosted by the Climate Response Fund, is taking place in Pacific Grove, California-USA, where scientists discuss possible means to counter-balance climate change and its impacts. The kind of measures proposed to mitigate climate change pertain to the realm of geo-engineering and climate intervention techniques, and are outlined in the Conference's working agenda.(1) ...

Click here toread more!



Tuesday 23 March 2010

Franz J. T. Lee: The historic roots of oligarchic racism in Venezuela


Published: Thursday, August 26, 2004
Bylined to: Franz J. T. Lee
(Cordial reposting due to current topicality.) 
Franz J. T. Lee: The historic roots of oligarchic racism in Venezuela
 University of Los Andes (ULA)  professor Franz J. T. Lee writes: One of the quintessential elements of the capitalist world system -- applied ideologically by the "Opposition" in the national and international mass media, to "divide and rule" the Venezuelan people -- is social discrimination, racism.
In fact, racism is the ideological reflection of the world market, of the international division of labor, that is, of globalization, of the vicious global class struggle.
In fact, Racism is Ideology par excellence. Its current, concrete reality is global fascism, is globalized Apartheid.
Social discrimination, racism, is an innate characteristic of any capitalist society, just like economic exploitation, political domination, destructive militarization and mortal alienation. All of them are intrinsic elements of our world system, to eradicate them, the whole exploitative labor system has to be annihilated. As ideology, there is no capitalism without racism, and vice versa; no matter what excuse we may have, who favors capitalism, sows racism; to eliminate any one of the two, we have to annihilate both. This also applies to all five capitalist essences.
Long ago, in Venezuela, Andres Eloy Blanco, demanded that somebody must paint "black angels" for him, indicating that the European Conquest, that Christianity, have already painted racism into our very sacred essence, into the very soul of Latin America. Concerning the Bolivarian Revolution, the clarion call, the "Diana" attack, has to be: Do not paint any angels for me, neither black angels nor white devils!
The worst that could have happened in Venezuela was when the oligarchs began to attack the black face -- the expression of African slavery -- of the Bolivarian Revolution, when they slandered President Chavez with racist, fascist diatribes. However, because of a colonial education for barbarism, although they experience it daily, very few Venezuelans know what is racism, what is social discrimination, and what is its relation to capitalism and imperialism. Thus, we will summarize the historical and social roots of racism here. We will under-line its ideological functions, to indicate that the Bolivarian Revolution does not need any ideology, or ideological education, rather it urgently has to develop its own scientific práxis and philosophic theory, to tell the world what is happening here in Latin America.
The Concept "Racism"
"Race," "racial prejudice," "racial discrimination" and "racism" are very vague, unscientific and poly-dimensional conceptions, which have caused ideological confusion and social disaster over the last three centuries. Although Arthur J. de Gobineau published a manifesto, The Inequality of the Races, and Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels made their manifesto public at about the same time, yet none of them dealt with the crucial question, namely, the relation of the so-called "race struggle" and the "class struggle," especially in the "Third World" context.
However, these authors cannot be dissociated from their intellectual environment; they are products of their epoch, no matter how critical and revolutionary they may have been. This also applies to us, when we kiss "Mi Negra," or make jokes about Africa: His name is "Negro," his surname is "Mierda"; just imagine what Nelson Mandela would think about us -- about this result of decades of "escualido," puntofijista education. Everything is fine with "Mi Negra," from the very heart of the Congo, however, when she is being presented to her future parents-in-law, then the real racist drama begins.http://www.vheadlines.info/readnews.asp?id=22589
In the epoch of "discovery," Western Europe had experienced an unprecedented development in technology and science, which was accompanied by a strong feeling of "white race superiority."
The social sciences bore the imprint of this arrogance, and anthropology, ethnology or sociology attempted to legitimize scientifically the hegemony of Europe and the supremacy of the "Aryan race." Already prior to the French Revolution, great philosophical thinkers like Montesquieu and Voltaire had paved the road for a scientific "racist" thoughts.
Although Karl Marx spoke about "barbarian and semi-barbarian countries dependent on the civilized ones," and found a subject of derision in Lassie's "negroid" features, there is no reason whatsoever to define scientific socialism, as developed by him as being a "racist ideology." However, we must see our teachers within their historic context, and criticize them according to the limitations of their personal and historic knowledge; above all, one realizes how deeply "racism" has penetrated the very "soul" of human beings, living under capitalism, colonialism and imperialism.
Arthur De Gobineau was of the opinion that all ancient and modern "civilizations" and cultures were "the creation of white men, the only history being white history." Thus, because all history of "non-white" cultures were practically unknown before 1847 in Europe, we find the controversial statement in the Communist Manifesto: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggle." In a letter to A. H. Starkenburg, Engels even went so far as to state: "We regard economic conditions as the factor which ultimately determines historical development. But race is itself an economic factor."
These examples raise the crucial question: not whether "races" should be treated equally, not whether "races" are equal, but whether the category of "race," which is the base of "racial prejudice" or "racism," is scientifically a valid one. Now, "ghosts," "angels" or "demons" have not been proved to exist in physical reality, but nevertheless they exist intellectually and spiritually in the minds of millions of Latin American human beings.
Similarly, "races" and "racism" are social realities of our epoch. The problem is not to show that they really exist, but that they are pseudo-concepts, part and parcel of bourgeois and oligarchic ideology, which operates with categories which are scientifically invalid.
In Venezuela, these are all necessary to rationalize oligarchic class rule, economic exploitation and to maintain the status quo of "white" hegemony -- and nowadays, even "black" supremacy as well. Only when this point is clear can we analyze contemporary "racism" in all its shades and shadows, fired from Plaza Francia.
"Race," "Racial Prejudice" and Racism
The concept "race", in its current use, appeared for the first time in 1684. The French medical doctor and traveler Francois Bernier, wrote about "four or five races of people, whose differences are so obvious, that by right these should be used as the basis for a new division of the world." The real founder of the "race" doctrine, later developed as an ideology, was the Swedish natural scientist, Carl Von Linne. In the tenth revised edition of his famous book, "Systema Naturae," in 1758, he divided the human species into four major "races", according to physical, psychological and social features: Indians, Europeans, Asiatics, and Negroes.
Due to the contributions of Houston Chamberlain, G. V. de Lapouge and de Gobineau, eventually the "racist" ideologues settled for three major "race" groups: Caucasoid, Mongoloid and Negroid. These were again sub-divided into various groups, including, for example, the famous "'Aryan race.”
Scientific knowledge was harnessed in support of the theory of "white race superiority". Charles Darwin's book, "The Origin of the Species. The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life" (1859) , gave a great impetus to "race" doctrines; in fact, even Marx was fascinated by Darwin's book, obviously for other reasons, and he even wanted to dedicate the second volume of Capital to Darwin. Darwin had connected evolutionary theory to the "race" theory, creating "Social Darwinism," a tendency which had applied the biological selection theory to the historical social process. (This eventually found its application in Nazism and apartheid, in ideas like the "Herrenvolk" and "Aryan race").
The genetic laws of J. G. Mendel demolished the anthropological criteria for defining "race", and the biological/genetic "racist" scientists had to seek refuge in the field of sociology. From discovering "gene pools," the term "sociological races" was developed, for the mechanism of biological heredity made the anthropological concept of "race" meaningless. From "sociological races," ''race prejudice" was inferred, especially by the German Nazi scientists, and later by their pupils, the South African "Afrikaner" (Boer) scientists.
"Group Antipathy" in Ancient Civilizations
"Civilization" is a concept created at the same time as "race'", and presupposing as it does "civilized" and "uncivilized" peoples, it has many "racial" connotations. Currently, in racist fashion, in his "new wars", Bush is using this concept against the "Arab barbarians."
  • We need just to read the works of Hegel, Marx, Engels, De Gobineau or Darwin to see how this term was used against what were in fact culturally highly developed peoples, in Africa, in Latin America, in Venezuela.
In the case of Ancient Egypt, for instance, about a third of the population was composed of "Negroid" peoples, some pharaohs were of "Negro" origin, and at a time an Ethiopian dynasty reigned. The Egyptian rulers had enslaved peoples from many countries, among them Africans, especially from Nubia and Ethiopia. The ruling classes spoke scornfully about these groups, but social relations in the slave-owning society of Egypt had nothing to do with "race prejudice". We have many accounts of how the Egyptians mixed freely with their neighbors, whether slave or free.
In the ancient Greek civilization we find similar social patterns. For Plato, Heracleitus or Aristotle slaves were not considered as citizens, and throughout their works we find scornful remarks about them, for example, calling them "speaking tools".
This also applied, however, to the white slaves from the North; "race prejudice" was not a relevant factor. The Hellenic Greeks had a cultural bond, and the basic division was simply Greeks and barbarians. The latter were simply peoples who did not speak Greek or possess Greek culture. But the Greeks founded colonies, encouraged the ''barbarians'' to participate in Greek culture, married them freely, and once they had acquired a working knowledge of Greek culture, all the Europeans, Asians and Africans were included in the sonorous concept "Hellas." The pre-Columbian African travels, the Transatlantic Slave Trade, the origin of the world market, the infamous capitalist "Bermuda Triangle," all link us here in Venezuela to this cultural African heritage, to permanent world revolution.
At the Time of the Empire of Alexander the Great, a new Greco-Oriental ruling class and culture came into existence, on the basis of all the civilizations within the empire. The class distinction between the ruling class and the un-Hellenized natives was a property, an estate one, not a "sociological race'' division.
In the great Roman empire which followed, similarly, the slaves did not differ in outward appearance from their masters, or from "free men." The norm for superiority in Rome was a cultural/class attribute, and as the empire grew, the basic distinction of Roman citizenship was extended to all freeborn persons in the various municipalities.
In his famous book: "Caste, Class and Race," Oliver Cromwell Cox concluded: "There seems to be no basis for imputing racial antagonism to the Egyptians, Babylonians, or Persians." As Ina Corinne Brown stated, "it is important to emphasize the fact that race prejudice such as we know it did not exist before the modern age."
Slavery And "Racism"
From the Roman Empire, to the "barbarian" invasions of Europe, the reign of the Moslems, and until the era of domination of Roman Catholicism, the rationalization given for slavery was not slaves' color, but culture or religion. Even as late as the 15th century, when the Transatlantic Slave Trade began, Africans were not enslaved because they were black, but because they were not-Christian, and for economic reasons. According to the late President of Trinidad and Tobago, Eric Williams, in his book, "Capitalism and Slavery."
"Slavery in the Caribbean has been too narrowly identified with the Negro. A racial twist has thereby been given to what is basically an economic phenomenon. Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery. Unfree labor in the New World was brown white, black and yellow; Catholic, Protestant and Pagan."
Before slavery became "big business," the readiness of an African slave to become a Christian was sufficient to gain his emancipation. Later, after the "race" ideology was developed, he had no possibility to change his genes, and slave status was identical with black, and later with "colored" or yellow.
During the "age of discovery" and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, the very European languages became vehicles of emerging "racism"; it entered into children's stories, rhymes and songs. The "Ten Little Black Niggers," the "Struwwelpeter,"  the "Bimbos," etc., all came into existence. The word "negro" never was used in Africa before the 15th century, especially not in "Black Africa," but ever since then "negro" and "negrero" became household words.
The "Negro," as his colonial designation indicates, was distinguished from his white slave-master by his skin color -- black. Over the decades the invidious connotations of the slave status were transferred to anyone who was black, and eventually to anyone who was "non-white." We have seen already how Bernier, de Gobineau or Linne had then elevated "Europeans" with a white skin color to "superiority" and "Negroes" to "inferiority," using these as pseudo-categories in their "race doctrines." However, "racism," like capitalism itself, had a long historic process of development; only in the 19th century, when capitalism had captured economic and political power, could "racism" reach maturity as part of the general Ideology which gave rationalizations for colonial, social discrimination, and for the division of labor on an international scale.
Capitalism and "Racism"
Concerning the genesis of "racism" and its relation to capitalism, we might quote from a lecture held by the author at various universities in Germany, in October 1976:
" 'Race hatred' ... as a derivative of 'underdevelopment' of Africa and the 'development' of Europe came into existence and became the distinguishing mark of social relations between men of different pigmentations. The concept 'Neger' (Negro) thus acquired its historic discriminatory content ....
'Racism' ... is very closely knitted with the genesis of world capitalism; it functions as a disguise, as rationalization for the barbaric crimes of the colonial epoch .... But it also has a function at home in the metropolitan countries; the common members of the 'master race' stand high up on the rungs of the social ladder of the world, higher than the 'aborigines', 'Bushmen' 'Negroes', 'Red-skins', 'Coolies', 'camel-drivers', etc."
Summarizing, as stated before, "racism" and "capitalism" have a similar genesis. There can be no "racism" without capitalism, and no world capitalism without international "racism." "Racism" is a direct product of the evolution of colonialism and imperialism; it is either openly present or potentially latent in all capitalist countries. Wherever capitalism is flourishing as "neocolonialism" in the so-called "developing world," "racism" in modern forms, with new faces, and new masks, is virulent and contagious.
The capitalist ideology used by the "Opposition" in Venezuela -- against the poorest classes, who support the Bolivarian Revolution -- is pure "racism." Their violent diatribes, calling for "civil disobedience," for "social insurrection," against a legitimate, democratic government, their racist, fascist attacks against Chavez, demonstrate their bloodthirsty capitalist essence. They don't care about the millions of impoverished masses in Latin America, they just see "tin-collectors," the "scum of the earth," "speaking-tools."
For the first time in Venezuela, the Bolivarian Revolution has given human dignity and worth to the impoverished multitude, enables it to participate in its own destiny. This is too much for the fraudulent "democratic co-ordination" of racism, for corrupt, "democratic" Corporate America, they have to stop this by all violent means, by means of a 10 or 20 years "ancien regime" of terror, of dictatorship.
However, they never will return, the Bolivarian Revolution has left them behind, has crossed the Rubicon on August 15, 2004. President Chavez does not recognize their existence anymore, the Zombies can now decimate each other, can enjoy the "silver bullets" of revolutionary Renaissance and of revolutionary Emancipation.
Franz J. T. Lee
franzjutta@cantv.net
http://www.vheadlines.info/readnews.asp?id=22589

Friday 19 March 2010

(VIDEOS): Franz tells about his political struggle against Apartheid in South Africa and world fascism


Who is Franz?- ¿Quién es Franz?
(VIDEOS): Franz tells about his political struggle against Apartheid in South Africa and world fascism

AUTOBIOGRAIA DEL PROF. DR. FRANZ J. T. LEE
ENGLISH -- WITH SPANISH SUB-TITLES (1/4)
4shared:

Prof. Dr. Franz J. T. Lee tells his interesting life and vast political experience as a fighter against South Africa's Apartheid and his theoretical & praxical contribution to Venezuela's Bolivarian Revolution.

El Prof. Dr. Franz J. T. Lee cuenta su interesante vida y vasta experiencia política como luchador contra el Apartheid en Sudáfrica y sus contribuciones teorico-práxicas a la revolución bolivariana en Venezuela. (Inglés con subtítulos en español). Visit us at--Visítenos en http://www.franzlee.org.ve

FRANZ LEE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY AUTOBIOGRAFIA DE FRANZ LEE (1/4)http://www.4shared.com/file/109858308/bb9ce219/pequeachoza.html

 
 

MORE VIDEOS
  
 

Wednesday 17 March 2010

Beyond Orwell: The Electronic Police State, 2010 - By Tom Burghardt

Beyond Orwell: The Electronic Police State, 2010
by Tom Burghardt

Global Research, March 16, 2010

A truism perhaps, but before resorting to brute force and open repression to halt the "barbarians at the gates," that would be us, the masters of declining empires (and the chattering classes who polish their boots) regale us with tales of "democracy on the march," "hope" and other banalities before the mailed fist comes crashing down.

Putting it another way, as the late, great Situationist malcontent, Guy Debord did decades ago in his relentless call for revolt, The Society of the Spectacle:

"The reigning economic system is a vicious circle of isolation. Its technologies are based on isolation, and they contribute to that same isolation. From automobiles to television, the goods that the spectacular system chooses to produce also serve it as weapons for constantly reinforcing the conditions that engender 'lonely crowds.' With ever-increasing concreteness the spectacle recreates its own presuppositions."

And when those "presuppositions" reproduce ever-more wretched clichés promulgated by true believers or rank opportunists, take your pick, market "democracy," the "freedom to choose" (the length of one's chains), or even quaint notions of national "sovereignty" (a sure fire way to get, and keep, the masses at each others' throats!) we're left with a fraud, a gigantic swindle, a "postmodern" refinement of tried and true methods that would do Orwell proud!

Ponder Debord's rigorous theorem and substitute "cell phone" and "GPS" for "automobile," and "Internet" for "television" and you're soon left with the nauseating sense that the old "infobahn" isn't all its cracked up to be. As a seamless means for effecting control on the other hand, of our thoughts, our actions, even our whereabouts; well, that's another story entirely!

In this light, a new report published by Cryptohippie, The Electronic Police State: 2010 National Rankings, delivers the goods and rips away the veil from the smirking visage of well-heeled corporate crooks and media apologists of America's burgeoning police state.

"When we produced our first Electronic Police State report" Cryptohippie's analysts write, "the top ten nations were of two types:

    1. Those that had the will to spy on every citizen, but lacked ability.
    2. Those who had the ability, but were restrained in will.


But as they reveal in new national rankings, "This is changing: The able have become willing and their traditional restraints have failed." The key developments driving the global panopticon forward are the following:

    ● The USA has negated their Constitution's fourth amendment in the name of protection and in the name of "wars" against terror, drugs and cyber attacks.
    ● The UK is aggressively building the world of 1984 in the name of stopping "anti-social" activities. Their populace seems unable or unwilling to restrain the government.
    ● France and the EU have given themselves over to central bureaucratic control.


In France, the German newsmagazine Spiegel reported that a new law passed by the lower house of Parliament in February "conjures up the specter of Big Brother and the surveillance state."

Similar to legislation signed into law by German president Horst Köhler last month, police and security forces in France would be granted authority to surreptitiously install malware known as a "Trojan horse" to spy on private computers. Remote access to a user's personal data would be made possible under a judge's supervision.

While French parliamentarians aligned with right-wing President Nicolas Sarkozy insist the measure is intended to filter and block web sites with criminal content or to halt allegedly "illegal" file sharing, civil libertarians have denounced the legislation.

Sandrine Béllier, a member of the European Parliament for the Green Party, said that "when it comes to restrictions, this text is preparing us for hell."

Additionally, the new law will include measures that will further integrate police files and private data kept by banks and other financial institutions. French securocrats cynically insist this is a wholly innocent move to "maintain the level and quality of service provided by domestic security forces," Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux told Spiegel.

Generalized political measures such as these that hinder free speech and expression, whilst enhancing the surveillance capabilities of the state, also indicate that so-called "Western democracies" are not far behind beacons of freedom such as China, North Korea, Belarus and Russia when it comes to repressive police measures. Indeed, Cryptohippie's rankings place the United States a mere 2/100ths of a point behind Russia when it comes to Internet and other forms of electronic spying.

The top ten scofflaws in 2010 are: 1. North Korea; 2. China; 3. Belarus; 4. Russia; 5. United States; 6. United Kingdom; 7. France; 8. Israel; 9. Singapore and, 10. Germany.

A Profit-Driven Panopticon

In a capitalist "democracy" such as ours where the business of government is always business and individual liberties be damned, grifting North American and European telecommunications and security firms, with much encouragement and great fanfare from their national security establishments and a lap-dog media blaze the path for Western versions of the sinister "Golden Shield."

Recently in the United States, whistleblowing web sites such as Cryptome and Slight Paranoia have come under attack. Both sites have been hit by take down notices under the onerous Digital Millennium Copyright Act for posting documents and files that exposed the close, and very profitable arrangements, made by giant telecommunications firms and ISPs with the American secret state.

In Cryptome's case, administrator John Young had his site shuttered for a day when the giant software firm, Microsoft, demanded that its so-called "lawful spying guide" be removed by Young. All five files are currently back on-line as Zipped files at Cryptome and make for a very enlightening read.

But the harassment didn't stop there. When Young published PayPal's "lawful spying guide," the firm froze Cryptome's account, in all likelihood at the behest of America's spy agencies, allegedly for "illegal activities," i.e., offering Cryptome's entire archive for sale on two DVDs!

Why would the secret state's corporate partners target Young? Perhaps because since 1996, "Cryptome welcomes documents for publication that are prohibited by governments worldwide, in particular material on freedom of expression, privacy, cryptology, dual-use technologies, national security, intelligence, and secret governance--open, secret and classified documents--but not limited to those. Documents are removed from this site only by order served directly by a US court having jurisdiction. No court order has ever been served; any order served will be published here--or elsewhere if gagged by order. Bluffs will be published if comical but otherwise ignored."

In previous reports, Cryptohippie characterized an electronic police state thusly:

    1. It is criminal evidence, ready for use in a trial.
    2. It is gathered universally ("preventively") and only later organized for use in prosecutions.


Silent and seamless, our political minders have every intention of deploying such formidable technological resources as a preeminent--and preemptive--means for effecting social control. Indeed, what has been characterized by corporate and media elites as an "acceptable," i.e. managed political discourse, respect neither national boundaries, the laws and customs of nations, nor a population's right to abolish institutions, indeed entire social systems when the governed are reduced to the level of a pauperized herd ripe for plunder.

How then, does this repressive metasystem work? What are the essential characteristics that differentiate an Electronic Police State from previous forms of oppressive governance? Cryptohippie avers:

"In an Electronic Police State, every surveillance camera recording, every email sent, every Internet site surfed, every post made, every check written, every credit card swipe, every cell phone ping... are all criminal evidence, and all are held in searchable databases. The individual can be prosecuted whenever the government wishes."

"Long term" Cryptohippie writes, the secret state (definitionally expanded here to encompass "private" matters such as workplace surveillance, union busting, persecution of whistleblowers, corporate political blacklisting, etc.), "the Electronic Police State destroys free speech, the right to petition the government for redress of grievances, and other liberties. Worse, it does so in a way that is difficult to identify."

As Antifascist Calling and others have pointed out, beside the usual ruses deployed by ruling class elites to suppress general knowledge of driftnet spying and wholesale database indexing of entire populations, e.g., "national security" exemptions to the Freedom of Information Act, outright subversion of the rule of law through the expansion of "state secrets" exceptions that prohibit Courts from examining a state's specious claims, one can add the opaque, bureaucratic violence of corporations who guard, by any means necessary, what have euphemistically been christened "proprietary business information."

In a state such as ours characterized by wholesale corruption, e.g., generalized financial swindles, insider trading, sweetheart deals brokered with suborned politicians, dangerous pharmaceuticals or other commodities "tested" and then certified "safe" by the marketeers themselves, the protection of trade secrets, formulas, production processes and marketing plans are jealously guarded by judicial pit bulls.

Those who spill the beans and have the temerity to reveal that various products are harmful to the public health or have deleterious effects on the environment (off-loaded onto the public who foot the bill as so-called "external" costs of production) are hounded, slandered or otherwise persecuted, if not imprisoned, by the legal lackeys who serve the corporatist state.

How does this play out in the real world? According to Cryptohippie, the objective signs that an electronic net has closed in to ensure working class compliance with our wretched order of things, are the following:

Daily Documents: Requirement of state-issued identity documents and registration.

Border Issues: Inspections at borders, searching computers, demanding decryption of data.

Financial Tracking: State's ability to search and record all financial transactions: Checks, credit card use, wires, etc.

Gag Orders: Criminal penalties if you tell someone the state is searching their records.

Anti-Crypto Laws: Outlawing or restricting cryptography.

Constitutional Protection: A lack of constitutional protections for the individual, or the overriding of such protections.

Data Storage Ability: The ability of the state to store the data they gather.

Data Search Ability: The ability to search the data they gather.

ISP Data Retention: States forcing Internet Service Providers to save detailed records of all their customers' Internet usage.

Telephone Data Retention: States forcing telephone companies to record and save records of all their customers' telephone usage.

Cell Phone Records: States forcing cellular telephone companies to record and save records of all their customers' usage, including location.

Medical records: States demanding records from all medical service providers and retaining the same.

Enforcement Ability: The state's ability to use overwhelming force (exemplified by SWAT Teams) to seize anyone they want, whenever they want.

Habeas Corpus: Lack of habeas corpus, which is the right not to be held in jail without prompt due process. Or, the overriding of such protections.

Police-Intel Barrier: The lack of a barrier between police organizations and intelligence organizations. Or, the overriding of such barriers.

Covert Hacking: State operatives copying digital evidence from private computers covertly. Covert hacking can make anyone appear as any kind of criminal desired, if combined with the removing and/or adding of digital evidence.

Loose Warrants: Warrants issued without careful examination of police statements and other justifications by a truly independent judge.

Sound familiar? It should, since this is the warped reality manufactured for us, or, as Debord would have it: "The spectacle cannot be understood as a mere visual excess produced by mass-media technologies. It is a worldview that has actually been materialized, a view of a world that has become objective."

That such a state of affairs is monstrous is of course, an understatement. Yet despite America's preeminent position as a militarist "hyperpower," the realization that it is a collapsing Empire is a cliché only for those who ignore history's episodic convulsions.

If, as bourgeois historian Niall Ferguson suggests in the March/April 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs, the American Empire may "quite abruptly ... collapse," and that this "complex adaptive system is in big trouble when its component parts lose faith in its viability," what does this say about the efficacy of an Electronic Police State to keep the lid on?

Despite the state's overwhelming firepower, at the level of ideology as much as on the social battlefield where truncheons meet flesh and bullets fly, Marx's "old mole" is returning with a vengeance, the "specter" once again haunting "rich men dwelling at peace within their habitations," as Churchill described the West's system of organized plunder.

Against this loss of "faith" in the system's "viability," Debord points out, although the working class "has lost its ability to assert its own independent perspective," in a more fundamental sense "it has also lost its illusions." In this regard, "no quantitative amelioration of its impoverishment, no illusory participation in a hierarchized system, can provide a lasting cure for its dissatisfaction."

Forty years on from Debord, sooner rather later, an historical settling of accounts with the system of global piracy called capitalism will confront the working class with the prospect of "righting the absolute wrong of being excluded from any real life."

As that process accelerates and deepens, it will then be the "watchers" who tremble...

Click here for the original!

Tom Burghardt is a frequent contributor to Global Research.Global Research Articles by Tom Burghardt 


Also see, in this blog: Orwellian Emancipatory Jewels or How Also To Read Nineteen Eighty-four Critically Today? By Franz JT Lee
Click here!
 

Saturday 13 March 2010

Billionaires and Mega-Corporations Behind Immense Land Grab in Africa


Billionaires and Mega-Corporations Behind Immense Land Grab in Africa
By John Vidal, Mail & Guardian
Posted on March 10, 2010, Printed on March 13, 2010
http://www.alternet.org/story/145970/
Awassa, Ethiopia -- We turned off the main road to Awassa, talked our way past security guards and drove a mile across empty land before we found what will soon be Ethiopia's largest greenhouse. Nestling below an escarpment of the Rift Valley, the development is far from finished, but the plastic and steel structure already stretches over 50 acres* -- the size of 20 soccer fields.

The farm manager shows us millions of tomatoes, peppers and other vegetables being grown in 1,500 foot rows in computer controlled conditions. Spanish engineers are building the steel structure, Dutch technology minimises water use from two bore-holes and 1,000 women pick and pack 50 tons of food a day. Within 24 hours, it has been driven 200 miles to Addis Ababa and flown 1,000 miles to the shops and restaurants of Dubai, Jeddah and elsewhere in the Middle East.

Ethiopia is one of the hungriest countries in the world with more than 13-million people needing food aid, but paradoxically the government is offering at least 7.5 million acres of its most fertile land to rich countries and some of the world's most wealthy individuals to export food for their own populations.

The 2,500 acres of land which contain the Awassa greenhouses are leased for 99 years to a Saudi billionaire businessman, Ethiopian-born Sheikh Mohammed al-Amoudi, one of the 50 richest men in the world. His Saudi Star company plans to spend up to $2-billion acquiring and developing 1.25 million acres of land in Ethiopia in the next few years. So far, it has bought four farms and is already growing wheat, rice, vegetables and flowers for the Saudi market. It expects eventually to employ more than 10,000 people.

But Ethiopia is only one of 20 or more African countries where land is being bought or leased for intensive agriculture on an immense scale in what may be the greatest change of ownership since the colonial era.

Land rush
An Observer investigation estimates that up to 125 million acres of land -- an area more than double the size of the UK -- has been acquired in the last few years or is in the process of being negotiated by governments and wealthy investors working with state subsidies. The data used was collected by Grain, the International Institute for Environment and Development, the International Land Coalition, ActionAid and other non-governmental groups.

The land rush, which is still accelerating, has been triggered by the worldwide food shortages which followed the sharp oil price rises in 2008, growing water shortages and the European Union's insistence that 10% of all transport fuel must come from plant-based biofuels by 2015.

In many areas the deals have led to evictions, civil unrest and complaints of "land grabbing".

The experience of Nyikaw Ochalla, an indigenous Anuak from the Gambella region of Ethiopia now living in Britain but who is in regular contact with farmers in his region, is typical. He said: "All of the land in the Gambella region is utilised. Each community has and looks after its own territory and the rivers and farmlands within it. It is a myth propagated by the government and investors to say that there is waste land or land that is not utilised in Gambella.

"The foreign companies are arriving in large numbers, depriving people of land they have used for centuries. There is no consultation with the indigenous population. The deals are done secretly. The only thing the local people see is people coming with lots of tractors to invade their lands.

"All the land round my family village of Illia has been taken over and is being cleared. People now have to work for an Indian company. Their land has been compulsorily taken and they have been given no compensation. People cannot believe what is happening. Thousands of people will be affected and people will go hungry."

It is not known if the acquisitions will improve or worsen food security in Africa, or if they will stimulate separatist conflicts, but a major World Bank report due to be published this month is expected to warn of both the potential benefits and the immense dangers they represent to people and nature.

Leading the rush are international agribusinesses, investment banks, hedge funds, commodity traders, sovereign wealth funds as well as UK pension funds, foundations and individuals attracted by some of the world's cheapest land.

Together they are scouring Sudan, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, Malawi, Ethiopia, Congo, Zambia, Uganda, Madagascar, Zimbabwe, Mali, Sierra Leone, Ghana and elsewhere. Ethiopia alone has approved 815 foreign-financed agricultural projects since 2007. Any land there, which investors have not been able to buy, is being leased for approximately $1 per year per 2.5 acres.

Saudi Arabia, along with other Middle Eastern emirate states such as Qatar, Kuwait and Abu Dhabi, is thought to be the biggest buyer. In 2008 the Saudi government, which was one of the Middle East's largest wheat-growers, announced it was to reduce its domestic cereal production by 12% a year to conserve its water. It earmarked $5-billion to provide loans at preferential rates to Saudi companies which wanted to invest in countries with strong agricultural potential .

Meanwhile, the Saudi investment company Foras, backed by the Islamic Development Bank and wealthy Saudi investors, plans to spend $1-billion buying land and growing seven million tonnes of rice for the Saudi market within seven years. The company says it is investigating buying land in Mali, Senegal, Sudan and Uganda. By turning to Africa to grow its staple crops, Saudi Arabia is not just acquiring Africa's land but is securing itself the equivalent of hundreds of millions of gallons of scarce water a year. Water, says the UN, will be the defining resource of the next 100 years.

Huge deals
Since 2008 Saudi investors have bought heavily in Sudan, Egypt, Ethiopia and Kenya. Last year the first sacks of wheat grown in Ethiopia for the Saudi market were presented by al-Amoudi to King Abdullah.

Some of the African deals lined up are eye-wateringly large: China has signed a contract with the Democratic Republic of Congo to grow 7-million acres of palm oil for biofuels. Before it fell apart after riots, a proposed 3 million acres deal between Madagascar and the South Korean company Daewoo would have included nearly half of the country's arable land.

Land to grow biofuel crops is also in demand. "European biofuel companies have acquired or requested about 10 million acres in Africa. This has led to displacement of people, lack of consultation and compensation, broken promises about wages and job opportunities," said Tim Rice, author of an ActionAid report which estimates that the EU needs to grow crops on 43 million acres, well over half the size of Italy, if it is to meet its 10% biofuel target by 2015.

"The biofuel land grab in Africa is already displacing farmers and food production. The number of people going hungry will increase," he said. British firms have secured tracts of land in Angola, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Nigeria and Tanzania to grow flowers and vegetables.

Indian companies, backed by government loans, have bought or leased hundreds of thousands of acres in Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Senegal and Mozambique, where they are growing rice, sugar cane, maize and lentils to feed their domestic market.

Nowhere is now out of bounds. Sudan, emerging from civil war and mostly bereft of development for a generation, is one of the new hot spots. South Korean companies last year bought 1.75 million acres of northern Sudan for wheat cultivation; the United Arab Emirates have acquired 1.875 million acres and Saudi Arabia last month concluded a 100,000 acre deal in Nile province.

The government of southern Sudan says many companies are now trying to acquire land. "We have had many requests from many developers. Negotiations are going on," said Peter Chooli, director of water resources and irrigation, in Juba last week. "A Danish group is in discussions with the state and another wants to use land near the Nile."

In one of the most extraordinary deals, buccaneering New York investment firm Jarch Capital, run by a former commodities trader, Philip Heilberg, has leased 2 million acres in southern Sudan near Darfur. Heilberg has promised not only to create jobs but also to put 10% or more of his profits back into the local community. But he has been accused by Sudanese of "grabbing" communal land and leading an American attempt to fragment Sudan and exploit its resources.

New colonialism
Devlin Kuyek, a Montreal-based researcher with Grain, said investing in Africa was now seen as a new food supply strategy by many governments. "Rich countries are eyeing Africa not just for a healthy return on capital, but also as an insurance policy. Food shortages and riots in 28 countries in 2008, declining water supplies, climate change and huge population growth have together made land attractive. Africa has the most land and, compared with other continents, is cheap," he said.

"Farmland in sub-Saharan Africa is giving 25% returns a year and new technology can treble crop yields in short time frames," said Susan Payne, chief executive of Emergent Asset Management, a UK investment fund seeking to spend $50-million on African land, which, she said, was attracting governments, corporations, multinationals and other investors. "Agricultural development is not only sustainable, it is our future. If we do not pay great care and attention now to increase food production by over 50% before 2050, we will face serious food shortages globally," she said.

But many of the deals are widely condemned by both Western non-government groups and nationals as "new colonialism", driving people off the land and taking scarce resources away from people.

We met Tegenu Morku, a land agent, in a roadside cafe on his way to the region of Oromia in Ethiopia to find 1,250 acresof land for a group of Egyptian investors. They planned to fatten cattle, grow cereals and spices and export as much as possible to Egypt. There had to be water available and he expected the price to be about 15 birr (about $1) per 2.5 acres per year -- less than a quarter of the cost of land in Egypt and a tenth of the price of land in Asia.

"The land and labor is cheap and the climate is good here. Everyone -- Saudis, Turks, Chinese, Egyptians -- is looking. The farmers do not like it because they get displaced, but they can find land elsewhere and, besides, they get compensation, equivalent to about 10 years' crop yield," he said.

Man-made famine
Oromia is one of the centers of the African land rush. Haile Hirpa, president of the Oromia studies' association, said last week in a letter of protest to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon that India had acquired 2.5 million acres, Djibouti 2,500 acres, Saudi Arabia 250,000 and that Egyptian, South Korean, Chinese, Nigerian and other Arab investors were all active in the state.

"This is the new, 21st-century colonization. The Saudis are enjoying the rice harvest, while the Oromos are dying from man-made famine as we speak," he said.

The Ethiopian government denied the deals were causing hunger and said that the land deals were attracting hundreds of millions of dollars of foreign investments and tens of thousands of jobs. A spokesperson said: "Ethiopia has [187 million acres] of fertile land, of which only 15% is currently in use -- mainly by subsistence farmers. Of the remaining land, only a small percentage -- 3 to 4% -- is offered to foreign investors. Investors are never given land that belongs to Ethiopian farmers. The government also encourages Ethiopians in the diaspora to invest in their homeland. They bring badly needed technology, they offer jobs and training to Ethiopians, they operate in areas where there is suitable land and access to water."

The reality on the ground is different, according to Michael Taylor, a policy specialist at the International Land Coalition. "If land in Africa hasn't been planted, it's probably for a reason. Maybe it's used to graze livestock or deliberately left fallow to prevent nutrient depletion and erosion. Anybody who has seen these areas identified as unused understands that there is no land in Ethiopia that has no owners and users."

Development experts are divided on the benefits of large-scale, intensive farming. Indian ecologist Vandana Shiva said in London last week that large-scale industrial agriculture not only threw people off the land but also required chemicals, pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, intensive water use, and large-scale transport, storage and distribution which together turned landscapes into enormous mono-cultural plantations.

"We are seeing dispossession on a massive scale. It means less food is available and local people will have less. There will be more conflict and political instability and cultures will be uprooted. The small farmers of Africa are the basis of food security. The food availability of the planet will decline," she says. But Rodney Cooke, director at the UN's International Fund for Agricultural Development, sees potential benefits. "I would avoid the blanket term 'land-grabbing'. Done the right way, these deals can bring benefits for all parties and be a tool for development."

Lorenzo Cotula, senior researcher with the International Institute for Environment and Development, who co-authored a report on African land exchanges with the UN fund last year, found that well-structured deals could guarantee employment, better infrastructures and better crop yields. But badly handled they could cause great harm, especially if local people were excluded from decisions about allocating land and if their land rights were not protected.

Water is also controversial. Local government officers in Ethiopia told the Observer that foreign companies that set up flower farms and other large intensive farms were not being charged for water. "We would like to, but the deal is made by central government," said one. In Awassa, the al-Amouni farm uses as much water a year as 100,000 Ethiopians.
*Measurements in the article have been adapted from metric system.
© 2010 Mail & Guardian All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/145970/