Apr 07

Remembering Rwanda

Yesterday, April 6, marked the17th anniversary of the assassination of Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana which catalyzed a genocide in which 800,000 Tutsis (a Rwandan minority) and moderate Hutus (part of the majority) were systematically murdered in a three month span.

A former supervisor of mine was in the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) at that time, and he was put on the ground in Rwanda some two months into the slaughter, after the UN had finally garnered the political will it needed to become involved. He told me that he was advised to brace for the smell. As he stepped off of the plane into the airport, he said that the smell of death was overpowering as it came in through the shattered windows.

Rwanda remains one of the greatest tragedies and embarrassments for the international community of the last several decades. Recalling the events of the first and second UNOSOM missions, during which a pullout of US support ended in disaster, the UN membership and then DPKO Director Kofi Annan were unwilling to heed the warnings of Roméo Dallaire, the officer in charge of the Rwandan peacekeeping force. Dallaire reported on the weapons caches that he had discovered, as well as the intense propaganda that was the lead up to the start of the genocide. The murder of ten Belgian peacekeepers, whose force served as the backbone of the operation, led to the reduction in the size of the UN’s force in Rwanda to 270. The US and a large part of the international community refused to define the slaughter as a genocide as it happened, because that would have entailed a responsibility to act under international law.

I recently did a podcast on the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), a concept that was in part born out of the aftermath of the Rwandan Genocide, along with the massacres in Srebrenica, the failure in Somalia, the genocide committed by the Khmer Rouge, and other massive crimes against humanity. On this day of remembrance, as we mourn the dead and think on the overwhelming failure of the international community to act accordingly in the face of incredible injustice and enormous loss of human life, it is so very important that we renew our commitment to the protection of the human rights of those whose governments have proven unwilling or unable to do so themselves.

We must, collectively and as a community of global citizens, make a commitment to never again allow a Rwanda. The United Nations is holding a commemoration today that will feature survivor testimonies, and speeches on the themes of reconciliation and education in order to prevent genocide. History without education is doomed to repeat itself. We can no longer claim ignorance, not in a world of instantaneous information and perpetual connection. We have learned lessons from the failure to act in Rwanda, and it is our responsibility to inscribe those lessons on our hearts.

I encourage you to educate yourself about this tragedy, and to give your support to the survivors of Rwanda and the members of the Rwandan community who are working tirelessly to rebuild their country to this day. Here are a list of organizations that could benefit from your interest and support.

Rwanda Women’s Network: http://www.rwandawomennetwork.org/
Rwanda Survivor’s Fund: http://www.survivors-fund.org.uk/
Avega Agahozo: http://www.avega.org.rw/English.html
Foundation Rwanda: http://www.foundationrwanda.org/

Stephen Thompson is a Program and Research Intern with the SISGI Group’s Research Division. For more information about the SISGI Group visit www.sisgigroup.org
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Apr 06

Government & Security – Part II

The Opportunity

In my last post, I spoke about how developing nations face two main obstacles in their path to economic and social development. Corruption in government and constant conflicts often plague developing nations and inhibit their ability to break the shackles of poverty.

I believe that the countries that have the best chance of winning the battle against conflicts and poverty are the ones that possess a strong and responsible government. Peaceful countries that are accountable to their citizens have the highest probability of actually ending any form of poverty their country faces. Regimes that are moving towards peacefully leading their nations need to concentrate on an important aspect of governance – transparency. Transparency in the government brings two advantages. It makes the government accountable to its citizens and gains its citizens’ confidence. All governments need to make sure that scarce resources are spent well and investments are made in the poorest of people.

The responsibility and the greatest ability to improve governance and security in countries lies with the country’s own leaders, media and civil society. Nevertheless the role of donor countries, private companies and other development partners should not be overlooked. To help promote good governance, donor countries and recipients should first thoroughly report all development assistance that is given and to which industry it is allocated.

There is no way I can tackle an important issue like government and security in just a couple of paragraphs. But the point I am trying to make, is that a transparent government and responsible donor countries can win half the battle. Having a corrupt-free government ensures that billions of dollars in aid are allocated appropriately, the first step towards solving a country’s poverty and conflict problem. Pointing fingers at the opposition, or the United Nations, or any foreign body is not the correct path. For a sustainable impact, a government needs to resolve internal issues.

Udit Hinduja is a student at New York University double majoring in Economics and Political Science. As a Program and Research intern with the SISGI Group his focus areas are education, poverty and economic development in Asia and South America.
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Apr 05

The Problem with Gitmo

Yesterday, US Attorney General Eric Holder made a statement declaring that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, will be tried by a military tribunal in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. Although somewhat inevitable, it comes as a disappointment for those who supported President Obama’s original plan to transport the Guantanamo detainees to the US for trial.

A bit of background: The Guantanamo Bay detention camp (Gitmo for short), is a US military holding facility located in Cuba and established in 2002 for enemy combatants captured in Afghanistan and Iraq. Since its creation, Gitmo has been the target of innumerable protests and criticisms, ranging from allegations of torture to the weakening of the international human rights framework. Many of the detainees at Gitmo have been incarcerated since the camp was opened, without having been tried and proven guilty.

Congress has been adamantly opposed to Obama’s position, and has blocked the funding necessary for closing the camp, as well as for the transfer of Gitmo detainees both to other countries and to the Untied States for trial, forcing the hand of the Attorney General to proceed with military tribunals.

Gitmo is an affront to justice, both domestic and international. Not only does it severely undermine the power of the Geneva Conventions by barely allowing the detainees any rights as prisoners of war, but the extra-judicial, quasi-legitimate nature of the entire operation, screened from criticism, is unacceptable. The Red Cross wasn’t allowed to investigate until 2004, and when its report detailing torture was leaked to the public, the United States rejected it.

The Obama administration was seeking to inject some new justice into the proceedings at Gitmo by allowing the detainees the right to a fair trial on American soil, but that has now become impossible, and the only option remaining is military tribunal. This entire situation smacks of hypocrisy and eye-for-eye politics. Terrorists, acting individually and not as a part of any state or military, attacked the United States in what came to be considered an act of war. The United States has refused to treat them as prisoners of war, with all of the rights that go along with that as laid down by the Geneva Conventions. Instead of combatting terrorism with justice and taking the moral high ground, which it could so easily do, the US is instead abusing its prisoners, assuming guilt and incarcerating them for years without trial with no hope of release and opaque tribunals.

The US needs to assume responsibility for its actions, and as the paragon of democracy and equality it claims to be, the US cannot dismiss the rights it holds sacred when it comes to fair trials, even for prisoner combatants held off of US soil.

Stephen Thompson is a Program and Research Intern in the SISGI Group’s Research Division. For more information about the SISGI Group visit www.sisgigroup.org
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Apr 04

Help or Not – Series 1

Microsoft’s Bing Japan Earthquake Tweet

That was the tweet that got people asking:

Was Microsoft Wrong to Use the Japanese Earthquake for Marketing?

It all started with what some people consider the age old scratch my back and I’ll scratch your back concept i.e. to donate $100,000 and at the same time use that effort to market Bing.

The tweet led to a whole lot of criticisms such as:

“Hey@bing, stop using a tragedy as a…marketing opportunity.”…Michael Ian Black.

“Why doesn’t Bing just give $100K to support Japan? Why turn a tragedy into a promotional opportunity? That isn’t even a large sum for relief“…Kiel T F Schmidt as kieltfs.

“Nothing like human suffering to promote your product. If Microsoft had done the same during 9/11 would you even be asking this question? I suspect not. I imagine the outcry from the American public would have been deafening.“…Dave

Although Microsoft apologized by saying “…the tweet was negatively perceived. Intent was to provide an easy way for people to help Japan. We have donated $100k.“, I wondered whether people were really being too harsh?

When a loss occurs, the last thing anyone wants to see is someone trying to benefit from such a loss or to use that loss as a tool for marketing.  The tragedy about corporate giving today, is that it has picked up on the trend that once corporations make some form of “donation“, they should be excused from certain ethical expectations especially towards the recipient.  The question I feel compelled to ask in looking at Microsoft’s act is why not simply donate the $100k towards Japan’s relief efforts? Wouldn’t that have placed the company in good light with the public, if its true aim was to contribute towards the Japan relief efforts? Alternatively, if the company’s main reason was to market Bing, why not give the 100k when people click on Bing without associating it with such a tragedy?

Some people may feel that I am equally being too hard on Microsoft and others claim that “at least the company is helping and the money is getting there ~ Continue reading

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Apr 01

Responsibility to Protect

Responsibility to Protect (R2P) is a relatively new concept in political theory. Basically, it is the idea that governments everywhere have a responsibility to uphold and protect the human rights of their citizens. And, if a state is unwilling or unable to do so, it is the duty of the international community to step in and end human rights violations. Given the recent interventions in Libya, the uprisings in the Middle East and Africa, and the general state of the world over the past twenty years, R2P has become more and more relevant. This video provides a brief history of the concept, and details some of the ways in which it is being used or misused today, and the hope it creates for the future.

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Apr 01

Government & Security

The Challenge

Development in African countries faces a serious barrier. Over the past two decades, democratization has swept across Africa, reaching countries like Egypt, Tunisia and now Libya. But while the international community rejoices, what they need to understand is that democratization is just the first step. The eradication of poverty is not that simple.

Experts estimate that African nations lose approximately 148 billion dollars to corruption, which amounts to around one quarter of GDP. With alarming rates of corruption in sub-Saharan countries, it comes as no surprise that there is still such wide spread poverty in spite of economic assistance from developed nations like the United States and the countries of the European Union. Corruption has been entrenched for years on end, often through systems of patronage and nepotism. This corruption tarnishes peoples’ images of their governments, and even democracy. The value of stolen assets held by banks in developed countries is estimated at $20 billion to $40 billion per year – a figure equivalent to 20-40% of flows of development assistance.

But the above is only faults in government. Conflict is another major deterrent toeconomic development on the African continent. In 2006 alone, almost half of the world’s high intensity conflicts were in sub-Saharan Africa. The cost of armed conflict in 23 sub-Saharan African countries between 1990 and 2005 has been placed at $284 billion. This is an average of $18 billion per year and represents an average annual loss of 15% of GDP. To put things into perspective the above figures represent one-and-a-half times the average African countries’ spending on health and education combined. All this money used in conflicts could have been redirected towards spending in the social sector, but instead is used as military spending.

Now there may be hundreds of other reasons that are proving to be obstacles in development on the African continent, but government and security alone occupy a large chunk of it. You can see this trend not only in African countries, but in other conflict-affected countries all over the world. Next week, I will be providing the next step that needs to be taken and offer potential solutions to these problems. Give me your opinions in the comment box below.

Udit Hinduja is a student at New York University double majoring in Economics and Political Science. As a Program and Research intern with the SISGI Group his focus areas are education, poverty and economic development in Asia and South America.
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Mar 28

8th Annual African Economic Forum (AEF)

Friday and Saturday, March 25th & 26th, 2011, were two amazing days in New York City.  On both days, Columbia University held the 8th Annual African Economic Forum (AEF), organized by the graduate school of business, the School of International Public Affairs (SIPA Pan African Network – SPAN), and the Africa Law Students Association at Columbia Law School.

The forum brought together an estimate of about 400 people to discuss key issues facing the African continent and strategies for a prosperous Africa.  This years theme is Roaring Giant: Africa’s Economic Ascent.  I felt truly privileged to attend some of the amazing sessions which highlighted Entrepreneurship in Africa, the Emergence of African Film, Innovations in Healthcare Delivery, Energy & Infrastructure, the Changing Picture of Financial Services in Africa and many more.

Some of the key panelists included:

J. Kofi Bucknor, Managing Partner, Kingdom Zephyr

Fola Adeola, Co-Founder, Guaranty Trust Bank

Shantayanan Devarajan, Chief Economist – Africa Region, The World Bank

Danny Jordaan, CEO of the 2010 FIFA World Cup

Charles W. Brumskine, Esq., Senator, Liberia

Dambisa Moyo, NY Times Bestselling Author and Economist

Although most sessions were really interesting and highly interactive, one session that in my view took things up a notch, was the session on Entrepreneurship in Africa. The panelists in this session were Yonas Maru, founder & Managing Director of Bandwidth & Cloud Services Group, Chif Umejei, CEO at Vault Noir, and Asif Abdulla, Managing Director Primefuels Companies.  What I liked most about this session was the fact that the panelist  were willing to talk about their personal lives at the start of their various businesses, some of the previous challenges they had encountered in business, and some of the challenges which they continue to encounter as entrepreneurs in the 21st century.  Another fact which I think made the session much more interesting was the fact that we had three entrepreneurs operating from different perspectives – two almost entirely based on technology and another whose business began much earlier and not entirely dependent on technology.

I read some interesting snippets on twitter about the AEF and thought it would be nice to share it:

One shirt doesn’t fit all. Africa is unlike other emerging markets – private equity must anticipate situations – Innovative Health panel – Sunnykay

Fashion panel was about if African fashion is seen as luxurious. We have heard “exotic” , tribal, ethnic and spicy. luxurious? – afrosocialite

We cannot just wait around for good leaders to emerge. We’ve got to start doing things today. Lets empower people – Deverajan

The key point, I took from the AEF is that almost anyone can come up with an idea but the ability to take risks and the importance of good management and continuous innovations cannot be over stated.  It is up to us, individually, to take that first step.

Ufuoma Barbara Akpotaire is a Program and Research intern with the SISGI Group’s Research Division. To learn more about the SISGI Group please visit www.sisgigroup.org
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Mar 25

The Economic Atom Bomb

On the 11th of March, at precisely 2:46 p.m., a 9.0 magnitude earthquake struck Japan leaving destruction in its path. The loss of lives and property are constantly rising even today. But probably one of the biggest blows to Japan was the crumbling of its economy. Questions arose of whether the 3rd largest economy in the world would be able to bounce back. With oil refineries, car manufacturing units and the electronic industry damaged, it is understandably hard to believe that Japan will be able to recover. What is worse is that because of the global financial crisis, interest rates are already at zero percent, and cutting taxes is not an option either. More information on how the quake has hit Japan’s economy can be found in the video here.

Analysts have proposed the solution of selling government bonds, but many economists think that this would be improbable. I would like to remind everyone of a similar earthquake that struck Japan in 1995. Kobe was left utterly devastated, with over 100 billion dollars in damages. Nevertheless, the resilience of the people of Japan surfaced and Kobe was rebuilt within five years. Today, there is almost no evidence that an earthquake hit Kobe. In my opinion, Japan will recover. Yes, it may take time, but it will prove the world wrong and do what it does best – stand up again.

Udit Hinduja is a student at New York University double majoring in Economics and Political Science. As a Program and Research intern with the SISGI Group his focus areas are education, poverty and economic development in Asia and South America.
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Mar 24

Censoring Revolution

The Tunisian Revolution ignited protests across Northern Africa and the Middle East, but they have not been the only areas affected. Much to the Chinese government’s dismay, human rights and pro-democracy groups in China have used the Middle Eastern and African protests as an inspiration for their own campaigns. This has led to incredible censorship above and beyond what China is infamous for.

The Chinese government does not like to talk about touchy subjects, and so those subjects become taboo or illegal. Tibetan and Taiwanese independence, the Tiananmen Square protests, pornography and religion are all highly censored and regulated topics, the discussion of which can lead to incarceration and worse. China has received a great deal of criticism from the international community and organizations like Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders.

Recently, China and Google have made the news with Google’s bitter struggle to find a foothold in the Chinese market while attempting to remain open and uncensored. China has launched several cyber attacks against Google, attempting to access information on protestors and dissidents who use Google’s services.

In the wake of the revolutions in the Middle East, China has adamantly condemned the uprisings, and denied that they have resulted in any similar anti-government feelings in China. China has used passage of a UN Security Council Resolution calling for a no-fly zone and the commencement of attacks against Libya (a resolution it did not exercise its veto powers against) to wage a propaganda war against the West in an attempt to nip anti-government sentiment in the bud.

(This is, of course, not to say that there is no truth to China’s arguments about oil power struggles and Western interventionism. As I discussed in my last blog, propaganda and motivation are not always on par with one another. In fact, now is as good a time as any to mention that the United States has its very own wikipedia article on censorship as well.)

Over the past several weeks, China has put in place a system where the use of the word “protest” during a phone conversation or in a text message will result in immediate denial of service, a new level in their electronics and communications censorship program. All in all, China’s paranoia and extreme lack of transparency have been and continue to be extremely oppressive and dangerous for its people. The citizens of China live under the vigilant eye of Big Brother, and with the introduction of automatic voice screening technology employed by the government to monitor and end potentially dissident conversations, China’s censorship powers continue to grow.

The revolutions of the past month and a half have renewed the feelings in Chinese citizens that the government can be held accountable to its people, and the next several months could see very interesting, and quite possibly violent shifts in the politics of China.

Stephen Thompson is a Program and Research Intern with the SISGI Group’s Research Division. To learn more about the SISGI Group please visit www. sisgigroup.org
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Mar 23

Water Changes Everything

Yesterday, on the 22nd of March 2011, was World Water Day. It was a day to raise awareness for something most people in developed nations take for granted – clean drinking water. Right now, almost a billion people don’t have access to clean and safe drinking water. That’s about one in every eight people.  Only after looking at a few more statistics do we really understand how grave the water situation is. 90% of the 42,000 deaths that occur every week from unsafe water and unhygienic living conditions are to children under five years old.

Water changes everything. It is closely related to the quality of education, food and sanitation facilities in any particular country. In Africa alone, the overall economic loss due to the lack of clean drinking water and sanitation is $28 billion. Every dollar invested in improving water related conditions can yield $ 12 in economic returns. It is amazing what a difference something so simple can make. Water, the elixir of life, a basic necessity, is the main cause for 80% of diseases and kills more people every year than all forms of violence, including war.

How can we as individuals make a difference? There are numerous things we can do. Below are just a few of them:

  1. Understand how privileged you are to be drinking clean water. The picture on side of this article is actually a glass containing drinking water in it, water that is used by billions of people in developing nations to quench their thirst.
  2. Take quick showers and learn to turn off the tap and not let the water run unnecessarily.
  3. Use water wisely. When cleaning dishes and doing laundry, use the right amount of water proportional to the number of dishes/loads you need to wash.
  4. Water your plants only when necessary. More plants die from over-watering than under-watering.

These are just 4 ways. There are countless more, 100 of them can be found here. There are tons of organizations that have been set up to combat the water problem our world faces. Charity: Water, an organization particularly close to my heart, does an excellent job of providing clean drinking water to communities that have been stuck with unsafe water for years. What Charity: Water does is go to communities and build wells in the area. These wells are funded by donations from people across all walks of life- from celebrities like Will Smith, to students from high schools, to working class men, to single mothers. Donating to charity water means that 100% of your donations goes directly to the field.

While it may seem a herculean task to provide everyone on earth clean drinking water, it is important to realize that this is one of the few things where those with the privilege of not having to be concerned about clean water, can actually make a huge difference. You can start right from the comfort of your home.

Udit Hinduja is a student at New York University double majoring in Economics and Political Science. As a Program and Research intern with the SISGI Group his focus areas are education, poverty and economic development in Asia and South America.
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