merde

Something on Angolagate at Comment is Free. Shame it is in a way (free, that is) judging by the level of comments coming in from a few clever-clogs with nothing better to do. The knowingness of people, eh. Never ceases… And the strange one who implies I think the French are the only greedy foreigners who made money out of Angola. She/he correctly cites the Cubans as having benefitted too – indeed, she’s right, and it is something I have written about myself. Anyway, I did have a line in there about Mark Thatcher, another son of another former European leader. But the lawyers must have taken it out. Shame. All this makes me ask myself, once again, what is the point of writing anything less than several thousand words? Readers assume you are claiming the final word on the entire range of the subject, regardless of the fact you have 800 words only. What’s the matter with everyone? Aren’t readers prepared to use their brains when they digest news and comment? In this case the subject matter is France and Angola. Not Spain and Angola, or Britain and Angola, or even (really) Israel (ponder the multi-national Gaydamak’s role) and Angola. Wake up, dear public. Wake up. And go spend your bitter energy elsewhere. Throw a brick through a bank. Don’t throw it at me (unless you’ve done a bit more research about my work first and still feel you hate me)!

a haven called home

“I get very angry that these greedy bastards in the City [of London] and elsewhere are able to drag us all down. Dante had the right idea, tip them head down in shit 23 hours a day.” Someone great said that.

Someone much less great, Marshall Langer, said this: “The most important tax haven in the world is an island. They are surprised, however, when I tell them the name of the island is Manhattan. Moreover, the second most important tax haven in the world is located on an island. It is a city called London in the UK.”

I live about a mile north of that second most important tax haven. And I often think it’s strange that people who live on that rainy island called Britain don’t realise just how responsible are British accountants, bankers and lawyers – often educated at our ‘best’ schools like Eton et al, and taken through our ‘best’ universities like Oxford et al – and just how rich they get by operating in and maintaining what is probably the most fundamental corruption in the world.

People point fingers at the elites of that country I like so much, Angola, as well as other places like Nigeria, and say They’re so corrupt, it must be awful… All those poor people… Their rulers are so corrupt… What can be done? Why is Africa so corrupt?  I too curse the level of corruption among the Angolan elite. But there is one thing that I really don’t do: I don’t think that my own British elite is not just as dirty and guilty and corrupt. The men in suits in the City of London are in many ways the makers of corruption, the partners and engineers of corruption, they are the very rich people who help make corruption possible and help make other very rich people even richer; they are the people who oil the system that allows it to work, that allows money to be hidden and hurried away, and they are the people who benefit from it too. They are also supremely rich. Some of them are the kind of people I went to school with, or the kind of people who the girls I went to school with have married. Some of them, anyway.

And all these people – the rich and corrupt of the City of London, the city of Luanda, the city of Manhattan, Delhi, Sydney, Malabo, Lisbon, Paris, Caracas, São Paolo et cetera et cetera – are operating in a world far above the rest of us, in a community of money and corruption. Which is why I get annoyed at those who condemn the rich of, say, Angola, as somehow being worse than the rich of, say, New York. Sometimes people come back at me, arguing, But Lara, the rich in Angola are worse… They are richer… They care less about their own poor… And I know then that there’s no point arguing. These people have a problem of vision, a psychosis of perception, which enables them to be blind to the extreme wealth of the wealthy world, whilst they are blinded by the wealth in the developing world. It’s more than hypocrisy: it’s psychological and bound up, too, with racism. Rich black people somehow being more shocking than rich white people. I’ve never quite understood this. I hate rich people, full stop. So when members of the Angolan elite get cross with me, and accuse me of being nasty about their beloved nation, I try to explain that they are missing the point: I’m just as nasty about their peers in London, the only difference is that they themselves aren’t interested in that. A double psychosis of perception, if you like.

I’ve never wanted my blog to become a ramble. This morning it has. Perhaps to cover up the shame of the crush… who knows? But can I encourage you all to take a look at the Tax Justice Network. I know it has the unsexiest name on the planet, and it does have a mild tendency to be a wee bit too knowing and a wee bit too I told you so, and seems to be run by largely (only?) men… but if I can get over all that – with all my chips, anger and general unsavoury behaviour – then it shouldn’t stop you from benefitting from the research they do and the important matters they are trying to tackle also. I sound like I’m lecturing you now, don’t I? Sorry.

I’d make it 23 days, Dante, not 23 hours. I’d leave them there, perhaps, for 23 weeks. Or years, why not…

P.S. I confess, I went to a school called The Lady Eleanor Holles School for Young Ladies. There you are. And it’s not a made-up name either, it’s true.

about bloody time…

BBC freelance foreign correspondents are refusing to sign new contracts. Freelances around the world claim that their incomes are being savaged by a perpetual round of financial cuts. They also claim that many programme producers have failed to pay freelances for work they have already commissioned and broadcast.

One veteran broadcaster said: “Jonathan Ross has no trouble getting his £18m, but he and all the BBC fat cats are having their obscene salaries and bonuses subsidised by freelances, whose precarious existence is exacerbated by the scandal that they are frequently cheated out of legitimate fees.”

Read the rest of this here

I’ve produced enough bile on the BBC not to comment further. I just hope Mr Byford stops jangling his hand in his pocket, and resigns.

dipnote

It’s this kind of paternalism – remarkably bland though it may be – that I loathe. The emphasis, inevitably, on the hard work of the kindly ‘folk’ who did the observing (they got up at five and didn’t finish til midnight – I’d love to know the $/hour rate they get paid); and the millions of hopeful Africans waiting patiently and, ah!, peacefully in long queues aware of their humble role in history and an emerging democracy. Does anyone ever write about North American voters like that? This level of benevolence works for Bono and Bob but it makes the rest of us feel deep rage. Do these ambassadors and diplomats not listen to what Angola’s so-called civil society say and to what the many brave independent journalists write? For many of these people have been, and still are, the fundamental actors in this ‘emerging democracy’ (emerging what?) and, in many cases, the people who’ve struggled and been imprisoned in the battle to try and create it during the last thirty or forty years. Many of them are saying that these elections mark a (democratic) return to a one party state.

Oh, Dipnote Dan, what a disappointment. Don’t patronise the people, telling them to be proud. Your own country showed us the true crisis of democracy in 2000. Angolan people also know this. You don’t need to speak down to them as if they were your children, sweet and untarnished by the realities of life, ignorant to the truth in this world. You pat them on the head and smile sweetly at their peaceful nature, and then turn your back and walk home rubbing your hands in oil deals. We know the history of diplomacy in Angola, where British and Americans in the service turn their hand to ‘consultation’ in the oil industry within minutes of leaving their posts, exploiting all those endless garden parties and tête à têtes with the MPLA et cetera. There’s nothing democratic about any of that. Nothing at all.

money

‘Wealthism can deepen the sense of isolation that many heirs feel. Raised in sheltered enclaves, they can be woefully ignorant of life in “the real world”. As a result, they may find it hard to make friends beyond their own small circle. This difficulty is one of the dilemmas of having inherited wealth: failed attempts to befriend those without wealth only intensify an heir’s sense of isolation. Joanie Bronfman interviewed one woman who clearly articulated this situation when she said, “There’s a world of other people that I can’t quite relate to. I can’t say, ‘Why don’t you just get a new car if your car breaks down?’ And that’s always my first reaction. There’s a definite separateness about my reactions to the people who don’t have money and the difficulties that they have.”‘ More on this here.

I don’t think there’s much to add to this. I just feel sorry for all those trustafarians. But do they really say things like this? Or is the book made up? (Thanks to ‘i on the ball patriot’ who drew my attention to this here.)

money mad

This article about rich Brits has been widely linked to, and I spotted it yesterday thanks to Infinite Thought (see blogroll right) and also JR who sent me the link to Lenin’s Tomb (also see blogroll right). So I can’t really add a lot to the comments of those far finer brains… Other than to say that I think it underlines what I wrote in criticism of Mr Kampfner’s piece on GQ. I know, I know… I’ve gone on and on about that… But it’s important. Our rich – that is, my rich there on yonder small island up north – are just as revolting as the rich spotted in Luanda or Rio or anywhere else you might like to choose.

I particularly like the line, Tax consultants Grant Thornton estimated that in 2006 at least 32 of the UK’s 54 billionaires paid no income tax at all. And to think of all those people who ask me, in suitably sympathetic tones, whenever I return to the UK from this southern part of Africa, ‘Ooh, but isn’t it awfully corrupt down there?’

And I really liked this one too: the law partners earned between £500,000 and £1.5m per year, putting them in the top 0.1% of earners in the UK, while the merchant bankers ranged from £150,000 up to £10m. I actually quiver when I read that. It thrills me in a way I’m not entirely able to comprehend.

And this: How much, we asked our group, would it take to put someone in the top 10% of earners? They put the figure at £162,000. In fact, in 2007 it was around £39,825, the point at which the top tax band began. Our group found it hard to believe that nine-tenths of the UK’s 32m taxpayers earned less than that. As for the poverty threshold, our lawyers and bankers fixed it at £22,000. But that sum was just under median earnings, which meant they regarded ordinary wages as poverty pay.

And I was particularly struck by this bit, here: ‘

“Providing for children” was flourished as a trump card, as if spending on offspring were automatically moral and good, regardless of how other people’s children fare.

“I work hard, I’ve got two boys and I want to provide for them.”

Just recently an Englishman working here in Johannesburg was trying to justify to me why he is now involved in high-paid and what I might call spy-work in Africa. He told me he had “no choice” because he had to put his kids “through education”, meaning private boarding school in the UK. Of course, poor luv, loathes the work he does and would much rather be a nice teacher or nice nurse or something mmm, yes, nice, you know, but he can’t afford to. And of course, like these bankers and lawyers in this article, he told me he works much harder than the rest of us. Much harder than say, all those cleaners who do night shifts across London every day…

I can’t even write intelligibly about this. I get too cross.

red, yellow, black

You are watching the television. It’s evening. You’ve finished dinner, and are sipping on tea, or a beer, perhaps a whisky. Your children might be asleep, your lover might have popped out. You are watching the news of your nation, alone, in your small front room. A peaceful hour to yourself, to sit and see what is happening in your country. There is music and a picture of the globe, spinning spinning spinning then stopping on the continent of Africa. There is your nation, in the bottom third on the left. And here’s the presenter, a large woman with golden skin and a huge smiling mouth, a deep strong voice, a woman you trust because you’ve seen her in a glossy magazine about local celebrities. She featured – a single mum – with her two kids. She’s strong and determined. She’s making it alone out there. She takes you through the stories of the day. She guides you around the country, dropping in on small towns all about the place where senior leaders have passed through. Her colleagues have done good film work. Here’s the Supreme Leader of the People’s Most Trusted Guide standing on a stage infront of a microphone perched on a tall metal pole just in front of his mouth. The Supreme Leader of the People’s Most Trusted Guide is wearing a baseball hat in the colours of the nation which are also the colours of the Supreme Leader of the People’s Party. Red, yellow, black. The Supreme Leader of the People’s Most Trusted Guide (SLPMTG) wears the baseball caps with pride, and he wears a thick T-shirt also richly coloured in red, yellow, and black, which stretches over his large, firm belly. In his hand, he holds a flag which is also in the colours of the Supreme Leader of the People’s Party: red, yellow and black. The SLPMTG is shouting to his Brothers! His Sisters! His Children! His People! His Party! The Liberators! of The Nation! As he shouts, he waves his flag and the colours of the flag ripple with the colours of his cap, and his shirt. The camera pans around to the cheering Brothers! Sisters! Children! and Liberators! of The Nation! They too are wearing baseball caps in the colours of the Supreme Leader of the People’s Party – red, yellow, and black; they too are wearing T-shirts in those colours; they too are waving flags in those colours – red, yellow and black. It is a beautiful sight, a colourful and exciting sight of excited people dressed in harmony with the colours of The Nation and The Party. The camera sweeps back to the stage, where the SLPMTG is now standing holding a large box. It must be heavy, for he is bending a little and has had to give his flag to an assistant. From the right of the frame, comes a Brother! from the People! As the Brother walks towards the SLPMTG, his Brothers! and Sisters! and Children of The Nation! cheer even louder. The camera swings back to them, to their cheering, and they have all raised their red, yellow and black flags and are waving them in a frenzy, shouting, cheering, smiling. The camera swings back to the stage, where the SLPMTG is now pushing the large box into the arms of the Brother! of The Nation! The camera zooms in on the box. A photograph on the side of the box shows a large desk-top computer and keyboard. The SLPMTG is giving this to the Brother! of The Nation! The crowd roars! Flags ripple and rattle in a frenzied shaking and applause. The camera pans out, showing a long line of Brothers! and Sisters! of the Nation! all queueing up to collect their desk top computer. The sound fades away, and we are back in the studio, our golden female presenter explaining, “These are the Youth of the Supreme Leader of the People’s Party. These are the Youth who liberated our Nation. They are being rewarded.” Our golden lady opens her face to a vaster smile than she has ever offered before. Her eyes twinkle, and for the first time, you notice a shining from her lips, a thick gloss that covers her beautiful pink lips. Your fingers are touching your own. Your drying lips. It crosses your mind to make sure you find some thick gloss in the morning on the way to work.

harvesting hunger with Angolan diamonds…

The seizure of farmland for the purposes of commercial diamond mining in Angola’s Lunda provinces is causing widespread hunger and deepening poverty, according to new research to be released tomorrow by my friend, the Angolan journalist, Rafael Marques. The report focuses on the activities of the Sociedade Mineira do Cuango which is a joint venture led and managed by a British-based mining enterprise, ITM Mining, in partnership with the Angolan diamond parastatal, Endiama, and Lumanhe, a private company owned by Angolan Army generals. This report encourages us to think a bit deeper about the definition of so-called blood and conflict diamonds.

If you’re interested in knowing more, please email Rafael on rafael@snet.co.ao

For those of you who are reading this in Johannesburg, you can come and listen to Rafael speaking about this topic next Tuesday, 5th August, from 5.30pm. I will also be speaking alongside a former BBC colleague, Justin Pearce, who wrote an interesting book based on his days of reporting for the BBC in Angola from I think 2001 to around about 2003, An outbreak of Peace. Today, Justin is working on a PhD about Angola at Oxford. I’m very excited about speaking alongside these two very gentle men. Oh, and by the way, we’ll be serving drinks after… so, come.

I nearly forgot to tell you where: it’ll be on the 6th floor of the Richard Ward Building (who he?), on the East Campus of the University of Witwatersrand, in the WISER seminar room. And believe me, we are, truly… And you might wish to ponder that the talk comes exactly a month to the day before Angolans will go to the ballot box to vote in the country’s second ever legislative elections. Other facts for the uninitiated: Angola became independent, so to speak, in 1975; the MPLA has been the ruling party since then; there have been two presidents, Agostinho Neto (1975-1979, when he died in Russia, some say, was murdered in Russia), and José Eduardo dos Santos (1979 to date). Angola is currently the biggest oil producer in Africa, selling more petrol to the Chinese than even the Saudis. The country is, as Rafael’s report informs, about to become the world’s 4th biggest diamond exporter. In Angola, one in four children die before they hit five years of age, and over two-thirds of the population (estimated to be anything from 12m to 15m people) live below what aidies and economists call ‘the poverty line’. Luanda, the capital, is estimated to be the most expensive city in the world – yes, in the world – overtaking Tokyo.

Oh, and the presidential elections, are not due until this time next year, when the President will be celebrating 30 years in power. Isn’t that just nice.

from dictator

to self-styled president in a week. That’s the M&G’s new line on Mr M. Still interested to know, then, how they will describe his ministers. Self-styled foreign minister? or Mugabe-styled foreign minister? Aren’t all political leaders self-styled to a large extent? Certainly those leaders mentioned below (yesterday) are. Perhaps I’m missing the point…

dictating dictators

And another thought on journalism in Johannesburg. I’m told that the Mail & Guardian, a leaning liberal newspaper owned by Zimbabwean businessman Trevor Ncube, will no longer – in print – refer to Robert Mugabe as ‘Zimbabwean president’. Instead he will be titled ‘dictator’. Many will no doubt applaud this. Not I. If he’s a dictator, what are Zimbabwean ministers of government to be called? And how do we define a dictator? If it is length of office and high levels of brutality, then the Mail & Guardian might add to its list other leaders like Angola’s president José Eduardo dos Santos (in power for 29 years, heading a party that has ruled Angola for 33 years, and during his term in office hundreds of thousands of Angolans have died – not simply because of a war). And what about Sudan’s Omar Hasan Ahmad al-Bashir, a mere baby of a president who came to power in 1989? Then there’s Equatorial Guinea’s president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, who assumed office in 1979 in a coup d’etat. Who? Where? Take a look on a map and wiki or Google the man. And don’t just get lost worrying about Mark Thatcher. If you are someone who dislikes Obiang and you happen to have the same citizenship as him, you can expect to spend years in prison, or be exiled, or be terrified into silence. El Hadj Omar Bongo Ondimba has been running Gabon with an iron fist for more years than I’ve been on this earth: he scooped up power in 1967 and hasn’t let go ever since. And he certainly hasn’t held on that long because he’s an angel. Not that that should bother the Mail & Guardian (and no doubt many ‘other’ western media corporations in the northern hemisphere).

But is dictating about longevity? Or is it about violence? Or unfair and fraudulent elections? Or ignoring the citizens of the country that (didn’t) put you into power, and just going into war anyway?

George Bush may be about to go, but (leaving his dad and the family & fraternal fortune aside for one moment) let’s not forget the 2000 and 2004 elections. He may have stolen them in a more stylish manner than Uncle Bob’s 2008 theatrics, but few sane people on this planet dispute the fact the US elections were certainly not free nor fair. And yet the Mail & Guardian refer to him, I believe, as the USA president. Does it not count – what he has done to the people of Iraq (to give just one example)? Or is dictating only truly dictatorial when it takes place on your ‘own’ soil?

Come on people: wake up. Please. Please. Wake up. Look at the world. The whole of it. And think a bit. And anyone out there who wants to add a dictator to the list, please write a comment. I want a long list!