Many glaring facts are testimony that African leaders are the worst enemies of their own people.

The leaders of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR), for example — meant to foster peace and stability in the region — have refused to marshal enough forces to flush out the bandits in the Congo forests.

If at the height of the Kabila crisis 16 countries entered the fray, why can’t they marshal forces now and pacify the region, beginning with DR Congo?

The country remains a haven of war lords, guarding and protecting international pillage of the mineral wealth, while the leaders ever globe-trot, “seeking solutions” to the region’s problems in five-star hotels— akin to what Graham Hancock calls discussing famine over steak!

Why didn’t the latest ICGLR convene in the jungles of eastern DR Congo, where people have been driven into a sub-human existence, serving as sex-machines and slaves?

The ICGLR has, among its goals, non-aggression and mutual defence. If this is the case, why then the arms race that we see among its individual member states?

The resources squandered on arms would go a long way in strengthening the economies of the region, thus reducing the causes of instability and its consequences. Sex and gender based-violence is a product of such instability.

Eastern DRC is in a state of bellum omnium contra omnias (war of all against all). And this can never be solved by condescending speeches in lakeside resorts. DRC and its neighbours are led by generals, yet the region remains unstable.

The International Criminal Court is, therefore, the only saviour for the suffering African peasant.

Since we have seen African leaders for what they are, we will lose nothing if we petition the ICC to expand the definition of crimes against humanity to include kleptocracy in all its manifestations, including pillage of resources (including oil and the DRC scenario).

Sandra Birungi
Via E-mail

 Lesson for South Sudan from Somalia

Somalia was once an important centre for commerce with the rest of the world.

But the Somali civil war, which began in 1991 when coalitions of clan-based armed opposition groups ousted the nation’s long-standing military government, changed all that. More than one million Somalis have died in the conflict. And despite interventions by various bodies, it continues.

The problem in Somalia has been caused by the Somalis themselves. Notwithstanding the cause of the conflict, the world should not give up on the country: It has innocent souls that perish on a daily basis.

Somalia shamefully stands on the global mapas the worst humanitarian disaster. This must serve as a warning to the people of South Sudan that what is happening in the Horn of Africa can happen there as well. South Sudan leaders should bury their differences to save the country.

Faridah Lule
Citizens’ Coalition for electoral Democracy in Uganda (CCEDU

 

East Africans are really a gullible lot

The snide remarks now littering the social media in relation to the rearing of the fabled quail are not only unfortunate but a serious indictment on public institutions mandated by the law to protect people from ecological and economic harm.

I have often wondered why it is so easy to lure people in East Africa, particularly Kenyans, into fraudulent ponzi, pyramid and multi-level marketing schemes.

In 2007, hundreds of pyramid schemes collapsed after fleecing Kenyans of millions of shillings. Whereas the Central Bank of Kenya had issued repeated warnings on the operations of those schemes, its managers feigned lack of statutory power to protect the people from the massive fraud.

Fast forward to 2013, the quail and its products have been cited as a panacea to all chronic illnesses without any scientific backing. The quail is a wild bird and the Kenya Wildlife Service should restrict the production and distribution of its products.

Capt (Rtd) Collins Wanderi
Via E-mail