My letter to our predecessors: “I am so sorry for the world we left behind”

Aleppo, Syria

20th May, Oslo.

Dear deceased and no longer living!

I am sorry for the world that befallen on you. That we the current living beings are not taking care of the world you left behind. That we in our egoistic and narrow minded spirit is continuing warfare, killings, looting and starving each other.

I am really sorry, that none of our leaders has learned from the past, which you try to teach us better. That the history and lessons we had by you, didn’t bear fruits. That we didn’t learn from the theories and the books of wisdom you left behind. I am so sorry, that your labor and dedication for a better future is dwindling away in rot and destruction.

I am sorry, that the world is a dangerous place, even as you tried to make it peaceful, that you tried within your means, to put forward mechanisms and organizations to keep us safe. That your negotiations and agreements, was made to secure borders and secure rights for all human beings. Instead we are ignorant of these facts and instead building drones to kill civilians. I am so sorry for that. We should have known better.

I am sorry that we have given all this powers to the corporations, made them legal bodies that operates in fashions and ways, that resemble slavery and also creates opportunities to extort nations. These corporations we have given power, to settle tax-scores and agreements that benefit the businesses, but not the governments nor the work-force, especially not the consumer in the long-run. We are accepting this theft for cheap products, but don’t think of the material cost nor the price of the labor of these fellow brothers and sisters. Which is countering the fight the previous generations did to secure a fair-pay and rights as workers in the industries and wherever you work. I am sorry, that we let this happen.

I am sorry, that we are not taking care of our planet, that we are filling it with plastic or any sort of garbage. We are floating it in the sea and we are destroying our forests, jungles, fjords and our soil in general. We are destroying our earth, we are worsening the climate change, the glaciers are melting, while we are drilling for more oil and gas. We are securing more coal and more uranium, while we are not sure of securing the damage after nuclear disasters, we already have had.

I am sorry for the next generation after us, that has to take care of this earth, that has to live in this environment, that has these political challenges, that has to rebuild these nations and republics. That has to find solutions to the trouble we left behind. I am sorry to you as well.

We should have known better, but we didn’t, I am sorry, we should have used the knowledge and wisdom of our predecessors, we should have used their time and opened our ears. Instead of piling up guns, drilling after oil and hoping that tomorrow never comes. That is how it seems. We didn’t think, we just let it go and never questioned the powers and the ones in top positions. So they could do something to stop conflict and stop the deaths of innocent civilians. We should have known better, but we continue like nothing.

I am sorry, we should have been better with what you left behind, but we didn’t, I hope when we meet again. That you forgive us and see that we should have taken your knowledge to heart and changed our ways. Not thinking about the next news-cycle, the next week, but been thinking about what leaves a mark for the next generation.

Sincerely yours…

The Writer of Minbane

A brief look into how similar Museveni’s rule is de facto the same as Mobutu!

In a clear reference to the team effort to dethrone Mobutu, the 53-year-old Museveni asserts that “for the first time since independence {in the 1960s}, the African intelligentsia, in partnership with the peasants, are assuming leadership.” This is an era of “new independence in decision-making. We don’t decide on matters because foreigners want us to decide.” He suggests that African leaders must push their countries toward “modernization and industrialization,” with special emphasis on infrastructure, education and health care. “If that doesn’t take place, the new order will be as empty as the old one,” he says” (Buckley, 1998).

President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni was supposed to be a liberator, a reformer and Marxists leader who rose from a Bush-War in the 1980s to change the state of Uganda. However, with time he has shown his true character, maybe that was the reason why he went rogue from being a minister to become a rebel. Maybe it should have been a visible sign from day one, as the National Resistance Army/Movement (NRA/M) leaders of 1980s has gotten a vital space from then until now. None of them has given way and are entitled because of what they fought for, which is non-existence.

Mobutu was supported and had a coup against the leader who liberated the now Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). President Museveni had a coup and a war against the first Prime Minister and President Dr. Milton Obote. Even on that level, Museveni has actually copied Mobutu. I’ll show parts of other articles that was written int the time of his reign, Mobutu, as it shows how he did it and then. It can show the similarities, and it shows that we haven’t gotten further than this. Museveni has become Mobutu in the flesh, he has become the ones that he fought against and isn’t funny. It is a tragedy, that to many people are living through and that should be shed a light on. Because the silence and the continued support of this sort of leadership and administration should stop. It doesn’t make sense.

Growing loans in 1980s:

Although the details of possible corruption and massive personal profit have captured most attention, the major portion of the report deals with Zaire’s $4.1 billion international debt. On this subject, Blumenthal bluntly says: ‘‘There is no – I repeat no – chance on the horizon for Zaire’s numerous creditors to get their money back. . . . There has been and remains only one major obstacle to annihilate such prospects – the corruption of the team in power.” He concludes that ‘‘Mobutu and his government show no concern about the question of paying off loans and the public debt. They are counting on the generosity of their creditors and the indefinite renewal of the loans and their repayment.” (Fouquet, 1982). So as the news of growing debts to the Republic of Uganda, don’t expect him to be in a hurry to repay the debts to the international creditors or anyone. As he taking out debt, to repay debts and money gets lost along the way. Even the accountability and transparency is lacking, as there are many ghosts, projects without any signs of change or building the infrastructure as promised. The money just vanish. It is just like Mobutu, everyone expect handshakes, all business-deals and corrupt affairs has to get a thumbs-up from the State House. It is just made like a rewind of the Mobutu rule.

How the Political Elite is eating:

Mobutu and his inner circle sit atop a social ladder of corruption. Everyone is forced to take from those less powerful, both to survive and to meet the demands of more powerful people above. Almost all of Zaire’s wealth stays on the upper rungs, in the hands of powerful politicians and politically-connected businessmen. The enduring symbol of this social stratum is the Mercedes-Benz. Zaire reputedly imports more Mercedes than anywhere in Africa and Kinshasa’s Mercedes dealers prosper while all around them crumbles. The Mercedes-riding class have made smuggling and black-marketeering Zaire’s leading industries. By paying bribes to customs agents instead of taxes to the Government, they have elevated illegal gold exports to ‘several times the (official) national production,’ according to a confidential World Bank report. While discreetly avoiding identification of the culprits, the World Bank also notes that theft and smuggling of Zaire’s most vital strategic mineral, cobalt, ‘is primarily carried out by some of the most powerful individuals in the country’” (New Internationalist, 1990). The richest people in Uganda, are the ones connected with the political elite, that get funds from the state, get license to do business and also lands. The businesses are getting back-door agreements with the government to do business. Even all investors are connected somehow and their deals are done in favor the President and the State House. If not Ministers and others close connected with the family, as the Operation Wealth Creations are giving state funds to favorable companies that are accepted by the General Salim Selah, which happens to be a brother of the President. The same thing is that Foreign Affairs Minister Sam Kuteesa are having business-deals with government and also all-over, while being in office and profiting on his position. That is just natural in the state of affairs. Just like during the times of Mobutu!

Not possible to get rid off:

“The one thing that everyone agrees on is that we’re a long way from getting rid of Mobutu,” an opposition leader said. “He’s incredibly tenacious, and appears determined to hold onto power at any cost.”” (Noble, 1992). Museveni are using all tactices, rewriting laws, making the constitution to fit his life. He is rigging elections, he is fixing the Parliament and also the institutions, all to go around him. He sends the Special Forces Command into Parliament to install fear and let know how important it is to him to get the law passed. There isn’t anything the President will not do, he will kill you if your becoming to close to him. If not he will house-arrest for just being a viable Presidential Candidate like Dr. Kizza Besigye. He will put your trial for treason, he will send you from court to court only malicious charges with no criminal intent.

Making political enemies into criminals, damaging their homes, charge them and hold them in contempt. Destroy and allege that Civil Society Organizations are using bad methods and disorganizing society in general, therefore, it has to stop. That is why the Army and the Government are used as tools to keep Museveni in power. Nothing else. Mobutu would be so proud!

Stalling Tactic:

Yet it is precisely these conditions that have made Mobutu’s tactics effective. Most Zaireans see a method in his seeming madness, a deliberate strategy of destabilization as a means of discrediting the movement toward democracy and undermining the capacity of the people to mobilize against him. “Mobutu tries to keep the population in fear,” a lawyer in Kolwezi told me. “The population is traumatized. Mobutu wants to keep them in this position for a long time. That’s how he maintains his position.” Foreigners living in Zaire often marvel at the “passivity” of the Zairean people; one I spoke to speculated about a version of the “battered-woman syndrome.” But Zaireans point out that Mobutu and his allies still have all the guns and all the money. Hundreds of thousands of people marched in Kinshasa, they reminded me, and more than thirty of them were shot dead. In any event, a clergyman said, “when the population is hungry and tired, it doesn’t have the energy to go into the streets.”” (Berkeley, 1993). It is not strange that Museveni does this, he has used the army all his life and his ego of being a General. His generals and his closest associates are usually connected with the army. He even shown up to Budget Speech with full army-fatigue. When the NRM shows up, he is either in a suit or army fatigue.

Museveni has used the army and spread fear, they are targeting people and arresting people. They are creating unknown militias, that comes and goes. The army is all out during elections and campaigns to install fear. Make people worry, as it was full-war, when it is really just dropping ballots into buckets. Seemingly, the army is used to do police work and everything else. The military are used in any sort of work, to prove the power of the army and capabilities.

So that the people knows, that if they are having trouble with the NRM, then they might meet the power of the Army. The army will kill and show no mercy, like they did in the recent time in Kasese against the Rwenzururu Kingdom. As this crime hasn’t been solved and neither has anything positive come out of it. As well as the rising levels of kidnappings, killings of woman in Entebbe and so on. The Police and Army are not able to contain the violence, as the corruption and lack of accountability has hit the security organizations. Which is like a wet-dream from the legacy of Mobutu, that lives-on with Museveni.

31 Years of Mobutu:

Once there, the strongman who, his opponents say, has beggared and brutalized Zaire for 31 years pledged that he was again ready to solve the country’s myriad problems. “The enemies of our country have chosen when I was sick to put a sword in my back,” Mobutu, 66, said in a nationally broadcast speech interrupted by applause, singing and the loud cawing of nearby peacocks. “I’m not going to disappoint you. I know your expectations and your hopes. I will act rapidly and positively.””(LA Times, 1996). Just like Museveni is saying anyone who questions his vision, his methods and policies are enemies of the state, so did Mobutu. Even after 30 decades of Mobutu, he did that and now we know that Museveni does the same. He says he will fix everything and he has the solutions, it is just that ones he orders to do it, doesn’t know how to do their job. That is just like a mantra he got from Mobutu.

We can see that Museveni has become a twin-soul of Mobutu. Everything Mobutu did, Museveni are doing. Both having amazing levels of cronyism, corporate politicians, bribes, corruption, spreading of fear and making people believe that Museveni cannot step down. The similarities are two alike. The same with the massive bank-accounts, while the state in rapid poverty, the lack of the accountability and transparency, all control from the State House and none in the institutions. Museveni and Mobutu are so the same.

Museveni forgot the peasants or he didn’t care about their participation, since he is the only man with a vision. That has he said all along. But that he has now become everything he was supposed to fight. Shows how bad it is for leadership to linger in power, because it evaporates and eat your soul. You loose everything in the hinges of staying in power. There is now nothing left for Museveni to do and that he hasn’t done. He can only eat, steal and spread fear, because he doesn’t have to deliver. He takes, he took and he continues to loot. There is no mercy, there is only thieving.

Museveni is now the Mobutu in the flesh, he is acting like Mobutu and talking like Mobutu. The difference is that is in Uganda and not the DRC. The DRC has the issue of Joseph Kabila, but Uganda has the issue of Museveni. Museveni, Museveni and Museveni is the problem.

This is just tragic and it should be known. Peace.

Reference:

Berkeley, Bill – ‘Zaire: An African Horror Story’ August 1993, The Atlantic

Buckley, Stephen – ‘AUTHORITY’S CHANGING FACE IN AFRICA’ (02.02.1998), Washington Post

Noble, Kenneth – ‘As the Nation’s Economy Collapses, Zairians Squirm Under Mobutu’s Heel’ 1992, New York Times

Fouquet, David – ‘Corruption charges swirl around Zaire’s President Mobutu’ (08.10.1982), The Christian Science Monitor

New Internationalist – ‘Zaire’s Den Of Thieves’ (05.07.1990)

Los Angels Times – ‘Mobutu returns to Zaire, but reveals no solutions Ailing strongman vows to fix myriad problems’ (18.12.1996)

RDC: Ensemble – Le President Declaration sur le Virus Ebola (20.05.2018)

South Sudan: Ustaz Lewis Anei Madut-Kuendit – “Declaration to join South Sudan United Front/Army-SSUF/A” (19.05.2018)

517 Days on Overtime: How come Kabila is still there?

It is weird and sad, that as the days goes, that President Joseph Kabila is still a thing. Let me clear, he is lingering unconstitutionally at his role as the President and without an official mandate. He is squatting at the highest office in the 3rd Republic and the world, just let him get away with it. It is like it easier that way, there is less accountability, less transparency and less proper guidelines of governance, therefore, let him be. So, the world can get the resources and the minerals from the rich country, while the state is piss-poor. Because who needs this stuff through proper procedure, tariffs and through fair trading. No, that is only for theories and not for the reality.

Kabila is still in power and its 19th May 2018. When his final term ended was on the 19th December 2016, which means that there has been 517 days since his term ended. What is more insulting is that he had long grace period before his first election in 2006 and the second in 2011, therefore needed to prepare to leave before the end of his second 5 year term in 2016. However, as we know, that didn’t happen. Therefore, he has been the de facto leader now since 26th January 2001. With two elected terms, but the rest of the time, been ruling with grace. That grace continues, without any hesitation or any significant change.

We have now let a man without any mandate rule for one year, five months and one day. That should be insulting to anyone, to let that happen and get away with it. It is just selfish to think otherwise. Yes, there are other self-serving, self-interested leaders who impose themselves on the their republic. They rig their constitutions, they make the laws of association and electoral malpractice into a profession. While the public await the army and the rigged tallies of their victorious achievement of another term, after paying off cronies and the making the institutions praise the almighty leader. That is happening all around the world, like we are still living in a feudal time and the peasants, just have to follow the anointed kings.

It is not like the two elections for Kabila was marred with issues, but the people and stakeholders had hope, as it was a significant change from the two brutal wars that had been. The government of the 3rd Republic would be different, as there haven’t been any peaceful transition of power. The last time that happen was with Patrice Lumumba and he got assassinated by a foreign force under code-name “Swamp Monster”. So who knows it was the Belgians or the CIA, as they both wanted a puppet to the Republic.

However, lets get back to Kabila, who is not leaving in peace, he isn’t leaving at all. He on his third illegal term, without any elections. Using all tools to stay in power, all insurgency, all massacres in Kasai-Oriental, Kivu’s and all the problems in the Republic. Establishing a hard-line against the real opposition in UNDP, Ensamble and everyone else questioning his powers. Stopping protests and activists from Lucha. Nothing is not touched, even bishops, priests and church protests is shut down with vile force. Nothing is to spare the people, only man who reign in mercy is Kabila. The rest has to bow their knees and hope they are not his prey. Therefore, we all need to pray.

Kabila continues to linger in power, 517 days over his mandate, the MONUSCO, the International Community, still letting him linger, nothing is imposed or taken away. A few sanctions on companies and few of the elites, even the vital minerals are still exported either through the ports or through Rwanda. Just like it has done for years. No-one questioning it, no one wonders where the militias are getting resources to buy arms, but who cares as long as the world can have a fancy smart-phone right?

Kabila just got it made. No one doubt it and steps on his throne. They just let him. The ones that does oppose. Will get the taste of pain, the agony and even stop breathing. That is known, but no one says much or cries havoc. It is just the Democratic Republic of Congo, a place where that is normal. They are our brothers and sisters, but we cannot shield them. We cannot make sure their future is sealed. No, as long as we get the minerals, we don’t mind war-lords, militias and scrupulous killings of civilians. We don’t mind, we get a bargain and the elites of Kinshasa get massive wealth. We are letting the masses starving, and letting the elite “Kabiliaist” eat of everyone’s plate. That is the order of our time.

Even with knowing that, we let it go and let it be. Because that pain and agony isn’t ours. But we let him stay and use his force, to generate wealth for our tech-companies, but he get to decide the fate of his civilians. However, he does that without a mandate, without a transparent leadership and without the needed accountability, that would lead into a better future. Because it is all in his decrees and his allies that matters. Not what is for the better future, but enrich his pockets. That narrative in our world, never gets old.

What is insulting is that he thinks he can get away with it. That he don’t think he got to pay for being in-charge over it and not trying make a difference.

Kabila is lingering and no-one is batting an eye. He is far from the only one. I know that, but still, that should not be forgotten. That he is now 517 days on overtime, that isn’t just awaiting CENI to push an election. That is postponing so he can loot a bit more and hope people forget about this. Peace.

South Sudan Council of Churces: Statement on IGAD High Level Revitalisation Forum – Intra- South Sudanese Stakeholders Consultations from the South Sudan Council of Churches (19.05.2018)

Somalia: Puntland – Statement in Response to Falsehoods by the Secessionist Entity of Somaliland (18.05.2018)

South Sudan: Omer Eshaq Mohammed from Lol State resignation letter to Maj. Gen. Rizik Zacharia Hassan (18.05.2018)

South Sudan: Hon. Ustaz Lewis Anei Madut-Kuendit resignation letter to President Salva Kiir Mayardit (18.05.2018)

Cambridge Analytica and SCL filed for bankruptcy, but all digital fingerprint leads to Emerdata!

On the 17th May 2018, the companies of Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL) USA, Cambridge Analytica Commercial LLC, Cambridge Analytica Political LLC & Anaxi Solutions Inc. This was announced on the 2nd May 2018, when there was also news that people behind this corporations had started a new company named Emerdata Limited. So even as they filed for bankruptcy on the 17th May 2018, the same operates are just moving and rebranding themselves.

The SCL USA says it had less assets, than 50,000 US Dollars and had between 50-99 creditors. By the filing of bankruptcy, the lawyer or attorney was compensated by Emerdata. So, it is easy to say that the familiar faces of Robert Mercer continues under the new umbrella company. It is even shown in the paperwork.

All of these companies filed the Chapter 7, bankruptcy filing, all of them. So, it is well-planned scheme. The Cambridge Analytica had about valued assets from around 100,000 US Dollars to 500,000 US Dollars. Therefore, it doesn’t seem like they had much of direct value, if they haven’t already moved all the assets of these companies to Emerdata, since the leadership and partners has already been appointed there. The liabilities of the company went between 1 million US Dollars to 10 million US Dollars.

The US Companies was all filed bankrupt in the US on the 17th May 2018, as the ones in United Kingdom on the 2nd May 2018. The board who resolved the matter was Robert Mercer and Rebekah Mercer, also Jennifer Mercer. Also, as with SCL USA, the payments of the attorney happen through the Emerdata Limited. So if you don’t see the pattern that the Mercers have put forward. You are not seeing it.

They are preparing the same operation with the Emerdata, just switching names and hoping that no-one notice the difference. Since the investigations into Cambridge Analytica in the European Union and United Kingdom has manifested the bad practices of these companies.

This will not be last day of this. CA and SCL are maybe history, but the people behind it. Still gearing up their electoral tools and machinery for the next one. They are making themselves ready for the next one whose needs to their services, where they don’t care about privacy laws or neither about breaching of public trust. That is as long as the Mercers and others their will to manipulate the electorate and the citizens where they operate. That is what these data companies does, and do with perfection. Peace.