The Africa story in the world mass media is relentlessly negative.
If it is not the AIDS pandemic, it's Ebola.
If it's not the long-running fratricidal conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Mobutu's Zaire, Patrice Lumumba's Congo, the Belgian Congo, and one of the largest tribal confederacies in Africa), it's:
1. The Boko Haram in Nigeria
2. The Muslim extremists in Somalia,
3. The civil war in the Sudan
4. The murder of migrant workers in South Africa
5. Terrorism in Libya
6. The turmoil in Egypt
7. The Lord's Resistance Army in Kenya (where some mainstream leaders have been hauled up before the International Criminal Court)
There is never any effort on the part of the international media to look behind this seemingly hopeless mess.
When people fleeing the continent die in the hundreds crossing the Mediterranean, the focus is on the crocodile tears shed by "liberals" and the efforts of do-gooding NGOs, never on what they are fleeing from.
In all the massive international coverage of the drowning of over 300 people in the Mediterranean, no one thought to recall one simple staggering statistic that was in the headlines in 2013: that illegal transfers of wealth out of Africa in the last three decades amounted to $1.4 trillion.
The mayhem forcing the desperate flight out of Africa is directly related to those transfers.
The beneficiaries of the illegal transfers are all in the wealthy countries of the North.
The mechanism to transfer the wealth is managed by the wealthiest of banks in mainly two countries, Britain and Switzerland.
But international mass media are silent about those Satanic connections.
They hear no evil, see no evil, and never ever speak any evil.
African leaders must deal with this conspiracy of silence by speaking about the connections at every chance.
The real story of Africa is one of enormous potential.
It is also one of massive struggle: the African Union is the most advanced experiment in South-South Cooperation in any region.
Given the odds, it has been a stupendous success.
That is a record to be proud of, to boast about.
We should all participate.
If it is not the AIDS pandemic, it's Ebola.
If it's not the long-running fratricidal conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Mobutu's Zaire, Patrice Lumumba's Congo, the Belgian Congo, and one of the largest tribal confederacies in Africa), it's:
1. The Boko Haram in Nigeria
2. The Muslim extremists in Somalia,
3. The civil war in the Sudan
4. The murder of migrant workers in South Africa
5. Terrorism in Libya
6. The turmoil in Egypt
7. The Lord's Resistance Army in Kenya (where some mainstream leaders have been hauled up before the International Criminal Court)
There is never any effort on the part of the international media to look behind this seemingly hopeless mess.
When people fleeing the continent die in the hundreds crossing the Mediterranean, the focus is on the crocodile tears shed by "liberals" and the efforts of do-gooding NGOs, never on what they are fleeing from.
In all the massive international coverage of the drowning of over 300 people in the Mediterranean, no one thought to recall one simple staggering statistic that was in the headlines in 2013: that illegal transfers of wealth out of Africa in the last three decades amounted to $1.4 trillion.
The mayhem forcing the desperate flight out of Africa is directly related to those transfers.
The beneficiaries of the illegal transfers are all in the wealthy countries of the North.
The mechanism to transfer the wealth is managed by the wealthiest of banks in mainly two countries, Britain and Switzerland.
But international mass media are silent about those Satanic connections.
They hear no evil, see no evil, and never ever speak any evil.
African leaders must deal with this conspiracy of silence by speaking about the connections at every chance.
The real story of Africa is one of enormous potential.
It is also one of massive struggle: the African Union is the most advanced experiment in South-South Cooperation in any region.
Given the odds, it has been a stupendous success.
That is a record to be proud of, to boast about.
We should all participate.
1 comment:
It's not only Africa. Almost all news stories in all the mainstream media are negative. There are a few isolated voices dedicated to positive stories, but on the whole, all media professionals seem to to believe that bad news sells.
It's part of the reason I stopped watching news or reading newspapers. i don't need any help getting depressed, thank you. I'm pretty good at that myself. :)
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