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AfricaFocus Bulletin 1/25/2016

worker | January 25, 2016 | 7:21 pm | Africa, Analysis, political struggle | Comments closed

Africa: Charting the Digital Gender Gap

AfricaFocus Bulletin
January 25, 2016 (160125)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

New research from the World Wide Web Foundation reveals new details
about the enduring digital gender gap in Africa’s urban cities,
despite the unprecedented expansion of access to mobile phones among
women as well as men. In poor neighborhoods of six African cities,
the study shows, “women are almost as likely as men to own a mobile
phone of their own, but they are a third less likely than men of
similar age, education level and economic status to use their phones
to access the Internet. ” The cities included were Lagos, Nairobi,
Maputo, Kampala, Yaounde, and Cairo.

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The full 10-country study, also including Manila, Jakarta, and New
Delhi in Asia, and Bogota in Latin America, predictably showed that
education, age, and income had significant effects on the scale of
the digital gender gap, and found that three of ten men surveyed
were adamant that the Internet should be a male-controlled domain.
But it also showed that once women did have access, they were able
to narrow the gap with men in effective use of the Internet.

It concluded that explicit attention to gender equity in ICT
policies could have major impact for poor women as well as men, in
an urban environment in which access to mobile phones is now almost
universal.

The report from Mozambique, which has long pioneered in Internet
access, well illustrates the point. “The Women’s Rights Online
Mozambique report found that while nearly all women and men in
Maputo slum areas own a mobile phone, only 33% of women had accessed
the Internet, compared to 59% of men. … The majority of
respondents (96% of men and 93% of women) used their mobile phone
every day.” But while women use it predominantly for voice and text
messaging, a higher proportion of men have access to data plans and
the Internet.

This AfricaFocus Bulletin includes the executive summary of the
report, as well as two brief blog posts on Maputo and Yaounde. The
full report, as well as data files from the survey, are available on
the website of the World Wide Web Foundation (
http://webfoundation.org).

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on information and communication
technology, visit http://www.africafocus.org/ictexp.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Women’s Rights Online : Translating Access into Empowerment

Global Report – October 2015

World Wide Web Foundation

with support from Swedish International Development Cooperation
Agency (Sida)

http://webfoundation.org/ – direct URL: http://tinyurl.com/ztjkmx9

Executive Summary

The newly adopted UN Sustainable Development Goals include an
important pledge to harness information and communications
technologies (ICTs) to advance women’s empowerment, as well as a
commitment to connect everyone in Least Developed Countries to the
Internet by 2020. However, until now, estimates of the “digital
divide” between women and men in use of the Internet and other ICTs
have been sketchy.

This report explores the real extent of that divide in nine cities
across nine developing countries, in order to gain a better
understanding of the empowering potential of ICTs as a weapon
against poverty and inequality, and the barriers that must be
overcome to unlock it. Research was designed and carried out in
close collaboration with leading national civil society
organisations in the countries we studied.

The stereotype of poor people in the developing world uniformly
“left behind” in the darkness of a life without Internet
connectivity is as misleading as its opposite: the cliche in which
almost everyone in Nairobi or Jakarta now wields a mobile phone that
gushes forth market price data, health information and opportunities
for civic engagement.

Instead, our research reveals a picture of extreme inequalities in
digital empowerment – which seem to parallel wider societal
disparities in information-seeking, voice and civic engagement. For
example, Internet use among young, well-educated men and students in
poor communities of the developing world rivals that of Americans,
while Internet use among older, uneducated women is practically non-
existent.

Inequalities in access

Women are about 50% less likely to be connected than men in the same
age group with similar levels of education and household income.

Women are almost as likely as men to own a mobile phone of their
own, but they are a third less likely than men of similar age,
education level and economic status to use their phones to access
the Internet.

The most important socio-economic drivers of the gender gap in ICT
access are education and age. Controlling for income, women who have
some secondary education or have completed secondary school are six
times more likely to be online than women with primary school or
less.

Cities with the highest gender gaps in education level such as
Nairobi (Kenya), Kampala (Uganda), Maputo (Mozambique), and Jakarta
(Indonesia) were also the ones where the highest gender gaps in
Internet access were reported.

Conversely, in the cities where women’s educational attainment
outstrips the men in our sample (New Delhi and Manila), the gender
gap in Internet access has closed.

Unconnected women cited lack of know-how and high costs as the major
reasons that they are not using the Internet. In the countries in
our study, a monthly prepaid data allocation of one GB (enough for
just 13 minutes of Web use a day, excluding video) costs, on
average, about 10% of average per capita income. That’s 10 times
more than what the same data costs the average OECD citizen,
relative to income, and is double what

people in developing countries spend on healthcare. In the countries
with the highest Internet costs as a proportion of average income,
our study found the lowest numbers of women online and the largest
gender gaps in Internet use.

Inequalities in use

How people use the Internet, once they are connected, is also
strongly influenced by offline inequalities. Most of the urban poor
respondents in our study face comprehensive marginalisation in civic
and economic life. Only a small minority proactively seek out
information from any source on topics key to achieving their rights,
and an even smaller percentage participate in political debate or
community affairs. Most are in insecure, informal work or don’t have
any reliable income of their own. Being female deepens exclusion on
every single one of these counts.

A few of these poor urban dwellers are starting to use the Internet
to change their situation – to gain a voice, seek information,
enhance their livelihoods, or expand their networks beyond existing
social boundaries. Not only is this group small, it is also
disproportionately male.

Women are half as likely as men to speak out online, and a third
less likely to use the Internet to look for work (controlling for
age and education). However, there is potential for digital
empowerment to spread much more widely and equitably:

* A high proportion of women and men surveyed recognise and value
the Internet as a space for commenting on important issues, and say
that the Internet has made it safer for women to express their views
– even though they may not yet be using it for this purpose
themselves.

* Large majorities of urban poor Internet users do already exploit
digital platforms as a vehicle for reinforcing the social ties on
which their survival often depends, suggesting that the Internet’s
power to enhance social capital could be an effective route to
digital empowerment.

* Education is a major enabler of digital empowerment among women,
suggesting opportunities for greater investment in girls’ education
to work hand-in-hand with targeted ICT skills programmes in schools.

* Gender gaps in how men and women use the Internet are significant
– but not as large as gender disparities in access to the Internet.
In other words, once women do manage to get online, the gap narrows
between female and male users in terms of digital empowerment. The
policy challenge is to grow the minority of women using the Internet
and expand their voice and choices into a majority – both through
expanding women’s access and in tackling barriers to women’s
empowerment.

Notably, women who are active in “offline” political and civic life
are not only more likely to be connected in the first place, but are
also three times more likely (controlling for education level, age
and income) to use the Internet to express opinions on important or
controversial issues than other women. We need to better understand
this synergy between offline and online agency in order to learn how
gender norms that silence women in both realms can be overcome.

Patriarchy online

Around three in 10 men agreed with sentiments that the Internet
should be a male-controlled domain, but only two in 10 women agreed.
Only a tiny fraction of women said they do not use the Internet
because it is “not appropriate” for them or that they are not
permitted to do so. Such attitudes were much more prevalent in some
cities than others, however. For example, in New Delhi and Manila
nearly two-thirds of men agreed with the statement that women should
not be allowed to use the Internet in public places, and over half
agreed that men have the responsibility to restrict what women look
at online. Yet, these were the two cities with the highest levels of
Internet use among women, suggesting that patriarchal beliefs don’t
necessarily stop women getting online. However, further research is
needed to explore the extent to which they contribute to self-
censorship in how, where and when women use the Internet.

Summary of key recommendations

We will not achieve the SDGs on universal Internet access and
empowerment of women through ICTs unless technology policy is
specifically designed to tackle and overcome the steep inequalities
of gender, education, and income outlined in this study.

Full details of each recommendation can be found at the end of the
report, but the fundamentals include:

1 Establish time-bound targets for equity in Internet access, use
and skills, by gender and income level. Our 2014 Web Index shows
that many national ICT strategies or broadband plans include, at
most, a rhetorical commitment to gender equity. A few have a
patchwork of interesting but small-scale programmes and initiatives,
but overarching targets linked to budget allocations are needed to
ensure coherence, coordination and scale.

2 Teach digital skills from primary school onwards. Our findings
point strongly to the overwhelming difference that education makes
to women’s use of technology, even when controlling for other
factors such as income and age. By making sure that primary and
secondary school curricula include ICT literacy basics, we can take
advantage of near-100% primary enrolment rates to open up digital
opportunities for everyone.

3 Smash the affordability barrier. Making broadband cheaper is not
only the best way to get more people connected, but also a
prerequisite to enable them to go online and explore longer and more
often, so they can fully unlock digital opportunities. For example,
women who are able to go online daily are nearly three times more
likely than infrequent users to report that the Internet has helped
them to increase their income.

4 Practice woman-centred design. The impact of online services could
be dramatically increased by defining the end user as a woman and
not just a generic “consumer”. Experience shows that when women are
not consulted, products and services are often destined to fail.
When government agencies and donors invest in such services, the
number one target for success should be uptake by low-income women.

5 Make women’s civic and political engagement an explicit goal. The
small minority of poor women who are already active in community or
political life are not only much more likely to be online, but also
far more likely to use technology in transformative ways.
Policymakers should work with women’s groups to find ways that
technology can help women to enhance their offline participation,
voice and power.

6 Combat harassment of women online. In 74% of countries included in
the Web Index, law enforcement agencies and the courts are failing
to take appropriate actions in situations where ICTs are used to
commit acts of gender-based violence. Governments must take steps to
enact adequate legislative measure

7 It’s not (just) the technology, stupid. Neither communications
ministries, which typically have lead responsibility for national
ICT strategies, nor gender ministries, where these exist, can
achieve the SDGs on Internet access and women’s digital empowerment
on their own. Additionally, our findings underline the lesson that
empowering women does not happen in separate boxes labelled
“offline” and “online”, but requires progress across several fronts
at once. Government agencies, civil society groups and private
sector stakeholders will need to work together in all sectors to
ensure that ICT initiatives are systematically integrated with wider
efforts to expand women’s choices and capabilities in the labour
market, in the home, at school and in public life. Training
policymakers across different sectors (such as health, education,
small business, agriculture) to understand and harness the potential
of ICTs to tackle poverty and gender inequality may be a good
starting point.

*************************************************

Mozambique: What is keeping women offline?

Web Foundation Â· December 11, 2015

Women’s Rights Online

http://tinyurl.com/zawsfyd

As part of our Women’s Rights Online research, this series of guest
blogs features on-the-ground perspectives from each of our research
partners around the world. In this post, Mozambique’s Science,
Innovation, Information and Communications Technology Research
Institute (SIITRI) analyses Mozambique’s Women’s Rights Online study
results and outlines how to get more of the country’s women online.

The Women’s Rights Online Mozambique report found that while nearly
all women and men in Maputo slum areas own a mobile phone, only 33%
of women had accessed the Internet, compared to 59% of men. These
results confirm that women and girls are being excluded online in
Mozambique, and that we must take action to make sure the digital
future is inclusive.

As part of the project, we surveyed men and women in 29 urban poor
areas of the capital, Maputo to learn more about why the gap in
Internet access persists.

In our survey, women cited four main barriers to Internet access:

1. Many women have never learned how to use the Internet

2. Women simply do not have a device

3. Women are not able to access the Internet on their devices

4. High costs, including both network costs and the opportunity cost
of accessing the Internet, prevent women from accessing the Internet

Another important issue we considered was how women use their mobile
phones. Since the mobile phone is the first place many people
experience the Internet, we needed to know if the increase in mobile
phone use was benefitting women in terms of online access.

The majority of respondents (96% of men and 93% of women) used their
mobile phone every day. The service most frequently used by
respondents was combination of voice calls and SMS, and the
frequency of use of these services was higher amongst women (64%)
when compared with men (49%), as more men used a combination of
voice, SMS and data services.

This discrepancy in ownership and access to data services can be
explain in part by differences between men and women’s disposable
income. A greater percentage of men than women own a mobile phone
and spend more on accessing data.

How can Mozambique expand women’s access to the Web?

It’s clear that efforts are needed to expand women’s access. There
is much to be done, but we recommend focussing on four key areas to
tackle the gap in Mozambique:

1. Improve education: First and foremost, we must tackle low levels
of education and high illiteracy rates of women and girls. Keeping
girls in school longer means reading skills will improve. The
government should also integrate ICT skills training into the
curriculum early on, to equip girls with the tools they need to
enter the information economy.

2. Change attitudes: We must also encourage changes in cultural
attitudes. The gender gap in education is often due to domestic
responsibilities, and traditions that downplay the importance of
girls’ education.

3. Provide affordable public access: In order to facilitate access
for women, ICTs need to be located in other local institutions women
frequent where they feel safe and welcome. These might include NGOs,
women’s employment centres, libraries and health centres. Providing
Internet access in a local health centre could bring the added
benefit of increasing women’s access to health information during
their visits.

4. Reduce the cost of mobile Internet: So many women own mobiles,
but so few are using them to get connected. Mozambique could
consider introducing a subsidised or free Internet access scheme,
providing more women with the opportunity to use the devices they
already have to get online.

How can we make this happen?

Mozambique was one of the first countries to adopt a comprehensive
ICT policy and implementation strategy. As a next step, it needs to
become fully gender responsive. SIITRI will target politicians,
policy makers and influencers directly with these recommendations to
close the gender gap in ICTs through engagement events, workshops
and roundtables. We have already begun this work by advocating at a
national level at the Maputo Internet Forum organised by Swedish
Embassy in October, through the ongoing work and advocacy of the
A4AI-Mozambique National Coalition, and by hosting a workshop on
“Advocating for Empowerment of Women through ICTs and the Web” in
late November. It is our objective to secure concrete and time-bound
commitments from the government to close the digital gender gap.

We must ensure the digital revolution is a revolution for women and
girls. We hope this project has begun that process, and we are
excited about the possibilities for women and girls in Mozambique.
You can follow our updates on our website (http://www.siitri.ac.mz).

***************************************************

Narrowing Cameroon’s gender gap: reasons for hope

Web Foundation Â· October 7, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/gn9jwwz

Women’s Rights Online As part of our Women’s Rights Online research,
this series of guest blogs features on-the-ground perspectives from
each of our research partners around the world. In this post, Julie
Owono, Head of Africa Desk at Internet Sans FrontiÃ¨res (
http://www.internetsansfrontieres.org/), shares her experience of
how improving women’s access to the Internet is empowering women in
Cameroon.

Being an expatriate Cameroonian woman, I know from personal
experience how Web-enabled information and communication
technologies (ICTs) can expand possibilities for women. I have had
opportunities that I could never have anticipated if I had remained
in the offline world. Indeed,Â I probably wouldn’t have found my
job, which now allows me to be involved in initiatives and projects
that help build a safe and accessible Internet for all, and help
tackle some social and economic issues that plague my country. I am
thinking for instance of the project Feowl, an open data project on
electricity cuts, that I created and implemented between 2012 and
2013.

I want the change that I have witnessed to spread to the many
Cameroonian women for whom survival and dignity are still a daily
struggle. ICTs are a tool â€“ one that, when paired with the right
skills, can be transformational and empowering.

This is the focus of my work at Paris-based NGO Internet Sans
FrontiÃ¨res: ensuring that the Internet remains a space for
borderless creation, cooperation, and interaction, as well as a tool
for economic, social and political advancement.

Promoting Internet access among disadvantaged communities is central
in our work â€“ from youth in Urban poor areas in Brazil, to helping
LGBT communities in Cameroon secure their digital communications,
and helping decrease the price of Internet access in the country
through our work with the Alliance for Affordable Internet -we are
committed to ensuring that the Web remains a space thatÂ anyone,
regardless of social, economic, political background can access and
use.

One disadvantaged group still experiencing barriers to access and
use of the Internet is women in developing countries. A 2012 study
by Intel and Dalberg on Women and the Web concluded that “across the
developing world, nearly 25 percent fewer women than men have access
to the Internet, the gender gap soars to nearly 45 percent in Sub
Saharan Africa”.

The figure is striking, but probably not surprising when compared it
to other gender metrics. Women are still the most subject to
inequalities. In Cameroon, women hold only 16.1 percent of the seats
at the parliament. 63.3 percent of the women aged 15 and above
participate in the labor workforce, while the figure goes up to 76.7
percent for men in the same age groups according to the UN’s Gender
Inequality Index. According to a 2007 survey by the Cameroonian
National Statistics Institute, Women spent an average 17 hours per
week on housework against 9 hours for men. We believe that access to
and effective use of the Internet can facilitate women’s
participation in political and economic life, closing the gender
gap.

The good news for Cameroon is that the Cameroonian Government has
taken the issue of the gender gap in ICTs seriously. Importantly,
the government has acknowledged that the major barriers to gender
equality are “socio-cultural hindrances, that are the corollary of a
patriarchal social organisation”. Admitting this challenge publicly
gives women space to discuss the problem and possible solutions
directly.

The government also claims to have trained more 100,000 women
between 2012 and 2002 in digital literacy and the use of ICT. Our
study suggests that while these efforts are commendable, we need to
expand on them to make visible progress on empowering women through
ICT.

The number of Cameroonian Internet users is also increasing,
particularly through mobile phones. More and more women use a well-
known Facebook group called Kamer sisters (read more about the group
here â€“ link in French http://tinyurl.com/jjc8cwf ), gathering more
than 7,000 Cameroonian women based in or outside Cameroon, to
advertise their products and businesses and look for jobs. It is not
rare to see women looking to hire nannies, or young women looking
for such positions.

Whatsapp is also gaining popularity as a platform for women to
generate income and run communications for their small businesses.
For example, one young female entrepreneurÂ advertises her talents
as hairdresser and makeup artist, giving her contact details on
whatsapp. For entrepreneurs like her, Whatsapp acts as a cheaper and
more direct alternative to a traditional website.

This is precisely what we hoped to achieve when Internet Sans
FrontiÃ¨resÂ decided to get involved in the Women’s Rights Online
project: see these new trends in the use of Web-enabled ICTs spread
among women from poor urban backgrounds andÂ benefit them socially
and economically. We look forward to sharing the full research
results and using them to understand the next steps for civil
society and government in narrowing Cameroon’s gender gap.

*****************************************************

AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with a
particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.

AfricaFocus Bulletin can be reached at africafocus@igc.org. Please
write to this address to subscribe or unsubscribe to the bulletin,
or to suggest material for inclusion. For more information about
reposted material, please contact directly the original source
mentioned. For a full archive and other resources, see
http://www.africafocus.org

AfricaFocus Bulletin 1/19/2016

worker | January 20, 2016 | 12:39 pm | Africa, Analysis, political struggle | Comments closed

Africa: Stealth Assault on African Seeds

AfricaFocus Bulletin
January 19, 2016 (160119)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“There is a renewed and stronger assault on seed … based on legal
systems that permit exclusive rights over seeds on the spurious
contention that plant varieties were ‘discovered’ and improved on.
But these ‘discovered’ varieties are the product of the whole
history of collective human improvements and maintenance carried out
by peasants. To assert exclusive rights over the whole on the basis
of small adjustments is nothing short of outright theft.” – South-
South Dialogue, Durban, South Africa, November 2015

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In rich countries, debate about industrialized agriculture often
focuses on Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) and the safety and
transparency consequences for consumers. In developing countries
with large sectors of peasant farmers, this is only a small part of
a larger debate on the future of agriculture, pitting multinational
companies and large-scale investors against the autonomy and rights
of peasant farmers.

Land grabbing is highly visible, and has attracted much international attention. Less visible, and potentially even more damaging, is the appropriation of rights to seeds, fueled not only by the companies themselves but also by a concerted campaign to erode farmers’ traditional rights to seeds in favor of patents by multinational corporations. This is a issue not only for GMOs, but also for other seeds produced by other breeding technologies.

The debate is filled with acronyms, as well as the claim that
“scientific” agriculture will provide food and development
benefiting the peasants as well. And the campaign to change laws and
erode traditional rights is unrelenting. It is based on the
Universal Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV
91), which works for the privatization of seeds by imposing
intellectual property rights on plant varieties.

In recent years a drive to extend these laws on “plant variety
protection” in African and other developing countries has rapidly
accelerated.

This Africa Focus Bulletin contains a recent declaration by groups
resisting this drive, and excerpts from a brief article by Dr. Carol
Thompson, noting the apartheid-like differential effect of these
laws. Also included (just below) are linked to other essential
resources on this issue.

For a recent series of short articles featuring interviews with
African grassroots leaders (mainly women), visit
http://otherworldsarepossible.org / direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/hjhe756

For global overviews of the issue, see

* The Berne Declaration. Owning Seeds, Accessing Food. 2014.
https://www.bernedeclaration.ch – direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/zcryou5

* GRAIN. UPOV 91 and other seed laws: A basic primer. October 2015.
http://www.grain.org / direct URL: http://tinyurl.com/hlvztp8

Two longer related reports with additional background specifically
on African seeds include:

* African Centre for Biodiversity. The expansion of the commercial
seed sector in sub-Saharan Africa: Major players, key issues and
trends. December 2015. http://www.acbio.org.za – direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/qy382hc

* African Centre for Biodiversity. Profiting from the Climate
Crisis, Undermining Resilience in Africa. Gates and Monsanto’s Water
Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) Project. May 2015.
http://www.acbio.org.za – direct URL: http://tinyurl.com/zk32nlu

For talking points and previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on
agriculture, food sovereignty, and related issues, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/intro-ag.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Declaration on Plant Variety Protection and Seed Laws from the
South-South Dialogue

Durban, South Africa

29 November 2015

http://www.acbio.org.za – direct URL: http://tinyurl.com/j5uxvkc

We, participants at the South-South Dialogue, are members of peasant
and civil society organisations and concerned individuals from
Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe working on issues of food and
seed sovereignty, peasants’ control of seed production and exchange,
and biodiversity. We gathered in Durban, South Africa 27-29 November
2015 to share information and knowledge, and to come to a common
understanding on seed and plant variety protection (PVP) policy and
laws and strategies for resistance and alternatives in the global
South.

We are working in our countries and regions to advance the ongoing
global struggle for socially just and ecologically sustainable
societies, in which farming households and communities have control
and decision-making power over the production and distribution of
food and seed.

Human societies and the seeds we use to produce the food that
sustains us have grown symbiotically over millennia. Seeds emerged
from nature and have been diversified, conserved, nurtured and
enhanced through processes of human experimentation, discovery and
innovation throughout this time. Seeds have been improved by means
of traditional and cultural knowledge transmitted from generation to
generation. Seeds are therefore the collective heritage for people
serving humanity. Peasants and indigenous peoples have always been
the custodians and guardians of the collective knowledge embedded in
the wide diversity of seed that has enabled the development of
humankind as a species.

However, today capitalist greed poses fundamental threats to the
continued conservation, reproduction and use of the biological
diversity nurtured for all this time. The forced enclosure of land
and other natural resources and its capture and conversion into
private property was one disastrous step. This has caused and
continues to cause social dislocation and displacement, damaging the
social fabric of human societies, severing the connection between
people and the land, and consolidating social, collectively-produced
wealth in the hands of the few at the expense of the many.

There is a renewed and stronger assault on seed, agricultural
biodiversity heritage and the knowledge associated with these.
Related law and policy making processes are already far advanced in
Europe, the United States and other parts of the world and are being
imposed on our countries in the South through multilateral and
bilateral trade and investment agreements. They are based on legal
systems that permit exclusive rights over seeds on the spurious
contention that plant varieties were ‘discovered’ and improved on.
But these ‘discovered’ varieties are the product of the whole
history of collective human improvements and maintenance carried out
by peasants. To assert exclusive rights over the whole on the basis
of small adjustments is nothing short of outright theft.

Efforts to expand this expropriation to the global South are being
pursued aggressively by multinational seed and life sciences
corporations and their cohorts in state and multilateral
institutions. This takes the form of a coordinated political and
technocratic crusade to impose uniform and draconian laws and
regulations in favour of intellectual property (IP) rights such as
plant variety protection (PVP) for private interests, the
proliferation of genetically modified (GM) seeds, and exclusive
recognition and marketing of seed and plant varieties that pass
through breeding and production systems tightly controlled by
economic elites.

There are no benefits for peasant and farming households and
communities, or for society in general, from these developments. In
a few short decades – just a small fraction of the time humans have
been engaged in industrial agriculture – this enclosure of the
collective seed heritage has spread virulently across the globe. The
historical practices of context-specific peasant-managed seed
systems we have relied on are vilified, denigrated as being backward
and obsolete, and criminalised. Farmers are taken to court and
imprisoned for maintaining the biological base as a living system
while seed and food corporations make huge profits legitimised by
seed and IP laws.

The result is the alarming erosion of agricultural biodiversity and
related knowledge, and a deepening threat to the sustainable use of
the genetic base, and consequently to food production and ecological
balance, and to humanity. Current seed and IP laws violate the ethos
of sharing between farmers, which is the backbone of peasant farming
systems, seed and people’s sovereignty and the basic human right to
food.

We cannot stand by passively and watch this legalised dispossession
and destruction. We are compelled to resist. We declare our
commitment to work in alliance with one another, with peasant and
indigenous peoples’ movements, and with other likeminded civil
society organisations and individuals, to fight the spread of this
aggressive and violent system of domination on the basis of
autonomy, collective self-organisation, cooperation, sharing,
solidarity and mutual respect.

We declare our principled opposition to any form of IP on life
forms, seeds and related information or exclusive rights to their
use. We reject genetic modification and other current and emerging
proprietary technologies in agriculture as these technologies are
built on the disintegration of holistic farming systems, the
exclusion of farmers from processes of plant breeding and natural
resource management, and the control of seeds and planting material
in the hands of corporate and political elites.

We reject the imposition of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on
its country members, through the Trade Related aspects of
Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement, to adopt rules
allowing the privatization of seeds and related knowledge. We reject
the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of
Plants (UPOV) type laws and other intellectual property regulation
on seeds and plant varieties. It is also unacceptable that bilateral
free trade agreements impose on Southern countries intellectual
property measures that go beyond the provisions of the WTO.

We are opposed to laws dealing with the marketing and certification
of seed. These new seed laws undermine peasant seed systems that
have been developed locally over generations of farmers and are
geared towards creating massively increased private sector
participation in seed trade. In addition, these laws promote only
one type of seed breeding. The entire orientation of these seed laws
is geared towards genetically uniform, commercially bred varieties
in terms of seed quality control and variety registration. What is
very clear is that these laws criminalise the marketing of farmers’
varieties. The ultimate aim of these laws is to facilitate new
markets for commercial seed companies and the occupation by
multinationals in the seed sector in the global south and displace
and criminalise peasant seed systems.

We oppose the fragmentation of genetic information and the divorce
of this information from physical resources through the Global
Information Systems (GIS) such as DivSeek (a global information
system on genetic sequencing and related knowledge for seed,
proposed by the World Bank), since there is the possibility of the
use of this information expediting the further privatisation of
seeds through international legal systems.

We will fight for laws, policies and public programmes that support
and strengthen peasants and communities to continue with their
diverse and context-specific practices of plant breeding, selection,
production and distribution. We will fight for a more responsible
role for public sector activities based on ongoing democratic,
participatory and transparent processes of engagement with citizens
and inhabitants of our countries and regions. We will continue to
defend our rights to produce, use, exchange and sell all seed and
planting material. We will work to recover, maintain and expand the
use of native and local seed, and the revival of diverse food
cultures as the most effective routes to protect biodiversity. We
recognise the irreducible diversity that can only be managed through
peasant seed production systems and maintained by peasants as
breeders and users of seed.

We believe seeds are the people’s heritage in the service of
humanity that should be managed collectively, democratically and
sustainably. We reaffirm the centrality of agricultural producers as
the primary stewards of our collective genetic resources, especially
women peasants who continue to play a direct role in the maintenance
and enhancement of these resources. We commit to supporting peasant
households and communities in their stewardship, and to building
links with allies, wherever we may find them, to advance the cause
of food and seed sovereignty.

Organisations:

AcciÃ³n EcolÃ³gica – Ecuador, AcciÃ³n por la Biodiversidad – Argentina,
African Centre for Biodiversity – South Africa, ArticulaciÃ³n
Nacional de AgroecologÃa/Grupo de Trabajo en Biodiversidad,
AsociaciÃ³n Nacional para el Fomento de la Agricultura EcolÃ³gica –
ANAFAE- Honduras, Commons for EcoJustice – Malawi, Earthlife Africa
Durban, Fahamu Africa, Farmers’ Seed Network – China, GRAIN, Growth
Partners Africa, Grupo Semillas – Colombia, JINUKUN – COPAGEN,
Cotonou, Benin, Kenya Food Rights Alliance, Movimiento de PequeÃ±os
Agricultores (MPA) – Brasil, Peasant Farmers Association of Ghana,
PELUM Association Zimbabwe, Red de Agrobiodiversidad en la Zona
SemiÃ¡rida de Minas Gerais – Brasil, Red de CoordinaciÃ³n en
Biodiversidad – Costa Rica, Red Nacional para la defensa de la
SoberanÃa Alimentaria en Guatemala, REDSAG – Guatemala, Red por una
AmÃ©rica Latina Libre de TransgÃ©nicos Swissaid Guinea-Bissau Zimbabwe
Smallholder Organic Farmers Forum (ZIMSOFF)

South-South Dialogue Participants (list available in original
document)

********************************************************

Apartheid Seed Law

Carol B. Thompson

Pambazuka News, June 3, 2015

[Excerpts only: for full text and references with explicit
comparisons to apartheid laws, see the original text at
http://www.pambazuka.net/en/category.php/features/94834]

[Carol Thompson is a professor emerita at Northern Arizona
University, a member of AGRA-Watch in Seattle, Washington, and co-
author with Andrew Mushita of Biopiracy of Biodiversity: Global
Exchange as Enclosure, which was featured in AfricaFocus after its
publication in 2007.]

Although political apartheid was dismantled by the 1994 election of
President Nelson Mandela, a new form of economic apartheid is now
stalking the entire African continent.

This new economic apartheid refers to the seed convention known as
UPOV91 (International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of
Plants), advanced by the European Union, the United States, and the
World Bank presuming to protect plant breeders’ rights under the
World Trade Organization. The EU is requiring its implementation by
African governments as a prerequisite for trading under the Economic
Partnership Agreements (EPAs), scheduled for 2016.

UPOV91 gives exclusive proprietary rights to plant breeders, who
work in modern laboratories full of expensive equipment. The
convention gives these breeders, or their corporate sponsors,
private ownership over a new strain, extending property rights
beyond the seed, to the full plant, and to “essentially derived”
products (e.g., flour from wheat).

To obtain this legal ownership, the new variety must be distinct,
uniform, and stable (DUS), characteristics not found in farmers’
newly bred varieties after their experimentation in the fields. It
means that farmers’ new varieties are not protected by the UPOV
convention and remain free for the taking.

Farmer breeders do not desire seed traits that are highly stable,
for they are looking for nuances in traits in order to choose the
next seeds for breeding. As one farmer asked, “what do they mean by
‘heritage seed’? Aren’t the seeds changing all the time?”

During the 20 years of proprietary rights for breeders of DUS
varieties, no one can exchange, use, experiment or save the seed
without permission, a prohibition eradicating farmers’ rights to
work with any seeds. Because farmers have cultivated diverse food
crops over millennia, two international laws protect farmers’ rights
(International Treaty for Plant Genetic Resources for Food and
Agriculture and the Nagoya Protocol to the Convention on Biological
Diversity). For African governments to incorporate UPOV91 into
national laws, they would have to violate these two treaties.

Farmers’ experimentation and freely sharing involve not only seeds
but the indigenous knowledge embedded in them. African farmers, for
example, know the hundreds of varieties of millets and sorghums or
teff, grains more nutritious than maize or rice or wheat, and ones
that are regaining interest on the continent because they grow well
in semi-arid conditions, while the more familiar maize varieties are
not standing up to climate change aridity. Smallholder African
farmers grow 20-25 crops on one hectare, sharing knowledgeâ€”sometimes
formally in farmer field schools but also daily in informal
waysâ€”about which variety grows best under another crop, where to
place the various crops in terms of moisture percolation in the
small field, and especially, variable planting times in case the
rains come late, or start early. Farmers know the nutrition value of
their biodiverse crops, encouraging children and mothers to partake
more of one (e.g., pearl and finger millets) than of another
(cassava). And nutrition includes feeding the living soil with
leguminous plants rotated with grain crops.

Why would anyone want to destroy farmers’ experimentation and
knowledge? For the same reason apartheid reigned too long: it is
profitable. UPOV 91 offers another way to privatize a living
organism, accomplished more easily than the difficult job of
enforcing a patent across the globe.

[The following comparisons make clear the parallel to apartheid
laws, in establishing unequal rights to access to resources that are
essential for human survival.]

Segregation with inferiority

UPOV91 is trying to establish, by law, the inferior status of
smallholder farmers who breed and do scientific experiments in the
field. It legitimizes the corporate plant breeders’ entitlement and
presumed superiority. The normative law translates back into profit
for the corporations benefiting from PVP – plant variety protection.
This constructed distinction between two different types of breeding
becomes a “ritual of truth”.

Aesthetics of segregation

UPOV91 legitimizes the view that “real plant breeders” wear white
coats and work in a sparkling laboratory with the latest
instruments, while projecting that farmer breeders working in the
soil are inferior. Because they cannot produce DUS (distinct,
uniform, stable) seeds, they are not breeders. The Gates
Foundation’s Program for African Seed Systems (PASS) call farmers’
seeds “weak” and “recycled”, “used for decades”. Like apartheid
benches “for whites only” in the parks and on the beaches, only a
breeder of DUS seeds can sit on the laboratory stool as a recogn1zed
seed breeder; farmer breeders do not qualify.

Legal enforcement of apartheid

The pass laws, restricting the movement of Africans at all times,
became a core impetus for organ1zing against apartheid from the
Defiance Campaign (1952) through “making the townships ungovernable”
(1980s). Any “non-white” without a pass could be detained for 90
days, or more, without trial or notification of any lawyer.

Farmer breeders will not be summarily detained, but Canada has
already made violation of its UPOV-based law a criminal act, not a
civil offense. The U.S. courts have upheld Monsanto’s allegations
against hundreds of farmers that they stole a “Monsanto gene”, when
most often, pollen carried by wind fertilized the farmers’ crops.
With these precedents, the economic apartheid of UPOV91 will most
likely be strictly enforced by the courts.

Resistance

Civil society and farmers across the African continent are
organizing against UPOV91, but the threat of the looming European
trade agreements (EPAs) remains. Just as civil society resistance in
the North changed the context for domestic apartheid, the
international community needs to voice and organize rejection of
this apartheid seed law.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization recognizes two seed
systems: the formal one and farmers’, because all breeders are
essential to cultivate new food varieties in this time of climate
change. Further, farmers are more advanced breeders because their
new seeds are already “field tested”, whereas laboratory-bred seeds
often fail during field trials, not expressing the traits desired.
Let us not allow UPOV to gain any “sensibility of normalcy” in
segregating and denigrating farmer seed breeders:

The international community’s vociferous and sustained rejection of
this new economic apartheid would protect the future of food for us
all.

*****************************************************

Africa/Global: Beyond the Paris Climate Talks

worker | December 10, 2015 | 8:29 pm | Africa, Climate Change, environmental crisis, political struggle | Comments closed

AfricaFocus Bulletin
December 10, 2015 (151210)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

As the climate talks in Paris draw to a close this week, the
countries present are still far from full agreement. Among the
latest surprises was the announcement by the Marshall Islands and
St. Lucia of a “Coalition of High Ambition Countries,” spearheaded
by small island states which are the most at risk of being submerged
due to climate change. The coalitionÂ includes over 100 countries,
including the European Union countries and the United States, but
notable exceptions are the largest developing countries, such as
China, India, Brazil, and South Africa.

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/clim152.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=
http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/clim1512.php

Details of the latest negotiations are complex, the outcome still
highly uncertain, and positions within each of the many negotiation
alliances are themselves subject to change. The remaining stumbling
blocks as of today are summarized in this article in The Guardian,
which has been covering the talks extensively as part of its “Keep
it in the ground” campaign.

“The six key road blocks at the UN climate talks in Paris” The
Guardian, December 10, 2015 http://tinyurl.com/p2nakd8

What is agreed among virtually all observers and participants is
that the results of the conference will fall far short of that
needed to curb climate change short of even more catastrophic
results in the coming decades, added to the documented increase in
“extreme weather events” already making themselves felt.

The outcome will depend in part on the agreed words on paper in the
next few days, but even more on the practical effect of multiple
technical and political trends around the world, both positive and
negative.

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains substantial excerpts from
articles on two particularly important issues beyond those in the
Paris text, namely the future of coal, and the threat to climate
action by governments coming from parallel and little noticed
negotiations in Geneva on the “Trade in Services Agreement” (TiSA).

There are also brief snippets from other relevant articles, on
agriculture, on critiques of the new OECD report estimating rich
country contributions to climate finance to date, and on rapid
advances predicted in renewable energy for both Africa and the
United States.

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on climate and the environment,
visit http://www.africafocus.org/intro-env.php

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Year-end Break for AfricaFocus; Asking for your Support

With this issue AfricaFocus Bulletin begins a year-end break in
publication. Publication will resume in early to mid-January. As
usual, the AfricaFocus website and social media pages will continue
to be available.

This is also time for a reminder that while AfricaFocus is and will
remain free to you and other readers, it continues to depend on
support from those readers who decide to make a voluntary payment to
help support this work. If you are able to do so, and continue to
find this publication useful, please go to
http://www.africafocus.org/support.php to make a secure contribution
on-line or to download a form to mail in with your check or money
order. Although this contribution is not tax-deductible, it may be
deductible as a business expense.

Best wishes to all for the holiday season and for the coming year.

William Minter, Editor, AfricaFocus Bulletin

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

“Thousands of Planned Coal Plants, if Built, Could Doom Efforts to
Contain Global Warming”

by Maureen Nandini Mitra, managing editor, Earth Island Journal

Alternet, December 4, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/q8gmjzo

I landed in Calcutta (Kolkata, if you are a stickler for official
names) on November 30, the day the world leaders, policy makers, and
environmental activists gathered in Paris to figure out how to curb
climate change. Officially, it’s wintertime in this city of my
birth, but the air on Monday night was anything but chilly. Instead,
it was uncomfortably muggy. The only sign of winter was the hazy air
— a regular year-end feature in this overcrowded, traffic-choked
metropolis in eastern India.

The unusually warm weather might be an anomaly, at least that’s what
the local weathermen say, but in my experience, winters here have
certainly become milder in recent years. (While winter is receding
here, the waters are rising. Calcutta is among coastal cities across
the world most vulnerable to increased flooding due to climate
change.)

Meanwhile farther south by the tip of the Indian peninsula, another
coastal city, Chennai, has been flooded for two months due to
torrential rains that have submerged homes and disrupted normal
life. The Indian Army has been deployed there to rescue people
stranded in their homes. The rains have broken a 100-year-old record
with one day’s rainfall covering an entire month’s average in a city
that’s more used to blazing heat than damp days.

When I spoke with a journalist friend living there last morning
(it’s past 3 a.m. Thursday morning here as I write this), she was
stuck in her second floor apartment with her invalid mother and
little girl with no power. Her cellphone, the only way she can
connect with the outside world, had barely any charge left. The
first floor of her building was completely inundated and she feared
the waters would soon rise further. “Even if the rescue boats come,
I can’t leave because they most likely won’t be able to evacuate my
mother,” she told me, before I hung up, not wanting to waste her
cellphone charge needlessly. I haven’t heard from her since.

This is it: the real, harsh, personal face of climate change. Given
such stark news, it was doubly depressing to read a new reportÂ by
Climate Action Tracker that shows that thousands of new coal plants
being planned in countries across the world, including India, could
doom efforts to contain global warming.

If all the 2,440 coal plants in the pipeline were to be built, by
2030, emissions from coal power would be 400 percent higher than
what is consistent with a 2degC pathway, says the “Coal Gap” report,
which was released in Paris on Tuesday. Using data from Earth Island
Institute’s CoalSwarm project’s updated Global Coal Plant Tracker,
the researchers calculated the effect of coal-fired power on global
emissions and concluded that even with no new construction, in 2030,
emissions from coal-fired power generation would still be more than
150 percent higher than what is consistent with holding warming
below 2degC.

The researchers based their assessment on planned new coal plants
both globally, and in the eight countries that each plan to build
more than 5GW of coal power capacity: China, India, Indonesia,
Japan, South Africa, South Korea, the Philippines, Turkey — plus
the EU28. In emerging economies, like India, the plants are being
planned in hopes of meeting rapidly increasing electricity demand,
while in the EU28, new coal plants will mainly replace existing
capacity.

Of course, the biggest offender here is China, which has 722 planned
plants that would emit 2.2 gigatons of carbon emissions a year. But
India isn’t lagging too far behind. The report notes that the large
amounts of new coal capacity planned in India and Turkey “could have
a relatively significant impact.”

“In India, stopping new coal fired power plants to be built could
mitigate 0.7 GtCO [gigatons of carbon emissions], provided low
carbon technologies are implemented,” it adds.

The researchers say, ideally, plans for these plants should be
canceled, but I sincerely doubt that will happen. At least not here
in India, where coal companies have deep ties with the political
class, and where the environment minister (who’s currently in Paris)
gives that same old line about the floods in Chennai being a
“natural calamity” that “can’t be directly linked to climate
change.”

*******************************************************************

The Coal Gap: planned coal-fired power plants inconsistent with
2degC and threaten achievement of INDCs

Climate Action Tracker, Dec. 1, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/h7b7jfp

Summary

* Holding temperature increase below 2degC, or below 1.5degC by
2100, requires a rapid decarbonisation of the global power sector.
IPCC AR5 scenarios indicate that this sector needs to reach zero
carbon emissions globally around 2050, 35 years hence. This means
phasing out emissions from coal-fired power by 2050.

* Even with no new construction, emissions from coal-fired power
generation in 2030 would still be 150% higher than what is
consistent with scenarios limiting warming to below 2degC above pre-
industrial levels (middle of the range). If the planned new coal
capacity – estimated by the Global Coal Plant Tracker – were to be
built, it would exceed the required levels by 400%.

* The planned new coal plants alone (globally, 2440 plants,
totalling 1428 GW) could emit approximately 6.5 GtCO2 , 16 – 18% of
the total allowed emissions in 2030 (under a 2degC-compatible
scenario). Including existing capacity with a technical lifetime
beyond 2030, total annual emissions from coal-fired power generation
could reach 12 GtCO2 in 2030.

* The CAT has assessed the impact of planned new coal plants both
globally, and in the eight countries that each plan to build more
than 5GW of coal power capacity: China, India, Indonesia, Japan,
South Africa, South Korea, the Philippines, Turkey – plus the EU28.
[The USA only plans to expand coal capacity by 3.5 GW.]

* Of these nine countries (incl. EU28) all have a CAT-rated INDC of
“inadequate” or “medium” (i.e. not sufficient to keep warming below
2degC), and have “current policy pathways” that are even less
ambitious. Their combined planned new coal capacity (2011 new coal
plants, totalling 1210 GW) could put them in an even worse
situation, adding emissions of around 1.5 GtCO2 to the CAT’s
projected currently policy levels.

* In seven of the nine studied countries – China, EU28, India,
Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Turkey – planned coal plants
threatens the achievement of the already only medium or inadequate
INDCs.

* The estimated emissions impact of planned plants that have been
announced and pre- permitted – i.e. not under construction or
permitted – would be 3.5GtCO2. Cancelling these plants could lead to
emissions reductions of 2GtCO 2 below current policy levels,
bringing countries closer to their proposed INDC levels.

[more at http://tinyurl.com/h7b7jfp]

*****************************************

Climate Deception: Non-binding “Targets” for Climate, but Binding
Rules on Trade in Services by Deborah James

Huffington Post, December 4, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/h6femp2

[Also note that the global Our World Is Not for Sale (OWINFS)
network works with PSI against the proposed TiSA. For more
information, visit http://ourworldisnotforsale.org/en/themes/3085]

The whole world is watching as world leaders from nearly every
country across the globe meet in Paris this week to set carbon
emission reductions targets to address global climate change.

Unfortunately representatives of 50 of the same governments are also
meeting this week in Geneva to negotiate binding rules that will
seriously constrain countries’ ability to meet those targets.

The 15th round of talks to create a “Trade in Services Agreement,”
or TiSA, are occurring once again in Geneva. Members of the TiSA
currently include Australia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica,
Hong Kong, Iceland, Israel, Japan, Liechtenstein, Mauritius, Mexico,
New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Peru, South Korea,
Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, the U.S., and the 28 member states of
the European Union. How come everyone knows about the Paris talks,
but not those in Geneva? Because the Geneva talks are convened in
secret – precisely because the negotiators don’t want the public to
know what they’re up to.

The TiSA is modeled on the General Agreement on Trade in Services
(GATS) of the WTO, which Naomi Klein has documented in her book,
This Changes Everything, has been used extensively against
environmental policies. Yet the point of the TiSA is to go further
than the GATS because corporations see the existing rules as not
“ambitious enough.” The financial services, logistics and
technological corporations, largely in the United States and also
the EU, are attempting to expand the WTO’s GATS to develop a set of
deregulation and privatization rules that constrain public oversight
of how services operate domestically and globally, setting aside
environmental, labor, and development issues in favor of
transnational corporate rights to operate and profit.

Fortunately, Wikileaks has come again to the rescue. Today they are
publishing analysis and secret, leaked proposals that would create
far-reaching rules that give corporations rights to access markets
and limit public oversight of environmental and energy services and
road transportation in TiSA member countries.

The analysis of a proposal for an “Energy Related Services (ERS)”
annex of the TiSA would give “rights” to foreign energy corporations
in domestic markets. Far from mandating reductions in carbon
emissions or promoting access for poor countries to clean
technologies, the proposed TiSA annex would actually limit the
ability of governments (on national, regional, or local levels) to
set policies that differentiate between polluting and carbon-based
energy sources, such as oil and coal, from clean and renewable
energy sources such as wind and solar. This is according to the
“principle of technological neutrality,” revealed in the analysis of
the proposed chapter by Victor Menotti published by the Public
Services International (PSI) global union federation today.

Since reducing the dependence on fossil fuels is the basis of much
of today’s climate policy, it is hard to imagine how governments
could achieve the reductions in fossil fuel usage required by the
targets if they are not able to differentiate among energy sources.

Developing countries have demanded that principles of common but
differentiated responsibility become enshrined in any new climate
deal; the TiSA would instead sidesteps developing country concerns
raised at the WTO, and fails to include the (weak) flexibilities for
developing countries included in the WTO’s GATS.

In fact, a main point of the TiSA seems to be to “shift political
power over energy and climate policies from people using their
governments for shaping fair and sustainable economies to global
corporations using TiSA for restricting governments from regulating
energy markets, companies, and industry infrastructure,” according
to Menotti. This includes ensuring domestic economic benefits from
natural resource extraction, a key strategy for poverty reduction in
many developing countries.

…

Both the TPP and the proposed TiSA would restrict governments’
ability to use public procurement to promote “green purchasing,”
through the chapter disciplining government procurement, which in
the TiSA is cross-referenced to environmental and energy services
chapters. According to the analysis by the Third World Network,
government purchasing “provides a major source of demand for
domestic service suppliers and reserving that for domestic companies
(or otherwise preferring them) can facilitate social and economic
development, provide employment and business opportunities for
marginalized or disadvantaged individuals and communities and act as
a ‘wealth redistribution’ tool.” The leaked chapter on government
procurement in the TiSA would open up government purchases that are
subject to public tender, by all government agencies, in any amount.

Thus like the TPP, the TiSA constrains the ability of governments to
set policies that favor environmental job creation policies
advocated for by Trade Unions for Energy Democracy and the call for
a Just Transition developed by the International Trade Union
Confederation (ITUC) and endorsed by We Mean Business, The B Team
and seven major civil society networks including CIDSE (the
international alliance of Catholic development agencies), Friends of
the Earth International, ActionAid International, Greenpeace
International, Christian Aid, WWF and Oxfam International.

[For more, read full article at more at http://tinyurl.com/h6femp2]

*****************************************************

Other relevant recent articles

(snippets only; for full articles see links)

“US Solar Market Prepares for Biggest Quarter in History” Greentech
Media, Dec. 9, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/zj7aho6

GTM Research expects the fourth quarter of this year to be the
largest quarter for solar installations in U.S. history. Led by the
utility-scale segment, the United States will install more than 3
gigawatts. Looking further out, cumulative PV installations will
nearly double between now and the end of 2016, bringing the
nationwide total to 41 gigawatts.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“Africa plans renewable energy drive that could make continent
world’s cleanest,” The Guardian, Dec. 7, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/zubqq8e

The African Renewable Energy Initiative (Arei) plans to develop at
least 10 GW of new renewable energy generation capacity by 2020, and
at least 300 GW by 2030, potentially making the continent the
cleanest in the world.

The International Energy Agency, which has said that Africa is at
the â€œepicentre of the global challenge to overcome energy povertyâ€,
estimates that annual electricity consumption per capita in Africa
for 2012 was around 600 kWh, compared with the world average of
3,064 kWh.

The plan to accelerate solar, hydro, wind and geothermal energy
could see Africa leapfrogging other continents by developing
thousands of small-scale â€œvirtual power stationsâ€ that distribute
electricity via mini-grids and would not require transmission lines,
which involve a loss of up to a quarter of power during the process.

+++++++++++++++++

“More countries reject OECD study of climate aid” The Guardian, Dec.
8, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/jt2zl48

China, Brazil and South Africa have joined India in rejecting a key
OECD study stating that rich countries have already mobilised nearly
two-thirds of the $100bn (Â£67bn) pledged to secure a new climate
deal.

The refusal by the world’s four most powerful developing countries
to accept the methodology used by western economists, to calculate
the money raised for poor countries to adapt to climate change,
suggests that finance will be the major hurdle at the end of the
talks on Friday.

The OECD study claimed that rich countries had already mobilised
$57bn of climate aid in 2013-14, as pledged in 2009. But Indian
government economists have claimed that the OECD study counted loans
made to developing countries and double-counted aid money, putting
the real figure closer to $2bn.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“A secret weapon to fight climate change: dirt” The Washington Post,
Dec. 4, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/z2hf4wd

We think of climate change as a consequence of burning fossil fuels.
But a third of the carbon in the atmosphere today used to be in the
soil, and modern farming is largely to blame. Practices such as the
overuse of chemicals, excessive tilling and the use of heavy
machinery disturb the soil’s organic matter, exposing carbon
molecules to the air, where they combine with oxygen to create
carbon dioxide. Put another way: Human activity has turned the
living and fertile carbon system in our dirt into a toxic
atmospheric gas.

It’s possible to halt and even reverse this process through better
agricultural policies and practices. Unfortunately, the world
leaders who gathered in Paris this past week have paid little
attention to the critical links between climate change and
agriculture. That’s a huge mistake and a missed opportunity. Our
unsustainable farming methods are a central contributor to
greenhouse gas emissions. Climate change, quite simply, cannot be
halted without fixing agriculture.

*****************************************************

Africa/Global: Changing “the Media”

worker | December 1, 2015 | 6:57 pm | Africa, class struggle, political struggle | Comments closed

AfricaFocus Bulletin
December 1, 2015 (151201)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“I’ve thought a lot about the outrage over unequal media coverage
when it comes to attacks in the Western world vs death in ‘other’
black and brown countries. I cringed when Barack Obama called the
Paris attacks an attack on ‘all humanity’–as if brutal attacks in
Pakistan, Lebanon, Nigeria, Kenya and Somalia and Mexico are not
quite up to that benchmark. I agree that we in the media need to do
a better job … [but] I can’t help but think that the ‘Why didn’t
the media care about _____’ stories will come, generate outrage
clicks and shares, and pass, without people really taking the time
to examine their own media consumption habits. … the stories were
written, you just didn’t click.” – Karen Attiah, Nov. 17, 2015

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/clik1512.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=
http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/clik152.php

As Washington Post digital editor Karen Attiah notes, there are
solid grounds for outrage at unequal media coverage of deaths in
different parts of the world. But the outrage often comes without a
differentiated analysis of “the media,” and failure to recognize
that each of us can have some effects on changing that coverage.
Granted that those who can make the most difference are the media
gatekeepers and editors who decide priorities for coverage on a
daily basis. But “the media” most of us have access to today include
not only the so-called “mainstream media,” but also many other forms
of media less restricted by gatekeepers, such as blogs, Facebook,
Youtube, and many more.

Readers and viewers can affect the reach of both mainstream and
other media by clicking, sharing, and other forms of multiplier
actions. In this digital age, mainstream editors must also pay
attention to click counts, and you can have influence by “boosting”
good articles by good journalists, not just complaining about the
bad ones.

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains excerpts from an outstanding set
of articles on the attack in Bamako, Mali, from one prominent
mainstream media outlet, The Washington Post, in the weeks following
Karen Attiah’s Facebook post cited above. So if you care about
Bamako as well as Paris, read these excerpts and also click to read
the full articles on The Washington Post website.

For previous articles by Karen Attiah in the Washington Post, visit
http://tinyurl.com/gqqy8ox

See in particular for related comment on the media:

“How Western media would cover Baltimore if it happened elsewhere,”
by Karen Attiah, April 30, 2015
http://tinyurl.com/zpm7vge

“Stop being angry at Western media for ‘ignoring’ Boko Haram,”
by Karen Attiah, Jan. 16, 2015
http://tinyurl.com/hq8fzc5

Another related article on Mali appeared in the Washington Post on
Nov. 30. “After this monthâ€™s attack in Bamako, what do we know about
fundamentalist Islam in Mali?,” by Sebastian Elischer
http://tinyurl.com/gry4399

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on peace and conflict issues,
visit http://www.africafocus.org/intro-peace.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Facebook post by Karen Attiah, Nov. 17, 2015

http://www.facebook.com/KarenAttiah

I’ve thought a lot about the outrage over unequal media coverage
when it comes to attacks in the Western world vs death in “other”
black and brown countries. I cringed when Barack Obama called the
Paris attacks an attack on “all humanity”–as if brutal attacks in
Pakistan, Lebanon, Nigeria, Kenya and Somalia and Mexico are not
quite up to that benchmark. I agree that we in the media need to do
a better job capturing that humanity in our stories on a regular
basis, not just when an act of mass violence rips lives apart. We
need to care about LIFE in countries and cultures other than our
own.

I can’t help but think that the “Why didn’t the media care about
_____” stories will come, generate outrage clicks and shares, and
pass, without people really taking the time to examine their own
media consumption habits. We didn’t Ignore Garissa. We didn’t ignore
Nigeria. Let me echo my colleagues and say, that the stories were
written, you just didn’t click.

I suggest that for all who are upset at what is perceived as a lack
of coverage of places like Kenya, Nigeria, and Lebanon, now would be
a good time to find, follow, subscribe to, click on, share the
stories of the many journalists who are reporting and writing these
stories in the places you are concerned about and who sometimes risk
life and limb to do so.
The clicks, the shares, the likes, on stories from Africa, from
Latin America, the Middle East–it makes a difference. It tells us
in the media that YOU care about these stories.

**************************************************************

“Extremists stormed the Radisson hotel in Mali’s capital, and at
least 20 people are dead. These resources can help you learn more.”
by Laura Seay and Kim Yi Dionne

Monkey Cage, Washington Post, Nov. 21

http://tinyurl.com/hb7nqqn

[article includes introduction and an extensive list of resources,
with links]

**************************************************************

“Mali’s president declares state of emergency after deadly hotel
attack, National mourning in Mali after gunmen storm luxury hotel,”
by Pamela Constable

Washington Post, Nov. 21, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/oz4622y

[Kevin Sieff in Nairobi contributed to this report.]

Bamako, Mali — On most weekends, every table at the Canoe Club, a
stylish riverside bistro and bar, is reserved long in advance.
Western diplomats and United Nations staffers rub elbows with Malian
officials and business travelers late into the evening, noshing on
paella or pizza and enjoying French wine and champagne.

On Saturday, a day after terrorists invaded the luxury Radisson Blu
hotel in this poor West African capital, taking 130 people hostage
and leaving 21 dead, the Canoe Club was deserted. Idle waiters
repolished glasses or refolded linen napkins. Patrick Aleine, the
chef and co-owner, sat at the empty bar in a despondent funk.

“This is a disaster,” he said, speaking in French. “We have always
tried to make foreigners feel at ease and secure here, and we are
always full. Today, there is not a single customer. Tomorrow, there
is not a single table reserved. I am staying open for now, but if
the foreigners don’t start coming back, the Malians won’t come
either. Then we will be finished.”

On the surface, the crowded, hardscrabble city of nearly 2 million
people appeared to return to normal with astonishing speed so soon
after a horrific terrorist attack.

Motorbike traffic clogged the narrow streets and red-dirt alleys.
Fishermen poled canoes on the Niger River, which divides the
capital. Women with babies on their backs hung laundry outside tin
shanties, sold baskets of fruit or ladled out rice and stew at lunch
stands. Every few hours, the Muslim call to prayer echoed from
mosques scattered across the city.

In the morning, President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita announced a 10-day
state of emergency, giving security officials extra powers to enter
homes without a warrant and to ban public rallies or marches. He
also declared three days of national mourning, acting to tamp down
public reaction to the violence. Police and army troops were
stationed on many corners, and armored pickup trucks full of combat
troops circled the Radisson Blu and other sensitive areas of the
city.

Later, the president visited some victims of the hotel attack in a
local hospital and toured the hotel, accompanied by Prime Minister
Modibo Keita and surrounded by bodyguards. Camera crews, blocked
from following them inside, peered at glass and debris strewn across
the lobby floor. Amid the scrum, a group of grim-faced Western
guests emerged with loads of baggage and were hustled into waiting
SUVs by armed escorts, headed out of the country.

From behind a police barricade, a crowd of young men watched the
scene. Most said they were Muslim, as are 95 percent of Malians.
They expressed anger and consternation at the attack, saying it was
the act of terrorists who did not represent their religion. One
violent regional jihadist group, the Mourabitounes, has claimed
responsibility, and witnesses said that the attackers freed hostages
who could recite the Koran.

“This is not good for us or for our country,” said Mainanto Mamdu,
21, a mechanic. “There is no meaning to what these terrorists are
doing, but it seems they can do whatever they want.”

Nafila Dao, 23, who sells cellphones, said the threat of Islamist
extremism is “everywhere now, and we cannot stop it. We were taught
that Islam is tolerant of all religions and people. These people are
just murderers.”

There was a jittery tone to every conversation and encounter, an
uneasy chill beneath the routine commotion. Many people walked away
nervously when asked about the hotel attack. Despite the new
security measures, many people seemed to feel that their government
was helpless to stop terrorism. Some worried that the close
relationship Mali has long enjoyed with its European allies,
especially France and Belgium, was at stake.

… [article continues at http://tinyurl.com/oz4622y]

A senior police official, whose squad was among the first to reach
the besieged hotel Friday, said Mali and its international allies
must work together to fight extremists. “We are facing a menace to
all countries and all colors,” he said. “I have brave men and they
stopped the guests from panicking, but we cannot defeat these groups
with force. We have to go deeply into their mentality and their
psyche.”

**************************************************************

“Five things you should know about Friday’s terrorist attack in
Mali,” by Susanna D. Wing

Monkey Cage, The Washington Post, Nov. 21, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/nqsnro2

[Susanna D. Wing is associate professor and chair of political
science at Haverford College. She is also the author of the award-
winning book, “Constructing Democracy in Africa: Mali in
Transition.”]

The Radisson Blu hotel in Bamako, Mali, hosted a gathering of first
ladies of West Africa when I was staying there in October 2011. The
regal, powerful women and their attendants dominated the upscale
lobby. The hotel was known for being safe and secure — a
requirement for its diplomatic and business clientele.

In the early morning of Nov. 20, the hotel was the target of a
brazen attack in which gunmen breached the security perimeter of the
hotel, shot a security guard and then took more than 100 people
hostage. Thankfully, most of those hostages escaped. Sadly, many did
not. What are the five things you should know about the Mali and the
attack on the Radisson Blu?

1. The Bamako and Paris attacks are connected, but analysis should
focus less on global terror trends and more on the complicated
history of Mali politics. In the wake of the tragic Paris attacks,
it is tempting to frame the most recent Bamako attack as connected.
While the terrible events in Paris and Bamako are linked because
terrorists in both instances crave the attention that such high-
profile attacks bring to their project, the Malian attack is part of
a more complicated history of insecurity linked to local politics.

Certainly, the Radisson Blu hotel was targeted precisely because it
is a favorite among expatriates. Moreover, a video released this
past October by Iyad Ag Ghali, leader of Mali-based jihadist
organization Ansar Dine, explicitly connects dissatisfaction with
Mali’s political settlement to attacking Mali’s former colonial
master, France. In the video, Ag Ghali claimed those who signed the
Algiers peace accord — a recently brokered peace agreement that
offered partial autonomy to northern Mali — had sold out. Ag Ghali
also praised the January attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris and called
for continued attacks on France.

In recent months, Amadou Koufa, an ally of Ag Ghali, created the
Macina Liberation Front (MLF) and has led attacks against the United
Nations Mission in Mali. In conjunction with Al Mouraboutin, an al-
Qaeda affiliate led by Moktar Belmoktar, it claimed responsibility
for the attack on the Hotel Byblos in SevarÃ© in central Mali
occupied primarily by peacekeepers. The week prior to the attack at
the Radisson, embassies called for increased vigilance in Bamako and
the capital was placed on a heightened terror alert. Al-Mouraboutin
has claimed responsibility for the attack.

2. The French intervention in January 2013 was only effective in the
short term. Following the 2012 coup d’Ã©tat in Mali, the French were
able to rapidly retake Northern territory occupied by extremist
groups such as Ansar Dine, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in
West Africa (MUJAO), and al-Qaeda in the Maghreb (AQIM). Many
Malians applauded the French intervention, and a former French
diplomat claimed that it was a courageous act on the part of
President Francois Hollande. The same diplomat also pointed out that
the intervention ignored the root causes of terrorism and “denied
the troubling reality of Malian politics.” The military response
only temporarily dispersed adherents to the rebel groups who then
splintered and formed new alliances.

The French Operation Serval and subsequent Operation Barkhane did
not include a long-term mandate for achieving stability in Mali. The
French left those tricky issues to be sorted out and moved on to
focus on regional counter-terrorism. However, the political crisis
in Mali is intimately linked to the rise in terrorist activities in
the country.

3. Counter-terrorism campaigns in the Sahel prioritize security and
not politics. The U.S. State Department, in partnership with USAID
and the Department of Defense, has led the Trans-Sahara Counter
Terrorism Partnership (TSCTP). The program has suffered from poor
management, a lack of coordination and slow disbursement of funds.
Some argue that the U.S. program has been a complete failure and,
sadly, the French counterterrorism program in the Sahel is modeled
on the U.S. war on terror.

Mali President Amadou Toumani TourÃ© promoted the flagship Special
Program for Peace, Security and Development in Northern Mali
(PSPSDN) to address insecurity in the North. The program focused
primarily on bolstering security forces at a time when local
populations in the North complained about discrimination by security
personnel and a lack of development funding reaching the region. The
program was rife with corruption and only served to stir up
animosity across the region.

4. The 2015 Algiers Peace Accord was fragile from the start. In June
2015 rebel factions in Mali signed The Algiers Accord with pro-
government groups. Few people had much faith that the accords would
actually bring peace and be fully implemented. Mali has a long
history of peace accords with the Tuareg that have not been fully
implemented. These suspicions were proven warranted when a ceasefire
was broken nearly immediately. Since the accords were signed,
violence has spread southward.

5. Mali’s fragile democracy remains rife with tensions. The conflict
in Mali today is part of ongoing tensions that go back decades
despite the country’s democratic reputation. Mali was considered a
model democracy prior to the March 2012 coup d’Ã©tat. Since
independence, various Tuareg groups pushed for autonomy and the
creation of an independent state of Azawad. The Tuareg are not the
only ethnic group living in northern Mali, in fact, they are a
minority, which complicates the creation of Azawad.

Even before the crisis in 2012, tensions in the capital had been
increasing between those promoting a secular state and those
challenging those ideals. The High Islamic Council of Mali gained
political legitimacy as President Amadou Toumani TourÃ© became
increasingly unpopular. The calls for an Islamic State of Mali, led
by Ansar Dine and others, were an extreme version of this
complicated tension. In response to the attack on the Radisson Blu,
President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita declared three days of national
mourning and a 10-day state of emergency. Commenting on the
terrorist attack, a cellphone merchant in Bamako, Nafila Dao,
proclaimed “We were taught that Islam is tolerant of all religions
and people. These people are just murderers.”

**************************************************************

“Malians defy the threat of terror,” by Pamela Constable

Washington Post, Nov. 22, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/jdpvd6e

[Pamela Constable covers immigration issues and immigrant
communities. A former foreign correspondent for the Post based in
Kabul and New Delhi, she also reports periodically from Afghanistan
and other trouble spots overseas.]

Bamako, Mali — Church bells pealed and wedding music blared across
this West African capital Sunday, as Malians dressed in their vivid
holiday best defied the threat of terror and skirted a state of
emergency to celebrate the rituals of life.

After visiting the luxury hotel where two gunmen shot and killed 19
people after taking about 130 hostage Friday, Senegal’s president
Macky Sall said at a news conference Sunday that a meeting of a West
African regional organization would be held soon to discuss regional
security concerns.

A coalition of separatist groups in northern Mali claimed that the
attack on the Radisson Blu Hotel had been aimed at sabotaging peace
talks they are holding with the Malian government of President
Ibrahim Boubacar Keita. A critical peace meeting was scheduled to be
held at the hotel soon. The group’s leader said jihadist groups are
trying to destroy the country.

The attack has been claimed by al-Mourabitoun, a violent jihadist
group affiliated with al-Qaeda that seeks to drive Western influence
from Mali and has been responsible for a number of other deadly
assaults in the past several years. But experts said the gunmen, who
also died, could be linked to other extremist Islamist groups in the
region, a confusing array of shifting leaders and allegiances.

The social and religious outings held across the capital Sunday were
congenial but not fully carefree, and the hotel siege was still on
everyone’s mind. Some foreign church-goers were accompanied by
bodyguards, and male wedding guests sat and watched with extra
attentiveness as their wives and daughters danced in outdoor tents.

But despite the jolting reminder Friday that Mali and its capital
remain vulnerable to a variety of violent groups — and the
announcements Saturday of a 10-day reduction of civil liberties and
three days of national mourning — thousands of people decided not
to let grief or anxiety ruin their plans.

From mid-morning on, people streamed into churches to sing and pray,
then mingled in the shade afterward to chat. Many women were clad in
brilliant patterned gowns and turbans; some men sported loose tunics
called fokia, printed with colorful drawings of Jesus and Mary or
with phrases from the Bible.

In interviews, some worshipers confined themselves to cautious
platitudes about the future being in God’s hands. But others offered
concerned comments about Islamist violence, which has spread from
the country’s arid north, threatening the social peace that both
minority Christians and majority Muslims have long known in the more
developed south.

“It’s true that we Christians are especially exposed, but so are
moderate Muslims,” said Edmund, 60, a retired airline worker wearing
a tunic with “Glory, hallelujah” written across it. He asked that
his last name not be used. “These terrorists do not speak for God.
It is easy for them to indoctrinate young people in our precarious
societies, with so much poverty and lack of work, but it is a
perversion to promise them a better world through force.”

… [article continues at http://tinyurl.com/jdpvd6e]

Some of the [wedding] celebrations went on for hours, with women in
elaborate party costumes singing and dancing traditional welcomes to
the groom while the bride was hidden nearby, being attended by
friends. At one wedding, an uncle of the bride, dressed in a
ceremonial white cap and robe, watched the festivities with a
satisfied smile and a close eye on the street.

“We are all troubled by this attack, and we know people are dead,
but we must still celebrate the living,” said the uncle, a 56-year-
old office administrator named Sidib Boubacar. “We are a little
limited by the current circumstances,” he added, referring to the
new security restrictions, “but if we stop what we are doing, it
will show we are afraid.”

**************************************************************

France’s war in Mali has not been able to end extremist violence

By Pamela Constable

The Washington Post, Nov. 25, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/obfexxp

Bamako, Mali — Two years after French troops drove jihadist forces
from northern Mali, a deadly attack on a luxury hotel has raised
concerns that Islamist extremists are gaining ground again in this
volatile country, despite a new peace accord among domestic rebel
groups.

While Malian and U.N. officials point to the peace agreement as a
potential milestone in pacifying the lawless, Arab-dominated north,
they also worry that violence could surge again. The weak central
government is struggling with a host of challenges: entrenched
poverty, drug smuggling, and a mix of growing competition and
collaboration among Islamist factions in the West African region.

“Mali today is as fragile as it was before the coup in 2012,” said
Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council in
Washington, referring to the military power grab that occurred as a
rebellion in the north gained strength. France intervened the
following year, after Islamist fighters seized control of a large
chunk of territory.

“The French may have prevented an Islamist takeover, but you can’t
rebuild a hollowed-out state in two years,” Pham said. “The borders
are fictional, and there is a fluid and permeable dynamic among
jihadist, rebel and criminal groups in the region. We are still
playing Whac-A-Mole.”

Few people predict that this nation of 17 million people will become
an Islamist beachhead again. But both Malian and foreign observers
worry that extremist groups based in surrounding countries could
still create turmoil, by capitalizing on domestic discontent here
and on the momentum from recent terrorist attacks in Paris and
elsewhere.

Two jihadist groups have asserted responsibility for last week’s
attack on the Radisson Blu Hotel, which left at least 20 people dead
in the bustling capital, hundreds of miles from the vast desert
region where Islamist militias normally operate. Experts differ on
the possible motive, with U.N. officials insisting the attack was an
effort to derail the peace talks and others suggesting it was part
of a new muscle-flexing rivalry between pro-al-Qaeda and pro-
Islamic-State groups in the region.

There also are conflicting opinions about the best way to contain
the possible comeback of Islamist extremism after two years of rule
by the government of President Ibrahim Boubacar KeÃ¯ta, which is
widely described as democratic but sluggish and corrupt.

Some look to the 8,000-member Malian army to enforce security,
although it is thinly spread and in dire need of reform and training
as well as equipment and funding, analysts say. Others say the key
lies in quickly bringing development, services and jobs to the long-
abandoned north, calling this the only way to prevent large numbers
of unemployed young Muslim men — as well as older ex-rebels from
various tribal separatist groups — from being recruited by well-
financed jihadist groups.

“It is a great achievement that the combatant groups have been
brought together and speak with one voice, but we need to bring
peace dividends — water, electricity, roads, schools — so the
population sees peace making a difference in their lives,” Mongi
Hamdi, the U.N. special representative for Mali, said in an
interview. “That is the glue that will keep people attached to
peace.”

Mali is heavily dependent on the international community for
security and economic survival. A U.N. peacekeeping force with more
than 10,000 troops is stationed here, and a smaller French
counterterrorism force has been based here since 2013. Large amounts
of development aid have come from the United States, France and
other countries. Some critics say the funding has been partly wasted
through corruption, but Hamdi and others argue that even more is
needed to reinforce the writ of the state in conflict areas.

Until now, Mali has been viewed largely as suffering from the
predations of extremist groups spawned in neighboring countries.
Libyan militants thronged into northern Mali after dictator Moammar
Gaddafi was overthrown in 2011, and a notorious Algerian jihadist
leader named Mokhtar Belmokhtar formed the group al-Mourabitoun that
most experts believe planned the Nov. 20 hotel attack.

… [article continues at http://tinyurl.com/obfexxp]

“There is still a positive peace dynamic, but the state is weak and
corrupt, and we have only had a democratic government for two
years,” said Mahamadou Camara, a magazine editor and former press
official in the KeÃ¯ta administration. “The greatest risk we face
today is that the positive momentum will reverse into a new spiral
of violence.”

**************************************************************

“This is what citizens say is needed to end Mali’s insecurity,” by
Jaimie Bleck, Abdoulaye Dembele and Guindo Sidiki

Monkey Cage, The Washington Post, Nov. 27, 2015

http://tinyurl.com/qx9pcq3

Jaimie Bleck is an assistant professor of political science at the
University of Notre Dame. She is also an American Council of Learned
Societies fellow currently conducting research in Mali. Her book
“Education and Empowered Citizenship in Mali” was published earlier
this year.

Abdoulaye Dembele is the national coordinator for the Farafina
Institute in Mali.

Sidiki Guindo is the director of the GISSE Institute for Public
Opinion Polling in Mali and a professor at ENSAE (l’Ecole Nationale
de la Statistique et l’Analyse Economique) in Dakar, Senegal.

On Nov. 20, the world’s eyes turned to Mali once again as 21 people
were killed during an attack at the Radisson hotel in Bamako, the
country’s capital. Many more were trapped in the building until
Malian Special Forces led a joint raid and killed two assailants.
Two different groups have claimed credit for the attack and two
arrests were made Thursday, but at the time of writing there is
still speculation as to which actors were responsible and an
unspecified number of accomplices are still at large.

The siege of the Radisson was only the most recent attack against
civilians in a wave of instability that has struck the country since
an insurgency began in northern Mali in early 2012. Mali continues
to face widespread insecurity despite a French intervention (in
2013), the restoration of presidential and legislative elections
(also 2013), the ongoing presence of more than 12,000 international
troops, and the recent signing of peace accords in June 2015. An
increase in attacks in Mali against U.N. forces over the last two
years has earned the peacekeeping mission there the dubious
distinction of being the “world’s most dangerous.”

In trying to understand the crisis, we return to the summer of 2013
— before the elections that ushered Ibrahim Boubacar Keita (IBK) in
as president — and ended more than a year of junta rule. At that
time, more than 500,000 citizens had fled Northern Mali. We surveyed
nearly 900 internally displaced persons who fled to Bamako as well
as SÃ©varÃ© and Mopti, twin cities that acted as an unofficial
dividing line between the government-controlled south and the north
at the height of its rebel occupation. We note that our study
population is not representative of all who fled; for instance, they
are typically more pro-government than those who fled to camps in
Mauritania.

When asked to name solutions to the crisis in Mali, the largest
percentage of displaced people — over 40 percent — referenced the
importance of improving governance and reducing corruption. In other
words, the most popular idea to resolve the crisis pointed not to a
security response but to government reform.

… [article continues at http://tinyurl.com/qx9pcq3]

As the Malian government and international donors seek to understand
what led to the attack and how to prevent other similar tragedies in
the future, the testimony of ordinary citizens suggests the need for
a broader reflection on the strength and evolution of state
institutions. While even the strongest states are vulnerable to
these acts of terror, forgetting the importance of a capable and
well-governed state risks trapping Mali in a cycle of crisis.

*****************************************************

Africa/Global: Follow the money

worker | November 11, 2015 | 7:50 pm | Africa, Analysis, class struggle, Economy, political struggle | Comments closed

AfricaFocus Bulletin
November 11, 2015 (151111)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“New research from the Tax Justice Network shows that the gap
between where companies pay tax and where they really do their
business is huge … even developed countries with state-of-the-art
tax legislation and well-equipped tax authorities cannot stop
multinationals dodging their tax without a thorough reform of the
global tax system. … [these practices have] a relatively greater
impact on developing countries, whose public revenues are more
dependent on the taxation of large businesses.”

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/iff1511.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=
http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/iff1511.php

Two new reports, briefly excerpted in this AfricaFocus Bulletin,
shed light on the complex global systems of tax evasion and tax
avoidance which are draining resources from public needs in both
rich and poor countries. While giant companies and the super-rich
move their money around the world in secrecy, the system is obscured
both by secrecy and by deceptive language.

Thus, according to the highly regarded and well-publicized
Corruption Perception Index from Transparency International,
Switzerland, Hong Kong, the United States, Singapore, Luxembourg,
Germany, and the United Kingdom are all among the 20 “least corrupt
countries” in the world. Yet the less-well-known Financial Secrecy
Index, from Tax Justice Network, also places them among the top 15
“secrecy jurisdictions” (also known as “tax havens”) which serve as
the essential “enablers” of corruption and of illicit financial
flows by multinational corporations.

Similarly, there is no doubt that Africa and other developing
regions are hardest hit by this global tax abuse, while they have
the most urgent needs for investment in public goods. But a new
report by the Global Tax Justice Network and other civil society
groups shows that rich countries themselves are also major losers,
as corporations shift profits from one rich country to another (as
well as to smaller smaller jurisdictions fitting the stereotype of
“tax havens”). In 2012 U.S. multinationals alone shifted between
$500-$700 billion dollars out of the country, or roughly 25 percent
of their annual profits.

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on tax justice and related
issues, visit http://www.africafocus.org/intro-iff.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Financial Secrecy Index 2015 reveals improving global financial
transparency, but USA threatens progress

Tax Justice Network

Press Release

http://www.taxjustice.net/

Nov 2, 2015

European Union moves furthest with reforms; USA causes great
concern; and developing countries are (as usual) reaping few
benefits.

Today the Tax Justice Network launches the 2015 Financial Secrecy
Index, the biggest ever survey of global financial secrecy. This
unique index combines a secrecy score with a weighting to create a
ranking of the secrecy jurisdictions and countries that most
actively promote secrecy in global finance.

Most countries’ secrecy scores have improved. Real action is being
taken to curb financial secrecy, as the OECD rolls out a system of
automatic information exchange (AIE) where countries share relevant
information to tackle tax evasion. The EU is starting to crack open
shell companies by creating central registers of beneficial owners
and making that information available to anyone with a legitimate
interest. The EU is also requiring multinationals to provide
country-by-country financial data.

But these global and regional initiatives are flawed and face
sabotage by lobbies that have already weakened them. Secrecy-related
financial activity risks being shifted to other areas such as the
all-important trusts sector, where no serious action is being taken
despite promises made by the G8 in 2013, and shell companies, where
many secrecy jurisdictions such as Dubai, the British Virgin Islands
or Nevada in the U.S. are refusing to open up.

The FSI Top 10

1. Switzerland
2. Hong Kong
3. USA
4. Singapore
5. Cayman
6. Luxembourg
7. Lebanon
8. Germany
9. Bahrain
10. Dubai / UAE

[Note from AfricaFocus Editor: African countries on the list rank as
follows: Mauritius 23; Liberia 33; Ghana 48; South Africa 61;
Botswana 62; Seychelles 72]

Crucially, even in those areas where there has been progress,
developing countries are largely being sidelined: OECD countries are
the main beneficiaries.

Our analysis also reveals that the United States is the jurisdiction
of greatest concern, having made few concessions and posing serious
threats to emerging transparency initiatives. Rising from sixth to
third place in our index, the US is one of the few whose secrecy
score worsened after 2013. Switzerland stays at the top of the index
and for good reason: despite what you may have heard, Swiss banking
secrecy is far from dead, though it has curbed its secrecy somewhat.
The United Kingdom also remains a huge concern. While its own
secrecy is moderate, its global network of secrecy jurisdictions â€“
the Crown Dependencies and Overseas Territories â€“ still operate in
deep secrecy and have, for instance, not co-operated in creating
public registers of beneficial ownership. The UK has failed to
address this effectively, though it has the power to do so.

The progress: a scorecard

Since the global financial crisis emerged in 2008, governments have
sought to curb budget deficits by cracking down on offshore
corporate and individual tax cheating and financial crimes by the
world’s wealthiest citizens. Campaigners have shown them the way and
the sea change in the political climate has been remarkable.
Progress has come in three main areas.

* Twelve years ago the tax justice movement created country-by-
country reporting (CbCR), a measure that can shine a lightÂ country
where they operate, including tax havens. They told us CbCR would
never happen: it is now endorsed at G20 level and the first schemes
to implement it are in place. However, we are concerned that CbCR
cannot work unless the information is made publicly available.

* Just four years ago they laughed at us for pushing the concept of
automatic information exchange (AIE), where countries routinely
share information about each others’ taxpayers so they can be taxed
appropriately. AIE is now being rolled out worldwide.

* They said we at TJN were crazy to contemplate public registries of
beneficial ownership (BO), to crack open shell companies and ensure
that businesses, governments and the public know who they are
dealing with, and to provide the basis for effective AIE. Beneficial
ownership registries are now endorsed at G20 level: we now need a
big political push to make them a reality and bring this information
into the public domain.

Of these areas most progress has been made on AIE, with several
schemes emerging. Though the G20 had mandated the OECD to create a
country-by-country reporting standard, what it came up with has
fallen well short, victim of heavy lobbying behind the scenes by
U.S. multinationals in particular. Finally, the UK has passed
legislation to create a public register of company beneficial
ownership information, and the EU has required all member states to
make beneficial ownership information available to anyone with a
legitimate interest. However, little progress has been made towards
creating an effective form of public registry for offshore trusts.

These broad changes are welcome, and we are pleased to see the EU
leading the way: even some of Europe’s historically worst secrecy
jurisdictions, such as Luxembourg and Austria, are engaging.

The EU’s leadership role, however, is called into question by recent
resistance, spearheaded by Germany, to block public access to CbCR
data and prevent expansion of CbC reporting beyond the banking and
extractives sectors. (Read more about the current EU-level
negotiations here.)

Almost all of the progress to date has arisen from public pressure.
To counter the lobbies that constantly seek to undermine progress,
sustained political grass roots pressure is indispensable.

The backsliding

Yet huge problems remain.

None of these initiatives take the interests of developing countries
sufficiently into account. They haven’t been centrally involved in
setting the rules, and most will see little if any benefit. (Note,
too, that secrecy is just part of a wider charge sheet against tax
havens, as the box above explains.)

Meanwhile, even progress to date is under threat:

* Private sector ‘enablers’ and recalcitrant jurisdictions like
Dubai and the Bahamas are beavering away finding exclusions and
loopholes, being picky about which countries they’ll exchange
information with, and simply disregarding the rules.

* The United States’ hypocritical stance of seeking to protect
itself against foreign tax havens while preserving itself as a tax
haven for residents of other countries needs to be countered. The
European Union must take the lead here by imposing a 35 percent
withholding tax on EU-sourced payments to U.S. and other non-
compliant financial institutions, in the same way as the U.S. FATCA
scheme does; and this should become global standard practice.

* The UK has been playing a powerful blocking role to protect its
huge, slippery and dangerous trusts sector, probably the biggest
hole in the entire global transparency agenda. See below for more
details.

The next section gives a brief description of the biggest players in
the secrecy world today.

FSI 2015: the big players

[See full press release for more details on each country

* Switzerland (first place)

* United States (3rd place)

* United Kingdom [not in top ten, but “supports a network of secrecy
jurisdictions around the world.” If counted together, would be first
place]

* Hong Kong [2nd place]

* Singapore [4th place]

* Cayman Islands [5th place]

* Luxembourg [6th place]

* Lebanon [7th place]

* Germany [8th place]

* Bahrain [9th place]

* Dubai [10th place]

******************************************************

About the Financial Secrecy Index

http://www.financialsecrecyindex.com/

The Financial Secrecy Index ranks jurisdictions according to their
secrecy and the scale of their offshore financial activities. A
politically neutral ranking, it is a tool for understanding global
financial secrecy, tax havens or secrecy jurisdictions, and illicit
financial flows or capital flight. The index was launched on
November 2, 2015.

Shining light into dark places

An estimated $21 to $32 trillion of private financial wealth is
located, untaxed or lightly taxed, in secrecy jurisdictions around
the world. Secrecy jurisdictions – a term we often use as an
alternative to the more widely used term tax havens – use secrecy to
attract illicit and illegitimate or abusive financial flows.

Illicit cross-border financial flows have been estimated at $1-1.6
trillion per year: dwarfing the US$135 billion or so in global
foreign aid. Since the 1970s African countries alone have lost over
$1 trillion in capital flight, while combined external debts are
less than $200 billion. So Africa is a major net creditor to the
world – but its assets are in the hands of a wealthy Ã©lites,
protected by offshore secrecy; while the debts are shouldered by
broad African populations.

Yet all rich countries suffer too. For example, European countries
like Greece, Italy and Portugal have been brought to their partly
knees by decades of tax evasion and state looting via offshore
secrecy.

A global industry has developed involving the world’s biggest banks,
law practices, accounting firms and specialist providers who design
and market secretive offshore structures for their tax- and law-
dodging clients. ‘Competition’ between jurisdictions to provide
secrecy facilities has, particularly since the era of financial
globalisation really took off in the 1980s, become a central feature
of global financial markets.

The problems go far beyond tax. In providing secrecy, the offshore
world corrupts and distorts markets and investments, shaping them in
ways that have nothing to do with efficiency. The secrecy world
creates a criminogenic hothouse for multiple evils including fraud,
tax cheating, escape from financial regulations, embezzlement,
insider dealing, bribery, money laundering, and plenty more. It
provides multiple ways for insiders to extract wealth at the expense
of societies, creating political impunity and undermining the
healthy ‘no taxation without representation’ bargain that has
underpinned the growth of accountable modern nation states. Many
poorer countries, deprived of tax and haemorrhaging capital into
secrecy jurisdictions, rely on foreign aid handouts.

This hurts citizens of rich and poor countries alike.

What is the significance of this index?

In identifying the most important providers of international
financial secrecy, the Financial Secrecy Index reveals that
traditional stereotypes of tax havens are misconceived. The world’s
most important providers of financial secrecy harbouring looted
assets are mostly not small, palm-fringed islands as many suppose,
but some of the world’s biggest and wealthiest countries Rich OECD
member countries and their satellites are the main recipients of or
conduits for these illicit flows.

The implications for global power politics are clearly enormous, and
help explain why for so many years international efforts to crack
down on tax havens and financial secrecy were so ineffective, it is
the recipients of these gigantic inflows that set the rules of the
game.

Yet our analysis also reveals that recently things have genuinely
started to improve. The global financial crisis and ensuing economic
crisis, combined with recent activism and exposure of these problems
by civil society actors and the media, and rising concerns about
inequality in many countries, have created a set of political
conditions unparalleled in history. The world’s politicians have
been forced to take notice of tax havens. For the first time since
we first created our index in 2009, we can say that something of a
sea change is underway.

World leaders are now routinely talking about the scourges of
financial secrecy and tax havens, and putting into place new
mechanisms to tackle the problem. For the first time the G20
countries have mandated the OECD to put together a new global system
of automatic information exchange to help countries find out about
the cross-border holdings of their taxpayers and criminals. This
scheme is now being rolled out, with first information due to be
exchanged in 2017.

Yet of course these schemes are full of loopholes and shortcomings:
many countries are planning to pay only lip service to them, if that
— and many are actively seeking ways to undermine progress, with
the help of a professional infrastructure of secrecy enablers. The
edifice of global financial secrecy has been weakened – but it
remains fully alive and hugely destructive. Despite what you may
have read in the media, Swiss banking secrecy is far from dead.
Without sustained political pressure from millions of people, the
momentum could be lost.

The only realistic way to address these problems comprehensively is
to tackle them at root: by directly confronting offshore secrecy and
the global infrastructure that creates it. A first step towards this
goal is to identify as accurately as possible the jurisdictions that
make it their business to provide offshore secrecy.

This is what the FSI does. It is the product of years of detailed
research by a dedicated team, and there is nothing else like it out
there. We also have a set of unique reports outlining detailed
offshore histories of the biggest players in the game.

************************************************

Global Alliance for Tax Justice

G20 among biggest losers in large-scale tax abuse â€“ but poor
countries relatively hardest hit

Press Release

[Excerpt. Full press release & related reports available at
http://www.globaltaxjustice.org | direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/pcbgoyw]

November 10, 2015

G20 countries are among the biggest losers when US multinationals
avoid paying taxes where they do business. This is the main finding
of ‘Still Broken’ a new report on the global tax system released by
the Tax Justice Network, Oxfam, Global Alliance for Tax Justice and
Public Services International in advance of the G20 leaders’ meeting
in Turkey.

Overall it is estimated that, in order to reduce their tax bills, US
multinationals shifted between $500 and 700 billionâ€”a quarter of
their annual profitsâ€”out of the United States, Germany, the United
Kingdom and elsewhere to a handful of countries including the
Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland, Switzerland and Bermuda in 2012.
In the same year, US multinational companies reported US$ 80 billion
of profits in Bermuda â€“ more than their profits reported in Japan,
China, Germany and France combined.

Claire Godfrey, head of policy for Oxfam’s Even it Up Campaign said:
“Rich and poor countries alike are haemorrhaging money because
multinational companies are not required to pay their fair share of
taxes where they make their money. Ultimately the cost is being
borne by ordinary people â€“ particularly the poorest who rely on
public services and who are suffering because of budget cuts.”

Rosa Pavanelli, general secretary of Public Services International
said: “Public anger will grow if the G20 leaders allow the world’s
largest corporations to continue dodging billions in tax while
inequality rises, austerity bites and public services are cut.”

The G20 Heads of State are expected to consider a package of
measures they claim will address corporate tax avoidance at their
annual meeting in Turkey on 15 and 16 November.

Alex Cobham, director of research at Tax Justice Network, said: “The
corporate tax measures being adopted by the G20 this week are not
enough. They will not stop the race to the bottom in corporate
taxation, and they will not provide the transparency that’s needed
to hold companies and tax authorities accountable. It’s in the G20’s
own interest to support deeper reforms to the global tax system.”

Twelve countries â€“ the United States, Germany, Canada, China,
Brazil, France, Mexico, India, UK, Italy, Spain and Australia â€“
account for roughly 90 percent of all missing profits from US
multinationals. For example, US multinationals make 65 percent of
their sales, employ 66 percent of their staff and hold 71 percent of
their assets in America but declare only 50 percent of their profits
in the country.

While G20 countries lose the largest amount of money, low income
developing countries such as Honduras, the Philippines and Ecuador
are hardest hit because corporate tax revenues comprise a higher
proportion of their national income. It is estimated, for example,
that Honduras could increase healthcare or education spending by
10-15 percent if the practice of profit shifting by US
multinationals was stopped.

Dereje Alemayehu, chair of the Global Alliance for Tax Justice said:
“If big G20 economies with well-developed tax legislation and well-
supported tax authorities cannot put a stop to corporate tax abuse,
what hope have poor countries with less well-resourced tax
administrations? Poor countries need a seat at the table in
negotiations on future tax reforms to ensure that they can claim tax
revenues which are desperately needed to tackle poverty and
inequality.”

The Tax Justice Network, Oxfam, Global Alliance for Tax Justice and
Public Services International are calling on the G20 to support
further reforms to the global tax system that involve all countries
on an equal footing. These reforms should effectively tackle harmful
tax practices such as profit shifting and the use of corporate tax
havens and should halt the race to the bottom in general corporate
tax rates.

Summary of report

In 2013 the OECD, supported by the G20, promised to bring an end to
international corporate tax avoidance which costs countries around
the world billions in tax revenues each year. However, with the
recently announced actions against corporate tax dodging, G20 and
OECD countries have failed to live up to their promise. Despite some
meaningful actions, they have left the fundamentals of a broken tax
system intact and failed to curb tax competition and harmful tax
practices.

It is often assumed that the richest and largest economies, home to
most of the world’s multinationals, defend the current system
because it is in their interests.

However, new research from the Tax Justice Network1 shows that the
gap between where companies pay tax and where they really do their
business is huge and that among the biggest losers are G20 countries
themselves, including the US, UK, Germany, Japan, France, Mexico,
India, and Spain. This shows that even developed countries with
state-of-the-art tax legislation and well-equipped tax authorities
cannot stop multinationals dodging their tax without a thorough
reform of the global tax system.

Profit shifting to reduce taxes is happening on a massive scale. In
2012, US multinationals alone shifted $500â€“700bn, or roughly 25
percent of their annual profits, mostly to countries where these
profits are not taxed, or taxed at very low rates. In other words,
$1 out of every $4 of profits generated by these multinationals is
not aligned with real economic activity.

Large corporations and wealthy elites exploit the rigged
international tax system to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.
This practice has a relatively greater impact on developing
countries, whose public revenues are more dependent on the taxation
of large businesses. Recent IMF research indicates that revenue loss
to developing countries is 30 percent higher than for OECD countries
as a result of the base erosion and profit shifting activities of
multinational companies.

Tax avoidance is a key factor in the rapid rise in extreme
inequality seen in recent years. As governments are losing tax
revenues, ordinary people end up paying the price: schools and
hospitals lose funding and vital public services are cut. Fair
taxation of profitable businesses and rich people is central to
addressing poverty and inequality through the redistribution of
income. Instead, the current global system of tax avoidance
redistributes wealth upwards to the richest in society.

That is why civil society organizations, united in the C20 group,
together with trade unions, are calling for the actions announced by
the OECD to be regarded only as the beginning of a longer and more
inclusive process to re-write global tax rules and to ensure that
multinationals pay their fair share, in the interest of developed
and developing countries around the world.

Considering the enormous losses that countries around the world
incur, it is alarming that the G20 seems fairly satisfied with the
current agenda. Governments and citizens of G20 countries should
wake up, face the facts and take additional action immediately.

*****************************************************

******************************************************

South Sudan: Hard-Hitting Report from the African Union

worker | October 28, 2015 | 9:37 pm | Africa, Analysis, political struggle | Comments closed

AfricaFocus Bulletin
October 28, 2015 (151028)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“Based on its inquiry, the Commission finds that there are
reasonable grounds to believe that acts of murder, rape and sexual
violence, torture and other inhumane acts of comparable gravity,
outrages upon personal dignity, targeting of civilian objects and
protected property, as well as other abuses, have been committed by
both sides to the conflict.”

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/ssud1510.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/ssud1510.php

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains excerpts from the introduction
and executive summary of the report, which was completed a year ago
but only released this month, after extensive internal consideration
by the African Union. The report is published in full, with the
exception of a confidential list of alleged perpetrators submitted
to the AU Peace and Security Council.

Although these excerpts focus on accountability for human rights
violations, the report also contains in-depth analysis and
recommendations on other fundamental issues of state-building, as
well as on continued engagement by the African Union, other
international institutions, and Sudanese civil society and
governmental institutions. In addition, there is a separate opinion
by one of the commissioners, Dr. Mahmood Mamdani, with very
substantive additional analysis. Your editor has not yet read the
full report (315 pages) and separate opinion (60 pages), but both
clearly warrant careful attention not just for their analysis of
South Sudan but also for their critical approach to international
peace-building initiatives more generally.

For other news on South Sudan, visit http://allafrica.com/southsudan
and http://sudantribune.com/

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on South Sudan, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/country/southsudan.php

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on peace and security, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/intro-peace.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Final Report of the African Union Commission of Inquiry on South
Sudan

AU Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia P. O. Box 3243 Telephone: +251 11 551 7700 /
+251 11 518 25 58/ Ext 2558

Website: http://www.au.int/en/auciss

[excerpts from executive summary; full executive summary and
full report available at http://www.peaceau.org/en/article/abc]

A. Introduction

1. As part of its response to the crisis in South Sudan, the Peace
and Security Council of the African Union (AU), at its 411th meeting
held at the level of Heads of State and Government, in Banjul, The
Gambia, on 30 December 2013, mandated the establishment of the
Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan (AUCISS). In the said
communiquÃ©, the PSC requested: […] the Chairperson of the
Commission, in consultation with the Chairperson of the African
Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) and other relevant
AU structures, to urgently establish a Commission to investigate the
human rights violations and other abuses committed during the armed
conflict in South Sudan and make recommendations on the best ways
and means to ensure accountability, reconciliation and healing among
all South Sudanese communities. Council requests that the above-
mentioned Commission submit its report to Council within a maximum
period of three months.

a) To investigate the human rights violations and other abuses
committed during the armed conflict in South Sudan;

b) To investigate the causes underlying the violations;

c) To make recommendations on the best ways and means to ensure
accountability, reconciliation and healing among all South Sudanese
communities with a view to deterring and preventing the occurrence
of the violations in future; and

d) To make recommendations on how to move the country forward in
terms of unity, cooperation and sustainable development;

e) To submit a report within a maximum period of three (3) months.

3. Pursuant to the AUPSC CommuniquÃ©, the Commission adopted the
Terms of Reference (ToR) detailed in the Concept Note Relating to
the Establishment of the AUCISS are to:

a) Establish the immediate and remote causes of the conflict;

b) Investigate human rights violations and other abuses during the
conflict by all parties from 15 December 2013;

c) Establish facts and circumstances that may have led to and that
amount to such violations and of any crimes that may have been
perpetrated;

d) Compile information based on these investigations and in so doing
assist in identifying perpetrators of such violations and abuses
with a view to ensuring accountability for those responsible;

e) Compile information on institutions and process or lack thereof
that may have aided or aggravated the conflict resulting in
violations of human rights and other abuses;

f) To examine ways on how to move the country forward in terms of
unity, cooperation and sustainable development;

g) Present a comprehensive written report on the overall situation
South Sudan to the African Union Peace and Security Council within a
period of three (3) months from the commencement of its activities.

h) Make recommendations based on the investigation on the following:

* appropriate mechanisms to prevent a recurrence of the conflict;

* mechanisms to promote national healing and cohesiveness,
particularly focusing on the need for all South Sudanese communities
to live together in peace;

* modalities for nation building, specifically focused on building
of a functional political order, democratic institutions and post-
conflict reconstruction;

* accountability mechanisms for gross violations of human rights and
other egregious abuses to ensure that those responsible for such
violations are held to account.

4. The Commission interpreted its mandate to consist of four focal
areas: healing, reconciliation, accountability and institutional
reforms. The Commission approached its mandate in a holistic manner,
emphasizing the interrelatedness of the mandate areas.

5. Following consultations, the Chairperson of the AU Commission
formally announced the creation of the AUCISS on 7 March 2014 at the
Headquarters of the African Union. The Commission is constituted as
follows:

The Chairperson:

i) H.E. Olusegun Obasanjo, Former President of the Republic of
Nigeria.

Other members of the Commission:

ii) Lady Justice Sophia A.B Akuffo, Judge of the Supreme Court of
Ghana, President of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights.

iii) Professor Mahmood Mamdani, Professor and Executive Director,
Makerere Institute of Social Research, Makerere University, Kampala,
Uganda, Herbert Lehman Professor of Government, Columbia University.

iv) Ms. Bineta Diop, President, of Femmes Africa SolidaritÃ© (FAS),
AU Chairperson’s Special Envoy on Women, Peace and Security.

v) Professor Pacifique Manirakiza, Professor of Law, University of
Ottawa and Member, African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights

6. The Commission was sworn in on March 12, 2014 and thereafter
adopted a programme of work.

…

21. During the first three months following its constitution, the
Commission conducted several missions to South Sudan and
neighbouring countries during the following dates; April 16
(Khartoum), April 23-30 (Juba), May 10-15 (Kenya), May 15-18
(Uganda); May 26-June 4 (South Sudan: Juba, Bor, Bentiu and
Malakal), June 5-7 (Kenya: Kakuma Refugee Camp) and Khartoum; and 20
July – 11 August (Unity, Upper Nile, Jonglei, Central Equatoria
State, Western Equatoria State, Lakes State, Western Bahr el Ghazar
State, Northern Bahr el Ghazal State, Warrap State and Eastern
Equatoria State).

22. The Commission was granted an extension of time of 3 months by
the decision of the 23rd Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the AU
held in Malabo from 26 to 27 June 2014 following the presentation of
its Interim Report to the Assembly of Heads of States and
Government. The Commission’s request for extension of time was
justified by the need to conduct more extensive consultations with
different sectors of South Sudanese Society in all the 10 states as
well as the Diaspora (Kenya, Uganda, Switzerland, United Kingdom)
and to finalize investigations. During this second phase of the
Commission’s work, the Commission covered the entire country between
July and August in its efforts to ensure that all parts of the
society – particularly those parts of the country that were not the
specific theatres of violence but had been, inevitably, affected by
the conflict – were given the opportunity not only to offer their
perspectives on the background to the crisis but to also air their
views on the way forward for the country.

…

*******************************************************

II. Examination of Human Rights Violations and Other Abuses During
the Conflict: Accountability

125. The Commission’s inquiry and investigations focused not only on
the key areas in the four states that have been the main theatres of
violence but also extended to other places where violations could
have occurred or where relevant evidence may be found. The sites of
investigations included Juba and its environs, Bor (Jonglei), Bentiu
(Unity), Malakal (Upper Nile), rural areas surrounding these major
towns, and Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. Time constraints precluded
visits to refugee camps in Ethiopia (Gambella), Sudan, and Uganda.
Site visits to alleged theatres of violence were undertaken where
permitted. In particular, the Commission visited Gudele joint
operation centre, Tiger Battalion barracks, Juba Teaching Hospital,
New Site burial site, Giyada Military Hospital, Bor Teaching
Hospital, St Andrews burial site, Bor burial site, Malakal Teaching
Hospital and Malakal burial site. Forensic reviews of the stated
sites were undertaken and documentation carried out. Witness or
survivor injuries were also examined by the forensic doctors and
forensic evidence was collected at crime scenes or incident sites.

Findings Relating to Violations of Human Rights and Other Abuses
(violations IHL)

126. The Commission found cases of sexual and gender based violence
committed by both parties against women. It also documented extreme
cruelty exercised through mutilation of bodies, burning of bodies,
draining human blood from people who had just been killed and
forcing others from one ethnic community to drink the blood or eat
burnt human flesh. Such claims were registered during interviews of
witnesses of crimes committed in Juba. Elsewhere, witnesses of
crimes committed in Bor Town, also provided evidence of brutal
killings and cruel mutilations of dead bodies. In Malakal town,
reports of abduction and disappearance of women from churches and
the hospital where communities had sought refuge during the
hostilities that began in December 2013 were rife. In Unity State,
Bentiu, the capital has been the focus of much of the fighting,
having changed hands several times between government and opposition
soldiers during the course of the conflict. Bentiu town is largely
destroyed. In Leer county, the Commission heard testimony of
civilians, including children and teenagers killed, houses, farms
and cattle burned, and of sexual violence.

127. Overall, the Commission found that while there was limited
active conflict in all states visited, tensions remain high in the
three most conflict affected states of Upper Nile, Unity and
Jonglei. Many respondents talked of fear and all stakeholders and
interlocutors noted a level of anxiety of an impending attack by one
side or the other. Life for civilians in all three state capitals of
Malakal, Bentiu and Bor has not fully returned to normal. The
majority of civilians remain either in UNMISS protection of civilian
sites (POCs) or in inaccessible locations in the surrounding
villages and rural areas. Guarantees of security remain a great
concern for civilians.

128. The Commission found that most of the atrocities were carried
out against civilian populations taking no active part in the
hostilities. Places of religion and hospitals were attacked,
humanitarian assistance was impeded, towns pillaged and destroyed,
places of protection were attacked and there was testimony of
possible conscription of children under 15 years old.

129. The Commission found that unlawful killings of civilians or
soldiers who were believed to be hors de combat (no longer taking
part in hostilities), were committed in and around Juba. The people
killed were either found during the house to house searches or
captured at roadblocks.

130. The Commission found that violations of human rights and other
abuses in relation to massive and indiscriminate attacks against
civilians and civilian property were carried out in Bor town.
Visible evidence of torched non- military objects like houses,
market place, administration houses, hospital and hospitals form the
basis of the Commission’s conclusion that these crimes were
committed. The Commission also found that civilians were targeted in
Malakal, which was under the control of both parties at different
times during the conflict. Serious violations were committed in
Malakal Teaching Hospital through the killings of civilians and
women were raped at the Malakal Catholic Church between 18th and
27th February 2014. In Bentiu the Commission heard testimony of the
extremely violent nature of the rape of women and girls – that in
some instances involved maiming and dismemberment of limbs.
Testimony from women in UNMISS PoC Site in Unity State detailed
killings, abductions, disappearances, rapes, beatings, stealing by
forces and being forced to eat dead human flesh.

131. Based on its inquiry, the Commission finds that there are
reasonable grounds to believe that acts of murder, rape and sexual
violence, torture and other inhumane acts of comparable gravity,
outrages upon personal dignity, targeting of civilian objects and
protected property, as well as other abuses, have been committed by
both sides to the conflict.

132. The Commission found that the context in which these violations
and crimes were committed is a non-international armed conflict
(NIAC) involving governmental (and allied) forces and SPLM/IO
fighters.

133. The Commission’s investigations as well as information received
from various sources, including its consultations, leads the
Commission to conclude that there are reasonable grounds to believe
that serious violations of human rights have occurred and that
serious violence of other abuses have also occurred, which, given
the context in which they have occurred – may amount to violations
of international humanitarian law.

Finding on the Crime of Genocide

134. The Commission finds that based on the information available to
it, there are no reasonable grounds to believe that the crime of
genocide has occurred.

135. Despite the seeming ethnic nature of the conflict in South
Sudan, the Commission, during its consultations with various groups
and individuals did not have any reasonable grounds to believe that
the crime of genocide was committed during the conflict that broke
out on December 15, 2013.

Recommendations Relating to Violations of Human Rights and Other
Abuses (Violations of IHL)

136. The Commission recommends the establishment of an ad hoc
African legal mechanism under the aegis of the African Union which
is Africa led, Africa owned, Africa resourced with the support of
the international community, particularly the United Nations to
bring those who bear the greatest responsibility at the highest
level to account. Such a mechanism should include South Sudanese
judges and lawyers. The Commission has identified possible alleged
perpetrators that might bear the greatest responsibility using the
standard of ‘reasonable grounds’ to believe that gross violations of
human rights and other abuses have occurred during the conflict (see
the highly confidential list not publicly available as part of this
report).

137. The Commission believes that with appropriate reforms, both
military and civilian justice can and should contribute to
establishing accountability. The Commission therefore recommends
that immediate reforms of civilian and military justice be
initiated. While it is believed that a long-term reform process of
the judiciary is necessary (see section recommendations related to
the judiciary above), a minimalist approach can be adopted with
respect to the criminal justice system.

138. Based on the central role played by customary justice in
facilitating access to justice in South Sudan, and the views
expressed by South Sudanese that this institution must play a role
in reconciliation at community level, the Commission recommends that
an appropriate role should be fashioned for traditional justice and
conflict resolution mechanisms, to be established in relationship
with formal accountability processes as well as the peace and the
national healing, peace and reconciliation. The Rwandan experience
with Gacaca could be instructive.

139. The Commission’s inquiry established that South Sudanese
traditional justice mechanisms combine retributive and restorative
remedies which include payment of compensation in modes acceptable
by litigants, often cattle. The notion of civil accountability i.e.
compensation to an individual for loss suffered, is indeed one of
the key features of South Sudan’s indigenous justice systems. More
importantly, the moral authority and legitimacy inherent in the
traditional systems, as understood and valued by the South Sudanese
people has a valuable role to play in healing and reconciliation and
appeasing the deeply felt grievance occasioned by violations
suffered by individuals and communities.

140. The Commission therefore recommends the creation of a national
reparations fund and programme linked appropriately to these
traditional justice mechanisms, to benefit victims of gross human
rights violations. Eligibility for reparative measures undertaken
(including rehabilitation and psychosocial assistance should not be
limited to the period to which the Commission’s mandate relates
(from December 15, 2013) but can include victims of past human
rights violations. While certain elements, particularly psychosocial
assistance and other appropriate forms of interim reparations should
be implemented immediately the broader reparations programme can be
linked to the work of a future Truth Commission.

Findings Relating to Healing and Reconciliation

141. The Commission found that the multiple conflicts and repeated
violations of human rights experienced in South Sudan have wrecked
relations between and among communities, and generated many victims.
It also established that the policy of amnesty adopted by the
government after the signing of the CPA left the past unexamined,
conflicts unresolved and their impacts, partly represented in
victims and survivors of human rights violations unaddressed.

142. The crisis has occasioned massive displacement of South
Sudanese (a reported 1.5m). Many of those displaced have live in
multiple protection sites and IDP camps around the country while
others have taken refuge in neighbouring countries.

143. The Commission’s consultations disclosed that many South
Sudanese take the view that reconciliation is dependent upon
justice, which is broader than criminal justice. The view was
expressed that those who have committed atrocities should be
prosecuted, and that victims and communities are unlikely to embrace
reconciliation otherwise, given the culture of impunity in South
Sudan. Recommendations Relating to Healing and Reconciliation

144. The Commission believes that the only sustainable solution to
facilitate the return of IDPs and refugees to their homes, is
dependent upon a political settlement in the ongoing mediation
process. The Commission urges all actors to work towards a speedy
resolution of the crisis.

145. The Commission recommends that warring parties should
facilitate the movement of IDPs in and out of the camps in their
respective areas of control.

146. It is the Commission’s view that it is necessary to establish a
structured process to provide an opportunity for South Sudanese to
engage with their history, to discover the truth about the conflicts
and human rights violations of the past, and to attend to the needs
of victims. This is the only way to foster healing, peace and
reconciliation in South Sudan, and to forge a common future. Such a
body should lead to truth, remorse, forgiveness and restitution
where necessary, justice and lasting reconciliation being achieved.

147. The Commission recommends that such a structured process must
involve and include women as key stakeholders, and that processes
and procedures operated by a future mechanism should be gender-
sensitive.

148. Overall, it is recommended that there is a need for a national
process, however organised, to provide a forum for dialogue, inquiry
and to record the multiple, often competing narratives about South
Sudan’s history and conflicts; to construct a common narrative
around which a new South Sudan can orient its future; to uncover and
document the history of victimization and to recommend appropriate
responses.

149. The Commission urges all sectors of South Sudanese society and
relevant regional and international actors to unite around the
process of national reconciliation, which is necessary for the
restoration of sustainable peace, social cohesion and stability.

150. The Commission recommends that the Truth and Reconciliation
should be established in relationship with ‘hybrid’ mechanisms such
as Wunlit with a mandate to investigate human rights violations and
to drive a national peace and reconciliation process. Unlike Wunlit,
such hybrid mechanism should be comprehensive, rather than
localized. Such mechanisms would operate under the national
mechanism, which should develop guidelines that seek to among
others, align the operations of grassroots mechanisms with human
rights and other identified ideals.

151. The Commission also recommends the establishment of a framework
for memorialization as part of the broader process of reparations.
This process should be inclusive and participatory.

On Sequencing Peace and Justice

152. The Commission’s discussion of the relationship between peace
and justice concluded that while they should be conceived as
complementary, comparative experience shows that the two notions are
often in tension, and that the context in which relevant processes
unfold is critical: while some contexts allow for reconciliation
processes and justice, particularly criminal justice measures to be
undertaken at the same time, multiple factors in other contexts
militate against such an approach. In these contexts, sequencing
offers an alternative approach that responds to the imperatives of
justice and the need to reconcile and establish stability in post
conflict societies.

153. Having considered the specific context of South Sudan, the
Commission recommends that consideration should be given to
sequencing of peace and justice, with the result that certain
aspects of justice allow for the establishment of basic conditions,
including restoring stability in South Sudan and strengthening of
relevant institutions. This should facilitate necessary reform of
the criminal justice system in order to implement some of the
Commission’s recommendations on accountability. These necessary
reforms to civilian and military justice should, in the context of
broader institutional reforms, facilitate the institution of
reconciliation measures.

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Africa: Tax tricks, mobile phones, and beer

worker | October 22, 2015 | 9:33 pm | Africa, Economy, political struggle | Comments closed

AfricaFocus Bulletin
October 20, 2015 (151020)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“Despite MTN having its headquarters located in South Africa, 55% of
the “management and technical fee payments” flow to “MTN
International” (MTNI)–a company which has no staff and is located
in Mauritius. The remaining 45% was paid to MTN Dubai–a subsidiary
which the company says it renders international financial services
and shared services to MTN Group.” – Quartz Africa, on new report by
amaBhungane and Finance Uncovered

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/td1510.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=
http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/td1510.php

The “Africa Rising” narrative is dubious as a gross
oversimplification of African reality. But it does point to at least
one important reality: the growth of consumer markets that are
attracting much international attention. Particularly notable are
two ubiquitous consumer goods, one old (beer), one new (mobile
phones), which are producing enormous profits. The question is where
do those profits go?

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains several background documents
related to (1) the South African mobile company MTN and exposure of
its profit-shifting strategies in a new report, and (2) the giant
formerly South African beer company SABMiller (just being
purchased by a rival global giant Anheueser-Busch InBev). SABMiller
was featured in an ActionAid report in 2010, which is summarized
below. So, to understand the complexity of “Africa Rising,” consider
these tax tricks the next time you are drinking beer and browsing on
your mobile phone.

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on tax evasion, illicit financial
flows, and related issues, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/intro-iff.php

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on information and communication
technologies, visit http://www.africafocus.org/ictexp.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Tax Tricks

South Africa’s ‘next president’ is entangled in another corporate
tax dodging allegation–this time it’s with MTN

Sibusiso Tshabalala

October 13, 2015 Quartz Africa

http://qz.com/522656/

For more detailed report, see http://amabhungane.co.za / direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/od3s9fd

South Africa’s deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa–long seen as the
most likely next successor to president Jacob Zuma–has seen his
name caught up in another corporate tax dodging allegation, this
time with Africa’s largest mobile phone company MTN.

Last week Friday, amaBhungane, an investigative journalism
organization, and Finance Uncovered, a global network of
journalists, published a story alleging that Africa’s largest mobile
network, MTN, was involved in shifting millions of dollars from its
subsidiary companies in Nigeria, Uganda, CÃ´te d’Ivoire and Ghana to
companies in Dubai and Mauritius in order to avoid its tax
obligations. This all happened under Ramaphosa’s watch, as he was
chairman of MTN’s board of directors, between 2001 and 2013.

In September last year, South Africa’s Mail and Guardian reported
that Lonmin–a mining company which Ramaphosa was a board member of
between 2010 and 2013–was involved in a scheme to move profits
generated from its platinum mining activities in South Africa to
Bermuda.

While Ramaphosa, one of South Africa’s richest men, has taken a
strong public stance against tax avoidance as deputy president it
doesn’t seem to be in tune with his former life as a captain of
industry. It is also causing a revision to the expectation that he
is next in line when Zuma’s term ends in 2019.

According to the report, MTN subsidiary companies in Nigeria,
Uganda, Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana paid “management fees”–which
according to MTN cover for elements like back office support,
technology transfer (to subsidiary companies) and use of the MTN
brand.

While it is common for telecom companies to charge their
subsidiaries management fees–as MTN itself argues in a response to
a set of questions asked by the investigative team–the bone of
contention is whether the large sums of money flowed to “real
offices staffed with people doing actual work to earn the money” as
the investigative report states.

MTN’s ‘management fees’

The investigative team reports that despite MTN having its
headquarters located in South Africa, 55% of the “management and
technical fee payments” flow to “MTN International” (MTNI)–a
company which has no staff and is located in Mauritius. The
remaining 45% was paid to MTN Dubai–a subsidiary which the company
says it renders international financial services and shared services
to MTN Group.

Territories like Dubai and Mauritius are better known as “tax
havens”–many multinational companies stash their profits here using
complicated payment systems to subsidiaries. The lure of a low tax
rate, or a sometimes a zero-rate tax regime, is hard to resist: it
means multinationals can cut the cost of doing business without
paying tax in the country they’re required to do so.

Chris Maroleng, MTN spokesman said the company has not been involved
in any tax avoidance scheme and that it had responded fully to the
investigative team’s claims.

“We have been able to prove that we’re tax compliant in all our
operational jurisdictions. We have not infringed any laws and we
have nothing to hide,” said Maroleng. He added that MTN had been in
contact with the amaBhungane and Finance Uncovered team for a
“protracted period” and that the company had satisfied itself with
all of its responses.

The deputy president’s office said it is referring all queries on
the matter to MTN.

Meanwhile, the Right 2 Know campaign, a South African organization
that advocates for freedom of expression and anti-corruption, has
played on a MTN ad-slogan from 2009 to signal their discontent. MTN
frequently used the South African slang word “ayoba” (loosely
translated as “cool”) in their ads. Now R2K–is calling for the
investigations against–has spun the slogan back to the company and
Ramaphosa. Their version: “Tax dodging is not ayoba.” (
http://www.r2k.org.za/2015/10/12/investigate-mtn-ramaphosa/)

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Finance Uncovered Investigation: MTN’s Mauritian Billions

Finance Uncovered, 09 Oct, 2015

http://www.financeuncovered.org/ – Direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/qhklzpa

The Finance Uncovered global network of investigative reporters have
today published a cross-border investigation into South African
telecoms giant MTN exposing how billions of rand from its
subsidiaries in Ghana, Nigeria and Uganda have been shifted to a
shell company in the small island tax haven of Mauritius.

The two year investigation spanning five countries was published
today in South Africa’s Mail and Guardian, the Ugandan Observer and
Ghana Business News.

The reporting team

Finance Uncovered is a global network of journalists from over 55
countries across the globe. This investigation was undertaken by
Craig Mckune of amaBhungane in South Africa, George Turner and Nick
Mathiason from Finance Uncovered in London, Francis Koktuse in
Ghana, Emmanuel Mayah in Nigeria and Jeff Mbanga in Uganda.

A report in Nigeria will follow shortly.

MTN’s Offshore Payments

The reporting team discovered MTN revenue producing companies
operating in Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda and Cote d’Ivoire made
substantial payments to offshore companies in Dubai and Mauritius.
These payments were counted as a cost of business for the operating
companies, lowering their profits and potential tax bill.

The enormous sums were purportedly for management and technical
services performed on behalf of these companies, as well as royalty
payments for the use of the MTN brand. In Ghana, these payments
accounted for more than 9% of the turnover of the company.

African journalists in Ghana, Nigeria and Uganda working with
Finance Uncovered discovered that 55% of management and technical
fee payments are directed towards MTN International, a company based
in Mauritius. The Mauritius company has no staff and is little more
than a post box. The remaining 45% was routed to MTN Dubai, where
the company employs 115 staff who provide shared services to the
group.

MTN told reporters that MTN International remunerates companies in
South Africa for management services performed on behalf of the
company. They were unable to answer why the payments were made to
Mauritius first.

Company documents published by MTN said that money in MTN Mauritius
was used to repay external debts of the MTN group and dividends,
rather than pay for management services.

But after further questions were put to MTN, the company was forced
to admit that not all of the revenue was passed onto South Africa.
The company refused to disclose how much it kept in Mauritius.

The company said that MTNI is resident in South Africa for tax
purposes and the Mauritian entity gives no tax benefit to the
company.

MTN in Africa

Our revelations are particularly sensitive given the sheer size of
MTN. The South African listed firm is the largest cell phone company
in Africa with 227,503,000 subscribers worldwide. Almost one in four
mobile phones in Africa are part of the MTN network a total of 161m.

This means MTN is the largest company in many of the countries in
which it operates. It is also frequently one of the largest
taxpayers in African countries so they are particularly vulnerable
to profit shifting by the company.

Game over?

Our investigation has established that a number of African countries
have now challenged the offshore payments made by MTN. Authorities
in Nigeria and Ghana have frozen payments and the Ugandan
Authorities has placed a large tax bill on the company for
management fees paid over a 6 year period.

Ghana

Scancom, MTN’s subsidiary in Ghana, paid 758m Cedi (Rand 3.7bn,
$401m) in management and technical fees to MTN Dubai between 2008
and 2013 equivalent to 9.64% of the company’s revenue.

An agreement between the Ghanaian Investment Promotion Centre and
the company that allowed the management fees to be paid expired in
2013 and payments have been frozen. MTN is currently negotiating a
new agreement with GIPC.

Uganda

MTN Uganda paid 3% of turnover in management fees between 2003 and
2009 to MTNI in Mauritius. The Uganda Revenue Authority issued MTN
with a “notice of assessment” in 2011. This was for a number of tax
issues between 2003 and 2009, but a large portion was to do with a
dispute over management fees. The total tax bill from the URA was
R467m ($69m).

Nigeria

In 2013 the company disclosed that it had paid R2.5bn ($562m) in
fees to MTN Dubai between 2010 and 2013. The company made this
disclosure because the fee payments had been reversed following a
failure to come to a new agreement on management fees with Nigerian
regulators.

Despite these fees being paid to MTN Dubai, MTN confirmed to us that
these fees are then ‘on-paid’ to MTNI in Mauritius and that MTNI
Mauritius is the ‘ultimate beneficiary’ of the fees.

Cote d’Ivoire

MTN has confirmed to us that the company paid 12bn West African
Francs in 2012 and 14bn West African Francs (Rand 512.9m, $55.53m)
in 2013 in management fees to MTNI. The figure for 2013 is
equivalent to 5% of the revenue made by MTN in Cote d’Ivoire.

*****************************************************

Finance Uncovered, “Can We Beat Tax Avoiding Multinationals?,”
Finance Uncovered, Oct. 18, 2015
[Brief excerpt. For full article visit
https://www.byline.com/column/39/article/499]

How the MTN case shows that OECD “solutions” for such tax evasion
will not work.

“Unfortunately the OECD proposals are unlikely to bring these
practices to an end, and could even make the whole process even less
transparent.

The OECD has embraced the armâ€™s-length concept and many of the
solutions it proposes are simply aimed at giving tax authorities
more and better tools to use in their transfer pricing
investigations. There will be better access to comparable data to
determine prices, bigger books of guidance for tax authorities, but
in the end tax authorities will continue to need to rely on complex
investigations and highly subjective analysis of the complicated
internal structures of multi-national companies.”

******************************************************

“Calling Time: Why SABMiller should stop dodging taxes in Africa”

by ActionAid, November 2010, Updated 2012

Summary by Malik Stan Reaves written for AfricaFocus Bulletin and
US-Africa Network, Oct. 20, 2015

Full report available at
http://www.actionaid.org.uk/tax-justice/calling-time-the-research

London-based SABMiller plc is the world’s second largest beer
company making more than $3 billion a year in profits. The origins
of the company date back to the founding of South African Breweries
in 1895 and it owns several African breweries. Its many brands
include Coors Light, Miller Light, Keystone Light (#2, #4, and #12
in sales in the USA), Castle, Kilimanjaro, and Lion (in Africa), and
Grolsch (in Europe and global).

The company has some 65 tax havens, and this ActionAid report
estimated it has used them to reduce their tax bills by as much as
1/5 in Africa. For example, its Ghana operations generate about $45
million a year, yet SABMiller paid no taxes for the two years before
the report and only for one year in the prior four years.

ActionAid estimated loses to governments in Africa of as much as $30
million a year, “enough to put a quarter of a million children in
school.”

To avoid paying taxes, SABMiller uses transfer pricing payments made
by its subsidiaries to sister companies in the corporation. “These
payments can reduce or even eliminate profits in one place at
a stroke of an accountant’s pen; a kind of financial alchemy that
also shrinks the company’s tax bill.”

ActionAid examined the accounts of eight SABMiller subsidiary
companies in Ghana, Mozambique, Tanzania, South Africa, Zambia and
India, along with researching the tax systems in these countries.
ActionAid identified four “tax-dodging” techniques used in Africa.
Tax dodging or tax avoidance is seen by ActionAid as designed to
comply with the letter of the law though the practice is
irresponsible and unethical (whereas tax evasion breaks tax laws).
The report notes that there is no mention of tax in SABMiller’s code
of business conduct and ethics.

The first is a loophole in Dutch tax law which allows SABMiller’s
Dutch holding company for its African operations, Rotterdam-based
SABMiller International BV, to pay next to no tax on the royalties
they earn. “Six SABMiller companies in Africa paid this Dutch
company $37.5 million in royalties last year, according to their
most recent accounts. If the company’s African operations that do
not publish accounts also make payments at the same rate, the total
can be expected to be $65 million. This corresponds to an estimated
tax loss to African countries of $15 million.”

The second dodge involves millions in management fees paid yearly by
African subsidiaries to SABMiller companies in European tax havens,
mostly in Switzerland. Some fees are high enough to wipe out all
taxable profits.

In the third dodge, SABMiller subsidiary Mubex in Mauritius is used
by SABMiller breweries in other African countries as a purchasing
agent, even though the goods may not be produced in or even transit
through Mauritius. Mubex makes a profit, the amount of which is
unknown due to tax haven secrecy, and is taxed at 3% as against what
would be much higher rates in the countries where the beer is
actually produced.

In the fourth tax dodge, African breweries are able to borrow money
from Mubex, in Ghana’s case seven times what’s allowed in that
country, leading to interest costs that erase sizable amounts of tax
liability.

ActionAid calls on SABMiller to do three things:

1. Take a responsible approach to tax. Stop using tax havens to
siphon profits out of Africa, for example by ending the huge
payments for lucrative brand rights and management services to
Switzerland and the Netherlands.

2. Understand and disclose the impact of its tax planning. SABMiller
needs a tax code of conduct to explain how it applies its
sustainable development principles to its tax affairs. It should be
open and transparent about its use of tax havens and tax avoidance
techniques.

3. Be more transparent about financial information. Make public the
accounts of each of its subsidiaries â€“ especially for companies in
countries where accounts are kept secret â€“ and provide a country-by-
country snapshot of tax payments and other financial information.

It further lays out several recommendations for governments to shore
up their tax operations and policies.

Outcomes:

In June 2011, a meeting of tax authorities from several African
countries, supported by the African Tax Administration Forum (ATAF),
considered the findings of the report. A multilateral tax treaty was
presented to ATAF’s council meeting the following year which would
“allow African countries to work together to investigate the tax
affairs of multinational companies operating across the continent”
(page 3, para 3).

Other Actions:

“Over 10,000 people across the world have taken action, asking
SABMiller to adopt a more responsible approach to its tax affairs in
the developing world. The company has been questioned in media
interviews, by ActionAid at its Annual General Meeting, and by
students at Edinburgh University, who voted to ban the company’s
beers from their student union.”

“Schtop tax dodging” beer mats found their way to Australia, Sweden,
the Netherlands, Ghana, South
Africa, Senegal and the United States.”

ActionAid charcterized SABMiller’s response to the outcry over its
practices as “a combination of denial and obfuscation,” including
ownership moves resulting in reduced transparency and shifting
exposure in Mauritius, but “increased royalty payments and
management service fees paid into tax havens across the continent.”

Given the “protests and occupations” in the 18 months since the
original publication of Calling Time, they noted that “corporate
attitudes towards tax have changed…increasingly aware of the
reputational issuesâ€¦ involved in governance around tax.”

Note:Â The corporate malfeasance in this ActionAid report is
identified as tax avoidance rather than tax evasion. ActionAid is
thus not accusing SABMiller of breaking any laws but of being
unethical and irresponsible “in failing to acknowledge the impact of
its tax dodging on public revenues.” The term “illicit financial
flows,” not yet in wide use at the time of the ActionAid report, is
not a concept used in this report. To what extent some forms of
abusive transfer pricing may be illegal as well as illegitimate is a
still unresolved issue in the literature on the subject.

*****************************************************

Beer & Mobile as Rising Retail Markets

“Anheuser-Busch InBev and SABMiller to Join,” New York Times, Oct.
13, 2015 http://tinyurl.com/otmzfxt

“The research firm Euromonitor International estimated on Tuesday
that the combined Anheuser-Busch InBev-SABMiller would account for
29 percent of global beer sales, after selling assets to win
regulatory approval. It also would be more than three times as large
in terms of sales as its next closest competitor, the Dutch brewer
Heineken, according to Euromonitor.”

“Bud-SAB tie-up hinges on a scramble for Africa,” Reuters, Sept. 24,
2015
http://tinyurl.com/ngsavbz

“Africa is Budweiser’s lost continent. For SABMiller, it is the
jewel in the crown. Where Anheuser-Busch InBev is basically absent,
Africa generated 28 percent of SABâ€™s revenue and 30 percent of its
EBITDA [Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and
Amortization]
last year. That’s the key to a potential offer by the Budweiser
brewer for its $89 billion rival.”

“SAB and Castel, one of its partners, share around 55 percent of
Africa’s ‘formal’ beer market.”

“The Beerhemoth,” The Economist, Oct. 17, 2015
http://tinyurl.com/pwwjula

“The battle lasted one tumultuous month. In September SABMiller, the
world’s second-largest brewer, said it was the target of a takeover
by its bigger rival, AB InBev. There followed a volley of bids,
skirmishes in the press and tense private talks: between them, the
firmsâ€™ main shareholders include a big tobacco company, the dashing
scion of Colombiaâ€™s richest family and three Brazilian billionaires,
not to mention South Africa’s public-investment fund. On October
13th, one day before a deadline mandated by British takeover rules
(SABMiller is listed in London), the companies announced a tentative
deal.”

“The Mobile Economy: Sub-Saharan Africa 2015”
http://gsmamobileeconomy.com/ssafrica/

“The mobile industry in Sub-Saharan Africa continues to scale
rapidly, reaching 367 million subscribers in mid-2015. Migration to
higher speed networks and smartphones continues apace, with
mobile broadband connections set to increase from just over
20% of the connection base today to almost 60% by the end
of the decade. Falling device prices are encouraging the rapid
adoption of smartphones, with the region set to add more than
400 million new smartphone connections by 2020, by which
time the smartphone installed base will total over half a billion.”

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