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A sustainable green revolution for Africa

Ofentse — Wed, 14 May 2008 09:27:40 +0000

The call for Africa to have an agricultural revolution to solve its food security (Leaders, May 10) is timely. But need it be like the green revolution in Asia? That used irrigation, fertilizers, pesticides and hybrid seed varieties to transform yields, and seemed to work. Grain production in the Punjab went from around 3m tons in 1965-66 to over 25m tons in 1999-2000. But this solution was effectively forced on India by the US withholding a guarantee of food aid, and had ecological and social costs. Monocultures replaced local biodiversity and only wealthier farmers could afford fertilizer.

A different approach would be a genuine “green revolution”, using sustainable, traditional and organic techniques, with full community involvement. The Ethiopian government’s Project Tigray, for example, used local methods and composting to increase faba bean yields fivefold, and there have been many other examples where local and organic techniques have transformed production. The involvement and participation of local people is essential, rather than having alien solutions imposed from outside. Using locally available inputs is more green, more sustainable and more resilient, and must surely be a keystone of any new initiative.

Scorpion's stung

Ofentse — Fri, 09 May 2008 10:23:08 +0000

THE future of the Directorate of Special Operations (DSO), better known as the Scorpions, South Africa’s special unit fighting organised crime and corruption, has looked bleak since December. It was then, at a crucial once-in-five-years party conference, that the ruling African National Congress (ANC) decided that the Scorpions should be disbanded by June. At the same meeting, at Polokwane, it elected Jacob Zuma, whom the Scorpions had investigated for years and accused of corruption and fraud, as its new party president in place of the country’s present state president, Thabo Mbeki. The ANC is keeping its word: the cabinet has approved two bills, soon to be put to Parliament, that provide for the absorption of the Scorpions into the police. Much needs to be done before the bills become law and the June deadline may well be missed. But the Scorpions’ days look numbered.

Mr Mbeki set up the unit in 1999, when crime was surging and the police unable to cope. Since then, little has improved. Jackie Selebi, the chief police commissioner who admitted being friends with a notorious criminal, has been suspended after being charged with corruption. This has dented the confidence of the police. Most South Africans think graft is increasing. The Scorpions’ high-profile cases, which include those of Messrs Zuma and Selebi as well as others against big crime networks, have brightened their image as fearless crime-busters. The unit has put a lot of people behind bars.

Africa must be more hard-nosed with China

Ofentse — Tue, 06 May 2008 09:20:22 +0000

A shipment of weapons from China destined for Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe is an obvious cause for the West to denounce Beijing’s involvement in Africa. But Western business and political leaders have already been watching China’s re-engagement with the continent with trepidation. China is setting up Confucius schools, laying out roads and railways and stitching together deals to buy its commodities — oil, platinum, gold and minerals. Perhaps not since the first wave of independence during the late Fifties has there been such a buzz in Africa. And crisis meetings, conferences and summits are hurriedly being put together as the United States, the European Union and Japan scratch their collective heads over how to respond. China’s investment might offer Africa the first real chance to lift itself out of poverty, not unlike postwar Europe under the Marshall Plan or the industrialisation of the Asian tiger economies, neither of which could have happened without US investment.

Police Told to Lower Crime Rate by Killing Criminals

Ofentse — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:54:37 +0000

SOUTH African police must shoot to kill and ignore regulations in the battle against one of the worst rates of violent crime in the world, a government minister says.
“You must kill the bastards (criminals) if they threaten you or the community. You must not worry about the regulations,” said Deputy Safety and Security Minister Susan Shabangu.

Mass murder – what mass murder?

Ofentse — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 06:41:20 +0000

After months of requests for an interview with Robert Mugabe and weeks of waiting in Harare, my patience finally paid off on December 21 last year. I was about to return empty-handed to Johannesburg when the long-silent telephone in my room at York Lodge in Harare rang at 9.30am.

Be at State House in half an hour, I was told. I grabbed the car keys and was on the road in less than 10 minutes. Once inside the grounds of the imposing colonial mansion, I was escorted by one security agent after another past rows of police cars, armed soldiers and Mugabe’s ever-ready motorcade towards the two stuffed lions that guard the visitors’ entrance and Mugabe’s domain.

There I waited in the elegant reception room amid displays of English porcelain, occasionally chatting to George Charamba, permanent secretary for information in the office of the president, for three hours. He told me that “His Excellency” viewed the interview as an opportunity to clarify some issues for the historical record and wanted to give it his full attention.

In Africa: from very little to almost nothing

Ofentse — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 08:48:09 +0000

The new prices in the small, tatty shop went up a few weeks ago, scrawled on scraps of blue cardboard beneath the broken plastic clock. Some villagers stared in silent shock. Others wanted to know why the price of everything had increased.

The shop assistant, Ngondile Ngcamphalala, 23, didn’t have much of an answer.

“I don’t know why. I always tell them that the prices have gone up at the warehouse where we get things from,” she shrugged, an old battery radio buzzing drowsily in the background.