AUTHOR: Dr. Jason Abbott
URL: http://profjabbott.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: jason.abbott [at] louisville.edu

My interest in democratization came when, in the course of my continuing research in Southeast Asia, the region was hit by the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis. In the maelstrom that followed, mass demonstrations both forced the resignation of General Suharto after 31 years in Indonesia, and provoked a political stand-off in Malaysia between the country’s long-serving Prime Minister Mahathir and his former deputy Anwar Ibrahim. Watching events unfold, my work slowly moved away from questions of economic management to analyze and explain why reform succeeded in one country but not in another.

Fast forward eight years. I had moved to the School of Oriental and African Studies where Suu Kyi herself had been studying for a PhD when she returned to Burma during the student uprising in 1988 that would see her assume the mantle of democracy activist. Within the space of the 12 months I was at SOAS, Southeast Asia was catapulted into the global media spotlight first by the coup in Thailand and then by the uprising in Burma led by the country’s Buddhist monks. Both events brought with them numerous opportunities for comment both on the TV news as well as radio for which I was lucky to be in the proverbial right place at the right time. By now, though my own work was firmly focused on questions of democratic transition and while I continued to primarily specialize on Malaysia, the media work I had done on Thailand and Burma meant that I was more cognizant of the historical backgrounds of both those countries. I had also become personally inspired by Aung San Suu Kyi’s story having read her Letters from Burma and Freedom from Fear as well as several of the biographies that have been written.

Less than a year after moving to the SOAS, I saw a job listing in The Chronicle of Higher Education for the Aung San Suu Kyi Endowed Chair in Asian Democracy at the University of Louisville and decided to apply for the post. The rest as they say is history. I can honestly say that at no point in my own personal journey did I ever expect that one day I would have the opportunity to meet ‘The Lady’ (as she is affectionately known in Burma) nor that Burma would have begun the dramatic changes we have seen in the past year and a half. It is rare, as an academic that in the cloistered halls of university campuses, that you actually witness the events and get to meet directly the people about whom you derive causal explanations for change. That I will is both an honor and a privilege.

AUTHOR: Dr. Jason Abbott
URL: http://profjabbott.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: jason.abbott [at] louisville.edu

Violence erupted after police tried to break up a crowd of several hundred CDC supporters that had spilt onto one of Monrovia’s largest thoroughfares. Shooting then broke out and a police officer said both the police and Tubman’s supporters had fired, but it was not possible to confirm the information.

A Reuters reporter saw a dead body with a bullet wound to the head at Tubman’s CDC party headquarters. Several people were injured, including two police officers.”I saw four dead bodies, two men and two women,” said Lavla Washington, a 36-year-old unemployed CDC supporter.

“I have never in my life seen the police treat civilians like the enemy. The Nobel peace laureate is killing us,” Washington said, referring to Johnson-Sirleaf, who was recently co-awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Tubman also blamed Johnson-Sirleaf.

“The situation is shocking, that live bullets were shot at peaceful people marching in the street. There is no excuse for that. It shows to you why the Liberian people are determined to get rid of this leader. She is somebody who will use violence against peaceful people,” he told Reuters inside the CDC headquarters shortly after the clashes.

Officials in Liberia’s government did not immediately comment. A U.N. vehicle had its windows smashed, according to a Reuters witness. At least two U.N. peacekeepers were injured, a U.N. official on the scene said. A spokesperson for the U.N., which is charged with securing the country in the wake of its civil war, said the mission was working with local authorities to “prevent any escalation of the situation.”

Johnson-Sirleaf took nearly 44 percent of the first round vote on October 11 and has since won the backing of the third-place finisher, former warlord Prince Johnson.

Former U.N. diplomat Tubman – who took roughly 33 percent in the first round – said last week he would withdraw from the race and called for a boycott because of evidence of fraud.

But international election observers called the October 11 vote mostly free and fair, and the United States, regional bloc ECOWAS and the African Union have all criticized Tubman’s decision to boycott the second round.

The vote is due to gauge the West African state’s progress since a devastating civil war ended in 2003 and pave the way for new investment, but fears are rising it could instead open the door to open-ended political turmoil.

Retreating CDC supporters set up barricades of burning tyres and tree stumps as they were pushed back by riot police.

Tubman told Reuters on Sunday he was seeking changes to Liberia’s vote-counting procedures and a delay to the run-off of between two and four weeks, adding that his party would reject the results if the election went ahead as planned.

“I think that at the end of the day we will have to evaluate what is likely to be better for the country: delaying the elections or going forward with them in a way that doesn’t carry the support of such a big party in the country.”

What started as a mere standoff between supporters of the Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) degenerated into serious rioting between members of the CDC and Liberia National Police (LNP) with at least three persons confirmed dead by AEP reporters and many sustaining injuries some from gunshots from the police.

According to AEP reporter stationed at the CDC headquarters, the rioting broke out after CDC supporters spilled onto the Tubman Boulevard infront of their party head headquarters in an effort to embark on what they called a “peaceful march” through the streets of Monrovia to hand their petition to the American Ambassador in Liberia and then to the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) about their unresolved grievances in the first round of elections which they claim was full of irregularities.

The LNP with support from the UN prevented them (CDC) from their march and set up a road block very close to the entrance of the President’s house on the Tubman Boulevard. This resulted in stone throwing from a section of the CDC crowd and the police responded in firing live ammunition into the crowd. “As long as they have not obtained permission from the Ministry of Justice the police will not allow them,” said police spokesperson George Badoo.

The police managed to disperse them by firing tear gas into the crowd. The street infront of the CDC headquarters is littered with empty tear gas shells as traffic is now open to the general public and some form order being restored.

Liberians are expected to go to the polls tomorrow 8th November to elect a new leader for the next six years amidst a boycott by the main rival to the incumbent president. The atmosphere in the capital city Monrovia is very tense as many citizens do not know what to expect tomorrow. The CDC supporters say they will not allow the elections to go on peacefully and Lybia will happen in Liberia tomorrow. “If they won’t let us have peace will also give them hell tomorrow” says Justin Jallah, a CDC member.

This is the first election to be administered primarily by the National Elections Commission and the first to be held under Liberia’s 1986 constitution. The election is being considered as a chance for Liberia to depeen its fragile democracy after many years of civil wars.

Meanwhile CDC Political Leader, Cllr. Winston Tubman has stated that incumbent president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is presiding over a divided country, quoting a report from the International Crisis Group on Liberia which he claimed was a testimony of his comments.

But warned that the division would not go away by use of threats, gimmicks and deception, stressing that divisions would be healed only by what he called recourse to visionary commitment to national peace building and constitutional democracy. “The President has no such commitment in her pedigree and most Liberians understand that.” He said

Cllr. Tubman on over the weekend in a news conference following his return from Abuja, Nigerian at the invitation of ECOWAS Chairman, Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan said the CDC pose “the greatest challenge to the failed and scared ‘Sirleaf/Boakai’ ticket. This is why according to him; the President’s comment that the CDC was afraid of defeat was a bluff.

“Despite six years of presidential visibility, the enormous advantage of national resources availed to the Unity Party Campaign, and the collection of National Election Commission, Mrs. Sirleaf managed by their own figures, only 43%of the votes. Thus more than 56% of the voters rejected her. In Nimba County, the rejection rate was about 75%. Who can be afraid of such weak incumbent?”

Meanwhile, Cllr. Tubman has called on his supporters to remain peaceful while at the same time asked them to make their way to the party Headquarters in white attires on Monday.

He called on Liberian security forces aided by UNMIL forces to refrain from threatening and intimidating peaceful, law abiding citizens as they exercise their constitutional rights of assembly, association and free speech.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the Harvard-trained economist is credited with luring hundreds of millions of donor dollars to her destroyed nation and getting $5 billion of its external debt wiped clean. Her critics, however, note that two out of every three Liberians still live in dire poverty and the country remains one of the least developed on the planet, according to World Bank and U.N. statistics.

Corruption and cronyism continue to erode institutions, and Tubman and Weah have complained that the country’s electoral process was stacked in Sirleaf’s favor.

The opposition party began threatening a boycott after the first round of voting on Oct. 11 showed that Sirleaf led with around 40 percent to the CDC’s roughly 30 percent. When the third-place finisher announced he was endorsing Sirleaf, her victory seemed assured.

To participate in the Nov. 8 runoff, the CDC’s demanded that the head of the election commission be replaced — and he was.

Then last week, Tubman said the changes did not go far enough and called for the election to be postponed. Then on Friday he called for a boycott when the government refused further concessions.

Outside observers said there was no reason for the boycott.

“The United States is deeply disappointed by the decision of the Congress for Democratic Change to boycott Liberia’s presidential runoff,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a statement. “The CDC’s charge that the first-round election was fraudulent is unsubstantiated.”

The head of the Carter Center’s observation mission in Liberia, Alexander Bick, said his staff had traveled to all 15 counties in the Tennessee-sized nation and while small irregularities were noted, there was no evidence of systematic fraud.

Electoral law allows candidates to pull out before the start of the election, but once the election is already in progress, ballots cannot be altered, he said. So both Tubman and Sirleaf will appear on Tuesday’s ballot. The boycott will not result in the vote being canceled.

“He is serious about wanting to boycott the election … (but) it does not nullify the election,” Bick said. “The key issue is that voters should make their choice. Some may participate. Some may not. But it should be left to the Liberian people, not to the politicians.”

U.N. “DEEPLY CONCERNED”

The United Nations Security Council said on Sunday it was “deeply concerned” by the boycott announcement, and added that it had received reports that members of Liberia’s national electoral body had received threats. It gave no details.

Johnson-Sirleaf, who campaigned to cheering crowds in the capital on Sunday, called the boycott unconstitutional.

Liberia is one of the world’s poorest countries, with over half of its people surviving on less than 50 U.S. cents a day. Fourteen years of intermittent fighting that ended in 2003 killed nearly a quarter of a million people and left its infrastructure in ruins.

Johnson-Sirleaf became Africa’s first freely elected female head of state in 2005, and has been internationally praised for reducing the country’s debt and maintaining peace. But she faces criticism within for the slow pace of development.

Analysts had anticipated that a smooth election would trigger a surge in foreign investment in resources like iron ore and oil, which have already attracted major firms like ArcelorMittal, BHP Billiton and Anadarko Petroleum.

Lydie Boka, head of risk consultancy StrategiCo, said a boycott risked undermining the credibility of the poll and may open the door for endless complaints over the process.

Many, like Rachael Dennis, a mother of four who works at a market stall, merely yearn for peace.

“Those who say they will not vote, it is their right to say so. For those who will go to vote too, it is their right. All that I am saying is there should be no hala-hala,” she said, using the local term for violence.

AUTHOR: Shout Africa
URL: http://www.shout-africa.com
E-MAIL: news [at] shout-africa.com

KIA fighters in Burma

Much has been made of late of the ‘concessions’ by the Burmese regime to dialogue and possible political liberalization that began with the release from house arrest of opposition figure, and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Aung San Suu Kyi. Indeed while such moves should be applauded and welcomed one cannot help but wonder if they are little more than a cynical public relations exercise by the country’s military leadership to curry international support for an easing of sanctions against the regime.

The strongest evidence that the new ‘civilian’ (sic) government of President Thein Sein is little more than an iron fist in a velvet glove comes from the continuing offensives by the Burmese military against ethnic minorities such as the Kachin and Karen. Indeed Derek Mitchell the new US special envoy for Burma confirmed on October 17th that there were credible reports of human rights abuses by the military against women and children including murder and rape. More recently allegations have been made that the Burmese Army, the Tatmadaw, has used mortar rounds that have contained poisonous gas in attacks on fighters of the Kachin Independence Army in three war zones: Ga Ra Yang village, Shwe Nyaung Pyin village and Waingmaw Township. On October 30th the Kachin News Group stated that soldiers from the KIA reported that black smoke billowing from areas where the mortar shells landed had left victims dizzy, struggling to breathe and vomiting for several hours. While there is no independent verification of the alleged use of chemical weapons if true such attacks would be in violation of the 1925 Geneva Protocol that prohibited the use of chemical and biological weapons.

These attacks are only the latest in an intensification of hostilities against ethnic groups that have occurred in recent months despite calls by President Thein Sein for national reconciliation. Criticism has also come from Burma’s neighbors. On October 29th Indonesia’s foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa urged Burma’s leaders to make concrete steps towards reconciliation while earlier this year in July Aung San Suu Kyi issued an open letter to the President in which she called for an urgent ceasefire and offered to act as a mediator. Besides the KIA the Burmese Army continues to be engaged in offensives against other armed ethnic groups including the Karen National Union and the Shan State Army.

While the Burman (Bamar) constitute about two-thirds of the country’s population Burma nevertheless is one of the most ethnically diverse countries in the world with 135 distinct official ethnic groups recognized by the government itself. Many of the country’s most important ethnic minorities (the Kachin, Karen, Shan etc) are located on the country’s mountainous borders and have been in conflict with the central authorities for over four decades. While full autonomy for the Frontier Areas, including a Kachin State, was agreed in the historic Panglong Agreement signed in February 1947 by Aung San Suu Kyi’s father, Aung San, the agreement was effectively scuttled following his assassination and the creation of irregular militia under the command of Ne Win who would later overthrow the democratic government of Burma in 1962. Following the establishment of his own personalized Burmese Road to Socialism Ne Win launched a brutal policy against ethnic and political rebels known as the ‘Four Cuts’. The policy was designed to cut the four main links of food, funds, intelligence, and recruits between insurgents, their families and local villagers and largely consisted of a policy of forced relocation and ethnic cleansing. Opponents of the regime internally and externally fear that the military is using the latest concessions to political opponents to deflect attention from the renewed offensives. Whether this is the case or not, what the incidents reveal is that gross abuses of human rights continue in Burma on an almost daily basis and that an investigation of the latest claims of the use of chemical weapons is urgently needed.

AUTHOR: Dr. Jason Abbott
URL: http://profjabbott.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: jason.abbott [at] louisville.edu

Former Rebel Leader Prince Johnson. Credit: Reuters

Liberia has finished the first phase of what is turning out to be a fascinating presidential election that also reveals just how fragile the country’s recovery from the depths of internecene warfare is. Incumbent president and recent Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf leads all candidates but appears set to fall short of the majority result needed to avoid a runoff. Her chief rival for re-election, former diplomat Winston Tubman, has claimed fraud and may not contest any runoff. Accounts indicate that the first round went peacefully despite Tubman’s charges.

But many eyes have not been on Tubman, but rather on Prince Johnson, a notorious former warlord who, despite receiving a  rather modest percentage of first-round votes to place a distant third stood to become kingmaker when Johnson Sirleaf failed to achieve outright majority in the first round.

Johnson did not allow the suspense to build. Although the runoff election will not take place until November 8 he has put his weight behind Johnson Sirleaf which may well be enough to provide the tipping point to propel the incumbent to reelection. Although by most accounts Johnson Sirleaf has been a marvelous leader for Liberia, not all agree, and oddly her Nobel Peace Prize, awarded a couple of weeks back (she shared the prize with another African woman, Liberian activist Leymah Gbowee, as well as with Tawakul Karman, a Yemeni pro-democracy advocate) may have hurt her in some circles where she is perceived as being too pro-western, at the expense of her local leadership.

I happen to believe that Johnson Sirleaf has been a fine president in nearly unimaginable circumstances and a worthy Nobel laureate.  Given the country’s recent history her reelection was bound to be a difficult one and the country’s divisions should not serve to undermine her accomplishments. Indeed, that Liberians are contesting their politics at the polls and not with guns represents a visible step forward. And while some may assert that the Nobel award was politicized, well, the Nobel Peace Prize in particular has never been free of politicization, for good or for ill.

Still, it is ironic that Prince Johnson will be able to claim some small share in Johnson Sirleaf”s victory. And it may well help to validate some of the criticisms against her in a small way. It would benefit her for the runoff not to be particularly close on November 8. The signs of progress in her country are modest but real. But much remains to be done. Liberians, whoever they supported in the first round, should hope she continues to be the right person to do so.

AUTHOR: Derek Charles Catsam
URL: http://africa.foreignpolicyblogs.com
E-MAIL: derekcatsam [at] hotmail.com

In a January 2010 article in Huffington Post, journalist and activist Steve Sheffey presented a detailed record of Obama’s pro-Israeli decisions and statements during his first year in office as the U.S. President, elaborately arguing that Obama has been one of the most loyal and faithful people to the cause of Israel and the Zionist lobby.

According to Sheffey, Obama is the first U.S. President who has ever hosted a “Seder” in the White House. Seder is a Jewish ritual service and ceremonial dinner for the first night or first two nights of Passover, a major spring festival which commemorates what the Zionists claim is the liberation of the Israelites from Egyptian servitude.

On December 21, President Obama signed a defense spending bill that includes $202 million in funds for Israel’s missile defense programs. “We are tremendously pleased with the ongoing cooperation between the United States and the State of Israel in the area of missile defense,” an Israeli official said after Obama signed the bill.

Sheffey adds that “no Administration in history has come into office with a Vice President, Secretary of State, and Chief of Staff with stronger pro-Israel credentials than this one.”

On June 4 in Cairo, President Obama told the Arab and Muslim world that America’s connection with Israel is “unbreakable.” He told the Arab and Muslim world that to deny the Holocaust is “baseless, ignorant, and hateful.” He told them that threatening Israel with destruction is “deeply wrong.” He said that “Palestinians must abandon violence” and that “it is a sign of neither courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus.” And he said that “Hamas must put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, and recognize Israel’s right to exist.”

All of these actions and statements which are purely directed at gratifying the Zionist regime and the active Zionist lobby in the United States indicate that President Obama is no different than George W. Bush and those before him who considered the security and stability of Israel their vital and crucial commitment.

Today, it’s almost clear to everyone that no politician with an anti-Zionist mindset could ever dream of living in the White House. This is what Prof. Naseer Aruri, the renowned political scientist and author has mentioned in his recent interview published on Veterans Today:

“the American political system has institutional and constitutional barriers against anti-Zionists winning the U.S. presidency. Take for example the Electoral College by which Americans elect their presidents. The EC stipulates that a candidate to the presidency must gain plurality and the winner takes all. These two factors (plurality and winner takes all) tend to polarize the system and promote the two party system. In that setting, there is no place for a minority, which is likely to be the anti-Zionist mindset.”

Now, Barack Obama has launched his electoral campaign for the 2012 presidential elections and faces a painstaking mission to accomplish. From one hand, he has lost the confidence of the ordinary American citizens who had come to believe that his slogan of change was a genuine and authentic one. On the other hand, he should seek the indispensable vote of the American Jews who have always played a vital role in determining the results of the presidential elections in the United States.

Obama has recently encountered a quandary which the Zionist Jews in the United States has created for him. According to the Agence France Presse Israel’s chief Ashkenazi rabbi Yonah Metzger on Sunday called on U.S. President Barack Obama to free Jewish-American spy Jonathan Pollard if he wants Jews to vote for his reelection.

Metzger warned Obama that he would do well to free Pollard if he wanted another term in the White House. “I’m not making a prophesy, but rather echoing the frustrations of numerous American Jews who voted for him and are disappointed by his lackadaisical approach to the numerous appeals for Pollard’s released,” he said.

However, the emancipation of Pollard is not the only order of the Zionist lobby for Barack Obama. The U.S. House of Representatives introduced the resolution 1734 on December 15, 2010 in which it was categorically demanded from President Obama to refuse to recognize an independent Palestinian nation. Former BBC Panorama presenter Alan Hart believes that this resolution was drafted by AIPAC and is considered to be the Zionist lobby’s new order for Obama. The resolution has expressively called upon the Administration “to affirm that the United States would deny any recognition, legitimacy, or support of any kind to any unilaterally declared “Palestinian state” and would urge other responsible nations to follow suit, and to make clear that any such unilateral declaration would constitute a grievous violation of the principles underlying the Oslo Accords and the Middle East peace process.”

Anyway, Barack Obama will be facing a serious dilemma in his path toward the 2012 Presidential Elections. Satisfying the Zionist lobby, regaining the confidence of the American public and compelling the international community that he deserves to be a Nobel Peace Prize laureate are all the responsibilities which seem to be quite unachievable and far-fetched for the so-called man of change.

AUTHOR: Kourosh Ziabari
URL: http://www.intifada-palestine.com
E-MAIL: kziabari [at] gmail.com