Mwenda among Top 100 Global Thinkers

By Joshua Masinde

The Independent Managing Editor, Andrew Mwenda, was listed by the Foreign Policy (FP) magazine amongst the Top 100 Global Thinkers, together with greats like US President Barack Obama, former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Pope Benedict XI (ranked17th), billionaire Bill Gates (ranked 12th) and a host of other leaders, Nobel laureates, journalists, economists and academicians.
At rank 98, Mwenda was recognised for his vociferous criticism of all elements of the African aid structure and like the other top hundred global thinkers, for contributing to the big ideas that shaped the world in 2009.
According to FP, Mwenda, a dogged and fiercely eloquent Ugandan journalist and editor of The Independent is a vociferous critic of all elements of the African aid structure. “Frequently harassed by the Ugandan government for his outspokenness and currently facing trial on 21 charges (including sedition), Mwenda goes even further than most aid critics: The continent, he argues, needs to fail in order to learn hard lessons as it picks up the pieces on its own. He responded with fire to Obama’s July speech in Ghana, writing, ‘Obama needs to listen to Africans much more, not lecture them using the same old teleprompter.’”
At home, Mwenda has serially castigated President Yoweri Museveni’s regime on corruption, sectarianism, human rights abuses, and for vesting the country’s leadership and resources in family rule. He has also been fighting for free speech and economic empowerment throughout Africa. His belief is anchored in the idea that western aid has been largely unhelpful to African development as it fans corrupt states and sustains wars.
US President, Barack Obama, was ranked second for re-imagining America’s role in the world. Other Africans listed amongst the top hundred include Dr. Kofi Annan, former UN Secretary-General. He was ranked 30th for his ceaseless work to create Africa’s Green Revolution. “Africa is the only region where overall food security and livelihoods are deteriorating,” he declared in 2007, vowing to create “an environmentally sustainable, uniquely African Green Revolution,” according to the FP.
Another African, George Ayittey, was ranked 76th for pushing policymakers to let Africa help itself. Sayyid Imam al-Sharif from Egypt was ranked 10th for striking a mortal ideological blow to al Qaeda. Ayaan Hirsi Ali from Somalia was ranked 48 for her provocative critique of Islam, the religion of her youth.
Ben Bernanke, the chairman of Federal Reserve in Washington, was ranked in first position for his role in staving off a new Great Depression. He topped the list for “turning his superb academic career into a blueprint for action, for single-handedly reinventing the role of a central bank, for preventing the collapse of the US economy. Having done all of these within the span of a few months is certainly one of the greatest intellectual feats of recent years.
Women bagged seventeen slots of the top hundred. They are: Zahra Rahnavard from Iran, ranked 3rd for being the brains behind Iran’s Green Revolution and the campaign of her husband, opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi; Aung San Suu Kyi, from Burma ranked 26th for being a living symbol of hope in a dark place; Elinor Ostrom from US, ranked 28 for showing us that the global commons isn’t such a tragic place after all; Esther Duflo from US ranked 41 for adding quantitative rigor to assessments of foreign aid; Ayaan Hirsi Ali from Somalia, ranked 48 for her provocative critique of Islam, the religion of her youth; Helene Gayle from US ranked 52 for putting HIV/AIDS in its big-picture context; Barbara Ehrenreich ranked 59 for her relentless efforts to understand the root causes of poverty and inequality; Esther Dyson from US, ranked 70th for accurately forecasting how the Internet will shape us; Anne-Marie Slaughter ranked 79th for helping transform Foggy Bottom from the inside out; Samantha Power from US ranked 80th for moving from moral authority to government authority on human rights; Hu Shuli a journalist from China ranked 84th for persisting in the idea that public accountability is possible even in one-party China; Jacqueline Novogratz from US ranked at 85th position for helping build a new generation of social entrepreneurs; Karen Armstrong from Britain ranked 87th for advocating a truce in the religion wars; Sunita Narain from India ranked 88 for giving voice to India’s environmental conscience; Martha Nussbaum ranked 93rd for making philosophy matter; Valerie Hudson from US ranked 97th for showing that gender imbalances have global consequences and Emily Oster from US ranked 99th for her creative research into what really helps the poor.
Some former and current prominent leaders also rated amongst the top 100 Global Thinkers include: Bill Clinton, the former US president, ranked 6th for redefining philanthropy in the modern era; Vaclav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic, rated 23rd for four decades of speaking truth to power; Fernando Henrique Cardoso, former Brazilian President ranked 11th for calling the war on drugs what it is: a disaster and former US Vice President Dick Cheney ranked 13th for his full-throated defence of American power.
Some Nobel laureates rated amongst the hundred include: Muhammad Yunus, a Bangladesh economist ranked 46th for proving that the poor are profitable, John Holdren and Steven Chu, ranked 34th for putting cutting-edge science back into power, Rajendra Pachauri from India ranked 5th for ending the debate over whether climate change matters, Joseph Stiglitz, from US ranked 25th for relentlessly questioning economic dogma, Paul Krugman, from US ranked 29th for proving that a Nobel Prize winner can also be a prolific pundit and unerringly correct doomsayer, Amartya Sen, a US economist ranked 58th for showing how democracy prevents famine.

FGM law offers respite to female posterity

By Joshua Masinde

Way back in 1999, during the December holidays after I had just completed my primary leaving examination, I had the privilege of attending an initiation rite of the Sabaot of Mt. Elgon region in Western Kenya. My uncle, with whose family I was staying, took me there. It was late in the night. The ghostly darkness, dancing odiously in the chilling breeze gave the night the smell of blood, incivility and abhorrence.
I had undergone my own rite of passage a year before. Practically, though not a fan of circumcision rituals, this one I was taken to attend was quite out of the ordinary.
Having expected to see brave young men, enduring the chilly night, dancing, drumming and jingling their instruments so used in circumcision rites, a surprise lay in waiting. Drama, dancing, and hullaballoo enshrined the occasion with vigour. The unexpected sight of a file of young, energetic and frail ladies, dancing vigorously, first in circles, then in one straight file away from the crowd, was to me a spectacular scene of witches dancing away their evil machinations past midnight, downloaded straight from a Nollywood script.
But, the most private details of the genitalia cut, was for us not to behold. But, my mind conceived all possible graphic details of the act itself, as I kept wondering that alas, and indeed, my unfortunate sisters had at last, mutated into adulthood, through a very excruciating exercise that was to change their lives FOR-EVER. The cut itself, blood trickling....
The lurid gory details clearly defined the blast from the past, with a sense of pity and remorse for the victims.
But, a recent parliamentary report on Female Genital Mutilation in Kapchorwa and Nakapiripit districts in eastern Uganda signalled a timely intervention, which could offer respite to the girls and women who would have undergone the crude cultural rite. This report led to the passing by the Ugandan legislature, on December 10, of a new law outlawing and criminalising FGM. The law grants a maximum 10 year-punishment for the perpetrators of the crude act, and life imprisonment for those who carry out aggravated FGM. This is a new lease of life in the female posterity who could have been subjected to the cut, much like their predecessors. Aggravated FGM is a case where the victim passes on after the cut, or is infected with HIV/AIDS or becomes disabled.
Prior to enacting the law, Dr. Chris Baryomunsi, Kinkizi east MP in Uganda moved a motion in Parliament on April 29, to prohibit female genital mutilation (FGM). Dr. Baryomunsi later introduced a private bill countering FGM in Uganda parliament in September for debate and was unanimously enacted into law on December 10.
The World Health Organization (WHO) defines female genital mutilation (FGM) as "the partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural or other non-therapeutic reasons.
FGM is practiced the world over, and Amnesty International estimates over 130 million women worldwide have been victimised. It is estimated that 92 million of Africa’s women have been victims with over 3 million cases carried out annually on the African continent. In Uganda, the Sabiny of Kapchorwa, Bukwo, Bugiri and Nakapiripirit districts in the eastern frontier have indigenous tribes that highly practice FGM, according to the parliamentary report. The rite is performed bi-annually each year.
There are about four ways in which FGM is executed: “Sunna" circumcision is the removal of the prepuce and/or the tip of the clitoris; Clitoridectomy, or excision, which is the removal of the entire clitoris and adjacent labia; Infibulation (pharaonic circumcision), removal of the clitoris and entire labia and then joining the scraped sides of the vulva across the vagina using thorns or catgut, leaving only a small opening for passage of urine and menstrual blood.
FGM is generally performed in unsanitary conditions with unclean sharp instruments, such as pieces of glass, stones, knives, or razor blades. A single instrument is often used on many girls and/or women without cleaning, leading to the transmission of various viruses, such as HIV/AIDS.
While there are no benefits associated with FGM, the procedure is characterised with health complications like cruelty of the procedure, urine retention which is painful, short term haemorrhage, which can lead to death. It can also engender infertility, vulva abscess, clitoral cysts, labia adherences, difficulties in menstruation, fistula, disability and increased risks of HIV/AIDS infections.
In the parliamentary report, Mr Peter Kamuron, a human rights activist, opines that; “Once a girl is cut, she is cut off from enjoying her reproductive health and rights and continuing with education, and from any hope for employment and or future economic survival.”
But, an initiative like the Reproductive Educative and Community Health (REACH) began in 1996 in Kapchorwa, which has been on the forefront in helping to mitigate FGM. Using education as its primary tool in eliminating FGM, REACH formed the Sabiny Elders Association to reach the people. Ultimately, the communities made their own the decisions to stop. The Kapchorwa district saw a tremendous 36 per cent decrease in FGM between 1994 and 1996.

Poor sanitation plagues Kampala’s slums

Patrick Odongo emerges from a latrine; a one storey structure erected approximately two metres from the ground. Towering in front of haphazard, ramshackle dwellings, there is no fee charged for using this latrine, reserved for the residents of Acholi quarter in one of Kampala’s sprawling slums. Parts of the latrine’s walls are damp, with a stinging smell permeating the environment.
Godfrey Nsubuga, a resident of Kavule, in Kampala, sits outside his dilapidated shack, neighbouring an unused latrine, raised a few metres from the filthy soggy ground. He says he does not use the latrine because it is full. This and the current latrine in use are so dilapidated that he fears they may succumb to the weight of human waste, or a storm.
Many such latrines sprawl haphazardly in slums around Kampala: Bwaise, Kamwokya, Kavule, Katanga, Kisenyi and Kivulu. Some of them are constructed an arm’s length from congested slum settlements, posing grave health risks.
Frequent flooding and the swampy slum areas rule out the sinking of latrines beyond one or two feet. Erecting a latrine with a stair case is the only option despite the hazards. Many residents acknowledged having experienced cholera outbreaks, associated with the filthy surroundings.
Decent toilets are available but at a cost. A user fee of between Ushs100 (US$0.05) and Ushs200 (US$0.1) is charged, which is often too high for families, most of who live on less than a dollar a day.
Moses Mugabi, a resident of Kamwokya, mans a latrine, which is also raised two metres from the ground. Despite no charge being imposed by the landlord, Mugabi charges Ushs100 (US$0.05) user fee. He ensures the latrine is kept clean, to keep diseases at bay. He acknowledges past incidents of cholera in an area prone to flooding.
There is some respite though after Amref, in collaboration with local communities constructed a few decent toilets, which residents use for free although in some slum areas such as Bwaise, on the outskirts of Kampala, residents pay Ushs200 (US$0.1) to use them.
Joan Nakibule, a resident of Kavule slum in Kampala, says the toilets have improved sanitation in the area. “When full, Ushs20000 (US$10.5) is collected from the households, to drain it,” says Nakibule, whose mother is a landlady in the settlements.
According to James Kiyimba, a social worker and communication officer with WaterAid Uganda, latrines are raised some metres above the ground because the water level is very high. He notes, however, that these present a challenge to children, the elderly, the disabled and the sick who can’t climb the stairs. They resort to easing themselves in polythene bags, a practice called ‘flying toilets’.
However, he adds, these latrines contaminate water sources. “Most water sources are contaminated through such practices,” he says, adding that these inevitably lead to cholera outbreaks.
Peter Kato, a medical doctor, says the latrines remain potential hazards for cholera outbreaks. He says the poor drainage in the swampy areas contributes to the pollution of water for domestic use as these latrines are very close to the settlements. “When it rains, the refuse in the latrines flow out and sprawl near the dwellings,” he says.
Statistics from the ministry of health in Uganda show that over 400 people die of diarrhea and cholera complications due to poor hygiene and sanitation. Although organizations such as Amref have initiated projects to help, a lot more still needs to be done.
By Joshua Masinde