Immigration law seesaws

As Denmark heads towards its next election, signs are that things are going to get ugly. The usual suspects (and casualties) are immigrants; more specifically, the non-European spouses of Danish citizens.

Under the new ‘finanslov’, or budget, they are likely to face even stiffer regulations before being allowed to take residency in Denmark. These regulations, modeled on the points-system already used in countries like the UK and USA, and which have been incubating for nearly two years, will include having to take a test to prove one’s Danish language skills, and one’s general knowledge about Denmark’s history and culture.

No prizes for guessing that the main instigator behind the stiffening of sentence is the hard-right Dansk Folkparti. The ruling Venstre coalition must have DF’s support to pass the ‘finanslov’, and in the process, acquiesce to the latter’s demands on immigration control. Denmark already has the tightest immigration laws in Europe, and indeed, the world.

There are no dearth of critics of this policy either. But given the coming elections, the centre-right government, and moderate left parties have all given their silent approval. A silence not matched by affected Danes.
Already, signs are that a partial rollback of the regulations must be accommodated.

This was clear after employees’ unions, many of whose member characteristically vote hard right, groused that the laws would exclude their blue-collar members from bringing foreign wives and girlfriends back home. As the immigration rules tend to be often re-written, it’s anyone’s guess when a new set of criteria will be suggested or passed into law.

Meanwhile, there’s plenty for immigrants and would-be arrivals to remain anxious about the state of play in Europe… if you’re non-European.

Africa’s Cup runneth over!

For too long, the world has taken away from Africa. Now, the world is coming back, on Africa’s terms.

Madiba’s image – his calm, strong face – gazes across Soccer City, Soweto, where the soaring voices of tenors stretch to the rafters, packed with fans, and where the dancers on the pitch wave colourful kente cloths frame the shape of a fabulous continent. This is the Football World Cup 2010. This is South Africa. My God, this is Africa. It can do it, and do it great.

I’m with them every step of the way. Even though I’m sat here, at a battered dining table, in my cold flat in Aarhus, and outside the rain has fallen incessantly for three days, I’m watching and my hopes and joys are squarely on the continent. Not so much the mother continent as a mother-by-adoption. As we might say in Africa: I am a brother, by a different mother.

Many say that South Africa is not Africa. But let’s leave that aside just this once, and pray that the Rainbow Nation’s coming out party is its best so far. Better still to come, I pray. And watching the opening ceremony, it’s pretty clear: all the colours of the rainbow, and one added, the most prominent – BLACK – are here. The naysayers can go hang. The cynics may quit now, the skeptics hold their tongues until later. The ghosts of the past – colonialism, slavery, wars, tribalism, disease, drought- are slowly being exorcised. This is the biggest stage the world can conjure, and this time, it’s being conjured in Africa.

Nkosi Sikelel’i Africa. God bless you Africa.

Crude noises: Obama’s deepwater blowout

Now, whose ass am I gonna kick?

Perhaps within the next 2 years – before the next US election-  we will look back to June 2010, and say, “That’s where Obama lost it.”

There is a lot on the President’s plate these days: oil spill, health care, Iraq, Afghanistan, off-shore drilling, property bubbles, unemployment, Guantanamo, financial crises, Greek crises, falling support for Democrats, the rising Tea Party types. A long list, topped by oil and the economy. In a sense, the two are synonymous and are unlikely to change soon. So why is Obama playing every populist card up his sleeve while crude washes up on America’s southern shores?

He has come down hard on BP – they deserve it. With a recent track record of ignoring safety measures, the Deepwater Horizon explosion was perhaps, just waiting to happen. Obama has said he is looking for ‘ass to kick’. Great, he needs to do that, say that, and be seen to be saying and doing it. But really, whose ass? Not just BP, for sure, but the four other American contractors including the Halliburton home-boys who have quietly slipped under the radar as Obama rails against those pesky, toffish, buck-toothed Brits who simply can’t run a rig. Never mind BP is a massive oil company with decades of experince, and a track record for corporate nastiness and untransparency. For those two last reasons, let BP pay, heavily for its rotten management of the crisis.

The blast is said to be an accident. But ultimately, it was Obama’s legislators who okayed off-shore oil drilling. Obama himself hurt millions of supporters, who voted him in on a green ticket, by rubber-stamping the expansion of off-shore drilling. Sure he has now ordered a 6-month moratorium. Oh, great! Six months? And after all that talk about “reducing our dependency on dirty, imported crude”? Utter window-dressing. And now saying BP has to pay salaries of those poor sods laid-off work thanks to the moratorium. Utterly absurd. A man as intelligent as Obama, with the kind of understanding he has of Wall Street and global finance, cannot honestly think this is possible or even legal. And he is an elite lawyer. So why even say it?

Media pundits have decried the move as ‘populist’. Yes, it is. It’s nationalist, it’s also quite reflective of his frustration and impotence. That leak is not plugged, his electorate is furious and he is seen to be ineffective. Worse, he is seen as aloof and stand-offish. However untrue these maybe, he can’t win. this is a natural disaster. Blasting BP, calling for its dividend payment o be withheld, calling for it pay for the cleanup and those fairytale wages, are all signs of anger, but also, fear, that this situation is out of hand.

However, most of these demands are probably illegal. How will the US stop the dividend payout of a UK company? What of the fact that 40% of BP stock is held by Americans: will they not want their dividends? And the US saying it will “not spend a penny” on the clean-up: what message does that send to the people at the centre of the crisis – the fisherman, wildlife conservationists, the tourism managers? They may think their government is being stingy, stupid or both.

But I’m probably most saddened by the nationalist rhetoric being deployed, and I say this despite being Indian – neither British nor American: the US needed and needs the UK, and vice-versa. Obama has cooled towards the Conservatives and Cameron, even though the latter acts like Americas lapdog (certainly a continuation of UK foreign policy in that respect). But the US can ill-afford to lose more friends, let alone it’s staunchest ally. What if the UK also ‘loses it’ and starts demanding action against US companies perceived to have exacerbated or promulgated the last financial crisis. While Europe roasts thanks to Greece’s profligacy, the spotlight is off America which until recently was stewing in Wall Street’s odorous juices…

Maybe President Obama will make angry noises now, and win the day after-all. Maybe it’s just a knee-jerk reaction to a hysterical US media demanding blood: BP’s, preferably. But that’s not how US presidents are expected to react. Certainly not this one. Please Mr President – don’t lose it now.

Iran sanctions: bullies swagger, people stagger

Iran’s tentative dance with the West continues today, as the UN proposes imposing a fourth round of sanctions. Aimed at curbing the alleged Persian desire for nuclear weapons, it has, at best, done no more than rattle sabres on all sides and raise tempers in an already apoplectic Middle East.

I can’t help feeling irritated and annoyed with this. Iran has at last made a concessionary swap of low-grade fissile material for enriched, non-weapons grade uranium. Brokered by Turkey and Brazil, this IS a step forward. Condemned by the US and usual suspects UK and France as “too little, too late”, it is much more than anything their good offices have achieved yet. While President Ahmadenijad makes no friends by railing that this is a “one-off” deal, the fact is, it was struck and is going ahead.

Certainly, Turkey and Brazil cannot be happy with these latest proposed sanctions. Their diplomatic credentials are questioned whenever brokerage with perceived rogue states like Iran gets underway. Both are in the G-20; one is a BRIC and both have UN Security Council membership aspirations. Neither wants to look stupid thanks to the ravings of the Iranian leadership but equally, neither wants to be humiliated by condescending threats of stiff sanctions rolled-out by the White House. Worse still that Foreign Secretary Hillary Clinton, like some stiff schoolmistress, should roll these threats out while visiting inconsequential Ecuador – in Brazil’s own backyard!

But! How many divisions does the Pope have: or in this case what veto powers do Turkey or Brazil have? None whatsoever.  Sanctions will go ahead, as it appears both China and Russia, desperate to avoid confrontation over Iran, will press sanctions while offering carrots and cookies to Tehran through other channels.

The outcome: no change. The grim visage of Ayatollah Khomeini gazes down upon his subjects and his people in power. Again, Iran, like the so-called rogue states, will be in a corner, pushed, harried, angered and therefore doubly dangerous. Again, the hardliners will win, their popularity and power diminishing at home, even as ordinary Iranians grown frustrated and furious. Of course, imposing sanctions and then expecting to talk on equal terms, is quite impossible. And the US knows it. That’s why it does it.

Methinks the ladies protesteth too much

Climategate Copenhagen just wont go away

The Danish climategate controversy keeps unfolding. Latest buzz from the UK Guardian refers to a leaked letter from outgoing UN climate chief Yvo de Boer to colleagues, castigating the Danish leadership for reneging on key policy positions carefully negotiated in the two years leading up to the COP15. The Danes, thanks to their infamous “Danish Text” – which was Denmark’s under-the-table draft resolution for the conference- are now accused of collusion with the USA and developed states to undermine the COP15 agenda.
If the letter is genuine, they are guilty of discarding pre-negotiated commitments to poorer states, suggesting the provision of loans rather than grants to them for climate mitigation activities, and generally behaving like the witch at the climate wedding. Rather unbecoming of a summit host, InnocentInk dares to think. Something rotten, again, in the climate change department of official Denmark.

You can see the full Guardian story here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/30/copenhagen-climate-talks-united-nations-letter

The Opportunist(s) at No.10

The Opportunist: no, not the name of the next B-grade Hollywood offering, rather the middle name of the next British Prime Minister. Who that shall be, we shall know within the next 12 hours.

No fears for a ‘she’ turning up to upset things British and apple-cartsy. As is evident, the UK is as far away as ever from electing a woman PM for only the second time in its history. And forget about electing a Black, Caribbean, Asian or Latin candidate. As has been clearly on display at this general election, the electorate has far more important things on its mind than diversity or gender equality.

What they do care about is… um…is…err… is it the economy? Well, my main man Gordon tends to think so. Well, that’s what he keeps banging on about. I wonder if he is employing an old trick of repeating oneself until what is said appears to be gospel as sheer fatigue and lack of interest makes other points of view appear worthless.

Coming from that angle, my less-than-main-man Dave is clearly concerned, like his voters with… um… with… errr, could it be immigration? Again, we don’t bloody know because Dave doesn’t seem to have a policy. He says he has one, and the Conservatives have been heard to say (rather than actually loudly say) that they have one. But that’s not the same as actually having a policy.

On that score, Gordon is very much on top. As McBroon, he has helped murder the economy with his deregulated financial sector, then helped save it, sort of, and then muttered all sorts of dire portents about what will happen if we don’t allow him to keep sorting it out. Dire portents, McBroon-style, being very different from what the pernicious financial markets in Wall Street, Fleet Street and Frankfurt think, and certainly altogether divorced from what the pesky Greeks think as they burn tyres, asphyxiate bank workers and look pale and exhausted at the prospect of ten years of fiscal stringency (this is Greece people, don’t worry, such stringency cannot be allowed to come to pass; neither the Olympian gods nor their fat financier equivalents who dodged taxes will allow it).

But back to DeCameron. DeSpooferon, DeClowneron, DeFafferon, DeScameron. These are all characters in search of an author and preferably, one who has authored a policy document. Last time I checked, the dear fellow had penned an open letter to the UK with his intentions. While googling the Cons, I came first to the Wikipedia page (which hopefully, was not manipulated by party faithful). If even Google can’t find the policy pages correctly, what hope for the Great British Electorate?

Who are, of course, obsessed with immigration. To be fair, they have a point, with EU free movement meaning so many Europeans do work in the UK. Please stop blaming the Asians and Africans. We fill the higher-end jobs and got their competitively and often get out sharpish as well. Which makes we wonder: what do the rest of Europe say about Brits making use of their right to European free movement? Are they making enough use of it at all? Again, good questions for the electorate to consider before electing a Tory government. Their response may be to pull the UK out of the EU – wahey! And then we will truly feel McBroon’s gloom and doom, what with over 70% of UK trade being with those fiendish Europeans.

Which leaves us with HE Nick Clegg, aka La Oportunista, as the Spanish might say. I am intrigued by how the British press, even the liberal press, has taken every opportunity to refer to his wife as Miriam Gonzalez Durantez. As if the full Spanish-shebang has to be brought into play to show how European (or how disloyal?) Clegg is. To be fair, the man just appears as Opportunist. While having done very well in his TV appearances, and certainly, having some good ideas on immigration, the economy, nuclear disarmament and the like, this man is no Barack Obama. In fact, even Barack Obama today, is not the Obama we hoped for. So, frankly, trundling out this absurd slogan of ‘Change’, is a gross insult to the British public.

And frankly, I’m horrified the Guardian, my favourite newspaper, has fallen for it and thinks this will be the change of a lifetime. Other than split the anti-Tory vote I wonder what effect voting Lib Dem can have. Also, clegg is a species of insect. While mosquitoes are indeed virulent and to be respected, I don’t know what impact a clegg has on its environment. Sure, the man may be king maker yet, but I’d like to, again, see a policy first. The lovely words have been spoken, but do they appear in print and can they actually be implemented Mr Clegg?

In short, the incumbent and the challengers are pretenders to No.10, and no viable candidates appear anywhere. Good luck Britain. I shall sleep well tonight and awaken in another land where all this really doesn’t matter. But which opportunist will murder your sleep for the next five years? Toodle-oo.

Who's next?

It’s an oil rush… if you’re a big multinational oil company

This month, Uganda, or at least the 3% of the population that reads newspapers, has been agog with news of the impending sale of Heritage Oil’s Uganda stake to Eni, the Italian para-statal petro-giant. The sale heralds the end of exploration by heritage, a primarily upstream oil company, and signals the shift to big-league oil processing. A shift that could see Uganda become one of the top 50 oil producing nations in the world.

But, as I as a foreigner am often admonished by locals: “This is Ugaaandaaa!”. Thanks, I noticed that for the last 2 years I’ve been here. However, the sheer murkiness surrounding the exploration and potential exploitation of this fair country’s hydrocarbons has generated more heat than will possibly be generated when actual crude starts flowing out of the ground, and the streets of its villages course not with milk, but with oil.

I’ve been studying and writing about Uganda’s oil exploits for a few months now. What I’ve seen with my eyes makes me quite hopeful about what the country could achieve if the crude is well managed. Most others, particularly the virulent and generally misinformed NGO lobby, think the country is on the path to the Niger Delta. In between, the oil MNCs are likely to have a great time, playing-off the expectations of citizens on one hand, against the ponderous bureaucracy of government, and minting bucks in the meanwhile.

There is no doubt, indeed, that oil players are here to make money for their shareholders. That is the law of business. Whether Heritage, and its fellow Uganda oil explorers – Neptune, Dominion and big-brother Tullow care for the environment (somewhat), indulge in occasional CSR projects (sometimes), and be transparent about their public information (somehow), it remains that they are here to find oil, guage its viability, present the right working policies to government, then with approval of the government, find and sell their licenses to the oil majors: Shell, Eni, Total, ExxonMobil, OilLibya, the Chinese, the Iranians, Reliance, or what have you.

Problem is, no one seems to know the fullness of the picture. The state-backed New Vision has now run two Saturday edition front-page headlines on oil. Both appeared suspect, one linking Libyan dealings to the oil outcomes, the other, in praise of Tullow. The Tullow boss, Aiden Heavy proclaimed (in the published interview) that Uganda will get 80% of oil revenues for every barrel. The paper, astonishingly, did not bother to ask how this is to be achieved but swallowed it whole. This is Ugandaaa.

Drill, baby, drill

As Uganda turns 47, the bells toll for 2011

2011 is going to be a big year in East African politics. By then, Rwanda will have presided over a general election which is likely to be non-violent, probably not very free, relatively fair, and will quite possibly, see one of Africa’s best managers leave office in a non-violent way. Paul Kagame may well hand over to others in his ruling party, and we hope he does and sets the gold standard for the region.

Again, South Sudan will, probably, hold its long-overdue elections in 2010, and will be preparing for 2011: the year in which it decides to be autonomous of northern Sudan and the diktats of the Islamists in Khartoum. It also conducts its first census in decades. That will help establish its population, how to demarcate its borders (especially if it is to be autonomous) and most importantly, decide how to share oil revenues with Khartoum. Most of Sudan’s oil lies in southern territory. So… it’s unlikely Khartoum will give up its prize without a bloody fight. By all accounts, both sides are re-arming in cynical defiance of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement they signed in 2004.

Kenya will probably have a decisive and confrontational 2012 election, or perhps one even next year, where the truculent Raila Odinga will likely come to the fore. Tanzania? Even when elections happen, we know they get new Presidents, from the same old ruling party. Change is more of the same. Burundi? It may well have returned to army rule before its next election but let’s hope it hangs together.

Which leaves Uganda. We’re heading for a bruising election. Even if nothing changes politically, Ugandans themselves may be rather more changed. So why are the bells tolling? If the recent riots are anything to go by (see the posts below), we will see many more disturbances, many more closures of radio stations, more journalists harassed and jailed, election reforms stalled, more people falling into poverty as a result of bad economic policies, climate change and global inequity, more opinion pieces written by ideologues of all hues, who have no ideas for change, just for continuity. And for too long, continuity has been mixed up with stability. Perhaps 2011 will show that progress and change provide the kind of stability that most African leaders can only dream about.

Uganda turne 47 years old on 9 October. It has been a long and difficult journey, often splashed with blood and fear. However, as a foreigner who has made it its temporary home, I will say the country has also come a very long way. All these struggles can only make the country stronger, and perhaps, in the long run, give it the democratic stability that western powers dutifully preach at home and neglect practising abroad; or indeed, give it the resilience to manage its own affairs in the face of enormous political and environmental challenges. As one letter in The Monitor put it – congratulations to Ugandans for sticking it out and staying together despite the hate and hunger than has often marred their lives. Really, it is a lot to think about and admire, if not necessarily to be completely proud of.

The number 2011 has some mystical ring to it. 2 + 0 + 11 makes 13, which is considered unlucky. And 2+0+1+1 makes 4, which in Mandarin, shares the same sign as ‘death’. Hhhmmm… but it could also be time for change, which in itself, is no bad thing. Change is constant, and that constancy of change, gives Uganda its own kind of stability. Even when you see the same people in charge for a quarter century perhaps you feel, that things, when they do change, will mark a terrible shift from what prevails now. And even if they seem like they don’t, they still have changed. Uganda cannot go down to the same river twice.

Gorilla, gorilla!

Sure can’t beat the excitement of being in Uganda, being a journalist, and being crazy… This week has gone in a flash, as most of it was spent tracking the elusive mountain gorilla in a patch of remote, dense jungle in Uganda’s south-western tip. Basically, where Rwanda meets DR Congo, meets Uganda, various families of gorilla roam contentedly in the dense undergrowth that blankets the rugged mountains and volcanoes that dot this astonishing patch of earth. This is the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park in Kisoro district, the land of a hundred hills (while Rwanda clearly is the land of a 1000 hills). And truly, this is “gorillas in the mist” territory.

These hills are topped perennially with wispy cloud, drenched in dense fogs and are so innaccessible that nature has had time and space to develop into the most splendid forms imaginable. Darwin would have found quite the crucible of life had he come here.

So, I went tracking with a bunch of other journalists – enough to scare away wildlife for miles around. But we came upon Uganda’s newest ‘habituated’ gorilla family. And got charged at by a very ill-tempered felame with big, sharp canines. Blame that on the photographer from the government-owned national paper here. He got way too close and then made the cardinal error of running away when the lady growled. You’re supposed to stand your ground and humble yourself.

More on this subject later, after I’ve written the articles I’m supposed to write on the trip and published the relevant photos. No first rights, nor payments for work on the blogs, alas. Post-broadsheet publication, there will be follow-up on my gorilla encounter. Oh, and did I mention there are only 740 gorillas left in the world? So seeing them is a bit of a treat.

Kampala cools off, demands are deferred, blame games begin

Kampala began a quiet week this Monday, as tempers cooled-off. The police and army ceased-fire and the rioters stayed home or went back to being unemployed and frustrated. Business, by mid-week, had picked up to near normals levels. The traffic jams certainly, are at previous levels again.

As the fires died down, and the embers cooled to ash, the political firestorm and usual, predictable blame-game began. Yesterday, Tuesday 15/09, President Museveni called an extraordinary session of Parliament to explain (or reinforce) his stance against Cultural Kingdoms that have political aspirations (though no perceivable unifying, national agenda) as is ostensibly the case with the Buganda Kingdom. He promised there would be no mercy for rioters again, which made on wonder if there ever had been such clemency in the past. And he blamed the political opposition for fomenting trouble, abusing national trust, inciting rioters, bucking the cultural institutions to exceed their role and generally being pests. the two-and-a-half-hour speech was combined with a lesson on Ugandan history, the need to industrialise, outlines of national vision, the path to ‘vertical integration’, speaking Kiswahili, and the need to create more jobs, factories etc. etc. etc. The President often uses the abbreviation ‘etc’ by way of the phrase ‘et etc etc’ in his speeches when he doesn’t have more examples to provide.

This was naturally, preceded by the leader of the opposition FDC tearing into government for having fomented violence, abused trust, played with people’s feelings towards cultural institutions, destroyed national fabric, bred ethnicism, failed to build an economy or provide jobs etc etc etc.

And Buganda Kingdom, the trigger and flashpoint of the latest (and many prior) crises, is keeping its head down. They are toeing the official line. Their Kabaka (King) has cancelled the social visit (see post below) which triggered the flames. They are going to talk with government. But their demands have not gone away; but merely been deferred.

In between these to extremes, or perceived extremes, you find they tread some common ground. All those things that the ordinary Ugandan does not enjoy – health care, decent education, proper salaries, full time employment, access to life-changing technology etc etc etc. No one here has provided proper ways of navigating out of these treacherous waters yet. No one on any side of the political spectrum has real solutions, or up-to-date ones to maximise Uganda’s potential.

As these fundamental social iniquities remain unresolved, you can expect more trouble in the months ahead, especially as the country goes to the polls in February 2011. And if you want to know what those troubles may be, they are: etc etc etc… no one who matters cares to fills in the blanks.