Category Archives: The World

Coincidentally or not, most of the UN’s astounding failures recently have been in Africa, particularly Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Congo and Sudan.  While the United Nations’ bureaucrats and troops deployed in South Sudan fly in and out of Uganda’s Entebbe airport, ordinary people take one of the many buses that depart from a derelict bus stand in the centre of Kampala for the capital Juba. A distance of 515 kilometres is covered in 12-14 hours if one is lucky, which means no rains, no accidents and no breakdowns. The Republic of South Sudan is the world’s newest country, having seceded from the Republic of the Sudan in July 2011 after a … Continue reading →

In his third and last part of analysing the 2012 US Elections, Prof Campbell discloses new information technology tools that the Obama campaign used to defeat Mitt Romney and his Republican election machinery. Earlier in the campaign, the Obama team had rolled out the Dashboard (data mining) application that was to be the basic tool of the volunteers in the field. This dashboard program that had been specifically developed by the campaign was built off technology used by the campaign in 2008 and was meant to replicate a campaign field office, allowing volunteers to do phone banking, organise events and talk to campaign leaders from their laptops or smartphones. It … Continue reading →

In his second part of analysing the recently concluded American elections, Prof Horace Campbell discusses how the Obama Camp contacted every one out of 2.5 people throught the United States to urge them to go out and vote, outmanouevring The Romney Camp that insisted on the use of the Media as their main tool. The election season in the United States is dragged out because of the process that is called the primary. Barack Obama was the incumbent for the Democratic Party; hence there was no primary contest. Mitt Romney emerged as the candidate for the Republican Party after a slug fest that pushed the party even more in the … Continue reading →

President Barack Obama won re-election thanks to the amazing organisational capability of his campaign team and the massive outpouring of a new political coalition in America inspired by the new energy of the Occupy Wall Street Movement of the past two years. Horace Campbell, Professor of African American Studies and Political Science at Syracuse University, discusses how Obama pulled off this year’s win. Barack Obama was re-elected President of the United States on November 6, 2012. His campaign organisation defeated the candidate of the Republican Party, Mitt Romney. The process of the election of the US presidency is mediated through an 18th century institution called the Electoral College. Under this … Continue reading →

By Robert Asketill On June 18 this year,  the President of the Peoples Empowerment Party (PEP) of Barbados, David Comissiong, threw down the gauntlet to the International Criminal Court (ICC), when he and a group of Pan-African activists lodged a petition at the ICC’s headquarters in The Hague, Netherlands, demanding that the political and military leaders of the United States, Britain, France, Canada, and Italy, be investigated and prosecuted for the commission of crimes against humanity and war crimes against the nations and people of Libya, Cote d’Ivoire, Haiti and against the African-American population of the USA. Comissiong was among a 27- strong international delegation that congregated in New York … Continue reading →

By Abdou Diouf and Kamalesh Sharma The Los Cabos summit is looking at key facets of sustainable development, notably green growth, food security and climate change. About 90 per cent of the world’s countries are without seats at the G20 table and most continue to experience severe development challenges beyond their control – challenges associated with access to finance for development, to international trade markets, equitable participation in the global trading system, and attracting investment, particularly in infrastructure. These challenges are compounded by persistent debt and, for many states, especially small island countries, high vulnerability due to their susceptibility to natural disasters. It is evident that the G20’s nine-pillar multi-year … Continue reading →