Politics
Donald Trump: The Most Un-American President
9 min read.President Trump’s subversion of American nationalist ideology has had major implications both nationally and internationally. At the national level, by talking up strongman tactics, derogatorily dismissing his political opponents, and dismissing the media as an enemy of the people, Trump helps shape the character and behaviour of Americans, especially his most ardent supporters, in a way that doesn’t augur well for a democracy like the U.S. By WANJALA S. NASONG’O
Nationalist scholarship has it that every national group across the space of time and place is more or less a successful melting pot where diverse population groups are merged, acculturated, and eventually assimilated. This process occurs at different rates and in different ways, depending on each population group’s place in the political and socio-economic systems. Successful nationalist projects always produce a nationalist myth, portraying the origin, place, and mission of the nation in the global scheme of things.
For instance, the history of race and ethnicity in the United States has been fraught with tension, rivalry, and conflict. The English arrived on the continent, not as immigrants entering a foreign society forced to acquire a new national identity, but as a colonial vanguard keen on recreating a New England in the image of the England they had left behind. From the beginning, they were the predominant ethnic group. They enjoyed a political and cultural hegemony over the life of the American nation-in-the-making.
The non-English populations that followed, namely, the Dutch, the French, the Germans, the Irish, the Italians, the Poles, and the Russians, were regarded as aliens forced to adapt to English rule in terms of both politics and culture. The establishment of English as the American lingua franca was thus a critical first step in the gradual assimilation of the multiple ethno-racial groups of the so-called colonial era in the American nationalist project. These non-English immigrants were a major source of labour originally imported to populate the American landmass, and later to provide cheap labour for industrial development as indentured labourers. As indentured servants, however, they were both scarce and expensive. Moreover, as contract labourers, they could bargain for acceptable terms and entered the ranks of free labour once their contracts expired.
This is the genesis of slavery as the second source of ethnic pluralism in the United States with the forced importation of more than half a million Africans. The system of chattel slavery was more expedient and more profitable for the southern plantation owners. Whereas the indentured servant from Europe expected land at the end of his contract, the African slaves – who were conspicuous by their skin colour and ignorant of the white man’s ways and language and who had been abducted from their homeland and forced into perpetual servitude in a strange land – could be kept permanently in servitude, divorced from the land they worked. Racial differences were utilised to rationalise slavery and to exact resignation and complete mechanical obedience akin to a plough-ox or cart-horse.
The third ethnic pluralism in the United States was originally rooted in conquest. Native Americans were systematically uprooted, decimated, and banished to reservation wastelands. The Mexicans in the southwest were conquered and their land annexed by an expansionist nation under the rationale of “manifest destiny”. The warfare against the American Indians, which included broken treaties, expropriation of their land, rebellion and ultimate defeat, was based on the stereotype of Indians as nomadic hunters and “uncivilized savages”. As one early seventeenth-century document put it: “Savages have no particular propertie in any part or parcell of that country, but only a general residencie there, as wild beasts have in the forests” (sic). Their land was thus taken and they were herded to reservations, where they still remain, crippled with poverty, hunger, disease, and wanton neglect. If the American Indian was the nation’s first minority, the future did not bode well for the many minorities that followed.
In spite of America’s brutal and convoluted history, the American nationalist myth constructs the United States as a deep comradeship of middle class society – as a land of liberty and opportunity; a shining city on a hill; a beacon of hope for the oppressed. America is characterised as a land of the free and home of the brave. Seymour Martin Lipset, a foremost American nationalist scholar, argues that whereas societies like the British, Canadians, French, and Germans are rooted in a history of nationality related to community as a basis of their legitimacy, American society is defined by ideology. Being an American is an ideological commitment rather than a matter of birth.
In spite of America’s brutal and convoluted history, the American nationalist myth constructs the United States as a deep comradeship of middle class society – as a land of liberty and opportunity; a shining city on a hill; a beacon of hope for the oppressed.
American society is organised around an ideology that embraces a set of dogmas about the nature of a good society. The American creed is summed up in four words: anti-statism, egalitarianism or meritocracy, individualism, and populism. Americanism is thus regarded as a highly attenuated, conceptualised, platonic, impersonal attraction toward a system of ideas, a solemn assent to a handful of final notions, including democracy, liberty, and opportunity, to all of which the American is said to adhere rationalistically as a socialist adheres to socialism. The most ardent American nationalist is wont to cry out: “Give me liberty or give me death!” Indeed, the state slogan of New Hampshire, one of the thirteen founding colonies of the union declares: “Live Free or Die!”
Accordingly, virtually every American president, from the most conservative Republican to the most progressive Democrat, has historically embraced this idealised notion of the United States, which has defined their behaviour both at home and abroad. Every American president prior to Donald Trump (at least since the twentieth century) has viewed the global role of the U.S. as the promotion of democracy, human rights, and liberty by persuasion and the power of example where possible, or by coercion and force of arms where necessary. The notion of the U.S. as a land of the free and home of the brave, as a shining city on a hill, a beacon of hope for the oppressed, and a place where “freedom rings” has provided American leaders with the moral authority to demand the same for oppressed peoples around the world.
The emergence of Donald Trump, however, has had the effect of upending and disrupting this state of affairs. Trump’s actions and behaviour both at home, and especially abroad, have negated the very essence of the ideals upon which the American nationalist myth is constructed, with serious implications for the standing of the U.S. both domestically and internationally. Of the four concepts upon which the American creed is constructed, Trump’s onslaught has been focused on three – anti-statism, egalitarianism/meritocracy, and populism.
How has Trump’s behaviour effectively subverted these concepts and what are the implications of this subversion?
The emergence of Donald Trump, however, has had the effect of upending and disrupting this state of affairs. Trump’s actions and behaviour both at home, and especially abroad, have negated the very essence of the ideals upon which the American nationalist myth is constructed, with serious implications for the standing of the U.S. both domestically and internationally.
The first key value representing Americanism is anti-statism. The argument here is that the American Revolution weakened the social values of an organic community and strengthened individualistic and anti-statist ones. The U.S. is deemed to be dominated by pure bourgeois and individualistic values. The U.S. is posited as having been born in the spirit of revolution against a government perceived to be tyrannical. Its anti-tyrannical bias was written into the constitution as the separation of powers, to ensure that no executive would ever again become too powerful. The weakness of the state and the emphasis on constitutionally-mandated division of powers hands lawyers a uniquely powerful role in America and make its people exceptionally litigious.
President Trump’s assault on the notion of separation of powers is manifested in his demand that the Department of Justice, especially its head, the Attorney General, should serve as the president’s personal lawyer and protector rather than as a public defender and protector of the rule of law. When Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from overseeing the Special Counsel investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections, Trump went ballistic and eventually sacked him, arguing that he would not have appointed him had he known he was going to recuse himself from the Robert Muller investigation. Indeed, if Trump had his way, he would want all governmental powers concentrated in his office.
Trump has displayed a fondness for authoritarian leaders, such as Russia’s Vladimir Putin, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, and the Philippines’s Rodrigo Duterte, who he considers as strong leaders who have strong control over their countries. This betrays his craving for similar powers – like the ones he enjoyed as the all-powerful head of the Trump Organization. Unlike his predecessors, President Trump finds himself stymied and frustrated by the constraining effects of the institutional limits on the U.S. presidency.
The second value that defines Americanism is meritocracy or egalitarianism. American egalitarianism is defined as equality of respect and opportunity. Equality of respect places emphasis on egalitarian social relations and the absence of the demand that those in the lower social order give overt deference to those in the upper classes. Equality of opportunity stresses meritocracy and equal opportunity for all to rise economically and socially. The practical impact of this principle has been a reinforcement of social etiquette, empathy, and compassion in inter-personal relations.
President Trump has subverted this principle, dismissing it as an unnecessary baggage of political correctness. This was on display right from the start of his candidacy for president when he went on to derogatorily refer to Mexican immigrants as rapists who bring drugs and social problems to the U.S.
Uncharacteristic of any and all public figures in American politics, Trump has also taken to insulting and bullying his political opponents. Those he does not see eye to eye with bear the brunt of insulting sobriquets. During the 2016 Republican Party Presidential primaries, Marco Rubio became “Little Marco”, Ted Cruz became “Lying Ted”, Jeb Bush earned the nickname “Low Energy Bush”, while Hillary Clinton was branded “Crooked Hillary”.
Trump’s does not just insult his opponents, but even those within his inner circle who get a taste of his wrath when they fall out with him. Former Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, went from being “a world class dealmaker” who would “be a star” at the time of his appointment to “dumb as a rock” and “lazy as hell” upon his sacking. Steve Bannon, Trump’s campaign manager who briefly became the White House Chief Strategist, was once described by the president as “tough and smart” but then became “Sloppy Steve” who had “lost his mind” after he was extensively quoted in a book critical of the president. Omarosa Manigault Newman went from “loyal friend” to “not smart”, “low life” and “whacky Omarosa”. Following his recusal, the president mocked Attorney General Jeff Session by calling him “mentally retarded”, “a dumb southerner”, and “Mr. Magoo” (a cartoon character).
Uncharacteristic of any and all public figures in American politics, Trump has also taken to insulting and bullying his political opponents. Those he does not see eye to eye with bear the brunt of insulting sobriquets. During the 2016 Republican Party Presidential primaries, Marco Rubio became “Little Marco”, Ted Cruz became “Lying Ted”, Jeb Bush earned the nickname “Low Energy Bush”, while Hillary Clinton was branded “Crooked Hillary”.
Populism as an American value is elaborated as the belief that the will of the people should dominate the elites, that the public choice is superior to professionalism. This is institutionally reflected in the early extension of the suffrage to all white males. Subsequently, it was reflected in the passage of the sixteenth amendment providing for the popular election of senators, in the direct election of judges in state and local jurisdictions, in the emergence of the primary system of nominating candidates for public office, in the judicial procedure of trial by a jury of one’s peers, and in the diffusion of the use of a referendum and public opinion surveys.
Central to this is the importance of a free media and freedom of expression. President Trump has sought to subvert this through his morbid dislike for media reports that are critical of him and his policies, declaring any and all news he doesn’t like as “fake news” and going so far as labeling the press “an enemy of the people”. This kind of rhetoric is usually associated with authoritarian leaders rather than with leaders of the so-called free world. Indeed, no other American president, despite their feelings of being unfairly criticised by the media, has ever gone after the media this brazenly.
President Trump’s subversion of American nationalist ideology has had major implications both nationally and internationally. At the national level, by talking up strongman tactics, derogatorily dismissing his political opponents, and dismissing the media as an enemy of the people, Trump helps shape the character and behaviour of Americans, especially his most ardent supporters, in a way that doesn’t augur well for a democracy like the U.S. His behaviour has emboldened white supremacists. The direct results of this include the mailing of pipe bombs to key Democratic Party leaders and a media house in October 2018 and the racist Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 2017. The president’s equivocation in condemning the rally, which turned violent resulting in one fatality, made matters worse. The white supremacists now see in him an ally in the White House. Indeed, White nationalist leader, David Duke, thanked President Trump for his “courage and honesty” in blaming the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, on the alt-left.
President Trump’s subversion of American nationalist ideology has had major implications both nationally and internationally. At the national level, by talking up strongman tactics, derogatorily dismissing his political opponents, and dismissing the media as an enemy of the people, Trump helps shape the character and behaviour of Americans, especially his most ardent supporters, in a way that doesn’t augur well for a democracy like the U.S.
At the international level, Trump’s jettisoning of American exceptionalism has had him commit to withdrawing the U.S. from leadership of the world. He has questioned the existence of NATO and demanded that other members step up their defence spending. He constantly berates his generals about what the U.S. is doing in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Syria, and even in South Korea and has declared he wants out of these places. In other words, the impact of Trumpism is American retreat from global leadership under the guise of “America First”, and an end to U.S. commitment to spreading democracy, civil and political liberties, and human rights across the globe. Furthermore, Trump’s rhetoric and style have helped embolden authoritarian leaders around the world. They have been afforded the leeway to harass the opposition and the mass media without fear of sanction from the so-called leader of the free world.
In the final analysis, when Barack Obama won the U.S. presidency in 2008, Trump was on the forefront of the birther movement that sought to delegitimise the Obama presidency by insinuating that he was un-American, Kenya-born, a foreigner who had conned his way to the presidency. Paradoxically, by subverting the key elements of American nationalist ideology that has formed the bedrock of American exceptionalism, Trump is proving, so far, to be the most un-American of American presidents.
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Politics
Being Black in Argentina
What does Javier Milei’s presidential victory mean for Argentina’s black and indigenous minorities?
On November 19, Javier Milei secured the presidency of the Republic of Argentina with 56% of the vote. However, his victory is expected to significantly impact a specific segment of the country.
During my six-month exchange in Argentina’s Venado Tuerto (pop. 75,000) in 2016, I encountered someone of shared Black ethnicity on the street only once. A person whom many locals incidentally mistook for me—along with a Cuban Black girl, the only black person like me in the whole high school. As insignificant as a census of this small city’s population may seem, it effectively illustrates a sobering reality: the presence of Black people in Argentina is sparse, and their numbers have dwindled over time.
“Hay más por otros lados, acá no llegaron” (There are more of them elsewhere, they have not arrived here) is a rhetoric prevalent among many Argentines, but the reality is quite dissimilar. Contacts between Argentina and Black people, particularly of African descent, date back to the 16th century transatlantic slave trade, when West and Central Africa people were brought by Spanish and Portuguese settlers to the coastal city of Buenos Aires, only to be sold and moved mostly within the Río de la Plata, present-day Argentina and Uruguay. In “Hiding in Plain Sight, Black Women, the Law, and the Making of a White Argentine Republic,” Erika Denise Edwards reports that between 1587 and 1640 approximately 45,000 African slaves disembarked in Buenos Aires. By the end of the 18th century, one-third of Argentina’s population was Black.
What, then, became of the Black African population in Argentina? Some attribute their decline to historical factors such as their active involvement in conflicts including the War of Independence against Spanish colonists (1810-1819) and the war with Paraguay (1865-1870), in which Black men often found themselves on the front lines, enduring the brunt of the attacks, or even choosing to desert and flee the country. These factors intersect with a gradual process of miscegenation and interracial mixing, leading to a progressive whitening of the population—both in terms of physical attributes and ideology.
Adding to this complex mix, political rhetoric comes into play. Influential Argentine leaders, such as Domingo Faustino Sarmiento in the 19th century, idealized white Europe not only as a model for overcoming the country’s socio-economic challenges but also as a narrative that implied the absence of Black people in Argentina, thereby erasing an integral part of the nation’s history.
Doing so has shrewdly allowed a country to avoid reckoning with its past of slavery and navigate the complexities of its presence, using the escamotage that there are no race-related issues in the country because there are no Black people. This assertion is incorrect for several reasons beyond those mentioned above. First, despite being imperceptible to the naked eye, there is a small but existing population of Afro-descendants in Argentina. Nevertheless, in my second stay in Argentina, this time in Buenos Aires, it became more apparent to me how a certain nationalistic current, in the footsteps of Sarmiento, proudly makes itself of this consistent lack of Black heritage. Comparing itself favorably to neighboring countries, this current boasts a notion of white supremacy in Argentina, which celebrates the Italian immigration from the 19th and 20th centuries as the foundation of national identity, while largely overlooking the historical legacy of African bodies that predates it.
As a result, even in a cosmopolitan capital city such as Buenos Aires, a significant portion of the white Argentine population based its identity on my opposite—not knowing that as an Afro-Italian, my Italian citizenship actually made them closer to my blackness and African roots than they wanted. Asserting that there are no racial concerns in Argentina is misleading. It amounts to the invisibilization of racial discrimination in a country where those who deviate from the preferred prototype, including Indigenous communities such as Mapuche, Quechua, Wichi, and Guarani, experience limited access to education and social services, and are disproportionately prone to experience poverty than their white counterparts.
Even within everyday discourse in Argentina, the assertion is refuted: many are labeled Black despite not matching the physical appearance associated with the term. The expression “es un negro” might refer to everyone who has darker skin tones, grouping them into a specific social category. However, beyond a mere description of physical attributes, “es un negro” delineates a person situated at various margins and lower rungs of society, whether for economic or social reasons. The appellation is also ordinarily used in jest as a nickname for a person who, of “black phenotype,” has nothing. The label “morocho” seems to be the most appropriate appellation for dark-skinned people in the country.
Argentine white supremacist identity is often matched by a certain right-wing political ideology that is classist, macho and, to make no bones about it, xenophobic. In the 2023 elections, such a systemic structure takes on the face of Javier Milei. The Argentine’s Donald Trump claimed in 2022 at the presentation of his book that he did not want to apologize for “being a white, blonde [questionable element], blue-eyed man.” With false modesty, the demagogue took on the burden of what it means in the country to have his hallmarks: privilege, status, and power.
Milei’s need for apologies should not revolve around his connotations but rather the proposals presented during his election campaign and outlined in his political program, which include the dollarization of pesos and the removal of government subsidies. Besides assessing if these actions would really benefit the vulnerable economy of the country, it’s worth questioning why it’s the middle-class, often white population that stands to suffer the least from such policies. They can afford to transact in dollars, weather an initial depreciation of their income, and provide for their children’s education without relying on government subsidies. In essence, they can do without the limited benefits offered by the Argentine state, given their already privileged positions.
The election of this politician not only adversely affects Black minorities, but also targets apparent minorities whom this divisive ideology seeks to erase, including Indigenous populations and the poorest segment of society—the current Argentinian “blacks”—who significantly enrich the Argentine populace. In such a scenario, one can only hope that the world will strive for a more consistent record of their existence.
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This post is from a partnership between Africa Is a Country and The Elephant. We will be publishing a series of posts from their site every week.
Politics
Risks and Opportunities of Admitting Somalia Into the EAC
The process of integrating Somalia into the EAC should be undertaken with long-term success in mind rather than in the light of the situation currently prevailing in the country.
The East African Community (EAC), whose goal is to achieve economic and political federation, brings together three former British colonies – Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania – and newer members Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, and most recently the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Somalia first applied to join the EAC in 2012 but with fighting still ongoing on the outskirts of Mogadishu, joining the bloc was impossible at the time. Eleven years later, joining the bloc would consolidate the significant progress in governance and security and, therefore, Somalia should be admitted into the EAC without undue delay. This is for several reasons.
First, Somalia’s admission would be built on an existing foundation of goodwill that the current leadership of Somalia and EAC partner states have enjoyed in the recent past. It is on the basis of this friendship that EAC states continue to play host to Somali nationals who have been forced to leave their country due to the insecurity resulting from the prolonged conflict. In addition, not only does Somalia share a border with Kenya, but it also has strong historical, linguistic, economic and socio-cultural links with all the other EAC partner states in one way or another.
Dr Hassan Khannenje of the Horn Institute for Strategic Studies said: ”Somalia is a natural member of the EAC and should have been part of it long ago.”
A scrutiny of all the EAC member states will show that there is a thriving entrepreneurial Somali diaspora population in all their economies. If indeed the EAC is keen to realise its idea of the bloc being a people-centred community as opposed to being a club of elites, then a look at the spread of Somali diaspora investment in the region would be a start. With an immense entrepreneurial diaspora, Somalia’s admission will increase trading opportunities in the region.
Second, Somalia’s 3,000 km of coastline (the longest in Africa) will give the partner states access to the Indian Ocean corridor to the Gulf of Aden. The governments of the EAC partner states consider the Indian Ocean to be a key strategic and economic theatre for their regional economic interests. Therefore, a secure and stable Somali coastline is central to the region’s maritime trade opportunities.
Despite possessing such a vast maritime resource, the continued insecurity in Somalia has limited the benefits that could accrue from it. The problem of piracy is one example that shows that continued lawlessness along the Somali coast presents a huge risk for all the states that rely on it in the region.
The importance of the maritime domain and the Indian Ocean has seen Kenya and Somalia square it out at the International Court of Justice over a maritime border dispute.
Omar Mahmood of the International Crisis Group said that ”Somalia joining the EAC then might present an opportunity to discuss deeper cooperation frameworks within the bloc, including around the Kenya-Somalia maritime dispute. The environment was not as conducive to collaboration before, and perhaps it explains why the ICJ came in. Integrating into the EAC potentially offers an opportunity to de-escalate any remaining tensions and in turn, focus on developing mechanisms that can be beneficial for the region.”
Nasong’o Muliro, a foreign policy and security specialist in the region, said: “The East African states along the East African coast are looking for opportunities to play a greater role in the maritime security to the Gulf of Aden. Therefore, Somalia joining the EAC bloc will allow them to have a greater say.”
Third, Somalia’s membership of the Arab League means that there is a strong geopolitical interest from Gulf states like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. However, Somalia stands to gain more in the long-term by joining the EAC rather than being under the control of the Gulf states and, to a large extent, Turkey. This is because, historically, competing interests among the Gulf states have contributed to the further balkanisation of Somalia by some members supporting breakaway regions.
On the other hand, the EAC offers a safer option that will respect Somalia’s territorial integrity. Furthermore, EAC partner states have stood in solidarity with Somalia during the difficult times of the civil conflict, unlike the Gulf states. The majority of the troop-contributing countries for the African Union Mission to Somalia came from the EAC partner states of Uganda, Kenya and Burundi. Despite having a strategic interest in Somalia, none of the Gulf states contributed troops to the mission. Therefore, with the expected drawdown of the ATMIS force in Somalia, the burden could fall on the EAC to fill in the vacuum. Building on the experience of deploying in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, it is highly likely that it could be called upon to do the same in Somalia when ATMIS exits by 2024.
The presence of the Al Shabaab group in Somalia is an albatross around its neck such that the country cannot be admitted into the EAC without factoring in the risks posed by the group.
According to a report by the International Crisis Group, the government of Somalia must move to consolidate these gains – especially in central Somalia – as it continues with its offensive in other regions. However, Somalia may not prevail over the Al Shabaab on its own; it may require a regional effort and perhaps this is the rationale some policymakers within the EAC have envisioned. If the EAC can offer assurances to Somalia’s fledgling security situation, then a collective security strategy from the bloc might be of significance.
Somalia’s admission comes with risks too. Kenya and Uganda have in the past experienced attacks perpetrated by Al Shabaab and, therefore, opening up their borders to Somalia is seen as a huge risk for these countries. The spillover effect of the group’s activities creates a lot of discomfort among EAC citizens, in particular those who believe that the region remains vulnerable to Al Shabaab attacks.
If the EAC can offer assurances to Somalia’s fledgling security situation, then a collective security strategy from the bloc might be of significance.
The EAC Treaty criteria under which a new member state may be admitted into the community include – but are not limited to – observance and practice of the principles of good governance, democracy and the rule of law. Critics believe that Somalia fulfils only one key requirement to be admitted to the bloc – sharing a border with an EAC partner state, namely, Kenya. On paper, it seems to be the least prepared when it comes to fulfilling the other requirements. The security situation remains fragile and the economy cannot support the annual payment obligations to the community.
According to the Fragility State Index, Somalia is ranked as one of the poorest among the 179 countries assessed. Among the key pending issues is the continued insecurity situation caused by decades of civil war and violent extremism. Furthermore, Human Rights Watch ranks Somalia low on human rights and justice – a breakdown of government institutions has rendered them ineffective in upholding the human rights of its citizens.
Somalia’s citizens have faced various forms of discrimination due to activities beyond their control back in their country. This has led to increasingly negative and suspicious attitudes towards Somalis and social media reactions to the possibility of Somalia joining the EAC have seen a spike in hostility towards citizens of Somalia. The country’s admission into the bloc could be met with hostility from the citizens of other partner states.
Dr Nicodemus Minde, an academic on peace and security, agrees that indeed citizens’ perceptions and attitudes will shape their behaviour towards Somalia’s integration. He argues that ”the admission of Somalia is a rushed process because it does not address the continued suspicion and negative perception among the EAC citizens towards the Somali people. Many citizens cite the admission of fragile states like South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo as a gateway of instability to an already unstable region”.
Indeed, the biggest challenge facing the EAC has been how to involve the citizens in their activities and agenda. To address this challenge, Dr Minde says that ’’the EAC needs to conduct a lot of sensitisation around the importance of integration because to a large extent many EAC citizens have no clue on what regional integration is all about”. The idea of the EAC being a people-centred organisation as envisioned in the Treaty has not been actualised. The integration process remains very elitist as it is the heads of state that determine and set the agenda.
The country’s admission into the bloc could be met with hostility from the citizens of other partner states.
Dr Khannenje offers a counter-narrative, arguing that public perception is not a major point of divergence since “as the economies integrate deeper, some of these issues will become easy to solve”. There are also those who believe that the reality within the EAC is that every member state has issues with one or the other partner state and, therefore, Somalia will be in perfect company.
A report by the Economic Policy Research Centre outlines the various avenues through which both the EAC and Somalia can benefit from the integration process and observes that there is therefore a need to fast-track the process because the benefits far outweigh the risks.
EAC integration is built around the spirit of good neighbourliness. It is against this backdrop that President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has extended the goodwill to join the EAC and therefore, it should not be vilified and condemned, but rather embraced. As Onyango Obbo has observed, Somalia is not joining the EAC – Somalia is already part of the EAC and does not need any formal welcoming.
Many critics have argued that the EAC has not learnt from the previous rush to admit conflict-plagued South Sudan and the DRC. However, the reality is that Somalia will not be in conflict forever; at some point, there will be tranquillity and peace. Furthermore, a keen look at the history of the EAC member states shows that a number of them have experienced cycles of conflict in the past.
Somalia is, therefore, not unique. Internal contradictions and conflict are some of the key features that Somalia shares with most of the EAC member states. The process of integrating Somalia into the EAC should, therefore, be undertaken with long-term success in mind rather than in the light of the situation currently prevailing in the country.
Politics
The Repression of Palestine Solidarity in Kenya
Kenya is one of Israel’s closest allies in Africa. But the Ruto-led government isn’t alone in silencing pro-Palestinian speech.
Israel has been committing genocide against the people of Occupied Palestine for 75 years and this has intensified over the last 30 days with the merciless carpet bombing of Gaza, along with raids and state-sanctioned settler violence in the West Bank. In the last month of this intensified genocide, the Kenyan government has pledged its solidarity to Israel, even as the African Union released a statement in support of Palestinian liberation. While peaceful marches have been successfully held in Kisumu and Mombasa, in Nairobi, Palestine solidarity organizers were forced to cancel a peaceful march that was to be held at the US Embassy on October 22. Police threatened that if they saw groups of more than two people outside the Embassy, they would arrest them. The march was moved to a private compound, Cheche Bookshop, where police still illegally arrested three people, one for draping the Palestinian flag around his shoulders. Signs held by children were snatched by these same officers.
When Boniface Mwangi took to Twitter denouncing the arrest, the response by Kenyans spoke of the success of years of propaganda by Israel through Kenyan churches. To the Kenyan populous, Palestine and Palestinians are synonymous with terrorism and Israel’s occupation of Palestine is its right. However, this Islamophobia and xenophobia from Kenyans did not spring from the eternal waters of nowhere. They are part of the larger US/Israel sponsored and greedy politician-backed campaign to ensure Kenyans do not start connecting the dots on Israel’s occupation of Palestine with the extra-judicial killings by Kenyan police, the current occupation of indigenous people’s land by the British, the cost-of-living crisis and the IMF debts citizens are paying to fund politician’s lavish lifestyles.
Kenya’s repression of Palestine organizing reflects Kenya’s long-standing allyship with Israel. The Kenyan Government has been one of Israel’s A-star pupils of repression and is considered to be Israel’s “gateway” to Africa. Kenya has received military funding and training from Israel since the 60s, and our illegal military occupation of Somalia has been funded and fueled by Israel along with Britain and the US. Repression, like violence, is not one dimensional; repression does not just destabilize and scatter organizers, it aims to break the spirit and replace it instead with apathy, or worse, a deep-seated belief in the rightness of oppression. In Israel’s architecture of oppression through repression, the Apartheid state has created agents of repression across many facets of Kenyan life, enacting propaganda, violence, race, and religion as tools of repression of Palestine solidarity organizing.
When I meet with Naomi Barasa, the Chair of the Kenya Palestine Solidarity Movement, she begins by placing Kenya’s repression of Palestine solidarity organizing in the context of Kenya as a capitalist state. “Imperialism is surrounded and buffered by capitalistic interest,” she states, then lists on her fingers the economic connections Israel has created with Kenya in the name of “technical cooperation.” These are in agriculture, security, business, and health; the list is alarming. It reminds me of my first memory of Israel (after the nonsense of the promised land that is)—about how Israel was a leader in agricultural and irrigation technologies. A dessert that flowed with milk and honey.
Here we see how propaganda represses, even before the idea of descent is born: Kenyans born in the 1990s grew up with an image of a benign, prosperous, and generous Christian Israel that just so happened to be unfortunate enough to be surrounded by Muslim states. Israel’s PR machine has spent 60 years convincing Kenyan Christians of the legitimacy of the nation-state of Israel, drawing false equivalences between Christianity and Zionism. This Janus-faced ideology was expounded upon by Israel’s ambassador to Kenya, Michel Lotem, when he said “Religiously, Kenyans are attached to Israel … Israel is the holy land and they feel close to Israel.” The cog dizzy of it all is that Kenyan Christians, fresh from colonialism, are now Africa’s foremost supporters of colonialism and Apartheid in Israel. Never mind the irony that in 1902, Kenya was the first territory the British floated as a potential site for the resettlement of Jewish people fleeing the pogroms in Europe. This fact has retreated from public memory and public knowledge. Today, churches in Kenya facilitate pilgrimages to the holy land and wield Islamophobia as a weapon against any Christian who questions the inhumanity of Israel’s 75-year Occupation and ongoing genocide.
Another instrument of repression of pro-Palestine organizing in Kenya is the pressure put on Western government-funded event spaces to decline hosting pro-Palestine events. Zahid Rajan, a cultural practitioner and organizer, tells me of his experiences trying to find spaces to host events dedicated to educating Kenyans on the Palestinian liberation struggle. He recalls the first event he organized at Alliance Français, Nairobi in 2011. Alliance Français is one of Nairobi’s cultural hubs and regularly hosts art and cultural events at the space. When Zahid first approached Alliance to host a film festival for Palestinian films, they told him that they could not host this event as they already had (to this day) an Israeli film week. Eventually, they agreed to host the event with many restrictions on what could be discussed and showcased. Unsurprisingly they refused to host the event again. The Goethe Institute, another cultural hub in Kenya that offers its large hall for free for cultural events, has refused to host the Palestinian film festival or any other pro-Palestine event. Both Alliance and Goethe are funded by their parent countries, France and Germany respectively (which both have pro-Israel governments). There are other spaces and businesses that Zahid has reached out to host pro-Palestine education events that have, in the end, backtracked on their agreement to do so. Here, we see the evolution of state-sponsored repression to the private sphere—a public-private partnership on repression, if you will.
Kenya’s members of parliament took to heckling and mocking as a tool of repression when MP Farah Maalim wore an “Arafat” to Parliament on October 25. The Speaker asked him to take it off stating that it depicted “the colors of a particular country.” When Maalim stood to speak he asked: “Tell me which republic,” and an MP in the background could be heard shouting “Hamas” and heckling Maalim, such that he was unable to speak on the current genocide in Gaza. This event, seen in the context of Ambassador Michael Lotem’s charm offensive at the county and constituency level, is chilling. His most recent documented visit was to the MP of Kiharu, Ndindi Nyoro, on November 2. The Israeli propaganda machine has understood the importance of County Governors and MPs in consolidating power in Kenya.
Yet, in the face of this repression, we have seen what Naomi Barasa describes as “many pockets of ad hoc solidarity,” as well as organized solidarity with the Palestinian cause. We have seen Muslim communities gather for many years to march for Palestine, we have seen student movements such as the Nairobi University Student Caucus release statements for Palestine, and we have seen social justice centers such as Mathare Social Justice Centre host education and screening events on Palestinian liberation. Even as state repression of Palestine solidarity organizing has intensified in line with the deepening of state relations with Apartheid Israel, more Kenyans are beginning to connect the dots and see the reality that, as Mandela told us all those years ago, “our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of Palestinians.”
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This post is from a partnership between Africa Is a Country and The Elephant. We will be publishing a series of posts from their site every week.
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