In response to an a January 2008 article by The Economist, “A Very African Coup”, concerning the humanitarian crisis in Kenya, Sir Edward Clay, the British high commissioner to Kenya from 2001 to 2005, warned that the recent election-driven violence was a result of two underlying problems:

“First, there has undoubtedly been a serious breach of Kenya’s electoral law. A result arrived at illegally is itself illegal. Second, the poorest, whether in the slums of Nairobi or in the rural areas, had all too little to lose in the recent violence. Most people living in the slums are inhabitants of shanties erected at the whim of rapacious landlords, who are themselves part of the political class. Some of  these residents have now had their votes stolen as well. Kenya requires a solution that restores social harmony and cohesion. A political understanding between party leaders is necessary, but not sufficient. Without sider social harmony, life for most of Kenya’s people will become even more intolerable. The poorest attack their equally poor neighbours and set fire to the little they have in common not because they hate these targets in themselves but because they see no other adequate way to express their grievances…”

Civil unrest stems from a desperation bred by a lack of basic necessities. Throughout history hungry, unemployed groups who lack the infrastructure necessary for self sustainment have been the most likely to violently rise up against political oppression. The events in Kenya should act as a reminder that the first and most important requisite for social harmony is a fair, healthy economy.

An article published by Scott Johnson of Newsweek International highlights the U.S. Government’s recognition of humanitarian aid as a preventative form of counterterrorism. As for the “Peace Corps with a weapon” concept, The Neutral Development Project makes no comment. Nonetheless, an interesting article:

Taking the war on terror to Africa

The United States is planning a new strategic command to take the global War on Terror to the Horn of Africa

Sept. 17, 2007 issue – America is quietly expanding its fight against terror on the African front. Two years ago the United States set up the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership with nine countries in central and western Africa. There is no permanent presence, but the hope is to generate support and suppress radicalism by both sharing U.S. weapons and tactics with friendly regimes and winning friends through a vast humanitarian program assembled by USAID, including well building and vocational training. In places like Chad, American Special Forces train and arm police or border guards using what it calls a “holistic approach to counterterrorism.” Sgt. Chris Rourke, a U.S. Army reservist in a 12-man American Civil Affairs unit living in Dire Dawa, in eastern Ethiopia, says it comes down to this: “It’s the Peace Corps with a weapon.”

Read on at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20657234/site/newsweek/

The Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) is a non-state armed group (NSAG) that operates in eastern Ethiopia. Regardless of whether or not their cause is just or constructive, what drives them is clear:

“When I realized that there is no education, no health services, no development, and children don’t go to school, I knew that there were problems.”

Here is a June 2007 New York Times video report on the ONLF by  Jeffrey Gettleman

http://youtube.com/watch?v=B2UsCzim6cc

In late July The Economist published an article entitled “A Computer in Every Pot”, which talks about the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project, an initiative to provide a low-cost laptop to the poorest children in the most austere locations. The effort has been spearheaded by Nicholas Negroponte, co-founder of the Media Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

Here is a key exerpt describing the project:

…This week sees the realisation of Mr. Negroponte’s five-year dream. After field testing in Nigeria and Brazil, the OLPC project’s first model, a rugged little green laptop called the XO that can run on batteries, solar power, a miniature windmill or hand- or foot-crank, goes into mass production. Schoolchildren in developing countries will start receiving the remarkable computer from October onwards.

The first batch is being supplied to some 30 of the world’s poorest countries for $176 apiece. As production builds up at Quanta, the huge Taiwanese laptop-maker that is producing the machine for OLPC, Mr Negroponte hopes to drive the unit cost down to $100.

It is no secret that the presence of education in a society is one of the most essential elements necessary for basic economic development. Thanks to the OLPC, “economically deprived children will have the chance to feel the exhilaration of computer-based learning”. To say that we at NDP are impressed would be an understatement.

Four Islamist terrorists were given life sentences this week for plotting to explode bombs on London’s transport system on July 21st 2005 (two weeks after suicide-bombers killed 56 people). All four men were originally from the Horn of Africa.

From the BBC (January 2006):

21 July plot suspects: Charges in full
Of those arrested over the failed 21 July bombings, five people have been charged with conspiring to attack the London transport network. A sixth has been charged with conspiring to cause explosions, while another man was charged with having information that could have led to prosecution.
A provisional trial date of September 2006 has been set for five of the suspects.

Hussain Osman, 27, has been accused of the attempted bombing of Shepherd’s Bush Tube station.

Yassin Hassan Omar, of New Southgate, London, 24, has been accused of the attempted bombing of a Victoria Line train, near Warren Street.

Ibrahim Muktar Said, 27, of Stoke Newington, north London, is suspected of the failed Hackney bus bombing.

Ramzi Mohamed, 23, is suspected of the attempted Oval Tube bombing.

HUSSAIN OSMAN, YASSIN HASSAN OMAR, IBRAHIM MUKTAR SAID, RAMZI MOHAMED
The charges against them are that:

On 21 July 2005 they did attempt to murder passengers on the Transport for London system

On or before 21 July 2005, they did conspire together with others to murder passengers on the Transport for London system

On 21 July 2005, they unlawfully and maliciously made or had in his possession, or under his control, an explosive substance with intent by means thereof to endanger life or cause serious injury to property

On or before 21 July 2005 they did conspire with others to cause by an explosive substance, explosions of a nature likely to endanger life or cause serious injury to property

MANFO KWAKU ASIEDU
Manfo Kwaku Asiedu, 32, of Finsbury Park, north London, is charged over an unexploded device found at Little Wormwood Scrubs park in west London. The charges he faces are that:

On or before 21 July 2005, he did conspire together with others to murder passengers on the Transport for London system

On or before 21 July 2005, he did conspire with others to cause by an explosive substance, explosions of a nature likely to endanger life or cause serious injury to property.

ADEL YAHYA
Adel Yahya, 23, of the Tottenham area of north London is charged with conspiring to cause by an explosive substance, explosions of a nature likely to endanger life or cause serious injury to property.

Mr Yahya was arrested after he arrived at Gatwick airport on a flight from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on Tuesday, 19 December.

He is accused of conspiring with five others to cause explosions on or before 21 July.

MUHEDIN ALI

Muhedin Ali, 27, from west London, has been charged with having information which could have led to the prosecution of Hussain Osman.

He was charged on 27 January, 2006.

He is also charged with knowing or believing that Hussain Osman had committed attempted murder, conspiracy to murder and other offences.

The first annual Neutral Development fundraiser was a complete success! Our expections were surpassed in terms of both turnout and total funds raised. Everyone had a great time, and what’s more, it was all for a great cause. The official numbers will be published soon, but it’s looking like we sold more than 70 tickets and – including proceeds from the raffle – were able to raise an after-cost total of more than $1,800! This will be more than enough to get us off our feet and on the fast track to becoming a group with some serious fundraising power.

Lots of people contributed to this, so I’d like to use this post to thank the following NDP team members, without whom this event wouldn’t have been possible:

Katie Gagne – Events Director
Taylor Bires – Raffle and Donations
Alex Marguerite – Raffle and Donations
Jackie Downing – Raffle and Donations
Jared Peterson – Finance Director
Will Van der Veen – Promotions
Patrick Semmens – Website

Thanks guys. Give yourselves a pat on the back. Can’t wait until next year!

-Rich

From the Council on Foreign Relations, an excellent interactive map of The Horn:

Council on Foreign Relations – The Horn of Africa

A quote from the website:
“As violence in the Horn of Africa grabs international headlines, Western officials have become increasingly concerned that the region could become a haven for terrorist activity. Somalia’s last functioning government fell in 1991, and since then, intelligence officials believe several al-Qaeda operatives have sought refuge there. U.S. interest piqued when a group of Islamic fundamentalist militias threatened to take control of much of the country in 2006, only to be put down by an Ethiopian intervention.

Somalia is not the only source of strife in the region. Pockets of relative stability have become burdened by thousands of refugees, and bad blood between Ethiopia and Eritrea poses a perennial threat to the fragile region. “

Blowing the Horn
By John Prendergast and Colin Thomas-Jensen
From Foreign Affairs
April, 2007

Summary: The Greater Horn of Africa, the hottest conflict zone in the world, is a legitimate concern of U.S. officials. But their overwhelming focus on stemming terrorism there is overshadowing U.S. initiatives to resolve conflicts and promote good governance — with disastrous implications for regional stability and U.S. counterterrorism objectives themselves.

The piece is strongly opinionated, something NDP tries to stay away from, but Prendergast does outline the major problems facing the Horn with a clear and concise, country-by-country structure. These are nine pages that will dramatically enhance anyone’s understanding of the geopolitical dyanmics as they relate to counter-terrorism efforts within the region.

Key exerpt:

The Greater Horn of Africa — a region half the size of the United States that includes Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya, and Uganda — is the hottest conflict zone in the world. Some of the most violent wars of the last half century have ripped the region apart. Today, two clusters of conflicts continue to destabilize it. The first centers on interlocking rebellions in Sudan, including those in Darfur and southern Sudan, and engulfs northern Uganda, eastern Chad, and northeastern Central African Republic. The main culprit is the Sudanese government, which is supporting rebels in these three neighboring countries — and those states, which are supporting Sudanese groups opposing Khartoum. The second cluster links the festering dispute between Ethiopia and Eritrea with the power struggle in Somalia, which involves the fledgling secular government, antigovernment clan militias, Islamist militants, and anti-Islamist warlords. Ethiopia’s flash intervention in Somalia in December temporarily secured the ineffectual transitional government’s position, but that intervention, which Washington backed and supplemented with its own air strikes, has sown the seeds for an Islamist and clan-based insurgency in the future.

Worth the read.

KENYA:
April, 2007
The Wall Street Journal recently published an article entitled A Dam Connects Machakos, Kenya, To Archbold, Ohio, addressing issues highly relevant to the NDP cause.

Two key experpts stand out:
Residents of that small village and neighboring hamlets on the plains west of Todelo provided the money to construct the crude cement-and-stone dam, which is about 100 feet wide and 10 feet deep. Over the past four years, they have sold cattle and hosted an annual hamburger festival to raise more than $70,000. That money has helped build several hundred small-scale dams and water retention ponds in the Machakos area, delivering 5,000 families from drought and hunger…

They are farmers tilling a field largely neglected by the big international aid agencies: the economic development of small farming communities in Africa. While international aid for education and health projects and emergency food relief has grown over the past two decades, aid for agriculture and rural development has shrunk by more than half, contributing to increasing malnutrition and hunger…

Most impressive about this initiative is how a relatively small amount of money changed the lives of so many. A small group of neophytes, employing local fundraising efforts equivalent in complexity to those you might expect from high school kids trying to raise money for a prom, helped save lives and inspire hope. $70,000 raised over four years from events such as their annual “Burger Bash” helped make a lasting impact on a village in dire straits. It should act as reassurance that members of the Neutral Development Project are up to the challenge.

ETHIOPIA:
Projects by Partners in the Horn of Africa in Ethiopia:
- Installation of a flour mill in the North Wollo region. Wollo flour mill serves 1,500 families and the income is allocated by an elected committee for projects which benefit all of the villages.
- Two microfinance projects currently in place provide unemployed or underemployed women can start their own businesses
- After the first loan is repaid, women are entitled to larger loans.
- Protecting clean water sources like springs and artesian wells and digging shallow water wells.
- Renovations on a high school library and construction of a footbridge for access to medical services during rain season
- Establishment of a community peer education program to accurately inform inner city Addis Ababa residents about HIV.

DJIBUTI:
The Near East Foundation
In poor communities across the country, the Near East Foundation, in conjunction with local officials, is creating a credit based system of cooperative farms to combat the lack of resources, planning, and emergency funds available to the subsistence farming community. At around $5,000 per community, the goal is to create “a sound micro-finance culture within the country” and help move Djibouti’s farmers off of the vicious cycle of hand-to-mouth existence they’ve been living.

UGANDA & SUDAN:
Dunavant Cotton
…Then cotton growing revived in Uganda, and Dunavant Enterprises came to town about five years ago, paying cash on delivery. After three seasons of growing cotton for Dunavant, the world’s largest privately owned cotton broker and one of the biggest family-owned agribusinesses in the United States, Mr. Okelo, who owns less than three acres and has two wives and a passel of children, had saved $300, about double his annual earnings before Dunavant started buying his cotton.
Last summer, Mr. Okelo opened a small grocery store.

”Before Dunavant, no one came to help us,” says Mr. Okelo, 40, who has farmed a variety of crops in these parts for about 20 years.

…There is another reason for optimism about Africa: Some countries, including Sudan, Zimbabwe and Uganda, are growing much less cotton than they did in the past. So shifts in the cotton trade have raised hopes that Africans can ”go back to the future” and become a global cotton power, said Maggie Kigozi, chief of Uganda’s investment authority in Kampala.”
Source: New York Times, Out of Africa, Cotton and Cash, January 2007