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Reconnecting The Umbilical Cord: Haiti To Join the African Union By Sophia S. Vilceus

November 11, 2012

Reconnecting The Umbilical Cord: Haiti To Join the African Union
By Sophia S. Vilceus

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(TriceEdneyWire.com) - On the fourth floor of Howard Center, two graduate students and two professors in African Studies mulled Haiti's application to become the first potential non-African member of the African Union in January 2013.

“If you consider that islands like Martinique are quite far away from Europe but are still part of the European Union, Martinique by virtue of being a part of France, Haiti’s becoming an AU member doesn’t seem so improbable," said Phiwo Mnyandu, a PhD student from South Africa.

Mnyandu was referring to the 7,371 miles from Port-au-Prince, Haiti, to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, headquarters of the African Union. The distance between Fort-de-France, capital of Martinique and Brussels, Belgium, headquarters of the European Union, is 4,376 miles.

Alem Hailu, an African Studies professor at Howard University elaborates, “Skeptics will undoubtedly point to the insurmountable problem of geography, politics and logistics that will be faced. Visionaries who focus on possibilities grounded in relentless efforts and commitments, on the other hand, can find reason for hope and triumph."

Professor Mbye Cham of the African Studies program at Howard acknowledges the obvious challenges that will inevitably surface due to the geographical distance between the two regions however he supplements that by saying that the advent of such advanced technology and communication would mitigate potential drawbacks.

There seems to be a common theme of support yet apprehension.

"I for one would like it," Mnyandu said. "Symbolically, powerful. Materially, I’m cautious. I’m not sure how much material and developmental benefit Haiti can extract from similarly impoverished countries in Africa."

Cham refutes the aforementioned statement by asserting that the amount of institutional resources, intellectual capacity, and technological exchange that would occur would lead to meaningful advancement.

Public Radio International, a weekly one-hour radio program, posted on its website on October 17, 2012 that Haiti is set to become the latest member of the African Union in January, if all goes as planned. AU has 54 member states, all of them on the African continent. Haiti’s communication minister Ady Jean-Gardy made the formal application in July at an African Union summit in Addis Ababa, the blog post reported.

“We are practically connected by umbilical cord to Haiti,” said Mian Georges, of Benin who has actively been involved in missions based in Haiti, according to PRI.

George’s symbolism reinforces a broader idea, though. In essence this idea is that Haiti joining the African Union is viewed as such an avant-garde idea because it displays the understanding of the inherent connectedness that these two cultures share.  Haiti joining the AU would allow Africa to breathe life into Haiti with the same umbilical cord that was forcedly cut centuries ago.

Haiti and Africa have always had an intimate relationship. From West Africans being sold and shipped to Haiti during the Transatlantic Slave Trade, to Toussaint L’ouverture—a Beninois slave who drove Napoleon out of Haiti in the 18th century and led the first Black Country to independence.  For a long time, Haiti was the only Black member of the United Nations and used that platform to advocate for Africa’s break from colonial rule.  After the devastating earthquake in 2010, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Senegal — though financially burdened themselves--- were among the first countries that donated millions of dollars and resources for Haitian students to complete their studies for free in Africa.

Cham attributes this special relationship between Haiti and Africa to a few things, one of which being the direct impact that the Haitian Revolution had on Africa’s own independence movement and other cultural and political movements such as The Negritude Movement. He explains that the influence and intellect of the Haitian Revolution laid the foundation for figures such as Leopold Senghor and Leon Damas to emerge within the Diaspora.

 "If we apply the notion of cultural geography, Haiti should be part of the African Union," said Naglaa Mahmoud, a PhD student from Egypt. "We share the same culture, same history, and many situations as Haiti.  Haiti stood up for Africa’s independence. I think it is a powerful idea and it is also inspirational for those who dream of melting barriers of historical memories of slavery.”

There is modest debate surrounding the symbolic significance that would be rendered should Haiti in fact become a member of the African Union, however the larger question then becomes what tangible and concrete benefits would Haiti and African countries reap in the process? This joining of states would force us to look past the ethereal bond that Africa and Haiti often claim and move the African Diaspora in a direction of substantially being involved and concerned with one another.

“Ways that would benefit the people of both constituencies should be viewed as incremental steps," Hailu says. "The significance lies both in the symbolic as well as substantive value of affirming commonalities of culture and history.  Furthermore, Haiti's membership to the AU can assist in strengthening structures of policy, research and partnership.”

Hailu encourages both Haiti and The African Union to look to other political models. “Examples from other world experiences that have found value in regional co-operations include America’s with ASEAN, the commonwealth organization, New Zealand’s Australia’s and Japan’s membership in regional organizations," he says. "Haiti’s as the latest case, therefore, can only be viewed as a similar step in unifying the dreams, experiences and pragmatic stride toward building a strong international structure of interdependence and mutual reinforcement.”

Essentially, the ideal of the African Union is to promote a united continental Africa—a broad continental Africa that includes the Diaspora.  An aim of the AU is to promote better corporations in different regions of Africa. With that being said, Cham concluded, “Haiti joining the AU makes perfect sense. I just hope people are serious about it and invest the necessary creative and intellectual work to make it viable."


The Community Has a Second Term, Now What? by Dr. Wilmer J. Leon III

The Community Has a Second Term, Now What?  
By  Dr. Wilmer J. Leon III  

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(TriceEdneyWire.com) - The results are in.  They will not be official until the Electors convene on December 17th and prepare their Certificates of Votes. But for all intents and purposes President Barack Obama has won his second term by defeating Mitt Romney 303 electoral votes to 206 and the popular vote 50 percent to 48 percent.  

Now what?  When you look at the electoral map, red states / blue states it becomes fairly obvious the country has politically re-segregated itself with a solid Republican South (except Virginia and Florida) and this re-segregation falls along racial lines. Many White voters are voting their sentiments instead of their interests. As Tim Wise writes in Between Barack and a Hard Place, Obama’s success is meaningful but “the larger systemic and institutional realities of life in America suggest the ongoing salience of a deep-seated cultural malady-racism-which has been neither eradicated nor even substantially diminished by Obama’s victory.”  

In the wake of this recent victory and with the new political capital that has been generated, the African-American community must move away from the politics of personality (just being grateful that there’s an African American family in the White House) and mature into a politics of policy outcome.  The time for deference and timidity has passed.  The collective efforts should be on targeted policies focusing on housing, education, unemployment, health disparities, and incarceration.  

Dr. Boyce Watkins wrote a very insightful piece entitled "3 Things Obama Must Address for Black People," in which he correctly highlighted that the collective African-American community and the Obama administration has been too politically polite; too deferential regarding White sensitivity towards race. With the second term in hand the African- American community must present legislation through its representatives in the CBC that targets its concerns and demands that President Obama uses his bully pulpit to speak to these issues as he has with same-sex marriage and The Dream Act. 

The African-American community must stay engaged in the process as a political interest group and hold its elected officials accountable for delivering the policy outputs that it sent them there to deliver.  This will not be easy. As Dr. Ronald Walters highlighted in his piece, "Barack Obama and the Politics of Blackness," the Obama campaign emerged from the center of American politics, “…and the structural requirements of fund raising and the interests projected by White voters.” 

Walters contrasts President Obama with other Black presidential candidates who have not faced that problem or seeming contradiction because they, “…emerged from the Black community at the margins of the American electorate.”  The community cannot allow the de-racialized politics of the Obama administration and the Mayor Corey Bookers of the world to become its politics. The community must control the politics of its representatives not allow the representatives to control the politics of the community.  

The questions should not be what should President Obama do for Black America but what will Black America do for itself politically and when?  How does Black America develop the political power, will, and leverage to implement substantive change?  Thereby, dictating an agenda instead of as Watkins writes, sitting “… quietly on the sidelines, hoping that if we are silent enough, people won't realize that Obama is black like the rest of us.”  

The community has a second term, now what?  

Go to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.,  www.wilmerleon.com , email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. orwww.twitter.com/drwleon


7 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW TO PROTECT OUR VOTE

7 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW TO PROTECT OUR VOTE

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Source: National Coalition on Black Civic Participation

1.VERIFY your registration status and your poll location before Election Day by calling your local Board of Board of Elections, 1-866-MYVOTE1 or visit www.unityvoterempowermentcampaign.org.

2.VERIFY the proper identification needed to vote in advance. Be sure to TAKE PROPER ID TO VOTE. To check ID requirements for your state visit www.costoffreedom.info or download the Election Protection App. Text OUR VOTE to 90975.

3.VERIFY that YOU will be in town on Election Day - If available in your community, vote early or by absentee ballot

4.DON'T BE AFRAID TO REQUEST HELP from poll workers. Poll workers are there to help YOU.

5.YOU HAVE A RIGHT to file a complaint if you think your rights have been violated. If you need assistance call 1-866-OUR-VOTE.

6.STAND YOUR GROUND - If there is a problem at the polls you have a right to cast a provisional ballot. However, not all provisional ballots count, so call 1-866-OUR-VOTE to verify your status FIRST.

7.VOLUNTEER to be a poll worker or monitor in your local community at www.ncbcp.org and www.866OURVOTE.org.

 

President Obama Re-elected! Black Vote Does It - Again By Hazel Trice Edney

President Obama Re-elected! Black Vote Does It - Again
By Hazel Trice Edney

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(TriceEdneyWire.com) - After a long and bitter campaign, President Barack Obama won re-election with 303 electoral votes to Mitt Romney’s 206 on Tuesday largely due to the grassroots get-out-to-vote campaign in the African-American community.

“From Florida to Virginia to Ohio to Pennsylvania, the Black vote was the deciding force in the most important states in this election,” says Ben Jealous, President/CEO of the NAACP in a brief interview following the Obama win. On election eve, the NAACP issued a statement saying it would have turned out more than 1.2 million voters by the time polls closed on Election Day. The NAACP called it the largest get out to vote success in the organization's 103-year history.

The effort was partially in response to an apparent rogue campaign by Republicans to change voting laws to make it more difficult for African-Americans to vote. Most of the new laws were struck down in court challenges while an army of African-Americans registered themselves and others to assure victory on Nov. 6.

“My heroes are our members who stood up to voter intimidation, who turned back voter suppression, who set records for voter registration and turnout,” Jealous said. “We were successful in mobilizing our community through an incredible storm of voter repression because we planned our work and we worked our plan.”

Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., who spent the final days before the election getting out the vote in the battleground of Ohio rather than in his Chicago hometown, noted Obama’s uphill battle against racism.

“The personal attacks on the president : ‘You’re a liar, you’re not an American, you’re not a Christian, you’re a retard’," he recalled the hateful statements made by some Romney supporters during the campaign. “People took those hits as personal aimed at them. He was bearing the cross for us. Those are the things they call us every day …And it made him a martyr for all practical purposes. He had to take that stuff. He had to take those insults. They’d never treated the president that way before.”

Obama seemed keenly aware of the grassroots efforts. Even before his public concession speech shortly before 2 a.m., his campaign sent an email with a targeted message of thanks.

“I'm about to go speak to the crowd here in Chicago, but I wanted to thank you first,” said the message that hit inboxes minutes before the President, First Lady Michelle, and daughters Malia and Sasha took to the stage before a roaring crowd of more than 10,000 in Chicago. “I want you to know that this wasn't fate, and it wasn't an accident. You made this happen. You organized yourselves block by block. You took ownership of this campaign five and ten dollars at a time. And when it wasn't easy, you pressed forward.”

The win comes at the end of a long and cantankerous battle against challenger Romney, a millionaire businessman and former governor of Massachusetts. Romney’s taunting campaign style appeared to have riled voters. Obama, maintaining his trademark style of focus and passion, exuded grace in his acceptance speech.

“Tonight, in this election, you, the American people, reminded us that while our road has been hard, while our journey has been long, we have picked ourselves up, we have fought our way back, and we know in our hearts that for the United States of America the best is yet to come,” he said to thunderous applause. “I want to thank every American who participated in this election ... whether you voted for the very first time or waited in line for a very long time. By the way, we have to fix that,” he said in obvious reference to the extremely long lines experienced by thousands across the nation. Some voters stood in lines for up to five hours to assure that they would vote.

Despite a clearly divided country with the re-election of a Republican-majority House of Representatives and a Democratically-led U. S. Senate, the President used his campaign speech to call for unity.

“I believe we can seize this future together because we are not as divided as our politics suggests. We're not as cynical as the pundits believe. We are greater than the sum of our individual ambitions, and we remain more than a collection of red states and blue states. We are and forever will be the United States of America,” he said. The familiar theme resonated with the cheering crowd and the millions watching on television who recall it from his debut in national politics as a U. S. Senator during the Democratic National Convention of 2004.

Romney, in Boston with thousands of somber campaign supporters, at first did not concede as he awaited the results from Ohio. When he finally conceded around 1:30 a.m., his usual hard edge had softened as he gave his concession speech.

“I have just called President Obama to congratulate him on his victory. His supporters and his campaign also deserve congratulations. The nation, as you know, is at a critical point,” Romney said. “At a time like this, we can't risk partisan bickering and political posturing. Our leaders have to reach across the aisle to do the people's work. And we citizens also have to rise to the occasion.”

Moving “forward” as was his campaign slogan, President Obama returned words of grace, setting aside the bitter words of just a few days ago.

“I just spoke with Governor Romney and I congratulated him and [vice presidential candidate] Paul Ryan on a hard-fought campaign,” he said in his speech. “We may have battled fiercely, but it's only because we love this country deeply and we care so strongly about its future…In the weeks ahead, I also look forward to sitting down with Governor Romney to talk about where we can work together to move this country forward."

Get Out to Vote Activities Continue Amidst Hurricane by Hazel Trice Edney

Get Out to Vote Activities Continue Amidst Hurricane
Protect Our Vote Sunday Announced for Oct. 28 and Nov. 4
By Hazel Trice Edney

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President Barack Obama receives an update on the ongoing response to Hurricane Sandy at the National Response Coordination Center at FEMA headquarters in Washington, D.C. on Sunday. FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate, right, and Richard Serino, FEMA Deputy Administrator, are seated next to the President.  PHOTO: Pete Souza/The White House

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Only days before the presidential election, a mega-storm slowed down both candidates and threatened to knock out power in at least 10 million homes across the East Coast. But, even as the storm hit, a Black voter operation used every possible mechanism to continue get-out-to-vote and voter protection efforts for Nov. 6.

“The Black community is facing one of the greatest challenges ever against malicious schemes and laws deliberately aimed at stopping and discouraging our people from exercising their right to vote. Only a unified effort by the Black Church can protect the vote won through the blood, sweat and tears of our people over the years,” said Dr. W. Franklyn Richardson, chairman of the Conference of National Black Churches, in a release announcing "Unity: Protect Our Vote Sundays” sponsored by a string of civil rights organizations Oct. 28 and Nov. 4.

Meanwhile during the storm, “We have robo calls featuring Actress Vivica Fox telling the people in the states to vote early and the people in the states who can’t vote early, she’s just telling people what they need to do to be prepared to vote,” says Edrea Davis, a spokeswoman for the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation one of the civil rights organizations involved in the Unity movement. She says calls are also going out encouraging people to “Walk a friend to the polls,” a special outreach to the youth.

“The hurricane is going on but the work is also still going on,” Davis said. Live calls were also being made across the South. “Yes they’re working, encouraging people to exercise their right to vote.”

Escalating activities toward Nov. 6, “Unity: Protect Our Vote Sundays” is a plan for Civil Rights and Black church leaders to join forces to protect Black voters.

The partners include The National Coalition on Black Civic Participation (NCBCP) the Conference of National Black Churches (CNBC), National Action Network, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (LCCRUL), Samuel DeWitt Proctor Project and A. Philip Randolph Institute (APRI), according to a release.

“The Unity: Protect Our Vote Sundays goals are to mobilize Black faith leaders in a call to action to Black denominational and congregational leaders to take up arms to mobilize and protect their congregations from voter suppression tactics across the country by providing them with tools and information to protect their vote through Black Youth Vote, Black Women,’’ said NCBCP President/CEO Melanie Campbell in a release.

As the storm approached, President Obama – on a break from campaigning – issued a warning.

“Obviously, all of us across the country are concerned about the potential impact of Hurricane Sandy. This is a serious and big storm,” he said in a statement released immediately after a meeting with FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) on Sunday. “But the other thing that makes this storm unique is we anticipate that it is going to be slow moving. That means that it may take a long time not only to clear, but also to get, for example, the power companies back in to clear trees and to put things back in place so that folks can start moving back home.”

Hurricane Sandy was expected to affect some 50 million people from South Carolina to the New England states. Authorities speculated that it could also affect election turnout and voting if major damage and power outages continue into next week. Encouraging everyone to take the storm seriously, Obama said the federal, state and local governments are working together to protect residents and their homes.

Meanwhile, Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, both continued television advertisements, but stopped email fundraising and canceled some travel as the storm came closer to land earlier this week. Maryland cancelled early voting as the state and Washington, D.C. declared a state of emergency.

With threats of voter intimidation at the polls amidst the close race, plans for Election Day continue. The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and Election Protection are providing voter protection tools including its national nonpartisan Election Protection Hotline, 1-866-OUR-VOTE. They also have a free mobile app to download and use in case voters are blocked in their effort to vote or have questions (Text OURVOTE to 90975).

“As we have done for over 10 years, the Election Protection Coalition will be there for all voters to safeguard their fundamental right to vote and have that vote counted on Election Day,” said Barbara Arnwine, President and Executive Director, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

Meanwhile, volunteers are also needed to serve as poll monitors, says CNBC President, Jacqui Burton.

She is encouraging denominational leaders, pastors, clergy, lay leaders and attorneys "to volunteer to serve as poll monitors in our massive effort to mobilize an ‘Army of Poll Monitors’ to be a moral presence at the polls against efforts to intimidate Black voters.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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