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--- On Fri, 9/24/10, O E <[email protected]> wrote:
From: O E <[email protected]>
Subject: Fw: ZImbabwe Article From UN General Assembly 2010
To: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected],
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"CAAEF" <[email protected]>, "Joan Cambridge" <[email protected]>, "regina
chivanga" <[email protected]>
Date: Friday, September 24, 2010, 8:12 AM
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From: O E <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Fri, September 24, 2010 11:02:28 AM
Subject: ZImbabwe Article From UN General Assembly 2010
Zim’s MDG history should inspire world
>From Obi Egbuna at the UNITED NATIONS, New York.
WHILE President Mugabe was addressing the Millennium Development Goals summit,
which was part and parcel of the 65th UN General Assembly here, one was left
wondering how US-based NGOs, educators, journalists etc, who if they were
listening to the President objectively had one question echoing in their minds:
Since when do African dictatorships in the classical sense of the word, work so
tirelessly to elevate the human standard of living?
Despite a decade of illegal economic sanctions, the foundation President Mugabe
laid in the education sector has seen Zimbabwe retain top spot as the most
literate nation in Africa even though the sanctions have wreaked havoc with the
country’s education sector.
What this basically means is that Zimbabwe did not wait for the year 2000 UN
Millennium Summit to know that there was need to significantly invest in social
services to improve the lot of the people.
Zimbabwe’s achievements must have left many here wondering how Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch, the recognised human rights watchdogs on
today’s world scene, appear to exclude Zimbabwe’s overwhelmingly positive
attributes from reports that too often sound like extensions of US-EU
Intelligence reports.
What is becoming a fundamental necessity for Africans (African-Americans) born
and raised in the US, is to look at our plight inside US borders in relation to
our human and social conditions, before we can appreciate Zimbabwe’s resolve in
meeting MDG goals which in their case is inextricably linked to defending their
sovereignty.
There is an adage often used in the United States which says "if you are living
in a glass house don’t throw stones", this puts US president Barack Obama in an
extremely delicate position if he continues to believe that the US Government
can pass moral judgment on any African, Asian, Caribbean or Latin American
Nation past or present.
Because the UN happens to be geographically based in New York, it would be
helpful to shed light on the city where President Mugabe boldly stated US-EU
Sanctions are the biggest threat to Zimbabwe meeting MDG goals.
The Children’s Defense Fund whom many believe inside the Civil Rights Movement
set the standard for research, collecting data and circulation, have provided
the following alarming statistics about children in New York City;
l There are presently 384 000 children in New York that don’t have health
insurance.
l A child in New York is abused or neglected every seven minutes.
l A child in New York is born into poverty every 10 minutes.
l A child or teenager in New York is killed by gunfire every four days.
l In New York 66 percent of 4th graders read below proficiency. This also must
be looked at in the context of the US Ambassador Susan Rice spearheading a
campaign to scramble together a Human Rights Report, which was prepared to meet
the deadline of the beginning of the UN General Assembly.
These alarming figures challenge us to make a clear distinction between
countries like Zimbabwe, that are struggling to meet MDG goals due to economic
strangulation and limited resources, and countries like the good old US of A
who don’t meet goals due to a preoccupation and obsession with war and greed.
Because the MDG debate had a strong focus on HIV and Aids, the US and British
Government had to feel like church goers when it comes time to confess your
sins, especially since it is public knowledge that they conspired to deny
Zimbabwe access to the Global Fund on numerous occasions this decade.
If the so-called African Americans make up 12 percent of the general
population, and the President of the Black Nurses Association highlighted that
in 2000, 66 percent of the 41 960 HIV and Aids adult and adolescent cases were
Africans born in the US and Hispanics, and young African-American women have
the highest HIV-infection rate of any group, this should convey a message to
our health advocates that isolating poor countries of their kith and kin, due
to failed attempts at political coercion and intimidation is not an option.
What this reveals is the US has no problem letting hatred for President Mugabe
and Zimbabwe based on ideological differences; carry over into the humanitarian
arena. This is compatible with President Obama reminding us that he feels "the
might of the US military must be matched by the strength of US diplomacy".
Because President Mugabe and Zimbabwe have also been attacked concerning the
conditions of prisons in their country, it would be interesting to hear a US
response if he chose to highlight the fact, in New York State Governments spend
3,4 times more per prisoner than per public school pupil.
The tragic backdrop to this dynamic is there are more of our brothers in
prisons, than in universities, and former US President Bill Clinton passed a
law stating convicted felons were not eligible for financial aid.
This means the man who before President Obama’s victory, was referred to as the
first African President because of his ability to masquerade in our presence,
could care less if we couldn't afford the exorbitant college fees inside US
borders.
When we discuss MDG goals and put strong emphasis on health, women and
educational issues, the contradictions of our former colonial and slave masters
are magnified for all to see, and this reality neutralises their ability to
lecture to the ancestral products of nations they have raped, looted and
plundered.
The Black Nurses Association in coalition with 19 other US based Women’s Groups
recently wrote a letter to US Senator Harry Reid, the Senate's Majority Leader,
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader John Boehmer and
Senator Mitch McConnell the Senate Minority Leader, that was warning the US
Government that State governments are not meeting health care needs of low
income families.
The letter went on to discuss how vulnerable women would be if the American
Jobs, Closing Loopholes and Preventing Outsourcing Act bill, leaves out a six
month extension of an increase of medical aid funding.
The BNA also has initiated intense engagement with the Chair and Co-Chair of
the Senate Appropriations Committee Senators Daniel Inoye and Thad Cochran, in
coalition with the America Nursing Shortage Relief, which is connected to
Zimbabwe indirectly because no other African Head of State has discussed the
brain drain more than President Mugabe.
When you go to a hospital in any major US city, you will be treated by doctors
and nurses who were born in either Africa, Asia, India or the Caribbean.
The National Medical Association also conducted a study entitled Racial/Ethnic
Disparities in the Utilisation of High Technology Hospitals, the study
highlighted that racial/ethnic minorities inside US borders are less likely to
utilise hospitals that have the availability of technology services and
infrastructure systems and level 1 trauma centres.
In the Nation Capital Washington DC, DC General Hospital was closed leaving the
eastern part of the city, which is 95 percent predominantly African with no
Level 1 trauma centre or pre-natal care unit, meaning victims of shootings,
stabbings and car accidents could bleed to death before they reached the next
hospital close in to that part of the city.
It was President Mugabe’s biggest influence Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah who told
us "before the decline of Colonialism what today is known as aid was simply
Foreign Investment", when we are guided by historical responsibility and not
the purse strings of the enemies of human progress, then and only then will we
lend our voices, human and material resources to those who, based on their
track record, have earned the right to be its recipients.
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