Senior member of the ruling African National Congress pleaded says he’s not guilty in the first day of his corruption trial.  Jackie Selebi, former Interpol president is being charged with having links to organized crime and accepting bribes worth 1.2m rand ($157,000).

During the case at Johannesburg’s High Court, prosecutors will seek to prove that Mr Selebi, 58, received corrupt payments over a five-year period.  At the heart of the allegations is Mr Selebi’s relationship with convicted drug smuggler, Glen Agliotti, who is also accused of links to the murder of a prominent mining magnate.

Jackie Selebi’s relations with former South African President Thabo Mbeki has also called for concern that the ousted president protected Selebi when corruption charges originally were filed while Mbeki was still president.  Mbeki was finally forced to place Selebi on leave as police chief because of the allegations.

Mr. Zuma,  South Africa’s new president – who had graft charges against him dropped on technical grounds shortly before he became head of state – has promised to make a priority of fighting corruption, a major issue in the country.

But Monday’s defence statement suggests the trial could become a sounding board for allegations reaching towards the highest levels of the ruling party.

Wait a minute, this sounds familiar.  Oh yea! Yesterday it was thought France was responsible for the deadly attack in Somalia.  However, since the raid was a “success” and a top militant was perhaps killed, the United States now admits involvement.

Of course, this is just my theory, however it follows the pattern of our foreign policy tactics.  Why the end run?  The question of anyone being in Somalia just because there are cultural groups there we don’t like is of importance.

The al-Shabab seemingly operate in the country of Somalia.  They formed in 2004 because the Islamic Courts Union (ICU)was lost at the hands of its’ rival the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) during the Somali Civil War.  The ICU is a group of Sharia Courts and their rival administration group was the TFG which is backed by the United Nations.

It is known that the TFG does not equally or rarely represent the peoples of Somalia – hence the al-Shabab.  I realize it’s not that cut and dry but because a group of people arm themselves, the U.S. makes them a terrorist group.  Doesn’t our country give us the right to bear arms?  Does that make us terrorists?  I have a feeling many would agree.

Foreign soldiers attacked militants in Somalia today killing at least two people in a helicopter raid.  According to some reports, the uniforms of the soldiers had a French insignia.  Eye witnesses also state that the troops took away two men and at least two more bodies were left on a road in Barawe.

Spokesman for the French Defense Ministry, Christopher Prazuck, denied any French soldiers were involved despite a local man at the scene insisting he spotted the French flag on the shoulders of the uniforms.

Neither Somali government nor Islamist forces have helicopters.

Why is it still okay to treat African countries especially Sub-Saharan Africa like there are no rules? France knows they followed no official  protocol and the United States is just as bad.  How are the governments of these countries ever going to trust the West if we keep treating them like we own them or they’re ignorant to what’s really going on?

Skhumbuzo Mhlongo was a 22 year old trying to get a job in Johannesburg, South Africa.   In order to work, one must have identity papers – kind of like a passport.  The young man was found dead over the weekend in an apparent suicide.

Mhlongo had been trying for some time to obtain identity records in order to secure a job he was offered working at a factory that manufactures bird food.  Coupled with the disappearance of his mother and watching over his younger siblings, not being able to receive his necessary documentation proved too much.

According to the BBC, the case prompted Home Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to break down in tears at a press conference. She suspects the official wanted a bribe.  She said she “would leave no stone unturned” in the investigation into the identity of the official.

The Department of Home Affairs has come under heavy criticism over the years for its inefficiency in issuing ID documents, birth certificates and passports, with some people claiming to have waited up to four years.

The past two days has brought violence to the northern states of Nigeria.  Islamist militants have been attacking police stations and civilians bringing the death toll to 150.  According to the BBC, the militants are barricaded into a small area in the city of  Maiduguri which is the capital of Borno State.

The radical Islamists have been on the rampage because they believe their governments are too influenced by Western liberal values.  This belief comes despite in 1999, 12 northern Nigerian, mainly Muslim, states adopted Sharia law following the end of military rule.

The militants have been centered around a religious leader – Mohammed Yusuf, who lives in Maiduguri.  Mr. Yusuf has specifically targeted students at the University in Maiduguri in which a number of them quit school and have instead followed him

Sharia law is basically Islamic religious law.  It is the legal framework within which the public and private aspects of life are regulated for those living in a legal system based on Islamic principles.  Islamic law is now the most widely used religious law, and one of the three most common legal systems of the world alongside common law and civil law.

The headline reads what seems to be something not possible.  According to architect Magnus Larsson – anything is possible.  He has proposed a 6,000 km ‘wall’ be built from Mauritania in the west of Africa to Djibouti in the east.  His theory would keep desertification at bay possibly saving human lives and cities.

Larsson unveiled his idea at the annual TED Global conference in Oxford last week.  He proposed that by injecting a soil bacteria – Bacillus pasteurii - into the sand, a natural cement is formed (calcium carbonate or calcite).  Now, ‘injecting’ sand with a bacteria is much more easier said than done.  Currently, the idea is to station balloons along the proposed wall line and allow the sand dunes to blow over the top of them.  Once that happens, the balloons can be popped releasing the bacteria.

According to a 2007 UN study  desertification is described as “the greatest environmental challenge of our times” and that currently about 2 billion people are potential victims of desertification.

Of course anything that can save lives seems a worthy pursuit.  Many towns are facing extinction because of sand dunes threatening to envelope them.  I understand much more planning must be done before such a project is put in motion, but I am a bit wary about messing with nature.  I understand desertification is not natural, however the Sahara Desert does have a natural cycle of its own.

It has been substantiated that the Sahara Desert was once ‘wet’.  Larger and lakes and more rivers once existed in the Desert well before our time.  Most of our land was different back then, however how are we to know for sure that building this wall will not inhibit in some way the natural forces that take place across the Sahara or even the continent?

The great thing is that people are thinking and coming together to find solutions.

70,000 construction workers went on strike today demanding a 13% increase in pay.  The average worker brings in about $310 a month, but some officials say that a lot of workers are not even getting that amount.  Soccer City union organiser Patrick Geqeza blamed management inflexibility for precipitating the strike.

“We feel bad about going on strike. [But] they don’t want to meet us half way,” he told AP news agency.

Six entirely new stadiums are being built for the World Cup, while four are being modernised.  Danny Jordaan, head of the World Cup organising committee, said he respected the right of the workers to strike but felt the dispute would be resolved without affecting the construction schedule.

“The construction workers have been the lifeblood of the 2010 Fifa World Cup project,” he said in a statement.

“Their hard work has ensured that we are on track to meet our deadlines and that our stadiums will be among the best in the world next year.”

The Justice and Equality Movement has been spotted driving through Darfur refugee camps in Chad according to the BBC.  JEM is a Sudanese rebel group fighting against the Sudan government along with the Sudan Liberation Movement.  It’s rare to see armed personnel in a refugee camp because it is illegal  according to international refugee law and can potentially draw combatant fire upon the refugees.

JEM says that they have permission to be in the camp in order to re-fuel, get supplies and have maintenance work done on their vehicles.  However, their presence is making the refugees and aid workers uneasy because they realize the opposition could be close.  The BBC’s Celeste Hicks in Bahay says last month planes bombed three kilometres away from the camp, in what was believed to be Sudanese retaliation for JEM taking the Darfuri towns of Kornoi and Um Baru in May.

The Justice and Equality Movement originated in 2000 as a result of the publication of The Black Book. It was later learned that the leader of JEM, Khalil Ibrahim, was one of the authors of the book which outlines a history of disproportionate political control by the people of northern Sudan and marginalization of the rest of the country.

The Somalia Civil War seems endless.  A war that has been fought for decades has snowballed into one, if not the most devastating turn for an African country.  Somalia, a country with no government desperetly pleads with the African Union and the international community to come to their aid.  There have been many meetings, delegations, and words printed in newspapers about their dire situation.  But that’s all that it is – words.

The UN has managed to peace together an offensive against the piracy with no help from the African Union.  They have given permission to countries whose shipments are in jeopardy, to enter Somali waters and engage the pirates.  This offensive has led to about 100 arrests of pirates according to the UN and the United States.

“The international maritime presence is increasingly successful,” U.N. special envoy to Somalia Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah told reporters.

“It is successful because pirates have to go further away,” Ould-Abdallah said. As a result, pirates have to spend more of the ransom money they receive to hijack ships and avoid arrest.

However, this is just a small dent into the problems that plague Somalia.  Many countries are calling for some sort of ground intervention and ways to solve Somalia’s bigger issues as the only real way to curve piracy.

It’s really hard to just talk about one aspect of Somalia’s plight, such as piracy.  There are many different angles that feed into each other.   And to get a firm grasp on piracy, we must look into the bigger picture of what the people of Somalia are going through and what their governments as well as the international community is doing about it.

Somalia’s Civil War

As with most African countries, Somalia’s troubles began after colonial rule.   Britain and Italy gave Somalia their independence in the summer of 1960 respectively, with Britain owning northern Somaliland and Italy ruling the remainder country.  Somalia wished to re-draw the country’s boundaries, which included Ethiopia and Kenya, back to its originality prior to colonialism.   Ethiopia as well as Kenya, being their own nation now, wanted no part and the Ogaden War ensued in the late 1970s.

Somalia acted unilaterally without consulting the international community, which was generally opposed to redrawing colonial boundaries, while the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact countries refused to help Somalia, and instead, backed Communist Ethiopia. Still the USSR, finding itself supplying both sides of a war, attempted to mediate a ceasefire. In general, due to America’s opposition to the communist government of Ethiopia, it sold a lot of modern weapons to the Somalia government.

For most of the war, Somalia appeared to be winning in most of Ogaden, but when Somali forces failed to capture Harer, Soviet and Cuban forces and weapons came to the aid of Ethiopia. The Somali Army was decimated and Somalia sought the help of the United States.   Although the Carter Administration had expressed interest in helping Somalia, it later declined, as did American allies in the Middle East and Asia.

With the end of the Cold War, Somalia was left abandoned.   After the dust cleared, citizens were left facing a totalitarian government that became increasingly resistant to political and cultural movements.  All across the country cultural groups banded together against the government and by 1991 the Somalia Civil War had begun.

Somalia’s Transitional Government

Due to the ongoing war and constant unrest, no government could function and please all of the differing rebel groups.  Because the voices of the people were not being heard, many more cultural groups formed their own military groups for protection to where now, there are many different factions fighting for different reasons.  It is impossible for the government to please everyone.

In the spring of 2000, a Transitional National Government was instituted in the country in the hopes that peace and reconciliation would follow.  A president was instituted specifically over the differing factions of the country.  Four years later, the Transitional Federal Government was put in place to ease the country into a more representative government and make headway to stabilizing the country and building infrastructure.

Somalia Now

Unfortunately, to this date, peace and reconciliation has not occurred.  And the conditions of the country has ultimately bred fear amongst its’ people, warlords to run the country and piracy among the seas.   It’s hard to fathom and entire country not having a government, but when this happens there is no infrastructure.  There is no united military or navy.  There are no exports and because of the lack of government power, most countries have slapped sanctions against the country, so the people are getting no aid or food.

Another issue that many are unaware of is the fact that European and Asian fishermen or trawlers have been illegally fishing off the coast of Somalia.  Since there is no coast guard, Somalia finds it impossible to patrol it’s lengthy coastline.  As I reported before, illegal dumping of toxic and hazardous waste has also led to resentment and piracy views of some.

Somalia’s issues are not going to just go away.  They need help.  The transitional government has literally pleaded with the African Union, the West, and their neighbors to pull together and help them fight.  No one has been willing.  Europe and Asia have been using the country as a toxic dumping ground while America has turned a deaf ear only responding when one of our own is in need.

For More News “Piracy in Somalia – Part I” , “Part II“,” Part III“

The 13th Annual African Union Summit begins today in Sirte, Libya.  The theme of the summit, “Invest in Agriculture for Economic Growth and Food Security”, is just one of the major topics to be discussed by the heads of states of the continent.  Additional issues concerning the summit include discussion on strengthening the role of the AU in the prevention, management and resolution of election disputes and violent conflicts in the world’s poorest continent. They will also explore ways to prevent unconstitutional changes of government and to strengthen the capacity of the AU to deal with such situations.

The summit was due to be held in Madagascar this year.  However, with their ongoing political strife, the country was suspended in their membership by the African Union and the conference was later cancelled.

The hopes of making the African Union an authority on the continent and holding countries and their leaders accountable is a big concern to the international community as well as to African states.  It seems that the AU is trying to re-define their purposes by transforming their executive arm into a more authoritative one.  This plan was brought to the forefront of last years summit and proves to be a high priority at this one.