mweshi

What has transpired in Kenya since the election has been quite depressing to say the least. It’s sad to see a nation that was well and truly on its way to economic prosperity suddenly digress in that manner. The scale of violence has left me speechless, especially after getting firsthand accounts from friends caught up in areas that witnessed the worst of it.

Nonetheless, amid all of the political bickering that continues while lives are being ruined, cheetah innovation, ingenuity and passion shines bright as a group of friends and fellow TEDsters have come up with a new tool to help people chronicle/document incidents of violence, looting, etc. around the country called Ushahidi, Swahili for witness.

Thanks for the tip Hash.

I’m probably a bit late in blogging this, but do join the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP) and the Stand Up and Speak Out campaign set to kick off in the next few hours! Millions of people around the world will rally together from 21:00hrs GMT today, the 16th of October until tomorrow evening at 21:00hrs to speak out against poverty and inequality and for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Let’s help “break the world record so we can break the record of broken promises.”

Live jazz is hard to come by in Lusaka on a weekday, let alone jazz being played by one of Africa’s jazz legends for a great cause! Imagine my surprise when I heard that Hugh Masekela was playing at the Lusaka Golf Club on Wednesday night while having drinks with friends over at our favorite spot after what had already been a busy and hectic week.

A couple of friends had been talking about some tickets they had for this “music gig mid-week,” last weekend but they didn’t quite explain the magnitude nor the cause behind it; I figured it would include the regular lineup of guys I’ve heard playing ad nauseam over the past weeks so I wasn’t too bothered about it. The concert was set for 8PM and I was being told about Hugh playing around 8:30PM. Almost shot myself in the foot by thinking he’d be in town for the week, with the SADC summit currently taking place, and I’d be able to catch him on Friday night or something. In retrospect, I can only imagine what insults I would have been hurling at myself had I missed the concert.

After learning that it would be a one-night-only event, I went along with my friends and it was definitely worth it! Hugh played all his splendid hits to a very ecstatic crowd and everyone left the venue on a hump day high when the band finished playing around 12:30AM.

It was only when we got to the Golf Club that I learnt of the nature of “the gig.” The “African Solidarity Concert” was organized by the Darfur Consortium, an African and International Civil Society Action for Darfur of which Mr Masekela is a Goodwill Ambassador.

Proceeds from the concert will go towards

supporting the efforts of the women of Darfur to empower themselves, their families and their communities through support for the Belil Internally Displaced Persons Women’s Community Centre, in South Darfur

The Darfur Consortium

Very glad I went as it was a worthwhile mid-week outing. Good thing I also had my cam handy, more shots of Hugh on Flickr!

This past weekend I had the opportunity of participating in a day long medical outreach with a few members from my Rotary club, Maluba. We traveled to a remote area given to the Anglican Church by government about 68km from Lusaka, called Kansenga. Maluba in collaboration with the Anglican Church of Lusaka is working on building a clinic in the Kasenga settlement with the involvement of the community in the building process.

Saturday was the groundbreaking day and we traveled to the settlement with medicines donated to our club by businesses and clothing donated from Japan. We also carried some maize meal (used in making Zambia’s staple food nshima) for the orphans who live within the same community.

The situation is quite dire for the people of the Kasenga settlement. To get any sort of medical services or attention, people have to walk 25km to the nearest clinic in Kasisi; the catchment area has about 2000+ people who need assistance; most of the people suffer from malaria,conjunctivitis, anaemia, worms, etc.; on our way back to Lusaka around 7PM, we had to take a young mother and her sick baby into the city so she could medical attention for the child. I sat next to the mother and child in the car and every time the baby’s head rested on my arm, my arm felt intensely hot, the baby’s temperature must have been close to 40 deg. Celsius. Our rotarian doctor suspected it was meningitis hence the urgency in referring the mother and child over to the UTH (University Teaching Hospital) in Lusaka for urgent medical attention for the child.

By the time we left Kasenga, we had registered, administered medicine, vitamins, and referrals as well as clothing to about 255 people from the community. For me, this was one of the most fulfilling days I have had as a rotarian and seeing the smiles on the faces of the people there in the midst of all that goes on around them on a daily basis was quite a humbling moment.

Kasenga is one of our club’s new projects for the year, though we have a few other projects including a school (Bauleni Primary School), a clinic (Bauleni Clinic) both of which the Maluba club helped in building, and the Bauleni SWAAZ family support home for orphans who’s parent(s) died from HIV/AIDS that we support monthly by giving food and clothing.

You can view a few more photographs in my Zambia photoset on Flickr

While getting my weekly dose of Studio 53 on MNet’s Africa Magic this evening, I learnt of the passing of one of Africa’s greatest artists (film director, producer and writer) and the man considered to be the “Father of African film,” Ousmane Sembène (1 January 1923 — 9 June 2007).

I read Ousmane Sembène’s God’s Bits of Wood (originally written in French under the title Les Bouts de Bois de Dieu) while attending high school in Addis Ababa. At the time, it was one of the best African books I had ever read and till today it remains on top of my list.

It’s books by writers like Ousmane, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Cheikh Hamidou Kane, Camara Laye, Chinua Achebe, and others that have influenced the strong desire in me to be part of the African Cheetah Renaissance and what I hope to accomplish while I live, breathe and traverse this boat we all call life.

To M. Sembène Ousmane, I say, rest in perfect peace Sir and thank you for putting Africa on the world’s map in your own unique way.

PS: Be sure to read this great article on the man and his work.

…

Well, TED Global wrapped up yesterday and quite a few of us were left a tad sad that such an amazing week was over. I believe the people of TED provided us with a great platform with which to communicate with one another and if we can harness the power of those present at TED, Africa’s future is looking very bright! Here’s a quick summary of some of the talks from yesterday.

Patrick Awuah - Cofounder, Ashesi University in Ghana

Africa can only be transformed through enlightened leaders.

The question of transformation in Africa is a question of leadership.

Every society must be intentional about educating its leaders.

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala - former Finance Minister of Nigeria and Fellow of the Brookings Institution

Why is it that Africans want to totally take the other side of the aid coin by completely refusing it. Africa has been giving aid to the west since the slave trade and we should not be ashamed or refuse if they want to give it back. The US and Europe could not have been built without Africa’s aid. Let’s not be on the defensive for what the west is giving back.

Support women and create jobs. Put more resources in the hands of women:
Placing more resources in the hands of women results in greater spending on human capital, i.e. household services, health, education and food

Aid should be channeled to the right places with total involvement of its recipients from the onset; if this trend continues we won’t achieve any development. Africans need to take charge of where aid should be channeled.

Planted seeds

Emeka put it well when he summarized the conference and said “what we have done at this event is plant seeds.” Indeed the seeds of change, progress, and a new African renaissance have been planted!

I can’t believe the conference is about to end in a few! This has been the most fulfilling, thought provoking, inspiring and educational event I have ever attended and as I mentioned this morning to conference attendees, thanks to TED for this wonderful opportunity of brining together so many progressive Africans. What happens after this conference now is entirely up to all of us who love our continent. To all TEDsters out there, let’s make this event the genesis of the cheetah renaissance!

Salim Amin is asking every African and those interested in the continent to help his for Africa by Africa 24-hour news channel, A24 come to fruition. With 900 million people on the continent, we continue to look to international news channels to provide information about our continent.

Amin’s channel aims to provide training for journalists across the continent as well as breaking news with 46 stations, offered to all terrestrial television providers free of charge and revenue will be generated through advertisements.

It’s time Africa got its own 24-hour news channel. Most of the talks and discussions here at TED this week have focused on the fact that we rarely have positive viewpoints on Africa from western media and this channel will definitely bring and help to paint a positive light on the continent.

James Shikwati just finished his talk and his main point is that we kick aid out and start thinking of new and ingenious ways of growing African economies, especially through business and youth empowerment.

Ory Okolloh, a lawyer, activist and blogger from Kenya gave a pretty poignant talk about reversing the brain drain and what can be achieved if Africans in the diaspora were to come back and simply take the plunge to help the continent.

President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete also spoke to us this morning about uplifting our people by giving them opportunities and incentives. As a TEDster and an African, I would personally like to thank President Kikwete for the wonderful hospitality Tanzania has given to us through the week.

Tanzania is one country that in my eyes continues to work hard at political stability, economic growth and a solid succession path that has always looked for fresh ideas and new leadership especially in a time when most African states have political dinosaurs continuously imposed on them without a transparent process.

Connecting the Continent

AMD’s Héctor Ruiz, the CEO of AMD just put up a chart on the use of the Internet per 1000 people and it’s sad how far back we are on the continent because of high costs to internet access.

AMD’s 50×15 initiative is a business venture and not a charity, it’s focused on simple, accessible, and human-centric solutions; it’s based on a “geo-sensitive” approach and is about fostering local, integrated, end-to-end ecosystems. AMD’s vision of local integrated, end-to-end ecosystems encourages the building and development of complete hardware and software solutions locally to provide solutions. Architecture for Humanity is also involved in the design of the best-suited computer lab for the emerging world.

A very important point Héctor made throughout his talk was of his father’s constant reminders for Héctor to strive and achieve more than he did, in the context of the continent, the current generation has to do better in all facets of their lives than that of our parents and we should wake up every morning wanting to achieve more and better than they did. Africa’s Cheetah generation (as Dr George Ayittey referred to the current conscientious and increasingly passionate generation) couldn’t have been challenged any better.

Herman Chinery-Hesse of theSOFTtribe gave a good talk about being proud to be an African and working in Africa once you have acquired the necessary skill set. One should not wait for government to provide a job, but come up with innovative solutions and business ideas as this is what will change Africa and not aid because we’re resourceful people. His other argument is that in order to get any services, rural areas the people will need to have cash and theSOFTtribe has come up with a system that will enable people to send cash to one another via the mobile phone.

One champion for all of us that decided to come back home after spending years away to startup businesses has to be Nick Nesbitt of Kenya’s KenCall; he made a decision to come back initially thinking he was coming back to save the continent but has now shifted gears to actually trying to get a business going that empowers his employees.

Here’s a brief run-down of the talks from this morning at TED. The conference is still on and we just heard from AMD CEO, Héctor Ruiz. Enjoy.

Tales of Invention
Bola Olabisi an African innovation evangelist and founder of the Global Women Inventors and Innovators Network (GWIN), a group that wants to “improve self-confidence and self-esteem, increase motivation, broaden horizons and experience, and raise the aspirations of creative, inventive and innovative women” all over the world.

What stood most about her talk was her showcasing of lo-tech inventions by some of Africa’s up and coming women inventors and innovators. Definitely an inspiration for a lot young girls and women on the continent and the world over.

Following Bola’s talk, we had the wonderful opportunity to listen to another inventor and chemical engineer, Moses Makayoto. He’s the inventor of the popular Mama Safi detergent, produced cheaply using local materials. His challenge to TEDsters was that Africa must industrialize in whole and not in parts! A very poignant statement considering we have so many great inventors on the continent and yet we do not have any manufacturing plants.

Continuing with the ingenuity that stems from necessity in Africa, William Kamkwamba is one of many unsung heroes that are enriching and empowering not only their lives but the lives of those around them as well. William Kamkwamba created a windmill in Malawi using locally available materials after reading a book called “Using Energy” by Atwater, M. et. Al. His main materials consisted of:

• old bicycle parts
• wooden poles
• plastic pipes
• an old car batter for energy storage, etc.

The windmill provides enough electricity to light up his family’s hut and power their radios, saving them about K600 (Malawian Kwacha or US$4.00) per month in paraffin and radio battery costs. In an age when young adults tend to wallow in their sorrows by picking up a beer bottle after failure or disappointment, 19 year-old William chose to do something for himself and his family. In recognition of this tremendous contribution to his community, he’s back in school again with the help of well-wishers, this after he had to drop out because of a lack of school fees. William’s now looking for assistance in getting more materials to improve his windmill to provide more energy for various uses in the household and to pump water for the irrigation of crops.

Noah Roberts, another TED Fellow and the CEO of docvia, a company that deals with Health Informatics gave an inspirational short talk on the power of Open Source in delivering healthcare solutions to people in the developing world. I sat down with Noah at the beginning of the week for dinner just before TED began and I believe he’s got some brilliant ideas and I would implore African leaders, politicians, healthcare specialists, etc. that want to raise the effectiveness of healthcare delivery to start talking to people like Noah.

Mohammed Bah Abba of Mohbah Rural Horizons from Kano, Nigeria designed and created a food preserver/refrigerator that’s currently being used in places like the Sahel and the Darfur region to help preserve and cool vegetables and other perishable foods in these extremely hot environments.

For the Health and Heroism session of the morning, Ernest Madu put his mouth where his mouth was by starting the Heart Institute of the Caribbean, a facility that has brought world-class medical services to the West Indies at 10% of what it costs to run and provide similar services in the continental United States. His argument is that through tele-medicine technology and education, we can improve the livelihoods of millions of people in the developing world. Also utilizing electronic medical systems to patient information that can be used in rural areas as well at a low cost.

Don Cheadle gave a brief talk via video on the crisis in Darfur and how we can all bring an end to the dehumanizing state the people of the Darfur region find themselves in today, please join participate.net in raising awareness on the crisis.

For someone who has seen first hand the destruction of war in two of Africa’s former war zones of Liberia and Sierra Leone, it makes me proud to know that no matter what many people go through in war, there are always individuals who do great things in bringing awareness to the rest of the world about the plight of the true victims of war, the population. One such individual is Corneille E.N. Ewango an environmental defender that has dedicated his life to protecting the Okapi Faunal Reserve. His talk also echoed the importance of education for the youth of the continent as that will be the best way of empowering the continent.