Oil company forced to Shell out millions

Shell Oil has agreed to an out-of-court settlement of $15.5 million with the Ogoni people of the Niger Delta in Nigeria after a legal battle lasting almost 14 years.  In agreeing to this settlement Shell is effectively admitting guilt for  human rights abuses, including complicity in the murder of Ogoni activist the writer Ken Sara Wiwa.  This landmark victory sends out a powerful message to big multi-nationals with no regard for human rights or the environment who think they can run rough-shod over anyone who gets in the way of their blood-money making activities.

Visa Card Apartheid Flags to be banned in the Rainbow Nation?

The South African political commentator Khaya Dlanga has called for the old apartheid-era national flag to be banned, echoing the ban on swastikas in post-war Germany, after a rugby supporter was spotted waving the said item at a recent rugby match. This flag (when turned upside down) always used to remind me of the Visa card logo – which begs the question was the old SA government receiving secret donations from Visa to prop up its regime? Will Visa cards also be banned? There are obvious connotations for oppression and bigotry (not to mention unwelcome bank statements!) associated with this flag harking back to the days when 80% of the population had no say in the running of the country. And the presence of the union jack and Dutch flag in the middle tier serve as a reminder of the country’s colonial past, which many South Africans would no doubt like to forget. While we’re on the subject, it baffles me as to why independent progressive countries like Australia and New Zealand still insist on having the union jack in the top left corner of their flags as if to remind themselves of the legacy of their colonial past – particularly when you think about the animosity with “the poms” when it comes to cricket and rugby. Yet they insist on holding on to the apron strings of Mother England, a sentiment which means little to the average Maori or Aborigine. The Brazilians don’t have a Portuguese flag on their national flag, the Mexicans don’t have a Spanish flag on theirs. But that’s a whole new debate.

 Back in the day South Africa was not a popular country. I remember hearing on the news around about 1985 of an incident in Dublin when a supermarket check-out girl refused to sell a customer South African fruit. A number of well-known rock musicians got into trouble for playing at the infamous Sun City resort. During his incarceration Nelson Mandela became an iconic figure throughout the world and championed by some of the biggest names in entertainment from Peter Gabriel to Sting. Yet to the shame of western governments who refused to impose economic sanctions on SA, apartheid continued for much longer than it should have. Gold, diamonds and oranges were obviously more important to them than social justice. However western powers continue to back totalitarian governments from Saudi Arabia to Uzbekistan when it ties in with their selfish, strategic or economic interests.

Oppressive regimes were (and still are) present in several other African countries of course, but unlike many of these countries SA was no impoverished third world tin-pot dictatorship. This was a supposedly developed forward-looking civilised western society.
A few white South Africans still no doubt nostalgically yearn for a return to the “good old days” when “kaffirs” knew their place, but the rest of the world has moved on.
These were bizarre times indeed. These were the days when black South Africans supported anyone but their own country in rugby, though not long before Mandela in a Springboks shirt made the noble gesture of presenting the world cup to the victorious SA team.

The apartheid regime was a goldmine for satirical comedians. The 1970s comedy team The Goodies brilliantly sent up the concept in this classic episode (the best bits happen around 1 minute and 35 seconds into the clip) where they introduce a new law called “apart-height” which discriminates against short people.  There was also the Spitting Image song “I’ve never met a nice South African” – which although a little harsh and inaccurate, it is mildly amusing (unless you’re South African of course). I should say at this point, that having lived in London for the best part of a decade, I’ve met many nice South Africans. It’s also worth pointing out that even South African comedians like Peter Dirk-Uys were ridiculing their own government at the time.

We also had films like Richard Attenborough’s Cry Freedom, a portrait of the life and death of political activist Steve Biko and his friendship with the white journalist Donald Woods. After Hollywood had endured much criticism for its politically incorrect habit of portraying villains as black or Hispanic, one of the films in the Lethal Weapon series featured white South Africans as the main bad guys, a fashionable trend at the time.
How things have changed. But although that democracy now prevails in SA, things are far from sweet and rosy. It’s the all too familiar story of yesterday’s oppressed becoming today’s oppressors. The Catholic church in Ireland endured centuries of persecution under British rule, but when part of the country gained independence, the church abused its special position and became a brutally oppressive institution aided by the state for the best part of 50 years.

There are striking parallels here with the ANC. The current SA government’s incompetence in dealing with AIDS in the country, its inability to effectively deal with the violent crime epidemic, its refusal to take Mugabe to task over the catastrophe engulfing Zimbabwe and the widespread accusations of corruption and nepotism within the party as an elitist minority lives the high life, while the majority of citizens live in poverty all beg the question – has anything really changed?
We’re now back the flag question. In a country which supposedly prides itself on diversity and freedom of expression, banning the old flag, as some commentators have pointed out would be counterproductive. Practical reasons aside, it’s unlikely that a drunken Afrikaaner will stick his flag into a chip & pin machine by mistake instead of his credit card when paying for the Oranjeboom and biltong for the braai at the local supermarket. It could do irreparable damage to the machine – not to mention the flag.

I’m reminded of a well-documented incident in the 1960s when the then young firebrand preacher Ian Paisley protested at the presence of an Irish tricolour (which was at the time banned in Northern Ireland and few if any were openly displayed even in nationalist areas) at the Sinn Féin office on Belfast’s Falls Road. A mob encouraged by Paisley converged on the premises and smashed the window in an attempt to remove the offending flag. A few days later, in response to this incident hundreds of tricolours were put up all over West Belfast. I’m sure some of them are still there to this day.

Lessons to be learned indeed.

 

 

 

The “Nice video, shame about the song” effect

Nice video - shame about the song

In the early 1980s the popular BBC comedy show Not the Nine O’Clock News mocked the pretensions of the contemporary pop video phenomenon in the famous sketch “Nice Video Shame About the Song” (avaialble on Youtube if you’re interested).  It was a magnificent piece of satire, highlighting the fact that pop videos had become over-elaborate and relied heavily on the state of the art special effects of the time like Quantel and Paintbox, as if in an attempt to make up for the crapness of the song.  Bands like the Human League, Duran Duran and Visage were particularly guilty of this.

I was reminded of this recently when on a Ryanair flight which arrived at its destination ahead of schedule.  To celebrate this momentous event a trumpet fanfare was played and an American voice announced over the tannoy how great Ryanair was. I’ve been a regular flyer with Ryanair for the best part of a decade now. To be fair, I’ve only had two bad experiences with them, one of which was mostly my own fault for being late. So, in principle I’ve got no problem in flying with Ryanair, but I can’t say I care much for the airline’s chief executive, the publicity-seeking, money-grabbing Michael O’Leary as I’ve made clear in a previous post.

Essentially what I’m getting at here is the fact that it is quite possible to admire great works of art, literature and music without liking their creator.

U2 are without doubt a fine bunch of musicians, but their lead singer is equally without doubt a egomaniacal, sanctimonious, self-righteous irritating little tosser – as I’ve made clear in a previous piece.  Another loud-mouthed Dubliner, not quite as nauseating, but almost as sanctimonious was a fine musician and songwriter in his day. I don’t like Mondays, Rat Trap and Banana Republic are among the greatest songs of the 1970s, but the man who wrote them is an arrogant tosser.

Also, take Andrew Lloyd-Webber for instance.  Cats, Evita and Phantom of the Opera are all outstanding works of musical theatre, even though their creator is an obnoxious trout-faced, medieval-haired twat.

An obnoxious trout-faced medieval-haired twat

Blackadder is in my view one of the greatest comedy shows ever – but I don’t care much for its co-writers Ben Elton and Richard Curtis and their smug, self-righteous “oh look how great we are” demeanours.

So when you bring Ben Elton and Andrew Lloyd-Webber together (a match made in Hell if ever there was one) as was the case for The Beautiful Game, a musical about a Belfast youth soccer club amidst the backdrop of the violence which enguled the city in the early days of the troubles, the result is an abomination.  Two rich middle class prats from the English Home Counties lecturing people on how bad it all was in Belfast back then.  It’s almost as bad as mega-rich rock musicians from Dublin lecturing the world on how bad things are in Africa.  If they really feel that strongly about it they should go and live in Africa.

At this point I will grudgingly admit that I was a teenage U2 fan during my younger and more foolish days.  Then I gradually saw the error of my ways.

Nice songs,  shame about the singer, etc.

 

 

 

 

Putting the meltdown into perspective

While clearing away some old newspapers I came across an article published in the Observer in January by Tim Adams which explores the anxieties and fears curently engulfing western society in the face of the current financial crisis. One paragraph in particular sticks out:
“I was in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in September, an awfully long way from where our generally abundant nation was fretting about its mortgage extensions and its job prospects, and I wondered just how the people there – who had lived with war for 15 years – coped psychologically with the constant fears of their lives. Why weren’t they all on the verge of a nervous breakdown? How could they sit and laugh in the sun? The most plausible answer was that they did not have even the luxury of anxiety; their expectation of security had never extended much beyond the next hour or two. Anxiety is a disease of relative plenty; it arises not from fear at what you do not have, but fear of what you might lose.”

Probably of scant consolation to anyone who’s just lost their job, but it does put things into perspective.