"Oil exploration activity in Eastern Africa hit a notch higher on Monday [June 1, 2009) after two international exploration firms, signed joint venture agreements to explore black gold in the arid northern Kenya region and parts of Ethiopia."
Africa Oil Corp- a Canadian oil and gas company with interests in exploration licenses in Puntland, Somalia- signed an agreement to jointly seek for oil and gas resources in Kenya’s Anza basin with oil exploration firm, East Exploration Limited (EAX). (EAX) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Black Marlin Energy who run offices in Mombasa, Dar es Salaam, Antananarivo and the UK from their headquarters in Dubai.
Read more here...
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Friday, June 05, 2009
WIKILEAKS WINS AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL AWARD FOR KENYA STORY
The Black Campaign reports that "Wikileaks won in this year's Amnesty International's Media Award, New Media category for their expose on Kenya's extrajudicial police killings. The report titled Kenya: The Cry of Blood - Extra Judicial Killings and Disappearances, was posted on Wikileaks' front page for an entire week beginning November 1st 2008."
Read the rest of the story here.
Read the rest of the story here.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
THE BLACK CAMPAIGN
The Black Manifesto
Africa needs you. No it doesn’t:
As a First World citizen, you have tremendous power. What platitudes you choose to buy or not buy can change your life and your conception of the self. What you cannot do, though, is bring social change to Africa.
For Africa:
Social change is not an agenda that you can set;
Social change is not an ideology you can impose;
Social change is all the little things you do to take yourselves and others closer to a decent human reality.
Social change is not about wishing the best for Them, it is about making the best of yourself and letting Africans draw inspiration from you.
Social change is not travelling halfway around the world to dig a well, it is pausing first to ask the African: ‘But what do you need to solve your water problems?’
Social change is not about making decisions for Them, it is about making a conscious decision to let Africans make up their minds, define their hopes and dreams and then allowing them access to the tools that will help turn their dreams into reality.
Social change is not about what you do for Them.
Social change is about what you do for you.
Social change is not about going to right the wrongs in Africa.
Social change is about changing what your government does in Africa. And if you cannot, changing your government.
Social change is not about the globe-trotting do-gooders- degrade their noise.
Social change is not about switching to Black, but we urge you to switch anyway.
Get Black because you, unlike the impoverished millions in Africa, have the right to choose.
Black is the new Red.
I invite you to join me and others at The Black Campaign, today.
Africa needs you. No it doesn’t:
As a First World citizen, you have tremendous power. What platitudes you choose to buy or not buy can change your life and your conception of the self. What you cannot do, though, is bring social change to Africa.
For Africa:
Social change is not an agenda that you can set;
Social change is not an ideology you can impose;
Social change is all the little things you do to take yourselves and others closer to a decent human reality.
Social change is not about wishing the best for Them, it is about making the best of yourself and letting Africans draw inspiration from you.
Social change is not travelling halfway around the world to dig a well, it is pausing first to ask the African: ‘But what do you need to solve your water problems?’
Social change is not about making decisions for Them, it is about making a conscious decision to let Africans make up their minds, define their hopes and dreams and then allowing them access to the tools that will help turn their dreams into reality.
Social change is not about what you do for Them.
Social change is about what you do for you.
Social change is not about going to right the wrongs in Africa.
Social change is about changing what your government does in Africa. And if you cannot, changing your government.
Social change is not about the globe-trotting do-gooders- degrade their noise.
Social change is not about switching to Black, but we urge you to switch anyway.
Get Black because you, unlike the impoverished millions in Africa, have the right to choose.
Black is the new Red.
I invite you to join me and others at The Black Campaign, today.
Monday, February 02, 2009
PICTURES OF STARVING CHILDREN SELL PORNO
Once in a while a story comes up that is, admittedly, beyond the imagination of the sexually perverted moron that authors this blog. A story so up his alley- the purveying of sleaze and the bashing of the Save Africa brigade- that it is shelved.
Well, but let us face it, the reason why I did not blog about the Porn for Charity story when I first had it was because:
a) I was angry I had not thought of the idea first;
b) I could not believe that they shot this in Kenya without me
c) I had to spend weeks and weeks of, elusive, internet time trying to find a bootleg copy of the video.
And now that I have slightly got over the first two issues, by abusing myself to the titillations of Japanese AV (yes Nana, you didn't hola at this tribesman but know that his seed is spattered over all corner workstations in every cybercafe in downtown Nairobi), I can write this.
Okay this is where some people take a deep breath or others sing Kumbaya but I will watch just one more Japanese schoolgirl action take before I can write the next sentence.
Back!
Now where were we... Yes, issue three has not been fully resolved yet. The first thing I did when I learnt of the existence of the video was to email several Japanese girls of my sexual acquaintance asking them if they would be kind enough to send me the video. Unfortunately none of them replied and it is understandable considering the language barrier seeing as to how all the conversations I ever had with them begun with:
“You. Me. Jiggi... Jiggi?”
And ended with:
“Africa Jiggi good, No?”
“Africa Jiggi gooood, Yeeeesssss!”
Okay, the truth is that one responded. In Japanese. (Readers Voice: How resourceful!) But reader doesn't know what I know, that Google Translate is the one true International Postman- delivering smut to those who hanker after it, across language and geographical barriers, to even places beyond that point its sister, GoogleMaps, says be dragons. So I hit translate and:
“You dirty little monkey.”
You have a right to your own reading of her response but you must remain cognisant of how much of the nuance of meaning is lost in translation. Besides most of this software is written by Indians who got to America in shipping crates and ended up in Silicon Valley having miraculously evaded the TOEFL. So to every man his reading, mine being:
You: refers to me, silly!
Dirty: refers to the things I made her do, or the place I made her do it
Little: I do not know what that refers to but what it does not refer to- a part of my anatomy
Monkey: The reader can Sambo this to absurdity but I was recently informed that Monkey is a term of endearment in certain cultures
But I am yet to receive the video from her so I assume she is still trying to copy out my name and address, or (because a man can hope) making a video of herself to send over as bonus footage.
The upside of my weeks long search is that I have had a thorough recap of Japanese porn and been amazed at how much non-pixelleted stuff has come out since I been gone. Dude, the girls are even shaven now! But not even Time magazine could lure me to what they refer to as Japan's Booming Sex Niche: Elder Porn. Not, even with a turn-on title like Maniac Training of Lolitas because, prejudiced I am not but a porno featuring a 74 year old Jap is nothing more than a Viagra ad. I mean, honestly, who can survive Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the Yakuza and still get it up? But I will keep an eye out on this Kamikaze and hope that one of his dives might give us a snuff film that will, while lacking any erotic appeal, have a comic one.
But you know, I really should be surfing this city for a couch to crash out on tonight rather than surfing the net for bukake!
Well, but let us face it, the reason why I did not blog about the Porn for Charity story when I first had it was because:
a) I was angry I had not thought of the idea first;
b) I could not believe that they shot this in Kenya without me
c) I had to spend weeks and weeks of, elusive, internet time trying to find a bootleg copy of the video.
And now that I have slightly got over the first two issues, by abusing myself to the titillations of Japanese AV (yes Nana, you didn't hola at this tribesman but know that his seed is spattered over all corner workstations in every cybercafe in downtown Nairobi), I can write this.
Okay this is where some people take a deep breath or others sing Kumbaya but I will watch just one more Japanese schoolgirl action take before I can write the next sentence.
Back!
Now where were we... Yes, issue three has not been fully resolved yet. The first thing I did when I learnt of the existence of the video was to email several Japanese girls of my sexual acquaintance asking them if they would be kind enough to send me the video. Unfortunately none of them replied and it is understandable considering the language barrier seeing as to how all the conversations I ever had with them begun with:
“You. Me. Jiggi... Jiggi?”
And ended with:
“Africa Jiggi good, No?”
“Africa Jiggi gooood, Yeeeesssss!”
Okay, the truth is that one responded. In Japanese. (Readers Voice: How resourceful!) But reader doesn't know what I know, that Google Translate is the one true International Postman- delivering smut to those who hanker after it, across language and geographical barriers, to even places beyond that point its sister, GoogleMaps, says be dragons. So I hit translate and:
“You dirty little monkey.”
You have a right to your own reading of her response but you must remain cognisant of how much of the nuance of meaning is lost in translation. Besides most of this software is written by Indians who got to America in shipping crates and ended up in Silicon Valley having miraculously evaded the TOEFL. So to every man his reading, mine being:
You: refers to me, silly!
Dirty: refers to the things I made her do, or the place I made her do it
Little: I do not know what that refers to but what it does not refer to- a part of my anatomy
Monkey: The reader can Sambo this to absurdity but I was recently informed that Monkey is a term of endearment in certain cultures
But I am yet to receive the video from her so I assume she is still trying to copy out my name and address, or (because a man can hope) making a video of herself to send over as bonus footage.
The upside of my weeks long search is that I have had a thorough recap of Japanese porn and been amazed at how much non-pixelleted stuff has come out since I been gone. Dude, the girls are even shaven now! But not even Time magazine could lure me to what they refer to as Japan's Booming Sex Niche: Elder Porn. Not, even with a turn-on title like Maniac Training of Lolitas because, prejudiced I am not but a porno featuring a 74 year old Jap is nothing more than a Viagra ad. I mean, honestly, who can survive Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the Yakuza and still get it up? But I will keep an eye out on this Kamikaze and hope that one of his dives might give us a snuff film that will, while lacking any erotic appeal, have a comic one.
But you know, I really should be surfing this city for a couch to crash out on tonight rather than surfing the net for bukake!
Monday, January 26, 2009
WRITING QUEER KENYA
A public service announcement in the spirit of this blog's continued pursuit (even when seeming more lewd than learned) of a public discourse on sex and sexuality. A discourse that revolves around pleasure and choice rather than the ubiquitous sex is immutably tied to death and disease paradigm of the religious and development industries.
Start of Message
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Writing Queer Kenya
Editors: Keguro Macharia and Angus Parkinson
We lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex individuals, in a word, queers, have had the distinct un-pleasure of being told we don't exist—in official government statements, historical documents, and contemporary statements. Well, we do.
We want Kenyan stories by Kenya-based and Kenya-born queers. About everything. We want writing about the dailyness of our lives, the good, the bad, the weird, the indifferent. If you have lived it, we want to hear about it. We especially want to reach beyond Nairobi, Mombasa, and other cities to all corners of the country. And we know the rest of Kenya, Africa, and the world wants to hear these stories as well.
Formats
We have three distinct formats. Choose what appeals to you.
1. Interviews: Tell us your story. Get in touch with us and we'll arrange an interview. We value your time and your confidentiality. Not sure you want to meet us directly? We have phones and email and all manner of ways to make this happen.
2. Letters to Kenya: Write (or unearth) a 500-1,000-word letter. To whom? Parents, pastors, the government, best friends, former friends, present lovers, former lovers, the person you really want to tune. Get personal, get intimate. Say what you really want to say!
3. Personal narratives: Write (or unearth) a 2,500-3,000-word narrative about the dailyness of being queer. The high points, low points, the endless plateaus, the quick glances, indrawn breaths of desire, domestic thrills, sexual boredom, beginnings and endings. If you write it, we'll consider it.
All submissions should be typed, double-spaced, and submitted electronically to queerkenya AT gmail.com. If you can't type, don't want to, or can't get hold of an email program that functions, get in touch with us. We can help.
How You Can Contribute
1. Get the word out. Convince your friends with hidden manuscripts or stories that must be shared to un-closet them.
2. Send us encouraging emails. We need your good wishes, your fabulously good wishes.
3. Volunteer time! We need all the help we can get.
4. Take ownership. We're editing, sure, but these are our collective stories.
Important Dates
April 30, 2009: Deadline to Receive Submissions
June 30, 2009: Selected Contributors Contacted
Publication: December 2009.
Questions? We're glad to answer. Please contact us at queerkenya AT gmail.com
End
Saturday, January 24, 2009
OBAMA RESCINDS MEXICO CITY
I generally do not do news and links on this blog but seeing that, I am creatively challenged this week due to a series of unfortunate events lately, I am posting this. Also in lieu of two blog posts I have been meaning to write since Obama's election last november:
The implications on Public Health Service delivery in Kenya of:
a) California's Proposition 8;
b) The Mexico City Policy
I will get round to it, someday, but in the meantime, and if only to keep my online footprint, here goes:
For those who have followed the politics of The Reagan- and successive rethugs- administration's ban on US funding for 'abortion' programmes abroad, it will come as no surprise that Obama rescinded the Mexico City Policy also known as the global gag rule within the first few days in office.
It is important, though, to note that while the tradition is to reinstate or rescind the policy by presidential decree on the 22nd of January, Obama held out until the 23rd. The 22nd of January is the anniversary of the landmark US ruling on Abortion, commonly referred to as Roe Vs. Wade and both Clinton and Bush have used this day to sign executive orders on the Mexico City Policy and make a statement of their views on Roe V.s Wade.
Obama, who signed the decree with little media fanfare, while choosing to be less combative noted that:
Obama also reinstated America's payments to UNFPA, who the Reagan and Bush administrations accused of supporting imposed abortions in china's one child policy.
And now we can sit back and await the fallout.
And from Kenya, he can expect a letter from Dr. Jean Kagia
Only this time, the chairperson of the Protecting Life Movement of Kenya might feel inclined to attach pictures of aborted foetuses floating down the Nairobi.
A study- I cannot find the report online- results of which were released in 2004 and that involved the Kenya Medical Association, the Kenyan chapter of the Federation of Women Lawyers, and the Ministry of Health suggests that 300,000 women procure abortions annually in Kenya and of this 2,600 die from complications.
Bottom line is that those are not all fourteen year olds, there are many married women amongst them. So question is not whether that woman in Kibera who has ten kids and finds herself pregnant again and the mzee (who has totally refused to use a condom) tells her 'that is your shauri', needs an abortion or not but where she can get access to safe and affordable sexual and reproductive health information and
services.
In other news, there is a very queer anthology in the works, whispers of are beginning to become loud murmurs, whose details I will be posting here soon. All I can say now is that it is to be Edited by Dr. Keguro Macharia and Angus Parkinson. Now if I could just dig up that call for submissions....
The implications on Public Health Service delivery in Kenya of:
a) California's Proposition 8;
b) The Mexico City Policy
I will get round to it, someday, but in the meantime, and if only to keep my online footprint, here goes:
For those who have followed the politics of The Reagan- and successive rethugs- administration's ban on US funding for 'abortion' programmes abroad, it will come as no surprise that Obama rescinded the Mexico City Policy also known as the global gag rule within the first few days in office.
It is important, though, to note that while the tradition is to reinstate or rescind the policy by presidential decree on the 22nd of January, Obama held out until the 23rd. The 22nd of January is the anniversary of the landmark US ruling on Abortion, commonly referred to as Roe Vs. Wade and both Clinton and Bush have used this day to sign executive orders on the Mexico City Policy and make a statement of their views on Roe V.s Wade.
Obama, who signed the decree with little media fanfare, while choosing to be less combative noted that:
"For too long, international family planning assistance has been used
as a political wedge issue, the subject of a back and forth debate that has served only to divide us. I have no desire to continue this stale and fruitless debate."
Obama also reinstated America's payments to UNFPA, who the Reagan and Bush administrations accused of supporting imposed abortions in china's one child policy.
And now we can sit back and await the fallout.
And from Kenya, he can expect a letter from Dr. Jean Kagia
Only this time, the chairperson of the Protecting Life Movement of Kenya might feel inclined to attach pictures of aborted foetuses floating down the Nairobi.
A study- I cannot find the report online- results of which were released in 2004 and that involved the Kenya Medical Association, the Kenyan chapter of the Federation of Women Lawyers, and the Ministry of Health suggests that 300,000 women procure abortions annually in Kenya and of this 2,600 die from complications.
Bottom line is that those are not all fourteen year olds, there are many married women amongst them. So question is not whether that woman in Kibera who has ten kids and finds herself pregnant again and the mzee (who has totally refused to use a condom) tells her 'that is your shauri', needs an abortion or not but where she can get access to safe and affordable sexual and reproductive health information and
services.
In other news, there is a very queer anthology in the works, whispers of are beginning to become loud murmurs, whose details I will be posting here soon. All I can say now is that it is to be Edited by Dr. Keguro Macharia and Angus Parkinson. Now if I could just dig up that call for submissions....
Thursday, January 15, 2009
RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW
[...]
Now whatever I did over the next few days drained through the ever widening cracks in my memory. Lying here scribbling this, I can, through my legendary deductive skills, arrive at two conclusions: a) I have a numbing pain on my left arm and my left knee is badly grazed which means that I must have taken a mighty fall; b) I have an itch like I swallowed a tin of kukumanga and that is to, without a doubt, say that I did not get laid. Yet again.
As to the question of whether I drank or not, I will take the trouble to remind you that that is, in my profound view of life, a purely ontological question long addressed by Descartes: I drink therefore I am.
Now if you will allow me a moment, I need to scrummage for a cigarette. That while congratulating myself for not having spilt my alcohol. This is an assessment easily arrived at easily by noting the fact that only my left arm and knee are injured. Is it not funny how a can of Kanee can be not only a metaphorical clutch but a literal one too?
Yet at this point I must beg your empathy. See, wherever and whenever it is that I fell, I must have picked myself up and finished my drink. Pretty commendable, even fortunate, I agree but only for that time and terribly unfortunate for now because from where I crawl there is no alcohol in sight. And, obviously because misery loves company, I cannot find even a bloody cigarette butt.
What, pray tell, did I ever do to deserve living through such interesting times? (Interesting, of course, in the Chinese curse's sense).
For now though, I have told you all- yes, all it takes is a few sentences- that I know about my life at this moment. What else is there to say while you know I cannot afford the luxury of the future tense and my past is a couple of inferences. I could hazard a peek at an immediately conceivable future, filled with Kanee and cigarettes, but haven't we been through that heartbreak already?
Yes, I hear your pontifical advice: “Why don't you at least try to sleep those injuries off, for now?”
I do hear you, but you know what? It is fucking New Year's eve and I just realised someone stole my mattress!
[...]
Well, and now that the new year is upon us and with this blog celebrating its third anniversary this Sunday, all I can say is that I have a new drink, a new crew and a desire to tell you about life in my neck (noose, policeman's boots and all) of the woods. Stay tuned!
Now whatever I did over the next few days drained through the ever widening cracks in my memory. Lying here scribbling this, I can, through my legendary deductive skills, arrive at two conclusions: a) I have a numbing pain on my left arm and my left knee is badly grazed which means that I must have taken a mighty fall; b) I have an itch like I swallowed a tin of kukumanga and that is to, without a doubt, say that I did not get laid. Yet again.
As to the question of whether I drank or not, I will take the trouble to remind you that that is, in my profound view of life, a purely ontological question long addressed by Descartes: I drink therefore I am.
Now if you will allow me a moment, I need to scrummage for a cigarette. That while congratulating myself for not having spilt my alcohol. This is an assessment easily arrived at easily by noting the fact that only my left arm and knee are injured. Is it not funny how a can of Kanee can be not only a metaphorical clutch but a literal one too?
Yet at this point I must beg your empathy. See, wherever and whenever it is that I fell, I must have picked myself up and finished my drink. Pretty commendable, even fortunate, I agree but only for that time and terribly unfortunate for now because from where I crawl there is no alcohol in sight. And, obviously because misery loves company, I cannot find even a bloody cigarette butt.
What, pray tell, did I ever do to deserve living through such interesting times? (Interesting, of course, in the Chinese curse's sense).
For now though, I have told you all- yes, all it takes is a few sentences- that I know about my life at this moment. What else is there to say while you know I cannot afford the luxury of the future tense and my past is a couple of inferences. I could hazard a peek at an immediately conceivable future, filled with Kanee and cigarettes, but haven't we been through that heartbreak already?
Yes, I hear your pontifical advice: “Why don't you at least try to sleep those injuries off, for now?”
I do hear you, but you know what? It is fucking New Year's eve and I just realised someone stole my mattress!
[...]
Well, and now that the new year is upon us and with this blog celebrating its third anniversary this Sunday, all I can say is that I have a new drink, a new crew and a desire to tell you about life in my neck (noose, policeman's boots and all) of the woods. Stay tuned!
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