Issue # 7
my whole body changed into something else
This group exhibition, hosted by Stevenson Gallery, is curated by Sisipho Ngodwana and Sinazo Chiya. The title of this exhibition is drawn from a quote by Sun Ra, in which the American artist, musician and thinker describes a moment of abduction and renewal. Ra states that, in a pivotal journey between Earth and Saturn, his tangible form and personal history were metamorphosed, allowing him to continue existence in a truer mode: as an alien brought to preach peace. In pursuing the questions raised...
This group exhibition, hosted by Stevenson Gallery, is curated by Sisipho Ngodwana and Sinazo Chiya. The title of this exhibition is drawn from a quote by Sun Ra, in which the American artist, musician and thinker describes a moment of abduction and renewal. Ra states that, in a...
Today we present the third episode of ZAM’s #ImagineMandela video series. It features Adriaan van Dis. This Dutch bestselling author is an outspoken voice against racism and exclusion. His books are being translated in many languages. Van Dis is also a patron of the annual ZAM Nelson Mandela Lecture. The video is filmed in the Amsterdam Transvaal neighbourhood. Street names are dedicated to key players in the former white ‘Boer Republics’ in South Africa. 'In prison', Van Dis says, 'Nelson Mandela...
Today we present the third episode of ZAM’s #ImagineMandela video series. It features Adriaan van Dis. This Dutch bestselling author is an outspoken voice against racism and exclusion. His books are being translated in many languages. Van Dis is also a patron of the annual ZAM...
One meme that has been circulated widely during the rioting and looting in South Africa is of an evil king – Lord Farquaad from Shrek – standing on his palace balcony, exhorting his troops to go fight for something he wants, saying: ‘Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make’. South Africa’s plunder king and his family, the Zuma’s of Nkandla, and their accomplices in the state, are Lord Farquaad. Having written the textbook on looting – ‘Radical Economic Transformation’ as...
One meme that has been circulated widely during the rioting and looting in South Africa is of an evil king – Lord Farquaad from Shrek – standing on his palace balcony, exhorting his troops to go fight for something he wants, saying: ‘Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice I am...
‘I have been told by a friend that this Nigerian guy resides somewhere along this street’. While strolling through Yeovil – a quiet leafy luxurious suburb in the eastern border city of Mutare, Zimbabwe – a young man approaches me inquiring about a Nigerian diamond buyer whom he believes lives in the area. The young man acts as if he is in a market place, looking for someone to buy his tomatoes. The Precious Stones Trade Act According to Zimbabwe’s Precious Stones Trade Act, unlawful dealing in or...
‘I have been told by a friend that this Nigerian guy resides somewhere along this street’. While strolling through Yeovil – a quiet leafy luxurious suburb in the eastern border city of Mutare, Zimbabwe – a young man approaches me inquiring about a Nigerian diamond buyer whom he...
On the morning of October 30, 2019, Maxillary Owilli, 56, walked into the bank in the northern Uganda district of Abim, looking forward to his payday salary. But moments later the teacher of Murolem Primary School, in the same district, left the bank premises dejected. He was not going to be paid that month. ‘They told me it ‘hanged’ and went back to the ministry’, he says. When complaining to his district office he was handed a form to fill and a promise that all would be well the following month....
On the morning of October 30, 2019, Maxillary Owilli, 56, walked into the bank in the northern Uganda district of Abim, looking forward to his payday salary. But moments later the teacher of Murolem Primary School, in the same district, left the bank premises dejected. He was not...
That many African state systems can be called ‘kleptocracies’, i.e. states whose leaders make themselves rich and powerful by stealing from the people, is a conclusion long arrived at by most African investigative journalists. Many of the colleagues we connect with in the ZAM network have dedicated their careers, and often their lives, to exposing and hopefully helping dismantle these systems. Together, in investigations such as African Oligarchs, Public Disservice, The Associates, Risking Death to...
That many African state systems can be called ‘kleptocracies’, i.e. states whose leaders make themselves rich and powerful by stealing from the people, is a conclusion long arrived at by most African investigative journalists. Many of the colleagues we connect with in the ZAM...
Officials of Nigeria’s federal marriage registries extort prospective married couples by charging them fees way above the official rate, diverting up to half of the country’s minimum wage at a time into their personal bank accounts. Taiwo Adebulu went undercover to record how these civil servants work together, and across marriage offices, to do this with impunity. He also discovered how an online registration portal, meant to be a solution to the corruption, is routinely sabotaged. On the right...
Officials of Nigeria’s federal marriage registries extort prospective married couples by charging them fees way above the official rate, diverting up to half of the country’s minimum wage at a time into their personal bank accounts. Taiwo Adebulu went undercover to record how these...
There was, once, an investment, south of Durban in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. A local factory wanted to produce soap and perfumes. Normally, they would be looking to recruit some workers from the townships in the area, but this time it was different. Some men with knives and spears said they were workers, but also they said they were the neighbourhood committee. They were the people. And they wanted the people’s share of the project. Then there was another committee. And another one. Among the...
There was, once, an investment, south of Durban in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. A local factory wanted to produce soap and perfumes. Normally, they would be looking to recruit some workers from the townships in the area, but this time it was different. Some men with knives and...
On July 9, 2021, the award winning Ivorian movie Night of the Kings premiers in Dutch cinemas. Its director, Philippe Lacôte (Abidjan), wanted to explore what fantasies can be developed when your body is locked up. A young man is sent to ‘La Maca’, a prison in the middle of the Ivorian forest ruled by its inmates. As tradition goes with the rising of the red moon, he is designated by the Boss to be the new ‘Roman’ and must tell a story to the other prisoners. Learning what fate awaits him, he...
On July 9, 2021, the award winning Ivorian movie Night of the Kings premiers in Dutch cinemas. Its director, Philippe Lacôte (Abidjan), wanted to explore what fantasies can be developed when your body is locked up. A young man is sent to ‘La Maca’, a prison in the middle of the...
A six month investigation in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda reveals widespread use of clinics that claim ‘therapy’ will change a person’s sexual choices. When Samuel (not his real name) was a teenager, he was sent to live in a windowless room in a deserted area on the outskirts of Nairobi, the Kenyan capital. Here, he said, he was given electric shocks and shown pictures of ‘ruptured anuses and wounded penises’ by people who told him that if he didn’t stop being gay, he would ‘meet the same fate’. ‘I...
A six month investigation in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda reveals widespread use of clinics that claim ‘therapy’ will change a person’s sexual choices. When Samuel (not his real name) was a teenager, he was sent to live in a windowless room in a deserted area on the outskirts of...
When COVID 19 pandemic news started flooding TVs and social media, South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa spoke to his nation like a true statesman. He did not, like Donald Trump in the United States, oscillate between denial and promoting untested medication. He ordered a lockdown, encouraged mask wearing and had isolation centres built in event halls. Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, Mali, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and even Congo introduced similar policies and programmes. Save for the crazy...
When COVID 19 pandemic news started flooding TVs and social media, South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa spoke to his nation like a true statesman. He did not, like Donald Trump in the United States, oscillate between denial and promoting untested medication. He ordered a...
When COVID 19 hit Mali, businessman Boubacar Thiam was one of the many who felt a ‘sense of panic’. ‘Maybe I should have thought about it for longer’, the chairman of APBEF, the association of financial and banking enterprises of Mali, says. ‘But we were told there was a global pandemic and many of us might die. So we put US$ 1,234,885 into the voluntary fund that the government presented. We did not foresee that there would be no traceability’. On a picture taken at the 1st of April 2020 launch of...
When COVID 19 hit Mali, businessman Boubacar Thiam was one of the many who felt a ‘sense of panic’. ‘Maybe I should have thought about it for longer’, the chairman of APBEF, the association of financial and banking enterprises of Mali, says. ‘But we were told there was a global...
Cabo Delgado, 2021. Over 600 000 people, more than a quarter of the population, live in refugee camps, battling food and water shortages, mosquitoes, and disease. The Mozambican province has been under attack from violent militants – Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jamo, or the local ‘Al Shabab,’ as residents call it – since August last year. Humanitarian aid organisations like Doctors without Borders barely cope, especially now that the pandemic is spreading and people present with cough, fever and shortness of...
Cabo Delgado, 2021. Over 600 000 people, more than a quarter of the population, live in refugee camps, battling food and water shortages, mosquitoes, and disease. The Mozambican province has been under attack from violent militants – Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jamo, or the local ‘Al Shabab,’ as...
Shakeera Baker doesn’t like asking for help to put food on the table for herself and her two children, but she struggled to make ends meet in mid-2020 already. And then the COVID lockdown prevented her from even going to look for work. So she and her equally unemployed husband applied for the new COVID 19 grant. 1 At 350 Rands, US$ 20, per month, it wasn’t going to be much. It barely buys you some electricity, some bread, some tea, cooking oil, rice, some vegetables. But it was something. Only they...
Shakeera Baker doesn’t like asking for help to put food on the table for herself and her two children, but she struggled to make ends meet in mid-2020 already. And then the COVID lockdown prevented her from even going to look for work. So she and her equally unemployed husband...
One of the guests at ZAM’s recently screened The Kleptocracy Project livecast on Thursday 24 June, the softly spoken Ivan Pillay, impressed many in the audience with his in depth understanding of dysfunctional systems in African governance and how to fix them. If you want to get to know him better, you may be interested in the recently published book The Unlikely Mr Rogue in which he is a central character. The book narrates Pillay’s personal history from the time he was involved in the armed...
One of the guests at ZAM’s recently screened The Kleptocracy Project livecast on Thursday 24 June, the softly spoken Ivan Pillay, impressed many in the audience with his in depth understanding of dysfunctional systems in African governance and how to fix them. If you want to get to...
Progressive South Africans fighting for justice are celebrating the Constitutional Court’s decision on Tuesday 29 June to sentence former president, Jacob Zuma to fifteen months in jail. The verdict for contempt of court was issued because Zuma failed to comply with a direct order by the same Constitutional Court to appear before the country’s Judicial Commission of Enquiry into State Capture that investigates ‘allegations of state capture, corruption, fraud and other allegations in the public...
Progressive South Africans fighting for justice are celebrating the Constitutional Court’s decision on Tuesday 29 June to sentence former president, Jacob Zuma to fifteen months in jail. The verdict for contempt of court was issued because Zuma failed to comply with a direct order...
Today we present the second episode of ZAM’s #ImagineMandela video series. It features Tanja Jadnanansing , chairperson of the South East District Council in Amsterdam. In this area more than 170 cultures and nationalities live together. Here, later this year, Nelson Mandela’s life and work will be honoured with the unveiling of a memorial. It is also dedicated to the people of ‘South East’. Jadnanansing: ‘My ideal is to show all of Amsterdam, all of the Netherlands and, indeed, all of the world...
Today we present the second episode of ZAM’s #ImagineMandela video series. It features Tanja Jadnanansing , chairperson of the South East District Council in Amsterdam. In this area more than 170 cultures and nationalities live together. Here, later this year, Nelson Mandela’s life...
Over the past few years the Rwandan Supreme Court seating as the Constitutional Court has established itself as a reliable force in considering challenges to unconstitutional laws. That’s why public interest petitions have arisen. In 2018, there was a petition about defamation and the Supreme Court largely ruled in favor of rights to expression. In response the president of Rwanda called for the repeal of the article that protected his office from defamation. The parliament proceeded to amend the...
Over the past few years the Rwandan Supreme Court seating as the Constitutional Court has established itself as a reliable force in considering challenges to unconstitutional laws. That’s why public interest petitions have arisen. In 2018, there was a petition about defamation and...
A trip to Niger on the trail of colonial crimes was an eye-opener for a young British-Nigerian poet. At the end of the 19th century, European powers came together to carve up the great African cake. One of the pieces of land allotted to the French was an area branching into the Sahara Desert in what was to become Niger. My film African Apocalypse (showing at the Docville Festival in Leuven 10,16,19 June) follows the road created by the French invasion of 1898-99 in which a French colonial officer,...
A trip to Niger on the trail of colonial crimes was an eye-opener for a young British-Nigerian poet. At the end of the 19th century, European powers came together to carve up the great African cake. One of the pieces of land allotted to the French was an area branching into the...
The film Message from Mukalap captures a unique sound recording from 1936 in the now extinct Khoe language !ora. It will be screened at the upcoming International Film Festival in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. At the core of the film Message from Mukalap lies a unique sound recording that captures a spoken message from a man named Mukalap. It was recorded around 1936 in South Africa. Mukalap speaks in the now extinct Khoe language !ora. In his message he calls on an European audience to just for once...
The film Message from Mukalap captures a unique sound recording from 1936 in the now extinct Khoe language !ora. It will be screened at the upcoming International Film Festival in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. At the core of the film Message from Mukalap lies a unique sound recording...
Traces of colonialism are often hidden in plain sight and continue to have a conscious or unconscious effect in today’s society. In this project/exhibition the traces are a school building, a park, imperialist myths, but also the presence of people with African roots (who are) born in Belgium. Fifteen international artists inhabit the imaginary city, Congoville ,where they guide the visitor over the Middelheim site. They walk as ‘black flâneurs’ through the present and history and guide us in a...
Traces of colonialism are often hidden in plain sight and continue to have a conscious or unconscious effect in today’s society. In this project/exhibition the traces are a school building, a park, imperialist myths, but also the presence of people with African roots (who are) born...
