It’s been one year since the release of Kony2012. Thank you for engaging with thoughtful advocacy and voices for peace, and standing against the demands for further militarization in Africa. As Margaret Mead says: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
We remember the late Hugo Chavez as someone who represented a conscious practice of human rights as he warned against the outside exploitation of Africa.
Venezuela’s Ties with Africa - Pravda
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“Hugo Chávez also warned African leaders that more military interventions by the ex-imperialists and neo-colonialists will very likely occur, pointing out the fate of the Jamahiriya and Mali.
President Chávez wrote that the malicious exploiters want to enrich themselves at the cost of Africans by taking away their natural resources and waging wars on those that are not willing to comply. He urged African leaders to speed up the process of unification and to reject all interventionist activities by NATO.”
Maurice Kirya - “Mulembe Gwa Kirya”
*This one gets at our hearts in a different way. So much color, life, and love in this black and white music video…
#VisibleFeelGoodUganda
PS. His album is available on i-tunes!!!
Maurice Kirya - “If I Ever”
The sweet, sweet, sweet tunes of this Ugandan artist quite visibly melts our hearts…
#VisibleAudibleUganda
Another beautiful and moving piece by our one of our favorite Acholi artists, Vincent Okuja.
Check out Bila-wa, a very visible and LOUD Luo hip hop movement from Gulu,Uganda:
https://soundcloud.com/bilawa/lapiny
https://www.facebook.com/bilawamovement
Bila-wa is a platform that uses the fusion of poetry, hip-hop, storytelling, and local instruments for a positive cause. Bila-wa is used in Luo culture and we are focused on making sure that the issues in our community are heard. The name Bila-wa comes from Luo words “Bila” (“a long circular tube from an animal’s horn”) and “wa” (“ours”), therefore Bila-wa means “Our Horn” or “Our Voices”.
#VisibleLoudUganda
“The Bone Brain” - Gulu Films
A very universal message to not be a “bone brain” from Gulu, Uganda.
**Be sure to check out more films from this visible, innovative Acholi film group:
WEBSITE: http://gulufilms.com/
FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/UnitedYouthEntertainment
#VisibleUganda
Respond with Good
As we honor Martin Luther King Jr., let’s make sure to also honor and remember his message of non violence.
MLK: Message for a Violent Society- Huffington Post
”When you are treated with evil, find a way to respond with good - to open new possibilities, not to follow in the terror of the old possibilities.”
KONY 2012, Military Humanitarianism, and the Magic of Occult Economies
“The trust in US global (military) policing is a sad irony of historical and political ignorance, given that back in 1961 the CIA was implicated in partaking in the plot to murder Congolese politician Patrice Lumumba, to have his body dismembered and dissolved in acid, and to facilitate Mobutu’s military takeover. Still, Invisible Children lobbying led to US President Obama ordering one hundred “military advisors” to follow the US troops who were already on the ground supporting the Ugandan army, as he announced in October 2011. The US.. hereby secured yet another geographical warfront in its global war on terror, on yet another continent. With this bigger picture in mind, one might ask what the Invisible Children lobbyists really mean by their powerful slogan, “Stop at nothing”?”
#AFRICOM2012, Stop the real threat to Uganda
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Sverker Finnström is an associate professor of cultural anthropology at Uppsala University. He is the author of Living with Bad Surroundings: War, History, and Everyday Moments in Northern Uganda (2008) and co-editor of Virtual War and Magical Death: Technologies and Imaginaries for Terror and Killing (forthcom- ing). This essay is a preliminary report from a research project on global war and transnational (in)justice, funded by the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation.
