The Abominable Live 8

I felt dizzy when I read about Bono and World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz talking about poverty in Africa. But the worst had still to happen.

I wanted to laugh – but I couldn’t – when I heard George W. Bush talking about the great generosity of US Government to help the developing countries. But the worst had still to happen.

I felt sick when I saw Tony Blair and Sir Bob Geldof flirting and preaching on TV about Make Poverty History. But the worst had still to happen.

I thought of Afghanistan and Iraq when I heard UN Secretary General Kofi Annan saying: "On behalf of the poor, the voiceless and the weak I say thank you." But the worst had still to happen.

Then I saw Bill Gates on the stage of Live 8 in London, calling for generosity. But even that wasn’t the worst.

The worst would be let these clowns blind us on the real causes of the problem, in Africa as anywhere else. The worst would be falling in this propaganda trap orchestrated by war criminals and their friends. The worst would be let them win.

This morning I read an open letter by Sir Bob Geldof to the leaders of the G8. Toward the end, he writes: “Today there will be noise and music and joy, the joy of exuberant possibility. On Friday there will be a great silence as the world awaits your verdict.”

Let’s not be silent, neither on Friday, nor on Saturday or on any other day. Let’s not be silent against this clan of gangsters who arrogate to themselves the right to decide the life and death of millions of people and our very survival on this planet.

To keep my sanity I collected a few articles about all this. Take a look!

"I will be going up to Edinburgh not to march in favour of the G8, but to protest against it. And to protest against Geldof and Bono as well."

Monbiot to march against Live 8 and MPH (Make Poverty History). By Stuart Hodkinson. Red Pepper

“This initiative is driven out of northern countries, the African leg of Live8 was just tagged on the end so it's not geared to African audiences. This is where Africans and genuine friends of Africa . . . who are forced to live with this patronising mega focus are caught up with frustrating ambiguities,” wrote Abdul-Raheem Tajudeen, a commentator in Tanzania's Guardian newspaper. “How can you say that this focus on Africa is bad when the complaint before is that there is not enough attention to the challenges of the continent? Yet something inside you tells you that this interest is just the fashion of the moment and after it all, the public can actually return to their ignorant ways having done their bit for Africa.” In Kenya, Solomon Mbicha, a 31-year-old architect, takes an even more cynical view. “This is all done for publicity and economic gain. They do not really care for the people affected, the so-called people they are supposed to help,” he says. “Africa's problems can only be solved by Africans, not by external forces.”

Bob who? Live8 fails to resonate in Africa. By Andrew England in Dar es Salaam. Financial Times

Money from Live Aid saved lives but, as aid expert David Rieff recently argued, it may also have led to the loss of just as many lives. There was no sea change in attitudes. That wave of compassion did not stop millions voting for right wingers like Thatcher, Bush and Kohl in subsequent elections. Today, Africa is, if anything, worse off. (...) Geldof's un-punkishly conciliatory stance to these people creates the illusion that, as with the tsunami, "no one is to blame".

Why I won't be watching Live 8. By David Stubbs. Reviews editor of The Wire music magazine. BBC News

The former Genesis singer, who has been a leading proponent of world music, said he had failed to persuade Bob Geldof, the organiser of Live8, of his case. Speaking at a press conference in London, Gabriel said: "I do think it would be better to have a larger African presence in Hyde Park. Bob made the point that in places like China, if there's an act that comes on TV that they don't know, whether from Africa or Germany, they may well switch off. He wants to keep people watching. I don't agree that's the right criteria, but there it is."

Revealed (at last): Live8's African artists. By Cahal Milmo. Belfast Telegraph

The Bob Geldof superstar concert series 'Live 8' correctly stood accused of being 'hideously white' (as Black Information Link put it), since only one band from Africa was scheduled amongst dozens at the five major performances. (A hastily arranged additional concert in Johannesburg may lead to a kind of outsourcing for black bands.) In any case, Sir Bob's mid-1980s Live Aid famine relief strategy is widely understood to have flopped because it ignored the countervailing roles of imperial power relations, capital accumulation, unreformable global institutions and venal local elites problems repeated and indeed amplified in Live 8. (,,,) Bono in particular has been obsequious. At the last New Labour party convention, Bono labeled Blair/Brown the 'Lennon and McCartney of poverty reduction'. According to Quarmby, 'some groups involved in Make Poverty History were horrified. John Hilary, director of campaigns and policy at War on Want, was in the audience. "When Bono said that, many NGO leaders who were there put their heads in their hands and groaned It's a killer blow for us. To see the smiles on the faces of Gordon Brown and Tony Blair! This is exactly what they want - they want people to believe that this is their crusade, without actually changing their policy."'

How Glo-Bono-Phonies and Trojan Horse NGOs Sabotage the Struggle Against Neoliberalism. By PATRICK BOND, DENNIS BRUTUS and VIRGINIA SETSHEDI. CounterPunch

The front page of the London Observer on 12 June announced, "55 billion Africa debt deal 'a victory for millions'." The "victory for millions" is a quotation of Bob Geldof, who said, "Tomorrow 280 million Africans will wake up for the first time in their lives without owing you or me a penny...". The nonsense of this would be breathtaking if the reader's breath had not already been extracted by the unrelenting sophistry of Geldof, Bono, Blair, the Observer et al.
Africa's imperial plunder and tragedy have been turned into a circus for the benefit of the so-called G8 leaders due in Scotland next month and those of us willing to be distracted by the barkers of the circus: the establishment media and its "celebrities". The illusion of an anti establishment crusade led by pop stars - a cultivated, controlling image of rebellion - serves to dilute a great political movement of anger. In summit after summit, not a single significant "promise" of the G8 has been kept, and the "victory for millions" is no different. It is a fraud - actually a setback to reducing poverty in Africa. Entirely conditional on vicious, discredited economic programmes imposed by the World Bank and the IMF, the "package" will ensure that the "chosen" countries slip deeper into poverty.

The G8 Summit: A Fraud and a Circus. By John Pilger. New Statesman

The spectacle of Bob Geldof and Bono bear-hugging G8 leaders in Genoa on Saturday was revolting. It was not just the manic presumption that they would have an iota of influence, or the phoniness and the crass attention-seeking of the exhibition that was stomach-churning. It was their giddy association with the rulers of the world and their eloquent dissociation from the tens of thousands who had gathered to protest against the unfairness and inequities of the new world order. The G8 represents the tyranny of the new world order against the interests of the world's poor. Self-chosen on the basis of their military might and capitalist credentials, the G8 seeks to further its hegemony of the world, amid a pretense of compassion for the developing world. (Geldof and Bono unwittingly - one assumes - helped further that pretense by the ghastly photo-opportunity in which they participated.) It represents the damaging consequences of globalization and the marginalization of the Third World.

Published on Wednesday, July 25, 2001 in The Irish Times. Geldof and Bono Out of Tune on G8. By Vincent Browne. Read the article on Common Dreams

(...) globalisation does not mean 'the impotence of the state', but the rejection by the state of its social functions in favour of repressive ones, irresponsibility on the part of governments, and the ending of democratic freedoms. (...) Democracy consists not only in the possibility of expressing different points of view (this possibility was manifested to some degree in the discussion in the castle), but also in everyone having this possibility. The problem lies not only in politics. At its heart is the indifference of the media, and above all of the television, to any attempt at 'dull' theorising, the rule of banality, and the refusal to listen to the opinions of people outside a narrow circle of 'newsmakers' (whether these are official or 'alternative' is ultimately unimportant).

The lessons of Prague, by BORIS KAGARLITSKY. Issue 89 of INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM JOURNAL


On the same topic:
- Cosa Nostra
- Nothing About Us, Without Us
- Iraq, G8 and a Question for Bono & Sir Bob
- The battle to re-conquest Africa