Barack Obama to face protests in South Africa after years of laissez-faire

[alp227]

David Smith in Johannesburg and Afua Hirsch in Accra
The Guardian, Monday 24 June 2013



(AP photo of then-Senator Obama in 2006 with Archbishop Desmond Tutu)

Symbolism will hang heavy this weekend when Barack Obama visits Soweto, the cradle of South Africa's black liberation struggle, and Robben Island, the prison where Nelson Mandela, who remained in critical condition in hospital last night, languished for years, plotting his nation's rebirth.

Obama should not expect red-carpet treatment from all South Africans, despite the historic affinity between the civil rights and anti-apartheid movements. Workers, students and Muslim groups are among those determined to give Obama a bumpy landing when he descends on Africa's biggest economy.

"NObama" is the cry from the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the South African Communist party, which have called for "all workers" to join mass protests including a march on the US embassy in Pretoria on Friday.

Academics and students have vowed to boycott the University of Johannesburg's award of an honorary law doctorate to Obama. The Muslim Lawyers' Association has called for the president to be arrested as a war criminal.

While these may appear fringe group stunts that US presidents face all over the world, South Africa is an unusual case. Cosatu and the Communist party form a "tripartite alliance" with the governing African National Congress (ANC) and expect to be heard. Cosatu in particular, with 2.2 million members, is central to the ANC's election machinery and well rehearsed in mobilising demonstrations that have been known to turn violent. The secretary general of the Communist party, Blade Nzimande, doubles as the country's higher education minister and the ANC has plenty of self-professed communists and Marxists with a flair for anti-western rhetoric.

full: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/25/barack-obama-protests-south-africa

"NObama? Hey that's OUR word, stolen by a buncha black commies!" --US Teabaggers

[WestStar]

1. 'Arrest Obama when he visits'

The Muslim Lawyers Association in Johannesburg wants US President Barack Obama arrested and tried for war crimes when he arrives in South Africa on June 29.

It submitted a 600-plus page document to the Office of the National Director of Public Prosecutions on Friday asking for an investigation into Obama's involvement in the Middle East.

Group spokesman Yousha Tayob said Obama ordered drone strikes that killed innocent civilians.

In terms of the Rome Statute, South Africa has the right to prosecute a war criminal on its territory, said Tayob.

Researchers from New York University School of Law and Stanford University Law School recently released a report entitled "Living Under Drones: Death, Injury and Trauma to Civilians From US Drone Practices in Pakistan".(snip)

National Prosecuting Authority spokesman Bulelwa Makeke said the office had received the docket and was studying it.

http://www.timeslive.co.za/thetimes/2013/06/11/arrest-obama-when-he-visits

[Cali_Democrat]

2. Don't worry Obama. Fuck the haters. n/t

[Ken Burch]

3. The working-class majority in South Africa has good reason to protest any visit by a U.S. president

After all, the project of creating a multiracial democratic society has been badly damaged by the U.S. insistence, at the outset of majority rule, that that country sign a brutal IMF austerity agreement to pay back the debts incurred by its previous white supremacist dictatorial rulers.

It's immoral to make any formerly oppressed nation pay the debts of its oppressors...and we never had any right to force South Africa to do that. And the massive spending restrictions the IMF imposed on South Africa made it impossible for the country to make the investment it HAD to be able to make in housing, healthcare and education. Those social needs can never be met by the private sector working in pursuit of short-term individual gain for the few.

If the country falls into some sort of dictatorial, tribal-based rule(as it would if Inkatha ever took over, for example) that would be the U.S. government's fault.

[liberal_at_heart]

4. Africans should beware. They are the next victim of capitalism.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. I think Africa's point is that it's been a prominent victim of capitalism for 2 centuries

and of earlier forms of global trade for another couple of centuries before that.

[Ken Burch]

6. Imperialism, actually.

We just call it "capitalism" nowadays because the empires are corporations and the emperors wear tailored suits instead of helmets with spikes or feathers.