Saturday, August 11, 2012

Gwynne Dyer: The fate of Africa



                          
Introduction: This piece on Africa from Gwynne Dyer is a must read. His perspectives and insights leaves much to think about...

Can African nations grow their economies faster than their populations?
Good news from Africa: After two decades of bloody anarchy, Somalia is finally on the mend.
There is something resembling a government coming into being in Mogadishu, with much help from African Union troops.
Bad news from Africa: the situation in Mali is awful.

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Sugarcoating 133 Years of Americo-Liberian Dominance


Introduction: Liberia has a tradition of appointing national orators on its independence day, a custom that stretches back to the country's foundation. This year speaker was Dr. Elwood Dun a Liberian academic. Here is Samuel D. Tweah Jr. critique of Dun's "Renewing our national promise," in which he disagrees fundamentally with Dun's interpretation of Liberia's history. Tweah  accused Dun of sugar coating the past, and being less candid about the historical national narrative which culminated in Liberia's founding. Says Tweah, "Dr. Dunn makes several troubling and baffling assertions which are teased and fleshed out...the Professor summarizes 133 years of political wrongdoing as prejudice. This is gross, tendentious understatement that has to be challenged. And more to the point, he uses ‘prejudices’ alongside ‘preferences’ as if to argue that ‘preferences’ define or connote the positives of the era while ‘prejudices’ explain the negatives." Both Dun and Tweah's posits are worth reading...

Saturday, August 4, 2012

NFF says Steven Keshi job is on the line!

By ralph geeplay

The Eagles



The Nigerian Super Eagles coach, Steven Keshi is about to lose his high paying job if he fail to beat the Lone Star of Liberia and qualify the Eagles for Afcon finals next year in South Africa, Nigerian football officials are saying. Echoing the Nigerian football house sentiments quite recently was Mike Umeh, the vice president of the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF).

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Augustine Ngafuan and Liberia’s economy diplomacy


By: ralph geeplay

Liberia’s Foreign Minister (FM) Augustine Kpehe Ngafuan comes to the foreign minister  position with a core strategic objective for promoting Liberia policy initiatives by advancing what he and Sirleaf on many occasion have termed the “the economy diplomacy,” of the Unity Party led administration. The West African state which is still reeling from almost two decades of civil strive wants to build bridges with investors and foreign governments by winning investment to the country as it advance peace, and thereby, over all create stability.