Thursday 30 April 2020

An Open Letter To Awula Serwah - Of The Eco-Conscious Citizens Group

Awula Serwah, I speak humbly, as a major private stakeholder, in the upland evergreen rainforest in question (whose family are lucky and privileged to own a total of 14-square miles of freehold land, in the Atewa Range with 99.6 acres of it inside the official government forest reserve).


Ohemaa, the irony in all this, is that all that is actually needed, on the ground, so to speak, is to empower the youth in fringe-forest communities, such as those in Osino, Saamang, and Akyem Juaso, to bootstrap their way out of poverty. Simple. Uncomplicated. Doable. Case closed.

Empowering the younger generations in fringe-forest communities can easily be done, for example, by offering them free training courses, to enable them: farm giant African land snails; produce organic honey; produce organic mushrooms; and, paid well, monthly, they will happily protect the Atewa Forest Reserve, as community forest guards, and grow industrial hemp in sundry community land restoration schemes. It is that simple, Ohemaa.


Yet, for decades, trillions of the hard currency equivalent, in Ghana cedis, have been collected by sundry NGOs, with very little impact on those poor rural farming communities, nationwide. That is the true scandal. That, and the stupidity of Vice President Bawumia, and Senior Minister, Hon. Yaw Osafo Marfo - who went to China and signed away the birthright of Akyems without our permission.


And, as the Atewa Forest Reserve faces an existential threat, where, pray, are the Chiefs of the Akyem Abuakwa State Council, who for years, fanned their massive egos, by greenwashing - making patently untruthful claims that they were committed protectors of Mother Nature?


They are also another treacherous group, which will be roundly condemned by future generations, for aiding and abetting that privileged-insider-group of shortsighted morons-in-high-places, who have sanctioned the crime against humanity that allowing the mining of bauxite, and gold, in the Atewa Range, and the Atewa Forest Reserve, represent. Shame on all of them. Hypocrites. Hmmmm, Oman Ghana eyeasem - asem kesie ebeba debi ankasa. Hmmmm. Yooooo...

Saturday 25 April 2020

Spiked/Brendan O'Neill: The importance of courage

The importance of courage

Boris now needs to show leadership and take us out of this lockdown.
Brendan O'Neill

Brendan O'Neill
Editor

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Here are some words you would never have expected to read in the Guardian. Boris Johnson’s government, the paper says, is using the refrain ‘following the science’ to ‘abdicate responsibility for political decisions’. It reports some experts’ concerns that in constantly saying ‘we are following scientific advice on Covid-19’, ministers are ‘abdicating political duty to [a] narrow field of opaque expertise’. In short, the cabinet is too faithfully traipsing in the wake of scientific expertise rather than making judgements about what might be the best course for the country in the era of Covid. The Guardian says there is now worry among scientists themselves that the current ‘prominence given to science in supporting political decisions risks burdening scientists with unrealistic expectations’.
This is a turnaround of epic proportions. The Guardian has probably done more than any other media outlet to push the new orthodoxy that political decision-making must be expert-led and scientifically infused. On everything from climate change to a No Deal Brexit, the liberal elite’s mantra in recent years has been ‘Listen to The Science’ or ‘Listen to The Experts’. The Science – they always say ‘the science’ rather than just ‘science’, to give it an extra godly quality – has been turned into a kind of gospel truth we must all bow down to, and upon which all political decisions must be based. Indeed, for the past year we have had Greta Thunberg, feverishly promoted by the political establishment and media class, touring the world and demanding we all ‘listen to The Science’.
Now, it seems, this latter-day demand for unflinching fealty to an implacable truth – though in this case derived from science rather than from God – is being called into question in some quarters. It has dawned on people that science is a complex, drawn-out, falsifiable search for solutions and truths, not a dispenser of unquestionable wisdom that entire societies must organise themselves around. The Spectator reports that ‘cabinet members have been taken aback by the disagreements among those now advising the government’. One cabinet member says ‘scientists are as bitchy as a bunch of lawyers’. Another says that even the scientists who make up the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies – which has effectively become the supreme governing body of the UK – ‘don’t agree with each other’. ‘They bicker’, apparently, which is not at all surprising: science is an often conflictual process of expanding our understanding of the natural world, not a font of unimpeachable political or moral wisdom.
The cabinet member said to the Spectator: ‘And we talk about following “the science” as if there is one opinion and not at least seven.’ This is a critical point and one that must endure even after the Covid-19 crisis. Science is not a good guide for society. Of course science is essential to our understanding of the world and to the creation of the new insights, technologies and treatments our societies need. But it cannot tell us what is best for our societies in political, moral or economic terms. Indeed, it is the very specialised nature of science, whereby very clever people remove themselves from normal life and focus on one field for a very long period of time, that makes it unsuited to the broader, democratic question of what is in the best interests of society. When science becomes infused with politics, both suffer: science risks becoming politicised while democratic life is weakened through a growing reliance on ‘expert advice’ over the considerations and wisdom of the crowd.
What the Covid-19 crisis has really done is throw the science question into sharp relief. In the eyes of those of us who understand the importance of democratic leadership and the necessity of specialised science, there has always been a problem with using science to justify political action and moral conviction. But now, because of the intensity of the current crisis, others appear to be realising that, too. Epidemiologists might understand how viruses tend to spread, but their understanding of the dire economic consequences of a lockdown is no better than anyone else’s, some are saying. Modelling might be a useful source of information for politicians, but to partake in an unprecedented demobilisation of working people and economic life on the basis of a model is ridiculous and dangerous, others are saying.
This is all good, if a little late. But we need to push further now. One of the key dynamics in the politicised elevation of science and expertise in recent years has been the crisis of politics and institutions, and in particular the crisis of leadership. Science has slowly filled the gap where political and moral judgement ought to be. In the Covid-19 crisis, one of the most striking things has been the relative ease with which the government has abdicated its judgement in favour of following the science or succumbing to media pressure and to supposed public opinion. It speaks to a political class that lacks the capacity for leadership, and in particular lacks leadership’s most important virtue: courage.
This is not Boris-bashing. There is no more infantile political pursuit in the UK right now than Boris-bashing. It is ahistorical to pin the blame for the decades-long sclerotic nature of the British bureaucracy on a man who has been PM for eight months, and it is immoral to blame deaths from Covid-19 on him too, as if a novel virus could be stopped in its tracks by political decision-making alone. Will Boris also be culpable for this year’s flu deaths? That would be ridiculous. No, this is a call for a broader reorientation of political life, away from the caution and instinct for self-preservation that has defined it for a few decades now, and which has fuelled its reliance on the authority of science and experts, and towards a new and meaningful era of leadership in which our leaders take seriously their responsibility to make judgements, take decisions, and convince the rest of us, intellectually and democratically, that it is the right course of action.
It is now widely reported that Boris’s government hasn’t only been ‘following the science’ but has also felt under incredible pressure to buckle to the media class’s demand for action, in particular for a lockdown, and to ‘public opinion’ that says the lockdown is the right thing. There is no doubting the corrosive role the media are playing right now, and have been for many years in fact. Their increasingly opinionated, moralised coverage of the news, in which they seem to think their role is to harry and shame people in power rather than to report on what is happening, has led to a dangerous culture of media self-importance. Politicians, already feeling uncertain of their authority, too often feel cowed by the newly arrogant, agenda-defining media, and are reluctant to fall foul of their demands and diktats. If it is true that Boris put the country into lockdown partly in response to media pressure, then the media themselves may have a lot of questions to answer about the damage currently being done by this unprecedented freeze on working life and the economy.
As to the question of ‘public opinion’ – this needs to be put into context. Polls currently show fairly widespread support for the lockdown. But we must remember that ‘public opinion’ is a sometimes invented, or at least embellished, phenomenon, sometimes shaped by polling questions or political expectation. Even more important than that, right now the public has been demobilised. Indeed, there is no ‘public’ to speak of in Covid-hit Britain. We have been utterly atomised, pushed into our homes away from the world. What people say now, in this individuated, concerned state, might be different to what they would say in a properly public forum like a meeting or a hustings or a protest. Being with others influences our opinions and our confidence. The notion of public opinion in a time when public life has been retired is something we should at least be sceptical about.
Against all of this – against scientific advice, media pressure and alleged public opinion – Boris now needs to push back. He needs to think, not about what the papers want to hear or what modellers with no political or economic nous think we should do, but about what is best for the country. This lockdown is proving disastrous. It has ended our freedom, it is causing economic mayhem, it is giving rise to mass unemployment, and it has replaced public life with a culture of atomisation and fear. We need a far more strategic focus on protecting those most vulnerable to Covid-19 alongside a commitment to reopening society and reviving economic life and everyday liberty. Courage will be required. Judgement – and confidence in one’s judgement – will be essential. There will be criticism, there will be op-eds by angry scientists in the press, there will be Twitterstorms about ‘Boris the Butcher’. Ignore it all and lead. And use the institutions of democracy to bring the public along with you. This shouldn’t even be a radical proposal. Indeed, there is already a word for this kind of action: politics.
Brendan O’Neill is editor of spiked and host of the spiked podcast, The Brendan O’Neill Show. Subscribe to the podcast here. And find Brendan on Instagram: @burntoakboy
Picture by: Getty.
To enquire about republishing spiked’s content, a right to reply or to request a correction, please contact the managing editor, Viv Regan.

Comments

Tinfoil Hat

24th April 2020 at 11:11 pm
There is a very simple model that describes how Coronavirus would expand exponentially. two parameters are not known 1) What is the value of R with and without lockdown? 2) What is the mortality rate? These are known within certain bounds but those bounds mean that removing the lockdown has to be done in a very careful way unless of course you believe that economic growth trumps large numbers of avoidable deaths. I despair of the unscientifically educated authoritarians who run or inform our society through ignorance.

Chauncey Gardiner

24th April 2020 at 10:29 pm
“That would be courageous.”
Isn’t that the kill shot Sir Humphrey would deploy when endevouring to discourage the PM from doing something … courageous?

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Friday 24 April 2020

Will A Digital Ghana Cedi Save Our National Economy From Collapsing - As A Result Of The Varied Impacts Of The COVID-19 Pandemic?

It is said that cash is King. In that sense, it is an all-conquering type of royalty, which even the most rabid of the world's anti-Monarchists, worship fervently, globally. However, if we are serious about containing the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, in Ghana, then we must rid our country of as much cash as is practicable - for currency notes and coins can carry the coronavirus and many other bugs, one presumes.


Yet, as we are all aware, paper currencies cannot be washed under running tap water - said to be the most effective way of killing the COVID-19. What, then,  must those who now govern our nation, do, to help stop the spread of the coronavirus across Ghana, because we do need to spend cash to ensure our survival?


With the adoption of QR codes in Ghana, perhaps we finally have the opportunity to transform our country, into a cashlite African society. What the Bank of Ghana (BoG) needs to do, to make that happen, is to create a new Digital Ghana Cedi (DGC).


Having done so, the BoG should then open digital accounts for all Ghanaian citizens, into which it should deposit DGC 250,000 onetime payments, to enable every Ghanaian pay for a property - in new planned green cities across Ghana: which will replace our country's many urban slums that will otherwise remain hotspots of all manner of viruses and dangerous pathogens, which could wipe us all out, someday. Cool.


They can be repaid over whatever lengthy period is needed to do so - with monthly mortgage payments of DGC200 only, in the case of the most vulnerable individuals, financially: till the principle sum is repaid. There must also be a waiver of all interest payments.


The beauty of such an empowering economic initiative, is that it will prevent eventual economic collapse from the much-needed, lifesaving lockdowns - which incidentally could also be made bearable, for the citizenry, with DGC2500 paid into those selfsame digital accounts all Ghanaians will have with the BoG, every month a lockdown order persists.


The question we must ponder over is: Would such an initiative by the BoG, during the COVID-19 crisis, help launch our move into a truly cashlite-digital-economy, and make it possible for Ghanaians to spend those monthly DGC250O payments paying tro-tro mates, as well as tomato, onion and other foodstuff sellers, in markets across Ghana using QR codes - and finally make it possible for Ghana to be transformed into an African equivalent of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia?


The time has definitely come for the BoG to roll out a digital Ghana cedi - for it will eventually help save our national economy from collapsing: as a result of the varied impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Cool.

Thursday 23 April 2020

The Only Way For China To Atone For Her COVID-19-Era Egregious-Racism Against Africans Resident Across China

China is a great nation with a civilisation that was once dominant, and more advanced, than any other, in our biosphere, at a certain stage in human history. Many inventions have come from her many brilliant minds over the centuries, such as gunpowder.

She has also been a long-standing ally of Africa's, since the era of the Communist Party Chairperson, Chairman Mao Zedong.

For example, in a financially ground-breaking move, at that time, China gave an interest-free loan, of U.S. $500 million, to finance the construction of the Tazara railway line, from landlocked Zambia to the Port of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, to give then-beleaguered Zambia, direct access to the sea, without depending on her racist neighbour, at the time, apartheid-era South Africa.

Today's COVID-era racism against Africans in China, can never be justified under any circumstances. And the Chinese authorities should not attempt to do so. They ought to make amends, directly to all those Africans, treated so appallingly by agents of Chinese officialdom - and to their home-countries' by empowering them, through debt forgivance: to stop their economies collapsing from the existential-need-for-lockdowns, to contain and defeat COVID-19. Now. Not tomorrow.

Thus, above all, to restore trust in her special relationship with Africa, China should write off all the monies loaned to the continent of Africa, by converting those loans to grants. Simple. That is the only way to show, by deed, nor words, remorse for the totally unacceptable victimisation of innocent people from a continent whose mineral resources have powered China's stunning economic transformation into the world's leading economy.

Monday 20 April 2020

China Must Stop The Racist Attacks On Africans Resident There - For Africa Is A True And Longstanding Friend Of Beijing's

The continuing and unacceptable mistreatment of so many Africans residing in China, in the midst of the strict measures in force across that great nation, in the  COVID-19 era, is most unfortunate - for, it has racist undertones, which  don't speak well of a nation that has been a long-standing ally of Africa,  for decades: from the era of the Communist Party Chairman, Mao Zedong, till date.


As it happens, yesterday,  I was privileged to watch a viral video clip  of a Nigerian diplomat, accredited to China, who was berating an arrogant young Chinese state official, who had been called to the scene, by police officers, who had ordered the Nigerians out of their homes, and had had the temerity to confiscate their  passports.


The incensed Nigerian  diplomat, snatched all the siezed  passports out of the hands of the stunned police officers (all in personal protection kits), who were lined up, facing the evicted Nigerians they were  victimising, so egregiously,  and made it plain to the young state official (who had obviously been called to the scene by the police officers), that the passports  were the properties of the Government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and that under the Vienna Convention,  siezing them was akin to siezing Nigerian property.


I kept on muttering to myself,  as I watched the scandalous scene unfolding,  that no Ghanaian diplomat stationed abroad, would ever go to such lengths to assist such resident Ghanaians involved in a confrontation with local  police officers,  who were being unprofessional and  behaving unjustly.

Kudos to that brave and erudite Nigerian diplomat in China. It is yet another example of the  supreme self-belief, which one finds amongst those who constitute  Nigeria's political class, which  drives Africa's many enemies, to constantly forment secessionist tendencies, across Nigeria - in order to weaken her permanently, so that her natural place in the comity of nations, as a global power, is never secured.


Incidentally, one wonders whether  any of the  brilliant young people, in the online environmental-activist-family, Eco-Conscious Citizens, can ever imagine our cowardly fence-sitting diplomats abroad, defending victimised Ghanaian citizens, in China, like that? No. Never. Our vampire-élites exist only to feather their own nests - and that of their extended-family-favourites and cronies.


Otherwise, why do the morons who govern our country, still refuse to see sense, and abondon the stupidity that allowing a vital watershed and ecosystem services provider (supporting three river systems), to be destroyed, represents?


Is it not just to enable China gain access to the rather  poor-quality bauxite, which the Atewa Forest Reserve contains - even though it will destroy three very important  rivers that are  sourced by the Ghana Water Company Limites  (GWCL),  to enable it  treat and distribute potable water, to over 5 million Ghanaians? Massa, is that not the height of foolishness? So why are they do determined to go ahead and do it, I ask?


Hon. Yaw Osafo Marfo,  and Vice President Bawumia will be cursed by future generations, for sure,  if that lunacy goes ahead. They had no right to go to China to sell the birthright of Akyems without our say so. The sods. So outraged is one about this issue, that were one younger, by now,  one would definitely have overthrown the fools proposing this crime against humanity,  long, long  ago.


Be that as it may,  suffice it to say that the time has now come for China  to act swiftly,and decisively, to stop the racist attacks on Africans resident in China. Its officials need to remember that Africa is indeed a true and longstanding friend, of Beijing's. Hmmmm, Oman Ghana, eyeasem ooooo - enti yewieye paaa enei? Asem kesie ebeba debi ankasa. Yooooo...

Saturday 18 April 2020

Atewa Forest Reserve: Why President Akufo-Addo Must Listen To Environmental Activist Groups Like The Eco-Conscious Citizens Group

In the unusual and uncertain times we now live in, wise leaders worldwide, ought to  listen to their people -  and promptly  address their COVID-19 era concerns. In that sense, U.S. President Trump, is a very,  very wise leader: for  backing those Americans who are protesting against the economy-destroying and undemocratic  COVID-19 lockdowns.

Here in Ghana,  as World Water Day (Sunday, 22 March, 2020) approaches, we must also commend environmental activist  groups, such as the Eco-Conscious Citizens group, which are demanding that the government acts to protect the Atewa Forest Reserve by halting plans to allow bauxite mining in it  - because it is the watershed for three major river systems, the Birim, the Densu and Ayensu rivers, sourced by the Ghana Water Water Company Limited  (GWCL), for  treatment to produce potable water,  for over 5 million people in southern Ghana.

May God bless, protect and guide all the  gallant members of the Eco-Conscious Citizens group, always. And many thanks indeed to the brilliant young journalist, Sefanam Agbobli, for the  words of wisdom contained in her very well-written article, entitled:  "COVID-19: Use lockdown to clean our cities, protect Atewa forest – Group urges gov’t". Cool.

And,  hopefully, in light of the fact that  today,  the vast majority of  Ghanaians have seen the important  role the availability of  potable water, in communities nationwide, plays, in ensuring the health of the citizenry (demonstrated so vividly, in the advice given by the authorities  tasked to ensure  public health across Ghana, that hand-washing under running tap water, helps prevent people from being infected by the dangerous and highly infectious COVID-19 virus;  and reinforced by the government's dramatic and unprecedented lifesaving decision, to bear the cost of water for households across the country, for the next three months!); the government of President Akufo-Addo, will now finally come to  understand,  clearly, why they must no longer risk the well-being of the millions who depend on the three major river systems, which  take their watershed from the Atewa Forest Reserve: and act swiftly, to  rescind the terrible and amoral  decision, to allow the mining of bauxite in the Atewa Forest Reserve.

Finally, it is important that all the members of our country's political class, understand clearly, that  forced-regime-change can actually result from this burning-issue, if President Akufo-Addo  does not ignore all his advisors, and personally take action  to rescind that foolish and shortsighted decision, immediately. Yooooo. Hmmmm. Eeiiii, Oman Ghana, eyeasem ooooo - enti yewieye paaa enei? Asem kesie ebeba debi ankasa, oooo. Yooooo...

Friday 17 April 2020

NoMoreFakeNews, com /Jon Rappoport: Protests against lockdowns: here they come


Protests against lockdowns: here they come
(To read about Jon's mega-collection, The Matrix Revealed, click here.)
"The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion." -- Edmund Burke, 1784.

The Chinese regime broke the ice by imprisoning 50 million people at the start of Operation Fake Pandemic.  It sent a signal to the fascist CDC and World Health Organization that they could command huge imprisonments in other countries.

Well now, in America, a different kind of ice is being broken.  ---The resistance against the imprisonment, against the economic devastation, against the loss of freedom.

The governors of American states are behaving like the governors of the original colonies, taking their orders from a foreign power.  In this case, the power is the CDC, the World Health Organization, and by extension, the United Nations, of which the WHO is a branch.

Yes, a bloodless coup has already occurred.

The UN, in particular, has stated in a thousand different ways that it wants the US, and every nation, to bow to a world authority.  The current strategy is medical.  If climate change didn't do the trick, try another angle.

"This will teach the Americans a lesson."

Americans may have their own lesson to teach.

The last time I looked, Bill Gates hadn't bought off the whole country yet. 
 
The Telegraph, UK, April 16: "Release us!' Anti-lockdown protests break out across America, with some featuring flags and guns"

"Four states see protests with more to come as critics target governors and demand their constitutional rights"

"In Kentucky the protesters chanted 'we want to work' and 'facts over fear'. In Michigan some carried rifles with their US flags as the snow fell."

"There were Trump caps visible among the crowds gathered in Ohio, while in North Carolina a woman led away by the police shouted 'God Bless America'."

"Right across the United States, a country now in its second month of tight restrictions to stem the spread of Covid-19, small but vocal protests have begun to spring up."

"These anti-quarantine gatherings, emerging amid unprecedented surges in unemployment, are happening at state capitals and often targeted at governors."

"The common thread is a demand for orders keeping people at home and businesses shut to be loosened, thereby helping a US economy choked off by the lockdowns."

"Many of the signs and shouts accuse the state governments of overreach - a clue, perhaps, as to why such protests are being seen in America but not yet in Britain."

"Suspicion of big government is deeply rooted in a country born from revolution and a point of pride on the Right, where many of the protests appear to be emanating from."

"It may also reflect frustration voiced by Donald Trump, who has made no secret of his desire to lift restrictions and at times bemoaned scientific advisers pushing social distancing rules."

"On Wednesday the US president was set to share with governors his administration's guidance on how to open back up society after the 'Great Lockdown'."

"In recent days Mr Trump has stuck an upbeat tone, talking of 'light at the end of the tunnel' and saying on Wednesday that America had passed its peak of Covid-19 cases."

"One of the biggest protests occurred in Michigan, whose governor Gretchen Whitmer is a rising star in the Democratic Party and has clashed with Mr Trump in recent weeks."

"Thousands of people descended on the Michigan Capitol in Lansing on Wednesday, many sitting in cars and honking horns in what was dubbed 'Operation Gridlock'."

"One poster read 'hands off our citizens!!!'. Another declared 'I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery'. A third just had two words written: 'Release us!'"

"Some of those present said Ms Whitmer's stay-at-home order was too restrictive, stifling the economy and unfairly undermining personal liberty."

"[A] woman who spent some of the protest waving the stars and stripes from the back of a pick-up truck had been impacted by job losses."

"'Our community is struggling. My husband is on unemployment [benefits] for the first time in our life,' she said. 'We want to go back to work'."

"Michigan has been one of the US states hardest hit by the financial deep-freeze caused by the coronavirus pandemic, with a quarter of the workforce filing for unemployment."

"Right across America record job losses are being recorded. On Thursday it was announced 5.2 million people filed for unemployment benefits last week."

"That takes the four-week total up to 22 million, or around one in eight people working a month ago. It is unlike anything seen since the Great Depression in the 1930s."

"In Kentucky, another Democratic governor, Andy Beshear, was the target of criticism as around 100 protesters voiced their disapproval at the state Capitol in Frankfort."

"They chanted 'open up Kentucky' and 'you're not a king, we won't kiss your ring', sometimes through megaphones, as the governor tried to brief the press on the outbreak..."

---For one of their International Youth days, the United Nations cooked up the slogan, "Change Our World."  Through their World Health Organization, they're trying all right.  But the phrase is so weak.  Maybe I can help them out.

---Workers of the world, unite.  You have nothing to lose but your chains.  Remember that one?  Doesn't really gain traction when the first step is firing all the workers from their jobs.  How about one people, one country, one leader, Hitler's contribution.  No thanks.  There's always Stalin's gem: a single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.  No, let's leave Joe and Mao and Adolf in the dustbin of lunatics.  So what else?

I like the simple: LIBERTY.

It ripples.  It has waves.  Far reaching implications.

Those protestors in Michigan and Kentucky and Ohio and North Carolina.  They're peculiar.  They're not behaving like robots wearing medical masks.  They're acting like... live humans.  Humans who are free.
Use this link to order Jon's Matrix Collections.
Jon Rappoport
The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world.
You can find this article and more at NoMoreFakeNews.


Sent from Samsung tablet.

A quick Note To My Favourite Nephew - Kofi Boakye-Yiadom

One agrees 100 percent with you,  favourite nephew. The Holy Spirit does not mislead. Ever. Utter nonsense for T. B. Joshua to say he was misled by the Holy Spirit. How can that be possible,  I ask? How dare he lie so blatantly, like that? Who born dog? Joshua is definitely  a con man,  if ever there was one. Big time.

Just like that so-called 'Bishop' Owusu-Bempah - yet  another shameless Ghanaian con man, using God's name to frighten foolish politicians: in orderto get them to end up  becoming beholden to him, to be milked endlessly, by that sod. Fools.

By the way, all the above revelations are straight from God Almighty, himself, oooo, Massa. I dey get connection paaapa. Yooooo. Hmmmm...

As for our politicians,  they are actually drinking in the Last Chance  Salon, but don't realise it. The greedy sods. Serves them right - what is coming to them, that is. Greedy bastards most of them are.  Cool.

What they are oblivious to, is that currently  the conditions  are perfect for the next Jerry Rawlings to rise up,  and disband the NPP/NDC  duopoly, with immediate effect - to  widespread   acclaim from a thoroughly-fed-up population tired of their many big-lies and endless-thieving. Those two political parties are Ghana's two biggest criminal organisations.

That new Jerry Rawlings,  will then go on to maintain President Akufo-Addo (God bless him!),  as leader of an emergency  government of national unity - whiles serious housecleaning is carried out to retrieve all taxpayers' cash that has been siphoned off into private  pockets nationwide. Insha Allah.

Even offering to build 1000 new National Cathedrals, now tgeybhave been nade aware if this revelation, will not prevent what is going to hit them,  from eventually occurring, Massa - and it will take place during a six-month lockdown: after our healthcare system has been overwhelmed by COVID-19 cases.

God Almighty revealed that to me direct, too, oooo, Massa - but  unfortunately forgot   to tell me the exact date,  favourite nephew. I await his WhatApp message confirming it. Will tell you  then.  Cool.

As for  National Security,   they will have to cut open my head,  to find that D-Day date, out, Massa. Yabre eni nkwasiasem, wai. Haaba. Hmmmm, Oman Ghana, eyeasem, ooooo - enti yewieye paaa enei? Asem kesie ebeba debi ankasa. Yoooooo...

Sent from Samsung tablet.

Thursday 16 April 2020

When Will We Plan Towards 100 Percent Organic Food Production In Ghana?

As a wise and aspirational people, the question we must ponder over is: When exactly are we going to embark on emergency planning, for moving rapidly  towards 100 percent organic agricultural production in our homeland Ghana, as a public health assurance-measure? 

Ditto as a soft-option  national security resilience-measure, to enable us have strong immune systems empowering us to better resist the impacts of sundry viral pandemics, with the potential to destroy our national economy, whiles trying to contain them through lockdowns?

As a people, are we not lucky to have Apostle Kojo Safo-Kantanka's miraculous organic weedicides, organic folair fertilisers,  and organic  growth medium, which, if produced in factories nationwide (and the manufacture and importation of all synthetic pesticides and fertilisers banned immediately), will simply mean that all the foodstuff produced in farms across Ghana, will be organic, after the standard conversion period of three years? 

And will that not make us  a healthy people - and  boost our immune systems: at very little cost to families right  across Ghana, I ask? Furtheremore,  has the time not come, dear reader (in the super-dangerous  COVID-19 era, in which we are now living), for us to end the egregious-stupidity of our too-clever-by-half  ruling-élites? 

Particularly, dear reader, when that  egregious-stupidity is killing us,  so-so,   waaa, waaa, waaa, because an apparently unstoppable Obonsam-fireman-coronavirus-miasma, was let into Ghana, from outside our borders, and now appears to be  slowly enveloping us in relentless fashion, even as we speak? Haaba.


To counter it, should we not simply opt  to boost our immune systems, nationwide, by eating only organic agricultural produce? Fellow countrymen, and countrywomen, there is no more time to waste - let us plan towards the day when we will only grow and eat organic agricultural produce,  in our homeland Ghana. Quickly. Now. Not, tomorrow. Full stop. Eeiiii, Oman Ghana, eyeasem, ooooo  - enti yewieye paaa enei? Asem kesie ebeba debi ankasa. Hmmmm. Yooooo...


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The Conversation/Roberts, Benjamin and Smart: Why heavy-handed policing won’t work for lockdowns in highly unequal countries

Why heavy-handed policing won’t work for lockdowns in highly unequal countries

Police trying to enforce COVID-19 lockdown regulations outside a shop in Yeoville, Johannesburg. Marco Longari/GettyImages
Many African countries have imposed lockdown measures stricter than countries in Europe and Asia in a bid to contain the spread of the new coronavirus. But, due to the significant variation in living conditions on the continent, implementing these measures is likely to be more difficult in some places than others.
This presents a significant challenge for the police. Should they rigidly enforce social distancing and other measures, or should they be more cognisant of the local context?
A significant proportion of Africans live in high population density slums and townships or urban areas. Effective social distancing is impossible because of overcrowding and poor sanitation.
“Lockdown”, as it is meant in wealthy Western nations, is therefore simply impossible in overcrowded conditions with no sanitation.
Even where a semblance of lockdown is physically possible, many people in Africa live in poverty, on a hand-to-mouth basis. For them a lockdown is not an option because it means loss of the means to live. Over 330 million Africans, out of a population of 1,3 billion, already live in hunger. Often the need to eat forces people out of their houses.

Read more: Zimbabwe's shattered economy poses a serious challenge to fighting COVID-19

How should police respond to regulations that are effectively impossible to enforce strictly, and how should they respond to non-compliance?
Many countries across the continent, for example South Africa, Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda, have deployed police, and in some cases the army, to enforce lockdowns, in many instances using heavy-handed tactics.
However, heavy-handed policing will not slow transmission of COVID-19. What’s needed is a harm-reduction approach. Nested in a concern for human rights and sensitive to the context individuals find themselves in, harm reduction encapsulates the range of pragmatic and practical steps to lessen the impact of inherently harmful behaviours or situations.
In policing, harm reduction approaches have been used successfully in response to substance use and have wider application to a range of other contexts, including pandemics.
In an African context, this could relieve security services of the expectation to achieve the impossible, and would allow citizens to inform the design of responses that are effective in the context.

Heavy handed

The justification for imposing lockdowns is to protect the population from a disease that continues to spread in most countries across the world. That public-health goal must be kept in mind when deciding policing strategy, especially if leaders are to avoid suspicion of seizing an opportunity to display strength or extend the reach of the state.
Unfortunately, as noted, police have all too frequently taken a heavy-handed strict enforcement approach towards lockdown regulations. Some, such as in South Africa and Uganda, have employed brutal force to achieve compliance. This has led to a number of deaths.
In South Africa, this is despite clear instructions to the contrary from President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Violations of human rights to this extent are not warranted as they fail to consider the difficulty of compliance for many citizens. They may also be counterproductive, resulting in more public order problems and even in violent protests. This has already happened in some parts of the continent.
The excess use of force also alienates police from the community, reduces trust in police, and reduces the legitimacy of authority in the eyes of ordinary people.

What policing strategies should look like

Policing strategies for pandemics should be highly contextual and dependent on the capability, capacity, history and local legitimacy of the police. A strict securitised enforcement model that attempts to enforce, to the letter, whatever the government suggests, is unlikely to work in many contexts.
Police should be using more contextual harm-reduction approaches. Their responses to violations should be proportionate to the circumstances, which may make compliance untenable.
In “harm-reduction approaches”, police would attempt to clearly communicate social-distancing techniques, but would not use forced compliance. They would tolerate curfew breaking, instead seeking to inform and guide those breaking curfews, and achieve compliance that way.
To achieve active compliance, it is often more effective to pose problems to a community and ask the community to come up with the solution than to seek to impose a solution devised elsewhere. From a procedural justice perspective, this gives the community an active “voice”.

Read more: Pandemic underscores gross inequalities in South Africa, and the need to fix them

Similarly, authorities need to give communities explanations for particular decisions.
This harm reduction approach to policing allows for the co-creation of solutions between citizens and state.
It stands the best chance of effectiveness, given the impossibility of implementing the kind of lockdown that appears to have been effective elsewhere.
A securitised approach is unhelpful where those regulations are either impossible to implement or ineffective in the context, due to overcrowding and poor, shared sanitation.
Heavy-handed policing will be recognised as unreasonable and will damage the credibility and legitimacy of both the police and the state at a time when trust is of utmost importance. This will likely reduce public cooperation, leading many to disregard public health messages.

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