Headlines : "War on Terror"

In the name of my father, Ken Saro-Wiwa

Summary:

an excerpt from an email I sent today:

...I intend to refer to it if need be to shake some people of influence to action. The video begins with archival (formerly secret) footage of Napalm bombings in Vietnam, then transitions to current-time Iraq and the use of phosphorous. It’s primarily interviews and it does show the physical evidence… nuff said. This type of footage from Vietnam was the ‘straw’ that broke through to people and mobilized them in 1970 – made them stop their government’s war – how is this different? Is man’s inhumanity to man now a taboo subject?

Did you know that today is the 10th anniversary of Pulitzer Prize winner Ken Saro-Wiwa’s execution in Nigeria for for campaigning against the devastation of the Niger Delta by oil companies, especially Shell and Chevron?

And now, it’s STILL about the oil ….

and intuitively we know WATER is infinetely more important… hence the disconnect:

it’s really about the water

[Posted By gaanjah_mama]

By The Observer
Republished from The Observer

Ten years ago the writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was executed by the Nigerian government. Ken Wiwa talks about his father's legacy and how he is continuing his fight for justice

Your dad’s dead. For most of my adult life I’d lived in dread of hearing those words. Even before he became a global icon of social justice I was keenly aware that my father’s death, whenever it came, would have a profound impact on my life. Years before they killed him I would imagine what it would be like to receive the news. I would rehearse scenarios in my head; how would I feel, how would I react? I never imagined, not even in my wildest calculations, that my father’s death would have such an impact well beyond my personal universe.

On the day they killed him I remember walking up a hilly street in Auckland. I was 25 years old and had flown to New Zealand to try to lobby the Commonwealth Heads of State to intervene on behalf of my father, who had been sentenced to death at the end of October. At the top of the street I turned to view the sunset. Looking out over the city centre below me and out into the harbour in the distance, I watched the sun sink into the sea, casting a pale orange glow against the sky. I remember the…

Click here to read the rest of the article

Posted by gaanjah_mama
Harold: "You're good with people." Maude: "Well, they're my species."