The Algerian History of France

Since we seem to have stumbled this time around on english news - ive begun looking elsewhere. There is a special edition of the journal French History on Algeria - it came out at the end of 2006 so its pretty current. It has about five articles for rethinking algeria and france and their colonoial and post-colonial histories. the problem is im not sure everyone has free access to this onlne journal - so if you dont, e-mail me and ill give you my university pin and ID. Its editied by Bertrand Taithe a really cool cultural historian.

"Pilot" commnunes, SADR solidarity, U.S. economic connection

It doesn't look like the Algerie Presse Service has free full articles on the English site; I wrote to them to see if we can get access.

Meanwhile, a couple headlines/summaries caught my eye. First, I get the impression of solidarity with the Sahrawi people's movement in Western Sahara. New negotiations are about to start in Manhasset, NY of all places. Does anybody know the history of that peace process and why the U.S. is involved? Sahrawis have elected about 34% women to their council.

Second, four "pilot" communes for mountain farming have been started in the area around Constantine. Further searching turns up nada. Why scare quotes? Are communes the common farm unit there?

Third, exchange with the U.S. grew 23% last year, to record levels. Would be interesting to learn who's cashing in on this.

Rank Order - Public debt

So the GINI for Jezair is not that interesting - theyre at 35.5 which is pretty much middle of the pack. but algeria does have a very low public debt as % of GDP at 9.7% putting it in the top ten countries with best ratio. by contrast, its other N african neighbors come in at Egypt: 105% and Morroco: 65%. The US is at 36.8%.

Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed

I missed the event but historian Martin Evans spoke at my office recently. Here's the audio for Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed. There's also a transcript.

French law on colonialism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

French law on colonialism - : "The February 23, 2005 French law on colonialism was an act passed by the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) conservative majority, which imposed on high-school (lycée) teachers to teach the 'positive values' of colonialism to their students (article 4). The law created a public uproar and opposition from the whole of the left-wing, and was finally repealed by president Jacques Chirac (UMP) at the beginning of 2006,"

Pro-colonial legislation

PARIS (FRANCE) – The collective work of "Colonisation history, rehabilitations, falsifications and instrumentalizations" has been awarded the anticolonial book, the event organizer Ishtar area asserted Friday. The book, co-supervised by historians Alain Ruscio and Sebatien Jahan, is meant to be a cry of alarm of 17 researchers in different disciplines before the initiative to rehabilitate colonialism through numerous actions including law dated 23 February 2005, which has been decried mainly for its article that put forward the positive aspects of this abject system.

?? What's this law?

How to Get Ahead in Ibadan

I was about to click on an article about resolving land disputes between the federal and state government when I spied this tidbit about headhunters. The article really doesn't have enough details, or journalistic standards, to figure out what's going on, but basically some guys, maybe ritualists, were caught with a plastic bag containing three heads which they were delivering to a customer for about 26 dollars apiece. One of the young suspects was driven into a life of crime by drugs.

Petropolitics and AFRICOM

"Nigeria's Resurgent Oil Diplomacy" comments on how the Yar'Adua administration is taking advantage of high oil prices to reposition Nigeria regionally and internationally. At stake is the gas flaring deadline, and location of the DoD's new AFRICOM initiative.

Guns and Whammo

A bunch of naija military officers were fingered for gunrunning recently. An audit of arms and ammunition "could not give an accurate account for nearly ten thousand General Purpose Machine Gun (GPMG), and over five thousand riffles [sic] and thousands of boxes of grenades and other ammunitions." That's a lot of heat. Supposedly the weapons were bought by "criminals" in neighboring countries and by "militant groups" in the Delta region. One of the guys had to be recalled from a peacekeeping mission, probably the African Union Mission in Sudan, to face charges.

Pre-Valentine's Day Special: Nothing Says Forever Like a Magun Charm

Ok, i don't know where to start here... How about with the article "Choir Leader Dies After Extra Marital Sex" [sic] in today's Independent. Then for follow-up reading on the power of the magun charm, there's this hot romance between two police officers whose circumstances resemble wolf physiology. Still not convinced? Maybe this discussion board on myth and reality can debunk the juju.

Power Problems

I mean electricity, and control. Looks like the energy infrastructure is operating at 40 percent of capacity, and national needs are about 2.2 times capacity. $10 billion was allocated to the National Integrated Power Projects to fix this problem, but results have not materialized. That's a lot of money with which to do nothing.