In the March 2010 issue of The Walrus, Arno Kopecky’s article “Law of the Jungle” took a hard look at Canada’s recent free trade deal with Peru. A few days ago, Kopecky flew back into Lima, Peru’s capital, en route to the country’s northern jungle. During the months to come, he’ll be “piping up semi-regularly” from the region with notes on local effects of the Canadian government’s so-called Americas Strategy. This is his first post of the blog series to come.
It seems that strategy matters to the Harper Administration, which made sure the proposed Free Trade Agreement with Colombia was the first bill Parliament saw after prorogation. The issue of free trade always inspires colourful debate, but this one is particularly heated, in light of allegations linking Colombian President Alvaro Uribe’s government to an impressively wide range of human rights abuses. CBC’s The Current ran a good piece on the issue in late February; writing in the Globe and Mail a few days later, Campbell Clark suggested that our government’s motivations in signing the deal have less to do with money than power. After all, he noted, Colombia only buys about 0.2 percent of our exports, so what’s really going on here is a snub to Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, arch enemy of Prez Uribe and all things fair and free.
While I don’t doubt Harper’s enthusiasm for the Great Game (and hockey too), I do think it’s important to consider what we might want to buy, and on what terms, from an oil-sodden country filled with precious woods and metals. So far, there’s little evidence that even the most benevolent intentions from Ottawa and Bogota can enforce human rights and environmental regulations in Colombia’s hinterland.
I haven’t been to Colombia yet, so rather than wade deeper into speculative cynicism, I’ll refer to an experience I had last fall in another resource-loaded, regulation-deprived country now linked by free trade to Canada: Peru. Speaking off the record (sigh) with a Canadian diplomat in Lima, I asked why Canada had refused to publicly criticize Peru’s government for a lethal clampdown on native protesters in the Peruvian Amazon last June — precisely the kind of action everyone fears in Colombia. (The Peruvian protests were a direct response to free trade and resource extraction on native land.) This seemed as good a chance as any to hold our trade partners accountable for human rights. The diplomat, however, assured me that conversations were taking place behind closed doors, and that to raise the issue publicly would be counterproductive.
Really? Then why did Peter Kent, our Minister of State of Foreign Affairs for the Americas, immediately and publicly condemn Chavez — with whom Canada is not even considering a FTA — for shutting down six television stations in January? I don’t ask that question to endorse Chavez or his tactics. But as Canada starts hurling sticks and carrots into Latin America, I wonder how carefully we’re watching where they land. Sooner or later, folks here will start throwing them back.
Twenty years ago today, in the single most important moment in 360 years of South Africa’s blood-drenched history, Nelson Mandela walked away from Victor Verster Prison a free man. February 11* is a hallowed day in the local calendar. It may therefore seem inappropriate to profile a noisy, profane rap act named Die Antwoord (Afrikaans for “the answer”) by way of celebration. But, as Mandela marched out of jail into the future, he knew that his release posed a difficult question: Can South Africa transform into a nation united and governed by principles other than race? Die Antwoord, who appear to occupy an entirely different universe from Mandela, are the most articulate answer he could have hoped for.
Over the course of the past ten days or so, the band have been propelled by the likes of Boing Boing, Twitter, Pitchfork, Reuters, et al into the very maw of Fame 3.0. As lead rapper Waddy, a.k.a. Ninja, puts it: “Look at me now! All over the interweb.” Indeed, only two weeks ago, Ninja and his sidekicks Yo-landi “Rich Bitch” Vi$$er and the flabby DJ Hi-Tek were paying dues; now they’re rolling in nunchaku. For their international fans, Die Antwoord are exotic, furious, and, most importantly, new. But what their lyrics mean — or what they stand for precisely — no one in Brooklyn or Paris or São Paulo can say.
Ninja is, at first glance, your typical white trash rapper. He wears his hoodie low; his rangy body is marked with crude tattoos. It takes a second or two to realize that Run-D.M.C. were playing Applebee’s buffets by the time they were of Ninja’s vintage: he is closer to middle age than middle school. He raps in a scattershot mixture of English and Afrikaans; his accent is unfathomable. His lyrics reference the minutely specific to the hip-hop generic: “If you don’t like funerals, Ninja says don’t kick sand in his face,” recalls a South African peanut-butter commercial from the ’80s; “too hot to handle, to cold to hold,” fist-bumps vintage MC Hammer. The clue to Die Antwoord’s raison d’être hides in the intro of their astonishing debut album $O$, where Ninja informs us that, “I represent South African culture. In this place, you get a lot of different things…Blacks. Whites. Coloureds. English. Afrikans. Xhosa. Zulu. Watookal. I’m like all these different people, fucked into one person.” Then Ms. Vi$$er pipes in, dismissing him with a high-pitched “Whateva, man.” (more…)
This June’s FIFA World Cup Final South Africa represents a risky bet that, like many wagers, poses itself as a question: Can an African nation successfully host a massive sports tournament without descending into chaos? FIFA, soccer’s international organizing body, has smartly hedged. In choosing South Africa, they can ostensibly tap into the best of both worlds — an industrialized democratic African nation not currently undergoing a civil war, and a first class African country brimming with the continent’s possibilities.
The previous Olympics were, of course, also held in a developing nation, but that event was a breeze by comparison. In Beijing, the regime used an iron hand to tamp down potential flare-ups, especially regarding the key issues of infrastructure and security. The Chinese, however, had one city to deal with, while the 2010 World Cup organizers must manage nine. What’s more, there is no iron hand in South Africa, which is in part what made the country so appealing in the first place. But with horrendous violent crime statistics, Stygian transportation problems and an angry underclass that cannot be controlled by the state, the FIFA showcase could explode like a French striker facing an Italian midfielder.
How shall it all pan out? FIFA — a powerful extra-governmental organization sometimes compared to the pre-Renaissance Vatican — is holding thumbs, to say nothing of the South African authorities. Regardless, World Cup preparations are altering the country — arguably Africa’s most important — and it seems appropriate to document these changes. In this, the first of a series of posts leading up to the 2010 tournament, we shall kick off at centre field, as it were — in the newly refurbished FNB Stadium, now called Soccer City. (more…)
The Walrus HOOPP Pension Debate
Be It Resolved That Canadians Are Incapable
of Saving for Their Retirement Needs Alone
12 pm, Wednesday, May 30 at
Hart House Debate Room, Toronto
The Walrus Glenbow Debate
Calgary’s Cowboy Culture:
Living Legacy or Just History?
6:30 pm, Thursday, June 7 at
Epcor Centre: Max Bell Theatre, Calgary
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