Nick Wadhams

Truly Amazing

The World Health Organization has done it again.

A couple of days ago, the WHO sent out a news release announcing that polio had been eradicated in Somalia. Many news organizations wrote stories reporting this fact, giving enormous amounts of free publicity to the WHO. One of them happened to be The Associated Press.*

Unfortunately for AP, the global news wire violated an embargo that barred news organizations from reporting the story until 09:30 GMT on March 25. In an broadside sent to everyone on his media distribution list, WHO News Team Leader Dick Thompson brings down the hammer in classic schoolmarm fashion: Though an AP "investigation" later found the embargo violation to be an accident, "accidents have consequences, both to reporters preparing their own stories and to the embargo system which we value."

Then, AP reaps the whirlwind. News Team Leader Dick Thompson again: "The sanction for AP is the same as it has been for others _ a two week suspension from the distribution list."

Smackdown! AP gives the WHO free publicity and mistakenly releases the story early, thereby giving the WHO a little more free publicity, and the WHO goes all Security Council on its ass. Take that, AP, you... you... you giant news organization that just gave us lots of free publicity! See if we let you give us lots of free publicity ever again!

This isn't the first time. Less than a year ago, the WHO did the same thing to the New York Times. Who does the WHO think it is?

The real question here, aside from the idiocy of embargoes, is whether polio has truly been eradicated in Somalia. After all, polio was eradicated in Somalia once before, in 2002, but came back. And, as the AP story notes, there's not really a whole lot of reliable data in Somalia, so no one really knows if polio has been eradicated (again). Which, of course, just makes News Team Leader Dick Thompson look even more silly. With data like that, you might think he'd take his free publicity and run.

*Disclosure: I was an Associated Press reporter for eight years. Two of those years were spent covering the United Nations and its various agencies full-time (and often giving them free publicity). Stuff like this sometimes made me want to feed 440 squirrels through an industrial-sized woodchipper.

Gorillas and the Myth

Like every other hack working in the gorilla-obsessed Africa journalism biz, I got in on the action after Congolese authorities arrested a senior national parks official on allegations that he may have been involved in a spate of gorilla killings last year.

Conservationists are saying this means that Congo is finally getting tough on the traders who are destroying Congo's forests to make charcoal. Upon reflection, I'm not so sure. Congo is so corrupt that any good deed ought to be viewed with skepticism. Another possibility is that he screwed with someone higher up the food chain.

Stock Market Madness

Tomorrow's IPO of East Africa's largest mobile-phone service provider, Safaricom, has triggered a gold-rush-style frenzy. Kenya's newspapers are full of ads -- 11 in today's Daily Nation -- for banks and other companies offering loans so people can afford to buy some Safaricom stock.

Even Safaricom is getting in on the action, as this ad shows. The small print reads "... in your future. Open a CDS account early with your preferred Stock Broker. To save time we encourage you to apply online... A CDS account enables you to trade your shares in the stock exchange. With changing technology a CDS account will enable you to buy shares in future IPO's with ease."

Gee, thanks, Safaricom!

The Daily Nation has a special section devoted to the IPO. In a slightly encouraging sign, the lead article's headline is: "Taking a loan to buy stocks not good idea."

British Airways Blues

One of the perks of blogging is that it allows you to rage about things that would otherwise fester and likely result in some sort of mental breakdown years down the line.

Today's example involves British Airways. We are interested in our month-old child accompanying us to the United States. How happy we were to find out that a newborn's ticket is 10 percent of the adult fare! That's just $75.

But wait! Actually, the ticket costs more than $600. Why? According to BA, there is a $520 surcharge that includes taxes, fuel fees and other assorted costs (clutch hair, shriek, pound forehead on computer keyboard).

It should be noted that the child weighs less than most carry-on luggage and will not actually be taking up a seat. She's smaller than an inflight meal, for God's sake. I could hollow out a small space between the binding of "The Scramble for Africa" and put her inside (lightbulb appears above head and begins to shine brightly).

Oddly, another airline, KLM offers a slightly better deal. There is no charge for a newborn to accompany an adult. Unfortunately, we had already purchased our tickets through BA.

For future reference. KLM = neato (despite the shredded squirrel incident). BA = bad.

Brief photographic interlude:

 

It is a tired, tired question, but why are airlines, and BA in particular, allowed to treat people like such crap? They're so polite on the phone but then they goose you as soon as you walk in the door. There's a snickering, sneering quality to the whole thing. "You have no choice! So, just for fun, we're going to add a little tax! Hahahaha! Eat that!"

Particularly galling is BA's high minded scheme allowing you to offset your carbon emissions on each flight. Jerks.

Where was Wangari?

To me, one of the most curious things about Kenya's political crisis was the almost complete absence of the country's Nobel Peace Prize winner, Wangari Maathai. She lost her seat in parliament and then played no significant role in finding any sort of solution to the crisis.

Sure, Maathai made several public statements and pleaded for calm, but no one ever really seemed to listen to her. You'd think a Nobel winner would have some moral authority, but she was never brought in to help -- which may suggest that the Kenyan view of her differs slightly from the international view of her.

Maathai's ineffectiveness raises questions for me about her worth as a Nobel recipient. After we arrived I was struck by the number of people who thought she hadn't deserved it. At the time, I dismissed those complaints as sexist sour grapes. We had met Maathai at a book signing in New York, and like everyone else, I was impressed. She even signed a book for us ("Zoe, Best of luck in Nairobi indeed! Peace always, Wangari"). Now, I'm not so sure.

News from today's paper adds to the impression. The Daily Nation reports that displaced people in Nakuru rejected her call for them to return to their homes. And then -- always a bad sign -- Maathai refers to herself in the third person. "If you do not listen to Wangari today, one day you will listen to somebody else." You can almost hear a "harumph" at the end.

(UPDATE: Lest I get too carried away with all the Wangari bashing, it's important to highlight what two commenters, Sijui and my esteemed colleague African Safari, point out below. Wangari Maathai's loss of her parliamentary seat and her subsequent absence from the political negotiations may have had less to do with her own failings than with the failings of the system in which she operates.)

Obama's Somali Friend

Hillary, watch out. The man responsible for dressing Barack Obama in traditional Somali garb is demanding an apology.

Kenyan Muslims had already protested the silly fervor surrounding the photo.

It need not be said that Obama's Kenyan ancestry plays a huge role in his popularity here. But it's interesting that for all Hillary's talk about being the one capable of handling that 3 a.m. phone call, people in the rest of the world generally seem more confident that Obama would be best for the job (though gender issues are a huge factor, too).

Kenya and tribe

Anyone who doubts that "tribe" or "ethnicity" is a fundamental element of Kenyan identity need only look in the classifieds section of the newspaper every Saturday.

There are the obvious ones:

"A 26-year-old Luhya lady, taking a degree though working with a three-year-old son, loving, caring and God-fearing, is looking for a God-fearing graduate/well educated, honest intelligent, working loving and non-alcoholic man residing in Nairobi. Must be a Luo, Luhya or a Kamba."

And the slightly more discrete ones (Central Province is the Kikuyu homeland, and by mentioning it, you at least reveal a little more about yourself):

"Mona, a 35-year-old lady from Central Province, is seriously looking for a single/widower Seventh Day Adventist man from any part of the world, with or without children, for a long-term relationship leading to marriage."

"I'm a 50-year-old man, retired but with a stable income from Central Kenya. I'm looking for a mature, lonely but not desperate lady for a serious relationship and/or companionship."

Kenyans and parenthood

Given all that's occurred in the last week, it was impossible to resist reading a big story that appeared in Kenya's "Daily Nation" newspaper on Wednesday about child-rearing. The story discussed an amendment to Kenya's employment act that now gives women three months maternity leave, rather than two. It also gives fathers two weeks of paternity leave.

I would have expected this idea to cause some consternation in Kenya. After all, I am the source of some amusement in our apartment building for doing things like hanging laundry and carrying a baby. Our guards would never say anything to me, but they've told Z that Kenyan men just don't do that.

The opposition's failure

A week has passed since Kenya's government and the opposition signed a power-sharing deal, and by all accounts, both sides are willing to make this thing work.

Now the opposition leader, Raila Odinga, bears that smug smile of a man who has gotten his. He must be relishing the new debate over where to put a prime minister's office. Surely he'll have a prime minister's residence, too. And a prime minister's vehicle convoy.

U.S. Embassy

Just visited the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi to get the documents that will be required to get a passport for the little one. A small fact that seems to me rather telling about the new attitude of the United States abroad: There is no public parking at the Embassy. A minor point, indeed, but why not? Surely the security risk of paving a small tract of land a few hundred yards away from the Embassy compound and allowing cars to park there would not be terribly high. In fact, most government institutions on the planet feature public parking lots, particularly those, like the U.S. Embassy, where hundreds of people come each day to do various kinds of business.