‘Terrorism committed against Africans is not terrorism’

By Tanonoka Joseph Whande

Tragedy on African soil is hardly considered disastrous enough to warrant the attention of the world. Whenever Africa has a disaster, a smaller disaster in Europe leapfrogs the continent.

Africa, even when it’s under extreme stress, does not complain much but, rather, finds ways to survive when its elders run errant.

This is more so true in Zimbabwe where funerals are more of celebrations of a life than mourning it. Zimbabweans sing, joke and dance at funerals because they recognize the person gone more than his or her absence.

Africans do not weep for their dead, as such, but appreciate and celebrate the contribution of their deceased.

After all, the dead have played their part and are out of harm’s way. Unless, of course, if their exit door leads in the opposite direction of where St. Peters is waiting instead of where 71 virgins are writhing in erotic, patient expectancy to glorify and pleasure a man “wanted dead or alive” in this our world…a man who has blown himself up into the heavens yonder and who has killed innocent men, women and children in the mistaken belief that he was earning martyrdom.

They are told that such martyrs are rewarded with a bevy of virgins in the life yonder.

This has to be the most ridiculous nonsense anyone, let alone a worldwide religion, could ever believe.

Judging by the way He discourages it, God, our Creator, is not very keen on our sexuality. The prohibition, subtle but irritatingly persistent, makes me wonder why God would dare anyone of us to kill each other in His name so as for us to be rewarded with virgins who, last time I checked, didn’t make any difference in this world.

Apart from that, these internationally and cosmologically pimped virgins are other people’s daughters. Anyone who believes that God, the God we know and pray to, would snatch young women from their parents, actually abusing His own creations by forcing them to please murderers, is absolutely out of their minds.

If those morons who claim to murder in God’s name did not find women down here, where God created more of them than men, they sure as hell won’t find them in the afterlife.

Enough of that nonsense.

We have heard about embarrassing outsiders who flock to funerals and pathetically weep more dramatically than those who have lost their kin.

For one reason or other, they desperately want to endear themselves well with the bereaving family.

In this past week, I was reminded about these fakes by none other than the American media and their response to last week’s tragedy in Paris, France.

In January 2010, the little island of Haiti was hit by a devastating earthquake that left more than 220, 000 people dead.

Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere, is only as far from the USA as Harare is from Gaborone, Botswana (681 miles or 1064Km) and remains an embarrassment to the USA, Mexico and Canada.

The guilt is evident.

Haiti’s distress “unleashed an unprecedented flood of humanitarian aid — $13.5 billion in donations and pledges”.

As expected, there was an avalanche of American media, particularly CNN, anchoring their daily news programmes from many spots around Haiti. They were, of course, mindful of how the world’s attention was all focused on the poor island.

After milking the island of all the international attention it was receiving, the media packed up and left.

The Haitians still do not know where the billions went – something the American media, or any other media, is not quite concerned to pursue.

But we did not see the same enthusiasm from the American media when Ebola ravaged Sierra Leone and Liberia.

The coverage was extensive, yes, only because it involved American and European missionaries and aid workers.

There was intense coverage in the US because the virus had set foot on American and European soil so, in the end, it wasn’t so much about the millions of Africans at risk but about a handful of Americans and Europeans who had been exposed to the virus.

Fair enough; to each his own.

For a long time now, Nigeria has been in the midst of a crisis fermented by the Islamist group Boko Haram. The damage, to both human lives and infrastructure, is a matter of public record.

The most widely reported case was the abduction of hundreds of young school girls. The American media played a courtesy role and was complemented by Michelle Obama who trumpeted the “Bring back our girls” slogan before everybody turned their backs to worry about other things of more importance to them.

Nigeria’s neighbours, Cameroon and Niger, continue to suffer deaths of their citizens from the same group, making it a regional threat.

On this, Africa continues to receive token coverage from the media and lip service from American and European governments.

Compare that to the cranked up spotlight shone on Malala, the Pakistani girl who survived an attempt on her life by the Taliban and went on to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Over the years, Kenya has seen its share of some of the most gruesome attacks on its citizens, especially Christians. From hotels, beaches, supermarkets and highways, Kenya was repeatedly hit by Al-Shabaab Islamists and there was token coverage of the crisis.

On September 21, 2013 Al-Shabaab gunmen attacked and killed 67 people, leaving 175 people injured at a mall in Nairobi.

Imagine were this in Europe.

The first week of January 2015 saw Islamists attack the offices of the French satirical weekly newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, in Paris.

Eleven killed; eleven injured.

Less than a week later, over two million people from all over the world, including 40 presidents and prime ministers, descended on Paris for “a rally of national unity”.

Six of Africa’s presidents (from former French colonies of Mali, Niger, Togo, Benin, Gabon and Senegal) attended the rally in Paris.

Four months later, on April 2 this year, Islamists killed 147 people, mostly students, at Garissa University College in north-east Kenya.

There were no rallies attended by people from all over the world.

No foreign leaders flew in; no African presidents made a presence.

There were condemnations from Washington, London, Paris and other world capitals. Just words, no symbols like we witnessed after the eleven Charlie Hebdo killings.

A few days ago, Islamists seized a hotel in Mali and, at last count, 21 people from all corners of the globe had been killed. The item is not even showing on internet news websites, except for “one American killed in a hotel siege in Mali…”

Apparently, terrorism committed against Africans is not terrorism, unless if there is, among them, an American or European.

Boko Haram killed two thousand people in Nigeria a few days before the Charlie Hebdo attack, no one marched; no world leaders gathered – not even African presidents.

It has been more than a week now since the terror attacks in Paris. CNN has almost all its news anchors still there, still “reporting” on the attacks, so do many other American networks, not to mention dozens of reporters from individual newspapers and news websites in the US, Britain and Europe.

They are not even embarrassed that they are getting in the way of the French people who lost their loved ones.

American media is ruthless. They are oblivious to the fact that they are now a disturbance to those in mourning.

But beyond all this, I see that monster called racism and I dare them deny it.