NO ECOLOGICAL SUSTAINABILITY WITH POLITICS APART

We have now reach the end of the marathon. Results still appending. People yet more perplex than ever before. Mother nature is crying and her children much more ignorant and greedy. We are at loggerheads with what the real playing cards should be and what they should actually entail.

We are now in our jubilation moods that science continue to be the leading discovery tool and that it is guided by her own laws and seconded or defended by profound legal tools. This is a strong amalgamation and a breakthrough. And with this, we will understand how our ecological footprints are under pressure. With jurisprudence as a strong allied now, we are hopeful that lawyers and legal gurus will not just defend cooperate interests against the commons-ecosystem.

When we put into focus in our academic discourses of what a horrific pattern we are taking towards our ecosystem,we always tend to ignore politics as a solution. We tend to forget the mechanism under which we are operating. Politics in this our desperate seek for solutions is second to nothing. And this must be made clear for it is the power of the problem and the solution.

Weathering into science and jurisprudence without involving politics will be definitely void in any of our golden concerns to drive back to nature and to regenerate our ecosystem. With a simple mathematics into any given equation, the problem must first be fully understand then a solution could be amicably found. However, knowing fully that we are loosing our ecosystem due to the malpractices that our own actions are causing, we must fist consult our conscience. Of course, most of the ecologically unfriendly behaviours are coming from the actions of multi-companies/multi-nationals and who directly dance to the wimps of political powers. These companies are powerful as they are because they are in harmony with the political engineers. We will not debate out their evil relationship since that is generally transparent. What we basically need here is a correlation of the two mentioned fields above,(science and jurisprudence)and politics or even economics. We cannot call for bread without the service provider and so we cannot call for a solution without involving the parties involve. Politics is the brain behind the ecological hiccoughs we continue to survive. We must involve the politicians to find a better ground.

Warmly and warmly we are striving to nowhere without calling for a convergence between nature and politics. Both areas are disciplined not necessarily distinct from each other. Since naturally we “cannot” stop destructive scientific inventions that are scrambling for our limited ecosystem, what we do have to see for is a political intervention. It is the force destroying our ecology and until it is alerted, we will continue to hallucinate for better a world.

While exploitative economic systems cover themselves with politics, science and jurisprudence continue to hustle for independent solutions. Why should they battle for acceptance? In approaching a global problem, a global solution most be solicited. Scientists and legal gurus are just as conscious as the politicians are, their deference is while it takes a decade to hear from an Italian legal scholar or an american physicist, it takes probably an hours to hear from a Gambian dictator.

When the best is not available, the available becomes the best! Though, politics and politicians might be seen as the dirty cards joker/s, it does not negate the fact that they are fundamental in this whole games of throne. Maneuvers anywhere are invaluable for any metamorphoses especially that which has to do with our immediate survival.

Many scholars, including activists in all fields of life have grown despondent over the seeming inability of the politicians to tackle head-on the fatal ecological crises we are facing today, yet, could we actually triumph without political cards? Crises as to which mechanism is sustainable, is totally a political procedure and directive even though science must give the breakthrough first. Many others are also gravely concerned about proceeding with “elections” under the auspices of science and jurisprudence about the heavily complex capitalist political structures giving way to our ecological disappearance, however, without no first look at politics, current circumstances, including many more to come will be heavily skewed.

Wonderful when we see grave problems, difficult they are to solve though. Some express doubts about the alacrity and/or capacity of the politicians/politics to take on the big issues in the public interest. These are all legitimate concerns and should be accommodated. Meanwhile, we must not fail to understand that it is a common problem and only a common solution could serve longer.

Well is quite commendable and glorious to see the concerns of scientists and legal gurus pondering for a solution into what might be a better world, it will be much more if they succeed in bringing to table politicians to debate about the matter. This way, it is not “an empathy ideological jihad or academic overexercise” but rather a common call for a common overdue solution. Many who profess serious concerns or doubts are great people, who continue to battle the system valiantly, while some watch from the sidelines. The politicians are akin to an enterprise just as the scientists or the legal gurus. “It is a game if you like”. Every scientist or legal guru is a shareholder entitled to political dividend. Every politician is also entitled to equal say on all matters of this common enterprise. As your property, your right to determine it’s fate is both sacred and sacrosanct. Admittedly there are so many issues with the politicians, but so are with the polity as well and so is it in science and jurisprudence. The politicians are nothing without us. So before playing politics in fields it is rather awkward, we better play it in its right parameters! We can make and unmake politics/politicians and so is our ecosystem but only when the apt mechanisms are given.

When politicians are found wanting, they call for legal defense. When they need new machines/instruments, scientists arrive to their aid, “but when the whole world need help we call for politicians because it is much more a wider scope for both science and jurisprudence.” Politics have the only power to enforce environmentally friendly mechanisms and the power to make it legal or otherwise.

We need a shift of paradigm from divergence to convergence on matters of public interest. It is alright to condemn the market politics that is extraordinarily polluting, exploitative and polluting, but, is better to solve it with those who are controlling this evil wheel.

When you cannot do without something, you are compelled to adapt to it. Trying to fix our ecology in accompany with politicians who are giving ways to all types of markets will be much more better than abandoning them as it will acknowledge their endeavors.

Well, it is clear now than ever before, that politics is ruling over all disciplines but it is difficult to understand, that we need political solutions into our must challenging maters like our ecological system. Notwithstanding, the politicians needs scientists and legal gurus, empathy and understanding most, your help to direct it, shape it and launch it as you desire is indispensable. It does not require your sympathy. It demands your partnership, but must not be permitted to ‘gallivant’ on its own devices — you ought to ensure that. You could only determine that if you take ownership of the process. You cannot do that if you distance yourself from them because you do not approve of their methods or unwillingness to apply certain methods. Do not defeat yourself. If you do not want them to proceed with elections, take the gauntlet in your own hands, making sure they do not. Whatever your priority may be, if the politicians did not respond to them, then its a direct reflection of your own failure too. A people get the type of leadership they mould. For instance, I have no qualms to being guided, criticized, investigated, debated upon, confronted, being put to task, and certainly I also want to be practically supported fully if you find me the material. Those who don’t, have the option not to support me, opt for others or requiring me to further prove my salt. This is basic. The politicians must be minted by you in such a way that your compass would be their sole navigational instrument. Get your fingers oiled in the world politics for ecological change. Your seat at the table is assured, assume it. Do not wait to be invited. The price that you pay for not getting practically involved is to get the results others decide for you. The choice is yours.

BETTER ECOLOGY WE ALL CALL FOR… . LONGER LIVE MOTHER NATURE

WHY IS POVERTY UNDER CULTIVATION IN THE GAMBIA?

Poverty is under cultivation in The Gambia! 

Anytime we imagine the impacts of poverty, we create more mental pictures of elevating a better status. When we see physically drain villagers on their ways to their farms in Badari, we debate if they could really lift the locally made hoes for an hour. If they cannot, that determines the durability of their hunger. When women and children in the villages of Bansang rush out of to the hospital for lack of medicines, we a forced to comprehend that their homes are hardly habitable. If young boys in the streets of Banjul are turned to be professional beggars, we never thought of the family he come from! When young boys and girls choose to undertake perilous journey outside The Gambia, do they not see any faith in their institutions? If the brain powers in the prisons are compared to those not, are we on anyway to combat poverty? If our institution hopes for more international aids rather than cultivate for their own prosperity we are perplex as to whether we will ever go without international aids. If a reach man in his comfort zone at Kololi got rubbed, is it because he has more than he needs? When young boys and girls are beaten for following tourists in the beautiful beaches of Senegambia, are they immoral or compelled by subconscious social constructions? If in any way I am confused in not catching the real courses of poverty in The Gambia, the probability is that, the problems are cultivated and more than I can see them.

We are all subjects of poverty. Our institutions are not only authoritarian because we have a higher percentage of ignorance but because the majority are poor. The poor nearly have little time to talk about complex political and economic structures that directly affects and defines them. They rather will prefer to hustle on mechanisms of making food available on the table. When a poor husband of three or four wives send his daughters to bear the burdens of early marriage, it is not enough to say he is religious or ignorant of the consequences thereof but rather, his conditions are largely dictated by poverty -he had to meet the basic needs of an extended family. This is not to claim that nuclear families are not facing the brunt poverty. They just do it in their own ways.   

Poor institutions are the root cause of what we will define in a word as poverty. Poverty as a condition of not meeting ones basic needs is largely overwhelming and undefeatable if we are to continue with the institutions we have today. Majority of The Gambians are born death in poverty and do largely nothing significant to change them. This is embedded in our house of ignorance which is the root cause of individual and collective poverty almost every Gambian is engulfed in today. When a father is face with the striking decision in which of his child to send to school or to seek medical care, is because he failed to calculate his own poor status. If the daily chores are considered to be feminine rather than shared, this state condemned women to the ultimatum of poverty. When I rush to the hospitals in any part of The Gambia, women and children dominate the queues for seemingly unavailable medicines while men endure with their poor health status at work.   

Bad polices are largely political and secondarily religious. When a poor school graduate cannot find anything to do, our political institutions are to blame but when the same individual goes on marrying four wives, his poor decision is largely influenced by his religious background. In a society where manhood is typically measured by how many wives or children one brings up, not only political institutions are decaying but also moral ones. If we are so dull to understand our own “bad” cultures and traditions but instead centralise our failures on the government alone, we will hardly triumph over poverty.

When white colour jobs are seen as the ultimatum of success, that shows how less innovative a population we are. The Gambian culture faces more loopholes than it presents for progress against poverty. We are friends with aids and enemies with our own makings. Rwanda and Ethiopia are doing handsomely well because they do keep themselves well and others only secondarily.      

Cultures and traditions are lenses of perception. They are spectrums of the reality. When they drive us apart, they should be abandoned and so as when they condemned us to poverty. Most of what I analysed from the poverty in The Gambia is culturally and traditionally link. When children are raised for the mere sake of carrying out matrimonial duties I cry in my mind as to whether we are not completely lost. 

Leadership from the informal to the formal sectors are mostly unfair. Merit is not given to whom it belongs to, rather it follows the background of who belongs to which group, party or which faith or idea you share. Favouritism and nepotism are corner stones that shamefully define The Gambian community. In fact, it is “institutionalised”. This is what one will broadly define as corruption. To me, Gambian corruption is inbuilt.  We are born in it, brought up in it and it unfortunately continue to accompany many to their untimely graves. The way a society normalise evil tells how poverty is deepen. When the poor only concentrate on having food on the table regardless to how it is gain, not only is morality lost, but there you can see the frustration imposed by poverty. When a person’s live is put on stake because of food, one might underestimate the scars of poverty. When poor voters sold their voices for a plate of rice, and laugh to satisfy the leaders one might understand that the pit of poverty is not as shallow as the corrupt statisticians will necessary show.

Leaders are not necessarily incapable to lead better, they are also capacitated by the poor majority to lead badly. Poverty is not actually the root cause of all evils happening in The Gambia but it is necessarily link to it. When the few powerful or rich class dictates a society because of the need to have food on the table, and the poor majority accepts that, that food itself becomes illegal.         

International migration laws complicate things for undocumented migrants

Africa » Gambia

Monday, January 11, 2016

More than 51 million people, worldwide, are forcedly displaced today as refugees, asylum seekers, or internally displaced persons.The majority come from Africa and Asia, according to Migration Policy Institute (MPI).

According to the 1951 Geneva Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, for any person to be recognised legally as a refugee, the person must be fleeing persecution on the basis of religion, race, political opinion, nationality, or membership in a particular social group, and must be outside the country of origin.

But this very definition characterised by these attributes are highly undefined and technically difficult for the majority of those fleeing for their lives to fulfil.They are either too complex to defend or broad to follow by those refugees who nearly cannot even remember where they are fleeing from.

From more than two years involvement both as a journalist and as a student of a legal clinic, I have found this strict international definition as biased and unfitting for the majority of those who seek for protection.

However, the contemporary drivers of displacement are complex and multi-layered, making protection based on a strict definition of persecution increasingly problematic and challenging to be implemented both on moral and legal grounds.

Many forced migrants now fall outside the recognised refugee and asylum apparatus.Much displacement today is driven by a combination of intrastate conflict, poor governance and political instability, environmental change, and resource scarcity.

These conditions, while falling outside traditionally defined persecution, leave individuals highly vulnerable to danger and uncertain of the future, compelling them to leave their homes in search of greater security.

In addition, today’s global displacement picture is further complicated by the continuous blurring of lines between voluntary and forced migration by world powers couple with the expansion of irregular migration.

The MPI report details the increasing mismatch between the legal and normative frameworks that define the existing protection regime and the contemporary patterns of forced displacement.

More than 33.3 million potential refugees, according to migration figures, remain within their own territories and mostly into the urban areas. 

LOSS OF IDENTITY. THE NORTH POOLS VS THE SOUTH POOLS.

At the college, when I was studying to be a qualified teacher, I was taught to be critical. However, this was a good side of my college experiences. What was bad was that my critique was allowed only when it was made towards my own civilization. My own culture. My beliefs. The “West” even to an average African undergraduate are "perfect or nearly so". But I would not have worried that much if this belief is individual or just primitive.  

Under a canopy to be at the same time a critical professional journalist, my scopes against invasion were growing. My understanding towards Africa and its interests to let her children not suffer stampedes. My auditor who was a politician always welcome my headlines. The only place where my critical views could be hard was here. The media he always tell me dictates the world. He was the first to tell me Africa cannot attain her own will and required global recognition until she ignores the western media. From here on, I was inspired to be a journalist. Through our local media at the college level, I have published many articles much of which were a critique towards the status quo. Bless with skills to put words into action, I was into caricaturing public figures. Was this the time I called public attention? Maybe yes. The college notice board was from then the best common gathering. The attention that was shown by public figures and ordinary individuals encouraged me more into what many was either scared of or failed to do –criticizing the status quo. The day I met the registrar and the principal of the school discussing while watching a caricature of themselves on a college noticeboard and asking who I was gave me further spirits. In this accidental early morning contact with them while replacing other articles at the noticeboard, I got interrogated and I was identified. They were not conservatives. They motivated me. They asked for clarifications before any future publications of articles. The public and student roar that could not let calm the administration made me to first experience intellectual dictatorship. From then on a censorship began.

Fist, for all freedoms to be granted academic freedoms must be given space. My college could not allow freedom of speech because it will risk her autonomy and let her naked. Pushing more articles under my name tantamount failure for me. Must I capitulate under this condition? No! I was ever courageous until the D-day. The day I was formally condemned and prevented from publishing on the College newspaper taught me a lot. I began to critically ask myself of what was abnormal. My moves which I could not help control made me a “black sheep” at the college. Nonetheless, believing ever in what I do, I could not be distracted. The presence of my parents again would have been useful here. Passing from them young, I could still remember. They used to tell me a lot of wisdom. “Do not give-up”, “What is Important is What Comes out of You and not your Attire”, “The Majority is not always right”, “Find home even in the jungle on the truth”, “Think before you leap”, to mention but a few guide me through and this is both culturally and religiously true for many Africans.

My links after to study Political Science and International Relationships were never accidental. My parent who were not very active in politics were rich in political thoughts. I could realize this when they mediate among other people. When they communicate, it was rich beyond home consumption. Even though, they could not see me read politics at this level and engage in it at national platforms, I am grateful I owe them this inspiration.

Having undergone a difficult atmosphere at the college, I was better prepared for the university. I had cultivated well. The bad wind that blew me, tossed  upon me some good wills. Experience to fight. Combating for justice was always my first slogan. Politics ever found a great space in my heart. I read mountains on African history and politics. I learned to emulate many freedom fighters in Africa. All of a sudden I was nicknamed a Pan-African. Whether this was true at that time was something I had to figure out. While not refusing the public claim, I was already one. My colleagues who used to pull my legs at the university were mostly politician themselves. At table conferences on the way out for Africa, I always take the lion share. I was more connected to research on “The African Condition” than to studying for marks. I think this was why I was ‘more stuffed’ than many of my colleagues at the centre table. Organizing symposiums on Africa became my way. One memorial event of such was the greatest debate ever organised in the Gambia College for years(2009-12) which I personally pioneered but happened to be a debater for the motion. The motion which was “African’s underdevelopment was internally induced” was defended by the HTC (Higher Teachers Certificate) students against the PTC(Primary Teachers Certificate) students. Some events passed across with less public attention but most were very successful.

My faculty that was said to be the most democratic at the university do not find funds with ease. In fact majority of those who study politics then had to sponsor themselves. Other department attracted government scholarships. Ours was considered an ‘opposition’. The government felt very reluctant to award even the most brilliant students who choose to study politics. Again academic freedom was ‘denied’. The means to an end. Every African government who wills to stay in power first ‘destroy oppositions’. They could only trespass smoothly in such a doing. Until today, many African universities do not have academic freedom.

My story that could tell a little about every African, is an interesting one. Africans embracing after losing wars against their colonial masters found themselves “more secured” in the constructed colonial borders than their ancestral ones. Africans are contended to be identified as Gambians, Nigerians, South Africans, Tanzanians, Malians etc. than sharing a common continent or in fact refusing a colonial flag or anthem. This will also lead into whether they are either French-speaking people or English speaking people throwing out their ancestral ethnic groups. This self-denial of one’s nature leads to cultural and traditional breakdowns if not a total extinctions to some forms. Refusing to be identified as one Africans, helps more to allowing western invasion. My own intelligence at school, college and at the university was measured by how fluent I am in English language. An African child is happier to be fluent in one or two colonial language than traditional ones. I still cannot count more than five African languages that are taught at a university level in Africa. Whether or not these languages are in fact recognized in their own parliaments and neighbouring countries is another great debate. African disunity was fundamentally link to themselves not using a common language. Very few West Africans could find comfort communicating to an East African without using a colonial language. Since traditional communications are polluted extensively by this foreign languages, African identity is threatened.

Language as a basic tool to identity, culture and dignity were first interrupted by western invasion into African territories. Even political campaigns are mostly carried in this foreign languages. Many African parliaments never discussed about introducing discussions in their own local languages. It is not unusual for an African parliamentarian or public figure to be quoted for grammatical errors. This has made the Golden Continent not receive comments from many parliamentarians who became silent not to be ridiculed the next day on the media. Political appointments are most often made on whether you are from a Western university or not. Africans are found to be both haters of the West and friends at the same time. This two contradictory futures are yet to be tabled and sadly not many African knew this. I have to be frank. In other to be marked well in exams, citations were preferred from Western authors than African writers even when it is about Africa. Africa was designed by the West to be consumed in inferiority and Africans sadly fuel this. Hardly could I find African literature in the selves of the library. African universities will rather spend a million on a single western author than promoting thousands of African writers at a lower cost. Was this the cause of why I cannot realize myself in a western university. I doubt not.

Many African religions found their roots outside her borders. Islam and Christianity has chased away forever many ancestral religions. Another cause for continuous unrest in the golden continent. Islam or Christianity as imperial instrument do not welcome traditional religions. They were rejected outright from dominance. Since the locals were found very fragile to defend themselves, their ideologies easily faded out with their religions. Islamic or Christian civilizations took dominance. Indigenous civilization and its origins were disregarded and considered barbaric. The indigenous Africans were divided within themselves into Christianity or Islam welcoming unrest. Most political instabilities were not known to Africa before these religions. The importations of these “superior” beliefs destroy African religious independence. The gods outside Africa were stronger and more powerful than the local gods. Since African beliefs were highly associated to which god one worship, the invaders trade first in this ideological war using a divide and rule system to conquer the locals. And due to this calamity, I could not see what my ancestors really had as their gods. This indispensable dignity was denied from me and many other Africans. The question what were our traditional religions is no more relevant to the majority of Africans. Religion goes around self-identification. Dignity in a nutshell. What I face today in a Western society is surely link to this. I cannot easily claim originality without a linkage to one or two western ideologies.

Even though Islam is fairly link not to be a western culture, was because Islam and Christianity were nearly always enemies in dominance for Africa. In many western societies who are aware of this historical background tends to discriminate Islamists. When I speak as a person, my ideologies are first link towards Islam and other things only secondarily. My African Christian friends experienced a different prejudice. Sharing one colour and cultural heritage but at divergences before a western fellow because he is convinced I am less “tolerant”. I was found to be a Muslim. While figuring out why my views are less accommodated in a western society, I first must allow their views to be more democratic, open and superior before an ear is given to my views.

Adaption or surrender? Inferiority or superiority? Documentation or refusal? Christianity, Islam or other western mind-sets? Dominance or total self-censorship?

While many of those questions found contrasting answers inside me, the reality cannot be refused. I am forced to eat a bread singing against my own dignity. I do not need freedom without floor nor do I need floor without liberty. I am either provided all the rights linked to a democratic society or denied all!

I used to read as an undergraduate, that many westerners are now sympathizers of Africa and that many regretted their past actions and in-actions. There is nothing more hoodwinking than that statement. This is a total falsification. Until now, what is evidential to most of all, is the West trying to occupy and plunder more African resources than ever before. Their refusal to share a common table over essential global decisions are self-evidently plenty to be mentioned herein. The West never on their drawing boards had a good uncorrupted intention towards Africa. After clearly reading from secondary schools to undergraduate level, and now accidentally under western wimps directly, I cannot ask them to fool me more. Mine (and ours) is a total ‘inferiority’ under western analysis.

Africans compelled away from their homes continue to be a self-denial to “real human status” in Africa. Stops, questions, mockery, bad winks continue to pave our way. Continuous stops by police on my way to school taught me that humanity holds no fair judgment. Even my close friends were attracted to me because I an African and not because we are equally homo sapiens. The first question every “white” man asked me is, why are you here? I can never remember asking another coloured person why he was in Africa. Was this because I thought Africa was for all? Was I more democratic and freedom conscious? At the sight of this question I feel really bad. Not because I do hate the question itself but the motive behind it. I can fully remember running to plug fresh mango fruits for other coloured people in Africa as a gift to them. I cannot forget other Africans giving their comfortable houses to other coloured people in the name of humanity. What do we African receive as a compensation for our goodness? Our hospitality?

I cannot imagine being refused human identity for the mere fact that I am African. Being in Europe, all I seemingly perpetuate fighting for is an identity…an African identity is lost…finding it seems a matter of wait-and-see.

My well-founded, excellent and original ideologies are denied until associated to a non-African thinker.

BORDERS ARE NOT THE SOLUTION

INTRODUCTION

            On March 27^th 2015, during the weekly celebration of the Biennale Democrazia,[1] the IUC organized an open activity at the International University College of Turin (IUC).[2] The aim of this activity was to think critically about one of the most provocative claims of migration studies, as explicitly made by the political theorist Joseph H. Carens: should borders be free?[3]

            In order to involve all the participants[4] in this very hard discussion, as part of the organizers, we built upon previous methods used by Prof. Ulrich and Maurizio Veglio in their classes at the clinical program of human rights and migration law at IUC. Fundamentally, these teaching methods have the following characteristics: after explaining the topic of the debate which was “No Borders”, they make the participant “choose sides” of their likes either for or against the motion on the controversial issue and they forge an active role on the debate about the political and moral dimension of law.

            In this paper, I aim to bring together the main outcomes positive and negative that came out of this event. I will also dwell on taking a meddle position here in other to allow the reader to make a choice. It will be left to the reader of this paper to support either sides. I will address in details how the activity was designed and how the participants of the “no borders event” reacted to our pedagogical experiment[5].

 Why the activity was designed?

The IUC as a university college believes in debating on topical issues and attempting a solution to them. According to the director of the whole programme and the university, the IUC partake in fair academic exercises that will bring about a positive societal change. The whole programme or event was in honour of the “Biennale  Democrazia”-a biennial festival of Torino. For this particular year, it was on many touching topical matters among which migration stands challenging and thus was deliberately chosen by the organizing committee.

The event was organised days before its actual happening to allow many people an opportunity to witness  and contribute their quotas to one of the outstanding political, social and economic problem of our society.

The organizers believed that dividing participants into groups was more effective and productive than the alternative. And so it was. The two professors then gives the floor to the groups to make their discussions and findings in one and half hour and bring forward their presentation.

Participants that were divided into two groups came from all part of the world. They were burdened to see economically, socially, politically  to name but a few within a scientific framework whether or not should we open borders. In short, whether borders makes sense anymore?

Rafael Zanatta and Alagie Jinkang led these groups(36 all together and each group 18) to discussions at different locations. They coach them and belongs to those respective groups thereof. They wrote the findings and assisted by three other participants from the groups presented their final outcomes.

The goals of the event were to discuss on migration as a natural phenomenon and a normal thing that should be seen in that perspective to be appropriately tackled. The organizers vehemently believed that until the people are well educated on the realities of migration (positive and negative) nothing successful will be achieved.

REASONING AND ARGUMENTS FOR THE “NO BORDERS”

In this debate, the supporters of the motion “Open Borders” who had sought to have win the debate deliberated well. They claimed borders to be meaningless especially when we look at the Mediterranean issue. They said these borders are unfair and unrealistic especially in our world today. These debaters who came from many cultures around the world claimed that borders are much of a political conscience, artificial and uneconomical.

“Many millions are invested in borders and proves not to have serve to decrease ‘illegal’ migration. In discussions of immigration and border security, attention often focuses on the 1,954-mile land border between the United States and Mexico. Yet the federal agencies involved in immigration enforcement have personnel and operations at other U.S. borders and at ports of entry in all 50 states. Over the past two decades, increased federal funding for border security has meant more facilities, equipment, and personnel devoted to this mission. Since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in 2003, funding for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the agency that manages the nation’s borders, has risen from $6.6 billion to $12.4 billion in fiscal 2014—in real terms, a 91 percent increase.[6] We should by now think where these monies are going because there are no improvements towards controlling ‘illegal’ migration in the Mediterranean sea, as well as in the south American borders[7]” they said.

“Thousands of lives are lost already in this venture[8]. Are we out to help these people or to push them to commit suicide by closing the borders before them? Border control methods as we have now are pushing migrants to take more illegal ways of entries than ever before. This is calling many people to their untimely graves mentioning the death toll of more than 3000 people only in this year in the Mediterranean[9] ” they lamented.

According to this group of debaters, who depended on the arguments of Joseph H. Caren on “OPEN BORDERS” claimed that not only are these border control methods ineffective but also inhumane. They claimed that immigrants using the Mediterranean are normal people with all rights as those constructing laws against them. These are people leaving their homelands mostly because they are compelled to do so. They have families, they have cultures and religions running from wars, famine, diseases, poverty, natural disasters, and other social conflicts caused by human dictators or other negative dictating factors that are beyond their control or at least their individual levels. The majority of those people will chose to leave home if there are possibilities. They held the cosmopolitan believe that as human beings we should not give up solidarity by closing borders and kill people.

The debaters took a historical glass on this condition and concluded it is morally unfair and unlawful to close our borders before these people.

“Many European boats were duck on the Asian and the African coasts in the times of slavery and colonialism for ‘exploitation’ but then it was never call illegal migration. These were times when Europeans were going in their mass numbers to exploit Africa and Asia, but boats are now “illegal” because it is Africans and Asian people using them to save their lives. It is now ‘illegal migration’ and was called ‘exploration’ when done by Europeans. Europe and America should be merciful to these people now and should be ready to at least compensate them what they have been robed off by accommodating them. They are poor because Europe and America have gone rich by plundering them. If borders are deliberately constructed before these people, it will further aggravate their losses and leads to more unsuccessful inhuman borders control methods” said the group for the motion defending themselves with the moral point of views given by Joseph H. Caren.

When they turn their focus to how we are culturally separated from each other, when we still claimed to have live in a liberal world or in a global village, these debaters said opening borders will closed this gap. People will be more integrated culturally and religiously and that will facilitate and motivate economic boom where there are no borders. And they further claim that the movement of people through the opening of borders will encourage economic development such as in creating employment opportunities since no one country will like to lose her population and thus will be forced to provide services to them. Closed borders will prevent social cohesion and encourage conflicts. Opening our borders according to this group of debaters, will annihilate all misconception about invasion since according to them multicultural societies are more democratic and open than closed societies giving examples of Canada and the U.S.

They further denied the claimed pronounced by many politicians on intellectual, religious and cultural conflicts that will be cause if borders are open, saying that opening our borders will create more positive integration. This group had it that open borders motivate language, religious, traditional, and educational evolutions that closed borders failed to do and that as intellectuals we should accept opening our borders and raise awareness on the issue in our societies. Sensitisation and orientation according to them will serve to solve this problem and save many lives since to them the root cause of the close border issue is the lack of education.

“Growth is worth it. Opening borders will replace the aging population and inspire progress. Since we have different age groups, other countries or regions are more fortunate than others, encouraging the movement of people will simply solve that problem” they continued.

In concluding their claims, these debaters said nothing will be more important than reciprocating. They said the trans-Atlantic relations will promote both south-north relationships and north-south relationships thereby denying a ‘south-north parasitism’ as argued by some authors. However, agreeing on intellectual basis to what they call as ‘expensive expenses’ involve in the Mediterranean affairs, these group recognised the lack of international support towards aiding entering points of these ‘refugees’ and call for international solidarity in burden sharing. They call on the EU member states to help Italy and Greece which are the main entering points.

A striking point among many was that, at the point of guns, floods, tsunamis, poverty to mentioned but a few, how did the developed world expect to receive a visa or a valid travelling document(s) from these people. Where is our sense of morality defining subjects like refugee to control people from escaping losing their lives? Why do we call it illegal when they have no other mode to saving their lives? Are they more criminals than we are in creating bad laws to kill those in need?

Open border still continue to be a great discourse yet sensitisation is lacking on it they concluded.

REASONING AND ARGUMENTS IN FAVOUR OF THE “NO BORDERS

The group of participants against the “no borders thesis” was formed by students with different backgrounds (e.g. law, economics and sociology) and from different countries (e.g. Russia, Italy, canada and China).. As an outcome they presented five arguments against the idea of opening the borders for all people all around the world.

They claimed that the “open borders” does not mean that migrants will have rights. Therefore, migrants can suffer with human rights protection, considering that countries will not necessarily harmonize their legal protections.

They claimed that opening of borders might imply that developing countries’ citizens will not have incentives to develop or improve their national political and economic systems, because people will try to move to Europe where “everything is ready” and oppression occur in a much lower level.

They argued that the opening of borders might increase intercultural conflict. The concrete examples mentioned by the group were the Islamic banking system in Russia and the Muslim veil prohibition in France.

These defenders claimed that the opening of borders generates a problem of public policy planning and allocation of resources in the country that receives the migrants. This would happen because governments would not have stable previsions and population data. This would create a problem for the “rationalization of government” in the sense that it would become difficult to anticipate public policy issues that are connected to the characteristics and needs of a determinate population.

They concluded claiming that the opening of borders creates a scenario for desperate use of natural resources (e.g. water) and stifle innovation and technological improvement in countries with bad conditions. The argument is twofold. First, the group claimed that, in a hypothetical scenario of really scarce water resources, people would massively move to countries like Brazil, in which rivers have abundant clean water. But this could also lead to an unsustainable use of resources that could lead to its end (something like a “tragedy of the commons”). Second, the group claimed that this enhanced mobility would make people less opened to challenges and hard situations in their own environment. This could lead to less social cohesion and very few incentives for technological solutions that demand joint commitment and discipline.[10]

CONCLUSION

This important debate that sparks more light on the matter that our society strives to provide a tangible solution to.  The moderators of the event and professors of the great event recapitulate the main points of the debaters and awarding praises to both groups for their eloquent and research and effort in making the event successful and memorial in the academic calendar of the IUC.

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[1] See http://biennaledemocrazia.it/

[2] IUC is a college created in 2008 that offers a master’s course of comparative law, economics and finance. It is focused on interdisciplinary and critical analysis of law. The IUC also offers a clinical program on human rights and migration law. For more info, see http://iuctorino.it/

[3] Carens’ argument is best synthesized in his latest book, which inspired our activity. Cf. Joseph H. Carens, The Ethics of Migration. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 225-254 (chapter “the case for open borders”). Researchers can find different debates around Carens’ work. See, e.g., Joseph H Carens, Aliens and Citizens: the case for open borders, The Review of Politics, v. 49, n. 02, p. 251-273, 1987; Jürgen Habermas, Straggles for Recognition in Constitutional States, European Journal of Philosophy, v. 1, n. 2, p. 128-155, 1993; Matteo Gianni, Multiculturalisme et Démocratie: quelques implications pour la théorie de la citoyenneté. Swiss Political Science Review, v. 1, n. 4, p. 1-38, 1995; Myron Weiner, The Global Migration Crisis: challenge to states and to human rights. MIT: Harper Collings College Publishers, 1995, p. 171-182; Daniel Loewe, Immigración y El Derecho de Gentes de John Rawls: argumentos a favor de un derecho a movimiento sin fronteras, Revista de Ciencia política, v. 27, n. 2, p. 23-48, 2007; Lea Ypi, Justice in Migration: A Closed Borders Utopia?, Journal of Political Philosophy, v. 16, n. 4, p. 391-418, 2008; Ricard Zapata-Barrero, Utopian Political Theory and Migration without Borders. International Journal of Social Science Studies, v. 1, n. 1, p. p173-183, 2013.

[4] Participants added to the students and professors of the IUC, include an activist and a law student from Egypt, lawyers from Italy, two human right lawyers from Sweden and one blogger and journalist from Germany, a politician from England plus others natives from the city of Torino all graced the ceremony and contributed to the debate. 

[5] I account here as the organizers was indispensable as it helped facilitate the whole event successfully. The two professors of the migration clinic plus Rafael Zanatta and the author of this paper all belongs to different schools of taught. However, this great balance from the side of the facilitators ease and enrich the whole discussion. The programme started at 10am in the morning at the IUC third floor and ended at 1pm. It was a three hours of contested debate.

[6] See The Pew Charitable Trusts  Research & Analysis  Immigration Enforcement Along U.S. Borders and at Ports of Entry

[7] Ibib Border Patrol does not operate at land ports of entry but does apprehend individuals who cross the border without authorization between these ports. It maintains and monitors border fencing, patrols land borders, operates land-based surveillance equipment, and conducts search and rescue missions, among other duties. The agency is organized into 20 sectors that cover all 50 states. (See Figure 2.) The number of Border Patrol agents has grown from 10,717 in fiscal 2003 to 21,391 in fiscal 2013—a 99 percent increase.⁷ It has been especially notable along the southwestern border. Still, the northern border also saw a gain in agents, from 569 in fiscal 2003⁸ to 2,212 in fiscal 2014.

[8] See http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/9/29/migrant-deaths-report.html Researchers collated previously scattered data on migrant deaths since 2000 and settled on a conservative tally of 40,000 victims worldwide — or about eight each day over the past 14 years. As steep as that estimate is, the IOM said it likely undershoots the actual number of irregular migrants who perish making arduous journeys across land and sea because so many governments make no attempt to keep track of their deaths.

[9] The results of IOM’s research found a concentration of migrant deaths in the Mediterranean Sea, about 75 percent, or 3,072 of the estimated deaths this year, compared with 700 in all of 2013. The Italian government has already reported nearly three times the number of undocumented migrants attempting to reach its soil than in 2013, or 112,000 people. Those figures, the IOM noted, reflect a “dramatic increase in the number of migrants trying to reach Europe.

[10] The group mentioned South Korea as a concrete example of how natural barriers (topography and few conditions for agriculture) created, along the past centuries, cultural conditions for more cohesion and cooperation for development.

Doctors without Borders denounces appalling condition of Italian camps

Africa » Gambia

Tuesday, January 05, 2016

Doctors without Borders (Mèdecines Sans Froniéres, MSF) has denounced the poor and undignified state of the emergency camp at the Italian border town of Pozzallo, the main entering point of African migrants into Italy.

The international humanitarian agency has disclosed their dissatisfaction towards the humanitarian services Italian authorities are offering to the immigrants at the emergency camp of Pozzallo in Sicily.

MSF has been working with the Italian government on the migration.On 30 December 2015, it reported that the rights of the migrants at the camp are not respected.

The agency has given its official report on the poor sanitary services, and the low dignity with which the migrants are treated.

Stefano di Carlo, head of MSF in Italy, said they have ceased all services they provide to the migrants in the region of Ragusa, one of the largest hosting places for migrants in Italy.

Mr Carlo said until the Italian authorities improve services at the camps to recognise the dignity of the migrants, MSF will not collaborate with them.

MSF works with more than 60 countries in the world offering priceless services for free to humanity including migrants.

Giovanni Colombo, a worker at the ports for migrants, said:“It is really sad and a shame on the Italian government to refuse to provide humanitarian services to the most vulnerable people.”

The news of MSF’s withdrawal from the camps due to poor services offered by the Italian authorities has been trending in Italian journals and the social media.

However, our correspondent in Italy said no concrete visible action has yet been taken by the Italian authorities as conditions at the camps are still appalling.

Humanity Against Humanity: refugees are threaten habitation in Turin

The refugees occupying the ex-Olympic village are continuously under attack by the indigenous people but today’s riot left many questions on the lives of immigrants and refugees not only in Via Giordano Bruno but also the whole of Turin.

On the 12th of June 2015 marks an important day in the lives of refugees and asylum seekers in Turin. More than a hundred people all believed to be inhabitants of the city, took to the streets against the occupation of the EX-MOI by the refugee majority of whom are believed to be from Africa running from war, hunger, persecution and other matters worth running for a better life. But is unfortunate that these people are not secured.

An abandoned village that is injected life by those running for there lives seems not to have done the proper thing. According to the last sitting of the local government of Turin, these people must be ejected out of this there locality believed to be their only and second home. In fact many others are borned and hold a strong and family relationship there. Many of these occupant unemployed, undocumented and frustrated are found illegal by the community of Torino.

Seeing dark colored children and pregnant women running for their lives sounds to be violent, however, to their dismay that was just the starting. Italy that serves as a doorway for many of this fugitives fail to welcome them. Human civilization has shown the dark side of its growth. Humanity against humanity. The north pool against the south pole. The game of violence against women and children has taken political and thus seen innocuous towards the refugees and immigrants.

If there is any sense in  human solidarity, the formal and executive proposal of ousting these homeless people should be reconsidered by the community of Torino. It is still touching that nearly a thousand people live like in the jungle. Neither the government of Italy nor the local community has shown any serious attention to the welfare of these people. Life to these people is matter of seeing the next day. If we are not definitely more animal than we think we are, these minority should not be left at the mercy of violence.

According to the art. 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. The right to life, to habitation and freedom are fundamental for human existence without difference.

While a number of the occupants complain about their missing ones due to an arbitrary arrest yesterday others hide under their pillows.

However, while we wish the precious lives of our lovely brothers and sisters are protected and save-guided, their situations are a matter of wait-and-see.