THIS COUNTRY AFRICA

(Issued as a work in progress)

The American Ambassador, Smith Hempstone went native acquiring a legendary taste for Nyama choma and Tusker. When he wasn’t engaging in the Kenyan pastime of barroom politicking he returned to his bunker on the corner of Moi and Haile Sellassie Avenues to receive delegations of anti-government elements. His wholehearted support for Kenya’s umpteenth liberation can never be forgotten; he came, he got drank on his ego and our booze, he wrote the book.

Always the book. Saving Africa is a labour of love; the book is your pension plan.

A few short years later that bunker was rocked by a huge explosion. Many Kenyans died that day. Far more Kenyans than Americans. But the Kenyans didn’t get eulogized by CNN; at least not in the way the American ‘martyrs’ were. The Kenyans were a mere body count. Yet another statistic streaming at the bottom of the page to the mundane dirge of football and NHL scores.

Then 9/11 happened and America forgot Nairobi. Well that is those of them who knew where it was.

9/11: an attack on the civilized by the so called uncivilized. A raison-d’etre for the tyranny of the self-declared civilized.

9/11: more than just a date, an event. A turning point. A veritable monument in the history of man; only rivaled by the death of Christ. Humanity has only known three eras: the BC, the Anno Domini and Post 9/11.

***

If George Bush could count this would be year 5, P-9/11 in Bushian Reckoning. But even though he didn’t decree that we adjust our calendars, he did adjust the way that we live. In this age, you cannot have a wedding party anywhere from Kabul to Ay-rack without clearance from the Global-Village Chief in Washington DC. And in war torn Somalia, they have learnt that not every low flying plane is on a food drop mission.

Last Christmas at a White House party George Bush overhead an aide state: in Somalia, they don’t know it Christmas. Being patently ignorant of all things African and unaware of that global euphemism for starvation Bush assumed that the only reason they wouldn’t know it was Christmas was because they were Muslims. So in true if they are not for our televangelicals they are against us fashion Bush called in his favourite Navy Pilot.

…and the hapless fishermen, women and children on hearing the sound of approaching aircraft ran into the village square with arms wide open to catch food rations. What they caught was a Christmas present a la George Bush. KABOOM! Shortly thereafter, CNN reported the killing, in Somalia, of an Al Qaeda commander.

The villagers in that remote outpost had never heard of Al Qaeda and George Bush; they never will.