Sir Bob Geldof returns to Ethiopia

With Christmas music on the airwaves many are again hearing the song "Do They Know It's Christmas." The song was the featured single on the album Band Aid, a project that Bob Geldof put together to raise funds for the Ethiopian famine of the mid 1980s.

The royalties from the music sales not only fed the Ethiopian people at the time of the famine. As the years have gone by and the sales of the music continued, the money has helped to build Ethiopia to make sure the country can withstand any future calamity.

Twenty Five years after the project, Bob Geldof returned to Ethiopia to see how the country has changed. The story from the UK's Independent is long and reads like a book at times. We encourage you to take a look at Paul Vallely's story, as our snippet (although longer than usual) does not do it justice.

Bob Geldof sat uncomfortably in a vast field of igneous rocks scattered apparently at random among the sere grass. But the rocks had been placed deliberately on the volcanic soil of the great plateau which had been lifted by magma from the earth’s mantle millions of years ago to form the mountains which are the roof of Africa. Each stone marked a communal grave in which between eight and 20 people were buried.

Tens of thousands of children, women and mainly elderly men were interred here in the fields of Korem when famine swept the desiccated Ethiopian highlands in 1984/5. Around a million are said to have died. A sizeable number of them perished here on the great plain where stood the camp of 300,000 people who had fled their homes, days and weeks walk away in the remote mountain fastness. They had come to Korem in the hope of finding food. But many found nothing except a place to sit in slow silent eye-glazed apathy as they waited to die. Twenty five years ago I had been in that terrible camp and watched the tardy response of the international community arrive too late to save so many individuals.

It was around the same time that Bob Geldof had first come to Korem a few weeks after he galvanised the pop world to make the Band Aid record which was to go on to become the biggest fundraising effort in human history. £100 million was given by the public for the stricken people of Africa.

Last week he returned. And in the very place where so many people had died, he came face-to-face for the first time with some of the survivors. “What I remember of the people was their immense dignity in the face of everything,” he told them.

They smiled wanly, and thanked him, but it was not how the victims remembered it. A quarter of a century on they told him how it really was.

“It is a challenge to the imagination,” said Gebremedhin Alemu, now aged 60, who had walked 100 kilometres with his wife and six children in search of food aid which took two years to materialise in adequate quantities. “We were reduced to a sub-human situation. When someone died, we went to bury him, and by the time we came back someone else had died.”

“People were buried like animals,” said Haile Melicot, now 50. “There was no system. No honour. People were just put into mass graves without anyone knowing who had been buried where. We were so weak that the aid agencies had to pay people to carry the bodies from the camp up here to the burial place.”

“Our respect for you, our brother in hard times, is boundless,” Gebremedhin told Geldof. “At a time when our dignity was questioned, you came and paid for people with energy to bury our dead.”

This was not what Geldof had expected. But the wave of gratitude, for whatever the perceived priorities of the one-time famine victims was overwhelming and humbling. “We have just come back to pay our respects,” the singer told the men.

“We want you to pass on our thanks to the brothers and sisters outside Ethiopia who helped us,” said Alana Abraham, 52, who had arrived at Korem with three brothers and was the only one of his family to survive.

“Is there anything else we could do for you?” asked Geldof. In reply the men told him of their lives since, of years of good harvests, of the economic booming of the little town, of plenty and prosperity. “One farmer even has a minibus,” said Alana Abraham in total awe.

But there was one thing they lacked, because it was not a priority for the government or within the development mandate of the aid agencies. They would like a fence around the mass grave areas – both the Christian and the Muslim one – to stop animals from trampling on the dignity of the dead.

Band Aid would build one, Geldof said, from the royalties which still, 25 years on, come trickling in. The joy of the survivors took him utterly by surprise. They shrieked their pleasure, hugged the Irishman and turned around to share the good news with the rest of the crowd.

“If we lose our sense of shared humanity,” said Geldof quietly, as he walked away to the church at the other side of the graveyard, “something withers inside us”

Controversial economist Moyo takes aim at rock stars

The economist Dambisya Moyo is making a lot of news lately to drum up sales for her latest book "Dead Aid". As a part of the book tour, the economist criticized rock stars who promote African Aid such as Bono and Bob Geldof.

Moyo is of the opinion that foreign aid breeds corruption. She claims that aid makes African leaders more accountable to the donors than to the African public.

From the Sydney Morning Herald, Damiem Murphy records Moyo's complaint to rock starts who try to drum up aid for Africa.

Finally somebody has shown the chutzpah to say "enough already" to those wealthy world-weary worrywarts Bono and Bob Geldof. Sydney-bound Dambisa Moyo, a Zambian-born economist, says the singers have glamorised aid to Africa to such an extent that it is damaging the very people it is supposed to help.

Moyo's book Dead Aid has received huge publicity in the US and Europe, not least because she is been bold enough to speak out against the beatific Bono and the sainted Sir Bob and such feel-good moments as the Live Aid concert of 1985.

Moyo, who is heading to Asia to promote her book, hopes to get to Sydney next month. "Celebrities have raised millions, but it only served to further corrupt governments with the leaders able to steal money without suffering any consequences for years while at the same time the people have been made further aid-dependent. Today Africa is far poorer than it was 40 years ago."

Moyo argues that aid has not only perpetuated African poverty, but also worsened it, and thinks it would be a good idea for all aid to be halted within five years. A firm believer in market forces, she thinks African countries should look towards other sources of finance as India and China did over the years when billions was being given to Africans.

"You get the corruption - historically, leaders have stolen the money without penalty - and you get the dependency, which kills entrepreneurship. You also disenfranchise African citizens, because the government is beholden to foreign donors and not accountable to its people."

Geldof to appear at global poverty summit

from Ireland On Line

Campaigning musicians Bob Geldof and Damien Rice will share a platform at a prestigious global conference in London this month.

This year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore is keynote speaker at the second annual Fortune Forum Summit which will also be attended by former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

Other guests from the entertainment world at the event on November 30 will include Hollywood actress Daryl Hannah.

The Fortune Forum, founded by philanthropist Renu Mehta, is a charity organisation that campaigns against global poverty, climate change and diseases in the developing world.

Former US president Bill Clinton addressed the inaugural event last year.

Geldof is well known for his work on the Live 8 campaign while Rice has raised awareness of humanitarian issues including the detention of Burma opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The rage of a crusader

from The Khaleej Times

VIJAY DANDIGE (Staff Reporter)

Sir Bob Geldof. The name may not mean much to the iPod generation. Actually, he was awarded an honorary K.B.E. - Knight of the Order of the British Empire – by the Queen, so he can’t be technically called Sir. But the media has been calling him Sir... and he’s been variously dubbed: pop star, actor, poet, open-plan politician, living saint. He started as the lead singer of the Boomtown Rats, an Irish ‘new wave’ band of the 1970s and 1980s.

In 1984, he shot to international prominence. Legend has it that he was watching a BBC television news report on famine-stricken Ethiopia, and was so moved by the plight of starving children that he decided to try and raise money using his contacts in pop music.

He rounded up 40 British pop musicians (including Sting, Bono and Paul McCartney) to record the tune "Do They Know It's Christmas" under the name Band Aid. The song was a tremendous hit and led to the largest televised concerts known as Live Aid, held in London and Philadelphia on 13 July 1985. In 2005 he helped organise another day of mega-concerts, called Live 8, urging leaders of the G8 nations to forgive African debt and increase aid to the continent. Live 8, with concerts in 10 cities around the world, was held on 2 July 2005. His name has been synonymous with Africa, charity and poverty eradication.

Sir Bob was in Dubai recently, his second visit, for a live show at the Irish Village that he gave on Friday, organised by the Transguard Group and the Irish Village. Last year, he made a guest appearance at a charity auction, helping raise Dh 500,000 for the children of the Rashid Paediatric Therapy Centre in Dubai.

Meeting the legendary Sir Bob is a pleasantly jarring experience. No pomposity. No grave airs. None of the dour demeanor of a recipient of Royal honours. He’s the absolute pinnacle of informality. In the hotel suit, multimillionaire Sir Bob is sitting on a sofa, his long legs crossed, wearing a broad-striped cotton shirt, jeans and scuffed brown shoes.

A silver chain dangles from the neck, and a thick mane of uncombed, unruly white-gray hair frame his face. A rocker’s look. He was 33 when millions saw him on TV during Live Aid, making a pitch for Ethiopia’s starving children. Today at 56, his 6’1” frame has hardly put on any flab. He’s lanky, sinewy, almost lean. And in his informal chat with City Times, he shows that he has lost none of his sting, nor his barb, nor his fluency, nor his colourful profane language.

You have done tremendous work in your life. What has kept you going?

If it wasn’t entirely working, I’d have stopped. No point in flogging dead horses as they say, you know. And you become even more boring than you actually are if you keep talking about something that isn’t moving. At the same time, the more you talk about it, the more you learn, the more people say, ‘why not.’ So, things do move…maybe too slow for where people want it go, because politics is incremental.

What’s happening with the political effort against poverty eradication?

The reality of the issue I deal with is that even if Britain said we are going to eradicate African poverty, that’s not going to happen. There isn’t enough money in the UK to do that. And besides, the Africans have to do it themselves. But at least we got a consensus. All the group, whether it’s European union or United States, or China and India now with their great poverty problems themselves, were beginning to focus on the fact that actually this is a function of globalisation and can be addressed in that fashion. And the Arab League who got a great responsibility in this, but they failed. Like most of the other states, they failed - to acknowledge their responsibility or to do anything. And that’s a scandal, you know.

Looking back, how much of your effort in Africa helped….and is there a solution to the poverty problem?

I don’t know…I don’t know…how much it helped. Of course, there’s a solution to it. Look at what’s happening in China. Four years ago, China was dependent on foreign aid. This year it will take one per cent of its people out of extreme poverty. One per cent! And of course, the bigger factor is that trade pulls people out of poverty because you need to suck people into the growing economy. You need to have them producing. The tragedy of poverty is that everyday you see people not eating, not going to school. You don’t want to see that happening to individuals.

The reality is that, one definition of poverty is that it denies people the right to exploit themselves, and their creativity and their intelligence. That’s what it does. And that’s what we use to produce and to grow economies. Grow an economy and you build hospitals and schools. Once you build them you can put people into that, and people then contribute to the overall wealth of the planet. Right now we exclude half the world from contributing to this. That makes no sense whatsoever, in the moral sense obviously, bit in the other sense, political sense, economic sense. So, I don’t understand why there isn’t more effort made towards this.

And there is small effort and we helped produce that effort. And if it didn’t work at some level, I’d stop. But it does work; it is just very incremental. And within the next 50 years of course, Africa will explode, you know, dynamically, economically…I mean. And it’s beginning to happen now, but not quick enough for the millions of people who have died this year, unnecessarily.

Long back, in explaining your motivation for taking up causes, you had once said, “I'm enraged by the world. I want to punch its lights out." Do you still have that emotion?

Yes, of course. I mean you know when I think about it…, as I said, the Arab League meeting, next week. You know half of the leaders will show up, as usual; they will make some grand pronouncements; there will be rivalries between the Libyans and….Gaddafi will do his usual stage stuff; the Saudis will get fed up… you know… it’s a joke.

Let’s take the Global Fund for AIDS, malaria and TB. This is the United Nations’ fund to deal with these three killers. You go to school, you are beginning to have a life, the next day a mosquito bites you and you are dead. Now, malaria is a great problem in Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Particularly in this region, it’s a very big problem. And this is the fund that everyone agreed to set up, except for the Americans who set up their own thing, kept it far, and which is very effective, as effective as the Global Fund.

So how much does the Middle East contribute to this great global fight against these three killers of children? I’ll tell you. Saudi Arabia gives $2.5 million a year, and Kuwait in 1993 I think made a one-off contribution of a million dollars. This, for one of the greatest killers in the region!

Now, Saudi Arabia and Yemen have a sort of responsibility to deal with this issue because it is their area. Instead, money from the world comes in to deal with malaria in Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Good. I don’t mind contributing to stopping kids dying of malaria in Saudi Arabia. But don’t you think, the Saudi government, one of the richest on the planet, can give a little more than a million pounds a year. A million pounds in a year! Don’t you think they should do that? What’s the problem with them? What is their problem? We’re trying to deal with sickness.

There’s a UN mandate, the Fast Track Education Initiative, where all children will go to school by 2015. Isn’t that an amazing thing…to put your kids into schools so that they learn, begin to know how to use their brains so that our economies in the region and everywhere else will grow? And what’s their contribution to this? Zero! Why can’t they be serious about this?

They’ll say, ‘Bugger off, Geldof…who are you to come into our country and say such things...” Well, you know…”Bugger off you, I’m me; if I can talk about it, why shouldn’t I? I don’t want to see children dying in the world. I don’t want to see them not being educated. As a result, I got a right to say these things.

Do you think music can contribute to solving problem of the world?

Music can contribute to getting people around, as I say it, the electronic heart of the television. People listen to music all over the world. And there’s a general agreement that there are great stars that everyone listens to. And so, if they’re going to be on TV, a lot of people will watch. And if you tell the people the reason you are doing this is for this, you then get a sentiment.

Of course, you can focus the political lobbies, but there’s a general sentiment that music is the best vehicle for doing it. But that doesn’t mean that musicians have a unique responsibility to do this. The only responsibility an artist has is to create good art. That’s it. They fail if they create bad art. Now if you’ve a brain that thinks I’m interested in this, then do it. If you’ve a brain that’s not interested in it at all, then don’t do it. There’s no moral compunction. Journalists should do more…. (He laughs)

What do you think of personal charity, and what’s your view of the charity of Bill Gates?

Personal charity is absolutely critical. Bill Gates’ charity is not more important that a reader reading this, putting a couple of dirhams into some charity box. In fact, it’s enjoined in Islam, as it’s in most religion because it is so important. And in countries where governments contribute little, personal charity is king.

But personal charity is political. Personal charity is like the butterfly…you know...the Chaos Theory…where a butterfly flaps its wings in a Brazilian rainforest and the next minute there’s a hurricane in Hamburg… Well, putting a dirham in a charity box is the political equivalent of the Chaos Theory because somewhere down the road you get political policy happening because somebody contributes. That means they want to do something; they want to help…

Bill Gates is very rich, so his charity is greater. But it’s a fantastic thing what Gates is going, and it is world changing, because the amount of money he has, it can change things hugely. He’s doing even more than most states because of his wealth. But Bill Gates is not doing any more than someone in the streets of Dubai deciding to put three dirhams in a collection box. Gates is not doing any more than that; it is just on a greater scale.

You have taken a stand on many issues, from Africa to debt relief for developing nations. Have you never felt strongly about British soldiers dying in Iraq?
Like everybody else, I’ve opinions about everything. But what I focus on talking about is poverty in Africa. I’ve done that for 24 years. If I start crapping all about everything else under the sun, I’m going to dissipate my focus and people will say, ‘Oh, he’s just a blurter.” So I just focus all the time on Africa. And whereas some situations are chronic, they’ll pass…in history. But this situation we cannot allow to pass where innocent children die every 30 seconds, just simply because they are poor. That’s the greatest moral scandal in the planet. It is an intellectual absurdity and morally repulsive.

'Dr Geldof' hails Brown and Blair over poverty

from The Yorkshire Today

Campaigner Bob Geldof lavished praise on Prime Minister Tony Blair and Chancellor Gordon Brown yesterday for their work in tackling world poverty.

He said that without their work things like cancelling Third World debt would never have been possible.

"Without question Blair and Brown have completely altered the possibility of this issue (world poverty) being celebrated today," said Geldof. "If there wasn't Blair and Brown I can't imagine where we would have gone.

"What is clear and I have spent enough downtime with them is that there is no question in my mind that they feel as personally impassioned on this.

"I guess because it is relatively easy to get your head around this as a solvable issue. Dealing with the NHS may not be."

Geldof was speaking before he received with the Chancellor an honorary degree from Newcastle University celebrating the work of the Make Poverty History campaign.
He said Mr Brown and Mr Blair were genuinely interested in the issue.

"It is like they get all 'studenty'," the former Boomtown Rat singer said.
Sir Bob said that in the 1980s it was not possible to change world policy on poverty and hunger because of the Cold War – but times had changed. "Brown has focused development as foreign policy and it has been elevated to the really highest part of British policy," he said.

The Chancellor and Sir Bob were among five people receiving honorary degrees from Newcastle University to mark the work of the Make Poverty History campaign.
They all received an honorary doctor of civil law degree from university chancellor Lord Patten.

They were honoured alongside political economist Susan George, former President of Tanzania Benjamin William Mkapa and Dr David Golding, of Make Poverty History North East.

The Chancellor was instrumental in getting the G8 countries to agree at Gleneagles in 2005 a debt relief package for the world's poorest countries.

As the politicians met in Scotland, Sir Bob and U2 front man Bono organised the Live8 concerts, which formed part of the Make Poverty History campaign.

Mr Brown said: "This is a very special day because
it is the celebration of the contribution of some the individuals I admire most in the world."

Honours for pair trying to wipe out poverty

IC Chronicle

By Amy Hunt And Nicola Juncar,

Political hot topics were debated on Tyneside as Chancellor Gordon Brown and campaigner Sir Bob Geldof paid a visit to the region.

The pair were invited to receive honorary degrees from Newcastle University for their work to wipe out poverty in developing countries.

And Mr Brown, seen as Prime Minister-in-waiting, officially launched Newcastle College's Trade Union Education Centre.

Mr Brown and Sir Bob took the opportunity to speak about issues close to their hearts, with the Irish former pop star taking part in a debate on world poverty issues with fellow debt relief campaigners and honorary graduates. They were political economist Susan George, former President of Tanzania Benjamin William Mkapa and Dr David Golding, development co-ordinator of Make Poverty History North East.

And the Chancellor addressed delegates at the College's Rye Hill Campus, saying he believes the North East is leading the way in forging an economy to rival huge powers like China.

"This facility has grown so much in such a short space of time," he said.

"Just a few years ago, this service came from one room and was used by a handful of people.

"From that, we now have this fantastic centre that more than 2,500 people use and it offers more than 1,000 courses.

"I know the difference trade union learning can make.

"At award presentations, I've seen the enthusiasm of learners who've finally achieved a skill that the old school system didn't give them credit for.

"I've seen the delight from the mums who've won their first award, after their school could not provide for them."

He added: "We need to be looking at the work going on in other countries to make sure we are still moving forward.

"Countries like China have a highly-skilled workforce, as well as four million graduates a year compared to 400,000 here.

"Centres like this one help to provide training for skills and everyone should be given the opportunity to reach their full potential.

"The North East has the highest number of trade union members in the country and I think we should be so proud of what is being achieved in this region."

Afterwards Mr Brown paid a visit to The Sage Gateshead, where he picked up his doctor of civil law from Newcastle University's chancellor, Lord Chris Patten, for his efforts in improving aid, trade and debt relief in the world's poorest countries.

Newcastle University took the unusual step of awarding an honorary degree to a serving politician because of the chancellor's contribution to eliminating third world debt.

Sir Bob and Mr Brown, who have worked together to find a solution to poverty in developing countries, met briefly with the other graduates before the ceremony.

And Sir Bob paid tribute to the work the Chancellor and Prime Minister have done on the issue.

He said: "Without question Brown and Blair have completely altered the possibility of addressing this issue.

"They feel as strongly about this as I do and they did force the world to change things at Gleneagles, because of us making a fuss.

"There are millions of people alive today because of what happened."

He also urged people in the North East to play their part in keeping pressure on governments to solve the problem of third world debt.

He said: "It seems absurd to me that people should have nothing in a world of surplus, that is something which still irritates me.

"Governments want to do nothing. It's our job to make them do something.

"I would urge you today to write to Gordon Brown and insist."

After the ceremony Mr Brown was whisked away to return to London, while the other graduates took part in a debate on world poverty, taking questions from the audience.

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Making the world listen

The Make Poverty History campaign was launched as Britain took on the presidency of the G8 in 2005, with the hope of catapulting debt relief to the top of the political agenda.

The campaign set out to raise public awareness of Third World debt and to put pressure on governments to take action to wipe this out.

It was a coalition of more than 400 charities, unions and faith groups ranging from Oxfam and Comic Relief to the Transport and General Workers Union.

Scores of famous faces promoted the campaign by wearing white wristbands bearing the Make Poverty History slogan, and a series of street protests and pop concerts around the world kept the issue in the news.

Sir Bob Geldof was instrumental in promoting the campaign and in keeping the pressure on politicians to stick to promises made at the G8 summit held in Gleneagles, Scotland.

Brown honoured for world poverty work

from The Guardian

The chancellor, Gordon Brown, and musician Bob Geldof are to be honoured for their work in tackling world poverty, it was announced today.

They are among five people receiving honorary degrees from Newcastle University on Monday to mark the work of the Make Poverty History campaign.

Mr Brown will receive an honorary doctor of civil law degree from the Tory politician Chris Patten, the university's chancellor.

Lord Patten, who was a member of the Conservative cabinet and then governor of Hong Kong, is also chancellor of Oxford where Mr Brown is still resented for his criticism over Laura Spence, a comprehensive school student rejected by Magdalen College.

He and Live8 organiser Mr Geldof will be honoured alongside political economist Susan George, former president of Tanzania Benjamin William Mkapa and David Golding, of Make Poverty History North East, in a ceremony at the Sage Gateshead music centre.

The chancellor was instrumental in getting the G8 countries to agree a debt relief package at Gleneagles in 2005 for some of the world's poorest countries.

As the politicians met in Scotland, Geldof and U2 front man, Bono, organised the Live8 concerts, which formed part of the Make Poverty History campaign.

Professor Christopher Edwards, vice-chancellor of Newcastle University, said: "The university is delighted that Gordon Brown has accepted our invitation to receive an honorary degree.

"Ordinarily, the university does not award honorary degrees to serving politicians, but senate has made an exception in this case because of the enormous personal contribution Gordon Brown has made to the campaign designed to increase international aid and eliminate the debt owed by the world's poorest nations."

The news of Mr Brown's honorary degree comes on the day it emerged that he intends to make free universal education one of the two pillars of Labour's foreign policy if he becomes prime minister later this year - the other pillar being climate change.

Writing in the Guardian, he said "education could be the greatest gift" the rich world could give to the poorest countries.