Dr Susanna's guide to MJoTA sites
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Beautiful last day of April. I enjoyed April. So many things let go, and new things started. That is the nature of Spring.
Last week I read in an English news-site that girls who went to all girls' schools are fearless, and believe we can do anything, because we were not being constantly knocked down by males who were trying to prove themselves. Yes. That is right. I always believed I could do anything I tried. And here it is, the end of April, I am sitting in my beautiful new office, writing the film-script and business plan for a story about the air war in Nigeria in 1969-1970. I definitely believed, and still believe, that a good idea is unstoppable as long as behind it is a pure heart and focus.
I believe that Sierra Leone can conduct a fair and peaceful election and that the crippling bipartisanship can be overturned.
I believe that Sierra Leoneans can rise above Red Party and Green Party politics and accusations of wrong-doing (and the wrong-doing in both parties, acknowledged by them, will make your head spin). I believe in Sierra Leone. I believe that the new government will reverse the selling of the country to anyone waving dollars or pounds - good God, 2 casinos in Freetown hiring Sierra Leoneans at sub-poverty wages, WHAT WERE YOU THINKING MR PRESIDENT!!
I believe Sierra Leone can become the jewel of Africa, because the land is fertile, and once Sierra Leoneans believe it themselves, it will happen.
The first step is a constitutional convention. Throw out the old constitution that favors thievery at the top, because the infrastructure is not in place to funnel funds into schools, hospitals, universities, post offices, libraries.
I believe Sierra Leone can do this. Because I know Sierra Leoneans. I know Arthur Chinsman-Williams, who meets with other agricultural engineers every Friday to discuss agricultural development, and what they are growing, and what they are building. Click here for stories on him and other Sierra Leonans living in Sierra Leone.
I know many food Sierra Leoneans living outside Sierra Leone. In New York, I know Zain Harrell-Sesay and Rugie Bahr, who put their hearts and souls into the Sierra Leonean Nurses Associations. I know Julia Hawa Turay, who is the president of Tegloma New York, and Alfred Jamiru, who is the national president of Tegloma. I know they all call for a united Sierra Leone. Of course I know Zainab Wai, I went to Sierra Leone with her and she took me into her family. Uncle Sidique Wai gave the keynote address on Saturday at the party put on by the United Sierra Leonean Organizations, whose president is the always pleasant nurse and former army officer, Ahmed Kargbo.
These Sierra Leoneans are awesome. They will all do everything they can to ensure free and peaceful elections. Now what is needed is for every Sierra Leonean to follow their lead.
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Another beautiful April Saturday in South Jersey! Below is a picture from my desk, as I look left. Below that is a picture from my desk as I look right. Calm and beautiful and green, and no-one looking for me, shooting at me, bombing me. Not so in France in 1918, when the greatest pilot of all times was downed and killed by an Australian soldier shooting from the ground. You can watch the fictionalized version of the story of the Red Baron, scholar, sportsman, bellman, aviator, ace, click here. Last night I watched the fictionalized version of the Battle of Britain, made in England in 1969. You can watch that too, click here. All April I have been immersed in the stories of pilots and wars, after spending March immersed in the stories of Nigerians during their bloody civil war that spawned the rise and fall of the Republic of Biafra, click here. What I have learned has surprised me. I am a pacifist, as are a majority of women of my generation whose parents served Britain and her allies in the Second World War, and whose grandparents served Britain and her allies in the First World War. When I was of age to join the military, that was the last thing I was going to do, the war in Vietnam was in full swing and my generation did not want to be annihilated because of the unintelligent decisions of old men with gout. I have learned that the air war in the First World War was pretty much fought like the ground war; pilots attacking each other rather than strategically sneaking off and bombing military and economic targets. The air war in the Second World War was much smarter; and the end of the war resulted from massive bombing of Germany and of Japan. I have learned that pilots are not like the rest of us. They think in 3 dimensions. They are part of the stars and the universe, and don't see their death as huge tragedies. Brave souls. Pilots deserve a better world. Simple as that.
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Happy Birthday Mama Salone! I have created a page on the Red Baron, because he is certainly the most famous fighter pilot ever, and a great movie was made about him. You can watch teh entire movie on MJoTAtalks.org! Really! To go to the page for teh Red Baron and watch the movie, click here.
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Sudan. Hearing reports that the already deteriorated security is far worse. That airplanes from the region that calls itself Sudan are bombing the country that declared itself the sovereign state of Southern Sudan. Learning more and more about the fluidity of borders. Borders are created and respected by financial and emotional interests. Emotions are the wild card. I ask myself daily, why is the genocide in Sudan being allowed to continue? Who is paying for the planes and the bombs? Who is paying for the soldiers supplies and ammunition?
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Sierra Leone. We have the 51st anniversary of the independence of Sierra Leone tomorrow, and I will be celebrating with Sierra Leonean communities. And this morning I woke to headlines that Charles Taylor has been convicted of aiding and abetting the Liberian rebels who set up shop in eastern Sierra Leone and marched with Sierra Leonean rebels into Freetown, causing havoc.
Charles Taylor was the leader of rebels from 1989, and president of Liberia from 1997 to 2003. During this time Liberia went through waves of civil war that was described in the movie Pray the Devil Back to Hell, click here,
For stories on the Nobel Prizes awarded to Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, click here, to Liberian social worker Leymah Gbowee, click here
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Wow. After Germany invaded Poland by land, sea and air in 1939, the northern European countries Norway, Sweden, Denmark declared themselves neutral (Finland was already being pummeled by Russia in the Winter War).
On April 9, 1940, Germany started its occupation of Norway and Denmark. Only Sweden was allowed to remain neutral. Count Carl von Rosen was Swedish, and the nephew of Luftwaffe commander Hermann Goering. European policies have long been decided by marriage. This story gets more interesting by the minute.
Read about Count Carl von Rosen, click here. Watch a video of Count von Rosen in Gabon, preparing the Biafran Babies for bombing raids with Squadron Leader August Biafra, click here. Read the kwenu.com version of the Biafra babies, click here. Read the Biafran Swedish pilot version, click here.
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World Malaria Day
MJoTA.org malaria resources: click here.
From WHO.int: "In
2010, about 3.3 billion people - almost half of the world's population - were
at risk of malaria. Every year, this leads to about 216 million malaria cases
and an estimated 655 000 deaths. People living in the poorest countries are the
most vulnerable. World
Malaria Day - which was instituted by the World Health Assembly at its 60th
session in May 2007 - is a day for recognizing the global effort to provide
effective control of malaria."
The first issue of Medical Journal of Therapeutics Africa focused on malaria. Since then we have occasionally published articles, these can be accessed on www.mjota.org/malaria.html, click here.
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From the United States National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, statement by BF Hall MD, PhD and AS Fauci MD
"On World Malaria Day, we stand at a critical juncture in our
efforts to control a global scourge. This year’s theme—Sustain Gains,
Save Lives: Invest in Malaria—stresses the crucial role of continued
investment of resources to maintain hard-won gains. Lives have indeed
been saved. According to World Health Organization (WHO) estimates,
annual deaths from malaria decreased from roughly 985,000 in 2000 to
approximately 655,000 in 2010. Improvements were noted in all regions
that WHO monitors, and, since 2007, four formerly malaria-endemic
countries—the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Turkmenistan and
Armenia—have been declared malaria-free. However, about half of the
world’s population is at risk of contracting malaria, and the disease
continues to exact an unacceptably high toll, especially among very
young children and pregnant women.
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID),
part of the National Institutes of Health, is committed to maintaining
the research momentum needed to eradicate this mosquito-borne parasitic
disease. Our investments include programs designed to strengthen
research capacity in those countries most affected by malaria. For
example, through the 2010 International Centers of Excellence for Malaria Research initiative,
NIAID has established 10 research centers in malaria-endemic regions
around the world. NIAID also provides access for U.S. and international
scientists to multiple research resources as well as training for new
investigators. Additionally, NIAID supports the Global Malaria Action Plan (GMAP) , an international framework for coordinated action designed to control, eliminate and eradicate malaria.
NIAID’s research portfolio includes an array of projects aimed at
better understanding the disease process and finding new and improved
ways to diagnose and treat people with malaria, control the mosquitoes
that spread it, and prevent malaria altogether through vaccination.
Earlier this month, an international team including NIAID-funded
investigators reported that resistance to artemisinin—a frontline
malaria drug—has spread from Cambodia to the border of Thailand and
Burma, underscoring the importance of continued efforts to detect
artemisinin resistance and slow its spread. Other grantees have
identified a major region of the malaria parasite genome associated with
artemisinin resistance, raising the possibility that scientists will
have a new way to monitor the spread of drug resistance in the field.
The spread of artemisinin-resistant malaria highlights the need for
new and improved malaria drugs. Two recently completed drug screening
projects offer some hope. In one project, NIH scientists screened nearly
3,000 chemicals, and found 32 that were highly effective at killing numerous genetically diverse malaria parasite strains.
Another screening project identified a new class of compounds that
inhibits parasites in both the blood stage and in the liver. The
research could lead to the development of malaria drugs that attack the
parasite at multiple stages in its lifecycle, which would hamper the parasite’s ability to develop drug resistance.
Work continues on a novel anti-malaria compound, NITD609, first described by NIAID-supported researchers in 2010.
A mid-stage clinical trial to assess NITD609’s activity in people began
in Thailand this year. Research on NITD609 is a continuing
collaboration among NIH-funded scientists, the pharmaceutical company
Novartis, and the nonprofit Medicines for Malaria Venture.
Because the risk of childhood malaria is related to exposure before
birth to the malaria parasite through infected mothers, NIAID scientists
recently initiated a program on malaria disease development in pregnant
women and young children that could yield new preventive measures and
treatments for these most vulnerable groups.
The mosquitoes that spread malaria are also the target of
NIAID-supported science. In 2011, researchers identified bacteria that
render mosquitoes resistant to malaria parasites.
Further study is needed, but it may one day be possible to break the
cycle of infection by reducing the mosquito’s ability to transmit
malaria parasites to people.
A vaccine to prevent malaria has been frustratingly elusive, and so initial positive results reported last year by the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals and their collaborators
came as welcome news. In a late-stage clinical trial in approximately
6,000 African children, the candidate vaccine, known as RTS,S, reduced
malaria infections by roughly half. Currently, eight other vaccine
candidates are being tested in NIAID-supported clinical trials. One of
them uses live, weakened malaria parasites delivered intravenously to
prompt an immune response against malaria. An early-stage clinical trial of this vaccine candidate began at NIH earlier this year.
Whether the remarkable returns on investment in malaria control will
continue in years ahead depends on our willingness to commit needed
financial and intellectual resources to the daunting challenges that
remain. On World Malaria Day, we join with our global partners in
affirming that commitment and rededicating ourselves to the efforts to
defeat malaria worldwide."
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The story below is interesting for many reasons.
One is that Sadick Abubakar was chosen to receive the diaries and bring them back to Ghana.
Sadick is a good friend of MJoTA.org, and has selflessly come to my aid spectacularly in more than one occasion. When I think about his aid, it has always been in connection with police connections through my Sierra Leonean Uncle Siddique Wai who is the African community's liaison with the New York Police Department.
Sadick describes himself online this "I am a product of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and
Technology, Founder and ex Programs Chairperson of the West African
Chapter of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), Current National
Youth Coordinator of United African Congress Inc. Member of the
Metropolitan New York Society of Automotive Engineers."
He is a young man, a graduate in mechanical engineering from the university in Kumasi, Ghana, which bears the name of Kwame Nkrumah.
I have never been to Ghana, yet I feel that I have. A good country to be the first to kick out the British. A good country to be the first visited by the world's first African president of a non-African country.
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Kwame Nkrumah’s 40-year-old stolen diary returning to Ghana
Source:
citifmonline.com Wed, 11 April, 2012
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A diary belonging to Ghana’s first
President, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, which dates from the mid-1960s, and has
been at the centre of a long legal battle between an American
businessman and an African scholar from Kenya, will soon be returning
home.
An American, New York businessman Robert Shulman is battling Vincent
Mbirika, a Kenyan-born, New York-based scholar and amateur investigator,
who doggedly tracked down and succeeded in retrieving the diary from
the American who had it in his possession for many years.
The Kenyan, who describes himself as Africa’s “Indiana Jones” has
convinced the Eastern District Court of Pennsylvania in the US that the
diary rightly belongs to Ghana and to the Nkrumah family and should be
returned to Africa.
The judge ruled that the diary, which offers a rare look into the
public and personal life of the great Pan-Africanist, was among the
possessions of Dr Nkrumah when he died in Romania in 1972. The judge has
ordered that the diary should be handed over to the Ghanaian ambassador
in Washington for onward conveyance to Ghana.
Mbirika invited Sadick Abubakar, a Ghanaian living in Washington and a
director of the United African Congress, a US advocacy group for
African expatriates, to help in contacting Nkrumah’s relatives back home
to provide the necessary backings.
The diary has travelled around the world over the last 40 years from
Ghana to Guinea to Romania and America. Shulman has been keeping the
diary for many years now and with the latest ruling Ghanaians will now
have a feel of what their founding father wrote about his career.
The diary entries start from the mid-1960s, when the Osagyefo was
president, and run to the late 1960s when he had been deposed and was
living in exile in Guinea as a guest of President Sekou Toure.
One entry, from 1966, the year Nkrumah was ousted by the military,
mentions the purchase of military equipment from the Soviet Union. In
another entry, from 1968, when Nkrumah was living in Guinea, the former
president instructs his wife, Fathia, to “take care” of their children –
Gamal Gorkeh, Sekou, and Samia (who is now an MP in Ghana and
chairperson of the Convention People’s Party founded by her father).
Possibly the most compelling entry in the diary (which is about the
size of a small paperback and has a bookmark with the colours of Ghana’s
flag stuffed in its pages), is one where Nkrumah, who had been Ghana’s
head of state since independence from Britain in 1957, reflects on the
abrupt end of his presidency. It makes clear that Nkrumah was worried
about Ghana and Africa’s future. He wrote: “Things will not go well for
Ghana” and said his “vision” for Ghana would now be “lost”.
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April plays tricks on us. I am
sure scheduling Easter, Passover and tax day in April was because we are
all useless while the dogwood and azaleas are blooming in colors that
are inside our bodies, on our lips, in our mouths, in the white of our
eyes, teeth and bones. A monumental trick was played on me on
April 25, 1986, in Freiburg-im-Breisgau in the south-western tip of
Germany, where some years later, a wrong turn put me in France instead
of Switzerland. I had been in Germany since early March, when
the snows were 3 feet deep and the mountains of the Black Forest that
ringed Freiburg seemed to me to be there to oppress, ring me in. April
25 was Anzac Day, and I brought bottles of sekt to the liver laboratory
in the Faculty of Inner Medicine where I had come to learn how the liver
gives up its secrets. In the evening I walked through the ancient
city to the Zille Stube, a cheerful bar which I had visited previously
and could be counted on having an obliging pianoplayer. As I
drank a beer I looked around the room. Two men were sitting at a table
next to the pianoplayer, watching me, and talking. I knew they were
talking about me, so I walked over to the pianoplayer and asked him to
play "Walzing Mathilda" in honor of the fallen Australian and New
Zealand soldiers, the Anzacs. He did, the blond man laughed, and invited
me to sit with him. And that, my youngest son Allister and
my daughter Patience, is how I met your father, Ernst
Lothar Blossfeld Dipl Physik. For story and audio on Lothar's mother
Ruth, click here. Seems
like April played tricks on Rudolf Okonkwo. He wrote today in Sahara
Reporters a beautiful love letter to his love, his partner, the mother
of his children, his wife, his nurturer, his muse, saying that he has been in heaven for 10 years, because on this day in 2002, Edna said yes to him. I have met Rudolf a
few times in New York: he is an exceedingly bright journalist of the
take-no-prisoners type. Until today, I did not know he had a soft side. The
side I know is uncompromising, demanding professional behavior of
everyone. On the day that General Ojukwu died, he published an interview
he had with him in 2001. I have republished his interview, and edited a
lovely picture he had taken of himself with General Ojukwu, click here. What
is amazing is that Rudolf looks younger today than he did 10 years ago
when this picture was made. Tricks of April. God bless Rudolf and his
family. To read the interview, click here.
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A lovely April day in South Jersey, the cherry blossoms have mostly fallen in a carpet on my front lawn, the azaleas are blooming all over my front and back garden; pink, red, white. And the pink and white dogwood blossoms are framing my back yard roses. Ah, to be in South Jersey now that April is here! Indeed.
I always love talking about starting and growing businesses, because that involves clever ideas and numbers; and I live and breathe both.
Last night I drove myself to the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Business School and hung out with a dozen other entrepreneurs who have mostly started businesses, but this time we want to do it right, which is hopefully what we will learn at Wharton Small Business Development Center.
I am looking for financing for the MJoTA.org media empire, and also for making the movie based on the life of the former Chief Pilot of a defunct country plus a defunct national airline, Captain Okpe.
For a story about the Wharton Small Business Development Center, click here.
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May 19-20, come to Philadelphia.
Saturday, May 19, Black Veterans Museum known as
the Aces Museum at 5901 Germantown Avenue, for Memorial Day
celebration.
Sunday May 20, from 10 am until 8pm, AfricCom Philly (which is the Coalition of African Organizations in Philadelphia) has its annual
health fair at 4901 Kingsessing Ave, where you get health care free.
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I posted a 48-minute documentary about an international simulated air battle over the United States in 2004. The rationale for this battle was that most fighter pilots die in the first 10 missions. And if they survive the first 10, then they have massively increased the odds of surviving until they are shot down, until they have pilot error, until the airplane collapses, or, if they are one of the very few, until the war ends. Being a fighter pilot is a dangerous career. Watch the movie on the Bombing for Biafra page, click here.
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Mr Ribadu, ah, I became
his most devoted fan when Nigerian Democratic
Liberty Forum invited him, Sahara Reporters and and Okey Ndibe to Queens, New York, for a
memorial for Advocate Gani Fawehinmi.
Mr Ribadu is an honest man. James Ibori is a convicted felon. He tried
to bribe Mr Ribadu with 15 million US dollars, in a sack, to not
investigate his thieving. Mr Ribadu put the money in a police account in
Central Bank, as evidence of a bribe being offered, and kept on his investigation. This sort of honesty was not tolerated in the Yar Adua administration (hey, he even lied about when he died), and Mr Ribadu was forced out of his job as head of Nigeria's anti-corruption
group.
Mr Ribadu ran for president in 2011. He carried a single Nigerian state, Osun State.
And Mr Ibori was Governor of Delta State. Before that, he was a science and economics graduate and was accused of theft when he worked in the UK. The UK has not been known for its tolerance of Africans, I don't know if the accusations were well-founded. However, he was a crook in Nigeria. Mr Ribadu said so and has a sackful of American dollars to prove it. And I believe Mr Ribadu,
I have known a secret for some years, a secret that has drawn me to Nigeria and Nigerians like a moth to a flame. If you are going to be a really good person, you had better be Nigerian, because Nigerians make better good people than anyone else. Like Mr Ribadu.
And if you are going to be a crook, you had better be Nigerian. Nigerians make the best crooks in the world. Like ex-Governor Ibori.
Enjoy the video from the BBC.
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The story I have added below is about a bomber pilot who was dropping
bombs on Germany in 1944 when he had to bale out, and was captured with
another pilot when he landed. Two pilots did not survive, and in old age
he obsessively tracked down the crash site and looked for the bodies.
He found one, and had him buried.
I am preparing the movie script
and financial plan of The Last Flight, and I spent 2 months talking
with the bomber pilot who described his life in the book. I have read a
mountain of books on the Nigerian-Biafran War, I flew to Lagos as the
guest of the bomber pilot, I have been finding movies about bomber
pilots, I have been finding out about post traumatic stress syndrome.
I
don't seem to be any closer on determining why Captain Okpe was able to
fly more than 500 missions during the Biafran War, frequently as the
only pilot (as time went on, he reported directly to the Biafran
President, General Ojukwu), and how he was able to move on to an
extremely successful career as a commercial pilot: he flew 747s, huge
planes, everywhere, until he moved on to a career as a civil accident
investigator in 2001, and in 2005, moved into the private sector.
The
following story gives insight into the bonds that fighter pilots have.
And makes me weep hot tears that the airport Ulli was razed by the
Nigerian government. So many pilots and civilians were buried there.
The RAF bomber pilot who single-handedly recovered the body of the co-pilot and comrade he lost on Berlin raid 60 years ago Published in http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ Written by
Andrew Levy, 13 October 2008
Hero: Former Pilot Officer Reg Wilson who found the body of a former comrade killed when their plane was shot down 60 years ago.
Crammed
together in their unwieldy aircraft and utterly dependent on one
another, the bomber crews of the Second World War forged friendships
that often only death could break.
Which is why Pilot
Officer Reg Wilson never forgot the night more than 60 years ago when he
lost 2 friends in the night skies over Germany.
As he
entered his old age - the memories of his youth perhaps more powerful
than ever - Mr Wilson began a quest to find their remains.
Yesterday
he told how at last he had succeeded in finding one of those friends,
flight engineer Sergeant John Bremner, and finally laying him to rest.
Sergeant Bremner will be buried with full honours at the Heerstrasse War Cemetery in Berlin next Thursday.
'It's only right that John is honoured,' said Mr Wilson, of Chigwell, Essex.
'Thousands of good men, like John, lost their lives. It must not be forgotten. It will be an emotional, but happy, day.'
Sergeant Bremner died aged 21 on the night of January 20, 1944, when 800 aircraft raided the German capital.
Among the 27 aircraft lost was Halifax LW337 from 102 Squadron based at RAF Pocklington near York.
The aircraft - nicknamed Old Flo by her 8-man crew - was heading for home when she was hit by anti-aircraft fire.
Long search: Pilot Officer Wilson and Sergeant John Bremner
Woodland hunt: Reg with wife Barbara in the
woods in Koepenick, Germany, where the plane was discovered 60 years
after it went down.
Another survivor from Old Flo, rear-gunner Sergeant John Bushell, 84, said: 'It burst into flames from wing tip to wing tip.
'I was thrown out after hitting my head on a gun. I came to in free-fall and managed to pull the chute.'
Both
he and pilot Mr Wilson, along with bomber aimer Flying Officer Laurie
Underwood, now 86, and pilot Flying Officer George Griffiths survived
and became prisoners of war.
A Halifax bomber like the one shot down as it approached Berlin 60 years ago.
The
bodies of second pilot Sergeant Kenneth Stanbridge and wireless
operator Pilot Officer Eric Church were buried after the war.
But Sergeant Bremner and gunner Warrant Officer Charles Dupueis were never found.
Mr
Wilson, 85, a former management consultant, began his search for
answers in 2005 when he travelled to Berlin with his daughter, Janet
Hughes, 46, who speaks fluent German.
They met local historians
and witnesses and the next year, he returned and found the wreckage with
the help of a team of volunteers using metal detectors.
War heroes: George 'Gag' Griffiths and Sergeant Kenneth Stanbridge
Reg shows off some of the debris from the crashed Halifax bomber.
Final
confirmation that the remains belonged to Sergeant Bremner, of Elswich,
Northumberland, arrived after a DNA sample was taken from his sister
Marjorie, 89, who will also attend his burial.
Mr Underwood, of Wetherby, West Yorkshire, is too ill to go and Mr Griffiths died in 1998.
A
Royal British Legion spokesman said Mr Wilson's quest 'spoke of the
searing and life-long impact of service in the armed services. People
don't put away their war memories easily.'
Survivors: Sergeant John Bushell and Flying Officer Laurie Underwood.
Some 55,500 young men of Bomber Command died during the war.
Last
night Mr Bushell, of Oakley, Bedfordshire, added: 'My abiding memory of
John is singing our hearts out together at a piano bar in York. He was a
war hero who gave his life for his country.'
Former RAF Rear Gunner John Bushell holding his Prisoner Of War ID Card which he took from the prison office when he was freed.
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Apr 16, 2012
Lovely, gorgeous spring day, and Brother Saleem invited his Independent New Jersey Council on Africa Diaspora to Rowan University for a tour and lunch with the African Studies staff.
Rowan University is in the middle of New Jersey, in Glassboro, but you would never find it unless you made a determined effort. Not near any major highways, not a flight path for planes, or even geese.
However, Rowan University is a magical institution because a man named Mr Rowan in 1985 said, damn it, the middle of nowhere needs a fine engineering school, and wrote a check of $100million (my eyes can't focus after $1million) and the trustees of this small community teachers college immediately changed the name of the college from Glassboro State College to Rowan University.
Why did Mr Rowan do it? I remember reading the newspaper about the gift in 1992, he really did not have a good answer. He was not an alumnus, either was his wife. I concluded that the man behind the richest gift to any learning institution ever was quite simply a good man.
And who was Mr Rowan? He was born in 1923, his father was a physician, and he trained as a bomber pilot for the United States Air force in World War II. He is reported saying that he was disappointed that the war ended before he could bomb anything.
understand,After that he had a successful career as an electrical engineer. And from what I understand, 20 years after making magic happen in South Jersey, he is still living a quite life. Dive bomber tactics. Fly in, drop $100 million, fly away. A good man indeed.
In the years since, I had only been to Rowan University once, around 2003, when Patience was a small child singing in a community choir, ChildrenSong. Then I remember driving past a lot of fields to get to the auditorium, which was magnificent.
Today, my goodness, driving down Mullica Hill Road and I had the feeling I was in a great university. A huge medical school is opening in the fall, and the engineering school has been outstanding since the 1980s, when the trustees started using Mr Rowan's gift for how it was intended.
When we arrived, Brother Saleem sat us down for coffee and chats, and of course I whipped out a copy of The Last Flight to tell them about the heroic missions Captain August Okpe flew in the Biafran War. We walked past streams and students camped out for awareness of the need for higher education, and students participating in a fair to become organ donors alive (hey, you have 2 kidneys! and you can always spare blood marrow and a piece of your live), or dead (take everything, I am out of here).
And I chatted with Joe about post traumatic stress disorder, asking him if he has ever come any bomber pilots in his work as a PTSD counselor. He said not, but the way to exorcise demons is to simulate old battles to process what happened. He told me this could be done by writing a book, which is what Captain August Okpe did. Or giving a small college that no-one ever heard of $100million.
We had a lovely lunch discussing how the African Diaspora can work with the African Studies department. The faculty are talking about integrating African Studies with the new medical school. I told them about Aces Museum in Philadelphia for Black Veterans, and about the Coalition of African Communities in Philadelphia, and going to Nigeria in March to research the Nigerian-Biafran Air War, and of course, Bedford Stuyvesant Volunteer Ambulance Association.
Ah. I just love that Mr Rowan was a bomber pilot.
So much to do to educate South Jersey about the importance of Africa in all our lives. God bless Brother Saleem, and the Rowan University African Studies faculty for trying.
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Apr 15, 2012Ah. Danny Boy. For our fallen heroes.
Click here for stories on the fallen heroes of the Biafran War.
My mother was Irish, born in Ireland Patience Uprichard, when Ireland was one. During her lifetime many heroes fell: in Ireland and all over the world. Click here for more on my mother. Click here for the un bearably sad story of my grandfather's cousins.
My grandfather, Hubert Cecil Dodgson. The young British soldier in the picture on the left, he survived the First World War, and died in his bed 44 years later.
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Apr 13, 2012Talking about HIV/AIDS and therapies. I remember Pax Herbals in Edo State had patients living with HIV more than 10 years. They were treating them with something, and it wasn't antiretroviral drugs.
However, if you have HIV, get the antiretroviral drugs unless you can get the monks at Pax Herbals to take care of you. I remember in Kenya in 2008 all antiretroviral drugs were free, thanks to the Clinton Foundation, God bless them indeed.
Click here to get a page of articles in MJoTA on traditional therapies, http://www.mjota.org/traditionaltherapies.html
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Ganymede
Movies LLP is a New Jersey Limited Liability Partnership between the
publisher of MJoTA.org, Susanna J Dodgson, and Augustine De Hems Okpe,
the former Chief Pilot of the defunct nation of Biafra and the former
Chief Pilot of the defunct international airline Nigeria Airways.
The
movie script to the book by Captain Okpe is under production by Dr
Dodgson and Omenihu Amachi, whose paintings are all of Biafra and can be
seen on MjOTA.org, click here http://www.mjota.org/ganymedemoviesllp.html
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Apr 12, 2012
The man from Gilead Pharmaceutical Company was at the African Caribbean Business Council Forum today, giving his talk about the threat and treatment of HIV/AIDS.
He is Mr Amadou Diagne, Senior Medical Science Liaison, Gilead Sciences, Inc
I have now heard him 4 times, in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and seen him at other African community events. He is passionate about preventing HIV/AIDS in African Diaspora communities, and he told me today he has had feedback from several who had not known they were infected, but sought testing and treatment after listening to him.
Ah, as I told him, and also Philadelphia's wonderful Ghanaian foot doctor and educator (he started schools in Accra and Philadelphia, and inducts Ghanaian Queens and Kings), Dr Samuel Quartey: if only drug companies selling high blood pressure medicines and diabetes medicines would sponsor health professionals to aggressively seek out African communities to warn against cardiovascular disease. Which is going to kill more adults in African communities than ever HIV/AIDS will.
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Apr 7, 2012
If you want to be my friend, if you want me to work with you in your business, if you want to work with me in my business, if you want to have interaction with me at all, I have a single requirement.
That you be kind to me. That is the message of Easter. Be kind.
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How can you be kind? If you are my children, come help me move some junk, even better, take it away!
if you are everyone else, and this works for my children too: tell me the truth.
It is not ok to lie to me because I am a woman. It is not ok to lie to me because my ancestors were pale Western Europeans.
It is not ok to lie to me ever. Not ever.
I will forgive you when I discover you have lied. But it will change my relationship with you forever. Because I will know that you have lied to me once, and I will not believe you ever again.
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And I wish you kindness this Easter, this Passover. Be kind, and always believe in miracles.
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Gosh, here I am in South Jersey enjoying gorgeous sunshine and pink and white blooming trees and opera, and in Malawi a revolution of a kind I like. Mrs Joyce Banda is President of Malawi. A woman.
Here is an article I found that was published in Forbes Magazine originally and then republished in a Malawian newsite, www.faceofmalawi.com.
By the way, don't make a complete idiot of yourself and mix up Mali with Malawi. Different countries.
Forbes Africa Magazine |The 20 most powerful women in Africa, no3: Joyce Banda
on Oct 11, 2011
The first issue of Forbes Africa magazine which went on sale October
1st, highlights the 20 most powerful women on the continent, ranging
from positions in politics, telecoms, finance, mining and aeronautics.
In order from one – 10, they are:
1.Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, president of Liberia;
2.Ngozi Okonjo-Iweal, minister of finance in Nigeria;
3.Joyce Banda, vice-president of Malawi;
4.Gill Marcus, governor of the Reserve Bank of South Africa;
5.Joyce Mujuru, vice-president of Zimbabwe;
6.Diezani Allison-Madueke, minister of petroleum resources in Nigeria;
7.Isabel Dos Santos, an Angolan businesswoman
8.Maria Ramos, CEO of Absa bank;
9.Mamphele Ramphele, former director of the World Bank
10.Linah Mohohlo, governor of the Bank of Botswana.
Positions 11 – 20 went to:
11. Nicky-Newton King, deputy CEO of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange;
12.Wangari Mathaai, the first African women to receive a Nobel Peace Prize(R.l.P)
13.Siza Mzimela, CEO of South African Airways
14.Nonkululeko Nyembezi Heita, CEO of Arcelor Mittal in South Africa
15.Graça Machel, chancellor of the University of Cape Town
16.Pinky Moholi, CEO of Telkom
17.Hynd Bouhia, former director of the Casablanca Stock Exchange
18.Bridgette Radebe, chairperson of Mmakau Mining
19.Irene Charnley, non-executive director of the MTN group
20.Monhla Hlahla, CEO of Airports Company South Africa.
The honour to Wangari Mathaai, Kenyan environmentalist
and political
activist, comes posthumously as she died in Nairobi at age 71 on 25
September 2011 after a long battle with cancer.
She was the first East African women to receive a doctorate
in
anatomy and the first environmentalist to receive a Nobel
Peace Prize
for her initiatives in promoting sustainable development, democracy and
peace
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Apr 6, 2012
I found the story below on Reuters. It is a about, Azawad, a new nation that has declared itself separate from Mali
African Union has refused to recognize the new state. Today is the 18th anniversary of the start of the Rwanda genocide. And I am up to my eyeballs as I am trying to get the pieces together to make a movie on the genocide of 3 million Biafrans before and after Biafra declared itself independent from Nigeria, so I am concerned.
I don't know whether the new country is a good or bad idea, but I do know that secession is a desperate act by peoples who are convinced they will continue to be murdered, genocided, if they do not break away. I ask you to read and consider and follow the money. The pockets of African, French, British, Chinese, and US billionaires are often the main consideration of who recognizes which authority.
Until proven otherwise, I support Azawad! God bless the citizens, and keep them safe this Good Friday.
Mali rebels declare independent 'Azawad'
By Bate Felix
BAMAKO (Reuters) - Mali's
desert Tuaregs proclaimed independence for what they call the state of
Azawad on Friday, a secession bid immediately rejected by the African
Union, neighbouring Algeria and the former colonial power France.
The nomadic people has nurtured the dream of a Saharan homeland
since Mali's independence in 1960 and has come closer than ever to
attaining it by seizing key northern towns this week while the capital
Bamako was distracted by a coup.
Neighbours fear the creation of a new state could encourage
separatists elsewhere, while the presence within the rebellion of
Islamists with ties to al Qaeda has sparked wider fears of the emergence
of a new rogue state threatening global security.
"The Executive Committee of the MNLA calls on the entire
international community to immediately recognise, in a spirit of justice
and peace, the independent state of Azawad," Billal Ag Acherif,
secretary-general of the Tuareg-led MNLA rebel group MNLA said on its
www.mnlamov.net home page.
The statement listed decades of Tuareg grievances over their
treatment by governments dominated by black southerners in the distant
capital Bamako. It said the group recognised all borders with
neighbouring states and pledged to create a democratic state based on
the principles of the United Nations charter.
It was datelined in the town of Gao, which along with the ancient
trading post of Timbuktu and other northern towns fell to rebels in a
matter of 72 hours this week as soldiers in Mali's army either defected
to the rebellion or fled.
Reuters Television pictures from Gao taken hours before the
overnight website declaration showed jubilant MNLA soldiers celebrating
in the local governor's residence in Gao, decked with an MNLA flag and
re-christened "The Palace of Azawad".
The territory claimed as Azawad roughly corresponds to the three
northern regions of Mali which together make up a zone larger than
France. The term is thought to have linguistic links to the dried up
Azawagh tributary of the giant Niger river which snakes through West
Africa from Guinea to Nigeria.
The 54-state African Union rejected the independence call as
"null and of no value whatsoever", urging the rest of the world to shun
the secession bid. Algerian Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia said his
country could never accept a break-up of its neighbour.
France also rejected the declaration and Defence Minister Gerard
Longuet said it was now up to Mali's neighbours to see whether
negotiations were possible with the MNLA - a move that could target an
autonomy deal short of full independence.
"What we want from ECOWAS is for them to work out a real
long-term solution for Mali," Longuet told reporters in Paris of the
15-member West African regional bloc.
WHO'S IN CONTROL?
Initial reactions in Bamako were of dismay.
"This is really a bad joke," Toure Alassane, a 42-year-old native
of Timbuktu said at gathering of about 200 northerners protesting
against the move in the capital Bamako.
"It will never work. You don't just declare independence when
people don't have food to eat and nothing is functioning in the north,"
he said. Widespread food shortages caused by last year's rain failure
have been aggravated by the insecurity.
In the northern town of Kidal, one resident said control was not
in the hands of the MNLA but of the Ansar Dine Islamist group which
seeks to impose sharia law across Mali.
"Nothing goes without their say," the resident said.
The advance capitalised on confusion in Bamako after a March 22
coup by mid-ranking officers whose main goal had been to beef up efforts
to quash the rebellion.
In a sign of growing foreign concern, Britain said it was
temporarily closing its embassy and pulling embassy staff from the
country, "given the unstable and unpredictable situation in Mali and the
continuing lack of constitutional rule".
Mali's worried neighbours see the handover of power back to
civilians as a precondition for moves to help stabilise the country and
have imposed economic and diplomatic sanctions aimed at forcing junta
leader Captain Amadou Sanogo to step down.
On Thursday a team of mediators expressed hope Sanogo would soon
announce steps that would allow them to drop the sanctions on Africa's
third largest gold miner, which include the closure of borders and the
suspension of its account at the regional central bank. There was no
immediate response from the junta.
ECOWAS military planners are preparing the mandate for a force of
up to 3,000 soldiers which could be deployed in Mali with the dual aim
of securing the return to constitutional order and halting any further
rebel advance.
France's Longuet put MNLA's fighting strength at a maximum 3,000
forces and estimated that was 10 times the combined head count of Ansar
Dine. He reaffirmed that France could provide an ECOWAS force with
logistical help including transport.
© Thomson Reuters 2012 All rights reserved
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Apr 3, 2012
If you really want things done well, and done fast, prayer. Prayer is much more efficient and consumes less energy.
Case in point. I have been painfully trying to install engineered bamboo floors in my office and kitchen since October, which means I have drawn out the agony for 6 months, ugh. I had a contractor who I gave money to finish the job when I was in Nigeria, he happily pocketed the money and told me it took him 60 hours to apply 3 coats of paint to the walls and lay down a subfloor.
Prayer. Along comes the cavalry, a second contractor is happily laying down the floors, and decided he needed to replace 2 boards in the kitchen that are 4 x 8 feet and half-inch thick. I drive a 1996 Lumina.
Which is a neat dark green car, great for nipping up to New York and down to DC and across to Philly, which is where I would have been today to collect boxes of "The Last Flight" ($50 each plus shipping, beautifully printed and bound hard back, contact me if you want to buy a copy or 10).
I bought the 2 sheets, lay down a towel on my roof, and started tying pieces of rope.
The first angel appeared and helped me put the wood on top of the ropes on the roof.
The second angel appeared in a huge red van, a large middle aged lady, who said she would happily drive me and the wood to wherever I wanted to go. That was lovely of her, but I was enjoying the challenge on a glorious April day, and I already had the wood on the roof. I thanked her, and she told me she would pray for me! I thanked her, thinking what a great gift she had given me.
The third angel appeared immediately, a 50s gray man, who told me I needed to tie the rope to the front of the car, the car had holes in the front underneath for that purpose.
So I got down on the ground, threaded the rope and battened down the hatches, and drove home like I was Moses driving through the parted red sea.
Yes. Prayer. Quicker than anything!
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Biafra was the eastern third of Nigeria that tried to become its own
nation on May 30, 1967 because other Nigerians were murdering them, on Jan 15, 1970 the
rest of Nigeria stopped murdering them and they became again part of
Nigeria.
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MJoTAtalks, click here
-MJoTAtalks:
Art Bearing Witness with Omenihu Amachi, click here
-MJoTAtalks: Health with MJoTA publisher, click here
-MJoTAtalks: Fiction with MJoTA publisher, click here
-MJoTAtalks: Music & Youth with Irv & Carlos, click here
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Biafra audio. Listen to speeches by General Ojukwu and the Biafran national anthem. Click here.
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Haddonfield New Jersey mayor is Tish Colombi. Lovely picture of Tish in article on Olympic runner who grew up in Haddonfield, click here.
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