"The lower-middle-class people in there, behind their lace curtains, with their children and their scraps of furniture and their aspidistras - they lived by the money-code, sure enough, and yet they contrived to keep their decency. The money-code as they interpreted it was not merely cynical and hoggish. They had their standards, their inviolable points of honour. They 'kept themselves respectable' - kept the aspidistra flying." George Orwell, "Keep the Aspidistra Flying", 1936.
Showing posts with label amnesty international. Show all posts
Showing posts with label amnesty international. Show all posts
The popularity of talent shows such as “The X Factor” has shown just how many people have the urge to strut their stuff in public and believe that they have what it takes to get to the top. A very small handful of those who expose themselves to potential ridicule in this way actually do make it. As for the rest, their friends and family may regard their desire to become celebrities as a touch of madness.
Akmal Shaikh is not the obvious candidate for a career in the pop industry. Fifty-three years old and father to five children he comes from north London and is a British national. He has shown the signs of serious mental illness for years and it is likely that he is suffering from Bipolar Disorder which used to be known as Manic Depression. This condition can lead the sufferer to behave in ways that the average person would regard as risky or unacceptable. They can run up large credit card debts, shoplift and display all kinds of antisocial behaviour. They often end up in the criminal justice system before their condition is identified. In Akmal’s case it meant that he was living in Poland at the mercy of friends who were in fact members of a criminal gang. They persuaded him that they had contacts in the music industry and that he had a real chance of making it. It would involve his travelling to Kyrgyzstan and then China. Considering his state of mind it is not surprising that he accepted this as the truth and also agreed to take some luggage with him. He trusted them.
Upon the discovery of four kilos of heroin in this luggage Akmal was charged with drug smuggling. He was found guilty and sentenced to death. Now that he has lost all his appeals there is no hope for him other than the pressure that can be placed on the Chinese authorities by people like you and me.
Even if you have never done anything like this before please think about doing it now. All you have to do is add your name and email address to the form but it would be more effective if you thought up your own polite message (even if you don’t feel like being polite - don‘t make things worse by expressing too frank an opinion).
Akmal Shaikh has probably been quite a challenging dad to love but that is because he is a very sick man who needs help. He is not a criminal. His case has the support of Stephen Fry, Amnesty International and Reprieve. Please help Akmal’s family bring him back home to north London.
Occasionally something happens that makes me feel very protective towards my belongings. Following an attempted break-in I began stashing jewellery out of sight and the threat of a flood had me moving irreplaceable things upstairs. Watching news reports of refugees in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990’s and images of the homes they had left behind I wondered what I regarded as so precious that I would try taking it with me. Money and documents, obviously, valuable jewellery, some photos maybe. Would we have tried to take Jones the cat with us or would we have given him a quick and kind death because we were uncertain about what was ahead of us?
Thus far in my life I have been lucky in that I have not had to make those decisions. I live in a country that has not faced invasion for more than sixty years and, in spite of certain recent events, could still be regarded as a democracy. I don’t have to bribe a councillor to raise an issue of local concern and the police usually turn up when I need them. There is likely to be someone out there to help if I fall on hard times. If I get pregnant the system should kick in to make sure that my child is fed, clothed and housed adequately, if not by me then by the state. Most of the time I take all this for granted.
A couple of things have reminded me that I am unbelievably lucky. One was the news that Madonna had been allowed to adopt a second Malawian child. The other was that Amnesty International has launched the “Demand Dignity” campaign to raise awareness of poverty and the impact it has on human rights. The term that stood out to me when reading about it was “absolute poverty” - according to the world bank that describes the condition of 1.3 billion people. Absolute poverty in 2009. Poverty means no clean water, no adequate sewage, no education, no healthcare, no voice.
It also means no certainty that the ramshackle roof over your head will still be there tomorrow. In the UK I can be certain that, should anyone find that they have the right to turn me out of my home, for whatever reason, I will at least have the chance of appeal and some notice of when I will be expected to leave. This is not the case in places like Kenya’s Deep Sea settlement where private companies are gaining land for development by illegally evicting people who have nowhere else to go. The developers are being supported by the authorities and police so those who had little to begin with are being forced to leave in the middle of the night taking with them only what they can carry. Bulldozers are literally showing up without any warning.
The campaign will also be raising awareness of corporate responsibility and the profound impact business can have on impoverished communities. They are usually powerless to defend themselves when their home is targeted by those with an agenda that does not have their best interests at heart. Native people in Canada have been directly and very badly affected by the construction of a gas plant in their area. No one in a wealthy city would tolerate a birth rate where 19 out of 21 babies were still born, yet this is what they have had to endure as a result of this imposition on what they regard as their ancestral land.
Women and children bear the brunt of this situation and the third focus of the campaign is on maternal mortality. Where I live it is expected that a pregnant woman will put her feet up and be cared for by those around her. She becomes as precious as the child she is carrying. In poor communities ease is not an option for expectant women. The need to continue working, often quite strenuously, creates a greater risk to the unborn child and mother. Add to that the lack of good antenatal and postnatal healthcare and you have the answer to why so many women who are considered to be in a condition of “absolute poverty” die as a result of becoming pregnant.
This brings me to Madonna and her adoption of Mercy, whose biological mother died during childbirth. Try for one moment to forget about the fuss surrounding what should be a private matter between an adopter and those officials concerned in assessing that person’s right to adopt a particular child. Try instead to wonder what it must be like to be born in poverty in a country where your life expectancy is 40 and where you are likely to be orphaned by AIDs. Someone with a lot of money takes an interest in your country and offers to do something about healthcare, education and child care. What would you do if you were a Malawian? If you had any sense you would put your hand up and say “Yes please!”
In my opinion too many people are ready to point a finger at Madonna and say that she has bought this child without caring in the slightest about the others that are left behind in those orphanages. That she has set up her charity, Raising Malawi, as a vehicle for the Kabbalah sect that she follows. That those who run the Kabbalah Centre in the US are looking for a country to take over.
Mmmm. Well, if they are planning to take over Malawi and run it they aren’t particularly good at keeping it a secret. I think someone will notice if that democratic country suddenly becomes a dictatorship run by a particularly pale blonde woman with an American accent. I realise that she sometimes acts as “She Who Must Be Obeyed “ but even she realises that there are limits. For centuries Christians have imposed their religion on hapless orphans throughout Africa, not always kindly, so why is the particular religion an issue?
I had felt for some time that Africa needed Madonna and even though I have some doubts about the Kabbalah Centre I have none about her decision to promote a religion other than Christianity. I believe that Raising Malawi is a genuine attempt on the part of a well informed individual, who has campaigned on the AIDs issue for years, to do something concrete and positive about it. I feel that Madonna is taking seriously the concept of “ubuntu”, a philosophy promoted by Mandela and Tutu. Above all I think that a little girl is going to grow up surrounded by people who genuinely love her and have her best interests at heart. Madonna may not turn out to be the perfect mum but she is doing her best in the only way she knows how.
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