Alguns apontamentos sobre Dili

Notes on Dili, East Timor

July 22, 2014 By James Clark

A little big city

Dili is the smallest capital city in Southeast Asia, and also the newest, having gained independence from Indonesia in 2002. While Dili is going to feel sedate after being in the other capital cities of the region, travel is a relative experience so your impression will depend on where you’re arriving from.
Coming from the two international connections of Darwin or Singapore, Dili will feel like a small country town. I arrived in Dili after travelling through Flores and West Timor, where most of the cities were dusty and rundown places. For me Dili felt modern and orderly with things to do like cinemas (one at least) and cafes.

[East Timor Government Building]
After being in places that offered little in entertainment, to be a city with bars and cafes was a welcome relief. Along the waterfront there are a number of sports bars and restaurants that sprung up to serve the UN and NGO crowds that were here after independence. Most of these organisations have since left and the places were quiet whenever I visited.

[One of the bars on the waterfront.]

Sticker Shock

While the most of the international workers have gone they have left inflated prices. Dili isn’t Australia expensive, but coming from Indonesia you will notice the price differences. East Timor use the USD as its currency and prices here are noticeably more expensive than in Indonesia.
Accommodation is expensive and there aren’t guesthouses here like you find across Southeast Asia. I stayed at the East Timor Backpackers which is a decent budget option and a good place to meet other travellers.

Proudly Independent

I arrived just after the 12 year anniversary of East Timor’s independence so I couldn’t tell if the flags that were out were for the day or if they are always out. Either way you get a sense that people are proud of their hard-won independence.
One thing I noticed here was that I stopped getting the “hello mister” greetings from the kids walking by. I’m not sure if this is a cultural thing where people are more conservative, or if the city is just burned out with foreigner fatigue after the days of the UN/NGO being here.

On The Waterfront

There is not a lot to do here but I enjoyed walking around this new capital city, especially along the waterfron. The waterfront has lots of potential to become a vibrant destination. Unfortunately there is a large stretch that has been taken over by embassies. There are some empty lots on the waterfront currently used as banana plantations, so it seems the embassies got in while the land was cheap and available. It’s shame that these international bunkers should take up prime real estate when the city could have made more money in the long term by putting apartments along here.

Cristo Rei of Dili

The most notable landmark of the city is the big Jesus that overlooks the harbour. When I first saw the statue in the distance I knew I was going to walk there. I didn’t consult a map but it looked like it was about an hour away. It turned out to be over 2 hours of walking.

[Jesus in the distance may be further than He appears.]
I was wearing flip-flops which were being eaten alive by the rough roads, but for some of the way you can break the walk up with stretches of beach like this.

The long walk turned out in my favour as I arrived close to sunset.

[Cristo Rei of Dili (Christ the King of Dili)]
From here it’s a spectacular view over the harbour and back toward the city.

I was tempted to get a taxi back but I had told myself I would walk there and back. I’m glad I did walk back otherwise I would have missed out on this sunset.

Nicholau Lobato Monument

Another statue worthy of a visit is the Nicholau Lobato monument which is located at the roundabout at the airport entry. If you are arriving by air or from West Timor by land this will be the first thing you see in the city.

Lobato was prime minister of East Timor during the brief period of Independence in 1975, between when the Portuguese left and Indonesia occupied. After fleeing to the hills as part of the resistance movement he was killed in combat in 1978.
The airport is now named in his honour, and if you are flying out it’s worth going to have a look. It’s a five minute walk from the terminal and there is nothing to do at the airport anyway.
Near the monument is this billboard of East Timorese heroes. Look how badass these guys are.

In the centre is José Manuel Ramos-Horta, who became the second president of East Timor in 2007. I don’t know if it made the news where you come from, but he became a household name in Australia when he was shot in an assassination attempt and was evacuated to a hospital in Darwin.
I had only seen recent pictures of him, from the time he was shot to now. Today he looks like a priest or distinguished professor (or Nobel Peace Prize winner). 70′s Ramos-Horta is looking like the Serpico of Timor-Leste.

Cinco polémicos dirigentes africanos

Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, President of Equatorial Guinea
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo is Africa’s longest serving ruler. He has ruled Equatorial Guinea, a tiny, oil-rich West African country, since August 1979 when he overthrew his uncle, Francisco Macías Nguema, in a bloody coup d’état. Equatorial Guinea is one of the continent’s largest producers of oil and has one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, but this doesn’t necessarily translate into prosperity for its people. The country ranks very poorly in the United Nations human development index; the vast majority of Equatorial Guineans hardly have access to clean drinking water. The country also has one of the world’s highest under-5 mortality rates: about 20% of its children die before the age of five. Many of the remaining 80% of the children don’t have access to quality educational and healthcare facilities. Meanwhile, the first son of the president, Teodorin Obiang (who is in line to succeed his father), spends millions of dollars of state funds financing his lavish lifestyle which includes luxurious property in Malibu, a Gulfstream jet, Michael Jackson memorabilia and a car collection that could easily make billionaires go green with envy.

José Eduardo dos Santos, President of Angola

 

José Eduardo dos Santos is Africa’s second longest serving president. He took the reins of power in September 1979 following the natural death of his predecessor Agostinho Neto. To his discredit, Jose Eduardo has always run his government like it’s his personal, privately-owned investment holding company. His cousin serves as the Angola’s vice president, and his daughter, Isabel Dos Santos is arguably the wealthiest woman in the country. Angola is extremely resource-rich. According to the United States Agency For International Development (USAID), the country is the second-largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa and the seventh-largest supplier to the United States. Angola also has massive diamond deposits and occupies an enviable position as the world’s fourth largest producer of rough diamonds.
But for all its resource wealth, the vast majority of Angolans still live in the most horrid socio-economic conditions. 68% of the country’s total population lives below the poverty line of $1.7 a day, while 28% live on less than 30 cents. Education is free, but it’s practically worthless. Most of the schools are housed in dilapidated structures and there is a severe deficit of skilled and qualified teachers. According to the U.N. Children’s Fund, 30% of the country’s children are malnourished. The average life expectancy is about 41 years while child and maternal deaths are extremely high. Unemployment levels are very high. But José Eduardo dos Santos is unaffected. Rather than transforming Angola’s economic boom into social relief for its people, he has channeled his energies towards intimidating the local media and diverting state funds into his personal and family accounts.  Dos Santos’s family controls a huge chunk of Angola’s economy. His daughter, Isabel Dos Santos has amassed one of the Angola’s largest personal fortunes by using proceeds from her father’s alleged corruption to acquire substantial stakes in companies like Zon Multimedia, a Portuguese media conglomerate and in Portuguese banks Banco Espírito Santo and Banco Português de Investimento among others.

Robert Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe

 

Many Zimbabweans seem to think Mugabe is doing a stellar job. The country is on an economic rebound after several years of decline. GDP growth in 2011 was over 7% and the Southern African state has experienced single-digit inflation since 2009. The country’s agricultural sector is fast recovering after years of food shortages fueled by disruptions caused by Mugabe’s infamous seizure of white-owned commercial farms. Mugabe’s government has also recorded significant achievements in education as a result of extensive teacher training and school expansion projects: At over 80%, the country has one of the highest literacy rates in Sub-Saharan Africa.
But Mugabe’s inadequacies overshadow his achievements. For one, he has failed to deal with the ever-present problem of employment. The country’s high literacy rate does not necessarily translate into employment opportunities for its people. Zimbabwe’s unemployment rate is the highest in sub-Saharan Africa: it’s over 60%.
Despite entering into a power-sharing agreement with the former opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Mugabe still wields almost total control over government institutions – a feat he has been able to achieve through his use of violence and subjugation. He remains reluctant to allocate substantial political powers to the MDC, and human rights abuses in the Southern African country are rife. The 87 year-old megalomaniac has vowed not to step down despite having ruled the Southern African state for over 24 years. He is seeking re-election in the country’s presidential polls slated for later in the year. Analysts expect the election to be besieged by fraud as the previous one.

King Mswati III, King of Swaziland

Sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch presides over a country which has one of the world’s highest HIV prevalence rates: ver 35 percent of adults. Its average life expectancy is the lowest in the world at 33 years; nearly 70 percent of the country’s citizens live on less than $1 a day and 40 percent are unemployed. But for all the suffering of the Swazi people, King Mswati has barely shown concern or interest. He lives lavishly, using his kingdom’s treasury to fund his expensive tastes in German automobiles, first-class leisure trips around the world and women. But his gross mismanagement of his country’s finances is now having dire economic consequences. Swaziland is going through a severe fiscal crisis. The kingdom’s economy is collapsing and pensions have been stopped. In June last year, the King begged for a financial bailout from South Africa, and the country is at a dead end, so badly that it recently announced its withdrawal from the 2013 Africans Nations Cup, citing lack of finances as the principal reason.

 

Omar Al-Bashir, President of Sudan

Sudan’s President seized power in 1989 in a bloodless military coup against the government of Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi- a government which was democratically elected by the people of Sudan. Soon after seizing power, Al-Bashir dispersed all political parties in the country, disbanded the country’s parliament and shut down all privately-owned media outlets. His reign has been characterized by a civil war in which over one million have been killed, while several millions have been displaced. Al-Bashir is still wanted by the International Criminal Court for instigating crimes against humanity, particularly in directing and funding acts of violence against the Southern Sudan. Famously corrupt, a diplomatic wikileaks cable revealed that Al-Bashir likely siphoned some $9 billion of his country’s funds into his private bank accounts in the United Kingdom.  MFonobong Nsehe/Forbes

O Burkina-Faso nasceu há 30 anos

Il y a trente ans, le 4 août 1984, Thomas Sankara renommait l'ancienne Haute-Volta en Burkina-Faso, le "Pays des hommes intègres". Un changement de nom officiel et très symbolique, destiné à rompre avec le passé colonial et à concrétiser les objectifs de la révolution sankariste.

C'était il y a trente ans. En vertu d'une ordonnance du 2 août 1984, le capitaine Thomas Sankara, désireux de faire table rase du "passé réactionnaire et néocolonial", rebaptise la Haute-Volta en République démocratique et populaire du Bourkina Fâso (orthographe originelle). Le premier mot signifie "homme intègre" en langue mooré et le second "terre natale" en dioula, soit "le pays des hommes intègres". Ses sept millions d'habitants ne sont plus des Voltaïques mais des Bourkinabè.
Le drapeau de l'ancienne Haute-Volta, composé de trois bandes noire, blanche et rouge, est aussi remplacé. Le nouvel étendard national est désormais composé de deux bandes horizontales rouge et verte, frappées d'une étoile jaune à cinq branches. Le tout représentant respectivement les idéaux de révolution, de travail de la terre, et d'espérance. Autre transformation : l'hymne national. La chanson Volta laisse la place au Ditanie, ou "chant de la victoire". La devise nationale est elle aussi modifiée, passant de "Unité-travail-justice" à "La patrie ou la mort, nous vaincrons".
Sankara à la guitare
Ce changement de nom de l'ancienne colonie française est célébré deux jours plus tard, le 4 août, jour du premier anniversaire de la révolution de Thomas Sankara. Ce jour-là, le Conseil national révolutionnaire (CNR) organise des festivités dans tout le pays en l'honneur du nouveau Bourkina Fâso. Outre les cérémonies officielles, des matchs de football et de boxe, ainsi qu'une course cycliste, sont organisés.
À Ouagadougou, les festivités sont menées par le capitaine Sankara en personne. Le jeune leader de 36 ans, qui a pris le pouvoir avec un groupe d'officiers un an plus tôt, jubile. Au petit matin du 4 août, après une nuit de fête avec une vingtaine de proches dans son quartier général, il attrape une guitare dont il commence à gratter les cordes. Un de ses ministres et un sergent-chef lui emboîtent le pas. Le petit groupe tire l'assemblée de sa somnolence. Parmi les convives, un invité de marque : le président ghanéen John Jerry Rawlings, dont les grandes lunettes sombres ne masquent pas l'étonnement face aux talents cachés de son hôte. Comme l'écrit Mohamed Selhami, alors envoyé spécial de Jeune Afrique, "la révolution n'est pas seulement cette chose qui immobilise l'esprit, elle sait aussi l'égayer, surtout lorsque Thomas Sankara s'en occupe".

L'article de Mohamed Selhami, paru dans le Jeune Afrique n°1232-1233, paru entre le 15 et le 22 août 1984.

"Il fallait prendre des initiatives audacieuses et radicales"
Muni de son inséparable revolver incrusté d'argent et d'ivoire, le capitaine anti-impérialiste expliquera à notre ancien collaborateur avoir changé le nom de son pays "pour mieux appliquer notre conception révolutionnaire". Selon lui, "il fallait prendre des initiatives audacieuses et radicales, entre autres effacer les traces du colonialisme. À commencer par l'appellation donnée par celui-ci à notre pays. Le nom Haute-Volta ne répondait ni à des critères géographiques ni à des critères sociologiques ou culturels".
Trente ans plus tard, le Burkina Faso reste connu dans le monde entier comme le "Pays des hommes intègres". Le capitaine Thomas Sankara, assassiné le 15 octobre 1987 dans des circonstances troubles, est lui devenu une légende, adulé bien au delà des frontières de l'ancien berceau de la révolution sankariste.
___
Benjamin Roger


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Jornal de Angola em defesa de Obiang

O Jornal de Angola volta hoje a criticar Portugal, pela segunda vez em três dias, e novamente sobre a Guiné Equatorial, acusando os portugueses de darem "lições de democracia" quando no país "há crianças a morrer de fome". Em causa está a adesão daquele país, antiga colónia espanhola em África, à Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa (CPLP), concretizada quarta-feira na Cimeira de Díli, em Timor-Leste, apesar das dúvidas lançadas a partir de Portugal.

"Os portugueses têm um grande orgulho na expansão marítima da qual resultou o seu império. Mas agora há países e povos que guardam a memória desse passado comum e querem pertencer à CPLP. Alguns renegam esse passado e opõem-se ao alargamento da organização. São demasiado pequenos para a grandeza da Língua Portuguesa", afirma o editorial.

No editorial, intitulado "A grandeza da língua", o diário estatal recorda que parte do território da Guiné Equatorial "já foi colónia portuguesa" e que a ilha de Fernando Pó [atual Bioko] recebeu o nome do navegador português, o mesmo acontecendo com a ilha de Ano-Bom. "Mas na pequena ilha [Ano-Bom] está um tesouro da lusofonia: fala-se crioulo [fá d'ambô] que tem por base o português arcaico e que chegou quase incólume aos nossos dias", diz o jornal.

Afirma que "está provado" que aquelas ilhas da "foram povoadas por escravos angolanos" e que Angola pretende "ir lá render homenagem" aos antepassados. "Agora que Fernando Pó e Ano-Bom fazem parte da CPLP, mais facilmente podemos cumprir esse dever. Mas sem a companhia das elites estrábicas, que nem sequer foram capazes de defender a dulcíssima língua portuguesa do Acordo Ortográfico", lê-se.

Sobre as dúvidas em torno da adesão da Guiné Equatorial, o Jornal de Angola já tinha criticado Portugal no editorial de terça-feira, o mesmo dia em que o vice-primeiro-ministro Paulo Portas foi recebido em Luanda pelo Presidente angolano José Eduardo dos Santos.

Hoje é a vez de o ministro da Economia, António Pires de Lima, visitar a capital angolana. "Os angolanos querem saber mais sobre a Língua Portuguesa (...) Os portugueses deviam ter o mesmo interesse, mas pelos vistos só estão interessados em dar lições de democracia, quando dentro das suas portas há crianças a morrer de fome", diz o editorial.

O matutino volta a referir-se às "elites portuguesas ignorantes e corruptas", afirmando que com a introdução do português como língua oficial no país "esse argumento deixou de valer".

Num dos artigos mais críticos de Portugal dos últimos meses, aquele jornal diz que "em Lisboa surgiram numerosas vozes contra a adesão" mas que "nunca chegarão aos céus", provenientes de "políticos e líderes de opinião". "O que revela uma contradição insanável eivada de ignorância e uma tendência inquietante para criar um 'apartheid' nas relações internacionais", escreve o matutino. Diz por isso que não se "compreende" a "soberba" com que em Portugal "tratam a Guiné Equatorial e o Presidente Obiang".

Classifica o tema da pena de morte, invocado por Lisboa, como "muito débil", tendo em conta que os Estados Unidos "executam todos os dias condenados à pena capital" e que "nem por isso os porta-vozes dessas elites querem expulsar o seu aliado da OTAN [NATO]". "Pelo contrário, quando Washington anunciou que ia sair da Ilha Terceira por já não ter interesse na Base das Lajes, todos se puseram de joelhos, implorando que a base aérea continue", crítica, em editorial, o Jornal de Angola. Lusa

Aumentam as tensões em muitas partes do mundo

The last twelve months has seen a notable rise in tensions in many parts of the world. Thailand is back under military rule, China has become more aggressive with Japan and its other maritime neighbours, Russia invaded Ukraine, and existing conflicts in Syria, Gaza and Iraq all intensified.

While these conflicts have caused immense human and political dislocation, financial markets have been rather sanguine. The Russian stock market, for example, is down only around 5% from twelve months ago. Markets are betting that economic relationships are going to trump political ones, a point that caused some disruption in the Indian parliament this week. For my part, I'm worried that markets are underpricing political risk in a desperate search for some returns.

The Economist

Mais de 800 palestinianos mortos

Israel's security cabinet has rejected a Gaza ceasefire proposal put forward by US Secretary of State John Kerry, officials say.

Mr Kerry has been pushing for a halt to 18 days of fighting between Israel and Islamist group Hamas.

An Israeli official told Reuters that the cabinet wanted changes to the agreement before ending the offensive.

More than 800 Palestinians, mostly civilians, and 36 Israelis have died since the start of the conflict.

Desapareceu um Boeing argelino

An Air Algerie flight travelling from Burkina Faso to Algiers has disappeared from the radar, apparently while flying above the Malian airspace.
The aircraft, believed to be a Boeing 737-600, lost contact 50 minutes after the takeoff.
"Air navigation services have lost contact with an Air Algerie plane Thursday flying from Ouagadougou to Algiers, 50 minutes after takeoff," said the airlines.
Flight AH 5017 was not visible on Flightradar24, a live-tracking website for all the planes across the world.

O aparelho deveria ter partido da capital do Burkina Faso às 00h45 e era aguardado em Argel às 05h40.