Is Aid a Right?

No. Aid is many things, but a right it is not. Thanks for reading.

That's Miz Ambassador To You.

I has been so long since anyone has tried to recruit me online, I've been feeling a little neglected. Quite lonely, to be honest. So it was with great delight that I learned that I have recently been appointed Ambassador to the African Refugees from Libya and Sudan. And here is the letter to prove it:

IN COURTESY OF THE GOVERNMENT OF GHANA AND THE UNITED NATIONS
DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INFORMATION.

Attention!

I am Hon Dr. Johnson Williams, the United Nations Special Presidential Task Force Chairman for Refugees here in Ghana, West Africa.

I am tasked by the Forces mentioned above to pass this information to you that you have been nominated as an Ambassador to the African refugees from Libya and Sudan by the United Nations and the Honorable Members of Parliament of the Republic of Ghana.

The meeting was held yesterday in the Osu Castle with five representatives from United States of America, New York and three representatives from United Kingdom, London respectively from the offices of the United Nations and nominated you to occupy the position of Ambassador for the Government of the Republic of Ghana.

By virtue of this act, the High Panel of the UN and of the House of Parliament of the Republic of Ghana demands that you forward your particulars to this noble office including a scan copy of your passport or driver's license or national identification card with immediate effect.
Should you have any question(s), please contact the UN Appointment Committee on:

We look forward to working with you soon.

Best Regards,
Hon. Dr. Johnson Williams
Special Presidential Task force Chairman
United Nations Head Quarters, Accra-Ghana.

Sorry people, got to rush. I am now a VIP: people to represent, Geneva to conquer, got my eye on TEDx, you know how it goes. Toodles. Oh, yeah and credit card information to impart, of course... Who says poverty doesn't pay. Heh.

On False Advertising: The Rapture

Y'all have to understand: I was raised High Catholic. For real. Since those kooks in New York have been nattering on about The Rapture this and The Rapture that, all my demons have come out to play. The seven horsemen of the Apocalypse, the Chosen ones, the triple six and Nostradamus- been there, read that, amongst other things. Dan Brown has nothing on the crazier corners of Catholic psychosis.

It has been a long journey, lapsing from all the Hail Marys and learning how to live without the scent of frankinscense and myrrh, and not an easy one. So here's my beef: why raise all those expectations of The Rapture- only the most feared and anticipated event in Christiandom, ever- only to drop the ball at the last minute? sSomeone needs to be sued for false advertising. I want my anxiety back, every last minute I spent scouring my soul and prematurely making peace with God. And while you irresponsible prophets of doom are at it, catch a clue: market research is a good thing.

Bad Air

Twenty-plus years of total immunity didn't prepare me for this event. Hoooo-yay, did that plasmodium get me good! I'm talking about malaria, that putrid parasite from hell. This disease is beyond nastiness- of all the ailments I have ever had this is the only one that I would gladly trade for a full-technicolor effects aches-and-shakes migraine headache.

Like most absurdly healthy people, I am an absolute horror when sick. Stoic to the point of stupidity, I spent at least two days reading up on malaria when someone suggested it might be the cause of my stomach ache rather than go to the hospital. After all, it never happened to me, right? Right. I even had the gall to sweat through my liver exploding- twice- rather than admit that I might have to go for a simple. Fricking. Test. Because it doesn't happen to me, right? Right.

Let me tell you what it feels like when those little buggers explode out of your liver. It feels like maybe you have a mild stomach ache at first- kinda like a gas bubble, right up high by your diaphragm. Then it brings The Pain. The Pain is like a supernova has gone off inside your body. It's a cross between the evillest period cramp on earth and a sword thrust through your gut. It's like being vivisected without anasthesia. I was soaked in a cold and clammy sweat, but the high pain threshold withheld the mercy of passing out. So did I heed the advice I was given? No, because I don't get malaria, right? Right.

Yeah.

Well, this story pretty much ends with me availing myself of Tanga's private clinic services on a fine Saturday morning. I threw in the towel, went to get tested and endured what has got to be the slowest and most disinterested medical service on the face of the planet*. Four prescriptions and 25,000 shillings later, it was time to ponder the wisdom of my health policies. What I learned is this: no sane person actually lets their liver explode twice. And: sweet Jesus, children under five are the most vulnerable to this fresh hell? Oh no :(

And finally: thank God for modern medicine. I love it. I love the little yellow pills that take the pain away, and I love the fat white pills that take the pain and the fever away. I love my cantankerous doctor who didn't even check if there were contra-indications with the drugs I told him I was using to treat the stomach ache that wasn't a stomach ache, even though combining them might have killed me (he neglected to say stop using the other ones). I love the slow-ass pharmacist who took forever to get me the pills. The happy, happy pills that took all that pain away. I love the impressively patient people who cajoled/bullied me back to health. I love the trees, I love the air, I love hearing music even though I think I might still be missing a few tones because something went funny when I started taking the pills. I love life, even if my limbs are too weak to do much for the next week or so.

You want to know what love is? Love is the absence of pain. Simple, but true. And that's a lesson I got from malaria. I guess I love malaria too. This might be the delirium talking.

*I am ashamed to say it, but at one point I was ready to elbow a sick old lady and a couple with an evidently feverish child out of my way to get to the doctor before he disappeared for yet another tea break or whatever the (expletive deleted) doctors on duty do when they aren't treating the people who have been waiting for them all (expletive deleted) morning. It got that feral.

The Stalker: A Local Story of a Woman Who Gets Called By Her Phone.

Oh yeah- leapfrogging. When a technology is adopted so late in the game that the adopter skips merrily past the costs and technological constraints of earlier models of said technology and arrive fresh at the very edge of things. In East Africa, we have leapt the frog on mobile phones and mobile banking. With the right provider you can pay anyone, find out anything and practically fly any plane with your trusty little made-for-EA Nokia (warranty provided in Kiswahili and English). What's not to like?

Well. My phone has started calling me. To be more specific, my mobile phone service provider has started calling me directly. It all started out innocently enough: Bharti Airtel, the Company Formerly Known as Zain, Formerly Known as Celtel, added a nifty new feature. Every time I made a call, it would let me know how many of my Shillings I'd just tossed their way and my balance. No problemo, for those of us on prepaid it's a handy way to keep track of things.

Then, whenever I would send a text message, the phone would let me know how much it had cost me and efficiently suggest that I send a couple more texts to tap into their gajillion-free-sms a day promotion. Alrighty then, I thought- nothing wrong with a suggestion or two. After all, I am already their customer, right? How nice of them to "save" me some money.

Then one day I made the mistake of checking the day's exchange rate. The next day, I was considerately sent a text with the exchange rate for the currency I had checked up on. Shades of Big Brother, but okay. There was an escape clause (so I thought): you could send the word STOP to their five-digit code. So I did. And lo and behold, the next day I got the exchange rate text again. So I said STOP again. And lo and behold, the next day... you get where this is going don't you.

So now, I get the daily text message I do not want. Every time I talk on the phone I get an instant replay after disconnecting. And every time I text message, the little cheerleader that lives in my phone gets a sugar rush and starts yelling at me to send More! More! More! I thought that this is about as bad as it can get.

Until the day my phone called me. I picked up, thinking that a long local number like this might be attached to a potentially lucrative networking/work connection. "Hello?" I went with Professional Voice- alert and friendly but slightly cool to the touch. Silence. Then the pre-recorded message in Universally Annoying Female Voice began. I had just been cold-called by an android from my phone company to sell me services that I don't want. This, in addition to their newfangled habit (borrowed from Vodacom) of dropping your calls mid-conversation for the fun of it.

No one wants to be called by their phone. Ever. What's next, refrigerators that purse their lips in disapproval every time you reach in for just one "last" slice of chocolate cake?

How marketing departments come up with such evil schemes, I do not know. But there is a special circle of hell for them in the eternal inferno where they are hung upside down with their heads in a boiling river of fire and angry customers pelt them with early-model mobile phones while yelling "One minute for a third of a Shilling!" and "Hallo! Hallo! We Nani? Mzee Juma yupo? Kwani we ni nani?"

Tanzania...without aid?

There's a very interesting debate that went down on As I Please, the blog formerly known as African Bambataa. What's interesting about it is the competition between rhetoric and reality, that gap between what we want and what we can get. I must admit to a strong bias towards historically grounded political-economic perspectives of the 'development problem' rather than purely economic (or purely political for that matter) perspectives. And, of course, hard-nosed pragmatism. The comments section offers some revealing ruminations.

Anyways, for those who are interested in what development aid is like in practice- the flip side of theory and political rhetoric- this makes an excellent companion piece.

Sports Doping, African Style, and Another Bad Question from the BBC

I was sitting around being mildly hypnotized by the variety of Kiswahili accents on BBC Idhaa ya Kiswahili when I tuned back in for this story: a FIFA anti-doping official type was in South Africa attending a conference on traditional practices (read: witchcraft and herbal medicines) that are used to enhance footballers performance.

The challenge? Some of the substances consumed by African footballers might actually give them an unfair advantage on the pitch. But how does FIFA test for this variety of unknown substances. Heh. I wish them the best of luck.

Then the Beeb brought down my intellectual high with this stupid-ass question: "Can coups in AFrica be a good thing? Are they bad, or can they achieve something good?"

Hold up, now, Beeb. How patronizing can you get? A coup must, by its very nature, use illegal means to change the balance of power, thereby suspending democratic processes and placing everyone in that polity at the mercy of the perpetrators of the coup. Whether or not outright violence is used, who in their right mind can support coups as a viable regime-change mechanism?

Does the Beeb think that the British might enjoy a coup or two, perhaps? No? Then why the hell should Africans do so? Institutional racism sucks.

Chauvinism? What's that?

This article hardly needs an introduction. Click the image to enjoy a larger scan. Do not drink coffee while reading, it will scald your nose on its way out.

Know Your Em Pee Continued: Polis could be better!

So. I have heard from a couple of people who were of the opinion that the piece of research put out by Uwazi/Twaweza/Whatever incarnation of a Hivos-supported initiative it is about MP performance in Bunge is at best a partial measure of performance, at worst a vapid piece of crap. I am of the former opinion because I like the fact that Uwazi made some use of Polis data to begin the examination of MP performance. Anyone can have an opinion about politics, but opinions are far more interesting when backed by empirical data.

And here I am on Polis trying to figure out how the heck to get more information on my MP because I agree that counting the number of Bunge session interventions during an MP's term in office doesn't tell us very much about said MP's actual utility. Case in point: lots of CCM MPs capitalized on the anti-corruption drive initiated by the opposition to spew copious amounts of hot air into the House and gain instant popularity via the media, Anna Kilango style, but there is little evidence of genuine belief in the cause. And just last week, I listened to Mzee Malecela (aka Mister Anna Kilango) justify the rejection of a bill reducing the President's executive powers on the basis that after God Almighty, he should be the ultimate authority in Tanzanians' lives. Fun couple.

This raises a question though- how to come up with a relatively solid measure of MP performance that incorporates indicators of quality, effectiveness, accessibility, etc (i.e. those hard-to-measure things). I found a project in this vein by the Canadians supported by the World Bank. Because I privilege particularism over universality in the pursuit of deep knowledge of a polity, I am more interested in a Tanzanian list of indicators of MP performance. I am neutral, it can include items like direct patronage to capture MPs like Rostam Aziz who support their constituency's development partly through the use of their very deep pockets. Ideas?

And on that note- special seats. I do believe we have a minimum of 75 seats in Parliament set aside for women, appointed at the discretion of their party. Affirmative action, Bongo style. Sadly for us Tanzanians, these "representatives" don't seem to be vigorous in the pursuit of anything other than their per diems. As a feminist, it drives me crazy to see so much wasted opportunity: 75 women in the august house and we're still not having a conversation about issues like our squirelly inheritance laws, high rates of schoolgirl pregnancy accompanied by low rates of impregnator convictions (there is a strong child abuse element to this phenomenon), prostitution and pornography (fine if you're an adult, not if you are a minor), entrenched sexual harrassment...

Imagine, if you will, that these appointed MPs are free to choose any issue to make their own on a national scale- the environment, education, taxation, constitutional law, etymology, corporate governance, whatever, without the weight of a constituency to drag them down. And still, they suck. I hope that there is a special place in hell for them.

Jay Kay has said several times that he intends to find a way to make the parliament more 'gender-balanced' than it is*. I support the sentiment Jay Kay, but before you start raping the constitution to do so, maybe you should focus the party's energies on appointing better women politicians to parliament. Lets start there.

*tokenism is not a solution, no matter how many tokens you appoint. And Polis: more difficult to work than it needs to be. I am still stuck somewhere in the antechamber.

The Elephant in the Room...an update.

I wrote about homosexuality in the V-day post because we don't talk about it publicly here in Bongo, let alone voice our support of the gay and lesbian community, and it seemed an opportune time to do so. The intention was to bust the myth that it is all homophobia and 'backwardness' in our African communities, and to convey the sense that there is a core of tolerance that should be fought for and expanded.

It was during this self-same weekend that the minions of evil in Mombasa got the upper hand over reason and human rights. Starting on Thursday and going on through the weekend, several people have been assaulted and arrested for 'being gay' while local religious leaders fan the flames of bigotry. I have read competing eye-witness reports on the events in Mombasa, and what exactly triggered the attacks- some say a wedding, others say the wedding was just a rumor. Beneath the pretexts, it looks as though this a concerted effort involving the religious zealots, the police and some members of the local community. The core issue remains though, that of intolerance, and at this particular moment Mombasa is the warfront. Big up to GALCK and allies- may you win this fight.

Is That My Elephant in The Room? The big fat Valentine's weekend rant

Yeah, yeah, Valentine's Day: big and fat and pink and lurking in a tutu in the corner of the room offering Ferrer Rocher truffles alongside a single red rose. A couple of years ago, some ladies of my acquaintance (Sisterhood of Men, woohoo!) used to celebrate the other kind of V-Day: the local production of Eve Ensler's Vagina Monologues. The last one I attended was very, very good- it was presented as a Kitchen Party celebration complete with TMI advice given to the young bride. Let me tell you- there are talented actors in Bongo and no, they don't seem to be appearing on Africa Magic. If anyone is hosting or knows about a V-day event this year, speak up! Because folks, this is a project that is worth its weight in Hallmark cards.

So, back to celebrating love, and the freedom to love. I was wandering through The Black Snob and having a good time right up until I came across her post about violence against homosexuals in two African countries. This, good people, is what I call a double-edged sword. Its complicated. On the one hand, I understand and appreciate her desire to lend her voice and support to Ugandans and South Africans who are experiencing horrible social violence due to homophobia. On the other hand, there is something so Heart of Darkness about the tone and the approach- there go those Africans again, human rights recidivists that they are:

"The fact is, in the face of death and rape, gays and lesbians in Africa are still loving each other. DEATH and RAPE. They are still coming out to their families and friends. In the face of discrimination, harassment, murder and violence, they are still declaring "I'm here! I exist! I am human! I have a right to be loved and love whom I please!"

Indeed. It has been a while since I got on my Things Africans Don't Do soapbox, so let me wield it here: Ms. Belton, please consider the weight of your choice of words. They might encourage your readers to believe that there are more Museveni-following, lesbian-raping kak-witted bigots in (the vast, incredibly diverse, multi-country CONTINENT that is) Africa than there really are. If your beef is Uganda's anti-gay bill, by all means talk about it. If your issue is sexual violence and homophobia in South Africa (which by the way extends far further than corrective rape for lesbians), by all means talk about it. But I suggest you avoid the Afrochauvinism and get down and dirty with the specifics of your causes.

Case in point: Tanzania has a vast range of culturally-grounded responses to same-sex love ranging from embeddedness (i.e. an accepted cultural role) to total intolerance. And that's just one African country, which has two major religions and over 100 ethnicities. Imagine, now, that there are over 50 countries in Africa- and no, we are not nearly as homogeneous as is purported. Ms. Belton's argument is framed by the legal battle for civic rights- the fight of the minority against the tyranny of the majority. She says this:

"Right now the mob is trying to rule in Uganda and South Africa against gays and lesbians and that's wrong. Right now the mob is trying to act like the government creating state sanctioned marriages between homosexuals would affect your religious marriages. I say, the mob needs to calm the hell down. You're big enough and you're bad enough to be gracious and tolerant. It won't kill you. It never has. Not even once."

She is right. The anti-lesbian 'mob' in South Africa is completely unsupported by their awesomely progressive constitution, and you might want to take a look at the Treatment Action Campaign that was headed for the longest by this gentleman. As for Uganda, again, context: Museveni is a despot and he was using his despotic powers for evil to oppress homosexuality. He succeeded, to the chagrin of those Ugandans who totally disagree with him. Do the majority of Ugandans actually want to kill homosexuals? Tafakari.

I do not mean to belittle the battles that are faced by people who are homosexual living in African countries (see how I did that? African countries...). And advocacy is invaluable. It is true, Ms. Belton, that being gay and out is not a picnic in many African societies (did it again) just as it is not in the majority of the world- your country included, as you well know. But we're just not the crazed and monolithic mob your post implies. There is tolerance, and compassion, even humor. And support. And protection. We do exist that have people in our lives whom we value, admire, dine with, celebrate and cry with, etc who also happen to be homosexual. We do this against the current of patriarchy, in spite of the fights it engenders with our families, or the strain it places on other relationships. Hell, in some places we are not even a hidden minority- we are the newly emerging normative middle class.

So Ms. Belton my dear: Happy Valentine's (or V-) Day. Have a homophilic, Afropositive weekend. And that David Wise guy in your comments section who said: "BTW, I forgot to denounce the persecution of gay people in Uganda and South Africa. These places are still relatively backward, so it doesn't surprise me that this would go on. I'm sending them positive energy and may they see divinity in all people and respect the rights of others"...totally owes some people an apology.

A Bad Case of Afro-pessimism

Is it the accumulated effect of fruitless gestures that makes Afro-pessimists so deeply bitter? What makes a non-African care deeply enough to hate the continent with such virulence? This one has visited a couple of times, perhaps giving him the misguided belief that he 'knows' Africa and has become an authority. Africa is not for beginner philanthropists, nor the weak of mind, nor the faint of spirit. She is not for those who seek easy answers and instant gratification. Her problems cannot be 'fixed' with a donation campaign and bourgeois guilt. Loving this continent, believing in her present, investing in her future, remembering her past is not a job for just anyone. It is a job for the biggest of hearts, the strongest of wills, for those whose humanity does not sour from disappointment. Part-time do-gooders need not apply.

Exporting HIV? Mr. Myers, spare us your poisonous concerns. We do better without your ilk. If, however, you are ever tempted to play your part in returning the massive wealth (material and human) that the West has been pillaging from this continent since slavery, and which provided the foundation for your blood-soaked 'prosperous' consumer society, be sure to write a column about it.

Africa is giving nothing to anyone -- apart from AIDS
By Kevin Myers

Thursday July 10 2008

No. It will not do. Even as we see African states refusing to take action to restore something resembling civilisation in Zimbabwe, the begging bowl for Ethiopia is being passed around to us, yet again. It is nearly 25 years since Ethiopia 's (and Bob Geldof's) famous Feed The World campaign, and in that time Ethiopia 's population has grown from 33.5 million to 78 million today.
So why on earth should I do anything to encourage further catastrophic demographic growth in that country? Where is the logic? There is none. To be sure, there are two things saying that logic doesn't count.
One is my conscience, and the other is the picture, yet again, of another wide-eyed child, yet again, gazing, yet again, at the camera, which yet again, captures the tragedy of . . .
Sorry. My conscience has toured this territory on foot and financially. Unlike most of you, I have been to Ethiopia ; like most of you, I have stumped up the loot to charities to stop starvation there. The wide-eyed boy-child we saved, 20 years or so ago, is now a priapic, Kalashnikov-bearing hearty, siring children whenever the whim takes him.
There is, no doubt a good argument why we should prolong this predatory and dysfunctional economic, social and sexual system; but I do not know what it is. There is, on the other hand, every reason not to write a column like this.
It will win no friends, and will provoke the self-righteous wrath of, well, the self-righteous, letter-writing wrathful, a species which never fails to contaminate almost every debate in Irish life with its sneers and its moral superiority. It will also probably enrage some of the finest men in Irish life, like John O'Shea, of Goal; and the Finucane brothers, men whom I admire enormously. So be it.
But, please, please, you self-righteously wrathful, spare me mention of our own Famine, with this or that lazy analogy. There is no comparison. Within 20 years of the Famine, the Irish population was down by 30pc. Over the equivalent period, thanks to western food, the Mercedes 10-wheel truck and the Lockheed Hercules, Ethiopia 's has more than doubled.
Alas, that wretched country is not alone in its madness. Somewhere, over the rainbow, lies Somalia, another fine land of violent, Kalashnikov-toting, khat-chewing, girl-circumcising, permanently tumescent layabouts.
Indeed, we now have almost an entire continent of sexually hyperactive indigents, with tens of millions of people who only survive because of help from the outside world.
This dependency has not stimulated political prudence or commonsense. Indeed, voodoo idiocy seems to be in the ascendant, with the next president of South Africa being a firm believer in the efficacy of a little tap water on the post-coital penis as a sure preventative against infection. Needless to say, poverty, hunger and societal meltdown have not prevented idiotic wars involving Tigre , Uganda, Congo , Sudan, Somalia , Eritrea etcetera.
Broad brush-strokes, to be sure. But broad brush-strokes are often the way that history paints its gaudier, if more decisive, chapters. Japan, China, Russia, Korea, Poland, Germany, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in the 20th century have endured worse broad brush-strokes than almost any part of Africa.
They are now -- one way or another -- virtually all giving aid to or investing in Africa, whereas Africa , with its vast savannahs and its lush pastures, is giving almost nothing to anyone, apart from AIDS.
Meanwhile, Africa 's peoples are outstripping their resources, and causing catastrophic ecological degradation. By 2050, the population of Ethiopia will be 177 million: The equivalent of France, Germany and Benelux today, but located on the parched and increasingly protein-free wastelands of the Great Rift Valley.
So, how much sense does it make for us actively to increase the adult population of what is already a vastly over-populated, environmentally devastated and economically dependent country?
How much morality is there in saving an Ethiopian child from starvation today, for it to survive to a life of brutal circumcision, poverty, hunger, violence and sexual abuse, resulting in another half-dozen such wide-eyed children, with comparably jolly little lives ahead of them? Of course, it might make you feel better, which is a prime reason for so much charity. But that is not good enough.
For self-serving generosity has been one of the curses of Africa . It has sustained political systems which would otherwise have collapsed.
It prolonged the Eritrean-Ethiopian war by nearly a decade. It is inspiring Bill Gates' programme to rid the continent of malaria, when, in the almost complete absence of personal self-discipline, that disease is one of the most efficacious forms of population-control now operating.
If his programme is successful, tens of millions of children who would otherwise have died in infancy will survive to adulthood, he boasts. Oh good: then what?I know. Let them all come here. Yes, that's an idea.
kmyers@independent.ie

See at http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/kevin-myers/africa-is-giving-nothing-to-anyone--apart-from-aids-1430428.htm

Press Reliese

Yes, that title contains a typo, but not one of mine this time. During an idle moment of multi-media-multi-tasking yesterday, I decided to check out the news bulletin on the state broadcaster. I usually watch That Other Channel like everyone else but lately their news service has been pretty craptastic, barring the very cool journalist-on-the-hoof reports by Jerry Muro. Big up Jerry! Anywho, turns out the TeeBeeCee is not bad for an instrument of the state.

What, the point, you ask? Well, you know how Andrew Chenge aka Mr. Vijisenti was 'apparently' caught ju-ju-ing his fellow MPs on tape about a month back? The Police and the Chief Chemist been investigating the incident all this time. Yesterday by chance I caught someone on the TeeBeeCee interviewing whichever hapless police chief had been ordered to aanounce the results of the investigation. Part of the clip showed the 'Press Reliese' issued by the police. Hapless Mouthpiece told us that:

1. No cameras had been turned off since 2006 (who asked?)
2. No-one was caught on tape inside the Parliament building therefore no one was in there
3. The dust that was collected for investigation contained no poison, therefore
4. There was no witchcraft. no juju. no nothing. nada. zip.

Sooo...um. yeah. I am not sure just how stupid these people think Paradisans are, offering up such a dismal disclaimer. It reflects poorly on the liars that they are not able to finesse a more credible lie, and this has been a longtime concern of mine. It seems that our politicos have gotten so complacent about fibbing that they are phoning it in now. They are not taking the appropriate time to respect our intellects by weaving a web of deception that would provide us with hours of entertainment in the unravelling. Where's the subtlety, the ambiguity, the false trails, the spin doctors? What a sad state of affairs.

Red-Handed

The former Attorney General, former Minister of Infrastructure, currently beleaguered owner of a few billion 'vijisenti' Mr. Andrew Chenge was caught on CCTV a few nights ago doing something very fishy inside Parliament. Mheshimiwa was filmed entering the building after hours in the company of a Parliament staff member, and sprinkling an unknown substance on every all the MPs' seats. He spent an especially long time hovering around the Speaker's chair. I am guessing it was not linen freshening spray.

Yes, for really. Seriously! No lie. Straight story. A senior politician and reputed lawyer has resorted to shifty shenanigans to get his vijiploblems fixed in the Bunge. Personally. He did it his own grow-ass self. And got caught too. I guess when your career is going up in flames, no measure is too desperate or too stupid to be attempted. Add in that dratted security technology and a once-respectable man becomes a bit of a joke.

Dear Mr. Chenge, may I advise you to go sit in the corner and take a time out? I understand that it may not be in your nature to give up without a fight, but matters have progressed beyond the stage of struggling. Your goat, Mr. Chenge, is roasted. Your chickens have come home and they are roosting. You are reaping what you sowed, et cetera. What you have left in the public eye at this point is a tiny little modicum of dignity, that stuff that we so willingly accord to old men with money and pot-bellies. I suggest you hold on to it with both hands. Sneaking around ju-juing your fellow MPs isn't the way to do it.

Coming soon to a health clinic near you: a subsidized sex-life

I found this in my inbox this morning courtesy of Cynthia. I am not entirely sure what to make of this article, except to say that the saying 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions' was coined for these kinds of incidents. Ms Medlin's line, in particular, is priceless. Do we assume that people who are living in poverty aren't rational enough to consider long-term consequences of their behavior unless someone provides a $45 incentive? Why does this make me feel mildly nauseous?

By Andrew Jack in London

Published: April 25 2008 22:25

Thousands of people in Africa will be paid to avoid unsafe sex, under a groundbreaking World Bank-backed experiment aimed at halting the spread of Aids.

The $1.8m trial – to be launched this year – will counsel 3,000 men and women aged 15-30 in southern rural Tanzania over three years, paying them on condition that periodic laboratory test results prove they have not contracted sexually transmitted infections.

The proposed payments of $45 equate to a quarter of annual income for some participants.

The programme, jointly funded by the World Bank, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Population Reference Bureau and the Spanish Impact Evaluation Fund, marks an important step in the fight to tackle Aids, which claims 2m lives a year.

In spite of billions of dollars spent annually on treatment and prevention worldwide, there were about 2.5m new HIV infections in 2007, predominantly in Africa.

Carol Medlin from the University of California, San Francisco, one of the researchers, said: "We hope this 'reverse prostitution' will make people think hard about the long-term consequences of their short-term behaviour."

The Tanzanian experiment is a big advance in efforts to test public health ideas more rigorously, with some participants placed in a control arm not offered payment in order to track the effects of the programme precisely.

"Conditional cash transfers" have already been used in Latin America to motivate poor parents to attend health clinics, and have their children vaccinated and schooled. Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of New York, last year unveiled a project to boost school attendance.

The designers of the Tanzanian programme believe that payments of $45 when combined with careful counselling could play an important role in reducing HIV infection, especially for vulnerable young women.

The study will be conducted by the Ifakara Health Research and Development Centre in Tanzania, in conjunction with researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, the University of California, San Francisco and the World Bank.

The Tanzanian trial programme, which is still subject to fine-tuning and ethical approval, will not specifically test for HIV, which is costly and already widely conducted in the country. It will use proxies including gonorrhoea, and guarantees any participant found to be infected receives state treatment.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008