Documents show politics drove Alberta's decision to lift COVID restrictions, critics argue

Thu, July 14, 2022 

Dr. Deena Hinshaw, Alberta's chief medical officer of health, prepared a PowerPoint presentation that was given to cabinet ahead of its Feb. 8 decision to ease public health measures, which included eliminating masking in schools. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press - image credit)

Two key documents — shielded from the public until now — are providing some insight into how the Alberta government came to ease COVID-19 public health measures earlier this year.

A Court of Queen's Bench justice in Edmonton recently rejected the government's cabinet confidentiality claim and ordered a PowerPoint presentation and cabinet committee minutes be disclosed. It stemmed from a case challenging the decision to remove the province's school mask mandate and block school boards from bringing in their own.

Lawyers for the Alberta Federation of Labour (AFL) and the parents of five immunocompromised children argue Albertans have the right to know what led up to the decision to lift the mandate.

The first of the highly anticipated documents is a Feb. 8 PowerPoint presentation prepared by Alberta's chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, which was presented by Health Minister Jason Copping, according to the province.

It offers three possible options for lifting restrictions, seemingly crafted within the parameters of earlier guidance from the Priorities Implementation Cabinet Committee (PICC).

"Per previous PICC direction, three-step approaches to easing are proposed, with a focus on removing the restrictions exemption program and easing youth masking requirements," the PowerPoint presentation said.

The first option proposed significant easing in Step 1, including eliminating school masking right away.

The second option suggested more moderate easing initially with school masking lifted in Step 2.

The third option left the approach open to the cabinet committee.

"The options presented to cabinet very much skewed in favour of lifting restrictions," said Lorian Hardcastle, who teaches health law and policy at the University of Calgary.

CBC

"Interestingly, embedded in what I would expect to be a scientific discussion were considerations around political concerns and economic concerns. And very notably to me is that one of the "pros" listed in this presentation was to have Alberta be a leader in reopening, and that has nothing to do with science. That's politics."

In its discussion about timing, the document noted certain unspecified metrics would need to be achieved before moving to next steps and that "Alberta will be a leader in entering the endemic space, balancing the risks and benefits to easing before other Canadian jurisdictions."

Cabinet committee minutes

The provincial government was also ordered to hand over cabinet committee meeting minutes from Feb. 8, the day it announced its plans to lift public health measures.

The minutes — which include the decision reached but no documentation of any discussion — show the second, more moderate option was chosen.

But the framework for easing restrictions that was actually put in place differs from the second option presented to cabinet and it appears the plan was modified.

The province lifted masking in schools two weeks after moving into Step 1 and before moving into Step 2. It also lifted the overarching provincial mask mandate earlier than the scenario laid out.

According to Hardcastle, with no record of the cabinet discussion, it's impossible to know exactly what led to the changes.

"We don't have a lot of information on how or why that decision was reached, and I think that's unfortunate from an accountability perspective," she said.

Colin Hall/CBC

While the PowerPoint laid out a plan for removing public health measures, it also noted Alberta was not yet in the endemic phase.

Any easing of measures, it said, "should be predicated on declining rates of new COVID-19 hospitalizations over a sustained period of time."

The PowerPoint noted the COVID positivity rate at the time had been stable for a few weeks, and while hospitalizations seemed to be at a "plateau," they were "still high and straining the system."

It also warned that once COVID infrastructure is "ramped down," it would be difficult to re-establish quickly and that an uptick in cases would be expected as restrictions eased.

"If the situation worsens and the continued transition to endemic is not possible due to the level of strain on the acute-care system, the reinstatement of public health measures may be recommended," the PowerPoint reads.

The AFL, which is one of the applicants in the case, calls the revelations in the documents "unsettling."

"They had their eyes clearly focused on politics and their own narrow political interest, rather than the broader public interest where their focus should have been," said AFL president Gil McGowan.

"I find it really troubling that the government was making a decision that was going to affect the health and safety of so many people, including our kids, just so they could say that they're first. That's not something that should be on their mind. What they should be focused on is the public interest and public safety, not bragging rights."

Alberta government defends decision

The Alberta government said the documents filed in court show what they've argued all along.

"We moved forward with a plan to safely lift public health measures, in line with other provinces and other countries, based on the best available evidence, and advice from Alberta Health and the chief medical officer of health," Steve Buick, press secretary for Health Minister Copping, said in a statement emailed to CBC News.

"We stand by our decision to lift public health measures, including ending mandatory masking in schools. It was the right choice for kids, and it did not pose undue risk to our communities."

Buick said the documents show the provincial government did not cast aside advice contained in the PowerPoint presentation.

Suggestions that we ignored or overrode recommendations are simply false. - Steve Buick, press secretary for the health minister

"The minister of health provided cabinet with three options, presented uniformly without a recommended option. Cabinet chose from those options. Suggestions that we ignored or overrode recommendations are simply false," said Buick, adding the provincial government is determined to avoid disruption of schools in the future as much as possible.

What these documents highlight, one expert argues, is the delineation between public health and political decision-makers.

"It wouldn't be unusual for there to be fairly strict general guidelines announced by the decision-maker and then for the public service to work within those guidelines to give options on exact details of the implementation," said Dr. Michael Curry, a clinical associate professor in the department of emergency medicine at the University of British Columbia who teaches about legal and ethical issues.

"So I think what Albertans can glean is that there was a discussion between cabinet which put some limits on the options that would be brought forth by the public health office, and the public health office brought forward a number of expert recommendations to the cabinet. But the exact implementation seems to have been a decision that was made by the cabinet."

Behind the COVID curtain: formerly confidential Alberta government documents made public

The Provincial Court of Alberta released documents on Wednesday that provide the public a glimpse behind the curtain on how the UCP government decided when to begin removing Alberta's COVID-19 restrictions in February.


Dr. Deena Hinshaw, Alberta's chief medical officer of health, updates media on the COVID-19 situation in Edmonton, Friday, March 20, 2020.

Meaghan Archer - Yesterday 

The documents — which were previously marked confidential — were ordered by provincial court to be turned over by one of the authors, along with the health department and chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw, after the parents of five immunocompromised kids and the Alberta Federation of Labour sued the UCP government over the decision to lift the mask mandate in February.

Premier Jason Kenney announced on Feb. 8 that the province would be lifting the vaccine passport system, and only five days later, end the school mask mandate.

The decision was made shortly after the UCP COVID cabinet committee met and weighed options presented by Health Minister Jason Copping on how to move forward as Alberta transitioned out of the pandemic phase of COVID-19 and into the transition phase

The third and final phase is the endemic phase.

Read more:
Challenge on lifting mask mandate in Alberta schools denied by court

The document states that Alberta would be leading the way into the endemic phase with a “gradual removal of public health measures” to decrease risk.

However, the document warns that “lifting restrictions should begin only once pressures on the health-care system have sufficiently eased and are likely to continue easing.”

“From my perspective, it clearly shows that their eyes were focused clearly on politics, especially their narrow self-interest and politics, and not where it should have been, which is on public safety, especially for our kids,” said Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour.

As requested by the provincial government, Hinshaw provided recommendations for going forward with lifting all restrictions, which included ramping up the capacity of the health-care system as it was going to become overwhelmed, and warning of additional waves as a result of increased exposure.


“She was right about all of her warnings and they just ignored them. And now we're paying the price,” McGowan said.

Read more
Disclosing Hinshaw’s COVID-19 restriction discussions won’t affect cabinet confidentiality: expert

Overall, she gave three options on removing restrictions, the first being removing the majority of restrictions, including removing masks in schools in Step 1.

The second option kept more restrictions in place and the school mask mandate not being lifted until Step 2.

The third option left all decisions up to the cabinet.

“The big, big takeaway for me was just how focused this was on reopening being a key driving concern of our pandemic policy,” said Lorian Hardcastle, associate professor of law at the University of Calgary's Cumming School of Medicine.

“There's a lot of criticism out there that the government's approach at times favoured politics over what made sense from a public health perspective. And I think we see elements of that in this presentation.”

The government denies ignoring or overriding any of Dr. Hinshaw’s recommendations.

Read more:
COVID-19: Edmonton, Calgary school boards weigh in on Kenney dropping mask mandate for kids

“The minister of health provided cabinet with three options, presented uniformly without a recommended option. Cabinet chose from those options,” Steve Buick, press secretary to the minister of health, wrote in a statement on Wednesday.

“We stand by our decision to lift public health measures, including ending mandatory masking in schools. It was the right choice for kids and it did not pose undue risk to our communities."

“I think that the government's concern is that if we start to erode away at cabinet confidence, there will be very little that they can discuss that voters in the public won't ultimately get access to,” said Hardcastle.

The biggest lesson, according to McGowan, is that “we really desperately want to make sure that we don't make the same mistake in the fall that was made in the spring.”

— With files from Tom Vernon, Global News

Video: Alberta drops mask mandate for kids, education minister says boards can’t enforce their own

Kenyan farmers swap tobacco for beans

Over 100 Kenyan tobacco farmers took part in a government-backed project to plant sustainable crops instead of the usual tobacco plants. Their first harvest so far already yielded 135 tons of high-iron beans.



Farmers have sold 135 tons of beans to under the World Food Program's regional buying scheme

Some 100 Kenyan farmers were part of a pilot project to help farmers transition from tobacco to alternative food crop farming. The World Health Organization (WHO), the World Food Program (WFP) and the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) funded the project and helped retrain the farmers.

They were given the opportunity to transform their fields from tobacco leaves to a myriad of crops — including corn and sweet potato.

DW's Thelma Mwadzaya, who visited the farms, says she saw sprawling vineyards alongside neatly done homesteads. She attributed it to a sign that "the farmers are living under better living conditions."

"The project in Migori for the tobacco farmers is a major shift towards attaining a healthy nation and the Ministry of Health fully supports such ventures," says Kenya's Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe.

Farmers' health is a major concern for the Kenyan government and the UN agencies
Health hazards and school dropouts

Farming tobacco plants contributed less than 1% to Kenya's economic development. The farmers were further exposed to serious health risks, such as cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, over 20 different types or subtypes of cancer, and many other debilitating health conditions, according to the WHO.

During handwashing of tobacco leaves without protective gloves, farmers expose their skin to the highly-addictive nicotine substance.

The WHO also reports that more than 6,000 Kenyans die of tobacco-related diseases every year. The global annual death toll of 8 million deaths occurs mostly in low and middle-income countries, which are "often the main targets of intensive tobacco industry interference and marketing," according to the global public health institution.

Most of the farmers say they were happy to move away from such health hazards and towards less labor intensive and environmentally friendly farming.

"My teeth have fallen and left me in bad shape," said Patrice Chitang'ita Kisunte, a farmer from Sakuri in Kenya's southwestern Migori county.

"I advised [other farmers] to stop tobacco farming and plant other things like maize, beans and potatoes."

The health of the farmers was one of the major concerns for the Kenyan government and the three United Nations agencies. Another was mass school dropouts among farmers' children.

"When tobacco was being grown actively, there was a lot of school drop outs," says Rose Ghati, a resident and farmer in Kuria.

"They used to leave school because they know that tobacco is there and they can make money off it."

WHERE DO YOUR WINTER ROSES COME FROM?

Bright colors

The homes near Kenya's Lake Naivasha are as colorful as the millions of flowers grown there each year. Known as the "flower bed of Africa," the area north of the country's capital Nairobi, exports cut roses, carnations and other blooms around the world. The industry is central to the country's economy. But it has a dark side too.

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Markets for the goods

The UN agencies launched the Tobacco Free Farms project in Migori County with the government of Kenya to mitigate these issues. The collaboration is the first of its kind in the world.

According to the WHO, the project has seen farmers' health improve, increased school attendance amongst children previously working on the farms, and crops which are considered better for the environment replacing tobacco.

"Right now, my kids have time for homework, but during tobacco farming, they did not," said long-time tobacco grower Alice Achieng Obare, one of hundreds of farmers in Migori county who have moved away from tobacco.

Kenya used to be a major export of tobacco leaves

"WFP has provided a ready market for high iron beans, promoted good agricultural practices, nutrition sensitization, and post-harvest loss training," says Simon Cammelbeeck, the managing director of the Farm to Market Alliance, another partner in the project.

Growing beans has the added advantage that they are full of iron, which is said to help counter numerous heath and development problems among children and pregnant women.

"The process used in that project is for the entire value chain, from production of what we call alternative food source to putting food on the table," says Husna Mubarak, a project officer with FAO.

"Most importantly there's technical support, on how to till the land, plant the seeds, and most importantly provide capacity to ensure that you are able to add value to it, package it and be able to market it out."



Watch video04:47
Kenyan farmers embrace organic farming

Knowledge transfer

Kenya had ratified the legally binding WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in 2004 and became the first country in the world to pilot the alternative tobacco project.

"We are encouraging the farmers to farm other cash crops," Elizabeth Robi, assistant chief of the Sakuri area in Kuria East, told DW.

"Most farmers have shifted to coffee. This is because that tobacco was affecting even the person who is not farming through inhaling that smoke. So their health has improved."

The government and the three UN agencies plan to take the knowledge from the pilot project to farmers along the former tobacco belt in Kuria West.

Thelma Mwadzaya in Kenya contributed to this article.

Edited by Keith Walker

THE KANGA: EAST AFRICA'S CULTURAL JEWEL
A rich fashion trend history
The origin of the kanga can be traced back to coastal East Africa in the mid-19th Century. It is believed that some stylish women in Zanzibar had the idea of buying printed kerchiefs in lengths of six. This was later modified into pairs. They were sewn together into single designs called 'Leso' after the square kerchiefs that had originally been brought to Africa by Portuguese traders.
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Africa still too reliant on commodities exports, UN says

Nearly 60% of African countries remain dependent on exports of commodities despite decadeslong efforts to diversify. A shift to technology and financial services could help them withstand economic shocks, the UN says.

The United Nations has called for African countries to diversify their economies away from commodities

African countries must break their reliance on commodities exports for economic growth and diversify towards higher-value services, the United Nations warned Thursday.

The call comes as the price of many key commodities — which skyrocketed over the past year to the benefit of many African export-led economies — have begun to cool off.

In its Economic Development in Africa Report 2022, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) urged governments across the continent to boost investments in technology and financial services, among other sectors.

UNCTAD noted that 45 of the continent's 54 countries still remain dependent on agricultural, mining and extractive exports, despite decadeslong efforts to diversify their economies.

'Highly volatile revenues' from commodities

The report said the heavy reliance on commodity exports like oil, gas, minerals, food and agricultural raw materials resulted in ″highly volatile revenues″ for low-income nations due to the ″price boom and bust nature of the market.″

The paper described the so-called ″resource curse,″ where commodities-rich countries tend to have low growth and development outcomes due to the price instability of their exports.

UNCTAD said this vulnerability is ″often amplified″ by geopolitical factors and events like the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2008-9 global financial crisis.

While several African countries have taken steps to boost their services sectors, the UN body noted that they have been mainly focused on transport and tourism, which now makes up to two-thirds of service exports across the continent.

Information technology (IT) and financial services account for just 20% of Africa's services exports, it said.

By moving economic sectors up the value chain, African nations could better weather economic shocks like climate change, future health emergencies, and the food crisis exacerbated by the Ukraine conflict, UNCTAD said.

Africa needs more high-tech investment

″Our latest report focuses on the services sector … particularly enterprises that are high-skilled and high- knowledge, such as fintech, health care technology, logistics technology as well as agriculture and energy [technology],″ Paul Akiwomi, UNCTAD's director for the Division for Africa, Least Developed Countries and Special Programs, told DW.

Akiwomi said investments in new economic areas would also bring benefits to support countries' existing commodity sectors, for example, through new technologies.

"We believe that this can alter the development trajectory of many countries, moving them away from being solely commodity-based to more diverse economies," he added.

He gave the example of Mauritius, which was an agricultural economy with sugar cane as its major export. Over the past 20 years, the Indian Ocean island has diversified its economy and more recently has moved into financial services and fintech, winning substantial investments from India and the United States.

UNCTAD is pushing African nations to create the environment for high-tech startups to thrive

″Now SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises] account for 40% of GDP and 56% of jobs. So this is a massive shift in the diversification of the economy,″ Akiwomi told DW.

He also noted how Nigeria and Kenya have become major hubs for fintech and health tech startups respectively.

Economic diversification would also help to boost the new middle class in Africa as it would create more high-skilled jobs in operations, finance, engineering and marketing, among others, the UN spokesman said.

However, UNCTAD's report said it was vital that African governments provide adequate regulatory frameworks and financial mechanisms, and called for more innovative financial instruments for local SMEs to secure access to financing.

″The financing of SMEs that are innovative and technology-driven is still a very difficult area in Africa,″ Akiwomi told DW, adding that ″the culture of lending money for an idea is still not there.″

Citing data from the International Finance Corporation, UNCTAD's report noted that Africa's 50 million SMEs have an unmet financing need of $416 billion (€415 billion) every year.

African free trade zone will help growth

The paper described how the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), which took effect in 2019 and which aims to create a single market for the continent's 1.4 billion people, will help new sectors thrive by boosting inter-Africa trade.

"AfCFTA allows for scale," Akiwomi said. "Each country will be moving at a different pace and level based on their comparative advantages."

"You have shorter distances between countries, you get access to intermediaries, lower trade costs, access to other services. All of these benefits would allow African countries to transform their economies," he told DW.

A startup in Benin has come up with the Xover COVID infections tracking app

Commodities boom helps but hurts too

Rising commodities prices as a result of supply chain delays in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic have been a blessing and a curse to many African countries.

While nations have achieved much higher prices for their exports, African consumers and businesses have not escaped the much higher costs of oil, gas, food and fertilizers.

While some financial analysts have declared a new commodity supercycle — a longer era of higher prices for raw materials — prices have already started to moderate in recent months.

The price of copper has since fallen to an 18-month low and oil prices are more than 20% off their recent highs, further boosting the argument for new, more reliable engines of growth.

Edited by: Hardy Graupner

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Amazon offers concessions to end antitrust probe, says EU

Amazon has offered to "refrain" from using the data of competitors after the EU accused the US retail and tech giant of collecting the information to benefit itself at the expense of its rivals.



Amazon aims to end a pair of antitrust investigations with a series of concessions to the EU

Seeking to resolve two European Union antitrust probes, Amazon has offered to stop using data related to its competitors to boost its own retail business, EU regulators said on Thursday.

The EU's competition authority has accused the online giant of using the data to benefit its own retail business, to the detriment of rivals that also sell on its platform.
Amazon to treat sellers equally

With the threat of a multi-billion dollar fine hanging over the online retailer for its data collection practices, an EU statement said Amazon "commits to refrain from using non-public data relating to, or derived from, the activities of independent sellers on its marketplace."

More specifically, Amazon has offered to treat sellers equally when ranking their offers for the "buy box" on its platform, which generates a large portion of its sales.

Amazon will also insert a second buy box for a rival product if it differs considerably in price and delivery from the product in the first box.

Accusations of breaching 'EU antitrust rules by distorting competition'

In November 2020, the bloc's executive branch, the European Commission, released a statement saying it had informed Amazon of its "preliminary view" that it had "breached EU antitrust rules by distorting competition in online retail markets."

The European Commission accused Amazon of "systematically relying on non-public business data of independent sellers who sell on its marketplace, to the benefit of Amazon's own retail business, which directly competes with those third-party sellers."
Under the microscope

Last week Britain's competition watchdog — the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) — launched an investigation into whether Amazon has been abusing its dominance in the marketplace to undermine rivals.

Thursday's concessional move from Amazon is not the first time it has decided to try to stave off EU sanctions. In 2017, it scrapped some clauses in its distribution deals with European e-book publishers, leading regulators to call off their probe.

In 2019, Amazon restructured its terms of service for third-party merchants and persuaded the German antitrust agency to end its seven-month investigation.

jsi/sms (Reuters, AP, AFP)

Sri Lanka: President Rajapaksa emails overdue resignation

Protesters were withdrawing from government buildings as they awaited the president's formal resignation. Gotabaya Rajapaksa had promised to step down by Wednesday.

Issued on: 14/07/2022

Colombo was relatively calm on Thursday, a day after exiled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa had promised to step down

Sri Lanka's embattled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa sent his letter of resignation to parliament via email on Thursday — a day after the Wednesday deadline he had repeatedly given himself to leave office.

Rajapaksa and his wife fled to the nearby Maldives on Wednesday aboard an air force jet. Rajapaska landed in Singapore Thursday where authorities there said he was on a "private visit" and had neither requested nor been granted asylum.

Reports earlier on Thursday said he was on his way to Singapore before possibly continuing on to Saudi Arabia.

"The authenticity and the legality of the e-mail will have to be checked out" before being formally accepted, parliament speaker spokesperson Indunil Yapa told the AFP news agency, adding that a formal announcement was expected on Friday. 

Over the weekend, protesters had stormed Rajapaksa's presidential palace, and on Wednesday, they also occupied the office of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who had quickly taken over as acting president and now is bearing the brunt of the protesters' anger.

Wickremesinghe responded with a nationwide curfew, adding: "We can't allow fascists to take over."

After months of protests, the streets of Colombo were calm on Thursday morning after protesters appeared to broker a truce with authorities.

Protesters occupied Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's office on Wednesday, but agreed to withdraw on Thursday

Protesters ready to stand down

"We are peacefully withdrawing from the presidential palace, the presidential secretariat and the prime minister's office with immediate effect but will continue our struggle," a spokesperson for the demonstrators said on Thursday morning.

The negotiations to vacate the occupied buildings follow clashes between protesters and police on Wednesday night outside parliament that saw one killed and 84 injured.

"This building is a national treasure and it should be protected," Omalpe Sobitha, a senior Buddhist monk who supported the protest movement, told reporters. "There must be a proper audit and the property given back to the state."

Sri Lankans are cautiously waiting for President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to formally resign

The road ahead

Sri Lankan lawmakers have agreed to elect a new president on July 20 to serve for the remainder of Rajapaksa's term, which ends in 2024. The new president could in theory appoint a new prime minister, pending the approval of parliament.

Whoever takes the reins from the Rajapaksa political dynasty will be tasked with bringing Sri Lanka's economy back from collapse. Food, fuel and medicine remain in extremely short supply.

As one 24-year-old university student told the Associated Press: "Gotabaya resigning is one problem solved, but there are so many more."

Street party draws curtain on Sri Lanka's Rajapaksa era

Sean GLEESON and Maryke VERMAAK
Thu, July 14, 2022 


Exhausted and drained after nearly 100 days of protests, a small crowd gathered its remaining strength Thursday to celebrate the resignation of Sri Lanka's leader at the seaside headquarters of their campaign to oust him.

A stone's throw from what had days earlier been the office of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, people smiled wearily at their compatriots as they danced, handed out sweets, embraced each other or waved the national flag.

For more than three months, the seafront boulevard has been home to a cluster of tents used as a staging post for protesters demanding the despised leader step down for his role in driving Sri Lanka's battered economy to ruin.


But only a few hundred people gathered to mark a major milestone in months of agitation, when Rajapaksa emailed his resignation from a safe haven in Singapore after fleeing the country to escape public wrath.

Many veterans of the protest movement were exhausted after enduring tear gas barrages and tense confrontations with security forces in the preceding days.

For others, the moment was marred by word that a legal technicality may delay formal recognition that Rajapaksa had indeed stepped down.

"I certainly feel, I think the crowd here definitely does feel, quite happy about it," activist Vraie Balthaazar told AFP.

"But at the same time, I think there's also until we see the letter, there's always a sense of apprehension."

Part of the small crowd drawn to the protest camp on Thursday evening danced to an improvised call-and-response song by performers on a wooden stage, chanting through a scratchy public address system, as a bemused pair of Buddhist monks looked on.

Elsewhere, the camp continued its function as a safety net for residents of the capital immiserated by the country's economic crisis, with a group of needy citizens queuing up at a soup kitchen.

Nearly all of those present had left by midnight, in the face of evening rains, Sri Lanka's chronic petrol shortages and a government curfew imposed to contain unrest.
- 'People's power' -

The subdued celebration was a far cry from the high-octane confrontations on the streets of Colombo at the weekend, when huge throngs of people elbowed their way past troops to seize Rajapaksa's home and office.

Soldiers had fired in the air to clear a passage for the president's escape, mirroring the ignominious exit of his brother Mahinda, the ex-premier, from his own residence two months earlier.

Their departures, along with the resignation of sibling finance minister Basil Rajapaksa in April, have wounded -- perhaps terminally -- a clan that dominated the country's politics for much of the past two decades.

"We feel really amazing. We have shown the people's power," university student Anjana Banadrawatta told AFP.

Under Sri Lanka's constitution, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe will automatically become acting president until parliament can appoint a successor.

But protesters are also demanding Wickremesinghe's resignation, accusing him of helping to prop up a political order that has allowed corruption and authoritarianism to flourish.

Banadrawatta said he and others would continue their struggle in the morning.

"We are starting a new fight tomorrow with new hope," said the 22-year-old.

But before then, he added, "of course we are going to have fun and celebrate."

gle-mav/slb/to

How has Sri Lanka's economic crisis impacted its Tamil minority?

Amid the economic and political turmoil in Sri Lanka, experts say the country's Tamil minority, who paid a heavy price during the civil war, feel victimized all over again. Some are fleeing to Tamil Nadu in India.

14/07/2022


Analysts say it's harder for Sri Lankan Tamils to protest because they would have to deal with the military

Sri Lanka's economic and political crisis has reached a breaking point in recent weeks, with the island nation facing severe shortages of essential supplies and fuel.

Thousands of Sri Lankans took to the streets in the capital Colombo, demanding that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe step down.

But protesting is a luxury many Sri Lankan Tamils do not enjoy, and scarcities induced by the economic crisis are also not new to them, says Nilanthan, a political analyst based in the northern Sri Lankan city of Jaffna.

Sri Lankan Tamils, the country's largest ethnic minority, account for nearly 12% of a population of 22 million, and are mainly concentrated in the northern and eastern provinces.

The ethnic minority shares deep social, cultural and linguistic ties with people in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, and has been struggling to recover from decades of a civil war that lasted until 2009 and claimed around 100,000 lives.

'We are being victimized again'

In the island's latest economic and political crisis, Nilanthan says Sri Lankans "are all equally affected across different ethnicities and social backgrounds."

"There is no fuel and essential commodities everywhere. But it is an additional burden for Sri Lankan Tamils, as we are being victimized again. We are victims of war and now we are also victims of the economic crisis, '' Nilanthan told DW.

Packiyanathan Ahilan, a senior lecturer at the University of Jaffna, says economic suffering is something Tamils in the northern and eastern provinces are all too familiar with, having endured shortages for many years during the civil war.

''Tamils were already trained to survive without fuel, gas and electricity and less. So somehow, they can manage the ongoing issue based on their many years of experience being a Tamil in Sri Lanka. But it is difficult to live and run a day-to-day life for them too," Ahilan told DW.

Tamils 'cannot protest'

Sri Lanka's northern and eastern provinces have hardly seen protests like the ones which took place in other parts of the country.

"Sri Lankan Tamils living in these regions cannot protest," said Nilanthan. ''Apart from isolated incidents of altercations between protestors and police officials, the protestors [in other regions] have largely remained unharmed… If Singhalese [largest ethnic group in Sri Lanka] agitate, they deal with the police. But here, we would have to deal with the military, '' Nilanthan added.

Thangamuthu Jayasingam, a Batticaloa-based attorney and director of the National Peace Council, says Sri Lankan Tamils who have come out to protest for other issues have suffered for it.

''Hence, they are cautious about actively protesting… But Sri Lankan Tamils support the protests heart to heart. They never voted for the Rajapakshas,'' Jayasingam said.

Civil protests have placed a spotlight on misgovernance and the divisional tactics of politicians based on religion and ethnicity.

Ahilan says protesters are calling for the removal of the politically powerful Rajapaksha family because of corruption. "Tamils want justice for war crimes."

The Rajapaksha family played a major role in Sri Lanka's civil war and their victory in the war was also one of the reasons they came to power.

Some Sri Lankan Tamils are also demanding structural changes, including more autonomy and demilitarization.

"If Sri Lanka does not sort out its minority issue, it will pull them down in the international stage too,'' said Jayasingam.

Escape to Tamil Nadu

At least 100 refugees, mostly Sri Lankan Tamils from the Northern and Eastern provinces, have arrived in India's Tamil Nadu in the past months. Many of them sold their homes and lands to pay for their boat trips to escape Sri Lanka's economic crisis.

"They think that Tamil Nadu is safe and whenever there is danger they flee there," said Nilanthan, adding that Sri Lankan Tamils are culturally and linguistically connected to Tamil Nadu.

According to Jayasingam, India is "a friendly country" for Sri Lankan Tamils. "Whoever has means to go there are trying to go. It is within reach for them. If things get worse, there will be more refugees in the future.''

With a significant Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora abroad, the remittance economy has also helped keep some Tamils afloat. But Tamils from lower income groups do not have access to this. ''They are only trying to enter India as refugees,'' said Ahilan.

All Sri Lankans are trying the best they can to manage their economic situation with limited resources, said Nilanthan. ''Sri Lankan Tamils are survivors of a genocide, and we will try to survive this too. ''

Edited by: Sou-Jie van Brunnersum

'Things are changing every hour': Sri Lankans' fury turns on PM after president flees

Issued on: 13/07/2022
01:50
Ranil Wickremesinghe, who was named acting president of Sri Lanka on Wednesday as its political and economic crisis deepened, is tantalisingly close to the pinnacle of power but may not get much time to enjoy it. FRANCE 24's Navodita Kumari tells us more on this tense day in Sri Lanka.

 

Opinion: No progress in Sri Lanka without total overhaul of political system

Without a complete transformation of the political system, Sri Lanka won't be able to eliminate the abuse of power and corruption that landed the nation in such dire straits, writes journalist Amirthanayagam Nixon.

12/07/2022


Public anger is running high amid Sri Lanka's worst economic crisis in decades

These are turbulent times in Sri Lanka, with the country plunged into full-fledged economic and political turmoil.

Despite the dramatic circumstances, the political class has not risen to the challenge. No politician seems to be in a position to come up with concrete solutions and put an end to the crisis.

Ever since news emerged that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa would step down on Wednesday as a result of the popular uprising against his government, there has been a race to decide who the next president will be.

The country's Sinhala ethnic-majority dominated political parties are also wrangling over who will become the new prime minister.
Political bickering over who should take over

Ranil Wickremesinghe, the leader of the United National Party, who took over as prime minister after the president's elder brother Mahinda Rajapaksa stepped down in May following violent protests, tried hard to resolve the economic problems.

Sri Lankan journalist Amirthanayagam Nixon

Wickremesinghe, who served as PM multiple times before his latest stint, has the political experience and the necessary connections internationally to secure foreign financial aid for Sri Lanka and get the country out of its economic hardship.

According to the Sri Lankan constitution, if the president resigns, the prime minister becomes the acting president, until parliament convenes and selects a new president.

So if Gotabaya steps down as promised, Wickremesinghe will automatically become interim president until parliament elects an MP to serve out the presidential term, which ends in November 2024.

But Samagi Jana Balawegaya, the main opposition party, is demanding that its leader Sajith Premadasa be made president.

The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna party, dominated by the Rajapaksa family, continues to enjoy a majority in parliament and wants the next president to come from within its ranks.

Another opposition party, Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, is seeking the prime minister's post.

While political parties are bickering, the general public, who are hit hard by soaring inflation and shortages of essential items, including food, fuel and medicine, are angry and dismayed by politicians' self-serving rhetoric and actions.

IN PICTURES: SRI LANKA UNRAVELS INTO POLITICAL TURMOIL
Sri Lanka spirals into political crisis
Sri Lanka's legislature has announced that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa will step down next week after widespread protests calling for him to take responsibility for the nation's worst economic crisis in recent memory.
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Ethnic conflict and military budget

Meanwhile, industrial production has plummeted, export earnings have dried up and government coffers are empty. The country is bankrupt and has nearly exhausted its already scarce supplies of fuel.

The reasons for Sri Lanka's current economic turmoil date back to the nation's almost three-decade-long civil war. This was a clash between the Sinhalese-dominated Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam insurgent group, which had hoped to establish a separate state for the ethnic Tamil minority, who make up about 15% of the nation's 22 million people.

Even though the conflict, which began in 1983, ended in 2009, successive governments continued to allocate more and more resources for the military at the expense of other development projects.

Despite the economic problems, Colombo earmarked 373 billion Sri Lankan rupees ($1.86 billion, €1.8 billion) for the 2022 defense budget, a 14% increase over the allocation in 2021.

In the 13 years since the end of the conflict, the Ministry of Defense has been the recipient of the highest share of government spending.

Ethnic tensions have hindered the country from developing its Tamil-populated northern and eastern regions, which are rich in marine resources. The development of those regions could boost the economy, particularly seafood exports, generating wealth and foreign income.

Likewise, the Kankesanthurai natural harbor in Jaffna, in the Northern Province, remains underdeveloped while the Trincomalee harbor on the east coast is used solely by the Sri Lankan navy for military purposes.

This imposes a huge economic cost on Sri Lanka as ships carrying goods from India have to sail all the way to the Colombo port, on the southern coast, incurring huge costs.

Total overhaul needed

Ethnic polarization, discrimination and a lack of meaningful power sharing with minority Tamil and Muslim communities are the root cause of the current political and economic turmoil.

To prevent such crises in future, there will have to be a total eradication of ethnic tensions, corruption and abuse of power. That will require a complete overhaul of the Sri Lankan state and power structure.

But the Sinhalese-majority dominated political parties and the Buddhist clergy are not ready for such changes, yet.

There are now steps being taken to pass the 21st amendment to the nation's constitution aimed at empowering the parliament and curbing the unfettered powers of the president.

But simply passing such an amendment without a complete transformation of the political system won't eliminate the abuse of power and corruption that landed Sri Lanka in such dire straits.

Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru

CHEAP LABOR, DEPRESSED ECONOMY

Why investors take a shine to eastern Germany

Foreign and domestic companies are increasingly looking to eastern Germany when seeking sound investment opportunities. There are a number of reasons for this trend as Hardy Graupner found out in the town of Guben.

Guben's mayor, Fred Mahro, points to where Rock Tech Lithium will hopefully build its facility to produce lithium hydroxide

From a window on the second floor of the town hall, mayor Fred Mahro overlooks the green spaces in the center of Guben. The eastern German town, located some 100 kilometers (62 miles) southeast of Berlin and close to the border with Poland, does not make it into the headlines very often.

But right now, says Mahro, Guben stands for the eastern German state of Brandenburg's increasing ability to attract crucial investments from home and abroad in future-oriented industries.

German-Canadian company Rock Tech Lithium is planning to build Europe's first lithium converter in Guben, which would be a pivotal element in the region's e-mobility drive. If everything goes to plan, the firm would produce 24,000 metric tons of lithium hydroxide annually — a crucial battery ingredient and enough to equip half a million electric vehicles with lithium-ion batteries.

Rock Tech Lithium has big plans for its building site in Guben — construction work is scheduled to start in autumn

Complete shift of focus

Like most areas in the former communist East Germany, Guben had to almost completely reinvent itself after German reunification in 1990. At that time most of its old industries broke away and the town's population shrank by half. The restructuring process has never really stopped, and when German lawmakers decided in 2020 to completely phase out coal, the lignite open-cast mining area around Guben was in shock again.

"When the debate about a possible exit from our lignite coal in the region started here some five years ago, we stuck our heads together in the town hall and discussed what it would take to create alternative jobs," Fred Mahro told DW. "It was clear that we needed to attract new businesses and that they would need suitable locations— so we didn't lose any time and secured permission from the authorities to build new plants in our huge industrial park."

Rock Tech Lithium is investing some €470 million ($473 million) in its future Guben location. It appreciated the fact that the groundwork was already prepared. The company had no doubt it wanted a European location for its converter as the continent takes the lead in electromobility and aspires to boost its self-reliance in critical industries. This is especially true now that the European Union is on its way to ban the sale of combustion-engine cars and passenger vans as of 2035. With these massive changes coming, the German-Canadian enterprise can count on rising demand for batteries for electric vehicles in the years ahead.

"We had looked all across Europe for a suitable production site, but in the end we prioritized Guben as our focus is not just on producing lithium hydroxide, but on sustainability," the CEO of Rock Tech Lithium, Markus Brügmann, told DW. "Guben had already been developed as an industrial site and it has an on-site rail connection which will allow us to avoid truck transportation."

Rock Tech Lithium CEO Markus Brügmann says opting for Guben was a strategic decision

The missing link in the value chain

The chief executive added that a location in the eastern German state of Brandenburg had almost become a must, considering the latest industrial activities in the area surrounding Berlin.

"Just look at what has been happening in Brandenburg in terms of the electric battery value and supply chain. We're just closing a gap," Brügmann explained. "You have everything here from the production of electric cars to battery manufacturing, but you don't have the production of lithium hydroxide yet, that's where we come in. So, strategically, we're at the right place in Guben with potential customers all nearby."

With negotiations about its Guben investment ongoing, Rock Tech Lithium doesn't want to disclose who its future customers may be. Suffice it to say that Brandenburg is also home to a Tesla Gigafactory and a large BASF plant where cathode active materials will be produced that are also needed for lithium-ion batteries.

Brügmann says that as early as 2030, about half of the materials to be used by Rock Tech Lithium in Guben will come from recycled batteries.

"There's no doubt that the big shift to electromobility has helped recent investment activities in eastern Germany," Claus Doll, project manager at the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (Fraunhofer ISI), told DW. "Had Germany continued to push combustion engine technology, it would have been a lot harder for them to secure a greater share of the pie, but now traditional structures are being dismantled as new technologies that didn't exist before are making inroads."

US chipmaker Intel plans to build several semiconductor plants in Magdeburg

Space is of the essence

What has played into the hands of authorities in eastern Germany is that the mostly rural and less densely populated states like Brandenburg and Saxony-Anhalt offer better greenfield investment opportunities than the traditional core industrial regions in the west and southwest of Germany.

"One big advantage that eastern Germany has is there's no lack of space for big projects — space that's so much harder to find in western Germany," said Doll. "And there's a profound interest in new technologies and industry in general. Communities there also come up with a lot of incentives to attract businesses and projects, which are quite often implemented faster in the east because of less red tape and a more practical approach."

The availability of vast spaces for new projects has indeed turned out to be a big plus, be it for Tesla's huge electric car factory in Grünheide, Brandenburg, or chipmaker Intel's plan to build several semiconductor factories for €17 billion in Magdeburg, Saxony-Anhalt.

"Space may not be relevant for all projects, but it certainly is for the big ones like the investments of Tesla and Intel where we're talking about at least 100 hectares each," Robert Hermann, co-CEO of the Germany Trade & Invest agency, agreed. "And such big available areas are definitely easier to find in eastern Germany," he told DW.

R&D: A lot of catching-up to do

A large proportion of the overall investment in eastern Germany has been going into production and not so much into innovation or research and development (R&D) where higher-paying jobs can be found.

"Research and development is primarily taking place in the traditional western hubs of the German auto industry," said Fraunhofer ISI's Claus Doll. "But there's hope that the new production sites in eastern Germany will gradually attract more research clusters. We need better storage technology for renewables, and a lot of research on that is already underway in eastern Germany."

Germany Trade & Invest, which is responsible for marketing Germany as a business location and attracting companies, agrees that a shift toward more R&D in eastern Germany is already well underway.

"The big investment projects by the likes of CATL [China's biggest producer of lithium-ion batteries] in Thuringia, Rock Tech Lithium in Brandenburg or Intel in Saxony-Anhalt, all of them in eastern Germany, will no doubt contribute to attracting more R&D and innovation to the region," GTAI's Robert Hermann argued. "Tesla for instance has already announced that part of its battery cell research will happen in Brandenburg and Berlin."

Emerging energy dilemma a spoilsport?

No matter which company puts down roots in eastern Germany, it will need a steady energy supply for production.

"Renewables cover about 95% of eastern Germany's electricity needs, and that's crucial for many investors," Hermann said. "It often influences their decision on where to put their money as they want to produce sustainably and flag this sustainability to their customers."

Though a lot of eastern Germany's electricity comes from renewable sources, it can be unreliable at times. Many industries need additional sources of power like oil or gas to run their facilities.

Russia's war in Ukraine and the ensuing Western sanctions have changed everything, with supplies from Russia no longer guaranteed and both German households and businesses preparing for an energy crisis in the winter months.

That's certainly a big headache for Guben's mayor.

"Investors might get cold feet given the energy problems ahead," Fred Mahro conceded. "The question is just when we will be able to almost entirely do without gas — that's something I cannot imagine right now for many industries, including those in Guben."

Rock Tech Lithium's chief executive is confident that a solution can eventually be found. "We don't see this as the end of any investment here," Markus Brügmann emphasized.

"There will hopefully be alternative natural gas from other sources; we also have a plan to use hydrogen that might eventually replace natural gas — but in the beginning, we will need natural gas, liquefied natural gas, and we're confident to secure the amount of LNG that we'll need as of 2024 when production is scheduled to kick off."

Opinion: Germany's Ahr Valley flood disaster management is the next tragedy

One year after the flood disaster in two German states, those affected are still struggling with the trauma and the consequences of political failure, writes Christoph Strack.

A year after the floods many of those affected are still dealing with the trauma and the authorities' inaction

The images of that night have left an indelible impression. They remain traumatic for the people who experienced and survived the flood disaster in western Germany on the night of July 14-15, 2021. People who feared for their lives, who are mourning the loss of loved ones, who lost everything.

These images also made it clear to everyone in Germany and Central Europe that life from now on would probably become even more unpredictable due to extreme weather events. That's another reason why those shocking images have left their mark.

Some of the scenes we witnessed from the affected regions became iconic within days. They were like a portent, shaking people awake, unsettling them, frightening them. At least 184 people died in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia when nature unleashed its almost unimaginable forces.

The last victims are still missing to this day in the idyllic Ahr Valley, where 134 people died. The lives of tens of thousands have been affected and many have had to start over from scratch. People will have to struggle with trauma and anxiety attacks for a long time to come.

Heroic stories and a political culture of failure

In the ensuing days, there were many stories of suffering and also impressive tales of heroic acts and stories of hope. They deserve to be told and listened to.

DW editor Christoph Strack

At the opposite end of the spectrum, there are stories of failure. German authorities and politicians like to portray themselves as acting in the best interests of their citizens, and to imply that this rich country is the navel of progress and digitization.

And then there are the failures inherent in systems and political decision-makers, which have so far only been insufficiently named and dealt with. Alarm chains did not work; regulations turned into obstacles; rescue helicopters lacked technical recovery equipment, and necessary communication was technically impossible. Lives were saved in many cases thanks to personal heroism. And lest we forget: Experts say the catastrophe was foreseeable days before.

Since the flood, people in Germany have donated more than €650 million ($651 million). The affected states and the federal government provided aid and set up reconstruction funds. And yet there are numerous reports from the flooded regions that people have been waiting and waiting, that there has been little progress. This is a disgrace and cannot continue.

Extreme weather events are becoming the norm

It should be clear to everyone by now that things will never be the same again — that's not really the point. You can't tell people that they should not build their house down by the river  without providing them with timely and concrete prospects.

This is all the more pertinent given that humankind will have to prepare for more extreme weather events in future. To cite just one example: Just days ago, we saw shocking photos and videos of glacier collapses of almost unimaginable proportions occurring in the high mountain regions in Italy and Kyrgyzstan. Just imagine the damage if there had been a dam somewhere along the line of such a glacier.

German viewers are used to seeing TV pictures of floods in Bangladesh or India, of drought in Australia or the Sahel, of burning forests in the Amazon — almost in passing just ahead of the sports results or the weather report, and too far away to concern us. But the images today come from even more places, from the Ahr or Italy, from the US or Greece, from Siberia or Oceania. It's serious.

Taking responsible action is a priority

The floods on the Ahr and Wupper rivers also became part of Germany's federal election campaign in September 2021. All eyes were on the climate crisis and the environment. But then the coronavirus reared its ugly head again, followed by Russia's attack on Ukraine. A society fixated on breaking news and outrage is dangerously quick to forget its long-term commitments. In doing so, it jeopardizes its resilience in crisis situations.

At the same time, the consequences of climate change and global warming will never leave us neither here in Germany nor across the globe. The Ahr Valley floods have shown that there is no such thing as a safe terrain any longer.

Understanding that makes it all the more important to help and to act, and to be able to do both responsibly. The stories from the Ahr Valley recounting death and suffering, hope and help and frustration, compel us to act together. And never to simply stop listening.

This piece was originally written in German.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/bordiga/works/1951/murder.htm

Murder of the Dead by Amadeo Bordiga 1951 

To exploit living labour, capital must destroy dead labour which is still useful. Loving to suck warm young blood, it kills corpses. So while the maintenance of ...