AFRIPOL.ORG IDEAS HAVE CONSEQUENCES
RUSSELL SIMMONS, DIAMOND AND AFRICA:WHO IS HELPING WHOM? -By Emeka Chiakwelu, the founder of Afripol Organization. 05/14/07
Russell Simmons the Hip-hop mogul and of recent, a diamond trader announced few months ago of a fact-finding mission to Africa as he commenced his Diamond Empowerment Fund(DEF).
According to him the intention of DEF is to teach Africans how to cut and polish diamonds rather than simply mining them. That was the initial agenda but since his return from Africa the mission has been altered from empowering to patronizing Africans.
This was supposed to be an empowerment agenda not a charity work.
"We want more of black Africans to become executives," the 49-year-old hip-hop mogul told the Daily News in Friday's editions, before his departure to Africa. "The diamond industry should be the leader of African empowerment," he equipped. That was concisely how Simmons made us to perceive his fact-finding mission. But since he came back from Africa his initial rap has changed. What happened to the mission? Has it become a deferred mission?
Botswana, South Africa, and Mozambique where Simmons and his delegation visited are relatively stable nations and diamond transactions in these countries are relatively safe and transparent. These nations were said to be implementing The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme.
The trip to these southern countries presuppose the movie, “Diamond Blood” - which delineated the harshness and brutality associated with diamond trade in Sierra leone. Since Simmons is now part of diamond industry, maybe he was used to project an benevolent face of the industry. Russell Simmons credible image was probably utilized by the industry for not only that he is of African ancestry, but he is also known as an activist with conscience.
The consequential fire of blood diamond was burning in Sierra leone, Liberia, Ivory coast and others, while taking a trip to safe places in southern Africa. This act by itself undermine his so-called commitment to the empowerment of the Africans as he put it.
Nothing is wrong with putting up a good public relation but he must be straight forward with us. Just keep it real!!
“My (only) agenda is to uplift African people … and all people” , Simmons said.
The mission of empowering Africans have now become a charity work of donating used computers, used books and lead pencils to desperate Africans. The strategic pictures taken with the poor African pupils were scattered worldwide in media and internet. Russell Simmons is bigger and beyond this mirage and must abandon this “we are the world” gimmick.
Russell Simmons and his friends continue to generalize on Africans. They should be specific and mention those countries they are sending their charity and spare rest of the African countries
from this humiliation.
© 2007 AFRIPOL.org
note :The Kimberley Process is a joint government, international diamond industry and civil society initiative to stem the flow of conflict diamonds - rough diamonds that are used by rebel movements to finance wars against legitimate governments. The trade in these illicit stones has contributed to devastating conflicts in countries such as Angola, Cote d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sierra Leone. The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme is an innovative, voluntary system that imposes extensive requirements on Participants to certify that shipments of rough diamonds are free from conflict diamonds. The Kimberley Process is composed of 45 Participants, including the European Community. Kimberley Process Participants account for approximately 99.8% of the global production of rough diamonds.
RUSSEL SIMMONS HEADING TO AFRICA ON DIAMOND MISSION 11/16/06
Russell Simmons the Hip-hop mogul will be visiting South Africa and Botswana diamond mines and factories on a fact-finding mission as he commences the Diamond Empowerment Fund to teach Africans how to cut and polish diamonds rather than simply mining them.
Majority of diamonds from Africa are cut in Belgian and Israel.
About 40 per cent of the world's supply of rough diamonds are produced by De Beers at their mines in Africa - South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and Tanzania, in conjunction with the respective governments of those nations according to its website.
"We want more of black Africans to become executives," the 49-year-old hip-hop mogul told the Daily News in Friday's editions. "The diamond industry should be the leader of African empowerment."
De Beers revenue in 2005 was US$6.5 billion and claims the diamond industry has a "zero tolerance" policy toward conflict diamonds.
Revenues generated from diamonds selling in war-torn African countries were used to purchase weapons that perpetuated sufferings in those nations.
A rapper Kanye West featured the song "Diamonds From Sierra Leone" in his CD about the evil of the diamond money, fueling wars in Africa and financing civil wars in Sierra Leone and Liberia in the 1990s.
