Africans to Bono: 'For God's sake please stop!'

"THE BONO WATCH… We checked out the web site of Forbes Magazine, co-owned by Bono, in late July and found an endorsement of pro-censorship lunatic Sam Brownback’s flat tax proposal and a relentless drumbeat for lower taxes for the rich. This is fine with Bono, who moved his corporate headquarters from Ireland to Holland to avoid paying a 12.5 corporate tax rate, less than Irish plumbers or teachers pay. Indeed, one reason Bono’s such a fan of George Bush is that Dubya has blocked European attempts to eliminate Continental tax havens.

Bono also says that “Bill Clinton did an incredible thing on starting this debt cancellation. He deserves real credit. And now, President Bush deserves credit for finishing it out.”

Bush “finishing out” debt cancellation? Bono is not telling the truth. The May/June issue of Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting’s Extra! breaks it down: “Before the G8 summit, African countries owed a combined total of $15 billion a year on debt payments; after the vaunted debt relief agreements, they owed $14 billion a year. Only a quarter of African countries were even eligible for the debt relief program, which required them to enact harmful neoliberal economic stipulations, like privatization of vital services such as water and education, and acceptance of heavily unequal trade rules that prevent true economic development. What’s more, none of them actually received 100 per cent debt cancellation.”

At June’s Technology Entertainment and Design conference in Tanzania, Andrew Mwenda, a Ugandan journalist and social worker, spoke out against reliance on foreign charity, pointing out that it had never succeeded in reviving an economy anywhere in the world, least of all Africa. He made his points only with difficulty however because throughout the speech he was heckled from the back of the room with shouts of “Bullshit!” and “Bollocks!” The heckler was Bono, who apparently believes that the nonsense he’s been spoon-fed by the likes of Bush and Tony Blair is gospel. What Bono doesn’t want to hear is the truth: He’s not one of the oppressed, the oppressed never asked him to speak for them, and he has about as much chance of leading Africa out of its economic and political problems as his political pals do of creating peace and justice in Mesopotamia."

taken from a email list I'm on

more on the conference here