Saswat Pattanayak
Call me superstitious, but somehow I always tend to hope for the maxim that speaks: All’s well that ends well. And hence, certainly in the last week of this month, I had not imagined the year 2006 would leave such bitter memories behind.
It all started with one death: Gerald Ford’s. And ended with one execution: Saddam Hussein’s.
What has Ford got to do with Hussein? I would probably have not wondered aloud such an analogy on another occasion. After all, one was the celebrated president of world’s oldest democracy, and the other was the disgraced president of a dictatorial regime.
For celebration of Ford’s legacies, there are museums, schools, world leaders and history books. For Hussein, only condemnations follow from all above quarters. We are observing memorial services cherishing the memories of Ford beginning Friday, whereas the global condemnation ceremonies to mark the former Iraqi head have started from Saturday. New York Times while pouring in rich tributes for Ford churned out a news story out of an obituary, headlined its editorial as “Gerald R Ford” to portray the legend on Thursday. And yet on Saturday, the liberal paper had made an editorial out of a hard news piece, and headlined its lead story of the day thus: Dictator Who Ruled Iraq With Violence Is Hanged for Crimes Against Humanity. Yes, that’s the headline from world’s most ‘respected’ newspaper, not a sentence from some kangaroo court.
And yet, amidst the word-games of the colonial language that accentuates the stark differences perpetuated by its mainstream media masters, I am struck by few similarities between the two dead former leaders.
Both climbed the ladders of politics not through legitimate elections, but by assuming power. Ford quietly succeeded a corrupt tax evader Spiro Agnew to become the vice president, and with a lot of pomp and show, inherited a corrupt war criminal Richard Nixon’s throne to become the president. Similar “corrupt bargains” were made in Iraq for Saddam to remain in power. Hussein quickly ascended Ba’ath Party ladders without the credentials, political, military, or otherwise. And earned his fame and glory in his attempt to assassinate the then Iraqi head Abdul Qassim. Ironically, just like Ford who rose to power without any mandate except merely with approval from the US Congress, Saddam’s claim to fame was reached through the American interventions in Iraq to fund the Ba’athists to get rid of left-leaning Qassim. In a sure manner well recorded, but seldom quoted, the US war machine created both Saddam, and Ford.
A New York Times columnist in an editorial piece (March 14, 2003) had done some elaboration, at least about Saddam, a few years back:
“The Iraqi leader seen as a grave threat in 1963 was Abdel Karim Kassem, a general who five years earlier had deposed the Western-allied Iraqi monarchy. Washington’s role in the coup went unreported at the time and has been little noted since. America’s anti-Kassem intrigue has been widely substantiated, however, in disclosures by the Senate Committee on Intelligence and in the work of journalists and historians like David Wise, an authority on the C.I.A.
From 1958 to 1960, despite Kassem’s harsh repression, the Eisenhower administration abided him as a counter to Washington’s Arab nemesis of the era, Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt — much as Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush would aid Saddam Hussein in the 1980’s against the common foe of Iran.
Then, on Feb. 8, 1963, the conspirators staged a coup in Baghdad. For a time the government held out, but eventually Kassem gave up, and after a swift trial was shot; his body was later shown on Baghdad television. Washington immediately befriended the successor regime. ”Almost certainly a gain for our side,” Robert Komer, a National Security Council aide, wrote to Kennedy the day of the takeover.
As its instrument the C.I.A. had chosen the authoritarian and anti-Communist Baath Party, in 1963 still a relatively small political faction influential in the Iraqi Army. According to the former Baathist leader Hani Fkaiki, among party members colluding with the C.I.A. in 1962 and 1963 was Saddam Hussein, then a 25-year-old who had fled to Cairo after taking part in a failed assassination of Kassem in 1958.
According to Western scholars, as well as Iraqi refugees and a British human rights organization, the 1963 coup was accompanied by a bloodbath. Using lists of suspected Communists and other leftists provided by the C.I.A., the Baathists systematically murdered untold numbers of Iraq’s educated elite — killings in which Saddam Hussein himself is said to have participated. No one knows the exact toll, but accounts agree that the victims included hundreds of doctors, teachers, technicians, lawyers and other professionals as well as military and political figures.”
The US war mongers funded the Iraqi despot to continue murdering communists and innocent civilians. At the same time, back home, they got Ford to continue the same legacy. Not surprisingly, Ford became not just the only unelected president, but even the most unpopular one at his time. He pardoned without any conditions whatsoever the biggest war criminal of recent times: Richard Nixon, the officially recognized disgraced president. Like Hussein, Nixon was a zealot anti-communist, a massive war and hate proponent. And Gerald Ford whose six day national mourning continues with half-mast flags, was the greatest supporter of Nixon. He provided all the support that Nixon required to save face, and his life. And no, all thanks to Ford, Nixon was not hanged.
Times have changed. But times do not change philosophically on their own tunes. They change just the way the ruling classes decide. And as predicted, after an initial hue and cry by the marketplace of ideas, Ford continued to be cherished for having pardoned Nixon and saved America’s image. Saddam, soon after the demise of communist powers, was brushed off as forgotten legacy that could have otherwise tarnished America’s image.
Today, alas, if we recall history accurately in its sequence and reasoning and ruling class motives and working peoples resentments, there is just one fallen guy between the two. And not surprisingly, Ford has been pardoned.
But there is worse in store. Now that Saddam is not there anymore, perhaps true to the nature of obituaries, true to the nature of support lent to Ford’s legacies after his death, many of us would invariably see light in Saddam as well. In the battle of ideologies, perhaps it would seem as though Saddam fought a different battle than that of American power elites. And after much accentuation of these differences, the corporate media would have succeeded in establishing a hyper reality of virtues and vices. And the reification of historical insanities may again begin when we either pay rich tributes to Saddam to posit him against America or vice versa. Or like the European allies in the war, when we take the moralist positions against capital punishment in order to oppose Saddam’s death.
Saddam’s death should have been quite predictable. After all, those that stop serving the masters, are condemned to harsh course. It’s the masters that we need to be beware of. The masters that enslaved Africa, colonized Asia, and impoverished majority of world population through global capitalism. If they kill their disobedient agents, that’s not a bother. We didn’t ask for the agent anyway. The point is we need not take the masters any longer either.
And neither do we want any more of their agents. Some of them may rally behind the masters, like Pinochet who died a natural honorable death recently. And some may yet go pose a challenge, like Bin Laden who may end up in Saddam’s shoes one day soon. But any indulgence in positing the agents against the masters is well playing into the plans. It’s like supporting the European leaderships today who are their virtuous best in the criticism of American punishment degrees. Or listening to New York Times declaring how the criminal against humanity is our man no more.
Either way, we would miss the boat. The issue is not in differences between two such elements borne out of greed, competition and oppressions. Not the difference between Ford and Hussein. It’s the similarities among them that should make us shiver.
Brother Malcolm X used to open his address with: “Friends, brothers and enemies…” If we succeeded in identifying the categories, we hopefully would have left the worst of times behind as we start marking a new year tomorrow.
Radical Notes 
Orissa: Throttled Dissent, Overstepped Laws, Displaced People
Here is a classic case of manufactured consent.
News is agog that India will have its Harvard University in next two years. Even Forbes Magazine testifies to that. The corporate media hails a proposed university in India to be the greatest hope of reified vision where huge mass of people will be educated for betterment of India’s economy; and, its poor state Orissa’s. It is being hailed as the institute that’s receiving the single largest donation ever worldwide: $1 billion, and yes its going to be the university with largest real estate holdings ever. So welcome to capitalism that apparently does good, through capitalists that claim to be philanthropists of great cause.
Are there any protests against the university? Hardly any. Who would protest establishment of a first world standard university in a third world standard country? Instead, there is huge celebration of this proposal, of a one billion dollar charity. It’s a poor peoples’ world, and free money counts. The donor, Anil Agarwal is being hailed as a messiah of sort whose generosity is redefining cannons of capitalism. ‘Let them eat cake’ is after all being replaced by ‘Let us serve them’!
The esteemed Chronicle of Higher Education has been publishing features to highlight Vedanta, and last week, it has advertised the vacancy positions, including that of a Provost and Chief Academic Officer. US-based Ayers/Saint/Gross Architects have been hired to design the Harvard clone. 8,000-acres of land are being earmarked for this gigantic project (Harvard has only 4,938 acres). In other words, the largest ever education project in the world is underway already.
Why?
The Corporate Charity for Profits Syndrome:
Last week, a LA Times investigation excavated how the richest man in the world Bill Gates evades taxes through his philanthropies. In fact, worse, his Gates Foundation invests 95% of its worth on industries that defeat the purpose of its 5% charity causes.
How much does Anil Agarwal, the 245th richest person in the world emulate the club chair? Totally. It appears, he fails to escape the capitalistic dictums: the crude greed in sophisticated pill. Proponent of the later stage of feudalism, landgrabbing capitalists have been targeting Africa and Asia for their wealth accumulation. And ironically, they have been employing causes such as AIDS and education as excuses to divert the public attention from the real issues: exploitation of resources, harassment of indigenous peoples, and murders of activists.
Behind the euphoria that outlines a $1-billion charity of Agarwal for the proposed university, lies the three years of vehement protests of thousands of indigenous/tribal people who are being inhumanly displaced a little distant away for a much larger corporate project that shall hamper the ecology and destroy livelihoods of local poor for the profits of the same bunch of profit mongers living in Britain.
The man who has promised to donate for university to educate people also happen to be the one who has been investing in nearby landmines to displace people and stake private ownership over public resources through suspect means. Only that, the dreams of furthering his landmining business would not advance if attempts are not made to eliminate the long prevailing popular resentments. And for that, the corporate house has taken shelter in some upper class intelligentsia that profits directly from a world-class educational institute in bargain. And this group of abettors comprises some high-profile educators inside India and outside of it, who have been impressing upon the media agencies to glorify this business house that funds their future abode.
The nexus between profiteering capitalists and kingpin professors also has complete consent from some political bigwigs and media business houses. All of them stand to benefit from a university that’s advertised as catering to upper class, upper caste youths of India who have had a remarkable private school education already, considering that the Vedanta University is to be based on “need-blind admissions”. So yes, in the most backward of states in India, only students with so-called ‘merit’ (implying most filtered students from urban school education) will benefit.
The Casualties of University:
I recently spoke with some activists participating in protests movements in Orissa against the Sterlite business expansions. The resentments are taking place at both the urban hotspots like Puri (near which the university is proposed) as well as in rural heartlands of Lanjigarh, Kalahandi (where the alumina project is underway).
Activists told me that at the university site, at least 20,000 people are affected by the project, whereas nearly a thousand are getting evicted. And yet, the business house is conducting press meets to send falsified numbers that the media are readily savoring. As per Ajit Kumar Samal, vice-president of the project, rehab packages are assured for all those going to be displaced. “The willing and educated persons of about 80 families, likely to be displaced, would be imparted capacity building training to absorb them in the project. We are ready to provide compensation amount as soon as the Government appoints a committee to fix the quantum” (The Pioneer, January 6, 2007). So, the number estimated by the Vedanta University stands at 80, from whom chosen few will be given compensation only after bureaucratic clearance. Of course, when it comes to affected people, the industries face bureaucratic hassles as well.
Adding more to the irony is the fact that with such billion-dollar promise quotes, the industry/government has succeeded in diverting the center of focus from Lanjigarh land scams to Puri as education site.
Smooth Operation:
For a business baron who, according to Forbes Magazine, “built his London-listed Vedanta Resources by acquiring state-owned mining and metal assets in India where main operations are located,” it was imperative that the protests of environmentalists and other activists be dismissed as routine hindrances in “developmental” path whereas the mass looting of home country resources for individual profit accumulation is planned out. Its as though, the onus on protecting the mother nature lies only with some professional environmentalists who need to be chided for receiving money from non-governmental organizations, whereas the greedy corporate houses’ demands be hailed all the while, for their skillful trampling down of peoples’ aspirations to hold onto their forest lands for their meager livelihood!
Vedanta Resources has already completed its 1.4 million tonne alumina project in Orissa’s Kalahandi district despite resistance. But the protest movements against its further plans to take siege of Niryamgiri Hill is continuing without much support of media or political outfits. Following the West Bengal model, even the state’s official communist parties have not reacted much apart from scantily registering protests against governmental repression. Only the Marxist-Leninist front of the left wing have come out to support the peoples’ causes. Lanjigarh at the first stage has already witnessed the $874 million project, but is unwilling to part with more of its sacred hills.
What’s shocking in the entire process is that in spite of mammoth popular opposition to the mining projects in Orissa, Agarwal’s Sterlite has managed to sign an agreement with the state Government under Naveen Patnaik to set up both the alumina refinery in Kalahandi as well as aluminum smelter and power plant in Jharsuguda. Subsequently it reached agreement with the Orissa Mining Corporation to jointly operate the Niyamgiri bauxite mines. The refinery is almost completed and the importing of bauxite through Vizag port has already started.
Not just that the majority people have no say in a plutocracy such as India, where the rich landgrabbers still rule the destiny of its poor, the private corporate houses also flout the laws of the lands to go to such extremes as displacing people and terming them as encroachers on their own lands. Not just the fact that such lands are illegal to be sold to non-tribals, but also the fact that Supreme Court appointed environment-empowered-committee has strongly disapproved of the project location, has not dissuaded the state government from its unholy alliance with the foreign firm.
Apart from its obvious anti-people repercussions leading to displacement of tribal groups, Lanjigarh has attracted ire of the Supreme Court of India and subsequently many environmentalists. As a result, Ministry of Environment & Forest has also recently issued directives to the Wildlife Institute of India to undertake studies related to the impacts of mining on biodiversity including wildlife and its habitat in the proposed Bauxite Mining area at Lanjigarh, Kalahandi as per the recommendations of the Forest Advisory Committee.
The findings, among other things suggested the following:
The manufactured euphoria over the richest proposed university in the world is as illusive as the concept itself. A business house employing power tactics, first tries to set up an ecologically disastrous mining project to exploit Orissa’s indigenous areas for private gains. Facing stiff opposition from people and environmentalists alike, it struggles to gain a foothold for almost three years. And finally, wins the corridors of powers as predicted, with a side dish, a dream university: one that has allured the intelligentsia and educated section of the state, to create a normalization that can facilitate corporate hegemony over a land’s soul—its peoples.