remarkable media silence on congo protests
Published:
December 11, 2011 00:47
by
rikki
Neighbourhoods: west_end whitehall
this evening there was a massive police operation in central london to control a passionate but mainly peaceful protest by up to 1000 congolese people which began in whitehall, spreading to trafalgar square, and with further breakaway groups marching through the west end. mainstream coverage has been minimal.
fact sheets
sit-down protests meets santa-con santas
disturbing images
whitehall cordon
all ages present
lote of FIT around
cordon closing in on sit-down
clearing roads
people dragged to pavement
officer JI 44 who kept assaulting women
huge police operation
pushing protestors into the square
charing cross traffic stopped by breakaway group
shaftesbury avenue
what we all want
stay back
arrestee dragged into bookshop
another violent arrest at royal academy
crazed baton wielding TSG with elderly woman
click on image for larger version. 'some rights reserved' - free for credited non-commercial use, otherwise contact author for permission
----
today's protest follows two others this week, with serious clashes between police and hundreds of protestors outside downing street on tuesday, and on thursday evening oxford circus was closed down for a while, and police arranged for an empty train to ferry protestors to seven sisters station for dispersal in tottenham.
but you'd be hard-pressed to find much about these events on bbc or other mainstream media other than a brief report of 143 arrests this evening, with no explanation of the issues other than it being 'a demonstration over election results'.
well, according to the very passionate voices on the streets tonight, the issue is years of mass rape, genocide, and repression (with UN estimates of more than 5 million, nearly a tenth of the population, murdered in the past decade) and the western states' support for an illegitimate leader after rigged elections.
the protestors believe that joseph kabila, who this week was announced as clear leader in the first democratic elections in the country in 40 years, is a corrupt rwandan military man with a deadly army unit of 7000 soldiers who is supported by western interests. they believe that etienne tshisekedi has a much larger popular vote, with estimates of support above 50%.
it is not hard to see why the west would meddle in the affairs of this huge country. it has vast mineral wealth, being the main world source of 'coltan' used widely in mobile phones, as well as cobalt, copper, uranium, gold, diamonds, tin, and zinc. as is often the case in africa, despite these huge resources, the standard of living of ordinary people in this rich country has been spiralling downwards for years.
the congolese protestors see cameron, sarkozy, and obama as the three biggest hypocrites, looters, and supporters of the illegitimate regime responsible for the human rights abuses in their country. with the first results of the election coming out, they see western support as a key ingredient in the rigged vote.
on tuesday a few hundred congo supporters blocked whitehall outside downing street, and as police TSG cleared the road, one protestor was violently head-butted and received a broken nose (fortunately caught on video by activists and soon to emerge).
today, up to a thousand protested again in whitehall, and the road was blocked for hours with a huge police containment operation failing to get to grips with the protest, and breakway groups forming further road blocks around trafalgar square and other parts of london.
as i arrived at around 7 this evening, a group of a couple of hundred were sitting in the road at the south side of trafalgar square at the top of whitehall. with huge numbers of police engaged in containing the main crowd in whitehall, the road blockade lasted for up to an hour, and during that time, at least a hundred more actually broke through the police line in whitehall and joined them.
for the most part, the protestors were very passionate and committed but peaceful.
as hundreds of riot police flooded the area, an operation began to push protestors into trafalgar square and off any roads. more sit-downs occurred and police became violent in removing them.
one particular officer, JI44, seemed to take great delight in continuously assaulting people, including passers-by, and particularly worryingly, women.
eventually, this large group of protestors was pushed into trafalgar square, but as more riot police entered the square from the north, several hundred protestors made a break up the steps and marched along charing cross road. catching the police out completely and avoiding being kettled, they set off on a boisterous walkabout down shaftesbury avenue, and along piccadilly.
overstretched police became involved in occasional scuffles with protestors and there were several violent arrests.
numbers dwindled gradually, and i headed back to trafalgar square to see what was happening, but there were few protestors left there, just vast swathes of police lines.
i heard later that there were more than a hundred arrests around pall mall, apprently for "affray", which seems most unlikely based on what i'd witnessed so far.
of course, among the boisterous crowd, there were some youths who took things too far, and i heard reports of photographers being attacked, and passers-by being harrassed. perhaps i was lucky, but my own expereicne of the people i met was that they were desperate to be heard, were passionate, loud, and boisterous, but completely peaceful and frightened for their compatriots.
they kept asking why the bbc wasn't covering what was happening in the democratic republic of congo and were desperate for their voices and for the plight of their people to be heard.
Contact email: rikkiindymedia(At)gmail[dot]com
Additions
Capitalisation
Published: December 11, 2011 07:59
by
Pete
I appreciate the article but why does it have no capitalisation whatsoever? Capitalisation was made to aid communication, why would you leave it out and make the article harder to read?
Thanks
Published: December 11, 2011 11:39
by
putdownyourguns
Thanks for this article.
I stumbled across this protest last night and was astounded that is was really only the Congolese community out on the streets. I was talking to some of those protesting and they were so tired. Tired of their voice not being heard. Tired of the violence, corruption and pain.
There was a 9-year-old girl who could tell me all about how and why soldiers rape and murder. It broke my heart that such a young girl was so aware that her beautiful country is devastated by these stoppable atrocities. She even mentioned how the children there have 'to make their own toys'. Not good enough.
I was told it wasn't safe to pass through, but the swarms of forceful police were more unnerving than the requests for peace.
Thanks again for this.
it's on the BBC website
Published: December 11, 2011 12:46
by
anon
I just read it on the BBC website, so it's not not been silenced that much?
I watched them arrive at Trafalgar Square
Published: December 11, 2011 12:52
by
Douglas
I stood with my wife by the Lions at Trafalgar Square as the mob arrived. I moved off to watch the carol singers by the Christmas Tree and enjoyed the lovely festive spirit. We soon moved up the stairs to look over towards the crowd arriving. What I saw shocked me.
The first feral group of girls lead the much of the abusive behaviour. A few had turned up prior and been greeted warmly with a hug by a large chap in the choir. Soon these girls used the platform as a stamping tool to gain volume. Some opened the area to the tree and I feared the worst for the small children with families watching.
No sooner had these girls egged on the mob, than a few 'boys' aged 15 - 19 arrived a picked up anything and threw it into the crowd. This included cups of hot drinks and bottles of water. the groups with younger children instantly moved to safety as this one youth in particular with a hoodie and a light blue scarf across his face head towards an area with several drinks and launched them at people, hitting one woman in the face. She approached him and remonstrated, he responsed by shoving so hard she lost her footing. The kind of shove you do not expect a 15 year old boy to give a 40 year old woman - ever!
At this point it became highly charged and a few moved towards her, the large man from the choir - to his credit, forced 6 or 7 back in one strong push. Catastrophe averted and no doubt her life saved!
From here on in a few girls were screaming and shouting, their energy likened to that of the possessed. A few others, calmer and more sincere talked and negotiated the situation and an exit.
I was shocked to see so many British Transport Police less than 100ft away doing nothing to assist. Police were lined up within view and let this happen. That woman could easily have been killed in my opinion.
I had a great afternoon in London seeing a show in the West End prior to this. Sadly this behaviour angered me too much to stay, and we left and returned home earlier than planned. I was, and still am shocked at the behaviour of these children/youths.
Their attitude and behaviour is not right, and it should not go unpunished. It is sad to say, but were I downstairs instead of on the balcony and someone had pushed my wife or I, their night would have ended a lot quicker that they planned. I guess they were fortunate, as was I.
I saw the photographer in the mix of the crowd taking pictures. I decided to use my camera phone from the balcony with flash on to alert the youths to the fact people were watching and recording the incident. None are any good, but the short video clip does show the end of the confrontations.
Disgusted and disappointed
Published: December 11, 2011 14:12
by
caroler
I was the organiser of the choir group that were singing the carols when the youths kicked off. We are a group of friends who had come together to collect money for Macmillan as many of us have been touched by cancer. People in our group had flown in from all corners of the world - the UAE, Canada, Spain.. I had children from my class in the crowd who had come to join in with some of the songs, something they were very excited about and had worked hard to learn their words. What happened was outrageous. Those youths were looking for trouble. They were extremely aggressive and violent. Their message was lost because of their behaviour. I have no sympathy for people that are violent and show complete disregard for small children or anyone else for that matter. How on earth did they manage to create such havoc for so long? 20 minutes passed before there was any sign of the police! It's disgusting. What would have been a happy life long memory for many that were there, it became a nightmare. My friend was hit by a flying bottle, the woman mentioned above is suffering from breast cancer. It's just wrong.
I appreciate the reason for their protest but there are ways of telling that story. Its hard to be sympathetic towards an aggressor.
Interestingly, the man with the big camera (Paparazzi) appears to have been 'with' the group. A conversation was overheard between him and the youths - they told him to stop photographing them as they were assaulting people. They didn't want that on camera. He'd been with the group the whole time. I'd be interested to see what happens with those photos.
trafalgar square incident
Published: December 11, 2011 16:30
by
rikki
i saw the trafalgar square incident in question. it was indeed instigated by a very small group of congolese youths, and their behaviour was misplaced and unacceptable.
i imagine that when they saw the brightly lit festive carol scene, having just been first imprisoned and then pushed around by police, they wanted to lash out at the comfortable cosiness of it all, perhaps representing to them that our christmas season seems most based on buying shiny new electronic equipment at the expense of the lives of the congolese people (find out about coltan if you don't know what i mean by this).
these kids however, got it wildly wrong in this instance, and the macmillan charity collection is about as wrong a target as they could have chosen. on top of which, their behaviour was completely unacceptable, uncaring and downright dangerous.
having said that, and totally understanding the anger of the macmillan people, given that this small group of nasty youths represented about 0.1% of the overall protest, i'd rather this thread wasn't hijacked over one shocking but unrepresentative incident and that the main issue of an ongoing holocaust backed by western interests remains the focus of sensible comments.
in response to the person who flagged up the bbc article above - were the issues covered? no, they weren't. the one protestor quoted gave the impression the main issue was electoral fraud, but despite her mentioning people being killed every day, the bbc finish with the fact that 4 people were killed in the congo, missing out the small matter of a tenth of the population killed in the last decade - we're talking between 5 and 8 times the population of birmingham. where is the analysis of western interests responsible for this genocide?
latest news on arrests
Published: December 11, 2011 16:39
by
rikki
the police announced the following figures a short while ago:
139 arrests yesterday:
3 charged for obstructing the highway (oh wow, during a protest, really?)
3 charged for breaching SOCPA (unlawfully demonstrating near parliament - a reprehensible law in a supposed free democratic society)
1 charged for assault on police (often used against protestors after police have assaulted them - expect a string of police witnesses in court with strangely similar notes)
3 people cautioned for obstructing the highway and breach of SOCPA (cautions handed out to people who aren't sufficiently knowledgeable about the law to know that cautions are generally tried when the police know they haven't got enough evidence for a sustainable charge)
10 people bailed to return pending further enquiries (chilling effect on protest - no surprise if on return there's no further action)
3 people released no further action (speaks for itself)
116 people remain in custody at various police station across london (held for 18 hours already without charge - hope they know enough to get good independent lawyers and prepare to sue the police for compensation)
maths
Published: December 11, 2011 16:40
by
simon
the issues weren't covered, but i do feel the last poster was possibly being ironic as to why the incident happened, or niave, and to say it was 0.1% of those present, does he mean one person? there seems agreement that around 1000 people attended, with the hard work undone by a small minority,
do the math!
Published: December 11, 2011 18:50
by
rikki
durrrr, yes i should have put 1%, not 0.1%. numbers clearly not my strong point. there were maybe up to ten youths (if that) directly involved in the incident.
so please read as "no more than one percent" - still hardly representative of the demo in any way.
Where has our humanity gone?
Published: December 11, 2011 21:40
by
Kabeya
First of all I would like to thank all of you for your comments. It means a lot to all of us fighting for the congolese people cause.
Regarding the Trafalgar incident, I totally understand that the organizers were and maybe are still furious about it. They felt that chiildren's live were put in danger by the erratic behovior pf the "mob" and police took "very long" according to them to show uand do something about it. What I am now asking them to do is to put themselves in the shoes of the "mob" and try to imagine what it feels like to know that 5 to 8 million people have died (numbers are still increasing by the day) in your country and one of the men responsible for that is beingg kept in power by western leaders using various tactics including "not covering any of it in mainstream media" because of economic interests? People are dying!!! Those kiids probably had hot chocolate and yoghurt after the incident!!!! The ones in Congo, if they are not dead, then they are still wondering what hot chocolate tastes like because western powers (including England and the leaders the choir's leaders voted for) are keeping in place murderers in power!!! Choir leaders, you hold that position because you are serving God. If it is only religion to you, then i understand your anger. If it is Christianity, you should not be able to sleep for days after hearing what's going on in the Congo. Where has our humanity gone???!!!!
error...as always
Published: December 11, 2011 21:58
by
anon
you wrote "(cautions handed out to people who aren't sufficiently knowledgeable about the law to know that cautions are generally tried when the police know they haven't got enough evidence for a sustainable charge)"
This is sadly a total load of crap, spouted by those who are also lacking in legal knowledge.
A caution is only allowed to be issued if there IS enough eveidence to charge but the suspect has suffcient lack of previous convictions for like offences to warrent it. The caution can be offered but does not have to be accepted and this is spelt out at the time that the offer is made.
Like those so called "street lawyers" maybe a couple of episodes of "law and order" or "rumpole" dont really cut it in the real world.
cautions too
Published: December 12, 2011 00:06
by
rikki
"anon" is now descending into abuse. i think we know your job mate. actually in the "real world" we all know how the police use cautions. the real indicator of what goes on in reality is the number of times that charges get mysteriously dropped after people refuse to accept cautions.
meanwhile, once again, i ask if comments can be about the real issues of genocide and western implication rather than silly nitpicking.
russia vs congo
Published: December 12, 2011 01:54
by
themuffeledcriesofcongo
First off to the caroler my sincerest apologies for what happened to you and the ladies it should not have happened and it was despicable to see some people detract from what was supposed to be a peaceful protest.
The situation in Congo has been severely overlooked but instead the western media focus their efforts on the protests in Russia,whilst i say this not to demean the protest in Russia as the protests are of a similar nature,however the Congo is a nation whose history is permeated by widespread violence targeted at ordinary civilians.Considering that clashes in the Congo between Kabila loyalist and opposition supporters could escalate into civil war if tensions aren't thawed,the lack of comprehensive media coverage that engages with the issues at the heart of the matter instead of it being mentioned as an aside or only having the focus on the negative aspects of the protest are profoundly shocking.
The protest are not limited to the UK and protest have taken place across the world and people are evidently angered at being robbed of a fair outcome.Although i don't agree with the use of violence present at the protest for heavens sake let the Congolese revolution be televised and not merely as a passing issue.
how much does an iphone really cost?
Published: December 12, 2011 13:46
by
rikki
link to an excellent and moving blog on this protest and the issues behind it
http://hesmackeditbro.wordpress.com/2011/12/11/how-much-does-an-iphone-really-cost/
Does anyone know...
Published: December 13, 2011 11:46
by
iphone-hater
...if the issue is specific to iphones?
Or does it include other technological devices?
Does anyone have links that explain why the iphone industry in particular is a problem here?
More info and links appreciated.
Does anyone know...
Published: December 13, 2011 21:41
by
oNKeNI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrU2Nz2XX3I&feature=related
We as consumers are collectively more powerful, and can make these big Cooperation’s do as we ask them to as they would not exist without us, our money and our need to purchase the latest gadget they manufacture.
We should refuse to buy any of the products which includes Conflict Minerals.
If <<<<you>>>> could do that you would be choosing life over death for those who risk their lives to get these minerals needed to make these gadgets so that you can be on trend and keep up with the Joneses.
I am not saying stop buying!!! But stop supporting suffering
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrU2Nz2XX3I&feature=related
Conflict Minerals Company Rankings | RAISE Hope for Congo
follow this link anf you would get an overview on the companies and thier rankings!!!
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/climate-change/cool-it/Guide-to-Greener-Electronics/#.TuS19TGhz-w.facebook
Not just i-phones
Published: December 14, 2011 19:37
by
Mhairi McAlpine
Its not just i-phones but practically any technological device you can think of. They need Coltan to work - and 80% of the world supply of coltan is in the Congo.
Couple of blogposts with more background
http://mhairi.wordpress.com/2011/12/12/on-the-congo/
http://mhairi.wordpress.com/2011/12/14/more-on-the-congo/
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Thanks so much
Thanks v much for being there & reporting this...can't believe there were so many people arrested & hardly a mention...could it be because they're congolese by any chance?