Scott Bartley (seated right), country director of the fictional Aid for Aid: “Many of you will ask who I banged to get this position?” https://www.devex.com/en/blogs/49/blogs_entries/82828?source=MostPopularNews_5
Here is the story at NewEurope (hat tip: Jewell). Be sure to check it out and see the hilarious trailer!
Kenyan producer Hussein Kurji has created a mockumentary which humorously reveals real issues facing international NGOs. The show, titled The Samaritans, portrays Aid for Aid, a completely dysfunctional NGO.
The show, produced by Xeinium Productions, a Kenya-based production company co-owned by Kurji, is a comedic satire is meant to expose the sometimes dubious nature of large, international NGOs. It centers around the fictional Aid for Aid’s Kenya field office, which, as Kurji put it, “does nothing.”
[….]
Kurji explained how, after being asked to pitch a comedy show, he conceived The Samaritans as a mix of The Office and crazy NGO stories he had witnessed or heard from friends who worked with different organizations.
The show includes many of the critiques of big NGOs: the detached bosses who fly in from New York or London to try and micro manage operations in a country they know little to nothing about and lack of transparency or accountability about where and how funds are actually being used, among others.
Speaking of large NGOs out to save the world, I couldn’t help think about one of the largest in the US—The International Rescue Committee, one of nine major federal refugee contractors—and their glittery NYC media events(at the Waldorf Astoria) and their superstar CEO David Miliband with his nearly half million dollars a year salary!
Court says Ali Mohamed Ali not a pirate, now seeking asylum in US! http://thesomalian.com/us-dropping-case-against-man-accused-of-piracy/
Update February 19th: Writers at NRO blast Holder for botching this case, here.
The case against a middle-aged English-speaking “pirate” ended and now the question becomes, can Ali Mohamed Ali get asylum in the US thus setting up the problematic scenario that the Guantanamo Bay prisoners have also posed for out legal system. Try them in the US and if they aren’t convicted, then what?
The failed prosecution of an alleged Somali pirate — and the fact that that failure could leave him living freely, and permanently, inside U.S. borders — is highlighting anew the risks of trying terror suspects in American courts.
Just a few weeks ago, Ali Mohamed Ali was facing the possibility of a mandatory life sentence in a 2008 shipjacking off the coast of Yemen — an incident much like the one dramatized in the film “Captain Phillips.” Now, the Somali native is in immigration detention in Virginia and seeking permanent asylum in the United States.
Ali, who was accused of piracy for acting as a translator and negotiator for a crew of pirates, was partially acquitted by a jury in November after a trial in Washington. Prosecutors initially vowed a retrial but decided last month to drop the rest of the case against him.
That’s just the kind of situation that opponents of U.S. criminal trials for Al Qaeda suspects caught abroad have long feared: The government falls short at trial — and the courts eventually order an accused terror figure freed to live legally among Americans.
“It’s a trial, not a play. You don’t know how it’s going to end,” said Cully Stimson, a former military prosecutor and defense official now at The Heritage Foundation. “Justice has all sorts of twists and turns. … It really has to be thought through at the highest level of government before we take action to bring someone here.”
One current federal terrorism prosecutor said the Ali case and the potential for his eventual release is another reason why foreign Al Qaeda suspects picked up overseas should not be brought to the United States but should instead be detained at Guantánamo or some other facility.
“It’s a significant risk … to say, ‘Oh well, we’ll just turn him over to the immigration service’” if a criminal case falls apart, said the prosecutor, who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak publicly. “You can’t count on the justice system working out just the way you want it to.”
Even some proponents of closing Guantánamo and relying on American civilian courts to prosecute alleged terrorists agree that the collapse of the Ali case highlights the potential downside of bringing suspected terrorists to the United States for trial.
Read the next sectionabout other cases and the pitfalls. Then back to Ali’s case near the end of the article. This was a dumb move by someone in the Obama Justice Department! Ali had a good claim that he was a hostage negotiator, an official in Somalia, and seems to have been an unlikely pirate! No, not getting soft on Somalis! Just something stinks about this whole government case!
The Ali case went off the rails for the government in the face of his claims that he was solely trying to resolve the hijacking of the M/V CEC Future — an event in which 13 crew members were held hostage for 71 days. While prosecutors contended Ali was “every bit as responsible” as those who carried weapons, the middle-aged English speaker, who had spent more than two decades in the United States, may not have seemed like an eye-patch-wearing or AK-47-toting type. [What he was doing in the US for 20 years (refugee?) and not becoming a citizen is a question I would like answered.—ed]
By the time of his arrest in 2011, Ali was serving as education minister for an autonomous area in Somalia. Officials lured him back to the United States by inviting him to attend an education conference. He was arrested when he landed at Dulles International Airport.
Minneapolis City Council Member Abdi Wasame with supporter Rep. Keith Ellison
From the Minneapolis Star Tribune (hat tip: Steve). Emphasis mine:
A day after political tensions in Minneapolis’ Somali community erupted into caucus-night chaos, leaders grappled with how to repair their image and simultaneously channel its massive political ambitions in a more peaceful manner.
The Cedar-Riverside precinct hadn’t even elected officers Tuesday night when a brief melee broke out between activists on opposing sides of a legislative race between DFLers Mohamud Noor and longtime Rep. Phyllis Kahn, highly unusual for the normally staid events.
Facilities staff decided to end the event, at the Brian Coyle Community Center, prompting a handful of police officers to begin loudly dispersing hundreds of confused attendees.
“It became a farce,” said Minneapolis City Council Member Abdi Warsame, a Kahn supporter who became the country’s most prominent Somali-American politician last fall.
“And now the community looks bad. Now the Somalis look horrible … All the negative assumptions people have of our community [are] going to come to the fore because three or four individuals couldn’t behave themselves.”
Warsame, who was not at the Coyle Center, has received about 50 calls from concerned community members.
He worries that people will stop participating if the process isn’t improved. “People might start saying, ‘If I go to these places, people will start fighting each other.’ ”
The Somali community has grown into a major political force in Minneapolis, able to assemble massive numbers of voters at political events.Some well-attended yet similarly chaotic caucuses in April helped propel Warsame to win the DFL endorsement over incumbent Robert Lilligren, who complained that the events were tainted by irregularities.
But many attendees who speak little or no English are also not well-informed about the process, raising fears among opposing activists that voters will be manipulated.
The number of mostly economic migrants trying to reach Europe has gone through the roof since this time last year! Most are seeking asylum (of course) and most will not be granted ‘refugee’ status.
Note that of the 1,123 rescued, 1,000 are young men.
Italy’s navy has rescued 1,123 people from inflatable boats in the space of 24 hours, as clandestine migration from North Africa reaches record levels.
The latest migrants were found in eight boats and a barge about 120 miles (222km) south-east of Lampedusa.
They included 47 women, four of them pregnant, and 50 children, all probably from sub-Saharan Africa, the navy said.
[….]
Some 2,000 migrants landed on Italian shores last month, nearly 10 times the number recorded in January 2013.
[….]
According to the government, last year saw an “incessant and massive influx of migrants” with a total of 42,925 arrivals by sea, or more than three times as many as in 2012.
[….]
Once in Italy, the migrants will be assessed to see if they have legitimate grounds for claiming asylum.
They have to satisfy the authorities that they are fleeing persecution and would face harm or even death if sent back to their country of origin.
Nearly three out of four asylum applications in EU states were rejected in 2012. [But, are those rejected sent back to Africa or left to wander Europe?—ed]
Read it all. Also, check out the BBC’s Mediterranean migration route map we posted here. Note that Turkey (Istanbul) is a main hub for the illegal migrants.
Addendum: Arab Newssays ‘go after the people smugglers’ to stop the flow.
When your “welcoming” community is preparing to open its arms to refugees for the first time, remember it is required by federal law that your local government is responsible for the cost of educating the kids (don’t forget the ESL budget), and for providing interpreters for medical services (refugees come with HIV/AIDS and TB, need costly meds) and for any court proceedings (how much did that recent refugee murder trial cost Utah or the Colorado rape trial cost?).
One huge problem that happened near where I live is that fire and rescue had an emergency involving a refugee they were not aware of, and due to a language barrier an unnecessarily expensive and frightening ‘rescue’ occurred because they thought the woman had Ebola (a disease first discovered in the Congo)!
Here is some useful data for your consideration. Local governments! Better get your translators lined up!
Top ten languages spoken by recent refugees! (from WRAPSnet) Note Arabic is number one!
