It is all too obvious that Aljazeera failed to do its homework. It is surprising to me because, usually, their documentaries are fact-checked before production. Understandably, though, with someone like Eva reporting for them from Ghana, and with the importation of Nigerian cameramen to do the job, it is almost certain to me that she was on a treasonable mission. Maybe, it was for such a malicious reason that she was being so esoteric about it otherwise why did she not give the job to her own kin? We have even better Ghanaian cameramen and women, with emphasis on women, who could have been contracted to do the job. Not only did Eva Atiboka cause to mislead the world against her own people, she also disenfranchised her brothers and sisters by giving the job of shooting the documentary to foreigners instead. I reckon, these are the mannerisms of a nation wrecker that she has exposed herself to be!
It is imperative to know that Aljazeera’s mischievous and negative documentary was filmed on a Sunday when most people were at church, hence their ability to influence a few naïve villagers who were overwhelmed with the cameras and the opportunity to be ridiculed across the globe by people seeking to impoverish Africa and Africans, prancing at the least opportunity to kill the African Dream!
Shame on Aljazeera for such untoward behaviour! So, does the management of this media network think that child slavery in Ghana is rampant? Have the macho journalists of Aljazeera ascertained whether their reporter has a child servant at her home or not? Of course, if she has, she will say that it is her distant relative that she is caring for, and so will all others who behave in this surly manner, taking advantage of poverty to employ their relatives in their homes in the city under the pretext of raising them when these children, really, are in servitude. Aljazeera must ask those working for it to investigate their correspondents and their teams who are disseminating such fake stories how many underaged relatives they have working for them as servants!
It is a norm that in villages, children often help their families on farms over the weekends and on holidays. There are some that fetch water for their households before going to school, is that, also, slavery? Why doesn’t Aljazeera ask those anchors that are of African heritage about the normalcy of this kind of life here on the continent? These are our traditions, so the West or their assigns cannot impose their own ways on us just like we cannot impose our traditions on them. I, for example, used to help my father on his poultry farm as a child, carrying loads of chicken feed on my head and back; did that make me a child slave? I did it for as far as my memory can go back in time with eager and glee. Sometimes, he would fetch me from school and proceed directly to the farm to do chores like feeding the chicken and gathering eggs. Other times, on weekends, I would accompany him to participate in the slaughtering and dressing of chicken for onward distribution to restaurants and supermarkets, so what might that be referred to, if I may ask? It certainly made a responsible man out of me; I can tell you that!
Everyone belonging to the knit and fabric of Ghanaian society has done some form of work on farms or other places for their parents at one time or the other, but the demagogues at Aljazeera and other networks seemed to adopt the strategy of Gog and Magog just to spread hatred and tension all over, in this specific instance! Shame, again, on Aljazeera Network for raising rubble and filth where the environment is a healthy and clean one for the sole purpose of doing the bidding of the Colonialists that seek to reinvent colonialism in the cocoa industry and others!
On the other side of the equation, there are the children of Western farmers that work on farms, driving tractors as early as ten or twelve years old among other chores like helping to roll up hay and gather fodder for their animal husbandry, what is that called? Recreational activity? It is child slavery if practiced in Ghana, but recreational activity if practiced in the USA, Europe, or the UK! How come, other cocoa producing countries on other continents do not get exposed in such bad light? You want to know why? Well, it is because they do not possess the trump card to give them the muscle to fight for better conditions for their farmers. The international cocoa industry cannot do without Ghana’s produce that is rich and pure, hence their struggle for continuous dominance of the business. By doing what they did, Aljazeera sought to put the livelihoods of millions of farmers in the manipulative hands of Western buyers! Believe you me, it will never work!
The Western countries, and all developed countries in the northern hemisphere for that matter, are heavy producers of carbon dioxide due to massive deforestation over the years that created room for humongous ranches for the production of meat and dairy. Cattle droppings (dung) emit methane gas that has the propensity to produce thirty times the levels of carbon dioxide which rise into the upper atmosphere and are transported via air masses across the hemispheres. In Africa, for example, due to the thick tropical forests, these levels of carbon dioxide are sequestrated to produce oxygen. GOD in HIS Wisdom created plant and forest cover that survive on carbon dioxide by photosynthesising, thereby, releasing oxygen as a byproduct, which is what human beings live on. In plain terms understandable by the average person, let me just say that we fart carbon dioxide that plants and trees require while they in turn fart oxygen which we, human beings, need. This form of symbiosis guarantees the continuity of life.
However, due to the movement of air masses, carbon dioxide is exported from those ranch intensive countries to the forest areas in Africa, Latin America (Amazon Forest) and others where it is sequestrated and returned as oxygen, which is exported back to the ranch countries. So, by default, the Western rogue nations are exporting poison to us and we are exporting pure oxygen back to them. Somehow, we always seem to be on the disadvantageous part of the equation, and as if we do not have enough problems to grapple with, they come attacking us for the little money that we may get in the process.
It is alright for them to shave their forest cover and replace it with grasslands for their animals while it is not okay for us here in Africa to do same because that will threaten their existence. To them, Africans may die because we are lesser human beings! No one cares about us, but if anyone dies from amongst their lot, it is described as tragic. THE HYPOCRISY! THE SADISM!
That is why carbon audits must take place. The unfortunate countries that are affected by the greed and insatiable thirst for our blood must be made to pay a premium for the oxygen that is produced and exported to the bullies of the West who should rather allow their forests to regerminate to acceptable norms while they find other means of rearing their cattle.
By Fadi Dabbousi