CBC's Neo-colonial approach towards Eritrea is a mockery of intelligence

The Fifth Estate: Award-winning trash journalism 

By Network for Swedish Eritreans (NSE)

The right of Eritrean people is certainly abused by Ethiopia’s noncompliance to the EEBC's final and binding border decision and flagrant violation of international law occupying undisputed Eritrean territory without any legal measures taken against it. Standing in far north Ethiopia, probably in the very Eritrean territory illegally occupied by the Ethiopian regime, CBC’s The Fifth Estate recently released a clearly biased documentary, titled ‘Nevsun in Eritrea: Dealing with a Dictator,” [1]. The documentary accusing Eritrea of crimes and human rights abuse purposely failed to mention the nonchalant and impotence of the UN to use its mandate to implement its own decisions and to stop the abuse on the integrity and sovereignty of Eritrean people, government and territory.

Like many African countries Eritrea is a land of mineral riches [2], a prospector’s paradise. Equally true, Eritrean government holds a policy that stands for cooperative arrangements, for mutual benefits which emphasizes reliable partnership, local equity and positive engagement [3]. This policy has been successfully implemented and demonstrated in the partnership between Nevsun and the Eritrean Government owning 60% and 40%, respectively with decisions taken in consensus style [4]. This partnership of shared benefits implemented on the ground between the Eritrean government and Nevsun is a genuinely people oriented model between developing countries and multinationals that should have been brought up in the report by CBC.

The CBC was blind by politically being biased and coming with preconceived perceptions and ideas and missed an opportunity for real news with a considerable Canadian flavour and impact coming from Africa. Considering that, Nevsun, probably is one of very few international corporations with a working principle of mutual respect and benefit, abandoning the old paradigm of neo-colonial exploitation African primary resources; The CBC could have uplifted the case of Nevsun’s operations in Eritrea as noble act for Canadian people’s pride.

However unfortunately, the CBCs program chose to focus on the baseless and biased argument, that the Eritrean Government used the proceeds from the mining operations in its support of terrorist groups, such as the Al-Shabab. Within 40 minutes and 40 seconds on Friday Feb 12, 2016 the program repeatedly aired a video clip from Al-Shabab groups and their hideous act on civilians in Kenya, falsely alleging Eritrean Governments involvement.

In its attempt to project a dramatic jaundiced effect indicating the Eritrean Governments involvement, the reportage failed to mention that:

the Eritrean Government’s declaration against terrorists groups. In fact Eritrea recently joined hands with Saudi Arabian initiative in the fight against terrorism [5] 

the Somalia Eritrea Monitoring Group (SEMG) concluded that there was no evidence to substantiate allegations that Eritrea supplied Al-Shabaab with arms and ammunition” [6].(SEMG is UN organ, assigned to investigate Eritrea’s involvement in Al-Shebaba)

the Ambassador to the United Nations, Dumisani Kumalo’s, reported revealing that eighty percent of ammunition available at the Somali arms markets was supplied by Transitional Federal Government of Somalia (TFG) and Ethiopian troops [7,8]. (Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo’s was a chairman of the U.N. Security Council's Somalia sanctions committee) 

the US State Department statement that the peacekeeping force African Union Mission in Somalia, (AMISOM), is delivering arms to the TFG, a belligerent of the conflict, on behalf of the USA. 

· the Ambassador Herman Cohens statement that “Those of us, who know Eritrea well, understand that the Eritrean leadership fears Islamic militancy as much as any other country in the Horn of Africa region.” There was no, and there is no “intelligence, real or fabricated”, that links Eritrea to Al-Shabab or any form of extremism in the region other than that what the Ethiopians and their Western enablers told us.(Ambassador Cohen has years of experience and intimate knowledge of the region of East Africa). 

Why the seemingly respected CBC broadcasting ignores these well documented and investigated facts and prefer to refer to Matt Bryden who was discredited and removed from the monitoring group [9] or to collect hearsay from incredible sources in the street is beyond comprehensive. Even more shocking is that the CBC openly collaborated and collected “information” from a former arms trafficker who admitted supporting the Al Shebab. Moreover, the CBC report disregards the human rights impact assessment of the Bisha mine in Eritrea by an international human rights lawyer Mr. Lloyed Lipsett 4 to rely on non-substantial insults by anti-Eritrea elements and testimonies by asylum seekers whose future in Canada, Europe and US depends on how well they defame Eritrea.

The report cannot change the reality in Eritrea, Eritrea’s endeavours for development and social justice and its struggle to turn dirt into gold. The report however, is an insult to the intelligence of its followers and severely puts CBC's reputation into question.

References 
1) http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/episodes/2015-2016/nevsun-in-eritrea-dealing-with-a-dictator
2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pvNp9gHjŅ
3) http://www.scribd.com/doc/289344388/Eritrea-a-Reliable-Partner-EU7#scribd
4) http://www.nevsun.com/pdf/Nevsun-2014-CSR-Report.pdf
5) http://hornofafrica.de/statement-of-the-foreign-ministry-on-saudi-arabiass-initiative-in-the-fightagainst-terrorism/
6) http://www.tesfanews.net/no-evidence-eritrea-support-alshabaab-un-monitors/
7) http://reliefweb.int/report/somalia/arms-reach-somali-warlords-despite-un-sanctions
8) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7417435.stm
9) http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N12/463/85/PDF/N1246385.pdf?OpenElement

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