Journalist, or analyst?

We all know how hot the job market is these days in the Chinese financial industry, and with almost every hirer facing the question of where to find enough smart people to fill those openings, some banks are trawling an alternative talent pool — financial journalists.

In fact, the media industry has been a talent source for fund houses and investment banks for some time, but mostly for public relations- or marketing-related roles.

Talk to a spokesperson for a big bank such as Citigroup or Morgan Stanley, and you shouldn’t be surprised to learn she or he once worked for a leading media organisation before moving to the so-called “dark side”.

More recently, some banks are starting to realise that journalist can handle more than PR. What about as economists or analysts to study monetary policy and capital markets for big global banks in China?

The head of China research at a British bank recently sent an email to his friends advising that the bank was looking for a China economist and researcher to join his fast-expanding team in Shanghai or Beijing. Besides a basic financial and economics-related educational background, the notice highlighted one condition that the ideal candidate would meet.

“We are looking for candidates with either a decent advanced (i.e. post-graduate) degree in economics and/or with a strong background in journalism/industry research in China. We view a journalist’s eye for a story and ability to work out how particular policies work in practice in China as strengths,” the hirer said in the note, which was widely distributed among financial journalists in China this week.

Separately, at almost the same time, the China research team leader at a big European investment bank also published a new job notice for China stock analysts in Beijing, and asked his colleagues to spread the word, especially among their financial media friends. Among the requirements, the hirer pointed out that the applicant should demonstrate excellent writing skills, especially for analytical articles.

As far as I know, not too many journalists have MBAs, which are often considered an entry ticket for a career in investment banking or asset management. For roles such as economist at a big bank, a PhD used to be a basic requirement, but in a developing market such as China, do people really want to make things a bit easier?

Given China’s immature market environment, the right information and fast access to key economic data are becoming more important for economists and analysts, whose reputations rely on the credibility of their forecasts and a sensitivity to market trends (ahead of their competitors).

Such work often relies on an extensive network of contacts in different industries and ministries across the vast nation.

Meanwhile, in China’s capital markets, rumours are often proved to be true. For example, about two weeks ahead of the release of official data early this month, the stock market in Shanghai was already full of talk and speculation that inflation in November would reach a new high of 5.1 percent on year.

Guess who is usually among the first to hear these rumours? Good financial journalists with strong ties with government sources.

Some industry watchers have observed that economists in China are becoming more like newsbreaking, investigative journalists. Remember Beijing’s surprise announcement of a 4 trillion yuan (about 586 billion U.S. dollars at that time) stimulus package in late 2008 to help maintain economic expansion amid the global financial crisis?

To some clients of a big U.S. bank, the announcement may not have been very surprising as they had learned of the plan from the bank’s economist, who had tapped his well-placed sources in Beijing for intelligence.

Perhaps, a good China economist can someday teach at Columbia Journalism School when he feels he earns enough money? By the same token, a financial journalist could also teach MBA students how to develop a source network in China.

George Chen is a Reuters editor and columnist based in Hong Kong.

In California - Parents reclaim a failing school - and make history

The writer, a Republican, is governor of California.
 
History is usually made by a small group of passionate people. On Dec. 7, history was made by a small group of parents in Compton, California.
Their children attend McKinley Elementary School - a school that has been defined as failing for the past 10 years. Using a new power known as the "parent trigger," which I fought for and state legislators approved last year, these Compton parents banded together to demand change. The legislation allows parents of students at troubled schools to demand such significant reforms as closing a school, replacing a school's management or most of its staff, or reorganizing a school into a charter, if 51 percent of parents sign a petition.
McKinley Elementary is being reorganized and will soon be transformed into a charter school run by Celerity Educational Group, which is successfully operating three other schools in California.
Some have called this action "the shot heard across the country" - and they're not overstating the case.
To get some perspective of the scope of this new power, consider the heart wrenching stories brought to public attention this year in the documentary "Waiting for Superman," which focuses on the failures of our public education system.
Without the power of the trigger legislation, parents whose children are in what the documentary and others call "dropout factories" have only one avenue to save their children. They must win a lottery to get them into a highly performing charter school.
Across the country, millions of families' prayers go unanswered. These parents are left to face the bleak reality that their child will be forever stuck in a failing school and a failing system. The exit doors may as well be chained.
For millions of low-income families, this means that their child is doomed to a life of unrealized potential.
For millions of California families, this is the shattering of the American dream.
Now, however, for the first time in California history, these historically underserved parents have new power and new choice.
The package of reforms I signed in January gives parents significant options for changing their child's school as well as the freedom to leave failing schools or send their child to a new school or even a new district. Schools are eligible for the 51 percent trigger if they have been judged under state standards to have shown no progress for three consecutive years.
While leaders of the State Teachers Union have threatened legal action to try to stop parents from using this groundbreaking power, I am confident that if they try to thwart the public, the courts will end up upholding this important bipartisan legislation. Changes such as replacing a school's principal and staff do not come unless there have been continued years of failure and a majority of parents banding together and signing a petition.
This sort of majority-demanded restructuring is exactly what just happened at McKinley Elementary School. More than 60 percent of McKinley parents signed a petition and chose to convert to a charter school.
Throughout history, all great movements have started at the grass-roots level, with ordinary citizens and communities rising up to demand change.
In California, like in many other states, our public education system is not based on merit or holding the adults in whose care we have placed our children accountable. Some students get a good education, but others do not, and report after report reaches the same conclusion: No matter how much money we throw at the problem, unless the school is fundamentally fixed, we will not get the results in student performance we all deserve.
Giving parents the power to hold their schools accountable is a giant step forward, and I believe that what happened in Compton is the beginning of a movement that will sweep the nation.

BY ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER

My day in parliament: a story of a beginner

I start my day by attending planning meeting in the news room with my colleagues. It is only after that meeting someone knows what he or she will be covering for the day. The editor asks me if I have something in hand for the day and I respond “no”. Ok, go and cover the parliament proceedings.

At the parliament, I spend between 30 and 45 minutes going through security checks and feeling the forms to get registered. Then I take a seat in the cabins especially designated for the press. Untill then, I have no clue of the agenda. Lack of specialization? Shortage of staff? I do not know the answer, but that is the way we do things here. A reporter is expected to cover whatever issue and sometimes subjects he has never heard of.

Now I know the issues on the agenda and I am looking forward to hear some heated debates that can give me a chance of writing something interesting. But after hours seating and listening to the debates my frustration gets even worse. The notions of opposition the MPs hold is that of saying “no” whenever the rulling bench says or is perceived to be saying “yes”. No matter what is being discussed. This also applies to the MPs of the rulling party.

It is a breach. I mingle among the MPs hoping to create some sort of a “source” that can give me substance. 

Everyone is eager to gossip about the colleagues on the opposite side but not about the issues. All parties have the same excuse: “party discipline”. It sounds true because we elect lists of people not people. But as I insist, another true emerges. They do not read the massive documents that are printed for every session and, those who read do not understand the issues.

How do I get copies of the documents if everyone has the power to declare them “secret”. The only way is to approach those who do not read and see if I can get a copy. It is the opposite, Those who do not read the documents consider everything secret even the budge with their names. So, it is not surprising that most of the stories we write are about the agenda and not the issues.

"Miracle rescue" saves chilean miners

Twelve of Chile's 33 trapped miners were hoisted to safety in a cramped rescue capsule on Wednesday, cheering and punching the air as they hugged their families after two months deep underground.

One by one, the miners climbed into the capsule, which is barely wider than a man's shoulders and equipped with a gas mask and escape hatches, and took a roughly 15-minute journey through 2,050 feet of rock to freedom.

Scenes of jubilation erupted every time a new miner arrived at the surface of the San Jose gold and copper mine in Chile's northern Atacama desert.

Rescuers plan to pull all 33 men to the surface within the next 36 hours, and possibly even quicker.

While the first to be rescued were in good shape, some have been struggling with illness and are more fragile.

Mario Gomez, at 63 the oldest of the miners, suffers from silicosis and was breathing from an oxygen mask as he reached the surface. He was helped out of the capsule, and immediately dropped to his knees to pray with his yellow hard hat still perched on his head.

Euphoric rescuers, relatives and friends broke into cheers -- and tears -- as the miners emerged to breathe fresh air for the first time since the mine collapsed on Aug 5.

"This is a miracle from God," said Alberto Avalos, the uncle of Florencio Avalos, a father of two who was the first to emerge, shortly after midnight.

The miners have spent a record 69 days in the hot, humid bowels of the mine and, for the first 17 days, they were all believed to be dead.

Their story of survival and the extraordinary rescue operation have captured the world's attention.

The operation was executed almost flawlessly through the night and included dramatic live images of miners hugging rescuers in their tunnel deep inside the mine. An estimated 1,500 journalists from around the world were at the mine to report on the rescue.

Chilean President Sebastian Pinera waited at the mouth of the rescue shaft to greet and hug the men.

'GOD AND THE DEVIL'

Mario Sepulveda, the second miner to escape, had everyone laughing when his whoops of joy resounded on the surface even before he arrived. He then stepped out of the capsule, opened up a yellow bag, pulled out souvenir rocks from below and began handing them out to the rescuers and even Pinera.

"I'm so happy!" Sepulveda yelled, grinning, punching his fist in the air and hugging everyone in sight. However, he also sounded a darkly serious note.

Rescued: Florencio Avalos, Mario Sepulveda, Juan Illanes, Carlos Mamani, Jimmy Sanchez, Osman Araya, Jose Ojeda, Claudio Yanez, Mario Gomez, Alex Vega, Jorge Galleguillos, Edison Pena.

To follow: Carlos Barrios, Victor Zamora, Victor Segovia, Daniel Herrera, Omar Reygadas, Esteban Rojas, Pablo Rojas, Dario Segovia, Yonni Barrios, Samuel Avalos, Carlos Bugueno, Jose Henriquez, Renan Avalos, Claudio Acuna, Franklin Lobos, Richard Villarroel, Juan Aguilar, Raul Bustos, Pedro Cortez, Ariel Ticona, Luis Urzua
Source: List given to miners' families

In my opinion: Historic win or not, Democrats could pay a price

As the final round of the battle over health-care reform begins Sunday, President Obama and the Democrats are in reach of a historic legislative achievement that has eluded presidents dating back a century. The question is at what cost.

By almost any measure, enactment of comprehensive health-care legislation would rank as one of the most significant pieces of social welfare legislation in the country's history, a goal set as far back as the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt and pursued since by many other presidents. But unlike Social Security or Medicare, Obama's health-care bill would pass over the Republican Party's unanimous opposition.

Even Republicans agree on the magnitude of what Obama could pull off, while disagreeing on the substance of the legislation. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said: "Obviously, he will have achieved as president something nobody else has done. So in that sense, it's historic." But he added, "It doesn't end the health-care debate -- it just changes it. And if it does pass, it would be a historic mistake."

The lengthy and rancorous debate has inflicted considerable damage on the president and his party. It helped spark the grass-roots "tea party" movement and generated angry town hall meetings last summer that led to some opponents painting Obama as a socialist and a communist for advocating a greater government role in the health-care industry. The issue now is whether final passage of the legislation -- Senate leaders say they will take up the reconciliation bill this week -- will cause more harm or begin a turnaround in the Democrats' fortunes heading toward the November midterm elections.

This is not how the struggle over health care was supposed to unfold. When the president decided last year to push for comprehensive reform, there appeared to be the best opportunity in a generation to ensure that nearly all Americans have access to health insurance. There also seemed to be a consensus among business, labor and health-industry groups that government help was needed to rein in the escalating costs of health care.

A year later, Obama and Democratic congressional leaders are struggling to find the final votes in the House to push the bill through, against united Republican opposition and a country sharply polarized over whether and how health-care coverage should be extended to virtually all Americans. Liberals say the bill should have created a government alternative to private insurance; conservatives decry an increase in taxes and expensive new government programs.

The political stakes are enormous. Obama's approval ratings are below 50 percent in several recent polls, and more people disapprove of his handling of health care than approve. The outcome of the debate will stamp his presidency.

Democrats are afraid of failure and nervous about what success could bring. They fear substantial losses in November, with their majorities in the House and Senate possibly at risk if the country turns even more negative toward the administration and its policies. Republicans vow to continue challenging the program at the state and national levels.

Regardless of the political fallout, historians say health-care reform will take its place in the same category as the enactment of Social Security in 1935 and Medicare in 1965, and only a rung or two below passage of the major civil rights bills of the 1950s and 1960s. In addition to the bill's providing coverage for more than 32 million uninsured Americans, people would no longer be denied coverage because of preexisting conditions. The "doughnut hole" for Medicare prescriptions would eventually be eliminated, and young people could stay on their parents' insurance plan through age 26.

"I think this will be seen as a really major reform initiative," said presidential historian Robert Dallek. "How it plays out remains to be seen. But if Social Security and Medicare and civil rights are any preludes to this initiative, then I think it will become a fixed part of the national political/social/economic culture."

But there is a major difference between this health-care battle and the debates that preceded passage of Social Security and Medicare. Although there was opposition to those measures -- conservative opponents called Medicare socialized medicine -- in the end they passed with overwhelming, bipartisan majorities.

The House approved the Medicare bill on a vote of 313 to 115, including 65 Republicans -- nearly half the GOP caucus at the time. The Senate approved the measure by 68 to 21, including 13 of the 27 Republicans.

Niger: When is a coup a good coup?

Weeks after the African Union boldly announced the end of an era of coups on its continent, Niger’s military staged a spectacular overthrow.

Heavily armed in armoured vehicles soldiers blasted their way into the presidential palace, arrested the President Mamadou Tandja and dissolved every democratic institution in the uranium-exporting nation.

Niger’s new military rulers, the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (SCRD), faced the standard flurry of strongly-worded statements from Western nations and regional bodies that condemned people taking power through unconstitutional means.

But, more interestingly, there was no insistence on Tandja returning to his job. Instead, the focus appeared to be on looking towards elections and a new government. Tandja had drawn the ire of many Nigeriens and the international community over his successful campaign last year to change the constitution and extend his time in power by at least three years.

Spontaneous celebrations in Niamey after the military take-over were, therefore, not surprising. But, faced with the illegal ouster of a president many believed had become unconstitutional, the international community also seems to have been quick to recognize the opening the coup has offered.

Analysts cite members of the junta having been involved in a previous coup that swiftly led to elections as a reason for optimism. They also say Niger’s military is more professional than in place like Guinea, where soldiers have also grabbed power but failed to deliver elections despite over a year in power.

An aggressive, bold military operation has delivered a new dynamic that months of diplomatic and political wrangling failed to achieve.

Has the international community been too quick to jump at this opportunity? Or, if the politicians appear to be failing, should the military be allowed to play the role of arbitrator in crises like Niger’s?

Coups, especially in West Africa, seem to be alive and well. Niger’s takeover follows similar ousters in Mauritania and Guinea in 2008, and another one in Madagascar last year.

What impact are these actions having on confidence in a continent that is attracting unprecedented investment and is keen to draw a line under a violent and chaotic past?

Does swiftly accepting Tandja’s ouster not set a dangerous precedent for crises elsewhere?

The african youngest king

At first glance, he looks like any other 17-year-old. He bobs his head to rapper Jay-Z, plays video games and reads the "Twilight" vampire books. When he's not doing homework, he kicks a soccer ball in his backyard.

Yet looks can be deceiving.

People in this corner of western Uganda know the young man as King Oyo, one of the world's youngest ruling monarchs. The teen king rules over more than 2 million people in the Tooro kingdom, one of four kingdoms in Uganda that conjure images of pre-colonial Africa.

King Oyo lives for part of the year in a palace perched on a hill in Fort Portal, a place where bicycles stacked with bananas race past ramshackle huts in the shadow of a snow-capped mountain. He also has a palace in the bustling Ugandan capital, Kampala, where he studies at a private school while soldiers stand guard.

Friends at school greet him with hugs and handshakes, but back home, subjects kiss his feet while sprawled before him on the ground, as if they were doing push ups.

"I still find it a little uncomfortable when people bow, especially the older ones," says the king, whose full name is Oyo Nyimba Kabamba Iguru Rukidi IV. "My friends at school (could not) care less that I'm a king. They like me for who I am, not for what I am."

King Oyo has worn the crown for as long as he can remember.

He ascended to the throne aged three, after his father died in 1995. For his coronation, the toddler sat on a miniature throne and played with toys after a mock battle with a grown-up "rebel" prince. At one point, his majesty dashed from the throne to climb onto his mother's lap. He also yanked off a lion-skin crown that was too heavy for his little head.

The next day, King Oyo attended a meeting with Cabinet members who were old enough to be his grandparents.

Now he stands nearly six feet tall and looks much more regal. He sits on a throne draped with leopard skin and wears a royal robe of blue and gold, his cropped hair covered by a crown with a fluffy white tail.

"The first few years, I did not know what was going on," he says. "I think I realized when I was about 6 that I really was king, and my life was going to be different. I was going to have responsibilities toward a lot of people."

King Oyo oversees a Cabinet that includes a prime minister, board of regents and councilmen. The president of Uganda, Yoweri Museveni, advises him. So does Libyan leader Col. Moammar Gadhafi.

In addition to serving as the figurehead for members of the Batooro tribe -- the group that makes up most of the Tooro kingdom -- the king oversees efforts to raise money for projects involving such things as health and education. He implements programs to boost cultural pride. He also helps oversee how his kingdom spends tax money that it gets from the Ugandan government.

The king makes major decisions with the help of regents and advisers. His mother, Queen Best Kemigisa, lives in the palace and works closely with him, though King Oyo will become the sole decision-maker when he turns 18 in a few weeks.

"It's a huge responsibility," the king says, "but I have a lot of support from my mother, my sister and others, so I know I can do it."

The job has its perks.

Fawning subjects give him livestock and spears. He travels to meet world leaders. And teenage girls and young women flock to his palace for public events, though the king changes subjects like a veteran politician when asked whether he's dating.

"I can't wait to see the new "Twilight" movie, he says with a sly smile.

There are downsides.

King Oyo travels with a security detail of military guards who also hover around his school. That makes it hard to blend into a crowd.

"At times, I'll have things I want to do, but I can't just get up and do them like ordinary teenagers do," he says. "I can't always do what I want because I have obligations."

Kingdoms in Africa date at least to the Egyptian civilization, though their numbers have declined in the last few hundred years.

The monarchies are based on ethnicities, sparking concerns of a setback in national integration efforts, said Ndebesa Mwambutsya, a history professor at Makerere University in Kampala.

"Ugandans identify themselves first with their tribes and kingdoms, then as citizens," he says. "This works in most African cultures because people have lost faith in the government, and tribes and kingdoms provide a nucleus around which an identity can be forged."

Finding a balance between national unity and tradition can be a challenge, according to the professor.

"It's a paradox in itself. It is important that African culture is preserved because a people without culture is like groping in the darkness," he says.

"At the same time, there's globalization, there's consumerism, there's national integration. Making all those fit in with traditionalism is a tall order -- it needs perspective to ensure kingdoms are not counterproductive."

Many Africans, like the people in King Oyo's realm, identify themselves as a member of a tribe or ethnic group first and as citizen of a nation second. That is partly a legacy of colonialism, when European powers drew boundaries for countries and territories that lumped together people of various tribes and ethnic groups, including many who had a history of poor relations.

Tension between ethnic groups within the same country often has flared into violence around the continent. The 1994 genocide in Rwanda, which killed nearly 800,000 people, for example, was a result of inter-ethnic violence. So was the post-election violence in neighboring Kenya that left more than 1,000 dead in 2008.

In Uganda, the central government outlawed kingdoms in 1967, but the president reinstated four of them in the '90s on the condition that their leaders focus more on culture and less on national politics.

Other African countries, such as Lesotho and Swaziland, also have kings. The king of Swaziland is famous for festivals at which scores of virgins dance for him, but King Oyo is sedate by contrast. He presides over a kingdom where time seems to have stopped.

Snow-capped Mount Rwenzori peeks through the mist and glints under moonlight, a hulking backdrop to the shacks and banana plantations that dot rolling landscapes. The lush, green vegetation does not translate into wealth, though: Most people in the kingdom -- like people in the rest of Uganda -- live in poverty.

Even so, some people have pinned their hopes on the young king.

"His age brings a lot of financial support from leaders who want to mentor him and see him succeed," says Ruhweza Remigious, 34, a carpenter who lives in a mud hut across from the palace in Fort Portal.

"Most Africans are led by older people who don't do anything," Remigious says. "He is young and eager, and we hope he will give us a better life and modernize our infrastructures."

That's a heavy burden for anyone to shoulder. It puts particularly strong pressure on a teenager who likes to hang out with his buddies from school and root for his favorite soccer team -- Arsenal, of the Premier League in England.

So would he have chosen to be king?

He pauses.

"I'm not really sure if I can answer that question," he says. "Being a king is not easy. Sometimes I wish I could just be ordinary."

This is Australia in 40 years

Australia circa 2050, population 35 million, climate change induced rising sea levels have flooded the Gold Coast resort region, apartment blocks are now used to grow food and people commute in monorail pods above the sea.

In another city, Australians live on floating island pods with apartments both below and above sea level, the population has shifted from land to the sea because of the sky-rocketing value of disappearing arable land.

Climate change has also forced many Australians to move inland and create new cities in the outback, relying on solar power to exist in the inhospitable interior.

These are just a few urban scenarios by some of Australia's leading architects shortlisted for "Ideas for Australian Cities 2050+" to be staged at this year's Venice Architecture Biennale.

While these images may sound like science fiction, many architects and demographers say Australian cities must radically transform to cope with the pressures of population growth and climate change or face social unrest and urban decay.

"If we don't get this right ... all hell breaks loose, or our cities break down, there's not enough water, there's not enough power," said one of Australia's leading demographers Bernard Salt.

Australia survived the global financial crisis, due largely to China buying its resources, and while resource exports will continue to bolster its economy for decades, future prosperity may be threatened by a growing, aging population, according to an Australian government report released in February.

The report said Australia's population was set to rise by 60 percent to 35 million by 2050, mainly through migration, yet cities are already groaning under the present population.

"One of the major frontier issues for Australia over the next decade will be the future of our cities," said Heather Ridout, chief executive of the Australian Industry Group, which is calling for major infrastructure investment in cities.

Among the beneficiaries of such development would be property firms like Lend Lease, Stockland and Mirvac Group, building material groups Boral Ltd and CSR, Australia's top engineering contractor Leighton Holding Ltd, and the country's biggest private hospital operator, Ramsay Health.

But demographers warn that Australian cities need to not only expand infrastructure, but ensure future residents have equal access to city facilities.

Racial riots at Sydney's Cronulla beach in 2005 and a series of attacks against Indian students in the past year are signs of growing social tensions in Australian cities, say demographers.

"If we have a rising population, we need to make sure that we have appropriate infrastructure, so that we don't lose the social cohesion that we take for granted," said Larissa Brown from the Center for Sustainable Leadership. "We need affordable access to housing, to transport, to healthcare."

While Australia is double the size of Europe, three-quarters of the country is sparsely populated countryside or harsh outback, leaving the bulk of the population to inhabit a thin strip down the southeast coast. In fact, around 50 percent of the population live in the three largest cities -- Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane -- on a combined land area that is about the size of Brunei or Trinidad & Tobago.

Haiti: Stop Blaming the Victim

I empathize with the situation in Haiti. The loss of an estimated 200,000 people to an earthquake is one of the cruelest act nature can ever give to humanity. It is most cruel when one considers the fact that the availability of well planned infrastructure and effective governance system would have reduced the loss and damage. It is depressing to observe the international press blaming Haitians instead of probing the genesis of disorder in this Caribbean country.

Haiti is the least developed country in the western hemisphere. An estimated 80% of its population lives below the poverty line. The country offers a classical example of how elites in developed economies conspire with elites in poor countries to disenfranchise the citizenry. It is on record that a North Atlantic Alliance that featured the French, the English, the Americans and the Dutch initially refused to recognize the independence of black Haiti in 1804. This alliance against Haiti’s independence manipulated both politics and economics, literally suffocating the newborn Haiti from interacting with the rest of the world. To gain acceptance in the global family, Haiti had to literally bribe France with an estimated $ 21 billion (then 150 million Francs). The bribe passed as debt to France.

“Why are Haitians unable to come out of poverty?" an international journalist asked me, expecting my response to focus only on the negative effects of aid and the World Bank machination at the behest of the North Atlantic Alliance.

Haitian elites working in collaboration with developed country elites financed by donor communities stole Haitian people's abilities to take charge of their destiny. Haitians are unable to exit poverty because their country's attempt to fit into a skewed global market system ignores the fundamentals - the people of Haiti. They, and as we here in Africa, have remained spectators in the global system.

Our political, school and economic systems among others have not given us an opportunity to evolve a system unique to our situation. When buildings come crushing on the poor who migrated from their villages in search for false hope in the city - the press blames them. When fire guts settlements in Kibera slums, the elite are heard asking:

“Why do they stay in such deplorable buildings anyway?"

The Haiti debacle should serve as a wake up call for underdeveloped nations to probe existing systems even as they rush to take a seat on the bus of development. Let the spirit of over 200,000 Haitians who passed away due to the bad governance seed planted in 1804 re-energize the quest to have Haitians take charge of their destiny.

I applaud the gesture extended by the Senegalese president, Abdoulaye Wade that has offered land to Haitians. I also applaud all other African nations and especially Jacob Zuma of South Africa that have committed to support Haiti at its greatest hour of need.

Haiti does not need aid to develop. Haiti offers a clear example of the purpose of aid, it is not to help people develop; it benefits donor's interests! It is important to distinguish between the typical World Bank aid of underdevelopment and emergency assistance in times of catastrophe. Putting people first in any given country offers a clear benchmark to determine the abuse behind development aid and even emergency assistance.

It is time the elites in poor nations sought to evaluate the bigger picture and their country's core interests. You and I have the responsibility to take charge of our destiny.

James Shikwati james@irenkenya.org is Director, Inter Region Economic Network.