October 26, 2016

"Africans chuckle at ugly US election."

A BBC headline.
Under the hashtag [#Nov8AfricanEdition], Nigerians and other Africans have been flipping the script and imagining how events in America would be reported if they were happening in Africa, with fake "breaking news" headlines and sarcastic support.

23 comments:

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Africans chuckle at ugly US election.

There's an Obama/birther joke in there somewhere.
I'm pretty sure there's a Leslie Jones joke in there too.

But it would be hate speech for me to bring them up.

So I won't.

Nonapod said...

It's funny to them because we're starting to look more like them.

Among the many ways we Americans have been privileged is a relatively low level of corruption in our government compared to most other Nations on Earth (at least until recently, anyway). African governments of course often have notoriously high levels of corruption. It's a little frightening that we're starting to look and feel more and more like an African nation. We have one Presidential candidate that should be in jail (and most people know it even if they won't admit it) and the other who seems demagogic and bellicose. We have a clearly corrupt IRS, FBI, and Justice Dept.

JPS said...

Oh, they want to flip the script? Fine. I have a massive sum of money in a secret bank account, and I fear instability in this country no matter who wins. I'm going to start e-mailing Nigerians and asking them for their banking information. If they'll let me stash my money with them, I'll let them keep a generous chunk of it for their troubles, once things calm down here.

rhhardin said...

Africans are smarter than US women.

hombre said...

Africans are pleased. With the promise of Hillary in the offing, the US is poised to descend deeper into a cesspool of corruption that rivals their own.

Schadenfreude, Nigerian, or maybe Kenyan, style.

rehajm said...

Nonapod beat me to the definitive snark on the matter. Well done.

CJinPA said...

Africa: We haven't mastered the whole "feed ourselves" thing, but we've got sarcasm down pat.

AllenS said...

From what I've heard, is that Kenyans have publicly declared that Obama was born in the US.

Lewis Wetzel said...

No comment from Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan?

D. B. Light said...

Goodluck Jonathan should hook up with former Thai PM, Yingluck Shinawatra? Lotsa luck there.

Sebastian said...

"Goodluck Jonathan should hook up with former Thai PM, Yingluck Shinawatra? Lotsa luck there." Maybe the late Cardinal Sin can mediate.

Question: is photo ID racist in Africa?

oleh said...

P'shaw! What conceit! If this was going on in an African country it would never be reported here.

buwaya said...

"the late Cardinal Sin can mediate."

He could indeed. Very good at it he was. He did the proverbial herding of cats, keeping dozens and dozens of Filipino politicians headed in the same direction.
My revolutionary chief, the old Cardinal. A great man.

Sebastian said...

"buwaya said...
"the late Cardinal Sin can mediate."

He could indeed. Very good at it he was. He did the proverbial herding of cats, keeping dozens and dozens of Filipino politicians headed in the same direction.
My revolutionary chief, the old Cardinal. A great man."

See, this is what I like about this blog.

John henry said...

It is not possible to have fair elections without paper ballots, filled in person at the polling place on election day.

No absentee ballots
No early voting
No voting without proper ID

These three things at a minimum, though I could add some others as well.

You know, like the rest of the world does.

There need to be exceptions, sure. The exceptions need to be minimal and truly necessary. Probably no more than 2-3% of total votes cast.

Even more important than fair and honest elections is the perception of fair and honest elections. Under our current system I suspect that some large majority of Americans believe the system is rigged. Perhaps not rigged all over but in many major cities, at least.

This belief it nothing new, it's been help for 100+ years. There is some reason behind the belief but even if the belief were completely false, it doesn't matter. When people do not believe in the legitimacy of elections, they will not believe in the legitimacy of govt and law.

John Henry

John henry said...

To those who claim that there is no widespread fraud in elections in the US, I refer you to Baudelaire:

“The devil’s best trick is to persuade you that he does not exist.”

Kayser Soze also said much the same thing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgSL3hY5iPE

John Henry

John henry said...

At the last debate Crooked Hilary said how pleased she was with all the AIDS drugs that the Clinton Foundation was supplying to Africa.

As the Brits say "Pull the other one, it's got bells on it."

The Clintons are deep in bed with the Indian pharma company Ranbaxy. It has a long history of supplying adulterated drugs with little or no active ingredient. Especially to Africa but also to the US. It paid $500 million in fines in the US not long ago.

http://fortune.com/2013/05/15/dirty-medicine/?iid=sr-link1

Nice folks, really care about Africans:

Ranbaxy executives didn’t care, says Kathy Spreen, and made little effort to conceal it. In a conference call with a dozen company executives, one brushed aside her fears about the quality of the AIDS medicine Ranbaxy was supplying for Africa. “Who cares?” he said, according to Spreen. “It’s just blacks dying.”

Who cares indeed. Certainly not the Clintons. At least as long as they get paid off.

John Henry

John henry said...

Blogger AllenS said...

From what I've heard, is that Kenyans have publicly declared that Obama was born in the US.

Is that because they want nothing to do with him?

For the record, I have never been a birther. I've always believed that President Obama was born in the US.

John Henry

John henry said...

Speaking of Nigerian voting, this is from a site describing the process. Lots more but these seem key:

All procedures specified in the Guidelines and Regulations for the conduct of the 2015 General Elections remains in effect with following expectations:

Voting shall be by the Continuous Accreditation and Voting System.

The accreditation process shall comprise of authentication and verification of voters using the Card Reader, checking of the Register of Voter, inking of the cuticle of the specified finger.

The ballot paper shall be issued in the prescribed manner by the Presiding Officer of a Polling Unit/Voting Point (Settlement) and the Assistant Presiding Officer (VP) in the case of a Voting Point (VP).

Accreditation and Voting shall commence at 8:00am and close at 2:00pm provided that any voters already in the queue shall be granted access to Accreditation and Voting in the prescribed manner.

The Polling Unit layout shall require the Presiding Officer to sit next to the APO II.

The Presiding Officer shall act as the Overseer.



Paper ballot
Voting in person
Voting at place of registration
Inking of finger
Verification of the voter roll
Polls open from 8AM to 2PM

Gee, kinda like Puerto Rico and the Philippines.

Why can't the US have elections as well done as Nigeria?

More here: http://www.inecnigeria.org/?page_id=22

John Henry

Anonymous said...

Hillary does remind me of Winnie Mandela.

narciso said...

more like christina kirschner, bill should take care of himself,

Anonymous said...

CJinPA Africa: We haven't mastered the whole "feed ourselves" thing, but we've got sarcasm down pat.

Thread winner. Game over.

Anonymous said...

I live in Kenya and am surprised by the number of Trump supporters here. In the last week I spoke with a Kenyan woman who didn't like Hillary and thought Trump would be a good president because of his business expertise. I spoke to a Ugandan man who supported Trump because he thought Trump would take out African dictators like Museveni, and I spoke to a Kenyan man who thought that women are not equal to men, shouldn't be politicians, and he supported Trump. I think the average Kenyan views the US elections similar to any other US election.

Back to the BBC article, I would say that educated Kenyans who don't like the US and never have are using this election to tell everyone how Americans are hypocrites. I think they're wrong because I believe that the American election system, the FBI, IRS, and Justice Department have people working for them that have a great deal of integrity and they keep the system honest.

Then there is of course Malik Obama who is voting for Trump and like Trump views the elections as rigged against his candidate because of voter fraud. What is interesting is that the Kenyan Constitution bans state officers from having dual citizenship (Chapter 6 para. 78). Since Malik Obama ran for Governor, he either revoked his US citizenship to run, or he was prepared to revoke it if he was elected. He therefore may be committing voter fraud if he revoked his citizenship as he should have.

It is interesting watching the election from Kenya, but the BBC article is not at all accurate in how it presents the reality here.