African funerals are more of celebrations of a lost life than they are to weep for the departed.
After all, the dead played their part and are out of harm’s way ÔÇô unless, of course, their door leads in the opposite direction of where St Peters is waiting but where there are no 70+ virgins waiting to glorify a life that ended other lives in the mistaken belief that they would be martyrs to be rewarded with tens and tens of virgins in the life yonder.
This has to be the most ridiculous nonsense anyone would ever believe.
God, our Creator, is not very keen on oursexuality – judging by the way He discourages it – but He would dare someone to kill in His name so as to be rewarded by virgins who, last time I checked, don’t make any difference in this world.
Besides, those virgins have to be some people’s daughters and anyone who believes that God, the God we know and pray to, would snatch young women from their parents, actually abusing His own creations by forcing them to please murderers, isabsolutely out of their minds. If those morons who claim to murder in God’s name did not find women down here, they sure as hell won’t find them in the afterlife.
Enough of that nonsense.
The big issue remains with those who remain behind; their work is yet to be done.
We have heard about embarrassing outsiders, hardly known visitors, who flock to a funeral and weep pathetically more than those who have lost their kin.
It happens all the time, especially when some people desperately want to be considered as part of the family or as feeling the loss just like the bereaving mother and father ÔÇô hoping, of course, to reap more than the false tears they shed.
They put up a show that ends up insulting and embarrassing everyone in attendance.
It seems that some people believe that crying louder at some other family’s funeral makes the fake crier a closer member of the grieving family than the relatives themselves.
This week, I am reminded about these fakes by none other than the American media and their response to last week’s tragedy in Paris, France.
In January 2010, the little island of Haiti was hit by a devastating earthquake that hit a magnitude of 7.0 on the Richter scale; it left more than 220, 000 people dead.
Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere and as far from the USA (681 miles or 1064Km) as Harare is to Gaborone, remains an embarrassment to the USA, Mexico and Canada.
And the guilt is evident.
The earthquake in Haiti“unleashed an unprecedented flood of humanitarian aid ÔÇö $13.5 billion in donations and pledges, about three-quarters from donor nations and a quarter from private charity”.
We also witnessed an avalanche of American media personalities, particularly CNN, anchoring their daily news programmes from many spots in Haiti, mindful of how the world’s attention was focused on the poor island.
After milking the island of all the attention it was receiving, the media packed up and left but the Haitians are demanding to know where the billions went ÔÇô something the American media is not quite concerned to pursue.
We did not see the same enthusiasm from the American media when Ebola ravaged Sierra Leone and Liberia.
The coverage was extensive, yes, because it involved America missionaries and aid workers. There was intense coverage in the US because the virus had set foot on American soil so, in the end, it wasn’t so much about the millions of Africans at risk but about a handful of Americans who had been exposed to the virus.
Nigeria has been in the midst of a crisis fermented by the Islamist group Boko Haram. The damage to both human lives and infrastructure affected several other countries bordering Nigeria.
The most widely reported being the abduction of hundreds of young school girls. The American media played a courtesy role and was complemented by Michelle Obama who trumpeted “Bring back our girls” slogan then everybody turned their back to worry about other things of more importance to them.
Compare that to the cranked up spotlight shone on Malala, the Pakistani girl who survived an attempt on her life by the Taliban.
Over the years, Kenya has seen its share of some of the worst gruesome attacks on its citizens, especially Christians. From hotels, beaches, markets and highways, Kenya was hit by the Islamists Al-Shabaab and there was what I call token coverage of the crisis, which is still on going.
The first week of January 2015 saw Islamists attack the offices of the French satirical weekly newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, in Paris.
Eleven killed; eleven injured.
Less than a week later, over two million people from all over the world, including 40 presidents and prime ministers from the world stage, descended on Paris for “a rally of national unity”.
Six of Africa’s presidents (from Mali, Niger, Togo, Benin, Gabon and Senegal) attended the rally in Paris.
Four months later, on April 2 this year,Islamists killed 147 people, mostly students, at Garissa University College in north-east Kenya.
There were no rallies attended by people from all over the world.
No foreign leaders flew in.
No African presidents made a presence.
There were lots of condemnation from Washington, London, Paris and other world capitals. Just words, no symbols like we witnessed after the Charlie Hebdo killings.
As I write, Islamists had taken over a hotel in Mali and, at last count, 21 people from all corners of the globe had been killed. The item is not even showing on some internet websites filled with how some transgender personality “stunned” at a gathering somewhere.
The murders of Africans in Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger, Somalia or Mali are, apparently, not news around the world.
When thousands were killed in Nigeria a few days before the Charlie Hebdo attack, no one marched; no world leaders gathered ÔÇô not even African presidents.
It has been a week now since the terror attacks in Paris. CNN has almost all its news anchors still there, still “reporting” on the attacks. So does many other American networks, not to mention dozens of reporters from individual newspapers and websites in the US.
They are not embarrassed that they are getting in the way of the French people who lost their loved ones.
American media gains when the French cry; they are having a good time totally oblivious to the fact that they are now more of a disturbance than sympathisers.
American media is ruthless.
It is jealous of itself and wants to be in the news too.Worse still, it considers some lives less important than that of their own. But beyond all this, I see that monster called racism and I dare them deny it.
