[via translator] Aminata Traoré of Mali begins by saying that she’s representing the African perspective. There’s been no genuine hybridzation in Africa, she says. Rather, there’s been a cultural polarization. Poor countries are getting poorer. “We are left alone with our fear and our loneliness, and you are left alone with yours.”

We don’t believe in globalization, she says. To us this is nothing but Westernization. The West wants to be the center of the world. [Maybe we should retitle Friedman’s The World Is Flat as The Sun Revolves around the Earth.] Globalization is war, war against all. The G8 is using Africa to conceive the mistakes of their own system, she says.

To reach Africa with commnication, sizable investments are made in mobile phones. We’ve reached a point where we can say: “I make phone calls, therefore I am.” We have been reached, but in the worst possible way, she says.

While we are talking about the fate of Africa, thousands of childrens are dying, she says. While you sit at home in your living rooms, you see pictures of starving African children surrounded by flies. The neo-liberal reforms are on the way. But Africa doesn’t work that way. So it’s necessary to justify neo-liberalization by further damaging the part of the world that has already been severely damaged. The prosperity of the Northern hemisphere is largely built on the exploitation of other parts of the world.

We are those who are not wanted.

Debt reduction, etc., is about making your conscience feel better, she says. We know that the war in Iraq is about oil, and we worry about future wars for resources. We don’t hvae a lot to trade, so we don’t know where our place is. We are in a trough, at the bottom. But this does not mean that we’re worse off than others. The entire Southern hemisphere is in this position. If there is globalization it means restructuring the world according to Western standards.

I understand that not everyone in the West benefits from globalization. This gives me hope that maybe Europe and Africa can be partners and Europe can render genuine assistanceship. We should start with agricultural agreements, she says.

Vincenzo: But some Europeans understand…

Aminata: My pain is that I feel more alienated than I did 25 years ago. The West has succeeded in putting Africans against one another through elections. You cannot help Africa with money. You can only help it by understanding it. [Technorati tags: ArsElectronica2005 AminataTraore]

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