EXPATRIATES DISPLACED BY LIBYA CONFLICT NEED AID

Erle Frayne D. Argonza

Too many expatriate workers are helping to build the Libyan economy and society to bring it closer to modernity. They comprise over 1/3 of the Libyan population of 6 Million+, and they include thousands of my fellow Filipinos. With the conflict between pro and anti-Kadhafy forces escalating, expats were so badly displaced along the way.

I hope I could have been interviewed by Kadhafy himself before the turmoil started. For I would candidly recommend to him to simply absorb en toto the expatriate workers in Libyan society and let them be a constitutive part of the population there. They have already enriched Libyan life in no small measures, so there’s no reason why they should be treated as foreigners forever.

But Kadhafy and the Arabic Libyans (Berber ethnicity largely) do not have on the agenda such large-scale citizen conversion out of the expats. And now, with the turmoil broiling hot to oust him, Kadhafy may be as blind as ‘three blind mice’ to even notice the expats who are fleeing the conflict.

Filipinos are a bit lucky in that, with just a score of thousands or so of my compatriots working there, the diverse embassies and consulates in the Mediterranean can act together to help them pull out quickly and go back to Manila. That precisely happened to the expat Filipinos, and so to the thousands of British, Chinese, Japanese, French, and other nationalities.

But not so for the Afro expats such as those coming from Ghana and Ethiopia. There are also those thousands coming from Bangla Desh, Pakistan, and other developing countries. They are in a calamity situation and they badly need humanitarian aid to salve their hunger and daily survival problems.

I guess the very employers of the expats were simply unprepared for the contingencies of a war situation. Nobody in the corporate boards of the employers could have foreseen what was to happen in Libya, and so the employers were caught flat-footed by the rapidity of the force majeure. The echelon officials of the employers pulled out all so suddenly, leaving behind many of their personnel.

Libya is too close to Europe which for now is in the best position to rush aid to those displaced expats. Egypt and Tunisia were burnt out by their own turmoil that overthrew their chief execs, so they are sadly unprepared for large-scale contingencies to help out the overflowing thousands of displaced expats.

Now, how far can Europeans share aid and in what form, as well as how far can they assist the expats to get back to their respective countries, remains to be seen. The lackadaisical action from Europe could backlash in due time, with the Afro and 3rd world expats finding every route they can to migrate to Europe instead, and eke out a life there as illegal migrants.

And Europeans better be quick in helping out. For several other Arab states are burning in infernal social turbulence, and they too can see expats as well as their own citizens migrating in huge waves to Europe for greener pasteurs.

[Philippines, 16 March 2011]

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INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY MUST INTERVENE IN LIBYA

Erle Frayne D. Argonza

World opinion has been moving closer to approving a full intervention to oust Libya’s mad leader Kadhafy. As to what forms of intervention will be adopted, global leaders are still in the dark as of the moment.

I am not wont to see foreign intervention myself in the internal affairs of any country. This is a matter of respecting the principle of sovereignty, mutual respect, and cooperation among nations.

The Libyan case is different however. Arab citizens who were sick and tired of the authoritarian Kadhafy regime voiced their collective decision to oust Kadhafy via peaceful means, in the same way that Egyptians and Tunisians did before them. But Kadhafy chose to gun down and bomb to smithereens the peaceful protestors, and that constitutes the heinous crime of genocide.

Libya’s own anti-Kadhafy forces are allergic to direct intervention from outside, but given the situation that Kadhahy had stocks of billions of money to wage an enduring war of attrition, the cash-starved anti-Kadhafians better rethink their position. The mass slaughter in Rwanda finally ended precisely when a contingent of external forces sweepingly invaded Rwanda and deposed the mad leadership there, and the Rwandan precedent is there for the Oust Kadhafy rebels to study and follow.

True, economic progress did see the light of day during Kadhafy’s permanent incumbency. An infrastructure boom has been taking place prior to the protests. Just by looking at those glimpses of Libya provided by international news reporters, one is given the chance to witness the urbanization and good planning done in the rising cities there.

But Libya’s path to progress was done at the expense of civil liberties. The country is awash with gory narratives of how Kadhafy’s detractors were jailed, tortured, and brutally killed in prison camps. When Kadhafy is gone, investigators ought to conduct diggings of possible mass graves and show the world the deaths that took place as social price of Kadhafy’s version of economic progress.

Libya’s economy benefited almost exclusively from oil revenues, and whenever vast quantities of oil are concerned there also are the Anglo-European financiers working behind the scene to cash in on the Libyan oil. Even now, the same financiers have been manipulating the petrol spot market for colossal profits from out of oil price hikes, thanks to their front man Moammar Kadhafy.

We just hope that when Kadhafy will be ousted, the link between his Libyan oil billions and the Western financiers will be exposed to the hilt. I will be lauding the major media outfits if they will take on the cudgels of exposing the threads of greed as mentioned above, which I doubt will happen. So far, only the fringe groups have been doing the daring investigations if ever, such as the Executive Intelligence Review circle.

Meantime, the world community is talking about the Libyan conflict, and configuring courses of action to intervene in that ‘regime change’ phenomenon. What should be clear from the onset is that the Libyans themselves are the heroes of the Oust Kadhafy movement, even as the burden of reconstructing a badly damaged post-Kadhafy nation will fall in their shoulders.

[Philippines, 16 March 2011]

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Come Visit E. Argonza’s blogs anytime!

Social Blogs:
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OIL SPECULATORS CASH IN ON LIBYAN TURMOIL

Erle Frayne D. Argonza

A full-blown civil war is now brewing as I write this note. As the gloomy events unfold, greedy speculators are busy taking advantage of a conflict situation by playing it up nauseatingly on the petrol spot market. Wars and mini-hotspots surely have a way of making some greedy families make lots of money, so let me add more reflections about the Libyan hot fires’ impact on oil price.

The notorious financier speculators have been planning all along to cash in on a global conflagration that should have pitted the Sunni-Zion alliance versus Iran-led coalition. Such a planned catastrophe was suddenly derailed by the mass rousing of younger generations of Arabs who now desire for the overthrow of their respective tyrants or sovereigns.

With the world war III prospect now sorely diminished, the financiers had to find a quick fix to their addictive greed for easy profits. And that’s how their fixated eyes marveled at the conflict that suddenly unveiled in Libya which, as everybody knows, sits on huge reserves of oil from where the tyrant largely derives his income for country and family.

Nobody knows how long the conflict lasts in Libya, but it is getting clearer as of this writing that Kadhafy’s legitimacy before his own supporters is rapidly effacing. The situation is as fluid as petrol gushing out of Libya’s oil wells, so it pays to keenly observe the events on a day-to-day basis.

One thing though is certain about the conflict’s time frame: it will be short, and no protracted war will come from the forecast loser—tyrant Kadhafy and minions. So, given the short time frame, the speculators have to ride along with the waves of turmoil, and cash in quick on the hot events.

So the spot market is ablaze at this moment with a sort of hour-by-hour anaysis of the situation and superficial forecast of oil prices. Superficial, because insider trading is the in-thing among the dirty players in the same commodity market, with a coterie of financiers fronting for their invisible sponsors among the Anglo-European oligarchs. There is no science into the oil spot market, just plain mafia-type dirty speculations.

Already, retail oil prices are skyrocketing in countries that are dependent on oil imports. In the United States, oil prices get hiked on a daily basis. East Asian countries follow very closely not far behind from the USA in terms of constant rising of retail prices, or those that hurt the pockets of downstream end-users. Food prices are direly affected by the same OPH (oil price hikes), and so you could imagine the glee of another branch of the dirty speculators cashing in on the food commodities trading.

With the dizzying rapidity of the flow of conflict-induced events, we can only surmise that OPH will hover the $170-$200 per barrel of oil (‘sweet crude’ standard). As the events are happening, anti-OPH and anti-food price hikes are now raging across the globe, including the Philippines. These protest actions are complicating the mass panic that is generated by the rising prices of oil & food, with potential hysteria that could explode into food riots in the short run.

While billions of poor folks suffer from the rising prices, the greedy speculators’ pockets are satiated anew rendering them instantly happy over very fat profits. Commodities speculation is done without any compunction over their catastrophic effects on peoples, as they are done by conscienceless market players.

But never forget that the greed of the dirty speculators is insatiable, and so the said financiers’ eyes are again busy searching for some other hot fires in the event that the Libyan conflict ends soon. Those hot fires are no other than the socio-political turmoil that is now brewing across the Arab region.

[Philippines, 04 March 2011]

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Come Visit E. Argonza’s blogs anytime!

Social Blogs:
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PERSIA RE-AWAKENS TO CONFRONT REVIVED ROME (EU-USA)

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Good day! Magandang araw!

In previous articles I have articulated about ancient racial consciousness that could awaken at some juncture after a long dormancy period. The dormancy could be 2,000 years approximately, which coincides with Arnold Toynbee’s 2,000-year civilizational life.

The revival of ancient Roman consciousness had already been galvanizing, with the European Union and USA (w/ Canada) serving as the two (2) sections of the New Rome. Brussels is the capital of the revived Rome, a fact that is now well established. The revival of Bonapartism, also articulated in previous articles, is also unfolding at this moment, with war policy serving as option to abolish nations.

As such an eventuality is happening, another ancient power, Persia (Romans termed it Parthia) is also re-awakening. To recall history, Persia/Parthia challenged Rome with devastating results, and Rome was never able to conquer the Persians who continued to harass Roman provinces in Asia till the beginnings of Byzantium.

If there is any one power that knows the agenda of Rome (knows it instinctively or unconsciously), it is Rome’s ancient enemy Parthia. Parthia is now rising like a phoenix, and it is preparing to face New Rome in an offensive manner. ‘Offensive’ means confronting an adversary from a position of strength, just to stress the point.

New Rome has already prepared the Semitic coalition (tackled in previous articles) which it will use as a buffer against a marauding New Parthia. Both Sunni (gulf states) and Zion are armed to the teeth and are showing a semblance of an offensive coalition as well, though it remains to be seen whether the coalition will indeed be able to demonstrate muscle in a ‘clash of civilizations’ with revived Parthia.

A forecast Zion-Sunni versus Parthia conflict could indeed take place any time now, with New Rome (probably using American assets) igniting the war at its inception. But on the unconscious level, Zion & Sunni isn’t what Parthia will be staking claims on.

Parthia is after Rome (EU primarily, USA secondarily), and it will use the conflict with Zion & Sunni precisely to scourge the latter so that its scared peoples will migrate westward in massive herds. Waves after waves of Semites (largely Arabs) will move by land, water, and sea to Europe, the most likely new home, to escape Parthia’s wrath.

Berbers, Hamites, Arabs and black Africans will also most likely take sides in such a conflict, even as many of their scared peoples will move northwards to Europe from Africa in massive herds. Whoever the African hordes will be siding with, the result will be the same: tens of millions of its peoples buzzing off northwards to perceived safe havens.

The possible destruction of Iran via conventional means and limited frontier nukes may not necessarily destroy Parthia. Parthia is bigger than Iran, as Shiite allies will join the fray and be home to guerilla assets who can be used to harass the West no end. While the West uses conventional warfare, Parthia will use a combination of conventional and non-conventional strategies (e.g. Hezbollah rocket attacks inside Lebanon, Syria, and maybe even inside Europe).

Destroying and depopulating Iran will prove to be a hallow victory. Because even with Iran gone, at least 150 Millions of Arabs and African hordes will have nestled in Europe who, a short time later, will continue the ‘clash of civilizations’ wars via cultural conflicts and economic over-stretch for a continent that is now rapidly decaying back to 3rd world status.

Cultural decay in the West can be a catastrophic result of the coming clash with Parthia. Just as in ancient times, when “barbarian” hordes took over Roman provinces, Arab and African hordes will be moving up to squeeze themselves in lands they will occupy. Meanwhile, Parthia will be having the last laugh as its ghost will hover over Europe via the migrant hordes.

If New Rome wishes to survive the coming decades, its sane stakeholders should think many times before waging a cataclysmic war versus a revived Parthia. No one power can ever win such a conflict, the only winner being Death & Destruction of a scale heretofore untold.

[Philippines, 24 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

ARAB GULF STATES: HOW ASIAN?

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


It’s now past 8 p.m. as I write this piece inside my studio apartment, and my writing is currently accompanied by chill music from Brazil. For this piece let me toss the query: how Asian could the Arab gulf states be?

To begin my reflections, let me share to you a portion of my family history. My mother, a dietician/health professional, decidedly joined the fray of the ‘gulf state fever’ in the early 80s by seeking work in Saudi Arabia’s hospitals. For four (4) years did she work in the kingdom that is so endeared to many overseas Filipinos like her, until she departed for a new destination (USA where she retired).

When she started working there, her purses began to balloon quickly just as Arabia’s oil pumps were gushing out colossal petrodollars like limitless boons from heaven. She gleefully told us of the fat overtime pays she and her staff received, thus enabling her to send us in the Philippines—then a depression-struck ‘sick man of Asia’—quanta of dinars to quaff our thirst for back-up money.

That was the trend, until around 1984 when patterns suddenly changed. Mother began to complain of working overtime with no extra (overtime) compensation, and until 1986 when she quit Arabia for America no more extra boons came via the overtime pay. Something awefully wrong was going on in the gulf states and not just in Saudi Arabia, this was for sure.

The gulf states as a whole comprised a region that was considerably a growth driver of the global economy for a time until approximately the mid-1980s. At that time, it had so much petrodollars stashed in Western banks and investment houses that it needed for its internal growth, but such growth was choked up by fluctuations in the oil demand globally.

Before long, Asia’s ‘dragons’ and ‘tiger economies’ caught up with the gulf states. As the former kept surging upwards, the latter fluctuated between stagnation and paltry growth. India and emerging markets of Asia were recently added to the list of growth drivers of the world, while the gulf states are mired in a rather delusional self-image of growth driver that is more a thing of the past.

The word ‘Asia’ today has become synonymous with ‘growth driver’. But let it be clarified that the gulf states just don’t fit well into this growth category. For sure, their diversification of dynamic sectors from oil to manufacturing, infrastructures and services have paid quite fatly for them but only for them and not for the planet as a whole.

The gulf states are now quite prepared for the eventuality of drying up of its oil reserves. They are likewise in sync with the rise of mega-cities that the dragons, tigers and emerging markets have began snowballing, capped by prestige projects of towering buildings notably the Taipei 101 and Petronas towers, with Burj Dubai leading the way for the former. But the same states’ return to the halcyon days of being a global driver is simply a thing of the past.

Dubai is a case in point of a mega-city that is too over-ambitious in its goal to become the financial center of Asia. It embarked on gigantic projects totaling past the $3 Trillion mark from circa 2005 through 2015, aimed at eventually shoring up its new image as a financial center. As the giant commercial complexes were done, the greater problem was who would be their end-users? Without end-users, no pay-ups for expenses used to fund the projects will accrue to the coffers.

Honestly, I will still need to be convinced that gulf states are truly Asian in their growth propulsion. I see more of the hands of Euro-oligarchs such as George Soros & cronies in building those gigantic projects there, with the Arab investors serving as mere junior partners if not dummies in a growth game with dubious motives.

Gulf states are playing the game of the ‘virtual economy’ or ‘casino economy’ and that is far from being Asian. In contrast, the dragons, tigers and emerging markets are engaged in the ‘real economy’ of manufacturing, infrastructures, agriculture, and transport industries, backed by solid science & technology innovations, rendering them the label of ‘truly’ Asian.

If there is any urgent message I’d send to the said Arab state, it is this one: dis-engage willfully from the encumbrances with Europe’s financier oligarchy, reverse ‘virtual economy’ policies, and move back to the ‘real economy’. With that probably and hopefully the same region will regain its former esteemed image as a growth driver of the global economy, a true Asian region indeed.

[Philippines, 21 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]