The VOICE Online: Karawane Festival Statement and Premier Videos -
Preparing for 2010
Open-Air Caravan Festival 2010
From 4-6 June, 2010 in Jena, Germany
A Bastion of humanity and solidarity
"Unite Against Colonial Injustice in Memory of the Dead and Victims
of Fortress Europe"
Festival Statement and Call for Participation
Hurrah!!! The Caravan Festival is set!
In less than two weeks, the long awaited Caravan Festival 2010 kicks off
in Jena, Thuringen from the 4th till the 6th of June 2010. The Caravan-for
the Rights of Refugees and Migrants will be organising this Festival of
political and cultural resistance against colonial injustice and in memory
of the mortal victims of the construct known as "Fortress Europe". Through
art and dance, critical analysis and discussion, we hope to re-energise
and re-define the struggle against colonial injustice and bring into focus
again, one of its most cruel and deadly modern manifestations:
deportation. It will be a Festival in memory of the lives lost to Fortress
Europe and a celebration of the lives of all those who continue to defy
and survive the politics that is intentionally designed to divide, isolate
and destroy us. We uphold the sanctity of our inviolable human dignity and
physical presence here and anywhere in the world as our ultimate value! We
reject and refuse to accept the reasons and mechanisms used to build the
wall of ignorance and humiliation, racism and discrimination against our
presence here or anywhere else. We are reclaiming what rightfully belongs
to us and what we cannot be denied.
The Caravan Festival is about our physical presence and dignity, our life
experiences and those of the dead, our struggle and resistance, solidarity
and humanity. It is a show of defiance, a bastion of solidarity. We are
defying the oppressive and repressive machinations that have been the
hallmark of European and American intervention in our lives for ages.
Together in this Festival, we are uniting against their will and
demonstrating our strength to resist the aims and methods of this
barbarism. We are here because they destroy our countries. We are here and
we will fight.
Away with the fear and lets regain our Freedom
For centuries the powerful have used fear as their weapon of choice.
Through fear, human beings are forced into submission and isolation from
one another. Through the power of fear we learn and teach that silence and
bowing our heads, indifference to resistance and defending ourselves are
tantamount to survival. Through fear, the visible wounds on the visible
human beings become invisible, hidden behind the false and malicious
narrative of superiority and inferiority, civilised and savage, poor and
rich, weak and strong and of course innocent and guilty. In order to
maintain this control over our minds and our bodies, the powerful develop
the complex to fit in those narratives into past, present and future,
which we are all required to adhere to. In their narrative we are taught
to be receptive to injustice and war, and to accept the creation of the
Untermenschen that they have made of us. We are meant to adore the
supposed superiority of a violent and dominant culture. We are expected to
co-operate and collaborate with them in the perpetuation of that false
representation of our inferiority and never to question their false and
self-deluded notion of the superiority of Western and European identity.
Any challenge to this narrative and hegemony is met with vitriolic
rhetoric and ultimate brutal and violent actions sometimes resulting in
deaths at the hands of state agents. But with this Festival, we are
confronting and defying them and we are conquering that fear. We are
making a stand that we have no fear to say what we know for a fact and
that we mean what we say. We are calling on them to look beyond their
nose, to acknowledge their history and take a stand for humanity because
it is a fact that since the brutal advent of colonialism, the European
identity has been constructed on the wicked presumption of superiority
over all other cultures and people. In order to create the fundamental
belief of the greatness of European ideals and values, the "Other" had to
be constructed into the polar opposite of that greatness. Thus, Africans,
Asians and Latin Americans are still violently relegated into that
category of inferior and salvages. For centuries, forced and inhuman
separation, rape, abuse and enslavement of millions of people were the
handiwork and hallmark of European and American adventurers into the
so-called third world countries. These were closely coordinated under the
uncontrollable greed and wanton exploitation of our land and the
destruction of our cultures.:
http://thecaravan.org/files/caravan/Festival_2010_flyer_en.pdf and
http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1570
Incredibly, in spite of the hundreds of millions of victims of slavery,
colonialism, and imperialism, not to mention when the chicken came home to
roost in the homebred National Socialism, most Europeans and their
descendants throughout the world continue to believe in their superiority
of thoughts, ways of being and actions. Even with all these atrocities,
they are consolidating the very system that produces intolerance,
unbridled greed and hate, and intensifying the consequent ruthlessness of
that brutality at home and abroad (:
http://www.karawane-festival.org/de/hintergrund/ueber-koloniales-unrecht...).
Rise up against Deportation and the deadly Frontex machine of Europe
Once again, the age-old mechanism of fear is being viciously deployed to
justify the deadly and wholly inhuman project FRONTEX. Rather than deal
with their greed-induced and self-inflicted systemic and structural
problems arising from war and imperialism, resulting in harsh migration
processes, human and environmental destruction, the narrative of fear is
again being woven around migrants. Not only do they want that migrants are
afraid to come here they also want to make the populace here afraid of
migrants-swarming them.
In order to mask their true intention and perpetuate colonial injustice,
they are re-doubling their efforts to continue to portray migrants and
potential migrants as the lazy and naive that must be kept at bay by
FRONTEX. They portray victims of their brutal system as those who need
their very (European) military protection and border militarisation. In
this manner, the "good people of Europe" dubiously narrate clear acts of
violent exclusion and oppression as a humanitarian act with FRONTEX as a
noble project.
There is hardly a more glaring and painful example than the Island of
Gorée off the coast of Senegal. During the time of slavery and colonial
rule, Gorée served the Europeans as one of the major "gateways to hell",
through which millions of Black Africans kidnapped, were deported from
their lands to build the economies of Europe and the Americas. This as we
all know became the most barbaric and brutal forced migration in human
history. Today in continuation of their colonial injustice and barbarity,
they have now extended their FRONTEX border regime beyond the immediate
European borders and a FRONTEX post is in Senegal.
There, FRONTEX controls all Ships leaving Africa towards Europe to make
sure that no "illegal immigrant" leaves Africa. In effect, we are
experiencing an increased militarisation of the borders and Seas including
spheres of international waters. All in their attempt to prevent the
migration of a needy, defenceless and deprived people they find difficult
to control but determined to exploit.
Thousands of refugees and migrants die at the ever extending and
increasingly militarised European borders yearly and many more are forced
to drown, "thanks" to FRONTEX. These lots cannot even reach the European
borders alive. Any attempt to render any help and rescue them results in
criminal prosecution. If European dogs or cats are in danger, emergency
service and ambulance assistance are immediately made available, but if
its human beings drowning and calling for help, the only help for them is
to hasten and help them to drown through FRONTEX. In Spain, scenes
reminiscent of the Franco years were replicated a few years ago when
Spanish soldiers suddenly joined their police compatriots in shooting and
killing innocent, unarmed and defenceless refugees and migrants in Ceuta
and Melilla, all in the name of protecting Spain from being swarmed with
the 'unwanted'. Europe with its valued freedom and equality, human right
and dignity fell silent and accepted it.
Further, border control and persecution against migration are already
extended to inland control of African States. African governments are
being pressurised and blackmailed into signing dubious agreements to act
as conduits for European deportation machine with FRONTEX as its monster
agency. Led by Italy and supported by the mentality of Fortress Europe,
African countries are being coerced to accept their newly given status of
European dumping grounds as exemplified by the scandalous and nauseating
agreements with Libya and other North and sub-Saharan African states.
Human rights and human dignity, the supposedly "core European values" are
tossed away in a flash when it comes to dealing with the "Other". We are
not even venturing into the issue of dumping toxic waste materials in
African countries by Europeans-that's another story entirely. Memory
sounds a fresh note of warning on the brutal migration control politics of
Fortress Europe and colonial injustice. The "Frontexation" of European
border system is a deadly physical and ideological weapon of the Fortress
Europe where the militarisation of the seas and land borders is forcefully
deployed against migration. It is meant to strengthen the ignoble system
of divide and rule and the globalised apartheid of selection and
exploitation (
The 'Fortress Within': Restriction of Movement and Refugee Self-Organisation
http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1300).
There must be an end to this inhumanity and broad day barbarism, because
there is another way. We refuse to accept their lies, their manipulations
and their uncontrollable gluttony that has only served to unleash human
suffering, environmental disaster and perpetual wars. With this Festival,
we call on all well-meaning human beings to unite and oppose FRONTEX and
the system behind it and to once again revel in the spirit of humanity and
solidarity. We unite to defy and deny their aims; we show solidarity to
uplift the human spirit.
But then 
in spite of the abuse and oppression, the intimidation and
humiliation, we are partakers in our own fate. Instilled with fear, each
try to deal with our own problems on our own, thinking that if we just
behave well and stay out of trouble then we will be left alone - allowed
to live peacefully. But peace is not that cheap, not least, for us. Many
people do not realise, - even those who suffer most directly from the
problems, the viciousness of the system. We are often led to think and
feel lonely and falsely harbouring the prospect of even fighting and
winning alone. We must do it together to defeat the monster.
Statistics vary below 1 and 3% of all refugees that are ever actually
granted the status worthy of protection. And of those that have been
granted asylum, such as some refugees from Iraq and Syria, many have had
their status taken away and are sent back to countries deemed "safe" by
European bureaucrats. But when these same bureaucrats advise their
citizens planning vacations, they advise them not to go to these countries
or if they must, they should wear bullet proofs because it's not a safe
place. Double standards, dubious morality, or pure liars? You judge. Those
of us they failed to deport are forcefully consigned into the humiliating
and inhumane category of "illegal immigrants" – their favoured position to
best exploit to our bone marrows and deny us any human dignity and or
rights. That much is on offer for the much-vaunted European values.
Karawane Festival On Social Exclusion - No Lager! No Residenzpflicht!
http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1640
Call for Participation
We want to call on all well-meaning people to support our call to overcome
the fear to unite in dignity. We want to unite and rise up against social
exclusion of refugees and migrants in Europe and consolidate our
solidarity to uplift the human spirit. As we are all part of this problem,
we also have to become part of the solution. If we can join together and
overcome our fear, if we can stick together in dignity and solidarity and
if we express our own narratives of resistance, then the so-called
"powerful" will loose the very power with which they have managed to
manipulate and dominate us for more than 500 years. In Germany, we want to
expose the racist hypocrites who preach freedom and equality, human right
and human dignity that is "unantastbar" but continue with institutional
discrimination and treat us like criminals through "Residenzplicht", so as
to fan the flame of societal racism against us.
Let's aspire to that "revolutionary vision" that can redefine our dignity
not by National laws or passport but by our physical presence and humanity
as the ultimate universal value. Let's build that space of our own to
relate to each other even with all the differences we may have. We hope
that you participate in this event and join thousands of others who want
to mourn and honour the dead victims of Fortress Europe, celebrate the
presence of those who are here and build a better world for all. Join us
as single individuals or activists or as group(s). We're looking forward
to seeing a lot of you.
Stop the deportations. Abolish Residenzpflicht now!
Freedom of movement is everyone's right!
We restate and reaffirm that our freedom of movement is non-negotiable!
No Lager! No Police Brutality

No Fortress Europe! Stop "Frontex" now!
The VOICE Refugee Forum
Join the Caravan Network!
http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1627
Please Donate to "KARWANE" Festival in Memory of the dead and victims of
European Border Guards in Europe
http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1637
Video Online:
- The video is about self-organization. On the 10th of April, 2010 in
Berlin, several activists from different networks met to discuss the
struggles for their dignitiy and right to live and to prepare the
KARAWANE-Festival 2010 in Jena, Thüringen.
Video:
http://karawane-festival.org/de/hintergrund/video-vorbereitungstreffen/
- Interview Yufanyi Mbolo zu Jena Festival 2010 auf AFROTAK TV cyberNomads
Das Interview findest Du in zwei Teilen unter
http://www.youtube.com/user/AFROTAKTVcyberNomads#p/u/1/m2WGxwPo6gI
und
http://www.youtube.com/user/AFROTAKTVcyberNomads#p/u/0/sATGmBN2ZY0
Online Premier VIDEO: "Over come your fear for freedom" - Preparing for
Karawane Festival 2010
The video is about self-organization. On the 10th of April, 2010 in
Berlin, several activists from different networks met to discuss the
struggles for their dignitiy and right to live and to prepare the
KARAWANE-Festival 2010 in Jena, Thüringen.
Video:
http://www.karawane-festival.org/de/hintergrund/video-vorbereitungstreff...
AFROTAKTVcyberNomads - youtube
Interview Yufanyi Mbolo zu Jena Festival 2010 auf AFROTAK TV cyberNomads
Das Interview findest Du in zwei Teilen unter
Part 1) http://www.youtube.com/user/AFROTAKTVcyberNomads#p/u/1/m2WGxwPo6gI
und
Part 2)http://www.youtube.com/user/AFROTAKTVcyberNomads#p/u/0/sATGmBN2ZY0
The VOICE Refugee Forum
Address: Schillergässchen 5 07745 Jena
Tel: +49 (0) 3641 6652 14
Fax: +49 (0) 3641 420 270
E-Mail: thevoiceforum@emdash.org
Internet:
http://thevoiceforum.org
http://thecaravan.org
http://karawane-festival.org
The VOICE Refugee Forum Jena
Adresse: Schillergässchen 5, 07745 Jena
Tel. Handy 0049(0) 17624568988,
Fax: 03641 / 42 02 70,
E-Mail: thevoiceforum@gmail.com
Internet: http://www.thevoiceforum.org
Gegründet: 1994, Arbeitsweise: Kampagnen,Aktionen, Vernetzung.
Publikationen: E-Newsletter
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