Word: geldof
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Think of Ethiopia and you probably think of famine. And Live Aid. And Bob Geldof. And that's been bugging Ethiopians for 20 years. Ethiopia is a proud nation, the only place in Africa never to be colonized and a place with a civilization that dates back as far as ancient Egypt. Christianity flourished in Ethiopia before it took hold in Europe, and it was a Christian king of Ethiopia who gave shelter to the first Muslims in 615 A.D. after they were thrown out of Saudi Arabia as heretics - as a result, in the Koran, Mohammed tells all Muslims...
...Western musician definitely not invited is Sir Bob Geldof. Partly this is a matter of musical preference. "We never really knew who this guy was anyway," says Sammy, a journalist for the Sub Saharan weekly newspaper as he sips Arabica in one of Addis' smart streetside caf?s. "We never knew any of his tunes. And then suddenly he was here to save...
...Geldof's absence is also about pride. The Irish singer raised $100 million through Band Aid, a supergroup of British pop stars that set the mold for charity records to come, and Live Aid, which did the same for worldwide charity concerts. The money was to help alleviate the devastating Ethiopian famine of 1984-5, in which more than a million people are thought to have died. But Ethiopia, a nation of nearly 80 million people, now boasts consistent economic growth of 10%, and in that context the famine, and Geldof, are remembered with more than a tinge of humiliation...
...announced by former Vice-President Al Gore, Live Earth had to battle doubt and disinterest. The public had grown increasingly jaded over all-star charity rock festivals, particularly two years after the even larger Live 8 benefit shows for Africa and global poverty. (Live 8 organizer Sir Bob Geldof dismissed Gore's effort as "just an enormous pop concert.") And while the organizers claimed to be raising awareness, critics scolded that the global public is well aware of the perils of climate change...
...Being Africa's premier diva is not a crown that Kidjo wears lightly. As an African, she says, she comes from a place with problems. But as a musician, she argues, she can solve them. Kidjo first came to prominence in the 1980s, a time when Bob Geldof was fashioning Live Aid around the idea that music could be charity. Kidjo had an even more ambitious idea, which drew on her voodoo roots in the old African slave port of Cotonou, Benin, where she grew up: music is "the ultimate power," she explains over lunch in Paris, her adopted home...