Egypt, Tunisia, Thailand... Top 10 destinations for Social Upheaval

A Tide of civil unrest has swept through at least 11 nations in just the past week.  Media focus has been on the successes of the "Jasmine Revolution" and developments in Egypt, which is populous, geopolitically significant, and in total upheaval; but nations far and wide are experiencing mass-protests and anti-government demonstrations. 

Cairo, January 25 2011 by Muhammad*#

The underlying cause connecting all of these movements is the political and economic disenfranchisement of large majorities and groups of people within their nations.  It could be that what now is being witnessed will be seen broadly as a sociological reaction to generally poor ongoing conditions which became exacerbated by ongoing effects of a global economic crisis and major moves in global food and fuel inflation.  This situation has threatened a future of abject poverty and destitution on large populations of working poor, unemployed, pensioners, students, small business operators, professionals; anyone with debts or low incomes.  In these conditions, any political or economic event can become a symbol of repression which people begin to rally against, venting their anger and will to change in street demonstrations and violent confrontation with security forces. 

While the list is dominated by the Middle-East/African-Arab speaking nations of Egypt, Jordan, Yemen, Tunisia, Algeria and Lebanon, there is representation from the Sub-Sahara in Cote D'Ivoire and Ghana, as well as Europe and Asia with Albania, Bangladesh and Thailand.  In no particular order:


JORDAN
Last Friday saw thousands of protestors marching in Jordan, and was the 3rd consecutive day-of-prayer protest.  Jordan fits the same profile as the other Arab countries in upheaval: A large population mainly below the age of 30, under the strain of rising prices and unemployment, facing a lifetime of economic deprivation and political disenfranchisement.  Today, February 1, King Abdullah has dismissed his cabinet and prime minister.  His appointment of former general and PM Marouf Bakhit as the new Prime Minister will likely be seen as an empty gesture, as Bakhit is an entrenched member of the political class who was already PM from 2005-2007.


EGYPT
The Egyptian government, led for 30 years by Hosni Mubarak, on January 28 shut down all cell-phone and internet access as it faced popular calls for him and his government to step down during consecutive days of demonstrations.  The entire Presidential cabinet has been purged and restaffed.  Sources put today's crowds at million strong just in Cairo. Transportation has been severly restricted and night-time curfews are in place but ignored.  Protestors have occupied buildings, and the army has refused to use violent coercion against the people whose demands it views as "legitimate."  This represents a major break from President Mubarak, who is himself a former Air Force Commander and Chief of Staff.  Clashes between demonstrators and security forces have cost more than 125 lives.  The protests began in earnest on January 25, a date on which the government annually commemorates the police.  Activists organised for that day a massive apolitical demonstration against police brutality, dubbed the "day of rage."  The protests, unified by the rally-call "Kefaya!" (Enough!) have gathered momentum and are ongoing at the time of publication.


LEBANON
Angry demonstrations hit the streets of Beirut and elsewhere in Lebanon on January 25.  Politics remain as a constant catalyst to demonstrations and unrest in Lebanon, a country which has felt the brunt of 2 wars in the past 3 decades.  Lebanese society faces a lack of housing and vital state infrastructure, unemployment and rising prices, a factionalised society along religious, sectarian and political lines, and the constant threat of renewed war from its southern neighbor Israel. 


YEMEN
Near daily protests since mid January in Yemen and the capital Sanaa have seen calls from tens of thousands for the ouster of 32-year President Ali Abdullah Saleh.  Yemen is an extremely poor nation, located at the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula and across the gulf of Aden from Somalia.  America has called Yemen an Al-Qaeda haven and has been making drone attacks inside the country.  The country has already been coping with open revolt from rebel and separatist movements.  With war, corruption, high unemployment and rising prices plaguing the nation, thousands of people with nothing to lose have turned out to demand rights, justice and new government.  One man, Fouad Sabri, lit-himself on fire in an attempted suicide protest, immitating the act which sparked the Tunisian uprising. 


ALGERIA
Rioting and protests have continued to errupt for over a month as economic turmoil engulfs the country.  Algeria has suffered for a long time with a housing shortage, and the young population is acting out against their impoverished living conditions, rising prices and lack of economic opportunity.  Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the 12-year president, has vowed to quash the unrest; along with employing security forces he has put in place a cooking fuel subsidy and has also ordered major purchases of wheat with the hopes of holding domestic food prices down. 


TUNISIA
A month of protests which saw the ouster of Tunisia's 23-year president, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, continue into their 6th week after being dubbed the "Jasmine Revolution."  Sparked by the suicide protest of Mohammed Bouazizi on Dec 17th, general strikes and protests against indignity, police brutality, organised corruption and generally lacking rights and freedoms continue.  Security forces, out of seeming habit or acculturation, continue to use deadly violence against the crowds, who are now specifically calling for the president's former cronies to resign their posts in various state ministries and the interim government. 


BANGLADESH
Bangladesh is experiencing violent demonstrations as its stock market is rapidly collapsing.  Since a previous report about it here at World Headlines Review, more street violence has been seen as markets hit new lows and stability has failed to return.  Trading was again halted on the Dhaka exchange for a third time, on January 20, to stop rapid and massive declines which threatened a total collapse of stock values.  In a seemingly unrelated story, the AFP reports that a police officer was killed and several police and civilians seriously injured in protests which saw 20,000 villagers fighting against the appropriation of their land by the government.  For the masses of Bangladeshis, it seems there is no safe place to put your savings, be it stocks or real-estate. 


ALBANIA
A country of some 3 million people on the Mediteranean coast of Europe, Albania's social unrest has expressed itself slightly differently from other nations.  Factions within the country have fought with each other and the police over political scandals and corruption.  On January 21, 3 civilians were killed when security forces fired on anti-government demonstrators.  At its core, the unrest is the result of the same rising prices, unemployment and rampant corruption that is swelling the ranks of the uprisings in many other nations.  


THAILAND
Anti-government protests by "red-shirts" and "yellow shirts" saw thousands of demonstrators occupying streets and neighborhoods in Bangkok this week.  The Thai government has been beset by protests for years now, from groups who seem to recognise no democratic forum for redress except direct action.  In December 2008 the Bangkok international airport was occupied by protestors, leaving many tourists stranded and creating international headlines.  Since then, protests continue largely in the absence of international attention.


GHANA
Thousands of people demonstrated in the capital of Accra and Kumasi on January 26, calling for government action against poverty and rising food and fuel prices.  The protests were peaceful.


COTE D'IVOIRE
In a poor country facing massive unemployment and inflation, a political crisis has sparked violence along social, political and ethnic lines.  The UN this week reported estimates of 260 deaths in the rapidly evolving situation.  Violence erupted when Laurent Gbagbo, the incumbent President, was defeated in a recent election.  Gbagbo has refused the election results and is pitting the ethnic and economic prejudices of his southern support base against the growing anger of the supporters of President-elect Alassane Ouattara. 

Cairo Police Line, January 25 by Muhammad*#

The above list briefly illustrates a number of locales experiencing unrest right now or in the past week.  Haiti and Belarus are two more countries which could be added to the list if the timeframe was widened to the past month.  Both countries have been mired in violent protest against corruption and anti-democratic government.  In all of these countries, where there are little to no rights or freedom to associate, to gather publicly, to speak one's opinion vocally, where there are no democratic venues for ordinary people to make themselves heard and to seek redress, the only option is to defy the law, defy curfews, and face tear-gas, batons and bullets in the streets. 

What seemed to happen first in Tunisia may yet inspire more people to take to the streets, but what is actually happening will continue as long as there is a reason: People facing a bleak future, with little to lose and everything to gain, finding common cause with each other and searching for hope and the power to shape their own destiny

Street-battles in Cairo

Read Sources On:  Egypt  - Lebanon  - Thailand1  - Thailand2  - Cote D'Ivoire1  - Cote DI'voire2  - Ghana1  - Ghana2  -  Albania1  - Albania2  - Bangladesh1  - Bangladesh2  - Yemen1  - Yemen2  - Yemen3  - Algeria  - Jordan 1  - Jordan 2

Bangladesh: Dabbling in Dhaka Stock Markets

A classic stock market boom-bust cycle is underway in Bangladesh, inciting riots after the closure of the country's main markets in Dhaka and Chittagong this week.  The picture painted by the charts and reports from Bangladesh make for an abject lesson in how markets fluctuate and are driven by salesmanship and sentiment.

The chart below demonstrates relatively stable conditions in the Dhaka Stock Index until a surge of buying in November of 2009 (Point "I") across all sectors in the market formed the catalyst for a year of bullish sentiment which drove markets ever upward.  At the time Point "I" also represented an all-time high for the market:

Chart Analysis by Phil McGavin

The peak at Point "II" on the chart represents mid February, 2010, a point in time at which stockmarket prices were already double what they had been a year before that point in February 2009.  At this time an article, Stock Market: A Ticking Time Bomb, appeared in the the Bangladeshi publication The Financial Express, discussing the phenomenon: "The surge in the price index and the associated increased market volatility, somehow reminds us about the boom and bust of 1996. A sudden influx of funds and a surge in retail investors are pushing the DSE index forward without regard to economic fundamentals...Currently the market is entirely being driven by mob frenzy, and how long this will continue is to be seen."  The article discusses M2 inflation and an influx of new and uneducated investors and margin traders as the forces behind the accumulation and higher valuation of the market's stocks, resulting in the week-to-week setting of new highs.

Point "III" on the chart represents the peak of the euphoria, which was reached in the first week of December 2010, roughly a month ago. From there prices have fallen at breakneck speed.

During the period between Points "I" and "III", ordinary Bangladeshis became enamoured with the ongoing success of the stock markets, as they watched the value of their cash savings gaining only on marginal interest.  Average Bangladeshis also understood that their savings were losing value as a cause of the severe boughts of inflation they were experiencing in food and fuel prices.  Throughout this time, investment retailers and banks, similar to those we have in the West such as CIBC Wood Gundy, the Cooperators and Edward Jones to name a few, were able to paint the market as a secure vehicle for savings and earnings as they could present data and charts which showed values and returns on an uninterrupted upward trajectory.  They made a great deal in fees and commissions by helping millions of ordinary Bangladeshis get into the market.

However, exactly as happens everywhere else, most ordinary Bangladeshis as well as the low-level investment package salespeople working for the Retailers and Banks, did not know that the Banks and Investment firms themselves were already placing sell orders at the predicted tops in the same sectors and stocks they were still enticing people to buy and earning fees on.  These large institutions correctly recognised that soon there would be no significant amount of investors or capital left to purchase further stock and continue to drive prices upwards.  They also recognised that the mindless mass-purchasing of the stock market (that they helped to create) had driven prices well beyond their fundamental value.

On Dec. 5th, a major process of unwinding began as large investors and banks began to "book profits," which is economic jargon for realising cash gains by liquidating an asset.  Even during this time less prudent Bangladeshis were still offering to buy stock at prices which had the smart money hitting the sell button.  One by one these large stock holders began to unload, and in the glut of selling prices have tumbled since early December to Monday's low.  On that day, the entire Dhaka exchange index lost 9.25% percent inside an hour, before authorities halted trading to prevent a complete collapse of the market.  The BBC reports that "police used tear gas and baton charged investors who had attacked government buildings in protest at collapsing share prices" on Monday.  Such a sharp decline likely represents a sudden awareness by many more market participants that the markets are still overvalued, and they are thus either exiting the markets or unwilling to invest in it further.  More unfortunately, it represents the self-fuelling effect of automatic execution stop/sell orders and margin calls which were triggered as prices fell, which added to the momentum of the selling frenzy.  It was this automatic and self-perpetuating triggering of sell orders which caused authorities to suspend trading on the exchanges.  The massive dip and its triggering of stop/sells and margin calls has forced book-losses on many ordinary investors, who are for the most part poorly advised and educated as to how to compete in financial markets.  

Chart Analysis by Phil McGavin

The chart to the left shows the market from just this past August until now.  "III" is the same December 5th point as that of the previous chart, the ultimate high of the market, which was 8918.5.  Point "B" is the low of 6499.5 which was formed after trading was suspended this Monday, January 10th.  While such is an astounding loss of 28.2%, this only reflects movements in the stock index, which is itself an average of the values of all stocks on the exchange.  Many investors have realised losses far worse than this as their exposure to the market is in only a number of stocks thereof; many individual stocks performed far worse than the market average.  Usually such stocks are held primarily by uninformed investors who purchase baskets of stock packages and mutual funds from retail investment firms.  These are the people rioting in the streets and claiming that they have lost most of their savings.  Though the index did recover to above 7500, it is clear that this is to a level which is still not above the upside of a forming downward channel. That levels in the index were restored to where they were a few days before Sunday and Monday's panic does not change the fact that sentiment has turned against the market and that prices are likely to continue downwards even faster than the extreme manner in which they rose, to levels which are below actual stock values.  These fluctuations will see many middle class people in Bangladesh wiped out and starting from square one in a country where there is no social safety nets and whose lowest common denominator is homeless refugees of the past years' repeated monsoon floods.

The ongoing Bangladeshi Stock Maket unravelling is a real-time view into the anatomy of a market bubble, and yet another of example of why people everywhere must be weary of investing in markets they do not understand.  To invest in any market is primarily a speculative business decision, not a method for retirement savings.  One should not undertake to do so without some education and limited experience of their own.  Furthermore, one should be leary on handing over their hard earned money to brokers and investment retailers whose organisation's primary interest is fees and commissions; organisations who are not regulated from betting against their own advice; advisors who in large part have no experience or earnings in stock markets and whose education is limited to brief certificate programs at community colleges which merely familiarize them with basic economic terminology and theory.  


Read the Financial Exchange article from Point "I", December 1, 2009:
http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/more.php?news_id=85612

Read the "Ticking Timebomb" article from Point "II", February 19, 2010:
http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/more.php?news_id=92946

Read about the Riots:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12149340
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12162039

Peas in a Water Pod: China, India and Bangladesh; Atlanta, Alabama and Florida

Two Economist articles of recent publication draw attention to the imminent threat that the availability of water, or the lack thereof, poses to social, political and economic stability.  A Himalayan rivalry, Aug 21; and Chattahoochee blues, Sept 18; describe current and potential disputes on both domestic and international levels. 

In discussing the extremely complex nature of relations between India and China, A Himalayan rivalry briefly describes the recent Sino-Indian war which saw China attacking India while the USSR and USA were preoccupied with the 1962 October Cuban missile crisis, with China occupying disputed areas in Arunachal and Kashmir for roughly a month before peace and withdrawal.  The long border between the two countries was, in 1962, a demarcation with no real geographical, historical or even official basis after more than a century of gerrymandering by the British and Russian empires competing for control of central Asia.  To a great extent it remains so today, and its obscurity mirrors the current relationship of the two giants, whose trade has increased from “$270m in 1990” to an expected “$60 billion this year,”  yet whose militaries still manoeuvre along the borders; China making “huge improvements... in its border infrastructure, enabling a far swifter mobilisation of Chinese troops there,” and India announcing “last year that it would deploy another 60,000 troops to Arunachal,” a border province at the eastern end of India, most of which is claimed by China as “Chinese South Tibet.” 

Yarlung Tsangpo River, Tibet - by Fighting Irish 1977

Arunachal is not only a new home to 60,000 Indian troops, but also a province through which the Brahmaputra River flows; from Tibet to Bangladesh and into the Indian ocean; sustaining millions of Indians and Bangladeshis.   According to The Economist, “China appears to have reasserted its demand for most of India’s far north-eastern state,” (Arunachal) having made diplomatic mischief with citizenship and visas for Arunachalis and by objecting to Asian Development Bank loans to India “on the basis that some of the money was earmarked for irrigation schemes in Arunachal.”  Whether or not China will have Arunachal remains to be seen; however, China will have its water.  A possible motivation for the objection to the above mentioned financing of irrigation projects in India is that should China begin diverting water from the Brahmaputra, the impact would be much more measurable in its effects on agriculture and industry, thereby strengthening India’s claims of damages against China. 

The Economist reports that one dam is being built on the Brahmaputra, or the Yarlung Tsangpo River as it is known in Tibet, however the Zangmu dam is actually only one of a few that China has apparently already announced publicly.  Considering China’s penchant for great works of engineering as in the Three-Gorges-Dam, its long term view in policy matters, its demonstrated willingness to divert waters as in the ‘South-North Water Transfer Project, and as China prefers in matters most sensitive to announce their intentions and projects near or at completion as a fait-accompli; many in India and Bangladesh surmise that with the infrastructure already being put into place, a gradual if not sudden diversion of the waters that feed the Brahmaputra River is an inevitability, in light of China’s already apparent problem of feeding and watering its 1.34 billion inhabitants.  Many sources show a litany of dams currently under construction and in planning stages along the Yarlung, well beyond what is publicly admitted by Chinese officials and media.    

Aspects of the Brahmaputra/Yarlung situation are paralleled in the south-eastern US as described in Chattahoochee blues, where local water utilities are illegally supplying the growing Greater Atlanta area with more and more water from Lake Lanier, itself created by the construction of the Buford dam on the Chattahoochee river in 1956; a dam originally intended primarily to supply power.  Downstream farms, industry and communities in Georgia and Alabama want to ensure their own adequate supply of water; as do communities, environmentalists and oyster farms in Florida; where fresh water from the Chattahoochee empties into the Apalachicola river, sustaining the watershed and floodplain which feeds the complex ecosystem of forests and marshes and the special balance of fresh and salt water where the river meets the gulf of Mexico. 

 Federal courts have been forced through a process of lawsuits into a position where it must take sides in a dispute which it understands cannot be fairly resolved, as there is plainly not enough water to satisfy the overall demand, if not need.  Their decision has been to defer to the judgement of Congress or to a negotiated solution between the parties, with the caveat that should neither process produce a decision by 2012, local water suppliers in greater Atlanta will (still) no longer be able to legally use Lake Lanier as a source of water.  While the court recognises this outcome as a “Draconian result”, the status-quo being already one of illegal removal of water from Lake Lanier, watchers will await what Draconian measures the authorities will employ to stop Atlanta from supplying itself with water from the lake, if any. 

There seems to be a precedent forming both on domestic as well as international levels that is one of first-come, first-served.  Furthermore, if nations fail to properly resolve and manage their own internal water-resource problems and allow their populations to deprive each other and suffer thereof, there seems little hope that any agreement internationally as to the equitable and sustainable distribution of water is possible.   

The Economist; A Himalayan rivalry: 

http://www.economist.com/node/16843717

The Economist; Chattahoochee blues:

http://www.economist.com/node/17043462

More on the Brahmaputra/Yarlung River: 

http://tibetanplateau.blogspot.com/2010/04/india-poorly-informed-about-chinese.html