THE FIGHT for AFRICA He Has Campaigned with George Clooney and Produced a Book with Ryan Gosling
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048-049 Giving_Layout 2 27/11/2019 16:43 Page 1 INTERVIEW THE FIGHT FOR AFRICA He has campaigned with George Clooney and produced a book with Ryan Gosling. JOHN PRENDERGAST tells us why the fight against exploitation in Africa has defined his life. WHAT ARE THE ROOTS interests, and objectives. When he decided to because they follow the celebrities and OF YOUR ACTIVISM? ramp up his activism on Africa, we found learn from them. The celebrities also can I am a work-in-progress human rights and ways to work more closely together, help “make it loud,” as George Clooney peace activist, constantly evolving to try to particularly by travelling to African war would say. They make it really hard for make the biggest impact I can with the gifts zones. politicians to turn away or say they didn’t that I have been given. Ever since I was We faced many dangerous situations and know. young, I have always identified with the were inspired by remarkable people underdog. From my own difficult everywhere we went. Those experiences have TELL US ABOUT THE SENTRY childhood I developed a real discomfort created a trust and bond that reinforces our For three decades I worked on with unfairness. commitment to do all we can to make a humanitarian aid, development policy, As I learned more about the world, and difference. We’re two Irish guys from the peacekeeping, conflict resolution, and learned about the injustices and midwestern US doing more than we ever human rights monitoring, all in Africa. But inequalities that are at the core of our thought would be possible. And I think we through all this work, I concluded that all shared global history, I reacted with a both believe we can do more together than of the good efforts that organisations and mixture of anger at the past and present we can separately. governments in Africa and around the along with hope for the future, if only world were making on these issues were enough of us would take a stand and raise YOU HAVE WORKED WITH being undermined by systemic corruption. our voices in support of threatened peoples CELEBRITIES INCLUDING DON I have come to believe that the biggest and the environment. Fighting for human CHEADLE, RYAN GOSLING, AND obstacle to peace and human rights in rights has been at the centre of who I am MATT DAMON. WHAT ARE THE Africa’s major wars is the phenomenon of for much of my life. BENEFITS OF WORKING WITH state capture, where a small group of HIGH PROFILE PEOPLE? political and military officials and their GEORGE CLOONEY IS ONE OF THE As Don Cheadle would say, they are able to international commercial collaborators FOUNDERS OF THE SENTRY – HOW take a mirror and redirect all the light and hijack the state institutions and repurpose DID YOU BECOME FRIENDS AND attention on them as celebrities onto them for their own enrichment. All the FELLOW CAMPAIGNERS? forgotten issues. Celebrities are like master good efforts at development and peace are We met at a rally for the people of Darfur and recruiters to causes all over the world. Many put at risk because of the incentive realised we had very similar backgrounds, people have learned about issues simply structure in these countries, which favours 48 048-049 Giving_Layout 2 27/11/2019 16:43 Page 2 Clockwise from main: John Prendergast photographed in Congo, where he wrote a book about the remarkable people he has met through his charity work; Prendergast at a refugee camp in Uganda; Prendergast with George Clooney and Don Cheadle; Prendergast’s most recent book violence over coexistence, and looting over TELL US ABOUT YOUR have been to Congo for hundreds of years. economic development. MOST RECENT BOOK Many have heard one or two things about We decided to go after that looting When I started doing research for Congo the Congo’s past through “King Leopold’s machine that was robbing these countries Stories: Battling Five Centuries of Ghost” or maybe Mobutu and his reign, but blind and warping the incentives away Exploitation and Greed, I was stunned at the cumulative story was mind- from peace and human rights. The best way how deeply connected Europe and the US boggling. Over a quarter of the people to do that, we thought, would be to follow enslaved on America’s plantations were the money and turn over the evidence to from Congo. banks and governments around the world Our auto industry has twice been that can do something about the billions of dependent on Congo for its expansion: first dollars that are illicitly pouring out of for the rubber for the tires, and now for the Africa every year through the formal cobalt in electric car batteries. Congo international financial system. delivered the copper for weapons systems in World War I and the uranium for the WHAT IS THE MAGNITSKY ACT atomic bombs in World War 2. The country AND WHY DOES IT MATTER was a major pawn in the Cold War, and it BEYOND THE UNITED STATES? has supplied the essential ingredients for It’s a policy instrument that allows the US our cell phones and laptops. to impose sanctions on the basis of The list goes on. Europe, America and corruption and human rights abuses. The now China have gone in and simply taken law is inspiring other countries to pass whatever they wanted – the people, the similar legislation, so more and more resources, the wildlife – and left the countries can utilize this policy tool. My country in ruins. I was inspired by the dream is that some day there will be the efforts of the Congolese people to fight back same kind of accountability for human against this tidal wave of unfairness, so the rights violations and grand corruption as book profiles many of these “Upstanders,” there is for terrorism and narcotics these heroes battling for a better future for trafficking. their country. 49.