By Buyile Matiwane
With global tension running high over the past two weeks due to the conflict in Ukraine, the world has placed a microscope on elements that are critical for defining personal freedom, human rights and sovereignty.
The ability to uphold rights and freedoms has been a yardstick to ensure the highest standards and quality of life are upheld as best as possible the world over. This is also meant to set the tone for how countries relate to one another.
Our inability to accurately and objectively assess a country’s commitment to human rights and civil liberties is based on the fact that the general discourse is biased and convoluted. The most blatant and recent example of the skewed discourse of power has been the limited and one-sided reporting of the Ukraine crisis.
The general global discourse power is skewed towards the West and is overwhelmingly aligned with the US. For us to get a clearer picture of the real state of affairs, it is prudent to first look at the human rights track record of the US in order to fashion an opinion on whether we can be comfortable with it having so much power and authority on issues relating to human rights.
The US has the world's highest number of Covid-19 cases and deaths, with 34.51 million confirmed cases and 480 000 fatalities, which far surpassed the numbers in 2020. Average life expectancy fell by 1.13 years, the biggest drop since World War II.
According to data from Johns Hopkins University, by late February 2022, the number of confirmed Covid-19 cases in the US had exceeded 78 million and the death toll had surpassed 940 000. The public security situation in the US has deteriorated and violent crimes remain prevalent.
There were 693 mass shootings last year, up 10.1% from 2020. More than 44 000 people were killed in gun violence. More than 420 bills with provisions that restrict voting access have been introduced in 49 US states.
Only 7% of young Americans view the country as a “healthy democracy”. Around 81% of Asian-American adults say violence against Asian communities is rising. Hate crimes against Asians in New York City have jumped 361% since 2020.
In the 2021 fiscal year, the US detained more than 1.7 million migrants at its southern border, including 45 000 children. A US drone strike during its withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan killed 10 members of an Afghan family, including seven children, the youngest of whom was 2 years old. The US still holds 39 detainees at the Guantanamo prison.
Fernand de Varennes, a UN special rapporteur on minority issues, said the US legal system of human rights protection was incomplete and outdated, which had led to growing inequality.
As for the US malpractice in creating human rights crises in other countries, Stephen Walt, a professor of international relations at Harvard University, said: “Americans must first fix what has gone wrong at home and rethink how they deal with the rest of the world”.
In 2021, the US public persona of “human rights defender” was debunked at the so-called “Summit for Democracy”, and became a farce. At the 48th session of the UN Human Rights Council, many countries blasted the US for being the “biggest destroyer” of human rights in the world and urged the country to address its own severe human rights violations.
The USA Today website reported on June 21 last year that the police in the US fatally shoot about 1 000 people a year. They have fatally shot more than 6 300 people since 2015, but only 91 officers have been arrested, or just 1% of those involved.
We, as communities, need to be more vigilant and ensure that we gradually win back the discourse about power in our bid to create our own standards. The US has a lot to account for, both in America and in the rest of the world.
We must create the conditions to sift the truth from the myths and put the interests of our people first.
* Matiwane is the deputy-president of the SA Students Congress