Flying into Mwanza Airport: Issue #2
The video “Darwin’s Nightmare” is a French-Austrian-Belgian documentary that deals with social and environmental impacts of the industry of fishing around Tanzanian Lake Victoria. In its opening, there is a Soviet Ilyushin II-75 cargo plane that lands on Mwanza Airfield. The flight is from Europe and is full of processed Nile Perch fillets which are a new species of fish and responsible for the extinction of endemic species in the lake. The main issue that the film discusses is the effect of the new Nile Perch in Lake Victoria. The maker of the film carries out interviews with fishers, villagers, prostitutes, guards, local factory owners, and Ukrainian and Russian plane crew. It has negative impacts on the local economy. Sauper dwells on the effects of European aid as well.
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There are many factors responsible for African underdevelopment. The video by Sauper shows some of these issues and discusses them comprehensively. Some of them are rampant corruption, endless conflicts inadequate education system, among many others. One of the problems is rampant and constant interference by western nations. They provide aid with the excuse that it is helping the locals. In addition, there is a supply of arms, which facilitate conflicts. According to the video, flying into Mwanza Airport is a significant challenge, given the evidence of the aircraft wreckage on site. There is also unscheduled nature of air traffic in the airport. However, the Russian pilots willingly risk their lives by flying into it. The relevant conclusion for the significant risk that they are taking is that they stand to gain from their flying in there. One cannot say that it is money or work that informs them because of the underdevelopment of the economy of the area. Tanzanian economy is also weak. Thus, they cannot purport to be looking for jobs or money. The plane that they have is carrying firearms which they will sell to the African community, and even transport elsewhere to facilitate warfare.
The aircraft is sufficiently large, and the crew is small in number. According to the video, the pilots are carrying the new species of Nile Perch that is leading to the extinction of the local species. However, as the maker of the video interviews the pilots, there is a realization that they are carrying firearms for the African wars. It is one of the factors that are responsible for the underdevelopment of the continent because instead of helping the people, western nations want to increase the sales of their weapons by facilitating conflicts. By introducing the new species, the community will suffer from loss of jobs and income. The guard that the maker of the video interviews confirms that they shoot at people when there is trespass. The conflicts that will arise from the new developments will facilitate weapon acquisition whereby the Ukrainian crew will gain by selling the weapons. It is imperative to note that Tanzania is not the only African country in conflict. There are many others. The guns will move to different states from the Tanzanian coast.
The film by Sauper dwells on the unending flow of weapons and ammunitions from arms dealers in Europe. The planes that transport the Nile Perch are the ones that carry the ammunitions and arms. They feed on the conflicts within these countries. Dima, the plane engineer, says that European children receive grapes for Christmas, while African children receive guns. This film covers in great depth the absence of sanitation and the readily available drugs and prostitution rings for children. The main issue is the availability of weapons, which western nations get into African countries on the guise of providing aid. The weapons go into Africa through the aircrafts that supposedly is carrying aid.
- Sauper, Hubert. “Darwins Alptraum/Darwins Nightmare (Hubert Sauper, 2004).” YouTube, TouTube, 2 Dec. 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcnTWAyzhbg. Accessed 24 Oct. 2017.
