China skirting African corruption in direct aid – As China’s strategic interest in East Africa grows, instead of simply giving cash as foreign aid, China prefers to pay Chinese companies to improve infrastructure, bypassing local politicians and construction crews. Just last month, Chinese workers built two towers in Kampala, in what “aid watchdogs applaud as a model to help defeat the inefficiencies and cash-pocketing corruption associated with other systems of foreign aid delivery.” This new model could help to “cut the risk of aid scandals like the one that rocked the $22.6 billion Global Fund.” (AP, Rodney Muhumuza)

World Bank: Break Down African Trade Barriers – In a new World Bank Report, De-Fragmenting Africa: Deepening Regional Integration, they say that regional trade barriers are preventing African countries from earning billions of dollars. Combining the individual country markets would “bring a lot of opportunities for people to trade across borders, but (also) to exploit the benefits of a much larger market.” The World Bank is expected to increase funding to regional trade integration projects for 2012. (VOA, Joe DeCapua)

Oil Corruption May Threaten Angola, Nigeria, Stifling Growth, Agency Says – According to the anti-corruption group, Global Witness, Africa’s largest oil producers, Nigeria and Angola, “have granted stakes in oil fields to companies that may be acting as fronts for government officials, stifling development in both countries.” While oil exports have generated billions of dollars for both countries, the “misappropriation of public funds by corrupt officials remains one of the main causes of poverty.” Both countries must do more to increase transparency and decrease corruption to fight the “resource curse.” (Bloomberg, Henrique Almeida)

African Farming Needs Business Approach, Nigera’s Adesina Says – At the “Feeding the World” meeting in Geneva on Wednesday, Nigerian Agriculture Minister Akinwumi Ayo Adesina, explained that “we must begin to take agriculture in Africa as a business,” and not merely a social sector. He described the need to leverage investments to fix the infrastructure gap and “get smart about new instruments to finance agriculture.” (Bloomberg, Rudy Ruitenberg)

UPDATE, 2/9/2012: Yesterday, President Goodluck Jonathan appointed his rival in last year’s presidential election, Nuhu Ribadu, as chairman of a new oil task force dedicated to tracking revenues paid to the government, and monitoring crude oil production and exports. Mr. Ribadu is formerly the chairman of Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, and accepted the post at the helm of the 21-man Petroleum Revenue Special Task Force despite his political affiliations because of the “national consensus” on the “deadly impact of corruption.”

What is the fuel subsidy?
Though Nigeria produces more than 2 million barrels of oil a day, the vast majority of Nigerians see limited benefits from their country’s natural resources. Nigeria has four oil refineries that only operate at about 23 percent of their potential capacity — and as a result, the government has had to import refined products such as petrol to meet the needs of citizens. The government paid the importers in order to control the price, kept low at $1.70 a gallon, thus ensuring that Nigerians were able, until January 1st, to enjoy the low fuel price as one of the benefits of the crude oil they produce.

Why did the government remove it?
On the first day of the year, President Goodluck Jonathan removed the hefty fuel subsidy. Though the subsidy keeps fuel prices low for Nigerians, the cost of the subsidy comes out of government coffers. The $8 billion per year the government was spending on the fuel subsidy is equivalent to more than 25 percent of the government’s annual budget. Many observers argue that subsidies do not ultimately benefit the poor and the money could be better spent in social sectors such as education or public health.

SEE ALSO: Occupy Nigeria

What was the response to its removal?
The removal of the fuel subsidy, and the immediate increase in the price of fuel, transportation and food, came abruptly, and disregarded ongoing negotiations with the labor unions and civil society. The cost of a gallon of gas increased from $1.70 to $3.50 overnight. Tens of thousands of Nigerians protested the removal of the subsidy and Nigeria’s major labor unions organized strikes shutting down businesses, schools and air travel for 8 days. The fundamental grievance Nigerians had with the removal of the subsidy was not just the resultant increase in fuel prices but also that the subsidy regime was a well-oiled corruption machine that should have been addressed before the subsidy itself was removed.

Why was the removal partially reinstated?
The Nigerian President restored part of the fuel subsidy on January 16. This brought the price of a gallon of gas down to $2.27, and ended the biggest protests in Nigeria’s history. The deal also forestalled a plan by the trade unions to halt the country’s oil production, a move which would have hurt Nigeria’s economy.

What does the episode say about governance in Nigeria?
Though the President announced that the removal of the fuel subsidy would give the government the means to fix the country’s many basic infrastructure problems, most Nigerians remain skeptical that these noble objectives will ever be realized. This is because there was no way to ensure that the money would go to meet these goals. Nigeria has been plagued for decades by corruption and mismanagement especially in the oil sector.

The abrupt nature of the removal of the subsidy which was seen by some as act of insensitivity by a government that is out of touch with the economic struggles of the majority of the Nigerian people. Even with a more gradual plan, transparency and accountability would be necessary to ensure Nigerians know that the funds are being properly channeled to projects and social development programs that would benefit the poor. While the partial reinstatement of the subsidy has quelled the protests and kept the economy going, the root causes of the protests remain unresolved.

What is different about these protests?
A bulging middle class with access to the internet took to social media platforms including Facebook and Twitter to swell the protests, which organized under an “#OccupyNigeria” banner based on similar movements in Europe and the US. These platforms, and the general message that the government was not listening to the voices of the Nigerian people, gave the middle-class a channel through which to make their voices heard and engage with other protesters.

Nigeria has had a turbulent start to 2012, with fuel subsidy protests and deadly bombings by Islamic extremist group Boko Haram. Keep an eye out for updates on the landscape of governance in Nigeria on the ONE Blog.

Funding squeeze, apathy mean another half century of AIDS – UN expert – Paul De Lay, the deputy executive director of UNAIDS said that while the world could soon reduce new HIV infections to zero with enough funding, “global apathy and the financial crisis mean it might take another 50 years to stop the AIDS epidemic.” De Lay called on developing countries to take responsibility for eradicating HIV in their own countries instead of relying completely on foreign assistance, especially at a time when HIV/AIDS efforts are facing an unprecedented drop in funding. (AlertNet, Thin Lei Win)

World Bank Warns on Africa Trade – A new World Bank report shows that African countries are “sacrificing billions of dollars in potential trade each year to inefficient border crossings and discordant regulations that make it difficult to do business on the continent.” The World Bank urges these countries to streamline border protocols, invest in infrastructure, and coordinate legal and financial rules to help boost international trade. (WSJ, Patrick McGroarty)

Nigeria: Child Lead Poisoning Crisis – Thousands of children in northern Nigeria are in need of immediate medical assistance, as they face the “worst lead poisoning epidemic in modern history.” According to official estimate, 400 children have already died, yet no efforts have been made at environmental cleanup. Children are exposed to the lead dust when processing ore in the mines, from mining family members, or when the lead-filled ore is crushed at home. (Huffington Post)

Zimbabwe’s Long Winter – As dictatorships are collapsing in around the world in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen, some are wondering if Zimbabwe might be next. Despite the fact that Zimbabwe consistently ranks quite low in international quality of life ratings, and is home to an increasingly repressive government, Zimbabweans are currently “too scattered to coordinate a revolt.” A mere 40% of Zimbabweans live in urban areas, making “the ignition of social discontent into a fiery uprising unlikely.” (NYTimes, Eusebius McKaiser)

Mali’s footballers hope Africa Cup win could bring peace – If Mali’s soccer team wins against the Ivory Coast on Wednesday, they would qualify for the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time since 1972. The players hope that a “win could help unite a country that is threatened by disintegration,” as Mali’s three northern regions have been fighting since mid-January. Francois Zahoui, the team’s head coach, explained that “football, especially in our country, is a uniting factor that creates social cohesion and togetherness.” (Reuters, George Fominyen)

Horn of Africa Famine Six Months Later – In a recent briefing about the famine in the Horn of Africa, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Diplomacy for the Bureau of African Affairs, Bruce Wharton, explained that we need to “work with regional governments and others to establish longer-term food security assurance,” and fill the “fundamental need for stable, secure, and citizen-focused governance in Somalia.” The U.S. has been the largest humanitarian donor to the region. (VOA)

Malaria death toll falling – A recent study by the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) indicates that despite the fact that malaria kills about 50% more people than previously realized, “efforts to combat the disease have however evened out reducing the totally number of global deaths.” The report also shows that malaria deaths peaked in 2004, at 1.8 million people, and have since been declining. (Digital Journal, Robin Okuthe)

Why Mitt Romney Should “Be Concerned About the Very Poor” – Mitt Romney’s comment last week that he is “not concerned about the very poor,” raises questions about the causes and ways of addressing poverty in the U.S. While poverty in America is not the same extreme poverty that many people face in Africa, where “the issue is often sheer survival,” the impact of poverty, especially on children, is still devastating. To hear a presidential candidate like Romney “dismiss the issue . . . is still unbelievable.” (Huffington Post, Steven Cohen)

Female genital cutting sworn off by thousands of African villages – The UN Population Fund and UNICEF announced Monday that eight thousands communities in Africa have abandoned the practice of female genital excision, a coming-of-age ritual in many regions that “ensures chastity and makes a woman marriageable.” UN agencies have been pushing to end this practice, as it has no health benefits, can cause significant pain, pose long-term risks during childbirth, and recurring infections. (Los Angeles Times)

Sebastian Coe says he’ll help bring Olympics to Africa for 1st time – Sebastian Coe, the head of the organizing committee for the London Olympics and former middle-distance running great, announced on Tuesday that it is his “dream” to see the Olympics held in Africa. South Africa is expected to launch a bid for the 2024 Summer Games. (AP)

What is the Global Partnership for Enhanced Social Accountability?
In April 2011, World Bank President Robert Zoellick addressed the Peterson Institute for International Economics about the implications of the political revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa on how we should think about development. He focused specifically on the importance of citizen action and civil society: “An empowered public is the foundation for a stronger society, more effective government, and a more successful state,” he said. The World Bank is currently developing a proposed Global Partnership for Enhanced Social Accountability to support civil society organizations (CSOs) in developing countries to hold governments accountable and improve development outcomes.

Why are CSOs important?
Civil society organizations are a valuable resource and an effective tool in delivering assistance in developing countries. Getting CSOs involved in the design, monitoring and evaluation of development projects can help to ensure that objectives are delivered effectively and equitably. Involving organizations that understand a project’s context, including the needs of intended recipients, should produce more transparent and effective programs.

What does the World Bank have to do with social accountability?
The World Bank has projects in virtually every developing country. In 2011, the World Bank provided $46.9 billion for more than 300 projects. The World Bank views the proposed Partnership as a way to leverage its unique reach to strengthen capacity and support for CSOs already working on accountability and transparency in developing countries.

How does the Partnership intend to strengthen CSOs in partner countries?
Building on feedback received through country-level consultations last year, the Partnership aims to strengthen CSOs in three main ways:

What’s next in the development of the partnership?
Currently, the World Bank is holding public consultations. The deadline for first stage comments is March 3. ONE will be making its voice heard by raising a series of important questions, including how the proposed Partnership would be governed and implemented.

If you are at the frontline of development, working for or with CSOs in a developing country, it’s time to make your voices heard, too. The Global Partnership for Enhanced Social Accountability is riding a welcome wave of support for increased transparency and accountability in development. Important questions remain about the design and implementation of a fund to support civil society, but the timing is right for such an initiative. We’re excited to see how the proposal evolves. Keep an eye out for updates here on the ONE Blog.

Imagine you had to make one decision that could change your community and livelihood dramatically. Wouldn’t you want to be 100 percent sure your decision created the best opportunities possible for you and your family?

On the flip side, what if that decision involved an investment of millions of dollars? You would want all the information you could find about the possible outcomes and risks of your decision, wouldn’t you?

Today, across the globe, citizens of resource-rich yet poor countries and investors in oil, gas and mining companies have a problem just like this. These odd couples both need to make very important decisions about natural resource projects and the companies that undertake them, but they don’t have enough information to make sure their choices are right.

SEE ALSO: US regulators feel pressure to weaken transparency law… and why you should care

Without the disclosures required by the Cardin-Lugar Amendment (Section 1504 of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act), investors cannot put an accurate dollar amount on the risk to their investments caused by things like social or political conflict. In turn, citizens of countries where those investments are taking place don’t have the necessary information to hold their governments accountable for the cash windfalls from those resources, or to make informed decisions about whether natural resource development is the right choice for their communities.

The disclosures mandated by Cardin-Lugar also create broader benefits that local communities, investors, companies and consumers around the world can all share. The stability that happens when a country’s citizens feel they are getting a fair return on their natural resources lowers the risk of investing in companies that operate there. In addition, it also lowers a company’s cost of doing business and, in turn, may lower the costs of some of the commodities on which the entire world depends.

The support of ONE and its members is critical in making the case that these disclosures matter. You’re helping ensure that the world’s choices about natural resource development and investments are fully informed ones.

You can find out more about sustainable and responsible investing at www.calvert.com and follow Paul on Twitter at @paulbugala.

Improving Governance Through Budget Transparency – The current fiscal crises in the US and Europe has led to “greater scrutiny of the efficacy of public expenditures,” which will likely have the greatest impact on “foreign aid and development assistance, as countries demand greater accountability for each dollar or euro spent.” This scrutiny has led to a recent surge in government-led initiatives that aim to increase fiscal transparency and make “aid to conflict ridden countries dependent on improved governance.” (Huffington Post, Michael Lipsky)

Is Malaria Twice as Deadly Than We Think It Is? – The news last week that malaria kills nearly twice as many people per year as we had previously thought “plunges the current multibillion-dollars anti-malaria campaign, and the push to reach a 2015 deadline for achieving the eight Millennium Development Goals, into grave doubt.” Previous statistics have underestimated the scope of the malaria problem, believing that it was a disease that primarily afflicted children. (TIME, Alex Perry)

ICYMI: Aid Groups Ask US to Consider Cross-Border Aid Effort in Sudan – A coalition of human rights groups appealed to the Obama administration last week to spearhead a cross-border aid operation in South Sudan to provide critical food and medicine to people living in the region. The organizations urged the US government to continue engaging with the Sudanese government in an effort to convince them to allow international humanitarian aid workers and aid assistance into the South Kordofan and Blue Nile regions. (VOA, James Butty)

South Africa Pauses on Mines – The South African ruling party, the African National Congress, seems to be “pivoting away from the charged politics of mine nationalization in a bid to reassure investors and rev up a weak economy.” South Africa’s economy is in need of foreign investment and capital to increase GDP, and some argue that “investors won’t be ready to ‘embrace’ South Africa until the passage of some time and examples of new mines successfully coming on stream.” (WSJ, Devon Maylie)

The dangers of carving up Somalia – The current build-up of military presence in Somalia of African Union, Kenyan and Ethiopian forces is an unprecedented occurrence, and “could prove counter-productive, given the lack of resources for stabilizing local politics and strengthening the economy.” Several diplomats have warned that “those intervening should not ignore the successes of the regional administrations.” (The Africa Report, Parselelo Kantai and Patrick Smith)

Malaria death toll possibly twice as high as experts estimated – A new study funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation suggests that malaria may have killed as many as 1.2 million people in 2010, 90% of whom are in Africa. This figure is twice as high as the World Health Organization’s estimate of 655,000. The study also challenges the belief that children under the age of 5 and pregnant women are the most susceptible to the disease. (AP)

UN declares Somalia’s famine over, but says millions across East Africa still in crisis – The United Nations declared Friday that Somali’s famine is over, yet “2.3 million people remain in a food crisis situation in Somalia and still need assistance.” Across the Horn of African, more than 9.5 million people still need aid, and continued assistance is needed to prevent the fragile region from reverting back to famine. (AP)

Africa Farms Need Crop Aids Tailored to Local Needs, DuPont Says – At a forum on global food needs on Friday, international agriculture companies agreed that they must work more closely with farmers in poor countries to adapt products that can help increase crop production. DuPont, the world’s second largest seed producer, “outlined goals for alleviating poverty worldwide, including making food more available and nutritious and protecting the environment.” (Bloomberg)

Innovations in Light – According to Tina Rosenberg of the New York Times, the “unsolved problem for lighting Africa isn’t designing a great lamp…it’s designing a great business model.” Rosenberg highlights three innovative ideas that are bringing more light to people throughout Africa, including creating a light bulb out of a plastic water bottle, which refracts and disperses sunlight without costing a dime. (NYT)

Debate amid kidnappings: Is Chinese investment good for Africa? – The kidnapping of Chinese workings in Sudan this week has put a spotlight on “the growing involvement of China as an economic force in Africa.” China has turned to Africa to meet its demands for energy, while providing money and manpower for building projects throughout Africa. Not everyone has welcomed the increased Chinese presence, as worker’s rights and the Chinese government’s willingness to deal with repressive governments are called into question. (Los Angeles Times)

Famine Crisis Warning for West African Sahel Region – Early warning systems indicate that “famine is imminent” in regions of Mali, northern Burkina Faso and parts of Senegal due to erratic rains and poor harvests. In addition, conflict in Ivory Coast has hindered trade and contributed to a 40% inflation rate for food. (Reuters)

The Future of Foreign Aid Money – In a survey of 41 aid agencies, Reuters found that respondents overwhelmingly believed that environmental disasters will be the biggest factors in increasing the need for humanitarian aid, and that disaster preparedness is critical. Aid organizations recognize that “funding for disaster risk reduction…is not very ‘sexy’ for donors,” yet it is the most cost effective way to mitigate more extreme disasters. (Huffington Post, Tom Murphy)

Malaria Researchers Find Weakness in Global Killer - It isn’t always easy to catch a killer. Doing so often demands a determined effort, a detailed profile, and sometimes, a bright light. That’s what researchers at Washington University in St. Louis are trying to do. The killer they’re after is one of the deadliest in history. In 2010 alone, it afflicted an estimated 216 million people, and took some 655,000 lives worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.

New App Aims to Fight Poverty – At the recent World Economic Forum, a new mobile phone app project was announced to help alleviate poverty and improve education. Called AppBridge, the app was developed by a group called Young Global Leaders. The early apps will help to provide skills training and “link entrepreneurs with micro-credit lenders or with markets,” and should be available by March. (VOA,Jon DeCapua)

A Fresh Take on the World Food Problem – A new report on the recent policy reforms inspired by the global food crisis “found that genuine reforms are under way but that they have been slow and halting.” While the governments of richer countries have contributed some resources towards the crisis, they have not met their commitments. The report suggests that a failure to address the crisis more aggressively will be much more costly in the long-term. (NYTimes, Justin Gillis)

How Much Does Uncle Sam Spend on Foreign Aid? – When asked whether the US could reduce the Department of Defense military spending by reducing foreign aid, Paul Solman reasons that foreign aid “is defense spending: it’s simply for the direct defense of countries other than the United States.” In addition, he argues, foreign aid represents less than 1% of the US budget, “and reducing foreign aid even to the vanishing point…wouldn’t go very far in reducing military spending.” (PBS NewsHour, Paul Solman)

ICYMI: Carter Center gets $40 million pledge from donors to wipe out Guinea worm disease – The Carter Center hopes to eradicated Guinea worm disease, a “debilitating parasite that once plagued millions of people across the developing world,” by 2015, with the help of recent donations. While about 3.5 million people suffered from the disease when the eradication program began in 1986, in 2011 only 1,060 cases remain. While there is no vaccine or medicine for the parasite, “infection is prevented by filtering water and educating people how to avoid the disease.” (AP)

Ten years ago today, at a small press conference in New York, Bono and Bill Gates launched an activist entity called DATA, with start-up funds from Mr Gates, George Soros and Ed Scott.

I was one of the founders, along with Bobby Shriver and Lucy Matthew, and appointed the executive director. Though we started small, our oh so clever acronymic name stood for audacious goals: to campaign on debt, AIDS, trade and aid in partnership with African activists – in return for African governments offering more democracy, accountability and transparency to their citizens. We aspired to be data-based activists with a transatlantic bipartisan strategy, blending pop and policy, so that those with extreme global power would be forced to deal with extreme local poverty – and take the historic opportunity before us to end it.

This little unit evolved into ONE, and in partnership with others helped catalyze the Make Poverty History campaign, the Live 8 concerts and (RED), enabling tens of millions of people to take effective action against extreme poverty. Curiously, hardly anybody knows what all this, and the huge Jubilee Drop the Debt movement where we cut our activist teeth, really achieved.

Some think it achieved nothing or even backfired. So by telling you now the aim is not to blow our own trumpet but to sound a loud alarm, because if people don’t get to know about the wild successes of these struggles, as well as lessons learned from some big failures, they won’t get what’s at stake if progress stalls and programs get cut back.

The statistics of success seem staggering. Maybe that’s part of the reason that people don’t know what’s been achieved; the super-sized statistics drown out more human-size stories. For example, since we and partners ramped up our campaigning for access to life preserving anti-AIDS medication, access increased – from only 50,000 people in Africa receiving the life-saving anti-retrovirals in 2002 to over five million people receiving the drugs in 2010. Such huge inhuman numbers have millions of human faces. Grace and Agnes are two HIV positive Ugandan activists who, when we first met them a decade ago, weren’t able to get the drugs they needed to keep them healthy. Their friends were dying in droves; surely they would themselves depart soon. They had formed a solidarity group, the AIDS Support Organization, to sing to each other and find strength in the face of this daily struggle, and spread a hopeful message of AIDS prevention to those not yet infected. I recall our fury that these brilliant people would die so prematurely, leaving a generation of AIDS orphans. Yet just two weeks ago – ten years to the day after we first met them – we hung out with Grace and Agnes again, as the equatorial sun set on a veranda overlooking Lake Victoria. They are so alive and beaming with pride as they told us how, with a little help from their friends like Presidents Bush and Clinton, they’ve helped get nearly 300,000 more HIV positive Ugandans on to life-preserving, orphan-preventing medications.

Scale this up to 5 million across Africa, and 6.6 million globally, and we see an achievement on an epic scale. It is one of humanity’s greatest recent endeavors. Yet it is a tale rarely told. The story is similar in the spread of bed nets and medications to beat malaria, which have cut death rates in half in 11 African countries. It is similar for education, with 46.5 million more children in school across Africa, in part because of dropped debts. It is similar for vaccinations: 5.5 million deaths have been averted through investments in the GAVI Alliance for simple childhood immunizations. And it is similar for AIDS, TB and malaria, with the Global Fund, also set up ten years ago, saving over 100,000 lives every month from these three killer diseases.

It is hugely humbling to see a campaign you work for catch fire, shift from the margins to the mainstream and know that for each of the millions of lives changed, there are a million others on the other side of the planet across seemingly vast divides, who reached out in partnership. Real people believing in each other and working together to change the world.

But there is no room for smug self-congratulation as the struggles against disease, inequality and illiteracy are far from over, and especially as we learn the lessons of three scandalous oversights: on food security, on trade, and on support for African civil society and their drive for improved transparency and accountability.

Firstly, we were all far too late to campaign for increased investments into food security until the price of food spiraled out of control, hitting the poorest hardest. Still nearly a billion people go hungry every day. Thankfully, the combined leadership of Kofi Annan, Bill Gates and President Obama has put the importance of food security back on the map. But there’s still much, much more to do.

Secondly, we never got going on trade. Despite repeated efforts, the Doha Trade Round is dead, and the often promised Development Round has delivered nothing. Yet steps can – and must – still be taken, for example to support intra-African trade and integration, and provide greater access to all developed markets for African goods, quota and duty free. The better news is on investment as word of Africa’s booming economies has transformed perceptions. Ten years ago the Economist called Africa the “hopeless continent”. In December, the Economist wrote of an “Africa Rising”.

Thirdly, calls from African civil society for greater transparency and accountability have often been paid politically correct lip service, but real support was scarce. Now we’re trying to make up for lost time, in particular by backing activists’ calls for oil, gas and other extractive companies to “publish what they pay” governments for the right to extract natural resources. This will allow citizens to scrutinize official accounts and reduce space for corruption. Indeed, all public finances must be made more transparent and all projects more rigorously monitored for impact, especially by the marginalized – the very people these projects are intended to help. In the last ten years new technologies – led by the mobile phone and social media – make it now much more possible to turbocharge such transparency drives.

It’s an understatement to say that the world has changed utterly this last ten years, in some ways better, some worse. We’ve witnessed serious failures of political and corporate leadership bring on a devastating financial crisis. We’ve also seen that it is leadership from the people that is more often what inspires. From the Arab street to the millions of people delivering lifesaving support to each other on an epic scale we, as citizens and as organized global civil society, can change the course of history. In the face of such progress, and so many remaining challenges and opportunities, the abiding lesson must be that cynicism is unacceptable, apathy is the enemy, to care can be cool. There are grounds for optimism, for hope – for when we work together as one, across political divides, oceans, ethnicities, and beliefs we’ve seen we can achieve awesome results. With so much more to do forgive us if we celebrate – for it’s the best way to accelerate.

This post first appeared on the Huffington Post UK website