News Lelemuku

MEXICO CITY, LELEMUKU.COM - Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s first 100 days in office have combined a compulsive shedding of presidential trappings with a dizzying array of policy initiatives, and a series of missteps haven’t dented his soaring approval ratings.

Lopez Obrador has answered more questions from the press, flown in more economy-class flights, posed for more selfies with admiring citizens and visited more genuinely risky areas with little or no security than several combined decades of his predecessors.

He’s also surprised many by maintaining a cordial relationship with U.S. President Donald Trump, helping contain Central American migrant caravans while resisting U.S. efforts to oust the leftist government of Venezuela.

High ratings, many initiatives

The folksy perennial candidate took office Dec. 1 and by the end of his first month, Lopez Obrador’s approval rating surpassed 80 percent. He has taken full advantage of that mandate to move quickly on many fronts — perhaps too many.

“Every week he announces at least one or two things,” said Ivonne Acuna Murillo, a professor of political science at the Iberoamerican University in Mexico City. “Sometimes the speed of the issues he is putting on the agenda is such that an issue they put out in the morning is displaced by another in the afternoon.”

Before Lopez Obrador had even taken office he held a referendum on the partially constructed $13 billion Mexico City airport. He used the resulting vote as a green light to cancel a project he had campaigned against.

During his first month in office, Lopez Obrador launched a military assault on the country’s fuel theft gangs, dividing the security of Mexico’s critical pipelines and refineries between the army and the navy. The hastily planned offensive created gas shortages across the country, but somehow didn’t dampen his popularity.

This month, he overrode complaints by human rights campaigners and got the Congress and state legislatures to approve constitutional reforms creating a heavily militarized National Guard that he touts as the key to getting control of Mexico’s runaway violence.

Daily press conference

A typical day starts with his 6 a.m. Cabinet meeting, focusing on security, where he gets the daily crime report. At 7 a.m., he steps on the dais at the centuries-old National Palace to start a free-wheeling, open-ended press conference that often goes for 1½ hours.

From there he might hold a meeting on the initiative of the day, and then around noon he flies off — tourist class, fielding hugs and taking selfies with fellow passengers — to some provincial city, where he’ll meet with local leaders, eat at some modest local cafeteria, then hold another open-air rally and take some more hugs. Then he’ll catch another tourist-class flight to Mexico City. (He says he gets to bed early).

The part of the day he most clearly enjoys? Pressing the flesh and handing out time-tested one-liners at rallies in provincial towns, essentially, the same thing he has been doing for the last 20 years on the campaign trail as a three-time presidential contender.

No imperial presidency

“He is a bit messianic, meaning evangelical. He’s out there preaching all the time,” said Federico Estevez, a political science professor at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico. “He’s Bernie Sanders with power.”

“I’m not sure if this a good governance model, but it’s an exceptionally good political one,” Estevez said.

It’s easy to lose sight of how different this all is, unless you’ve lived through decades of Mexico’s distant, imperial presidency, in which the president seldom appeared beyond orchestrated speeches, or as a motorcade of luxury vehicles speeded to the president’s personal airplane hangar for flights aboard the presidential jet to carefully guarded events.

Gone are the motorcades, gone is the jet, gone is the security, gone is the official presidential residence. You’re more likely to see Lopez Obrador buying himself a $1 styrofoam cup of coffee at a convenience store or eating beans at a roadside restaurant, than to see him rubbing elbows with foreign dignitaries.

Lopez Obrador rode a wave of popular discontent with corruption in Mexico, and has attracted a near-unquestioning devotion because of his own honest, rumpled style.

“The advantage that Andres Manuel has as leader is that he arrived with a backing that no president has had in Mexico,” said Benjamin Arditi, a political science professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

Lopez Obrador has already had spats with NGOs, regulators, environmentalists, outside experts and ratings agencies. His campaign against crime and violence has yielded few results. He chafes at those who ask for feasibility or environmental impact studies for his pet projects.

Results less rosy

But hardly anyone notices.“There is a devotion, something almost religious,” said Jose Antonio Crespo, a political analyst at Mexico’s Center for Economic Research and Training. “It makes people believe only what he says, against everything that experts or ratings agencies or international organizations say. They don’t matter, it only matters what he says.”

At least two ratings agencies have downgraded their outlook on Mexico’s debt to ‘negative’ since he took office. His decisions, like the one to cancel the airport project, “don’t generate the slightest bit of confidence,” Crespo said, “and that is going to have a cost, is having a cost, in terms of capital leaving, or money not being invested.”

For Lopez Obrador, Mexico’s foreign policy boils down to simply non-intervention, and he leaves the field to his top diplomat, Marcelo Ebrard.

Remain in Mexico critics

But some critics say Mexico is doing Trump’s bidding by accepting the U.S. “remain in Mexico” program and by restricting the movement of caravans of Central American migrants.“Remain in Mexico” makes Central American asylum applicants await resolution of their cases from the Mexican side of the border.

“It is a U.S. policy that once again subordinates Mexico’s immigration policy,” said Oscar Misael Hernandez, an immigration researcher at the College of the Northern Border in Matamoros.

Others saw it as a pragmatic calculation that U.S. courts will soon put a halt to the program. Allowing it in the meantime helps U.S. relations and helped Mexico win a $10.6 billion U.S. commitment for regional development, meant to create jobs in Central America and southern Mexico so fewer people feel compelled to leave.

With growing signs of anti-migrant sentiment in Mexico, containing migration costs Lopez Obrador little in political terms, and is balanced by his push to grant work visas for migrants.

The new administration’s most widely criticized misstep was Lopez Obrador’s decision to ax funds for nonprofits working on issues ranging from promoting art and culture to providing domestic abuse shelters, arguing the “intermediaries” were too often used to siphon away government funds. Lopez Obrador wants to give the money directly to the people who needed it, but experts say that won’t work for complex social services like day care and shelters for battered women.

Mariana Banos, whose Fundacion Origen offers support services to women, often through partnerships with other organizations and local governments, said many groups will have to shut down because they depend entirely on government funding.

She scoffed at the corruption allegations and urged the government to reconsider.

“You have to work hand-in-hand, not create a divide, not stigmatize,” she said.

Despite the frictions there are lighter moments to “The 4-T,” a play on Lopez Obrador’s description of his administration as the “fourth transformation” of Mexico.

Lopez Obrador sometimes laughs at his own jokes. He posts Facebook videos from roadside restaurants, with impromptu lectures on the health benefits of coconuts or local fruits. And Mexicans crack up at his frequent, folksy catch phrases like “Me canso ganso,” equivalent to “I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.”

Enterprising designers have come up with a web app that allows people to make resolutions and receive a text message from an AMLO-bot saying “Monica, you’ll lose weight this year, or I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.” (VOA)

SACRAMENTO, LELEMUKU.COM - There are indications North Korea may be preparing for a missile or space launch, National Public Radio is reporting. The U.S. news outlet said an analysis of satellite images of the Sanumdong facility near Pyongyang reveal the presence of trucks, cars, rail cars and cranes.

"When you put all that together, that's really what it looks like when the North Koreans are in the process of building a rocket," said Jeffrey Lewis, a researcher at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey, California.

Lewis has studied the images, which were provided by DigitalGlobe, a U.S. commercial provider of space and earth imagery.

This development comes on the heels of U.S. President Donald Trump saying he would be "very disappointed" if North Korea is resuming nuclear testing after his recent meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

Trump made the comments to reporters Friday as he prepared to travel to Alabama to view tornado damage. He said he has greatly improved U.S. relations with North Korea during his time in office.

"Look, when I came in," he said, "under the Obama administration, North Korea was a disaster. You were going to war, folks, whether you know it or not. ... I inherited a mess."

He continued, "Right now you have no testing, you have no nothing. Let's see what happens, but I would be very disappointed if I saw testing."

Trump and Kim met last week in Vietnam in a summit meant to reach an agreement on North Korean denuclearization. But the meeting broke down over an impasse over how many sites North Korea would shut down.

Following the summit, South Korean newspapers reported there was evidence of new activity at the Sohae long-range rocket site, a site Kim agreed last year to shut down as part of confidence-building measures with the United States.

North Korean state media acknowledged the failed meeting for the first time Friday, saying the people of North Korea blame the United States for the collapse of the talks.(VOA)

NEW JERSEY, LELEMUKU.COM - An Air Transat flight was forced to divert Saturday morning to Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey after reports of a possible fire in the cargo hold.

According to the Federal Aviation Administration. (FAA) passengers on board the Boeing 737 which flew out of Montreal and was bound for Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

"They evacuated onto the airport's runway via emergency slides," according to FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen.

Airport firefighters responded to the scene. The incident prompted the Newark airport to shut down all runways briefly, but flights resumed soon after.

Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, told CNN that the pilot of the Air Transat flight requested an emergency landing at 8:20 a.m., saying there was smoke in the aircraft.

"The plane landed safely. Passengers were evacuated on the runway via the chutes and bused to the terminal, where they will be housed until the airline can determine what it wants to do with them," Coleman said.

Two minor injuries were reported, he said, but they were unrelated to the smoke. The incident is under investigation, Coleman added, and authorities are working to get the aircraft off the runway.

An Air Transat statement said, "Our 189 passengers' safety is our top priority and they were evacuated promptly upon landing."
The Canadian airline said it will send another plane to get passengers to their destination. (CNN)

JERUSALEM, LELEMUKU.COM - When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has run into political trouble in the past, he has lashed out at the media, the political opposition and Israel's Arab minority with incendiary and divisive language to galvanize his nationalist base.

Ahead of April 9 elections, Netanyahu has zoned in on prominent Arab lawmaker Ahmad Tibi.

The Israeli leader, slumping in the polls after the dramatic announcement of his pending corruption indictment, is portraying Tibi as a threat to national security in a charged campaign that critics say questions the loyalty of the country's Arab citizens.

Using his own nickname, Netanyahu has been repeating a campaign mantra: “Bibi or Tibi.” The snappy slogan, eagerly parroted by his hard-line allies, highlights Netanyahu's efforts to paint his challengers as weak “leftists” conspiring with Arab Israelis and a hostile media to oust him.

It also shines a spotlight on Tibi — an affable, media-savvy political veteran who speaks fluent Hebrew. Tibi is known for his harsh criticism of government policies toward the country's Arab citizens and toward Palestinians who live under Israeli control in territories Israel captured in 1967.

“Until this week, I didn't know that against my will I was a leading candidate for prime minister,” he said with a smile from his home in an Arab neighborhood of Jerusalem.

Despite the humor, Tibi said he is concerned about what he views as Netanyahu's attempt to demonize Israel's Arab minority.

“He is delegitimizing the Arab parties, the Arab lawmakers and the Arab public in general,” he said. “He's trying to transmit that it is either me, the supposed patriotic Jewish leader, or the Arabs will take over the country and decide who will be the prime minister. And he portrays this as a nightmare.”

Arabs make up about 20 percent of Israel's 9 million residents. They hold full citizenship rights but have faced decades of discrimination.

The outgoing Netanyahu-led government further stoked tensions by passing a controversial law that defines Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. A parliamentary panel recently recommended banning an Arab party from running in the election, while Netanyahu has courted anti-Arab extremists in hopes of improving his re-election chances.

Part of Netanyahu's typical stump speech these days alleges that his prime challenger, ex-military chief Benny Gantz, will be unable to build a ruling coalition without the backing of Arab parties. Arab parties never sat in an Israeli coalition government, and they say they have no interest in doing so now.

Gantz has been quick to reject the association, flaunting his tough military record of pounding Gaza militants and saying he would not rely on the Arab bloc in parliament to stabilize a future government.

The charge nonetheless is part of the Netanyahu campaign playbook that has worked before.

Fearing a possible loss on election day in 2015, Netanyahu mobilized his supporters by releasing a frantic midday video in which he warned that Arab voters were heading “in droves” to the polls. The move, for which he later apologized, appeared to help turn the tide and secure another term for him.

If he wins again, he's expected to walk back his rhetoric once more, said Yohanan Plesner, president of the non-partisan Israel Democracy Institute.

Plesner said Netanyahu tends to speak in two voices about the Arab minority.

He said Netanyahu has earmarked unprecedented budgets to Arab communities to try to close the wide economic gaps between Arabs and Jews.

But during election campaigns, Netanyahu attempts to mobilize his base, Plesner said. Netanyahu “recruits the ultimate `other' of Israeli life, which is the Arab minority,” he said. “It is cynical, and it is effective.”

Such rhetoric will encourage more Arab voters to sit out the election, said Thabet Abu Rass, co-director of the Abraham Fund Initiatives, a non-profit dedicated to promoting equality in Israel.

“A lot of people are now saying we cannot continue to play the game and pretend Israel is a state for all its citizens,” he said. “And they'll say we have to highlight this by boycotting the election.”

At the same time, many Israeli Jews, especially among Netanyahu's right-wing base, consider the Arab minority disloyal for sympathizing with the Palestinians and other Arab adversaries. A decade ago, Arab lawmaker Azmi Bishara fled into exile after he was accused of spying for Hezbollah — a charge he denied.

The 60-year-old Tibi illustrates many of the contradictions faced by Israel's Arabs. He's worked as a gynecologist in Israeli hospitals and served for years as a member of parliament, but also advised Yasser Arafat, the late Palestinian leader.

For the past two decades, Tibi has advocated for Arab rights in Israel and for a Palestinian state. Hard-line lawmakers frequently brand him a fifth-column in the Israeli legislature.

But he is also considered the most popular Arab lawmaker, even among Israeli Jews. He is a regular on their television screens, known for his witty quips.

In parliament, he's earned praise for his environmental and consumer legislation and for his promotion of Holocaust commemoration that touched many Jews.

In the current election campaign, he has refrained from endorsing any of Netanyahu's challengers, wary of playing into the prime minister's hands. Tibi said he is ill at ease with the leadership of the Blue-and-White party, which includes Gantz and two other former chiefs of what he calls the “occupation army.”

But he makes no qualms about wanting to unseat Netanyahu, whom he accuses of “Arab hatred” and of leading Israel down a dangerous path by deepening control over the occupied West Bank and its millions of Palestinians.

“It's possible that Benjamin Netanyahu is leading us toward a binational state, and then it will either be an apartheid state in which only the Jews can vote or a democratic country in which there is one person, one vote,” he said. “If that happens, tomorrow I will run against Bibi. Then it will really be Bibi or Tibi.” (VOA)

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says the U.S. is looking for ways to get humanitarian assistance into Venezuela, after troops loyal to President Nicolas Maduro repelled aid trucks in clashes at the borders with Brazil and Colombia.

The top U.S. diplomat, in an interview Sunday on CNN, did not suggest how the U.S. might carry out the aid mission in the face of armed opposition.

He said, however, that the United States would consider imposing more sanctions against the Venezuelan government to increase pressure on Maduro to quit in favor of the country's interim president, Juan Guaido, the president of the National Assembly. Guaido is considered by the U.S. and dozens of other countries as the legitimate leader in Caracas.

Pompeo called Maduro a tyrant, saying, "I'm confident that the Venezuelan people will ensure that Maduro's days are numbered."

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence is meeting Monday with Guaido and other regional leaders in Bogota, the Colombian capital, to discuss a strategy against Maduro and how to get aid into Venezuela, where supplies of food and medicine have run low.

Maduro has blocked the aid effort spearheaded by the U.S., saying it is a pretext for an armed U.S. invasion.

On Saturday, Maduro supporters fired bullets at those attempting to get aid trucks into Venezuela, while Venezuelan border troops fired tear gas and rubber bullets.

Foro Penal [Criminal Forum], a group that tracks violence in Venezuela, reported four deaths at the Brazilian border with Venezuela on Saturday. It said the victims were shot by pro-government militia members.

A spokesman for the group, Alfred Romero, posted a video on Twitter saying more than two dozen other people were wounded in the violence.

At one border point, aid trucks caught fire, leading the crowd to rush to save the boxes of food and medical supplies.

A U.S. State Department official traveling with the Brazilian aid convoy told VOA that the trucks crossed the borderintoVenezuela, but were not allowed through the military checkpoint there, and did notunload their cargo.

Afterward, Guaido pressed the case for new foreign assistance to oust Maduro. "Today's events force me to make a decision: to pose to the international community in a formal way that we must have all options open to achieve the liberation of this country that is fighting and will continue to fight," he said on Twitter.

The European Union, also supporting Guaido, condemned Maduro's actions to repel the trucks with the humanitarian aid. "We repudiate the use of irregular armed groups to intimidate civilians and lawmakers who have mobilized to distribute assistance," EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said on behalf of the 28-member bloc of countries.

Sunday, Pompeo deplored the fact that the Venezuelan military, despite a small number of defections to the opposition, has mostly remained loyal to Maduro.

"We hope the military will take that role back in protecting their citizens from these tragedies. If that happens, I think good things will happen," he said.

"We're aimed at a singular mission -- ensuring the Venezuelan people get the democracy they so richly deserve and the Cubans and the Russians who have been driving this country into the ground for years and years and years no longer hold sway," he said.

Colombian officials say more than 60 Venezuelan soldiers defected Saturday. Venezuelan Army Major Hugo Parra announced his defection, telling VOA Noticias he recognizes Guaido as the legitimate president of Venezuela.

Guaido tweeted his praise of the soldiers' actions. "They aren't deserters," he said. "They've decided to put themselves on the side of the people and the constitution."

Maduro announced in a speech to his supporters Saturday that he is cutting off diplomatic ties with Colombia. Colombia President Ivan Duque has been making public appearances with Guaido as they work to transport aid across Venezuelan borders.

Duque said Colombian ambassadors and consuls have 24 hours to leave Venezuela.

Colombian Foreign Minister Carlos Holms Trujillo released a statement in response, saying, "Colombia holds the usurper Maduro responsible for any aggression or violation of the rights of Colombian officials in Venezuela."

Maduro also said he would defend Venezuela's independence with his life. He called Guaido a puppet of the White House.

Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted his support for Guaido.

"The people of Venezuela stand at the threshold of history, ready to reclaim their country and their future. God Bless the people of Venezuela!" Trump said. (VOA)

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says the U.S. is looking for ways to get humanitarian assistance into Venezuela, after troops loyal to President Nicolas Maduro repelled aid trucks in clashes at the borders with Brazil and Colombia.

The top U.S. diplomat, in an interview Sunday on CNN, did not suggest how the U.S. might carry out the aid mission in the face of armed opposition.

He said, however, that the United States would consider imposing more sanctions against the Venezuelan government to increase pressure on Maduro to quit in favor of the country's interim president, Juan Guaido, the president of the National Assembly. Guaido is considered by the U.S. and dozens of other countries as the legitimate leader in Caracas.

Pompeo called Maduro a tyrant, saying, "I'm confident that the Venezuelan people will ensure that Maduro's days are numbered."

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence is meeting Monday with Guaido and other regional leaders in Bogota, the Colombian capital, to discuss a strategy against Maduro and how to get aid into Venezuela, where supplies of food and medicine have run low.

Maduro has blocked the aid effort spearheaded by the U.S., saying it is a pretext for an armed U.S. invasion.

On Saturday, Maduro supporters fired bullets at those attempting to get aid trucks into Venezuela, while Venezuelan border troops fired tear gas and rubber bullets.

Foro Penal [Criminal Forum], a group that tracks violence in Venezuela, reported four deaths at the Brazilian border with Venezuela on Saturday. It said the victims were shot by pro-government militia members.

A spokesman for the group, Alfred Romero, posted a video on Twitter saying more than two dozen other people were wounded in the violence.

At one border point, aid trucks caught fire, leading the crowd to rush to save the boxes of food and medical supplies.

A U.S. State Department official traveling with the Brazilianaid convoy told VOA that the trucks crossed the borderintoVenezuela, but were not allowed through the military checkpoint there, and did notunload their cargo.

Afterward, Guaido pressed the case for new foreign assistance to oust Maduro. "Today's events force me to make a decision: to pose to the international community in a formal way that we must have all options open to achieve the liberation of this country that is fighting and will continue to fight," he said on Twitter.

The European Union, also supporting Guaido, condemned Maduro's actions to repel the trucks with the humanitarian aid. "We repudiate the use of irregular armed groups to intimidate civilians and lawmakers who have mobilized to distribute assistance," EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said on behalf of the 28-member bloc of countries.

Sunday, Pompeo deplored the fact that the Venezuelan military, despite a small number of defections to the opposition, has mostly remained loyal to Maduro.

"We hope the military will take that role back in protecting their citizens from these tragedies. If that happens, I think good things will happen," he said.

"We're aimed at a singular mission -- ensuring the Venezuelan people get the democracy they so richly deserve and the Cubans and the Russians who have been driving this country into the ground for years and years and years no longer hold sway," he said.

Colombian officials say more than 60 Venezuelan soldiers defected Saturday. Venezuelan Army Major Hugo Parra announced his defection, telling VOA Noticias he recognizes Guaido as the legitimate president of Venezuela.

Guaido tweeted his praise of the soldiers' actions. "They aren't deserters," he said. "They've decided to put themselves on the side of the people and the constitution."

Maduro announced in a speech to his supporters Saturday that he is cutting off diplomatic ties with Colombia. Colombia President Ivan Duque has been making public appearances with Guaido as they work to transport aid across Venezuelan borders.

Duque said Colombian ambassadors and consuls have 24 hours to leave Venezuela.

Colombian Foreign Minister Carlos Holms Trujillo released a statement in response, saying, "Colombia holds the usurper Maduro responsible for any aggression or violation of the rights of Colombian officials in Venezuela."

Maduro also said he would defend Venezuela's independence with his life. He called Guaido a puppet of the White House.

Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted his support for Guaido.

"The people of Venezuela stand at the threshold of history, ready to reclaim their country and their future. God Bless the people of Venezuela!" Trump said. (VOA)

DAKAR, LELEMUKU.COM - Vote counting has begun in Senegal after a peaceful day of voting in Sunday's presidential election.

Polls closed at 6 p.m. local time and preliminary results are expected as soon as Monday or Tuesday, according to CENA.

After three weeks of campaigning, long lines of voters formed early Sunday to either support incumbent Macky Sall's bid for re-election or replace him with one of his four challengers - Idrissa Seck, Ousmane Sonko, Madické Niang or Issa Sall.

The election process was smooth and there were no major disruptions in the election process, Doudou Ndir, president of Senegal's electoral commission (CENA) told a press conference.

"Our observations show everything is proceeding in good conditions, peacefully, calmly," Ndir said.

President Sall, 56, cast his ballot in his hometown of Fatick early Sunday. "I hope that at the end of this day, the Senegalese people will be the sole winner," he said after voting.


"What we all have in common is our country, and we want a candidate who will work for it, for our Senegal," Mbéne, an 18-year-old student who voted for the first time Sunday, told VOA Afrique after casting her ballot for Sall.

Though some will renew their support for Sall, some young voters are pledging their support to the youngest of the candidates, Ousmane Sanko, 44, who is promising drastic changes from the current system.

"The system has been in place for 60 years with the same men, the same heads, and we need to break from this," Pape Amadou Diop, a student in Dakar, said after voting for Sonko, whom he calls the "perfect representation of hope in Senegal."

Approximately 15,000 voting stations were expected to be open Sunday. CENA chief Ndir said that by noon, about 30 percent of eligible voters had cast their ballots.

A candidate must win more than 50 percent of Sunday's vote to be declared Senegal's president. If no one wins an outright majority, then the top two contenders will face off in a run-off vote in March. (Salwa Jaafari-VOA)

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - Some fun and interesting facts about Tuesday's nominations for the 91st Academy Awards:

• After more than 30 years and some two dozen films, Spike Lee received his first Academy Award nomination for best director for "BlacKkKlansman." It's also the first time one of his movies has been nominated for best picture.
• Glenn Close's best actress nomination for "The Wife" is her seventh, and could finally mean her first Oscar. She has more nominations without a win than any other living actor or actress.
• "Black Panther'' is the first Marvel movie - and the first superhero film of any kind - to be nominated for best picture. Its $700 million box-office take is more than the earnings of the other seven best-picture nominees combined.
•  "Roma" is the first Netflix film to be nominated for best picture.
• Sam Elliott's first Oscar nomination - for best supporting actor in "A Star Is Born" - comes 50 years after his first acting credit, on the TV series "Judd, for the Defense."
• Rami Malek, nominated for playing Queen frontman Freddie Mercury in "Bohemian Rhapsody," is the only first-time Oscar nominee among the men up for best actor. He's up against multiple nominees Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, Viggo Mortensen and Willem Dafoe.
• Yalitza Aparicio's nomination for "Roma'' comes in her first role as an actress.
• This is the second of Hollywood's four versions of "A Star Is Born," to get a best picture nomination, along with the 1937 original. The 1954 and 1976 versions each got several Oscar nominations, but not for best picture.
• No women were nominated for best director this year. The number of female directorial nominees in the 91-year history of the Oscars remains five.
• Eighty-seven countries submitted movies to be considered for best foreign language film. Five got nominations : Germany, Japan, Lebanon, Mexico and Poland.

- Bob Hope hosted the Oscars a record 19 times. No one is scheduled to host this year's ceremony. (VOA)

JAKARTA, LELEMUKU.COM - Minister of Public Works and Public Housing Basuki Hadimuljono has expressed the Government’s commitment to improve infrastructure and facilities in four tourism strategic areas (KSPN), namely Lake Toba, Borobudur Temple, Labuan Bajo, and Mandalika.

Those four tourism strategic areas are part of the Twelve National Tourism Strategic Area (KSPN) known as “the New Bali”.

Basuki added that with adequate infrastructure and facilities, it is expected that tourists will stay longer in Indonesia. He also said that infrastructure development in those areas also takes into account disaster risk management.

In the meantime, Head of Center for Strategic Areas Development (BPIW) of Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing Hadi Sucahyono said that BPIW continued to coordinate with a number of related agencies such as the Geological Agency and the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB).

“Infrastructure development in the KSPN is planned in an integrated manner, including by structuring the area, improving road access, providing raw water and clean water, managing waste and sanitation, and improving residents’ occupancy through an infrastructure development master plan prepared by the Regional Infrastructure Development Agency,” he said.

The master plan for the development of KSPN, he added, is made for the next ten years with more details made in a five-year plan, while an evaluation is carried out annually. “Key tourism areas become a top priority in our infrastructure development,” Hadi said.

“The focus is on the development of four KSPN given the number of tourists visiting the areas continues to increase. Investment is a key driver to boost economic potentials of the regions,” Hadi said, adding that infrastructure development is not only to attract tourists but also to improve quality of life of the communities and to boost local economic potentials.

“The Ministry supports the development of infrastructure that is not only beneficial for tourists but also for low-income communities,” Hadi added.

In Mandalika, the Government has made several efforts to re-structure Kuta village by repairing six roads, pavements, drainage systems, and public open spaces equipped with a playground that can be enjoyed by the locals.

The Government has also provided assistance for low-income communities with decent housings through 200 self-help housing programs in Central Lombok regency, which can be used as homestays. Moto GP circuit will also be built in Mandalika with the five-star hotel standard around the area.

In Lake Toba, the Government has improved access from Silangit airport to both the outer ring and the circumference in Lake Toba, including by dredging the river channel and building Tano Ponggol bridge as well as the Lumban Pea and Lumban Julu integrated rest area.

In Kampung Ujung, Labuan Bajo, which is the hub to cross to Komodo Island, eateries have been built, equipped with accessible roads and drainage.

In Borobudur Temple, the Government has revamped a number of tourist destinations near the temple such as Mendut Temple, Pawon Temple, and Puthuk Setumbu. The Government has also improved access from the new airport in Kulonprogo. (Setkab)

JAKARTA, LELEMUKU.COM - Coordinator of Special Staff to the President Teten Masduki said that President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo is not angry on Bukalapak CEO Achmad Zaky’s controversial tweet.

“The President is not angry and accepts his (Zaky) apology,” Teten told reporters after accompanying President Jokowi in a meeting with Zaky at the Merdeka Palace, Jakarta, Saturday (16/2). The President asked the CEO of Bukalapak to be more careful and despite the wrong data used, he agreed with the issue raised by Zaky.

Teten expressed hope that the meeting can stop the recent commotion which according to him is ‘economically unfavorable.’

The Government has provided a lot of support in terms of, for example, regulation and financing in order to help many start-up companies to grow. Therefore, the President is concerned that the recent #UninstallBukalapak hashtag movement on Twitter would hurt e-commerce business in Indonesia.

For the record, Bukalapak is one of the four Indonesian unicorns (start-up company with a current valuation of US$1 billion or more) that developed during the administration of President Jokowi. The other three are Go-jek (ride-hailing and logistic service), Traveloka (airline ticketing and hotel booking service), and Tokopedia (online marketplace).

“These four companies, which are also listed in 10 strongest startups in Southeast Asia, are our pride,” Teten said. (Setkab)

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - The White House on Sunday defended President Donald Trump's declaration of a national emergency to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border to thwart illegal immigration even though he said he didn't need to do it.

"He could choose to ignore this crisis, but he chose not to," Trump adviser Stephen Miller, an immigration hardliner, told Fox News Sunday.

Miller assailed former Republican President George W. Bush for an "astonishing betrayal" of the U.S. nearly two decades ago when four times as many illegal migrants were entering the United States as now. But Miller said the "bottom line" is that "you cannot conceive of a strong nation without a secure border."

He said Trump's action is "defending our own borders." He illegal immigration "is a threat in our country."

Miller said Trump's actions were justified under a 1976 law giving presidents authority to declare national emergencies, although none of the 59 declared since then has involved instances when a president has attempted to override congressional refusal to approve funding for a specific proposal.

Trump declared the national emergency on Friday to circumvent Congress, which had refused his request for $5.7 billion in wall funding, even as it approved $1.375 billion for barriers along about 90 kilometers of the 3,200-kilometer border. Trump plans to tap more than $8 billion in government funds authorized for other projects the build the wall, although lawsuits challenging the action are already being filed to block his transfer of money.

Miller said more than 320 kilometers of the border wall would be built by the end of September 2020, just weeks before Trump stands for re-election to a second four-year term.

Trump said he declared the national emergency because he was unhappy with the amount of money Congress authorized.

"I want to do it faster," he said. "I could do the wall over a longer period of time. I didn't need to do this. But I'd rather do it much faster."

Trump's staunchest critics, including Democrats who have announced they are running against him next year and other lawmakers, have attacked his national emergency declaration as an end-run around the constitutional provision that U.S. funding authorization lies with Congress and noted that he said that he did not need to take action.

Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, told CNN, "If we give away, if we surrender the power of the purse… there will be little check and no balance left. It'll not be a separation of powers anymore, just a separation of parties."

Journalist Bob Woodward, who chronicled the first year of the Trump presidency in a best-selling book called "Fear," told Fox News he believes Trump made the national emergency declaration because "he looks strong. He looks tough to lots of people."

Trump centered much of his successful 2016 campaign for the White House on a vow to build the wall and make Mexico pay for it. He long since abandoned direct payment from Mexico, when its leaders rejected the idea, and instead sought congressional approval of the U.S. taxpayer funding. (VOA)

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COM - Iran's foreign minister on Sunday accused Israel of looking for war and warned that its actions and those of the United States were increasing the chances of a clash in the region.

Addressing the Munich Security Conference, Mohammad Javad Zarif, also criticized the U.S. administration after Vice President Mike Pence this week called on European powers to pullout of the nuclear deal with Iran. Zarif urged France, Germany and Britain to do more to save that accord.

"Certainly, some people are looking for war... Israel," Zarif said. "The risk [of war] is great. The risk will be even greater if you continue to turn a blind eye to severe violations of international law."

Accusing Israel of violating international law after bombing campaigns in Syria, Zarif criticized European powers for not calling out Israel and the United States for their behavior in the region.

"Israeli behavior is putting international law on the shelf, U.S. behavior is putting international law on the shelf," he said.

Speaking to his Cabinet on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Iranian belligerence was the main destabilising factor in the entire Middle East.

"We must deny Iran nuclear weaponry and block its military entrenchment in Syria. We will continue taking constant action to ensure Israel's security," he said in remarks broadcast on Israeli media.

Europe falling short

Vice President Pence on Friday accused Iran of Nazi-like anti-Semitism, maintaining his harsh rhetoric against Tehran just a day he attacked European powers for trying to undermine U.S. sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

Zarif said the U.S. had an "unhealthy" and "pathological obsession" with Iran and accused Pence of trying to bully his allies.

"All in the name of containing Iran, the U.S. claims, and some blindly parrot, that it is Iran that is interfering in the region, but has it been asked whose region?" Zarif said.

"Look at the map, the U.S. military has traveled 10,000 kilometers to dot all our borders with its bases. There is a joke that it is Iran that put itself in the middle of U.S. bases."

Zarif, who said Iran was committed to the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers for now, also accused France, Britain and Germany of not doing enough to ensure Tehran received the economic benefits of that accord.

These three countries this month set up the Instrument In Support Of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX), a new channel for non-dollar trade with Iran to avoid U.S. sanctions. But diplomats say it is unlikely to allow the big transactions that Tehran says it needs to keep a nuclear deal afloat.

Washington's major European allies opposed last year's decision by U.S. President Donald Trump to abandon the deal, which also includes China and Russia, under which international sanctions on Iran were lifted in return for Tehran accepting curbs on its nuclear program.

"INSTEX falls short of commitments by the E3 [France, Germany, Britain] to save the nuclear deal," Zarif said. "Europe needs to be willing to get wet if it wants to swim against the dangerous tide of U.S. unilateralism." (VOA)

LOS ANGELES, LELEMUKU.COM - First it was the furor over a proposed new "popular" film category, then it was the fiasco over planned host Kevin Hart, and last month the organizers of the Oscars were accused of intimidating celebrities not to present at rival award shows.

Last week, another storm erupted when, as part of a pledge to shorten next Sunday's Oscars ceremony, plans to present awards for cinematography, film editing, live-action shorts and makeup/hairstyling during commercial breaks were slammed as insulting by actors, directors and cinematographers. Five days later, the plan was scrapped.

It's been a tough 12 months for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as it battles to restore its annual Oscars show to a must-see event after the U.S. television audience slumped to an all-time low last year.

"This year, the bigger question than who will win at the Oscars is what the heck is going on at the academy?" said Tim Gray, awards editor at Hollywood trade publication Variety.

"There have been a slew of bungles," Gray added. "I feel they are flailing around and acting out of desperation."

Under pressure from the ABC television network to trim and liven up the ceremony, the academy has seen many of its efforts backfire.

Bungles include a retreat in September over a proposed new "popular film" category, the withdrawal in December of Oscars host Kevin Hart because of past homophobic tweets, and an accusation in January by the U.S. actors union that the academy was pressuring celebrities not to appear or present at award ceremonies other than the Oscars.

The Oscars is the last in a long Hollywood season that sees award shows and celebrity-packed red carpets every week over two months.

"The academy is caught between its role as a venerable institution that confers honors for the ages on film and the demands of the hurly-burly of social media, the 24/7 news cycle and the demands of the ratings," said Sharon Waxman, founder and editor in chief of Hollywood website The Wrap.

'People really care'

The academy did not return a request for comment for this story, but said in a letter to members last week that show producers "have given great consideration to both Oscar tradition and our broad global audience."

ABC Entertainment President Karey Burke told reporters earlier this month she believed that the publicity around the Kevin Hart withdrawal showed the Oscars was still relevant.

"I, ironically, have found that the lack of clarity around the Oscars has kept the Oscars really in the conversation, and that the mystery has really been compelling," Burke said. "People really care."

The missteps have all but drowned out initial kudos over this year's diverse Oscar nominations list, which range from art house films like "Roma" to superhero blockbuster "Black Panther" and crowd-pleasing musicals "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "A Star is Born."

Awards watchers say the Academy's efforts to deliver a compelling show for viewers next week still risk falling flat.

"The Academy is dealing yet again with what appears to be a leading film that is a very small film, in Spanish, and in black and white, that has not been seen by that many people, Waxman said, referring to best picture front-runner "Roma."

Recent best-picture winners include small art-house films "The Shape of Water" last year and "Moonlight" in 2017.

"That is the more fundamental problem the Academy is facing with this telecast," Waxman added.

Variety's Gray said that, for the movie industry, the Oscars ceremony is always an enjoyable family get-together.

"The Oscars should also be fun for the viewing audience," he said. "We will see if they are." (VOA)

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COm - In early January, labor activist Esmail Bakhshi posted a letter on Instagram saying he had been tortured in jail, attracting support from tens of thousands of Iranians online.

Bakhshi, who said he was still in pain, also challenged the intelligence minister, a cleric, to a public debate about the religious justification for torture. Late last month, Bakhshi was rearrested.

Sepideh Qoliyan, a journalist covering labor issues in the Ahvaz region, was also rearrested on the same day after saying on social media that she had been abused in jail.

Bakhshi's allegations of torture and the social media furor that followed led Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to call for an investigation, and the intelligence minister subsequently met with a parliamentary committee to discuss the case, a rare example of top officials being prompted to act by a public backlash online.

"Each sentence and description of torture from the mouths of #Sepideh_Qoliyan and #Esmail_Bakhshi should be remembered and not forgotten because they are now alone with the torturers and under pressure and defenseless. Let us not forget," a user named Atish posted on Twitter in Farsi on Feb. 11.

"When thousands of people share it on social media, the pressure for accountability goes up," said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director at the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran. "Sham investigations won't put it to rest. Social media is definitely becoming a major, major public square in Iran."

Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi said last month, without naming Bakhshi, that allegations of torture online constitute a crime.

His comments follow growing pressure from officials to close Instagram, which has about 24 million users in Iran. Iran last year shut down the Telegram messaging app, which had about 40 million users in the country, citing security concerns.

"Today you see in cyberspace that with the posting of a film or lie or rumor the situation in the country can fall apart," Dolatabadi said, according to the Iranian Students' News Agency.

"You saw in recent days that they spread a rumor and announced the rape of an individual or claimed suicide and recently you even saw claims of torture and all the powers in the country get drawn in. Today cyberspace has been transformed into a very broad platform for committing crimes."

Arab population

The arrests of Bakhshi and Qoliyan are part of a crackdown in Ahvaz, center of Iran's Arab population. Hundreds of activists there pushing for workers' and minority rights, two of the most contentious issues in Iran, have been detained in recent weeks.

The Arab minority in southwest Iran has long claimed that it faces discrimination from the central government. Frustration has occasionally turned into violence: in 2005 the city was struck by bomb attacks for which government sources blame Arab separatist groups.

Last autumn, gunmen killed 25 people, including 12 Revolutionary Guards, in Ahvaz. Islamic State and an Arab separatist group both claimed responsibility. Officials vowed revenge and hundreds of people were arrested.

On Wednesday, a suicide bomber killed 27 Revolutionary Guards in southeast Iran, where the Baluch minority shares the same grievances as the Arab community: government neglect and discrimination.

"The general situation with regard to human rights in Iran is reaching a crisis point," said Mansoureh Mills, Iran researcher for Amnesty International. "This wave of arrests of Ahvazi Arabs is one part of the Iranian authorities waging a year-long campaign to completely crush dissent."

Two of Abbas Zahiri's brothers were among many people arrested on the day of the Ahvaz attack. They were accused of taking video footage on their phones near the scene and are currently in jail, in poor health, according to Zahiri.

"They are under pressure to confess their links to those who carried out the attack," Zahiri, 18, told Reuters from Ahvaz.

In recent weeks, several activists in Ahvaz have been sentenced to death on security charges, according to their families and human rights groups.

Abdollah Marmazi, an Arab rights activist, was arrested last autumn on security charges after the Ahvaz attack. He was not allowed to see his lawyer or contact his family for months, his sister Amal said in an interview from London. Last month, he was sentenced to death.

Their brother Hatam, also an Arab rights activist, was killed in jail after being arrested last summer, according to Amal. "My family has no hope of seeing him again," she said.

"They believe he is dead."

Judiciary offices in Ahvaz and Tehran said nobody was available to comment.

Human rights

Amnesty documented the arrest in 2018 of more than 7,000 "protesters, students, journalists, environmental activists, workers and human rights defenders, including lawyers, women's rights activists, minority rights activists and trade unionists."

Bakhshi and Qoliyan were initially arrested last November after attending a gathering of workers from the Haft Tapeh sugar cane factory who were demanding unpaid wages.

Hundreds of workers from an Ahvaz steel mill were protesting about unpaid wages at the same time. Authorities feared that the labor protests could dovetail with grievances of minority rights activists and cause further unrest, analysts and activists said.

Labour activists elsewhere in the country went online to support the protesting Ahvaz workers.

Both Bakhshi and Qoliyan turned to social media to detail the abuse they said they faced in custody after they were released in December. Bakshi wrote in Jan. 4 on Instagram that security agents beat him "to the edge of death."

"Today, after the passing of approximately two months from that difficult day I still feel pain in my broken ribs, kidneys, left ear and testicles," Bakshi wrote. The post was shared thousands of times on social media.

After Rouhani's call for an investigation, parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy commission met Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi on Jan. 8. Alavi denied Bakhshi had been tortured, the spokesman for the parliamentary committee, Ali Najafi Khoshroodi, told the Tasnim news agency.

The government did not announce any further investigation of Bakhshi's allegations, an indication that the meeting may have been largely symbolic, analysts say.

Iranian state TV aired a report on Jan. 19 in which Bakhshi and Qoliyan admitted having ties with individuals and groups outside the country planning to overthrow the Islamic Republic.

Rights groups say the videos were false confessions recorded under duress. Bakhshi and Qoliyan were rearrested a day after the broadcast.

Their arrests demonstrate Rouhani's inability to rein in the intelligence ministry, where Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has the final say.

Still, the ministry's role in arrests in Ahvaz and elsewhere has dented Rouhani's pragmatic reputation, analysts say.

"People are not going to look to Rouhani as an alternative to the more hardline elements like the Revolutionary Guards or the people who control the judiciary," Ghaemi said. "This is going to put Rouhani and his administration squarely in the camp of hardliners that he has tried so hard to distinguish himself from." (Reuters/VOA)

KHARTOUM, LELEMUKU.COM - Sudan's state-run news agency says a parliamentary committee tasked with amending the constitution to allow President Omar al-Bashir to run for another term has abruptly canceled its meeting.

SUNA says the meeting was scheduled for Sunday but has been postponed for "emergency reasons." It says a new date will be announced later.

Sudan has been rocked by a wave of protests since December calling on al-Bashir, who seized power in a 1989 military coup, to step down. Activists say at least 57 people have been killed, but the government tally stands at 30.

Al-Bashir has vowed to run for another term, saying the country can only change leadership through elections. (VOA)

ISLAMABAD, LELEMUKU.COM - Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman will begin his maiden two-day state visit to Pakistan Sunday, where he is expected to announce investment projects worth billions of dollars.

The rare high-profile trip, however, comes amidst Pakistan’s dangerously escalating tensions with archival India over last week’s deadly suicide bombing in the disputed Kashmir region.

New Delhi accuses Islamabad of playing a role in the attack that killed more than 40 Indian security forces. Pakistani officials deny the charges as baseless.

Crown Prince Salman, known as MBS in short, will be accompanied by a high-powered delegation, including members of the royal family, key ministers and 35 leading businessmen. He is scheduled to hold meetings with Prime Minister Imran Khan and Pakistani military chief, General Qatar Javed Bajwa.

Pakistan maintains strong political, cultural, economic and defense ties with Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Kingdom hosts more than 2.5 million Pakistani expatriates, and is a key source of oil supplies for Islamabad - on deferred payments, as well cash grants to help Pakistan’s often ailing economy.

“The historic visit will take the bilateral relations to the new heights,” Finance Minister Asad Umar said before MBS was due to arrive in Pakistan.

During Crown Prince Salman’s visit the two countries will sign eight agreements in various sectors, including energy and an estimated $10 billion oil refinery in Gwadar where China has recently built and activated a major seaport.

The unprecedented Saudi investment is being viewed by Prime Minister Khan’s nascent government as a major boost for Pakistan, which is facing an economic crisis and balance of payments pressure.

Investment Minister Haroon Sharif said the government has also arranged a conference of visiting Saudi businessmen with their Pakistani counterparts to promote private partnership and investments.

High Regional Tensions

But last week’s deadly suicide car bombings in Kashmir and in a border region of neighboring Iran have raised regional tensions. Tehran has accused Pakistan-based anti-Iran militants for orchestrating the attack that killed 27 personnel of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).

The Indian government has vowed to punish and internationally isolate Islamabad, while Iranian leaders are demanding Pakistan bring to justice perpetrators of the bombing in Sistan-Baluchistan border province.

Pakistani leaders have rejected Indian allegations as unfounded and pledged cooperation to investigate them provided New Delhi shared “evidence” with Islamabad.

“It is preposterous to think that Pakistan can be “isolated”,” Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua said in a special briefing to foreign diplomats on the rising bilateral tensions.

Pakistan maintains close counterterrorism cooperation with Iran and officials say bilateral ties have significantly improved in recent years. Officials reject suggestions Islamabad’s deepening ties with Riyadh are undermining relations with Tehran.

Former Pakistani diplomat, Asif Durrani, insisted the militant attacks in Iran and Indian Kashmir could be an attempt to overshadow the royal visit and put Pakistan under pressure.

“Iranian and Indian accusations against Pakistan over these incidents, even if for varied reasons, smack off ulterior motives to malign Pakistan despite the fact that these incidents wouldn't benefit Pakistan in any way,” noted Durrani who was Islamabad’s ambassador to Tehran until a few months ago.

Durrani noted that the Saudi prince’s visit has assumed extra importance due to the prevailing situation in the region, especially in the backdrop of Riyadh-Tehran Iran rift.

Pakistan has always walked a tightrope while trying to maintain a balance between Iran, and Saudi Arabia

Sunni-dominated Pakistan has deep ties to Saudi Arabia in all fields, but it shares a porous border with Shi’ite Iran, stretching over 900 kilometers. A fifth of Pakistan’s more than 200 million residents are Shiite Muslims who maintain close cultural and religious ties with the Iranian nation. (VOA)

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - In 1895, Mark Hanna, a U.S. senator from Ohio, explained how politics worked in his times: “There are two things that are important in politics,” he said. “The first is money, and I can’t remember what the second one is.”

Nearly 125 years later, things haven’t changed much.

In every two-year federal election cycle in the U.S., candidates and their supporters spend billions of dollars to raise their public profiles, get their messages out, and discredit their opponents.

By the best available estimates, the 2016 presidential elections cost $2.4 billion when spending by candidates and various interest groups are combined. And, by all accounts, it would have been much more except for Donald Trump’s unique campaign strategy, which relied in large part on “earned” (read: free) media coverage rather than paid advertisements.

That’s an astounding amount of money — larger than the economies of dozens of countries around the world in that same year, including Lesotho, Bhutan and Belize. If you add in spending by candidates for other federal offices — members of the House of Representatives and the Senate — the total figure skyrockets to about $6.5 billion.

Surge in campaign spending

Historically, this is a relatively new phenomenon. According to researchby political scientist Zachary Albert of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, between 1980 and 2012, spending on congressional campaigns rose 600 percent when adjusted for inflation. Over the same period, spending on presidential races increased by a stunning 1,200 percent.

In part because of Trump’s relatively low-cost campaign (he spent $398 million compared with Democrat Hillary Clinton’s $768 million), the 2016 presidential campaign was less expensive than the 2012 version. But experts don’t expect that anomaly to repeat itself.

Asked what spending would look like in 2020, Candice Nelson, professor and chair of the Department of Government at American University in Washington, didn’t miss a beat.

“2020 will be the most expensive presidential race ever,” she said.

No choice but to announce early

The extraordinary cost of U.S. elections is one reason Democrats aspiring to run against President Trump in 2020 are announcing their candidacies and starting to raise money.

Nine candidates have officially declared themselves in the race, including New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro, former Maryland Congressman John Delaney, Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, California Senator Kamala Harris, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, author Marianne Williamson, and entrepreneur Andrew Yang.

Another two have announced exploratory committees, and at least 16 more are openly suggesting that they, too, might make a run for the White House.

And it’s possible that Trump will face a primary challenge for the Republican Party’s nomination — a fight that could attract a handful of GOP candidates, and even more money, to the campaign.

A recent report in The New York Times noted that millions of dollars from individual donors in small-dollar amounts are already being channeled to potential Democratic candidates through online fundraising platforms.

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont would be able to launch another presidential campaign in 2020 with $2.1 million in such donations, while former U.S. Congressman Beto O’Rourke of Texas has already netted $743,000. Both have expressed interest in running, but neither has officially announced his candidacy.

Trump’s permanent campaigning

For his part, President Trump never really stopped raising money, letting his 2016 campaign transition into a 2020 effort without a break. Between January 2017, the month he took office, and the end of December 2018, Federal Election Committee datashows that the Donald J. Trump for President campaign operation took in $67.5 million, and began 2019 with $19.3 million in cash on hand.

Of course, individual candidates’ outlays are supplemented, and often eclipsed, by the spending of outside entities seeking to influence the outcome of an election. Official party committees and various forms of political action committees pour hundreds of millions of dollars into presidential races every cycle, vastly increasing the total expenditure.

In 2016, for example, spending by the presidential candidates themselves added up to less than half of the total amount spent. A half-dozen Democratic presidential candidates have pledged not to accept corporate PAC contributions for their 2020 campaigns in an effort to demonstrate their independence from corporate influence.

There is no question that among advanced democracies around the world, the U.S. is an extreme outlier when it comes to campaign spending, both in absolute spending and in spending per eligible voter.

In the 2015 parliamentary elections in the United Kingdom, for example, parties were barred from spending more than $29.5 million in the year leading up to the vote. In the election that swept Emmanuel Macron to power in France in 2017, candidates could spend only a little less than $25 million each.

But why is the U.S. so different?

Some reasons are obvious. First, as we’re currently seeing, presidential campaigns begin extremely early. While this is caused, in part, by the need for an early start to cover the total cost of a successful campaign, it also contributes to the overall price tag.

Campaign cost factors

Second is the cost of getting a campaign message out in a country as large, both in terms of population and in terms of geography, as the U.S.

In general, a campaign’s largest single expense category is in paid communication. This encompasses television, radio, direct mail and digital media.

“There are hundreds of media markets and some in places like New York or California, you’re talking thousands of dollars per spot,” said Nelson, the American University professor. “And there is so much media now ... it’s not like back in the day 40-50 years ago when there were three major networks and that was where you advertised. Now there are multiple platforms and you have to advertise on them. So it’s more expensive.”

But other than the rise of digital media over the past few decades, paid communication alone can’t account for the meteoric rise of campaign spending.

There are, at least, two other major factors to consider.

First, until 2008, major party U.S. presidential candidates had always chosen to accept public funding for their campaigns. This meant that the U.S. Treasury would provide funding to the candidates for their campaigns, with the understanding that candidates would abide by strict limits on how much they could spend.

Candidates shun public funding

This changed in 2008, when Barack Obama, as the Democratic nominee, declined federal money. This freed him from spending restrictions, and powered by a strong national fundraising campaign, he was able to greatly outspend his rival, Republican John McCain.

Until then, 2008 was the most expensive presidential race in history. Since then, no major party candidate has accepted federal campaign finance funds, and the results are cycles of ever-larger fundraising efforts and campaign expenditures.

Perhaps even more important was the 2010 Supreme Court decision in the case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The ruling made vast changes to the rules regulating who could spend money on political campaigns, opening the doors to direct spending by businesses, labor unions, nonprofits and other independent groups, which injected hundreds of millions of dollars in additional spending into presidential races.

“By 2020, we’ll be 10 years into Citizens United, so you have outside groups spending inordinate amounts of money that, at the presidential level, we just didn’t have even 15 years ago,” Nelson said.

Looking forward, it’s unclear whether the upward trajectory of campaign spending can be flattened anytime soon.

Most favor campaign fund limits

It’s certainly not a question of public preference. Polling shows that a very large majority of Americans favor legal limits on how much money can be spent on federal elections.

Even many politicians have spoken up against the pernicious influence of money in politics, bemoaning the hours they spend on the phone, nearly every day, speaking to potential donors. The practice is so common, it even has a derisive nickname on Capitol Hill: “Dialing for Dollars.”

The problem is more fundamental than any question of public opinion or political will. The Supreme Court has ruled time and again that limits on campaign spending are, broadly speaking, in conflict with the Constitutional guarantee of free speech.

Some seek constitutional change

In the opinion of some campaign finance reform activists, this leaves only one path: a change to the Constitution itself.

“We face a constitutional crisis in our country, and no mere set of policies or laws can fix it,” said Ben Gubits, director of political strategy for the group American Promise. “We really do need to fix our constitutional foundation.”

American Promise is one of many groups pushing for the passage of a 28th Amendment to the Constitution, which would make it explicitly legal for lawmakers to limit campaign spending.

“It’s our responsibility to fix our broken democracy, as citizens,” Gubits said. “As Americans, we’ve kind of abdicated some of this ... and it’s up to us to take responsibility for fixing this thing when it gets off track.” (VOA)

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - Andrew McCabe, a former FBI acting director, says two years ago, top U.S. law enforcement officials considered invoking a constitutional amendment to remove President Donald Trump from office after he fired then-FBI director James Comey.

At the time, Comey was heading the agency's investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

McCabe, who himself was later fired from the FBI, told CBS News in an interview that aired Thursday morning that the officials in May 2017 discussed whether to invoke provisions of the 25th Amendment, which allows a vice president and a majority of the 15 Cabinet members to declare a president incapable of handling the duties of the presidency, making the vice president the acting president.

The officials ultimately did not move to oust Trump. But McCabe, then the No. 2 official in the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said soon after he discussed Comey's firing with Trump, he ordered the bureau to begin an obstruction of justice investigation of Trump and a counterintelligence probe involving the president and his ties to Russia.

A short time after the McCabe interview, Trump called him "a disgrace to the FBI and a disgrace to our Country."

Trump also recalled his 2016 election against Democrat Hillary Clinton in a Twitter post.

In the interview, McCabe said he initiated the investigations to make sure they were firmly implanted should he be forced out.

"I was very concerned that I was able to put the Russia case on absolutely solid ground, in an indelible fashion," McCabe told CBS interviewer Scott Pelley. "That were I removed quickly or reassigned or fired, that the case could not be closed or vanish in the night without a trace."

McCabe said he "wanted to make sure that our case was on solid ground, and if somebody came in behind me and closed it and tried to walk away from it, they would not be able to do that without creating a record of why they made that decision."

He confirmed reports from months ago that Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general who appointed Robert Mueller as special counsel to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 elections, considered wearing a wire to meetings with Trump to document their conversations.

A Justice Department statement contended that Rosenstein made the offer sarcastically, but McCabe said the suggestion was taken seriously at the time and was discussed more than once.

Last March, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired McCabe just short of McCabe's scheduled retirement to deny him full retirement benefits.

Two weeks later, the Justice Department said McCabe was dismissed for authorizing an aide to talk to The Wall Street Journal about the FBI's probe of the charitable foundation headed by Bill and Hillary Clinton, and "lacked candor" in discussing it with Justice officials.

Trump, in his frequent Twitter comments about the Mueller investigation, has often assailed McCabe, lumping him in with disparaging comments about Comey. (VOA)

TOKYO, LELEMUKU.COM - Inpex Corporation announced that the LNG Tanker Oceanic Breeze called for the first time at Inpex’s Naoetsu LNG Terminal (the Terminal) located in Joetsu City, Niigata Prefecture, Japan, delivering a cargo of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the Inpex-operated Ichthys LNG Project (the Project) in Australia.

Oceanic Breeze is owned by Oceanic Breeze LNG Transport S. A. (OBLT), a joint venture between Inpex Shipping Co., Ltd. (Inpex Shipping) (30%) and Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha Ltd. (K-Line) (70%), and designated to transport the 0.9 million tons per year of Ichthys LNG entitled to INPEX.

Oceanic Breeze’s transportation and delivery of Ichthys LNG to the Terminal marks a significant milestone in Inpex’s development of a global gas value chain business, positioned as one of the company’s business targets outlined in Vision 2040 announced in May 2018.

Going forward, Inpex will continue to strive to serve its customers with safe and stable supplies of natural gas, an environmentally friendly fuel.

Inpex Corporation is Japan’s largest exploration and production (E&P) company, and a mid-tier E&P player just behind the world’s oil majors.

Inpex is currently involved in approximately 70 projects across more than 20 countries, including the Ichthys LNG Project in Australia as Operator. Inpex aims to become a leading energy company and continue providing a stable and efficient supply of energy to its customers. (Inpex)

ANKARA, LELEMUKU.COM - China has issued a travel warning to its residents visiting Turkey, in a move seen as targeting Turkey's large tourism industry. The advisory is the latest escalation in bilateral tensions after Hami Aksoy, a spokesman for the Turkish foreign ministry, condemned China's treatment of its Uighur minority.

In a statement, Aksoy said 1 million Uighurs have been arbitrarily detained and subjected to torture and brainwashing. Beijing swiftly shot back, calling the Turkish statement "vile." Chinese officials called on Ankara to withdraw what they described as "false accusations."

The northwest Xinjiang region of China, home to most of the country's Uighurs, has been under heavy police surveillance after years of ethnic tensions that have sometimes exploded into violence.

The Chinese government calls its crackdown a counterterrorism effort.

In the past, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan advocated for the rights of Uighurs, who are ethnically related to modern-day Turks, and the country often received Uighurs seeking asylum. In recent years, however, analysts say booming trade with China became more of a priority for Erdogan and his government.

"They stopped talking about this burning issue, preferring an economic relationship with this giant country," political scientist Cengiz Aktar said.

Erdogan is a conservative Muslim and has been increasingly positioning himself as a defender of global Muslim rights. The Turkish leader regularly condemns Burma's treatment of Rohingya Muslims, and he is vocal in his support for the Palestinians.

Aktar said the growing international condemnation of Beijing over its treatment of Uighurs forced Ankara to speak out.

"The issue became universal, and there were reactions all over the world especially from non-Muslim countries. So, [Turkey] felt simply compelled to react to it," he said.

Election politics also is a factor, with Erdogan's AKP Party competing in hotly contested local polls next month. Analysts say backing the Uighurs will play well among religious, conservative voters.

Analysts expect Beijing to impose further economic sanctions on Ankara, meaning the price Turkey will pay for standing up for the Uighurs in China could be considerable. (VOA)