Sojourn

(album: Left Foot, Right Foot - 2001)

The first world's got greedy, we're consuming it all
The third world's got hunger and military control
This unequal balance is a master plan
One gets rich from the other's land
They've got it all worked out and we give our consent
They've got it all worked out for Central America
They've got it all worked out for Africa
And in our naivety we believe myths and overconsume
And give them our consent
Dying in the shadow of the USA
Let them eat bullshit, make the land pay
Make a fast deal with the local elite
Then substitute cash-crops where once grew wheat
Build a cycle of dependence on a starvation-diet
With food as a weapon, workers stay quiet
And multinational names have blood on their brands
From taking an interest in misused lands
Del Monte, Tate Lyle, Ralston Purina
Coca-Cola, RTZ, and Unilever
All packaging lifestyles for the glamorous west
Expand the company, exploit the rest
We are not isolated by distance
But by greed and our racist history
Just a wall's width away
Still impossible to see across
This space in front on me
It's we who write this history
We who guard the money-tree
We support the companies
We stole the colonies
And when the system starts to crack
We'll have to ready to give it all back
See the space which lies between the rich and the poor
How the space increases as we keep on taking more
Keeping that space between us all
Is how the west can keep control...
With a mission and a chequebook promising aid
Posing for the camera the United Nations man came
He talked of control and the terrible drought
And the way that the west would bail them out
They he stopped smiling and talked conditions
Of mutual aid; of American wishes
Sending in aid with sewn-on strings
If they won't buy arms then it's pulled back in
Feeding the world American style
Col Sanders has an empire behind his smile
Back up the investments with a military regime
Then cleverly say: It's to keep the world free!
But the multinational myths are beginning to fall
The poor don't want aid, they want control
And if we really want to see the Third World eat
We've got to see through the wraping on the high street
Past barriers of culture that dictate our lives
We're busy consuming as the other half dies
And the answer's not a question on charity
Not whilst profit's still the top priority
So let the glossy shop-fronts know what to expect
And you Bosses of Companies...
..and the cycle of hungry children
Will keep on going round
Until we burn the multinationals to the ground