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Zimbabwe: Union chief faces flak over Mugabe speech

2007-07-20

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=314398

Zimbabwean police summoned a leader of the country's main union organisation to answer charges on Thursday that he called for President Robert Mugabe's overthrow in a May Day speech, the movement said. While there was no immediate comment from the police, a spokesperson for the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) confirmed secretary general Wellington Chibebe had gone with his lawyer to Harare's main police station.

Language, liberation and development

Approach methodologies for a postcolonial Africa

Kum’a Ndumbe III

2007-07-18

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/features/42686

Is there a connection between language and the enslavement or liberty of a people and their capacity for development? What have been the experiences of African countries between political independence and 2006, the year of African languages? In this article, Prince Kum’a Ndumbe III elucidates these questions. He also describes the approaches of the AfricAvenir Foundation to raise consciousness about language and development amongst the people and the decision makers.


1. Language, thought and the colonial context

Language and the articulation of thought

When a child is born and their tongue remains ‘attached’ or ‘stuck’, the child will not be able to speak correctly. It is imperative that this organ, which allows us to modulate the sounds of our speech and articulate the words we wish to pronounce, is freed if the child is not to remain handicapped for life. In my Doula tradition, we carry out this benign operation fairly early on. If, later, we see that a child is becoming particularly loquacious, then the tradition is to crack a special nut in the baby’s mouth (‘ba bo mo kasso o mudumbu’).

The language we use enables us to articulate our ideas, feelings, faith, dreams and vision of the world. Language allows us to recount our everyday, to interrogate our past and plan our future. It enables us to articulate constructed thought. And thought is a vehicle of development – or regression.

Thanks to the creation of thought and its practical or technical implementation, discoveries are made, acquisitions preserved, change comes about, predictions and probabilities are programmed, and potential dangers are forewarned of. But it is also thanks to thought that hatred, wars and destruction materialise. Thought and the articulation of ideas are at the centre of human existence; they determine the quality and the rhythm of our progression on earth.

The colonial experience of African countries determinedly applied the breaks to the articulation of the collective thought of the African peoples. The coloniser’s language was imposed as the only officially recognised language. African languages were condemned to the domain of folklore as ‘vernacular languages’ or ‘patois’. Thought, that continued to be articulated by individuals in their ‘patois’, was not recognised and was marginalised. But the collective articulation of the ideas of a given African people no longer identified with the thought transposed by the coloniser’s official language. In the colonial encounter between Europe and Africa in African lands, the articulation of thought thus suddenly became a question of contested political power.

The shock of encounter in the articulation of ideas, in the African colonial context, could not admit compromise. The colonist’s language assumed exclusivity in the public life of the colonies. Thought expressed in indigenous African languages became marginalised. It was labelled primitive, barbarous, backward, incapable of intellect, incapable of communicating progress or development. Knowledge communicated in African languages was thus characterised as non-knowledge by the colonial master. In reality, thought expressed in an African language felt subversive because it could neither be understood, nor controlled, nor commanded by the colonial master. It had to be defeated or reduced to silence.

Despite the presence of the coloniser, African populations did not stop thinking or articulating their ideas in their own languages. But as they lived as conquered, dominated peoples, whose territories remained occupied militarily, often for over a century, all public support for the articulation of their ideas was suppressed. These ideas had all but disappeared from public spaces and were unknown in the administration, schools, media, and, to some extent, in churches.

Language and transformation in the postcolonial period

Africans themselves had passed through the filter of the colonial administration, schools or church seminaries. Indeed, they had no other sources of information other than the media, articulated in the language of the coloniser. Thus they ended up convinced that Africa would not produce original thought worthy of progress and development. Ideas of progress could only be articulated in the language of the European coloniser.

These same Africans would assume power in African countries after the independence movements of the 1960s and 1970s. They continued the application of the colonial project by imposing the former coloniser’s language on the African people. Despite formal independence, which the Asian countries also acquired, thought in Africa remained colonial in linguistic articulation and expression, interleaved in the norms and structures of language and dissemination determined by the European metropoles.

Now, for these same European metropoles, Africa is only a marginal, peripheral continent, very much of secondary concern in the global strategy of power sharing in the world. According to this strategy, Africa must be severely contained, marginalised, controlled, weakened and dominated in order that the winners of globalisation may continue to draw from it what they need to nail their power and globalised supremacy.

African populations, continuing in their overwhelming majority to live their daily lives in their languages, which are no longer used as a means of communication and administration, do not even really understand the strategic games they are embarking on. They remain for the most part ignorant of the concepts, discourses and programmes elaborated for them at national as well as global levels. These populations thus remain in a state of paternalistic dependency. They did not conceive, and do not even have access to, the debate about the fate reserved for them in the framework of globalised competition.

The official language of the public domain operates as an insurmountable barrier for such African populations, who, in fatal error, have sometimes ended up internalising the notion that all these discourses in the white people’s language, which they only understand approximately, do not concern them. They believe that the powerful African elite and international organisations will seal their fate, while they do not have the right to speak. We often hear people saying that they have become powerless in the face of destiny, and that only a divine power could break the conspiracy created by the alignment of the interests of the postcolonial local elite with the powers of foreign organisations.

2. The postcolonial state and linguistic schizophrenia

Permanent structural violence and hijacking the discourse

African populations thus live, for the great majority, in a permanent state of structural violence. This violence confiscates all elaboration of thought and fundamental discourse on the life and future of a given African nation. The tiny minority which has gone through the filter of Western schooling, and has become incapable of articulating thought and discourse in its own African mother tongue, largely shares the foreigner’s discourse on Africa. Those who try to oppose it do so by derisory means: opposition itself being articulated in a language that the population does not know or hardly understands.

The opposition that should claim back the articulation of thought and discourse in people’s everyday language lacks structural support. The ordinary people, although implicated, do not have access to the opposition discourse, purportedly articulated in their favour – as this is in the white man’s language. Some may contest my argument with the assertion that French, English, Portuguese and Spanish have become African languages, since in most cases these languages are the only ones used in schools, the administration and the media, in short, in everyday public life, and because this has been the case for more than a century.

Statistics frequently account for the African population of a country by simply considering them as speakers of the former colonial language. Nigeria, with its 470 African languages thus becomes an anglophone country. The two Congos with the 221 languages of the DRC and the 60 languages of Congo Brazzaville become francophone countries.

Certain discourses in Africa today try to demonstrate, more and more insistently, that European languages such as French, English and Portuguese have become African languages. Advantage should be taken of their status as African languages, notwithstanding of course, the peculiar linguistic development, by which Africa has enabled the enrichment of European languages, on African soil. Despite all this, it remains true that the imposition of European languages on Africa has not succeeded in wiping out the African people’s daily use of their own languages.

Linguistic schizophrenia and development

Africans today thus live in a situation of permanent linguistic schizophrenia, by which personal and intimate matters are articulated in African languages in the strictly private space – at home, in rituals or in convalescence. Whereas anything considered important will unfold in the public sphere in European languages, which are barely known or commanded. Structural violence engenders linguistic schizophrenia, which separates or removes the citizen from the sphere of thought and discourse about the stakes of the nation.

Modern Africa is participating powerlessly in an intellectual genocide that is structural because it is perpetrated every day by the administration, schools, the media etc. Anyone who fails to fundamentally turn their back on their African language and culture, and does not manage to learn the white people’s language (‘bwambo bwa mukala’), is rejected by the system. That citizen will be condemned to survive, or otherwise, in the so-called informal sector, abandoned by the administrative structures and international cooperation. For it is only in this so-called informal sector, which ‘gets by’ that everyday articulation of thought and discourse is permitted in African languages.

Thus, only Africans who have successfully passed through the filter of structural linguistic violence are in a position to read, and perhaps to understand, the foreign discourse on the development of African countries: a discourse articulated exclusively in European languages. The debate on development in Africa remains conceived, elaborated and pronounced in languages which are barely understood or grasped by the overwhelming majority of Africa’s populations, who therefore cannot not participate in the debate. They cannot understand, criticise, amend or reject the outcome of the debate. And yet, it is they who are invited to implement it.

Thus we are living with a debate that is in essence anti-democratic, as it is neither communicated nor shared by the majority of the population. It simply imposes itself through the trick of structural violence. Discourse on the development of Africa will struggle to become an African discourse as long as it is not conceived, developed, criticised, amended and rejected by African populations themselves, in the languages they command and use every day. This is a terrible situation as it affects the lives of several hundreds of millions of people who should, but do not really manage to, get to grips with it.

The new political and international legal framework

The current historical situation presents the African elite with a deep dilemma. To remain or accede to power, it must conform to the rules of the game that govern the system of domination on the African continent. It knows it must negotiate power by forcing itself to satisfy those outside the continent who determine who remains in power in any given African country. Given that this is the underlying situation in most African countries today, African political actors will wisely refrain from requiring African populations to re-appropriate for themselves the articulation of thought in African languages. Others will simply refuse to support the demand for an African re-appropriation of the discourse on African development; they will recognise the danger of destabilising their own political position.

Resolutions of international conferences, conventions signed by states and ratified by parliaments such as the Unesco convention of 2003 for safeguarding intangible cultural heritage, the declaration by the African Union that 2006 would be the year of African languages, or current programmes in the francophone zone promoting partner African languages in primary schools all provide new legal and political bases and a recognisable framework for actions that avoid the suspicion that they are intended to destabilise existing regimes. But as reality shows us, very few African political leaders genuinely demonstrate the backbone to give back to their people the power to articulate their own destiny.

The directives of the African Union are, however, sufficiently clear today, thanks to the determination of such countries as Mali, South Africa, Nigeria etc. Besides these official measures, acts of civil courage and the commitment of African civil society have enabled initiatives to re-appropriate the discourse on the collective destiny of the African peoples.

3. Methodologies trialled by the AfricAvenir Foundation

It is in this context that our modest organisation, the AfricAvenir Foundation for African renaissance, development, international cooperation and peace, based in Douala, has been trying for some years to stimulate a debate in the media about the introduction of African languages into the public domain, and to suggest how this could be done.

Discussion forums and African indabas

These discussion forums organised in Douala and in indabas in the surrounding villages in 2004–06 have illustrated the hunger of the local peoples for their Cameroonian languages and, above all, their willingness to contribute personally to their promotion. However, they want to see that there is the political will to set up an institutional structure so that individual efforts can be brought together and channelled.

African language competitions in schools

Cameroonian language competitions, organised by the AfricAvenir Foundation in 2004–05, have confirmed the enthusiasm of the 1,600 pupils, representing 16 educational establishments who participated in the competition for African languages. For the first time in their lives, these pupils, educated exclusively in French and/or English, participated in a competition in which they were allowed to articulate their ideas and feelings in their Cameroonian language through rhetoric, translations, readings, song, poetry, dance etc. However, the pupils participating in the competition, and their families, became conscious of the seriousness of the gaps in their knowledge of their own cultural heritage. A general determination to use their languages more fully in their everyday lives was born.

Storytelling afternoons and soirées

Storytelling afternoons in schools and the soirées at AfricAvenir in 2004–05 have led to the discovery of a fabulous African world to which young schooled Cameroonians no longer have access. Stories told in Cameroonian languages with a short translation in French provided at the beginning of the session evoked more than curiosity – the pupils returned to their parents asking for storytelling evenings in their languages at home. Moreover, once the brief summary had been given in French, the same public attentively followed the stories in Douala, Tpuri, or Ewondo for over three hours!

Religious choirs, rap and song evenings

Christian choirs invited to the foundation sing in Cameroonian languages in church on Sundays, which is already a well-established tradition. Cameroonian singers mostly use Cameroonian languages, particularly the Douala language, in their songs. Whether their performances include religious or secular music, they are well attended.

In a new initiative, we are keen to have rap sung at AfricAvenir in Cameroonian languages. Indeed, young people have asked us to organise a rap competition in our languages.

African language cinema months

Our programme of films in African languages allowed us in 2005 and 2006 to look beyond Cameroon and show many African films, including for example those by the Senegalese Sembène Ousmane in Woolof, subtitled in French. The audiences confirmed that it was perfectly possible to make a film in an African language and have an international audience. Sango Malo, the film by the Cameroonian Bassek ba Khobio, demonstrated that several Cameroonian languages could be used in the same film without causing any difficulties for the audience. On the contrary, when we heard our own languages spoken in the film, we recognised ourselves in it more closely, and appreciated the multilingualism of Cameroon.

The book and CD collections at the Cheikh Anta Diop library

To support the learning of national languages, the AfricAvenir Foundation has undertaken to collect stories in Cameroonian languages that have been published in specialised journals anywhere in the world since the end of the 19th century. Research was carried out in the libraries of the former European colonial powers and stories, some of which had been published before 1900, were photocopied and classified into two main chronological groups. These can be consulted in the foundation’s Cheikh Anta Diop library in Douala.

The foundation’s library also commissioned a team to look in bookshops and cultural, linguistic and religious centres for any books or pamphlets published in Cameroonian languages. This work proved tiresome, as the bookshops and distributors only disseminate books in the official languages – French and English. To date, we have however managed to collect 251 books in 81 Cameroonian languages at the Cheikh Anta Diop library. The result of this initiative was publicly exhibited during 2007.

Publication of illustrated works of multilingual stories

Another team at the AfricAvenir Foundation is preparing the publication of a book of the story ‘Masomandala’ or ‘Jeki la Njamb’a Inono’. This epic was published in the German colonial period, in German in Germany, and in the Douala language. It has been taken up again by our team, which comprises a Cameroonian professor of German, a Douala language specialist, an Ewondo language specialist, a writer, and a book illustrator. This epic, which is about 50 A4 pages long, currently exists in Douala, Ewondo, French and German translations. A trilingual edition is planned in two volumes, Doula–French–Ewondo for Cameroon and an illustrated edition for Germany.

Effectively this epic, collected around 1901, brings to life a profoundly African world and its myths, beliefs, philosophy, political and social organisations, means of resolving conflicts and economic mechanisms. We find ourselves interrogated by an Africa of unsuspecting wealth, demanding its place in our modernity.

This alternative ‘global approach’ practiced by AfricAvenir has only been possible thanks to the support of the Austrian ministry of culture and science since 2004, and that of the Styrian province in Austria (Steiermark) in 2006. Without their support our work would have remained purely theoretical.

Conclusion

As we have argued in this presentation, language is a fundamental means for articulating individual and collective thought. When a language is taken away from its people, when it is forbidden to them, when it becomes marginalised in public life, the people’s thought is also marginalised, the people lose their words and the power to conceptualise and articulate their being. The foreign language, which henceforth occupies the public space, is accompanied by political and linguistic structural violence, bringing in its wake its own vision of the world, present and future ideologies, philosophy, values and dreams. It subjects the dominated population to foreign needs, which are frequently and directly opposed to the needs of the subjugated people.

Thanks to the struggle of Africans for a profound renaissance of the continent, and thanks to new inter-African and international conventions, a more appropriate structure is emerging which will permit African peoples to re-appropriate the articulation of their thought in their own languages, even if their populations – who are by tradition multilingual – also use languages of international communication. This transformation, so long as it is accompanied by consistent political will, will open up a new path for development, articulated by Africans themselves, from which international cooperation can only gain in quality and effectiveness.

* Prince Kum’a Ndumbe III is a professor at the University of Yaoundé, Cameroon. He is president of the AfricAvenir Foundation, www.africavenir.org

This paper was given at a symposium on African languages held in October 22006 at the University of Vienna, Austria. It was originally published in French in Pambazuka News on 7 June 2006, www.pambazuka.org/fr/category/comment/41906.

Translated from French by Stephanie Kitchen, Publications Manager, Fahamu.

* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org.

Equatorial Guinea: Beneath the oil boom

Agustín Velloso

2007-07-18

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/42685

Equatorial Guinea is basking in its new found oil wealth. It is diversifying its economy, modernising its infrastructure and investing in public health and education. But underneath the increased transparency in financial practices, the government is guilty of serious human rights abuses particularly against children and young people.


Equatorial Guinea, a tiny country of 28,000 square kilometres located in Western Africa, has a GDP of US $25.69 billion (2005 est.) and a GDP growth rate (2004 est. average) of 25.7 per cent. With a population of 540,109 (July 2005 est. - same source), its flourishing economy is based on its main natural resources: petroleum and timber.

Because of this, the country has recently become a target of international attention, including from the main world institutions - World Bank (WB) and several United Nations subsidiary bodies; some international organisations – Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), European Union (EU); individual state agencies – the United States Department of State; and some big corporations and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). In recent reports, made public by these observers, the country enjoys 'a spectacular abundance of oil revenues' (OECD); and consequently 'the world’s highest GDP growth between 1995 and 2001' (EU).

According to information provided by governmental sources, 'in 1995, Equatorial Guinea was found to have massive reserves of petroleum. Shortly thereafter, significant reserves of natural gas were also discovered. These findings have generated substantial revenue for Equatorial Guinea (EG), revenue which is being invested in increased transparency in its financial practices, and diversifying its economy, modernising its infrastructure, strengthening its public health system, and promoting education to build a strong foundation for the future of the country'. Impressive as this data appears, the information provided by foreign agencies and country officials should be compared to information provided by locals. Then a clearer picture of the country can be seen.

On February 27, 2007, the website actualidad.terra.es posted a piece of news sent by the news agency EFE with the title: 'Seminar on poverty and conflict resolution opens in EG.' The information says: 'State radio made public today the government’s plan, together with oil companies operating in EG, to organise a seminar to discuss measures to fight poverty and issues related to transparency and technology transfer.'

But not all actions conducted by the government of EG are so public. Many things the government and its ministers get up to receive much less publicity.

For instance, on that very day in the mainland town of Acurenam, a group of children were bathing on the river bank as they always have. The Deputy Minister of Agriculture, who accompanies President Teodoro Obiang on his pre-electoral tours around the district, took some time off to swim. He ordered some children to wash his car while he went swimming. Afterwards, he noticed his watch and some clothes were missing. The children did not notice anything was missing, since they do not have watches and bathe with only their shorts on as that is all they have.

The deputy minister conducted himself in private that day the same way he conducts himself in his governmental affairs; he threatened to break all the children’ legs if the watch was not returned. When it wasn’t, he took them all in their wet clothes to the police station where some children were tortured, according to reports of the Comisión Ejecutiva Nacional de Convergencia Para la Democracia Social (CPDS) - press release, February 26, 2007 www.asodegue.org/febrero27071.htm.

16 children were detained. Most of the children were 15 years old, others were 17, eight, and the youngest was five. A similar number managed to escape. This means that 30 children were able to share in the spoils of the robbery – as a best case scenario: assuming they actually did take the watch.

Then, they could still count on a good US$60 by selling the watch on the black market. This would work out as US$2 per child. Ironically, two dollars a day is the exact amount which most people who don’t happen to be governmental ministers live on in Africa, as estimated by United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) scholarly reports.

In spite of this, these children with US$2 each have more than enough to wander through mud-covered streets, to jump over open-air sewage pipes and to play count the few traffic lights and signs. Those are the only games they can play in a land without libraries, book stores and civic centres, or any real public services.

General conditions in EG have been disastrous for its most vulnerable and young population. 44.2 per cent of the population is aged under 15. According to the UNDP Human Development Report, 56 per cent do not have access to clean water. 47 per cent have no proper sanitation infrastructure. In addition, 19 per cent of children under five are not an acceptable weight for their age (1995-2003). 65 per cent of births are not attended by qualified personnel (1995-2003). The country has 25 physicians per 100,000 inhabitants (1990-2004) to deal with these health problems and many others, such as malaria, other tropical illnesses, and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

A day out with the deputy minister is not that expensive for the children of Acurenam, especially if you take into account the free transport to the police station, threats, beatings and torture. All these services are covered by the Minister and President Obiang, a very generous leader as we can see. None of this is news to the US ambassador either.

On March 8, 2006, the US Department of State Report on Human Rights Practices in EG states that 'Members of the security forces tortured, beat, and otherwise abused suspects, prisoners, and opposition politicians. Further, security forces continued to arrest and detain persons arbitrarily and with impunity. Security forces often detained individuals "on orders from superiors" without any further legal process' www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61567.htm.

In other words, the state department quite accurately predicts the deputy minister’s behaviour a year beforehand. This is not a great mental feat since anyone who has seen or, worse, suffered 'conflict resolution' under Obiang, can similarly predict such things. This is something all embassies accredited to Malabo know only too well. The Department of State tells of other similar abuses of power:

'Policemen violently attacked the young people and those accompanying them, hitting them with the butts of their handguns, causing substantial injury to several of them, and leaving some girls in the group undressed in public. At least 10 were detained on police premises. They were released one week later.'

According to some foreign sources, never mind government’s sources, it seems that Equatorial Guinea is moving in the last years, in particular during the oil boom years, slowly but soundly, to higher standards of social and political development. Without doubt, credit has to be given to meetings held by EG ministers and UN high officials, business done by oil companies and cooperation programmes carried out by Western governments. Obiang is also a strong contributor to the wellbeing of his countrymen, mainly through his trips to the United States, France and Spain, where he always finds support for his policies.

But above all, most of the credit rests with foreign journalists. Their almost constant press coverage, and never ending courage to stand up to the oil companies have helped make Equatorial Guinea the household name around the world it has obviously become.

It is a shame that the children of Acurenam are so ungrateful and spend their time stealing from defenceless deputy ministers. Let us just hope that police station visits and their broken legs help them appreciate all that is done by Obiang, his government, and the international press in their name. Then, maybe in years to come they will be able to live on US$2.10 a day.

* Agustin Velloso, UNED, Facultad de Educacion, Paseo Senda del Rey, nº 728040-Madrid, Spain.

* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org.

The English translation of the article by the author was reviewed by David Anderson, University of Oxford.

This piece was originally published in Cross Currents: www.crosscurrents.org.

Saving Darfur or salvation delusion?

Steve Fake and Kevin Funk

2007-07-18

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/42683

Steve Fake and Kevin Funk argue that in calling for UN intervention as a solution to the Darfur conflict, the Save Darfur movement is not only ineffectual, but is inadvertently propping up the US government’s contradictory posturing between on the one hand condemning Khartoum, and on the other, praising the Sudanese government for its support of the 'War on Terror'. In the end, it is doing nothing.


The United States has substantial ties with the Sudanese government. However, buoyed by a large grassroots movement to 'Save Darfur', Washington has also strongly condemned Khartoum for the crisis in the beleaguered region. The contradiction is striking – on one hand, the United States highly prizes Khartoum for its key role in intelligence-sharing in the supposed 'War on Terror'; yet simultaneously Washington has taken the lead in declaring (for domestic political reasons) that the Sudanese government is carrying out 'genocide' in Darfur. Adding fuel to the fire, Sudan is an area of great strategic interest to the United States, as it seeks to both prevent the consolidation of Chinese influence in Africa, and gain control over Sudan's substantial oil reserves.

It is within this framework of contradictory posturing and US geopolitical motives that are less than humanitarian that the activist movement addressing Darfur operates. Spearheaded by the 'Save Darfur Coalition', a collection of high-profile human rights and civil society groups, much activism has been dedicated to prodding Washington into action, generally through supporting the deployment of UN 'peacekeeping forces'; some commentators have called directly for 'humanitarian intervention' in Darfur. Yet given the strategic and hegemonic interests at stake for the United States in Sudan, salient questions arise about how activists can circumvent Washington's machinations and pursue a truly humanitarian agenda.

Concerns about the coalition

For its part, the Save Darfur Coalition has often legitimated concerns that it is patently unaware or even supportive of Washington's plans for the region, and ignorant of fundamental issues of the conflict. Most prominently, the coalition has at times been guilty of sidetracking Darfurian and Muslim activists, describing the conflict in harshly oversimplified ethnic terms, receiving official sanction from and doling out praise to the Bush administration, and failing to consider Washington's potential interest in a UN deployment or 'humanitarian intervention' – or the potentially dangerous outcomes of such actions. The very size and prominence of the movement is a reflection of its political harmony with centres of power in the United States. Accordingly, while doing much to propel this humanitarian catastrophe onto the national radar, the movement as a whole has demonstrated considerable myopia in both its actions and rhetoric.

This is not to say, however, as suggested by the tone in some left-wing commentary, that just because many Darfur activists have a naïve credence in US benevolence, and fail to recognise that Washington clearly has ulterior motives at stake, that the question of aiding Darfurians should be tossed aside. As the commentator Justin Podur summarises, the real world demands not allowing genuine concern for victims of atrocities to be transmuted by interventionist hypocrites into apologetics for an imperialism that will ultimately produce more victims of more atrocities. But those same victims deserve better than mere denunciations of intervention and its apologists as hypocrites and warmongers.

There are several measures that can be taken with minimal danger of promoting US foreign policy objectives. The extent to which these steps have not been pursued is itself a clear indication of how much substance lays behind Washington's fiery rhetoric on Darfur.

To take but the most elementary point of departure, one would expect that if actually concerned with Darfur, the United States and the rest of the West more generally would shower humanitarian funds onto the aid organisations operating in the region. This, of course, is consonant with the wishes of Darfur activist groups, and is the bare minimum that could be expected of the munificent leaders of Western civilization, renowned as they are throughout commercial media and our intellectual culture as committed to alleviating suffering around the globe.

Returning to Planet Earth, one finds the relief agencies in a similar situation to the Darfurian people – teetering on the edge of collapse. Due to insufficient financial support, services to displaced victims such as health care have been restricted, 'feeding centers have had to be closed, food cannot be distributed, staff are being reduced, [and] teachers in camps are no longer being paid'. At one point, the World Food Programme was forced to cut its food rations in Sudan by half, due to funding shortages – especially serious since the UN estimates that there are some 4,000,000 Darfurians 'in need of aid to survive'.

Impasse over peacekeepers

As frequently recounted in the press, the UN and the West, led by the United States, are at an impasse with Khartoum over its refusal to allow in a force of around 20,000 UN peacekeepers. (Though the latest news is that Sudan has assented to a joint UN-AU force of 17,000-19,000 troops, Khartoum's repeated history of obstructing the implementation of agreements warrants considerable scepticism of this development.)Tellingly, less noted has been the West's position towards the African Union (AU) forces already on the ground in Darfur. Again, if the heated rhetoric from Western capitals contained any meaningful shreds of reality, the AU troops should enjoy boundless support–especially from those declaring 'genocide' in the region.

Yet instead of being met with jubilation and generosity by Western leaders, the AU's own call for its forces to be increased to 21,000 has been greeted by silence, beyond empty moral platitudes, a demonstration of how seriously Darfurian lives are taken in the West. Further exposing the hypocrisy, the former UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Sudan, Jan Pronk, has made the common sense request for the international community to use the funds that would be spent on a UN force – he estimates between US$1 billion and US$1.5 billion to aid the AU peacekeepers. Again, such proposals are studiously ignored, once more demonstrating Washington's unwillingness to actually aid Darfurians.

For its part, the larger Save Darfur movement has generally failed to emphasise the issue of fully funding the AU, demanding more prominently a UN deployment; or, as some have urged, a 'humanitarian intervention'. Yet such advocacy fails to account for several key realities, even beyond the stark implausibility of the United States supporting international action for non-selfish motives.

Even if well-intentioned, it is entirely possible that an intervening force would cause more harm than it could potentially alleviate, especially given Khartoum's disapproval of its deployment, and the possibility of an insurgent movement rising against it. Crowds of Sudanese have demonstrated against a UN presence, and the contention that UN forces would turn Sudan into 'another Iraq' resonates strongly in the region for reasons that should be clear, with Pronk noting that many in Khartoum fear that al-Qaida would be drawn into the country.

Ground invasion nightmare

Indeed, disaster scenarios are not difficult to imagine. Gareth Evans, president and chief executive of the International Crisis Group, observes that 'On all available evidence, a ground invasion would not only be a nightmare to effectively implement, but would lead to the collapse of the extremely fragile north-south CPA [Comprehensive Peace Agreement], and make impossible the work of the humanitarian agencies in Darfur' – an outcome with potentially catastrophic consequences.

This conception of a UN presence in Sudan also ignores a fundamental element in this, or any 'humanitarian' mission – that sending in troops might stabilise the situation, but without a working political agreement to enforce it will not necessarily lead to any sort of just, long-term outcome to the underlying issues. For example, Pronk, who was ordered to leave the country by Khartoum in October 2006, rightly comments that a 'Military presence in order to keep the peace is a condition, not a solution in itself'.

Aside from the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA), which was heavily backed by the United States and deeply unpopular amongst Darfurians, remarkably little interest has been shown in developing a political solution by the United States, nor the Save Darfur movement, which has instead latched onto its cure-all of UN troops. Commenting that those seeking an intervention 'are suffering from a salvation delusion', Alex de Waal, a fellow of the Global Equity Initiative at Harvard and a director of Justice Africa, London, criticises the framing of the entire debate about Darfur, arguing that:'A political settlement has been completely overlooked or downplayed by the US. The whole debate has gone off on a red herring—UN troops.'

Darfurians deserve better than a potentially ill-conceived UN intervention, which may plunge the region into further chaos and serve as a vehicle for US geopolitical interests. Their suffering also merits more than the crocodile tears being shed by Washington, or an activist movement which has done much to bring attention to Darfur, but has largely failed to realise that a Western-backed force would not be equivalent to 'the armed wing of Amnesty International'.

Other paths to pursue

In addition to funding relief organisations, which is evidently of less importance to Washington than saber rattling, there are other paths to pursue, if one cares to seek them. Activists must push the West to support negotiations between Khartoum and Darfurian rebel groups, instead of advocating an agreement such as the DPA that does not reflect popular demands.

Pressure should be applied on rich countries to compel them to grant asylum to Darfurian refugees. Washington should be obliged to pay reparations to the people of Sudan for bombing the al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in 1998, an attack which killed perhaps 'several tens of thousands', and supporting Khartoum in the 1980s as it waged a bloody civil war that would claim over 2,000,000 lives.

Finally, the West cannot be allowed to continue hampering the AU forces in Darfur; these troops require full funding, a broadened mandate, and a proper opportunity to halt the violence in the region – not to be completely sidelined for the 'red herring' of UN troops. The fact that these steps have not been taken is sufficient to understand Washington's true position vis-à-vis Sudan–a reality that should not be lost on Darfur activists.

For additional commentary, please see Footnotes - "Saving Darfur or Salvation Delusion?"

Washington DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, June 20, 2007.

Web location: fpif.org/fpiftxt/4314

* Steve Fake and Kevin Funk are social justice activists who are currently writing a book about Darfur. They maintain a blog with their commentary at confrontingempire.blogspot.com/. They are contributors to Foreign Policy In Focus.

* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

Whither the voice of women in the grand debate?

Roselynn Musa

2007-07-18

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/42684

The idea of the grand debate remains everything but grand in so far as the debate is seen as an imposition by our leaders, to the exclusion of the people, especially the masses, and of course we know that women constitute the bulk.


When I first heard about it, I asked myself a couple of questions which I did not get answers to. First, I asked why it is qualified by the adjective, ‘grand’ when there is really nothing grand about it in either scope or substance.

The idea of the grand debate remains everything but grand in so far as the debate is seen as an imposition by our leaders to the exclusion of the people, especially the masses, and of course we know that women constitute the bulk. There can be nothing grand about the debate so long as its train is moving, and the people, both women and men, are not carried along with it.

One of the next questions I asked myself was: why should we be having this debate in the first place? I would have thought that the question 'to be or not to be' on regional integration is as good as answered; and the questions remain ‘when’ and ‘how’? The question should not be: whether or not. It is a given, and there is no going back. It is a situation of forward ever, backward never. Unlike the OAU, the AU's envisioning for Africa of a peaceful, united and prosperous continent driven by its people lays claim to be a union of African people, and not just a club of heads of states. But how far this is true, we are yet to see.

Our leaders did not stop at theorising. They stepped further by creating new organs like the Pan African Parliament (PAP) and the Economic and Social and Cultural Council (ECOSOCC) through which the voice of the people will be projected to provide room for popular participation by the people in its activities.

The adoption of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights in 1999 signalled one of the preliminary and important steps towards including African peoples, including women, in deciding their own affairs. This was further elaborated with the signing of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa in 2003, and its coming into force in 2005.

The difference between the OAU and the AU is also seen in the AU's highlighting of human rights, which includes gender equality. This is evidenced by its excision of the clause of non-interference in the internal affairs of member nations, for which the OAU was notorious, and also the adoption of the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa of 2004. But the extent to which these have made a difference in the lives of African women, if at all, is not clear.

Speaking of the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality, it struck me that when a document is referred to as being solemn, it simply depicts the deep sincerity underlying its signing and adoption. In all the AU documents I have come across, it is only this very important document that, paradoxically, bears this adjective. I stand to be corrected. The document could anyway have been referred to simply as a ‘declaration on Gender Equality in Africa’, given the little or no attention paid to it by our leaders, thereby connoting neither deepness nor sincerity.

But come to think of it, when our leaders signed the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality, no one held guns to their heads. They were not cornered, threatened or blackmailed into making commitments to it, leaving one wondering why they are now paying lip-service to it. Why they are dragging their feet and why are we having such a hard time getting them to implement it? At the recently concluded G8 meeting in Heilingendamm, our leaders accused the G8 of reneging on their promises to Africa, but many Africans sadly do not see our leaders in the same light.

Not only is the low level inclusion of women noted in the grand debate, the inclusion of the masses generally is rather more than a little disappointing. If most of the citizens are not included in the debate, how then is this situation different from what it was centuries ago, when our forefathers ceded our entire land and livelihood to the colonial masters for mere ‘shoestrings’. Women were not consulted then, as we are not now. How many peoples and groups have had the opportunity to deliberate and contribute to this ‘grand debate'?

Analysing the official AU study on the proposed union government, gender was mentioned in passing as an area of focus, but did not carry with it any substance. It was not clear what is to be done with respect to gender. As a matter of urgency, African women want this to be broken down so as to be sure we are not being ‘offered’ another white elephant. If gender is a crosscutting issue, as it is often said, and all the areas of priority would be viewed through gender lenses, this should not just be done, but be seen to be done.

Apart from African women, civil society organisations should be included to make the debate meaningful. It is recognised that one of the causes of collapse of some previous regional integration arrangements, e.g. the East African Community (1967-1977), was the low level of involvement of civil society in their activities buttressing the fact that the effectiveness and sustainability of regional integration in Africa will be ensured through sustained political will and involvement of the people in the continental integration processes.

Civil society organisations have been challenged severely on what and who gave them the mandate to represent the people, who elected them and what the basis is of their legitimacy. But when patients are referred from government’s hospitals, due to inadequate facilities and expertise or both, to Nairobi Women’s Hospital, no one raises the question of legitimacy.

The AU has secluded itself in this debate so much so that even the legislative authorities at national level and the Regional Economic Communities (RECs) are left behind in the grand debate, despite the fact that Africa’s integration process has always been government-led. Yet the latter are supposed to be the building blocks on which the foundations of the union are based.

It is essential that involvement in the debate on union government should not stop at jaw-jawing, but include considering the peoples’ interests and opinions, taking them on board, and basing them on the strategic area of focus on shared values and common interests.

They should not stop at just soliciting public participation and opinion, but should also find ways of exciting them, just like it is done in voter education before an election, where political parties state their manifestos, who is contesting and what the electorate stands to benefit.

It is noted that there has been a dearth of information from the media, both of the process leading to it, and also of the debate itself. But that is understandable, such is the inactivity on this question for the media to cover widely and deeply.

I am sure when our leaders started thinking and deliberating on these issues, right from the beginning, they did not foresee that it was not going to be a thorny path. This path hopefully will be in a smooth and straight road. Yet they should remember that they can only get there if they remain dedicated to the cause of the journey and do not waver.

We can see from the experience of the EU that there certainly will be conflicts. We should then, even at this formatory stage, begin to think of the conflict prevention and management that should put mechanisms we want in place without waiting for them to erupt, and we start applying the fire brigade method.

* Roselynn Musa works with African Women’s Development and Communications Network, FEMNET, Nairobi, Kenya.

* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

Nigeria's resident and former presidents

Tajudeen Abdul Raheem

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/panafrican/42687

Tajudeen Abdul Raheem writes on the recent elections and presidential transition in Nigeria, and concurrent popular protests. He notes that it cannot be good for accountability that the resident president is not held accountable, because people are too obsessed with a former president. Instead, he argues that a new alliance and broad coalition for change needs to be built, to exert democratic pressures on the political system.


I was in Nigeria all of last week. It was my first time in the country since the innauguration of President Umaru Musa Yar’ Adua, following an election that is universally believed to have been flawed in practically all senses. There were threats by very angry politicians and aggrieved activists that 'Yar Adua will not be sworn in', come 29 May.

The first test of that threat was on 1 May, when the Nigeria Labor Congress (NLC) called for mass protests during its traditional May Day activities. I happened to be in Abuja at the time. Many of the activists thought the May Day events could become a wider protest about the elections, that would make the country ungovernable. It came to pass without the kind of mass support that was expected. However, a more popular protest called by the NLC after Yar Adua had been sworn in was more successful, because it was based on issues (yet another hike in the domestic oil price) that most Nigerians can easily relate to.

Anybody with a less partisan take on the dynamics of the power play should have realised that flawed as the elections were, it was highly unlikely that the new president would not have been sworn in. Even with the electoral challenges in the courts from the candidates of opposition parties, there was no way the state would have allowed a legal lacuna and political vacuum. But I was speaking to an unwilling audience of friends and compatriots. I warned them against making threats that cannot be enforced. Moses had more luck in his exile on the mountains. Part of the problem with the protests had to do with the anomalous situation of there being no credible leader to rally the population and transform their anger into political force that cannot be ignored. The truth is, that all the parties rigged where they could. But the PDP, being the ruling party at the centre, had more powers and better opportunities for robbing people of their mandate, essentially through control of the results declaration by an openly partisan electoral commission. The process by which the leading presidential challengers in other parties, governorship and other candidates emerged in the various parties was mostly imposed by powerful cliques.

In spite of the vast powers of the ruling PDP, in areas that are very strong opposition turfs like Lagos, Kano, Zamfara or Abia states, the incumbent governors used their popularity and advantages of incumbency to successfully checkmate the PDP machinery and retain power. Therefore, when it comes to rigging, most of the politicians, especially those in the three leading parties (PDP, ANPP and AC), cannot thump their chest about who is cleaner. Yes, Nigerians were robbed of their votes. But one does not intimate that the sense of loss at the national level is in terms of whether candidate A or B had been robbed. The fact that the politicians were not calling for the results to be cancelled in the areas where they had won presented other challenges.

How can the election be flawed only where the ruling party had won? Sections of civil society were calling for cancellation of the whole election, and a re-run. But the politicians who had 'won' were certainly not in favour of that, regardless of their parties. There were also those who had called for an interim government, which was also not a realistic option, because of the political interests at stake.

Nigerians may be aggrieved and remain extremely bitter. But not many are willing to die for any politician anymore, since there are no fundamental differences between them, apart from the ‘I want to chop too’, or ‘I want to be this or that’ - without any bother about policies or alternative programmes for the emancipation of the populace from poverty and want amidst plenty.

The situation is further complicated by two important factors. First, there is resignation that Yar’ Adua would probably have defeated the closest two of his many rivals. Second, the personality of Yar Adua himself - as non-confrontational, being unknown and therefore greatly underestimated - focused more attention on Obasanjo who had orchestrated his nomination and presided over his anointment. There was and still is great anger at the former president.

When I returned to the country early in July, I was hoping that by then the dust was settling, and that there would be a more sober atmosphere in the country. How wrong was I?

There are still many grieving democrats who are refusing to accept that Yar Adua, barring an unlikely decision in the tribunal to nullify the election, will be president for the next four years.

Talking to the usual chattering classes of media pundits, NGO activists and opposition-sympathising politicos, one could make the mistake of believing that General Olushegun Obasanjo is still the tenant in Aso Rock. Every decision or non-decision of Yar Adua is analysed through the lenses of Obasanjo still driving from the back seat from his country home in Ota farm.

In part, Yar Adua’s style of stoic silence in the face of public pressure makes him vulnerable to accusations of being a puppet of the former president. Nigerians are so used to militarised leadership, where things are done ‘with immediate effect’, by executive fiat, that they think Yar Adua is indecisive for taking time before nominating his cabinet, and making senior appointments in dribs and drabs.

If we rewind back to 1999, it took Obasanjo quite some time to exert control over his government. In fact, until his second term, he did not have full control of his administration. Unfortunately for Yar Adua, he does not have four years to wait. However, he will not act in the ways critics of Obasanjo would like. They want him to go after Obasanjo openly, which will not be wise, given the current power balance within the ruling PDP. A president who does not know where the cutlery is cannot start inviting people to dinner!

But as happened between Obasanjo and those vested interests that brought him to power: what goes around comes around. Yar Adua will sooner than later enforce his footprints on his administration and the party that brought him to power. The first cabinet will not be his personal 'A' List. The list of special advisers and key para-statal appointments may be more indicative of his policy thrust and political direction. Obasanjo's so-called 'dream team' did not come into cabinet until his second term, but most of them were key advisers or heads of para-statals.

Obasanjo should know better; that government by proxy does not work in Nigeria. However, the elixir of power is difficult to shake off. It is most deadly in its hangover effect on ex-presidents.

It is not just the pathological anti-Obasanjo elements in Nigeria that believe he is the power behind the throne, and look for him under every executive bed. From all available evidence, Obasanjo, too, is suffering from this grand delusion. I call it Executive withdrawal syndrome.

For now, Yar Adua can enjoy the unusual convergence between the two. This will mean that all his bad decisions, failure or inability to make any decision can be blamed on Obasanjo’s pressures. The good ones will be interpreted as evidence of his becoming his own man! I even read paid adverts and news reports in Nigerian newspapers warning Obasanjo to 'leave Yar Adua alone' - as if he had complained to anybody! It is quite unrealistic to expect that the PDP and the former president from the same party will not attempt to influence the president. That's what politics is all about. But to assume that a president is nothing but a creation of his sponsors removes human agency and turn politics into a game of zombies.

If Obasanjo is the only one putting pressure on Yar Adua, that is the only pressure he will respond to. However, if the grieving democrats can come back to earth, exert their own pressure and engage on their own issues, they may be suprised at the kind of potential influence they could wield. Issues around reform of the electoral process, constitutional reform, freedom of information, transparency and accountability, and independence of the judiciary could be important entry points. The pressure for reform cannot be driven by the political class. Most of them have lost all moral and political credibility. A new alliance and broad coalition for change needs to be built, to exert democratic pressures on the political system. It needs CSOs, NGOs, mass labour, youth, student and women's movements, and other popular forces in strategic partnership with democratically minded elements in the system.

My fear is that people are too obsessed with Obasanjo, baying for his blood and daring Yar Adua to wield the sword. This may actually make Yar Adua take it as his mantra that it is good for him to be permanently underestimated by his opponents. As long as they continue to blame Obasanjo, he may have more room to do what he really wants to do. It cannot be good for our accountability that the resident president is not held accountable for his action or inaction, because people are too obsessed with a former president!

Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

Stopping intellectual genocide in African universities

Ngugi wa Thiong'o

2007-07-15

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/42604

Great to see that Pambazuka is helping raise consciousness on the issue of indigenous languages Stopping intellectual genocide in African universities. It is a national and class issue; it is an African issue; it is a global issue.

The Chinese diaspora in Africa

Questionnaire

Giles Mohan

2007-07-17

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/letters/42660

We write to request the help of your readers. Our project aims to ascertain the state of knowledge on Chinese Diasporas in Africa, focusing both on 'what is' and 'what will be'. We are keen to find out what knowledge exists around economic, social and political aspects of the Chinese diaspora and to determine what, if anything, key international agencies are doing to address this important new area of activity in Africa. We would appreciate you spending a few moments to answer the questions at the link shown below.
The Chinese diaspora in Africa
Questionnaire

The project aims to ascertain the state of knowledge on Chinese Diasporas in Africa, focusing both on 'what is' and 'what will be'. We are keen to find out what knowledge exists around economic, social and political aspects of the Chinese Diaspora and to determine what, if anything, key international agencies are doing to address this important new area of activity in Africa. What follows is a series of questions which we would appreciate you spending a few moments to answer.

Your name.
Organisational affiliation.
Position in organisation.
Contact details. Email: Phone:

1. Do you consider the Chinese Diaspora in Africa to be a significant new development on the continent? If so, why?

2. What do you know about the economic activities of the Chinese Diaspora in terms of geographical areas of operation, scale and sectors?

3. What do you know about the social organisation of the Chinese Diaspora and their migration trajectories?

4. Do you have a sense of the reasons behind the migration of Chinese to Africa?

5. Do you know what role the Chinese state or African host states play in encouraging Chinese Diasporic activity?

6. Do you have a sense of how Africans perceive and treat Chinese migrants in their country?

7. Has your organisation made any formal or informal recognition of this issue? If so, what and how far has this gone?

8. Do you know of any publications in the public domain on this subject? If so, could you give details?

9. Can you recommend other people we could contact who might have knowledge of this issue?

10. We plan a sample of more in-depth interviews, either by phone or face to face, and would like to know if you would be willing in principle to take part in one?


Please return to
Giles Mohan at g.mohan at open dot ac dot uk


Research team

Project leader: Dr Giles Mohan, Development Policy and Practice Department, The Open University.
Project researcher: Dr Dinar Kale, Development Policy and Practice Department, The Open University.
Project advisor: Professor Raphie Kaplinsky, Development Policy and Practice Department, The Open University.

Paying tribute to Sajida Khan (1952-2007)

Patrick Bond and Rehana Dada

2007-07-17

http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs/default.asp?2,40,5,1363

Estate community of Durban (the core city in the eThekwini Municipality), a traditionally ‘Indian’ neighbourhood now also hosting thousands of ‘African’ and ‘coloured’ residents. Sajida Khan and her siblings grew up and some still reside there.

There are many people around the world who know this house, because its location made Khan one of the key figures in the struggle against the world capitalist elite’s ‘solution’ to climate change: carbon trading. The first paragraphs of a Washington Post article heralding the Kyoto Protocol in March, 2005 (just after the Russian government agreed to sign, thus bringing the treaty into force) are as follows:

Sajida Khan, who has fought for years to close an apartheid-era dumpsite that she says has sickened many people in her predominantly brown and black community outside Durban, South Africa, was dismayed to learn recently that she faces a surprising new obstacle: the Kyoto global warming treaty.

Under the protocol’s highly touted plan to encourage rich countries to invest in eco-friendly projects in poor nations, the site now stands to become a cash cow that generates income for South Africa while helping a wealthy European nation meet its obligations under the pact.

The project’s sponsors at the World Bank call it a win-win situation; Khan calls it a disaster. She said her community’s suffering is being prolonged so that a rich country will not have to make difficult cuts in greenhouse gas emissions at home.

‘It is another form of colonialism,’ she said.

Privatising Durban’s air

Two years later, Khan was battling cancer for the second time, suffering chemotherapy that burned out her hair, and simultaneously trying to recover from an awful back injury which broke vertebrae. Inscribed on her body was evidence of an enduring fight against an insensitive industry whose illegal medical waste incinerator had sprinkled toxins onto her home until its closure, and whose perfume rods today spew a smell just as noxious as the rotting garbage they are meant to disguise.

Even in her last days, Sajida told us, she could not bear the thought that for seven to twenty more years, the landfill site would remain open. The municipality’s justification is to capture carbon credits by selling investments in Bisasar operations to global polluters, who in turn will face less pressure to cut their own emissions.

This represents the ‘privatisation of the air’, say critics in the Durban Group for Climate Justice, an international campaigning network which Khan’s struggle inspired the founding of in 2004.

The officials’ goal is to sell carbon credits via the World Bank to big corporations and Northern governments, as part of the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). Although Khan’s 90-page Environmental Impact Assessment submission appears to have frightened the World Bank off its $15 million Bisasar investment for now, two other smaller Durban landfills were adopted by the Bank in mid-2007, and eThekwini Municipality officials express every intention of continuing the Bisasar project with new private sector partners.

The South African Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism supports this form of carbon colonialism. Its National Climate Change Response Strategy was released in September 2004, and insists that citizens understand ‘up-front’ how the ‘CDM primarily presents a range of commercial opportunities, both big and small. This could be a very important source of foreign direct investment’.

As Daniel Becker of the Sierra Club’s Global Warming and Energy Program interprets, ‘It’s sort of the moral equivalent of hiring a domestic. We will pay you to clean our mess. For a long time here in America we have believed in the polluter pays principle. This could become a pay to pollute principle’.

Payments to South African polluters could be lucrative indeed. The US is the largest CO2 emitter in absolute terms, but in relative terms the South African economy emits 20 times as much of that gas than the US, measured by each unit of output per person.

SA’s five-fold increase in CO2 emissions since 1950 can largely be blamed upon Eskom, the mining houses and metals smelters, who brag about the world’s cheapest electricity for industrial users. A small proportion – less than 5 per cent of all consumption - is due to low-income households coming onto the grid in recent years. In one fell swoop last November, Eskom added a potential 3.5 per cent increase in grid demand – raising the likelihood of yet more overload and brownouts - by offering extremely cheap electricity to the Canadian firm Alcan for its Coega smelter, which will hire fewer than 1000 workers.

Into the debate over post-apartheid climate policy marched Khan, an ordinary resident who equipped herself with detailed knowledge of chemistry, public health and landfill economics. Khan had organised a landfill-closure petition campaign with 6000 signatures as well as a mass march during the mid-1990s. Even after the mass mobilising ended, for nearly fifteen years she was a pain in the neck to apartheid-era and post-apartheid bureaucrats who first located the continent’s largest formal dump in a residential area and then promised closure to reap votes, but subsequently refused its decommissioning.

As a Muslim woman, Khan waged her campaign at a time, as Ashwin Desai puts it, ‘when religious gate-keepers were reasserting authority over the family. This involved the assertion of male dominance.’ She resisted, Desai testifies:

Sajida Khan was breaking another mould of politics. During apartheid, opposition in her community was channelled through the male-dominated Natal Indian Congress and Durban Housing Action Committee. But these were bureaucratised struggles with the leaders at some distance from the rough-and-tumble of local politics. She eschewed that. Her politics were immediately on her doorstep. It was a politics that, gradually at first, made the links between the local and the global. It was a kind of trailblazing politics, that later was manifested in what have become known as the ‘new social movements’. In contrast, her political peers in the Congress tradition have built an impressive electoral machine, but ended up merely with votes for party candidates rather than a movement to confront global apartheid and its local manifestations.

What about class, though? Asked if the battle is over a selfish interest, property values, she rebutted, ‘No, no. It’s to do with pollution, and it transcends race and color’.

Yet there are certainly class and to some extent race and gender power relations in play. At the upper-end of the satellite photo, the Kennedy Road shack settlement – which is just as close to the dump as Khan - organised a dozen residents to formally recycle material from the dump. (Many dozens more used to informally pick materials from the dump, until Durban Solid Waste limited access due to safety and health dangers.)

Kennedy Road leaders accused Khan of threatening livelihoods, as well as a handful of promised jobs and bursaries (in Uganda of all places) in the event the CDM project gets off the ground. With the World Bank investigating the potential R100 million investment, tensions rose.

Insensitively, Khan sometimes used the word ‘informals’ to describe the shack settlement residents and once advocated that they be moved off the land, to areas nearby, sufficiently far from the dump (she recommended a buffer for all residents of 800 meters) to be safe from the windswept dust. At the nearby clinic, healthworkers confirmed to us that Kennedy Road residents suffer severely from asthma, sinusitis, pneumonia and even TB.

Khan had a profound empathy for people in the same proximity as cancer-causing and respiratory-disease particulates, as she noted in an interview: ‘Recently a woman was buried alive. She died on the site [picking rubbish, killed by a dump truck offloading]. I could have saved her life.’

Ecofeminist anti-capitalism?

The first use of the term ‘ecofeminism’ was in Francois d’Eaubonne’s 1974 book Le Feminisme ou la Mort, ‘Feminism or Death’. As this article was prepared for Agenda, Khan’s condition worsened, and she fell into a coma on July 12 and died three days later.

It’s here where ecofeminist theory sheds light on struggles that unite Khan’s with the anonymous shackdweller’s. In the words of Kathleen Manion,

Certain ecologically damaging issues have more of a detrimental effect on women than on men, particularly as women tend to be more involved in family provisions and household management. Such problems include sustainable food development, deforestation, desertification, access to safe water, flooding, climate change, access to fertile land, pollution, toxic waste disposal, responsible environmental management with in companies and factories, land management issues, non-renewable energy resources, irresponsible mining and tree felling practices, loss of biodiversity (fuel, medicines, food). As household managers, women are the first to suffer when access to sustainable livelihoods are unbalanced. When the water becomes unportable, the food stores dry up, the trees disappear, the land becomes untenable and the climate changes, women are often the ones who need to walk further and work harder to ensure their families survival.

For a middle-class woman, Sajida Khan, just as for the impoverished woman killed on the dump, the struggle for reproduction was more costly than we readers can contemplate. High-profile heroines have led such struggles: for example, Lois Gibbs against toxins at Love Canal, New York; Wangari Maathei fighting for Kenyan greenbelts; Erin Brockovich campaigning for clean water in Hinkley, California; Medha Patkar opposing big dams in India; etc, etc. Others have written eloquently of Chipko tree huggers (Vandana Shiva) and the Niger Delta’s women activists (Terisa Turner).

In all these cases, including Bisasar Road, women’s defense of immediate family and community is a compelling handle for a larger analysis of patriarchal power relations and anthropomorphism.

But though Khan did not find a way to work with all her neighbors, as a result of huge political, class and race divides, her campaign against carbon trading using Bisasar Road dump has at least brought this pilot project to the world’s attention, as an example of how ‘low-hanging fruit rots first’, to borrow the metaphor of Canadian CDM critic Graham Erion.

Still, the attention she has gained for this cause only goes so far, Desai observes:

Sajida’s main strategic flaw was the belief that by meticulous scientific presentation of the facts based upon thorough research, she could persuade the ruling class. Facts became the main weapon of struggle. But without an ongoing critical mass of people, once the World Bank was convinced she was right and dropped out – apparently the case by 2006, just as happened with the Narmada dams in India – then the domestic government stepped in, to take up the slack. So eThekwini Municipality is now taking over from the World Bank and looking for investors, because the bigger cadreship isn’t there to stop it. Facing down the World Bank was impressive, and deserved the claim to a victory. But it’s one thing to tell truth to power, and Sajida was absolutely brilliant in defeating the system’s experts. I hosted one debate for the Mail & Guardian in 2005, and she got a first round knockout. However, the corollary is that you must not just talk technically, but also expose and defeat the power. And you need a much bigger mass movement to do that.

Ecofeminist-socialist Ariel Salleh might also find in Khan’s story an inspiring if as yet uncertain fight against capitalist patriarchy:

As an old feminist adage goes: ‘the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.’ For socialists, the capitalist class, its government cronies, and lifestyle hangers on, are the master, and his house is the global public sphere. For ecofeminists, this is also true, but there is another master embodied in the private power relations that govern everyday life for women at home, at work, and in scholarship. This is why we use the double construct capitalist patriarchal societies—where capitalism denotes the very latest historical form of economic and social domination by men over women. This double term integrates the two dimensions of power by recognising patriarchal energetics as a priori to capitalism. As reflexive ecosocialists know: the psychology of masculinity is actively rewarded by the capitalist system, thereby keeping that economy intact.

As Khan struggled for life, the toxic economy of Bisasar Road was being rebuilt by the municipality with the global capitalist master’s CDM tool. Although her brother Rafique will take up the baton, Khan’s campaign to close apartheid’s dump may ultimately fail, as a result of the various post-apartheid forces whose interaction now generates overlapping, interlocking, eco-social and personal tragedies.

Elusive gender, class, race and political unity

If inhaling status quo pollution meant paying dearly with her health for so many years, still, Khan was partially successful: preventing a major World Bank investment and raising local/global consciousness. Most importantly, she left us with a drive to transcend the inherited conditions and mindsets into which apartheid categories have cemented infrastructures and people.

Pessimistically, it may not be feasible for Clare Estate residents from different and sometimes opposed race/class backgrounds to forge more effective alliances against the municipality, in the short term. It may be only a matter of time before the price of a tonne of carbon dioxide is attractive enough to bring new investors to Bisasar.

Optimistically, before that point is reached, an ideal solution does exist, uniting the red and green strands of politics against capitalist-patriarchal rubbish, for Durban should and could:

# adopt a ‘zero waste’ philosophy that would create dozens – perhaps hundreds - of reliable jobs in recycling for Kennedy Road shackdwellers, who where needed could (at their own volition) be suitably resettled with security of tenure, on stable land in the immediate vicinity, and


# simultaneously terminate and rehabilitate the Bisasar dump, while safely removing its methane, preferably through piping it out of the area to a nearby gas main via a cleansing filter.


Regardless, with women’s bodies carrying deep scars of this fight, and with many women in the vicinity of Bisasar Road suffering respiratory diseases and other health/welfare problems from the dump, we all – especially those (like we authors and many of you readers) with an inordinate contribution to climate change and municipal waste - have an obligation to be part of a solution. As Desai mused,

Sometimes when lives are judged by visual victories, we see failures, and after all, the dump remains right outside Sajida’s front door after her 14 year fight. But on the other hand, if a life is judged by a legacy that endures and is built upon, hers is one of multiple larger victories: of a woman standing against male domination of nationalist politics, of knowledge about global capitalist ecology over amnesia, of ordinary people harnessing the most incredible forms of expertise so as to enter forums usually dominated by people with multiple degrees, and of a political ecology that is a politics of all the people. Whatever you might say about her race and class privilege, the final denominator is that she’ll die fighting the cancer infection, and fighting the dump that gave her that cancer. This was not a death of privilege, it was murder.

The 2007 Caine Prize for African Writing

2007-07-18

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/books/42667

The 2007 Caine Prize for African Writing, the leading literary prize for short stories from the African continent, was awarded to Uganda’s Monica Arac de Nyeko for her story ‘Jambula Tree’ published in African Love Stories (Ayebia Clarke Publishing 2006).

The Chair of Judges, the writer Jamal Mahjoub from Sudan, who was himself short-listed for the Caine Prize in 2004, announced Monica as the winner of the £10,000 prize at a dinner held in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, UK, on 9 July 2007.

He described her story as ‘a witty and touching portrait of a community which is affected forever by a love which blossoms between two adolescents’.

The other judges of the 2007 prize were: Wangui wa Goro, the Kenyan academic, critic and writer; Delia Jarrett-Macauley, an award winning novelist; Jonty Driver, South African poet and novelist; and Robert Molteno, former managing editor, Zed Books.

The 2007 prize winner, Monica Arac de Nyeko, was born in Uganda. She is a member of the Uganda Women Writers Association (FEMRITE). She was also short-listed for the Caine Prize in 2004 for her story ‘Strange Fruit’.

As part of the award, Monica will take up a month’s residence at Georgetown University, Washington DC, as a ‘Caine Prize/Georgetown University Writer-in-Residence’. The award will cover all travel and living expenses.

Also on this year’s shortlist were: Uwem Akpan, from Nigeria, for ‘My Parents Bedroom’ (The New Yorker); E.C Osondu, from Nigeria, for ‘Jimmy Carter’s Eyes’ (AGNI Fiction Online); Henrietta Rose-Innes, from South Africa, for ‘Bad Places’ (New Contrast); and Ada Udechukwu, from Nigeria, for ‘Night Bus’, (The Atlantic Monthly). Kenyan Billy Kahora’s ‘Treadmill Love’ published in The Obituary Tango (Jacana/New Internationalist 2006) was highly commended by the judges.

The Caine Prize was launched in 2000, named after Sir Michael Caine. It is awarded to a short story of between 3,000 and 15,000 words, published in English, by an African writer whose work reflects African culture. Translations are eligible, and the internet is an acceptable mode of publication. Previous winners include Helon Habila, Segun Afolabi, Brian Chikwava, Binyavanga Wainaina, Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor and Mary Watson.

For further information, see
Caine Prize for African Writing
Ayebia Clarke Literary Agency and Publishing
BBC interview with the 2007 winner

Tlhokomeliso

Poem

Rethabile Masilo

2007-07-17

http://poefrika.blogspot.com/

tlhokomeliso
‘if needs be, it is an ideal
for which I am prepared to die.’
~ntate mandela


before the naming rites,
even before we were free to be free
from terror in our ranks,
before prison or death
became our constitutional rights,
a cry echoed among the elements
to shake the tenements
inside heaven and inside hell;
flesh came into my shell,
resided in me, heavy and light
according to the moment—
like a rumour, God and politics
entered me and sat on my heart;
so I must ask you to destroy me
because there’s a part of me that
still belongs to the sun, and will
not acquiesce; for the benefit of
your crew, destroy, before it’s too
late, the blood in me that is hers
and will not succumb — slay
this whole idea of a Motuba who
rides a sun-ray to illume our day.

© Rethabile Masilo - http://poefrika.blogspot.com/

Madaraka Nyerere interview

Madaraka Nyerere

2007-07-19

http://www.pambazuka.org/en/broadcasts/podcasts.php

Madaraka Nyerere, the son of the former President of Tanzania, Julius Nyerere, talks to Adam Ma'anit from the New Internationalist for Pambazuka News.

Madaraka Nyerere was in London to re-launch the Arusha Declaration, the document which is the foundation of socialist principles practiced by Nyerere's government, with the Global Women's Strike.

Madaraka explores the reasons why Nyerere's policies have been demolished by capitalism, and the relevance of his father's work for modern Africa and the women's rights movement.

See Global Women's Strike for more on the publication of the Arusha Declaration.

Music in this podcast is brought to you by Busi Ncube from Zimbabwe and kindly provided by Thulani Promotions.

The ravaging of Africa

Asad Ismi

2007-07-17

http://www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=23508

The ravaging of Africa has been enriching Europe and North America for more than 500 years. First, European empires imposed slavery and colonialism on the continent. After 1945, the United States took over as the dominant neo-colonial power.

Through the Pentagon and the CIA, the US government has fueled 14 wars in Africa. The methods employed include direct and proxy invasions as well as arms transfers and military training. The US has used the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to systematically demolish African economies and health and education sectors. This military and economic war enables the looting of Africa's resources by Western multinational corporations. Washington's genocidal imperial strategy has killed more than 26,000,000 Africans but failed to suppress popular resistance.

28 activists from 16 African countries were interviewed for the series.
The documentary is based on Asad's award-winning article of the same title. For his publications visit: www.asadismi.ws/
To respond email: aismi@can.rogers.com


Episodes:

1. 'Militarizing Africa' describes how the United States has fomented the devastating war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as taken part in and engineered the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia. With Mfuni Kazadi, Millicent Okumu, Farah Maalim and Halima Abdi Arush.

2. 'Economic War' focuses on the World Bank's and IMF's decimation of the economies and social sectors of Guinea, Zambia, Kenya and South Africa. With Bakary Fofana, Sara Longwe, Caroline Adhiambo, Njuki Githethwa and Molefe Pilane.

3. 'Corporate Plunder' details the disastrous effects of Royal Dutch Shell's operations in Nigeria and those of Canada's Tiomin Resources in Kenya. Also highlighted is the massive tax looting of Africa by Western corporations. With Ifieniya Lott, Mwana Siti B. Juma, Charles Abugre and John Christensen.

4. 'African Resistance' celebrates the liberation of Southern Africa, the defeat of US aims in the Congo and Somalia, as well as the diverse non-military struggles against US domination that were represented at the World Social Forum. With Wahu Kaara, Amade Suca, Mfuni Kazadi, Farah Maalim, Virginia Magwaza-Setshedi, Emilie Atchaka and Njeru Munyi.

Ghana: Parliament, Reasoning, and Development

Kofi Akosah-Sarpong

2007-07-17

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/wgender/42665

The criminalization of Female Genital Mutilation, part of some of the cultural inhibitions stifling Ghana’s progress, by the Parliament of Ghana, indicates attempts to rediscover the state from its roots. It raises the fact that, unlike years ago, the elected representatives are expanding their thinking in relation to Ghanaian norms, values and traditions in Ghana’s progress. The act simultaneously touts the good aspects of the Ghanaian culture and also attempts to refine the ancient cultural inhibitions that have been stifling Ghana’s development process. At deeper level, there is clear demonstration that the law-makers, as the key face of Ghanaian elites and prominent directors of progress, are increasingly having fuller grasp of Ghana’s development process.

Still, by this act, including the heated debate it generated, as the Ghana News Agency (June16, 2007) reported, the elites are “rediscovering the state,” from the roots of its original Ghanaian indigenous values, and “starting to consider the challenges ahead,” as the inhibitions within the values of the 56 ethnic groups that make-up Ghana nation-state pop up now and then in the drive for progress. The Ghana nation-state cannot work harmoniously if there are huge in-built unrefined inhibiting values that stifle it. The attempts are not only to refine the inhibitions within the culture but intellectualize it, enlighten it, as Prof. Kojo Yankah, of the University of Ghana, would say, for progress. For years, such inhibiting cultural practices such as the destructive Pull Him Down syndrome (Prof. Kwesi Andam, of University of Science and Technology, thinks is partly responsible for the decline of the once prosperous Fanteland); immense dabbling in the irrational juju-marabout mediums that twists reasoning(coup-makers used this and nearly blew Ghana into pieces); human sacrifice (there are campaigns Africa-wide to stop this practices); and the excessive interpretation of events as caused by witchcraft and not human agency, have impacted negatively on Ghana’s progress.

As the main centre for national reasoning and reflection, as the fountain of human rights, effectively human refinement, as the key forum of national struggles, and the main juggler of the contending issues of a nation-state slightly founded on the wrong footing, the Parliament of Ghana refracts both the inhibitions and the positive parts of Ghanaian values and traditions, its ex-colonial legacies and the deftness to appropriate as much as practicable global development values for Ghana’s progress. In this sense, the Parliament has huge task, unlike years past, to deal with not only the emerging challenges but the good parts of Ghanaian values and the inhibiting parts such as a shrine near Kumasi ritually sacrificing deformed babies for host of material demands from juju-marabout-minded Ghanaians. How do you change such thinking in the larger development process?

Such long-running counter-productive cultural practices have led some critical observers to question African elites inability to boldly attempt to refine them and led to all sort of views about Africa’s values, especially as science grow globally and certain human events are thought not to be caused by demons, divine feat, evil spirits, or unforeseen forces. From afar and inside Africa, some observers have argued that Ghanaian/African elites cannot think and have no confidence in their own values as critical domains for progress. The German thinker, Friedrich Hegel, thought that Africans cannot think or are philosophically weak. The late Senegalese President, Leopold Senghor, perhaps influenced by Hegel, thought Africans cannot think and brought in Europeans when he has developmental challenges. The Ghanaian law-makers are saying today that both Hegel and Senghour were wrong, that Africans can think from within their values in the global perspective in the context of their norms, values and traditions. Hence, the criminalization of FGM.

Either from the twisted views of Hegel or Senghor, which pretty much reflected the jaundiced European views of Africa’s values and traditions, as the French would tell you with their warped view that Africans needed to be “civilized” because they cannot think and are “primitive,” there have been long-running perception that African elites, after freedom from colonial rule, have not been able to intellectually come out with the thinking that allows them to model their progress from within their norms, values and traditions, and deal with the emerging development challenges effectively. When Ghana’s Dr. Y.K. Amoako, ex-chair of the Addis Ababa-based UN’s Economic Commission for Africa, observed that Africa is the only region in the world where its development paradigms are foreign dominated, Dr. Amoako was effectively saying that Africa’s elites have not being able to overturn the European views of the fact they are so weak that they cannot think from within their values and need foreign values and traditions to develop. Pretty much disturbing! The contention is how Ghanaian/African elites can think through their values and traditions to come out with development paradigms that reflect their environment as the Southeast Asians and other prosperous nation-states throughout the world have done and are still doing a la globalization.

One mistake Ghana’s Founding Fathers did was failing to structure and direct the nation-state from within Ghanaian values and traditions. If the Founding Father had examined the contradictions and atrocities within the values and traditions and laid them out for rigorous refinement in Ghana’s progress, as the current law-makers are attempting to do, the Founding Fathers would have set the path, long ago, for enlightened processes for progress. The criminalization of FGM, in the broader context of nation-building, represents a rebirth – indeed, a reconnection between the “state” (as the political authority) and “nation” (as the root, values and traditions) – since there are conscious attempts to awaken the long-suppressed values, appropriate the good parts and refine the inhibiting aspects for national development.

South Africa: 2007 Woman of the year finalists announced

2007-07-20

http://www.sawoman.co.za/pages/79568134/Newsroom/Articles/2007-Finalists-announced.asp

The finalists of the 2007 Shoprite Checkers / SABC 2 Woman of the Year Award were announced in Johannesburg and these 21 outstanding achievers selected from over a thousand nominations countrywide, will now compete for the prestigious 2007 Shoprite Checkers / SABC 2 Woman of the Year title. The finalists include world-renowned sportswoman and administrators, internationally recognised researchers, academics, public health workers and business entrepreneurs who have achieved not only in their own right but who have also made a difference to the broader South African society.

Uganda: Study on women's access to ICTs and empowerment

2007-07-19

http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=a--e95381-1

Much of the discourse on women and information and communication technologies (ICTs) seems to indicate that as a result of using these technologies, marginalised groups like rural women can get empowered. ResearcherPatricia Litho conducted a case study of an ICT project that was established in Uganda with an aim of economically empowering women, to asses the extent to which rural women were able to access ICTs, and if as a result they were empowered as claimed by the project reports.

Zimbabwe: Daughters fetch high prices as brides

2007-07-19

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=73272

Daughters have become a high-priced commodity in Zimbabwe, where a dowry has become a means of escaping poverty in a rapidly declining economy. "When people are mired in such hunger as we have been seeing in this country for over seven years, they will do anything to survive," Innocent Makwiramiti, a Harare-based economist, told IRIN.

Zimbabwe: Maternal deaths become a neglected tragedy

2007-07-20

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=314295

"It is a nasty experience, which I do not want to be reminded of. But if you try to keep it to yourself, it will remain a shock for a long time. I cannot even explain the pain I felt after being told that I was carrying dead bodies in my womb," says Sesedzai Manzanga, a Harare teacher, as she recounts giving birth to a dead set of twins two years ago.

Africa: Though uneven, freedom is advancing - report

2007-07-19

http://www.freedomhouse.org/uploads/press_release/africa_report_jul07.pdf

Freedom House has released an analysis of democracy in sub-Saharan Africa showing that the region has experienced notable increases in freedom over the past generation, although more setbacks than gains were seen in 2006. “Sub-Saharan Africa in 2007 presents at the same time some of the most promising examples of new democracies in the world—places where leaders who came to power through fair elections provide real opportunities for their citizens to live in freedom,” said Thomas O. Melia, deputy executive director of Freedom House.

Congo: Baka artists housed in zoo

2007-07-19

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6898241.stm

Human rights activists have criticised the organisers of a music festival in the Republic of Congo for housing pygmy musicians in a tent at a zoo. Other artists at the Festival of Pan-African Music (Fespam) are staying in hotels in the capital, Brazzaville. The organisers say the grounds of Brazzaville zoo are closer to the pygmies' natural habitat.

Global: Native Peoples Renew Call for U.N. Recognition

2007-07-19

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=38593

Leaders of the world's 370 million indigenous peoples are reiterating their calls for the 192-member U.N. General Assembly to recognise their sovereignty over ancestral lands and resources. "It is now time for the General Assembly to adopt the declaration by vote, if necessary," Les Malezer, chairman of the U.N.-based Indigenous Peoples Caucus, told reporters at a news conference Wednesday.

Nigeria: Human Rights Defender at Risk

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/rights/42708

Nigerian, Human Rights Defender and founder of The International Centre for reproductive health and Sexual rights (INCRESE) in Niger State, Dorothy Aken’Ova has been ostracised and intimidated by family and community because of the work she does.
Nigerian, Human Rights Defender and founder of The International Centre for reproductive health and Sexual rights (INCRESE) in Niger State, Dorothy Aken’Ova has been ostracised and intimidated by family and community because of the work she does.

Social activists and Frontline HRD like Dorothy are a special group of people who put their lives at risk to defend the rights of others. Dorothy has been defending sexual rights and the reproductive rights of women in Nigeria for over 10 years. When one considers her work is concentrated mainly in the North of the country in those states where Sharia law has been adopted as part of the state legal system, her stance on sexual and reproductive rights places her at even more risk.

For the past 12 months, Dorothy has also been at the forefront of the the campaign to prevent the passing of the Nigerian “Same Sex Marriage Bill”. This has involved attending campaign meetings in Abuja, attending House and Senate hearings, making press statements and addressing sexuality rights in Nigeria at the World Social Forum as well as the sessions of The African Commission on Human and People’s Rights.

Because of her public stance against the Same Sex Marriage Bill and her work on sexual and reproductive rights, Dorothy is now at risk of never seeing her 8 year old son again as the courts have ruled against her having access to him.


Human Rights organisations to contact.
Madre - www.madre.org
Human Rights Watch - www.hrw.org
Amnesty International - www.amnesty.org
Frontline Defenders - www.frontlinedefenders.org
International Gay and Lesbian Association - ilga.org
International Gau & Lesbian Human Rights Commission - www.iglhrc.org

Sierra Leone: War crimes court jails militia chiefs

2007-07-19

http://africa.reuters.com/wire/news/usnL19739170.html

Sierra Leone's special war crimes court on Thursday sentenced three leaders of a militia to long jail terms for war crimes that included killing, raping and mutilating civilians. Alex Tamba Brima and Santigie Borbor Kanu were jailed for 50 years each and Brima Bazzy Kamara for 45 years. All three had been convicted last month by the United Nations-backed court of crimes against humanity committed during the West African country's 1991-2002 civil war.

Chad: President accepts idea of EU peacekeepers to protect Darfur refugees

2007-07-20

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/07/19/europe/EU-FIN-France-Chad-Darfur.php

Chadian President Idriss Deby said Thursday that he accepts the idea of an interim European Union peacekeeping force in the African nation to protect people affected by violence spilling over from neighboring Darfur. Deby spoke after meeting French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has been pushing for the force.

Ethiopia: Relocation of Somali refugees begins

2007-07-19

http://www.unhcr.org/news/NEWS/469ce3b96.html

The UN refugee agency has reopened the Teferi Ber camp in eastern Ethiopia and begun relocating some 4,000 Somali refugees there from an overcrowded makeshift settlement close to the border with Somalia. The first two convoys on Friday and Monday carried a total of 1,043 people, who were warmly and loudly welcomed by the local population when they arrived at the UNHCR-run camp here from Kebribeyah, some 120 kilometres to the south. There will be a convoy every three days.

Kenya: Clashes, elections and land - church keeps watch in Molo

2007-07-20

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=73319

“Onyo! Onyo! Onyo! Warning! Warning! Warning! … A warning has been issued to the people who are not from this region! This is our land from before! … Time has come for you to leave our land and return to yours! … Whoever disobeys will die! The Rift Valley Land Owners & Protectors army is ready to fight for its right till the last blood drop is shed!”

West Africa: Dozens of migrants lost overboard near Canaries

2007-07-19

http://africa.reuters.com/wire/news/usnBAN927991.html

Dozens of African migrants were lost overboard in heavy seas on Thursday as the Spanish coast guard tried to rescue them near the end of a dangerous voyage to the Canary Islands in a wooden boat, officials said. About 100 Africans hoping to migrate to Europe were flung into the open sea after their long, canoe-shaped open vessel, known as a cayuco, capsized just as the Spanish coast guard drew alongside to take them aboard before dawn.

South Africa: COSATU statement on treatment of Union VP

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/socialmovements/42748

The Congress of South African Trade Unions strongly condemns the detention, interrogation and searching of the First Vice-President of the SA Municipal and Allied Workers Union (SAMWU), Xolile Nxu, by Israeli security officials in both Israel and South Africa.
19 July 2007

The Congress of South African Trade Unions strongly condemns the detention, interrogation and searching of the First Vice-President of the SA Municipal and Allied Workers Union (SAMWU), Xolile Nxu, by Israeli security officials in both Israel and South Africa.

When he arrived at OR Tambo Airport, on his way to attend the Second Annual Conference on Popular Non-Violent Resistance in Palestine, he was detained by a man in plain clothes who claimed to be "The Chief of Security". He says: "I was taken to a small room and subjected to a long and abusive interview, during which I was forced to take off my belt and my pants". The security officials eventually escorted him directly through customs and onto the plane, one minute before it took off, after plastering all his luggage and hand luggage with red stickers.

On arrival in Israel he was again interrogated until after midnight, was the last person to be released from the airport, and then transported to a checkpoint in the West Bank where he was dropped off at 1am. "Because of the apartheid system imposed by Israel on the Palestinians," says SAMWU, "no Palestinian was permitted to collect Mr Nxu at the airport.
He had to cross the checkpoint before meeting the Palestinian activists who took him to his accommodation in Bil'in village".

When Nxu left the country he was detained for eight hours at Ben Gurion airport and interrogated about each and every country stamp on his passport. Security staff also threatened him physically when he refused to reveal the names of the Palestinian conference organisers.

COSATU shares SAMWU's alarm that Israeli security appears to have impunity to behave in this fashion at a South African airport, with apparently even more power than customs officials. We shall be taking the matter up with the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Airports Authority to check whether this behaviour is condoned and what action the SA government is going to take to protect its citizens from such abuse.

South Africa is a sovereign state and there is no way its citizens should be treated like this by the security forces of a foreign country.
There is absolutely no justification for the Israel government to have its own offices, secret police and power to bypass customs at our airports.

South Africa: Israelis detain and strip search Union VP in South Africa

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/socialmovements/42747

The First Vice-President of SAMWU, Mr Xolile Nxu, was detained, interrogated and strip searched by Israeli security en route to the Second Annual Conference on Popular Non-Violent Resistance held recently in the West Bank village of Bil’in, Occupied Palestine. The conference was attended by 400 people from across the world, including EU Parliamentarian, Luisa Morgantini. Mr Nxu spoke on South African resistance to Apartheid, and also held discussions with Palestinians about the need for a One State solution to the current occupation.
19 July 2007

The First Vice-President of SAMWU, Mr Xolile Nxu, was detained, interrogated and strip searched by Israeli security en route to the Second Annual Conference on Popular Non-Violent Resistance held recently in the West Bank village of Bil’in, Occupied Palestine. The conference was attended by 400 people from across the world, including EU Parliamentarian, Luisa Morgantini. Mr Nxu spoke on South African resistance to Apartheid, and also held discussions with Palestinians about the need for a One State solution to the current occupation.



Mr Nxu arrived at OR Tambo Airport at 9am for a flight leaving at 11am. He was detained by a man in plain clothes who claimed to be “The Chief of Security”.


“I was taken to a small room and subjected to a long and abusive interview, during which I was forced to take off my belt and my pants” says Mr Nxu. The Israeli security eventually escorted Mr Nxu directly through customs and onto the plane itself, one minute before it was about to take off, after plastering all his luggage and hand luggage with red stickers.



SAMWU feels that it is very alarming that Israeli security has free reign in OR Tambo airport, with apparently even more power than customs officials. The union was under the impression that South Africa is a sovereign state and that our citizens are not accountable to the Israeli secret police. It is quite notable that no other country apart from Israel has their own offices, secret police and power to bypass customs at our airports.



Mr Nxu’s ordeal did not end there. When he arrived at Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv, Israel that night at 10pm he was again interrogated until after midnight. He was the last person to be released from the airport. Mr Nxu was then transported to a checkpoint in the West Bank where he was dropped off at 1am. Because of the apartheid system imposed by Israel on the Palestinians, no Palestinian was permitted to collect Mr Nxu at the airport. Mr Nxu had to cross the checkpoint before meeting the Palestinian activists who took him to his accommodation in Bil’in village.



The next day, Mr Nxu accompanied the Bil’in Popular Committee against the Apartheid Wall to a rally demanding the release of Palestinian detainees in the city of Ramallah, just 10 kms away. The group was suddenly stopped at a “temporary checkpoint” and informed that “people from Bil’in are no longer allowed to visit Ramallah”. Mr Abu Ma’an, an elderly leader of the Land Defence Committee in Palestine, was then arrested by Israeli soldiers when he told them that their roadblock was illegal. Mr Nxu then had to intervene and negotiate for Mr Abu Ma’an’s release. Thereafter, the group had to take another arduous route, driving through mountains, to get to Ramallah.



Mr Nxu said that “Israeli Apartheid is worse than South African apartheid. I cannot accept that the very people who were subjected to pogroms in Europe, who understand how it feels, are now doing the very same thing to the Palestinians that was done to them in Europe.”



“Israel must release all detainees now. Israel cannot pretend to want talks with the Palestinians while others are still in prison. America is supporting the consolidation of Israeli Apartheid. The Apartheid Wall itself contravenes the International Court of Justice decision that it must be dismantled. The forced removals of Palestinians from Jerusalem, the imprisonment of children, the humiliation of Palestinians at checkpoints, the theft of their land and house demolitions – all this is tantamount to refusing the Palestinians their rights”.



Mr Nxu also visited the eight meter high concrete wall built by Israel which divides the West Bank into ten Bantustans. “The Apartheid Wall is not for security but has been built specifically to set a new Palestinian border and to steal land that is now annexed into Israel. Israel is not a democracy but an ethnocracy,” said Mr Nxu.



When Mr Nxu left the country he was detained for eight hours at Ben Gurion airport and interrogated about each and every country stamp on his passport. Israeli security also threatened him physically in a failed bid to extract the names of the Palestinian conference organisers from him.



“What I want to know is why was I the only one at that airport who had to go through this? I want to return to a one state democratic Palestine and not a Bantustan homeland, next time I go back. Any two state solution will simply be a Bantustan solution” said Mr Nxu.

Algeria: Senate ratifies electoral changes

2007-07-19

http://tinyurl.com/2jyqaw

Algeria's National Council has approved the lower National Popular Assembly's amendments to the electoral law. The changes impose more difficult conditions for small and new parties to field candidates for election. The senators also approved the postponement of local elections from September until November.

Angola: Savimbi's ghost haunts opposition vote

2007-07-20

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=314473

Members of Angola's main opposition party streamed into a conference hall on Thursday to cast ballots in a leadership race overshadowed by the ghost of Jonas Savimbi, the guerrilla leader who founded the movement. Larger-than-life images of Savimbi, killed by Angolan government troops in 2002, greeted more than 1 000 delegates of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (Unita) who gathered in the town of Viana, 20km outside Luanda.

Egypt: government cracks down on Islamist opposition

2007-07-20

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=314410

It was 3am when armed security agents hammered on the door of Khairat al-Shater's flat in Nasser City; his daughter Zahra could only watch and comfort her distraught children while her father and husband, Ayman, were detained as Hosni Mubarak's latest crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood got under way. "The Brotherhood are good people," insisted Zahra, in a hijab of the kind increasingly seen on the streets of Cairo. "We believe in peaceful change and the regime is crushing us.

Ethiopia: Activists given life terms

2007-07-19

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/31510E14-A682-4EA2-9E67-B1B03C1AC5A6.htm

More than 30 opposition members in Ethiopia have been given life sentences for their role in 2005 election protests. Adil Ahmed, a high court judge, gave life terms to 34 of the 38 defendants, including Hailu Shawl and Bernahu Nega, two senior leaders of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) party.

Ethiopia: Protest leaders released

2007-07-20

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6908039.stm

Thirty Ethiopian opposition leaders have been pardoned and freed from prison just days after being given life sentences over election protests. Three minibuses have reportedly left the prison while the group's supporters whistled and shouted for joy outside. The group always said the trial was political and refused to enter a plea, leading to the men's conviction.

Namibia: "Severe blow" to corruption fight

2007-07-19

http://www.afrol.com/articles/26163

The national anti-corruption agency of Namibia has decided not to investigate further the controversial awarding of bidding to top officials in the Office of former Namibian President Sam Nujoma. Human rights activists call the decision a "severe blow to Namibia's anti-corruption crusade."

Tanzania: Government to undertake survey on corruption and governance

2007-07-20

http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/News/news1607079.htm

Tanzania's Prevention and Combating of Corruption Bureau (PCCB), through its Directorate of Research Control and Statistics, will engage a consultant to conduct the National Government and Corruption Survey (NGACS). The survey is part of the National Anti-Corruption Strategy and Action Plan (NACSAP II) 2006-2010 and is intended to develop empirical information that will be discussed, analysed and used to help the government, civil society and the private sector to formulate policies and programmes to strengthen good governance.

Zimbabwe: Double standards as elite gain from price controls

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/corruption/42750

Although many ordinary shoppers may have bought a few reduced items during the government enforced price controls over the last three weeks, the so-called Operation Dzikisa Mitengo (Reduced Prices) has been an even greater opportunity for the elite in the country to loot with impunity. And those authorised to monitor the exercise have also taken advantage of their positions and helped themselves to goods, while applying the law selectively to their advantage.
SW Radio Africa, 18 July

Double standards as elite gain from price controls

By Tererai Karimakwenda

Although many ordinary shoppers may have bought a few reduced items during the government enforced price controls over the last three weeks, the so-called Operation Dzikisa Mitengo (Reduced Prices) has been an even greater opportunity for the elite in the country to loot with impunity. And those authorised to monitor the exercise have also taken advantage of their positions and helped themselves to goods, while applying the law selectively to their advantage. Bulawayo based lawyer Josphat Tshuma said he noticed that some of the price task forces appeared to have colluded with "would-be shoppers" in order to loot expensive goods at prices lower than those stipulated by government. He described how long queues suspiciously developed in front of certain shops very early in the morning before they opened. This was followed by the sudden appearance of a task force accompanied by unidentified individuals who then forced shop owners to reduce items to ridiculous prices. The gang that had already been waiting outside is then allowed in and they would buy up almost everything in the shop. Tshuma said the whole operation seemed to be well organised and described it as "military." Shoppers are now struggling with serious shortages and thousands of business executives were arrested, jailed and fined for failing to comply with the new price regulations. But the powerful and well-connected chefs are operating outside the law.

One perfect example is that of the former Zimbabwe National Army Commander Vitalis Zvinavashe, reported in the Zimbabwean newspaper. Now a Senator, Zvinavashe is alleged to have blocked senior police officers supervising the price crackdown from impounding 30 tonnes of cement belonging to him, which he was selling above the stipulated price. Found stashed in a warehouse in the Tynwald suburb of Harare Zvinavashe was selling the cement at $1,5 million a bag while the government controlled price is $150 000. An officer involved in the case is alleged to have said: "He didn't have many words for us, he merely ordered us to leave." In another reported incident, Mugabe’s military bodyguards have been accused of seriously assaulting shoppers who were in a queue in Borrowdale Brook in Harare on Tuesday. As the story goes, about 15 of the soldiers demanded to buy groceries ahead of shoppers who had waited for more than four hours at a Spar supermarket. The shoppers refused and chaos broke out as the soldiers began beating up everyone with booted feet and fists. It’s reported that the supermarket belongs to the Governor of Mashonaland East and Zanu PF central committee member Ray Kaukonde. The governor has also been accused of hoarding basic commodities. Warehouses at several police stations are reported to be full of all sorts of items confiscated from the shops. In Bulawayo, a police truck was seen packed with furniture and heading for the local station. Our sources also witnessed several incidents in which individuals at these warehouses helped themselves to sugar and other scarce items that had been confiscated, without so much as any paperwork or questions asked.

Africa: Annan urges stronger links between farmers and researchers

2007-07-19

http://www.scidev.net/gateways/index.cfm?fuseaction=readitem&rgwid=4&item=News&itemid=3761

Former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan has urged African farmers to build stronger links with scientists and research institutions as part of their efforts to boost food production on the continent. He also said that, whatever the potential future benefits of genetically modified (GM) crops, conventional seed breeding currently represented an important path towards securing a 'green revolution' in Africa, and thus of decreasing Africa's dependence on food aid.

Africa: Developing nations protest secretary-general's decision to abolish Africa post

2007-07-19

http://tinyurl.com/39yv4a

A powerful group of developing countries has accused Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon of trying to downgrade the U.N.'s focus on Africa by consolidating several key posts without General Assembly approval. The Group of 77, which represents 132 mainly developing countries and China, urged the secretary-general in a letter obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press to reconsider the changes and respect the mandates of the General Assembly.

Africa: Gabon to repay its debt early

2007-07-19

http://www.afrol.com/articles/26155

Only a few years ago, oil-rich Gabon had to ask the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for help to reform its economy, which had accumulated an unsustainable level of foreign debts. Today, a recovered Gabonese economy enabled authorities to negotiate an early repayment of its US$ 2.3 billion debt burden.

Africa: Population Report highlights continent's challenges

2007-07-19

http://www.buanews.gov.za/view.php?ID=07071613151002&coll=buanew07

The Africa Population Report has revealed that poverty, unemployment, poor health and malnutrition are some of the biggest challenges facing social growth and development on the continent. Speaking at the opening of the 6th General Assembly of the African Population Commission in Johannesburg on Monday, South Africa's Deputy Minister for Social Development, Dr Jean Swanson-Jacobs, highlighted these issues and advocated a call to action.

Global: Selected uses of official statistics by CSOs to improve public sector performance

2007-07-19

http://www.q-squared.ca/pdf/Q2_WP37.pdf

This paper published by Q Squared uses case studies of recent initiatves to explore how official statistics have been used by civil society organisations (CSOs) to hold public agencies accountable for service delivery or for the effective use of public resources. Amnog the key findings are that where governments are committed to increase the accountability of the public sector to citizens, it may be necessary to create new institutions and/or pass new legislation in order to raise the demand for data.

Africa: Two barriers no better than one against HIV - Study

2007-07-19

http://www.scidev.net/News/index.cfm?fuseaction=readNews&itemid=3750&language=1

Using a condom in conjunction with a diaphragm — a latex contraceptive cap that fits tightly over a woman's cervix — to protect against HIV infection in women is no more effective than relying on a condom alone. The findings are reported in an article published in The Lancet (13 July) by Nancy Padian, from the University of California in San Francisco, and her colleagues. The team, from Methods for Improving Reproductive Health in Africa (MIRA), did a randomised trial of almost 5,000 sexually active, HIV-negative women in South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Kenya: New study on sustainability of antiretroviral therapy in HIV-infected urban adults

2007-07-19

http://www.aidsmap.com/en/news/D974414B-30D8-4C5B-A9FC-C0971BDE0639.asp

Frequent antiretroviral therapy (ART) switches in HIV-infected Kenyan urban adults might limit the efficacy of ART, according to the findings of an observational study published in the July 1st issue of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes. The authors sound the alarm that this is a potentially serious threat to the sustainability of HIV treatment programmes in Kenya and other developing countries.

Tanzania: Government to step up ARV rollout and VCT

2007-07-20

http://www.plusnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=73298

The Tanzanian government has announced plans to nearly double the number of people on antiretroviral (ARV) treatment by the end of 2007. The East African country, where an estimated 1.4 million people are living with the HI virus, has 77,066 patients on the life-prolonging medication; the government intends to raise the number to 150,000 by December 2007, and to 200,000 by the end of 2008.

Zambia: Measles vaccine has short-lived in HIV-infected children - new study

2007-07-19

http://www.aidsmap.com/en/news/454AE4AF-399B-4F33-9F0E-CDC4609DA5C2.asp

The level and longevity of protective antibodies elicited by a measles vaccine is significantly shortened by HIV infection in Zambian children, according to the findings of a prospective study published in the August 1st issue of the Journal of Infectious Diseases. Measles immunisation programs may have to consider repeated vaccinations in areas of high HIV-1 prevalence.

Zimbabwe: Silver lining to economic cloud

2007-07-20

http://www.alertnet.org/db/blogs/1265/2007/06/16-153939-1.htm

The impact of Zimbabwe's sky-rocketing inflation isn't all bad, as it seems to be bringing down HIV rates, the Washington Post reports. Inflation of more than 4,500 percent means bread, milk and other provisions are out of reach for many citizens. But so is maintaining a mistress, visiting a prostitute or keeping a second, or even, a third wife.

South Africa: Community organizations meet on lesbian murders

2007-07-19

http://www.mambaonline.com/article.asp?artid=1153

LGBTI organisations appear to be taking some action after the recent murder of a lesbian couple in Soweto. The Joint Working Group (JWG) - a national network of LGBTI organisations and partners - hosted a meeting on 18 July at Constitution Hill Women’s Gaol. It was attended by a range of organisations and individuals with the purpose of coordinating various initiatives in response to the murders of Salome Masooa and Sizakele Sigasa - two black, lesbian activists who were killed in Soweto two weeks ago.

South Africa: Curative Rape: A Crime of Hate

2007-07-19

http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/topstories.aspx?ID=BD4A519414

South Africa has just released it's latest crime statistics. writes that many "anti-constitutionalists" are calling for the return of hanging as the number of violent crimes are on the increase.
South Africa has just released it's latest crime statistics. writes that many "anti-constitutionalists" are calling for the return of hanging as the number of violent crimes are on the increase. But for this group of people, violent crime does not include hate speech - verbal abuse against the LGBTI community. Trengove Jones goes on to point to the links between those calling for a return of hanging for murder and those who scream for the curative rape of lesbians.

"On SAfm’s Morning Talk last week, caller after caller vomited out appalling hate speech. Diminishing the murders, one speaker said “society cannot be expected to accept (lesbianism)”. Another happily noted that “the best way to deal with them is to rape the lesbianism out of them”. Seeming to condone intellectual confusion as well as murder, one stated that “the ethics of our community does not allow lesbianism” and that “I am willing to enforce nature as far as must be”. And, of course, “We need to revisit the constitution.”

Africa: African environmentalists discuss climate change adaptation strategies

2007-07-19

http://www.sardc.net/Editorial/Newsfeature/07350707.htm

African environmental experts meet in South Africa in August to strategise on a continental position to incorporate climate change adaptation programmes in national development policies. The Climate Change Action Africa 2007 conference will be hosted by the International Quality and Productivity Centre (IQPC) in Midrand from 28 to 30 August.

South Africa: The impact of the platinum mining industry on local communities

2007-07-19

http://www.bench-marks.org/downloads/070625_platinum_research_summary.pdf

This report published by the Bench Marks Foundation discusses corporate responsibility issues around the platinum mining industry in Rustenburg, South Africa. It examines mining companies against internationally accepted standards of socially responsible business practices and looks at how mines invest in local communities, in order to assess the full impact of mining activities on local communities.

Botswana: UN Human Rights Committee to examine Botswana

2007-07-19

http://www.survival-international.org/news/2478

Survival has submitted a report to the UN Human Rights Committee detailing the Botswana government’s failure to implement the December 2006 ruling in the case of the Kalahari Bushmen. The committee will meet to consider issues relating to Botswana’s compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Zimbabwe: Operation Murambatsvina victims at the back of the queue for housing

2007-07-19

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=73296

Scarce building materials, earmarked to rehouse victims of Zimbabwe's Operation Murambatsvina, have been diverted to other projects, including work on a mansion for President Robert Mugabe in an exclusive suburb of the capital, Harare. In the winter of 2005, informal homes and markets were demolished in the ZANU-PF government's Operation Murambatsvina, aimed at clearing slums and flushing out criminals, but which left more than 700,000 people homeless or without a livelihood.

DRC: Arbitrary dismissals spark calls for action

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/42693

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) hascalled on the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to put pressure on the board of the private media group Raga SPRL so that 9 arbitrarily dismissed union delegates can return to work as agreed a month ago with the mediation of the Labour Minister.
INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF JOURNALISTS - Media Release
18 July 2007

IFJ Calls for DRC Government Action for Workers Arbitrarily Dismissed by Media Group The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today called on the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to put pressure on the board of the private media group Raga SPRL so that 9 arbitrarily dismissed union delegates can return to work as agreed a month ago with the mediation of the Labour Minister.

“This move by the board of Raga SPRL is unacceptable and will only deepen the crisis in the company,” said Gabriel Baglo Director of IFJ Africa office. “We call on the Labour Minister Marie-Angel Lukiana Mufwankolo, who obtained this agreement, to pressure the board to reinstate the nine employees.” On June 8, 2007, under the initiative of the Labour Minister a meeting gathered the Raga SPRL board and union leaders. This meeting followed the dismissal without notice of nine union representatives for alleged “serious malpractice” according to the General Manager of Raga SPRL, Parag Bhimjihany.

The trade unionists had organised a strike last February for improved working conditions. A labour inspector authorized the immediate dismissal of the strike organisers because their action was in violation of the labour code. This decision was overruled by the Labour Minister requiring the immediate resumption of eight of the workers after June 8 meeting. It was agreed that the leader of the trade unionists, the journalist Fabien Lumbala Kalonji has to be suspended for 15 days for “misleading his colleagues”.

According to the National Union of Press Professionals (SNPP) of DRC, a little more than one month after this agreement, the board of Raga SPRL has not respected any of its engagements. The dismissed journalists have not yet resumed work.

“We call on the government, through the Ministries of Information and Labour, to take its responsibilities to make the law and the agreement signed last month to be respected by Raga SPRL board,” said Stanis Nkundiye, Secretary General of the SNPP.

The IFJ and the SNPP also denounced the insecurity the nine media workers are facing since early last month. These unionists, and particularly their leader, were summoned by the criminal police of Gombe in Kinshasa. They have also complained of people hanging around their houses at night.

“The authorities must make sure that these intimidations end and take care of the safety of the unionists and their families”, Baglo said. The IFJ called on the government to launch a campaign in DRC to put an end to the abuse of workers in media companies. Many journalists have no contracts or are poorly paid in the country.

For further information contact the IFJ: +221 842 01 43
The IFJ represents over 600,000 journalists in 114 countries

Guniea-Bissau: Police gets tough on journalists

2007-07-19

http://www.afrol.com/articles/26164

In Guinea-Bissau, which lately has experienced very few attacks on press freedom, a special unit of the police prevented a journalist from taking photographs of a police operation and seized the journalist's camera. The press fear tougher times may come. A group of policemen who are members of the "Ninjas", a special unit of the Guinea-Bissau police earlier this month prevented Helmazin Cunha, a journalist working with the 'Nô Pintcha' pro-government newspaper from taking photographs of an operation they undertook to clear hawkers off the street

Morocco: Journalists being held for publishing internal security memo

2007-07-20

http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/84934/

Reporters Without Borders condemns the arrest of Abderrahim Ariri, the publisher of the weekly "Al Watan Al An" ("The Nation Now"), and one of his journalists, Mostapha Hurmatallah, on 17 July 2007 in Casablanca after they published the text of an internal security memo circulated by the General Directorate for Territorial Surveillance (DGST), an intelligence agency.

Somalia: IFJ condemns further arrests of journalists

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/media/42692

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has condemned the persistent arrest of journalists in Somalia by the state security agents following the arrest of radio producer Abdifatah Dahir Jeyte, on 16 July, by Puntland Intelligence Service (PIS), a counter-terrorism branch of the north-eastern city of Bossasso in Puntland region. The journalist was released after a protest of his colleagues and NUSOJ mediation.
INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF JOURNALISTS - Media Release


18 July 2007

IFJ Condemns Further Arrests of Journalists in Somalia The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today condemned the persistent arrest of journalists in Somalia by the state security agents following the arrest of radio producer Abdifatah Dahir Jeyte, on 16 July, by Puntland Intelligence Service (PIS), a counter-terrorism branch of the north-eastern city of Bossasso in Puntland region. The journalist was released today after a protest of his colleagues and NUSOJ mediation.

Abdirahman Mohammed Habane was also arrested on 12 July by officers from the Criminal Investigation Department in Hargeisa the capital city of the de facto independent republic of Somaliland.

“These continued arrest of journalists in Somalia in relation to their work is designed to intimidate them and to prevent critical reports,” said Gabriel Baglo, Director of the IFJ Africa office. “Journalists must be allowed to perform their duty without any form of intimidation or harassment.” Abdifatah Dahir Jeyte, working with Radio Voice of Peace based in the city of Bossasso, was arrested on 16 July when about 30 soldiers stormed the offices of the radio station. After searching the offices they ordered Abdifitah to go with them to PIS headquarters in Bossasso, were he remains detained. He is accused of sending inaccurate reports to the news media in Mogadishu, which according to the PIS threatens the security of Puntland and spreads misinformation about the semi-autonomous region.

"We don't understand the reasons behind these baseless allegations. This is an outrageous move which we strongly denounce,” said Omar Faruk, National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) Secretary General.

Abdirahman Mohammed Habane, journalist with Jamhuuriya Daily Newspaper, was arrested following a news report that he made on the inauguration of an elder as a traditional leader. Clashes had subsequently taken place between the elder’s supporters and those opposed to his inauguration. The NUSOJ believe that his arrest was related to these disturbances.

The IFJ condemned in the strongest possible terms these persistent arrests of journalists in Somalia.

“We call on the Transitional Federal Government, and Puntland and Somaliland authorities to release Habane immediately and unconditionally and to ensure that journalists in Somalia work in a safe environment,” IFJ Baglo said.

For further information contact the IFJ: +221 842 01 43

The IFJ represents over 600,000 journalists in 114 countries

Swaziland: Parliament seeks to sanction editor

2007-07-19

http://africa.oneworld.net/external/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.misa.org%2F

The Swazi Parliament is seeking to sanction the editor of the privately owned Times of Swaziland Sunday newspaper, Mbongeni Mbingo, for expressing himself about the affairs of the House of Assembly in a recent commentary in his publication.

Global: Stop trying to save Africa

Uzodinma Iweala

2007-07-20

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/13/AR2007071301714.html

Last fall, shortly after I returned from Nigeria, I was accosted by a perky blond college student whose blue eyes seemed to match the "African" beads around her wrists. "Save Darfur!" she shouted from behind a table covered with pamphlets urging students to TAKE ACTION NOW! STOP GENOCIDE IN DARFUR! My aversion to college kids jumping onto fashionable social causes nearly caused me to walk on, but her next shout stopped me. "Don't you want to help us save Africa?" she yelled.

DRC: Crisis in North Kivu "ignored", say activists

2007-07-19

http://www.afrol.com/articles/26166

"Few humanitarian organisations, despite the availability of funding, have stepped forward to help" civilians in Congo Kinshasa's eastern North Kivu province, activists complain in a new report. More than 160,000 Congolese have abandoned their homes in North Kivu since January 2007, when Tutsi warlord Laurent Nkunda began deploying troops across the province.

Somalia: Deadly blasts overshadow peace talks

2007-07-20

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=314331

Peace talks due to start in Somalia this week were overshadowed by a grenade attack in a Mogadishu market that killed at least three people on Wednesday. The attack caused chaos at the Bakara market a day before the opening of the peace meeting, already adjourned from the weekend in a climate of violence.

Sudan: Call for upcoming Darfur talks to be inclusive

2007-07-19

http://www.ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=38584

Representatives of Sudan's government and rebel groups will meet in the northern Tanzanian town of Arusha next month in a bid to hammer out a deal to end four years of conflict in Darfur. The Aug. 3-5 conference was announced Monday at the end of a two-day gathering in Libya's capital, Tripoli, organised by the African Union (AU) and the United Nations -- also aimed at finding a solution to the crisis in the western Sudanese region.

Sudan: More than 50 people killed in flooding

2007-07-19

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/MCD929111.htm

More than 50 people were killed and 20 injured in Sudan's worst floods in living memory which have partially or completely destroyed 18,000 homes, the head of civil defence said on Thursday. Hamadallah Adam Ali told Reuters major roads to some parts of the country had been flooded and police helicopters and government planes were flying in emergency aid and tents to affected areas in Sudan's east, southeast and around Khartoum.

Sudan: UN calls on key rebel leader to embrace peace efforts

2007-07-20

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=73333

The United Nations has urged a prominent Darfur rebel leader to join efforts to end the devastation in Sudan’s western region, even though Abdel Wahid Nour, leader of a faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement, has declared he would not participate in peace talks next month.

Zimbabwe: City warns of health risk as it cuts water

2007-07-20

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=314368

Zimbabwe's second largest city, Bulawayo, warned residents on Wednesday to guard against outbreaks of disease as it was forced to cut their water supply. Authorities said they had decommissioned one of Bulawayo's three remaining dams because water levels were too low, leaving in operation only two of the five dams that supply the southern city of about one million people.

Zimbabwe: Country hit by four days of blackouts

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/conflict/42749

For the past four days, Zimbabwe has been hit by an electricity blackout that has plunged the country into darkness and exacerbated the suffering of people already reeling from an ever-deepening economic and political crisis. A source from Zimbabwe, speaking to the Cape Argus on condition of anonymity, said power availability had been very intermittent since the weekend and was mostly accessible for periods of four hours in the evenings.
Cape Argus (SA), 18 July

It's horrible, says Zimbabwean, as country hit by four days of blackouts

By Thabo Mabaso

For the past four days, Zimbabwe has been hit by an electricity blackout that has plunged the country into darkness and exacerbated the suffering of people already reeling from an ever-deepening economic and political crisis. A source from Zimbabwe, speaking to the Cape Argus on condition of anonymity, said power availability had been very intermittent since the weekend and was mostly accessible for periods of four hours in the evenings. "It is difficult for the man in the street. We can't afford to run a generator, but running one is quite useless anyway because there is no fuel throughout the country," said the source, who feared identification could result in retribution from Zimbabwe's feared security police. Critics of President Robert Mugabe's government have reported routine assaults by supporters of the ruling Zanu PF and members of the security services over the last few years. The source said the current blackouts were the worst to hit Zimbabwe in a long time. On previous occasions the outages would, for instance, affect the country once a week. This time, the blackouts had continued unabated for four consecutive days. "It is horrible. We can't cook; there is no electricity, no gas. And when you get to work you can't do anything, because there is no electricity," she said. "All we have been told is that the power cuts are due to load-shedding to irrigate wheat." Kumbirai Mafunda, the acting political editor of Zimbabwe's independently owned Financial Gazette, said the electricity cuts had mainly affected high density areas. He added that the cuts could be the result of a shortage of coal to fire up the country's power utility company.

The lack of foreign currency reserves has also impacted on the importation of spare parts and equipment to repair outdated machinery at the power utility. Last week Zimbabwe announced that it would import coal from Botswana. The Financial Gazette has speculated that the persistent power outages could affect the irrigation of the country's much-needed wheat crop. "The power cuts have forced families to use firewood to cook. The cost of firewood is, however, beyond the means of most families. "The consequence of these cuts to families has been devastating. What is worse is that there is no indication of when the problem will be sorted or power restored," Mafunda said. Meanwhile, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has cited Zimbabwe as one of 28 countries in the world facing food shortages over the coming year. In a statement yesterday, the FAO estimated that the production of maize, a staple of many households, was expected to decline by 43% in Zimbabwe. "Lower food production and rising domestic and regional prices are expected to adversely affect the food security of more than 4 million vulnerable people in Zimbabwe," the FAO said. Yesterday, the US also announced that it would donate 47 400 tons of food aid to Zimbabwe. The US government said its food aid efforts would feed about 1.4m people until the next harvest, in early 2008.

Zimbabwe: Masvingo blitz team grabs relief food

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/conflict/42751

Police have seized food earmarked for relief aid from a warehouse in Masvingo as part of the crackdown on the business sector, sources say. Aid agency sources told The Financial Gazette this week that police arrested the manager of a Blue Ribbon Foods warehouse, which stored relief supplies sourced by CARE, an international non-governmental organisation (NGO).
Financial Gazette, 19 July

Masvingo blitz team grabs relief food

Kumbirai Mafunda, Acting Political Editor

Police have seized food earmarked for relief aid from a warehouse in Masvingo as part of the crackdown on the business sector, sources say. Aid agency sources told The Financial Gazette this week that police arrested the manager of a Blue Ribbon Foods warehouse, which stored relief supplies sourced by CARE, an international non-governmental organisation (NGO). Police proceeded to seize the consignment although CARE had formally notified Masvingo Provincial Governor Willard Chiwewe that the group had stored foodstuffs at the warehouse pending distribution to starving villagers in the area. In Mashonaland Central, NGO officials report that police impounded and ordered the sale of a truckload of cement that World Vision International (WVI) was distributing to schools in Rushinga. Lazarus Dokora, Member of Parliament for the area, however, intervened to stop the forcible sale of the cement after a WVI officer sought his assistance.

The crackdown on NGOs follows government's threats to swoop on aid groups it claims are stockpiling foodstuffs to hand out to opposition supporters before next year's elections as part of what the ruling Zanu PF government sees as an international plot to effect regime change. Aid officials say the current crackdown on relief agencies is reminiscent of what happened five years ago when soldiers impounded food stocks stored at a United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) warehouse. "What is happening now in terms of searching for perceived hoarders mirrors what happened in 2002 when the UN food basket at the UNICEF warehouse was forcibly taken by the army and the (UN) Secretary-General had to intervene. The President had to apologise at a meeting in New York. What was taken was given back," said one official. To prevent further food seizures, NGOs this week suggested that humanitarian coordinators should get a letter from the Social Welfare Ministry authorising them to provide aid. To do this, they would need to store supplies in appropriately leased warehouses with the knowledge of relevant government or provincial authorities. Officials said the letter would enable them to store or transport supplies.

Burkina Faso: Burkinabé peasants start using ICTs

2007-07-19

http://www.iicd.org/articles/burkinabe-peasants-start-using-ict

In Burkina Faso 80% of the population lives in rural areas. In this context, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) will contribute to development only if they are linked to the specific rural situation and solve concrete problems of the rural inhabitants. Among the initiatives undertaken by agricultural organizations to find the usefulness of ICT, the initiative of the Federation of Agricultural Professional Producers of Sissili (FEPPASI) is one of the most concrete.

East Africa: EASSI launches website

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/internet/42691

The East African Sub-regional Support Initiative for The Advancement of Women (EASSI) is taking giant leaps in the world of IT. The launch of this website is another example of the many strides this organization is taking to become a giant in the world of communication. With the need to communicate at every level in the advancement of women’s causes, this website is an opportunity to have dialogue with women from all over the world.
EASSI WEBSITE LAUNCH -14 JULY 2007

EASSI is taking giant leaps in the world of IT. The launch of this website is another example of the many strides this organization is taking to become a giant in the world of communication. With the need to communicate at every level in the advancement of women’s causes, this website is an opportunity to have dialogue with women from all over the world.

With a clear home page, one can easily click onto the flag of any member country, information about the member organizations, their role, their general profile and their work as part of the women’s movement are all given in detail. There are also important links to other websites.

While the previous website emphasized captions of members, this new one has advanced to highlight current news, important regional and world events, member countries, EASSI contacts and also an invitation to take part in the discussion forum. The discussion forum is an adventurous way of keeping in touch with members, friends and partners. To take part all you have to do is click onto the forum, sign in your name and password and other details and after that, you can log on and participate at your leisure. Topics will be changed on a monthly basis. The first topic of discussion was whether affirmative Action was a plus for women. The current topic of discussion is on donor aid. Is donor aid crippling or empowering? You are all welcome to be a part of this. Make your voices heard!

The website will always have current news. Right now, you can find out about the newly elected board, upcoming advocacy campaigns on peace and anti FGM and much more.

Beverley Nambozo Sengiyunva
Programme Officer, Communications & Networking The East African Sub-regional Support Initiative for The Advancement of Women (EASSI)
Plot 87 Bukoto-Ntinda Road P. O. BOX 24965, Kampala Uganda
Tel: 256-41-285163, 285194
Fax: 256-41-285306
E-mail: nambozo@eassi.org
eassi@eassi.org
Website: http//www.eassi.org

Global: Microsoft accelerates free access to journals

2007-07-19

http://www.scidev.net/gateways/index.cfm?fuseaction=readitem&rgwid=4&item=News&itemid=3757

Information technology company Microsoft will give technical assistance to enhance access to online research for scientists, policymakers and librarians in the developing world.This was announced at a meeting in Washington on 10 July.

Nigeria: ITs will help in poverty reduction - State governor

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/internet/42753

The governor of Nigeria's Imo State , Chief Ikedi Ohakim, has declared that the evolution of Information Technologies (ITs), would make the difference in the fight to reduce poverty in any country. Chief Ohakim, who spoke at the on-going 21st international conference and Annual General Meeting of the Nigeria Computer Society (NCS) being held at the Imo Concorde Hotel, Owerri, Imo State, under the theme "Achieving the Millennium Development Goals in Nigeria: IT strategies and tools."
Highway Africa News Agency

The governor of Nigeria's Imo State , Chief Ikedi Ohakim, has declared that the evolution of Information Technologies (ITs), would make the difference in the fight to reduce poverty in any country.

Chief Ohakim, who spoke at the on-going 21st international conference and Annual General Meeting of the Nigeria Computer Society (NCS) being held at the Imo Concorde Hotel, Owerri, Imo State, under the theme "Achieving the Millennium Development Goals in Nigeria: IT strategies and tools."

Ohakim said that the conference is coming at a time when Nigeria and its people are putting everything in place to ensure that the country benefits from global strategies to reduce poverty by the year 2015 as stipulated in the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

"As the most populous country in sub-Saharan Africa, the issue of poverty is one Nigeria can no longer afford to pay lip service to," he said.

Gov. Ohakim stressed that while the nation was striving through local efforts to reduce poverty in the land, he strongly expressed belief that Nigeria must link with the rest of the world in the strategic agenda.

"This is because poverty itself is not only a universal phenomenon but it's contagious," he said, noting that those rich nations cannot really claim to be rich in the face of pervasive poverty among more than 80 per cent of the world's population.

Gov. Ohakim emphasised that with the modern breakthroughs in Information Technologies, he strongly believed that it would make a difference.

"As I have always said, the difference between wealth and poverty is information," he said, adding that given giant strides in ITs so far, ?there is a growing optimism that mankind is getting closer to the universal objective of reducing poverty to its barest minimum."

He urged the NCS to keep playing a very critical role in this regard, observing that Computers are the main tools in ITs, which are the key drivers for economic growth and national prosperity.

Ohakim observed that he was encouraged and not surprised that NCS member companies have made positive impact on the development of computer hardware and software as well as capacity and diffusion in the country.

"I am glad to note that your members now produce branded Personal Computers (PCs) that compare in standard and quality with internationally popular brands. We now have local brands like Zinox, Omatek, Speedstar, Brian etc that can match international brands like HP, IBM, Dell to mention a few," he asserted.

Uganda: All 79 districts to be online by 2010

2007-07-20

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/internet/42752

In a period of three years all Uganda's seventy nine districts of will be online by the year 2010, according to the information and communication technologies minister Dr. Ham Mulira. This follows the ministry's role in spearheading the development of the National Data Transmission Backbone Infrastructure (NBI) and the Electronic Government Infrastructure (EGI) project that is being implemented in phases but will eventually link all the districts of Uganda by 2010.
Highway Africa News Agency

In a period of three years all Uganda's seventy nine districts of will be online by the year 2010, according to the information and communication technologies minister Dr. Ham Mulira.

This follows the ministry's role in spearheading the development of the National Data Transmission Backbone Infrastructure (NBI) and the Electronic Government Infrastructure (EGI) project that is being implemented in phases but will eventually link all the districts of Uganda by 2010.

"The project is to be financed by the Republic of China through a loan from the Exim Bank of China and it will be implemented in three phases and phase one is to cost $30m that has already been approved by Parliament," he said "The development of the project including feasibility and the quantification of the requirements was completed by the ministry in November last year," he told HANA in an interview in Kampala.

He also said a component of the project will provide enhanced communication facilities to support the forthcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM).

"The project is meant to complement and not to compete with the private sector initiatives because it is the responsibility of government to develop the infrastructure like roads," he said.

"In the same way the national backbone is like a road and considered a digital highway in that although government builds it, usage is for anyone including telephone service providers."

"Provision of the infrastructure by government allows the private sector to concentrate on investments in the actual value added services delivered rather than developing infrastructure."

"It is therefore a form of public-private partnership with the ultimate benefits being to the consumer community in terms of more services including voice and data and Internet access," he said.

He said on completion of the Electronic Government (E-Government), "the project would for example improve efficiency of service delivery and people will be able to communicate while the ease of information flow would lead to efficiency in decision making processes." The project is planned to be implemented in three phases which are similar but only differentiated by magnitude of scope in terms of geographical coverage.

The first phase will establish the NBI in three towns of Kampala, Jinja and Entebbe and the E-government that shall link ministries.

The NBI is intended to ensure that high bandwidth data connection is available in all major towns of Uganda at reasonable rates.

The EGI is designed to reduce the cost of doing business in government, improving communication between government agencies and reducing the need for officials to commute for meetings and thus increasing efficiency.

Africa: The State of Philanthropy in Africa - Call for Abstracts

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/fundraising/42690

TrustAfrica is pleased to announce the first in a series of publications on the state of philanthropy in Africa. TrustAfrica is soliciting abstracts of papers that can help measure the state of philanthropy in Africa. Successful abstracts will be developed into book chapters that will be published in the beginning of 2008. Abstracts (250 words maximum) are due no later than September 15, 2007.
Trust Africa
The State of Philanthropy in Africa

Call for abstracts

TrustAfrica is pleased to announce the first in a series of publications on the state of philanthropy in Africa. TrustAfrica is soliciting abstracts of papers that can help measure the state of philanthropy in Africa. Successful abstracts will be developed into book chapters that will be published in the beginning of 2008. Abstracts (250 words maximum) are due no later than September 15, 2007.

Please send abstracts to moyo@trustafrica.org , or info@trustafrica.org Contact détails Mermoz Pyrotèchnie Route de la Stèle, Lot N° SR 12 BP 45435, Dakar-Fann, SENEGAL Tel: 221-869-4686 E-mail: info@trustafrica.org Website: www.trustafrica.org

Introductory Statement
Although a culture of giving and mutual support has deep roots in Africa, formal institutions of philanthropy are somewhat new. TrustAfrica, a foundation based in Dakar, Senegal, seeks to build understanding and support of this vital sector by promoting mutual learning and knowledge building among African institutions. Slated to debut in 2008, The State of Philanthropy in Africa is a series of publications that will reflect on theoretical, philosophical as well as historical and cultural underpinnings of the field and explore its relation to civil society, the state, regional organisations and Africans in the Diaspora. The series seek to build an infrastructure for philanthropy in Africa through research, intellectual reflection and policy debates.
The publication will address and fill gaps in the field of philanthropy as it is practiced in the African context. Philanthropy, especially in Africa is not a popular field, even in spaces of higher learning. Mention the term 'philanthropy' at an African university; students and lecturers alike are likely to ask, 'what is that?' Talk of 'African philanthropy' is even less familiar. It is hoped that this initiative will address the myth that philanthropy is not an interesting field of study and research, and other related misconceptions. In other words, this initiative seeks to introduce a new narrative on African Philanthropy.
The present dynamism and 'renewed excitement' around Africa's development is taking place at a time when development actors, including international donors, are rethinking the way they view and analyse Africa. The emergence of organisations in Africa that advocate for African leadership and 'collaborative strategies' in resolving the problems of the continent represent an important development.
Against this backdrop, arises the question of African philanthropy; whose function and definition has often remained 'unclear'. Even in the architecture of philanthropies or in the broader political economy of 'philanthropies', African Philanthropy is relegated to the margins. African forms or 'notions' of philanthropy do not play any major role in the global context. But for many in Africa, these different philanthropic practices influence their lives in positive ways. There is research showing that most communities in Africa depend on each other for their development purposes. One is not allowed to 'suffer' while neighbours watch. Various communities have mechanisms that cater for the needy. Current trends in Africa project a commitment to positive changes. Africa is in a different ideological mode today than it was some two or three decades ago.
There is renewed attention both by Africans and the international community on Africa's development trajectory, processes and initiatives. The new Pan-Africanism manifests itself in many forms. At the political level there is a degree of political willingness towards a people-union (Union Government), based on popular participation and solidarity; and at the economic level, various regional economic communities and initiatives are forging ahead amid challenges towards the harmonization of their policies, programmes and finally towards a common market.

It is in this context that TrustAfrica is calling for contributions to The State of Philanthropy in Africa book in a bid to interpret philanthropy in Africa in ways that use African prisms; taking into account African contexts.
Thematic areas include:
Theoretical and philosophical underpinnings of philanthropy in Africa,
Philanthropy and culture in Africa,
Philanthropy and Religion in Africa,
Institutional forms of philanthropy in Africa
Philanthropy, the state and development,
Philanthropy and the Diaspora,
Philanthropy and civil society,
Philanthropy and assets

Specific questions include:
Local forms of philanthropy and the challenge of resources mobilisation
Does local giving (local philanthropy) add value to African foundations that are supported mainly by big international donors?
What explains most Africans' general willingness to give to institutions such as foundations (as expressed in formal and informal gatherings/networks) and the reluctance to actually donate or give to these institutions?
What is the psychological impact of international philanthropy on Africans toward giving and by implication on development in Africa?
Which worldview defines philanthropy? Is it appropriate? Does it position different philanthropies in their appropriate positions in global relations?

Institutional forms of Philanthropy: Foundations in Africa
How can foundations reconfigure themselves in ways that impact positively on development?
How do foundations work with new initiatives in Africa that seek a united and sustainable Africa?
What are the current mechanisms that facilitate an interface between foundations and the new African agenda (AU, RECs, NEPAD, etc)?
How do foundations align their work with that of the African peoples? In other words, beyond making grants and implementing projects, do foundations understand the people and the cultures under which they operate?
What limitations do foundations face in their grant-making, especially with regard to African organizations, most of which do not usually meet donors' criteria?
Endowments for African foundations have been difficult to establish. Some organizations in Africa have shied away from creating endowment funds while others have creatively established them.
What are the possibilities and limitations of endowment building in Africa?

Civil Society and States in Africa
Civil society organizations have advocated for participation in the AU and other regional bodies. A number of spaces have been made possible in the process either through advocacy (created spaces) or by invitation (invited spaces). How can civil society manage these various spaces in ways that facilitate productive collaboration?
How can African philanthropy be targeted to strategic plans of nation states, regional communities, civil society and the AU and its organs?
What role can philanthropy play in connecting citizens to their leaders?
Can philanthropy be a vehicle for citizens' participation in decision-making, development initiatives, policy formulation and implementation?
How does philanthropy take advantage of the new thinking in Africa, which promotes the inclusion of civil society and other social formations in the affairs of the continent and member states?
How can African philanthropy (and/or philanthropy in Africa) build a social movement for peace, development and inclusion?
Diaspora and African Development How do the Diaspora organize, how are they motivated, what are their contributions to Africa and their mode of engagement with African institutions;
What are the present frameworks/structures in Africa for financial, social, political and intellectual capital from the Diaspora;
Why are the African Diaspora not as passionate about Africa as the European and American Jews about Israel;
How do African embassies in other parts of the world engage the Diaspora on issues of Africa at a country, regional and continental level?

Kenya: 2nd Annual Connecting Rural Communities Africa Forum 2007

2007-07-19

http://www.events.cto.int/crcafrica07

The 2nd Annual Connecting Rural Communities Africa Forum 2007 will bring together African government officials, senior figures from African regulatory authorities and international ICT experts who are leading the private sector connectivity drive to discuss key challenges, opportunities and benefits of connecting rural Africa. The event runs from 21st – 24th August 2007.

Africa: Director - SARPN

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/jobs/42702

Southern African Regional Poverty Network (SARPN) invites applications for the post of Director from persons with regional experience to lead the organisation. SARPN was established with the primary objective of promoting poverty reduction in the SADC region through networking, broadening and deepening of stakeholder access to development information and participation in the poverty debate.
SARPN is hiring Director (Head of SARPN)

Pretoria, South Africa

SARPN was established with the primary objective of promoting poverty reduction in the SADC region through networking, broadening and deepening of stakeholder access to development information and participation in the poverty debate.

SARPN invites applications for the post of Director from persons with regional experience to lead the organisation.

Applicants must have a minimum of 5 years managerial experience and exposure, preferably in a regional capacity including:

· Public policy and processes · Management and leadership experience · Policy Research experience · Sound working understanding of the SADC region, NEPAD, Pan African Parliament and similar institutes The successful candidate will be selected from applicants who are nationals of the SADC region and who have relevant post graduate senior academic degree qualifications and linkages among relevant networks and policy actors across the SADC region.

The Director's key performance areas include the following:

· Report to a Board of Directors · Planning, positioning, influencing, leading and directing the medium to long term strategic positioning of SARPN as a platform for information exchange and debate amongst stakeholders.

· Establishing, developing and nurturing networks across political, social, economic and geographical boundaries primarily within the region · Strategic organisational leadership · Organisational financial sustainability through fundraising · Stakeholder relations management (Donors, regional institutes, etc)

· Institutional operational leadership (finance, human resources, marketing, etc)

Applicants must have strategic thinking ability, exceptional interpersonal relations skills and people management skills, analytical, pro-active, track record of participating in the regional poverty debate and an extensive knowledge of current poverty debates in and across the region.

The remuneration package is highly competitive.

Applications must only be submitted electronically by email to info@ndotshi.co.za marked for the attention of Braen Migogo.
For any enquiries, please phone +27 11 706 9350 Only CV's submitted in this manner will be considered. No telephone contact should be made with the SARPN. Only shortlisted candidates will be considered. SARPN reserves the right not to appoint.

Africa: Executive Secretary - AFARD/AAWORD

2007-07-19

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/jobs/42688

The Association of African Women for Research & Development (AAWORD) invites applications from suitably qualified African Women scholars/administrators for the post of Executive Secretary (ES). This position is the highest management post in the Secretariat and the successful candidate shall be responsible for the overall day-to-day management of the Secretariat and the affairs of the association. CLOSING DATE July 20th , 2007.
VACANCY ANNOUNCEMENT EXECUTIVE SECRETARY

The Association of African Women for Research & Development (AAWORD) invites applications from suitably qualified African Women scholars/administrators for the post of Executive Secretary (ES). This position is the highest management post in the Secretariat and the successful candidate shall be responsible for the overall day-to-day management of the Secretariat and the affairs of the association.

Established in 1977 with its headquarters in Dakar, Senegal, AAWORD is a Pan African, Non-governmental and Non-profit making association of African women researchers and activists. Its membership is composed of twenty-two National Chapters with eight regions representing East Africa, West Africa (Anglophone and Francophone), North Africa, Central Africa, Lusophone Africa, Europe and America. The goal of the Association is to work towards the creation of value-driven, democratic and egalitarian societies in Africa, that recognize in their constituencies women's fundamental rights on the basis of the principle of equality of women and men and as individuals and as citizens. The position of the Executive Secretary is strategic within the association both in the development of the programme mandate of AAWORD and the realisation of the strategic institutional objectives set by the General Assembly of its members.
The successful candidate will:
Take a lead role in designing and developing the Association's programme of work, schedule of activities, networking with National Chapters, maintaining communication with members of the Association and carrying out the tasks in according with existing constitutional rules and strategies.
Be responsible for undertaking advocacy, public information and public relations roles in the interest of the Association
Undertake fund-raising and mobilisation of other resources to secure the growth and sustainability of the Association.
Implement the strategic plan of the Association for the realisation of the institutional mission and objectives; and
Develop proposals for the funding of the work of the Association in liaison with the Executive Committee

QUALIFICATIONS Applicants must:
Have a sound university education and at least 10 years of Post-doctoral experience in a research environment or 10 years experience in administration at a similar level.
Have a good knowledge of theoretical and empirical debates concerning gender-related issues in Africa.
Possess a demonstrable ability to mobilise and promote the work of the Association.
Have a proven experience in fund-raising, resource management, proposal preparation and budgetary forecast.
Have demonstrable skills in the management of personnel in a diversified, multi-cultural environment; and
Be fluent in French or English and have a good working knowledge of the other language
Knowledge of Arabic, Spanish or Portuguese will be an added advantage.
Applicants with the qualifications set out and wishing to spend sabbatical leave will be seriously considered.

WORKING CONDITIONS
The salary level that will be offered will be attractive and comparable to those of similar posts in international NGOs.

HOW TO APPLY
Please send a written application, detailed curriculum vitae describing your professional experience; three to four samples of scholarly work; and three references to:

The President AAWORD/AFARD Sicap Sacre Coueur 1 Villa No. 8798, B.P 15367 Dakar-Fann, Senegal Email: aaword@sentoo.sn <mailto:aaword@sentoo.sn> cc malikabenradi@yahoo. france Fax No.: (221) 824 20 56 CLOSING DATE July 20th , 2007

Ghana: Program Director, Ghana Urban Renewal Program, CHF International

2007-07-20

http://tinyurl.com/3ymr8t

The Program Manager will oversee and manage all Ghana-based field activities of the Urban Renewal Implementation and Learning Initiative focusing on urban renewal in select cities in Ghana. Strong background in urban and slum upgrading, community development, local economic development and/or public administration. Minimum 7 years experience in program management in domestic and/or international contexts. Strong track record of working with various government and foundation donors and NGO implementing partners.

Mozambique: HIV/AIDS Behavior Change Technical Advisor, CAP Mozambique, Center for Civil Society & Governance

2007-07-20

http://employment.aed.org/openings/international/7178.html

Based in Mozambique, the HIV/AIDS Behavior Change Technical Advisor will provide technical assistance to CAP grant recipients in designing and implementing community-based HIV/AIDS prevention programs. She/He will provide technical expertise in behavior change strategies to CAP partners through trainings and mentoring. The HIV/AIDS Behavior Change Technical Advisor will develop and adapt behavior change tools and train CAP grant recipients in integrating them into their programs.

Netherlands: Research internship, Greenpeace International

2007-07-20

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/about/jobs/researcher-internship-in-resea

Research internships are full-time positions (40 hours per week) for a maximum of half a year and include early morning, late night and weekend shifts. Remuneration is via a modest monthly honorarium. Monitor, capture, filter and organize media information and market intelligence into databases for briefs and reports to ensure strategic information is available for Greenpeace’s campaigns and projects. This role is very detail orientated, involves multiple concurrent daily deadlines and administrative tasks within the research unit. Closing Date: 30 September 2007

South Africa: Secretary General, CIVICUS

2007-07-20

http://www.internationaljobs.org/hotptc.html

Based in Johannesburg, CIVICUS seeks a new Secretary General, an inspiring and energetic leader who will be responsible for the global coordination and implementation of the mission, overseeing organizational day-to-day operations, and global fundraising and programmatic operations around the world. The position requires at least 8 years proven senior-level managerial, problem-solving and strategic planning capability and commensurate fiscal responsibilities required, preferably as an executive in a multi-national nonprofit organisation. Nominations and applications due by October 1, 2007.

Uganda: Chief of Party, ACDI/VOCA

2007-07-20

http://www.acdivoca.org/internationaljobs

We are currently seeking a Program Manager for an upcoming one-year program in Uganda. This program focuses on rebuilding communities in northern Uganda and helping transitional IDPs get back on the road to self-sustainability. Program components include road rehabilitation, land clearing, and crop production and harvesting. The project office will be located in Gulu. Hiring is contingent upon award from donor; anticipated start date is September. We require minimum of 8 years of in international development is required, with 3 years overseas in positions tied directly to project implementation.

UK: Global Agriculture Scale Up Project Manager, Oxfam

2007-07-20

http://tinyurl.com/28ejpm

The Global Agriculture Scale Up Initiative was launched in April 2005 as a major initiative in Oxfam's Global Livelihoods Strategy and Corporate objectives relating to Aim 1-Sustainable Livelihoods. The position will aim to provide overall leadership, coordination and support for the Global Agriculture Scale-up Initiative, working closely with country, regional and Oxford based staff to successfully deliver the entire project.Closing date: 3 August 2007.

Fahamu