Revival of Pan-Africanism Forum presents:

Celebrating the Life of Thomas Sankara with a roundtable discussion on
Revolution and Counterrevolution in Africa

The 25th anniversary of the assassination of Thomas Sankara provides a moment for reflection upon Sankara’s life and his contributions to PanAfrican thought and the relevance of his thinking to the uprisings currently in North Africa and beyond.

Speakers include:

Patricia Daley, Lecturer in Geography at Jesus College, University of Oxford

Jeremy Keenan, Department of Anthropology and Sociology, London School of Oriental and African Studies

Gnaka Lagoke, Founder, The Revival of PanAfricanism Forum

Firoze Manji, Editor in Chief, Pambazuka News

Carina Ray, Department of History, Fordham University

Date: 8 June, 2012

Time: 2.30pm - 6.30pm

Location: Habakkuk Room, Jesus College

For more information, please contact
Joseph Kangah [email][email protected] Amber Murrey [email][email protected] or visit us at www.revivalofpanafricanism.org

On April 26, 2012 in Ouagadougou, a hearing on the presumed confinement of Thomas Sankara was put off until May 24, 2012 by the judge because the general rapporteur would be absent on a mission.

The complaint was first filed in 2002 by Me Dieudonnée Nkounkou and has been pending in the courts of Burkina. It has since been pursued by CIJS lawyers Sankara and Farama. The room was filled with Sankarists and curious onlookers who sang the national anthem and then booed the bench when the judge delayed the case.

On April 25, 2012, after five years on trial at the Special Court for Sierra Leone, Charles Taylor—suspected of being involved in the disappearance of Thomas Sankara—was found criminally responsible for having abetted and ordered crimes against humanity in Sierra Leone. This makes Charles Taylor the first former head of State to be convicted by an international court.

Meanwhile, the International Justice for Sankara Campaign is still waiting from the State party Burkina Faso to follow up on a request for a DNA forensic report as a follow up stipulated in the UN decision.

The CIJS wishes to thank all those who have shown their support in this 15-year struggle against impunity and calls for ongoing general mobilization.

Burkina Faso's Network for Access to Essential Medicines (RAME) has called on the Burkinabè government to increase the budget allocation to the health sector to avoid interruptions to AIDS treatment. Despite an emergency plan announced in January, which will see the government spend around one billion CFA francs - two million dollars - to procure AIDS drugs in this West African country, patients and civil society groups are demanding permanent measures to ensure the availability of anti- retrovirals and reagents.

A dozen traditional gold mining sites have appeared in recent years in the province of Ganzourgou. Gold panners from all over flock there to work the sites, most often living in the greatest promiscuity, without any infrastructure for sanitation and with no access to public basic services. The miners migrate according to the discovery of new veins of gold, usually moving there from the rural areas of Burkina Faso as well as from neighbouring countries (Togo, Benin, Ghana). Between one quarter and one third of them are under 18.