Pambazuka News 537: Land grabs, kleptocratic capitalism and citizen protests
Pambazuka News 537: Land grabs, kleptocratic capitalism and citizen protests
The International Monetary Fund said it had reached a staff-level agreement with Angolan authorities that could lead to the release of $136 million in funding to the African oil producer. IMF mission chief to Angola Mauro Mecagni said in a statement the disbursement of the next tranche under Angola's $1.4 billion loan agreement first needed the approval of the IMF's board. Some $1.25 billion has been disbursed to date. Mecagni said there had been 'considerable progress' by Angola in implementing agreed economic measures following a 2009 fiscal and balance of payments crises.
Bushmen living in Botswana's Central Kalahari Game Reserve will receive a crucial new water supply next month after winning a lengthy court battle, the diamond firm mining the area said. Botswana's highest court ruled in January in favour of the Bushmen who had fought for years for the right to re-open a crucial water well that supplied their village.
Hacktivist group Anonymous says it has dumped onto the web data that it claims was taken from the government servers of several countries. The group indicated this was part of its AntiSec operation, a move to steal data from governments it did not agree with. In a message on its Twitter account, Anonymous claimed to dump data from 'Anguilla, Brazil, Zimbabwe and Australian Government Servers.' Anonymous said it started with the userbase of Zimbabwe, which it said was 'rather small'.
Over a thousand ZANU PF supporters, bussed in mainly from rural areas, stormed the offices of the Ministry of Finance on Monday (27 June) and shockingly threatened to beat up or kill Minister Tendai Biti. The ZANU PF thugs, who held office workers hostage from 11am until early evening, sang derogatory songs against Biti and his MDC-T party. The crowd, which initially gathered at the ZANU PF provincial offices along Fourth Street in central Harare, marched to Biti’s office building under a police escort.
People who attended a Harare Residents Trust meeting (HRT) were left terrified after ZANU PF youths gate crashed the event and beat up guests and members. The meeting was held on Saturday (25 June) at the Mbare Netball Complex, with the aim of discussing issues affecting residents, such as the problems with power shedding and refuse collection. However, a ZANU PF mob appeared and unleashed terror. Among those who were severely beaten was Precious Shumba, HRT co-ordinator and founder, who had to be taken to hospital. Although now discharged he is still too unwell to attend work.
Malawi's President Bingu wa Mutharika said Saturday he would not take International Monetary Fund (IMF) advice to devalue the local currency because he was protecting the poor. Both the business community and the IMF were 'pressuring the government' to devalue to Kwacha to K180 to a dollar, he said. 'If we do that, prices of essential products and services will go up including transport. Who will win?' asked Mutharika. The president was speaking after the IMF said its programme in Malawi had stalled over policy disagreements.
Up to 44 per cent of children in Mozambique suffer from chronic malnutrition, according to an official study. The conclusion was made by the World Food Program (WFP) representative in Mozambique, Lola Castro, and the deputy representative of the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) in Mozambique, Roberto de Bernadi said. Entitled 'Child poverty and disparities in Mozambique 2010', the study analyses child poverty, malnutrition, child abuse and impact of HIV/AIDS.
The UNHCR has written to the Government of Mozambique reminding it of its obligations under the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugee and the 1969 OAU Refugee Convention. This follows reports of deportations by the Mozambique authorities. In one report, 93 asylum seekers were deported to Tanzania in the early hours of Tuesday morning (21 June). The group, comprising 59 Somalis and 34 Ethiopians, had recently arrived by boat near Mocimboa da Praia in northern Mozambique. Most were young men but among them was a woman, four children, and three elderly men. Many were suffering medically as a result of their journey.
Readers of a Zambian Watchdog article are divided over the controversy surrounding the K5-billion that the government has released for the funeral of Fredrick Chiluba. The majority of comments to the article feel that the amount is too much and that a break down should be provided of how the money is spent, but some comments defend the expenditure. 'Why do you have to complain about the money spent? I think it’s for a good cause he was our president he deserves a decent sent off. Some of you, you don’t even pay tax why complain? You are overseas remember!!!(sic),' wrote Mthunzi Chopamba. But others are more cynicial: 'Even in death Chiluba continues to steal from us,' wrote Brainee.
The Right2Know campaign has welcomed the ANC's concessions on the Protection of Information Bill (the Secrecy Bill). 'It is a first, but important step, which may signal a willingness by democrats within Parliament and government to push back against an apparent grab for power by securocrats within the state. This would have been impossible without the voice of ordinary South Africans who have led the struggle for the Right2Know campaign over the past year.'
The African Union (AU) should press Senegal to extradite the former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré to Belgium, a coalition of his victims and human rights groups said. 'Time is up,' said Jacqueline Moudeina of the Chadian Association for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (ATPDH). 'We would have liked to see Habré tried in Africa, but after 20 years the important thing now is that justice be done somewhere.'
Devolving power to local authorities is helping Cameroon step up its fight against a two-year cholera outbreak, say government and aid agency staff. In 2010 decision-making and financing on health, water infrastructure and education was devolved to the country’s 376 local government councils. Slow to get going at first, since early 2011 these councils have more effectively fought to prevent cholera, said Casimir Youmbi, programme manager of Plan International in Cameroon.
With some 15 million children working in Nigeria, often in dangerous jobs, the International Trade Union Confederation has decried the alarming level of child labour in the country and anti-trade union violence in a report to the World Trade Organisation. The Brussels-based International Trade Union Confederation, represents some 175 million workers in 151 countries, including Nigeria. In the report submitted to the 153-member World Trade Organisation (WTO) in Geneva, the group said that 'Some 15 million children are at work, many in dangerous jobs.'
Ghana has a free education system, yet over a million of Ghana’s children do not attend school, says this article from Ghana's The Mail. 'Ghana’s government has a duty to create an environment that facilitates education. It should provide not only the education itself, but the means to get materials such as books and pens if a family cannot afford it.'
Mauritania said on Sunday 26 June that 17 people were killed in a joint attack carried out with Mali on an al Qaeda in North Africa's (AQIM) camp in the Wagadou forest region near Mauritania's border on Friday. A spokesman for the Mauritanian army said 15 al Qaeda fighters were killed and nine were captured by the Malian army. Seven Mauritanian soldiers were wounded, but two of them died later from their wounds.
Urban farming in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is providing a livelihood for thousands of city dwellers, with vegetables bringing in good money for small growers and helping to alleviate high levels of malnutrition nationally, agricultural officials say. The demand for vegetables and the high prices they command in DRC cities - up to US$4 per kilo - has pushed many jobless residents into becoming small-scale growers. Most of the green spaces along the roadsides of the capital, Kinshasa, have been transformed into small farms.
April protests in Swaziland galvanised the democratic movement and saw ordinary people turn out in the droves, writes Peter Kenworthy. But getting rid of a king turns out to be very much a process and not an event.
A parliamentary budget office would assist Tanzanian MPs in engaging with the executive, argues Eugenia Madhidha.
Chadian families are facing worsening food insecurity, becoming more indebted, and selling off personal possessions as they try to cope with the loss of remittances from relatives who have returned home from Libya. Remittances, which half of the households in Chad's western and southwestern regions of Kanem and Bahr el Ghazal used to receive, are down by 57 per cent, according to a survey by NGOs Oxfam and Action Against Hunger (ACF). Households on average were sent US$220 per month.
An estimated 10 million people across the Horn of Africa are facing a severe food crisis following a prolonged drought in the region, with child malnutrition rates in some areas twice the emergency threshold amid high food prices that have left families desperate, the United Nations reported. In some areas of Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia and Uganda, drought conditions are the worst in 60 years, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in an update.
Certain antiretroviral (ARV) drugs commonly used in the developing world may be responsible for premature ageing, according to the authors of a new study published in the journal, Nature Genetics. Newer, less toxic but more expensive ARVs are more commonly used in the Western world. Nucleoside analogue reverse-transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs) have enabled millions of people living with HIV to prolong their lives. 'We noticed that people in their 40s who had been on NRTIs for the past several years had signatures of ageing in their muscles commonly found in healthy people in their 70s and 80s,' said Prof Patrick Chinnery of the University of Newcastle in the UK, one of the study's lead authors.
Of all the vulnerable groups in the country, the most affected are nearly a million children, most of whom either stay home or have returned to schools looted or destroyed during the fighting.
The UN Children's agency UNICEF and the US-based non-governmental organisation Save the Children have been actively involved in a 'Back to School' initiative with support from the Ministry of Education.
When the monthly contraceptive injection that Bernadette Asiimwe, a mother of four, got from government health centres in western Uganda was out of stock for weeks she fell pregnant with her fifth child. By the time Assiimwe decided to pay for the contraceptive and went to Reproductive Health Uganda, a family planning association, she was already four weeks pregnant. Asiimwe is not alone -many mothers like her in western Uganda have had unintended pregnancies due to shortages of commonly used contraceptives in government health facilities.
Clashes between Egyptian security forces and more than 5,000 protesters in Cairo's Tahrir Square, have left more than 590 injured, according to witnesses and medical officials. Tahrir Square, the epicenter of protests that toppled Hosni Mubarak, Egypt's former president, was sealed off early on Wednesday (29 June) as lines of security forces in riot gear strived to regain control from demonstrators. Witnesses said the clashes started on Tuesday when police tried to clear a sit-in at the state-TV building, which included families of those killed during the country's revolution earlier this year, known as the 'martyrs', according to the Daily News, an Egyptian news website.
Nearly 70 journalists were forced into exile over the past 12 months, with more than half coming from Iran and Cuba, says a new survey by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The report is just one of the ways IFEX members marked World Refugee Day on 20 June. Eighty-two per cent of journalists left their home countries between 1 June 2010 and 31 May 2011 because of imprisonment, or the threat of being jailed, says CPJ. Another 15 per cent fled following physical attacks or threats of violence.
A police officer and two others have been arrested as suspects in the stabbing death of journalist Ibrahim Foday of 'The Exclusive' newspaper near Freetown, Sierra Leone, say the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF). Foday was beaten and stabbed on 12 June in the east of the capital while covering clashes between neighbouring villages Kossoh and Grafton over a piece of land, report the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) and other IFEX members.
It was apparent at the 13th annual strategy meeting of the African Initiative on Mining, Environment and Society (Aimes) held in Harare last week that challenges posed by the mining industry are similar throughout the continent. The event, which was organised by the Zimbabwe Environmental Lawyers Association (Zela) and Third World Network-Africa in collaboration with ActionAid International (Zimbabwe), ran from 21-24 June. Held under the theme: 'The African Mining Reform Agenda: Mobilising for Developmental Impacts', the meeting saw Aimes member countries, among them Kenya, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Ghana, DRC, Zambia, and Zimbabwe taking part. The Aimes meeting, among its many objectives, aimed at coming up with strategies to vigorously advocate for mining companies to not only accept the need to have a CSR policy, but to make it mandatory.
A new report from Unicef notes that global income inequality, as measured by the Gini coefficient, is 64 per cent higher than it was 200 years ago. The report notes that the poorest 20 per cent of the world's population holds two per cent of its income. At the rate of change posted in the past 20 years, it will take more than 250 years for the bottom 20 per cent to go from two per cent to 10 per cent.
In this Policy Brief PLAAS Senior Researcher Ruth Hall argues that Africa, a continent plagued by chronic food insecurity, is now considered to be the future breadbasket of the world, and is expected to help meet its rising food needs. In the process of cashing in on the opportunities offered by cheap land and water, large-scale investors are displacing land uses and land users in ways that could aggravate the already severe challenges of rural poverty and hunger.
The number of clinical trials in developing countries has surged in recent years but the legal and ethical frameworks to make them fair are often not in place, the 7th World Conference of Science Journalists, in Qatar (27–29 June), heard. By 2008, for example, there were three times as many developing countries participating in clinical trials registered with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) than there were in the entire period between 1948 and 2000, with many 'transitional' countries, such as Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa, taking part.
Egypt's government has announced an ambitious plan for a tenfold increase in spending on scientific research within the next three years, at an event where the prime minister declared science as a top priority. It plans to raise the percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) spent on scientific research from 0.23 per cent to two per cent. But critics say this is too much, too fast.
The UN has, for the first time, taken a major step towards defining the relationship between the internet and human rights. At a recent event there were more than 50 attendees and the event culminated in over 40 countries signing on to a joint statement commending the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression’s report, which had been featured at the event. This article from the Association for Progressive Communications includes an interview with Joy Liddicoat, head of APC’s Connect your rights! campaign, to get a better understanding of what this means for internet rights.
Zimbabwean police Wednesday (29 June) arrested an editor and a journalist from a privately owned newspaper for reporting on the arrest of an ally of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. Nevanji Madanhire, the editor of The Standard newspaper, and Patience Nyangove, a reporter, were picked up by detectives at the paper’s offices in central Harare. A manager of the parent company – Alpha Media Holdings (AMH) – was also arrested.
For the past five years, water has been seeping out of the ground beneath parts of Nouakchott, undermining foundations and transforming some areas of the Mauritanian capital into uninhabitable marshes. Recent studies by the government suggest that nearly 80 per cent of the overall surface area of Nouakchott could be submerged in less than a decade - in 20 years at most. One scenario predicts the disappearance of the city by around 2050.
The Climate Change Media Partnership has published a briefing paper that recommends ways for policymakers to support a better class of climate change journalism that is relevant to local audiences, builds public awareness of the issues and contributes to improved policymaking. Climate change journalism can protect people and promote sustainable development - but only if it is accurate, timely and relevant, the brief says.
Sudan has agreed to bring some former rebels into the its army and the south played down a northern threat to shut oil pipelines, as the country's halves scramble to prepare for the south's looming secession. South Sudan is due to become the world's newest independent state in less than two weeks, but the two parts of the country have yet to iron out tough issues, from the mutual border to how they will share oil revenue and divide $38 billion in debt.
The South African Commercial Catering and Allied Workers' Union (Saccawu) has filed an appeal against the Competition Tribunal's decision to allow Walmart to acquire a controlling stake in Massmart. The Competition Tribunal was due to give reasons on Wednesday for its decision to allow US giant retailer Walmart to acquire 51 per cent of local retailer Massmart in a R16.5-billion deal.
The presidents of China and Sudan have cemented economic ties between their countries during a state visit by Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese leader, to Beijing. China is a major buyer of Sudanese crude oil, and is keen to ensure the partition of Sudan into two states will not descend into fighting that could disrupt supplies and damage Beijing's stake on both sides of the new border.
When it comes to the politics of international law, ‘[t]he case of Libya is a reminder that power matters, as does who wields it and why,’ writes H. Nanjala Nyabola.
Our grassroots intelligence has informed us that Prof. Sam Ongeri or his proxies in the corruption cartels are planning to send hooligans to visit violence on us so as to disrupt our sit-in. Our civic actions are non-violent, constitutionally protected and therefore we refuse to be cowed and shall continue with our sit-in until Prof Ongeri see some sense enough to resign.
http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/537/june_23_b_tmb.jpgThe inspiring uprisings in Senegal represent ‘a ticking bomb finally exploding’, writes Arame Tall, with a highly diverse cross-section of Senegalese society out in force to protest the dearth of economic opportunities, political mismanagement and governmental scandals: ‘What has taken place in Senegal is most of all a reclaiming by a people of a voice they thought they had a lost and a dignity even they themselves had forgotten they had.’
At a meeting between the UN Security Council and the African Union High Level Ad hoc Committee on Libya on 15 June, Dr Ruhakana Rugunda, Uganda’s permanent representative to the United Nations, gave the African Union’s stand on NATO’s invasion of Libya.
On 23 March, the University of Johannesburg in South Africa cut all ties with Ben Gurion University in the Negev in Israel. Salim Vally is a senior researcher at the Centre for Education Rights and Transformation, lecturer at the Faculty of Education, University of Johannesburg and the coordinator of the Education Rights Project. While he was in Montreal in May 2011, giving a lecture at McGill University in Montreal entitled .
How can the race question not be one of the key issues of concern for those who are for a better life for all South Africans? asks Sehlare Makgetlaneng.
With ‘father of African liberation’ George Padmore commemorated with a plaque in London this week, Cameron Duodu reflects on Padmore’s enormous influence on the anti-colonial movement and his experiences in Trinidad, the US, the USSR, the UK and across Africa.
VIOLENT RIOTS AGAINST POWER CUTS IN DAKAR
Tidiane Kassé
Dakar has had a night of riots, with the masses taking to the streets since the end of Monday 27 June to protest against power cuts. In several areas of the city, the electricity supply is only available in a sporadic manner for a few hours – sometimes a few minutes – with sessions that can last for close to 24 hours.
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SENEGAL: WHEN WADE BACKED DOWN ON 23 JUNE
Tidiane Kassé
The 17th amendment to the Senegalese constitution, which was to take place on 23 June, fell through. The people took to the streets of Dakar – as well as in the towns upcountry – to protest against the proposed bill that President Wade had forwarded to Parliament. This was a bill whose aim, had it gone through, would have opened up an avenue for Wade's son, Karim, take on the succession to power, but also would have guaranteed him an easy victory in the 2012 presidential race.
THE ERA OF THE BADLY ELECTED PRESIDENT!
Alioune Sarr
If the bill proposed by Abdoulaye Wade passes, 25 per cent of votes cast would be enough to become president of the republic. In a country which counts 12 million inhabitants with an electoral body of 4,917,160 voters, then 1,229,290 votes would be enough for one to be elected in the first round of elections. For Alioune Sarr, never would we see a president so badly elected.
WHY I VOTE AGAINST
Samba Diouldé Thiam
A public revolt forced President Abdoulaye Wade to withdraw the bill he proposed to amend the constitution, yet it was already before parliament. Although the liberal majority was already ready to let the bill pass by mechanical vote, members of parliament from the ruling party – as well as those from the opposition – were ready to vote against. Samba Dioulde Thiam is one of them. He explains his reasons why.
GUINEAN CIVIL SOCIETY SUPPORTS THE STRUGGLE OF THE SENEGALESE PEOPLE
The National Council of Organisations of Guinean Civil Society, faithful to its cause of being watchful and in accordance to its values and principles, notably in terms of human rights and democracy, insists on expressing their concern with regards to the events that took place in Dakar on 23 Thursday June 2011.
Global greenhouse gas emissions rose faster than ever last year and the market-based schemes set up to bring emissions down are in trouble. That’s the bad news from two recent reports by the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the World Bank. The IEA said emissions in 2010 were five per cent higher than 2008, the previous highest year. It estimated that about 44 per cent of the emissions came from coal, 36 per cent from oil and 20 per cent from natural gas. It also said 80 per cent of projected emissions from energy generation in 2020 'are already locked in as they will come from power plants that are currently in place or under construction today'.
A series of conferences in Africa and Europe focused on the role of social media in promoting democracy and good governance in Africa has triggered discussion about its real impact on the continent. Dibussi Tande rounds up commentary from African bloggers.
The French military has confirmed that it airdropped weapons to civilians fighting in rebel-held areas in the western part of Libya. Colonel Thierry Burkhard, a spokesperson for the French general staff, told Al Jazeera that the military had dropped assault rifles, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers to groups of unarmed civilians it deemed to be at risk. The Le Figaro newspaper and the AFP news agency reported that France had dropped several tonnes of arms, including Milan anti-tank rockets and light armoured vehicles.
Haitian President Michel Martelly, who came to power in mid-May, must urgently rehouse homeless quake survivors still living in camps nearly a year and a half after the disaster, and meet the basic needs of those who remain in urban slums, says a new report from the International Crisis Group (ICG). The Brussels-based think tank warns the new government faces an 'immediate crisis' amid the growing frustrations of these vulnerable groups in the capital, with 650,000 people still waiting for permanent housing in more than 1,000 unstable emergency camps dotting Port-au-Prince. With the onset of the hurricane season, storms have already flooded 30 camps, driving people to abandon their tents.
South Africa’s ANC Youth League ‘might speak in the name of the poor to advance its agenda but everyone knows that it is not a poor people’s organisation’ despite media portrayals of Julius Malema as a champion of the country’s oppressed, writes Ayanda Kota.
The ‘global coalition’ is ultimately a mere front for the dominance of Western economic and political interests over genuine democratisation for the peoples of Africa, writes Zaya Yeebo.
The conflict that began in Libya on 17 February 2011 with a popular revolt against Gaddafi’s regime has triggered a mass exodus of the civilian population into neighbouring countries. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled, mainly into Tunisia and Egypt. An International Federation for Human Rights report, based on the findings of a mission to the Egypt-Libya border, reveals the vulnerable situation of refugees and migrants stranded at the Salloum Land Port and presents numerous accounts of violence targeting Sub-Saharan African migrants in Eastern Libya.
There was an ‘undeniable optimism’ and sense of hope at this year’s ZIFF, writes Kari Dahlgren, as the creativity and dialogue the film festival sparked provide a source of ‘unity and strength to both imagine and bring forth global social and economic justice.’
The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and its member organisations in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the Groupe Lotus, ASADHO and the Ligue des Électeurs, have welcomed United Nations Security Council Resolution 1991 adopted 28 June and renewing the mandate of the United Nations Organisation Stabilisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO). In light of upcoming elections, the Resolution reads that the MONUSCO shall support the electoral process 'through the provision of technical and logistical support' including, 'by monitoring, reporting and following-up on human rights violations in the context of the elections'.
This report, from 2010 and published by the Interagency Working Group on Climate Change and Health, highlights 11 key categories of diseases and other health consequences that are occurring or will occur due to climate change. The report also examines a number of cross-cutting issues for research in this area, including susceptible, vulnerable, and displaced populations; public health and health care infrastructure; capacities and skills needed; and communication and education efforts.
Amnesty International’s 2010 annual report on Senegal found that sermons by religious leaders fuel homophobia and undermine the fundamental rights of gay people in that country. The report was presented recently to media and civil society during a press conference held at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in Dakar. Seydi Gassama, director of Amnesty International Senegal said, 'The situation of human rights in Senegal is far from brilliant. Religious tolerance is one of the characteristics of Senegalese people and we cannot tolerate religious leaders that pronounce threats against homosexuals.'
Eucharia Uche, the coach of the Nigerian national women’s soccer team, the Super Falcons’ has said she will use spirituality to combat lesbianism on the side. Speaking about what she termed, 'spiritual warfare', she recently said, 'I came to realize it is not a physical battle; we need divine intervention in order to control and curb it [lesbianism].' As soon as she was hired as the first female coach of Nigeria’s powerful women’s national soccer team, Uche expressed her concern about rumoured lesbians on the national side, describing it as a 'worrisome experience' at a seminar.
Patrick K. Wrokpoh, Liberian journalist and contributor to Pambazuka News, died last Friday following a brief illness. C. Winnie Saywah looks back on his career.
Nigeria’s new law on Freedom of Information (FOI) may impact positively on LGBT rights advocacy in the country. The law will address the situation of corruption and promote good governance, which is a foundation for the protection of fundamental human rights. LGBT rights activists could leverage the provisions of the new law to improve on their research and documentation of human rights violations on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity/expression.
In this article, UNHCR Public Information Intern Dasha Smith speaks to Neil Grungras, who has spent many years advocating for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex refugees and asylum-seekers, and is the founder and executive director of the San Francisco-based Organisation for Refuge, Asylum and Migration (ORAM). This interview comes at a time when accounts increasingly emerge of persecution and violence towards refugees and asylum-seekers in parts of the world based on sexual grounds.
A fresh start for the new IMF boss?
There are still a few escape routes open...
Pearls of wisdom from Zimbabwe, Sudan and Uganda...
Nothing will stop Uganda's president...
As protests mount over fraud in Kenya’s Ministry of Education, Henry Maina discusses the investigation and proposes lessons to be learned.
TB is a leading cause of death among people living with HIV in Zambia, according to Justin O'Brien, policy, advocacy and communications manager for The Zambia AIDS Related Tuberculosis Project, ZAMBART, a nongovernmental organisation that aims to improve the quality of life of people with HIV and TB. About 70 per cent of Zambian TB patients have HIV, according to the World Health Organisation. Dr. Peter Chungulo of ZAMBART says that poverty and malnutrition, or undernutrition, also contribute to TB infections, whether it's new cases or relapses.
The central challenge facing Nile Basin States once the Comprehensive Framework Agreement is ratified will be establishing a new regime that works for the benefit of all 11 nations affected, rather than favouring Sudan and Egypt, writes Aaron Tesfaye.
According to a recent study by the Southern African Power Pool (SAPP), the SADC region will continue to require more energy in the future for its developmental needs, reports Kizito Sikuka for Southern African News Features. Member State utilities through SAPP have identified a number of priority projects for commissioning over the next few years to address the energy situation in the region. Most of these projects are targeted at renewable energy sources such as solar, hydro and wind – which are less polluting to the environment compared to other forms such as coal. These projects include the Mphanda Nkuwa hydropower project in Mozambique, Itezhi Tezhi hydropower in Zambia and the Kudu gas project in Namibia.
http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/537/dakar_protest_tmb.jpgThe people of Senegal are out in protest over President Abdoulaye Wade’s efforts to manipulate the country’s constitution, writes Sokari Ekine in this week’s round-up of African uprisings. Ekine also discusses the continuing public sector strikes in Botswana and the creation of an online collective of activists opposed to Equatoguinean President Obiang Nguema’s rule.
Forty years on, first and second generations of Igbo ‘removed from their parents and grandparents respectively who freed British-occupied Nigeria in 1960 and survived the follow-up genocide’, are ‘once again tasked and poised to restore’ their ‘lost sovereignty’, writes Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe.
Right at the bottom of the pyramid are phone users who can’t afford the minimum cost for a SIM to share in someone else’s phone, writes Russell Southwood from Balancing Act. Movirtu has produced a cloud-based, login account which will enable anyone who has access to a GSM phone to share it but still retain their own number. The product was being tested in 2010 and started being deployed as a pilot with several operators in Africa.
Child marriage is increasingly recognised as a serious problem, both as a violation of girls’ human rights and as a hindrance to key development outcomes. As more resources and action are committed to addressing this problem, it becomes important to examine past efforts and how well they have worked. This International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW) report summarises a systematic review of child marriage prevention programs that have documented evaluations. Based on this synthesis of evaluated programs, the authors offer an analysis of the broader implications for viable solutions to child marriage.
The International Criminal Court's deputy prosecutor rejected charges it unfairly targets Africa, saying the victims were also African and that indictments were led by referrals from Africans themselves. In a joint interview with Reuters and France's TV5 in the Ivorian capital, ICC Deputy Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said the high rate of referrals in Africa could just as easily show that leaders on the continent were taking their responsibilities to international justice seriously.
The countrywide shortage of neurologists is preventing people with epilepsy from getting proper care in the public sector. Epilepsy is supposed to be diagnosed by a neurologist, but in Gauteng there are only three hospitals with neurology departments. This means that everyone in the province who has epilepsy has to visit either Johannesburg General, Chris Hani Baragwanath or Pretoria Academic hospitals. Epilepsy can, for the most part, be controlled by daily medication but people normally only receive a six-months prescription.
This Greenpeace report examines the use of glyphosate, the active ingredient in many herbicides sold throughout the world, including the well-known formulation, Roundup. 'Glyphosate based herbicides are used widely for weed control because they are non-selective; glyphosate kills all vegetation. Glyphosate has been promoted as "safe". However, mounting scientific evidence questions the safety of glyphosate and its most well known formulation, Roundup. The evidence detailed in this report demonstrates that glyphosate-based products can have adverse impacts on human and animal health, and that a review of their safety for human and animal health is urgently needed. The widespread and increasingly intensive use of glyphosate in association with the use of GM (genetically modified, also called genetically engineered or GE) crops poses further risks to the environment and human health.'
There’s clear consensus that defining and demarcating the border between North and South Sudan is a necessary precondition for peace. But deploying Ethiopian peace-keepers to Abyei is simply a ‘band-aid’ that ‘would not help peace and may even make things worse by intensifying regional rivalry,’ writes Yohannes Woldemariam, given the Ethiopian government’s lack of neutrality in Sudan.
The head of Egypt’s military intelligence has promised Amnesty International that the army will no longer carry out forced ‘virginity tests’ after defending their use, during a meeting with the organisation in Cairo on Sunday. Major General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), discussed the issue with Amnesty International’s Secretary General Salil Shetty months after the organisation publicized allegations of the forced ‘tests’. Major General al-Sisi said that ‘virginity tests’ had been carried out on female detainees in March to 'protect' the army against possible allegations of rape, but that such forced tests would not be carried out again.
The infant mortality rate and under-five mortality rate are globally regarded as among the best indicators of the health of a community, argue three University of Cape Town professors in this article about informal settlements. 'In Khayelitsha about 60 children among every 1,000 born alive die of diarrhoea-related illness before their fifth birthday - 10 times more than in our southern suburbs. That under the prevailing conditions this number is not appreciably higher could be ascribed to households doing their utmost to maintain as high a standard of hygiene as possible.'
Food insecurity, loss of food sovereignty, the displacement of small farmers, conflict, environmental devastation, water loss, and the further impoverishment and political instability of African nations – these are among the consequences of large-scale investments in land in Africa, a special investigation by the Oakland Institute has revealed. Pambazuka News spoke to Anuradha Mittal, Jeff Furman and Frederic Mousseau about what prompted their research and what they discovered.