Pambazuka News 477: Zimbabwe: Demystifying sanctions and strengthening solidarity
Pambazuka News 477: Zimbabwe: Demystifying sanctions and strengthening solidarity
While many respected sources have raised serious concerns about the health of Ethiopian political prisoner Birtukan Midekssa, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi alarmingly continues to insist that her situation is one of 'perfect health', writes Alemayehu G. Mariam.
Fiercely critical of the US's role and continued presence in Haiti in the wake of the country's earthquake, Kali Akuno highlights the dangers of the supposedly neutral term 'humanitarian intervention' and calls for solidarity with the Haitian people in the face of the 'militarisation of the relief and reconstruction effort'.
Omar al-Bashir's vote at the Sudanese elections and the response of Kenya's immigration services to Al Shabab feature in Gado's cartoons this week.
With Zanzibar in the throes of political instability as its 2010 elections approach, Chambi Chachage calls for a 'win–win situation' and draws upon Mahmood Mamdani's emphasis on 'survivors' justice'.
The march against home demolitions and forced evictions 'Don’t Push Down My House' was scheduled to take place on Saturday April 10, in Benguela, Angola. In a letter to Omunga, the provincial governor of Benguela did not authorize the demonstration because 'the province of Benguela has not registered demolitions, forced land evictions and other acts that collide against the law'.
Our country is in crisis. The internal contradictions of the African National Congress have bought it to the point where it is no longer able to give leadership to society. It continues to speak the language of nationalism and national liberation but it has degenerated into an association of predatory elites hell bent on using the state to plunder the society. The gap between the ANC’s language and its practice is now so large that the organisation can no longer speak to the national interest with any conviction, clarity or credibility.
It is possible to address the negative effects of female circumcision without denigrating African women. African women who have undergone circumcision also deserve integrity and respect! Please this petition urging Good Vibrations to drop their support of Clitoraid. Clitoraid's humiliating campaign urges supporters adopt African women's clitorises.
ANC Youth League President Julius Malema’s racial pot-stirring coupled with the gruesome murder of white supremacist leader, Eugene Terre Blanche, has led to a rise in racial tensions in South Africa and lots of soul searching about the future of the 'Rainbow Nation'.
Sanusha Naidu writes about the China-Africa joint research and exchange program that was launched at the end of March by the follow-up committee of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), in partnership with the Institute of West Asian and African Studies (IWAAS) of the Chinese Academy of Social Science (CASS).
With concerns surrounding Sudan's ability to deliver free-and-fair elections and Omar al-Bashir's ruling National Congress Party (NCP) the only party pushing for an April vote, Sudan Democracy First Group argues that the US should respect the will of ordinary Sudanese instead of propping up the status quo.
As 36 imprisoned Saharawi activists continue a hunger strike from seven Moroccan jails, Konstantina Isidoros writes of the 'groundswell of international condemnation of Morocco's behaviour'. Protesting against Morocco's longstanding occupation of Western Sahara and the human rights abuses suffered by the indigenous Saharawi population, the hunger strikers' action represents the latest peaceful challenge to the Moroccan state's illegal claims on Western Sahara, stresses Isidoros, from individuals widely recognised as 'prisoners of conscience'.
In debates about Zimbabwe's political crisis and the role of the international community, it is difficult to sort out reality from rhetorical smoke and mirrors, write Briggs Bomba and William Minter. The current debate on ‘sanctions’ is a classic example: There is much strong language for and against, but rarely do debaters bother to say which measures are actually in place and what specific effects they have or should have.
The recent murder of Eugene Terreblanche, founder of the white supremacist Afrikaner Resistance Movement, should have focused the attention of the world on the exploitative, oppressive and de-humanising conditions of the landless peasants and farm workers in South Africa, writes Mphutlane wa Bofelo. But it’s easier for the country’s elites to blame racism alone for the incident than to acknowledge the historic links between race and class dynamics and to tackle the disparities that these have created, he concludes.
As a range of interest groups clamour for amendments to Kenya’s draft constitution on the basis of claims that it ‘legalises abortion’, Mary Wandia asks them to consider the ‘sobering facts on abortion, women’s rights and the status of women’. Voluntary abortion ‘happens irrespective of whether laws making it legal or illegal exist’, writes Wandia, and Kenya’s current legislation simply ‘makes safe abortion “illegal” and unsafe abortion “legal”, sentencing poor women and girls to unnecessary and preventable suffering and death.’
A discussion with the Afrikaner Resistance Movement’s Andrie Visagie on live national television has ‘brought into sharp focus a whole host of tensions, contradictions and implications of what it means to be a South African in 2010’, writes Liepollo Lebohang Pheko. Visagie’s outburst is a reminder, argues Pheko, that this ‘liberation of ours is hotly contested, differentially experienced and highly compromised; the majority are yet to fully move into an encompassing expression of this citizenship and liberation at all levels and spheres of life.’
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has damned a recent report by the US Department of State into the country’s human rights practices in 2009 as ‘Lies, lies and implausible lies’. Alemayehu G. Mariam imagines how Zenawi might respond to a sample of the findings included in the document.
Since the beginning of the year, the situation for the Kakuma News Reflector has become increasingly precarious, KANERE writes – a dangerous sign for refugees wishing to exercise their right to a free press and express their voices through the independent newsletter, which operates out of Kakuma Refugee Camp in northwestern Kenya. Here KANERE shares details of how the safety, protection and security of its journalists in the camp have been jeopardised.
Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s latest publication, ‘Dreams in a Time of War: A Childhood Memoir’, is ‘a treasure-house of childhood memories’, writes Peter Wuteh Vakunta. ‘It is an informative and didactic memoir written with the intent of taking the reader down memory lane. The story of Ngugi’s travails through life, it lends credence to the wise saying that epic characters are often associated with humble beginnings.’
As racial tensions continue to rise over the murder of Eugene Terreblanche, Azad Essa writes a satirical piece on reports from the South African Muslim and Halaal Authority (SAMHA), that they have been inundated by calls from foreigners asking ‘if it was true that Terrorblanche was Muslim'.
‘There is no doubt that South Africa will become the next frontier for "land invasions"', writes Grasian Mkodzongi, ‘the situation in the country is a ticking time bomb. It’s almost impossible to think that a system of extreme injustice and poverty reflected across the country could be sustained forever.’
Mphutlane wa Bofelo’s article is a ‘weighty warning about leftist spin’ for those who, ‘in their naivety and idealism, tend to see compatriots in anyone who talks the talk’, writes Anne Price, in a letter addressed to the author.
I was pleasantly surprised to discover that this article was written by a man, writes Elma Doeleman.
History suggests that the World Bank’s management believes transparency is something that should apply to its clients and other external stakeholders rather than to itself, writes David Shaman. He invites readers to share their own experiences and observations at his new blog.
Morgan Tsvangirai’s contradictory statements on LGBTI rights, Madagascar’s elections and various interpretations of Africa by western visitors are among the topics featured in Sokari Ekine’s roundup of the blogosphere.
FEMNET has been spearheading the process of mobilizing women in Africa to engage in the monitoring of the aid effectiveness agenda. The purpose is to ensure that gender and human rights perspectives in the aid effectiveness agenda take centre stage in the discourse. The other objective is to influence donors implementing the PD and AAA to adopt gender equality and women’s empowerment indicators as one way of assessing development effectiveness.
Gender Links, a dynamic Southern African NGO based in Johannesburg invites applications for the post of Editor of its Opinion and Commentary Service and related publications. All applications must be received by close of business on 23 April 2010. Late applications will not be considered.
The Oxfam International Liaison office with the African Union (OIAU) would like to put a call for civil society actors or staff of locally constituted NGOs, and coalitions of organizations who have the mandate and plan to engage the African Union, to be present in Addis Ababa and conduct their work. This secondment call is to enable committed and often disenfranchised communities’ representative to get the opportunity to meet the policy and decision makers at the AU Commission.
In January, 2010, a team from Cultural Survival's Global Response program went to Kenya to document a year-long pattern of brutal police assaults on the Samburu people of northern Kenya. These assaults, which include killing, raping, beating, and wholesale robbery, take place in an atmosphere of racial prejudice and discrimination against pastoralist tribes that resist assimilation and westernization in order to maintain their unique cultures. Kenyan police forces operate with impunity throughout the country, but in northern Kenya their brutality targets a specific ethnic community in violation of their rights as Indigenous Peoples.
The 19th African Human Rights Moot Court Competition will be held at the University of Abomey-Calavi, Cotonou, Benin from 4 - 9 October 2010. The deadline for Faculty registration was 28 February and individual registration is 15 May 2010.
Individuals from all African countries are invited to apply for admission to study for the Master‚s Degree (LLM) in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa at the Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria, South Africa
Women's civil society groups were noticeable by their absence from the landmark Haiti donor conference on 31 March, which secured pledges of US$5.3 billion over the next two years to support the country’s post-quake recovery. Their lack of a presence at the meeting was indicative of a broader missing voice in Haiti’s long-term reconstruction prospects, gender activists argued.
KONI – The Panafrican Alliance of Colombia is a non-governmental organization based in Bogota. In the spirit of pan African solidarity and cooperation, Koni has designed and availed a platform of technologies and tools for the exchange of ideas, methodologies and strategies of development on the African continent, and its Diaspora in Colombia
When President Barack Obama took office in January 2009, it was widely expected that he would dramatically change, or even reverse, the militarised and unilateral security policy that had been pursued by the George W. Bush administration toward Africa, as well as toward other parts of the world.
The University of Texas at Austin scholars to submit conference papers for the 2011 conference on Africa in World Politics. The goal of this conference is to create an interdisciplinary dialogue concerning Africa's contemporary and historical place in world politics.
The corruption money would have constructed over 5,400 classrooms, paid 315,000 teachers, provided over 7.4million families with treated anti malaria mosquito nets’. The Tanzania corrupt Radar scandal appears to be taking a new twist as the notorious British Serious Fraud Office (SFO) now faces a potential legal suit over the manner in which it handled the corruption case involving the British Aero Space (BAE)
The public outcry of alleged entrenched corruption in Tanzania’s National Housing Corporation (NHC) appears to have reached catastrophic proportions with helpless victims alleging that the vice is so extensive and deeply rooted to the marrow of this giant state corporation
Help give Nigeria a voice at Chevron's Annual General Meeting this year by donating your frequent flyer miles or proxy vote to the JINN delegation. Each year, Chevron stakeholders gather for the company's Annual General Meeting at the end of May.
Shareholders have the opportunity to speak--or to donate their shares to allow others to speak at the meeting as their proxy. JINN needs your help in increasing Nigeria' representation at the meeting by providing proxy votes and frequent flyer miles. If you own shares in Chevron and wish to donate your proxy vote, or if you have frequent flyer miles on any airline, please
contact Abby at (415) 990-0792 or [email][email protected]
With humble respect, on behalf of the refugees living in the camps of Dadaab, we would like to share our grievances with the world and ask for you to help us find our way to freedom. Our lives in the camps are far worse than you can imagine. We live in an open prison, far away from justice and humanity. We talk, but our voices are never heard. We move, but only inside a cage. We have many skills and talents, but we are denied our chance to maximize our potential. We are chained to a life full of stress and despair; a life for which many would prefer death. We are denied opportunities for education and employment. We live in a condition without adequate water, food, or health facilities. We are arbitrarily beaten or detained by police within the confines of the camp. We lack the ability to freely express ourselves or have control over the decisions affecting our lives.
The African Research and Resource Forum (ARRF) is a research, data resource, reflection and policy debate institution devoted to the resolution of the governance and development issues confronting policy-makers and societies in the East African Community (EAC) and the Great Lakes Region. It links scholars, researchers, opinion leaders and public service functionaries to interact and share ideas. The Forum also facilitates the evolution of a regional community of scholars, activists and institutions, with a shared interest in resolving inter-African development problems.
Civil society organisations in Angola gave a lesson of citizenship, courageously marching to say “Don’t Push Down My House”.The demonstration finally and peacefully took place in the coastal city of Benguela. Despite of the ban announced by the provincial government, the march managed to break the silence and voice the protest against the brutal house demolitions and forced land evictions that have become a regular occurrence in Angola in the last years.
Sydney University’s Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies is now offering its globally renowned Masters program of postgraduate coursework to students around the world. Graduates enjoy challenging and rewarding careers in aid and development, in NGOs large and small, think-tanks, governments, universities and beyond.
Oxfam GB’s Global Centre of Learning on HIV and AIDS, based in the Pretoria Regional Office, seeks to recruit a Grant Manager to manage the CS Health Policy Action Fund supported by WHO. The grant was awarded in recognition of Oxfam’s growing record of work on health in international development, covering issues related to health systems strengthening (particularly health financing and health care delivery), access to medicines, sexual and reproductive health and HIV and AIDS
First Lady Thandiwe Banda has said Zambia has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world and that safe motherhood is still far from being assured. Ms Banda was speaking in Lusaka when she officiated at the opening of a media capacity building workshop on the campaign for accelerated reduction of maternal mortality in Africa (CARMMA).
The proposed media law is a monster, says Dr George Lugalambi, chair of a coalition fighting to preserve press freedom in Uganda. Publishers and journalists would have to apply annually for a licence, which could be revoked at will in the interests of "national security, stability and unity," or if coverage was deemed to be "economic sabotage."?
In the wake of a continent-wide upsurge in homophobia with Zimbabwe’s leaders Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai being the most recent to put there voices to it, Rev. Pieter Oberholzer and gay Christian activist, Victor Mukasa, were chased away “like lepers” from a consultative meeting on homosexuality held on 16^th March in Malawi. They’ve been attending on invitation of secretary-general Canaan Phiri of the Malawi Council of Churches (MCC), who organised the event.
Amkeni Wakenya is a UNDP led Facility set up to promote democratic governance in Kenya. The name Amkeni Wakenya is inspired by the second stanza of the National Anthem that calls upon all Kenyans to actively participate in nation building. Amkeni Wakenya primarily works through Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in recognition of the significant role that they play in ensuring that the aspirations of Kenyans are taken into consideration in the democratization process.
Applications are now open for the RVI’s first Great Lakes field course, to be held from Saturday 17 to Friday 23 July 2010 in Bujumbura, Burundi. The course is a fast-track, graduate-level introduction to the history, political economy and culture of Rwanda, Burundi and the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Taught in English and French by a distinguished faculty of international and regional specialists, the course follows in the tracks of the acclaimed annual RVI courses on Sudan and the Horn of Africa. For more information please see Courses or download a prospectus here. The application deadline is 7 May 2010.
Rich countries have threatened to cut vital aid to the developing nations if they do not back the deal agreed at the UN climate summit in Copenhagen, it has emerged. The pressure on poor countries to support the US, EU and UK-brokered Copenhagen accord came as 190 countries resumed UN climate talks in Bonn in an atmosphere of mutual suspicion.
The "post amnesty" process that is supposed to be rehabilitating militants in the Niger Delta continued to face questions throughout March. Matters were not helped when a gathering of government and Niger Delta leaders associated with the process in Warri, Delta State, was interrupted by two car bombs planted by disgruntled militant
New Field Foundation is expanding and deepening its grantmaking to support rural women and their organizations, families and communities in West Africa through its Rural Women Creating Change program. We are seeking a Program Consultant for the Mano River Union, who is familiar with the realities and potential of rural women in the border region of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone
The ambassador of the Republic of Congo to Cuba, Pascal Onguemby, rejected the lies included in an anti-Cuba resolution recently approved by the European Parliament. Addressing participants in the inauguration of the Eleventh International Conference on African Culture in the Americas that began today in Santiago de Cuba, the African diplomat spoke on behalf of the ambassadors from Burkina Faso, Cape Verde and Mozambique, as well as the cultural attaché from Angola.
South Africans are facing tough times. It is a time when there is no humanity, a time when no one in government is interested to listen to your story if you are a poor person. There are good thinkers in this country, but if their ideologies are coming from the bottom up, from poor communities, no one is prepared to listen carefully.
International agency Oxfam is deeply concerned with the recent detention of one of its staff and two colleagues from the Ngorongoro NGO Network (NGONET) by authorities in Loliondo, following protests by local women about alleged violations of land rights in the area. The three were detained on 12 April and released the next day on bail. Oxfam calls on the authorities to hold an immediate investigation into the detentions, and take steps to address the concerns of local communities amid growing tension in the area.
At noon April 15, 500 members of Women and Men of Zimbabwe Arise marched to the offices of the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA), Megawatt House, in Harare. Three simultaneous protests converged at the ZESA headquarters where the peaceful group handed over ‘yellow cards’ to staff members of the electricity service provider along with a report that outlines WOZA’s demands.
TechSoup Global, the U.S.-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that provides technology resources and knowledge to NGOs around the world, and GuideStar International, a U.K.-registered charity that promotes transparency and civil society organization (CSO) reporting, have announced that they will combine operations in order to strengthen their respective capacity-building programs for civil society. The two organizations share a mission to benefit global civil society through the provision of technology, information, and resources.
On the International Day of Peasants’ Struggle, April 17, FIAN International together with many other civil society actors calls for an immediate stop of land grabbing. A new report published by FIAN International documents the findings of two research missions on land grabbing to Kenya and Mozambique, and concludes that land grabbing violates human rights.
Fahamu’s Refugee Programme is pleased to introduce the , a monthly publication that aims to provide a forum for providers of refugee legal aid. With a focus on the global South, it aims to serve the needs of legal aid providers as well as raise awareness of refugee concerns among the wider readership of Pambazuka News. The e-Newsletter will follow recent developments in the interpretation of refugee law; case law precedents from other constituencies; reports and helpful resources for refugee legal aid NGOs; and stories of struggle and success in refugee legal aid work. It welcomes contributions from legal aid providers, refugees, and others interested or involved in refugee legal aid.
In this week's roundup of emerging actors news, Three steps to unleashing Africa's genius, China is ready for Ghanaian entrepreneurs, South Africa and China sign trade deals worth R2,3bn, Africa and India to boost cooperation in agricultural technologies for smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa.
61 of the 65 members, including juveniles, arrested outside ZESA headquarters in Harare earlier today have been released without charge. Four members, Jenni Williams, Magodonga Mahlangu, Clara Manjengwa and Celina Madukani, remain in custody and will spend the night in cells. They are being charged with participating in an illegal gathering.
On 4 April 2010 Egyptian State security arrested Karar from the street while he was returning from a bank to his home. Karar is a secondary school student and was in the midst of preparations for the final secondary completion exams.
With piracy raging in the Indian Ocean, international disputes over undersea oil and gas, and chronic overfishing, the oceans have rarely been subject to such varied and environmentally damaging conflict outside a world war. In Who Rules the Waves? Denise Russell gives us a rare insight into these issues and how they could be resolved.
The head of a 19-state African trading bloc has denied the Gulf’s policy of snapping up cheap farmland across the continent is tantamount to a ‘neo-colonialist’ land grab. Sindiso Ngwenya, secretary general of Comesa, which counts Kenya, Egypt, Sudan and Madagascar among its members, said multimillion-dollar land deals aimed at securing the Gulf’s food supply provide crucial capital to overhaul poverty-stricken rural areas and build infrastructure.
Egyptian private equity firm Citadel Capital is seeking to buy Kenya’s firms and long-term land leases as it seeks agro-based raw materials to feed its food business. Citadel’s consumer food business, Gazour, is keen to cut reliance on imports to supply its Egyptian plants by controlling the supply chain from farmer to the shop shelf to protect it from global commodity price fluctuations
A year after the purchases of vast swathes of farm land in Africa first drew public attention, transactions remain as opaque as ever. Private companies are resisting a global code of conduct that would ensure transparency and local elites continue to benefit from deals that encourage corruption and increase food insecurity.
An extensive study of rape victims in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), commissioned by Oxfam and conducted by the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, shows that 60 percent of rape victims surveyed were gang raped by armed men and more than half of assaults took place in the supposed safety of the family home at night, often in the presence of the victim's husband and children.
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has said that its new toolkit will highlight anti-hunger and development efforts by helping countries gather more accurate information on differences between men and women in agriculture.
Disturbed by the failure of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) to discharge its duties, the Kenyan government has now initiated the process of disbanding the body. Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs Minister, Mutula Kilonzo, under whose docket the TJRC falls, said Thursday that he had asked the Parliamentary Committee on Legal Affairs to work on modalities of disbanding the Commission.
As the indefinite strike called by Gabon's oil workers entered day two Thursday, the government has said it is willing to resume dialogue to end the strike. "The government solemnly reaffirms its preparedness to resume the dialogue," said a statement by Labour Minister Maxime Ngozo Issondou.
A resident magistrate in the southern Tanzania region of Ruvuma has sentenced a group of 74 Ethiopian nationals to six months imprisonment or a fine of 10,000 shillings (approximately US$10) for illegal entry into the country.
Nigeria's anti-graft Economic and Financial Crimes Commi ssion (EFCC) has declared the immediate past governor of oil-rich Delta State, James Ibori, wanted for alleged official corruption and money laundering. An EFCC statement said a court warrant had been obtained for the arrest of the governor, who was earlier freed of a 170-count charge of corruption against him by a court. EFCC has appealed against the ruling.
Ethiopia’s premier Meles Zenawi on Tuesday strongly warned opposition parties against any violence ahead of the parliamentary and presidential elections in Ethiopia on 23 May. In a rather harsh parliamentary debate after he presented the government’s annual report to the House, opposition MPs bombarded Zenawi with accusations that his government and party members had continued to intimidate their members.
HIV/AIDS could pose a security concern in Africa due to high infection rates among military forces, Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete has cautioned, saying the loss of personnel not only af fected military preparedness but also increased costs of recruitment and training of replacements.
Guinean Minister of Territorial Administration and Political Affairs, Nawa Damey, on Monday urged political parties to put an end to "unauthorised demonstrations" which could cause traffic jam in Conakry, the capital. In the statement, read on the State Radio, the Minister called on political lead ers to exercise restraint and understanding in their activities so that they could make their contributions towards building a peaceful political transition in the country.
The Gambian government has given reasons why investigation into the murder of journalist Deyda Hydara has not been concluded. According to the Interior Minister, Ousman Sonko, two key witnesses in the case are outside the government jurisdiction and attempts to reach them have been unsuccessful.
Prime Minister Raila Odinga became the first Kenyan to register electronically as a voter following the introduction of a landmark electronic register, aimed at curbing fraud in future elections, which led to widespread chaos in 2008. Odinga, who led the opposition Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) during the 2007 Presidential elections, hailed the introduction of the electronic voter register as a historic step towards changing Kenya's previously flawed elections, leading to chaos.
The sub- regional rights body, Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), will Tuesday launch the West Africa Media Development Fund (WAMDEF), aimed at providing “low-interest credits to address the financial challenges of small and medium, private and independent media in West Africa.”
Hundreds of marabouts in Senegal subject talibés living under their de facto guardianship to conditions akin to slavery. They force the children to perform a worst form of child labor—begging on the streets for long hours—and subject them to often brutal physical and psychological abuse, all within a climate of fear
Sudan’s ruling party has said that the southern army had killed nine people, including at least five of its officials, stoking tensions during voting in the first open elections in 24 years. Oil-producing Sudan entered the last of a five days of presidential and legislative polls that mark a key test of stability for Africa’s largest country, emerging from decades of civil war and preparing for a 2011 southern referendum on independence.
Madagascar's leader has vowed to disband his internationally rejected government and form an interim body with an ousted opposition leader following an ultimatum from the army to solve a festering crisis. Analysts say there has been growing unease in some quarters of the government and military, and increased international pressure on Andry Rajoelina to solve the crisis, which has unnerved investors in the island's oil and mineral resources.