Pambazuka News 462: From Belém to Copenhagen
Pambazuka News 462: From Belém to Copenhagen
Petina Gappah isn’t betraying her roots by objecting to ‘being labelled the voice of Zimbabwe’, Chielo Zona Eze writes in this week’s Pambazuka News, she just doesn’t want to be pigeon-holed into the ‘transcendental role of saving the African, by telling his or her story’.
A ‘revolutionary’ new volume of essays published by the University of KwaZulu-Natal Press seeks to revive the tradition of intellectual argument in post-apartheid South Africa.
Sokari Ekine presents a selection of posts from her favourite commentators on the arts and literature in the African blogosphere.
A dramatic ‘realignment’ in the coalition of political forces that came together at South Africa’s ruling African National Congress’ 2007 Polokwane conference – which swept Thabo Mbeki out of the presidency of the party and country and lifted Jacob Zuma to the pinnacle of power – is currently taking place, writes William Gumede in this week’s Pambazuka News.
Horizon Community Association (HOCA), an LGBTI organisation in Rwanda, in collaboration with the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL) and the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) calls on all human rights defenders, organisations, governments, civil society, globally, to immediately take action against a proposed article in the draft Penal Code Act in Rwanda which would criminalise homosexuality. The lower house of the Rwandan Parliament will hold its final debate on this draft code Wednesday 16 December 2009. A vote on this draft code will occur before the end of this week.
FIAN International welcomes the 30th anniversary of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which is to be celebrated tomorrow. The current global food crisis affects women disproportionately. Where the human right to food is violated or threatened, women and girls are often specifically or more severely affected.
We invite applications for organizations in the Horn, East and Southern Africa interested in participating in an extensive, 3-year technical assistance partnership with Raising Voices to prevent violence against women and HIV in their communities using the SASA! Activist Kit. Deadline for applications December 21st, 2009
Public Health Reports (PHR) is inviting papers for a Supplement on Social Determinants of Health and Data Systems. The Editors of seek manuscripts that advance the scientific knowledge and public health research, practice, and policy on data systems related to addressing social determinants of health (SDH). Deadline for submission: June 1, 2010. The anticipated publication date for the PHR Supplement is Fall 2011.
Carleton University’s Centre for Media and Transitional Societies (CMTS), in collaboration with Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC), is pleased to launch a call for concept notes, in French or English, outlining proposed research examining the impact of convergence between traditional radio and new information and communications technologies (ICTs) in sub-Saharan Africa.
Men and women of African descent wanted from across the African diaspora to Judge essays written by children aged 8 to 16 years for "The Annual Essay Contest for Children of African Descent". Essays will be submitted in both English and French. Schools in English- and French-speaking Africa and the diaspora are invited to indicate their interest in participating in this contest. Visit: for previous years' winners. [email][email protected]
A project entitled Promoting the Effectiveness of Democracy Protection Institutions (DPIs) in Southern Africa was recently undertaken by the Governance Institutions & Processes Programme at EISA. Eight EISA research reports (numbers 39-46) are the culmination of this regional project. Empirical research was conducted in early 2009 on the performance of 12 human rights state institutions established to promote democratic governance. Research focused on two types of DPIs in Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia, where they exist.
AMERA-Egypt is pleased to advertise the vacancy of Psychosocial Team Leader. The job of Psychosocial Team Leader is full-time for 35 hours per week, and s/he works under the day-to-day supervision of the Deputy Country Director. Its purpose is to develop affective and adequate programming, manage the operation and effective delivery of the psychological and social services for refugees seeking asylum in Egypt.
In the wake of the Sharm El-Shikh meeting, Chinese ministries and organizations are even busier mobilising all necessary resources to make up a few shortfalls in achieving “the eight policy measures to enhance practical cooperation with African countries, writes Liu Haifang.
This latest briefing from the International Crisis Group examines the situation in the run-up to national elections due next year and the early 2011 referendum on self-determination in the South. It concludes that key elements of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which ended the two-decades-long civil war between North and South Sudan, have not been implemented.
Negotiators worked through Tuesday night without a positive outcome on providing financing for poor countries, commitments on emission reductions or a legally-enforceable treaty. NGOs were definitely not happy with the move to limit their access to the conference during the last few days.
The African Civil Society have condemned the proposed appeal by PM of Ethiopia, Meles Zenawi with French President, Nicolas Sarkozy. In proposing such an appeal, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is undermining the bold positions of our negotiators and ministers represented here, and threatening the very future of Africa.
At the opening of the Copenhagen conference on climate change, twenty UN human rights experts, including Olivier De Schutter, stated that a “weak outcome of the climate change negotiations threatens to infringe upon human rights”. The Special Rapporteur warns that only climate policies deeply rooted in a human rights regime can guarantee minimized impacts upon the most vulnerable.
Ama Biney reviews two recent books, united in their call for Africa’s disengagement from aid dependency, but with sharply contrasting ideological visions for how to do this and to what end: Dambisa Moyo’s Dead Aid Why Aid is Not Working and How There is Another Way for Africa and Yash Tandon’s Ending Aid Dependence.
Pambazuka books are now sold through as well as from our own Pambazuka Press website. Please contribute a review – short or full length – and a rating for any Pambazuka books you have read to help new customers.
As the United Nations Climate Change Conference approaches its final day, Salma Maoulidi writes in this week’s Pambazuka News of her elation at ‘the stance of African countries and other developing nations against a unilateral pollution emissions framework being imposed by rich, industrialised and polluting nations’. But, Maoulidi argues, unless key global governance structures are reformulated to make them relevant and accountable to global citizens, not just imperial and financial interests, the outcomes expected of international forums will remain elusive for Africa, no matter how well resourced and empowered the continent’s delegations.
Many of you will be familiar with Sokari Ekine who has been writing the Africa Blogging feature on Pambazuka News since 2005 as well as contributions to our C& A and book reviews. Her blog Black Looks has been submitted for this year's BOBs awards under the category of "Best Blog in English". We at Pambazuka believe she deserves our support and if you agree you can vote for Black Looks .
Amnesty International deplores the continuing failure of the South African authorities to investigate impartially and fully human rights abuses which occurred during and after armed violence at the Kennedy Road Informal Settlement (Kennedy Road) in Durban last September. This despite repeated calls since October for an independent and impartial commission of inquiry into the surrounding circumstances and extent of the violence and its aftermath.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, an arm of the UN, the global food crisis is worsening. In 2009, over 1 billion people were undernourished globally, up from 873 million in 2004-2006; the accelerating growth and urbanisation of the world’s population, which is predominantly taking place in the developing world, is increasing the pressure on food resources and provoking food security fears.
Sudan wants to attract foreign investors to cultivate vast tracks of land that are currently unused in Africa’s largest country, State Minister for Finance Tarek Shalabi said.
As the world meets to find ways of mitigating the impact of climate change, Nigeria, like other African nations which are at the receiving end of the effects of the global climate change, is counting its losses from the impact of the phenomenon.
Kenya's assistant Minister for Trade Omingo Magara, who is a top leader of the ruling Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), lost his parliamentary seat this week after a petition against his 2007 parliamentary victory succeeded, following months of trial.
Ethiopian authorities have released former opposition politicians, jailed for causing mayhem after the 2005 general elections, but the fate of an influential former party leader, Birtukan Mideksa, remains unclear.
Gender activists from East and Southern Africa have expressed shock at the backward trends in the 50/50 campaign in recent elections. The African Union (AU) has set a goal of achieving parity between women and men in decision-making by 2020, while the Southern African Development Community (SADC) target calls for 50% women in decision-making in all sectors by 2015.
Kenya's main political groupings, the Party of National Unity (PNU) and the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) continued to wrangle over the constitutional powers to be given to future President and Prime Ministers of the republic.
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki has ordered a probe into the disappearance of millions of shillings meant to finance the free primary school initiative, which attracted over seven million children previously locked out of school.
Niger's president, Mamadou Tandja, on Wednesday opened the campaign for 27 December local elections and urged his compatriots to turn out in their numbers to elect their representatives for the 266 local councils.
The Deputy Commander for Civil/Military Affairs of the US African Command (AFRICOM), Amb. Anthony Holmes, Wednesday visited Luanda, Angola, to foster a working relationship with the Angolan government.
The African Human Rights and Peoples Court based in Arusha, Tanzania, has said that it was incompetent to examine a request to suspend the judicial proceedings in Senegal against Chad's former president Hissein Habré.
The Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI), based in Entebbe, Uganda, has been recommended to host the Secretariat of the African AIDS Vaccine Programme (AAVP), after a very close competition involving a total of eight applicant institutions located in seven countries in Africa.
A lot has happened since the 44th and first African American US President was sworn in. Some scholars, like Prof. Issa Shivji at the University of Dar es Salaam, argue that the issue now is not Obama’s presidency and what it portends to Africa, but rather the emergence of new ‘hegemonic’ powers in global political and economic governance.
Four freelance journalists on 17 December 2009 filed an application with the High Court in Harare seeking a nullification of the election of the new Zimbabwe Union of Journalists (ZUJ) executive. The applicants are citing irregularities in the manner that the elective Congress was convened and conducted.
MISA-Zimbabwe has been following with particular interest the seemingly contentious issue of shortwave radio stations within the context of the ongoing SADC mediation process.
Zimbabwe's ruling political party has been accused of launching a "widespread and systematic campaign of rape and sexual terror" aimed at intimidating opponents and voters in the troubled African nation, according to a new report released here.
A Western Sahara activist expelled by Morocco has been allowed to return from Spain after maintaining a hunger strike for 32 days. Aminatou Haidar, 42, left Lanzarote airport in the Canary Islands on a small, private plane after a deal was reached, details of which are unclear.
The former governor of Nigeria's oil-rich Delta State has been cleared of 170 charges of corruption - involving the laundering of millions of dollars. The federal court in Asaba said there was no clear evidence against James Ibori, governor from 1999 to 2007.
An high-profile former Nigerian minister has gone to court to challenge the international arrest warrants issued last week on corruption charges. As a close ally of ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, former Abuja Minister Nasir el-Rufai used to be one of Nigeria's most powerful people.
South African ex-Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, criticised for questioning whether HIV causes Aids, has died aged 69 from liver disease. Her critics dubbed her "Dr Beetroot" for her advocacy of healthy eating rather than drugs to fight HIV.
Opposition parties in Namibia have launched a court challenge to the results of last month's election. President Hifikepunye Pohamba and his Swapo party won a landslide victory with more than 70% of the vote.
The more people in a meeting, the more difficult it is to achieve consensus. Accordingly the UN negotiating system, built on consensus processes and inordinately influenced by the wealthy G8 nations, makes agreement difficult, writes Glenn Ashton.
The killing and rape of hundreds of opposition supporters on September 28, 2009, by Guinean security forces are likely to amount to crimes against humanity. Accountability for the attacks is key to addressing Guinea’s ongoing political crisis, which deepened following a December 3 shootout involving the country’s coup leader and his aide de camp, both implicated in the September violence.
The Angolan government should ensure freedom of the press as host of the Africa Cup of Nations, Human Rights Watch has said. The football tournament will take place January 10 to 31, 2010, in four coastal towns in Angola, including in the oil-rich enclave of Cabinda, site of a long-standing separatist insurgency.
Many governments' policies toward migrants worldwide expose them to human rights abuses including labor exploitation, inadequate access to health care, and prolonged detention in poor, overcrowded conditions, Human Rights Watch has said, in advance of International Migrants Day, on December 18, 2009.
In this week's emerging powers news roundup, China joins the US in making key concessions in Copenhagen, and China continues to invest in, among other countries, Guinea, Ghana Botswana, as Sino-African trade grows to nearly $107 billion in the past year.
On the ninth day of the Copenhagen climate summit, Africa was sacrificed. The position of the G77 negotiating bloc, including African states, had been clear: a 2C increase in average global temperatures translates into a 3–3.5C increase in Africa, writes Naomi Klein.
United Nations humanitarian agencies are providing emergency supplies and other forms of assistance to Kenyan Government officials as they respond to an outbreak of cholera in the northwest of the country that has left at least 26 people dead.
Nearly three years from the signing of a peace agreement in Côte d'Ivoire, emergency operations are slowing but humanitarian needs remain, aid workers say. More funds are needed to support the transition from humanitarian to development.
The World Bank and China are discussing setting up low-cost factories in industrial zones in Africa, that the Chinese will build. A nice little idea that’s maybe meant to help could end in a new regime of industrial slavery.
It's really no surprise that a major split has occurred between developing countries at the United Nations climate conference in Copenhagen over the best way to help the most vulnerable countries, or that developing countries reacted furiously to the leaked draft agreement that would hand more power to rich nations, sideline the UN's negotiating role and abandon the Kyoto protocol.
Former Argentinian Environment Secretary Romina Picolotti and Center for Human Rights and the Environment co-founder Jorge Daniel Taillant have authored a new piece laying out the case for the World Bank to determine its energy agenda on a human rights based approach.
In his op-ed featured on All Africa, Frank Muramuzi of the National Association of Professional Environmentalists analyzes the World Bank’s disastrous approach to energy lending, focusing specifically upon large hydropower projects in Uganda.
People across the world leave their homes, families and countries in search of work and education, and to escape poverty, discrimination and conflict. Many risk everything, even their lives, for security and a chance to earn a living. At every step, they are vulnerable to exploitation, fraud and human rights abuses.
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the Eastern Africa Journalists Association (EAJA) welcome the re-launch of Tanzanian Union of Journalists (TUJ). In a three-day meeting in Dar es Salaam, which ended on 5th December 2009, Tanzanian journalists elected a seven-member committee to steer the Tanzania Union of Journalists (TUJ) into proactive labour union and to convene a congress as a way of re-building and promoting democracy in the union, ensuring better conditions of service and ethical journalism.
International assistance is vital to prevent the Central African Republic (CAR) from falling back into political crisis and potential new fighting as it prepares for elections next year after a decade of violence and conflict between Government and rebel forces, the top United Nations official for the country has warned.
Tribal violence in the north-west of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has sent 84,000 people fleeing across the border into the Republic of the Congo since last month, with the United Nations refugee agency reporting that supplies to assist the displaced are running low.
United Nations peacekeepers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have suspended logistical or other support for units of the National Armed Forces (FARDC) when there are sufficient grounds to believe their operations would violate human rights, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said.
The top United Nations envoy to Sudan has welcomed the peaceful ending of the registration process for next year’s elections, the first multi-party polls in the country in decades, with more than 75 per cent of people of voting age registering to cast their ballots.
The Security Council has extended for another year the United Nations political mission in Burundi, calling for full support for next year’s elections in the war-scarred African country while voicing concern at continuing human rights violations, sexual and gender-based violence, restrictions on civil liberties and political violence.
Uncertainty surrounding the impasse in Guinea Conakry is forcing Guineans to flee their country. Reports say that about 200 Guineans have been registered to have entered Senegal through its borders with the troubled West African nation.
A leading human rights lawyer has launched legal action to try to force Nigeria's President, Umaru Yar'Adua, to hand executive powers to his deputy while he receives medical treatment in Saudi Arabia.
A Constitutional Select Committee, meant to drive the process towards a new constitution, announced on Wednesday that it will resume its work on the 4th January next year. Morgan Tsvangirai, Robert Mugabe and Arthur Mutambara, the three political party principals in the coalition government, are expected to officially launch the process on the 7th January.
Egypt has obtained $5 billion from international and regional financers to fund and complete its 2007-2012 five year plan to boost energy output, the state news agency MENA quoted the electricity minister as saying on Friday.
The search for an effective microbicide has been dealt another blow with disappointing study results from PRO 2000, an early generation microbicide gel that was tested to prevent HIV in women.
Kenya is seeking the services of leading mobile phone companies in an ambitious campaign to market the East African Community Common Market. In an Obama-inspired campaign -- where ICT played a major role in galvanising public support -- the country plans to educate all the 17 million Kenyans who own mobile phones on how they stand to benefit from the Common Market, whose protocol was signed a month ago.
Three experts from The Hague are in Kenya to hear the views of victims of post-election violence on how they would like those responsible for the chaos punished. Their arrival signals that the court is firmly focused on Kenya although the judges took a break for the annual Judicial Winter recess last Friday. The recess ends on January 4. Right, post-election violence in Naivasha.
A trial of pre-exposure prophylaxis to prevent HIV infection in Botswana is highly unlikely to show whether giving antiretroviral drugs to block infection is effective, due to a lower-than-expected rate of new infections and low retention rates, the US Centers for Disease Control announced on December 17th.
While changes in antiretroviral regimens are often impelled by side-effects, a considerable proportion of first-line changes in a west African cohort were found to be due to other issues, according to a forthcoming article in the journal AIDS.
Morocco is working to improve services for Down's syndrome and other handicapped children, many of whom have no access to local primary schools. Halima, 45, lives in Sidi Kacem with her husband and four children, including an 8-year-old boy with Down's syndrome. For years, Halima hoped her son would be able to attend school in spite of his disability, but no schools in the region cater to children with special needs.
The European Commission has reiterated its commitment to fund development projects in the African and Caribbean countries following consultations by member states this week.
When 18-year-old Tsitsi Makwiyena looks down at her son Desmond in her arms, she sees not just a one-week-old perfect baby boy, but also the high price she paid to escape her home country of Zimbabwe and start a new life in urban South Africa
A new police force plan to recruit youths in each community, to help fight the country-wide spate of armed robbery, has provoked controversy and sparked a nationwide debate. Communities are concerned that some area volunteers are known to be ex-child combatants, who may have participated in committing horrific atrocities against civilians.
Prisca Musonda is an ardent supporter of Patriotic Front leader Michael Sata and his party. She has travelled with him to most parliamentary constituencies campaigning in elections. But now she fears Zambia’s general elections set for 2011 could turn violent and go wrong for most voters, unless the latest spate of violence can be curbed.
Nearly one-third of all water-related disasters occur in Africa. The second issue of Joto Afrika considers the relationship between climate change, the greater incidence of extreme weather events, such as drought and flooding, and the increasing scarcity of water on the African continent.
The number of successful applications for gay asylum seekers in France is about 15% above average of successful applications in the general population but, an organisation in the country that helps persecuted people with asylum, says it processes about 30 application per year without absolute certitude.
As the 2010 Soccer World Cup approaches, expected to bring an influx of gay tourists to South Africa, Health4Men, a health centre for men who have sex with men (MSM) in Soweto has urged entertainment venues in all cities to promote responsible sex among gay men. Themed Responsible Sex Promotion by Gay Venues, this initiative is targeting night clubs, bars, taverns, guest houses and sex venues, making available free condoms, lubricant sachets, fact sheets, posters and public health notices.
Dulane Jama and his family suffered in silence for three years in a remote corner of eastern Ethiopia before he finally decided to go and look for a safe place to live before they all died. After an arduous and dangerous trek across Somalia, he ended up about four months ago at Dadaab, a sprawling and overcrowded refugee complex in north-east Kenya housing almost 300,000 refugees. Most are Somalis who have fled conflict or persecution in their troubled homeland.