Angola's electoral commission has rejected appeals from the country's main opposition party to challenge election results on grounds of "voting irregularities" at polling stations. "The claims of Unita are not accompanied by any proof," Adao de Almeida, a spokesman for the national electoral commission, said in the Luanda province on Monday.

Sediment cores drilled from one of East Africa's Great Lakes show that rainfall in the region is highly sensitive to climate changes in the Northern Hemisphere. Analysis of the cores — collected from the bottom of Lake Tanganyika in East Africa's Rift Valley and dating back 60,000 years — suggest that rainfall is sensitive to changes in winter winds in northern Asia and sea surface temperatures in the Indian Ocean.

Victims of violations committed by military officers are taking their case to the country’s highest court after a military investigation confirmed its officers were forcing parking offenders to violate corpses in July 2008.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/396/climatec_change_uganda_l.jp... in Uganda, whose contribution to global warming has been minuscule, are feeling the impacts of climate change first and worst. On the one hand there is more erratic rainfall in the March to June rainy season, bringing drought and reductions in crop yields and plant varieties; on the other hand, the rainfall, especially in the later rains towards the end of the year, is reported as coming in downpours that are more intense and destructive, bringing floods, landslides, and soil erosion.

The Centre for Rights Education and Awareness (CREAW) is a non-governmental, non-partisan, membership organization whose Mission is to transform society by empowering women and expanding new frontiers for women’s rights and freedoms. Our Vision is to realise a just and free society in which women and men have, exercise and enjoy equal and full rights and opportunities. We are seeking the services of a researcher. Appliction deadline: 26 September 2008.

The nexus between aid, security and development is now beyond doubt. In fact, security is a precondition for development. The often cited ‘no development without security, no security without development’ captures this interconnectivity (Dochas 2007). Iraq, despite huge avalanche of aid for reconstruction, is a good example of the importance of security. Sadly, aid has become one of the casualties in the ‘war on terror’. It has been rapidly securitised. Self-interest and political motives determine the priorities of aid. Since the start of the ‘war on terror’, when United States (US) President Bush claimed that anybody was either a friend or an enemy, aid has become one of the weapons in their arsenal. War on terror has brought back the state as the sole referent in security. International aid as known today originated during the Cold War at a time when the US felt that the whole continent of Europe would be converted into a socialist camp and pumped billions of dollars through the Marshal Plan to jumpstart the war damaged economies. Enter 9/11, the good intentions of aid were set aside for the political priorities and self-interest.

US President George Bush said on 20 September 2001: ‘We will direct every resource at our command to the disruption of the global terror network’. Relief became a reward for useful intelligence information. Aid was not only a weapon on the battlefield but also used in diplomatic negotiations with poor countries. In 2003, the US threatened poor UN Security Council members like Angola, Cameroon and Guinea with a reduction of international aid. In the post 9/11 era Africa continued to need security and aid as much as before to overcome its ‘tremendous economic, social and political’ (Mohiddin 2007) challenges. Yet Africa did not have ‘capable and intelligent states’ (Kauzya 2007) able to provide much needed security which is a precondition for development and peace. Any form of aid creates an asymmetrical relationship between the donor and the recipients vitiating the spirit and letter of the Paris Declaration. This relationship fosters ineffective aid. In fact, it does harm by feeding into existing conflicts thereby perpetuating conditions of insecurity that hinder meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/394/Tandon_l_and_tmb.jpgThe following is an excerpt from the concluding chapter of Yash Tandon's new book, Ending Aid Dependence, published by Fahamu Books, September 2008. For more information please visit, .

For far too long the debate on development aid has been constrained by conceptual traps and the limitations of the definitions provided by the donors. If the recipients or beneficiaries of aid are to own the process, as present trends in the development literature suggest, then the conceptual reframing of the issues must itself change its location from the North to the South.

The conceptual starting point is not aid but development. The horse of development must be put before the cart of aid. Growth, admittedly, is an important aspect of development, and indeed there is no need to labour the point (as some orthodox economists and the World Bank attempt to do defensively). But growth is not the same as development. In this [book], we have defined development, following in the footsteps of Julius Nyerere, the founding president of Tanzania and the first chairman of the South Centre, as ‘a long democratic process, that starts “from within”, where people participate in the decisions that affect their lives, without imperial interference from outside, and aimed at improving the lives of the people and realisation of the potential for self support, free from fear of want and political, economic and social exploitation’. We put it as a formula: Development = SF + DF – IF, where SF is the social factor – the essential well-being of the people; DF is the democratic factor – the right of the people to participate in decision-making that affects their lives; and IF is the imperial factor – the right of nations to self-determination and liberation from imperial domination.

This is in sharp contrast to the mainstream orthodox economists’ definition as Development = Growth + Wealth accumulation, where Growth = Open markets + Foreign investments + Good governance (as defined by the West), and the wealth accumulation by the rich is assumed to ‘filter through’ to the poor by market- driven forces.

The most critical aspect of our definition of development is its political economy and historical context. The developing countries have gained their political independence, but in most cases they are still trapped in an asymmetrical economic, power and knowledge relationship with the former colonial powers that con- tinue to dominate the process of globalisation, and the institutions of global governance (the IMF, the World Bank, the WTO, WIPO, WCO, OECD, EU Commission, etc). The developing countries are making heroic efforts to disengage from this lock-in situation (demanding policy space, for example). Some of them (the so- called newly emerging industrialised countries of the South) have indeed succeeded or partly succeeded, but the bulk of the devel- oping countries are still trapped in the shackles of history. Africa, especially, is identified as a continent that has not fared well. From this trap, Africa and others can liberate themselves only if they take matters of development into their own hands – and do not leave it to aid and its delimiting and colonising conditionalities, such as the structural adjustment programmes of the IMF and the World Bank, and now the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness.

In other words, the national project, the project for self-determination, is still on the agenda of political action for developing countries. Its counter, the imperial project, is also still alive, but gradually weakening. Its ideology – the Washington consensus and globalisation – crafted after the dominant paradigm of free market liberalism and Western systems of governance, democracy and the rule of law, has lost credibility and legitimacy. This is not to undervalue the importance of democracy or the rule of law. Without these there would be anarchy and oppression. But these values cannot be imposed on the developing countries from outside, and certainly not loaded on to the wagon called ‘development aid’, followed by sanctions against those who fall short of Western donor expectations. The experience of Zimbabwe, tragic in its consequences, is an example of the curse of Red Aid, swallowed by a government and a people who had sacrificed so much to win their political independence. It is for this reason that the case of Zimbabwe has been analysed in detail in this monograph.

The fundamental reason why the relationship between ‘aid’ and ‘development’ is not fully understood is because of the way both terms are defined in the OECD-DAC vocabulary, definitions which have also been adopted by the United Nations. These are self-serving, West-centric, value-loaded and arbitrary definitions. It is argued here, for example, that there is no good reason for excluding what I call Yellow Aid (or military and political aid) from the definition. This kind of arbitrary exclusion ignores the military and political assistance provided by countries in the South too, for example, the liberation of Southern Africa. Worse still, it places military aid under the carpet, outside of a rational discourse within its political and ethical context.

In this context, it is argued that the 0.7 per cent has acquired a ‘mythical’ status. It carries an ethical-moral dimension, and provokes a lot of passion, particularly among civil society and in the North. This is an understandable reaction from NGOs and civil society organisations that have a strong affinity with the South on grounds of solidarity, but they have an imperfect understanding of the structural problems with the aid architecture. For the developing countries, the 0.7 per cent is a weapon to hold the North to their promises, even when the last 40 years’ experience should have made them wiser. An extended and expanded version of the 0.7 per cent model is the ‘booster’ model of aid. This is based on the assumption that the resource gap in developing countries (in particular, Africa) should be filled by a massive dose of aid over a number of years until the countries take off, like an aeroplane. The proponents of both the 0.7 per cent and the booster models need to question the resource gap theory. They will then understand that the developing countries do not have a resource gap. It is a gap unwittingly or deliberately created, directly as a result of the activities of global corporations and the misdirected policies of the IMF and World Bank. The irony is that the booster aid is still packaged within the framework of the very conditionalities that are part of the problem and not the solution.

This monograph provides a new taxonomy for development aid – in five hues – in a more rational and comprehensive classification. Development aid is placed along a continuum from Purple Aid (based on solidarity) on the extreme left and Red Aid (ideological aid) on the extreme right. In between are Orange Aid (which is really not aid at all, and should simply be called commercial transactions); Yellow Aid (already explained above); and Green/Blue Aid (whose three components – the provision of global public goods, non-tied humanitarian and emergency aid, and compensatory finance – are segments of the totality of financial and technical and technological assistance that are genuinely developmental. These are part of the global good not only from the national (recipient) country’s perspective, but also from the global perspective. One implication of this classification, for example, is that global civil society in the North as well in the South might find they have more affinity with Purple Aid, and perhaps also with Green/Blue Aid, than with aid of the other three colours.

The body of the book consists of the seven steps that the developing countries need to take in order to exit aid dependence. The most difficult is the first step – the psychology of aid dependence. The dependence psychology has not only occupied the minds of leaders in many (if not most) developing countries, but it has also taken roots in mass psychology. It is not necessary to attempt to summarise the seven steps. Much more can be written on the subject than is contained in this monograph. The important point is that the process has to begin somewhere and very soon. It is an agenda that has to be captured by the people themselves at community and grassroots level. However, it also requires an enlightened and visionary leadership at national, regional, and continental levels.

It is argued here that the present aid and development architecture at the international level is an obstacle to the realisation of the national project. Three power asymmetries – economic power, political power and knowledge power – are deeply embedded in the existing structures. It is a continuing battle for the developing countries to try and secure policy space within the constraints imposed by these asymmetrical structures.

The present debate on the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness (PDAE) is located in this larger context to explain the circumstances in which the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC) and the World Bank and IMF are trying to retain their relevancy and legitimacy, both of which have been severely eroded as a result of the changing geopolitical and economic realities of the last decade or so. If the OECD, the World Bank and the IMF do not achieve what they hope for at the Accra conference on aid effectiveness (September 2008) and the Doha Monterrey Review Process (November–December 2008), then they could face oblivion within the next decade. For the DAC its oblivion is a historical necessity in any event. At best, it should remain as a body to coordinate policies for OECD member countries. As for the World Bank and the IMF, they can salvage themselves if they pull out of Red Aid, withdraw to their original missions, and give voice to those who have suffered most from the developmental failure of their policies and the financial volatility of the last two decades.

In this broad historical and political perspective, the Development Cooperation Forum (DCF) of the UN and the fast evolving South–South relationship can play a very positive role. However, it faces many challenges, and its future is still largely uncertain.

At the end of the day, we need a truly heterogeneous, pluralistic global society that is based on the shared values of our civilisation, and the shared fruits of the historical development of the productive forces of science, technology and human ingenuity. Only on this basis can we build a global society that is free from want, exploitation, insecurity and injustice.

*Yash Tandon is the executive director of the South Centre, Geneva, an intergovernmental think tank of the developing countries. Dr Tandon’s long career in national and international development spans time as a policymaker, a political activist, a professor and a public intellectual. He has written over 100 scholarly articles and has authored and edited books on wide-ranging subjects from African politics to peace and security, trade and the WTO, international economics, South–South cooperation and human rights. He has also served on several advisory committees.

*Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/

Equitable and sustainable structural transformation of African economies is a prerequisite for improving livelihoods across the continent. Despite decades of reform often led under structural adjustment programmes, and a very high level of openness, most sub-Saharan African countries remain highly dependent on a narrow range of mineral and agricultural commodities, with low levels of value-addition and low potential for job creation. Africa’s share of world trade has declined from 5.5 per cent in 1980 to 2 per cent in 2003, and of this trade there is an overwhelming dependency on trade with the EU (European Union). Stimulating growth that enhances welfare, creates quality employment, and fulfils social and economic rights requires holistic economic policies and the political space and financial means to implement them - at national and continental levels. These policies need to reflect the aspirations and values of all sectors of society and to further regional integration and a process of sustainable agricultural reform and industrialisation. As one of Africa’s leading economic partners, in terms of trade and investment, as well as wider financial support through aid finance, the EU could play an important and significant role in supporting holistic and equitable economic transformation across Africa.

REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS

Trade policies have a critical role to play in supporting economic development across Africa. These policies are increasingly set through agreements in international arenas. Whilst the World Trade Organisation has set trade rules that have implications for African countries, it is a new generation of bilateral/regional trade and investment agreements that will critically determine the types of trade and wider economic policies that governments can use to support development. The ongoing negotiation of Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries and the EU will have a decisive impact on the trade and economic policies of African countries. For most African countries, the EU is the single most important trade partner and thus any agreement with the EU will have substantial implications. The EU’s current EPAs’ proposal are in danger of undermining the very policies that African countries require to promote regional integration and transformation of their economies. There are widespread and justified fears that the configuration of the EPA negotiating blocs will undermine rather than promote aid effectiveness.

The third high level forum (HLF3) on aid effectiveness will be held between the 2nd and 4th of September in Accra to discuss the implementation of the Paris Declaration on aid effectiveness since 2005. Prior to the HLF3, civil society representatives expressed concern that the 'HLF could represent a step backwards in efforts to improve aid effectiveness'. Meanwhile, African, Caribbean and Pacific countries and their counterparts in Central and Latin America to ‘put an end to the long drawn so called banana war'. ‘After failing to strike a deal at the last WTO negotiations in Geneva, ACP countries want to reiterate their position on the decision of the European Union, the major consumers of Latin American banana to gradually reduce the EU’s tariff of 176 Euros per tonne to 116 Euros by 2015’. Also in trade-related news, the United States and the East African Community (EAC) signed a new trade agreement that will see the deepening of relations and bilateral trade, valued at about $1.2 billion last year. While, analysis of the growing involvement of Russia in Africa has come under the US radar of concern given ‘Africa’s increasingly recognised geopolitical significance as well as the strategic importance of its natural resources to the security of the United States’.

Also, this week, there remains uncertainty about whether Uganda will join the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) customs union, that is soon to make the regional bloc a free trade area and guarantee preferential rates to members’ exports. Uganda’s reticence to embrace the free trade area stems from national protectionists and the manufacturing lobby who regard the union as a threat to its nascent industry. Similarly, during the second round of negotiations on the protocol for a common market for the EAC, Tanzania expressed concern with respect to provisions on the free movement of persons and labour.

Following the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) is investigating the appropriate steps towards full integration into the AU architecture. Also this week, a committee of experts on gender held a two-day meeting in preparation for the session of African ministers in charge of gender and women's affairs due to discuss and adopt the AU’s gender policy. In South Africa, the ten permanent committees of the Pan African Parliament held new round of sittings from 25 to 29 August in preparation of the forthcoming ordinary session of the Parliament to be convened between 27 October and 7 November this year.

In peace and security related news, the AU commission chairman, Jean Ping, visited Mauritania to talk with the junta that seized power on 6 August, along with other political stakeholders and civil society in an effort to find a solution to the constitutional crisis ensuing from the military coup. Though the AU has strongly condemned the putsch, a majority in the Mauritanian parliament has pledged loyalty to the new military regime. In other news, the AU commission chairman has welcomed the signing of the agreement between Somalia's Transitional Federal Government and the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia and added that his institution would do all that is necessary for the effective implementation of the deal. Ping also announced that the AU would work closely with the United Nations to ensure the early deployment of a UN peacekeeping operation in Somalia and called on the international community to provide the necessary support to sustain the current political momentum in Somalia. However, the AU and chief negotiator in the Zimbabwe conflict, President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, were unsuccessful in reaching a deal between the two main rivals at the recently concluded Heads of State and Government summit of Southern African Development Community (SADC). In their final communiqué, SADC leaders 'reaffirmed their commitment to work with the people of Zimbabwe in order to overcome the challenges that they are facing'. Activists, trade unionists and other human rights organisations strongly condemned SADC leaders for failing to include in their communiqué the global demands to have the ban on humanitarian food aid in Zimbabwe lifted accusing them of not being geared to handle the crises in Zimbabwe. Though some analysts decry the ‘nauseating power sharing gimmick in which the ‘paradox of Africa’s fledgling democracies is just a starting point for negotiations’. Also regarding southern Africa, AU commission chairperson Jean Ping sent his condolences to the family and the people of Zambia following the passing of President Levy Patrick Mwanawasa, which has spurred speculation about political unrest in Zambia.

In other news, Ms Maria Netto, United Nations Development Programme's climate change policy advisor noted that developing countries may not achieve their Millennium Development Goals targets by 2015 unless they addressed climate change concerns. Further, the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation will organise, in October, a six-day seminar in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, to analyse the implications of global climate change for sustainable agricultural production in African, Caribbean and Pacific countries.

The Advanced Conflict Transformation (ACT) is a four week course that is organized by COPA. This course offers diverse aspects of conflict transformation and peace building. It is aimed at participants working in related fields on the African continent. Although reference is made to the impact of international political and economic events & trends on the continent, emphasis is placed on culturally sensitive and sustainable responses to regional and community conflicts in Africa.

This course examines globalization and its socio-economic consequences. It offers an analytical interpretation of the ongoing debates concerning the dynamics, institutional structures, and central processes of globalization and the organized resistances of civil society groups and networks worldwide. Inherent in this examination is a critical understanding of the role and nature of hegemony in the relations between countries in the institutions of global governance. Application Deadline: September 15, 2008.

Fourteen members appeared on 26th August, before Magistrate Doris Shomwe in Harare Magistrate’s Court. They had been arrested near the Zambian Embassy in Harare on 28 May 2008, where they were to hand over a petition to the SADC chair calling for an end to post-election violence.

Zimbabwe has lifted a ban on aid agencies that was imposed ahead of the June 27 presidential run-off over accusations that some were siding with the opposition. “The government has with immediate effect lifted the suspension of operations of private voluntary organisations and NGOs,” said a social welfare ministry statement.

This article from Future Medicine reports on research into the effectiveness of male circumcision (MC) as a means of preventing HIV in Africa. Findings show an average 65 percent reduction in HIV infection as a result of MC, rising to 76 per cent in South Africa where HIV prevalence was highest. MC has also been shown to eliminate or significantly reduce the risk of acquiring or spreading many sexually transmitted infections including syphilis as well as human papilloma virus.

Kenya’s President Mwai Kibaki, Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka and Prime Minister Raila Odinga will spend Kenya shillings 1.2 Billion (100 million shillings per month) on their households and press units this financial year. Considering the economic condition of Kenyans, poverty levels in our country and the country’s substantial development finance needs, can we afford to pump so much into the personal comfort of so few?

We women from 15 West African countries and Mauritania, representing 33 organisations and networks of the sub region, at the West African Women’s Consultative Meeting on Aid Effectiveness and Gender Equality, organised in Lome, Togo from 25th to 27th June 2008 by Women in Law and Development in Africa, (WiLDAF) with financial support from UNIFEM Regional Office for West Africa and OSIWA (Open Society Institute for West Africa);...

Not far from the closely packed mud huts of Pabo camp for Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) in Northern Uganda, the Catholic parish office lights up like a beacon in the inky night of this war-torn area; the region has never had electricity. Last year, the Pabo diocese used a wireless internet connection provided by an NGO called Battery Operated System for Community Outreach (BOSCO) to apply for a $40,000 grant for solar panels. Now the health center has an internet phone they can use to call free anywhere in the world, and students at Pabo secondary school are sharing stories of abduction and war on personal blogs.

Angola overtook Nigeria this year as Africa’s largest, and the world’s eighth largest, oil producer—a combination of Angola’s surge in growth and Nigeria’s decline in production following rebel attacks on its oilfields. Angola is now producing over 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd) of high-quality crude oil from onshore and near-shore fields, up from 900,000 bpd in 2002 and from 500,000 bpd in 1993.

Voting is taking place in Angola in the first parliamentary polls for 16 years. Although 14 parties are taking part, the contest is primarily between long-term rivals, the ruling MPLA party and opposition Unita party.

The wife of Kenya's prime minister has turned down a controversial monthly allowance of $6,000 (£3,000) offered to her by the government. Ida Odinga thanked the state for appreciating her role, but said she did not need money for her legacy. The decision to pay hefty salaries to the wives of the prime minister and vice-president provoked public outrage.

The Southern Cameroons National Council has met with European Commission representatives and raised afresh their concerns over human rights in Cameroon. As the institutions of the European Union begin to prepare themselves for a return to business as usual after the summer months, UNPO was able to bring together members of the Southern Cameroons Nations Council (SCNC) and representatives of the Union’s Development and External Relations sections in a meeting to discuss the current situation in the troubled country of Cameroon.

The May 2008 attacks and the responses they have triggered from both Government and South African civil society could well transform the migration debate much more profoundly than first meets the eye, writes Aurelia Wa Kabwe Segatti.

The Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) has condemned Tuesday's arrest and detention of its officers, community elders and some journalists at Iwherekan community, Delta State by soldiers guarding gas flaring sites operated by Shell. The group demands their immediate release and an apology from the military and Shell.

For years now, women’s groups in Southern Africa have campaigned tirelessly to ensure that the Southern African Development Community adopt the Protocol on Gender and Development. Yesterday, the SADC finally took that historic step. Member states will be obliged to amend their laws to ensure equal rights for women across a wide range of issues, from provisions that require member states to enshrine equality in their constitutions, to firm commitments to reduce maternal mortality by 75 per cent.

The European Union has reached a new agreement aimed at preventing import of illegal timber from Africa, but environmental campaigners believe bolder action is needed to curb deforestation across the globe. Under a deal reached with Ghana Sep. 3, the EU has undertaken to establish border controls to prevent unlicensed wood from the West African state entering the Union's 27 countries.

While aiming at its unity, Africa has attempted a number of initiatives to search for a collective development strategy. Such a search included the Lagos Plan of Action, the African Alternative Framework to Structural Adjustment Programmes, and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD)

Globally half of the people living with HIV and AIDS are female. Biologically, women are more likely than men to acquire HIV. Gender inequalities and human rights violations heighten girls' and women's vulnerability. Investing in comprehensive HIV prevention for women and girls is also an investment in the health and well-being of boys and men and of communities.

In order to measure progress on achievement of the Paris Declaration, the 3rd High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness called on developing countries to partner with donor communities to ensure good statistics are produced to facilitate development results.

Congo's eastern borderlands risk plunging back into all-out war between the army and Tutsi rebels after the heaviest clashes in months, the U.N. peacekeeping mission chief said. The enemies fought heavy battles last week in North Kivu province, where violence fuelled by simmering ethnic tensions has raged despite the official end of Congo's broader 1998-2003 war, a regional free-for-all over the country's mineral wealth.

The government of the Peoples’ Republic of China says it has resolved to build 100 primary schools across Africa, with Liberia considered as one of the favorites to benefit from the gesture. The special envoy on African Affairs at the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Mr. Liu Guijin, said in addition to the construction of these schools, his government has planned to build 13 hospitals across the continent to assist with the medical needs of the countries that would benefit.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its affiliate the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists are calling for a new strategy to remove harsh media laws that have been used to intimidate and stifle independent journalism. The IFJ says the government has indicated its willingness to have a full review of the extensive legal regulations that have been put in place over the past five years.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has dismissed an appeal by prosecutors against its earlier decision to suspend the trial of the Congolese rebel leader Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, accused of recruiting child soldiers to serve in his militia. The court announced the decision in a statement, noting that judges with the ICC’s trial chamber had made the ruling.

United Nations humanitarian agencies are expanding their relief efforts across West Africa, where rising flood waters have displaced hundreds of thousands of people in seven countries, damaged major infrastructure and sparked the threat of widespread outbreaks of infectious diseases.

Zimbabwe’s power sharing talks looked set to completely collapse on Thursday after Mugabe issued an ultimatum to the MDC to join a proposed unity government or be left out. The ZANU PF leader threatened to appoint a new cabinet if the MDC did not sign up. “If after tomorrow (Thursday), Tsvangirai does not want to sign, we will certainly put together a cabinet. We feel frozen at the moment,” Mugabe told the state owned Herald newspaper.

Textbooks may soon be available online if a pilot project yields results. The Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) has entered into an agreement with the Kenya Institute of Education (KIE) meant to provide learning materials to schools in soft copies as well as online. According to the deal, the CCK will fund digitalisation of 11 Form One subjects at an initial cost of Sh15.2 million.

The Kenyan human rights organisation Independent Medico-Legal Unit (IMLU) released its final report today on the gross human rights violations conducted both by the so-called Sabot Land Defence Forces (SLDF) and a joint police and military operation in the Mt Elgon area of Western Kenya. The report documents murder, rape, arbitrary and mass arrests, enforced disappearances, torture, destruction of property, and cruel and inhuman and degrading treatment and punishment of civilians.

South Africans who believe in a conspiracy theory that HIV was introduced by white people as a way of controlling the black population are significantly less likely to have had an HIV test, according to a study published in the September 1st edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes. For the South African government to restore the public’s faith in their response to HIV, they need to “present a consistent and strong prevention platform about the importance of testing”, argue the investigators.

HIV prevalence and incidence in rural Uganda appear to be increasing, researchers report in a study published in the August 20th edition of AIDS. Coinciding with these increases, the investigators observed changes in HIV sexual risk behaviours in certain groups. The study was conducted in villages in rural Uganda and the trends it revealed mirror other evidence from Uganda pointing to increases in HIV prevalence and incidence.