Mary Wandia and Neelanjana Mukhia reflect on the struggle to free women from violence, the ravages of HIV/AIDS and the effects of conflict

Women and girls encounter violence in their homes, communities, schools, workplaces, streets, markets, police stations and hospitals. Violence, or the threat of it, not only causes physical and psychological harm to women and girls, it also limits their access to and participation in society because the fear of violence circumscribes their freedom of movement and of expression as well as their rights to privacy, security and health. The epidemic of violence against women has been a key focus for women’s rights movements for many decades. The movements for a long time fought to have violations of women’s human rights in the private sphere recognized knowing too well that it is within this space that the most insidious and vicious violations of women’s rights take place. They were aware that women’s empowerment and gender equality in all spheres cannot be achieved unless violence against women, the tool used to control, dominate and subordinate women and girls by men is not eliminated.

African women did not wait; they have been part and parcel of that fight that culminated in the 1993 United Nations Declaration ‘Women’s Rights are Human Rights’ and called for the elimination of violence against women in Vienna. The international community acknowledged that violence against women is a human rights violation that women experience at all stages of their life cycles in peace time and war. African women also joined global women’s movements in Beijing in 1994 where women’s human right to be free of violence and the threat of it was identified as one of the critical areas of concerns and actions for all stakeholders.

By the turn of the century, African women seized the opportunity to ensure that the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (2003) supplements the provisions of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and domesticates the Vienna and Beijing agreements on violence against women. The protocol breaks new ground in calling for African countries to protect women from all forms of violence through legislative measures, public awareness, and support in the form of health services, legal assistance, counseling and vocational training.

Beyond setting the legal and normative frameworks above, women went back to their communities, nations and regions to sensitize them to end violence against women through campaigns on ‘zero tolerance to violence against women’. They expended a lot of energy and creativity to develop different strategies to suit different contexts.

Unfortunately, their communities, nations and governments did not heed the campaigns. The onset of the HIV/AIDS pandemic found a bosom friend in the pandemic of violence against women. The intersection of the two pandemics remains a testimony of the cost of ignoring calls to end violence against women. The HIV/AIDS pandemic now wears a woman’s face. It remains a stark reminder that violation of rights in one sphere leads to more serious violations in other spheres resulting into compounded situations.

Human rights are interrelated and interdependent. That fact is brought home by the intersection of HIV and violence against women in Africa. Today, African women are bearing the brunt of the HIV pandemic –in sub-Saharan Africa an estimated 1.7 million people were newly infected with HIV in 2007, bringing to 22.5 million the total number of people living with the virus. Unlike other regions, the majority of people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa (61%) are women [2].

There are a number of reasons for this – women’s sexual physiology increases their risk of HIV; but much more importantly it is their social, economic and sexual subordination that increases their risk. Women are unable to negotiate safe sex or refuse sex with men because of violence or the fear of violence. They are at the receiving end of coercive sex. Women’s and girls’ economic subordination, lack of economic opportunities and choices may also contribute to their resorting to transactional sex.

Just as violence against women increases their risk to HIV, it is also a consequence of HIV sero status. HIV positive women as a result of their status are more likely to face stigma, discrimination, and violence and rights violations from their intimate partners, families, communities and states. There have been cases reported of HIV positive women being denied their sexual and reproductive rights by health practitioners merely because of their HIV status. HIV positive women also face the possibility of disinheritance and dispossession from their families. Gender inequality and violence against women often inhibit women’s and girls’ ability to take full advantage of crucial – even life-saving – services. A recent UNFPA/WHO report notes that, in the context of AIDS, “violence against a woman can interfere with her ability to access treatment and care, maintain adherence to antiretroviral therapy or feed her infant in the way she would like” [3].

In situations of conflict, the intersecting human rights and health crises of HIV and violence against women are exacerbated in situations of conflict. We know that the incidence of rape skyrocket during conflict as it is used as a weapon and tactic of war. Women and girls are targeted strategically for rape, sexual slavery and violence. HIV in combination with rape, violence and sexual slavery increases women’s risk exponentially. In Rwanda, it was reported that close to 500,000 women and girls were raped during the genocide.

In Rwanda, the WHO reports, “the HIV prevalence rate in rural areas dramatically increased from 1% before the start of the conflict in 1994 to 11% in 1997. In a survey of the women who survived the genocide, 17% were found to be HIV-positive. In another survey carried out by the Rwandan Association for Genocide Widows (AVEGA), 67% of women who survived rape had HIV” [4]. Women are also disproportionately affected as a result displacement, dispossession and collapsed health, law enforcement and other social infrastructures. A case in point, during the recent conflict in Kenya, HIV positive women were unable to access life saving ARV drugs because of displacement. And those who were raped could not access PEPs on time.

There has been attention given to violence against women by many stake holders for many decades. This is in large part due to the actions and advocacy of the global women’s movements. However, when it comes to the intersection of violence against women and HIV, and the increasing risk of women and girls to HIV, there has been little concerted effort. Governments have acted to address the HIV pandemic with many interventions – some of them have worked some have not. However, they have been largely blind to the reality of women’s risk to HIV and its key driver – violence against women. This blindness is not restricted to governments in Africa, multilateral agencies and bilateral donors in charge of defining the global AIDS response have been equally blind to the intersecting crises.

For the last couple of decades, these international agencies and national governments have put money, time and effort in to the ABC paradigm of HIV prevention. An intervention that disregards the reality of inequality and subordination women and girls face. Abstinence, Be Faithful, Condomise does not begin to consider the endemic violence against women and girls. Research has established that a large proportion of girls’ sexual initiation is coercive and that many women do not have control over whether or not they will use condoms during sex. Indeed many women cannot negotiate consensual sex. Given this reality those in international agencies and governments should have asked the question a long time ago – does ABC really work for women? Or for that matter do other HIV interventions work for women; have they been designed informed by the differential access women have to health services?

In order to bring greater attention to and action on the intersection of violence against women and HIV&AIDS by all actors at the international, regional and national levels, a campaign was launched in March 2007 – the Women Won’t Wait. End HIV and Violence against Women. NOW. The Women Won’t Wait campaign is led by a coalition of organizations and networks committed and working for many years to promoting women’s health and human rights in the struggle to comprehensively address HIV and end all forms of violence against women and girls now. Women Won’t Wait seeks to accelerate effective responses to the linkages of violence against all women and girls and HIV by tracking and, where necessary, calling for changes in the policies, programming and funding streams of national governments and international agencies [5].

Funding for programmes that focus on violence against women and girls in connection to HIV remains inadequate and inconsistent. Research conducted as part of the Women Won’t Wait: End HIV and violence against women and girls. Now. campaign entitled Show Us the Money: is violence against women on the HIV&AIDS donor agenda? illustrates the lack of concerted funding efforts aimed at fighting the twin pandemics. Released in March 2007, the report analyses the policies, programming and funding patterns of the largest public donors to HIV&AIDS: the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the President’s Emergency Fund for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR/US), and the UK Department for International Development (DFID), along with the World Bank, and UNAIDS (the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS). In an era of increasing accountability, Show us the Money aims to hold donors responsible to basic health and human rights standards in their policies, programmes, and funding streams.

According to the report, whereas issues around violence against women may be acknowledged in HIV policy documents of major donors, such a focus is often absent from programming on the ground. HIV programme efforts rarely cite violence against women and girls as a major driver and consequence of the disease, nor measure its occurrence statistically. Separate funding streams for each create an ineffective and dysfunctional split in intervention efforts, which do little to address the root causes of either pandemic. Furthermore, it is almost impossible to track resources targeting their intersection, as none of these donors specifically track their programming for and funding to violence eradication efforts within their HIV and AIDS portfolios.

Having assessed the gaps in policy, programming and funding on the intersection, the campaign developed key demands of bilateral, multilateral and technical agencies; and national governments:
• Prominently, publicly and consistently underscore that violence against women and girls is a major driver and consequence of HIV&AIDS
• Significantly increase current funding for programmes to prevent and redress violence against women and girls in addition to broader and increased investment in sexual and reproductive health and rights
• Establish concrete targets on the elimination of violence against women and girls as a part of the Universal Access Process
• Achieve universal access to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health services by 2010; and rapidly scale up integrated SRHR and HIV services
• Achieve universal access to PMTCT+ services by 2010 by fully supporting and funding national PMTCT+ plans
• Expand training to 50% of all health care service providers by 2008 (with particular attention to those providing PMTCT) to recognize and respond to the signs and symptoms of violence as a routine part of HIV&AIDS testing, treatment, care and support, rising to 80% by 2010.
• Rapidly and massively scale up education about and the provision of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) and emergency contraception to survivors of sexual violence. These services should be available on demand at 50% of each country’s emergency care facilities by 2008, rising to 80% by 2010.
• Rapidly expand the distribution of female controlled prevention methods, including the distribution of the male and female condoms to women, men and transgender people. These services should be available on demand to 50% of all requesting it by 2008, rising to 80% by 2010.
• PMTCT+ services should be available on demand to 80% of those in need of PMTCT+ by 2008, rising to universal access to PMTCT+ services by 2010.
• Anti-violence education programmes operating in all communities where gender-based violence occurs.

Overall, the first year of the campaign has been a productive one; with several of the agencies we reviewed having taken bold steps toward making their operations more “gender-sensitive.” It is hoped that “gender-sensitivity” for these agencies includes a complex analysis and consistent effort to grapple with the intersection of HIV and violence against women and girls. The most significant steps were taken by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (and its effort to engage in a more gender-sensitive response to the three diseases) and UNAIDS. Indeed, among the agencies we reviewed, UNAIDS was the only one to introduce new activities specifically designed to confront violence against women and girls in the context of the HIV pandemic by including violence against women in their the 2005-2008 estimation of the Global Resource Needs.

We hope that other agencies will follow their lead in recognizing this dangerous synergy and taking action. Moreover, while we welcome the positive changes in policy and programming, one of the central problems identified in Show Us the Money remains: the means of measuring, tracking and quantifying support to violence against women and girls within HIV portfolios continues to lag far behind policy and programming efforts.

The waiting must end. Women’s movements throughout the world have long fought for concrete action to promote and protect the human rights of all women – including the rights to be free from violence, coercion, stigma and discrimination, and the right to achieve the highest attainable standard of health, including sexual and reproductive health. However, this global standard is rarely translated into policy and practice. In the case of the links between violence against women and girls and HIV, resulting in a deadly failure in policy and an abrogation of governments’ and donors’ accountability to respect, protect and fulfil the human rights of all.

Linda Osarenren writes a hard hitting essay on the ways and means African cultures perpetuate sexism, patriarchy and violence against women

INTRODUCTION

The Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices IAC is an international network NGO and works in 28 African countries through its National Committees (NCs). It has 16 Group Sections in Europe, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and USA.

The Vision of IAC is to see a society in which African women and girls fully enjoy their human rights to live free from harmful traditional practices (HTPs).

The Mission is to contribute to the improvement of the health status, Human Rights and quality of life of the African women and children through elimination of harmful traditional practices and promotion of beneficial ones.

Documented evidences, observations and statements confirm that millions of women and girls world-wide are systematically subjected to violence in the name of tradition and respect for culture and identity.

Even the worst forms of violence continue to be tolerated as inevitable and women bear life-threatening acts with apathy and silence as part of their tradition.

The prevailing patriarchal system built on the ignorance and economic vulnerability of women encourages and preserves practices that are gruesome in order to subjugate women.

The socializing process of boys and girls is constructed to instill a feeling of inferiority and fear in girls and women and this process is fiercely guarded as part of Tradition maintained for social cohesion.

While this reality is a world-wide phenomenon what vary are the degree of gravity and forms of suppression from community to community. If we take the practice of female genital mutilation and the justification advanced, the picture presents itself as follows:

FGM is practiced for reasons such as:

- Preservation of virginity
- Avoid promiscuity
- Ensure fidelity in marriage
- Social integration and to be marriageable.

All these reasons show the constituted norms of social relationship between men and women. As a result of internalized value system, women have, for far too long, accepted FGM.

Female Genital Mutilation and all other harmful traditional practices are addressed in Article 5 of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa”.

FORMS OF TRADITIONALLY CONDONED VIOLENCE AGAINST WONEN AND GIRLS INCLUDE:

PREFERENCE OF SONS OVER DAUGHTERS:

The preference of a male child over a female is violence against girls in Africa within the family. Son preference is favoritism towards male children with concomitant disregard for daughters. This discrimination in many cases occurs before the birth of a girl-child.

For a young couple in some African communities prayers for fecundity would either wish for sons only or for “sons and daughters” with sons taking precedence over daughters. It is always “sons and daughters”, never “daughters and sons”.

At the first sign of pregnancy, a woman receives unsolicited prayers from her family-in-law for the safe delivery of a baby boy. Many husbands on their part secretly or overtly express to have a male child as the first-born. Inadvertently the expectant woman would also wish for a male child as her first born in response to attitudes and behaviors that reinforce women’s subordination.

Scientific data on the prevalence of son preference is difficult to obtain. According to WHO countries in Africa where son preference is most apparent are Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, Cameroon, Liberia, Senegal and Madagascar. Oppressive patriarchy and male dominance in all African societies mean that in all countries, there is some form of son preference and discrimination against girls.
Although cases of female foeticide, infanticide and sex-selective abortion are not common in Africa, couples desiring sons have been known to adopt the billings method to ensure the conception of sons.

The roots causes of son preference among African families include he social roles ascribed to men and to women. Sons are preferred in order to perpetuate the family name while a girl loses her identity with marriage. Even in societies where girls retain their fathers’ names in marriage, son preference is still the norm. The responsibility for the care of aging parents often falls to sons who also perform their parents’ burial rites. Thus not having a son is a source of vulnerability for parents while having daughters only is a social stigma.

The effects of son preference ripple into other spheres such as nutrition and education. In the traditional African homes sons would be given better food than daughters and are more likely to be enrolled in schools and encouraged to finish. When funds are short, a girl is likely to be withdrawn from schools so as to make allowance for a son to be educated irrespective of whether the girl is naturally intelligent and the son is dull.

A mother who has had four daughters consecutively is likely to keep on bearing more children than initially planned hoping to have a son, with the attendant consequences of high parity on mother and siblings.

Son preference reinforces a girl’s low self worth, low self-esteem, depression and eventual low productivity in adulthood.

- LIP PLATE:

Girls and women in parts of Ethiopia wear lip plates for protection and marriageability. In some cases, the hole is so big that it can pass through the head of the woman.

- TROKOSI:

Young girls are given to fetish shrines, forced under threat of death to live as domestic and sex slaves. They are girls paying for crimes they did not commit, crimes linked to family members who committed petty offense generations ago before the girls were born. (Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria)

- WORKLOAD ON WOMEN AND GIRLS:

In almost all of African homes, household chores and care-giving fall almost exclusively on the shoulders of daughters and their mothers. Hardly do sons participate equally in domestic work. Girls take on household and care giving tasks in addition to or instead of going to school.

A typical house-help (a girl) would rise very early and retire last and go late to bed. On top of this, the house girl is scolded or beaten fairly regularly for any misdemeanor in addition to receiving very poor or no pay for her services. The poor, harsh treatment and forced labour constitute violence against girls in the family.

Women without house helps take on these duties, giving care at home while working full time in offices outside of the home. Overburdening of women and girls take a toll on their health and social life.

- FORCED FEEDING:

Young girls are fed by force to make them gain weight, and obese to be attractive to husbands who consider this as beauty. The health consequences include hypertension, malformation of the bones and diabetes. (Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Mali. In some communities, relatives, to make women who have newly given birth, gain weight and “be healthy” feed her forcibly.

- VIRGINITY TESTING:

In order to present a woman as a virgin on her wedding day, she is subjected to pressure and put under control by her family in obedience to the norms of the society. However a man is free and never made to be tested for virginity. A virgin woman on the first night of marriage is respected while the non-virgin is shamed and sometimes returned to her family (Somalia).

- WIDOWHOOD AND WIFE INHERITANCE:

At the death of a husband accusing fingers are pointed at the widow suspecting her of being the cause of death directly or indirectly. She is compelled to undergo certain rites some of which could be very harsh and dehumanizing. Besides, at end of the rituals she could be forcefully inherited against her will. Articles 20 and 21 of the Protocol address this harmful tradition.

- FORCED CHILD MARRIAGE:

Child marriage is “any marriage carried out below the age of 18 years before the girl is physically, psychologically and physiologically ready to shoulder the responsibilities of marriage and childbearing” (Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices-IAC).

The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights sets 18 years as the minimum age of marriage in Article 6 (b)

All child marriages including abduction for purposes of marriage are invariably forced and violate the right of a girl to choose her spouse.

The prevalence of child marriage in all of Africa is difficult to determine. In some selected countries such as Mali, Mozambique, Niger and Chad the prevalence of child marriage is between 70 and 80 percent (DHS 1996 – 2001 cited in child marriage Hotspots).

In some African communities girls are betrothed in infancy and married as early as 7 years. Young adolescents are abducted and forcibly married while others have their marriages arranged by their fathers and given to much older men. In Ethiopia in a study conducted among 227 wives, 60% said they were abducted before 15 and 93% before age 20. (UN OCHA/IRIN Publication 2005 page 64.)

Child marriage is violence against girls. Marriage automatically imposes the status and responsibilities of an adult on a young girl thus denying her the protection of childhood by family members and community.

Poverty and ignorance seem to be the main reasons for child marriage where parents desire material gain in form of bride price. Other motives include controlling a girl’s sexuality, curbing promiscuity and out- of -wedlock pregnancy. Child marriage and abduction are forms of gender-based violence with multiple consequences. Some of these are sexual assaults due to the power inequities between older husbands and child brides. These girls also stand the risk of physical violence from their husbands and in-laws.

Pregnancy, childbirth and childcare are risks and burdens for any married under-aged girl. Fistula is closely linked with obstructed labour during child bearing among girls between 10 and 15 years of age. In Ethiopia where child marriage is prevalent, doctors at the Fistula hospital in Addis Ababa operate on approximately 1,200 girls a year (UNICEF report 2001).

Child marriage denies a girl of formal education and self-development with all the benefits accompanying good education. Victims of child married are often invariably trapped in a cycle of poverty and low self-esteem for life.

Unfortunately legislative provisions in some countries such as Algeria, Chad, Libya, allows a rapist to be pardoned if he marries his victim even if victim is a minor. Abduction of minors where men consummate the marriage with rape is permitted in some rural settings in Ethiopia irrespective of the legal provisions outlawing abduction.

- FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION:

Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) encompasses “all procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural or other non-therapeutic reasons.” (WHO 1995).

According to UNICEF estimate, about 140 million women and girls have undergone FGM worldwide, and a further 2 million girls are at risk of undergoing the procedure every year.

There is no specific prevalence rate for all of Africa. However the Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices (IAC) has documented evidence of the prevalence of FGM in 28 African countries. The national prevalence rate in Africa varies from approximately 5 percent in Uganda to over 90 percent in Somalia.

Whatever the type of FGM practiced, the sustaining factor is gender inequality, a desire by society to subjugate women and control their sexuality in the name of desirable tradition. Thus FGM is clearly one of the most obnoxious traditionally condoned violence against girls in the family and society. A female circumciser in Kenya sums up the main reason behind FGM thus: -

“When you cut a girl, you know she will remain pure until she gets married, and that after marriage, she will be faithful…. But when you leave a girl uncut, she sleeps with any man in the community”.

All other reasons advanced for FGM including mysticism, spirituality and linking it with Islam are additional reinforcement to sustain the practice and be acceptable to prospective suitors. Thus women for the benefit of men uphold FGM. These are the social factors of acceptability as well as economic factors for the benefit of the circumcisers and the parents whose circumcised girls attract higher bride price.

Perhaps another silently sustaining factor is political. In some communities, the votes of women circumcisers can be a crucial deciding factor in the success of a political candidate. Thus some government hierarchies are unwilling to talk against FGM and instead dine and wine with circumcisers.

The consequences of FGM could be immediate causing bleeding; infection and death while the long-term effect include urinary tract infection, infertility, psychosexual malfunction and likelihood of HIV transmission.

The desires to restrain a girl’s sexuality have blinded practitioners to the consequences of FGM. Attempts to ameliorate the health hazard have led to “medicalizatiion” of FGM whereby orthodox health personnel undertake the operation in hygienic environment, using sterilized instruments.

FGM is a violation of the human rights of girls who ought to be protected against any bodily harm by the State as demanded in many relevant international legal instruments including the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa’.

HOW IAC ADDRESSES FGM AND OTHER HARMFUL TRADITIONAL PRACTICES:

IAC applies different entry points using holistic and integrated approach in its campaign against FGM and other harmful traditional practices. These methods include:

- Training: of trainers, of peer educators, legal bodies, traditional birth attendants, media professionals, curriculum developers
- Information and Sensitization: raising awareness among different target groups
- Advocacy and Lobbying: with policy makers, legislators, religious leaders, community leaders, and traditional rulers.
- Empowerment of women and ex-circumcisers through micro credit and vocational training.
- Service provision for victims and would-be victims of harmful traditional practices (HTPs)
- Research: on different aspects of FGM and HTPs for better program planning

VISIBLE PARADIGM SHIFT:

We have recorded measurable impact since IAC’c programs to eliminate FGM and other HTPs began. At national/community Level:

- Youth stand up against FGM
- Excisors lay down their knives to take up alternative means of income generation
- Religious leaders openly condemn FGM
- Women join hands against FGM and make public declarations against the practice
- There is legislation in 16 countries

AT REGIONAL LEVEL:

- Adoption and ratification of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of women in Nov. 2005. (Articles 2, 5, 6, 20 address traditional practices)
- Adoption of the Solemn Declaration by AU Heads of States and Governments in July 2004

AT INTERNATIONAL LEVEL:

- The UN General Assembly Declaration
- Resolution of the UN Commission on Human Rights
- Appointment of Special Rapporteurs on (a) Violence Against Women (b) Harmful Traditional Practices (HTPs)
- EU expression of concern about FGM and other HTPs

THE WAY FORWARD:

In order to mobilize communities against FGM and other harmful traditional practices, IAC in 2003, organized an international conference on Zero Tolerance to FGM to share experiences, synthesize actions among all key players in the campaign and to devise forward-looking strategies to address the FGM phenomenon and other traditionally condoned violence against girls and women. Going by the Millennium Development Goals, the target date for elimination is 2015.

The International Conference adopted February 6 as the international day on Zero Tolerance to FGM as well as adopted the Common Agenda for Action.

POLICIES AND INSTRUMENTS:

Violence Against Girls constitutes a fundamental violation of the Human Rights of girls as stipulated in several international Human Rights Instruments: -

1. Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women “States should condemn violence against women and should not invoke any custom, tradition or religious consideration to avoid their obligations with respect to its elimination” (Article 4)
2. Convention on the Rights of the Child “undertake to protect the child from all forms of sexual exploitation and sexual abuse and to take all effective and appropriate measures with a view to abolishing traditional practices prejudicial to the health of children”
3. The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (Articles 2, 5, 6, 20)
4. Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)
5. Provisions by individual countries in Constitutions, legislations, Penal codes among other measures.
6. The UN general Assembly Declarations and resolutions of the Commission on Human Rights
7. Legislations and Penal codes in several countries

CONCLUSION:

Legal provisions have not proved to be sufficient deterrents. Therefore, considerable attention should be given to raising awareness among girls, families, and communities

Governments should take compulsory girl-child education as a priority. This would on the long run alleviate much of the poverty that is at the root cause of most of the gender-based violence suffered by girls. On the whole, men need periodic training and refresher courses on gender and power relations.

“Putting an end to gender-based violence will bring us that much closer to a stage of human social development in which the rights, responsibilities and opportunities of individuals will not be determined by the fact of being born male or female. The goal is to create a world where all people regardless of gender are free to achieve their full potential” (Broken bodies, broken dreams, UN OCHA/IRIN publication 2005).

*Linda Osarenren is a Senior Program Officer at the Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices (IAC).

**Please send comments to or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

Una Kumba Thompson talks about the special challenges facing Liberian women and calls for greater solidarity amongst African women.

For over two years Africa and the world has seen and witnessed the rise and fall of Liberia. Starting from the 1800s with the arrival of free slaves to the shores of West Africa, leading to the declaration and independence of Liberia in July 26, 1847.
 
Since that time, Liberia has served as a beacon of hope for Africa, until 1980 when this “proclaimed” peaceful country experienced its first calamity of a bloody coup de tait. The country thereafter degenerated into anarchy and chaos, with rampant corruption, human rights abuses and bad governance as its hall mark. 

1990 civil war was the final result of one hundred and forty years of rule of successive governments. It is estimated that over 250.000 Liberians and other nationals died in this crisis; including raping of women/girls, sporadic killing, execution of civilians and destruction of millions of dollars of property, infrastructure and a complete break down of the rule of Law.  Liberia became a “no mans” land with its people fleeing and seeking refugee in various African, European countries including America; thousands languishing in refugee camps. The once beloved nation, one that African countries strived to emulate had become a sad story. 

Just as everything must come to an end, so it was that the civil crisis came to an end in 2003.The ushering in of another interim government with the support of regional and international organizatons, countries lead the process of the general elections of Liberia.

The election of 2005 saw again the transformation of Liberia, setting once more a record in African history as the first African country to elect a woman as their President H.E Ellen Johnson – Salieaf.  

Liberia is once again on the rise, showing to Africa and the world at large that indeed women are capable of leading their nations. African women as well as Liberian women are now singing the song “this is our time” while African men are now realizing that times have changed and that women also can be Heads of state.  

Fingers are pointing to, heads are turning towards, and eyes are focused on Liberian not in pity but in admiration- setting the pace once more for true democracy  in the African continent.

DEFINING A NEW ERA FOR LIBERIAN WOMEN

Liberian women have felt the tied of woes over the years, paid the price of successes, failures in blood, tears, sacrifice even unto death. Their sufferings are untold, their numerous contributions, yet not recorded. 

Today, Liberian women are more conscious of their rights to political, social and economic inclusion and their significant contributions. It is in recognition of these rights that their issues are identified in order to correct the wrongs and rebuild Liberia for sustainable and lasting peace. 

There are many issues that women are faced with in Liberia that were never considered National issues, but norms of the society and community. This orientation is a major cause of women marginalization, discrimination, exclusion and human rights abuse. 

Some of the prevalent issues that are of grave concern are; Gender Based Violence (GBV) { rape, domestic violence, Sexual exploitation), Harmful Cultural practices, particularly FGM, the lack of marketable vocational and technical skills, illiteracy and access to Justice. 

Before the civil war, women/girls were seen as sex objects, to provide sex for the pleasure of men be it by coercion, force, exploitation, mutual agreement or violence. Sexual abuse was never a topic to be discussed in private or public. The Liberian government and society perpetuated a culture of violence against women that saw the escalation of rampant sexual abuse against women and girls during the war. Even though the guns are silent, women and girls continue to suffer sexual violence. 

The lack of political will to implement laws to protect women/girls and the acceptance of harmful cultural practices,( FGM, beatings, killings, arranged child manages, incest, rape, dowry or bride price) are major contributing factors to the high rate of illiteracy, violence and vulnerability of women in Liberia. 

For this and many other reasons, WOLPNET- Women of Liberia Peace Network, a non political, governmental organization, has joined the vanguard to promote women’s rights and to advocate for the adherence to and implementation of national conventions such as the AU Protocol to support, protect and enhance women social economic, civil, liberty and political development. 

With the collaboration and financial support from regional and international organizations, WOLPNET is engaging communities, public and policy makers through its program/projects to sensitize and highlight these issues affecting women Advocating for change in policy, ending violence against women, elimination of harmful cultural practices (Female Genital Mutilation), right to dignity, life, and integrity. 

Through its media program, Women Agenda, WOLPNET is spreading the message of positive change; a change that is transforming and defining politics in Liberia; a change that must also be realized in the lives of women by the elimination of vices that impede women progress, calling for full implementation of; Article 2 elimination of discrimination against women ,Article ¾ rights to dignity, life integrity and security of the person Article 8, Access to justice and equal protection before the law by the AU Protocol on Human and peoples rights on the right of women in Africa. 

To my sisters and women, I urge you to say no to male supremacy, superiority, political domination, exclusion, discrimination and Violence against Women (VAW). Stand for peace, justice, equality and unity.  

The road is rocky and very rough right now, but my sisters, it has been for a long time before now. Like Liberian women, you have been excluded, abused, misused, disgraced, discriminated against and persecuted. 

Nevertheless, stand firm. Liberian women can do it you can do the same .Do not go down but stand up fighting for women’s right; your bodies may be broken but do not allow you sprit and minds to be broken. Remember, many are called but few are chosen- to lead the cause for justice and equality.   

*Una Kumba Thompson is CEO of Women of Liberia Peace Network (WOLPNET).

**Please send comments to or comment online at www.pambazuka.org
                       

The East African sub-regional women's collective calls for a comprehensive peace plan that is cognizant of how violence affects women.

We, members of the regional women’s voices for peace initiative from Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Somalia, Tanzania and Uganda gathered here in Nairobi on the 15th February 2008 bring women’s voices and solidarity messages to the people of Kenya. We take cognizance of the exceptional suffering that has been meted out on the most vulnerable members of the population especially women and children. We know what war can do to a country and its people, and we urge Kenyans to stop the actions that will take the country down that road.

We renounce the violence that erupted across Kenya following the election in December 2007. As women many of us have suffered with different experiences of violence and war in various countries in the region. We are aware that in Kenya women have been widowed, buried children, been raped and witnessed the rape of daughters. As women of the region, we express our deep pain, grief and shock at the unfortunate retrogression in the political situation in Kenya. As mothers we are tired of violence and war, Africa is suffering. Enough is enough!

We also recognize that the youth who are paying the ultimate sacrifice are our children and the future hope of the nation and continent. We also recognize that large numbers of people are now displaced from their homes and land. Many of these are women who have endured gender based violence and lost access to basic care, medicines and food supplies.

We appreciate the on-going mediation processes and urge the parties involved to look beyond the immediate political interests and take into consideration the interests of all Kenyans.

The regional women’s voices for peace initiative is concerned that while the broad issues of democratization, human rights and business interests may be addressed in ongoing efforts to finding a solution to the crisis; it is important to articulate women’s voices on the effect and impact of the crisis and the search for solutions.

Recommendations:

We hereby call for:

1. A total end to the violence, including addressing the underlying and deep rooted causes of the conflict,

2. Medical, humanitarian and psychosocial support to female victims of sexual and gender based violence,

3. Speedy political settlement including the active implementation of UNSCR Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security, the AU Peace and Security Protocol, the EAC Treaty provisions on peace and security and the Great Lakes Conference on Peace and Security,

4. Political and legal reforms that will bring on board women in political leadership and other high-level positions of governance,

5. Truth, justice and reconciliation mechanisms and other national healing processes,

6. Retributive justice including compensation that pays attention to the special circumstances of women.

7. East African Community and other regional blocs to seriously address the Kenya issue which has the potential to jeopardize the regional integration process.

We call upon the people of Kenya, to desist from acts of violence, promote tolerance and peaceful co-existence. The instruments of peace will be the people of Kenya themselves.

*Please send comments to or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/352/we-remember.jpgWith presidential elections in Zimbabwe just around the corner, Patrick Bond and Grace Kwinjeh look at who the national, regional and international players are, and consider various people-centered alternatives.

INTRODUCTION

The March 29 election in Zimbabwe is very likely to result in Robert Mugabe winning, by hook or by crook, a slim 50%+ majority, so as to avoid a run-off. In the last presidential election, in 2002, his main opponent Morgan Tsvangirai – leader of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions from 1988-99, but subsequently also supported by business and most Western governments - officially received just 40% of the vote.

Massive irregularities – such as far fewer urban polling stations - were noted by all honest observers, and the pre-election playing field was skewed by lack of a free press, Tsvangirai's frame-up on a bogus treason charge, and his party's inability to campaign peacefully in many regions. He nearly certainly won, but was cheated out of a democratic, peaceful regime change supported by most progressives in civil society.

Since then, core degenerative dynamics have included economic rot, sustained political repression, and two important splits in the dominant parties, Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZanuPF) and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)-Tsvangirai.

THE MDC AND ZANU-PF INTERNAL SPLITS

The first split was when in October 2005, key officials of the MDC – led by secretary-general Welshman Ncube and Vice President Gibson Sibanda – broke away a small faction of supporters, due to what they claimed was Tsvangirai's ‘dictatorial style’. The catalyst was Tsvangirai's insistence on boycotting Mugabe's new Senate. Ironically, in this election MDC-Tsvangirai has posted candidates for the Senate.

A brand new leader was chosen for the breakaway group, Dr Arthur Mutambara, formerly a firebrand student leader opposed to Mugabe's early 1990s structural adjustment program and state corruption, who subsequently studied at Oxford and Michigan, and by the mid-2000s moved back to the region, to take a job at Johannesburg's Standard Bank.

An effort to rejoin the two factions failed when MDC-Tsvangirai demanded too many parliamentary seats in MDC-Mutambara's Matabeleland heartland, according to the latter. Then Mutambara dropped out of the presidential race once a brand new candidate – from the ruling party (the first substantial defection since 1990) – jumped in to challenge Mugabe on February 5.

In Zanu PF's case, the split may yet become serious, but now amounts to just renegade former finance minister Simba Makoni, a long-term favourite of neoliberal forces internal and external. By early March, only two other major ruling party figures, former revolutionary Dumiso Dabengwa and parliamentary leader Cyril Ndebele, publicly supported him. Makoni hoped for backing by the powerful couple Solomon and Joyce Mujuru (Zimbabwe's vice-president), not only failed to materialise, but Joyce then endorsed Mugabe to most observers' surprise.

Although she was once tipped as his successor, a different faction in ZanuPF led by Emmerson Mnangagwa is expected to reign once Mugabe finally retires.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/352/46561.jpg COST OF MUGABE’S REIGN

But the damage done in the meantime, including the coming weeks of violent electioneering, will be extreme.

For example, the economic contradictions of running a growing patronage-based regime with a rapidly declining Gross Domestic Product are felt mainly in the inflation rate. Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono made a stunning revelation in January: 67 trillion Zimbabwean dollars (US$33 million at the then effective exchange rate) were in circulation but could not be traced inside the financial system.

The banks had only Z$2 trillion cash on hand. Said Gono, "The rest of the money is with cash barons who have opened mini-central banks at their houses. Unfortunately the people doing that are influential citizens with leadership positions."

One accused was the former chairperson of the Finance Portfolio Committee in Parliament, David Butau, who escaped to Britain. Butau's rebuttal was that he was about to make a stunning revelation of "shady deals" by the central bank: "Gono should publish all the payments he made to Flatwater, to Michigan as well as declare how he bought shares in Doves." At least Z$7 trillion is estimated to have been captured by these shady shell companies in recent months.

Instead of coming to grips with cronyism, Gono's solution is to print infinite numbers of Z$, using expensive imported German paper. With inflation rising far beyond the 100,000% level, amongst the highest recorded in world history, there are only a few areas Zimbabweans can dump money into so as not to see it evaporate instantly: hard currency, real estate, local stock market shares and durable consumer goods.

As a result of the cash shortage thus caused, a large proportion of Zimbabweans suffered the Christmas and New Year holiday break without access to money. The shortages of cash and basic goods – electricity, clean water, petrol, most medicines, many foodstuffs - epitomises the freefall of a once quite prosperous site for a largish middle class.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/352/46561cartoon.jpgMeanwhile the tiny, kleptocratic ruling elite grew wealthy at the expense of the vast majority of people, as unemployed soared to more than 80%. Life expectancy for an average Zimbabwean dropped to 32 and 37 years for females and males respectively, and AIDS medicines that were once available have become scarce. The education system faces near total collapse.

Without growing electricity supplies, there is little hope of an upturn. Mozambique's Hidroelectrica de Cahora Bassa power utility recently suspended supplies over an outstanding debt of US$26 million. The South African parastatal Eskom cut Zimbabwe's power supply when in January regular 'load-shedding' electricity shortages hit home.

As for the durable political repression faced by any opposition politician or civil society activist, anyone brave enough could have remarked upon Mugabe's monomaniacal and extremely violent tendencies from at least 1982, not long after the country`s liberation from white-ruled Rhodesia. Over the subsequent four years, the Matebeleland region witnessed the North Korean-trained Fifth Brigade massacre over 20 000 civilians, mostly of the Ndebele ethnic group.

THE BIRTH OF THE MDC

The West preferred to look the other way, courting Mugabe as an ally in part to persuade the apartheid government to begin gradually deracialising capitalism, the way Zimbabwe was – ever so gradually. By 1989, whites still received 97% of bank loans, though they were 3% of the population; during the 1990s white control of land actually grew thanks to liberalisation and lower state spending.

As the World Bank and International Monetary Fund began screw-tightening from 1984, intensifying the loan flows and neoliberal pressure in 1991, Zimbabwe's once impressive expansion of health clinics and schools, the development of a state-based middle- and lower-middle-class, and the sustenance of the inherited vibrant manufacturing sector, all waned.

Then the inevitable IMF Riots began in the early 1990s, growing in intensity and numbers of aggrieved constituencies until 1997. That year Mugabe began the political and economic zigzagging for which he is now famous. There were new patronage payments to liberation war veterans following embarrassing protests, and a new war against Democratic Republic of the Congo rebels (with Mugabe propping up Laurent Kabila), whose high costs were offset by army elite accumulation.

Alongside deep structural economic rot, the fiscal drain and threats of radical land reform led to a late 1997 currency crash. In 2000, after losing a referendum on a new Constitution, Mugabe authorised the war vets to invade white farmers' properties (some inherited from Rhodesian days but a large share paid for in cash since liberation in 1980 after the state declined its first option to buy), causing a substantial agricultural sector collapse. By then, too, corruption was so well entrenched that inevitably, civil society turned to alternative organisations for political inspiration. A Working People's Convention in 1999 mandated the trade unions to form a new party, and the MDC was born.

Was the MDC born free? Or free-market? By early 2000, it appeared the white business elite had captured the MDC, as economic spokesperson Eddie Cross promised the privatisation of "everything", including the schools. In subsequent years a more explicitly social-democratic ideology was adopted. But how deep?

In July 2007, for example, the first drafts of the MDC's 2008 electoral programme were shown to neoliberal officials of the Cato Institute in Washington; in contrast, it was only at last month's launch that Zimbabwean civil society got its first glance at the quite uninspired manifesto. Makoni's is just as vapid. And Mugabe's will change nothing.

SOUTH AFRICA: WHOSE FRIEND? WHOSE FOE?

Some may conclude, then, that the March 29 election is only interesting from the standpoint of personalities operating within preconstrained 20th century paradigms (nationalism and neoliberalism), with little or no mass popular content or appeal. And after all, nearly all the prior contested elections – since 1990 - have been marked by rigging, state sponsored violence, and repressive legislation curtailing media and political freedoms.

For this, plus sustained repressive behaviour, Mugabe and more than 100 top officials face Western personalised "smart sanctions" - travel bans and account freezes – as well as an arms embargo. China and Russia subsequently became much more important trading partners.

But one major regional supporter of Mugabe continues to have influence: South African president Thabo Mbeki. Although displaced as African National Congress president by Jacob Zuma in December, and although Zuma's labour backers hate Mugabe and expect him to shift tack, there was no apparent change in the nurturing of the Zimbabwean dictatorship from Pretoria in subsequent weeks. South African officials continued to hope and "expect" a "free and fair election".

Mbeki had gained a mandate from regional governments to mediate the Zimbabwe crisis in March 2007, and managed to sucker both MDC-Tsvangirai and MDC-Mutambara into endless talks that gained superficial legislative changes. Late last year, amendments were made to the Electoral Act and the Access to Information and Privacy Act, but there is still no free press and highly constrained ability to even campaign for the coming election.

Worse, Mugabe unilaterally announced the 29 March election date, which the MDC desperately wanted postponed until June so as to vet the now-corrupted voters' roll and also gain more media and non-violent campaigning space. It was clear the Mbeki negotiations were a stalling and divide-and-conquer tactic, and that this worked to raise hopes of internal reform in the two MDC camps.

WHAT ARE THE ALTERNATIVES?

In the context of recent upheavals rocking Kenya over disputed elections, can Zimbabwe afford another stolen poll? Unfortunately, there may be insubstantial protests from the political elites who lose. A top official of MDC-Tsvangirai, Johannesburg-based former member of parliament Roy Bennett, specifically called on the party's constituents not to hit the streets, though he suggested no other recourse than more talks.

And the smaller MDC-Mutumbara seems able to stomach any level of state repression in the interests of elite participation, a matter embarrassingly obvious when Makoni snubbed Mutumbara's attempt at an alliance last month - yet the latter still endorsed the former.

In short, what was once a united opposition, one strong enough to defeat Mugabe's sponsored Constitutional proposals in a 2000 Referendum, is now deeply fractured, but on personality not substantive lines.

And sadly, a good many of those who might have insisted on the MDCs putting petty squabbling over trivial spoils behind them, in search of a common platform to not only dismiss Mugabe's government but generate a real socio-economic alternative, are no longer in Zimbabwe. A huge exodus of young Zimbabweans, the cream of the country's talent and literally millions of its hardest workers, have emigrated, desperate for survivalist opportunities further a field.

Thousands based in central Johannesburg, some have found refuge in Bishop Paul Verryn's Central Methodist Church. At any one time, says Verryn, he has 200 teachers sleeping on the church floor: "They are amongst the best teachers in Africa, Zimbabwe, until recently, has had the highest rate of literacy in Africa."

The Johannesburg metro police arrived on February 7 at midnight to arrest 1500 Zimbabweans, alleging they were illegal aliens. Police captain Bheki Mavundla bragged of his "sustainable crime-combat operations" aimed at "eradicating criminal elements from the district and building". In fact only 15 were found not to have papers, and thankfully this new version of apartheid-style "swart gevaar" – the Afrikaner's notorious fear of black immigration to the cities – was widely condemned in what is usually a quite xenophobic South African society.

Some like senate candidate, torture victim and war veteran Sekai Holland see hope in the latest political developments: "However most Zimbabweans are finally forced by this bad situation to talk to one another across all political divides, to find common ground to move on and build the country together. Mugabe continues to ignore these developments. It is a dangerous time, yet it is also a time of great opportunity if this current mood to work together continues,"

This leaves us to search for the main wellspring of hope for a Zimbabwean recovery within those courageous civil society forces who remain. In early February, reminiscent of the Working People's Convention nine years earlier, more than 5000 representatives of activist groups gathered for the National People's Convention. Key groups included the trade unions, Women of Zimbabwe Arise, the National Students Union, National Constitutional Assembly, Christian Alliance, Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, and Lawyers for Human Rights.

The Peoples Charter adopted touched on many issues, ranging from constitutional reform, gender, elections, national economy- but the most fundamental statement to come out of this gathering was the resolve: “And hereby further declare that never again shall we let lives be lost, maimed, tortured or traumatised by the dehumanising experiences of political intolerance, violence and lack of democratic government.”

*Professor Patrick Bond is the Director of the Durban based Centre for Civil Society and Grace Kwinjeh is a South-African based Zimbabwean journalist.

**Please send comments to or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

On Thursday our members of parliament will be formally called to national duty to bring to life the Harambee House Accord. Our members of parliament should not be left alone in that duty. As citizens we are also called to national duty.

First is to be informed. The mediators of Kenya's political crisis have set up a web site with links to all the agreements so far, statements and other material that is informative.

The web site is

Many of us publicly celebrated the signing of the Harambee House Accord, but our members of parliament have been uncharacteristically silent. Between now and when debate on the Harambee House Accord begins they will need encouragement to avoid selfishness, narrow party interests and visualise the national interest. As citizens, it is our national duty to provide that encourage, remind our parliamentary leaders that this is not just about them. It is about all of us.

For instance, the Serena Accord of 1st February, 2008 calls for politicians of different persuasions to hold joint rallies to advocate peace. A few were held the day and weekend that accord was announced. Then what happened?

The Serena Accord also states that militias need to be demobilised and disarmed. But it does not say who should do this or when this should begin or end.

But our focus as citizens should not be limited to the Annan-mediated accords.

For example, under the arrangement elaborated in the accords, there is not going to be a significant opposition in parliament. So who will act as a check on the government? Ensure that what the politicians have agreed to is implemented? As citizens we will be required to be more vigilant than before.

In the months to voting day, lots of questions were raised about the type of political parties we have. The chaotic nominations of parliamentary and civic candidates prompted many of those questions. The general sense was, "Well, that is politics for you". It doesn't have to be that way. And there's a possible answer: the Political Parties Bill.

It was passed by parliament in November and is waiting for the assent of President Mwai Kibaki. The importance of this bill is it proposes to steer our political parties to become mature organizations that are responsive to their members and have a national agenda.

For a detailed analysis of the bill you can go to http://www.capf.or.ke/document/Political_Parties_Bill_2007.pdf

The National Constitutional Assembly strongly condemns the arrogance being displayed by the Zimbabwean government and President Robert Mugabe for being at liberty to authorize who will come and observe elections this March.

President Mugabe has already hinted that he will invite only his friends and those perceived to be enemies of the state will not be welcome to come and observe.

The Zimbabwean leader was also recently quoted as saying those in the European Union and Commonwealth were not invited to come and observe elections. The NCA is worried that Mugabe is taking his elevating personal feelings about own foes ahead of national interests.

The NCA is worried that because Mugabe had differences with the Commonwealth he is taking those differences to an election which himself is a competitor and dictate who is supposed to come and this contradicts his gospel of patriotism as he is putting personal interests above everything.

Foreign Affairs Minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi told diplomats in Harare on Thursday that the government had selected 47 foreign observer teams, "on the basis of reciprocity, objectivity and impartiality in their relationship with Zimbabwe."

"Clearly, those who believe that the only free and fair election is where the opposition wins, have been excluded since the ruling party, Zanu PF, is poised to score yet another triumph," Mumbengegwi said.

It is the feeling of NCA that such moves by the government already jeopardize chances of those elections being legitimized by the international community and traditional supporters of ZANU PF will obviously endorse the elections as free and fair just like in the past.

NCA wants to notify all concerned in the upcoming 29 polls that the coming elections should not be reduced to a birthday party where only friends are invited but that it is a national election which should be open to scrutiny from diverse societies.

Already signs of rigging are set in place, the voters' roll is in shambles, the delimitation of constituencies was done in a patronage base and these signs coupled with manipulation of state resources for campaign purposes such as the reserve bank, national youth militia to intimidate opposition supporters will even make this election worst and far from being legitimate.

The NCA reiterates its long standing point that only a new people driven democratic constitution in Zimbabwe will make it a point that an Independent Electoral Commission will be responsible for accrediting who comes and observe elections in the country.

Currently the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission which obviously is dominated by ZANU PF stalwarts and sympathizers is failing to independently execute its duties as there is massive interference from the foreign affairs and presidency department.

The NCA calls on SADC, AU and all concerned parties to condemn such activities which are being demonstrated by the Robert Mugabe regime in trying to secure yet another victory through controversial means.

State media said Russia was the only European country invited while 23 African and several Asian nations would also monitor the polls, along with teams from regional economic blocs.

All 13 SADC states (Angola, Malawi, Zambia, Botswana, Namibia, Tanzania, Mozambique, Swaziland, Lesotho, South Africa, Mauritius, DRC and Madagascar) have been invited alongside 10 other African countries, namely Senegal, Algeria, Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, Libya, Uganda, Ethiopia and Sudan.

Five Asian countries -- China, India, Malaysia, Indonesia and Iran -- and four countries from the Americas -- Brazil, Jamaica, Venezuela and Nicaragua -- will observe the elections.

African regional organisations invited are SADC, the African Union, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, NAM, the Economic Community of West African States, Pan African Parliament, Economic Community of Central African States and East African Community.

Among the invited sub-regional organisations are the Africa, Caribbean and the Pacific, Association of South East Asian Nations, MAGREB Union, Community of Portuguese Speaking (Lusophone) Countries and Inter-Governmental Authority on Development.

South Africa has indicated it will send an observer mission with 54 members drawn from government, the parliament, the political opposition and civil society.

*Please send comments to or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

Thank you for this revelatory piece on violence against women in Africa (http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/46280). The contents of the article both horrified me and spurred me to action. I have shared the article with my classmates in my current Media and Gender course.

My opinion is that the movement for women's rights needs to reach the same worldwide fever pitch as the movement for AIDS education or Environmental Protection. I believe this can be accomplished through the coordination of International NGOs, corporations, and governments and law-making organizations.

I believe we could start organizing a benefit walk to raise money for this cause, much like the nationwide walks for breast cancer. My question for you is: when we have money to distribute, what specific organizations should it go to, considering that we need to attack this problem from many angles (education of boys and girls, lobbying for women's political involvement, exposure through media or documentaries, pressure on governments and UN, support for physical and emotional recovery of the women)? What priorities would you delineate in this fight against global femicide?

Often I am content with your atricles, especially when they address substance; however, the recent articles dealing with Kenya's slaughter of many people who were used as pawns by two quislings only to continue filling their coffers and kowtowing to USA imperialist interest - you can do better by exposing the actual interest of the two servile contenders.

cc President Dadis Camara of Guinea is an example of militariat rule in West Africa, writes Jibrin Ibrahim, Director of the Centre for Democracy and Development. Camara has been avoiding elections, with claims for the need to challenge drug networks and end corruption, but, says Ibrahim, this is an agenda to legitimise his rule. The drug networks, Ibrahim suggests, are closely linked to a military ruling class that is kept in place by the state’s high expenditure on the military and its exclusion of ordinary people from politics.

cc Barack Obama's claim that people of colour are ‘90 per cent of the way to equality’ with whites in the US is false, says activist Juan Santos in an interview with Il Manifesto’s Andrea Luchetta. Citing figures on unemployment, poverty and imprisonment, Santos suggests that the US operates under a caste system in which race plays a key part in determining social class. Obama's silence on the question of race in the run-up to the elections was tactical, says Santos – to dare to talk openly about race and oppression would alienate the millions of white centre-right voters whose support he needed to win the election. Racism, says Santos, rewards the powerful: 'They have no reason to stop racism unless its continuance results in a level of resistance that endangers the system of profit itself'.

Zimbabwean activist Prespone Matawira has devised a board game representing the game Zimbabwean women play every day, that of health, life and death.

cc The Group of 20 (G20) is making a big show of getting together to come to grips with the global economic crisis, writes Walden Bello. But here's the problem with the upcoming summit in London on April 2: It's all show. What the show masks, says Bello, is a very deep worry and fear among the global elite that it really doesn't know the direction in which the world economy is heading and the measures needed to stabilise it.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, on a three-nation tour of Western Africa, pledged to break from his predecessors’ “neo-colonial” policies and forge business ties in the region. “We are still being reproached for neo-colonial interference,” Sarkozy said in Brazzaville, the capital of Republic of Congo, where he stopped after visiting the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo. “I’ve already started bringing things back toward greater transparency and common interests.”

cc Zanu PF 'must demonstrate, by concrete positive actions, that it has turned over a new leaf and is now worthy of the nation’s trust' writes human rights lawyer Dewa Mavhinga, as he ponders the importance of trust in human relationships in general and for the future of Zimbabwe in particular, both in terms of the parties to the inclusive government and that government's contract with the country's citizens and the international community.

The lives of Zimbabwean women have deteriorated dramatically over the past decade, writes activist Prespone Matawira, but now is the time to be creative and confront, unpick, challenge patriarchal and capitalist power in order to make lasting change real for women. Feminist consciousness, says Matawira, challenges many of our deep-held assumptions which are not often noticed because they are so pervasive. And its complexity helps us understand other related oppressions based on race, class, age, sexual orientation, and disability.

Salma Maoulidi pays tribute to Khalfani Hemed Khalfan, who died on 28 March 2009. Khalfan, an activist who campaigned primarily for the rights of people with disabilities in Zanzibar through organisation , helped bring about the passage of Tanzania's Disability Act and encouraged participation in civil society more broadly in Zanzibar.

I am delighted to announce the launch of a which will keep you informed about the activities linked to the mandate. It will help you to keep track of developments in the large number of areas which have an impact on the enjoyment of the right to food: international trade and the role of agribusiness; food aid and development cooperation; the rights of land users and access to land; access to inputs for agriculture and intellectual property rights; legislative frameworks implementing the right to food; or the impact of climate change on the right to food.

China’s continuing African trade investment and aid could act as a buffer for African economies, a recent report suggests. And if China can steer its way through the crisis it could become a ‘development partner of choice’, increasing its ‘soft power’ influence in the developing world and acting as a steadying factor in trade and investment compared to the West, writes Stephen Marks.

I truly enjoyed reading . Rory Kilalea is so inspiring. I have been writing short stories of late which I had dismissed as not worthy to develop into a book, but feel inspired. My articles though not yet published touch on the tough life being endured by Zimbabweans and also brutal experiences of the last elections as told by eyewitnesses from my home area, something not to be forgotten for a very long time, in fact the next generation should know what happened during that year of madness so that very madness will not rise its head again. (Midlands State University)

is a crime in itself. As Mamdani shows, simplistic (and inconsistent) responses to the problems of Darfur risk creating deeper crisis not only for the people of Sudan but for available instruments of international justice. As in the Nuremberg trials which placed the lens on Nazi atrocities without addressing the complicities of American and other Western capitalists, without whose collusion the Nazi project would not have advanced to the level it did, the powerful obscure their active role in genocide.

Should the victims of some of the more brutal aspects of Bashir's regime wait for political reform to get justice? I agree and the ICC shouldn't be allowed to administer selective justice. I think the article is however insensitive to those who suffer in conflicts like Darfur, at the hands of the likes of Bashir, even if he's not solely to blame, in saying retribution should wait until their country has experienced sufficient political reform. As the head of state, accountability should start with him. I wonder if the author would feel the same if he'd been directly affected by the conflict. The ICC's execution is far from perfect but surely there must be a way to bring all war criminals to book, be it in the US or elsewhere, that takes into account the political sensibilities of the country involved.

is one of the most coherent and cogent analysis of the current global crisis, its impact on Africa and most important of all, the necessary African response. It is no exaggeration to say that all of us and particularly those of us who aspire to a leadership role in Africa must study this document very, very closely indeed!!! This is no less than a key component of the new econo-political architecture of a 'Liberated, Unified and Transformed Africa!!!

From the 28th March to the 4th April, women and men from all over the world will be in the streets to protest against capitalism and war and to affirm that they will not pay for the crisis. Launched by the Social Movements’ Assembly, that gathered during WSF 2009 in Belem.

The South African Broadcasting Corporation SABC, has produced a remarkable documentary about conditions in Zimbabwean prisons which will be screened nation-wide on Tuesday. Produced by SABC’s Special Assignment team, the film entitled “Hell Hole” takes viewers into Zimbabwe’s prisons – which it ways have become virtual death traps for prisoners.

Israel carried out air strikes in January on a convoy moving through Sudan which it believed to be carrying weapons destined for Hamas in Gaza, according to a report by the US television network CBS. Two Sudanese politicians confirmed that unidentified aircraft targeted the convoy in a remote desert region north-west of Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast.

IGLHRC, Global Rights, INTERIGHTS, ICJ-Kenya and CAL are pleased to announce a call to writers, in the broader sense of the word, to submit pieces of writing of less than a thousand words on the topic LGBT rights are human rights.

Hundreds of African migrants are believed missing after the boats they were using to try to reach Europe capsized on Sunday and Monday. At least 21 bodies have already been recovered, and search-and-rescue operations are ongoing, Libyan officials told Reuters. News agencies, citing Italian media reports, claimed 23 survivors had been recovered. One of the boats was believed to be carrying around 250 passengers, and another had as many as 365.

Madagascar's transitional leader Andry Rajoelina unveiled his new administration Tuesday and immediately froze all mining contracts, defying regional powers who have ordered him to reinstate his toppled predecessor. Rajoelina, who forced president Marc Ravalomanana to step down earlier this month, said he was ordering a review of all mining contracts with foreign firms to ensure greater revenues from drilling and extraction rights.

In the wake of the 2008 global food crisis, African capitals have been buzzing with renewed talk of the need for food self-sufficiency, and rice is often at the top of government agendas. Although everyone agrees on the need to increase production, the solutions coming out of the corridors of power boil down to the tired old formula of getting more fertilisers and “high-yielding” seeds to farmers.

Join us as we seek to remember and celebrate Haiti and its Revolutionary history. We shall remember the slave revolution of 1791-1804 which was the only successful slave revolution in history. In addition we shall seek to create awareness about recent political events in the country such as the kidnapping of Aristide, the disappearance of Pierre- Antoine Lovinsky and the deployment of a United Nations military force (MINUSTAH), actions that were all coordinated by imperialist forces.

In less than one month, South Africans go to the polls to elect a government for the next five years. We have already witnessed pre-election violence in KwaZulu-Natal and legal problems regarding the right of South Africans to vote abroad. While no election proceeds without hitches, the question is whether South Africa is setting a good example for the rest of the continent with the way its elections will be conducted.

As leaders of the world's most productive economies meet in London on Thursday, street activism around the need for poverty alleviation and action on climate change is expected to divert the world's gaze from official proceedings. For African governments and civil society organizations, any diversion which focuses attention on issues of social justice will be welcome.

First there were "blood diamonds," the gems that fueled conflict and human rights abuses in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Then there was "conflict cocoa," the chocolate source that's harvested by children and funds civil war in Ivory Coast. Now concern is rising about the minerals that go into common consumer electronics. Could that be a BloodBerry or a Conflict Cell in your pocket?

China’s contribution to the International Monetary Fund will exceed Japan’s when new quotas are implemented, making it second only to the U.S., under a new formula agreed by the IMF last year, a People’s Bank of China official said. The central bank official, who declined to be identified, told Caijing that the IMF passed a resolution in 2008 to adopt the new formula this year. But the implementation was postponed after G20 finance ministers agreed in London last month conduct the next IMF quota review in 2011, bringing it forward from the original schedule of 2013.

China has agreed to buy bonds issued by the International Finance Corporation, an arm of the World Bank, to help finance trade credit, the People’s Bank of China said. The central bank did not give further details about the transaction in a statement on its website on April 1. The IFC’s new trade finance program “aims to provide liquidity support to financial institutions engaged in trade finance by providing them additional credit lines so as to restore the damaged trade finance channels and to fight the global economic recession triggered by the crisis,” the central bank said.