The Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy are seeking entries from inspirational and innovative local sustainable energy programmes from Asia, Africa and Latin America. Entry is free, and up to six winners will receive £20,000 each in prize money for programme development, with one overall Energy Champion awarded £40,000.

As the ICC prepares to prosecute perpetrators of the 2008 post-election violence in Kenya, Isaac Newton Kinity asks whether the court will view the boys who killed militia to defend the town of Nakuru – and who unwittingly prevented further bloodshed – as heroes or criminals.

Jean Gregoire Sagbo is Russia's newly elected councilman of Novozavidovo, a rural community about 65 miles north of Moscow. Russia is still entrenched in the enigma of racism and plagued with systemic violence. But among the 10,000 residents here, 48-year-old Sagbo, though an immigrant from Benin, is perceived as a Russian who cares about his adopted hometown, reports

The launch of the Decade of the African Woman from 2010-2020 happens this week in Nairobi as delegates at another women's event in Johannesburg have noted that African women continue to be left out of the media. At the first day of the Fourth Annual Gender Links Gender and Media Summit in Johannesburg, the results of the Gender and Media Progress Study (GMPS) were highlighted and the lack of progress since the 2003 Baseline Study was widely discussed.

Only a handful of African governments have so far pledged financial commitment to a planned US$600 million endowment fund to support the activities of the fledgling African Network for Drugs and Diagnostic Innovations (ANDI) initiative - and none have yet paid up. ANDI aims to be the first pan-African health research and development (R&D) network, tackling Africa's diseases with home-grown drugs and diagnostics.

Four NGOs have criticised a social movement for disrupting ordinary life in Cape Town with a protest campaign aimed at highlighting a lack of service delivery in informal settlements. But Abahlali baseMjondolo, which has launched the strike in informal settlements, have responded, saying they have never called for violence and accusing one of the NGOs, the Treatment Action Campaign, of double standards. This post contains the original statement issued by COSATU Khayelitsha, the Treatment Action Campaign the Social Justice Coalition and Equal Education, calling for a rejection of Abahlali baseMjondolo's tactics and a responding statement from Abahlali baseMjondolo.

Land and housing are the most urgent problems in South Africa’s cities, writes S’bu Zikode, but as long as the country pretends that the issue of land is technical and not political, it will not be resolved. The real struggle, says Zikode, is to ‘put the human being at the centre of our society, starting with the most dispossessed, who are the homeless.’

In the latest news involving Africa's engagement with China, India and other emerging powers: Asian giants extend assistance to Ghana; No prominent African politician congratulates Chinese human rights activist Liu Xiaobo; China keen on investing in Sudan; China urged to withdraw funding from Ethiopian dam; Exim Bank gets $150 mn to push India-Africa trade; Uganda seeks easier study visas, job permits in India; India’s total trade with COMESA rises more than three-fold; Russia's LUKOIL wants more oil from Ghana and Nigeria Approves $2.5 Billion Sale of Nitel to Dubai's Minerva.

Kimani wa Wanjiru interviews Professor Abdilatif Abdalla, a writer jailed by the Kenyatta regime after he questioned the direction in which it was guiding Kenya in a political pamphlet. Ironically the anthology of poems Abdalla wrote while in prison won the 1974 Jomo Kenyatta Award for Literature, which was named after the very man who incarcerated him.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifJacques Depelchin outlines the centuries-old exercise of power that has kept Haitians in a state of oppression. What is needed, he argues, is for common sense and humanity to emerge.

The Unemployed People's Movement will March on Jacob Zuma in Durban on 14 October 2010 in support of an earlier letter of demand issued to South Africa's president.

Dr Kizza Besigye has called for the resignation of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Attorney General after the Constitutional Court ordered that he and 10 others be discharged from any further prosecution arising from the treason charges they have been facing since 2005. All the five judges said they could not allow continued trial of the suspects when their fundamental human rights were being grossly violated by state agents.

"The way political parties conduct their affairs will determine the quality and strength of South Africa’s democracy," begins this research into the internal functioning of South African political parties by Idasa’s Political Information & Monitoring Service (PIMS). "Among the aims of this PIMS research project is to provide a comprehensive assessment of existing internal interest disclosure models and practices by South African political parties and to provide a best-practice guide for use in South Africa and possibly elsewhere on the African continent."

A recent report confirmed that the Lundin Oil Consortium led by the Swedish Oil Company Lundin Oil AB had caused enormous loss of human lives and destruction of property in Sudan, says this article on The Current Analyst. 'The start of oil exploration by Lundin in 1997 set of a vicious war in the area. The case of Lundin in Sudan could be taken as the most telling and convincing testimony of the link between oil and destructive civil wars in Africa.'

The UAE controls more than 2,800 square kilometers in farms in Sudan as a result of its decision to invest in agricultural projects in fertile Arab nations to slash its soaring food import bill, according to a Sudanese official. The farms, scattered over Khartoum, Jazeera, Nile and other arable provinces in the East African Arab country, are more than triple the area of Bahrain and account for nearly 3.5 per cent of the UAE’s total area.

It is projected that if the economy does not improve within the next two years, more than half a million mineworkers in the region will lose their jobs. It is estimated that more than 25 per cent of mineworkers are HIV positive. Only two countries reviewed in the study by the Southern Africa Resource Watch have sufficient reserves to deal with a long-term recession.

Following a controversial ruling by US Judge José A. Cabranes of the Manhattan-based federal Second Circuit Court of Appeals that transnational corporations ‘cannot be held responsible for torture, genocide, war crimes and the like’, Abena Ampofoa Asare discusses the challenges for establishing responsibility and valuing human rights over profit.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said the arrest on Monday of Rwandan rebel leader Callixte Mbarushimana in France for serious crimes in the Kivu region of the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2009 sends a strong signal to other abusive commanders that the International Criminal Court (ICC) will be persistent in its apprehensi on of suspects. French police arrested Mbarushimana Monday morning in Paris, where he has resided since 2003.

It is the rainy season in Southern Sudan. The annual floods don’t make life any easier in an area already struggling to recover from decades of civil war. But this year, the flooding was unusually severe. In mid-September, heavy rains caused rivers to break their banks and flood the lowlands of Aweil South, in Northern Bahr El Ghazal state — submerging villages, crops and grazing land for cattle. Hundreds of people who would have been taking in a harvest of sorghum and groundnuts — now ruined, along with their homes — are instead camping by the roadside.

Zimbawe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has asked the United Nations and European Union not to recognise new ambassadors unilaterally appointed by President Robert Mugabe, his spokesman said Tuesday. 'Those appointments are supposed to be by consultation,' Tsvangirai's spokesman Luke Tamborinyoka told AFP. Under the Global Political Agreement (GPA) that created the unity government between Mugabe and Tsvangirai, the prime minister should be consulted on all appointments, Tamborinyoka said.

A minister kidnapped by pirates in Somalia's semi-autonomous region of Puntland has been freed. Ports Minister Said Mohamed Rageh was ambushed last Friday and held in the remote pirate stronghold of Jariban. His release came after negotiations between the pirates and Somali elders.

As part of a broad coalition, War on Want has submitted a letter to the UK government demanding the immediate release of three detained Saharawi human rights activists. One year ago, a group of prominent Saharawi human rights defenders were arrested upon their return from a humanitarian visit to Saharawi refugee camps in Algeria. Despite not having committed any crime, the activists were charged with threatening Moroccan national security.

Professional civil society has won some important victories in post-apartheid South Africa, but has not stopped material inequality from worsening, writes Richard Pithouse. 'When a social system is not working, people have the right to challenge it directly and outside of the rules that it sets for engagement. Until and unless we reach a point where the actions of the state are beginning to turn the tide against economic and political exclusion, the state’s legal right to declare popular forms of revolt illegitimate has no moral standing.'

The actualisation of the East African Community Common Market is arguably the most critical step in our regional integration efforts in East Africa, writes Oduor Ong’wen, the SEATINI Kenya country director. 'The steady, albeit grudging recourse towards regionalist thinking among the ruling elite in the Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda is without doubt a welcome strut in the wake of contemporary international relations.'

Fuel has become so precious in Malawi that it is now being rationed. People park their vehicles at service stations overnight, forming long queues as they wait for petrol tankers to arrive. The Council for Non-Governmental Organisations in Malawi (Congoma), an umbrella body representing non-governmental organisations, has blamed the shortage of foreign exchange on President Bingu wa Mutharika who they accuse of undertaking too many international trips that waste foreign exchange.

'Voice for the voiceless' is the slogan adorning the walls of Liberia’s first and Africa’s second radio station for women. Situated down a bumpy, dirt track on the edge of the capital, Monrovia, the Liberia Women Democracy Radio (LWDR), claims it wants to advance women and promote change. In a country trying to rebuild itself after 14 years of civil war in which women bore the brunt of the violence, they remain the most vulnerable group in society.

The African Woman and Child Feature Service (AWC), launched the 'Beyond Numbers' publication on Friday, 8 October 2010. This new publication is based on a qualitative study that was carried out in Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and South Sudan. The objective was to reveal the impact of the women’s movement for participation and representation in political decision making in Eastern Africa.
The study considered the impact of a critical mass of women on such areas as institutional reform culture, service delivery, ability to challenge the status quo, change laws and policies that affect women at various levels of society.

This volume explores some of the key features of popular politics and resistance before and after 1994. It looks at continuities and changes in the forms of struggle and ideologies involved, as well as the significance of post-apartheid grassroots politics. Is this a new form of politics or does it stand as a direct descendent of the insurrectionary impulses of the late apartheid era?

Zambia's communications authority on Wednesday reversed its decision to shut down five main Internet service providers, saying they would be allowed another chance to renew their licences. The firms were ordered on Tuesday to shut down by the end of the week, after regulators said they had not renewed their operating licences. But the order raised fears that Zambia could be cut off from the Internet.

Nigerian former militant leader Henry Okah will be kept apart from other prisoners at a Johannesburg prison until his bail application is heard next week, his attorney said on Tuesday. 'By agreement between us and the state Mr Okah will be held in a single cell at the Johannesburg Correctional Centre,' his attorney Rudi Krause told Sapa.

While improved access to anti-retroviral therapy in South Africa has enabled infected AIDS orphans to live well into adulthood, it has created new challenges as the generation emerges to take their place in the workforce.And a lack of forethought has resulted in certain challenges not being addressed, says a new study by Idasa’s Governance and AIDS Programme (GAP) on children living with and affected by HIV and AIDS.

Gado considers reactions were Mugabe to die.

Nigeria's Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM) calls for the immediate arrest of those behind attacks on students over 12–14 July.

State Security Minister Siyabonga Cwele has refused to supply a report on 'information peddling' - despite the information being revealed in an open parliamentary committee meeting with media present. His refusal is seen as a foretaste of a new era of state secrecy, following Defence Minister Lindiwe Sisulu’s refusal to release President Jacob Zuma’s flight details.

Diop Olugbala (aka Wali Rahman) will be sentenced on Wednesday, 13 October to a possible 10 years in prison for speaking out on behalf of the rights of the black community. A press conference and demonstration will be held prior to Olugbala’s sentencing hearing. Endorsing and participating in Wednesday’s press conference and demonstration will be the International People’s Democratic Uhuru Movement, African Socialist International, Pan Africa of International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu Jamal, Black and Nobel Bookstore, Pastor Donna Jones of Cookman Methodist Church, Top Dollar CEO of the Dollar Boys and Alison Hoehne of the African People’s Solidarity Committee.

The Egyptian government is hoping to cultivate wheat and other cereals on fertile land in African countries to feed its growing population of over 80 million. In early September it signed a deal with the Sudanese government to give Egyptian companies access to Sudanese farmland. 'Growing essential crops like wheat in other water-rich African countries where fertile land is in abundance is an important solution,' said Ayman Farid Abu Hadid, chairman of the state-run Agricultural Research Centre, which signed the deal on behalf of the Egyptian government.

Stigma has allowed a disfiguring microscopic worm to thrive in Kenya's coastal region, but with adequate funding, the spread of lymphatic filariasis (LF), also known as elephantiasis, could easily be stopped in the east African country with the help of just a couple of pills a year. Spread by mosquitoes, elephantiasis can cause severe swelling of the limbs, breasts, and scrotum as well as thickening and hardening of the skin.

Ugandan health workers are concerned by the growing number of HIV-positive teens who are abandoning their HIV treatment after turning to bogus religious leaders. 'Over the years we have noticed a growing trend of adolescents and caregivers who have withdrawn from treatment with a belief of having been cured of HIV/AIDS in church,' said Cissy Ssuna, the counsellor coordinator at Baylor College of Medicine Children's Foundation Uganda, which treats more than 4,000 HIV-infected children, 750 of whom are adolescents.

The diaspora has a key role to play in using the resources at their disposal to build the power of Nigeria and the rest of Africa, argues Okello Oculi.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifNnimmo Bassey, environmental justice activist and winner of the Right Livelihood Award, often referred to as the 'Alternative Nobel Prize', pays tribute to Pambazuka News on occasion of its 500th edition. ‘Through this medium we build and equally recover lost memories for future action,’ he writes.

The second issue of the Right to Food and Nutrition Watch is a powerful tool to put pressure on policymakers at the national and international level to take the human right to food and nutrition into account. The Right to Food and Nutrition Watch provides a platform for human rights experts, civil society activists, social movements, the media, and scholars to exchange experiences on how best to carry out right to food and nutrition work, including lobbying and advocacy. The 2010 version notes the unacceptable number of 925 million people suffering chronic hunger in a world that has enough food for all and the dramatic increase of land grabbing.

With Angola’s parliament spending over US$43 million on top-of-the-range BMWs, Rafael Marques de Morais discusses the government’s inability to properly represent its citizens and what the money might have bought if spent in the public interest.

Despite the indisputable progress on gender equality, some current Tunisian laws still contain discriminatory language. Legal reforms need to address the reality of women’s situations: It is only in a minority of families that there is joint decision-making and household tasks remain a female responsibility.

The refugee and displacement problem is one of the most complex humanitarian issues facing the Middle East, aid workers say. Elizabeth Campbell, senior advocate at US NGO Refugees International, believes it is likely the Middle East hosts the highest number of refugees and asylum-seekers in the world. She underlined the need to find lasting solutions: 'Any time that people remain uprooted and have not been afforded basic rights or pathways to durable solutions, it is a humanitarian crisis. In this article from IRIN, the refugee challenges of the countries in the region are profiled.

The Black is Back Coalition has announced a march and rally on the White House to take place November 13, 2010 beginning in Washington, DC’s historic Malcolm X Park. This will mark the second year in a row that this black coalition will be protesting at the White House while Barack Obama, the first black US President, occupies it.

The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) has launched a new advocacy campaign to combat sectarianism in Egypt under the slogan, 'Reject Sectarianism'. The organisation said that the campaign is a joint movement and an appeal for collective action to eliminate sectarianism and strengthen the values of equal citizenship and shared existence.

Gender equality and women's empowerment are essential to South Africa's attainment of the MDGs. Women assume multiple roles, as mothers, leaders, students, decision makers, farmers, workers, voters, carers and much more. In each of these roles, the ability to be educated and healthy, to have voice and influence, to enjoy opportunities and choices are critical to the attainment of the goals. Without gender equality and women's empowerment, women are less able to reach their full potential, live a life of dignity, and be productive citizens. In this report, the Commission for Gender Equality seeks to provide an African-based mechanism for measuring the status of women as compared to men's in the social, economic, and political spheres.

‘The funding of climate change adaptation and mitigation-oriented programmes in Africa has opened up new forms of resource imperialism, extractive investment and land grabbing opportunities, in particular for European and Chinese companies,’ writes Blessing Karumbidza. Land-intensive projects negatively affect the livelihoods of people who rely on land for food and other resources. The case of Idete village in Tanzania, the site of a plantation by Norway-based Green Resources AS, is an example of how supposedly ‘clean development’ projects don’t always benefit the community.