"The follow-up committee for the ratification and the implementation of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) on the Rights of Women in Africa informed us that the law on the ratification of the Protocol was adopted unanimously Wednesday the 1st December at the National Assembly. The law has now to be transmitted to the President of the Republic will promulgated it. The instrument of ratification will then be deposited at the African Union." (Also available in French)

There is one village in Kenya, a place the people call Umoja, that manages to stand out from the rest. There are almost no men living here. Women run the show in Umoja, which was founded about a decade ago, and that is very odd in such a patriarchal part of the world. "We are always under men," said Rebecca Lolosoli, who is the leader of the three dozen or so women who live in Umoja, which means Unity in Swahili. "The men treat us like nothing. You are there to give them children. We're like property, and we're mistreated." Umoja traces its origins not so much to political protest, however, as to acts of sexual violence against the women, reportedly by British soldiers.

Activists working to end female genital mutilation in Africa find themselves in a bitter phase of the struggle. Now that some traditional practitioners have disavowed it, many doctors and nurses are taking up the illegal practice. And these are people that activists thought were their friends. "With activists campaigning about the unhygienic conditions in which traditional circumcisers carry out their trade, some parents are taking their daughter to the modern doctors," says Efua Dorkenoo, a Ghanaian activist against FGM. "This is actually taking people centuries back," says Millie Odhiambo, executive director of The CRADLE (also known as the Child Rights Advisory Documentation and Legal Centre).

Governments, aid agencies and donors need to acknowledge the chronic nature of problems that lead to recurring crises in Southern Africa, such as the widespread food shortages two years ago, a new report recommends. Titled "Southern Africa: The Cycle of Poverty Continues", the study by the development agency Save the Children argued that although the number of food insecure people was now estimated to be 60 percent lower than at the height of the crisis in 2002, "Save the Children does not believe that it is a case of 'mission accomplished', and that we can now shift our collective energies to other acute crises". The report commented that the process of development had stalled or reversed in most of Southern Africa over the last 10 years.

Reparations should be the banner through which Africans and the international solidarity movement unite in an ever-expanding struggle against the forces of neo-liberal globalization, argues this commentary on Nepad and reparations from the www.zmag.org website. "The global justice movement must take up the demand for Africa reparations until those who have benefited from the crimes of slavery, colonialism and global apartheid are finally held accountable and made to pay reparations that are long overdue," it concludes.

A Ugandan opposition MP has alleged that one of his staff was tortured by state security services. Driver Sam Ongiya, 26, claims he was picked up by armed men and forcefully interrogated about opposition activities. Opposition politicians fear increased harassment as Uganda prepares for democratic elections in 2006. Human rights groups report that torture by state security agencies is common in Uganda but the government maintains it is working to eliminate it.

Setting up an independent electoral commission to oversee Angola's first post-war elections was critical to the credibility of the poll, analysts said on Tuesday. "Although peace has been achieved, Angola remains politically polarised. It is vital that a new, independent commission be established to ensure that voters buy into the process - without such a body, one can expect to see numerous challenges to the eventual results," Martinho Chachiua, of the Electoral Institute of Southern Africa, told IRIN.

President Mamadou Tandja has won a second five-year term in office, becoming Niger's first head of state to secure re-election as the arid landlocked country enters a new era of political stability.
Full story: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=44576

BACKGROUND BRIEFING: During virtually its whole independent existence, Niger has see-sawed between fragile democratic governments, whose stability has depended on their varying ability to incorporate representatives of the country's ethnic patchworks, and military dictatorships of varying shades of authoritarianism. Niger has never had what could be termed a totalitarian or overwhelmingly repressive government. Yet at the same time none of the military or civilian administrations could be said to have satisfactorily guaranteed civic rights and freedoms. Read this election briefing on the Niger elections from the Centre for Democracy and Development by clicking on the link below.

Vital food rations for 118,000 refugees in Ethiopia may be cut by 30 percent unless international donors supply 4.2 million dollars to buy cereal, the United Nations' food agency warned. Ethiopia's refugee population is almost entirely dependent upon food aid as people are unable to farm for themselves without angering the locals, who also rely heavily on international support to feed themselves.

A Nigerian state governor under investigation for alleged money-laundering in Britain can't be tried in Nigeria because of the immunity he enjoys from prosecution under the constitution, a court ruled Monday. More than GBP1 million that Plateau state Governor Joshua Dariye is suspected of having diverted from Nigeria's treasury was traced to eight bank accounts in Britain, Nigeria's attorney general's office said last month.

Since the end of apartheid a decade ago, growing numbers of refugees from across Africa have been heading towards the continent's richest and most industrialised country. No one knows how many African immigrants have settled illegally in South Africa. Estimates vary from 2 to 10 million people, or between 5 and 25 % of South Africa's population.

Only 14 percent of South Africans believe their country should follow Zimbabwe by seizing white-owned commercial farms for landless blacks, while 31 percent of 2,000 South Africans surveyed - including 45 percent of whites - said they felt there was a danger the chaotic scenes seen in Zimbabwe could be repeated in their country. Although many white farmers say they see the need for change, some describe the process as "Zimbabwe in a velvet glove".

Black Looks is produced by an African feminist who describes herself as "a woman of a certain age who has travelled the world, the cities of Africa, the Americas, Middle East and Europe, now living in rural Spain under the guise of being an organic farmer. But still my heart is and always will be in mother Africa." Her blog contains commentaries about current issues in Africa such as Sudan, the Ghana elections and slavery, a variety of categories and an archives option. It also contains some recommended reading and links to other blogs and websites of interest related to African women and art.

"The matter of who's "more" black has a certain personal resonance. Like many foreign blacks, I'm often treated by my black peers as a usurper. Furthermore, my children have the same pedigree as Barack Obama: Kenyan father and American mother. After three decades in America, I still anguish about the sad state of the relationship between American and African blacks. Each group, safe within its own prejudices and preconceptions, rejects the other."

Civil society organisations, Zimbabweans in the Diaspora, and other citizens in the SADC region are gathering in front of the Zimbabwean Embassies or High Commissions in their respective countries on International Human Rights Day to protest against the wave of repression which limits civic space and undermines civil liberties in Zimbabwe.

Hunger and malnutrition cause tremendous human suffering, kill more than five million children every year, and cost developing countries billions of dollars in lost productivity and national income, according to FAO's annual hunger report, 'The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2004'. "More than 20 million low birth-weight babies are born in the developing world every year," the report says. These babies faced increased risk of dying in infancy, while those who survive often suffer lifelong physical and cognitive disabilities.

A fresh strategy towards peacekeeping is needed in Liberia and Sierra Leone if both are not to remain shadow states, vulnerable to new fighting and state failure, argues the International Crisis Group (ICG) in a new report. "The international community needs to make genuinely long-term commitments - not two to five years, as at present, but on the order of fifteen to 25 years - to enable new political forces to develop," said the report.

The UN Peacekeeping Mission to DRC (Monuc) should increase its presence in rebel controlled areas to ensure a greater proportion of children are demobilised with minimum risk, says a Save the Children report that looks at the Disarmament, Demobilisation, Repatriation, Rehabilitation and Reintegration process (DDRRR) of Rwandan boys and girls formerly associated with armed groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The report recommends that community members and leaders should be trained on child protection issues.

The mild-mannered, soft-spoken UN Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, has been receiving the unwholesome attention of the triumphalist neo-con fundamentalists and also that of sections of what passes for 'liberal' opinion in the USA, a country that is in the grip of right wing extremism.

The ostensible reason for shooting pointed arrows at Mr Annan are the salacious but very selective revelations emanating from US investigations into the Iraqi Oil for Food programme. The allegations include corruption, diversion of food money into private coffers, fraudulent contracts and all manners of underhand activities by individuals and companies (mostly Western), and others.

These allegations are not earth shattering given what is going on with US mishandling of the Iraqi economy and its vital oil resources since they occupied the country. US companies and principally the notorious Halliburton of the US Vice President Dick Cheney are accused of similar practices. So why is the US so interested in investigating the UN in Iraq without allowing any censure of its own illegal activities in that country?

Even big Western humanitarian agencies that often keep their mouth shut in relation to powerful Western Governments (who were often their biggest Donors or protectors) were sufficiently outraged to break with their unwritten convention (of looking the other way when their governments are misbehaving) and demanded accountability from the US proconsul for Iraq, Paul Bremmer, before he handed over to their crony, Iyad Allawi and other US puppets in the Interim Government of Iraq.

Both Bremmer and the Bush administration treated the request with contempt because they believe they are above the standards of public probity they demand of everybody else, especially those governments or individuals they may not like. Since the US demands accountability from everybody else, who dares demand accountability from the US and its chosen agents? This is why the US has given itself the power to act as global law enforcer but exempts itself from the International Criminal Court. The Americans can fight wars on behalf of the UN but are not bound by UN procedures or resolutions.

The double standard stinks. The attack on the UN has taken an ironical personal turn for Mr Kofi Annan. His son is alleged to have worked for and received payments from one of the companies accused of being involved in the Iraqi gravy train. And because of this Annan's persecutors are demanding that Uncle Kofi should resign. They want him punished for a yet to be proven criminal act by his son. The logic is that because Annan Sr was in charge of the UN and these things happened under his watch he should carry the can. Yet nobody demanded the resignation of Bush for allowing the US to be attacked by not concentrating on his watch! Not even the chiefs or operatives of the various security and intelligence services that failed the country on that fateful day were compelled to resign!

The fact that Bush's family has a long history of juicy business relationship with the Bin Laden family and the obvious conflicts of interest in that was never an issue for US voters who returned Bush to power. The Enron and Halliburton scandals and the personal involvement of senior administration officials, Republican financiers and other supporters have not led to any resignations in the US government.

So why are they calling for Kofi Annan's head?

The reason is not difficult to see. Kofi Annan, like Boutros Boutros- Ghali before him, both of them pro American gentlemen, when they started out, later than sooner, discovered that the credibility of the UN and their own personal credibility demand being able to stand up to the bullies in the US who see the UN as an after-sales service complex for American misadventures. They hounded Boutros-Ghali out of office when he began to resist the US’s more brazen abuse of the UN system and their contempt for multilateral solutions.

When they were sending attack dogs at Boutrous-Ghali, Mr Annan was the master's poodle presented to the world as a 'safe pair of hands', 'moderate', 'sensible' and all the other superlatives used to dress up being 'a house Nigger'. And he seemed to play ball for many years, but over Iraq he began to grumble which became much more open during and after the last UN General Assembly when he declared the war against Iraq and the Anglo-American occupation of that country as illegal.

Consequently the Bush administration and their screaming loony sects decreed an end to his term. Some of the criticisms they are making of Annan today were the same ones many who had opposed his candidacy in 1997 put forward.

For me the biggest stain in his dull bureaucratic career at the UN will remain inaction over genocide in Rwanda which he has been doing everything to atone for in the past few years. However his Rwanda record did not matter then so why now? The answer is simple: Mr Annan is now tired of being 'a House Nigger'. For talking back to his masters they want to banish him from the palace. It is yet another abject lesson for those Africans or other developing world peoples who always want to play it safe and be on the right side of the big powers. You are nothing but a disposable towel to them. You are not any 'special friend' or 'great leader' but a convenient tool and they will get rid of you when you are no longer of service.

A defence of Annan and the UN is a correct thing to do today because those calling for his head and bashing the UN are more dangerous to our world. It is not an endorsement of all Annan and the UN did or did not do but an expression of hope that together the whole world can make the UN be of better service to humanity. It is a proclamation of a fact that is definitely lost on Bush and his gangsters that the US does not own this world. It is a shared universe in which all of us, big and small countries, rich and poor, super power and powerless, are legitimate stake holders whose interests are better served by genuine cooperation, multilateralism and respectful interdependence, than by the bullying by one super power. It is a shared world in which none of us is a tenant to the Americans.

* Dr Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem is General-Secretary of the Pan African Movement, Kampala (Uganda) and Co-Director of Justice Africa

* Please send comments to

>>>>>SOLIDARITY LETTER

(The following is the text of a petition email circulating on the Internet in support of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan)

Dear Secretary General,
We, a group of concerned young people from across the globe, have watched with dismay the attacks on the integrity and the legitimacy of the United Nations.

During these difficult and challenging times, we stand with you in solidarity against all forces that seek to destroy the organization or undermine the high office of the Secretary-General. In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King: "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy." We believe that you will rise to the challenge and lead the organization out even stronger.

The United Nations, today more than ever before, needs a leadership that is firm and not intimidated into giving up the integrity and independence with which a body like the UN deserves to operate. We the people need to stand up and defend the organization not only against those who are bent on destroying it, but also against those who's actions expose the organization to such critics.

We recognize that giving in to the forces currently calling for your resignation would only serve to undermine the UN as an in dependent organization and would weaken the ability of the UN as a vehicle to work for peace and justice around the world. That is why this cannot be seen as an attack on any one individual, but the UN as a whole. For the UN to continue to play its vital role and to command the respect of the world, it must maintain its credibility by ensuring that those who act in the organization's name do so transparently and with high integrity. We hope that with this full knowledge of the facts, appropriate actions shall be taken to save this essential organization unfounded damage and accusations.

We pledge to do all we can to defend the integrity of the organization in our communities and resist the systematic campaign that seeks to poison public opinion against the organization. We strongly urge you to continue to play your role without fear or favour.
In Solidarity,
Signed:

PLEASE TAKE THE FOLLOWING URGENT ACTIONS:
1. ENDORSE this letter to the UN Secretary General by responding to this with Your NAME and COUNTRY (Add organization if you want) by Sunday. PLEASE SEND IT DIRECTLY TO [email][email protected]
2. FORWARD this email to other colleagues and POST this announcement on your organization's website and list-serves.
3. Shape PUBLIC OPINION in your community and country by raising the issue and challenging the critics. Contribute to media discussions- Radio, Print and TV etc.
4. Our US colleagues should visit the UN Association website and take action:

Zimbabwean women activists are to petition parliament on Friday to approve a four-year-old Prevention of Domestic Violence Bill. The activists, frustrated with continued delays in the bill's approval, have chosen the last day of the worldwide campaign dubbed "16 Days of Gender Activism against Domestic Violence" to make their appeal.

When the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) was signed in 1994, the United States, Europe and Japan dominated the world's software, pharmaceutical, chemical and entertainment industries. The rest of the world had little to gain by agreeing to these terms of trade for intellectual property. They did so because a failure of democratic processes nationally and internationally enabled a small group of men within the United States to capture the US trade-agenda-setting process, to draft intellectual property principles that became the blueprint for TRIPS and to crush resistance through US trade power.

At least USD$75 million have been pledged to support the health sector in Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, in an effort to hasten the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). To ensure success, a joint three-tier budget, involving the federal and state governments as well as donor agencies, will be adopted. Funke Adedoyin, Minister of State for Health, was cited by the News Agency of Nigeria on Wednesday as saying Nigeria was "scaling up its health activities in 14 pilot states where indices indicate that there have been a steady increase on child mortality and HIV/AIDS prevalence."

Barely emerging from years of civil conflict, two countries in West Africa are waging a new war – a battle to eradicate all forms of violence against women. Last Thursday, the authorities in Sierra Leone and Liberia joined humanitarian organisations like the UN refugee agency and the International Rescue Committee to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and to launch 16 Days of Activism to Eliminate Violence against Women.

Poverty will only cease when it is recognized as a violation of human rights and, as such, abolished.

One should be aware that the striking feature of our civilization, as it globalizes around the aspiration to unprecedented prosperity, is the persistence and even increase of poverty. It is an overwhelming fact: poverty affects half the world's population. It is spreading: the vast majority of the 2 to 3 thousand million human beings who will be added to the world's population before the end of the century will be exposed to it. It is putting alarming pressure on the environment and global equilibrium. The figures are apocalyptic: 8 million children die each year because of poverty, 150 million children under the age of five suffer from extreme malnutrition, 100 million children live in the streets. Every three seconds, poverty kills a child somewhere. And our world puts up with it.

When, in 1994, 800 000 corpses of Tutsi and opposition Hutu victims of genocide in Rwanda were carried on rivers of blood through the country of a thousand hills, the world held its breath. We all felt guilty. We wished that action had been taken to prevent it. We all said, once again, "never again!". The United Nations established an International Tribunal to establish the truth and hand down justice. "We cannot bring back the dead, but the guilty shall pay. International law will prevail. Morality is safe". But what about the 8 million children who die each year from poverty-related diseases? We are well aware of these figures and they are probably under-estimated.

What, then, is the basis of the ethical double standard which leads us to accept the poverty manufactured by our society, even though it kills more surely and methodically than machetes and militias? Is there a single moral or ethical justification for this central contradiction between the equality proclaimed in the granting of rights and growing inequality in access to life-giving resources? To address this question is essential for the preservation of our own humanity.

It would seem, however, that the famous "standards of decency" are changing. Thus, the international community has set, as a priority for the millennium (Millennium Development Goals [MDGs]), to reduce by half in 15 years the number of people living in extreme poverty. This approach, however laudable in itself, does not exhaust the issue. For one thing, the intended goal will not easily be reached. But even if it were successfully achieved, the basic question would remain untouched: can persistent poverty be tolerated at all?

This problem has to be tackled from another angle. As long as we consider poverty as a quantitative, natural deficit to be made up, the political will to reduce it will not be energized. Poverty will only cease when it is recognized as a violation of human rights and, as such, abolished. This is why, and this is how.

When poverty is defined in relative terms, it is at once infinite and incurable. We are forced, at the same time, to consent to it indefinitely and to exhaust, in vain, unending resources in seeking to reduce it. This relativistic approach can only determine an arbitrary poverty line which is adopted as an artificial horizon. But such a bogus horizon remains unbearable: what do one or two dollars a day mean, and above all, what right do we have to make do with such a figure? For poverty is not a fate to be alleviated by international charity or aid. Nor does poverty reflect poor people's lack of self-reliance or their inability to compete in a free-for-all of supposedly equal opportunities. Poverty does not persist solely because of incompetent, corrupt governments that are insensitive to the fate of their population. No. Fundamentally, poverty is not a standard of living or even certain kinds of living conditions: it is at once the cause and the effect of the total or partial denial of human rights.

Of the five families of human rights - civic, political, cultural, economic and social - proclaimed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as inherent to the human person, poverty violates the fifth, always; the fourth, generally; often the third; sometimes the second, or even the first.

Reciprocally, the systematic violation of any one of these rights degenerates rapidly into poverty. As was recognized at the International Conference on Human Rights held in Vienna, in 1993, there is an organic link between poverty and violation of human rights.

And yet, human rights are indefeasible and inseparable. Their violation is a fundamental infringement of human dignity as a whole, and not a regrettable inconvenience to be endured by distant neighbours. It must therefore cease, and the imperative takes a simple form: poverty must be abolished. The claim sounds naïve, and may even bring a smile to your lips.

Condescension would, however, be misguided as well as inappropriate. There is nothing to smile at in distress, misery, dereliction and death which march in grim parade with poverty. We should, indeed, be ashamed. But the issue is also substantive: the abolition of poverty is the only fulcrum that offers the leverage to defeat poverty.

Leverage, in this case, comes from investment, national and international reforms, and policies to remedy the deficiencies of all kinds that are the backdrop to poverty. Fortunately, humanity now has the means to answer the challenge: never have we been so rich, so technically competent and so well informed. But in the absence of a fulcrum, these forces cannot act as effectively as they might.

If, however, poverty were declared to be abolished, as it should with regard to its status as a massive, systematic and continuous violation of human rights, its persistence would no longer be a regrettable feature of the nature of things. It would become a denial of justice. The burden of proof would shift. The poor, once recognized as the injured party, would acquire a right to reparation for which governments, the international community and, ultimately, each citizen would be jointly liable. A strong interest would thus be established in eliminating, as a matter of urgency, the grounds of liability, which might be expected to unleash much stronger forces than compassion, charity, or even concern for one's own security, are likely to mobilize for the benefit of others.

By endowing the poor with rights, the abolition of poverty would obviously not cause poverty to disappear overnight. It would, however, create the conditions for the cause of poverty to be enshrined as the highest of priorities and as the common interest of all - not just as a secondary concern for the enlightened or merely charitable. No more than the abolition of slavery caused the crime to vanish, no more than the abolition of domestic violence of genocide have eliminated such violations of the human conscience, the legal abolition of poverty will not, then, make poverty disappear. But it will place poverty in the conscience of humankind at the same level as those past injustices the present survival of which challenges us, shocks us, and calls us to action.

The principle of justice thus implemented and the force of law mobilized in its service are of enormous power. This, after all, is how slavery, colonialism and apartheid were ended. But while slavery and apartheid were actively struggled against, poverty dehumanizes half the planet to a chorus of utter indifference. It is, undoubtedly, the most acute moral question of the new century to understand how such massive and systematic violations, day in, day out, do not trouble the conscience of the good people who look down upon them.

While equality of rights is proclaimed, growing inequalities in the distribution of goods persists and is entrenched by unjust economic and social policies at national and global level. To deal with poverty as a violation of human rights means going beyond the idea of international justice - which is concerned with relations between states and nations - towards the creation of global justice, which applies to relations between human beings living in a global society and enjoying absolute and inalienable rights - such as the right to life - that are guaranteed by the international community.

Such rights do not belong to the citizens of states but, universally, to human beings as such, for whom they are the necessary condition of life on the planet. The obligation to denounce violations and to ensure respect, protection and effective enjoyment of rights is incumbent on all, without distinction of race, country, or creed. The principle of global justice thus establishes the conditions for a fairer distribution of the planet's resources between its inhabitants in light of certain absolute rights. Let us remember that, morally speaking, the right to property is not absolute: it follows that territorial sovereignty, which entails ownership of natural resources, cannot qualify an absolute right, such as the right to life elsewhere.

What we must note is that nearly 3 billion people receive only about 1.2% of world income, while 1 billion people in the rich countries receive 80%. An annual income transfer of 1% from one group to the other would suffice to eliminate extreme poverty. In fact, the transfer continues to operate in the opposite direction, despite efforts towards debt reduction and development aid.

At the end of the day, there is a simple choice. Not between a "pragmatic" approach, based on aid granted by the rich to the poor, and the alternative sketched here. The real choice is between the abolition of poverty and the only other way for the poor to obtain rights, which is for them to take them by force. Needless to say, the latter solution usually causes misery for all: social strife, rampant crime, mass uncontrolled migration, smuggling and trafficking are the only things to flourish. But what moral basis do we have to demand moral behaviour from people to whom we deny any opportunity to live a healthy life? What right have we to demand that they respect our rights? The sombre option will become increasingly likely if nothing is done - or too little, as tends to be the case with pragmatism, however deserving.

The options thus reduce to a single choice, which is the only one compatible with the categorical imperative to respect human rights: to abolish poverty in order to eradicate it, and to draw from this principle all the consequences that free acceptance of it implies.

No great programme will ensure the eradication of poverty. Its proclaimed abolition must, first, create rights and obligations, and thereby mobilize the true forces that can correct the state of a world plagued by poverty. By simply setting an effective and binding priority, abolition changes the ground rules and contributes to the creation of a new world. Such is the price to pay to give globalization a human face; such is also the greatest opportunity for sustainable development that we can hope to grasp.

What are the implications for NGO activity? First, I would suggest that it is imperative to develop strategies that give tangible significance to the principles of indivisibility and interdependence of human rights. The unfortunate historical separation of human rights into civil and political rights on the one hand, and economic, social and cultural rights on the other, has tended to entrench the view that poverty was beyond the scope of human rights NGOs and to farm out poverty to market forces or development processes. Campaigns for ratification of international treaties must promote treaties on social, economic, and cultural rights, national legislations must be amended accordingly, and violations of such rights must be actionable. Furthermore, in the field, research techniques must be deployed to monitor the violations suffered by victims, fulfillment of their obligations by states and international actors, and reparations for injured parties.

Ultimately, the issue is to mobilize public opinion for a universal justice that is within our grasp. Its emergence has been lengthy - very lengthy. From the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to the Rome Conference that established the International Criminal Court, the emergence of universal justice has been defiled by acts of barbarity that have grossly infringed human dignity. Now, however, the legal instruments are there, and, step by step, experiments and initiatives give hope. It remains to energize political will by unceasing mobilization, true thinking, the contributions of experts and support for victims and their families.

What promises does such global justice bear? Let me quote Nobel Laureate José Saramago: "Were such justice to exist, there would no longer be a single human being dying of hunger or of diseases that are curable for some but not for others. Were such justice to exist, life would no longer be, for half of humanity, the dreadful sentence it has hitherto been. And for such justice, we already have a practical code that has been laid down for fifty years in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a declaration that might profitably replace, as far as rightness of principles and clarity of objectives are concerned, the manifestos of all the political parties of the world".

Such global justice is essential in order to ensure common welfare, and therefore international peace. To ensure freedom from poverty, a fundamental human right. To give dignity to the poor and the outcasts. But to succeed in the quest for justice, every single individual must be made aware of the issues at stake and mobilized.

The world will celebrate Human Rights Day on December 10. What better day to remember the rights of the poor?

* Pierre Sané is UNESCO's Assistant Director-General for Social and Human Sciences, a post he has held since joining the Organization in May 2001. He is responsible for a programme of work that ranges from human rights and the fight against discrimination to philosophy, ethics of science and technology, policy-action research and international cooperation in Social Sciences. Prior to joining UNESCO he was Secretary General of Amnesty International (1992-2001). At the beginning of his career he worked in the field of regional and international development both in Africa and in Canada. He writes this article in his personal capacity and not as a representative of UNESCO.

* Please send comments to [email protected]

* International Human Rights Day takes place on December 10.

>>>>>Human Rights Links:

http://www.ohchr.org/english/events/hrd2004.htm
http://www.un.org/av/special/hrday/
http://www.hri.ca/index.aspx
http://www.hrweb.org/
http://www.derechos.net/
http://www.hrw.org/
http://www.amnesty.org/

A few years ago it was an unknown blot on the map wedged between Cameroon and Gabon and home to roughly 525 000 people. But within a few years it has quietly rocketed up the rankings to become Africa's third largest oil producer. In 2004 it has firmly grabbed international attention with a coup plot that just keeps on unravelling.

The latest revelations on the Equatorial Guinea coup plot confirm earlier speculation that it was an 'open secret' within the global intelligence community. Last weekend the Observer UK reported that the British government knew about the coup several months before it was launched. The Observer said two reports on the coup were handed to British Intelligence and to a senior colleague of US defence secretary Donald Rumsfield. This news steps up the pressure on Tony Blair's government to explain why they failed to act according to international norms and warn the government of Equatorial Guinea.

Sharper questions for the UK government to reveal how much it knew come at an embarrassing time for Tony Blair. Blair has previously described Africa as a "scar on the conscience of the world". More recently he created the Commission for Africa to probe Africa's development challenges. Last week the Commission began a series of meetings throughout the continent aimed at gathering input on Africa's challenges. Blair will be keen to avoid any implication that his government tacitly supported the plot.

More than one billion children, half of the world's population of children, suffer from poverty, violent conflict and the scourge of AIDS, the United Nations Children's Fund said in its annual report. The rights of children to a healthy and protected upbringing, as laid out in the widely-adopted 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, were regularly imperiled, due in part to the failure of governments to carry out human rights and economic reforms, UNICEF said.

The railroading through Parliament in November 2004 of the NGO Bill means that the government of Zimbabwe (GOZ) has now completed its strangling of three basic freedoms. Freedom of association has now joined freedom of information (the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act - AIPPA - shut down the only independent daily newspaper) and freedom of assembly (the Public Order and Safety Act - POSA - makes any gathering subject to police permission and scrutiny) in the oxygen tent in line with the GOZ strategy of shutting down all independent voices and democratic spaces. By contrast, the government sponsored Youth Militias (Green Bombers) operate with impunity.

ZANU-PF's strategy for survival and retention of their ill-gotten assets is a holistic strategy of repression with mutually reinforcing elements. Increased militarisation sees military and security sectors immune from the law and occupying increasingly prominent positions in the intelligence, provincial administrations and electoral authorities. Secondly the regime has used its presidential powers to amend the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act allowing police to detain without formal charges opponents of the regime, supposedly to counter corruption. Thirdly the judiciary is almost completely compliant, as shown in its confirming most of the contentious legislation. The neutralising of the judiciary has important knock-on effects in areas like press and media freedom and intimidation, information starvation, freedom of the opposition to assemble and be heard, politicisation of the police, further land 'resettlement', human rights violations, show trials of the opposition, politicisation of governmental-controlled food aid, public order and the like.

The NGO Act bans foreign funding for political governance, human rights and anti-corruption work and effectively proscribes international NGOs from carrying out such work. It makes registration of NGOs subject to arbitrary authority under a government-controlled NGO Council and provides severe penalties including shutting down NGOs and imprisoning staff for contravention of the Act. Very wide-ranging definitions leave much to ministerial dictate and arbitrary decision-making from both formal and informal government structures.

It is unclear how much the Act will affect the churches in Zimbabwe; government assurances that they will be fine if they stick to 'religious matters' contrast with the police closing down meetings held in churches to discuss the Act. The Act went through despite its running contrary not just to the Zimbabwean constitution, but also to several regional and international rights conventions that Harare has signed up to, and despite its likely economic impact given the numbers employed in the NGO sector and its effect on foreign exchange and tourism (what is left of it).

The NGO Act, the Electoral Amendment Act as well as legislation to provide payments to collaborators (non-combatant forces in the 1970s liberation war) are all in the context of the forthcoming parliamentary elections. These are set for March 2005 although the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is currently suspending participation until the conditions for a free and fair election are met, although it will be meeting in late November to review this. The combined legislation will severely limit any check on the government, make illegal non-governmental funding for civic and voter education, ensure government control of the electoral process and support from a potential opposition force of 'collaborators'.

It is widely believed that 'a dirty dozen' of NGOs already named in the newspapers and mostly operating within the human rights arena were the primary target although the bill would affect all NGOs. This would include the national Constitutional Assembly, the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum and Transparency International Zimbabwe.

For a local journalist, although the immediate target are indeed NGOs (foreign and national) the wider context is of control of black, particularly rural, Zimbabweans to ensure not just obedience but the impossibility of thinking any other way than in channels laid down by ZANU-PF and of destroying the MDC. A peace activist described the strategy as - 'the regime attempting a scorched earth policy in terms of social formations. While it wants to hold elections so as to appear democratic it wants to prevent thought, communication, information, and analysis.'

The act has been on the way since 2000 when the GOZ saw then the result of civil society lobbying in the rejection of the government's draft constitution in a referendum. It was given additional impetus by Zimbabwean civil society providing much of the evidence for the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights report on Zimbabwe finally submitted to the African Union to outrage from Harare at being criticised by fellow Africans (far harder to bear than from the West). The GOZ is convinced that NGOS are a front and money conduit for the MDC who are themselves a front for Tony Blair - a position hardly helped by the Blair statement in July 2004 in the UK parliament that he was working for regime change in Zimbabwe.

In fact the act could be said to be already in operation before its official date. A climate of fear and arbitrariness around NGO work has existed for some time with local ZANU-PF activists and youth militias feeling free to determine who is allowed into 'their' area whatever local governors might say. Work permits (TEPs) for outside NGO staff are being refused almost as a matter of course. To see how the proposed NGO Council would look, says a local human rights activist, we should examine the workings of the supine pro-government Media Information Council.

The Act has served its purpose of dividing and confusing civil society as to the best response to the legislation - pretending it is not happening, ignoring the plight of others and carrying on programmes as much as possible, seeking friendly 'godfathers' inside ZANU-PF, relocating and/ or shutting down in Zimbabwe. The use of repressive divide and rule tactics make the NGOs the latest in a series including the judiciary, the media, the churches and farmworkers and farmers.

Internationally and regionally the GOZ has divided or silenced critics with even the limited sanctions regime ineffectual, despite their renewal in Europe in February 2004 and in the USA. The GOZ control strategy appears to be to survive until the elections, despite the likely gap in food supplies and then to get an African 'free and fair' verdict which would take the heat off, challenge the international community to lose interest and give it a strong hand in post-election negotiations with the MDC. This would also give Mbeki a vindication of 'quiet diplomacy' even though Harare is in undoubted breach of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) electoral protocol it signed up to in Mauritius in August 2004.

Who is then standing up to the government on the NGO bill? Foreign embassies are not able or not willing to say much. NANGO, the Zimbabwe local NGO umbrella body presented a forceful case to the Parliamentary Portfolio committee examining the bill, but is unable to affect the strategy. Whilst rights-oriented Zimbabwean NGOs protest, the churches appear busy defending their own territory and interests, but not those of wider civil society. International development NGOs who are mostly Western do not wish to be painted like their governments as part of the plot to 'recolonise' Zimbabwe. Despite the brutal expulsion from Harare in October 2004 of a Congress of South African Trade Union (COSATU) fact-finding and solidarity delegation to Zimbabwe, the South African government appeared keener on criticising their fellow Alliance members than the Mugabe regime. Some regional churches and NGOs have provided critical support for Zimbabweans but have been unable to persuade their governments or ruling parties to make much beyond the occasional muted criticism as happened in Botswana.

However it does appear that the confidence of the ruling party in its hold on power has run into a number of problems even if they are unlikely to result in any other electoral scenario but ZANU-PF maintaining its electoral hold including enough seats to change the constitution. Its propaganda is subject to massive public scepticism in relation to the supposedly improving economy -the public does not believe that inflation is going down in light of its own experience. Some of the first wave of settlers who seized land are in turn being thrown off their land so that the elite can have it (breeding a kind of sans culotte bitterness). Economically, the crisis of production and livelihood continues - a systematic process of de-professionalisation and de-capitalisation. A very significant proportion of professionals, such as doctors, engineers, educationalists and financial managers have sought employment elsewhere. Despite rumours of its demise, the parallel market is up and running again with the rate against £1 being roughly Zim $14,000. A much -vaunted accommodation with the IMF is no more likely than returning foreign investment. 99% of the population live with an income less than the poverty datum line, mitigated only by remittances from the 15 to 25 % of the population living outside.

The cabinet decision to expel COSATU showed the South African public its contempt for the neighbours and indeed for court orders against the expulsion. COSATU was mobilising itself and civic groups in the region to "seal entry points into Zimbabwe for four days" from December 4 to 8.

Internationally, parliamentarians were horrified by the treatment of MDC MP Roy Bennett - who physically attacked the Minister of Justice after endless taunting from him, and was sent to prison with a sentence of hard labour. The not guilty verdict in the trial of MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai for treason showed how threadbare the case was, according to a lawyer observing the trial. The latter said that although there was no case to answer, the judge with a vestige of professional self-respect, but allegedly a recipient of a farm under the fast-track land reform process, prolonged the trail as long as possible so that the state could tie up Tsvangirai in a lengthy legal process.

The government appears to have little strategy or resources to deal with an expected food gap between January and March, although it has loudly proclaimed that it will be self-sufficient - to widespread disbelief - and does not need NGO or World Food Programme help. Nor does the refusal to allow in British media organisations to cover the cricket in late November show Harare in a good light.

The debate on whether free and fair elections can be held or not is critical, for the coming months. Some form of transitional administration, with international (UN, AU, SADC) support, will be needed. But how can such a transitional arrangement be brought about? In the end the whole system of neo-patrimonialism and endemic corruption presided over by the regime needs root and branch change. The authoritarian mindset has little ability to think alternatives other than repression and blame on outside conspirators. In the words of the Crisis in Zimbabwe NGO Coalition 'Slurs, verbal abuse, violence and intimidation may win arguments, but they can never reconstitute, heal or rehabilitate societies. NGOs may be closed, elections may be rigged, newspapers may be bombed and millions starved, but it will never kill the people's love for liberty.'

* Steve Kibble is Africa/Yemen Advocacy Coordinator for the Catholic Institute for International Relations.

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The Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID) is calling for papers on feminist organisational strengthening and movement-building, to share with other AWID members and others around the world. They seek essays and case studies from all areas of the world; those selected will receive an honorarium of $USD1,000 to be used towards organisational strengthening activities.

In its work supporting NGOs in developing countries, Together Against AIDS/AIDS-ACTION has witnessed the mobilization of community-based organizations around providing care, support and access to treatment for people living with HIV/AIDS. Yet, their contribution to the struggle against the pandemic remains virtually unknown. Together Against AIDS conducted a mapping survey throughout Africa from January to April 2004 that underscores what community groups - specifically PLWHAs groups - are doing in the realm of access to treatment, with respect to the World Health Organization's stated goal of placing 3 million people on ARV therapy between now and 2005.

South Africa has succeeded in killing off two United Nations resolutions condemning widespread rights abuses in Sudan and Zimbabwe, ignoring European Union and American protests. The UN General Assembly's Third Committee, which covers human rights, blocked the proposed resolutions by adopting so-called "no-action motions" filed by SA on behalf of an African group of nations.

Parliamentarians from the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of countries agreed this week on setting up a joint 'parliament' to improve internal cohesion and to gain influence with the European Union, World Trade Organisation and other bodies. The ACP parliament could get going as early as April next year if national parliaments approve.

One important task of the Nordic Africa Institute is to establish and maintain relations with African research communities. This is inter alia carried out through a Guest Researchers' Programme, the aim of which is to provide opportunities for its participants to pursue their own research projects, thereby indirectly strengthening the academic milieux in African countries, and promoting scholarly exchange with Nordic research communities.

The Disability and Rehabilitation team of WHO (WHO/DAR) and AIFO/Italy invite projects involved in disability and rehabilitation activities to be part of a multi-country action learning research initiative. Selected projects will be invited to a preliminary meeting to be held in Rome from 6 to 8 April 2005. For reading details about the initiative and for downloading the application form, click on the following link: http://www.aifo.it/english/resources/announcements.htm

The African Commission is due to hear a legal case brought by the Endorois, a Kenyan pastoralist community, at an admissibility hearing scheduled to take place in Dakar in early December. In a significant development in the struggle for rights of the Endorois pastoralists, in June 2004, the Commission accepted a call by rights groups to enact 'Provisional Measures' to prevent irreparable harm to the community and their lands as a result of mining activities. The Commission made an urgent appeal to President Mwai Kibaki of Kenya, urging him to ensure 'no further issuance of the alleged mining concessions'. The case is likely to coincide with Kenyan 'pastoralist week' during which communities will raise rights issues and threats to their future cultural survival.

Giving Africa's HIV-positive children a cheap antibiotic could nearly halve the death rate, research shows. The Medical Research Council trial in Zambia was stopped early when it became obvious how effective daily co-trimoxazole treatment was. The World Health Organization and Unicef are altering their drug advice in line with the Lancet study.

The road between Ziguinchor, capital of Senegal's lush southern region of Casamance, and Cap Skirring, a once booming beach resort, is only 70 kms long. But the journey takes three hours because of military roadblocks and killer pot-holes caused by two decades of strife-related neglect. The Casamance, wedged between Guinea-Bissau to the south and Gambia to the north, was once Senegal's bread basket and a tropical haven for European tourists. But for 22 years it has been the scene of an on-off separatist conflict that has displaced 50,000 people and left hundreds injured by land-mines.

In the aftermath of this month’s general elections, gender imbalances in government still pose a challenge in Namibia. As expected, Namibia’s minister for lands and resettlement – Hifikepunye Pohamba – swept to an easy victory in last week’s presidential poll, while the ruling South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO) maintained its parliamentary majority in the legislative vote. But, hopes that Namibia would reach a target set by the Southern African Development Community (SADC) of having women gain 30 percent of parliamentary seats by 2005 were dashed.

Women's Initiatives for Gender Justice (WIGJ) is an international women's NGO that monitors the International Criminal Court (ICC) from a gender perspective. They have just conducted a mission to Uganda following the Ugandan government's referral of the situation in Northern Uganda to the ICC. "In order to effectively perform its role as the gender watch of the ICC, WIGJ's objectives of the mission were broadly to meet with, speak to and consult with women victims and survivors of the conflict, meet with local NGOs and CBOs, meet with the local cultural, religious and district leadership, and ascertain their analysis of the conflict, their assessment of the impact and consequences of the conflict on the lives of people in the region generally and women and girls in particular, and to get an overview of their perspective on the referral of the situation in Northern Uganda to the ICC."

Wangari Maathai's Green Belt Movement trains women to set up their own tree nurseries. "We make them independent people who can take care of their environment by themselves," says Maathai. As well as tree planting, Maathai is African Co-President of Jubilee 2000 and is campaigning for the cancellation of Third World Debt.

The MDG Campaign Manager will be responsible for all staff, interns and volunteers who are part of the MDG Department, as well as the management of external consultants and services. The incumbent will be required to operate to tight deadlines using independent judgement within clear parameters and to develop and implement department work plans and objectives.

On 24 November 2004, the Borno state government in northern Nigeria declared the British Broadcasting Corporation's (BBC) Hausa Service correspondent, Alhaji Adamu Mato, a "persona non grata" and banned him from continuing to report from the state following allegations of "incorrect" reporting about the region. The government has banned the correspondent from the state's Government House in Maiduguri and all government institutions, ministries and parastatals, in addition to public functions.

Reporters Without Borders has welcomed a statement from Ivorian president, Laurent Gbagbo, condemning the ransacking of opposition and independent newspaper offices on 4 November and the opening of an investigation to punish those responsible. But the worldwide press freedom organisation called on him to go further to ensure these newspapers can circulate freely again and to restore order within the state-owed media.

Environmental group Earthlife Africa will go to court on Monday as part of the group's legal battle against power utility Eskom's proposed pebble bed modular reactor (PBMR), with the court case aimed at upholding South Africa's environmental rights, Earthlife said in a statement. The Legal Resources Centre will be representing Earthlife Africa in the case. The authorisation of Eskom's proposed PBMR will come under judicial scrutiny on November 29, 2004 and November 30, 2004 when a full bench of the Cape Town High Court considers whether the authorisation of the plant given on 25 June, 2003 was unlawful.

This paper examines the disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration (DDR) programme that took place when conflict ceased in Sierra Leone. While these programmes effectively reached out to male combatants, they largely ignored women's roles and experiences of conflict. This paper explores women and girls' unique experiences of conflict, and assesses how a gender perspective can improve formal disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration (DDR) programmes.

As an anti-AIDS Foundation in Somalia called AIDSOM Foundation, we are so happy to receive your weekly electronic forum for social justice in Africa. Thanks for your informative communication.

HIV/AIDS infection among teachers in West African countries results in higher mortality rates, an increase in early retirements and lower productivity. These factors exacerbate problems of access, equity, efficiency and management, according to a paper from the HIV/AIDS Impact on Education Clearinghouse. This paper examines the literature on how HIV/AIDS has impacted teachers and other education personnel in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cote d`Ivoire, Ghana, Mali, Nigeria and Senegal. It focuses on the areas of: prevalence; impact on professional lives of teachers; impact of teacher infection on schools; impact of teacher infection on students; infection of administrative personnel; responses from teachers; and responses from management.

Success in reducing childhood mortality requires more than the availability of adequate health services with well-trained personnel. As families have the major responsibility for caring for their children, success requires a partnership between health workers and families, with support from their communities. Published by the World Health Organization (WHO), this report presents the evidence for twelve family and community practices identified as being of key importance in providing good home-care for the child.

A US bill scheduled for approval contains a controversial amendment that will impose further sanctions on countries that have ratified the International Criminal Court (ICC) treaty. The amendment would prohibit assistance for countries that have refused to sign a "bilateral immunity agreement" to shield US citizens and certain foreign nationals from transfer to the ICC for investigation or prosecution for atrocities or genocide. The funds affected include support for anti-terrorism activities, peace building, democratization and counter-drug initiatives.