PAMBAZUKA NEWS 159: RIGHTS OF WOMEN IN AFRICA: LAUNCH OF ONLINE PETITION TO AFRICAN UNION
PAMBAZUKA NEWS 159: RIGHTS OF WOMEN IN AFRICA: LAUNCH OF ONLINE PETITION TO AFRICAN UNION
A spokesman of President Domitien Ndayizeye said on Monday that the South African team in charge of Burundi's peace process had rejected a government proposal to extend the transitional period by one year. The spokesman, Pancrace Cimpaye, told IRIN in the Burundian capital, Bujumbura, that the mediation team had maintained that the transitional period should end on 1 November as stipulated in the Arusha Peace and Reconciliation Accord, signed in August 2000, under which the three-year transitional period in Burundi was established.
Several thousand supporters of President Laurent Gbagbo attended a rally in Abidjan on Saturday to call for the resignation of Prime Minister Seydou Diarra. They also demanded UN peacekeeping troops press ahead with the disarmament of rebels, known as the "New Forces."
This Research Matters “Call for Proposals: Innovation in the Consolidation and Dissemination of GEH Research” has been designed to advance the GEH mandate through innovation, consolidation, and the on-going dissemination of GEH research results. Grants disbursed under this Call will promote new and creative ways of connecting researchers and research-users, consolidate existing evidence, and disseminate evidence-based research to a larger range of research-users. Grants are not intended to support new research but rather to support the advancement of existing or anticipated research results.
Chief Electoral Commissioner Eugene Davies told journalists on Friday that results from last Saturday’s local elections would be delayed while 68 separate appeals were investigated. Between the close of polls on 22nd May and up to the 27th May, "the Commission received a total of 68 appeals from political parties and independent candidates," said Davies.
The UN Relief/Humanitarian Coordinator in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Herbert M'Cleod, has set up an inter-agency Crisis Task Force for the eastern town of Bukavu where fighting between rival factions of the Congolese army erupted on Wednesday, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported. "The task force will interface with the ICRC [International Committee of the Red Cross] and will undertake an evaluation of the humanitarian needs in Bukavu as soon as security permits safe and unhindered access," OCHA said in a report of the current situation in the town.
The latest death of a suspect in police custody in Swaziland has triggered renewed calls from the public and human rights groups for a probe into allegations of torture. Mandla Ngubeni, 28, was taken in last Friday for questioning by police in Mbabane, the capital, along with seven other employees of Fast Towing Services after Lilangeni 28,494.2 (US $4,363) was found missing from the company. Ngubeni was discovered dead in a police cell at 04h00 on Saturday. His family was not notified of his whereabouts until 10h00 on Sunday.
Tensions between political parties in the Comoros were set to heighten following a "surprise" decision by Union President Azali Assoumani this week to postpone the opening of the national assembly. The establishment of the federal assembly was expected to resolve the impasse between political leaders and pave the way towards permanent stability in the troubled Indian Ocean archipelago.
Political talks between the Togolese government and opposition parties officially opened last Thursday under pressure from the European Union (EU) despite the absence by main opposition parties. Some 26 political parties were invited to participate in the opening ceremony of the first political talks to be held since 1999. The EU is currently putting pressure on Togo to improve democracy, one of the conditions to lift ten-year-old sanctions against the country.
Sylvia Ssinabulya, an MP in Uganda and a member of the Ugandan Family Planning Association (FPAU) has urged the government to legalize abortion. She said legalizing abortion would give women raped in war zones opportunity to terminate unwanted pregnancies.
The civil wars that hit the Republic of Congo intermittently in the decade after 1992, the year of the first democratic elections, displaced up to 800,000 people. Most of these had either returned or settled down in their areas of displacement when hostilities broke out again in March 2002. The renewed fighting sent around 100,000 people, mainly Lari from the hard-hit Pool region which surrounds the capital Brazzaville, fleeing from their homes. In March 2003 a ceasefire was signed between the main rebel group and the government. The fighting has also resulted in massive organised looting, the burning of houses, and destruction of the rural economy and infrastructure and has devastated the social fabric of the Lari.
Health officials at district level in northwestern South Africa have been put on "red alert" to prevent the spread of polio from neighbouring Botswana, a government spokesperson told IRIN. Southern Africa recorded its first case of polio in more than a decade when the disease was reported in Botswana earlier this year.
Despite the apparent move towards peace in Liberia in recent months, the situation of thousands of the country's displaced remains desperate. While many of Liberia's estimated 500,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) may wish to return to their areas of origin, very few have been able to do so. Faltering attempts to disarm the country's estimated 45,000 combatants have so far done little to reassure civilians that the tenuous peace will hold.
As the clock ticks closer to the deadline for introducing a new constitution in Kenya, Atsango Chesoni – for one – is filled with anticipation at the coming change. The women’s rights activist and official at Bomas Katiba Watch says the country’s existing constitution discriminates against women, especially on the issue of property rights – and that change in this matter is long overdue. ("Katiba" is the Swahili word for constitution, while Bomas refers to the venue on the outskirts of the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, where constitutional negotiations took place.)
"Worse than dogs and pigs" is how Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe described homosexuals almost a decade ago, when the gay community attempted to highlight widespread homophobia in the Southern African country. That statement, reported around the world, still reverberates in the country, casting a long shadow over the exercise of sexual freedom. Yet, in subtle ways, things are also changing.
African Trade Ministers meeting on 27-28 May in Kigali, Rwanda, have issued a "Kigali Consensus" on the World Trade Organisation welcoming the emerging consensus to drop from the work programme the three Singapore issues of investment, competition and transparency in government procurement. They stressed that they "have been consistently concerned with the potential serious implications of the Singapore issues on African economies," but that they had remained engaged in the discussions.
The public quarrel between public protector Lawrence Mushwana, National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka and former justice minister Penuell Maduna will test the ability of the African National Congress (ANC) to handle disputes that threaten to split the party, experts say. A war of words broke out between the three men following the release of Mushwana's report last week, which was critical of the way Ngcuka handled the allegations of corruption against Deputy President Jacob Zuma.
Aid agencies are calling on the international community to take urgent action to help the growing number of Sudanese refugees in eastern Chad. More than a million mainly black Africans in Sudan's western Darfur region have been driven from their homes by gangs of Arab militia. Around 180,000 have sought sanctuary in neighbouring Chad. A representative of the UN refugee agency says the response to recent aid appeals has been disappointing. The approaching rainy season will also soon make it hard to reach those in need.
The holiday of an Indian politician and his family has turned into a nightmare, after a South African Airways official allegedly accused them of buying their passports. They claimed the SAA official was racist after she accused them of buying their passports, and refused to listen to the advice of an immigration official at the airport who said the passports were in order. However, SAA's corporate communications manager, Rich Mkhondo, denied the allegations.
Asylum seekers who launch appeals against being deported will no longer be allowed to remain in the UK while their cases are heard, Appeal Court judges have ruled. Lord Justice Brooke said that currently asylum seekers are usually allowed to stay in the UK when an appeal is launched regardless of its merits.
He said that this should no longer be the case due to the numerous challenges against deportation being made in the Court of Appeal by illegal immigrants.
"My marriage to a black African man, who is part Kenyan and part Malawian, stirred a variety of reactions, ranging from curiosity and admiration to disdain and downright hostility. I must admit that I am still surprised at the level of support I received from some members of my immediate family. There are no 'pluses' for marrying an African, at least in the eyes of the Asian community in Kenya."
Four opposition parties operating in Ethiopia have voiced their concern over the upcoming election activities and ongoing human rights violations in the country. The Ethiopian Democratic Party (EDP), Oromo National Congress (ONC), Ethiopian Peace and Democracy Alternative Forces (EPDAF) and South Ethiopia Democratic Union (SEDU) were the political organisations that gathered on Sunday at Meskel Square to voice their concern over the current political situation in Ethiopia.
Democratic Republic of the Congo army soldiers this week battled a renegade army faction near the eastern town of Bukavu, shattering a fragile truce struck early this morning after the commander of the renegade group received assurances that the government would protect a group of ethnic Tutsis in the region. Clashes in eastern D.R.C. have killed at least 45 people since Wednesday, including a U.N. peacekeeper. The fighting between the renegade and regular forces resumed near the Bukavu airport, 15 miles north of the South Kivu provincial city, when the commander of the regular forces launched a fresh attack, according to unidentified security officials.
An appeals panel of the U.N.-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone has ruled that former Liberian President Charles Taylor is not immune from prosecution for war crimes. Attorneys for Taylor had argued that the court overstepped its bounds by indicting the head of state of another country. Four appellate judges, however, ruled that because the court is an international tribunal, it does have that authority. "We hold that the official position of the applicant as an incumbent head of state at the time when these criminal proceedings were initiated against him is not a bar to his prosecution by this court," said a statement read by the court president, Justice Emmanuel Ayoola.
The mantra that market reforms would pull the least developed countries out of poverty collapsed under major new findings by UNCTAD presented in London last Thursday. The 50 least developed countries (LDCs) increased gross national income (GNI) and export growth but poverty levels within the countries have also risen, or at least not declined, says the report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). "Trade liberalisation has actually worsened the trade balance in LDCs," the report says.
Activists have expressed outrage at South Africa's decision to stop a roll-out of anti-Aids drugs for children. The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) accused the authorities of putting people's lives at risk. The health department is advising hospitals not to enrol new children on the programme in case there are not enough drugs for them to continue.
Despite being vigorously promoted in the policy arena and having been implemented in several countries in the South in the 1990s, water and sanitation privatization has achieved neither the scale nor benefits anticipated, says a paper from the International Institute for Environment and Development, which is pessimistic about the role that privatization can play in achieving the Millennium Development Goals of halving the number of people without access to water and sanitation by 2015.
It is only by constantly keeping the debt issue at the top of the political agenda, that governments will be forced to take action. The World Development Movement (WDM) needs people who are able to campaign at short notice, whether it be writing a letter to your MP, attending a demo or participating in online discussions.
Appeals Worldwide specializes in producing appeals letters based on Amnesty International cases, for you to send to the authorities in the countries concerned. Never before has it been so easy to act on behalf of human rights victims.
Members of the African Union struck a deal with wealthy members of the World Health Organisation to be compensated for the loss of their health care workers to richer countries, the Nairobi Daily Nation reported Friday. The negotiations were held during the 57th World Health Assembly in Geneva May 17-22. "The African Union pushed the agenda of compensation as one voice and we will jointly negotiate the terms like the European Union does," said Gideon Konchella, Kenya's assistant minister for health.
The Zimbabwean government has proposed obliging its internet service providers to divulge details of e-mails deemed offensive or dangerous. Zispa, the local ISP association, has asked the government to clarify its proposed addendum to providers' franchise contracts. One ISP told BBC News Online it was not a provider's duty to police the net. President Robert Mugabe has suggested the internet, widely developed in Zimbabwe, is a tool of colonialists.
There are no books, no chalk and little hope as children are forced out of class. Deep in the Zimbabwean bush, 65 miles west of Harare, four teachers start each day by washing goat droppings from their primary school’s concrete floor. They have no textbooks, no stationery and no chalk. Five years of economic collapse, political oppression and rampant lawlessness, compounded by the scourge of Aids, are threatening to deprive an entire generation of Zimbabwean children of any meaningful schooling.
Worldphilanthropists.org is a non-denominational, non-political organisation designed to bring together on one site as much relevant information as possible on the subject of philanthropy.
Media for Development Trust (MFD) is one of the leading producers and distributors of African film and development communication in Africa south of the Sahara. Established in 1989, MFD is a registered, non-profit social welfare organisation seeking to promote development through communication, particularly through the production and distribution of high quality, socially conscious films and videos that are relevant to an African audience. MFD distribute a wide range of films from all over Africa, produced and directed by distinguished local and international filmmakers, some of which are award winning. They have just finished writing and recording our two-year-long project, the radio serial drama, Mopani Junction. A talented team of 6 young writers put together 104 episodes, with exciting storylines as well as important information about HIV and AIDS. MFD is building a new website at an address which is more snappy and easy to remember. It’s going to be more modern, more colourful and more user-friendly. It’s under construction at www.mfd.co.zw . If you want information now though, visit the current website at www.samara.co.zw/mfd or contact [email protected]. For a listing of MFD films, click on the link below.
The driving assumption within the international development policy establishment is that 'there is no alternative' to neo-liberal economics and globalisation. In 'Reclaiming Development' Ha-Joon Chang and Ilene Grabel explain what this dominant school says about how economies develop and the economic policies it imposes worldwide. By analysing the actual historical experiences of the leading Western and East Asian economies during their development, the authors question the validity of the neo-liberal development model.
The ‘Zimbabwe crisis’ has become the subject of intense debate both inside and outside Zimbabwe, and explanations for its origins, forms and outcomes have been many and varied. What is, however, disappointing is that despite their multiplicity, these explanations have done little to improve our understanding of the complexity of the problems confronting the country. The main problem being that many of these explanations have not only been parochial and partisan but also imagined; seeking to interpret the present problems out of history and context. Moving away from the tradition of narrow and partisan explanations which abound on the topic, this study, bringing together expertise from various scholars, policy analysts, development practitioners and activists who have all researched and written on Zimbabwe for years, analytically examines the crisis through its complexities and contradictions while also trying to suggest solutions to it.
The links between biodiversity and the path to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have not been made explicit, even though biodiversity plays an important role in ensuring that the targets of the MDGs for sustainable development are successfully achieved. This report examines the role of biodiversity in achieving the targets of each of the MDGs (including poverty, gender and education, health, and environmental sustainability). The report also considers links between climate change, biodiversity and the MDGs.
Ahead of next week’s "Group of Eight" Summit in Sea Island, Georgia, Africa Action co-hosted a media briefing in Washington, DC entitled "President Bush’s G-8 Summit: Priorities of a Global Minority?" Africa Action also released a statement on "The G-8 and Global Apartheid", describing the G-8 as a form of global minority rule, whose policies and actions have resulted in patterns of gross global inequality that are clearly linked to race and place. At the media briefing, a panel of leading analysts discussed the inadequacy of the G-8 leaders’ policies on key global issues such as HIV/AIDS, poverty and the debt crisis in the world’s poorest countries.
Standing atop a sand dune, Klaas Matthuis can see more dunes almost surrounding Struizendam, his village in Botswana on the border with South Africa. They are bare of vegetation except the one he stands on, which has large clumps of grass, trees and shrubs. Mr. Matthuis, vice-chairperson of a new community resource management committee, is showing visitors from Kenya, Mali, and the University of Oslo in Norway the dune that has been stabilized by fencing out goats and cattle and planting various indigenous species.
The World Health Organisation last Thursday announced a plan to provide antiretroviral drugs to about half of the HIV-positive people in Ghana by the end of 2005, Reuters reports. The program is part of WHO's 3 by 5 Initiative which aims to treat three million people with antiretroviral drugs by 2005, according to WHO Ghana Program Director Napoleon Graham.
A lot of work and sensitisation needs to be done in many countries in southern Africa to ensure that they produce and implement national budgets that are gender sensitive. In its 1997 Declaration on Gender and Development, Southern African Development Community (SADC) member states made a commitment to ensure that gender is routinely taken into account in all sectors. National budgets world-wide are often assumed to affect everyone more or less equally, and have been instrumental in perpetrating and reproducing gender biases, yet they also hold the possibility for transforming existing gender inequalities.
Barbara Lopi and Priscilla Mng’anya
The girl-child in southern Africa is faced with many challenges, which include poverty, effects of HIV and AIDS, dropping out of school, commercial sex work and child abuse. The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (BPFA) mandates governments and states to eliminate all forms of discrimination and abuses against the girl-child, and to ensure that girls enjoy their rights in totality. In the Southern African Development Community (SADC), six countries (Angola, Botswana, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia and Zambia) have identified issues affecting the girl-child as a priority. However, the region still has insufficient innovative programmes to effectively deal with the challenges of girls in rural communities including those out of the formal education systems and organised groups.
Chipo Chigumira
The South African government's neglect of schools on commercial farms prevents thousands of rural children from receiving an adequate education, Human Rights Watch says in a new report. Farm schools provide the only educational opportunity for farm workers’ children in South Africa. The 59-page report, "Forgotten Schools: Right to Basic Education for Children on Farms in South Africa," found that the government's failure to negotiate contracts with farm owners impedes children’s right to basic education. In the worst cases, farm owners have deliberately obstructed children's access to the schools.
The AIDS and Rights Alliance for Southern Africa (ARASA) is leading an initiative to establish a Code for the SADC region on Gender and HIV/AIDS. This Code is similar to the ‘Code on HIV/AIDS and Employment’ that was adopted by SADC 1997, but focuses specifically on the gendered dimensions of the AIDS epidemic. ARASA, in consultation with a number of human rights, gender and AIDS-services, has drawn up a draft Code entitled “Urgent Measures needed to Promote the Equality of Women and the Reduction of Women’s Risk of HIV infection”.
It is very interesting to note that women met in Zambia to reveal and make some recommendations for the way forward (Pambazuka News 157: Implementing the Beijing Platform for Action). This is highly recommended by all women, expect women and girls with disabilities as it seems this target group is left out. I think it is high time that women with disabilities are included in issues concerning other women and given the opportunity to air their views.
Barbara Lopi Replies: Thank you for your comments to the editorial ‘Implementing the Beijing Platform for Action’ that appeared in Pambazuka news. Indeed it was interesting for SADC gender activists to meet in Zambia and reflect on progress towards the implementation of the Beijing PFA. The Lusaka meeting is among the many fora taking place to share progress and chart the way forward. In this case, participation to this meeting was limited to representatives of National NGO focal points. Issues of women and girls with disabilities where considered as cross-cutting and featured in all discussions on the 12 critical areas of concern. But I do agree with you that little came out in the recommendations.
Currently, countries are in the process of preparing progress status reports on implementation of the BPFA and I will advise that you forward recommendations to the relevant NGO and government machineries that are working on the progress review reports in your country. Currently, discussions on issues that various groups would like to be included in the plan of action post Beijing +10 are in progress. Regarding what we at SARDC WIDSAA have done, our key mandate as an information organisation is to ensure that information on the situation of women's empowerment issues in various aspects in the southern African region is made available to the relevant policy makers and development planners for use. We thus, in collaboration with national partners and other relevant organisations, collect, document and disseminate information on gender and development related issues for use in lobbying, advocacy and policy formulation. For instance, our publication Beyond Inequalities: Women in Southern Africa (2000) has various chapters on the 12 critical areas of concern, including one on women with disabilities.
Indeed the white space got to me. Here I was anxiously logging in at an Internet Cafe to get my weekly instalment of Pambazuka News. It was there in the inbox! I read the letter and then came to the white space. It made me realise that even though I cannot at the moment contribute financially, the least I can do is say "Thank you". So, I am saying thank-you, ndatenda, siyabonga to the Pambazuka team for the weekly updates. They say you don't know what you have until its gone! At least next week Pambazuka will be back. Thank you once again and God bless.
I went through your article (Pambazuka News 156: From Coffins to ABC’s) and I found it most interesting and educative.
The Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa has published the second edition of the Compilation of the Decisions on Communications of the African Commission (1994 - 2001). All of the decisions that the Commission has taken on human rights cases brought against states parties have been collected here and indexed by country and by article. This is a valuable resource for those who are interested in understanding how the Commission responds to allegations of human rights violations. Contact the Institute at the website below for more information.
In its advocacy for worker’s rights, the Kenya Human Rights Commission’s research into Women Working in Precarious Conditions in Export Processing Zones confirms the negative effects the conduct and actions of these key non-state actors have on human rights hence justifying the need for monitoring by civil society in this new world order, where private corporations exercise inordinate influence over local laws and policies. A new publication from the Kenyan Human Rights Commission, Manufacture of Poverty, focuses on this issue.
Since the Zimbabwe Government embarked on its fast track land resettlement programme, the food situation, particularly in respect of the staple maize, has been getting worse every year. Initially people were talking of food shortage, but "famine" would now seem a more appropriate term to apply to the situation the country now faces. "Famine" has been used to describe situations of extreme food scarcity and starvation in countries such as Ethiopia and Eritrea. Nobody ever contemplated that Zimbabwe, formerly the bread-basket of southern Africa, would come to be referred to in terms of famine.
More than half of Zambia’s children aged under five are stunted –one of the highest levels in Africa, according to UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF). "The levels of child malnutrition in Zambia had showed improvement throughout the 1990s, but since 1999 have deteriorated quite significantly," UNICEF’s nutrition and health officer, Claudia Hudspeth, told IRIN.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has warned of dire health consequences for millions of people in Darfur, Sudan. A significant increase in disease and death is inevitable without a rapid increase in external help. The catastrophe can only be prevented through an urgent scaling up of the current international response.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) launched this year's campaign for World No Tobacco Day with the slogan: 'Tobacco and Poverty: a vicious circle', stressing the enormous economic costs of tobacco use and cultivation to families, communities and countries. The slogan 'a vicious circle' explains the inextricable link that exists between tobacco and poverty, and how the use of tobacco, especially by poorer people who consume this product the most, can cause harmful consequences to their already precarious economies and income.
More and more people in the landlocked desert state of Niger are volunteering to undergo testing for HIV/AIDS as acceptance and understanding of the disease improves, according to health workers in the capital, Niamey. "The image of AIDS has changed. People no longer associate it with death, weight loss, incurability", Doctor Kadidiatu Gouro, the director of the Anonymous and Voluntary Testing Centre (CEDAV) in Niamey told IRIN.
Nigeria’s National Assembly has approved eight new laws giving President Olusegun Obasanjo sweeping powers in strife-torn Plateau State where he imposed a state of emergency last month after a surge in inter-ethnic and religious violence. The laws approved by the two-chamber legislature on Tuesday gave the police and other security services the power to detain people indefinitely, conduct searches without warrants, impose curfews and ban public processions.
The leaders of rival ethnic militias agreed to make peace in the Nigerian oil town of Warri on Tuesday, while government officials urged foreign oil companies to resume operations disrupted by fighting in the Niger Delta region during the last year. In another part of the town, troops of a joint military task force demolished houses in three slum districts in an operation aimed at ridding Warri of the guns and criminals that have fuelled violence in the town.
A new United Nations report has urged the Angolan authorities to transfer more power to local communities. The joint study by the UN Development Programme and Angola's ministry of territorial administration has called for greater decentralisation of power. The report noted an "enormous need" for local-level staff to provide basic services and promote development in areas such as agriculture, commerce, transportation and housing.
The Public Integrity Index is the centrepiece of the Global Integrity report, providing a quantitative scorecard of governance practices in each country. The Public Integrity Index assesses the institutions and practices that citizens can use to hold their governments accountable to the public interest. It does not measure corruption itself but rather the opposite of corruption: the extent of citizens' ability to ensure their government is open and accountable.
The Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Kenya (ICPAK) has accused the Narc Government of blackmailing citizens under the pretext of the war on corruption. Addressing the society's 20th annual seminar, Ms Rose Ogega, the ICPAK chairman, told Ethics and Governance Permanent Secretary John Githongo and Constitutional Affairs minister Kiraitu Murungi to stop cheating the Kenyans that they are combating corruption in Government.
"History is replete with instances of good concepts weakened by vague definitional parameters and the concomitant blurring of focus. This is equally true in the case of the notion of access to information. A good starting point is the observed variations in the title of legislative instruments – ‘Access to Information’, ‘Freedom of Information’ and ‘Right to Information’." You can read more at the resource page on access to information at the anti-corruption website, Coris.
The government’s blitzkrieg on corruption has claimed its biggest corporate scalp to date following the arrest of South African-based Zimbabwean business mogul, Mutumwa Mawere in Johannesburg this week, the Daily Mirror reported. A South African police spokeswoman confirmed that Mawere was picked up by Interpol officers in the plush Johannesburg suburb of Sandton on charges of violating the Zimbabwe Exchange Control Act.
Rose Lukanu Tshakwiza, a journalist with Congolese National Radiotelevision's (Radiotélévision nationale congolaise, RTNC) Lubumbashi station and a local Radio France International (RFI) correspondent, have been receiving death threats since 25 May 2004. The threats were reportedly received from anonymous phone callers claiming to be members of the youth branch of the Union of Congolese Federalists (Union des fédéralistes congolais, UNAFEC), a party whose national president is also justice minister.
Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has condemned the harassment by the authorities, particularly by the security forces, of journalists who are taking a stand for press freedom. The organisation also protested the arrest of six journalists from the daily "Al-Azmina" over a damning report on Sudan's financial and economical situation. "The journalists have tried to resist official pressure and stand up for freedom of information by creating a committee to defend press freedom and by submitting objections to a new press law that was submitted to Parliament by the president of Sudan for ratification," RSF said.
On March 01, this year the Tanzania Development Gateway (TzDG) of the Economic and Social Research Foundation (ESRF) organized a one-day workshop on the Internet Development and the Role of Media in Promoting Open and Inclusive Information Society. Aloyce Menda, the Coordinator of Journalists' Union for Science & Technology Advancement in Africa, presented the paper available through the link below on how the media in Tanzania can promote local content development to enhance inclusive information society in Tanzania.
ARTICLE 19 Global Campaign for Free Expression has welcomed the Access to Information Bill tabled by the Ugandan Government but signalled that more work is needed to bring it in line with international standards. "On the whole, the Bill represents a positive effort to operationalise the constitutional guarantee of freedom of information. ARTICLE 19 particularly welcomes the provisions on the duty to publish information whenever this is in the public interest, and the protection granted to 'whistleblowers'. At the same time, the Bill still fails to conform fully to international standards on freedom of information."
Lucien-Claude Ngongo, deputy editor of the weekly newspaper Fair Play, has been detained in the DRC capital Kinshasa for a week without charge, according to local press freedom group Journaliste en Danger (JED). Local journalists say Ngongo has been questioned about an article he wrote denouncing corrupt practices by an expatriate businessman.
The Shuttleworth Foundation supports Maths, Science, Technology and Entrepreneurship initiatives and invites proposals from innovative educational pilot projects.
The project focus areas are:
Maths, Science, Technology and Entrepreneurship in General Education and Training (GET) phase; and
Numeracy in the Foundation Phase.
The project should demonstrate cost-effective management of resources and innovative teaching and learning methodologies on the specified subject matter.
For more information contact the Shuttleworth Foundation at tel: 021 970-1200
The Star reports that the national Health Department denies any delay on the part of the South African government in disbursing Aids funds to recipients. This is a response to the statement made by the Global Fund to FightAids, Malaria and TB, on channeling Aids funds directly to the beneficiaries in South Africa and complaints by recipients of delays in receiving their funds.
Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has expressed deep concern over the deterioration of "Le Venin" ("Venom") publication director Gaston Bony's health. Bony is imprisoned in the Agboville penitentiary, just outside of Abidjan. "The deplorable conditions of [Bony's] detention and a five day hunger strike have considerably weakened him," said the organisation. Bony, who is also a radio host with La voix de l'Agnéby (The Voice of Agnéby), a local radio station, has been in prison since 31 March 2004.
The Global Fund to FightAids, TB and Malaria has expressed its dissatisfaction over the South African government’s delay in disbursing funds allocated to various HIV/Aids prevention projects. The R1 bn funds allocated to South Africa last year could be withdrawn. The Global Fund is also exploring the possibility of dealing with the HIV/Aids NPOs directly. Love Life, one of the NPOs benefitting from the Global Fund, also expressed their frustration over the delay in the disbursement of funds by the government.
In March 2004 the Resource Alliance held the 5th International Workshop on Resource Mobilisation in Johannesburg, South Africa. The event was the most successful in the series, with 271 participants attending from 48 countries. The Resource Alliance wishes to thank those who supported the event including: the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), Plan International, the Commonwealth Foundation, the South African Institute for Fundraising (SAIF) and Downes Murray International, South Africa.
www.whoseland.com focuses on the unfolding story of land rights struggles. The site explores: land rights issues; relationships with other cultures; the future of indigenous minority cultures; and custody of the land for future generations.
"During the past decades, many people believed in the idea that the rural areas did not have an important role in economic development.....In fact rural areas are very rich and concentrate the majority of natural resources, such as water, farm land, minerals, and biodiversity. It's not a coincidence that international financial institutions, like the World Bank, focus their projects on these regions." Visit the webpage of the Land Research Action Group for more information on this booklet.
Edited by Evanize Sydow & Maria Luisa Mendonca
"In South Africa land is presently not only one of the most defining political and development issues, but also perhaps the most intractable. The continuing racial maldistribution of land will either be resolved through a fundamental restructuring of the government’s land reform programme, or it will be resolved by a fundamental restructuring of property relations by the people themselves. Which direction the country follows depends to a large degree on the urgent and immediate responsiveness of the government to the needs and demands of the country’s 19-million mostly poor, black and landless rural people." This is according to the introduction of a paper published on the website of the National Land Committee.
A meeting, jointly hosted and organized by the Center for Governance and Development (CGD) and the Development Policy Management Forum (DPMF) was held in Nairobi on the 4th of March 2004. The theme of the meeting was “Deepening Regional Integration For Democratization and Development Through Networking/Coalition Building in the East African Community (EAC)”. The meeting was organized under a project of the Ford Foundation's Special Initiative for Africa (SIA) that, through an earlier workshop, mandated the DPMF to develop a program for mobilizing CSOs and Research Institutions (RIs) to “promote regional cooperation for democratic governance and monitoring the African Peer Review Mechanism process”.
SaferAfrica whose mission is to serve the long-term security and development needs of Africa and its peoples, in accordance with the vision of African Renewal and values of Pan-Africanism, has a programme on “AU-NEPAD”. This programme is fully engaged in the on-going transformation of Africa's peace, security and governance. It provides expertise and supports the development of capacity for the African Peer Review Mechanism process and facilitates consultative meetings for the AU Commission on the policy and operationalization of new AU and NEPAD structures.
Cotton anchors the economies of some of the world's poorest nations. But in 2001, the most recent year for which statistics are available, 24 sub-Saharan African states lost an estimated $302 million in cotton exports. The culprit? Soaring government subsidies for cotton farmers in the US. From 1994 to 2001, US cotton supports rose from $99 million to nearly $4 billion, according to official figures.
Google is planning to launch itself into the field of free electronic messaging. The service Google is putting in place, under the name of "Gmail", is being tested out on a small number of users.
While Sierra Leoneans in the country would be glued to their radio or television sets following the Local Government Elections as they trickle in, those in the Diaspora and with access to the internet now have the opportunity of following the same on the website, www.elections-sl.org.
Isis-Women's International Cross Cultural Exchange (Isis-WICCE) was the winner of the Gender and ICT Award presented by GKP and APC WNSP in the category "National and Local Outstanding Multi-stakeholder Initiatives", reports the May edition of Pula, the Newsletter of the Association for Progressive Communications Africa Women (APC-Africa-Women). The winning initiative focuses on recording and telling the little-known stories of women in situations of armed conflict in Uganda and other African nations. Since 1997, Isis-WICCE has documented the experiences of women in such situations in 10 countries in Africa through its networks.
South Africa is celebrating ten years of democracy - a period during which the country has shown progressive leadership, including explicitly targeting information and communications technology (ICT) as an enabler of socio-economic development. In its re-election campaign this year, the Government promised to focus on poverty alleviation and job creation. But, ironically, the Government's legislative efforts affecting new technologies like Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and Wireless Fidelity (WiFi) are actually working against the development goals it seeks to achieve.
The African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights recognizes the importance of women’s rights through three main provisions. Article 18(3), covering the protection of the family, promises to ensure the elimination of all discrimination against women and also ensure protection of the rights of women. Article 2, the non-discrimination clause, provides that the rights and freedoms enshrined in the Charter shall be enjoyed by all irrespective of race, ethnic group, colour, sex, language, religion, political or any other opinion, national and social origin, fortune, birth or other status. And Article 3, the equal protection clause, states that every individual shall be equal before the law and shall be entitled to the equal protection of the law.
However, the above provisions are not adequate to address the rights of women. For example, while Article 18 prohibits discrimination against women, it does so only in the context of the family. In addition, explicit provisions guaranteeing the right of consent to marriage and equality of spouses during and after marriage are absent. These omissions are compounded by the fact that the Charter places emphasis on traditional African values and traditions without addressing concerns that many customary practices, such as female genital mutilation, forced marriage, and wife inheritance, can be harmful or life threatening to women. By ignoring critical issues such as custom and marriage, the Charter inadequately defends women’s human rights.
The World Conference on Human Rights held in Vienna, Austria in 1993 made advances to human rights theory and practice with respect to women's human rights. The Declaration and Programme of Action of the World Conference on Human Rights at Vienna emphasized: “The human rights of women and of the girl child are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of the universal human rights.”
It also emphasized that elimination of violence against women is a human-rights obligation upon states. This was the first attempt to address the marginalisation of women’s human rights from the work of mainstream human rights. Thus the slogan that emerged from Vienna: “Women's rights are human rights”. Following almost directly on from Vienna, it was imperative for the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) to expose the specific inequalities that impact negatively on the lives of women and thereby acknowledge that “women’s rights as human rights must be respected and observed”.
Developing the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa:
Article 66 of the Charter that provides for the establishment of Protocols and Agreements to supplement its provisions gave impetus for the consideration and subsequent formulation of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa.
The process started with a meeting organised by Women in Law and Development in Africa (WiLDAF) on the theme “The African Charter on Human and People's Rights and the Human Rights of Women in Africa” in March 1995 in Lome, Togo. The meeting called for the development of a Protocol to the Charter on Women’s Rights. The meeting also called on the ACHPR to appoint a Special Rapporteur on Women’s Rights in Africa. The Assembly of Heads of States and Government of the Organisation of Africa Unity (OAU) at its 31st Ordinary Session in June 1995, in Addis Ababa, mandated the ACHPR to elaborate a Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa.
The first Draft was prepared by the experts group meeting organised by the ACHPR and the International Commission of Jurist (ICJ) in Nouakchott, Mauritania, April 1997. The experts comprising of members of the ACHPR, representatives of African NGOs and international observers prepared the first Draft Protocol that was submitted to the ACHPR during its 22nd Session held in October 1997 for consideration and comments. The draft was also circulated to NGOs for comments.
The 12th ICJ workshop on “Participation in the African Commission on Human and People's Rights”, October 30 to November 1, 1997, in The Gambia, provided the opportunity for NGOs to make input into the Draft Protocol and pass a resolution calling upon the ACHPR to ensure the completion of the Draft Protocol in time for presentation to the next session of the ACHPR.
The First Meeting of the Working Group on Women’s Rights that brought together members of the ACHPR, the ICJ, WiLDAF and the African Centre for Democracy and Human Rights Studies (ACDHRS) was held in Banjul, The Gambia from 26-28 January 1998. The meeting amended the Draft Protocol and developed the terms of reference for the appointment of a Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Women in Africa.
During its 23rd Session held in April 1998, the ACHPR endorsed the appointment of the first Special Rapporteur on Women Rights in Africa with a mandate that included working towards the adoption of the Draft Protocol on Women’s Rights. The ACHPR forwarded the Draft Protocol to the OAU Secretariat in 1999. The Inter Africa Committee (IAC) and ACHPR met to merge the Draft Convention on Traditional Practices with the Draft Protocol in 2000, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
The first OAU Government Experts Meeting on The Draft Protocol was held in November 2001, in Addis Baba, Ethiopia. The experts amended the Draft Protocol developed by the ACHPR and called on the OAU to schedule a second AU experts meeting in 2002 to consider the draft again before the hosting of an OAU ministerial meeting on the same. African women’s organisations participated in the meeting as observers. The OAU scheduled the second experts meeting and ministerial meeting two times in 2002 but had to postpone them due to lack of quorum. Thus the Draft was not presented for adoption by the inaugural Summit of the African Union (AU) held in Durban, South Africa in July 2002 and it seemed that there was little political will among African governments to move this process forward.
In January 2003, African women's organisations from across the continent met in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia at a meeting convened by Equality Now, FEMNET and the Ethiopian Women Lawyers Association (EWLA) to come up with strategies to lobby the AU and individual governments to schedule and attend the expert and ministerial meetings on the Draft Protocol. Represented at the meeting were ACDHRS, Akina Mama Wa Africa, the Association of Malian Women Lawyers (AJM), the Association of Senegalese lawyers (AJS), Equality Now, EWLA, Femmes Afrique Solidarite (FAS), FEMNET, WILDAF, and WRAPA. These organisations pooled comments in a collective mark-up to strengthen the document and bring it into line with international standards. Following the meeting they met with officials of the AU, including the then Acting Commissioner for Peace and Security, who was in charge of the Protocol, and urged him to call for the second experts and ministerial meetings on the Protocol in March 2003 in an effort to ensure that the Draft Protocol was adopted by the AU Summit in July 2003. The organisations further lobbied ministries of Justice and Gender at national level through their networks to confirm their participation to ensure the AU obtained the required quorum.
The Second AU Experts Meeting followed by the Ministerial Meeting on the Draft Protocol was held in March 2003, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The meetings amended and adopted the Draft Protocol and recommended it for adoption by the Executive Council and Assembly of the AU. African women’s organisations attended the meetings as observers and lobbied the experts and ministers to strengthen the Draft Protocol to the level of regional and international human rights agreements on women.
The Second Ordinary Summit of the AU adopted the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa on July 11 2003, in Maputo Mozambique. The Assembly appealed to all member states to sign and ratify the Protocol in order to ensure its speedy entry into force. The Protocol will enter into force after 15 countries have ratified it. The Protocol will complement the African Charter in ensuring the promotion and protection of the human rights of women in Africa.
Content and meaning for women in Africa
Mainstream international human rights standards are defined in relation to men's experience, and stated in terms of discrete violations of rights in the public realm whereas most violations of women’s human rights occur in private. The private/public dichotomy that is detrimental to women continues to exist. In most African countries, the same constitutional provisions that guarantee gender equality allow exceptions in the so-called “private law” areas of customary law, personal law and family law. Serious violations of women’s human rights such as violence against women and provisions that discriminate against them are found in that private sphere.
Human rights guarantees in the legally binding human rights conventions such as those to the right of life, to bodily integrity, and to be free from torture, cruel and degrading treatment, have not been interpreted to include such acts as domestic violence, rape, female genital mutilation, forced sterilisation, forced childbirth, and numerous other forms in which violence against women and girls is manifested in Africa.
Provisions on women’s human rights in the UN Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), and the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action have not involved a conceptual shift or effected structural changes needed to implement their resolutions. The Protocol primarily complements the African Charter and international human rights conventions by focussing on concrete actions and goals to grant women rights. It further domesticates CEDAW and the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action in the African context.
The Protocol is in three sections. The first section covers the rationale behind its elaboration, making reference to both regional and international commitments regarding women's human rights. The second section outlines the rights to be upheld by the Protocol. And the third and final section covers implementation by addressing the manner in which it is to be adopted and monitored, as well as the process through which it may be amended. The Protocol affirms four broad categories of rights: civil and political rights; economic, social and cultural rights; the rights to development and peace; and reproductive and sexual rights.
Status of Ratification
Almost a year after its adoption, only one member state of the AU, The Comoros, has signed and ratified it. Twenty-eight member states have signed but are yet to ratify it as at May 12, 2004. This calls for 14 more countries to ratify in order for it to come into force. Its entry into force is critical because it will commit governments to:
* Submit periodic reports to the ACHPR on legislative and other measures they have undertaken to ensure the full realization of rights recognized under the Protocol;
* Integrate a gender perspective in their policy decisions, legislation, development plans and activities and ensure the overall well-being of women;
* Include in their national constitutions and other legislative instruments fundamental principles of the Protocol and ensure their effective implementation;
* Eliminate all forms of violence and discrimination against women in Africa and promote equality between men and women.
Advocacy Needs and Initiatives
Given the time and effort necessary to persuade governments to adopt this Protocol compared with the desperate urgency to promote, protect and safeguard women's human rights in Africa, African civil society organisations have to campaign and lobby governments to sign and ratify the Protocol as soon as possible and in any event, as a gesture of commitment, before the next AU Summit to be held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in July 2004.
The Oxfam GB, Equality Now, FEMNET, CREDO for Freedom of Expression and Associated Rights and FAHAMU have started a campaign targeting 14 countries that have already signed with the aim of lobbying them to ratify. They have drafted a petition to be presented to the AU Summit in July 2004.
Kindly sign up at
To supplement their efforts you could as an individual or organisation:
* Contact relevant government officials in ministries of foreign affairs, women’s affairs, and justice and urge them to ratify the Protocol;
* Urge governments to be fully involved in the full realization of the human rights of women, if they have not done so;
* Encourage government officials to include the issue of the Protocol in contacts with other governments and to state their positions publicly in the media or other events;
* Inform and increase public awareness about the Protocol by putting women’s issues on the human rights agenda at various fora;
* Mobilize national and local support for the Protocol among academicians, parliamentarians, and the media;
* Work on creating a better and common understanding of issues as provided for in the Protocol;
* Support the organisation of local focal points on the Protocol to lobby and monitor government positions. The focal points will later be effective in the monitoring of implementation of the Protocol by governments.
Conclusion
The Protocol, once it enters into force, will usher in a new and significant era in the promotion and protection of the rights of women in Africa and end impunity for all forms of violations of the human rights of women in Africa. As Dr Angela Melo, Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Women, ACHPR notes:
“The women of Africa who have suffered for long, their efforts at building our beloved continent have gone on for long without acknowledgement, and the men of Africa should be equally committed to the task. The urgent need to work towards the ratification and effective implementation of the Protocol urgently is a great challenge, yet a duty we all owe to posterity and to Africa.”
*Mary Wandia is the Advocacy Officer with The African Women’s Development and Communication Network (FEMNET) E-mail: [email][email protected]
* Please send comments to [email protected]
REMEMBER: Please sign the petition at
* NOTE FOR EDITORS: Please note that this editorial was commissioned from the author for Pambazuka News. While we are pleased that several print publications have used our editorials, we ask editors to note that if they use this article, they do so on the understanding that they are expected to provide the following credit: "This article first appeared in Pambazuka News, an electronic newsletter for social justice in Africa, Editors are also encouraged to make a donation - and to sign the online petition at
We representatives of some of the largest continental organisations and national networks headquartered in several African cities, bringing together women's organisations, labour, researchers, development and advocacy NGOs across Africa note that a pre-occupation with domestic issues and international security priorities have displaced the capacity of the G8 to meet it's obligations to Africa in 2004.
Two years after the Africa Action Plan was announced, G8 commitments to Africa appear buried beneath an avalanche of inaction on core areas such as HIV/AIDS, poverty eradication and debt. Africa's cheque remains unsigned and un-cashable in spite of obvious need and progress by the African Union and member-states to meet their obligations to Africa's poor and marginalized.
We nevertheless call upon the G8 to do the right thing in 2004, by announcing a comprehensive debt cancellation strategy for heavily indebted countries; greater market access for African commodities; an end to World Bank/IMF conditionality and delivery on the Africa Action Plan. Should these actions be taken at the upcoming G8 Summit on the Sea Islands, it would dramatically change current trends and create conditions for the determined pursuit of the Millennium Development Goal's in Africa.
Debt Cancellation
Noting the emerging consensus within the G8 on the need for debt cancellation for Iraq and that current debt relief mechanisms are unable to address debt sustainability among several African Countries, we call on the G8 to announce debt cancellation for heavily indebted countries in Africa. If there is one obstacle that stands in the way of Africa meeting the millennium developments goals and assuring basic human rights for its citizens, it is the odious debt that strangles public expenditure and domestic economic growth.
In many African countries, significant resources are being diverted away from basic social services into debt repayment obligations. Broadening access to HIPC for African countries such as Somalia, Sudan and Liberia for instance and deepening the relief, is a step in the right direction but a miniscule step. HIPC countries' sustainability criteria needs to be broadened beyond its narrow link to exports and relate more to poverty and government expenditure on basic social services. The cost of servicing debt continues to be a major source of state failure in Africa. Prioritising only collapsed states and states that have clearly become important to the war on terror for the G8 is short sighted and could open the door to future crises.
The G8 must ensure that all future calculations of debt sustainability for poor countries are linked to the Millennium Development Goals. In addition, the G8 must commit an additional $2.3 billion to ensure that all HIPC countries are brought down to the agreed 150 per cent debt to exports threshold.
Trade Justice
The G8 must address the systemic imbalances in current trade agreements which continue to prop up a multilateral trading system that undermines economic growth and poverty alleviation. Current reform of these agreements would help even the playing field and advance Africa's economic interests. At the World Trade Organisation (WTO), emphasis must necessarily shift away from expanding the trade agenda in favour of addressing existing asymmetries.
The G8 must therefore commit to dropping demands on expanding the WTO agenda to include new multilateral rules on the Singapore Issues. The recent proposals within the European Union to reduce domestic subsidies and open up market access for products of export interest to developing countries can create a firm basis for progress on the Doha Development Agenda.
All G8 members must rally support for this proposal and submit tangible and time-bound commitments on reduction of domestic and export subsidies including all forms of export credits that have a subsidy component. The G8 needs to take greater leadership in injecting political momentum towards realizing the objectives of the Doha Development agenda.
The G8 must make trade count for Africa by addressing World Bank/IMF trade liberalisation conditionality, the dramatic fall in the value of Africa's primary agricultural exports, current G8 tariffs on Africa's exports including non-tariff barriers that continue to discourage processing and value-adding of African commodity exports.
HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis AIDS continues to undermine Africa's development, adversely impacts on the provision of health services and constraints food security and agricultural productivity particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa which has been most affected by the epidemic. Access to affordable life-saving medicines and policy flexibility on intellectual property rights is a pre-requisite in the fight against AIDS. This G8 must go beyond empty promissory notes and support the Global Fund on fighting HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis by increasing funding to enable WHO meet its target of placing 3 million people, predominantly from sub-Saharan Africa, on ARV treatment annually over a five year period. The G8 must also not unnecessary fetter African countries keen on using available flexibilities on parallel importing and compulsory licensing to avail affordable life saving medicines.
Continental Integration
Despite the failure so far of the G8 to live up to its promises regarding support to important African initiatives, African States have embarked on an ambitious programme of continental institutional renewal with the formation of the Peace and Security Council, pan African Parliament, African Court of Justice and the African Peer Review Mechanism (2001-2004). Progress continues to be made on all these fronts.
Nevertheless, a lot more remains to be done by our leaders to enable poor and vulnerable citizens to inform their governments' priorities and trade offs of national and international policy making. As the G8 meets African leaders, we call on the latter to commit to deepening democratic practise and public accountability across our continent by supporting on-going initiatives and strengthening institutions that enhance democratic culture and principles.
* Please send comments to [email protected]
Nigeria’s Federal High Court agreed Monday to review the asylum status of fugitive former Liberian President Charles Taylor. Indicted one year ago for war crimes by the United Nations Special Court for Sierra Leone, Taylor has avoided justice by receiving asylum from Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo in August 2003. The High Court decision allowing the challenge to Taylor's asylum status to go forward was brought on behalf of two Nigerian businessmen who were tortured in 1999 by rebel groups in Sierra Leone backed by Taylor.
* Comment and Analysis: G8 summit 2004: Africa’s cheque remains unsigned and un-cashable
* Conflict and Emergencies: “Darfur 2004” may join “Rwanda 2004” as shorthand for international shame, says ICG
* Human Rights: Nigeria High Court to review Taylor asylum
* Refugees and Forced Migration: Forced migration online resources
* Women and Gender: Engendering national budgets
* Development: The G8 and global apartheid
* Health: African nations to be compensated for brain drain
* Social Welfare: ‘Kids as commodities? Child trafficking and what to do about it’
* Environment: Civil society proposes forest reform
* Internet and Technology: Email control looms in Zimbabwe
Nearly 60 people have been killed in clashes between rival clans in the southwestern town of Bulo Hawa, humanitarian sources said. About 2,500 families had been displaced in and around the town while another 2,000 people had fled to Mandera in neighbouring Kenya, they added. Relief workers in Bulo Hawa, Gedo Region, told IRIN by telephone that the latest round of fighting, which took place on Tuesday, was "a continuation of tension between rival clans that had built [up] since May" over control of the local administration.
On 11 July 2003, the African Union adopted the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa, marking a significant step forward in promoting the rights of women within Africa. But almost a year after its adoption, only one member state of the AU, The Comoros, has signed and ratified the Protocol. Twenty-eight member states have signed but are yet to ratify it as at May 12, 2004. This calls for 14 more countries to ratify in order for it to come into force. Oxfam GB, Equality Now, FEMNET, CREDO for Freedom of Expression and Associated Rights and FAHAMU have started a campaign targeting 14 countries that have already signed with the aim of lobbying them to ratify. A petition has been drafted that will be presented to the AU Summit in July 2004. You can sign up at .
Last Tuesday was Africa Day. Unfortunately this will be news to many Africans, including leading newspapers, politicians, political parties, media establishments and even many governments across this continent that passed through that day without any sense of its historical significance.
It was May 25 1963 that the Organisation for African Unity was formed. In recognition of that historical date May 25 became Africa Day across Africa and in the Diaspora. A time was when the day used to be remembered and celebrated as Africa Liberation Day in solidarity with the struggles for the liberation of African countries (mostly in Southern Africa) that were still under settler colonialism and apartheid.
With the liberation of South Africa there seemed to be a feeling of 'victory at last'. It appears there are no great battles to unite our efforts and build solidarity both on the continent and in the Diaspora. The whole of Africa may now be under African rule but the agenda of liberating our peoples from poverty, ignorance and underdevelopment is as real today as it was in the 1960s and even more urgent.
The official decline in the status of Africa Day in many African countries dates back to the 70s/ 80s when many of them became fortresses to all manner of despotic regimes that did not even represent the people of that country let alone Africa. There were also a number of countries, aided and deluded by the opportunistic politics of the cold war who thought they could 'make it on their own' without their neighbours as long as they remained loyal servants of the West or the East. A few also tried to maintain Non alignment without credibility because in practice they were aligned to one power or the other but also courted the rival power as and when necessary. So Non Alignment became political and ideological promiscuity deployed by leaders to shore up their regimes.
It all seems so long ago now that being pro-this or pro that foreign power, was the biggest issue for our leaders while being pro-Africa was regarded with ideological suspicion.
For instance the Western powers and their ideological surrogates among our founding fathers regarded Nkrumah, because of his Pan Africanist commitment, as an ambitious 'communist' who wanted to be president of Africa! Lumumba was a 'dangerous communist' who had to be eliminated even though his own people popularly elected him. So was Nasser, in Egypt and Ahmed Ben Bella in Algeria. Even Pan Africanists like Oginga Odinga who did not become President were also targeted . I have just been rereading William Atwood's ‘The Reds and the Blacks in Africa’ and anyone who wants to know how the cold war heated up and burnt Africa should get that book.
The good thing today is that after several decades of trying to be like other people and dancing to their tunes, regardless of ideological leaning, the collective experience is that we can only be ourselves and we need each other to counter the threat of marginalization, rapacious globalisation and the consolidation of whatever little gains may have been accomplished in a number of countries. No one country can be a sustainable miracle if its neighbours are in hell.
This is what has motivated renewed enthusiasm in regional and continental integration in the past few years. The best expression of this is the African Union, which was inaugurated in 2002 in Durban, South Africa; consequent to the transformation of the old OAU, which began, with the extra ordinary Summit called in Sirte, Libya, in 1999.
The new Union, in spite of sniggers and jeers from internal and external Afro pessimists, has continued to make steady progress. The AU Commission is now in place and has worked at break neck speed since the assumption of office of the Chairman, former Malian President, Alpha Konare and his fellow commissioners last year. In March, the Pan African Parliament was inaugurated with 5 representatives each from all the 53 member states of the AU and the indefatigable Beatrice Mongela from Tanzania elected its speaker.
Last Tuesday, the Peace and Security Council was formally inaugurated.
The CSOs, NGOs, Pan Africanist groups and Diaspora organisations have been active in the process and final protocol of the Economic and Social Council of the AU through which all kinds of non governmental, civil society, professional and any interested groups across Africa and the African Diaspora can have institutional engagement with the African Union.
The African Union provides a new opportunity for re-engaging with the wider Pan Africanist agenda of uniting Africans. But why do so many of our peoples remain indifferent?
A lot has to do with the distrust and suspicion about any initiative that comes from African leaders. There are just too many painful scars on our physical bodies and body politic inflicted by trusting our leaders that people now generally want to err on the side of caution.
This credibility deficit means that African leaders have to show that they are really committed and they mean it this time. One thing they can all do to convince our peoples that they are serious is to remove all the bureaucratic anti -people rules and procedures that govern intra-African movement of peoples. It is simply ridiculous that most Africans find it difficult to enter another African country with their African passports.
And shamelessly it is easier if you are American or European to visit, work, and settle in African countries than it is for Africans!
If May 25 no longer has any historical resonance what about July 9 2002 which was the date of the formal inauguration of the AU? What better way to bring it to the popular consciousness of All Africans especially our young people in schools, colleges and universities and popular forces in general by officially declaring the day as, African Union Day in all our countries?
At present there are less than a dozen African countries that continue to honour Africa Day.
The leaders of Africa need to re-engage Africans directly and practically by freeing us to be free to move and settle, without let or hindrance, from Cape Town to Cairo and also grant the same freedom to our peoples in the Diaspora who choose to exercise the right. Otherwise Africa day or African Union will not have any meaning for our peoples. It will just be another day, in the plantation, as we wait for 'Uhuru'.
* Dr Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem is General Secretary of the Global Pan African Movement, based in Kampala, Uganda and also Director of Justice Africa, based in London.
* Please send comments to
The Chronic Poverty Research Center's latest report examines what chronic poverty is and why it matters, who the chronically poor are, where they live, what causes poverty to be persistent and what should be done. A section of regional perspectives looks at the experience of chronic poverty in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, transitional countries and China. The report argues that the chronically poor need targeted support, social assistance and social protection.
PAMBAZUKA NEWS 204: Kenya: The Constitution as a promissory note
PAMBAZUKA NEWS 204: Kenya: The Constitution as a promissory note
In this paper, the author compares the context, themes and outcomes of the two United Nations conferences, held within six months of each other in 1995: the World Summit on Social Development at Copenhagen and the Fourth World Conference on Women at Beijing. The author finds that Copenhagen set the scene for the aid system’s over-arching policy instrument (the PRSP) while Beijing became invisible to the mainstream. Could it have been otherwise? Can the gender equality agenda still provide an opening to different ways of thinking about economy, society and politics that would allow international aid to support transformative processes for social justice?
Pambazuka News: Support the cause of social justice
Pambazuka News: Support the cause of social justice
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
First of all, thanks to all of you for the support you have given Pambazuka News recently – we continue to receive news, information and letters of support from our readers, as well as donations.
Since we last wrote to you, we have:
* Contributed to worldwide mobilisations to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Rwanda Genocide through a special section in Pambazuka News and by producing a special commemorative issue of Pambazuka News
* Armed African parliamentarians with crucial information for the first meeting of the Pan African Parliament in Addis Ababa. Some 260 printed copies of the special issue of Pambazuka were distributed free to every parliamentarian attending that meeting – our thanks to Oxfam for their support for printing and distribution
* Organised a petition to the Africa Union on freedom of expression
* Sounded the warning bells about the massacres in Darfur
* Provided a platform for critical debate and discussion in the region and a means for sharing information
We are about to run a campaign to have the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa ratified by African countries. This campaign is being organised jointly by Equality Now, the African Women’s Development and Communication Network (FEMNET), Credo for Freedom of Expression & Associated Rights, Oxfam’s Pan African programme and Fahamu. Fahamu is developing an online petition facility and we are investigating the possibilities of enabling people to sign using SMS/Text messaging technologies.
Pambazuka News is quickly becoming an influential tool for the struggle for social justice in Africa. Pambazuka News has more than 12,000 subscribers and a readership estimated to be at least 60,000 (excluding those who read it online at AllAfrica.com and at Pambazuka.org).
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There are many ways of improving both the service that Pambazuka News provides you as well as the effectiveness of Pambazuka News in promoting the cause of social justice.
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Now, we want to ask you to support us by making a regular donation for your subscription - especially if you aren't based in Africa.
So here’s what we ask: make a donation for your subscription to Africa's best social justice e-service.
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This week there is no Pambazuka News for you, apart from this letter. The empty space below shows what impact we'll have on the cause of social justice if we don't get your help.
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PAMBAZUKA NEWS 157: FROM BEIJING TO AFRICA - IMPLEMENTING THE BEIJING PLATFORM FOR ACTION
PAMBAZUKA NEWS 157: FROM BEIJING TO AFRICA - IMPLEMENTING THE BEIJING PLATFORM FOR ACTION
Ntenjeru North MP Kefa Sempangi has submitted a proposal to the Government asking for the transfer of children in the internally displaced people's (IDPs) camps to Kampala until the northern war ends. He said the children should be brought to Kampala to access education, medication and other services that are lacking in the IDP camps.
The number of refugees who have fled to Chad to escape fighting in the Darfur area of western Sudan could be as high as 200,000, nearly double the official estimate of 110,000, Refugees International reports. The sharply higher figure is based on the observations of Refugees International advocates in Chad, as well as informal estimates by the United Nations.
When water affairs ministers from countries along the Nile met recently to discuss the fate of the river, Boutros Boutros-Ghali was not in the room with them. But the lingering memory of his comment that future wars would be fought over water probably was. The former United Nations Secretary-General first made the remark in the 1980s. The notion of potential ‘water wars’ has also been explored in a book of the same title and in numerous reports. In addition, the phrase crops up repeatedly in articles that deal with water scarcity in Africa, and the possibility of conflict amongst communities desperate to ensure access to water.
The government wants to amend the Electoral Act in a move that will further close any democratic space remaining in the country's political system. Under the proposals contained in the Electoral Amendment Bill 2003 which analysts say are clearly targeted at the opposition MDC, it will increasingly become difficult for poor urban dwellers - who are the opposition party's main supporters - to vote because they would, among other stringent requirements, have to produce proof of residence.
The United Nations must urgently pass a resolution on Darfur that contains five main points: The condemnation of what has been happening and a demand that it stop; The imposition of an arms embargo, A call for the safe return of displaced persons to their villages of origin; The authorisation of a high level team to investigate the war crimes and an unambiguous warning to Khartoum. This suggestion comes from the International Crisis Group, which calling for major international action to address the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Darfur, western Sudan. According to USAID, even if the war were to stop immediately, as many as 100,000 people will likely die in Darfur in the coming months due to the desperate humanitarian situation. Visit the ICG's campaign page to find out more about how you can help.
The World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) says it is gravely concerned for the personal integrity of ten people arrested and allegedly tortured by the Sudanese armed forces. OMCT said it was reported that detainees were subjected to torture during their custody in the military camp in Bouram. Military intelligence officers allegedly tied them to each other with robes and put them into a lorry for four days without food or enough water. They were beaten with sticks and gun butts, punched, kicked and tied by the legs and arms upside down against a tree for many hours.
More than 700,000 South African children aged 14 years and younger are HIV-positive, according to figures reported last week. A survey by the Human Sciences Research Council found that the Aids epidemic was as widespread among the country's young as in the population at large. An estimated 5.7 million of South Africa's 45 million people are infected with the virus, giving it the largest HIV-positive population in the world. The survey found that 5.4% of two to 14-year-olds were HIV-positive, compared with 5.3% of the total population. Among two to nine-year-olds the infection rate was 6.7%.
At least 57,000 people have fled their homes following sectarian violence involving Christians and Muslims in northern and central Nigeria, officials said on Friday. More than 30,000 Christians have been displaced from their homes in Kano, the largest city in northern Nigeria, which was racked by religious violence on Tuesday and Wednesday, they said. A further 27,000 displaced people had sought refuge in Bauchi state in east central Nigeria following a massacre of Muslims by Christian gangs in neighbouring Plateau state earlier this month, the officials added.
African ministers in the economic sector, meeting next week in Kampala, Uganda, plan to focus on what Africa can do to become more competitive in global trade. Current trade negotiations, as well as the perennial and unresolved issues of debt and aid, will feature in discussions at the meeting. But documents prepared for the meeting, including a preview of this year's Economic Report on Africa, stress that African countries must also build internal conditions for more competitive and diversified trade. An edition of the AfricaFocus Bulletin released this week contains excerpts from the overview of the Economic Report on Africa 2004, released by the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) in time for the ministerial meeting.
Malawi soon will begin a five-year, $196 million nationwide program to provide antiretroviral drugs to HIV-positive people at no cost, Xinhuanet reports. The program is to be funded by a grant from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Malawi's Health Minister Yusuf Mwawa said that 50 sites throughout the country will participate in the program, including hospitals run by the Malawi Defence Force and Malawi Police Service - two agencies "seriously hit" by the HIV/AIDS epidemic - according to Xinhuanet.