African women still have a long way to go to break through the glass ceiling in the largely male-dominated worlds of business and politics, but in the field of conservation in Africa, women are making important breakthroughs. While women have been involved in African conservation for decades, traditionally the focus has been on species conservation. Today, women are getting involved in all aspects of African conservation from community involvement to policymaking and funding.

The action to ban the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists' Association (EFJA) is a reprisal and retribution for the justifiable criticism made by the organisation of the government's new Draconian press law, which, among other things, requires newspapers to pay tax on press releases and gives government officials thirty days to reply to questions raised by the press, according to an organisation, the United Ethiopian Democratic Forces (UEDF).

Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has called for the immediate reappearance of the Arabic-language daily "Al-Ayam", which was suspended on 16 November 2003. The organisation has also condemned the harassment of journalists by the security services. One of Sudan's leading dailies, "Al-Ayam", which marked its 50th anniversary in October, has been suspended indefinitely on the order of the state prosecutor in charge.

World Food Programme Executive Director James Morris on Monday announced that the organisation within the next six months will shift its aid efforts in Southern Africa from providing traditional emergency food aid to providing HIV/AIDS-related assistance, the Financial Times reports.

As part of sweeping efforts to eliminate measles from Africa, the Measles Initiative program was launched this week in Guinea. More than 3.5 million children in the West African nation will be vaccinated against the disease, which has largely been forgotten in countries like the United States but is still a childhood killer in many areas of the world.

The Democratic Alliance has strongly rejected the majority view of Parliament's ethics and members' interests committee "that Deputy President Jacob Zuma be cleared of all charges" regarding his alleged non-declaration of benefits.

The United Nation’s Emergency Relief Coordinator, Jan Egeland declared that the United Nations, donors and the Ugandan government have “done too little” to address the humanitarian situation in northern Uganda. Following a two day visit to northern Uganda where he visited Kitgum and Gulu districts as well as IDP camps, Egeland told the press that he was “shocked” by what he saw and that he did not know of another “place in the world where such a bad situation has so little international presence and so little international relief.”

The United Nations has protested to the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after being prevented from inspecting a plane it suspected of bringing weapons into the volatile east of the country. "MONUC (the UN Mission in the DRC) has protested vigorously to the transitional government of the Democratic Republic of Congo for having prevented its verification assignment in Kamina," it said in a statement.

Guinea's umbrella opposition coalition, the Republican Front for Democratic Change (FRAD), has strongly attacked the country’s Security Minister, Aboubacar Sampil, accusing him of trying to crush the opposition and warning he should be prepared for the worst.

The main premise of this paper is that freedom of expression (and other human rights) possesses a contingent universality. The element of contingency lies in the dependence of such human rights norms upon two different sets of facets and processes. These are, first, the dynamic of internal domestic affairs, and, second, the dynamic of external or international affairs. Moreover, these two dynamics carry on a perpetual interaction in which each influences and is influenced by the other. National standards and practice are the bases of international standards and the necessary context of their implementation. Yet national standards and practices are in turn affected by international responses to the poor articulation or persistent violation of human rights at the local level.

Zimbabwe has been experiencing a number of problems in recent years. This is due to both man-made and natural causes leading to human suffering and at times death. The major problems can be traced back to the rejection of a government sponsored constitutional reform that was followed by “fast track” land reform as the government blamed commercial farmers for its demise.

Finger pointing, chaos, violence, and destabilization of the political and socio-economic environment followed this process. Civic society and the international community responded by putting pressure on the government to respect the rule of law, central to the Abuja agreement brokered by Nigeria and South Africa. To worsen matters, Zimbabwe experienced a serious drought in the 2001/02 agricultural season.

The combined effect of the above mentioned problems resulted in, predictably, serious problems of food shortages, unemployment of over 70 %, high inflation of over 525,8 %, increased poverty of over 80 % of the population living below the poverty line and lack of foreign currency.

The most affected by this crisis have been the poor, especially in rural communities. Their only means of livelihood is subsistence agriculture. Hence, the drought dealt a big blow to their welfare since they now have to rely on a very imperfect and unreliable market for supply of food and other basic commodities. Food inflation continues to rise despite the Government's efforts to arrest it with price controls and price freezes. This, obviously, has serious gender implications. Women, children, the disabled, terminally ill and the elderly have to bear the biggest burden. In rural Zimbabwe a lot of households are female headed as the husbands are employed in urban areas. This means the mothers have to fight a lone battle in providing for the family and the father is not available to fend for the day-to-day needs of the family.

Some traditions and customs in the Zimbabwean culture expose children, particularly girls, to abuses. For example, practices like kuzvarira, which literally means swapping the girl child for food to save a starving family, condemns the girl to perpetual suffering. She is forced to marry early and is therefore denied a chance to prepare for her future through attending school. The marriage is often to a very old husband – not of her choice – and it is mostly polygamous, making life a living hell for the young girl. Those who don't find themselves in this predicament may still suffer in different ways. Some are forced to drop out of school as resources run dry in the family. Child labour is rampant in the country and is actually rising due to food shortages.

Some women and girls walk into loveless, unplanned marriages due to desperation. Their aim is to escape starvation but, unfortunately, they expose themselves to abuses by their husbands who can take advantage of their desperation at will. Prostitution becomes another option for others who fail to make ends meet. Hunger knows neither limits nor dignity and induces reckless and dangerous behaviour.

The forced marriages and prostitution put women in danger of contracting Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STD), or worse still HIV/AIDS. This partly explains why HIV/AIDS cases have been on the increase in the country. In fact, the district hospital in Insiza district reported an increase in cases of STDs and HIV/AIDS related aliments amongst girls as young as 12 years old. More and more people are going to die due to food shortages as rational behaviour has been suspended. Desperation is now leading them to take dangerous or risky decisions.

Unscrupulous business people have been quick to take advantage of the suffering people, making matters even worse. The writers of this report witnessed a pathetic situation in rural Zimbabwe (Chiendambuya in Makoni district) where a miller approved to mill and sell maize meal at controlled prices by the Grain marketing Board was selling the product at nearly double the price. Not only was he overcharging, but was selling off his truck in the bush. The people - estimated to be 90 % women - had to wrestle for the scarce commodity and each time the driver thought the situation was getting out of hand he would drive away for a distance of about a kilometre.

The poor villagers - comprised of the elderly, the disabled, pregnant, sick and those carrying babies - would race each other to the truck where they would buy on a “first come first serve” basis. It was a sorry sight to see people undertake such a physically demanding exercise. This is a typical survival of the fittest scenario where vulnerable groups like women are obvious losers. The few who are young and energetic outrun the vulnerable, thus buying most of the food, since they were able to catch up with the lorry and join the queue more than once.

Each day, mostly women and children are seen in queues as early as 4am at retail and wholesale outlets in anticipation of deliveries which usually do not come. Often they go back home empty handed, depressed and dejected, yet continue to hold hope that one day Zimbabwe will be back on track as the food basket for Southern Africa.

Zimbabweans can no longer afford to buy basic food stuffs in the shops as the rate of inflation has continued to escalate with the latest figure rising by 70,2% from 455,6% in September to 525,8 percent in October 2003. (The Herald of November 20 2003). To overcome these hardships, people are engaging in illegal activities. Some are selling gold on the black market and illegally exporting it to neighbouring countries. Others are doing fuel deals and some have joined the money lending business where the poor are being exploited with interest rates in the range of 30 – 80% per month. Also the banks have significantly increased their borrowing rates, which range from 129 to 169% per annum. Therefore this will mean that the rich will be the richest and the poor will be the poorest. It is the hope of every Zimbabwean that the National budget to be tabled in Parliament today – November 20 2003, will come up with favourable solutions to revive the economy.

* The author, who lives and works in Zimbabwe, did not want her real name used for political reasons.

* Please send comments on this editorial - and other events in Africa - to

"Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Union (ZCTU) leaders and other civic society leaders were arrested for protesting on 18 November 2003 and we are therefore calling for a stayaway to be held on Thursday 20 November and Friday 21 November 2003."

A call has gone out to the Nigerian Federal government to endorse and adopt the African Charter on Broadcasting. The Charter proposes a three-tier structure of broadcasting for African countries, comprising a state radio sector, a private commercial sector, and a community radio segment. The charter was passed in 2001 by stakeholders in African broadcasting and endorsed by the African Union at its Maputo Summit in July this year.

"I cannot conclude he was not a spy," former intelligence operative Mo Shaik told the Hefer Commission on Thursday about national director of public prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka. An emotional Shaik admitted that mistakes had been made during the liberation struggle in the identification of suspected informers. This had had "terrible consequences", Shaik said, apparently struggling to hold back tears.

Zimbabweans view the country's banking industry as being very corrupt according to a recent survey of the sector. Transparency International Zimbabwe (TIZ), a subsidiary of the international anti-corruption movement, commissioned the survey in collaboration with the Mass Public Opinion Institute.

This new publication summarizes discussions from the Eighth Roundtable on Communication for Development Roundtable (Managua, 2001) on strategies to meet the urgent challenge of HIV/Aids. It highlights communications that address the needs of young people, use of community media, and community mobilization to tackle gender- based violence and discrimination.

Researchers need to be aware of gender concerns and policy-makers need to look very carefully at the sex and gender implications of all research findings before deploying them in the development of services, according to a report from the Global Forum for Health Research. The report is a resource for researchers who wish to incorporate gender concerns into their work in systematic and appropriate ways.

The optimal inflation target is generally higher for a high-corruption country than for a low-corruption country. Therefore, an inflation target of 1.4 percent, that is common among developed countries, is generally not something to be emulated by developing countries, says an International Monetary Fund paper that examines the role of corruption in the design of monetary policies for developing countries.

Two conferences that took place in Mozambique last week addressed issues surrounding the AIDS epidemic in Southern African nations. One conference examined the role of public-private partnerships in the fight against AIDS. The other conference considered ways of alleviating the effects of HIV on regional food production.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed recent contributions to its appeal for southern Africa, but expressed concern that its operations were still only 38 percent funded. Unless WFP receives immediate donations, 6.5 million people will face severe hunger at the most critical time of year.

Members of Parliament have demanded an investigation into the alleged bribe scandal regarding the proposed Bujagali hydropower project in Jinja, east of Kampala. The legislators demanded to know the MPs who received bribes, saying these were serious allegations that were tarnishing the image of parliament.

The Socialist Forum of Ghana has categorically rejected the decision of government to enter into a non-surrender agreement with the United States Government. It said: “We unhesitantly call for mass mobilisation to demonstrate to the world that the people of Ghana are peace-loving and reject all forms of impunity and to force a reversal of the agreement.”

The Western Cape department of education is awaiting a report into allegations of racism at the Edgemead High School in Cape Town, the department said. A 16-year old black schoolgirl was allegedly physically abused and defacated on during the alleged incident under investigation.

The Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo, has urged oil firms to open up their accounts to scrutiny as part of a new anti-corruption drive. "Whatever you receive, you must publish... I would appeal to extractive industries to participate," he said.

“You and the other companies are cited because you aided and abetted the Apartheid regime in its orgy of murder, torture, rape and kidnapping during the period indicated in our complaint, that is from the time of the Sharpeville shooting until the end of Apartheid rule. You are well aware that at that time you, jointly and severally with the others cited above, offered the Apartheid regime financial support, supplies of strategic goods, such as armaments, energy resources and motorised transport vehicles, and computer support.”

To date, public awareness of the role of the WTO has largely focussed on the protests surrounding its biannual ministerial meetings, most notably in Seattle in November 1999. However both in Seattle, and subsequently, a less visible process of dialogue between civil society and trade policy makers has been developing at national level. These stakeholders include non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working with poor and marginalised communities. A number of governments from both developing and developed countries included NGO representatives on their official delegations to the Seattle and Doha (2001) Ministerials. The aim of the exercise is twofold: involving a wide group of stakeholders in policy design should lead to trade policies that better reflect the needs and interests of the public, and should also encourage more widespread ‘ownership’ of national trade policies, helping to avoid damaging splits between governments and the organisations of the poor. This paper looks at two examples of stakeholder involvement from East Africa - Uganda and Kenya.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), together with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), is launching the 4th Phase of the Assisting Communities Together (ACT) Project, which makes grants up to US$ 5,000 available for community-based organisations to support them in their human rights education activities.

It is possible to control TB. In contrast to some other modern plagues, with TB we know what must be done, we know how to do it, and we know how much it will cost, states a paper by the Stop TB Partnership. "If we effectively apply proven, cost-effective strategies for TB control, adapting and improving them to meet the challenges described in this document over the next five years, we will have taken a giant step towards eliminating tuberculosis as a threat to future generations."

Although Botswana, one of the African countries hit hardest by the HIV/AIDS epidemic, offers free antiretroviral drugs, has 16 treatment facilities and hundreds of trained doctors and nurses, the nation is "barely making a dent" in fighting the disease. However, a new initiative to provide HIV tests as part of routine medical checkups in public and private clinics may help to improve HIV testing rates in the country.

The small Southern African country of Malawi, with a population of just 11 million, has found itself at the heart of the AIDS pandemic. Health activists in Malawi have often pointed the finger at traditional beliefs and practices as being amongst the main catalysts for the spread of HIV. Now, officials, ethnic leaders and health workers are taking steps to transform these beliefs.

Countries with high levels of corruption are losing biodiversity faster than better-governed ones, according to a new study published in Nature. The report suggests that this is partly because poorly paid officials in developing countries can be bribed to ignore conservation laws. Another reason is that government conservation departments often lack the political clout to enforce regulations.

As the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights opens its 34th ordinary session in Banjul, The Gambia, African NGOs have called on it to question states over gross violations of human rights and have highlighted omissions in their state reports concerning indigenous peoples and minorities. Over 100 NGOs from across Africa attended an NGO Forum convened before the Commission during 3-5 November.

You are doing excellent work.

A new fully revised and updated edition of this standard Ghanaian sociology text, to take account of the many developments which took place in the country towards the end of the twentieth century: transition from military to constitutional rule, a new constitution, and democratic change of government. The thesis, and starting point is that thorough knowledge of traditional life and institutions is required to fully understand contemporary Ghanaian society and appreciate its problems.

Understanding globalisation is key for the future of development. Increasingly globalised patterns of economic exchange and political interaction shape the possibility of reforms to benefit the poor. There is an urgent need to assess what challenges this new context poses for development. In particular, what are the challenges to the objective of poverty reduction implied by globalisation?

John Madeley has interviewed some of the world’s most courageous and innovative campaigners and progressive thinkers. This book contains what they think about: What globalisation really is; What's wrong with it; Practicable and concrete alternatives. Interviewees include: Peggy Antrobus, Walden Bello, Barry Coates, Fiona Dove, Gustavo Esteva, Hazel Henderson, Francois Houtart, Martin Khor, David Korten, Caroline Lucas MEP, Helena Norberg-Hodge, Ann Pettifor, Devinder Sharma, Vandana Shiva, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz and many others.

During the fifth ministerial of the World Trade Organisation, the efforts of the United States and the European Union to maintain the current inequitable global trading system provoked the formation of the G 21, a block of countries led by Brazil, India, South Africa, and China. While our enthusiasm is tempered by our disagreement with its endorsement of the panacea of greater market access to northern markets as a solution to the inequities of global agricultural trade, we nevertheless see the G 21 as a positive development. This is not, unfortunately, the view of the US and the EU, which have initiated a campaign to neutralize, isolate, and destroy the new formation.

A new report published by Minority Rights Group International (MRG), highlights the double discrimination faced by Twa women in the Great Lake Region of Africa, both as indigenous peoples, and as women. Twa communities have faced widespread discrimination, marginalization and violation of their rights in the region. Twa women additionally face gender discrimination, from both broader society and from within their own Twa communities.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud Lubbers has appealed to the Tanzanian government to continue its long-standing tradition of hospitality to refugees, the majority of whom are from Burundi. He urged the government not to stain its outstanding record of asylum by imposing more restrictive policies on the movement of refugees. Lubbers was speaking about new measures which have curbed the movement of more than 480,000 Burundian and Congolese refugees living in 12 camps along Tanzania's western border.

The Anglican Church of Kenya has barred all its 28 dioceses from having any involvement with Gene Robinson, the new bishop of New Hampshire in the United States - and the first openly gay clergyman. Robinson's consecration on November 2 has threatened to split the global Anglican community.

Can the worldwide expansion of distance education help developing countries to realise their education goals? Could new information and communication technologies (ICTs) help attain the Education for All goals adopted at the Dakar education forum? How can public and private providers and donors work together to increase the quality and spread of distance learning? A report from UNESCO’s Division of Higher Education reviews recent developments in open and distance learning.

Efforts to implement a ruling on the border dispute between Nigeria and Cameroon have hit a snag, with the filing of a law suit by Cameroonian exiles who reject the decision. They have demanded that Nigeria maintain a military presence in the Bakassi Peninsula, one of the areas that should be ceded to Cameroon, and that the government recognise the existence of Ambazonia - an independent state that would include the peninsula.

The government of Nigeria has rushed health workers to Daramba, a village on the border with Niger, following an outbreak of whooping cough - one of the six main killer diseases for children. Health officials blame the outbreak on the attitude of villagers who have shunned routine immunisation.

Hopes that the bitter conflict which has left between 500,000 and 800,000 people internally displaced in Côte d'Ivoire had been resolved, faded in September 2003 when the rebel groups, known as Forces Nouvelles, pulled out of a new broad-based government of reconciliation. New displacements, fuelled by inter-community hostility, are continuing in western regions.

An outbreak of cholera has killed 17 people in recent weeks in a swampy area of the Niger valley near the city of Mopti in central Mali, government officials said on Monday.

This paper argues for a reappraisal of the position of education in emergency programming. It explores the links between education and the wider protection needs of the children it assists. It suggests that, as protection in conflict emerges more clearly as a legitimate humanitarian concern, so the role of education as a tool of protection must be more clearly understood.

Although governments have increasingly become aware of the problem of orphans and vulnerable children in Southern Africa, countries still lacked the capacity to effectively deal with the problem, a regional workshop heard on Monday.

For a long time, lecturers of the public universities in Kenya have stagnated at a salary which cannot sustain their livelihoods for even a week. Due to this situation, it has been very difficult since 1989 for most university departments to attract new members of staff. Attrition of the staff members has been on the increase, and most of those who have remained have been forced to moonlight and engage in other activities that leave very little room for serious academic work. This is a very unfortunate situation. The consequence, as in many other universities in Africa, has been the tendency for academic standards to fall. Education, and especially higher education for any nation is an investment in the future.

A school meals programme, whereby free meals are distributed to orphans and disadvantaged girls in primary schools, is now catering for a total of 122,000 children in six provinces of Mozambique. The programme, conducted by the World Food Programme (WFP), in coordination with the country's Education Ministry, was launched in Zambezia, in the centre of the country, in November last year, and now has been extended to Manica, Sofala, Tete, Nampula and Cabo Delgado provinces.