CANCUN TO DUBAI: FROM DEGLOBALISATION BACK TO GLOBAL APARTHEID?
CANCUN TO DUBAI: FROM DEGLOBALISATION BACK TO GLOBAL APARTHEID?
Environmental Affairs and Tourism Minister Mohammed Valli Moosa has launched a book highlighting South Africa's strides towards environmentally friendly practices since the dawn of democracy. The book entitled 'People, Parks and Transformation in South Africa - A century of Conservation, A Decade of Democracy'' shows the different phases the country has taken pre-and post-1994 in this regard.
Botswana's antiretroviral Aids therapy programme last week launched a tool designed to teach Batswana about HIV/Aids and get more communities talking about treating the disease.
A national human rights NGO in the Republic of Congo launched a programme on Friday, supported by the US and the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), to fight the exploitation and trafficking of children in the country. The project, led by the Association panafricaine Thomas Sankara (Apts), will focus on the dissemination of information to, and the training of, government officials, journalists and civil society organisations. They, in turn, would then be responsible for disseminating this information to the public.
As part of the Kenyan government's efforts to regain vast wealth stolen by corrupt officials and politicians, it is encouraging "whistle blowers" to come forward with information, Assistant Minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs, Robinson Githae, told a conference on Friday. He said people giving evidence would receive "protection" and that they should approach either the Ministry of Justice, the Attorney General or the Anti-Corruption police directly.
A new study in central Africa suggests that the onslaught on wild game, for what is generally known as bushmeat, threatens wildlife and poor households that depend on it as a source of food and cash income, the Zoological Society of London reported last Wednesday. The society's research results suggest that the current situation is even more serious than previously thought.
Nigeria and Cameroon plan to create a cross-border park to protect rare birds and a type of endangered chimpanzee threatened by the bushmeat trade, a conservation group said last Thursday. The announcement was made at the 5th World Parks Congress in the South African port city of Durban, where more than 2,000 scientists, policymakers, and activists are meeting to examine the state of the world's protected areas.
HIV/AIDS should be looked at as a "social issue, not just a medical one," according to participants attending a conference on the impact of the epidemic on women that opened last Tuesday in Botswana.
Things have taken an ugly turn in Burundi, with the two major rebel movements exchanging fire outside the capital, Bujumbura, this week. The larger of the two, Pierre Nkurunziza’s Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD), has yet again reneged on the eight-month peace deal it struck with the transitional government.
Nigerian author Chinua Achebe has rejected the accusation that one of his books is pornographic. A Roman Catholic group, the Kenya Parents Caucus, has demanded that Achebe's book, A Man of the People, and two other texts in Kiswahili be removed from the school syllabus on the basis that they are pornographic.
Amnesty International has urged President Paul Kgame to guarantee basic human rights for all Rwandese. "President Kagame should exercise the mandate he has won to guarantee the freedom for all Rwandese and for all sectors of society to express their views, in particular with respect to the ongoing campaign for parliamentary elections scheduled for 29 September through 2 October, " the organisation urged.
Scientists have ascertained that a local herb that grows in most parts of Uganda is effective in curing malaria, including strains that are resistant to conventional drugs. Dr. Goretti Nambatya, the National Chemotherapeutics Laboratory (NCTL) director said they identified the herb through countrywide surveys in which they collected a variety of herbal concoctions. Scientists are preparing for large-scale tests, based on World Health Organisation guidelines.
The World Health Organisation warned its members Friday that they are losing the battle against child mortality and may fail to meet a target to reduce it by two-thirds by 2015. WHO data analysis shows no significant strides in the past decade, with mortality rates no longer decreasing in many countries and even rising in some.
The Ruth First Fellowship awards R25,000 for a research project in her tradition of critical, independent, socially-engaged writing. A four-page proposal is required by 26th September. Further information available from Anton Harber, Wits School of Journalism. fax (011) 717 4039.
Women activists in Malawi have waged war against child labour saying it is one of the many forms of violence that women in the country suffer from. In the fight against child labour - especially among the girl-children - women activists, educationists and entrepreneurs are using education as weapon to empower girls. They say the rampant violence in Malawi is partly due to the high levels of illiteracy among women and girls.
Even critics of massive spending on computer and Internet technology in Africa, at what they fear is at the expense of poverty alleviation efforts, are conceding that so-called ”New Media” are helping Africans economically. Computers linked to the worldwide information web via the Internet are also helping efforts to promote democratisation and gender empowerment.
Ayele Ajavon is a happy woman, so she believes. After she was divorced by her husband, she sought solace in the church. ''I turned to the church and found a job and a new partner,'' says Ajavon, now a secretary in the capital Lome. But Ajavon cannot take any step or decision without consulting her pastor who also happens to be her ''new partner''. And she donates part of her salary to the church, as tithe.
President Laurent Gbagbo appointed new ministers of defence and internal security on Saturday, filling key portfolios that had been vacant for six months. The long-awaited move should allow Cote d'Ivoire's derailed peace process to get back on track. Gbagbo named law professor and human rights activist Martin Bleou Minister of Internal Security. Rene Amani, a political independent with close personal links to Prime Minister Seydou Diarra, was named Minister of Defence.
The Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel movement has threatened to pull out of a broad-based transitional government that is due to take power next month, claiming there are plans to deny it key government posts.
At least 25,000 Angolan refugees have been returned to their home country since the start of the voluntary repatriation programme run by the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The returns have been organised by UNHCR in cooperation with the governments of Angola and countries of asylum.
A human rights group has called for the immediate release of nine human rights activists arrested for protesting school fees in the city of Lubumbashi, southeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The Association Africaine de Defense des Droits de l'Homme (ASADHO/Katanga) said the nine men and women were arrested by the Police Nationale Congolaise on 8 September after organising a peaceful protest against what they believed to be unreasonable school tuition fees. They were demanding that the state assume its responsibilities in supporting education, as many children had been forced to leave school, unable to pay the fees.
Thousands of children fleeing Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) attacks in northern Uganda’s troubled Pader district are now stranded in neighbouring Karamoja, unable to rejoin their families, according to government officials.
Tempers flared among delegates attending the fifth World Park's Congress in Durban, South Africa, when renowned conservationist Dr Richard Leakey 'rubbished' the concept of categorising indigenous people from the rest of the local communities, saying it amounted to politicising conservation.
A lawyer, who was grilled about her sexual lifestyle when she applied for a job with the Film and Publications Board, is to receive an out-of-court settlement - two years after the incident. Gauteng attorney Kerry Williams had applied for a job as an examiner with the board in June 2001 to classify films and "represent the young, white, gay constituency".
Thousands of activists converged on Cancun to declare that the brutal economic model advanced by the World Trade Organisation was itself a form of war, writes author Naomi Klein. "War because privatization and deregulation kill - by pushing up prices on necessities like water and medicines and pushing down prices on raw commodities like coffee, making small farms unsustainable. War because those who resist are routinely arrested, beaten and even killed. War because when this kind of low-intensity repression fails to clear the path to corporate liberation, the real wars begin."
I thought the editorial by Ezekiel Pajibo in your latest newsletter was excellent.
When Andy Rabagliati started working to deliver Internet access to some poor rural schools in South Africa, he chose Linux and other open-source software. With open source he could do things he couldn't do with commercial, proprietary software and save money. In Africa, in Asia, in much of the world - especially in the developing nations - open source is looking like the best way to usher in the information age.
During the last decade of the Internet boom in North America and Europe, business leaders in the Western Cape Province of South Africa hoped that Cape Town could become the next great centre of the ICT revolution. The conditions were certainly ripe. Several local universities had been churning out a steady flow of computer engineers for a number of years. Many Cape Town residents speak English, which would make communication with most of the leading ICT industry easier. The stunning geography and weather had already prompted a steady stream of foreign tourists to the Province. However, the grim reality was that most South African engineers and other highly skilled workers were leaving the country in droves, costing the country billions of Rand.
In many rural towns and villages in the Commonwealth technology is unknown and not accessible. In an attempt to bridge the digital divide, more than sixty women entrepreneurs in Kenya's Eastern and North Eastern Provinces are getting a chance to join in the technological revolution through exposure to computers.
This discussion list has been created to facilitate the exchange and sharing of information by African Civil Society Organisations on the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Process and Summit. You can subscribe by filling out the form provided at the website link provided.
The Equinet Newsletter is the newsletter of the Network for Equity in Health in Southern Africa. The Newsletter is delivered by e-mail twice a month and includes the following sections: Editorial, Equity and health general, Resource allocation, Public-private subsidies, Household poverty, WTO, economic and social policy, Human resources, Human rights and health, Research and Policy, Popular participation / governance and health, SADC News, Useful Resources, Letters and Comments, and Jobs and Announcements. Subscription is free.
This title looks at the degree to which recent reforms undertaken in Sub-Saharan Africa have enhanced institutional capacities across the breadth of government. It analyzes to what extent reforms have been internalized and defended by governments, paying special attention to the impact of public sector reforms on the economy. The question of whether ownership can be attained when countries continue to be heavily dependent on external support is also addressed.
“It cuts across genders, but it seems to be more prevalent with young males. Maybe it has to do with the faceless formless masculine thing, whatever that 'thing' is. What appears to be the case, though, it that it is more difficult to break the 'streetness' in boys from the streets than in girls.” This socially committed and subtle novel presents in a convincing and realist style, a bird's eye view of life in the slums of Accra. Amma Darko is one of the most significant contemporary Ghanaian literary writers and this is her third novel.
The history of Zimbabwe has always been reflected in its oral and written literature. Much of the serious fiction written in the 1980s and early 1990s focused on the effects of Zimbabwe's war of liberation. Little has yet been written about post-independence Zimbabwe and the complex and challenging issues that have arisen in the last twenty years. This anthology of twenty-two short stories provides a representative sample of the range and quality of writing in Zimbabwe at the turn of the century, and an impressionistic reflection of the years since independence in 1980.
Using 50 questions and answers, this book explains in a simple but precise manner how and why the debt impasse for developing countries has been arrived at. Illustrated with figures, maps and tables, it details the roles of the various actors involved, the mesh in which indebted countries are caught, the possible scenarios for getting out of the impasse, and the various alternatives to future indebtedness. It also sets out the various arguments - moral, political, economic, legal and environmental - on which the case for a wholesale cancellation of developing countries' external debt rests.
HelpAge International will run a three-day workshop (17th – 19th September) to address the role of older persons in the care of AIDS orphans and other vulnerable children. This will take place at the Silver Springs Hotel in Nairobi, Kenya. Participants are drawn from Southern and Eastern African countries and the UK. They will comprise representatives of organisations working with older people, orphans and other vulnerable children, AIDS Control Councils, government representatives and donor agencies. Older people and AIDS orphans will be invited to participate and share experiences.
The second East African Gender Budget Conference aims to share experiences in the region on gender budgeting in the context of globalisation and to provide an opportunity to: Share and network on gendered approaches through which to engage effectively in the current economic discourse; Build capacity on gender trade and macroeconomic concerns; and Debate alternatives to overcome the current negative effects of globalisation.
The last reserve of the rich mangrove forests in Ogoniland and other parts of Rivers State in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria, is currently facing the greatest threat of its life due to a development project related to liquid gas. Please write to the Nigerian authorities protesting the development.
Fourteen Southern African nations have agreed common guidelines on how they should handle genetically modified (GM) organisms and the products resulting from biotechnology. They agreed, for example, in the light of last year's controversy over the import of food aid containing GM ingredients from the United States, to try to source food aid from within the region.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) began on Monday distributing food aid to an estimated 15,000 internally displaced Burundians in Mubimbi Commune, Bujumbura Rural Province, an official told IRIN on Monday.
Another 177 internally displaced people (IDPs) were transported out of Monrovia on Friday by the UN refugee agency, as efforts to relieve the pressure on the chronically overcrowded Liberian capital, as well as to launch exploratory missions and spread aid elsewhere in the country, start to gather momentum.
As a new deadline looms for illegal immigrants to leave Djibouti, the UN refugee agency is to begin training government officials to sit on eligibility commissions that will determine who is entitled to refugee status in the tiny nation in the Horn of Africa.
Pick up any newspaper in southern Africa and chances are that the vast majority of stories filling its pages are written by men about other men. In two southern African countries - South Africa and Zambia - women's advocates and media associations are working together to change that. In South Africa, Gender Links, a South Africa-based organisation that promotes gender equality in and through the media, teamed up with the Media Institute of Southern Africa, which supports an independent press in the region, to conduct a study of women in mainstream news coverage.
In this edition: A brief profile of the WTO, Oxfam brings together G8 heads for breakfast in Cancun, Limiting citizen expression at the WTO, Suicide and protest at the WTO. To subscribe or unsubscribe please email [email protected]
The Eritrean government should release political prisoners and allow for freedom of the press, Human Rights Watch said on the second anniversary of a major crackdown against civil society. Eritrea’s practice of arbitrary arrests and detentions continues to this day. "Eritreans, who struggled valiantly to become free and independent, deserve to have their human rights respected," said Peter Takirambudde, executive director of the Africa Division of Human Rights Watch. "Unfortunately, the government continues to deny them that opportunity."
According to the first post-apartheid national Census in 1996, 8.5% of South African children between the ages of 7 and 15 were not in school while approximately 16% of learners in Grades 1 to 7 were out of age (in school but older than their grade cohort by at least three years). From an educational point of view, these two groups of learners represent important lenses for marginality - children, who for whatever reasons, are unable to keep average pace with basic schooling.
Working children are common in developing countries. The cluster of young street vendors seen at traffic lights belies the largely invisible mass of working children. They are at home cleaning, cooking and caring and provide the household's fuel and water. They are busy tending crops and livestock and, sometimes, they are paid for their labour. But how long do they spend on these responsibilities? How does their work affect their capacity to participate in the schooling offered to them?
"I wasn't getting anything from the relationship. Not even make-up from Clicks. He was making me a stupid. So I had to break up with him," says Dudu, a 16-year-old from Umlazi township, Durban. Dudu’s attitude towards relationships and sex is indicative of a growing and worrying national trend that has been identified in new studies. Findings have shown that consumerism and materialism has led to many young South African women embarking on relationships for what researchers call “the three Cs”, cash, clothes and a cellphone.
Liberian government forces and rebel fighters are committing grave human rights abuses while peacekeeping forces remain inadequate, Human Rights Watch says in a new briefing paper. A U.N. peacekeeping force of 15,000 has been proposed for deployment in October, but it could take months for the force to reach full capacity. Despite assurances by U.S. forces and the West African peacekeeping force known as ECOMIL that the situation in Liberia has stabilized, marauding armed bands continue to commit murder, rape, forced recruitment and looting.
After much wrangling from the French, the UN Security Council unanimously passed resolution 1495 right on the July 31st deadline for the rollover of the MINURSO peacekeeping operation in Western Sahara. In the best diplomatic tradition, the resolution affirmed the commitment to provide for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara, even while it seriously compromised on it by supporting a peace plan that would allow the Moroccan settlers in the territory to vote on independence in five years.
Hundreds of Sudanese refugees are streaming into Chad to escape new air attacks, reportedly by government forces, in Sudan's war-scarred Darfur region, pushing the number of Sudanese who have recently fled to the neighbouring country to nearly 70,000, according to the UN refugee agency.
Deputy President Jacob Zuma's bid for a court order to get hold of a document allegedly implicating him in a bribe suffered a major setback on Monday. Pretoria High Court Judge Jerry Shongwe struck the matter off the roll due to lack of urgency and instructed Zuma to pay the legal costs of the respondents - the national director of public prosecutions, the National Prosecuting Authority and the Scorpions.
Struggle leaders on Monday called on the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), in word and song, to ensure that the African National Congress won the third democratic elections next year. Addressing delegates at Cosatu's eighth national congress in Midrand, former president Nelson Mandela said: "I'm confident that the ANC is going to lead this country for a long time to come.”
Madagascar said Tuesday it planned to more than triple the size of its nature reserves to help protect some of the planet's weirdest and rarest creatures. Long isolated from the rest of the world, the African island's wildlife has evolved in unique and startling ways, making it an ecological treasure trove.
The international community needs to provide financial and technical help for Africa's protected areas, the World Parks Congress has recommended. In a report issued on Tuesday, it says one of the most important environmental challenges facing the continent is the need to reconcile development needs with sustainable management of its natural resources.
Over the past few eventful days, dozens of activists from South Africa have been on the streets of Cancun, Mexico, immersed amongst thousands of small farmers and fisher people from all over the world. What is amazing and inspiring is that the many colourful banners and placards, flags and chants, songs and drumming, each with their distinctive cultural characteristics, all carry similar messages against the World Trade Organisation, against the unjust and destructive economic system it is being used for, against the damages to the world environment, to peoples livelihoods and to their very lives - as expressed so dramatically in the symbolic suicide of the Korean farmer, Lee Kyung Hae.
It was agricultural subsidies, not education, that led to the collapse of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks at Cancun yesterday. But activists warn that a less well-known component of WTO negotiations, the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), is a lurking threat to public education systems everywhere. Groups including Education International, the worldwide federation of teachers’ unions, say that GATS would force countries to allow more foreign providers to sell education services, whether through distance learning or by establishing satellite institutions overseas.
More than 100 villages were flooded at the weekend after Nigeria's state power firm opened an endangered hydroelectric dam, a government spokesman said Monday. Mahmud Abdullahi, a spokesman for the northern state of Niger, told AFP that the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) had opened the gates on Nigeria’s largest hydroelectric station on Saturday.
These days there is a buzz in the upper storeys of Nigeria's finance ministry, a palpable feeling that at last Africa's most populous country could be on the verge of meaningful economic reform. Much is at stake as the new finance minister, former World Bank vice-president Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, prepares to take a machete to the corrupt and inefficient thickets of Nigeria's overgrown public sector.
Empowerment of women must be accompanied by nationwide and region wide campaigns whose aim is to shift mindsets so that power can be seen in both feminine and masculine moulds. In addition, Southern Africa must be wary of being caught in the numbers game. The subject of women in decision-making must be approached from the three perspectives of access, participation and transformation. This is according to a paper by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance that examines the degree of representation of women in the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
This article addresses women's health care in Tanzania through various factors, including maternal mortality, HIV/AIDS, women's workload, number of births per woman, and female genital mutilation. The authors suggest that, to improve the health of women in Tanzania, health and health-related sectors should cooperate and collaborate in order to empower women in the areas of education, social status, and technology. Policies must also address poverty, nutrition, adolescent health, and violence and sexual abuse.
The major fault lines between rich and poor countries finally cracked open on Sunday as WTO talks collapsed in Cancun. A newly formed group of developing countries, including China, India and Brazil, stuck together to resist new negotiations and trade rules they felt were stacked against the poor, including the slashing of farm subsidies. An organisation called The Women’s Edge Coalition says the collapse is a victory for the world’s poor, the majority of whom are women.
Water privatisation was on the radar screen of officials, activists and corporate executives alike during the WTO Cancun meetings in Mexico. Privatizing municipal water services is a worldwide phenomenon in both developed and developing countries. However, community outcry against the practice is also on the rise. French-based Suez, the worlds second largest water company, has concessions in more than 100 countries around the globe. Yet, as local residents can attest, privatising water has actually made it much less accessible.
Vice President Alhaji Aliu Mahama on Monday lauded the creation of an Anti-Corruption Unit within the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ). The unit will investigate and prosecute public office holders and institute civil proceedings to recover money embezzled or diverted.
Hardly nine months into the new government no one really expected that the Republic of Kenya would be corruption-free territory. But given the commendable anti-corruption laws enacted by the government and the rhetoric of its top leadership on corruption, reasonable people must have expected lesser impunity. Yet the new face of NARC corruption is as ugly and shameless as ever, says this editorial in the East African Standard.
Nigerian authorities have uncovered a huge deficit in the state pension fund, confirming what many unpaid former state workers have feared for years. Retired civil servants have long complained of non-payment of their pensions, with many forced to queue for days to claim what they are owed. The revelation is likely to stir suspicions that some of the money may have been misappropriated.
Recent media reports have revealed that some African countries are pushing for Zimbabwe’s readmission into the Commonwealth Councils in December alleging that the country’s state of affairs has improved. But the situation on the ground, particularly the continued erosion of basic human rights, proves otherwise. For example, The Daily News reported on September 9 that Martin Mukaro of Chitungwiza was arrested for faxing documents containing information on pre-election conditions at a phone shop at Manica House in Harare. He was charged with breaching the repressive Public Order and Security Act (POSA) and is currently out of custody on $10,000.00 bail.
Two photographers, Tsvangirai Mukwazhi of the Associated Press and Paul Cadenhead of Reuters were arrested on 15 September at the offices of The Daily News. The two were taking photos of the police seizing The Daily News’s computers and other equipment. They were immediately arrested and taken to the Harare Central police station were they were charged under the Miscellaneous Offences Act, section 7 for allegedly interfering with police work.
Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has called on the Burundian government to immediately end its suspension of Isanganiro radio station for giving air time to anti-government rebels. "This decision deprives people of news and is especially damaging at a time when the country is starting new talks to re-establish peace," said the organisation in its letter to Communications Minister Albert Mbonerane.
The paramount chief of the Batawana tribe, Tawana Moremi, physically attacked Booster Galesekegwe, a photojournalist from the weekly "Mmegi" newspaper, and broke his camera on September 6. Moremi also attacked Kagiso Sekokonyane, acting editor of "Mmegi Monitor", "Mmegi"'s sister newspaper.
"The newspaper is banned." With these words the Zimbabwean Government closed the country's leading and most popular newspaper, the independent Daily News, on 12 September 2003. The ban follows a Supreme Court ruling on 11 September that the paper was operating illegally. Plainclothes security police, accompanied by about 20 paramilitary police armed with automatic rifles, burst into the newspaper's offices in central Harare at about 5pm, ordered staff to leave and arrested Nqobile Nyathi, the Editor, and Simon Ngena, the production manager. Please click on the link below to read a host of protest statements from the Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum, Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA), MISA-Zambia, Article 19, International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and World Association of Newspapers (WAN). MISA-Zimbabwe has condemned the action as a serious violation of media freedom and are calling for letters to be sent to Zimbabwe's embassies and high commissions, Members of Parliament in Zimbabwe, the police and relevant ministries, calling upon them to allow the Daily News to continue operating, reminding them that the newspaper is a legally registered company, calling upon them to uphold the rights of the paper to the enjoyment of freedom of expression and desist from harassing media houses on the basis of repressive laws.
Send appeals to:
President Robert Mugabe
Office of the President
Munhumutapa Building
Samora Machel Avenue/ 3rd Street
Harare, Zimbabwe
facsimile: 263-4-708-820
Minister of Information and Publicity
Professor Jonathan Moyo
Office of The President
Munhumutapa Building
Box 777
Causeway
Harare
Phone 00 263 4 706 894, 707 091 –7, 707098
The Chairman
Dr Tafataona Mahoso
Media and Information Commission
P O Box CY 7700
Causeway
Harare
Tel 703 416
The Attorney General
Mr Andrew Chigovera
2ND Floor Corner House
Samora Machel Ave
Box CY 880
Causeway
Harare
Zimbabwe
Phone 00 263 4 77 32 47
Please copy all correspondence to [email protected]
The inaugural "Reporting on the Information Society" awards, given jointly by the Global Knowledge Partnership and Panos, aim to encourage and bring to international recognition thoughtful and incisive reporting on developing countries' progress to becoming "Information Societies." Four awards of $2,000 each will be made for published journalism by developing country journalists (print, radio, TV or web) that goes beyond describing projects or new investment initiatives to analyse broader questions such as the social impact of ICTs, particularly on rural or disadvantaged groups, or national and global communication policy issues.
He/she will be responsible for providing technical expertise within the project objectives & work plan, coordinating the implementation, supervision and follow-up of the project activities in close collaboration with the administrative coordinator on site. MPH and/or Medical doctor qualified in public health & epidemiology with a minimum of 5 years of field experience particularly in Africa requested.
The Human Rights Secretariat Manager will closely work with the Sector Manager and Project Manager in establishing an effective network of agencies and relevant stakeholders, supporting capacity building activities of legal practitioners and local authorities.
The International Foundation for Education and Self-Help (IFESH) is a leading international, non-profit, non-governmental organization focusing on human resource development, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa. IFESH is seeking a long- term Program Coordinator and six short-term consultants for a community-based program to reintegrate ex-combatants in northern Katanga Province.
The successful candidate will be responsible for the management of staff in the Project Coordination Unit; recruitment and management of short-term consultants; management of workshops and study tours; procurement of equipment (using UN modalities); facilitating task forces, financial and technical reporting. Experience required includes 3 years experience in natural resources project management & planning, knowledge of socio-economic survey and/or conservation legislation with a masters or PhD in relevant fields.
The SA Guild of Motoring Journalists (SAGMJ) has invited Not for Profit Organisations (NPOs) to take part in the first "Drive for Charity", a new initiative to raise funds for struggling NPOs.
Resource Alliance invites registered African not-for profit organisations to enter an awards competition for their resource mobilisation achievements. The participants will be required to explain and describe their local resource mobilisation technique, whether it was successful or if not what lessons were learnt.
The organisation Giving and Sharing has the honour of inviting you to the Media Launch of a national awareness campaign highlighting volunteerism and philanthropy in South Africa. Date: 8 October 2003. Time: 10.00am. Venue: The Parktonian All Suite Hotel, 120 de Korte Street, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Police in Blantyre arrested Frank Namangale on September 16. Namangale, a reporter with the "Daily Times" newspaper, was arrested on charges of "publishing false information likely to cause fear and alarm to the public". Namangale was released on bail later the same day.
A Norwegian government delegation arrives in Kenya next month to lay the foundation for the re-establishment of a development aid agency. The team, to be led by former prime minister, Torbjorn Fagband, will be in the country from 22 October to re-launch the Norwegian Development Agency. Norwegian parliament vice-president Inge Lonning said Norway was happy about the Kenya government's commitment to fight corruption.
Dr. Kenneth Kaunda has got a point. All is not well in the fight against corruption. This fight is certainly not being executed in an objective, effective and efficient way. The high hopes and expectations that were raised by a seemingly dedicated and resolved President are being called into question - and this not unfairly. The momentum and steam that was generated is being lost to what appears to be incompetence and a lazy approach to a matter that requires both skill and dedicated interest.
Forty-nine years after the death of his wife, General Kibira Gatu is still a bitter man, thanks to the atrocities committed during the British colonial era. Now aged 68, Gatu, a former guerrilla in Kenya's Mau Mau movement, was fighting to free his country from the yoke of colonialism when British soldiers abducted his wife in 1954. "They took my wife away and killed her, separating her from our one-year-old son," he told IPS this week. Rights activists have accused previous governments of neglecting the war veterans, most of who have been living in desperate conditions. Many have died in absolute poverty.
According to official statistics, there are 2.2 million HIV infected people in Ethiopia, out of a population of 67 million. Ethiopia ranks third after South Africa and Nigeria in sub-Saharan Africa in absolute numbers of people living with HIV/AIDS. The United Nations agency, UNAids estimates that 91 percent of reported AIDS cases are within the age group of 15 to 49, the most economically active and productive age group in Ethiopia.
The debate on abortion came to the fore early this year when a section of women parliamentarians openly called for its legalisation. Health minister, Charity Ngilu, has asked the government to spearhead public debate on abortion. She said it was unfair that women did not have a free hand in their reproductive health. "I personally feel the continued denial of women to make free choice on their reproductive health life is wrong and the policy should be reformed to allow that freedom," she was quoted as saying by a local newspaper.
A government report into Zimbabwe's controversial land reform programme has opened a can of worms, throwing the spotlight on corruption surrounding the ownership of multiple farms by senior government officials and others close to the establishment. To date only one politician has publicly surrendered his extra farms to the state, a month after the expiry of a two-week deadline set by President Robert Mugabe.
"The military of Guinea Bissau has taken this action because the government is abusing the constitution and seems incapable of resolving the country's mounting political and economic problems,” says Verissimo Correia Seabre, the army General who led Sunday's coup. Already, the coup has been condemned by the regional body ECOWAS, or the Economic Commission of West African States, the African Union, the United Nations and the Association of Portuguese Speaking Countries. And mediation efforts are underway.
Related Link:
* President resigns
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3113572.stm
The decision by the Government to ask Aids patients to pay for drugs at public hospitals has been condemned. The move will deny the majority of more than 200,000 people living with Aids access to the life-prolonging drugs commonly called anti-retrovirals, the Kenya Network of Women with Aids executive director, Ms Asunta Wagura, said.
This working paper from the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) analyzes child labour and education challenges among indigenous and tribal peoples. A number of project and policy approaches are assessed, followed by a list of recommendations for action. Based on a global review of existing evidence and documentation, indigenous and tribal children are identified as a group at particular risk of ending up in child labour.
The Kenyan delegation played a critical role in the collapse of the World Trade Organisation in Cancun, Mexico. NGO and media sources in the UK say it was the decision of Trade minister Mukhisa Kituyi to walk out of the talks, following the refusal of the EU to back down on some of its key demands, after days of tough talking, which finally signalled the end of the talks.
As the world becomes a global village, many people are losing touch with their roots and some can no longer speak their mother tongue. But people who speak Sesotho sa Leboa, more commonly known as Northern Sotho or Sepedi, needn’t fear losing their language: it’s been captured in South Africa’s first online, bilingual Sesotho sa Leboa/English dictionary.
Lectures have resumed at the University of Ghana, Legon, after a three-week strike by lecturers to press home demands for better conditions of service.
Police in Zimbabwe have arrested more than 100 opposition supporters trying to hold a rally against President Robert Mugabe. The protesters - organised by the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) - were gathering in a square in central Harare when the riot police arrived and broke up the crowd.
The Nigerian government has warned Liberia's former president Charles Taylor not to interfere in the affairs of his home country. The statement comes just days after the UN Secretary General's special envoy to Liberia, Jacques Klein, alleged that Mr Taylor had been meddling in Liberia's political affairs.
The United Nations has launched an initiative to deal with the threat that HIV/Aids poses to African states, where 70% of the world's HIV positive people live. The 20 commissioners, mostly drawn from Africans in leadership positions, are over the next two years supposed to devise policies to help African governments cope with the impact of the virus.
Conservationists from around the world have agreed upon a 10-year plan to increase and improve the protection of the earth's most sensitive and important environmental areas. The Durban Accord was signed by more than 2,500 delegates from 170 countries on the last day of the World Parks Congress in South Africa.
The United States is planning to move some of its forces from Europe to Africa. The thinking is being driven, in part, by the new oilfields being developed off the coast of West Africa. Cameroon, Gabon and Equatorial Guinea have already reached access agreements allowing the Americans to use their airfields.
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has arrested former president Chiluba's former economic advisor Donald Chanda for theft of K20 million. The ACC also arrested former Public Service Pensions Fund (PSPF) managing director Offman Gondwe for abuse of office.
No fewer than 30 people have been confirmed dead within the last month in Gusau following an outbreak of cholera in the area. The UNICEF consultant at the Gusau General Hospital, Dr. Sa'adu Idris, said the hospital has admitted 150 patients suffering from the illness in the last month.
Santigie Kanu, a non-commissioned officer who formed part of a military junta that ruled Sierra Leone from 1997 to 1998, was indicted for war crimes on Wednesday by the country's UN-backed Special Court. Kanu, who is popularly known as "Brigadier 55," was charged on 17 counts with violating article three of the Geneva Convention and committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Tensions ahead of four critical by-elections in Zambia have seen sporadic violence erupt between ruling party and opposition supporters in the run-up to the polls. The ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) is hoping to gain an outright majority in parliament, while the opposition is desperate to bolster its numbers after losing some of its legislators through floor-crossing and a court ruling stripping an MP of his seat.