PAMBAZUKA NEWS 67
PAMBAZUKA NEWS 67
A Catholic priest and the Nyeri Catholic Arch-diocese were yesterday awarded Sh4 million in libel damages against the East African Standard and the Daily Nation. Nyeri High Court Judge J V O Juma found the two newspaper publishing groups guilty of defaming Father John Mwangi Maimba and the church four years ago.
Hundreds of Kenyan slum and street children last Thursday thronged the National Stadium in Nairobi to take part in the finals of a month-long soccer tournament, as part of an initiative launched this year to combat drug abuse and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), including HIV/AIDS, among these high-risk youth.
Technical training, the basis of industrial development to which the Government is committed, is reeling under such serious difficulties that unless something is done urgently, it may keel over altogether.
To better address the deteriorating situation in the Mano River region that threatens the fragile peace process, leaders of the "Mano River Women's Peace Network" (MARWOPNET) will come together for a Training Workshop from 7-10 June in Freetown, Sierra Leone. The Network is comprised of a cross-section of women from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea who are dedicated to engendering the peace process in the sub-region. In the past, the Network has succeeded in encouraging the leaders of the Mano River Union to initiate dialogue within and between the three countries. Both the United Nations Secretary-General, Mr. Kofi Annan, and the UN Security Council have publicly recognised the contributions of the Women's Peace Network.
UN agencies, NGOs, refugees and local communities have joined hands in an effort to protect and rehabilitate the environment in southern Guinea, but participants say available resources fall short of actual needs.
South Africa's hunting industry has boomed into an R800-million per year foreign exchange earner, the Bosveld Hunters' Association announced this week. Association chairman Fred Mulders said on Thursday that more than 300 000 foreigners flock to Limpopo, Mpumalanga, the Eastern Cape and North West province every year for the winter hunting season.
Deputy president Jacob Zuma has been excused from testifying at a R1,1 million corruption trial in Mpumalanga after submitting a nine-page sworn affidavit denying that he had any material evidence in the case. Zuma was subpoenaed to testify at the trial of former Mpumalanga government advisor Pieter Rootman along with a list of other provincial political heavyweights.
The prevalence in South Africa of morbidity associated with an incomplete abortion -- whether spontaneous or illegally induced -- "immediately decreased" following the legalization of abortion in the country, according to recent study.
The Presidential Elections that took place from March 9 to 11, 2002, in Zimbabwe provoked enormous internal and international controversies. The impact of the continued presidency of Robert Mugabe, head of state and leader of the government under ZANU-PF since Zimbabwe's Independence in 1980, for the country, the region and the continent might be far reaching. The consequences are not yet fully apparent, but the current debates also centres around the case of Zimbabwe as a litmus test for the notion of "good governance" and democracy as perceived and acknowledged by other African leaders, especially in the context of the "New Partnership for Africa's Development" (NEPAD). The contributions to this Discussion Paper offer critical and political comments from scholars mainly in or from the Southern African region, who have been closely involved with regional and Zimbabwean issues.
A constitutional dispute between Capitol Radio Private Limited and the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Authority (BAZ) over the legality of the latter(BAZ)will begin at the Supreme Court on June 19. Chief justice Godfrey Chidyausiku together with Justice Sandura, Cheda, Gwaunza and Malaba will hear the matter.
A new government study on child labour in Kenya reflects the tough economic realities which, combined with the negative effects of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, are causing an unprecedented rise in poverty levels among Kenyan households, according to a leading child rights activist. Entitled "The 1998/'99 Child Labour Report", it concluded that many children in Kenya were in the workplace, often under hazardous conditions, despite the legal provisions and intervention programmes put in place to combat child labour.
A magistrate's court in Zimbabwe has ruled that The Daily News reporter Lloyd Mudiwa and Guardian foreign correspondent Andrew Meldrum must be tried on allegations of having "written falsehoods". The two are being charged under the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
A handful of NGOs are trying to stop AIDS in Angola before it reaches catastrophic proportions. All the ingredients for a crisis exist in the country: four million people are displaced, there are lots of soldiers with weapons and no control, appalling poverty, high unemployment, low education, crowded shantytowns and lots of young women with no jobs, no education and no possibility of earning an income except through sex.
The Japanese government has donated US $17 million to fight polio - almost half of which will be used to combat the virus in Africa. The money will be spent in six countries - Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Ghana, India, Nigeria and Sudan. The contribution brings the total Japan has contributed this year to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) for polio eradication and other child health initiatives to US $31.6 million.
The government of Ghana this week began a major, multi-year initiative to improve the health of Ghanaian children by upgrading home-based care for common childhood illnesses. The first phase of the initiative, the “Home-based Care for Malaria” program, was launched on May 22 by the Director-General of Ghana Health Service (GHS), Agyeman Badu Akosa. Malaria is the reason for almost half of all outpatient visits and over one-third of all in-patients at GHS facilities. The disease is the cause of one of every five deaths in children under age five. The high death rate from malaria is due to a number of factors, but chief among them is improper or incomplete treatment.
Tanzania's Parliament has been accused of legalising corruption by passing laws which provide loopholes to politicians during election campaigns. University of Dar es Salaam Law Professor Chris Peter said one of the laws allows a candidate in an election to spend money for entertaining his followers or voters. Peter told parliamentarians attending a three-day workshop on corruption in Dar es Salaam that the Electoral Laws (Miscellaneous Amendments Act, 2000 which was assented to by President Benjamin Mkapa on April 8, 2000 legalises corruption.
Six men have been jailed for terms of up to 20 years for their alleged involvement in a failed coup attempt in early 2001 in Côte d’Ivoire. Seven others were acquitted, the pro-state Fraternite Matin daily reported. At the end of the three-week long court case, four of the accused were found guilty of taking part in the alleged 7-8 January plot to overthrow President Laurent Gbagbo's government and of being part of an armed group. Each received a 20-year sentence. Two others were given three-year jail terms for the illegal possession of firearms, the newspaper said.
Malawi's existing health challenges of cholera, malnutrition, malaria and HIV/AIDS have been joined by another - the bubonic plague. Seventy-one cases of the medieval-sounding disease carried by fleas and rodents have been reported in the far south of the country since April, the World Health Organisation (WHO) says.
Journalist Abduel Kenge of "The Express" was arrested and held in police custody for four hours on Tuesday 21 May 2002, it has emerged. Kenge was arrested for allegedly engaging Vice President Ali Mohamed Shein in a manner not befitting the public official's status.
Despite the devastating effect of conflict on women in war-affected countries, women have demonstrated enormous leadership and courage in mobilizing support networks for peace, justice, and reconciliation. This is according to experts researching a report on the impact of war on women, expected to be released in September 2002.
The systematic sale of live chickens to disadvantaged communities for informal slaughter, has potentially lethal consequences especially for the very young, very old and those carrying the HIV-AIDS virus, says Compassion in World Farming.
Privatising the Dar es Salaam Water and Sewerage Authority (DAWASA) was one of the conditions given Tanzania to receive the HIPC debt relief. Now, the government has raised a credit to fund the US$145 million upgrade of DAWASA, needed to sell off the company at a lower price. Concerns are the privatisation will produce higher water bills or even become another corruption trap.
The UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has expressed "grave concern" over the situation of refugees in the northeastern Kenyan town of Mandera where disease and malnutrition have claimed the lives of 10 Somali refugees. The refugees - estimated at between 3,500 and 5,000 - fled to the northeastern Kenyan town of Mandera in April from inter-clan fighting in Bulo Hawa, just across the border in Somalia.
The Nairobi-based United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is coordinating a multifaceted programme to mark World Environment Day, which fell on Wednesday, by "contributing to the healing of the ailing planet". In one initiative, some 6,500 indigenous trees are to be planted in an environmentally damaged part of the Aberdare Mountains, which is intended to help restore the health of local rivers, retain moisture in the land and stabilise soils.
The systematic use of helicopters to attack villages in the Pool region of the Republic of Congo shows "a wanton disregard for civilian lives", Bill Paton, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Brazzaville, has said. "We have first hand testimonies from several villages of helicopter attacks on civilians. We have the names of ten villages we are sure of," he told IRIN on Tuesday.
Parliament is set this year to consider a number of methods of keeping businesses, government and society clean of corruption and bribery. The anti-graft measures will be considered against the backdrop of the upcoming trial of former African National Congress chief whip Tony Yengeni for allegedly taking bribes from a company hoping to win a State contract related to the multi-billion rand arms deal.
Global environmental watch-dogs have launched an inquiry into an alleged plot to export wild gorillas from Nigeria to Malaysia using a false permit and in defiance of international agreements on the sale of rare animals.
Angolan aid groups say a French-Swiss investigation into alleged illegal arms dealing, corruption and money laundering by top French and Angolan figures has hurt famine relief efforts. "Many international organizations have refused to send aid because they think Angola's rulers are too rich," Tunga Alberto, head of the Angolan Federation of Non-governmental Organizations, told The Associated Press.
Perpetrators of armed attacks in the run-up to the last general election in Kenya have said that they were backed by ruling party officials, Human Rights Watch has revealed in a new report."The spread of small arms and the manipulation of ethnic tensions are an explosive mix," said Lisa Misol, researcher with the Arms Division of Human Rights Watch and author of the report. "Kenya must stop weapons from getting into the hands of people who would use them to disrupt the vote."
A programme to distribute 60,000 insecticide-treated mosquito nets to thousands of households in Kikimi, an outlying district of Kinshasa, has been launched. The programme is part of the global "Roll Back Malaria" initiative, which seeks to halve the world's malaria burden by 2010.
A total of 518 of 3,000 refugees of Congolese origin have been transferred from transit centres in Cibitoke and Bujumbura Rural to Muyinga Province in a government-led move to establish a unified refugee camp in the north of the country. Some of the refugees had been living in the "transit centres" for up to two and three years, an official from the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees told IRIN.
Cameroon's security forces came in for special mention this year in Amnesty International's latest report on human rights violations worldwide. However, local rights advocates say they are also worried by abuses committed by other sectors, including traditional chiefs. "Unbelievable and unacceptable things are happening in the traditional chiefdoms in the north of Cameroon," says Hilaire Kamga, president of the Cameroonian chapter of the France-based NGO, Nouveaux Droits de l'Homme.
Africa needs to focus on human resources if it hopes to improve its public health sector, experts said at a three-day conference in Benin. The conference, organised by the World Health Organization (WHO), culminated in the drafting of recommendations to strengthen the knowledge and skills of public health workers in treating patients.
The HIV/AIDS pandemic has spurred significant advances in reproductive health policies across Africa. However, governments do not allocate sufficient legal and financial resources to ensure that the policies are effective, according to a report launched by advocates from seven African countries and the U.S.-based Center for Reproductive Law and Policy (CRLP). The report is based on two years of collaborative research and analysis of laws and policies related to the reproductive lives of women.
Negotiators hunkered down in Indonesia on Monday, trying to bridge differences and agree to a plan for a U.N. summit that aims to drag millions out of poverty while protecting the environment. Critics have predicted the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in August would be a flop unless the current Bali meeting revamped a draft agenda, which they say doesn't go far enough to help the world's 1.2 billion people living in poverty.
Kenyan President Daniel Arap Moi says that it is his wish to retire once his term ends and to hold the next general election without delay under the present constitution.
The Kenyan government and the World Food Programme (WFP) have jointly sent emergency food aid to some 47,000 residents of Tana River District, eastern Kenya, who have been cut off by heavy rains that have caused flooding in western and eastern parts of the country in the past few weeks. A road convoy carrying relief food left the north-eastern Kenyan town of Garissa on Monday under military escort, heading for Ijara division, Tana River District, where some 40,000 residents were in urgent need of emergency relief, a humanitarian source in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, told IRIN on Monday.
Republic of Congo's military claimed Monday to have retaken the southern region of Pool, the scene of a two-month rebellion that sent tens of thousands of civilians fleeing. The army gave no details of the operation, however, and refused to talk about the whereabouts of the rebellion's leader, or of the hostages he had taken in the bitter fighting.
Bookings for the conference “The Impact of African Writing on World Literature” at the Baxter Theatre Hall in Cape Town on July 26-27 have opened and places are limited to a first-come-first-serve basis.
The deadline for stand bookings at the Zimbabwe International Book Fair – where the unveiling of Africa’s 100 best books of the twentieth century takes place – is June 17. Scheduled for Cape Town between July 26-28, the fair also has a second leg in Harare between July 29 and August 3.
The Tanzanian government has charged two environmental activists and an opposition political leader with sedition for speaking out about allegations of widespread human rights abuses at a World Bank Group guaranteed gold mine. Please take 15 minutes to send a short fax to World Bank Group President James Wolfensohn.
A recent rapid assessment by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), an associate organisation of the United Nations, has found that child labour is "common" in Zanzibar, with prostitution, fisheries and seaweed farming among the "most hazardous" sectors in which children are involved.
A workshop on human rights training will take place between June 27-28 in Cape Town, South Africa.
We are greatly concerned about the lack of attention concerning Mario Masuku, a prisoner of conscience in Swaziland and the President of PUDEMO (People's United Democratic Movement) of Swaziland. He was arrested in 2001, but due to the corrupt and crisis-torn justice system of the Swazi regime, he still has not been given a hearing. There is also a deliberate plan by the regime to allow him to die peacefully. Mr Masuku is suffering from diabetes, which is now worsening. We call upon the international community to immediately send a fact-finding mission to Swaziland, to assess the situation of Masuku, including his sleeping conditions, solitary confinement and terrible conditions in jail. His family is subjected to the most difficult conditions of political persecution, economic hardships and social frustrations. We are concerned that there is no adequate attention being paid to Swaziland compared to Zimbabwe. We are exteremely concerned about the refusal of the Commonwealth to act for the suspension of Swaziland,like it did Zimbabwe.
Bongani Masuku
Secretary General
Swaziland Solidarity Network
tel: 011 339 3621/33 (South Africa)
A United Nations report has highlighted the development and environmental problems facing farmers in Ethiopia. The report stresses the devastating impact of high debt and falling crop prices, while calling for a ban on making charcoal out of virgin forests to halt deforestation and massive soil erosion.
A United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) study has revealed that millions of babies go unregistered at birth, denying them an official identity, a recognized name and a nationality. "A birth certificate is one of the most important pieces of paper a person will ever own," said Carol Bellamy, UNICEF Executive Director. "Unregistered children lack the most basic protection against abuse and exploitation and become a more attractive commodity to a child trafficker, illegal adoption rings, and others who seek to take advantage of their non-status," she said.
A UN-chartered aircraft carrying 7.7 mt of food and non-food items landed at Kindamba in Pool region on Sunday, bringing the first relief aid to the beleaguered town since fighting erupted two months ago between government troops and so-called Ninja militiamen, the UN Humanitarian Coordination Office in the Republic of Congo (ROC) capital, Brazzaville, has reported.
Kenyan immigration authorities and the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) are making arrangements to facilitate the transportation of hundreds of refugees whom the police arrested last week in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, to refugee camps in the north of the country.
The Sudanese army and Popular Defence Forces (PDF) militias have claimed recent military victories in Bahr al-Ghazal State, southern Sudan, and in Blue Nile State, in the east of the country, during recent engagements.
About half a million Mozambicans are in need of food aid, a Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP) joint assessment has found. The Crop and Food Supply Assessment Mission visited Mozambique from 21 April to 10 May this year to evaluate the current situation and determine needs in the wake of a regional food crisis.
Malawi's High Court on Monday ruled that President Muluzi Bakili cannot ban demonstrations over a controversial campaign urging him to stand for a third term in office. The court ruling came after influential religious groups, including the Roman Catholic church and the law society of Malawi, applied for an injunction against Muluzi's threat to stop demonstrations over the third term issue.
African leaders are gathering in Durban, South Africa, to discuss a key plan for the continent's economic development just weeks before the time comes to argue the case with the world's richest states. The three-day Africa Economic Summit which opened on Wednesday will tackle Africa's home-grown recovery plan, known as Nepad, which targets increased foreign investment and better economic growth.
Up to 12 people are reported to have died in fighting in Madagascar's north-eastern, vanilla-producing region of Diego Suarez. Seven soldiers and three civilians were killed on Monday, reports the French news agency, AFP, quoting hospital and military sources.
The prime minister of Lesotho took up his post on Tuesday following his party's victory in an election rejected by the opposition. At an inauguration ceremony boycotted by opposition parties, Pakalitha Mosisili pledged to fight HIV/Aids, the food shortage and massive unemployment.
A former senior official in Lesotho found guilty of taking bribes from an international consortium of construction firms has been sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Thousands of people fled northern neighborhoods in Burundi's capital Tuesday after rebels attacked military positions a few miles away, witnesses said. National Liberation Forces rebels attacked two military positions about nine miles north of the capital's center, said a witness who did not want to be identified. The National Liberation Forces are one of two main Hutu rebel groups fighting the Tutsi-dominated army.
As fighting persists in Liberia, the exodus to neighbouring countries has been continuing, with 3,400 Liberian refugees arriving in Sierra Leone's camps over the last week and 13,000 arriving in Guinea's camps since the beginning of the year.
Burundian army soldiers forced more than 30,000 civilians from their homes in Ruyigi province in eastern Burundi in late April and early May, Human Rights Watch reports. Burundian authorities have refused to allow humanitarian aid groups to provide assistance to the displaced persons, who are suffering from malnutrition and disease.
Despite Nigeria's commitment to human rights, the country is yet to append its signature to the optional protocol of the United Nations Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Making the disclosure in Lagos, Thursday, Lagos lawyer, Mr. Fred. Egbe, called on President Olusegun Obasanjo to go beyond the brands of paperwork and act on the instrument.
Scientists and health officials have criticised what they call the "cool response" of the developed world towards investing in an African AIDS vaccine. "We will continue to challenge the apathy of the rich nations to investing in an AIDS vaccine," Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said at the first forum of the African AIDS Vaccine Programme.
THE Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) has banned two wild animal exporting companies over permit fraud. The cancellation of the licences follows investigations into cases of altering permits and fraudulent exportation of thousands of reptiles.
The World Food Programme (WFP) revealed last week that about 80 Sudanese refugees enter Uganda everyday. This daily influx adds to the approximately 50,000 Sudanese already living in refugee camps in northern Uganda.
This is the first call for applicants for Adilisha distance learning courses for human rights and advocacy organisations in southern Africa. Fahamu, in association with the Department for Continuing Education at the University of Oxford, will be offering courses specifically designed to meet the needs of human rights and advocacy organisations in southern Africa. Developed together with international and regional experts, seven courses will be run in the course of the next 12 months.
We, members from the civil society in Malawi, call on the NEPAD secretariat to halt the implementation of the NEPAD initiative until there is wider public endorsement and a sharper focus on fighting poverty in poorer African countries. We have met several times both at national and international levels to discuss the initiative and have found that NEPAD offers little prospects of benefit for the poorest in Africa.
Ethiopia needs at least US $166 million a year to fight the HIV/AIDS crisis that is devastating the country, a government official has said. It also needs food aid for orphans and victims of the virus, Abebe Kebede from the metropolitan HIV/AIDS secretariat, told IRIN.
The Trade Union Congress (TUC) has now joined with Action for Southern Africa (Actsa)in a new phase of campaigning to improve access to treatment for HIV/AIDS by lobbying the British government to demand that it lives up to its promise to prioritise Africa. Countries in the Southern Africa region, which is home to one third of the world's HIV-positive population, simply do not have the resources they need to fight AIDS and the response from the international community has been bitterly disappointingly.
Join the campaign at: http://www.actsa.org/HIV/main.htm
The Burundian human rights advocacy group, Iteka, reported on Monday that about 1,000 Congolese refugees of Tutsi origin, known as the Banyamulenge, were refusing transfer from transit camps in Bujumbura Rurale and Cibitoke to a refugee camp in northeastern Burundi where Hutu rebels are active. The Burundi government and the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees began transferring Congolese refugees to a camp in Gasorwe Commune, Muyinga Province, on 27 May. "They think their security will not be guaranteed in the new camp, which is situated close to the borders with Rwandan and Tanzania," Iteka reported.
The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) has welcomed the declaration of a state of emergency over HIV/AIDS in Zimbabwe, but has urged a return to democratic accountability and the rule of law.
The truth about the Presidential Housing Initiative (PHI) was that it was meant to launder public funds, National Movement Against Corruption (NAMAC) secretariat head Dr Steven Moyo has charged.
HelpAge International Africa Regional Development Centre is planning to conduct a training course on ageing in Africa in Nairobi between October 14-18.
At their meeting in Canada in June, the Group of Eight (G8) richest countries will have it in their power to radically transform the lives of millions of children and adults worldwide by taking concrete steps to end the global crisis in education. As a worldwide coalition of trade unions, popular educators, child rights activists and NGOs, we are asking for your help in making this happen.
Ten tonnes of African bushmeat may be reaching London every day, according to a British film on the trade. It says the extent of the killing has already left some countries with few animals to poach.The effort to save the great apes, it says, now stands at one second to midnight. Yet corruption, inertia and sheer poverty allow all-out, unsustainable slaughter to continue apace. The film, No Hiding Place, made by Television Trust for the Environment (TVE), is shown in its Earth Report series on BBC World.
The traditional way of life of 20 000 people living in the rainforests of the south-westerly Dzanga Sangha national park in the Central African Republic is being threatened by an influx of loggers. "People are seeing their habitat diminished by logging companies, which is leading to a decline in animal populations, but the government wants to log and conserve at the same time," says the park director, Etienne Bemba.
Mali's elections earlier this month marked an important milestone, with a democratically-elected president replaced for the first time. Former army general Amadou Toumani Touré won the election, gaining 64 per cent of the vote. He is scheduled to take office on 8 June.
A disarmament programme for the Karamojong in Uganda is being used as an excuse for systematic brutality, writes a special correspondent. Army elements have seen the disarmament as an opportunity to exact revenge on the feared and despised pastoralists, taking their cattle, persecuting, and killing.
Jean Marie Biju-Duval of France,lead counsel for genocide suspect Ferdinand Nahimana, has told judges at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)that an expert witness testifying for the prosecution in the so-called "Media Trial" is mistaken in calling his client's writings "ethnicized." The attorney made the claim when he cross-examined Alison Des Forges, Human Rights Watch Advisor and expert in Rwandan history.
You are invited to participate in the on-line discussion "Information and
communication technologies (ICT) and their impact on and use as an instrument for the advancement and empowerment of women" which will run
from 17 June to 19 July 2002.
How can men and women working in the unprotected "informal economy" be helped to better defend their rights? That priority concern for the union movement is on the agenda of the International Labour Conference, which opened in Geneva on 3 June. At the grass roots level, the unions are establishing contacts and tackling the "most urgent" problems, so as to ensure the survival of workers subjected to harassment and dangerous and undignified working conditions.
UNIFEM facilitated a solidarity mission by the Women’s League of the African National Congress (ANC) on 4 April to support Congolese women attending the Inter-Congolese Dialogue (ICD) in Sun City, South Africa. The ANC women shared the history of their struggle for political participation and urged the Congolese women to create a support group to assist one another to access political leadership. They also urged the more than 60 Congolese women present to fight the system of gender discrimination and not their male counterparts.
Dr. Inonge Mbikusita-Lewanika, President of the Federation of African Women's Peace Networks, whose creation UNIFEM facilitated and continues to support, was recently appointed Zambia's Special Envoy and Ambassador to the Organization for African Unity (OAU). Dr. Lewanika, also the President of Zambia's opposition party, 'Agenda for Zambia,' was sworn in at the State House in Lusaka on 22 March by Zambian President Mwanawasa. The President said that, "women had not been given a fair share of national responsibilities in Zambia," and that he was “convinced Dr. Lewanika would carry out her responsibilities adequately and effectively."
The Moroccan government has proposed to parliament an amendment to the electoral code whereby 10 percent of parliamentary seats at the national level would be reserved for women candidates. Currently only 0.5 percent of the members of parliament are women. In another move to promote gender equality, the six parties of the ruling coalition committed to a 20 percent quota of female candidates to run for the September 2002 parliamentary elections. Over the past two years, UNIFEM has supported the coalition of women's groups who have lobbied for these changes.
The Gender Caucus for the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) invites you to consider and implement the recommendations contained in the attached statement as your organisation makes preparations for the WSIS. The gender caucus consists of representatives of organisations that responded to an invitation by UNIFEM to contribute to ensuring that gender dimensions are included in the process of defining and creating a Global Information Society that contributes to sustainable development and human security.
A new policy for internally displaced persons (IDPs), which the Ugandan government is formulating with support from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs(OCHA), has reached the last stage of consultations and is expected to be ready for implementation soon, according to a senior official in the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM).
A funding shortfall is “seriously hindering” the ability of The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) to undertake planned, regular humanitarian activities, as well as its capacity for emergency response. The annual appeal for US $24.6 million for emergency programme interventions in the southern sector of Sudan was only 37 percent funded as of the end of April, the agency says.
Uganda is in the process of reshaping its defence policy so that it can run military incursions into neighbouring states to attack rebels there. Defence Minister Ruth Nankabirwa said the move was part of a four-year defence review programme to set out Uganda’s strategic goals and move its army into a post conflict era.
A potentially explosive situation is looming in Burundi, where around 700 South African peacekeepers are guarding Hutu politicians. SA diplomatic efforts appear to have run onto the rocks, with Deputy President Jacob Zuma being described as “biased” by a rebel leader, while inside the country social tensions are mounting. Analysts say there is a possibility of direct intervention by Tanzanian and Ugandan troops, but that the SA forces are prepared to get out of the way of any fighting.
Women voice their hopes for a peaceful and healthy planet in a document called "Women's Action Agenda for a Peaceful and Healthy Planet 2015", a blueprint of their dreams and goals for sustainable, gender-sensitive, people-centred development launched at the World Summit on Sustainable Development Prepcom meeting in Bali.
Interior Minister Pierre Oba announced on Tuesday that 51 of 137 available National Assembly seats had been determined in the first round of legislative elections in the Republic of Congo.
Unbelievably, with the response to HIV entering its third decade, and as another severe food shortage unfolds, one of our most enduring questions is how the vicious cycle between food insecurity and HIV/AIDS impact and vulnerability can be understood and broken. Research on the impact of HIV/AIDS on agriculture, rural development, nutrition, food security and rural poverty has been carried out. Unravelling the interaction between them has been problematic because of the institutional frameworks that have seen food security as being worlds apart from the biomedical paradigm that has -and still does - characterize the way we have thought of AIDS to date.
Government forces in Liberia have launched a new offensive against a three-year-old insurgency, attempting to dislodge rebels from their northern stronghold on the border with Guinea, military officials said Wednesday. The troops on Tuesday attacked the town of Voinjama, about 160 miles northeast of the capital, Monrovia, the officials said on condition of anonymity. The government met stiff resistance, and sporadic gunfire continued around the town on Wednesday, they said.
Minister in the Presidency Essop Pahad has told the National Press Club that South Africa cannot tolerate a situation where one individual controls the .za domain on the Internet, after Mike Lawrie, the domain's administrator, insisted that he would not hand over the administration if the new electronic communications bill provided for government interference.
South Africa is the first major sub-Saharan African country that is trying to create a competitive connectivity market. How it is done and whether it succeeds will have important lessons for the rest of the continent.[News Update]
Scientific American has created a list of top web sites in the fields of Medicine, Earth & environment, Computer Science, Astronomy & Astrophysics, Mathematics, Engineering, Biology, Chemistry, Archeology & Paleontology and Physics. Many of these sites demonstrate the true power of the Internet to build resources and share specialised knowledge. Explore.
THIS YEAR'S THEME: People-Centred Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Policy in Africa.
Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) has called on governments to rescue the Earth Summit negotiations taking place in Bali, Indonesia. Governments have been watering down the few meaningful targets and timetables still on the table at the Fourth Preparatory Meeting for the Earth Summit and are not making enough financial resources available for achieving sustainability, says FoEI.
Oscar Olivera – an unassuming but forceful protagonist in the fight against water privatization in Cochabamba, Bolivia – spoke to a packed audience of 300 community activists, unionists, NGO-types and academics in Johannesburg two weeks ago as part of the Municipal Services Project’s “Services For All?” conference (see www.queensu.ca/msp for details). Weaving between critiques of international capital and the daily grind of poverty, Olivera delivered a talk that was at once universal and personal. With his own political odyssey wrapped in the particular struggles of the Bolivian highlands he has transcended these boundaries and made links with the international struggle against neoliberalism. His dynamism was clearly contagious. One elderly community representative from a township in the Johannesburg area stood up after the talk to announce: “Now that I have heard Oscar, I am brave. I too will fight the multinational corporations”.
The international organisation of food security is in disarray. How has this happened? New research on food aid by the Overseas Development Institute, ODI, makes clear the seriousness of the issue. Tackling hunger is crucial to the international targets for reducing poverty. The report shows that the poorest 1.5 billion people in the world live on less than $US1 a day and typically spend 80 percent of their income on food. The study suggests that the chaos arises from a loss of confidence in all forms of food aid except for emergency relief. Furthermore, although there are many ways in which donors can help overcome hunger apart from food aid, internationally negotiated commitments on food security are not adapted to include these. Institutional arrangements exacerbate the problem, notably regarding the role of the World Food Programme (WFP), the USA and the EU.
The rhetoric may be in place, but are donors’ new aid policies actually reflecting the identified needs of the poor? How could donors’ new architecture of aid be tweaked to allow space for the principles and practices of the sustainable livelihoods (SL) and rights-based (RB) approaches to development?
What are the consequences of discrimination against the two-thirds of the world’s over-60s who live in developing countries? How does ageism and stereotyping influence attitudes and allocation of resources at household, community, national and international level? What can be done to ensure that older people benefit from the full range of internationally accepted human rights?
Are developing countries missing out on the technological revolution? How can small businesses and rural farms benefit from information technology (IT)? While many people are illiterate, they will have little chance of 'surfing the net’. If the internet is a long way in the future, rural villages can benefit enormously from more basic technology such as the telephone and the radio.