Not a single cent of the R153 million allocated to RDP projects from the National Lottery Fund has been spent, reports the Sunday Independent. The issue of unspent RDP funds has been a subject of discussion between the Minister of Trade and Industry, Alec Erwin, and the Minister of Finance, Trevor Manuel, for a long time. No solution seems to be in sight. The closure of the Ministry of Reconstruction and Development (RDP) in 1996 left a vacuum in terms of an institutional mechanism to take forward the RDP programme and - in the current scenario - distribute RDP Lotto funds.

When Ken Amoah established a child-welfare organisation eight years ago, he sought to rescue child labourers from a life toiling in the streets. The foster home, which is located in the New Achimota section of Accra, was set up to provide needy children with a place to live, an education - and a respite from work. Amoah has delivered on some of his goals, yet his prime donors - an arm of the Danish government called Danish International Development Assistance - are wondering whether he - and not neglected children - is the main beneficiary of his Accra-based organisation, Children In Need Ghana.

The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) and the Media Foundation of West Africa (MFWA) have issued a joint statement in which they say they are "gravely concerned about the continued illegal and arbitrary closure" of Citizen FM radio station in Banjul, The Gambia. For more than two years, the government of President Yahya Jammeh has stopped Citizen FM from broadcasting on a false claim that the station's owner, Baboucar M. Gaye, has not paid his taxes and licence fees. MISA and MFWA believe this accusation to be a blatant fabrication. Citizen FM has not been charged in court, nor has it been ordered by any court to cease broadcasting based on the authorities' accusations.