Reporters Without Borders has called on the authorities of the semi-autonomous northeastern region of Puntland to immediately release radio Voice of Peace director Awke Abdullahi Ali, who has been held in the region’s capital, Bossasso, for nearly two months. Ali has not been charged although, under the law, no one should be held for more than 48 hours without charge.

Activists have sent another letter to Cepheid, the manufacturer of the revolutionary GeneXpert multi-drug resistant TB diagnostic machine, urging them to bring down the price of their products so that more people can access this lifesaving test.

So far this year 14 schools have been burnt down in Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State, northern Nigeria, forcing over 7,000 children out of formal education and pushing down enrolment rates in an already ill-educated region. In a video posted on YouTube in February, Boko Haram, the Islamic jihadist group based in Nigeria, called on their followers to destroy schools providing Western education.

Guest Speakers: Denis Goldberg, Sipho Pityana, Eusebius McKaiser and Richard Calland.

The African Anthropologist is the official journal of the Pan-African Anthropological Association. It is published biannually by CODESRIA on behalf of the Association. The journal is planning to produce a special issue focusing on ‘sexuality’. We hereby invite contributions on various aspects of sexuality.

Are you an African leader with a vision for the future of your continent? Applications for the next Programme for African Leadership at the London School of Economics close on May 4th 2012. Successful applicants will take part in a three week intensive programme of lectures, debates, seminars and events based around issues of leadership as well as international affairs and development. Participants will benefit from gaining access to an active pan-African alumni network of rising leaders, w...read more

Africa is not cashing in enough from its large gold resources, despite the spiralling price of the precious metal over recent years, according to a working paper published by the African Development Bank (AfDB). The paper, entitled ‘Gold Mining in Africa: Maximizing Economic Returns for Countries’, points out that gold mining is a significant activity in at least 34 of the continent’s 54 countries. A key factor is unfair concession agreements, say the authors of the paper, which severely limi...read more

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A discourse of international governance is in the making. Yet market logic like ‘carbon trading’, ‘geo-engineering’, or ‘climate smart agriculture’ cannot restore broken life-support-systems in nature.

'My job as a poet is to wake myself up and take responsibility for learning the truth. That means doing hard work, looking beyond headlines, being willing to interrogate data, structures, systems.'

A new report from the Auditor General’s office shows that there is need for close to 3,000 lecturers and others in more senior positions in the four of the five public universities. Universities with grave demand for more academic staff include Makerere, Gulu, Mbarara and Kyambogo. In some public universities, the academic staffing is even below half of what is required by the National Council for Higher Education. To make it worse, the few dons in public universities are quitting for jobs in...read more

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