Zone 2- Africa Summary, week # 127

Week # 127, Dated 3^rd-9^th July, 2010

POLITICS OF SECURITY AND CONFLICT ISSUES

West Africa: Formal negotiations began last week on a new international treaty to control the trade of conventional weapons. More than 190 nations are taking part at U.N. headquarters in New York. Supporters of the treaty say it would save thousands of lives every year.

In Nigeria a senate panel has sought the Death Penalty for Terrorist acts. The Senate Joint Committee on Terrorism proposed the maximum penalty for anyone found guilty of engaging in terrorist acts as against five years imprisonment recommended in the bill for an Act to provide measures to combat terrorism at present before the National Assembly.

In a recent report UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said that the progress made by Guinea-Bissau following last year's political crisis could be jeopardized unless major reforms in the areas of defence and security are carried out.

Meanwhile the government of Mauritania is putting 500 imams on its payroll, providing monthly "stipends" if they help stop the spread of religious extremism. The aim of the operation is to limit the recruitment of fundamentalist scholars to Mauritania and better regulate the mosques and their selection of imams, according to Ahmed Ould Mukhtar of the Nouakchott Ministry of Islamic Affairs.

In Nigeria some northern politicians in Abuja have raised a different view other than the one making the rounds on the contentious zoning issue, saying they neither supports zoning or the candidature of any particular candidate for the presidency but stress the need for generational change in the next dispensation, noting that a younger candidate is more desirable.

Central Africa: AU Peace and Security Comissioner Ramtane Lamara has said that the deadly bomb attacks in Kampala, Uganda have strengthened the continent's resolve to root out al-Qaida-linked elements in Somalia. A spokesman for the U.S. National Security Council called the Kampala attacks 'cowardly and deplorable', and said Washington is ready to assist Uganda in any way possible. Meanwhile the recorded death toll of the two Kampala bomb blasts rose to 74.

In Sudan, tension over the future of Abyei, a flashpoint region roughly the size Lebanon on the north-south border, erupted into armed violence and street demonstrations last week. Gunmen mounted an attack near the village of Tajalei, about 30km northeast of Abyei town, killing five people, a police officer and four civilians.

Rwanda's Kagame is to face 3 challengers in election. Rwanda's electoral commission said that four candidates, including the incumbent, are cleared to run in the August 9 ballot. The commission says some people who were expected to run, including opposition figure Victoire Ingabire, did not submit applications. Critics have accused President Kagame of stifling opposition and freedom of expression ahead of the poll. Rwandan authorities arrested Ingabire in April and accused her of working with rebels to destabilize the country.

East & the horn of Africa: Heavy fighting in the northern areas of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, has trapped many residents in their homes, with some unable to bury their dead, civil society sources said on 6 July. The fighting has rendered the areas inaccessible to those who could provide help to the affected families.

Kenya was under heightened security after terrorist bombs killed 74 people in Kampala. ‘Our thoughts are with relatives and friends of the victims, and at this tragic moment the people of Kenya stand with their brothers and sisters in Uganda," the President of Kenya said in a statement.

Southern Africa: In Zimbabwe a team of consultants has been sent out as part of a parliamentary outreach programme to find out what people would like included in a proposed new constitution. But for the past two months the members of the youth militia aligned to President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party - have been warning villagers to either shut up or support ZANU-PF's view on the new constitution, which includes no limit on the number of presidential terms that can be served. They have dubbed their operation "Vhara Muromo", or Shut Your Mouth.

HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL ISSUES IN DOMESTIC POLITICS

West Africa: A former Sierra Leonean rebel leader – released from his jail cell in Rwanda to testify on behalf of Charles Taylor – last week distanced the activities of his rebels from the former Liberian President. Mr. Taylor did not control the rebels’ actions, receive diamonds from them, nor provide assistance to them during Sierra Leone’s bloody civil conflict, he said.

Ghanaian Government last week lashed at the negative perception against women and other socio-economic barriers that continue to work against gender mainstreaming in governance. "These negative trends have eroded confidence and created fear on the part of most women to take up political or decision making position," Mrs. Juliana Azumah-Mensah, Minister of Women and Children's Affairs stated in Accra.

Although about 90 % of African constitutions endorse gender equality and affirmative action, only 11 countries have achieved parity in secondary education, a new study shows. Abdoulie Janneh of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) presented these disappointing numbers at seminar in New York.

Central Africa: The International Criminal Court (ICC) has suspended proceedings in the case of a Congolese warlord, Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, the founder and leader of the Union of Congolese Patriots in the Ituri region of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) accused of recruiting child soldiers, saying that prosecutors have refused orders to disclose information to his defence.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has begun the distribution of seed, agricultural and fishing tools to some 35,000 people in Equateur province, a remote region in northern Democratic Republic of Congo. The aid will allow tens of thousands of people in the town of Dongo and the surrounding area to plant their crops in time for the next harvest in November. Almost the entire town of Dongo, some 100,000 people, fled ethnic clashes that erupted in October.

A former senior official in Kigali City Rwanda has been sentenced to life by a Gacaca court for Genocide crimes. The Court found Sophanie Rutayisire responsible for, among others, the death of 80 Tutsis who had sought refuge at B.G.M. Rubirizi College in Kanombe, Kicukiro District, and the disappearance of several others shortly before the Genocide.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued a second arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, adding genocide to the list of charges for crimes he has allegedly committed in the war-ravaged Darfur region.

International peacekeepers said last week that 221 people have been killed in Sudan's volatile Darfur region in June. The United Nations - African Union peacekeepers in Darfur said most of the deaths were due to inter-tribal clashes. The death toll was significantly less than May, when nearly 600 people died in rebel and tribal fighting.

Southern Africa: In South Africa some recent xenophobic attacks and memories of countrywide attacks on foreign nationals two years ago have combined to create an exodus of people from the coastal city of Cape Town to their home countries or South Africa's rural areas. A Somali trader was killed just over a week ago on the outskirts of Cape Town, and on 6 July a Zimbabwean national, Reason Wandi, was thrown from a moving train by passengers and suffered serious injuries.

HEALTH, ENVIRONMENT AND DOMESTIC POLITICS

West Africa: The European Commission is seeking to dismantle the drug cartels that use West Africa as courier channel to funnel illicit drugs to Europe. The Commission therefore urged leaders in the region to increase funding for drug control stressing that funding is a reflection of political will to stop drug barons.

Nigeria’s Federal Government and the United Nations agency, the United Nations Development Programme last week commenced efforts to check forest destruction with the inauguration of the National Technical Committee on Reducing Emission from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Abuja.

Nearly 17 % of Niger's children younger than five suffer acute malnutrition, a 5 % increase over the same period last year, according to a national survey released by the government. More than 15 % acute malnutrition is classified as a critical emergency by the UN World Health Organization (WHO). The report links this increase to the poor 2008-2009 harvests.

Ghana has achieved 96 % reduction in Guinea Worm cases and is expected to hit the 100 % reduction mark towards completion, Dr Siedu Korkor, Guinea Worm Eradication Programme Manager said last week.

The Ghana Health Service (GHS) last week gave the assurance that as far as available evidence indicates, the Influenza ‘A’ (H1N1) vaccine is safe. However, it was following up and monitoring reports on all adverse reactions following the vaccinations, just as being done after all vaccinations, to inform policy decisions.

Staffs from NGOs and the health authorities are going house-to-house to distribute thousands of bottles of bleach to residents in the Bafata area of central Guinea-Bissau, to prevent another cholera outbreak. An epidemic in 2008 claimed at least 225 lives and infected more than 13,000 people.

Recent reports suggest an imminent threat of hunger in several countries of the West African sub-region. Persistent drought in the region partly accounts for this. Because of the resulting poor harvests and soaring food prices, some West African countries are already experiencing the hunger crisis. According to its 2010 report, the British charity Oxfam, said that it had already launched emergency appeal for seven million pounds sterling to help about 800,000 people threatened by hunger in different countries of the sub-region.

Central Africa:

East & the horn of Africa: An initiative by the Tanzanian government hopes to reduce HIV transmission along the country's expanding road network by targeting construction crews and the communities that surround them.

Southern Africa: Another year with a surplus harvest of maize, the staple food, is good news for Malawi, but dry spells in the south have left around 700,000 people in need of food assistance.

In a bid to ease pressure on South Africa's over-burdened public health sector, the government has given hospitals and clinics permission to give patients on HIV/AIDS treatment a three-month supply of their antiretroviral medication (ARVs). An estimated 700,000 patients are currently receiving ARV treatment through monthly visits to public health facilities.

POLITICAL ECONOMY

West Africa: the Federal High Court in Asaba, Delta State, Nigeria has ordered multi-national oil giant, Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited (SPDC) to pay the people of Ejama-Ebubu Community in Tai Eleme local government area of Rivers State the sum of N15.4billion as special and punitive damages for oil spill in community in 1970.

Nigeria last week threw its investment window open to all member countries of the D-8 business community to avail themselves of the abundant opportunities that abound in the country in the areas of industrial development, power sector, agriculture, communication technology, oil and gas.

Gold production in Ghana, Africa’s largest producer of the metal after South Africa, rose 3.1 % to 696,172 ounces (19,736 kilograms) during the first quarter from a year earlier, the Chamber of Mines said. Compared with the previous three months, gold output fell 8.1 %

Meanwhile according to Ghana’s energy minister Ghana will definitely pump its first barrel of oil in 2010 but it will take four to six months to reach its planned output of 120,000 barrels per day (bpd).

The International Monetary Fund has said that debt relief will open a new financial front and opportunities for Liberia. IMF First Deputy Managing Director John Lipsky said concessional financing from donors should be available giving the hope that critical infrastructure projects could be properly financed. Mr. Lipsky hopes that such investment in infrastructure would lead to more jobs creation, enhance growth and help reduce poverty.

The European Union has offered to make available 6.5 billion Euros for financing programme initiatives in West African countries under the Economic Partnership Agreement Development Programme over a four-year period (2010-2014).

East & the horn of Africa: China's Ministry of Commerce (MOC) announced last week that the country will cease levying tariffs on 60 % of imports from 26 least developed African nations, including Ethiopia and Liberia. This policy went into effect July 1, an MOC spokesman said. §

________________________________________________________
Business and Politics in the Muslim World (BPM)refers to the project entitled, "Globalized Business and Politics: A View from the Muslim World.' The blog development project has been undertaken and jointly developed by the Gilani Research Foundation and BPM as a free resource and social discussion tool.
Please Preview your comments before posting.