Côte d’Ivoire: UN Helps Ease Former Fighters’ Return to Civilian Life

The United Nations is helping former combatants and members of self-defence forces to ease back into civilian life in Côte d’Ivoire, which has been divided since 2002 between the Government-held south and opposition-dominated north.The six-month initiative will offer vocational training and assistance for some 1,300 people and set up over 1,000 micro-credit projects, such as cattle farming and retailing activities.

Africa: New Nile Pact Stalled

Kampala — Ten years of negotiations over a new protocol governing shared use of the Nile River are hanging in the balance, with Egypt and Sudan refusing to give up their present power over how much water is used by countries further upstream.The current agreement prohibits countries downstream from using Nile waters beyond an agreed curve, and gives Egypt powers to monitor the flow at key points.”The technocrats had worked out all the paper work for a good protocol but the politicians have thrown a clean piece of cloth in the mud,” says Professor Afuna Aduula, chair of the Nile Basin Discourse Forum, a consortium of civil society organisations looking at issues along the world’s longest river.

Oil Prices – OPEC to Meet in Cairo

The 13-member nation of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) will meet in Cairo, Egypt on 29 November for “consultation” on the oil market, a senior Iranian oil official said yesterday, after oil prices continued their slide.OPEC members are calling for action to halt oil’s slide to around $56 a barrel as they face reduced revenues and a struggle to finance domestic programmes.Iran had previously said the oil cartel could meet before a gathering scheduled for December 14 in Algeria, with some suggesting the meeting could be on 28 November in the Egyptian capital.

Malaria vaccine for Africa

A malaria vaccine trial on children in Africa starts next month researchers have said. The medical trial will take place on about 16,000 children and has come about as the researchers try to create the world’s first malaria vaccine. Malaria kills more than one million children yearly in Africa.The vaccine trials are expected to take place in such countries as Burkina Faso, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania.Malaria is one of the diseases which is killing more people especially children in Africa and is caused by parasites and spread by mosquitoes.The British drug-maker GlaxoSmithKline PLC is teaming with the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, which is an anti-malaria charity funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, clinics and research centres in Africa to develop a malaria vaccine, according to the NewsDay report.

Egypt discovers ancient pyramid

Egypt has discovered a 4,300-year-old pyramid near ancient city of Memphis about 20km south of Cairo, Egypt’s culture minister, Faruq Hosni announced. He made the announcement in Saqqara, an ancient burial ground which dates back to 2,700 BC and is dominated by massive bulk of King Zoser’s step pyramid.The pyramid, which is believed to have belonged to Queen Sesheshet, was discovered in the sprawling rulers’ burial. It is the 118th discovered pyramid in Egypt and most were built as tombs for the country’s Pharaohs and their consorts during the Old and Middle Kingdom periods.According to Husni, the pyramid, which is five meters tall, is believed to have been 15 meters tall when it was first built for Queen Sesheshet, mother of King Teti who founded 6th Dynasty of Egypt’s Old Kingdom.

Intimidation as Al Ahly defeat Cotonsport

Cotonport lost to Al Ahly 0-2 in the first leg finals of the MTN CAF Champions league. Despite Al Ahly’s domination of the match, the Egyptians had intimidated and caused Cotonsport psychologically. Cotonsport put up a spirited game, as they played an experienced side in front of 70,000 supporters.Cotonsport players and officials were greeted with intimidation as they met a hostile reception at the Cairo International Airport. The Cameroonian delegation had to pay $50 per person to be released from their plane. A representative of Al Ahly claimed they could not support extra charges from the visitors and said the Cameroonian delegation should have boarded a commercial flight.Though the situation was attributed to lack of communication within Al Ahly, Cotonsport and the Cameroonian embassy in Egypt, a Cameroonian student in Egypt said that there was a strong possibility it was a ploy to demoralise the players. Testimonies from Cameroonians in Cairo, have it that matches there are won outside the stadium.

Shortlist for Africa’s best player out

The Confederation of Africa Football has unveiled the shortlists for the Glo-CAF Awards 2008. CAF Director of Communications, Sulemana Habuba also announced innovations in the event with the aim of making it prestigious. The Media and Technical Committees nominated the shortlists for the two awards.The innovation Habuba said had led to the creation of the Glo-CAF Best Player on the Continent and the Glo-CAF Best Player across the World, according to cafonline.

Egypt: Joy as 11 hostages freed

Eleven Western tourists and their Egyptian guides kidnapped in a remote border region of Egypt are now free. Abducted 10 days ago, the five Italians, five Germans and a Romanian and their guides are said to be in good health.The news broke on Egyptian state television and confirmed by the Italian officials, the BBC reported. They have been taken to a military base in the capital, Cairo. “Our compatriots are free, and they are with Egyptian forces,” said Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.No details were given on the circumstances of their release. The kidnappers had demanded that Germany take charge of payment of an $8.8m (£4.9m) ransom. The news said it is unclear if any payment was exchanged.The abductees had been touring in an area well off the beaten track but a messy end to this crisis would not have been good for the health of the Egpytian economy, the news network said.

Museveni: Africa can solve food crisis

Africa has sufficient agricultural potential to become a food basket for the whole world, President Museveni of Uganda said. He said the continent could solve the current food crisis if the relevant production interventions are undertaken during the launch of the P4P at the United Nations.Purchase 4 Progress (P4P) is an initiative of the World Food Programme (WFP) which aims at transforming the way WFP purchases food in developing countries by giving priority to small scale farmers to sell their surplus produce to WFP at competitive prices while giving the food to those who have little or no food at all.According to a press release from the state house in Uganda, the programme which will initially target 21 countries, Uganda inclusive, aims at helping farmers to earn reasonable income and predictable market for their produce. It will initially target 350,000 households over a period of 5 years.The WFP is supported by the Bill Melinda Gates Foundation and the Howard G. Buffet Foundation.President Museveni launched the programme jointly with Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete, Rwandese President Paul Kagame and the WFP Executive Director Mrs. Josette Sheeran.President Museveni said that 67% of the farmers in Sub-Sahara Africa have been practicing subsistence agriculture and not fully utilizing the region’s agricultural potential. He said that with the current food shortage in the world, it was time for African farmers to engage in commercialized agriculture and produce food beyond their subsistence needs. He, however, noted that interventions in terms of irrigation, the use of fertilizers and other forms of modern agricultural practices need to be emphasized to enable the region produce optimally.Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete welcomed the programme saying that it would help unlock the potential of farmers in rural Africa since they will be assured of the market for their produce. President Paul Kagame of Rwanda lauded WFP for its support to his country. He said that the organization has responded to the feeding needs of over 54,000 people in Rwanda. He also hailed their support through the School Feeding Programme and welcomed the Purchase 4 Progress Programme saying it was an appropriate intervention.Ms. Josette Sheeran, the Executive Director of WFP, said that in addition to purchasing their produce, WFP would facilitate farmers with modern farm inputs, equip them with modern agricultural skills to boost the quality and quantity of their output.Mr. Bill Gates and Mr. Howard Buffet said they were committed to helping farmers in the developing world to better their incomes because they constitute a large part of the poorest of the poor in the world. They said that they committed their organizations to supporting Purchase 4 Progress Programme because its objectives are in line with the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals.

Corruption: Africa’s movers and shakers

Corruption has significantly improved in Nigeria and Mauritius over the last year, according to the Transparency International`s 2008 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). The southern African country ranked 41 out of 180 countries with a score of 5.5 out of 10. Nigeria (2.7) jumped from 180 to 121.The CPI measures the perceived levels of public-sector corruption in a given country and is a composite index, drawing on different expert and business surveys. The 2008 CPI scores 180 countries (the same number as the 2007 CPI) on a scale from zero (highly corrupt) to 10 (highly clean).According to the report released on Tuesday in Berlin, Botswana leads the league table of top 10 least corrupt African countries at the 36th position with a score of 5.8. Mauritius closely followed then Cape Verde at 47th spot with a mark of 5.1. Africa’s fourth went to South Africa at the 54th slot with a score of 4.9, Seychelles gained 55th and bagged 4.8 and then Namibia landed at the 61st position after scoring 4.5.Others are Tunisia (62) with a score of 4.4, Ghana ranked 67 and scored 3.9, Swaziland (72) and attained 3.6 followed by Burkina Faso at 80th position after it obtained a mark of 3.5.However, Somalia (180), Sudan (173), Chad (173), Guinea (173) topped the top 10 corrupt countries on the continent scoring 1.6 each but Somalia which managed only 1.0. Equatorial Guinea (171) and the Democratic Republic of Congo (171) followed them with a score of 1.7 each. On top of them was ailing Zimbabwe, which is lying at the 166th position and scored 1.8. The remaining medals for the other three corrupt countries went to Gambia (158), Angola (158) and Guinea-Bissau (158) after all three scored 1.9 each.On the global scene, Denmark, New Zealand and Sweden share the highest score at 9.3, followed immediately by Singapore at 9.2. Bringing up the rear is Somalia at 1.0, slightly trailing Iraq and Myanmar at 1.3 and Haiti at 1.4, according to TI website. The global anti-corruption watchdog said while score changes in the Index are not rapid, statistically significant changes are evident in certain countries from the high to the low end of the CPI. Looking at source surveys included in both the 2007 and 2008 Index, significant declines can be seen in the scores of Bulgaria, Burundi, Maldives, Norway and the United Kingdom. Similarly, statistically significant improvements over the last year can be identified in Albania, Cyprus, Georgia, Mauritius, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, South Korea, Tonga and Turkey.