08 Aug 2009
Kenya expels an Eritrean diplomat for alleged security reasons a day after the US Secretary of State visited the country and accused Asmara of destabilizing the region.

Quoting officials, Kenya's Daily Nation newspaper said the Kenyan government had deported the Eritrean diplomat on Friday.

"There are two cases involving Eritrean nationals who were deported on security-related grounds," the paper quoted an immigration department spokesman as saying.

The Nation did not name the envoy, and said the other Eritrean was a businessman who was expelled a month ago.

Eritrea denies supporting militants in Somalia, and in turn accuses the United States of causing more bloodshed in the failed Horn of Africa nation by sending tons of weapons and ammunition to the Somali government.

On Thursday, Hillary Clinton had warned that the US would take action against Eritrea if Asmara did not stop supporting the Somali insurgents, including al Shabaab, Kenyan media reported.
prees tv

07 Aug 2009
The people of Niger have voted in favor of a constitutional reform giving President Mamadou Tandja unlimited chances at the country's leadership.

On Friday, the country's electoral commission said initial results from the related referendum had shown 92.5 percent popular approval of the reform, Reuters reported.

The 71-year-old president has ruled the country since 1999, winning the post twice through 'free and fair' elections. Tandja's second term ends on December 22.

The Tuesday event, though, witnessed military suppression of opposition protests aimed at preventing public access to the polling stations.

The opposition had urged a boycott on the plebiscite and said Tandja had pulled the same card as many aging African leaders, refusing to step down in his twilight days. They also said he stood to benefit from the recent exploration deals, which target Niger's oil and rich uranium resources.
prees tv

05 Aug 2009
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has begun her tour of seven African nations by stressing Washington's desire to become a 'partner' of Africa.

Clinton arrived in Kenya on the first leg of her tour on Wednesday, launching a surprise video message by US President Barack Obama, addressing the continent.

"To all Africans who are pursuing a future of hope and opportunity, know this: you have a partner and a friend in the United States," said Obama whose father was born in Kenya.

The 11-day trip, which comes just three weeks after Obama visited Ghana, is to emphasize the importance of Africa for the Obama administration.

Meanwhile, opening the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) Forum in Nairobi, Clinton said that Washington wants to be a “partner, not patron” of Africa.

Stressing on the importance of issues such as investment, corruption and human rights, the top official warned that Africa's economic progress would depend on good governance.

"True economic progress in Africa will depend on responsible governments that reject corruption, enforce the rule of law, and deliver results for their people," Clinton said.

She also told the forum, which was attended by Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, that "investors will not be attracted to states with failed or weak leadership; crime and civil unrest; or corruption that taints every transaction and decision."

Her remarks were a reference to Kenya, a top Washington ally in Africa, which has been condemned for its failure to implement key points of a power-sharing deal that ended a deadly electoral violence last year.

The AGOA initiative -- a program which provides some 40 sub-Saharan nations with preferential access to US markets -- has been widely criticized for its inability to provide basic needs for Africans who are mostly suffering from extreme poverty.

While still in Kenya, Clinton is also to meet Somali President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, whose interim government is struggling with insurgency.

Clinton is next expected to fly to South Africa, Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo, followed by Liberia and the Cape Verde.
prees tv

08 Aug 2009
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has met with South African President Jacob Zuma as both countries expressed willingness to improve strained bilateral ties.

The two officials met in the coastal city of Durban on Saturday.

Clinton, who was expected to press Zuma for help in Zimbabwe, praised insight shed on regional issue by the leader and described the meeting as "helpful."

"He gave his views on regional issues from Zimbabwe, Somalia, and Sudan. His advice on these issues was extremely helpful," she said adding that US President Barack Obama was determined to open a new chapter in the countries' cooperation.

"In both countries there are two new administrations which are taking that relationship a level higher. That is what we are trying to do," Zuma said after the 45-minute long meeting with Clinton, who is on an 11-day trip to the continent.

On Friday, Clinton said the huge number of Zimbabwean migrants in South Africa proved failure on part of the leadership in Harare.

She stressed that Johannesburg could play a key role in convincing Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to honor the terms of the power-sharing agreement singed with Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.

Clinton's seven-nation tour of Africa comes amid Obama's new policy of involving the continent in regional and global scene.
prees tv

06 Aug 2009
The United States signals deeper involvement in Somalia, revealing a new plan to double its military supplies to the Horn of African country from 40 to 80 tons.

The Somali transitional government's soldiers who are already receiving military training from the US in Djibouti are to receive double the amount of arms and ammunition, a US State Department official disclosed on condition of anonymity.

The US military has a base in Djibouti, where the Somali soldiers are being trained, he said.

Meanwhile, the State Department Spokesman Robert Wood said, "We are obviously going to look for ways that we can help to support that government to eventually help bring stability to that region, which is an important US foreign policy goal."

Earlier in Nairobi, the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pledged "very strong support" for Somalia's transitional federal government in a meeting with President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.

Clinton also called Eritrea to stop supporting the Al-Shabaab gunmen, who are fighting the transitional government for control of the impoverished country.

This while the US is accused of conducting over flights, causing panic among the Somalis. Washington has also carried out a number of airstrikes on Somalia, in which civilians lost their lives or suffered injuries.
prees tv

07 Aug 2009
The Somali opposition leader has condemned the recent meeting between Somalia's President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys who is also the Chairman of Hisbul Islam said that the meeting would not help resolve the differences between the opposition and the government which have been involved in a bloody fight against each other, Press TV correspondent reported on Friday.

Earlier, Clinton vowed very strong support for Somalia's transition federal government in her meeting with President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed in Kenya.

Clinton told Sharif the United States was prepared to meet his request for unspecified assistance.

Washington has been shipping the Somali government supplies of arms and ammunitions to fight against insurgents.

A US State Department official said on Thursday that the US planned to double the amount of arms and ammunition.

The opposition leader also threatened to increase attacks against the US-backed government.
prees tv

08 Aug 2009
Somali President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed has sought more international help to battle militants after meeting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

On Thursday, Clinton pledged strong support for Ahmed's fragile administration during a meeting with him in Nairobi.

She also warned that Washington would take action against Eritrea if it did not cease support for Somali rebels.

A day after the meeting, the African country's president said his government, which controls only parts of the capital Mogadishu, needed more help from overseas in order to beat the militants.

"The Somali government alone cannot bring a solution to the mayhem these groups are causing," Ahmed told Reuters in an interview.

"If we don't confront them with the assistance of the world, the situation may turn into an uncontainable security threat."
prees tv

09 Aug 2009
At least seventeen people have been killed and over thirty others injured in clashes between two regional clans- both involved in piracy- over tribal rivalry.

A fierce gun battle erupted on Saturday night in the lawless state on the Horn of Africa in which tribesmen from two adversary clans engaged in a full-blown conflict over the rape of a girl and land disputes.

The two clans, located in the eastern coastal region of Haradheere, have reportedly stepped up their hostilities that have caused a throng of local residents to flee the area.

Each tribe frequently launches pirate attacks on foreign ocean-liners from remote areas around the town of Haradheere demanding increasing ransoms from international shipping operators.

Somalia has become the quagmire for piracy and other criminal acts ever since the country's former dictatorial regime was toppled in 1991 highlighting the failure of interim governments.

A projected 17,000 Somalis have been killed and an estimated 250,000 others have been internally displaced over the past two years alone in the ongoing civil war that has crippled the poverty-stricken nation.

The country is mainly controlled by anti-government al Shabaab rebels who have been targeting international and national peace-keeping forces in order to obtain more leverage in negotiations with foreign governments.

prees tv

07 Aug 2009
Niger's current president wins a controversial referendum with 92.5 percent of the votes to change the country's constitution and extend his authority.

Mamadou Tandja, 71, in power since 1999 will now have unlimited mandates and will be the sole holder of executive power for probably a life time.

The Friday turn-out was 68.26 percent or around 4.1 million votes, Commission Chief Moumouni Hamidou announced late on Friday.

The vote beefs up his power to stay beyond the December 22 end of tenure. He will head the army, name the prime minister and have complete control of the cabinet.

Tandja has consistently claimed that his bid to cling to power is to fulfill 'the will of the people'.

Niger, the world's third largest uranium producer has abundant oil, but does not have a senate.

Tandja ran into stiff opposition from both the parliament and the constitutional court in his bid to extend his rule. He dissolved both, declared an emergency and began to rule by decree. He rejected the 1999 constitution limiting presidential mandates to two terms.

The opposition has denounced the vote as Tandja's 'coup d'etat'.

The European Union has threatened Niger with economic sanctions and the Economic Community of West African States regional bloc, which Tandja once headed, has threatened similar measures.

prees tv

06 Aug 2009
Nigeria has allowed a Ukrainian plane to continue its journey to Equatorial Guinea after it was held for weeks over a cargo of weaponry.

Authorities released the plane and its seven crew members on Tuesday, a Nigerian official and several military sources said on Wednesday.

Nigerian security officials had found the arms and ammunition on board the AN-12 cargo plane on June 17, while conducting a routine check of the aircraft, which had landed to refuel at Kano airport.

As part of a subsequent probe, crew members were detained and questioned in the capital Abuja.

They were, however, released on Tuesday as authorities apparently established that the cargo was not intended for Nigeria.

"We were asked by Abuja to release the aircraft and that we have done. They left here by 2.30 pm (1330 GMT) yesterday," Reuters quoted a top official at Kano airport a saying on condition of anonymity.

The plane, owned by the Ukrainian company Meridian, had departed from the Croatian capital, Zagreb, carrying what is now believed to be an arms shipment ordered by the government of Equatorial Guinea.

One of Africa's largest oil producers and a popular attraction for US oil companies, Equatorial Guinea has experienced decades of instability and numerous coup attempts.

Back in 2004, foreign mercenaries, led by former British special forces officer, Simon Mann, conducted an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the Equatorial Guinean president Teodoro Obiang Nguema.

In the court preceding that followed, Mann accused Mark Thatcher, son of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, of being one of the five-men responsible for the 2004 plot.

Thatcher, however, denied any involvement in the coup attempt, which, according to Mann's confessions, was orchestrated by Spain and South Africa.

In a more recent incident, gunmen on motorboats attacked the presidential palace in the capital, Malabo, on February 17.

The failed attack led to the dismissal of several ministers by Nguema, who himself faces accusations of human rights abuse and political oppression.

Nguema came to power in 1979 after overthrowing the Spanish-backed government of Francisco Macias.

Thu, 06 Aug 2009
The Information Minister of the semi-autonomous administration of Puntland has been killed by six unidentified gunmen in Galka'yo town in the Mudug region of Somalia.

Information Minister Warsame Abdi Shirwa'a, known as Sefta Bananka, was killed as he came out of a restaurant in the town in central Somalia, a Press TV correspondent reported on Wednesday.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the assassination.

Puntland, home to one-third of Somalia's population, was declared an autonomous region in 1998.

Meanwhile, insurgents have carried out dozens of attacks in Mogadishu in the past 12 hours.

More than 10 civilians were killed and some 40 others injured in Mogadishu and the Ceel-Qalaw district on Wednesday.

5 August - The United States African Development Foundation (USADF), in partnership with the Government of Zambia and Zambia Agribusiness Technical Assistance Center (ZATAC), held a grant recipient ceremony recognising four grants totaling nearly half a million dollars and which are benefitting grassroots groups in Zambia.

The grantees are the Chambeshi Rice Farmers Association (CRFA), Chavuma District Farmers Association, Kadande Farmers Group (KFG), and Zambezi Organic Rice Growers Association (ZORGA). The USADF began funding these groups in 2009.

During the ceremony, USADF President Lloyd Pierson made it clear that these grants are being 100 percent invested in African enterprises to create jobs, increase incomes, and support a high quality of life for the grantees.

He stated, “USADF and Zambia have a long-standing history of working to serve the people of Zambia by funding grassroots groups. The Foundation chooses to recognize these grants today for they are supporting not job creation and income generation, but are supplying essential food outputs to their communities.”

CRFA is an association with 500 members located in Mungwi, 993km from Lusaka and currently produces organic rice and is looking to produce and export quality rice that is profitable for members.

The eighteen month grant will aid in developing a business and marketing plan, improving rice outputs, and beginning to market rice. These steps are designed to increase CRFA’s prospects for sustained growth in the future.

Located in Chavuma District, Chavuma DFA is an organisation of farmers who grow rice, cassava, and maize. Chavuma is located in Northwestern Province in Zambia, a remote and underserved province with poor roads and infrastructure. The Association works with farmer members to provide services such as market information extension services, and access to buyers such as the Food Reserve Agency. The eighteen month grant will position Chavuma DFA to meet requested standards and market demand. Funds will specifically fund improvements to financial systems, create a marketing plan, develop marketing strategies, train members, and supplying milling equipment so the association can establish a local, sustainable milling facility.

KFG, Located in Chama District, is an organization of farmers who grow rice and other crops such as maize and groundnuts, providing a market for the agricultural products its members produce. Chama is a remote town along the Zambia Malawi boarder, approximately a ten hour drive from Lusaka. The organization has identified a high demand for its rice but cannot meet those demands due to its limited production, storage, and marketing capabilities. The eighteen month grant will be used to finance improvements to its financial systems, development of a business and marketing plan, trainings in improved agronomic practices, and purchasing milling equipment.

ZORGA is an association with 85 members located in Sefula, Western Zambia, 615 km from Lusaka. ZORGA currently produces organic rice and is looking to produce and export quality rice that is profitable for members.

The eighteen month grant USADF funding will fund a business and marketing plan, procure office equipment, and pilot the milling and marketing of rice. As a result, Association profits and member wages are anticipated to increase, securing a higher quality of life for members.

USADF began programming in Zambia in 2004. Zambia’s current portfolio stands at twenty-eight investment projects totaling over $4.8 million dollars.

By staff writer

© afrol News

6 August - The ruling African National Congress (ANC) in South Africa has dismissed claims by the opposition Democratic Alliance that government had approved doggy arms deals, some to countries under the arms embargo.

Responding to the claims in parliament, the Justice and Constitutional Development Minister, Jeff Radebe, said the government would in no way act in a manner that undermines the laws governing the procurement of arms.

The DA had alleged that the country's arms control body had authorised deals such as a weapons exhibition for North Korea and possible sales to Iran, Syria and Libya, further saying other approvals were made when the body had not been meeting.

Mr Radebe said government took the allegations very seriously and that such could never be left unchallenged. He further warned that the portfolio committee in parliament will investigate the DA's claims and how it had arrived at their allegations.

"South Africa is committed to the international agenda of responsible trade in arms," he said.

He said it was in this spirit of commitment that South Africa established government structures to deal with the regulation of various kinds of arms, adding that each of the structures operated on the basis of a legal framework and that there was no way the alleged "dodgy" deal could have occurred.

"Decisions taken by the NCACC meetings are executed by the NCACC secretariat in terms of the practical issuing of the permits to the defence industry applicants," added Mr Radebe.

Earlier, the DA had been accused of bring to the public ‘stolen information’ when the allegations surfaced.

The arms deals in South Africa have been some of the most scandalous with several former and current leaders having been questioned in relation to some of the international deals.

By staff writer

© afrol News

6 August - Small island developing States, some of them along the African waters, and among the world’s most vulnerable countries, have received a boost of nearly $3 million to give them better access to technology, thanks to a joint initiative by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) and Spain.

The $2.8 million project, funded by Spain, seeks to create a group of experts, both local and international, to help address development obstacles, ranging from limited Internet connectivity and access to affordable technology.

It will also help set up a much-needed central knowledge management system and information clearing house for the nations, which suffer from drought and depend on waning tourism revenues in the midst of a major global recession.

Entitled “Capacity Development through Education for Sustainable Development and Knowledge Management for Small Island Developing States (SIDS),” the initiative was signed into action yesterday in New York by Spain and Sha Zukang, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs.

By staff writer

© afrol News

6 August - The British Department of International Development (DFID) has committed £20 million that will support a land registration programme for Rwanda.

The five-year project will see million of Rwandans attain certified rights to land as well as create a data base of land ownership in the east African state.

According to a statement issued by DFID yesterday, the project will also contribute towards lessening violence in the country, as a result of land disputes.

"For the first time, men and women in Rwanda will be able to defend their land rights through the law courts, giving them the peace of mind to invest in their farms and build their businesses," said the International Development Minister Mike Foster.

He also said by getting legal rights to land, poor farmer's lives would be transformed as many Rwandans had no way to prove what they own, making it too easy for others to take land away from them.

The project which is scheduled to be completed by 2014, follows a three and half year pilot programme funded by DFID that tested the land registration method. During a trial, DFID said only five percent of land rights were disputed.

Rwanda, with a population of over 10 million experiences regular disputes over land, sometimes turning very violent. Some arguments have even been advanced that partly, land disputes contributed to the 1994 100 days genocide, where an estimated 800,000 people were killed in ethnic violence.

By staff writer

© afrol News

7 August - The Basarwa communities in Botswana will get a $100,000 grant to help them with organized cattle ranching.

United States African Development Foundation (USADF), in partnership with the Government of Botswana, held a grant recipient ceremony recognising a grant totaling nearly USD$100,000 benefiting the Komku Development Trust, a community group in Botswana, which was also represented by Xharae Xhase, the coordinator and 2009 AGOA session panelist.

During the ceremony, USADF Vice-Chairman Dr John Agwunobi, emphasised the importance of grassroots development in Botswana, by stating “USADF is a US Government Agency committed to funding groups at the grassroots level to create jobs and increase incomes. This grant is at the heart of what USADF does.”

This grant will fund Komku Trust to work with seven San communities in Western Botswana to help their members move from subsistence cattle rearing to organised cattle ranching with a management and land use plan, permanent access to water and land ownership. Under the programme, the Komku Trust will work together with the Botswana Meat Commission so that cattle raised by the San community members will be sold under the company’s quota of beef to the European Union.

The two year, $100,000 grant will fund improvements to financial systems, training, a farm development and livestock management plan, and a five year business plan, a major boost to the groups’ limitations to join the commercial ranks.

USADF began programming in Botswana in 1985. Botswana’s current portfolio stands at twenty-two investment projects totaling more than $3 million.

By staff writer

© afrol News

7 August - The military chiefs of the United Nations’ largest and most complex peacekeeping operations have urged member states to provide the troops and equipment necessary to carry out their missions in the war-ravaged regions of Darfur in western Sudan and eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

“We have had a challenging time to meet all our mandated tasks because of the issue of deployment and lack of capabilities,” General Martin Luther Agwai, Force Commander of the joint African Union-UN mission in Darfur (UNAMID), told reporters in New York yesterday.

The Security Council authorised the deployment of UNAMID to quell fighting and protect civilians in Darfur, where an estimated 300,000 people have been killed and some 2.7 million others forced from their homes since fighting erupted in 2003, pitting Government forces and allied Janjaweed militiamen against rebel groups.

UNAMID has been working in Darfur, having less than 70 percent of the authorised number of troops under the 2007 Security Council resolution setting up the force, said Gen Agwai.

In addition, “we have been able to be one of the best sources of authenticated information of what is happening in Darfur,” he said. “We have come a long way, but there are still a lot of challenges, no doubt about it.”

At current strength UNAMID is unable to provide full-time security to all of the makeshift camps sheltering the millions of people who have fled the violence engulfing the region over the years.

“We have not been able to have a 24/7 protection coverage in most of the IDP [internally displaced persons] camps,” said Gen Agwai. “We have prioritized the most vulnerable and volatile camps.”

He noted that some of the displaced people camps have 90,000 to 100,000 people taking refuge in tents and makeshift shelters.

“The bigger the camps the more volatile and problematic they are and those are the ones with a 24/7 UNAMID presence,” he said, including patrols that protect women when out collecting firewood.

With full deployment the mission would be more mobile and have a further reach, “instead of [looking like] very small ink spots on blotting paper. [We currently have] 32 spots, but we’re beginning to expand and spread.”

Gen Agwai expected 92 percent deployment by the end of the year, but stressed that there is little “point having boots without capabilities. Ethiopia has now pledged five [attack] helicopters to the mission … [but] to the best of my knowledge nobody has pledged one utility helicopter to the mission.”

As a sign of UNAMID contributing to an increasing sense of security in the region, Gen Agwai said that the incidence of rapes and assaults has been cut. “The number of people dying because of the crisis is down. The figure is now ranging from about 120 to 150 deaths in a month and not hundreds or thousands in a month as in the past.”

The UN peacekeeping mission in DRC, known as MONUC, is effectively engaged in three separate military operations, said the operations Force Commander, Lieutenant-General Babacar Gaye.

MONUC is supporting the Congolese army (FARDC) in an offensive against the notorious Ugandan rebel militia, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) on one front; a group of remnant armed groups in Ituri province in northeastern DRC; and a Rwandan rebel force, known as the FDLR, in North and South Kivu.

“Our mission is so far the largest peacekeeping mission deployed around the world and we are facing all the challenges that peacekeeping have to face today,” Lt-Gen Gaye told the press briefing. “This means the use of force, the protection of civilians and so on and so forth.”

The latest bout of fighting between DRC troops and the rebel FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda) and their local allies uprooted a further 35,000 people in South Kivu last month, bringing the total displaced there since January to 536,000, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). More than 1.8 million people are now internally displaced in the DRC’s east.

Lt-Gen Gaye stressed the drastic need for extra troops on the ground to implement MONUC’s protection mandate. “Everything is on track but unfortunately the first boots are still expected.”

He said that MONUC is slated to soon receive a Bangladeshi battalion, an Egyptian battalion, a Jordanian special force company, an Egyptian special force company and a Bangladeshi engineer company.

“Unfortunately, we are yet to have the 18 helicopters that have been authorised by the Council,” he added.

By staff writer

© afrol News

7 August - Access to food for the people of Madagascar remains unreliable because of the impact of natural disasters, which routinely strike the island, and continuing political tensions, a United Nations report has warned.

The joint Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP) mission tasked with assessing crop and food security in Madagascar underscored the effect a run of cyclones on the east coast in 2008-2009 and several years of drought in the south has had on the country’s crops.

In addition, the political crisis – involving the resignation of President Marc Ravalomanana in early March, amid a dispute with the mayor of the capital, Antananarivo, Andry Rajoelina, who now leads the country – combined with the global economic recession has had repercussions for public finances, exports, tourism, unemployment and the national currency, and a knock-on effect on the agricultural sector, according to the FAO-WFP report.

The report noted that food production varies widely across the Indian Ocean nation with good rainfall benefiting the 2008-2009 harvest in the centre, north and west of the country, as well as favouring rice-growing areas with an estimated 8 per cent increase in paddy production to over 4 million tons of rice.

However, the drought devastated the south, home to some of the country’s poorest communities, has caused national maize, sweet potato and cassava production to slump.

The production of maize in the province of Taliara in the south, which contributes 30 percent of the national total, is expected to halve next year, and its sweet potato harvest, around 20 percent of the national total, will slump by around 20 per cent, according to the report. In addition, cassava production in the area will fall by 15 percent.

The report also stressed that the amount of cereal required by the country, including cassava and sweet potato, will exceed total cereals availability by about 206,000 tons. Although commercial wheat and rice imports would normally cover the shortfall, a government announcement of its intention to import 150,000 tons of rice to be sold at moderate prices could unsettle free-market trade.

Commercial interests are likely to “wait-and-see” how market prices react to Government imports, which could lead to delays or breakdowns in stocks, causing a price explosion during the lean season – beginning in September-October – reminiscent of the timing of events that led to the 2004-2005 food crisis.

The humanitarian wing of the UN had earlier revised downwards its appeal for aid for Madagascar but warned that the country's population still remained highly vulnerable to the impact of cyclones, drought and continuing political tensions.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs was seeking a $22.3 million for its “flash appeal” for Madagascar, a reduction from the $35.7 million it had sought in April.

OCHA also said Madagascar remains unprepared for the next cyclone season, with inadequate stocks of emergency goods and inefficient mechanisms to coordinate any emergency response. The Indian Ocean country is often battered by cyclones in the early months of the year.

By staff writer

© afrol News

5 August - Nigeria's main militant group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), has pronounced its stand of the money for disarmament, saying its struggle was not for sale.

MEND said in a statement late yesterday that its taking of the deal would not be in exchange for money

"When we choose to disarm, it will be done freely, knowing that the reason for our uprising which is the emancipation of the Niger Delta from neglect and injustice has been achieved," said the group in a statement.

The Nigerian government has made offers to the militants in the Delta offering cash deals as part of the settlement and general amnesty to push for peace in the region. The amnesty deal is offered from 6 August until 4 October.

The Nigerian President, Umaru Yar'Adua, had also in late June offered unconditional amnesty for all militants who lay down their arms, but militants had stepped up their attacks after what they called unprovoked assaults by the government forces.

MEND has declared several ceasefires, with the latest being the last month a 60-day ceasefire in response to the amnesty offer. The group claims to be fighting for a larger share of the oil revenues for the Niger Delta communities and has distanced itself from other groups that have been said to be criminally motivated and involved in kidnappings for ransoms and other monetary deals.

By staff writer

© afrol News

4 August - The World Bank has approved a US$500 million Development Policy Credit to support Nigeria’s economic reforms in the financial sector and public financial management.

The credit, according to the bank, is in response to the current global financial crisis.

“The loan is intended to provide budgetary support to the Federal Government of Nigeria to partially off- set the fiscal impact of the crisis as well as maintain its current economic reform path in the financial sector, fiscal policy and financial management, and governance,” said Michael Fuchs, and Lead Financial Economist and Task Team Leader.

This assistance package builds on strong government ownership of a medium-term reform program, which consolidates the successful record of economic management and reforms since 2001, while putting emphasis on cushioning the damaging impacts of the financial crisis on those at the poorest of the poor, the World Bank also said.

Commenting on the assistance, the Country Director for Nigeria, Onno Ruhl said, “The benefits to be derived from the program include maintaining confidence and stability in the financial system, strengthening the banking system, supporting reforms spearheaded by the Central Bank of Nigeria, as well as supporting the Government’s fiscal and financial management, including the objectives of the 2009 budget that focuses on maintaining fiscal stability while raising government investment spending to accelerate non-oil growth”.

The operation involved extensive consultations with a wide array of government agencies and other donors.

By staff writer

© afrol News