ISIOLO-LAIKIPIA, 23 September 2009 (IRIN) - The drought that has ravaged parts of northeastern Kenya, killing a large number of livestock, has affected the availability of milk, in turn undermining child nutrition, say officials.

"I decided to migrate from Losuk [in Samburu District] to save the remaining livestock and my family, but they almost perished along the way," Joseph Lemanyan, a livestock keeper, said.

"Most [of my livestock] died as we migrated. My youngest child, a girl, became ill and died on the way."

Lemanyan's family is among hundreds to have moved south to the foothills of Mount Kenya, but there they lost more cattle because of the cold weather.

"I arrived here [in August] with 42 [heads of] cattle... half of them have died due to cold here," said the father of five, who left Losuk after losing 64 heads of cattle within three months.

The death of so many cattle has reduced the supply of milk, which should form a large part of the daily diet of children.

"Children are on the brink of death... The numbers of malnourished children coming to our feeding centres is going up and up and we expect it to get worse," Catherine Fitzgibbon, Save the Children’s deputy director in Kenya, said on 22 September.

"If we cannot get more food or cash to the region urgently to help families buy food, more children will die."



One meal a day

Most of the rural population in the areas where Save the Children is working is heavily dependent on relief food and many children are eating only one meal a day, of corn porridge.

"This poor diet means they are missing out on vital nutrients, which can mean they grow up stunted and their brains and bodies can suffer permanent damage," the organization said.

Since July, the number of severely malnourished children seeking treatment at its northeastern emergency feeding centres has increased by 25 percent.

Molu Sora, the programme manager in the Marsabit Arid Lands Resource Management office, said livestock had also died across the rangelands stretching between Kenya and Ethiopia. "Animal carcasses are all over the place," he said.

As a result, many families, mostly comprising women and children, are trekking long distances to save remaining livestock herds, said Francis Merinyi, a child rights activist with the ILAMAIYO community group in Laikipia.

School attendance

Merinyi said a survey conducted in Laikipia West District in August found that about 900 children had left school to join the migrating herds. More children had also been forced to work.

Increased conflicts among pastoralists have also been reported. On 15 September, at least 400 Pokot raiders attacked Samburu manyattas (homesteads), killing 21 residents. Eleven raiders were also killed, according to the Kenya Red Cross.

Observers say El Niño-related short rains, expected from mid-September to December, could either help or aggravate the situation.

"The government and donors need to be aware of the changing climate now and in future, and shape their policies accordingly," Philippa Crosland-Taylor, head of Oxfam GB in Kenya, said in August.

"Emergency aid is urgently needed now, but in the long term we need to rethink policies to focus on mitigating the risks of droughts before they occur, rather than rushing in food aid when it is too late."

irinnews

JOHANNESBURG, 23 September 2009 (IRIN) - Climate related natural disasters like droughts, hurricanes and floods forced 20 million people - slightly less than the population of Australia - out of their homes in 2008 alone said a new study, making a strong case for regularly monitoring displacement in the context of climate change.

A total of 36 million people were displaced worldwide by sudden-onset natural disasters, including earthquakes and landslides. During the same period 4.6 million people were internally displaced by conflicts.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the Geneva-based Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre jointly conducted the study, Monitoring Disaster Displacement in the Context of Climate Change.

"Had it not been for the Sichuan earthquake in China, which displaced 15 million people, climate related disasters would have been responsible for over 90 percent of disaster related displacement in 2008," the study commented.

Using the 2008 data as a test case, the study proposed the ongoing monitoring of disaster related displacement using existing information, such as the Emergency Events Database produced by the Belgium-based Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters, cross-referenced with various other sources, and individually investigating events to estimate the numbers of persons displaced.

The next step is further research into displacement caused by slow-onset disasters and sea level rise. The study also called for a legal framework to protect people forced to cross a border by a natural disaster.


irinnews

NAIROBI, 24 September 2009 (IRIN) - Donor-backed user fees for health services were supposed to decentralise primary healthcare and provide revenue for essential drugs: instead, advocacy groups charge, they have ended up killing the poor in the developing world.

For the vulnerable, even nominal fees can mean a denial of access to basic healthcare – especially among women and children. According to the online research guide Eldis, user fees “appear to have raised less revenue than expected; have acted as a disincentive for both poor and non-poor people to use health services; and have not led to the degree of community participation envisaged”.

Anti-user fee campaigners have now won powerful international backing from, among others, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Six countries - Malawi, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nepal and Burundi – are to receive US$5.3 billion in financing raised by the high level taskforce on International Innovative Finance for Health Systems, to help them extend free healthcare to women and children.

But doing away with user fees alone is no panacea to improving medical access for the poor. “Focusing on user fees may do little to improve access as there are usually other, greater financial barriers such as purchasing drugs, unofficial fees, and transport,” Eldis noted.

In a 14 September policy paper – Your Money or Your Life – a group of NGOs and health organizations stated: “The need to make healthcare free and expand access in these and other countries is beyond question, but to do so successfully requires high-level political commitment and sustained additional financial and technical support.”

Donor funding is notoriously unreliable; governments may well eventually have to turn to taxation to cover those costs – or a hybrid mix of free care for the poorest, and national insurance schemes for those who can afford to pay modest premiums. Meanwhile, most African governments are still well short of fulfilling their commitment made in 2001 at Abuja, Nigeria, to allocate 15 percent of their budgets to health.

“Ultimately the decision to abolish or keep fees has to be made as part of broader health sector financing policy,” Eldis concludes.

IRIN looks at the state of healthcare in three of the countries that have won funding:

Sierra Leone

The government plans to make healthcare free for pregnant and lactating women and under-fives by January 2010. But in a country with only about 170 doctors for more than five million people, minimal medical supplies and a health infrastructure still crawling back from 11 years of civil war, an enormous job lies ahead to ensure the free service will be a quality service.

“We must prepare health facilities for the four- to 10-fold increase we can expect from abolishing health fees,” Samuel Kargbo, the Health Ministry's director of reproductive and child health, told IRIN. “When we eliminate health user fees we must have sufficient equipment, manpower and medicines. Otherwise we negate everything we are trying to do.”

The government has made pronouncements of free care in the past but it was never backed up with the necessary planning and infrastructure.

Now a working group – representatives of the Health Ministry, donors, development organisations and NGOs – is studying how to implement free care in a sustainable way. Doctors from Nigeria and Cuba are due in Sierra Leone in the coming weeks, but in the longer term Sierra Leone needs to produce more doctors and retain them, Kargbo said.

“There are many hurdles to overcome,” noted Jan van ‘t Land, head of mission with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Sierra Leone. “Logistics and human resources are two of the biggest weaknesses of [this country’s] health system.” MSF is a member of the working group.

“The main question is who will pay in the end; it will cost a lot of money. The political will is there. I am hoping the government’s final policy on providing free care for pregnant women and under-five children will not be just another document,” said Van ‘t Land.

Sierra Leone’s free-care policy will be part of a two-pronged approach, with a national health insurance scheme to be introduced in the coming years, according to Health Ministry officials.

Burundi

In 2006, the government introduced free healthcare for maternal deliveries and children under five.

“Before the free medical care measure, 20.4 percent of women delivered at hospital. In 2007, 41 percent of women went to hospital, while in 2008 the number reached 47 percent. We expect to reach 51 percent this year,” Sostène Hicuburundi, in charge of health funding in the Ministry of Public Health, told IRIN. There has also been a significant rise in treatment of under-fives.

But there have been problems with implementation, with the health system unprepared for the rise in demand.

“Our work has doubled, even tripled. Before the measure we did from 35 to 40 caesarean sections per month. We now carry out about 65,” said Spes Ntaconayigize, head nurse of the gynaecology unit at Prince Regent Charles Hospital in the capital, Bujumbura.

A lack of equipment and staff shortages have taken their toll. "A woman can spend 24 hours on a stretcher after delivery for lack of beds. This is painful for us as the patient sometimes does not understand why she remains there. The lack of material adds to the stress on us," said Ntaconayigize.

According to Your Money or Your Life, “The performance of the existing free healthcare policy is compromised by inefficient reimbursement procedures for health facilities and insufficient support from aid agencies.”

Mozambique

Free is not always free. People living with HIV in Mozambique have access to free antiretroviral (ARV) treatment, but they must pay hospital user fees and for medicines to treat common HIV-related infections.

Hospitals charge patients an administrative fee of only 10 Meticais (US$0.37), but according to Alain Kassa, MSF head of mission, even that small amount is a barrier for many people, especially when combined with the cost of transport from distant rural areas.

Drugs to treat opportunistic infections, which are supposed to be free, are also not always available.

"This is commonplace: not to find prophylactics, antibiotics or Paracetamol [pain medication] in those public pharmacies," said Cesar Mufanequisso, coordinator of a local NGO, Movement for Access to Treatment in Mozambique (MATRAM). "People living with HIV get their ARVs free, but other medicines are usually out of stock and they have to buy them."

Those who cannot afford to go to hospital or buy medicines from private pharmacies “often opt to see a traditional healer who will allow them to pay at a later stage”, said Nacima Figia, HIV coordinator for the international anti-poverty NGO, ActionAid.

irinnews

25 Sep 2009

NATO has established a working relationship with authorities in Somalia's semi-autonomous Puntland in an attempt to uproot piracy off the Horn of Africa.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), has identified the move as a measure to target pirates active around the northern territories of Somalia and to help avoid possible clashes with 'honest fishermen.'

"Identifying areas from where pirates may launch their operations is one way to curtail this illegal activity. Once the pirate are at sea in their small skiffs they are difficult to identify from honest fisherman, although working closely with our allies, it has been possible to develop a profile on who they are," the international military alliance headquartered in Brussels, Belgium, said in a statement.

The statement adds that a number of Puntland coastguards in northern Somalia territories have joined two NATO warships, part of alliance's anti-piracy mission in the region that seeks to eliminate the threat of more attacks by sea bandits pestering trade ships in one of the world's business waterways.

"Working with Somali authorities in support of their own resolve to rid their shores of this scourge has shown early signs of success," A Press TV correspondent quoted the statement as saying on Friday.

NATO has recently warned of an increase in piracy around the Gulf of Aden and other coastal regions of the lawless state once the monsoon conditions ease off.

Somali pirates have carried out more than 114 attempted attacks on sea liners since the beginning of 2008, 29 of which ended in the hijacking of the targeted vessels.

Somalia-based pirates have so far obtained millions of dollars in ransom from shipping firms. The bandits claim that they need the money to pay out their tribal expense, while some reports allege that the fortune is amassed to fund anti-government campaigns.

presstv

25 Sep 2009

Nigeria has warned Niger Delta rebels fighting for larger share of the oil-rich country's revenues that an amnesty deadline for their surrender would not be extended.

Defense Minister Godwin Abbe rejected on Friday the rebel's request to rethink the October 4 deadline.

"To all those still in doubt, the deadline for amnesty is Sunday, October 4, 2009 and government does not intend to extend it," local media quoted Abbe as saying on Thursday.

"I therefore appeal to those that are yet to lay down their arms to do so and join all other peace-loving Nigerians in their quest for accelerated development of the Niger delta," he added.

The remarks were made at the end of a rehabilitation program for 300 of the militants who have given up arms under the amnesty, declared in June by President Umaru Yar'Adua, which offers an unconditional pardon to repentant rebels.

Government Tompolo and Ateke Tom, commanders of the region's main rebel group, Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) waging a 'war' on the country's oil industry, asked for three more months last week to resolve some issues.

The amnesty, which officially began in August, is seeking to avert further unrest, which has blocked the country from pumping two-thirds of its oil capacity and caused production to decline, and resulted in a 60-day truce with MEND.

MEND has rejected the amnesty but extended the truce which ended on September 15 by a month, demanding the removal of military forces from the area and a “meaningful dialogue” with Abuja.

Insecurity has long plagued the Niger Delta, one of the world's largest wetlands where almost all of Nigeria's oil comes from. The locals are angry at their continued poverty in the world's eighth largest oil producer.

presstv

23 Sep 2009

Somalia's al-Shabaab group has publicly announced its loyalty to al-Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden, in a video documentary released recently.

An al-Shabaab official in Mogadishu confirmed the authenticity of the 48-minute film--released for the Eid al-Fitr feast marking the end of the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, AFP reported.

Entitled 'Labaik ya Osama' (At your service, Osama), the video was posted on Islamist Internet forums in recent days and is presented as a 'gift to the lions of Tawheed (belief in the oneness of Allah) and the Muslims everywhere'.

Al-Shabaab fighters distributed the video in several Mogadishu neighborhoods, including in Suqaholaha, where a public screening was also organized following the Eid prayers.

The group is fighting to overthrow a fragile western-backed transitional government in the Horn of Africa country.

The video opens with an artistic animation of whirling flower tendrils and text in English and Arabic paying tribute to the mujahedeen (holy warriors) in Palestine and the Arabian Peninsula, as well as the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"Receive glad tidings and rejoice, and we are awaiting your guidance in this advanced stage of jihad," the voice of top al-Shabaab leader Ahmed Abdi Godane (also known as Abu Zubayr) tells bin Laden in the video.

presstv

24 Sep 2009

Pirates have killed the Syrian captain of a Panama-flagged ship off the coast of Somalia, in a failed attempt to hijack the vessel.

The bandits boarded the Barwaqo near Mogadishu's port on Thursday, but were met with fierce resistance from the captain of the vessel, a Press TV correspondent reported.

"The pirates killed the captain after he refused to turn the ship. Usually, we send police when commercial ships draw near the port but the pirates were already on board and opened fire injuring one policeman," Abdiasis Hassan, a Somali Minister for ports, was quoted by Reuters as saying.

African Union peacekeeping troops and Somali police rescued the ship and managed to kill seven pirates and sink one of the boats used by the bandits, officials told Press TV.

"The captain was a Syrian and his body is at the port now," Ahmed Abdi, a port official, told Reuters.

presstv

On Thursday, Farhan Haq told the Swiss News Agency that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi submitted a proposal last month that would abolish Switzerland but it was immediately thrown out of discussion because it would have contradicted the United Nations charter, which states that no member country can threaten the existence or sovereignty of another nation. Therefore, the document was never circulated nor published.
Gaddafi was to present this to the General Assembly during his speech on Wednesday.
However, this is not the first time Gaddafi has made such a motion. During the G8 Summit in Italy in July, according to Foreign Policy, the Libyan leader said Switzerland “is a world mafia and not a state” and “formed of an Italian community that should return to Italy, another German community that should return to Germany, and a third French community that should return to France.”
The animosity that brews Gaddafi’s resentment towards Switzerland stems from last year’s incident when his son, Hannibal, was arrested at a hotel in Geneva because of aggravated assault against two of his servants, according to Time. When Gaddafi learned of these events, he immediately shut down Swiss-owned businesses in Libya and began expelling Swiss diplomats.
Many experts and analysts do not see much reasoning for his beliefs. Warner, a political scientist at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva said, according to Yahoo! News, "Even though Gaddafi is a leader of a country and the current head of the African Union, he loses credibility when he comes up with outrageous comments like that."

digitaljournal

25 Sep 2009

President Jacob Zuma will meet the country's police commissioners next week to discuss crime fighting initiatives, the presidency said on Friday.

"The fight against crime is one of the five key priorities of government. In this meeting, a first of its kind, the president will share his vision with station commissioners," it said in a statement.

The announcement comes just three days after Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa revealed an upsurge in house robberies, car and truck hijackings, and sexual offences.

While the 2008/09 crime statistics revealed a decrease in bank robberies, cash-in-transit heists, and murder and crimes against children, new police Commissioner Bheki Cele said he was not happy.

"Am I happy, no, I'm not happy," Cele told reporters on Tuesday.

"You cannot be happy when 10 people are killed let alone 18?000," he said.

Along with Mthethwa, Cele said they recognised the police needed to do more, and had begun an audit of how they deployed their human and material resources, and the time of that deployment.

Other steps police planned to take included pushing ahead with the controversial change to section 49 of the Criminal Procedure Act to give police wider powers to shoot at dangerous criminals, strengthening speciality units, and improving the way police stations respond to distress calls.

In next Tuesday's meeting with the more than 1000 commissioners, Zuma would try to get "firsthand accounts of work from the coalface", the presidency said.

"The meeting forms part of President Zuma's intention to meet with public servants who are in the coalface of service delivery... to ensure that they understand government objectives from the highest office," it said.

Accompanying Zuma for the meeting at the Monument Function Centre in Pretoria will be Mthethwa, Justice and Constitutional Development Minister Jeffrey Radebe, Correctional Services Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula and Social Development Minister Edna Molewa.

All nine premiers and MECs responsible for community safety were expected to attend the 10am meeting.

equitysavant[/font]

25 Sep 2009

The Point has been dabbling in a little mathematics. And by dabbling I mean groping aimlessly in the dark and by mathematics I mean numbers generally... and the Fibonacci sequence specifically.

Ah, you see how I casually threw that out there ? the product of a misspent youth. Or, to be more honest, far too many episodes of 'Criminal Minds'.

So, back to those Fibonacci numbers. This is the sequence:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55...

Basic principle: each number is the sum of the two previous numbers. This brings me to the point ? a South African Fibonacci sequence for the week.

0: John Hlophe (call ups to the Constitutional Court bench);
1: SA police (the number of times crimes stats have been released in the past year);
1: Jacob Zuma (maiden speech at the UN);
2: Julius Malema (current count of charges against him);
3: Wives of Jacob Zuma (well, that's pretty self-explanatory);
5: Springboks (number of games won in the Tri-Nations);
8: Pius Langa (number of years since he was appointed deputy chief justice);
13: Blade Nzimande (number of times he has insisted he is, in fact, a communist);
21: Helen Zille (the number of times she uttered Jacob Zuma's name this week);
34: Leonard Chuene (number of lies told about Caster Semenya);
55: Michel Hulley (the number of times he's tried to get JZ out of trouble).

Okay, okay... I confess, from 13 down they're all just approximations. But hey, who said journalists could count?

WE DON'T NEED NO EDUCATION

So, he pops up at spot number four in my sequence, but, really, you could probably put him anywhere. Yip, I am talking about the invaluable Julius Malema. The consistency with which he provides fodder for humour is truly remarkable.

If mention of the chubby-one's name causes you to break out in a sweat, froth at the mouth and start biting the furniture, I advise you to simply skip over this section. If the symptoms continue, then you may have rabies. There's nothing I can do about that.

Right, back to this week's double whammy of Malema-madness. Yip, not only was he in court, he also threw a big bash at his Sandton home and may or may not have assaulted a grumbling neighbour.

Let's begin with that court appearance.

In his testimony, Malema whined (like a petulant child) that instead of helping to educate him the women's rights organisation dragged him to court.

"They should have seen an opportunity to educate a young man... I must say I am highly disappointed... the first opportunity they saw to educate a young man, was to rush to court."

Ah, yes, but Malema assumes that the young man in question can actually be educated.

"I'm not an expert. I'm a layman who can only respond to the utterances I've made. On statistics? it's something you have to argue with your learned friend [his lawyer]. I know nothing about statistics. That's why I didn't even bother myself to read this document? which I would not (have) the capacity to do."

I think that proves my point. But, just in case you're not convinced, here's what he had to say after his party.

"If there was going to be any beating surely it was not going to be done by me. It is really unfair to try and paint us as a wrong picture. "

Hmm? that's a little ambiguous. Is he suggesting that he, the former child-soldier, is incapable of beating someone, or is he suggesting that now he gets his henchmen to do his dirty work?

"Even after the party, we cleaned up everything so there should not be any accusations that there were bottles all over and there were condoms."

Well, I think we can take a positive out of this: condoms reduce the chances of procreation.

WELCOME TO GANGSTA'S PARADISE

When she wasn't sending her cronies to spy on Malema (yes, he really said that), the Zillenator was frothing at the mouth over JZ's lawyer's latest attempts to pervert the course of justice. There is also the possibility that she had just read a newspaper containing the most recent tidbits from Malemamunchkin.

"The latest move by President Zuma's lawyers demonstrates once again how important it is not to be beguiled by the president's personal charm. His public relations will not protect the Constitution. In fact, it is a convenient smokescreen behind which the assault on the Constitution continues unabated."

Ah, see, she's falling for his personal charms. Zumilla: you read it here first.

"We are sinking into a kind of gangsterism when the decisions of the state justice system depend not on the law but on party intrigue."

Despite the impending descent into gangsterism, Zuma seemed to be pretty firm on the rule of law.

"The extreme manner in which some of our citizens tend to express their grievances lately is totally unacceptable. We cannot continue to loot shops, burn tyres, throw garbage on our streets, blockade roads, damage property, or, most disturbingly, march in violation of court orders, to voice your dissatisfaction."

Perhaps this is the smokescreen.

MISSING THE IRONY

Earlier this week, the US shut down its embassy and consulates in the face of some mysterious threat. The South African government, worried that this would scare tourists and investors off, issued the following statement.

"Obviously, the closure of the embassies is not something that is a good thing because it creates an impression that we are not a safe country... We want to reassure the public that South Africa is indeed a safe country."

This in the week that they finally released the crime statistics. I suspect the fact that 50 people are murdered every day will hold a little more sway than the temporary closure of the embassy of a country paranoid about national security.

The Point challenges you to come up with your own South African Fibonacci sequence. Otherwise, just post your favourite quote from the week?

equitysavant

23 Sep 2009

Outgoing South African Reserve Bank governor Tito Mboweni was among several world finance experts who did not provide adequate leadership to prevent the global finance crisis, former president Thabo Mbeki said on Wednesday.

Mbeki was speaking on the "effective exercise of leadership" and the future role of the youth at the University of the Witwatersrand, in Johannesburg.

"The effective exercise of leadership must, in part, be based on as thorough an understanding as possible of objective reality," he said.

Mbeki was addressing a packed hall. Crowds of students trying to push their way into the auditorium were locked out by security officials.

"The correctness of this view is confirmed by what happened which led to the current global economic recession and the various questions this has thrown up," said Mbeki, who was welcomed with loud cheers.

Economists failed to predict the crisis

Mbeki said most economists failed to predict the global financial crisis, and quoted from speeches delivered by the chairman of the United States Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, in April this year and Mboweni, in March this year.

"On 13 March 2009, the outgoing Governor of the South African Reserve Bank, Tito Mboweni, went further to say: 'The global financial system is a finite entity, and although risk can be passed around, it does not disappear.

"'We had probably underestimated the inter-linkages of financial systems across the globe, and the extent to which globalisation had created a complicated network of circuits for the contagion of financial risk...'."

Bernanke had said the financial industry "designed securities that combined many individual loans in complex, hard-to-understand ways".

These new securities later proved to involve substantial risks, risks that neither the investors nor the firms that designed the securities adequately understood at the outset.

Governors failed to understand the crisis

"These statements by two central bank governors emphasise precisely the point that even they failed to understand what was happening in the global financial markets and therefore did not provide the leadership that was necessary to avert the financial crisis which led to the current global recession," Mbeki said.

He also referred to a New York Times article written by Noble Laureate in Economics Paul Krugman in which he asked how economists failed to predict the crisis.

"Professor Krugman had made the charge that because they failed to understand objective reality, the world's economists failed to see the then impending global financial and economic crisis," said Mbeki.

"Accordingly, they failed to provide the leadership which could have resulted in various interventions being made, which would have saved the world from a crisis that has resulted in the impoverishment of hundreds of millions and an alarming growth in levels of unemployment."

Companies that are too big to fail

The aftermath of the global recession raised several important questions, including how to limit the centralisation of capital to avoid the "emergence of monopolies and oligopolies made up of companies that are too big to fail".

Also, the role of the state in the economy, regarding the ownership of companies and the regulation of the market, needed to be discussed.

"I pose these questions without providing any answers, once again to underline the point that our young emerging leaders will have to participate in the effort to answer them.

"For them to be helpful to society, those answers will have to be based on a profound understanding of the process of contemporary social development."

In South Africa, young leaders would always have to grapple with issues of social development, transformation and how to create a non-racial society, said Mbeki.

SA a non-racial country?

"I am certain that there are very few South Africans, if any, who today would, for instance, question the need for us to transform ours into a non-racial country.

"The reality however, is that because this objective, like the others mentioned in our constitution, cannot be realised in a short time, the young emerging leaders will still be faced with the task to lead the country as it continues to strive to implement the constitutional prescription to build a non-racial society."

On how to be a good leader, Mbeki, who was removed from office by his own party, said honesty was a key characteristic.

"To lead, means to engage the people in an honest and sustained manner to mobilise them so that they too play an active and conscious role in the process of fundamental social transformation rather than remain as immobilised spectators who expect government to ?deliver'.

"It means learning the habit always to tell the truth and thus cultivate the confidence of the people in you, who will be their leaders," said Mbeki.

equitysavant[/font]

President Rupiah Banda has called on developed countries to lead the way in agreeing on ambitious and legally binding greenhouse gas emission reduction targets.

In his pre-recorded message posted on the internet to the United Nations climate change summit held in New York yesterday, Mr Banda said climate change has threatened sustainable development of all countries in the world.

He said like many other developing countries, Zambia was already experiencing adverse effects of climate change, noting that this trend must be reversed through finding an effective adaptation framework to reduce the risks posed to humanity.

President Banda said countries all around the world should act pragmatically to reverse the negative impact of climate change.

He said huge amounts of financial support should be provided to the most vulnerable developing countries to finance their adaptation and mitigation programmes.

"These funds must be additional to the Official Development Assistance (ODA). In addition, a transparent financial mechanism should be put in place so that deserving vulnerable countries can easily access the funds," he said.

The UN climate change summit, which was convened by UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon yesterday, was a huge step towards the big climate change summit to be held in Copenhagen, Denmark in December.

The Copenhagen summit will produce a new treaty to replace the 1997 Kyoto protocol, which expires in 2012.

President Banda said this support should also include capacity building to enable local communities, who are at risk of effects of climate change, to learn new ways of responding to the challenges.

"This December, we have to make a choice. To act responsibly as a united global community and provide a firm ground to safeguard our common good or stick to traditional positions and negotiating tactics and consign our future and that of our children to doom," he concluded.
He was among more than 100 heads of State and government that attended the summit at the 64th General Assembly of the UN.

Meanwhile, Mr Ban has urged heads of State and government attending the General Assembly to accelerate their action against global warming and preserve the planet for future generations.

Mr Ban said when he officially opened the summit, that world leaders should now stop dragging negotiations towards coming up with a new agreement to curb greenhouse emissions that would go into 2012 when the Kyoto protocol's first commitment period expires.

"Climate change is the pre-eminent geopolitical and economic issues of the 21st Century. It rewrites the global equation for development, peace and security," he said.

For over five years since the first announcement of the licensing of private refineries, the nation has waited endlessly for their eventual take-off. While the licensees kept reassuring of their seriousness, there is virtually nothing on the ground to demonstrate their readiness to build.

While the dithering continued, Nigeria's foreign reserves continued to dip as government continued to dip its hands in the till to shore up local demand for imported refined products.

Last week, government reversed a policy decision which has been a disincentive for the licensees to build. It was the removal of the $1 million non-refundable deposit as a pre-condition for approval to build any 10,000-barrel capacity local refinery. This reversal of policy comes ahead of a November deadline for the beginning of the full deregulation of the downstream sector expected to see Nigerians buying petroleum products at rates dictated by international market forces. Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Odein Ajumogobia who announced the policy shift said the measure was to attract both local and foreign investors to buy into the refining sub-sector.

It is disheartening that Nigeria continues to use the top-down approach to governance, where the leadership assumes it knows what the people want without first consulting them. The $1 million deposit was, ab initio, unnecessary given that the country is seeking to woo investors to its local production sector to boost local supply, creating jobs and even making room for export and foreign exchange earnings. This removal is therefore intended to encourage the emergence of locally-built refineries and an opening to build capacity and enable self-sufficiency.

It is a normal part of governance all over the world that government gives incentives to investors ready to commit to local development. It is commendable that government has finally shown its ability to reason and encourage private-sector led initiative aimed at increasing its capacity building potential. It is also encouraging that this is coming at a time when some of the few surviving companies operating in the country are winding down their operations.

Nigeria could have saved huge sums in foreign exchange if it had taken this decision earlier and by now its planned total de-regulation of the downstream sector will not appear as an albatross. Rather, it has opened its borders to uncontrolled importation of refined products while selling its crude in the international market. No country serious about development can afford to open its borders to unbridled importation when it has the capacity to produce locally. What reasonable governments do is to check the balance between local production and local demand and to open up importation space to bridge the shortfall until it can meet all its demands and even export. This would have saved jobs, increased earnings and saved foreign exchange.
While reversal of policy is commendable, government needs to tackle the problem of inconsistency in policy. Our acquiescence to Nigeria being a dumping ground for refined products has culminated in low capacity utilisation and the recent troubles in the finance sector. Banks preferred to grant loans to importers of refined crude instead of giving such loans to productive sectors of the economy. One of the fallouts of this misguided policy is the ongoing crisis in the banking sector. We therefore suggest that in addition to the removal of this clog, small though it is, government should introduce some level of tax incentives to further encourage the licensees to speed up local production. Most importantly, we hope that when the refineries are finally built, government would have declared a state of national awakening on the power sector such that they can function without delay.

It is also important that the authorities hasten the process of bringing back normalcy in the oil producing region. This will reassure the investors whose interest in setting up private refineries may have been dampened by the way that Niger Delta unrest has led to pipeline vandelisation which is responsible for the start and stop operations of existing government owned refineries.

As the FIFA Under-20 World Cup begins today in Cairo Egypt, Nigeria's Flying Eagles will lead African teams to challenge for the top prize in one of the world biggest soccer show.

The FIFA U-20 World Cup is one of three major events being staged on the continent in the build-up to next year's World Cup slated for South Africa. Nigeria will also host the FIFA U-17 World Cup.

No doubt, the African continent which is yet to win the trophy would strive to get hold of the trophy in a tournament which is being held for the second time in the continent, after the maiden edition in Tunisia in 1977.

The FIFA U-20 World Cup is the only under-age men's global championship that an African team is yet to lay its hands on as winners despite coming close on a number of occasions. Despite successes in the FIFA U-17 World Cup and the Olympics, African teams are yet transcend that performance to the U-20 division, a competition famed for South American dominance.

The Flying Eagles under the tutelage of Coach Samson Siasia have lost in the final of the championship twice in 1989 against Portugal in Saudi Arabia and to Argentina at the 2005 edition held in Netherlands.

The other country from the continent to have come close to lifting the trophy is Ghana who like Nigeria has also lost twice in the final in 1993 and 2001, thereby extending the continent's misery in the competition.

This explains why the continent's hope of the first U-20 World Cup trophy will rest on the shoulders of the Samson Siasia-led Flying Eagles.

Other countries carrying the continent's banner at the biennial soccer fiesta are hosts Egypt, continental champions, Ghana, Cameroon and South Africa. They will be all out to break the 32-year jinx engulfing the biennial championship as far as African teams are concerned.

Also, this is the third time after Nigeria 99 that the youth showpiece event is being staged on African soil. Mali's bronze feat in 1999 serves the brightest spot as no African team made it to the last four in 1977 in Tunisia.

After the CAF U-20 Championship in Rwanda early January which produced the continent's representatives for the global championship, all five teams: Egypt, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon and South Africa have been engaged in fervent preparations in their quest for the ultimate.

While the Flying Eagles spent the last two weeks in Mallorca Spain preparing and acclimatizing in readiness for the tournament.

The Flying Eagles are drawn in Group B alongside Spain, Tahiti and Venezuela. Former Super Eagles midfielder Samson Siasia, who guided the Flying Eagles to a runners-up spot in the Netherlands in 2005, has been charged with the responsibility of leading the 'Flying Eagles' to the promise land in Egypt.

Siasia took over from Ladan Bosso after the continental championship and the latter is brimming with confidence after training camps in Qatar and Spain. The Ex-international star has named balanced team of local and foreign-based stars, and has conspicuously left out some members of the Golden Eaglets squad that won the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Korea two years ago. Amongst them are striker Rabiu Ibrahim and Lukman Haruna.

"We have confidence and we have the players to do us proud. The training camps in Qatar and Spain have helped the team greatly and we are heading to Egypt believing we can conquer," Siasia told the media before departing for Egypt.

This is Nigeria's eighth appearance at the championship and expectations back home and across the continent are high from the likes of Captain Odion Ighalo, Haruna Lukman, Rabiu Ibrahim, Sone Aluko and Yakubu Alfa to go the extra mile.

Hosts Egypt are drawn in Group A alongside Italy, Paraguay, and Trinidad and Tobago. The Junior Pharaohs begin their campaign against the Caribbean Islanders in the opening match today at the Borg El Arab Stadium in Alexandria.

Head coach Miroslav Soukup and his charges have been engaged in series of preparations as they seek an improvement of their bronze feat in Argentina in 2001. The Junior Pharaohs are making their fifth appearance at the biennial championship and the bringing on board of Soukoup, who guided his native Czech Republic to silver at the last edition in Canada two years ago confirms their readiness to rule the world.

After a least expected performance at the continental championship, where they failed to progress past the group phase, Coach Soukoup and his deputy, Ex-national star, Hany Ramzy has led the team to training tours in Europe coupled with participation in invitational tourneys to fine-tune their preparations.

Matches against Korea Republic, Czech Republic, Spain and Australia, training camp Germany and an appearance at the Toulon Tournament in France is considered a great form of preparation for the likes of Shihab Ahmed, Moustafa Salim, Saad Eddin Samir and Mohamed Taalat as they seek for the ultimate.

Runners-up at the continental championship, Cameroon are housed in Group C together with USA, Germany and Korea Republic. Not much has been heard of Coach Alain Wabo's team but for a training camp in Germany few months ago ahead of the global tourney.

Cameroon, gold medallists at the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000, has yet to establish themselves as a powerhouse at the biennial championship. Of four previous appearances in 1981, 1993, 1995 and 1999; a quarter-final berth in 1995 marks their biggest feat.

Thirty-eight year old Wabo, creator of the ant-attack system will be relying on the likes of Brice Owono of Cotonsport Garoua, Parfait Essengue of Italian side Piacenza, Jacques Zoua among others to scale past the preliminary hurdle into the medal zone.

African champions, Ghana's Black Satellites are ranked high and have been tipped to go far. The Satellites making their fifth appearance are in Group D with England, Uruguay and Uzbekistan.

The Satellites, twice runners-up in 1993 and 2001 have endured a bittersweet form of preparation for the tournament. Two weeks camping at the Aspire Sports Academy in Qatar and seven-day acclimatization in Tunisia climaxed their preparations, which saw most of the selected players unavailable.

The team is led by Andre Ayew, son of Ghana legend Abedi Pele and is under the technical guidance of Sellas Tetteh, who guided the Black Starlets to fourth place at the last U-17 Championship in Korea. Products of the juvenile team namely Abeiku Quansah, Joseph Addo, Philip Boampong, Daniel Opare and Ransford Osei are all part of the team opens their campaign against little known Uzbekistan.

After an eight-year absence, Tetteh is hoping to lead his young team to the ultimate backed by his experience with the national team, where he deputized for more than four years.

"For eight years we have not been to the U-20 World Cup so to return as champions of Africa is remarkable. It's gratifying to me that we're not just winning but also doing so by playing beautiful football," said Tetteh.

The continent's final representative is the Amajita's of South Africa. If the level of pre-tournament preparation was the deciding factor, no African team comes near the Amajitas. The South African have toured West Africa, South America as well as Europe in fining tune their preparations.
Coach Serame Letsoaka's boys are perched in Group alongside Hungary, United Arab Emirates and Honduras as they make their first appearance at the youth championship since 1997.

Letsoaka, who assumes the Technical Directorship of South African Football Association (SAFA) after the tournament remains optimistic about the abilities of his team that placed fourth at the continental championship.

"We are a good side and I don't doubt that. It's always good when we go to these tournaments as underdogs because we can therefore surprise people. In our team, we have exciting players and they will show the rest of the world what they are capable of."

Meanwhile, the tournament that pieces together the best youth teams around the world ends on Friday, October 16.

Activists have launched a campaign to have the headquarters of a top African human rights body moved from the Gambia after the country's president reportedly threatened to kill human rights defenders.

The online Gambian news service, Freedom Newspaper, reported this week that President Yahya Jammeh had said in a television broadcast that he would kill "anyone who wants to destablise this country."

The newspaper said Jammeh's "exact words" in a television broadcast had been: "If you think that you can collaborate with so-called human rights defenders, and get away with it, you must be living in a dream world. I will kill you, and nothing will come out of it.

"We are not going to condone people posing as human rights defenders to the detriment of the country. If you are affiliated with any human rights group, be rest assured that your security, and personal safety would not be guaranteed by my Government. We are ready to kill saboteurs.”

The African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights is headquartered in the Gambian capital, Banjul. The commission reports to the AU, its members are elected by the AU Assembly and it is tasked with interpreting the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and dealing with complaints about violations of the Charter.
In response to Jammeh's reported remarks, campaigners from non-governmental organizations, including the Coalition for an Effective African Court on Human and Peoples Rights and the Open Society Institute, are circulating a petition to the AU asking that the commission stop holding meetings in the Gambia and that its headquarters be removed from the country.

Jammeh's threat "leads us to fear for the safety, security, and lives of ourselves and our colleagues who have to work with the... Commission," the petition says.

"Quite apart from violating the right to life in Article 4 of the... African charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the assurance by President Jammeh that his Government will not guarantee the security and personal safety of human rights defenders visiting the country clearly and unilaterally repudiates the basic obligation assumed by The Gambia... to guarantee the safety and security of the members and personnel of the... as well as all users of the Commission."

Abuja — The meeting summoned by the National Working Committee (NWC) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to discuss modalities for picking a consensus candidate for the party in the February 6, 2010 governorship election in Anambra State has failed to produce result.

The 47 PDP aspirants that attended the meeting failed to agree on the adoption of such a consensus candidate.

But they agreed on one thing: the procedures for the primary election.

The aspirants agreed that the primary election beginning on September 28 should be conducted with the use of the party's membership register and that fresh registration of party members should commence today and end on Saturday.

PDP National Chairman Vincent Ogbulafor while opening the meeting yesterday told the governorship aspirants to lock themselves up in a room and choose a consensus candidate.

Ogbulafor also read what could be the riot act to the aspirants, asking them to be orderly, responsible and disciplined.

He said: "We called you here to admonish you to be orderly, responsible and organised in the primary election to choose a candidate that would fly the party flag at the governorship election. Power belongs to God and He gives power to whosoever He prefers. There is the need for the fear of God to be in you as you prepared for the contest, but bear in mind that only one person would emerge victorious at the end of the day.

"So many people picked form in this contest, but only one person will emerge victorious. It is our wish that you lock up yourselves in one room and choose a consensus candidate among yourselves. Look at yourselves and pick a consensus candidate."

But no sooner Ogbulafor finished speaking and journalists sent out than the aspirants were said to have spoken against the idea of a consensus candidate.

Some of the aspirants who later spoke with THISDAY said they would prefer a transparent primary election where all of them would contest and have their fate decided through the ballot box.

However, there was an agreement among the aspirants on the procedures for the election.

Before the meeting, the aspirants were said to have been complaining about an absence of an authentic PDP membership register at the various wards in the state.

Benue State Governor Gabriel Suswam, who addressed newsmen after the meeting, said the party had agreed that all the available wards membership register shall be used for the primary election commencing from September 28.

"We know that there are more than one membership register in all the wards but this meeting has agreed that all the registers shall be collated and harmonised for the election commencing as from Monday, September 28," he said.

Before then, there were allegations that some aspirants had printed several PDP membership cards to be used at the primary election.

Suswam said fresh membership registration would commence from today till Saturday and all the registers sent to the Barn Hill Hotel from where he and members of his committee would be operating from.
He said three delegates would be elected at the ward congress election, urging delegates seeking election to come with their passport photographs to enable him append his signature on each delegate that won the election.

Suswam also said delegate forms would be sold at a price not lower than N10, 000 per delegate.

Over 750 delegates are expected to be elected from the 236 wards in the state.

All the delegates would assemble in Awka, the state capital, on October 2 at the state congress to elect the governorship candidate of the party.

Suswam also urged the aspirants to consider talking to each other so as to prune their number down.

He expressed optimism that the number of aspirants would be reduced by Monday.

The security services in Morocco have arrested 24 members of a "terrorist network" linked to Al-Qaeda that recruited volunteers for suicide bombings in Iraq, the interior ministry said Wednesday.

In a statement carried by the official MAP news agency, it said the network coordinatedg "with terrorists in Sweden, Belgium and the Syria-Iraq zone" and also sought recruits for Al-Qaeda to fight in Afghanistan and Somalia.

The suspects -- now being questioned by police -- were arrested in several cities in Morocco, said the ministry, which did not specify the date when they were apprehended.

According to the interior ministry, those arrested were also planning to carry out "terrorist acts" inside Morocco, and to that end were preparing to welcome Al-Qaeda specialists to help assemble explosive devices.

In recent weeks, the judicial authorities in Morocco have been dealing with a number of cases involving suspected members of networks described as terrorist operations.

On September 3, 38 people suspected of belonging to a network that recruited Moroccans for Iraq and Algeria appeared before an anti-terrorist court in Sale, the twin city of the capital Rabat.

Members of that alleged network, dismantled in July 2008, came from Tangiers and five other cities in the north and northeast of the North African kingdom.

Police say the suspects intended to join "terrorist groups" in desert camps run by Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb before proceeding to Iraq.

On September 2, the court in Sale postponed to early October a hearing into another case involving 43 people charged under anti-terrorist legislation and suspected of links with Al-Qaeda in the Islmaic Maghreb.

At least eight people are reported to have been killed and dozens more wounded during a gun battle in Mogadishu, the Somali capital.

Members of Somalia's al-Shabab group attacked an African Union peacekeeping base, sparking the clash on Tuesday, officials said.

A spokesman for the AU force, Bahoku Barigye, said no peacekeepers were killed in the firefight.

Witnesses reported seeing at least eight corpses.

"The bodies were beyond recognition. There was blood and flesh everywhere," Hassan Mohamoud, a witness, said.

Peacekeepers targeted

Last week al-Shabab launched two suicide car bombs on the main AU force base in Mogadishu, killing 17 peacekeepers.

It was the deadliest single attack on the force of 5,000 troops from Burundi and Uganda since they arrived in 2007.

At least 29 Burundian soldiers have been killed in the country since their mission began.
Al-Shabab said that attack was in retaliation for a US raid on September 14 that killed Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, an al-Qaeda suspect, in southern Somalia.

The US military has launched several air attacks inside Somalia in the past against individuals blamed for the bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.

In May last year, US aircraft killed Aden Hashi Ayro, the then leader of al-Shabab and allegedly a senior al-Qaeda member, in an attack on the central town of Dusamareb.

Al-Shabab - meaning "the Youth" in Arabic - is believed to be largest group among several Islamist and clan militias battling the UN-backed transitional government in Somalia.

Al-Shabab says it seeks to impose its own strict version of Islamic law across Somalia.

The group is accused by the US of having links to al-Qaeda, and is believed to have been reinforced with foreign fighters.

Expanding reach

The FBI has expressed concern that al-Shabab may be expanding its reach and actively recruiting Western nationals to fight in Somalia.

No one knows for sure where the group gets its financial and logistical support, but Eritrea and some Arab countries have been accused of funding the conflict in the Horn of Africa.

The country has been ravaged by violence and anarchy since regional commanders overthrew Mohamed Siad Barre, the then president, in 1991, before turning on each other.

Piracy has flourished off the Somali coast, making the Gulf of Aden one of the most dangerous waterways in the world.

Libya's president has attacked the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council during his first ever address to the UN General Assembly.

In a one-and-a-half hour speech in New York on Wednesday, Muammar Gaddafi said the veto-wielding nations of the Security Council were ignoring the views of the full 192 members of the General Assembly and the principles of the UN charter.

"The preamble [of the charter] says all nations are equal whether they are small or big," Gaddafi said in his address.

But he accused the permanent members of the council of undermining other states.

"The veto [held by the five permanent UN members] is against the charter, we do not accept it and we do not acknowledge it," he said.

"Veto power should be annulled."

In a speech that far exceeded the 15-minute slot he was allocated, Gaddafi read aloud sections from a paperback copy of the UN charter; at one point, he held it up and made a small tear in the cover, signalling his disdain.

"The Security Council did not provide us with security but with terror and sanctions," he said.

Council members criticised
Gaddafi said the council, comprising the US, Britain, France, Russia and China, had failed to prevent or intervene in 65 wars that have taken place since the United Nations was established in 1945.

"How can we be happy about the world security if the world is controlled by four or five powers?" he complained. "We are just like a decor."

In his opinion, the General Assembly is the "the parliament of the world" - a 192-member body that should be dictating decisions to the Security Council.

In the past two decades, emerging economic powers such as Germany, India, Japan, and Brazil have called for reforming the composition of the Security Council and creating additional permanent member seats.

Veto power deplored

Gaddafi said adding more permanent seats would be counterproductive.

Instead, he called on regional federations and organisations, such as the Arab League, Organisation of American States, the African Union, and the Non-Aligned Movement to be given permanent seats at the Security Council.

The five permanent members should lose their veto, or the UN should expand the council with additional member states, Gaddafi said.

"It should not be called the Security Council, it should be called the 'terror council'," he said, adding that the permanent members treat smaller countries as "second class [and] despised" nations.

"Now, brothers, there is no respect for the United Nations, no regard for the General Assembly," he said.

'Disaster' for Africa
Mohamed Ben-Madani, editor of the Maghreb Review, told Al Jazeera's that Gaddafi's speech was a "disaster" for the African Union and Arab and Muslim delegations at the General Assembly.

"I think the Libyans deserve much better than this. It is a disaster for Arab world opinion. Tearing up the UN charter is shocking, but this should have been expected from the beginning," he said.

"He said nothing about Libyan human rights and better education [for Libyans]. He said nothing about climate change or the environment."

As Gaddafi spoke, the US senate approved a resolution condemning the "lavish" welcome-home ceremony that Libya gave last month for Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, who was convicted of the bombing over a US passenger aircraft over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1989.

The US senate demanded that Tripoli apologise for the celebration, which came after Scotland's justice minister released al-Megrahi, a former agent, on compassionate grounds.

Libya has a temporary seat on the Security Council until the end of 2010.

Compensation urged

At one point, Gaddafi proposed a solution to the problem of illegal immigrants streaming from the North African coast to Europe.

"World colonial powers took the wealth from Africa, Asia, and Latin America so it is to be expected that the new generation of youth will follow that wealth," he said.

"Return that wealth, and you will see illegal immigration drop," he said.

He praised Italy for "apologising for its colonialist venture in Libya [in the 1920s]" and building hospitals throughout his country.

He called for $7.77 trillion in compensation to be paid to Africa from its past "colonial masters".

Obama praised

Gaddafi praised Barack Obama, the US president, describing him as a "son of Africa" and a "flash of light in the darkness".

He said he fully agreed with Obama's UN speech, describing it as unprecedented from a sitting US president.

Gaddafi, who was addressing the General Assembly for the first time since he seized power in his country 40 years ago, appeared to be rambling at times, reading from hand-written notes as he addressed dozens of issues.

At one point, he questioned the assassination of John F Kennedy, the US president.

"The assassination of Kennedy in 1963 - we want to know, who killed him? Lee Harvey? Why was Harvey killed?" he said, referring to the man who was arrested in connection with Kennedy's murder and shot dead while being transferred between jails.

Heavy rains and flash floods have killed 17 people in southern Tunisia. Most of the victims were killed when the roofs and walls of their homes collapsed. Others were carried away by flood waters that rose to more than six feet in some areas. Six members of a particular family were among those killed
As a result of the floods, 17 are dead and eight injured, but the search for missing people continues. President Ben Ali gave instructions to ensure an immediate remedy to the situation," state news agency TAP said on Wednesday.

The incident occurred in Redeyef, a town situated in a semi-arid and deprived phosphate mining region that saw riots last year as residents demanded more government help to create jobs.

By this time of the year Tunisia normally enjoys dry season but heavy rains have fallen for days across the North African country and in neighbouring Algeria, where 16 people have been reported killed in the past week