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- Volume 24, Issue 2, 2010
Africa Renewal - Volume 24, Issue 2, 2010
Volume 24, Issue 2, 2010
The Africa Renewal magazine examines the many issues that confront the people of Africa, its leaders and its international partners: sustainable development goals, economic reform, debt, education, health, women's empowerment, conflict and civil strife, democratization, investment, trade, regional integration and many other topics. It tracks policy debates. It provides expert analysis and on-the-spot reporting to show how those policies affect people on the ground. And, it highlights the views of policy-makers, non-governmental leaders and others actively involved in efforts to transform Africa and improve its prospects in the world today. The magazine also reports on and examines the many different aspects of the United Nations’ involvement in Africa, especially within the framework of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD).
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In poverty battle, a few reasons to smile
Author: André-Michel EssoungouMuch of the recent reporting about Niger could lead readers to believe that beyond political turmoil and tragic famine, nothing else is worth the attention. Yet, the United Nations reports, the West African nation can claim a major – but underreported – achievement: in absolute terms, it is among those few countries in the world where child mortality has declined the most.
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Africa’s hard road to the Millennium Development Goals
Author: United NationsAccording to various reports by the UN and other organizations, Africa is facing big challenges in achieving the world’s anti-poverty Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The overall statistics may be sobering, but some countries are showing bright spots of progress, which are highlighted below.
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For African business, ending corruption is ‘priority number one’ - Interview: Georg Kell, Executive Director, The Global Compact
Author: United NationsThe United Nations Global Compact is an initiative to encourage businesses to voluntarily adhere to ethical standards. Launched a decade ago in 2000, the initiative now has about 7,700 corporate participants and stakeholders in 130 countries, including 297 firms in 29 sub-Saharan African nations. Most recently, a high-level business leaders summit in New York on 24-25 June, organized by the Global Compact, declared that “embedding human rights, labour, environmental and anti-corruption principles into corporate practices benefits both society and business.” Just before the summit, Africa Renewal spoke with Executive Director Georg Kell about the Compact’s anti-corruption work.
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Weighing a half century of independence
Author: Ernest HarschStanding before an assemblage of local and international dignitaries in Cameroon’s capital, UN Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro noted that she had been too young to celebrate Cameroon’s independence on 1 January 1960. But in her own country she did ““““remember clearly the joy in my school when Tanzania became independent. Those were heady days indeed for Africa.”
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‘A lot of reasons to be optimistic’ - Interview: Cheick Sidi Diarra, UN Under-Secretary-General
Author: Cheick Sidi DiarraThe United Nations Office of the Special Adviser on Africa was created in 2003 to increase international support for Africa’s development and security, especially for the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), the African Union’s programme for economic, social and political advancement. Under-Secretary-General Cheick Sidi Diarra, who is from Mali, heads the office as special adviser on Africa. Fifty years after many African countries gained their independence, Africa Renewal sought his views on the continent’s progress and challenges.
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Ghana’s economy: Hope rekindled
Author: Efami DoviWhen the church bells rang across the city of Accra to signal the birth of modern Ghana, it was a period of hope and optimism for a better future. Victor Adams was in his home village of Shiashi, a suburb of the Ghanaian capital. At the time, in 1957, Shiashi had no electricity, roads or piped water. “There were only eight of these houses in the entire village,” recalls Mr. Adams,
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Good governance: Central to all progress
Author: André-Michel EssoungouNever before had pictures of endless lines of enthusiastic voters in front of polling stations defined Guinea’s international image. But on 27 June – after 52 years of independence and a turbulent political history – a festive atmosphere engulfed the West African country as millions were allowed to choose their leader for the first time, from among 24 candidates. Guineans came out in large numbers and showed considerable patience while waiting, often for hours, in front of polling stations.
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African media breaks ‘culture of silence’
Author: Kwame KarikariWhen on 18 March this year the Daily Nation, one of Africa’s biggest and most successful independent newspapers, celebrated its 50th anniversary, Charles Onyango Obbo, a columnist for the Nairobi, Kenya, paper, wrote, “It has mostly been hell on earth for the African media for most of these 50 years. In fact the freest period for the African media generally has been the 15-year period between 1990 and 2005.”
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African women’s long walk to equality
Author: L. Muthoni WanyekiAfrica’s political independence was accompanied by a clarion call to eradicate poverty, illiteracy and disease. Fifty years after the end of colonialism, the question is: To what extent has the promise of that call been realized for African women? There is no doubt that African women’s long walk to freedom has yielded some results, however painfully and slowly.
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A ‘wind of change’ that transformed the continent
Author: United NationsWhen UK Prime Minister Harold Macmillan addressed the whitesonly South African parliament in February 1960, he could not have known that his speech would still be studied by historians years later. But that was the year 17 African countries achieved their independence, with many others soon to follow. His words were prophetic: “The wind of change is blowing through this continent, and whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact. We must all accept it as a fact, and our national policies must take account of it.” Those remarks would come to be seen as the epitaph of European colonialism in Africa and the harbinger of an African nationalism sweeping irresistibly from the north.
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Visions of independence, then and now
Author: United NationsOne cardinal fact of our time is the momentous impact of Africa’s awakening upon the modern world. The flowing tide of African nationalism sweeps everything before it and constitutes a challenge to the colonial powers to make a just restitution for the years of injustice and crime committed against our continent….
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Africa watch
Author: United NationsThe world marked the first Nelson Mandela International Day commemoration on 18 July with films, lectures, concerts and charitable activities in dozens of countries and communities. At United Nations headquarters in New York an audience of about 600 attended a 15 July screening of the documentary Nelson Mandela: Son of Africa, Father of a Nation, which was introduced by the producers, Jonathan Demme and Peter Saraf. The following day, the General Assembly devoted an informal meeting to the South African leader. The president of the assembly, Ali Treki, described Mr. Mandela as an ““international hero“ for his role in ending apartheid. The General Assembly’s decision to establish Nelson Mandela International Day, he said, “is a call to action to make the world a better place, one day at a time.”
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