New African articles from July 2007

New African archives from July 2007

Zimbabwe: a test case.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... As a sympathiser of President Mugabe's government, the disturbing and amply magnified images of Morgan Tsvangirai's beating on BBC dealt a serious blow to my conviction that the veteran Mugabe is indeed upholding the principles of democracy...

'Go hang, Baffour'.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... I have just finished reading your interview with President Robert Mugabe in the May issue of New African. You have proved once again that you are one of Africa's biggest lackey's. Go hang! Sean Paterson [Sent by email, address withheld...

'Why don't you go hang and leave us alone?'.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... How low can a man stoop? (Baffour's Beefs, A tale of two countries, NA, June). I think you are not proud of yourself at all. How can you compare Ghana and Zimbabwe at all? You come here to Zimbabwe and tell us to support our leaders, yet have...

'The rural people will never surrender'.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... Some people keep on struggling and you are one of them, Baffour. And you do it in a serious way which I recognise very much myself. I still remember when we met in London several years ago and your speech on Zimbabwe was so committed and honest...

Sacking who?(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... Simon Barker wants Baffour Ankomah sacked from New African as editor (Readers' Letters, NA June). His sin: "Reporting Mugabe as some sort of anti-imperialist hero?" With all fairness, does President Mugabe need Baffour to portray him as an...

Zimbabwe at the crossroads.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... My last contribution published in your magazine followed your 2002 interview with President Mugabe, in which I expressed my respect and appreciation for his historical achievements as a fellow Zimbabwean, now in the Diaspora. Events in the last...

Xenophobia in South Africa.(Letters)(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2007... I would like to refer to Baffour's Beefs ("But we have President Kufuor", NA, May), in which he writes about xenophobia in South Africa, especially against fellow Africans from other parts of the continent. Baffour also correctly mentions that...

Farewell, Brother Tony.(Baffour's Beefs)(Tony Blair)(Essay)
July 1, 2007... "The fear of missing out means today's media more than ever before, hunts in a pack. In these modes, it is like a feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits. But no one dares miss out... The final consequence of all this is that...

"None of us can stand alone".
July 1, 2007... As African leaders meet on 1-3 July in the Ghanaian capital, Accra, to deliberate on a union government for Africa, New African dedicates this month's issue to the search for an All-African union government. And how better to start than to go...

Give us African unity now! Forty-seven years after many African countries gained their independence, pan-Africanism is still only words on paper. African unity is for diplomats, not the rest of us. Thus, African leaders cannot leave their summit in Accra without giving us, ordinary Africans, African unity now!, writes Cameron Duodu who has seen it all--since 1958.
July 1, 2007... African leaders have been attending summits of this kind for the past 40 years. Yes, the first summit of the (then) Organisation of African Unity (OAU), now the African Union (AU), took place in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in May 1963. Since then, a...

'If we want to survive, we must unite'.(Interview)
July 1, 2007... Dr Hassy H. B. Kitine, a retired Tanzanian parliamentarian, government minister, and pan-Africanist extraordinaire, worked closely with the country's founding father, the late President Julius Nyerere, and rose to become the director general of...

Nicky Oppenheimer: 'Why Africa will succeed'.
July 1, 2007... Nicky Oppenheimer (pictured) has been the chairman of the De Beers Group since January 1998. De Beers is the world's largest diamond mining and marketing company, and has an extensive presence in Africa. Oppenheimer is, therefore, uniquely...

Kaunda: 'it's not right to demonise Mugabe'; "Now my prayer is that the Zimbabwe issue will be treated differently by Blair's successor, Gordon Brown", writes Zambia's former president, Kenneth Kaunda.(Comment)(Robert Mugabe)(Viewpoint essay)
July 1, 2007... President Robert Mugabe's government has been widely condemned in the West. Its leaders say Mugabe is a demon, that he has destroyed Zimbabwe and he must be gotten rid of--but this demonising is made by people who may not understand what Mugabe...

Seven communication tips an effective leader must have: if persuasion is what you want, the email, voice mail, telephone and telefax are "poor" channels. If you want to put your workers on the vision trip, look into their eyes and tell them your mission.(Nuggets in a Nutshell)
July 1, 2007... Small things have great effects. For example, communication is something every Dick and Harry do. Yet, it carries such a great deterministic power that the success or failure of any union depends on its proper use! Bad or no communication trips...

Zimbabwe: surprise, surprise, tourism is on the rise; Zimbabwe is an enigma. From politics, economics to tourism, the country is defying all logic and confounding its detractors. Thus, even for the dyed-in-the-wool nationalist, statistics showing foreign tourism hitting an all-time high in 2006 is a bit difficult to believe. But it is the truth Baffour Ankomah reports.(Feature)
July 1, 2007... What? I asked. "You mean foreign arrivals in Zimbabwe in 2006 hit an all-time high?" Simbarashe Mandinyenya, director of the Zimbabwe Tourist Authority's Research and Development division nodded vigorously. "I know it is difficult to believe,"...

Diego Garcia: 'Time is very dear to us'.(Feature)
July 1, 2007... The people of the Chagos islands who were forcibly removed from their homeland by Britain to pave the way for the huge American military base on the island of Diego Garcia, have won yet another victory in the British courts to return home. But...

Sierra Leone Liberia; Taylor's trial: whose agenda? Unless the SCSL Trial Chamber puts its foot down and ensures its orders are immediately obeyed by the Court Registry, the smooth running of Charles Taylor's trial may be in real jeopardy, reports Osei Boateng.(Feature)(Special Court for Sierra Leone)
July 1, 2007... The UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL) may have finally handed down its first verdicts in four years of existence, convicting three former rebel leaders of crimes against humanity on 20 June. But its biggest case involving the...

Not even death can separate them ... Fathia Nkrumah rejoins her husband: Stephen Gyasi reports from Accra on the state funeral accorded Fathia Nkrumah, wife of Ghana's first president, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, on 12 June.(Feature)(Obituary)
July 1, 2007... Fathia Nkrumah's long-cherished dream of reuniting with her late husband, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, albeit in eternity, was realised on 12 June when she was laid to rest at the Kwame Nkrumah Mausoleum in Accra, next to her late husband. She was 75. ...

Water, water, everywhere and not a drop in the dam!(Under the Neem Tree)
July 1, 2007... It is amazing that part of our collective psyche will be praying that the rains get even heavier in Ghana, so that the Volta Lake may fill up and deliver power to our homes. Yet, on the other hand, the more sympathetic souls amongst us will be...

Adieu to the duke of African cinema: Saturday 9 June was a sad day for the international community of arts and culture, following the death of the African movie legend, Ousmane Sembene. He was 84. Mercy Eze explores the engaging career of the duke of African cinema.(Obituary)(Obituary)
July 1, 2007... Struggle and success often highlight the legacy of the world's great men and women. But the uncompromising nature of the Senegalese film legend, Ousmane Sembene (1923-2007), has had a distinguished influence on not only his own outstanding...

Fill in this questionnaire & win a free subscription.(READER'S SURVEY)(Survey)
July 1, 2007... Dear Reader, Your opinion is invaluable to help us assess your information needs, as well as help our editorial, advertising and marketing departments to continue to develop the magazine in ways that we hope you find useful, interesting...

The rise and rise of agriculture: once upon a time, agriculture was a dying sector of Kenya's economy. Now no more. For the past few years, it has been the wheel behind the country's economic turnaround, reports Wanjohi Kabukuru.(FOCUS ON KENYA)
July 1, 2007... While campaigning for the presidency in late 2002, President Mwai Kibaki had to use layman's economic terms to explain to a local radio interviewer why Kenya was an agricultural economy. The interviewer would not budge. His "critical questions"...

Nairobi takes to the treadmill: the fitness craze is not only for Westerners. Kenyans are also on the hook, reports Stephen Williams.(FOCUS ON KENYA)
July 1, 2007... You don't have to go far in downtown Nairobi to find a fast-food joint these days. Whether it's fish and chips, chicken and chips, burgers and chips, ribs and chips, chips or just plain old nyama choma (roast meat), Kenyans, like most Africans,...

Waiting for results: hopes of economic progress were high following the election of President Mwai Kibaki's government in 2002. But it has not all been smooth sailing, reports Neil Ford.(FOCUS ON KENYA)
July 1, 2007... Economic growth during the first half of President's Mwai Kibaki's government was weak but has picked up to around 5% a year over the past two years. Drought hit the output of the agricultural sector, which still employs most Kenyans, but...

Soko Tele: plugging a gap others cannot reach; An innovative way of sending money to relatives in rural areas has been launched in Kenya. Stephen Williams reports.(FOCUS ON KENYA)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... Celtel, the pan-African mobile phone company with the largest footprint in Africa and operations in 15 countries, is renowned for some of the continent's most progressive corporate social responsibility programmes. One of its oldest markets is...

Kenya Airways: more questions than answers; What actually happened to Kenyan Airways Flight 507, which disappeared soon after takeoff from Douala airport in Cameroon on 5 May? There are still more questions than answers, reports Wanjohi Kabukuru.(FOCUS ON KENYA)
July 1, 2007... In the wee hours of Saturday 5 May, Flight KQ 507 destined for Nairobi taxied at Cameroon's Douala International Airport, ready for takeoff. Just 5km after takeoff, KQ 507 joined the list of aviation disasters. All 105 passengers and the...

The way forward: "The future is bright for Tanzania but we need to work hard," says Dr Juma Alifa Ngasongwa, Tanzania's minister for planning, economy and empowerment. He talked to Baffour Ankomah.(Special Report: Tanzania)
July 1, 2007... Tanzania has been focusing on growth as a key element in the fight against poverty. The National Strategy for Growth and Reduction of Poverty (NSGRP, also called Mkukuta in Swahili) is divided into three clusters. The first addresses the...

Agriculture: still awaiting investors; There is every incentive to double agricultural production in Tanzania. "We are, thus, looking for investors who can bring in good seeds and also irrigation, because our agriculture is very much rain-dependent.".
July 1, 2007... The government of Tanzania has adopted an Agricultural Sector Development Strategy (ASDS) which sets the framework for achieving the sector's objectives and targets. Agriculture remains the largest sector in the economy and hence its...

Serengeti shall not die: Navaya ole Ndaskoi on why the Maasai people forced out of the Serengeti plains when it was declared a game reserve in 1929 should be catered for by today's development programmes.(Special Report: Tanzania)
July 1, 2007... Old maps and remnants of settlements and animals show that during the last three centuries the Sahara Desert has advanced 250 miles southward on a 1,250 mile front. "In that short time, 390,000 square miles of good land have been lost. In...

Who are Africa's true friends? We all know what it is like to wait for a "cheque in the post". Let's imagine that you are the leader of an African independent nation who has just returned home from the G8 summit. What's it like waiting for the money to come in? Money that somebody else is "giving" you? ... Why do we have a shaky grasp of history?(Not in Black or White)
July 1, 2007... How long do you have to keep covering the same old ground, over and over, before you get so gargantually bored that you fall asleep with your eyes wide open and a big yawn stamped on your face? That is how I feel about "aid" and pleading groups...

Africa raising its game in telecoms: it is often said that Africa's information and telecommunication technology is poor compared to the global growth in technology. But as Regina Jere-Malanda finds out, Africa is fighting the "divide" to the hilt and is winning.(Telecoms)
July 1, 2007... No doubt, information and telecommunication technologies are as central to the development agendas of a country as they are critical in facilitating socio-economic development. The general consensus emphasises how countries particularly in...

A marriage worth studying.(Diaspora)
July 1, 2007... Forty years ago, at the height of the racial prejudice that kept the British Empire afloat, mixed-race marriages were as rare as a horse-drawn carriage is on the streets of today's London. "Critics considered that our marriage would be lucky to...

Humanitas working to keep African children in school: Efam Dovi reports on a diasporan initiative supporting children to stay in school in poor villages in Kenya, Ghana and Benin.(Diaspora)
July 1, 2007... A new hands-on approach to how African diasporan groups can concretely help the mother continent is being tried by Humanitas Afrika, founded in Prague, Czech Republic, in 2000. Instead of restricting itself to the issuance of pious statements...

Africa & the Caribbean: our future is bound together.(Diaspora)
July 1, 2007... Last year, the African Union decided that South Africa should host the first African Union-Caribbean Diaspora Summit in 2008. In preparing for the summit, various regional Diaspora conferences are being held this year in Europe, the Caribbean...

Namibia: the opposition implodes; The reality show of the implosion of the Namibian opposition continues. Perhaps someone on a white horse will soon come to rescue them and ride with them into the sunset a la John Wayne? Do I hear the name Tony Blair?, asks Uazuva Kaumbi.(Endtail)
July 1, 2007... I have observed what seems to be a contradiction of democracy--in authoritarian regimes, people are fighting for multiparty democracy to allow opposition parties to flourish, yet in multiparty democracies opposition parties are crumbling due to...