The job description includes: To support the food security project manager in mobilising communities at grass roots level and to improve the effectiveness of the project by building a strong partnership with the extension department of the Ministry of Agriculture (at municipal and provincial level) and civil society organisations; To support the project manager (PM) in the management of project activities using Concern's Project Cycle Management model, policies and strategy; and To support the PM to prepare high quality reports and proposals.

Gracelino is dressed in dirty rags. He extends his skinny arm into his pocket and produces a small plastic bottle filled with a see-through liquid. This is gasoline which he bought for $1 at a market, and there is enough here to last him for up to three days. "You put the petrol onto a piece of cloth and sniff it. It makes me feel high, but I know it's no good for me and so I'm going to stop doing it," says the 15-year-old. Gracelino is one of many street children who are addicted to a by-product of the very substance that makes Angola so rich in one of the world's most sought-after resources.

The Country Director (CD) will join the Angola programme at an exciting point in its development. Concern has been operational in Angola since 1993 and are now developing a strategic plan to focus on advocacy and working with partners. The CD's role will be to provide management and leadership to this process.

Discussions are taking place in Angola over the date of the next presidential and parliamentary elections. Elections were last held in 1992, but the rebel movement UNITA rejected the results and plunged the country back into war. Following last year's peace agreement UNITA has fully committed itself to the constitutional path. A dozen years after the last elections, the focus is turning to the urgent need to hold elections to reaffirm the legitimacy of the government.

Humanitarian groups this week reported a critical breakdown in the essential medicines pipeline in three provinces of Angola. Most affected by the shortages were the central Bie and Huambo provinces and Benguela in the west.

Isaias Samakuva last Friday won a landslide victory to become the new leader of Angola's former rebel movement UNITA. Samakuva, formerly UNITA's representative in London and Paris, was elected with 78 percent of the vote at a party congress held in Viana on the outskirts of the capital, Luanda.
Related Link:
BBC profile of new leader
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3031752.stm

Just 15 months after a cease-fire ended three decades of devastating civil war, Angola has taken two significant steps on its long road to recovery. Campaigns in health and education, backed by UNICEF and supported by all levels of Government, are proving vital in restarting the development of social services in Angola.

Angolan refugees departed from camps in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) last Friday, in the first phase of a voluntary repatriation programme spanning three countries in the region. On day one of the operation more than 500 Angolan refugees are returning to M'Banza Congo in northwestern Angola and Luau in the eastern reaches of the country, the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugee (UNHCR) said.

Angola on Thursday announced it would make public all its oil payments under a new push to stamp out corruption and attract aid and investment. Aguinaldo Jaime, the country's deputy prime minister, said: "For the first time in Angola's history, the budget will encompass all revenue and that will send to the donor community the signal that the Angolan government is committed to a fully transparent way of managing the budget."

Angola's ruling MPLA has started preparations for a landmark congress in December that will see the most comprehensive cleaning out of a revolutionary movement in Africa. President José Eduardo dos Santos said 45% of the party's leadership would be swept out to make way for new blood. He is insisting that every position, including that of leader, be contested at what will be the MPLA's fifth congress.

The political opposition and social forces that seek change face "serious constraints" due to the prevailing and absolute disrespect for the basic rules of democracy, concluded a recent meeting of civil society and opposition leaders. Among the constraints highlighted was the absolute party control of state institutions and the media.

Angolan refugees planning to return home from southern African countries will be able to receive information on the repatriation process and conditions back home from special weekly radio bulletins. The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) will send a weekly update on the conditions refugees can expect to find as they voluntarily return to Angola after more than a year of peace, UNHCR external relations officer Matthew Brook told IRIN.

Conditions had stabilised in virtually all areas of Angola where humanitarian agencies had sustained access but overall, levels of vulnerability remained some of the highest in the world, the mid-term review of the 2003 Consolidated Inter-agency Appeal (CAP) for Angola said.

Angola's offshore oil riches will soon propel the country into the million-barrel-a-day club, but corruption and poor governance threaten billions of dollars in future investment, analysts say. Angola is sub-Saharan Africa's second largest producer behind Nigeria, producing some 900,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil with a significant increase seen over the next five years.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Zambia will on Wednesday start registering the first of an estimated 90,000 Angolan refugees for their voluntary repatriation.

How is globalisation affecting the lives of the 3.4 million inhabitants of the Angolan capital, Luanda? Can the state use wealth from oil and diamonds to lift the city's poor out of poverty? Can civil society release the potential of the poor to become development actors?

African governments and major international oil explorers are meeting in Angola to discuss how to exploit offshore oil from West and Central African nations. The government of host nation Angola has been criticised by international donors for failing to stop corrupt officials pocketing oil revenues.

Angola's children are finally beginning to enjoy the fruits of the end of the country's long civil war with back-to-school-campaigns, free birth registration and a decrease in malnutrition rates.

A life-saving measles vaccination campaign has reached 2.1 million Angolan children so far, the UN Children's Fund said. The vaccination campaign was launched in late April and is spearheaded by the Ministry of Health with key financial, logistical and training support from UNICEF.

Founded in 1978, Human Rights Watch monitors and promotes human rights in some 70 countries worldwide. It is known for its in-depth investigations, its incisive and timely reporting, its innovative and high-profile advocacy campaigns, and its success in changing the human rights policies of abusive governments and forces as well as influential governments and international institutions.