African debt campaigners meeting at the World Social Forum (WSF) in  Porto Alegre, Brazil learned with great interest of the high-profile  panel on Africa and its debt burden at the World Economic Forum, the  gathering of power elites held in Davos, Switzerland at the same time  as the WSF. The panel featured U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, South African President Thabo Mbeki, former U.S. President Bill Clinton, the world's richest person, Bill Gates, and rock star Bono. "We are pleased to see Mr. Clinton, Mr. Blair, and Mr. Gates taking an interest in the struggles of African peoples," said Demba Moussa Dembele of the Forum on African Alternatives in Senegal.  "But will this meeting mean anything? We are tired of hearing noble speeches about our continent, no matter how famous the speaker."

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) remains firm in its intention to send a new fact-finding mission to Zimbabwe, despite official warnings that such a delegation would not be welcome. Last week COSATU said the situation in Zimbabwe was critical, as the present legal and political situation was not conducive to holding free and fair elections, due in March, and alleged that labour unions were being suppressed.

"As you may already know, world renowned Kenyan playwright, novelist and social critic Ngugi Wa Thiong'o and his wife Njeeri Wa Ngugi were brutally attacked on August 11, 2004, in an apartment in Nairobi, Kenya. Ngugi was severely beaten and burned with cigarettes, and his wife, Njeeri, was raped in the ordeal. Subsequently, several people were arrested in conjunction with the attack, and it is becoming increasingly clear that this was a politically motivated assault on a leading international intellectual and his wife. It was the first time that Ngugi had returned to his home country after 22 years of political exile. We are writing to ask you to take a few minutes of your time to send a letter to the  addresses appended below to encourage the Kenyan courts and government to take this attack seriously, and to prosecute not only the direct attackers, but all those involved in the attack."

- Based on a recent update compiled by Equality Now

Status of signatures and ratifications

Total signatures – 33
Total ratifications – 7

Upcoming Events
The Executive Council Session of the African Union will take place in Abuja on 28-29 January 2005.

The 4th African Union Ordinary Summit - will take place 30/31 January in Abuja (Nigeria).

Pre-Summit on Gender will be held in Abuja during 25-26 January 2005
Members of the Solidarity for African Women’s Rights (SOWR) Coalition will have a consultation meeting on 26th January in Abuja and ask lobbying strategies and share campaign updates.

Conference on FGM in Djibouti - No Peace Without Justice, in collaboration with the Government of the Republic of Djibouti, will be hosting a conference during 2-3 February 2005 in Djibouti. The conference will discuss the Protocol on the Rights of Women with a view to advocating for its ratification and generate strategies for implementation.

“Engendering African Politics” Conference, April 2005, Addis Ababa.
The African Association of Political Science is sponsoring a conference to bring together policy makers and activists to develop and debate recommendations for strengthening a women’s rights platform across Africa.

“When Women Gain, So Does the World” Conference, June 19-21, Washington, DC.
The Institute for Women’s Policy Research will host the Eighth International Women’s Policy Research Conference. The conference will cover topics such as ‘family, culture, and population’, women’s leadership in public life, and women’s rights to health and income security. For more information visit www.iwpr.org

Latest Country Updates

Benin

The WiLDAF West Africa Office reported that on January 6, the National Assembly of Benin unanimously approved a law that authorized ratification of the Protocol. Although the official instrument of ratification must still be deposited with the African Union in order to take effect, the passage of No 2005-04 signals a willingness on the part of the Assembly to make the Protocol a reality for Beninese women.

Djibouti

FRENCH: Décembre 2004 : conduite d’une pétition dans le cadre des 16 jours d’activisme
- Support explicatif du protocole : document « présentation du protocole de Maputo au regard de la législation djiboutienne » établi par Mme Zeinab Kamil Ali
- Militantes chargées de la collecte de signatures de divers horizons
- Approche d’une large frange de la population djiboutienne : parlementaires, juges, personnel des Nations Unies, travailleurs du secteur public, personnel du secteur bancaire, ports et zones franches, travailleurs du secteur privé
- Collecte de 383 signatures

Janvier 2005 : participation de Mme Zeinab KAMIL ALI au colloque « Femmes et citoyenneté » organisé par une association djiboutienne SOLIDARTE FEMININE

- 1ère journée 17 janvier 2005 : intervention de Mme Zeinab Kamil Ali sur le thème des droits des femmes en Afrique
- Intervention axée sur une présentation du Protocole de Maputo et un fervent plaidoyer pour sa ratification par Djibouti
- Sensibilisation de femmes parlementaires, de la société civile, avocats, juges et représentants diplomatiques de l’ambassade américaine, représentant de la banque mondiale dans le cadre de ce colloque

ENGLISH: In December 2004, the National Union of Djiboutian Women, working as member of the coalition “Solidarity for African Women’s Rights (SOAWR)”, collected
383 signatures on a petition to the Heads of States calling for ratification
of the Maputo Protocol. Those signing the petition reflected a large section
of the Djiboutian population, including judges, United Nations personnel,
public sector workers, and private sector workers. Also in December, Zeinab
Kamil published an article titled “Presentation of the Maputo Protocol With
Regard to the Djiboutian Legislation.”

In January 2005 Zeinab Kamil participated in a symposium titled “Women and
Citizenship” organized by a Djiboutian association, Female Solidarity. She
made a presentation on women’s rights in Africa and emphasized the need for
ratification of the Maputo Protocol in Djibouti.

UNFD is continuing with its campaign and anticipates that the Djibouti
government will soon be discussing the ratification of the Protocol.

Guinea

The Guinean Parliament has ratified the Protocol and the government has indicated that it is in the process of forwarding the ratification to the African Union. Campaign focus is moving to domestication of the Protocol.

Kenya

The Coalition on Violence against Women (COVAW) is continuing with the lobbying of the Kenyan government to ratify the Protocol.

Mozambique

Due to the recent election, much of the lobbying work of the FDC (Foundation for Community Development) has been at a stand still. However, the government has promised to put the Protocol on the agenda of the First Session of Parliament. The FDC will continue its campaigning work to ensure that this happens and that the Protocol receives a fair and full discussion. Congratulations to Mozambique for the appointment of a female Prime Minister who also holds the position of Finance Minister!

Namibia

Sister Namibia is continuing campaigns to popularize the Protocol in the country. Naimbia was the 4th country to ratify the Protocol.

Nigeria

Nigeria ratified the Protocol and activists are now focusing on domestication and implementation.

South Africa
The South African Parliament ratified the Protocol in December 2004 and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has since deposited the instrument of ratification to the African Union.

Uganda

Progress on the Protocol has been slow in the Uganda. Akina Mama wa Afrika attributed this to the election campaigning and the fact that Ugandan women activists are focusing their energies on the Domestic Relations Bill, currently in the house, to ensure that this new family law bill will protect women’s rights. Despite these intervening events, the Ministry of Gender has prepared a cabinet brief on the Protocol which Akina Mama wa Afrika will use to lobby other members of government.

News Brief 1 – How to speed up ratifications to the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa? This was the central question of a session at the recently-concluded 36th Ordinary Session of the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights co-chaired by Equality Now Programme Officer Caroline Osero-Ageng’o and the Special Rapporteur on Women’s Rights Commissioner Angela Melo.

Commissioner Melo noted that she had been in contact with various NGOs and 48 ministries of foreign affairs as well as 45 officials that are working with these ministers. She has also been in contact with Mrs. Mongella, the Speaker of the Pan African Parliament. She said that the problem of lack of translation into Portuguese was slowing work amongst the Lusophone countries and noted that there was need to support the Special Rapporteur in her work for the ratification of the Protocol.

Together with the participants they explored strategies of attaining ratification and came up with the following suggestions:

- translate the Protocol into national languages and disseminate it at national levels in all countries,
- undertake an audit of ratification of the CEDAW and discuss the experiences in different countries, including whether it has been translated into national laws, with a view to replicating successful strategies,
- create awareness on the Protocol – meet religious associations and lobby parliamentarians with a view to building a strong constituency of support for ratification, and ensure coordination so as to reduce the expenses on the campaign, and
- engage men in the campaign on women’s rights issues.

News brief 2 - Mary Wandia (FEMNET), Hannah Forster (ACDHRS), Kafui KUWONU (WiLDAF) and Faiza Mohamed (Equality Now) attended a consultation on Human Rights that was organized by the Political Affairs Division of the African Union, with support from the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and held at the African Union conference center in Addis Ababa from 9-10 December 2004.

They used this opportunity to brief participants, who were from all regions of Africa and the Diaspora and working on human rights, media, youth, community development, corruption, capacity building and peace building, about the campaign and urged them to add their signatures to the petition; and included a call for a speedy ratification of the Protocol in the communiqué that was generated at the conclusion of the consultation meeting.

The African Union declared the week of 6th –13th December 2004 as a treaties week whereby member states were called upon to ratify pending Protocols. Unfortunately, the Protocol on Women’s Rights only received 2 additional signatures – Chad and Swaziland – but no ratifications.

Text Now 4 Women’s Rights campaign and Petition signatures

This component to the campaign aimed at recruiting mobile users in Africa to support the online petition currently running at the Pambazuka website has continued. There are currently 3935 signatories to the petition, about 500 of which have been received by SMS. Signatories have been received from 111 countries. This breaks down into 43 African countries and 68 countries from outside of Africa. 'Block votes' numbering several thousand have also been received from membership organisations, but these have yet to be tabulated.

There are now over 500 people who have signed up for free SMS alerts about the campaign. If you haven't registered for this service, visit http://www.pambazuka.org/petition/alerts.php

Senegal's fledgling gay movement is battling for recognition in the struggle against HIV/AIDS and hopes to win its first ever government grant to assist homosexuals living with the disease. The problem is that homosexuality is illegal in devoutly Muslim Senegal, and the MSM movement - the acronym stands for "Men who have sex with men" - is asking for funds from the government-run National Council to Fight AIDS (CNLS).

The world’s most impoverished countries are forced to pay over £30 million every day to the rich world in debt repayments, while millions of their people die from poverty. Jubilee Debt Campaign is asking supporters to send an email to those who have the power to end this injustice.

Via Campesina - the global alliance of peasant, family farmer, farm worker, indigenous, landless peoples and women's organizations, and other rural movements - calls for solidarity with the millions of people affected by the tsunami disaster and is launching a global fundraising campaign to channel assistance to affected communities of fisherfolk and peasants, for our own relief and reconstruction efforts, through our grassroots member organizations (http://www.viacampesina.org) and our sister organizations of fisherfolk.

Columbia University's Human Rights Advocates Program (HRAP) is now accepting applications for the 2005 program. Applications are due by March 21, 2005. Today, one of the greatest challenges faced by poorer countries is the impact of the global economy on their communities. Few of the leaders working in those communities have access to the institutions where the economic policies that affect their lives are made. Moreover, those who gain access are often not prepared with the knowledge, skills, and contacts necessary to influence the process.

"The villagers dont understand what has happened to their world. Our crew keep telling us that the people they meet are deeply afraid of the ocean that has sustained them for generations...the people are suffering from 'ganguan jiwa' .... a disturbance of the soul."

An upbeat New Year's message by Prime Minister Themba Dlamini has been rebutted by Swaziland's pro-democracy groups, with labour unions calling for a general strike in January to protest lavish royal spending and a controversial draft constitution. "Poverty has been a great enemy for both social and economic development in our country. His majesty's government has put measures in place, and I hope this will go a long way to addressing this challenge," said Dlamini in his New Year's address, without offering specifics.

Despite promises that developing countries should "own" IMF and World Bank policies, parliaments continue to be sidelined or undermined by these institutions. Parliamentarians and campaigners have started an International Parliamentarians' Petition (IPP) signed by legislators from both developed and developing countries, and backed by civil society groups worldwide. The IPP is a practical way to assert support for the principle of parliamentary sovereignty, and to call for parliaments to be fully involved in the development and scrutiny of IMF and World Bank policies.

The Stop EPAs campaign was launched in Lusaka with a ringing and militant call on African people to mobilise themselves to provide their governments with the moral authority to reject the Economic Partnership Agreements being negotiated between the ACP countries and the European Union. Defining the terms of the discussion, Kathleen Boohene of the Third World Network Africa, described EPAs as a looming monster that would devour all our progress.

Buoyed by successful global initiatives to ban landmines and create an international criminal court, a coalition of NGOs plans to launch a worldwide campaign seeking support for ''new and innovative sources of financing'' to help eradicate hunger and poverty. ''The idea is to copy the successful global processes that resulted in the convention to ban landmines, and also the statute to create the International Criminal Court (ICC),'' says Katarina Sehm Patomaki of the Helsinki-based Network Institute for Global Democratisation (NIGD).

SANGONeT has been engaged in developing a new website for the Development Institute for Training, Support and Labour (Ditsela). Ditsela's main objective is to help the labour movement build its capacity to be able to respond effectively to the challenges it faces. The new Ditsela website is available at http://www.ditsela.org.za

Burundi began on Monday a weeklong health protection campaign targeting over three million children and 17,000 pregnant women, in an effort to reduce the country's high infant and maternal mortality rates. During the campaign, medical teams are due to deworm an estimated three million children aged from one year to 14 years; provide vitamin A for another one million infants aged from six months to 59 months; immunise 17,000 pregnant women against tetanus, and distribute mineral salts and folic acid to them.

In a unique all-in-one pilot campaign launched on Monday, almost a million Togolese children are to be vaccinated free of charge against measles and polio as well as being given mosquito nets to fight malaria and pills to treat intestinal worms. Authorities are targeting 866,725 children aged between nine months and five years. They will be given a shot against measles, a polio vaccination, a pill against intestinal worms and a mosquito net treated with repellent to protect them from the malaria-carrying insects.

Several years have passed since Tanzania ratified an International Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Violence Against Women (CEDAW). Nothing has been done to incorporate the convention in the country’s domestic laws up to now when the world is marking 16 Days of Activism Against Women Violence (16DAWV). This derails efforts to curb violence against women and schoolgirls, with the latter being the most affected.

Tributes continue to come in for Dr Sylvia Tamale, the first woman Dean of the Faculty of Law at Makerere University, Uganda. Dr Tamale, an internationally renowned feminist activist and academic was honoured on December 2nd by the women's movement in Uganda for her extensive work to advance human rights in Africa. As we reflect on the impact of violence on the lives of women over the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence, we hear from two contributors. One is a survivor of domestic violence, and the other a young lesbian activist in Uganda. Both (whose identities have been protected) wished to express their appreciation for Dr Tamale's support for their individual and collective struggles. They also wish to focus attention on the critical importance of the work that Dr Tamale and others like her do. - Sarah Mukasa, Akina Mama wa Afrika

We Do Not Interfere in Domestic Matters

"The first step towards ending an abusive relationship is to have the courage to speak about it. To tell someone about the hell that you are living with is the first small step towards healing oneself. When I was ready to take that step, Sylvia was there to pick me up and to help me start the healing process. And so I will honor her, even as she honors me; by telling you my story. I am a survivor of domestic violence and an activist. My field of activism is democracy and good governance for my country Uganda. I have come to be active in women's rights after realizing that part of the reason that our countries have a huge democracy deficit is the non-involvement of women as primary actors in decision-making. But back to the subject:

I bring to the campaign to stop violence against women a perspective that I hope will help people to discard the often-misconceived stereotypes about the women who are subjected to domestic violence. I am a lawyer with a postgraduate degree in law and I studied the international protection of human rights. One would imagine therefore that I know my rights. This did not stop me from living with and marrying a companion who shot me through the right hand wrist in a fit of anger and possessiveness. I lived with my husband trying to make a marriage out of a war zone, seemingly unable to change my circumstances for eight years.

Each year the violence got worse especially after the birth of our first child (we have two). I knew he was being unfaithful and lived with the constant fear of contracting HIV/AIDS. Yet I went ahead and had a second child. When I tried to introduce condoms into the marriage I was battered for that too. And I stayed on a few more years. Until one day my daughter (3 years at the time) woke up during a particularly bad fight and found her father holding a cocked pistol to my head. It was then that I knew I had to leave. I decided that this was not the legacy I was going to leave for my daughter. I did not want her to grow up believing it is normal for women to be battered. I had never seen a fight between my parents as I grew up and they are still married.

I had a good job, good education; I am a political leader and a regular political columnist in Uganda. I had a very good standard of living. So why was I putting up with this abuse? Is it culture, upbringing or am I just a little crazy to have stayed with this man?

Then of course there is the question of making the laws work. The night I allowed myself to see that I was indeed a battered wife after all those years, I called my friends to come and help before my husband murdered me and I told them to bring the Police with them. The Police refused to come because they did not 'interfere in domestic matters'. This was assault with a deadly weapon. I did not need any subsidiary/domestic violence laws, the Penal Code should have been enough. But since I was a woman, being battered by her husband, the Police refused to interfere. In the morning I rushed to a local medical clinic and called a photographer to take pictures of my injuries (Now I think of it I never got round to picking up the pictures). I walked to the police station with the confidence of a lawyer who knew her rights. However, the drunken sod at the police laughed at me. "We do not interfere in domestic matters".

My husband is an army officer and so I went to his overall superior and asked him to disarm this domestic terrorist. Once again I was ignored. I called a relative who was a government Minister and asked her to talk to my husband's boss, he told her something like: "You know her! She must have provoked him". The 'Boy's Club' shut me out and I was on my own.

I did all the lawyerly things. I started the judicial separation process, appeared before a family court to settle the case. A senior Attorney represented my husband. He refused to believe that my husband could hold a gun to my head and he built a case based on the premise that I wanted to squeeze money out of my 'poor husband in some kind of revenge'. So I finally put on the 20/20 eyeglasses and allowed myself to see my life for what it was- a typical story of "The abused woman". The law and those who would write it, who swore to protect and defend it, were actually working against delivery of justice. I was in a country with no services for battered women. The counselling I got was from parents and friends who had no clue about domestic abuse except what they read and what I myself told them.

Throughout all of this, Sylvia has remained a true girl friend. When the abuse started I was hesitant to tell anyone about it because I thought it would be admitting to failure and weakness. But because of the trust that existed between us I was eventually able to open up to tell her what was going on. She listened and gave whatever advice she could. She listened to my woes and cried with me when I needed to cry. By simply being there, listening and believing in me, she kept me going another day.

When things were really tough Sylvia held on. Aside from the physical injuries, women who experience domestic violence have to deal with deep, often overwhelming feelings of complete worthlessness.

Sylvia would not let me give in to this mental anguish. She even asked me to edit the book she was writing at the time in 1997-98 but I was too consumed with my misery and could not complete the task. The fact that she offered showed me that she was trying to pull me out of my misery so that I could do something worthwhile and start believing in myself again.

After I left my husband Sylvia did not allow me to wallow in guilt and shame for a failed marriage. She came and sat with me in my new home and talked me through the threatening phone calls that my husband made from time to time. Sometimes I drank too much alcohol to take away the pain. Sylvia patiently waited for me to realize that the answer was not at the bottom of a bottle.

I guess the most important thing in all this is that my relationship with Sylvia and my closest friends never changed. That gave me a sense of security and continuity. I knew that in spite of all that happened I had a friend I could count on to pick me up and make sure I went on with my life.

Thank you Sylvia. It is time you were recognized for the work you have done for women such as myself in this county.

Sylvia, Our Hero, Our Friend. We are proud to commemorate the achievements of our dear friend and partner in the struggle for the rights of sexual minorities, Dr Sylvia Tamale. We are very honoured and grateful to be part of this ceremony. As you are all aware, Sylvia has endured a lot of criticism and hostility for speaking out. Yet she still chooses not to keep silent."

"As SEXUAL MINORITIES UGANDA (SMUG), we have benefited so much from the support of this powerful woman. I remember the first time our organization first met her way back in 2003. She was such a great and positive force. This was a total departure from our past encounters with the mainstream civil society and human rights sector. Often we were subjected to abuse, ridicule, dismissal, outright hostility. Occasionally if we were 'lucky', we met with those who arrogantly informed us, that our issues are not 'priorities'. Oh really? So it is fine in the meantime for us to be subjected to abuse, torture, ridicule, humiliation, police harassment, criminalization, and to live a life of constant fear and insecurity? All this came from the movement that is supposed to be promoting human rights in this country. Those who arrogantly spoke down to us in this way did not even recognize the irony of their remarks. Heterosexual women, who fight for the right to choose their partners; who resist the humiliation of having their sexuality policed and monitored by an established patriarchal order (for example, the policy of rewarding girls who remain virgins until marriage, as one of the main HIV prevention strategies of the Buganda Kingdom, FGM, early marriages and so on), would have us submit to the very oppression they resist. They do not see our struggle as a natural extension of the rights they seek. Apparently, the struggle for women's autonomy and bodily integrity is limited to a select few! One is forced to ask the question, what is the good of human rights if they do not protect the rights of all human beings? For whatever else people choose to call us, we are first and foremost, human beings.

And so when we met Sylvia we were somewhat cautious.

What a breath of fresh air she was. Here was someone who listened to us. She was not judgmental. She did not think us mad, immoral or evil. Instead she encouraged us to stand up for our rights, never to quit no matter what. She says we may never live to see the fruits of our efforts, but at least we would have made a difference, and the world a better place. She understood our pain and isolation, our fears and our hopes. She has inspired us to fight on.

This brave and courageous woman was last year voted worst woman of the year in a poll that was taken in one of Uganda's leading dailies. What a strange world we live in. Someone who stands up to fight for the rights of all people, without qualification; someone who struggles for an end to all violence and discrimination; this is the person, voted the worst woman of the year? Well, there are many of us who do not agree with this. Sylvia is our woman of the year, always.

We feel very honoured to be here today. We believe in Sylvia and we thank her for standing by us through thick and thin. She is such a wonderful person, one who inspires us. We have learnt and continue to learn so much from her.

We are proud to be associated with someone who understands our language, one who believes that it is unacceptable to discriminate against others simply because they are different from ourselves. Whilst many people in this country call gays and lesbians mad, insane, sick (you know what they call us), at least we know that there are people in this country who care to get along with us, even if they have not walked in our shoes.

To us Dr. Tamale is a friend, parent and a teacher.

Sylvia you will always be our hero."

The world will be marking 16 days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence from November 25th to December 10th 2004. Once again, women's organisations and human rights activists all over the world will come together in their various communities. Last year, the AWDF awarded a total of USD$15,000 in grants to 17 women’s organisations in Africa to celebrate the 16 Days Campaign. In 2004, AWDF will award USD $15,000 to 17 organisations.

"Increasingly, African NGOs are networking with the aim to achieve common goals. As Mark Surman and Katherine Reilly argue in "Appropriating Internet for Change", the broad majority of civil society organizations are struggling with the issue of how to increase the impact of campaigns, projects and programs using networked technologies. This also applies to African networks, which are involved in transnational advocacy. This paper relates to African organizations and networks, which work together on issues beyond their national borders. We focus here on online collaboration between national organizations, which form a network to advocate at the regional and international level."