This week, to coincide with civil society meetings being launched in Accra, Ghana, in the run up to the African Union (AU) Summit on Continental Government, we publish a special issue of Pambazuka News. Given the large number of articles and issues addressed, we will be sending out Pambazuka News in three parts. Part 1 and Part 2 will contain the main articles on the topic, and will be sent out, respectively, today (Thursday), and tomorrow (Friday). Part 3, the Links and Resources section, will contain some of your usual favourites, letters to the editor, as well as the summaries of useful websites. Thanks for your understanding.

Ishmael Reed Publishing Co. is looking for new (and preferably not published elsewhere) short stories by Kenyan authors to be published in January 2008. Translated work from any of the Kenyan languages into English is particularly welcome. The submission deadline is July 15, 2007.

The Progressio Development Worker (DW) will support the Academy of Peace & Development (APD) in assisting local government efforts to establish legal reform for increasing citizen involvement in local decision-making - including participatory planning and budgeting, mandatory public meetings, discussion forums and referenda on local issues. Deadline: July 1 2007.

The Programme Specialist is responsible for: Supporting implementation of projects in the Rule of Law and Security (ROLS) Programme area; Ensuring high quality monitoring and evaluation, reporting and oversight/quality control for the ROLS programme area; Coordinating the monitoring of progress on Country Programme outcomes and outputs; Liaising and strengthening partnerships with other UN agencies, government officials, technical advisors and experts, multi-lateral and bi-lateral donors and Somali civil society; Providing policy and programmatic advice and facilitating knowledge management. Closing Date: 27 June 2007

ACORD is in process of streamlining and focusing her interventions to the four thematic areas of livelihoods, HIV/AIDS, gender and conflict. ACORD is implementing a Pan African advocacy programme on food sovereignty and overall thematic strategies. Similarly ACORD's country and regional strategies are being thematically aligned. In this context the volunteer will contribute towards aligning grants with ACORD's strategic objectives.

Kenyan Writers – Call for Submissions (deadline approaching)

Ishmael Reed Publishing Co. is looking for new (and preferably not published elsewhere) short stories by Kenyan authors to be published in January 2008. Translated work from any of the Kenyan languages into English is particularly welcome. If you haven't already, please send your short story, accompanied by a brief author biography, to the anthology editor, Mukoma Wa Ngugi, at [email][email protected] with the subject heading, Kenya - new short fiction. The submission deadline is July 15, 2007. The file should be attached, in MS Word and not more than 20 pages double-spaced.

The Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) invites the urgent attention of the membership of the Council, the wider African and global social research community, all believers in the democratic ideal, and all persons of good will to the serious developments in Ethiopia bearing on the lives of 38 persons, all citizens of Ethiopia, who had been arrested in the aftermath of the street protests that greeted the manipulation by the authorities of the results of the 2005 general elections. The 38 are part of a total of 111 persons – including 25 persons who had already been forced into exile – initially charged with an assortment of offences arising from the elections.

It is with an angry sadness that we learned of this giant's death over the weekend. If there was one book that I could name that had such a profound effect on my thinking, it was God's Bits of Woods. We named our son after Sembene Ousmane. We have long wanted to interview Sembene Ousmane in these pages, but somehow didn't manage to work up the courage to speak with such a giant. His contribution to our understanding of the struggle for emancipation in Africa is unmeasurable. His memory lives on in his films and his writing. It is for us to make certain that future generations in Africa will study his works, and by studying them, find the pathway to freedom.

The following select list may help those less familiar with his work:

Selected filmography:
Borom Sarret (1963)
Niaye (1964)
La Noire de...(1966)
Mandabi (1968)
Xala (1974)
Ceddo (1977)
Camp de Thiaroye (1988)
Guelwaar (1992)
Faat Kiné (2000)
Moolaadé (2004)

Books:
Le docker noir, 1956, Paris: Debresse, novel, new edition: Présence
Africaine, Paris, 2002,
- engl. The Black Docker, London: Heinemann, 1987.
O pays, mon beau peuple! 1957.
Les bouts de bois de Dieu, 1962.
- engl. God's Bits of Wood, London: Heinemann, 1995.
Voltaïque, Paris: Présence Africaine, 1962, short stories.
L'Harmattan, Paris: Présence Africaine, 1964, novel.
Le mandat, précédé de Vehi-Ciosane, Paris: Presence Africaine, 1966,
- engl. The money-order: with, White genesis, London: Heinemann, 1987
Xala, Paris: Présence africaine, 1973.
Le dernier de l'Empire, L'Harmattan 1981, - 'a key to Senegalese
politics', Werner Glinga, engl. The last of the Empire: A Senegalese
Novel, London: Heinemann, 1983.
Niiwam, Paris: Presence Africaine, 1987, engl. Niiwam and Taaw: Two
Novellas, Oxford and Portsmouth, N. H.: Heinemann, 1992.

The Gambia has announced the creation of its first science academy, which will address the shortage of scientists in the country. The academy will prepare students at primary and secondary level for university-level science, technology and mathematics courses.

Does electronic learning (eLearning) threaten to displace the teacher? This question emerged at an international conference held in Nairobi last week, attended by 1,400 people from 88 countries. The latest in information communication technology (ICT) with a focus on education, training and development was showcased.

South Africa has crossed a Rubicon in the past few months in relation to HIV and the ball is now in civil society’s court to achieve progress, Mark Heywood of the AIDS Law Project told the closing session of the Third South African AIDS Conference in Durban on June 8.

A history of African historiography from an African perspective, attempting to answer questions concerning the practice of history from the civilizations of ancient Egypt, through the varied cultures and regions of the continent, to contemporary times. The book presents the philosophy of the oral tradition as co-existent with the written traditions of ancient Egypt, the Islamic tradition, and the western European historiographical traditions.
ISBN: 978-97837314-7-9 312pp. 2006 Onyoma Research Publications
$29.95/£19.95

Orders
North America - Michigan State Univ. Press,
Elsewhere - African Books Collective, www.africanbookscollective.com

It is now forty years since the beginning of the genocide of the Igbo people, a holocaust of unprecedented proportions in recent African history. According to the author of this study it was the ‘foundational genocide of post-conquest, European-occupied Africa’. This text demonstrates that the Biafran War, 1967-1970, was the second phase of the Igbo genocide, following the initial massacre of 100,000 Igbo across the principal towns and cities of northern Nigeria.
ISBN: 978-0-9552050-0-2 183pp. 2006 African Renaissance
$29.95/£19.95

Orders
North America - Michigan State Univ. Press,
Elsewhere - African Books Collective, www.africanbookscollective.com

The first formal publication of two early plays by Soyinka, with a foreword by Abiola Irele. Widely regarded as Soyinka's first play, The Invention (1959) reflects the obsession with race that marked the apartheid regime, and prophetically depicts the beginnings of the crumbling of the apartheid system in the futuristic setting of Johannesburg in 1976. It expresses the concern of the African diapsora with apartheid, which was felt to be an affront to the entire race. The Detainee (1965) is a radio play. The plot foreshadows the writer's own imprisonment and his now familiar concerns about the vagaries of African politics.

'...these plays take us back to the first manifestation of a creative genius that was soon to flourish.' - Abiola Irele
ISBN: 978-1-86888-329-5 94pp. UNISA Press 2005
$19.95/£14.95

Orders:
Africa - UNISA Press -
North America - Michigan State Univ. Press - www.africanbookscollective.com

Security forces in southern Sudan are in desperate need for training and funding to protect civilians against attacks by Ugandan rebels, aid agency World Vision said in a report on Wednesday. Civilians and officials in Western Equatoria state, where Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels had been staying under a Sudanese-brokered truce with the government in Kampala, have blamed the guerrillas for looting, raping, killing and abducting children in the area.

One of Africa’s most respected and famous filmmakers Ousmane Sembene, also known as the Father of African Cinema, passed away on 9 June. Messages of condolence have been pouring into the office of the Pan African Federation of Filmmakers (FEPACI), an institution that Sembene co-founded in 1969.

He did not spare African rulers. He remained critical of post-colonial Africa for failing to meet many of her peoples’ expectations, where injustice continues to prevail. Sembene Ousmane is recognised as the Father of African cinema and has received countless awards and distinctions. As with his books, he used the medium of film as a critical and an educational tool, without compromising on aesthetics and the artistic impulse. His work promoted freedom and social justice, and aspired to restoring pride and dignity to the African people. He was a founder member of FAPACI (Pan African Federation of Film Makers) 1969-1970. South Africa joins the rest of Africa and the world in paying our deepest respects to a great revolutionary artist, Sembene Ousmane.

The protracted provincial border dispute between the government and residents of Khutsong, a township outside the mining town of Carletonville, has blocked the funding of a care centre for mentally and physically challenged children.

Authorities in Tanzania have expressed concern over the large numbers of pupils, mostly girls, who drop out of school because of pregnancy, teenage marriage, child labour or truancy. President Jakaya Kikwete said the number of primary school drop-outs rose to 44,742 in 2006 from 32,469 the previous year.

This volume discusses the contested nature of intellectual property rights and indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) in the context of southern Africa, including the protection of folklore, IKS in a digital era, the valuation and safeguard of heritage sites, the need for appropriate IKS legislation, community-based control of natural resources, and the role played by traditional music in the maintenance of community.

This empirical grounded collection of papers is a unique and distinctive contribution to the literature on IKS. The specific IKS-related issues raised and dealt with in this volume are generic in the sense that the very same issues are being contested in different parts of the world.

ISBN: 978-2-86978-194-8, 138pp, publ. 2007
Africa: 20.00 USD; CFA 10,000; elsewhere: US$24.95/GBP16.95

Orders:
Africa -
North America - www.africanbookscollective.com

Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has been named winner of the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction. She beat five other contenders for the £30,000 women-only award, including Kiran Desai, shortlisted for her Booker Prize winner The Inheritance of Loss. Adichie's novel, Half of a Yellow Sun, is her second work and set during the Biafran War of the 1960s.