Women Garner Majority of Seats in New Rwanda Parliament

In a world's first, women MPs have outnumbered their male counterparts resulting from a Parliamentary Election. Rwanda, emerging barely 14 years from the dark episode of its 1994 Genocide, had already made huge strides for women in policy-making by making it mandatory for 30% of its Parliamentarians to be women, but in the latest election the nation far surpassed that quota, bringing in 45 women MPs -56.25% of the 80 seat Legislature. Rwanda is the first country anywhere in the world to achieve this milestone and demonstrates that nation's desire to bring women into the forefront of decision making as well as its high prioritization of women's issues. The country had before this election already made very progressive and novel steps to ensure that every sector of society was well represented by reserving special seats in Parliament for women, the youth and the disabled. This development should, however, earn Rwanda more global attention in a world that has all too often despised the leadership potential in women.

All the parties fielding candidates in Rwanda's September 16 - 18th election had at least one woman winning a seat with the coalition Rwanda Patriotic Front taking the lion's share of 42 seats.

http://www.unifem.org/news_events/story_detail.php?StoryID=736

http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:joP82iqgUJ8J:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_parliamentary_election,_2008+Rwanda+Elections+2008&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1

Kenyan Park Sees The Return of Big cats

The East African nation of Kenya has many beautiful sites to see, from its idyllic coast to the wonders of its Mara Game reserve in the South West of the country, but probably one of its most fascinating locations is the Nairobi National Park where lions for a long time roamed in close proximity to the capital city providing an interesting contrast of the totally wild and cosmopolitan city in one portrait. The number of lions and other big cats had, however, by 2003 seen a sharp decline, largely because of being hunted down by Pastrolists with whom they share the Park. In 2003 alone, 11 lions were killed. This had be due to the fact that the big cats had been killing livestock and their Pastoral owners had not been compensated through a now terminated Lion Endowment Fund which had existed for this purpose. Thankfully, this crisis spurred some of the friends of the park into action to save the situation; Since 2004, African Heritage Day has been held, hosted by a Mr. Alan Donovan, co-founder of African Heritage, an African Art House, to raise money to encourage migration into and keep Big Cats at the park. The effort has received support from a wide array of people and organizations and now the park is beginning to see the return of lions and other Big Cats returning the park to its status as a most fascinating of sites.


http://allafrica.com/stories/200809220321.html

East Africa International Business Forum

Kigali, Rwanda will from October 29-30 host the East Africa International Business Forum which will bring together stakeholders in the East African Business Community as well as potential investors. The Forum is being organized by the Commonwealth Business Council (CBC) and the East African Business Council (EABC) with the support of the government of Rwanda and should be an important shop window for the five countries that make up the East African Community -Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi. The East African region has a market of approximately 100 million people. Already the US-based Corporate Council on Africa (CCA), Germany's Afrika-Verein and the French Council of Investors in Africa (CIAN) have announced their support for the forum, bringing with them representation of well over 250 companies. These organizations along with CBC will represent a huge number of Africa's leading investors - bringing together five of the G8 countries as well as India, Nigeria and South Africa. Their involvement is said to likely contribute to increased investment in East Africa. The forum is themed "East Africa: One Market One Destination".

Fighting Disease Through ICT

In Africa, the growth of mobile phone usage has been nothing short of phenomenal. The phone, because of its relatively low cost (in some cases), easy set-up and greater efficiency than land lines has brought many Africans into a high efficiency communication age enabling them to communicate with one another and the world with an ease they could not have imagined possible just a few years ago. Mobile phones have become an essential component driving business effectiveness and efficiency, over and above the primary help it has given to people to enhance communication. Modifications on the phones have also seen them being used for a number of business and non business applications. It is now beginning to catch on as well that mobile phone applications can be very powerful tools in the battle against disease on the Continent. With the ability to take and use the phones in even some of the more remote regions, mobile phones can truly be a potent force for health care. This fact has spurred a joint venture between the United Nations Foundation and the Vodafone Foundation - Technology Partnership - whose purpose is to help far-flung health workers share critical medical data. The venture will expand the use of an open-source application known as EpiSurveyor, which can be downloaded to mobile phones, enabling healthcare workers to track data on various health concerns, to 22 African countries by the end of this year.


http://allafrica.com/stories/200809220356.html

Trans-Saharan Pipeline Prospect Receiving Attention

Nigeria, which has the seventh largest reserves of Natural Gas of any country in the world is beginning to receive heavy attention because of its prospects of supplying some of its gas to Europe through a trans-Saharan pipeline. Gazprom, Russia's leading gas supplier has already held talks with the Government of Nigeria over the pipeline, signing a memorandum of understanding covering co-operation in the exploration, development and transportation of gas reserves. The European Union has quickly followed suit, expressing its desire to help build the pipeline which could take gas from Nigeria to Europe through Niger and Algeria. Gas from Nigeria would be a very crucial alternative supply source for the EU which has had differences with its current chief supplier, Russia. Nigeria (and the other countries along the pipeline route) would, of course, have to find a means of protecting the pipeline, with the presence of militants in Nigeria's gas-producing Niger Delta, Tuareg rebels in Niger, and Islamist groups in Algeria who may see the pipeline as a very tempting target.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7621500.stm

Voting Reform Recommended For Kenya

After six months of information collecting and review, the The Independent Review Commission (IREC), looking into the issues surrounded the disputed December 2007 Kenya Presidential elections, handed in their final report to the President and Government of Kenya. While handing in the report, IREC, headed by South African Judge, Johann Kriegler, made the submission that even with a thorough investigation of facts and circumstances surrounding the election, it was impossible to ascertain who really won the December 2007 polls. The Commission could, however, conclusively say that there was great need to overhaul the Electoral Commission of Kenya and its functions. This change, they said, was necessary to avoid a repeat of the confusion that surrounded the 2007 poll results and subsequent violence that followed. In effect, IREC has given Kenya one pillar on which to build a future of peace and stability and part of a road-map through which the country can avoid pitfalls of chaos. The country will do well to heed IREC's advice and the rest of the Continent would do well to look at the report for themselves.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7621777.stm

Zimbabwe: Historic Unity Pact Signed Today

In the most concrete step made towards political reconciliation and progress in Zimbabwe yet, the key players in the country's political crisis signed a Unity Government Pact in the country's capital, Harare, today. The signing of the pact was witnessed live by millions of Zimbabweans on TV and presided over by Thabo Mbeki in the company of 10 African Heads of State. The Pact inaugurates opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai as Prime Minister, keeping Robert Mugabe as President with reduced powers. Arthur Mutambara is Deputy Prime Minister. The three leaders will be sharing power and the Cabinet will consist of 31 members, 16 from the former opposition party MDC and its breakaway faction led by Tsvangirai and Mutambara respectively, and 15 from Mugabe's ZANU-PF. According to Tsvangirai the top priority of the new government would be to bring food to food-scarce Zimbabwe. He urged parties to look past past wrongs. Mugabe, on his part, hailed the Pact as a triumph of African Diplomacy.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200809150833.html

Kenya: Acting Finance Minister Acts Tough on Port's Authority

Government seems to be working in an unprecedented fashion in Kenya; Roads are being repaired, laxity and inefficiency is being addressed, Members of Parliament are being held more accountable and the rule of law seems to be applying to the political elite more than it ever has before. This has probably come on the back of a pervasive mentality that the country must move forward from the dark, old era of bloated, inefficient government and the tighter media scrutiny of the work of Kenya's Coalition Government. Among the stand-out Ministers in this Government have been the Prime Minister, Raila Odinga, and maverick Acting Finance Minister, John Michuki. Mr. Michuki is famous for bringing sanity to the transport sector while serving as Transport Minister in the previous Government. He now is bringing order to Kenya's port where cargo delays, mismanagement and inefficiency has hampered the work of the most important port along the Eastern shore of Africa. The Acting Finance Minister was exactly what the port needed after years of inaction on its many ills. Among the sweeping reforms ordered by the Minister was the destruction of 700 imported vehicles and cargo in 7,000 containers abandoned at the port. He also issued directives to various agencies to comply with and enhance the Port's 24 hour operation. The Port's reforms should serve to remove the virtual bottleneck that the Port had become to its clients.

http://www.nation.co.ke/business/news/-/1006/468948/-/jixatcz/-/index.html

Tanzania: Country making use of Natural Gas Potential

Traditionally, it has been North, West, Central and Southern African countries that have been the energy and mineral giants of the continent with East African lagging far behind. The rest of the Continent's energy and mineral wealth has improved the standard of living of most of it's people very little (by and large) and has instead brought bloodshed and anguish as factions in these regions have fought over the resources. It is only now, decades after energy and mineral resources were discovered, that many of the countries in the rest of Africa are beginning to mend from resource mismanagement and war. Now East Africa is beginning to discover its own natural reserves of energy and mineral wealth. Hopefully, the troubles of the rest of Africa with mineral wealth has been a lesson to this region; Tanzania has found significant coal and natural gas reserves on its territory and already has plans to export some of its gas wealth to Kenya. This is in addition to its huge reserves in eleven key minerals which include gold, Nickel, Tanzanite, Diamonds, copper, Iron ore, coal, Limestone, soda ash, gypsum and phosphate. Whether the newly discovered Natural Gas and minerals' potential for creating wealth is fully exploited is a question that Tanzania's government and people will have to answer but they need not look far for wisdom on what not to do.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200809150569.html

http://www.ippmedia.com/ipp/observer/2008/08/31/121629.html