What is a common factor in ensuring that women do not marry too young, do not have more children than they can cope with, do not die giving birth — and contract HIV in smaller numbers? The answer is men. That is the message for World Population Day 2007, which is being marked on Wednesday under the theme <i>Men as Partners in Maternal Health</i>.
About one million people in need of antiretroviral (ARV) treatment are yet to receive it in four Southern African states, according to Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), the global NGO specialising in medical services. On the African continent, about 70% of people who need ARVs do not have access to the drugs.
A senior African National Congress MP, Ben Turok, says the existing trade agreement between South Africa and the European Union has not benefited his country. The agreement "is not a good agreement. It has not brought benefit to South Africa. Europe has been the beneficiary," Turok said in an interview.
In Africa, 25 countries are expected to experience water scarcity or water stress in the next 20 to 30 years. This translates into 16% or 230-million of Africa’s population facing water scarcity by 2025, and 32% or 460-million people living in water-stressed countries by that time.
Reports that Zimbabwean Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu has annulled the registration of all NGOs active in the country have been greeted with dismay by civil society representatives. State-controlled television was quoted as saying that the annulment was aimed at identifying "agents of imperialism".
A debate is under way among analysts and civil society activists about how South African President Thabo Mbeki should proceed in fulfilling the mandate given to him last month by the Southern African Development Community to continue mediating between Zimbabwe’s government and opposition.
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/ 28 February 2007
After her father was murdered, Vanessa Lynch started a fund-raising initiative called the DNA Project to help the South African Police Service build up an efficient DNA database that can be used to identify criminals or to eliminate suspects. She explains how the project works and what its benefits are.
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/ 15 January 2007
This year will mark the first occasion on which an African country, Kenya, is serving as sole host of the World Social Forum (WSF) — a gathering that had its beginnings in the Brazilian town of Porto Alegre seven years ago. While the WSF did come to Africa in 2006, this was in the context of a so-called "polycentric forum" that also saw gatherings take place on other continents.
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/ 9 November 2006
The 2006 <i>Human Development Report</i>, titled <i>Beyond Scarcity: Power, Poverty and the Global Water Crisis</i>, focuses on the ongoing problems that surround provision of potable water and sanitation. The document was launched on Thursday in Cape Town by the United Nations Development Programme.
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/ 2 November 2006
"I was arrested a dozen times," notes Tapera Kapuya, a student leader at the University of Zimbabwe between 2001 and 2002 who says he was the target of both police and the Southern African country’s intelligence agents. "In November 2001 I was abducted from my room in the university by state agents and tortured for three days," he told Inter Press Service in South Africa, where he lives in exile.