A survey conducted in Kenya by a corruption watchdog has found that ordinary Kenyans were forced to pay less money in bribes last year than in the previous year. The survey by Transparency International said that ordinary Kenyans had become emboldened and were beginning to challenge the culture of bribe-taking.

The New National Party's leadership has suspended the party membership of Social Development Deputy Minister David Malatsi and former Western Cape premier Peter Marais pending an internal party investigation. Earlier in the week the pair were suspended from party activities pending a probe by the Public Protector into their role in the controversial Roodefontein golf estate development.

What is the role of Northern NGOs within the context of development aid to South Africa? This report examines what a selection of Northern NGOs have been doing in South Africa, particularly since 1994. It also looks at what their priorities have been and how they have changed. This also includes the question of what they see as their future roles and contributions towards development in South Africa, in coming years.

Around 12 million of Southern Africa’s 60-million people may die prematurely of Aids alone unless prompt and decisive action is taken to respond to the region’s humanitarian crisis, United Nations agencies have warned.

The multibillion-rand Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP), which transfers huge quantities of water from the rugged peaks of the Mountain Kingdom to the industrial heartland of South Africa, has always fitted the current stereotype of large dams – that they are massive, expensive and, environmental campaigners would say, destructive. The conviction on bribery charges last year of former Lesotho Highlands Water Authority (LHWA) CEO Masupha Sole and Canadian engineering firm Acres International added another dimension – corruption.

Around 12 million of Southern Africa's 60-million people may die prematurely of AIDS alone unless prompt and decisive action is taken to respond to the region's humanitarian crisis, United Nations agencies have warned.

There is a current discussion on the role that ICTs potentially have to play in rural areas of the developing world. Its stated aim is to look beyond the current 'digital divide' debate, which focuses on information disparities to assess the potential role of ICTs in the context of current rural development paradigms.

Through an article about AGOA you published recently, I learnt about your excellent web site. I am a Tanzanian citizen, a strong believer in social justice. I am also the co-coordinator of an informal group called Indigenous Rights for Survival International (IRSI). IRSI is a loose network of young people with an interest in public policy issues in Africa. We mainly discuss policy issues through email and ultimately write articles in the press. I am sending you this letter (available through the link below), which I wrote to the President of the United Republic of Tanzania calling on him to stop the violation of fundamental human rights in Loliondo Division of Ngorongoro, Tanzania.

Mozambican Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi has made it through to the final phase of the election of the next general director of the World Health Organisation (WHO). The others who have passed into the final stage are the Belgian Peter Piot, who heads the UNAIDS programme, the South Korean Jong Woo Ook, who heads the WHO programme against tuberculosis, the Mexican health minister Julio Frank Mora, and the former Egyptian health minister, Ismaial Salam.

President Mwai Kibaki last week restructured his government, trimming the functions of his office and naming a special official to spearhead the war on corruption. A department has been set up in the Office of the President to deal specifically with the fight against corruption and advise the president on the cleanup campaign. Its head will be the Permanent Secretary in charge of Governance and Ethics. John Githongo, long-time columnist for The EastAfrican and executive director of Transparency International (Kenya Chapter), was appointed first holder of the office.

Former president pro-tem of the Liberian Senate, Cllr. Charles W. Brumskine returned to his country last week after many years in exile in the United States. He fled Liberia in 1998 after he broke away from the regime of President Charles Taylor. Brumskine is planning to run for president in elections scheduled for October this year but the government of Charles Taylor has been cracking down on dissent and is battling an armed rebellion in the Northern part of Liberia.

The UN Humanitarian Envoy for Cote d'Ivoire, Carolyn McAskie, at the weekend appealed to the Ivorian government to exercise its obligations with regards to humanitarian law and provide protection to refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs).

UN agencies working in Somalia have called on Somali leaders and all parties to the conflict to take immediate measures to ensure that children are protected from violence. In a statement issued last Friday, Maxwell Gaylard, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, expressed deep concern at the recent killings, kidnappings and attacks targeting children.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Sergio Vieira de Mello, has promised a continued role for the UN in the promotion of human rights in Angola. However, the Brazilian diplomat has rejected calls for the UN to play a more forceful role in the investigation of alleged human rights abuses.

The 27 December 2002 elections and the smooth handover of power that followed was historical in many ways, and was praised globally as an example of democratic maturity in an African country.

The UN has prepared a coordinated multi-sectoral response to a malnutrition crisis it says is "likely to occur" in the country due to a poor harvest.

One man died and seven people were injured - two critically - in an attack on a ZANU-PF meeting in Kuwadzana, a suburb of Harare which is preparing for a local election.

Good initiative, looking forward to learning more about the newsletter.

The underdevelopment of Africa through the much talked about brain drain dates back to the period of the slave trade when a substantial part of Africa's able bodied labour force were carted to Europe and America. In his award winning book ''How Europe underdeveloped Africa'' the late Patrick Wilmot stated that the lack of economic progress by African countries stems from the age long problem of brain drain. Today, that phenomenon is a fatal cancer eating deep into the tissues of the African soul. But as we are made to understand, help is not too far away.

With peace seemingly entrenched after nearly three decades of civil war, Angolan society now strives for normalcy. But, warn observers, the end of the war is merely the beginning of a long, hard road to development.