An op-ed piece in The Citizen notes that Saturday’s sinking of a ferryboat off the coast of Unguja Island with the loss of almost 200 lives brings to the fore a very pertinent question: were any lessons learnt from the May 21, 1996 MV Bukoba disaster in Lake Victoria in which close to 1,000 people died? It is hard not to draw comparisons between the two incidents given that factors behind the accidents bear an uncanny resemblance.

In this week's edition of the Emerging Powers News Round-Up, read a comprehensive list of news stories and opinion pieces related to China, India and other emerging powers...

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Please contribute here now so that our voices can be heard outside South Africa:

Citing the long history of the presence of peoples from the Indian sub-continent in Africa, the National Museums of Kenya sponsored, in 2000, a special exhibit on the 'Asian African Heritage.' This special issue of Research in African Literatures follows the lead of this exhibition by bringing together new essays by some of the leading scholars who have written on Asian African literatures in East and South Africa. The articles engage both with writers who are now considered canonical, such as M.G. Vassanji from Tanzania and Ahmed Essop from South Africa, as well as newer voices that have emerged over the past decade.

This year’s International Literacy Day, celebrated world-wide on 8 September, will focus on the link between literacy and peace. During a ceremony in New Delhi, India, UNESCO will award the international Confucius and King Sejong literacy prizes to projects in Burundi, Mexico, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the United States of America. South and West Asia account for more than half (51,8%) the world’s adult illiterate population, ahead of sub-Saharan Africa (21,4%), East Asia and the Pacific (12,8%), the Arab States (7,6%), Latin America and the Caribbean (4,6%), North America, Europe and Central Asia (2%).

Several leading human rights activists are urging South African President Jacob Zuma to reconsider his plan to appoint a controversial pastor to lead the country's judicial system. Three women Nobel laureates say that Zuma's selection, Mogoeng Mogoeng, would weaken women's rights if appointed as chief justice of the Constitutional Court.

Hundreds of placard-carrying women, from about 10 Gbaramatu communities in Warri South-West Local Government Area of Delta State, laid siege to the project site of Chevron Nigeria Limited at Chanomi Creek and disrupted the laying of pipelines for the multi-billon dollars Escravos Gas to Liquid project.

Human Rights Watch reports that black Libyans and African migrants are being held on suspicion of having fought as mercenaries for Gaddafi, by the de facto authorities, the National Transitional Council (NTC), solely on account of their skin colour. The migrants are being held in ad hoc places of detention across Tripoli, and it remains unclear how or if the NTC plans to review each case to determine whether there is evidence of criminal activity or not.

Social Media for Social Change is an intensive course for youth and volunteers that will introduce you to social media tools that drive social change. Social media includes internet-based and mobile phone tools and platforms for communications, such as Facebook and Twitter. The course will provide you with skills in how to plan and organise a basic social media communications strategy for your organisation that strengthens networking. To register or get more information about the Training, please contact Isabella Falsted at [email]isf.gptza@ms.dk or Elsie Eyakuze at [email]eyakuzee@mstcdc.or.tz

Total global mobile connections are set to surpass 6 billion by year-end, according to the latest Wireless Intelligence forecasts, a landmark which would mean the industry has added the last 1 billion connections in just 16 months. Wireless Intelligence estimates that the 6 billion milestone will be reached in late November and that total global connections will end the year at 6.07 billion. Africa is set to overtake the Americas as the second-largest regional market on 648 million connections (11 per cent of the total). Africa is forecast to record the strongest year-on-year connections growth of all the global regions, rising 18 per cent over the previous year.

The Executive Director of the Ghana Blind Union (GBU), Dr. Peter Obeng Asamoah, has appealed to the government to channel more resources into the education of persons with disability in the country, especially the blind. He stressed that if the country was serious about getting rid of blind beggars from the streets of the cities, then a conscious effort must be made to provide them with the requisite education.

The IIE Scholar Rescue Fund (SRF) is pleased to announce a call for applications for threatened academics whose lives or work are in danger in their home countries. Fellowships support temporary academic positions at safe universities and colleges anywhere in the world. Professors, researchers, and lecturers from any country or field may apply.

The Inaugural OUT Film Festival will be the first public showing of cinema that reflects the life of sexual minorities. The film festival wants to make known a community that Kenyan society deems to be secret. The festival aims to entertain, educate and celebrate. There will be a variety of films and documentaries from within and outside the continent that will alter the way you look at the way the Queer community lives and loves.

The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement North (SPLM-N) declared resistance to what it described as a coup against the elected governor of the Blue Nile State, Malik Aggar, announcing intensification of its efforts to forge a nationwide alliance to execute regime-change agendas.

Africa Today spoke with Professor Lako Tongun on the independence of the Republic of South Sudan. Professor Tongun was in attendance during the celebrations in Juba, South Sudan on July 11, 2011.

The rape of girls and women remains a major concern in South Africa, and the health care sector needs to be better equipped to collect evidence to prove sexual violation to help secure the conviction of perpetrators by the courts. The Foundation for Professional Development, a project of the South African Medical Association, is trying to improve how rape survivors are treated. It’s currently training health care workers to counsel victims of rape and to collect forensic evidence to help survivors build strong legal cases should they want the justice system involved.

Thomas C. Mountain, writing on counterpunch.org, reports that the recently released, and long awaited, Wikileaks Files on Ethiopia expose the lies used to justify UN 'inSecurity' Council Sanctions in force against Eritrea.

As of September 1, the Guantánamo Public Memory Project will be coordinated from the Institute for the Study of Human Rights at Columbia University, steered by a leadership committee of partners including the International Coalition of Sites of Conscience.

Women are our best hope for the continent, says Zimbabwean writer Petina Gappah in her introduction to The Africa Report's list of the 50 women shaping Africa. Porgress has been slow, but many women are showing the art of the possible, inspiring a new generation to take control of their destiny.

INTERPOL has issued Red Notices for Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, his son Saif Al-islam Gaddafi and former director of military intelligence Abdullah Al-Senussi after the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Luis Moreno-Ocampo, requested the world police body to issue internationally wanted persons notices against the Libyan nationals for alleged crimes against humanity, including murder and persecution.