One of the most important vehicles by which CODESRIA has sought to mobilise national-level research capacities and to channel these into organised reflections has been the National Working Groups (NWGs) which it has encouraged African researchers to organise autonomously on priority themes of their choice. NWGs have been supported by the Council in over forty African countries and have resulted in some of the most interesting studies on politics, economy and society in contemporary Africa.

Louis Michel, the Belgian former EU development commissioner and current prominent Liberal MEP has shocked his home nation and its one-time central African subjects by calling King Leopold II, the Congo's colonial master responsible for between 3 million and 10 million deaths, a "visionary hero."

Boubacar Boris DIOP

Wazir Mohamed

Fodé Roland Diagne

As criticisms of President Obama’s war and economic policies mount, the group that first questioned his intentions regarding the concerns of the black community is holding a national Congress to define a black agenda to serve the interests of black people.

With World Cup security stewards complaining of poor working conditions and unpaid wages, a labor dispute threatens to overshadow the action on the pitch in South Africa. SPIEGEL spoke to union head Evan Abrahamse about the workers' complaints.

After seven years of devastating effects of Access to information and protection of privacy act (AIPPA), the media and the population at large have welcomed the registration of four newspapers in Zimbabwe, which are Newsday, Daily News, Daily Gazette and The Mail. The latest is News Day, the new private daily newspaper that descended on the streets of Zimbabwe on 4 June 2010.

This latest report from the International Crisis Group, examines Cameroon’s situation after 28 years under President Paul Biya. The ruling party is weakened by intense internal rivalries over control of resources and positioning for the post-Biya period. Having done away with the constitutional limitation on the number of presidential terms, Biya, who is at the same time feared and opposed within his own party, is deliberately maintaining uncertainty over whether he will stand again.

The family, friends and well wishers of former member of parliament for Nyakach and eminent trade unionist Hon. James Dennis Akumu,

Cordially invite you to a Harambee
on Saturday 3 July 2010
at the United Kenya Club from 5:00pm–8:00pm

Hon. Akumu has been unwell over the past five years due to kidney complications. The Harambee is organised to raise funds for kidney transplant in India at the end of July 2010.

If you cannot make it to the Harambee, you may send your kind donation to:

J.D. Akumu
Standard Chartered Bank Ltd
Yaya Centre
Account No: 01501-9736-9300
Nairobi

You may also contribute via M-Pesa to Mrs Grace Akumu, Tel: 0725-808.292.
Those in Kisumu may also get in touch with his sister Mrs Asenath Bole Odaga on
Tel: 0733-959.681 / 0724-690.137

Thanking you in anticipation of your gracious support.

Do you want an insight into the investment opportunities in Ghana right now? Have you been trying to locate means of finance for your enterprise in Ghana? Would speaking to a knowledgeable experienced and well connected business person from Ghana be of use to you? Then this event is where you should definitely be to get some answers!

Namibia’s National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) calls upon visiting Zambian President Rupiah Bwezani Banda to help establish the fate or whereabouts of several Namibian freedom fighters who had disappeared without a trace to date on Zambian soil between 1976 and 1978. The Zambian security forces, presumably acting on the instructions of then SWAPO President Sam Nujoma, rounded them up after they were accused of being “radicals” and or “rebels”.

Swaziland's death rate more than doubled in a decade, proof of the toll of AIDS, statisticians in this southern African kingdom has said. Nombulelo Dlamini of the Central Statistical Office discussed a new study comparing censuses in 1997 and 2007 in an interview on Wednesday. The study shows that in 1997, the death rate was 7.6 people in 1,000. By 2007, it was 18.03 per 1,000 people. Life expectancy over the period decreased from 60 to 43 years.

The UN and humanitarian partners are very concerned at the increasingly insecure environment in Darfur in which the humanitarian community serves the people of Sudan. The steady deterioration of security conditions, particularly in the past two months, is not only affecting the population but directly targets the humanitarian community.

Over 50 million people in Africa and elsewhere in target countries benefited from loans of the Food Facility, a special instrument with a budget of 1 billion euros, established a year ago by the European Union (EU) to face the food crisis in developing countries, official sources said. According to a document, made available to the media, 65,000 children received supplemental nutrition care through the loans of the Food Facility, managed by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).

A new report by UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said that global prices of food could climb by as much as 40 per cent in the coming decade. FAO said that the rise would be caused by the growth in global population, which would increase the demand for more food. The report, entitled: "The Agriculture Outlook 2010-19", which was made available to the Pan African News Agency (PANA) on Wednesday, anticipated that wheat and coarse grain prices could jump to levels of between 15 and 40 per cent higher than they were between 1997 and 2006.

The United States has welcomed the release by a Rwandan court of Peter Erlinder, an American lawyer who had been detained since May on charges of denying the 1994 genocide. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said US embassy officials were at the court hearing and immediately shared the news with Mr Erlinder's family.

The World Cup has rightly captured the country’s imagination, writes Leonard Gentle. Despite Bafana’s anaemic performance against the Uruguayans, there is still a clear sense of relief amongst opinion makers that we’re pulling off hosting the event. The dominant voice proclaims that we’ve proven everyone – meaning the prophets of doom – wrong.

People look for refuge in other countries because they have no other option- they are being persecuted at home because of who they are, their beliefs or their opinions. Sadly, all too often, instead of finding safety in other countries, many find closed borders, xenophobia, detention and terrible living conditions. Some are denied a fair hearing of their asylum claims and could be forced to return home, where their lives are in danger. On World Refugee Day, 20 June 2010, Amnesty International calls on states to reaffirm everyone's right to seek and to enjoy asylum, as recognized in article 14 of the UDHR.

At least 11 people were killed on Friday and dozen others wounded after rebel militias attacked the barracks of Somali government forces in Hosh, southern Mogadishu. "Insurgents, supported by foreign terrorists, attacked our base in the Hosh area early this morning," government security official Ahmed Warsame said.

The world's oceans are virtually choking on rising greenhouse gases, destroying marine ecosystems and breaking down the food chain -- irreversible changes that have not occurred for several million years, a new study says. The changes could have dire consequences for hundreds of millions of people around the globe who rely on oceans for their livelihoods.

The historic meeting at the Kennedy Road settlement on Sunday went well despite the intimidation from the local ANC. The background to this meeting, and its importance, is that in September last year Abahlali baseMjondolo(AbM) and the Kennedy Road Development Committee (KRDC), the openly and freely elected committee in the settlement, were expelled in violent attacks organised through the local ANC and supported by the police and the criminal justice system.