DIPLOMAT East Africa - Volume 19

>> Women of Substance PG. 10 November 2011

Volume 019

Door to Region, Window on World

Kenya’s War of Choice KDF Goes After Somali Militia Gang

Special Feature PG. 45 Kenya KSh300

Uganda USh9000

Tanzania TSh7500

Rwanda RWFr3000

Burundi BUFr6000

South Africa R30

Rest of Africa US$4

USA $4

UK £3

Canada $5

Rest of Europe €3.5

•DIPLOMATIC LICENCE

Kenya’s War is About Regional Security

A

n enduring lesson of the post 9/11 period is that the war on terror is a war without end and that any means is justifiable as long as it helps achieve its end.

Kenya has sent its troops into Somalia in its first cross-border campaign in 44 years and it is understood that the offensive was under detailed consideration for several weeks before the official declaration of war against Al Shabaab on October, 15 2011.

The action is justified in the light of the unprovoked attacks by the ragtag Somali militias on Kenyan territory and, in particular, on the economically strategic tourism sector.

International law is on Kenya’s side too. Indeed, the United Nations Security Council in passing Resolution 1368 which condemned Al Qaeda’s attacks on the US on September 11, 2001, asserted the Universal Right to Self-Defence of victim states.

But Kenya must make a distinction between a “war of necessity” and a “war of choice” as it prosecutes its military operation against the Al Shabaab militia. If the objective is to clear the militia from areas bordering Kenya and to capture the all –important port of Kismayu; it must end its operation once it achieves these goals and hand over the areas to the African Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) troops.

It must also assure Somali President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed of its true intentions and strive to rally him to its side; going to war against a militia in a foreign state without the express consent and support of the government of that country is fraught with danger.

It is encouraging that the Somali Prime Minister, Abdiweli Mohamed was in Nairobi just days after Sharif disowned the Kenyan operation to pledge his government’s support for the attack, emphasising the fact that the troops from the Federal Transitional Government were leading the joint Kenya/AMISIOM operation.

We, at Diplomat East Africa have no problem with who leads the operation, as long as it either crushes or deals a serious body blow to the murderous Al Shabaab militias.

Sharif has expressed fears that Nairobi could be planning

to establish a Jubaland enclave to act as a buffer between Kenya and Somalia, further breaking up the troubled country. Kenya’s Prime Minister Raila Odinga has gone out of his way to assure the Somali government that Nairobi has no such intentions.

Odinga had better be right because any Juba State, or Azania as the French call it, will be of bigger peril to Kenya and Ethiopia than to the rest of Somalia, which has seen Puntland and Somali land break away without dampening its warlord’s appetite for sundry quarrels and armed conflict.

For Kenya, it holds a real risk of awakening the secessionist instincts in Kenya’s Ogaden community. It also puts Ethiopia, which is Kenya’s ally in the fight against the Somali terror group, in a difficult position as it seeks to put down the rebellion by the Oromo in the south of the country.

But the Kenya government must also learn the art of public communication during a time of crisis. The government must speak with one voice; we cannot have different ministers speak at variance on the same issue at the same time. It is disconcerting and creates the impression of an angry drunkard fighting imaginary enemies.

It would also help if we could see a drop in the bravado and tough talk; Kenya is not the first country to dash into Somalia only leave with its tail neatly curled between its legs.

Just ask Washington about is military-cum- humanitarian operation in 1993 that ended dramatically with the “Black Hawk chopper down” incident or Ethiopia’s highly expensive attempt in 2006/07 to oust the Islamic Courts only to have the Al Shabaab move in.

But one thing need not be gainsaid; any military venture in Somalia is always going to be a risky venture. If there is one thing Somalis know best, it is war; when they are not fighting external aggression they are busy fighting one another, so in a sense they get enough practice.

In a nutshell, Kenya’s war in Somalia is about regional security. Al Shabaab menaces us all in East Africa and the Greater Horn Region

November 2011

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•IMMUNITIES & IMPUNITIES

Heard and Quoted

"

"It is the Al Shabab who have declared war against us, we have subsequently done the same and there is no turning back", Francis Kimemia, Kenya's PS in Charge of Internal Security.

2

"It is a historic moment. It is the end of tyranny and dictatorship.

Gaddafi has met his fate," Libya's National Transitional Council spokesman, Abdel Hafez Ghoga, after reports of Gaddafi's capture and killing at Sirte on October 20th.

November 2011

"The discovery that this expansion is accelerating is astounding. If the acceleration continues, the universe wil end in ice," Nobel jury on nominating three people for this year's prize.

Terrific, thank you. I feel married. I feel absoletely wonderful," UK music icon, Sir Paul McCartney, 69, on marrying New York heiress, Nancy Shevell, his third wife at Westminster Registrar's Office, London.

•DIPLOSPEAK Have Your Say

Dictators Beware!

The recent death of Muammar Gaddafi has got me thinking about the fate of dictators not only in Africa but the world at large. Turned against by the same people who he had been ruling for 42 years one can only wonder how he did not see this coming. With this new era of the 21st century people are more aware of their rights and have access to information. The same fate also befell Hosni Mubarak. A revolution was planned under his nose and further fueled through FaceBook.

Luckily for him, he didn’t end up dead in a culvert like Gaddafi but is under trial and was first hauled to court in a cage! Not to be left behind is Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali who fled to Saudi Arabia after similar protests. I can bet he is not about to resurface any time soon after what happened to Gaddafi.

Then we have Saddam Hussein whom was was executed, after his flight from justice ended up in a foxhole. If dictators were keen on following regional affairs they should have borrowed a page from Saddam’s book. Still the same cycle: protests begin, dictator flees or goes into hiding, and he is hunted down and in unlucky circumstances killed.

This serves to show those dictators’ years of ruling are about to come to an end and if not handled well it will be a nasty end. The cases of Gaddafi, Sadam Hussein are more than adequate examples of the possibilitie It is apparent that the era of highhanded regimes are marked around the globe, but all this can change.

The (dictators) do not have to wait to resort to violence and death before they yield. They can do the dignified thing and just quit. If not they should know that their rod is on the fire waiting to be retrieved and moulded accordingly. As they say, the die is cast

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RANT/RAVE

>> Eritrea Takes on Ethiopia PG. 13 October 2011

Volume 018

Door to Region, Window on World

I am pleased with the action that the government of Kenya is taking

to fight the Al Shabaab of Somalia

Mother Courage Tribute to Prof Wangari Maathai 1940-2011

Special Feature PG. 19 Kenya KSh300

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Grace Njeri Nairobi, Kenya

KENYA STANDS UP I am pleased with the action that the government of Kenya is taking to fight the Al Shabaab of Somalia.

For long these rebels have stirred trouble along the Kenyan coastlines but this time they have stirred up an hornet’s nest. Kenya has never been known to associate with war but I would call this a necessary measure, lest the Al Shabab think they are about to get away with murder, literally. The support the Kenyan army is getting from the Somali government is also admirable, even with the elections just around the corner. All leaders agree that this was a wise decision and support it fully. Kenyan citizens are also in support of the war. The army needs nothing more than moral support from their mother country. With that in place the soldiers will fight to the bone for Kenya not because it’s their duty but also because they have been made to feel it is right.

Most Kenyans may be apprehensive especially because the Al Shabaab has threatened to attack the city of Nairobi. Kenya is seen as a safe

November 2011

haven for the neighbouring troubled countries of Somalia and Sudan. It is also of importance economically to landlocked countries such as Uganda and Rwanda. Therefore, instability in Kenya affects other states in the region, as demonstrated during the 2007-8 post-poll violence, in which youths uprooted the railway in parts of Nairobi, affecting transport of fuel to Uganda. The war against the Al Shabab is one that must be won.

That is as it should be.

Justus Muhwezi, WE'D LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU: Send your letters to, letters@ diplomateastafrica.com.

Submission of a letter constitutes permission to publish it in any form or medium. Letters may be edited for reasons of space and clarity.

DISCLAIMER: All letters submitted to Diplomat East Africa are presumed to be intended for publication. The editor reserves the right to edit all letters. Readers are advised to keep their letters short and to submit their names and addresses even when these are not to be published.

Uganda

WELCOMING PALESTINE TO UNESCO It may not ease the daily pain of occupation and blockade or the endless anguish of refugee status and exile or the continual humiliations of discrimination and second class citizenship, but the admission of Palestine to membership in UNESCO is for so many reasons a step forward in the long march of the Palestinian people toward the dignity of sunlight! The event illuminates the path to self-determination, but also brings into the open some of the most formidable obstacles that must be cleared if further progress is to be made. The simple arithmetic of the UNESCO vote, 107 in favor, 14 opposed, 52 abstentions, and 21 absent fails to tell the story of really one sided was the vote. What is most impressive about the UNESCO vote is that despite the US diplomacy of threat and intimidation, the Palestinian application for membership carried the day.

Richard Falk USA

>> Women of Substance PG. 10

Volume No 019 • November 2011

Door to Region, Window on World

Kenya’s War of Choice KDF Goes After Somali Militia Gang

Special Feature PG. 45

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DIPLOMATIC LICENCE Kenya’s War is About Regional Security.........................1

DESIGN TEAM Daniel Kihara Raphael Mokora

PHOTOGRAPHY Yahya Mohamed

CONTRIBUTORS Biko Jackson, Nairobi Godwin Muhwezi, Arusha Edward Githae, Kigali Silvia Rugina, Kigali Godfrey Musila, Johannesburg John Gachie, Juba John Mulaa, Washington DC Julius Mbaluto, London Manoah Esipisu, London Kennedy Abwao, Addis Ababa Mishaeli Ondieki, Los Angeles Rodney Muhumuza, Kampala Peter Mwaura, Nairobi Robert Mugo, Alberta, Canada

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IMMUNITIES AND IMPUNITIES...................2 THE REGION Regional intrigues Blur War in Somalia......................................................6-9 Women of Substance............................................. ..10-12 Diplomacy with Some Charisma.............................13-14 Kenyan Media at War...............................................15-16 Lessons From Botswana...........................................17-18

DNA Half Century for Human Rights...............................19-20 Steve Job's Formula for Success...............................21-23

Economy 'Colour Your World'..................................................24-25 Premier Business Talks Come to Nairobi....................................................26 Best Place to Do Business..............................................27

TOURISM DAY Domestic Tourists.....................................................28-29

DISCLAIMER: Diplomat East Africa may not be copied and or transmitted or stored in any way or form, electronically or otherwise, without the prior and written consent of the publisher. Diplomat East Africa is published at Vision Plaza, Ground Floor, Suite 19, Mombasa Road, by Global Village Publishers (EA) Limited, Box 23399 – 0625, and Telephone 020-2525253/4/5. Registered at the GPO as a newspaper.

WORLD FOOD DAY

World Environmental Powerhouse ..............................................................36-37

GLOBAL STAGE Hard Times in the US................................................38-39 Libya on the Cross-Road..........................................40-41

HEALTH Curbing Mother-Child Deaths.................................42-43 Major Onslaught to Tame Malaria................................44

AU-IBAR SPECIAL REPORT AU-IBAR Marks 60th Anniversary...........................45-48 AU Leadership behind IBAR's Success........................49 Animal Resources - a Driver for Economic Development in Africa...........................50-51 IBAR’S Fight Against other Animal Diseases........................................................53-55

DEA HOTELS Timeless Elegance….................................................56-57

CULTURE Memories are made of this…...................................58-59

ODYSSEYS Nairobi to Juba – By Road.........................................60-61

ENVOYS OF SPORT

Marking World Food Day amid Dwindling Supplies..................................................30-31

Football's Big Names Missing..................................62-63

Green Agenda

BRIEFS..........................................................64

UNEP Youth Conference Spotlights Green Economy......................................34-35

DIARY..........................................................66

November 2011

55

•THE REGION AU-Leadership

6

November 2011

November 2011

Regional intrigues Blur War in Somalia After years of frustration over the seemingly endless crisis in Somalia, Nairobi has decided enough is enough after the terror gang Al Shabaab targeted the country’s economically strategic tourism sector, but vested interests are getting in the way of the military campaign, reports MOHAMMED WARSAMA

A

s we went to press, Kenya was marking the second week in its war against the rag tag terror militia, the Al Shabaab inside Somalia. It was the Kenya Defence Forces’ first cross-border excursion in 44 years against a nebulous and shadowy gang with no fixed address.

But regional supremacy intrigues involving bitter rivals Ethiopia and Eritrea, and Uganda hosting the hapless Somali President Sheikh Sharif after he publicly denounced Kenya’s incursion into his country risk undermining Kenya’s campaign to rid the region of the Al Haraka Al Shabaab menace.

President Yoweri Museveni has so far the largest number of troops under the African Union Mission to Somalia (AMISOM). The 9,000 troops also have a small Burundian presence.

Kenya last went to battle in 1967 in the so-called Shifta War against Somali-backed militia who wanted the country’s Northern Frontier Districts to secede to Somalia. Indeed, under retired President Daniel arap Moi, Nairobi was averse to sending

its forces to war, instead, he was fond of holding airy meetings seeking to reconcile Somali's feuding factions and forming transitional governments for the country.

He had more success in Sudan than in Somalia. Somalia, though, has always been of special interest to Kenya, which has a population of about 2.4 million ethnic Somalis and hosts about 600,000 refugees from the troubled country.

Nairobi has also greatly benefited from Somali investments and their remittances from the diaspora, with the city suburb of Eastleigh earning itself the sobriquet of little Mogadishu, after the Somali capital.

KAMPALA ACCORD

It was not lost on observers that Sharif owes his position to the Ugandan President who on June 9, 2011 under the terms of the so-called Kampala Accord, enabled the Somali President and Speaker’s tenure extended by one more year, in effect over riding the country’s constitution. This way he saved Sharif from a no-confidence vote instigated by the Speaker of the Somali National Assembly in the face of a damaging

standoff between the president and a former PM Mohamed Abdullahi.

Mohammed, a US-educated former diplomat was widely credited with launching a crackdown on graft, paying public sector salaries and improving security in Mogadishu, but he became too popular for Sharif’s comfort and was ousted with Museveni’s support.

Ironically, Sharif landed in Kampala on November 2, just a day after his Prime Minister, Abdiweli Mohammed jetted into Nairobi to assuage angry Kenyan officials over his president’s change of heart over the military incursion.

Sharif had assured the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) of his government’s full backing for any military campaign to rid Somalia of the Al Shabaab menace in a meeting held in Addis Ababa on October 21.

IGAD countries, save for Eritrea and Uganda; do not hold Sharif in high esteem. Indeed, confidential documents on the Somali situation seen by Diplomat East Africa, accuse Sharif, a colourless former warlord, of being the biggest obstacle to peace in Somalia.

November 2011

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•THE REGION Kenya at War

ETHIOPIA VERSUS ERITREA

Even more intriguing are reports of planes landing at airfields in the country bearing arms for the militia and, for which, Ethiopia has enthusiastically blamed Eritrea, thereby opening a new and distractive front in the campaign.

Security sources who spoke to Diplomat East Africa expressed skepticism about the arms report, pointing out that at the moment Somali airspace is under 24-hour surveillance by US, French and British intelligence. Secondly, why would Eritrea send a plane to Somalia at a time when it’s being blamed for supporting the terror gang?

It is understood that the bulk of special forces from the US and NATO, which had been deployed in North Africa and, in particular Libya, during the Arab Spring uprising that saw the demise of Muammar Gadhafi, are now in the Horn of Africa region.

France, in particular, is keen to avenge the kidnapping and death of its citizen and the capture of its security intelligence operative by Al Shabaab, while the US has never really forgiven the Somali warlords

8

for the downing of its Black Hawk chopper in 1993 that saw its security and humanitarian operation end in humiliation.

Tanzania has expressed support for the Kenyan incursion but has offered no direct assistance, while Rwanda, has already committed troops to the UN peacekeeping forces in Darfur and Haiti, might be too stretched to assist in Somalia.

So far Kenya, which has about 5,000 troops in Somalia, appears to be fighting a “phantom war” with the only indication of any military activity being Armed Personnel Carriers and four-wheel all-terrain vehicles manoeuvring in desolate dry land, with no enemy positions in sight and no evidence of any damage.

The only hint that these gallant soldiers are engaged in any war is the daily briefing by military spokesman Major Emmanuel Chirchir.

The incursion into Somalia and the declaration of war against Al Shabaab was made public on October 15, 2011, but so far the fighting has a distinct surreal feeling to it. The casualty figures released by the KDF have so far been low for a

November 2011

campaign of this magnitude; with less than 10 Kenyans reported either dead or missing and about 100 Somalis killed.

Two days after Kenya launched its campaign, the US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Johnnie Carson was in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, for private talks with President Paul Kagame, who had just launched a training programme for military officers from the East African Community countries on counter-terrorism, rapid deployment and disaster management. It is believed that Kenya's war in Somalia topped the agenda.

Kenya’s action is justified in the light of the unprovoked attacks by the ragtag Somali militias on its territory and, in particular, on the economically strategic tourism sector.

Though Al Shabaab took the blame for the kidnap and death of French woman Marie Dedieu and the capture of British tourist Judith Tebutt whose husband was shot dead during the incident in Kenya’s northern tourism circuit; it is turning out that the attacks could have been committed by the less known terror gangs Ahlu Sunna Wal Jamah and Ras Kamboni which are based just north of Kenya/Somalia border.

INTERNATIONAL LAW

International law is on Kenya’s side too. Hot pursuit is allowed in international law and indeed, the United Nations Security Council in passing Resolution 1368 which condemned Al Qaeda’s attacks on the US on September 11, 2001, asserted the Universal Right to Self-Defence of victim states.

The dissent by the Somali President did threaten to put a wrinkle on Kenya’s campaign, raising the distinctly bad taste of the incursion appearing rogue; but the rest of his government quickly broke ranks with him and supported the campaign. The surprise arrival of the Somali Premier in Nairobi and

•THE REGION Kenya at War

his endorsement of the campaign in press briefings with his Kenyan counterpart, Raila Odinga, gave the incursion the much-needed seal of approval.

His assertion, made with a straight face that troops from the largely hapless Transitional Federal Government were leading the campaign that has also co-opted the overstretched AMISOM team were received with good humour in Nairobi.

Obviously the remarks were meant for his domestic audience in Somalia, which had reacted with anger to remarks by President Sharif that his government was unhappy with the presence of Kenyan troops in his country.

As it is, his TFG soldiers are protected by the AMISOM troops, just like they have provided a shield around the rest of his beleaguered government. But the statement served another purpose; it was meant to undermine a viral propaganda campaign by Al Shabaab indicating that, in reality, the Kenyan campaign was being directed by the Ethiopian government.

Historically, Somalis detest Ethiopians and any indications that the Kenyan campaign was being directed from Addis Ababa would have seen a groundswell of Somali opposition to it.

Kenya has stated its objectives as being; to clear the militia from areas bordering the country, if possible to break its back and to capture the all–important port of Kismayu so as starve it of funding. It must end its operation once it achieves these goals and hand over the areas captured to the AMISOM troops.

In a nutshell, Kenya’s war in Somalia is about regional security. No country in the region is safe from terror gangs. When they attack Nairobi or Kampala as they have done in the past; tourists and foreign investment flee from the entire region.

Kenyan troops crossed the bor-

der at Dhobley from where a road leads through Bilis Cooqaani to Kismayu, the important port city in the hands of Al Shabaab. Kenyan troops in this area have been held back by heavy rains and flooding.

Chirchir says the push to Afmadow, a strategically important town located near the road to Kismayu, will continue in dry weather. During the next few weeks, there are likely to be occasional gaps in the rain, but whether these will last long enough to allow the movement of heavy equipment is unclear. The current rainy season could very well render most roads impassable until January.

The Kenyan offensive is targeted heavily supported by US, French and British air planes which have specific sites, allowing the ground troops a free run. The Kenyan air force has so far, say military sources, seen light fighting; dropping bombs on training grounds and camps.

The French navy along with those from other NATO countries have also been deeply involved in fighting pirates off the Somali coast, in a way starving the militias of funding.

The intelligence support Kenya is

receiving is also said to be far superior to any that was made available to the TFG troops or even to Ethiopia in 2006 when it invaded Somalia to expel the Islamic Courts Union that were headed at the time by Sharif.

As it is, Kenya is fighting a "war of choice" in which it chooses when and where to attack; rather than a "war of necessity" in which it has no choice but to go to war to protect its territory or national interests.

The Kenyan operation is not quiet risk free, though Al Shabaab in its usual hubris declared war on Kenya and threatened disastrous terrorist attacks. So far not much has come from the threats save for two grenade attacks in downtown Nairobi in which one person died and a couple were seriously injured.

Until Somalia has a functioning government capable of defending itself from the notorious warlords and misguided militias who have run amok in the country since the collapse of the Siad Barre government in 1991, Kenya and the East African must keep the option of having a military presence in the Juba region open

November 2011

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•THE REGION

Women of Substance

Women of Substance NOBEL PEACE PRICE

In a dramatic departure from its founding articles, the Committee of the Nobel Peace Prize seems to have adopted a new quality in considering Ellen JohnsonSirleaf, her compatriot Leyman Gbowee and Yemeni women’s rights activist Tawakkul Karman - their protest ability.

BY MOHAMMED WARSAMA

10

November 2011

ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF:

Outgoing Liberian President

•THE REGION

Women of Substance

I

n a twist of timing and fate, the winners of the Nobel Peace Prize for 2011 were announced just 24 hours before the first African woman and environmentalist to receive the prestigious award, Kenya’s Wangari Maathai was laid to rest on October 8.

And that was not the only coincidence; all the three winners were women who were recognised for their role in fighting injustice in their societies and two were African; Liberia’s outgoing President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and her compatriot Leymah Gbowee. The third is Yemeni women’s rights activist Tawakkul Karman. They will share the US$1.5 million prize Gbowee, a Liberian peace activist who is also as a social worker and trauma counsellor, organised the peace movement that led to the end of the second civil war in 2003.

Tawakul Karman, 32, is one of the most vocal human rights activists in Yemen, and a member of the country’s main Islamic opposition party, she heads the NGO Women Journalists Without Chains that she formed in 2005.

All three women epitomise the late Maathai’s famous edict that “the world was full of cowards who ask that heroes die for them”; they are all heroes who stand for what they believe in the face of formidable opposition.

But for Johnson-Sirleaf, not even the rare privilege of being awarded the Nobel Prize could convince her fellow Liberians to vote her in outright as president for a second term in the face of a strong challenge from a former UN diplomat Wilson Tubman. She will have to face him in a runoff to determine Liberia’s next president.

In awarding the coveted Peace Prize to three indomitable female campaigners against war and oppression, the Nobel Prize Committee made a firm commitment that entrenching women’s rights is vital

for world peace.

Nairobi-based Liberian diplomat Mr Seth Nichols says JohnsonSirleaf’s nomination was partly due to her ability to face challenges head on. “A measure of success in life is not necessarily the absence of problems but the ability to solve problems. That she has demonstrated very well.

“But she was found wanting in the areas of public probity. She has not made any serious attempts to rid her country of corruption; her record in healing the country is dismal, particularly after she manipulated the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Committee, turning it into a toothless bulldog.”

In announcing the nominations, Nobel Peace Prize committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said it was vital that women play an active role in the peace-building process.

“We cannot achieve democracy and lasting peace in the world unless women obtain the same opportunities as men to influence development at all levels of society,”

HONOURED:

Leymah Gbowee (left) Organised peace movement, and Late Wangari Maathai, The late Kenyan Icon

he said. It was almost an eerie echo of the sentiments made by the Committee when it awarded the Prize in November 2004 to Maathai. But the difference is that the reputation of the Kenyan as a warrior for environmental conservation had long preceded her credentials as an activist for democracy, political freedoms and human rights.

Indeed, Maathai’s battles with Kanu and President Daniel arap Moi’s dictatorship were what epics are made of and it was almost poetic justice that he did not attend, for whatever reason, her State burial ceremony.

But questions were raised about her nominations, with many governments and politicians seemingly unable to comprehend the peace connection between human rights and the environment.

The queries have surfaced again in respect of Johnson-Sirleaf, Africa’s first freely elected female president, who has won widespread praise for her work in rebuilding Liberia after a bloody 14-year civil war.

November 2011

11 11

•THE REGION

Women of Substance

She has attracted suspicion too.

She was a firm backer of warlord and a former president Charles Taylor, who is facing war crime charges at the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

played an active and supportive role in the transitional government as the country prepared for the 2005 election. She ran for the elections and won, and on November 8, 2005 was inaugurated as the 24th President of Liberia, beating international footballer George Weah by a huge margin.

ONCE JAILED

The 72-year-old former finance minister, once jailed as an opposition activist, was elected in 2005.

“I have an opportunity to open the doors for more African women to hold high level political positions, because I represent the aspirations and expectations of Liberian African women – maybe women all over the world – therefore the pressure is on me to make sure that I succeed,” she said.

It is reported that though Johnson-Sirleaf did not physically partake in the killings of over 300,000 women and children during Liberia's 15 years of civil war, she supported Taylor financially to carry out massacres and other atrocities.

Johnson-Sirleaf at one point denied every allegation of supporting Taylor until the BBC played her statement ordering Taylor’s rebels to level down the capital city of Liberia and the presidential palace.

She was born in Monrovia, the Liberian capital on October 29, 1938.

She graduated from the College of West Africa in Monrovia after studying Accounting and Economics. She moved to the USA for further studies after marrying Johnson-Sirleaf.

An alumnus of the prestigious Harvard Business School, she returned to Liberia and joined the government of William Tolbert where she served as minister for Finance between 1972 and 1973. When Tolbert was overthrown and killed by army Sergeant Samuel Doe who then embarked on a violent purge of the government, Johnson-Sirleaf sought exile in Nairobi, where she served as Director of American bank Citibank between 1983 and 1985.

She returned to Liberia to run for

12

SEX STRIKE

the Senate in 1985, but was arrested and jailed for 10 years for speaking against Doe’s military regime.

She did not stay in prison long after Washington exerted quiet pressure on Monrovia.

Johnson-Sirleaf returned to her second home in the US, where she joined the HSCB Equator Bank and later the United Nations Development Programme Regional Bureau for Africa.

In 1997, she returned to Liberia as an economist working for the World Bank‘s Africa Office. But the allure of politics was too strong to resist and she ran against Taylor and though she fared poorly – garnering only 10 per cent of the votes against Taylor’s 75 per cent, did not give up.

She turned against Taylor – her one time ally – and for her troubles was arrested and again charged with treason. When Taylor fled to exile in 2003, she took over the leadership of the Unity Party. During the period of civil disturbance in Liberia, she

November 2011

TAWAKKUL KARMAN:

Founded Women Without Chains

Her fellow countrywoman, Gbowee, mobilised and organised Liberian women against the brutal civil war, across religious and ethnic lines, she also famously organising a ‘sex strike.’ The committee praised her for enhancing the influence of West African women. Activist Tawakkul Karman was praised for playing a leading part in the struggle for women’s rights and democracy in Yemen, despite the most trying circumstances. The mother of three said the award was a victory for Yemen’s democracy activists who would continue to fight for full rights in the country.

ULTIMATE RECOGNITION

The three women fought for women human rights and for that they won the ultimate recognition.

“Their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights to full participation in peacebuilding work” is what brought the three women the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize.

“We cannot achieve democracy and lasting peace in the world unless women receive the same opportunities as men to influence developments at all levels of society”, said the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

“I am very happy that three women won”, Jagland, added. The last time the Nobel Peace Prize was shared between three winners was in 1994

•THE REGION Eastern Africa Beat

GENDER AGENDA

Diplomacy with Some Charisma

“There are as many great women ambassadors as there are men. It simply takes being open, leading from the front, as you represent a country, such as Kenya, that is highly respected and recognised globally,” says MISHI MWATSAHU, DEAN OF KENYAN AMBASSADORS. JANE MWANGI reports

“I

t used to be that the only way a woman could truly make her foreign policy views felt was by marrying a diplomat and then pouring tea on an offending ambassador’s lap.”

So said Madeleine Albright, while addressing the Women’s Foreign Policy Group (WFPG) in Washington shortly after President Bill Clinton’s re-election she was at the time immersed in an undeclared campaign to be named Secretary of State.

It is a weighty statement by all standards, given past realities when diplomacy was the preserve of men. It was not until 1933 that there occurred a shift in the tide of the changing face of diplomacy when 13 countries, including Nicaragua and Turkey, appointed women diplomats.

Until the mid-20th century, the most extensive contribution made by women to diplomacy was as the wives of diplomatic and consular officers. Today, the playing field is favourable to ‘Her Excellencies’ as they increasingly continue to be the highest representatives of their countries.

All the while decked in the allencompassing elements of benevolence and affability, female ambassadors are bringing the necessary verve and pulse to the hitherto boring and well-thoughtout practice of diplomacy.

One such woman and the in-

MISHI MWATSAHU

Dean of Kenyan Ambassadors

spiration behind penning these words is the Dean of Kenyan Ambassadors and Kenyan ambassador to Pakistan, HE Mishi Masika Mwatsahu. Glancing at her, you immediately perceive an underlying sense of propriety that is fast preceded by a refreshingly candid smile. The sun is lying low on the horizon, painting the sky with a

reddish hew as we sit down and get into an engaging conversation.

“As a Dean of Ambassadors I am tasked with the mandate of making sure that issues are coordinated in a proper manner for the interest of my fellow ambassador-colleagues, if there are concerns among us; I follow it up on behalf of the team. Am the representative of the ambassadors. It is by and large a ceremonial title,” she says. The Dean is appointed based on a single criterion – being the longest serving envoy.

Ambassador Mwatsahu talks about her position with apparent enthusiasm, “I am proud of it and making history in my own unique way. It gives you a vantage point as an advisor of sorts and the spokesperson of the rest of the ambassadors and high commissioners.

The Dean is given respect among the ambassadors’ circles.

For example, if the ambassadors have a burning issue that can only be raised in a confidential forum, I come in to front that matter. In a session with the president, I speak on behalf of the ambassadors and give the vote of thanks.”

Experience without some sort of moral compass is not enough as this highly cultured envoy explains. Her duty station is more than just the average post of accreditation as she has made it her business to inculcate a sense of attachment- a home away from

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home so to speak. Having served as the Dean for slightly less than a year, she has, however, been a high commissioner for six years. “I have 12 local staff apart from the home-based staff and my slogan has always been ‘we are family’.

My policy, and one which I practice in my mission, is, if there are any issues or problems, we sort them out together just like a family would. Over and above that, I often involve the families of my staff in many ways when it comes to situations where their input is required.”

And of course when it comes to the occasional high tea, Mwatsahu is the perfect hostess. “I have a lot of interactions with the spouses of the staff whom I often invite for high tea and we talk for hours on end. This makes them feel loved and appreciated because Pakistan is a very stressful station; we refer to it as a hardship station even though it hasn’t been recognised as such yet.”

“I have managed to get over 200 Kenyan students on scholarship and some have my direct line and call me often even at night when they are in the midst of sitting their exams and feel pressured,” says the soft-spoken envoy. It is not hard to derive her love and oneness for the job and more so the ability to go beyond the call of duty. One of her current undertakings is to bring together Kenyans living in Pakistan.

“I am looking to register an association called ‘the friends of Kenya’ which was an idea by a certain lady from Karachi.” This, she says, was prompted by the reality that most Kenyans living abroad don’t register with their missions. “You only get to discover that one is a Kenyan citizen when it comes to social events because they come

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in their throngs. So this will be a way of bringing together Kenyans living in Pakistan and also act as a support group and gradually many of them will be proud to say they are Kenyans.”

Ambassador Mwatsahu’s take on diplomacy is one where servant-leadership takes centre stage and having an open door policy.

So, do female ambassadors fare significantly above their male counterparts when it comes to the practice of diplomacy? I ask.

“I wouldn’t want to be gender biased. There are as many great women ambassadors as there are men. It just takes being open, exercising servant leadership so that you lead from the front, as you are leading a whole country that is highly respected and recognised globally. Follow policy, organise, observe and consult. Not having qualms with the host representatives. It’s an honour serving my government and carrying the Kenyan torch out there. I am proud to be serving my country in my capacity as ambassador.”

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BIO DATA Ambassador Mwihu Mwatsahu has previously served as a civil servant mainly in the local government. She worked in the Mombasa municipal council as Director, Social Services and Housing is credited for having implemented key programmes with the World Bank, DFID among others. She has also served as the Kwale Town Clerk and Malindi Town Clerk and was part of the team tasked with re-awakening the Nairobi city council as Director Social Services and Housing.

She has three grown-up children

UN SUPPORTS TRAINING FOR DR CONGO POLICE AHEAD OF ELECTIONS More than 700 police officers are being trained by the United Nations and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to provide better policing in the country’s province of South Kivu during this month’s elections.

According to a news release issued by the UN peacekeeping force in the DRC (MONUSCO), training started earlier this week for police officers at the Lake Tanganyika district and will continue for three weeks, ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections slated for 27 November.

Officers will receive joint training

by UN Police (UNP) in South Kivu and the Congolese National Police Force (PNC) on the maintenance and restoration of law and public order as well as on technical and professional interventions.

The training will be both theoretical and practical, and will include hands-on training on crowd and public protest management techniques.

The initiative is part of an ongoing UN mandate to provide stability to the country and support for the restoration of the Government.

Since 1999, the UN peacekeeping mission in the DRC – with some 19,000 uniformed personnel currently on the ground – has overseen the vast country’s emergence from years of civil war and factional chaos, culminating most notably in 2006 with the first democratic elections in over four decades. But fighting has continued sporadically in the east, where the bulk of UN forces are deployed

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COMPETITION

Kenyan Media at War The two largest-selling English dailies are fighting each other in a war of supremacy. Each is claiming growth but offering no figures as proof. It is a war for market share

BY DEA REPORTER

T

he print divisions of Kenya’s oldest media house, the Standard Group, and the most profitable, the Nation Media Group (NMG) have been locked in a war of words which

has been both sterile and futile.

NMG has been telling its readers that 9 out of 10 Kenyans read the Daily Nation and its sister titles the Saturday Nation and Sunday Nation.

This is not new because NMG

began doing this in 2005. But the Group seemed to up the ante when it started telling advertisers that it has the greater reach because of its readership. Indeed, in both adverts NMG suggested that the Standard’s closest rival was the Group’s Taifa title.

NMG’s Taifa Leo and its sister title Taifa Jumapili are Kenya’s only Kiswahili titles, but they have always struggled in the market. Indeed, an attempt by the Standard Group in 2004 to launch a Kiswahili title failed because the already established Taifa titles were struggling.

It would, therefore, appear Standard executives were pricked

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to the quick for their titles, The Standard, Standard on Saturday and Standard on Sunday to be depicted as more of Taifa’s rivals than of their English counterparts from Kimathi Street, in downtown, Nairobi.

But what appears to have really stuck in the craw of the executives on Mombasa Road, where the Standard Group is based was the insinuation that advertisers are better served by the NMG titles than by their own titles. They copied their colleagues on Kimathi Street and hit back at NMG with a dose of its own medicine.

Advertising is the lifeline of a commercial newspaper title and it is a given that the NMG titles are choke full of adverts and also hog death announcements. Standard executives, fearing the NMG ads would adversely affect their standing in the advertising stakes, could not take this campaign lying down.

They put out full page adverts to declare that the Group has grown over the last five years by 30 per cent. The Standard adverts implied that their growth had been achieved at the expense of the NMG titles. And this, the ads boasted, was a fact.

But where the NMG ads were confined to newspapers, the Standard ones appeared to boast about group growth. Second, where the NMG adverts were backed by market research, the Standard ads did not quote or make available the source of their declarations.

The Standard Group did not tell its readers what 30 per cent growth exactly meant in terms of the circulation of their titles. A 30 per cent growth over a five-year period in the shrinking newspaper market is a substantial gain, but, inexplicably, the Standard was shy about printing these figures.

NMG, too, is not about to splash its circulation figures on its

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pages, but to its credit, it is a member of the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC), which fact it proudly flaunts on its back page. The Standard is not an ABC member.

Clearly the rival titles would like to do better in the market, but as the Standard said in its adverts, the newspaper market has not grown over the last five years. This is in keeping with a global trend in which newspapers are turning more to developing their webbased editions and titles than launching new print publications.

Researcher Synovate Limited carries out quarterly surveys. Individual media and other businesses commission such researchers to carry out surveys on newspaper, radio, television, internet and print trends. These, are however, not made public. They are mainly for internal consumption and of limited circulation.

While media institutions are shy to make public their circulations, viewership or listenership ratings, it is a poorly guarded secret that they use this information, where it is favourable to woo advertisers.

These surveys do not have circulation figures but feature percentages about daily and weekly readership by gender and age groups and magazine readership.

The NMG sales executives are more likely to point out to advertisers that their titles outsell the Standard and are, therefore, a better platform for reaching their target audiences.

Their Standard counterparts are more likely to purvey the view that because they have newspapers, radio, TV and outdoor advertising presence they have a package on offer to rival any that the competition has. The Standard papers may have grown, but the NMG titles are still ahead of them by streets. However, NMG is fiercely protective of its market

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While media institutions are shy to make public their circulations, viewership or listenership ratings,

it is a poorly guarded secret that they use this information, where it is favourable, to woo advertisers

leader status and the advertising that depends on it so much so that the slightest growth or even innovation by the competition is quickly noticed and dealt with.

It is this that accounts for the aggressive advertising that pricked the Standard executives. In this regard it is important to observe that the NMG’s advertising war began in 2005 soon after the referendum on the constitution.

Standard executives were caught unawares by the blitz, but quickly and happily noted that their titles had gained in circulation. The thinking on Mombasa Road is that while Standard titles may not have substantially eaten into the NMG market this renewed blitz points to growing discomfiture at Kimathi Street.

It is somewhat puzzling that NMG and Standard who are first and second respectively in the newspaper market have failed to replicate their dominance in print in the broadcast market yet most Kenyans get their news from radio, followed by television, with newspapers coming in a distant third.

It is interesting to observe that though both NMG and Standard have broadcast divisions, these have not featured in the ad war in their papers. Informed opinion avers that it is Citizen TV (for Royal Media Services) and not NTV (for NMG) or KTN (for Standard) that rules viewership in Kenya.

It must be a bitter pill to swallow for Standard that KTN, for a long time the market leader, now lags behind Citizen TV and NTV. NMG and Standard must also be uncomfortable that their radio stations (Radio Maisha for Standard) and Easy FM and Q FM (for NMG) are walloped by Radio Africa’s Kiss FM and Classic FM, and Royal Media Services’ Radio Citizen

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SOUTH SUDAN

Lessons From Botswana

BY OBIAGELI EZEKWESILI

A

While there is no silver bullet for building a newlyindependent nation, Juba

needs to give priority attention to at least three areas

fter South Sudan achieved independence on July 9, 2011 citizens and leaders of Africa’s newest nation must be bothered by one question: How does our country go from being one with one of the worst human indicators in the world to prosperity, avoid the mistakes other African countries made after gaining independence 50 years ago?

South Sudan can look for inspiration from many development models, but it will ultimately follow one of its own fashioning. It could help if Africa’s youngest nation emulated an African example.

Botswana was one of the 25 poorest nations in the world, with only 50 university graduates at the time of independence. It is now one of Africa’s richest countries. How did Botswana do it?

“Botswana succeeded partially because it made education, skills training and water development among its top development priorities” Festus Mogae, former President of Botswana recently told a group of development practitioners.

SANCTIONS

Land-locked and economically isolated as a result of sanctions and boycott campaigns against Rhodesia (today’s Zimbabwe) and then apartheid South Africa, Gaborone invested in its most important resource: its people. It created the conditions for citizens to do what they already did best (livestock rearing). A prisoner of geography and geopolitics, Botswana promoted regional integration and trade with its neighbors notwithstanding the difficult context.

According to Mogae, Botswana’s independence leaders ensured that the country’s traditions of consultation, transparency and accountability were molded into the fabric of the newly-independent country.

Botswana then focused on providing security, justice and jobs to its citizens, getting revenue from its abundant natural resources to benefit a majority of them. Today, South Sudan starts off with more university graduates than Botswana. But unlike Gaborone at independence, Juba needs to rebuild from and reconcile after a brutal war that has cost more than two

million lives. The new nation faces daunting challenges, including the lack of basic capacity to handle core functions of the State. While there is no silver bullet for building a newly-independent nation, Juba needs to give priority attention to at least three areas.

First, the new country’s leaders and the political elite must involve citizens early on in devising any development strategies. The approach and process has to be bottom-up, inclusive and consultative; carefully analysing opportunities and weaknesses, defining the roles of the government, private sector, civil society and ordinary citizens. Leaders can and should provide a clear and shared sense of joint investment if South Sudan is to set a solid foundation for a prosperous future. The elite should not articulate the vision of the nation behind closed doors.

Secondly, South Sudan must foster private sector growth and the emergence of small business, the engine of jobs and wealth creation in any economy. The economic strategy should be broadbased, prioritising the needs of

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the population. Africa’s youngest nation urgently needs a diversification strategy that moves it away from a mono-product economy.

It needs to explore opportunities, notably in agriculture which is a bigger and more sustainable asset than oil on which Juba currently depends for 98 per cent of its revenue. For oil revenue to benefit the majority of South Sudanese requires the EITI++ approach – an approach that goes beyond basic transparency and maximises the value of oil concessions, monitors compliance with contracts, and ensures not only transparency in the management of oil revenue but also its efficient investment in pro-poor and sustainable development programs.

Beyond oil, fixing agriculture offers the best chance for creating jobs, improving incomes and reversing food insecurity. The UN estimates that about four million South Sudanese (half of the population) were in need of food assistance this year alone. Shared and inclusive agricultural growth is essential for improving incomes and ensuring poverty reduction in a country with a 46 percent poverty rate.

Neglect of agriculture would create uneven growth, increase inequity and increase the risk of social unrest.

Thirdly, it must build the institutions it needs to guarantee security for its citizens, provide basic social services (health, education, and low-income housing), create jobs and enhance livelihoods, bridge its infrastructure gap, and boost political and trade relations with its neighbors, including the North. The best institutions will be inclusive, paying keen attention to the interests of the most vulnerable - youth, women, children, the elderly, the physically challenged, war victims, internally displaced, returnees, and ex-combatants.

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Lastly, South Sudan must resist the temptation to adopt quickfix, populist solutions, with little chance of sustainability. Yet, the new nation must move with a high sense of urgency, recognising that the poor and hungry cannot wait generations for solutions to their most urgent problems.

As in Botswana after independence, the center of gravity in South Sudan needs to shift from the elite to ordinary citizens. The euphoria of independence must quickly give way to the hard work of security sector, economic and governance reforms with a focus on empowering citizens, especially women, to solve their own problems. It must awaken their creative genius and support their efforts to hold their government and development partners accountable.

Several African countries such as Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana and Zambia, at independence, had per capita incomes that exceeded those of East Asian countries including South Korea. Less than half a century later, the average per capita income of sub-Saharan Africa – even after adjusting for differ-

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OBIAGELI EZEKWESILI (right) : And left: a map

of Southern Sudan

ences in purchasing power – was less than one-fourth of East Asia.

Leadership matters and with it, the governance and people-friendly development policies that have separated the winners from the losers. For South Sudan, setting up the right institutions, adopting the right and sound policies, and ensuring effective and efficient public investment in the sectors that matter to the poor will help lift the maximum number of its citizens out of poverty and commence the country’s journey to socio-economic transformation.

Nation building takes time, and South Sudan could do well to take full advantage of lessons derived from well-known development success stories.

Ms Obiageli Ezekwesili is the World Bank Vice-President for Africa and co-founder of Transparency International

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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Half Century for Human Rights

With a membership of over three million people in more 150 countries and having won a Nobel Peace Prize and UN prize in the field of human rights, Amnesty International continues to be proactive in pushing for the universal recognition of human rights.

DEA’S JANE MWANGI spoke to COUNTRY DIRECTOR, JUSTUS NYANG'AYA

JUSTUS NYANG'AYA:

Amnest international country director

D

IPLOMAT EAST AFRICA: Amnesty International has been around for the last half a century. Give us a brief history of this global movement and its relevance today.

JUSTUS NYANG'AYA: When Amnesty International was born in 1961 the issues were social and political in nature but the scope of our work widened to include economic and cultural rights in order to give credence to our vision of a world where every person enjoys all of the human rights he/she is entitled to.

It all began when the founder, Peter Benenson read about two Portuguese students sentenced to seven years in jail for allegedly ‘raising their glasses and toasting to liberty’.

Benenson went ahead to publish a story seeking interventions from all around and called it ‘the forgotten

prisoners’. We would adopt prisoners of conscience, campaign for them and they would be released.

We have done that in many countries, most recently involving our very own Al Amin Kimathi. We decide to change with the times and see whether there are certain areas of need that we ought to concentrate on. This was sparked by the realisation that millions of people are not actually prisoners in detention camps but are rather imprisoned by poverty and bad policies of government. That is why we are in the economic, social and cultural rights realm where we work with and empower the marginalised in society.

Q: The universal declaration of human rights stipulates that every person should be able to enjoy all the human rights enshrined in it but this is not the case. Which are some of the gravest human rights violations that AI has had to contend with?

A: Freedom of speech, something that has led to prisoners of conscience. People who say what they believe in and those who participate in demonstrations should not be restrained by the powers that be. Secondly, the death penalty, which violates the right to enjoy life.

It is the responsibility of the government to ensure nobody loses their life but they can be punished using the due process of law and fair trial.

We have a campaign to abolish the death penalty and extra-judicial executions. Thirdly is security for everybody to be able to live free from fear of persecution.

Q: In your 2011 report on the state of the world’s human rights; narrowed down to Africa, how does the human rights track record compare with that of pre-independence days?

A: We have a long way to go but we are certainly in the right direction, however, what is dragging us back is impunity. This is where we see a major violation of human rights whereby there is the lack of respect for the laws of the land; laws instituted by leaders who do not adhere to them, yet expect others to do so. It reflects back on us and, therefore, there needs to be a greater respect for the law. This has created a major human rights claw back.

Q: Somali asylum seekers continue crossing the border into Kenya, a situation that has led to overcrowding, impeding access to water and sanitation services. Is the international community, Amnesty International and Somalia’s neighbours playing their part in containing the human rights situation in Somalia?

A: This has to do with abuses and violations. The former is when the government is responsible for

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creating insecurity and violations of rights, as has been the case in Somalia. The international community has been providing serious support in trying to create stability.

We acknowledge the government for providing refugee camps and ensuring their rights are protected.

However, there is also the flip side whereby Kenyans are now being exposed to a lot of criminals harbouring arms and weapons who are coming as a result of the lack of screening due to the border closure.

A lot more needs to be done in order to safeguard the right to security for Kenyans and the displaced refugee population from Somalia.

Q: What is your take on the ongoing ICC process? Are you optimistic that the process will yield justice for the victims and more so the Internally Displaced Persons?

A: People see the suspects as heroes and yet many of the victims were displaced. Somebody once said that if we all woke up and realised that we belong to the same tribe, we would still find something to divide us. We are focussed on the ICC process, fine let’s do that, but what about the local process? There are people who took part in burning, rape and looting, and nobody is doing anything about it. What will prevent them from doing the same in 2012. I am fearful that the government is not doing enough in making the necessary measures that will prevent a repeat of similar atrocities. The Gacaca Courts in Rwanda ensure that the civilians who were perpetrators of the genocide go through a local system and that is bearing results. I am disturbed that the government is not giving the people going back to their lands adequate security. This is a very grave concern.

Q: What does the 50th anniversary herald for Amnesty International in its quest towards the protection

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of human rights?

A: There are bigger things that we are looking at, the challenges of the last 50 years are difficult. We are coming up with a new presence where we don’t have to work through members, but rather through partners. There are many places around the world where Amnesty International never existed but now does due to the new forms of presence.

In areas where there are human rights violations and we do not have a base there, we are coming up with what we call ‘moving closer to the ground’ where work that is done is seen to be localised.

This year we are in the process of creating three regional hubs- one in Johannesburg to oversee the southern part of Africa. Nairobi is being upgraded into a hub where we will, therefore, be looking at the Great Lakes region, Horn of Africa and Eastern Africa. We have gross violation of human rights within Ethiopia, Eritrea and parts of Uganda and this hub will be focussed on that.

The third hub will be in Dakar, Senegal which will be looking at issues affecting francophone countries. We also have a project in Nigeria that will cater for Anglophone West Africa. We are also looking at establishing a presence among the BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India and

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China). Amnesty has always been as a Euro-centric organisation but now we are going to be seen as part of a global movement. There will be a lot more engagement at the local level 50 years going forward. Amnesty will have come of age and will reflect a true global movement of human rights defenders

BIO DATA Justus Nyang’aya holds a Master of Arts degree in Applied Linguistics from the University of London and studies in Leadership Governance, Peace and Conflict from the United Nations University, International Leadership Academy in Amman, Jordan. He has previously worked with Lead Africa as CEO and Specialist on Peace, Governance and leadership. He also served as a facilitator to the Sudan Peace Process under Inter-Sudanese Consultation on Peace and Justice.

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FIRST LOVE

Steve Job's Formula for Success You've Got To Find What You Love

Jobs, the Apple-founder and former CEO who invented and masterfully marketed ever-sleeker gadgets that transformed everyday technology, from the personal computer to the iPod and iPhone, has died. He was 56. The company he founded, Apple created several iconic products, including the iPod, iPhone and iPad, that have changed the face of consumer technology forever.

He made this speech at Stanford University during grraduation in 2005.

I

am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a

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college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school.

She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my workingclass parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one

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of the best decisions I ever made.

The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it.

And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example: Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great.

It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life.

But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal

computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do.

Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.

So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and

all of my workingclass parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out.

What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very

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public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything.

It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers.

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and bet-

ter as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.”

It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked.

There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even

know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day.

Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades.

Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept: No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much

November 2011

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•ECONOMY

Investment•Technology•Prosperity

PAINT MATTERS

'Colour Your World' Sadolin Paints (E.A.) Ltd is a regional brand with world class appeal.

MANAGING DIRECTOR, MR SALIM ALIBHAI spoke to DEA’S JANE MWANGI on the product portfolio of the largest paint company in East Africa.

Below are excerpts of the exclusive interview; pictures by PHOTO EDITOR, YAHYA MOHAMED.

D

IPLOMAT EAST AFRICA: Give us a brief overview of your operations in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.

MR SALIM ALIBHAI: Sadolin has a well-developed countrywide network of distributors along with Sadolin Tanzania and Sadolin Uganda, making us the largest paint brand in the East Africa region. We have embarked on an on-going process of upgrading our operations. We are upgrading our machinery, which we obtain from

24

November 2011

Denmark, Germany and Italy. We are also installing a modern ventilation system and re-wiring of the entire company, all aimed at ensuring our employees work in a healthy and safety environment.

Investing in our Human Resource capital is a major undertaking over the years. We have sent over 70 per cent of our sales team for skills development training to countries such as South Africa, Denmark, Cyprus, UK, Holland, Oman and Dubai.We have a lot of in-house training as well.

Q: What is your affiliation with Akzo Nobel Coatings - the world’s number one paints and Coatings Company?

A: Sadolin Paints (EA) Limited was established as a subsidiary of Sadolin and Holmblad of Denmark in 1959. In the 1980s Sadolin Denmark became part of the Akzo Nobel Coatings, which is of course the world’s number one Paints and Coatings Company, which then decided to divest their interest in East Africa in 1991. Akzo Nobel signed a long term Technical and Trademark Agreement with the new local owners of Sadolin Paints (EA) Limited to provide it with technical support. There is a transfer of technology through our varied network and interactions with other countries. We don’t have to re-invent the wheel as this is done on a large scale by virtue of being part of the Akzo Nobel group. We stand for uncompromised product quality, hence people who know quality come to us.

Q: You have built quite a comprehensive product portfolio from automotive refinishes to decorative as well as industrial paints.

Take us through this progression.

A: The Company was established 52 years ago with a philosophy to cater for the premium niche market. We are the first company to have started manufacturing the assembly line of paints. With the support we had from Denmark we became a market leader and were supplying the decorative line. We boast of our superior quality as all our raw materials come from Europe and are governed by the quality adherence of the Akzo Nobel group. I say this not as a

•ECONOMY

Investment•Technology•Prosperity

marketing gimmick but by virtue of being the best. The Decorative range includes both water and oil -based paints, undercoats, thinners, spirits, Sadotex wall finishes, Weatherguard, exterior wall finishes and Multicolour decorative finishes. Additionally, the range also consists of wood finishes, which protect wood from parasites and fungi whilst maintaining a large choice of finishes. These include the Pinotex range of wood finishes, quality wood furniture finishes and a wide range of clear and pigmented varnishes. The offerings are complete with a range of pigmented varnishes. Importantly, we are the only company that offers a 7-year warranty for the extreme weather guard as long as the customer adheres to our surface measures. In regard to the range of industrial products there are Roller & Coil Coatings, Stoving enamels, & Drum enamels for the packaging industry.

The basket of products also includes body fillers, sanding sealers, spot putty and grey primers for the automotive industry and

a range of adhesives for wood, parquet, ceramic tiles and for carton sealing. We offer a programme called Painters Training Programme, in which we actually help them in increasing their earnings and honing their skills.

We also have an Automated Tinting Machine (ATM) which enables us to get the exact pigment specified by the client.

Q: Having been in the industry for 52 years, what bottlenecks have you experienced so far?

A: Our main bottleneck is counterfeit products. This spoils our reputation. As a counteractive measure, we have come up with a special tin, which is unique to our brand. Despite the fact that this measure in turn slows down our production and increases our costs, it is a necessary action. It is unfortunate that the punitive measures against counterfeit in this country are not adequate.

The other bottleneck is the weakening of the shilling, which has led to an increase in the price of raw materials, which, in es-

sence, forces us to increase the prices of our products.

Our main bottleneck is counterfeit products. This spoils our reputation. As a counteractive measure, we

have come up with a special tin, which is unique to our brand

Q: Your signature line is ‘colour your world’. How has this enabled you to take your products to the next level?

A: We have access to the world’s largest painting company and in addition to having the best technology we are trying to colour the world in Kenya. The original colour is still intact many years on, ours does not fade. SPEAL is now excitingly poised for bringing in many new products to the Kenyan market, which will enable it to personify its signature line “Colour your World”.

Q: What is your outlook for the coming year in terms of business growth and expansion?

A: Expansion is an on-going process. We have got some products coming up soon. We were the first company to receive ISO 9002 certification in the year 2000 and ISO 9001 in November 2003 and are now working on another certification

November 2011

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•ECONOMY

Investment•Technology•Prosperity

CONVERGENCE AFRICA

Premier Business Talks Come to Nairobi Founders of the AFRICA AWARDS FOR ENTREPRENEURSHIP to host a conference for entrepreneurs, investors and business leaders

By SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

A

private international investment group, Legatum and Omidyar Network, a philanthropic investment firm, recently announced the launch of Convergence Africa, a high-profile one-day conference. It will be headlined by globally-renowned champion entrepreneurs, Sir Richard Branson, Founder of the Virgin Group and Mr Tony Elumelu.

Emelu is a former Group CEO of United Bank for Africa, Chairman of Heirs Holdings Group and Founder of The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

Convergence Africa will take place on December 8, 2011, at the Kenyatta International Conference Centre in Nairobi, followed by the Africa Awards for Entrepreneurship Gala Banquet. Tickets and attendance information for both events are available at www.

ConvergenceAfrica.com.Logo: www.apo-mail.org/legatum.jpg “Entrepreneurs represent Africa’s future,” said Sir Richard Branson, “I’m constantly inspired by the ambition, determination and passion of entrepreneurs.

Convergence Africa is a wonderful platform to bring together entrepreneurs and investors to accelerate growth across the continent.” He continued: ”I’m delighted to be able to participate in this inaugural year and look forward to meeting many of Africa’s

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brightest business leaders.”

Convergence Africa is the event that brings together the entrepreneurs, investors, policymakers and businesspeople who will drive Africa’s growth. In addition to Sir Richard Branson and Elumelu, speakers include Fred Swaniker, Founder of the African Leadership Academy; and prominent investors, international journalists and seasoned entrepreneurs. The heart of the Convergence Africa conference is a unique series of Master Classes, conducted by experts in their fields and moderated by wellknown international journalists, covering topics most relevant to entrepreneurs, investors and policy-makers.

Master Class speakers include, among others, Jacqueline Muna Musiitwa, Founder, Hoja Law Group, Magatte Wade/Founder, Adina and Tiossano, James Mwangi, CEO, Equity Bank, Nik Nesbitt, Founder, KenCall and Bame Pule, Pan-African Private Equity Investor.

Actis Convergence Africa will culminate in an exclusive session of Investor Speed Dating, designed to match investors with a selection of the brightest entrepreneurs and their businesses in a series of rapid-fire pitches for funding. Fifteen venture capital and private equity firms from across Africa and overseas, including principals from Actis, Devel-

November 2011

opment Partners International, GroFin, Heirs Holdings, Springhill Equity, and many others will each hear pitches from amongst more than 30 pre-qualified potential investee companies.

CONNECTIONS

Master Class speakers include, among others, Jacqueline Muna Musiitwa, Founder, Hoja Law Group, Magatte Wade/ Founder, Adina and Tiossano, James Mwangi, CEO, Equity Bank, Nik Nesbitt, Founder, KenCall and Bame Pule, Pan-African Private Equity Investor

“Convergence Africa is where capital meets opportunity, bringing investors and entrepreneurs face-to-face and creating a platform for making connections and sharing best practice,” said Alan McCormick, Managing Director of Legatum. “Given the importance entrepreneurship in fuelling Africa’s continued growth, we believe Convergence Africa is the perfect complement to the Africa Awards for Entrepreneurship.”

The Africa Awards for Entrepreneurship, (www.AfricaAwards. com), the continent’s most prestigious business award, immediately follows Convergence Africa.

Now in its fourth year, the Africa Awards programme recognises and rewards business leaders who embody the entrepreneurial spirit and qualities required to succeed in business and who are the inspirational role models for the next generation of African entrepreneurs.

This year the Africa Awards for Entrepreneurship expanded to include every country across the continent

•ECONOMY

Investment•Technology•Prosperity

INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITIES

Best Place to Do Business Rwanda is the most business-friendly destination in East Africa, the third in Africa and the second top reformer globally, according to the World Bank BY MOHAMMED WARSAMA

R

wanda has been ranked the third easiest place to do business in Africa after Mauritius, which comes first and the continent's economic giant, South Africa, which is second, according to the 2012 World Bank Doing Business Report, which was recently released.

The report ranks Rwanda at position 45 globally, having moved up 13 places from the 58th position it occupied in 2010, in being business friendly worldwide.

Globally, Kigali is the second top reformer over the period of five years between 2006 and 2011, after Georgia.

These two countries have been the most consistent in reforming over the years. Mauritius is ranked first in Africa and 23rd globally followed by South Africa which ranks second and 35th globally.

The prestigious World Bank Doing Business Report is considered the most important indicator of destinations where foreign business should go when seeking investment opportunities, sound judicial systems and corruptionfree regimes.

The ranking places Rwanda ahead of its East African Community (EAC) partners as a choice destinations for direct foreign investment and international business. The rest of the EAC countries of Burundi, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania rank much lower.

Globally, Rwanda was ranked 45 and top in the EAC region; Kenya was second, Uganda third, Tanzania fourth and Burundi fifth. Responding to the report, Rwanda Development Board (RDB) said the business reforms that have earned the country acclaim, are part

of the government’s extensive efforts to promote itself as an attractive business and investment destination in order to drive the growth of the private sector.

“We are encouraged by this ranking; it is a result of efforts by government to streamline business procedures, create a conducive legal framework, reduce bureaucracy and improve service delivery in order to promote both domestic and foreign investment,” said John Gara CEO of the Board.

More improvements have been made in the areas of setting up businesses, where Rwanda is now the eighth easiest in the world having improved on last year’s ninth position.

As part of the reforms, the country has shortened the required procedures and introduced free online registration.

Other criteria considered include; getting credit, in which the country ranks eighth in the world up from 32nd position last year, after the government created a fully functional private Credit Reference Bureau. In Paying Taxes, Rwanda has moved to the 19th position up from last year’s 43rd; making the country one of the easiest place in the world to pay taxes.

In enforcing contracts; Rwanda is the 39th easiest in the world and the position remains unchanged from last year. “The country will continue to enhance progress beyond the World Bank Doing Business indicators to enhance the business environment," reads part of the statement from RDB. It asserts that RDB will continue the public-private dialogue that has precipitated in some of the reforms as well as drive the efforts to provide a better business climate in order to encourage private sector growth.

Globally, Rwanda was ranked 45 and top in the EAC region; Kenya

was second, Uganda third, Tanzania fourth and Burundi fifth

In addition, building on gains made in cross-border trading, Rwanda will continue to work with its partner states in the region, particularly in the EAC to promote a regional approach to business reforms.

Doing business has become easier in East Africa since 2005.

Sharing good practices could bring East Africa closer to global top performers. If each East African country were to adopt the region’s best practice in each of the Doing Business indicators, the region’s average ranking on the ease of doing business would be 18 instead of 117.

If the best global regulations and procedures were implemented across the board, the business regulatory environment in East Africa, as measured by the Doing Business Survey, would be comparable to that of Japan.

EAC members are already seeking to learn from one another’s good reform practices through the World Bank Group-sponsored Network of Reformers initiative.

Main Findings Between June 2009 and May 2010, as recorded by Doing Business 2011 Survey, East African countries implemented eight reforms making it easier to do business. That brought the region’s total since 2004 to 54. Of the eight reforms, three were carried out in Rwanda, two each in Kenya and Uganda, and one in Burundi.

As recorded in Doing Business 2011 Survey, Kenya dropped four places in the rankings on the ease of doing business (from 94 in the previous year to 98). Tanzania dropped three places (from 125 to 128). Burundi re­mained at 181. Uganda improved seven places (from 129 to 122), and Rwanda, for the second year in a row, featured among the 10 economies that improved the most on the ease of doing business, moving up from 70 in the global rankings to 58 in 2011 and now 48.

As a result of the reforms in business registration, the average time to start a business in East Africa fell from 37 days in 2005 to 24 days in 2010

November 2011

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•TOURISM DAY GOING PLACES

Domestic Tourists The Kenya Tourism Board has launched a major drive to get Kenyans to know their country and its places of interest. MR MURIITHI NDEGWA the managing director shares his thoughts on the initiative with DEA REPORTER CAROL KIIRU products such as sports, culture, conference tourism, water sports among other products that the country has to offer.

MR MURIITHI NDEGWA:

Managing Director Kenya Tourism Board

D

IPLOMAT EAST AFRICA: Tourism has become a popular global leisure activity. The world tourism organisation reports that in 2010 Europe topped the list of the most visited countries in the world. How can the Kenya place itself on the map and be in a position to compete with such destinations?

MR MURIITHI NDEGWA: For Kenya, we have campaigns to ensure that our assets remain the same. The beach and wildlife safari have been the major attraction in terms of touristic products. Moreover, we have diversified our products to be able to target the varied needs of our target audience. In the same light we have aggressively marketed niche

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November 2011

Q: Given that your mandate is to promote tourism, how has KTB furthered this venture and fulfilled its purpose of fostering awareness among local communities on the importance of tourism and its social, cultural, political and economic values?

A: KTB in conjunction with The Ministry of Tourism has come up with forums in which we have the communities at the tourist destination participate to ensure that one does not affect the other.

These forums have been conducted with the help from Tourist Officers present in every province.

Their role is to provide the link between the communities and the authorities running the tourism programmes.

Q: Domestic tourism has become a significant form of tourism in Kenya where it is found that it can cushion the industry during low periods of international tourist arrivals. What is the strategic plan to encourage Kenyans of all walks to become active participants in Domestic Tourism as a way of boosting the sector?

A: We have strategies that help further the domestic tourism in the country. First we have started a culture change programme where if we are able to change the perception of the diverse cultures

in the country only then can we as Kenyans embrace what each community has to offer. We have also engaged the stakeholders to partner with the authority to help bring about stability through packaging for domestic tourism.

Another plan is through the electronic and print campaigns such as ‘twende tujivinjari” that have been running all over the country and worldwide and of course the use of technology. We have used the social media to be able to reach the youth through facebook and twitter.

Q: Tourism industry is the second largest source of foreign exchange revenue followed by agriculture. Having main attractions rooted on culture and ecotourism, what’s the country’s contribution to the local and global tourism compass?

A: The contribution is large and far reaching. In approximation we have about 500,000 Kenyans directly and indirectly participating in tourism related activities. Of the total Ksh 62.46 billion earned in tourism in 2009, it is projected that 30 per cent came from domestic tourism. The number is currently progressing over time and with our strategies this is only the tip of the iceberg.

Q: How does KTB plan to create a network of Domestic Tourism stakeholders who will contribute to its growth and to organize relevant forums where they could

•TOURISM DAY participate in exchange of ideas?

Have the relevant tourism stakeholders effectively leveraged the strengths, opportunities and potential the country has to offer?

A: Through strong regional associations we have had sessions with the various key players and stakeholders having them bring about cohesion in the industry.

There have been four stakeholder forums held so far in western Kenya, North Rift, Nairobi and Mombasa with the rest planned for December 2011 and June 2012.

These forums address the need of having every person play their part aggressively so as to have Kenya be the tourist hub for the region.

Q: Vision 2030, Kenya’s economic development plan, states that the tourism sector should record three million tourists annually by 2012. Are we currently registering these numbers? Do we have enough accommodation facilities and proper infrastructure to house all these arrivals?

A: To tell you the truth this is our projection which we hope to achieve with all factors held constant. Investment opportunities on accommodation facilities have already been on the rise in the past years presenting on availability of bed capacities for the increasing number of clients. We are sure of meeting the much needed bed occupancy rate with the existing investment opportunities in hotels and lodges both in the city and across the country.

Q: Domestic tourism has been low over the years; the numbers are inadequate. As the managing director, what measures are you taking to turn around the trend since you mooted new strategies to domestic tourism marketing?

A: KTB has been engaging

ers. It would suffice to say that initiatives to meet the need for domestic tourism are being addressed and effectively so.

Q: Ecotourism, also known as ecological tourism is fast becoming popular encouraging responsible travel for conservation purposes. Is this an area likely to benefit the economic development of local communities and the environment at large?

A: KTB is keen on ecotourism which means the involvement of communities in tourism activities. As much as there is need for progression it does not mean we do so at the expense of the environment. The involvement of the communities means they benefit directly from tourism activities. Kenya has been regarded as an eco-tourism destination and has received a number of awards especially from China Trade for being steadfast in adopting ecofriendly practices.

schools to participate in domestic tourism from as low as the elementary levels to build a holiday culture. Provision and availability of consumer friendly tourism material on domestic tourism is also a way of campaigning for domestic tourism among local tourists.

We have also had aggressive marketing campaigns within the country and on the global front plus having partnership programmes with various stakehold-

A cheetah family

Q: How does KTB work with MICE sector as they too are part and parcel of promoting tourism in Kenya?

A: First and foremost KTB is part of the MICE Committee and we work on strategies to promote the MICE ventures. KTB is working with stakeholders such as Kenyatta International Conference Centre (KICC) and Meeting Africa in a bid to enhance the venture.

We also identify and promote MICE activities alongside other areas with emphasis of countries such as South Africa, Gulf countries India, the US and Europe

The contribution is large and far reaching. In approximation we have about

500,000 Kenyans directly and indirectly participating in tourism related activities

November 2011

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•WORLD FOOD DAY HIGH PRICES

Marking World Food Day amid Dwindling Supplies

By GERARD LYONS

W

orld Food Day is observed each year on October 16th. This date commemorates the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (UN) in 1945. This year the theme of World Food Day is “Food Prices: from crisis to stability.” Rarely could the subject have been more relevant for economies and people across the globe.

According to the UN, world food prices surged to an all-time high back in February. Even though many items have fallen in price since then, food prices are still high and have doubled over the past five years. The trend for food prices is clearly up.

Demand is rising. Supply is not keeping pace. Several factors explain this worrying development.

On the positive is that as emerging economies grow, more people are moving out of poverty, finding jobs and are able to feed themselves or spend more on food.

As they do, families are changing their diets as they have access to a greater variety of foods. Rising demand for meat is just one example. Global food consumption per person has risen on average by one fifth since the 1960s.

The trouble is not everyone has been prepared for this.

There are widespread concerns about dwindling crop yields, and greater scarcity of fertile land, not

30

A maize crop helped by infrastructure development and rapid urbanisation.

There is still much that needs to happen to eradicate poverty, find jobs and see living standards rise.

As this happens, food demand is likely to keep rising. The world’s population is expected to rise from 7 billion to 9 billion by 2050.

Food demand is likely to rise, in both quantity and quality.

What needs to happen to meet this challenge? Many things.

There is likely to be a price, quantity and technology response. The price response has already been evident as food prices rise. This is a concern as the poorest spend a greater proportion of their income on food, and they are least able to cope with higher prices. In

November 2011

some rapidly growing economies, rising food prices can feed general inflation, explaining why many central banks have been tightening policy. World Food Day will have rising food prices at centre stage.

The World Bank recently highlighted high rates of malnutrition among young children in India and parts of Africa. But many countries have issues. For instance, Vietnam, the Philippines and China are among the countries in east Asia that are vulnerable to food price inflation.

Throughout this year, the Group of 20 (G20) has been seeking ways to curb speculative activity from pushing commodity prices higher. This issue still needs to be addressed.

Perhaps the most interesting questions are whether supply can respond, and how technological progress can help? There is cause for optimism.

It is only in recent years, as prices have risen and as prospects for emerging economies have improved, that the need as well as the potential to boost supply has grown in prominence. Admittedly it is not just about food.

Supply of energy and metals has also attracted attention. There is now a desire from the private sector to invest more in commodity producing countries. There are many winners in this. Just look at the increased interest and investment in sub-Saharan Africa

•WORLD FOOD DAY in recent years. No one should under-estimate how much needs to be done. For instance, global cereal production may need to rise by 40% by 2050. That is a big increase, particularly as the use of biofuels has the potential of worsening the demand-supply balance. Excluding biofuels, much of the increase in cereals demand will be for animal feed to support the growing consumption of livestock products.

Finally, the importance of technology. The world needs a second ‘Green Revolution’, similar to the one that led to the advances in crop production seen in the 1960s. There needs to be another leap in technology to boost crop yields and output.

The significance of this should not be overlooked. For example, in recent years, corn and rice yields have slowed sharply. In the future, perhaps as much as fourfifths of the increased output may come from intensification of cropping rather than from increases in arable land.

No-one really knows how much needs to be invested, but it is huge. The UN believes $10 trillion will need to be invested in agricultural infrastructure, research and development by 2050 to ensure sufficient food supplies.

It may turn out to be much more than this, as there are so many complexities.

One is the need to ensure more efficient use of water. Technology can certainly make progress here.

Just take Australia’s increased water efficiency for irrigation. Other economies with a water shortage are making progress. Singapore is just one example. Some waterdeficient countries are seeking to import crops that need large amounts of water. The Middle East is one such region. Agriculture consumes around 70% of all

Finally, the importance of technology. The world needs a second ‘Green Revolution’,

similar to the one that led to the advances in crop production seen in the 1960s

freshwater available globally, and 82% in low and middle-income countries. While water use has increased sharply its efficiency has barely improved.

Across some countries, where subsistence farmers hope to gain, there is concern about the future of genetically modified foods. Yet, across some net food-importing countries, such as the Philippines, Burkina Faso and Senegal, GM crops are seen as an important part of reducing import needs and boosting crop yields. It is a complex area meriting further research and investment.

Overall, global demand for

food will continue to rise. With World Food Day focusing attention on the need for stable food prices, this should turn attention to the need to invest in new supply and to search for technological advances.

The winners from the current shift in the balance of power affecting the world economy will be those countries that have the cash, the creativity or the commodities. Food producers should be at the forefront of the winners from commodity rich countries.

Dr GERARD LYONS is Chief Economist at Standard Chartered Bank

Curriculum vitae

Gerard Lyons

GERARD LYONS Dr Gerard Lyons is the Chief Economist and Group Head of Global Research at Standard Chartered. He is also an Economic Advisor to the Board and a Member of the Bank’s Executive Forum. Previous roles at the Bank include Member of the Global Markets Management Team and of the Risk Management Committee.

Gerard has held senior roles at leading international financial firms since starting in the City 25 years ago. His previous positions include Chief Economist at DKB International, Consultant to the Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank Tokyo, Chief UK Economist at Swiss Bank Corporation, beginning his career with Chase Manhattan. He gained his PhD on testing the efficiency of financial futures markets at the University of London.

Gerard is currently a Council Member of the University of Warwick, Vice Chairman of the 48 Group Club (China), Member of the Advisory Board for the Grantham Institute on Climate Change, Committee Member of the Hong Kong Association, Member of the International Council of the Bretton Woods Committee and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. He is on the Panel of Economic Advisors to the Mayor of London and on the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Banking and Capital Markets. In previous years he has held other positions, such as Chair of the Steering Committee of the Asia Study Group at Chatham House, a Committee member of the Centre for Economic Policy Research and, in 2006, he was UK Co-Chair of the UK-Hong Kong Business Partnership. At the end of 2010, he was appointed a Fellow of the Society of Business Economists and elected to the Council of The Royal Economic Society. In early 2011 he became a member of the European Commission’s “informal network of leading China experts”.

Gerard has also authored 'The Qatar 2020 Report' requested by, and presented to the Emir in February 2006 and he was the co-author of the 'Report of the Commission on the £ Sterling' for the then leader of the UK Opposition, William Hague, as well as being on the Council of the `No’ Campaign. Gerard has published widely on economic and financial issues, writes regular newspaper columns and is regularly invited to speak at conferences. He has testified to the US Senate Banking Committee, the US Congress Foreign Affairs Committee and UK parliamentary Committees, and presented papers to the Commonwealth Finance Ministers Conference and spoken at the EU-China Summit in Beijing. He has an excellent forecasting record, and has topped the Sunday Times annual forecasting table twice in the past decade and is widely credited with accurate predictions ahead of the financial crisis.

Based in London, he travels widely, speaking to the Bank’s clients, meeting policy makers and addressing audiences around the world. Gerard was born in Kilburn, London, and is married with three teenage children and now lives in Kent. He is a supporter of Fulham Football Club and most enjoys viewing his wife’s art and watching his children participate in their stand-up comedy, drama and various sports.

November 2011

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•PICTORIAL Lights•Camera•Action

1. DEA's Jane Mwangi with Algerian Ambassador's wife, Nabila Maandi and her children Soulef, Wanis and a friend's son, Houria Benchabane 2. Algerian Ambassador, Saad Mandi with Moroccan Ambassador, Abdelilah Benryane during the Algerian 3. Toasting to the event, Deputy Speaker Farah Maalim with the Algerian Ambassador to Kenya Saad Maandi 4. The Managers of Pride-Inn Hotel, Westlands 5.The Kenya Mission to UNON Ambassador, George Owuor congratulates Algerian Ambassador, Saad Maandi during the occasion

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November 2011

•PICTORIAL

Lights•Camera•Action

6. Charles Adhola (right), a Human Resource Consultant of Kimberly Ryan, explains what managers check in a curriculum vitae during one of a series of career guidance presentations at the Australian Studies Institute (AUSI).

Among the students who attended the talk were Catherine Njoroge (left), Darius Kibua (second left), and Sajni Ladha (second right).

7. Mr. Eliud Garry Michura of Kabarak University with the Korean Ambassador Chan Woo Kim and Prof. Peter B Kibas Deputy Vice Chancellor Kabarak University 8. Mr and Mrs Matere Keriri enjoying the Korean National Foundation day.

9. HE Antonio Ortavio Sa Ricarte Brazilian Ambassador, Mexican Ambassador HE Luis Javier Campuzano and the Chilean Ambassador HE Conrad Paulsen Rivas at the function.

10. The Canadian High commissioner to Kenya David Collins and Polish Ambassador to Kenya Ms Anna Grupinska having their photo taken at the Korean National Foundation day.

November 2011

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•GREEN AGENDA Planet Earth

DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY

UNEP Youth Conference Spotlights Green Economy Lack of green job initiatives and skill shortages may constrain employment growth and the transition to sustainable development

By SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

U

rgently bridging the skills-gap among young people through improved education and training will be one of the keys towards delivering a global Green Economy.

The consensus was reached at the Tunza International Conference for Children and Youth in Bandung, Indonesia, last month with over 1,400 young participants.

Nearly 40 per cent of the world’s unemployed -- over 80 million people are between the ages of 15 and 24. According to the latest estimates, more than 36 million of them live in Asia and the Pacific.

Accessing Green Jobs that are good for the environment and good for business will be critical for achieving sustainable development goals ranging from eradicating poverty to accelerated growth in sectors such as sustainable agriculture to renewable energies, which are also part of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Indonesia could become a model on how to achieve broad sustainability goals that include green jobs for young people as a result of a new initiative with the International Labour Organisation

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November 2011

Ruth Mulenga:

UNEP Youth Council, Zambia, explained her experience as a mentee in the area of solid waste management.

(ILO). The initiative, which is getting underway, has been inspired

by Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, the President of Indonesia, during his address to the 100th session of the International Labour Conference in Geneva in June 2011.

“In Indonesia, we intend to advance a national green-skills development strategy. We plan to pursue a decentralised youth apprenticeship programme for green jobs and take measures to foster entrepreneurship and selfemployment in the green sector,” he said.

The initiative builds on new research by UNEP and the ILO that indicates that while jobs in

high-emission “brown” industries, or in currently unsustainable sectors such as many of the world’s fisheries, will be redefined and some of them lost in the transition to a Green Economy, millions of new “green” jobs will be catalysed to support sustainable agriculture, construction, energy, forestry, tourism, transportation and waste management and recycling sectors.

However, the educational and vocational training that will prepare youth for these jobs and bring the skills needed to grow sustainable economic sectors is currently inadequate, new research by the ILO shows.

“From Asia to the Middle East and Europe, and from North America to Latin America and the small island developing states, the issue of youth employment is emerging as a challenge to the global economy and to social stability in countries and communities. Some governments are now factoring youth into green employment and green development strategies and launching the vital green entrepreneurial initiative as well as education and skills initiatives to support this,” said Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director. “The Rio+20 meeting in June

•GREEN AGENDA Planet Earth

next year represents a central opportunity to adopt far more wideranging policies and smart instruments to scale-up and accelerate such transitions. The Bandung Declaration at conference offers a moment and a vehicle for the children and youth to send a clear and unequivocal message to world leaders meeting 20 years after the Rio Earth Summit that this is what they want and the future they deserve,” he added.

There are already a growing number of new or redefined jobs in the transition to the Green Economy. While some need engineering and technical skills in new green technologies like “hybrid” car engines, solar panels, or LED lighting, others simply require retraining in more sustainable industries such as organic farming, biomass or green construction.

According to the Green Jobs: Towards Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World report produced in 2008 by UNEP, the ILO, the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and the International Organisation of Employers (IOE) by 2030 up to 12 million people could be employed globally in biofuels-related agriculture and industry, 2.1 million in wind energy and up to 6.3 million in solar.

The report is the first comprehensive and authoritative overview which addresses the complexity and policy relevance of global environmental challenges and employment.

Growing environmental awareness is also helping channel interest in a greater variety of “green jobs”. For example, more people are employed worldwide in renewable energy than in the fossil fuel industry.

The automotive sector has also begun to attract workers in eco-friendly vehicles, including hybrid, electric and hydrogen-

powered ones and the construction industry is beginning to focus on green sustainable buildings which consume less energy.

There are a number of reasons for the shortage in skills. The explosive growth in new green sectors, such as energy-efficient buildings, electric cars, waste management, renewable energy, have outpaced an increase in teachers and trainers, particularly in developing countries. Professor Gusti Muhammad Hatta, State Minister for the Environment in Indonesia said, “Green jobs in emerging economies will benefit a broad cross-section of the population, especially young people.

That is why it is essential to develop new skills and capacities for the future. We look forward to the Bandung Declaration to bring these ideas to the forefront of the

YOUTH AGENDA:

Representatives at a recent Youth Conference on Climate Change

global agenda for Rio+20.”

Some countries and educational institutions have already begun to focus on training programmes for building strategic skills for the transition to a Green Economy with more “green jobs”.

In Bangladesh, the Grameen Shakti has trained over 1,000 women and youth to qualify as certified solar technicians.

In Brazil, the National Biodiesel Programme trains rural technicians to assist agricultural producers to grow bioenergy crops.

In Indonesia, where 40 per cent of the labour force is working in the agricultural sector, the country’s Ministry of Agriculture in 2002 launched the Climate Field Schools to train farmers in planting strategies that address climate change.

The University of Miskolc in Indonesia now offers courses in Mechanical Engineering with a major in energy conversion. India’s National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 (NREGA) is a guaranteed wage employment programme that enhances livelihoods in rural areas.

Water conservation accounts for about half of the total projects supported under NREGA, with 850,000 water conservation works funded and completed from 2006 to 2008. In the District of Jalaun (Uttar Pradesh), NREGA provides training and jobs for villagers to develop solutions to their heavily silted water harvesting infrastructure, alleviating their water shortages.

In South Africa, there is the Expanded Public Works Programme of “Working for Water” which provides training for disadvantaged communities to control and remove invasive alien plants which pose a threat to water security in the country

November 2011

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•GREEN AGENDA Planet Earth

TREASURE TROVE

World Environmental Powerhouse UNEP says the Democratic Republic of Congo could become a real power of African development provided that the pressures on its natural resources are urgently addressed

By SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

W

ith half of Africa’s forests and water resources and trillion-dollar mineral reserves, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) could become a powerhouse of African development provided multiple pressures on its natural resources are urgently addressed.

A major Post-Conflict Environmental Assessment of the DRC by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) underlines the global significance and extraordinary potential of the country’s natural and mineral resources.

However, the study warns of alarming trends including increased deforestation, species depletion, heavy metal pollution and land degradation from mining, as well as an acute drinking water crisis which has left an estimated 51 million Congolese without access to potable water.

The outcomes of the two-year assessment was released recently in Kinshasa, by UNEP’s Executive Director, Mr Achim Steiner, and the DRC’s Environment Minister, Mr José Endundo.

Conducted in conjunction with the DRC’s Ministry of Environment, Nature Conservation and Tourism, the assessment highlights successful initiatives and identifies strategic opportunities to restore livelihoods, promote good governance and support the sustainability of the DRC’s post-conflict economic reconstruction, and reinforce ongoing peace consolidation.

The study’s good news is that

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most of the DRC’s environmental degradation is not irreversible and there has been substantial progress in strengthening environmental governance.

For example, through steps such as regular anti-poaching patrols, the Congolese Wildlife Authority has secured the Virunga National Park, which at the peak of the DRC’s crisis was losing the equivalent of 89 hectares of forest each day due to illegal fuelwood harvesting.

However, the country’s rapidly growing population of nearly 70 million people – most of whom directly depend on natural resources for their survival – and intense international competition for raw materials are adding to the multiple pressures on the DRC’s natural resource base.

KEY FINDINGS

The DRC has the highest level of biodiversity in Africa, yet 190 species are classified as critically endangered, endangered or vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Elephants and mountain gorillas are among the species under threat.

Up to 1.7 million tonnes of bushmeat (mainly antelope, duiker, monkey and wild boar) are harvested annually from unregulated hunting and poaching, contributing to species depletion.

The DRC’s tropical rainforests extend over 1.55 million km² and account for more than half of Africa’s forest resources – making them a critical global ecosystem service provider and a potential source of

November 2011

THREATENED: The

Congo forest

up to US$900 million in annual revenue up to 2030 through REDD+.

The DRC has the largest artisanal mining workforce in the world – around two million people – but a lack of controls have led to land degradation and pollution. Its untapped mineral reserves are of global importance and are estimated to be worth US$24 trillion.

Around 15 tonnes of mercury are used annually in the DRC’s artisanal gold mining operations, making it the second largest source of mercury emissions in Africa.

The Congo basin supports Africa’s largest inland fisheries with an estimated production potential of 520,000 tonnes per year. While at the national level this resource is under-exploited, there are many instances of serious over-

•GREEN AGENDA Planet Earth

fishing pressures at the local level.

The most alarming climate change-related issue is the vulnerability of rain-fed small-scale agriculture. For example, as of 2020, the duration of the rainy season in the drought-prone region of Katanga is expected to reduce from seven months to five months.

There is a remarkable rise of ‘people-based’ social enterprises, most of which reply on natural resources. Yet with a fragile banking system and limited incentives to formalise transactions, the informal sector’s growth has become a critical structural problem as businesses can operate beyond environmental and labour laws.

As it is still emerging from a long period of State decline and protracted crisis, the provision of basic services, including energy and water supply, and environmental problems in urban centres remain key challenges for the DRC. To support the DRC’s development challenges, a doubling of aid is urgently needed, including an estimated US$200 million per annum for the environment.

Steiner said the assessment highlights strategic opportunities that can support the sustainability of the DRC’s post-conflict economic reconstruction and serve to accelerate peace consolidation efforts.

“This assessment confirms the DRC’s unique endowment of natural resources and how they can contribute to sustainable economic growth, but also reveals the legacy of using these resources in fuelling much of the conflict and human tragedy that has plagued its people for too long,” he said.

“It is UNEP’s hope the assessment’s outcomes will galvanize action and greater support from the international community and help set the nation on a more sustainable course, capitalising on the opportunities offered by a green

vironment challenges and we look to such mechanisms to support a sustainable recovery in the DRC,” the Minister said.

Funded by the Government of Norway, the UNEP post-conflict environmental assessment covers all of DRC, not only conflictaffected areas, and provides 70 recommendations covering 15 sectors and 13 environmental degradation ‘hot spots’.

KEY RECOMMENDATIONS

economy in the DRC,” he said.

The assessment aims to support the creation of enabling conditions for a transition to a ‘green economy’ in the DRC and promote a fundamental rethinking of the country’s ‘frontier’ approach to the use of its natural resources.

Speaking at the launch, the Environment Minister, Endundo, said the government welcomed the assessment which sheds light on important issues and opportunities, including the potential of the carbon market and ecotourism as sources of large-scale financing.

“We know from this two-year joint study that the DRC’s vast mineral reserves are again the object of intense foreign competition and that this is placing great pressures on our forests, wildlife and water resources.

“The REDD+ scheme in which the DRC is already engaged could potentially generate the necessary funding to address a wide range of development and en-

Map of the Democratic Republic of Congo

There is a remarkable rise of ‘people-based’ social enterprises, most of

which reply on natural resources

Engaging in a ‘green economy’ transition whereby sustainable reconstruction in the DRC includes capitalizing on the DRC’s emerging social economy to generate ‘green jobs’ and other employment, including for former combatants.

Diversifying energy sources as a basis for restarting economic activity. The DRC has a hydropower potential of 100,000 megawatts – or 13 per cent of the world’s hydropower potential – which could meet domestic needs and generate export revenue from the sale of electricity.

Overcoming the considerable environmental liabilities of a century of mining – with immediate action to remediate mining pollution ‘hotspots’ in Katanga – by introducing a new, modern mining approach and formalising the artisanal mining sector to introduce better environmental and occupational health standards.

Promote trans-boundary collaboration for sustainable fisheries management in the internationally-shared Great Rift Valley Lakes.

Strengthening institutional capacities for disaster preparedness – such as epidemics, volcanic eruptions, floods and forest fires – including early warning systems.

More detailed surveying and mapping of natural resources and integrating the economic valuation of ecosystem services into all development planning

November 2011

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•GLOBAL STAGE Window on World

UNCLE SAM 'S WOES

Hard Times in the US

States dole out unemployment benefits based on different calculations to those who lost their jobs through no fault of their own. This means that those who willfully leave their employment or who have had no steady jobs receive no benefits, and 9.1 per cent of Americans are unemployed

By JOHN MULAA

WAITING FOR JOBS:

Americans at a job centre

U

nited States President Barack Obama knows the narrative only too well: Bad economic times are lethal to an incumbent’s re-election prospects.

Jimmy Carter and George Bush Senior are the most recent embodiments of the time-tested maxim.

Obama knows he faces tough prospects as the high level of unemploy-

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November 2011

ment rate continues to cause him growing political misery. The President’s attention, political itinerary and everything in between shows he is aware that he must slay the monster in one way or another in order stand a chance of retaining the White House. Since shortly before Obama took office to now, the US economy has shed an incredible number of jobs, an estimated 7.5 million of

them, although some grimmer estimates have put the figure north of 10 million. This translates to an unemployment rate of 9.1 per cent, an average that camouflages huge economic and racial categories.

According to the most recent figures, African-American unemployment rate is in excess of 16 per cent while white unemployment is slightly above 8 per cent, almost half

•GLOBAL STAGE Window on World

of the rate for Blacks and Latinos.

Furthermore, across all the races it is the most vulnerable, the less educated, the less connected, the less wealthy, That are bearing the brunt of the job market malaise.

For the moment there is no panacea in sight. Obama’s recently proposed Jobs Bill is languishing somewhere in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, with little hope it will see the light of day anytime soon. A stimulus plan by another name, Obama’s plan proposes to spend half a trillion dollars on a variety of public projects and taxcuts mostly for working Americans and those who employ them in order to inject some momentum in an economy that is sputtering and showing signs of conking out altogether.

And what must be worrisome to Obama, a majority of Americans are beginning to hang the economy around his neck. They are telling pollsters in increasing numbers it is he, and not his predecessor George Bush, who is responsible for the state of the economy. Politically unsettling for the president is his loyal constituency of African Americans beginning to show signs of restiveness. Obama has been compelled to remind black leaders to “stop complaining”.

At the annual awards dinner of the Congressional Black Caucus, Obama told black leaders who have criticised him for not doing nearly enough to address black unemployment to quit complaining and to focus on supporting him.

What does it mean to be unemployed in America? It depends.

The better off are cushioned by savings and other resources and can weather the downturn much better than the many who live from paycheck to paycheck. States dole out unemployment benefits based on different calculations to those who lost their jobs through no fault of

their own. This means that those who willfully left their employment or who have had no steady jobs receive no benefits. They rely on other sources such as charities and wellwishers to survive. With each passing week, it becomes more difficult.

States have time limits for benefits.

Because of the prolonged recession with very few jobs being created, Congress, at the urging of the President, has extended the length of time the unemployed can receive benefits. Even that has not been without a fight. Some Republicans of libertarian bent are philosophically opposed to unemployment benefits arguing that they dull the keenness with which the unemployed should be looking for jobs. They are a minority though.

How have immigrants been affected by the US economic downturn? The flow that used to cross the US-Mexican border in search of jobs north has slowed to a trickle. Immigrants are rational economic beings; they see little point in risking all to get to a place that offers few pickings. Those already in country are getting by as best as they can as they are not entitled to any benefits and there are reports many are headed back home.

Some Republicans of libertarian bent are philosophically opposed to unemployment benefits arguing that they dull

the keenness with which the unemployed should be looking for jobs. They are a minority though

Immigrants from elsewhere including Africa are staying put determined to weather the current ill wind or simply because they are aware that returning to their original homes does not offer much of a promise either. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that some are going back.

Kenya-centricwebsitescarrystories of Kenyans, mostly the younger cohorts, who have decided to throw in the towel and return home figuring perhaps that though it might be tougher back home at least there is a social network one can lean on in times of distress in contrast to the US which can be chillingly impersonal and seemingly uncaring.

While in Nairobi recently, I heard stories of some Kenya couples in the US who had shipped their children back home, even if temporarily, as the economic bite got deeper and options ran out.

Will the US regain the jobs, at least some of them, it shed? Politicians, economists, and no doubt religious folk are hard at work and praying that indeed the jobs return. The alternative is too grim to contemplate. Going by the history of past recessions, some jobs will return but not all of them. And the ones that eventually reappear may demand different skill sets from the jobs that disappeared. That is the positive scenario.

The pessimists see little silver lining on the horizon. If anything they are fearful that even the few low jobs remaining may be outsourced. For instance, it is rumored that some fast food joints are considering outsourcing order taking.

In other words a placed order will be routed via India or China before it is relayed to the fellow who eventually gives it to you. That will cut out the order takers and increase unemployment lines but it will cut the costs of the food chains and shore up the bottom line

November 2011

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•GLOBAL STAGE Window on World

ARAB SPRING

Libya on the Cross-Road

Is the ouster of the Muammar Gadhafi regime and his undignified death on the streets of his Sirte hometown a victory for democracy as Washington would have us believe? Only time will tell.

BY MOHAMMED WARSAMA

S

peaking to journalists after a courtesy call on Rwandan President Paul Kagame just a day after the brutal death of Muammar Gadhafi, the US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Johnnie Carson said it was a great moment for democracy and the Libyan people.

Perhaps he should have added that it was also a great day for Washington which steered the United Nations Security Council into endorsing a “no- fly zone over Libya and the use of “all necessary means to prevent mass atrocities” in the early stages of the Libyan crisis back in March this year.

The war in Libya was more about Washington’s geopolitical interests than actually protecting the people from the anticipated backlash by the Gadhafi regime.

The costs of the war was shared with NATO and most probably so will the steep cost of cleaning up, but that does not answer the allimportant question of: What next for Libya without Gadhafi?

Washington and its NATO allies have an international obligation under the military enforcement of the Responsibility to Protect to help disarm the rebels and lead Libya towards peace and security. To leave Libya in its present situation will simply create another Iraq.

ANOTHER IRAQ

Indeed, even in Iraq US's double standards are now public. Bagh-

40

dad’s refusal to grant US troops legal immunity has reportedly prompted Washington to abandon plans to keep a residual training force in the country after December 31, this year and to announce that all US troops will be going home.

Washington has contested the reports, but still maintains that it troops will be leaving at the end of the year as earlier planned.

There were even echoes of Saddam Hussein's humiliating arrest in Gaddafi's cage. He is said to have been hiding in a culvert just like the Iraq dictator in a hole on the ground.

November 2011

THE LATE GADHAFI:

in a file picture at AU function

The Americans hanged Hussein during Eid, an Islamic holy day of prayer and festivities, and promised the world that the crisis in Iraq was over. The blood letting and violence has not ended and is unlikely to end any time soon.

Carson spoke about Libyans having a real chance, at last, to determine their fate and chart their own destiny. Questions about Afghanistan and Iraq being replayed in Libya were quickly dismissed. So were questions about the proliferation of arms and the fact that most of the fighters were rapidly disappearing into the desert possibly to Al Qaeda camps in the Maghreb.

Can Africa afford the luxury of another failed state with the crisis in Somalia still on the boil? Carson couldn’t be drawn to responding to that particular question; but Europe had better be alive to Libya’s proximity to its doorsteps and what arms in the wrong hands could do to its collective security.

Britain and Spain have already faced terror attacks; perhaps not of the scale and magnitude of 9/11 in New York, but enough to place them squarely on the side of caution.

The Kigali press briefing moved on to regional matters and the achievements made by the Rwandan government in the last 17 years since the 1994 genocide that brought the country to its knees and other mundane niceties.

Clearly, what Carson missed had been well captured by his fel-

•GLOBAL STAGE Window on World low countryman and US Senator Lindsey Graham, who after a visit to Libya in late September this year, expressed shock at the number of militias on the lose. In the Libyan capital Tripoli alone, he counted as many as 28 militia groups all heavily armed and answering to its own chain of command.

In a sense, every major tribe has its own militia and it is doubtful as to whether the National Transitional Council (NTC) will be able rein in the emerging warlords and get them to form a new national army and police force. At it is, the NTC will be too busy fixing the economy and reviving the country’s oil output, which is it lifeline.

But was the ouster of the Gadhafi regime and now his undignified demise on the streets of his Sirte hometown a victory for Washington?

To its credit the Obama administration did cobble together a socalled “coalition of the willing” that brought on board the Arab League, the Organisation of the Islamic Conference and the Gulf Cooperation Council, albeit reluctantly.

Even fate seemed to have conspired against the Gadhafi regime, after China and Russia, the two permanent members of the UN Security Council, who would have been averse to allowing a US-led military intervention under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, withheld their veto.

Washington, it would seem then decided to pursue its true agenda which was regime change. Having convinced it NATO allies to help under write the adventure, it was simply a matter of time before the endgame arrived. And it did in a manner no one expected.

But signs that the situation in Libya could be trickier than anticipated are now emerging and the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has added his voice to those calling on all sides in Libya to lay down their arms and work together peacefully to rebuild the North African nation.

“Clearly, this day marks an historic transition for Libya,” Ban said at UN Headquarters in New York, reacting to the reports of the death of the Libyan leader and the end of fighting in Sirte and other cities.

“In the coming days, we will witness scenes of celebration, as well as grief for those who lost so much,” he stated. “Yet let us recognise, immediately, that this is only the end of the beginning. The road ahead for Libya and its people will be difficult and full of challenges.”

Pro-Gadhafi forces and rebels have been engaged in fighting for months after a pro-democracy movement emerged at the start of the year, similar to the popular uprisings witnessed in other parts of the Middle East and North Africa.

Ban stressed that now is the time for all Libyans to come together, and that they can only realise the promise of the future through national unity and reconciliation.

“Combatants on all sides must lay down their arms in peace,” he said. “This is the time for healing and rebuilding, for generosity of spirit – not for revenge.”

As Libya’s transitional authorities prepare the way for elections and take the many other steps toward building their new nation, “inclusion and pluralism must be the watchwords,” he added.

In a separate statement, Ban paid tribute to the Libyan people for their steadfastness and courage through all the pain they endured, and conveyed the condolences of the UN to the families of those who gave their lives in the struggle for freedom.

“Libya now closes a painful and tragic chapter and starts a new one based on national reconciliation, justice, respect for human rights and the rule of law,” he stated, adding that “the road ahead is full of challenges, but also opportunities.”

The UN began deploying staff last month to its newly established UN Support Mission in Libya (UN-

Washington, it would seem then decided to pursue its true agenda which was regime change. Having

convinced it NATO allied to help under the adventure, it was simply a matter of time before the endgame arrived

SMIL), headed by the SecretaryGeneral’s Special Representative, Ian Martin. The mission, based in the capital, Tripoli, will assist the authorities in restoring public security, plan for elections and ensure transitional justice.

Martin, speaking to reporters in New York via video-link from Tripoli, said that today is indeed an historic day and probably “the key moment of the transition.”

He said that as soon as the National Transitional Council (NTC) formally declares liberation, the path will begin towards the formation of an interim government, elections for a national council as a basis for a government with full democratic legitimacy and the drafting of a new constitution.

“It’s the people of Libya who have made their revolution and it’s the Libyan people, with youth and women very much at the fore, who will lead on the way ahead,” he stated. “But they have asked the United Nations to play a significant role in assisting them.”

Martin emphasized that, amid the celebration, no one should underestimate the scale of the challenges that lie ahead for Libya. He noted that there are many who have been bereaved, many others who have been seriously maimed and injured, as well as those who are traumatized not just by what has happened during the current fighting but by torture, disappearances and extrajudicial executions during the years of the Qadhafi regime.

At the same time, he stated that Libya is a country now which has a very strong sense of the values of human rights, democracy, accountability and transparency, precisely because these are the opposite of what has been experienced for so long.

“And it’s those values, United Nations values, that we will do our best to assist them in realising.”

November 2011

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•HEALTH Mind•Body•Soul

HEALTH MATTERS

Curbing Mother-Child Deaths

By SHITEMI BARON KHAMADI

Jonathan Scot Gration: US

Ambassador to Kenya

42

A

new initiative by the Kenya government dubbed ‘Let’s live campaign’ cites Millennium Development Goal numbers 4 (Reduce child mortality, 5 (Improve maternal health) and 6 (Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases) as the main focus. The campaign seeks to halve preventable deaths of children, mothers, certain cancers and non-communicable diseases

November 2011

and prevent HIV related deaths.

This initiative, therefore, mirrors MDGs that also hope to halve developmental concerns by 2015 although it has a shorter lifespan of one year.

According to the Kenya Population Data Sheet 2011 released by the National Coordinating Agency for Population and Development (NCAPD), adequate family planning methods are critical to reducing maternal and child mortality. The report affirms that ensuring access to family planning can prevent unintended pregnancies and reduce maternal and child mortality. Among married women ages 15 to 49, the poorest women have the highest unmet need for family planning.

Still, even among women in the wealthiest quintile, nearly one out of five married women has an unmet need for family planning.

In 2005, the Kenya and German governments introduced the Output Based Approach to reproductive health that initiated a voucher scheme whose primary objective is to help the poor to access highly subsidised quality reproductive health services. A client who is eligible to benefit from the scheme is required to purchase a voucher for the desired service at a subsidised cost.

The client then presents the voucher to an accredited service provider in one of the project sites in exchange for the desired service. At the end of each month, the accredited service providers submit their claims for the services rendered.

These claims are submitted to the Voucher Management Agency for reimbursement.

However, sustainability of the project became a challenge. Although it was intended that the project would be anchored on the Health ministry, budget constraints made its sustainability a challenge.

An earlier input-based approach to development, which primarily focuses on pumping money by government and development partners, had been used to address health issues in the country. This approach has, over the years, seen enormous financial resources channeled to the health sector to cater for infrastructure, personnel, drugs and supplies in a bid to improve the health of the citizens with less progress. This is because other barriers such as poverty make it difficult to access critical medication.

PRODUCTIVITY

The experiences of these projects were, therefore, instructive in birthing the Outcome Based Approach to reducing preventable deaths. This project, being a partnership between the Kenyan and US government, is meant to ensure that the country’s productivity is enhanced. “We have worked with the Government of Kenya and health experts to design an outcome-based approach, which can piggy-back on programmes that already exist”, said US Ambassador Jonathan Scot Gration. This means it’s about knowing the ways of cutting down mortality rates while reducing the focus on money.

•HEALTH Mind•Body•Soul

The set target is December 2012 when the initiative should have materialised by halving the deaths especially those occurring from the four thematic areas; HIV, communicable diseases specifically high mortality cancers such as lung, breast and cervical cancers.

as in Rwanda, will also inform how to make the programme better. Rwanda has had national health insurance for 12 years now in which 92 per cent of the nation Fight AMR! is“Save covered, and the premiums medicines for our children”

are US$2 a year. By comparison, in the U.S. only 85 per cent of people have health insurance and premiums cost thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars Incomplete doses

PARTNERSHIP

Many of the programmes will be to help in behavioural change through advocacy to promote healthy living. These programmes will come in handy especially in halving deaths due to cancers and HIV/AIDS. Although skeptism has been shown based on previous programmes and largely how sustainability of programs is difficult, Gration is still emphatic that it will be a success. He averred that “the Kenya government has decided that although people are saying the programme is too lofty, it will nevertheless take off and this is exciting.”

Public Private Partnership will be a critical component of the programmes. Here, it will come in through insurance and collaborate with other private companies and hospitals. Public health practitioners will be trained and given scholarships to improve their skills. Additionally, equipment will be sought from companies that make hospital equipment through their corporate social responsibility initiative.

Traditional birth attendants and all those who are involved in the birthing process will have to be trained to ensure the children being born are safe. These attendants know best the cultural practices and reasons why many women in rural areas do not go to hospitals for delivery. Training them is therefore a necessary component of the programme.

Best practices from the region,

This comic strip is part of a series developed by EPN to provide information on containing the spread of antimicrobial resistance.

Funding for the comic strips has been provided by the USAID supported SPS program of MSH.

November 2011

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•HEALTH Mind•Body•Soul

EXPERIMENTAL VACCINES

Major Onslaught to Tame Malaria

Hope has been rekindled in the fight against Malaria. Among the more than one million people it kills annually are hundreds of thousands of children, most under the age of five. Majority are from the developing world and almost 90 per cent are from sub-Saharan Africa.

BY CAROL KIIRU

T

he world has moved a step closer to taming the killer Malaria with an experimental vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline halving the risk of African children getting malaria in a major clinical trial.

This follows the first results from a large-scale trial of a new vaccine, RTS,S, published online in the New England Journal of Medicine, showing it can give children significant protection against the deadly disease that is responsible for close to 800,000 deaths each year. Malaria is endemic in more than 100 countries worldwide and killed some 781,000 people in 2009, according to the World Health Organisation.

RTS,S has provided “young African children with significant protection against clinical and severe malaria with an acceptable safety and tolerability profile,” says the press announcement made by the Malaria Vaccine Initiative (MVI) and GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) Biologicals, two of the main partner organisations that conducted the trial.

The vaccine is designed to prevent the parasite from infecting, maturing and multiplying in the liver, and from re-entering the bloodstream and infecting red blood cells.

It works by prompting the body’s immune system to defend itself against Plasmodium falciparum, the malaria

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parasite carried by mosquitoes. Researchers collected data on the first 6,000 children 12 months after they received three doses of the vaccine.

Those aged 5 to 17 months were shown to have reduced risk of clinical malaria -- marked by fever and chills -- by 56 per cent. Children had a 47 per cent lower risk of contracting severe malaria, which becomes a medical emergency with a patient exhibiting coma, severe anemia, respiratory distress and potential organ damage.

“A vaccine is the simplest, most cost-effective way to save lives,” Bill Gates said in a statement. “These results demonstrate the power of working with partners to create a malaria vaccine that has the potential to protect millions of children from this devastating disease.”

The US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) collaborated with the Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) to conduct the trial at one of the East African sites. CDC Director Thomas Frieden said in a statement that data to be collected in the future will be critical to understanding the usefulness of RTS,S. “The data, expected in 2012 and 2014 ... will be critical to understanding how the vaccine may be used to control malaria,” Frieden said.

“We would have wished that we could wipe it out, but I think this is

November 2011

The vaccine is designed to prevent the parasite from

infecting, maturing and multiplying in the liver, and from reentering the bloodstream and infecting red blood cells

going to contribute to the control of malaria rather than wiping it out,” Tsiri Agbenyega, a principal investigator in the RTS,S trials in Ghana, said at a conference about the disease in Seattle in the US. The new data, presented at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Malaria Forum conference in Seattle and published simultaneously in the New England Journal of Medicine, were the first from a final-stage Phase III clinical trial conducted at 11 trial sites in seven countries across sub-Saharan Africa. “We are very happy with the results. We have never been closer to having a successful malaria vaccine,” said Christian Loucq, director of PATH MVI, who was at the conference.

PROTECTION

He added that widespread use of insecticide-treated bed nets in the trial-by 75 percent of people taking part-showed that RTS,S can provide significant protection on top of other existing malaria control methods.

In the meantime, results in babies aged six to 12 weeks are expected in a year’s time and, if all goes well, GSK believes the vaccine could reach the market in 2015. The results were announced recently at the Malaria Forum hosted by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, Washington State

AU-IBAR Marks 60 Anniversary SUCCESS STORY

The African Union's InterAfrican Bureau for Animal Resources has a vision for an Africa in which animal resources make a significant contribution to the reduction of poverty and hunger by supporting and empowering the Member States and Regional Economic Communities

By JANE MWANGI

November 2011

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he African Union – Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) is a specialised technical office of the Department of Rural Economy and Agriculture (DREA) of the African Union Commission (AUC). IBAR takes pride in being the only African institution with the continent-wide mandate necessary to mobilise the full productive potential of livestock, fisheries and wildlife as resources for both human wellbeing and economic development in the 54 Member States of the African Union.

In celebration of its 60th Anniversary, IBAR is proud to share its history both with regard to its achievements in the animal resources sector in Africa, and the impressive growth that it has experienced as an institution over the past 60 years.

In sharing these achievements AU-IBAR hopes to contribute to a better understanding and recognition of the economic importance of animal resources in Africa, the vital role animal resources play in poverty reduction and livelihood support and the major contribution that it is making towards realising that potential.

November 2010: The President of the Republic of Kenya, HE Mwai Kibaki celebrating Kenya’s freedom from rinderpest by unveiling the commemorative statue in Meru National Park where the last case of rinderpest was reported in 2001. On his right is Prof. Ahmed El-Sawalhy, Director AU-IBAR and on his left Mr. Eric Van Linden, Head of the EU Delegation to Kenya and the Hon. Mohammed Kuti, Minister of Livestock Development, Kenya. On the front right looking on is Dr. Peter Ithondeka, Director of Veterinary Services Kenya and Dr. Julius Kipng’etich, Director of the Kenya Wildlife Service. Also looking on are (on the EU Head of Delegation’s left back ) Dr. W.N. Masiga, the OIE Regional Delegate and Mr. C. Camarada, the FAO Kenya Country Representative (far right back)

The Early Days: From IBED[1951] To IBAR [1971] The recognition for the need for an intercontinental institution to coordinate animal disease control activities by Member States stemmed from a meeting held in Nairobi in 1948 to discuss the worsening situation caused by rinderpest, a fatal and highly contagious disease of cattle and other cloven-hoofed animals including

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The AU-IBAR Headquarters in Nairobi

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•AU-IBAR Special Report

wildlife. Previous epidemics of rinderpest had wiped out more than 90 per cent of all susceptible animals; a disease of truly monumental impact on the lives and livelihoods of the peoples of Africa.

In 1951, a working group appointed by the Commission for Technical Cooperation in Africa (CCTA), an intergovernmental organisation, recommended that a body be created to deal with all aspects of highly infectious animal diseases in Africa, with a primary focus on rinderpest. This lead to the formation, on 1 November 1951, of the InterAfrican Bureau of Epizootic Diseases (IBED) located in Nairobi, Kenya. In 1956 the functions of IBED were expanded to cover broader aspects of animal health, prompting the renaming of IBED as the Interafrican Bureau

for Animal Health (IBAH).

After the formation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in 1963, it was decided to integrate the CCTA with the OAU, leading to the formation of the Scientific Technical and Research Commission (STRC) based in Lagos, Nigeria. The IBAH consequently became one of the specialised technical offices of the OAU under the Department of Science and Technology, but still based in Nairobi. The 14th ordinary session of the OAU Council of Ministers, held in Addis Ababa in 1971, endorsed a recommendation from the Directors of Veterinary Services that the functions of IBAH should be expanded to further address animal production activities and its renaming as the Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources (IBAR).

In 2003 IBAR became part of the Department of Rural Economy and Agriculture (DREA) of the African Union Commission, leading to its current and widely respected position as the only African institution with the continent-wide mandate necessary to mobilise the full productive potential of the animal resources sector.

IBAR currently employs some 90 staff (25 established and 65 project and short term staff) with key positions in animal health, animal production, trade and marketing and programmes and projects. Twenty four additional project staff will join IBAR with the launch, in January 2012, of the new flagship programme to reinforce veterinary governance in Africa (VET-GOV).

IBAR receives generous funding support from the EU, AfDB, USAID and the WB. The total project budget for the years 2010-2011 was US $96, 5 million. The projected budget for 2012 will amount to US $41 million. Between 2008 and

2010 IBAR has directly invested some US $64 million to enhance the capacity of Member States and Regional Economic Communities [RECs] to further develop animal resources.

IBAR’s Vision is an Africa in which animal resources make a significant contribution to the reduction of poverty and hunger.

The Bureau aims to achieve this by providing leadership in the development of animal resources throughout Africa by supporting and empowering the AU Member States and Regional Economic Communities.

Animal Resources in Africa: Facts and Figures The livestock sector alone accounts for over half of the agricultural capital stock in Africa and, together with other animal resources (fisheries and wildlife), accounts for some 35 per cent of Africa’s agricultural GDP. This figure is likely to increase within the next few years.

Livestock production, fishing, and wildlife are major and growing economic activities in

After the formation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in 1963, it was decided to integrate the CCTA with the OAU, leading

to the formation of the Scientific Technical and Research Commission (STRC) based in Lagos, Nigeria

AU-IBAR now also addresses the fisheries sector in Africa (Photo Source: WWF)

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Africa. The total annual fisheries production from Africa is estimated to be about 8 million metric tonnes which represents about 5 per cent of world fisheries production (FAO, 2010).

The sector provides employment for over 4 million people on the continent being equivalent to about 9 per cent of the total employment of about 45 million people in world fisheries. Wildlife contributes significantly to the economies of most sub-Saharan African countries.

The wildlife sector in Africa is worth US $7 billion with an annual growth rate of 5 per cent.

It is thus a major contributor to the continental gross domestic product (GDP). In East and Southern African countries, the consumptive and non-consumptive utilisation of wildlife is a significant foreign exchange earner (Kock et al. 2002).

With a livelihood asset of this potential it should come as no surprise that the AU-IBAR, together with its partners including the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), and its supportive donors, particularly the European Union, the African Development Bank, USAID and the World Bank, will continue to give the highest priority to realising the productive potential of Africa’s most valuable and uniquely sustainable animal resources.

IBAR’s Achievements in the Animal Resources Sector in Africa Since its establishment in 1951, IBAR has tackled a wide range of animal resources chal-

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Some diseases can be transmitted from wildlife to livestock

lenges, of which the long and hard fought battle against rinderpest in Africa was without doubt the most important. Now that this battle has been won, IBAR can use the experience and lessons learnt to address the many other challenges that remain.

The fight against and eventual eradication of rinderpest on this continent - A true African success story The coordinated battle against rinderpest in Africa, and its final eradication, stretches back 50 years from 1962 all the way through to 2011. Three major control and eradication campaigns were implemented during this period commencing with the Joint Project 15 (JP-15), when from 1962 to 1976 more than 70 million cattle were vaccinated in 22 African countries. JP 15 showed how coordinated action could dramatically reduce the incidence and economic impact of rinderpest but, unfortunately, it was not able to completely eliminate all sources of infection.

In the period following JP 15, some sporadic but relatively short lived outbreaks of rinderpest occurred but with time a progressive and escalating number of cases were being reported necessitating, in 1986, the launch by IBAR of a

AU-IBAR works to increase the contribution livestock makes to GDP, livelihoods, food security and food safety

second coordinated campaign, the Pan African Rinderpest Campaign or, as it was more widely known PARC. The campaign, which covered 35 African countries, used the emblem of a clover leaf as its logo, a symbol of luck according to the Irish! All cattle vaccinated were ear marked with this same motif.

By the end of a 12-year long campaign some 465.5 million doses of rinderpest vaccine had been used.

IBAR’s fight against other animal diseases has also been as instrumental; these include Trypanosomiasis and Tsetse Fly, Ticks and Tick Borne Diseases and Avian and Human Influenza.

The Director of IBAR, Professor Ahmed El-Sawalhy, and his team of highly specialised core and project staff are firmly set on a course to deliver quality and effective programmes in line with the Strategic Plan developed for 2010 to 2014.

The goal of this plan is to achieve a positive and sustained impact on the productivity of the animal resource sector in Africa, enhancing the contribution made to poverty reduction, livelihoods and GDP. For this objective it is critical that IBAR has the understanding and support of policy makers in all MS, RECs and donor communities for the contribution that animal resources can make for the socioeconomic benefit of this continent and its people. Many millions of livelihoods can be materially improved if the constraints holding back the inherent productivity of Africa’s animal resources are successfully removed.

IBAR would like to take the occasion of its 60th Anniversary to thank all partners and stakeholders for having contributed to the successful enhancement of animal resources in Africa, and in particular the European Union, and looks forward to many more years of fruitful collaboration to come!

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AU Leadership behind IBAR's SUccess

H.E Dr Jean Ping, Chairperson, African Union Commission Dr. Ping is a national of Gabon where he worked in senior positions including ministerial assignments till his appointment as AUC Chairperson. He has also led several delegations of Gabon to important forums including presiding over the 59th Session of the UN General Assembly.

H.E Rhoda P. Tumusiime, Commissioner for Rural Economy & Agriculture, African Union Commission, She is a national of Uganda. Prior to assuming this portfolio, she held various senior positions in the Government of Uganda including Commissioner for Agriculture and Commissioner for Women and Development.

H.E Erastus J.O. Mwencha, Deputy Chairperson, African Union Commission Mr Mwencha, a national of Kenya, was appointed to the position in January 2008 having served as the Secretary General of COMESA. Prior to that, he worked in senior positions in ministries of trade and industry in Kenya. Mr Mwencha is a strong advocate for the greater allocation of resources for the livestock sector in Africa.

Dr Haile G. Abebe, Director, Department of Rural Economy & Agriculture (DREA) Dr. Abebe is a national of Ethiopia.

AU-IBAR is one of the technical and specialized agencies of DREA whose purpose is to provide leadership, facilitate policy coherence, harmonization and coordination required in addressing challenges related to agriculture and rural development.

Prof. Ahmed El Sawalhy Director, AU-IBAR Prof. El Sawalhy is a national of Egypt and is the 9th Director of IBAR. He was the Chief Animal Health Officer of IBAR prior to his appointment as Director in 2009.

Previously, he worked in academia and research in Egypt where he also received several awards and honours.

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60 ANNIVERSARY

Animal Resources - A Driver for Economic Development in Africa

The African Union's-Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources is a specialised technical o ice of the Department of Rural Economy and Agriculture (DREA) of the African Union Commission (AUC). The Director, PROF AHMED EL-SAWALHY talks to DEA’S JANE MWANGI about its vision as it marks 60 years

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IPLOMAT EAST AFRICA: Do you believe that your policies are working in view of the fact that Africa loses

November 2011

the largest number of livestock whenever there is drought on the continent? For example, in the recent drought in East Africa and the Horn Region?

PROF AHMED EL-SAWALHY: It is critical to understand that across the continent each country is different for instance; you cannot compare a large pastoralist community like Somalia with say, South Africa. AUIBAR cannot mitigate the risk of another drought, but is currently busy putting in place, together with its partners, mechanisms to better anticipate such droughts. We work to strengthen the capacities of the AU Member States in order for them to anticipate situations such as the recent drought situation in the Horn of Africa. One should not forget that AU-IBAR is a technical advisory body, and has no implementation power at the national levels as such.

We therefore try to work through the Regional Economic Communities in Africa who, to a certain extent, have implementationpoweratthenational level. The process of introducing new approaches and solutions to climatic change, and have them accepted and implemented at the national level, may take years, and AU-IBAR is working hard, together with its partners, to mitigate the risks communities run should such situations occur again in the future.

Q: What is AU-IBAR doing to encourage African governments to make livestock and fisheries development get as much prominence as the one given to the wildlife sector in the national development agendas?

A: We are indeed working hard to promote the importance of livestock and fisheries as integral components to the respective national GDPs on the African continent. And not only that but also putting the protection and development of livestock and fisheries higher on their national development agendas.

Q: How would you rate the AU membership’s recognition of the importance of the livestock sector and its potential in improving the living standards of the people?

A: I believe the recent drought in the Horn of Africa brought to the fore the economic cost of a catastrophe of such magnitude; not only in terms of the loss of livestock, but also the low prices at which livestock had to be sold within a very short period of time. In addition, the traders bore the brunt as a result of the huge economic losses incurred. AU-IBAR hopes that it will not have to take another natural disaster to make AU Member States realise that livestock and fisheries are one of the main contributors to national wealth

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and, therefore, fundamental to the improvement of living standards among its populace.

Q: AU -IBAR has been at the forefront indevelopingmechanisms and measures to mitigate climate change and food security in Africa?

Have your efforts worked? Can you share with us some of your successes?

A: In recognition of the current global concerns on the phenomenon of climate change and the extreme vulnerability to food insecurities of agrarian and pastoral communities especially in physically degraded ecologies, we started the Livestock for Livelihoods project in the year 2010.

This is premised on the urgent need to elaborate sustainable climateproof production systems in arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs).The project aims at strengthening the resilience of livestock-based communities through the improvement of resource management in ASALs of Africa.

By improving Natural Resource Management (NRM) strategies, especially at the livestock-wildlifeenvironment interface, the action seeks to significantly improve food security as the beneficiaries adopt best practices and better understanding of the ecological dynamics in the context of climatic variability. In addition, it is anticipated that the action will strengthen the inherent capacities of Regional Economic Communities and the end-users at community level to develop and implement adaptation and mitigation frameworks against the impacts of Climate Change on rural livelihoods.

Q: Please tell us about your collaboration with other research and scientific organisations such as UN-FAO and World Organisation for Animal Health. Who else do you work with?

A: Over the years AU-IBAR has very fruitfully worked together with organisations such as UN-FAO,World organisation for Animal health (OIE), ILRI,WHO, the IAEA, theWWF, among others. Such collaborations ensure that we work in complementary rather than duplicative fashion, when it comes to the protection and development of the animal resources sector in Africa. Animal health may have an impact on human health; hence our collaboration with the WHO for example is very integral. It is this all-encompassing approach that ultimately ensures the improvement of the livelihoods of all people living in Africa in addition to combating poverty and hunger on the African continent.

Q: Please share with us the main objectives of your Strategic Plan 2010 - 2014. You have outlined six areas that form the pillars of the plan. Also share with us the details and expected outcomes.

A: Well, some of the six areas include emerging and re-emerging diseases, including zoonoses, the disproportionately low share of livestock and fish in overall agricultural research and national development budget. In addition to the continuing gap in capacities of African agricultural and livestock sector institutions, in particular, represents a major constraint to the design and implementation of effective programmes. In response to these challenges, AU-IBAR works through six strategic programmes, which include 1) reducing impact of trans boundary animal diseases (TADs) and zoonoses on livelihoods and public health in Africa (TADs and Zoonoses); 2) Enhancing Africa’s capacity to conserve and sustainably use its animal resources and their natural resource base (Natural Resources Management); 3) Improving investment

Over the years AU-IBAR has very fruitfully worked together with organisations such as UN-

FAO, World organisation for Animal health (OIE), ILRI, WHO, the IAEA, the WWF, among others

opportunities and competitiveness of animal resources in Africa (Investment and Competitiveness); 4) Promoting development of, and compliance with, standards and regulations (Standards and Regulations); 5) Improving knowledge management in animal resources to facilitate informed and timely decision-making (Knowledge Management); 6) facilitating the development of policies and institutional capacities for improved utilisation of animal resources in Africa (Policies and Capacity Building).

Q: As you mark your 60th Anniversary, please share with us your future plans and objectives.

What has been your biggest challenge or setback so far?

A: AU-IBAR’a biggest challenge, rinderpest, also turned into AUIBAR’s greatest success, that is, the eradication of the disease from the African continent. AU-IBAR considers every unexpected outbreak of an animal disease as a setback, but we are confident that, in close collaboration and consultation with our partners, we will be able to tackle and overcome such challenges. AUIBAR’s future plans and objectives are well documented in our Strategic Plan

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OVERVIEW OF PROJECTS IMPLEMENTED BY IBAR

FROM - TO

Joint Project 15 (JP-15)

1962 – 1976

Pan African Rinderpest Campaign (PARC)

1986 – 1999

Pan African Programme for the Control of Epizootics (PACE)

1999 – 2007

Community Animal Health and Participatory Epidemiology (CAPE) -Part of PACE

2000 – 2004

Pan African Vaccination Programme (PANVAC)

1986 – 2004*

The African Wildlife Veterinary Project (AWVP)

1998 – 2000

The Somali Ecosystem Rinderpest Eradication Coordination Unit (SERECU) I & II Project

2006 – 2010

The Regional Programme on Ticks and Tick Borne Diseases (RTTDC)

1998 - 2001

The Regional Project for Poultry and Milk Production in East Africa

1999 – 2005

The Pastoral Livelihoods Programme (PLP)

2000- 2005

The Pastoral Livelihoods Programme HIV/AIDS (PLP HIV/AIDS)

2003-2006

North Eastern Pastoral Development Programme (NEPDP)

2005 – 2008

Farming in Tsetse-Controlled Areas (FITCA)

1999 – 2003

Animal Resources Information System (ARIS)

2000 – 2008

Animal Resources Information System 2 (ARIS 2)

2009 - Date

The Livestock Data Innovation in Africa

2010 - 2012

Livestock Emergency Intervention to Mitigate Food Crisis in Somalia (LEISOM)

2008 - 2011

Livestock for Livelihoods Project (L4LP)

2010 – 2013

Participation of African Nations in Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standard-setting Organisations (PAN-SPSO)

2008 – 2011

Sheikh Technical Veterinary School and Reference Centre (STVS)

2002 - 2010

Somali Livestock Certification Project (SOLICEP)

2008 - 2011

Support Programme to Integrated National Action Plans for Avian and Human Influenza (SPINAP-AHI)

2007 - 2010

Early Detection, Reporting and Surveillance – Avian Influenza in Africa (EDRSAIA)

2007 - 2009

Emergency Relief Support to Combat Avian influenza (ERSCA)

2006 - 2010

Vaccines for the Control of Neglected Animal Diseases in Africa (VACNADA)

2009 - 2011

Regional Action for Livestock Production in Eastern Africa (RALEA)

1998 - 1990

Dryland Livestock Wildlife Environment Interface Project (DLWEIP)

2005 - 2008

* NOW SPECIALIZED TECHNICAL OFFICE, BASED IN ETHIOPIA, UNDER DREA Partnership Secretariats housed by AU-IBAR

From - To

International Scientific Council for Trypanosomiasis Research and Control (ISCTRC)

1949 – Date

Partnership for Livestock Development, Poverty Alleviation and Sustainable Economic Growth in Africa (ALive)

Founded 2003 Washington Secretariat 2003-2009 Nairobi Secretariat 2009- date

Strategic Partnership for Sustainable Fisheries Investment Fund (SPFIF)

November 2005-November 2015

Initiatives of which AU-IBAR is the Lead Institution for Livestock

From - To

The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP)

Lead since 2006

United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification – Thematic Programme Network 3 (UNCCD-TPN 3)

Lead since 2001

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IBAR’S Fight Against Other Animal Diseases Trypanosomiasis and Tsetse Fly Trypanosomiasis, also known as sleeping sickness, is a parasitic disease. The impact of the disease extends over 37 countries and an estimated 10 million sq. km (a third of the continent) of land area.

The African Union and its technical institutions AU-IBAR and the Pan African Tsetse and Trypanosomiasis Campaign (PATTEC) coordinate innovative approaches that provided rural communities with the incentives and means to sustainably manage their own tsetse control programs.

IBAR has a long history of col-

laborations with the International Scientific Council for Trypanosomiasis Research and Control (ISCTRC) with both institutions coming under the mandate of the STRC in 1965. The Council, whose roots extend to the formation of the CCTA in 1959, was established following the recognition that the removal of tsetse and trypanosomiasis required an international organization that would serve as a vehicle of cooperation and implementation across national, regional and continental barriers. ISCTRC, with its secretariat at IBAR, has continued to act as

a platform for knowledge sharing and information dissemination on trypanosomiasis research and control.

Ticks and Tick Borne Diseases Tick-borne diseases are diseases which are spread between animals by the bite of an infected tick. Ticks become infected by feeding on animals that are either sick from disease, or are apparently healthy but have the parasite in their blood (carriers). Under the auspices of IBAR, regional programs to control ticks and tickborne diseases have made signifi-

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cant gains in improved livestock productivity.

committees and at the Codex Alimentarius Commission.

Avian and Human Influenza Since the 2003 avian influenza strain H5N1 outbreak in East Asia followed by Europe and Africa, IBAR has been actively involved in efforts to support prevention and control interventions in Africa through the EU funded Support Programme for Integrated National Action Plans against Avian and Human Influenza (SPINAP-AHI, 2007-2010), and the AfDB-funded Emergency Relief Support to Combat Avian influenza (ERSCA, 2006-2010).

Under the leadership of IBAR, and in collaboration with other technical organizations and key global actors, African countries have developed Integrated Action Plans (IAPs) against HPAI and mobilized resources for its prevention and control efforts safeguarding the public from this potentially deadly disease.

Climate Change and Food Security IBAR has also been at the forefront in anticipating the impacts of climate change on food security in Africa, by strengthening the resilience of livestock-based communities through improved resource management in the Arid and Semi-Arid Lands [ASALs] of Africa. Natural Resource Management (NRM) strategies have been strengthened, especially at the livestock-wildlife-environment interface. This action has significantly improved food security through beneficiaries adopting best practices with greater understanding of the ecological dynamics in the context of mitigating the impact of climatic variability.

IBAR: more than just animal diseases IBAR’s does not only focus on coordinating the fight against animal diseases, but also works to enhance livestock production and facilitate trade and marketing of animals and animal products in compliance with international sanitary and phytosanitary standards (SPS). Through the leadership of AU-IBAR, African delegates to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) present, since 2009, coordinated positions on animal health standards of the OIE Terrestrial and Aquatic Codes (Africa speaking with one voice). With regard to food safety standards, African delegates also coordinated their positions on proposed Codex standards during their adoption both at Codex

54

Training and Capacity Building Training and capacity building of human resources at all levels to develop the livestock sector is another area in which IBAR invests considerable effort. A major programme has been conducted to strengthen MS livestock disease surveillance and reporting.

Recently IBAR undertook a needs assessment of animal resource training institutions, professional demography and accounting / financial management practices as currently serving the animal resources sector in Africa.

The Sheikh TechnicalVeterinary School Reference Centre (STVS) for Somalia has been established

by IBAR. The school’s curriculum has been expressively developed to serve the needs of the livestock production system as practiced in the arid and semi-arid lands of the

The AU-IBAR mounted a highly visible campaign throughout Africa warning of the dangers of Bird Flu

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Horn of Africa and to support the sustainable development of the livestock industry in the region.

The school has been handed over to the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD).

IBAR would like to pay credit to its implementing partners, notably the Italian NGO, Terra Nuova and the Makerere University Uganda, for their contribution to training and capacity building of veterinary services.

Animal Resources Information System (ARIS)

In order to achieve its objectives, IBAR requires quality, complete and timely animal resources information for planning, decision making and monitoring activities.

In recognition of this, IBAR developed an Animal Resources and information system [ARIS] for the collection, storage and analysis of animal resources data. The goal of ARIS is to help position IBAR at the continental level and national authorities at the country level as the central sources of comprehensive African animal health and production information

IBAR currently employs some 90 staff (25 established and 65 project and short term staff) with key positions in animal

health, animal production, trade and marketing and programmes and projects

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November 2011

55 55

•DEA HOTELS Lifestyle & Hospitality

A CENTURY OF PERFECTION

Timeless Elegance…

A luxurious 5-star hotel with a rich history, Nairobi’s Sarova Stanley was named Kenya’s Leading Hotel at the 18th World Travel Awards and has hosted famous names: Michael Caine, Barbra Streisand, Sean Connery, Sir Richard Branson, and Zambia’s former President Dr Kenneth Kaunda

By JANE MWANGI

T

he Sarova Stanley sits strategically in the heart of the city; a rustic and charming hotel overflowing with history. From the day it opened its doors in 1902, this celebrated establishment has become one of Africa’s landmark hotels, offering unparalleled signature service for that unforgettable experience. The stature and importance of Sarova Stanley is nothing short of remarkable with an enduring legacy that is inextricably linked to the history of Nairobi.

Like sand through the hour glass, the passage of time has seen the ho-

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tel take pride of place as the country’s first luxury hotel and one of the finest meeting spots. From the popular rendezvous of the colonialists to being the place where writer Ernest Hemingway thought up themes and wrote some of his most famous short stories and books. Captivatingly in 1923, Kenya’s first locally brewed beer was served here to Ewart Grogan who had walked from Cape to Cairo to prove his love for a woman.

Sarova Stanley has played host to a long line of personalities. These include such famous names as Michael Caine, Barbra Streisand, Sean Con-

nery, Sir Richard Branson, not forgetting Kenyan President, Mwai Kibaki and Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, the founding president of Zambia. Notable entertainers like Frank Sinatra and ragamuffin Grammy award winning musician Shaggy have also had a taste and feel of the charm that is the Sarova Stanley.

It is small wonder then that it continues to be a recipient of many awards. The Sarova Stanley was recently crowned Kenya’s leading hotel in the World Travel Awards 2011 for the second year running and as Kenya’s Luxury Business Hotel at the 2011 World Luxury Hotel Awards.

The Rooms Division Manager, Ronnie Kithinji termed this high acclaim as testament to exemplary service delivery, business acumen and extending beyond mere hotel practice.

“We have given our customers what is expected of us and place high premium on how we relate with them in totality; we are, therefore, very proud to receive this global recognition.

“We are one of the few heritage ho-

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Lifestyle & Hospitality

tels which further adds to the allure and we are very proud to work under a building that is over 100 years old. We keep up with the international trends whilst still maintaining the heritage aspect,” he says they do this through branding of the rooms after iconic personalities who have stayed at the hotel.

“We are very customer0-focussed having taken our service to another level. We believe in profiling of our guests such that the minute he/she steps into the hotel we are well aware of the customer’s preferences, likes and dislikes, from the pillows, music, drinks, food etc. When a customer comes, we have their data in our system and put that extra touch and personalised service.”

The hotel also continues re-inventing itself through the recent renovation of which Mr Kithinji says, “We are especially proud of the foyer as our guests can now drive into the hotel freely without running into the general public. We have also upgraded the security with an increase in the CCTV cameras.”

Thorn Tree Cafe The Thorn Tree Cafe is a legendary open-air, bistro style pavement cafe and is most famous for its message board located at the centre of the restaurant. Legend purports that the Thorn tree cafe - named for a single centrally situated Acacia tree - became a makeshift post box for travellers who left mail pinned onto its trunk.

‘Tree mail’ endures despite email and the Thorn tree Cafe flourishes as the crossroads of Africa. “We used to have a thorn-tree and for years it became a symbol where people would meet and leave messages. But pollution took effect and with the help of the Kenya Forest Service we have a new one. It is an icon and basically that is our brand for that restaurant.”

The magnificent speciality suites at Sarova Stanley are in a class of their own offering the most distinctive experience. These include, the Windsor Suite, named to commemorate the attendance at a ball in the hotel in 1928 of the Prince of Wales who later and

THE FAMOUS THAI CHI RESTAURANT

THE CLUB ROOM

RONNNIE kITHINJI:

Rooms Division Manager

briefly became King Edward VIII and the Duke of Gloucester.The Stanley Suite also serves as the Presidential Suite named after the explorer Henry Morton Stanley and the Karen Blixen Suite author of Out Of Africa and Shadows on the Grass who frequently dined at The Stanley.

Then there’s the ritzy Thai Chi that has been named the most authentic Thai restaurant in East Africa for its traditional Thai decor and delectable Thai specialties prepared by experienced chefs from Thailand. The Pool Deck Restaurant located on the fifth floor is a buffet style eatery with al fresco dining by the swimming pool serving Kenyan specialties as well as popular continental and Asian dishes.

When it comes to sensational cocktails and fine brews, then the Exchange Bar is the perfect place.

The Exchange Bar retains the feel of a traditional English Gentleman’s club with its decor and warm atmosphere.

Sarova Stanley is truly in a class of its own

November 2011

57

•CULTURE

Reviews•Raves•Revues•Repasts

KENYA AT 50

Memories are Made of This…

As the 21st Century enters its teens and Kenya gears up to celebrate its first 50 years as a sovereign modern nation, it is important to sit back and take stock. And there is no better stock-taking tool than Walking in Kenyatta's Struggles, subtitled My Story.

By NGARI GITUKU, CULTURE EDITOR

T

his is the Second Edition of the memoirs of the founding Head of Kenya’s Civil Service and FounderGovernor of the Central Bank of Kenya. Mr Duncan Nderitu Ndegwa. The new-look memoirs tell of the life story and lessons of a high-

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November 2011

profile individual who has lived on the frontline of national, regional and world events and affairs.

And at a time when the world seems to be tottering in unprecedented and unpredictable ways, preserving institutional memory becomes ever more critical for what we

live through at a given time could in a matter of years become remote or totally alien. That, indeed, is the only way we can keep in touch with the past in a way that benefits the present and the future.

Sample this. Who could have visualised Africa with a billionth people two years ago after we were had been told the Aids pandemic would wipe out the continent? Who could have foretold how Climate Change would lead to Hurricane Irene just the other day tearing through one of the world’s most iconic metropolis, New York, or indeed the many other heterodox happenings that have hit the world in recent years?

How can the past be of use to the future unless those at the news-making edge publish chronicle of their experiences?

It is absolutely essential that national institutional memory in written form be preserved, disseminated and inculcated. And not just for the sake of it; but for reference at critical junctures of history.

Fortunately, the technologies for such preservation and refinement have never been more advanced as in this unfolding Age of Digital and the seamless convergence of information communications technologies

•CULTURE

Reviews•Raves•Revues•Repasts

(ICTs), print, electronic and online.

In Kenya’s case, on the cusp of the nation’s 50th anniversary, national institutional memory must be preserved in such a way that it, for instance, becomes easy to link the memorable Sessional Paper Number 10 of 1965 to Vision 2030. And the Lancaster Constitution to the one promulgated last year. It is important to occasionally take a look at, say, the systems and values of governance through the epochs with a view to fortifying the process of development planning.

Besides providing cues to all that and more, Ndegwa’s memoirs inform, entertain, educate, provoke, challenge, prick, prod as well as give readers a rare window on the world.

Participating in the development of this memoir thus far I can attest that the learning curve and experience have been invaluable as well as enthralling.

Clearly, Ndegwa’s retirement as Central Bank Governor in 1982, (30

years next year), has, in many ways been a working retirement. He has used his time well, not only chairing various boards but also reading very widely, deeply and relevantly.

Looking back now, I have no doubt he was always disposed that way, even long before retirement, but the man is now decidedly a polymath — he is as well-versed in history, political science, philosophy, linguistics, anthropology, sociology, psychology besides his own forte – economics.

The revised edition of Mr Ndegwa memoirs made has his latest effort at the book eminently worthy of quotable reference.

In an environment where many memoirs done by retired public servants often come across as works of self-sanitisation or works of delusions of grandeur, Ndegwa’s has offered that desirable and refreshing departure.

The Second Edition includes some brand-new chapters, and a

number of riveting after-words, including a piece on “The New Constitution and the Moral High Ground”, “The Tiger Woods Hoax” and “Roasting Mbariki for the 21st Century”.

For a man who witnessed Kenya turn into an independent nation and stayed a whole 15-year course in public service, Mr Ndegwa’s is as much about Kenya’s metamorphosis as it is about his life.

Indeed, working with Ndegwa on his memoirs was a personal odyssey into first-hand and eyewitness history related wisely, eruditely and thoughtfully.

I believe that Ndegwa’s book is an invaluable addition to the growing bookshelf of magisterial publications on Kenya’s experience in the late colonial and post-colonial period, among them Professor Caroline Elkins’s 2005 classic Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain’s Gulag in Kenya

The revised edition of Mr Ndegwa memoirs made has his

latest effort at the book eminently worthy of quotable reference

CAN SCIENCE HALT AGING? Author: Ray Kurzweil Title: The Singularity is Near Publisher: Penguin Date: Copyright 2005 by Ray Kurzweil Pages: 212-213 Some researchers believe we will soon be able to reverse the process of aging: “An energetic and insightful advocate of stopping the aging process by changing the information processes underlying biology is Aubrey de Grey, a scientist in the department of genetics at Cambridge Univer­sity.

De Grey uses the metaphor of maintaining a house. How long does a house last? The answer obviously depends on how well you take care of it. If you do nothing, the roof will spring a leak before long, water and the elements will invade,

and eventually the house will disintegrate. But if you proactively take care of the structure, repair all damage, confront all dangers, and rebuild or renovate parts from time to time using new materials and technologies, the life of the house can essentially be extended without limit.

“The same holds true for our bodies and brains. The only difference is that, while we fully understand the methods underlying the maintenance of a house, we do not yet fully understand all of the biological principles of life.

But with our rapidly increasing comprehension of the biochemical processes and path­ways of biology, we are quickly gaining that knowledge.

We are beginning to understand aging, not as a single inexorable progression but as a group of related processes. Strategies are emerging for fully reversing each of these aging progressions, using different combinations of biotechnology techniques. “De Grey describes

his goal as ‘engineered negligible senescence’ - stopping the body and brain from becoming more frail and disease-prone as it grows older.

As he explains, ‘All the core knowledge needed to develop engineered negligible senescence is already in our possession - it mainly just needs to be pieced together.’ De Grey believes we’ll demonstrate ‘robustly rejuvenated’ mice - mice that are functionally younger than before being treated and with the life extension to prove it - within 10 years, and he points out that this achievement will have a dramatic effect on public opinion. Demonstrating that we can reverse the aging process in an animal that shares 99 per cent of our genes will profoundly challenge the common wisdom that aging and death are inevitable. Once robust rejuvenation is confirmed in an animal, there will be enormous competitive pressure to translate these results into human therapies, which should appear five to ten years later.”

November 2011

59

•ODYSSEYS People & Places

TRAVELLER’S DIARY

Nairobi to Juba – By Road The writer narrates his experiences as he journeys to South Sudan from Kenya, the missed opportunities for cross-border trade and the trials of dealing with a foxy bus conductor

By WANJOHI KABUKURU

I

was to leave Nairobi, Kenya for Juba, South Sudan at 9.30am. This was not to be. I left on the same day at 1.00pm. No explanation was given and I did not ask for any from the management of Kampala Coaches. It was not my first time to use these interstate coaches. Five years ago I had used another interstate coach to travel to Burundi. At the time it took is 24 hours to arrive in Bujumbura.

This time around I was told it would take the same time to reach Juba. My seat companion was a buxom lady with a penchant for stories. I saw no harm in entertaining some of her stories. Being a frequent traveler on this route because of her business undertakings, she gave me the necessary tips for survival even though I had not asked for any advice. One piece of advice that I found useful was when she muttered “For you to make it in business in this region as a cross-border trader, you must have time and plenty of it. Never be in a hurry. That way it is easy for you to cope and accept the realities on the ground.”

I had no clue as to why she readily offered me such advice freely. She had seen that instead

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November 2011

of getting angry when I sensed a delay in our trip I had sought for a restaurant to grab a meal. As other passengers engaged in “how to improve services” by the bus company I was little fazed other than eating as I was not sure where we would stop for a meal. Common sense dictated that I won’t be told when to take my meals so I was better off preparing myself.

As soon as I had mouthed the last morsel of a serving of French fries and stew, and we were called in to board the bus for the long journey.

I had amply prepared myself for this long trip. This was not my first

long trip by road. And certainly it isn’t my last.

Two and half hours later we stopped at Nakuru to relieve ourselves and also for a quick bite and refreshments. It was pouring heavily and the weather was chilly.

At 8pm we made a stopover in Eldoret for dinner. I fancied myself with a plate of pasta and minced beef stew serenaded with a medley of vegetables and downed it all with a mug of steaming hot tea to ward off the cold. The journey was still at its infancy, considering where I was headed to. So far the usual drama associated with such travel was missing. The journey was smooth as the roads network is in good condition.

We arrived at the muddy and poorly maintained Busia border point, Kenya at midnight. After Immigration and customs check in both Kenya and Uganda we were on our way to Kampala.

True the journey was long but it was made bearable by the soothing stereo system streaming out Steve Kekana, Pat Shange, Papa Wemba, Paul Simon, Lucky Dube and Stephanie Powers who gave the journey a surreal continental feel. No doubt it is a tiring journey and as such any distraction is a welcome inconvenience.

•ODYSSEYS People & Places

Other than listening to the chatter of the buxom companion with other fellow passengers, the lady seated in front of me had her fair share too. She reclined her seat rather steeply and from her phone conversations she was involved in an altercation with someone over a business gone sour and from the look of things annoyance was written all over her. Surprisingly as she reclined her seat she took time to engage her phone on myriad text messages (sms’). The short messages were lurid and it was clear she was having a bad time with her jilted lover. I decided I may as well take a mind trip of sorts listening to Pat Shange “Am not a cassanova” lyrics rather than be accused of “phone hacking”.

KAMPALA

At exactly 4am we made our entry into Kampala. Too bad I was asleep when we first crossed the Nile in Jinja. As I said bye to my buxom lady the bus company treated us to some hot pilau, water and a mug of tea. At 6am we were on the road again headed into Northern Uganda. Soon after leaving Kampala, a lady passenger in Muslim garb obviously a new passenger who had joined us in Kampala came to occupy the seat left by the buxom lady.

I was fast drifting to sleep when the bus conductor woke me up and told me that the bus management had decided to change me from my seat from the middle of the bus to the front seat near the driver. I asked why and he answered curtly “sababu management imesema” (because the management has said). I refused and drifted to sleep.

Much later is when it dawned on me that the lady was a girlfriend to the bus crew and was on a free ticket to Juba. Foolish me, I was unaware the conductor want-

ed some chintzy carousal time in the cover of darkness. I felt sad for “denying” him such a wonderful opportunity to “misbehave in a public service utility”.

So far the trip had been smooth until we reached Gulu when the conductor found the courage to ask his girlfriend to join him and replaced her as my next seat companion with a Southern Sudanese man. Yet again I had missed the picturesque Victoria Nile rapids with all their stunning glory at Karuma Bridge. Blame it on the smooth Masindi-Gulu Highway.

The Southern Sudanese man was quite talkative. I must say he was good company considering the Gulu-Atiak-Nimule road in the Ugandan – Southern Sudan border was nothing but rough. The 104 kilometre gravel road ensured no sleep for the entire four hour bumpy stretch.

I later come to learn that some $100 million has been allocated to upgrade this road to bitumen starting later in the year. At midday we were in Atiak where we alighted for the Ugandan Immigration and Customs officials to look into our travel documents.

If Busia border point is unkempt, Atiak is worse. Interestingly in all these border points, there are business opportunities that have been underutilised. The need for properly constructed and planned shops, restaurants, rest rooms, banks, forex bureaux, lodges, Customs and Immigration offices and other essential amenities needs not to be overstated.

A one stop border crossing with all the attendant needs for travelers is an economic boost with vast prospects that the East African Community (EAC) needs to fast track.

As usual I was promptly stamped through. However I was surprised when after walking

for a short distance I only found our bus waiting and no offices for South Sudan immigration. I found this rather odd. I asked my Southern Sudanese friend and he laughed.

“Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) forced the Ugandan border point to be pushed further inwards. The LRA are no joke,” he said laughing.

We boarded our bus again for a 25 minute drive before we reached Nimule, the former garrison town. The Southern Sudan Nimule border point looked better organised than the Ugandan I quipped. “The LRA can play with UPDF at will but not SPLA.” He answered curtly.

IMMIGRATION

Much later is when it dawned on me that the lady was a girlfriend to the bus crew and

was on a free ticket to Juba

Fierce nationalism was evident in his tone. We were finally on South Sudan’s soil. At the Nimule South Sudan Immigration as our passports were being stamped we were asked to part with five South Sudanese Pounds, arguably the strongest currency in the region followed by Ethiopian Birr.

I didn’t understand as I had already paid for a $50 permit in Nairobi. When I didn’t get a receipt for the cash I fully understood the meaning. Leaving Nimule for Juba our driver automatically shifted from left to right hand drive. Tarmacking of the 190 kilometre road complete with bridge upgrades from Nimule to Juba is almost complete and from the look of it, Southern Sudan is investing heavily in infrastructure.

We finally crossed the steel bridge on the White Nile as it snaked its way northwards, marking our entry into the river port city of Juba. It was the third time crossing the Nile and didn’t want to lose the chance. 30 hours after we left Nairobi we had covere some 893 kilometres (555miles)

November 2011

61

•ENVOYS OF SPORT

Didier Drogba (R) of Cote D’Ivoire celebrates with his teammates after scoring in a group match against Benin of the African Cup of Nationsheld in Sekondi, Ghana, Jan. 25, 2008. Cote D’Ivoire won the match 4-1.

CUP OF NATIONS

Football's Big Names Missing With African football heavyweights Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria and Cameroon out, will the Ivorians finally triumph?

By RONALD BERA

A

s delegates from the Confederation of African Football (CAF) continue conducting last minute inspection of facilities ahead of the 28th edition of the 2012 African Cup of Nations, speculations continue as to who – with the usual tournament favorites out of the

62

equation – will emerge as winner.

With a number of teams regarded as the ‘continent’s best are not taking part in the bi-annual event questions mount as to the quality of the games.

A number of the tourney’s favorites such as Egypt, Nigeria South Africa and Cameroon failed to qualify for the competi-

November 2011

tion which will be held from January 21 to February 12 with Gabon and Equatorial Guinea as the cohosts.

Ghana and Ivory Coast are as the top title contenders, but many feel that the Ivorians will be leaving nothing to chance after a 20-year old quest to clinch a second cup.

HARD NUT

With heavyweights Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria and Cameroon – teams that have in the past proved much hard a nut to crack for Ivory Coast out of the equation - who will stop them?

Tunisia, Angola, Ghana, Senegal, Morocco, Guinea or Zambia?

Sudan will be representing the East African football fans.

The absence of major teams, analysts say, has the ripple effect of depriving fans – and Television viewers - the chance to see their favorite players in action. It even has the potential to reduce the

•ENVOYS OF SPORT

Egyptian fans cheer after Egypt defeated Cote d’Voire in the 25th African Nations Cup final match held in Cairo, capital of Egypt, Feb.10, 2006. Egypt won 4-2 in penalties.

expected amount of revenues expected from the tournament.

This means that the likes of three-time UEFA Champions League winner and Africa’s best player - Samuel Eto, Chelsea’s John Obi Mikel, Egyptian Mohamed Zidan and Tottenham’s and Bafana bafana’s midfielder - Steven Pienaar, will be missing in action.

It is hard to tell how the absence of such key players will affect the turn-up of football lovers for the games. However, there is little consolation in the fact that there are key point-men as well as some rising stars to watch out for in the participating teams.

The talented Ivorian Elephants boasts of ‘big’ names such as Chelsea’s talisman and Captain Didier Drogba, Salomon Kalou, brothers Yaya and Kolo Toure and Emmanuel Eboue. As well as CSK Moscow’s front man Seydou Doumbia.

From an underdog’s perspective, Zambia’s rising star, Emmanuel Mayuka and the likes of Christopher Katongo and James Chamanga will not disappoint.

The talented Ivorian Elephants boasts of ‘big’ names such as Chelsea’s talisman and

Captain Didier Drogba, Salomon Kalou, brothers Yaya and Kolo Toure and Emmanuel Eboue EPL side Arsenal will be represented by Moroccan Marouane Chamakh, Gervinho and Tunisian Issam Jemma – who was the top scorer in the qualifiers. Last season’s top scorer in the French Ligue 1, Moussa Sow, will also be in action in January.

PHARAOHS

So far, defending champions, the Pharaohs – Egypt’s national side, have been the most successful team in the cup’s 54-year old history, winning the competition for a record seven times since its inauguration. Unfortunately, they will not be there to defend their title.

Also, Cameroon’s Indomitable Lions and the Super Eagles from

Nigeria will not be taking part in the competition. South Africa, a top dog in African football will also be missing in action.

The tournament’s draw, set to take place at the end of October, will see the 16 qualified teams pitted into four groups of four teams each. The two top teams from each group qualify for the quarterfinals. The winners in the quarter’s progress into the semi-finals, and the winners eventually advance to the finals.

The two host countries’ teams qualified automatically for the tournament. The other 14 qualified teams were ranked based on their performances during the last three Africa Cup of Nations – 2006, 2008 and 2008.

The Togo national team was initially banned from the 2012 and 2013 African Cup of Nations

by CAF after they withdrew from the tourney in 2010 following an attack on their team bus. The ban was later lifted after Togo sent out an appeal to FIFA’s Court of Arbitration for sport

November 2011

63 63

•BRIEFS ‘The Club’ Falls Short on Human Rights

By RONALD BERA

The just ended Commonwealth meeting in Australia has failed to rally the heads of State and Government to establish a watchdog mechanism for monitoring the human rights situation in the member-countries. Despite the failing, the organisers said the meeting was highly successful in addressing concerns by members. Some members of the 62-year old Club of mainly ex-British colonies rejected a key reform proposal – one of many drafted by an eminent persons group to appoint an authoritative figure to oversee human rights, democracy and the rule of law for the 54-nation bloc. The proposal was made two years ago in the wake of human rights concerns in some of the Club member-countries such as Nigeria, Uganda, Sri Lanka and Pakistan.

The forum however, still made progress by strengthening the role the Commonwealth can play in dealing with nations involved or accused of human rights abuses. The three-day Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting faced accusations it was becoming inept because of its failure to address the human rights abuses its 2 billion members were facing. The Sri Lankan military had been under close scrutiny in the lead up to the summit because of allegations of possible war crimes in 2009 as it quelled a decades-long civil war against the Tamil Tiger rebels.

Already, there are concerns that nations might boycott

64

the next summit in Sri Lanka in 2013 if the issue is not resolved.

International media reports that Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard had supported the recommendation to appoint a human rights watchdog, but other countries raised concerns. Commonwealth foreign ministers would examine the proposal further and later report their findings, said the Prime Minister. The leaders while insisting that progress had been made to promote democratic values in member states also made landmark decisions, including agreeing to lift a ban on monarchs marrying Roman Catholics.

Corruption rocks Uganda’s very-green oil industry Uganda is yet to produce a single barrel of oil since oil exploration commenced in the country a decade ago – and yet three senior ministers are already facing accusations of accepting bribes from oil companies who want a stake in the world’s booming industry.

Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi, Internal Affairs and Foreign Affairs ministers Hilary Onek and Sam Kutesa have been accused of

receiving funds to lobby for oil production rights for a group of oil firms. The ministers have all denied their involvements.

Kutesa has since stepped aside but - in a bid to allow investigations into other separate charges of abuse of office and causing financial loss relating to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting held three years ago in the country.

The summit also reversed centuries of tradition by changing royal succession rules to allow a monarch’s first born child to ascend to the throne – regardless of the sex. This now means that a girl too could as well ascend to the throne.

The leaders also agreed – while pledging to donate millions of dollars - to step up efforts to eradicate polio worldwide. The crippling disease is still endemic in Afghanistan, Nigeria, Pakistan and India. Cases were recently reported in parts of East and Central Africa too. Given the economic challenges currently facing the world, the leaders emphasised on the importance and the need of the international community in working together to secure a sustainable global recovery.

November 2011

Office of Kenya’s Prime Minister on the spot over misappropriated funds The World Bank demands a refund of its money after an external audit report revealed that officials at the office of the Kenyan Prime Minister had allegedly embezzled over Ksh900 million meant to finance youth projects across the country.

The bank had donated Sh4.3 billion (US$43 million) to support infrastructure projects aimed at curbing the rate and number of unemployed youth. Tens of thousands of youth were supposed to benefit from the initiative.

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•DIARY INTERNATIONAL OBSERVANCES NOVEMBER 6 November

International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict

20 November

Universal Children’s Day

10 November

World Science Day for Peace and Development [UNESCO]

20 November

Africa Industrialization Day

14 November

World Diabetes Day [WHO]

20 November

World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims [WHO]

16 November

International Day for Tolerance Resolution 5.61 of the 28th session of the UNESCO General Conference

21 November

World Television Day

17 November

World Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Day [WHO]

25 November

International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women

17 November

World Philosophy Day [UNESCO]

29 November

International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People

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