Cameroon Echoes {Echos Camerounais}

Funmilayo Ransome Kuti (25 October 1900 – 13 April 1978). A Wonderful Activist And A Great Lagosian.

 

Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti (1900-1978) was a Nigerian feminist who fought for suffrage and equal rights for her countrywomen long before the second wave of the women's movement in the United States. She also joined the struggle for Nigerian independence as an activist in the anti-colonial movement. Described by many as the mother of women's rights in Nigeria, she was regarded in her time as "The Mother of Africa."

An educationist and an activist, she founded a secondary school in Abeokuta to educate and train Nigerian men and women as future leaders.

She led a successful movement that helped abolish separate tax rates for women. In 1953, she founded the Federation of Nigerian Women Societies which formed an alliance with the Women's International Democratic Federation.

Ransome-Kuti's political activism led to her being described as the doyen of female rights in Nigeria and was regarded as “The Mother of Africa.” Early on she was a very powerful force advocating for women's right to vote. She was described in 1947, by the West African Pilot as the “Lioness of Lisabi” for her leadership of Egba women on a campaign against arbitrary taxation of women. That struggle led to the abdication of the Egba King Oba Ademola II in 1949.
fought for suffrage

Belgian bid to ban 'racist' Tintin in the Congo

 A Congolese man is trying to get a controversial Tintin book banned in the cartoon star's home country of Belgium.

The ginger sleuth's "little (black) helper" in Tintin in the Congo is seen as "stupid and without qualities", Bienvenu Mbutu is quoted as saying.

"It makes people think that blacks have not evolved," said Mr Mbutu, who lives in Belgium.

A court is to rule on whether the book can be sold in Belgium and, if so, whether it should carry a warning.

Cameroon police clash with journalists

Police block the path of demonstrating journalists in Cameroon's capital, Yaounde during the World Press Freedom Day. Photo/BBC 

By BBC  

Journalists protesting against the death of a Cameroonian newspaper editor clashed with riot police in the capital Yaounde.

Several hundred demonstrators were prevented from staging a sit-in at the Prime Minister's office to mark World Press Freedom Day.

The authorities said the protesters had not given them proper notice to hold a public rally.

Cameroon Expresseditor Bibi Ngota died last month in a Yaounde prison.

Mrs HIV: Contradictory Policies in the Fight Against HIV in Africa

Kampala — Unlike many films that have been done on HIV, Miss HIV takes you behind the curtains on what is really happening in the battle against a virus that is now the leading killer of people under 60 worldwide. The docu-drama Miss HIV unearths the international conflict of HIV/Aids policies while following the journey of two simple HIV- positive women who enter the contest. The documentary highlights the international controversies over the prioritisation of abstinence, faithfulness and use of condoms in fighting the HIV pandemic. Elizabeth Ramolale, one of the women, sees that African nations are dying and she wants to break the stigma that keeps it hidden. 

How to stop HIV spreading in Zambia's prisons

Moral concerns are stopping condom distribution in Zambia's prisons

BBright spent two years in Zambia's Lusaka Central Prison for selling cannabis but fears he now faces a life sentence.

"I did it because of hunger," says Bright softly.

"There's not much food in prison. Sex has become the way of payment."

The wall prevents an inmate from going outside, but the disease has no boundary Dr Chisela Chileshe Zambia Prisons Service medical director

"Conditions were bad," he remembers. "We had nshima [maize meal] and beans two times a day. I never felt full."

One day, the cell "captain" gave Bright extra food, then asked him for sex.

"I had never had sex with a man, but I did it. The first time it was painful, but I joined a group of maybe 20 men who did that.

"Mainly they were people who were condemned, or who had been jailed for 25 years. They hadn't seen women for a long time."

Lapiro's Case To Be Tabled At UN

By Daniel Gwarbarah

The case of ace musician, Pierre Roger Lambo Sandjo aka Lapiro de Mbanga, serving a three-year prison term at the New Bell Prison in Douala, will soon be tabled to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention.

Rapid Action Network, a human rights pressure group, announced the initiative in a release dated April 21.The group recalls that Lapiro de Mbanga was detained on April 9, 2008 and sentenced to a three-year jail term in September of the same year for allegedly taking part in anti-government riots.

It observes that the Writers in Prison Committee (WiPC) is continuously protesting the imprisonment of the songwriter and singer "whose final appeal has still not been heard despite having served more than two years in jail…" "WiPC believes that Lapiro de Mbanga, an outspoken critic of the regime both as a musician and an opposition party member, is being punished for his critical views, in violation of his right to freedom of expression," the release states.

Calling on the authorities to release Lapiro, WiPC reiterated that the musician's appeal is pending before the Supreme Court in Yaounde following numerous delays. It states that in March, the Independent Commission against Corruption and Discrimination, COMICODI, reportedly wrote to President Paul Biya asking for a pardon for Lapiro, anchoring their plea on the numerous irregularities in his trial.

Lapiro is, however, quoted as having rejected such pleas for a presidential pardon, preferring to wait for his appeal to be heard by the Supreme Court. "A group of US lawyers working with Freedom are now preparing to submit Lapiro de Mbanga's case to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention," the Rapid Action Network release declares.

Hundreds attend Terreblanche's funeral: Memories of Apartheid South Africa

Hundreds of people in South Africa have attended the funeral of Eugene Terreblanche, the white supremacist leader, who was murdered on his farm last Saturday. But black people were kept away from the church in Ventersdorp, nort west of Johannesburg, for fear of an emotional service spilling out onto the streets and erupting in racial violence. Tensions have been running high since two black farm workers have been charged with Terreblanche's murder.

Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb frees Italians in Mali

In December, AQIM published a picture purportedly of Mr Cicala and his wife An Italian couple who were being held hostage in the west African country of Mali by al-Qaeda militants have been released. Sergio Cicala and his wife, Philomene Kaboure, were picked up by an army patrol, local officials said. Italy's foreign minister said they were "in the hands of Malian authorities" and were being taken to a "safe place". Mr Cicala and Mrs Kaboure - who is also a citizen of Burkina Faso - were seized in December in neighbouring Mauritania. They had been driving past the eastern town of Kobenni on 18 December - en route to Burkina Faso to see Mrs Kaboure's 12-year-old son - when they were abducted by gunmen from their four-wheel-drive vehicle.

Sex Workers to Boycott Labour Day

The decision aims to counter the Wouri Senior Divisional Officer decision to ban prostitution in the city.

A band of sex workers commonly called « liberal sisters » last Monday convened an extraordinary general assembly at the Njogmabi neighbourhood in Douala to retaliate the recent administrative decision which interdicts prostitution at the Bonanjo residential area. In their final communiqué, the “liberal sisters”, made up of school dropouts, widows and outlaws, stated emphatically that their activity has not only helped reduce the rate of unemployment, poverty and crime among women, but has also contributed immensely in tourism development, given that they play an indispensable role to host and guide many visitors.

Somali radio stations comply with Islamists' music ban

All but two of Mogadishu's 13 radio stations used to broadcast music Most radio stations in Somalia have stopped playing music, on the orders of Islamist Hizbul-Islam insurgents who say that songs are un-Islamic. The stations said they had to comply with the ban as if they did not, they would be putting their lives at risk. The BBC correspondent in Somalia says this latest order has strong echoes of the Taliban in Afghanistan. In the past, militants in some areas have banned watching films and football and forced men to grow beards.