'The rebellion of the poor has been spreading from town to town, from squatter camp to squatter camp, since 2004. Last week it arrived in Grahamstown. There is no third force, political party or communist academic behind our struggle. It is oppression at the hands of the African National Congress that has driven us into the rebellion of the poor. We are in rebellion because we are being forced to live without dignity, safety or hope.'

Thousands of workers of the Mahalla Textile Company held a strike last week demanding better wages. According to the Center for Trade Union & Workers’ Services (CTUWS), 24,000 workers took part in the protest. The workers from the morning shift had joined their colleagues from the night shift and gathered in front of the company’s headquarters, where they announced their strike.

Born out of the optimism at the new millennium that Africa’s time had come, the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), a tool designed to promote good governance on the continent, is built on the belief that the continent does not lack ideas to advance its development, but that states have struggled to live up to their principles and implement their policies. The APRM rests on the fundamental belief that good governance is a precondition for taking Africa out of its spiral of conflict, underdevelopment, poverty and increasing marginalisation in a globalised world. Looking in the rear-view mirror almost a decade after the APRM was first conceived, Grappling with Governance: Perspectives on the African Peer Review Mechanism explores how this complex process has evolved from theory to practice in a variety of contexts. In a combination of case studies and transversal analysis, multiple voices from different African civil society actors - mainly analysts, activists and journalists - examine the process from their specialised perspective. The chapters tease out what can be learned about governance in Africa from these experiences, and the extent to which the APRM has changed the way that governments and civil society groups engage. The book is available for purchase on

The African Women's Development and Communication Network is looking for a suitable candidate to fulfill the position of Programmes Manager. The position offers possibility of gaining experience working for a lead African women's regional organisation in a stimulating, multicultural and dynamic environment.

There have been clashes between police and opposition protesters in Lafia in north-central Nasarawa state. Witnesses say police fired tear gas and shot in the air to disperse the crowds who were burning tyres in the streets. The unrest follows the stoning of President Goodluck Jonathan's convoy in Lafia earlier this week while he was campaigning for April's election.

Talks to have private universities absorb some government sponsored students have stalled, reports the Daily Nation. The drive started last September when suspended Higher Education minister William Ruto invited heads of private universities to a meeting on increasing access to higher education. Ruto said expanding university education 'would give the economy the much needed human capital to drive its long-term growth strategy in line with Vision 2030'.

Italian authorities are struggling to cope with a crisis on the tiny island of Lampedusa after thousands of migrants arrived from Tunisia. A holding centre designed for 850 people is reported to be overflowing. More than 4,000 migrants are said to have arrived there in recent days.

'The agenda for women’s rights and empowerment in each country must be supported by the political leadership,' says Norah Matovu-Winyi, Executive Director, African Women’s Development and Communication Network (FEMNET). In this interview with IPS, she said in future World Social Forums 'there is need to support more women to participate in the dialogues', Matovu-Winyi said. Women learn a lot from each other and in many instances discover that their struggles are the same despite coming from different continents.

Visit this page to meet those who sacrificed themselves in the effort to overthrow Hosni Mubarak.

Local elected officials in southern and western Ethiopia are bitterly opposing the selling away of farm land by the Woyanne ruling junta to foreign investors, reports Ethiopian Review. Some of the local officials who take a stand are receiving threats and being summarily dismissed by Meles Zenawi’s puppets who are installed as regional administrators.

As it now stands, the United States appears content to contemplate exchanging Hosni Mubarak for Egypt's new Vice President, Omar Suleiman, the Egyptian spy master - that is, one dictator for another - to maintain the status quo. But as this article from Mother Jones points out, Suleiman 'looks to be a nasty piece of work'.

A Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) team is in Uganda to observe this week’s elections. The team is led by Mr Simbi Mubako from Zimbabwe. The mission follows an invitation from the Ugandan Government. Comesa has in the past deployed similar observer missions to Rwanda, Burundi, DRC, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The regional bloc said in a press statement that the observation of Uganda’s polls is meant to contribute to transparency of the process.

South Africa has expressed sharp concern over concerted attempts by leading industrialised countries, particularly the US and the European Union (EU), to extract onerous commitments from developing countries as a condition to concluding the stalled Doha Round trade negotiations. 'We are deeply concerned over attempts to raise the level of ambition by leading industrialised countries in industrial goods and services that would call for a substantial payment from developing countries,' South Africa’s trade and industry minister Dr Rob Davies told IPS.

'NGOs don't mobilise people, desperation mobilises people,' said a Cambodian land activist as he related the experience of Boeung Kak villagers who were driven off their land by their own government to make way for corporate profiteering. Such stories were abundant from all corners of the world this week at the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal. The forum, which celebrated its 10th anniversary this year, attracted representatives from civil society organisations, social movements and unions from more than 123 countries. Present among them were land rights activists and small farmers, who came to relate and decry the unfettered grabbing of their land.

A new Eurodad report provides a critical analysis of the World Bank’s role in Climate Finance. Civil society actors have long been contesting the role of the World Bank as an appropriate channel for climate finance based on the Bank’s questionable green credentials and its history of advising economic policy reforms to developing countries. The report concludes by outlining the reasons why – in light of the analysis of the Bank’s delivery of climate finance as it relates to the financing instruments - the World Bank is not the best-placed institution to channel climate finance or to set the highest standards for a legitimate and development-friendly climate finance architecture for the future.

Media in Southern Africa still has a long way to go towards gender sensitive reporting in newsrooms, a study by Gender Links has revealed. Most Southern African media houses in 14 countries had very few reports on gender based violence from mid October to mid November in 2009 in a study carried out during that period. A media progress study and gender in media education audit workshop by Gender Links in Gaborone also revealed that Botswana remained in the lower ranks of most categories of the study.

The Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, NEITI, has recommended a drastic restructuring of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, in order to ensure greater transparency and credibility of certain oil sector payments and receipts in the national oil and gas behemoth. NEITI's recommendation was made in its latest reconciliation report, which covered the period of 2006 to 2008 and published on the website of the extractive industries watch-dog.

Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara refused to resign, defying a directive from his party to step down and accept a ministerial position after he lost the party’s leadership. Mutambara was replaced by Industry Minister Welshman Ncube as head of the faction of the Movement for Democratic Change at its congress in January, after which the party said he would move to the Minister of International Co-operation and Regional Integration.

Apart from the looming job losses in Swaziland’s public sector, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have also warned of retrenchments following the government’s decision to suspend procurement from small businesses. The government of the southern African autocratic monarchy has been forced to cut expenditure after its receipts from the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) shrunk with 60 per cent.

The chairperson of West Africa's regional bloc on Tuesday (08 February) criticised South Africa for sending a warship to the region amid Côte d'Ivoire's political crisis, but the South African government maintained it had sent the vessel as a negotiating venue. The dispute comes amid a growing rift between African nations on how to resolve the political stalemate in Côte d'Ivoire. Incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo has refused to cede power more than two months after the UN said he lost the election.