Unions representing civil servants in the country have given the coalition government up until the end of December to review their salaries, or face crippling industrial action in the new year. The unions are demanding a minimum salary in line with the Poverty Datum Line, which is pegged at US$540. Tendai Chikowore, the chairperson of the Apex Council that represents civil servants, said they had a meeting with government representatives on Friday: 'It was clear that they (government negotiating team) had not been given the mandate by Treasury giving them the parameters within which to negotiate,' she said.

This report from the International Social Security Association identifies, synthesises and interprets the most important recent developments and trends in Africa in social security. A key observation is that extending effective coverage for essential cash benefits and health care remains the continent’s major social security priority and greatest social policy challenge – but rapid extension is possible.

The embattled ANC Youth League president Julius Malema has been given another lifeline in politics after Limpopo province nominated him to serve on the ANC's powerful provincial working committee. Malema and his cohorts were suspended two months ago by the ANC's national disciplinary committee (NDC). The Mail & Guardian has further learnt that the ANC provincial conference will resolve that the issue of Malema's suspension needed political solution as opposed to the NDC processes, which the ANC Youth League has claimed were driven by political agenda to deal with Malema and weaken the youth league.

Devaluation, fuel shortages and economic mismanagement have conspired to push staple food prices to 'alarming levels' in urban areas of Malawi, where even catching a bus to work has become an unaffordable luxury for many, according to residents and analysts. 'At the moment, we are only concentrating on finding enough money for food and water,' said father-of-four Francis Tambula, who walks 7km every day from his home in Blantyre’s Ndirande township to his shop in the Limbe trading centre because paying for public transport would consume half of his income.

Unemployed young Moroccan graduates hope that once new Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane assembles his government within the next few days, their situation may finally begin to improve. In its electoral platform, the Justice and Development Party (PJD) vowed to reduce unemployment by 2 per cent and to give 100,000 grants to unemployed young people to support them through training courses. The PJD has proposed to introduce jobseekers' allowance and to raise the minimum wage to 3,000 dirhams.

Firoze Manji, editor-in-chief of Pambazuka News and publisher of Pambazuka Press, celebrates half a century of Tanzanian Independence with a reflection on the life of Julius Kambarage Nyerere, the first president of Tanzania. 'Nyerere was not simply a player on the national terrain. He was a pan-Africanist and an internationalist - not only in thought and writing, but crucially in his praxis. The support and refuge that Tanzania provided to the liberation movements was unprecedented. His commitment to welcoming and integrating refugees into Tanazanian life was extraordinary. And his willingness to speak out loud against injustices across the world, including Palestine, marks him out from the many so-called leaders who have come to be known more for their betrayal than any commitment to political principles.'

Congo's top opposition figure has urged the armed forces to obey him after losing elections he says were fraudulent. Etienne Tshisekedi said he would offer a 'great prize' to anyone who captured President Joseph Kabila. A close aide to Kabila dismissed Tshisekedi's comments as showmanship and said the opposition leader had made similar calls against former President Mobutu Sese Seko that had been ignored by the people

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has minced no words but directed the Malawi government to institute a liberalised exchange rate regime as a way to manage the overvauled local currency, the Kwacha. This is contained in a report titled ‘Liberalization of the foreign exchange regime for current account transactions and exchange rate flexibility’ on Malawi by IMF’s Mission chiefs Etibar Jafarov, Nadia Rendak and Kelly Eckhold with Morten Jonassen Norges Bank.

'The magnitude of African capital flight is staggering both in absolute monetary values and relative to GDP. For the thirty-three sub-Saharan African countries for which we have data, we find that more than $700 billion fled the continent between 1970 and 2008. If this capital was invested abroad and earned interest at the going market rates, the accumulated capital loss for these countries over the thirty-nine-year period was $944 billion. By comparison, total GDP for all of sub-Saharan Africa in 2008 stood at $997 billion.' This means, L. Ndikumana and J. Boyce, in their new book 'Africa's Odious Debts', that the rest of the world owes more to these African countries than they owe to the rest of the world. This suggests that Africa could expunge its entire stock of foreign debt if it could recover only a fraction of the wealth held by Africans in foreign financial centres around the world. The latest edition of the Africa Focus Bulletin contains extracts from the book.

Recent municipal elections in Mozambique show that the ruling party in Mozambique, Frelimo, may not be as strong as it would like to think. Luca Bussoti reports that low voter turnout and an impressive showing by the opposition suggest all is not well for Frelimo.

‘As a people, we have looked and continue to look to our western saviours to ride in on their magnificent white horse to our rescue. This ain't happening,’ writes Happy Kinyili, in a call for Africa to 'imagine and envision' the future for itself.

1000 times before
We said never again
And here we are
1000 times over
Again

Making meaningless pledges
Which you can’t consume
Guiltily plastering your sores
So that they may be out of sight
And so out of mind
But the benjamins don’t heal your wounds
Rather they leave them festering

Your empty bellies
Swollen with sorrows over our empty words

1000 times before
We said never again
And here we are
1000 times over
Again

Technocrats and the judiciary aren’t any more likely to make decisions based on the people’s wishes than elected politicians, cautions Leonard Gentle. Democracy ‘is a matter of constant contestation in which ordinary people either actively engage in and expand its terrain – or their power and choices become more and more constrained by powerful and vested elites’.

The growth of social movements will help sustain the revolutions in North Africa, despite the difficulties encountered on the path to democratisation, writes Dimitris Papanikolopoulos.

African Union chairperson, Jean Ping, argues here that the case of the AU’s intervention in Libya is a classic example of how African efforts to solve the continent’s challenges go unreported or are twisted to suit a hostile agenda.

Women of Zimbabwe Arise report on a case in which charges against six women were dismissed. In another case, two women face a case seen as an attempt to fix them with criminal charges.??

As South Africa's ANC prepares to mark its 100th anniversary, Dale T. McKinley reflects on how capital came to trump the aspirations of workers in the aftermath of the Polokwane conference four years ago.

For the last decade the Zimbabwean government has been in default on most of its debt owed to the rest of the world, currently estimated to be around US$7 billion. This debt dates primarily from loans made in the 1980s and 1990s by private lenders such as banks; foreign governments such as France, Germany and the UK; and multilateral institutions like the World Bank, African Development Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF). This report from the Zimbabwe Europe Network argues that in order to move towards a just and positive resolution to this crisis the origin of Zimbabwe’s debt must be investigated. The legitimacy of the debt needs to be established by examining whether these loans genuinely benefited the Zimbabwean people.

A corruption scandal in Sierra Leone could damage President Ernest Bai Koroma's chances of re-election next year and undermine his attempts to rebrand the West African state. Last month a television documentary investigating illegal logging alleged bribery in the office of Sierra Leone's Vice President Samuel Sam Sumana, dubbed 'Timbergate' by the press.

North African unity has been elusive for decades, despite the fact that the countries of the region have a lot in common. Imad Mesdoua believes the recent dramatic political changes provide a useful opportunity to resume the quest for unity.