Following Norway’s terrorist atrocity, Gerald Caplan underlines the egregious double standards around discussing terrorism.

South Africa’s revolutionary radicals recalcitrant in their reflective refusal to revere ‘freedom days’ are dubbed as reactionaries by the ‘democratic state’, writes Reverend Mavuso Mbhekeseni.

Senegal: The Balkanisation of the rule of law, justice under threat and the republic in danger
Aboubacry Mbodji

Senegal’s political crisis is the result of several factors linked to the derailment of the principles of the rule of law that require the separation and independence of the executive, legislative and judicial branches of the state, the equality of all citizens before law and the respect of the sovereignty of the people. Ten years of political alternation have led to a ‘patrimonialisation’ of power and the concentration of power in a single family, which according to Aboubacry Mbodji ‘is a serious danger to the republic’. This is the real meaning of the revolts taking place in the country.

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Can the independence of South Sudan inspire anglophone Cameroon?
Patrice Nganang

The independence of South Sudan on 9 July this year marked the birth of the 54th African nation. This also marks the second time, after Eritrea, that the principle of the inviolability of colonial borders has been flouted, a precedent that according to Patrice Nganang could be applied to anglophone Cameroon.

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Why is emergency aid insufficient?
Renaud Duterme

If charity were enough to abolish misery and exploitation, says Renaud Duterme, we would be living in an idyllic world. The crisis in Somalia, he argues, shows yet again that the concepts of solidarity practised by development organisations are the wrong solutions.

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Normalisation and its effects on producers in the global South

Normalisation is increasingly visible in international commercial transactions whose complexity constitutes an obstacle in the access to European markets by countries in the global South. The solution proposed by the organisation ‘Engineers without frontiers’ is to rethink the way these norms are conceived with the active involvement of southern countries.

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In the wake of London’s riots, Patricia Daley reflects on her teenage years growing up in Hackney, the long-term challenges presented by the riots and the hypocrisy behind elite pontificating in response: ‘How can we teach our children to respect human lives, property and their communities, if those with power do not set an example?’

Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu has called for a 'wealth tax' to be imposed on all white South Africans. The former archbishop of Cape Town and former head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) also called on members of President Jacob Zuma’s cabinet to sell their 'expensive cars', 'to show you care' about the poor in South Africa. Tutu said apartheid had left South Africans riddled with 'self-hate', and it was directly to blame for the country’s vicious crime rate and road carnage.

ANC Youth League president Julius Malema’s fate, and that of his executive, rests with the ANC’s top six officials, who will decide whether to accept the league’s apology and retraction of what the mother body regards as a politically embarrassing call for regime change in Botswana. ANC spokesman Jackson Mthembu said officials would continue discussing the matter and there was no deadline to finalise these talks. He had earlier said the ANC would first have to weigh up whether the apology undid the damage to the ANC and the country. The youth league’s apology on Saturday came nearly two weeks after it vowed to stand by its intention to mobilise opposition to Sir Ian Khama’s government, which it described as a 'puppet regime'.

A chase for votes has kicked off for the much-anticipated 20 September Zambia elections. At least 10 presidential hopefuls are in the race after seven of their colleagues pulled out. Over 500 candidates are vying for the 150 seats in the National Assembly. Aspirants and their campaigners are crisscrossing the breadth and length of the country, hoping to get their lion’s share of votes.

A summit of Southern African leaders this week was unlikely to affect the political crisis in Zimbabwe given the lack of regional consensus on the issue, analysts said. The fragile power-sharing government between Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and rival Morgan Tsvangirai was expected to feature prominently when leaders from the Southern African Development Community meet on Wednesday and Thursday in Luanda, Angola.

Morocco's government has proposed that a parliamentary election take place early in November instead of the scheduled date of September next year. During long overnight negotiations with the interior ministry, officials from some 20 political parties agreed in principle for the election to be held in mid-November.

About a third of Madagascar’s 20 million people do not have access to water for washing and most of the rest share unsanitary toilet facilities, according to a July 2011 World Bank Water and Sanitation Programme (WSP) report. The threat of diarrhoea and other diseases is particularly acute in some of the poorer suburbs of the capital Antananarivo. A network of canals, storm water drains and channels criss-crossing the city are choked with rubbish, causing flooding in low-lying areas during the March to November rainy season. In April 2011, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported a worrying rise in pneumonic plague.

Southern Africa, including Namibia, stands to loose a lot should the euro collapse, a local economist said. 'No one will be unscathed, not least Southern Africa,' said Rowland Brown, economist at Capricorn Investment Holdings (CIH). The region’s exports will be particularly hard hit, he said. Central in the unfolding financial drama is how much longer Germany will be willing to cover debt for others with little chance of being completely refunded, he said.

‘Britain has an enduring problem of racial and class inequality and exclusion, out of which riots occasionally explode,’ observes Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, following four days and nights of unrest across the UK that have ‘left this declining post-imperial country deeply shaken and searching for answers, for redress, for culprits.’

With all the current talk in the media about the riots on the streets of the UK, Alex Free argues that the focus should be on the real looters in the country and global economy at large.

This week the international news has been dominated by two distinct yet not unrelated events – the international financial crisis and the eruption of young people onto the streets of Britain. Two features of these events are worth pointing out, observes Firoze Manji.

The Mawingu camp for internally displaced persons affected by Kenya’s 2007- 2008 post-election violence is a desolate place. Located in the Rift Valley, the camp is a collection of tattered, sagging and forlorn tents. Save for the 120 children crammed in a room shouting in unison during an English lesson, there is no other sign of life. Many of those who live here left early in the morning to look for menial jobs. If they are lucky they will earn Shs 100 (one dollar) for a day’s work.

The United Nations Human Rights Council should accept responsibility, on behalf of the world forum, for the famine spreading through eastern Africa, and should call for member countries' cooperation to overcome the desperate food crisis there, experts said. One of the 18 independent experts on the advisory committee to the Council, Chilean academic José Antonio Bengoa, set forth the idea of asking for an urgent special session, in an attempt to draw the attention of the international community to the gravity of the crisis in the Horn of Africa.

With nearly two months to go before constituent assembly elections, Tunisia confronts a long list of challenges to the creation of a democratic system, begins this policy brief from Freedom House. 'Expectations for swift and wide-ranging reforms are very high among a population hungry for change after decades of harsh authoritarian rule. Ordinary citizens are eager to enjoy the benefits of meaningful political freedom and economic prosperity, having endured unrelenting repression, mismanagement, and the plundering of resources by a small circle around the family of former president Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali.'

The 'downgrade of the US credit rating is part of the forward planning by the top capitalists to guarantee the political and military hegemony of the richest one per cent of the US population,’ writes Horace Campbell.

Yash Tandon takes a deeper look at the mass killings in Norway on 22 July. The event, he writes, 'gives us a moment to comprehend the deeper meaning of human existence'.

Cape Verdeans are going to the polls this month to decide who will replace Pedro Pires as he approaches the end of his second and final term. As Cláudio Furtado writes, regardless of who ultimately triumphs, two things make this particular election stand out: the fact that four candidates – three with a genuine chance of winning – are in the running and the wider implications for the PAICV (Partido Africano de Independência de Cabo Verde) party and the country’s government.