Alemayehu G. Mariam speculates on the possible benefits and drawbacks of remittances to Ethiopia from the Diaspora. Using examples from Latin America and Asia, the author suggests the cash influx to Ethiopia (estimated at over a billion US dollars per year) can either be harnessed for investment, or, more negatively, trigger ‘Dutch Disease’.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifPambazuka News has a 10-year track record of publishing articles that present a direct counter to the status quo. Moving beyond its 500th issue and into its second decade, the Pambazuka News community will be able to connect and share information on an unprecedented level, thanks to a forthcoming new web platform. This, believes editor Firoze Manji, makes Pambazuka News well placed to reflect a mood in Africa that is one of ‘discontent, of a search for alternatives to the ideology of looting and personal enrichment’.

The global financial and economic crises exposed one of the major weaknesses of a number of African economies: their dependence on too few export commodities and one or two sectors. Such dependence makes many countries vulnerable to fluctuations in commodity prices, demand and extreme weather events such as droughts and floods. This joint study between the United Nations Office of the Special Adviser on Africa and the NEPAD-OECD Africa Investment Initiative looks at how African governments can diversify their economies and analyses five countries' economic diversification profiles in particular.

Fuel has become so precious in Malawi that it is now being rationed. People park their vehicles at service stations overnight, forming long queues as they wait for petrol tankers to arrive. The Council for Non-Governmental Organisations in Malawi (Congoma), an umbrella body representing non-governmental organisations, has blamed the shortage of foreign exchange on President Bingu wa Mutharika who they accuse of undertaking too many international trips that waste foreign exchange.

The actualisation of the East African Community Common Market is arguably the most critical step in our regional integration efforts in East Africa, writes Oduor Ong’wen, the SEATINI Kenya country director. 'The steady, albeit grudging recourse towards regionalist thinking among the ruling elite in the Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda is without doubt a welcome strut in the wake of contemporary international relations.'

How much would it cost to ensure that the Millennium Development Goals are achieved in Africa despite climate change? This paper estimates that climate-resilient development in Africa could require international financial assistance of $100 billion a year over the period 2010-2020. This total is about 40 per cent higher than the original MDG estimate of $72 billion.

Two more passenger 'fast-train' routes are being mooted, one between Johannesburg and Durban and the other from Johannesburg to the north of the country. Ordinary citizens, states Saliem Fakir, may wonder if we need to spend scarce money on new rail infrastructure. 'Is South Africa’s money not better spent on improving freight rail that could take lots of trucks off our roads by transporting goods safely and easily to and from our harbours? And what about public transport for the poor?'

Zimbawe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has asked the United Nations and European Union not to recognise new ambassadors unilaterally appointed by President Robert Mugabe, his spokesman said Tuesday. 'Those appointments are supposed to be by consultation,' Tsvangirai's spokesman Luke Tamborinyoka told AFP. Under the Global Political Agreement (GPA) that created the unity government between Mugabe and Tsvangirai, the prime minister should be consulted on all appointments, Tamborinyoka said.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifIn a speech given to the Africa–Canada Forum, Hakima Abbas discusses the contemporary challenges for Africa’s self-determination and the centrality of the continent’s social movements in ‘entrenching democratic principles’.

'Quite obviously, the first job of the courts is to enforce the Constitution and the rights which it contains. A person whose home has been destroyed and who has nowhere she can legally live, has no access to housing and is denied one of the most fundamental necessities of life. A court cannot fold its arms and say that this is bad luck, it is the consequence of apartheid, and one day things may change. The question is not whether the court should do something. Rather, it is what the court should do.' - Advocate Geoff Budlender, the Second Irene Grootboom Memorial Lecture (2010) in Salt River, 11 October 2010.

Civil society organisations in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region have resolved to support the implementation of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in Zambia. Countries implementing EITI committed themselves to publish all payments made by oil, gas and mining companies to the government.

"The way political parties conduct their affairs will determine the quality and strength of South Africa’s democracy," begins this research into the internal functioning of South African political parties by Idasa’s Political Information & Monitoring Service (PIMS). "Among the aims of this PIMS research project is to provide a comprehensive assessment of existing internal interest disclosure models and practices by South African political parties and to provide a best-practice guide for use in South Africa and possibly elsewhere on the African continent."

With Angola’s parliament spending over US$43 million on top-of-the-range BMWs, Rafael Marques de Morais discusses the government’s inability to properly represent its citizens and what the money might have bought if spent in the public interest.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifNnimmo Bassey, environmental justice activist and winner of the Right Livelihood Award, often referred to as the 'Alternative Nobel Prize', pays tribute to Pambazuka News on occasion of its 500th edition. ‘Through this medium we build and equally recover lost memories for future action,’ he writes.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifSokari Ekine looks back on years of involvement in Pambazuka News.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/500/10_500.gifAs Pambazuka celebrates its 10th year and 500th issue, Ama Biney discusses challenging ‘the negative images and stereotypes of Africa in our globalised world’.

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As Pambazuka News celebrates its 500th issue, Patrick Burnett discusses the publication’s history and growth and the limits of Clay Shirky’s notion of the ‘cognitive surplus’.

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Tidiane Kassé

Sana Guy

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Franklin Lamb

Liberia holds its second post-war presidential and legislative elections in October 2011. The first, held in 2005, was a landmark: it was the first free and fair elections in the country’s long history. Since then Liberia, previously wracked by bloody petty wars, has been largely stable, though very fragile. The 2011 elections will probably be just as important as the one in 2005 as their successful conduct will determine when the UN, which still maintains about 8 000 troops in the country, will finally withdraw, says this situation report from the Institute for Security Studies.