Sudan’s oil deposits have made it one of the fastest growing economies in Africa, yet ‘violence, disease and malnutrition’ continue to kill its people, Khadija Sharife writes in this week’s Pambazuka News. With access to natural resources from water to grazing land already at tipping point and cited as a root cause of the country’s conflict, Sharife assesses the role played by the Khartoum government and multinational interests in diverting much needed oil wealth from the Sudanese people.

‘I am an angry African,’ Assefa Bequele writes in this week’s Pambazuka News, challenging the continent’s failure to meet its collective responsibilities to children. ‘I will tell you why and what, I hope, we can do to build an Africa fit for children and help nurture an African man and woman that can walk with pride on the world stage’, says Bequele, calling on fellow Africans to ‘have the courage and be the first to speak out and engage in the defence of the inherent rights of all human beings including children’.

If the South African state is a democracy, Michael Neocosmos asks in Pambazuka News, how has it condoned the deployment of violence and murder on the shackdwellers movement Abahlali baseMjondolo, an organisation of the poor that has ‘engaged in peaceful protests’ and ‘advocated peaceful alternatives to the dominant politics’? At the root of the problem of the state reaction to Abahlali, Neocosmos argues, is ‘not simply a failure of democracy, but a systematic failure of citizenship and of the nation.’

Concerned over the supply of oil to the US and a supposed need to continue the global 'War on Terror', President Barack Obama has essentially maintained the militarised approach to Africa that was the hallmark of his immediate predecessors George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, writes Daniel Volman. The escalation of AFRICOM (United States African Command) activities, argues Volman, underlines a troubling commitment to an approach based on might and dominance, one entirely at the expense of promoting sustainable economic development and democracy.

Politics under Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade has come to represent a depressingly familiar picture of elite dominance and broad social inequality, writes Amy Niang. With no clear succession plan in place and the state's legitimacy continuing to erode, the absence of an institutionalised effort to achieve stability in the political system remains a salient obstacle to democratic change, argues Niang.

With Sierra Leonean President Ernest Bai Koroma seeking to respond to the recent upsurge in armed robberies in the country's capital Freetown, Roland Bankole Marke discusses efforts at crime prevention in the country.

Corruption is preventing the world from reducing extreme poverty, from averting child deaths and even from fighting epidemics like HIV/AIDS. And it will have a devastating effect on the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals if not tackled directly by each national government.

The Moroccan government is taking fresh steps to support beleaguered local businesses, which are a key part of the national economy. Two new programmes by the National Agency for the Promotion of Small and Medium Enterprises (ANPME) are intended to boost competitiveness in the struggling sector.

Arab and Muslim countries must review their development strategies to benefit from transformative policies, innovative projects, and plans for renewal linked to shifting to a knowledge-based economy, according to a declaration issued December 3rd by participants in a Tunis conference.

President Jose Eduardo dos Santos was re-elected head of Angola's ruling MPLA party on Wednesday, a move that signals the 67-year old leader plans to extend his three-decade long rule of one of Africa's top oil producers.

The UN Security Council has called for the holding of credible presidential elections in Côte d’Ivoire at the earliest date possible, after the much-delayed polls were recently postponed again.

The United Nations official leading efforts to tackle malaria is visiting Nigeria and Kenya, the two nations which together account for one third of the estimated 1 million deaths worldwide from the deadly disease.

Opposition parties are troubled by what they say is government’s strategy to keep them out of the general elections in May 2010. They accuse the ruling Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) of harassment. This includes arrests, obstruction of public meetings, and even murder.

Nigerian anti-corruption officials have raided a meeting of opposition leaders and arrested Attahiru Bafarawa, who ran for president in 2007. The EFCC accuses him of involvement in a 6bn naira ($40m) fraud from his time as governor of Sokoto State.

The battle over who will eventually succeed 85-year-old President Robert Mugabe as party leader threatens the future of his long-ruling Zanu PF but analysts say an immediate split is unlikely at a congress which began this week.

A top UN official has praised "great progress" in easing Zimbabwe's humanitarian crisis, but urged donors to continue supporting the country's recovery from a decade of economic freefall. "It has been refreshing to see great progress in so many aspects that worried us in February. I trust this positive trend will continue," UN assistant secretary general for humanitarian affairs Catherine Bragg told a news conference.

The African Union (AU) Wednesday expressed deep concerns over the lack of progress on key talks aimed at ending the political deadlock in Madagascar, following a coup in the Indian Ocean island in March 2009.

Amongst the topics that Dibussi Tande covers in this week's review of African blogs are the link between conservative American evangelism and the growth of homophobia on the continent, the release of the film 'Invictus' and the trend of casting African Americans for African roles, and tips on how Africa can profit from hosting the upcoming World Cup.

A new report, "The World Bank - Civil Society Engagement: Review of Fiscal Years 2007 to 2009" was launched at a reception on October 4 at the Annual Meetings in Istanbul. Some 100 CSO representatives and Bank staff attended. Senior Vice President Marwan Muasher made a few remarks in which he stressed how the review vividly documents the myriad forms of engagement between the Bank Group and civil society across the institution and globally.

Nigeria’s External Affairs ministry has uncovered $15.3 million of school fees racket allegedly perpetrated by some Nigerian diplomats. Minister Ojo Maduekwe said investigations were on, to determine the perpetrators, but vowed that those found culpable of defrauding the government would be dragged before the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for prosecution.