As part of their joint efforts to form a new trading bloc, Brazil, South Africa and India are increasing their collaboration in science and technology. The potential benefits are significant – provided that other developing countries are not excluded, says this SciDev.net editorial.

If it hadn't been for a lack of concentration, Onesmo ole-MoiYoi's plans to be a cattle herder might have worked out. As a boy growing up in a Maasai village on the border of Tanzania and Kenya, he regularly took charge of the community's herd, often numbering some 800 cows. But his lack of concentration led to him being relieved of his cattle-caring tasks and sent to school - which set him on the path to becoming one of Africa's top scientists.

Amnesty International (AI) on the 13th of November 2003 called for a moratorium on forced evictions in Angola, claiming that over 5,000 people had been forcibly removed from their homes in three mass evictions between 2001 and 2003.

On November 11 2003, Omega Television- a privately owned, free-to-air station based in Lusaka - was ordered shut following the reversal of a High Court order allowing it to continue its test broadcasts to Lusaka.

Members and sympathisers of Mozambique's former rebel movement, the Resistencia Nacional Mocambicana (Renamo), seized Radio Mozambique journalist Salvador Januario at the weekend and held him prisoner inside the local Renamo offices in the northern province of Cabo Delgado for several hours.

Journalist Paulus Sackarias and driver Simon Haimbodi, both employed by the Afrikaans daily newspaper Republikein, were threatened and arrested at the weekend in a confrontation that resulted in the confiscation of their company vehicle by Special Field Force (SFF) members.

The workshop content includes: Fundraising in South Africa; Ethics and fundraising; New trends and the importance of fundraising; Finding potential donors; Writing a corporate proposal; How to raise money in your Community and generate income; and Special events and useful contacts.

In recent years, industrialized nations led by the US have imposed global trade agreements more favorable than ever to the giant media corporations. This has resulted in the rise of a global media oligopoly: a few tightly knit, dominant transnational firms with interlocking boards of directors and unprecedented lobbying power. This lack of diversity is causing news from a large part of the world simply to disappear. Visit Choike.org, a portal on Southern civil society, for more information.

Since the Supreme Court refused to hear The Daily News' constitutional challenge to the Access to Information Act until it registers with the Act's Media and Information Commission, the paper's publishers, the Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe, have suffered a number of legal setbacks in its efforts to obtain justice from the country's courts, details the Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe.

Bassey Inyang, a correspondent for the "Daily Independent" newspaper in Cross River state, has been ordered to leave the state by the Cross River State House of Assembly. Inyang was given seven days to leave, as of 30 October 2003. According to Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)-Nigeria, the House of Assembly claimed that an article published in the 24 October edition of the newspaper, entitled "Bribery Scandal Rocks River Assembly", was false.

The State Security Service (SSS), the Nigerian executive's security service, has banned three newspapers - "Nigerian Tribune", "The Monitor" and "New Age" - from covering events at Aso Rock, the seat of the Nigerian government. The SSS provided no reason for the decision but told affected reporters from the three papers that their names had been removed from the list of journalists who "deserved to continue reporting from the Villa."

Mamane Abou, editor of the private weekly "Le Républicain", was sentenced to six months in prison on 7 November 2003, in the capital, Niamey. "This sentence is nonsense. This journalist was only doing his job and nothing can justify such a heavy sentence. Moreover, the court did not follow the normal legal procedure. Mamane Abou was sentenced in absentia, yet he is being held at Niamey prison," Reporters sans frontières (RSF)
said in a statement.

In a 10 November 2003 letter to the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists' Association (EFJA), the Ministry of Justice's Associations' Registration Office banned the organisation from carrying out its activities. EFJA obtained official recognition seven years after its establishment and for the past three years has been carrying out its work under very difficult and challenging conditions.

Three staff of the privately-owed Radio SIDO FM station are being detained at the Ségou prison, 200 km south-west of Bamako, capital of Mali. The Ségou court charged Mamoutou Traoré, senior administrator of Radio SIDO, his deputy Gatta Bah and Amadou Chérif Haïdara, a presenter, with the offence of "slander and incitement to violence."

A prominent independent journalist has been forced to flee Sudan in the face of persecution by the Sudanese government, Human Rights Watch says. Nhial Bol, former managing editor and reporter at the Khartoum Monitor, Sudan's only daily English-language newspaper, fled Sudan to Kenya in late October following repeated government actions against the Monitor, and arrests and threats against his life.

On the 'Nigeria-AIDS' forum, members discuss current issues and information about HIV/AIDS in Nigeria. They also receive the monthly Nigeria AIDS Bulletin (started since December 1998), news and views on HIV/AIDS from Nigerians across the world, information about grants, resources, international job vacancies, upcoming conferences as well as research reports and other news relevant to Nigeria.

Human Rights Committee E-News features sections containing job, fellowships and volunteer postings, educational courses and conferences and human rights news.

This glossary has been developed by Jill Ritchie of Papillon Press and Consultancy, in co-operation with Thusanang. Both Ritchie and Thusanang will add new entries to the glossary on an on-going basis. If you have a funding or fundraising term that is puzzling you, and which is not explained in the glossary already, please send it to us at [email protected].

The first New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) ministerial conference on science and technology (S&T) held last week in Johannesburg adopted a plan of action for its S&T programme. The plan, which was adopted by delegates from 34 African countries, covers three areas of governance of S&T within NEPAD, and finance provision and flagship programmes covering 12 areas identified at the conference, the Department of Science and Technology said in a statement.

Mandla Njokwane, once a street kid and now a tutor at the Youth Development Trust (YDT) centre in Johannesburg, was awarded the youth innovation award at the annual African ICT Achievers awards. Njokwane, who grew up in Thokoza on the East Rand, was awarded a learnership at Thutong Training Institute For Communication and IT (TIICOT) as part of his prize.