The Bureau Chief of The Source magazine in Port Harcourt, Nigeria's delta region, Mr. Lawson Heyford, was arrested on August 23, 2003 by police detectives. Sources said his arrest may not be unconnected with stories he wrote on a communal clash in July in Ataba town, in the Delta region, during which many persons were killed and houses destroyed.

This is a new series of books for leaders of organisations who want to increase their financial independence at a time when grants from foreign agencies are shifting or shrinking. This series details a varied, sustained, local fundraising program. The books are written specially for agencies in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, Latin America, and who want to begin or improve their fundraising programmes.

Developing countries have next to no say in the evolution of information and communication technologies (ICTs). At its Genoa Summit in 2001, the G8's Digital Opportunities Task (DOT) Force called for greater southern involvement in ICT decision-making. What are the prospects for bridging the digital divide? What principles should govern ICT relations between north and south?

Can information technology promote new public management (NPM) in Africa? Can e-government projects improve public sector effectiveness and bureaucratic efficiency? How should e-readiness for e-government be measured? How can we close the gaps between project design and African public sector reality that have caused most e-government projects to fail?

Microsoft has claimed victory over the Blaster virus - but has warned of more problems if users do not act to fix a hole in its software. The virus is believed to have been written by computer hackers with a grudge against Microsoft and has so far affected an estimated 300,000 PCs worldwide. Unlike previous viruses, which arrived as an email attachment, the Blaster 'worm' tunnels in undetected via an internet connection. It was designed to launch an attack at midnight local time.

In detailed documents submitted to the secretariat of the United Nations’ World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) and the APC Women’s Programme recognised the efforts of the WSIS drafting committee to include the concerns and interests of the many governments, private sector and civil society stakeholders taking part in the process which will culminate in the first ever UN Summit dedicated to communications in Geneva in December. However, say the ICT activists, “there are critical issues [that] are not addressed sufficiently, if at all”.

eAfrica - The Electronic Journal of governance and innovation - focuses this month on new efforts to reduce the African brain drain and harness the financial and intellectual resources of the African diaspora. The full issue is available by email as an Adobe Acrobat file and is also available on the website: www.wits.ac.za/saiia. To subscribe, email your name, job title, organisation and country to us at [email protected] To unsubscribe, email to [email protected].

On 29 August 2003, police officers arrested Guy Kasongo Kilembwe, editor-in-chief of the satirical newspaper "Pot-Pourri", following the publication of an article criticising a member of parliament's reported embezzlement of funds. On 31 August, after being held in police custody for 48 hours, the journalist was transferred to Kinshasa's Penitentiary and Reeducation Centre (Centre pénitentiaire et de rééducation de Kinshasa, former Makala central prison). "Without commenting on the content of the offending article, we condemn all cases of preventive detention for defamation, which should fall within the competence of civil courts," Reporters sans frontières (RSF), Secretary-General Robert Ménard said. He asked that Kasongo be released, presumed innocent, and granted a fair trial.

South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) station managers have been ordered in a secret memo to avoid broadcasting programmes involving "political discourse", citing the arms deal row, in the run-up to next year's election. The memo said the decision had been taken against a background of discussion of corruption allegations against Deputy President Jacob Zuma.

Digital Opportunity Channel (www.digitalopportunity.org) has created a special coverage section at its Website dedicated to the upcoming World Summit on the Information Society. The resource will feature news and analysis about the summit from a civil society perspective - especially NGOs based in the developing world. See the special coverage at http://www.digitalopportunity.org/article/archive/4732.

Balancing Act’s News Update covers connectivity developments in Africa and goes out to 6142 subscribers in government, the private sector, civil society and education. It has subscribers in almost all African countries.

On 22 August 2003, Lawson Heyford, the Port Harcourt bureau chief of "The Source" magazine, was arrested by police officers and detained at the Force Criminal Investigation Department (FCID) in Lagos. According to Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) Nigeria sources, the police gave no reason for Heyford's arrest, but information gathered suggests the police action was informed by articles the journalist wrote on an intra-tribal conflict in southern Nigeria.

The 3½ day workshop will link strategic communication, media relations, and message design and delivery. The workshop will provide hands-on learning in 4 areas: Developing Winning Messages; Crisis Management; Camera/Microphone Readiness; and Internet Monitoring and Marketing.

Apocalyptic predictions about South Africa's aids orphans problem are "unfounded and ill-considered", according to a study by the Centre for Social Science Research (CSSR) at the University of Cape Town. "By misrepresenting the problems faced by children and their families, attention is distracted from the multiple layers of social, economic and psychological disadvantage that affect individual children, families and communities," said the study.

Bookings now open for the following:
* 2 September 2003 - Joburg: Proposal Writing & budget design;
*3 September - Joburg: Special Events planning and implementation;
*4 September - Joburg: Fundraising Administration & Report writing;
* 16 September 2003 - Durban: Introduction to Fundraising & Resource Mobilisation - 1 day fast-track programme to get you started;
* 21-23 September 2003 - Durban: Resource Mobilisation & Fundraising Development;
*28 October - Joburg: Income Generation for NPO's;
* 4-5 November - Joburg: Practical Proposal Writing - effective writing skills and more;
*11-12 November - Joburg: Succinct Report Writing and planning for a logical flow;
*18 November - Joburg, Cape Town and Durban - Planning for Successful Fundraising - Strategies & Approaches;
*20 November - Joburg: Introduction to Fundraising & Resource Mobilisation;
*24-25 November - Cape Town: Train-the-Trainer in Resource Mobilisation & Fundraising Development;
*26-28 November - Cape Town: 3-day Resource Mobilisation & Fundraising Development.
Further information available from Thea at SAIF Education & Training Centre: 27 (0) 11 794 5224 or e-mail [email protected]

* Learning to Train - While this handbook is intended primarily as a resource for trainers working in the development sector, it will be of value to anyone seeking to work with adult learners in a respectful, facilitative and enabling manner.
* Project Planning in a development context - a set of 3 handbooks.
* Ideas for Change - a series of user-friendly publications with practical ideas and information for people working with people, and with change and development organisations. - Visit the URL link provided or write to the email address below.

ThinkQuest Africa (TQA) www.thinkquestafrica.org is an Internet based extra curuiculla educational program administered and managed by SchoolNet Africa (www.schoolnetafrica.org) to promote a new way of learning through cooperative activities. TQA targets students in the age of 12-19 to form teams from 4 partners and two coaches from Africa to develop an educational web site about a topic of their interest.

Reporters sans frontières (RSF), has expressed concern about the numerous attacks on press freedom in Nigeria recently and the growing climate of lawlessness in which journalists have to work, especially outside Lagos. The organisation urged the authorities to ensure greater security for journalists working throughout the country and not to allow abuses and irregularities to go unpunished.

Reporters sans frontières (RSF), has protested the Uganda Law Council's 22 August 2003 ban on lawyers appearing in the media without its permission and called for the measure to be dropped. Law Council Chairman Elijah Wante told the organisation the measure was aimed at preventing lawyers from "misusing the media" and "misleading the public" and that the only public stance permissible was that of the council.

Information Minister Jonathan Moyo has revealed that he intends to expand his propaganda campaign to continental proportions with the help of satellite communications. Reportedly, Moyo and his Tanzanian counterpart signed an “agreement to co-operate in the media field”, which would see the two set up a 24-hour satellite news channel. ZTV quoted Moyo as saying the station will help in telling the “true African story”. Moyo did not clarify what he meant, but in the past the government’s spin doctor and the media he controls have narrowly defined such issues as the ‘African story’ from a ZANU-PF point of view while dismissing all other interpretations as neo-colonialist and pro-Western, reports the Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe.