Broadband for All aims to provide broadband connectivity to South Africa’s under-served areas through a community-centric model rather than a telco-driven model. The model leverages wireless-mesh technologies to link priority government sites and high bandwidth users such as schools, municipalities and government offices, who in turn provide a link to smaller customers such as businesses, NGOs and individuals.

Kenya is quickly gaining a competitive advantage in the mobile payments space. Led by mobile operator giant Safaricom with their Mpesa product, the market locally sees huge value in mobile money transactions. Add to that a regulatory system that is relaxed enough for innovation to be encouraged, and you have a great space for interesting things to happen.

Somalia is one of the most dangerous places on earth to be a journalist. More than 30 reporters have been killed by armed groups since 1992 - including nine in 2009. The most recent journalist killing occurred on 4 May 2010, when three gunmen shot dead broadcast journalist Sheik Nur Mohamed Abkey as he was returning home from the state-run Radio Mogadishu. Members of the armed opposition group al-Shabab claimed responsibility for the killing.

At the International Criminal Court (ICC) review conference last month in Kampala, negotiations to add the crime of aggression to the court’s docket topped the agenda. The crime of initiating offensive warfare had been prosecuted after World War II. But when the Rome Conference established the ICC in 1998 as the first permanent court to try crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide, it deferred a decision on aggression to another day.

The Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC) has granted licences to four new media houses, its chairperson Godfrey Majonga said. The registration comes two months after the new media watchdog issued licences to three daily newspapers -- The NewsDay, The Daily News and The Daily Gazette.

The four journalists and their driver who had been abducted on 11 July 2010 by gunmen in Aba, Abia State, in southeastern Nigeria, were released on 18 July at about 1:30 am (local time) by their captors. The chairman of the Lagos State Council of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Mr. Wahab Oba, said they were dropped off by the gunmen at a bush path in Ukpakiri in the state and had to wait till about 6:00 am before walking to the local market where they met an unnamed community leader who took them to a police station. He said the sum of N3 million (US$20,000) was taken from them.

Colleagues of a radio journalist who was attacked by unknown assailants on 16 July 2010 are suspecting the military of being behind the attack. "Mansaré must have been a victim of an action carried out by persons hostile to his reports possibly, it is a settlement of scores," according to a colleague of Mansaré who spoke to the Media Foundation for West Africa's (MFWA) correspondent in Guinea on condition of anonymity.

On 21 July 2010 Swazi traditional authorities threatened Swazi journalists with death if they continued to write stories considered by the authorities as undermining the country's leadership and system of government. The death warning came from Prince Mahlaba, brother to King Mswati III and also a member of the King's advisory council, the Swazi National Council Standing Committee (SNC), which is a highly influential body in Swazi politics.

Journalists and media organisations have denounced the move by the Securities Commission of Zimbabwe (SEC) to register financial journalists as securities investor advisers in terms of the Securities Act of 2004. In terms of Statutory Instrument 100/200 which put into force the Securities Act, financial journalists are required to pay a license fee of $2 000 by 31 December 2010. Media practitioners argue that this would result in over-regulation of media practitioners. Media organisations argued that financial journalists who report and analyse securities such as stocks, bonds, bills and others are already accredited by the statutory Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC).

The third National internet Governance forum was held in Kampala on 14th/July/2010 at Imperial Royale Hotel. It was organized by I-network, CIPESSA and WOUGNET in collaboration with Uganda Communications Commission(UCC) and the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (MoICT). Its purpose was to prepare for the forthcoming East African Internet Governance forum scheduled for 11th to 13th August 2010.

"Africa is the only continent where the majority of children start school using a foreign language. Across Africa the idea persists that the international languages of wider communication (Arabic, English, French, Portuguese and Spanish) are the only means for upward economic mobility. .. [But] New research findings are increasingly pointing to the negative consequences of these policies ... We recommend that policy and practice in Africa nurture multilingualism; primarily a mother-tongue-based one with an appropriate and required space for international languages of wider communication." - Adama Ouane, Director, UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning

Amnesty International has urged the Kenyan authorities to investigate the death of a market trader reportedly shot dead by police during a protest against forced evictions in a Nairobi settlement. Jackson Maina Kihato, 74, was killed on Monday after he tried to complain about the police beating a woman during demonstrations in Kabete NITD. Protests have continued in the settlement since an estimated 1,000 people lost their homes and market stalls in a mass forced eviction on 10 July.

South Africa's parliament is considering an information bill the government says will better protect secrets but critics fear could hamper access to market-sensitive data and muzzle media investigations. The Protection of Information Bill sets guidelines for classifying state information as well as creating a legislative framework for the government to combat espionage and other hostile activities.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and some 37 journalists' unions and association are pressing government leaders attending the 15th African Union Summit in Kampala, Uganda, to make safety of African journalists a priority for the African Union. In a letter to AU leaders the unions, led by the IFJ African regional body the Federation of African Journalists, welcomed the declaration by African leaders to designate 2010 as the "Year of Peace and Security in Africa".

On 21 July, when ruling on a case where 21 victims of torture at Nyayo House had approached the High Court for justice, Lady Justice Hannah Okwengu found the State agents culpable of having violated human rights and fundamental freedoms with impunity. While the victims filed the case way back in 2004, it was a vindication that even if the wheels of justice grind slowly, they still deliver justice and reparations to those afflicted by human rights abuses. The Judgment is a citadel for the defence of human rights in Kenya in many ways.

The arrest of three journalists in Cote d’Ivoire for publishing a leaked report on alleged corruption in the coffee and cocoa trade, and the death of Pius Njawe, Cameroonian journalist and founder of newspaper Le Messager, are among the key stories covered in this week’s round-up of the African blogosphere.

Théophile Kouamouo, the Editor-in-chief of the Ivorian daily 'Le Nouveau Courier' and three of his collaborators are being held in detention at the headquarters of Ivorian judiciary police section in Abidjan, after publishing the results of the investigation carried out by the Prosecutor about alleged fraud and embezzlement in Cocoa and coffee sector.

The Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), the African regional organization of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), expresses its abhorrence of the bomb attacks in Kampala, Uganda, last night, in which more than 60 people were killed, including Vision Voice journalist Stephen Tinka. FAJ President, Omar Faruk Osman, strongly condemned these barbaric attacks in the Ugandan capital and conveyed his condolences to the family of late journalist Stephen Tinka, the members of the Ugandan Journalists Union, as well as to other victims and their families who have been tragically affected by these attacks.

The Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), the African regional organisation of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), strongly condemned the kidnapping of Zonal leaders of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) on 11 July 2010 as a deplorable and a criminal act that was intended to destabilise NUJ dynamic leadership's commitment to defend journalists' rights and interests.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has added its voice to that of journalists in Africa and around the world who have been shocked by the news of the death of leading Cameroonian journalist Pius Njawe who has been killed in a car accident in the United States. "Pius Njawe was a great friend of press freedom and also a loyal supporter of journalists, not just in Africa, but around the world," said Aidan White, IFJ General Secretary.