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▶ Marines and Burundi soldiers conduct joint exercise | YouTube
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Burundi's Female Ex-Combatants Find Acceptance, Livelihoods | Worldbank
Female ex-combatants from Burundi's civil conflict are finding livelihoods, social support and acceptance through the Government of Burundi's Demobilization and Transitional Reintegration Project supported by the World Bank and the Governments of Belgium, the Netherlands and Norway.
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Small LED device piloted to empower women and power rural communities in Burundi | UNICEF
A little LED device called Nuru is being piloted to power homes and empower women, in Burundi.
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The latest cycle of violence in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the brief occupation of Goma by the “M23” rebels call for a re-examination of how UN peacekeepers have approached the physical protection of civilians in the DRC over the past 13 years. This article examines how lessons from early protection crises led the UN missions in the DRC to develop a series of innovative tools for a better peacekeeping response based on improved civil-military coordination and enhanced communication with the local population. It analyzes how the need to mitigate the negative impact of joint UN-Congolese military operations led to a progressive shift from a largely UN-centric and troop-intensive approach to physical protection to a greater focus on the Congolese security forces. As the UN peacekeeping understanding of the protection of civilians – and its concomitant bureaucracy – continues to expand, peacekeeping strategies should refocus on strengthening national protection capacities through security sector reform. This article concludes that the 2012 crisis in DRC could serve as a trigger for such a shift, aimed at building legitimate institutions and encouraging the host government to shoulder its primary responsibility to protect its citizens. The new Intervention Brigade together with the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework for the DRC and the region could provide the broader political strategy on which to anchor this reform process.
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In early 2012, Congolese army deserters formed the M23 rebel movement. This article analyses the insurgency and other armed group activity in the eastern DRC in the light of the politics of rebel-military integration. It argues that military integration processes have fuelled militarization in three main ways. First, by creating incentive structures promoting army desertion and insurgent violence; second, by fuelling inter- and intra-community conflicts; and third, by the further unmaking of an already unmade army. We argue that this is not merely the product of a ‘lack of political will’ on behalf of the DRC government, but must be understood in the light of the intricacies of Big Man politics and Kinshasa's weak grip over both the fragmented political-military landscape in the east and its own coercive arm. Demonstrating the link between military integration and militarization, the article concludes that these problems arise from the context and implementation of integration, rather than from the principle of military power sharing itself. It thus highlights the crucial agency of political-military entrepreneurs, as shaped by national-level policies, in the production of ‘local violence’.
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How did the conflict in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) impact family planning perspectives among survivors of sexual violence and their partners? Analysis is ongoing. Preliminary analyses suggest poor understanding, availability, and use of family planning methods, and strong themes about the impact of poverty on desired family size and the influence of male power and intimate partner violence on family planning. Findings suggest the war's violence continues in couples today, negatively impacting access to and use of family planning. Efforts to improve women's negotiation skills with respect to family planning and dispel myths related to certain methods are critical features of any program to improve family planning use.
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Reflections on ECAS and Fieldwork in African Conflict areas by Marsha Henry | Mats Utas Blog
Attending the European Convention of Africa Studies this past June for the first time, it was encouraging to see several panels devoted to methodological questions raised by conducting research in African conflict areas and violent settings.
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Les quatre vérités de René Abandi, au nom du M23 | le carnet de Colette Braeckman
Interview de René Abandi, chef de la délégation du M23 négociant à Kampala et en charge des relations extérieures. Nous l’avons rencontré alors qu’il transitait par Bruxelles, en route vers Kampala où la négociation doit reprendre avec la délégation gouvernementale.
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In DRC, Promoting Peace Through Village Committees | VOA
For more than 20 years, the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has been wracked by war, ethnic violence and sexual assaults. More than two and a half million people are internally displaced, and hundreds of thousands of others have fled to neighboring countries. Despite that, efforts continue on the grassroots level to bring peace between local communities by ending disputes over land and livestock
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Striking Gold: How M23 and its Allies are Infiltrating Congo's Gold Trade | Enough
The M23 rebel group has taken over a profitable part of the conflict gold trade in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, or DRC. It is using revenues from the illicit trade to benefit its leaders and supporters and fund its military campaign by building military alliances and networks with other armed groups that control territory around gold mines and by smuggling gold through Uganda and Burundi. M23 commander Sultani Makenga, who is also allegedly one of the rebels’ main recruiters of child soldiers according to the U.N. Group of Experts on Congo, is at the center of the conflict gold efforts.
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Province-Orientale : Soigner les troubles mentaux des victimes de la LRA | Syfia
A Doruma, tout au nord de la Province Orientale de la RD Congo, martyrisé par l’Armée de résistance du Seigneur (LRA), de nombreux habitants souffrent de traumatismes psychologiques. Particulièrement ceux qui ont été kidnappés par les soldats et sont rejetés par la communauté à leur retour.
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Can Radios Stop the Lord’s Resistance Army in Congo? – By Scott Ross | African Arguments
In northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), rural radio stations are used to protect civilians from violence. Part of a growing network of high frequency (HF) shortwave radios that connects rural villages in remote parts of the DRC and neighboring Central African Republic (CAR), these radios are switched on each day as local radio operators report their village’s status in relation to a widespread conflict in the region.
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DR Congo: we are all implicated in the carnage – we can no longer ignore it | theguardian.com
A Congolese gynaecologist is tipped to win the Nobel peace prize ahead of Malala Yousafzai. His awful task deserves global recognition
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Dr. Denis Mukwege: Congo's Nobel Nominee | Huffington Post
Bukavu, a city situated on Lake Kivu, is home to Dr. Denis Mukwege. The son of a Pentecostal minister, he is a gynecological surgeon and savior of women suffering from fistula. Addressing the needs of the women he treats, as well as their families is urgent to him. Nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize, Dr. Mukwege has drawn the attention of the medical industry, human rights advocates, and those concerned with conflict mitigation and diplomacy alike.
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Scholarship on youth in Africa has mostly focused on unemployed young people, portraying them as a lost generation and exploring how states have failed them. Literature on young employed Africans has been conspicuously absent. This research portrays how a group of young professional Rwandans who define themselves as “diaspora” living in post-genocide Kigali, are redefining national belonging in economic terms. Many young professionals have moved from the diaspora to Rwanda because the state offers them a platform where they can find employment or start their own business: an entrepreneurial citizenship. The city of Kigali is experiencing physical and social transformation, and these young professionals are driving such change. The young people in this study see Rwanda as a place where they can belong by being cosmopolitan, and especially by becoming entrepreneurs. They feel that in Rwanda they are able to be global citizens more easily than in the Diaspora. This feeling of global citizenship is, ironically, what inspires in them a sense of national identity. This research explores the youth in the broader sense of economic activity and time and their sense of belonging in everyday life, in the capital city of Kigali.
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A conversation about media self-regulation in Rwanda | IFEX
Rwandan journalist Fred Muvunyi last week became the first head of the new Rwanda Media Commission, a seven-member self-regulatory body. It is a first for a country with a spotty record of press freedom and a history of self-censorship
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Miracle cow kicked poverty out of Mukagatare’s life | New Times
Grâce Mukagatare does not stop praising God for what she calls a miracle—a cow she acquired through One Cow per Poor family programme—that transformed her life.
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Rwanda : Des femmes bouchères dynamiques | Syfia
De plus en plus de femmes rwandaises sont bouchères, un métier qui leur faisait peur jusqu'à présent. Au sein des coopératives, leur dynamisme et leur honnêteté sont reconnus et appréciés.
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Kofi Annan: 'African justice is weak' | theguardian.com
The former UN secretary-general talks to David Smith about al-Shabaab, the success of Rwanda, and the future of Zimbabwe
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The Rwandan case: is it possible to truly compensate victims of genocide? | Insight on Conflict
Jean-Paul Mugiraneza discusses why the victims of the Tutsi Genocide- one of the worst incidences of mass killing in the 20th century- are still struggling to receive financial compensation for their physical and material loss 20 years on, and asks, is it even possible to fully compensate these people after such an atrocity?
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'The MDGs are a floor, not a ceiling' | Guardian
Prime minister of Rwanda, Pierre Habumuremyi, explains that success in reducing poverty is down to a having a clear national strategy and effective local implementation
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Growth Poverty and Inequality in Rwanda: A Broad Perspective | UNU WIDER
In this study we focus on growth, poverty and inequality in Rwanda. We take a broad perspective, in two respects. First, we consider a long time period so as to compare the current situation with the pre-war situation, allowing us to assess whether the recent successes can be attributed to a recovery from a very low post-war base or whether they mark ‘real’ progress. Second, we look beyond static measures of material welfare and study economic and social mobility as well as indicators of human development and subjective well-being.
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On Friday and Saturday I spent a strange couple of days attending a conference at SOAS (partially sponsored by the RAS). It was called ‘Rwanda under the RPF: assessing 20 years of post-conflict governance.’ I don’t normally have much time for write-ups of conferences like this, unless Paul Kagame was actually there. However, in this case I think the way in which debate was conducted reveals something quite interesting about the positioning of the particular groups involved.
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Property rights have been noted to increasingly play a central role in the management of land resources. This paper examines the implications of land tenure on soil conservation on the slopes of Mt Elgon, Eastern Uganda. Primary data were obtained through household surveys and field observations conducted in Tsekululu Sub County, Bubulo County, Manafwa District, Eastern Uganda between September and December 2012. The sampled parishes were stratified according to their distance from the Park boundary. SPSS (16) was used to compute descriptive statistics such as frequencies and percentages. Check dams and gulley controls were the most common structural measures adopted by farmers in all the three sites, although, overall the level of adoption by park-adjacent communities was lower compared to distant ones, whose reluctance to invest in long term conservation techniques is attributable to the tenure insecurity, while the high adoption rate by distant communities is owed to the transferability, alienability, exclusivity and enforceability rights that secure private land. Thus, a policy environment that guarantees tenure security of park adjacent farmers could help in incentivizing investment in soil conservation. Success thereof will be achieved if the politicians, Park Authorities and local communities jointly participate in their design and implementation.
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This study on female entrepreneurs in Western Uganda provides empirical evidence on the socio-economic effects of participation in a microfinance cooperative of both the female entrepreneur and her husband. Participation by female entrepreneurs in a microfinance cooperative is not an unconditional blessing: even though it does deliver higher household incomes, it might also deteriorate the female's household decision-making power when her husband participates in the same self-help group of the microfinance cooperative. This offers new insights for development policy and for entrepreneurship scholars to study the bright and dark sides of microfinance.
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Among farmers worldwide, and in particular in developing countries and transition economies, genetically modified (GM) crops have progressively grown in popularity and are now planted in approximately 160 million hectares in 29 countries. In the discussions of biosafety regulations for GM crops and whether to approve such crops for commercialization, many countries, including some African nations, have gone beyond environmental assessments and are now introducing socioeconomic considerations as part of their decisionmaking process. While there is scientific consensus that GM crops are as safe as conventional crops, these additional regulatory layers may be motivated by policymakers’ concerns regarding public perception. There are, however, very few guidelines on how to ensure that this inclusion of socioeconomic considerations results in a robust and efficient decisionmaking process. Socioeconomic Considerations in Biosafety Decisionmaking: Methods and Implementation provides guidance to professionals involved in assessing the ex ante impact of a GM crop in the context of an approval process. Using the case of GM cotton in Uganda, the authors illustrate the evaluation of socioeconomic impact on farmers, the national economy, and trade.
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Transforming Gender Relations in Agriculture in Sub-Saharan Africa | Eldis
This book is based in the premise that empowered women and men are more successful farmers who are more able to make the most of the opportunities around them. It argues that there is a causal relation between more equal gender relations in the household and in the community, and better agricultural outcomes. Standard development interventions such as more extension services, better information, more fertilizer, better machinery – will not fully achieve their goals unless women and men are on equal footing and unhindered by gender norms that limit what is ‘appropriate’ from them to do or be.
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The Arrogance of Good Intentions - Barrons.com
The Idealist: Jeffrey Sachs and the Quest to End Poverty by Nina Munk - Review by William Easterly
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The rise and fall of decentralization in contemporary Uganda | UNU-WIDER
There has long been an emphasis on the importance of decentralization in providing better quality public services in the developing world. In order to assess the effectiveness of decentralization I examine here the case study of Uganda, which has seen major decentralization of power over the last quarter-century. Initial excitement about Uganda’s decentralization programme has, however, tapered off in recent years due to a number of problems outlined here. I suggest that many of these problems are the consequence of broader problems of poor state capacity and institutions that are endemic in developing countries.
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This study assessed the association between household family structure and early sexual debut among adolescent girls, ages 15–19, in rural Rakai District, Uganda. Early sexual debut is associated with detrimental physical, emotional, and social outcomes, including increased risk of HIV. However, research on the family’s role on adolescents’ sexual risk behaviors in sub-Saharan Africa has been minimal and rarely takes into account the varying family structures within which African adolescents develop. Using six rounds of survey data (2001–2008) from the Rakai Community Cohort Study, unmarried adolescent girls (n = 1940) aged 15–17 at their baseline survey, were followed until age 19. Parametric survival models showed that compared to adolescent girls living with both biological parents, girls who headed their own household and girls living with stepfathers, grandparents, siblings, or other relatives had significantly higher hazards of early sexual debut before age 16. Adolescent girls were significantly more likely to debut sexually if neither parent resided in the household, either due to death or other reasons. In addition, the absence of the living biological father from the home was associated with a higher risk of sexual debut, regardless of the biological mother’s presence in the home. Our study’s findings suggest that family structure is important to adolescent girls’ sexual behavior. There is need for research to understand the underlying processes, interactions, and dynamics of both low and high-risk family structures in order to devise and strategically target interventions for specific types of family structures.
