Deadline: 15 August 2010.

The Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) and the Youth Empowerment and Transformation Trust (YETT), in collaboration with young women’s networks and formations in Southern Africa, are hosting a Southern African Young Women’s Festival (SAYWF) in Harare from 24 to 28 October 2010.

The Festival is designed to provide space for young women between 18 and 30 years of age, to come together and share experiences, share strategies and energise each other and celebrate their youth and the potential they have to advocate for social justice in their respective communities.

Activities at the festival will include panel discussions, talent shows, debate contests, inter-generational dialogue sessions, talk shows, music and film shows and many other exciting activities. The platform will also make space for structured training sessions on various key skills including ICTs and life skills, to equip young women with the practical skills they need for effective advocacy for women’s rights. (please indicate the training sessions you would like to attend on the form below). The event is also designed to be a launching platform for the 16 Days national campaigns envisioned to be driven by young women across the region. OSISA and partners will be funding these campaigns.

The festival is organised to respond to the dire need for a safe space for young women in the region to share their own experiences and learn from and encourage each other to engage in activism that transforms their communities. Youth-related spaces are often dominated by young men, and young women hardly have safe spaces and platforms on which to speak about issues that affect them specifically as young women. Yet with challenges such as increasing unemployment, HIV and AIDS and rising levels of poverty, young women are the worst affected. This Festival, which is envisaged to be a biannual event, will provide that much needed space for young women to engage on these and other issues.

Young women from Angola, Botswana, DRC, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe are encouraged to apply to be part of this exciting event! OSISA and partners will cover the full costs, including travel, accommodation, subsistence and training for all selected participants. To qualify, candidates should be between 18 and 30 years, working in organisations/networks and formations committed to social justice and especially women’s rights. University students who provide proof of interest in women’s rights issues will also be considered. Selection will be on a first come first served basis!

To apply fill out and send by email or fax, the Application Form below. Each submitted form should be accompanied by a motivation letter, expressing why you should be selected to participate. The letter should not be more than 1 page.

For more information on this initiative and the Young Women’s Voices: 16 Days Campaigns, please contact: Tsitsi Mukamba at tsitsim@osisa.org or Hilda Makamure hildam@yet.org.zw oryouthnow@mweb.co.zw

Or Phone: +27 11 5875000 or +27 836615600 (Tsitsi)

+2634747986 or +263712441032 (Hilda)

http://yfa.awid.org/2010/07/call-for-participation-southern-african-young-women%E2%80%99s-festival/

If you are interested in this position please contact us before the end of the day on Tuesday 4th August, 2010.

Open Source Zambia (OSZ) is a no strings attached organization. Come with knowledge, share knowledge, leave with knowledge. The meetings, events, networking and more are all structured in similar fashion.

Healthy Discussion

Want to debate issues related to ICT in Zambia or an interesting thread shared by a fellow African blogger titled “5 Reasons Why Local Developers are Poor and would Remain So” then OSZ is your forum.

Networking

Members of the group work in various for-profit, government and non-profit organizations. They are prominent technology evangelists and are actively involved in organizing events such as Barcamp Lusaka.

Isn’t it time for you to join as well? Sign up for your account at OpenSourceZambia.

In a press release, Kennedy Sinkali, surrounded by a crowd of eager fifth-grade school children, is captured explaining phonics to them in front of a laptop screen. Sinkali is a teacher in a village near Ndola in the Copperbelt province of Zambia and uses the school’s only computer, which has to be shared between four classes and three hundred children.

Natasha Bomba, who took the picture while volunteering at the school, was announced as the winner of the first eLearning Africa photo competition. The prize, a digital camera, will be presented during the eLearning Africa conference from May 26th – 28th in Lusaka, Zambia.

The photo which takes the first runner-up prize was taken in Cameroon by Jenny Sanborn from HITIP, a non-profit, community-based organisation. She photographed Karine, a survivor of polio who lives in Douala. Rather than begging, she sells phone credit to make her living.

Mary Ann Hood from South Africa took the picture which was announced by the jury as second runner-up. It shows six-year-old Thandi from Uganda followed by her friends, taking pictures with a mobile phone camera.

To view the top ten entries and the audience favourite, go to eLearning Africa Photo Competition.

The ten best photos and the audience favourite will be featured in an exhibition at the eLearning Africa conference.

eLearning Africa launched the online photo contest in the run-up to this year’s conference to find out how ICTs have changed lives in Africa. The organisers invited people from Africa to submit images that show how they live, learn and work with ICTs.

eLearning Africa is the key networking event for investors, education experts, as well as providers of education and training on the continent. More information can be found at www.elearning-africa.com

The top three photos can be downloaded at: http://www.elearning-africa.com/pdf/press/eLA2010_PhotoCompetition_Top_three_photos.zip

In an interview with eBrain Chairperson, Lee Muzala said the eBrain Forum of Zambia’s mission was to contribute to the improvement of quality of life through promoting the use of information communication technologies (ICTs) for purposes of development by raising awareness, conducting monthly meetings, baseline surveys, research as well as building capacity among members.

Explaining their role in the eLearning Africa Conference, Muzala said eBrain Forum of Zambia had representation on the eLearning Africa 2010 Organising Committee, and was playing a key role in ensuring that Zambia was prepared to host the event.

“We have also managed to bring on board our funders who will be supporting the preparations by providing and paying for Coordinating Officer as well as paying for a survey to measure the extent of eLearning usage in Zambia,” explained Muzala.
He added that eBrain together with their cooperating partners, the International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD) will be exhibiting at the conference, and that they have several members that will make presentations during the conference, as well as chair some of the parallel sessions.

He explained that the eBrain Forum willl also be having a special event called “Teachers Forum”, on the pre-conference day, which will enable around 50 pre-service and in-service teachers to share their experiences of using ICT in the classroom. Some will be familiar with ICT in the classroom, others will have little or no experience of ICT.

The goal is to allow Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and teachers to showcase a wide range of tried-and-tested ICT initiatives and tools. This will be done in an informal ‘Market Place’ environment with a view to inspire teachers to replicate similar activities in their own schools, where possible. IICD and the eBrain Forum of Zambia are co-organising this half-day event, which includes space for an interactive discussion and presentations.

Muzala noted that hosting the conference brings with it, its own benefits as pointing out that it will allow local firms, teachers, schools heads, government officials and other interested parties to see technologies being applied in the area of eLearning through the various organisations that will be exhibiting. He said hosting the eLearning Africa event in Zambia will also help give insight to the country as to cases of eLearning in other countries.

He looked at eLearning not look at eLearning as a technology but a process that is there to help students learn even better and differently.

“I would like to believe that eLearning brings with it several benefits such as reducing some of the costs associated with education if implemented correctly. He said it also allows schools to educate people they could not previously like those working for a living and those people who are geographically dispersed and many other kinds of people.

Muzala also added that studies have shown that students who would not raise a hand in class will be very active in posting to discussion boards showing that they communicate better in a web based environment than in the traditional classroom.
Meanwhile, Muzala who is also Managing Director of Trio Consult/Global Teenager Project (GTP) will be part of a discussion panel to discuss issues of content generated during GTP activities and how best they can be packaged and re-used by other students as referal materials. They will also be looking at the benefits of adopting the concept of Learning Circles used as the core activity of GTP, and how they can be used locally to enable learning among Zambian students.

Recieving the award which was the first of its kind by the Free and Open Source Foundation for Africa (FOSSFA) and Digital Commons,Remmy said that there was need for Journalists to report on FOSS issues for the development of the African software industry.

The award was presented to him in Accra, Tuesday night, at the weeklong 4TH Idlelo conference organized by FOSSFA, Digital Commons and Deutsche Welle, colourful dinner hosted at the Council of State House, Accra.

Speaking at the ceremony, chairperson, FOSSFA, Nnenna Nwakanma noted that the award was open to Africans living on the continent, authors of articles or broadcasts that were published or aired in the last two years.

Winning entries, she pointed out was an article described as valuable to an African audience, which showed clarity in communication and significantly disclosing, explaining, interpreting and reporting the impact of FOSS on the development of Africa and recognizin newsworthiness thereof.

Therefore, she said that Nweke’s piece on ‘Open Source as a business solution’ meant the aforementioned criterion based on the juries declaration and therefore, was pronounced the best.

She also promised that FOSSFA would continue to support African media practitioners, even as she solicited for more reportage in African media.

Nweke is not new to professional recognitions as he had in the past won the Siemens African Profile Award for 2004 and 2005; thus becoming the first Nigerian to win such award on excellence in science and technology reporting twice in addition to a merit awarded him in 2008.

He is also a Highway Africa News Agency (HANA) journalist recently rebranded based at Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa, where he won the second prize in Local Content Application category at the African Information Society Initiative (AISI) awards in 2005 organized by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

In 2006, Nweke was honoured with the Hewlett Packard (HP) Nigeria’s top prize for Nigerian ICT journalists in technology reporting, whereas he was the first runner up in the Nigerian IT & Telecom Awards print category.

Currently, a Master of Arts student of University of Malta in Contemporary Diplomacy, Nweke was at the Global Knowledge Partnership (GKP-07) in Malaysia, where he took the second prize in ICT Research and Innovations category of AISI.

While at the 10th Highway Africa conference-06, he was adjudged the SABC-HANA Journalist of the Year in recognition and promotion of creative, innovative and appropriate use of new media technology on the continent, even as he emerged the Publicity Secretary, Nigeria Internet Group (NIG) a not-profit organisation.

A founding member of the Joint Action Committee on ICT Awareness (JACITAD) and focal point for the African ICTMedia for Nigeria, Nweke, last year was nominated into the International WHO’S WHO of Professionals in 2009 Edition.

Nweke is also a member of the New Media team a Live Blogging African team English content creator.

Developing sustainable and effective educational infrastructures is one of the goals of the event, the largest pan-African conference in the field of Information Communication technologies (ICT) for education and training in Africa.

The fifth eLearning Africa Conference will take place in Lusaka, Zambia from May 26 – 28, 2010, under the patronage of the Zambian Minister of Education, Ms Dora Siliya.
With a multitude of best-practice examples on display, eLearning Africa presents how and where technology-enhanced learning can boost the Continent’s economies and development. International experts provide participants with solutions on how online education and training can be implemented in corporations and organisations successfully and cost effectively.

Education providers, corporations, decision makers from governments and educational institutions, as well as non-governmental and development organisations from Africa and the rest of the world convene at the annual event.

eLearning Africa will be accompanied by an exhibition and demonstration area where leading international eLearning manufacturers, suppliers and service providers present their latest products and services.

More than 1,500 education professionals from around the world are expected at this year’s eLearning Africa.

In a press release, ITU indicates that the equipment was airlifted out of Geneva on Monday 1 March, and is expected to be deployed on the ground as early as today, 2 March. ITU is working with emergency communications partner Iridium Communications Inc. to ensure connectivity for satellite handsets, which will be used by local authorities to facilitate humanitarian assistance to disaster victims. ITU is also striving to source additional equipment from El Salvador and Nicaragua, where it had been deployed last year to help those countries restore communications after their own natural disasters.

“Our hearts go out to the government and the people of Chile, who find themselves having to deal with a tragedy similar to that which so recently devastated Haiti,” said ITU Secretary-General Dr Hamadoun Touré. “We are proud to be a long-standing leader in coordinating the provision of emergency telecommunications and will continue to actively contribute assistance in partnership with ITU membership.”

ITU’s Area Office in Santiago, Chile, is already providing expert on-the-ground support to local authorities, as well as to the local UN Operations Centre, to coordinate the restoration of damaged communication systems and manage spectrum requirements for the wireless systems used by humanitarian agencies.

Sami Al Basheer Al Morshid, Director, ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau, said: “I would like to thank Iridium for supporting ITU on this sad occasion. Communications networks were disrupted by this massive earthquake, hampering rescue operations and the delivery of essential logistics and services. Our assistance will contribute towards the bridging of the current communication gap.”

ITU is providing Iridium satellite phones which can use both satellite and GSM networks, as well as delivering accurate GPS positioning coordinates to aid relief and rescue. ITU covers all expenses relating to transportation, deployment and use of equipment, which will be at the disposal of the authorities in Chile for as long as they require it.