EUROPEAN UNION GRANTS LIBERIA LOAN FOR EMERGENCY AID

The European Union


The European Union (EU) has decided to release a loan of 10 million euros, as an additional aid to Liberia to enable some 500,000 people in the country to have access to health care and drinking water, according to the press statement issued in Brussels by the European Union last year.

The loan, among others, will be used to bridge the funding gap in the transitional period between humanitarian aid funding and development funding. 

The EU noted that the aid to Liberia has been so far "successful and helped to establish a link between emergency aid, rehabilitation, and development".

Out of the loan, 7 million euros will be used to fund the primary health care projects and to improve maternal and infant health. In addition, the loan will be used to finance programs for access to drinking water and sanitation networks and for the improvement of hygiene.

Part of the funds of about 2.95 million euros will be used to ensure a harmonious transition to bridge the gap until the end of the process. 

Liberia is one of the African countries that was totally crippled by war during the era of Charles Taylor, who is now facing criminal charges at The Hague.

AFRICA's TRADE AND ECONOMIC GROWTH WITH THE US

Africa and the US trade

Africa is a continent that answers the need for all raw materials required by advanced countries, including the United States of America. 

In regard to Africa's economic growth, the US will maintain a good relationship with Africa, said Ron Kirk, US Trade Representative, in his recent official tour to Tanzania.

Discussing the importance of trade-in promoting economic growth in Africa and the US, with international trade, students from the University of Dar es Salaam and Mzumbe University, Ambassador Ron Kirk said there was an urgent need to prepare the next generation of government and business leaders for the demands of an increasingly competitive global economy.

Tanzania is one of the numerous African countries blessed with extraordinary natural resources with and the US wants to maintain good relations. As the next generation leaders, you need to lead the way in taking advantage of those resources, so that Tanzania can realize its full potential," said Ron Kirk to the students.

Kirk, whose trip highlighted the strong partnership between the US and Tanzania, focused on the progress made under AGOA, but also discussed the need to do more to increase US exports to Africa, to support America's economic recovery at home. 

He commended Tanzania for being one of the only four countries worldwide to be selected for President Obama's new Partnership for Growth (PFG) initiative, which seeks to promote broad-based economic growth in developing countries.

The other countries for PFG are Ghana, El Salvador, and the Philippines. The US exports to Tanzania grew by 3.6 percent between 2009 and 2010, rising to 164 million dollars. 

ALBERTINA SISULU: LEGEND OF A POLITICAL HEROINE

Albertina Sisulu

Albertina Sisulu, one of the political icons of the Apartheid era, who sacrificed her life and fought against the evil-Apartheid alongside her husband, Albert Sisulu, has died at the age of 92 on Thursday 2/06/201.  

               

The death of struggle veteran Albertina Sisulu has left the ANC in shock, disbelief, and devastated at the loss of a mother, says ruling party spokesman Jackson Mthembu.

Albertina Sisulu was the widow of Walter Sisulu, the first secretary-general of the ANC, a Robben Island prisoner, and a friend of Nelson Mandela. 

Her extraordinary personal sacrifices were to let ordinary Africans lead a dignified life, free of the daily discriminations and humiliations that constituted the Apartheid system.

She endured a lot so that each person, regardless of race or creed or gender, could enjoy the full range of pleasures and sorrows, challenges and accomplishments that define the daily essence of an ordinary person. 

Born in 1918, in the village of Camama in the Transkei region of South Africa, Albertina chose to study nursing. She married Albert Sisulu in 1947.

Albertina was the only woman present at the birth of the African National Congress Youth League. She became more of an activist, leading the ANC Women's League in the famous 1952 Defiance Campaign and boycotts, protests, and sit-ins of the 1950s. 

In the 60s, she endured several banning orders by the Apartheid government.

Her husband was sentenced to life imprisonment on Robben Island, one of the notorious prisons in South Africa, forcing her to raise a family on her own. Like Winnie Mandela, Adelaide Thambo, wife of Oliver Thambo, and Ma Mbeki, she bore the burden with quiet and defiant dignity.

How much could a woman take in those dark, anguished days? At one time, Albertina had three of her children in jail with her husband over the anti-Apartheid struggle. 

Yet not once did her suffering diminish her attentiveness to the travails of others. Albertina Sisulu belongs to a breed of dying giants, the giants who liberated Africa of all its inhabitants.

She belongs to the giants who had fought to see the fall of Apartheid. Her selfless sacrifice can never be erased from the political history of South Africa. May her soul rest in perfect peace.