Login to BlackFacts.com using your favorite Social Media Login. Click the appropriate button below and you will be redirected to your Social Media Website for confirmation and then back to Blackfacts.com once successful.
Enter the email address and password you used to join BlackFacts.com. If you cannot remember your login information, click the “Forgot Password” link to reset your password.
BY MIRIAM MANGWAYA THE Zimbabwe Human Rights Association (ZimRights) has filed an urgent chamber application at the High Court seeking an order to compel government to provide a COVID-19 national vaccination roll-out plan. In papers filed at the High Court, ZimRights, represented by Tendai Biti of the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, wants the government to present the budget for COVID-19 vaccine before Parliament. Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga who is the Health minister, Finance minister Mthuli Ncube and President Emmerson Mnangagwa were cited as respondents. ZimRights wants the government to provide the COVID-19 national vaccination deployment plan within seven days of the High Court order. In his founding affidavit filed at the courts, ZimRights national director Dzikamai Bere stated that section 29 of the Constitution obliges the government to take all practical measures to ensure the provision of basic accessible and adequate health services throughout Zimbabwe. In the face of a ravaging pandemic that has claimed lives of over two million people globally and over 1 200 in Zimbabwe, ZimRights is calling for government to act timeously and save lives from the pandemic. “Section 29(3), in particular, obliges the state to take all preventive measures within the limits of resources available to it, including education and public awareness programmes against the spread of diseases. Section 76 obliges the State to take reasonable legislative and other measures, within the limits of the resources available to it, to achieve the progressive realisation of the right to healthcare,” Bere said. He also urged government to take a cue from other countries and take the necessary steps and a human rights-centred approach to fight coronavirus. “We are simply asking the government to lead, and save lives.” ZimRights said. “We don’t understand how anyone can fail to agree with us given the far-reaching consequences of inaction.” The World Health Organisation is urging governments to avail factual information on COVID-19 to the public. In its efforts to combat the spread of the deadly virus, ZimRights provided urgent humanitarian support to marginalised communities and institutions reaching out to over 17 000 people and 26 institutions that include rural clinics, schools, quarantine centres and correctional facilities. Follow Miriam on Twitter@FloMangwaya
A November 26 letter from the presidency asked the head of Uganda's national drug authority to 'work out a mechanism' to clear the importation of the vaccines.
China has about five COVID-19 vaccine candidates at different levels of trials. It was not clear what vaccine was being imported into Uganda.
One of the frontrunners is the Sinopharm vaccine developed by the Beijing Institute of Biological Product, a unit of Sinopharm’s China National Biotec Group (CNBG).
On Wednesday, the United Arab Emirates said the vaccine has 86% efficacy, citing an interim analysis of late-stage clinical trials.
China has used the drug to vaccinate up to a million people under its emergency use program.
On Tuesday, Morocco said it was ordering up to 10 million doses of the vaccine.
Record cases
Uganda on Monday registered 701 new COVID-19 cases, the highest-ever daily increase, bringing its national count to 23,200.
The new cases were out of the 5,578 samples tested for the novel coronavirus over the past 24 hours, the country's health ministry said in a statement.
Tuesday's tally was 606, the second-highest ever number of new infections, bringing the cumulative number of confirmed cases in the east African country to 23,860.
Health authorities have blamed ongoing election campaigns which have drawn huge crowds for the rise in infections.
The Gauteng Health Department has been posting myth busters regarding the COVID-19 vaccine. Here’s to separating the truth from the tale.
SILAS NKALA/LORRAINE MUROMO Teacher unions have urged the government to suspend the remaining examinations to save lives as cases of COVID-19 continue to skyrocket, necessitating the imposition of stringent lockdown measures at the weekend. Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga on Saturday suspended the reopening of schools, but allowed examination classes to go back to school to complete their examinations, as he introduced a raft of new measures that include closure of formal and informal business that are not essential service providers. Chiwenga also introduced a dusk to dawn curfew for the next 30 days to try to arrest the spiralling cases of COVID-19. Government announced that only pupils writing examinations would be at school today to complete their examinations, while the rest of the learners would open at a date yet to be announced. But the Progressive Teachers Union (PTUZ) and the Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (Artuz) said government should consider completely closing the schools to avoid exposing pupils and teachers to the virus. PTUZ president Takavafira Zhou said the whole examination process should be suspended to save lives. “We urge the ministry to postpone the writing of exams in light of the quantum leap of COVID-19 cases in the country. “It is important to prioritise the health and safety of students, teachers and ancillary staff,” Zhou said yesterday. Earlier on, PTUZ secretary-general Raymond Majongwe through the union’s official Twitter account said teachers and learners should only go back to school if government made a commitment to pay invigilation allowances as well as test for COVID-19 before anyone enters the examination room. “We have only two conditions for invigilating the second phase of exams. “Zimsec must pay for the invigilation, candidates and teachers must get tested for COVID-19, all of them before exams start,” Majongwe said. In a statement the Artuz urged its members not to report for duty on Monday 4 January 2021 until COVID-19 is under control. “The sharp increase in COVID-19 deaths in the last few days is a signal to defer opening of schools and Zimsec public examinations. “Opening of schools for exam classes under the current situation will be equivalent to first degree murder by the responsible authorities,” the teacher union said in a statement. “We are witnessing high profile people succumbing to COVID-19, a majority of them were admitted to private elite hospitals with better healthcare equipment as compared to public hospitals. “This alone shows that teachers, economically disadvantaged students and low-class citizens are more trapped to death once infected.” Artuz added: “Regardless of the COVID-19, teachers are highly incapacitated to report for duty.”
BY SILAS NKALA THE Environment Management Agency (EMA) in Bulawayo has been petitioned by a human rights organisation, Matabeleland Institute for Human Rights (MIHR) to release its charges against the Bulawayo City Council for failing to repair burst sewerage pipes and collect refuse. The petition, dated January 14, addressed to EMA Bulawayo manager, Sithembisiwe Ndlovu came in after council blames fuel shortages to its failure to collect refuse. “As MIHR, a stakeholder in human rights issues in the country, we request EMA to make available to the public, the actual practical measures it has taken to hold BCC accountable and ultimately protect Bulawayo residents from environmental rights violations due to poor sewage and refuse management currently happening in the city,” MIHR co-ordinator, Khumbulani Maphosa wrote. “Our request for this information was grounded on the realisation that there was increased raw sewage spillage and illegal litter dumping which is attributable to poor environmental management by the BCC. BCC councillors have also acknowledged that.” Maphosa said ward 4 councillor Silas Chigora also testified that the local authority has been inconsistent in collecting refuse sometimes going for two months without doing so, thus contributing to illegal litter dumping. “The presence of unattended overflowing sewage and uncollected litter all over the city is a violation of fundamental human rights and freedoms, especially environmental rights as enshrined in section 73 of the Constitution read together with section 51 (right to human dignity),” Maphosa said. “BCC is legally mandated and obliged to ensure proper management of sewerage and the timely collection of litter. The local authority also has the mandate to enforce by-laws for the avoidance of pollution through indiscriminate littering. “EMA has among its functions the duty to assist and participate in any matter pertaining to the management of the environment, to regulate and monitor the collection, disposal, treatment and recycling of waste, and to regulate and monitor the discharge or emission of any pollutant or hazardous substance into the environment (section 10(1)(b)(i) of the Environmental Management Act [Chapter 20:27).' The human rights group believes that it has a responsibility to request and subsequently be given this information as section 4(1)(b) of the EMA Act accords them the “right to access to environmental information….” “Section 62(1) of the Constitution accords us ‘the right to access any information held by the State or by any institution or agency of government at every level, in as far as the information is required in the interest of public accountability’,” he said. “Therefore, we ask for this information. Since the problem of indiscriminate overflow of raw sewage and litter dumping has been worsening over the past 8 months. We request this information to be provided to the public between now and January 22. This is also because of the emergency nature of the issue as it is of public interest, especially during this COVID-1
The cash-strapped Council for Medical Schemes, the medical schemes regulator in South Africa, spent R11.3m on a high profile probe into allegations of racial profiling by medical schemes, a Business Day report said in November.
LAWYERS ACTING on behalf of Shukri Abdi are set to pursue an unlawful killing verdict...
The post Shukri Abdi: Why lawyers are suing the police for failing to do a full investigation appeared first on Voice Online.
Dorothy Height was born on this day.
For nearly half a century, Dorothy Irene Height has given leadership to the struggle for equality and human rights for all people. Her life exemplifies her passionate commitment for a just society and her vision of a better world. - National Council of Negro Women
Education:
1929 - Graduated Rankin High School, Rank PA (Valedictorian)
1932 - BA New York University, New York City
1933 - Master in Educational Psychology - New York University
New York School of Social Work - Columbia University (Advance studies)
Honorary Degrees:
1967- Doctor of Humane Letters, Tuskegee Institute
1970- Doctor of Humane Letters, Coppin State College
1970- Doctor of Humane Letters, Harvard University
1970- Doctor of Civil Law, Pace University
1974- Board of Humane Letters, University of Massachusetts
1975- Doctor of Humane Letters, Howard University
1975- Doctor of Humane Letters, Smith University
1975- Doctor of Humane Letters, New York University
1977- Doctor of Humane Letters, Bethune Cookman College
1980- Distinguished Service Medal, Barnard College
1981- Doctor of Humane Letters, Spelman College
1982- Doctor of Humane Letters, Emmanuel College
1982 Doctor of Humane Letters, Berea College
1983-Doctor of Humane Letters, Bowie State College
1985- Doctor of Humane Letters, Smith College
1989- Doctor of Humane Letters, College of the City of New York
1989- Doctor of Humane Letters, Lincoln University
1990- Doctor of Laws, Princeton University
1992- Doctor of Humane Letters, Central State University
1993- Doctor of Humane Letters, Tougaloo College
1994- Doctor of Humane Letters, Bennett College
1996- Doctor of Humane Letters, University of the District of Columbia
Degree information provided by the National Council of Negro Women
[Zimbabwe Independent] ZIMBABWE, like the rest aof the world, is battling second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. The country's health facilities are inadequate and ill-equipped to deal with the surging numbers across the country.
BY HARRIET CHIKANDIWA PROSECUTOR Tapiwa Kasema (45), who is facing allegations of criminal abuse of office, will spend another night in custody after Harare Magistrate Ngoni Nduna set his bail ruling for Wednesday. Kasema was arrested for consenting to bail in a case involving four armed serial robbers. He works at the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) as a principal law officer. It is alleged that on August 24, armed robbers Musa Taj Abdul, Tapiwa Rudolf, Godfrey Mupanhanga and accomplices were arrested in Beitbridge over a spate of murders and armed robbery cases committed in and around Zimbabwe. On August 25, they were taken to court facing 53 counts of armed robbery, where they were denied bail and remanded in custody. Sometime this month, Abdul applied for bail and the NPA assigned Kasema together with two other officers to oppose the application. On December 8, Kasema allegedly consented to the granting of bail without following laid down procedures. The court heard that the offence came to light after the CID Homicide queried the release of the accused on bail by the High Court on December 11, 2020, and it came out that Kasema had unlawfully consented to the release of the applicants. A report was then made to the police leading to the arrest of Kasema. He will spend another night in custody after Nduna postponed the hearing to tomorrow.
[New Times] The National Commission for Human Rights (NCHR) has joined hands with other institutions to celebrate the 72nd anniversary of Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
by Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent Comedian Bill Cosby and his supporters expressed confidence after his lawyer presented oral arguments to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Tuesday, December 1. Attorney Jennifer Bonjean appeared to score multiple points with the seven justices. She skillfully pointed out that Cosby had agreed to waive his … Continued
The post Cosby’s attorney appears to score points in Supreme Court argument appeared first on New Pittsburgh Courier.
While promotion of senior members of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) have been put on a hold, 296 junior ranks have been promoted.
The article 296 junior police ranks promoted appeared first on Stabroek News.
Norman B. Rice was born in Denver, Colorado. He migrated to Seattle in 1970 to attend college. In 1972 he earned a bachelor’s degree in communications and two years later a master’s degree in public administration both from the University of Washington.
Rice then worked as a television news reporter on Seattle’s KOMO-TV and KIXI radio. Following his media stint, he held a series of administrative positions. Rice served as assistant director of the Seattle Urban League, Executive Assistant and Director of Government Services for the Puget Sound Council of Governments, and Manager of Corporate Contributions and Social Policy at Rainier National Bank.
Norm Rice’s political career began in 1978 when Seattle residents elected him to fill a vacancy on the City Council. He was reelected to the Council in 1979, 1983 and 1987. Rice ran for mayor in 1985 but lost to incumbent Charles Royer, another former journalist. In 1988 he ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic Party nomination for the 7th District, losing to former Washington state senator Jim McDermott.
During his 11 years on the council, Rice chaired the Energy, and Finance and Budget, committees, and also served a term as Council President. As a member of the Finance and Budget Committee, he worked for more equitable utility rates by Seattle City Light, the city owned utility, lobbied for the passage of the Women and Minority Business Enterprise Ordinance, and called for Seattle companies to end their investments in apartheid-dominated South Africa. Rice also worked to lower crime in Seattle and supported the use of city funds to help impoverished Seattle residents.
On July 28, 1989, Rice filed his candidacy for mayor of Seattle and three months later on November 7 defeated city attorney Doug Jewett by 99,699 votes to 75,446 to become Seattle’s 49th mayor. He was also the first African American mayor of Seattle. Rice was elected to a second term in 1993.
During his tenure as mayor, Rice streamlined the Seattle Public School system, promoted human
One of the leading figures of the Civil Rights Movement which took place in the 1950s and 1960s, Ella Baker, was born in Virginia in 1903. Growing up in North Carolina, Baker had a close relationship with her grandmother, a former slave, and heard narrations of many of the experiences which the latter lived through.
Baker was an intelligent child and attended Shaw University in Raleigh, becoming the valedictorian for the batch of 1927. Upon graduating, she relocated to New York City where she juggled between various jobs to fulfill her basic needs. Before she became involved in Civil Rights Movement, Baker contributed to the start-up of a club, Young Negroes’ Cooperative League, which permitted its members to accumulate their funds in order to benefit from better deals on goods and services. In the preceding years, she also served on the editorial boards of American West Indian News and Negro National News.
Beginning work for the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) in 1938, Baker frequently travelled to various parts of the country in order to raise funds and recruit new people to the NAACP. Initially starting off as a field secretary, Baker was promoted to the organization’s national director of branches for her extensive work in issues related to job training and equal pay for black workers. Realizing the demanding nature of the job, Baker resigned in 1946 to look after her niece but continued work with the New York branch for better academic prospects of black children.
In 1953, Ella Baker ran for New York City Council on the Liberal Party ticket. Following this failure, the independent individual worked as Director of the Harlem Division of the New York City Committee of the American Cancer Society.
Four years later, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. asked Baker to take up the position of Executive Director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), a civil rights group headed by African Americans, to which she agreed. It was Baker who initiated the creation of the
President Donald Trump and his allies say their lawsuits aimed at subverting the 2020 election and reversing his loss to Joe Biden would be substantiated, if only judges were allowed to hear the cases. There is a central flaw in the argument. Judges have heard the cases and have been among the harshest critics of the legal arguments put forth […]
[AI London] Electric vehicles considered essential to tackle climate change but batteries pose serious risks to human rights and environment
THE trial of MDC Alliance activists Netsai Marova and Cecilia Chimbiri failed to kick-off yesterday after they requested for a stay of trial pending a High Court determination on their application to challenge separation of trial. By MIRIAM MANGWAYA Chimbiri and Marova were jointly charged with Harare West MP Joanah Mamombe on allegations of faking abduction. But last month, the State successfully applied for separation of trial of the two from Mamombe, who has a mental ailment. Magistrate Bianca Makwande ruled that Mamombe should be separated from her co-accused since the doctors’ reports on her mental health status were not specific about the date that she would be fit to stand trial. The trio, through its lawyers Alec Muchadehama and Jeremiah Bhamu, filed an application for review of Makwande’s ruling at the High Court. The matter was postponed to December 17, 2020 for possible trial, if the High Court determination on their application would be out on that day. The State, led by prosecutor Amos Reza, however, submitted before the court that if Marova and Chimbiri were to be tried separately, Mamombe should not follow their proceedings. l Follow Miriam on Twitter @FloMangwaya
JUSTICE Minister Delroy Chuck yesterday charged newly appointed Court of Appeal President Justice Patrick Brooks to ensure a timely reduction in the number of backlogged cases at the high court, stressing that the issue has persisted for too long.Justice Brooks replaces Justice Dennis Morrison, who retired on December 4, having served four years in the post.
Press Release - The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and the World Health Organisation, as co-leads of the COVAX initiative for equitable global access to COVID-19 vaccines, alongside key delivery partner UNICEF, are pleased to publish COVAX’s first interim distribution forecast.
Gwendolynne Moore is the first African American member of Congress from Wisconsin where she represents the state’s Fourth Congressional District. Moore, a community leader and lifelong civil rights and human rights advocate, is the first woman to represent the Fourth Congressional District. She is only the second woman to be elected to Congress from Wisconsin.
Gwen Moore was born April 18, 1951 in Racine, Wisconsin and raised in Milwaukee. She is the eighth of nine children born to a factory worker father and a public school teacher mother. Moore graduated from North Division High School before attending college at Marquette University. Although she was a teenage mother who went on and off welfare, Moore earned her Bachelor of Arts in political science from Marquette in 1973.
After college, Moore became a housing activist and community leader. She has worked for the city of Milwaukee as a city development specialist and was an organizer with Volunteers in Service to America. Moore has emphasized a desire to increase and improve the quality of housing and communities in Milwaukee. She helped establish a community credit union to assist low-income residents in purchasing homes.
In 1989 Moore was elected to the Wisconsin State Assembly. Four years later she became a member of the Wisconsin State Senate, serving until 2003.
In 2004 Moore ran for the Fourth District Congressional Seat. She was elected and took office on January 4, 2005. Moore serves on the House Committee on Small Business and the House Committee on Financial Services. During her first term in office Moore was a co-sponsor of the SHIELD Act which helps protect victims of domestic abuse from the possibility of pursuit by their attackers. She co-sponsored legislation to oppose predatory lending and has called for the removal of troops from Iraq. Moore has also pushed for expanded Medicaid assistance and introduced legislation which provided support for small businesses.
During her second term beginning in 2007, Moore was appointed to the
[This Day] In the wake of the recent actions of nation state actors and associated groups in many African countries to subvert civil and digital rights of their citizens, Paradigm Initiative, a pan-African social enterprise working to advance digital rights and inclusion in Africa, has released a short film entitled Training Day as a vehicle to seed major take outs from it's 2019 Digital Rights in Africa Report.
Kofi Atta Annan, born on 8 April 1938 in Kumasi, Ghana, served as the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) between 1997 and 2007. As a young man, Annan finished his undergraduate studies in economics at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1961. He then completed his graduate level work, also in economics, at the Institut universitaire des hautes études internationales in Geneva, Switzerland from 1961 to 1962. Annan returned to the United States, and earned a Master of Science degree in management in 1972 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Annan fluently speaks French, English, and a number of African languages.
Kofi Annan joined the United Nations in 1962 when he went to work for the World Health Organization. Since then he has been involved with the United Nations in a number of different branches, including the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the UN Emergency Force in Ismailia. Annan was assigned to UN Headquarters in New York where he worked with issues ranging from human resources management to peacekeeping.
On January 1, 1997, Kofi Annan became the Secretary-General of the United Nations. He served a second five year term beginning in 2002. Annan is the first Secretary-General to have been appointed from a UN staff position. In 2005, he helped establish two new bodies within the UN; the Peacebuilding Commission and the Human Rights Council. His involvement with peacekeeping is vast, as he has played key roles in a number of international negotiations. In 1996, he facilitated negotiations with Baghdad, Iraq in regards to their oil sales as funding humanitarian relief. In 1999, he played an important role in helping ease tensions between Libya and the UN Security Council, During the same period he also persuaded the international community to focus on the violence that was occurring in East Timor. Two years later, in 2000, he helped facilitate Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon.
Annans years at the UN have focused on creating relationships
An Eco-Friendly Manufacturing Plant is Turning Plastic into Bricks
After Kenya imposed a ground-breaking law in 2017 on the use, manufacturing and import of plastic bags as part of global efforts to limit plastic waste, four engineers in Nairobi saw an opportunity in the estimated 500 tonnes of plastic waste the city generates daily and founded Gjenge Makers — a company that recycles plastic bottle tops and cooking oil containers into environmentally friendly bricks. Nzambi Matee, a co-founder of Gjenge Makers, explains how it came about.
\"So we started by collecting plastic waste and selling it to recyclers. That was in 2017, and then we realised three to six months later that we were collecting more waste than we could sell, than the recyclers could absorb. So that's when we decided what more we could do with the remaining plastic, as a value-added aspect, to see if we could put a product on the market using the plastic waste, and that's how we started making the paving stones\".
Grey pavers sell for around 8 euros per square meter, while coloured pavers sell for around 10 euros.
Matee describes the logic behind the ecologically-sound operation, \" Once the manufacturers package the soft drinks, or whatever product they are packaging, once the consumer finishes with that product, they have nowhere else to take it other than the litter box. And so, with that, we decided why don't we create a plug where instead of having the plastic to go the dumpsite, we intercept it on the way, and hence we started the making business.\"
The waste is then crushed into small pellets, sorted according to colour, mixed with sand and the desired colour pigment — before being taken onto the production line where they are moulded and put into a hydraulic press.
Ann Muthoni, the Programme Coordinator at Mukuru Slums Development Projects, shares some inside information, \"We had used the ballast before, but most of the trainees were complaining the ballast was damaging their shoes, so the Gjenge pavers, we find them very friendly. Walking on them feels like you are walking on rubber*
Gjenge Makers can currently produce up to 1,500 bricks a day with homeowners and schools as clients.
The West Dumping Plastic Waste in Africa
Although many African countries are making an effort to overcome the pressing issue of plastic waste, their efforts are often thwarted — as many countries in the Western world have used many nations in Africa as their plastic waste dumîng ground.
In April, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) - whose members include Shell, Exxon, Total, DuPont and Dow, companies already guilty of polluting many rivers in Africa via oil drilling and oil spills, proposed investments in recycling in Kenya with a catch.
The recycling investment deal is one only provided that the recipient country accepts US plastic waste i.e. Kenya would get about 500 million tonnes of plastic waste exports from the US per year.
Plastic But Not a Superficial Issue
According to a 2018 United Nations (UN) report, an esti
