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Views and news on peace,
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October 1997


CONTENTS






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Editorial

We are happy to inform our readers of AFRICANEWS recent association with two publication: the Agency DIA and African Woman and Child features.

DIA (Documentation et Informations Africaines) is a Catholic Press agency, the only one in Africa, determined to recapture the glory of its past. Based in Kinshasa, founded in 1957 and owned by the Episcopal Catholic Conference of Congo, DIA was managed for 25 years by the Scheut Fathers and since 1983 by the Jesuits.

In 40 years of existence, DIA has contributed to making known to the world the cultural, ecclesial, political reality of Africa and in particular of the Congo. Its policy is for the promotion of justice, and the conscientisation of the African people towards the building of a more human and democratic society, in a perspective that is specifically Christian.

Africa Women and Child Feature Service, born a few years ago in Nairobi by the initiative of some long standing friends of AFRICANEWS staff, is a service of news and analyses on women and children. The features are written from a progressive perspective by trained and experienced African women journalists.

AWC Features was born out of the realization that people's empowerment through communication plays an important role in the process of economic and political change of a society.

Features give special attention to areas of hardship such as war zones and rural or remote communities. As far as possible, AWC Features strive to maintain editorial independence and professional integrity.

Selected news and articles from DIA and AWC Features will from now on form an integral part of the WEB edition of Africanews. The articles will be offered to our readers in their original languages, French for DIA and English for AWC Feature. The cost of printing makes it impossible, at least for the time being, to offer them in our hard-copy edition.

This association, which ensures that our readers get information by other professional African sources, will probably develop into something more structured. We hope other information agencies will join us in offering the world a balanced view of African life. It is in this spirit that readers are also requested to communicate with us on what is going on in their neighbourhood.

In this issue, our first article by Noel Bruyns spotlights the role of South Africa's Churches during apartheid. Three mainline Churches - the Catholic, the Anglican and the Salvation Army - have admitted that their acts of omission during the dark days of white supremacist rule in South Africa contributed significantly towards propping up the regime.

Read about their confessions to the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The overthrow of Mobutu Sese Seko in former Zaire at the middle of this year has been seen as the beginning of the waning of France's influence in Africa. In our second article, correspondent James Brew, examines the complex play of factors that is responsible for France's dwindling fortunes in the continent.

Boro Klan's book review brings to mind that eternal classic by Walter Rodney, "How Europe Underdeveloped Africa". Klan reviews C. Warren Hollister's book - "Medieval Europe" in which he examines the impact of geography - in this case the Sahara Desert in Africa's underdevelopment.

Patrick Mawaya from Malawi cautions that ethnic tensions are building up to dangerous levels in that country and warns that something should be done - and fast.

Patrick Chapita brings us the story of how albinos in southern Africa are unable to secure employment because employers say they are a turn-off to customers. Here then is a case where someone's genetic misfortune is used as the basis of judging his worth in the workplace. Find out also in that story how a unique organisation is trying to create awareness on the plight of albinos in southern Africa.

And read some more...

Africanews staff


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USAGE/ACKNOWLED
Contents can be freely reproduced with acknowledgements. The by-line should read: author/AFRICANEWS.
Send a copy of the reproduced article to AFRICANEWS.

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