Global Voices · Citizen media stories from September 2011

September, 2011

Monthly archive · 162 posts

Stories from September, 2011

4 September 2011

Zambia: Netizens Worried About Poll Violence Rhetoric

Written by Gershom Ndhlovu · Sub-Saharan Africa

Zambia goes to the polls on September 20 to elect a new president, members of parliament and local government representatives. The opportunity to discuss this important national event is not lost on netizens as they use the Internet to talk about the threat of violence, bribery and even just plain support of their political parties and candidates.

· read »

Angola: Videos from Repressed Youth Protest in Luanda

Written by Janet Gunter · Sub-Saharan Africa

On Saturday, September 3, 2011 a group of around 200 young people assembled in Luanda, Angola to protest lack of freedom and the 32-year reign of President José Eduardo dos Santos. According to witnesses, the protest ended with police beating a number of protesters.

· 7

· read »

African Women Striving to be Heads of State

Written by Lova Rakotomalala · Sub-Saharan Africa

Since Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf became President of Liberia in 2006, several other African women have decided to run for the continent's top level political jobs. The increase of female candidates is undoubtedly a step in the right direction; Lova Rakotomalala introduces some of the rising stars.

· 5

· read »

3 September 2011

Panama: Government Alliance Breaks

Written by Ariel Moreno · Translated by Nathan Jones · Latin America

Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli has removed Vice-President Juan Carlos Varela from his post as chancellor, causing a rift the alliance between the country's ruling parties. On Twitter the reactions came fast from interested netizens.

· 3

· read »

Libya: First Football Win as a Free Nation

Written by Amira Al Hussaini · Middle East & North Africa

Libya beat Mozambique 1-0 in the African Cup of Nations qualifier, its first victory since the fall of the Muammar Gaddafi regime. Twitter is buzzing with joy as Libyans taste their first win for a free Libya.

· read »

Kazakhstan: Bloggers Denounce Repeated Blockage of LiveJournal

Written by Sergey Park · Translated by Adil Nurmakov · Central Asia & Caucasus

On August 19, 2011, the largest Russophone blogging platform LiveJournal was blocked in Kazakhstan, less than a year after access to it was re-opened in fall of 2010. This intrusion of the state into virtual life, has stirred up the blogosphere.

· 2

· read »

Updates from September, 2011

20 September 2011

Honduras

“Competing stories have developed about what happened in the Bajo Aguan last Friday, when a combined military-police patrol alleges it was ambushed by foreign guerrillas at La Consentida plantation, near Sonaguera”, RNS summarizes these conflicting reports in Honduras Culture and Politics.

• Silvia Viñas

Mexico

The Triqui indigenous people of Mexico living in the United States as undocumented immigrants are easy targets for robberies and police questioning because they often don't speak Spanish or English –Ismael Flores in Vivir México [es] reports.

• Silvia Viñas

Colombia

Nazih Richani in Cuadernos Colombianos –a NACLA blog– has written two posts (1, 2) on Colombia's new methodology to calculate poverty: “The newly adopted Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) factors in health, housing, living standards, and government subsidies, alongside income. The problem is, regardless of the ‘methodological rigor,' there are many doubts over whether the new methodology actually captures the magnitude and scope of the problem.”

• Silvia Viñas

Trinidad & Tobago

Jamaican litblogger Geoffrey Philp is excited about “the second OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, which will reward the best Caribbean book published this year with a US$10,000 prize.”

• Janine Mendes-Franco

Cuba

Writing at Havana Times, Alfredo Fernandez suggests that “if it doesn’t allow free access to the Internet soon, Cuba will be a country of virtual illiterates in the next few years.”

• Janine Mendes-Franco

Curaçao

“Yesterday an IMF delegation presented their 2011 Article IV Consultation Discussions: Preliminary Conclusions with the usual rhetoric, cut, reform, kill mantra”: TRIUNFO DI SABLIKA posts a poem intended to show “that these programmed Washington DC economists are not gods.”

• Janine Mendes-Franco

Belize

“Belize’s founding father and first prime minister has died at the age of 92,” notes Repeating Islands; Life in a Banana Republic writes about her memories of the man, saying: “I shared a historical moment with the first Prime Minister of Belize with Rt. Hon. George Cadle Price, and I thank him for that wonderful lifetime memory.”

• Janine Mendes-Franco