Stories from Quick Reads and Guinea-Bissau
Civil Society Resumes Watchdog for Guinea-Bissau's Presidential Run-Off
Getting set for Guinea-Bissau's presidential run-off on May 18, 2014, the Group of Civil Society Organizations for the Elections (GOSCE) resumed its monitoring activities of the electoral process on May 14. Live updates from the ground can be followed in the website bissauvote.com, which provides a map of reports that are being collected by a...
The Africanized Experience of Lisbon
The media and racial stereotypes [pt], through the perspective and experience of two specialists in the area of the study of race, both Afroportuguese, born in Lisbon, Portugal. is the topic of a new podcast. An interview with Grada Kilomba, academic of Santomean origin at the Humboldt University Berlin, translated into...
Understanding Human Rights in Portuguese-Speaking Countries
[All links lead to Portuguese language pages, except where otherwise stated] The Portuguese language version of the educational manual for human rights “Understanding Human Rights” is available online. The website provides the complete manual in pdf format or divided into chapters, as well as training material, bibliographical references and institutional information specifically aimed at...
Re-Imagining Lusophony and Decolonizing the Mind
The Fourth International Congress in Cultural Studies – Colonialisms, Post-colonialisms and Lusophonies has a call for paper submissions open until October 15, 2013 November 15, 2013 [deadline has been extended]: To demystify, to dehierarchize, to establish a policy of difference, to allow a multiplicity of voices, to constitute so many projects of possible modernities/rationalities...
Guinea Bissau's Parliament Rejects Amnesty for Coup Perpretrators
A law granting amnesty to those involved in the Guinea Bissau's April 2012 military coup was rejected by the national parliament on Tuesday, September 10, 2013. On the eve of the opening of the special session, the Guinean Human Rights League had repudiated the amnesty law proposed by the transition government in an open...
Guinea-Bissau Youth Calls for Peace
The Guinean movement Ação Cidadã (Citizen Action) [pt] released an open letter [pdf] on May 8 “from a youth who wants to have their place in their own land in peace, with the freedom and progress they are entitled.” The document calls for young Guineans to mobilize peacefully for peace, democracy...
Children Back in Guinea Bissau After Senegal Fire
The blog of the Association of Friends of Children (AMIC) reported [fr] that 20 ‘talib’ children from Guinea-Bissau who had been caught in a raging fire at an Islamic school in the capital of Senegal, Dakar, in early March, have now been handed back to their families. As Rising Voices reported back in...
Guinea-Bissau is Second Worst Democracy
The Democracy Index 2012 from The Economist Intelligence Unit, published on March 19, 2013, places Guinea-Bissau second to last in the ranking, just before North Korea. The same day a coalition of civil society organizations released a roadmap with concrete proposals for the restoration of constitutional order following the military...
New UN Envoy Blogs from Guinea-Bissau
Ex-President of East Timor, UN representative and Nobel Peace Prize winner José Ramos-Horta is blogging from Bissau, the capital of Guinea-Bissau. He writes of his warm reception by people at a marketplace. He republishes his posts on his Facebook page where they are widely commented on.
Hand-painted Ads in Guinea-Bissau
In Guinea-Bissau “there is a real market of experts on painting wall advertisements”, says landscape architect Manuel Bivar. In 2011, he shared a collection of photos featuring hand-painted ads from Guinean shops on the African contemporary culture website, Buala.
Three Portuguese Language States Ignore UN Convention Against Torture
Three Portuguese language countries are part of a short list of states which have not ratified the UN Convention against Torture: São Tomé and Príncipe, Angola and Guinea Bissau. Fábio Pereira, Communications Officer and Assistant Editor of Torture Journal, shares an open letter [pt, pdf] he has sent to the Portuguese Language...
Searching for Bissau-Guinean Journalist who Disappeared in Angola
Journalist and university professor Milocas Pereira, from Guinea-Bissau, disappeared from Luanda, Angola, where she lived, more than six months ago. Celina Spencer, President of Guinea-Bissau Community Association of Immigrants in the U.S.A, has recently launched a petition asking for assistance from the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in...
Guinea-Bissau: International Arrest Warrant Against Blogger
The most visible face of Guinea-Bissau's blogosphere, António Aly Silva, wrote [pt] that he is being accused of “the crime of incitement to war” and that an international arrest warrant was issued against him by the regime in power since the coup of April 2012. In an interview [pt] for...
Guinea-Bissau: More citizen frustration with turmoil
Buala blog shared a message circulating via email by Moema Parente Augel e Johannes Augel [Pt] raising international awareness about the “abusive and illegal regime” in Guinea-Bissau and what they deem to be an attempted counter-coup on October 21. IT specialist Gabriel Vaz also shared his dissatisfaction with turmoil in his...
Guinea-Bissau: Chinese Loggers near Buba River
The minutes of a youth and citizenship meeting held in October 2012 in Guinea-Bissau mentions [pt] the “massive logging of pau de sangue” woodtrees (Pterocarpus violaceus Vog.) by Chinese companies in the region. The post stresses the lack of information and “the silence of local and national authorities”. Novas da Guiné...
Africa: The Challenges of Building African Platforms
John Karanja discusses the challenges of building African platforms: What is an African platform? What does it look like? and perhaps more importantly what does it do? Will it address a Need or a Want? What exactly will make it African? Will it work elsewhere in the World?
Guinea-Bissau: Suspected Coup Leader Pansau N'Tchama Captured
Zenaida Machado posted on her twitter feed: “@zenaidamz: #GuineaBissau: Pansau N´Tchama, the man who allegedly plotted Sunday attack to army barracks which killed six, has been captured”
Guinea-Bissau: Six Killed in Attack to Military Base
An attack to a military base [pt] in Guinea-Bissau on the night of October 20, 2012, took the lives of at least six people. BBC journalist Zenaida Machado (@zenaidamz) informs on Twitter that the alleged mastermind of the attack is Captain N’Tchama, a member of the army elite unit who...
Guinea-Bissau: Impact of Tourism in the Bijagós Islands
Tourism doesn't always mean wealth and development for the Southern countries. The statement comes from a report [pt] on “Dynamics and impacts of the expansion of tourism in the Bijagós islands”, a protected sea area in Guinea Bissau. Cape Verdean blog Morabeza shares [pt] the study by CETRI (Centre Tricontinental)...
Nigeria: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala Declines WTO High Post
Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Nigeria's Finance and Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy is not interested in the World Trade Organisation (WTO) top job. Pascal Lamy will retire soon and there's been speculations that Okonjo-Iweala may seek to replace him.
Portuguese, a Global Language?
A community page on Facebook, Língua Portuguesa: Uma Língua Global? (Portuguese Language: A Global Language?) [pt], provides a diversity of materials to promote the debate about the expansion of Portuguese language and its consequences. Several critical issues on the policies of this language of around 200 million speakers are addressed,...
