Norway has failed to qualify for the World Cup in South Africa next year.

The players and the coach and many others had dreamt that they had a chance but that was not to be. The answer came yesterday and they now have to accept total defeat and stop dreaming anymore. They have to watch the games at home and those who bought tickets to travel thinking the team could qualify have to accept they have lost their money.

Norway has not qualified a number of times and those who were dreaming should have known that unless the team gets a qualified coach, qualified in the sense of modernity, they will not get anywhere.

The team and the coach may now rest and stop the dreams unless the team is totally given a overhaul and a new coach thinking modern is in place.

By Chief editor Korir/ API

ETHIOPIA: Maids, condoms and kerosene

Photo: WD/IRIN

Tsehay Tura learned how to protect herself from HIV after she was already infected

ADDIS ABABA,  – The life of a domestic worker in Ethiopia is rarely an easy one. Often escaping a deeply impoverished existence in the rural areas, these women find themselves in employment hundreds of miles away from their hometowns as maids – or serategnas in the national language, Amharic.

A lack of education, minimal opportunity for normal interaction with society and anecdotal evidence of sexual activity and abuse have led health workers to classify domestic workers as a high-risk group for the contraction of HIV. To begin to address this issue, a pilot project was recently completed by the Washington DC-headquartered social marketing organization, DKT-Ethiopia, and the French oil company, TOTAL.

Dubbed Condoms and Kerosene, the project involved setting up an HIV/AIDS awareness and demonstration site at the Lions’ TOTAL Station in Siddist Kilo, north of the capital, Addis Ababa, with the idea of reaching domestic workers at one of the few places they regularly visited outside work.

Hard-to-reach

Because of their closeted existence, “traditional methods of social marketing do not reach them on a consistent basis; they even do not watch TV programmes as they are too busy in the kitchen”, said Haileyesus Assefa, public affairs manager at TOTAL Ethiopia.

“As much of their income comes in-kind – in the form of food and shelter – they have little cash,” Haileyesus added. “One of the few purchases they make on a regular basis is kerosene.”

Over a 60-day period ending in June, DKT-Ethiopia marketers set up shop to demonstrate proper condom use and provide free prophylactics to domestic workers and anybody else who visited the Siddist Kilo fuel station.

One of the beneficiaries was 31-year-old Tsehay Tura, who works in a number of houses throughout the capital. HIV-positive and with two children, one of whom is also infected, Tsehay said she only became aware of the facts of HIV after she was infected. She says many domestic workers are equally ignorant when they arrive in Addis.

Low awareness, high risk

“Many are coming from rural areas and they do not have awareness; many are sexually active with guards and are also frequently raped by their masters or their master’s children,” she said.

“They go to night school and they might have affairs with their classmates,” added TOTAL’s Haileyesus.

The anecdotal evidence is that many domestic workers become sex workers

Another potential pitfall for domestic workers is commercial sex work, which they frequently enter into if they run into problems with their employers. While sometimes preferable, the terms of employment are nevertheless incredibly harsh, with a working day of 18 hours, a paltry monthly salary of between US$9 and $15, and one day off per month.

“The anecdotal evidence is that many domestic workers become sex workers… this is one of the exit paths for them,” said Ken Divelbess, project coordinator of DKT-Ethiopia. “There is very limited evidence about domestic workers in general; it could be 5 percent who become sex workers, it could be 90 percent.

“It is critical [to reach them] as we believe that the first month as a sex worker is the most dangerous, as that is when people can take advantage.”

Conducted with the support of the Ethiopian Business Coalition against HIV/AIDS, the World Bank Institute’s Rapid Results Institute and the local NGO, Timret Lehiwot (The Coalition for Life), the DKT-Ethiopia/TOTAL project reached more than 14,000 men and women and distributed approximately 35,000 condoms; its success has spawned discussions about conducting similar demonstrations across the city.

wd/kr/oa/mw source.irinnews.org

SWAZILAND: Ambitious target for male circumcision

Photo: UNAIDS

Male circumcision is being adopted in many African countries

MBABANE,  – Swaziland’s Ministry of Health and Human Services aims to provide circumcision to 80 percent of men aged 15 to 24 in the next five years, in response to the surging number of men requesting the procedure to reduce their risk of HIV.

Circumcision was widely practiced during the 19th century, but it fell out of favour until evidence in the past few years showed that circumcision could reduce a man’s risk of contracting HIV by more than half.

Swaziland has the highest HIV prevalence in the world – 26 percent of adults are infected according to UNAIDS – but health ministry studies have shown that men still reject condoms and engage in unsafe sexual practices such as having multiple partners.

Health officials are now encouraging the renewed popularity of male circumcision by devoting publicity and resources to making it more easily available. Around 1,000 men have already been circumcised at the Litsemba Letfu (SiSwati for “our hope”) Male Clinic in Matsapha, halfway between the capital, Mbabane, and the central commercial hub of Manzini.

The project is funded by the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and is the first medical facility specifically for men.

“Litsemba Letfu is more than a circumcision clinic; we offer the minimum package of male circumcision services, which includes HIV counselling and testing and the provision of condoms,” said Jessica Greene, technical services director of Population Services International (PSI), the non-profit organization that runs the clinic.

“We are in the process of integrating STI [sexually transmitted infections] treatment and have longer-term plans to integrate a broader range of men’s reproductive health services.”

At the official opening of the clinic last week, Health Minister Bennedict Xaba noted the misconception that circumcised cannot become infected with HIV.

“Male circumcision can reduce the risk to men of acquiring HIV from their sexual activity, but they must also know that it is not a magic bullet. Men who are circumcised, and their sexual partners, must continue to take additional HIV prevention measures,” he said.

Bongiwe Zwane, a communications officer at PSI Swaziland, cautioned that male circumcision was “a step forward”, not a solution, to Swaziland’s AIDS epidemic.

“We use the opportunity of men coming to the clinic to open their eyes to other ways they can protect themselves,” she said. “It is also new and good that men are talking to other men about this.”

The celebrity endorsement of Okwakhe Dlamini, the reigning Mr Swaziland, has also boosted efforts to promote male circumcision. Dlamini agreed to write a weekly diary of his experiences after undergoing the procedure for the Swazi News, a local newspaper, and has done spots for national radio and addressed students at tertiary education institutions.

“My phone has been ringing off the hook with even people I haven’t spoken to in ages wanting to find out what it’s like,” he told IRIN/PlusNews. “My loved ones, my parents, my siblings and my friends have been there every step of the way, encouraging me to share with my peers and other Swazi men. I want men to think about their future.”

Dlamini said women should also be informed about the benefits of male circumcision so they could encourage their partners, friends and male relatives to follow suit.

jh/ks/he source.irinnews.org

ZAMBIA: Court case reignites HIV testing debate

Photo: Kristy Siegfried/IRIN

Only 15 percent of Zambians have tested for HIV

LUSAKA,  – The human rights record of the Zambian military is being tested in court by two former air force officers who allege they were fired for being HIV positive.

Stanley Kingaipe and Charles Chookole claim they were tested and treated for HIV without their knowledge, and then discharged for being medically unfit a year later. They argue that their dismissal was based on their HIV status and are seeking reinstatement; they are also suing the military for damages to their mental and emotional health.

The air force has denied the claims, saying Kingaipe was discharged because he had cancer, and that Chookole had developed tuberculosis.

The case, which is being tried in the High Court in Livingstone, Zambia’s tourism capital, has reignited a debate about the validity of mandatory HIV testing in a country where 14 percent of the population of 11.7 million are HIV positive, but only 15 percent have ever been tested for HIV, according to the Ministry of Health.

Mandatory HIV screening is not legal in Zambia, but in an attempt to broaden the reach of voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) the government introduced a policy of provider-initiated testing in 2005, whereby patients visiting public health facilities for any medical condition would be routinely tested for HIV unless they expressly refused.

According to Health Minister Kapembwa Simbao there were still too few people who knew their status; much to the consternation of human rights and AIDS activists, she called for the introduction of compulsory testing in December 2008.

A local newspaper, The Post, reported Simbao as saying: “VCT has reached its peak, and we have to move and ensure that we compel everyone to have an HIV test. The people dying from this disease are innocent young children and very productive young men and women, leaving a country with no productive sector.”

Sam Kapembwa, of the Zambia National AIDS Network [ZNAN], an umbrella group for non-governmental HIV/AIDS organisations, disagreed. “We think that military staff should be tested for fitness, and not for HIV,” he told IRIN/PlusNews. “To test military personnel for HIV, let alone fire those who are [found to be] positive is unacceptable; it is promoting stigma and discrimination.”

The government has denied that the two military men were tested for HIV, but the ex-officers told the court they had blood tests in 2001 that they believed were part of routine check-ups, after which they were put on medication without being told what it was for. A year later a medical board declared them permanently unfit for service.

Both men later voluntarily tested for HIV and claimed it was only then that they discovered the medicines they had been taking were antiretroviral (ARV) drugs used to treat HIV.

The military is the largest civil-service sector in a country where only 500,000 formal jobs exist, but soldiers are also among the groups with the highest risk of HIV.

A senior police officer, who declined to be named, said routine medical check-ups were normal in the police service to ensure fitness, but an HIV test was not included. “Maybe in the recent past the thinking has started changing after seeing so many people dying of AIDS in the Service, and the cost implications to the country,” he commented.

Sam Kasankha, a spokesperson for the government’s Human Rights Commission, said his organisation was considering the debate on mandatory testing but had yet to come up with a final position.

“Personally, any mandatory testing is against the rights of an individual,” he noted. “Every human being is entitled to decide whether they are ready or not to know their [HIV] status; it should not be used as a basis for hiring or firing an individual.”

nm/ks/he

NIGERIA: Government steps in to curb farmer-nomad clashes

Photo: Aminu Abubakar/IRIN

Recurring violence: a man examines his burnt-down house following clashes in Bauchi state, February 2009 (file photo)

KANO,  – The national government has started marking out grazing reserves across Katsina and Bauchi states in northern Nigeria, as well as the capital Abuja, to curb often deadly clashes between farmers and nomads over pasture.

The three planned reserves, to serve about 15 million pastoralists, involve demarcating 175,000ha of grazing land, building veterinary service centres, and constructing settlements for nomads to use en route, at a cost of US$247 million, director of livestock and pest control in Nigeria’s Agriculture and Water Resources Ministry, Junaidu Maina, told IRIN.

The government is also demarcating a 1,400km livestock route from Sokoto state in the northwest to Oyo state in the southwest; and another 2,000km route from Adamawa state in the northeast to Calabar in the delta region, said Maina.

“The development of the grazing reserves and livestock routes has become imperative to avoid conflicts between pastoralists and farmers due to increased urbanization and rapid population growth,” Maina pointed out.

As pasture shrinks, disputes have increased, particularly in the north during the May to September rainy season, when herds invade farmland and eat crops.

Two days of fighting between farmers and nomads in June left three dead and a number of pastoralists’ settlements burned in Plateau state.

Maina said once built, the three grazing reserves would be managed by a team of pastoralists, conflict resolution committees and local government representatives.

Reasons for the clashes

In addition to population growth and continued felling of the forests for cooking fuel, northern nomadic communities are increasingly moving southwards as once-green pasture becomes desert, Kabiru Yammama, environmental consultant with Nigerian NGO Green Shield of Nations, told IRIN.

Just over a third of land that was cultivable 50 years ago is now desert across 11 of Nigeria’s northernmost states: Borno, Bauchi, Gombe, Adamawa, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Yobe, Zamfara, Sokoto and Kebbi, Yammama said.

Facts
	April 2009: Authorities expel 2,000 Fulani nomads from southern part of Plateau state to avoid conflict. This was linked to ethno-religious clashes in Jos in November 2008 between Muslims (most of the Fulani nomads) and Christians (most farmers) which killed 400.
	May 2009: Local authorities expelled 700 pastoralists from Borno state in the northeast to stop clashes between settling nomads and indigenous farmers. The nomads had travelled 1,000km eastwards from Zamfara state in search of grazing land.

The livelihoods of some 15 million pastoralists in northern Nigeria are threatened by decreasing access to water and pasture — shortages linked to climate change, according to Yammama.

Abubakar Sadiq, political science professor at Ahmadu Bello University, blamed traditional chiefs and local authorities, who control land allocation in rural areas, for the clashes, accusing them of allowing farmers to encroach on nomadic grazing land.

“Once the farmers paid some money the traditional and local authorities would allocate them some portion from the grazing field and gradually it was all eaten up,” Sadiq said.

Nigeria officially has 415 grazing reserves but only one-third are in use, while the remaining 270 have been built on or farmed, Maina said.

Muhammad Nuru, head of Fulani nomad union, the Plateau state branch of the Myetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, says the government’s move was positive. “We believe this will go a long way to resolve the nomad-farmer disputes. We are delighted with this government’s practical move.”

But some pastoralists say more has to be done to also protect existing livestock routes. “There is a need for northern state governments to complement this [federal government] effort by demarcating at least 18km of land for the cattle breeders as livestock routes,” Isa Abdullahi Jabe, secretary of Jigawa chapter of pastoralists union Myetti Allah, told IRIN.

When Jigawa state – long a focus of clashes – demarcated 20km of livestock routes several years ago, conflicts dropped from an average of 20 per year to three in 2009, according to Dahiru Mohammed, Jigawa state director livestock services.

Nomads from Nigeria, Niger, Benin, Cameroon and Senegal all now profit from Jigawa’s cattle routes, Mohammed said.

Farming issues

However, Sani Nanono, head of the Kano chapter of All farmers Association of Nigeria, told IRIN: “Such measures can only be sustained if farmers are also considered in the equation.

“The soil is degraded, seeds are low-yielding and farmers need large swaths of land to grow more. This is at the root of the grazing reserve encroachment.

“Farmers need to be provided with new farming techniques, high-yielding crop varieties and other farming tools and incentives to uplift them from the traditional subsistence farming to modern mechanized farming,” Nanono told IRIN.

aa/aj/mw source.irinnews.irg