Nairobi, Kenya | AFP | Kenya Police and revenue authority KRA officers on Wednesday morning raided the headquarters of the Africa Centre for Open Governance (AfriCOG), a day after the interior ministry’s NGO Board ordered the shut down of the NGO. KRA and Police officers argued for hours with lawyers …
Read More »Kenya seeks to shut down two rights bodies in wake of election
Nairobi, Kenya | AFP | The Kenyan government has moved to shut down two rights organisations, one of which said Tuesday that it was contemplating court action over last week’s disputed presidential election. Kenyan Human Rights Commission (KHRC) board member Maina Kiai said it was “no secret” the organisation had …
Read More »Six Red Cross workers killed in Central African Republic
Libreville, Gabon | AFP | Six Red Cross workers were killed last week amid violent clashes in southern Central African Republic, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Wednesday in an updated toll. The bloodshed occurred last Thursday at a health centre in Gambo, 70 kilometres (45 miles) …
Read More »Four killed in latest roadside bomb in Kenya
Nairobi, Kenya | AFP | Four people, including three NGO workers, were killed Tuesday when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in eastern Kenya, a local government official said, in the latest such attack in the country. “We have four people dead from the incident that occurred between Dadaab and …
Read More »PROFILE: Esther Kalenzi’s passion to help
Esther Kalenzi is the founder of Forty Days over Forty Smiles Foundation, a local NGO that helps the needy; especially children and youth. Helping the needy is a passion she first exhibited as a student at Aga Khan High School in Kampala when she raised funds from fellow students to …
Read More »PROFILE: Beverly Nambozo hungers for poetry
Beverly Nambozo Nsengiyunva is an inspiration to herself. She is the brain behind Beverly Nambozo Poetry Award. At only ten years, Nambozo was a bibliophile consuming books like food. Even when her mother pushed her to sleep she would read under the covers late into the night. Born in Kampala …
Read More »Kigali enforces ban on business offices in residential premises
The office space business in the Rwandan capital Kigali is undergoing remarkable innovations as people dash to beat a March 2017 deadline to vacate offices from residential premises. The directive announced in early January gave businesses and Non-Government Organisations operating in residential premises a three months ultimatum to vacate. City …
Read More »Uganda one of 10 countries hosting half world’s refugees
London, United Kingdom | AFP | Ten countries accounting for 2.5 percent of world GDP are hosting more than half the world’s refugees, Amnesty International said Tuesday as it slammed what it called the selfishness of wealthy nations. In a report on the plight faced by the world’s 21 million …
Read More »Egypt freezes assets of human rights defenders, NGOs
Cairo, Egypt | AFP | An Egyptian court froze assets of five prominent human rights defenders and three non-governmental organisations on Saturday, provoking fears of an intensified crackdown on civil society. They had been under renewed investigation for allegedly receiving foreign funds in a case that stretches back to 2011 …
Read More »Cutting bank costs can be great for NGOs
COMMENT: By Milly Kyolaba One of the biggest challenges Non Profit Organisations (NGOs) and development agencies operating in countries like Uganda face is getting the balance right between managing their budgets administrative and overhead costs versus the amount of money they actually use to support the intended beneficiaries. Critics often …
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