Kwami Ahiabenu,II Knowledge Chief

RWI Accepting Applications for Media Training Program-OIL AND GAS

2012-02-05T09:33:00.000-08:00

This May, in Kampala, Uganda, Revenue Watch will begin our third class for African journalists seeking new expertise in reporting on oil, gas and minerals.

Without an informed, responsive media community providing oversight of the money from these industries, governance weakens, corruption rises and citizens lack the knowledge to hold their governments accountable and the opportunity to benefit fully from their country's natural resource wealth.

The application process is open to journalists from Ghana and Uganda. The program is designed for individuals with a demonstrated interest in reporting about the extractive sectors of oil, gas and minerals. To fill out an application now, go to:www.revenuewatch.org/mediatraining2012.

This latest class in our ongoing media training program is conducted in partnership with the African Centre for Media Excellence (ACME) in Uganda, Ghana-based Penplusbytes and the Thomson Reuters Foundation. After the initial Uganda session from 14-23 May, two parallel workshops will be held, one for Ugandan participants in Kampala on 20-29 August, and one for the Ghanaians on 3-12 September in Accra.

RWI and our partners take a holistic approach to our journalist trainings, combining workshops, roundtable discussions and field trips with expert dialogues, mentorships, reporting grants and presentations on topical issues.

The most recent training included a study trip to Cameroon, where Ghanaian journalists met with their counterparts in local media, as well as civil society activists, company executives and government officials in the oil, gas and mining sector in the commercial capital of Douala. In December, three of our Ugandan trainees were recognized for their reporting on extractives with awards from ACME, a leader in journalistic expertise and a partner in the RWI program.

Applications for the upcoming class will be accepted through 29 February, 2012.

http://www.revenuewatch.org/news/rwi-accepting-applications-media-training-program

Lecturer rates Ghana’s oil high

2011-12-04T22:37:00.000-08:00

A LECTURER at the Department of the Chemical and Petroleum Engineering at the College of the Engineering of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) has acknowledged the huge potentials of Ghana’s oil find.

Dr. Stephen Kudom Donyinah says the quality of Ghana’s oil is unique and, therefore, Ghana cannot fail with the discovery.
He was sharing his views on Ghana’s budding oil and gas industry at the launch of the “Strengthening Media Oversight of the Extractive Sectors Pilot program” in Kumasi, under the Oil and Gas Project of the Penplusbytes (International Institute for ICT Journalism), in conjunction with Revenue Watch Institute, to increase media coverage of the oil related issues.

The pilot programme aims at promoting good governance and an effective oversight of the oil, gas and mining (extractive) resources and revenues, and ensuring a knowledgeable and active media which is critical to having an informed and engaged public, civil society and parliament that can hold government to account.
The editors discussed the latest development in the oil and gas industry, the role of Civil Society Organizations in the oil & gas sector, status of legislation, policies and regulations at the meeting.

Dr. Donyinah said the oil find had come at the right time, and urged Ghanaian authorities to cash in on this single find and encourage the local content aspect of the industry. He noted that growth of the Industry calls for training of the youth and recommended the proper management of the human resources to enhance the local content component of the industry in order to meet international standards.
The Chemical and Petroleum Engineering lecturer also called on local business entities to pull resources together to acquire oil blocks from the Ghana National Petroleum Company (GNPC) for management by locals for accelerated investment.
Dr. Donyinah announced that the Tullow Oil has offered scholarships for 50 students of his outfit, to be trained and help in the oil and gas industry, for the needed expertise to fill the existing gap.
Mr. Emmanuel Kuyole, the Africa Regional Coordinator of Revenue Watch Institute (RWI), a non-profit policy institute which promotes the effective, transparent and accountable management of oil, gas and mineral resources for the public good through capacity building, technical assistance, research and advocacy, in his keynote address said the oil industry was an opportunity to correct the imbalances of the first extractive resources.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

The RWI Co-ordinator hoped structures would be put in place to regulate the industry for effective operations and impact on the local people.
Mr. Kwami Ahiabenu, President of Penplusbytes indicated that the pilot project aims at exposing journalists to the oil and gas Industry by equipping them with knowledge and skills to report effectively on the oil and gas industry.
He disclosed that 15 journalists have been trained to meet this requirement and that the next batches of participants are expected to enroll in a course in May 2012.

http://ghanaian-chronicle.com/business-news/lecturer-rates-ghana’s-oil-high/

Future Journalists gather for Ghana's first online journalism boot camp

2011-10-17T09:39:00.000-07:00

Future journalists will gather at the Accra International Press Centre on 21st October, 2011 for the first Boot Camp on online Journalism under the theme "Enhancing your Future as a Journalist through Online Journalism"

Keynote address for the occasion will be delivered by Ethan Zuckerman, Director of the MIT Center for Civic Media, USA and board member of Penplusbytes and Dr. Kwabena Riverson, board chair of Penplusbytes, will deliver welcome address with Kenneth Ashigbey managing Director of Daily Graphic Company serving as chair for this important boot camp.

The Boot Camp is aimed at providing learning and knowledge exchange opportunities in online journalism topics such as. ; online News Publishing and Online tools for gathering news, revenue models for online news, modern trends in broadcast technologies and social media and journalism.

The International Institute for ICT Journalism (Penplusbytes) working with Ghana Journalists Association(GJA) is organizing this boot camp with support from Raycom Technologies, IPMC and Main One Cable.

The highlight of the event will be the launch of Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) Social networking platform www.gjaghana.org. The platform is intended to provide members of the association with opportunities to effectively explore the inherent benefits of social networking tools as they interact and connect with the general public. It has become necessary that today's journalists harness the presence of these social network tools in the creation and dissemination of news content. According to Mr. Bright Blewu, Secretary-General of Ghana Journalists Association "the face of journalism is changing rapidly due to the advent of new technologies bringing with it challenges and opportunities and as an association we are committed to support our members to take advantage of new media in order for them to serve their audiences better while at the same time maintaining the highest professional ethics."

The one-day media boot camp, will offer a practical, in-depth and hands-on application of new media in the newsroom and forms part of Penplusbytes 10th anniversary celebrations. Kwami Ahiabenu, II President of Penplusbytes noted that, "As we celebrate 10 years of empowering the media through the use of ICTs to advance quality journalism we are excited to provide a unique opportunity to future journalists to help them navigate the new media world as they grow as journalists in our new information age".

Other presenters at the boot camp will include; Isaac Yeboah of myjoyonline.com Chris Donkor of Dot house, Kent Mensah of Citifmonline, Nana Kwabena of Edge cube and Prince Asare of Viasat 1.The rest are Alex Adjei Bram of SMSGH, John Totoe of Mobile Content, Isaac Maafo of Bulksmsghana, Kofi Amamoo of Expresso, Charity Donkor of MTN and Prof Linus Abraham (Rector) of NAFTI

Participating schools will include, African University College of Communication, Ghana Institute of Journalism, School of Communication Studies, Christian Service University, Kumasi, NAFTI and Jayee College.

Editor's Note

Penplusbytes

International Institute of ICT Journalism (Penplusbytes) is an organization that seeks to empower the media through the use of ICTs to advance quality journalism. It consists of a network of media organizations and journalists interested in using ICTs effectively to advance the course of journalism. We have trained over 500 journalists from various parts of Africa and across the globe in cutting edge new media technologies and contemporary ICT issues.

GJA

Created in 1984, the Ghana Journalists Association is a professional association for Ghanaian journalists. The Association's purpose is to improve the standard of professional practice in the press, encourage the growth of the mass media, and protect freedom of expression. The Association is a membership organization of journalists with a National Executive elected by the members

Boot camp : Enhancing your future as a Journalist through online Journalism

2011-09-07T00:29:00.000-07:00

Penplusbytes in collaboration with the Ghana Journalists Association will be organizing a first ever boot camp on online for future journalists at the Accra International Press Centre on 21st October 2011 with support from Main One and Raycom Technologies. The boot camp forms part of 10th anniversary of the International Institute for ICT's Journalism (Penplusbytes), which was establish on 18th July 2001 with the vision of empowering the media through the use of ICTs.
Under the theme "ENHANCING YOUR FUTURE AS A JOURNALIST THROUGH ONLINE JOURNALISM" is aimed at educating budding journalists on online reporting and related technologies and how they can take advantages of opportunities offered by online journalism as part of their career development plan. as journalists.

www.penplusbytes.org

AEP to cover Liberia 2011 referendum

2011-08-19T13:08:00.000-07:00

Accra, Aug. 16, GNA - Staff of African Elections Project (AEP) would participate in the coverage of the Liberian Referendum scheduled for August 23.

This would be under its Liberia Elections Incidents Monitoring system project in strategic partnership with Humanity United.

This was contained in a statement issued in Monrovia on Tuesday by Mr Jeremiah Sam of Penplusbytes and copied to the Ghana News Agency in Accra.

AEP was established in 2008 to enhance the ability of journalists and the mass media to provide more timely and relevant election information and knowledge while undertaking the monitoring of specific and important aspects of governance.

"Liberia's referendum has largely been viewed as a giant stride in the country's democracy since the end of the civil war in 2003. It entails a "yes" or "no", to the four proposed constitutional amendments, including whether the country should hold its general elections in October or November during its elections year," the statement added.

The statement said AEP was working with the Liberia Media Centre, Ushahidi Liberia and other partners to provide comprehensive report from all the 4,457 polling stations across the 1,780 voting centres via an SMS system, a call centre and the use of social media tools such as Twitter, Face Book and You Tube.

It pointed out that in a related pre-referendum activity, AEP had organised a workshop for Liberian journalists, call centre agents and field officers on how to access the use of ICT and the social media in covering elections and ensuring transparency in the whole process.

"We are pleased and proud to be part of such a broad-based effort aimed at entrenching democracy in Liberia. AEP will cover this referendum until the final result are declared and provide a non-partisan coverage while chronicling any referendum-related violence incidence or irregularities", said Mr Kwami Ahiabenu II, African Elections Project Team Leader, when addressing the opening session of the workshop.

"After covering elections in 10 countries, AEP is no doubt a ground breaking project providing an important contributory role in deepening democracy and supporting the creation of open societies through capacity building for the media and other key stakeholders.

"At the same time, it provides a unique online elections information and knowledge platform that will eventually provide transparent access to the electoral processes across the continent," Mr Ahiabenu added.

GNA

AFRICAN ELECTIONS PROJECT TO COVER LIBERIA REFERENDUM

2011-08-16T08:52:00.001-07:00

African Elections Project (AEP) is covering Liberian Referendum scheduled for 23^rd of August, 2011 under its Liberia elections incidents monitoring system project www.myliberiawins.org in strategic partnership with Humanity United (http://humanityunited.org/ )

Liberia's referendum has largely been viewed as a giant stride in the country's democracy since the end of the civil war in 2003. A "yes" or "no" to the four (4) proposed constitutional amendments, including whether the country should hold its general elections in October or November during its elections year.

In addition to its main website www.myliberiawins.org AEP is working with the Liberia Media Centre, Ushahidi Liberia and other partners to provide comprehensive report of happenings and events from all the 4,457 polling places spread across the 1,780 voting precincts via an SMS system, a Call centre and the use of social media tools such as twitter, facebook and youtube.

In a related pre-referendum activity, AEP has organized a workshop for Liberian journalists, call centre agents and field officers on how to access the use of ICT and the social media in covering elections and ensuring transparency in the whole process.

"We are pleased and proud to be part of such a broad-based effort aimed at entrenching democracy in Liberia. AEP will cover this referendum until the final result are declared and provide a nonpartisan coverage while chronicling any referendum-related violence incidence or irregularities" said Mr. Kwami Ahiabenu II, African Elections Project Team Leader.

" After covering elections in ten countries, African Elections Project is no doubt a ground breaking project providing an important contributory role in deepening democracy and supporting the creation of open societies through capacity building for the media and other key stakeholders, while at the same time providing a unique online elections information and knowledge platform that will eventually provide transparent access to the electoral processes across the continent"Ahiabenu added.

African Elections Project was in established 2008 with the vision of enhancing the ability of journalists, citizen journalists and the news media to provide more timely and relevant elections information and knowledge while undertaking monitoring of specific and important aspects of governance.

For more information contact: liberia@africanelectons.org , SMS- International: +2336332011, Follow us on twitter: @liberiaelection http://twitter.com/liberiaelection

Signed

Mike Butscher

Monrovia, Liberia

Monrovia 16th August 2011

Serving as a chair for Highway Africa New Media Awards 2011

2011-07-26T06:04:00.001-07:00

Rhodes University's Highway Africa programme and its partners are pleased to announce the opening of the nomination process for the prestigious Highway Africa New Media Awards.

For 11 years these unique awards within the profession of journalism on the continent, have been rewarding pioneering, innovative and creative use of technology in journalism and the media. The Awards were established reward and recognise African innovation in the area of digital media and to highlight the role that digital technologies play in journalism and the media at large.

The Highway Africa New Media Awards are in three categories:

Individual – awarded to individual persons who design or appropriate new affordable applications of communication technologies to overcome the limitations of existing infrastructure and / or capital resources.

Not – for – profit – awarded to users of appropriate media technology to advance and assist communities and persons limited by infrastructure and / or technological access.

Corporate – awarded to corporate groups for creative and appropriate adaptation of technologies within the continent to complete effectively in the wider environment.

Submissions can be made electronically to awards@highwayafrica.com copied to m.letlhaku@ru.ac.za and b.jacobs@ru.ac.za.

The closing date for entries is August 2011, 16:30 South African time.

The winners will be announced at the prestigious SABC-Telkom-Highway Africa New Media Awards gala dinner on the evening of 18 September 2011 during the 15th edition of the Highway Africa Conference.

For more information contact Bronwyn Jacobs (b.jacobs@ru.ac.za ) or Visit www.highwayafrica.com to download entry forms.

Liberia Elections 2011 Media Monitoring Group On Facebook

2011-07-06T10:51:00.001-07:00

African Elections Project Liberia monitoring team has spotted a new group on Facebook for upcoming Liberia 2011 Elections called
Liberia Elections 2011 Media Monitoring Group

According to the group page it is designed to discuss media coverage of the elections based on media monitoring results and alerts of on media compliance to code of ethics, journalism standards and conflict sensitive elections reporting.

join the group at http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_137338993012105

Charging your Customers high internet prices - MTN Ghana leads the way

2011-06-28T01:30:00.001-07:00

With a lot of high-speed Internet cable landing on the coast of Ghana the expectation was that Internet prices will go down.
With a majority of persons in Ghana accessing Internet on the mobile phones using internet dongles, it quite interesting for MTN to increase its pricing on its mobile data service. According to the company, the prices went up in the name of price rationalization, not sure what that means.

Internet campaign currently going on facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/MTN-your-new-internet-charges-are-too-much-aba-do-something-about-it/118902514865411 and http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=240006512691473 to aimed to pushing MTN to reduce prices.

see MTN Ghana official customer satisfaction page at http://www.facebook.com/mtnghanacustomers

Unity and Impunity: The Challenges for Ivory Coast's New President

2011-04-24T09:45:00.000-07:00

Monday's arrest of former President Laurent Gbagbo, ending the four-month post-election standoff, was largely met with relief in Ivory Coast. But the divisions in the countrypossibly worse now than at the time of the election last Novembermeans the nation's legitimate president, Alassane Ouattara, will have to be a skillful broker if he hopes to bring the battered nation together.

Ouattara, a former deputy director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), had the support of a majority of voters in last November's election. Nevertheless, the vote split between Ouattara and Gbagbo ran along much the same lines as north-south alliances in the 20023 civil war.

Gbagbo posited the fight for the presidencyand his fight to stay on even after losing the electionas a battle for the nation itself for true Ivorians, accusing Ouattara of being a puppet of France and the West.

On April 1, with the support of France and the United Nations, Ouattara launched what became a 10-day final siege ending with the capture of Gbagbo and his wife, who had been hiding in a bunker beneath the presidential palace.

In his first statement to the Ivorian people since the arrest, Ouattara explained that the military operation was aimed at ending the security and humanitarian crisis plaguing the whole country, which he blamed on the obstinacy of the previous president.

Ouattara appealed to all Ivorians to uphold peace and to abstain from any acts of vengeance and repression and he announced plans to establish a National Trust and Reconciliation Commission to investigate crimes perpetrated during the years of war.

"All provisions will be made in collaboration with international tribunals and human rights organizations, to investigate, prosecute, judge and punish severely the perpetrators of these unspeakable acts," said Ouattara in a statement from April 12.

Many crimes perpetrated in Ivory Coast by both sides of the divide over the last months have come to light. Last week, a U.N. human rights team found over 100 bodies within 24 hours.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay condemned the series of vicious attacks on civilians, calling the reports he was receiving utterly horrifying. "They are finding more bodies every day," he said.

"The first priority is to do everything possible to stop further killings and violations. But equally important is to end impunity in Ivory Coast," stressed Pillay.

A report by Human Rights Watch from April 9 states that Ouattara's forces of killed hundreds of civilians, raped more than 20 alleged supporters of his rival, and burned at least 10 villages in the far western region of the country. Gbagbo's forces were likewise blamed for killing more than 100 presumed Ouattara supporters.

Although the death toll in the recent conflict is unclear, some organizations estimate it to be at least 1,500. U.N. aid officials say that up to 1 million Ivoirians have been displaced in the violence, including 135,000 seeking refuge in Liberia.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) is also conducting steps toward a requesting it be allowed to start a full investigation into international crimes committed in Ivory Coast.

But whether the ICC will prosecute Gbagbo will depend on a decision, which has to come from inside the country, says Mariya Nedelcheva, member of European Parliament and part of the European Union delegation to Africa.

According to Nedelcheva, the two main objectives of Ouattara as president will be regaining peace and stability, and helping the country recover from its current humanitarian crisis. To do this, he will have to reconcile the two sides and try to prevent further exacerbation between them in the aftermath of the arrest.

"This will be Ouattara's biggest challenge: to play the role of unifier of the nation," says Nedelcheva.

In her assessment, from now on democracy and political pluralism in Ivory Coast will also be tested. This means that those who supported Gbagbo will also need to be involved in the process of recovery.

"If this fails to be done, we risk running in the same situation we witnessed four months ago."

For the moment, joy and happiness over a new freedom dominated Abidjan on April 12, although some were commenting with sadness about the number of people killed in the crisis. Merchants and taxis were getting back to the streets.

"The mood felt like: 'We're all tired of this war and we just want to live in peace and unity,'" wrote Ivorian blogger Kanigui Yeo via e-mail, using a pseudonym because of threats he has received for his posts on Twitter.

But this unity might be hard to achieve. According to Kwami Ahiabenu from African Elections Project, Gbagbo's followers, who accounted for 45.9 percent of the electorate during last November's elections, are going to be a source of problems for Ouattara. One of the reasons is that they strongly believe Ouattara is not even a true Ivorian because of his origin from Burkina Faso. That, and his close ties to France.

"Ouattara's basket will be full as a president: ruling a deeply divided conflict prone country, broken economy and perceived illegitimacy," wrote Ahiabenu via e-mail from Ghana.

Gbagbo's supporters are unlikely to simply change their hearts because their leader has been arrested. Gbagbo's supporters know that their leader ultimately surrendered because of pressure from the international community and that he had no other choice, says Ambroise Pierre, head of Reporters Without Borders' Africa desk.

"They will feel wronged and see the situation as an act against Ivory Coast and against Gbagbo," said Pierre.

Unifying the troops from the warring sidesRepublican Force of Ivory Coast loyal to Ouattara, and the militants faithful to Gbagbois another massive challenge.

"How will Ouattara manage to merge these two completely different armies with completely different philosophies? That is very difficult," says Julie Owono, a Cameroonian blogger for Global Voice.

Still, Ouattara has the necessary legitimacy both from both large portions of the population in Ivory Coast and abroad. On top of that, he has the reputation of being a gentle man fostering peace.

"Ouattara is a man of peace. This is the word he has been saying for the last four months," says Owono.

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/world/unity-and-impunity-the-challenges-for-ivory-coasts-new-president-54612.html

Workshop : "The Role of New/Social Media in the Promotion of Press Freedom"

2011-04-19T01:06:00.001-07:00

Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) is organizing a one-day workshop on the impact of new/social media on development, scheduled for Tuesday, 19th April 2011 at 9:30 a.m. at the Ghana International Press Centre, under the theme: "The Role of New/Social Media in the Promotion of Press Freedom". The workshop is part of GJA's celebration of the 2011 World Press Freedom Day on May 3, which is under the theme: "21st Century Media: New Frontiers, New Barriers".

Chairperson Ambassador Kabral Blay-Amihere, Chairman, National Media Commission (NMC)

Welcome Remarks Mr. Ransford Tetteh, GJA President

Speakers/Topics

The State of Social Media -Global overview and The Frontiers and Barriers to Social Media - Ms. Myra Michele Brown U.S. Embassy

Challenges to Journalistic Standards in a Digital Age -Kwami Ahiabenu,II www.penplusbytes.org

Professor Linus Abraham, Director, NAFTI

Media Laws and Regulations in a Digital Age -Mr. Berifi Apenteng, NMC

Mrs. Abena Asafu-Adjei - Director of Legal Services, NCA National Communication Authority (NCA)

Social Media: the Gender Challenges- Ms. Dorothy Gordon D-G, Kofi Annan International IT Centre

Speaking at one day workshop on "The Role of New/Social Media in the Promotion of Press Freedom"

2011-04-13T05:05:00.001-07:00

Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) is organizing a one-day workshop on the impact of new/social media on development, scheduled for Tuesday, 19th April 2011 at 9:30 a.m. at the Ghana International Press Centre, under the theme: "The Role of New/Social Media in the Promotion of Press Freedom". The workshop is to usher in the GJA's celebration of the 2011 World Press Freedom Day on May 3, which is under the theme: "21st Century Media: New Frontiers, New Barriers".

During this workshop, I hope to make a presentation on the topic : Challenges to Journalistic Standards in a Digital Age (Kwami Ahiabenu,II www.penplusbytes.org )

Other topics and invited speakers include :

Chairman of National Media Commission

The President of GJA

The State of Social Media Global overview/ The Frontiers and Barriers to Social Media - Ms. Myra Michele Brown U.S. Embassy

Professor Linus Abraham, Director, NAFTI

Social Media: the Gender Challenges- Dr. Audrey Gadzekpo

Media Laws and Regulations in a Digital Age -Mr. Berifi Apenteng

Mr. Paarock VanPercy, D-G, National Communication Authority

Ms. Dorothy Gordon D-G, Kofi Annan International IT Centre

ends

African Elections Project(AEP) to cover Niger second run Elections

2011-03-10T23:20:00.001-08:00

African Elections Project (AEP) http://www.africanelections.org/niger, your authoritative elections information and news services is covering Niger Elections 2^nd round slated to take place on Saturday the 12^th of March 2011 between the former Prime Minister Seini Oumarou(MNSD-Nassa) and long-term opposition figure Mahamadou Issoufou(PNDS-Taray)

The Niger 1^st round general elections, took place on Monday 31^st January 2011 to elect a president out of 10 candidates and 113 members of parliament. The final results indicated that, none of the 10 candidates who aspired to be president got more than the 50% required thereby necessitating a second round to take place.

According to Gerard Guedegbe, who is leading a team of reporters to cover this elections said "African Elections Project is set to provide timely and relevant elections information and knowledge while undertaking covering specific and important aspects of governance working hand with citizens journalists and civil society actors engaged in elections observations."

AEP was established in 2008 to empower journalists to cover elections using Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) across the continent. AEP have successfully covered elections in Botswana, Namibia, Ghana, Guinea, Cote d'Ivoire, Mauritania, Mozambique, Malawi, and Togo and has launched coverage of the upcoming elections in Liberia with plans are also far advanced to cover Nigeria, Uganda and Cameroon.

In addition to its flagship online portal, http://www.africanelections.org/niger AEP is covering this elections using other new media tools such as facebook, blogs, frontlineSMS and twitter http://twitter.com/nigerelections. Subscribers can subscribe to our SMS news and results service by sending a text message to (00227) 97 16 30 37 in Niger or international - +447537401839

The African Elections Project-Niger is coordinated by Ghana based International Institute for ICT Journalism (www.penplusbytes.org ) working hand in hand with la Maison de la Presse du Niger and other key partners. The Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) www.osiwa.org is the main strategic and funding partner for AEP Niger.

Signed

Boubacar Diallo

Maison de la Presse du Niger

Niamey, Niger

10^th March 2011

--
International Institute for ICT Journalism
www.penplusbytes.org

Liberian Journalists equipped with skill for effective Electoral Coverage

2011-02-28T13:59:00.001-08:00

Served as a facilitator at this workshop, it was a great experience :

A six day workshop under the theme "Enhancing the Role of the media for Effective Electoral Coverage" took place in Monrovia, Liberia from 21st to 26th February. The workshop is under the 5year The Civil Society and Media Leadership Programme of IREX www.irex.org in partnership with USAID, Liberia Media Centre, International Foundation for Electoral System (IFES) and African Elections Project www.africanelections.org.

The workshop is part of the process to prepare Journalists in Liberia to cover upcoming October 2011 general elections

Participants are being taken through topics such as, voter Registration, Exhibition and the Final Process, The National Referendum; Facts You Ought to Know, Drawing of Electoral Districts, Prospects and Challenges to the 2011 General and Presidential , PUL'S Code of Conduct (Elections) & Code of Ethics, Liberia's electoral history, Understanding Liberia's Election Laws & the Process, Conflict Sensitive Reporting & Information Management and ICTs and Elections Coverage which is being facilitated by African Elections Project, Liberia www.africanelections.org bringing project experience from 10 countries in this area.

The workshop is being attended by 24 participants drawn from radio and print Liberia journalists.

AEP

Le projet sur les Elections en Afrique (AEP) couvrira les élections législatives et présidentielles au Niger 2011

2010-12-29T08:49:00.001-08:00

Communiqué de presse

Niamey Niger, 29 Decembre 2010

Le projet sur les Elections en Afrique (AEP) couvrira les élections législatives et présidentielles au Niger 2011

Le projet sur les Elections en Afrique (AEP) http://www.africanelections.org/niger couvrira les élections législatives et présidentielles qui se tiendront le Lundi 31 Janvier 20011 pour élire le président de la république et les 113 membres du Parlement. AEP a été mis en place en 2008 pour renforcer les journalistes à couvrir les élections grâce aux Technologies de l'Information et de la Communication à travers le continent

AEP a couvert avec succès les élections au Botswana, Namibie, Ghana, Guinée, Cote d'Ivoire, Mauritanie, Mozambique, Malawi, et au Togo. Les prochaines étapes du projet sont la couverture des élections au Nigeria, Liberia, Uganda et Cameroun.

L'équipe d' AEP a lancé ce jour, le projet AEP-Niger à Niamey au cours d'une session de formation qui a regroupé des journalistes Nigériens.

Selon Kwami Ahiabenu, II, le Responsable de l'équipe d'AEP "Avec le Niger, le projet a couvert dix pays et notre vision est que le projet contribue à une meilleure couverture des élections au Niger, grâce au travail des journalistes professionnels, des organes de presse ainsi que celui des parties prenantes clés des élections par la fourniture d'une information indépendante et impartiale avec les TICs .

En plus du site web http://www.africanelections.org/niger/, AEP couvre les élections avec d'autres nouveaux media comme facebook, blogs, frontline SMS et twitter http://twitter.com/nigerelections.

Les personnes désireuses peuvent souscrire au service des info et résultats par SMS en envoyant un message au (00227) 97 16 30 37 au Niger ou à l'international au +447537401839

Le projet African Elections -Niger est coordonné par l'Institut International de TIC journalisme (www.penplusbytes.org ) en collaboration avec la Maison de la Presse du Niger et d'autres partenaires clefs. Open Society Initiative for West Africa www.osiwa.org est le principal et stratégique partenaire financier du projet au Niger.

Fait à Niamey le 29 décembre 2010

Boubacar DIALLO
PCA Maison de la presse
mobile +227 90444535 ou 96979622

co-author : Because Accountability Counts – A Journalist guide for covering post-elections

2010-11-30T13:54:00.001-08:00

Because Accountability Counts – A Journalist guide for covering post-elections in Ghana is one of the key building blocks for Ghana Post-elections Intervention Project whose main objective is to help overcome the challenges and problems affecting citizens' ability to hold elected representatives accountable for promises they make during pre-election campaigns. The guide's main objective is to empower journalists and other stakeholders
with an information and knowledge resource for playing the watch and guide dog role in holding elected officers accountable. It provides an overview of post-elections landscape of Ghana, covering governance, legislative issues, political parties and their manifestoes,ruling party, opposition and governing after an election and provides guides for covering:
1. Parliament, Political Parties, Ruling Government (mapping campaign promises
& manifesto), Opposition and Key Governance Issues
2. Investigative journalism and post-elections coverage
3. ICTs and Covering Post-Elections
4. Covering Budget and Extractive Industries and
5. Lessons to be learned from the post 2007 election crisis in Kenya

Download a copy of the the guide here

African Elections Project - Guinea and Cote d'Ivoire

2010-11-15T16:05:00.001-08:00

We are running up the coverage of Guinea runoff with the declaration of provisional results by Guinea Electoral Commission Chief - Siaka Toumany Sangare
The results shows Alpha CONDE of RPG earning 1,474,973 votes representing 52.52% of votes cast while his rival Cellou Dalein DIALLO of UFDG closely followed with 1,333,666 votes (47.48%)

We are now looking forward to Cote d'Ivoire second run elections scheduled to take place on 28th November 2010 between Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara

Hopefully launch coverage of Niger 2011 elections soon as well

follow us at http://twitter.com/africanelection

join us on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=117355568298287

Beyond the Bank: The Rise of Mobile Money in Ghana

2010-10-22T07:50:00.001-07:00

As the number of mobile phone subscribers in Ghana increases, so does the market for mobile money services. The majority of Ghanaians lack any formal bank account. Kwami Ahiabenu II reports on how mobile money could change the shape of financial transactions in the country.

By Kwami Ahiabenu II

An estimated 80 percent of Ghanaians are "unbanked" – meaning they conduct their transactions outside the banking sector with no access to financial services. Products like "mobile money," that enable safe and secure money transfers without the use of a bank account, could have a major impact on this unserved segment of the population. Mobile money gives anyone with a mobile phone the ability to transfer money, make cash payments and conduct other financial transactions over the phone.

Mobile money is a relatively new phenomenon in Ghana. It was first introduced by the telecom company MTN a year ago. MTN Mobile Money operates in partnership with nine banks. Currently, more than 2 million Ghanaians are registered as active users. MTN expects this number to grow as a result of the resources they have committed to educating subscribers about switching from the traditional mode of cash payments to electronic payments. Earlier this year, Zain became the second mobile operator to provide mobile money services through the introduction of ZAP, working with three banks.

How Will Mobile Money Help Ghana?

With more than 15,000,000 mobile phone subscribers in Ghana, the potential market for these new services is significant. Mobile money presents certain advantages for Ghanaians without access to banks. It reduces the transaction costs of financial services for the poor, especially those in rural areas where financial services seldom exist. Mobile money saves the cost of travel and time spent visiting the nearest town to access financial services. As noted in AudienceScapes research , mobile money provides people with a way to transfer money safely and keep (or even increase) their savings.

Mobile money has the potential to create jobs directly through hiring in the mobile phone companies, partner banks and the more than 4,000 merchants involved in Ghana's mobile money system. Key partners in the provision of mobile money services include commercial banks, mobile phone operator's shops, distributor shops and accredited agents.

Jobs may be created indirectly as mobile money contributes to growth in Ghana's business and trade. If deployed successfully, mobile money could help individuals harness funds outside the banking system and channel them into the formal financial sector, thus making it easier to gather funds for investments.

Not surprisingly, the general manager of Mobile Money-MTN, Bruno Akpaka, sees many benefits for Ghana as it continues adopting this service. Akpaka believes mobile money will "help trade activities within the country and foster strong business partnerships."

"The creation of wide merchant footprints in places where traditional banks cannot go also contributes to bringing people into this new model of financial transactions," said Akpaka. "MTN Mobile Money is bridging this existing huge gap between the unbanked and the financial sector."

The Rise of E-Money Services

The introduction of mobile money service is taking place in isolation but in parallel with the advent and expansion of other financial electronic payments services. One of these is E-Zwich, an electronic platform that enables the loading and spending of electronic cash and also allows the settlement of inter-bank claims in addition to online transactions. Others are being made available over the Internet and through SMS-text messages.

The government regards these services as banking. They are strictly regulated and licensed by the Central Bank- Bank of Ghana under its branchless banking policy.

Both MTN and ZAIN SIM cards are enabled to utilize the service but each new subscriber needs to register for the service at before it is activated. Upon activation, the user is provided with a secure electronic "wallet" where funds can be disbursed or uploaded. The users can either exchange electronic money for physical cash (cash out) at shops, partner banks and accredited agents or make use of it in making purchases or transfers.

Enabling a Cash Flow to Rural Areas

In general, the most popular mobile money service is money transfer. The trend is for users in urban areas to transfer funds to recipients in rural areas. Traditionally in Ghana, city dwellers often send money to members of their extended family living in rural areas.

Other typical services include the purchase of mobile phone airtime, goods and services through electronic transfer of money from user's wallet to the merchant's account.

Commenting on money transfer via mobile phones, Carl Niikoi Ashie, an m-commerce (mobile commerce) specialist at Zain who works on ZAP, said: "The customers can 'cash in' by loading money onto their ZAP wallet, then send the money to someone else on their phone in a simple process. The person receiving the money can 'cash out' by going to any of our outlets and exchanging the e-value for physical cash. We're seeing tremendous growth in the service across the country, with more cash-in done in the major cities while cash-outs are seen predominantly in the smaller towns."

Ashie sees a lot of evidence that his product is reaching Ghana's unbanked. "Users do not need to have a bank account to use the service. Currently, there are a lot of monetary transactions that take place outside the confines of the banks and it will take a product like ZAP to fill the void while providing a secure, convenient and trustworthy channel of transaction," said Ashie. "Some customers have also requested products that will allow them to use their ZAP wallets for savings and hence enjoy interest on their savings, just as pertains in the traditional bank setting."
http://audiencescapes.org/ghana-mobile-money-branchless-banking-research-MTN-E-Zwich

Texts a New Tool in Guinea’s Historic Election

2010-09-01T08:41:00.001-07:00

Mobile phones turned citizens into election observers in Guinea's landmark presidential election. The technology will also be used to help voters in the upcoming September run-off poll.

By Kwami Ahiabenu II

On June 27, 2010, Guinea held what is widely being hailed as the nation's first freely run democratic election since gaining independence in 1958. A run-off between the two presidential candidates earning the most votes will take place on September 19, 2010. Another first in this landmark election process is the use of mobile phone technology.

Mobile phones have become a preferred means of communication in Africa because they are convenient and affordable relative to other methods. Most countries on the continent are now recording the use of mobile phones by all key stakeholders in their elections: from electoral officials, political parties and individual candidates, to electoral security agencies, civil society organizations, and local and international observers.

Candidates use mobile phones to raise funds and campaign. Voters can use mobile phones to verify their registration information and correct it if necessary before going to the polls. Mobile phones are also used to inform citizens about voter registration, and to inform registered voters about when, where and how to vote. And, in Guinea, phones have been used as a tool for election observation.

"If you have a problem during voting, send a text message to 8080." During the first round of elections in June, this was the message that Guineans around the country received at public forums, on the radio and in newspapers. The message advertised an election-monitoring service based on SMS text messages. The SMS service used a short code number, "8080," which enabled all mobile users in Guinea, regardless of their mobile operator, to send election-related queries, comments and report problems. The service was implemented by a coalition of government, private and business partners. These included the nonprofit group Alliance Guinea, the African Elections Project, Guinea's National Independent Election Commission (CENI), mobile operators (Areeba, Cellcom, Intercel Guinee, Orange or Sotelgui) and African Business Services.

Commenting on the SMS election-monitoring service, U.S. Ambassador Patricia Moller said at a briefing before the June election: "The United States is committed to ensuring that these are the freest and most transparent elections in Guinea's history. This innovative initiative will help to make this vision a reality…By providing voters with the means to protect their vote, we have helped to place the future of their country in the palm of their hands. This technology will allow CENI, local and international observers, and security forces to respond to incidents in real time."

After voters went to the polls, Alix Davilmar of the Guinea-based African Business Services, the providers of the short code service, declared the service a success. Davilmar said: "We received about 4,000 SMS [messages] before the day of election and on the day of elections there were approximately 8,000 SMS entries. After the Election Day, over 2,000 SMS entries also came in. These messages were all posted online and distributed as e-mail alerts to election administrators and observers, international media, civil society organizations or the general public."

The election did experience some glitches, according to the Carter Center, a U.S. NGO with expertise in observing elections which was on the ground in Guinea. In a statement, the Carter Center described some of the problems observed, "Confusion about several important aspects of voting and counting procedures, delay in allocation of polling stations, and late delivery of essential voting materials negatively affected the quality of polling."

Despite these difficulties, the period following the election has been calm and the results respected by all parties. The Carter Center itself declared the elections a success and noted, "the elections were marked by broad political participation, a spirit of open campaigning, and transparency."

Now all eyes are on the September poll, as Guineans prepare for the country's return to civilian rule.

http://audiencescapes.org/texts-new-tool-guinea-historic-election-mobile-communications-carter-center

Ghana – land of Gold, land of technology-Overview of ICT Sector

2010-08-27T18:44:00.001-07:00

Kwami Ahiabenu,II

Introduction

Ghana can be counted among leading countries in West Africa's information and communication technology (ICT) space; its industry is growing with new developments being recorded each passing day. In recognising the potential of ICTs as an important tool, the government and industry stakeholders are aggressively pushing to accelerate the growth and development of the country in all sectors. Ghana's Extractive Economy with weak Industrial Base

At independence, the Ghanaian economy was relatively robust and well supplied with natural resources, skills and finance with an average per capita income of US $600.(1957). Over time, however, the structure of the economy has not seen any significant change, it is still an extractive-based economy with gold, timber and cocoa constituting its main sources of foreign exchange.

Another key characteristic of its economy is a heavy dependence on international financial and technical assistance in all sectors, which has inevitably resulted in an enormous external debt portfolio. In order to tackle its mounting external debts, 2002 saw Ghana opting for debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) scheme, a World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) debt relief initiative. As a result of the HIPC programme, Ghana will save a total of US$230 million annually in debt service costs over 2004-2013, according to IMF estimates. To deal with the growing levels of poverty, Ghana has also developed Poverty Reduction Strategy (GPRS) which chronicles its "agenda for growth and prosperity.

KEY ICT SECTORS IN GHANA AND INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITIES

If the performance of a stock exchange is a strong indication of a country's investment climate, then Ghana is an attractive prospect for those seeking a good return on investment. The Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) is among the best performing markets in the world. In 2003, it outperformed the effective yield of the benchmarked 91 and 182 day Treasury bills with market capitalisation rising by 104% while market turnover in value terms was up 335%.

Furthermore there a rising number of entrepreneurs running a number of successful ICT and ICT-enabled businesses, a strong indication of the significant potential for growth of ICT enterprises in Ghana.

The ICT sector is enjoying sustained growth in key areas such as ICT training, internet service provision, business outsourcing processing, telecommunications and software.

Telecommunications
Telecommunications remains the top growth area both in the area of fixed and mobile telephony, though mobile telephony is the leader in this sector; currently there are two national fixed line operators in Ghana – Ghana Telecom (GT) and Westel.

Westel has not been able to meet its rollout obligations as a second national operator and the National Communication Authority (NCA) initially imposed a fine of a little over US $71 million on the company. While through government intervention the figure has being reduced to US$25milion, Westel continues to mount a court battle to avoid paying the fine.

Generally, GT remains the biggest ICT player in Ghana by the virtue of its combined fixed lines; mobile telephony, international bandwidth wholesaling and ISP service offerings.

Mobile Telephony
Long waiting periods for fixed telephony – in some cases up to a year - plus limited availability in most areas of the country, has fueled the rapid growth of the mobile telephony business in Ghana. With four mobile operators, namely GT (One Touch) Milicom (Mobitel), Scancom (Spacefon) and Cell Tel (Kasapa) servicing the needs of an estimated one and half million mobile phone subscribers. Spacefon remains the market leader with 800,000 plus subscribers. Furthermore, with the recent introduction of advanced mobile communications technology such as General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), the operator is able to offer multimedia services including Internet browsing.

Kasapa prides itself on being the most inexpensive provider of cellular calls. Its business model has to date proven to be highly successfully, cost effectively offering cheap call rates by avoiding the use of fancy technology. It remains the only non-GSM cellphone provider to date, relying rather on analogue technology, and offers free activation and starter packs.

Mobitel is Ghana's first cellphone company, and initially dominated the industry as a leader for some time prior to the introduction of competing operators. Unfortunately, it did not recognise that GSM was the driving force of mobile telephony, and thus it did not rush to implement the technology. Failure to capitalise on this market current cost it dearly as competitor Spacefon introduced GSM and subsequently took a very significant share of the market. In the interim, however, Mobitel has successful implemented its GSM system and it is working hard to gain market share.

With a strong sales drive, One Touch was dominant for some time, but the company has taken a decision to stop selling services to new subscribers due to lack of capacity on its switches. It recently expanded its network significantly and it is poised to take a healthy proportion of the growing Ghanaian cellular market.

Developing human capital for ICTs
Ghana has adequate human resources to drive ICT growth and development, but faces the well documented issue of the significant skills gap that persists in Africa, especially in the high level ICT skills area. This situation is compounded by a brain drain effect, where top professionals - including ICT-trained individuals – are lured away to First World countries. Currently there is enormous demand for ICT training, which presents a host of investment opportunities for entrepreneurs.

The ICT human resource landscape is characterised by four types of ICT training opportunities. At the upper level, tertiary institutions - mostly universities - are focused on producing computer science, engineering and information system graduates. In recent times, an increasing number of private universities have initiated operations in Ghana, with most providing ICT-based training, filling the training gap resulting from the lack of capacity of public sector universities.

The second type of training is competence-based instruction, which is aimed at producing specific ICT skills as required by industry verticals. This level of training is a niche market with few institutions offering services in this area; there is therefore a significant level of opportunity that can be tapped by appropriate providers.

The next level of training is end user training at the mass market level. There are a number of training schools providing service in this area; at this level the market is somewhat saturated.

A growing phenomenon is teaching computer literacy in schools. This opportunity carose as most formal schools in Ghana do not provide computer literacy. With many schools now outsourcing their training needs to third parties instead of developing their own computer centres, opportunities exist for providers of such facilities and equipment to address the market need for basic computer literacy at the school-learner level. The Ministry of Education is encouraging and working with such training schools, but it is constrained by lack of a policy to guide the process, as well as the absence of predefined ICT curriculum for the schools.

Internet Service provision
Internet service provision is also another area of considerable growth and opportunity in Ghana. There are a number of ISPs working under an industry body, Ghana Internet Service Providers (GISPA) which is working to regulate the provision of Internet connectivity on the country. The success of the body in regulating the industry has been demonstrated in a recent case where Ghana Telecom was offering cheap bandwidth through its ISP division, while selling at a higher price to other ISPs - GISPA successful negotiated price reduction to create a fair environment in which the ISPs could conduct their business.

Though a considerable number of end users make use of dial up Internet access, most Ghanaians tend to use the Internet at public access cyber cafes, which are dotted all over the country. However, due to high costs including that of bandwidth, most cyber cafes in Ghana are struggling to break even.

Outsourcing in Ghana and Software Development
There are a number of outsource service provider companies in Ghana, including Affiliated Computer Services, Rising Data Solutions, AQ Solutions and Supra Telecom.

However, Supra Telecom has closed shop, since its parent company in the US filed for bankruptcy.

Ghana is positioned to benefit from outsourcing business opportunities, but it must establish an enabling environment including a pool of high quality yet affordable English-speaking computer literate workers as well as an inexpensive telecommunication infrastructure. Generally, Ghana has a long way to go before it can call itself a true outsourcing location.

Local development of software is becoming popular with a number of software companies and consultancies providing solutions in this area; some are already exporting their products. Local software development, however, remains an industry in its infancy and therefore presents an area of potential growth.

Government ICT
The Ministry of Communication is the leading government organ responsible for ICT in Ghana and is charged with the responsibility of coordinating government use of ICTs. In 2002, it developed an ICT for Accelerated Development (ICT4D) policy which articulates the vision of transforming Ghana into an information-rich knowledge-based society and economy through the development, deployment and exploitation of ICTs within the economy and society. The key focus of the government is to create enabling environment to nurture the development of the ICT industry in the country.

Challenges facing ICT development in Ghana
Perhaps the most significant issue facing development in Ghana is a reality that confronts many African countries – it has a cash-based economy with limited development of its financial services infrastructure. With over 80% of money in circulation outside the banking system, finding affordable loans and credit is very difficult if not impossible. This situation has lead to the small scale nature of most ICT businesses since they are constrained in their capacity to expand. Furthermore, the size of the ICT market is relatively small since most organisations which can benefit from ICTs products and services are slow to invest in this area.

Lack of policy implementation, lack of telecommunications infrastructure and poor regulatory environments are also affecting the growth and development of the industry.

Ghana's ICTs industry is highy visible internationally with a lot of opportunities yet to be leveraged. It has chalked up many successes but there is a long way to go for ICTs to contribute significant to growth and development of the country and overtake the traditional resources exports which include gold, cocoa and timber.

Nurturing Media in West Africa

2010-08-26T07:12:00.001-07:00

The West African Media Development Fund opens it doors to facilitate the growth of media in the region. AudienceScapes interviewed the fund's CEO about their plans to sow the seeds of a vibrant and pluralistic media sector.

By Kwami Ahiabenu II

The growth and development of the media as a business venture in West Africa is hindered by a number of factors. The region possesses a limited professional capacity to produce journalism, operating a media outlet is expensive, access to credit facilities is limited and the cost of borrowing is typically high. These factors are threatening the growth of pluralistic media in the region.

To solve some of these challenges, media funds have been established to provide media organizations with affordable and readily available lines of credit. Examples of media funds active on the continent include country-based funds like the Tanzania Media Fund, regional funds like the Southern Africa Media Development Fund, and at the global level, the Media Development Loan Fund.

Media organizations in West Africa were encouraged when the West Africa Media Development Fund (WAMDEF) was set up. Launched in April of this year, WAMDEF will provide financial support to privately owned, independent media organizations established on weak capitalization and operating under precarious economic regimes.

From its headquarters in Accra, Ghana, Kwasi Owusu Asare, chief executive officer of WAMDEF, spoke to AudienceScapes about the progress of the fund and his vision for the future:

AudienceScapes: Can you tell us more about WAMDEF, when it was established and why the need for such a fund?

Asare: WAMDEF was launched on the 13th of April 2010 as an initiative of the Media Foundation for West Africa and Free Voice of the Netherlands. This was after comprehensive research had been conducted which showed clearly the challenges independent media had in accessing credit for growth. The WAMDEF Fund does not only provide credit, but also provides technical support which is critical to the support/sustainability of these businesses.

AudienceScapes: What is your geographical coverage and do you have country offices or representatives?

Asare: Our mandate is to work in all West African countries, but currently we do not have in-country offices, though we are planning to develop this in the near future. We are currently using an in-country representative of MFWA which has a presence in all West African countries.

AudienceScapes: Why is a special case being made for media funding in the region instead of the media being empowered to apply for commercial lending?

Asare: This is because the media has the challenge of not being able to meet the requirement for credit of most financial institutions in the subregion, plus the media is generally seen as a high-risk venture.

AudienceScapes: Who qualifies to tap into the fund and what is the procedure for doing so?

Asare: Basically, any registered news and information disseminating agency, registered and operating within the subregion, is qualified to apply. An applicant has to visit WAMDEF to download an application form. After submission of the form, it will be assessed and a decision communicated to the applicant within 8 weeks.

AudienceScapes: Does WAMDEF have any particular focus in the types of media organizations it will select for funding? Any priorities?

Asare: WAMDEF is particularly interested in news and information-dissemination independent media organizations.

AudienceScapes: Do you providing funding for new media?

Asare: Yes.

AudienceScapes: Do you have any funding opportunities for freelancers or sole proprietorship-type media operations?

Asare: Each media organization is assessed based on its merit.

AudienceScapes: Are funds provided interest free? And typically what is the duration for paying back such funds?

Asare: Our portfolio includes:

* Quick operating loans of up to $10,000, repayable between 60-120 days.
* Short-term loans between $10,000 and $50,000, repayable between 120 days and 2 years.
* Medium-term loans between $50,000 and $100,000, repayable between 3 and 5 years.
* Long-term loans between $100,000 and $200,000 repayable between 5 and 7 years.

Please visit our website for more information. These options are not cast in stone but are assessed and dealt with on case-by-case basis. These loans are not interest free but are offered at much lower interest rate (60-70% less) than prevailing commercial rates in the country of the applicant.

AudienceScapes: How many applications have you received so far?

Asare: Some 30 applications have so far been received, and more keep coming in.

AudienceScapes: Has WAMDEF made any investments yet?

Asare: We will be making our first investments in September 2010.

AudienceScapes: What kind of technical assistance do you expect to deliver the most? What do you see as the greatest technical assistance needs for media organizations?

Asare: The greatest technical assistance media organizations needs are its internal systems. Most of them have no software to harness revenue, ensure internal control, track performance, etc. Closely following these are the human resource capacities especially in the areas of management and general leadership.

AudienceScapes: What are some of your key challenges and achievements over your short period of operations?

Asare: The general volume of financial requests is a testament to the fact that private independent media needs support and we need more partners in this venture.

AudienceScapes: What is your vision for the fund and how do you see contributing to the growth of free and vibrant media in the region?

Asare: The fund will definitely make a major contribution to the strengthening of democracy in the subregion.

source: http://www.audiencescapes.org/intermedia-nurturing-media-west-africa-media-development-fund

Africa Media and Democracy Conference PROGRAMME DETAILS

2010-08-18T05:26:00.001-07:00

ACCRA- GHANA -PROGRAMME DETAILS:

DAY-1 – 18 AUGUST 2010

7.00 am-10.00am - REGISTRATION

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9.30am WELCOME COCTAIL RECEPTION & CULTURAL PERORMANCE BY THE GHANA DANCE ENSEMBLE.

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10.00 am –10.05 am - INTRODUCTION & WELCOME: MRS - DEMAY ALARBI

10.05 am– 10.15am - CHAIRMAN OPEN REMARKS - PROF. KWAMI KARIKARI, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR (Media Foundation For West Africa-MFWA)

10.15 am -10.25 am- ADDRESS BY DIRECTOR OF AMDMC- BARIMA ADU-ASAMOA

10.25am- 10.50 am-OFFICIAL OPENING ADDRESS BY H.E. JOHN DRAMANI MAHAMAH - THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF GHANA.

10.50am – 11.10am - CHAIRMAN CLOSING REMARKS

*GROUP PHOTOGRAPH - ALL DELEGATES AND VIPS

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11.10am – 12.00pm TEA & COCOA BREAK

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PLENARY -1: NEW MEDIA & DEMOCRACY

Dedicated To The Memory of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah (1909 - 1972)

TIME: 12.10pm -1.10 pm

CHAIRPERSON: BAFFOUR ANKOMAH, EDITOR - NEW AFRICAN MAGAZINE (UK)

(1)YANG JIOA- Identity, social rights and the role of the internet media: A case study of Chinese entrepreneurs in Ghana. University of Florida. (USA)

(2) EDDIE CAVINES OMBAGI- Digital Media and Democracy: How the internet is changing the Face of African Politics. Kabianga University College. (MALAWI)

(3)AKIN IWILADE –New media, Intermediality and the future of Democracy in Nigeria.Obafemi Awolowo University. (NIGERIA)

(4) DR. CHRISTY BEST-The New Media as Tools for Participatory, Democracy and Good Governance. University.(NIGERIA)

(5)MESHACH OFUAFOR - The Influence of "New Media" forms on Media Reportage and Democracy in Nigeria. Obafemi Awolowo University Ile-Ife. (NIGERIA)

(6) AHIABENU KWAMI, II- Covering elections in Africa using mobile phones.

(Director, International Institute for ICT Journalism and Consultant, African Elections Project. (Ghana)

CHAIRPERSON CLOSING REMARKS

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1.10pm– 2.00pm - LUNCH

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PLENARY -2: MEDIA & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF MADAM FATHIA NKRUMAH (1932- 2007).

TIME: 2.00pm- 3.00pm

CHAIRPERSON: MR. GABBY OCHERE-DARKO, DIRECTOR, - DANQUAH INSTITUTE

(7) ORLANDO BAMA: Assessing media development in developing societies: in search of a new paradigm for Africa in the late modern age.

(Institute of Communication Studies – University of Leeds)

(8) IGINIO GAGLIARDONE: New media, new players, new questions: towards new models for media development. (UK)

(Stanhope Centre - London School of Economics)

(9) PROF.RAN JIJUN Transcending the African paradigm: seeking a PR strategy with Chinese characteristics.

(Department of International Studies – Foreign Affairs University – Bejing)

(10) DR. LI XIFENG: Perspectives on the role of China in the development of the CHINA. African media sector. (Chinese Academy of Social Sciences)(CHINA)

(11) DR.NICOLE STREMLAU: Problematizing press freedom rankings

(Programme of Comparative Media Law and Politics – Oxford University)

CHAIRPERSON CLOSING REMARKS

3.00pm – CLOSE

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THE ACCRA TOUR - 19^th AUGUST 2010 – TIME: 3.00pm – 5.00pm

THE ACCRA TOUR: Visit the Mausoleum of one of Africa's most influential political leaders and political philosophers in the 20th century, Osagyfou Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, first President of Ghana and principal advocate of Pan-Africanism. Take a trip to the Dubois Centre in memory of leading African – American scholar and major intellectual icon of the Africana World, then follow up to the George Padmore Library, dedicated to the memory of Dr. George Padmore, the West-Indian Pan-Africanist and special adviser to Ghana's first President. George Padmore greatly influenced Dr. Nkrumah's Pan-African project: The political liberation of Africa.

W.E.B DuBOIS CENTER: The W.E.B. Du Bois Memorial Centre for Pan-African Culture is a national historic monument of Ghana, under the umbrella of the Ministry of Chieftaincy and Culture. The final resting place of W.E.B. and Shirley Graham Du Bois, this major World tourist site houses the mausoleum, personal library, and museum of the Du Boises' rich lives as influential American and Pan-African thinkers and activists. The Centre was created, in 1985, as a research institution for Pan-African history and culture, and as a crucible for African/Diasporan creativity and promotion of the social, political, cultural, and intellectual legacy of Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois.

THE ACCRA TOUR SCHEDULE (Local Time)

Date: 19^th August 2010 (Tuesday)
Departure from Conference Venue: 3.00 pm – 5.00 pm
End of tour: 5. 00pm

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6.00pm – 8pm SOCIAL/NETWORKING @NIC

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DAY-2 – 19^thAUGUST 2010

7am -10am-REGISTRATION

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10.00 am – 10.05am -Introduction & Welcome

10.05am – 10.10am – CHAIRPERSON: PROF. DR.DR. DANIEL BUOR, VICE-CHANCELLOR, VALLEY VIEW UNIVERSITY.

10.15am- 10.25 am– KEY NOTE ADDRESS: DR. KWADJO AFARI DJAN (Chairman Electoral Commission of Ghana)

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PLENARY- 3 – MEDIA, ELECTIONS & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF DR. W.E.B DUBIOS (1868 – 1963)

TIME: 10.00am -11.00am

CHAIRPERSON DR. GARETH STANTON, GOLDSMITH, UNIVERSITY OF LONDN

(12)FREDRICK OGENGA-Fast-Track programme, electoral land grabs or local South African press expressing fears of a Zimbabwe in South Africa? The representation of economic collapse in Zimbabwe. University of Witwatersrand.(SOUTH AFRICA)

(13) TAYE C. OBATERU- Ethnic in Media Coverage of Elections and the Electoral Process. University of JOS. (NIGERIA)

(14) AKPOJIVI UFUMA-The fairness clause: an examination of media freedom during electioneering period in Nigeria. (UK)

(15) JEFF JOHN KABONDO –The Media and Democracy in Malawi: Reflection on Malawi's Electoral Democracy. (MALAWI)

(16) JANICE WINTER, Mediating Polarities in South Africa's Defensive Democracy. Axes Programme on Journalism and Democracy - (UK)

CHAIRMAN CLOSING REMARKS

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11.00 am– 11.15am TEA & COCOA BREAK

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PLENARY -4: MEDIA, SOCIETY & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF DR. JOHN CLERKE (1915-1998)

TIME: 11.15am -12.45pm

CHAIRPERSON: PROF. KWESI YANKAH - PRO VICE CHANCELLOR, UNIVERSITY OF GHANA.

(17)DR. SIMEON H.O. ALOZIEUWA- Media, Ownership Influence and Crisis\Conflict Situation in a Multi- Ethnic Society: Toward a Framework for Democratic Consolidation in Nigeria. (NIGERIA).

(18) UTULU, ANTHONY U & AWOPEJU AYO -The role of the Media in the Concept of good Governance in Nigeria. (NIGERIA)

(19) DANIEL NKRUMAH-Defying the odds: Ghanaian media thrive despite difficult challenges. (Daily Graphic – Accra) (GHANA)

(20)TIMOTHY QUIASHIGAH-From " Radioracy" to " Radiocrazy": The Evolution of (GHANA.)

(21) DAN ELLA, Media truth and crisis management: The Jos Experience (NIGERIA)

………………………………………………………………………………………………….

12.45pm– 1.45pm LUNCH

…………………………………………………………………………………………………

1.45-2.45: CULTURAL PERFORMANCE BY THE GHANA DANCE EMSEMBLE@NIC

…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

MEDIA WORKSHOP PRORAMME-1

2.45 pm – 3.45pm

CHAIRPERSON: AMBASSADOR KRABAL BLAY-AMIHERE

(Chairman, National Media Commission, Ghana)

LEAD SPEAKER: ALOYS BATUNGWANAYO:

'THE BURUNDIAN EXPERIENCE' (LA BENEVOLENCIJA BURUNDI). The session is based on the research of 15 Journalists from different media houses currently implementing a media/election program in Burundi. Mbariza Ntore ("inform us so we can vote"): journalistic unity in the land of political pluralism. A media synergy project in Burundi to Improve Journalistic Reporting around the 2010 Elections. The presentation will be structured around two concepts: first, understanding the Burundian (central African) context and second, the explanation of a combined media synergy project that accompanies the elections of 2010.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

MEDIA WORKSHOP PRORAMME-2

3.45 – 4.45:

OVERVIEW: Informing responsibly: A National Duty? The focus of this programme is to provide participants with critical insight on the role, responsibility and pitfalls in covering/reporting elections. It is intended to provide participants with a legal, constitutional and ethical framework in a local context, but equally draws on diverse examples such as United Kingdom, U.S.A etc.

PANEL MEMBERS:

CHAIRPERSON: BOBBY W. LIVINGSTONE, DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC INFORMATION NATIONAL ELECTIONS COMMISSION. (LIBERIA)

(a) Panel Member : BAFFOUR ANKOMAH, EDITOR - New African Magazine

(b) Panel Member : GABBY OTCHERE-DARKO, Director, - Danquah Institute

(c) Panel Member: PROF. KARIKARI , Executive Director, -Media Foundation For West Africa.

(d) Panel Member : NANA SERWA ASAMOAH –(LLB, FC, LB)

………………………………………………………………………………………..

(e) 4.45pm – 5.45pm - CUTULRAL PERFORMANCE BY GHANA DANCE ENSEMBLE

....................................................................................................................................................

6.00pm - CLOSE

DAY-3 – 20^thAugust 2010

7am -10am-REGISTRATION

10.00 am – 10.10am -Introduction & Welcome

10.00am – 10.15am – CHAIRPERSON: DR. AUDREY GADZEKPO

10.15 – 10.45 – KEY NOTE ADDRESS: PROF. KWAME KARIKARI , (Executive Director MFW).

………………………………………………………………………………………………

10.45 – 11.00 TEA & COCOA BREAK

....................................................................................................................................................................

PLENARY -5 MEDIA & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF SOJOUNER TRUTH (1797 – 1883)

TIME:11.00-12.00

CHAIRPERSON: DR. AUDREY GADZEKPO AG. DIRECTOR SCHOOL OF

COMMUNICATIONS, UNIVERSITY OF GHANA, LEGON.

(22)MISS JOYCE N.OMWOHA- Talk Radio In Kenya: Mediating Public Discourses On Democracy And Good Governance .University Of Witwatersrand.(SOUTH AFRICA)

(23)MISBAHUDEEN AHMED-RUFAI- Lessons From The Past And Lessons From Abroad.Harold Washington College.(U.S.A)

(24) EKUNDAYO AFOLABI- The Africa Media And Democracy.(NIGERIA))

(25) JENDELE HUNGBO - Talking to the polls: election discourses in two radio talk shows in post-apartheid South Africa. (WITWATERAND-SA)

............................................................................................................................................................

PLENARY -6 :MEDIA, GENDER & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF DR. PATRICE LUMUMBA (1925–1961)

TIME:12.00 -1.00

CHAIRPERSON : MRS. JEANNETTE QUARCOOPOME, MFW

(26)NICHOLAS A.BASTINE-The Role Of The Media In Protecting Womens and Children's Rights in Democratic Ghana- Lensing The Trokosi System In Ghana.Canada.

(27) AUGUSTIN-UFUA ENAHORO: Media, Gender And Democracy: The Nigerian Video Industry As A Paradigm.University of JOS, (NIGERIA)

(28) SAMUEL BENAGR—Vestiges of the Postcolonial in Ghanaian video film practice.University Of Bedfordshire.

PROF. KATE ADOO ADEKU AND AMIE JOOF, .Gender, Media and Governance : Experiences from some African countries. (GHANA/SENEGAL)

..........................................................................................................................................................

1.00pm – 2.00pm - Lunch

...............................................................................................................................................

PLENARY -7 MEDIA, CONFLICT & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF CHEIKH ANTA DIOP (1923 - 1986)

TIME:2.00-3.00

CHAIRPERSNON : MRS. JEANNETTE QUARCOOPOME

(29) BAMIDELE OLUWASEUN- Utilizing Informatioin Media To Revitalize The Political Education For Sustainable Democracy In Sub-Saharan Africa.Faith Acadamy,Ota.(NIGERIA)

(30) GODFREY DANAAN- Ethnic Conflicts And Media Interventions In A Democracy: The Jos Episode.University Of JOS.(NIGERIA)

(31) ELIJAH CHIWOTA: Doing Good Governance From The Grassroots- A Mwanachi Perspective.Zimbabwe.(ZIMBABWE)

.................................................................................................................................................................

PLENARY -8 MEDIA & DEMOCRACY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF AMY GARVEY ( 1895– 1973)

TIME: 3.00pm -4.00pm

CHAIRPERSNON: PROF. BARFUOR ADJEI-BARWUAH

(32)AKPOJIVI UFUOMA- The Fairness Clause: An Examination Of Media Freedom During Electioneering Period In Nigeria .(UK)

(33)YANG JIAO- Internet, Investment Policies And Chinese Entrepreneurs In Ghana. University Of Florida.(U.S.A)

(34)BARNABAS THONDHLANA- Media, Political Rhetoric's And Political Violence.Zimbabwe.(ZIMBABWE)

....................................................................................................................................................................

MEDIA WORK SHOP -3

5.00pm- 6.00pm SESSION-2: PANEL DISCUSSION: 'Announcing of elections results' ahead of an Electoral Commission: When does 'announcing' become 'endorsement' of a particular political party contesting a democratic election?

The Panel aims to address and examine among others the location of such media practices, their constitutional legitimacy and their relevance to freedom of information in a democratic dispensation. It will seek to address media practises such as the 'announcing of elections results' ahead of an Electoral Commission or the 'deployment of Press Conferences' by political parties as political posturing during voting and ballot counting period of an election. The conference will address both the constitutional and ethical issues that arise from such practices and provide context for comparison, dialogue and analysis between media practices situated in different cultural-political environment. When does 'announcing' become 'endorsement' of a particular political party contesting a democratic election? What is the impact on the electorate of such early announcements of election results from electoral constituencies? What are the implications for social and national cohesion of such practice in fiercely contested elections? what is the way forward?

The Panel is represented by the Four (4) major political parties in Ghana that contested the last (2008) General Elections.

CHAIRPERSON: DR. YAW BAODU-AYEBOAFOH (General Manager –Newspapers-Graphic Corporation)

Panel Member: MR. BERNARD MONAH - PNC ( General-Secretary)

Panel Member: MR. WLIIAM DOWOKPOR - (Communications Director) CPP

Panel Member: MR. ASIEDU-NKATIA - (General –Secretary) NDC

Panel Member: MR. AKOTO AMPAW - LLB ( Member Ghana Bar Association,& Coalition on the Rights of Information Bill) Ghana

Panel Member: MR. DAN BOTWE - NPP

………………………………………………………………………………………………

6.00pm-6.30pm: OFFICIAL CLOSING CEREMONY ………………………………………………………………………………………………

http://amdmc.org/

MCT starts election reporting training for journalists

2010-07-14T00:50:00.001-07:00

The Media Council of Tanzania (MCT) will run training on election reporting for print-media journalists in the country between now and early August, this year. The MCT Manager for Publications, Research and Documentation, John Mireny said a total of 230 journalists will be trained under the programme supported by the UNDP Election Project Support (EPS) for Tanzania for the 2010 general elections. Nine trainers who will conduct the election reporting training began a five-day Training of Trainers (TOT) course at the MCT headquarters in Dar es Salaam on July 12.

Two facilitators – one Tanzanian Fili Karashani of Tanzania Press Centre and a Ghanaian - Kwami Ahiabenu,II a consultant at African Election Project, are running the course attended by editors and senior editors drawn from a number of media houses and media training centres. According to the MCT Executive Secretary, Kajubi Mukajanga, the course is intended to hone the professional skills of the journalists in covering the forthcoming general elections.

He told the participants for the TOT course at a brief opening ceremony, that they are expected to coach and mentor the mid-career journalists between now and November, this year. The trainers will conduct three-day courses for journalists in zones throughout the country.

The general elections in Tanzania are expected to be held on October 31, this year.

end

source : http://www.mct.or.tz/

ICT for Civic Engagement in Nigeria

2010-07-09T05:54:00.001-07:00

Participating in ICT for Civic Engagement in Nigeria taking place in Abuja from July 19th to 20th

Nigerians, and indeed the world, are collectively holding their breath in anticipation of the 2011 presidential election. Indeed this election's importance to the citizens of Nigeria and the good functioning of the government cannot be overstated. And no longer is there doubt as to the tremendous promise – and associated risks – of using information and communication technologies to enhance the effectiveness of both electoral activities and new approaches to reform, monitoring, and civic participation in the democratic process.

This upcoming symposium and workshop emerged from a July 2009 conference in which diverse non-governmental organizations (NGOs) made plain the requirements of robust state accountability and transparency for civil society to succeed with its missions – and the concomitant potential of ICTs to support these goals of participatory, inclusive and deliberative processes of decision-making. What became eminently clear from these NGO participants was that Nigeria now sits at a critical juncture with respect to this civic engagement, with all eyes focused upon the upcoming election.

out and about

2010-07-08T07:12:00.000-07:00

Yamoussoukro, Abidjan, Conakry, Nairobi, Dar Es Salaam,Lagos, Abuja

Serving at the Chair of the Jury for the Highway Africa New Media Awards 2010.

2010-06-19T08:33:00.001-07:00

The Awards, which were pioneered 9 years ago to highlight the role that digital technologies play in journalism and the media, are unique and prestigious awards within the profession of journalism on the continent. The awards reward pioneering, innovative and creative use of technology in doing journalism that serves Africa and its citizens.

Highway Africa New Media Awards 2010 @ 14th edition of the Highway Africa Conference, 4-7 July 2010 at Rhodes University- 3 categories:

· Individual/Student – awarded to individual persons who design or appropriate new affordable applications of communication technologies to overcome the limitations of existing infrastructure and/or capital resources.
· Not-for-Profit – awarded to users of appropriate media technology to advance and assist communities and persons limited by infrastructure and/or technological access.
· Corporate – awarded to corporate groups for creative and appropriate adaptation of technologies within

Awards Ceremony

Winners will be announced at the Telkom – Highway Africa New Media Awards ceremony on the evening of Sunday, 4 July 2010, in Grahamstown.

www.highwayafrica.com

AFRICAN ELECTIONS PROJECT RANKED INGENIOUS BY INNOVATION FAIR

2010-04-21T00:30:00.001-07:00

The African Elections Project was selected to be a part of 33 key projects out of 223 innovative projects submitted from around the globe and joined the rest of selected projects to participate in the World Bank Innovation Fair held in South Africa from the 12 – 15 of April with one of its partners International Institute for Sustainable Development.

The main theme for the occasion was "Innovation Fair: Moving beyond conflict" with a focus on two critical challenges of development in fragile states namely Communications for Governance and Service Delivery and Conflict and Violence Prevention. This initiative is directed towards uncovering a long lasting route to peace and security across the world by soliciting ideas from participating organizations. Selected participants came from over 40 countries which included India, Zimbabwe, Lebanon, Ghana, Sri Lanka, Yemen, DR Congo, Guinea-Bissau and Kenya.

This African Elections Project (AEP) was chosen for its work in the area of Communication for Governance and Service Delivery because of its innovative use of social media to develop capacity and monitor governance process prior to, during and after the elections. The project leverages the free, fair and unbiased media and the crucial role they play in elections such as providing impartial information thereby contributing to peace building during elections. .

Kwami Ahiabenu II, the representative for the African Elections Project opined that "the fair provided a platform for the exchange of ideas on how to replicate one project in a different context and how to improve ideas based on experience to reduce conflict conditions or the fear of a potential conflict.

The African Elections Project is aimed at developing the capacity of the media in ICTs in elections coverage while stimulating the provision of elections information and knowledge via its portal www.africanelections.org and other new media tools. African Elections Project has so far covered elections in Ghana, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique, Botswana, Togo, and Namibia with planned coverage of Cote d'Ivoire, Niger and Guinea in the pipe line. The project is coordinated by the International Institute for ICT Journalism (Penplusbytes) working hand in hand with key partners www.osisa.org and www.osiwa.org .

Signed

Jerry Sam, Project Manager,

Dr Riverson chairs Penplusbytes board

2010-04-12T00:57:00.001-07:00

A RENOWNED Ghanaian International research scientist, Dr Kwabena Riverson , has been appointed Chairman of the International Institute for Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) Journalism (Penplusbytes). Penplusbytes was established on July 18, 2001 and has over the nine years of its existence, grown into a large network of over 600 journalists in 35 countries across the globe.

As a leader in developing ICT journalism and also ensuring its commitment to improve ICT journalism, PenPlusBytes undertakes both face-to-face and online training of journalists on cutting edge, new media technologies and contemporary ICT issues.

A statement issued by PenPlusBytes said Dr Riverson, who is the team leader for the Enterprise & Institutional Repository and Digital Library Projects at CSIR where he is currently working to forge international collaboration in Information Management Research projects and also sits on the board on NTHC (USA) Ltd. and UIQ Services Ltd.

It named other board members as Ethan Zuckerman, USA; Charity Binka, Ghana; Gregg Zachary, USA; Kwami Ahiabenu, Ghana; Bryan Pearson, UK; Dan Gillmor, USA, with Andrew Kwesi Kafe, Ghana as secretary to the board.

The statement quoted Dr Riverson as pledging his commitment to ensure that "PenPlusBytes achieves its vision of driving excellence in ICT journalism".

Ghana’s Competitive Mobile Market Spurs Multiple Apps

2010-03-14T14:43:00.001-07:00

By Jeremiah Sam & Kwami Ahiabenu,II of penplusbytes.org, Ghana

Accra, Ghana)--Ataa Neequaye, a boat owner in the port area of Jamestown, said fishermen often used to throw some types of catch back into the sea rather than bring them to shore when local prices didn't make it worthwhile to haul them in. But now, equipped with mobile phones, fishermen can call ahead to contacts in various fish markets for price updates and sail to the most profitable destination, reducing waste and increasing incomes. Neequaye added that the phones, some of which can find signals as much as 15 to 20 nautical miles offshore from terrestrial cell towers, also allow the fishermen to call for supplies to be delivered to them or to report emergencies.

Onshore, traders in Ghana's largest market, Makola Market, are also benefiting from the mobile revolution. Maame Ama Donkor, a tomato "market queen" said phones help her significantly reduce the cost of business communications and slashes her traveling costs.

These are but two examples of the many ways in which Ghanaian individuals and businesses are using mobile phone applications to simplify their lives and boost their productivity. A vibrant and competitive mobile market, featuring five operators and a sixth (GLO) on its way in 2010, has created a market-driven enabling environment for useful applications in a variety of sectors-agriculture, commerce, health, education and more. What's more, mobile phone tools are likely to multiply as more users are able to access the internet from their handsets, either going online directly or by using their phones as a modem connected to a computer. (Click here to view the Ghana Communication Profile)

Transparent Markets

As in the fishing community, Ghanaian farmers are tapping mobile phones for up-to-date market information. For example, Esoko Ghana has developed a commodity index to track the prices of selected agricultural products across the country. Mark Davies, chief executive officer of Esoko Ghana, said the price information is sent to farmers across the country by SMS text messaging, thus giving the farmers enhanced market knowledge, more negotiating power and increased revenue potential. Esoko also provides weather updates, education on better farming practices and prices for farming inputs.

Mobile Money

A number of financial institutions are offering mobile financial services, which are expected to attract a huge amount of liquidity held by Ghanaians currently operating outside the banking system-the so-called 'unbanked'. MTN Ghana pioneered mobile money transfer in 2009, and other players are getting into the act. For example, Afric Xpress has introduced txtnpay, a system for sending money, paying bills, buying mobile prepaid airtime, checking bank balances and paying electronically for goods and services. Rhukaya Adams, a sales agent at txtnpay, says that a lot of people use this system to pay their cable television bills; Adams said people will soon be able to pay their utility bills with this system. Another payment services is offered by eTranzact, while most banks are now enabling client access to their bank accounts through mobile phones.

The health sector is also benefitting from mobile telephony. For example, Ghana's Ambulances Service Directorate reports that in some parts of rural Ghana, mobile phones have helped to drastically reduce childbirth-related mortality among women by creating a communication channel between patients and health care institutions in other locations.

Mobile phones are also providing a helping hand in the fight against counterfeit pharmaceutical drugs. A relatively new application called mPedigree, developed in Ghana, allows the purchaser of the drug to check its authenticity by sending a code number on the drug package to the legitimate manufacturer via a short-code (4digit) text message address. The sender receives a quick reply saying whether or not the drug is authentic.

Government in the Mobile Game

The government has also entered the mobile arena. The National Lottery Authority (NLA) has developed a new game called "Mobi Game 2 Sure" which makes use of mobile phones to attract customers. George Osei Akoto, account manager at NLA Mobi Game, said the game has been a big revenue generator for the lottery, which is a crucial part of government revenues.

Mobile phone applications are also now the norm on the political front. During Ghana's 2008 elections, a number of political parties used them in campaign communications and fundraising efforts, while election observers used mobiles for monitoring tasks. For example, the New Patriotic Party (NPP), used the mobile phone to raise funds by text message.

The Downside of Mobile Use - Crime

As with all new tools, they can be used for harmful purposes as well as beneficial ones, and mobile phones are no exception. In response, the National Communications Authority has announced plans to register all mobile users in order to combat some of these challenges. Ostensibly, registration would make it possible to track down callers suspected of illegal activities. So far there does not seem to be any public opposition voiced about registration.

References

1. Number of mobile users http://www.nca.org.gh/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=171&Itemid=103

2. Etranzact http://www.etranzact.com/

3. Txtnpay http://sb.txtnpay.net/index.php

4. Esoko http://www.esoko.com/

source :http://www.audiencescapes.org/ghana%E2%80%99s-competitive-mobile-market-spurs-multiple-apps-203

President Olusegun Obasanjo, former president of Nigeria and Kwami Ahiabenu,II - African Elections Project

2010-03-07T08:04:00.000-08:00

President Olusegun Obasanjo, former president of Nigeria and head of Africa Union Observer mission to Togo Presidential elections 2010 with Kwami Ahiabenu,II Consulting Editor of African Elections Project, coverage of Togo Presidential Elections 2010 www.africanelections.org/togo

3rd Penplusbytes Global Online Course in ICT Journalism (April 20 to July 20 2010)

2010-02-22T05:05:00.001-08:00

After successfully pioneering an online course in ICT Journalism in 2006, The International Institute for Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Journalism Penplusbytes second online course took place in 2007. Participants from Africa, Asia, North America Europe and Australia have taken advantage of this unique learning opportunity to grow their knowledge of ICT Journalism. We are pleased to announce the 3rd Global Online Course in ICT Journalism (April 20 to July 20 2010). Course details are provided below :

Course Objective: Participants will be exposed to the wider context of ICTs assisted journalism including its history, how these technologies are impacting on the world of journalism, how ICT can be used in producing stories and how to manage change process in using innovative ICT tools.
Course Description and Goals: This course teaches the theory and concept of ICTs journalism; the impact of ICTs on Journalism and how to increase excellence in journalism using ICTs as a tool.

At the end of the course, the participants will learn four main set of skills:
You will learn and understand broad spectrum of ICTs tools available for journalism
You will learn how to research and publish content online
You will learn that despite that the proliferation of technology for journalism the fundamental principles of journalism still apply.
You will learn how to use a selection of ICT tools for journalism

Prerequisites: This course does not have any special prerequisites though participants will need to have basic computer skills such sending and receiving mails, managing files and browsing the Internet. The course assumes participants are practicing journalists who have mastered journalism skills.

Class Meeting: Participants are expected to meet online via group discussion weekly, it is expected that a participants must devote at least five hours per week online.

Course Content
Introduction to ICT Journalism – concept, theory and definition
ICT tools for Journalism – web 2.0/3.0, wikis, blogs, podcasting, online collaborative tools, newsroom content management system and publishing platforms
The role of information and knowledge management in the newsroom
Specialization in ICT Journalism
Online Research
Business Models of Online Journalism
Future of ICT Journalism

Materials : Participants will be provided with regular resources during the duration of the course, these resources will available mostly online or via CD ROM.

Grading: Participants are expected to undertake weekly assignment, participate in online discussion, make use of ICT tools and produce a final project work to be published on Penplusbytes website.

Certificates :
All participants who fully successfully complete the course and would be awarded a certificate.

Application
Please complete application form and write a separate one-page statement on how this seminar will help you in meeting your journalistic and leadership goals.

To fill out your application form online and submit your statements go to http://www.emailmeform.com/fid.php?formid=544722

Alternatively you can email completed form and statement to or for your inquires :
EMAIL : training AT penplusbytes.org

Closing date for receipt of application and statement is 20th March 2010.

Notification of acceptance: 2nd April 2010

Engaging, informative, and high-quality online training course created and offered by Penplusbytes.

Metering Paid Content So It Protects -- Even Grows -- Online Ad Revenue

2010-02-22T02:57:00.001-08:00

It used to be simpler: If you want to maximize online ad revenue, don't even think about charging for your content.

But several speakers at Friday's paidContent conference said that the relationship is becoming less black and white. And some, notably FT.com Managing Director Rob Grimshaw, argued that paid content can actually increase online ad revenue.

"There's no tradeoff between having a subscription business and an ad business," Grimshaw said. "The more registered and paid subscribers, the more successful the advertising that results."

FT.com, the online edition of the Financial Times newspaper, has become the standard-bearer for the so-called metered approach to charging for online content that The New York Times and others plan to adopt. FT.com users can read a few articles each month before they're asked to register, and 10 articles before they're asked to buy a subscription.

Grimshaw said FT.com has 1.9 million registered users and 121,000 paying users, categories of users that advertisers find significantly more valuable than visitors who have not invested the time and/or cash in the site. He said such users are especially valuable in a time of declining ad revenue: "In a real tough market, it gives you a competitive edge."

The New York Times abandoned its earlier paid content venture, Times Select, not because it wasn't making money (220,000 users were spending $10 million a year), but because the paper concluded it would make more money from advertising on freely-available pages.

Now the paper hopes its metered subscription model will drive overall revenue.

Martin Nisenholtz, senior vice president for digital operations at the Times, said:

"Our goal is to maximize overall revenue. The goal isn't to say we've created largest circulation revenue base or the biggest advertising revenue base. It is to maintain the largest overall base of revenue. The meter has to do with subscriber and advertising management. If you move the meter out and in, the model you create around that can be maximized for overall total revenue."

Nisenholtz declined to provide specific numbers, but Steven Brill, co-founder of the Journalism Online system to enable content charging, said he estimates that the Times will put less than 10 percent of its online ad revenue at risk with the metered online subscription approach it is developing.

It's unclear to what extent paid users can boost the online ad revenue of smaller publications. Jim Shine, publisher of the 32,000-circulation Lima News in Lima, Ohio, told me last year that such a boost to ad revenue had not yet materialized from the pay wall the paper installed last August.

Times Company CEO Arthur Sulzberger cautioned against drawing industry-wide lessons from New York Times experiments: "Answers that we are coming up with are not necessarily the right answer for other news organizations locally. There are other opportunities that might work for them."

http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=131&aid=178187

Ghana to Host focuss info initiative workshop on the use of information sharing and collaboration tools

2010-01-13T02:52:00.001-08:00

On Thursday 28th January, Kwami Ahiabenu II will facilitate a Focuss.Info workshop in Ghana at the Institute for Scientific and Technological Information (INSTI) of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, Accra which is based on an award granted by the Focuss.Info Initiative. The workshop is expected to be attended by a cross session of professionals from academia, research, NGOs and Information and Communication Technologies sector.

After a successful Focuss.Info workshop in South Africa, this will become the second workshop in which a local workshop facilitator in Africa, Asia or South America aims at
promoting new information and communication (ICT) skills among peers in the domain of global development research and cooperation.
As a result, the Initiative improves access to information, a fundamental right that strengthens democracy, and supports human rights. The objective of Focuss.Info also correspondents to the work of UNESCO, which helps to develop effective 'infostructures', including developing information standards, management tools and fostering access at the community level.

The workshop will emphasize on social bookmarking as a key tool for information sharing and collaboration. This is important, because the search engine incorporated in www.focuss.info is only harvesting and indexing the websites that have been selected as value and stored in social bookmarking accounts (such as Delicious.com) by peers in global development cooperation.

The workshop content will be uploaded as a dairy to a weblog located on the website of Focuss.Info - by clicking on 'Focuss Workshops' and 'Kwami Ahiabenu'. Based on this
interaction, the workshop is enriched with more information from the readers of the workshop weblog and also shows and tells how the local community can use social bookmarking as an online information sharing and collaboration tool.

Please keep visiting www.focuss.info and following the workshop of the Focuss.Info Intiative in Ghana or other workshop facilitators.

contributing content for Audiencescapes

2010-01-01T08:17:00.000-08:00

Together with my colleague, Jeremiah Sam we are writing four articles on

1) mobile phones and development
2) community radio
3) youth and media
4) microblogging and social websites

for publishing to audiencescapes
visit audiencescapes website later this month to read these stories from Ghana.

African Elections Project 8 countries Done, 45 more to go

2009-12-08T01:19:00.000-08:00

2008 and 2009 saw us covering elections in 6 countries namely

1.Ghana
2. Malawi
3. Mozambique
4. Mauritania
5. Namibia
6. Botswana
with pending elections in
7. Guinea
8. Cote d'lvoire

African Elections Project (AEP) is aiming at covering 10 countries in 2010. Using ICTs powered by the media, AEP is helping in the democratic process on the continent

COLLOQUIUM ON AFRICAN ELECTIONS: BEST PRACTICES AND CROSS SECTORAL COLLABORATION

2009-11-19T05:02:00.001-08:00

I presented a paper at COLLOQUIUM ON AFRICAN ELECTIONS: BEST PRACTICES AND CROSS SECTORAL COLLABORATION from November 11-14, 2009 at Accra-Ghana, press release below

ACCRA, GHANA – More than 100 practitioners and experts on elections from 25 African countries will convene in Accra Nov. 12-14, to assess recent elections across the continent and develop recommendations for standards that could mitigate conflict and improve election processes. Recommendations from the colloquium will be aimed at enhancing prospects for credible elections in Africa by heightening standards of professionalism among election administration officials, political parties, civic groups, security services and the media.
The Colloquium on African Elections: Best Practices and Cross-Sectoral Collaboration will focus on Ghana's 2008 elections, which were universally viewed as credible despite heated political tensions and a razor-thin margin between the candidates. Participants hope to draw on lessons from the experience in Ghana, where for the second time in less than a decade, political power has
changed hands from the ruling to an opposition party through the ballot box.
Effective collaboration among all sectors of the electoral process helped ease tensions, enhanced transparency and built voter confidence in the election results.
Participants will also explore the differences between the Ghanaian experience and elections in other countries such as Kenya and Zimbabwe, which experienced gross irregularities, fraud and conflict. They will identify the factors that contributed to different outcomes in each of these cases and discuss how to foster credible elections on the continent based on these case studies.
"This is an opportunity for Africans to reflect on our own experiences and build upon our successes. As a regional initiative, this conference will bolster electoral reformers, and civic and political stakeholders on the continent," said Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, chair of the Electoral Commission in Ghana.
At the conclusion of the colloquium, participants will release a communiqué summarizing their discussions and sharing their recommendations for election standards in Africa.
Co-organizers of the colloquium include the National Democratic Institute, Africa Center for Strategic Studies, International Foundation for Electoral Systems, Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy, Open Society Initiative for West Africa and United Nations Development Programme.

COLLOQUIUM ON AFRICAN ELECTIONS: BEST PRACTICES AND CROSS SECTORAL COLLABORATION

2009-11-09T02:23:00.001-08:00

November 11-14, 2009

Accra, Ghana

The International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), the National Democratic Institute (NDI), the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy (NIMD), Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA), and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) will co-sponsor a Colloquium on African Elections from 12‐14 November 2009 in Accra, Ghana.

The colloquium will review the challenges and best practices in the conduct of elections in Africa, with a particular focus on lessons that could be shared from Ghana's 2008 electoral process.

Approximately 100 participants from 25 African countries will attend the colloquium. Participants will include elections commissioners, political party leaders, civic advocates, leaders of elections monitoring groups, journalists and high level officials of security services that oversee peace building and law enforcement missions around elections.

The Colloquium on African Elections: Best Practices and Cross-Sectoral Collaboration will seek to address two critical points:

1) the effective performance of entities involved in the electoral process and

2) the linkages that should exist among stakeholders, and how to foster cross-sectoral collaboration during elections.

Examining the strengths and weaknesses of the Ghanaian electoral process and how it compares with other African countries will facilitate sharing knowledge and strengthening linkages among different sectors of the electoral process. The anticipated outcome of discussions at the colloquium will be to identify guidelines on how to conduct credible elections, ease political tensions, enhance transparency, and facilitate the acceptance of genuine election results by political contestants and their supporters. Sharing best practices among African practitioners will enhance prospects for democratic elections across the continent and inspire professional conduct among various stakeholders in countries preparing for upcoming elections. The Consortium of organizers are hoping to compile the cases of best practices in elections in Africa and publish on a book form.

African Elections Project to Cover Botswana Elections 2009

2009-10-18T12:47:00.001-07:00

GABORONE Botswana, October 15 2009 –

African Elections Project To Cover Botswana Elections 2009.

The African Elections Project (AEP) www.africanelections.org/bostwana will be covering Botswana's 10^th general election, taking place on October 16 2009, to elect parliamentary and council representatives. AEP in conjunction with its partners, Media Institute For Southern Africa (MISA) www.misa.org held a two-day workshop aimed at equipping journalists with cutting edge Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) skills in elections coverage in Gaborone on 28-29 September 2009.

AEP was established in 2008 to empower journalists to cover elections using Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) across the continent. After a successful take-off in Ghana, Cote d' Ivoire, Mozambique, Malawi and Guinea, AEP also launched its Namibia phase of the project in Windhoek on 13th October 2009.

In Southern Africa, AEP is covering Botswana www.africanelections.org/botswana elections schedule to take place on 16th October 2009, Mozambique's elections www.africanelections.org/mozambique) taking place on 28th October 2009 and Namibia's elections www.africanelections.org/namibia taking place from 28th to 29th November 2009. The Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa www.osisa.org is providing funding for these countries coverage.

The role of the media in ensuring free and fair elections is indispensable. All over the world the media is playing this important role of ensuring free and fair elections by working with all stakeholders across board.

The media can strengthen the electoral process by providing independent information through impartial coverage. Three important focal issues come into play: access to information on the political process, ability to undertake investigative journalism and documentation of lessons and experiences from the electioneering process.

The African Elections Project is coordinated by Ghana based International Institute for ICT Journalism (www.penplusbytes.org) working hand in hand with key partners.

AEP Botswana

Associate Editor

Bay Tsimane

African Elections Project- Botswana, Namibia and Mozambique

2009-09-17T14:39:00.001-07:00

African Elections Project

Elections are crucial bedrock for democracies and enabling a free and open society. The role of the media in ensuring successful election is very crucial. All over the world the media is playing this important role of ensuring free and fair elections by working with all stakeholders across board.The media can strengthen the electoral process by providing independent information through impartial coverage. Three important elements come into play: access to information on the political process, ability to undertake investigate journalism and document lessons and experiences from the electioneering process.

There are a lot of challenges and problems facing the media in the area of election coverage. Key among them is lack of access to real-time information, lack of capacity to undertake investigative journalism surrounding elections, use of ICTs in coverage, inability to produce balanced reports and to incorporate user content are some of the challenges and problems facing the media during elections coverage. In order to address some of these problems, African Elections Project was launched in September 2000 with the following key activity areas :

v Training for senior editors, journalists and reporters

v SMS application in coverage and monitoring

v Election Guide for the Media

v Information and Knowledge Online Portal

v Knowledge products for the media

v Media Content Monitoring

With funding from OSISA - The Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa www.osisa.org working with key partners, African Elections Project is providing coverage for the following countries in the Southern Africa region :

1. Mozambique http://www.africanelections.org/mozambique/

http://twitter.com/mozambiquevotos

2. Namibia http://www.africanelections.org/namibia/

http://twitter.com/namibiaelection

3. Botswana http://www.africanelections.org/botswana/

http://twitter.com/botswanaelects

If you are in the region or any of the above countries and want to get involve with this exciting project send a mail to

info@africanelections.org

Hope to hear from you soon

Editor

www.africanelections.org

Countries Covered so far :

Ghana www.africanelections.org/ghana
Mauritania www.africanelections.org/mauritania
Malawi www.africanelections.org/malawi

Pending Elections :

Cote d'Ivoire www.africanelections.org/cotedivoire,

Niger www.africanelections.org/niger

and Guinea www.africanelctions.org/guinea

"Reporting Democracy: Media and Elections in Africa"

2009-08-13T11:52:00.001-07:00

Speaking at highway africa part of "Reporting Democracy: Media and Elections in Africa" panel scheduled for Tuesday, 8 September, 2009 :
Anchor: Professor Jane Duncan
Izak Minnaar, Head: News Research, SABC
Kwami Ahiabenu,II Director, Penplusbytes
Kubi Rama, Deputy Director, Gender Links
Manoah Esipisu, Deputy Director, Communications & Public Affairs Division, Commonwealth
William Bird, Executive Director, Media Monitoring Africa

this year's theme is Reporting Africa – 2010, Development & Democracy and the event takes place from 5-8 September 2009 at Eden Grove Complex, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa

African Communications Educators meet in Accra next week

2009-08-05T01:18:00.001-07:00

The university of Ghana, School of Communications is hosting next week from Tuesday 11th to Thursday 13 August 2009, African Communications Educators under the umbrella of The African Council for Communication Education (ACCE). According to ACCE website it is a non-profit-making non-governmental organization was formed 1975 with funding and support from UNESCO. Initially, it acted as an association of Heads of Schools of Journalism and Communication on the African continent. The association later transformed itself into the only regional organization of Africanist communication scholars and practitioners in Africa. Currently, its headquarters is located in Nairobi, Kenya.

The conference topics are very interesting, highlights below :

Plenary 1 – Communication And Democracy

Plenary 2 – Communication Theory

Plenary 3 – Professional Development, Training & Standards

Acce Business Day

Plenary 1 – Getting Published In The Africa Media Review: Processes And Prospects
Plenary 2 – Building The Future Of Acce
Acce Organizational Matters – Elections Or Formation Of Interim Co-Ordinating Committee

(1) Communication, Language & Culture – Panel A

(2) Communication, Language & Culture – Panel B

(3) Communication & Gender

(4) Communication & Democracy

(5) Communication & Globalization

(6) Communication & Development Challenges – Panel A (Health)

(7) Communication & Development Challenges – Panel B (Health)

(8) Communication & Development Challenges – Panel C (Mixed Development Challenges)

(9) Community Communications

(10) ICTs And New Media – Panel A

(11) ICTs And New Media – Panel B

(12) Classroom-Workplace – A Dialogue

(13) Professional Development, Training & Standards

(14) Communication Ethics

(15) Communication And Conflict

(16) Graduate Studies Forum

Speakers at the opening ceremony includes
-Prof Alex Quarmyne Former UNESCO Regional Communication Adviser for Africa Founding ACCE Member
-Prof Kwame Karikari, Executive Director Media Foundation for West Africa
-Prof Alfred Opubor, Coordinator Communication for Education and Development (Cotonou) Founding ACCE Member

Dr Audrey Gadzekpo, Acting Director, School of Communication Studies, University of Ghana (Legon) is delivering the welcome remarks with Ms. Joyce Aryee, Executive Director, Ghana Chamber Mines, serving the role of chairperson.
His Excellency, Mr. John Mahama, the Vice President of the republic of Ghana is expected to deliver the official Opening Address
Also in attendance will be Prof Nii Boi Tagoe, The Vice Chancellor, University of Ghana

On day 2, Wednesday 12 August, Penplusbytes is organising a workshop on ICT JOURNALISM and Blogging

Also penplusbytes is going to provide live text of the event via www.twitter.com/penplusbytes

I was not involved as a member of the local organising committee but helped with technology side of things, build the conference website http://acceaccra2009.org/
which was quick and dirty on word press
hoping to provide wifi if we get connectivity options right during the conference

One key person, I am looking at meeting during this meeting is Prof Guy Berger from South Africa, Rhodes University, who is speaking on " Social Networking and African Journalists: A Social Capital Perspective on Highway Africa as the Continent's Largest Annual Gathering of African Media Practitioners" under the Professiona Development, Training and Standard Plenary on Day 2

To download the full programme go to http://acceaccra2009.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/acce2009_programme_final-17-07-2009.doc

KS/KM in a World Of Change - An Open KM4Dev Community Gathering, Brussels, October 6-8, 2009

2009-07-30T06:08:00.001-07:00

KS/KM in a World Of Change - An Open KM4Dev Community Gathering, Brussels, October 6-8, 2009

We are in a time of significant global change. Climate change impacts agriculture, water, health and other development areas. Global financial crises affect the poor and everything they need. How can knowledge sharing and knowledge management help us address these complex and interrelated issues? Join us for three days of thinking and working together on these issues at the 2009 KM4Dev annual gathering. Over the three days, we will have both separate theme focused conversations and then we will weave them together to think about the role of KM/KS separately and collectively.

Pre-workshop - October 5

Side meetings:
- IKM-Emergent IKM-Emergent_francophone_discussion
- Francophone CoP Francophone_KM4DEV_CoP_discussion
- Welcome to KM4Dev!!! An introduction to the community for newcomers

Evening plan: for those who arrive before 8pm, dinner reservations will be made at La Gioconda[1]

Day 1- October 6

Morning:

Introductory activity (participatory) and introduction to KM4Dev for newcomers
Plenary - keynote about complexity, interrelatedness followed by a World Cafe conversation on the topic
Lunch
Theme huddles - identify key areas where KM/KS can have a positive impact in the work in the sectors, e.g.:
- Agriculture
- Water and Sanitation aka WASHuddle
- Climate Change
- Health/HIV-AIDs
- Gender
- Decentralization and local governance
- Education and Learning (aka "eduhuddle")

Afternoon Regroup (all participants):

KS activity (e.g. River of Life)
Short speaker/self-run video interviews of each other/inspiring selection of related YouTube videos and interesting websites

Day 2- October 7

Morning:

Welcome back, short interim report outs
Back to thematic huddles
Lunch

Afternoon:

Hands-on Social Media workshops - one goal is to start capturing report outs from huddles on some social media
Interactive report outs

Day 3 - October 8

Morning:

Welcome back/activity
What do we do with what we have surfaced - weaving and integration
Lunch

Afternoon:

KM4Dev community meeting
Farewell

TIC et élections en Mauritanie : LES JOURNALISTES RENFORCENT LEUR CAPACITES

2009-07-13T12:16:00.001-07:00

COMMUNIQUE DE PRESSE

Un atelier de formation sur la couverture des élections en utilisant les techniques de l'information et de la communication (TIC) a été organisé le 9 juillet 2009 dans les locaux de l'Université Virtuelle Africaine à Nouakchott en Mauritanie à l'intention d'une trentaine de journalistes provenant de tous les médias mauritaniens.
Le séminaire organisé par l'Institut international des journalistes TIC ''Penplusbytes'' en collaboration avec le soutien de Open Society Initiative for West Africa visait à renforcer les capacités des journalistes afin qu'ils puissent couvrir de façon efficace les prochaines élections dans le pays, grâce aux TIC.

Le jour de cette table ronde, les journalistes issus de la télévision, de la radio, de la presse en ligne, de la presse et des radios communautaires ont eu droit a des communications sur ''le cadre légal des élections'', ''l'organisation pratique des élections'', ''l'excellence dans la couverture des élections avant, pendant et après'', ''le rôle du reportage d'investigation dans la couverture des élections''.
La présentation sur le système électoral a été faite par Me Cheikhany Jules, Juriste et Expert des questions électorales à la Commission Electorale Nationale Indépendante (CENI) .

La deuxième communication a été essentiellement consacrée à des exercices pratiques sur le journalisme d'investigation en période électorale animée par Gérard Guedegbe, Secrétaire général du Forum Africain des Reporters d'Investigations. Les journalistes ont suivi dans un premier temps des démonstrations sur la création d'un blog, la mise en ligne des photos, des sons.

Par la suite, les professionnels des médias ont été invités à créer leurs propres blogs, assistés des organisateurs.
Quant au Président du Penplusbytes, M. Kwami Ahiabenu II, il a fait une présentation sur l'importance des TIC dans le journalisme et a exposé les composantes du projet sur les élections en Afrique mis en œuvre grâce au partenariat agissant entre Penplusbytes et Osiwa.

Le séminaire sur la couverture des élections en utilisant les TIC a été ouvert par le Président du Penplusbytes, M. Kwami Ahiabenu II, le Chargé de Progamme Média et TIC à OSIWA, Ben Akoh, M Hassan Diouk Chargé de Programme à l'IPCD, partenaire local de Penplusbytes. Dans son intervention il a tenu à saluer la structure pour le financement de cet atelier. Mais surtout, M. Kwami Ahiabenu et le Penplusbytes pour la contribution à la formation des journalistes Mauritaniens sur la couverture électorale aux moyens des TIC.

Le président du Penplusbytes, M. Kwami Ahiabenu II, lui a insisté sur la nécessité de former les journalistes à l'utilisation des TIC pour réussir les élections en Mauritanie. Mais surtout permettre à ceux-ci de participer à la création de contenu sur le net.

www.africanelections.org/mauritania

Creativity is a drug I cannot live without.Cecil B. DeMille (1881 - 1959)

2009-07-01T13:34:00.001-07:00

African Elections Project (AEP)

2009-06-17T17:18:00.001-07:00

Our African Elections Project(AEP) is growing and we are happy to add http://www.africanelections.org/mauritania/ to our vision of creating an online space for elections information and knowledge in Africa
enjoy your visit to the great African Elections online resource

quote of today

2009-06-17T17:16:00.001-07:00

The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.

Niels Bohr (1885 - 1962)

‘Sakawa’ deals and money transfer

2009-06-09T02:38:00.001-07:00

Internet fraudsters operating in the 'sakawa' underworld are said to have deeply penetrated some money transfer outlets with enticing offers to enable them to retrieve large sums of money sent to them by their victims abroad.

A case in point is a lady attendant at one of the transfer outlets in Accra alleged to have been compromised by 'sakawa' boys with huge sums of money in 'kickbacks' in lieu of the presentation of correct documents for the collection of their remittances.

The attendant (name withheld) allegedly collects 10 per cent of the amounts involved from 'sakawa' boys who present code numbers and their personal identity cards to collect money in the name of females and 20 per cent from those who do not present identity cards.

The system of money transfer requires the recipient to produce a code number from' the sender and recipient's national identification, such as passport, driving licence or voter ID card, in order to redeem the money sent.

Meanwhile, the 'sakawa' boys pose as females to deceive their victims and money is sent to them in the female names they present. In their bid to retrieve the money, they have struck a deal with the lady attendant to circumvent the requirement by not presenting the appropriate identity cards or presenting only the code numbers.

In a practice believed to be widespread, money transfer attendants allegedly demand big percentages before obliging to the deal, sometimes to the displeasure of the 'sakawa' boys.

A source at Accra New Town, whose lead the Daily Graphic followed to ascertain the deal, said while transacting a business at one of the money transfer outlets at the Accra North Post Office recently, he eavesdropped on a bargain between a suspected 'sakawa' boy and a lady at one of the counters on the percentage to pay on the money he was to collect.

The source said he was confused initially because he thought it was the responsibility of the sender, not the receiver, to pay the transfer charges. It was curiosity that made him know that the 'sakawa' boy wanted to collect the money in the name of a female.

"The lady told the guy that since he did not bring any ID card the percentage will be higher. After taking my money, I decided to wait a while to watch what went on at that counter. I spent almost three hours there and can you imagine that about 10 boys who came there to pick money were all taking the money in female names? Mr Editor, this lady is making money over there," he wrote to the Daily Graphic.

On a verification mission to the transfer post at the Accra North Post Office, some clients who had gone there to transact business were observed giving money to some of the attendants but the purpose of the gesture was not clear.

Although the financial manager in charge of money transfer at the Accra North Post Office could not immediately confirm or deny the allegation, she indicated that in the past there had been reported misconduct on the part of some of the attendants; for which reason they had been reshuffled.

Some of the 'sakawa' operatives have also targeted the Ghana Post Company (GPC) as another major conduit for sending messages to and receiving parcels from their victims abroad.

On a daily basis, 'sakawa' boys troop to the GPC Headquarters in Accra and other post offices elsewhere to collect large quantities of parcels."

Some 'workers at the GPC Headquarters confirmed to the Daily Graphic that the "sakawa' boys were always lurking around the vicinity to collect parcels.

The difficulty facing the company, however, is that it cannot determine a fraudulent parcel unless it is based on a tip-off, a fact acknowledged by the Deputy Managing Director (Operations & Development) of the GPC, Mr Nicholas N.Y. Dery.

He said without a tip-off from a sending administration about the fraudulent nature of a parcel, "we will go ahead and deliver".

Mr Dery cited two instances when the company had to return parcels to the sending units in the US and Canada because they were deemed to have been fraudulently sent.

In the early days of 'sakawa', the 'Swedru boys', who are widely acknowledged as the pioneers of cyber fraud in Ghana, used the post office as the main conduit for sending large volumes of letters and nude pictures of ladies, mostly scanned from magazines, to their victims abroad.

Some of the 'sakawa' boys managed to lure their victims to Ghana, put them in plush hotels, squeezed all the money on them and left them stranded in town.

Security sources at the GPC recalled instances when some of the foreign victims who could not buy air tickets back home had to wander along the corridors of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service, hoping for salvation.

In one instance, according to the sources, a white lady who was lured into the country was dispossessed of every money, impregnated and abandoned in misery by 'sakawa' boys.

With the passage of time, the use of the post office for correspondence with their victims became unattractive for the 'sakawa' boys, as officials of the company began intercepting volumes of the correspondence and, with the collaboration of the police, succeeded in arresting some of the boys.

The Internet, thus, became a safer, faster and more preferred option for the 'Swedru boys' and in no time they infested all the major cities of the country with the cyber crime.

The proliferation of Internet cafes, their accessibility and affordability, as well as growing ICT literacy rate among the population and the potential wealth the Internet offers, have all conspired to make online crime a rather daunting task for an emerging ICT country such as Ghana.

While acknowledging the government's plans to address the problem through the enactment of a Cyber Security Law and the establishment of a Cyber Emergency Response Team as steps in the right direction, an ICT consultant, Mr Kwami Ahiabenu, said, "We have a long way to go in our attempt at resolving this problem."

He said the security agencies, for instance, lacked resources and capacity to deal with the complex nature of cyber crime in terms of policing online space, making arrests and prosecuting suspects.

He said as of now the situation clearly indicated that Ghana was not prepared for the lCT race, otherwise pre-emptive measures would have been taken, knowing very well that cyber crime was part of the ICT revolution.

The complicity of some policemen in the cyber crime, as exemplified by the recent arrest of a policeman for allegedly defrauding a Namibian of $7,900, and the admission by DSP Felix Mawusi of the CID that the police lacked the capacity and logistics to combat cyber crime underline the enormous security challenge facing the nation.

Source: Daily Graphic

African Elections Project launched in Malawi

2009-05-20T22:27:00.001-07:00

The International Institute for ICT Journalism, based in Ghana, has launched the first ever elections project for Malawi. The president of the institute, Kwami Ahiabenu, says it's designed to promote the use of Information and Communication Technology tools (ICTs) in generating election information.

Malawi will hold national elections on May 19.

"For any elections, people ... want to know how they can participate effectively in the democratic process. We believe that [by] using ... ICTs, we can actually help the flow of information, and [provide] knowledgeable elections both on-line and off-line," he says.

Ahiabenu says the project will train senior editors, journalists and reporters and develop and distribute an election guide for the media. It will also provide election coverage using SMS (Short Message Service) text messaging and an Online Portal (www.africanelections.org/malawi).

He says mobile phone users in Malawi will be able to access election news updates and certified results through a short code service number (2009) provided by local mobile phone network provider Telekoms Network Malawi (TNM). Observers can also subscribe to e-mail newsfeeds.

The coordinator of the project in Malawi, Victor Kaonga, says it will open Malawi's electoral process to the outside world. "I think generally the world is now looking at how Malawi will perform at this election. The project will contribute towards sharing of information and ... to the generation of information here in Malawi. I guess the world will be monitoring whatever is happening and will [help improve democracy in the country and] also the democracy of the Internet." he says.

The Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa is funding the project, which has also been launched in Ghana, Ivory Coast and Guinea.

The executive director of Media Council of Malawi, Baldwin Chamwaka, welcomed the development, saying Malawi should be proud to be the first country in Southern Africa where the African Elections Project has been launched this year.

Source: voanews.com

African Elections Project launched in Malawi

2009-05-10T05:30:00.000-07:00

African Elections Project launched in Malawi

Across Africa, elections are now becoming the de facto means of selecting political leaders; however, there is a dearth of elections information and knowledge online. As a means of contributing to resolve this problem, the African Elections Project was conceived to provide coverage of elections using Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) across the continent.

After a successful take-off in Ghana, Cote d' lvoire and Guinea, the African Elections Project (AEP) launched its Malawi phase of the project in Blantyre on 6^th May 2009. The Malawi project has the following key components : Training for senior editors, journalists and reporters; development and dissemination of an election guide for the media, an SMS/Mobile application in election coverage and monitoring; information and knowledge Online Portal ( www.africanelections.org/malawi ) and Knowledge products for the media and Media Content Monitoring. Through this project, mobile phone users in Malawi will be able to access election news updates and certified results through a short code service number (2009) provided by Telekoms Network Malawi (TNM) whilst email users will be able to subscribe to newsfeeds directly from the website. Malawi Presidential and Parliamentary elections is scheduled to take place on 19th May 2009.

At the launch of this project in Blantyre, the Executive Director of Media Council of Malawi (MCM), Mr. Baldwin Chiyamwaka said "this project is a welcome development since it provides country specific relevant elections information contributed by journalists and ordinary citizens. Also, it integrates SMS as broadcast, monitoring and citizen journalism tool, as mobile phones have become increasingly preferred means of communication in Africa due to their convenience and relatively low cost of deployment". He added that Malawi should be proud to be the first country in Southern Africa where the African Elections Project has been launched this year.

Also present at the launch were key partners including Malawi Electoral Support Network (MESN), National Media Institute for Southern African (NAMISA) and National Black Programming Consortium (NBPC).

In a message, Ms. Thandi Mbvundula, the ICT Programme Manager for the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) said "We are excited to be part of this project and to support its launch within the Southern African region, primarily because of its contributory role in deepening democracy and supporting the creation of open societies through capacity building for the media, while at the same time providing a unique online elections information and knowledge platform that will eventually provide transparent access to the electoral processes across the African continent".

The African Elections Project-Malawi is coordinated by the International Institute for ICT Journalism ( www.penplusbytes.org ) working hand in hand with key partners with funding from the Open Society Initiative for Southern African (OSISA - www.osisa.org )

Signed

Victor Kaonga

Project Coordinator (Malawi)

www.africanelections.org/malawi

Benin hosts Penplusbytes Communication Design Workshop

2009-04-27T14:41:00.001-07:00

Thirty (30) West African Newspaper and Magazine Designers from both Francophone and Anglophone speaking West African countries are meeting at the Universite d'Abomey Calavi, Campus Numerique Francophone de Cotonou in Benin for the 2nd West African Communication Design Workshop.

Thirty (30) West African Newspaper and Magazine Designers from both Francophone and Anglophone speaking West African countries are meeting at the Universite d'Abomey Calavi, Campus Numerique Francophone de Cotonou in Benin for the 2nd West African Communication Design Workshop.

Opening the workshop, Guy Constant Ehoumi, deputy president of Union des Professionnels des Medias du Benin - UPMB (Journalists Union of Benin) said they are pleased to welcome participants from West African countries to Contonou for the workshop and asked the participants to take advantage of this unique training opportunity to learn more about how to improve the design and layout of their various publications.

The workshop which runs from 6th to 10th April 2009, focuses on visual theory, design as a profession, working on publications in a newsroom and designing for different audiences. This short course also engages already existing knowledge about what constitutes good newspaper/magazine. In addition to the main course, a group of participants are taking a Training of Trainers (TOT) course in design communications.

Speaking on the objectives of the course, the president of Penplusbytes, Kwami Ahiabenu II, said "unfortunately most training programmes for the media turn to forget the role of design in the media and we have come out with this workshop to provide capacity building for design communicators and graphic design in West Africa thereby filling a major training gap."

Participants to the workshop are drawn from the following West Africa countries including: Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Senegal, Ghana, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Cote D’Ivoire and The Gambia.

Two key experts in design communications namely; Shalen Gajadhar of Rhodes University, South Africa and Nahmsath Yabouri, an Open Source expert based in Togo are the key facilitators for this course.

The second workshop training course on Design Communication 2009 is jointly organized by The International Institute for ICT Journalism www.penplusbytes.org, Highway Africa, Digital Media Foundation in partnership and with funding from Open Society Initiative of West Africa (OSIWA), www.osiwa.org.

watch video of opening ceremony at

http://penplusybytes.ning.com/video/design-communications-2-benin

African Elections Project Malawi - AEP www.africanelections.org/malawi

2009-04-27T11:33:00.001-07:00

Malawi Elections Project Scope The African Elections Project (AEP) is aimed at developing the capacity of the media in ICTs in order for them to use it as a tool for election coverage and the provision of elections information and knowledge for Elections in Africa

The African Elections Project- Malawi is coordinated by the International Institute for ICT Journalism www.penplusbytes.org working hand in hand with key partners with funding from Open Society Initiative for Southern African www.osisa.org Elections Project Scope

The African Elections Project (AEP) is aimed at developing the capacity of the media in ICTs in order for them to use it as a tool for election coverage and the provision of elections information and knowledge for Elections in Africa

The sub levels of this project are:

* Training for senior editors, journalists and reporters
* Development and dissemination of Election Guide for the Media
* SMS/Mobile application in election coverage and monitoring
* Information and Knowledge Online Portal
* Knowledge products for the media
* Media Content Monitoring

online spaces

1. website http://www.africanelections.org

2 blog http://malawaielections.blogspot.com/

3. relevant links http://delicious.com/malawielections

4. pictures http://www.flickr.com/photos/malawielectionspix/

5. our twitter http://twitter.com/malawivotes2009

The Gold Coast Chiefs list - Ahiabenu Soga

2009-03-04T00:11:00.000-08:00

Information and Knowledge Management powered by ICTs

2009-02-01T08:17:00.001-08:00

I was privileged to be invited by the Media Foundation for West Africa to participate in their Institutional Capacity Building, Staff Orientation and Re-orientation meeting which took place at Holy Trinity Spa & Health Farm, Sogakofe in January 2009.The theme for the meeting was Building Institutional & Operational Capacity for Enhanced Efficiency and Effectiveness and I shared with the group some thoughts on Information and Knowledge Management powered by ICTs
The presentation was made up of two parts below :

Part one

- What is Information and Knowledge Management?

- Internal communication and information sharing

- Personal Electronic & Data Management

- Developing an information and knowledge management plan

- Change management

Part Two

- Information and Communication Technologies and KM

- Word, spreadsheet, outlook (database), folder management)

- Microsoft vrs Open source

- Online tools – Internet, Intranet, web 2.0: online documents and wikis

- Effective use of LAN

- Website management – posting, updating and editing content

- Security and back up

ends

Coverage of Elections in Ghana and Kenya: Lessons for Africa's Democracy

2009-01-20T03:30:00.001-08:00

PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Accra, GHANA, Jan. 20, 2009 -- The African University College of Communication, in collaboration with the International Institute for ICT Journalism (Penplusbytes) will host a press briefing at 11 a.m. Thursday, January 22, at AUCC's campus located at Discovery House,

No. 2 Jones Nelson Road, off Kojo Thompson Road in Adabraka. The briefing will consist of the exclusive release of the findings of AUCC's Media Monitoring Centre on Ghana's 2008 Elections.

AUCC Dean of Journalism, Absalom Mutere, who was chairman of Kenya Media Council 2002-2007, will lead a panel discussion covering the topic "Coverage of Elections in Ghana and Kenya: Lessons for Africa's Democracy." Other panel members will include:

Paul Adu Gyamfi, chairman, National Media Commission

Kwami Ahiabenu,II Penplusbytes

Alison Bethel, Knight International Journalism Fellow

Reggie Jackson, professor emeritus, Visual Communications, AUCC

AUCC and Penplusbytes monitored the Ghana elections from the AUCC Media Monitoring Centre, including during the run-off and the special election held in the Tain constituency. For the first time since the election, the findings will be shared with the public and the panel will discuss them as well as the way forward for Ghana's media.

Chairman for the session will be Prof Alfred Opubor, Distinguished Professor of Journalism, AUCC.

As an African training institution, AUCC is committed to promoting journalistic excellence particularly at this phase of the continent's political development. From lessons learned and the sharing of best practices, AUCC believes that journalism will positively contribute to enhancing democracy and stability in Africa.

CONTACT: Absalom Mutere

African University College of Communications

+ 233-21 - 258584

From: African University College of Communications (AUCC)

Quote of the Day

2009-01-07T01:01:00.001-08:00

"Life is like a trumpet - if you don't put anything into it, you don't get anything out of it."

William Christopher Handy -

Los Alamos - May his soul rest in peace, my Dog for Seven years

2009-01-02T10:12:00.001-08:00

check out our Ghana's elections twitter

2008-12-16T00:30:00.001-08:00

at http://twitter.com/ghanaelections
follow us today

www.africanelections.org

2008-12-16T00:27:00.001-08:00

Three West African countries, namely Ghana, Guinea, and Cote d‘Ivoire, will organize elections this year and 2009. Access to timely, factual and unbiased information on elections is still a key problem in these countries.

The problem is compounded by the lack of skills required by the media to navigate the sometimes difficult terrain of elections. Again, some media professionals in these countries lack information and knowledge resources required to perform their functions effectively. Furthermore the use and availability of ICT tools for journalism is problematic.

In order to tackle some of these challenges, the International Institute for ICT Journalism (www.penplusbytes.org), in partnership with and with funding from, the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) and other partners, is embarking on West African Election Information and Knowledge Project.

The flagship of this project is our online portal which provides country specific relevant elections information contributed by journalists and ordinary citizens. The project will also integrate SMS as broadcast, monitoring and citizen journalism tool as mobile phones have become increasingly preferred means of communication in the sub region due to their convenience and relatively low cost of deployment.

The project which covers Ghana, Guinea and Cote d'Ivoire has six key components:

1. Training of senior editors, journalists and reporters;

2. Developing and disseminating an Election Reporting Guide for the Media;

3. SMS/ Mobile phone application in election coverage and monitoring, using FrontlineSMS; short code 1927 on all networks

4. Development of Information and Knowledge Online Portal; and

5. Provision of Knowledge products for the media

6. Media Content Monitoring

Please visit the elections portal at http://www.africanelections.org for up to the minute election news, features, live results, analysis and more. The portal adopts the respective lingua franca of the countries i.e. French for Guinea and Cote d'Ivoire and English for Ghana.

See our web 2.0 applications at http://www.ghanaelectionshotline.com/ghana/blogs/?post=60

For more information contact:
GHANA- ghelections@penplusbytes.org
GUINEA- guineaelections@penplusbytes.org
COTE D' IVOIRE - cielections@penplusbytes.org

Helped out with Partners for Gender Justice Meeting

2008-12-16T00:25:00.001-08:00

Partners for Gender Justice Meeting: The Role of the Judiciary in Promoting Gender Justice in African Countries, hosted by the Ghanaian Judiciary, and co-organized by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), United Nations Fund for Women (UNIFEM)by International Legal Assistance Consortium (ILAC), International Association of Women Judges (IAWJ), and Brandeis University. (19 - 21 November 2008 Accra, Ghana)
part of this great meeting as an event consultant

ICT AND ELECTIONS COVERAGE CONAKRY GUINEA

2008-12-16T00:21:00.000-08:00

Malgré une connectivité améliorée, les radios ouest-africaines peinent à tirer profit des TIC (Communiqué)

2008-10-16T07:39:00.001-07:00

Afrique de l'Ouest

L'Institut Panos Afrique de l'Ouest vient de produire une nouvelle publication sur les radios et les technologies numériques de communication dont le titre est "Radios et NTIC en Afrique de l'Ouest : connectivité et usages". Les résultats principaux de cette recherche qui porte sur 220 radios sont présentés dans ce communiqué de presse.

Communiqué de Presse

Malgré une connectivité améliorée, les radios ouest-africaines peinent à tirer profit des TIC

Téléchargez gratuitement votre copie - Ficher pdf, 886 kilos

Les radios demeurent le médium de communication le plus approprié à la communication sociale et à la communication de développement en Afrique. Après deux premières enquêtes en 2001 et 2003, l'IPAO vient de réaliser une nouvelle étude sur les radios et les technologies numériques de communication. Dans cette étude, il s'agissait de faire l'état des lieux de la connectivité des radios ouest-africaines aux (N)TIC (internet, satellite, ordinateur, outils de stockage numérique, etc.), d'analyser les usages mis en œuvre, d'identifier les contraintes, opportunités, et de faire des recommandations aux différents acteurs. L'étude est principalement axée sur sept pays cibles (Ghana, Bénin, Sénégal, Mali, Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, Niger) et concerne toutes les radios (communautaires ou associatives, commerciales, confessionnelles et religieuses). Deux cent vingt (220) radios ont été enquêtées. Les principaux outils de recherche utilisés sont le questionnaire, l'interview, l'analyse documentaire. Les résultats révèlent que, de manière globale, les radios des sept pays ont un taux d'accès moyen à l'internet (51,8 %), avec une grande disparité selon les pays et les types de radios. En effet, d'une part, alors que le taux de connectivité est de 72,2% pour les radios privées commerciales, il se limite à 31,5% pour les radios communautaires ou associatives. D'autre part, au niveau des pays, les radios ghanéennes présentent 93,5% de taux de connectivité, les radios sénégalaises 89,7%, alors que seulement 20% des radios de la Sierra Leone sont connectées. Au Ghana et au Sénégal, pratiquement toutes les radios commerciales sont connectées. En outre, 72,7% des radios communautaires sénégalaises disposent de l'Internet, alors que seulement 8,3% des radios communautaires nigériennes sont dans ce cas. Le taux de connectivité, toutes radios confondues, au Burkina, Faso, au Bénin et au Mali, sont respectivement 61,5%, 55% et 34%.

C'est grâce à la technologie ADSL que la majorité des stations de la sous-région se connecte, en particulier au Sénégal, où plus de 92 % des stations accèdent au réseau mondial grâce à cette solution. Comme l'illustre les coûts d'accès présentés, dans certains pays, l'utilisation de l'internet devient de plus en plus accessible, mais ceci se limite aux régions ayant de bonnes infrastructures. La forte pénétration de la téléphonie mobile sur le continent permet aux stations d'en faire un outil incontournable de reportage et d'échanges avec les auditeurs ; cet usage remporte aujourd'hui l'adhésion de tous les auditeurs de radio.

Même s'il a été identifié environ 70 sites web de radios, celles-ci sont encore très faiblement et de manière très précaire présentes sur l'internet. Dans la plupart des pays, la diffusion en live sur internet est très instable (streaming régulièrement inaccessible) ou inexistante, bien que souvent annoncée. En outre, un grand nombre de ces sites web ont très peu - ou pas du tout - de contenus. Le Sénégal et le Ghana sont les pays où les radios disposent davantage de sites web, mais la diffusion en direct sur l'internet est beaucoup plus stable au niveau des radios ghanéennes. La présence sur le web illustre encore que ces deux pays sont ceux dont les radios tirent davantage profit des TIC.

Par ailleurs, les services à valeur ajoutée du mobile, en particulier le SMS, utilisé par 83,8% des stations interrogées, connaissent un énorme succès auprès des populations. Ces nouveaux services sont considérés comme d'importants outils d'interactivité entre stations radio et auditeurs, et constituent de plus une source potentielle de revenus substantiels pour l'entreprise radiophonique.

Globalement, le satellite est peu utilisé par les radios. Il sert principalement à la réception des programmes. Les radios communautaires sont les plus nombreuses à l'utiliser, à 57,7%, alors que cette statistique est de 28,8% pour les radios commerciales. Le fort taux d'utilisation de ce moyen de communication par les radios communautaires s'explique par les appuis internationaux dont elles bénéficient dans ce cadre. En ce qui concerne la diffusion de programmes par le satellite, quasiment seules les radios publiques, disposant de subventions publiques conséquentes, peuvent se permettre de l'utiliser, notamment vers l'Afrique, l'Europe et les USA.

Par manque d'information ou par méconnaissance des TIC, il a été également remarqué une confusion dans certains esprits entre logiciels libres et logiciels propriétaires, voir même au sujet du type de connexion internet dont dispose la radio. Les besoins en formation restent énormes et concernent tous les domaines des NTIC, en particulier celui de la production numérique, de l'utilisation basique des ordinateurs, de l'Internet et celui de la création ou la maintenance de services avancés de diffusion et de téléchargement en ligne. Les coupures de courant sont particulièrement indexées dans les pays ayant les meilleures connectivités comme un véritable obstacle.

Plusieurs recommandations ont été faites à l'attention de tous les acteurs interpellés par le développement du secteur médiatique, au niveau national, régional et international. A titre d'exemple, on peut mentionner les recommandations suivantes :

1. Mettre en place, en impliquant toutes les parties prenantes, des stratégies nationales et régionales spécifiques et dédiées à la prise en compte des nouvelles technologies dans les radios et les médias en général ;

2. Développer la connectivité dans les pays par l'augmentation de la bande passante, la consolidation des infrastructures, l'extension de la couverture des réseaux téléphoniques et la baisse des coûts d'accès ;

3. Former le personnel des radios en gestion du streaming audio et vidéo pour favoriser la présence des radios sur l'internet ;

4. Favoriser la mise en place de serveurs pouvant héberger les sites web des radios faisant du streaming à des coûts relativement abordables ;

5. Renforcer l'intégration des TIC dans la formation des journalistes et animateurs de radio, au niveau des structures et dispositifs de formation académique et alternative (auto-formation, formation par les associations et les réseaux de radios, etc.) ;

6. Faciliter les négociations auprès des opérateurs de télécommunications pour réduire les coûts d'accès aux TIC aux stations radios, en particulier celles qui sont communautaires ;

7. Favoriser la prise en compte de la convergence par les organes de régulation des TIC, en créant des mécanismes de collaboration entre régulateurs des médias et des télécommunications, ou en créant des organes de régulation uniques convergés ;

8. Mettre en place des actions dans les différents pays pour une meilleure compréhension et prise en compte des enjeux nationaux et internationaux de la radio numérique.

Supervisée par le Programme TIC de l'IPAO, l'étude a été coordonnée par Malick Ndiaye, avec la collaboration de Hyppolite Djiwan (Bénin), Abdoulaye Diallo (Burkina Faso), Kwami Ahiabenu II (Ghana), Aziz Diallo (Mali), Abdourahamane Ousmane (Niger), Boubacar Khalil Ndiaye (Sénégal), Andrew Kromah (Sierra Leone).

Radios et NTIC en Afrique de l'Ouest : connectivité et usages, IPAO, octobre 2008. Disponible en téléchargement sur le site de l'IPAO.

Téléchargez gratuitement votre copie - Ficher pdf, 886 kilos

Auteur : Programme TIC de l'IPAO

Date : 16 octobre 2008

WEST AFRCAN TRAINING WORKSHOP ON ELECTIONS COVERAGE USING ICTS

2008-10-06T02:27:00.001-07:00

DATES AND COUNTRIES

26th to 27th September at Grand Bassam, Cote d' Ivoire
9^th to 10th October at Accra, Ghana

19^TH to 19^th November, Conakry, Guinea

INTRODUCTION

The International Institute for Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Journalism - Penplusbytes, in collaboration with the Ghana Journalists Association , REPPRELCI (Réseau de Professionnels de la presse en Ligne de Côte d'Ivoire and other key partners with support from Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) is organizing two sets of training for Ghana and Cote d'lvoire.
This training workshop is in line with the vision of ensuring the media is empowered to provide high quality coverage of the upcoming Ghana's and Cote d'lvoire elections using ICTs.

TARGET PARTICIPANTS

1. Print
2. TV
3. Radio
4.Community Radios
5. Online

Workshop Content

- The Electoral System -legal, constitutional, processes, supervision,
monitoring and observation

- Excellence in Elections coverage - pre, during and post periods:

- Use of ICTs in Elections content generation, publishing and monitoring

Facilitators

Local and International experts are expected to facilitate this
important workshop providing insight both from theoretical and practical
aspects of elections coverage.

Workshop Segments

1. Online segment

2. Face to Face Segment

3. Online Segment

Course Delivery

- Maximum use of Interactive presentations

- Course Work

- Group Discussion

- Hands on

SEGMENT ONE - ONLINE PHASE

- Seek to serve as an introduction to the course

- Assess the level of ICTs skills of participants

- Provides an opportunity for participants to play with online tools especially blogging

SEGMENT TWO - FACE TO FACE

DAY ONE F2F

Part One

- Opening Ceremony and launch

- Introduction of Participants

- Learning objectives and learning Contract

Cocoa Break

Part Two

- The Electoral System - History, legal and constitutional

- The Electoral System -processes and supervision,
monitoring and observation

- The Electoral System - monitoring and observation

- Group Work and Discussions

Lunch

Part Three

- Excellence in Elections coverage - pre, during and post periods

- The role of investigative reporting in Election coverage

F GROUP WORK ON KEY INVESTIGATIVE SKILLS TO REPORTING:

o potential electoral frauds in order to be accurate, effective and preserve peace in electoral period (during elections process and post election process)

o Follow-up of the deliberation process at the electoral commission (during elections process)

o Candidates' campaign accounts follow-up (post election process)

§ GROUP DISCUSSION ON:

· Ethical issues to care for, while investigating in electoral period

- Group Work and Discussions

Part Four

- introduction to PENPLUSBYTES/OSIWA Elections Project

DAY TWO F2F

PART ONE

- Recall of day one and review of learning objectives

- Introduction to ICT Journalism

- Convergence

Cocoa Break

PART TWO

- Introduction to the Use of ICTs in Elections content generation, publishing and monitoring

- Tools of our trade – video and video blogging

- Tools of our trade – online photos and audio

LUNCH

PART THREE

- Tools of our Trade – online tools – websites, blogs and Mapping

- Tools of our Trade - mobile journalism – SMS

- Group Work and Discussion

PART THREE

- PENPLUSBYTES/OSIWA newsroom Project

- Course Evaluation and distribution of certificates

- Conclusion

SEGMENT THREE - ONLINE

- follow up

- monitor online content of participants

- review post elections issues

- Peer Assist

Ends

Contact

www.penplusbytes.org

ICT4D

2008-10-02T01:47:00.001-07:00

Speaking at GINKS www.ginks.org second ICT4D series on the theme "The use of ICTs
in Effective Election Reporting" on the 2nd October 2008 at CSIR-INSTI at
9.00am.

Africa Media and Broadcasting Congress 2008

2008-07-22T03:24:00.000-07:00

Speaking at the Africa Media and Broadcasting Congress 2008
According to the event organisers, the congress is The most significant annual gathering of decision makers in Africa’s media, broadcasting and mobile sector
Date : 27 – 31 October 2008
Venue : Sandton Convention Centre, Johannesburg, South Africa

my session will be on : Expansion and growth in African media
• Sharing key points from a successful business strategy
• Evolution of hardware and software – how do we remain
competitive?
• What does the future of media in Africa look like?

see http://www.terrapinn.com/2008/mediaza/ for more detials

The price of greatness is responsibility.

2008-07-18T02:37:00.000-07:00

Sir Winston Churchill

what is Open Space?

2008-06-30T02:26:00.000-07:00

In Open Space meetings, events and organizations, participants create and manage their own agenda of parallel working sessions around a central theme of strategic importance, such as: What is the strategy, group, organization or community that all stakeholders can support and work together to create?
http://www.openspaceworld.org/cgi/wiki.cgi?AboutOpenSpace

dreams

2008-06-30T02:23:00.001-07:00

A dream is reality which has yet to materialize
- Dave McDaniel

oh Portugal

2008-06-21T01:47:00.000-07:00

oh Portugal
I am yet to see more of you

Day Two : The 2008 Africa Media Leadership Conference: “Doing Digital Media in Africa: Prospects, Promise, Uganda 2008

2008-05-26T06:41:00.000-07:00

How can African Traditional Media can tap into new Social media and blogs
Dave Duarte, leading South African Blogger

outline
1. Online attention economy
2. Social media and blogs
3. Value Creations in the WWW( Wild Wide World)

If every thing is free online, what is not free, according to Dave
a. Trust
b. Brand
c. Authenticity

He suggested that we are living in the area of the new 4ps
of
1. peer to peer
2. participation
3. predictive modeling
4. personalization

He said the elements value creation WWW are
- Revelation
- Plasticity
- Aggregation

POINTERS TO TWO SITES
MUTI

Muti is a community site, dedicated to African content, which is driven by users posting interesting links which are then rated and discussed by others.

AMATOMU

Amatomu www.amatomu.com/ is a blog search engine and article aggregator, focusing on blogs published in South Africa.

CONCLUSION
the more you share, the more you win

Day Two : The 2008 Africa Media Leadership Conference: “Doing Digital Media in Africa: Prospects, Promise, Uganda 2008

2008-05-26T05:13:00.000-07:00

Accessing Software from Open Source - the case of Nika Content Management System
Prof Guy Berger

In his discussion, he took a the following key areas :

1. The scope of CMS
2. Tech must be slave not the master
3. Open Source
4. NIKA
5. Lessons
6. Conclusion

CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (CMS)SCOPE

Six dimensions of CMS
1. "content" platform agnostic, "media assets"
2. Databased - searchable, multi- publish
3. A- Z all the work flow not only publishing to the web component which is T-Z
4. Knowledge Management - generation, coding, refinement
5. DRM - Digital Right Management - capital assets
6. EM - Enterprise Management including Customer Management System

STARTING YOUR CMS
You can start small but it is important to have a vision and have the big picture in mind at the outset

TECH MUST BE THE SLAVE NOT THE MASTER
Your strategy must drive your CMS not technology driven
the technology can do almost every thing but you have to drive it in order to achieve your goal in implementing your CMS.
One area is taxonomy which is linked to your strategy rather than technology
Who is responsible for tagging your content? what tags or labels are most appropriate, these questions must be answered in organizing content as part of your CMS.

OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE(OSS)

- examples : Apache, Firefox, Open Office, GIMP, Scribus, Dupal

not all open source are free and not all free software are open source
the key about the open source is the source is available and free to modify
You need in house developer to harness the power of open source
A lot of news organizations are using Open Source such as Dupal including New York Observer

NIKA DIGITAL NEWSROOM ( NIKA means "TO GIVE")
This CMS was developed by Vincent Maher at University of Rhodes
PHP(OSS) and cold fusion at earlier stages (2005)
had a mobile version as well and receiving input from mobile phone as well

NIKA OSS PILOT WORK FLOW 2007
Lessons
- timing and training
start simple function and progressively scale up

TRIAL IN 2008
- Grocott's Mail - replace chatoic folders
Use Gallery 2(OSS) for image management
Still to come for Nika are features such as mobile, social networking, video, etc

CONSIDERATIONS FOR THE FUTURE
1. Need better management and consultation
2. Need policy on archives, DRM, metadata
3. Automation vrs customizing for web/phone
4. How much complicity and clicks to incorporate in the CMS
clicks before content is posted online,the smaller the clicks the better
some times it took 18 clicks for some system
5. Static vrs dynamic, intelligent CMS
static limits creativity whereas an intelligent can learn and helps stimulate innovation and creativity. The aim is to go for a more intelligent CRM

CONCLUSION
movement to dispersed computing and there is no need to built a lot of online tools now
One idea is to build your own CMS using freely available online tools but the free CMS means not DRM and it may not work well with bad internet connections which is the case in Africa.
NIKA CMS is scheduled to be available for demonstration at Highway Africa 2008 and may be available in year 2009.

Day Two : The 2008 Africa Media Leadership Conference: “Doing Digital Media in Africa: Prospects, Promise, Uganda 2008

2008-05-26T04:04:00.000-07:00

Prof Guy Berger on DIGITAL LITERACY FOR AFRICAN NEWSROOM

How do you find information which is useful for your newsroom ?
the presentation addressed this question by looking at
* Monitor hot topics

1 Do the web
a. Google alerts
b. Web TAB
c. RSS
- via your browser
- via email
RSS FWD www.rssfwd.com/
- via dedicated RSS reader
www.newsgator.com
www.netvibes.com
Google Reader
when an old site does not have RSS, then you can make use of a convertor for example,
www.feedlity.com
2. Yahoo pipes
filter, aggregate content and mash up as well
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/
www.feedity.com/
use of online translation to manage the feed as well for other languages
3.online communities :communities of interest
joining a communities of interest, with like minded and provides information important for you
technorati www.technorati.com/
face book community of interest
social booking www.del.icio.us.com

find useful info from the rubbish on the web
so go out and multiple

Africa Media Leadership Conference 2008 opens

2008-05-25T00:34:00.000-07:00

Africa media leadership conference 2008 opens with opening addresses by Francis Mdlongwa, , Director of Rhodes University Sol Plaatje Institute for Media Leadership, South Africa and Frank Windeck, Director of KAS Sub-Sahara Africa Media Porgramme, South Africa
Key Note by Prof, Guy Berger, Head of Rhodes University's School of Journalism and Media Studies, South Africa on the changing landscape of the media online

SECOND NATIONAL ICT 2008 AWARDS HELD

2008-05-19T23:21:00.001-07:00

The Ministry of Communications in conjunction with the ICT Community organised the second national ICT Awards 2008 at the Accra International Conference Centre. It was a night of celebration, excellence and innovation. The awards ceremony was attended by 400 persons from the ICT community, business, academia and industry in the presence of dignitaries including His Excellency President John Agyekum Kuffour (represented by Hon Kan Dapaah, MP, Minister of Defence), the Hon Deputy Minister of Communications, Frederick Opare-Ansah, Hon Kojo Armah, MP and chair of the Parliamentary Select Committee and Mr. Yoofi Grant of Databank chaired the awards night programme.

In a speech read on his behalf, His Excellency The President John Agyekum Kuffour said, " I am proud of our performances in the sector as a nation and I am even proud of the excellence that some Ghanaians have exhibited in the sector". The performances of the Ghanaian hardware and software engineers have demonstrated that when it comes to the use of brainpower, the Ghanaian is a force to reckon with. Today when the names of the "Great in the Industry" the geniuses, are published a number of Ghanaian names feature".

During the programme a minute silence was held to commemorate the memories of three personalities of the ICT community who had been lost namely – Guido Sohne, software guru, Julianna Kaufmann, a Telecom expert and Fred Nutsugah Secretary to the Parliamentary Select Committee on Communications. In his speech, His Excellency President John Agyekum Kuffour said " I convery my condolences to the bereaved family, friends and compatriots of the late Guido Sohne, the distinguished software engineer who made a mark on the International Scene.

The awards, which took place on Saturday, May 17, 2008 as the world celebrates World Telecommunications and Information Society Day, rewarded individuals/companies in 13 (thirteen) catergories with the flagship award being the ICT Personality Of The Year 2007, which went to Mr. Akwasi Pianim Osei. His citation read, "Tonight we are here to acknowledge Akwasi Pianim Osei, one of the leaders in the field of ICT in Ghana. IT Consultant for the planning, procurement (involving major tenders), and implementation of real time banking packages and related services for Ghana's top financial institutions and team leader in the implementation of computerization projects and studies in various government, public, and private sector organizations over the past 20 years. Based on these many achievements by Akwasi Pianim Osei, The Ministry of Communications and the ICT community in Ghana has unanimously agreed to confer the prestigious ICT Personality Of The Year award to Akwasi Pianim Osei for his leadership in advancing ICT in Ghana.

Other award winners include

TELECOM COMPANY OF THE YEAR - TIGO with KASAPA as first runner up and MTN as second runner up.

TOP CAFÉ OF THE YEAR went to SMART INTERNET & MULTIMEDIA with CYBERCITY INTERNET as first runner up.
TOP ICT TRAINNING INSTITUTION went to IPMC with NIIT as first runner up while KNUST COMPUTER SCIENCE DEPARTMENT was awarded second runner up
INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER OF THE YEAR – the winner was BusyInternet with Zip Net and Netafrique Ltd coming as first runner up and second runner up respectively.
TOP ICT FOR DEVELOPMENT PROJECT OF THE YEAR – the winner was Computerised School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS) with CEPS(GNET) as first runner up.
BUSINESS PROCEESING COMPANY (BPO) OF THE YEAR – the winner was ACS-BPS
TOP GOVERNEMENT ICT PROJECT OF THE YEAR – the winner was Office of the President, Ghana ICT Project, first runner up Computerised School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS) and the second runner up is National Fibre Optic Project.
GUIDO SOHNE TOP SOFTWARE COMPANY OF THE YEAR – the winner was Rancard Solutions, with Somuah Info System as first runner up and B system was awarded second runner up.
TOP HARDWARE COMPANY OF THE YEAR – went to IPMC with Masai as the first runner up
TOP ICT START UP PERSONALITY OF THE YEAR went to Justice K.B Annan
LIFE TIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD went to Busy Internet for their pioneering work in the provision of shared Internet Access through the

establishment of a world class cyber café which has set the highest standard for Ghana's cyber café industry and beyond

The winners of Ghana ICT awards will be entered into the African ICT Achievers awards scheduled to take place in South Africa.

The 3^rd National ICT award is scheduled to take place on Saturday 16^th May 2009.

www.ghanaictawards.com

Ends

Second ICT awards Held

2008-05-19T02:10:00.001-07:00

President John Agyekum Kufuor on Saturday said the healthy partnership between the private sector and Government was yielding positive strides in the development of Information Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure and services in the country.

"We have seen that ICT brings us together, it expands and improves education and agricultural production, helps in health delivery and provides empowerment especially for the girl child," President Kufuor noted in a speech read for him by Mr Albert Kan Dapaah, Minister for Defence at the second ICT awards night in Accra.

He said government would continue to provide an enabling environment to support the activities of all communications service providers to ensure that citizens are not denied the benefits of technology no matter their location.

Dr Benjamin Aggrey Ntim, Minister of Communication, said the objective of this year's award was to create greater awareness of the role of ICT in the public services and the development process within the framework of the information society.

He said government decided to institute this awards scheme to acknowledge the various roles being played by institutions and individuals towards the promotion, learning and usage of ICT.

Some 13 awards were presented to deserving individuals and institutions with the top ICT personality of the year going to Akwasi Pianim Osei.

Tigo mobile network won the top telecom company of the year award with the prize for the top ICT training institution of the year and top hardware company of the year going to IPMC.

The top ICT for development project of the year went to the computerized school selection and placement system (CSSPS) while the Office of the President ICT project won the top government ICT project of the year.

Busy Internet won top internet service provider and a lifetime achievement awards.

Ran card limited won the top software company of the year, while Cyber city internet won top internet café of the year and Justice K.B. Annam being adjourned the best ICT start up company, individual division. Microsoft Company won the best foreign entity prize.
GNA

Africa’s media bosses examine emerging digital media platforms

2008-05-15T09:10:00.001-07:00

Press Release

JOHANNESBURG, May 15 – Leaders of Africa's news media meet in Uganda in a week's time for an annual summit focusing on how the continent is embracing new media technologies to serve the changing needs and interests of their customers.

The senior editors and CEOs of media firms stretching from South Africa, Namibia and Swaziland in the south to Kenya and Ethiopia in the north and from Senegal and the Ivory Coast in the west will meet in Kampala for three days from May 25 for their Africa Media Leadership Conference.

The conference is co-hosted by Rhodes University's Sol Plaatje Institute for Media Leadership (www.spiml.co.za/www.spiml.com) in South Africa and Germany's Konrad Adenauer Stiftung Foundation (www.kas.de/).

"This year's conference is looking at a range of digital media platforms that have emerged and continue to emerge around the world and the challenges that face media companies in Africa in adopting and adapting these platforms for their competitive advantage," said Francis Mdlongwa, Director of the Sol Plaatje Institute (SPI).

"Given the breath-taking technological changes which are re-shaping and even redefining the entire media industry, we felt that Africa should pause, take stock, look at what works and does not work in our part of the world and why, and plan ahead," he added.

The SPI is Africa's only university-level institution offering high-level media management and leadership training programmes to both practising and aspirant media leaders from across the continent. It runs a post-graduate programme in media management and leadership and a series of certificated management programmes for senior editorial and business media managers.

Frank Windeck, the head of the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung's Sub-Sahara Africa Media Programme, the sponsor of the Africa Media Leadership Conference series, said: "These meetings give Africa's top media people a unique opportunity to network at the highest level and to examine key industry and other issues which concern them and to seek practical solutions by examining case studies drawn from Africa."

The conference will be attended by 40 media executives.

The conference series was launched by the SPI and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung in 2002 to promote high-level interaction among Africa's media chiefs and to seek practical, innovative and creative solutions to challenges faced by the African media.

The conference meets annually in an African country, and past conferences have debated topics such as Revenue Generation for Robust African Media (Cape Town, South Africa); South Meets East: Strategic Challenges for African Media (Nairobi, Kenya); Managing Media in Recession (Mauritius); and Policies and Strategies for Media Viability (Maputo, Mozambique).

Issued by:

n SPI Director Francis Mdlongwa (email: f.mdlongwa@ru.ac.za; mobile phone +27-(0) 83-629-2312; office phone +27-(0) 46-603-8781; fax +27-(0) 46-622-9591)

n KAS Director for Sub-Sahara Africa Media Programme Frank Windeck (email:Frank.Windeck@kas.de; office phone +27-(0) 11-214-2903)

Please contact either Francis or Frank for any further information on the Africa Media Leadership Conference.

ENDS