South Africa: Foreigners (still) beware
As Aunesi Omari and her children cowered in her room in Philippi, a low-income section of the South African city of Cape Town, in Western Cape Province, she heard the armed men outside shout: "We're going to kill you because you don't want to listen."

ANGOLA

Angola dances to the Blue tune
[Pedro de Gouveia] In Africa, there are few countries in which the ubiquitous red and white colours of Coca-Cola haven't been plastered across billboards, buildings and banners to epitomise "Cocacolonisation" by the world's biggest soft drink brand.

KENYA

Product placing Kenyan tourism industry
[Titus Kaloki] It was delightful to read in one of our common dailies, the Daily Nation, about how the corprate players in Kenya have come to see sense in product placement and sponsorship on popular TV shows.

AFRICA

10 priorities for digital advertising transformation
Creating effective digital advertising operations is crucial for media companies regardless of the current adverse economic climate, according to Gartner Inc.

South Africa Ad Network is launched - sabiOne.com
African online display ad network sabiOne.com has launched a South African channel named the 'South Africa Ad Network' within the platform. This has been necessitated by the high number of publishers covering the SA market and the need for better local targeting and ad customisation by local advertisers.

African-American women in cinema film festival
NEW YORK: Two of Nigeria's top actresses, Patience Ozokwo and Ini Edo, brought “Greetings from Nollywood” to United Nations Headquarters on Monday, 17 November 2008, at a morning press conference celebrating the Eleventh Annual African-American Women in Cinema Film Festival.

Telkom wants a bigger slice of Africa
Telkom, one of the continent's largest fixed-line operators, will continue to pursue ICT opportunities outside South Africa.

Software pirates bust in Durban
Two Durban-based computer outlets, Computer and Electronic Services in Smith Street and World Wide Web in the Bluff, have been raided by police for allegedly selling PCs pre-loaded with illegal software.

AFRICA

Deal-making and best practice sharing at AfricaCom 2008
The 11th AfricaCom conference and exhibition closed on 19 November 2008, in Cape Town, South Africa, following two days of intense discussion, best practice sharing and deal-making among the continent's telecoms stakeholders.

Gateway awarded Best pan-Africa Wholesale Offering
LONDON: Gateway Communications, a supplier of secure, reliable telecommunications services across Africa, was awarded Best pan-African Wholesale Offering at Capacity Magazine's Global Wholesale Telecommunications Awards. The awards were announced on the first evening of Capacity Europe 2008 at a reception attended by over 300 senior industry executives.

Nigeria's satellite setback
Nigeria's attempt to bridge the digital divide in Africa has suffered a setback after its first communications satellite failed.

11th AfricaCom congress attracts record registrations
The 11th AfricaCom congress opened earlier this week in Cape Town with record attendance levels and the biggest ever conference and exhibition, reflecting Africa's booming telecommunications market.

Kingsley Sibanda, "You feel like a bandit fighting a sitting government"
All Zimbabwean journalists are required to register with the state-appointed media board that vets applicants. Kingsley Sibanda (not his real name), 30, is struggling to survive as an unaccredited freelance journalist writing for foreign publications.

AFRICA

Be more positive about Africa, journalists told
[Walter Wafula] Africa's journalists should compile positive stories to improve Africa's image and open it up to growth opportunities.

ZAMBIA

Zambia: MPs call for regulation of media
On 13 November 2008, the members of parliament in Zambia called for the regulation of media organisations through the use of statutory instruments as opposed to self-regulation because of the alleged biased media coverage of the just ended presidential by-election.

Mobile technology ushers new hope for Africa's poor
Mobile technology has been hailed as the latest agent for transformation within Africa, this is according to the panelists' attending an e-strategies conference in Cape Town last week.

MTN goes beyond barriers and borders
Tim Lowry, vice-president: SEA Region of MTN Group and managing director of MTN South Africa, delivered the opening keynote presentation titled: "Beyond Barriers and Borders", at the 2008 AfricaCom Conference in Cape Town on 18 November, 2008.

Sybase 365, Safaricom sign service agreement
Sybase 365, a subsidiary of Sybase, Inc., a global leader in mobile messaging services, announced its agreement with Kenyan operator, Safaricom Limited, for international SMS inter-operator services.

mCel and AIRCOM optimise 3G in Mozambique
AIRCOM International, an independent network planning and optimisation consultancy, announced on Tuesday, 18 November 2008, that it is working with Mozambique operator mCel to support the update of the mCel planning tools for 2G and 3G networks.

Cell One brings Opera Mini to Namibia
OSLO, NORWAY - Marking the company's first operator-branded delivery to Africa, Opera Software announces its new agreement with Namibia's Cell One.

CENTRAL AFRICA

Third Rwandan mobile licence awarded to Millicom
NEW YORK and STOCKHOLM: Millicom International Cellular S.A. (Millicom), the global telecommunications company, announced on Monday, 17 November 2008, that it has been successful in the tender for the third national mobile licence in Rwanda against three other bidders.

Alcatel-Lucent to deploy mobile cellular network in Nigeria
PARIS: Alcatel-Lucent announced on Tuesday, 18 November 2008, Nigeria's Emerging Market Telecom Services Ltd (EMTS), a subsidiary of M/s Etisalat Telecommunication Corporation and M/s Mubadala Development Company, has awarded Alcatel-Lucent a multi-million Euro contract for the deployment of its new mobile cellular network in the country on a turnkey basis.

AIRCOM provides network optimisation tools to MTN Uganda
AIRCOM International, an independent network planning and optimisation consultancy, announced on Tuesday, 18 November 2008, that it has signed a deal to deliver network optimisation tools to MTN Uganda. MTN continues to deploy GSM network infrastructure across Uganda and now provides mobile coverage to over 150 cities, towns and villages across the country.

Mobile game now with added football community SMS feature - Starfish Mobile
Starfish Mobile Nigeria has teamed up with Zain, a major mobile Telecommunications company, to launch the latest football community mobile news alert feature based on the top European teams.

AFRICA

Open Air Cinema helps educate, entertain Africa
LINDON, UTAH: Open Air Cinema has announced a humanitarian effort that includes a subsidised program to provide non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and small business owners in Africa with its inflatable movie screens to show films in an outdoor environment.

KENYA

Retailer launches Christmas consumer promotions
[Carole Kimutai] Despite the global crunch that has seen a drastic reduction in consumer spending, retail supermarket chain Nakumatt has launched a R3m (KSh30m) Christmas season rewards program that will run for two months.

UGANDA

Ugandan PR practitioners to be honoured
[Walter Wafula] Public relations officers are to be rewarded for excelling in their profession, following the introduction of the first Public Relations Excellence Awards in Uganda. The Public Relations Association of Uganda (PRAU) in Kampala unveiled the awards, last week.

EAST AFRICA

Exploring the role of PR at EAPRA 2008
The 3rd East African Public Relations Conference by the Public Relations Association of Rwanda (PRAR) will be held from 4-5 December, 2008 at the Kigali Serena Hotel in Rwanda. The conference, tagged EAPRA 2008 will bring together about 200 PR professionals and practitioners from all member states of East Africa.


Effectively manage internal communications throughout the African continent - ChatROOM
When organisations deal with staff compliments of several hundreds across different countries on various levels of hierarchy and from different cultures, educational background, language preferences and demographics, effective internal communication becomes a major challenge.

ZIMBABWE

Zimbabwe: No jingle bells, just a hopeless Christmas
[Dumisani Ndlela] What used to be a festive season full of spending has turned out to be a time of grief for both shoppers and retailers in Zimbabwe. Shops which used to burst with customers scrambling for bargains are desolate, and newspapers, which used to struggle to cope with advertorials on retail specials, are battling to fill advertising space.

A toast to Africa
[Jacqui Pile] Of all SABMiller's markets, Africa has been the most resilient against the global slowdown.

Madagascar leases out half its arable land
South Korean firm Daewoo plans to grow maize on one million acres of land in Madagascar. The firm will pay nothing for the lease of the land. The Indian Ocean island will gain employment opportunities and infrastructural developments from Daewoo's 99-year lease of 1.3m hectares.

Africa, G8 and OECD countries meet in Ethiopia
ADDIS ABABA: More than 150 high-level representatives from Africa, G8 and OECD countries met in Addis Ababa this week to discuss priority actions needed to keep Africa on a strong growth track despite an increasingly unstable international environment, weakened by the recent global financial crisis as well as severe food and fuel price shocks.

Engen expands in Rwanda, Burundi and Guinea Bissau
Engen, the African petroleum products marketer, has increased its African footprint, with the acquisition of Total's operations in three African countries - Guinea Bissau, Rwanda and Burundi, effective 19 November 2008.

Senegal: Weighing the benefits of solar stoves
Researchers have sold over 1,000 solar stoves to rural families in Senegal in a bid to prove that the ovens can improve child and maternal health and reduce household fuel consumption.

Nigeria: Under-development continues to fuel oil theft
ABUJA: Crude oil smuggling continues unabated in the Niger Delta in southern Nigeria, spurred by chronic under-development, a disaffected youth, and increasing lawlessness.

Ghana: Service export strategy launched
A programme dubbed: ‘National Services Export Strategy', has been launched with the aim of exporting consultancy services, medical tourism, travel and leisure, education and other non-tangible and invisible services provided by Ghanaians abroad.

Fraud: Citibank experts to probe Ethiopian national bank's security code system
Experts from Citibank, the New York-based banking giant that recently was swindled of 27 million dollars from the Ethiopian National Bank's US account, have scheduled to visit the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) within the next few weeks to verify NBE's SWIFT security code system through which the two banking entities have been communicating.

Egypt: The rate is right
The Central Bank of Egypt stood its ground keeping interest rates unchanged, Niveen Wahish analyses the significance of the decision.