IMF: Fixing Exchange Rates Will Make Matters Worse For Economy

The Resident Representative of the International Monetary Fund has said that The Gambia government’s decision to fix the exchange rate of the country’s depreciating currency, the dalasi, against major currencies of the world will make matters worse for the economy.

Gaston Mpatswe, who was yesterday briefing journalists barely a month after IMF approved a 10 million US dollar bailout  for the country, said the sooner the authorities lift the restrictions on the foreign exchange, the better for the economy.

He said: “The depreciation of the dalasi is a symptom of what is happening in the economy. It is just a symptom of the problems that were in the economy over a period of time.  And we believe that fixing the exchange rate is not helping the economy. When you fix it, people will keep their foreign currency and that will make matters even worse. It also will increase speculation, excess demand pressure, makes export of Gambian goods and services expensive and it will have direct impact on the poor because it will not reduce inflation or depreciation of the dalasi and families that are relying on remittances will have to spend on those expensive goods after the exchange rate has gone down. The recovery of the dollar also affected the dalasi.

“We have engaged the government on economic implications of fixing foreign exchange rate. We will have a consultation with the government on the economy in future and we will provide fiscal advice on what the government might do to tackle certain problems in the economy.

“Gambia has been registering a volatile growth rate over the years. The country needs 3.3 percent over a sustained period to be able to reduce poverty. I cannot say if The Gambia is in an economic recession; the economy is facing severe challenges that have to be corrected. The economy is at a crossroads. The government has been borrowing to finance its increasing deficit, both domestically and externally. The Gambian economy needs structural adjustment.

“The export of the country is around $107.3 million while import is around $306.6 million. The fiscal deficit has steadily increased; it was estimated at 4.45 billion dalasis at the end of 2014, against a surplus in 2007. The Gambia’s first challenges are related to structure of the economy and repeated spending pressures that have been affecting the country over a period of time.”

Source www.http://standard.gm/

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Burundi Opposition Figure Shot Dead

Zedi Feruzi was the head of the opposition party Union for Peace and Development [Citi FM]

Opposition officials confirm death of Union for Peace of Development party leader in capital Bujumbura.

Zedi Feruzi, a leader of an opposition party, has been shot dead alongside his bodyguard in Bujumbura, a leading opposition figure has confirmed to Al Jazeera.

Feruzi, whose bloodied body was found in the Ngagara district of Bujumbura on Saturday evening, was the head of the opposition party Union for Peace and Development (UPD).

Leading opposition figure, Agathon Rwasa, said there was no information on who had killed Feruzi, but he had spoken out against President Pierre Nkurunziza’s decision to stand for a third-term in office.

Residents said a third person, believed to be another police officer tasked with protecting Feruzi, was seriously injured in the incident.

“We heard around 20 gunshots, everyone fell to the ground, people saw a Toyota car speeding away,” said a neighbour, who did not witness the shooting himself.

Around an hour after the attack police had yet to arrive at the scene, according to the AFP news agency.

Meanwhile, two barricades of tyres were set alight in the district, where local youths were sealing off streets and alleyways to outsiders.

Saturday’s assassination will add to tensions in Burundi after a month of protests against President Nkurunziza.

A coup attempt to remove Nkurunziza by army officers opposed to his decision to contest the presidential vote failed after the intervention of loyal members of the military.

More than 20 people have died in anti-government protests since the president’s announcement to stand in late April.

Source: Al Jazeera And AFP

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US: Military Whistleblowers At Risk

Retaliation for Reporting Sexual Assault

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The US military’s progress in getting people to report sexual assaults isn’t going to continue as long as retaliation for making a report goes unpunished. Ending retaliation is critical to addressing the problem of sexual assault in the military.

Sara Darehshori, senior US counsel

(Washington, DC) – US military service members who report sexual assault frequently experience retaliation that goes unpunished, Human Rights Watch said.  The report is the result of an 18-month investigation by Human Rights Watch with the support of Protect Our Defenders, a human rights organization that supports and advocates for survivors of military sexual assault. Despite extensive reforms by the Defense Department to address sexual assault, the military has done little to hold retaliators to account or provide effective remedies for retaliation.

The 113-page report, “Embattled: Retaliation against Sexual Assault Survivors in the US Military,” finds that both male and female military personnel who report sexual assault are 12 times as likely to experience some form of retaliation as to see their attacker convicted of a sex offense. Retaliation against survivors ranges from threats, vandalism, and harassment to poor work assignments, loss of promotion opportunities, disciplinary action including discharge, and even criminal charges.

“The US military’s progress in getting people to report sexual assaults isn’t going to continue as long as retaliation for making a report goes unpunished,” saidSara Darehshori, senior US counsel at Human Rights Watch and co-author of the report. “Ending retaliation is critical to addressing the problem of sexual assault in the military.”

The exclusive mechanism intended to protect service members from employment-related retaliation, the Military Whistleblower Protection Act, has yet to help a single service member whose career was harmed, despite the prevalence of the problem. Defense Department surveys indicate that 62 percent of those who report sexual assault say they experienced retaliation. Congress should strengthen the law to give service members the same level of protection as civilians, Human Rights Watch said.

Human Rights Watch, with assistance from Protect Our Defenders, conducted more than 250 in-person and telephone interviews, including with more than 150 service member survivors of sexual assault. The report relies primarily on the accounts of 75 survivors who are currently serving or left the military in 2011 or later. Human Rights Watch also examined numerous US government documents produced in response to public record requests, and analyzed data about administrative decisions in which service members had sought corrections to their records in relation to a sexual assault. The research included all branches of the US military.


“A certain Sergeant in my platoon had told me he would kill me if we ever went to Afghanistan because ‘friendly fire is a tragic accident that happens,’” said a soldier who reported a sexual assault by a male soldier from another platoon in 2012. “After I had been there for a year, someone tried to knife me in a bar and kept screaming ‘DIE FAGGOT, DIE’ and that was when I told my Captain that I wanted a discharge before I ended up dead on the evening news which would be bad for him too.”

Defense Department statistics indicate the pervasive problem of retaliation, and various disciplinary actions are available. Yet Human Rights Watch found little effort to deter retaliation by holding wrongdoers accountable for their acts.

Victims of retaliation by their supervisors rarely turn to the Boards for Correction of Military Records, the administrative bodies responsible for correcting injustices to service members’ records. Human Rights Watch found that alleged attackers sought and received corrections in their records far more often than victims, even though victims are much more likely to experience administrative action needing correction. 

“When no one is held accountable for retaliation, it creates a hostile environment for all survivors, and sends a message to criminals that they can act with impunity” said Don Christensen, president of Protect Our Defenders and former chief prosecutor of the US Air Force. “When a survivor who reports sexual assault is 12 times more likely to suffer retaliation than they are to see their rapist convicted, it demonstrates the military has a long way to go in fixing this problem.”

Protect Our Defenders has created a Pro Bono network of lawyers and organizational staff to assist rape and sexual assault survivors with claims arising from being raped or sexually assaulted while on active duty, including claims relating to the various forms of retaliation.

A major barrier to reporting sexual assault is fear of punishment for minor misconduct at the time of the assault, such as underage drinking or adultery, Human Rights Watch found. Though the military does not consider this retaliation, for survivors facing charges, the consequences could be devastating. Several survivors interviewed were court-martialed or disciplined for actions that only came to light because they reported their assaults. Even if they are acquitted or given minor disciplinary action, any reprimand may be fatal to prospects for promotion or the ability to stay in service. Congress should prohibit this type of punishment to ensure that victims of violent crimes can report them without fear of negative consequences.

Human Rights Watch also documented the negative repercussions for survivors who reported or sought assistance with recovery from sexual assault. Survivors reported significant barriers to mental health care – from stigma to lack of confidentiality – that may negatively impact military readiness. The Defense Department should expand initiatives created as part of its response to sexual assault, such as the Special Victim Counsel program and expedited transfers, and non-military options for mental health care, in order to give survivors the tools and control to direct their recovery and their future in the military, Human Rights Watch said.

“Service members who report sexual assault should not only be protected from retaliation, but they should also have access to the health care and support they need,” said Meghan Rhoad, women’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch and co-author of the report. “No one should be forced to choose between reporting being raped and staying in the military.”

http://www.hrw.org/source_ 

Gambia, Togo Deny ECOWAS Term Limit

No to term limit. Faure Gnassingbe, President of Togo

How convenient for other ECOWAS leaders to wave along with the votes of two small countries against the proposal to cap Presidential term in office at the Accra ECOWAS bloc summit. If ECOWAS want to salvage any self-respect from being a toothless bogus African regional money wasting diplomatic outfit, then they have to convene an emergency meeting and adopt the voting rights of the majority. How can two small countries ruled by bandits and mafias prevailed over 13 bigger countries?
Gambia and Togo should be made to adopt the term limit proposal and ECOWAS thus cement a legacy of promoting genuine democracy and rule of law. The lack of electoral reforms and the adoptions of ‘term limits’ are the major causes of conflicts and post-election violence in Africa. ECOWAS has shown a lack of muscle and wherewithal in many endeavours, however, if they can get the ‘term limit’ in office right, many of their failures will be forgiven.

A condition should lay down on Gambia and Togo, if they failed to heed, let them be kicked out of ECOWAS regional bloc and lose out on all the multilateral benefits and common trade agreements and travel benefits. Gambia and Togo can ignore EU but not ECOWAS. Salvage some decency and pride ECOWAS. It is Pathetic and sad, Africa still struggles with the basics yet we want to bash former colonial master at every given opportunity. Let ECOWAS be realistic and reconvene an emergency season under the new head, Macky Sall. This issue will not go away. Africa needs leadership in ending permanently all avenues to civil war and needless loss of life. Get the political temperature right and the rest will fall in-line.

Below is the press statement.

ACCRA, May 19 (Reuters) – West African leaders on Tuesday rejected a proposal to impose a region-wide limit to the number of terms presidents can serve, after opposition to the idea from Togo and Gambia, Ghana’s foreign minister said.

The proposal was discussed at a regional summit in Accra. Togo and Gambia are the only members of West Africa’s ECOWAS bloc that do not limit the number of presidential terms to two.

“It was a proposal that was put on the agenda for the heads of state and governments to decide on and at the end today’s deliberations, it was not adopted.” Foreign Minister Hannah Tetteh told Reuters.

“This dissenting view (from Togo and the Gambia) became the majority view at the end of the day,” she said. (Reporting by Kwasi Kpodo and David Lewis; Writing by David Lewis; Editing by Bate Felix and Robin Pomeroy)

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-3088315/W-African-leaders-drop-term-limit-idea-Gambia-Togo-oppose.html#ixzz3afxEaZhN
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Where is Britain,s compassion For Migrants In Crises

    

May 13, 2015

David Mepham

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  A Libyan Navy boat carries migrants back to the coastal city of Misrata May 3, 2015.
  © 2015 Reuters

On the steps of Downing Street last Friday morning, fresh from an election victory, David Cameron described Britain as a country of “great compassion”. He’s right. The British public contributes generously to humanitarian appeals in response to natural disasters or other emergencies around the world. But there is little evidence of either compassion or generosity in the British government’s own response to the unprecedented crisis along Europe’s southern coastline.
Today the European Commission will propose a new EU-wide policy on migration, which is expected to recommend – sensibly and appropriately – that the EU agrees to take a larger number of refugees, as well as a new mechanism for sharing out more equitably the responsibility for refugee protection across the 28 member states. But UK Ministers have already rejected the proposals, saying that they will not participate in the scheme or accept any additional refugees into the UK.
Britain’s response is simply indefensible. Less wealthy countries like Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon are hosting millions of Syrian refugees; Lebanon alone has over a million. And while Europe as a whole should be prepared to do more, Britain’s record compares unfavourably with that of other EU member states. In 2014, Germany, France, Italy and Sweden all granted asylum to more people than Britain.  
While a staggering 1,750 migrants and asylum seekers have died attempting to cross the Mediterranean since the start of the year, the British government also chooses to present this crisis not in terms of human rights or humanitarian obligations, but primarily as one of border control and law enforcement. At the UN Security Council, the British are pressing for military action to destroy the vessels being used to make the crossing to Europe. But they have not explained how such action would make things safer for asylum seekers and their young families, or what destroying their only escape route would mean for those then left behind in chaotic and conflict-ridden Libya.
This approach also willfully ignores the massive and multiple push factors that lead people to flee their homes. Half of those who reached Italy from North Africa last year were from Syria, Eritrea, and Somalia – countries wracked by extraordinary violence and insecurity, where human rights abuses are egregious and widespread. Is David Cameron really suggesting that those who escaped the horrors of war-ravaged Syria or the police state that is Eritrea should be forced to go back there? The British people are more compassionate than that, and their government should be too
source: www.hrw.org

First ICC Acquitted Defendant Returned to DR Congo

      

                                                                  Netherlands Rejected Asylum Claim Over Safety Fears

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(Kinshasa) Mathieu Ngudjolo, the first defendant to be acquitted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), was deported to Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, on May 11, 2015, his lawyers said. Following his acquittal by the ICC, Ngudjolo said he feared for his safety if returned to Congo. However, Netherlands immigration authorities did not find grounds to grant his asylum claim.

“We and others will be looking to the Congolese authorities to ensure Mathieu Ngudjolo’s safety and security once he is back in Congo,” said Géraldine Mattioli-Zeltner, international justice advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “The ICC, which has an office in Kinshasa, and the Dutch embassy should closely monitor Ngudjolo’s situation for as long as necessary.”

Ngudjolo was the former chief of staff of the Front for National Integration (FNI), an armed group involved in the local and regional conflict that ravaged the Ituri province of eastern Congo in the early 2000s. He was arrested in Kinshasa by the Congolese authorities in 2008 pursuant to an ICC arrest warrant on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the village of Bogoro, Ituri, in February 2003. The ICC trial chamber acquitted Ngudjolo of all charges in December 2012. The acquittal was confirmed in appeal on February 27, 2015.

Ngujdolo has filed for compensation at the ICC following his acquittal.
source:http://www.hrw.org/

Tired of presidents in West Africa changing their constitutions

             

Tired of presidents in West Africa changing their constitutions to run for third term in office and creating instability, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is planning to enact a new clause that will prohibit presidents of member countries from staying beyond two terms.
This clause will be tabled at the next ECOWAS meeting this week. Reliable ECOWAS sources told The Finder that when adopted, the clause will bind all member states, even though proponents are not sure if member states will abide by the clause.
Political analysts say a situation whereby elected presidents who swear to protect the constitution often end up messing up the same through kangaroo referendums to remove term limits and run for third, fourth and as many terms as they want amounts to ‘civilian coup,’ which should equally be condemned as military coup d’états.
Examples are the cases in Togo, Niger, Cameroon, Burkina Faso, and Senegal.
To enforce the new clause that prohibits third term as well as all protocols, conventions, declarations and directives, ECOWAS is also considering the adoption of a new legal regime for Community Acts that will make all ECOWAS decisions immediately applicable and binding on member states and eliminate parliamentary approvals.
Information on ECOWAS website indicates that the new legal regime for Community Acts is part of the transformation of the Secretariat into a Commission.
Until now, obligations of member states were captured principally in Protocols and Conventions which are subject to lengthy parliamentary ratification processes by each member state.
These processes delayed the entry into force of the legal texts, thereby paralysing the integration process.
Decisions of the authority were, however, immediately applicable and binding on member states whilst those emanating from the Council of Ministers were only applicable and binding on the Community Institutions.
Under the new legal regime, the principle of supranational becomes more pre-eminent and there is now a de-emphasis on the adoption of Conventions and Protocols.
Community Acts will be Supplementary Acts, Regulations, Directives, Decisions, Recommendations and Opinion. Thus, the authority passes Supplementary Acts to complete the Treaty.
Supplementary Acts are binding on member states and the institutions of the community.
The Council of Ministers enacts Regulations and Directives and makes Decisions and Recommendations.
Regulations have general application and all their provisions are enforceable and directly applicable in member states.
They are enforceable in the institutions of the community. Decisions are enforceable in member states and all designated therein. Directives and their objectives are binding on all Member States.
Source: www.ghanaweb.com
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