The World Watcher

The bond between the Pursuit of Happiness and the Success Pathway

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 04 Apr 2017 09:03:00 +0000

What is happiness? What causes happiness?

Before we can try to define ‘happiness’ first, we should try to figure out what Happiness is Not!

‘You cannot buy happiness’

This old adage has a more meaningful and deeper truth to it. Though the presence of money and other material things can ease one’s life, however, they cannot fulfil what the soul needs. So no, wealthy is not happiness – it is means to happiness but not happiness.

No person can ever find themselves having arrived to Happiness final destination therefore, one does not wake up one day and say, “Are we there yet?” because happiness takes effort to maintain it. The sources of short-term happiness such as getting a new job usually fade with time once the receivers get used to them.

So what is happiness?

Happiness is a choice – you can either choose to be happy or choose not to be! Stress is part of life but how one let it affects them is also a choice. An individual’s reaction to stress and other negative emotions will either give power over their happiness to external factors or reclaim it – depending on their actions.

Through time, science has tried to define happiness and since the beginning, religion has told people what happiness is but through all this, it can be revealed that happiness does not fall in the ‘one size fits all’ mould. One man’s definition of happiness differs from the next individual’s definition, in other words, our mental mind-sets dominate and characterise our outlook on happiness.

Happiness and Success

Success is a moving target.

For motivated people, target never stands still and therefore as people, we should avoid measuring our happiness by our success but rather it should be the other way around; happiness should precedes success. A driven person will always move their success target once they reach their set goal e.g. getting a job promotion will results in one wanting to get to a higher office position or even wanting to own one’s business and therefore basing one’s happiness on the level of one’s success will most of the time result in disappointment. Any happiness that is born of success will only lasts until the adrenaline of the success evaporates.

The number one goal for most of people is to be ‘happy’ but the definition of happiness is different from each individual.

Happiness should be constructed and rooted within for it to have a major impact in an individual’s life. People who visit their inner being to develop their happiness usually have better chances of making it out stronger when faced with hardships than those who base their happiness on circumstances’ outcomes. There is no argument that happiness and success are connected but none can replace the other.

Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present. - Jim Rohn

Habits and Happiness

Our day-to-day habits act as our happiness investment – is how we react to stress, how much we value ourselves and our significant relationships that build or break our happiness voyage and therefore have a massive impact on our success outcome.

A recent neuroplasticity research pointed out that the ability of the brain to change even in adulthood demonstrate that as humans develop and acquire new habits, their brain is also rewired and as such, one can train their brain to be positive. Old habits are hard to break as they have become part of our lives through automation for example, if every time you are thirsty you unconsciously reach for soda instant of water that is an acquired habit – a negative one! To break this habit, one can slowly introduce water by making sure that they drink a glass of water before bed and first thing when they wake up then they can introduce a third glass of water at noontime then from there on they can take it to another level by drinking a glass of water before every meal. It may take time to break this habit but one should remember that this habit was not formed overnight and so it will take time to end it.

Happiness is a form of art that can be learnt.

Try to invest in your happiness by training your mind to focus on one positive thing every day for the next three weeks and see the impact it will have in your overall life outlook. By focusing on positive things in your life, you create your own world – a world you have a powerful saying in it. Activities that can fuel your positive mindset:

Meditate for at least 5 minutes every day;
Include exercise in your daily route;
Go over the things you are grateful every day before bedtime and every morning when you wake up;
Try to compliment at least one person everyday;
At the end of your day, try to go over ‘life lesson’ you learnt from your daily experience;
Dedicate at least four days in which you eat healthy thus a day every week totalling 48 days a year of healthy eating.
Keeping a gratitude journal as a form of a technique to explore happiness in different forms.

So how do you train your mind new and positive habit? Repetition. Repeating a behavioural pattern will result with the behaviour getting engraved in one’s ‘neural pathways’. And that is the best way to develop and maintain a new habit.

Choosing the ‘right’ habit should start with the question, ‘why?’ Why do I want to meditate 5 minutes a day? Why do I want to include exercise in my daily route? Asking this question will help one determine whether they are developing a habit for the right reason or not.

The success journey is a learning curve that should bring an individual happiness as they learn new and valuable habits that lead to meaningful life therefore it is with gradual developed, positive, and mindful habits that one can attain true happiness.

Motshelo Savings Account Can Lead to Success

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 16 Feb 2017 10:20:00 +0000

(Motshelo Account Part 2)

Each year all individuals are presented with a blank-life diary filled with 12 months in

which the first 11 months are set for all to write their success story and the last month is

for all individuals to look back and make evaluation of their journey. The final page of

the Success Life diary Most successful people have come to realise that to attain

success in life, one needs to focus on the next action steps in order to accomplish their

goals.

Most people usually start their year hyped up with ways to write their success stories

through achieving their set goals but by mid-year, the majority of them usually throw in

the towel due to lack of motivation or unforeseen demoralising circumstances and this is

where the Barclays Motshelo Savings Account comes in.

Imagine having a financial partner who keeps your funds secure and at the same time

providing you with attractive interest rate and monthly interest. This partner does exists

in the form of the Motshelo Savings Account.

This group savings account has been setup with the knowledge that life will always

present distractions to all individuals and therefore, it is there to make sure that its users

never have to worry about their motshelo contributions going missing as it offers funds

security and it also encourages its users to work toward a common goal success.

Motshelo Savings Success Stories

Below are but a few of motshelo groups that have opened the group savings account in

order to realise their common goals:

Zipporah Light Masika Motshelo Group has managed to achieve big goals for their

individual members such as building houses for ourselves, to pay bogadi, dig boreholes,

pay school fees and buy trucks for transport businesses.

Moeza Motshelo Group saved for different projects and its members have been able to

accomplish their goals such as paving our yard, buying plots, paying for school fees,

deposit for a car and settling our debts.

For Skeem Motshelo Group, most of its members wanted to build their own homes,

and they saw Motshelo as the best and most affordable solution. Currently most of the

members are pursuing building projects with the help of the Motshelo.

All Fresh Motshelo Group members’ primary savings objectives included home

improvements and other individual projects.

Youth and Motshelo Group Savings

More and more youths have seen the need and advantages of joining metshelo as a

way of improving their lives and such they should also take funds security and

accountability into consideration so that they do not become overwhelmed of

disappointed if anything untoward happens to their funds and the best way to do that is

by opening the Barclays Motshelo Savings Account.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. – Mark Twain

There has never been any better time to open this savings account but NOW! All that is

needed to open the account are: P500 opening and operating balance, minimum of at

least three members, Omang or passports of two signatories and proof of residence and

the group does not have to have a formal constitution.

To know more about your savings options at Barclays, visit: Motshelo Account Page

Want to be a ‘Moreki’ this year, why not start your journey with Barclays Motshelo Savings Account?

Motshelo Savings Account

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 22 Dec 2016 10:37:00 +0000

Free funeral cover of P2,000 each for 10 nominated members. Check. Free cheque book. Check. Free SMS alert notifications. Check. Attractive interest rate for a better return on savings. Check. Monthly interest paid into the account. Check. Free cash and cheque deposits. Check. All these and many more comes with the award winning Motshelo Savings Account offered by Barclays Bank Botswana.

Motshelo Savings account was introduced in September 2012 to cater for unbanked market of traditional group savers. Though metshelo groups have been around for many years, this group of thousands of youths, elderly, underserved and more affluent Batswana did not have access to bank services. As a way of promoting financial inclusion, Barclays bank offered this service after they observed that the reports of security, lack of accountability, missing funds and lack of reconciliation within metshelo groups were on the rise.

Not only does Motshelo Savings account offer funds security and accountability but it also fosters the spirit of social relations (Kutlwano) and cooperation where members come together to pool funds towards common goal with the intention to grow interest

Metshelo groups have long been used as vehicles to pool money for common goals amongst the members and as such, any goal that requires funds to undertake can be saved for.

Importance of Saving

It is usually hard to save individually due to unforeseen spending, but most people find it more beneficial to save as a group.

The money is there when you need it – it offers easy access to your money.
Your money works for you – the more you save the more interest for your savings you are likely to get.
The main objective of metshelo is to save towards common goal which can include major life-changing goals such as weddings, building a house and paying for your children’s school fees.

Requirement to open the Barclays Motshelo Savings Account

Most people are usually not optimistic about opening bank accounts because of their requirements but Barclays has simplified the process of opening the Motshelo Savings Account. It only requires P500 opening and operating balance, minimum of at three members, Omang or passports of two signatories and proof of residence The group does not have to have a formal constitution.

The benefits of starting a motshelo group are countless but saving the funds in a savings account will ensure that the benefits are maximised as it offers both protection and accountability for the funds and that is why opening Barclays Motshelo Savings account is a smart step for every motshelo group that wants to safeguard their vision and wants to see their goal for farther.

To know more about your savings options at Barclays, visit the official site here.

5 MONEY MANAGEMENT TIPS FOR EVERYDAY LIFE

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 28 Nov 2016 13:13:00 +0000

5 Money Management Tips for Everyday Life

12 Ways Stay-at-home Mothers (or Anyone) can Make Money at Home

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 21 Nov 2016 14:14:00 +0000

It is no joke that raising children is expensive more especially the first year of their lives and as such any extra income is welcomed. With so many scammers offering business opportunities that promise individuals chances to become millionaires or even billionaires overnight it is often frustrating for stay-at-home mothers who want legitimate ways to earn extra income for their household.  

Some legitimate opportunities require an individual to part ways with more money in order to join their network ‘parties’. Below are some of the ways stay-at-home mothers can utilise their skills to make extra income at the comfort of their homes.

1.     Tutor

Are you good at any subject be it Maths, Sciences, and others? Depending on your proficiency, you can make money by giving Primary, Junior or senior school student extra lessons after school. You can even offer cooking lessons.

2.     Offer Hairdo Services

Can you do magic with hair? Why not plait or do hairstyles services to your neighbours and friends to make passive income? Make sure you give quality and good job because your customer’s hairstyle will act as an indirect advertising platform. 

3.     Kids Party Planner

Do you enjoy planning and hosting your child(ren)’s birthday parties? You can make money by starting a children’s animation theme party planning business. You will need equipment such as party tables, chairs and costumes. If you cannot afford to buy them, you can rent them but just make sure that your planning price covers the rental fee in order to make profit.

Remember happy parent and child means free marketing through word-of-mouth.

4.     Language Teacher 

You can take advantage of your native language knowledge by offering foreigners lessons. Many people will take the opportunity of learning a foreign language this includes sign language too. If you are fluent in other languages, you can offer more than one language lessons.

Advertise your classes in the local papers.

5.     Babysitting 

Do you love children? How about turning that passion into money? There are parents out there who will appreciate a sense of friendly, intimate care for their children than leaving them in packed nurseries or kindergartens. 

6.     Gift Basket Maker

If packaging gifts for your family gives you the butterflies then you can supplement your family’s income by becoming a gift basket maker. You can offer gift basket for various occasions or you can choose one theme e.g. sympathy events, birthday goodies bags, corporate baskets, anniversaries or wedding gift baskets.

Setup an eCommerce website that will enable your customers to place orders online. 

7.    Garage sale

Make extra cash by de-cluttering your house. Use social media such as Facebook to advertise; take pictures of some of the items on sale and post them in the Facebook groups you have joined. 

8.     Rent out a room

If you have an extra room in your house and you don’t mind sharing then why not turn it into cash cow by renting it out. Just make sure you have governing rules such as who and when to clean, whether to share food or not and visitors’ regulations into the open so that the arrangement can work for both of you.

9.     Become an Influencer

You can turn your followers into source of income by posting third party ads on your account. All you need is to have a few thousands of followers in any of your active social media account to sign up and become an influencer. Try Webfluencial.

10. Become a Seamstress/Dressmaker

If you can turn a simple cloth into a ‘dressable’ item with just a needle and thread then why not make money from your skill? Search the internet for patterns and be on the lookout for new fashion trends and try to copy them. Take pictures of your designs and advertise your work on social media such as Facebook and Instagram. To keep your overhead and startup cost low, buy a second-hand sewing machine from a local pawn shop and ask your customers to bring their own fabric material. 

11. Photographer

If you are skilled at taking photos, you can sell your work to Sites that are looking to buy digital photos. Try these popular sites:

Make sure your photos meet all the requirements needed to submit for each Site as poor quality work may results in your work being rejected.

You can also use DeviantART to advertise your work.

12. Offer your services on Fiverr

Are you a graphic designer or good at logo designing, writing resumes programming or website SEO? Then you can sell your services on Fiverr by creating a $5 gig. You can include some ‘add on’ to make extra cash – don’t forget to promote your gigs through other social media platforms such as Facebook.

Fiverr is the online market where any thing goes - even gigs where someone offers the service of being your 'long lost friend' for a fee, weird stuff, hey!

Bonuses:

Sell Your 'New-like' Old Stuff

If you have old stuff packed somewhere in the house, you can get rid of them and make money at the same time. There are people out there who will pay to have your old valuable household items including old TV or shoes (just make sure they are still wearable). Use site such as eBay

Sell your Craft on Etsy

For those with creative hands, you can start by setting up your Etsy store for free to sell your crafts. All you need is 30 minutes of your time and to list an item it will cost just $0.20 for 4 months. You can sell you knitted items, craft or paintings online too on Etsy.

Continental Free Trade Area - Building the Next Africa

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 19 May 2016 10:57:00 +0000

The African continent has a combined population of more than one (1) billion people in its fifty-four (54) countries and its combined gross domestic product (GDP) is more than USD 1.2 trillion, however, the continent records low continental trade which stands at a total of 14% according to United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. The low intra-Africa trade still remains a pressing issue for the development of the continent and that is why the African Union, in its twenty-fifth Summit held in South Africa in June 2015, has made it its main objective to tackle this problem by pushing forward the creation of a continental free trade area (CFTA) by 2017.

Through its objectives, CFTA intends to improve and boost trade across the continent by creating a single continental market for goods and services and to expand the intra-African trade by improving harmonisation and coordination of trade liberalisation.

Brief Overview of CFTA in Intra-African Trade Monetary Value and Prospect

In their computable general equilibrium (CGE) analysis, Cheong, Jansen and Peters estimate that compared with the baseline, the regional FTAs will stimulate the intra-African trade by 35.7 per cent (or $23.6 billion) and the CFTA will increase the trade by 52.3 per cent (or $34.6 billion) in 2022 and therefore increasing exchange within the continent in all main sectors: industrial sector will rise by 53.3 per cent, agricultural and food products trade by 53.1 per cent and the service trade will increase by 31.9 per cent. The CFTA also has the potential to decrease the imports from outside the continent by USD 10 billion.

Implementing the CFTA

There are few stimulants and initiatives that the continent can put in place in order to pave way for the CFTA and some are discussed below.

Free Should Mean Free: Elimination of Non-Tariff Barriers

In 1994, the then Organization of African Unity introduced the Abuja Treaty which established the African Economic Community (AEC) and called political and economic integration and for the removal of tariffs on goods and services traded within the continent’s RECs in order to make way for free trade areas. It is saddening that it costs less to export goods from continent to European market than it is to ship them within the continent because of high trade taxes imposed by the countries themselves. To harmonise tax, the countries should develop and increase bilateral and multilateral tax tools.

Regional economic communities (RECs) should be used as grounds to eliminate all non-tariff barriers, transit corridor issues, implement continental uniform tax administration and the AU should pave a way for the continent’s customs union that will embrace all regions as one so as to create common external tariff rate to be imposed on all imports. Instead of upholding the need to dominate the continent’s market and stand as single entities, the blocs need to pave a way forward to feed into AEC and CFTA by complementing each other when it comes to resources such as personnel and competencies.

The CFTA can work hand in hand with the recent introduced Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) which has brought together three (3) RECs; COMESA, EAC and SADC. The TFTA aims to create free trade amongst its twenty-six (26) member states and therefore the CFTA can benefit from this relationship.

Promoting Trade within Individual Countries

African countries need to first minimise the trade footprints left behind by their former colonial sovereigns in which African countries’ trade is dominated by the former rulers and in place, start to maximise trade with each other. For the CFTA to be realised, Africa needs to start with small steps by endorsing intra-trading between individual countries in order to build and realise the bigger picture.

Trade amongst African countries have received heavy blow from the countries themselves as they tend to favour individualism where each country tries to serve and protect its interest ahead of the continent’s goal; tax is used as a political tool to drive the various countries’ agendas. Once the countries get used to dealing with one another on small scales, then regional economic blocs such as SADC and COMESA can be brought in to work together in harmony in order to solidify the CFTA objective.

Regulatory Reforms, Eliminate Hindering Administrative Barriers and Corruption

Many African traders have experience gruelling border checks, harassment and illegal solicitation from police or customs officials one way or another. Roadblocks tend to make the goods transportation between countries strenuous and time-consuming as the traders are usually made to offload and unpack packages and even at times money extorted from them.

According to the Africa Infrastructure Knowledge Program, most of African countries scores low on the Logistics Performance Index. The Africa Infrastructure Knowledge Program reports that corrupt acts such as bribery, can increase the shipping costs of a standard 20-foot container travelling between South Africa’s economic hub and East Africa or the Far East by up to 14 per centtherefore increasing the total port costs up to 130 per cent. All of these acts are costly for the intra-trade and usually end up skyrocketing the goods and service prices for the consumers.

According to World Bank Group’s Doing Business, it takes approximately 108.2 hours to export goods and 123.0 hours to import them across the Sub-Saharan African ports and borders**. Efficient customs processing and boarder handling will assist in reducing time spent on customs clearance and inspection procedures, and shipping times, therefore cutting shipping costs.

Invest in the Youth and Embrace them into the Continental Economic Movement

According to World Population Prospects: The 2015 Revision, Africa, along with Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean accounts for 90 per cent of the world’s young people and due to the youthful age structure of African and Asian countries, young people population will continue to grow and will reach 3.4 billion of more than 9 billion people projected by 2020. The 2015 Revision further notes that all major areas of the world, except for Africa, will have nearly a quarter or more of their populations aged 60 or over by 2050*.

Data: UN World Population Prospects 2015: The 2015 Revision

Most of African countries idolised the youths during their time of liberations as they were active in mobilising resistance against their colonial or neo-colonial rulers and that helped most countries to gain their freedom. Unfortunately, most of these leaders who are now not as young as they used to be, due to their legacy as liberation heroes or compromised linked patronage have nurtured the need to cling onto the political and office powers that they gained during the struggles and instead of stepping down at the end of their tenures they still extend their office terms at times risking civil uproars. Africa has been referred to a young continent due to the high number of youth it has and therefore there is need to embrace them into the continent’s economic discussions and forums.

Youths are innovative, technically and technocratically skilled and equipped and more and more ambitious youth are embracing the possibility of united and developed Africa and therefore capable to bring to table ideas that will help to shape post-colonial continental trade. If Africa is to prosper, then governments need to invest more on the youth as the saying goes, 'they are the future leaders' and it will be disheartening for the continent clueless and uninformed in the future. Youths need to be bought into the idea of borderless trade and made aware of the potentials of the African continent.

Investing in the Continental Multimodal Transport Infrastructure

Transportation plays an important role in the growth and efficiency of the intra-regional trade. The underdeveloped transportation infrastructure in the continent hampers the continental trade as it limits ease of access to consumers due to high costs of importation and exportation. In 2009, Sub-Saharan African’s unpaved secondary roads totalled about 80% of all roads in the region.

The modes of transportation between African countries still need to be improved and integrated in order to contribute significantly to the intra-trade as the success of CFTA implementation will rely on low transportation costs. The Africa Infrastructure Country Diagnostic (AICD) reports that transportation costs increase the prices of African goods by a whopping 75 per cent and that the continent will need to spend approximately USD93 billion a year for a decade to construct the infrastructure needed to meet development goals growth.

However, focus should not be only on the physical transportation infrastructure but also the logistical systems and technology should be improved and interlinked so as to allow the ease of flow of trade from its origin to its destination within the continent whether through road, air, railway or water therefore avoiding unnecessary freight delays experienced by traders.

Encourage Private Sector Participation Infrastructure (PPI) and Attract Investors

As discussed above, infrastructure resources remain underdeveloped in most African countries and need expertise and magnitude investments in order to build and maintain them. Poor infrastructure hinders the flow of trade across the continent and such for the CFTA objectives to be achieved, African countries need to work out partnership with the private sector.

Some developing countries, have initiated ways to overcome this problem by promoting competition, attracting and bringing private sectors and foreign investor on board. However, to attract both domestic and foreign private sectors, the countries need to put in place reliable and well-defined macro-economic policies that are suitable for business environment. To attract investors, African governments need to implement regulatory reforms that will eliminate uncertainties and make it easy to improve business activities and the easiness of doing business across the borders.

Export Diversification of Products (Manufactured within the Continent)

Manufacturing sector can assists in accelerating the continent’s growth and development by creating employment (with the potential to raise millions of people from poverty) and boosting economic empowerment among the continent’s people but currently natural resources and a small number of primary products dominate the trade export in Africa. Most African countries exports raw materials to European and Asian markets which in turn make their way back into the continent as finished commodities.

The African manufacturing sector is crippled by unreliable and inadequate trade logistics which usually result in increased production costs for the continent’s manufacturing sector and therefore casting the continent’s manufacturers as bad merchants to any businesses in the global value chains (GVCs).

Manufacturing is high-productivity sector that needs to be invested in and as such, countries need to introduce incentives such as low taxes and access to availability of funds in order to boost the industrialisation in the continent. African countries should improve productivity in areas that have a comparative advantage so as to assists their goods to progress in the GVCs. It is high time the continent use its mineral wealth for its own development and to propel economic growth that is needed. Countries should be encouraged to buy into the ‘Made in Africa’ brand by increasing inter-country trade between the countries.

Recognising and Utilising the Informal Trade and Promoting Small-scale Sector

Though majority of African countries produce and export raw materials, there are few processed goods coming from these countries. Informal trading is more regionally integrated when compared to the formal economy; a hawker in Botswana will in fact find it easier to get bale clothes from countries such as Zambia and South Africa than it will be for a small enterprise owner to do a cross-boarder trade.

Economic development policies among the countries do not work in harmony with one another and at times they clash at the cost of SMEs. The African economic drives are too-focused on formal sector and overlooking the informal one. Most of the continent’s intra-trade is predominated by small scale sector but the states are failing to fully utilise these sector by easily availing funds to it and also require the traders to pay sales tax on any taxable sales in the process.

Adopt African-Caribbean (Afro-Caribbean) Islands into its Economic Blocs

Every little mass of economy brought into the continental free trade should be welcomed with open hands. Embracing and forming partnership with the African-Caribbean countries such as Jamaica, and the Dominican Republic into the continental trade programme will assists in the parties’ greater integration into the world’s economy.

Though the Islands do not have geographical connection with the continent, they are connected through their shared culture. The continent’s involvement in the upliftment of the African-Caribbean Islands came to light when the continent’s countries came in solidarity to assists the country after the mayhem of the massive earthquake in 2010. The Africa Renewal reports that:

Among the biggest governmental contributors in Africa are: Morocco (not a member of AU but still seeking readmission into the union), which pledged some $33 mn in humanitarian assistance; Ghana, with $3 mn in emergency relief; the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which has promised $2.5 mn; and Equatorial Guinea, with a pledge of $2 mn.

And finally, in order for the CFTA to be a success, the continent needs to tackle issues by phases rather than taking everything at once for instance, they could first start with issues facing the movement of labour (the goal of visa-less cross-border movement should be discussed here) followed by tangible goods trade then move to service trade and from thereon they can look at the barriers of intercontinental trade.

Sources:

* World Population Prospects 2015

** Doing Business Project

Learning to Let go of Your Failures

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 10 Feb 2016 09:46:00 +0000

How many times have you beaten yourself up for having failed a task or not achieving your set goal?

How many times have you been stuck in a one place after failure?

The world that we live in nowadays can be unforgiving, merciless, intolerant and harsh towards any mistake one makes. It will actually remind you, without failure, of all your mistakes you have ever made - even the minor ones. From our childhood, we are taught to measure ourselves, abilities and talents against that of others. Our brains have been programmed to focus more on our failures than our victories – our conquests are short-lived. The society judges an individual based on those failures:

A bad breakup will mean that I’m a bad person;
A failed business venture means I do not have what it takes to make it in the industry;
Bankruptcy means it is the end of me, that whatever is left of my life is doomed;
A rebellious child means I failed the child as a parent;
An outburst when still working on your anger issues means I will never be a better person.

The light in the end of the tunnel is realising that letting go of one’s failures will take one to greater heights – it will enable them to reach for their full potential. Failures were and are not meant to be nurtured but to be used as our stepping stones. The important habit will be to learn from our failures and not live with them; failure should be seen as a friendly foe – try to get the best from the relationship but at the same time put a distance between to avoid getting burnt. As much as learning is an integral part to one’s success journey, so is failure.

Never hate on failure because you can never rid yourself or your heart of something that you loathe. Hating something only makes it worse because it becomes part of your life, like the saying goes, it will be staying in your heart rent free. Talk about it but do not dwell much on it. Appreciate and recognise it but do not let it be part of your identity. Study successful people both famous and the ones in your community to learn how they overcame their failures because one guarantee is that to get where they are, they went through disappointments and failures – use their encounters as lessons and not as a way to avoid failing.

"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm."

- Winston Churchill

Great chefs do not normally get their best dish in one try – they have to try different ways to end up with their perfect menu and that is what we should do with our goals. If you fail in way, try another way until you get it right. Failure does not define you but how you react to it characterises you!

Say you are given a shirt to fold it neatly and on your first attempt you do not get it right - the folds do not appeal to you, what’s your next move? You are obviously going to give it another shot, and another and another until you get it right, right? So what happened here? Because of your believe that this was a simply task and you could easily conquer it, you kept on trying until you got what you wanted without crouching to a corner and wallow in self-pity or labelling yourself a loser. That is how you should view life – that it is all about trial after trial until you get it right. Remember, failing does not make you a failure but giving up on yourself does.

If we apply the shirt-folding technique in our daily lives we can achieve more than we ever knew we were capable of. Emotions often obstruct one’s overall view of the events and hinder them from seeing mistakes in a positive perspective – as learning opportunities.

Finally, I want you to do yourself a favour:

that vision that you have set aside because it seemed impossible to do - go and revive it;
that dream you pushed aside because it is too late or you are too old (or too young) for that ‘stuff’ – give it a go and know that to achieve your dreams they don’t require you to always be practical and too responsible but they require passion and purpose;
people will at times doubt your dreams because they don’t understand them but remember you don’t dream for them but for yourself;
big dreams come with uncertainty and without the blueprint and that is the beauty of it because they make going after them more interesting and allow you to see your potential.

The colour of failure is not black and white – learn to see more than what went wrong but also what went right during the process. Celebrate your victories often.

A United and Prosperous Africa (As Long As...)

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 05 Jan 2016 15:01:00 +0000

A united and prosperous Africa will remain a dream as long as its leaders drive their personal agendas ahead of the interests of its people.

As long as one country estimates that it is superior to others.
As long as there are countries that wear the pity blanket and consider themselves inferior to others. As long as corruption and fraud rule the day.
As long as the colour of one’s skin determines the treatment they get from their fellow Africans.
As long as there are people born into the ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ bloodline – Africans are of one bloodline.
As long as country borderlines are not to regulate or limit the movement of people but are used as tools to block African Makwerekwere (foreigners) to enter certain well-off countries.
As long as African countrymen steal from the Continent.
As long as the doors are opened for opportunists to grab the Continent’s natural resources and leave its natives destitute.
As long as a few rich are allowed to steal from the poor, widows, orphans to satisfy their greedy, bottomless and large stomachs.
As long as there are sell-out statesmen running the continent.
As long as there is no gender equality.
As long as there’s no peace and justice for all Africans.
As long as the Continent’s leadership is not held accountable.
As long as its people remain as consumers of junk commodities that are thrown into the Continent.
As long as the nations are under dictatorship on how they should run their states by outside forces.
As long as African countries continue to rely on handouts.
As long as self-serving and self-seeking infringe on the democracy and the truth.
As long as capitalists are made to rule socialist communities.
As long as instead of empowering their people, the leadership become slaves of alien oligarch.
As long as instead of reconciliation and healing among torn nations, leaders and foreign forces seed hostility and confusion.
As long as one African language is better than others.
As long as the oppressed become the oppressors.
As long as the uBuntu value is lost to the youth who wrongly embrace the immoral of other nations.
As long as embracing one’s culture is deemed shameful.
As long as ignorance is celebrated and the foolish lead the majority.
As long as justice is justice when it advances a few.
As long as modern-day slavery is permitted.
As long as the children remain voiceless and are victims of ill-activities of covetous men.
As long as women remain victims of imperfect ruling systems.
As long as money’s voice shouts louder than the welfare of the people.
As long as black on black racism is allowed to continue to co-exists with man.
As long as the black or brown skin is deemed contagious.
As long as Pan-Africanism remains a joke to others.
Your hairstyle, your skin colour, your beliefs, your education, your background, your gender do not define your Africanism but your true consciousness; your critical consciousness defines your Africanism.
A united and prosperous Africa starts with each individual.

“I am not African because I was born in Africa but because Africa was born in me.”

― Kwame Nkrumah

Young Women and Political Rights

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 22 Dec 2015 11:21:00 +0000

Youth across the world have been marginalised in issues of political and decision-making processes, with young women encountering more and sever forms of discrimination when compared to their male counterparts. Due to social norms in many countries, young women's voices have been silenced to prevent them from standing up for their rights. Young women face poverty, numerous types of discrimination, inadequate and limited education, unemployment and few job opportunities.

Traditionally, young women have joined and been active in political movements in their respected universities but however, they are usually overlooked whenever a formal political leadership position becomes available – political party leaders will rather choose to fill the position with incapable older male colleague than let a young woman take the reins therefore, denying the young woman her political rights.
Young women join these movements in hope of participating in formal political institutions such as parliaments and/or included in policy development but instead their leaders choose to use them as vehicles of driving motives and recruiting more supporters. The young women activists’ disillusions to engage in governance are planted and nurtured then dashed by some leaders who have no regards to the young women’s political rights.

Image Source: morgueFile

In most countries, a person is eligible for national parliament seat only once they are 25 years of age and above which makes it hard for youth to partake and hold high political leadership position. There is high need of countries across the globe to enhance young women political participation during elections, institutional political processes and even public administrations.

Women in politics face violence, intimidations and sexual exploitation from their male counterparts and they are expected to be silent about these issues and if one stands up against the maltreatment of women she is usually singled out and bullied by both her male and female colleagues.

Since the beginning of the 20^th century, many international and intercontinental political institutions have been preaching about young women involvement in the political systems but unfortunately, the same institutions have failed to implement procedures to enhance their international conventions and declarations.

Throughout the continent of Africa, there has been civil unrest caused by dissatisfied youth who are particularly refusing to accept the status quo of their nations; and young women have been seen partaking in these political movements and protests. The Arab Awakening in the Middle East and North Africa has seen many disgruntled youths taking matters into their hands by starting political movements which rose against their countries’ regime without the involvement of political parties.

To put an end to disenfranchisement of young women in politics, their political rights need to be recognised and supported and also, they should be viewed as key stakeholders in the national and global development agenda, and part of resilient democracy.

Way forward

· Nations across the globe need to put in place initiatives that will invest in young women’s political rights and engaging them in democratic governance activities. Young women should be involved from the initial creation of these initiatives.

· Voters across the platform need to stop sexualising the voting process and instead give capable women a chance to showcase their abilities.

· Meaningful and efficient methods of young women political participation should be viewed as essential and vital to democratic right and support programmes should be instigated. These methods could be young women-led.

· Through related programmes, policymakers need to develop and foster youth participation in politics, not only in the voting phase but throughout the electoral cycle in order to remove or minimise existing barriers that make it hard for youths, especially young women to partake in politics. This programmes should be engaging to the youth either through:

§ Collaboration with the youth;

§ Consultation between the policymakers and the youth;

§ and even letting the youth to lead them.

· Training courses that aim to promote and foster social inclusion, political participation for young women should be implemented and during these training, they should be given hands-on experience by placing them in formal political institutions to work or volunteer for them.

10 Financial Tips Every (Smart) Young Woman Should Know About Money Management

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 21 Dec 2015 07:53:00 +0000

We all have relationship with money; some love it, hate it, worship it and some even have chrometophobia also known as the fear of money. Some have it and some do not but regardless of each person’s money situation, everyone deals with money on daily basis, as a result, it is very important for one to know and learn ways in which they can use money to serve them best.

Below are 10 things that every young, professional woman who is new to the workforce or is a start-up entrepreneur will need to lead a positive and stress-free relationship with their money and assist them to get ahead and stay ahead with their money.

1. Set Financial Goals

Just like everything that you embark on in life, you should set long-term and short-term goals regarding what you want to achieve with your money. First, you need to identify what it is that you really want, when you want it and ways to achieve it. It is always the best practice to write down goals when making life plans and financial plans are not different.

This will help you as a reference in future in your path to achieve financial management and once a goal has been achieved; always make sure you cross it off the list.

When setting financial goals, it is advisable to seek assistance of professionals such as an accountant or financial advisor to help you reinforce and reach your goal.

2. Budget

In order to manage your finances, you need to know where it is going. Make a habit to write down monthly expenses to track your money, this will make it easy to make monthly budget. Budgets are also essential to making financial goals.

3. Shop Smarter and Cut Down On Unnecessary Expenses

If you find yourself working hard but living from check to check (or so to say), then it is high time to take a very good and long look at your spending habits. Spending that is out of control is usually one of the leading hurdles to managing one’s finances. Do you find yourself spending money at work to buy breakfast and lunches? Why not make your meals from home and bring them with you to work.

Going out every weekend can be replaced by having your friends over at your house and have ‘chill’ moments – not only do you save on fuel but also the costs of having fun will be reduced as any consumed beverage will be on limit.

4. Create other income streams

As a working young woman, most of the time your salary does not cover all your monthly expenses and that requires you to cut down on things that you might deem important and if your monthly expenses are already spread thin, then cutting down will not do you any good. At this point, it is important to monetise on any talent you have that is not related to your job otherwise, your employers might accuse you of conflict of interest, for example if you are a professional teacher and you know that your baking skills can rival that of television bakers, you can bake cakes and sell them to your friends and neighbours and before you know it, you will be having orders that will make you smile all the way to the bank.

5. Invest Your Money

The saying, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket,” can be successfully applied when investing one’s money. At young age, every woman, should learn to invest their funds so that they can dip into it in the future. However, you should avoid putting all your money in one basket, this will minimise the risks of you losing your money if the company you are investing on does not do well or as expected in the market.

To avoid financial rip-offs, you have to always remember, if it is too good to be true then it is probably is and that there is no getting rich overnight when it comes to saving and investing – these are for long term.

6. Negotiate Higher Salary

The issue of women getting paid lower salary than their male counterparts has been around for centuries across the globe and African women are not immune to it but of lately, women have been advised to take hands into their own hands and ask for salary increase that they believe they are deserve.

7. Avoid Paying Debt with Another

Pay down debts with more debt does not only put you in more debt but it will also make it hard to complete write them off. Try to avoid taking out loans or new credit cards to make debt payments rather, try to pay off your debts on monthly basis and on time without fail. Try also to add extra cash so as to meet you balance in short period. However, if you have high consumer debt, then using this system can be the only way out using the debt consolidation as a form of debt refinancing.

8. Have Emergency Fund

Rainy days, like losing your work, do not announce themselves when they close in on their victims so it is always best to be prepared. Make a habit of putting a certain amount of cash in savings account to save up as emergency funds – you can make a debit order to automatically debit your savings account.

9. Keep Your Personal Information Protected

This is one of the financial management tips that is often overlooked. Identity theft can results in you losing your hard-earned money to crooks that are always on the lookout for their next victim.

Be wary of disclosing your personal information such as account, identity number through the phone or online.

10. Develop Strong Credit Report

Your credit history should the foundation of your financial management journey at young age. Credit report reflects how you managed your past debts and your current debt amount. Having good credit record and score can play a major role in you getting favourable loan and mortgage terms in future.

Self-Discovery for 'Unclaimed Lives'

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 07 Dec 2015 13:47:00 +0000

Who are you?

If you find it hard to answer this question or hesitate before answering it then it simply means that you have not yet discovered who you really are. Knowing who you are makes it easy for any individual to know what they want and do not want out of life. It makes it easy for one to set goals and have something to live for. Self-discovery is not something that happens overnight but still, it is something that one should aim to have in life – it comes in bits and the bits that one has at any given time are what they can confidently define themselves by.

The knowledge of oneself helps to limit the chances of one having to be told who they are by others. Lack of self-knowledge means that an individual does not own their lives but it is rather owned by those who dictate to them, in other words, it opens up doors for other people to order them around. People without self-knowledge are a risk to themselves and others as they stand for nothing and are easily influenced and manipulated by others.

© Thato Gaboitsiwe (www.thato.me )

We live in the world that preaches self-discovery and individualism but at the same time, it questions and crucifies anyone who tries to embrace those qualities.

What it takes to discovery yourself?

The answer is your intuition and self-will!

The truth of the matter is, ‘your intuition does not dwell where your comfort resides.’ Taking risks, liberating your inner-being, possession of positive imagination and believing in oneself are ways in which a person can discover themselves. It means divorcing oneself from all things that are mediocre and superficial and getting reborn by setting dreams and goals that ring with your innermost person. It means taking charge of one’s life and dreams to produce the things they want out of life. It means seeing life in a broad way.

One lie that most people have believed for long and still hold is that self-discovery involves spiritual journey that is not attached to material needs. What is it that a man can achieve without material assistance? If an individual finds passion in helping the poor, then wouldn’t feeding and clothing them with the help of their material gains be realistic? The people who have achieved pure and unpolluted spiritual path know that it is not about denying themselves the delight of gaining materially but is about knowing how to utilise the materials to improve the universe around them.

One of the steps to self-discovery is first acknowledging the value that one possesses; be it in their community, jobs, relationships and their nations. Until one knows and recognises their importance in their surroundings, they will live the life that is handed out to them which normally means suffocating and destroying their dreams. The best person to really know what you want from life is You and you can only do that once you have discovered your really self. You do not have to be a prodigy or extraordinary talented to go after your dreams, you just need you passion.

An individual with strong self-will and the propensity to reach forward and create something out of their life will usually find the meaning of life and discover themselves along the way to their success. As people, we fear not what we know as it leads to comfort but our fears are with what we do not know – what we do not understand. We tend to use societal stereotypes to shield ourselves from the unknowns. Until and unless we break from the mould the society has set for us then we will never go for what belongs to us; we will never know what lies beyond the known.

Life is all about embracing the unknowns. It’s about passion.

Do not listen to what people tell you about the universe rather go out there and define the world through your own eyes. Challenge yourself in order to arrive at your destiny. Sprint into life; let it bruise you but just keep on keeping on. Having a dream is not a luxury; it is a necessity!

If you don’t push yourself, your life will remain Unclaimed. Learn to want more from life without entitlement.

Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma – South Africa’s Ideal Presidential Candidate

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 12 Oct 2015 09:41:00 +0000

Image Credit: http://tvnewsroom.consilium.europa.eu/

“My election is not a personal victory but a victory for the African continent in general and for women in particular… I would like to thank Dr Jean Ping for all the hard work he has put into the Commission and I would just like to say I have known Dr Ping for some time – when he was still the Foreign Minister of Gabon. I hope that although you have said you have bowed out, if I do knock at your door asking for advice, that the door will be open...

It is fitting that this happens during the period declared as the Decade of Women by this very Assembly. We are grateful as women that our leaders have understood that women have to participate and take their rightful place in society so they can reach their full potential because it is only if men and women reach their full potential, shall we as a continent reach our full potential.”

- Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma's Acceptance Speech

With less than a year left in her tenure as the chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma’s name has been making waves as the next to lead South Africa’s ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), which will inevitable make her the country’s next president if the ANC wins the upcoming national elections. South Africa’s next national elections will be in 2019 but the ruling party’s conference in which it will elect for its leader will be in 2017.

The current ANC leader and also the South African president, Jacob Zuma, has been reported to have no interest in serving a third term as the ANC president and by the look of things, Dlamini-Zuma will be headed against the current deputy, Cyril Ramaphosa, who happens to the majority’s favourite but this will not be the first time Dlamini-Zuma finds herself in this ‘predicament’ – it will be history re-writing itself once again...

Not an Easy Road to Chairpersonship

When she took over the chairpersonship of the AU Commission back in 2012, Dlamini-Zuma was welcomed by security crises across the continent including the brewing conflict between Sudan and South Sudan, the escalating conflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and also the instability in northern Mali where Islamist militants had seized control of several towns following a political insurgence. Hers was not an easy road to this top post in the African continent; though she had the support of most of the Anglophone countries predominantly the southern Africa countries, she still had to fight for the post against the then commission chair, Jean Ping of Gabon, who had the support of most of Francophone countries who were lobbying for his second term and this led to stalemate. The battle for the leadership position, which was divided by linguistic lines, left the Continent torn into two with English-speaking countries as Dlamini-Zuma supporters and the alienated French-speaking countries rooting for incumbent Ping. Ping, Gabon’s former foreign minister, had led the Commission’s executive arm since 2008.

On the other side, some countries that felt that by awarding the chair to South Africa which happened to be one of the Continent’s major nation, it will push for its own agenda and will try to use the commission to dominate the continent. The countries cited the fact that South African’s individual regional and global interests laid at the heart its foreign policy which may compromise its stand as unbiased leader.

Dlamini-Zuma won the chairpersonship by 60% (37 votes from the 54 member states) in the third round of voting (the candidate required to secure a two-thirds majority vote to be declared a winner) therefore making her the first woman to lead the AU commission.

She had to trend carefully and at the same time mend the wounded ties caused by the battle and also show her stewardship capability. She had to stand not as a South African but as an African – a Pan-Africanist to be exact.

Speech of H.E Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, Chairperson of the African Union Commission during the official visit of the President of the United States, H.E Barack Obama, to the African Union Headquarters (July, 2015,) © AU Commission

Former anti-Apartheid Activist

During her youth days, Dlamini-Zuma was an active underground member of the ANC and also an elected deputy president of South African Students Organisation. These organisations were actively fighting the then South African apartheid regime. In 1976, she fled into exile in the United Kingdom where she resumed and completed her medical studies at the University of Bristol after two (2) years.

Politics in her Bloodstream

After the 1994 elections, under the country’s former president Nelson Mandela’s cabinet, she was appointed as Minister of Health – a post she held until 1999. She was appointed Foreign Affairs Minister by the then President Thabo Mbeki in 1999 and later on as Minister of Home Affairs under President Jacob Zuma’s cabinet until her resignation in 2012. She was elected the chairperson of the AU Commission.

Her Leadership Achievements

As South Africa’s Foreign Africa Minister, she advocated for her country’s foreign policy which campaigned and supported human rights, peace and stability as well as collective development and advancement of the African continent.

As the Minister of Health in her country, she fostered fundamental health reforms as a result she managed to de-segregate the health system and gave free basic healthcare to the poor.

In 2001, she acted as the president of the UN World Conference against Racism (WCAR) held in Durban, the aim of the Conference was to eradicate racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance and in her closing remarks, she pointed out that Durban had decided to pave a way for a new road-map to fight against racism.

Through her tenure as the commission’s chair, Dlamini-Zuma has been determined to reawaken the spirit of Pan-Africanism and establish the AU as a noteworthy, premier Pan-African institution as well as promoting continental integration.

Heading Africa’s Continental Union

In order to breathe life into Pan-Africanism and enhance continental integration, Dlamini-Zuma initiated the 50 year vision for Africa called Agenda 2063. In the Agenda 2063, the commission states that, “Africa should end all wars by 2020” which may seem unrealistic looking at the way the continent is currently dealing with wars in most African countries by remaining mum and waiting for the western countries to intervene. It should however be noted that one of the Agenda 2063 visions was to accelerate the subject of the continental Free-Trade Agreement which was recently signed by EAC-COMESA-SADC member states therefore sealing the vision of African preceding policy-makers.

As the AU chair, Dlamini-Zuma has voiced her worry on the ‘lack’ of professionalism by the AU which has seen many state members sending deadbeat diplomats as their Addis Ababa representatives therefore resulting in the commission’s development stagnation.

As an Ideal Candidate

The support for Dlamini-Zuma, though it would be rooted for by many feminism groups which is great achievement (and will be a huge step stone for them), it should be appreciated that her role as head of the AU Commission puts her in a good position that South Africa as a country should be eager to enjoy and benefit from. She is in a better position that has allowed her to know her country’s economic and political strength, not only locally but in international terms. She also holds within her knowledge the scope of various policies from across the continent that she, in her role as the chair, has been exposed to and which she has seen first-hand how they benefited and/or failed the countries that implemented them.

Having had made history by becoming the first woman to lead the commission, it is then clear and understandable that becoming the first female president of her country will be an easy transition for her. It should also be noted that not only was Dlamini-Zuma representing women in this high post but also stood as a candidate of the southern region which in almost half a century of the commission’s existence, it had never held. By electing for Dlamini-Zuma into the presidential seat, South Africa, as one of the major nations will be making a marking and probably becoming a ‘spokes-country’ for gender-equality that has become one of the continent’s hot topics.

Her experience as a former cabinet minister for two different ministries makes her capable and more than qualified for this role.

Her track-record has shown her to be one principled person who does not tolerate indolence and failure but a leader who calls for accountability in office – something that South Africa’s government really needs at the moment.

Violence Against Women - A Case Study

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 16 Sep 2015 08:38:00 +0000

Image Credits:flickr.com/Steve Hammond

Introduction

Everyone was talking about it, well, almost everyone. In fact, they were not talking per se, they were sneering. I mean she is the one who put herself in that situation in the first place. If only she had listened to him and had not provoked him; she was the one to blame and now the poor man was harassed by the police. Women nowadays ask for a lot, why couldn’t they just shut their mouths and raise children like they are supposed to? This equal rights issue was ruining ‘our’ women, it was ruining African women – the Western men have left their women to disrespect them and now they want to spread the decay into the Motherland continent? These were questions men asked during their drinking sprees and women who had nothing except sitting under trees all day long gossiped about.

Dorcus or MmaDineo as she was affectionately called by her eldest child’s name as a sign of respect in our culture was our neighbour. Growing up, I was used to her affectionate and contagious laughter that could be heard from afar. She was a gentle soul and the kind of a person who cheered people up even during devastating times. Everyone loved her, everyone except the men she dated. She could not keep a relationship, every man she was with always left her for another woman but they all made sure to leave her with a farewell gift – a child. She had five babies by four different men and none of these men was man enough to take care of their child so as a result, she had to work countless hours as a house help to put food on the table.

As time went on, lady luck seemed to remember MmaDineo and came knocking on her door in the form of Kitso, a miner in the local mine. Kitso was a true Prince Charming, he cared for both MmaDineo and her children and never raised his voice at her. He was the kindest being MmaDineo has ever come across. He was what she needed; more especially that he could help to take care of her and the children financially. He asked her to quit her job which she reluctantly did but she had no reason to be worried, after all, he was taking care of her financially.
Months into the relationship, Kitso started coming late home from work and whenever he was home, he will emotional abuse her: always found something wrong that MmaDineo has done then he will put her down and in the process, making her feel horrible about herself. He will come in the middle of the night and sexually forced himself onto MmaDineo and other times, he will bring other women and sleep with them in front of MmaDineo. He refused to give her money to buy food and household items - she had to rely on monthly food ratio that her youngest child got from his monthly clinic checkup.

He apologised every time after the outbursts and promised to never repeat them and told her that he loved her but he never kept his word because after a day or two, he will be back to scolding her. She somehow believed and hoped he will change, that he was going through something that will be sorted in time and that they will be back to their happier times. She was ashamed to tell anyone her problems, after all, she was taught from young age that 'A strong woman is the one who wears her problems inside and never let the world know about them.' Only the abuse did not stop there, he started to shove her then it moved to random slaps across the face.

People in the neighbourhood were aware of what was happening in MmaDineo’s household but no one took a stand, even those she had helped during their trying times. Kitso was the head of the house and whatever he said, it went, they said to one another. Every time they heard MmaDineo screaming for help, the neighbourhood women will within a blink of an eye gather together and start whispering; ‘What have she done now to incite Kitso?’ , ‘That woman is so ungrateful!’ , ‘I heard that she told Kitso that she’s not willing to share him with other women! The nerve of that woman; who does she think she is? We share our men with other women but does she see us complaining, huh?’ , ‘Well, if she doesn’t want him then she should pass him to me because right now I can do with a man who makes money of his own.’

One day, MmaDineo was listening to a radio programme when she heard about a place for women like her; women caught in abusive relationships. She went to the Shelter for Abused Women where they helped her to file a case of domestic abuse against her partner but after some coaxing from Kitso’s sister, MmaDineo withdrew the case.

MmaDineo asked Kitso to move out and this made Kitso angry that he broke into MmaDineo’s house one night, sexually forced himself onto her then started hitting her, punched her in the face and then threw her on the floor, he then mounted on top of her and punched her all over the face and gut and when he thought she was dead he left. She was found unconscious by one of the Women's Shelter volunteer who had come to check on her. She was taken to the hospital. She later opened a case against Kitso and also applied for restraining order against him which was granted by court.

My dear reader, now that you have finished the above story, I would like for you to take a moment and reflect on the story characters and ask yourself which one do you identify yourself with:

MmaDineo (the Victim) – Are you caught in an abusive relationship?
Kitso (the Perpetrator) – Are you victimising your partner?
The community (the Bystander) –Do you know anyone who is going through an abusive relationship and you have chosen to look the other way or talk about them?
Kitso’s sister (the Perpetrator’s Supporter/Accomplice) – Do you find yourself defending the perpetrator’s actions?
The Women's Shelter/The Volunteer (the Victim Advocate) – You make your stand against women abuse and you give your shoulder to the victims.

Whatever character one associates themselves with, the fact remains that we all have to stand against women violence and when one finds themselves in approval of this crime, they need to reflect on their principles.

Aware Helpline in Singapore ad Poster ("Verbal abuse can be just as horrific. But you don’t have to suffer in silence.")

Unfortunately, unlike MmaDineo, not all women are lucky enough to escape domestic abuse – some women have paid with their lives. According to the findings of the report, ‘Global and regional estimates of violence against women: prevalence and health effects of intimate partner violence and non-partner sexual violence’ carried out by the World Health Organization in 2013, as many as 38% of all murders of women are committed by intimate partners and that 7% of women have been sexually assaulted by someone other than a partner worldwide. The widespread of unequal rights and women discrimination across the globe have been the fuelling factors in violation against women, both at home and in the community.

Other findings of the WHO 2013 report are:

35% of women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence;
Almost one third (30%) of all women worldwide who have been in a relationship have experienced physical and/or sexual violence by their intimate partner;
38% of women have experienced intimate partner violence in some regions.

Without realising it, communities have contributed to unequal power between men and women; they have made violence against women acceptable. Any wrong in couple relationships is normally attributed and blamed on the woman and the male partner’s actions are never questioned.

The discrimination against women definition according to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa:

Discrimination against women" means any distinction, exclusion or restriction or any differential treatment based on sex and whose objectives or effects compromise or destroy the recognition, enjoyment or the exercise by women, regardless of their marital status, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in all spheres of life"

Women are subjected to public humiliation if they do not live up to the ‘perfect’ partner image and made to believe that they are worthless if they find themselves in failed relationships. Some women are raped by their partners but are too ashamed to report the cases to the relevant authorities or if they do, they usually withdraw the cases due to intimidation and victimisation from the perpetrator’s friends and relatives friends or even the woman’s. This stems from the belief that marital rape does not exists and therefore even if a woman does not give consent for sex, their partner can have their way with them as long as the woman and man are married or in a relationship. A forced sexual intercourse is simply that – forced sexual intercourse and can never be excused for anything. To avoid stealing the survivor's’ dignity and humanity, communities need to support, protect and empower and not oust.

Most African countries, more especially the ones in the north region such as Algeria, Nigeria, Sudan, Morocco, Egypt and Tunisia are still yet to recognise the importance and support for equal rights for women.

The African Development Bank's (AfDB) The African Gender Equality Index 2015 places the African countries (in order of achievement) in top 10 overall performance:

South Africa
Rwanda
Namibia
Mauritius
Malawi
Lesotho
Botswana
Zimbabwe
Cape Verde
Madagascar

The Millennium Development Goals' Goal 3 and Gender Equality

In the Millennium Development Goals which was signed by 189 countries in September 2000, under Goal 3 - Promote gender equality and empower women, the countries committed themselves to ‘Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005, and in all levels of education no later than 2015’

The question that arises is how much of MDGs Goal 3 have been achieved?

According to the UN Women, ‘Gender parity in schooling worldwide is closest to being achieved at the primary level; however, only 2 out of 130 countries have achieved that target at all levels of education. Globally, 40 out of 100 wage-earning jobs in the non-agricultural sector are held by women. But women still enter the labour market on an unequal basis to men, even after accounting for educational background and skills.’

The Secretary-General of United Nations in the Commission on the Status of Women report, states that, ‘While the three indicators under Goal 3 reflect important dimensions of gender inequality, the narrow focus of Goal 3 fails to address such critical issues as violence against women, inequalities in the division of unpaid care work, women’s limited access to assets, violations of women’s and girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights, and their unequal participation in private and public decision making beyond national parliaments.’

Way Forward

“There is one universal truth, applicable to all countries, cultures and communities: violence against women is never acceptable, never excusable, never tolerable.”

United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon (2008)

The society needs to come together and condemn and abolish all practices including the traditional ones that endanger the well-being of and discriminate against women and girls. Women and girls should be protected and nurtured at all times.

Countries should enforce laws that strict and inhibit all forms of violence against women including physical abuse and close any opportunity for perpetrators from coerced women into sex.

Societal norms and stereotypes, cultural beliefs and practices discriminate and stigmatise against a girl child as from an early age, boys are given more preference over the girls consequently legitimising, tolerating and perpetuating the never ending cycle of violence against women. The society needs to be educated in the importance of treat and value both child genders equally in order to eradicate and uproot factors that deprive women equal rights with men at an early stage.

The Power of Words

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 06 Aug 2015 10:57:00 +0000

Image Source: pixabay.com

Words are powerful tools! They can build or destroy our worlds – they can create mayhem, harmony, heal, or even destroy. Words come in two forms; as positive or negative and as such, each individual have the responsibility to use words carefully.

“Words have energy and power with the ability to help, to heal, to hinder, to hurt, to harm, to humiliate and to humble."

- Yehuda Berg

Using Words to Create Other People’s Worlds

Before words come into existence, they first occur as mere thoughts in an individual’s mind which are then translated into words. The words are then followed by actions, either from the speaker or the hearer of the words .It is of uttermost importance to know that spoken words have impact on the listener and as such, before one speaks, they should first take time to contemplate what they are about to say and the manner in which they are going to say it. For instance, a person may easily take an advice from someone who gives it in a kind, gentle and encouraging manner than from someone who criticises using destructive and hurtful words even if the advice was of value. This is because the listener might find the advice objectionable in its judgmental undertones.

Both the words and the tone we use when speaking have an impact on the message we want to relay therefore, each and every one of us is compelled to be disciplined when speaking by using encouraging, kind, inspiring and building words when addressing others. Words should not be used to break others down, manipulate, demean, or abuse anyone. There are people who at times seem like they are pressurised to voice out their thoughts even when there is no need for that – they usually overlook the consequences of their words this at times may result in breaking relationships beyond redemption.

Using Words to Create One’s World

“Every thought of yours is a real thing – a force”

- Prentice Mulford

Thoughts, words and actions are interlinked and through practice, one can learn to easily control all three. The ability to control one’s thoughts will result in controlled words and actions but in order to control one’s thoughts, an individual needs to first acknowledge that their world exists in two different dimensions; first in their mind then in reality. The frequency of one’s thoughts will eventually attract to the person their circumstances and events based on what they feed their mind. An individual who believes that they are doomed and are unlucky in life is bound to attract to them misfortune after misfortune and will usually have no control over their circumstances.

In other words, each one of us has a choice to make regarding their lives – we can choose to be ‘lucky’ or to draw bad charm into our lives. An experience is summoned into one’s live through persistent thoughts. An average person, through life experiences and human interactions, is programmed to think ‘natural’ thoughts; fear, insecurity, defeat, fretting about the future, poverty, competition, misery, failure, powerlessness. What we do not realise is that through reprogramming and realigning of one’s thoughts, an individual can manifest their desires and also positively influence their actions towards actualising their goals.

Speaking positive statements that are aimed at shaping one’s conscious and the subconscious mind is a way of influencing one’s future. The statements when operated for the purpose of autosuggestion are intended to motivate, encourage and to benefit their owner. This is called affirmation!

The power of affirmation is synonymous with the saying, ‘you are what you think’.

Affirmations work hand-in-hand with self-acknowledgement. Until an individual acknowledges themselves, then all the affirmations they are practising will just ‘evaporate’ with time as their subconscious mind will contradict whatever they are feeding to their mind. The subconscious mind cannot be controlled completely; impulse thoughts may involuntarily pop in but at the same time one should be aware of and have absolute control on what they feed their conscious mind as it will automatically send the thoughts to the subconscious mind. The subconscious mind is never inactive – it at work even if the owner is asleep.

Consistent acknowledgement of one’s self helps to boost self-confidence, success conscious, sense of independence, allows one to be authentic to their true-self, builds up individual’s ‘chutzpah’ and encourages one to be optimistic about life consequently helping an individual to stay focused on their goals.

Examples of affirmation to use:

I success in everything I do;
I always happy;
Things work out for my good;
I am kind, loving and helpful person;
I attract the right people into my life;
I easily achieve my goal;
I am healthy;
My mind is alert and focused;
I frequently draw money and wealth to me.

When speaking affirmations, one needs to link them with related feelings for example, if one intends to lose 5 kg of body weight, they should affirm by saying, “I’m 5 kg lighter. I weight (say the body weight they want to achieve) and I’m healthy.” and imagine themselves in that state in order to generate the feel good feelings. They should affirm with faith, love and passion to speed up the desire and intensify the impact of their affirmations.

However, we cannot solemnly rely only on thoughts and words; we have to transform them into actions in order to manifest our goals.

Tripartite Free Trade Area: The Long Awaited Common Market For African Economic Integration

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 02 Jul 2015 14:05:00 +0000

AFRICA, 2015 - This year, Africa and the world witnessed an event that many naysayers said it will never come to pass; the signing of a historical pact – Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) agreement or the Cape to Cairo free trade zone in Sharm el Sheikh (Egypt) on June 10th, 2015. The deal was officially unveiled during the 25th African Union Summit in South Africa which was held on 7-15 June 2015.

Image Source: AFP

This is an exciting trade and infrastructure development in Africa at the moment but it depends on whether the parties to the arrangement see this as an opportunity or threat,"

Kuugongelwa-Amadhila - Prime Minister (Namibia)

This is the continent’s largest intra-African free trade zone and currently comprises of 26 African states within the Cape Town (South Africa) and Cairo (Egypt) area. Zimbabwe's head of State, Mr. Mugabe put it in a simple term, a deal that would create a "borderless economy".

The COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite member states have a combination of GDP of US$1 trillion, more than half of the continent’s GDP and population of over 600 million. For a continent that has been stagnated with slow progress in accomplishing economic integration, this change was overdue but still a welcomed one.

"Africa has made it clear that it is open for business."

Jim Yong Kim - World Bank President (Regarding the TFTA)

The intra-regional trade will see three of African existing regional trade blocs, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and the East African Community (EAC) merged to form a single trade zone. It should however be emphasised that the Tripartite does not have a formal institutional status and therefore is neither a REC nor a legal structure.

With an average growth rates of 5% in the passing years, the continent needs to integrate its economy in order to foster a way forward to cross-regional infrastructure development more especially modes of goods transportations (railways, roads and airlines) and also to boost the investment. Its main objective is to fast-track the continent’s economic integration and accomplishes regional sustainable economic development.

The Tripartite is founded on three (3) pillars:

Market Integration: Its aim is to eliminate trade barriers and ease goods movement across its members. This will in turn lower the costs of goods and reinforce more visible intra-regional trade and increase economic activities throughout the region this will come through the implementation of duty free, quota free market access for all originating goods. It has since put into place a common online computerised system which will assists in identifying and therefore lead to the elimination of non-tariff barriers (NTBs).

Infrastructure Development: The Task Force has so far outlined and listed the energy, transport and telecom sectors as priority infrastructure projects. A broader market means investment flow growth which will boost the regional infrastructure development.

Industrial Development: The Tripartite also aims to realign industrial production between its members which in turn will also assists in the industrial production expansion.

The three Regional Economic Communities (RECs) trade blocs also come with their own challenges:

COMESA – Since the launch of its Custom Union (CU) in 2009, which gave its member states a three-year transition period to align their national tariff to the Common External Tariff (CET) and other requirements the custom union’s progression have been elusive with none of the members meeting them up to this point. In order to control inflation, one of its member state, Ethiopia, has imposed prices controls on its essential goods therefore interfering with free trade.

EAC – This is the most advanced and more integrated regional bloc of the three. It brings with it high competition and disputes between two of its member states, Kenya and Tanzania. Tourism is one of the main issues between these two neighbouring countries with ideological differences; Kenya is a capitalist while Tanzania on the other hand is a socialist. On the bright side, the two countries have been working hard to salvage their relationship through talks.

SADC – South Africa, with a continental trade weight, dominates trade in the SADC. It exports more goods to the world than other state members and most of the members trade more with South Africa than with others, resulting in virtually no intra-SADC trade with 10% of total SADC trade between 2000 and 2010. It is also a member of Common Monetary Area (CMA) with three other countries; Lesotho, Swaziland and Namibia, from a five-member state custom union, Southern African Customs Union (SACU), and its currency, Rand, is commonly used as legal tender in these countries therefore boosting South Africa’s status as the regional’s significant hub for trade. Like the COMESA’s customs union, the SADC FTA is still in its infancy and without much visible progress but it has some of its members; Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, South Africa and Namibia as members of one of the oldest custom union – SACU which was formed in 1910.

The Tripartite brings with it more advantages for its members which include:

increased and wider market,
cheaper but quality foods for the consumers,
industrial production increment,
the inflow of foreign direct investment into the region will help in increasing their economic growth.

However, many have raised concerns that the TFTA is going to benefit countries unequally as economic powerhouses like South Africa and Nigeria that are already dominating the continent’s trade. More than half of intra-African exports is dominated by five countries; South Africa, Nigeria, Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya and Egypt. This means countries with small economies with limited industrial production capacity and less competitive edge will have to compete with giant and well established industries which will pose a threat to their already weak economies.

Most of African countries have inadequate trade‐related infrastructure.

Informal traders make most of African countries’ market, including the cross-border, intra-regional trade so the question is; what policies are going to be put in place to cater to them in terms of inter-governmental procedures which usually turn to be obstacles to this trade?

Another concern is that the deal is mostly likely to benefit foreign multinational corporations which will piggyback on the free trade as it will give them a more easy access to mass markets that is supposed to benefit Africa.

For countries with governments that rely heavily on revenue from customs duties, this will be a heavy blow. The writer however believes that the Tripartite should come up with a structure to compensate these countries.

Now what is left is for countries to inform and educate their communities; the general public, all civil servants together with the private sector about the TFTA.

My hope is that more African RECs may join the Free Trade and therefore improve the intra-African trade. Hopefully, this will be a step towards the creation of African monetary union and introduction of a common currency for the continent in the future.

You can view the Communiqué of the Third COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite Summit, 10 June 2015: Towards a Single Market here or the Sharm El Sheikh Declaration Launching the COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite Free Trade Area, 10 June 2015 here. For more COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite documents you can visit the tralac Website here.

Living in the Moment Is a Recipe for Happiness

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 11 Jun 2015 14:14:00 +0000

"Live in the moment."

We have all heard of this cliché that it has long since lost its meaning. But what if you were told that it is a way to a happier you?

Often times, people spend most of their time either being anxious or self-conscious. They rush through life without enjoying it, as a matter of fact, they let life live them instead of it be otherwise. They are concerned about and dwell in the past and tend to worry about the future. What they do not realise is that once they let go of these negative feelings and learn to live in the now - to live in the moment, then they can actually start enjoying life and be content with who they are.

Living in the moment means seizing one's ‘present’ and realise its importance and impact on one’s life – on their future. It is all about prolonging the value and quality of one's time; every second of it. Living in the moment helps one to give full attention to a task at hand without worrying about the outcomes – this assists in helping one to give quality and remarkable results. People who live in the moment usually focus on the task at hand wholeheartedly and without a doubt and find it easy to work on the mistakes they make along the way. They are usually happier and motivated than their counterparts.

One example of people who live in the moment are professional athletes. Once an athlete gets on the racing track, they tune out everything and immerse themselves on the race. They rarely acknowledge the presence of their competitors; the world and competitors disappear. It is rare to see an athlete looking behind to check on how far the other participants they have left behind have fared on the race because to them, those competitors belong there – in the past. They simply avoid the cardinal and common mistake of putting their energy on the OUTCOME FOCUS.

Living in the moment means giving full attention to:

People one comes in contact on daily basis – listen attentively;
Task that an individual is doing such as driving, eating, writing, giving speech, exercising or relaxing;
One’s actions and thoughts.

In other words, living in the moment means letting go of one’s self-imposed pressure and huge expectations we have of ourselves. It helps an individual to take things easy and stop putting too much pressure on themselves which in turn eases nervousness that usually leads to low self-esteem.

One needs to understand that living in the moment does not mean that they should not make plans for and prepare for the future but for them to be conscious and aware of their presence. An individual should try by all means to avoid putting all their focus and energy on the past as it will only steal their presence and future. If one has gone through painful and traumatising past, they need to accept the past and the fact that they cannot change it and move on. They need to be optimistic about both the present and move toward the future with purpose.

Ways to live in the moment:

Enjoy every moment you spend on any activity;
Practise gratitude on daily basis;
Observe and enjoy your surrounding – do not overlook it;
Try to relax and feel peace;
Enjoy your life.

It's Ok To Just Be Who You Truly Are

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 19 May 2015 11:07:00 +0000

Image credit: publicdomainpictures.net

Recently I had an interesting conversation with a friend who also happens to be a colleague. He told me that he plans to move from the city and stay in a farm in the near future. He mentioned that he needed to get away from the sham that most people in our city are living. I agreed with him. Yes, most people here are not true to themselves, as a matter of fact, most people across the globe do not really know their true selves because they have never met their ‘real’ selves.

Most people, more especially the youth, live their lives trying to please their ‘friends’; they spend money unnecessarily; they want to be seen in fancy cars they cannot afford, designer clothes that are out of their affordability. I'm not saying it is wrong to have ambitions but it is wrong not to be realistic when it comes to important issues - issues that concern one's life.

The so-called friends are the very people who in future will be leading the mass that will be laughing at them when they find themselves in trouble. These kinds of ‘friends’ are only there when times are good and easily disappear when tribulations come knocking. They are bad influence and will easily find it right to fund your path to self-destruction. I had a talk with my best-friend the other day and she told me about one of her friends; she told me that the lady’s friend is always ready to give her money to buy alcohol and go clubbing but if she ever tries to borrow money to do something good for herself, this friend snubs her and refuses to help. She however pointed out this pattern to this lady and asked her if that is the kind of person she can say that tomorrow when she is in trouble she can rely on.

In order for us to acknowledge ourselves, we need to take stock of the people we surround ourselves with; are there to add value to our lives or they are like parasites? They suck the lives out of our souls? Are they appreciative of our individualism or they want us to be imitations of themselves? Do they allow us to be who we really are or they chain us to their idealism of who we should be? Can we put our lives in their hands and trust that they will see us through it all or are they poisonous to us? Once these questions have been honestly answered, it will be easy for one to make informed decisions regarding those they let into their inner circle.

The youth of today have made it almost mandatory to validate their lives based on their friends’, colleagues’ or even strangers’ lives. They are afraid to get to know themselves because most of the time they find out that who they really are will be rejected by the crowd. What they don’t realise is that, most of the times, the gang leader is probably not happy with their lives and the only happiness they get is when they make other people’s lives miserable.

Like counterfeit money, you can only trick unknowing victims to believe that it is the real thing but to a trained eye, it is easy to identify the forgery and once that happens, it is just a matter of time until everyone else know about one’s faux living.

To get rid of the feelings of inadequacy and self-shame, the individual have to internalise oneself. First they need to accept that they existence is not a mistake and that they are unique – they can never be the same you nor the same me that is why it is okay to be yourself; to be different. If it means seeking professional help in order for one to learn to accept and love themselves then they should do so and the sooner they make the decision, the faster they will be able to embrace their true self and find inner peace which will lead to them being content with whom they are. It’s a simple equation; find inner self, fall in love with your true self and it will be easy to know your dreams and follow them.

Sometimes we lose ourselves in the dreams that other people have of us.

A Better You? Don't Forget the Self-compassion Ingredient

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 16 Apr 2015 13:30:00 +0000

We live in the world where self-criticism is celebrated; we are taught to be hard on ourselves in order for us to make it through life. We are taught that being kind to ourselves is an act of self-pity, selfishness or egotistical. Our modern culture encourages self-criticism because it believes that it actually motivates us to be successful and without fail, frowns on any individual who believes in extending compassion to themselves. What the society is not aware of, is that self-criticism is actually self-destructive motivator; is like giving a child a hand-grenade to play with – it will eventually blow them up. Self-criticism plants the feeling of unhappiness and lack of self-esteem in its victim and that feeling stays with them even if they become successful later in life.

Self-criticism becomes a ball of chain that holds its prey down in the long run.

What the society need to preach is self-compassion. Self-compassion is the ability of one to not only feel sympathy for others, but also the ability to enclose themselves in that compassion; being kind, taking one’s interests and being into consideration during trials and disappointments. People with self-compassion tend to:

find happiness,
feel as part of their society,
be content with who they are in life,
gain in-depth understanding of the world easily,
be responsible for themselves and their actions,
be optimistic; they do not let adversity define them.
easily rebound from their mistakes with ease because of their emotional resilience.

One of the fatal mistakes that people tend to make is to confuse self-compassion with self-pity; the truth is, the two are just a world apart. A person with the former personality knows how to treat themselves with love and sympathy whilst a person with the latter is usually prone to exaggerating their personal problems and will easily drift into self-absorbed sorrow over their misfortune.

A person who suffers from self-pity has a habit of believing that they are victims of the situation even if evidence says otherwise. People with self-pity are usually prone to invite everyone and anyone who cares enough to listen to them to their misery party and anyone who tries to assist them by trying to shake them from that emotional path is deemed to be an enemy.

Take an example of an example of two people with the same predicament but with different temperament:

Student A and Student B sat for their end of year examinations. Both of the students failed the examination and par the College Board regulations, they are both required to resit for their examinations.

Student A was disappointed with the results; he sat down and went over the things that might have led to him failing. Amongst the list were lack of motivation and poor study habits. He told himself that failure is part of life and should never define a person but what should, is the actions that follow the setback. He decided to step up and be responsible towards his schoolwork and study hard and smart in preparation for his retake.

Student B on the other hand blamed his lecturers for not being good enough, he claimed that he was not given enough time to prepare himself (even though he had a whole year to do so); he also claimed that the exam was leaked to some students but when asked to bring forward evidence or to bring the case to the board he claimed he had no time for that; above all, he argued that the lecturers at his college hate him and that is why they failed him (he wrote the examination online and he got his marks before he left the exam room). He however overlooked the fact that he did not attend most of his classes; he came drunk to the exam room.

The difference between the two students is that Student A owned up to his mistakes first and then extended self-compassion to himself whilst Student B decided to wallop in self-pity and victimised himself.

Self-compassion is having the skill of giving one’s best even after going through adversity because of the awareness and acknowledgement that failure and part and parcel of life and as such should not be feared. It the ability to transcend disappointment and seeing one’s self as capable but above all is having flexible mind-set rather than a rigid one that will enable them to bounce back.

People who are self-compassionate usually treat themselves kindly and fairly and therefore tend to develop emotional resilience. Simply put, self-compassion is practising the Reverse Golden Rule: treat yourself as you would treat others. It should be noted that Reverse Golden Rule is best practised by an individual who already practice the Golden Rule.

Ways to improve self-compassion:

Learn to forgive yourself for any mistakes you have committed in the past and take in account that mistakes are part of life and therefore you are bound to make them in the future. Self-judgement does not solve any problem, as matter of fact it makes matters worse as it makes an individual see all their wrongs.
Give yourself positive talks; express your gratitude to yourself for all the times you have managed to meet your goals or have risen above failure. Avoid down-talking yourself at any cause.
Treat yourself the same way you will treat someone you care about who is going through difficulties.
Give yourself an occasional hugs especially whenever going through disappointments. Practice mind and spiritual purification and self-reflection activities such as yoga.

Africa still failing Africans

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 08 Apr 2015 13:53:00 +0000

Image Credit: hdwallpapers-3d.com

For a continent that is deemed to be rich in natural resources which include diamond, gold, chromium, cobalt and manganese to name a few, Africa is a home to over one billion of people who are only seen but not heard. The richness of the Mother continent are enjoyed by few Africans whilst the lion’s share is being devoured by aliens. Both the continent’s governments and multinational firms engaged in fraudulent schemes have plundered Africa of its resources. According to the African Union’s report, the African continent loses more than $50 billion every year in illicit financial outflows.

Puppet and corrupt Leadership

Most of African leaders are totally compromised, non-progressive, lack vision and mostly selfish people. African leadership has been turned into cult – the natives have fallen into the deadly trap of hero worshiping their leaders. They have lost the ability to evaluate their leaders’ capabilities and abilities – they have simply derailed from the Africa First vision. True visionaries have either long gone or have simply gone silent and in their place stand storytellers who are feeding the people with lies after lies.

Most of the continent’s leaders’ systems fall under the following:

Despotism: The so-called leaders who are planted by outside power in order for them to take control of the states. These puppets later appoint their friends to take over and continue the vicious corruption cycle
opportunistic looking for ways to maximise their personal gains who rule with absolute power
those who have turned a blind eye to the cry of their own people
and the rare types who have made it their life mission to be servants to their people – these are what we call conscious leaders who live their lives in pursuit of the truth

On daily basis, they make poor decisions that only enrich the already rich few and their families and friends. They make fatal choices that leave more and more Africans enslaved to poverty and diseases. The tendency of African leaders to shy away from the truth in important issues just goes to highlight the consequences of who got into power through force whether directly or indirectly, those who have the sense of entitlement to power. These so-called leaders arrogate leadership roles to themselves. Sigmund Freud summers up these narcissistic leaders’ behaviour in a precise way, "because of early frustrations, they arrogate to themselves the right to demand lifelong reimbursement from fate."

African leaders need to go back in time and remind themselves the important role of a community leader. They need to awaken their memories because it seems as if they have forgotten that the whole reason for them to be holding the office is that they should be a vase in which ideas are dropped by the subordinates and then selected in accordance to their merit and relevancy to the need of their people.

A great deal of the continent’s leaders are good speakers but fail dismally when it comes to delivering their promises; Africans are at a point where they need to know that speeches alone, no matter how genuine they are, have never and will never build the much needed infrastructures or eradicate poverty. Leaders who are African in the outside but non-African in the inside need to be done away with. To further explain the above point, does a leader who knows the pain and suffering of their people but still goes ahead to steal the only opportunity their followers had to a better chance of better lives including education, access to the much needed medication or putting food in their table be pro-African? No, they are simply African by their heritage and physical appearance but deep inside there is nothing African about them. The raison d'être of every African (and African American) is and always have been ‘Africa for All Africans and its Descendants’.

Many questions have arisen from the system of African leadership – many questions without answers;

Why is the blind leading the sighted?
Why is the child teaching the elderly wisdom?
Why submit yourself to self-bondage, why tie your neck with a chain and still expect to survive?

In short, these kinds of leaders are corroding the continent’s development by shrinking the hope of many natives.

Poor Industrialism

It is true that Africa is a rich land as it produces tons and tons of raw materials but most of the benefits do not reach the man in the street because the resources are exported to developed countries that in turn transform them to usable goods and then sell them back to Africa at exorbitant prices. Foreign organisations, individual aliens and their naïve African yes-men own hundreds and hundreds of mines all over Africa whilst the majority of natives work every day to enrich this minority. This goes to show that the Motherland loses twice; first is the day-light robbery committed by having the riches taken from the continent and secondly these nations control their markets by selling the end goods back to Africa at prices that they have set without consulting African stakeholders.

It is high time that the issue of total ownership of the land’s resources is re-addressed.

This year, 2015, the United Nations will be celebrating the 26th Africa Industrialisation Day but what is to the name? How industrialised is the continent? And how much that have been industrialised belongs to its people? Where is the evidence of industrialisation in Africa? Although it is not a public holiday, Africa Industrialisation Day is commemorated globally on the 20th of November every year since its inception in 1990 during the 25th Ordinary Session Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and then by UN General Assembly. Every year, almost all African leaders and international stakeholders come together to evaluate the African industrialization progression.

Most African countries have no industrial development policies put in place in order to advance their industries. Little or no form of actions have been taken to come up with ways to identify factors that limit industrialisation or initiate systems to mitigate the already identified constraints.

Lack of Foreign Investment

Civil wars, political instability, acts of terrorism, outbreak of fatal infectious diseases and religious conflicts have not really painted Africa as a diamond that it is. What they have achieved is chasing away many authentic potential investors and this has made it hard for Africa to develop as most of its countries either remained stagnated or getting poorer.

Peace uncertainty in most countries has made it hard for private investor to invest in the continent’s economy including the manufacturing industry.

As much as conflicts may be blamed for little private investment in African industrialisation or lack thereof, the questions still remain, ‘What are African nations doing about it? What economic development reforms and investors’ incentives have the nations put on the table in order to attract more investors?’

The 20th and 21st centuries has seen Committee for Development Policy (CDP) of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) declaring most of African countries as developing countries moving them from being least developed countries (LDC). This caused many governments and not-for-profit organisations that were hooked on the Western aid to panic as they had been used to the hand out system and mostly had a dependency mentality and a sense of entitlement to many donations they received from these donors. This decision has benefited most of it ‘victims’ as it allowed them to stand on their feet and reinvest in themselves in order to survive. Unfortunately the benefit comes with a big but; the bigger piece of the pie has gone to the donors as it has benefited them the most. Most private firms donors reprioritized their aiding agendas – they halted most of their industrial development aid and focused on their line of business environment leading to inadequately and ineffectively restricted investments thus from the industrial development view. This has opened the door for many predatory organisations.

African nations should come together as a continent:

Create its own innovators and inventors
Craft a ‘Made in Africa’ brand that embraces and represents all the different Africans cultures. How about we start to support African firms that make Pan-African clothing apparels (prêt-à-porte or haute couture, your choice)?
Implement and promote industrial development and structural policies that increase industrial exports
All African nations to unite and aggressively enter the manufacturing industry and global market as one and form distribution power to support each other. Southern African Customs Union (SACU) is a customs union that was established on a great vision; to support the free interchange of goods between Member States. African countries can commit to a custom union which each member state is awarded to trade with what it is capable of supplying with the aid of others.
Take ownership of its mining rights and detect how the resources benefit all native Africans.
Take ownership and control of the Motherland – Africa for native Africans vision

Take ownership and control of the Motherland – Africa for native Africans vision

Marsha Wright’s Think Big Sundays Making a Positive Impact

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 17 Mar 2015 07:00:00 +0000

We all face challenges in our lives – this is not unique because it is a platform in which life is founded on but what remains exceptional is what is rooted in an individual’s mind; what they let penetrate their consciousness. To make it through the challenges, we need to blend our thinking with our daily lives – they have to be one. If an individual have a negative mind-set but still hope life will turn out good for them then they are living a deceit; either consciously or unconsciously. We need to align our minds with what we want in order to make phenomenally positive and constructive changes in our lives and this can be achieved through positive thinking.

Having a positive outlook in life helps us to cope easily in our day to day dealings. People who have positive attitude tend to be more optimistic in life and happier and successful than their counterparts. Positive thinking is a state of mind that can be developed by an individual in order to achieve their life goals and visions. In other words, positive thinking can be concluded as having good intentions for your life and communicating them with your mind which in turn gives you enthusiasm for life.

One of the experts who truly believe in the power of positive thinking is Marsha Wright. Through her popular Think BIG Sunday with Marsha, she encourages her 180K+ Twitter followers to share inspirational quotes that encourage a lifestyle of thinking beyond one’s circumstances.

Every Sunday without fail, Marsha opens the door for her followers to share quotes that build and inspire one another by tweeting them using the hashtag #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha. Not only do the participants get motivated but also get the chance to get lot of audience and therefore expanding their reach – free of charge! The Think Big Sunday with Marsha “lasts almost 2 days because we start from 12 midnight Asia time till 23:59 Pacific,” says Marsha in one of her tweet.

Below are some of the #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha tweets:

Paulo Del Picchia – ‘#ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha Lets all be the leaders we wish we have had! #leadershipquotes’

Betha Mukodzani - ‘Life becomes easier when we learn to accept an apology you never got!’ #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha #Forgiveness

Sajuks – ‘”The secret to getting ahead is getting started.” – Mark Twain’ #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha #quotes

Srkian Nishu – ‘”Safe and security (don’t) just happen” – Nelson Mandela’ #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha

The Think Big Sunday with Marsha trend have also gained positive comments from other participants:

Pythagoras – ‘@marshawright: Reading inspiring quotes uplifts the mind (sic) #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha brilliant’

Martha Flores – ‘Dear Marsha, thank you for your support promoting. God bless you forever! #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha @marshawright

The tweets are different but they share one message: encouraging every one of us to aim for exceptional life through believing in ourselves; helping each other; being humble; making wise choices in life. In simply words, the motto of Think Big Sunday with Marsha is, see the glass as half full. Without doubt, this is one of legacy projects that have come from using social media prudently. It cultivates the spirit of self-awareness and self-empowerment and therefore creating powerful, conscious and resourceful leaders.

The #ThinkBIGSundayWithMarsha has become a self-guided improvement movement with thousands of people and organisations participating every Sunday. Both original quotes and quotations are allowed to be tweeted and can be retweeted or favoured by other participants.

Follow Marsha Wright on Twitter @marshawright

And of course follow me at @ThatoGaboitsiwe

Youth Unemployment and Entrepreneurship

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 12:38:00 +0000

Image Credit: http://www.hdwallpapers-3d.com

The recent global financial crisis which broke out in 2008 saw both the developed and developing economies collapsing with most governments having to bail out giant corporations. At this moment in time, most economies are going through the global economic recovery, which it going at a slow pace. The Sub-Saharan Africa is one of the economies that have been enjoying visible and vigorous economic growth but just like other economies, it is faced with many challenges that resulted from the recession and one issue that is more concern is the escalation of unemployment - youth unemployment in particular. The uneven economic recovery has so far proven to be a jobless one.

According to the International Labor Organization (ILO) in its recently published Global Employment Trends for Youth 2014 report, almost 202 million people around the world were unemployment in 2013 – with an increase of almost 5 million compared to the previous year.

ILO projects that if the nothing is done to alleviate the situation, global unemployment will eventually reach more than 215 million people by the year 2018. On annual basis, 42.6 million people around the globe enter the labour market but ILO estimated that only 40 million new jobs will be created annually.

Not only are the youth facing the challenge of unemployment but also the disparity between their skills and employability has widened. On annual basis, more and more youth graduate to join the employment market but are equipped with mismatched skills and therefore rendering them unemployable.

This is not a government-only issue; government, societies and private entities need to come together and find a way to mend the torn blanket. This is a challenge that need all stakeholders to form a coalition that will work towards tackling this issue. It is high time youth are reskilled in order to meet the current market needs – entrepreneurship mentality needs to instilled in the youth at tend age so as assist them to be less dependent on the government to prove them with jobs. This will play a crucial role in reducing the unemployment rate as job seekers will turn into job creators.

Youth entrepreneurship as the solution

Entrepreneurship is about curving paths and discovering opportunities where others find and see nothing. It is about selling products and/or service to others at a future point and making them believe/realise they needed it. Entrepreneurship is simply a character that is born with a person; the spirit of survival and therefore, not everyone is born an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs create employment for their fellow human beings and as such, they are the solution to high rate of unemployment. It is basically impossible to create or sustain jobs without entrepreneurship.

Entrepreneurship has proven to be key instrument and valuable strategy for boosting job creation and improving youth’s livelihoods and economic independence. Even though many countries are aware of the importance of youth entrepreneurship, there has been little effort, if any, to view entrepreneurship from the youth’s perspective; the youth’s economic and social contribution has been underrated and unutilised. Youth needs to be integrated into labour markets and their entrepreneurial potential should be utilised and maximised in order to lessen the persistently high global youth unemployment.

The normal guaranteed job-for-life career paths are disappearing on daily basis and many youth are aware of the shift in policy and such, they are now involved in informal economy and have created employment through micro entrepreneurism and self-employment to generate income and improving their livelihood and therefore reducing the dependence on the government and overcoming poverty.

Many actions need to be taken by nations to bring to a halt elements that accelerate worldwide youth unemployment and the recovery of labour markets:

Entrepreneurship spirit needs to be promoted at schools;
Governments should provide conducive environment for the aspiring entrepreneurs such as providing youth entrepreneurs with incubators;
Financial awareness should be taught at schools in order to teach the youth the value of money and the importance of investing it;
Financial institutions should make it easy for youth entrepreneurs to access funds;
Governments should encourage angel investors and crowd-funding methods and also allocate funds to support programmes that promote entrepreneurship amongst the youth;
Academia should encourage innovation and creativity in their students;
Policy makers need to put conducive labour market policies into place in order to alleviate the unemployment challenge such as supporting informal employment and turning them into formal structures.

Women Should Help Each Other

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 10 Feb 2015 08:56:00 +0000

There is a special place in hell for women who don't help each other.

- Madeleine Albright

Image Credit: http://www.hdwallpapers-3d.com

When Taylor Swift quoted Albright (she credited it to Katie Couric though) in her interview with Vanity Fair, after the gag Tina Fey and Amy Poehler made at her expense during the Golden Globes, most people might have taken her speech lightly but the thing is, this quote could not be far from the truth. But in Fey and Poehler’s defense we can say the comediennes were just doing their job – making jokes with no intention of offending anyone as they later claimed. But that’s another topic for another day.

Professional successful women usually do not take it to a newbie trying to ‘steal’ their spotlight. Most women have to fight and work ten-times more than their male counterparts in order for them to succeed in any profession dominated by men and so they tend to feel that other upcoming women should go through what they went through if they are to make it to the top. They feel that helping them up might soften them and as such they might not last longer at the top. This, even if it is intended well, is far from the truth – women at the top should leave the path they have paved on their way to the top visible for other women to follow so as to balance gender load in the managerial positions.

Some women are hell-bent on undermining and being catty with others and not for the reason mentioned above but due to the fact that they feel a species of the same calibre, in this instance, another woman is only there to compete against them. In their minds, another woman who joins the game is an enemy and as such, should be done with. They would rather unfairly support a male colleague just to despise and see the dismissal of the ‘foe’.

Another example of catty and unnecessary catty remarks is of that of the former Californian Republican Senate candidate and former Hewlett-Packard CEO, Carly Fiorina, regarding her Democratic opponent, Sen. Barbara Boxer. Instead of her attacking the Democratic based on her political history she attacked her rivalry’s hair, “God, what is that hair? Soooo yesterday,” was her unguarded comment when she thought her microphone was off.

However, I had not kept those dreams to myself… This woman wants exactly what men want and are allowed to have without anybody even thinking about questioning their capabilities... These are the problems that ambitious women in the world over always encounter… The thing to do is never to be apologetic about it. You will sometimes feel alone and hated, but that comes with the territory.”

Madam Speaker, Sir! Breaking the glass ceiling: one woman’s struggles by Margaret N. Nasha. MP, PH.

Even in domestic and private lives, women still find it hard to work together in harmony. It is actually rare to hear a woman saying they get along with their mother-in-law or vice versa. As a matter of fact, they will rather fight hard to tear each other down or make each other to be a monster in the husband/son’s eyes.

Jealousy, rivalry and resentment amongst women have really made it hard for them to break-even in the predominately male environments. Women do not realise that, most men prey on their weaknesses and use their same-gender enmity against them in order to continue dominating the leadership and managerial positions. Women tend to attack other women’s looks and will even resent another woman for her good looks whilst men do not take other men’s looks into consideration when competing for the same job (unless of course if they are in the fashion industry). Most women are usually intimidated by an attractive woman’s looks than by their social skills and capabilities.

This kind of women has the Mean Girl syndrome – bullying, demeaning and belittling other women and throwing pointless tantrums. The Mean Girl usually have psychological issues including low self-esteem that they need to deal with otherwise they will always try to make themselves feel better by being rude and disrespectful of others. They are the very people who fuel the stereotype that professional women are spiteful.

At the same time, it should be appreciated that there are women out there who use their looks and bodies to climb the corporate ladder but at the same time it should be emphasised that not all women are like that. This kind of behaviour should be frown upon and pruned as it does not give the clean impression that many women have fought for – that women are capable of doing the same jobs that men can do. It is of good advice for women to give each other the benefit of doubt before they bully each other.

Sadly in other instances, women tend to underestimate themselves and opt to giveaway their power when it comes to negotiating their advancement. They would rather avoid the confrontation that comes with wanting to achieve one’s desires more especially if that individual happens to be a female. They take the keep-your-head approach and let opportunities pass them by; it is of great value for women to learn to use their work experience to sell their capabilities and advance themselves in their careers.

Way forward

Women should setup strong and active network groups to help and encourage each other. They should also be supportive of each other and be willing to share success tips, ideas, opportunities and business advices as it is with no doubt that the support any woman gets from other women can prove to be invaluable at any given time.
Social media platforms can be used to connect women from across the globe so as to enable them to come as one and tackle problems that are unique to women.
Women need to realise that the motto, ‘United we stand, divided we fall’ applies to them as well. A woman who has the support of other women is stronger than any situation that men will throw at her. Success will come to women who practice feminism than those who want to adopt the ‘masculine’ approaches.
From an early age, women should be taught to form their own network of personal Board of Advisors. These are the people that have their best interest at heart and are to be trusted to always give them sound and genuine advice than those who will feed them sycophantic counsel and celebrate in their fall.
Each woman should learn to surround themselves with successful people and how to be better role models for one another. They should also know how to stand their ground and at the same time handle themselves with grace and dignity when they are being bullied.

Everyone needs to be a Self-Leader

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 13 Jan 2015 08:16:00 +0000

Image Credit: Imagebase.net

Self-leadership is the ability of one to manage their lives in such a way that it brings about positive outcome in their lives. When you practice self-leadership, you become your own leader as well as your own follower. A self-leader strives to lead themselves to personal development and excellence. One of the advantages of self-leadership is that, a self-leader is able to keep constant supervision of their improvement and/or relapse as they spend most of their time with themselves. The reason why I use and highlight the word, ‘most’ rather than ‘all’ is because most people ‘sleepwalk’ throughout their existence and as such, are not aware of how they spend their time. They have little if no control of their lives.

It is easy to influence or to be influenced by the person one spends their time with and therefore with the ever-presence of one’s self we tend to shape our lives with our thoughts and beliefs. For any leader to be an effective leader, they need to first be effective in leading themselves. Until one is able to successfully lead themselves, the chances of them having effectual leadership of others is nearly impossible as the cliché goes, ‘you cannot give what you do not have.’

In order to achieve effective self-leadership, one needs to go through the process of inner influence first otherwise the individual might be easily influenced by others in which will result in them being puppet leaders. A puppet leader is a person who is supposedly leading others but with no control of the situation - other people who are more influential or mentally stronger than them will make decisions and lead through them. Self-leadership helps one to know their “stand” and understand themselves better and assists us to exercise self-motivation. It is one of the tools needed to pursue our individual visions and goals as it includes self-control and self-knowledge.

While it important to celebrate and encourage self-leadership in ourselves, we also need to be aware of narcissism tendency as these two are usually confused for one another. A narcissist is a person who is excessively fascinated in themselves. The “word” comes from a Greek myth about a proud young man named, Narkissos, who fell in love with his reflection which in end became his undoing. People with narcissism behaviour tend to put themselves above anyone else and have no regard for others whilst on the other hand, a person who “possesses” is effective self-leader is not too independent and arrogant; they are aware that it takes a good leader and each individual player to effectively achieve teamwork. An effective self-leadership balanced with effective group-leadership can benefit both the individual and the organisation collectively.

An effective self-leader is a person who “values” their individualism and therefore are more likely to encourage and value the identity of each individual follower or in this aspect, employee. This will encourage employees to showcase their unique skills and therefore contributing towards the development of others and the organisation as well.

The external leader (leadership of others) within us needs to recognise and appreciate the internal leader in order for the two “characters” not to clash with each therefore resulting in self-conflict.

Catcalls are not Compliments

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 22 Dec 2014 15:43:00 +0000

Days ago I went to a local mall to do some shopping. As I was walking in the shopping centre, a group of young men (how I wish I could call them gentlemen but they were far cry from that) walking behind me started to give me catcalls. I ignored them and kept on walking but unfortunately the catcalls did not stop, as a matter of fact people started to stare at me so I decided to do the only thing that I thought will save me from further embarrassment I was forced to endure - I slowed down to allow them to pass me by. As they passed, one of them took hold of my left arm and did the Jason Derulo’s Wiggle line on me (Now I don’t have anything against Derulo, as matter of fact, I'm his fan.); and he said, “Damn, gal you have bright future behind you.” Hearing that, I saw red; in my mind I was puffing my chest. If there is anything I can’t stand is a situation whereby a woman is demeaned and worse still, when that woman happens to be me! - I felt so degraded. So what did I do? I gave the guy my most sincere smile, looked him in the eyes and said, “Too bad I can’t say the same about you but then again you wouldn’t know what to do with it!” His response: “Why you tripping, I was only paying you compliment.” I don’t know which was worse for him; his so-called friends laughing at him or me turning the table on him. Of course, I could have brushed off their comments but all it would have done was to put me under further objectification. This incident made me reflect on what women go through every day - Violence Against Women (VAM).

Throughout history, public harassment of women has been accepted and condoned, as matter of fact, women are expected to indulge the humiliation without protest. Most cultures across the globe considered a woman to be a man’s properties and that gave him the legal right to do as he pleases with her; for an unmarried woman, she had her father and male siblings as her owners whilst the married woman was subservient to her husband:

The Hindus practiced the Sati ceremony whereby a widow offers herself as a sacrifice on her late husband’s funeral pyre.
In the 18th century, England and America common laws allowed husbands to apply the rule of the thumb. A man was allowed to chastise his wife with a stick no wider than his thumb.
African and Indian women were forced into marriage and other times, more than one woman will share the same husband. In India, 18-year old Mangli Munda was ordered by village elders to marry a dog in order to get rid a bad-luck curse that's overshadowing her. The girl expressed her displeasure in marrying the dog but due to her culture’s beliefs and customs, the wedding had to take place in order to be free of ‘bad luck’.
In Rome, both the church and law allowed for women who were accused of practising witchcraft to be burnt alive.
Some countries still practice honour killings. Women who are raped are usually blamed for bring the tragedy to themselves and also for bringing shame to her family and therefore the only choice is forced marriage to her rapist or to be killed, if she is married and she’s raped by someone else other than her husband then honour death will be her fate. A woman who refuses forced marriage can fall victim of honour killing.
In October 2012, Malala Yousafzai, a Pakistani human and women rights activist was shot three times by a gunman for advocating for education for girls in her native Swat Valley, where the Taliban have banned girls from attending schools. Fortunately enough she survived and was awarded the Noble Prize.

Most people do not categorise catcalls as a form of VAM but it is – Period! Catcalling is a form of sexual harassment. This behaviour violates women’s dignity, creates humiliating environment for its victim and it also is uninvited and unwelcomed.

... “violence against women” means any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life."

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), (Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women resolution

In order to up their sales, more and more musicians have taken to objectifying women’s bodies in their music videos. Many female artists and reality stars are taking off their clothes and flaunting certain parts of their bodies such as bosoms and backsides in order to get more people to pay attention to them. Some celebs have gained fame through the parade of their body parts and this on its own gives out the idea that objectifying women’s body parts is the right way to go about things and as result, it encourages sexist attitudes toward women. We do appreciate the pressure they go through in order to stand out but at the same time, other artists still managed to be and stay relevant in the entertainment industry without ‘selling’ their dignity, a good example is of Adele who managed to win numerous music awards including six Grammy Awards with her clothes still on. Please note that I have no objection to women celebrating their sensuality but where do we draw the line?

Women like Oprah Winfrey, Dilma Rousseff, Geun-hye Park, Indra Nooyi, Mother Theresa, Folorunsho Alakija, and Darlene Zschech gained fame and wealth without taking off their clothes or objectifying their bodies, so what is that they are doing different from the semi-nude celebrities? Because of what they see on TVs, many men believe that catcalls are compliments and flattering to women and without the right message sent out; women will never be liberated from gender-based violence. It is not wrong to compliment a woman on their looks as long as it does not put her in discomfort. The difference between compliments and catcalls is that, compliments uplifts and show women respect whilst catcalls are cheap, disrespectful and violate women’s rights.

Women and young girls need to know that the dignity of a woman is in the way she holds herself – the standards she upholds and men should be taught that a true man is a man who respects women.

Botswana: Africa's Shining Star

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 09 Dec 2014 13:41:00 +0000

Image Credit: Freedigitalphotos.net

GABORONE, BOTSWANA - The just released Transparency International (TI)Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) 2014 has ranked Botswana as the least corrupt country in Africa for the 19th year in a row. Since 1995, the anti-corruption group TI releases its annual CPI which has been a vehicle in bringing out the international issues of corruption in public sectors to light. It has prompted governments to heed to the corruption subject and put it on the international policy agenda.

The 2014 Corruption Perceptions Index shows that economic growth is undermined and efforts to stop corruption fade when leaders and high level officials abuse power to appropriate public funds for personal gain...

Corrupt officials smuggle ill-gotten assets into safe havens through offshore companies with absolute impunity,... Countries at the bottom need to adopt radical anti-corruption measures in favour of their people. Countries at the top of the index should make sure they don’t export corrupt practices to underdeveloped countries.”

José Ugaz, the chair of Transparency International.

Botswana did not only do well in the continent but also globally, the latest index puts the country above almost two-thirds of the European countries and amongst the top fifty of the 175 surveyed countries. Botswana ranked 31st out of 175 countries with overall score of 63, ahead of Lesotho, Namibia both ranked 55th and with a score of 49 each and one of the Sub-Saharan powerhouse country, South Africa, ranking 67th with a score of 44. Botswana is the only African country to score above 60 out of 100. However, the country still needs to work hard in order to combat corruption activities as it still lags behind when compared to Denmark, which holds the #1 spot at 92 out of 100.

Corruption and Money Laundering

Many people argue that corruption is a matter of individual’s consciousness and self-awareness standing. Whether that holds water or not, the bottom line is, corruption ruins both individual and the society in large. It creates an atmosphere of mistrust amongst civilians, costs lives, democracy, as well as people’s rights. Corruption tolerance in a society will only yield dishonest and deceitful leaders.

Money laundering is the process of transferring funds obtained through criminal activities to conceal their origins. The perpetrators then transform the funds into ostensibly legitimise monies and assets for future use by introducing them to financial systems using different methods such as the use of monetary mechanism like money orders and cheques, or by dividing large amount of money into subtle amount before depositing it into their bank account(s). This money can also be used to finance illegal activities such as terrorism, drugs smuggling and human trafficking.

The funds are usually channelled through series of conversions such as the use of different banks scattered across the world or purchase of non-existing goods or service before making it to the launderer’s bank account therefore appearing legitimate.

Anti-corruption administration - Botswana’s zero tolerance

Botswana’s zero tolerance approach to corruption has contributed in it establishing channels that will assist both the government and society in the fight against corruption and money laundering. The Southern African country has put in place different measures to combat corruption:

Eastern and Southern Africa Anti-money Laundering Group (ESAALG)

Botswana is a member of Eastern and Southern Africa Anti-money Laundering Group (ESAALG) which aims to tackle money laundering and terrorist financing amongst its Member States. One of the objectives of the ESAALG is to adopt and implement the Forty Recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). FATF is an inter-governmental body that develops and promotes both national and international policies that combat money laundering and terrorist financing.

Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC)

This independent law enforcement agency was established in 1994 under the Corruption and Economic Crime Act of Botswana. By following and employing 3 dimensional strategies which are investigation, corruption prevention and public education, the Directorate has manged to act against corruption and economic crimes:

Investigation – It investigates allegations of corruption and economic crime and also dubious transactions matters.
Corruption Prevention: Through this division, DCEC audits governmental and parastatal institutions’ systems to stem out any loophole that can open the door for corruption.
Public Education: The mandate of this division is to sensitise the public on the issues of corruption and also to solicits its support in the fight against corruption.

Anyone can report corruption and economic crime to DCEC. The informant can choose to be anonymous when report their suspicions in order to protect themselves against victimisation. However, the DCEC have put in place protective mechanisms that ensure that its informants are not victimised or maltreated and it also carries out its investigations and cases with extreme confidentiality.

Anti-money Laundering Committee

This committee was formed by Botswana government to fight corruption. The committee is made up of different parastatal and government institutions which include the DCEC, Ministry of Finance and Development Planning, Bank of Botswana, Attorney General and Botswana Police Service. Every two months, the committee holds a session in which the members communicate their self-evaluation, assessment, technical support and information that assist in combating money laundering.

The Public Procurement and Asset Disposal Board (PPADB)

This parastatal institution falls under the ambit of Ministry of Finance and Development Planning and was passed and endorsed by an Act of Parliament of 2001. The mandate of PPADB is to adjudicate and award tenders for Central Government and any other institutions specified under the Act for the delivery of works, services and supplies related services. Any institution that plans on doing business with the Botswana government have to register with PPADB so as to enable it to enforce guidelines that manage projects to guarantee value for money in the procurement and assets disposal.

Competition Authority (CA) and Competition Commission

This is another operational autonomous parastatal that was established by the Competition Act of 2009. It was enacted at the same time with the Competition Commission whose mandate is to act as the governing body of the CA and adjudicate over matters referred to it by the CA. The CA on the other hand operates as the secretariat and conducts the daily procedures of the Authority such as regulating the merging of organisations, and carrying out investigations that include but not limited to bid rigging, price fixing, market allocation scheme and overseeing and solves any arising matter pertaining to the Act. Both the CC and CA fall under Ministry of Trade and Industry. The Authority advocates for fair competition and market amongst enterprises.

Anti-Corruption School Curricula

The government of Botswana have included Corruption awareness as part of the school curricula. This assists instil moral uprightness attitude therefore ensuring that students grow to be upstanding and principled citizens. Anti-Corruption clubs have been established in both junior and senior schools whilst in primary schools, The Raboammaaruri (literary meaning father of truth) campaign have been formed. The objectives of the clubs and campaign are to encourage integrity, accountability and anti-corruption information dissemination.

Countries, more especially African ones, need to establish balance on power, advocate and endorse anti-corruption practices and laws. In addition, I commend the Botswana government on enforcing laws and policies that tackle corruption therefore becoming a leading example to its African counterparts. It goes to show that African governments have the capacity and capability to work on their ethics in order to serve their people.