This crisis was sparked off by a series of protests by Anglophone lawyers against the appointment of a majority of Francophone magistrates to Anglophone courts. Anglophone teachers later joined these protests to demand reforms, especially regarding the educational system. Though the government tried to address these concerns through a commission it set up, the protests continued and later turned into demands by some members of the Anglophone public, for a separate state.
Category: Conversations
Reconnecting Experiences to Politics: Purposeful in Conversation
It is imperative for those doing social justice work to go through their own personal journeys of liberation. Realising our feminist visions of what our communities and the world could and should be is not possible without these journeys – feminist popular education plays an essential role in sparking and nurturing this journey.
Pan-African Popular Education in Motion: A Conversation with Towards Feminist Consciousness Collective
Towards a Feminist Consciousness is a pan-African queer feminist col- lective founded in 2017 as a safe and liberating space to discuss, theorise, and organise around issues of feminism and liberation, deconstructing them in light of our contexts where systems of oppression intersect: colonialism, patriarchy, heteronormativity, capitalism, racism, and exile
This Land: Intergenerational Conversations about Women, Agriculture and Climate Change in Zimbabwe
Chido Nyaruwata speaks with Martha Gorimani Abstract Chido Nyaruwata speaks with Martha Gorimani, who owns a medium-sized farm in Mashonaland East Province in Zimbabwe. Chido spent three days at Martha’s farm in May 2023 and two days at Martha’s childhood home in Manicaland Province in October 2023. The conversation piece is a compilation of their…
Her Excellency Professor Abena P. A. Busia interviewed Bernardine Evaristo author of the 2019 Booker Prize-winning Girl, Woman, Other during the 3rd Nkrumah Festival
In Conversation Her Excellency Professor Abena P. A. Busia interviewed Bernardine Evaristo, author of the 2019 Booker Prize-winning Girl,Woman, Other, during the 3rd Kwame Nkrumah Festival at the Institute of African Studies, University of Ghana, Legon. Themed “Pan Africanism, Feminism, and the Next Generation: Liberating the Cultural Economy”, the festival was held from 15 to…
A Union like None Other on the Continent – Akosua K. Darkwah Speaks with Deborah Freeman Danquah, General Secretary of the Union Of Informal Workers’ Associations (Uniwa) of TUC Ghana
Globally, the African continent has the largest percentage of workers in informal employment. Based on data collected in 2016 by Bonnet et al. (2019: 10), 89% of workers in the sub-region work in informal employment.The figure is higher for women than it is for men, standing at 92% and 86% respectively.Workers in informal employment are…
Working with Rural Women to Secure Resource Access – Akua O. Britwum speaks with Fati Abigail Abdulai
Akua Britwum spoke to Fati Abigail Abdulai from Ghana, in a virtual interview on Sunday the 2nd of May, 2021. Fati Abdulai is the Director of Widows and Orphans Movement (WOM) of Ghana. She has held her position since 2013, when Fati’s mother, the founder of the WOM, retired. Fati had been supporting her mother…
Working with the State to Secure Rural Women’s Rights – Akua O. Britwum speaks with Rizwana Waraich
Akua Britwum speaks with Rizwana Waraich of Pakistan virtually, on Tuesday the 4th of May 2021. Rizwana is a board member of the Lok Sanjh Foundation, an NGO based in rural Pakistan, and also works as a freelance consultant. In this interview, she reveals the struggles with contradictions within state support structures that are supposed…
A Female Inventor Ahead of her Time – Akosua K. Darkwah speaks with Veronica Bekoe
African scientists have responded to the pandemic by developing a range of largely low-tech innovations to either ease testing/treatment or assist with adherence to the containment measures imposed by various states. In Dakar, Senegal, students built a multifunctional robot that helped caregivers treat patients while minimising the risk of infections; in Nigeria, another student built…
Addressing the Needs of People with Disability During the COVID-19 Pandemic – Akosua K. Darkwah speaks with Comfort Mussa
The World Health Organization estimates that 15% of the world’s population has a disability of one form or the other (WHO, 2021). With a population of approximately 1,390,000,000 people on the African continent (Worldometer, n.d.), this translates to 220,000,000 or roughly the entire population of Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation. Life for Africa’s citizens with…