14 May 2018

Spain: Facebook to install its “Ministry of Truth” in Barcelona

Alejandro López

Facebook, the world’s largest social media company, is looking to open an “internet content control center” in the iconic Torre Glòries in the Spanish city of Barcelona. This modern-day iteration of Orwell’s Ministry of Truth will implement Facebook’s latest “community guidelines” to censor content on the social media platform under the catch-all phrase of “combating fake news.”
Two weeks ago, the Competence Call Center (CCC) rented 9,000 square meters in eight floors of the towering emblematic building. The company, used by Facebook to implement its censorship guidelines, had already opened another censorship center in Germany in Essen, a model it will now replicate in Barcelona, according to Spanish economic newspaper Cinco Días.
The same daily announced the new offices will be staffed by around 500 employees. A source at real estate consulting company Engels & Völkers told EFE that the Barcelona branch of the Competence Call Center, Holding GmbH, will have Facebook employees assigned to its premises.
Barcelona was chosen by Facebook after reaching an outsourcing agreement with CCC, the sources told EFE.
Although the direct tenant will not be Facebook, which has not made any statements, CCC sources assured El Periódico that the task of the new staff in Barcelona will be to delete videos, publications and photos that violate the rules of the social network.
The announcement comes weeks after Facebook spelled out its new “community guidelines.” Purely at its own discretion, and with no legal oversight or recourse, Facebook will target any critical political view deemed to be violent, defamatory, “extremist,” “bullying” or “fake news,” and flag such material for removal or undetectable censorship.
In its new guidelines, Facebook users will not even know their content is being blocked from distribution as “fake news” because such censorship is a “sensitive issue,” i.e., it would infuriate users aware that their democratic rights are being violated.
The new 500 employees will join Facebook’s 20,000 censors working for the company’s “security” and “moderation” departments.
The Catalan political elite has not waited to celebrate Facebook’s entry in Barcelona.
The local government of Barcelona, controlled by the pseudo-left Barcelona en Comú (Catalan for Barcelona in Common), welcomed Facebook’s announcement. The Councilor for Tourism, Trade and Markets of Barcelona, Agustí Colom, said that the city council will contact the company to help and facilitate its "landing" in the city. He added that “it’s great news that goes in line with the economic growth of the city which has not stopped attracting investment in recent years.”
The spokesperson of the opposition Catalan separatist Democratic European Party of Catalonia (PDeCAT) said that “this is good news for Barcelona and Catalonia,” adding that it showed the viability of Catalan independence.
The other political parties also welcomed the arrival of Facebook, with a Socialist Party representative declaring this would create “quality jobs.”
Alongside nakedly financial considerations, faced with growing social opposition, the contending political forces on both sides of the divide over Catalan independence agree that political discourse should be controlled and censored by Facebook—which works with the military and intelligence apparatus all over the world to suppress critical news outlets.
The day before it was announced that Facebook would be “landing” in Barcelona, an event to discuss “fake news” was organized by Spain’s daily El País and other European media outlets from the Leading European Newspaper Alliance (LENA).
The conference was attended by representatives from Google and Facebook, Members of the European Parliament from major European political parties, and the eight editors-in-chief from the LENA newspapers: EL PaísLe FigaroLe SoirDie WeltGazeta WyborczaLa RepubblicaTages-Anzeiger and Tribune de Genève.
The tone was set by Jaume Duch, the spokesperson of the European Parliament and its Director-General of Communication. Duch said that within the European institutions “there is a real concern about a possible negative impact of the ‘fake news’ and the interventions of third parties in the next year,” in a reference to Russia.
Pilar Castillo from Spain’s right-wing governing Popular Party called for a system to “abort the consequences of fake news arrivals that aim to impact the elections to the European Parliament.” In her view, this system should be developed as soon as possible by the European institutions in the form of “preventive shock therapy” because “it would take a long time” to develop legislation on the matter.
The social democratic Member of the European Parliament, Iratxe García, advocated the adoption of legislative measures.
Maite Pagazaurtundúa, a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), referred to fake news as “a transnational problem” and called for the adoption of measures to “avoid something catastrophic in the next elections.”
The message stemming from the conference was clear. Bourgeois politicians and the media of all stripes are preparing the next pretext to clamp down on the Internet and democratic rights: Russian interference in the 2019 European elections.
This was made clear the following day by an editorial in El País:
“Stopping anti-European messages from gaining ground requires the cooperation of tech companies such as Google and Facebook. The first, albeit insufficient, step is for tech companies to change their algorithms so that fake news is given a lower ranking and is harder to find online, and quality content is given greater visibility. It is also important to educate people so that they develop a social and critical awareness that is able to see through deceptive arguments …
“Adopting these measures from a global perspective, in which all European states are involved, is the only way the EU will be able to successfully fight against the challenges posed by disinformation.”
This comes from a newspaper which four months ago was forced by a court to publish a correction for a fraudulent and demagogic article on Catalan public television TV3. The article concocted a list of false “facts” to back its argument that one of the reasons behind the growth of Catalan nationalism is the role played by Catalan public television. El País also sacked its regular collaborator, John Carlin, for having published a piece in The Times critical of the Spanish government and the king’s roles with regard to the situation in Catalonia.
On December 19, a UK Parliamentary Select Committee began an inquiry into Russian interference in foreign elections. Among those invited to give their expert opinion was a Spanish delegation comprising David Alandete, managing director of El País. The daily has published over 50 articles talking about Russian “interference” in the Catalan referendum on independence last October.
Under questioning from Members of Parliament, Alandete and others in the Spanish delegation were forced to admit that they did not actually have any evidence that Russian news sources had influenced the Catalan referendum result. In other words, all the articles were fabrications.
Rather than denounce the hypocrisy of this and the role played by the bourgeois media in promoting “fake news” to defend austerity, war and attacks on democratic rights, the pseudo-left Podemos is colluding in this process.
Miguel Urbán, MEP for Podemos and a leading Pabloite, participated in the fraudulent conference organized by El País. Advising his fellow politicians, he said that it was necessary to improve “digital literacy and transparency” and that he was opposed to “laws [passed] on the spur of the moment.”

Israel marks 70th anniversary amid war crimes and deepening social crisis

Bill Van Auken

Israel today marks the 70th anniversary of the declaration establishing a Jewish state in Palestine, which coincided with the end of the British mandate established following the defeat of the Ottoman empire in World War I.
This year, the anniversary will be marked by Israeli troops shooting Palestinian demonstrators on the Gaza border and stoking up war fever against Iran.
The anniversary will be overshadowed by the formal opening of a new US embassy in Jerusalem, a violation of international law ordered by the Trump administration that has put a final nail into the coffin of the so-called “peace process” between Israel and the Palestinians and the illusion of a “two-state solution.”
It will also be the occasion for another round of bloodshed at the heavily militarized Gaza security fence, where for over six weeks thousands of Palestinians have demonstrated in what has been declared the “Great March of Return.” Over this period, some 50 demonstrators had been killed, and many thousands wounded, as the Israel Defense Forces have been given shoot-to-kill orders against unarmed protesters. On Monday, Israeli forces killed a further 37 demonstrators, and injured more than 500.
The protests are bound up with the origins of the state of Israel and their historical consequences. The demonstrators are demanding their right of return to the homes and villages from which they were expelled 70 years ago in what Palestinians refer to as the Naqba, or catastrophe. Some quarter of a million Palestinians were driven from their land through a systematic campaign of terrorism and intimidation, a gigantic act of “ethnic cleansing” designed to carve out a Jewish state based on race and religion.
The actions of Washington, both the transfer of its embassy to Jerusalem and the ripping up of the nuclear agreement between the major world powers and Iran, have been celebrated by the right-wing Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. They have given this regime what amounts to a green light to both redouble the violent suppression of the Palestinian people and to launch military attacks in Syria that are aimed at provoking a confrontation with Iran that could spiral into a catastrophic region-wide conflagration.
Israel’s rulers are deliberately whipping up war fever as a means of directing outward the immense social tensions building up within Israeli society and diverting attention from the series of corruption scandals that have implicated the entire political establishment, from Netanyahu on down.
Given the events unfolding today, the criminal celebration by US and Israeli officials of the embassy move, and the new round of carnage on the Gaza-Israel border, there will be little attention paid to the great world historical questions bound up with Israel’s origins and development, which are inextricably tied to the fate of the working class in the 20th century and the historic crisis of revolutionary leadership.
It was to these essential historical questions that the World Socialist Web Site pointed in 1998 on the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the state of Israel.
“Within Israel’s birth and evolution are concentrated the great unresolved contradictions of the 20th century. Its essential origins lie in one of history’s greatest crimes against humanity, the Nazi Holocaust. The extermination of six million European Jews was, in turn, the terrible price paid for the crisis of the working class movement brought on by the Stalinist degeneration of the Soviet Union and the Communist International. Stalinism’s crimes and its domination over the workers movement prevented the working class from putting an end to the crisis-ridden capitalist system, which found in fascism its last line of defense.
“The defeats of the working class, the crimes of Stalinism and the horrors of the Holocaust created the historical conditions for Israel’s creation and the Zionist movement’s largely successful attempt, aided both by US imperialism and Stalinism, to equate Zionism with world Jewry. It was a movement and a state founded ultimately on discouragement and despair. Stalinism’s betrayals produced disillusionment in the socialist alternative that had exercised such a powerful appeal to Jewish working people all over the world. The crimes of German fascism were presented as the ultimate proof that it was impossible to vanquish anti-Semitism in Europe or anywhere else. Zionism’s answer was to get a state and an army and beat the historical oppressors of the Jewish people at their own game.
“The tragic irony of this supposed solution is Israel’s association of the Jewish people—traditionally and historically connected with the struggle for tolerance and freedom—with the brutal suppression of another oppressed population.”
In the 20 years since the publication of the 1998 statement by the WSWS, the malignant contradictions within Israeli society have only deepened. The number of inhabitants in the illegal Zionist settlements in the territories occupied by Israel since the 1967 war—the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Syria’s Golan Heights—has risen from 160,000 to over 600,000.
While Israel withdrew its troops and settlements from the Gaza Strip, it remains an occupied territory, effectively an open-air prison over which Tel Aviv exercises direct control in terms of borders, air and maritime space, while dictating the conditions of mass unemployment and poverty in a territory whose average income is roughly equivalent to that of Congo. The IDF has launched repeated wars against the territory that have claimed the lives of thousands of civilians, while devastating essential infrastructure. This near-genocidal campaign continues to this day with the slaughter of demonstrators on the Gaza border.
Real wages have been falling steadily since 2000 in the West Bank under the nominal rule of the Palestinian Authority, which has functioned as an auxiliary police force for the Israeli occupation, while enriching a thin layer of corrupt PLO officials and businessmen.
Within Israel itself, which ranks second only to the United States as the most socially unequal member nation of the OECD, and where the poverty rate stands at 22 percent—55 percent for Israeli Palestinians and one third for the country’s children—class tensions are growing.
Israeli dock workers ended a three-day strike Sunday under a court back-to-work order after shutting down the ports of Eilat, Haifa and Ashdod. Last December saw a nationwide strike against the decision of the generic pharmaceutical giant Teva to lay off a quarter of its workforce, and municipal workers in Jerusalem staged a walkout in January, blocking access to the Knesset with garbage trucks, over threatened mass layoffs and failure to receive their wages.
Seventy years after the founding of the state of Israel, it is now clearer than ever that there is no national solution to problems confronting any section of the working class across Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. Only the unification of Jewish and Arab workers across the region on the basis of a socialist and internationalist program can provide a way out of today’s bloody and increasingly dangerous impasse.

12 May 2018

Samsung Junior Engineering Academy for Young Students (Fully-funded to Seoul, South Korea) 2018

Application Deadline: 22nd May 2018

Eligible Countries: International

To Be Taken At (Country): Samsung Global Engineering Center, Seoul, Korea

About the Award: Winners of the Junior Engineering Academy will be given the opportunities to participate in the 2018 Junior Engineering Academy which program includes specialist lecture, laboratory demonstrations and experiments, hands-on project, presentation competition and a variety of other activities in order to advance their awareness on the role and commitment to energy efficiency, energy conservation, and mitigating energy-related impacts on the environment. Junior Engineering Academy will be held at Samsung GEC, headquarter of Samsung Engineering in Seoul, South Korea.
Purpose of the Junior Engineering Academy:
  • To raise awareness among youth within the community towards conservation of the environment and energy efficiency
  • To grow future eco-leaders by enhancing global leadership resulting from participating a variety of activities throughout the Academy
  • To fulfill the social responsibility through educating the future generation
Type: Training

Eligibility: 
A. Participants: Eco-generation members around the world aged between 14 and 16
B. Facilitator: Eco-generation member aged 18 or older

  • Effective date of age determination is as of 22nd May, 2018.
  • To create an account and to become an Eco-generation member, please click here.
Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: Free flight tickets and accommodations will be provided to the selected global participants and facilitators

Duration of Programme: August 6th~ 10th, 2018

How to Apply: 
A. Please make a Video clip of you talking about ‘Why I should attend this Junior Engineering Academy’ within 2 minutes.
– Please tell us about your dream in the future and why it’s important to relate engineering with your dream.
B. Please upload it to Youtube (www.youtube.com) with UNLISTED option. You may use other streaming or cloud service to upload your video.
C. Please write a brief of your clip in the content box.
  •        – Go to the Application Form page (Click here).
  •        – Please write a brief of your video clip in the content column.
  •       – Copy your Youtube link or downloadable video link and paste it in the URL box under Content box.
  •        – Attach your CV in the attachment column. (MS word and pdf type only)
  •        – Complete the application by clicking the Submit button.
  •        – To check your application, please visit Home>E-gen Event>Monthly Event>My Page
  •          * Application Guide: Please visit this LINK
Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: Samsung Engineering.Co., Ltd.

Global Good Fellowship for Entrepreneurs 2019

Application Deadline: 30th June 2018

Eligible Countries: All

To be taken at (country): Washington, D. C., US

About the Award: The Global Good Fund Fellowship is a 12-month program supporting the leadership development of young social entrepreneurs across the globe. The Global Good Fund develops these innovators by pairing them with executives who serve as Mentors, and by providing leadership assessment resources, a network of peers, sector expertise, and targeted financial capital.
The result is empowered leaders who scale their social enterprises and ultimately deliver sustainable social impact. We believe growing leaders is the most effective strategy for solving complex social problems and achieving global good.

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility: In order to be considered for the fellowship, candidates must meet the following minimum requirements:
  • Enterprise that the candidate leads is at least one-year old;
  • Enterprise must have at least one full-time employee in addition to the candidate;
  • Candidate is committed full‐time to running his/her enterprise;
  • Candidate is under 40 years of age (if 40 or older, explain rationale for joining fellowship);
  • Candidate should not be currently receiving formal coaching/mentoring support;
  • Candidate has to be in a position where s/he has decision making power.
Candidates who meet the requirements will be invited to participate in Phase II of the application process.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Program: Following a rigorous five-stage process, selected Global Good Fund Fellows embark on a structured 12-month journey of experiential learning, executive mentoring and that leverages proprietary leadership development tools and methods honed since 2012. At our core is The Global Good Fund 360 MIRROR – the first evidence-based leadership assessment created specifically for social entrepreneurs. Our proven leadership development tools and services are also available to individuals, social enterprise organizations, NPOs and impact-driven corporations.
Each Fellow receives a leadership development grant of up to $10,000. These funds are used explicitly for LDP implementation and leadership development with a special focus on experiential learning.

Duration of Program: 12 months (Jan 1-Dec 31 2019)

How to Apply: Apply here

Visit Fellowship Webpage for details

Award Provider: The Global Good Fund

Paradigm Initiative Digital Rights and Inclusion Media Fellowship 2018

Application Deadline: 30th May 2018

Eligible Countries: African countries

To Be Taken At (Country): Nigeria

About the Award: The Paradigm Initiative Digital Rights and Inclusion Media Fellowship 2018 seeks to embed media professionals within the daily work of Paradigm Initiative in the fields of digital rights and digital inclusion in Africa. Starting from August 2018, Media Fellows will work out of our offices in Yaba, Ajegunle Lagos; Aba, Abuja and Kano in Nigeria. Applications is open to Journalists working in Africa. This fellowship seeks to expose media professionals to an under-reported field of work in national development and hopes to increase reporting on digital rights and inclusion in Nigeria and beyond.

Type: Fellowship (Professional)

Eligibility: To be eligible for the Paradigm Initiative Digital Rights and Inclusion Media Fellowship:
  • The Fellowship is open to journalists affiliated with mainstream print and online newspapers in Africa
  • Interested candidates must demonstrate previous coverage of human rights and/or tech issues and interest in advocacy journalism
  • Interested candidates must not have spent more than ten years in journalism. We are most interested in outstanding, early career journalists
Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: 
  • 2-day Orientation and Digital Rights/Inclusion training
  • 2-week residency at Paradigm Initiative’s offices in Nigeria. The Fellow will spend time at the Yaba HQ, Aba LIFE Centre, Abuja office, Ajegunle LIFE Centre and Kano LIFE Centre
  • 4-month virtual collaboration with Paradigm Initiative
  • Fellowship may also include fully-funded local and international travels to participate in and cover relevant events
    Interaction with leading stakeholders in digital rights advocacy
EXPECTATIONS
  • Fellows will be expected to participate in all scheduled activities
  • Fellows will be expected to publish, in their affiliated newspapers or magazines, at least twelve reports on digital rights and inclusion issues during the fellowship period. Fellows will retain full editorial direction on the stories
  • Fellows will be expected to continue to provide coverage to digital rights and inclusion issues after their fellowship
  • Paradigm Initiative will provide fellows with a monthly stipend, and a one-time research grant, during the fellowship period.
Duration of Programme: 5-month programme (August to December 2018)

How to Apply: Fill the application form below:

Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: Paradigm Initiative

Science and Language Mobility Scheme Africa for African Researchers 2018

Application Deadline: 25th May 2018.

Eligible Countries: African countries

About the Award: The Science and Language Mobility Scheme Africa is a five-year programme that funds researchers from Anglo and Francophone Africa to undertake scientific research in language regions other than their own.  The programme seeks to build language skills and cultural capabilities of researchers as they undertake their projects, a strategy towards addressing one of the barriers to intra- Africa scientific collaboration.
It is a collaboration between the African Academy of Sciences, Wellcome and Institut Pasteur providing travel grants for short term visits of up to six months to African researchers. At the AAS, the scheme will be implemented through the Alliance for Accelerating Excellence in Science in Africa (AESA).

Scope: Science and Language Mobility Scheme Africa is a closed call.  Applicants will be grantees funded through the AAS and the NEPAD Agency’s AESA platform, such as the Human Hereditary and Health in Africa (H3 Africa), the Developing Excellence in Leadership, Training and Science (DELTAS) Africa, and Institut Pasteur networks.
The scientific scope of applications should focus on biomedical science and public health of relevance to national, regional or global health.


Type: Grants

Eligibility: You should:
  • Be a citizen of an African country
  • Be based in Africa
  • Be affiliated with a recognised academic, medical or research institution that is part of either the DELTAS Africa, H3Africa, or Institut Pasteur networks.  For-profit organisations are not eligible
  • The call is also open to non-African investigators who must be resident in Africa (evidence may be requested), have an appointment/affiliation with an African institution, and their residence and tenure of service with the appointing African institution should cover the duration of the award.
  • Possess a PhD or postdoctoral fellowship or equivalent research qualification/professional experience.
  • Hold a permanent or fixed-term contract in an eligible institution which must span the duration of the exchange.
While applications that involve existing collaborations will be considered, applications from new collaborations, young/early-career researchers (postdoctoral researcher not in an established academic post), and a diverse range of applicants, particularly female are strongly encouraged.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The Award provides travel grants for short term visits of up to six months to African researchers.

How to Apply: Apply here

Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: African Academy of Sciences, Wellcome and Institut Pasteur

TWAS Young Affiliates Programme for Researchers from Developing Countries 2018

Application Deadline: 31st May 2018.

Eligible Countries: Developing Countries

About the Award: The honour is given to researchers from developing nations who have at least 10 international publications. The nominees should show potential for a high-impact career. During their five-year tenure, Young Affiliates build networks with other affiliates and with elected TWAS Fellows. They also attend international conferences such as the TWAS General Meeting where they make contributions and are exposed to mentoring as well as collaboration opportunities. The five selected TWAS Young Affiliates will also be part of and work closely with the TWAS Young Affiliates Network (TYAN) which was established in 2016 during the 27th TWAS General Meeting in Kigali, Rwanda.

Type: Award, Research
Eligibility: To be eligible for the TWAS Young Affiliates:
  • Nominations are invited from TWAS and AAS fellows, Members of National Academies and fellows, Members of National Young Academies of Science, Research Institutions, Research Councils, Universities, Government entities and other such bodies that have or know this talent in sub-Saharan Africa.
  • Nominations of female and young scientists from Science and Technological Lagging Countries is highly encouraged.
  • Nominees must be aged 40 or less and living and working in a developing country.
Number of Awards: 5

Value of Award: 
  • Young Affiliates build networks with other affiliates and with elected TWAS Fellows.
  • They also attend international conferences such as the TWAS General Meeting where they make contributions and are exposed to mentoring as well as collaboration opportunities.
Duration of Programme: 5 years

How to Apply: All nominations for the TWAS Young Affiliates must be forwarded to twasrossa@assaf.org.za by 31 May 2018. Please note that late submissions will not be considered.

Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: TWAS-ROSSA

FINCAD Women in Finance Scholarship for Postgraduate Studies 2018

Application Deadline: 30th June 2018

Offered Annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: All

To be taken at (University): Any university accredited by the national or international body approved for that purpose in the country where the university is situated.

About the Award: FINCAD established the annual FINCAD Women in Finance Scholarship to encourage and support outstanding women in the field of finance, particularly relating to the use of derivatives in capital markets and/or financial risk management, and give them an opportunity to cultivate their skills and knowledge.

Type: Master/PhD degree

Eligibility: 
  • The scholarship is open to women of any age and citizenship who are studying Finance in an accredited graduate-level program.
  • The scholarship will be awarded to a deserving applicant who is enrolled in a post-graduate program with an emphasis on finance, particularly relating to the use of derivatives in capital markets and/or financial risk management. If your field of study does not meet that description, DO NOT APPLY.
  • Applications and all supporting documents, except university transcripts must be in English.
Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Programme: The Scholarship is an award of US$10,000 to support graduate-level studies.

How to Apply: It is important to go through the application procedure and visit the Program Webpage (link below) before applying for this scholarship.

Visit Programme Webpage for details

Award Provider: FINCAD

Important Notes: The winner will be notified in Autumn 2018.

United Nations Office in Africa Young Professionals Programme (Paid) 2018 – Malawi

Application Deadline: 13th May 2018

To Be Taken At (Country): Malawi

Type: Internship

About the Award: The UNDP Young Professional Programme (YPP) is designed for highly qualified and motivated young Malawian professionals recently graduated from Masters programmes or in some cases, from Bachelor’s Degree programmes. The programme provides an opportunity to start a development career through “on the job’ professional development that can be based on learning from UNDP’s programmes, policies and operations. Training and learning will be part of the day to day activities under the UN Young Professional Programme.

Eligibility: Candidates for the UNDP YPP will be selected on a highly competitive basis. The key qualifications required for consideration will include one to be under 30 years of age and having an academic qualification, as outlined in respective Terms of Reference (Master’s degree while in some cases, bachelor’s degrees, completed not more than 2 years ago. The candidates will be offered a Service Contract for a maximum 2 years, renewable each year.

Number of Awards: It is estimated that a total of 10 professionals will be recruited in 2018.

Value of Award: Successful candidates will receive an “all-inclusive package ” to cover living and travel costs.

Duration of Programme: 1 year renewable to a maximum of 2 years (Estimated start date would be 1st June – 1st July 2018.).

How to Apply: Apply for any of the positions you asre interested in, on the Programme Webpage (see Link below)

Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: The United Nations

Important Notes: The United Nations does not charge any application, processing, training, interviewing, testing or other fee in connection with the application or recruitment process. Should you receive a solicitation for the payment of a fee, please disregard it. Furthermore, please note that emblems, logos, names and addresses are easily copied and reproduced. Therefore, you are advised to apply particular care when submitting personal information on the web.

ACME/International Land Coalition (ILC) Journalism Workshop for African Journalists (Fully-funded to Uganda) 2018

Application Deadline: 18th May 2018

Eligible Countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, DR Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

To Be Taken At (Country): Kampala, Uganda.

About the Award:  The goal of the training is to accelerate reporting on land rights/governance in Africa by bringing together investigative journalists and ILC members to lead data-driven and knowledge-based investigations and informed advocacy on land.
The journalists will work with experts from ILC and other entities on knowledge aspects, and with ACME trainers on skills elements such as investigation and compelling storytelling. Much of the training will be informed by Transparency International’s manual on Investigating Land and Corruption in Africa, and will be organised around land investigations planning, land rights and corruption, and land story research and presentation. ILC partners will share case studies. Each journalist will be expected to write at least one story after the training. A small grant for story research and production will be made available.

Type: Training, Workshop

Eligibility: The training targets five journalists primarily from sub-Saharan African countries with active ILC membership. Also participating in the training will be five ILC members. ILC operates in the following countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, DR Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Number of Awards: 5

Value of Award: The organizers will cover participants’ travel, accommodation, meals and incidentals.

Duration of Programme: June 20 to 22 2018

How to Apply: Send in three sets of documents.
  1. The first document is a letter indicating who you are (bio-data – including your contact info), your job title and media house, how long you have worked as a journalist for, whether you have reported on land issues before, and why you would like to participate in this training.
  2. The second document is two samples of your best journalistic work.
  3. And the third is a letter from your editor endorsing your application. The editor’s letter should include his or her email address and phone number.
Send the application materials to training@acme-ug.org with a copy to btabaire@acme-ug.org and israel@landcoalition.info before close of business on Friday, 18 May 2018.

Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: International Land Coalition (ILC), African Centre for Media Excellence (ACME).

RUFORUM Young African Entrepreneurs Competition (Fully-funded to Nairobi, Kenya) 2018

Eligible Countries: African countries
Application Deadline: 31st August 2018

To Be Taken At (Country): Nairobi, Kenya

About the Award: The 2018 RUFORUM Young African Entrepreneurs Competition (RUYAEC) whose overall purpose is to catalyse entrepreneurship through promotion of business innovation and provision of seed funding to young entrepreneurs with creative and innovative business ideas among African youth. RUYAEC invites young (<35 years) African entrepreneurs and incubates to compete for 10 awards to show case their innovations, enterprises and business concepts and propositions.
The focus is for the young entrepreneurs to share their stories at an international stage with close to 1200 participants drawn from academia, business and industry, development organisations, practitioners and philanthropists. It is hoped that through this competition, young entrepreneurs’ business concepts, impact, innovation and business opportunities can be expanded.
While the focus of this competition is on innovation in agribusiness, other innovations, incubations, business enterprises and business concepts along ICTs, health, engineering, natural resources, meteorology, urbanization, green economy, and transport and communication, among other areas, will be considered.

Type: Entrepreneurship

Eligibility: Applications are invited from enterprises and individuals that meet the following eligibility criteria.
  • Persons with an established business enterprise and/or those with innovations that can potentially be commercialized and/or those with business concepts
  • The business enterprise/potential enterprise should have a defined business model that show case the innovativeness of the proposed enterprise/business/innovation.
  • Persons in the age category 16-34 years
  • Submissions should be in English or French using the template provided.
Value of Award: The ten (10) competitively selected business enterprises will receive all expenses paid trip (air
ticket, conference registration, and hotel costs) for participation at the RUFORUM Biennial Conference (22-26 October, 2018) in Nairobi, Kenya. The selected young entrepreneurs will receive a cash price award.


How to Apply: All applications should be submitted through the www.ruforum.org/younginnovators/

Visit the Programme Webpage for Details

Award Providers: RUFORUM

Peace Revolution’s Amandla Eastern & Southern Africa Fellowship 2018

Application Deadline: 30th June 2018

Eligible Countries: Eastern & Southern African countries

To be taken at (country): South Africa

About the Award: Everyday we wake up to an enduring world and too often get caught up in changing trends of fashion, technology, lifestyle, personal and professional life expectations. As a result we break down from stress, anxiety and emotional imbalance.
The fellowship offers 4 days intensive training program providing participants with deeper insight in the relationship between inner peace and sustainable world peace through mindfulness and meditation and enhancing their ability to create peace within their family, professional and social environment. Hence participants will learn the benefits of meditation in relation to::
  • Conflict prevention and nonviolent conflict resolution
  • How to overcome fear and deal with terrorism
  • Stress management
  • non-violent communication
  • Self-discipline and Human Rights
  • Enhancement of leadership and the pillars for a stable and peaceful society
Type: Fellowship

Eligibility: To be eligible, applicants should:
  • be African nationals residing in Eastern and Southern Africa (Burundi, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Djibouti, Comoros, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Egypt, Somalia, Malawi, Mozambique, Sudan, South Sudan, Botswana, Seychelles, Lesotho, Madagascar, Angola, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mayotte, Reunion and Mauritius).
  • be 20-32 years old at the time of submitting the application in order to receive the airfare support.
  • have completed at least 21 days of the 42-day online self-development program. Note that in order to submit the application form, candidates do not need to have completed the online self-development program.
  • have good proficiency in written and spoken English language.
  • be optimistic, open-minded, is a leader or shows leadership potential, and have a genuine interest in peace building.
  • send a recommendation letter from their organizations/institutions.
  • International successful applicants shall pay a commitment fee of 100 USD while local participants pay USD 50  before the arrival to the retreat site (by Bank transfer or Western Union)
Selection Criteria: include
  • Completion of at least 21 days of the online self-development programme.
  • Show of interest in meditation and self-development
  • Even distribution of participant from the eligible countries
  • Likelihood to benefit from participation in the program and to contribute to world peace
  • Commitment to adhere to the program of activities during the duration of the fellowship
Number of Awards: Up to 50

Value of Program: The four days fellowship will set up to 50 participants on a lifelong inner peace journey.  The Amandla Fellowship Includes:
  • Full or partial sponsorship of airfare support
  • Free accommodation
  • Free catering
  • Local transport to and from retreat centre
It will further presents an opportunity to:
  • Empower youth with tools to develop and maintain a successful personal and professional life by cultivating their inner peace, positive habits through self-discipline, mindful practices and meditation.
  • Build a network of peacebuilders to exchange experiences and visions for partnerships while fostering an intercultural dialogue and a life-long inner peace building network.
Duration of Program: 4 days

How to Apply: Apply here

Visit Program Webpage for details

Award Provider: Peace Revolution

World Trade Organisation Internship for Graduate Students 2018 – Geneva

Application Deadline: 22nd May 2018

Eligible Countries: All

To be taken at (country): Geneva

About the Award: The intern will have the following opportunities to:The intern will have the following opportunities to:
  1. participate in, and assist with, the day-to-day operations of the Budget and Finance Section. The WTO uses Oracle software (ERP system) for its financial management and reporting;
  2. analyse cost structures and develop cost-accounting procedures;
  3. participate in the documentation of procedures and drafting of policies related to accounting and control; and
  4. contribute to miscellaneous projects to be defined based on the needs of the section.
Type: Internship

Eligibility: 
  • Education: Interns must have completed their undergraduate studies in the administration, accounting and control discipline and at least one year of their postgraduate studies.
  • Knowledge and skills: Good Knowledge of excel suite (especially Pivot Table and Formulas) and of general accounting standards. Experience with Macros in excel would be a plus.
  • LanguagesExcellent speaking and writing skills in English or French. A good working level of the other language would be an asset.
Additional Information:
The official languages of the organization are French, English and Spanish.

Selection Criteria: Interns are recruited from among nationals of WTO members, countries and customs territories engaged in accession negotiations.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Program:
  • Paid interns receive a daily allowance of CHF60 (including weekends and official holidays falling within the selected period). No other remuneration of any kind shall be paid.
  • Travel expenses to and from Geneva cannot be paid by the WTO, and such travel is not covered by the Organization’s insurance.
  • Interns are also responsible for their own health insurance while they are working at the WTO.
  • The WTO can assist with visa applications where necessary.
Duration of Program: 6 months (June to December 2018)

How to Apply: All candidates must complete an online application form (in Program Webpage Link below).

Visit Program Webpage for details

Award Provider: World Trade Organisation

New Zealand government boosts foreign aid for “Pacific Reset”

John Braddock

New Zealand’s foreign service is to get a massive boost in funding, taking its total four-year allocation to nearly $NZ1 billion, to implement the Labour Party-led government’s “Pacific Reset.” The strategy is designed to intensify New Zealand capitalism’s presence across the region and push back against growing Chinese influence.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) will receive an operational expenditure increase of $150.4 million for the period, and $40.3 million in capital expenditure. Another $714.2 million has been earmarked for the Official Development Assistance fund, or foreign aid, to be prioritised toward the Pacific. The diplomatic corps will be increased, with another 50 positions and the reopening of an embassy in Sweden, closed in 2012.
The real purpose of the “Pacific Reset” is to reassert the historical dominance of New Zealand and Australian imperialism in the southwest Pacific. In recent years, Samoa, Tonga and other Pacific countries have received hundreds of millions of dollars in aid, infrastructure investment and loans from Beijing, outstripping that provided by Australia and New Zealand.
China’s involvement in the South Pacific is bound up with its response to Washington’s aggressive military and strategic “pivot” to the Asia-Pacific to confront China, which began under Barack Obama and has intensified under Donald Trump.
Foreign Minister Winston Peters, leader of the right-wing populist NZ First Party, announced MFAT’s budget allocation at a special presentation on May 8, ahead of the full budget release on May 17.
Labour previously sought to dampen expectations over the budget. Prime Minister Ardern last month delivered what the New Zealand Herald described as “a gloomy warning” over health and education expenditure. Finance Minister Grant Robertson re-assured business that “budget responsibility” to pay down debt would be a priority.
Peters said the increase in the foreign affairs portfolio reflected the “critical role” MFAT plays in keeping the country “safe and prosperous” in “an increasingly turbulent global environment.” It would demonstrate that New Zealand is “serious in addressing global and regional challenges and helping people in need.”
The Dominion Post on May 10 endorsed Peters’ anti-China stance, citing his media comment that “if New Zealand is not there, some other influence will be there.” Noting a “dramatic underfunding” of foreign aid—falling from 0.3 percent of gross national income in 2008 to 0.25 percent in 2016—the editorial said “feel good sentiments” about the Pacific “have now been backed by what really matters, and that is money.”
In March, Peters delivered a speech at the Australian strategic think tank, the Lowy Institute, declaring that the Pacific is “an increasingly contested strategic space, no longer neglected by Great Power ambition, and so Pacific Island leaders have more options. This is creating strategic anxiety.” He called for New Zealand, Australia, the European Union and the US, to “better pool our energies and resources to maintain our relative influence” against “external actors and interests.”
Peters’ speech coincided with a furore in the Australian and New Zealand media designed to ratchet up an ongoing anti-China propaganda campaign. Citing unnamed “intelligence and security” sources, unsubstantiated allegations were aired that China was about to establish a naval base in the tiny island nation of Vanuatu.
The “Pacific Reset” dovetails with Washington’s militarisation of the Asia-Pacific, including threats of war against North Korea, and trade war measures, aimed primarily at economically isolating China. New Zealand and its allies are preparing for a major war. Peters stated twice in his Lowy speech that “there has never been a time since 1945 when Australia and New Zealand need to work together more closely in the Pacific.”
The reopening of the Stockholm embassy signals a further alignment of New Zealand with the imperialist intervention in Syria and build-up by the US and European powers to isolate and prepare for war against Russia. Labour seeks the closest alliance with Australia, the US and European powers in order to ensure their support for the NZ ruling elite’s own neo-colonial operations in the Pacific.
Labour supported the previous National Party government’s commitment of $20 billion to upgrade the NZ military over 15 years to make it “inter-operable” with the US and allied forces.
In April, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern used a visit to Europe to promote increased military cooperation with France and Britain in the Pacific. She and French President Emmanuel Macron agreed to work together on “defence” in the region, where heavily-militarised French colonies are close neighbours to New Zealand. Macron accepted an invitation to visit New Zealand, which will make him the first French president to do so.
Washington’s strategic interest was underscored on May 7 by Hillary Clinton, the former US secretary of state and 2016 Democratic Party presidential candidate. Clinton, on a visit to promote her recent book, told an Auckland audience that China’s attempt to gain political power and influence in foreign countries, including New Zealand, is “a new global battle.”
Clinton claimed that Beijing was now much more active in the Pacific and intent on “dominating its part of the globe through soft power and the projection of its military capabilities.” Clinton cited the work of NATO-funded academic Anne-Marie Brady, who has called for New Zealand’s intelligence agencies to take action against Chinese “influence” in NZ politics and business.
In 2010, as secretary of state, Clinton was instrumental in intensifying the relations between New Zealand and the US as part of the Obama administration’s “pivot” to Asia to confront China. She signed the Wellington Declaration, paving the way for the resumption of military exercises and training between New Zealand and the US after a decades-long freeze in response to New Zealand’s anti-nuclear legislation.
Wellington’s operations in the Pacific have always been shrouded in a bogus “humanitarian” guise. The local imperialist powers have ruthlessly exploited the Pacific for more than a century. New Zealand occupied Samoa from 1914 to 1962 and brutally oppressed the country’s inhabitants. It profited from the looting of phosphates from Nauru and Banaba, in Kiribati. The Cook Islands and Niue are effectively still New Zealand colonies, with limited independence, while Tonga and Samoa depend heavily on NZ and Australian aid.
During World War II, Pacific islands were turned into bloody battlefields where the US, Australia and New Zealand fought Japan for domination over the region. Amid intensifying preparations for war, the NZ Labour Party has abandoned any pacifist pretences and is fully collaborating with the US-led imperialist militarisation of the Asia-Pacific region.

Costa Rican president threatens workers with renewed social attacks during inaugural address

Andrea Lobo

The new president of the incumbent Citizen’s Action Party (PAC), Carlos Alvarado, who won in April elections marked by deep popular discontent, gave a rabidly nationalist and reactionary inaugural speech on Tuesday. His government, he began, “emerges out of a national agreement, with the first multi-party cabinet and…a multi-party Congress directory.”
Behind the ruling class’s historical consolidation of power behind the incoming Alvarado administration, as the president himself noted, were “uncertain times in the concert of nations”. This was a veiled allusion to the stagnation of productive investments in the country and regionally, and to the mounting threats of commercial and military conflicts between the largest global economies.
Alvarado openly warned that the response by the ruling class will be an escalated assault against social programs and a frontal clash with the working class: “We’ll be austere, beginning with an efficient use of the public treasury; we’ll keep a strict fiscal discipline; we’ll be rigorous in controlling public spending.”
In the face of such a right-wing program aimed at implementing the dictates of Wall Street and the national oligarchy, nothing remains of the perfunctory promises of reforms to assist the poor and reduce inequality that Alvarado and the trade unions made during the campaign.
Setting the stage for this coming government, the last Congress approved labor and legislative reforms to expedite the implementation of austerity measures, the attacks on jobs and the criminalization of strikes, particularly of public employees and workers organizations independent of the trade unions. A police build-up has also been underway for more than eight years, and the trade unions are coordinating closely with the new administration to undermine any resistance.
Moreover, bills are currently being discussed to embed in the Constitution (Articles 176 and 184) new draconian limits to the public deficit, which would require mass firings in the public sector. Another constitutional change (Article 112), proposed ostensibly to combat “corruption”, would facilitate the expulsion of any legislator who falls out of favor with two-thirds of the Congress.
The historical precedent for this coalition government—embodied in the agreement signed on March 8 between Alvarado and Rodolfo Piza, the new minister of Interior and former presidential candidate of the conservative Social-Christian Unity Party (PUSC)—is the 1995 pact between the leaders of the two traditional right-wing parties, José María Figueres Olsen of the National Liberation Party (PLN) and Rafael Ángel Calderón Fournier of the (PUSC).
While the 1995 pact included a new World Bank structural adjustment program, sweeping deregulation and partial privatization of banking and pensions, the new agreement between the major political forces includes new regressive taxes, an outright prohibition of “collective agreements that increase public spending”, among other structural adjustments. These policies are being pursued in the interests of paying bondholders and accelerating the creation of a platform of cheap labor that can compete with the more impoverished countries in Southeast Asia, the rest of Central America and the Caribbean.
Alvarado’s speech drew largely from his past experience as a local marketing executive for the transnational P&G, resembling nothing so much as the kind of “talk” given by a tactless manager to workers ahead of a mass layoff. He asked for sacrifices for the “common cause” of the “enterprise”, and invoked outmoded calls for national unity from mid-19th century oligarchs, whom he described as “our grandparent’s generation.”
In front of a scattered crowd and as passers-by and the surrounding city carried on largely uninterested in the ceremony, Alvarado then candidly laid out the measures “that cannot be postponed” to escalate the decades-long assault on public employment and the living standards of the working class.
In his half-hour speech he urged the Congress—no less than seven times—to approve his “fiscal plan”, which seeks to impose a regressive value-added tax and incorporate cuts to annual wage increases for public employees, among other measures, to deal with Costa Rica’s public deficit.
During the weekend, the statistical agency INEC announced that unemployment rose last year to 10.3 percent and 25 percent for youth, explained by a drop in available jobs. Moreover, real wages fell for the public and private sectors, while informality is above 40 percent and 150,000 youth (15 to 24 years of age) neither work nor study.
Alvarado on Tuesday announced further partial privatizations of major public services, indicating that unemployment and issues relating to education, transport, water and electricity will be dealt with within the “framework of private concessions” and the “drive of the private sector.”
In reality, the resources exist for a massive public works project to provide quality social infrastructure and expand essential social services to everyone, while putting an end to unemployment, but it would require the seizure of the enormous wealth accumulated by a handful of Costa Rican oligarchs and extracted by transnational corporations, whose interests the establishment parties represent.
While the rise of the PAC and the Broad Front (FA) mirrored the “left” bourgeois governments that rose to power on a wave of social opposition across Latin America, starting with Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, the Solís administration didn’t even implement minor social reforms like its South American counterparts. The PAC and FA exposed their political bankruptcy immediately, by responding to the deepening crisis of the capitalist system with further attacks against the working class. Similarly, however, the so-called “pink-tide” governments and their right-wing successors have also escalated sharply their austerity measures and realigned their states and security apparatuses with US imperialism.
In fact, the PAC has simply operated as window-dressing for the same traditional forces, particularly the PLN. The incoming coalition government is the culmination of a series of political realignments within the ruling establishment to confront a growing crisis of political rule. During the 1990s, as the PLN and PUSC became deeply discredited after decades of eviscerating public health, education and social programs, they sought to attain a new façade more closely aligned with the trade unions to prevent the development of an independent opposition among the working class.
In 2000, Ottón Solís and other PLN leaders left the party to found the Citizen’s Action Party as a “progressive” and “left” alternative, opposing the plans to privatize the state electric company and the Free Trade Agreement with the US. In 2010, Luis Alberto Monge, the former PLN president who had consolidated the counterrevolutionary turn of the party through a 1982 pact with Reagan, was convinced by Solís’s project and backed the PAC. In 2014, the former PLN national secretary, Luis Guillermo Solís was elected president as the candidate for PAC, and now the new PAC administration is incorporating the PLN into its government.
On a parallel course, the Stalinist and pseudo-left Broad Front (FA) was founded in 2004 by José Merino and other politicians from previous PLN-tied experiments that sought to contain growing social opposition through “social-democratic” parties like Democratic Force (FD). Once PAC was elected in 2014, FA then entrenched itself within the new Solís administration to underpin the government’s ties to the trade union bureaucracy.
The Broad Front’s services to the government and the Costa Rican ruling class have translated into a sharp loss of popular support among workers and youth. It lost eight of its nine seats in the legislature in the February elections, even as social opposition continues to grow in the working class, reflected recently in the April 25 public-sector strike and mass protests on May Day.