Ghana – Damba: A Thanksgiving Festival
Each year, around May, the Gonjas people of Ghana’s Northern Region celebrate the Damba festival, where Islam and indigenous customs come together. Three days of events and celebrations. To remember the past but also to discuss currents issues. Bole is a small town and is the capital of Bole district, in the Northern Region of […]
Natural Resources: The Levels of Inequality
According to United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), there is “a high correlation between the levels of exports of natural resources and the levels of inequality”. The more a country depends on its natural resource exports, the more it will be vulnerable to illegal financial flows and price volatility. The extraction of oil, minerals […]
Mozambique – Bishops Denounce: “African Resources Plundered By Foreigners; The Needs Of Local Peoples Are Ignored”
“Governments of industrialised Countries seek to find a solution to the world’s energy and food crisis in Africa without trying to meet the problems of Africans”, denounce the Bishops’ Conference of Mozambique in a pastoral letter dedicated to the theme of development. Among African resources that are transferred to a foreign hand, there are cultivable […]
Colombia: Mission In Conflict Zones
The city of Tumaco has been the theatre of clashes between criminal gangs for the control of the drug market. Nevertheless, there are those who have chosen to remain, to grow in faith with the local people and to respond to numerous social challenges. This is the testimony of a young Comboni Missionary. When I […]
Nigeria – Cardinal Onaiyekan: “Why They Had To Wait Three Years For This To Happen”
Boko Haram militants have released 82 schoolgirls out of a group of more than 247, whom they kidnapped from the northeastern town of Chibok in April 2014 in exchange for prisoners and money. “We thank God that these girls have re-embraced their families, but I wonder why they had to wait three years for this […]
World Military Spending Increases For A Second Consecutive Year
According to new figures from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), world military expenditure rose for a second consecutive year to a total of $1686 billion in 2016. This is the first consecutive annual increase since 2011, when spending reached its peak of $1699 billion. The USA’s spending returns to growth; Saudi Arabia’s spending […]
Another Face Of The Migration Crisis In Africa
Nowhere do cities expand faster than in Asia and Africa. However, to develop them in a more sustainable and socially acceptable way, will be one of the greatest challenges for the implementation of the Sustainable Development goals (SDGs). During the last few decades, hundreds of millions of people have moved from their rural homes into […]
India: Sister Rose And The Rubber Cultivation
The introduction of rubber plantation by Sister Rose, in villages across the northeast of India, brought in progress to the lives of villagers. Residents not only improved their economic status but also ended their dependence on moneylenders who used to cheat them. “We would still have been poor, working for others if Sister Rose had […]
South Sudan: Bishop Kussala – “To Foster Reconciliation And Healing In Society”
The president of the Sudanese Catholic Bishops’ Conference called on leaders in South Sudan’s Bahr El Ghazal region to fight segregation and division, uniting to work for peace in the violence-ridden country. Achieving peace, said Bishop Barani Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio, “demands of all of us that we act with real respect for human […]
India: A Newspaper By Street Kids
‘Balaknama’, a newspaper that highlights the problems faced by Indian street children, is also a tool to change their lives. Damayanti, 12, moves fast along the queue of cars waiting for the green light in one of the busiest streets near the New Delhi railway station. She sells copies of ‘Balaknama’, the voice of children, […]