This Election Could "Make or Break Sierra Leone."

The most pressing long-term threat to stability in Sierra Leone, according to most sources, is the potential for political insecurity surrounding the elections of 11 August 2007.

Ninety-one percent of the country’s 2.8 million eligible voters have registered to cast a vote for their future. Fifty-six percent of them are under the age of 32 while women account for 49 percent.

So with the future of the country as stable as plutonium, where do you turn? Well, to the future, of course. With 56% of eligible voters under the age of 32, you must reach this group through music.

"Music is one of the most important resources of Sierra Leone," said UNDP Resident Representative in Sierra Leone Victor Angelo. "Artists for Peace represent what is best about the country and the UN is proud to support them so that the message of peace reaches all the citizens of the country," he said.

The group calls themselves Artists for Peace, and they represent more than a dozen well-known area musicians who will be touring the Sierra Leone countryside in a series of peace-promoting concerts.

Akin to anti-war activism @ UC Berkeley in the '60s, the Chicano Student Movement in the 70s, or the Tiananmen Square protests of the late 80s, the message being promoted by Artists for Peace is best described by their spokesman, Haroun Ahkim Dumbya a.k.a. Wahid. "If we pick up guns and fight each other again then the country will break. We want to be part of the making."

The current cabinet was appointed following the May 2002 presidential and parliamentary elections. Since that date there have been several changes.

Sierra Leone is one of the first beneficiaries of the United Nation’s new Peacebuilding Fund, launched last October to ensure that countries emerging from war and conflict do not relapse back into strife. Let us keep the country in our prayers.

Reuniting the Rwandan People

Painful and horrific as the 1990 to 1993 genocide was between the Batutsis and the Bahutus of Rwanda, the more devastating story of the end of the African continent and its people began over 100 years prior, during the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 to divide Africa. This is a facinating historical guide that I encourage everyone to read during a quiet moment.

Nonetheless, let's fast-forward to the present and highlight the good works being done to bring hope to countless people within Rwanda who desparately need our help.

Rwanda is a poor rural country with about 90% of the population engaged in (mainly subsistence) agriculture. It is the most densely populated country in Africa and is landlocked with few natural resources and minimal industry. Primary foreign exchange earners are coffee and tea. In 1994, there were very few functioning schools, hospitals, or factories. Public utilities like telephones, electricity and water were largely non existent. There was total displacement of the population, both internally and externally.

The road out of their current strain is the same road most of us travel without thought each day - education. We've all heard of the tremendous work Oprah is doing in South Africa and throughout the world. Well, there are many Oprahs in our global communities.

But out of despair comes hope and an opportunity to rebuild and create an even stronger community. And it all starts with, what else, education. The Maranyundo School for Girls in Nyamata, Rwanda is one such story.

The Culture Shop is excited to help the School through the purchase of Rwandan coffee from Thousand Hills Coffee Company, which was "formed to supply the United States with quality Arabica coffee from Rwanda and to help subsidize and promote the Rwanda Middle School Project."

As the rich blend of The Thousand Hills Coffee aroma fills the Shop's cafe area, you cannot help but have a "Calgon" moment. Your purchase of this coffee, whole bean or ground, will directly support the school project - which is slated to open for classes January 2008. Please call ahead or order online - we'll always have a bag waiting for you.

Thank you - from the children of Nyamata, Rwanda.

Why Should We Care About the Girls?

Who Cares About Girls? is a series that explores how the world treats girls. Hosted by award-winning journalist Lisa Ling and produced by National Geographic Television, the 2nd program in the series is titled Hiden Away: Slave Girls of India and aired on The Oxygen channel (who knew such a station existed) a few weeks back. Other installments will follow in 2007.

The United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, which this year is focusing on discrimination and violence against girls, has convened multiple panels to begin discussing issues ranging from rape, trafficking and prostitution to education, child labor and AIDS.

"The most important message is that governments should ensure that every working child gets a free education," said Sunita Tamang, lamenting that in her community in Nepal "people think that if you educate a girl child, it will only embarrass you."

Jordanian student Golfidan Khader Al Abassy described the discrimination against girls in families, schools and in the workplace in her country.

"I hope it will be in the near future that we will have the same opportunities as boys," she said. "The most important message which I want to send for all over the world ... (is) that the girls have a lot of power ... so if we give them the chance to prove themselves, they will be great persons. ... We have to believe in them."

Save the Earth? What a Bright Idea.

In my search to understand how we managed to get involved in a deadly shadow fight against a foe more dangerous than we imagined, I had to re-aquaint myself with the concept of greenhouse gases.

Here goes: First, sunlight warms the earth; the earth then radiates energy back up into the atmosphere, which warms the atmosphere. Heat is absorbed by certain gases (called greenhouse gases, mainly because they trap the heat in the lower atmosphere) and re-radiates some of this heat back down to earth.

There are basically four types of greenhouse gases: Water vapor (the most abundant); carbon dioxide; methane; and ozone.

The greenhouse effect helps to regulate the temperature of the earth. It is a naturally occuring process that is essential for life on earth.

However, the increase in the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, mainly carbon dioxide, is trapping the heat the earth releases, causing the global surface to basically sweat with a rising temperature. The earth sweats, it gets sick, everything in the earth gets sick. Oh, I get the picture?

The International Energy Agency (IEA) says China is the world's second largest producer of carbon dioxide, after the United States.The IEA finding confirms the growing role of China and other developing countries in the worsening greenhouse gas problem.

The biggest polluter by far is the United States, with 23% of the total, followed by China at 13% , Russia with 6%, Japan at 5%, and India at 4%.

Since no one is immune from this sickness, we may as well start doing something to save the earth from it's greatest enemy - it's human inhabitants.

"We don't want any more cata cata."

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Africa's first female President, has her hands full in Liberia. Years of civil war have left the capital city, Monrovia, in less than desirable conditions. The city has no running water or electricity, and many Liberians are homeless.

Surrounded by Sierra Leone in the north; Guinea in the northeast; and Cote d'Ivoire in the east and south, Liberia was once a West African success story. However, in 2003, the country emerged from 14 years of civil war that left an estimated 200,000 dead and the infrastructure destroyed. The civil war also put women in charge of households and communities because so many men were away fighting and dying.

Johnson-Sirleaf, sometimes called the "Iron Lady" for her unwavering grit and determination, holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado, a master's degree in public administration from Harvard University, and a lifetime of public service to her beloved Liberia. The 67-year-old economist has often held jobs in fields dominated by men, including finance minister of Liberia and vice president of Citicorp in Kenya.

A grandmother of 6, President Johnson-Sirleaf has pledged to bring the "motherly sensitivity and emotion to the presidency." "We don't want any more cata cata." Using a slang expression for corruption, Johnson-Sirleaf sent a loud and clear message while on the campaign trail in 2005 that business as usual would not be an option in her administration.

"My whole life has been in hard areas women are not usually in," she said in an interview. Male African leaders "associate me with the types of thinking men normally do. . . . I've challenged men. I've challenged Charles Taylor," she added pointedly.

Johnson-Sirleaf is one of only a few women who have been able to rise to positions of political power in African nations.

• In Zimbabwe, Vice President Joyce Mujuru made a name for herself during the country's liberation struggle in the 1970s. She is now one of President Robert Mugabe's closest advisors.
• Nigeria's Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was once vice president of the World Bank and now is known for her campaign to end corruption in the country.
• And in Mozambique, Prime Minister Luisa Dias Diogo shares the nickname "Iron Lady" with Johnson-Sirleaf.

Regardless of her governing approach, creating stability and fighting poverty will likely be major challenges during her term. But with the inauguration of a new president, there are signs the aid will return. The European Union has committed $70 million to help bring electricity back to the capital, Monrovia. The United States is committed to rebuilding the armed forces. The UN mission in Liberia, which includes 15,000 peacekeepers, costs about $700 million a year.

She cannot accomplish these daunting tasks alone - the international community must stand by her administration's efforts to bring Liberia to relative normalcy- it's the least that can be done.

Film Screening: "Iron Ladies of Liberia"
Date/Time: Monday July 16, 2007, 12:30pm
Venue: World Bank J building, (701 18th St., Washington, DC) Room J1-050
Discussion with filmmaker: Siatta Johnson