Advocacy International (Ai) has played a leading role in developing the public-facing side of a programme to save the lives of African mothers and babies – the Evidence for Action (E4A) project. We have been responsible for the development of an advocacy, communications and digital strategy; and the launch of a public engagement campaign: MamaYe!
Today 18th February, 2013 the public engagement strategy is enhanced with the launch of six websites, one for each of the countries, and one a ‘parent site’. The websites highlight news, evidence, and events organized by African-led teams in the six countries.
The programme aims to improve maternal and newborn survival in six countries in Africa (Ethiopia, Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Malawi and Tanzania.) It is led in-country by teams of African experts, and supported by an international consortium of experts based at UCL, University of Southampton, University of Aberdeen, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. The programme is funded by DFID, and led by Louise Hulton of Options – the sexual and reproductive health consultancy.
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Advocacy International is proud to have helped produce a new website for the African Union’s Campaign for the Accelerated Reduction of Maternal Mortality in Africa (CARMMA).
The website promotes maternal and newborn survival, and provides evidence on progress in achieving the targets African leaders have set.
Ai worked closely with a team headed by Commissioner Gawanas and Dr. Ademola at the AU’s Department for Social Affairs. Our work was part of the UKAID’s Evidence for Action project, which also aims to reduce maternal and newborn mortality in six countries in Africa. Ai is part of a consortium including the White Ribbon Alliance and experts in Maternal and Newborn Health (MNH) from UCL, University of Southampton, University of Aberdeen, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. The consortium is led by Options, a London health consultancy firm.
Mrs. Gawanas has just finished her term as Commissioner for Social Affairs at the AU and is succeeded by Dr. Kaloko, whose statement at the launch can be found here.
Jeremy Smith (centre) with Chen Jianhua (left), the Mayor of Guangzhou and Wan Qingliang (right), Party Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Guangzhou Committee. (Photo Source: newsgd.com)
Ai Director Jeremy Smith was invited by the Mayor of the city of Guangzhou, China, Mr. Chen Jianhua, to serve on a technical committee that shortlisted cities excelling in urban innovation. He attended the appointing ceremony in Guangzhou, China on October 15, 2012. He serves on the Technical Committee of the Award for Urban Innovation (“Guangzhou Award”) as one of eight experts from four countries, who evaluated 153 cities from 56 countries and regions of the world.
The Technical Committee then shortlisted 15 candidate cities and 30 expert-recommended cities from the 153 cities. A review committee will choose 5 winners from the list. Mr Smith will return to Guangzhou for the Gala award evening November 16, 2012.
September 26th, 2011
All of the team at Ai are deeply saddened to hear of the death of friend, colleague and great leader Wangari Maathai.
Ann Pettifor especially remembered the privilege of working closely with Wangari on the Jubilee 2000 campaign. Earlier today she said:
“Wangaari stands shoulder to shoulder with Nelson Mandela and Julius Nyerere as one of Africa’s – and the world’s – wisest and most effective leaders.
“I was privileged to know her as a friend; and as a colleague. But above all I was privileged to work closely with her during the Jubilee 2000 campaign. Not only was she Jubilee 2000′s representative in Kenya, but she helped lead the Jubilee 2000 Africa campaign
“May she rest in peace; and may her leadership of that and many other campaigns to protect Africa’s environment, grow in the world’s memory; just as the many trees she planted and helped propagate across Kenya – continue to grow and thrive.
The finest memorial a world leader could leave as a legacy.”
August 24rd, 2011
Last Sunday Ann Pettifor went on the Sunday Morning show with Ricky Ross to talk about Jubilee 2000, the fight to cancel the debt of the world’s poorest countries, and how the campaign on issues of international finance, sovereign debt and social justice continue.
Ann also got to play some of her favourite bits of music – Janet Baker singing the Mendelssohn Aria ‘O Rest in the Lord’ and Bob Marley’s ‘Redemption Song’.
Click the link below to listen to the whole show here, the interview starts at 7 minutes in:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b013n0zg
27th June 2011
The African Foundation for Development UK (AFFORD) invited Ann Pettifor to give the keynote speech at its Africa-UK Diplomatic Engagement Evening Monday evening, in the presence of the High Commissioners of Sierra Leone and Cote d’Ivoire.
Speaking on the theme of “Enterprise, Workforce and Institution Building in Post-Conflict States” Ann emphasized the vital importance of post-conflict African states building sound monetary systems. She argued that such systems should be designed to give African politicians the policy autonomy needed to formulate and execute their own monetary policy – and with it the domestic economic policies that will protect the interests of their people, and support their country’s advance.
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4th April 2011
In March, Ann Pettifor was honoured to be invited Ms Zarinah Anwar CEO of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Malaysia, and Dr Farhan Nizami of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies to attend a conference at Ditchley Park on “Shariah, Finance and the Public Good”.
But before the hard work of deliberation, delegates attended a splendid dinner at the Banqueting House, Whitehall, where they were welcomed by His Royal Highness, Dr Raja Nazrin Shah, Crown Prince of Perak, Malaysia.
In an opening address HRH asked the group to consider whether transfers of ‘artificial wealth’ served the public good; and whether Islamic finance could be distinguished from conventional finance? Prince Nazrin Shah suggested that trust in financial services has all but evaporated, and that such trust would not be restored until finance could demonstrate its concern with the public good.
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1st April 2011
Last week Jeremy Smith was in Brussels for the launch of a new publication, “Decentralised development cooperation – European perspectives”, for which he was the main author (read on to download English and French versions of the publication).
It has been produced by Platforma, the Europe-wide network of local and regional governments for international development, to showcase the role, cost-effectiveness and value of partnerships between cities, towns and regions from Europe with their counterparts in lower-income countries across the world. Jeremy’s warm thanks go to Lucie Guillet and Sandra Ceciarini, of the Platforma and CEMR secretariats, for their very considerable help in this work.
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By Ann Pettifor – 28th February 2011
“This is a global moment unlike any in memory, perhaps in history” writes Tom Engelhardt, author of “The American Way of War”.
There have been global moments before – like the Kennedy assassination, news of which sped around world by radio; the fall of the Berlin Wall and 9/11.
But none of those moments have made me feel quite like I do now: that thanks to global media networks I am an eyewitness, a spectator at a momentous and historic event: the transformation by ordinary Arabs, of their human condition. An uprising, largely peaceful and dignified, that nevertheless deserves to be defined as revolutionary. One bound to impact for generations on individual, personal relationships as well as on wider social, economic and political relationships. One that will likely alter the balance of power in our world.
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10th February 2011
In his Municipal Journal article, Ai Director Jeremy Smith highlights the legal flaws in Part 2 of the current Localism Bill, in which the government seeks to give itself a new power to claw back from local authorities certain fines imposed on Britain by the European Court of Justice. He points out that the government would be acting as prosecutor, judge while also being ‘co-defendant’ in such cases – so the issue should go to an independent court or arbitrator:
“Fog over Channel – continent cut off”, as the old newspaper heading went. But the Localism Bill could give us a new one “Fog over Parliament – EU fine”… well, ‘EU fines’ actually, as Part 2 of the Bill is headed. And a fog of confusion certainly exists over parts of Westminster.
The aim of Clauses 30 to 34 of the Bill is to give Ministers, for the first time, a power to claw back from a local authority (and there may be several involved) all or part of fines imposed on the UK by the European Court of Justice under Article 260 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, where the Minister is satisfied that acts or omissions of the authority have “caused or contributed to the infraction of EU law for which the EU financial sanction was imposed”.
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