African Wars and Ethnic Conflicts – Rebuilding Failed States

human development, culture

The Centrality of the Language Question in the Decolonization of Education in Africa1

This paper draws attention to the relevance of decolonization as a notion and process for education in our times. It points to specific instances of Eurocentric biases which affect the structure and content of contemporary education in Africa. These include the historical periodization scheme which is utilized across the board in the social sciences and humanities in African education and also the notion of ‘African Studies’ in African universities. It is argued that societal relevance is a crucial factor for education to be meaningful. The author argues that the language question; the need to use local languages that are shared by the masses of specific societies is essential for development and emancipation. It provides better bases for the upliftment of people; the requirements for knowledge production and the development of human capital. The paper points to historical and contemporary examples from Europe and Asia to explain how and why language is central to all attempts to create knowledge-based and knowledge-producing societies

The Intellectualisation of African Languages for Higher Education

This article was originally presented as a keynote Address at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Language Planning and Development Office (ULPDO) language symposium from 19-20 October 2015 at the Unite Building, Howard College, Durban, on the theme: Advancing the Intellectualization of African Languages in Higher Education. The position paper examines the challenge of how to intellectualise African languages and bring them up to speed with the linguistic techniques of modernity and advanced contemporary thought

Facing the future: between altruism and self-interest

No Abstrac

Self-disclosure in young people: A study of social undergraduate students in a Ghanaian university

The internet seems to have changed the way young people interact and have changed the way people view privacy and self-disclosure on social networks. This study surveyed a total of 146 young people from various backgrounds and sought to throw some light on online privacy culture of Ghanaian young people and the types of information shared. The study found that young people are generally heavy users of social networking sites and they have large groups of friends online. This indicated shallow relationships. This finding was consistent with another finding that though they shared personal information online, they were careful not to share intimate personal information. It also found that young people are quite competent in managing their privacy though they seemed to be neutral when it came to posting explicit materials online.

THE LATENT RESERVOIR IN ELITE CONTROLLERS AND FACTORS THAT AFFECT THE SUPPRESSIVE CAPACITIES OF IMMUNE EFFECTOR CELLS IN HIV POSITIVE INDIVIDUALS

Our inability to efficiently target and eliminate the latent reservoir remains the biggest barrier to a cure to HIV/AIDS. Accordingly, there exist several ongoing efforts to not only understand the reservoir in varied patient groups, but also to determine an efficient means to achieve either a functional or a sterilizing cure. To this end, several trials are underway with the shock-and-kill strategy remaining the most clinically advanced. Shock-and-kill employs the use of small pharmacological molecules termed latency reversing agents (LRAs) to reverse latency with two goals in mind. First, to transcriptionally activate latent reservoir cells so that their subsequent production of viral proteins renders them visible to the immune system for targeted elimination and second to achieve this in the presence of antiretroviral therapy (ART) so as to prevent new rounds of infection. Despite the allure of the shock-and-kill strategy, there has been no evidence to date of an ability of this strategy to reduce the size of the latent reservoir. One reason that shock-and-kill trials continue to fail to show significant reductions in the latent reservoir may be the inability of poorly functioning chronic progressor (CP- control HIV with ART) immune effector cells to effectively target and eliminate reactivated reservoir cells. While this may arise from pre-existing immune exhaustion, it is possible that the LRAs employed may themselves contribute to immune impairment. Consequently, enhancing the antiviral activity of effector cells might improve the effectiveness of shock-and-kill trials and may also enhance other therapeutic strategies aimed at eliminating the latent reservoir. Outside of shock-and-kill strategies however, other avenues exist to attain a functional cure of HIV/AIDS. In particular, given that elite suppressors (ES- control HIV without ART) control viral replication without therapy, they represent a model of a functional cure. Accordingly, coupled with a continued understanding of the immune factors that mediate elite control, characterizing the frequency of latently infected CD4+ T cells in ES may shed light on the reservoir size needed to attain a functional cure, with or without shock-and-kill strategies. We address each of these questions in this thesis write-up. Specifically, in chapter one, we assess the size of the inducible reservoir in ES to better understand what the latent reservoir in a functional cure might look like. Among other findings, our data demonstrates that despite the fact that most ES have markedly small reservoirs compared to CP, a small reservoir size may not be a requirement for attaining a functional cure. In chapter two, we tackle the shock-and-kill strategy to better understand if the LRA ingenol-B has any adverse effects on the HIV suppressive immune function of ES CD8+ T cells. We observe that while ingenol-B on its own has no adverse effects on ES CD8+ T cell HIV suppressive capacity, the combination of ingenol with another LRA, JQ1, inhibits the HIV specific suppressive capacity of CD8+ T cells in a dose dependent manner. Finally, in our effort to enhance the antiviral capacity of CP effector cells for the control of HIV infection, we explore the potential of using short course treatments of the type-1 interferon, IFN-α, to enhance NK cell immune function in ES and CP without inhibiting similar responses in patient CD8+ T cells. Our findings demonstrate that short course treatments of IFN-α not only enhance the HIV suppressive capacities of progressor and non-progressor NK cells, but achieve this while also enhancing the antiviral capacity of patient CD8+ T cells. Overall, our data have significant implications for the cure agenda

Culturally aligned security in banking. A system for rural banking in Ghana.

This thesis is an investigation into the unique rural banking system in Ghana and the role of information systems in fraud control. It presents a robust information security and internal control model to deal with fraud for the banking system. The rural banking industry has been noted for poor internal control leading to fraud. This has resulted in poor performance and even the collapse of some banks. The Focus of the study was on the processes used to deliver banking services. To design a protection system, a number of rural banks were visited. This was to understand the environment, regulatory regimes and the structure and banking processes of the industry and banks. Systemic vulnerabilities within the industry which could be exploited for fraud were found. The lack of structures like an address system and unreliable identification documents makes it difficult to use conventional identification processes. Also the lack of adequate controls, small staff numbers and the cross organisational nature of some transactions among other cultural issues reduces the ability to implement transaction controls. Twenty fraud scenarios were derived to illustrate the manifestation of these vulnerabilities. The rural banking integrity model was developed to deal with these observations. This protection model was developed using existing information security models and banking control mechanisms but incorporating the nature of the rural banking industry and culture of its environment. The fraud protection model was tested against the fraud scenarios and was shown to meet the needs of the rural banking industry in dealing with its systemic vulnerabilities. The proposed community-based identification scheme deals with identification weaknesses as an alternative to conventional identity verification mechanisms. The Transaction Authentication Code uses traditional adinkra symbols. Whilst other mechanisms like the Transaction Verification Code design v internal controls into the banking processes. This deals with various process control weaknesses and avoids human discretion in complying with controls. Object based separation of duties is also introduced as a means of controlling conflicting tasks which could lead to fraud

Aflatoxins and fumonisins contamination of home-made food (Weanimix) from cereal-legume blends for children

Background: Weanimix is an important food for children in Ghana. Mothers are trained to prepare homemade weanimix from beans, groundnuts and  maize for their infants. Groundnuts and maize are prone to aflatoxincontamination while fumonisin contaminates maize. Aflatoxin, is produced by the Asperguillus fungi while fumonisin, is produced by Fusarium fungi. These mycotoxins occur in tropical areas worldwide due to favorable climate for their growth.Objective: The objective of the study was to determine the levels of aflatoxin and fumonisin in homemade weanimix in the Ejura-Sekyedumase district in the Ashanti Region of Ghana.Methods: Thirty six homemade weanimix samples (50g each) were collected from households. Aflatoxin and fumonisin were measured using a fluorometric procedure described by the Association of Official AnalyticalChemist (AOAC official method 993.31, V1 series 4).Results: Aflatoxin and fumonisin were detected in all 36 samples, range 7.9-500ppb. Fumonisin levels range: 0.74-11.0ppm). Thirty (83.3%) of the thirty six samples were over the action limit of 20ppb for aflatoxin withan overall mean of 145.2 ppb whiles 58.3% of the samples had fumonisins above the action limit of 4 ppm with an overall mean of 4.7 ppm .Conclusion: There were significant aflatoxin and fumonisin contamination of homemade weanimix. Children fed on this nutritional food were being exposed to unacceptable levels of aflatoxin and fumonisin. Therefore there is a critical need to educate mothers on the dangers of mycotoxin exposure and to develop strategies to eliminate exposure of children fedhomemade weanimix to aflatoxin and fumonisin.Keywords: Aflatoxin, Fumonisin, Home-made Weanimix, infants