Untapped Opportunities: ICT Use by Zanzibar SMEs

An ICT use has become unavoidable in different aspects of human life; the development of business depends largely on the utilisation of the new technology. However, SMEs in Zanzibar have yet fully utilised the opportunity of ICT. This paper discusses the opportunities that could be grasped by SMEs in Zanzibar by adopting Information and Communication Technology in a wider range.Different literatures have been viewed to show opportunities that Small and Medium Enterprises can have by utilising ICT. Conclusion has been made by showing the importance of ICT use by Zanzibar SMEs. Keywords: SMEs, ICT, Untapped Opportunitie

Redefining taarab in relation to local and global influences

To refer to the origin of taarab as a direct importation of Egyptian music by the Arab upper class (Topp 1994:153) is a plausibility without solid evidence. To define it as a style of music played for entertainment at weddings and other festive occasions all along the Swahili Coast (153) is to exclude other styles of music, indeed played for entertainment at weddings and other festive occasions all along the Swahili Coast. To say that taarab contains all the features of a typical `Indian Ocean music`, combining influences from Egypt, the Arabian peninsula, India and the West with local musical practices (153) is apparently true but does not adequately capture the ambiguities and complexities of its protean nature. Refening to taarab as the Swahili popular `salon` music whose song may be recorded or, as often is the case, orally transmitted (King`ei 1992:29) is misleading, for taarab is not always `salon` music and the method and process of creating and transmitting a song in taarab is not the same as that of other forms of African music. To state that taarab has transcended its local Swahili boundaries to be consumed in other communities including other cities in East and Central Africa (Ntarangwi 1998: 150) is a valid statement from a point of view of media, change and spread, but still leaves out a lot to be said. Taarab, like so many complex living things, refuses to be thrust into neat bags or squeezed into terse all-embracing definitions. It is an ongoing process whose form(s) are amorphous, assuming different structures, roles, functions and epithets triggered by a number of factors. That notwithstanding - whatever forms, role and function taarab exhibits at different stages, its making consists of five major components or processes: the composition of the lyric, the composition of musical patterns, the extemporized performance of its song, instrumentation and audience

The Swahili novelist at the crossroad: the dilemma of identity and fecundity

\"Are there any national literatures in black Africa yet? The simple answer is no. [...] If one examines the development of the African language literature that do exists, one is struck by certain recurring tendencies. Many of the books produced, particularly the early works, are of a predominantly moralistic nature. Sometimes they are retelling of folk stories or Bible stories, sometimes imitations of European religious literature, sometimes both.\\\" (Lindfors 1997: 121; 123) Certain anomalies are obvious in the above extract. Swahili written literature with its long-standing tradition, dating far back to the 17th century, has relativly gathered its own aesthetic criteria, values and sensibility, hence \\\''own\\\'' integrity and world view. I dare say that Lindfors will be suprised to learn today, how fast the Swahili novel has developed since when he had left it when he read Andrzejewski et al (1985) and Gérard (1981), who (by the way), themselves did not then see the their works as presenting a complete picture of African literatures in African languages. This essay aims at showing the predicament of the Swahili novelist at the crossroads and how, in a contemporary situation, s/he works out his or her strategies towards resolving the impasses

Challenges Facing Informal Sector Members in Joining and Contributing to Social Security Funds in Tanzania: A Case Study of Masasi District.

The main aim of the study was to examine the challenges faced by informal sector members in the National Social Security fund in enrolment. Specifically, the study examined the perception of informal sector members in joining and contributing to the National Social Security Fund, to determine the factors influencing informal sector members to join in the National Social Security Fund, to identify the challenges facing informal sector members in joining to the National Social Security funds. This study used descriptive research design, the sample size comprised 96 informal sector members in which data was collected by using questionnaire and interview guide. The data were analyzed by using Microsoft excel computer software, in which descriptive analysis which allows the use of frequency and percentage were used. The findings revealed that informal sector members still challenged with a personal feeling and tradition believes which regarded as an obstacle to them to be enrolled in the NSSF. Also, the findings revealed that most of the informal sector members lacks knowledge and information on the NSSF services and benefits. Furthermore, the study established that the informal sector members are influenced by the future benefits and services offered by National social security funds. However, informal sectors employees still challenged by traditional values, norms, lack of proper and adequate information. Finally, the study recommends that NSSF should expand their operations to local areas like Masasi and its interiors so as to attract informal sector members such as farmers, potters and others to be enrolled. Also, the National Social Security Fund should improve procedures and regulations so that can attract informal sector members to be enrolled. Keywords: Informal Sector Employees, National Social Security Funds, Social Security Schemes, Beneficiaries

Optimal water resources management model for Ash Sharqiyah region domestic water supply, Oman

Continuously increasing water demand in various sectors is intensifying the water scarcity problem particularly in arid and semi-arid regions like Oman. In many areas of the Sultanate, demand for water far exceeds its current availability. This presents logistical challenges in overcoming this situation or at least keeping the water deficit as low as possible. In Oman, most of the readily accessible fresh groundwater resources have already been extensively developed in order to attempt to meet the increasing demand for water, and any further intensification of groundwater abstraction is therefore not sustainable. Attention has therefore turned to desalination of sea water to supplement the available groundwater resources. Desalination is expensive and energy intensive; hence it cannot realistically be the sole source of drinking water in Oman. Rather, a conjunctive use of groundwater and desalination optimally operated to meet water demands while ensuring the sustainability of the groundwater resources is the best option. Thus, a numerical simulation model of Ash Sharqiyah Sands Aquifer was developed in this study and used to assess the long-term impacts on piezometric heads of supplying the eight Wilayats of Ash Sharqiyah Region with water from the 29 operational wells located in two regional groundwater fields- the Jaalan and the Al Kamil. The simulation results showed that the existing provision from the two wellfields will be inadequate by the 1st of September 2025 to meet domestic water supply needs without creating excessive drawdown and the cessation of flow in some of the existing operational Aflaj, which are artificial, surface channels that tap and convey by gravity groundwater for diversion into various uses along its route. Supplementing the abstraction from the wellfields with the more costly desalinated water of the Sur Desalination Plant offers the prospect for combating the problem; consequently, a constrained optimization problem was formulated to find the least cost blending of groundwater and desalinated water to meet demands while satisfying various constraints including the need to maintain Aflaj flow. The optimisation revealed increasing contribution of desalination to future total water supply for the Region, as desalination water replaces pumping from wells that affect Aflaj flow, with implications for the project cost. However, significant reduction in the long-term total production cost was achieved by increasing up to 50% the existing pump capacity at the Jaalan, made possible because its associated Aflaj are located upstream of the wellfield and are hence only minimally affected by the current abstractions

Antibiotic prophylaxis in caesarean section at Al-Helal Al-Emirati Hospital (Al-HEH), Gaza Strip, Palestine: A clinical audit

Background Nowadays, there is a general consensus among the current best guidelines about the procedural aspects of antibiotic prophylaxis in Caesarean Section (CS). Clinical audit, which has never been done before in the Gaza strip, is a tool of quality control used worldwide for healthcare improvement and is aimed at assessing clinicians’ and other clinical staffs’ adherence to the applicable guidelines. Objective This study was undertaken to audit the use of antibiotic prophylaxis in CS at Al-HEH, Gaza Strip, Palestine. Methods A sample of 38 cases was selected randomly among all the women who underwent CS during the period from 22 March 2015 to 16 April 2015. Using SPSS program, data were analysed for age, type of CS, whether they received antibiotics or not, type of antibiotics, and timing of its administration. Results Of the total 38 patients, urgent CS was carried out in 31.57% of cases while the procedure was elective in 68.42%. Antibiotic prophylaxis was given in 60.53% of cases before the surgery while no prophylaxis was received by the rest. Using Chi-Square Statistic, it was found that the correlation between the type of CS and the decision of prescribing antibiotics before the surgery to be statistically significant (P= 0.02). Moreover, 81.58% of cases were found to have received antibiotics after the surgery and a lack of uniformity of the antibiotics given to this group was also noted. Conclusion This study indicates that clinicians at Al-HEH do not follow evidence-based practice regarding antibiotic prophylaxis when managing CS patients. Moreover, the non-justified use of antibiotics again in many of those who received

Versatility of the Taarab lyric: local aspects and global influences

‘Taarab’ is a popular music entertainment in East Africa whose origin is ‘contentiously’ given as Middle East. It is an art form imported to East Africa perhaps in the early years of the 1900s. Taraab has been ariedly looked at, but has generally been seen as a uniform body. This essay sets out to show that from its inception in East Africa, taarab has never been uniform as it started to develop its own characteristics and peculiarities as a performing art. It has been undergoing a number of changes in its musical and lyrical structures. It moved outward to become a popular music instead of being court music, and from being coastal music to being a music that has spread out to inland Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda and Burundi, thus approximating musical structures of these regions as it is assuming new roles and functions. Although in our description we do in passing refer to the whole body of the art complex ‘taarab’, it is on the lyric that we focus on. This article is written on the basis of findings from field work and library research that have been conducted from 2000 to date in a project entitled Local and Global Aspects of Taarab: A Popular Music Entertainment in East Africa, under the umbrella topic “Lokales Handeln in Afrika im Kontext globaler Einflüsse”, funded by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)

Clash of interests and conceptualisation of Taarab in East Africa

Remarks on aspects of taarab such as its history, nature, definition, and change appear prominently and repeatedly in nearly every previous study of the subject. Some of these remarks, however, serve more to expose a clash of interests rather than provide untainted facts about its conceptualisation. This esseay aims at revisiting the notion of taarab in an attempt to concretise its conceptualisation on the basis of various variables that affect change in its structure. The relevant variables are convergence, divergence, linguistic constrains, formal conventions, spontaneity and preparedness in composition, actualisation and performance, instrumentation (i. e. number of instruments and how they are played), the art of vocalisation, the performer/ audience divide, stage organisation, setting, occasion, functions and media influences. For the purpose of avoiding much attention to every category of taarab, however, we prefer to take `group-styles`- hence our concentration on three phases: the period of the inception of taarab in Zanzibar, the period prior to 1905 through the 1920s up to the 1940s when the phonograph record and then the sound film was introduced, from the 1950s to the 1960s when the radio was introduced, and from the 1970s todate - the period of the impact of the tape-recorder, video-recorder, TV - and most recently the period of the influence of satellite television. Our analysis is based on theoretical conceptions of genres by Dubrow (1982), Fowler (1991), Finnegan (1976) and Okpewho (1992) in written literature and `orature`

تدبير تسليم الحدث ÙÙŠ القانون العماني: واقعاً ومأمولاً

يشكل الأحداث ثروة حقيقة للأمم ÙÙŠ سبيل رقيها إلى سÙلَّم٠الحضارة الإنسانية، حيث تستمد منهم قوتها وأملها المنشود الذي تتطلع إليه ÙÙŠ تحقيق ما تصبو إليه من تقدم، وتجسيداً لهذه الأهمية Ùقد عنيت التشريعات القانونية بتوÙير كاÙØ© وسائل الحماية الضرورية للأحداث الذين يتعرضون للجنوح أو يرتكبون جرائم يعاقب عليها القانون، ومن أهم وسائل الحماية القانونية Ùرض تدابير رعائية مخÙÙØ© تكون وسيلة لعودة الحدث إلى جادة الصواب وعلى رأسها تدبير تسليم الحدث، ورغم أن هذا التدبير يبدو للوهلة الأولى واضح الغاية سهل التطبيق إلا أن الممارسات العملية والتÙريعات القانونية تÙظهر الكثير من الإشكاليات التي تستدعي الوقو٠عليها ودراستها واقتراح المعالجات المناسبة. وعليه Ùإن إشكالية الدراسة تكمن ÙÙŠ بيان مدى شمولية النصوص القانونية ÙÙŠ التشريع العماني لتغطية كاÙØ© جوانب تدبير التسليم وخصوصاً عند تزاحم جهات التسليم أو تعارضه مع حق الحضانة، كما أن القضاء يق٠حائراً أمام غموض بعض النصوص القانونية ÙÙŠ بيان الجهة المشرÙØ© على تنÙيذ تدبير التسليم ومدة التدبير وأسباب انتهائه والجهة التي تتولى الإنÙاق عليه خلال Ùترة التنÙيذ؛ مما يوجد خشية حقيقة من التأثير على Ùاعلية التدبير ÙÙŠ تقويم سلوك الحدث. ويرتكز البحث على المنهج الإستقرائي والمنهج التحليلي والمنهج المقارن. وقد خلصت الدراسة إلى نتيجة محصلتها؛ أن القانون العماني اشتمل على جملة ثغرات قانونية يلزم معالجتها عن طريق إجراء تعديل تشريعي لبعض مواد قانون مساءلة الأحداث لأجل تنÙيذ تدبير التسليم على نحو يحقق الغاية التي شرعت من أجله ويصل بالحدث إلى برّ٠الأمان.             &nbsp

The Kumaraswamy Skew-t Distribution and Its Related Properties

Skew normal distribution has been introduced by Azzalini (1985) as an alternative to the normal distribution to accommodate asymmetry. Since then extensive studies have been done on applying Azzalini’s skewness mechanism to other well-known distributions, such as skew-t distribution which is more flexible and can better accommodate long tailed data than the skew normal one. Cordeiro and de Castro (2011) proposed a new class of distribution called the Kumaraswamy generalized distribution (Kw − F) which is capable of fitting skewed data that cannot be fitted well by existing distributions. Since then, the Kw −F distribution has been widely studied and various versions of generalization of this distribution family have been introduced. In this paper we introduce a new generalization of the skew-t distribution based on the Kumaraswamy generalized distribution. The new class of distribution which we call the Kumaraswamy skew-t (KwST) has the ability of fitting skewed, long and heavy tailed data and is more flexible than the skew-t distribution as it contains the skew-t distribution as a special case. Related properties of this distribution family such as mathematical properties, moments, and order statistics are discussed. The proposed distribution is applied to a real data set to illustrate the estimation procedure