WOUGNET Update Newsletter - May 2006

[Dorothy Okello <dokello@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

WOUGNET Update Newsletter - May 2006
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A monthly electronic newsletter from Women of 
Uganda Network (WOUGNET) - http://www.wougnet.org
For comments or queries, contact info@xxxxxxxxxxx

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This month's contents:
1. Women Organisations in Uganda
2. ICT Policy
3. Links & Resources
4. Project News and Events
5. WOUGNET News
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
WOMEN ORGANISATIONS IN UGANDA
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= Efforts Integrated Development Foundation (EINTEDEF)
http://www.wougnet.org/Profiles/eintedef.html
EINTEDEF exists to provide and facilitate 
services geared towards improving the loving 
conditions of the marginalized people especially 
women. Operating in Kampala district the 
organization covers issues concerning ICT, 
reproductive Health, nature and environment conservation and HIV/AIDS.
http://www.wougnet.org/wo_dir.html#EINTEDEF


= Mbuya Kwaggalana Charity Group
http://www.wougnet.org/Profiles/mkcg.html
Kwaggalana?s mission is to empower women to 
improve their standards of living through 
training in life skills that will make them self 
reliant and also train members of the local 
community to improve their standards of living 
and alleviate poverty. The organization focuses 
mainly on women?s economic empowerment by 
conducting activities such as revolving fund 
loans and skills training. They target mainly women and local council leaders.
http://www.wougnet.org/wo_dir.html#MKCG


= FEMRITE celebrates ten years of the pen, 1996-2006
http://www.wougnet.org/Profiles/femrite.html
FEMRITE - Uganda Women Writers? Association will 
be celebrating ten years of existence in July 
2006. The association, which started from very 
humble beginnings, has grown into one of the 
leading women writers associations in Africa. It 
has groomed, nurtured and mentored many women who 
have gone on to become important writers, whose 
contribution to the writing field has been 
recognized both at national and international 
levels. In 2003, three of FEMRITE writers were 
finalists for the Michael Caine Prize, the 
ultimate recognition in African short story 
writing, while one won the Macmillan Writers 
Prize for Africa, 2005. Most recently, the 
Commonwealth Writers Prize, Africa region for 
2006 was also won by a FEMRITE member. Activities 
planned for the 10th anniversary celebrations 
will include: workshops in prose writing and 
poetry, writing and illustrating for children, 
and writing for film. Others will be a public 
dialogue, book launches, a writers? night with a 
bonfire, visits to schools and higher 
institutions of learning, and a dinner-dance. 
FEMRITE also expects to host three celebrated 
African writers - Prof. Akachi Eziegbo (Nigeria), 
Ayi Kwei Armah (Ghana/ Senegal) and Tsitsi 
Dangarembga (Zimbabwe). FEMRITE welcomes 
financial contributions and any other form of 
support in order to make this event a memorable and successful one.
http://www.wougnet.org/wo_dir.html#FEMRITE


= Akina Mama wa Afrika launches the AWLI TRAINING for 2006.
http://www.wougnet.org/Profiles/amwau.html#AWLI2006
Akina Mama wa Afrika held the Eastern Africa sub 
regional African Women?s Leadership Institute 
(AWLI) from April 24th ­ 5th May 2006, in Uganda. 
The AWLI aims to strengthen the personal and 
organisational capacities of young African women 
to influence policy and decision-making through 
training and networking. It serves as a 
networking, training and information 
dissemination forum for young women aged between 
25-40 working on gender issues. Since it was 
established in 1997, the AWLI and its related 
programmes, has a network of over 700 alumni from 
all over Africa. The countries from which young 
women will be selected to participate in this 
year?s Eastern Africa AWLI are: Burundi, Eritrea, 
Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Somaliland, Sudan, Uganda and Tanzania.
This year, a total of 23 participants from East 
and Horn of Africa attended from Kenya, Tanzania, 
Eritrea, Ethiopia, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi). 
The Theme for this year?s training was ?Women?s 
Human Rights- Back to Basics?. The opening 
ceremony of this year?s AWLI took place on Monday 
24th April 2006 at the Grand Imperial Hotel, 
followed by a reception. The ceremony comprised 
of several presentations from AWLI alumni. These 
included Solome Nakweesi Kimbugwe of Uganda 
Women?s Network (UWONET) on The Domestic 
Relations Bill and Milly Katana on Women?s Right 
to Health. Others were Hon Dora Byamukama Member 
of Parliament for Mwenge South Constituency on 
Women?s Legal Rights and Ms Sheila Kawamara 
Member of the East African Legislative Council on 
her personal experience in the fight for women?s rights.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ICT POLICY
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= Open Source Software (OSS) Weekend, 19 - 21 May 
2006, Uganda Institute of Information and 
Communications Technology (UICT), Nakawa
The Open Source Software (OSS) Weekend is an 
event that provides an excellent opportunity for 
private comapnies, NGOs, government departments 
and academic institutions to explore the 
potential of using Free and Open Source Software 
(FOSS) in Uganda. Having been held for the first 
time in 2005, it is planned that the event be run 
annually and this year's event is slated for 19th 
-21st May 2006. The goal of the OSS Weekend is to 
expose FOSS, its opportunities and case studies 
to the general public. Specific objectives for the event include:
-	To increase FOSS awareness among ICT end users, 
policy makers and technical personnel
-	To create Linkages and partnerships among the 
various stakeholders in the ICT sector through 
networking to promote sharing of FOSS resources, information and skills
-	To build FOSS capacity among ICT end users and 
technical personnel through the provision of 
training, educational resources and software
-       To show case innovative FOSS solutions implemented in Uganda
-	To enable FOSS practitioners have a greater 
understanding of the public's needs.
Participation at the OSS Weekend is open to the 
public. If you would like to discuss the issue of 
FOSS, to understand how you can use FOSS to meet 
your day-to-day needs, and to meet FOSS 
practitioners in Uganda, this is the event for 
you. Speakers at the event will include 
community-based FOSS practitioners and technical experts.
The venue is the Uganda Institute of Information 
and Communications Technology (UICT) in Nakawa. 
There will be daily sessions running from 9:00am 
to 5:00pm. Organisers for this event include 
EACOSS, LinuxSolutions, Linux Chix Uganda and 
WOUGNET.  In particular, WOUGNET is responsible 
for the session on FOSS in the community - 
showcasing FOSS initiatives in rural areas.For 
further information, contact: techsupport@xxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.wougnet.org/Events/projectnews06.html#OSSW06



= WOUGNET Gender and ICT Policy Advocacy Training Workshops

Under WOUGNET's Gender and ICT Policy Advocacy 
program area, WOUGNET aims to support activities 
in advocating for gender concerns within Uganda's 
ICT policy processes. With support of the 
Association for Progressive Communications (APC), 
WOUGNET held a public forum under the theme 
"Uganda's ICT Policy: Does it address the Gender 
Digital Divide?" that took place on Tuesday 7th 
March 2006. The main objective of the forum was 
to raise awareness on gender issues in the ICT 
policies and programmes, and the need to 
integrate gender into ICT policies and 
programmes. With support of the Association for 
Progressive Communications (APC), WOUGNET held a 
Gender Analysis training workshop that took place 
on Thursday 20th to Friday 21st April 2006. The 
main objective of the workshop was to build 
capacity of policy makers, ICT experts, gender 
experts and journalists in Gender Analysis 
skills. Topics covered included Gender 
sensitization and Gender and ICT policy. For more 
information, contact Goretti Amuriat, info@xxxxxxxxxxx


= Engendering e-Government policies in East Africa

WOUGNET was invited to make a presentation on 
"Engendering e-Government Policies in East 
Africa" during Stakeholders Consultative 
workshops on Cyber laws and e-Justice and on 
Information Security, 25-28 April 2006, convened 
by the East African Community at Grand Imperial 
Hotel. The workshops were a follow up on the 
recommendation of the second e-Government 
stakeholders meeting held in June 2005 in 
Nairobi, where cyber laws and e-Justice were 
identified as key cross-cutting issues that need 
to be in place for the successful implementation 
of e-Government applications in East Africa. The 
two-in-one workshop aimed at creating awareness, 
sensitization and advocacy on the significance of 
cyber laws and e-Justice, and the impact of their 
continuing absence in the East African region; 
and also to promote development of an appropriate 
legal and policy framework for e-government 
promotion in the region. The Information Security 
workshop specifically looked at issues of 
Information Security for e-Government and 
particularly the development of a Public Key 
Infrastructure policy framework for the region.
The workshop were organised by the East African 
Community and supported by the United Nations 
Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the 
Canadian Government through the Canadian e-Policy 
Resource Centre (CePRC). Local coordination in 
Uganda was by the National Planning Authority 
(NPA). The workshops had over eighty participants 
from the three EAC countries including 
representatives from government, civil society, 
private sector/IT experts, media, legal 
officers/experts and civil society. For more 
information, send email to info@xxxxxxxxxxx


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
LINKS & RESOURCES
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a) Development

= Pan African Development Education and Advocacy Programme (PADEAP)
http://www.wougnet.org/Links/development.html#PADEAP
Founded in 1997, PADEAP is a strategic center for 
the coordination of Pan African advocacy and 
development education initiatives. PADEAP?s 
mission is to create space and an enabling 
environment in which African peoples, their 
community organization, international NGO?s and 
other partners in African development can have 
dynamic engagement and dialogue on African 
Development issues. PADEAP Uganda is part of a 
bigger PADEAP family, which includes PADEAP - UK, 
PADEAP - Nigeria, and PADEAP - The Gambia.
= Global Volunteer Network
http://www.wougnet.org/Links/development.html#GVN
Global Volunteer Network, a non profit 
organisation, places volunteers in community 
projects throughout the world, giving them the 
opportunity to participate in a variety of 
educational, environmental and community aid 
programs. Examples of the exciting and rewarding 
activities available to volunteers include 
teaching English, environmental work, AIDS 
education, and assisting in an orphanage.The 
network has a number of projects offered in the 
Mukono, Jinja, and Kampala area.


b) ICT-related resources

= International Program for Development of Communication (IPDC)
http://www.wougnet.org/Links/ictresources.html#IPDC
IPDC is a UNESCO program that provides small 
grants to community/media projects. Media 
organizations such as press, radio and 
television, media training institutes, 
professional journalists' organizations, media 
development agencies, and community media 
organizations are eligible to seek support from 
IPDC. All proposals are processed by field-based 
Unesco Advisers for communication and 
information. Media projects with potential to 
serve as models are especially encouraged. 
Particular attention is always given to proposals 
from least-developed, landlocked and small island countries.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PROJECT NEWS AND EVENTS
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March 2006

= Uganda Land Alliance holds a workshop on women?s land rights

During December 2005 to February 2006, The Uganda 
Land Alliance (ULA) together with Actionaid 
International Uganda documented women?s voices 
from six districts in Uganda, with regards to 
their land rights. The voices of these women are 
contained in a 27 minute visual documentary 
?Biting the Feeding Hand? and a booklet. These 
were shown and distributed at a dissemination 
workshop that took place on Tuesday 28th March 
2006, at the Grand Imperial Hotel in Kampala. The 
documentary featured women in the rural areas 
talking about their struggles, dilemmas and 
challenges in fighting for their land rights.
From the concerns raised by the women a policy 
brief was developed. The women?s voices were 
shared at the International Conference on 
Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD) in Brazil, March 2006.
The objectives of the workshop were:
- To share the experiences of women as they voice their concerns on land rights
- To generate policy debate on women?s land rights.
- To forge a way forward for the recognition of women?s land rights in Uganda.
The expectation is to come up with concrete 
actions on the way forward. To change social 
systems and structures that deny women rights of control and ownership.
The workshop was chaired by Ms Goretti Karuhanga, 
Coordinator, Council for Economic Empowerment of 
Women in Africa (CEEWA -Uganda), who made a brief 
introduction of The Uganda Land Alliance. On the 
other hand Action Aid International Uganda, who 
partnered with ULA in getting the women?s voices, 
was represented by James Kintu, the Policy 
Analyst at ActionAid. He referred to his 
organization?s role as a partner in lobbying for 
land rights especially for women. ActionAid works 
in close collaboration with the land rights centers in the districts.
(Report compiled by Brenda Muyanja, WOUGNET Information Officer)



May 2006

= World Telecommunications Day - Promoting Global Cybersecurity,  17th May 2006
http://www.itu.int/newsroom/wtd/2006/index.html

The focus of much of telecommunications 
activities world wide is to harmonize national 
policies, bridge technological differences, 
foster interconnectivity and interoperability of 
systems on a global scale. The result is to bring 
the world closer - through a phone call, via an 
email, by watching TV or surfing the web. One of 
the key objectives of the World 
Telecommunications Day is to increase global 
awareness of the advantages that information and 
communications technologies have to offer and 
increase access to ICTs for a greater percentage 
of the population, especially the lower income groups in developing countries.
In 2006, the World Telecommunication Day carries 
added significance as 17 May has been identified 
by the Tunis phase of the World Summit on the 
Information Society as "World Information Society Day".
In today's interconnected and increasingly 
networked world, societies are vulnerable to a 
wide variety of threats, including deliberate 
attacks on critical information infrastructures 
with debilitating effects on our economies and on 
our societies. In order to safeguard our systems 
and infrastructure and in order to instill 
confidence in online trade, commerce, banking, 
telemedicine, e-government and a host of other 
applications, we need to strengthen our 
collective global cybersecurity. As this depends 
on the security practices of each and every 
networked country, business, and citizen, we need 
to develop a global culture of cybersecurity.
This is why, the ITU Council chose to highlight 
the serious challenges we face in ensuring the 
safety and security of networked information and 
communication systems and adopted the theme 
"Promoting Global Cybersecurity" for World Telecommunication Day 2006.


July 2006

Fellowship Announcement: HIV/AIDS and Health and 
Social Policy in Africa: a focus on gender, care, and sexual violence
(Deadline for applications: July 15, 2006)
http://www.wougnet.org/Events/projectnews06.html#HHSPA
The Social Science Research Council is pleased to 
announce the 2006-2007 Fellowship for HIV/AIDS 
and Public Health Policy Research in Africa. The 
program is open to African researchers, policy 
analysts, program planners and practitioners to 
support research on health and social policy in 
Eastern and Southern Africa relating to (1) 
political economy of care-giving and HIV/AIDS 
with particular emphasis on gender analysis; or 
(2) sexual violence and HIV/AIDS. Two Senior 
Fellowships of up to $25,000 and six Associate 
Fellowships of up to $10,000 will be awarded. 
Generous support for this program has been made 
available by the Open Society Institute's Network 
Public Health Program based in New York. 
Fellowships will be awarded for proposals 
addressing one of the two following areas:
        1) HIV AND CARE-GIVING
Research proposals should address health policy 
challenges as they relate to any or several 
aspects of: (a) various public health and 
development interventions, and whether and how 
such interventions are affecting costs and 
burdens of care-giving for HIV/AIDS; (b) social 
mobilization efforts around care-giving at 
various levels­local, national and/or global.
        2) RESEARCH ON SEXUAL VIOLENCE
Research proposals should address health policy 
challenges as they relate to any or several 
aspects of: (a) new ways of measuring and 
conceptualizing the connection between sexual 
violence and HIV/AIDS across a range of settings, 
including in the context of fragile states, armed 
conflict and post-conflict settings, and other 
forms of public or domestic violence; b) policy 
implications at a national level of decreasing 
vulnerability of individuals to sexual violence; 
(c) implications of HIV/AIDS and sexual violence 
for policy and programme interventions in public 
health, reproductive health, security and HIV/AIDS.
The deadline for applications is July 15, 2006.



August 2006

IT Governance And Strategy Summit 2006, 22 - 24 
August 2006, The Castle, Kyalami, Fourways, Johannesburg, South Africa
http://www.wougnet.org/Events/projectnews06.html#ITGSS
The IT Governance And Strategy Summit 2006 is a 
practical guide to governance application and 
excellence. The goal is to enable one 
strategically plan and maintain an Information 
Technology Governance Strategy, and includes the 
following: Create and maintain an effective IT 
Governance Framework for your company; 
Effectively apply management process guidelines 
to drive IT Governance excellence; Ensure that 
all internal IT projects are controlled within 
the IT Governance framework; Implement policies 
for both IT Governance and Legal Compliance; and 
Establishing roles and responsibilities for all of your internal role players.


November 2006

= Money & Movements International Meeting, 
November 9-11, 2006, Oaxaca, Mexico: Call for Participation
(Deadline for application: June 23, 2006)
http://www.wougnet.org/Events/projectnews06.html#MMIM06
Is there really too little money to support 
existing women's rights initiatives? Is it that 
women's rights groups are not bold enough in 
their fundraising strategies? Is it that donors 
simply don't understand the urgency and 
importance of this work? Or is it that we, as 
progressive women's organizations and movements, 
need to change ourselves to respond better to the current challenges???
AWID and Semillas invite you to join us in Oaxaca 
November 9-11, 2006 for a groundbreaking meeting 
of the international women's movement, where as 
many as 300 participants will convene to learn 
about the funding situation for women's rights, 
strategize with partners and progressive donors 
around funding challenges and opportunities, and 
begin the critical work of learning how to 
increase existing resources and mobilize new 
support for women's rights work. This meeting is 
a key follow-up activity to AWID's 
action-research initiative: Where is the money for women's rights?



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
WOUGNET News
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

= WOUGNET conducts Video training at Kubere Information Center in Apac

In partnership with the International Development 
Research Center (IDRC), WOUGNET organized a 
four-day participatory video training workshop 
from19th - 22nd April 2006 at the Kubere 
Information Center in Apac District, Northern 
Uganda. The workshop was facilitated by Heloise 
Nicholl a graduate student working with IDRC, in 
Ottawa, Canada. The objective of the training was to:
- Build the video-making capacity of WOUGNET by 
providing training in the use of applied video 
technology among staff and partners
- Create a short film on the KIC through the 
participatory involvement of staff and partners
Kubere Information Center (KIC) is a 
multi-dimensional information center offering 
agricultural information to rural women farmers. 
The main objective of the center is to enhance 
access to agricultural information by rural women 
farmers using a variety of Information and 
Communication Technologies (ICTs) in Apac 
district. The KIC was established with support 
from the Technical Centre for Agricultural and 
Rural Cooperation ACP EU (CTA) and operates under 
the Rural Access program of WOUGNET. The 
International Development Research Center (IDRC) 
is a public cooperation that was created by the 
parliament of Canada in 1970 to help developing 
countries use science and technology to find 
practical long term solutions to social, economic 
and environment problems they face.
For more information about the KIC and/or for a 
report on the video training (PDF format) contact 
Janet Achora, WOUGNET Program Officer - Rural 
Access, at kicinfo@xxxxxxxxxxx or call (041) 
532035 or visit the secretariat at Plot 53 Kira Road, Kamwokya, Kampala.


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WOUGNET is supported by APC, CTA, Dimitra/FAO and Hivos

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