This paper presents a case between South African Airways (SAA) and an applicant for employment who did not volunteer information about his HIV status. The matter between Jacques Charl Hoffmann, an HIV-infected man applying for a position as flight attendant, and SAA was heard before Judge Hussain in the Witwatersrand Local Division. Mr. Hoffmann contended that SAA had unfairly discriminated against him solely on the basis of his HIV-positive status. He argued that such unfair discrimination violated his constitutional rights to dignity, equality, fair labor practices, and privacy. Considered as a whole, Judge Hussain found that the policy of SAA was justified and substantiated. It is noted that the policy is not selectively applied against those persons who are HIV-positive, instead it is directed at detecting all kinds of disabilities that make employment as a flight attendant unsuitable. To the judge, the \"unsuitability\" of an applicant is to be considered against the policy\'s consideration of \"medical, safety, and operational grounds\". In conclusion, the court found it justifiable for the airline to conduct medical examinations of aspiring flight attendants, and its refusal to employ Mr. Hoffmann was not an act of unfair discrimination.

In Nigeria women\'s empowerment is essential to improving their standard of living and protecting their right to participate fully in development. More effective strategies are needed for women to participate in decision making. There are both static and dynamic aspects of the concept of empowerment. The former may lead to exogenous power strategies, while the latter may lead to endogenous empowerment facilitated by the dynamic concept that regards empowerment as a bottom-up process that develops the capacity of individuals. This process can be accomplished in six stages that encompass awareness, skills and capacity assessment, capacity-building and skills development, participation and greater control in decision-making, action for change, and evaluation. Nigeria needs an endogenous empowerment strategy for women\'s effective participation within organizations that is based on the tenet that women can only protect their interests through effective participation in their organizations and that highlights awareness-building, skills-acquisition and capacity-building, and changing discriminatory norms. External agents can not empower women but can foster conditions conducive to self-empowerment.

Most people in South Africa with sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) first seek help from traditional healers (THs). Since people with STDs are at greater risk of contracting and transmitting HIV than are those without STDs, THs comprise a good target group for HIV/AIDS education. A study was funded by the Scandinavian Institute of African Studies in which THs in Amatikulu, Ulundi, Nqutu, Durban, Pietermaritzburg, and other adjacent areas were surveyed about their HIV/AIDS-related knowledge, beliefs, and practices. Most AIDS-educated THs now acknowledge that AIDS exists and are taking protective measures, such as using disposable razor blades to avoid infecting patients with HIV during traditional treatments. However, many THs believe that AIDS has evolved from older, mystical diseases which only THs can cure. Traditional hospitals have proliferated in which HIV/AIDS patients seek treatment from what is more typically perceived by the THs and the general public as morbidity due to witchcraft and other spiritual causes. While each TH has his own blend of medicine against AIDS, the basic ingredients are common among all concoctions. One basic, common ingredient is a plant with documented anti-viral and anti-AIDS properties. The plant, however, is highly toxic and will itself kill the patient after a few days treatment. Another plant has considerable virucidal activity against several RNA and DNA attacking viruses. The traditional medicine was also found to contain plants which have traditionally been used against headaches, respiratory problems, chest and abdominal pains, colds, and dysentery. It also has documented antifungal and antimicrobial effects against common opportunistic infections, as well as being a sedative and painkiller. Traditional treatments against AIDS may help to improve patients\' well-being.

This study is based on interviews conducted among 8 women\'s income-generating groups and 12 individual women entrepreneurs in 15 villages in Masaka district, Uganda. The Baganda are the main tribe in the study villages. The study evaluates the economic achievement, objectives, and social characteristics of the groups. Groups ranged in size from 9-20 members. All had functioned for 3-5 years. A regular membership fee was paid through the sale of agricultural produce. Groups met at least every 2 weeks. This study revealed that the individual goals were to increase individual wealth, while the stated group goals were to invest in the community. Members considered the groups as useful in providing an easy way to raise capital. Most members considered financial status as a criterion for group membership. Elderly women tended to join social and handicraft groups. The women\'s group members tended to be friends before the establishment of the group and tended to be currently married to men residing in the area. Of the 12 women entrepreneurs, only 5 were currently married. All 12 women entrepreneurs had considerable initiative. The 12 women and the women\'s group members derived income from two or more sources: agricultural projects, animal husbandry, craft production, alcohol production and sale, or other activities. Study findings indicate that decisions were often delayed or avoided in order to preserve social cohesion. In a market-oriented enterprise, quick response time is needed and the bureaucratic dynamics would hinder some agricultural ventures. The poorest women experienced barriers to group membership. Women entrepreneurs were more successful than group women.

Targeted projects conducted by nongovernmental organizations (NGO) and other local groups form the core of the AIDS Control and Prevention (AIDSCAP) Project\'s comprehensive HIV/AIDS prevention programs in 17 countries. Each of the 465 subprojects is based upon a detailed subagreement outlining the project\'s objectives, each organization\'s responsibilities in meeting the objectives, the products to be delivered by the implementing agency, and the indicators for measuring whether the objectives have been met. AIDSCAP country and regional staff work closely with each implementing agency to review and strengthen every subagreement. AIDSCAP\'s rapid project development method, field tested in Tanzania and Honduras in 1995, accelerated the process by bringing together in one place staff from implementing agencies and AIDSCAP country and regional offices. In so doing, AIDSCAP and its partners were able to write, review, and complete most of the subagreements for each country program in just 2 weeks. The experiences in Tanzania and Honduras are described.

Rwanda erupted in civil war in the spring of 1994, leading to the flight from the country of hundreds of thousands of refugees into neighboring Tanzania and Zaire. Within days, the population of the Benaco refugee camp grew to more than 250,000, making it the second largest city in Tanzania. HIV infection rates in some sectors of the Rwandan population had been among the highest observed in Africa. High levels of HIV infection thus remain among the refugees from Rwanda. Four months after the beginning of the exodus from Rwanda, the AIDS Control and Prevention (AIDSCAP) Project contracted with CARE International to manage a broad-based HIV prevention pilot project for Rwandan refugees at the Benaco refugee camp. Conditions in the camp and the project are described, followed by consideration of the prevailing culture and behavior change. The author believes that the pioneering work at Benaco and three other Ngara District camps offers valuable lessons on working with displaced populations under crisis conditions.

This case study examines the conditions of families and individuals who resettled in Ghana. These Ghanaians (about 7000) had migrated to Liberia in search of a better life many years before, but they left Liberia because of Liberia\'s civil war. Many of these involuntary migrants were in fact Ghanaian \"returnees.\" Many of the migrants who returned were from the fishing village of Senya Beraku. This study includes a brief summary of findings from an evaluation of the Senya Beraku Cooperative Society, a nongovernmental credit organization providing loans to returnee families. Funding was available for loans to 120 families. Repayment rates showed that 80% of women and 60% of men repaid their loans. Refugee board members were accurate in predicting the success of repayment. 95% of loans were repaid by persons predicted to repay, and 40% of loans were repaid among persons considered unlikely to repay. The 75 members of the Cooperative were not considered representative of the 6500 returnee population. There were 7 defaulters and 12 nondefaulters among the interviewed population of Cooperative members. Findings indicate that the timing of loans was a critical issue for investment. Many loans were small and given at the beginning of the dry season when there was little economic activity. Most respondents had little or no formal education, but this appeared to be unrelated to loan performance. Readjustment was a function of many factors, including, for instance, family connections, degree of financial success abroad, and prevailing attitudes toward returnees. Defaulters more frequently reported negative social exchanges on their return. Most returnees were considered failures and suffered from a loss of status due to the forced return from Monrovia. 10 out of 19 experienced the loss of all their property and one or more close relatives. The 9 remaining lost some property and some relatives. More defaulters \"struggled with self-pity and a sense of paralysis.\" All respondents who were members of indigenous African churches were defaulters. A secure belief in God strengthened coping skills. Nondefaulters had more self-confidence in dealing with their situations. Many experienced guilt for a variety of reasons. It is suggested that strategies for reintegration must be long term and supportive of returnees needs.

Conventional wisdom, as reflected in reports by the World Bank and the Whitsun Foundation, maintains that control of population growth is the key strategy for stimulating socioeconomic development and ending widespread poverty. The Witsun Foundation has criticized the Government of Zimbabwe for failing to include specific policies for population control in its National Transitional Development Plan. the report further expressed alarm about future availability of land to contain Zimbabwe\'s growing population. Communal areas are designed for a maximum of 325,000 families yet presently contain 700-800,000 families. This Malthusian, deterministic emphasis on population growth as the source of social ills ignores the broader, complex set of socioeconomic, historical, and political factors that determine material life. Any analysis of population that fails to consider the class structure of society, the type of division of labor, and forms of property and production can produce only meaningless abstractions. For example, consideration of crowding in communal areas must include consideration of inequitable patterns of land ownership in sub-Saharan Africa. Unemployment must be viewed within the context of a capitalist economic structure that relies on an industrial reserve army of labor to ensure acceptance of low wages and labor-intensive conditions. While it is accepted that population growth is creating specific and real problems in Zimbabwe and other African countries, these problems could be ameliorated by land reform and restructuring of the export-oriented colonial economies. Similarly, birth control should not be promoted as the solution to social problems, yet family planning services should be available to raise the status of women. Literacy, agrarian reform, agricultural modernization, and industrialization campaigns free from the dominance of Western capitalism represent the true solutions to Zimbabwe\'s problems.

The sociocultural factors impacting on fertility behavior among the Yoruba of Nigeria were investigated in a sample of 330 women, 199 from Ife-Ife urban area and 131 from 3 rural villages also in the Oranmiyan Local Government Area. All study participants were Yoruba women married to Yoruba men who had at least 1 child; their mean age was 34.5 years and 41% had no education. The study was conducted during 1987. The responses confirmed the close link between marriage and procreation in this culture. Children are valued as a source of prestige to a woman, and childless women are stigmatized. The reasons for which children are valued were found to vary according to educational level. 77% of women with no education compared with 41% of those with high levels of education value children as a source of caretaking in old age. In contrast, 44% of highly educated women versus 11% of uneducated women valued children as a source of joy. Educated women were also more likely than women with no education to view motherhood as a means of fulfilling God\'s command to continue the human race. In terms of sex preference, higher percentages of educated and urban women wanted their 1st child to be a male and son preference has strong religious, legal, and social status significance in the Yoruban culture. However, all respondents indicated they wanted to have children of both sexes. More information on sociocultural factors examined in this study is needed to help in the design of a population policy for the Yoruba.

A case study examines the Nigerian effort to finance their communication industry. The study revealed that except during the period 1981-85, planned public investment in the communication sector has been moderately high at a level of 6.1% of aggregate ex ante expenditure. For the period 1960-80, actual communications expenditure as a ratio of actual total expenditure was lower at an average of 4.5%. Total sector performance measured by the degree of resistance to plan distortions was lower for the communication sector relative to aggregate performance through the 24-period beginning in 1962, except during the 2nd development plan period between 1970-74. The trend in domestic public financing appears to have been dictated by 2 factors: The philosophy of economic planning and the fluctuations in economic fortunes. The oil book of the mid-1970s prompted the largest planned allocation of 9% during the period 1975-80, although realized expenditure fell slightly below to a level of 7.2%. These observed trends show clearly a lack of any strong commitment by the Nigerian government for communication services to meet the needs of a significantly portion of the population, especially those in the rural areas. This situation is not likely to change soon due to the country\'s presently poor economy and the overemphasis by the government on market forces.