The present paper employed focus group interview discussions as data collection tool from a sample of 36 female and male undergraduate students at the University of Ghana to examine the effect of such socio-cultural factors as age, gender, education, and religion affect their participation in politics. Discourse and thematic analyses of the data corroborated many quantitative research findings of political participation. Males were more likely to express interest in and participate in politics than their female counterparts, while younger youth were less likely to participate in politics than older youth. Contrary to the findings of many quantitative studies, educational level had an inverse relationship with participation in politics, while no significant relationship was observed between religion and political participation by the youth. The relatively low participation in politics by the youth is the result of their sense of corruption and distrust in politics and the pervasiveness of discrimination based on age and gender.

The purpose of this study was to explore the attitudes of academics in the institutions of higher. This paper postulates that Institutions of higher learning are still masculine-orientated, and this creates a barrier for women in terms of career advancement. The study employed qualitative research methods to explore factors that contribute to the under-representation of women in senior positions at universities in South Africa. Purposive and convenience sampling techniques were used to select twenty-five female academics (25). Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data. Thematic analysis method was used to analyse the data. The findings demonstrate that the universities continue to be masculine-oriented within most of employment categories. Women face multiple challenges in ascending the academic ladder which results in their under-representation in management and academic position.

This paper is an examination of Nigerian elites in context of the interplay of politics, law and the society. Discourse on the Nigerian society has been subsumed on the legacy of colonialism; military in politics and ethnic chauvinism which has given birth to elites fellowship against national interests. While these academic debates have rested on the corridor of corruption and underdevelopment of the country leading to policy adaptation, yet cases of elites’ conspiracy against the organic law to undermine the general-will has persisted in the polity. Hence, this paper unravelled the whole process and suggested a path for a healthy politics. Secondary data were used in the course of this investigation and information were content analysed through theme. This was supported by the notions of classical scholars of elite theory Gaetano Mosca, Vilfredo Pareto, and Robert Michel. The investigation revealed that the Nigerian elites have been motivated on the grounds of personal desires; and the law (constitution) has been used to strengthen their ascendency in the polity. It further identified that the Nigerian society and law emanated from precolonial; colonial and military decrees; and which has created a need for convocation of genuine sovereign national conference of all elites in the existence groups in the country.

This study aims at investigating the potential and the impact of two women-initiated community projects to alleviate poverty in the Mutale Municipality. The study also looks at the challenges faced by women-driven community projects in the Mutale Municipality. Qualitative research methodology has been used to determine the nature and impact of women-driven community projects in alleviating poverty in rural areas around the Mutale Municipality. Interviews were used as the research instrument to collect data from 38 interviewees about the two women-initiated community projects in the Mutale Municipality. The findings revealed a positive impact of the women-driven community projects on the alleviation of poverty in the area. Furthermore, the findings also revealed a significant contribution by women through their community projects. Another important finding of this study is the lack of training and resources such as financial, machinery and transport to support women-initiated community projects. This study calls for women-driven community projects to receive equal support in terms of training and resources from the government and the private sector in order to promote livelihood and sustainability of the projects initiated and driven by women.

Problem-solving is a process—an on-going activity in which we take what we know to discover what we don't know. It involves overcoming obstacles by generating hypo-theses, testing those predictions, and arriving at satisfactory solutions. Problem-solving involves three basic functions: Seeking information, Generating new knowledge and Making decisions. Problem-solving activities involving problem-solving are designed to help learners develop responsibility for their own learning, starting from a low level of responsibility and then taking on a systematic and gradual approach as asserted in Scharle & Szabo. They can be easily integrated into regular lessons, since each activity serves a clear linguistic purpose as well as promoting more general learner development. The activities are also designed to develop a comprehensive range of skills and attitudes, including “developing learner strategies, monitoring learning processes, establishing self-evaluation, promoting motivation and developing co-operation”. The findings of the research revealed that educators experience many challenges in terms of teaching the implementation of problem-solving strategies so that the learners can understand the concepts and lesson content and use problem-solving skills. The ultimate goal should be set to get the learners apply them in their learning through the set tasks and activities. Through the interviews conducted with the educators on the use of the problem-solving activities, it was found that four out of six educators had knowledge of the problem-solving strategies; therefore, they were able to teach the learners through the various problem-solving strategies.

South Africa is a developing country, and organisations are always in the process of having to improve operational, functional, as well as human resource components. Organisations focus on continuous improvement and as a result training and development of skills and knowledge of its personnel has become an important area. Training and development is key in any organisation and therefore should be a priority for any organisation. Lack of training and development leads to employee demotivation, as well as, an increase in labour turnover with the municipality (Muhammad, 2010). The main objectives of this study were to assess the influence of training and development on employees’ performance, and to understand employees’ perceptions towards training and development at Umzumbe Local Municipality. The qualitative research approach was used, and the data was collected using semi-structured interviews, which was analysed by applying the thematic analysis tool. The non-probability purposive sampling was employed for proper selection of the participants. Fifteen participants from different units (middle and lower structures) within the municipality participated in this study. The results of the study reflect that it is critical to proper align the objectives of the training and development programmes with the needs of employees so to better capacitate and motivate them to execute their duties efficiently. Furthermore, the results has shown that the municipality must have proper measures to ensure that the training and development programmes are in line with the needs of the municipality. This study recommended that municipality must conduct the skills audit in order to develop relevant training and development programmes for the employees. Furthermore, municipality must have measures in place that will assess the impact or benefit of training and development programmes on the performance of the employees.

In view of the rife unemployment rate in Africa, there is a need to tap into schooling to instil in learners economic emancipation ideals that are likely to discourage them from resisting schooling and turning them into job-creators other than job-seekers. This paper diagnosis and examines how political awareness, economic emancipation and social activism could be instilled in learners displaying resentment of schooling. A good number of parents inclusive of teachers are in dilemma regarding why some of the 21st century learners resist and resent schooling. This is being vindicated by the exponential number of teachers who opt out for either early retirement or quitting the teaching profession because of some learners rebelling and revolting against schooling. The persistence of this teaching hurdle could lead to public secondary schools being bereft of competent and productive teachers. The research question guiding the paper is: to what extent could the emerging culture of anti-schooling by some learners be contained through the utilisation of political consciousness and emancipatory economic ideals?
The research methods employed to emerge with data germane for this paper were interviewing technique and literature study. Out of the population of 13 African public secondary schools of one circuit in Capricorn District of Limpopo Province, three African secondary schools were conveniently sampled. In each school, three respondents were interviewed. Three of the findings are that lack of political consciousness by pupils destroys their learning enthusiasm. Secondly, hostile schooling conditions are an impediment to training entrepreneurs from the crop of learners. Finally, inadequate encouragement of positive social activism by learners, is doing a disservice to schooling. As part of the conclusion, the investigator recommends that entrepreneurial spirit be spread in schools. In addition, the researcher recommends for the good utilisation of the schooling social space to salvage the future of myriad pupils.

In most developing countries, the majority of rural areas are characterised by abject poverty, low levels of literacy amongst adult women, under-utilisation of natural resources, compromised access to socio-economic infrastructure, non-availability of clean water for agricultural development and services, and a high dependency on social grants and unresolved land restitution and tenure issues (Hart & Jacobs, 2012). In the year 2009, the South African government undertook an initiative to resolve the challenges facing rural areas, thereby establishing a programme called the Comprehensive Rural Development Programme (CRDP). Obadire, et al. (2014) postulates that the Department of Rural Development and Agrarian Reform (DRDAR) introduced this programme in an attempt to fight poverty, hunger, unemployment and lack of development in rural areas. In the view of DRDAR (2013), the programme has a vision of creating vibrant, equitable and sustainable rural livelihoods.
This study is premised on the pathetic status of women, which has its origins from the apartheid past. Black African women have been discriminated and disadvantaged on cultural, business and political perspectives, and the poverty levels amongst women are higher than that of male-headed households. However, even though rural women have evolved to contribute in socio-economic roles to support their families; the development processes have been seen as inadequate (Osita-Njoku and Princewill, 2015:258). StatsSA (2014) stipulates that there is an increase in female-headed households in South Africa. This brings out a compelling reason for coming up with a study of this nature. The main aim of the study was to assess the influence of the CRDP in empowering women in the development site of the uMhlontlo local municipality. This study utilised a qualitative research approach. This is because the nature of the study required deeper understanding, illuminating and examining the participant’s experiences, ideas and attitudes in an etymological form. A non-probability technique, purposive sampling, and face-to-face interviews were used in this study.
The findings of the study revealed that rural women within the jurisdiction of the uMhlontlo local municipality benefited from the CRDP, and the government should continue implementing programmes of such a nature within the rural areas. The empowerment of women has resulted in improved living standards for their dependants and the community in general. It is clear from the findings that through the CRDP, the residents of the uMhlontlo local municipality, have obtained many benefits. In order to ensure that programmes such as the CRDP succeed and supported, it is recommended that the government create a good relationship with key local economic development stakeholders. Furthermore, it is recommended that the government create workshops or training aiming to capacitate the recipients.

Non-profit organisations (NPOs) are prominent in stimulating local economies – more particularly in rural areas – thus this paper documents the role of non-profit organisations that support agriculture in fostering local economic development and utilises a case study of the Siyavuna Abalimi Development Centre. The theoretical framework of this paper employed hypotheses that include: economic theories of the NPO; the co-management or co-production theory; and the stakeholder theory of the NPO. This paper employed a qualitative research design. Twelve semi-structured interviews were conducted with Siyavuna representatives and the LED officer from the Hibiscus Coast Local Municipality. The findings of this paper reveal that Siyavuna is an organisation that is highly active in LED activities. Its representatives regard the organisation as a LED project. The findings further demonstrate that Siyavuna has been striving to establish relationships and partnerships with local government since the time that it had been operating as a project and had not yet been registered as an NPO. The results reveal that within this relationship is a lack of trust and further issues such as conflict, in terms of respective community development approaches: Siyavuna uses the “bottom-up” approach, while local government uses a “top-down” tactic.

Globalisation is a highly contested term and has become a site for tension. Whilst globalisation, in the context of Higher Education, must be lauded for giving students and scholars access to work on a global platform, it has also reinforced inequalities that are already prevalent and has even created new ones. The negative impact of globalisation is evident most explicitly in developing countries such as South Africa. Against this backdrop of rising global trends, the overarching aim of this paper is to unravel how global trends influence the functioning of universities in Africa, with special reference to South Africa. This will be achieved by a thorough critical engagement with contemporary literature. The global trends selected for discussion are as follows: Internationalisation, Africanisation, Marketisation and New Managerialism.

African countries’ common position on the need for United Nations Security Council (UNSC) reform (the Ezulwini Consensus) has taken centre stage on the strategic and policy debate in international peace and security. Crimes against humanity or war crimes have been committed in countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) (and specifically the Eastern DRC), Sudan-Darfur, Rwanda, Uganda, Somalia among others. The UNSC has been less effective in dealing with volatile situations that threatened peace and security on the African continent. Thus, African countries seem to have realised that permanent representation in the Security Council by two of its member states would go a long way in addressing critical issues of continental peace and security. The African power and influence in the UNSC veto matrix would probably work in favour of continental interests. Whilst manoeuvres have been made at all levels on the need to reform the UNSC, Africa has found itself in a delicate predicament. This paper unpacks the dynamics surrounding Africa’s quest for UNSC reform and the predicament that the continent has found itself in. It will be argued in this paper that the dynamics surrounding Africa’s quagmire on the UNSC reform revolves around contentious issues such as divergent sub regional interests among the five Regional Economic Communities (RECS) and lack of continental institutional cohesion among other factors. There are various contending African positions in regards to reforming the UNSC. So far, the continent has been unable to decide on which country would be nominated for the permanent seats. Thus, the idea of rotating members on the permanent seats has been raised. What will happen if Africa gets two permanent seats and which countries will take the seats first if representation is rotational? Data was gathered mainly from secondary sources such as books, journals, internet websites and primary sources, more specifically interviews from academics, policy analysts and practitioners.