Ideological Neutrality in the Workplace

This note assesses the decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union in Achbita v G4S Secure Solutions NV and Bougnaoui v Micropole SA, the first cases dealing with religious discrimination under the Equal Treatment Directive 2000/43. Both cases concerned Muslim women wishing to express their religious beliefs by wearing an Islamic headscarf while working in a private undertaking. The Court held that the employees’ dismissal could not be justified by reference to clients’ prejudices against the headscarf. However, dismissal could be justified if pursued on the basis of a corporate policy of ideological neutrality which prohibited all visible religious, political and philosophical symbols. This note criticises the latter part of the Court's decision for, inter alia, placing too much weight on an employer's freedom to run its business in spite of the grave effects this has on employees’ fundamental right to manifest their beliefs at work.     

Women's benefits from agricultural technologies: evidence from poultry production among Nigerian fisherfolk

In many rural households, women are much more involved than men in poultry production. This article examines the introduction of exotic chickens into communities along the shorelines of Kainji Lake in Nigeria and the consequent impact on women's participation and decision making within the household. Women's household decision-making power, particularly in terms of spending money from the sale of chickens and their own extra income, is stronger when the household keeps improved chicken species. The rearing of improved chicken species was positively correlated with social-status enhancement, especially for women.     

The Chinese Dream: Its Meaning and Implication for Africa

<正>I thank the Chinese Association For International Understanding,CAFIU,for inviting me here again.For me,it is always a pleasure to be in China.There is always something new.When President Xi Jinping adopted"Chinese Dream"as a slogan,he took the world by surprise.Is it a new ideology?Is it an add-on to existing Chinese ideology?Is it just a means of consolidating power for the new leader?Is it     

The role of peace journalism in the deconstruction of elections and the “national question” in Nigeria

Nigeria, a very fragile country, is constantly teetering towards dissolution. For several decades post-independence, the country has been plagued by protracted disputations among the diverse ethnic nationalities, which have been attributed to the inadvertent merger of the Northern and Southern protectorates in 1914 by the British colonialists. Since the merger, there has been intense unrest among the various ethnic groups with tensions for greater resource control and self-determination. The country has also witnessed the intense politicisation of religion in ways that have continued to aggravate the deepening antagonism between Christians and Muslims, further broadening already existing fault lines. The longdrawn-out bickering has led to calls for a renegotiation of the terms of cohabitation among the various ethnic nationalities; and this has given rise to the “national question”, a term used to describe the quest to review the dilemmas associated with accommodating multipleidentity communities within the framework of a single, integrated, national political system. This article argues that traditional media reportage of the “national question” in Nigeria has been more divisive than uniting. The article proposes the adoption of a peace journalism approach to reporting the “national question” to ensure that members of the various ethnic nationalities consider and value non-violent responses to conflict.     

The Impact of Peace Journalism Training on Journalists’ Reportage of the 2015 Elections in Nigeria: An Action Research Case Study

During the run-up to the 2015 general elections in nigeria, there was widespread trepidation within and outside the nation that the increasing cases of electoral violence and political intimidation ravaging the country would snowball into full-blown violence, and possibly plunge it into civil war. this fear was largely instigated by the 2011 election, which was marred by pre- and post-election violence. Human rights Watch (2011) estimated that the violence led to over 800 deaths in three days of rioting which engulfed parts of northern nigeria. since the First republic elections in the early 1960s, the nigerian media have been very involved in the political process. the diverse nature of the media makes its ideological inclination easy to decipher, because of reportage that is often tilted along ethnic and religious lines. using data obtained through participatory action research involving 40 purposively selected participant journalists, this article proposes an alternative method of news reportage using the peace-journalism model. developed by lynch and mcGoldrick (2005), the model encourages journalists to report social issues in ways that create opportunities for society to consider and value non-violent responses to conflict, using insights from conflict analysis and transformation to update concepts of balance, fairness and accuracy in reporting. it also provides a new route map which traces the connections between journalists, their sources, the stories they cover and the consequences of their reportage.