The United States Agency for International Development/Ethiopia (USAID) Acting Mission Director Timothy Stein was joined by Minister of Health Dr. Lia Tadesse and Commissioner for Ethiopian Disaster Risk Management Commission Dr. Shiferaw Teklemariam to launch the USAID Health Resilience Activity. This five-year, $12 million (650 million Birr) project will empower the Ministry of Health to anticipate, prepare for, detect, respond to, and mitigate the impact of public health emergencies in Ethiopia. The collaboration between USAID and the Ministry of Health will lead to improved preparedness to effectively respond to public health emergencies at the sub regional level.
The launch, held at the Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI) National Training Center, was attended by representatives from regional health bureaus, regional public health institutes, UN agencies and other development partners, who highlighted the need for community-level health system strengthening. During his remarks, Acting Mission Director Stein noted, “The coordination of all development partners in the Public Health Emergency Management space is paramount to achieving these goals of the project.”
The project will provide leadership development and training on data use for early warning, preparedness, and response planning. Concurrent trainings will focus on mobilizing local resources for times of emergency.

Hundreds of migrant workers hired as security guards for last year’s World Cup are still being denied justice for the abuses they suffered despite FIFA and the hosts Qatar being warned that they were especially vulnerable to exploitation and workers raising complaints and protesting about their treatment.
An investigation has found serious labour abuses occurred at the World Cup and were not properly addressed, even though Amnesty International issued a 70-page report in April 2022, which sounded the alarm about systematic and structural labour abuses across the private security sector in Qatar.
“The World Cup organizers were well aware of the issues but failed to put in place adequate measures to protect workers and prevent predictable labour abuses at World Cup sites, even after workers raised these issues directly,” said Steve Cockburn, Amnesty International’s Head of Economic and Social Justice.

Netflix co-Founder and Chairman Reed Hastings this month joined African Leadership University students for a series of talks, a unique opportunity for them to gain personalised advice on realising their entrepreneurial aspirations. They were able to quiz Hastings on his experiences turning the idea for Netflix into an almost $200 billion global company that has revolutionised the entertainment industry. This was part of a special visit organised by ALU, during which students learned from a range of US business and non-profit leaders across a series of masterclasses and talks.
In addition to Hastings, the budding African changemakers heard from political commentator Frank Luntz; Laura Eberlin, Global CSR Lead at John Deere; and Danny Wright, co-Founder of GOOD, the conglomerate of social impact organisations, and former Chief Operating Officer of 1863 Ventures, the leading accelerator programme for historically underestimated entrepreneurs.

The United States Agency for International Development/Ethiopia (USAID) celebrated the impact of its Feteh (Justice) project, a $22 million (1.2 billion Birr activity). USAID/Ethiopia Deputy Mission Director Thomas Staal was joined by representatives from the Ministry of Justice, federal courts, regional supreme courts, the Ethiopian Federal Advocates Association, and civil society organizations working on legal and judicial reforms at a celebration event marking the successful completion of this project.
“Feteh has functioned as a ‘flagship’ program, leading the way for legal reform in Ethiopia,” said Deputy Mission Director Staal during his remarks.
Feteh began in February 2019, in response to the Government of Ethiopia’s request for assistance with legislative reform and support of its implementation. Feteh partners with legal institutions, including both federal courts and regional supreme courts, the Ministry of Justice, public prosecutors’ offices, the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), the office of the ombudsman, public defenders’ offices, law schools, civil society organizations, and the media. After the first two years at the federal level, the project was extended to include the Oromia and Amhara regional governments and to advance legal reform through key institutions such as the EHRC, the ombudsman’s office, media, and universities.