This Week: March 21 Edition

1. Fashion brands hightail it to South Africa

[blockquote source=”The Guardian”]Despite these clear hurdles, at least one of the reasons these global retailers are setting their sites on South African seems clear: it’s a nation that likes to shop and they seemingly like to do so in the style of American mega-malls rather than European high streets. Between 2002 and 2010, the nation went from having 239 shopping centres to 1,443,[/blockquote]

2. Can drones move product across the continent?? The cutely-named ‘Flying Donkey Challenge’ wants to find out

[blockquote source=”Simon Johnson, Director Flying Donkey Challenge”]“We feel  that if drones are going to be used to transport goods, the most logical place is Africa. Not for humanitarian reasons. We’re not doing this because we feel bad for Africa. It’s just the perfect place to start. The fact is, there’s incredible growth happening there, but not a lot of infrastructure. Roads just can’t be built fast enough. So why not use flying robots instead?”[/blockquote]

3.  The Pleasure Hospital: Raëlian funded NGO Clitoraid seeks to restore women’s ‘dignity and pleasure’

[blockquote source=”The Independant”]Bebe is given a local anaesthetic for the procedure which is a surprisingly simple one. Bowers investigates to see how badly Bebe has been mutilated. “No matter how severe it is,” Bowers explains, “we can always find the clitoris.” Although the visible part of the clitoris is cut off during FGM, it remains below the surface. “Voilà,” Bowers says as she finds it and pulls it up. “The clitoris now looks amazingly normal, part of an unaltered female anatomy.”[/blockquote]

4. A Fully Lived Life: Famed  Sierra Leonean poet, playwright and novelist, Yulisa Amadu Maddy died on Sunday aged 78.

5. How We Made it in Africa interviews Yolisa Phahle, M-Net South Africa’s first black CEO.

6. Real nice ‘graphs showing how Africa tweets. One takeaway–we talk about brands a lot. #Adidas anyone?

7. South African Public protector Thuli Madonsela gets good marks in the Jacob Zuma report.  

8. Black in America 

[blockquote source=”Ta-Nehisi Coates”]On Sunday, I took my son to see two movies at a French film festival that was in town. The local train was out. We walked over to Amsterdam to flag down a cab. The cab rolled right past us and picked up two young-ish white women. It’s sort of amazing how often that happens. It’s sort of amazing how often you think you are going to be permitted to act as Americans do and instead receive the reminder—”Oh that’s right, we are just some niggers. I almost forgot.”[/blockquote]