The Brikama Magistrates’ Court presided over by Magistrate Pa Harry Jammeh recently granted court bail to one Lamin Camara in the sum of D5000 with a Gambian surety.

Mr Camara is in court for traffic offences. It was alleged that the accused Lamin Camara on 16th August 2008 at Farato village drove a motor vehicle BJL9961D when the rear brake was not functioning. It was further alleged that on the same day, place and time the accused drove a motor vehicle BJL 9961D without due care and attention thereby causing an accident. He denied the charges.

Meanwhile the case, which was scheduled for hearing, could not proceed, as the prosecution witness was not in court. As a result, the case was adjourned until 15th September 2008. 

The CRR travelling Magistrate, Amadou Baldeh, recently convicted and sentenced one Muhamed Jaffuneh to a fine of D500 in default to serve three months imprisonment.

Mr Muhamed Jaffuneh some time in the month of June this year at the Bansang check point, drove a commercial vehicle registration number BJL 5315A without valid documents.

In a similar development, one Modou Gaye of Bansang was also sentenced to a fine of D1500 in default to serve 12months imprisonment by the CRR travelling magistrate, Amadou Baldeh, for permitting one Alhagie Malick Secka to drive an 18-passenger motor vehicle registration number BJL 6081C without licence or valid documents.

The new bill prohibiting the use of mobile phones while driving and, in another section, requiring the use of seat belts, holds out hope to many that road accidents will now diminish considerably. It should be appreciated by drivers that phoning while driving could create a high risk of road accidents, and some fatal accidents for that matter. Use of a mobile while driving carries two risk factors; it mostly compels the driver to have only one hand on the steering wheel; if confronted with sudden danger of collision, quick control or maneuver may not always be possible and this could lead to an accident. Secondly, use of his phone may require a driver to concentrate very intensively at some stage, and this could also lead to an accident. The legislation would therefore help reduce such accidents if not totally, at least drastically. But the legislation should ban headphones as well, because where as they avoid the first risk of one handed driving and control; it is also, like the hand phone, caught in the second risk of affected concentration.

Similarly the section of the bill requiring the use of seat belts has obvious protective merit. There have been accidents and casualties that could have been prevented by the simple use of a seat belt.

The belt secures a would-be casualty from being ejected through the windscreen or making serious impact with the steering wheel or dashboard. With this safety mechanism lots of accidents could be averted.

But everything said and done, there is still a need to tackle the root cause of many an accident, and this relates to speeding. Vehicles are being driven at such high speeds that there is no way of stopping or averting danger. The result? Serious or fatal accidents coupled at times with damage to public property or third party property. With regard to the new laws on the wearing of seatbelts we will see the saving of individual lives because of their implementation. Unfortunately when it comes to speeding many more lives are at risk. If two cars collide then the occupants of both are at risk. There is also the issue of innocent by-standers to be considered. The potential for injury where speeding is involved is far greater. We have witnessed many such accidents along the Banjul-Serrekunda highway and they abound on the Senegambia road. This being the case, it is therefore also necessary for the police to put up many more speed limits already imposed by law. This problem area has assumed greater urgency now that the rains are here as the roads will become extra slippery.

Forex Bureau Rates:

M J Finance 9965635

Buying

GBP  =        D40.00

US    =        D20.00

5000CFA =  D240.00

EURO =      D31.50

Swedish Kroner D320

Danish Kroner= D400

Selling

GBP   =        D41.50

 US     =        D21.50

5000CFA       D 250.00

EURO            D33.50

Kroner           D350.00

Danish Kroner D450

The World Bank Board of Executive Directors today approved a US$50 million grant to help reopen and maintain 1,800 km of roads, critical for the physical reunification, for achieving high, sustained and shared growth and for reconnecting the social fabric of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) as the country recovers from a decade of civil war.
 
The High Priority Roads Reopening and Maintenance (Pro-Routes) project builds on previous Bank’s efforts which helped construct almost 4,000 km of roads. The 1,800 km of earth roads envisaged in three provinces out of eleven under this project will serve the highest populated areas and connect to a network of about 7,000 km of high-priority roads already funded by various donors, including the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s soft lending arm. The roads targeted are Kisangani-Buta-Bondo-Bunduki (620 km) crossing Orientale Province and connecting to Equateur Province; and Uvira-Kasomeno (1,180 km) crossing the Sud Kivu and Katanga provinces.
 
The Pro-Routes project fits the road paving program to be funded by China either by connecting to it or by reopening sections that will be upgraded to paved standard.
 
“This project complements the massive investments in roads announced by the Chinese and is an illustration of the extent to which donors are willing to join forces to achieve quick and significant results on the ground, in ways that improve harmonization, cut transaction costs and ensure that donors are aligned with the priorities defined by the country,” said Marie-Francoise Marie-Nelly, the World Bank Country Director for DR Congo and Congo.
Pro-Routes project is co-financed by a multi-donor Trust Fund managed by the World Bank. An administrative agreement for an amount equivalent to US$75 million in support of the project was signed on March 17, 2008 with UK Department for International Development (DfID). DFID and IDA contributions may be increased in the future. Other donors – notably the European Commission, the African Development Bank and Belgian Cooperation - have expressed interest in joining the Trust Fund.
 
“Thanks to an expandable design built into the project, any new funds would be used seamlessly to help increase the scope without altering the nature and the concept of the operation. For example, a four-fold increase would fund the completion of the reopening and maintenance of the country’s entire high-priority road network,” said Alain L. Labeau, the World Bank’s Task Team Leader for the project.
DR Congo has identified a high-priority road network of 15,800 km of which 9,135 km of unpaved roads have been targeted for fast reopening under reduced technical standards supported by this project. The financial needs for rehabilitating the high-priority network, without upgrading to paved standard, are estimated at US$650 million.
 
Recognizing the vulnerability of earth roads to rainfalls and heavy trucks even if limited in number, an extensive maintenance program has been put together, initially funded by the project, and thereafter by a Road Maintenance Fund established under the project. The project also includes a program to develop the currently weak road construction industry and raise it to the challenge of rebuilding and maintaining tens of thousands of kilometers of roads scattered over DR Congo, a country the size of Western Europe. The project also provides targeted technical assistance to increase the capacity of DR Congo’s public works ministry and its Office des Routes to strategically manage and develop the road network in a budget constrained environment.
 
Pro-Routes is built on a comprehensive social and environmental program to offset potential adverse impacts in line with the Action Plan approved by the Board on January 10th in response to the Inspection Panel report
 
Adequate mitigation measures have also been taken to ensure that these roads – some of which cross and facilitate access to natural resources, traversing the second largest rainforest in the world – do not constitute a threat to the environment. Accordingly, it includes a comprehensive social and environmental program to offset potential adverse impacts in line with the Action Plan approved by the World Bank Board last January 10 in response to the Inspection Panel report. It will help strengthen local institutions in charge of forests and protected areas, partner with civil society organizations, and encourage the active participation of the local communities along the road corridors. For each dollar spent on road reopening and maintenance, 25 cents are spent on the social and environmental mitigation program.

In the previous article, we discussed how blogs can help you generate traffic for your main website. But what if you don’t have another site? Or what if you want your blog to be your main website, the exclusive carrier of your money making ventures?

This can be achieved, of course. Such is the versatility of web logs.

Standalone blogs are best utilized for online businessmen or women who have decided to pursue what many people call as nicheing. Yes, the word is ungrammatical, but it is a term that many Internet marketers have come to embrace with fondness. Nicheing involves the creation of many sites that cater to particular niches. Niches, of course, are very specialized markets, most of which are so obscure that they do not garner the attention of businesses, hence creating high demands with low supplies. The purpose of nicheing is to find these markets and provide for their needs. These enterprising businessmen would earn through the following ways:

* Creating and eventually selling products that aim to serve the said niches.

* Selling existing products that the said niches need.

* Providing for information that the members of the said niches can access for free, and enrolling the site that contains the information in a Pay Per Click (PPC) program like Google AdSense.

Regardless of what path the online entrepreneur decides to take, he should first create a site that serves as the repository of his commercial methods. Niches can be very rewarding. Since there is but a few competitions in the field, your search engine placement is sure to be higher than usual. Traffic should also be at a sustainable level since the members of a niche have nothing else to visit. This will mean a greater possibility for more sales, if you’re selling a product, or a higher Click Through Rate (CTR) if you’re enrolled in a PPC program.

Now, making a site can be quite cumbersome. You have to deal with the aspects of web design, graphic creation, and content writing among other concerns. What more when you have to create numerous sites for numerous niches?

Thankfully, blogs will make things a whole lot easier for you. Every online marketer who has attained success with niche marketing can attribute this to their proper exploitation of blogs. Whereas it would take you a couple of weeks to come up with 10 websites, it would only take you a couple of hours to come up with 10 blog sites. The sheer convenience and ease of web logs have made nicheing a very potent business model.

Blogs can very much substitute for a regular website. As we have previously discussed, high quality content is, ultimately, what will drive traffic to your site, and this kind of content can easily be carried through a blog. Also, you don’t have to change the entire page whenever you want to update your content, as you would with a regular website. With blogs, all you have to do is to write your update in a designated box and press the publish button. Of course, different blogging software have various features, but none comes more loaded than Wordpress (www.wordpress.com).

Blogging is the way to go if you want to create, and maintain, several niche sites. And Wordpress is the weapon of choice for most Internet marketers. To fully realize the potentials of the medium, therefore, you should be able to exploit all the features that Wordpress does offer. Again, David Pankhurst’s excellent report on powerful Wordpress secrets (http://www.malkeenan.com/top10tricks) will help you excel in this area.

Look out for the next article, where we’re going to discuss how you could efficiently integrate the Google AdSense program into your blog, and make it a passive income generating machine.

For More Free Resources visit www.freeearningtips.com

These days, it is a cut-throat competition. Unless you take advantage of the resources and the latest technologies right now, you may never be able to make it and eventually compete with other business people in your field. Hence, you have to make sure that you can build your own website. However, it should not just be any other site composed of multiple pages. You should also ensure that you have implemented an effective website design.

How Your Business Can Gain Something from Good Website Design

Why do you have to focus on your website design? Here are the numerous reasons why. Keep in mind that this list is not exhaustive. Nevertheless, there are the best purposes:

1. A good website design can drive traffic into your site. Whether you like it or not, Internet users will always go for websites that appear neat, easy to navigate, and professional looking. And these are usually the basic benefits that you can derive from having a good website design. The more people going into your website, the higher will be the possibility that you will be able to obtain the kind of sales conversion rate that you have always wanted for your online business.

2. You can generate sales leads from a good design for your website. An efficient web design allows you to build your number of potential customers. This is because you can include a mailing list where they can place their full names and e-mail address, making it real convenient for you to promote your products and services as well as send out news and other updates.

3. You can gain your own spot in search engines. This is also another huge advantage of an effective website design. As a business owner, it should not be sufficient that you can see your website in the Internet. Most of all, you must appear in at least the first pages of search engine results. A professional web designer can implement search engine optimization techniques that can make your web pages extremely friendly search engines such as Google, allowing spiders to index your web pages. You should bank on your maximum visibility.

4. An effective design for your website can help you increase your credibility. In business, it is very essential that you can build a good reputation or credibility not only for yourself but, most of all, for your small business. Otherwise, if people do not trust you, you will not be able to improve your sales, and you cannot even maintain your customer base.

Your web design, however, can increase your credibility. With excellent content to balance the aesthetic value of your web pages, you can provide information to your target market, allowing them to make careful and wise decisions. Your Products and Services page will also help you let your customers know that you can offer everything they need. Most of all, you can steer clear from penalties of search engines. After all, if you are doing web designing right, then you shouldn’t have implemented any online marketing techniques.

John Mahoney is a freelance author who writes about various technology related subjects including Website Design . For more information about John visit his website: www.techstore.ie