Africa
Ugandan military searching for over 200 escaped prisoners
The Uganda military is using aircraft and foot patrols to search for more than 200 inmates who escaped from a prison in north-east Uganda. The Area Army spokesman, Peter Mugisha, said this in Kampala on Thursday. He said that 219 inmates escaped from the prison near the remote town of Moroto, about 500 kilometres from the capital Kampala, on Wednesday, breaking into an armoury and seizing guns. A soldier and three escapees died in an exchange of fire, and another seven had been rearrested, Mugisha said. “We lost one of our soldiers when these guys fired back during the operation. We are pursuing them and we are using a helicopter to guide the foot troops,” Mugisha said. Get more stories like this on Twitter You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagi...
Kelechi Nwakali craves for perfect stay at Huesca
Kelechi Nwakali hopes his time with LaLiga club SD Huesca will give him the opportunity to get his career back on track. Nwakali joined Huesca from Premier League club Arsenal last summer. The 22-year-old was forced to sit -out the first six month of his contract after battling with visa issues. The talented midfielder finally linked up with Huesca in January after his paperwork issues were resolved. Nwakali featured in the club’s final five games of the campaign and played his part in their promotion to the Spanish top-flight. “It is a new beginning, I have had my ups and downs, but this is the time to make it right again, this is the time to get it back on track,” he BBC Sport Africa. “As the season progresses, I believe I am going to play more, right now I also play as a Number 4, the c...
Six killed in Burundi gun attack, weeks after similar incident
Unidentified attackers shot and killed six people in northern Burundi, an official said on Friday, weeks after a similar attack was reported in a southern province. The group launched the attack in Kayanza province on Thursday night from the Kibira forest, the regional governor said, and fled to the same area after the attack. “They arrived at a small centre … killed six people including two kids studying in primary school II and V,” Remy Cishahayo, army colonel and governor of Kayanza province, said on state-owned National Radio Television of Burundi. The forest in the past has served as cover for the ruling CNDDFDD – The National Council for the Defence of Democracy, Forces for the Defence of Democracy party – during its rebellion. Two people were wounded and were receiving treatment, wh...
Cameroon to hold first regional elections in December
Cameroon’s veteran leader, Paul Biya, on Monday, announced the country first regional elections in December, including in two western regions in the grip of a revolt by the anglophone minority. The indirect elections on December 6 in the country’s 10 regions will put in place councils provided for in a 1996 constitution in a move towards decentralisation but not yet implemented. These councils will also be elected in the two western regions where a nearly three-year-old insurgency has claimed over 3,000 lives. The two restive anglophone regions are home to a large minority of English speakers in a country where French speakers are the overwhelming majority — a situation that is the legacy of the decolonisation of western Africa by France and Britain more than six decades ago. Years of rese...
UN lauds Africa’s success in virus fight
The United Nations has commended Africa for its exceptional management of the COVID-19 pandemic with record low incidences and deaths. The President of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), Amb. Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, said this yesterday while addressing a virtual press conference, adding that the developing countries have done better than developed countries as regards the management of the pandemic. COVID-19 has spread rapidly and extensively to most countries in the world, resulting in considerable mortality in Europe and the United States, as well as in numerous upper-middle-income countries in South America and Asia. Experts predicted millions of COVID-19 deaths in Africa because many countries in the continent rank poorly on the United Nations Development Programme’s Human Dev...
Nigerian government approves new test kit for HIV
In its effort to ensure that the spread of the HIV virus is drastically reduced, the Federal Government has approved the inclusion of ”Wondfo HIV I and II rapid test kits” for use in the country. The National Coordinator, National AIDS/STI Control Programme (NASCP) Dr Akudo Ikpeazu, made the this known while presenting the evaluation report on the kit, on Tuesday in Abuja. “The Wondfo rapid test kit, could be used as a confirmatory test because of its high specification of 99.4 per cent,” she said. The coordinator said that in 2019, the Federal Ministry of Health (FMOH) approved the conduct of the laboratory performance evaluation of Wondfo HIV I and II rapid test kit. “The result of the evaluation which was conducted at the reference testing laboratory Public Health in Vitro Diagnostic La...
83 stranded migrants rescued in Sahara desert
Reuters Eighty-three migrants were saved last week after their smugglers abandoned them in the Sahara desert in northern Niger, the International Organisation for Migration said on Tuesday. A team from the IOM and Niger’s Civil Protection service found the group 230 kilometers (140 miles) from the crossroads town of Dirkou on September 3, the agency said on Facebook. The 83 comprised 75 Nigerians, 41 of them women, including twin four-year-old girls, as well as four Togolese, three Ghanaians, and a Malian. They had left the Nigerien town of Agadez, the main stepping-off point for African migrants trying to cross into Europe via Libya, a week earlier. On September 1, the migrants were abandoned by their four drivers, after first taking all their belongings, when they spotted military vehicl...
PDP: Nigerians can’t survive hike in fuel, electricity prices
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has told President Muhammadu Buhari that there is no way citizens can survive, what it described as the obnoxious hike in the cost of fuel and electricity, given the level of poverty his administration had allegedly already foisted on our nation. In a statement issued by Kola Ologbondiyan, National Publicity Secretary in Abuja on Tuesday, it observed that “the brazen attempt” by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, to justify the excessive hike in the cost of fuel from N87 per litre under the PDP to N162 as well as electricity from N30.23 per kWh to over N66kw/h, “as yet another daring and intolerable affront to the Nigerian citizenry, who have summarily rejected the increases.” The PDP said it stands with Nigerians in insisting t...
Presidential elections in Ghana, others top agenda at ECOWAS meeting
The 44th Ordinary Meeting of the Mediation and Security Council of the Economic Community of West African States has called attention to the ongoing insurgency in Nigeria, Gambia and Guinea Bissau as well as the political crisis in Mali. The Council at its meeting in Niamey, Niger, on Friday, also focused on forthcoming presidential elections in Guinea, Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Ghana, and Niger. The meeting was presided over by the Nigerien Minister of Foreign Affairs and Chair of the Mediation and Security Council, Kalla Ankourao. Ankourao recalled the challenges COVID-19 has brought upon the region coupled with the breakdown in democratic governance in Mali. He urged the ECOWAS body to take the necessary steps for the preparation and smooth conduct of the upcoming presidential electi...
VP Osinbajo: Virus vaccine distribution should be equitable
The Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo (SAN), has advised that the deployment of the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine should be done in an equitable and affordable manner in order to effectively contain the spread of the Coronavirus disease across the globe. The Vice President stated this on Friday at the virtual 2020 EURAFRICA Forum themed “Towards a realistic Euro-African partnership during and beyond the COVID-19 era”. The summit featured presentations from notable global leaders including the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Antonio Guterres, the Prime Minister of Cape Verde, Mr. Ulisses Correia Silva, among other speakers. The EurAfrican Forum aims to foster stronger collaboration between Europe and Africa, and better promote a shared green and inclusive growth, a...
Mali: Military opens talks on transition to civilian rule
Mali’s military junta will hold meetings on Saturday to discuss its promised transition to civilian rule after mounting pressure from neighbours to yield power in the weeks since it overthrew the nation’s leader. The West African country has long been plagued by chronic instability, a simmering jihadist revolt, ethnic violence and endemic corruption, prompting a clique of rebel colonels to detain elderly President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita last month. They pledged to step down after an undefined transition period, but the putsch has prompted Mali’s neighbours and former colonial ruler France to demand a swift transfer of power, with fears the crisis could impact neighbouring states. The 15-nation Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) regional bloc has imposed sanctions and closed...
US sanctions 11 entities for aiding Iran’s oil sector
The US imposed sanctions on 11 entities and three executives Thursday for allegedly aiding an Iranian energy firm that was blacklisted in January, and helping Iran export petroleum products . The new designations of companies and executives include six under the Treasury Department’s authorities and five under the State Department. All are based in Iran, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) or China. The State Department’s sanctions target Iran-based Abadan Refining Company; China-based Zhihang Ship Management, New Far International Logistics LLC and Sino Energy Shipping; and UAE-based Chemtrans Petrochemicals Trading. The department also imposed sanctions on New Far executive Min Shi, Sino Energy executive Zuoyou Lin and Abadan managing director Alireza Amin. “All entities targeted today contin...
