Category: Africa

By Jeffrey Moyo

HARARE (IDN) – Carrying a gigantic sack full of plastics debris picked up from rubbish pits, 33-year-old Herbert Mbedzi trudges around downtown Harare, the Zimbabwean capital rummaging dustbins for some more plastic waste for resale to recyclers.

Mbedzi claims that he has never been employed in his life and has now found a reliable source of income in dumped plastic junk, which has become “like gold” to him. “I have realised that my earnings each week from selling the plastics that I collect come to around 80 dollars because I have found reliable and constant customers like local firms involved in recycling plastics products,” Mbedzi told IDN.

By Jeffrey Moyo

MWENEZI, Zimbabwe (IDN) – Deep in Vesera village in Mwenezi district in Zimbabwe’s Masvingo Province, 34-year-old Albert Chindiro emerges from his pole and dagga thatched hut holding a medium size solar panel which he positions on the roof to recharge solar batteries for lighting when night falls.

The house of neighbour Alphios Mhike is linked to power lines from the state energy utility, the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA), but has long been disconnected from the after Mhike failed to keep up payments for prepaid electricity supplies. He too has now turned to solar energy.

By Kizito Makoye

DAR ES SALAAM (IDN) – Resting on her bed, Maimuna Saguti recalls the harrowing suffering she went through two months ago when she had to give birth under a mango tree while on her way to hospital.

“I don’t want to remember that day. The waters had broken hours before we reached the hospital,” she told IDN.

The 35-year-old food vendor from the village of Lukanga in Tanzania’s coastal Pwani Region suffered childbirth-related complications that not only caused an obstetric fistula, she also lost her child a few hours after giving birth.

NEW YORK (IDN | GIN) – Using every fibre of his being, track star Feyisa Lilesa of Ethiopia made a dash across the finish line at the just-ended Olympic Games in Rio but it wasn’t to be the end of his run.

Lilesa used his high profile silver medal victory to make a sign of solidarity with the Oromo people who are locked in a decades-long struggle with the government of Ethiopia. In a photograph seen worldwide, 26-year-old Lilesa stands with his arms crossed over his head – a gesture of defiance used by Oromos in recent months.

NEW YORK | JOHANNESBURG (IDN | GIN) – Prayers have been said this week for 34 men, employees of the UK mining company Lonmin, who were fatally shot on August 16, 2012 during a strike and protest action over pay and conditions at the British Marikana platinum mine.

The shootings, by the South African Police Service, unleashed a national crisis. A Commission, appointed by President Jacob Zuma, found that the “decisive cause” of events on four years ago was an unlawful and reckless decision by senior police officials to disarm and disperse the strikers, by force if necessary.

NEW YORK | FREETOWN (IDN | GIN) – At their next meeting in Geneva, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child will review reports detailing the obstacles, risks and challenges imposed by governments that limit the prospects for children to succeed.

Among the countries to be reviewed is Sierra Leone whose ban on admitting pregnant girls to mainstream schools was the subject of a briefing paper called “Shamed and Blamed”. Submitted by Amnesty International, it faults the policy expressed by Minister Minkailu Bah that “visibly pregnant girls would be a negative influence to other innocent girls”.

NEW YORK | PRETORIA (IDN | GIN) – Luvo Manyonga was overjoyed with the silver long jump medal awarded him at the Rio Olympic Games on August 14. But the track and field star from Mbekweni township in South Africa has soared over obstacles more than once.

Manyongo grew up in a single parent household in a township still struggling to provide regular services of water, sanitation and electricity. Drugs, guns and violence are never far from the world of young people without jobs or prospects. A few years ago, Manyonga was on the verge of becoming another statistic of this cycle of life.

NEW YORK | ABUJA (IDN | GIN) – A year after Nigeria was removed from the polio-endemic list, two cases have been reported in the northern Borno state, where the terrorist Boko Haram still controls the territory.

The eradication of polio, reported in 2015 by the World Health Organization, was called an “historic achievement” by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, a public-private partnership leading the effort to eliminate the disease.

As recently as 2012, Nigeria accounted for more than half of all polio cases worldwide. Since then, a concerted effort by all levels of government, civil society, religious leaders and tens of thousands of dedicated health workers resulted in Nigeria successfully stopping polio.

By Kingsley Ighobor*

NEW YORK (IDN | Africa Renewal) – A Liberian women’s peace movement led by 31-year-old Leymah Gbowee did something extraordinary in July 2003 to force Liberian warlords to sign a peace agreement that ended 10 years of a bloody civil war.

After months of fruitless negotiations, hundreds of women, members of Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace, gathered at the venue of the peace talks in Accra, Ghana, and sat at the entrance to the conference hall. They looped their hands and vowed to stop the warlords from leaving the venue until they had reached a peace agreement.

PRETORIA (IDN | GIN) – It was a long night for the African National Congress (ANC) party faithful as a popular revolt in the cities of Tshwane (Pretoria) and Port Elizabeth upended its long-held power base in those two key municipalities.

The ANC was beaten in working-class “black township” areas such as Mamelodi in Tshwane, and Motherwell in Port Elizabeth.