By Ronald Joshua GENEVA | BRAZZAVILLE (IDN) – While COVID-19 pandemic is playing havoc with the global economy and a frantic search continues for a vaccine, thanks to a concerted campaign of immunization, Africa is free of a highly infectious disease which mainly affects children under 5 years of age. It is a significant development […]
UNDP South Africa Analyses the Horrendous Impact of COVID-19
By Devendra Kamarajan JOHANNESBURG (IDN) – The COVID-19 pandemic will push South Africa’s overall GDP down by 7.9% in 2020 leading to major setbacks in addressing poverty, unemployment and inequality, the government’s development priorities, according to new research by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The study expects the economy to recover slowly through 2024.
US-Trained Colonel Called ‘True Force’ Behind Mali Coup
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has been ousted from power, removed by troops unwilling to keep up a bloody fight against jihadists and religious extremists who have been gaining ground while charges of corruption against the government continue to pile up. The “mutinous” army had […]
Burkina Faso Faces ‘Alarming Deterioration’ in Food Security as It Grapples with COVID-19
By Radwan Jakeem NEW YORK (IDN) – Two United Nations agencies have warned that about 3.3 million people in Burkina Faso are facing acute food insecurity. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) cited alarming new data, and the World Food Programme (WFP), stressed that “urgent and sustained action” is needed to address the worsening food […]
COVID-19 Derails Education in Southern Africa
By Jeffrey Moyo MUSINA, South Africa (IDN) – His three teenage children play home-made paper ball on the dusty streets of Musina, exercise books scattered on the veranda of their rented home in the South African border town with Zimbabwe. Yet Gerald Gava, the children’s 47-year old father, lies on a reed mat spread on […]
Spreading the Seeds of Multiculturalism: A Moroccan Perspective
By Jacqueline Skalski-Fouts VIRGINIA, USA (IDN) – Since early June, an estimated 15 to 26 million people across the United States have participated in protests against the death of George Floyd and the persistence of systematic racism in America, making it one of the largest movements in the country’s history. Recent trends have shown that […]
Dirty Oil Floods Pristine African Beach in Major Spill
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – An Indian Ocean island nation, beloved for its sandy beaches, pristine lagoons and reefs, its tropical climate and its multi-ethnic population, has become another world treasure soiled by the relentless trade in oil, shipped by tankers, unsafe at any speed. The ship that ran aground […]
Muslim Songwriter Facing Death Penalty for Blasphemy Revives Bitter Debate in Nigeria
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – Death sentences are rare in northern Nigeria where Sharia law is implemented alongside secular law in most states. But the recent sentence of a 22-year-old singer to die by hanging has revived an emotional debate in the West African nation. An upper Sharia court in […]
Democracy-Seeking Opposition Prepares To Fight ‘Coups’ In Two African States
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – Citizen activists in two West African countries, Ivory Coast and Guinea, are rallying their troops on social media to defend the constitutional limit of two terms which current office-holding presidents seem determined to defy. In Abidjan, the Ivory Coast’s commercial capital, police have been firing […]
Russia Sees Neocolonialism as An Investment Barrier in Africa
By Kester Kenn Klomegah MOSCOW (IDN) – Russia not only supported African countries in liberating themselves from the yoke of colonialism and attaining political independence but also facilitated in the UN General Assembly adopting in 1960 the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. It’s a landmark document which states that […]