Africa

Photo: Town hall Meeting with President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo at the Ghana Embassy in Washington, DC. Credit: Ghana Embassy, Washington, DC.

Ghana Rolls Out The Red Carpet To Encourage Resettlement In The Motherland

ACCRA (IDN-INPS) – In the heart of Accra, Ghana’s capital, just a few meters from the United States embassy, lie the tombs of W. E. B. Du Bois, a great African-American civil rights leader, and his wife, Shirley. The founder of the U.S.-based National Association for the Advancement of Colored People moved to Accra in 1961, settling in the city’s serene residential area of Labone and living there until his death in August 1963.

Mr. Du Bois’s journey to Ghana may have signaled the emergence of a profound desire among Africans in the diaspora to retrace their roots and return to the continent. Ghana was a major hub for the transatlantic slave trade from the 16th to the 19th centuries.

: Africa Renewal; THE WORLD; Africa; 01 February 2019

Photo: The Italian Coast Guard rescues migrants bound for Italy. Credit: IOM | Francesco Malavolta

Perils Of A Journey From Eritrea Through Libya To Europe

Migrants’ Search For Greener Pastures Carry Deadly Consequences

By Franck Kuwonu and Louise Donavan

This article first appeared on Africa Renewal, December 2018-March 2019 issue.

NEW YORK | NIAMEY (IDN-INPS) – Alone in Niger, the young man sits, filled with regrets. “I didn’t necessarily want to come this far,” he says with anguish. “Khartoum may have been OK.”

What made him extend his flight to a destination unknown? he wonders. He survived a perilous journey across deserts and seas, but at a terrible cost. His brother, with whom he was so close, lost his life after leaving the Sudanese capital, where the two had briefly settled after fleeing Eritrea, the country of their birth.

“So I left Khartoum too,” 36-year-old Tekle (not his real name) says, despairing over the unforeseen misfortune in his life.

: Africa Renewal; THE WORLD; Africa; 30 January 2019

Photo: Opposition candidate Atiku Abubakar in a letter to the Ambassadors of France, Germany, USA, Britain and the European Union, accuses President Buhari of threatening Nigerian democracy by serially breaching the provisions of the constitution. Credit: THISDAYLIVE.

Suspension Of Top Judge Casts A Dark Shadow Over Forthcoming Elections In Nigeria

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK | LAGOS (IDN) – Efforts to clean up government – difficult in the best of times – were hamstrung by none other than Nigeria’s top judge accused of failing to declare hundreds of thousands of dollars that ‘suspiciously’ appear in his accounts but were never declared as required by law.

President Muhammadu Buhari, who has often accused the judiciary of frustrating his anti-corruption fight, defended his announced suspension of Chief Justice Walter Nkanu Samuel Onnoghen.

In a furious tweet storm on January 25, President Buhari said the judge should have stepped aside when the allegations reached the court. “This is not a mere technicality like innocently placing a document in a wrong file or mistakenly placing yesterday’s date on a document.”

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 29 January 2019

Photo: Afropop. "Tuku’s band evolved over the years, always maintaining a fundamental integrity. In his late career, his sons performed with him. One son, Sam, was on his way to a promising solo career when he died in a car accident in 2010." – Banning Eye.

The African Music Community Mourns Tuku's Death

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK | HARARE (IDN) – After 67 albums and a score of awards and honorary degrees, Zimbabwe’s musical legend Oliver Mtudkudzi – affectionately known as ‘Tuku’ – lost his long battle with diabetes at the Avenues Clinic in Harare. He was 66.

He was buried January 27, with music, singing and dancing by thousands of his adoring fans.

On the Afropop music website, guitarist Banning Eyre recalled his friend: “Born in 1952, 'Tuku' grew up during the final decades of Rhodesian rule. He was a contemporary of Thomas Mapfumo, and both came of age during the brutal independence struggle of the 1970s, as Zimbabweans fought hard for liberation from the oppressive, racist Rhodesian regime.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 29 January 2019

Photo: Refugee students in a classroom in Uganda. UN Photo/Mark Garten

Uganda Hosts Africa's Largest Refugee Population

By Sulaiman Momodu

The writer is a public information officer with the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR. This article first appeared on Africa Renewal, December 2018-March 2019 issue.

KAMPALA (IDN-INPS) – As thousands of desperate men, women and children flee conflicts and natural disasters in search of a place of refuge, some countries are debating whether to accept or reject asylum seekers. But Uganda has opened its doors to refugees in record numbers.

Thirteen-year-old Robert Yatta was living with his aunt and going to school in South Sudan’s capital, Juba, when fighting broke out in early 2017.

: Africa Renewal; THE WORLD; Africa; 23 January 2019

Photo: A group of demobilized child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (2000-2007). Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

DR Congo Is Rotting From Within

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – The Algerian philosopher and revolutionary writer, Frantz Fanon, wrote: “Africa is shaped like a gun, and Congo is its trigger. If that explosive trigger bursts, the whole of Africa will explode.”

The Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa’s largest country, is now caught up in the aftermath of its first proper election since independence from Belgium in 1960. Towards the end of last year one could say, after years of non-stop wars and massive carnage, the country was 90 percent bereft of fighting.

The authoritarian regime of President Joseph Kabila was still in power but at last it had been pressured to call an election by the African Union, the Western aid-givers, some of the big Western businesses that mine in the mineral-rich country and, not least, the Catholic Church.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 22 January 2019

Photo: Voters look for their names in the lists during Presidential and Legislative elections in in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (30 December 2018). Credit: MONUSCO/Alain Likota

Congo's Constitutional Court Declares Tshisekedi Presidential Election Winner

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – The Democratic Republic of Congo finally has a president. Opposition figure Felix Tshisekedi was declared winner of the presidential race by the DR Congo’s top court on January 20.

The Constitutional Court said Tshisekedi had won by a simple majority, paving the way for him to take over from the current president, Joseph Kabila.

The outcome was challenged by runner-up Martin Fayulu who claimed that the election had been stolen and called on the international community to reject the results.

Election data leaked to some news organizations suggested that he won the vote.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 22 January 2019

Photo: IOM transit centres in Niger. Credit: IOM | Amanda Nero 2016

Cooperation Key To Confronting Migration Challenges In West And Central Africa

Viewpoint by Richard Danzinger

The writer is regional director for West and Central Africa of International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN migration agency. This article first appeared on Africa Renewal, December 2018-March 2019 issue.

DAKAR (IDN-INPS) – Without a doubt, migration is a defining issue of this century. One billion people, one-seventh of the world’s population, are migrants. Some 244 million people are international migrants, 40 million are internally displaced and 24 million are refugees or asylum seekers. In 2018, there is no longer a single state that can claim to be untouched by human mobility.

About 423 million people are living in the Economic Community of West African States, a 15-member grouping whose aim is to promote economic integration in a region where the unemployment rate is sometimes 20 percent – inevitably leading to migration.

: Africa Renewal; OPINION; 21 January 2019

Photo: DR Congo President Kabila casts his vote during Presidential and Legislative elections in Kinshasa. Credit: MONUSCO/John Bopengo.

South Africa Calls For Solidarity With DR Congo As Security Council Debates Early Election Results

By Santo D. Banerjee

NEW YORK (IDN) – South Africa has called on the international community in general and the UN Security Council in particular to provide the necessary support to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in the aftermath of the December 30 provincial and presidential elections that will be the first democratic transfer of power in the country’s history.

"The DRC has come a long way in its quest for peace and security," Ambassador Jerry Matthews Matjila, South Africa's Permanent Representative to the UN in New York told the Security Council during a three-hour debate on January 11 on preliminary results announced one day earlier, which put Félix Tshisekedi in first place for President, and the swift and varied reactions of some stakeholders.

: Santo D. Banerjee; THE WORLD; Africa; 14 January 2019

Photo: Anti-government protests have rattled Sudan after the government tripled the price of a loaf of bread. Credit: nileinternational.net

African Leaders Confront A 'Blue Wave' Demanding Change

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – When Democrats captured one House seat after another in the U.S. midterm elections, observers brushed it off as a "blue trickle". Later they had to admit: it was a giant blue wave.

Africans are also yearning for change and their frustration is erupting across the continent with a new crop of activists challenging the old order.

In Ethiopia, reforms are already underway since the installation last year of 42-year-old Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed. Women have been named to some of the government’s key positions – president, chief justice and half of all ministers. Thousands of political prisoners and journalists have been freed while senior officials accused of human rights abuses and corruption no longer enjoy immunity.