Africa

Photo: The then Malawi president Joyce Banda at the Nutrition for Growth conference in London on June 8, 2013. CC BY 3.0

Malawi's 'Fritter Seller' Ex-President Returns From Exile

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK | BLANTYRE (IDN) – Ending four years in political exile, Dr. Joyce Banda, once demeaned as a mere “fritter seller”, returned on April 28, risking possible arrest, as she greeted crowds of joyous supporters at the Blantyre airport and in her home town.

The second woman to lead an African country and the first woman president in Malawi, Dr. Banda assured her party faithful that she played no role in the widespread corruption scandal uncovered during her brief administration. “I am not afraid,” she said defiantly. “If they want they can come and arrest me because I have not done any wrong.”

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 01 May 2018

Photo: Opening session of the 10th Africa Carbon Forum in Nairobi. Credit: UNFCCC.

Africa Sends a Strong Message for Global Climate Negotiations

By Rita Joshi

BONN | NAIROBI (IDN) – Africa has generated a distinct message for the next round of international climate negotiations in Poland from December 3 to 14, 2018, which states: Action on climate change and sustainable development together is the way forward for Africa.

This top-line message emerged from deliberations during the Africa Climate Week in Nairobi. Some 800 delegates from 59 countries, including ministers and other high-level government and international officials, together with non-state delegates, offered their insights into the challenges and possible responses to climate change, and "harvested" those insights for consideration in the official international climate negotiation process.

: Rita Joshi; THE WORLD; Africa; 27 April 2018

Photo: An EU-backed private equity fund plans to invest in renewable energy firms across sub-Saharan Africa. Credit: Brookhaven National Laboratory

ACP Facility Helps Fight Energy Hunger in Southern Africa

By Jeffrey Moyo

MWENEZI (IDN) – Sixty-seven-year old Sarudzai Msipa heavily blows air in and out of her mouth, seated in the open-air on a goat skin mat outside her hut as she battles to revive a dying fire on her cooking place set up in the middle of her yard at her remote home in Mwenezi district in Zimbabwe’s Masvingo Province.

Just three sticks are in the fire to keep it alive and there is no sign of leftover firewood nearby. To Msipa, this means times are tough for her and many other villagers as the energy hunger takes a knock on them in this part of Southern Africa.

Even getting solar for lighting, is a non-starter for the Southern African region's many rural dwellers like Msipa who have to bear the brunt of the region’s deepening energy hunger.

: Jeffrey Moyo; GLOBAL GOVERNANCE; ACP Group of States; 26 April 2018

Photo: Makoma Lekalakala (left) and Liz McDaid (right). Credit: Goldman Environmental Prize.

South African Women Honoured For Anti-Nuclear Effort

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – Using the knowledge gained in the anti-apartheid struggle, two South African women challenged a secret, multibillion-dollar nuclear deal that would have dotted South Africa with nuclear power plants from Russia.

The women, Makoma Lekalakala and Liziwe McDaid, waged a five-year court battle against the plants. Against all odds, including a secret agreement between Russian leader Vladimir Putin and former President Jacob Zuma, the High Court ruled on April 26, 2017 that the $76 billion nuclear power project was unconstitutional – a landmark legal victory that protected South Africa from an unprecedented expansion of the nuclear industry and production of radioactive waste.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 24 April 2018

Photo: The walkway of the UN Headquarters in Nairobi. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Africa Grapples With Financing Climate Change Programmes

By Justus Wanzala

NAIROBI (ACP-IDN) – African countries are faced with the huge challenge of funding climate change mitigation and adaptation programmes to ensure sustainable development. Hard hit by the impacts of climate change manifested in persistent droughts, floods, storms, rising sea levels and other forms of disasters, they are linking actions on tackling climate change as key to attainment of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

A joint project of the 79-nation African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States is providing support for the purpose as part of a joint project with the Global Climate Change Alliance+ (GCCA) by way of offering technical assistance, promoting knowledge sharing, initiating regional dialogue, and facilitating regional partnership on climate change issues.

: Justus Wanzala; THE WORLD; Africa; 23 April 2018

Photo: The Press Union of Liberia President Charles Coffey, Sr. Credit: Front Page of Africa

Press Freedom Becoming Increasingly Vulnerable in Liberia

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK | MONROVIA (IDN) – Liberia’s new government under President George Weah is not having a honeymoon with the media though he has endeavoured to reassure journalists that they would have a "200 percent freedom of expression and press freedom under my government".

The one-time soccer star, who succeeded Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in the country's first peaceful change of power in seven decades in January 2018, is accused of allowing the press to be muzzled.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 17 April 2018

Photo: Omoyele Sowore | Credit: Daily Post Nigeria

A Journalist Joins the Presidential Race in Nigeria

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK | LAGOS (IDN) – Next year’s race for the presidency in Nigeria just got a lot more interesting as a crusading journalist – an upstart known for exposing the millions and billions stolen by a national “loot-ocracy” – announced his candidacy for the nation’s top job.

As news spread that the journalist, Omoyele Sowore, was testing the waters for national office, President Muhammadu Buhari, age 75, reminded Nigerians that he too would be a candidate, ending months of speculation that the President might step down.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 10 April 2018

Photo: Refugees and migrants held captive by smugglers in deplorable conditions in Libya. Credit: UNHCR

Embattled Netanyahu Aids Trafficking Refugee Route to Slavery in Libya

By Mirjam van Reisen and Gilad Liberman

BRUSSELS (IDN) – The previous two days have been rather turbulent in Israel's policy towards African refugees seeking asylum. On April 2, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared a halt to deportations to Rwanda, believed to be the "third-country" he had mentioned for the first time, while announcing a new agreement with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to resettle half of Israel's refugees in western countries and absorb the other half.

Within 24 hours, on April 3, he “froze” the deal. The EU office in Israel tweeted: “Guess it's just one of those days. At 20:57 you congratulate #Israel & @refugees on their agreement, at 21:46 you like @IsraelMFA announcement on the deal, at 22:50 the PM suspends it and blames, among others, #EU (where #UNHCR hoped to resettle significant number of refugees).”

: Mirjam van Reisen; THE WORLD; Middle East & North Africa; 04 April 2018

Photo: African Asylum seekers protesting against Israel's decision. Credit: chikaoduahblog

Surprise at Netanyahu's Rejection of Asylum for Africans

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – Thousands of African asylum seekers who reached Israel after dangerous voyages may have lost their last best hope to be released and sent to western countries or resettled in Israel after members of the Israeli coalition government trashed a negotiated asylum plan.

A landmark agreement negotiated with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had been announced only hours before it was pulled off the table. According to The Jerusalem Post, the plan was rejected by the Israeli cabinet, members of the governing coalition, the culture minister and the education minister who said “granting legal status to 16,000 infiltrators will turn Israel into a paradise for infiltrators”.

: Global Information Network; NEWSBRIEFS; 03 April 2018

Pain And Shock At Passing Of Winnie Madikizela Mandela

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) - Tributes to anti-apartheid icon Winnie Madikizela Mandela have been filling the South African radio air waves as news of her untimely passing on April 2 reached the far corners of the nation and the continent.

Heart-rending classics from the American songbook – from The Song for Mama by Boyz to Men to Donny Hathaway’s A Song for You – expressed the somber mood in the nation while social media filled with remembrances by those whose lives she touched – sometimes with a single word, sometimes with a long eulogy.