IDN-InDepthNews

NEW YORK – We may all speak English on the internet but there are hundreds of thousands of languages spoken worldwide and a UN agency wants to protect them.

“Languages are who we are,” said UNESCO director general Irina Bokova in her message on the occasion of International Mother Language Day. “By protecting them, we protect ourselves.”

The international day has been observed every year throughout the world on February 21 to promote linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingual education. In most parts of the world, students leave school proficient in more than once language. But in the U.S., this is rarely the case.

NEW YORK | KAMPALA – A crowded field of candidates squared off with President Yoweri Museveni at a rare debate this week, just days before national polls slated to take place on February 18.

The debate was held at the glamorous five-star Kampala Serena Hotel Victoria Hall in the capital Kampala. It confirmed various opinion poll projections: that the upcoming contest is a two-horse race between President Museveni and Dr Kizza Besigye.

NEW YORK | ABUJA – Critics who examined Nigeria’s budget for 2016 are shaking their heads in disbelief at the sight of excess and waste so familiar from previous regimes.

A 37.8 million naira item appears over 369 times, and money for the presidential clinic exceeds that for all 17 of the country’s teaching hospitals combined, according to Oluseun Onigbinde, partner and co-founder of BudgIT, a Nigerian group that campaigns for transparency in public spending.

In some instances, BudgIT found, the same purchase of vehicles, computers and furniture are replicated 24 times, totalling 46.5 billion naira ($234 million), 795 million naira is set aside to update the website of one ministry, while no purpose is assigned to a 10 billion naira provision in the education ministry’s spending plan. A report on the budget appeared in Bloomberg News.

NEW YORK | NAIROBI – Kenya’s tea planters are in for a much-needed lift with or without caffeine as trade with one the world’s 10 biggest tea-consuming nations comes on line.

East African tea exports to Iran are expected to jump more than fivefold by 2019 as trade with the Persian Gulf nation normalizes after western sanctions are lifted, a regional tea traders’ association said.