Who is Moise Katumbi, the man who could be Congo’s next president?

Congolese politician and football club owner Moise Katumbi, pictured attending a match of his club TP Mazembe in Lubumbashi on November 8, wants to replace Joseph Kabila as president this November.
Congolese politician and football club owner Moise Katumbi, pictured attending a match of his club TP Mazembe in Lubumbashi on November 8, wants to replace Joseph Kabila as president this November.

The president of a football club that has won Africa’s Champions League five times. The former governor of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) wealthiest region. An ex-ally of controversial DRC President Joseph Kabila.

Moise Katumbi holds a multitude of roles within one of Africa’s largest and most complicated countries. Now, he is hoping to add DRC President to his list of titles. Katumbi announced his candidacy on Wednesday for presidential elections due to be held in November having already received the support of three opposition movements in the country—the G7, the Collectif des Nationalistes and the Alternance pour la République 2016. “I sincerely thank these political movements, as well as all civil society, for the trust they have placed in me. I accept their nomination with humility and a sense of deep responsibility,” said Katumbi from his base in DRC’s second city Lubumbashi, in an emailed statement. Described as Congo’s “most popular man,” Katumbi served as a close ally of Kabila for eight years between 2007 and 2015 as the governor of Katanga province, a region in southeastern DRC that is rich in minerals including cobalt and copper, as well as diamonds. Katumbi was a popular governor in Katanga—a region the size of Spain—rebuilding around 30 percent of the province’s roads and increasing access to running water exponentially among the population. Come September 2015, however, Katumbi announced he was resigning his position and leaving Kabila’s party, the People’s Party for Reconstruction and Democracy, accusing the president of attempting to delay the 2016 elections.

Since then, Katumbi has been vociferous in his calls for Kabila to honor the constitution and step down at the end of his second five-year mandate in November. The DRC president has actually been in power since 2001, taking over after his father Laurent Kabila was assassinated. While Kabila has not publicly confirmed he will attempt to run again or amend the constitution, Congolese opposition activists have seen signs of what they term glissement, or the “slippage” of election dates as the president prepares to launch a third-term bid. In January, DRC’s electoral commission said it would take at least 13 months to update voter lists, pushing the elections back from their scheduled date. Katumbi has rejected the proposed delay, co-founding an opposition coalition called the Citizen Front that has demanded elections proceed as scheduled.

Moise-Katumbi's  calls for Kabila (right) to honor the constitution and step down at the end of his second five-year mandate in November has intensified.
Katumbi’s (right)  calls for Kabila (left) to honor the constitution and step down at the end of his second five-year mandate in November has intensified.

Much of Katumbi’s popularity is derived from his position as chairman of TP Mazembe, a Congolese football club that is one of Africa’s most successful teams ever. As well as winning a slew of national titles and the African Champions League, the club became the first from outside of Europe or South America to reach the FIFA Club World Cup Final in 2010, where they were ultimately defeated by Italian giants Inter Milan.

Should he ultimately succeed in his challenge to Kabila, however, DRC would not be getting a president without controversy. Katumbi has had to consistently deny accusations that he misused his position in Katanga to benefit his club—specifically, that a mining company made tax-deductible “voluntary social payments” totaling almost $2 million to the football club.

On Wednesday, the Congolese government also initiated an investigation into Katumbi’s alleged recruitment of mercenaries in his private bodyguard. Congolese Justice Minister Alexis Thambwe Mwamba announced that the government had “documented evidence” of former U.S. soldiers being employed by Katumbi, and the allegations follow the arrest of four relatives of Katumbi in Lubumbashi in April. Katumbi decried the allegations as “low manoeuvres” that would not deter him from his candidacy. “I will be the rule of law’s candidate,” he tweeted on Wednesday.

Over the coming months, Katumbi intends to try and attract further support from other opposition parties in DRC, including the Union for Democracy and Social Progress led by Etienne Tshisekedi, who came second to Kabila at the last election in 2011. Katumbi will be hoping that, as the elections approach, his proficiency in the sporting arena will translate into an effective presidential campaign.

Uganda bans media coverage of election result protests

There have been clashes between police and opposition supporters since the February election.
There have been clashes between police and opposition supporters since the February election.

Uganda has banned live media coverage of opposition protests against the re-election of President Yoweri Museveni.

The opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) has called for a “defiance campaign” against the 71-year-old leader extending his 30-year rule.

Security forces have sealed off the home of its leader Kizza Besigye, who described February’s vote as a “sham”.

The government says media organisations could lose their licence if they cover the protest.

Those who cover the event on social media would also be punished, the head of Uganda’s Communications Commission said.

Last week, a court ruled that what the opposition is calling a “defiance campaign” against the election result was illegal, but the FDC has insisted on going ahead with its activities.

Mr Museveni’s victory was upheld by the Supreme Court in March.

Media organisations have been told not to carry out live interviews with opposition members or show their activities in real time during their protests.

Live television coverage has become a key part of the way political news is being reported in Uganda, says the BBC’s Catherine Byaruhanga in the capital, Kampala.

There is currently a heavy military and police deployment around the city in anticipation of opposition action, our reporter adds.

Mr Museveni is to be sworn for a fifth term on 12 May.

Zimbabwe to print own version of US dollar

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Zimbabwe is set to print its own version of the US dollar in order to ease a cash shortage in the country.

Central bank governor John Mangudya said the cash, known as bond notes, will be backed by $200m (£140m) support from the Africa Export-Import Bank.

The specially-designed two, five, 10 and 20 dollar notes will have the same value as their US dollar equivalents.

Zimbabwe introduced the US dollar after ditching its own currency in 2009 following sustained hyperinflation.

Since then Zimbabweans have been using the dollar as well as a number of other foreign currencies including the South African rand and the Chinese yuan. But the BBC’s Brian Hungwe in the capital, Harare, says that bank customers are not always able to withdraw the amount of US dollars they want because of a shortage of dollar notes in Zimbabwe.

The governor stressed that the issuing of bond notes was not the first step on the way to reintroducing the defunct currency, the Zimbabwe Herald newspaper reports.

Mr Mangudya also introduced a number of other measures to steer people away from using US dollar cash.

This includes setting a $1,000 limit on how much cash can be taken out of the country.

He wants to encourage people to make greater use of the rand since a large portion of Zimbabwe’s trade is with South Africa.

Shoppers in Zimbabwe are not always able to use a the wide official range of currencies for all purchases
Shoppers in Zimbabwe are not always able to use a the wide official range of currencies for all purchases.

But our correspondent says that people are reluctant to hold rands as they are not confident that the currency will maintain its value against the dollar.

He adds that not all shops and traders accept the full range of currencies officially in use.

The central bank brought in so-called bond coins of one, five, 10 and 25 cents, pegged to the US dollar, in 2014.

Mr Mangudya said the bank was still working on a design for the new notes, but they should be in circulation “within the next two months”, the Herald reports.

Woman rescued after 6 days in collapsed building in Kenya

kenya

NAIROBI, Kenya – A Kenyan woman has been rescued after being trapped for six days in the rubble of a collapsed building.

Live TV footage shows the woman being carried away on stretcher covered by a blanket and with an oxygen tank by her side to a waiting Kenya Red Cross ambulance.

Kenya’s Disaster Management Unit said earlier Thursday medics had managed to give woman oxygen, water and glucose intravenously while she was stuck.

Her rescue Thursday comes as the death toll from the collapse of the seven story building rose to 36 and 70 people remain missing.

A nearly six-month-old baby was rescued on Tuesday, a development which raised hopes that more survivors would be found. The infant was found unharmed in a washbasin four days after the building collapsed.

Dealeryn Saisi Wasike, the nearly 6-month-old girl who was rescued early Tuesday from the rubble of a building that collapsed in Nairobi, Kenya. (Photo: Sayyid Abdul Azim, AP)
Dealeryn Saisi Wasike, the nearly 6-month-old girl who was rescued early Tuesday from the rubble of a building that collapsed in Nairobi, Kenya. (Photo: Sayyid Abdul Azim, AP)

With housing in high demand in Nairobi, some unscrupulous developers bypass regulations to cut costs and maximize profits.

After eight buildings collapsed and killed 15 people, President Uhuru Kenyatta last year ordered an audit of all the country’s buildings to see if they are up to code. The National Construction Authority found that 58 percent of buildings in Nairobi are unfit for habitation. Most of Nairobi’s 4 million people live in low- income areas or slums.

South Africa protesters torch schools in Limpopo province

South Africa has a long history of street protests
South Africa has a long history of street protests

BBC |  Protesters have burnt 13 schools in two areas in South Africa’s northern Limpopo province in a violent dispute over district boundaries, police say. Government officials appealed for an end to the violence, saying it affected the education of hundreds of children. Protesters say moves to include their neighbourhoods into a new municipality would delay efforts to get them better housing and water.

South Africa is due to hold key local government elections in August. Opposition parties hope to make gains at the polls, arguing that the governing African National Congress (ANC) has failed to improve basic services during its 22-year rule.

The ANC disputes this, saying most people have a far better standard of living since it took power at the end of minority rule in 1994.

Eight of the 13 schools were torched overnight, bringing to 13 the number of schools targeted since Monday, reports the BBC’s Pumza Fihlani from the main city Johannesburg.

The government says communities will be worse off by destroying buildings
The government says communities will be worse off by destroying buildings

On Friday, protesters failed in a court bid to prevent the inclusion of the mainly poor Vuwani and Livubu areas into a new district authority. The government says the plan is vital to developing the two communities.

South Africa has a history of violent demonstrations, going back to the days when people protested minority rule and it seems that this attitude still remains, our correspondent says.

People are often so frustrated about the lack of basic services like electricity and water that they resort to vandalism, targeting schools, libraries and even clinics, she adds. The government has often criticised the violence, saying it would leave communities worse off. Limpopo is one of South Africa’s poorest provinces, where the ANC has won previous elections by an overwhelming majority. The main opposition parties, the Democratic Alliance and Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), hope to weaken the ANC’s hold in the province in the August elections.

With help, Africa targets coordinated fight against Boko Haram

Boko carnage

N’Djamena (AFP) – With US and European support, African states threatened by Boko Haram are out to smash the militant Islamist group terrorising the region — but a coordinated response is required if they are to succeed.

A regional offensive launched early last year against the group by Chad, and Nigeria under new President Muhammadu Buhari has seen Boko Haram driven out from numerous towns and villages that it controlled in northeastern Nigeria.

Two weeks ago, Nigeria’s military said it would raid the group’s Sambisa Forest stronghold on the Cameroon border. The group also has hideouts within nearby Lake Chad’s huge maze of small islands and swampland.

Despite losing some ground in recent months the insurgents retain the capacity to launch attacks almost at will, notably via suicide attacks which require few resources.

British NGO Action on Armed Violence said earlier this week that Boko Haram attacks claimed three times as many victims last year as in 2014.

The group started wreaking havoc in Nigeria in 2009 and according to World Bank estimates has killed around 20,000 people, also sowing chaos and fear inside neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

US and British troops will join the international coordination effort against the group, while Nigeria and France on Thursday signed an agreement on closer military cooperation, including intelligence sharing.

Nigerian Defence Minister Mansur Dan Ali saluted the deal as evidence of a “growing partnership” between Abuja and Paris.

An 8,500-strong multinational force has been drawn up to track the jihadists, but its deployment has been haphazard with little to indicate the extent of real progress.

Even so, the Nigerian general overseeing the force, Lamadi Adeosun, indicated Friday during a meeting with French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian that “much has been done and is still being done to win the battle and ultimately win the peace”.

The Nigerian army is expected to launch an offensive in the coming days so as “to deny Boko Haram its traditional Sambisa sanctuary”, according to Chad military sources in the capital N’Djamena.

Such an offensive has been in the offing ever since Buhari took office a year ago but has yet to materialise.

– Imminent action –

“The idea is to be able to announce at the next Abuja summit (on May 14) that this sanctuary no longer exists. That is a military and also a political imperative,” says a source close to the president.

The summit will bring together leaders of Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria — allied neighbours in the fight against Boko Haram — as well as French President Francois Hollande and representatives from Britain and the United States.

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau appeared in a video late last month and “he still seems to be the leader and is hiding out in the Sambisa Forest,” according to a French military source.

The group is thought to number somewhere between 100,000 and 30,000. Its exact strength is hard to evaluate but the French source says that experienced fighters who have returned from Mali or Libya are no more than a small hard core.

The multinational force is preparing its own offensive along the border with Cameroon, Chad and Niger but time is of the essence with the rainy season approaching.

The multinational force, whose HQ is at N’Djamena although each nation’s contingent is under its own command, will have access to intelligence compiled by French and US drones and fighter planes — but communications, transport and logistics hardware are in short supply.

Coordination is paramount.

“If they are not coordinated they will never be able definitively to curtail Boko Haram,” a French military source warned.

General Adeosun says the international community should be doing more — red tape has held up 50 million euros ($55 million) of EU aid — and has asked for lifejackets and a consignment of flat-bottomed boats to take the fight to the enemy across the huge expanse of Lake Chad.

There are concerns Boko Haram may have received weapons via Libya from Islamic State through individual go-betweens, though Le Drian says that “for now we do not have proof of close links” between the jihadists.

On Saturday, Le Drian promised to do away with Boko Haram “barbarity” as he visited the Ivorian resort of Grand-Bassam, scene of a deadly March 13 attack blamed on an Al-Qaeda affiliate which killed 19.

“We are determined to fight together with the Ivory Coast authorities for our freedoms and against barbarity,” said Le Drian a day after pledging to lift the French troop contingent in the country from 600 to 900.

South Africa: Julius Malema vows to seize white-owned land

Malema, clad in the EFF's signature red overalls and beret, made many promises from free land, water and electricity for the poor to flushing toilets in all homes as he campaigned ahead of municipal elections in August.
Malema, clad in the EFF’s signature red overalls and beret, made many promises from free land, water and electricity for the poor to flushing toilets in all homes as he campaigned ahead of municipal elections in August.

The leader of South Africa’s opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party has launched his party’s campaign for the upcoming local elections, promising to rescue citizens from poverty, unemployment and corrupt government.

Around 40,000 people turned up at Orlando Stadium in Soweto on Saturday displaying massive support for fiery EFF leader Julius Malema’s promises to seize white-owned land without compensation and nationalise the banks.

The huge turnout was a shot across the bows of the ANC, which failed to fill a similar stadium during the launch of its own manifesto in the coastal city of East London two weeks ago.

“We are not chasing the whites away. We are saying you have too much land. We want you here in South Africa, but 80 percent of the land belongs to us,” Malema told the crowd.

The white minority still holds the vast majority of farmland as well as a disproportionate share of the country’s wealth.

The EFF is capitalising on black discontent over the perceived lack of change under the ANC government since the end of apartheid 22 years ago.

Campaign promises

Malema, clad in the EFF’s signature red overalls and beret, made many promises from free land, water and electricity for the poor to flushing toilets in all homes as he campaigned ahead of municipal elections in August.

“We want black communities to be like white communities,” he told the enthusiastic crowd.

The ANC, which has ruled since its iconic leader Nelson Mandela took power in 1994, showed in 2014 national elections that it still had overwhelming support.

However, it has been hard hit by a series of scandals involving President Jacob Zuma and some commentators predict it could lose a couple of major municipalities in the upcoming vote.

The EFF was founded 2013 by Malema after he was thrown out as the leader of the ANC’s youth wing.

In national elections less than a year later it won more than a million votes, taking 25 seats in parliament and becoming the third largest party behind the centrist Democratic Alliance, which holds 89 seats.

This will be the first time the EFF has contested local elections, where issues such as housing, service delivery, poverty and unemployment rank high on voters’ lists of complaints.

Ghanaian crowned first ‘Miss Africa Continent’

Ghanaian, Rebecca Asamoah was crowned the first ‘Miss Africa Continent’.

Johannesburg (AFP) – Barefoot, wearing traditional costumes including animal hide skirts and elaborately beaded headdresses, the contestants strutted the stage before Ghanaian Rebecca Asamoah was crowned the first ‘Miss Africa Continent’.

The 24-year-old dental hygienist beat 11 finalists drawn from an original list of 40 contestants from across the continent in the inaugural pageant at Johannesburg’s Gold Reef City casino on Saturday night.

Runner-up was Michelo Malambo of Zambia, while South Africa’s Jemimah Kandimiri was placed third.

The swimsuit contest was also a departure from the beauty contest norm, with contestants wearing black t-shirts and tight shorts while dancing barefoot to music such as “Africa” by Mali’s legendary afro-pop musician Salif Keita.

The pageant is the brain child of South African film producer Neo Mashishi, who says it aims to empower young African women.

“This is the first ever Miss Africa Continent,” said Mashishi, adding that it had been five years in the making.

“This is about Africa, we are selling Africa to the world, and we are proud to be Africa”.

“The way everything was done was African, we didn’t emulate anything from Miss Universe, or Miss World,” he said.

Asamoah, who wore braids, entered the stage in a traditional Ghanaian Ashanti gold-coloured beaded crown and then returned in a evening dress made from the country’s trademark kente cloth.

She walked away with a grant to study business management at Monash university in Johannesburg.

Runner up in the 2015 Miss Ghana competition, Asamoah said she wanted to see young people help uplift the continent.

“There are a lot of things to be fixed in Africa — water, education, environmental issues,” she told AFP.

“My main concern is the empowerment of youths… so we can work hand in hand and put our continent in the best place it should be.”

In the weeks running up to the event, the 12 finalists embarked on a series of pre-pageant activities, including showing off their culinary skills in cooking traditional meals from their native countries.

Ultimately, the organisers hope to involve the continental body, the African Union, “so our winner can play a role in uplifting Africa”and spearhead campaigns to fight Africa’s woes such as malaria, poverty and xenophobia.

On a bus, South Africans claim back land taken under apartheid

In this file April 24, 2012 photo, a worker walks between rows of vegetables at a farm in Eikenhof, south of Johannesburg. REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko
In this file April 24, 2012 photo, a worker walks between rows of vegetables at a farm in Eikenhof, south of Johannesburg. REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko

LONDON,  (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – South Africans whose land was confiscated under racist laws in the apartheid era have lodged more than 27,000 legal claims at “mobile land claims offices” housed in buses and four-wheel-drive trucks, a land rights commission said.

Six specially adapted vehicles have travelled between remote rural communities since April 2015, reaching more than 100,000 households, according to the Commission on the Restitution of Land Rights, which operates them.

They are part of an initiative to contact victims of racially motivated land dispossession and help them claim back their land.

Under the previous Union and apartheid white-minority governments, segregationist laws severely restricted the right of black South Africans to own land and forced millions onto reservations.

Alfred Msibi, 97, and Maria Sibisi, 79, from northeastern Mpumalanga Province, told Commission officials they hoped the use of mobile offices would speed up access to compensation for their historical claims.

“We have had no peace since the day we were dispossessed of our ancestral land,” a Commission statement quoted them as saying.

The Restitution of Land Rights Bill, aimed at restoring land to those who had it taken from them during the apartheid era, was among the first laws passed by the country’s first democratic government in November 1994.

But many people failed to claim their land in the initial period from 1995 to 1998, and President Jacob Zuma re-opened their right to make claims when he signed the Restitution of Land Rights Amendment Act on June 30, 2014.

Nomfundo Ntloko-Gobodo, Chief Land Claims Commissioner, said the decision was made to re-open claims because many families had not been aware that they qualified for the process, the commission statement said.

It quoted him as saying he was confident the mobile offices would enable farmers to reclaim their land by the 2019 deadline.

LAND CLAIM VEHICLES ON TOUR

The vehicles contain electronic equipment to register claims on site, and have toured sparsely populated areas of northeastern Limpopo province and towns in desert regions of Northern Cape province.

The initiative aimed to contact rural people who could not reach the 14 fixed-location offices, which are mostly in urban centres.

Staff are registering claims for South Africans who were dispossessed of land after June 19, 1913 – when the notorious “Natives Land Act” came into force. The Act prevented black South Africans from owning land outside designated reservations which amounted to just 7 percent of agricultural land, though black South Africans formed 67 percent of the population.

Under the Act and subsequent legislation, more than 3 million people were forcibly relocated to black townships and “Bantustan” homelands.

Land remains a highly emotive issue in South Africa, where 300 years of colonial rule and white-minority government left the vast majority of farmland in the hands of a tiny, mainly white, minority.

The 1996 constitution places a duty on the government to ensure equitable land distribution and address the consequences of the 1913 Act.

In 1996, two years after the end of apartheid, 90 percent of all agricultural land was owned or leased by just 60,000 white commercial farmers, according to government figures.

The National Development Plan set a target of transferring 20 percent of agricultural land to black South Africans by 2030. Between 1994 and 2014, the state handed 7.5 million hectares to black farmers, 46 percent of this target, according to official figures.

(Reporting by Matthew Ponsford, editing by Tim Pearce. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women’s rights, traficking, property rights and climate change. Visit http://news.trust.org)

Laws fail victims of forced, early marriage in “chauvinistic” Burkina Faso – Amnesty

huts
Huts in the village of Bagare, Passore province, northern Burkina Faso, March 30, 2016. REUTERS/Zoe Tabary

By Kieran Guilbert | Thomson Reuters Foundation

DAKAR, April 26 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Burkina Faso’s marriage laws are failing girls who are forced into early marriage by their families and threatened, abused and beaten by their partners for seeking contraception, Amnesty International said on Tuesday.

Forced marriage is illegal in the West African nation, but the law applies only to state-registered marriages, rather than the religious and traditional ceremonies which account for most of Burkina Faso’s forced and early marriages, Amnesty said.

The law also states that a girl must be aged 17 or above to marry, yet half of girls aged 15 to 17 in the northern Sahel region are married, the rights group said in a report.

“Current legislation in Burkina Faso has critical gaps… leaving many women and girls unprotected and unsupported,” the report said.

Burkina Faso has the sixth highest rate of early marriage in Africa, with one in 10 girls married by the age of 15 and more than half married by 18, according to the United Nations children’s agency UNICEF.

Families often marry off girls to improve family alliances and social status, or in return for goods, money and services.

Some areas of Burkina Faso also have the practice of ‘Pog-lenga’ or ‘bonus woman’, where a bride brings her niece to the husband’s family as an extra girl to be married, Amnesty said.

“I did not want to marry the man (her aunt’s husband). My aunt told me ‘if you flee, we will destroy you’,” Amnesty quoted 15-year-old Celine as saying, one of 379 women and girls interviewed by the human rights group.

While the government and donors subsidise the cost of contraception, many married women and girls still struggle to buy it as they cannot afford it, do not have control of their income and are prevented by their partners, Amnesty said.

Fewer than one in six women and girls in Burkina Faso use contraception, dramatically increasing the risk of unwanted and sometimes high-risk pregnancies, according to Amnesty.

At least 2,800 women in Burkina Faso die in childbirth every year, a figure that could be reduced by one-third with better access to birth control, the report said.

“There is a male chauvinistic culture which says: ‘I will decide in the place of the woman’,” Gaetan Mooto, West Africa researcher at Amnesty, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“Even when women have the money for contraception, they don’t have the control over their own bodies,” Mooto added.

The government of Burkina Faso was not immediately available for comment.

(Reporting By Kieran Guilbert, Editing by Ros Russell. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women’s rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)

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