Africa Business

France and Madagascar announced Wednesday they would strengthen economic cooperation through several ambitious projects, including a major hydroelectric dam, as President Emmanuel Macron kicked off a two-day state visit to the Indian Ocean island.The first official trip by a French president in 20 years is intended to strengthen bilateral ties and consolidate France’s presence in …

French president announces economic deals with Madagascar Read More »

Ivory Coast’s main opposition party has called for “marches” outside courts on Thursday, six months ahead of a presidential election, in protest against the removal of its candidate from the race.An Abidjan court on Tuesday struck Tidjane Thiam off the electoral list — a decision that cannot be appealed and rules him out of standing …

I.Coast opposition calls marches against leader’s eviction from electoral race Read More »

Tilahun Wale not only lost his right foot to leprosy — a disease that still affects thousands in Ethiopia — he also lost his family.”My family abandoned me. They blocked my number and refused to speak to me,” said Tilahun, 46, a farmer in Ethiopia’s populous Oromia region, who contracted leprosy around 10 years ago.Ethiopia, …

Patients with leprosy face lasting stigma in Ethiopia Read More »

Every morning the Congolese city of Bukavu, now under the control of the Rwanda-backed M23 movement, counts its dead.Corpses are discovered at dawn, lying in the steep streets of the capital of South Kivu province, which has been in the hands of the anti-government group since mid-February after it launched a lightning offensive.The Congolese administration …

At night, crime and fear stalk DR Congo’s M23-run areas Read More »

On a mountain near Sudan’s border, journalists climb rugged slopes, phones held high, hoping to catch a faint signal from neighbouring Chad to send stories amid the war’s two-year communications blackout.Journalists say efforts like these are their only way to tell the world about the horrors unfolding in Darfur, where accounts of sexual violence, ethnic …

‘No one else will’: Sudan’s journalists risk all to report the war Read More »

An Ivory Coast court on Tuesday struck main opposition leader Tidjane Thiam off the nation’s electoral list, closing the door on him running in a presidential election in October.The court said Thiam, who became head of the Democratic Party of Ivory Coast (PDCI) this month, was removed from the electoral list because he had lost …

I.Coast opposition leader Thiam barred from presidential election Read More »

Ghana’s new leader said Tuesday he initiated a fresh bid to woo back Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger to the west African bloc ECOWAS after the junta-led countries quit earlier this year.President John Mahama said his government had appointed a special envoy to “initiate high-level conversations” with the three countries after their withdrawal from the …

Ghana in fresh drive to woo back Sahel states to W.African bloc Read More »

With a former minister and central bank director embroiled in financial scandal, the island idyll of Mauritius is in political turmoil. The issue had risked tarnishing a visit by French President Emmanuel Macron this week, but he cancelled the trip on Tuesday in order to attend the funeral of Pope Francis.At the centre of the chaos …

Mauritius deep in corruption scandal Read More »

Church bells tolled across the capital of Africa’s most populous Roman Catholic nation on Monday after the death of Pope Francis was announced.Francis, who visited Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2023, was hailed as a “voice for the voiceless”.In Kinshasa’s Our Lady of the Congo Cathedral, Madeleine Bomendje struggled to accept the news: “It’s …

DR Congo Catholics say they have lost ‘the voice of the voiceless’ Read More »

It may be the gateway to the vast Sahara desert, but that doesn’t mean it’s free of that modern scourge of the environment — the rubbish humanity discards.In southern Morocco, volunteers are hunting for waste embedded in the sand, and they don’t have to look far.Bottles, plastic bags — “there are all kinds”, noted one …

Morocco volunteers on Sahara clean-up mission Read More »