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Following President Paul Kagame’s 99% election win, his former chief of staff, Theogene Rudasingwa*, speaks out against the international community’s uncritical support for the president and he explains why the Rwandan leader seeks to remain in power indefinitely. On 4 August, Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame was re-elected with a near-perfect vote of 99%, earning himself a place in history alongside …

President Jacob Zuma of South Africa again survived a no-confidence vote in parliament on Tuesday in the most serious attempt yet to unseat him after months of growing anger over alleged corruption and a sinking economy. Zuma had survived six previous attempts to dislodge him in parliament, but this was the first to be held by secret ballot after parliamentary …

More than 50 migrants from Somalia and Ethiopia were “deliberately drowned” when a smuggler forced them into the sea off Yemen’s coast, the UN migration agency said Wednesday, calling the drownings “shocking and inhumane.” International Organization for Migration (IOM) staffers found the shallow graves of 29 of the migrants on a beach in Shabwa during a routine patrol, the agency’s …

With voting over and counting underway, a crisis is brewing in Kenya, which held a general election on Tuesday. Over 80% of the results have been announced and the opposition is trailing the incumbent by over 1.2 million votes. On Wednesday morning, the election commission website showed Kenyatta leading with 54.4 per cent of the votes against 44.8 per cent …

A group of Tunisian fishermen blocked the boat of far-right movement ‘Generation Identity’ from docking at the port of Zarzis in the southeast of Tunisia , dealing the latest blow to a controversial mission aimed at disrupting the flow of migrant boats from North Africa to Europe. The Identitarians had chartered the vessel C-Star to run their anti-migrant mission ‘Defend …

Head of the European Union Elections Observer Mission in Kenya, Marietje Schaake, says Augsut 8’s elections should not be a life and death affair. She stated that Kenyans have shown that all they want is a peaceful, credible and transparent process in the exercise of their democratic rights. She was speaking in an interview with Daniel Finnan of Radio France …

The Comptroller-General of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), Mr Mohammed Babandede, announced this week that from 1 January 2018, anybody without a National Identification Number issued by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) will not be able to procure Nigerian passport. The condition applies to both first-time applicants and those renewing their expired passport, according to Babandede, who spoke in …

Rwandan President Paul Kagame has won a third term in office, garnering a whopping 98 per cent of votes counted, according to partial results released today. There had been little doubt that the 59-year-old would return to the helm of the east African nation which he has ruled with an iron fist since the end of the 1994 genocide. With …

Because they couldn’t sit at home doing nothing, 15-year-old Precious and Promise Idiaru took to sports many years ago. They started with football and later switched to basketball, in which the tall brothers have proved to be very good. They have now been nominated for Germany’s Under-15 national team which will take part in the 4-nation North Sea Development Cup …

Kenyans, Rwandans, and Angolans go to the polls in August to vote for president and members of parliament. The elections in Rwanda and Angola do not promise any surprises as the ruling parties in both countries are well entrenched in power. Kenya however is another matter. ———————— Kagame to continue The 4 August presidential election in Rwanda is seen as …

The population of people of African origin in Germany has nearly doubled in only five years, according to new figures published on Tuesday by the Federal Statistics Office. Moreover, the number of people with an immigrant background in the country reached a new high of 18.6 million in 2016, an increase of 8.5 per cent compared to the previous year. …

Exactly a week before Kenya goes to the polls to elect a new president, the official in charge of electronic voting was found dead on Monday after being missing for three days. The body of Chris Msando, who was the head of information, communication and technology at the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), was found in a bush by …

Two leading European countries are planning drastic measures to deal with migration from Africa through the Mediterranean. France says it wants to establish camps to vet migrants in Libya, Chad and Niger as Italy plans to deploy war ships to the Libyan coast to stop refugees and send them back. Italy’s cabinet on Friday (28 July) backed a plan by …

Google has officially launched its Street View of Nigeria’s commercial hub, Lagos, and the tech giant is looking to make the feature available across the country soon. The company launched the new service at the Google for Nigeria event which took place in Lagos last Thursday (27 July) in the presence of its CEO, Sundar Pichai. Street view is a …

A battery of new technological innovations has been unveiled by Germany’s refugee agency to help it determine more accurately the country of origin of asylum seekers and detect those who make multiple applications using different names. Jefferson Chase reports. No more Franco A.’s – that’s the motto at the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge …

“My message to the Gambians in the Diaspora is that we want them to come back home and contribute to nation building,” appeals President Adama Barrow as he hints of a possible trial of former leader Yahya Jammeh, currently in exile in Equatorial Guinea. In an exclusive interview with Omar Wally of Deutsche Welle (DW), Germany’s public international broadcaster, Barrow …

The Kenyan Diaspora and well-wishers of the East African country will gather in six German cities on Saturday, 5 August for Amani Kenya-Open Air Prayers for Peace and Unity.  According to the organizers, the event, which will hold in Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Munich and Wurzburg, is to show solidarity with their compatriots at home who will go the polls …

Two German army pilots have died after their helicopter crashed near Gao, eastern Mali. At the time of the crash, the helicopter was monitoring “confrontations.” The Tiger type army combat helicopter with two pilots onboard crashed for unknown reasons around 12:20 GMT/UTC about 70 kilometers (43 miles) northeast of Gao in eastern Mali, the Bundeswehr said on Wednesday. “Onboard the …

Nigeria is currently in a state of intense political agitation. An Igbo self-determination group, the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), is calling for a separate national state for the Igbo people of the country while other groups are advocating for a wide-ranging constitutional reform to devolve more powers to the federating states. Foreign governments are intervening in the debate. The …

Operation Sophia, the European Union migrant-rescue mission in the Mediterranean Sea, has been extended and will now run until 31 December 2018. EU leaders reached the agreement in Brussels on Tuesday (25 July) after Italy withdrew its veto. The extension was expected to be agreed upon last Monday but Italy, discontent with other EU member states’ efforts on the migrant …