Login to BlackFacts.com using your favorite Social Media Login. Click the appropriate button below and you will be redirected to your Social Media Website for confirmation and then back to Blackfacts.com once successful.
Enter the email address and password you used to join BlackFacts.com. If you cannot remember your login information, click the “Forgot Password” link to reset your password.
As political tensions and uncertainty continue to rise in Chad, Ruth Lago spoke with Attorney Max Loalngar to get more insight into the situation.
\t On Friday, internet and international calls were cut off across the West African nation in anticipation of the election results, according to locals and international observers in the capital, Conakry.
\t This was the third time that Conde matched-up against Diallo. Before the election, observers raised concerns that an electoral dispute could reignite ethnic tensions between Guinea's largest ethnic groups.
The Indian government have agreed to the IPL's request to stage the tournament outside of its home country for the third time.
Governments must attach strings as they pledge billions to pay for vaccines in developing countries
Geneva, 2 June 2020—Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) urged leaders to demand pharmaceutical corporations commit to selling any potential future COVID-19 vaccines at cost, as Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, prepares to launch a global mechanism to negotiate with corporations on such vaccines, and appeals to governments to set up a fund to purchase them for developing countries.
“Governments and Gavi need to demand that pharmaceutical corporations open the books so we can see how much potential COVID-19 vaccines will actually cost to produce,” said Kate Elder, Senior Vaccines Policy Advisor for MSF’s Access Campaign.
The COVID-19 vaccines fund that is being mapped out by Gavi aims to raise billions to pay for increased production capacity for future vaccines, and to secure a price, but there is no guarantee whatsoever that pharmaceutical corporations will charge affordable prices.
A fund that was designed by Gavi, the Gates Foundation, the World Bank and others in 2009 to pay for pneumonia vaccines suffered from pharmaceutical companies demanding a relatively high price for the vaccine, leaving developing country governments who have had to take over paying for the vaccine long term with unaffordable prices.
Read more about MSF’s analysis of the global mechanism for potential future COVID-19 vaccines, including MSF’s past experience with Gavi’s pneumonia vaccine Advance Market Commitment.
Writing in a statement published last week – 17th June 2020, the ECOWAS Ministerial Coordination Committee on Transport, Logistics and Trade made key recommendations on the harmonization and gradual re-opening of land, air and sea borders for restoring cross border economic activities, especially the movement of humanitarian personnel, medical supplies and equipment and essential goods in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
The ECOWAS Ministerial Coordination Committee Ministers discussed and agreed practical measures based on the report of the regional experts, as well as the draft Guidelines for the Harmonization and Facilitation of Cross Border Trade & Transport in the ECOWAS Region on the Covid-19 Pandemic and Related Post-Recovery Actions.
The ECOWAS Ministerial Coordination Committee Ministers recommended a gradual and coordinated opening of land borders and airports of ECOWAS Member States based on health data on the evolution of the pandemic.
According to the report, the opening of the borders must be based on the proposed guidelines for the mitigation of health risks and the harmonization and facilitation of cross-border trade and transport in the ECOWAS region in the context of the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Owing to the need to ensure an effective coordination mechanism to follow-up implementation of the guidelines at both national and regional levels, the Ministers called for the use of existing State or regional structures and committees responsible for ensuring the proper application of the protocols on free movement on Community corridors and borders of national and regional trade.
South Sudan Assistant Minister for Interior Garang M. De Mabior, who resigned from the Transitional Government on June 3, after only four months in office, spoke with Fred Oluoch.
If you follow the implementation matrix of the Revitalised Agreement on Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS), no other provision has been implemented, apart from formation of the Revitalised Transitional Government of National Unity (R-TGoNU) which circumvented these provisions.
In the absence of security arrangements, including demilitarisation of Juba, all major towns, civilian centres, disarmament of civilians, and unification of forces, inter-communal violence and general insecurity will continue hurting the already fragile economy.
They have used their privilege of incumbency to mobilise international diplomatic pressure against the SPLM-IO, so that we were persuaded to go to Juba and form a government in violation of the provisions of the Agreement.
I hope I am wrong in bringing our partners’ intransigence to public attention and that the unscientific way we are implementing the Agreement bears fruit, because my being wrong would mean the people of South Sudan will finally have achieved peace.
Kushayb, a senior Janjaweed commander in the early years of the conflict, was the target of a 2007 ICC arrest warrant on multiple counts including rape, murder and pillaging.
Hassan al-Senousi, another displaced Darfuri at the Al-Sarif camp near South Darfur's regional capital Nyala, said Kushayb's arrest brought him \"deep satisfaction\".
Kushayb's arrest comes less than a year after a transitional government took power following Bashir's ouster by the military in April 2019 on the back of vast protests against his rule.
Kushayb is set to be the first of five Sudanese suspects wanted by the ICC over atrocities in Darfur to appear before the court.
\"Kushayb's arrest is a success for international justice and... for the victims,\" Minni Minnawi, leader of a rebel group active in Darfur Sudanese Liberation Army, wrote on Twitter.
He said that his government intends to continue to listen and stay engaged with every voice in the civil society space because his government believes that each voice matters and every voice would make the country’s democracy better and stronger.
As a Government, we want to work with civil society to identify and resolve those structural imbalances and triggers,” the president said.
Executive Director of Campaign for Good Governance, Marcella Samba Sesay, said that the COVID-19 response requires every country to design its own pathway; adding that it is very important for the government and civil society to sit together to enable effective co-creation processes.
I have personally invited representatives of civil society organisations today to talk frankly about the relationship between government and civil society.
I want to thank members of Civil Society for their diverse support to the Government’s response to COVID-19 through direct support and other initiatives, advocacy, social mobilization, and also reiterating Government’s appeal to citizens to adhere to all Covid-19 healthcare and other directives.
Almost 1 000 Western Cape residents are in quarantine, Premier Alan Winde announced on Wednesday.
Winde said the province's Economic Development Partnership had been tasked with helping to co-ordinate food relief, across civil society, in partnership with the City of Cape Town.
The humanitarian campaign to feed the hungry also scored a valuable goal on Wednesday after Banyana Banyana coach Desiree Ellis received donations from Cape Town Mayor Dan Plato.
The equipment will help us to expand our outreach to residents and fill more empty stomachs,\" Ellis said
READ | Covid-19: Soup kitchens can no longer be policed or controlled court says
\"As a result of the severe impact of the national coronavirus lockdown, many residents have struggled to put food on the table.
These donations are intended to assist organisations feeding residents in need and, as a caring city, we are doing all we can to help residents,\" said Plato
He added food relief \"is the direct responsibility of national government, through the SA Social Security Agency\", but the City of Cape Town was attempting \"to fill the gaps, capacitating neighbourhood soup kitchens to feed hundreds of residents in their various communities\".
Government is taking the lead to reform the current pension system by abolishing the contribution to the National Pension Fund (NPF), while continuing to pay benefits to each and every one who has previously contributed to this fund.
The Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development, Dr Renganaden Padayachy, made this statement, today, in the National Assembly, in reply to a Private Notice Question pertaining to the pension reform.
Dr Padayachy highlighted that prior to the introduction of a contributory, participative and collective system, the Contribution Sociale Généralisée (CSG), a High-Level Committee on pension reform had already been set up since 2016 which is composed of members of both public and private organisations.
Furthermore, Dr Padayachy, underscored that despite the lockdown in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, discussions regarding the reform of the pension system with relevant stakeholders were ongoing.
The Finance Minister emphasised that the Basic Retirement Pension is being maintained at Rs 9 000 monthly, which is 20% above the relative poverty line.
The Congo, in west-central Africa, is bordered by the Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, the Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia, Angola, and the Atlantic Ocean. It is one-quarter the size of the U.S. The principal rivers are the Ubangi and Bomu in the north and the Congo in the west, which flows into the Atlantic. The entire length of Lake Tanganyika lies along the eastern border with Tanzania and Burundi.
Transitional government.
Formerly the Belgian Congo, this territory was inhabited by ancient Negrito peoples (Pygmies), who were pushed into the mountains by Bantu and Nilotic invaders. The American correspondent Henry M. Stanley navigated the Congo River in 1877 and opened the interior to exploration. Commissioned by King Leopold II of the Belgians, Stanley made treaties with native chiefs that enabled the king to obtain personal title to the territory at the Berlin Conference of 1885.
Leopold accumulated a vast personal fortune from ivory and rubber through Congolese slave labor; 10 million people are estimated to have died from forced labor, starvation, and outright extermination during Leopolds colonial rule. His brutal exploitation of the Congo eventually became an international cause célèbre, prompting Belgium to take over administration of the Congo, which remained a colony until agitation for independence forced Brussels to grant freedom on June 30, 1960. In elections that month, two prominent nationalists won: Patrice Lumumba of the leftist Mouvement National Congolais became prime minister and Joseph Kasavubu of the ABAKO Party became head of state.
But within weeks of independence, the Katanga Province, led by Moise Tshombe, seceded from the new republic, and another mining province, South Kasai, followed. Belgium sent paratroopers to quell the civil war, and the United Nations flew in a peacekeeping force.
Kasavubu staged an army coup in 1960 and handed Lumumba over to the Katangan forces. A UN investigating commission found that Lumumba had been killed by a Belgian
Press Release - As the COVID-19 pandemic swept the globe, civil society organisations responded nimbly and effectively, providing frontline help and defending the rights of people across the world. A report released today by global civil society alliance CIVICUS, ‘Solidarity in the Time of COVID-19’, highlights the irreplaceable role of activists, NGOs and grassroots organisations during the pandemic and calls on states to work with civil society to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 and create a better post-pand
[SNA] Khartoum -The Transitional Government has expressed \"full solidarity\" with the sit-ins in Nertiti, affirming that their message is received and a government delegation is now, on its way to the town within 24 hour.
Then in a move that totally made no sense, the country expelled World Health Organization staff for raising concern over the government’s nonchalant handling of the Covid-19 outbreak.
Corruption in Kenya, a vice that Justice Mumbi Ngugi described as “that insidious scourge that has reduced our society to penury” survived the change of government from Moi to Mwai Kibaki.
Protesters accuse him of corruption and ineffectual stewardship that has seen widespread terror attacks by Islamist groups allied to Al Queda.
Mr Keita came to power after the ouster of another corrupt regime that was also ineffectual against Islamist terror groups.
No sooner we elect another corrupt and ineffectual regime than we begin campaigns for the next election.
[Thomson Reuters Foundation] Nairobi -- From climate to human rights, how Joe Biden's appointment as the United States president will impact on Africa's 1.3 billion population
Nairobi — The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) Kenya has urged the Ministry of Labour, Social Security, and Services to ensure the inclusion of all elderly persons who qualify for the Inua Jamii program, which is aimed at cushioning Kenyans from effects of COVID-19.
During a meeting on the impact of the pandemic on the poor and vulnerable in society held Tuesday, ICJ also urged CS Simon Chelugui to incorporate the use of cashless transfer to ensure that elderly persons are able to access their funds without the risk of being exposed to the highly contagious disease when going to banks.
\"Based on the extensive and highly interactive deliberations guided by thematic experts, we urge the Cabinet Secretary Ministry of Labour to incorporate the use of cashless fund transfer to ensure that elderly persons who are vulnerable are able to access their monies without having to travel to banking halls,\" ICJ Kenya Chairman Kevin Mogeni said through a statement.
At the same time, the Kenyan section of ICJ wants the stimulus package to cater to persons in the formal and informal sectors, raising concern that the package only benefits those in the formal sector.
\"Partner with relevant institutions to ensure courts in rural areas and in prisons are equipped with the necessary infrastructure to enable cases to be disposed of expeditiously, \"ICJ Kenya pointed out in their recommendation to Judiciary.
Madagascar lies in the Indian Ocean off the southeast coast of Africa opposite Mozambique. The worlds fourth-largest island, it is twice the size of Arizona. The countrys low-lying coastal area gives way to a central plateau. The once densely wooded interior has largely been cut down.
Multiparty republic.
The Malagasy are of mixed Malayo-Indonesian and African-Arab ancestry. Indonesians are believed to have migrated to the island about 700. King Andrianampoinimerina (1787–1810) ruled the major kingdom on the island, and his son, Radama I (1810–1828), unified much of the island. The French made the island a protectorate in 1885, and then, in 1894–1895, ended the monarchy, exiling Queen Rànavàlona III to Algiers. A colonial administration was set up, to which the Comoro Islands were attached in 1908, and other territories later. In World War II, the British occupied Madagascar, which retained ties to Vichy France.
An autonomous republic within the French Community since 1958, Madagascar became an independent member of the community in 1960. In May 1973, an army coup led by Maj. Gen. Gabriel Ramanantsoa ousted Philibert Tsiranana, president since 1959. Cdr. Didier Ratsiraka, named president on June 15, 1975, announced that he would follow a socialist course and, after nationalizing banks and insurance companies, declared all mineral resources nationalized. Repression and censorship characterized his regime. Ratsiraka was reelected in 1989 in a suspicious election that led to riots as well as the formation of a multiparty system in 1990. In 1991, Ratsiraka agreed to share power with the democratically minded opposition leader, Albert Zafy, who then overwhelmingly won the presidential elections in Feb. 1993. But Zafy was impeached by Parliament for abusing his constitutional powers during an economic crisis and lost the 1996 presidential election to Ratsiraka, who again became president in Feb. 1997.
The Dec. 2001 presidential election between incumbent president Didier Ratsiraka and Marc Ravalomanana, the mayor
Nyeri Governor Mutahi Kahiga has declined to assent the County Covid-19 and Highly Infectious Diseases Response Bill, 2020.
\"The composition of the committee under the bill is non exhaustive and fails to consider other legislative instruments that allocate power to create committees like the county government Act,\" read the memo.
The Covid-19 bill sought to create a committee whose mandate is to deal with coronavirus and any other infectious disease.
The bill would have given public health officer power to inspect and monitor the spread and impact of Covid-19 and other infectious diseases.
The governor, further said that the provisions of the bill were already incorporated in the Public Health Act as well as the Nyeri County Health Services Act.
[FrontPageAfrica] Monrovia -The coronavirus pandemic poses serious threats to democracy. Many governments around the world have assembled emergency powers that restrict human rights and enhance state surveillance, often disregarding legal constraints, checks and balances, and time frames for restoring constitutional order.
Ethiopian opposition party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), has accused Prime minister Abiy Ahmed and his government of being in chaos and trying to thrive in chaos.
“It has become fashionable to blame TPLF for everything that goes wrong in the country,” Getachew Reda, a TPLF spokesman told the BBC denying that the front had any hand and or interest in the killing of Oromo entertainer Hachalu Hundessa early last week.
In a six page document titled “Context and Updates of Current Issues in Ethiopia,” the PM’s office cited two main factors for the assassination and subsequent deadly protests and mass arrests.
The document said “Unabated attempt made by aggrieved forces to perpetuate political tensions and increasing political polarization and the negative role of media in creating ethnic tensions;” were at the heart of the issues.
“It’s a flat-out lie,” Reda told the BBC stressing that the TPLF “doesn’t believe in eliminating individuals to make political scores.” The PM’s statement did not specifically mention TPLF but made inferences to them.
The paragraph that seemed to be pointing at the TPLF read: “... it should be mentioned here that the government is under constant and unrestrained pressure from disgruntled forces, organizing and supporting anti-peace elements, by using the economic and political muscles they have built over the last three decades, in order to undermine this inevitable reform process.”
Escalating war of words between PM Abiy administration and TPLF extremely dangerous, irresponsible.
Strategy of demonising TPLF deflects some of the Oromo anger but risks deepening sense of siege, victimhood in Tigray Region and stoke, potentially, new armed conflict.— Rashid Abdi (@RAbdiCG) July 10, 2020
Aside the TPLF, the governing party had also accused former Oromo rebel group of being behind the shooting of Hachalu Hundessa. Amid high security deployment, Addis Ababa and Oromia regional state remains peaceful according to reports.
Ethiopia is in the tenth day of an internet blackout that was effected the morning after the musician was killed. It is the longest blockade since Abiy came to power. A spokeswoman has defended the move.
“... if the internet is being used by certain forces to spread hate speech and vitriol, that is perpetuating and initiating ethnic, religious and communal violence, then ensuring human security supersedes,” Billene Aster Syoum told the BBC.
The People’s National Party (PNP) is rejecting as baseless the assertion by Prime Minister Andrew Holness that the party is pushing a strategy of confrontation in the ongoing election campaign. \tHolness issued the critique following his...
Demanding reparation for the more than 300 years of slavery in the Caribbean, Sir Hilary Beckles, vice chancellor of The University of the West Indies (UWI), charged that colonialism has left a legacy of diabetes and hypertension that continues to...
In Jan. 2007, the U.S. launched airstrikes on the retreating Islamists, who they believed included three members of al-Qaeda suspected of involvement in the 1998 bombings of the American embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. The air strikes were strongly criticized in a number of Muslim countries, which accused the Americans of killing Somali civilians. Battles between the insurgents and Somali and Ethiopian troops intensified in March, leaving 300 civilians dead in what has been called the worst fighting in 15 years. The fighting created a humanitarian crisis, with more than 320,000 Somalis fleeing the fighting in Mogadishu in just two months. In July, a national reconciliation conference opened in Mogadishu but was quickly postponed when leading opposition figures failed to appear. The fighting intensified once again in October. The Alliance for the Reliberation of Somalia, a coalition of moderate Islamist leaders, and the transitional government agreed to a cease-fire in June 2008 that called on Ethiopian troops that were propping up the fragile government to be replaced by UN troops. The future of the deal was tenuous from the start and was greeted by much skepticism. Indeed, it was unclear if the UN could assemble a force willing to be deployed to the troubled region, and several powerful Islamist groups did not participate in the negotiations.
Al-Shabab, the militant wing of SICC, began gaining strength in 2007. It allied itself with al-Qaeda and won the support of many local warlords, primarily in the south. The group has raised alarms in the U.S. that its brand of militant Islam would spread throughout eastern Africa and beyond. The group seeks to return Somalia to an Islamist state and has intimidated civilians with stonings, by chopping off hands, and by banning many forms of technology, while continuing to wage war against the transitional government. Al-Shabab has taken advantage of the power vacuum and weak transitional government. By February 2009, the group controlled almost all of southern
Daniel arap Moi , in full Daniel Toroitich arap Moi (born 1924, Sacho, Kenya Colony [now Kenya]), Kenyan politician, who held the office of president (1978–2002).
Moi was educated at mission and government schools. He became a teacher at age 21 and in the early 1960s, as Kenya began to move toward independence (1963), was appointed minister of education in the transitional government. Although he had originally been cofounder and chairman of the Kenya African Democratic Union, a party composed of minority peoples, he joined the Kikuyu-dominated Kenya African National Union (KANU) in 1964. That same year Moi was appointed minister of home affairs.
Named vice president in 1967, Moi became president in 1978 following the death of Jomo Kenyatta. He quickly consolidated his power, banning opposition parties and promoting his Kalenjin countrymen to positions of authority at the expense of the Kikuyu. He also curried favour with the army, which proved loyal to him in suppressing a coup attempt in 1982. His continuation of Kenyatta’s pro-Western policies ensured significant sums of development aid during the Cold War (1947–91), and under Moi’s stewardship Kenya emerged as one of the most prosperous African nations.
In the early 1990s, however, Western countries began to demand political and economic reforms, leading Moi to legalize opposition parties in 1991. The following year he won the country’s first multiparty elections amid charges of electoral fraud. Riots and demonstrations marred the 1997 elections, and hundreds of Kenyans, mainly Kikuyu, were killed. Easily elected to his fifth term as president, Moi promised to end government corruption and implement democratic and economic reforms. In an effort to combat corruption, in 1999 he appointed Richard Leakey, the popular and respected anthropologist, the head of the civil service and permanent secretary to the cabinet, a position Leakey retired from in 2001.
Required by the constitution to resign in 2003, Moi backed Uhuru Kenyatta, son of Jomo Kenyatta, as
Collectively, we need to provide extra support to protect those experiencing domestic violence through specializing training of first responders, additional emergency shelters for survivors, immediate removal of abusers, and increased support for helplines.
While the current economic downturn is affecting both men and women, past evidence shows that domestic violence against women increases during periods of high unemployment.
According to the Iraq Family Health survey, 1 in 5 Iraqi women are subjected to domestic violence.
As in many other countries, COVID-19 has exacerbated instances of domestic violence in Iraq, with an average increase of 30% since the country-wide curfew began, and some regions seeing an increase as high as 50%.
For survivors of violence and women displaced in Iraq and globally, the consequences of COVID-19 lockdowns often mean limited access to life saving services.
As protests over the killing of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, at the hands of a Minnesota White police officer rocked cities all across the United States, thousands of protesters gathered in downtown Pittsburgh Saturday afternoon.
What started as a peaceful march and protest escalated into violent tensions and forced Pittsburgh Public Safety to issue a curfew order effective at 8:30 p.m Saturday until 6 a.m. Sunday.
Public Safety Director Wendell Hissrich said the curfew will be in place Sunday as well.
“Multiple officers have been injured, but numbers are not yet clear,” according to the official public safety Twitter account.
Officials also reported late Saturday evening that officers were continuing to make arrests downtown.
South Africa's biomedical response has been exemplary, but it has failed to mobilise social movements essential for tackling public health crises.
There has been an exemplary biomedical response at the state level: the government acted swiftly to \"flatten the curve\"; it rolled out a sweeping programme of community screening, testing and contact tracing; and it put in place clinical facilities for palliative care.
Crucial food security interventions such as the South African National School Nutrition Programme - the largest of its kind of Africa - have been suspended, while other emergency food distribution measures have been beset by corruption, meddling and bureaucratic bungling.
One such sign was when the interim CEO of the Solidarity Fund, created to enable the private sector and civil society to support the COVID-19 response, announced the Fund would stop providing emergency food rations in favour of measures to \"activate communities to do things for themselves\".
That social movement for public health around the HIV/AIDS pandemic successfully linked poor people's demands for better medical care with demands to address the social and economic causes of inequality.
My Government is committed to providing support for survivors and the First Lady, myself, and my Government urge every Sierra Leonean to join in raising awareness, advocating, and standing up to rid this country of this menace.
With the support of international and development partners, traditional and religious leaders, civil society, the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists, and various community stakeholders, our COVID-19 preparedness and response measures have been robust.
To every Sierra Leonean who has complied with healthcare protocols, public-safety directives, and also communicated awareness of the virus, we thank you immensely.
Our anticipation and timely responses, contact tracing and surveillance, well-considered economic response, social safety support, and other measures have been praised and well-supported by our multilateral and development partners.
I urge every citizen to strictly comply with healthcare and public safety protocols — from handwashing, using face masks, social distancing, travel restrictions, and all other restrictions on public gatherings in public spaces.
Ivory Coast's government on Tuesday accused the opposition of \"plotting\" against the state after it vowed to set up a rival government following bruising presidential elections won in a landslide by the incumbent, Alassane Ouattara.
The standoff pitched the West African nation deeper into a three-month-old crisis that has claimed several dozen lives, triggering EU appeals for calm and dialogue.
Hours after 78-year-old Ouattara was declared victor with more than 94 percent of the vote, Justice Minister Sansan Kambile accused the opposition of \"acts of assault and plotting against the authority of the state.\"
The Abidjan public prosecutor has been asked to investigate, Kambile said, warning that \"all options are on the table.\"
Opposition leader Pascal Affi N'Guessan had told reporters late Monday that opposition parties and groups were forming a \"council of national transition.\"
\"This council's mission will be to... create a transitional government within the next few hours,\" N'Guessan said.
The goal, he said, was to \"prepare the framework for a fair, transparent and inclusive presidential election.\"
Ouattara's landslide in Saturday's vote had been widely expected -- two opposition leaders had called for a boycott of the ballot and a civil disobedience campaign.
But the protests and bloody clashes have also stirred traumatic memories of a crisis a decade ago that tore the country apart and dealt it lasting economic damage.
Around 3,000 people died after then-president Laurent Gbagbo refused to accept defeat by Ouattara.
N'Guessan late Monday said the \"transitional council\" would be led by opposition veteran Henri Konan Bedie, 86, a former president and long-term adversary of Ouattara.
\"Keeping Mr Ouattara as head of state could lead to civil war,\" he warned.
- Confrontation -
In Abidjan, the economic capital, security forces blocked off roads close to Bedie's villa.
They fired teargas to disperse small groups of supporters and journalists outside, preventing the staging of a press conference called to follow up Monday night's announcement.
In Daoukro, an opposition stronghold 235 kilometres (146 miles) north of Abidjan, anti-Ouattara protesters were manning barricades.
\"These results are a farce, \" said one, who gave his name as Firmin. \"We are going to carry on with civil disobedience until Ouattara steps down.\"
In contrast, Ouattara supporters sang his praises, saying he had strived to end instability in the world's top cocoa producer and revive its battered economy.
\"He has worked hard for the country. He has to carry on, not just for us, but for our children,\" said Hamed Dioma, a scrap-metal worker in a rundown district of Abidjan.
\"We are going to party.\"
Anger sparked by Ouattara's quest for a third term has revived memories of past feuds left mostly unreconciled after a 2002 civil war split the country in two.
Thirty people died in clashes before Saturday's vote, often between local ethnic groups allied to the opposition and Dioula communities seen as close to Oua
Scaled-down inauguration: Malawi president vows to declare assets
Malawi’s new president Lazarus Chakwera’s official inauguration took place today (July 6) days after he was sworn into office after defeating then incumbent Peter Mutharika in a keenly contested poll rerun.
The event was largely scaled down due to rising cases of the COVID-19 pandemic. It took place at the Kamuzu Barracks in Lilongwe. In attendance were high level members of government.
The guest list according to reports was restricted to just 100 delegates after the president cancelled major celebrations which were expected to be held at the Bingu National Stadium.
The most notable foreign dignitary being Samia Suluhu, Tanzania vice-president. Most diplomats serving in the country were in attendance with a more visible show of virus prevention measures as compared to a week ago during the packed swearing in.
The president officially received the sword of office which confers on him the power as Commander – in – chief of the Armed Forces.
#ChakweraInauguration in pictures#NationOnline pic.twitter.com/tJuYNYz1Gw— NationOnline (@NationOnlineMw) July 6, 2020
Local Nation newspaper reports that the president has pledged to declare his assets, reduce his powers, answer questions in parliament, consult the Leader of Opposition every three months and operationalise the Access to Information Bill.
Chakwera also praised major stakeholders in the election petition and subsequent re-election. He singled out among others the court witnesses, judiciary, civil society, journalists, members of parliament, campaign funders, Electoral Commission and members of the security forces.
“There cannot be a new Malawi if the only people deemed guilty of breaking the country are the ones who lost the election. There must be a collective responsibility in fixing the country’s problems,” he said.
