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Uganda’s inter-religious council called off the eagerly awaited presidential candidates’ debate.
The council said the debate, that was due on Thursday 03 was cancelled due to limited resources.
Local media reported that a total of ten presidential candidates were expected to grace the occasion.
This comes amid numerous complaints majorly from the opposition who have constantly blamed the security apparatus for rights violations.
Uganda opposition have in most cases face wrath of the police especially the renowned musician-turned politician, Bobi Wine.
Two weeks ago, 54 people died in protests after Wines supporters called for his release following a brief arrest at campaign rally.
They have defended themselves by claiming that they were only implementing Covid-19 guidelines to prevent the spread of Coronavirus.
Bobi Wine was later charged with violating pandemic restrictions on gathering of crowds and granted bail.
The embattled singer later met the electoral commission and asked them to ensure that there should be equitable campaigns and police should be stopped from intimidating the opposition leaders and their members.
\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.
On June 19, Americans around the country will celebrate Juneteenth, a holiday commemorating the Emancipation Proclamation in the USA.
It is the completion of the celebration of freedom in America,” said Steve Williams, president of the National Juneteenth Observance Foundation.
Here is what you should know about Juneteenth:
On June 19, 1865, Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger informed a reluctant community in Galveston, TX, that President Abraham Lincoln had freed enslaved Americans in rebel states two and a half years earlier.
“The date represents an important turning point for our nation and for human rights, and we believe that now, more than ever, it deserves to have its own day in the spotlight,” the tweet read:
President Donald Trump had planned to hold a campaign rally on Juneteenth in Tulsa, OK, the site of a massacre in 1921 when white men attacked and killed Black residents in a Black business district.
Though Juneteenth marks the day Texas was informed of the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing the slaves there as it had in other secessionist states, it did not apply to Union states, such as Maryland, which had slaves but had not seceded in the Civil War.
A law expert has said the resignation of Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) chairperson Jane Ansah just weeks into a crucial presidential election has plunged the country into yet another electoral crisis.
Justine Dzonzi: Fresh elections are court sanctioned polls therefore do not disrupt the electoral process
Justin Dzonzi of Justice Link says it will not be possible for a new commission to hold an election in two weeks' time.
The term of office for Ansah--a judge of the Malawi Supreme Court of Appeal--was set to expire in October this year while that for her eight commissioners is ending on June 5 this year
\"This means in two weeks' time, we will have no commission at all.
\"Take into account that we will have an election on 23 June, this is an electoral crisis,\" he said.
The judgment was upheld by the Supreme Court of Appeal, the country's top judicial authority, after an appeal by Mutharika and the electoral body.
Journalists in Cameroon have taken to the streets of Buea in the South west region to protest and demand an account of their missing colleague, Samuel Wazizi, after local media reported he had died in military custody.
Wazizi, was arrested in August 2019.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) confirmed his death in a statement on Wednesday evening, after a privately-owned Cameroonian TV station and then the National Union of Cameroonian Journalists (SNJC) announced his death on Tuesday.
Neither the government nor the army had yet confirmed the journalist’s death, or reacted to requests on his whereabouts.
Now, what really happened to Samuel Wazizi?
Guinea's main oppositon party published Friday a list of 46 people, aged between 3 and 70 years, killed during the repression of demonstrations after the October 18 election, officially won by the incumbent Alpha Condé.
Condé was declared re-elected on October 24 by the Electoral Commission for a controversial third term with 59.5% of the vote, but three of his opponents, including opposition leader Cellou Dalein Diallo, are contesting the results before the Constitutional Court, whose decision is expected on Saturday.
Diallo's party, the Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea (UFDG), denounced in a statement a \"wave of terror\" orchestrated by the government between October 19 and November 3.
\"The provisional toll of this repression is 46 dead, nearly 200 wounded by gunfire, about a hundred arrests and extensive material damage,\" according to the UFDG.
The opposition has so far reported a death toll of at least 27, while for the government, the post-election violence resulted in 21 deaths, including members of the security forces.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) Africa Officer Ida Sawyer on Twitter on October 24 accused Guinean security forces of killing \"at least 8 people, including 3 children.
Amnesty International for its part accused the same security forces of firing live ammunition at demonstrators, without giving a detailed account.
The Ministries of Security and Territorial Administration did not immediately respond to the multiple requests for a reaction from the AFP to the UFDG document.
This document includes a list of names, usually with age, profession, circumstances of death, contacts of a relative, and photos showing these people, dead or alive. In about fifteen cases, these are photos of bodies showing traces of violence.
Most of the presumed victims are young men and women between 15 and 30 years old: motorcycle cab drivers, mechanics, students...
The youngest are a boy and a girl of 3 years old, Mamadou Midiaou Diallo and Mariatou Bah, and the oldest Mamouna Camara, a housewife of 70 years old.
The UFDG also states that \"the overwhelming majority of the victims (...) belong to the same ethnic group as the opposition leader,\" in a country where community affiliations play an important role in elections.
Journalists in Cameroon have marched to government offices to demand an account of their missing colleague, Samuel Wazizi, after local media this week reported he was died in military custody.
Isidore Abah of the Cameroon Association of English-Speaking Journalists’ (CAMASEJ) says he led scores of reporters Thursday in a march to government offices in the southwestern town of Buea.
Abah said among the government offices they visited was that of Southwest Region Governor Bernard Okalia Bilai.
According to Abah, Bilai said only the central government in the capital Yaounde could tell them what happened to Wazizi.
Journalists in the French-speaking town of Douala staged a similar protest march Thursday to government offices.
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) on Thursday asked UK citizens to be cautious and cited \"possible clashes throughout the country\" during the November 28 inauguration.
\"Political tensions are high and demonstrations and clashes are possible throughout the country, particularly in the western region; you should exercise caution and, where possible, avoid travelling around areas where demonstrations may take place,\" the FCO said in a statement.
The office is anticipating possible demonstrations and clashes during the inauguration and Britons planning to visit Kenya during this period have been asked to exercise caution and, where possible, avoid travelling around areas where demonstrations may take place.
The areas where FCO advises against all but essential travel does not include Kenya's safari destinations.
In April, when political parties were scheduled to hold their nominations ahead of the deadline by the electoral commission, UK advised its nationals against all but essential travel to north eastern counties of Garissa, Wajir and Mandera as well as Eastleigh in Nairobi.
The new Malawi Electoral Commission, MEC, chief Chifundo Kachale also urged the public to observe necessary legal processes in dealing with electoral grievances.
June 23: Malawians vote in crucial presidential poll rerun despite virus
\tVoters in Malawi have already started casting their ballots today in crucial presidential election rerun pitting incumbent Peter Mutharika and opposition coalition leader Lazarus Chakwera.
Malawi joins a number of African countries that went ahead with elections despite the virus .
Confirmed cases = 749
\t\tActive cases = 480
\t\tRecoveries = 258
\t\tNumber of deaths = 11
\t
John Hopkins Uni stats valid as of June 22, 2020
\tU.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on “all political actors and stakeholders to renew their commitment to credible and peaceful elections, while observing all preventive measures against the spread of COVID-19,” the U.N. spokesman said.
VIDEO
\tA number of local and international organizations will observe the new elections, in an effort to make sure that they are free and fair, the newly-elected chairman of the Malawi Electoral Commission Chifundo Kachale said.
Preparations for next year's general elections got off to a bumpy start yesterday after authorities at the Electoral Commission (EC), rejected Opposition demand for a new 2021 roadmap, born out of a meticulous consultative process.
But the Commission maintained that the elections would go on as planned and asked Opposition parties to either accept the new roadmap announced on Tuesday or push for last-minute constitutional amendments to the current electoral laws.
Under the revised EC roadmap, political parties were given one month to organise their internal elections (primaries).
\"As an electoral management body that is interested in holding free and fair general elections, you ought to have sufficient consultation with all key stakeholder before you roll out this \"scientific\" revised roadmap...\" the letter to EC reads in part.
\"In the most ridiculous fashion, the Commission has released a revised roadmap for the 2021 General Election; which roadmap violates every aspect of a free and fair election, envisaged under Article 1(4) of the Constitution of Uganda,\" Mr Kyagulanyi said in a Facebook post yesterday.
[African Arguments] I was arrested and beaten last week for daring to contest the presidential election. This is not a fair fight, but I have no option but to be strong.
Malawi's electoral commission has appealed for peace and calm as it tallied ballots following a historic poll to re-elect a president after Peter Mutharika's victory was overturned.
More than 3,200 Ivorians have fled the ongoing post-election violence in their country to Liberia, Ghana and Togo, the U.N. refugee agency says. Ivory Coast's President Alassane Ouattara won a controversial third term in office in an election on Saturday that was marred by violence, intimidation and electoral malpractice. Opposition leaders who boycotted the election...
The post In Ivory Coast, thousands have fled ongoing post-election violence to Liberia, Ghana and Togo appeared first on Face2Face Africa.
The sudden death of outgoing Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza Tuesday came as a shock to everyone on the African political scene.
Nkurunziza ruled Burundi with an iron first for 15 years, including a controversial third term that saw hundreds killed in protests and more than half a million fleeing the country.
Burundi has begun seven days of mourning after the death of President Pierre Nkurunziza, who died Monday at a hospital in the town of Karuzi.
The rise of Imbonerakure will be Nkurunziza’s defining characteristic of his human rights record,” said Mudge.
Nelleke van de Walle, deputy director for central Africa at the International Crisis Group, said the future of Burundi depends on what the political system left behind by Nkurunziza will do in the coming months.
Recalling a major security incident that took place on Friday, 12th October 2012 – a month before elections were held in Sierra Leone, right in the heart of the business district of Freetown, involving the heavily armed motorcade of president Ernest Bai Koroma and the convoy of the then opposition SLPP presidential candidate – Retired Brigadier Julius Maada Bio, which could have led to catastrophic loss of life on both sides and another bloody civil war.
Thanks to the foresight, fortitude and cool-headedness of president Ernest Bai Koroma, and his quick decision to avert a bloody and catastrophic shoot-out between the heavily armed State security personnel and Maada Bio’s personal guards, the police successfully negotiated the traffic, bringing the standoff to a satisfactory end without a single shot fired, nor was Maada Bio arrested.
Palo Conteh (Photo) walked into State House with his shoulder bag carrying his gun, wrongfully bypassing the security scanner at the entrance, just as Maada Bio in 2012 wrongfully – and some may say foolishly, drove his convoy straight into the direction of the oncoming motorcade of the sitting president – Ernest Bai Koroma.
Maada Bio may have been able in 2012 to plead mitigating circumstances or ignorance of the president’s route of travel, but there is no doubt he made the wrong decision, just as Palo Conteh did on the 19th of March 2020 – carrying his gun into State House.
If found guilty by a justice system that is polarised by politics, he will face the gallows where he will be hanged until he draws his last breath – just for mistakenly and foolishly walking into State House with a gun which he handed over to security for safe keeping before his meeting with president Julius Maada Bio on the second floor.
June 12: Tigray ‘rejects’ HoF mandate extension, vows to hold polls
\tTigray regional state has all but rejected the regional parliament’s mandate extension granted by the House of Federation earlier this week.
June 10: MPs back extending Abiy’s term amid election delay
\tEthiopia’s upper parliamentary chamber, House of Federation (HoF), has approved an extension to the mandate of the current parliament as well as regional parliaments and councils.
The CCI’s recommendations included that terms of office of the House of Peoples Representatives, HoPR, the HoF, state councils and the executive at federal and state levels be extended for as long as COVID-19 pandemic continues to be a threat to public health, and a current State of Emergency (SOE) remained in place.
If major opposition parties reject the recommendations from the Council of Constitutional Inquiry, “protests or election boycotts could become a reality, reducing the chances of successful competitive polls in 2021,” said William Davison of the International Crisis Group (ICG), a conflict-prevention organisation.
June 8: Abiy rejects talk of transitional govt amid delayed polls
\tEthiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on Monday rejected the idea of forming a transitional government when his term of office expires in October, brushing aside fears of a constitutional crisis.
Virtual event takes place on Oct. 20 With just weeks to go before Election Day on Nov. 3, now is the time to make sure everyone’s vote counts. That’s why ten publishers of the leading Black newspapers in America will come together for a live event to discuss voting with purpose in the upcoming … Continued
The post 10 leading Black newspapers join forces to host ‘Voting With Purpose’ live event appeared first on New Pittsburgh Courier.
Parliament on Tuesday passed a resolution tasking government to waive water and electricity bills for a period of six months to help relieve the many Ugandans in the post-lockdown recovery process.
While debating a motion moved by Masaka Municipality MP Mathias Mpuuga, the legislators said since the lockdown was imposed in March, many Ugandans spend a lot of time at home and consume a lot of electricity and water more than they would use while at work.
Mr Mpuuga argued that Uganda should borrow a leaf from other countries, including Ghana, which have already paid off the water and electricity bills for the citizens for a specific period of time.
Ms Jesca Ababiku (Adjumani Woman, NRM) said much as the people in rural areas are not connected to water provided by the National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC), there is a need for government to also repair boreholes and other dilapidated water sources.
The MPs said with President Museveni not including waiver on water and electricity bills as part of a stimulus package during the State of the Nation Address on June 4, payment of the cumulative bills will suffocate many Ugandans.
A year after becoming the first black African woman to scale the world’s highest mountain, Saray Khumalo seems to have set a Guinness World Record for the most money raised during an eight-hour stationary cycling fundraiser, a report by VOA said. The award-winning mountaineer and entrepreneur raised nearly $44,000 after eight hours of spinning to support an...
The post The first Black African woman to scale Mount Everest just broke a Guinness World Record appeared first on Face2Face Africa.
Democratic Republic of Congo: President Tshisekedi reneges on justice pledge, leaving victims in despair
\tPresident Felix Tshisekedi of the Democratic Republic of Congo has reneged on his inauguration pledges to strengthen the rule of law, fight impunity and ensure justice, leaving the families of hundreds of people killed during the country’s pre-election crisis in despair, Amnesty International said today.
“President Tshisekedi and his government must acknowledge the pain that victims and their families have been enduring and publicly commit to promptly and effectively prosecute those responsible,” said Deprose Muchena, Amnesty International’s Director for East and Southern Africa.
Victims of 2015-2018 brutal crackdowns denied justice in the DRC, Amnesty International interviewed 115 survivors and victims’ family members, on their quest for justice.
Farcical investigations
\tUnder international pressure, former President Joseph Kabila constituted three committees to investigate the deadly crackdowns on protestors, none of which have resulted in any prosecutions.
A second committee created in February 2018 investigated the use of deadly force against protestors on 31 December 2017 and 21 January 2018, recommending prosecution of security officers who ordered or used excessive force against protestors.
At least 22 people died as the fiercest cyclone to hit parts of Bangladesh and eastern India this century sent trees flying and flattened houses, with millions crammed into shelters despite the risk of coronavirus.
Millions were left without power after Cyclone Amphan, packing winds of around 150 kilometres per hour (95 miles), carried away electricity pylons, walls and roofs, officials said Thursday as they began to assess the damage.
Bangladesh officials said at least 10 people had died, including a five-year-old boy and a 75-year-old man both hit by falling trees and a cyclone emergency volunteer who drowned.
Cyclones are an annual and growing hazard along the Bay of Bengal coast, claiming the lives of hundreds of thousands of people in recent decades.
Anwar Hossain Howlader, an official in the Khulna coastal district of Bangladesh, said a three-metre (10-feet) surge had destroyed embankments protecting villages despite locals toiling through the night.
Nigerian health authorities said they were battling a suspected outbreak of yellow fever in two southern areas that local media said might have left dozens dead.
Amid a global pandemic, it has gone by largely unnoticed - not least because the crisis also kept out election observers from the East African Community (EAC), the only foreign group the government accredited.
The ruling party has grown increasingly isolationist since the last election in 2015 when outgoing President Pierre Nkurunziza decided to stand for a third term, sparking months of protests.
The results - announced by the electoral commission three days after the vote - give the CNDD-FDD's candidate Evariste Ndayishimiye 68% of the vote.
Ndayishimiye's balancing act
One of the new president's key challenges on taking office will be to balance the various interests within the ruling party.
Ndayishimiye is new in the job and has made subtle overtures to international bodies in recent months, meeting with the AU Chairperson Moussa Faki and EAC officials.
President Donald Trump moved a campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, so it would no longer fall on June 19th, or Juneteenth, the day commemorating Black emancipation from slavery.
The president had been criticized for planning a rally on the holiday, specifically in Tulsa, the site of a 1921 racist massacre of Black people by white mobs.
, who is Black, had called Trump’s rally, when it was planned for Juneteenth, a “welcome home party” for “white supremacists.”
Pressed about Trump’s decision to hold a rally in Tulsa on Juneteenth, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters Thursday that it was a “meaningful day” for Trump, adding, “The African American community is very near and dear to his heart.”
Trump has a long history of racism, including calling for the death penalty for the “Central Park Five,” the Black teens wrongfully accused of raping a white woman in New York, as well as pushing the racist “birther” conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was not born in the U.S. and could not become president.
All the while, President John Magufuli has led a crackdown on anyone who dares raise concerns about the virus's spread in his East African country or the Government's response to it.
The country's number of confirmed virus cases hasn't changed for three weeks, and the international community is openly worrying that Tanzania's Government is hiding the true scale of the pandemic.
While many African countries have been praised for their response to the coronavirus, Tanzania is the most dramatic exception, run by a president who questions — or fires — his own health experts and has refused to limit people's movements, saying the economy is the priority.
While health experts say recorded coronavirus cases and deaths the world over are undercounts, Opposition leaders accuse Magufuli's Government of hiding the outbreak's true toll.
Kenya closed its border with Tanzania this month except for cargo traffic and imposed stringent testing measures on Tanzanian truck drivers after more than 50 of them tested positive for the virus in a single day.
[Dalsan Radio] Police in Bossaso have arrested two men in connection with the rape and killing of a small girl in the area. The two admitted raping and killing Naimo Abdi Mohamed whose body was found in the city's Raf and Raaho neighbourhood.
Nigeria’s president, Muhammedu Buhari on Sunday ordered an investigation into the reported gunshot(s) in the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
This was made known in a statement by the President’s Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu, on Sunday.
Local media had reported that trouble broke out when First Lady Aisha Buhari asked the Special Assistant to President Buhari, Sabiu Tunde Yusuf, to self-isolate in line with the COVID-19 guideline after returning from Lagos.
The country security agency has since arrested Shugaba and other security details of the first lady, a move condemned by the the president’s wife calling for their release.
However, presidential spokesperson, Garba Shehu said the president was not at any time in any form of danger arising from deadly infections or the reported incident by security personnel.
Confirmed cases = 6,673
\t\tActive cases = 4,435
\t\tRecoveries = 2,089
\t\tNumber of deaths = 149
John Hopkins Uni stats valid as of July 1, 2020
June 21: 100 days since index case; 4,738 cases
\tHealth Minister Mutahi Kagwe today announced that Kenya was marking 100 days since the first case was confirmed.
Total confirmed cases = 3,860
Total recoveries = 1,328
Total deaths = 105
Active cases = 2,427
\tFigures valid as of close of day June 16, 2020
June 15: 3,727 cases; burial guidelines relaxed
\tThe health ministry announced a relaxation of burial guidelines for victims of COVID-19.
Confirmed cases = 3,727
\t\tNumber of deaths = 104
\t\tRecoveries = 1,286
\t\tTotal tests = 118,701
\tMinistry of Health data, valid as of June 12, 2020
June 10: Kenya tops 3,000 mark
\tCase load topped 3,000 mark today with 105 new cases taking the tally to 3,094 confirmed cases, Health CAS Rashid Aman disclosed at the daily briefing on COVID-19.
Total confirmed cases = 2,600
Total recoveries = 706
Total deaths = 83
Active cases = 1,811
June 3: 2,216 cases, record recoveries
\t“This is the highest number of recoveries we have so far recorded since we announced the first discharge case on 1st April, 2020,” CAS Health Rashid Aman announced at today’s briefing.
\tMajor topics covered below include:
\t\tMay 31: Cases approach 2,000; Laikipia records case
\t\tMay 30: 1,888 cases, Kericho records infection
\t\tMay 27: Record one-day increase
\t\tMay 26: Govt intensifies voluntary testing calls
\t\tMay 23: 1,192 cases, additional health workers to be hired
\t\tMay 21: record one-day increase, Wajir rolls out campaign
\t\tMay 20: cases pass 1,000 mark, foreigners deported
\t\tMay 16: 830 cases, TZ, Somali borders shut
\t\tMay 14: Cases hit 758, focus turns to Kenya-Tanzania border town
\t\tMay 12: 715 cases, border crossings becoming flash point
\t\tMay 11: Cases reach 700, mass prisoner release
\t\tMay 10: 649 cases, Raila worries about Magufuli
\t\tMay 8: May 8: Govt to foot quarantine bills, cases at 607
\t\tMay 7: 582 cases, lockdown in Eastleigh, Mombasa City
\t\tMay 5: KQ’s UK repatriation flight returns
\t\tMay 4: Cases hit 535, govt decries abuse of relaxed measures
\t\tMay 3: KQ repatriation flight, Nairobi fumigation
\t\tMay 2: Case count at 435, mass testing starts
\t\tMay 1: Case count hits 411, Uhuru vows transparency
May 31: 1,962 cases as Laikipia records infection
\tToday, 74 people have tested positive for the virus fro
Zimbabwe has come under international scrutiny after President Emmerson Mnangagwa's government launched a crackdown against its critics that include opposition leaders, lawyers and journalists.
\"A pattern of intimidation and arbitrary arrest and detention of lawyers and journalists and indeed legitimate political opponents has distinctly emerged in Zimbabwe during the Covid-19 era,\" said Martin Okumu-Masiga, the AJJF secretary-general.
\"We urge the government of Zimbabwe to respect the rule of law and the right to freedom of expression and the right to fair trial as well as to respect the independence of judges and lawyers as is guaranteed by domestic and international obligations that the country is party to\" said Okumu-Masiga.
\"I draw the Zimbabwe government's attention to principle 16 of the UN basic principles on the role of lawyers, which requires surety from governments that lawyers are afforded the space to perform all of their professional functions free from intimidation, hindrance, harassment or improper interference; nor may lawyers suffer or be threatened with prosecution, or administrative, economic or any other sanction for any action taken in light of the recognised professional duties, standards and ethics.\"
\"We are concerned about the shrinking democratic space evidenced by abductions, arrests, persecution by the prosecution of civil society, lawyers and political opponents is inconsistent with (the government's) assertion that Zimbabwe is stable and peaceful.
The president of Kenya on Saturday announced its borders with neighbouring Somalia and Tanzania would be closed as the African country continued to battle the coronavirus outbreak.
In a briefing, Uhuru Kenyatta said the border would only be open to lorry drivers, but they would have to undergo tests before being allowed into Kenya.
However, I also strongly believe that we will only be able to do this the sooner we sharply suppress the growth of infections in our country.
Kenyatta also announced an extension of a curfew by 21 days, according to local media.
Kenyatta said lockdown measures would not be eased until the government managed to “sharply suppress the growth of infections in our country.”
