AFRICA

Cairo, Egypt | AFP | Mohsen al-Khayami has for years watched sadly as his once lucrative craft business dwindled and fellow artisans deserted the ancient art known as Khayamiya, or tentmaking, for better paying jobs. The 68 year-old, a master of one of Egypt’s most traditional crafts, has been handstitching the …

Kinshasa, DR Congo | AFP | Felix Tshisekedi was sworn in as the Democratic Republic of Congo’s new president Thursday after an election fraught with delays and doubts. Here is a recap. – Two-year delay – After being postponed three times, the elections go ahead on December 30, 2018 to chose …

Lagos, Nigeria | AFP | In the Ago Egun Bariga area of Nigeria’s commercial capital, Lagos, there is no road, no electricity, no running water and no rubbish collection. Now that high grass has blocked access to the water, there is no work either. The people of Ago Egun Bariga have …

Kinshasa, DR Congo | AFP | Felix Tshisekedi is to be sworn in on Thursday as president of Democratic Republic of Congo, marking the country’s first-ever peaceful handover of power after chaotic and bitterly-disputed elections. At 55, opposition leader Tshisekedi takes over from Joseph Kabila who is stepping aside after 18 …

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | After Zimbabwe’s authoritarian leader Robert Mugabe was forced from power, his successor Emmerson Mnangagwa declared the country had turned the page on repression. Today, such claims sound deeply hollow as Zimbabwe reels from its second crackdown on protest in less than six months, analysts …

Khartoum, Sudan | AFP | Sudanese police fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in the capital and its twin city of Omdurman Tuesday as demonstrators staged night-time rallies against the government. The after-dark demonstrations were the latest in more than a month of escalating protests against President Omar al-Bashir’s …

ANIANSUE, Ivory Coast | AFP | A dozen women, their bodies coated with clay, sway to beating drums as if in a trance, ankle bells jingling as they stamp their feet, in the eastern Ivorian town of Aniansue. They are training to become certified “komians”, or priestesses, steeped in traditional …

Kinshasa, DR Congo | AFP | DR Congo was on Monday making plans to install Felix Tshisekedi as its new president this week after a long and bitter election whose outcome was disputed by the runner-up and shunned by many western nations. The ceremony, which looks likely to happen on …

Nairobi, Kenya | AFP |  Four people were wounded when gunmen opened fire on a Chinese construction site in Kenya’s remote northeast, before being quickly repelled, police said on Monday. Eight attackers opened fire on the construction site near the town of Garissa late on Sunday evening, said David Kerina, …

Harare, Zimbabwe | AFP |  Zimbabwe’s High Court on Monday ruled that State Security Minister Owen Ncube had no power to order the internet shutdown which took place during last week’s nationwide protests. “It has become very clear that the minister had no authority to make that directive,” judge Owen …