Millions of people around the world enjoy drinking coffee. But the daily caffeine fix could be under threat – because climate change is killing coffee plants. As Henry Ridgwell reports, scientists in London are working with farmers in Africa to find a solution.
Camera: Henry Ridgwell
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Officials in Madagascar say Cyclone Batsirai swept through the Indian Ocean nation this past weekend, killing 20 people, displacing 50,000 and destroying crops that were almost ready to be harvested.

With a population of nearly 30 million, Madagascar had already been dealing with the aftermath of Tropical Storm Ana, which killed 55 people and displaced 130,000 just two weeks ago.

Officials say Batsirai struck a different part of the island further south where the population was already facing a precarious situation in terms of food supplies because of a severe drought.

Government officials say emergency rescuers were struggling to reach the worst affected areas Monday because 12 roads and 14 bridges were impassable, while rising river levels threatened to displace more people.

President Andry Rajoelina went to the town of Mananjary to survey the storm’s destruction and the relief efforts. Officials say the town was among the hardest-hit areas, with about 3,000 dwellings and government buildings destroyed and about 5,700 others flooded.

The state disaster relief agency said more than 200 schools were partially or fully destroyed, leaving more than 10,000 children unable to attend classes.

Jean-Benoit Manhes, deputy representative for the U.N, Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Madagascar, said the cyclone left the nation facing a humanitarian crisis due to food insecurity. He said the central part of the country, where most of the nation’s rice crop is located, was more affected by rain than wind from the storm. Water levels in the rivers there will rise, impacting the crops.

“The effects of the cyclone won’t end today. They will be felt for many months, especially in agriculture,” Manhes said.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse.
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A satirical author arrested in Uganda for insulting the son of President Yoweri Museveni has been denied permission to travel abroad. The satirical author had hoped to travel abroad to pick up an award and receive medical treatment.

Appearing in a Kampala courtroom Monday afternoon, author Kakwenza Rukirabashaija hoped the magistrate would ease some of his bail conditions.

Kakwenza, through his lawyer, was seeking release of his passport and also asked that his case be moved to the High Court for trial.

Kakwenza wants to travel to Germany to pick up a writing award and receive specialized treatment for torture he allegedly received in jail.

But lawyer Eron Kiiza says all the submitted requests were denied.  

“It jeopardizes the chances of our client to fight for his life and his health following the military torture in Entebbe. It’s obvious, since we started trying to expose his torture, they have been fighting it. So, this is the latest attempt to shield the wrongdoing from scrutiny,” Kiiza said.

In December 2021, Kakwenza was arrested for “offensive communication” under Uganda’s Computer Misuse Act. 

The author had written that the president’s son, Lt. Gen. Kainerugaba Muhoozi, was obese and bad tempered. Muhoozi is seen as Museveni’s possible successor in the next election in 2026.

Kakwenza was detained for a month, and for part of that time, he was held by the military at an unidentified location where he was reportedly tortured.

Kakwenza has said he was severely beaten and made to dance through the day and night with few hours of sleep. He said his captors also used a pair of pliers to pluck flesh from his thighs. 

Photos of his body published in local media show torture marks on his back, thighs and hands.

After the release of the images on social media last week, the U.S. and EU called for the prosecution of security personnel involved in torture. Ugandan officials have not commented on the claims.

However, the magistrate ruled that Kakwenza has no serious illness to warrant specialized treatment in Europe and said his medical condition can be handled in Uganda.

The magistrate also stated that Kakwenza does not need to visit Germany to receive his award, as this can be done online. He also turned down the request to move the writer’s case to the high court.

Kakwenza’s trial is now set to begin on March 23.
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Russia’s geopolitical ambitions in Africa have in recent years been backed by private military contractors, often described as belonging to the “Wagner group” — an entity with no known legal status.   

Most recently, Western nations have condemned the alleged arrival of Russian mercenaries in Mali’s capital Bamako, a claim denied by the junta that seized power in 2020.   

As relations with France worsen, the military rulers may be looking for ways to make up for shrinking numbers of European troops fighting Mali’s years-old jihadist insurgency.   

“Mercs [mercenaries] working in Africa is an established norm” thanks in part to decades of operations by contractors from South Africa, said Jason Blazakis of the New York-based Soufan Group think tank.   

“The Wagner folks are walking through a door that has long been open to their ilk,” he added.   

No information is publicly available about the group’s size or finances.   

But around Africa, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington has found evidence since 2016 of Russian soldiers of fortune in Sudan, South Sudan, Libya, the Central African Republic (CAR), Madagascar and Mozambique.   

Botswana, Burundi, Chad, the Comoros, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Congo-Brazzaville, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Nigeria and Zimbabwe are also on the CSIS’s list.   

In Africa “there is a convergence of many states’ interests, including China’s,” Alexey Mukhin of the Moscow-based Centre for Political Information told AFP.   

“Every state has the right to defend its business assets,” he added.   

‘Hysteria’ 

Wagner does not officially exist, with no company registration, tax returns or organizational chart to be found.   

When the EU wanted to sanction the group in 2020, it targeted Russian oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, an ally of President Vladimir Putin who is suspected of running Wagner.   

It imposed further sanctions in December last year when mercenaries’ arrival in Mali appeared certain — drawing accusations of “hysteria” from Moscow.   

Western experts say military contractors are embedded in Russia’s official forces like intelligence agencies and the army, providing plausible deniability for Moscow.   

Their deployment to African countries aims to “enable Russia to… regain this sphere of influence” that fell away with the collapse of the Soviet Union, said CSIS researcher Catrina Doxsee.   

The mercenaries’ presence has been growing even faster since a 2019 Russia-Africa summit.   

Moscow has been active “especially in what has traditionally been France’s zone of influence” in former colonies like CAR and Mali, said Djallil Lounnas, a researcher at Morocco’s Al Akhawayn university.   

While military contractors sometimes shepherd Russian arms sales, the revenue “really pales compared with the profit they are able to generate from mining concessions and access to natural resources,” Doxsee said.   

That makes unstable countries with mineral or hydrocarbon wealth prime customers — such as in Syria where the mercenaries first became known to the wider public.   

No questions asked 

Lounnas said that another advantage for clients is a lack of friction over human rights and democracy that might come with Western partners.   

“Russia has its interests. It doesn’t ask questions,” he added.   

Reports of violence and abuse on the ground suggest that same latitude may extend to the mercenaries themselves.   

In the CAR, the United Nations is probing an alleged massacre during a joint operation by government forces and Wagner fighters.   

One military source told AFP that more than 50 people died, some in “summary executions.”

On Thursday, the European Union said it would not resume military training in the CAR — suspended since mid-December — unless the country’s soldiers stop working for Wagner.   

Meanwhile the mercenaries’ results do not always measure up to the hopes of the governments that hire them.   

In Libya, Russian mercenaries suffered heavy losses in Marshal Khalifa Haftar’s year-long attempt to conquer the capital Tripoli, which was ultimately unsuccessful.   

And in Mozambique, the Russians retreated in the face of Islamic State group jihadists, ultimately losing out to South African competitors.   

Although lacking language skills and experience with the terrain, Wagner “were picked because they were the cheapest”, Doxsee said.   

“They didn’t have what it took to succeed,” she added, noting that “they’ve had a fair few failures” across Africa.   

Succeeding completely might actually harm the mercenaries’ business model, which thrives on unrest, conflict and crisis.   

“If a country such as the CAR hires them to train forces, to help them in their military efforts, it’s in their interest to accomplish that just well enough to continue to be employed,” Doxsee said.  

“If they actually were to do it well enough to resolve the conflict, they would no longer be needed.”
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After final against Egypt finished 0-0 in extra time, Sengal won shoot-out 4-2
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Tunisian judges on Sunday rejected President Kais Saied’s moves to disband the council that oversees them, a move they see as undermining their independence, setting up a new struggle over his consolidation of power.

Saied announced overnight he was dissolving the Supreme Judicial Council, one of the few remaining state bodies still able to act independently of him, the latest in a series of moves his opponents call a coup.

In July he suddenly suspended parliament, dismissed the prime minister and said he could rule by decree, and has since said he will rewrite the 2014 democratic constitution before putting it to a public referendum.

Saied has vowed to uphold rights and freedoms won in the 2011 revolution that introduced democracy, but his critics say he is leaning increasingly on the security forces and fear he will take a harsher stance against dissent.

Tunisia’s dire economic problems and a looming crisis in public finances risk undermining Saied’s declared plan to reset the 2011 revolution with a new constitution, raising the possibility of public unrest.

Saied has been tussling with the judiciary for months, criticizing its decisions, accusing it of corruption and saying it has been infiltrated by his political enemies.

The Supreme Judicial Council head, Youssef Bouzakher, early on Sunday said its dissolution was illegal and marked an attempt to bring judges under presidential instruction.

“Judges will not stay silent,” he warned.

Later, two other judicial organizations condemned the move as unconstitutional. The Young Magistrates Association said it was part of a political purge of the judiciary and the Judges Association said Saied was trying to amass all powers in his own hands.

Saied, a constitutional law professor before running for president in 2019, is married to a judge and has repeatedly said that the judiciary should remember it represents a function of the state rather than being the state itself.

In January, he revoked financial privileges for the council’s members, accusing the independent body established in 2016 of appointing judges to their positions based on loyalty to its leadership.

“Their place is not where they sit now, but where the accused stand,” Saied said of the council members in his overnight speech, delivered from the building of the Interior Ministry, which oversees Tunisia’s security forces.

Saied had called on supporters to protest against the council on Sunday, but only a few hundred people turned up. Some held a banner saying, “The people want to cleanse the judiciary.”

Several main parties in the suspended parliament, including the moderate Islamist Ennahda which has been part of successive governments since 2011, accuse Saied of a coup.

Ennahda leader Rached Ghannouchi, who is also the speaker of the suspended parliament, said in a statement on Sunday that the body rejected Saied’s decision to dissolve the council and voiced solidarity with the judges.

Three other parties, Attayar, Joumhouri and Ettakatol, issued a joint statement rejecting the move.
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A cyclone killed at least 10 people in southeastern Madagascar, the second to hit the Indian Ocean island in just two weeks, triggering floods, bringing down buildings and cutting power, officials said on Sunday.

One of the worst-hit towns was Nosy Varika on the east coast where almost 95% of buildings were destroyed “as if we had just been bombed” and floods cut access, an official said.

Cyclone Batsirai swept inland late on Saturday, slamming into the eastern coastline with heavy rain and wind speeds of 165 km/h (100 mph). It was projected it could displace as many as 150,000 people.

The damage from the storm compounded the destruction wreaked by Cyclone Ana, which hit the island, with a population of nearly 30,000,000, two weeks ago, killing 55 people and displacing 130,000

Madagascar’s office of disaster and risk management said in a bulletin late on Sunday 10 people had been killed. State radio said some died when their house collapsed in the town of Ambalavao, about 460 kilometers south of the capital Antananarivo.

“We saw only desolation: uprooted trees, fallen electric poles, roofs torn off by the wind, the city completely under water,” Nirina Rahaingosoa, a resident of Fianarantsoa, 420 kilometers south of the capital, told Reuters by phone.

Electricity was knocked out in the town as poles were toppled by gusts of winds that blew all night into Sunday morning, he said.

Willy Raharijaona, technical adviser to the vice president of Madagascar’s Senate, said some parts of the southeast had been cut off from the surrounding areas by flooding.

“It’s as if we had just been bombed. The city of Nosy Varika is almost 95% destroyed,” he said. “The solid houses saw their roofs torn off by the wind. The wooden huts have for the most part been destroyed.”

Another resident who gave only one name, Raharijaona, told Reuters even schools and churches that had been preparing to shelter the displaced around Mananjary in the southeast had their roofs torn off.

In the central region of Haute Matsiatra, villagers shoveled mud from a road to clear damage from a landslide caused by Batsirai.

Cyclone Ana that struck the Indian Ocean Island nation on Jan. 22, leaving at least 55 dead from landslides and collapsed buildings and causing widespread flooding.

After ravaging Madagascar, Ana moved west, making landfall in Mozambique and continuing inland to Malawi. A total of 88 people were killed.
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African leaders meeting in Ethiopia have condemned recent coups in the region. An African Union official says the organization has suspended four nations for unconstitutional changes of power.

Leaders gathered at the 35th African Union Summit have condemned the “waves” of coups seen in Africa. Ambassador Bankole Adeoye is the AU’s commissioner of political affairs, peace and security. He said summit attendees took a firm stance against any “unconstitutional change of government” in Africa.

“What is important is that our leaders have condemned in no uncertain terms that the African Union, the regional economic communities, will not tolerate a military coup d’etat in any form,” he said.

To underscore the point, the ambassador noted the AU suspended the membership of four nations: Mali, Guinea, Sudan and Burkina Faso.

At Sunday’s closing session, Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta presented a report linking coups to political instability and an absence of good governance that undermine Africa’s socioeconomic progress.

Kenyatta chairs the Peace and Security Council of the African Union. He called on the African Union to address root the causes of the coups.

The report also addressed ways to curb terror activities and politically-motivated conflicts across the continent, including in Ethiopia.

Ambassador Bankole says the Peace and Security Council is backing efforts to facilitate talks between the Ethiopian government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front while supporting Ethiopia’s commission for national dialogue. Armed conflict involving the government and TPLF erupted in November 2020.
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As efforts to assess impact of last month’s Tropical Storm Ana in Malawi continue, the country’s only power generating company says it has lost about a third of its generating capacity to the storm. Meanwhile, the government has appealed to donors to contribute toward the cost of rehabilitating the station, which it says is beyond its financial capacity.

Officials at the Electricity Generation Company, EGENCO, say Malawi has lost about 130 megawatts following the shutdown of its Kapichira Power Station in the Chikwawa district due to last month’s Tropical Storm Ana.

William Liabunya is EGENCO’s chief executive officer.

“We have lost the dam here because the control mechanism that we had to take the water to the intake of the machines has been destroyed,” he said. “We had the training dike and that has been washed away, and on the dam wall you have seen that now the water is passing through the dam wall and therefore we cannot hold any water at the dam and through that, we cannot generate any electricity.”

EGENCO operates four hydropower stations in Malawi: Nkula, Tedzani, Kapichira and Wovwe according to its website.

The company also operates thermal and solar power plants. Overall, it has a total installed generation capacity of over 440 megawatts, with about 390 of it from hydropower plants and about 50 megawatts are from thermal power plants.

The damage at Kapichira has cost the company 30% of the total hydropower generation.

Liabunya says plans are underway to construct temporary structures to help bring power back but he said he was not certain how soon that would be.

“We have just consulted an expert to look into this issue. In our own resource at the company we have looked at it, and we are saying that for the temporary structure that we want to put and quickly restore the power generation, we are looking at six months the time that will be required but that is to be verified by the consultant as he finishes the expert analysis of the work,” he said.

The storm also killed at least 90 people in Madagascar, Mozambique and Malawi.

The Department of Disaster Management Affairs says in Malawi, the storm killed 32 people and displaced 188,000 from their homes in 17 districts.

Meanwhile, donor partners and well-wishers including United Nations agencies in Malawi have started providing aid to victims.

Malawi’s Minister of Energy Ibrahim Matola is appealing to donors for help in rehabilitating the power station.

“These works cannot be done with only our local purse because we are so exhausted with other related issues. However, I would like to call upon the international community; The World Bank, IMF, European Union, Britain and the Americans to come and assist us,” he said.

Matola says Malawi would need about $23 million for the temporary rehabilitation of the damaged Kapichira Power Station.

In the meantime, some businesses in affected areas have closed temporarily, while others are using gasoline-powered generators.
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Cyclone Batsirai weakened overnight but floods were still expected due to heavy rain after it hit eastern Madagascar with strong winds, the island’s meteorological office said Sunday.

“Batsirai has weakened,” Meteo Madagascar said, adding that the cyclone’s average wind speed had almost halved to 80 kph, while the strongest gusts had scaled back to 110 kph from the 235 kph recorded when it made landfall on Saturday evening.

The cyclone, the second storm to hit the large Indian Ocean island nation in just a few weeks, was moving westwards at a rate of 19 kph, the meteorological services said.

But “localized or generalized floods are still feared following the heavy rains,” it said, adding that Batsirai should emerge at sea in the Mozambique Channel later Sunday.

Batsirai made landfall in Mananjary district, more than 530 kilometers southeast of the capital Antananarivo, around 8 p.m. local time (1700 GMT) Saturday.

It reached the island as an “intense tropical cyclone”, packing winds of 165 kph, Faly Aritiana Fabien of the country’s disaster management agency told AFP.

The national meteorological office has said it fears “significant and widespread damage.”

Just an hour and a half after it first hit land, nearly 27,000 people had been counted as displaced from their homes, Fabien said.

He said his office has accommodation sites, food and medical care ready for victims, as well as search and rescue plans already in place.

‘Very serious threat’

The Meteo-France weather service had earlier predicted Batsirai would present “a very serious threat” to Madagascar, after passing Mauritius and drenching the French island of La Reunion with torrential rain for two days.

In the hours before the cyclone hit, residents hunkered down in the impoverished country, still recovering from the deadly Tropical Storm Ana late last month.

In the eastern coastal town of Vatomandry, more than 200 people were crammed in one room in a Chinese-owned concrete building.

Families slept on mats or mattresses.

Community leader Thierry Louison Leaby lamented the lack of clean water after the water utility company turned off supplies ahead of the cyclone.

“People are cooking with dirty water,” he said, amid fears of a diarrhea outbreak.

Outside plastic dishes and buckets were placed in a line to catch rainwater dripping from the corrugated roofing sheets.

“The government must absolutely help us. We have not been given anything,” he said.

Residents who chose to remain in their homes used sandbags and yellow jerrycans to buttress their roofs.

Cyclone still ‘dangerous’

Other residents of Vatomandry were stockpiling supplies in preparation for the storm.

“We have been stocking up for a week, rice but also grains because with the electricity cuts we cannot keep meat or fish,” said Odette Nirina, a 65-year-old hotelier in Vatomandry.

“I have also stocked up on coal. Here we are used to cyclones,” she told AFP.

Winds of more than 50 kph pummeled Vatomandry on Saturday morning, accompanied by intermittent rain.

The disaster agency said the cyclone was expected to remain “dangerous” as it swept across the large island overnight and in the morning.

Flooding is expected due to excessive rainfall in the east, southeast and central regions of the country, it warned.

The United Nations was ramping up its preparedness with aid agencies, placing rescue aircraft on standby and stockpiling humanitarian supplies.

At least 131,000 people were affected by Ana across Madagascar in late January. Close to 60 people were killed, mostly in the capital Antananarivo.

That storm also hit Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, causing dozens of deaths.

The U.N.’s World Food Program pointed to estimates from national authorities that some 595,000 people could be directly affected by Batsirai, and 150,000 more might be displaced due to new landslides and flooding.

The storm poses a risk to at least 4.4 million people in one way or another, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said. 

  
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Tunisian President Kais Saied on Sunday dissolved the Supreme Judicial Council, the body that deals with judicial independence, a move that raises fears about the independence of the judiciary and was sure to anger his opponents.

Saied’s decision caps months of his sharp criticism of the judges. Saied has frequently criticized the judiciary’s delay in issuing rulings in cases of corruption and terrorism. He repeatedly said he would not allow judges to act as if they are a state, instead of being a function of the state.

Saied called the council a thing of the past, adding he will issue a temporary decree to the council. He gave no details about the decree.

In July, Saied dismissed the government and suspended parliament, a move his opponents described as a coup. He has been broadly criticized after seizing power and rejecting dialogue with all political parties.

The Supreme Judicial Council is an independent and constitutional institution, formed in 2016. Its powers include ensuring the independence of the judiciary, disciplining judges and granting them professional promotions.

Last month, Saied revoked all financial privileges for council members.

“In this council, positions and appointments are sold according to loyalties. Their place is not the place where they sit now, but where the accused stand,” Saied said in speech in the interior ministry.

On Sunday, parties and organizations, including the powerful UGTT union, will demonstrate to pressure the judiciary to hold those involved in terrorism accountable, on the ninth anniversary of the assassination of secular politician Chokri Belaid.

It is expected that Saied’s supporters will also protest in a second demonstration against the Supreme Judicial Council. “I tell Tunisians to demonstrate freely. It is your right and our right to dissolve the Supreme Judicial Council,” Saied said.

Saied’s approval of Sunday’s demonstrations comes even though a government decision to ban all demonstrations remains in effect.

Last month, police fired water cannons and beat protesters with sticks to break up an opposition protest against Saied, whose seizure of broad powers and declared plans to redraw the constitution have cast doubt on Tunisia’s decade-old democratic system and hindered its quest for an international rescue plan for public finances.

The president has initiated an online public consultation before drafting a new constitution that he says will be put to a referendum. He has not brought major political or civil society players into the process. 

 
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Guinea’s transitional assembly, which is tasked with organizing a return to civilian rule after the military overthrow last year of resident Alpha Conde, held its first session Saturday.

All 81 members of the national transitional council, known by its French acronym CNT, were present for the inaugural session in parliament buildings in the capital, Conakry, AFP journalists said.

The session lasted several hours and was opened by CNT President Dansa Kourouma and in the presence of transitional Prime Minister Mohamed Beavogui, a development expert.

“The radical change in the mechanisms that bring elites to power and allows them to remain in power almost indefinitely (is a problem that) must be definitively resolved,” Kourouma said in his speech.

He called for a constitution to be drawn up “that will not be easily modified,” a reference to Conde, who had sparked fury by changing the constitution in order to run for a third term.

“Our path will be strewn with all sorts of pitfalls that we are called upon to overcome from now on, until the installation of the future National Assembly, at the end of credible and transparent elections that will be organized to put an end to the transition,” Kourouma added.

Conde, who was Guinea’s first democratically elected president and had been in power since 2010, was deposed Sept. 5 the age of 83.

‘Work starts today’

Colonel Mamady Doumbouya, who led the coup, was sworn in as interim president a month later, promising to “re-found the state.”

He also vowed to fight corruption and reform the electoral system to hold “free, credible and transparent” elections.

The CNT, whose members were chosen by Doumbouya from lists submitted by political parties and associations, is tasked with drafting a new constitution and suggesting a date for a return to civilian rule.

In the meantime, the government and other institutions have been dissolved and ministers, governors and prefects replaced with administrators and soldiers.

The U.S. ambassador to Guinea, Troy Fitrell, congratulated the country on the new CNT.

“Work starts today to return democracy to the Guinean people,” he wrote in a tweet. “The challenge is to do it in 2022.”

Guinea is one of three West African countries where the military seized power in the last 18 months, along with Mali and Burkina Faso.

The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has suspended both Guinea and neighboring Mali from the bloc and imposed sanctions over the coups.

In a mark of defiance, the president of the transitional council of Mali and former junta member Colonel Malick Diaw attended Saturday’s inaugural session of Guinea’s assembly.

“With the political transition under way in Mali and Guinea our two countries are at a crossroads,” Diaw said, insisting the end goal was “political normalization.”

ECOWAS demanded that Guinea hold elections within six months of the coup, which would fall in mid-March. 
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The Moroccan royal palace said Saturday that a 5-year-old boy who was trapped in a deep well for four days has died. 

Moroccan King Mohammed VI expressed his condolences to the boy’s parents in a statement released by the palace. 

The boy, Rayan, was pulled from the well Saturday night by rescuers after a lengthy operation that captivated global attention. 

An Associated Press reporter at the scene saw the boy wrapped in a yellow blanket after he emerged from a tunnel dug specifically for the rescue.  

His parents had been escorted to an ambulance before the boy emerged. 

Online messages of support and concern for the boy poured in from around the world as the rescue efforts dragged through the night. 

Rescuers used a rope to send oxygen and water down to the boy as well as a camera to monitor him. By Saturday morning, the head of the rescue committee, Abdelhadi Temrani, said: “It is not possible to determine the child’s condition at all at this time. But we hope to God that the child is alive.” 

In the well for days

Rayan fell into a 32-meter (105-feet) well located outside his home in the village of Ighran in Morocco’s mountainous northern Chefchaouen province on Tuesday evening. He became trapped in a hole too narrow for rescuers to reach safely. 

For three days, search crews used bulldozers to dig a parallel ditch. Then on Friday, they started excavating a horizontal tunnel to reach the trapped boy. Morocco’s MAP news agency said that experts in topographical engineering were called upon for help. 

Temrani, speaking to local television 2M, said Saturday that rescuers had just two meters (yards) left to dig to reach the hole where the boy was trapped.  

“The diggers encountered a hard rock on their way and were therefore very careful to avoid any landslides or cracks,” he said. “It took about five hours to get rid of the rock because the digging was slow and was done in a careful way to avoid creating cracks in the hole from below, which could threaten the life of the child as well as the rescue workers.” 

The work was especially difficult for fear that the soil surrounding the well could collapse on the boy. 

Villagers gather

His distraught parents were joined by hundreds of villagers and others who had gathered to watch the rescue operation. 

The village of about 500 people is dotted with deep wells, many used for irrigating the cannabis crop that is the main source of income for many in the poor, remote and arid region of Morocco’s Rif Mountains. Most of the wells have protective covers. 

The exact circumstances of how the boy fell in the well are unclear. 

Nationwide, Moroccans had taken to social media to offer their hopes for the boy’s survival, using the hashtag #SaveRayan which has brought global attention to the rescue efforts. 
…

With rising oil prices, Nigeria is cracking down on oil theft as part of the country’s effort to recover missed revenue. Nigeria loses some 150,000 barrels of oil a day to illegal tapping of pipelines. At that rate, authorities say the country loses about $4 billion every year, or 10 percent of its annual budget.

Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission head Gbenga Komolafe announced the revenue-recovery effort this week but declined to provide further details on new steps authorities would take.

Gbenga said President Muhammadu Buhari approved the “Industry-Wide Oil Revenue Recovery Initiative” and formed a committee that includes several security agencies. He said the committee will begin operations soon.

“The positive impact of that will be witnessed very soon because there is [a] collaborative approach to stop the incident, especially as it affects the federation’s revenue. You should not expect me to disclose the strategy,” Gbenga said.

The petroleum commission says the ambitious recovery plan will double the nation’s output from 1.5 million barrels of oil a day to3 million barrels daily.

Output has dwindled in Nigeria in recent years as a result of the illegal tapping of oil pipelines. The commission said oil production slipped to 1.5 million barrels a day in December 2021 from 1.7 million at the start of last year.

Nigeria’s current production level falls short of OPEC’s earmark for the West African nation.

Energy expert Odion Omonfoman says the government’s revenue recovery plan is possible.

“That should have been $4 billion that would have accrued to the federation, which should have been used to build schools, hospitals, roads, infrastructure,” Omonfoman said. “But that money is pretty much stolen and doesn’t come back to Nigeria. It also harms investment in the oil and gas sector. If you notice, a lot of the IOCs are divesting from onshore and shallow water assets that they used to own.”  

But Omonfoman says while promoting initiatives that will boost production and generate more revenue, authorities must also consider local communities that are suffering from environmental hazards resulting from oil production.  

“Any action aimed at reducing the amount of sabotage, including involving the local communities who literally are unwilling participants in this business will be helpful,” Omonfoman said. “At the end of the day we must have a strategy that ensures that the local communities benefit from crude oil and gas productions within their area. You must have some form of incentive that will ensure and allow continuous production and community participation in protecting oil and gas assets.”

Oil prices have jumped on global markets to more than $90 per barrel. Nigeria’s economy is highly dependent on earnings from oil.

 
…

Increasing violence and insecurity in Burkina Faso are spurring refugees to flee into neighboring countries, adding to political and humanitarian crises in the Sahel region. 
The United Nations Refugee Agency, UNHCR, says some 19,200 Burkinabe fled last year to neighboring Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, and Benin.  This was a 50% increase from the previous year.  

The agency says the number of Burkinabe living in exile across the region has nearly doubled to more than 34,000. Among them are 7,000 refugees who have arrived in northwestern Ivory Coast, or Cote d’Ivoire, since May.

UNHCR spokesman Boris Cheshirkov says vicious attacks by armed groups, mainly in the region bordering Ivory Coast, are driving more people to flee across the border. 

“The influx has accelerated in the past six weeks—though it is not linked to the recent military coup in the country—with an average of 100 people daily recently crossing the border, according to local authorities,” Cheshirkov said.  “We have registered and have been providing assistance to over 4,000 of them already.”   

The increasing refugee movement is putting enormous strain on the fragile Sahel region.  The Central Sahel, which includes Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, is plagued by political instability, widespread violence, food shortages, and a climate crisis.  

Cheshirkov says this region of 20 million people cannot manage and support rapidly growing populations.  He warns intercommunal conflicts over scarce resources are worsening.

“The plight of Burkinabe refugees is becoming increasingly precarious as more people arrive in Cote d’Ivoire without personal belongings or food,” Cheshirkov said.  “They told UNHCR staff that civilians had been killed and their homes burnt down by extremists.  They are being hosted by Ivorian villagers in crowded conditions.”   

On top of the burgeoning refugee crisis, the UNHCR reports Burkina Faso also is facing a crisis of internal displacement.  It says increasing violence by armed groups has forced more than 1.5 million people to flee their homes.
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U.N. experts say rebel groups in Darfur that signed a peace agreement with the Sudanese government in 2020 continue to operate in Libya and profit from opportunities provided by the civil war and lack of government control in the oil-rich north African nation.

In a report to the U.N. Security Council circulated Friday, the panel of experts monitoring sanctions against Sudan stemming from the 2003 Darfur conflict said several sources in the rebel movements said they have no intention of completely withdrawing from Libya because they get most of their financing and supplies, including food and fuel, from engagements there.

They quoted one commander as saying: “We will have one foot in Darfur and one foot in Benghazi,” the main city in eastern Libya which is the stronghold of forces loyal to military commander Khalifa Hifter.

Libya plunged into turmoil after a NATO-backed uprising in 2011 toppled dictator Moammar Gadhafi, who was later killed. It then became divided between rival governments — one in the east, backed by Hifter, and a U.N.-supported administration in the capital Tripoli, each supported by different militias and foreign powers.

In April 2019, Hifter and his forces, backed by Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, launched an offensive to try and capture Tripoli. His campaign collapsed after Turkey stepped up its military support of the U.N.-supported government with hundreds of troops and thousands of Syrian mercenaries.

An October 2020 cease-fire agreement called for the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Libya and led to an agreement on a transitional government in early February 2021. Elections that were supposed to be held on Dec. 24 have been delayed.

The panel of experts said despite the cease-fire agreement’s call for foreign forces to leave, “most of the Darfurian groups in Libya continued to work under the Libyan National Army,” securing areas and manning checkpoints.

In return for their work, the experts said, the five main Darfur rebel movements that signed the 2020 Juba Peace Agreement were receiving payments and logistical support.

According to several unidentified sources in the movements, the experts said the money and support were agreed on in meetings between their military commanders and UAE representatives in Libya. “The payments were provided by the United Arab Emirates and channeled to the movements by the Libyan National Army, which took a cut,” the panel said.

“In the recent months with relative peace in Libya and the announcement of elections, there is pressure on the signatory Darfurian armed groups to leave Libya,” the panel said. “The payments to the Darfurian groups have been reduced.”

Sudan had been on a fragile path to democracy after a popular uprising forced the military to remove autocratic President Omar al-Bashir and his Islamist government in April 2019. But an October military coup has plunged the country into turmoil.

The Juba Peace Agreement was seen as a breakthrough in the conflict in the vast western region of Darfur that began when ethnic Africans rebelled, accusing the Arab-dominated Sudanese government of discrimination. The government in Khartoum was accused of retaliating by arming local nomadic Arab tribes and unleashing them on civilian populations — a charge it denies.

The experts said the UAE saw the Juba agreement as the basis for a successful transition and recommended that the Darfurian movements join the government. They said the UAE argued that it did not finance or arm the movements, and focused on health and education efforts as well as helping Sudan and other regional countries control their borders.

At a meeting in November, the panel said, the UAE responded to allegations of possible financial or military support to Darfurian forces both in Sudan and Libya by referring “to its country’s moderate position and struggle against extremism and hate speech.”

One major Darfur rebel group, the Sudan Liberation Movement-Army, led by Abdel-Wahid Nour, has refused to sign the Juba agreement and rejected the original military-civilian transitional government formed after al-Bashir’s ouster.

The experts said the rebel group also has a presence in Libya and continues to take advantage of revenue from the Torroye gold mine in its stronghold in Jebel Marra and a gold mine near Danaya in South Darfur “to strengthen its capability.”

The panel said it received information that UAE authorities had seized gold linked to one of the Darfurian movements and is seeking additional information.

It also reported that violations of the arms embargo against Sudan continued with the transfer of arms and other military materiel into Darfur. 

 
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More than 20,000 Sudanese and South Sudanese forced by violence to flee their refugee camps in northwestern Ethiopia are in desperate need of lifesaving aid. 

A camp hosting 10,300 Sudanese and South Sudanese refugees in Ethiopia’s northwestern region of Benishangul-Gumuz was looted and burned on January 18.  

This, after fighting broke out between unidentified armed groups and federal forces in the nearby town of Tongo. 

This alarming event followed the looting of another camp in the area in late December.  

A spokesman for the U.N. high commissioner for refugees, Boris Cheshirkov, said the situation in this region has been very tense since violence first erupted in December. 

“A total of 22,000 people in both camps have been cut off from access and assistance since then,” Cheshirkov said. “All humanitarian staff have had to evacuate, and access to the area including to the two camps remains impossible. “ 

The Benishangul-Gumuz region borders Sudan and South Sudan. It hosts more than 70,000 refugees from those countries, as well as more than a half-million Ethiopians internally displaced by intercommunal violence and conflict. 

Cheshirkov reports that since violence erupted in December, more than 20,000 refugees have made the long, difficult trek to three different sites closer to Asosa, the regional capital. He said all have arrived exhausted and in need of assistance. 

“UNHCR, the U.N. refugee agency, and partners are rushing life-saving aid to more than 20,000 refugees,” Cheshirkov said. “UNHCR is working with the Ethiopian Refugee and Returnees Service and partners to provide the most urgent assistance to displaced refugees, including hot meals, clean water, and medical care.” 

Cheshirkov said regional authorities are setting up a new temporary site that can hold 20,000 people. He said UNHCR is working to install basic services including shelter, water collection points and latrines. It then will seek to relocate the refugees to the new site as soon as possible. 

 
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The head of Sudan’s Sovereign Council has ordered various armed groups to leave major towns in the nation’s troubled Darfur region, to be replaced by a new hybrid defense force made up of government troops and those of armed groups that signed a landmark 2020 peace accord. 

General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan told reporters Wednesday that “within this week” fighters unaffiliated with that hybrid force would be expected to vacate major towns and assemble at designated areas in Darfur to pave the way for the joint force to take control of security in Darfur’s major towns.              

“There are other negative armed forces that are trying to cause havoc,” al-Burhan said. “We have jointly agreed to fight them and prevent them from causing insecurity for our civilians.”

Al-Burhan delivered his comments in North Darfur’s provincial capital, el-Fasher, where he and his ruling Sovereign Council deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo met with leaders of the nine armed groups that were signatories to the Juba Agreement of October 2020. They recommitted to create the joint force that had been approved by the pact but never implemented because of instability in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. That led to a complete military takeover last October 25, which al-Burhan defended, saying he was saving Sudan from civil war.

The joint force should be in place by next week, said al-Burhan, commander in chief of Sudan’s armed forces. The Juba Agreement’s terms call for a joint force of 12,000. 

Residents of Darfur have complained of brutal treatment by a variety of government-backed militias, a problem exacerbated by a resurgence of tribal clashes across the region.

In December, Sudan political leaders and anti-coup demonstrators rejected a deal worked out between al-Burhan and Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, who had been reinstated after initially being removed in the coup. 

At least 76 people have been killed in anti-coup protests as of last week, according a Sudanese doctors’ group.

On Wednesday, hundreds of internally displaced people rallied in el-Fasher to protest al-Burhan’s visit and the ongoing insecurity. Police used tear gas to disperse them, and at least five people were reported injured. 

Adam Rijal, spokesperson for the group General Coordination of Displaced Persons and Refugees, said its members would continue to protest killings and lootings allegedly carried out by government militias in Darfur.

The militias have not been held to account, Rijal told South Sudan in Focus via a messaging app. “There is no one that would write a regular report” to the United Nations Security Council, he said. “That is why they continue with their brutality against the people. The Sudanese government should take responsibility for these mistakes.” 

Al-Burhan on Wednesday said the transitional government was committed to protecting civilians and carrying out the deal’s security arrangements.

“I would like to assure our relatives in Al-Fashir and other towns that we are keen to work together as one people to maintain the security of our citizens,” he said to reporters. “We would also ensure that our brothers and sisters who have come back to resettle, that they live in peace and stability.”

This report originated with VOA English to Africa Service’s South Sudan in Focus program.
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U.N. and international aid agencies are making preparations to assist thousands of people in Madagascar ahead of a powerful cyclone that is expected to make landfall on the east coast Saturday. 

Two weeks after Tropical Storm Ana struck Madagascar, meteorologists are predicting a more powerful storm will strike the Indian Ocean Island nation. 

Clare Nullis, spokeswoman for the World Meteorological Organization, said experts describe the more powerful Tropical Cyclone Batsirai as “very dangerous.” 

“We are already going to see impacts today with very high waves at sea of at least eight meters, up to 15 meters. The wind speeds, as I have said, 200 kilometers an hour. The real threat here, as with many storms, is the rainfall. … Now if this rain falls on grounds, which is already saturated from last week’s rainfall, then obviously that exacerbates the risk of flooding,” she said. 

Tropical Storm Ana affected some 131,000 people across Madagascar, according to government officials. At least 58 people were killed and 72,000 displaced from homes that have been damaged, destroyed, or swept away by landslides. 

Aid agencies expect the impact of Tropical Cyclone Batsirai to be more devastating. They say about 4.4 million people are at risk across 14 districts in the country. They expect around 600,000 people to be directly affected by the storm, including more than 150,000 who are likely to be displaced. 

Jens Laerke, spokesman for the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said the U.N. and humanitarian partners are ramping up preparedness efforts ahead of the storm. 

“Our efforts under the government of Madagascar’s leadership include preparing for the pre-deployment of search and rescue capacity and response teams to areas likely to be impacted, aircrafts being placed on standby to support rapid assessment and response, and local purchases of humanitarian supplies to increase available stocks,” he said. 

The World Food Program has responded to the emergency by providing the government with an initial infusion of cash, and is distributing relief items such as tents, medicine, food, and hygiene and sanitation equipment. 

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said it is helping 2,000 families affected by Tropical Storm Ana, and is gearing up to assist victims of Batsirai. Priority needs, it said, include blankets, sleeping mats, kitchen sets, water, and sanitation and hygiene kits. 

 
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Following public outrage, Botswana’s government has revised a controversial spy bill which would have allowed investigators to intercept private communications without a court order. Under the revised bill, tapping private conversations now becomes an offense.

Botswana’s government removed controversial clauses in the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Bill, presented to parliament last month. The initial bill allowed investigators to bug communication devices and gave state agents immunity from prosecution.

In that version of the bill, there was no oversight body and investigating officers were also allowed to assume fake identities.

But on Friday, the government introduced a revised bill to parliament that will now make it an offense to tap conversations. An oversight body will be established under the control of the minister.

Opposition member of parliament Dithapelo Keorapetse welcomes the changes but still has concerns about the proposed law.

“What the state sought to do through this law, in its original form as it was gazette, tabled, read for the first time and second time, was to legitimize state terrorism,” said Keorapetse. “That is what we opposed.”

He says pressure from civic society groups led to the government removing what he calls the offending clauses of the bill.

“We are not ashamed to say that we would like to extend our sincere gratitude to the civic society, including the Law Society of Botswana, the media, trade unions, opposition, influencers and Batswana in general for their strong voice and campaigns against the bill,” said Keorapetse.

Cindy Kelemi, the director of the Botswana Network on Ethics, Law and HIV/AIDS, says there is still need for more debate on the bill.

“Our expectation is that a bill of this nature, which has the potential to infringe on people’s liberties, should have extensive engagements and consultation,” said Kelemi.

The Media Institute of Southern Africa wrote to President Mokgweetsi Masisi this week, urging him to halt debate on the bill pending public consultations.

MISA-Zimbabwe chapter’s Nqaba Matshazi says they welcome the new changes to the bill and will continue to engage with Botswana’s government.

“While there are still issues that we are concerned about, I think in everything that the government does and everything that parliament does, there should be a balance between the rights of citizens, particularly the right to privacy in this case and the state’s obligation in terms of national security,” said Matshazi.

When debate is finished, the revised bill is expected to pass into law with few changes.
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The chairman of the West African bloc ECOWAS said a surge of coups since a military government took power in Mali in 2020 must be contained before it devastates the whole region.

At the opening of a second ECOWAS summit on dealing with the January coup in Burkina Faso, chairman and president of Ghana Nana Akufo-Addo said the resurgence of coups in West Africa is worrying and must be stopped. 

“It’s with a heavy heart that I welcome all of you today back to Accra after our virtual meeting last week,” Akufo-Addo said. “Your presence here is a strong indication of your willingness to find a sustainable solution to the resurgence of the cancer in our region. Let us address this dangerous trend collectively and decisively before it devastates the whole region.” 

West Africa in the past year has seen a series of coups and attempted coups in Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea and Guinea-Bissau.

The Economic Community of West African States suspended Burkina Faso, Guinea and Mali from the 15-member bloc and imposed sanctions on Guinea and Mali after military takeovers. The African Union also suspended the three countries.   

But analysts question if the sanctions are effective when the coups are being driven by popular concerns about security and the fight against Islamist militant groups linked to Islamic State and al-Qaida.

Dean of the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College Vladimir Antwi-Danso told VOA that ECOWAS must be more proactive in helping member-states deal with insecurity. 

“The 21st century is a century of terrorism,” he said. “It’s festering. And that is what we should be thinking about rather than the AU and ECOWAS being seen condemning coups and closing borders. What are we talking about? Let’s be serious.” 

Former director of the U.N. Economic Commission for Africa Takyiwaa Manuh was more critical of the African groups of nations. Speaking on Ghana’s Asaase Radio, he said ECOWAS and the AU had failed to condemn elected leaders who change the law to extend their rule. 

“When somebody changes the rules and runs for a third term we didn’t hear ECOWAS condemning that. Why did ECOWAS not condemn that? Why did the Africa Union not condemn that? Right now, everybody is laughing, when ECOWAS imposes sanctions is like ‘There you go again, where were you when this was happening?’ And what it does is that it eats into the credibility of ECOWAS and the African Union,” Manuh said.

Regardless of the causes behind the coups, analysts say the military takeovers will scare investors away from West Africa.   

Daniel Amateye Anim, an economist at the Ghana-based Policy Initiative for Economic Development, told VOA the culture of coups could have dire economic consequences if foreign direct investments, or FDIs, dry up. 

“Investors may be deterred from bringing in investment into the region because the region will be considered no longer safe for investors,” he said. “Those who are already on the ground may be thinking of redirecting their investment into other economies where those places could be considered safe. And once FDIs are not coming into the equation what it means is that it may affect the overall GDP growth of the economies in the sub-region.” 

Meanwhile, West African leaders must decide how best to discourage more coups and get militaries to return to the barracks while countries are dealing with growing insecurity. 

 
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Mali has failed to meet debt payments of some $40 million in treasury bonds, blaming sanctions imposed on the country’s military junta by West African bloc ECOWAS.

The Malian Economy and Finance Ministry released a statement on Tuesday saying that recently imposed sanctions have prevented them from paying debt on treasury bonds totaling almost $5 million.

UMOA-Titres, the agency that manages public securities in the West African CFA franc zone, issued three separate statements to investors this week stating that Mali has missed several payments totaling $40 million.

Both the Economic Community of West African States and the West African Economic and Monetary Union imposed sanctions on Mali last month after the country’s military junta, which seized power last year, postponed elections.

The sanctions froze Mali’s assets held by the Senegal-based Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO).

Modibo Mao Makalou is an economist and former economic advisor to the Malian presidency. Speaking from Bamako via messaging app, he said that because of the sanctions, not only will the Malian government be unable to pay the state’s debt, but it will also be unable to pay for internal operations.

“If the state does not manage to refinance itself, not only with regard to the expenses for staff, but also energy, communication expenses, expenses for missions, including military operations — this will prevent the state from functioning on a daily basis,” he said.

The Central Bank of West African States serves the eight countries in West Africa that share a common currency, the West African CFA franc.

Kobi Annan, a risk consultant based in Accra with Songhai Advisory, an economic and risk consultancy firm focused on sub-Saharan Africa, says that Mali has some reserves that will carry the country through the next few months.

He says making Mali default on the debt is exactly how the West African sanctions are designed to work, to put pressure on the transitional authorities.

“This would be fully expected; this is part of why it’s done that way, to make things more difficult for Mali,” said Annan. “If you default on debt or if you don’t pay back debt, then you are deemed a higher risk, meaning that borrowing when you are able to becomes more expensive.”

Annan and Makalou both assert that eventually, as the Malian government becomes less able to access or borrow money and as its reserves dwindle, social services are likely to be affected, bringing the effects of the financial sanctions against the state into the lives of ordinary Malians.

Mali’s transitional military government has widespread support from the Malian population. Since being sanctioned, the government has not proposed a new election timeline, but has expressed a willingness to continue dialogue with ECOWAS.

The ministry’s statement added that debts would be paid as soon as restrictions are lifted.
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An oil production and storage ship exploded in southern Delta state and 10 crewmembers are feared dead, Nigerian authorities said. 

An official of the Sheba Oil Exploration and Production Company confirmed the incident in a statement Thursday. 

Ikemefuna Okafor said the offshore production facility known as Trinity Spirit erupted in flames in Ukpokiti, on the coast of Nigeria’s southern Delta state.  

He said the fire was believed to be caused by an explosion and that the incident was being investigated. 

Ikemefuna said the initial responders to the incident included local fishermen and Clean Nigeria Associates, a team operating at a nearby facility. 

The extent of damage is unknown. The ship is able to store up to two million barrels of oil and the explosion raises serious environmental concerns. 

Three months ago an oil spill in nearby Bayelsa state spewed for one month, causing severe damage to land and water bodies before it was contained. 

Ibiosiya Sukubo is a leader of one of the communities in the Niger Delta that was recently affected. 

“The ecological and aquatic devastation caused by oil and gas exploitation and exploration has been quite colossal and astronomical,” Sukubo said. “The movement of heavy marine vessels creating a host of turbidity without proper compensation, alleviation, remediation, is an appalling circumstance we find ourselves in Niger Delta.” 

Nigeria is trying to maximize its petroleum output, and authorities have intensified a crackdown on illegal tapping of pipelines.   

Petroleum officials say the country loses some 150,000 barrels of oil a day to such theft.  
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The Norwegian Refugee Council, which supports a school in the region, says two of the school’s students are among those killed
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