Kenyan authorities last week locked down the Nairobi neighborhood of Eastleigh because of a jump in confirmed coronavirus infections. As a result of the restriction of movement in and out of the area, aimed at slowing the spread of the virus, businesses in Eastleigh are struggling to get by.Mohamed Said, a food seller in the neighborhood, said business was poor, as few people were willing or able to shop at his store.Slack time in the morning”People are not coming to buy foodstuffs the way they used to before,” he said. “There is less movement of people around 4 in the evening. That’s when you see a few people around. When I come to the shop early in the morning, you regret coming to the shop that early because there are no people.”The lockdown is heightening frustration in the Somali-majority neighborhood in central Nairobi. Said’s neighbor, Hussein Osman, also a food seller, said he might soon go out of business.“Since the lockdown began, our business has gone down, and the lockdown has brought us a lot of losses,” he said. “We cannot afford to pay rent, and we are requesting the government to help whenever it can.”There were few people in the streets of Nairobi’s Eastleigh neighborhood, a predominantly Somali area, on May 14, 2020. Movement in and out of the area is restricted because of COVID-19. The lockdown is set to end May 20. (Mohammed Yusuf/VOA)Kenyan authorities closed off the area until May 20 after 29 new cases of the coronavirus were found there in a single day. Authorities are allowing only essential service providers, like medics and those delivering food, to enter and leave the area.Mohamed Mohamud said the restriction had made life difficult.“People here are businesspeople,” he said. “Some used to receive money from their relatives in Western countries, but now there is nothing.  Coronavirus has crippled our people in the West, and the income we were getting from here — it’s closed.  There is no help. There is no hope.”’We will succeed together’On Wednesday, Kenya’s interior minister, Fred Matiangi, met the leadership of Eastleigh and the Muslim community. He said the lockdown was meant to protect the community, and he rejected claims that the residents were singled out because they are mainly ethnic Somalis.“We are facing this challenge together,” the minister said. “We will succeed together if we continue to stand together. It’s unfortunate that perception can exist, but I came to confirm to you — and believe you me, for sure, this is the position of the government — there is no effort to target anyone on account of their creed, on account of their ethnic community.”The restriction on movements in the area is expected to end next week, but the decision will depend on how well the virus has been contained.
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Police in Cameroon have detained several hundred people for not wearing face masks in public, as COVID-19 cases in the central African state continue to rise. Seventeen-year-old David Ngwa Fru said a team of police and gendarmes detained him and his two younger sisters in the capital, Yaounde, on Thursday morning.”The police removed us from a taxi on our way to the market because we were not wearing our masks. They detained us at the police station for three hours. We paid 2,000 (each) before we were released. Many people who did not pay the money are still there.”Fru, speaking to VOA through a messaging app, said that although they were not issued any receipts, the police told them that the $9 he and his siblings paid were fines for not wearing their masks, and assured them that the money would be sent to the state treasury.FILE – A health worker wearing protective equipment disinfects a member of medical staff amid the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), at an hospital in Douala, Cameroon, April 27, 2020.Police official Oswald Ateba said officers are implementing a Cameroon government order that everyone in public must wear a face mask as of 6 a.m. Thursday. He said they have been instructed to arrest everyone found along the streets, markets, bars and popular spots without masks and to impound all vehicles and motorcycles that are seen with drivers and passengers not wearing masks.The police said authorities have detained hundreds of people, seized 250 motorcycles and impounded hundreds of taxis in Yaounde alone as part of efforts to implement the new rules.Government spokesperson Rene Emmanuel Sadi said the decision to make arrests came after lockdown restrictions were eased, but a majority of Cameroonians were not wearing masks.He said the government is also battling the growing stigmatization of people testing positive for COVID-19 and those who have recovered from the disease, stressing that COVID-19 is neither shameful nor a curse and any person can be contaminated.Cameroon has about 3,000 reported cases of COVID-19 and has recorded 139 deaths.Even though the government has eased the strict lockdown measures, Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute said on Wednesday no one should think that COVID-19 has been conquered in the central African state.  
 
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While the coronavirus has forced schools globally to switch to online learning, in developing countries like Nigeria, millions of children without remote- learning access have been left behind.  Forty percent of Nigerians live on less than $1 a day and only one in four have internet access.Seated under a pine tree on a sunny afternoon, 13-year-old Charity Yakubu’s older sister, Susan, is playing the role of teacher as she takes Charity through lessons she would have been learning in school.This has been their routine since March, when the coronavirus pandemic led Nigeria to close schools.“I feel very sad because I don’t get to learn new things, all the things I’ve learnt, I’ve forgotten them.  By God’s grace, let this coronavirus pandemic finish so that everybody can get to go back to school,” said Charity.Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics says only one in four Nigerians have internet access but three out of four have mobile phones.Nigerian educators, like Bala Babangida, the principal of the Unique Schools in Jos, says that while some Nigerians have been able to switch to online and social media learning, there are challenges.“Looking at the cost of data, and even the devices to use for effective learning, it is a bit problematic to Nigerians. I think if the government can do something about it, it will go a long way to bridge the gap between the rich and the poor,” said Babangida.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline. Embed” />CopyWith 40 percent of Nigerians living on less than a dollar a day, the added costs make remote learning, for the vast majority, out of reach.Veronica Ayuba has her 10-year-old daughter with her at her vegetable stall to help with the sales.Ayuba said she would rather have her daughter at home learning her schoolwork, but she is unable to help.Ayuba points out that authorities are saying parents should begin to teach children at home, but she said doesn’t know how to read, and she doesn’t know where to start.Making matters worse, the restrictions brought on by COVID-19 have cost many their jobs, including Yakubu’s mother, Salome, a domestic house maid.There is no money, Salome said, including money for food. She wonders where they can find the money to buy a good phone so they can learn on the internet.To help bridge the education gap, Nigeria is broadcasting lessons on state run television and radio stations, while children wait for the pandemic to ease up enough to allow schools to re-open. 
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While the coronavirus has forced schools globally to switch to online learning, in developing countries like Nigeria, millions of children without remote learning access have been left behind.  Forty percent of Nigerians live on less than $1 a day and only one in four have internet access. Ifiok Ettang looks at how families are trying to cope, in this report from Jos, Nigeria.
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There are few days when the Paris-based Pasteur Institute and its far-flung network are not in the news.
 
Last week, France’s flagship research foundation and its U.S. counterparts announced promising compounds for clinical testing against COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.
 
Its scientists estimated a French strain of the virus could have circulated here earlier than previously thought, and that less than 5 percent of French have contracted the infection – indicating confinement measures were working.  
 
In Africa, where the institute is present in nearly a dozen countries, the Pasteur Institute’s Dakar facility plans to roll out potentially game-changing rapid testing kits, and has earned African Union designation as a coronavirus reference center.
 
Yet even as the African facilities are lauded for their work and state-of-the-art equipment, some see them entwined with France’s colonial legacy, amid growing calls for building a home-grown response to COVID-19 and other health crises.
 
Others, however, see Pasteur’s presence in places like Abidjan (Ivory Coast), Yaounde (Cameroon) or Antananarivo (Madagascar)—answerable to national health ministries and mostly staffed and headed by Africans—as an essential part of the continent’s research landscape and development.
 
“Each institute is autonomous,” said Pierre-Marie Girard, director of the Pasteur Institute’s international network in an interview.
 A global presence
 
Founded in 1887 and named after iconic creator and French biologist Louis Pasteur, the institute quickly launched branches overseas, starting with a facility six years later in Tunisia, which was then a French protectorate. Today, it has facilities in 25 countries, including nations in Europe and Latin America.
 
In Africa, Pasteur researchers have focused on diseases like malaria, Zika and Ebola. The foundation has also partnered with the African Academy of Sciences to strengthen scientific collaboration between the continent’s anglophone and francophone regions. Some of its scientists have been tapped as Fellows of the Next Einstein Forum, aimed at building African expertise in science and technology.FILE – Lab technicians work in the virus epidemic department of the Pasteur Institute of Ivory Coast, near Abidjan, May 11, 2020.France designates roughly $7.6 million in annual funding to Pasteur Institute facilities in Africa and Southeast Asia — many located in former French colonies—along with another $4 million for the current coronavirus response. It sends over researchers and offers fellowships. Two of the facilities are headed by French nationals.
 
The institutes mostly “have their own programs and research financing,” Girard said, coming from host governments, grants and other sources.
 
Still, each must sign onto the foundation’s basic principles of research, teaching, technology transfer and working to improve the health of local populations.
 
Now, with the coronavirus ticking upward on the continent, the research has shifted to a new health crisis.
 
In Senegal, scientists are partnering with British technology firm Mologic to develop 10-minute detection kits, costing roughly $1 apiece. Pasteur Institute Dakar Director Amadou Sall says they should be ready in June.
 
The overall aim is “bringing local solutions to Africa’s health problems, that take local contexts into account,” Sall, a trained virologist, told France 24 news channel.
 
Such remarks resonate in a continent struggling to fill major gaps in its health sector—especially now. Ethiopia is upgrading old ventilators to serve COVID-19 patients—and training doctors on how to use them, according to news reports. Zimbabwean universities are making masks, gloves and hand sanitizers.
 
Other efforts are more controversial. Madagascar is touting an herbal remedy for COVID-19, which the World Health Organization cautions remains untested. Nonetheless, the product has sparked demand from a number of African countries.
 
“What if this remedy had been discovered by a European country, instead of Madagascar?” Malagasy President Andry Rajoelina said in an interview with France 24 and RFI radio. “Would people doubt it so much? I don’t think so.”FILE – A lab technician at the Pasteur Institute of Ivory Coast looks at collected samples to be tested for the coronavirus and other samples for analysis, near Abidjan, May 11, 2020.Colonial imprint
 
Others point more directly to the negative imprint of colonial medicine. Within this context, the Pasteur Institute’s past sometimes sits uneasily.
 
“The French justification of colonialism relied on an idea of the ‘civilizing mission,’ and providing modern hygiene and medicine was a key part of the promise,” said Aro Velmet, a University of Southern California historian who authored a book on the Pasteur Institute.
 
“Yet the French government was utterly unwilling to invest in the colonies in any capacity even close to the level of public health infrastructure being pursued” in France, he added in an email interview.
 
That legacy has left an imprint on international pharmaceutical companies today, Velmet said. He said they “tend to focus on studying and treating diseases that bring a lot of scientific prestige to the investigators, but are hardly the most urgent in the societies where the studies are being conducted.”
 
The current pandemic is also stirring old fears.
 
Last month, a pair of French doctors sparked widespread outrage, after one suggested, in a television interview, that trials be conducted in Africa on the effectiveness of a tuberculosis vaccine against the coronavirus. “No, Africans aren’t guinea pigs,” French anti-discrimination group SOS Racisme said. Both researchers quickly apologized, saying their remarks were clumsy but not racist. The vaccine is only being tested in Europe and Australia.
 
But some critics remain unswayed.
 
“The dialogue was neither an accident nor ‘fake news,’” wrote francophone studies professor Mame-Fatou Niang in the publication Slate Afrique. Rather, she said, it exposed “a whole set of practices that have accompanied the event of modern Western medicine” in Africa dating from colonial days.
 
Alfred Babo, a professor of anthropology at Fairfield University in the U.S. state of Connecticut, also called for the continent to “emancipate itself” when it came to Western research.
 
“African research and knowledge is given little credibility,” he wrote in France’s Le Monde newspaper, “especially if it doesn’t agree with reputed institutions like the Pasteur Institute.”
 
Pasteur Institute’s Girard says its facilities in Africa are essentially African ones — even if they get some French support.“Does it mean, because we’re partners—either through financing or experts—that this can be branded neocolonialism?” he asked.
 
“I understand that people want their Pasteur Institute completely autonomous,” he added. “But at our level, research is inevitably international.”
 
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South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said most of the country will move toward relaxing coronavirus restrictions later this month even as the number of confirmed cases topped 12,000.During a televised address Wednesday evening, Ramaphosa announced officials will immediately begin work on a proposal so that by the end of May, most of the country be placed on Alert Level 3 and certain businesses will partially reopen.South Africa’s approach to slowing the spread of the coronavirus is measured on a tier system, with 5 being the most restrictive.The country began Level 4 on May 1 by allowing residents to exercise outdoors and some businesses to reopen.Ramaphosa said parts of the country with high infection rates would remain under Alert Level 4, and travel to areas with lower rates of infection will be restricted.Ramaphosa also defended his handling of the COVID-19 outbreak, saying some citizens have questioned whether the nation’s approach in dealing with the coronavirus has been at the expense of the livelihood of its people. He said his administration’s strategic approach has been based on saving lives and preserving livelihoods.South Africa has the highest number of coronavirus cases on the continent, with 12,074 infections and 219 deaths.   
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Healthcare workers in the tiny Southern African country of Lesotho are attending to the country’s first COVID-19 patient. Lesotho’s health ministry confirmed the country’s first case Wednesday, making it the last of the 54 countries on the continent to report the disease. Authorities say the patient, who is in isolation, tested positive after arriving in Lesotho five days ago, but was not showing any symptoms.   The patient was the only one among dozens of travelers from Saudi Arabia and South Africa to test positive for the coronavirus. Lesotho is surrounded by South Africa, which has the highest number of confirmed cases in Africa with 11,350. Lesotho’s first positive case comes a week after the country lifted its national lockdown.  Lesotho’s Health Ministry said in a statement that it’s still awaiting test results from just over 300 people. Africa’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention reports the coronavirus has infected just under 70,000 people with more than 2,400 deaths on the African continent. 
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An immigrant from Congo who worked at the Tyson Foods pork processing plant in Waterloo has died of the coronavirus, the company confirmed Tuesday.The Congolese community in Waterloo has been mourning the death of Axel Kabeya, which several members announced Sunday on social media.A Congolese newspaper reported that Kabeya was one of the community’s best-known figures in Waterloo, where hundreds of refugees have settled in recent years. He’s survived by a wife and children. His age wasn’t immediately available.Tyson Fresh Meats spokeswoman Liz Croston confirmed the death, saying the company was “deeply saddened by the loss of a team member at our Waterloo facility.”The plant has had one of the largest coronavirus outbreaks in the nation, and more than 1,000 of its 2,800 workers have tested positive. After suspending production for two weeks, the plant reopened with new safety measures last week.Croston said Tyson is confirming only three deaths of Waterloo workers from coronavirus. Local officials say they can’t release the number of workers who’ve died.Advocates and family members have said that at least four workers have died at the plant, Tyson’s largest pork facility. After Kabeya, the others include a 65-year-old white man, a 60-year-old Latino man and a 58-year-old Bosnian woman.
 
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The World Food Program warns the COVID-19 pandemic threatens to boost the number of hungry people in the Middle East and North African region to more than 47 million, an increase of more than 6.7 million from current figures.This region has been mired in conflict, political instability and economic problems for years. COVID-19 is compounding these difficulties. U.N. agencies warn fragile and dysfunctional governments in the Middle East and North Africa are ill-equipped to deal with the pandemic and its impact.The Children wearing protective masks look from behind a window during a 24-hour curfew amid concerns about the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Sana’a, Yemen, May 6, 2020.WFP spokeswoman, Elisabeth Byrs said the report predicts the pandemic will increase extreme hunger and that many more people in the region will struggle to feed themselves as their means of livelihood disappear.“With little to no savings, no unemployment insurance, and reduced food subsidies, people who engage in subsistence or informal work to support their families cannot endure sustained lockdowns. Many of the people receiving food assistance rely on it for their survival,” she said.The World Food Program currently provides food to 23 million people in the region.  More than two thirds of this assistance is being channeled to people in Yemen and Syria who have been wracked by war, illness and hunger for years.WFP reports nearly 3.8 million children in 11 countries are no longer receiving school meals following school closures across the region, depriving most of the children of their only nutritious meal of the day.The U.N food agency says it is finding alternative ways to make up for these missed meals in nine of the 11 countries.  These include the provision of take-home rations and home delivery of food.  In some cases, WFP provides families with cash or vouchers they can use to buy food in local markets. 
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As the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Tanzania rises to more than 500, critics have gone after authorities for their handling of the pandemic and a lack of transparency. Charles Kombe reports from Dar es Salaam.
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The French News Agency, Agence France Presse, says Lesotho Prime Minister Thomas Thabane will turn in his resignation on Wednesday.   AFP says the 80-year-old Thabane revealed in a telephone interview that he was stepping down due to his age.  He said he will inform King Letsie III, the supreme traditional leader of the small southern African country, of his intention to resign. Thabane has been mired in a political and legal crisis stemming from the murder of his estranged wife, Lipolelo Thabane, in 2017.  The couple were going through a bitter divorce when she was shot dead in front of her house in the capital Maseru. Thabane’s current wife, Maesaiah, whom he married a few months after Lipolelo’s death, is charged with her murder. The prime minister has been named as a suspect, but has not been formally charged. After ignoring repeated calls for him to resign, Thabane’s coalition government collapsed Monday, with parliament due to meet next week to name a new prime minister.   Finance Minister Moeketsi Majoro has been nominated by the ruling All Basotho Convention to succeed Thanbane.   Thabane’s request for immunity from prosecution after leaving office was rejected last week by the governing party.   
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Rice plays a huge role in diets in Ghana, from the famous West African jollof rice to rice and stew – but most of these grains are imported.In 2019, Ghana launched Eat Ghana Rice, a campaign aimed at supporting the local rice industry, but imports still dominate.
 
Demand for local rice has been on the increase in Ghana as a result of the campaign. But in markets across the West African nation, imported brands still dominate.  
 
Rice industry insiders say locally grown grain may soon see a boost from an unexpected supporter: the coronavirus pandemic.   
 
With COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, some nations have temporarily banned exports of the grain to ensure food security.   
 
The Importers and Exporters Association of Ghana says the bans have sent imported rice prices soaring.   
 
Samson Asaki Awingobit, the association’s executive secretary, said “During the lockdown period, we saw that imported rice prices had gone high, so it has affected the Ghanaian consumers. Of course, the cost of rice has gone up.”
 
Awingobit said the high prices are making local rice more competitive, which could boost Ghana’s rice production and food security.   
 
Rice experts say the average Ghanaian eats about 40 kilograms of rice per year and Ghana’s farmers meet about half the country’s demand.   
 Aiming for self-sufficiencyRice breeder Maxwell Darko Asante says the gap, and supply disruptions from the coronavirus pandemic, show why more investment is needed in local rice.
 
“As science is driving the way we deal with this pandemic, it should apply to crop scientists as well, where the government should begin to pay more attention to crop science and crop research, and especially rice because we spend so much money importing rice,” Asante said.
 
Since 2017, Ghana has strengthened local food production through its Planting for Food and Jobs program.
 
The program supplies subsidized rice seeds and fertilizer to Ghana’s farmers to boost agriculture and food security.   
 
Ghanaian officials say the program is helping meet their target of boosting rice production to self-sufficiency by 2023.   
 
For the past decade, rice farmer Abena Abedi has worked with small-holder farmers to promote Ghana’s rice. She supports their planting and then buys, processes, packages, and markets the local grain.  
 
“The farmers have proven beyond a reasonable doubt that they can produce in abundance. If we are able to develop more lowlands, if we are able to rehabilitate the irrigation schemes we have available, if we are able to give stimulus packages to rice value chain drivers – they will be able to buy the surplus off the farmers immediately and pay them,” she said.
 
Abedi said a jump in demand for local rice after last year’s Eat Ghana Rice campaign proves the market potential.    
 
While the coronavirus pandemic has been disruptive, she said she hopes the outbreak will inspire more support for rice farmers across Ghana as a buffer against food insecurity and a boost to the local industry.   
 
 
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More than 800 sex workers across Botswana will receive food hampers donated by non-governmental organizations this week, with priority given to migrants, those who who are HIV-positive and those with young children.Two NGOs working with the sex workers’ organization, Sisonke, are assisting with the handouts.Program manager Mandla Pule says the project aims to help migrant sex workers who do not have access to the government’s coronavirus relief aid.”Our priority groups are sex workers, especially non-citizens, because under the Botswana social relief for COVID-19, only citizens are supported with food parcels. So, we saw fit that we target sex workers who are HIV-positive, and secondly, those with children and those who are foreigners,” Pule said.Authorities in Botswana imposed a nationwide lockdown in March to stop the spread of the coronavirus. The country has recorded 24 cases of the virus, and one death.Pule said restrictions in movement due to the lockdown have meant sex workers cannot meet their clients.”Sex workers are mostly affected because they are dependent on the movement of people. Under lockdown there are no people; nobody is allowed to go anywhere, so in turn they have lost an income,” Pule said.Sex work remains illegal in Botswana, but an estimated 7,000 locals and migrants are involved in the trade.Botswana has begun easing its lockdown restrictions and full activities are expected to resume after May 21. 
 
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An Ethiopian anti-aircraft missile brought down the Kenyan plane that crashed in the Somali town of Bardale last week, killing six people on board, multiple sources have told VOA Somali.
 
Ethiopian forces are stationed in Bardale to help their Somali counterparts retain control of the town, once controlled by militant group al-Shabab.
 
The May 4 incident began with the incoming Kenyan plane aborting a landing attempt because an Ethiopian military vehicle mounted with Zu anti-aircraft missiles was on the runway, officials say.  
 
The plane then flew over the military vehicle to make a second attempt to land. The Ethiopian soldier operating the Zu fired several rounds, hitting the plane, according to witnesses and Somali officials.
 
Weydow Ali Hassan is the town’s head of social affairs. Hassan was one of the officials waiting at the airstrip to receive medical supplies the plane was carrying.
 
“There was a technical vehicle mounted with a gun on where the plane was going to land. We thought it was going to collide into it,” Hassan said.
 
After the missiles were fired, the plane burst into flames and crashed on the side of the airstrip, according to Hassan.
 
His account was confirmed by a regional minister and an aviation official who both asked not to be identified for security reasons.
 
A fourth official who was not in Bardale said a donkey on the runway forced the plane to abort the landing and not the Ethiopian military vehicle. Hassan disputed that account.
 
“There was no donkey present there,” he said. “There were Ethiopian soldiers and their vehicles.”
 
Ethiopian military officials acknowledged their soldiers shot down the plane but say their military didn’t know the aircraft was due to arrive. They also say the soldiers feared the plane might “bomb” them.
 
Bardale, a small town about 60 kilometers west of Baidoa, lacks an air traffic control tower. Flight arrivals are conveyed by telephone to Somali officials on the ground.
 
“They were scared; it created fear,” says a source close to the Ethiopian soldiers. The soldier who fired the missile has been in Bardale “about 20 days,” according to the official.
 
A team of investigators from Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia has begun an investigation.  
 
The team will visit the site of the crash near the Bardale airstrip. Their first task is to recover the black box and voice recorder of the E120 aircraft, owned by Kenyan company African Express Airways. The recorders were located the day after the crash, but officials chose not to retrieve them until experts arrived. The area has been sealed off since, according to an official.
 
Somalia suspended both international and local flights due to the coronavirus epidemic but the aircraft, charted by an NGO, had a one-day special permit to deliver the medical supplies to Bardale.
 
Another contentious issue is the status of the soldier who fired on the plane. Multiple sources including an AMISOM source say they were told the person is a “non-AMISOM” soldier.
 
Non-AMISOM soldiers are Ethiopians who operate outside the mandate of the African Union Mission in Somalia. Ethiopia has nearly 4,000 soldiers serving as part of the AU mission, but non-AMISOM forces are larger. According to a reliable official, 75% of Ethiopian troops in Somalia are non-AMISOM soldiers.  
 
Somali and Ethiopian officials both say non-AMISOM soldiers operate under a “bilateral agreement.” The Somali opposition is questioning the legality of the presence of non-AMISOM Ethiopian forces in the country.  
 
The Somali government said it will await the results of the investigation being conducted.
 
“All the evidence is there [in Bardale]; we prepared ourselves, we saw the witnesses,” says Somali Transport and Aviation Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Salat, who visited the scene last week. “We are waiting experts from Kenya and Ethiopia to join us so that we can do a transparent investigation in order to share with the families of those lost and the company on what happened, how it happened and how to prevent similar incidents.”
 
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As many businesses reopen across Nigeria, workers are adjusting to the new reality created by the COVID-19 pandemic, including shorter work hours, pay cuts, and higher unemployment.  Nigerian authorities expect the jobless rate this year to hit one in three people.
       
Emmanuel Noble, 27, searched his phone, hoping for a response from one of the many places he has recently approached for a job.
 
He says it’s not been easy for him since he was laid off from his bartending job at an Abuja night club in March following Nigeria’s coronavirus lockdown.  
 
“You can imagine in a situation where you stay and you don’t have any source of income, it is very difficult to bear. We’ve been at home all through, nowhere to go, just sleep, wake up, walk around, nothing to do, no engagement,” Noble said.
    
Nigerian authorities last week began easing a nationwide lockdown but maintained restrictions on schools, religious bodies and businesses like night clubs, bars, and gardens where crowds usually gather.  
 
Millions of Nigerians such as Emmanuel whose livelihoods depend on these businesses and institutions are having a hard time meeting their basic needs.
   
“It even got to the extent that I wasn’t able to get recharge cards to load in my phone. I can’t make contact, it’s just like most movies we watch you see most people hopeless in the movie,” Noble said.
 
Nigeria has been battling high unemployment for many years. However, job losses triggered by the coronavirus pandemic is something new.  
 
Nigeria’s labor officials predict the unemployment rate may hit 33 percent by the end of this year.  
 
The country director of the International Labor Organization, Dennis Zulu, says the coronavirus pandemic took a bad situation and made it even worse.  
 
“Over the past few years we’ve been seeing an increase in the number of Nigerians who are unemployed and also because of new and young Nigerians entering the labor market who are not able to find jobs, this has further exacerbated the situation. So now coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic, the situation is of very serious concern and it could get worse depending on how this pandemic evolves,” Zulu said.  
      
Businesses are reopening across Nigeria but they are applying measures like shorter operating hours and pay cuts in order to survive in this age of the coronavirus.
 
Zulu said it could take them a while to stabilize.
    
“We should not be oblivious to the fact that some of them are still struggling now because the weeks of shutdown really affected their ability to generate working capital which they need for their own business operations,” Zulu said.
 
The International Monetary Fund, IMF, says Nigeria’s oil dependent economy will shrink by more than three percent this year because of falling global oil prices triggered by the coronavirus lockdowns.  
 
That is not good news for Emmanuel Noble.  He plans to keep looking for work.  
But unless something dramatic happens, his job search may go on for months to come.
 
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The chief of staff to Democratic Republic of Congo President Felix Tshisekedi denied embezzling more than $50 million in public funds at a brief opening of his trial Monday. The president of the court then postponed Vital Kamerhe’s trial for two weeks, until May 25, while the investigation into the case continues.  Kamerhe, the most senior politician to go on trial for corruption in the Congo, is seeking to be released on bail until his trial resumes. He has been in custody for just over a month. Kamerhe denied prosecutors claims that he stole money earmarked for public housing under President Tshisekedi’s flagship 100-day building program, which he managed with other top government staffers. Kamerhe faces up to 20 years in prison if found guilty. Two other suspects, including a top aide to president Tshisekedi and a Lebanese businessman, also pleaded not guilty to the charges. 
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Senegalese President Macky Sall says the West African country will begin reopening mosques and churches Tuesday and ease other restrictions imposed to contain the coronavirus. Sall announced the easing of the restrictions on Monday after Senegal registered a more than 30 percent jump in cases from the previous day, the largest one day increase in cases.Senegal’s President Macky Sall leaves after meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron and other state leaders at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Wednesday May 15, 2019.President Sall said along with relaxing the state of emergency measures on Tuesday, curfew hours will be from 9pm to 5am, instead of 8pm to 6am.  He said markets and other businesses previously restricted to opening on certain days will be now open six days and closed one day for cleaning. So far, Senegal has reported 1,886 coronavirus cases and 19 deaths. 
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As many businesses reopen across Nigeria, workers are adjusting to the new reality created by the COVID-19 pandemic, including shorter work hours, pay cuts, and higher unemployment.  Nigerian authorities expect the jobless rate this year to hit one-in-three while the International Monetary Fund says the economy will shrink by 3.4%.  Timothy Obiezu looks at how those made unemployed are trying to cope.
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To say South Africa is tired of the lockdown would be a gross understatement.Officials acknowledge the effect that a curfew and limitations on movement are having on the population’s financial and mental health, but say they are holding firm against a bigger health threat: that of a virus that has killed 3.2% of those known to be infected in the World Health Organization’s African region. The global death rate is about 7%, according to WHO statistics.  John Steenhuisen, the leader of South African main political opposition party, arrives ahead of the State of the Nation address by Cyril Ramaphosa, the President of South Africa, at the Parliament in Cape Town on Feb. 13, 2020.The head of the opposition Democratic Alliance, John Steenhuisen, told the ruling African National Congress, “We are no longer dealing, with a COVID-19 crisis. We are dealing with a lockdown crisis. An ANC lockdown crisis, to be precise. Let me be very clear about this: There is no longer a justification to keep this hard lockdown in place. Government cannot even produce this justification. They cannot show us the modeling they use to decide when to ease and when to tighten restrictions. They cannot do this, because they don’t seem to know for sure themselves.”    The initial five-week hard lockdown, which has now been replaced by slightly loosened restrictions, was aimed at buying the health system time to prepare for an inevitable wave of infections. Critics argue that that time is up, and that the harm done to livelihoods outweighs the risks faced by easing the restrictions. Most of the country is currently under what is known as Phase 4 of the eased lockdown, with a nighttime curfew and reduced shopping hours in place. The sale of alcohol and cigarettes remains illegal. Although several key sectors of the economy have gone back to work, many South Africans remain at home, unable to do so.  Shabir Madhi, professor of vaccinology at the University of the Witwatersrand, urged more targeted testing and screening, and huge improvements to water and sanitation. Lockdowns, he said, aren’t enough.  “And if we can’t do that, unfortunately, we’re setting up ourselves for, irrespective of what policy government has, if we’re not able to abide by those sort of conditions, if we can’t create an environment for people to actually practice those sort of interventions, we’re going to have a much quicker rate of transmission of the virus,” Madhi said. “And we’re trying to get a surge much sooner, and the peak with this wave probably will be much greater than we expect, if those non-pharmaceutical interventions don’t work.”People wearing face masks queue at a South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) to collect their government grant in Cape Town, South Africa, May 11, 2020.At this time, the government is holding firm in its positions. Over the weekend, Health Minister Zweli Mkhize noted an alarming rise in new infections in the Western Cape, and threatened that the nation may see a return to a total lockdown, or “heightened interventions of various forms” in some areas where transmission is high. Steenhuisen opposes that.  “The real tragedy playing out here is no longer the coronavirus, but the lockdown itself,” Steenhuisen said. “Because this lockdown is going to cost many more lives than it can possibly save.” President Cyril Ramaphosa has yet to say publicly when the restrictions might end; but, in his Monday newsletter, the president said the nation was stepping up its testing, screening and treatment regime. He noted, “The transition to the next phase of the coronavirus response, that of recovery, will be more difficult than the present one.”  
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The coronavirus has revived a hairstyle in East Africa, one with braided spikes that echo the virus’ distinctive shape.  The style’s growing popularity is in part due to economic hardships linked to virus restrictions — it’s cheap, mothers say — and to the goal of spreading awareness that the coronavirus is real.The hairstyle had gone out of fashion in recent years as imported real and synthetic hair from India, China and Brazil began to flood the market and demand by local women increased. Pictures of the flowing or braided imported styles are tacked up in beauty salons across much of Africa.  But now, in a makeshift salon beside a busy road in Kibera, a slum in the heart of the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, 24-year-old hairdresser Sharon Refa braids young girls’ hair into the antennae-like spikes that people call the “coronavirus hairstyle.” Girls shift in the plastic chairs as she tugs at their scalps.”Some grown-ups don’t believe that the coronavirus is real, but then most young children appear keen to sanitize their hands and wear masks. So many adults do not do this, and that is why we came up with the corona hairstyle,” Refa said, her face mask tucked under her chin.Kenya’s number of confirmed virus cases was nearing 700 as of Monday. With the widespread shortage of testing materials, however, the real number of cases could be higher. Health officials are especially worried about the possible spread of the virus in crowded slums.Mothers like Margaret Andeya, who is struggling to make ends meet, said the coronavirus hairstyle suits her daughters’ styling needs and her pocket. Virus-related restrictions have stifled the daily work for millions of people with little or no savings.  “This hairstyle is much more affordable for people like me who cannot afford to pay for the more expensive hairstyles out there and yet we want our kids to look stylish,” Andeya said.It costs 50 shillings, or about 50 U.S. cents, to get the braids while the average hairdo costs 300 to 500 shillings ($3 to $5). That’s money most people in Kibera cannot afford at the moment.  The technique used in braiding the coronavirus hairstyle is threading, which uses yarn instead of synthetic hair braids. This is the secret to making it affordable, residents said.”COVID-19 has destroyed the economy, taken our jobs from us, and now money is scarce. I therefore decided to have my child’s hair done up like this at an affordable 50 shillings, and she looks good,” said 26-year-old Mariam Rashid.  “The hairstyle also helps in communicating with the public about the virus.” 
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A loud hiss and grunt come from a green bag pressing air through a tube, as Senegalese researchers work to develop a prototype ventilator that could cost a mere $160 each instead of tens of thousands of dollars.  
The team is using 3-D printed parts as it works to find a homegrown solution to a medical shortfall that has struck even the richest countries: how to have enough breathing machines to handle an avalanche of COVID-19 patients who need the devices to help increase their blood oxygen levels.
Complicating the task in Africa is the fact that the peak in coronavirus cases for the continent’ is expected to come later than in Europe and the United States, well after dozens of other countries have bought out available supplies.
“Africans must find their own solutions to their problems. We must show our independence. It’s a big motivation for this,” said Ibrahima Gueye, a professor at the Polytechnic School of Thies in Senegal, on the 12-member team developing the prototype ventilator.
Their efforts are being mirrored elsewhere across the continent, where medical supplies are usually imported.
Many hope that these efforts to develop ventilators, personal protective equipment, sanitizers and quick-result antibody tests will lead to more independent solutions for future health crises.
Although the quality of some products won’t meet as high a standard as in the U.S. or Europe, Gueye said there is excitement that level can be reached eventually, with enough time and investment.  
In Ethiopia, biomedical engineer Bilisumma Anbesse is among those volunteers repairing and upgrading old ventilators. While the country has tried to procure more than 1,000 ventilators abroad, progress has been thwarted by the high demand.
“U.S. and Chinese companies that produce mechanical ventilators are saying they can’t accept new orders until July. The same is true with other medical items like PPE and gloves,” Annbesse said, referring to the personal protective gear worn to minimize exposure to health hazards.
Africans also are helping to develop tools for disease prevention and surveillance.  
Institut Pasteur in Dakar is working on a rapid test for COVID-19 in partnership with the British biotech company Mologic, which developed a rapid Ebola test. They hope the coronavirus test, which can give results in 10 minutes, could be distributed across Africa as early as June. Once a prototype is validated, the test kits will be made in the U.K. and at a new facility in Senegal for infectious disease testing, DiaTropix, that was founded by Institut Pasteur.
Workers in Dakar are using laser cutters to make about 1,000 face shields per week for health care workers. They also are creating key chains with prevention messages such as “Stay Home.”
Alcohol-based hand sanitizers are being produced in Zimbabwe on university and technical college campuses that have been transformed into “COVID response factories.” Higher Education Minister Amon Murwira said the teams are also producing face masks, gowns and aprons.
It’s not known whether these projects will be finished before the virus hits its peak in Africa, but observers say the longer-term impact of such ingenuity is substantial.
“Necessity is the mother of invention,” Dr. Ahmed Ogwell, deputy director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told The Associated Press. “What we’re seeing in Africa is going to change the way medical supplies in particular are manufactured.”
He predicted there would be a “new public health order” after the pandemic, with changes in global supply chains. Countries already are taking steps toward not having to rely on help from abroad.
Developing countries are scrambling for equipment as deliveries are hindered. But even India,
where some engineers are also trying to build low-cost ventilators, has access to more than 19,000 of them in addition to domestic manufacturers who are expected to deliver tens of thousands more.
African nations are understanding the importance of local production and ingenuity.
Ghana is using drone technology to transport COVID-19 tests and protective gear in collaboration with a U.S.-based company called Zipline that already was distributing vaccines and other medical products to remote parts of the country.
“This is a global pandemic: 210 countries and territories across the globe are affected,” Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari tweeted recently. “We cannot expect others to come to our assistance. No one is coming to defeat this virus for us.” 
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This is a story about books in an unlikely place, and their struggle to get into the hands of people during a national lockdown. South Africa’s eased lockdown means books are finally available for sale again, but in the nation’s biggest city, with its reputation for speed and hustle, do people care? VOA’s Anita Powell takes us on a literary journey through the unlikeliest of literary towns: Johannesburg.
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Clashes between two tribes in Sudan’s eastern city of Kassala killed three people and wounded 79 others, the state’s acting governor said on Sunday.Violence between members of the Beni Amer and Nuba ethnic groups, which has flared in the past, reignited on Thursday and escalated on Friday when houses were set ablaze, Brigade Mahmoud Baker Homd said in a statement.It was not immediately clear what caused Thursday’s clash.Violence between the Beni Amer and Nuba was reported in Port Sudan in January by a local doctors’ group that said eight people were killed and dozens injured.The two groups had made peace in September 2019 after Sudan’s top military commander, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, threatened to expel both tribes from the country if they did not commit to reconciliation.
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Turkey is threatening tough retaliation if forces loyal to Libyan general Khalifa Haftar strike Turkish interests or its diplomatic missions in Tripoli or elsewhere.Haftar, who has set up a rival government in eastern Libya, has been fighting to topple the internationally-recognized government of Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj.  “If our missions and our interests in Libya are targeted, we will deem Haftar’s forces legitimate targets,” The Turkish Foreign Ministry said Sunday.Turkey says the area near its embassy in Tripoli was shelled late last week. Haftar’s forces deny responsibility.But Turkey is strongly criticizing the United Nations for what it says is the U.N.’s failure to move against Haftar.“It is unacceptable for the United Nations to remain silent against this carnage any longer. Countries providing military, financial and political aid to Haftar are responsible for the suffering that the people of Libya are enduring and the chaos and instability the country is being dragged into,” the foreign ministry statement said.Turkey supports the Tripoli-based government as it tries to defend itself from a year-long offensive from Haftar to seize the capital.Weekend shelling in and around Tripoli has killed as many as six and wounded several dozen, reports say.  Residents in Tripoli say the fighting has been some the worst in recent months. The country’s only functioning airport has been badly damaged and parts of northern Libya are at risk of going dry after armed men stormed a power station belonging to the government’s water authority.Al-Sarraj’s Government of National Accord, has been able to push back Haftar’s forces which have the support of Egypt, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates.  Appeals from the European Union to all foreign countries earlier this year to stop supplying arms and interfering in Libya and let peace talks proceed have gone nowhere.   
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