Author: Amnewsworld

Two generations of Cameroonians have been born under the presidency of Paul Biya who, on Sunday 6 November, was marking 40 years of undivided rule. Known as the “Sphinx”, Biya is now 89 years-old and in poor health. Some people think it may be a good time for a change but fear the instability that may follow. Shopkeeper, Muriel Ewane, says: “After 40 years nothing has changed. It’s getting worse and worse, worse and worse. With life becoming more and more expensive. “We don’t even live on hope anymore. You can’t live on hope, you can’t live on hope in…

Delegates, organizers and observers were in the Egyptian coastal resort of Sharm el-Sheikh on Sunday for the start of COP27. Behind the picturesque setting, the venue has become a tightly controlled fortress as the climate conference gets underway. COP27 is being branded an “African COP” where the positions of African countries on issues like finance for adapting to climate change or adopting renewable energy sources will be central to the talks. The UN weather agency says 116 million people in Africa’s coastal states and islands face rising sea-levels and by 2050 African nations will need to spend $50 billion every…

Thousands of protesters in Mali held a rally on Friday organized by the High Islamic Council of Mali. The demonstration was in response to a social network video in which insulting remarks were made about Islam and a man trampled on a copy of the Quran. Although the government has condemned the video, many Muslims remain furious. One of the protesters, Issa Coulibaly, said: “There are people who have blasphemed our prophet, our religion, our holy book the Quran and our holy place the Kaaba. That’s why we went out to say that we don’t agree with that.” Marima Sogodo,…

Senegal’s main opposition leader, Ousmane Sonko, has appeared in a Dakar court over rape accusations with his lawyer calling the case a state “conspiracy” that should be dropped. He is accused of raping an employee of a beauty salon where he was getting a massage and his arrest in March 2021 led to deadly riots.  Sonko insists the claims are entirely false and that Senegalese President Macky Sall is attempting to set a trap for him and his supporters. Speaking at a press conference, Sonko, said:  “He (the senior judge) asked me: ‘Do I recognise that I had relations with…

Three people have been killed in scuffles over food aid at a displaced persons’ camp in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Many people in the Kanyarucyinya camp have fled fighting between the M23 militia and President Félix Tshisekedi has called for support from young people to resist the rebel forces. “In response to the strong demand from the youth, I invite them to organise themselves into vigilance groups in order to support, accompany and sustain our armed forces, our defence forces,” he said M23 rebels have captured swathes of new territory in recent weeks and displaced tens of thousands of people…

Ghana return to the World Cup after missing out in Russia 2018 with few expecting the Black Stars to cause a stir in Qatar. The lowest-ranked (61st) of the 32 teams that will participate at the 2022 Qatar World Cup, it will be difficult for Ghana to stage a repeat of their historic run to the quarter-finals of the 2010 World Cup. “I believe in the players that we have, I believe in the squad we have, especially if everyone will be there and there are no injuries and we have a full squad. I think we can create surprises,…

The UN climate panel (IPCC) has already written the worst-case scenario: in 2050, “the sea will rise by one meter”. Then it will swallow “a third of the ultra-fertile land of the Nile Delta and historic cities like Alexandria will be flooded”. Every year, the city of Alexander the Great sinks by three millimeters, weakened by the Nile dams upstream that prevent silt from consolidating its soil and by offshore gas drilling. Opposite, the sea is rising as much, due to the effect of warming and the melting of the ice cap. Hundreds of people have already had to leave…

Police in Nigeria has mounted a search for some 21 people abducted by gunmen while working on farmland whose owner is believed to have owed the alleged kidnappers coerced payments. The people kidnapped were teenagers working on a farm in the remote Faskari council area of Katsina state when the gunmen “singled out the farm and abducted them,” Katsina police spokesperson Gambo Isah said on Thursday “According to our investigation, the bandits placed some levies on some of these farmers, and this particular one refused to comply with their demands. … That was why they went to their farm and…

The United Nations has warned that nearly eight million people in South Sudan, or two-thirds of the population, are at risk of food insecurity and famine. “Hunger and malnutrition are on the rise in flood-, drought- and conflict-affected areas of South Sudan, and some communities are at risk of famine unless humanitarian assistance is sustained and climate adaptation measures are strengthened,” the new report released on Thursday said. The joint report by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the U.N. Children’s Fund (Unicef), and the World Food Programme (WFP) says the proportion of people facing high levels of food…

The United States has announced that it will pay a total of $36 million to the city and state of New York for the 1965 assassination of Malcolm X. The two men were cleared in 2021 after serving 20 years each for the killing. The lawyer David Shanies, defender of Muhammad Aziz, 84, and the family of Khalil Islam, who died in 2009, confirmed in an email to AFP on Sunday evening that an “injustice (had been) recognised today and a modest step is taken to correct it. The New York Times reported that the city’s legal department had earlier…