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LONDON (Reuters) - Nigerian novelist and poet Chinua Achebe, widely seen as a grandfather of modern African literature, has died at the age of 82, publisher Penguin said on Friday.
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I took Alu and nothing happened. I had another blood test to recheck and still had the same parasites. The drugs were fake.
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But mobile is fast emerging as a major transformative power. Already, in places like South Africa, mobile carries more advertising than all the traditional media combined. In places like Kenya, mobile banking is outpacing all traditional financial channels. And, everywhere from Nigeria to Uganda, people are turning to mobile for news or entertainment ahead of traditional media. People are hungrier than ever for quality content.
Why Now Is the Time for Media Innovation in Africa
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In these remote parts, facts are hard to come by — and the killers have proved elusive, apparently continuing their poaching even after the Cameroonian government sent in the military on March 1.
What is clear is that the poachers have been sweeping in on horseback from Chad or Sudan. They are heavily armed and highly organized. Confrontations with the military have left at least one soldier dead so far.
What is also clear is that the slaughter — which is unprecedented even in the context of a recent increase in wildlife poaching — has as its ultimate destination China and, to a lesser degree, Thailand and Egypt (where Chinese are the main customers of pilfered ivory from elephant tusks.)
Demand for ivory from China “is the leading driver behind the illegal trade in ivory today,” said Tom Milliken, an elephant and rhino expert for Traffic, an organization that monitors the global wildlife trade, in a telephone conference organized by the WWF this week.
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For elephants, 2011 was the worst year on record. Now add the hundreds killed in one national park in Cameroon alone, within just the last two months, and you get a sense of the urgency of the problem.
More on:
China’s Hunger for Ivory is Killing Cameroon’s Elephants
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ShortFormBlog: Tanzania ferry accident kills hundreds off coast of Zanzibar
- 240+ people killed in last night’s ferry sinking off Zanzibar
- 607+ people rescued; overcrowding was blamed for the disaster source
» A depressingly common occurrence: Accidents like these happen in the region every few years, most recently in 2009. And while this incident was…
(Source: shortformblog)
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UN and Kenya attacked over $60m Somali refugee camp that still stands empty
The United Nations and the Kenyan government have come in for a fresh round of criticism for the continued closure of a multimillion-pound refugee camp that has been left empty despite the deepening humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has been accused of misdirecting the media by renaming scrubland adjacent to empty facilities, rather than sealing a deal with Kenya to open up a camp that cost international donors $60m (£37m) to build and has been left locked since November last year. On a visit last month, the Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga said the camp would be opened by 24 July.
“To the thousands of desperate Somalis arriving every day, the sight of a fully equipped refugee camp standing empty must be the ultimate rebuke,” said Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. The New York-based watchdog called on the Kenyan government to immediately open up the extra camp adjacent to the existing Dadaab complex of refugee camps in northern Kenya, which now shelters 440,000 people.
Despite massive overcrowding at Dadaab, a new camp called “Ifo 2” has been left locked and empty throughout the crisis. The UNHCR’s decision to relocate famine refugees to scrubland near Ifo 2 – slated for a future site – and rename the whole area “Ifo extension” has led to confused reports suggesting the new camp was in operation.
William Stirling, a UNHCR official, confirmed that the camps have “still not opened” but denied misleading the media. Further confusion has been caused by conflicting statements from the Kenyan government, which followed last month’s visit by Mr Odinga when he said that Ifo 2 would be opened on “humanitarian grounds”.
However, Kenya’s President Mwai Kibaki reportedly told Jill Biden, wife of the US Vice-President Joe Biden, who visited earlier this week, that Somali famine victims should be helped on the other side of the border instead of flooding into Kenya. There are divisions in the Kenyan cabinet over allowing refugees to be housed in proper buildings at Dadaab with some ministers arguing it will encourage new arrivals and pose a security threat.
Humanitarian agencies at Dadaab have been frustrated by UNHCR’s refusal to admit it has no agreement on Ifo 2 with the Kenyan government. “They would rather move surreptitiously than bite the bullet,” complained one aid worker.
UNHCR officials have attempted to play down the difference between the Ifo 2 camp and the overflow area to where thousands of refugees have been moved. “I don’t see a huge difference between the sites,” said Mr Stirling who added that refugees would be accommodated in tents at either location and that water and sanitation was being provided.
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African AirFlying in a motorized paraglider over one of the most diverse continents in the world, George Steinmetz captures the stunning beauty of Africa’s landscapes and people. His pictures show not only the spectacular patterns of the land, but also the potential and hope that the continent encompasses.
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Photograph by Robin Hammond.
Mozambique—The glowing hues of dusk bathe a mud-splattered gold miner in the border province of Manica. The area draws scores of workers from neighboring Zimbabwe who pan for traces of the precious metal in turbid waters.
