By Rédaction Africanews with agencies Thousands gathered in the Iranian capital, Tehran, on Wednesday for a state send-off for the national football team due to take part in the FIFA World Cup next month. Participants, mostly government supporters, waved Iranian flags and held pictures of new supreme leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, amid chants of “Death to America” and “Death to Israel”. “This is the best farewell ceremony in the last four World Cups. The players stand alongside the people, and the people stand alongside the country’s dignity, honour and power,” the head of the Iranian Football Federation, Mehdi Taj, told…
Author: Montage Africa
By Rédaction Africanews and AP South Africa’s ruling African National Congress gathered for a key meeting as President Cyril Ramaphosa faces renewed impeachment pressure linked to the controversial Farmgate cash-heist scandal. The Constitutional Court revived impeachment proceedings last week, reopening scrutiny over the theft of roughly four million dollars in cash allegedly hidden at Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala farm. The ANC had previously blocked impeachment efforts against the president in 2022. Despite mounting political pressure, Ramaphosa has ruled out resigning. ANC Secretary General Fikile Mbalula said the president would challenge the Section 89 report through a legal review process following advice…
By Rédaction Africanews with AP Just hours after a South African judge said the long-running graft trial of Jacob Zuma, must proceed, the former president instructed his legal team to appeal the ruling. On Thursday, a KwaZulu-Natal High Court ordered that the so-called arms deal corruption case against Zuma and French defence giant, Thales, would go ahead on 1 February 2027. Judge Nkosinathi Chili accused Zuma and Thales of using “Stalingrad defence”, a legal term for a strategy to slow down proceeding through constant appeals, Chili said the “interests of justice” demanded that the case proceed. “Without this court’s intervention,…
By AFP Kenya’s commercial wildlife trade has expanded sharply over the past decade, with a tenfold rise in the number of captive-bred reptiles exported as exotic pets, a report by World Animal Protection said Thursday. Although the trade is legal, 77 percent of traded species have seen their populations decline in the wild, raising sustainability concerns. The trade in live reptiles rose sharply from 8,551 in 2013 to 86,330 in 2023, said the report, which analysed Kenya’s data from the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). The overall number of live animals traded…
By Rédaction Africanews and AP Political tension is rising in Madagascar, where a leading opposition lawmaker says he has asked the country’s top court to remove President Michael Randrianirina over alleged constitutional violations. The move comes just months after Randrianirina, a military colonel, took power in October following mass youth-led protests that forced former president Andry Rajoelina to flee the country amid anger over worsening water and electricity shortages. Since then, hopes for reform have begun to fade. Small but persistent protests have returned in recent weeks, led largely by young Madagascans frustrated with the slow pace of change. Opposition…
By Rédaction Africanews and AP The Community Violence Reduction Programme supported by the United Nations mission in the Central African Republic is helping vulnerable people rebuild their lives through vocational training and economic empowerment. In the town of Bimbo, Brice Nzambé, a man living with a disability, has become a symbol of that transformation. After receiving tailoring training through the programme in 2023, he opened his own workshop the following year and now employs five apprentices, including three women. Nzambé says the programme changed both his life and the way he sees himself. He explained that people with disabilities…
By Rédaction Africanews with agencies After years of sidelining the Sahel’s military rulers, the United States is moving to engage more with countries in the region. Top military officials warned a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Thursday, that extremist groups had expanded their operational capacity. “Today, the epicentre of global terrorism is in Africa. ISIS leadership is African. Al-Qaeda’s economic engine is in Africa. Both of these groups share the will and intent to strike our homeland,” said General Dagvin Anderson, Commander of the United States Africa Command. Referring to militant advances in West Africa, including a recent attack…
By AFP Egyptian smallholders have seen their lives upended by the war in Iran, with soaring fertiliser and energy prices forcing many to lay off workers and reduce the amount of land they farm. Before the United States and Israel launched the war that would end up engulfing the region, Ashraf Abu Ragab cultivated a full acre with a small crew. Now he farms just half on his own after sacking the workers he once relied on, and has quit growing wheat, a fertiliser-intensive crop. “Everything has become more expensive,” the 45-year-old told AFP, standing among rows of maize and sesame in…
By Kwabena Adu-Gyamfi Two Ghanaian brothers and a U.S.-based woman have been indicted in the United States for allegedly running a romance fraud scheme that targeted elderly Americans and funneled money through a cross-border network, according to federal prosecutors. Jamal Abubakari, Kamal Abubakari, both 22, and 53-year-old Amanda Joy Opoku-Boachie were charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. All three were arrested in Virginia and remain in custody. Prosecutors say the group used fake identities on dating sites and social media to build romantic relationships with older victims before convincing them to send money through wire transfers.…
Africa’s top health agency has declared an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s eastern Ituri province. Around 246 cases and 65 deaths have been reported, mainly in the gold-mining towns of Mongwalu and Rwampara, said the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC). Its statement on Friday added that it was convening a meeting with DR Congo, neighbouring Uganda and South Sudan, and other international partners to discuss priorities, including response efforts and cross-border surveillance. Ebola was first discovered in 1976 in what is now DR Congo, and is thought to have spread from bats. This is…