Across Africa in five minutes or less

GHANA

The government is putting in a lot of measures to stimulate job creation in an integrated and inclusive manner throughout the entire gold mining value chain, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia has indicated.

This integrated, inclusive chain will bring together large scale, small scale, sustainable community miners as well as other stakeholders such as refiners, purchasers and sellers of jewellery in an effort aimed at increasing the value Ghana derives from her raw materials and also bring clarity on the volumes and value of extracted materials.

BENIN

While welcoming the Committee Members, Mr. Mamadou Traore, Acting Commissioner for Education, Science, and Culture of the ECOWAS Commission, whose speech was read by H.E. Blaise Diplo-Djomand, Resident Representative of ECOWAS in Benin, highlighted that out of a total number of 1,121 cultural heritages on the list of world cultural and natural heritages, the ECOWAS Region has 32.

BURKINA FASO

Burkina Faso’s President Roch Kabore has dismissed the country’s defense minister in the wake of widespread protests Saturday against insecurity.

Cherif Sy had been defense minister since the country’s conflict with domestic terror groups started in 2015. His replacement is the president himself, along with a minister delegate, Colonel Major Aimé Simpore, who has been appointed to assist.

SENEGAL

The hashtag #JusticePourLouise has been trending in Senegal in recent days, the latest grim reminder of the country’s failure to deal with the scourge of sexual violence in Senegal’s education system.

In the latest case, a 19-year-old male student has been detained by police and accused of raping a 15-year-old girl, also a student at the same school. The accused reportedly shared a video about the rape that has been widely shared via WhatsApp and elsewhere. The widespread media coverage has included both condemnation of the rape and the accused, as well efforts to vilify and discredit the survivor’s account of the rape

NIGERIA

The Senate has passed the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB).

The bill was passed after the lawmakers considered the report of the Joint Committees on Petroleum (Upstream and Downstream) and Gas Resources on Thursday.

The passage of the bill as also a sequel to a closed door meeting with the Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva and the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mele Kyari.

LIBERIA

Over 350,000 persons are expected to obtain covid-19 vaccination as the World Bank approved additional financing to the Liberia COVID-19 Emergency Preparedness and Response Project.

The gesture is to enable affordable and equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines here.

SIERRA LEONE

The President of Sierra Leone, Dr Julius Maada Bio has in a live television broadcast reimposed a nationwide curfew and shut down congregational worship in the country for one month.  The reintroduction of these measures came after the country has recorded the highest number of covid-19 cases and deaths while experiencing the third wave of the pandemic. Also, the Delta variant, the deadliest of the pandemic has been detected in the country. However, the curfew will run from 11:00 pm to 5:00 am, starting from Monday, June 5, 2021, and the closure of congregational worship will start with immediate effect from tomorrow, Friday, June 2, 2021.

GUINEA

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded the Article IV consultation [1] with Guinea.

Although overall growth was strong, at 7.1 percent of GDP in 2020, buttressed by a buoyant mining sector, the non-mining economy-which employs the vast majority of the population-was significantly affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Inflation surpassed 10 percent at end- 2020 and has since accelerated to above 12 percent, as a result of rising food prices and freight rates associated with COVID-19-related supply disruptions, as well as the impact of the policies to respond to the pandemic

TOGO

The Human Rights Committee today concluded its consideration of the fifth report of Togo on measures taken to implement the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

During a dialogue held entirely online, Committee Experts praised the quality and clarity of answers provided by the State Party in the report.

EGYPT

Egypt is preparing to announce the inauguration of a new military base on its border with Libya as one of its measured options to confront Turkish influence in Libya and face Ankara’s refusal to withdraw its forces and mercenaries from Tripoli.

ALGERIA

Algerian Finance Minister Aimene Benabderrahmane was named prime minister Wednesday, the presidency said, following legislative elections earlier this month and as the country seeks to curb a deep socio-economic crisis.

SOUTH AFRICA

In South Africa, there have been 21.584 new cases of Covid-19, taking the total reported to 1,995,556. Deaths have reached 61,029 (+382), while recoveries have climbed to 1,754,793, leaving the country with a balance of 179,734 active cases. The total number of vaccines administered is 3,155,717 (+129,081).

ZIMBABWE

One day in April 2016, the Zimbabwean pastor Evan Mawarire was sitting in his office, frustrated at the persistent economic crisis in his country that was making it difficult to provide for his family. So, he decided to vent. He took out his phone, propped it up against the Bible on his desk, and recorded a video in which he spoke about the symbolism of the Zimbabwean national flag, and how the promises of freedom and prosperity that it symbolizes had been violated by the regime of then-President Robert Mugabe. The video quickly went viral, inspiring a hashtag, #ThisFlag, and massive pro-democracy demonstrations. Mawarire was arrested and imprisoned for his activism.

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