Novak Djokovic: Australia loses bid to delay tennis star’s visa appeal

A bid by the Australian government to delay Novak Djokovic’s appeal against deportation has been rejected by a judge overseeing his case.

The government had requested the tennis star’s court hearing be postponed until Wednesday, but it will instead begin as scheduled on Monday morning.

Djokovic was denied entry to Australia after landing in Melbourne last week to defend his Australian Open title.

His case has caused a huge outcry and made headlines around the world.

The world number one men’s tennis player – who has said he is opposed to vaccination – is in an immigration detention centre as his lawyers prepare to appeal against a decision by Australia’s federal government to cancel his visa.

Djokovic, 34, had been granted a medical exemption to play in the Australian Open tournament in a decision that infuriated many ordinary Australians who have been living under some of the world’s strictest Covid rules.

Djokovic court case: Could he argue his way in?

Is tennis saga an unforced error for Australia?

Why Djokovic is a polarising player

On Saturday, Djokovic’s lawyers submitted a 35-page document arguing that their client fulfilled the criteria for a vaccine exemption certificate because of a recent Covid infection, which was confirmed by a PCR test on 16 December.

There had been no prior announcement of Djokovic’s Covid infection, and photos have since emerged of the player apparently attending events in the Serbian capital Belgrade maskless at around the time he tested positive.

It is unclear whether he knew he had Covid when the photos were taken.

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The Australian government has insisted that a recent Covid infection only offers an exemption for residents – and in its own submission to the court on Sunday, government lawyers said the tennis star had been given no assurance a medical exemption would be accepted.

It appears that Djokovic’s team will effectively tell the court that the decision to revoke the visa was affected by a variety of “jurisdictional errors” – but that the government will firmly reject any attempt to have its processes ruled invalid.

Djokovic’s lawyers have said he was kept at the immigration control point at Melbourne Airport for about eight hours after he arrived, and that he had little communication with them during that period – which the Australian government says was in no way unfair to the tennis star.

On Sunday, a court order by Judge Anthony Kelly stated that the request to delay the hearing until 12 January had been “refused without prejudice” and that submissions must be presented to the court at 10:00 local time on Monday (23:00 GMT Sunday).

Last week, Tennis Australia said it would need to know whether Djokovic was participating in the Australian Open so that it could schedule his games in the competition.

While he awaits a final decision, Djokovic’s lawyers have asked he be moved from the immigration detention hotel that has often been criticised by refugees for its poor conditions, to “a more suitable place of detention” that would allow him to train ahead of the Australian Open.

Shaimaa Khalil reports from Melbourne’s Park Hotel on the latest twist in the Djokovic visa row

Australia’s pandemic border rules ban foreigners from entering the country if they are not either double vaccinated or have a medical exemption from having the jabs.

While foreigners can fly in to Australia on a visa applied for online, they must still clear immigration customs on arrival at the airport.

The Australian Open begins on 17 January in Melbourne.

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At least seven dead after Brazil cliff collapses on boats

At least seven people have been killed after part of a cliff collapsed onto leisure boats on a Brazilian lake.

Another three are missing and 32 injured following the accident in the south-east of the country.

Video circulating online shows the moment the rock detaches from the cliff face as onlookers try to yell warnings to the boats beneath.

At least one of the boats appears to have sunk, while others managed to escape.

The collapse at 11:00 local time (14:00 GMT) followed days of rain in Minas Gerais state, which had made the cliffs more susceptible to collapse, local fire officials told reporters.

“That piece will fall out,” a woman can be heard saying in a video of the accident. “Get out of there,” warns another, before the cliff collapses onto the boats.

Three vessels were hit by falling rock, Lieutenant Pedro Aihara told reporters. Out of the 32 injured, nine people were in hospital.

Divers and helicopters are searching the water for any more survivors.

Twenty people were initially reported missing, but Lt Aihara said most were accounted for after checking hospital lists.

Alessandra Barbosa told news outlet EPTV that she is seeking news of her uncles, who were spending the weekend at the site and decided to take a boat tour of the cliff.

“I called local hospitals. So far I haven’t had any information about them. We are distressed, very concerned,” she said.

“We get nervous because we have no information and it’s family, right? Family is everything to us.”

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Sudan’s anti-coup protesters tear-gassed

Sudanese security forces have fired tear gas to try to disperse the latest anti-government protest marches in the capital, Khartoum.

Among the groups joining Sunday’s demonstrations was the Central Doctors’ Committee whose members say they are angry at the impact of October’s military coup on health services.

Last week, Abdalla Hamdok resigned as prime minister amid continuing friction between the military and pro-democracy campaigners.

The UN envoy to Sudan, Volker Perthes, had called for both sides to engage in constructive dialogue.

But his proposal has been rejected by opposition trades unions and rebels in the Darfur region.

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Eduwatch pushes for prosecution of teachers who help students cheat in exams

Education think tank, Africa Education Watch, is pushing for the criminalization of teachers who aid their students in examination malpractices.

The comment comes on the back of the termination of the appointment of eleven teachers from the Ghana Education Service (GES) for involving in examination malpractice during the 2020 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) and the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).

In an interview with Citi News, Executive Director of Africa Education Watch Kofi Asare welcomed the step taken by the service but indicated that terminating their appointment is not enough; thus criminalizing the practice would deter others from engaging in it.

“There was consensus for the need to amend WAEC’s law and criminalize examination malpractice. If this is well implemented, we will make all kinds of examination malpractice unattractive for both the teachers and students.”

Meanwhile, the Founder of the Innovative Teachers Alliance Stephen Desu, has questioned the decision by GES to terminate the appointment of these teachers.

“The GES Council has not been formed yet, so I wonder the power with which the Deputy Director of Education sacked the teachers. First, it was Teacher Kwadwo, now 11 others. The teachers ought to have been represented by lawyers at the place, but they ended up going alone, that is where the problem is.”

“Any offence for which they were sacked are mere allegations. GES has no mandate to sack them. The Council has not been constituted yet, and yet GES has assumed the power to dismiss teachers.”

GES has interdicted 11 teachers over malpractices during the 2020 WASSCE and the BECE.

The GES, in a statement, indicated that the interdiction was based on a report by the West African Examination Council (WAEC).

The 11 officials have already admitted acting unprofessionally before a committee tasked to probe the alleged malpractices.

The GES suggested the temporary interdiction of the officers until the recommendation for termination of the teachers’ appointment is endorsed.

There have been reports of alleged malpractices, including leakage of question papers in the 2020 WASCCE and BECE.

Pictures of the mathematics 2020 BECE exam papers went viral on social media just a few minutes before the examination started.

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Nigeria motorbike gang attack: Death toll rises to 200

At least 200 people in Nigeria’s north-western Zamfara state have been buried after a wave of vicious attacks by gangs of gunmen over several days.

Survivors told the BBC that motorbike-riding gangsters attacked village after village, shooting indiscriminately.

The attacks are believed to be in response to military air strikes on Monday that forced some of the criminal gangs from their forest hideouts.

The groups have plagued Zamfara and neighbouring states for several years.

Known locally as bandits, these gangs are sophisticated networks of criminals who operate across large swathes of territory, often stealing animals, kidnapping for ransom and killing those who confront them.

This week, the government officially labelled bandits as terrorists, allowing security forces to impose tougher sanctions on the groups and their supporters.

On Friday it was initially reported that more than 100 people had been killed by suspected bandit militants in the region, after some 300 gunmen on motorbikes arrived in as many as nine communities between Tuesday and Thursday night.

Gunmen burnt homes and mutilated the bodies of their victims in the assault.

Villager Idi Musa told the AFP news agency that the attackers also stole around 2,000 cattle.

Local media reported that the armed groups behind the attacks appeared to be on the move – heading towards the western part of Zamfara state after abandoning hideouts in forested areas in response to sustained government attacks.

A spokesperson for Humanitarian Affairs Minister Sadiya Umar Farouq told AFP that more than 200 people had been buried.

• ANALYSIS: Outrage at Nigeria’s brazen bandit attacks
• WATCH: Kidnappers demand millions for a child’s life
• EXPLAINER: The motorcycle bandits terrorising northern Nigeria

She also confirmed that more than 10,000 people had been left homeless and many were still missing.

Meanwhile, officials in neighbouring Kebbi state said bandits had released a further 30 schoolchildren and one teacher who had been held for six months. It is not clear if a ransom was paid for their release.

In June, the kidnappers took 102 students and eight teachers from a school in the city of Birnin Kebbi. An unspecified number had already been freed last year, after their parents negotiated with the captors.

Kidnapping for ransom is a huge criminal enterprise in Nigeria.

A story has been trending this weekend about a father from Katsina state, which borders Zamfara to the east, who has been removing the roof of his house to sell the metal sheeting to raise a ransom of about $250 (£180) for his son.

The Katsina Post shared the photos of Sai’du Faskari on Facebook. He had himself been kidnapped by gunmen, and his children had raised about $125 for his ransom.

When his son went to pay the bandits off, he was then taken hostage.

Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari has promised that the government will not relent in its battle with the “outlaws”.

“The latest attacks on innocent people by the bandits is an act of desperation by mass murderers, now under relentless pressure from our military forces,” he said in a statement on Saturday night.

Nigeria’s armed forces said this week that they had killed 537 “armed bandits and other criminal elements” in the region and arrested 374 others since May last year.

Thousands of Nigerian troops have been deployed to fight them.

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