Meet: Mzansi's Sexiest 2016 finalists

 Mbali Nkosi  (All Access presenter).

More pics after cut.....

John Magufuli sworn in as President of Tanzania

Tanzania's new president John Pombe Magufuli. File photo.
Image by:  REUTERS

Magufuli's win in the October 25 poll with over 58% of votes cemented the long-running Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party's firm grip on power.
Vice-President Samia Suluhu Hassan, who comes from Zanzibar, was also sworn in at a stadium in the economic capital Dar es Salaam, an AFP reporter at the ceremony said.

Forced marriages, too many babies quash hope for Niger's girls

 

Girls are seen walking to school early in the morning along a street of Kano. (Reuters photo)

Fifteen-year-old Ousseina's dream of becoming a nurse is already over. "For me, school's finished," said the frail teenager who sells eggs by a roadstop in the southern Niger town of Maradi.
She, like so many other girls in this deeply poor west African state bordering the Sahara, has no choice but to wed very early.
"My marriage?" she said, her little body shrouded in a sky-blue veil.
"It will be after the harvest towards the end of November" -- seven months before she would have passed her school certificate, the key to further education and, with luck, a nursing career.

It’s about time we recognize that plagiarism is a global problem, not peculiar to Nigeria alone

Yesterday, Femke van Zeiji, a Dutch writer tweeted that an intern was fired for plagiarism and ended the tweet with: “he can always come and work for a Nigerian news outlet.” She further stated that in Nigeria, the practice of plagiarism happens with impunity, even though national copyright laws forbid it. While Femke’s assertion is true, it is also one-sided, plagiarism is not peculiar to Nigeria alone.

Rokhsana, Afghan woman stoned To Death for adultery

 

© AFP A video frame grab taken from footage recorded on 25 October 2015 - and made available by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty - shows men stoning Afghan woman Rokhsana 

 

A young woman has been stoned to death in central Afghanistan after being accused of adultery, officials say.
A video appearing to show the punishment has been posted online.
The 30-second clip shows a woman in a hole in the ground surrounded by turbaned men who hurl stones at her. Her fiance was lashed.

Can Ethiopia Survive Its Own War on Terror? By Christina Goldbaum

On April 2, as I waited in a doctor’s office near Nairobi, the anchor of Kenya’s morning news broadcast began reporting what would prove to be a horrific attack on Garissa University by the Somali terrorist group al-Shabaab. As the early news trickled in, some people around me looked at the television screen, and others just checked their phones. Most, however, just stared impatiently at the doctor’s door.

Photos: How free is freedom in Angola? By Manuel Nunes Ramires Serrano

Henrique Luaty and other Angolan activists were arrested for allegedly planning to overthrow the President. His hunger strike and a growing public support can strong-arm the Angolan government into making way for a democratic transition. 

 
Luaty Beirao. RTP caption.

On the 20th of June, fifteen Angolan activists were arrested in Luanda accused of attempting to disrupt public order and security. Seventeen activists were formally indicted (two of them were placed under provisional liberty, Laurinda Gouveia and Rosa Conde) of planning a coup d’état to remove the President of Angola from power. More pics after cut....

These Vintage Photos Recount Nigeria's History, Dissolving Stereotypes Along The Way Revisiting the stunning portfolio of royal photographer Chief S.O. Alonge. The Huffington Post

 

Smithsonian National Museum of African Art Reclining young lady Hand-colored photograph by Chief S.O. Alonge, c. 1950 Benin City, Nigeria Chief Solomon Osagie Alonge Collection EEPA 2009-007 National Museum of African Art Smithsonian Institution

 

 "We're connecting people with their own history, their own past, through photography," Amy Staples, curator at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, poetically explained to The Huffington Post.
Staples is specifically referencing the photography of Nigerian artist Chief Solomon Osagie Alonge. The photographer's work is currently on view, in an exhibition titled "Chief S.O. Alonge: Photographer to the Royal Court of Benin, Nigeria." The show attempts to tell the unique story of Alonge, who, born in 1911 in Benin City, Nigeria, became his country's first indigenous court photographer. More pics after cut

Blind Spots: Awake Africa, your future is here By Sean O'Toole

DRAW: Sherif Adel, Cairo illustrator of the comic 'Pass by Tomorrow'

In a way Paul Biya, Cameroon's low-key president, was right: Bekolo is now a highly regarded filmmaker and Ndikung owns a successful art gallery with an African focus in Berlin.
But last week in Johannesburg, at a public festival hosted by the Goethe Institute, the two men remarked on the irony of Biya's promise. The six-term president has been repeating his wisdom since taking office in 1982. Bekolo viewed this as symptomatic of a future drift in African politics.

Nigeria renews MTN's operating spectrum, licence

A man walks past a billboard for MTN in Nigeria.
Image by: Getty Images

 

 MTN, which had a $5.2 billion fine imposed on it by the Nigerian Communication Commission last week for failing to deregister SIM cards in its largest market, said it received confirmation from the regulator that its operating spectrum in the 900 MHz and 1800 MHz frequency bands had been renewed.
MTN's operating spectrum and its digital mobile license were issued in 2001, and both were due to expire in February 2016. Both have now been extended to 31 August 2021, the firm said.

Nigeria Warns Of Boko Haram Water-Poisoning Plot

Nigeria’s military has warned of a plot by the Boko Haram militant group to poison water sources in northeast Nigeria, various media outlets reported over the weekend. Officials have urged citizens to stock up on water and other necessary commodities while they investigate the issue.

Photos: President Buhari in India For Indian-Africa Forum Summit.

President Buhari is presently in India for the Indian-Africa Forum Summit. More pics after cut..

South Africa’s Student Revolt By NICKY FALKOF

 

Students marching at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg last week. Credit New York Times.

Last Wednesday, I arrived at the University of the Witwatersrand, where I work, and couldn’t get inside. Some major entrances to the campus in the center of Johannesburg were locked. Others had been barricaded by students. The university had expected a docile, two-hour protest; instead, a week before exams, the campus was shut down by a crowd of 2,000. It’s been closed ever since.

Students at Wits, as it’s known locally, are protesting because the poor are being priced out of higher education. 

Beyond oil: India needs to reimagine its ties with Nigeria By Siddhartha Mitter

 Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari spent the year 1973 in India as a young army officer receiving training at the Defence Services Staff College in Tamil Nadu. This week, Buhari returns as his country’s newly-elected civilian leader, and head of its delegation to the India-Africa Summit in New Delhi. He will be one of some 40 leaders at the summit, but his country has the most in common with India in terms of structure and scale.

African Poetry Book Fund Call for Entries for the 2015 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets

 

 

 

Alert! Submissions for the 2015 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets are open now, through to 1 December, 2015. Every year Prairie Schooner‘s sister organisation, the African Poetry Book Fund, publishes the first book of an African poet. The inaugural Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets was awarded to Clifton Gachagua of Kenya for his book Madman at Kilifi. The 2014 prize went to Somalian-American poet Ladan Osman‘s The Kitchen Dweller’s Testimony.