Africa (except North Africa)

29 November 2019; AFP: John Eromosele records the coordinates of a bustling canal on his smartphone from aboard a dug-out canoe navigating the floating slum of Makoko in Nigerian megacity Lagos.

The waterway is "like a boulevard, there's always traffic here," the computer coding specialist laughed as other boats jostled for space between rows of wooden houses on stilts.

Officially Makoko does not exist.

JOHNANNESBURG (Reuters) - A South African court on Friday rejected an appeal by former president Jacob Zuma that sought to prevent his prosecution on corruption charges over a $2 billion arms deal.

The ruling paves the way for Zuma’s long-awaited trial to start in February 2020.

Zuma, in office from 2009-2018, had previously applied for a permanent stay of prosecution on 18 charges of fraud, racketeering and money laundering relating to an arms deal with French defense firm Thales in the 1990s.

OUAGADOUGOU, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) -- An attack by unidentified gunmen Wednesday killed at least three people in the northern Loroum province in Burkina Faso, said the country's state news agency AIB.

The attack occurred at Bouna village, about 10 km east of Titao, the capital city of the province.

The African country has been marred by worsening security situation with attacks on a daily basis, which mostly happened in northern regions. The army has scaled up nationwide counter-terror operations.

COTONOU, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- Benin called on the European Union (EU) to send a new ambassador to the West African country as the incumbent one was ordered to leave for his involvement in "subversive" activities, Benin's government spokesman Alain Orounla said here Thursday.

"Our country wishes to maintain the partnership with (the) EU of which we expect the authorities to appoint a new ambassador for the continuation of our diplomatic ties," Orounla said in a news broadcast on the country's mainstream television channel and radio operator ORTB.

MOGADISHU, Nov 29 (NNN-XINHUA) — The UN refugee agency welcomed Somalia’s ratification of an Africa-wide treaty on the protection of internally displaced people.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said the ratification of the African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced People (IDPs) in Africa is a landmark achievement for the country and the African continent.

28 November 2019; AFP: Measles has killed more than 5,000 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo since January -- more than double the toll in the country's Ebola epidemic -- the World Health Organization said Wednesday.

"The DRC (measles) outbreak is the largest outbreak worldwide. It is one of the largest that we have seen," Kate O'Brien, director of the WHO's immunisation department, told reporters in Geneva.

27 November 2019; AFP: The black boxes from two French military helicopters that collided in Mali killing 13 soldiers have been found, a French military spokesman said Wednesday.

The crash occurred late Monday during an operation against jihadists in the Liptako region, near the borders with Burkina Faso and Niger. It was the heaviest single loss for the French military in nearly four decades.

WINDHOEK (Reuters) - Namibia has arrested its former justice minister on suspicion of receiving kickbacks from Iceland’s biggest fishing firm in a scandal that has cast a shadow over the ruling party as it faces its toughest challenge to date in an election on Wednesday.

Anti-Corruption Commission Director General Paulus Noa confirmed on Wednesday that former minister Sakeus Shanghala and Investec Asset Management’s former Namibia chief, James Hatuikulipi, had been arrested. He declined further comment.

LIMPOPO (South Africa), Nov 27 (NNN-SANEWS) — President Cyril Ramaphosa has reiterated that the South African government’s attempts to reconfigure and split Eskom into three divisions is not aimed at privatising the embattled power utility. 

These measures, he said, are rather aimed at stabilising the utility and getting it back on its feet.

“We are not going to privatise Eskom,” he said, comparing the move to auctioning one’s family for silver. “Eskom is going to continue being owned by our government.”

BENI, Congo (AP) — Ebola responders are on lockdown in the eastern Congo city of Beni after angry residents attacked a United Nations base to protest repeated rebel assaults, the World Health Organization said Tuesday. At least four protesters were killed, a local official said.

Every day that health workers don’t have full access to Ebola-affected areas is a “tragedy” that prolongs the second-worst Ebola outbreak in history, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Twitter.