Africa (except North Africa)

CAPE TOWN (Reuters) - The former leader of South Africa’s official opposition Democratic Alliance, Mmusi Maimane, gave up his seat in parliament on Thursday after quitting the national leadership and plunging the traditionally white liberal party into crisis.

Race and class remain highly divisive issues in South Africa, where the ruling African National Congress has been in power since the end of white minority apartheid rule in 1994.

Maimane had been expected to remain as parliamentary leader of the Democratic Alliance (DA) until the end of the year.

WINDHOEK, Oct 23 (NNN-ALLAFRICA) — Swapo presidential candidate for the upcoming presidential election President Hage Geingob asked for a fixed term of five more years.

This he said is for the party to complete the programmes already started.

Geingob made the request at a fully packed Kuisebmond Soccer Stadium at Walvis Bay, where the Swapo Party kicked off their star rally campaign in view of the upcoming elections, slate for November this year.

CAPE TOWN, Oct. 22 (Xinhua) -- South Africa has deported thousands of illegal immigrants in recent months following a new spate of xenophobic attacks, the country's parliament said Tuesday.

The parliament revealed the information after a meeting was convened by the Portfolio Committees on Home Affairs and Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs to look at solutions to challenges around immigration in the country, particularly in the northeastern province of Gauteng.

KIGALI, Rwanda, Oct 22 (NNN-XINHUA) – Rwandan President, Paul Kagame, officially inaugurated a dry port, Kigali Logistics Platform, Rwanda’s largest inland cargo handling facility, in the capital city of Kigali, as the landlocked country bids to become a regional logistics hub.

The platform also hosts a 2,500-square metre bonded warehouse of Rwanda Digital Trading Hub of Alibaba Electronic World Trade Platform (eWTP), Yiwu Global Innovation Centre.

OUAGADOUGOU, Oct. 21 (Xinhua) -- At least 14 people were killed in gun shootings over the weekend in northern Burkina Faso, local media said on Monday.

On Sunday evening, eight people were killed in Zoura village, northern Bam Province, by unknown gunmen.

On Saturday, a gun shooting claimed at least six lives in Dambatao, northern Loroum province.

Burkina Faso has seen an upsurge of terrorist attacks. Since 2015, a spate of terrorist attacks in Burkina Faso has killed more than 500 people and internally displaced more than 450,000 others.

GABERONE, (Reuters) - For the first time since it won independence from Britain in 1966, Botswana faces a genuine electoral contest on Wednesday, as a feud between its current and a former president throws one of Africa’s most stable nations into uncertainty.

The Botswana Democratic Party, in power since independence day, faces an unusually tough parliamentary vote, after the country’s former president and political heavyweight Ian Khama fell out bitterly with his hand-picked successor, President Mokgweetsi Masisi, earlier this year.

Mbanza-Ngungu (DR Congo), Oct 20 (AFP) At least 30 people were killed when a packed bus came off the road and burst into flames overnight near Kinshasa, the DR Congo capital, a local official said Sunday.

"The current toll is 30 dead. Eighteen others have third-degree burns," Red Cross spokesman David Nsiala told AFP.

"We are continuing the work of identifying the bodies," added Nsiala, who runs the Red Cross in Mbanza-Ngungu territory southwest of Kinshasa.

KIGALI, Oct. 17 (Xinhua) -- Rwanda's Senate on Thursday elected new president following a swearing-in ceremony of 20 new senators.

Rwanda's President Paul Kagame officiated the ceremony held at the parliamentary building in Kigali, capital city of Rwanda, sitting along with the outgoing Senate president Bernard Makuza, Chief Justice Sam Rugege and Prime Minister Edouard Ngirente at the platform.

Members of the two parliamentary chambers, the 26-member Senate and the 80-member lower house Chamber of Deputies were seated.

MOGADISHU, Oct 16 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A cache of weapons and 300 animals were seized from militant group al-Shabaab in an operation on Tuesday in Reydab village, 40km north of Baardheere in southern Somalia, the national army’s radio station reported.

The militants had forcefully taken the animals from locals, it said.

The commander of the operation Ali Mohamed Hassan told the radio station that several militants were captured alive.

Al-Shabaab – who want to overthrow the central government – impose taxes on locals to fund their operations.

NAIROBI, Oct 16 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The second phase of Kenya’s new railway line, running from the capital Nairobi to Naivasha town, will be opened Wednesday for passenger services only.

Cargo services will have to wait for the construction of a dry port, which could take longer than planned after the local Maasai community moved to court to oppose its construction.

The 120km stretch has been built by the China Communications and Construction Company at a cost of 150 billion Kenyan shillings.