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As at christmas day, Félix Tshisekedi, who has been in power since the beginning of 2019 and is running for a second five-year term, has achieved a score of 81.4% according to the Céni,
Many people have been killed since clashes began on Monday. Scores too had been killed in the run up to the vote as protestors marched against Conde's bid for a third term.
ARTICLE 19: Sierra Leone Telegraph: 4 November 2020: ARTICLE 19 strongly condemns excessive use of force by security forces and the riots by supporters of political parties in the aftermath of the presidential election in Guinea. At least 21 people were killed, including three children, hundreds of people wounded and [Read More]
[Daily Maverick] Since Nigeria launched its first microsatellite, NigeriaSat-1, in 2003, the country has expanded its space programme and is now a continent-wide leader in the field.
Electoral authorities in Guinea on Saturday declared President Alpha Conde winner of Sunday's election with 59.49% of the vote, defeating his main rival Cellou Diallo.
\t Some people went to the streets to protest immediately after the announcement. Such demonstrations have occurred for months after the government changed the constitution through a national referendum, allowing Conde to extend his decade in power.
\t Opposition candidate Cellou Diallo received 33.50% of the vote, the electoral commission said. Voter turnout was almost 80%.
\t Political tensions in the West African nation turned violent in recent days after Diallo claimed victory ahead of the official results. Celebrations by his supporters were suppressed when security forces fired tear gas to disperse them.
They accuse the electoral authorities of rigging the vote for incumbent president Alpha Conde.
\t At least nine people have been killed since the election, according to the government. The violence sparked international condemnation by the U.S. and others.
\t ``Today is a sad day for African democracy,'' said Sally Bilaly Sow, a Guinean blogger and activist living abroad. The government should take into account the will of the people who have a desire for change, he said.
ICC warning
The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor warned on Friday that warring factions in Guinea could be prosecuted after fighting erupted.
“I wish to repeat this important reminder: anyone who commits, orders, incites, encourages and contributes in any other way to crimes … is liable to prosecution either by the Guinean courts or the ICC,” she said.
#ICC Prosecutor #FatouBensouda: "I wish to repeat this important reminder: anyone who commits, orders, incites, encourages or contributes, in any other way, to the commission of #RomeStatute crimes, is liable to prosecution either by #Guinean courts or by the #ICC."
— Int'l Criminal Court (@IntlCrimCourt) October 23, 2020
\t On Friday, internet and international calls were cut off across the West African nation in anticipation of the election results, according to locals and international observers in the capital, Conakry.
\t This was the third time that Conde matched-up against Diallo. Before the election, observers raised concerns that an electoral dispute could reignite ethnic tensions between Guinea's largest ethnic groups.
The results represent a minuscule proportion of the overall votes cast, but they indicated a provisional lead for incumbent President Felix Tshisekedi, who is running for a second term
[New Times] Genocide convict Bernard Munyagishari changed his plea to guilty in an appeal hearing that started on Thursday, November 12 at the Court of Appeal.
Nelson Mandelas greatest pleasure, his most private moment, is watching the sun set with the music of Handel or Tchaikovsky playing.
Locked up in his cell during daylight hours, deprived of music, both these simple pleasures were denied him for decades. With his fellow prisoners, concerts were organised when possible, particularly at Christmas time, where they would sing. Nelson Mandela finds music very uplifting, and takes a keen interest not only in European classical music but also in African choral music and the many talents in South African music. But one voice stands out above all - that of Paul Robeson, whom he describes as our hero.
The years in jail reinforced habits that were already entrenched: the disciplined eating regime of an athlete began in the 1940s, as did the early morning exercise. Still today Nelson Mandela is up by 4.30am, irrespective of how late he has worked the previous evening. By 5am he has begun his exercise routine that lasts at least an hour. Breakfast is by 6.30, when the days newspapers are read. The day s work has begun.
With a standard working day of at least 12 hours, time management is critical and Nelson Mandela is extremely impatient with unpunctuality, regarding it as insulting to those you are dealing with.
When speaking of the extensive travelling he has undertaken since his release from prison, Nelson Mandela says: I was helped when preparing for my release by the biography of Pandit Nehru, who wrote of what happens when you leave jail. My daughter Zinzi says that she grew up without a father, who, when he returned, became a father of the nation. This has placed a great responsibility of my shoulders. And wherever I travel, I immediately begin to miss the familiar - the mine dumps, the colour and smell that is uniquely South African, and, above all, the people. I do not like to be away for any length of time. For me, there is no place like home.
Mandela accepted the Nobel Peace Prize as an accolade to all people who have worked for peace and stood against
[East African] Authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo have indicated they will tighten controls on mineral exports to tame a weakening local currency against the US dollar.
Editorial - The new plan by the electoral commission to streamline vetting of qualifications of candidates seeking political seats is remarkable. In this respect, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has entered into a partnership with the Kenya National Qualifications Authority (KNQA) to verify the academic certificates of candidates seeking seats in Parliament and county assemblies in a bid to weed out those with fake credentials.
Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States and the first African American to occupy the White House. Obama was born August 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii. His father, Barack Obama Sr., was a Kenyan graduate student studying in the United States and his mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, a white American from Wichita, Kansas. The two were married on February 2, 1961 in Maui, Hawaii. In 1971, when he was ten, Obama’s mother, who had remarried and was living in Indonesia, sent him to Honolulu, Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents Madelyn and Stanley Dunham for several years, where he attended Punahou, a prestigious preparatory school. Obama was admitted on a scholarship with the assistance of his grandparents.
Obama continued his higher education at Occidental College, Los Angeles, California. He later transferred to Columbia University in New York City, New York, graduating with a Bachelor’s (B.A.) in 1983. He attended law school at Harvard University, receiving his law degree (J.D.) in 1992. While at Harvard Obama was president of the Harvard Law Review. After relocating to Chicago he began working as a community organizer and later lecturing at the University of Chicago Law School on the subject of constitutional law.
In 1989 Obama met Michelle Robinson who at the time was an attorney at the Chicago law firm of Sidney and Austin. Obama was a summer intern for the firm that year. Three years later, in 1992, they were married. Their two daughters, Malia and Natasha (Sasha) were born in Chicago in 1999 and 2001, respectively.
In 1994, Obama was elected to the Illinois State Senate from an economically diverse district that includes Hyde Park (surrounding the University of Chicago) as well as working class African American neighborhoods in the heart of Chicago’s South Side. Obama remained in the State Senate until 2004.
During his tenure in the Illinois State Senate, Obama helped craft legislation to create the state Earned Income Tax Credit which reduced the tax bill of working class
[Monitor] Kampala -- The Electoral Commission (EC) has rolled out nominations for the local government councils.
I think he’s extremely popular right now because Trump has pretty much failed in every way possible – especially on the points where he said he could and would do things better than Obama did,” New York resident Alicia Butler told NNPA Newswire.
The main goal of Donald Trump appears to be to dismantle every signature achievement Barack Obama had,” Darné said of the impeached Trump.
Presumptive Democratic Presidential Nominee and former Obama Vice President Joe Biden have publicly stated that he would love to have former First Lady Michelle Obama as his running mate.
The “Committee to Draft Michelle Obama for VP” is working to build “substantial grassroots support for a potential Michelle Obama candidacy and help garner media attention for a vice-presidential nominee who has the power to beat Donald Trump,” according to the group’s press release.
I really wish Michelle Obama would become the vice president, although I definitely don’t blame her for not wanting to face all of the bad that comes with a high political office in this country.”
[DW] US sanctions in Africa needs an update. They've allowed Sudan to become pawn in the US election campaign. Plus the list of sanctioned individuals contains someone who has since died.
Kinshasa — A famed Congolese medic who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018 has resigned from the country's team formed to fight Covid-19.
Dr Denis Mukwege said he was quitting a special Commission for fighting Covid-19 in South Kivu, citing lack of facilitation from the government.
In a resignation note publicised on Wednesday, Dr Mukwege said the lack of laboratories for testing for the virus had frustrated the team's work.
His resignation from the special Health Commission could strike a blow to the entire national response team led by Dr Jean-Jacques Muyembe, another famed medical researcher in the Congo.
In the DRC, Dr Mukwege is famed for his surgeries to repair damage inflicted on sexually violated women during the Congolese civil war.
Corrigan, Mairead moi´rə kôr´ĭgən [key], 1944–, Irish social activist, b. Belfast. A volunteer social worker in the Catholic neighborhoods of Belfast, Corrigan saw three of her sisters children killed when a car driven by an Irish Republican Army (IRA) terrorist went out of control after being fired on by British troops. Betty Williams , who also witnessed the incident, joined with Corrigan to form the Peace People Organization, a movement of Catholics and Protestants dedicated to ending sectarian fighting in Northern Ireland. For their work the two women were awarded the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize.
On June 7, 1966, New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy became one of the first major American politicians to take a public stand against South African Apartheid when he delivered an address to the National Union of South African Students in New York City. His address appears below.
I CAME HERE BECAUSE of my deep interest and affection for a land settled by the Dutch in the mid-seventeenth century, then taken over by the British, and at last independent; a land in which the native inhabitants were at first subdued, but relations with whom remain a problem to this day; a land which defined itself on a hostile frontier; a land which has tamed rich natural resources through the energetic application of modern technology; a land which once imported slaves, and now must struggle to wipe out the last traces of that former bondage. I refer, of course, to the United States of America.
This is a Day of Affirmation, a celebration of liberty. We stand here in the name of freedom.
At the heart of that Western freedom and democracy is the belief that the individual man, the child of God, is the touchstone of value, and all society, groups, the state, exist for his benefit. Therefore the enlargement of liberty for individual human beings must be the supreme goal and the abiding practice of any Western society.
The first element of this individual liberty is the freedom of speech: the right to express and communicate ideas, to set oneself apart from the dumb beasts of field and fore t; to recall governments to their duties and obligations; above all, the right to affirm ones membership and allegiance to the body politic-to society-to the men with whom we share our land, our heritage, and our childrens future.
Hand in hand with freedom of speech goes the power to be heard, to share in the decisions of government which shape mens lives. Everything that makes mans life worthwhile--family, work, education, a place to rear ones children and a place to rest ones head-all this depends on decisions of government; all can be swept
n 1950 Ralph Bunche, a political scientist by training and then an official of the United Nations, became the first African American to win the Nobel Peace Prize. His brief acceptance address delivered on December 10, 1950, appears below.
Your Majesty,
Your Royal Highnesses,
Mr. President of the Nobel Committee,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
To be honored by ones fellow men is a rich and pleasant experience. But to receive the uniquely high honor here bestowed today, because of the world view of Alfred Nobel long ago, is an overwhelming experience. To the President and members of the Nobel Committee I may say of their action, which at this hour finds its culmination, only that I am appreciative beyond the puny power of words to convey. I am inspired by your confidence.
I am not unaware, of course, of the special and broad significance of this award - far transcending its importance or significance to me as an individual - in an imperfect and restive World in which inequalities among peoples, racial and religious bigotries, prejudices and taboos are endemic and stubbornly persistent. From this northern land has come a vibrant note of hope and inspiration for vast millions of people whose bitter experience has impressed upon them that color and inequality are inexorably concomitant.
There are many who figuratively stand beside me today and who are also honored here. I am but one of many cogs in the United Nations, the greatest peace organization ever dedicated to the salvation of mankinds future on earth. It is, indeed, itself an honor to be enabled to practice the arts of peace under the aegis of the United Nations.
As I now stand before you, I cannot help but reflect on the never-failing support and encouragement afforded me, during my difficult assignment in the Near East, by Trygve Lie:, and by his Executive Assistant, Andrew Cordier. Nor can I forget any of the more than 700 valiant men and women of the United Nations Palestine Mission who loyally served with Count Bernadotte and me, who were devoted servants of
[DW] On October 31, Ivorians will elect a new leader. President Alassane Ouattara is running for a third controversial term. The opposition is urging supporters to shun the poll -- a political crisis appears imminent.
Guinea is tracking down people who potentially came in contact with Ebola patients and will rush out vaccines to the area as soon as it can get them, after three people died of the disease, Health Minister Remy Lamah said on Monday. Lamah said that unlike during the deadliest known outbreak, which tore through West Africa between 2013 and 2016, Guinea now had the means to halt the resurgence of the disease. 'In 2013, it took us months to understand that we were dealing with an Ebola epidemic, while this time, in less than four days, we were able to do analysis and have the results. Our medical teams are trained and seasoned. We have the means to quickly overcome this disease,' Lamah said. The 2013-2016 outbreak killed 11 300 people, mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia. The second-deadliest known outbreak was declared last year in the Democratic Republic of Congo, but that country has also recorded new Ebola cases this month, alarming global health officials. Lamah did not say how many potential contacts health officials were trying to trace. However authorities including in neighbouring Sierra Leone are concerned that the disease could quickly spread in the area where borders are porous. A spokesman for Sierra Leone's health ministry said workers were on the ground at points of entry, performing surveillance in coordination with the Guinea authorities. 🇨🇩:#Ebola vaccination campaign officially launched in #Butembo #DRC — just one week after the resurgence of the virus. Health workers at Matanda health centre, where the first Ebola patient was treated, were the first to be vaccinated. pic.twitter.com/tNucuLpkrC - WHO African Region (@WHOAFRO) February 15, 2021 The resurgence started after the funeral of a nurse who was buried in southeast Guinea at the beginning of February. Authorities said seven people who took part in the funeral fell ill and tested positive for Ebola. Three have died, while four others are in isolation. 'As a priority, we are trying to trace all potential contacts to isolate them. At the same time, we will carry out a vaccination campaign in the locality, as soon as the doses are available,' Lamah told Reuters. 'What worries us the most is the dangerousness of the disease given what we experienced five years ago. We do not want to relive such a situation,' he said. Lamah said the government had received assurances from the World Health Organization that it will help it get vaccines, as doses stored from the previous outbreak had expired. Meanwhile in the DRC, an Ebola vaccination campaign has begun in the city of Butembo, in eastern DRC, the WHO said in a tweet on Monday. Health workers at Matanda health centre, where the first Ebola patient was treated, were the first to be vaccinated, the WHO said. Congo has confirmed four cases of Ebola since a resurgence of the virus was announced on February 7 in Butembo, the epicentre of a previous outbreak that was declared over last June. On Friday, 1,200 doses of Ebola vaccine and cold chain equipment arrived in the city, according to the WHO. Se
[Monitor] Ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party presidential candidate, Yoweri Kaguta Museveni is poised to extend his reign in power to 40 years after Electoral Commission (EC) chairman Simon Byabakama credited him 5,562,141 votes, representing 58.89% of the 9,445,184 valid votes.
In a joint statement, the opposition leaders described the elections as a \"simulacre d'élections\" or a sham, expressing their intent to protest against the observed irregularities during the voting operations.
Many were waiting for Ivorian opposition leader Henri Konan Bédié to speak, but instead it was FPI's P ascal Affi N'guessan who spoke for the opposition parties.
N'guessan confirmed they rejected the October 31st vote , and stated once more the opposition no longer recognized Alassane Ouattara as the country's president.
\" The Ivorian opposition political parties do not recognize the election of october 31st 2020. They note the end of president Ouattara's mandate as of October 31st 2020, and call on the international community to duly record it.\"
\"Therefore, the Ivorian opposition political parties demand the opening of a civilian transition, in order to create conditions for a just, transparant and inclusive presidential election \" N'guessan said.
Affi N'gessan also called for a transitional government to be instaured shortly with all opposition forces.
In the meantime, partial results have arrived at the electoral commission , which, department after department, continues to gather reports.
\" The key point tonight remains the turnout rate of this vote . This is what everyone is waiting for \" added Africanews' Abidjan correspondant Yannick Djahoun.
[Monitor] The Electoral Commission (EC) was justified to suspend election campaign meetings in 12 districts, court has ruled.
Congo MPs back president with speaker pick
President Yoweri Museveni, in power in Uganda since 1986, was re-elected on Saturday for a sixth term with 58.64% of the vote, the electoral commission said, amid accusations of fraud by his main opponent Bobi Wine.
Dr. Ralph Bunche receives the Nobel Peace Prize for his work as a mediator in the Palestine crisis. He is the first African American to be so honored.
Born: 7/18/1918 Mvezo, South AfricaDied: 12/5/2013 Johannesburg, South AfricaMandela spent most of his life campaigning for an end to apartheid in South Africa. After over 20 years in prison, he was released and was able to be the first elected President in post apartheid South Africa. Also admired for his forgiveness and willingness to reach out to the white community in South Africa.Awards / Achievements:
South Africa’s last apartheid President, F.W de Klerk, has withdrawn from a scheduled seminar in the U.S about minority rights because he did not want to embarrass himself or his host in the current racial climate, according to his foundation.
De Klerk, who was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize with Nelson Mandela was scheduled to speak on July 1 at an American Bar Association (ABA) virtual event on issues such as minority rights, racism, and the rule of law, Reuters reported.
“The allegation that De Klerk was involved in gross violations of human rights is baseless,” the F.W De Klerk foundation said in a statement.
After the criticisms, ABA confirmed De Klerk would no longer speak at the event.
“At a time like this where the whole world is crying out for recognition and demanding that value be placed on our lives, on Black lives, we think that ABA erred in inviting someone like De Klerk,” said Lukhanyo Calata, the son of Fort Calata, who was killed along with three other anti-apartheid activists by South African police in 1985 in an incident known as “The Cradock Four”.
