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At least 22 students killed after school collapses during morning class

Details: Written by Super User; Category: Africa; Published: 13 July 2024; Hits: 163

ABUJA - A two-storey school collapsed during morning classes in north-central Nigeria on Friday, killing 22 students and sending rescuers on a frantic search for more than 100 people trapped in the rubble.

The Saints Academy college in Plateau state’s Busa Buji community collapsed shortly after students, many of whom were 15 years old or younger, arrived for classes.

A total of 154 students were initially trapped in the rubble, but Plateau police spokesperson Alfred Alabo later said 132 of them had been rescued and were being treated for injuries in various hospitals. He said 22 students died. An earlier report by local media had said at least 12 people were killed.

Dozens of villagers gathered near the school, some weeping and others offering to help, as excavators combed through the debris from the part of the building that had caved in.

One woman was seen wailing and attempting to go closer to the rubble as others held her back.

Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency said rescue and health workers as well as security forces had been deployed at the scene immediately after the collapse, launching a search for the trapped students.

“To ensure prompt medical attention, the government has instructed hospitals to prioritise treatment without documentation or payment,” Plateau state’s commissioner for information, Musa Ashoms, said in a statement.

The state government blamed the tragedy on the school’s “weak structure and location near a riverbank”.

It urged schools facing similar issues to shut down.

Building collapses are becoming common in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country with more than a dozen such incidents recorded in the last two years.

Authorities often blame such disasters on a failure to enforce building safety regulations and on poor maintenance.

Ecowas tries to prevent junta-led breakup

Details: Written by Super User; Category: Africa; Published: 12 July 2024; Hits: 147

ABUJA - West Africa’s economic and political bloc has launched a formal push to convince three junta-led member states to shelve their joint breakaway plan, with Senegal’s president Bassirou Diomaye Faye appointed special envoy to the disaffected nations.

At a meeting in Nigeria’s capital Abuja on Sunday, Ecowas chair President Bola Tinubu of Nigeria commissioned Faye to work “around the clock” in concert with Togo’s President Faure Gnassingbe to persuade Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger to abandon their Alliance of Sahel States (AES) and remain Ecowas members.

They formed the AES as a defense pact last September, in the face of Tinubu’s threat to restore democratic rule in Niger through a military intervention. They declared their split from Ecowas in January. At the alliance’s first summit last weekend, Niger’s head of state Abdourahmane Tiani said their Ecowas departure is “irrevocable.”

A breakup of the bloc could “disrupt the freedom of movement and settlement of people” and worsen insecurity in West Africa, warned Omar Touray, president of the bloc’s commission.

Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger have mutual borders and are battling insurgencies by affiliates of Islamist groups Al-Qaeda and Islamic State. Each is led by a military government, following coups that overthrew elected civilian administrations, and has pared down defense partnerships with France and the United States while increasing engagement with Russia.

Stevie Wonder celebrated his 74th birthday by becoming a Ghanaian citizen

Details: Written by Super User; Category: Africa; Published: 10 July 2024; Hits: 170

ACCRA - The high-profile ceremony was a reminder of one of the legacies of outgoing President Nana Akufo-Addo, who in 2019 invited the Black diaspora to come “home” in a “Year of Return.” It amplified the West African nation as a major end-of-year holiday destination. He also oversaw a ceremony that granted citizenship to more than a hundred African Americans and Afro Caribbeans.

Since 2017, 268 Americans have obtained Ghanaian citizenship, Ghana’s Director of Diaspora Affairs, Akwasi Awua-Ababio told Semafor Africa. “Most of them see it as a right to restoration of their citizenship and the fact that they are one of us. It is a response to the president’s call,” said Awua-Ababio.

Ghana has been a popular place for settlement, often because many believe their families exited Africa through the forts and castles around Ghana’s coast, Aqua-Ababio explained. Others have also been drawn to Ghana’s positioning as a welcoming nation and a gateway to Africa. The majority of those granted citizenship, particularly those in the 2019 group, were already residents of Ghana and merely requested the opportunity to become citizens.

Ghana has long given citizenship to diasporan Africans who have established residency. Former President John Mahama oversaw a naturalization ceremony “restoring” citizenship to 34 diasporan Africans in December 2016, just before he left office. From the founding of the modern nation in 1957, early Ghanaian leaders led by the first president Kwame Nkrumah preached Pan-Africanism, one that transcended the shores of continental Africa.

Calls for 'restraint on all sides' as demonstrators storm Kenya's parliament

Details: Written by Super User; Category: Africa; Published: 26 June 2024; Hits: 160

NAIROBI - Ambassadors in Kenya have called for “restraint on all sides” after at least five people were killed and sections of the nation’s parliament set ablaze as demonstrators tried to storm the building.

The incident came on Tuesday as nationwide protests over tax reform escalated.

Lawmakers had just passed a contentious bill that would introduce new taxes.Police opened fire on demonstrators trying to storm Kenya's legislature in Nairobi, with at least five protesters killed, dozens wounded and sections of the parliament building set ablaze.

In a joint statement issued on Tuesday afternoon, ambassadors said: “We regret loss of life and injuries sustained, including the use of live fire.”

“We call for restraint on all sides and encourage leaders to find peaceful solutions.”

Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga also demanded an immediate end to violence against protesters and has called for dialogue and international intervention, KTN News reported.

In chaotic scenes on Tuesday, protesters overwhelmed police and chased them away in an attempt to storm the parliament compound. Flames could be seen coming from inside.

Police opened fire with bullets, after tear gas and water cannon failed to disperse crowds of hundreds of demonstrators.

A Reuters journalist counted the bodies of at least five protesters outside parliament. A paramedic, Vivian Achista, said at least 10 had been shot dead.

Another paramedic, Richard Ngumo, told news agency Reuters more than 50 people had been wounded by gunfire. He was lifting two injured protesters into an ambulance outside parliament.

Legislators fled through a tunnel, but protesters allowed opposition legislators who voted against the bill to walk out of the besieged building, according to reports.

The Kenya Human Rights Commission shared a video of officers shooting at protesters and said they would be held to account.

Two people died in similar protests last week.

"We want to shut down parliament and every MP should go down and resign," one protestor, Davis Tafari, trying to enter parliament, told Reuters. "We will have a new government."

Protests and clashes also took place in several other cities and towns across the country.

Parliament approved the finance bill, moving it through to a third reading by lawmakers. The next step is for the legislation to be sent to the president for signing. He can send it back to parliament if he has any objections.

The protesters oppose tax rises in a country already reeling from a cost-of-living crisis, and many are also calling for President William Ruto to step down.

Ruto won an election almost two years ago on a platform of championing Kenya's working poor, but has been caught between the competing demands of lenders such as the International Monetary Fund, which is urging the government to cut deficits to access more funding, and a hard-pressed population.

Kenyans have been struggling to cope with several economic shocks caused by the lingering impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, two consecutive years of droughts and depreciation of the currency.

The finance bill aims to raise an additional $2.7billion (£2.1billion) in taxes as part of an effort to lighten the heavy debt load, with interest payments alone consuming 37 per cent of annual revenue.

The government has already made some concessions, promising to scrap proposed new taxes on bread, cooking oil, car ownership and financial transactions. But that has not been enough to satisfy protesters.