Africa

With already more than 3.5 million displaced within and outside the borders of South Sudan and thousands more driven to neighbouring countries every day, the United Nations refugee agency has appealed for an urgent peaceful resolution to what has now become Africa&#39s worst refugee crisis.

The heads of the United Nations agencies for human rights, migrants, and refugees, and the UN envoy for Libya, today met in Geneva calling for international solidarity to address the flows of migrants and refugees in the North African country.

Welcoming political and security progress in Somalia since 2012, including the recently concluded elections in the country, the United Nations Security Council today highlighted the need to &#8220maintain the momentum&#8221 towards democratic governance in the African nation.

Two businesswomen in Nigeria describe what it's like to run their businesses in a country where 40% of women are entrepreneurs.

MPs of a radical opposition party brawl with security guards as they are ejected from parliament.

Punches are thrown as some South African MPs disrupt President Zuma's State of the Nation address.

Victorious Cameroon footballers ridicule a minister's bow when they meet president.

Ghana's new government counts its presidential fleet only to find more than 200 cars are unaccounted for.

Somalia has a new, apparently popular president. His main challenges include making federalism work, reducing corruption and improving security.

South Africans have had enough of broken promises and bad governance, reports the BBC's Andrew Harding from Port Elizabeth.

Secretary-General António Guterres joined the wider United Nations and its international partners in congratulating Mohamed Abdullahi &#39Farmajo&#39 upon his election as the Somalia&#39s new President and pledging to work with him and his new Government to tackle urgent national priorities, including averting famine.

Denouncing forceful entry by armed individuals into a hospital in the Central African Republic&#39s restive PK5 neighbourhood with the intention to kill some of the patients, a senior United Nations humanitarian official has emphasized that such incidents are in violation of the international humanitarian law.

The United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) today voiced concern about an escalation in the fighting between Government and opposition forces in the west bank of the River Nile in the African country&#39s north-eastern region.

Congratulating former Prime Minister Mohamed Abdullahi ‘Farmajo’ on his election as Somalia’s new President, the United Nations Assistance Mission in the country (UNSOM) said the UN and the wider international community are ready to assist him in addressing the myriad challenges that await his Government.

Côte d&#39Ivoire is on the path to durable stability, the United Nations envoy for the country today told the Security Council, but warned that authorities need to invest more in national reconciliation and transitional justice, and to improve the economic, social and cultural rights of Ivoirians.

Still seeking to implement a political accord signed more than a year ago, Libyans must make 2017 “the year of decisions” and political breakthrough, the United Nations envoy for the North African country urged today.

The United Nations office working to end conflict-related sexual violence helped to bring world-renowned surgeon Denis Mukwege and a team from his Panzi Hospital to Conakry, Guinea, to provide medical and psychological treatment for 30 of the women and girls raped in politically-motivated violence in 2009, it was announced today.

Thandiswa Mazwai on why South Africa’s rebel jazz music still matters today.

Three weeks after reports that Cameroon had blocked the internet in English-speaking regions, residents say services have yet to be restored. So what is going on?

By Tesfa-Alem Tekle

February 7, 2017 (ADDIS ABABA) - A rebel official from the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM-IO) has dismissed allegations that the group is preparing to relieve its leader, Riek Machar, and to elect another one.

First Vice President, Riek Machar, accompanied by SPLA-IO officers, Juba, 27 May, 2016 (ST Photo)

An opposition source who requested anonymity on Monday told Sudan Tribune that the SPLM-IO leadership at the headquarters in Pagak is set to elect a new leader to replace Machar.

The source pointed that Machar's presence in Johannesburg complicates the decision making process, stressing that he cannot continue to run the movement remotely from South Africa.

But an opposition official dismissed this false "rumours and malicious propaganda", pointing an accusing finger at the government in Juba saying they are "fabricating" such unfounded reports.

"The government in Juba is behind this malicious and baseless propaganda and it should not surprise anyone because this is not the first time for the fascist regime in Juba to manufacture lies with the intention to create confusion and mistrust within the leadership of the People's Movement under the leadership of Riek Machar," said Peter Oyoyo Kleto, SPLM-IO deputy representative to Republic of Tanzania told Sudan Tribune.

"I want to assure and inform all our comrades and all South Sudanese inside and outside the country that the leadership of SPLM/A IO is fully behind the leadership of our Chairman Riek Machar and his deputy Henry Odwar" he further said.
Kleto called upon President Salva Kiir to accept peace through the revival of the August agreement.

He went to say that the armed opposition movement under Machar leadership has huge support both inside and outside the country, warning that "any attempt to sideline him from the country's affairs will never bring peace to the country"

the rebel official called on the African union, Troika countries, European Union and the UN to work for a political process to revive the August agreement to end any further bloodshed and end the suffering of the people.

The SPLM-IO leader and former First Vice President is currently South Africa since October 2016. In November of the same year he attempted to regain the headquarters in Pagak near the Ethiopian border.

But the Sudanese and Ethiopian authorities barred him from entering into their territory, in line with a regional decision to prevent the resumption of hostilities in the young nation.

(ST)