That's all from the BBC Africa Live page today. Keep up-to-date with what's happening across the continent by listening to the Africa Today podcast or checking the BBC News website. 

A reminder of today's wise words:

And we leave you with this photo of people dressed up in their best Halloween costumes at the George Hay Park in South Africa's main city, Johannesburg:

Image source, EPA

If you're planning to go trick-or-treating in the South African city of Johannesburg for Halloween tonight, don't expect to be welcomed into every home to receive your sugary ransom.

In an apparent bid to avoid contact with local youths, property owners in the city's affluent Westcliff suburb have posted domestic workers outside the gates of their homes with baskets of goodies:

Image source, Reuters

The Moroccan fish-seller whose death has caused outrage in the kingdom died from "haemorrhagic shock after a chest wound", according to an autopsy report quoted by local media, AFP news agency says. 

The autopsy report also showed that Mouhcine Fikri sustained "fractures of the five first ribs left and right",  it adds. 

Thousands of people protested in several towns and cities after Mr Fikri was crushed to death in a refuse lorry while trying to retrieve fish confiscated by police.

The government has promised an investigation into his death in the northern town of Al-Hoceima on Friday. 

His death drew parallels to that of a Tunisian fruit-seller in 2010 which helped spark the Arab Spring uprisings.  

Thomas Naadi
BBC Africa, Accra

About 400 nurses at the Accra Psychiatric hospital in Ghana have begun an indefinite strike today, alleging unsafe working conditions. 

They say that the lack of essential medicines has resulted in some patients behaving aggressively, leading to nurses being attacked on several occasions.

They complain that because of a lack of health insurance they have to foot the bill themselves if they sustain injuries in the line of duty.

Nurses also say that on occasions they pay out of their own pockets to help patients in urgent need of treatment.

In September, the same psychiatric hospital shut down its outpatient department, because of financial constraints. 

The World Health Organization estimates that of the 2.7 million people in Ghana who suffering from mental disorders, just 2% receive the treatment they need. 

Watch the 2012 BBC investigation into care at Ghanaian mental hospitals.

Image source, TOM D MORGAN

MHD, a rapper from Paris, is pioneering a new genre of hip-hop, Afro Trap, blending trap music from the southern US with Afrobeat music, reflecting his Senegalese and Guinean heritage.

MHD grew up in Paris, but his parents are from West Africa.

Image source, AFP

France's Prime Minister Manuel Valls has been hailed as an African by his counterpart in Ivory Coast, Daniel Kablan Duncan, AFP news agency reports.

Mr Kablan was overwhelmed when the prime minister of the former colonial power attended the inauguration of a water pumping station in a suburb of Abidjan, the main city in  Ivory Coast.   

He is quoted by AFP as telling his guest: 

Scipio was a Roman general famed for his exploits against the ancient empire of Carthage in modern-day Tunisia. 

In response, Mr Valls proclaimed: 

He's been sharing photos of his meeting with Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara on Twitter: 

French-backed forces captured Ivory Coast's then-President Laurent Gbagbo in Abidjan after he refused to accept defeat in the 2010 elections won by Mr Ouattara.

Mr Gbagbo is standing trial at the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in relation to the violence which erupted after the disputed election. 

He has denied the charges.

On Sunday, Mr Valls visited a French military compound in Abidjan: 

Image source, AFP

Today being Halloween, the New Scientist magazine has taken the opportunity to reshare what it calls "one of the freakiest animals ever".

Trichobatrachus robustus, a species of frog found mainly in Cameroon, is described as a hairy frog with cat-like extendable claws. 

The scary bit is how it came to get its claws, replacing the rubbery, webbed feet characteristic of most frogs.

Scientists found that the creature "actively breaks its own bones to produce claws that puncture their way out of the frog’s toe pads, probably when it is threatened," the New Scientist adds. 

Read the full story here, external

Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered an investigation into allegations of sexual abuse at camps where women and children are taking refuge from militant Islamist group Boko Haram. 

Mr Buhari's office said he was shocked by the allegations, made in a report released by campaign group Human Rights Watch (HRW), and had instructed the police chief and state governors to immediately launch an investigation. 

HRW said it had spoken to 43 victims who had been raped or sexually exploited by security officials and vigilante groups.

The insurgency has left 20,000 people dead and more than two million displaced.

Many of those forced from their homes have fled to camps around the Borno state capital, Maiduguri.

However, the HRW report, external says some of them have suffered abuse in those camps.

Some said they had been coerced into sex and abandoned when they became pregnant.

Image source, AFP

The turnout in Ivory Coast's referendum on a controversial new constitution was very low, with most people heeding a call to boycott it, the main opposition leader has said, AFP news agency reports. 

President Alassane Ouattara should now withdraw the constitution or resign, Pascal Affi Nguessan, the chairman of the Ivorian Popular Front, told AFP. 

Mr Ouattara has campaigned for the adoption of the constitution, saying it will end divisions caused in the world's biggest cocoa producer over who is eligible to become president. 

The proposed constitution drops the requirement that both parents of a candidate be Ivorian, an issue which was used to prevent Mr Ouattara from running for office until his successful campaign in 2010.

The new constitution would also scrap the age limit of 75 for the presidential candidate, fuelling opposition concerns that the 74-year Mr Ouattara plans to run for office again in the next election. 

Vote-counting is expected to end later today or tomorrow. 

Read more: Will new constitution bring peace to Ivory Coast?

Conservationists in Zimbabwe are reporting the death of an old lion who was a companion of Cecil, the lion whose illegal killing by an American hunter last year prompted an international outcry, AP news agency reports. 

Lion researchers at Zimbabwe's Hwange National Park say that the carcass of a 12-year-old male lion named Jericho was found under a bush on Saturday, and that the death was probably due to natural causes, AP reports. 

Image source, Paula French

Read more: What Cecil the lion means to Zimbabwe

BBC Focus on Africa's Kim Chakanetsa has been speaking to the people behind the musical, A Man of Good Hope, which explores the refugee crisis in Africa, and is now playing at London's prestigious Young Vic theatre.

The play is produced by South African company Isango Ensemble.

Its co-founder Pauline Malefane and cast member Mandisi Dyantyis have been discussing with Kim why they thought it was important to tell the story and how they brought it to life on the stage: 

As the second and final term of the first African-American president of the US comes to an end, how has Barack Obama's presidency changed things for Africans in the US? 

The BBC's Zuhura Yunus is in Dallas, Texas, ahead of next week's US election and she's been speaking to African immigrants about how they relate to African-Americans:

BBC World Service

Zimbabwe is unveiling a new form of currency in an effort to resolve an acute cash shortage. 

The national reserve bank is to start printing what it calls "bond notes".

They will have a value equivalent to US dollars, and are supported by a $200m loan from the African Export-Import Bank. 

Today marks the launch of a public awareness campaign about the introduction of the bond notes in the coming weeks.

The scheme has sparked mass protests by people who fear a repeat of Zimbabwe's hyper-inflation seven years ago, when the central bank printed so much money that a loaf of bread ended up costing 100 trillion Zimbabwe dollars.  

Read more: Why are Zimbabweans protesting? 

Image source, AFP

Image source, AFP

South Africa's Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party has called for chief prosecutor Shaun Abrahams to be barred from practising law, following his blunder in charging Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan with fraud and then reversing the decision.

The party, led by firebrand Julius Malema, said it had written, external to the General Council of the Bar, which regulates the activities of advocates, asking for Mr Abrahams to be barred from the profession because he was "neither competent nor fit and proper" to practise law. 

It was also "highly improper" of  Mr Abrahams to meet President Jacob Zuma and other government officials at the headquarters of the governing African National Congress (ANC) on 10 October, the EFF statement added.

The High Court  ruled in April that Mr Zuma should be charged on more than 700 counts of corruption in relation to a 1999 arms deal, but Mr Abrahams and Mr Zuma have appealed against the ruling.

Mr Abrahams has repeatedly insisted that he acts impartially, and is not politically motivated.

Mr Abrahams dropped the charges against Mr Gordhan earlier today, saying he acknowledged that the finance minister had not intended to act unlawfully when he approved a severance package of about $80,000 (£65,000) for an employee more than a decade ago.    

BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

Ivory Coast's President  Alassane Ouattara has acknowledged that there were some disturbances during Sunday's constitutional referendum, but says they were isolated incidents. 

Youths destroyed some polling stations in the Abidjan district of Yopougon - a stronghold of the opposition Ivorian Popular Front. It had called for a boycott. 

The proposed changes to the constitution, which are likely to be approved, would abolish stringent requirements about the national identity of presidential candidates. 

The issue has contributed to years of unrest after it was used by the former administration of Laurent Gbagbo to prevent President Ouattara from standing.

Read: Will new constitution bring peace to Ivory Coast? 

Image source, AFP

Opposition parties in The Gambia have picked a single candidate to stand against President Yahya Jammeh in the 1 December presidential election, in the biggest opposition alliance in the country since independence, the AFP news agency reports. 

Businessman Adama Barrow of the main opposition United Democratic Party (UDP) beat candidates from three other parties at a convention held in the capital, Banjul. 

Mr Barrow, 51, is quoted by AFP as saying: 

The Gambia, a popular tourist destination because of its beaches, has never experienced a democratic transition of power since independence.

Mr Jammeh took over in a 1994 coup - his critics accuse him of running a repressive state, an allegation he denies. 

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has returned to his farm where he will spend the next week promoting agriculture and overseeing government projects across the district of Lowero. 

The presidential motorcade has, at least temporarily, been replaced by a bicycle, which he will be using to fetch water for his crops.

According to a spokesperson on the trip, the president has already been showing locals how to plant bananas and coffee, using plastic bottles to irrigate the land: 

The president has been tweeting photos of himself (in pink shirt and hat) lending a helping hand to local farmers.

"With changing weather patterns and unreliable rainfall, farmers must do more irrigation. Like I demonstrated, it should not be expensive," he said in another post.   

South Africa's governing African National Congress (ANC) has welcomed the decision of chief prosecutor Shaun Abrahams to drop fraud charges against Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.

In a statement, external, the ANC said the charges had a negative impact on the economy and raised "unnecessary speculation about the real motive". 

The party called on the "appointing authority", a reference to President Jacob Zuma, to hold talks with Mr Abrahams to "avoid a repeat of this and to protect the independence and integrity" of the National Prosecuting Authority.  

Image source, AFP

South Africa's chief prosecutor should be suspended immediately after the "seismic blunder" over charging and then clearing Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, the main opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) has said. 

Describing what it called "malicious political purposes" behind the fraud charges, the DA statement, external heavily criticised the head of the national prosecuting authority:

The DA called on President Jacob Zuma to suspend Mr Abrahams, amid strong suspicion that Mr Gordhan had been targeted for political reasons:

Pumza Fihlani
BBC News, Johannesburg

The decision to charge South Africa's respected Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan with fraud was the latest in a series of blunders that has cost the economy millions of dollars. 

Many had alleged that the case was politically motivated and this perception will only be made stronger following chief prosecutor Shaun Abrahams' sudden u-turn. 

In an hour-long explanation, Mr Abrahams said the decision to prosecute Mr Gordhan was ill-advised - even though he had made the announcement to charge him at a highly publicised press conference earlier this month. 

Now, Mr Abrahams seems to have buckled under pressure following the outcry in South Africa over the decision to prosecute Mr Gordhan. 

Image source, AFP

More than 80 of South Africa's leading CEOs, 100 stalwarts of the governing African National Congress (ANC), rights groups, lawyers, retired judges, opposition parties and even the ANC's chief whip had rallied behind Mr Gordhan, seeing the charges as a political ploy aimed at ousting him from office so that the treasury can be looted by corrupt people. 

The debacle has raised fresh questions about the independence of the National Prosecuting Authority and whether it has been reduced to a political tool. 

But Mr Abrahams is admanant that he is independent, that he does not owe anyone an apology and has rubbished calls for him to resign.