BBC World Service

A Kenyan couple who spent just $1 (£0.80) on their wedding, have now got married in a lavish Valentine's Day ceremony funded by well-wishers at a cost of $35,000. 

Wilson and Ann Mutura could not afford the costs of getting married so they postponed their wedding twice in 2016, before tying the knot last month. 

News of their $1 wedding went viral on social media and many Kenyans offered to help. At their first wedding, they wore casual clothes and their party took place without cakes, flowers or decorations. 

Photos of their $35,000 second wedding have been posted on Facebook:  

Twenty couples have got married today on Robben Island - where South Africa's most famous political prisoner, Nelson Mandela, was jailed for 18 years.

The Valentine's Day mass wedding is an annual event that has taken place for the last 16 years, reports South Africa's Eye Witness News, external. 

Grace Msibi, pictured with her husband above, told EWN that she jumped at the chance to renew her vows.

"It was the monument of apartheid but now it has turned out to be a place of love. We want to add to its history," Mrs Msibi said.

The two were captured dancing at the service:

International experts have gathered in Zimbabwe to discuss an outbreak of armyworms that is damaging crops in several African countries. 

The three-day meeting in Harare will try to come up with a comprehensive plan to halt the advance of the caterpillars. 

The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation has warned that the pests could cause widespread food shortages in regions that are already struggling with drought. 

Image source, EPA

The current outbreak has been blamed on a species of armyworm native to the Americas; it's not clear how they reached Africa.  

Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and South Africa are among the countries affected. 

South African athlete Oscar Pistorius shot dead his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp on Valentine's Day 2013, in a killing which shocked the nation.

His sister has tweeted:

The former Paralympian, known as the Blade Runner, is serving a six-year prison sentence for her murder.  

Image source, Reuters

The army in South Sudan has dismissed the deputy army chief's allegation that the military is ethnically biased and has accused him of fleeing to escape charges of embezzlement, AFP news agency reports. 

Lt Gen Thomas Cirillo Swaka left the country for an undisclosed destination after describing South Sudan’s conflict as “tribally engineered”, accusing the leadership of recruiting people from the ethnic Dinka group to strategic positions. 

In a resignation letter dated 11 February, Gen Swaka, who is from the Baris ethnic minority group, also accused the government of deliberately violating a 2015 peace agreement and prolonging the country’s civil war.

President Salva Kiir has denied the claims, saying the dominance of his Dinka group in the force was not a result of bias, but because others simply did not sign up during military recruitment.   

The army spokesman Brig Gen Lul Ruai Koang said that an investigation started in December "indicates that Thomas was personally and heavily involved in a scam where enormous quantities of food, fuel, lubricants and equipment have been diverted for personal consumption, have disappeared, been stolen or resold," reports AFP.

Gen Swaka has not yet responded to the corruption allegation.

South Sudan, which is home to over 60 different major ethnic groups has been beset by a civil war which the UN says has displaced 2.2 million people.  

Milton Nkosi
BBC Africa, Johannesburg

Image source, AFP

South Africans have reacted with shock at the news that a 39-year-old man accused of shooting dead a farm worker said he mistook him for a warthog.

The accused, South African Stephen Hepburn, appeared in court on Tuesday on a murder charge.

He and a female partner were hunting for warthogs on a farm in northern Limpopo province on Saturday when 23-year-old Jan Railo was shot dead.  

Police spokesman Brigadier Motlafela Mojapelo told the BBC that Mr Hepburn was arrested on Monday after the culpable homicide, or manslaughter, charge was changed to murder.

He told me the accused was not asked to plead during his court appearance, and the case was postponed to Thursday for a bail application.

Brig Mojapelo went on to say that Mr Hepburn said he shot in the direction of the noise and when he and his hunting partner went to check on their kill, they found a man lying on the ground.

Members of the local branch of the governing African National Congress (ANC), who attended the court hearing, said they did not believe the shooting was a case of mistaken identity.

Image source, AFP

UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson will visit The Gambia today, just weeks after long-time ruler Yahya Jammeh went into exile under military pressure from regional forces following his election defeat. 

Mr Johnson said he was very pleased that the West African state wanted to rejoin the Commonwealth - a move, he said, the UK would ensure happens in the coming months.   

He will meet new President Adama Barrow, who has repeatedly signalled his intention to return the country to international bodies such as the Commonwealth and International Criminal Court (ICC).   

Mr Jammeh had withdrawn The Gambia's membership from the Commonwealth in 2013, describing it as a "neo-colonial" institution.   

Image source, Thinkstock

The European Union promised The Gambia an aid package of about $80m (£65m) last week, almost three years after it froze its assistance. 

Many people in The Gambia are poor, and some of them try to make the treacherous journey to Europe in the hope of a better life. 

But the country is a popular with European tourists because of its beaches. 

Read: Jammeh gone but life is far from normal

Image source, Getty Images

The majority of cases in the world's largest outbreak of Ebola were caused by a tiny handful of patients, research suggests.

The study looked at cases in and around the capital of Sierra Leone, Freetown.  

The analysis, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, external, shows nearly two thirds of cases (61%) were caused by 3% of infected people.

Children under 15-years-old and adults over 45 were more likely to spread the virus.  

"I wonder whether it is to do with people coming to care for the young or old," Prof Steven Riley, one of the researchers at Imperial College London, told the BBC. 

Read more on the BBC News website.

A military court in Somalia's semi-autonomous region of Puntland has sentenced seven suspected militant Islamists to death for killing several top regional officials - including the director of Puntland’s presidential palace, Aden Huruse, the privately owned Shabelle news site reports, external. 

Some of the men, accused of being members of the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Shabab group, shouted "We are innocent" before the sentence was handed down by the court in Bosaso city.

Their lawyer said he would appeal against the ruling because there was no "credible evidence" against the seven. 

Read: The new Somali president with a lot on his plate

Image source, AFP

About 20% of the Nigerian currency, the naira, in circulation in the West African state is fake, an ex-deputy governor of the central bank, Obadiah Mailafia, has said. 

Speaking at a budget hearing in the National Assembly yesterday, Obadiah Mailafia called on the authorities to crackdown on fake money to protect the economy:   

He blamed the economic crisis in Nigeria on a wide range of factors - including the sharp fall in oil prices, dwindling foreign reserves, poor banking practices, regulatory failures and corruption. 

Nigeria - Africa's biggest economy - slipped into a recession last year for the first time in decades.  

Mr Mailafia warned the government not to increase interest rates, saying "it would further compound the hardship Nigerians are facing”. 

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