Stephanie Hegarty
BBC Africa, Lagos

The Nigerian army have issued a bounty of $8,000 (£5,724) for the leader of Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau.

But the BBC has found that, in a recent operation, soldiers were very close to Boko Haram’s main camp in the Sambisa forest when they were ordered to stop and eventually forced to retreat.

Shekau escaped from his hideout leaving behind his cap, a laptop, his jacket, his chewing stick and a pistol, a witness from the vigilante forces, working alongside the Nigerian army, told the BBC.

“They ran away I saw them with my naked eyes,” the witness added.

Around 200 to 300 Boko Haram fighters are in operation, according to a commander who defected just after the attack.

He told the BBC the militants are “still armed, but most of what they say is propaganda”.

The army repeatedly claim they’ve caught, killed or injured their elusive enemy.

But President Muhammadu Buhari’s claim a year ago that Boko Haram was technically defeated is still regarded sceptically by many Nigerians.

In the five days since Cyril Ramaphosa was sworn in as president of South Africa, we have learnt two things.

One, the man enjoys an early morning walk, and two, he knows how to get himself some good PR.

This morning, Mr Ramaphosa combined the two.

He set off from Gugulethu Sports Complex to the Athlone Stadium in Cape Town accompanied by a couple of hundred members of the public.

Mr Ramaphosa announced the walk on Tuesday, inviting members of the public to join him.

Image source, AFP

Image source, AFP

Image source, AFP

He revealed to reporters he hopes to make this a regular event - especially, he joked, his "tummy must fall", a reference to the various protest movements which have toppled university fees and statues in recent years.

However, the great publicity opportunity for the new president and his party, the ANC, did not go unnoticed - especially because Cape Town, and the Western Cape, are controlled by the opposition Democratic Alliance.

Image source, AFP

Two aid workers have been killed and a third is missing in the Democratic of Congo (DR Congo).

The two were targeted by "unidentified gunmen" on Saturday, a statement by the United Nations humanitarian office in the capital Kinshasa said.

UN spokesman Farhan Haq said victims were both employees of French NGO Hydraulique Sans Frontieres (HYFRO), which provides water.

It is not known what nationality the employees were.

The attack in North Kivu, in the east of the country, comes less than a year after two UN experts were killed in DR Congo.

The bodies of US citizen Michael Sharp and Swedish national Zaida Catalan were discovered in the central Kasai region, two weeks after they were abducted having gone to Kasai to investigate reports of abuses after local rebels took up arms.

North Kivu province, meanwhile, has also been wracked by violence, with an increase in kidnappings and killings due to rivalries between ethnic groups. In December, 15 UN peacekeepers were killed.

Our African proverb of the day:

Click here and scroll to the bottom to send us your African proverbs.

Good morning from the team at BBC Africa Live. We will be bringing you the latest news and views from around the continent today.

If you want to see what was making the headlines yesterday, keep scrolling down.

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

A reminder of today's wise words:

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

And we leave you with this picture taken by BBC Africa's Rachael Akidi in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania:

In the remote mountains of northern Ethiopia, a lone priest scales a 250m cliff each day to reach his church and study ancient books containing religious secrets.

Watch his awe inducing daily commute:

Image source, Reuters

A Catholic bishop in southern Nigeria has resigned after bishops in the Ahiara diocese rejected him, reports the AFP news agency.

The protests were motivated by the fact that Peter Okpaleke was not from the area, the Catholic Herald newspaper said at the time.

Bishop Okpaleke comes from the neighbouring Anambra state.

He was appointed in 2012 but was never able to take up his post.

In June Pope Francis met a group from the Ahiara diocese where priests had been refusing to accept Bishop Okpaleke.

He gave the priests 30 days to accept Bishop Okpaleke or risk being suspended.

But the row was not resolved.

The Catholic Herald reports, external that the case was a test of the pope's authority.

Image source, Reuters

Residents of Cape Town have been invited to join South Africa's newly elected President Cyril Ramaphosa for his daily morning walk.

A poster entitled "President promotes a healthy lifestyle", and with a photo of him in a tracksuit, has been distributed by the governing African National Congress (ANC), urging people to join him on a 5.5 km walk tomorrow morning from the Gugulethu Sports Complex to the Athlone Stadium.

Last week, Mr Ramaphosa caused a buzz on social media when he was spotted jogging on the beachfront, hours before he was sworn in as the new president following the scandal-hit Jacob Zuma's forced resignation.

BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

Talks are taking place between the government and the opposition in Togo in an attempt to end a long-running political crisis.

The presidents of Ghana and Guinea are mediating the negotiations.

There have been months of opposition protests calling on President Faure Gnassingbe to step down.

The two sides will discuss the possibility of reviving the 1992 constitution which limited the number of presidential terms to two.

A 28-year-old man was hanged in Botswana at the weekend after he was handed the death penalty for murdering his son, a prison official told AFP news agency.

Joseph Tselayarona's execution took place on Saturday at Gaborone Maximum Security Prison, AFP adds.

Earlier this month President Ian Khama said he supported the death penalty, reports the Botswana Monitor, external.

The country's position has been criticised by human rights monitors and the European Union.

The country last hanged a convict, a 59-year-old man, in May 2016.

The death penalty has been legal in Botswana since independence in 1966.

Image source, News Diggers

The motorcade of the Democratic Republic of Congo's President Joseph Kabila was involved in an accident in Zambia's capital, Lusaka, on Sunday, leaving one person dead and another seriously injured.

The accident happened on Leopards Hill road following the alleged failure by police to clear the route for Mr Kabila’s motorcade, according to eye witnesses.

Despite police officers lining the road, a light truck collided with the motorcade, leaving the driver dead and a police officer who was manning the road seriously injured.

Police spokesperson Esther Katongo said the driver, Andrew Phiri, was rushed to hospital, where he succumbed to his wounds.

Last week five people were killed in an accident involving a cement truck and Mr Kabila's motorcade in DR Congo's capital, Kinshasa.

Mr Kabila was visiting Zambia to strengthen bilateral relations when the latest accident happened.

South Sudanese rebels have released two Kenyan pilots they were holding after their plane crashed last month, Reuters news agency quotes a rebel spokesman as saying.

Rebels had asked for financial compensation for the death of one person and 11 cows, as well as the destruction of several houses in the crash.

They had been held hostage for more than a month after their plane crashed in South Sudan's Upper Nile region.

Last week an insurance company agreed to pay the compensation demanded by the rebels.

In a Reuters interview, Lam Paul Gabriel, deputy spokesman of the rebel SPLA-IO, insisted that the money was not a ransom.

"It is just a compensation requested not by the SPLA-IO but by the families of the deceased and the owners of the properties. All we did as SPLM-IO is just to facilitate the exchange and provide security for the pilots," he said.

Image source, AFP

Burkina Faso's president has paid tribute to Burkinabe film director Idrissa Ouedraogo who died from a stroke at the age of 64.

Roch Marc Christian Kabore is quoted in the cinema magazine Variety, external as saying his country “has lost a filmmaker of immense talent,” noting that the director “truly contributed to turning the spotlight on Burkinabe and African cinema beyond our borders”.

Mr Ouedraogo was one of a group of film-makers who helped put the country at the centre of African cinema.

He is best known for the 1989 film Yaaba, which means Grandmother, and Tilai which was released the following year.

They both won awards at the Cannes film festival.

Mr Ouedraogo spent much of the 1980s learning the art of film-making in Kiev and Paris and then returned home to make what are now considered classic pieces of cinema, often set in remote villages, examining the struggle between tradition and change.

Mary Harper
Africa editor, BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

Ethiopian media are reporting that stay-at-home protests are underway in a number of towns in the Amhara region.

Businesses are reported to be shut and streets quiet.

The protests are in response to a six-month state of emergency imposed on Friday.

Ethiopia's Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn resigned last week following nearly three years of opposition protests in the Amhara and Oromia regions.

BBC World Service

Israel's government says a historic, multi-billion-dollar gas deal has been signed with Egypt.

An Israeli company, Delek Drilling, announced what it said was a 10-year deal, worth $15bn (£10.7bn), to provide natural gas to Egypt.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the deal will not only boost Israel's economy and security, but enhance its regional ties.

Analysts say the deal appears to undercut the recent promise by Egypt's President Abdul Fatah al-Sisi that his country would soon be self-sufficient in natural gas.

Image source, AFP

Image source, Kano Pillars

Top Nigerian club Kano Pillars have announced the death of 28-year-old defender Chinedu Udoji in a car crash on Sunday.

The accident happened a few hours after a league game against his former club Enyimba.

Udoji, who played for Pillars in Sunday's 1-1 draw against Enyimba, was involved in an accident on his way back after visiting his former employers.

Read the full BBC story here

The wife of a Nigerian separatist leader who has been missing since last September has begged the Nigerian government for answers.

Uchechi Kanu told the BBC's Nkem Ifejika she believed the government knows where her husband Nnamdi - the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) movement - was being held after his home was raided by soldiers.

He failed to appear in court on treason charges in October.

Huge crowds have turned out in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare, for a memorial service in honour of the late opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai.

Many people are wearing red - the colour of his party, the Movement for Democratic Change.

The service is being held at Civic Square, where opposition supporters in the Mugabe era often gathered to protest in defiance of a police ban.

A journalist has posted a video of some of the mourners:

Mr Tsvangirai, who died of cancer last week, is to be buried in his home village on Tuesday.

BBC World Service

Image source, Getty Images

France has accused Equatorial Guinea of abusing the legal process by trying to get the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague to intervene in a case against the son of the African country's long-standing leader.

Teodorin Obiang Mangue - who's also Equatorial Guinea's vice president - was found guilty of embezzlement in Paris last year.

He was sentenced to a suspended three-year jail term and fined $37m (£26m).

Last year, the ICJ ordered France to suspend seizures of assets at the property.

The BBC's Hague correspondent Anna Holligan reports that in the first search of the property in question, a six-storey villa on the exclusive Avenue Foch, police needed trucks to remove 18 luxury cars, artworks and jewellery.

But Equatorial Guinea wants the ICJ to grant the vice president diplomatic immunity from criminal prosecution - and apply the same diplomatic immunity to a mansion near the Champs Elysees so it and the contents cannot be seized by the French authorities.

The French argue that this is an abuse of the court process.