Will Ross
Africa editor, BBC World Service

The UN Human Rights office says it is concerned at the increasing number of reports of voter intimidation, external, threats of violence and harassment ahead of Monday's elections in Zimbabwe.

A statement said the incidents were mainly in the rural areas and included reports of people being forced to attend political rallies.

The UN is also worried by the use of disparaging language against female political candidates.

The statement did however welcome what it called the widening of the democratic space in Zimbabwe.

Emmerson Mnangagwa, who became president after Robert Mugabe was forced from power last year, is being challenged by several candidates including Nelson Chamisa of the opposition MDC.

Image source, Reuters

Read more:

• Emmerson Mnangagwa: The 'crocodile' who snapped back - BBC News
• Nelson Chamisa - Zimbabwe's young political crusader - BBC News

Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Eritrea's President Isaias Afwerki have been awarded the United Arab Emirates' highest honour.

The two men are in the UAE after their dramatic steps towards reconciliation since the beginning of the month.

Advisers to the two leaders have been tweeting from the UAE.

The UAE played an important role in bringing the two countries together after two decades of tension, regional analyst Martin Plaut says, external.

You may also like:

• Ethiopian reunited with long-lost daughters in Eritrea after 16 years
• Ethiopia and Eritrea to play first football match since 1998

Police in Nigeria stopped Senate President Bukola Saraki from leaving his home, his media adviser Yusuph Olaniyonu says.

He has sent out a video which he says shows the police near Mr Saraki's house in Nigeria's capital, Abuja.

The police have now left the area.

The Senate president was summoned to the police in connection with a robbery in Offa, Kwara state in April, the BBC's Mayeni Jones says.

Armed robbers blew up the entrances of five banks in an operation which left six policemen and six civilians dead.

The police had said some of the robbery suspects confessed that they were working for the senate president, an allegation Mr Saraki denied.

The Senate president issued a statement last night saying that the police's invitation to give evidence about the robbery was politically motivated

He said it is "to stop an alleged plan by some senators and House of Representatives members from defecting from [President Muhammadu Buhari's] All Progressives Congress."

An accidental fashion accessory is helping Zimbabwe's new president rebrand the country - and distance himself from his predecessor Robert Mugabe and his 37-year rule.

Since the Davos summit in January, Emmerson Mnangagwa is hardly ever seen without a scarf in the colours of Zimbabwe's flag around his neck - no matter the temperature.

It was perfect for the freezing Swiss mountain village in mid-winter - and the Zimbabwean president proudly wore it during a BBC interview, later tweeting a clip of it saying, "Zimbabwe is open for business."

But the scarf now has a life of its own, beyond the World Economic Forum - and even has its own hashtag #EDscarf.

The president, popularly known by his initials ED, got his hands on the scarf by chance when a mother-and-daughter fashion start-up contacted the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the Saturday before the Zimbabwe delegation left for Davos.

Read more of the story here.

China's president and India's prime minister are both on the continent ahead of a summit of the Brics nations in South Africa starting on Wednesday.

The Brics group is made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Chinese President Xi Jinping landed in South Africa where he was welcomed by his South African counterpart Cyril Ramaphosa:

India's prime minister, Narendra Modi, has been in Rwanda:

And he is due in Uganda where he will meet officials as well as members of the Indian community:

Nigeria’s top football coach, Salisu Yusuf, has been caught on camera taking cash from men posing as football agents.

The footage was captured by controversial journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas in September 2017 - and is being broadcast for the first time by BBC Africa Eye.

The chief coach of the Super Eagles, and first assistant during the World Cup, is due to lead the national team to the Olympics in 2020.

Kennedy Gondwe
BBC News, Lusaka

A popular Chinese contraceptive pill in Zambia is having people talking about its efficacy and safety, because the language of instruction is in Chinese.

Ministry of Health permanent secretary Kennedy Malama told state-owned Zambia Daily Mail that it was worrying that women were taking the pill as they did not know the ingredients.

He urged women taking the Chinese contraceptive pill to stop immediately.

And the Zambia Medical Regulatory Authority says any medicine consumed in Zambia should have an English label.

Though the pill, which is referred to as “Chinese contraceptive”, is believed to have been imported for Chinese women in Zambia, it is popular in the country as it costs between $3 to $5 and is only taken once a month.

The Pharmaceutical Society of Zambia president Jerome Kanyika said in a statement shared with the BBC:

BBC World Service

A former vice-president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Jean-Pierre Bemba, is to return to the country next week following the quashing of his conviction for war crimes.

Mr Bemba's party says he will arrive on 1 August to submit his candidacy for the presidential poll due in December.

Candidates have until 8 August to register.

The long-delayed election is meant to choose a successor to Joseph Kabila.

His second and final term in office ended in 2017 but he has so far refused to stand down, sparking deadly protests.

In the 2006 poll, Mr Bemba was the runner-up behind Mr Kabila.

Profile: Jean-Pierre Bemba, DR Congo's ex-rebel and vice-president

Image source, AFP

Tuesday's African proverb:

Image source, Getty Images

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

Welcome to the BBC Africa live page where we'll be bringing you the latest news from around the continent.

BBC Africa Live
Natasha Booty

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:

And we leave you with this photo of a sleek goat taken by the BBC's Mary Harper in Hargeisa. She reckons there may be more goats living in the Somaliland capital than people:

Image source, Mary Harper

BBC World Service

The Somali government has confirmed that Islamist militants seized a military base in the south of the country early on Monday before soldiers retook it after heavy fighting.

A spokesman said six soldiers were killed, along with dozens of al-Shabab fighters.

An al-Shabab spokesman had earlier said the attack on the base at Baar Sanguni near Kismayo had killed 27 soldiers.

The jihadist group targeted a military base in the same area in June. During that attack an American soldier was killed and four others were wounded.

Khady Lo
BBC Afrique

Image source, YouTube/ARTE

A former slave who was released from bondage in 2008 is to stand in September's parliamentary elections, the anti-slavery group IRA-Mauritania says.

Habi Mint Rabah hopes to be elected as an MP for the recently formed IRA/Sawab coalition - which is comprised of IRA-Mauritania and the more established Sawab party.

"I became a slave at the age of five. Every day I had to take care of the cattle. Every night I was raped by my master," Ms Rabah said shortly after her release.

"I always thought, without really understanding, that it was normal."

Image source, Getty Images

Slavery was outlawed in Mauritania but remains widespread, according to human rights groups. Black people of certain ethnic groups are often enslaved as domestic workers by lighter-skinned Mauritanians.

Convictions are rare, and the country has jailed more anti-slavery activists than slave owners, rights groups say.

Habi Mint Rabah was saved thanks to her brother Bilal Ould Rabah, who had managed to free himself. He alerted human rights organisations and the IRA movement, whose mobilisation resulted in the release of his sister after more than 35 years in bondage.

"She is a victim of slavery who we freed. She joined us, is militant, and will prove herself against the dominant pro-slavery group in the coming parliament," says IRA's President Biram Dah Abeid.

Read more:

• Mauritania country profile
• Mauritania court gives toughest sentence for slave owners

Will Ross
Africa editor, BBC World Service

Image source, Getty Images

The mining company De Beers says it has started an operation to move 200 elephants from a nature reserve it owns in South Africa to neighbouring Mozambique.

De Beers says its Venetia Limpopo Reserve is currently home to more elephants than the ecosystem can sustain, whilst across the border Mozambique's elephant numbers have been declining.

Moving 200 elephants over a distance of 1,500 km (932 miles) is an ambitious task.

De Beers says it has just started relocating the first 60. Working with the Peace Parks Foundation, the animals in the Venetia Limpopo Nature Reserve will be tranquilised before being loaded onto lorries and driven across the border to Zinave National Park.

Mozambique's own elephant population was decimated during the country's civil war that ended in 1992. But it is feared that since 2010 the country's elephant population has halved due to rampant poaching partly fuelled by China's demand for ivory.

De Beers was founded by British imperialist Cecil Rhodes and until recently controlled the global trade in diamonds.

Nick Cavell
BBC Africa Sport

Image source, AFP

The Ethiopian Football Federation (EFF) and its Eritrean counterpart have agreed to stage a historic friendly game between the two nations in Asmara next month.

Both nations have been avoiding games that pitted them against each other since the 1998-2002 border war. But they now want to play again, following Ethiopia and Eritrea's diplomatic thaw and declaration that the "state of war" is over.

Ethiopia boycotted games against Eritrea in 2000 and the 2010 Council for East and Central Africa Football Associations (Cecefa) Under-20 tournament, which was hosted in the capital, Asmara.

Eritrea, meanwhile, failed to take part in the 2015 Cecefa senior challenge cup. It also forfeited the 2014 African Nations Championship first-round qualifier against Ethiopia.

Newly appointed Ethiopia coach Abraham Mebratu is expected to choose the exact date of the match in August.

The coach reportedly wants to prepare his charges for the friendly in the Eritrean capital and the Afcon qualifier against Sierra Leone.

Image source, Citizen TV

National television history was made in Kenya when a husband and wife team presented the news together for the first time.

Leading Swahili TV news presenter Lulu Hassan took to the air yesterday to present Citizen TV's Swahili-language bulletin alongside her husband Rashid Abdalla.

Ms Hassan presents the popular Nipashe Wikendi programme on what is Kenya's most popular TV station, external.

The pairing has been touted as the first ever married couple to present the news on Kenyan television.

Image source, Citizen TV

• Read the full story here

Royalty have been showing up for this year’s Hargeisa International Book Fair in the self-declared state of Somaliland.

The BBC’s Mary Harper snapped this shot of a king and a chief attending the event, one of the largest celebrations of literature and the arts in East Africa:

Image source, Mary Harper

The monarch in the headdress is Ahmed Iman Warsame, King of the Gaboye. Our reporter says the Gaboye are a much-despised minority clan in Somalia.

His business card says he is “King of the Horn of Africa” – which may be a bit of an exaggeration!

Next to him, wearing a sash, is Chief Abakar Salatin, from northern Bahr el Ghazal in South Sudan.

They have been invited to the literary gathering to compare and contrast South Sudanese and Somali royalty.

Milton Nkosi
BBC Africa, Johannesburg

South African police have established a special task force to investigate the fatal shooting of 11 taxi drivers over the weekend.

The new team will have at its disposal "specialised units, including crime intelligence, the Directorate for Priority Crimes Investigation (Hawks) and detectives," according to Police Commissioner Lt Gen Khehla Sitole. He says police now have a 72-hour plan to trace and arrest suspects.

The men from Gauteng province were travelling to Johannesburg on Saturday night when their minibus was fired at.

The dead men, and four more who were critically injured, were returning from a colleague's funeral in the coastal region of Kwa-Zulu Natal, police said. Their vehicle was found riddled with 255 bullet holes, according to police.

The motive is unclear although rivalry between groups running minibus taxi routes in South Africa has led to violence in the past. There have been other deadly shootings in the east of Johannesburg.

Minibus taxis are one of the most popular modes of transport in South Africa. They carry about 14 million passengers daily.

Image source, AFP

Will Ross
Africa editor, BBC World Service

Officials in Mali say 11 jihadists have been killed in the centre of the country when they tried to ambush soldiers.

A defence ministry statement said Sunday's attack, in the Soumouni forest in Segou region, left one Malian soldier dead.

Mali is due to hold elections next Sunday but there are fears the credibility of the poll could be undermined because of insecurity.

Tuareg militias supporting the Malian and French forces said more than 20 people were killed at Tindinbawen near the border with Niger on Friday - the latest in a string of attacks by the group calling itself Islamic State in the Greater Sahara.

Image source, Getty Images

BBC World Service

Islamist militants have attacked a military base in southern Somalia, detonating a suicide car bomb and sending in gunmen.

An al-Shabab spokesman said 27 soldiers were killed in the raid at Baar Sanguni, near Kismayo.

But the claim cannot be independently verified and the Somali government has not yet commented on the attack - which began just after early morning prayers.

The jihadist group targeted a military base in the same area in June. During that attack an American soldier was killed and four others were wounded.

Image source, AFP