BBC World Service

Image source, Getty Images

The founder of a South African group fighting for the right to die has been arrested in Cape Town and charged with murder.

A close associate confirmed that Sean Davison was detained following a search of his house.

The murder charge is reported to be related to the death of a friend in 2013 who lost the use of his arms and legs after a car accident.

Euthanasia is illegal in South Africa.

See update: Davison freed on bail

Ugandan pop star-turned-MP Bobi Wine has tweeted that he is returning home, more than two weeks after he flew to the US for medical treatment after accusing the military of brutally torturing him.

The Afrobeats star is out on bail after being charged with treason over the alleged stoning of President Yoweri Museveni's convoy during a parliamentary by-election campaign in northern Uganda.

Bobi Wine, whose real name is Robert Kyagulani, denies the allegation and accuses the government of trying to crush dissent.

Mr Museveni dimissed allegations of his torture as "fake news", and said he had "no head or chest injuries or bone fractures".

See update: Police warn Bobi Wine

Read: The president and the pop star

Andrew Harding
BBC News, Johannesburg

Image source, Getty Images

Poachers linked to drug gangs in South Africa are threatening the existence of a shell fish, highly prized by restaurants in China.

Stocks of abalone are declining at unprecedented speed, according to new research by the wildlife organisation Traffic.

They’re large, and round, and cling to rocks in the shallow, shark-infested waters off Cape Town.

But in recent years at least 96 million abalone have been poached by small teams of intrepid local divers, Traffic says.

Every year some 2,000 tons of abalone flesh are dried, and smuggled abroad, mostly by air to Hong Kong and beyond, where they’re re-hydrated and served as a gastronomic treat.

Traffic, which monitors wildlife trade, says the poaching industry is linked to Cape Town’s notorious drug gangs.

Campaigners want the species to be listed as endangered or at-risk in South Africa, warning that extinction is likely if there isn’t a concerted move to stop the poachers.

Mary Harper
Africa editor, BBC World Service

Image source, Getty Images

Equatorial Guinea has demanded that Brazil hand back more than $16m (£12m) worth of cash and luxury watches confiscated from a delegation accompanying the president's son, Teodorin Nguema Obiang.

Equatorial Guinea's foreign minister described the seizure as a "paltry and unfriendly" act.

Mr Obiang, who is vice-president of Equatorial Guinea, arrived in Brazil on Friday on board a private jet.

Brazil prohibits people from entering the country with more than $2,400 in cash.

Both Mr Obiang and his father deny misusing their country's oil revenue.

Jonathan Paye-Layleh
BBC Africa, Monrovia

Image source, Getty Images

The Liberian government says it is investigating what has happened to two huge consignments of money that were printed abroad and brought into the country between November last year and August this year.

The money, said to be local banknotes worth about $60m (£45.6m), has allegedly disappeared.

One media report says containers packed with the money left the port in the capital, Monrovia, under security escort in March and were thought to be headed for the central bank, but they vanished.

The consignment that came through the international airport cannot be account for either.

The justice ministry is asking the public to remain calm while a panel of security officers investigate the matter.

Minister of Information Eugene Nagbe has told state radio that President George Weah, who took office in January, is “unhappy” that he was not informed about the situation until now.

“This is alarming,” Mr Nagbe said.

No arrests have been made so far, but the information minister says he is certain they will get to the bottom of the suspected scandal.

Our proverb of the day:

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

Welcome back to BBC Africa Live, where we will bring you the latest news and views from around the continent.

BBC Africa Live
Natasha Booty

That's all from BBC Africa Live for now. You can 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 Tuesday's proverb:

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

And we leave you with this photo of a woman in Ghana's capital, Accra, taken by Nigerian photographer Yagazie Emezi:

Kennedy Gondwe
BBC News, Lusaka

Image source, Getty Images

Zambia’s President Edgar Lungu wants his officials to act on the results of an investigation into stolen donor funds.

The directive follows Britain's decision to freeze all aid to Zambia citing "fraud" and "corruption".

President Lungu wants decisive action taken against those responsible within a week.

The president is quoted by his spokesman Amos Chanda as saying:

Mr Lungu’s spokesman says the president is just as as the frustrated as Zambia donors because his priority is "the plight of the poor".

The money has gone missing from the Social Cash Transfer programme, which allocates money that is paid directly to the poorest in Zambia.

Mr Chanda adds that President Lungu met with donors at the start of September and "shared with them the measures being undertaken to address the problems encountered".

Image source, AFP

Moroccan singer Saad Lamjarred has been detained in France after prosecutors successfully appealed against his bail terms over a rape charge.

The 33-year-old was charged on 28 August with the rape of a woman in Saint-Tropez. He had been allowed to leave custody after posting a deposit of $175,450 (£133,500).

He is already facing rape allegations dating back to 2016 and was arrested in 2010 on suspicion of another assault.

His hit Lmaallem is the most-viewed song by an Arabic-language artist on YouTube, watched more than 650 million times.

• Read the full story here

Ishaq Khalid
BBC Africa, Abuja

Image source, AFP

Nigeria has declared a state of emergency after two major rivers burst their banks, killing more than 100 people and forcing thousands more from their homes in the past fortnight.

The declaration by the National Emergency Management Agency (Nema) paves the way for more aggressive measures to be taken to handle the crisis which has hit communities in 12 of Nigeria's 36 states.

Nema director Mustapha Yunusa Maihaja called the situation "alarming and devastating".

The floods are the worst to hit Nigeria in six years. The destruction is huge, the death toll is high and survivors are struggling to cope.

Some of the victims were killed by collapsed buildings while others were swept away by flood waters.

The declaration of a national disaster means the government could trigger the immediate deployment of all available resources and personnel, including the security forces, to deal with the floods.

The authorities say as Nigeria continues to witness heavy rains and the rivers continue to swell, more floods are expected, raising fears of more destruction.

Milton Nkosi
BBC Africa, Johannesburg

South Africans are on a high.

They have taken to the internet reacting to the ruling by the highest court in the land, which has decriminalised the use of cannabis at home.

Jokes and memes abound on social media - some people are rolling joints in front of police vehicles, while others are having fun with silly puns.

But the public is dismissing the crucial point of the ruling by omission or commission that this is for "private" purposes and not for public consumption.

The conundrum is how the state will deal with all those who have been convicted for violating existing laws and are now languishing behind bars serving sentences for being caught using "dagga", as cannabis is known locally.

On the other hand, those who have been advocating for this historic ruling are relieved that they can use the herb for medicinal purposes.

Here's a selection of South Africans' reactions on Twitter:

Jose Tembe
BBC Africa, Maputo

Image source, Andia

Drought has left tens of thousands of people at risk of starvation close to Mozambique's border with Zimbabwe, local authorities say.

Mapai district, in southern Gaza province, has had very little rain and cereal crops have been decimated by an invasive species known as corn earworm.

To avert the risk of starvation, Mapai District Administrator Darciso Namahuque has called for an ongoing ban on the consumption and movement of cattle - enforced to combat a local outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease - to be lifted:

Rachael Akidi
Head of East Africa, BBC World Service

BBC News Amharic, Afaan Oromoo and Tigrinya services aim to reach an audience that had for years been torn between two extreme choices: state-controlled media from both Ethiopia and Eritrea, and opposition platforms created by exiles based in the diaspora.

When we launched last September, none of us could have predicted the numerous historic events we would witness.

Ethiopia's former Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn resigned suddenly last February, following weeks of protests by disaffected groups. A state of emergency was imposed and for some weeks it appeared the political environment would continue to deteriorate.

Then a new Prime Minister was appointed. At just 41, Abiy Ahmed has overhauled the region. Ethiopia has restored diplomatic ties with Eritrea, and accepted and implemented the peace deal that ended the two nations' border war.

Last week, the common border was officially reopened and both sides started withdrawing troops from the are - marking an official end to the war. The Tigrinya service reporter Girmay Gerbu was the only BBC journalist to witness this historic event.

Our teams' reporting has set the regional news agenda. One highlight from the past year was an investigative report by Habtamu Tibebu of BBC News Afaan Oromoo into Ethiopia's biggest gold mining company, Midroc.

Environmentalists and residents of Oddo Shakiso, a mineral-rich district in south-western Ethiopia, had long claimed that mining activities were having dangerous effects and even causing congenital birth defects. But their complaints met with little or no response from the authorities.

Following the BBC's report, the government revoked the company's mining licence, and said it needed to investigate the alleged adverse effects to communities and the environment.

As Ethiopia and Eritrea implement momentous reforms, we hope the three services will continue to record these moments of history, while bringing stories from a previously under-reported region to the rest of the world.

• Read the full blog post here

Tomi Oladipo
BBC Africa security correspondent

Image source, Sky TG24

An Italian priest has been kidnapped close to Niger's border with Burkina Faso.

So far, the abductors have not made any demands. It is the second kidnapping of a European national this year in the West African state which has struggled to defeat jihadist groups.

However, it is still unclear who kidnapped the priest.

Residents of Bomoanga village - located more than 100km (62 miles) from the capital, Niamey - say armed men arrived on Monday night and seized the priest.

The Catholic Society of African Missions (Sam) says Father Pierluigi Maccalli has lived in Niger for the past 11 years. They say he has been actively promoting the development of education, healthcare and the training of young farmers in the southwest's Gourmancé area.

Militant Islamists are known to be active near the borders with Mali and Burkina Faso.

In June, Niger's President Mahamadou Issoufou told television broadcaster France 24 that an American missionary and a German aid worker - kidnapped in separate incidents in his country - were both alive.

BBC Sport

Image source, Getty Images

Montpellier and South Africa midfielder Keagan Dolly has undergone successful surgery on his fractured fibula.

The 25-year-old is set to be out for several weeks and could miss Bafana Bafana's upcoming 2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers.

South Africa have back-to-back fixtures against Seychelles in October and Nigeria in November.

He picked up the injury after just five minutes of Saturday's 1-1 draw with Strasbourg in the French league.

Dolly collided with Strasbourg's Jeremy Grimm and underwent surgery on Monday.

"Keagan Dolly had a successful surgery yesterday (Monday). We wish him a speedy recovery," Montpellier announced on Twitter., external

The Bafana Bafana international moved from 2016 African Champions Mamelodi Sundowns to French side Montpellier in January 2017 for a fee of around $2m, making it one of the most expensive transfers in South African history.

Mary Harper
Africa editor, BBC World Service

The presidents of Djibouti and Eritrea have met for the first time in more than a decade.

At a summit in Saudi Arabia, Presidents Ismail Omar Guelleh and Isaias Afwerki agreed on a new chapter of cooperation.

There has been a long-standing border dispute between the two countries, which has occasionally erupted into violence.

The United Nations Secretary General Antonia Guterres said he hoped the agreement would lead to great stability in the Horn of Africa.

There has been significant change in the region, mainly spearheaded by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who came to power in April.

Image source, SPA

In tribute to her late father who was Eritrean, US comedian Tiffany Haddish wore the colours of the East African nation's flag to the Emmy Awards in Los Angeles on Monday night.

She won the prize for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her hosting stint on the comedy sketch show Saturday Night Live.

The Girls Trip star visited Eritrea earlier this year for her father's funeral.

"I felt like my heart was being healed," she told EriTV, external at the time.

"I've been through a lot of things. I was trying to figure out, 'Who am I?' And now I have a way better understanding of who I am, why I'm on this earth - what my purpose is."

Image source, Getty Images

Rights group Amnesty International has authenticated a viral video showing the decapitated head of a Cameroonian security officer apparently filmed by separatists.

It says the footage and "brutal attacks against ordinary people and security forces" are proof of the "horrific escalation of violence" in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions.

Hundreds have been killed and more than 200,000 people forced from their homes since late 2016.

This video is the latest in a series of clips from Cameroon's violent conflict to circulate online. The Amnesty forensic experts who examined it say the gendarme had bruises on his head, which was laid on a blood-soaked cloth close to what they say could be his genitalia. An individual identifies himself in the clip as being a member of the armed separatists group "Ambazonia Liberation Forces".

Amnesty believes the video was filmed in Cameroon's North-West region, but says it has not been able to determine the exact location.

Aid agencies' efforts to assist civilians have been frustrated by the struggle to access conflict areas. Journalists have also been denied access to conflict zones.

Presidential elections are due to take place next month, in which President Paul Biya is seeking a seventh term in office.

Zimbabwean opposition lawmakers have walked out of President Emmerson Mnangagwa's state of the nation address in parliament.

An Al Jazeera journalist has tweeted this footage of them filing out the building:

Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) MPs and their leader Nelson Chamisa heckled President Mnangagwa when he started reading his speech before leaving the national assembly.

Reuters news agency attributes the display to the opposition's "lingering bitterness" after losing the disputed general election in July.

In today's speech, Mr Mnangagwa said the election period was decisively in the past.

President Mnangagwa also said the mining amendment bill passed in June will be brought back to parliament to "address some inadequacies", Reuters reports.

Previous changes saw the removal of clauses requiring foreign mining companies to list locally, and gave the mines minister the authority, after consulting with the president, to designate any mineral as strategic if "it would be in the interests of the development of the mining industry".