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

BBC Africa Live
Damian Zane

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 Thursday's proverb:

We leave you with this picture of a young boy at a fish farm in Egypt keeping hold of his catch:

We're used to countries having a ministry of defence but it's not often a government creates a government ministry dedicated to peace.

But Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed hopes to change that.

Mr Abiy, in his bid to reform the government, has slimmed down the number of ministries from 28 to 20.

But he has created a new one - the ministry of peace.

Since the prime minister came to power in April he has introduced some sweeping changes including making peace with country's long-time foe Eritrea.

So what will this new ministry do?

The details are vague. An official document says it will do things related to bringing peace and security in the country and it will strive for the rule of law, the BBC's Abebe Bayu reports from Addis Ababa.

Image source, AFP

News is emerging of a mine accident in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo that has killed at least 30 people, AFP news agency reports.

It says that a landslide a week ago trapped miners at an informal gold mine in Misisi, South Kivu province.

"Proper searches only began today [Thursday]," local official Aime Mutipula is quoted by AFP as saying.

A worker with a local NGO that specialises in the mining sector said: "At least 37 people have died according to a provisional toll."

Another person told AFP the death toll was 32.

Image source, EWN

This week, South African William Segodisho spoke about how a Catholic priest, Father William MacCurtain, had sexually abused him when he was a teenager staying in a Johannesburg homeless shelter in the 1980s.

In a moving testimony at a press conference he spoke about how it had destroyed his life and his attempts to get the church to accept responsibility came to nothing.

On Wednesday, Fr MacCurtain apologised for the abuse and now Mr Segodisho has responded:

"For 27 long years I have yearned and begged and cried for just these the three words from Fr Bill: 'I am sorry'.

"It has been a painful and a traumatic struggle that has poisoned the peace every human soul needs to thrive.

"The deliberate absence of the acknowledgement of my pain and this apology, has damaged me beyond recovery. I shall take it to my grave.

"Having said that, I am relieved that my struggle was not in vain. I welcome that finally my truth has been acknowledged and it is now officially affirmed that I am not the liar I was made out to be for almost three decades.

"His apology, late as it comes, gives me the peace my soul has been crying out for all along.

"It was unexpected because I had become accustomed to being disregarded and disbelieved.

"Better late than never. I will need time to digest it and determine whether to accept it, forgive the man and march on to live what little is left of my life in peace and harmony."

Killian Ngala Chimtom
BBC Africa, Yaounde

Lawyers in Cameroon defending leaders of a movement to create a separate state of Ambazonia have called on the government to produce evidence that their clients are still alive.

Barrister Christopher Ndong was representing his clients at a hearing at the Yaounde Appeals Court.

For the fifth time, secessionist leader Sissiku Ayuk Tabe and his fellow defendants were not present in court, despite a court order saying they should be there.

“We have fears that if they cannot be brought even at the level of the court of appeal, then there is something wrong,” Mr Ndong told the BBC.

The next hearing comes up on 1 November and the lawyer said if the defendants are not physically present, then the government "should present certificates of life to show that they are alive”.

Mr Ayuk and 46 others were arrested January in Nigeria and extradited to Cameroon.

Government spokesman Issa Tchiroma Bakary has said the separatists will answer for their alleged crimes.

Mr Ayuk was the president of the Governing Council of Ambazonia, a group that works for the secession of Cameroon’s English-speaking regions of Cameroon from the rest of the country.

Cameroon’s English speakers say they have been marginalised for decades by the predominantly Francophone government.

• Read more about Cameroon's Anglophone crisis: Red Dragons and Tigers - the rebels fighting for independence

Milton Nkosi
BBC Africa, Johannesburg

South Africa’s radical opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has denied links with a huge bank corruption scandal, after a forensic report into the collapse of VBS Mutual was published.

Party chairman Dali Mpofu told local media that the EFF, which has modelled itself as an anti-corruption force, did not get money from VBS.

The report, commissioned by the South African Reserve Bank, listed Brian Shivambu, the brother of EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu, as one of the people who received money from the collapsed bank.

The report said about 2bn rand ($137m, £103m) was "looted".

When asked about the R16m ($1m, £829,5) alleged to have been siphoned off by Brian Shivambu, Mr Mpofu scoffed at the idea.

“We are not answerable for brothers and sisters. We are not a burial society, we don’t have family membership schemes.”

In a statement, the EFF said that the loss of the money "is probably the greatest bank heists in South Africa".

It added that there should be a recovery plan in place for the bank.

The bank suffered a liquidity problem when it violated banking rules set by regulators.

The author of the report, Advocate Terry Motau, said: “The bank is in a hopeless situation and it cannot be saved. The elderly who have saved their monies are the ones who have suffered the most.”

The governing ANC said the law must take its course.

Caroline Lewis

Tanzanian billionaire Mohammed Dewji was kidnapped in Dar es Salaam on Thursday morning on his way to the gym.

I worked closely with Mohammed Dewji for around a year at the office of his company MeTL in Jubilee Towers in Dar es Salaam.

He has huge celebrity status in the country. You would be hard pressed to find a person in Dar es Salaam who did not know of Mohammed or the Dewji family and he would often draw large crowds at public events.

But despite his wealth and celebrity he is always incredibly relaxed in his approach to security, like the rest of the Dewji family.

He never moved with security guards or bouncers and would often pop out to the gym on his lunch break or to meet with friends after work.

In his day-to-day life he did not look like a billionaire. He is a friendly, affable young man going about his business.

• Read more about the kidnapping

Image source, EPA

The Ebola outbreak in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo could last at least another four months, the World Health Organization (WHO) says, Reuters news agency reports.

Peter Salama, the WHO's head of emergency response, has warned that the virus could spread to neighbouring Rwanda or Uganda.

He told Reuters that he is most concerned with the situation in Beni, in the east of the DR Congo, where people who may be carrying the virus are hiding from health workers.

The WHO says that 122 people have died from Ebola in the current outbreak which began at the end of July.

Image source, AFP

Abebe Bayu, BBC Amharic

Italy's Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has arrived in Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa, at the start of a visit to the Horn of Africa, which will also take in neighbouring Eritrea.

Mr Conte is visiting the two countries to offer support to help cement the peace deal between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which ended decades of tension over the exact location of the border.

Italy's prime minister is also expected to discuss economic issues with his Ethiopian counterpart, Abiy Ahmed.

Italy is particularly concerned with the number of migrants from the Horn of Africa who try to make it across the Mediterranean Sea.

The country, under the dictatorship of Benito Mussolini, occupied Ethiopia for a brief period in the 1930s. But Italy has repaired ties since then and the two countries now have strong relations.

Yemisi Adegoke
BBC Africa

Image source, Global Society for Anti-Corruption

Death-row inmate Celestine Egbunuche has been dubbed Nigeria's "oldest prisoner" amid a campaign calling for his release.

He is 100 years old and has spent 18 years in jail after being found guilty of organising a murder.

Small and slightly hunched over, he looks wistfully into space as he sits on a tightly packed bench inside a stuffy prison visitor's room.

He remains quiet during our visit - in stark contrast to the rest of the room that is filled with loud chatter at Enugu Maximum Security Prison in south-east Nigeria.

His son Paul Egbunuche, 41, sits protectively close to him - and does the talking. He is in jail on the same murder charge.

They were both accused of hiring people to kidnap and kill a man over an alleged land dispute in Imo state.

Paul maintains their innocence. They were detained in June 2000 and eventually convicted and sentenced to death in 2014.

• Read more on BBC News Online

BBC World Service

Police in Zimbabwe have arrested the head of the main trade union, the ZCTU, ahead of a planned protest over the country's deepening economic problems.

ZCTU President Peter Mutasa was among several dozen people detained in various cities across Zimbabwe.

Police had refused to give permission for a planned demonstration in the capital, Harare, saying it would not be safe because of an outbreak of cholera.

Zimbabwe has suffered shortages of fuel and some basic foodstuffs since the government announced a new tax on electronic payments last week.

A foreign currency shortage has worsened since President Emmerson Mnanagagwa won a disputed election in July.

Image source, EPA

In an effort to boost support for Kenya's national football team, the government is giving away all the tickets to Sunday's Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) qualifying match against Ethiopia for free.

In a statement, Sports Minister Rashid Echesa Mohammed said that it is the duty of "patriotic Kenyans... to support the team unreservedly".

The minister said that a win for the national team, known as the Harambee Stars, would put them on "the brink" of qualifying for next year's Afcon finals in Cameroon.

Ethiopia and Kenya played out a 0-0 draw when they met in the northern city of Bahir Dar on Wednesday.

Ethiopian fans were seen filling the stadium and there has been a push on social media that Kenyans should do the same, reports the BBC's Celestine Karoney in Nairobi.

There has been a bit of fan apathy in Kenya when it comes to football, she adds.

Kennedy Gondwe
BBC News, Lusaka

Image source, Kennedy Gondwe

The Zambian government has suspended more than 80 officials from the ministry of general education after an estimated $1.6m (£1.2m) of donor funds was allegedly embezzled, reports the state-owned Zambia Daily Mail newspaper.

Acting Education Minister Vincent Mwale told parliament on Wednesday that the UK government, through the Department for International Development (DfiD), has suspended funding to the ministry to pave the way for investigations.

He said the funding will only resume after the system is cleaned up.

“Over 80 officers have been suspended for financial irregularities. They remain suspended until further notice,” he said.

The development comes after London based journal Africa Confidential - which has recently been at the forefront exposing alleged corruption and fraud in Zambia - warned there was a huge financial scandal brewing in the ministry.

Last month, President Edgar Lungu fired Emerine Kabanshi, the minister in charge of community development and social welfare, after Africa Confidential reported that $4.3m meant for poor families was misspent. He also ordered a probe into the reports.

But Mr Lungu’s spokesman Amos Chanda has said Zambia has now returned $3.5m donated by the UK government after concerns were raised about how the money had been used.

Athuman Mtulya
BBC Africa, Dar es Salaam

Police in Tanzania are investigating the kidnapping of Mohammed Dewji, the country's richest man, who was seized this morning on his way to the gym in the country's main city, Dar es Salaam.

But how frequent are such incidents?

The city's name comes from Arabic, and literally means Abode of Peace. And Dar es Salaam is very safe, in comparison to Lagos or Johannesburg, the main cities in Nigeria and South Africa respectively.

Although Tanzania has seen a wave attacks and abductions of opposition politicians and perceived government critics, this is the first time a businessman of Mr Dewji's standing has been kidnapped in the country.

Businessmen have never felt at risk of being kidnapped and they often move around on their own. Some may have chauffeurs, but not bodyguards.

So Mr Dewji's abduction has come as a huge shock.

Image source, AFP

Africa, the continent with the fastest growing population, is doing worst when it comes to investing in young people.

The World Bank has just published its Human Capital Index, external, which is seen as a new way of measuring economic success and gauges how much effort is being put into developing the youth.

The higher the investment in education and health the more productive and higher earning the workforce tends to be, the World Bank says.

African countries dominate, external the bottom of the index.

Chad is the lowest rank country and 21 of the bottom 25 countries are in Africa including:

• 152nd - Nigeria
• 137th - Uganda
• 135th - Ethiopia

Kenya is ranked 94th and top-ranked African country is Seychelles at 43rd.

• Read more about the index from the BBC's Economics Editor

Growing up in Ghana, Farida Bedwei felt there was no representation of disability in any of the comics she enjoyed reading.

Now she has created Karmzah, a formidable super hero who - like Farida - is living with cerebral palsy.

She says it was crucial that the crutches which Karmzah uses to walk became a powerful part of her super powers.

She has been speaking to the BBC's Newsday programme:

Kenya's police chief Joseph Boinnet says that members of his force will be investigated over Wednesday morning's bus crash in which 56 people died, the BBC's Ferdinand Omondi reports.

The owners of the bus company have been arrested, he added.

Giving a press conference in the capital, Nairobi, Mr Boinnet said that the bus was licensed to carry 62 passengers but 71 people were on board. It also did not have a licence to travel at night.

There will be an investigation into whether police deliberately ignored the flouting of the regulations.

The bus travelling from Nairobi, to Kisumu, in the west, veered off the road, police said.

It was overloaded and speeding, a survivor told local media.

Police said the driver lost control and the vehicle plunged down a slope at a notorious accident black spot. The roof was ripped off.

Read more on this story.

Image source, AFP

Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari has threatened compatriots who hold assets abroad to declare them or face prosecution.

As part of his fight against corruption, the president has given people 12 months to register under the Voluntary Offshore Assets Regularization Scheme.

The president has tweeted that there will be "no hiding place" for those who try to disguise their offshore wealth.

Billions of dollars of public money are thought to have been transferred abroad by corrupt public officials.

In 2016, Mr Buhari's government announced that it had recovered $9.1bn (£6.9bn) of money illegally taken abroad, news agency Reuters reported at the time, external.

The president is running for re-election next year.

BBC World Service

A meteorite that is one of the biggest pieces of the moon ever put up for sale is being auctioned online by a Boston based firm.

The moon rock, weighing about 5.5kg was found last year in a remote area of Mauritania.

It is thought to have plunged to earth thousands of years ago.

Its large size and composition are very unusual. It could fetch around $0.5m (£380,000) at auction.