Kalkidan Yibeltal
BBC News

Image source, Jimma Institute of Technology

An Ethiopian father of 11 has become a social media sensation in the country after he enrolled at a university at the age of 69.

Orphaned at a young age, Tadesse Ghichile, couldn't continue his formal education after middle school until much later.

Now, he’s attending Jimma University in the western part of the country where he hopes to graduate with a medical degree.

Tadesse Ghichile is a farmer. When he’s not tilling the land, he works in a café in his village to support his family.

Yet somehow he found time to take - and pass - the national university entrance exam.

It was 10 years ago that he decided to resume formal education, which he had left in eighth grade following the death of his parents.

For a long time he had found it difficult to return to school especially after he started a family. But once he was back, he was determined to see it to the end.

Now, he’s enrolled in one of the country’s biggest universities.

He told the BBC he’s had lots of support from fellow students in the past few years and that he’s looking forward to what lies ahead.

Ishaq Khalid
BBC News, Abuja

Image source, EFCC

Nigeria has suspended indefinitely the country’s accountant-general after he was arrested by anti-corruption investigators over fraud claims.

The government said Ahmed Idris's suspension was meant to allow proper investigation of the claims.

He was arrested after being linked to fraud, money laundering and diverting nearly $200m (£161m) from government coffers, Nigeria's economic crimes agency said in a statement on Monday.

He is being detained by the anti-corruption agency and has not yet commented publicly on the allegations.

As the accountant-general, Mr Idris was the administrative head of the national treasury.

He has served in the role since 2015 when he was appointed by President Muhammadu Buhari.

President Buhari’s administration has recorded some successes in its fight against endemic corruption. Several high-profile politicians, businesspeople and internet fraudsters have been jailed.

The government recovered looted assets and about $800m in 2021 alone.

But critics say ordinary Nigerians have yet to see the impact of such recovery. The pardoning of jailed politicians, including two former state governors last month, has also cast a shadow on the anti-corruption campaign.

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A month after a zinc mine was flooded in Burkina Faso, relatives of those trapped refuse to give up.

British citizen Alaa Abdel Fattah's prison conditions are "inhumane", the foreign secretary is told.

That's all from the BBC Africa Live team for today, but we'll be here again on Thursday morning Nairobi time.

In the meantime you can check the BBC News website for African news updates as well as listen to our Africa Today podcast.

A reminder of our wise words of the day:

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

And we leave you with this picture of an art installation in Dakar by the artist Yakhya Ba on the tragedies of migration.

Image source, Getty Images

Patricia Oyella
BBC News, Kampala

Ugandan police have released on bond a Rwandan soldier and refugee they arrested from his home in Masanafu on the outskirts of the capital Kampala.

Sgt Major Robert Kabera fled to Uganda in November 2020 alleging political persecution from Kigali but the Ugandan police raided his home on Monday and searched it on suspicion that he was unlawfully in possession of a firearm.

Following his arrest, he was held at the Police’s Special Investigations Division, also in the capital.

His lawyer wrote on Tuesday to the country’s prime minister requesting an intervention into what he said was Kabera’s harassment, illegal detention and imminent extradition to Kigali.

Sgt Major Kabera is expected to report to the police in two days’ time as investigations continue into the charges against him of illegal possession of a firearm.

He had claimed in previous media reports that he was wanted by Kigali authorities partly because of his links to the family of Fred Rwigema, the first Commander of the Rwandan Patriotic Front who was killed in 1990 during the then rebels’ invasion of Rwanda.

The Rwandan government however accuses Sgt Major Kabera of allegedly defiling a family member in 2020, a charge he denies.

His arrest comes amid improved relations between Kigali and Kampala following years of tensions.

One of Rwanda’s key demands for a return to normalcy is the repatriation of some of its citizens that it considers a security threat.

Image source, Getty Images

#WeareallIdrissa is a top global trend after people online have been tweeting in support of Senegalese Paris St Germain football player, Idrissa Gana Gueye, after he refused to play for this team wearing a shirt with numbers displayed in Pride colours BBC Sports understands.

On Tuesday French clubs had been invited to mark 17 May's International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia.

Many of the tweets highlight the 32-year-old's Muslim faith and comment on the legality in the West to criticise Islam or the Quran but what they view as the perceived lack of freedom to oppose homosexuality.

However, the hashtag is also being used to spread homophobic content. Many online are angry about Gueye's reported actions and are calling it insulting and homophobic.

Homosexuality is illegal in Senegal and punishable by prison sentences of up to five years.

The French Football Federation (FFF) has reportedly written to Gueye to clarify why he was absent from PSG's Saturday match against Montpellier, according to the AFP news agency.

They want him to issue and apology, or say the rumours as to why he missed Saturday's game are unfounded.

The letter reportedly adds if he did refuse to play he would be "validating discriminatory behaviour".

Meanwhile PSG said that they were "very proud" to wear Pride shirts.

Initially PSG boss Mauricio Pochettino said only that Gueye missed the game for "personal reasons".

BBC Sport has approached Gueye's representatives for comment.

Read more: Idrissa Gueye refuses to wear PSG shirt featuring rainbow symbol

The authorities in Sudan have ordered a morgue in the capital, Khartoum, to shut down because bodies there are starting to decompose in the heat because of frequent power cuts.

The facility is said to hold nearly 1,000 unidentified corpses.

A health ministry official, Hisham Zain al-Abidin, said that the morgue was so overwhelmed that many bodies were left on the floors and rodents were scavenging on them.

Activists have expressed concern that its closure may cover-up the truth of how many were killed during protests against Sudan's military rulers.

Image source, Getty Images

Guinea include Valencia's former France youth defender Mouctar Diakhaby in their 23-man squad for next month's 2023 Africa Cup Nations qualifiers.

Kalkidan Yibeltal
BBC News, Addis Ababa

Image source, Amhara region

Relatives of a prominent Ethiopian army general say they fear for his safety after he went missing two days ago in the capital, Addis Ababa.

Brigadier General Tefera Mamo, former commander of the Amhara Special Forces that are allied to the federal army in its fight against rebels from the province of Tigray, had been critical of the government after he was removed from his position in February.

Gen Tefera Mamo left his home in Addis Ababa to meet a friend on Monday but never returned.

His wife has told the BBC she fears he has been abducted as she has not heard from him since.

He first came to public attention in 2009 when he was accused of plotting a coup against former Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and was thrown in jail. He was released in 2018 when the country was in the midst of political transition.

In July last year - when rebel forces from the country’s northern Tigray region were pushing southwards towards the capital he was appointed as head of the Amhara forces.

But earlier this year, in a sign that he had fallen out with authorities, he was replaced. He subsequently criticised the government.

Addis Ababa’s police have told the BBC that Gen Tefera is not in their custody.

Rhoda Odhiambo
BBC health reporter

Image source, AFP

Mozambique has declared an outbreak of wild polio after a young child was diagnosed with the disease in the country’s north-eastern Tete province - its first case in 30 years.

The World Health Organization (WHO) says doctors detected it when the child began experiencing the onset of paralysis in late March.

Neighbouring Malawi reported a similar case in February this year.

“The detection of another case of wild polio virus in Africa is greatly concerning, even if it’s unsurprising given the recent outbreak in Malawi. However, it shows how dangerous this virus is and how quickly it can spread,” WHO's regional director for Africa, Dr Matshidiso Moeti, said in a statement.

The health ministry is planning a vaccination drive aimed at reaching children who are either not immunised or partially protected to boost their immunity

Wild polio remains endemic in only two countries in the world - Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Sequencing done on the sample collected in Mozambique shows that the strain is similar to the one circulating in Pakistan.

Polio usually affects children under five, sometimes leading to irreversible paralysis.

Although it has no cure, it can be prevented through vaccination.

Vumani Mkhize
BBC Africa Business

Image source, Getty Images

Three construction firms in South Africa accused of inflating the cost of building a stadium in Cape Town for the 2010 football World Cup have agreed to pay the city’s authorities nearly $6m (£4.8m).

In an out-of-court settlement, WBHO, Stefanutti Stocks and Aveng Africa will pay the City of Cape Town $1.9m each over the next three years.

Cape Town Mayor Gordon Hill Lewis said the companies would also pay a minimum of $2.6m towards solar energy projects.

The companies were accused of colluding to raise prices during the construction of Greenpoint Stadium, which began in 2007.

An end to the legal battle will be a relief to the authorities as the 62,000-seater stadium has been a thorn in their side for many years.

The stadium that was estimated to cost $370m ballooned to $600m in total. It has never turned a profit, and operational costs are subsidised by Cape Town rate payers to the tune of more than $4m a year.

The facility has recently been taken over by the local rugby team, and has been renamed The DHL Stadium.

Local activist Sandra Dickson hopes the move will reduce costs for Cape Town residents: “The new tenants are wished well in their new home and the hope is that this drain of public funds will finally end.”

Five brand new stadiums at a cost of $1.8bn were built for the 2010 World Cup, and almost all are struggling to generate enough revenue to sustain themselves.

A similar trend continued four years later in Brazil, where many purpose-built stadiums became white elephants after the 2014 World Cup.

According to the South African government, the 2010 tournament is estimated to have cost the hosts more than $3bn.

They have been trapped in a zinc mine for the last month is still ongoing.

BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

The federal high court in Nigeria has denied a bail request for the separatist leader, Nnamdi Kanu, who is standing trial accused of terrorism and broadcasting falsehoods.

The charges against Mr Kanu, who leads a banned group called the Indigenous People of Biafra (Ipob), are linked to broadcasts he made in support of the secession of the mainly Igbo-speaking region of south-east Nigeria.

Five years ago while Mr Kanu was on bail, he fled the country.

But he was controversially captured last year - reportedly in Kenya - and taken back to Nigeria.

Despite low level clashes in the south-east, the pro-Biafra movement says it wants to achieve independence without violence, and has mounted a civil disobedience campaign, crippling local economic activity.

A report on global tobacco consumption says while the number of smokers has declined worldwide, they are on the rise in Africa.

The Tobacco Atlas report, external, compiled by a consortium of public health organisations and US academics, found that global smoking rates declined from 22.6% in 2007 to 19.6% in 2019.

But the report's authors from Vital Strategies and Tobacconomics at the University of Illinois said that parts of the world experiencing a growth in population growth had increasing numbers of smokers, including in Africa, the eastern Mediterranean and the western Pacific.

In at least 10 African countries the prevalence was rising among adults as well as among young people.

“The industry is still preying on emerging economies in ways that will lock in harms for a generation or more," the Reuters news agency quotes report author Jeffrey Drope as saying.

Image source, AFP

Ishaq Khalid
BBC News, Abuja

Gunmen have abducted dozens of passengers on the highway between the Nigerian capital, Abuja, and the northern city of Kaduna. The busy road is notorious for frequent attacks by armed gangs behind kidnappings for ransom across the region.

Witnesses say the kidnappers blocked the road on Tuesday evening, trapping dozens of vehicles, opening fire and abducting a number of passengers.

The security forces then responded and engaged the gunmen in a battle.

A traveller who escaped the attack told the BBC about 40 people had been abducted. Kaduna state's commissioner for internal security Samuel Aruwan confirmed the raid but could not confirm how many had been kidnapped.

The Abuja-Kaduna highway is arguably Nigeria's most unsafe road because of frequent attacks by kidnapping gangs.

Many risk using it because train services were suspended in March following an attack on a passenger train in which nine people were shot dead. Dozens of passengers kidnapped in that raid are still in captivity.

The authorities say the train services are due to resume in the coming days after the completion of repair work on the rail track destroyed by the attackers.

Image source, AFP

Emmanuel Igunza
BBC News

Image source, AFP

South Sudan says it is sending its army to the disputed oil-rich Abyei region, along the border with Sudan, following ethnic clashes that have killed more than 40 people.

The government has accused UN peacekeepers in the region of failing to protect civilians displaced during the latest spate of violence.

The deployment could reignite tensions with Sudan over the contested territory.

The ethnic clashes are between the Ngok Dinka community and the Misseriya Arab community who cross from Sudan looking for pasture.

The two groups have long-running disputes that have displaced thousands of people there over the years.

A referendum to resolve the status of Abyei was supposed to be held following a peace deal in 2005, but the vote has never materialised.

The latest violence comes as South Sudan grapples with rising inter-communal fighting in various parts of the country.

Violence has also been reported in the northern Unity State which borders Abyei, where armed groups have clashed over cattle.

On Monday, nearly 30 people were killed in Leer county in the latest bout of fighting that began in late February.

Analysts warn that the fighting threatens the fragile peace deal in the world’s youngest nation.

The double life of Richard Mbulu, who takes shots at goal for Baroka FC and fires shots on the shooting range as a soldier.

A rare white buffalo has been sighted in Tanzania’s northern Tarangire National Park.

The buffalo was first sighted in the park on Monday, attracting many tourists wanting to see the animal, the country’s national resources and tourism ministry said.

It was bigger than the other buffaloes, local publication The Citizen reported, saying it was seen mixing freely with the rest of the herd.

It notes that besides being rare, white buffaloes are considered sacred among some communities.

The Tarangire Park is located in northern Tanzania, south-east of Lake Manyara.