Image source, Getty Images

Nigeria's opposition presidential candidate Peter Obi has caused a huge upset by narrowly defeating the ruling party's Bola Tinubu in his heartland of Lagos state, provisional results announced by state election officials show.

Mr Obi won 582,454 votes, compared to Mr Tinubu's 572,606.

The official results will be announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (Inec) at its headquarters in the capital, Abuja.

Lagos is the commercial hub of Nigeria, and Mr Tiinubu was once its governor.

Richard Kagoe
BBC News, Nairobi

Image source, AFP

The M23 rebel group has seized more territory in the conflict-hit eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

The rebels captured Mushaki and Rubaya areas over the weekend and residents have fled to escape fighting.

The Congolese army has not commented on the fall of Rubaya, a mining town located about 50km (31 miles) west of the regional capital, Goma.

The town has large deposits of coltan, manganese, tantalum and other minerals.

The M23 rebels were on Tuesday set to begin withdrawing from some territories they recently seized, according to new timelines adopted by East Africa defence chiefs.

The ongoing conflict has displaced hundreds of thousands of people in the last six months.

DR Congo has accused Rwanda of supporting the M23 group, allegations Kigali has denied.

Officials working on Morocco's bid to replace Guinea as host nation of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations feel confident despite facing competition from neighbours Algeria.

Image source, Reuters

Police in Nigeria have urged presidential candidates to caution their supporters against making inciteful comments as Africa's biggest democracy waits for results of its most closely contested elections in years.

The police have also warned politicians against undue pressure on the electoral body, Inec, as anxiety builds over the slow pace of publication of results from polling stations.

Presidential candidates have been urged to "to seize the opportunity of this waiting period to emphasise the rule of law [and] respect for the constitution," a police statement, external said.

Results from just one state out of 36 and the federal capital territory have been announced.

Habtom Weldeyowhannes
BBC Tigrinya

Image source, Tour du Rwanda

An Eritrean cyclist who rides for the Italian team Bardiani CSF has won the Tour du Rwanda 2023 race after winning the final stage of the tour, which took place from 19 February and ended on Sunday.

Henok Mulubrhan, who was the 2022 African continental championship winner, waited until the last metres to launch an attack and beat his closest rivals.

The prize was presented to him by Rwandan President Paul Kagame.

"This is the best day of my life It was always my dream to win this race. The game was too tough in general. I will always remember this achievement," he said..

Eritrean riders won the yellow jersey for the fourth time this year after the Tour du Rwanda was upgraded to category 2.1 event.

Chris Froome, the four-time Tour de France winner, also took part in the tournament but went largely unnoticed.

Earlier, he had told reporters that the Tour de France in July was his main goal and that he was working hard to get in shape for it.

In 2021, Spanish rider Cristian Rodriguez became the only and first European to win the Tour du Rwanda.

Image source, Getty Images

French President Emmanuel Macron is expected to outline new Africa policy ahead of his visit to four African countries beginning from Monday.

He is expected to visit Gabon for an environmental summit, then Angola, Congo-Brazzaville and the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo.

It comes as Paris seeks to counter growing Russian and Chinese influence in the region.

Anti-French sentiment has been running high in some of its former colonies in the Sahel.

Last month, Burkina Faso gave France a month to withdraw its 400 special forces, and announced the official ending of the French military operation in the country a week ago.

In Mali, French troops withdrew from the country after the military government there started working with the Russian private military contractor Wagner.

The Russian group has also been operating in the Central African Republic.

BBC Monitoring
The world through its media

Image source, AFP

The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) says its presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar is on course to win Nigeria's presidential election.

The party said on Twitter that Mr Abubakar was “securing the highest number of valid votes cast as well as the statutory 25% in at least two thirds of the states”.

This is despite the Independent National Electoral Commission (Inec) only declaring official results from one out of Nigeria's 36 states.

The candidate of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) party, Bola Tinubu, won most of the votes from south-western Ekiti state, receiving 201,494 votes.

Mr Abubakar received 89,554 votes while Peter Obi of Labour Party got 11,397 votes.

Inec chairperson Mahmood Yakubu said the commission would announce some of the results from the other states at 10:00 GMT on Monday.

Inec said on Sunday that it was working to fix glitches on its election results viewing portal.

Final presidential results are expected to be declared by 1 March. The vote on Saturday was marred by pockets of violence, widespread delays and logistical problems.

The Economic Community of West African States' (Ecowas) election observer mission described the election as generally peaceful and with a massive voter turnout.

More on the three leading presidential candidates:

• Bola Tinubu, ‘Mr fix it’ seeking Nigerian presidency
• Peter Obi, Nigeria’s wildcard presidential candidate
• Atiku Abubakar, Nigeria’s perennial presidential candidate

A Ugandan nurse has won plaudits after making a treacherous climb on an improvised wooden staircase over a ridge to deliver vaccines to children in a remote village in the eastern part of the country.

The nurse, identified as Agnes Nambozo, was filmed making the steep climb on her way to vaccinate children in Masheluse village.

Health Minister Jane Aceng hailed her as "nurse of the year".

But some Twitter users in the country said the footage was an indictment of the government's poor record on infrastructure.

"It's a shame after over 50 years of self-rule citizens have to be subjected to this nonsense," said Chris Ngaruthi, external.

"I am very sure she will be a happy person if she is awarded a safe way to reach her people when providing medical care," said Eve Zalwango, external.

Mayeni Jones
BBC News, Lagos

Image source, AF

Initial results have started trickling in Nigeria’s most competitive general election since it transitioned to democracy 24 years ago.

Saturday’s polls went relatively smoothly but were hampered by delays and some instances of violence.

Results from just one state out of 36 and the federal capital territory have been announced.

The candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, won the small south-western state of Ekiti.

But it’s still too early to predict who will win the presidency.

The results announcement came more than 24 hours after polls officially closed, despite a new electronic system meant to speed up the publication of data from polling stations.

The delay has fuelled rumours of foul play in a country with a history of ballot rigging and vote buying.

The parties of the two main opposition candidates, former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party, and surprise third candidate, Peter Obi of the Labour Party, have condemned the delay.

The electoral commission has apologised for the slow pace of the new electronic system, blaming teething problems.

Nigeria’s next president will have a number of challenges to tackle including an ailing economy and rising insecurity.

Jose Tembe
BBC News, Maputo

Image source, AFP

Bodies from a cemetery on the banks of the Umbeluze river near the Mozambican capital, Maputo, have been swept by floods into nearby residences and spread across farms.

Televised images showed the effects of the raging waters that flooded many neighbourhoods in Boane district, about 25km south-west of the capital, and beyond.

The scattered bodies are reported to be endangering public health.

Members of the community spent the weekend collecting the corpses.

The affected cemetery is more than three decades old and holds many unidentified graves.

Tropical Cyclone Freddy made landfall in the country on Friday leading to major flooding across the region.

BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

The United Nations Human Rights Council begins a mammoth five-week session in Geneva starting on Monday.

The council promotes human rights worldwide and investigates violations.

It's expected to focus on Russia’s actions in Ukraine. The agenda also covers alleged war crimes in Ethiopia, and the suppression of women in Afghanistan and Iran.

The council will also look at Myanmar, South Sudan, North Korea and Belarus. However, member states decided not to discuss China's alleged abuses against its Muslim Uyghur community.

This session will be opened by the UN secretary-general, Antonio Guterres.

More on this story:

• Tigray war: Eritrean soldiers accused of rape despite peace deal

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Relations between Eritrea and Ethiopia have historically been difficult. Eritrea won independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after a 30-year war. A bitter border war between the two countries began a few years later. But by 2020, Eritrea sent troops to fight alongside the Ethiopian government against rebel forces in its northern Tigray region.

Kalkidan Yibeltal is a BBC correspondent in Addis Ababa. He explains the complex history between the two countries, and looks at the tentative peace now emerging in Tigray.

Presenter: Claire Graham Producer: Owen McFadden

Cyclone Freddy has made landfall on Madagascar, leaving destruction in its wake. At the time this edition of Science In Action is going to air, Freddy is on course to reach Mozambique and South Africa.

Freddy, which has been gaining strength since it originally formed on the 30th of January, is the most powerful southern hemisphere cyclone on record. Professor Francois Engelbrecht provides the science behind the storm system. In the centre of our galaxy, an enormous cloud is heading towards the Milky Way’s supermassive black hole. Dr Anna Ciurlo tells us that this is a unique opportunity to study the influence of the black hole on the cloud’s shape and properties. We’ve heard a lot about balloons floating above Earth recently… but what about sending balloons to Venus?

That’s exactly what Dr Siddharth Krishnamoorthy is proposing in order to study Venus’s seismic activity. Recorders on a “floatilla” above the planet’s surface could listen into Venus-quakes and reveal Venus’s mysterious past. And closer to home, scientists have discovered a new layer in the Earth’s core. We journey into the very centre of the Earth with Professor Hrvoje Tkalčić, who tells Roland what the innermost inner core can teach us about our planet’s past.

And, If, like this week’s Crowdscience listener Lili, you’re an avid gymgoer, you may well have wondered where your fat disappears to when you exercise?

Well, the short answer is that we convert it to energy that powers a whole range of physical processes, from breathing to walking as well as lying down and doing nothing. But the science behind energy expenditure is a little more complicated than that.

Presenter Anand Jagatia pops on an exercise bike to have his metabolism measured, and learns that he may be relying on an entirely different source of fuel as he works up a sweat. But is all that hard work worth the effort it involves? Recent research suggests there's a limit to the number of calories us humans can burn, and that doing physical activity isn’t a sure-fire way to keep trim.

Even hunter-gatherers who walk 13,000 steps a day have the same metabolic rate as the average American. So if working out isn't the best way to lose weight, how about harnessing our own fat to tackle the complications of obesity? It used to be thought brown fat was exclusive to babies (and bears) but we now know adults have some of it too, and it seems to play a vital role in combatting a range of chronic diseases including hypertension and diabetes.

Image: NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using VIIRS data from NASA EOSDIS LANCE, GIBS/Worldview, and the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS). Producer: Roland Pease Assistant Producer: Sophie Ormiston

A 2022 peace deal halted Ethiopia's two-year civil war. Women say it did not stop the violence.

The US military says it helped government troops fighting al-Shabab Islamists northeast of the Somali capital.

The brightly painted wooden sarcophagus was smuggled to the US by a global art trafficking network.

The US alleges Abu Agila Masud made the bomb that downed Pan Am flight 103, a claim his family refute.

Tanitoluwa Adewumi rose to national stardom after winning a major tournament at eight years old.

Washington makes a renewed effort to strengthen African ties in competition with China and Russia.