Jose Tembe
BBC News, Maputo

Image source, AFP

Mozambique’s largest sugar company has suspended sugar exports for at least two months due to flooding of its cane plantations.

Açucareira de Xinavane cited the difficulty of transporting sugar by rail to the port of Maputo, with the Limpopo line not in operation.

A company official explained that the suspension would guarantee the availability of sugar in the local market.

The announcement comes at a time when some sugar factories have been paralysed due to the flooding of farms.

Xinavane has lost about 2,000 hectares of sugar cane, some of which belong to small-scale farmers

The company produces about 340,000 tonnes of sugar annually, including 90,000 tonnes of white refined sugar, exporting 10,000 of it to European markets.

Ghana's finance minister has been visiting Beijing and praised the "positive and encouraging" meetings between the two parties.

The purpose of the trip was to meet Chinese counterparts to talk about Ghana's debt struggles, the Reuters news agency reports.

The country is currently facing high levels of inflation and has sought help from the IMF, which agreed a preliminary $3bn ($2.4bn) loan for the country in December.

Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta said on Twitter that he looked "forward to securing external assurances very soon" from China regarding the country's debt.

Part of the IMF deal requires Ghana to get "necessary financing assurances" from its creditors.

Image source, Getty Images

A Nigerian dog rights activist has told the BBC's Newsday programme that there is "uproar" over the killing of a pet dog called Roxie in her owner's estate.

"Roxie was a beautiful well-bred pet dog," Jackie Idimogu, who runs a dog charity called My Dog & I Group, in Lagos said.

She "happened to stray out of her home in the middle of the night", Ms Idimogu said, after which her owner alerted the estate security.

Roxie was later found on someone else's compound and her owner was on the way to collect her, but an estate security officer then allegedly proceeded to shoot her "three times" right "in front of" the owner.

People are upset over Roxie's death and have been "rising up" and want justice.

The estate management were not available for comment at the time of Newsday's interview.

The estate's rules said that a dog can be killed if it is dangerous or had attacked someone, but Ms Idimogu said this did not apply to Roxie.

You can listen to the full Newsday here (scroll 49 minutes into the audio).

Emmanuel Igunza
BBC News, Nairobi

Image source, AFP

A Kenyan court has dismissed an appeal by two men who are serving long sentences for their role in the 2015 Garissa University College attack, which left 148 people dead.

Judge Cecilia Githua said Hassan Edin Hassan and Mohammed Abdi Abikar would spend 41 years in jail as their appeal had not shown that the magistrates' court had erred in giving out the long sentences

The two Kenyans were convicted in 2019, while Rashid Mberesero, a Tanzanian national, received a life sentence before taking his own life in 2020.

They were all found guilty of conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack and of belonging to the al-Qaeda linked group, al-Shabab, but they appealed against the magistrates' court ruling.

But in her ruling, the high court judge said the punishment was lenient considering the “heinous, premeditated acts that caused much suffering to families of the victims”

The two can appeal against the judgement in the Court of Appeal within two weeks.

The attack at the university which killed mainly students, was the second-deadliest attack by the group in Kenya.

The al-Qaeda bombing of the US embassy in 1998 killed more than 200 people.

This case has been long-running and beset by many adjournments since the convicts were arrested soon after the April 2015 attack at the university.

And today was no different, the court was briefly disrupted as the judge delivered her judgement via video link, after her connection was lost.

The convicts, who were listening silently to the ruling from prison, briefly chatted to each other as the court waited for the judge to get back online.

And then the court clerk also got lost in translation, as she interpreted to Swahili the verdict to the two who were dressed in black and white stripped prison uniform

Mali and Everton midfielder Abdoulaye Doucoure speaks to BBC Sport about his faith as a Muslim, fasting during Ramadan and his relationship with team-mates Amadou Onana and Idrissa Gueye.

Image source, Getty Images

Three people including two police officers are missing after a boat capsized in Lake Victoria in Kenya.

The two and a revenue authority officer are said to have been part of a team of eight officers conducting a joint operation in the lake.

Their boat capsized at around midnight about 200m (660ft) from Mugabo beach in western Kenya, police are quoted as saying by local media.

Five were rescued and a search is under way for the missing officers.

Three firearms and ammunition that the missing officers had in possession are yet to be recovered, police said.

Image source, Getty Images

Rwanda’s Foreign Affairs Minister Vincent Biruta has said that the country is concerned about an imminent "genocide" against Kinyarwanda-speaking civilians in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

Addressing the National Consultative Forum of Political Organisations on Thursday, Mr Biruta blamed the international community for failing to act on escalating violence in eastern DR Congo, despite several reports and "evidence highlighting facts of possible genocide".

“Recognising genocide goes hand in hand with the responsibility to prevent it from happening. The reason some international actors are hesitant about recognising a genocide being planned in DR Congo is because it comes with a responsibility to intervene and stop it," Mr Biruta said.

“They are dodging that responsibility but we keep reminding them,” he added.

This comes as DR Congo continues to accuse Rwanda of supporting M23 rebels - in the decade-long conflict in the east DR Congo. Rwanda has repeatedly denied the claim.

Kigali also accuses DR Congo of backing the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, which includes alleged perpetrators of Rwanda's 1994 genocide.

In December last year, Rwanda’s pro-government New Times website said that alleged hate speech and targeted killings of Tutsi and Kinyarwanda-speaking civilians in DR Congo could be the first pointer of likely genocide, external.

Quoting UN Special Adviser on Genocide Prevention Alice Wairimu Nderitu, the report said that what was happening in DR Congo was similar to what happened in Rwanda before the 1994 genocide.

BBC Monitoring
The world through its media

Image source, AFP

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi has ordered a probe into reports of abuses by the police units deployed to disperse peaceful protests in the capital Maputo on Saturday.

He ordered the interior ministry to "investigate the reasons that led the police to engage in physical confrontations with the youths", state-owned Radio Mozambique reported.

Local media reported that authorities used tear gas, rubber bullets and dog units to repress marches in tribute to the late rapper Azagaia, in Nampula, Beira, Xai-Xai and Maputo cities on Saturday.

Civil society organisations, which denounced the brutal repression by the police, said dozens of protesters sustained severe injuries, and more than 100 people were arrested countrywide.

On Thursday, Mr Nyusi urged the police to resort to dialogue to find common ground that will allow the citizens to exercise their rights and the police to perform its duties.

Image source, AFP

South Africa's ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), on Thursday voted against a motion for an inquiry into alleged widespread corruption at the state power firm Eskom.

The state utility firm has been at the centre of rampant corruption accusations allegedly involving top ANC officials - amid a energy crisis in the country.

A tolal of 201 ANC members of parliament voted against the motion - againt 115 opposition members who voted for it.

The ruling party legislators argued the parliament's oversight mechanism and the appointment of an electricity minister were enough to address all the issues.

The motion had been tabled by the opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) party.

South Africa has been grappling with a power crisis, enduring up to 12 hours of scheduled power cuts in recent weeks.

Gudaf Tsegay had the best season of her career in 2022 despite being separated from her parents and siblings by Ethiopia's civil war.

Image source, AFP

Islamic police in Nigeria's northern Kano state have warned Muslims against violating religious norms during the holy month of Ramadan, including "eating in public".

In a statement on Thursday, the religious police force, known as Hisbah Board, warned that those who engage in societal vices during the sacred month will be punished, local media reported.

“Some of the youths who eat in public during the fasting period will not be spared either,” the commander-general of the board, Harun Ibn-Sina, was quoted as saying.

Mr Ibn-Sina said the board has deployed officers to mosques to ensure the safety during the fasting period which started on Thursday.

Hisbah Board enforces Islamic law in Kano, a largely Muslim state.

Image source, Getty Images

Zambia’s main opposition party, Patriotic Front (PF), has expressed concern that the US is "pushing homosexuality agenda" in the southern African country.

PF leader Given Lubinda on Wednesday cited an executive order and a presidential memorandum issued by US President Joe Biden on advancing equality for LGBT people.

"As Patriotic Front, we beseech Zambians not to allow the US to impose its values in Zambia. We must defend ourselves," Mr Lubinda said.

"Since both bilateral relations and foreign assistance of the US are tied to LGBTQ rights, Zambia might have to review its relationship with the US," he added.

He urged Zambians not to "abandon our norms, national values, religious and cultural standing to please the Americans".

The party's remarks come days ahead of the planned visit by US Vice-President Kamala Harris to the country next week.

On 14 March, President Hakainde Hichilema pledged to uphold Zambia’s laws that criminalise homosexuality and termed as falsehoods claims that his government supported gay rights.

During her nine-day tour of Africa that starts on 26 March, Ms Harris is also due to visit Ghana and Tanzania, where same-sex relations are illegal.

In Uganda, lawmakers on Tuesday approved an anti-gay bill which imposes harsh penalties for anyone who engages in same-sex activity.

Image source, AFP

A report of an investigation into the November plane crash in Tanzania says pilots failed to heed warnings from an automatic alarm system.

Nineteen people were killed in the 6 November crash into Lake Victoria, as the plane attempted to land in the lakeside town of Bukoba.

An initial report from the transport ministry painted a damning picture of the emergency services' preparedness to deal with the disaster prompting anger over the response.

On Thursday, a second preliminary report said a warning system that gave three alerts about "the excessively high descent rate" was "not followed by corrective action by the flight crew".

The report also noted that the weather condition was bad amid poor visibility, which "may have contributed to the failure to react to terrain warnings during the final approach".

Fishermen were first at the site of the crash, and spearheaded rescue efforts.

There had been 43 people on board and 24 survived. The two pilots were among the dead.

Image source, Getty Images

South African opposition minority party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), has said Russian President Vladimir Putin is welcome to visit Pretoria despite an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) against him.

The ICC, which South Africa is a signatory to, has accused Mr Putin of war crimes, which include the kidnapping of Ukrainian children in Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

Mr Putin is scheduled to travel to South Africa for the Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit in August.

EFF leader Julius Malema on Thursday said no-one was going to arrest Mr Putin while in South Africa, a country where Russia "played a huge role to support the struggle for freedom".

Mr Malema said that the South African government should not give in to pressure from the ICC, which he accused of "hypocrisy".

"Putin is welcomed here. No one is going to arrest Putin. If need be, we will go and fetch Putin from the airport to his meetings. He will address, finish all his meetings, and we will take him back to the airport," Mr Malema said.

"We know our friends. We know the people who liberated us. We know the people who supported us,” he added.

South Africa has close diplomatic relations with Moscow in spite of Western condemnations. Last month, its navy held joint exercises with Russian forces off the coast of South Africa. It has also abstained during UN votes condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

In 2015, the South African government was criticised for letting then-Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir leave the country despite an ICC arrest warrant.

The Newsroom
BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

The president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Félix Tshisekedi, has appointed a former militia leader, once convicted of war crimes, as his new defence minister.

Jean Pierre Bemba, a former Congolese vice-president, was cleared on appeal by the International Criminal Court in 2018.

He was convicted of failing to prevent his militia from committing crimes.

His appointment comes as the Congolese army battles the M23 rebels in the east of the country. Rwanda is accused of backing the M23 rebels but denies it.

Mr Tshisekedi also appointed his former chief of staff, Vital Kamerhe, as minister of economy. Mr Kamerhe was convicted of embezzlement but freed on appeal last year.

The changes comes as the country is due to go to the polls in December in which Mr Tshisekedi is expected to run for re-election.

Our proverb of the day:

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

Bournemouth's Antoine Semenyo scores a 96th-minute winner against Angola to give Chris Hughton victory in his first competitive game as Ghana boss.

That's all from the BBC Africa Live team for now, but we'll be back on Friday morning, Nairobi time.

There will be an automated news feed here until then. You can also get the latest on the BBC News website and listen to the Africa Today podcast.

A reminder of Thursday's wise words:

Click here to send us your African proverbs.

And we leave you with this picture of a Somali watermelon vendor In Mogadishu, taken as the city geared up for the fasting month of Ramadan:

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Four Kenyan MPs have been charged with unlawful assembly after taking part in anti-government protests on Monday, the Reuters news agency says quoting their lawyer.

During the demonstrations police tear-gassed opposition leader Raila Odinga's convoy in the capital, Nairobi.

Running battles took place on the main Kenyatta Avenue between police and demonstrators, some of whom threw stones at the security officers.

The protests also spread to other cities, with a university student reportedly shot dead in Kisumu.

Speaking on Thursday, Mr Odinga condemned what he described as “illegal arrests” – two of those held were leading members of the opposition in parliament. In all more than 200 people were detained.

Mr Odinga said “these patriotic Kenyans… have done nothing wrong. We demand that the charges be dropped unconditionally with immediate effect.”

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