By Edson Baraukwa | Africa Guardian A South African woman marked her 118th birthday on Friday, celebrating as one of the oldest individuals globally with a small gathering at her care home. Margaret Maritz, born on September 27, 1906, according to a copy of her identity card shared by a charity that organized the celebration in Touws River, approximately…
Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame says he might introduce a tax on church collections, seeking to tame what has turned out to be extortion and exploitative tendencies by evangelical clerics. In his first address after taking a new oath of office this week, the Rwandan head of state, strongly criticised church leaders who masquerade under the cover of God to…
Wider inclusion of persons with albinism can go a long way towards ensuring they live free from fear and discrimination, a UN human rights expert has said. Persons with the condition – which is caused by a lack of melanin pigmentation, affecting skin, hair and eye colour – continue to face an uphill battle to attain a life with…
Story by By EVELYNE MUSAMBI and BRIAN INGANGA, Associated Press • NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Pretty Peter flicked through frantic messages from friends at home in Uganda. The transgender woman is relatively safe in neighboring Kenya. Her friends feel threatened by the latest anti-gay legislation in Uganda prescribing the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality.” Frightened Ugandans are searching for…
Society has taken long to accommodate the reversal of roles where women can travel and leave the man to care for the children. I recall a scene in the play Aminata by Francis Imbuga in which a mother from a rural village, accompanied by her friends, visited her married son in the city. They found the son in the…
A selection of the best photos from across Africa and beyond this week: ___ Source here
A series of blunders by controversial televangelist Paul Mackenzie and his aides made his freedom short-lived after he was released by a court last month, leading to the discovery of mass graves in Kilifi’s Shakahola village. On March 23, Mackenzie had left a Malindi court a happy man after securing freedom on a Sh10,000 police bond in a case…
President Yoweri Museveni on Wednesday called on Ugandan MPs to “reconsider” draconian anti-gay legislation passed by parliament last month and widely condemned in the West. The Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2023 promises harsh penalties against anyone who engages in same-sex activity. “I return the bill to Parliament for reconsideration,” Museveni wrote in a letter to the house. The president has faced widespread…
NAIROBI (Reuters) – Kenyan police have recovered 58 bodies from mass graves in the Shakahola forest in eastern Kenya, thought to be followers of a Christian cult who believed they would go to heaven if they starved themselves, the inspector general of police said on Monday. ___ Source here
Summary Dr Stergomena Tax, the minister for Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation, said so far no Tanzanian living in Sudan has been affected by the fight Dodoma. The government yesterday allayed fears over the safety of Tanzanians in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. Dr Stergomena Tax, the minister for Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation, said so far no…
Maria Nkhoma, who lives in the southern Malawi district of Balaka, recalls a time she would miss classes because there wasn’t enough food at home. With no food, the 17-year-old who is now in secondary school would remain at home to take care of domestic chores as her parents went around in search of menial jobs to feed their…
The United Nations suggested on Wednesday that instead of focusing solely on the growing global population, it is imperative to consider women’s reproductive rights to bolster “demographic resilience.” The UN’s sexual and reproductive health agency, UNFPA, has recognized that there is a significant level of concern regarding the global population, expected to reach a maximum of approximately 10.4 billion…
Summary Inclination to violence and brutality, identity crises, perversion, and distaste of education and religion, are all being infused into societies by the use of information Globally, information has grown to become a valuable commodity for trade as well as a means of patterning societies’ and people’s lives and affairs. As such information oftentimes is potential money, as there…
__________________ Four people were on Thursday found dead and nearly a dozen others hospitalised in Kenya’s coastal Kilifi county, after being rescued while waiting the imminent end of the world. __________________ The victims who are believed to be members of Pastor Paul Mackenzie’s Good News International Church say they had been told to fast to avoid “apocalyptic damnation”, the…
The UN 2023 Water Conference, which takes place at UN Headquarters from 22-24 March, is being hailed as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to accelerate progress towards universal access to safe water and sanitation by 2030. Water is at the core of sustainable development. It supports all aspects of life on Earth, and access to safe and clean water is a…
Nearly 420 million children across the globe receive school meals – that’s 30 million more than in 2020 – the World Food Programme (WFP) said in a new report published on Tuesday. Amid the current global food crisis, with many families struggling to put food on the table, governments are increasingly seeing the value of these initiatives, according to…
Summary In 1962, President Julius Nyerere asked O. R Tambo to help recruit nurses from South Africa to reduce shortages of nurses in Tanganyika A nursing sister, Kholeka Rosemond Tunyiswa, who may not be all that well known in South Africa, passed away in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, on March 5, 2023. She was born in Port Elizabeth, now…
When babies do not feed directly from their mothers’ breasts during the first six months after birth, it puts them at higher risk of contracting a number of fatal diseases most significantly, diarrhoea, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). By Rodgers Otiso Diarrhoea, according to the WHO, is the leading cause of death among infants in developing countries…
Three deaths of leading stars in the past six months have robbed the Democratic Republic of Congo of strong pillars of its music industry. The death on Tuesday night in the United States of guitar maestro Denis Lokassa Kasiya, popularly known as Lokassa ya Mbongo, follows those of saxophone wizard and Veve band leader Verckys Kiamwangana Mateta last October,…
By Susan T. If you ask married couples if they would choose a different partner if they had the chance to do it all over again, about 60% of them will say they would. They may say that their current partner no longer loves or cares for them in the same way, or they want someone who is more…
A baby born somewhere on Tuesday will be the world’s eight billionth person, according to a projection by the United Nations. “The milestone is an occasion to celebrate diversity and advancements while considering humanity’s shared responsibility for the planet,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a statement. Also read: What census data means for Tanzania The UN attributes the…
With 92 million girls and boys in child labour — one in five children — Africa is the most-affected region in the world. Eliminating child labour worldwide will not be achieved without a breakthrough here. This is not justifiable. Children have the right not to work. Children trapped in child labour today are the unskilled labour force of tomorrow….
Inter-African migration is being driven by a rise in demand for skilled and semi-skilled workers in different economic sectors Because emigrants bring with them more than just economic needs from their home countries, migration is a trade stimulant in and of itself For migrants who contribute to upskilling, movement within the continent results in better-paying, more stable employment Migration…
By Anthony Muchoki Emilio Stanley Kibaki was born early in the morning of November 15, 1931. Named Mwai after his uncle from the mother’s side, his parents, John Githinji Kibaki and Teresia Wanjiku, had seven other children who, like all the others in the village, would help hew wood, till the garden, milk the cows and take them out…
The paramountcy of overcoming systemic prejudices against women in politics, the workplace, business, and the community cannot be overstated, as it may determine whether sub-Saharan African countries succeed or fail. Post the International Women’s Day and the clarion call to break the bias, there is a mountain of data to support this viewpoint, where women pushing the envelope are stymied by…
By Jonathan Cook, chair of the African Management Institute A past colleague and good friend, Conrad Viedge, passed away on Saturday after battling cancer. I was considering writing this column about business ethics, and the two came together rather well. Conrad was a good man in every sense. Not only did he pay his taxes, which I am sure…