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Ghanaians voted in an election seen as a close fight between President Nana Akufo-Addo and his longtime rival John Mahama, in a country long viewed a beacon of stability in a troubled region.
Announcement of the death of former President Rawlings pic.twitter.com/7ext0fp4sd
— Nana Akufo-Addo (@NAkufoAddo) November 12, 2020
Watch our report:
Up until now, the only black person to serve as a member of parliament since Portugal returned to democracy in 1974 was a man – Helder Amaral who represented the conservative CDS party between 2002 and 2019.
History was made last October when members of Portugal’s new parliament took office.
Among them were the country’s first black women lawmakers who all trace their origins to Guinea-Bissau, a former Portuguese colony in West Africa.
For the longest time, black people in Portugal were not fully considered as Portuguese citizens because of a 1981 law that was passed before their parent’s immigration status was regularised.
The three black women who made it to parliament were all activists who, during their campaigns, promised to fight these inequalities.
Barbara Oteng Gyasi, Ghana’s minister of tourism, has a message for the Black diaspora: come home.
Gyasi encouraged Black Americans to move to Ghana during a memorial service for George Floyd on June 5 in the Ghanaian capital of Accra.
Gyasi also expressed hope that Floyd’s death brings about change and called for an end to systemic racism.
Ambassador Erieka Bennett, Head of Missions at the African Diaspora Forum, praised Ghana and Gyasi for setting an example for the rest of the diaspora.
“Ghana has taken the leadership role on honoring and doing this…and we want to thank the Minister for the wonderful message she gave,” Bennett said at the memorial.
The G5 Sahel countries have declared the coronavirus pandemic now the public enemy number 1.
Situation of Covid 19 in the G5 Sahel, 21 May 2020 at 11H UT
Countries Declared cases Cured Deceased
Burkina Faso 809 661 52
Mali 931 543 53
Mauritanie 141 06 04
Niger 920 738 58
Tchad 565 177 57
G5 Sahel 3 366 2 125 224
Table drawn up from data supplied by Internet, section: Statistics for the coronavirus (COVID-19), updated in real time, minute by minute.
The opportunity also to launch « an urgent appeal to all partners for an even greater solidarity and a strong mobilization in favor of the G5 Sahel countries, to bring them emergency aid in equipment, materials and medicines which they greatly lack » As a response to this request, the European Union has decided to organize humanitarian flights to two of the G5 member states: Burkina Faso and Niger.
The G5 countries continue to face terrorist attacks in the three-border area, Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, as well as in the Lake Chad Basin (Niger, Nigeria and Chad).
His bitterness seems to have been understood by the other protagonists, since the G 5 Sahel ministers « welcomed the action of the Chadian Armed Forces under the direct command of their supreme leader, His Excellency, Mr. Idriss Deby Itno, and committed the countries neighbors to coordinate their actions in order to eradicate the hydra of Boko-Haram”.
The Sierra Leone Creole people (or Krio people) is an ethnic group in Sierra Leone. The Creole people are descendants of freed African American, West Indian and Liberated African slaves who settled in the Western Area of Sierra Leone between 1787 and about 1885. The colony was established by the British, supported by abolitionists, under the Sierra Leone Company as a place for freedmen. The settlers called their new settlement Freetown.[1] Today, the Creoles comprise about 5% of the population of Sierra Leone.[2] [3]
Like their Americo-Liberian neighbors in Liberia, Creoles have varying degrees of European ancestry because some of the settlers were descended from European Americans and other Europeans. Though the Jamaican Maroons, some Creoles probably also have indigenous Jamaican Amerindian Taíno ancestry.[4] Alongside the Americo-Liberians, the Creoles are the only recognised ethnic group of African-American, Liberated African, and West Indian descent in West Africa. As with their Americo-Liberian neighbors, Creole culture is primarily westernized. The Creoles developed close relationships with the British colonial power; they became educated in British institutions and held prominent leadership positions in Sierra Leone under British colonialism.
The vast majority of Creoles reside in Freetown and its surrounding Western Area region of Sierra Leone.[5] The only Sierra Leonean ethnic group whose culture is similar (in terms of its integration of Western culture) are the Sherbro. From their mix of peoples, the Creoles developed what is now the native Krio language (a mixture of English, indigenous West African languages, and other European languages). It has been widely used for trade and communication among ethnic groups and is the most widely spoken language in Sierra Leone.[6]
The Creoles are primarily Christian, at 90 percent and are the descendants of freed African American and West Indian slaves who were virtually all Christians. However, some scholars such as consider the Oku people as Creoles
“The family of George Floyd will like to acknowledge the message of solidarity resolution and virtual tribute from His Excellency Nana Akufo-Addo, the President of Ghana.
For them, the victory in the praise was the fact that through his gestures and tribute in the wake of Floyd’s death, Akufo-Addo had won some goodwill for Ghana.
However, in spite of Akufo-Addo’s attempt to add to his feats, this time, the portrait was tainted by how police in Ghana on Saturday evening dispersed Black Lives Matter protesters in the center of Accra with brute force.
But since Saturday night, some of the protesters have said they believe the aggressive response of the police was motivated by other issues they highlighted in their protest, including the unsolved case of recent kidnapping and murder of three girls in Western Ghana.
As the issue of Ghana’s own police brutality against mostly the country’s poor was debated on social media, Accra-based social justice activist and artist, Nii Kotei, took the opportunity to remind his followers on Twitter about episodes of brutality he has been noting since 2019.
Now, as restrictions on businesses begin to slowly lift and the state continues to introduce its plans for reopening, it will be up to the people to determine how we will continue fighting this pandemic day-by-day—and make sure our houseless community members are not left behind.
Mutual aid programs are a part of the legacy and tradition of Black communities throughout America and the Diaspora.
From sou-sou origins in West Africa to the Black mutual aid societies during Jim Crow and the Black Liberation Movements in the 1960’s, our communities have always been able to tap into our collective power by using mutual aid programs as a way to care and look out for one another.
While we are overjoyed with gratitude for the local business owners and volunteers who are supporting our most vulnerable community members during this time, 2020 is the year that requires more from everyone in America; and in a big way.
That’s why we’ve included My Black Counts educational materials in our mutual aid support bags for houseless community members to learn more about our Get-Out-the-Count movement.
Askia Muhammad Touré (1493-1528), established the Askia dynasty of Songhay.
Muhammad Touré continued Sonni Alis imperial expansion by seizing the important
Saharan oases and conquering Mali itself. From there he conquered Hausaland. The
vastness of Askia Mohammeds kingdom covered most of West Africa, larger than all of the
European states combined. With literally several thousand cultures under its control,
Songhay ranked as one of the largest empires of the time.
In order to maintain his large empire Muhammad Touré further centralized the government
by creating a large and elaborate bureaucracy. He was also the first to standardize weights,
measures, and currency, so culture throughout the Songhay began to homogenize.
Muhammad Touré was also a fervent Muslim; he replaced traditional Songhay
administrators with Muslims in order to Islamicize Songhay society. He also appointed
Muslim judges, called qadis , to run the legal system under Islamic legal principles. These
programs of conquest, centralization, and standardization were the most ambitious and
far-reaching in Africa at the time. It is of note that while the urban centers were dominated
by Islam and Islamic culture, the non-urban areas were not Islamic. The vast majority of the
Songhay people, around 97%, followed traditional African religions. Under the leadership of Askia Mohammed, Timbuctu once again became a prosperous
commercial city, reaching a population of 100,000 people. Merchants and traders traveled
from Asia, the Middle East and Europe to exchange their exotic wares for the gold of
Songhay. Timbuctu gained fame as an intellectual center rivaling many others in the Muslim
world. Students from various parts of the world came to Timbuctus famous University of
Sankore to study Law and Medicine. Medieval Europe sent emissaries to the University of
Sankore to witness its excellent libraries with manuscripts and to cosult with the learned
mathematicians, astronomers, physicians, and jurists whose intellectual endeavors
A Dallas police oversight board reported that it has had over 100 calls from residents complaining about police brutalizing protesters and reporting injuries as a result of police firing non-lethal but obviously harmful projectiles.
Louisville man defending himself from police attack shot and killed
Louisville police shot and killed restaurant owner David McAtee last week during a protest on behalf of George Floyd.
Minneapolis police claim they don’t fire rubber bullets, but protesters have reported being hit by projectiles and have shown news media large rocket- and bullet-shaped objects that police have fired at them.
The protest was one of many across the nation following the police killing of George Floyd on Memorial Day.
First, the Christian Monitor reported that Trump’s approval rating has dropped 20 points among voters over age 65, the biggest drop any other age group aside from 18-29-year-olds.
One specific challenge with our healthcare system strengthening efforts in Kenya is that many patients preferred to receive care from herbalists and found it convenient to consult them.
This helped us overcome many of the challenges with trust and lack of convenience that patients often mention when deciding to forgo care from the healthcare system.
The inclusion of these peer providers who have successfully managed their conditions has helped serve as a bridge between the community and healthcare system to improve our relationship and ability to communicate with each other.
This integrated approach has enabled our programme to build trust with the communities we serve and directly address the challenges with misinformation as members of the community feel much greater comfort with seeking advice from providers who are based within the community.
Our examples from Kenya show that when healthcare providers integrate into communities, people will be more likely to seek out their advice and trust their opinions.
In 2007, Ambassador John L. Withers II, a second generation diplomat, was appointed by President George H.W. Bush to serve as ambassador to Albania. Withers was born in 1948 in Guilford, North Carolina, to John L. Withers, Sr. and Daisy P. Withers. His father had briefly worked as a political science professor but is best known for his service as a diplomat for the United States Agency for International Development. His mother was a homemaker, raising John II and his brother Gregory. Withers, whose grandfather, Robert Baxter Withers, and father fought in World War I and World War II, respectively, spent his childhood where his father was stationed, in Laos, Thailand, Burma, Korea, Ethiopia, and Kenya, witnessing, first-hand, the struggle for Southeast Asian and East African independence.
Withers graduated from Harvard University in 1971 with a Bachelor’s Degree in History. In 1975, he earned his Master’s Degree in East Asian Studies from McGill University in Montreal, Canada. A year after graduating from Yale University (1983), with a Doctor of Philosophy Degree in Modern Chinese History, Withers began pursuing his Foreign Service career.
From 1984 to 1993, Withers’s path to the ambassadorship was unusual. He served in typical junior officer posts that ranged from Political Officer (PO) to Desk Officer (DO) but he was also posted in key countries to U.S. diplomacy in Northern/Eastern Europe, West Africa, and Southeast Asia, a rare combination of geographic areas for any diplomat. In this period he served at U.S. Embassies at The Hague, Netherlands (PO, 1985-1986), Lagos, Nigeria (PO, 1987-1990), and Moscow, Russia (PO, 1991-1993). At the State Department he was Desk Offer in the Office of Chinese Affairs (1986-1988), and in the Office of Northern European Affairs specifically assigned to Ireland and Iceland (1993).
As senior diplomat, Withers assisted mission chiefs in the Office of the Deputy Secretary, as Special Assistant (1993-1996), and in the U.S. Embassy in Riga, Latvia, as Deputy Chief of Mission
African immigration to the United States refers to immigrants to the United States who are or were nationals of modern African countries. The term African in the scope of this article refers to geographical or national origins rather than racial affiliation. Between the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 and 2007, an estimated total of 0.8 to 0.9 million Africans immigrated to the United States, accounting for roughly 3.3% of all total U.S. immigrants during this period.[2]
African immigrants in the United States come from almost all regions in Africa and do not constitute a homogeneous group. They include peoples from different national, linguistic, ethnic, racial, cultural and social backgrounds.[3] As such, African immigrants are distinct from African Americans, many of whose ancestors were involuntarily brought from West Africa to the United States by means of the historic Atlantic slave trade.
In the 1870s, the Naturalization Act was extended to allow aliens, being free white persons and to aliens of African nativity and to persons of African descent to acquire citizenship. Immigration from Africa was theoretically permitted, unlike non-white immigration from Asia.
Several laws enforcing national origins quotas on American immigration were enacted between 1921 and 1924 and were in effect until they were repealed in 1965. While the laws were aimed at restricting the immigration of Jews and Catholics from Central and Eastern Europe and immigration from Asia, they also impacted African immigrants. The legislation effectively excluded Africans from entering the country.
The Emergency Quota Act of 1921 restricted immigration from a given country to 3% of the number of people from that country living in the US according to the census of 1910. The Immigration Act of 1924, also known as the Johnson-Reed Act, reduced that to 2% of the number of people from that country who were already living in the US in 1890. Under the system, the quota for immigrants from Africa (excluding Egypt) totaled 1,100. (The
April 16: 5,530 cases, jumbo recoveries
\tTotal confirmed cases = 5,638 (new cases = 108)
Total recoveries = 1,460 (new recoveries = 1086)
Total deaths = 24 (new deaths = 0)
Active cases = 4,150
\tGhana recorded a boost in recoveries with a record 1,086 discharges authorities reported early Saturday.
READ MORE – Uniting behind a people’s vaccine against COVID-19
\t
April 14: 5,530 cases, 13 of 16 regions infected
\tTotal confirmed cases = 5,530 (new cases = 122)
Total recoveries = 674 (new recoveries = 160)
Active cases = 4,832
\tThirteen of the 16 regions in the country have recorded cases of the disease.
Statistics as at close of day May 13, 2020
\tTotal confirmed cases = 5,408 (new cases = 281)
Total recoveries = 514
Total deaths = 24
Active cases = 4,872
April 12: Cases hit 5,127; gold-rich Obuasi new hotspot
\tGhana’s case statistics passed the 5,000 mark after 427 new cases were recorded according to head of the Ghana Health Service, Dr. Aboagye.
May 10: 4,263 cases, Accra prison ‘infected’
\tGhana’s case statistics as of close of day May 9 stood at 3,263 according tallies released by the health service.
May 9: 900+ new cases, tally hits 4,012
\tGhana returned to most impacted West African country after authorities disclosed a record one-day increase of over 900 cases late Friday.
Skywatchers along a narrow band from west Africa to the Arabian Peninsula, India and southern China will witness on Sunday the most dramatic \"ring of fire\" solar eclipse to shadow the Earth in years.
Annular eclipses occur when the Moon -- passing between Earth and the Sun -- is not quite close enough to our planet to completely obscure sunlight, leaving a thin ring of the solar disc visible.
Remarkably, the eclipse on Sunday arrives on the northern hemisphere's longest day of the year -- the summer solstice -- when Earth's north pole is tilted most directly towards the Sun.
The full eclipse will be visible somewhere on Earth during just under four hours, and one of the last places to see a partially hidden Sun is Taiwan before its path heads out into the Pacific.
A solar eclipse always occurs about two weeks before or after a lunar eclipse, when the Moon moves into Earth's shadow.
Before Insecure star Jay Ellis would secure a leading role opposite Issa Rae in the hit HBO dramedy, he featured in a Ghanaian film about a traditional Ewe custom known as trokosi.
Trokosi has been the way of the Ewe people for centuries but in the face of modernization, or rather honestly, westernization, director Leila Djansi, urges abandonment of something African.
Other times, a young girl may be committed as a trokosi to a shrine as a symbol of the family’s gratitude to the deity of the shrine.
For as long as the priest of the deity would allow, women serving under trokosi would be housed at the shrine.
Governments in the three West African countries where trokosi is still practised have tried different means of rescuing the young women, from negotiations with local religious leaders to the threat of force carried by the state.
In the wake of the Covid-19 outbreak in West Africa, the drastic drop in advertising revenues on which legacy media organisations traditionally depend on to stay afloat has further worsened the already existing challenges in media financial sustainability.
According to Abdoul Fall Salam, General Manager of Seneweb, his online media portal has seen a sharp rise in visitors and is now getting revenue from the public sector.
Other major online media organisations across West Africa including Banouto Media in Benin, MediaForce-Afrique in Senegal, and International Centre for Investigative Reporting in Nigeria have all recorded a massive surge in numbers of visitors.
Although this is yet to translate into increased revenue streams for some outlets, Ade Simplice Robert, General Manager of MediaForce-Afrique, thinks that it presents an opportunity for online media organisations to gain more recognition.
The coronavirus pandemic is posing a serious challenge to the revenue streams of a number of media organisations.
A journalist, radical activist, and theoretician, George Padmore did more than perhaps any other single individual to shape the theory and discourse of Pan-African anti-imperialism in the first half of the twentieth century.
Born Malcolm Nurse in Trinidad in 1901, Padmore moved to the United States in 1925 to study at Fisk and Howard Universities. In 1928 he dropped out of Howards law school and joined the American Communist Party. Quickly rising in Party ranks as an expert on race and imperialism, Padmore moved to Moscow, USSR in 1929 to head the Cominterns International Trade Union Committee of Negro Workers and to edit the Negro Worker. In 1931 he published the influential pamphlet, The Life and Struggles of Negro Toilers. In 1933 the Comintern suspended publication of the Negro Worker and disbanded the Trade Union Committee of Negro Workers, prompting Padmore to split acrimoniously with the Party. In subsequent years Padmore would become a fervent anti-Communist, denouncing the Cominterns alleged manipulation of black freedom struggles in his 1956 book Pan-Africanism or Communism? However, throughout his life he continued to unite with activists and trade unionists on the radical left around the issue of anti-colonialism.
Padmore settled in London, UK in 1936. There he helped foster a radical milieu of Pan-Africanist intellectuals that included Padmores childhood friend, the Trotskyist theorist C.L.R. James. In 1936 Padmore published How Britain Rules Africa, followed a year later by Africa and World Peace. Along with I.T.A. Wallace-Johnson, Padmore and James founded the International African Service Bureau in 1937. Padmore guided the bureau through the late 1930s and early 1940s until in merged into the Pan-African Federation in 1944. He was a principal organizer of the Manchester Pan-African Congress in 1945, which helped lay the foundation for postwar African colonial liberation movements. Throughout this period Padmores articles and essays were printed regularly in the Chicago Defender, the
Transair, an ambitious company founded 10 years ago, has no passengers because of the pandemic - but it still has to fly its planes.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) estimates the crisis will inflict a hit of $314 billion on airlines' turnover this year, equivalent to a fall of 55% over 2019.
Such talk is grim news for Senegal's three airlines, the biggest of which is the national flag carrier Air Senegal, founded in 2016, which specialises in scheduled flights between West Africa and Europe.
\"Before (the pandemic), we were expanding, we were even thinking about starting inter-continental flights in a few years,\" Transair's boss and founder, Alioune Fall, told AFP.
Of this, 45 billion francs is likely to go to Air Senegal, while Transair, as a private company, is likely to be offered low-interest loans and a delay in value-added tax (VAT) payments.
The motorcade for President Donald Trump arrives at Trump National Golf Club, Saturday, May 23, 2020, in Sterling, Va. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
STERLING, Va. (AP) — President Donald Trump played golf Saturday for the first time since he declared the coronavirus pandemic a national emergency more than two months ago, leading to the shutdown of much of American society.
The White House had no comment on the president’s activities at the club, but said he and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had discussed the pandemic’s effect on the global economy on Saturday.
The World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a global pandemic on March 11, and Trump followed with the national emergency declaration two days later.
READ MORE: Former White House butler who served 11 presidents dies of coronavirus
Trump has ordered U.S. flags on federal buildings and national monuments to half-staff through Sunday in memory of Americans lost to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.
American flags fly at half-staff, following orders from President Donald Trump to honor COVID-19 victims, near the Washington Monument on the National Mall, May 22, 2020 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Trump levied frequent criticism of Barack Obama’s regular golf outings when he was president.
Officials from the UN, West Africa and the African Union (AU) have met an influential Muslim cleric behind demonstrations against Mali's beleaguered president, the coalition behind the protests said on Monday.
Tens of thousands of people joined a rally in Bamako last Friday to demand the resignation of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who was re-elected in 2018 for a second five-year term.
The alliance which organised the protests said \"a delegation from the international community met Imam (Mahmoud) Dicko\" on Sunday.
Its members came from the UN's peacekeeping mission in Mali, MINUSMA; the AU; and the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas), a 15-nation bloc that includes Mali, it said in a statement.
MINUSMA spokesperson Olivier Salgado said the head of the peacekeeping mission, Mahamat Saleh Annadif, \"along with representatives from regional organisations, met certain organisers (of Friday's rally) but also with representatives of national authorities... to find ways of renewing dialogue.\"
It has become a pattern every year for insurgents to step up attacks near Eid to sabotage the celebrations
\t“They arrived around 5:30pm and went on for more than four hours before the soldiers came to fight them,” said Bashir Manzo, a resident of Dapchi.
This attack is characteristic of the Boko Haram group, with which ISWAP split off in 2016, which regularly uses suicide bombers to target civilians.
Konduga is located in the Sambisa forest, a stronghold of Boko Haram from which suicide bombers have often launched their attacks in the past.
Earlier Monday, fighters from Boko Haram also attacked the village of Kautikeri in southern Borno State, beheading a resident and kidnapping a herder of 150 cattle, Ayuba Alamson, a Chibok community leader, told AFP.
“It has become a pattern every year for insurgents to step up attacks near Eid to sabotage the celebrations,” said the head of the anti-Jihadist militia in Borno, Babakura Kolo, saying this year “will be no different.
The possible return of former Ivorian president Laurent Gbagbo to the Côte d’Ivoire after his acquittal on charges of crimes against humanity might well be the catalyst for negotiations in that country, argues Thabo Mbeki.
These decisions concern the future of Mr Laurent Gbagbo, former President of Côte d’Ivoire.
Mr Gbagbo served as President of Côte d’Ivoire from 26 October, 2000 until 2011.
The Forum therefore pleaded with the ICC Prosecutor, Ms Bensouda, to withdraw the charges against Mr Gbagbo and therefore allow him to return home to contribute everything in his power to the achievement of the said national reconciliation.
Mr Bedie, himself a former President of Côte d’Ivoire, supported Mr Ouattara during the 2010 and 2015 Presidential elections and his party served in the Ouattara governments in coalition with President Ouattara’s RDR.
A plucky young girl in West Africa tells the story of her growing up in the novel Of Women and Frogs by Bisi Adjapon.
Esi lives a happy life in Lagos with her Ghanaian father, Nigerian mother and younger brother.
Over the years we follow Esi as she blossoms into a young woman.
Of Women and Frogs traverses the coming of age experiences of young African women and Esi’s feelings and frustrations are relatable.
In tracing Esi’s journey into adulthood Adjapon boldly explores the hard choices confronting African girls and covert topics such as unwanted pregnancies, back-alley abortions, masturbation and same sex relationships in boarding schools.
Mali on Saturday pledged to investigate claims that the army killed dozens of civilians in its conflict-riven centre, as complaints about the military's conduct in the West African nation escalate.
Some 30 people were killed and a village burnt in the region, officials said, but it was unclear who was behind the latest violence.
Friday's attack targeted a Fulani village named Binedama in the volatile Mopti region, said Aly Barry, an official from Tabital Pulaaku, a Fulani association.
Two other local officials confirmed the attack to AFP, but gave a lower death toll of 26, adding that the village was torched and its chief killed.
Tabital Pulaaku, however, accused Malian soldiers of being responsible but AFP was unable to independently confirm this claim.
Yoruba Americans are Americans of Yoruba descent. The Yoruba people (Yoruba: Àwọ̀n ọ́mọ́ Yorùbá) are an ethnic group originating in southwestern Nigeria and southern Benin in West Africa.
The first Yoruba people who arrived to the United States were imported as slaves from Nigeria and Benin during the Atlantic slave trade.[2] [3] This ethnicity of the slaves was one of the main origins of present-day Nigerians who arrived to the United States, along with the Igbo and Hausa. In addition, native slaves of current Benin hailed from peoples such as Nago (Yoruba subgroup,[4] although exported mainly by Spanish,[5] when Louisiana was Spanish) -, Ewe, Fon and Gen. Many of the slaves imported to the modern United States from Benin were sold by the King of Dahomey, in Whydah.[4] [6] [note 1]
The slaves brought with them their cultural practices, languages, cuisine[8] and religious beliefs rooted in spirit and ancestor worship.[9] So, the manners of the Yoruba, Fon, Gen and Ewe of Benin were key elements of Louisiana Voodoo.[10] Also Haitians, who migrated to Louisiana in the late nineteenth century and also contributed to Voodoo of this state, have the Yoruba[11] and Ewe as their main origins. The Yoruba, and some northern Nigerian ethnic groups, had tribal facial identification marks. These could have assisted a returning slave in relocating his or her ethnic group, but few slaves escaped the colonies. In the colonies, masters tried to dissuade the practice of tribal customs. They also sometimes mixed people of different ethnic groups to make it more difficult for them to communicate and bond together in rebellion.[12]
After the slavery abolition in 1865, many modern Nigerian immigrants have come to the United States to pursue educational opportunities in undergraduate and post-graduate institutions. This was possible because in the 1960s and 1970s, after the Biafra War, Nigerias government funded scholarships for Nigerian students, and many of them were admitted to American universities. While this was happening,
The indigenous hunter-gatherer occupants of Zambia began to be displaced or absorbed by more advanced migrating tribes about 2,000 years ago. The major waves of Bantu-speaking immigrants began in the 15th century, with the greatest influx between the late 17th and early 19th centuries. They came primarily from the Luba and Lunda tribes of southern Democratic Republic of Congo and northern Angola
Escaping the Mfecane:
In the 19th century there was an additional influx by Ngoni peoples from the south escaping the mfecane. By the latter part of that century, the various peoples of Zambia were largely established in the areas they currently occupy.
David Livingstone at the Zambezi:
Except for an occasional Portuguese explorer, the area lay untouched by Europeans for centuries. After the mid-19th century, it was penetrated by Western explorers, missionaries, and traders. David Livingstone, in 1855, was the first European to see the magnificent waterfalls on the Zambezi River. He named the falls after Queen Victoria, and the Zambian town near the falls is named after him.
Northern Rhodesia a British Protectorate:
In 1888, Cecil Rhodes, spearheading British commercial and political interests in Central Africa, obtained a mineral rights concession from local chiefs. In the same year, Northern and Southern Rhodesia (now Zambia and Zimbabwe, respectively) were proclaimed a British sphere of influence.
Southern Rhodesia was annexed formally and granted self-government in 1923, and the administration of Northern Rhodesia was transferred to the British colonial office in 1924 as a protectorate.
A Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland:
In 1953, both Rhodesias were joined with Nyasaland (now Malawi) to form the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland.
Northern Rhodesia was the center of much of the turmoil and crisis that characterized the federation in its last years. At the core of the controversy were insistent African demands for greater participation in government and European fears of losing political control.
The Road to
Electoral authorities in Guinea on Saturday declared President Alpha Conde winner of Sunday's election with 59.49% of the vote, defeating his main rival Cellou Diallo.
\t Some people went to the streets to protest immediately after the announcement. Such demonstrations have occurred for months after the government changed the constitution through a national referendum, allowing Conde to extend his decade in power.
\t Opposition candidate Cellou Diallo received 33.50% of the vote, the electoral commission said. Voter turnout was almost 80%.
\t Political tensions in the West African nation turned violent in recent days after Diallo claimed victory ahead of the official results. Celebrations by his supporters were suppressed when security forces fired tear gas to disperse them.
They accuse the electoral authorities of rigging the vote for incumbent president Alpha Conde.
\t At least nine people have been killed since the election, according to the government. The violence sparked international condemnation by the U.S. and others.
\t ``Today is a sad day for African democracy,'' said Sally Bilaly Sow, a Guinean blogger and activist living abroad. The government should take into account the will of the people who have a desire for change, he said.
ICC warning
The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor warned on Friday that warring factions in Guinea could be prosecuted after fighting erupted.
“I wish to repeat this important reminder: anyone who commits, orders, incites, encourages and contributes in any other way to crimes … is liable to prosecution either by the Guinean courts or the ICC,” she said.
#ICC Prosecutor #FatouBensouda: "I wish to repeat this important reminder: anyone who commits, orders, incites, encourages or contributes, in any other way, to the commission of #RomeStatute crimes, is liable to prosecution either by #Guinean courts or by the #ICC."
— Int'l Criminal Court (@IntlCrimCourt) October 23, 2020
\t On Friday, internet and international calls were cut off across the West African nation in anticipation of the election results, according to locals and international observers in the capital, Conakry.
\t This was the third time that Conde matched-up against Diallo. Before the election, observers raised concerns that an electoral dispute could reignite ethnic tensions between Guinea's largest ethnic groups.
On July 2, 2009 President Barack Obama appointed Gayleatha Beatrice Brown to be the United States ambassador to Burkina Faso, a nation in West Africa. This was her second ambassadorial appointment. Previously, Brown had been appointed by President George W. Bush to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Benin, a post she held from 2006 to 2009.
Brown was born in Matawan, West Virginia on June 20, 1947. Her family moved to New Jersey when she was a child and she graduated from Edison High School, in Edison, New Jersey in 1964. She received bachelor’s and master’s honor degrees from Howard University in Washington, D.C. in 1968 and 1970, respectively. Brown also did post-graduate work in international relations at the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.
Before joining the United States Foreign Service in 1982, Brown was a Special Assistant at the Agency for International Development (USAID). She was later Assistant Administrator for Africa and a legislative assistant to the House of Representatives.
Brown had had extensive overseas experience before her ambassadorial appointment. Her first posts were, successively, as Development Officer at the U.S. Embassies in Paris, France and Abidjan, Côte dIvoire. She also served as Counselor for Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa, and U.S. Consul General and U.S. Deputy Permanent Observer (concurrently) to the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, France. She was Chief of the Economic and Commercial Sections at the U.S. Embassies in Harare, Zimbabwe, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. She was also desk officer at the U.S. State Department for Canada, Senegal, Guinea, and Mauritania.
Brown has represented the Department of State at the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) at Credit Arrangement negotiations, and she was a Desk Officer for the U.S. Export-Import Bank (EXIM).
Brown’s honors and recognitions include the Lady of the Golden Horseshoe (West Virginia state
Many academics that I spoke with had limited faith in the possibility of an \"Africa Unity\", in fact to many; African Unity is an illusion that may never be realized.
As a result of these facts and many more, I got to realize why many of my colleagues in academia still see \"African Unity\" as a mirage and that Africa is million miles away from achieving the said objective.
Hence, the strategy in properly educating the new African generation would be to teach them more of African history including African civilization and teach them little or no history of the West.
I shall conclude by stating that \"African Unity\" is still very possible if all states in Africa could go back to the basis by using the strategy the West use in educating their generation about their greatness and contribution to the world, and teach less of Africa.
If we must attain \"African Unity\", then proper education of our new generation and emerging leaders should be the first place to begin.
Henry Francis Downing was an author, playwright, consul and sailor. He was born in New York City in 1846, the son of Henry and Nancy Downing. His family maintained an oyster business that had been owned by his grandfather, Thomas Downing, a well known freeman. His uncle was famed New York businessman and civil rights leader, George Thomas Downing.
In 1864 Henry Downing enlisted in the Union Navy at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. He began his service on board the U.S.S. North Carolina and was transferred to the U.S.S. Pawtuxet in December of 1864. Navy records listed him as having deserted in 1865, though it was later revealed he left the ship to attend his stepfather’s funeral, and his mother had obtained his discharge so that he could assist her.
After the Civil War, Downing began a journey around the world. He reached Liberia where his cousin, Hilary Johnson, would later become president of Liberia from 1884 to 1892. Downing lived in Liberia for three years where he was a private secretary to the secretary of state.
Downing returned to the United States and in 1872, reenlisted in the Navy and served for three years. Most of his time was served on the U.S.S. Hartford which operated off the coast of East Africa. With considerable time spent in both West and East Africa, Downing was one of the African Americans most knowledgeable about the African continent and its politics.
Returning to New York in 1875, Downing became a messenger and clerk of the Brooklyn Navy Yard. In 1876 at the age of 33, he married a woman named Isadora. The couple had two children.
By the 1880s, Downing became involved in New York politics and was a supporter of the Democrats and New York Governor Grover Cleveland. When Cleveland was elected President in 1884, Downing was rewarded for his support by an appointment as U.S. counsel to Luanda, Angola. He served in this post from 1886 to 1887, leaving because he was unsuccessful in getting significant American trade with this African nation.
After his resignation Downing returned to New
