Africa

Senegalese Singer Thione Ballago Seck Recalled As “A Legend”

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — Thione Ballago Seck, born in a family of praise or "griot" singers and one of Senegal's beloved music stars over the last four decades, has died at the age of 66 in Dakar on March 14.

Tributes poured in after his death was announced with the former mayor of Dakar, Khalifa Sall, paying tribute to a "true monument of Senegalese music". El Hadji Hamidou Kasse, a former journalist and current advisor to President Macky Sall, tweeted that Seck was "one of the artist heroes of an era".

: Global Information Network; ARTS & CULTURE; 15 March 2021

UN Acclaims VODAN's Contribution to Fight COVID-19 in Africa

By Reinhard Jacobsen

BRUSSELS (IDN) — The United Nations has commended VODAN-AFRICA for their innovative approach to "data sharing and re-use under the present COVID-19 circumstances". The Virus Outbreak Data Network is a system of sharing data on Coronavirus that ensures that the information remains in the country that generated it, rather than being exported and unavailable to local doctors and scientists.

The network includes computer scientists and health data management experts, clinicians and social scientists from all of the participating countries. Presently, these include Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Tunisia, Liberia and Zimbabwe.

: Reinhard Jacobsen; THE WORLD; Africa; 12 March 2021

Image credit: University College of Dublin (UCD)

African Women See No Reason to Hail Int'l Women's Day

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — March 8 marks the UN's International Women's Day — an occasion meant to be a global celebration. But with more and more women suffering each day, there is little to rejoice in Africa, say many women leaders from the continent.

"International Women's Day should celebrate the fruits of decades of activism. But on a continent where those who stand accused of sexual abuse often get rewarded rather than punished, what is there to be proud of?," said Cameroonian journalist Mimi Mefo Takambou.

: Global Information Network; SUSTAINABILITY; Gender Equality; 08 March 2021

Collage: Photos of Senegal President Mackey Sall, the Republic of Congo Denis Sassou Nguesso, and President Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea.

Attempts for Political Change in Senegal and in the Republic of Congo — Army Barracks Blast in Oil-Rich Equatorial Guinea

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — Calm has abandoned Senegal, a country in West Africa. The young people are rising up against the "wealth hoarding" political class. In Central Africa, the Republic of Congo, the opposition is seething as the 77-year-old President seeks another term. In another Central African country, Equatorial Guinea, a series of four explosions in the commercial hub, Bata, left a huge plume of smoke hanging over the city. Some 20 have reportedly died.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 08 March 2021

More Women Researchers in Developing Nations Than in the Rich

By Jaya Ramachandran

PARIS (IDN) — While women make up 33.3% of researchers in the global average, in South and Southeast Asia, several countries are achieving gender parity, according to data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics for 107 countries covering the years 2015–2018.

This is the case for Malaysia, Myanmar and Thailand, for instance. The most recent addition is Sri Lanka, where women accounted for 46% of researchers in 2015, up from 24% in 2006.

: Jaya Ramachandran; SUSTAINABILITY; Sustainable Industrialisation; 06 March 2021

Photo: US carried out air strikes in Syria targeting Iranian backed militias on February 26. Such airstrikes add to the suffering of the people who are already suffering during the COVID-19 pandemic. Credit: WFP/Khudr Alissa

Biden Should Stop Military Activism and Start Thinking

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power*

LUND, Sweden (IDN) — “Diplomacy is back”, President Joe Biden said recently. But then in the middle of a delicate diplomatic dance with Iran he goes and bombs a small, politically inconsequential, Iranian surrogate in Syria, in retaliation for the killing of one American soldier.

This seems to go against everything he said during his presidential campaign on moving towards fashioning a quick agreement with Iran so that the deal made by President Barack Obama that froze Iran’s nuclear activities could be resuscitated after Donald Trump’s decision to blow it up. Biden’s bombing has made the chance of simultaneous choreographed moves by both sides to get back to the deal made by Obama more difficult.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 02 March 2021

Photo: An event to commemorate the first anniversary of the abduction of Chibok schoolgirls in northern Nigeria held by CEE-HOPE in Makoko, Lagos Nigeria. CC BY-SA 4.0

Seven Years Since Chibok, Search on for Missing Schoolgirls in Latest Nigerian Kidnap

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — Nail-biting negotiations are underway for the release of 317 schoolgirls kidnapped on February 26 in north-western Nigeria — a region beset by banditry that takes thousands of lives each year. Terms of a large ransom are reportedly being discussed but officially denied.

Frightened parents who raced to the scene on hearing gunshots arrived too late to rescue their daughters at the Government Girls Secondary School in Jangebe, a village in Zamfara state. Police say they believe the girls in a state of distress were taken to a forest after being abducted at about 1 a.m. from their boarding school.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 01 March 2021

Image: Sunrise, Fog, Landscape, Mountains, Mist, Morning, Dawn as in diplomacy. Source: Pixabay.

The Great Game of Vaccination Diplomacy Targets Africa

By Kester Kenn Klomegah*

MOSCOW (IDN) — Russia is committed to helping eradicate the rapidly increasing coronavirus infections in Africa amounting to approximately 3.8 million with its latest developed Sputnik V vaccine. Such a step will enable Russia to reassert its geopolitical influence that involves a keen competition with other foreign players on the continent.

An official media release in mid-February said that the Africa Vaccine Acquisition Task Team — set up by the African Union to acquire additional vaccine doses so that Africa can attain a target immunization of 60% — has received an offer of 300 million Sputnik V vaccines from the Russian Federation.

: Kester Kenn Klomegah; THE WORLD; Africa; 25 February 2021

Photo: Some countries using COVID vaccine to enhance their soft power. Credit: UN Photo/Loey Felipe

Response to COVID-19 Embedded in Global Power and Diplomatic Wrangles

Viewpoint by Michael Jennings*

LONDON (IDN) — The COVID-19 pandemic has given rise to various new, repurposed or newly popular terms. The newest entry to the pandemic lexicon might be “vaccine diplomacy”, with some countries using their jabs to strengthen regional ties and enhance their own power and global status.

In early February, half a million doses of the Chinese Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine arrived in Pakistan, before soon also reaching 13 other countries including Cambodia, Nepal, Sierra Leone and Zimbabwe.

: Phil Harris; SUSTAINABILITY; Health & Well Being; 24 February 2021

Photo: Niamey, Niger's capital and economic hub. CC BY-SA 2.0

Heavily US-Armed Niger Faces Electoral Violence

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) — The country that drew worldwide attention over a now-debunked U.S. theory linking Saddam Hussein with the purchase of “yellowcake” uranium powder is in the spotlight again.

On February 21, unidentified attackers set off a landmine that exploded under a car full of election commissioners in the Tillaberi region of the landlocked West African nation of Niger, killing seven.