A senior source in Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s party claimed a resounding victory in Wednesday’s parliamentary and presidential election against Prime Minster Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
“We’ve taken this election. We’ve buried the MDC. We never had any doubt that we were going to win,” the source, who could not be named, told Reuters by phone on Thursday.
Releasing results early in Zimbabwe is illegal, and police have said they will arrest anybody who makes premature claims about the result.
Two Ugandan journalists who were arrested and detained in South Sudan at the weekend have been released but banned from entering the country.
Mr Justin Dralaze and Mr Hilary Ayesiga were arrested and detained at the National Security headquarters in Juba on grounds that they were filming key government and security facilities without authorisation.
According Mr Asan Kasingye, the Director of Interpol, the duo is scheduled to fly to Kampala Wednesday evening.
The government Tuesday ordered its embassy in South Sudan to secure the release of the two journalists.
The journalists who are attached to the China-based CCTV were reportedly working on a project in South Sudan.
South Sudan has remained under curfew after President Salva Kiir sacked his Vice President Riek Machar and the entire Cabinet.
{{Nigeria has prefered not to comment on the ongoing speculation that it is withdrawing its peacekeeping troops from Mali because it lost command of the Peacekeeping Forces to Rwanda.}}
Rwanda’s Gen Kazura Jean Bosco trounced other contenders to assume command of the new Peacekeeping force established in Mali.
Meanwhile Allasane Ouattara, President of Cote d’Ivoire, Authority of Heads of State and Government and Chairman of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) confirmed this move in Abuja where he refuted the speculations that Nigeria was withdrawing some of its troops because it had lost command of its peacekeeping forces to Rwanda.
Nigeria is now ready to remove some of its troops from the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), a part of the group that were transformed from AFISMA.
President Ouattara confirmed the receipt of a letter from President Jonathan declaring that the reason for the withdrawal of the Nigerian troops from Mali was precipitated by a domestic need. According to the letter from President Goodluck Jonathan, Nigeria needs some of its people, and the country wasn’t withdrawing all its troops, just a small part.
{{The Governor of Northern Province Bosenibamwe Aime has hailed former FDLR rebels for denouncing Genocide ideology and armed rebellion and choosing to return to their home country Rwanda.}}
Mr. Bosenibamwe was speaking to the Ex-combatants at Mutobo Transit center in Musanze district. The ex-combatants are undergoing rehabilitation before they get reintegrated into Rwandan communities.
The Governor was presenting to the Ex-combatants the current situation in the country and government policies saying the country had tremendously transformed in the past 19years since the members of FDLR committed Genocide in Rwanda.
The Ex-combatants numbering over 117 at the Center are part of the 47th group that has denounced rebellion and genocide ideology and therefore returning to Rwanda to participate in nation building.
FDLR rebel group is currently listed as a terrorist organisation with its leader being sought for various charges.
Following the successful first phase in the hygiene competition in the City of Kigali, Rwanda National Police on Tuesday launched the second hybrid to further promote cleanliness in the city.
The move seeks to influence sectors to strengthen their activities to improve sanitation in the three city districts – Nyarugenge, Gasabo and Kicukiro – under the police campaign of “Keep Kigali Clean and Green.”
The exercise started with the cleaning of Kimironko bus terminal in Gasabo District and giving CDs containing hygiene messages, to drivers of public vehicles.
The CDs are meant to be played in public cars to send the message to all Rwandans.
It also included erecting dustbins on roadsides.
The competition brings together 34 sectors in the three districts, in which the winning sector will be awarded a vehicle and the second gets a motorcycle, the Inspector General of Police, Emmanuel K. Gasana, said.
He added that a disciplined motorcycle operator with all the traffic requirements will get a motorcycle.
Others to be awarded are journalists, who will write best articles on hygiene promotion, song and poem composers.
The competition is slated to end in July next year.
He said the force conducts such hygienic activities across the country, including during umuganda.
The Minister of Local Government, James Musoni, while officially launching the exercise, said its success requires “ownership of the public.”
He said “pure cleanness starts with personal mind.”
He appealed to Kigali residents to own the exercise, take part in community work – Umuganda – and be part of the development the city needs today.
The Mayor of Kigali city, Fidele Ndayisaba said cleanliness in part of the city’s master plan.
He said they have introduced hygiene programmes in schools, delivered once week.
The first phase of the competition saw Kanombe sector of Kicukiro district emerging the winner, and walked away with a motorcycle.
Rwezamenyo Sector in Nyarugenge came second with 85 percent; Gikondo sector in Kicukiro was third with 79 percent while Niboye and Remera sectors from Kicukiro and Gasabo districts respectively shared the fourth spot with 77 percent.
{{Several heads of State are in Kenyan capital Nairobi for the special summit of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) to discuss mainly the hostilities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).}}
The leaders are also expected to discuss: tension between the two Sudans over the oil pipeline and rebellions, pacification of Somalia and the crisis in the Central African Republic (CAR).
The heads of States and governments will also discuss a number of others issues including trade, according to Ken Vitisia of Kenya”s ministry of Foreign Affairs.
President Yoweri Museveni the the Chairman of the ICGLR, Paul Kagame (Rwanda), Jakaya Kikwete (Tanzania), Joseph Kabila (DRC) ,Pierre Nkurunziza (Burundi) and the host Uhuru Kenyatta are attending the summit. South Sudan, Sudan, Angola, Zambia and CAR as well as the UN and development partners such as the African Development Bank, African Union and the World Bank are expected to send delegations.
ICGLR member countries are: Angola, Burundi, Central African Republic, Congo (Brazzaville), the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania and Zambia.
A media alert sent out by the ICGLR indicated that the summit will open at United Nations Complex, Gigiri after which the heads of State will shift to the Windsor Golf Hotel and Country Club where the rest of it will take place.
At a July 25, 2013 consultation of the Great lakes Region Foreign Affairs Ministers in New York, the M23 rebels were asked to stop attacks on DRC government forces and the DRC Government to exercise restraint. The consultation was arranged by the UN Special Envoy of the Secretary- General for the Great Lakes Region on the margins of the high-level Security Council debate on the Great Lakes Region.
They also recognised that the swift conclusion of the Kampala Dialogue between the DRC Government and the M23 would contribute to addressing the current situation in the eastern DRC.Among the issues of to be addressed during the Nairobi summit are the issues of refugees, the impending regional economic integration, investments in infrastructure and increased regional trade.
According to Vitisia, the summit will provide an opportunity for Kenya to take a leadership role in regional peace, stability and development.
He said Kenya will take the opportunity to push its agenda for the region to invest heavily in intra-regional infrastructure development. Kenya will also lobby for diplomatic support in its quest for a non-permanent seat at the UN Security Council for the 2017-2018 period.
{{Foreign Affairs Minister Louise Mushikiwabo has brushed off U.S. charges that Rwanda was supporting M23 rebel movement in DRC saying that levelling accusations would not help pacify the region.}}
Mushikiwabo on Tuesday told media in Nairobi, Kenya, “Those whose policy is to keep pulling countries of the region into a conflict that is not of their making, we don’t think that is helpful, Scapegoating is not going to help DRC.”
When asked if that amounted to a denial, she told Reuters in Nairobi: “I think my comment is very clear. There are many complex issues in Congo and those have to be looked at with a view to try to reach a peaceful situation in DRC.”
Minister Mushikiwabo was speaking on the sidelines of a meeting of ministers from the Great Lakes region in the Kenyan capital, which included discussions about eastern Congo and regional efforts to broker peace between the rebel group and Kinshasa.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry last week led a U.N. Security Council debate on the Great Lakes and urged 11 African nations which signed a February deal brokered by the United Nations on ending fighting to respect Congo’s sovereignty.
Alongside that peace initiative, Uganda has been hosting talks between Kinshasa and the M23 group.
Kenyan Foreign Minister Amina Mohamed told Reuters a draft deal had been given to Kinshasa and the rebels, and that representatives from both sides were expected to meet soon in the Ugandan capital to discuss it. She did not give a date.
But another delegate at the Nairobi meeting said the two sides remained far apart and little progress was being made in the Kampala talks.
Congo’s U.N. peacekeeping mission announced on Tuesday it was setting up a security zone around Goma and the nearby town of Sake, which briefly fell into M23 hands last year, to prevent the population being caught up in renewed fighting.
The mission, known as MONUSCO, said its troops would disarm, by force if necessary, anyone other than members of the Congolese security forces found carrying weapons within the zone after a 48-hour grace period.
An accompanying map of the proposed zone indicated it would not cover any areas currently held by M23.
“There are many armed groups in this area. Now the brigade is out to enforce peace by means of the security zone, this is the first stage,” Charles Bambara, MONUSCO’s spokesman, said.
The operation will be the first for the nearly 3,000-strong Intervention Brigade, which has been charged with aggressively neutralising armed groups in Congo’s lawless eastern borderlands.
At least 28 people have been killed in a series of explosions that targeted bars in the northern Nigerian city of Kano, a hospital source told media.
Witnesses said the blasts shook a Christian neighbourhood that has previously been attacked by militants from the Islamist group Boko Haram.
The army said 12 people had been killed when explosions placed in packages were dropped in the area on Monday evening.
In March, explosions at a bus station in the city killed more than 20 people.
Correspondents say the Muslim majority in the city are now anxious about possible reprisals, as people come out onto the streets after breaking their daytime fast during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
{{Observers greeted progress in the latest peace negotiations between Mozambique’s government and former rebels with cautious optimism Tuesday after months of renewed violence.}}
Simmering tensions between rebel group-turned-opposition party Renamo and the Frelimo government erupted into armed clashes in April — more than two decades after the end of the southern African country’s civil war.
After 11 rounds of talks aimed at resolving the crisis, news finally came Monday that the government and Renamo had reached a partial agreement to change electoral laws — an announcement that was broadly welcomed.
“This is a positive development. At last there is a basis for a compromise,” said Britain-based analyst Alex Vines.
It appeared the government was “serious about providing a face-saving mechanism for Renamo,” he added.
“At last the government and Renamo start to agree!” said independent newspaper O Pais.
Both sides said Monday they had made progress — the first time since talks started last December.
“Everything leads us to believe that conditions have been created for (an agreement) to be signed,” chief government negotiator Jose Pacheco told state-run Radio Mozambique.
“A good consensus prevails between the two parties on key issues,” said Renamo chief negotiator Saimone Macuiane.
But Renamo says it still wants clarifications before signing a 12-point agreement hammered out during exhaustive talks.
