{{South Sudan is set to join East African countries in the development of a standard gauge railway (SGR) to cut transport costs and boost regional trade.}}
Kenya reached a deal with Uganda and Rwanda to construct a railway that would link Mombasa port to Malaba on the border with Uganda. It will also be extended to Uganda and by 2018 to Rwanda.
South Sudan has agreed to join the three nations to extend the rail from Kampala to Juba.
“We do not want to be left out of this key infrastructural development and that is why we would like to be part of it,” said Leonard Nhial Bol of the Ministry of Transport, South Sudan, in a press statement released in Nairobi.
The Press statement followed a three-day meeting held last week in Nairobi which hosted Uganda and Rwanda officials.
A narrow-gauge track operated by the Rift Valley Railways runs to northern Uganda, near the border with South Sudan, where goods heading to Juba are offloaded and transported by road.
{{Five countries; Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya, which are severely affected by two deadly cassava viral diseases, have joined efforts to tackle the problem by sharing their top five varieties with tolerance to the two diseases.}}
The 25 varieties in total will then be evaluated in each country to identify those that are well adapted and acceptable to the local farming communities.
{{Mass multiplication}}
Together, cassava brown streak disease (CBSD) and cassava mosaic disease (CMD), are responsible for production losses amounting to more than $1b (Shs2.5t) every year and are a threat to food and income security for over 30 million farmers in the region.
The first consignment of 19 varieties to each of the countries, as tissue culture virus-tested plantlets, was handed to the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) that received them on behalf of the other national agricultural research systems.
The handing over was held at the Genetics Technologies International Ltd, a tissue culture-based laboratory based in Nairobi, Kenya, that was tasked with mass multiplication of the varieties.
The remaining varieties are still undergoing mass multiplication and will be sent out later.
{{Efficient distribution}}
At the event, Dr Joseph Ochieng, assistant director, KARI, said it marked an important step in the effort to control the two diseases in the collaborating countries.
He thanked all the partner organisations for their effort in collecting, cleaning up, and multiplying the varieties.
“The next task will be to ensure that, once these varieties are evaluated and the best varieties are identified, they reach the small-holder farmers by having an efficient seed distribution system in place,” Ochieng added.
{{Evaluate and choose}}
Also during the ceremony, Dr Leena Tripathi, IITA Kenya Country Representative, explained, “We are also looking to it to help our farmers cope with climate change as it is able to withstand harsh conditions such as drought and poor soils.
However, for this to happen we need to control the spread of these two diseases. And one of the most sustainable ways to do so is to develop varieties that have dual resistance.”
The five countries came together to freely share the best materials that are tolerant to the disease. Each country will have 20 new varieties to evaluate and choose for official release and multiplication to farmers.
Dr Edward Kanju, the project coordinator, noted, “We have also taken steps to ensure that we are not spreading the diseases from one country to another and that the materials that we are distributing are virus free.”
{{To increase yields}}
Each country will receive 300 plantlets of the 25 varieties, which they will multiply in bulk and test across different cassava-growing areas to fast-track efforts to provide farmers with these varieties.
Currently, the cassava yield in the five countries is very low averaging eight to nine tonnes per hectare but with these new varieties, yield could go up to 20 tonnes per hectare.
To date, despite all the breeding efforts, no country has developed varieties with resistance to the two diseases and they therefore continue to spread in the region.
However, varieties that are tolerant—showing mild symptoms but still giving acceptable yields—have been officially released and many more are in the final stages of official release in project target countries.
{{About the Project}}
This exchange of material is one of the key activities of the project, New Cassava Varieties and Clean Seed to Combat CMD and CBSD, led by IITA and funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
{{Uganda and Kenya have publicly announced plans to install surveillence teams at all entry points especially airports in order to curtail Ebola spread into their territories.}}
The vilgilance follows reports of deadly Ebola outbreak in Guinea which has so far killed more than 60 people.
Kenya government says persons traveling from Guinea will undergo special check at all ports of entry.
A senior government official in Kenya says, “We have been notified of the outbreak of Ebola Haemorrhagic fever in Guinea by the World Health Organisation, already 86 suspected cases including 60 deaths have been reported.”
{{The man at the centre of a divorce case with Kenya’s top female rapper Nazizi, Vini Leopold, has finally spoken out.}}
Vini, who spoke to Chillax from Arusha, Tanzania, said there was no bad blood between him and Nazizi, and added that it was part of life for people to either live together or get separated.
“Although we have both moved on, we are very good friends and will always be,” he said.
{Nazizi and Vinny}
{Nazizi performing live on stage}
{The rapper seen in bed with new lover also her Producer}
{{A key witness against Deputy President William Ruto should be heard entirely in camera, the prosecutor has requested.}}
Ms Fatou Bensouda told the ICC she was seeking protection for four other witnesses – P-0508, P-0028, P-0469 and P-0019 – who are lined up to testify against Mr Ruto in the crimes against humanity trial at the Hague.
The prosecutor asked the judges on Monday that witness P-0452 should be heard entirely in private session.
Ms Bensouda said witness P-0452 had indicated she was not afraid to testify, but now feels threatened.
She said Witness P-0019, has insider information about meetings held to organise and plan the 2008 post-election violence.
The witness, she said, had named Mr Farouk Kibet, a known Ruto associate, as a key coordinator of the violence.
According to her filing, witness P-0508 is a victim of the violence and his identity was disclosed on January 9, 2013.
Ms Bensouda says the witness has been threatened. The witness is afraid of endangering his life and that of his family, she submitted.
Witness P-0028, Ms Bensouda says, received direct and indirect intimidation over his knowledge of the post-election violence.
The witness possesses insider information about the planning meetings and Mr Ruto’s role, she said. The judges are yet to make a ruling.
{{Kenya’s National Assembly’s committee on Defence and Foreign Relations has demanded release of the report of the joint survey that was carried out on Migingo Island.}}
The committee has indicated that it will summon Foreign Affairs and International Trade Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohammed to make clear the status of the survey that was conducted by Kenya and Uganda following tension between the two countries both laying claim of ownership of the island.
Members of the committee made the demands as the Africa Human Rights Bureau Executive Director Dan Alila asked the Kenyan Parliament, both the Senate and the National Assembly, to approve military action against the Ugandan security forces who are occupying both the Migingo and Ugingo islands.
Mr Alila, a Kenyan, said in a petition to the parliamentary committee that the two islands are on Kenyan waters.
“Suitable measures must be undertaken to protect the citizens, defend Kenya’s territorial integrity and sovereignty and private property,” he said in his petition.
In a meeting with the committee Tuesday, Mr Alila said the Uganda security forces stationed at both Migingo and Ugingo have been harassing Kenyans.
The human rights activist wants Kenya to establish a permanent Naval Base on the disputed island, claiming various human rights abuses were being committed on the island.
He claimed torture, arbitrary arrests and even rape have been taking place at the island for over ten years now.
Committee chairman Ndungu Gethenji said the committee will officially write to invite the Foreign Affairs and International Trade Cabinet Secretary to produce all the necessary information related to the disputed ownership of the islands.
In particular the committee wants details of the joint survey that was meant to determine the territorial boundaries in the Lake Victoria.
Gem MP Jakoyo Midiwo said that Ugandan troops have practically taken over the island.
“…the Ugandan government has militarized the borders. Its troops attack and loot from people in Bondo and disappear in the waters,” he said.
Kiminini MP Chris Wamalwa said the government has a responsibility to secure its borders. His Fafi counterpart Barre Shill questioned why the survey report had not been made public.
“The report may have been swept under the carpet… but as long as our people continue staying there and we continue to claim that the island is ours, we must solve the issue,” he said.
{{Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta has said political unity is the best way of cementing gains made by the East African Community ( EAC).}}
President Kenyatta, who is the East African Community Summit Chairman, said on Monday that EAC is on course in establishing a political federation.
Already, the Summit is considering various structures in view of the political realities of the region.
“Our standing cooperation in our common life constitutes the foundation necessary for the federation we desire,” noted the President while addressing the East African Legislative Assembly ( EALA) in Arusha, Tanzania.
He disclosed that a committee of EALA has submitted its views on the Revised Draft Model Structure, roadmap and action plan for East African Political Federation for consultations at the partner-states level.
He expressed confidence that the summit, after evaluating the responses to the plans, will issue clear directions for the road ahead.
In Kenya a strange but true story has left a family totally confused.
{{Linnet Mungai who finds herself unable to lay both her mother and father to rest because of a land tussle acknowledges that the position her family finds itself in, is rather peculiar.}}
“I can’t believe it myself,” she told a local private radio.
In the span of two weeks Linnet lost both her parents amid a tussle over land.
“It started when my father Bernard Mungai Kirumba demolished my mother’s house insisting that since they split up 28 years ago, she should get off his property. He said he wanted to move back home with the wife he left us for as he was sickly,” she explained.
Home, being a one and an eighth acre property in Uthiru on which Wambui and her two children, Linnet and Kirumba Junior, lived.
“A week later, my mom who suffered from High Blood Pressure died from the stress at 55 years of age,” she recalled.
But even dead, Linnet said, her father didn’t want her mother on his land, “On the day of the burial, last Thursday, with her grave ready and people gathered, we received a notice of injunction from our father who insisted that she be buried elsewhere.”
And in what she views as karma, her father passed away the same day, “The following morning we got a report that the very same evening he died of a heart attack at 60.”
But even in death, Mungai’s nephew Muchemi Kirumba insists that his late uncle’s wishes must be respected and that Wambui should not be laid to rest on his property.
“Uncle Mungai wanted Wambui to come out of his premises. He got an eviction order and it was served to her and the children sometime in December. But she didn’t leave forcing uncle Mungai to evict her last Friday but one.
That is when he came with the police and the court order and they effected the eviction to the point where he demolished her house signifying the complete severance of their ties,” he narrated.
And so the Kirumba family remains divided on the way forward with Linnet and Kirumba Junior arguing that as next of kin, their father’s land now belongs to them and they should now be free to lay their mother to rest on it.
Muchemi however counters that his uncle’s wishes were clear, “and like a will,” should be carried out to the letter.
“When the question of where their mother should be buried arose, the father was still alive so the view of the children does not come into play. The children overriding the decision of their father would be taking advantage of the dead,” he argued.
“And Kirumba is not the only son. There’s the first born son Kirumba and another daughter from when uncle subsequently married,” Muchemi continued to say.
And the stalemate persists with Linnet and her brother arguing that their father should not be laid to rest until the contention surrounding their mother’s burial is resolved.
Both sides also maintain that they will not shy away from the courts to ensure that justice, as they perceive it, is done.
But as for the injunction Mungai had obtained against the burial of Wambui on his land, Nyamodi explained: “Unless his survivors were to then substitute him with another living party to the suit or his estate as the plaintiff in that suit, that suit then abates and if a suit abates it abates upon the death of the plaintiff and that would then be the end of the suit.”
The courtroom daggers having been re-drawn however, the court’s finding on the dispute should make for interesting reading as debate rages over the rights of women in and out of marriage.
“That would be an interesting question to be determined by court because there is a decision of the High Court in Busia that women are now entitled to matrimonial property.
But I’m sure the more it is tested judicially the more it will be refined and we hope that the courts will then ensure that women don’t enter into marriages simply to walk away with property,” Nyamodi capped off.
{Fresh grave where Wammbui’s body was to be laid}
{captialfm}
{{South Sudanese rebels of the SPLM/A In Opposition said on Tuesday their forces have advanced on Jonglei state’s Duk county after repulsing government troops and their foreign allies who had attacked their defence positions on Monday in the Greater Bor area.}}
the rebels military spokesperson, Brig Lul Ruai Koang, said that rebels had taken full control of the main town of Duk Padiet in Duk county after defeating the government forces in the area.
Duk Padiet town is north-east of Jonglei state’s capital, Bor, and strategic area for the defence of the state capital.
In Juba, the South Sudanese army confirmed the capture of the area by the rebels. He further said the fighters of the SPLM-In-Opposition launched their attack on Duk County on Tuesday.
“The rebels of Riek Machar attacked and overran Duk County yesterday at around 5:00pm. They are now in the area,” Aguer told Sudan Tribune on Wednesday.
This attack is “a clear violation of the cessation of hostilities agreement, which they have never respected. The SPLA has a right to defend itself and to protect the civil population and their properties,” he further stressed.
Aguer , however, did not elaborate on the army plans to retake the control of the area, although military sources claimed that government troops were regrouping and organising themselves for a riposte against the rebels.
However the rebel spokesperson claimed that their forces were advancing and pursuing the government troops to the south-west of the area.
“The government troops are currently being pursued in directions towards Poktap payam west. A lot of equipment have been already captured from the fleeing (government forces),” Koang claimed.
On Sunday, the former governor of Jonglei state and current lawmaker representing Duk County in the national parliament in Juba, Philip Thon Leek, appealed to the government to deploy more troops to the area as the rebels were mobilising for imminent attacks.
However, the rebels said they were in preparations in anticipation of an imminent attack from the government against their defensive positions in the county.
The rebels spokesperson, Koang, further dismissed the government announcements that the SPLA forces were advancing on Nasir, calling it a “wishful thinking”.
On Monday, the SPLA spokesperson, Col. Philip Aguer, told media that government troops (SPLA) were battling the rebels’ for control of their stronghold town of Nasir.
{{Lake Turkana Wind power project in Kenya will receive US$692mn in funds after 11 banking institutions signed a pact to finance the project.}}
According to officials, construction is likely to begin in June 2014 and the wind farm will have a capacity of 300MW.
The financiers include Africa Development Bank (AfDB), Standard Bank, PTA Bank, European Investment Bank and East Africa Development Bank, and shareholders will inject US$173mn.
The US$861mn project is touted to be the largest single wind power scheme in Africa, and will aid consistent power supply in Kenya.
According to a Kenyan official, a 428km transmission line would be built to transport the electricity from the wind plant.
Carlo Van Wageningen, chairman of Lake Turkana Wind power project, said, ”Once constructed, Lake Turkana Wind Power will be the largest single wind power project in Africa. It is, to date, the largest single private investment in the history of Kenya.”
The project expects to produce an initial 100MW in 2016, with the remainder expected to be produced in two years and eight months thereafter, added Van Wageningen.
Kenya generates 1,664MW of electricity and is working on expanding its power supply by adding 5,000MW by 2017.
The wind power scheme could help save Kenya up to US$150mn annually in money used to import fuel for thermal power generation, according to project sources.
