maputo, mozambique — Botswana’s President Mokgweetsi Masisi has promised to continue supporting Mozambique in its fight against violent extremism in the oil-and-gas rich province of Cabo Delgado, even after the imminent departure of southern African troops from the troubled region.    

Addressing a media conference upon his arrival in the Mozambican capital Maputo late Wednesday, Masisi said the withdrawal of troops from Cabo Delgado does not mark the end of his country’s support in combating violent extremism.  

Masisi said Botswana remains ready to assist Mozambique. 

“In the military and security space, we are going to share our know-how and expertise because we are to you what you are to us,” said Masisi. “And just to make it clear, we will stand shoulder to shoulder with the people of Mozambique in the quest for peace, so any instability such as we witnessed, we will be ready to intervene.” 

Botswana is the second country, following Tanzania to pledge continued support for Mozambique after the departure of troops from SADC, the Southern African Development Community. 

The SADC troops are due to leave Mozambique on July 15 due to financial issues.   

After holding official talks with Masisi at his seaside palace in Maputo late Wednesday, Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi thanked his visitor for Botswana’s role in the fight against terrorism in Cabo Delgado. 

“Together, we work to combat these attacks and this help does not end,”  said Nyusi. “There are many ways Masisi is supporting Mozambique and that will continue. We are training our officers, our military personnel in Botswana. And the flow will continue because these are the ones who must ensure the continuation of the fight.”

The SADC mission consisted of troops from Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Malawi, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia, working in collaboration with the Mozambican defense forces and Rwandan troops to combat acts of terrorism and violent extremism. 

The mission, known as SAMIM, has been in Mozambique since July of 2021 and was able to destroy the terrorist bases, reduce the number of attacks, and restore normal functioning to public and private institutions.

However, Webster Zambara, a senior project leader of peace-building initiatives at the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation in South Africa, predicted a long road ahead before terrorism is vanquished in northern Mozambique.  

Zambara spoke with VOA Thursday from his base in Cape Town over WhatsApp. 

“If you look at Boko Haram in West Africa, it has been there for 15 years now. If you look at al-Shabab in East Africa, it has been there for more than 10 years,” said Zambara. “So, anyone who thought that rising extremism in northern Mozambique is going to be a short war would not have looked at how terrorists have operated, not only in Africa, but even globally.  ” 

The insurgency in northern Mozambique began in 2017 and already has caused close to 6,000 deaths, leading to the displacement of more than 1 million people. Multinational oil and gas firms operating in the region, such as Exxon Mobil and Total, were forced to suspend operations over security concerns. 
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South Africa’s newly-appointed minister of sports – a self-described former gangster – wants to promote a sport that has associations with South African gangster culture. The sport of “spinning” involves fast-moving cars and dangerous stunts, and as Kate Bartlett reports from Johannesburg, the way it’s conducted is not always legal.
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YAOUNDE — Mixed reactions are swirling in Cameroon since Brenda Biya, the daughter of President Paul Biya, declared she is a lesbian. While LGBTQ activists see her declaration as an opportunity to push for greater rights in a country where same-sex relations are outlawed, anti-gay groups say they want Brenda Biya prosecuted.

Brenda Biya, the 26-year-old daughter of Cameroon’s president, Paul Biya, said she has received what she calls tons of insults as well as congratulatory messages in the past seven days.

The president’s daughter set off a firestorm of reaction in Cameroon last week when she shared pictures on social media of herself kissing her girlfriend and expressing her wish for them to live in harmony as a couple. She said LGBTQ people in Cameroon should be spared violence and brutality.

In a video released Tuesday night, Brenda Biya She said LGBTQ people have been calling to tell her that as President Biya’s daughter, she stands a chance of moving Cameroon toward abolishing laws that criminalize same-sex relations.

Brenda said she wants to give hope and love to the many people in Cameroon who suffer simply because of who they are.

Reverend Father Humphrey Tatah Mbui is director of communications at the National Episcopal Conference of Cameroon’s Roman Catholic Bishops. He said he was curious to watch the videos shared by Brenda because President Biya’s family members are practicing Roman Catholics.

Mbui said homosexuality, lesbianism or same-sex relationships are condemned by the church because it is sin against God’s teaching.

“The Church. however, is sympathetic towards people who find themselves in homosexuality, lesbianism or same-sex relationships. Just like Jesus Christ we condemn what is wrong, but we do not condemn the sinner because the sinner can always repent,” he said.

Mbui said the Church believes that if Brenda stops loving and having intimate relations with her female partner, God will reconsider her as his daughter.

Bandy Kiki is an LGBT activist. She said churches should allow LGBTI people to enjoy their lives without religious obstacles.

“There are some laws in the Bible which should absolutely not be accepted today — for example capital punishment, slavery etc., and I think the Catholic Church is realizing that because in recent times we have seen some changes. We recently heard the head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis, allowing priests to bless same-sex relationships.”

President Biya has not publicly commented on his daughter’s declaration. Brenda said she did not inform her family before sharing the videos on social media.

On Wednesday, the Cameroon Association for the Criminalization of Same Sex Marriages said it had filed a complaint against Brenda for promoting an illegal activity in the central African country.

Officials of Cameroon’s Ministry of Justice say they have received and will examine the complaint.

Cameroonian law prohibits sexual relations with a person of the same sex and imposes a penalty of between six months to five years imprisonment on people found guilty.

Rights groups say that Cameroon’s police target public gatherings of LGBTQ people, and thugs regularly beat people suspected to be same-sex couples. 

Rights groups say about 16 people are currently in prison for alleged consensual same-sex conduct or gender nonconformity. VOA could not independently verify that number. 
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Moki Edwin Kindzeka — Lawmakers with the ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement passed a law on Tuesday extending their term of office for one year.

The lawmakers were elected in 2020 to serve a five-year term expiring on March 10, 2025. But this week, President Paul Biya asked his government to pass a bill extending terms for all 180 members of Parliament by 12 months — well into 2026.

Biya’s Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement — also known as CPDM — holds 156 of parliament’s 180 seats.

Government officials say Cameroon’s constitution gives Biya the power to consult the Constitutional Council and ask parliament to vote on extensions and postpone elections whenever circumstances warrant.

Joshua Osih, a lawmaker and president of the opposition Social Democratic Front, disagrees.

Osih said the Social Democratic Front Party he leads strongly condemns as undemocratic the law extending the mandate of parliamentarians, postponing parliamentary elections in Cameroon from February 2025 to February 2026. He said the Cameroon government had five years to prepare for fresh polls in 2025 and should not give the impression that it was taken by surprise.

Opposition and civil society groups say Biya ordered CPDM lawmakers to vote on the bill because it makes it difficult for some main opposition leaders, including Maurice Kamto of the Cameroon Renaissance Movement Party (CRM), to be a candidate in presidential elections expected in October 2025.

Opposition says win was stolen

Kamto claims he won Cameroon’s October 7 presidential polls and that his victory was stolen by Biya. In 2020, his party did not take part in local council and parliamentary elections claiming that Biya had planned to rig the polls in favor of CPDM.

Cameroonian laws state that a political leader who aspires to be president must be in a political party that has at least a municipal councilor or is represented by a lawmaker in parliament. Kamtos’ CRM party has neither. The CRM said it expected to take part in February’s local and parliamentary elections to be able to endorse Kamto.

Kamto said the law extending the term of parliamentarians, along with a presidential decision postponing local elections, is another ploy by 91-year-old Biya to remain leader for life.

Kamto said he wants to reiterate to the government of Cameroon that his party and followers will not tolerate plans by Biya to stay in power. He said Biya and his government should not continue to take civilians for granted by abusing democratic rights and ruling the country with an iron fist.

Kamto said he will disrupt the elections if his rights are abused but did not say how. The government said joint local council and parliamentary elections will take place in 2026 after presidential elections in 2025.

Kamto said although Cameroon laws make it possible for presidential aspirants who are not endorsed by political parties to run, submitting 300 signatures from influential politicians, including former ministers, traditional rulers and religious leaders, as the law states, is very difficult. He said the leaders are either scared of Biya or are his political partners.

Biya has not said if he will be a candidate. But last March, CPDM supporters marched in the streets urging the world’s oldest leader to run for office in the 2025 presidential election, potentially extending his more than four-decade rule.

They said Biya is the only one who can bring peace and development to Cameroon, but the opposition says Biya must leave office after running Cameroon for decades.

Biya rules with an iron fist and is not ready to relinquish power until he dies, opposition and civil society say. But Biya’s supporters say he is a democrat and has won all elections since Cameroon’s 1990 return of multi-party politics.

If reelected, Biya will rule up to 2032. By then, he will be 98 years old.
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Burkina Faso is home to many people internally displaced by years of insecurity and conflict. Most of them live in various towns across the country, and some are now trying to find jobs in the capital, Ouagadougou, or starting businesses. VOA’s Gildas Da has this report, narrated by Anthony LaBruto.
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Nairobi, Kenya — Some Kenyan church leaders are calling on President William Ruto to dissolve his Cabinet as protests of his administration continue.

Ruto withdrew proposed tax increases that set off the protests, but many Kenyans blame Ruto’s Cabinet for the country’s debt and economic problems.

The National Council of Churches of Kenya, which represents some of the country’s biggest churches and religious organizations, has added its voice to protests, saying Ruto’s administration is marred by bad governance and allegations of corruption.

Council of Churches general secretary, Reverend Chris Kinyanjui called for Ruto to fire his ministers. 

“The president has himself said that his Cabinet is incompetent,” Kinyanjui  said. “Kenyans are saying he has an incompetent Cabinet, and in addition, many members of his Cabinet are also corrupt.”

Ruto’s government recently proposed tax increases to offset the country’s debt. The proposals sparked protests which killed at least 40 people and injured more than 380.

Ruto withdrew the tax hikes after protesters stormed the parliament buildings, forcing legislators to flee.

On Friday, Ruto announced new measures to reduce government expenditures, including merging key ministries and state corporations, banning the purchase of government vehicles for 12 months, and suspending nonessential travel by state and public officers.

Kenyan political commentator Dismas Mokua noted that none of Ruto’s Cabinet members have been convicted on corruption charges and told VOA that Ruto will be reluctant to dismiss them.

“If the courts have not pronounced one guilty of anything, the probability of President Ruto firing somebody from the Cabinet merely on the account of people demanding he should be fired is almost zero,” Mokua said. “But the key consideration here is really the cost of living. If he is able to turn around the economy and ensure the public debt is not a burden on the majority of Kenyans … then people will settle down and they will wait for 2027.” 

Some protesters are also demanding the formation of a new, independent electoral commission.

Mokua said the demands of the Kenyan protests – which have been dubbed Generation Z protests for the age of their organizers — are far reaching.

“The pressure which is going to be applied by Gen Z is not going to be limited to the national government. It will go down to county governments, it will go down to the members of the national assembly and it will go down to churches,” Mokua said.

The secretary-general of Kenya’s ruling United Democratic Alliance, Cleophas Malala, said the party will start a program of government outreach and engagement. 

He said political leaders must not come to the people only when they want their votes. 

Some experts blame the recent protests on a lack of space for Kenyans to air their grievances, and the government’s failure to engage with the public on laws being considered. 

The constitution requires citizens’ input before a law is passed, something that successive Kenyan administrations have made little effort to obtain.   
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Harare, Zimbabwe — After her son, the family’s shining light and only breadwinner, was arrested last year, Tambudzai Tembo went into meltdown. In Zimbabwe, where clinical mental health services are scarce, her chances of getting professional help were next to zero. She contemplated suicide.

“I didn’t want to live anymore. People who saw me would think everything was OK. But inside, my head was spinning,” the 57-year-old said. “I was on my own.”

A wooden bench and an empathetic grandmother saved her.

Older people are at the center of a homegrown form of mental health therapy in Zimbabwe that is now being adopted in places like the United States.

The approach involves setting up benches in quiet, discreet corners of community clinics and in some churches, poor neighborhoods and at a university. An older woman with basic training in problem-solving therapy patiently sits there, ready to listen and engage in a one-on-one conversation.

The therapy is inspired by traditional practice in Zimbabwe in which grandmothers were the go-to people for wisdom in rough times. It had been abandoned with urbanization, the breakdown of tight-knit extended families and modern technology. Now it is proving useful again as mental health needs grow.

“Grandmothers are the custodians of local culture and wisdom. They are rooted in their communities,” said Dixon Chibanda, a psychiatry professor and founder of the initiative.

“They don’t leave, and in addition, they have an amazing ability to use what we call ‘expressed empathy’… to make people feel respected and understood.”

Last year, Chibanda was named the winner of a $150,000 prize by the U.S.-based McNulty Foundation for revolutionizing mental healthcare. Chibanda said the concept has taken root in parts of Vietnam, Botswana, Malawi, Kenya and Tanzania and is in “preliminary formative work” in London.

In New York, the city’s new mental health plan launched last year says it is “drawing inspiration” from what it calls the Friendship Bench to help address risk factors such as social isolation. The orange benches are now in areas including Harlem, Brooklyn and the Bronx.

In Washington, the organization HelpAge USA is piloting the concept under the DC Grandparents for Mental Health initiative, which started in 2022 as a COVID-19 support group of people 60 and above.

So far, 20 grandmothers have been trained by a team from Friendship Bench Zimbabwe to listen, empathize and empower others to solve their problems, said Cindy Cox-Roman, the president and chief executive of HelpAge USA.

Benches will be set up at places of worship, schools and wellness centers in Washington’s low-income communities with people who “have been historically marginalized and more likely to experience mental health problems,” she said.

Cox-Roman cited fear and distrust in the medical system, lack of social support and stigma as some of the factors limiting access to treatment.

“People are hurting, and a grandmother can always make you feel better,” she said.

More than one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

“The mental health crisis is real. Where it’s a real crisis after the pandemic is that many clinicians have dropped out of the workforce,” said Dr. Jehan El-Mayoumi, who works as an expert with HelpAge USA and is a founding director of the health equity Rodham Institute at Georgetown University. She has struggled to get psychiatrists for acutely suicidal patients.

El-Mayoumi said the Zimbabwean concept provides people with “someone you can trust, open up your heart to, that you can tell your deepest secrets [and] that requires trust, so that’s what’s so wonderful about the Friendship Bench.”

The idea was born out of tragedy. Chibanda was a young psychiatrist, and one of just over 10 in Zimbabwe in 2005. One of his patients desperately wanted to see him, but she could not afford the $15 bus fare. Chibanda later learned that she had killed herself.

“I realized that I needed to have a stronger presence in the community,” Chibanda said. “I realized that actually one of the most valuable resources are these grandmothers, the custodians of local culture.”

He recruited 14 grandmothers in the neighborhood near the hospital where he worked in the capital, Harare, and trained them. In Zimbabwe, they get $25 a month to help with transport and phone bills.

The network, which now partners with the health ministry and the World Health Organization, has grown to over 2,000 grandmothers across the country. Over 200,000 Zimbabweans sat on a bench to get therapy from a trained grandmother in 2023, according to the network.

Siridzayi Dzukwa, the grandmother who talked Tembo out of suicide, made a home follow-up visit on a recent day. Using a written questionnaire, she checked on Tembo’s progress. She listened as Tembo talked about how she has found a new lease on life and now sells vegetables to make ends meet.

Dzukwa has become a recognizable figure in the area. People stop to greet and thank her for helping them. Some ask for a home visit or take down her number.

“People are no longer ashamed or afraid of openly stopping us on the streets and ask us to talk,” she said. “Mental health is no longer something to be ashamed of.”
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Beni, DRC — A military court in the volatile east of DR Congo sentenced 22 soldiers to death on Monday for “fleeing the enemy” during fighting with M23 rebels, a lawyer told AFP.

Sixteen soldiers were handed death sentences in one case in the North Kivu province, and six others in a separate case, coming just days after 25 soldiers received a similar judgment.

The latest sentences come as M23 rebels, which Kinshasha accuses Rwanda of backing, last week seized new terrain on the northern front of the conflict that has been ongoing for two-and-a-half years in the North Kivu province.

A military court condemned 16 people in one case in the court in North Kivu.

The prosecution had asked on Saturday that 22 people in the case be condemned to death.

But the court on Monday instead handed down 10-year prison sentences to three defendants and acquitted three other people.

In a separate case examined and judged on Monday in North Kivu six of the seven defendants were sentenced to death and one person was acquitted, lawyer Jules Muvweko told AFP.

Last Wednesday, a court sentenced 25 soldiers to death during a one day trial for also “fleeing the enemy,” lawyers said.

Since the end of 2021, the M23 rebels have conquered vast swathes of territory in the province, nearly completely encircling the provincial capital of Goma.
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Nairobi, Kenya — Hundreds of Kenyans gathered Sunday in the capital Nairobi for a memorial concert following deadly protests over tax hikes that saw the country’s leader scrap a controversial finance bill.

The initially peaceful rallies mostly led by Gen-Z spiraled into violence that left 39 people dead, rights groups have said, and saw President William Ruto reject the bill containing the hikes and promise spending cuts.

On Sunday people streamed into Nairobi’s central Uhuru Park from around midday to listen to performers and commemorate those who had died.

Victor Waithaka, 29, told AFP he was attending to pay tribute to the “heroes who died during the protests on the rejected finance bill.”

“This is our country, and we have the right to fight for our rights,” he said.

Large crowds shouted, “Ruto must go,” echoing demands made by protesters in previous weeks, and waved Kenyan flags as they danced to a medley of singers and performers.

“The fight has just begun, the political awakening [is] just the beginning,” prominent demonstrator Hanifa Adan told AFP on the concert’s sidelines.

Early Sunday morning some roads in the city were blocked by police officers.

The concert fell on so-called “Saba Saba” (Seven Seven) — the seventh day of the seventh month, marking the moment in 1990 that the opposition rose up to demand the return of multi-party democracy — and a day when demonstrations have previously taken place.

It follows Ruto’s decision Friday to announce budget cuts and increased borrowing, to cover the projected shortfall from scrapping the finance bill.

Following his speech, the president also took part in a sometimes-fiery exchange of views on social media platform X, in a wide-ranging conversation with younger Kenyans on social media.
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A young Frenchman who settled in Senegal a little over a year ago decided to master the local Wolof language. Now he’s teaching it to other people on social media. Allison Fernandes has the story, narrated by Michelle Joseph.
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MACHAKOS, Kenya — With dismay, Martha Waema and her husband surveyed their farm that was submerged by weeks of relentless rainfall across Kenya. Water levels would rise to shoulder height after only a night of heavy downpour.

The couple had expected a return of $1,500 from their three acres after investing $613 in corn, peas, cabbages, tomatoes and kale. But their hopes have been uprooted and destroyed.

“I have been farming for 38 years, but I have never encountered losses of this magnitude,” said the 62-year-old mother of 10.

Their financial security and optimism have been shaken by what Kenya’s government has called “a clear manifestation of the erratic weather patterns caused by climate change.”

The rains that started in mid-March have posed immediate dangers and left others to come. They have killed nearly 300 people, left dams at historically high levels and led the government to order residents to evacuate flood-prone areas — and bulldoze the homes of those who don’t.

Now a food security crisis lies ahead, along with even higher prices in a country whose president had sought to make agriculture an even greater engine of the economy.

Kenya’s government says the flooding has destroyed crops on more than 67,987 hectares of land, or less than 1% of Kenya’s agricultural land.

As farmers count their losses — a total yet unknown — the deluge has exposed what opposition politicians call Kenya’s ill preparedness for climate change and related disasters and the need for sustainable land management and better weather forecasting.

Waema now digs trenches in an effort to protect what’s left of the farm on a plain in the farthest outskirts of the capital, Nairobi, in Machakos County.

Not everyone is grieving, including farmers who prepared for climate shocks.

About 200 kilometers west of Waema’s farm, 65-year-old farmer James Tobiko Tipis and his 6½-hectare farm have escaped the flooding in Olokirikirai. He said he had been proactive in the area that’s prone to landslides by terracing crops.

“We used to lose topsoil and whatever we were planting,” he said.

Experts said more Kenyan farmers must protect their farms against soil erosion that likely will be worsened by further climate shocks.

Jane Kirui, an agricultural officer in Narok County, emphasized the importance of terracing and other measures such as cover crops that will allow water to be absorbed.

In Kenya’s rural areas, experts say efforts to conserve water resources remain inadequate despite the current plentiful rainfall.

At Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, professor John Gathenya recommended practices such as diversifying crops and emphasizing the soil’s natural water retention capacity.

“The soil remains the biggest reservoir for water,” he said, asserting that using it wisely requires much less of an investment than large infrastructure projects such as dams. But soil needs to be protected with practices that include limiting the deforestation that has exposed parts of Kenyan land to severe runoff.

“We are opening land in new fragile environments where we need to be even more careful the way we farm,” Gathenya said. “In our pursuit for more and more food, we are pressing into the more fragile areas but not with the same intensity of soil conservation that we had 50 years back.”
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PAARL, South Africa — Freya, a 6-month-old lion cub rescued from the wildlife trade in Lebanon, poked a curious nose out of her transport crate and sniffed the air. Satisfied, she took her first cautious steps in her new forever home in a sanctuary in South Africa.

Freya’s relocation to the Drakenstein Lion Park is only a partial success story.

She will never live as a lion should in the wild. She has been given lifetime sanctuary at Drakenstein, which has taken in other lions from zoos and circuses in France, Chile, Romania and elsewhere. Some have terrible backstories of abuse, noted on placards at the sanctuary: Ares was blind and neglected when he was rescued. Brutus had been beaten hard enough to break his jaw.

But as Freya settles in at Drakenstein, animal welfare groups have again drawn attention to South Africa’s contradictory position when it comes to the species that often symbolizes African wildlife.

South Africa, with an admirable reputation for conservation and ethical sanctuaries like Drakenstein, also has a thriving captive lion business where the big cats are bred for petting and other encounters but also for killing in “canned hunting” experiences or for the lion bone trade.

South Africa has special permission through the endangered plant and animal trade treaty CITES to export lion bones and skeletons, mostly to Southeast Asia to be used in traditional medicines. Canned hunting, where lions are chased down and shot in enclosures with no chance of a fair chase or escape, is also legal.

Animal welfare groups have pushed for the business of breeding lions in captivity to end. The South African government announced recently it plans to close down the industry and it’s expected to take two to three years if there are no legal challenges.

It has been a stain on South Africa’s conservation brand, said Audrey Delsink, the Africa wildlife director for Humane Society International, which was involved in Freya’s relocation. She said it was important for people to realize that the cute cubs used for petting encounters at some South African parks — but not at Drakenstein — end up being big lions shipped off to be killed.

“They’ve been pulled from their mothers, they’ve been hand-raised for you to take selfies with and enjoy them, and then eventually the same lions are going to be shot for trophies in a camp from which they cannot escape, and then end up as a bag of bones,” Delsink said.

There are more than 300 captive lion facilities in South Africa, with more than 7,000 lions. That is double the number of lions in the South African wild. Campaigners against the business say it should be made more clear to visitors that the vast majority of South Africa’s lions live in cages in the world’s largest captive lion industry.

“We cannot pull the wool over tourists’ eyes anymore,” Delsink said.

As for Freya, her rescuers hope that she will eventually bond and live in the same enclosure as young male cub Pi, who they believe is her brother and was brought from Lebanon in April.

Pi was illegally trafficked and owned by a man who used him to promote his TikTok account, said Jason Mier, director of Animals Lebanon, which rescued Pi and Freya. Pi often had his mouth taped shut when used for videos or selfies and was locked in a small cage at night. He was kept as a status symbol for his owner “to be able to show off I’m powerful, I have money, look at me,” Mier said.

Freya and Pi are the latest of nearly two dozen big cats rescued from various situations by Animals Lebanon. Some have come to Drakenstein, which doesn’t allow cub petting or any close encounters, but does welcome visitors to see the lions and learn about them.

Freya and Pi wouldn’t survive if released in the wild, so the sanctuary is the best option for them. Those involved in Pi’s rescue said they remember watching the cub experience grass under his paws for the first time at Drakenstein, even if it was in the enclosure he and Freya will likely inhabit for the rest of their lives.
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