Gaborone, Botswana — U.S. Africa Command, or AFRICOM, is working with southern African countries to combat gender-based violence in the military. This week, AFRICOM and regional military officials are holding a series of workshops in Zambia to strengthen regional collaboration in the fight against workplace harassment.

AFRICOM and its component, the U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Air Forces Africa, or USAFE-AFAFRICA, have united with the Zambia Defense Force to foster strategies to tackle gender-based violence in the region.

Botswana and Zambia are participating in efforts to strengthen regional initiatives against sexual assault.

Lieutenant Colonel Linda Jones, USAFE-AFAFRICA chief for African health engagements, said it is imperative to come up with strategies to fight gender-based violence in the armed forces.

“It is the responsibility of leaders that all of us set the tone, including an environment where everyone is valued and empowered to speak up against misconduct,” she said. “This involves not only enforcing policies but also modeling respect for behavior and actively supporting those who report incidents.”

In 2021, U.S. Defense Department officials reported sexual violence had reached the highest level ever reported, with 8.4% of women assaulted on duty.

U.S. Air Force Tech Sergeant Samara Brown said if left unchecked, gender-based violence can affect execution of military tasks.

“Gender-based violence undermines the core values of any military organization,” Brown said. “It erodes trust, disrupts unity, cohesion and ultimately compromises mission readiness. We must take a firm stand against it, not just as a matter of policy but a commitment to uphold the principles of honor, integrity and respect that define our service.”

Retired U.S. Air Force official and workplace development consultant Keith Castille facilitated the Lusaka workshop. He said such collaborations with the Zambia Defense Force can ensure gender-based violence is addressed within regional militaries.

“No military can tackle this issue alone,” he said. “By sharing knowledge and collaborating across branches and communities, we can develop more effective strategies to combat gender-based violence. Engaging in open dialogue, facilitating workshops and creating joint initiatives will enable us to learn from one another and strengthen our collective efforts.”

Attending the workshop in Lusaka, Zambian Defense Force Major Stephen Muleya said the military workplace must be free of gender-based harassment.

“When individuals know that they can perform their duties without the threat of harassment or violence, they are more likely to focus fully on their missions,” he said. “We must actively cultivate an atmosphere where everyone can thrive free from fear and intimidation.”

Zambian officials said they’re planning to open a regional office for innovative gender-based violence solutions.

Zambian air force legal adviser Major Glory Musonda said collaboration with U.S. partners should result in solutions to gender-based violence within the force.

“We all have a responsibility to build military environments where respect and dignity are upheld,” Musonda said. “It’s not enough to simply acknowledge the issue, we must  actively work toward solutions that ensure the safety and well-being of every service member.”

Meanwhile, officials representing the U.S. Army War College are in Lusaka for discussions on women, peace and security, which aligns with efforts to address gender-based violence in the region.
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johannesburg — South Africa is planning a massive mouse eradication project on a sub-Antarctic island to try to stop the invasive species from wiping out the precious seabirds that nest there.

Marion Island, in the southern Indian Ocean almost 2,000 kilometers from Cape Town, is a remote and windswept South African territory that’s home to extensive bird life, including the wandering albatross.

But those birds face an unusual threat: predatory mice that have been feasting on their chicks. The mice are an accident of history, but their population has been increased by climate change.

“The mice were introduced accidentally in the early 1800s,” said Anton Wolfaardt, a conservationist who is leading the program to eradicate the mice. “They came ashore – they were essentially stowaways on the vessels of the early seal hunters that visited the island.”

Huge jump in population

As the island has grown warmer and drier because of climate change, it has also grown more favorable for the mice. Now, by the end of the summer, the mouse population will have increased by 500 percent, he said.   

It was only fairly recently that researchers on Marion observed the mice preying on chicks, but the phenomenon has increased. 

The rodents are such a threat now, Wolfaardt said, “that experts predict that 19 of the 29 bird species on Marion Island face local extinction in the presence of mice.” 

Elsa van Ginkel, a researcher who was employed by the University of Pretoria to collect data on the island last year, said the island region was “truly out of this world. Walking among wandering albatross chicks every day and watching them grow into fledglings – wow, just wow, it’s an absolute privilege.”

But they are slowly being wiped out.

“These fledglings have no means of defending themselves from a mouse that actually starts eating it alive,” van Ginkel said. “It’s quite horrific.”

So Birdlife South Africa, a nongovernmental organization, and South Africa’s forest, fisheries and environment department are planning a major intervention to try to save the seabirds and restore the island to its natural state. 

Wolfaardt is heading the initiative, which is still seeking funding and is scheduled to take place in a few years.  

“Very simply, the operation involves broadcasting a specialized rodenticide bait, from bait spreader buckets that are slung beneath helicopters that are guided by GPS technology,” he said.

The pellets of rodent poison won’t negatively affect the rest of the flora and fauna on the island, experts say.  

A similar project has been undertaken before. In the 1940s, feral cats were introduced to Marion Island to try to control the mice, but then the felines started preying on the seabirds.  

The cats were successfully eradicated in the early 1990s, although that, of course, left the mice to flourish.
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Nairobi — As cases of mpox rise across the African continent, public health experts and world leaders are sounding the alarm, saying more needs to be done to contain the viral outbreak.

Fifteen countries in Africa are assessed as having active outbreaks, with Morocco being the latest to report a case.

Samuel Boland, mpox incident manager for the World Health Organization regional office for Africa, said that while the Democratic Republic of Congo and Burundi account for almost 90 percent of confirmed cases, more instances are popping up in other countries.

“DRC, Burundi [are] especially affected but also Cameroon, Central African Republic, Nigeria, Cote D’Ivoire, Republic of Congo, Liberia, Uganda, Kenya, Gabon, Rwanda, South Africa and Guinea,” he told VOA, speaking from Brazzaville in the Republic of Congo.  

The WHO says two distinct clades, or strains, have been identified. Clade I was formerly known as the Congo Basin clade, and Clade II was formerly West African clade. 

Previously known as monkeypox, the viral disease can spread through close contact between people, according to the World Health Organization, and occasionally via objects and areas touched by a person with mpox. 

Signs and symptoms include fever, rash, and swollen lymph nodes.  

Boland said there have been 6,580 confirmed cases so far this year, but there’s a bigger number of suspected cases. Suspected cases are clinically compatible with mpox but may not have been tested due to various limitations in several countries. That number has climbed to nearly 32,000. 

“Now amongst that large number of suspected cases, 844 people have died. But when focusing on the confirmed cases this year as in from the first of January, 32 people have, unfortunately, passed away,” Boland said.

In a virtual briefing last week, Jean Kaseya, director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, said mpox is not under control in Africa. He said that while vaccine donations are trickling in, the amount is insufficient to contain the outbreak. 

“Today, we have almost around 4 million commitments of doses, but we say we need more,” Kaseya said. 

U.S. President Joe Biden, in an address to world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 24, 2024, highlighted the need to “move quickly” to confront the mpox outbreak in Africa.  

“We’re prepared to commit $500 million to help African countries prevent and respond to mpox and to donate 1 million doses of mpox vaccine now,” he said. 

No specific date was given as to when the vaccines will arrive in Africa, but Biden said the investments will be delivered bilaterally, through existing relationships with partner countries, as well as through multilateral institutions.  

In addition to vaccines, Boland said this mpox outbreak requires interventions across the full spectrum of the public health sector. He said the world needs to scale up and make sure it can deliver in several areas.  

“Things like surveillance, which will include case investigation and contact tracing — both going out into communities and looking for cases,” he said. “Also engaging and encouraging communities to report cases when people become unwell.”  

He said this approach includes infection prevention and control, case management and vaccination. 
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Gaborone, Botswana — Botswana is hosting delegates from 33 African elephant range states for talks on the trade in live elephants. They are also seeking a common position as Africa battles increasing elephant populations in some areas, while the numbers decline elsewhere on the continent.

Botswana’s environment and tourism minister, Nnaniki Makwinja, said Africa must speak with one voice despite the peculiar challenges each region faces. 

“We are cognizant that the challenges that we face are diverse and there is no silver bullet to address these challenges,” Makwinja said Monday during the opening of the four-day meeting. “We call upon these countries to engage with us before they adopt measures that may undermine our efforts to conserve our wildlife heritage and sustainable development goals.”  

In 2022, delegates from Africa attended talks in Panama on the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, or CITES. They were divided over elephant management. 

Southern African nations want CITES to relax measures on elephant trade, but some parts of the continent, particularly the eastern and western areas, want stricter controls. 

Dan Challender, a conservation scientist on the wildlife trade based at the University of Oxford, said this week’s meeting in Botswana might not address all concerns given the uneven distribution of the animals across the continent. 

“The meeting provides an opportunity for African countries to come together and discuss trade in African elephants. I would expect them to find common ground on some issues but not all, recognizing the different status of the species and policy environments across the continent,” Challender said. 

The meeting is open to governments, but non-profit conservation organizations are not invited. 

Local conservationist Isaac Theophilus of the Botswana Wildlife Producers Association said delegates from countries that oppose trade in elephants should get a chance to see the impact of human-wildlife conflict. 

“We have two opposing blocks that will be seated around the same table to look at issues relating to elephant management,” Theophilus said. “My hope and wish is that those states attending would have an opportunity to interact with people in the (wildlife) area and get firsthand information relating to problems associated with living with an increasing elephant population.” 

Veterinarian and wildlife management expert Dr. Eric Verreynne said trade in live elephants poses logistical challenges. 

“Transporting elephants from one country to another brings with it some challenges. Most of these challenges relate to logistics,” Verreynne said. “They are bulk animals; it’s very, very expensive to transport. When you talk about females and calves, you have to take your family groups in one. The capacity to transport large numbers of elephants is limited.” 

Africa’s elephant population is estimated at 415,000, with more than half of the number living in southern Africa.
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A Kenyan conservancy is using reformed poachers to protect wildlife. Conservation authorities say the program has helped to significantly reduce cases of poaching, especially in northern Kenya where communities are notorious for illegal hunting. Victoria Amunga reports from Meru, Kenya. Camera and video editing by Jimmy Makhulo.
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DAKAR, Senegal — At least 30 bodies were found on a boat drifting off the coast of Senegal’s capital, the military said Monday, as the number of migrants leaving West Africa increases. 

The navy was informed of the vessel’s presence on Sunday evening and sent out a boat patrol to the area, 70 kilometers (38 nautical miles) from Dakar, Ibrahima Sow, spokesperson for Senegal’s military, said in a statement. 

“So far, 30 bodies have been counted,” Sow said. 

The advanced state of decomposition of the bodies is making the identification process very difficult, the military said, adding that investigations will provide more information on the death toll and the boat’s origin. 

Earlier this month, a boat carrying 89 people on board capsized off the coast of Senegal. At least 37 people died, according to Senegalese authorities. 

Many of the migrants leaving West Africa through Senegal flee conflict, poverty and a lack of jobs. Most head to the Canary Islands, a Spanish archipelago off the coast of West Africa, which is used as a stepping stone to continental Europe. 

Since the beginning of the year, more than 22,300 people have landed on the Canary Islands, 126% more than the same period last year, according to statistics released by Spain’s Interior Ministry. 

Last month, the Senegalese army said it had arrested 453 migrants and “members of smuggling networks” as part of a 12-day operation patrolling the coastline. More than half of those arrested were Senegalese nationals, the army said. 

In July, a boat carrying 300 migrants, mostly from Gambia and Senegal, capsized off Mauritania. More than a dozen died and at least 150 others went missing. 

The Atlantic route from West Africa to the Canary Islands is one of the deadliest in the world. While there is no accurate death toll because of the lack of information on departures from West Africa, the Spanish migrant rights group Walking Borders estimates the victims are in the thousands this year alone. 

Migrant vessels that get lost or run into problems often vanish in the Atlantic, with some drifting across the ocean for months until they are found in the Caribbean and Latin America carrying only human remains.
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Dar es Salaam, Tanzania — Police arrested Tanzania’s top opposition figures on Monday, their party said, as the authorities moved to block a mass protest in the commercial capital Dar es Salaam. 

Despite an official ban, the opposition Chadema party had vowed to go ahead with the rally over the alleged kidnapping and killing of its members by security forces.

Chadema said its chairman Freeman Mbowe and his deputy Tundu Lissu were both arrested on Monday, while riot police were stationed in key areas across the city to prevent gatherings.

“Demonstration is our constitutional right and we are surprised by the magnitude of force being used by the police to threaten people and suppress our freedom,” Mbowe told supporters before being led away by police, according to a video shared by the party online.

Chadema accuses President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s government of returning the country to the repressive tactics of her predecessor, John Magufuli. 

Hassan took over following Magufuli’s sudden death in March 2021 and appeared to signal a more liberal approach, reversing restrictions on opposition rallies and the media. 

But Chadema accuses the security forces of being behind the recent disappearance of several members and the killing of Ali Mohamed Kibao, of its national secretariat, who was found dead earlier this month.

Police also blocked a youth day rally by the party in August, arresting dozens of its leaders including Mbowe and Lissu. 

Rights groups and Western governments, including the United States, have raised concerns about renewed repression ahead of local elections in November and a general election in late 2025. 

Lissu, an opposition stalwart, has been arrested countless times and suffered multiple gunshot wounds in an assassination attempt in 2017. 

He returned to Tanzania last year after Hassan lifted the ban on opposition rallies. 

Police had alleged that the Chadema protests would be violent. 

But in a speech broadcast on X on Sunday, Mbowe said: “I remind Tanzanians that we are going to hold peaceful protests. We are neither carrying any weapons nor planning to violate the peace as some people allege. 

“In case some of us will be arrested, hurt or even killed, pray for us and never turn back. We are doing this to make our country a peaceful place to live,” he said. 
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MALINDI, Kenya — Shukran Karisa Mangi always showed up drunk at work, where he dug up the bodies of doomsday cult members buried in shallow graves. But the alcohol couldn’t numb his shock the morning he found the body of a close friend, whose neck had been twisted so severely that his head and torso faced opposite directions.

This violent death upset Mangi, who had already unearthed children’s bodies. The number of bodies kept rising in this community off Kenya’s coastline where extremist evangelical leader Paul Mackenzie is accused of instructing his followers to starve to death for the opportunity to meet Jesus.

While he sometimes sees the remains of others when he tries to sleep, Mangi said recently, the recurring image of his friend’s mutilated body torments him when he’s awake.

“He died in a very cruel manner,” said Mangi, one of several gravediggers whose work was suspended earlier in the year as bodies piled up in the morgue. “Most of the time, I still think about how he died.”

In one of the deadliest cult-related massacres ever, at least 436 bodies have been recovered since police raided Good News International Church in a forest some 70 kilometers inland from the coastal town of Malindi. Seventeen months later, many in the area are still shaken by what happened despite repeated warnings about the church’s leader.

Mackenzie pleaded not guilty to charges in the murders of 191 children, multiple counts of manslaughter and other crimes. If convicted, he would spend the rest of his life in prison.

Some in Malindi who spoke to The Associated Press said Mackenzie’s confidence while in custody showed the wide-ranging power some evangelists project even as their teachings undermine government authority, break the law, or harm followers desperate for healing and other miracles.

It’s not only Mackenzie, said Thomas Kakala, a self-described bishop with the Malindi-based Jesus Cares Ministry International, referring to questionable pastors he knew in the capital, Nairobi.

“You look at them. If you are sober and you want to hear the word of God, you wouldn’t go to their church,” he said. “But the place is packed.”

A man like Mackenzie, who refused to join the fellowship of pastors in Malindi and rarely quoted Scripture, could thrive in a country like Kenya, said Kakala. Six detectives have been suspended for ignoring multiple warnings about Mackenzie’s illegal activities.

Kenya, like much of East Africa, is dominated by Christians. While many are Anglican or Catholic, evangelical Christianity has spread widely since the 1980s. Many pastors style their ministries in the manner of successful American televangelists, investing in broadcasting and advertising.

Many of Africa’s evangelical churches are run like sole proprietorships, without the guidance of trustee boards or laity. Pastors are often unaccountable, deriving authority from their perceived ability to perform miracles or make prophecies. Some, like Mackenzie, can seem all-powerful.

Mackenzie, a former street vendor and cab driver with a high school education, apprenticed with a Malindi preacher in the late 1990s. There, in the laid-back tourist town, he opened his own church in 2003.

A charismatic preacher, he was said to perform miracles and exorcisms, and he could be generous with his money. His followers included teachers and police officers. They came to Malindi from across Kenya, giving Mackenzie national prominence that spread the pain of the deaths across the country.

The first complaints against Mackenzie concerned his opposition to formal schooling and vaccination. He was briefly detained in 2019 for opposing the government’s efforts to assign national identification numbers to Kenyans, saying the numbers were satanic.

He closed his Malindi church premises later that year and urged his congregation to follow him to Shakahola, where he leased 800 acres of forest inhabited by elephants and big cats.

Church members paid small sums to own plots in Shakahola, and were required to build houses and live in villages with biblical names like Nazareth, according to survivors. Mackenzie grew more demanding, with people from different villages forbidden from communicating or gathering, said former church member Salama Masha.

“What made me (realize) Mackenzie was not a good person was when he said that the children should fast to die,” said Masha, who escaped after witnessing the starvation deaths of two children. “That’s when I knew that it’s not something I can do.”

Mbatha Mackenzie, a mason who lives with his family and goats in a tin shack in Malindi, said that while Mackenzie was generous to his followers, he never treated his extended family with similar kindness.

“My brother — he seemed like a politician,” he said. “They have a sweet tongue, and when he talks something to the people, people believe him.”

A former church member who escaped Shakahola said she lost faith in Mackenzie when she saw how his men handled people on the verge of dying from starvation. She said Mackenzie’s bodyguards would take the starving person away, never to be seen again.

The woman said it was “like a routine” for the bodyguards to rape women in the villages. She says she, too, was sexually assaulted by four men while she was pregnant with her fourth child. The Associated Press does not identify victims of alleged sexual assault unless they choose to publicly identify themselves.

Those who tried to the leave the forest without Mackenzie’s permission faced beatings, as did those who were caught breaking fast, according to former church members.

Autopsies on more than 100 bodies showed deaths from starvation, strangulation, suffocation, and injuries from blunt objects. Mangi, the gravedigger, said he believed more mass graves were yet to be discovered in Shakahola. At least 600 people are reported missing, according to the Kenya Red Cross.
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N’Djamena, Chad — Severe flooding in Chad since July has claimed 503 lives and affected around 1.7 million people since July, the United Nations said Saturday in its latest assessment of the disaster. 

The floods have destroyed 212,111 houses, flooded 357,832 hectares of fields, and drowned 69,659 heads of cattle, said the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Chad. 

All of the country’s provinces have been hit, Chad’s water and energy minister Marcelin Kanabe Passale told journalists Saturday morning, warning of more trouble to come. 

“The waters of the Logone and Chari rivers have reached a critical height likely to cause obvious serious flooding in the coming days,” Passale said. 

N’Djamena, Chad’s capital, is located where the Logone and Chari rivers flow into each other. 

Passale recommended that all water from private wells be treated with chlorine before consumption. 

A flood-monitoring committee had been set up to “assess the risks associated with the pollution of drinking water supplies and rising river levels,” he added. 

The U.N. warned in early September of the impact of “torrential rains and severe flooding” in the wider region, particularly in Chad, calling for immediate action and funding to tackle climate change. 

This summer has been the hottest recorded globally since records have been kept, with a slew of record temperatures, heatwaves, drought and severe flooding. 
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Washington — The United States, the United Kingdom and Norway expressed “deep concern” on Saturday at the announcement of a two-year delay in elections in South Sudan, terming the extension of a transitional government a “failure.”

“This announcement demonstrates the persistent and collective failure of South Sudan’s leaders to create the conditions necessary to hold credible and peaceful elections,” said a joint statement from the three governments.

South Sudan won independence from Sudan in 2011 but was plunged into a civil war two years later that killed an estimated 400,000 people.

A 2018 peace deal brought together President Salva Kiir and bitter rival Vice President Riek Machar, but efforts to write a constitution and hold the country’s first elections have been repeatedly delayed.

Last week, Kiir’s office announced that voting planned for December would be pushed back by another two years, ahead of a Sunday deadline for the transitional government to be dissolved.

Cabinet Affairs Minister Martin Elia Lomuro said the extension was “in response to the recommendations from both electoral institutions and the security sector.”

The three countries “acknowledged” that polls could not be held as scheduled in December and blamed “a lack of political will.”

“Responsibility for this failure is shared by all parties in the transitional government,” said the statement. “As South Sudan’s leaders vie for power and fail to organize credible and peaceful elections, the people of South Sudan suffer the consequences.”

Earlier this week, the United Nations expressed “regret and disappointment” at the delay.

“Two years ago, we were in a similar situation, as we are today, and gave our support specifically under the condition that there would be no more extensions,” U.N. special representative Nicholas Haysom said in a statement.

South Sudan has battled flooding, hunger and violence, while its leaders have appeared reluctant to risk going to the polls and are accused of massive corruption.

Earlier this month, the U.N.’s humanitarian agency warned that more than 700,000 people had been affected by flooding, with aid failing to meet many in need.

South Sudan boasts plentiful oil resources, but the vital source of revenue was cut in February when an export pipeline was damaged in war-torn Sudan.
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