Africa Daily

“You catch the flu time and again. Once the weather gets this bad, guaranteed, we get sick” - Calvin Takesure, South African resident On the weekend of the 21st of September 2024, several provinces of South Africa were hit by a heavy snowstorm. Motorists travelling on the N3, one of the national roads towards the coastal city of Durban, were stuck in traffic and forced to sleep in their vehicles....

When president Samia Suluhu Hassan came into power in 2021 she lifted a ban on political rallies imposed by her predecessor the late John Magufuli, and promised the 4 Rs: reconciliation, resilience, reforms and rebuilding. But now, as the country heads towards elections - this year and next - fear is growing. Just under 3 weeks ago, an opposition official Ali Kibao, was abducted, killed and his bo...

Today on the podcast we meet a young Nigerian who’s made it her mission to revive the tradition of weaving – especially for women. Florentina Agu, the founder of luxury brand Hertunba, blends modern fashion with vibrant traditional Nigerian textiles, hoping to inspire more women and young people to consider making their livelihoods from this ancient craft. Between the 1970s and 1990s, Nigeria’s te...

Albinism is an inherited condition that affects the production of melanin. People born with the condition have fair skin, hair and eyes. Superstitions about the body parts of people with albinism have led to violent attacks. In 2008 Tanzania appeared to be the epicentre of these superstitions and attacks. Anyone living with albinism there lived in fear. The BBC’s former Tanzania correspondent Vick...

The Mpox outbreak was declared a public health emergency in August 2024. Since then, more than 29,000 cases and 738 deaths have been reported across 15 Africa Union member states, according to the Africa Centre for Disease Control (Africa CDC). Despite some progress, such as the delivery of 200,000 vaccines to the DRC, challenges remain in getting the vaccines to the most affected communities. The...

“I hated myself so much. But now I have the courage to love myself and see myself beyond this virus.” Singing a song in class with the words ‘Aids is a killer disease’ when none of your classmates know you’re HIV positive… Telling friends your status and then finding people are afraid to touch you… Being told by young men that you’re ‘lucky’ they will date you. Two young women from South Africa an...

Today Alan Kasujja sits down with Dan Marokane, the recently appointed CEO of South Africa's national power supplier, Eskom. He wants to understand how the new boss has been able to halt power cuts that have been devastating to both the economy and the wellbeing of all South Africans. These electricity problems started towards the end of 2007. Then president Thabo Mbeki apologised and admitted tha...

China is now Africa’s biggest trading partner, with 20% of exports going to China and 16% of imports coming from there, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). At the 9th Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) meeting earlier this month, President Xi Jinping promised $50 billion for African development, including military support and new jobs. While this partnership boosts developme...

Hunger. It’s not just a horrible feeling… it also has a massive impact on how a child performs academically and how productive they will be as an adult. A new Gates Foundation report “The Race to Nourish a Warming World” calls malnutrition the world’s worst health crisis - with more than 400 million children not getting the nutrients they need to grow and thrive. Many of those children are in Afri...

“I have eaten elephant meat. I have eaten hippo meat. I think what is food depends on where you are” – Romeo Muyunda, Namibia’s Department of Environment, Forestry and Tourism The drought, which became worse earlier this year, has seen crops being wiped out and animals dying across Southern Africa. As a result, 68 million people have been affected, with some now facing hunger. It’s reached a point...

Rebecca Cheptegei had just returned to her training base in Kenya from Paris, where she had competed in the women’s marathon at the Olympics. The following Sunday she and her two daughters aged 11 and 9 arrived home from a church service. Her ex-boyfriend was waiting at her home with a jerry can of petrol. He poured it on Rebecca and set her on fire as her children watched. She died four days late...

“Dream big! You can achieve your wildest dreams as long as you work hard and get yourself in school.” Nicknamed ‘the Beast’, Tendai Mtawarira is the most-capped prop to have played for the Springboks. Born in Zimbabwe, his talent at rugby was quickly spotted and he was offered a bursary as a teenager to train with the Sharks in South Africa. In 2008 he was called up to play for the national squad...

"The pilot told us, ‘Don’t go back...either you will be raped or killed at the airport if you go back.’" Safia Omer, a former member of Somalia’s national women’s basketball team, vividly remembers the day she knew she couldn’t return home. In 1991, as civil war erupted in Somalia, Safia and her teammates were in Ethiopia for a tournament when they were warned that it was too dangerous to return....

You may not have heard of the African Initiative before… It’s a Russian media organisation - established exactly a year ago – which defines itself as an “information bridge between Russia and Africa”. It has offices in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. But it also stands accused of targeting African journalists - and the public - with disinformation. So what is the end goal for Russia’s African Initia...

“My uncle passed away, his wife, his three sons, I lost my best friend, and a lot of people in Derna lost someone that they know.” On the 11th of September 2023 two dams burst in the hills above the city of Derna in Libya. Millions of tonnes of water were released in a catastrophic flood which killed thousands of people in the city. Whole neighbourhoods were swept away. Eastern Libya had been affe...

Egypt has offered to send 10,000 soldiers to Somalia to assist the country with peacekeeping operations. However, this seems to have unsettled Ethiopia which has said it could not “stand idle while other actors take measures to destabilise the region.” Ethiopia has been a key ally of Somalia in its fight against the militant group, Al-Shabaab. So what exactly has caused these tensions? And what ha...

The people of Tunisia are expected to elect a new president in October. But the build-up to the election has been marred by controversy with key political leaders being arrested and some journalists leaving the country. It all started in July 2021 when president Kais Saied suspended parliament and sacked the prime minister. These events were triggered by anger over the government's handling of the...

“Within just five years we lost almost 20 metres of the shoreline and it does not seem to be slowing with time.” Climate experts say up to 60% of Africa’s coastal land could disappear within the next 50 years due to coastal erosion resulting from sea-level rise. In this episode of Africa Daily, Alan Kasujja discusses the impact of this on coastal communities, and what they need to do to avert the...

The 36-acre landfill is the only landfill serving the whole of Uganda’s capital – Kampala. A city that’s home to an estimated four million people. It collapsed after weeks of relentless rain. The city authorities have reportedly been trying to find a new site for years. Many victims were living in unsafe conditions. An investigation has been ordered into years of neglect. Africa Daily’s Alan Kasuj...

A couple of weeks ago Africa Daily's Alan Kasujja spoke to two farmers in Nigeria and Tanzania about the challenges around farming in Africa. They talked about deteriorating soil quality, rising prices, insecurity and unreliable weather patterns. This week these issues will be discussed at the Africa Food Systems Forum 2024 summit which will be held in Rwanda’s capital Kigali. Heads of state, poli...

“More than ever, the people of Burkina Faso need to remain united around the defence and security forces.” A video showing scores of civilians shot dead in the ditches they were digging - was released by an Al Qaeda-linked group active in Burkina Faso earlier this week. It was apparent proof of a major attack it said it had conducted in the northern village of Barsalogho on Saturday. It’s believed...

“I always say to them (South Africans), these foreign nationals are developing your country. Why can’t you see that? The main guy who owned this shop was always helpful, especially to the old ladies here in our area.” – Samuel Makgowa, South African landlord Earlier this month, shops belonging to foreign nationals were, once again, shut down indefinitely in the township of Soweto in South Africa....

“As a person living with disability, sport gives you the purpose and the inspiration to move on with life because when you see someone who is physically worse off than you doing better than you, you get inspired and want to do more." The Paralympic games start today in Paris, just over two weeks after the Olympic games ended in the French Capital. Over 4,400 athletes with various forms of disabili...

“It becomes scary when you see people that would normally smile at you - and all of a sudden you see so many people on the streets making those kind of chants. And you think, 'wow, what has been going on underground? This is the city that I used to know. Why should I now be extra watchful? What exactly is going on?'” - Toyyib Adelodun, Nigerian migrant in the UK The world watched in shock as polic...

"If not now, then when? And if you don’t do it, who else will?” Those are the two questions Sara Sabry suggests all woman ask themselves when they’re thinking through a big move… and finding they don’t have the confidence to follow it through. And she should know. The Egyptian mechanical and biomedical engineer was the first African woman in space when she blasted off in Blue Origin’s New Shepherd...