The Democratic Republic of Congo announces that the world’s worst measles outbreak which killed more than 7000 children under five-years-old is over.

The announcement by Health Minister Eteni Londondo  still requires authentication by the World Health Organization which a day earlier 

declared Africa free of wild polio.

The measles outbreak occurred 25-months ago in the south-eastern corner of the DRC and then spread to all 26 provinces.

It infected 335 000 children who suffered blindness, brain swelling, diarrhea and respiratory infection. 

Congo’s hard-pressed medical infrastructure mounted a massive vaccination programme targeting millions of children.

Fighting measles, they were also combatting an EBOLA outbreak that killed 2287 people, vaccine-induced polio, COVID 19, which has killed 251 of the nearly 10 000 people it sickened, and even the bubonic plague. 

The end of the Congolese outbreak doesn’t allow medics to take their foot off the gas there or in any low income country.

An article in The Lancet earlier this year quoted  Tanja  Ducomble and Etienne  Gignano of Medecins Sans Frontieres saying outbreaks occur every two years in the DRC another countries that have a gap in vaccinations and poor access to health care.

Madagascar, Chad and Nigeria are African countries still fighting outbreaks and further afield the Philippines, Yemen and Ukraine are currently experiencing extensive measles infections.

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It is pretty much common cause among strategic analysts that the next world war will be fought over water .

The argument that oil might be the casus belli has been dealt a body blow by the Covid 19 lockdown.

The black stuff remains vital to economic prosperity – important enough, certainly to take up arms over it.

But in the last three months as the economy was forced to take a backseat to public health, the price of oil dropped below zero.

And through the worst times since the Second World War,  the clear stuff has remained as vital to life itself as ever it did.

The most dramatic example of this is the battle over the water in Africa’s longest river stretch 6650 kms from south to .

President Cyril Ramaphosa, in his capacity as revolving chairman of the African Union, presided over a virtual summit yesterday seeking agreement on the use of  the Nile.

The three parties in the thick of things – Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt – agreed to continue pursuing an accord.

That is obviously better than having any of them walk off in a huff.

But they are still a considerable distance from finding an African solution to this existential African problem.

We may take comfort from Egypt asserting that it will not go to war over the Nile.

But since President Abdel Fattah El Sisi has involved both the United Nations Security Council and the Arab, in addition to the African Union, in this imbroglio we may be assured the matter will not go away for some time.

El Sisi would have us believe that the problem started when Ethiopia broke ground nine years ago on the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) across the Blue Nile.

The six-billion-dollar wall rising 155-metres above the water below and extending 1,85 kms across the valley  will make Ethiopia Africa’s largest producer of hydro electric energy and lift many of that country’s 106-million people out of poverty.

Downstream, Egypt counters that the dam will reduce the supply of water on which 100-million of its people are entirely reliant for their survival.

The third riparian country at the top end of the giant river is Sudan, where the White and Blue Niles meet in its capital Khartoum.

It too complains that the GERD will reduce its supply of Nile water. But its position is convoluted by the fact that it will buy some of the 6500 mw generated at the GERD and that the dam will reduce the flood damage it suffers annually from the Nile.

Egypt’s historical hegemony over the Nile was underpinned by agreements signed in 1929 and 1959 by the colonial power, Britain.

Ethiopia was not party to those agreements that it maintain are part of an unhappy past.

It has sought a new agreement with all eleven riparian countries – Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and Eritrea in addition to the northern troika.

This has proved problematic because it requires more than a technical accord on water sharing.

It runs to legal, historical and trust issues that have brought the United States and Europe into the equation.

The matter has come to a head now because satellite pictures show Ethiopia is carrying out its plan to start filling the dam.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year for the compromise he showed in forging a peace with neighboring Eritrea, has been stubborn on this issue. He refuses to tell Egypt how much water will be allowed to flow downstream from the GERD.

Egypt wants this and more, nothing less than an agreement on how much water it can rely on in times of drought and an agreement on the very definition of a drought.

There is also divergence over the timing of the filling.

Ethiopia says it could complete this process in three years but offers a compromise of taking four to seven years. 

Egypt maintains the faster this happens, the greater the impact on its farmers downstream. It is asking for Ethiopia to take at least 21years to fill the dam.

However forceful the ministers of Ahmed and El Sisi may sound in negotiations, their positions must be seen against the domestic troubles in both Ethiopia, which has had to postpone for a year elections scheduled for August and Egypt which has had to commit its full military capability to fighting insurgents in the Sinai.

El Sisi’s claim to be fighting for the very existence of his people must be measured against the real beneficiaries of the Nile water – the factory owner and big farmers who are all part of the power elite that keep him where he is.

Ahmed, for his part, cannot back down on a project financed by loans and donations from a public that still vividly remembers the civil war and famine that turned it into a basket case.

The GERD is an integral part in Ethiopia continuing on its upward trajectory.

ends

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Special envoy of the United Nations Secretary General to the Great Lakes Huang Xia urges the international community not to let up on its support for the region.

Huang Xia says the number of coronavirus infections in the Great Lakes approaches 5 000. COVID 19 has killed 131.

The strict travel restrictions and quarantine has brought agriculture, mining and transportation to a standstill in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda and South Sudan. 

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Angry locals stoned health workers disinfecting  the home of the first identified new case.

The three new cases of EBOLA – after a seven-week period of no infections – are a 26-year-old electrician, and girls aged 11 and 7.

They are all connected to the Horizon Healthcare Centre in Beni.

Authorities say all the medical workers dealing with the outbreak that killed more than 2 200 people have been vaccinated.

Battling COVID 19 and the worst measles outbreak on the planet, these workers are at full stretch trying to prevent EBOLA taking hold again.

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This means the Democratic Republic of Congo is simultaneously battling EBOLA, the COVID 19 pandemic and world’s worst measles outbreak.

The new case of EBOLA reported in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo is the first since February.

The outbreak that started almost two years ago has killed 2 200 people and sickened more than 3 400.

Fighting it has been made extremely difficult because of military action in the affected area where rebels are fighting government troops.

Widespread denial of the outbreak and hostility towards medical personnel has also made the treatment extremely dangerous 

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Some of the injured had to be taken to hospital in private cars because the ambulances could not cope.

It was before dawn in the Brazzaville suburb of Kintele when the lightning struck.

Residents were about to wake on the first day of their lockdown to curb the COVID19 pandemic.

Eyewitnesses said a falling cable struck a house, starting a fire that killed the occupants.

Heavy rain hampered the rescue work.

People were urged to stay away from the disaster area and the Talangai Reference Hospital treating the injured.

The Republic of Congo has 22 confirmed cases of COVID 19.

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The world body says its absolutely vital to beef up health care of children in the DRC also facing  measles, cholera, malaria and EBOLA.

The figures are alarming. 5 300 children under five years old died from the world’s worst measles outbreak in the DRC last year.

There were more than 16,5 million cases of malaria resulting in more than 7000 deaths.

Cholera sickened 31 000 Congolese children.

The EBOLA outbreak is waning – no thanks to the various rebel militia that have turned three provinces in the Eastern DRC into a war zone.

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The region is within weeks of declaring itself EBOLA free after an outbreak that started last year.

The COVID 19 case in Goma is the first of the 17 cases of coronavirus in the DRC not originating in Kinshasa.

Authorities had planned a complicated three-week programme of four-day lockdowns in the capital followed by three days of allowing shopping for food.

This has been cancelled because the danger of unrest and price gouging by food merchants.

Public resistance to the fight against EBOLA has prolonged the second worst epidemic of the hemorrhagic fever in history.

The 3440 confirmed cases killed 2264 people 

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He was 81.

Yhombi was ill before he was infected with the coronavirus.

ends intro

Joachim Yhombi was an army officer who came to power in Congo Brazzaville in 1977 following the assassination of Marien Ngouabi.

He was deposed in 1979 by Denis Sassou Nguessou, the current president of Congo Republic.

Yhombi’s son Jean-Jacques announced his father’s death in Paris where he lived in exile.

Accused of mounting a coup against Sassou Nguessou, Yhombi was jailed from 1987 to 1990.

He was released before the 1991 election that brought multi-party democracy to his country.

He founded the Rally For Democracy and Development and lost a 1992 Presidential election.

He served as President Pascal Lissouba’s Prime Minister between 1994 and 1996.

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The official death toll in 10 but eyewitness put it higher. At least 40 people are injured.

ends intro

The truck hit a minibus taxi, several cars and motorbikes and a number of pedestrians.

Health Minister Eteni Longodo was on the scene soon  after the crash. He assured victims and their families they would get the best treatment.

The government in the Democratic Republic of Congo is criticised for not caring about the victims of road accidents who number 26 000 anually.

Poor roads, unroadworthy vehicles  and excessive speed are blamed for most of the crashes.

Interior Minister Gilbert Kankonde says government is seeking to address this.

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