African religious leader meeting in Nairobi have urged regional government to ensure the South Sudanese implement the peace deal signed a year ago.

Riek Machar has gone home for the first time since last October and reached an agreement with President Salva Kiir on ending  the bitter civil war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced a third of the population in Africa’s newest country. 

As the two leaders were shaking hands in Juba, religious groups urged neighboring government to maintain pressure on the South Sudan parties to make good on the latest of their undertakings.

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The judgment on this colonial-era legislation is now expected on May 24.

Judge Chacha Mwita told a packed courtroom that judges sat in on other matters in Nairobi and needed more time to consider their ruling on decriminalising homosexuality.

Kenya’s  LGBT community has become increasingly vocal about striking this law off the statute books.

Homosexuality is illegal in 70 countries around of the world – half of these in Africa.

In no fewer than four countries on this continent, same sex relations between consenting adults attracts the death penalty although there have not been any executions of late.

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Five of the jihadis responsible for the shooting and bombing have been killed.

The death toll from the  onslaught is at least 21.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta vows that his security forces will bring to book any other involved in Tuesday’s terrorist attack at the Westgate  Centre.

Al Shabaab, the Somali-based terror group has claimed responsibility, saying the operation was in retaliation for US President Donald Trump recognizing  Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Previous Al Shabaab attacks on Kenyan targets have been in response to that country’s military and political support for the Somali government.

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Having infamously scrambled for the continent 120 years ago, Western leaders are today seeking to dance here.

British Premier Theresa May twice skipped the light fantastic during her three-nation safari.

She danced her robot mash with Cape Town schoolchildren and with boy scouts and girl guides in Nairobi.

French President Emmanuel Macron boogied with musician Femi Kuti at the New Africa Shrine in Lagos last July.

Neither posed any immediate threat to Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

But it showed the lengths they were prepared to go to make friends in Africa.

May was in South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria. She sought to reassure the African heavy hitters that Brexit will not affect their economic ties with Britain.

Macron’s visit was billed as more culture than policy.

But his return to Lagos, where he spent six months as an intern in 2002, was obvious.  He wishes to keep the lines of communication in good order.

Angela Merkel was also in  Africa in the last week of August. She did not pack her dancing pumps for Senegal, Ghana and Nigeria.

Her preoccupation was securing deals with her hosts curbing the stream of irregular migrants from African into Europe.

All  these leaders mentioned Africa’s enviable economic growth and the market potential presented by its growing young population.

But they dared no raise hopes either at home or at their African destinations.

There is a new player in the modern scramble for Africa – and it is one that dwarfs them.

China’s dominance of the African market will be demonstrated at the Forum for China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).

Meeting in  Beijing, it is expected to feature a number of eye-watering offers from China to help Africa’s infrastructure deficit.

At the previous FOCAC in Johannesburg, this amounted to $60 billion.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has recently embarked on his own safari.

He stopped  Senegal and Rwanda before arriving in South Africa for the BRICS summit. Then he visited Mauritius on the way home.

China’s belt and road programme, designed to give Beijing better access to foreign markets, dominated.

Africa, providing strategic resources, played a major part in transforming China to the world’s second largest economy.

It does business differently from Africa’s traditional partners.

It does not impose values like observation of human rights and rule of law.

It provides credit freely. Approaching $100 billion dollars has been loaned by China for building African roads, railways, ports and major buildings.

Critics say Beijing’s constructing an elaborate death trap.

Beijing responds that the critics are none other than the former colonialists, who have an axe to grind.

Who can blame cash-strapped countries being attracted to China’s credit honey pot.

South Africa is among the latest, taking a $2,5 billion loan for ESCOM.

All above board and properly thought out, is the assurance from President Cyril Ramaphosa. 

Question: could that loan have been secured safely and on better terms  from the more rhythmic recent visitors? 

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The Australian Home Affairs Department in Canberra says the action follows internal disciplinary investigations.

The Australian High Commission in Pretoria is referring all inquiries to the country’s home affairs department in Canberrra.

They’ve confirmed that the visa of a Nigerian who is  on a student visa in Australia has been cancelled as a result of fraudulent conduct.

Australian home affairs officials in Pretoria and  Nairobi deal with issuing visas to African visitors.

They employ nationals from South Africa and a number of other African countries  to do the job.

The department has not specified the nationality of the sacked officials nor has it given the number of fraudulent visas they are believed to have issued.

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Government cites demonstrators’ lawless for this sweeping measure.

Having withdrawn from the re-run presidential election, opposition leader  Raila Odinga calls for daily protests next week to keep up pressure on election officials.

Security Minister Fred Matiangi maintains there is a clear, present and imminent danger of a breach of the peace.

Police have been notified that for the time being, demonstrations won’t be allowed within the central business districts of Kenya’s three largest cities.

Hundreds of opposition supporters have marched in recent weeks, sometimes burning tyres and clashing with police who have used teargas to disperse crowds.

Kenya has a recent history of deadly political violence.

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Their plane is out of the five-week air rally  taking the planes, some of them nearly 100 years old, from Greece to South Africa.

John Ordway and his daughter Isabella were fortunate  to escape safely from their 1941 Boeing Stearman that suffered todal engine and crash-landed in Mariashoni in Molo, Nakuru.

They were flying to Nairobi from Eldoret. Ordway, representing Ireland in the event, said they’re lucky to be alive.

He and his daughter have been interchangeably flying the plane as Ms Orway worked towards getting her pilot licence next year.

County police commander Hassan Barua said his officers were on the ground assessing the scene.

Ms Ordway says flying has always been a part of her life even though I was never formally a pilot.

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The Nairobi Declaration adopted at the Tokyo International Conference on African Development or TICAD, has leaders agreement to promote investment in infrastructure that leads to job creation in the region.

ends intro

Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says his country’s public and private sectors will offer cooperation for the development that is led by Africa itself.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta sitting alongside him at the post TICAD press conference says Japan does not press its own views on the continent and continues to be a force for African development.

Abe’s  pledged that Japan will mobilize a total of $30 billion in private- and public-sector funds to invest in Africa over three years to boost infrastructure-building on the resource-rich continent.

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In Nairobi, the Sierra Leon team’s been barred from entering a plane bound for the Indian Ocean island.

The Confederation of African Football confirmed Seychelles withdrawal in a statement without giving a reason.

Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koroma’s declared a state of emergency and ordered the military to enforce the quarantine of parts of his country….

….as has Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf who has also barred football matches and practices to avoid the human contact spreading the deadly haemorraghic disease that started in Guinea in February.

Both Koroma and Sirleaf have scrapped plans to travel to Washington for next week’s US Africa summit.

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