NEWS ANALYSIS

Libreville, Gabon | AFP |  Equatorial Guinea’s President Teodoro Obiang Nguema will celebrate forty years in power on Saturday, highlighting his status as Africa’s longest-serving head of state. Since he seized control in a 1979 military coup, rights groups have described Obiang Nguema, 77, as one of the continent’s most brutal …

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP |  The 2019/2020 South African Premiership season kicks off Saturday with Mamelodi Sundowns favourites to complete a hat-trick despite uncertainty over the future of multiple title-winning coach Pitso Mosimane. He is reportedly upset that the 2016 CAF Champions League trophy-holders want to hire an unnamed Spanish …

Goma, DR Congo | AFP | An epidemic of Ebola in eastern DR Congo sharply widened on Wednesday, the eve of the first anniversary of the outbreak, with the announcement of a death in a major city and the quarantining of 15 people in a province that had previously escaped the …

GAGLIANO DEL CAPO, Italy | AFP | Working in an arid Italian field of crumbly soil, agronomists are battling a rampant bacterium that has already infected millions of olive trees and could threaten the entire Mediterranean basin. Xylella fastidiosa, which has no known cure, has devastated ancient olive trees in Italy’s …

Accra, Ghana | AFP |  Fish vendor Mercy Allotey waits at the beachfront in Ghana’s capital Accra for customers to buy the freshest catch brought in by the brightly-coloured dugout canoes plying the coast. But she complains the local fishermen are now netting less and less as a combination of illegal …

Kolkata, India | AFP |  When England and Scotland play rugby each year, the winner hoists the Calcutta Cup — a relic of the sport’s roots in India, and a nod to the city where it is still thriving to this day. In the 1870s, when the Calcutta Rugby Football Club …

Harare, Zimbabwe | AFP |  Langton Chiwocha chose Emmerson Mnangagwa among 23 candidates in Zimbabwe’s presidential elections a year ago. Today he says he deeply regrets his choice. “We had high expectations as many promises were made, but things have turned worse since the elections,” Chiwocha told AFP. “I wish I …

Goma, DR Congo | AFP |  An Ebola epidemic raging in eastern DR Congo marks its first year on Thursday in a mood of fear mingled with hope that fresh money and a change of leadership will turn the tide. So far, 1,790 people have died of the dreaded haemorrhagic virus …

Tokyo, Japan | AFP |  For Japanese breakdancer Shigeyuki Nakarai, the prospect of winning a gold medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics has become something of an obsession. The proposal by Paris organisers in February to include the street dance lit a fire under the 17-year-old, aka Shigekix, who took bronze …

London, United Kingdom | AFP | This week’s latest Brexit-fuelled collapse in the troubled pound is a boon for tourists and multinationals — but spells trouble for the purchasing power of UK households. Sterling tumbled Tuesday to two-year lows against the euro and dollar, plagued with concern that Britain will crash …