Twenty years ago in May two remarkable events took place in the Horn of Africa. Somaliland re-established the old colonial boundary and declared itself independent from the rest of Somalia and in Ethiopia the Mengistu regime collapsed and was replaced by Meles Zenawi’s Tigrayan rule. The main city of Somaliland, Hargeis, had been utterly destroyed [...]
Officials at UN headquarters in New York have been cock-a-hoop about the apparent decisive role the world body’s peacekeepers in Cote d’Ivoire played in swinging the balance of power in favour of Alassane Ouattara in the battle over the presidency of the country. The international community is also exultant, with headlines the world over screaming: [...]
There is a story in West Africa that as Ghana and the Ivory Coast approached independence (Ghana became independent in 1957 and Ivory Coast in 1960), their respective founding leaders, Kwame Nkrumah and Felix Houphouet-Boigny, disagreed on the paths they would take their respective nations. Nkrumah preached political freedom for the masses while Houphouet-Boigny argued [...]
Making it as an artist in Uganda is tough, but painter and fashion designer Stella Atal has managed to succeed where others have failed. She puts it down to tenacity and talent, but to establish one-self as a successful commercial artist in a country that dissuades young people from pursuing art as a career requires [...]
The dispute over the building of unenclosed public toilets in Makhaza, Khayelitsha Township, on the outskirts of Cape Town is escalating into a dispute over the country’s Constitution itself. The toilets were built by the Democratic Alliance (DA) led government of the city in 2009 in response to what they perceived as the ruling ANC’s [...]
The country is once again in the midst of political transition, and the way that presidential aspirants within the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) party are conducting themselves has done little to demystify the process to ordinary Nigerians. There are five candidates from the North with intentions to run: Former military President Ibrahim Babangida, former [...]
The Archbishop of Sudan, Daniel Deng Bul Yak visited the UK on the 5th and 6th of October as part of a series of diplomatic and public events to raise international awareness towards the upcoming referendum in the country. NAA spoke with him about his hopes for his country’s future. As head of the Episcopal [...]
President Goodluck Jonathan’s claim that the bomb blasts that rocked the federal capital, Abuja, on 1st October, was not the work of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) continues to attract heavy criticism. The country’s Northern Political Leaders Forum has asked the president to resign within seven days or face the [...]
Recent trends and technological advances have made it easier for people to trace their historical lineage. This has sparked and sustained the success of programmes like the BBC’s ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ which over the past few years has attempted to bring family histories to life. An array of stars and celebrities have [...]
2010 has been a tremendous year for Africa. Not only are seventeen countries celebrating 50 years of independence, but the continent has also attempted to forge ties and unite under a banner of peace. The AU’s African Year of Peace and Security reflects a milestone in the continent’s history. The past fifty years have been [...]
