July 25, 2021 – Djibouti News Gazette

July 25, 2021

Zimbabwe Receives COVID-19 Vaccines from China Amid Fears of Third Wave

Zimbabwe on Sunday received one million SINOVAC vaccines it bought from China as the African country battles to meet the demand for the COVID-19 jabs. Zimbabweans want to get vaccinated to beat a third wave facing the country.

After the arrival of the doses from China on Sunday, Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube told reporters that Zimbabwe had paid $92 million for 12 million jabs from China and from the COVAX – the United Nations’ vaccine-sharing initiative.

“So, our vaccination program and vaccine acquisition program is going very well. For the first dose, we are already reaching about 50,000 vaccinations per day, which is good going indeed. So, all is going well. And we feel that we are well on our way of achieving that target of herd immunity which we need in order to open our economy safely so that the recovery is sustained and we can move from strength to strength with our objectives,” said Ncube.

In a virtual press conference this week Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, the World Health Organization’s regional director for Africa, said the continent was going through a third wave of COVID-19 infections and should urgently ramp up COVID-19 vaccination program.

“Africa continues to lag behind, sadly. Yet Africa’s supply crunch is starting to ease. The first delivery of doses donated by the USA through the COVAX Facility are arriving in Africa and altogether nearly 60 million doses are expected in the coming weeks through COVAX from Team Europe, UK, purchased doses and other partners. African countries must go all out and speed up their vaccine rollouts by five to six times if they are to get all these doses into arms and fully vaccinate the most vulnerable 10% of their people by the end of September,” said Moeti.

COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Slightly more than 1,400,000 Zimbabweans out of a population of 14 million have received their first shot, and nearly 680,000 have received their second inoculation since the program started in February.

Norman Murwizi is one of the Zimbabweans who has yet to get a vaccine due to shortages.

“The chances of me getting vaccinated would have increased due to increase supply of vaccines. My guess or wish will be – the service rate will actually have improved so that the number (of people to vaccinated) will plummet and the chances of people getting vaccinated does increase. So, the expectation increases of me getting a vaccine with no hassle at all. Or with minimum farce,” said Murwizi.

Zimbabwe had turned down Johnson & Johnson vaccines which the African Union sourced for its members with financing from the African Development Bank but changed its mind.

Zimbabwe has 97,277 confirmed coronavirus infections and 3,050 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University, which is tracking the global outbreak. On Sunday, Dr. John Mangwiro, Zimbabwe’s junior health minister, said with the arrival of a million jabs, the vaccination program would intensify.

Source: Voice of America

July 25, 2021

Man Accused of Attempted Assassination of Mali President Dies in Custody

A man accused of attempting to stab Mali’s interim President Assimi Goita last week has died in hospital while in the custody of security services, the government said in a statement on Sunday.

Goita, a special forces colonel who orchestrated two coups in the last year, escaped unharmed after the assailant tried to stab him during prayers at a mosque in the capital Bamako on Tuesday.

Security agents threw a man into the back of a military pickup truck, video obtained by Reuters showed, as Goita was ringed by bodyguards.

“During the investigations … his state of health deteriorated,” the statement said. He was taken to hospital, where he died, it said.

An investigation is underway to determine the cause of death.

Mali, the theatre of French-supported operations against al Qaeda and Islamic State-linked insurgents for a decade, was thrown into political turmoil after a military junta led by Goita toppled President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita in August 2020.

Goita served as vice-president to transitional leader Bah Ndaw until the latter’s ouster in May.

Source: Voice of America

July 25, 2021

Ethiopia’s Amhara State Rallies Youth to Fight Tigrayans as War Expands

Ethiopia’s Amhara state on Sunday called on “all young people” to take up arms against Tigrayan fighters who are battling the federal government military and forces from all of Ethiopia’s other nine regions.

The call for mass mobilization against Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) fighters – whom Amhara’s military said were now attacking the state – expands the eight-month-old war and instability in the Horn of Africa country.

“I call on all young people, militia, non-militia in the region, armed with any government weapon, armed with personal weapons, to join the anti-TPLF war mission from tomorrow,” Agegnehu Teshager, president of Amhara regional government was quoted as saying by the region’s state media.

Calls to TPLF spokesman Getachew Reda, for a comment were not answered.

War erupted between the Ethiopian military and the TPLF, which rules Ethiopia’s northernmost region, in November.

Three weeks later, the government declared victory when it captured Tigray’s capital Mekelle, but the TPLF kept fighting. At the end of June, the TPLF seized control of Mekelle and most of Tigray after government soldiers withdrew.

This week, the Tigrayans pushed their offensive to Afar, their neighboring state to the east, where they said they planned to target troops from the Amhara region fighting alongside the federal military in the area.

Afar is a strategic region for landlocked Ethiopia because the main road and railway linking the capital, Addis Ababa, with the seaport of Djibouti runs through it.

On Saturday, Amhara’s special forces commander, Brigadier General Tefera Mamo, was quoted by the region’s state media as saying the war had expanded to the state.

“The terrorist group has started a war in the Amhara and Afar regions and is also harassing Ethiopians,” Tefera said, referring to TPLF. “Amhara Special Forces are fighting in coordination with other security forces.”

Thousands of people have died in the fighting, around 2 million have been displaced and more than 5 million rely on emergency food aid.

Source: Voice of America

July 25, 2021

Cameroon: Civilians Flee After Deadly Boko Haram Attack

Cameroon says hundreds of civilians have fled Sagme, a northern village on the border with Nigeria, after a Boko Haram attack Saturday that left eight government troops dead and 13 wounded, according to a press release. The Cameroonian military deployed to the area and said fighters were also killed.

Cameroon’s military says about 90 heavily armed terrorists on six military tactical vehicles and several motorcycles entered the country from Nigeria Saturday, launching attacks on Sagme village.

Sagme is located in Cameroon’s Far North region that shares a border with Nigeria’s Borno state, said to be an epicenter of jihadist group Boko Haram.

The press release by Army Captain Cyrille Serge Atonfack Guemo says the troops fought back but did not say how many combatants were killed. Guemo said the fighters escaped to Nigeria carrying bodies of their dead peers.

Midjiyawa Bakari, governor of Cameroon’s Far North region, said six of the Cameroonian troops were killed on the spot while the other two died while being transported to a hospital in the northern town of Maroua. He said many troops suffered severe wounds during the intense shootout with Boko Haram terrorists but managed to escape. Bakari said he is extending the condolences of Cameroon’s President Paul Biya to the families of the soldiers killed.

Cameroon’s military said Biya immediately ordered the deployment of more troops to secure the country’s territory and civilians.

Bakari said several hundred civilians escaped from Sagme and neighboring villages to the bush for safety. He said the fleeing civilians should return to their villages as the military has been redeployed to protect lives and property.

He said people who think that Boko Haram has been eradicated from northern Cameroon are wrong. He said he is calling on civilians to help the military fight the terrorists through information sharing.

Bakari said he has asked traditional rulers, the clergy and community leaders to remobilize self-defense groups, especially along the border with Nigeria.

The Nigerian government has not issued a statement regarding the attack. But the Multinational Joint Task Force of the Lake Chad Basin Commission, comprising troops from Cameroon, Nigeria, Chad and Benin, has acknowledged the incident and said the fighters crossed over from Nigeria.

Security analyst and former military spokesman Didier Badjeck says the Cameroonian military alone cannot defeat Boko Haram terrorists.

He said Boko Haram has been infiltrating many localities on the northern border with Nigeria and that it is very difficult for the military to detect the terrorists if civilians do not collaborate by reporting strangers in all border towns and villages. Badjeck said churches and mosques should ask civilians to stop lodging visitors and giving strangers food, thinking that they are obeying religious teachings.

Badjeck said fighters may be disguising themselves as ranchers moving around in search of food for their cattle or as farmers visiting markets to sell crops.

In December 2020, Bakari said Boko Haram was establishing ties with top officials of his region. The revelation came after Cameroon’s military arrested Blama Malla, a former lawmaker, for allegedly supplying cattle to the Nigerian terrorist group. Malla was detained in the northern town of Mora.

Boko Haram terrorists have been fighting for 11 years to create an Islamic caliphate in northeast Nigeria. The fighting has spread to Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Benin, with regular killings, burnings of mosques, churches, markets and schools, and attacks on military installations.

The United Nations reports that Boko Haram violence has killed 30,000 people and displaced about two million in Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger and Chad.

Source: Voice of America

July 25, 2021

28 Abducted Baptist School Students Freed in Nigeria

Armed kidnappers in Nigeria have released 28 of the more than 120 students who were abducted at the beginning of July from the Bethel Baptist High School in the northern town of Damishi.

Church officials returned those children to their parents at the school on Sunday. But the Rev. Israel Akanji, president of the Baptist Convention, said more than 80 other children are still being held by the gunmen.

So far 34 children kidnapped from the school on July 5 have either been released or have escaped from the custody of the gunmen. It is unclear when the other children will be released. The gunmen have reportedly demanded 500,000 Naira (about $1,200) for each student.

Akanji said the church did not pay any ransoms because it is opposed to paying criminals, but he added the church was unable to stop the children’s families from taking any actions they deem fit to secure their release.

A spokesman for the Nigerian Police, Mohammed Jalige, said security forces and civilian defense forces were on a routine rescue patrol July 12 around the forests near the village of Tsohon Gaya when they found three exhausted kidnapped victims roaming in the bush. Two other students escaped on July 20 when they were ordered to fetch firewood from a nearby forest. Jalige said they were undergoing medical examinations.

Gunman called bandits have carried out a spate of mass abductions from schools in northern Nigeria this year, mainly seeking ransoms.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who won election on hopes that he would tackle Nigeria’s security challenges, has not been able to do much in addressing the growing cases of mass abductions from Nigerian schools.

Source: Voice of America