News Africa Extended

News Africa Extended

Kenya sentences ivory smuggler to 20 years

Posted: 22 Jul 2016 12:52 PM PDT

Ivory smuggling kingpin Feisal Ali Mohamme, was sentenced for the possession of more than 400 pieces of ivory worth almost half a million dollars.

|||

Nairobi - A Kenyan court Friday convicted ivory smuggling kingpin Feisal Ali Mohammed and sentenced him to 20 years in prison for possessing more than 400 pieces of ivory worth almost half a million dollars.

Kenya Wildlife Service celebrated the “landmark ruling” as “a strong message to all networks of poaching gangs, ivory smugglers, financiers, middlemen and shippers.”

The service said on Twitter it was a “resounding guilty verdict” that is a “tough warning to poaching gangs and their financiers.”

Mohammed's ivory was confiscated in 2014 in a warehouse in the coastal city of Mombasa.

According to the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), some 35 000 tusked animals were killed on the continent in 2015 alone. The total elephant population on the continent is between 400 000 and 500 000.

In April, President Uhuru Kenyatta set fire to 105 tons of ivory and more than a ton of rhino horn in a ceremony aimed at highlighting the plight of the East African nation's endangered wildlife. The pile was valued at around 150 million dollars.

In addition to his sentence, Mohammed also was fined 200 000 dollars.

DPA

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Zambian prisoners not allowed to vote

Posted: 22 Jul 2016 10:29 AM PDT

No Zambian prisoners will be able to vote in the general elections set for August 11 as they are not covered by the voter registration exercise.

|||

Gaborone - The Zambian government says none of the prisoners currently held in correctional facilities across the country will vote in the general elections set for August 11 because they were not covered by the voter registration exercise, which ended in February.

The declaration is contained in an opposing affidavit submitted by the Attorney-General’s office in response to a Constitutional Court challenge from the Zambia Prisons Care and Counselling Association (PRISCCA).

PRISCCA director Geoffery Malembeka approached the court to seek an order to compel the AG’s Office and Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) to ensure that prisoners exercised their right to vote in the upcoming polls.

In his submission, Malembeka said because one remained innocent until proven given guilty in terms of Zambian law, all pre-trial and remand prisoners should vote in terms of Article 46 of the Constitution, which allows all eligible citizens to vote.

He pleaded with the court to order the Ministry of Home Affairs to issue identity cards to all prisoners who are eligible to vote. Malembeka also sought an order to compel the ECZ to conduct a timed voter registration programme to ensure that all prisoners who were eligible exercised their right to vote.

In his opposing affidavit, Senior State Advocate at the AG’s office, Murah Kapamba, conceded that the rights of the prisoners had been violated. The AG’s Office said the prisoners could only vote in the 2020 elections because the issuing of registration cards could not be done before the August 2016 elections.

Additionally, the AG noted that voter registration and pre-election verification were lengthy processes which required much more time than the few weeks left to the next election. ECZ’s director of elections, Chomba Chella, submitted that even with a favourable court order, allowing the prisoners to vote would be a violation of the law as none were registered voters.

Further, the electoral commission argued that no polling stations had been set up in correctional facilities. The Constitutional Court is expected to hold hearings on the matter ahead of the elections. Eight political parties will take part in the tightly contested presidential, parliamentary, referendum and local government poll.

However, the main contest is expected to take place between President Edgar Lungu’s governing Patriotic Front (PF) party and the main opposition United Party for National Development (UPND) of leading presidential contender Hakainde Hichilema.

African News Agency

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Zimbabwe war veterans turn on ‘dictator’ Mugabe

Posted: 22 Jul 2016 04:58 AM PDT

Zimbabwean war veterans have turned on their long-time ally President Robert Mugabe, describing him as a dictator.

|||

Harare - Zimbabwean war veterans turned on their long-time ally President Robert Mugabe, describing him as a dictator in a jolting rebuke underlining political manoeuvring over his succession and mounting anger over economic woes.

The veterans, who have campaigned, often violently, for the veteran leader during presidential elections since 2000, said they were withdrawing their political support, a statement that exposed rifts in the heart of Zimbabwe's establishment.

“(Mugabe's) leadership has presided over unbridled corruption and downright mismanagement of the economy, leading to national economic ruin for which the effects are now felt throughout the land,” the Zimbabwe Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA) said.

“We note, with concern, shock and dismay, the systematic entrenchment of dictatorial tendencies, personified by the President and his cohorts, which have slowly devoured the values of the liberation struggle,” the veterans added in the statement issued after a seven-hour meeting of its leaders on Thursday evening.

The 92-year-old president - the country's only ruler since independence from Britain - is looking increasingly frail and struggling to walk up stairs in public, though he has said he wants to live to 100, and denies local media reports that he has prostate cancer.

As senior members of the ruling ZANU-PF party manoeuvre for advantage in a post-Mugabe era, two factions have emerged, one linked to Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa and one to Mugabe's wife Grace.

Veterans want Mnangagwa to succeed Mugabe, saying this would be in line with party tradition. Mugabe last month warned veterans against trying to influence the choice of who will succeed him.

“The centre can not hold and I am seeing Mugabe increasingly under siege. We are in a transition now from the Mugabe era, no doubt about that,” said Ibbo Mandaza, a leading academic and political commentator.

Former finance minister, Simba Makoni, who was seen as a future Mugabe successor before leaving ZANU-PF to challenge him in 2008, said on Friday the president should resign because he had failed Zimbabweans.

Political infighting has been exacerbated by an economic crisis, widely blamed on mismanagement and, more recently, the effects of a region-wide drought.

Public anger over inflation, unemployment and other hardships has poured out into the streets in a nation-wide protest movement.

In a show of support for those demonstrations, organised by activist pastor Evan Mawarire's #ThisFlag movement, the veterans accused the police of brutality against protesters.

Reuters

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now