South Africa lifts liquor ban, school openings delayed

In October last year, around a dozen armed men riding motorbikes attacked a bilingual school in Kumba, also in the Southwest, killing seven children aged nine to 12. A dozen other children were wounded, either by gunfire or machete.

The NGO says authorities desperately need to do more to address the crisis of gender-based violence, particularly amid the pandemic. But hard data on the number of victims is still worryingly difficult to come by.

In Afghanistan, women have now been waiting for three months for their fate to be decided by the Taliban government. One key question is whether older schoolgirls will be able to return to high school. With winter school holidays coming up, women in Kabul fear that the Taliban will simply play for time and postpone any decision on the issue. In the meantime, some Afghan provinces have been able to reopen their schools, but not others. Our team on the ground reports from Kabul.

South Africa's health minister has said a newly identified coronavirus variant is of "serious concern." Scientists said the variant could be behind a major spike in cases in the country.

The Dutch public health institute said in a statement that testing was continuing on the samples of 61 people who tested positive for COVID after arriving from South Africa.

It was the largest single transfer of white rhinos ever undertaken. The species is threatened by illegal poaching.

President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday hosted his South African counterpart, Cyril Ramaphosa, in the Presidential Villa Abuja.⁣ ⁣The South African President who is accompanied by a delegation of ministers and business leaders is on a state visit expected to reinforce South Africa’s bilateral relations with Nigeria as well as strengthen partnerships directed at African development and cooperation in multilateral forums.⁣

South Africa's president warns of a "health apartheid", criticising travel bans once again. This as Omicron becomes the dominant strain of Covid-19 in the country. Meanwhile in Cameroon, we meet survivors of sexual violence from the Anglophone regions. Rape and abuse are being used as weapons of war in the conflict. Finally, our reporters are in Gambia ahead of Saturday's presidential poll. We bring you a report on voters waiting to take part in the country's democratic transition.

The new variant has come with a spike in cases, but it remains to be seen how much it will affect South African hospitals. New COVID infections have jumped from about 200 a day last month to more than 11,500 on Thursday.

Ethiopian authorities have closed all secondary schools so pupils can harvest crops for those on the frontline of the civil war, state-affiliated media says. ... More than 2 million pupils were already out of school due to the war which started in the northern region of Tigray last year, the government says.

The spekboom plant, excellent at sucking CO2 out of the atmosphere, has been badly degraded in South Africa. Now an initiative is using innovative planting methods to bring back the plant and restore soil and biodiversity.

South Africa is grappling with the fourth wave of the coronavirus, driven by the omicron variant. The country is pushing for more vaccinations — and for its own mRNA vaccine.