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Algeria Uprise

A demonstrator holds a sign referring to the three B's, Abdelkader Bensalah, Tayeb Belaiz et Noureddine Bedoui, interim rulers they want removed from their posts, during a rally in Algiers, Friday April 5, 2019. Thousands of Algerians are chanting, singing and cheering after their movement forced out longtime President Abdelaziz Bouteflika - and demanding that other top figures leave too. Crowds massed Friday in Algiers boulevards and headed toward the central post office, symbol of the movement that has upended this energy-rich North African country. (AP Photo/Toufik Doudou)

Date april 2 2019
Algerian Parliament to make President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s resignation official


Abdelaziz Bouteflika is an Algerian politician who served as President of Algeria from 1999 until 2019. As President, he presided over the end of the bloody Algerian Civil War in 2002 when he took over the project of Liamine Zéroual, and he ended emergency rule in February 2011 amidst regional unrest

Both houses of Algeria’s Parliament are meeting next week to take official note of the country not having a leader after the resignation under pressure of its president.
A senator from former President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s FLN party, Abdelouahab Benzaim, says the two houses plan to meet on Tuesday.
If the president’s office is vacated, the Algerian Constitution calls for the head of the upper house to serve as leader for a maximum of 90 days before an election.
Bouteflika stepped down after two decades on April 2 after a pro-democracy protest movement won the army’s backing.
A Bouteflika appointee, Abdelkader Bensalah, is the leader of parliament’s upper chamber. The protesters are calling for him and others who make up the top of the country’s power hierarchy to leave, too.


Rhino Poacher Killed by Elephant and Eaten by Lions, Officials Say

A man suspected of being a rhino poacher was killed last week by an elephant and his remains devoured by a pride of lions at a South African park, officials said.


A lion at Kruger National Park in South Africa, where the remains of a man who officials said was poaching rhinos in the park were found last week.CreditCreditJerome Delay/Associated Press

Rangers at Kruger National Park and other searchers found only a human skull and a pair of pants, the park said in a statement on Friday.

Four of the dead man’s accomplices were arrested, the authorities said.

The man’s accomplices told his relatives that they had been in the park to poach rhinos on Tuesday night when he was killed by an elephant, local officials said.

A search party, including rangers on foot and members of the park’s air wing, searched the area that was described by the family but could not find the body because light was fading, the statement said. Searchers found the remains on Thursday morning.

The managing executive of the park, Glenn Phillips, offered his condolences to the family of the dead man, who was not identified.

“Entering Kruger National Park illegally and on foot is not wise,” he said in the statement. “It holds many dangers and this incident is evidence of that.”

Mr. Phillips said it was sad to see the daughters of the man “mourning the loss of their father, and worse still, only being able to recover very little of his remains.”

Kruger National Park advertises itself as offering “an African safari adventure of a lifetime.” At nearly two million hectares, it is the largest national reserve in South Africa, according to its website, which added that it was home to animals such as lions, elephants, rhinoceroses, leopards and African buffaloes.


Omar Al-Bashir falls, interim leaders to take over


Sudanese Protesters Reject Military Junta,Demand Civilian Govt ‘Now’

Sudan President Hassan Omar al-Bashir has stepped down following months of protests triggered by a steep rise in bread and fuel prices.

Reuters Africa and Arab media outlets on Thursday reported the fall of the Sudanese strongman, quoting military, government and provincial sources.

CNN, citing multiple sources, reported that Mr al-Bashir had been put under house arrest and his personal guard replaced.

The reports indicated that talks were underway in Khartoum to form a transitional council.

Dubai-based al-Hadath TV interviewed North Darfur Economic Resources Minister Adel Mahjoub Hussein who said “president Bashir stepped down”

Fall of Omar Hassan al-Bashir,

The Fall of Omar Hassan al-Bashir, the ‘Spider’ at the Heart of Sudan’s Web
Egyptians vote

Egyptians vote on changes that would extend el-Sissi’s rule

Egyptians cast their ballots Saturday on the first of three days of voting on constitutional amendments that would allow President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi to stay in power until 2030 and broaden the military’s role.

Critics have blasted the proposed changes as another major step toward an authoritarian government perhaps even more severe than that of former President Hosni Mubarak, whose nearly three decades of autocratic rule was ended by a popular uprising in 2011.

The nationwide referendum came amid an unprecedented crackdown on dissent in recent years. El-Sissi’s government has arrested thousands of people, most of them Islamists but also prominent secular activists, and rolled back freedoms won eight years ago.

Polls closed at 9 p.m. local time. Voting will stretch over a period of three days to allow maximum turnout, which the government is hoping to lend the referendum legitimacy.

Mahmoud el-Sherif, spokesman of the National Elections Authority, said more than 61 million people are eligible to vote. Results were expected within a week, el-Sherif said in a news conference.

Outside a polling center near the Giza Pyramids, around two dozen people, mostly elderly women, lined up waiting to cast their votes. Heavy police and army security was reported at polling stations throughout the country.

Haja Khadija, a 63-year-old housewife, said she came for the “security and stability” of the country. “We love el-Sissi. He did lots of things. He raised our pensions.”

Omar Knawy, who writes novels, voted “No” in the referendum. He said he opposes most of the changes, especially those that would enable el-Sissi to stay in power beyond his current second four-year term. He also opposes articles that declare the military the “guardian and protector” of the Egyptian state, democracy and the constitution.


Caster Semenya: Cas ruling ‘justifies discrimination’ – Athletics South Africa

Athletics South Africa (ASA) says it is “reeling in shock” after Olympic 800m champion Caster Semenya lost a landmark case against athletics’ governing body.

The South African, 28, challenged new IAAF rules which attempt to restrict testosterone levels in female runners.

Semenya,

Semenya, who won Olympic gold at London 2012 and Rio 2016, says she will “once again rise above”

Athletes with differences of sexual development (DSD) must now take medication to compete in some track events or change to another distance.

ASA said the decision “goes to lengths to justify” discrimination.

Semenya had challenged the IAAF’s new rules at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) but on Wednesday it announced it had rejected the appeal.

“We believe their decision is disgraceful,” ASA added.

And it said by justifying discrimination, Cas had “seen it fit to open the wounds of apartheid” – the South African political system which enforced white rule and racial segregation until 1991 – which it pointed out was “condemned by the whole world as a crime against humanity”.


Ethnic attacks in Mali killed 18 civilians this week: peacekeeping mission


MNLA (National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad) fighters around Tessit, Gao in

At least 18 civilians were killed in two related attacks this week in central Mali, the United Nations MINUSMA peacekeeping mission said on Saturday, as the death toll from fighting between local hunters and herders continues to climb.

MINUSMA did not identify the assailants in the attacks on a Dogon ethnic community in the Mopti region.

The region has been engulfed in a conflict between Dogon hunters and Fulani herders that killed hundreds of civilians in 2018 and is spreading across the Sahel, the arid region between the Sahara desert to the north and Africa’s savannas to the south.

MINUSMA said a number of Dogons were killed in an ambush on Wednesday, while other members of the same community were killed on Thursday as they tried to retrieve the bodies from the previous day’s attack. One Fulani civilian was also killed, it said.

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