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Live Reporting

Dickens Olewe and Lucy Fleming

All times stated are UK

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  1. Scroll down for Monday's stories

    We'll be back tomorrow

    That's all from the  BBC Africa Live  page today. Keep up-to-date with what's happening across the continent by listening to the  Africa Today podcast  or checking the  BBC News website .

    A reminder of our proverb of the day:

    Quote Message: The shadow of a tree will return." from A Kalenjin proverb sent by Evans Cheruiyot Kibet in Embomos, Kenya
    A Kalenjin proverb sent by Evans Cheruiyot Kibet in Embomos, Kenya

    Click here to send us your African proverbs.

    And we leave you with this photo of a man getting off a bus in Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa - from  gboxcreative  Instagram account: 

    View more on instagram
  2. How is Cameroon coping with internet blackout?

    The internet blockade in English-speaking regions of Cameroon enters its seventh week. 

    The shutdown was imposed by the government after protests opposing plans to prioritise the use of the French language over English in courts and schools. 

    People from the Anglophone regions say they are treated as second-class citizens by the francophone-dominated government.  

    BBC Focus on Africa's Randy Joe Sa'ah spoke to residents of the regions to see how they are coping without the internet: 

    Video content

    Video caption: English speakers have gone six weeks without internet

    Read more: Cameroon's coding champion

  3. Limpopo River bursts it banks in Mozambique

    Jose Tembe

    BBC Africa, Maputo

    The Mozambican emergency authorities say the mighty Limpopo River has burst its banks in the country’s southern province of Gaza.

    They are urging people living near the river's banks in Chokwe and Guija districts to seek higher ground.

    A surge down river in Zimbabwe and South Africa raised the level of the river in Mozambique to more that 7.5m - almost 3m above flood alert level.  

    In 2000 the Limpopo broke its banks prompting the worst flooding in the country’s history - more than 700 people were killed and almost half a million others were left homeless.

    According to a report on the national independent television station STV, 600 hectares of crops have already been lost and several roads in the Limpopo Valley have been cut off the Guija-Chinhacanine, Guija-Chibuto and Chissano-Chibuto roads.

    Further north, the Save River has, for the second time this year, inundated the town of Machanga, in the central province of Sofala.

    The sharp rise in the level of the Save has been attributed to torrential rains in neighbouring Zimbabwe.

  4. Ghana celebrates: A nation is born

    Ghana today marked 60 years of independence with official celebrations, marked with pageantry and colour, taking place at a public square in the capital, Accra (see earlier entries) -  but what was it like on 6 March 1957 when it was officially declared an independent nation?

    BBC Rewind takes a look back at the events of that day (most of the video has no sound): 

    Video content

    Video caption: Ghana celebrates: A nation is born
  5. Alain Gomis' Fespaco pedigree 'saluted'

    
          Alain Gomis, winner of the 25th Pan-African Film and Television Festival (FESPACO) top award.
    Image caption: Alain Gomis is the second director to have won the Golden Stallion twice

    Senegal's President Macky Sall has commended film director Alain Gomis for winning the Golden Stallion of Yennega.

    It is the top award at Fespaco - Africa's biggest film festival which wrapped up over the weekend in Burkina Faso' capital, Ouagadougou.

    Gomis won  the trophy and a cash prize of 20,000,000 CFA ($32,000; £26,000) for his film Felicite, about a Congolese nightclub singer's struggle to care for her son following a motorcycle accident.   

    The Senegalese news agency APS quotes the president as saying:

    Quote Message: That prestigious distinction rewarding you for your film Felicite follows the one that was awarded to you in 2013 at the same festival. I salute your exceptional pedigree and congratulate you warmly."

    The Senegalese film director took the Golden Stallion four years ago for the film Tey.

    He is the second person to be double winner of the prestigious prize after Malian filmmaker Souleymane Cisse.

    Twenty films were up for the Golden Stallion during the seven-day festival.

    Read more: Six things about Fespaco 2017

  6. DR Congo burial of Tshisekedi postponed

    Leone Ouedraogo

    BBC Africa

    Etienne Tshisekedi
    Image caption: Etienne Tshisekedi died in Brussels on 1 February

    The body of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s veteran opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi is not going to be repatriated this week as planned.

    The family of Mr Tshisekedi, who died last month in Belgium aged 84, had planned to hold a funeral in DR Congo this coming Saturday.

    Mr Tshisekedi's younger brother Gerard Mulumba told the BBC that the family could not agree with the authorities on a burial site in the capital, Kinshasa.

    Mr Tshisekedi’s family want the body to be buried at the headquarters of UDPS, the party he founded.

    But the authorities have offered another location: The Gombe cemetery in the city centre.

    There has been no official response yet to the announcement.

    Mr Tshisekedi's death has plunged the DR Congo into uncertainty as it came amid negotiations between the opposition and government to end a political crisis - triggered by the refusal of President Joseph Kabila to stand down at the end of his term last December.

    Elections are now due before the end of the year and Mr Tshisekedi's son Felix has been chosen to lead the opposition coalition in the negotiations.

    Read: Felix Tshisekedi: Congo opposition leader's son takes over

  7. Seventy-year-old 'sits Sudan school exam'

    Ibrahim Haithar

    BBC Monitoring

    A 70-year-old has just sat basic stage school exams in Sudan's West Kordofan state with the hope of going to secondary school and eventually university, Dutch-funded Radio Dabanga reports.

    View more on twitter

    Ibrahim Yagoub Fudeili, who joined dozens of pupils taking the Certificate of Primary Education (CPE) exam, told the radio station:

    Quote Message: I want to encourage children to pursue their education.
    Quote Message: Do it for Sudan's progress in science."

    He said he had had to give up his education when younger because of financial difficulties.

  8. South Sudanese general sets up rebel group

    A prominent South Sudanese general, who resigned from the army last month, has set up a new rebel group.

    Gen Thomas Cirillo Swaka said President Salva Kiir had led the country into an abyss. 

    Dutch-funded Radio Tamazuj reports that it has seen copy of  Gen Cirillo's declaration.

    View more on twitter

    In the letter he says he is setting up the National Salvation Front (Nas) to fight the badly tarnished image of South Sudan:

    Quote Message: The National Salvation Front (Nas) is convinced that to restore sanity and normalcy in our country, Kiir must go, he must vacate the office without further bloodshed."

    The BBC's former South Sudan correspondent James Copnall says the new rebel leader is very popular in his home region of Equatoria.

    It is not clear how many troops he has, but it is possible that soldiers from several rebel groups from Equatoria could join him, our reporter says.

    South Sudan's civil war began just over three years ago.

    It has become a complicated conflict with many rebel movements fighting the government. 

  9. Trump order: Libyans, Somalis and Sudanese banned

    Donald Trump signing the new executive order

    US  President Donald Trump has now signed a new executive order placing a 90-day ban on people from six mainly Muslim nations, including three African countries.

    Iraq has been removed from the list of countries contained in the previous seven-nation order  

    The previous order, which was blocked by a federal court, sparked confusion at airports and mass protests  

    So what is different about the new order?

    Citizens of Iran, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, the other six countries on the original list, will once more be subject to a 90-day travel ban.

    Though the new order clearly states refugees already approved by the State Department will be allowed to enter, it also limits the number allowed in at 50,000 for the year.  

    The new directive also lifts a blanket ban on all Syrian refugees.

    Green Card holders (legal permanent residents of the US) from the named countries will not be affected by the new order.

    The Associated Press reports the new order does not give priority to religious minorities, unlike the previous order.

    Critics of the Trump administration had argued that was an unlawful policy showing preference to Christian refugees.

    The new order is set to take effect on 16 March.

    The 10 days' advance notice may help to avoid some of the chaotic scenes at US airports that occurred on 27 January when the first executive order was announced without warning.

    Read more: 'We Sudanese still feel like pariahs'

  10. Nigerian ex-governor jailed for five years

    A court in Nigeria has found a former state governor guilty of corruption in one of the first high-profile convictions in President Muhammadu Buhari's anti-graft war.

    James Bala Ngilari has been sentenced to five years in jail for corruption for breaching due process for awarding a contract worth more than $500,000 (£408,000) for the procurement of 25 cars.

    Ngilari, from the opposition party People's Democratic Party (PDP), was governor of the north-eastern state of Adamawa from October 2014 to May 2015.     

    It was one of the three states affected over the last few years by the Boko Haram Islamist insurgency.

    Ngilari's lawyer pleaded for leniency for his client saying he had made "invaluable contribution when he was the governor of the state during the trying moment of insurgency", the AFP news agency reports.

    Judge Nathan Musa said the sentence was a warning to other poilticians: 

    Quote Message: It is my hope that his conviction and sentence will serve as a deterrent to serving governors."

    Ngilari told reporters as he was taken to a prison van that the judgement was flawed and he would appeal, AFP says. 

    Ngilari first served as Adamawa's deputy governor but took over as governor after two years following the impeachment of his predecessor over corruption allegations.

  11. Liberia calls for boycott of street sellers

    Jonathan Paye-Layleh

    BBC Africa, Monrovia

    Street selling is a big business in Liberia – and peddling, mainly by children of school-going age, has  become so  uncontrollable in the capital, Monrovia, that it now amounts to a public nuisance.

    At every street corner and at traffic lights, children literally bump into stopping vehicles offering items such as water in plastic sachets and sweets to passengers.

    Driving in central Monrovia is also difficult as pedlars of all ages block already narrow streets with goods ranging from apples and other fruits loaded on wheelbarrows to second-hand clothes and shoes.

    To try to combat this, the government is now asking passengers to boycott street sellers and their goods in the hope that once there are no buyers the pedlars will disappear.

    To enhance this campaign, the government has started erecting anti-street selling billboards in strategic places in the city:

    A sign urging motorists in Liberia to boycott street sellers

    Though in a nation where laws are made and ignored with impunity it is hard to see it being a success.

  12. Analysis: Language row 'a diversionary tactic'

    Pumza Fihlani

    BBC News, Johannesburg

    A South African government spokesperson who insisted on using the Zulu language during an interview in an English-medium radio station is no stranger to controversy.

    Lumka Oliphant had to issue a public apology in recent months after hurling insults at critics who had questioned whether her boss was competent enough to run the country's department for social development.

    South Africa is a young democracy with a youthful population now asking pressing questions about how to build the unified "rainbow nation" that was envisaged by Nelson Mandela when he became the country's first democratically elected president in 1994.

    The divisions left by white-minority rule and the legacy of colonialism remain.

    The country has 11 official languages and some argue that the elevation of English above others as the lingua franca of national debate provides evidence of a continued form of "self-colonisation".

    However valid that debate is, there are accusations that it was opportunist of the spokeswoman to use it here.

    It is being seen as a deliberate attempt to divert attention from the issue at hand - the crisis over social security payments.

    Ms Oliphant had been talking to the state broadcaster earlier today in English - and had been on that same radio station a number of times and spoken in English.

    She has also addressed many press conferences in English in the past without raising the issue.

    So why now? Smoke and mirrors, argue her critics.

  13. Zimbabwe deal over Christmas bonuses

    Shingai Nyoka

    BBC Africa, Harare

    Zimbabwe’s government has committed to paying civil servants their end-of-year bonus for 2016 in cash, ending a stand-off which saw a strike by nurses.  

    A meeting between the unions representing civil servants and government has ended with an agreement to stagger the payouts.

    Some unions are describing it as a big win for workers.

    The finance ministry will begin paying bonuses, usually equivalent to a month’s wages, in cash in April.

    Earlier in the negotiations, unions - representing more than 250,000 workers, had rejected government’s offer of small plots of land instead of cash payouts.

    The bonus payments will be staggered over a four-month period.

    Health workers and the defence forces will receive theirs first, followed by police and prison workers in May, teachers in June and the rest of the civil service in August. 

    Christmas bonuses are traditionally paid at the end of the November or at the very latest before Christmas. 

    But over the last two years, the government has delayed payments to the following year, citing a lack of cash and an under-performing economy. 

    The government spends more than 80% of its income paying salaries.

    Demonstration in Harare, Zimabbwe, over the economy - 2016
    Image caption: People protested last year about the government's mismanagement of the economy
  14. Trump uncertainty prompts Nigeria's US travel advice

    Martin Patience

    BBC News, Nigeria correspondent

    Nigeria has advised its citizens against any non-urgent travel to the United States until the US clarifies its visa rules.

    Africa's most populous country was not one of the seven countries affected by US President Donald Trump’s initial travel ban. 

    But in a statement a special adviser to Nigeria’s president said there were several cases where Nigerians with valid US visas had been denied entry to the country ( see earlier entry ).

    In light of this, the Nigerian government is now advising against all but essential travel. 

    This travel advisory will be seen as an extraordinary reflection of the uncertainty generated by President Trump's executive orders. 

    Arrivals area of JFK airport in the US
    Image caption: Several Nigerians with valid visas were denied entry to the US recently

    Read more: A Nigerian software engineer claims he was handed a written test by a US border officer  

  15. UN approves Gambia's army chief

    James Copnall

    Africa editor, BBC World Service

    A UN source has told the BBC that the new head of the Gambian army, Masanneh Kinteh, is welcome to visit Gambian troops serving in the peacekeeping mission in Darfur in Sudan. 

    The UN blocked his predecessor, Ousman Badjie, from making a similar trip after he appeared to back the then-President Yahya Jammeh's attempt to stay in power after he lost elections. 

    Mr Jammeh eventually left the country, allowing the winner of last year's election, Adama Barrow, to take over. 

    The UN source said the decision had been made because of the replacement of Gen Badjie, and the new government's commitments to make security sector reforms and respect human rights and the rule of law.  

    Ousman Badjie
    Image caption: Ousman Badjie was sacked as The Gambia's army chief last month
  16. Cyclone Enawo to hit Madagascar

    The island of Madagascar is braced for strong winds and torrential rain, as Cyclone Enawo approaches.

    The BBC's weather team says that high winds and flooding will be experienced in the country which has been suffering from a drought: 

    BBC Weather's John Hammond has more details:

    Video content

    Video caption: Residents should prepare for destructive winds, torrential rain and landslides
  17. Is Kaduna airport ready for Abuja traffic?

    Intensive work is underway at Nigeria's Kaduna airport some 190km (120 miles) north of the capital Abuja, ahead of a planned relocation of international flights from the main airport in Abuja. 

    The airport will handle traffic for the next six weeks while Abuja runway is repaired. 

    An official from the Federal Aviation Authority of Nigerian (FAAN) told Reuters news agency that workers were working round the clock to have the airport ready. 

    Most floor and ceiling tiles have been fitted and all air conditioning units have been installed, but electrical fittings are unfinished, chairs for the arrival and departure areas lie strewn about and a car park expansion is incomplete, Reuters reports.   

    Several international airlines have refused to operate flights to Kaduna as they worry about the safety of their passengers in a region that has been known for kidnappings. 

    Henrietta Yakubu from the FAA has been telling BBC's Focus on Africa programme about plans to protect passengers, including using luxury buses and police escorts: 

    Video content

    Video caption: Airlines threatened to stop flying to Abuja due to safety concerns over runway condition
    Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja
    Image caption: Abuja airport will be closed for six weeks

    British Airways , Lufthansa and South African Airways have refused to fly into Kaduna. Ethiopian Airlines has however said it will use the alternative airport. 

    An official from FAAN told Reuters that police have been deployed to the region to ensure passenger safety and that roads leading to the airport had been fixed.

    Kaduna airport can handle up to 500 passengers at one time, equivalent to three or four short-haul jets, the report says.  

    Data from Nigeria's airport authority shows Abuja airport handled 4,859 domestic flights in December compared with the 171 that flew in or out of Kaduna, it adds. 

  18. Celebrities celebrate Ghana's 60 years of freedom

    Queen of Afro pop, Efya, has tweeted a photo of herself in the colours of Ghana to celebrate her country’s independence day (see earlier report):

    View more on twitter

    Her words in Twi “nshira nka yen” mean “let the blessings touch us” - a sentiment likely to be shared by UK musician Ed Sheeran, who tweeted to his more than 17 million followers:  

    View more on twitter

    At the official celebrations at Black Star Square in the capital, Accra, it has been all pomp and pageantry as smartly dressed security and school children entertained the public to a march pass and gymnastic display, says the BBC’s Thomas Naadi.

    A man blowing a horn at Black Star Square

    A number of foreign dignitaries, including Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, whose first wife Sally was from Ghana, and Togolese leader Faure Gnassingbe watched the event.

    
          Robert Mugabe at the celebrations for Ghana's independence in Accra
    Image caption: President Robert Mugabe was among the dignitaries in attendence

    Addressing the crowd, President Nana Akufo-Addo said Ghanaians should mobilise their resources to propel the country to prosperity and urged them to work hard and fight against corruption.

    Our reporter says Ghana, which gained independence on 6 March 1957, is still struggling to improve the living conditions of its people.

  19. BreakingTrump to sign new immigration order

    Donald Trump is to sign a new executive order on immigration later on Monday, his aide Kellyanne Conway has said.

    A revised order has been expected from the White House since the earlier ban was blocked by a federal court.

    The previous order suspended the entire US refugee resettlement programme and blocked citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the US. 

    The first order which was overruled by a federal court banned travel from citizens of Somalia, Sudan and Libya. 

    Read full story

    Donald Trump
  20. Body of British rancher recovered

    Anne Soy

    BBC Africa, Nairobi

    The body of British rancher Tristan Voorspuy has been recovered near his burnt-down lodge in Laikipia county, Kenya’s Interior Minister Joseph Nkaissery has announced. 

    Mr Voorspuy was shot dead over the weekend by armed headers who have invaded private farms in the area in recent weeks. 

    Media reports say Mr Voorspuy had gone to inspect his farm when he was attacked. 

    Attempts by a search team to retrieve his body had earlier been repulsed by the armed herders.

    Mr Nkaissery directed security agencies to immediately arrest political leaders for inciting people to commit murder, poaching, cattle rustling and the destruction of property. 

    Tristan Voorspuy
    Image caption: Tristan Voorspuy was killed by herders on Sunday while inspecting some of his lodges