Africa Live: Germany detains alleged Nigerian mafia members

That's all from the BBC Africa Live team for now. To keep up with news from the continent, visit the BBC Africa webpage.

And if audio is your thing, have a listen to the BBC's Focus on Africa and Africa Daily podcasts.

A reminder of Wednesday's wise words:

Quote Message: The earliest cow to the creek drinks clean water." from A Luyana/Lozi proverb sent by Mulako Sianga in Kitwe, Zambia

The earliest cow to the creek drinks clean water."

And we leave you with this photo from Kenya's capital Nairobi, where residents of the Mathare slum look on from their balconies following heavy rain and floods in the country.

AFPCopyright: AFP

University of Nigeria NsukkaCopyright: University of Nigeria Nsukka

A lecturer at one of Nigeria's leading universities - the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) - has been suspended following allegations that he sexually harassed a female student, a statement by the university has said.

The move comes after a video went viral on social media, showing a man in only his shorts and trying to hide his face as he is confronted by people in what appears to be an office.

In the video, a person says: “We have been following this case from day one, we have tracks, all the voice notes, and everything.”

Another one says. “A married woman for that matter, someone’s wife.”

The university said the lecturer has been suspended, pending the outcome of an investigation by a disciplinary panel.

He has not yet commented.

"For the record, the University of Nigeria has zero tolerance for sexual misconduct involving our staff and students,” the university statement said.

“As a university, we are committed to protecting our students from any form of abuse and exploitation,” it added.

Two Sudanese nationals and a South Sudanese citizen have been arrested by police in the UK after five migrants died in the English Channel.

The men were detained on suspicion of facilitating illegal immigration and entering the UK illegally.

Five people, including a seven-year-old girl, were killed in a crush on board a boat crossing the Channel.

The boat was carrying 112 people at the time of the tragedy.

Speaking after the arrest, National Crime Agency (NCA) Director of Investigations Craig Turner said: "This tragic incident once again demonstrates the threat to life posed by these crossings and brings into focus why it is so important to target the criminal gangs involved in organising them."

Officers have already conducted initial interviews with the men, who are aged 19 and 22.

Further interrogations will follow in the coming days.

Read the full report here.

Getty ImagesCopyright: Getty Images

Portugal's President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa has said that his country must take full responsibility for colonial-era abuses and that there are circumstances in which reparations should be paid.

President de Sousa has several times expressed regret for Portugal's role in enslaving and colonising Africans.

Now, he's said that in some cases it should "pay the costs" for wrongs done - such as when massacres took place under colonial rule, or where significant items were looted and never returned.

BBCCopyright: BBC

German police have arrested 11 Nigerian men suspected of being in a mafia group who orchestrated large-scale dating scams.

The Black Axe gang was involved in "multiple areas of criminal activity" globally, Bavarian police said in a statement.

In Germany, the organisation focuses on romance scams and money laundering, the force added.

The statement said: "Using false identities, the fraudsters for example signalled their intention to marry and in the course of further contact repeatedly demand money under various pretexts."

Globally, the gang's main areas of operation were "human-trafficking, fraud, money-laundering, prostitution and drug-trafficking".

The arrested suspects all hold Nigerian citizenship and are aged between 29 and 53.

They were detained on Tuesday in raids across the region of Bavaria following a police probe that lasted more than two years.

A 2021 BBC investigation of Black Axe unearthed evidence that the group had infiltrated politics in Nigeria and ran a killing operation spanning the globe.

Read more:

• Leaked documents shine spotlight on secretive Black Axe gang

Authorities in Tanzania have shut down five hydroelectric stations in a bid to reduce excess electricity in the national grid, the country's prime minister has said.

Kassim Majaliwa said the main plant, Mwalimu Nyerere Hydroelectric Station, has alone generated enough electricity to power major cities, including Dar es Salaam, the country’s commercial hub.

"We have turned off all these stations because the demand is low and the electricity production is too much, we have no allocation now, “ an official from state-run power company, Tanesco, said.

The 2,115 MW Julius Nyerere hydropower dam is said to be almost full with water, following heavy rains that started early this year.

A current spell of extreme weather has caused at least 58 deaths in Tanzania and devastated other East African nations like Kenya.

It is the first time Tanzania, which suffers chronic power shortages, has closed hydroelectric stations due to excess production.

Getty ImagesCopyright: Getty Images

The Tanzanian government has denied allegations that villagers have been subjected to abuses, including forced evictions, as part of a project to expand a national park in the south of the country.

On Tuesday, the World Bank said it had suspended its funding of a $150m (£120m) tourism project in Ruaha National Park, saying it was deeply concerned about the allegations.

“The Tanzanian government does not violate human rights when implementing all its projects, including this one being funded by the World Bank,” government spokesperson Mobhare Matinyi told state broadcaster TBC.

“What happened is that the World Bank received some reports from civil society organisations that cast some doubts on the project, alleging some human rights violations in the area. The reports are not true."

Known as Resilient Natural Resource Management for Tourism and Growth (Regrow), the project seeks to "improve the management of natural resources and tourism assets" in southern Tanzania, the World Bank previously said.

Mr Matinyi told a local newspaper that the World Bank has so far disbursed $125m (£101m) of its funding for Regrow, which launched in 2017.

Last year, American think-tank Oakland Institute reported that villagers had been raped by rangers and were being evicted from their land because the park was being expanded.

Oakland Institute also pointed to reports, from a Tanzanian MP and a community organisation, that rangers had allegedly killed villagers.

AFPCopyright: AFP

The replacement of a senior official in the Zulu monarchy in South Africa has sparked a row with the local Kwa-Zulu Natal (KZN) provincial government.

The traditional prime minister of the Zulu nation, Thulasizwe Buthelezi, accused the KZN government of terminating the employment of Inyosi Buzetsheni Mdletshe, who is King Misuzulu ka Zwelithini's praise singer and cultural adviser.

The provincial government has denied the allegation as "false reports".

In a statement Mr Buthelezi said Mr Mdletshe was integral to the king's royal duties.

He added that the row was the latest in a series of incidents where the KZN administration has treated King Zwelithini in "a disrespectful manner".

"His Majesty cautions the KZN government that the disdain with which they treat the royal family in general, and his majesty in particular, is an affront to the Zulu nation," Mr Buthelezi said.

The provincial government denied that they had ended Mr Mdletshe's employment prematurely. They said Mr Mdletshe had come to the end of a two-year extended contract and that a new praise singer had succeeded him.

"It would then not be prudent for the provincial government to have two praise singers who are paid by the government from the same budget, so that is where the issue is," the KZN government said in a statement.

The Zulu kingdom is the largest of South Africa's eight traditional monarchies that are officially recognised by the government, all of which are funded by taxpayers.

A residential building that was under construction in Ethiopia’s capital city has collapsed, killing seven people sleeping in a house next door.

The disaster happened early on Wednesday at around 05:00 local time (02:00 BST) in Addis Ketema, one of the busiest neighbourhood's in Addis Ababa, local media reported.

Nigatu Mamo, a spokesperson for the local authoritie, told the BBC the deceased include children aged four, 11 and 12.

"The victims lost their lives due to lack of air," Mamo added.

Reports say the police have launched an investigation to determine the cause of the collapse.

It is not the first time the area has experienced an incident of this kind - in 2022 at least six people died and seven others were injured after a building fell in Merkato, one of Africa’s biggest open markets.

Experts have said that poor quality structures and weak regulations are likely to have caused the buildings to collapse.