00:00Hello and welcome. You're watching Eye on Africa and I'm Clarisse Fortuné. These are the headlines.
00:05The world of athletics loses one of its own to domestic violence.
00:10Olympic athlete Rebecca Sheptege died days after being set on fire by a former boyfriend,
00:16shocking the world of sport and beyond. The UN strongly condemns her violent murder.
00:23The first batch of mpox vaccines have finally arrived in a DRC.
00:27The country has been the epicentre of the outbreak with other 19,000 cases reported.
00:33China pledges to give 50 billion dollars in financing for Africa.
00:38For more than 50 African leaders also secured many deals in agriculture, mining, trade and energy.
00:48She was 33 years old. She had just returned from Paris for the Olympics.
00:53Now Olympic athlete Rebecca Sheptege is dead. She died from complications after being set on fire
01:00by a former boyfriend. The murder has sparked widespread emotion,
01:04particularly in her home country Uganda. Bastien Renaud reports.
01:10The first reactions to Rebecca Sheptege's killing came from Uganda. The minister for
01:14education and sports sent his condolences to the family and to Ugandans at large.
01:20Then the Uganda athletics federation said how deeply saddened it is by the death of its athlete
01:27and called for justice. And then later in the day the family spoke to the media in Eldorado,
01:32the town where she died. Of course they shared their pain. They said how painful it is to lose
01:38a sister, a daughter. And then they blamed the Kenyan police. They said that she had
01:43been threatened by the man who killed her for a while. Listen to her mother.
01:50I have no strength. I just blame the police in her home of Ndebes. They were responsible for
01:57providing security for my child's home but failed. I have nothing else to say.
02:05There is now an investigation ongoing. According to the police, 80 percent of her body was burnt
02:11after she was allegedly attacked by a former boyfriend. The police said that neighbours
02:15witnessed the attack. They said that they saw the man pouring a liquid on Tsheptege's body
02:21before burning her. This man is now in hospital. He was injured as well. 30 percent of his body
02:26was burnt. He will be arrested as soon as he is discharged from hospital, according to the police.
02:33Many erections from all over the place. From Janet Museveni, Uganda's first lady,
02:37to Kenyan sports minister Kishungba Mokomen who said it was a stark reminder that more must be
02:44done to combat gender-based violence. The Paris Olympics organisers also voiced their
02:49profound indignation and sadness. Outrage and sorrow as well from fellow athletes.
02:56At least we are more vulnerable because we are being used. We have these men who come around and
03:05just use us as properties. They see a young girl, manipulate them.
03:11And it was the latest horrific act of gender-based violence in the East African country where
03:16activists have warned of a rising femicide epidemic and are calling for long overdue action.
03:23Jairi Migwe is the founder of Osikimie, an organisation that fights gender-based violence.
03:30This is the fourth murder in a series of murders from 2021 for female athletes. But this is also
03:38another, I will not call it murder, I will call it femicide because femicide is the intentional
03:42murdering of women due to their gender and also intimate femicide which is what happened in this
03:48case. If you look at the intentionality of the murders between all these athletes who have been
03:54murdered by their husbands, boyfriends or partners, if you look at it there is a thread of financial
04:00finances. The fact that these women have been able to be on the prime of their life,
04:05been able to amass wealth and this wealth unfortunately has led to their death.
04:10Femicide has been rampant in this country. I remember in the beginning of this year on 27th
04:14of January, us Kenyans and us Kenyan women, and thank God for the Kenyan public as well,
04:19we did a femicide march on 27th of January where we were demanding for the government to speak
04:25about and also act upon incidents of femicide. By that time we had 32 cases of dead women
04:31in one month. As we are looking at, reported cases are 112 as of this month,
04:37that is a lot of women who have died. You see, if we don't act upon something,
04:41what are the repercussions when these women are killed? When Agnes Tirope was killed,
04:46the case is still in court. When Damaris was killed, the man disappeared.
04:54And all this I'm looking at athlete cases. I'm also looking at cases that have happened yet and
04:59still we have not seen the pursuance of justice. We have not seen the stance of the nation against
05:05femicide. If the head of the nation, the president, does not say anything about femicide,
05:10how are we going to treat it? Now in other news, the first lot of
05:13mpox vaccines has finally arrived in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The country
05:19has been the epicenter of the outbreak. More than 19,000 cases have been registered
05:24and nearly 630 deaths reported. Emmett Livingstone in Kinshasa has more.
05:31Nearly 100,000 mpox vaccines arrived by plane in DR Congo's capital Kinshasa on Thursday,
05:37the first batch to reach the country, which is the epicenter of the global mpox outbreak.
05:42The vaccines produced by Bavarian Nordic were procured and delivered by the European Union.
05:47100,000 more vaccines are expected to arrive in Congo on Saturday, but experts are warning that
05:52the rollout could be complicated in Congo, which has dire infrastructure and is plagued
05:57by conflict. What's more, the temperature at which the vaccine has to be kept poses a problem.
06:08Now they have to be delivered to difficult areas such as South Kivu and the equator region,
06:13where the vaccine has to be kept in a cold storage at minus 20 degrees.
06:18These are logistical challenges and we are in the process of working with our partners,
06:23in particular UNICEF, the Ministry of Health and various NGOs.
06:32European countries and the EU are due to donate a total of 566,000 vaccines to Congo. However,
06:38this number is unlikely to end the epidemic. Congo's health ministry says it needs 3.5
06:43million vaccine doses to tackle mpox. The country has recorded about 18,000 mpox infections and over
06:49600 deaths. This represents over 90% of the global cases, according to the WHO.
06:56Let's head now to Beijing, where the 9th China-Africa Forum, FOCAC,
07:00is underway. Almost every African country has sent a high-level delegation to the event
07:06that focuses on trade and development goals across the continent. And this Thursday,
07:10Chinese leader Xi Jinping pledged over 50 billion dollars in credits, aid and investment.
07:17Covering the summit for us is our Beijing correspondent Ye Nalli.
07:23The China-Africa relationship is now at its best in history. That's what President Xi Jinping said
07:28during his keynote speech at this year's FOCAC. He described China's ties to the continent as
07:34mutually beneficial, whilst adding that, I quote,
07:37the Western approach has inflicted immense suffering. The Chinese leader also announced
07:43over 50 billion U.S. dollars in credit, aid and investment, including 1 billion in military
07:48assistance. It's interesting to note that FOCAC was first launched in 2000, and this is the ninth
07:54edition compared to the U.S., for example, that has held just two U.S.-Africa leaders' summits,
08:00once in 2014 and again in 2022. After President Xi's opening address, African leaders
08:08representing different parts of the continent also took to the stage. South Africa's Cyril Ramaphosa
08:13thanked the hosts at least five times, mostly for their approach towards the continent,
08:19saluting China's interest and their collaborative approach. President Ramaphosa ended his short
08:26speech with a preview of the upcoming final declaration of this year's forum, saying that
08:31the signatories support a one-China policy and view that the People's Republic of China is the,
08:38I quote again, true and only representative of the people of China. Nothing new per se,
08:45but certainly a strong message of support to the room full of high-ranking Chinese officials and,
08:49of course, African delegates sitting in Beijing's Great Hall of the People.
08:54And meanwhile, the United States announced this week an additional $40 million to combat
09:00food insecurity on the continent at a time when malnutrition and famine are on the rise. Thousands
09:06of experts are also looking at solutions to this crisis in Rwanda at the biggest
09:11African forum on agriculture. Clément Diorama has more.
09:16African agriculture specialists gathered in Kigali to learn from recent crises
09:21and find solutions. Almost 10 years ago, African Union member states signed the Malabo declaration
09:27aimed at reducing poverty and improving access to food by 2025. Around 50 countries committed
09:32to various objectives, including dedicating 10% of their budget to agriculture. However,
09:38this goal remains far from being achieved. According to the UN, this year at least
09:4255 million people in West and Central Africa struggled to feed themselves.
09:47What we're seeing overall is that malnutrition rates are increasing exponentially. There's been
09:54some progress in the area of improving breastfeeding, but all the other nutrition
10:00indicators were behind. So we need a seismic shift, some new creativity, some innovation.
10:07The causes of malnutrition and famine include conflicts like in Sudan, as well as climate
10:12change and rising food and fertilizer prices. In 2023, the DR Congo and Nigeria, Sudan and
10:18Ethiopia were ranked by the UN as among the countries most affected by food crisis.
10:23The Kigali forum is exploring new ideas such as crop diversification, grain processing,
10:29better management of agricultural budgets and improving trade between African states.
10:36And that's the end of our edition. Thank you for watching ION Africa.
Comments