With an audience reach of 52 million in Africa, the German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) has become the first international broadcaster to launch ‘Facebook Live Audio’. DW has been streaming live radio programs for Africa daily on the network’s Facebook platform in English, French, Hausa and Kiswahili in recent weeks. The live broadcast of audio content on Facebook has …

Despite Spanish government’s efforts to stop the referendum, Catalans overwhelmingly voted for an independent homeland on Sunday. The conflict between Madrid and Barcelona has now reached a decisive stage, report Helena Spongenberg and Eric Maurice. Catalan separatist leaders will press ahead with the region’s independence in the wake of a referendum on Sunday (1 October), which the Spanish government said …

The European Commission is setting aside €500 million to pay member states to resettle 50,000 refugees from Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya and Sudan by late 2019. EU home affairs commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos told reporters on Wednesday (27 September) that the move was needed to help curtail irregular migrant flows to Europe. “I really count on member states to make ambitious …

Kenya’s ruling Jubilee Party has presented parliament with proposals intended to prevent the Supreme Court annulling the results of a coming re-run presidential election, as it did the last vote in August. The court struck down President Uhuru Kenyatta’s poll victory then, saying there had been illegalities and irregularities in the transmission of results. Kenya used two systems to transmit …

German movies, cultural and media workshops are part of celebrations marking 60 years of co-operation between Germany and Ghana, reports Isaac Kaledzi  from Accra. For Yibor Kojo Yibor, a Ghanaian cultural analyst, Saturday, 30 September’s event in Accra offered an opportunity for Ghanaians to reflect more on Germany’s culture and way of life. “I think that what is interesting for Ghanaians is …

Chancellor Angela Merkel has the backing of nearly 60 per cent of voters to form a ruling coalition with the Greens and FDP, a new survey says. However, Germany may have to wait until the New Year for a new government. Fortunately for Chancellor Angela Merkel, the most likely option when it comes to forming a governing coalition in the …

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has announced the date of Nigeria’s next general elections. The presidential and parliamentary elections will be held on 16 February 2019, INEC said on its official Twitter account on Thursday. The date will mark the end of ailing President Muhammadu Buhari’s first term. He has not said if he will run again. Buhari came …

Cameroonian President Paul Biya has dispatched the military to the South West and North West Regions of the country ahead of Independence Day on 1 October to face off secessionists. The military deployment was officially announced by the Governor of the South West Region Bernard Okalia Bilai on Thursday after restricting movement of people and vehicles, closing all public places …

Pope Francis launched a global Roman Catholic campaign on Wednesday to improve the lot of immigrants and one of his top cardinals urged politicians to “touch the hand of a migrant” before trying to stereotype them. The two-year “Share the Journey” campaign comes at a time of growing anti-immigrant sentiment in the United States and many European countries where far-right …

The number of asylum seekers “in limbo” in the EU is likely to have become greater than the combined populations of Cyprus and Malta, estimates indicate. More than 1.1 million of the 2.2 million people who sought asylum in the EU and associated countries Norway and Switzerland in 2015 and 2016 still do not know if they will get it, …

A British Airways hostess has been sacked after a Snapchat video she recorded slamming Nigerian passengers went viral. Joanne Wickenden, who was wearing her uniform in the minute-long video, was complaining about excessive demands by Nigerian passengers while making references to male genitals. “All the Nigerians are gonna be there like ‘gimme Coca Cola, gimme beef, why you have no …

Following the shocking victory of a far-right party at Germany’s general election, Carl Bildt, Sweden’s former prime minister, writes on the challenges facing Europe, a continent that once exported war and turmoil, but now wants to protect itself from its neighbours’ problems. By Carl Bildt Travelling through Germany in the run-up to its federal election of 24 September, one cannot …

Governor Henry Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa State has called on Nigerians in the Diaspora to work together irrespective of tribe, religion or political affiliation to make Nigeria great again. Governor Dickson, who stated this in Atlanta last weekend at a dinner in his honour by Nigeria’s Consulate-General in America, Ambassador Kayode Laro, said Nigeria is a great country with great …

bankomo is an account that’s open to absolutely anyone – there’s no minimum deposit amount and there’s no credit check. All you need is an appropriate piece of ID. And a smartphone or Internet access. bankomo isn’t free, of course. It costs 4.90 euros a month in 2017, with the monthly fee rising to 8.90 euros from 1 January 2018. …

MoneyGram Plus* members can win 100,000 euros with the new MoneyGram MegaDeal. Additionally, the world’s second biggest money transfer provider will raffle amazing prices worth more than 1,000 euros each from July until December 2017. MoneyGram PLUS clients who make a transaction will receive a leaflet with an activation code to register for the MegaDeal monthly raffle. This personal activation …

It wasn’t the race that anybody anticipated and the world record of 2:02:57 still stands, but Kenya’s Eliud Kipchoge came away from the 2017 Berlin Marathon on Sunday with the win in 2:03:32—and he faced some unanticipated late-race competition from a newcomer to the distance. Although the pre-race hype focused on a battle between the “big three” of Kipchoge, Wilson …

Angela Merkel looks set to govern Germany for another four years together with liberals and greens, but there is a new troublemaker – the far-right AfD party – on the scene, reports Andrew Rettman. The likely CDU/CSU-FDP-Greens coalition emerged after exit polls on Sunday (24 September) said Merkel’s centre-right CDU/CSU party won with 32.5 per cent and the centre-left SPD …

German voters go to the polls on Sunday, 24 September, to elect the 19th Bundestag. Here are some important facts and figures about the election. Polling Time Polls are open from 8am to 6pm The Electorate About 61.5 million German adults are eligible to vote. According to official numbers there are 400,000 less voters than in 2013. The breakdown of …

With opinion polls suggesting a third of the electorate is still undecided about who to vote for a day before the federal parliamentary election, candidates have been out and about doing some last-minute campaigning. While Angela Merkel is widely predicted to be re-elected chancellor, her conservative CDU party seems to have taken a last-minute dip in support. It has slipped …

Ghana wins three-year case as the International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea rules that it did not violate the rights of its neighbour in oil exploration, report Emma Farge and Kwasi Kpodo. The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, sitting in Hamburg, Germany, on Saturday drew an ocean boundary favouring Ghana in a dispute with its …