GABON COUP LEADERS NAME GENERAL NGUEMA AS NEW PRESIDENT.
Army officers who seized power in a coup in Gabon have named General Brice Oligui Nguema as the country's transitional leader.
Gen Nguema was earlier carried triumphally through the streets of the capital Libreville by his troops.
The deposed President, Ali Bongo, has appeared in a video at his home, calling on his "friends all over the world" to "make noise" on his behalf.
The former French colony is one of Africa's major oil producers.
==================================
PRESIDENT TINUBU CONDEMNS GABON COUP.
President Bola Tinubu has expressed his deep concern over the political situation in Gabon and the socio-political stability in that country.
Tinubu's reaction came hours after a group of Gabonese military officers appeared on television announcing they were "putting an end to the current regime" and cancelling an election that, according to official results, President Ali Bongo Ondimba won.
The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, while speaking with State House correspondents, expressed Tinubu's belief that the rule of law and a faithful recourse to the constitutional resolution of electoral disputes must not be allowed to perish in Africa.
"President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is watching developments in Gabon very closely with deep concern for the country's sociopolitical stability and the seeming autocratic contagion apparently spreading across different regions of our beloved continent," he said.
"The president, as a man who has made significant personal sacrifices in his own life, in the cause of advancing and defending democracy, has all of the unwavering belief that power belongs in the hands of Africa's great people, and not in the barrel of a loaded gun."
=================================
COMMONWEALTH CALLS GABON COUP DEEPLY CONCERNING.
The Commonwealth has voiced fears about a military coup in Gabon, which joined the grouping last year, and said it was monitoring the situation closely.
Secretary general Patricia Scotland said the situation was "deeply concerning", adding: "The Commonwealth Charter is clear that member states must uphold the rule of law and the principles of democracy at all times".
This comes hours after a group of Gabonese military officers appeared on television announcing they were "putting an end to the current regime" and cancelling Ondimba's election.
While announcing the cancellation of the vote results, one of the officers said "all the institutions of the republic" had been dissolved.
The address was read by an officer flanked by a group of a dozen army colonels, members of the elite Republican Guard, regular soldiers and others.
It came moments after the national election authority said Bongo had won a third term in Saturday's election with 64.27 percent of the vote.
=====================================
INTERNATIONAL OUTRAGE OVER BONGO'S OUSTER IN GABON COUP.
The international community, has expressed concern and deplored the upwelling wave of military coups in Africa, as Gabon became the seventh African country to fall to a military coup.
Gabonese army officers, under the aegis of the Committee for the Transition and Restoration of Institutions, CTRI, sacked President Ali Bongo, placed him under house arrest and took over power in the oil-rich Central African country.
The leaders of the coup in Gabon have named Republican Guard Chief, General Brice Oligui Nguema, as transitional president, according to a TV statement.
"General Oligui Nguema Brice was unanimously appointed chairman of the Committee for the Transition and Restoration of Institutions, chairman of the transition," declared an officer in the presence of dozens of senior officers, according to the press release read out on Gabon 24.
With Gabon, the number of countries in Africa under military rule in the last two years has jumped to seven. The others are Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, Sudan and Niger.
As the ousted Ali Bongo cried out for help, the Gabon coup elicited immediate reactions from President Bola Tinubu of Nigeria; the United Nations, UN; European Union, EU; African Union, AU; Commonwealth; United States of America, US; Russia; and France, who deplored the putsch.
While French Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, said her government was following events in Gabon "with the greatest attention," Russia said it was "deeply concerned" over the situation in Gabon.
=====================================
BUILDING FIRE IN SOUTH AFRICA KILLS SIXTY-FOUR.
A fire that engulfed a five-storey building killed more than 60 people including children in central Johannesburg on Thursday.
This is according to the South African city's emergency services which says another 43 were injured, some suffering from smoke inhalation, and were taken for treatment at local hospitals.
Emergency Management Services spokesman Robert Mulaudzi said the death toll is at 64 including seven children, with some left burned beyond recognition.
He said the youngest victim was aged less than two years old.
Firefighters at the scene had put out the flames and search and recovery operations were ongoing.
=========================================
FIVE RAIL WORKERS KILLED IN ITALY AFTER BEING HIT BY TRAIN.
At least five people have died after a train hit railway workers at high speed close to a station in Italy.
The workers, aged between 22 and 52, were replacing part of a track outside the northern city of Turin when they were killed.
They had been working on the line between Turin and Milan when the empty passenger train went through Brandizzo station at a reported 160km/h (100mph).
Mayor Paolo Bodoni told Italian media an investigation was under way.
Two workers survived unscathed but were taken to hospital for observation.
==========================================
NORTH KOREA SAYS IT SIMULATED NUCLEAR STRIKE ON SOUTH.
North Korea says it has fired two short-range ballistic missiles to simulate nuclear strikes on military targets in South Korea.
State media said the tests were held as a warning against the US deployment of strategic bombers to the region.
South Korean media reported the missiles were fired off the east coast around midnight.
The launches come amid Washington and Seoul's annual military drills- which always provoke the North.
Pyongyang has long denounced the combined drills as the US' rehearsal for war.
============================================
MEXICAN OPPOSITION PICK FEMALE ELECTION CANDIDATE.
Mexico's opposition coalition has named an outspoken female senator with indigenous roots as their candidate for the 2024 presidential election.
Xóchitl Gálvez is a 60-year-old computer engineer and businesswoman.
Her nomination raises the prospect of Mexico having a female president for the first time.
Former Mexico City mayor Claudia Sheinbaum is considered the frontrunner for leftist President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's Morena party.
Gálvez is backed by a three-party coalition including the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which dominated the country's politics until 2000.
============================================
MICROSOFT BOWS TO EUROPEAN UNION COMPETITION CONCERNS OVER TEAMS.
Microsoft will unbundle its Teams communications from its popular Office suite in an attempt to assuage EU antitrust concerns.
The European Commission launched the investigation in July to see whether the US tech giant was "abusing and defending its market position" by bundling the software together.
If the commission probe finds against Microsoft, the company could face a hefty fine or other ordered remedies.
In a bid to address the concerns, Microsoft will unbundle Teams from its Microsoft 365 and Office 365 suites in the European Economic Area and Switzerland from October 1.
This is according to the company's vice president on European government affairs, Nanna-Louise Linde who added that Customers will now be able to buy the software without Teams at a lower price.
Microsoft bundles Teams with its cloud-based Office 365 and Microsoft 365 suites, which include its popular Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Excel programmes.
No comments:
Post a Comment