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Teachers in Zim threaten to down tools over 'deteriorating working conditions' - report
A Zimbabwean teachers union has reportedly declared a nationwide strike over deteriorating working conditions.
According to Daily News, the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ) said its members were "fed up with a government they see as unresponsive to their concerns".
PTUZ general secretary Raymond Majongwe said the teachers were set to down tools on Friday.
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Kidnapped schoolchildren freed in troubled Cameroon region: minister
Seventy-nine school pupils abducted by gunmen this week in a troubled English-speaking region of Cameroon have been freed, the country's communications minister told AFP Wednesday.
"All 79 students have been released," said Issa Bakary Tchiroma, without giving details of the circumstances under which they were set free.
The kidnappings on Monday were the first such mass abductions seen in Cameroon and coincide with an upsurge of political tensions in the majority French-speaking country.
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Study finds 'significant decline' in genital mutilation rates in girls in Africa
Rates of female genital mutilation among girls under 14 have fallen sharply in most regions of Africa over three decades, according to ground-breaking analysis cautiously welcomed by aid groups.
The age-old ritual of cutting or removing the clitoris of young females has been decried by human and women's rights advocates and can lead to a host of physical, psychological and sexual complications.
And yet it remains widespread in parts of Africa and the Middle East.
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Freed Cameroon pupils 'look tired, psychologically tortured', says church official
The 79 school children kidnapped by unidentified gunmen from a school in Cameroon have been released, but two of the three staff members abducted are still being held, said a church official.
"They were brought last night to one of our churches ... near Bamenda (the regional capital). They look tired and psychologically tortured," said the moderator of the country's Presbyterian Church, Fonki Samuel Forba. The students are between 11 and 17 years old.
He pleaded with the kidnappers to "free the staff still in their keeping."
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Nigerian court rejects bail for pro-Iranian Shiite cleric
A Nigerian court on Wednesday refused to release a Shiite Muslim cleric who has been in custody since 2015 following deadly clashes between troops and his supporters, his lawyer said.
Ibrahim Zakzaky, who leads the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), and his wife, Zeenat, are standing trial on charges of culpable homicide and unlawful assembly.
At the state high court in the northern city of Kaduna, soldiers were on guard, barring access to both the media and the public in a move denounced by his lawyer Maxwell Kyon.
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