ISIS & Niger October attack; Shabaab’s children fighters; Cameroon’s language refugees, and more

Cape Town could become first major city in world to run out of water after 90-day warning (Lydia Smith, Independent)
Cape Town may become the first large city in the world to run out of water, as officials warn there are fewer than 90 days left before the supply runs dry. The city’s mayor Patricia De Lille said residents had until 22 April until “day zero”, when authorities have estimated the water supply will be finished if residents do not scale back their usage. As a result, officials have introduced strict measures to limit the consumption of available water, including capping usage at 87 liters per person per day. The crisis is the result of three years of low rainfall and drought, coupled with a growing population and an increase in water consumption.

Egypt raises “extreme concern” about Nile Dam with Ethiopia (Hamza Hendawi, AP)
Egypt’s president says he expressed his “extreme concern” over the lack of progress in talks over the construction of a massive Nile dam in Ethiopia during a meeting with that country’s visiting prime minister. Egypt fears the dam, which is about 60 percent complete, will significantly reduce its vital share of the Nile’s waters. Ethiopia has downplayed those fears and said it needs the dam for its own economic development. A grim-faced President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi emerged from a meeting in Cairo on Thursday with Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, saying cooperation between Nile basin countries should not be a zero-sum game. El-Sissi says Ethiopia has rejected an Egyptian proposal for World Bank experts to mediate the dispute. Egypt depends on the Nile for almost all of its water needs. 

In Central African Republic, militia violence leaves villages devastated (Alexis Huguet, AFP)
[…] Two rival armed groups, calling themselves the National Movement for the Liberation of the Central African Republic (MNLC) and Revolution and Justice (RJ), are jockeying for control of the area. Up until the end of last year, they divided territory and checkpoints — a crucial source of income where businessmen, travellers and farmers are charged a fee to pass through. But the murder of an RJ leader in November set off a chain reaction of killing and counter-killing. Retaliatory attacks swiftly spread to the local population, suspected of conniving with the other side. The better-armed MNLC is being supported, according to several witnesses, by fighters on horseback from the Fulani nomadic ethnic group, who have come from Chad.

Italian lawmakers pass anti-terror military mission to Niger (VOA)
Italian lawmakers have approved sending a military mission to Niger to combat human trafficking and terrorism. The vote in the Chamber of Deputies on Wednesday was likely lawmakers’ last session before a March 4 election. Premier Paolo Gentiloni has said some of Italy’s troops now in Iraq will be transferred to the African nation, a major migrant trafficking route. His center-left government is focusing on Africa in a strategy to combat trafficking of migrants to Libya and then onwards toward European shores via perilous journeys in smugglers’ unseaworthy boats.

Tunisia’s rulers fail to live up to Arab Spring promise (Christina Okello, RFI)
Nearly one thousand people have been arrested in Tunisia in the biggest wave of social unrest since the revolution. Anger at new austerity measures has brought hundreds of Tunisians back onto the streets with the same demands they did back in 2011. Seven years on, protesters say the government has failed to live up to the promises of the Arab Spring. Every January since the 2011 revolution, Tunisians have taken to the streets to vent their anger over high unemployment and corruption. Seven years on, some of the same problems remain. “People are very angry and very frustrated by the lack of hope and lack of perspective,” says Olfa Lamloum, the Country Manager in Tunisia for the British NGO International Alert. Protests that are usually confined to Tunisia’s socially deprived west and south regions, have this year spread to the capital Tunis.

Shabaab forcing civilians to hand over children: HRW (AFP
Somalia’s Al-Qaeda linked Shabaab insurgents are increasingly threatening civilians and forcing them to hand over young children for “indoctrination and military training”, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Monday. The rights watchdog said an aggressive campaign to recruit children had begun in mid-2017, with the jihadists taking reprisals against communities who refuse to cooperate. Hundreds of children have fled their homes to avoid this fate, often alone, it said in a statement. “Al-Shabaab’s ruthless recruitment campaign is taking rural children from their parents so they can serve this militant armed group,” said Laetitia Bader, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch.

Zambia: Edgar Lungu’s heavy hand shows in response to cholera outbreak (Kristen Van Schie, Daily Maverick)
The headline shouldn’t have come as a surprise: “Zambia police arrest 55 in riots over cholera control rules”. Zambia’s response to the cholera outbreak, which began in October and has killed more than 70 people, has in the last few weeks been a show of force. Earlier in January, President Edgar Lungu took to the streets of Lusaka flanked by soldiers in a clean-up operation that saw unhygienic markets and restaurants shuttered. He railed against the city council’s failings. Street vending was banned across the city. But then the government began introducing regulations that granted powers to suppress, starting with a ban on gatherings of five or more people. The interdict encompassed weddings, funerals and sports events. In one instance, police used tear gas to break up a church service. To prevent travel, Lusaka’s main passport office was closed, while the start of the school year was postponed.

At least 15,000 Cameroonian refugees flee to Nigeria amid crackdown (Reuters)
More than 15,000 Cameroonian refugees have fled to Nigeria amid a crackdown on Anglophone separatists, the United Nations (UN) refugee agency and Nigerian government officials said on Thursday. The once-fringe English-speaking movement in majority French-speaking Cameroon has gathered pace in the last few months after a military crackdown on protests, leading it to declare independence in October for a breakaway “Ambazonia” state it wants to create. The move poses the biggest challenge yet to the 35-year rule of President Paul Biya, who will seek re-election this year, and the violent repression he has unleashed has driven thousands of people from English-speaking regions across the border into Nigeria.

Tension keeps rising in Cairo over Turkey-Sudan island pact (George Mikhail, Al Monitor)
January is Egypt’s coldest month as far as temperatures go, but things are heating up rapidly there over Turkey’s recent deal to lease Suakin Island from Sudan. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Turkey just plans to renovate the island and restore Ottoman relics. But Egypt, as well as Saudi Arabia, fears Ankara’s plans go much further, to include a military base that could threaten their security. “The Suakin Island deal is provoking anger in Egypt because it has ambiguous objectives, and because there is [already] a problem between the parties that signed the agreement and Egypt,” Maj. Gen. Kamal Amer, the head of the Egyptian parliament’s National Defense and Security Committee, told Al-Monitor. Amer was referring to the Egyptian-Sudanese territorial dispute over the Halayeb and Shalateen triangle, and Sudan’s position against Egypt in Cairo’s argument with Ethiopia over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. As for Turkey, Egypt distrusts Ankara’s support for the Muslim Brotherhood, which Egypt considers a terrorist group.

Genocide negotiations between Germany and Namibia hit stumbling blocks (Henning Melber and Reinhart Kössler, Times Live)
Namibian-German negotiations about the genocide perpetrated in the former German colony South West Africa in 1904-1908 have just entered their third year. The start of the negotiations in late 2015 marked a turning point after more than a century of German denialism. But now tangible progress seems elusive, and a crisis may be imminent, delaying justice for the Ovaherero and Nama descendants of the main victim groups. There’s always been unity in Namibia about the broad demands towards Germany - recognition of the genocide, an apology and reparations. This has been true even though there’s been considerable controversy about the issue of representation at the negotiations, with the feud between groups representing the victims and the Namibian government turning bitter at times.