CONTINENTAL DRIFT

AU suspends coup-hit Sudan

The AU has suspended Sudan from all of the organisation’s activities in reaction to the 25 October coup. Protest action against the military takeover continued during the week with trade unions representing doctors and oil workers joining. The AU called the takeover unconstitutional and its chairperson called for the “immediate resumption of consultations between civilians and military”.

Cambridge returns statue

A bronze statue has been returned to its home country of Nigeria by the UK’S Cambridge University. The Okukur statue, which is of a cockerel, was taken from Nigeria by British colonial forces in 1897 and given to Jesus College, Cambridge’s constituent college, by a student’s father.

The college stopped displaying the statue in 2016. The Oba of Benin, the traditional ruler and the custodian of the culture of the Edo people, said he hoped it would “expedite the return of our artworks, which in many cases are of religious importance to us”.

No self sales, sir

Police in Kano State, Nigeria arrested 26-year-old Aliyu Na Idris for selling himself on the street. “The decision to sell myself was due to poverty, I plan to give my parents 10-million naira when I eventually get a buyer, pay five-million naira as tax to the government, give two-million naira to anyone who helped me get a buyer and keep the remaining for daily upkeep,” he told journalists.

Madagascar needs aid

A devastating drought has put at least one million people in Madagascar “on the brink of famine”, according to Amnesty International. The rights organisation also noted that the effects of the drought were exacerbated by climate change and that this is the worst drought in four decades. “The international community must immediately provide the people in Madagascar affected by the drought with increased humanitarian relief and additional funding for the losses and damages suffered,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty’s secretary general.