The Minister of finance is uncertain how 2021 state budget will be successfully executed in Cameroon. Speaking in Ebolowa today, Louis Paul Motaze said it is due to the uncertain security situation in the Anglophone regions and COVID-19. He stated that 100 billion frs CFA is to kept aside to check the spread of COVID-19; and over 200 billion will be disbursed to accelerate decentralisation in the regions.
63 billion francs cfa is the 2021 public investment budget for the Littoral region. The budget was launched today. Officials say infrastructural development is to be a top priority.
Cletus Asongwe has been installed as the Divisional Officer for Douala 5. SDO for Wouri called on the new administrator to handle with tact issues of banditry and land grabbing. Cletus Asongwe will have to handle a vast sub-division made up of people from diverse backgrounds.
Over 1000 trucks transporting assorted goods from Cameroon to Central African Republic blocked in the East Region of Cameroon for over a month. This is due to insecurity in the country. There are plans for military men to escort the trucks.
Match tickets for CHAN in DOUALA have met with timid purchase, four days to the start of the African football championship. Sales points are seemingly empty.
The Minister of Transport, Ngalle Bibehe today ended a two-day working visit to the South West region in preparation for the upcoming African Nations Football Championship (CHAN). In a meeting with members of the Transport syndicate and taxi drivers union, he emphasised on the importance of exercising diligence throughout their transport duty during the period of the CHAN.
The University of Maroua has been a victim of burglars as a total of 140 PB laptops were today declared to have been stolen by unknown individuals. University authorities have affirmed that the place where the mini laptops were kept, was ransacked and totally cleared by the thieves. Investigations have however been opened to track down the thieves.
A 50-years old man was today saved by the police from mob justice as he was accused of sexually abusing an 11 years old girl in Loum. The suspect was narrowly saved from the crowd of angry villagers, though he pleaded innocent for the accusations levied against him.
A girl died today in Douala after being hit by a stray bullet. The girl who goes by the name Mireille Atabong died after suffering for more than a month at the hospital. She was allegedly caught by a police stray bullet on her back as they aimed at some bandits whilst on a crime operation in December. She was rushed to the military hospital where she was given 9 bags of blood in a bid to save her life.
A search is continuing for around 20 people feared to have drowned when a barge sank on the Congo River in the north-east of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Officials say the barge sank on Friday evening as it left Kisangani, the capital of Tshopo province, heading for the town of Basoko. They said more than 200 people had survived but six bodies had been recovered.
Malawi’s transport minister Sidik Mia has died this morning from Covid 19, information minister Gospel Kazako has confirmed. We reported earlier that the local government minister Lingson Belekanyama had also died. The two senior ministers died within two hours of each other.
An appeals court in Egypt has acquitted two women who posted videos on the video-sharing app TikTok which the authorities deemed immoral. University students Haneen Hossam and Mawada al-Adham were sentenced along with three men last July to two years in prison and fined $19,000 (£14,000) each. The jail sentences were the first of several against women social media influencers accused of having disturbed the moral fabric of Egyptian society.
Ghana’s government has announced the date for the funeral of former President Jerry Rawlings. The former president will lie in state for public viewing from 24 to 26 January according to the communique. The burial is scheduled to take place on 27 January. The former president died in mid-November at the age of 73 after being admitted to a hospital in Accra.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has used a Syrian airline under US sanctions to transport humanitarian aid to Libya. The WHO has posted a photograph of a Cham Wings aircraft it had used to ferry 16 tonnes of medicines and supplies from its warehouses in Dubai to Libya’s second city Benghazi. The organisation’s representative in Libya Elizabeth Hoff used to be its envoy to Syria for seven years from 2012. The Syrian private carrier was placed under US sanctions in 2016 for reportedly carrying weapons and foreign fighters to support President Bashar al-Assad’s troops against rebels.
Foreign news: BBC