N'DJAMENA, April 8 - Chad's President Idriss Deby, an ally of Western nations in the fight against Islamist militants, is poised to extend his three-decade rule in Sunday's election despite mounting signs of popular discontent with his leadership.

Every Easter weekend, several millions of Zion Christian Church (ZCC) faithful from across southern Africa descend on “Moria city”, the church’s capital in the north of the country, for their annual pilgrimage.

Five of the dozens of students kidnapped from a college in northwest Nigeria were reunited with their families Wednesday, two days after having been found by the military.

Zimbabwe's tobacco output is expected to grow by around 9% to 200 000 tons this year, the industry regulator said Wednesday, providing a major source of foreign currency for the country's embattled economy.

Mozambique has told the international community what support it needs to deal with an Islamic State-linked insurgency.

Mozambique's president, Filipe Nyusi, on Wednesday said Islamic State-linked insurgents had been forced out of Palma, a key northern town that the rebels hit in a brazen raid last month.

Nigeria has directed its 36 states and federal capital territory to stop giving first doses of AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccines once they use half their current stock in order to safeguard supply for the second dose, its health minister said.

Gunmen stormed a police station in southeast Nigeria and freed prisoners, a day after the restive region was hit by a prison breakout blamed on separatists, police and local media said on Wednesday.

More than 1 000 people fleeing an attack on Palma were not allowed to cross into Tanzania to seek asylum, the UN says.

Gunmen have kidnapped two Chinese workers from a gold-mining site in southwest Nigeria and shot their security guards, police said on Wednesday, in the latest such incident in the area.

Six southern African presidents are to hold emergency talks on the crisis in northern Mozambique, where jihadists last month seized a key town, a regional bloc said Tuesday.

United Nations teams have received "worrying" reports that Tanzania has rejected over 1 000 people seeking refuge from an Islamic State-claimed attack on a town in northern Mozambique.

More than 1 800 prisoners are on the run in southeast Nigeria after escaping when heavily armed gunmen attacked their prison using explosives and rocket-propelled grenades, the authorities said.

Sudan's cabinet approved a bill Tuesday abolishing a 1958 law on boycotting Israel, after Khartoum and the Jewish state struck a deal to normalise ties.

The Suez Canal Authority is considering expanding the southern section of the waterway where the container ship Ever Given became stranded, its chairman said on Tuesday.

Tanzania’s new president Samia Suluhu Hassan said on Tuesday that her government would form a committee for scientific research into Covid-19, in a departure from the pandemic-sceptic policies of her predecessor John Magufuli who died last month.

The metical has appreciated 14% against the dollar since the beginning of February, making it the world’s best performing currency in the period. And its stellar run isn’t over yet.

The South African National Editors' Forum has given its support to international calls for justice for South African photojournalist Anton Hammerl.

Assailants were heavily armed with assault weapons, rocket-propelled grenades, and improvised explosive devices.

The most powerful of the Central African Republic's armed groups said in a statement on Monday it will quit a rebel coalition aiming to unseat President Faustin Archange Touadera.