First Independent Mena Newspaper
Three people, including a one-year-old child, were killed when a building collapsed in Soweto, a township in Johannesburg, in the early hours of Sunday, December 28. The Johannesburg Emergency Management Services (JEMS) reported receiving an emergency call shortly after 3:00 a.m. local time (0100 GMT). Six people were inside the structure at the time; three […]
In the early hours of Sunday, 21 December, a group of armed men attacked KwaNoxolo tavern in Bekkersdal, 46 km west of Johannesburg, killing nine people and injuring at least ten others. Around 12 gunmen in a white minibus and a silver sedan opened fire on patrons and continued shooting randomly as they fled. Some […]
The Bourse Régionale des Valeurs Mobilières (BRVM), West Africa’s regional stock exchange, has reached an unprecedented market capitalization of about $21.2 billion, marking a milestone for the eight-member West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU). Announced on Wednesday (15 Oct), the BRVM’s market cap has soared 29.13% since the end of 2024, with a remarkable […]
As tensions surge between the world’s two largest economies, China is ramping up its global diplomacy, holding strategic talks with Saudi Arabia and South Africa to counterbalance the United States’ sweeping new tariffs. China’s commerce minister Wang Wentao recently held virtual meetings with his counterparts in Saudi Arabia and South Africa, focusing on responses to […]
A staggering 60% of African young people are looking to leave their respective countries in the next five years in search of a better life, with unchecked corruption being the “single greatest hurdle” threatening their future on the continent, according to a new poll by the Johannesburg-based Ichikowitz Family Foundation. One-third of the nearly 420 […]
Once a model of urban development in Africa, Johannesburg has come to represent all that is wrong with urbanization in the continent due to the failure of the ruling party, ANC, to provide basic services and upgrade infrastructure. The city came to the spotlight of several international media outlets such as the Financial Times and […]
Crises in Africa are being overlooked, with news about humanitarian emergencies on the continent buried beneath the weight of media attention focused elsewhere, according to a recent report by CARE International. The 2023 report entitled ‘Breaking the Silence: Ten Humanitarian Crises That Didn’t Make Headlines in 2023’ lists ten forgotten humanitarian crises of last year, […]
Casablanca Finance City (CFC) has maintained its position as the leading African financial center in the half-yearly rankings of the 34th edition of the Global Financial Centers Index (GFCI) that has also included Mauritius, Kigali, Johannesburg, Nairobi, Cape Town, and Lagos on the list. Within the North Africa and Middle East region, the leading Moroccan […]
China has added three new areas for investment to its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) focusing on the African continent where it has spent billions of dollars in infrastructure. The new areas are namely industrialization, increase in agriculture investment and talent development. President Xi Jinping launched the three-pronged plan during a China-Africa leaders’ roundtable meeting […]
African countries have called on China, Africa’s largest trading partner for 14 consecutive years, to shift the focus of the economic relationship from building infrastructure on the continent to supporting local industrialization. With China’ trade with Africa having surged in 2022 by 14.8% year-on-year to reach $282 billion, the Asian powerhouse has been Africa’s largest […]