Algeria saw its largest protests ever yesterday in several cities against ailing president Abdelaziz Boutfleika after he announced that he would be running for a fifth term.
Basketball in Africa is getting a boost next year with the launch of the first NBA-affiliated regional league.
On his first visit to Egypt that took in archaeological sites in Luxor and a cathedral bombed by Islamic State, French president Emmanuel Macron’s remarks to his counterpart Abdel Fattah el Sisi about the country’s deteriorating human rights situation on live television saw both leaders temporarily drop their diplomatic masks.
Morocco is banking on a French-built bullet train being an investment draw card for the country by linking its major cities and sprucing up its image internationally in the process. The train was launched this month by King Mohammed VI with French president Emmanuel Macron following a decade-long development program backed by mostly French funding as well as some Gulf region financial support.
In a bid to boost its local tourism industry, Morocco is going to start to taxing Airbnb and travel site, booking.com from next year. The government believes the move will help local hotels and travel agencies to stay competitive as international holiday-makers increasingly use the travel services, which end up cutting some of the local players.
Cairo
Brisbane, Australia
On the first day of this year, Egypt’s Grand Mufti Shawki Allam rang in 2018 with a sternly worded fatwa (religious edict) that Bitcoin trades lead its users to “fraud, betrayal and ignorance”.
Last week, in a lavish ceremony President Abdel Fattah El Sisi was handed the first locally made smartphone called Nile X, which is designed for the Egyptian consumer.
At a sold out Cairo concert of indie rock Lebanese band Mashrou’ Leila, a group of Egyptian fans raised rainbow flags in a celebratory gesture of awareness about the LGBT community’s plight.
Uber is set to launch a bus service in Egypt, the most populous Arab country with over 90 million inhabitants and notoriously heavy traffic.
When Bushra al-Fadil landed in London to receive the 2017 Caine Prize for African Literature, he spent a day perusing the library of the School of Oriental and African Studies.
Cairo
Egypt has disrupted voice over internet protocol (VoIP) services this week for users who use messaging apps like Apple’s FaceTime, Viber, Skype, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.
Morocco’s King Mohammed VI made Saad Eddine El Othmani, a psychiatrist, as the country’s newest prime minister last week.
Former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was acquitted on all charges on Friday for killing around 900 protestors during the 2011 Arab Spring uprising, which led to him being deposed after thirty years in power.
Egypt has placed former soccer star Mohammed Aboutrika on a terrorist watch list, while he’s away in Gabon, as a TV commentator at this year’s African Cup of Nations soccer competition.
Cairo
Photos of children as young as 2 years old are the face of a Facebook campaign against Morocco’s decision to block residents from using voice over IP (VoIP) apps like Skype, Viber or Whatsapp to make free phone calls.
A Congolese priest in Germany has resigned after he received death threats targeting him for his work with refugees and his race.
Ikea is set to open its first store in Morocco after the government gave the go ahead following months of diplomatic deadlock with the Swedish government. The diplomatic spat was over Sweden’s plans to recognize the independence of the disputed Western Sahara territory.
Dozens of Cairo taxi drivers protested this week against Uber and others ride hailing apps such as Dubai-based Careem.
On a lazy weekend in El Shabraween, a village in Egypt’s delta about 110 kilometres east of Cairo, Mohamed El Garhey is hard at work lining up chairs in a circle for a meeting with locals to discuss the village’s needs. They meet on the premises of the first floor of the 25 January Hospital that he helped make reality by raising funds and awareness through Twitter.
Egypt’s turnout at this week’s parliamentary elections was so staggeringly low it prompted a columnist for one of the country’s biggest tabloids to claim that Egyptians prefer porn to politics.
