Africa starts 2020 battling extremism, Ebola and hunger

A tragic airline crash with far-reaching consequences, cataclysmic cyclones that may be a harbinger of future, death of an African icon and a new leer who won bel Peace Prize. se African stories captured world’s attention in 2019 — and look to influence events on continent in 2020.

battles against extremist violence and Ebola will also continue to be major campaigns in Africa in coming year.

crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jet shortly after takeoff from dis Ababa in March killed all 157 passengers and crew. disaster, which claimed lives of a large number of U.N. officials, involved a Boeing 737 Max jet and came just five months after a similar crash in Indonesia of same aircraft.

Boeing was inundated with questions about safety of its plane. After initially claiming that it was safe, company was forced to ground plane after many countries refused to let it fly in ir air. In December Boeing anunced that it would suspend production of jet.

air crash was a trial for Ethiopia’s reformist Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who later in year won 2019 bel Peace Prize for achieving peace with neighboring Eritrea. But Abiy is challenged by often violent ethnic rivalries in his country and elections set for May 2020 will be crucial, analysts say.

Cyclone Idai ripped into Mozambique in March, killing more than 1,300 people, making it “one of worst wear-related disasters ever to hit sourn hemisphere,” according to U.N. A month later Cyclone Kenneth roared into rrn Mozambique, killing more than 50 people.

This was first time in recorded history that Mozambique h two major cyclones, prompting some to worry that country, with a 1,000-mile Indian Ocean coastline, may be prone to more storms as a result of climate change.

Across Mozambique more than 2.5 million people remain in urgent need of assistance, according to U.N. Mozambique also starts 2020 troubled by ongoing attacks on vehicles in country’s central area and by Islamic extremist attacks in country’s rth.

Extremist violence continues to vex Africa from east to west.

2019 began with extremist violence. In Kenya in January, insurgents launched an assault on a luxury hotel and shopping complex in Nairobi that killed at least 14 people.

year came to an end with extremist attacks across continent.

A bomb in Somalia killed 78 people, including many university students, in capital, Mogishu, on Dec. 28, deliest attack in years. Somalia’s al-Shabab, allied to al-Qaida, claimed responsibility for bombing.

In Nigeria extremists linked to Islamic State group circulated a video showing 11 hosts, most of m Christians, being executed. y were thought to be killed on Christmas Day. extremist group, which calls itself Islamic State West Africa Province, said captives were executed as revenge for killing of Islamic State group leers in Iraq and Syria in October.

In rrn Burkina Faso, jihists killed 35 civilians, most of m women, and ensuing clashes with security forces left 80 jihists de, West African nation’s president anunced Dec. 24. That attack came weeks after an attack on a convoy carrying employees of a Canian mining company in which at least 37 civilians were killed in country’s east. Both attacks were by groups numbering close to 100, indicating presence of relatively large, well-organized extremist groups.

“ startling deterioration of security situation in Burkina Faso has been a major development in 2019,” said Alex Vines, director of Africa program at Chatham House, British think tank. ”re’s been a dramatic spike in extremist attacks.”

Frequent attacks in Burkina Faso’s rth and east alrey have displaced more than a half million people, according to United Nations. While Burkina Faso’s military has received training from both former colonizer France and United States, it starts 2020 with little progress in halting surge in extremist violence.

Congo starts year waging a different kind of war — a campaign against Ebola, which has killed more than 2,200 people since August 2018. medical effort to control second deliest Ebola outbreak in history has been severely hampered since start by presence of several armed groups in eastern Congo, epicenter of epidemic. It was hoped that new vaccines would help control outbreak more quickly, but violence has hampered those efforts.

Congo’s President Felix Tshisekedi, elected in 2019, said in vember that he was optimistic that Ebola outbreak would be ended before 2020, but epidemic continues throughout eastern Congo.

South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa, re-elected in 2019, said in a New Year’s statement that need to boost his country’s ailing ecomy and create jobs is his biggest challenge for 2020. Nigerian President Muhammu Buhari, also re-elected, has said that his government has controlled rebellion by Boko Haram extremists, but violence continues to plague country’s rast.

Zimbabwe’s longtime ruler, Robert Mugabe, died at 95 in September. Mugabe, guerrilla leer who fought to end white-mirity rule in Rhodesia and n ruled independent Zimbabwe from 1980 until 2017, left a mixed legacy of liberation, repression and ecomic ruin.

Zimbabwe begins new year with severe ecomic problems including inflation estimated at more than 300% and widespre hunger. In an emergency appeal at end of December, U.N.’s World Food Program said that even though sourn African country h suffered a drought, Zimbabwe’s food shorts are a “man-me” disaster, laying blame squarely with President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government.

once-prosperous country staggered to 2020 with power shorts lasting up to 19 hours per day and large parts of capital, Harare, a city of some 2 million people, going without running water.