African press review 25 July 2014

The crash of Air Algérie flight AH 5017 in northern Mali with 118 passengers and crew on board is the top story in most African newspapers.

The Algerian newspaper El Watan quotes Mali’s Transport Minister Amar Ghoul as saying that the debris of the chartered Swift Air plane en route from Ouagadougou to Algiers have been spotted in the north of the country, although he noted that the information needed to be confirmed. The Algiers-based newspaper reports that six Algerians were on board the fated flight, which also had 51 French nationals, 24 Burkinabés, a Cameroonian, a Nigerian and citizens from 13 other countries.

In Mali L’Essor joins speculation about what may have happened to the McDonnell Douglas 83 airliner. It cites a statement by Burkino Faso Transport Minister Jean Bertin Ouedrago explaining that the pilots had asked to change route during the flight because of a powerful sand storm on the flight path in Mali’s airspace.

South Africa’s Mail and Guardian has learnt from aviation websites that the missing aircraft is one of four MD-83s owned by Swiftair. It was 18 years old. The paper also says that US plane maker McDonnell Douglas, now part of Boeing, stopped producing the MD-80 airliner family in 1999 but it remains in widespread use, mainly in the United States.

The Mail and Guardian also observes that, whatever the cause, another plane crash is likely to add to nerves in the industry, after the downing of the Malaysia Airlines plane over Ukraine last week, the crash of a TransAsia Airways off Taiwan during a thunderstorm on Wednesday and the cancellation by several airlines of flights into Tel Aviv due to the conflict in Gaza.

Also in South Africa, City Press reports that 13 officials have been charged for maladministration related to the 17-million-euro upgrades to President Jacob Zuma’s rural homestead.

According to the paper, while the Special Investigating Unit was reluctant to provide the names of those charged, some are senior managers who sat on the Bid Adjudication Committee that awarded tenders for the Nkandla refurbishment. It however says there are fears that government officials are being made scapegoats while those who actually benefited financially from the upgrading of Nkandla might get off lightly.

In Kenya the Daily Nation reports that the country’s counties have run out of cash to pay their workers’ salaries. According to the paper, governors accused lawmakers at a press conference in Nairobi on Thursday that there was no money in their bank accounts because MPs had delayed passing the law to release 1.9 billion euros for devolved governments.

The July salaries, expected to be paid on Friday, will have to wait until the money is released, according to the Daily Nation.The paper says it also emerged on Thursday that Controller of Budget Agnes Odhiambo had turned down the budgets of 44 counties for not adhering to the recently issued caps on spending.

Standard Digital is reporting a bombshell from the ongoing international Aids conference in Melbourne, Australia. It reports that Kenya is among countries told to embrace gay sex or forget aid. It attributes the remarks to retired Australian high court judge Michael Kirby.

According to the paper Kirby angrily told countries, most of them in Africa, to make the activities legal or keep their begging bowls this, in a keynote speech witnessed by UNaids Executive Director Michael Sidibe. Kirby was reported verbatim saying that patience was wearing thin among Western countries which donated roughly half of the19 billion dollars in funds to fight Aids in developing economies last year.