Newscast - Africa

Germany’s embattled defense minister, who was criticized over the pace of a massive project to modernise the military and for Berlin’s stuttering response to the Ukraine war, has resigned.
Christine Lambrecht says that months of media focus on my person had stood in the way of a factual debate about the military and Germany’s security policy.
She says the valuable work of the soldiers and many people in the department must stand in the foreground.
A spokesperson for Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he had accepted Lambrecht’s resignation and a replacement would be announced soon.

China's economy grew last year at the second slowest rate in almost half a century - a sign of how the country's strict coronavirus regulations have affected businesses.
Official figures show the gross domestic product of the world's second-largest economy rose by 3% in 2022.
The policy had a major impact on the country's economic activity last year but the sudden relaxation of the rules has led to a jump in Covid cases that threatens to also drag on growth in the early part of this year.
Jacqueline Rong, deputy China economist from the BNP Paribas bank says the data came in stronger than our expectation. Nevertheless, it reveals the hard hit to the Chinese economy from a zero-Covid policy and a property rout in 2022.
Experts have voiced caution over China's economic numbers - with some warning that the trajectory of the data rather than the figures themselves are a useful guide to how the country's economy is performing

Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon warned London against any bid to block a controversial Scottish gender recognition law, adding her devolved government is prepared to vigorously defend its powers all the way to the UK’s top court.
The looming standoff over the law to make it easier for people to change gender ratchets up London’s tense relations with Scotland’s regional government, less than two months after the ruling Scottish National Party saw its efforts to hold a new independence referendum stymied by the UK Supreme Court.
Sturgeon says that her government is prepared to “rigorously” defend the gender legislation all the way to the UK’s top court if Prime Minister Rishi Sunak steps in to block it.

Industrial action looked set to intensify after Britain’s largest teaching union announced a series of strike days over pay next month in England and Wales.
The National Education Union says its members voted overwhelmingly to walk out as part of calls for an above-inflation pay rise.
The announcement came as public sector workers hold a wave of walkouts for salaries to take into account double-digit inflation.
NEU joint general secretary Kevin Courtney says they believe the government knows there needs to be a correction on teacher pay.
It said each school will only be affected for four days.

South African opposition groups, a trade union and business owners have threatened to sue the government over the crippling blackouts in the country.
They have given the government up to Friday to stabilise electricity supply or face legal action for contravening its duty to provide electricity.
They have written a demand letter to the Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan and the chief executive of the state utility firm Eskom, Andre de Ruyter, saying the state was in breach of its obligation to provide electricity.
The blackouts have persisted for more than a decade, amid poor management and corruption at state firm Eskom South Africa Faces Legal Action Over Power Crisis

The Federal Government announced that the licensing round for seven deep offshore open oil blocs, which commenced on January 3, 2023, would last for four months.
The Chief Executive, of Nigeria Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, Gbenga Komolafe, says the approval of the exercise by President Muhammadu Buhari was the first in the last 15 years.
He explained the commission had announced the commencement and launched the bid round portal which was officially opened on January 3, 2023.
He noted that in compliance with the provisions of the PIA 2021 and regulations made pursuant to the Act, the commission issued a licensing round guideline and published a licensing round plan for a total of seven deep offshore open blocs.

Nigeria’s inflation rate eased to 21.34% in December 2022 from 21.47% in November 2022, first drop in about 11 months.
The National Bureau of Statistics showed a decline of 0.13% between November and December.
The NBS reports say In December 2022, the headline inflation rate eased to 21.34% compared to November 2022 headline inflation rate which was 21.47%.
This shows that the headline inflation rate increased in the month of December 2022 when compared to the same month in the preceding year.
The percentage change in the average CPI for the twelve months ending December 2022 over the average of the CPI for the previous twelve months period was 18.85%, showing 1.89% increase compared to the 16.95% recorded in December 2021.”

The United Kingdom government plans to revise the law to give police more powers to crack down on protests, after demonstrations that have seen some people blocking roads or marching slowly.
The amendments to the Public Order Bill, to be tabled on Monday, will broaden the legal definition of serious disruption”, giving police greater flexibility and “absolute clarity” over when they can intervene in a protest.
The moves against the right to protest followed a series of demonstrations that have blocked the M25, the London orbital motorway that is the busiest road in the country, and closed down parts of the capital.

Belarus says the joint air force drills it will begin with Russia on Monday are defensive in nature, but the exercises are taking place as concerns grow that Moscow is pushing Minsk to join the war in Ukraine.
Pavel Muraveyko, first deputy state secretary of the Belarusian Security Council, says the exercise is purely defensive in nature
Muraveyko added that the exercises, which will continue until February 1, will involve training for aerial reconnaissance, deflecting air strikes, and air cover of important objects and communications.

Oxfam says the world’s top 1 percent grabbed nearly two-thirds of the $42 trillion in new wealth created since 2020, in a new report released to coincide with the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Oxfam’s “Survival of the Richest” report released says the share was almost twice as much money as the amount obtained by the bottom 99 percent of the world’s population.
Oxfam says a 5 percent tax on the world’s multi-millionaires and billionaires could raise $1.7 trillion a year, enough to lift 2 billion people out of poverty.