Scottish government gives £500,000 aid for drought in East Africa

Four charities will be tasked with giving out food packages and improving water access.

The Scottish government has announced a £500,000 aid package to help countries struggling with drought in east Africa.

Four charities - Christian Aid, Mercy Corps, Sciaf and Tearfund - will split the funding, receiving £125,000 each.

The charities will be tasked with giving out food packages, improving water access, training hygiene promoters and providing cash transfers.

They will operate in South

Sudan, Kenya and Ethiopia as the region faces its driest conditions in decades.

Scotland’s international development minister Neil Gray said: “This funding will support four essential projects ensuring people suffering from the drought receive necessary food supplies and enhanced access to clean water - a vital measure in preventing waterborne diseases.

“The Scottish government is committed to fulfilling its role as a responsible and compassionate global citizen and this aid from our Humanitarian Emergency Fund will provide essential help to those in desperate need.”

Fespaco: Tunisia thriller Ashkal takes top film prize

By Natasha Booty & Nicolas Negoce

Afirst-time solo feature film director has won one of cinema’s top awards.

A representative for Youssef Chebbi, 38, said the filmmaker was “grateful for the trophy” at Fespaco in Burkina Faso, awarded for the murder mystery Ashkal, set in his native Tunisia.

The film sees a male-female police duo unravel a dark and puzzling case in the Gardens of Carthage.

Started in 1969 and now in its 28th edition, the biennial event was this time watched over by military rulers.

Burkina Faso has been under junta control for just over a year and the Fespaco film festival happens only once every two years. So photos from Saturday’s ceremony show military men with red berets and machine guns alongside Africa’s artistic elite.

Chebbi himself did not attend the award ceremony. It is not known if this was an act of conscientious objection to Burkina Faso’s current political situation.

But the man who collected the prize on Chebbi’s behalf from soldier-turned-President Ibrahim Traoré, said that winning the Etalon d’or du Yennenga - as the top award is known - “means a lot” to Chebbi.

The festival attracts thousands from across the continent with filmmakers from Nigeria, Kenya, Somalia, Uganda, South Africa and more taking part this year. Nearly half of all entries in the fiction category were directed by women.

Apolline Traoré was a front-runner for top prize, eventually

Coming Second

Sira, the tale of a woman’s struggle for survival after being kidnapped by jihadis in the Sahel, won Burkinabè director Apolline Traoré second place in the fiction category.

And third place went to Kenya’s Angela Wanjiku Wamai for Shimoni.

In her closing remarks at Saturday’s awards ceremony, Fespaco jury head and producer Dora Bouchoucha, made apparent reference to racist remarks by Tunisia’s president about subSaharan Africans changing his country’s demographics as part of “plot” by foreign powers.

“I am deeply sad and at the same time grateful my actions in terms of promoting African cinema are recognised in Burkina Faso,” said Ms Bouchoucha.

Legs4Africa prosthetic technician

olds, to encourage young people into the profession.

Ms Yearworth, who was born in Bristol, was one of only a few female technicians when she began her career in 2015.

“Then I had a moment where I realised, ‘Oh wow I can create this’.

“It’s a perfect combination of making things and helping people.” experience was “invaluable” in starting the dismantling program and training the centres across Africa.

“honoured”

To Be Female Role Model

Bex

Yearworth is a trustee with Legs4Africa which transports prosthetic limbs to people in Africa

A prosthetic technician who has helped to change the lives of amputees in Africa said she is “honoured” to be a role model for a national exhibition.

Bex Yearworth, 32, is a trustee at Bristol charity Legs4Africa where she was integral to UK prosthetics being recycled to support thousands of amputees in sub-Saharan Africa.

The charity has helped more than 14,000 people to walk again.

The exhibition is being held in the National Science Museum, London.

It is dedicated to 11 to 16-year-

She said it was “a big responsibility and an honour” to be selected for the exhibition which was “an amazing opportunity to inspire young people”.

“There is a massive skills shortage in the industry so to be able to shine the spotlight on prosthetics and break down some stereotypes that still exist I hope we will be able to encourage more young people to see it as a future career opportunity.”

Ms Yearworth, who was working as a RADA-trained theatre technician in London’s West End, “stumbled across” prosthetics after spending time being treated in hospital and rehabilitation units for a connective tissue disorder.

She said she was looking for a better work-life balance as theatre hours can be “unpredictable”.

“I really aggressively started applying for trainee positions and coming up to eight years later it has been all the things I hoped it would be at that time.”

“Sometimes I don’t really believe I do this... then I have an existential moment when someone has a walk on a leg I’ve made and... it’s mind-blowing,” she added.

Ms Yearworth said she was “lucky” to have had employers who recognised the passion she had for volunteering with Legs4Africa.

Tom Williams, CEO of Legs4Africa, said “It is great to see [Bex’s] work recognised. She is a real inspiration, and we are lucky to have her as part of our [specialist] team.”

He said Ms Yearworth has helped make the recycling of prosthetics possible and her

Egypt jails dozens accused of Muslim Brotherhood links

Acourt in Egypt has handed down jail sentences, ranging from life to five years’ hard labour, to 30 people for involvement with the nowoutlawed Muslim Brotherhood. Ayesha Khairat al-Shater and her husband were given 10 years each. Her father was the Muslim Brotherhood’s first nominee for president in 2012 before he was replaced by Mohamed Morsi. She was arrested in 2018 and charged with misuse of social media and promoting terrorist ideas.

Amnesty International and other rights groups had described her detention as arbitrary and campaigned for her release.

Source; BBC