Law enforcement agencies in South Africa have taken five individuals into custody over the weekend in connection with a horrific, widely condemned farm attack that left 50-year-old cattle farmer Donovan Marx severely injured and recovering in hospital. The incident unfolded last Wednesday at Marx’s property outside Ventersdorp, a small rural town in the country’s North West province. According to official police statements, a gang of masked, armed men first accosted a farm employee who was mowing the lawn outside the residence, tied his hands and feet with cable ties, and forced him to reveal Marx’s whereabouts. When Marx returned home shortly after, two members of the group ambushed him, shooting him in the upper torso before dragging him inside the home, stabbing him repeatedly, and severing both of his ears during the prolonged ordeal. The suspects then ransacked the property, stole three firearms from a household safe, and fled the scene in Marx’s personal van. The trapped farm worker eventually managed to free himself and alert emergency services, rushing the gravely injured Marx to a local medical facility, where he remains under care; local outlet IOL reports that surgical teams were unable to reattach his severed ears, meaning he will likely require prosthetic devices for functional and cosmetic recovery. News of the five swift arrests, for suspects ranging in age from 26 to 56, has been met with widespread relief from Marx’s immediate family, who released a statement acknowledging the police progress and urging the formal legal process to proceed unimpeded to ensure accountability. The barbaric, unprovoked assault has sparked public outrage across South Africa, a nation already grappling with persistently high rates of violent crime. Senior government and parliamentary figures have also weighed in: Agriculture Minister Willie Aucamp explicitly condemned the attack, stating such senseless acts of violence have no place in South African society, while Ian Cameron, chair of parliament’s police oversight committee, praised law enforcement for the rapid apprehension of suspects and called for a thoroughly investigated, robust case to be presented in court when the five accused make their first scheduled appearance on Tuesday, facing charges of house robbery, attempted murder, and unlawful possession of firearms and ammunition. The incident has also reignited public discourse around highly contested, widely discredited claims pushed by fringe right-wing groups that targeted attacks on white Afrikaner farmers constitute a genocide against white South Africans – a narrative that has been formally rejected by every major political party in the country, including parties representing Afrikaner communities, but which was previously amplified by former U.S. President Donald Trump, who floated offering special asylum status to white Afrikaners. The latest official South African crime statistics, covering the April to June 2026 reporting period, do not track farm-specific attack metrics separately, and documented only one recorded rural robbery over that three-month window. National police data further confirms that the overwhelming majority of all crime victims in South Africa, including those targeted in rural and farm settings, are Black South Africans, a demographic reality that counters the skewed framing of fringe extremist narratives.
标签： Africa
非洲
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Uganda begins withdrawing troops from Somalia after 20 years
Nearly two decades after first dispatching military personnel to Somalia under African Union peacekeeping frameworks, Uganda has formally launched the long-anticipated pullback of its forces assigned to the continental bloc’s stabilization missions. The first cohort of 109 service members from the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) departed Somalia’s coastal capital Mogadishu on a recent Friday, a move publicly confirmed days earlier by Uganda’s top military commander General Muhoozi Kainerugaba.
As the very first African nation to contribute troops to the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) when the initiative launched back in 2007, Uganda’s military footprint in the Horn of Africa nation has been a cornerstone of regional efforts to fend off violent extremist threats. The original AMISOM mandate was designed to shield Somalia’s fragile transitional government from relentless assaults by al-Qaeda affiliated al-Shabab insurgents, who have waged a brutal, decades-long campaign of violence across the country.
Over the course of the 20-year deployment, Ugandan troops bore the brunt of high casualty counts in joint operations alongside the Somali National Army, leading successful offensives that ousted al-Shabab fighters from Mogadishu and most major urban centers, reclaimed vast swathes of strategic territory, and secured critical government infrastructure to prevent the collapse of Somalia’s state institutions. The UPDF contingent remained embedded in successive iterations of AU-led operations, including the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS), which was structured to gradually devolve full security control to local Somali forces. In 2025, ATMIS was succeeded by the African Union Support and Stabilisation Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM), whose core mandate is to build the operational capacity of Somalia’s domestic security agencies to assume full national security oversight.
General Muhoozi announced the commencement of the phased withdrawal in a public post on social media platform X, noting, “As we promised, we have started withdrawing UPDF from Somalia. After 20 years of a lot of blood and sacrifice, we are handing over security to our Somali brothers.” The staggered withdrawal schedule is projected to wrap up completely by August 2027, though the UPDF will not fully exit Somalia entirely: roughly 2,000 Ugandan troops deployed under separate bilateral security agreements between Kampala and Mogadishu will remain stationed in the country, separate from the approximately 4,500 Ugandan personnel currently serving under the AUSSOM banner.
The drawdown announcement comes as AUSSOM grapples with growing fiscal uncertainty, as planned cuts to United States and United Nations financial support for the AU mission loom on the horizon. A 12-month transition period is set to kick off in January, providing the Somali federal government and African Union leadership a window to secure alternate funding streams to sustain ongoing stabilization efforts. Requests for comment from Uganda’s acting military spokesperson Chris Magezi to the BBC went unanswered at the time of publication.
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Namibia overpower Ireland in series decider
Against the backdrop of Windhoek’s cricket grounds on 28 August, the final clash of the five-match one-day international (ODI) series between Namibia and Ireland delivered a landmark result, as the host nation claimed a decisive five-wicket victory to seal a 3-2 overall series triumph. The contest unfolded with a lopsided opening batting performance from the visiting Irish side, who won the pre-match toss and elected to take first strike. Ireland’s innings quickly unravelled, with opener Tim Tector dismissed for just five runs in the second over, followed closely by Andrew Balbirnie who fell for nine. A brief bright spell from Cade Carmichael was cut short when he became the first of seamer Jack Brassell’s three wickets, leaving the Irish middle order under immense pressure. While Harry Tector and team captain Lorcan Tucker mounted a brief resistance, and Jordan Neill’s blistering 33 runs off 25 deliveries prevented a total batting collapse, the Irish side was eventually bowled all out for a mere 129 runs in just 33.1 overs. Namibia’s star all-rounder JJ Smit was the architect of the batting collapse, finishing with exceptional figures of four wickets for only 20 runs, tearing through Ireland’s lower order to set his side a trivial run chase. Namibia’s response at the crease was far from flawless, with opener Michael van Lingen caught for 15 in the seventh over and top scorer Louren Steenkamp run out for 46 runs off 44 balls by Ireland’s Matthew Humphreys, who claimed two wickets for 48 runs to keep the visiting side’s faint hopes alive. However, a steady 30-run knock from Namibia captain Gerhard Erasmus steadied the innings, and the hosts crossed the 130-run mark in just 21.2 overs with five wickets still in hand, wrapping up the series win long before the allocated overs were exhausted. The series holds critical competitive value for both sides, as Namibia is set to host the ICC Cricket World Cup Qualifier in February of the following year, making this hard-fought series a high-stakes preparatory campaign for Gary Wilson’s home squad. Post-match, Ireland captain Lorcan Tucker acknowledged his side’s underperformance, noting that the team had failed to bring their top-level skill execution to the deciding fixture despite high pre-match motivation to claim the series. Tucker added that the Irish squad would take valuable lessons from the competitive tour, noting that Namibia’s consistent, disciplined execution of top-order batting and middle-overs bowling had served as a valuable learning opportunity, and that the team would be reviewing gaps in their skill intensity ahead of upcoming international fixtures, while offering full credit to the host side for their consistent, diligent play across the five matches.
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More than 5,000 die from Ebola in DR Congo’s deadliest outbreak
Official data released by the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) national health authorities confirms that the ongoing Ebola outbreak has claimed more than 5,000 lives, marking the deadliest Ebola emergency ever recorded in the country’s history. First detected in May, the outbreak had already outstripped the 2018–2020 Ebola crisis that killed 2,299 people by August this year, with a current case fatality rate standing at 48.6% across 10,300 confirmed cases distributed in 8 of the country’s 26 provinces.
The epicentre of the crisis remains in north-eastern Ituri province, a long-running active conflict zone where restricted movement and fragmented access to communities have severely hindered standard virus containment efforts. Compounding these operational barriers, widespread misinformation among local populations has triggered a wave of violent attacks against frontline responders: earlier this week, a nurse was killed and a second health worker sustained critical injuries while responding to an Ebola alert, after local youth falsely accused medical teams of contaminating local water supplies and deliberately spreading the virus. Last month, a local politician was beaten to death by crowds for advocating evidence-based Ebola prevention measures, and the Red Cross documented 11 separate violent incidents in the outbreak’s first 100 days that left volunteers injured and an emergency ambulance burned to the ground.
This 17th recorded Ebola outbreak in DRC’s history is classified as the second largest global Ebola emergency on record, trailing only the catastrophic 2014–2016 West African outbreak that killed over 11,325 people and spread as far as Europe and the United States. United Nations officials warn that the current DRC outbreak is claiming lives at a far accelerated pace compared to prior large-scale events. The pathogen driving the current crisis is the Bundibugyo Ebola species, for which no pre-approved vaccine or targeted therapeutic treatment is currently available, though multiple candidate vaccines are now in active clinical trial phases alongside expanded diagnostic testing and supportive care rollouts.
Cross-border transmission has already been documented across the region: Uganda recorded 20 confirmed cases and 2 fatalities in the early months of the outbreak, with no new cases reported since August, though targeted travel screening and entry restrictions remain in place for all travellers arriving from DRC. Kenya has confirmed 9 cases and 2 deaths linked to the outbreak, while Nigeria’s national disease control agency announced two new suspected cases over the weekend that are now in isolation and undergoing diagnostic testing, following a confirmed Ebola case in October that was medically evacuated to Switzerland for advanced care. Public health authorities have sought to calm global concern, with the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control stating that the risk of infection for populations across the European region remains extremely low.
The World Health Organization’s Africa regional office has issued an urgent call for scaled-up core public health interventions, unimpeded humanitarian access to conflict-affected communities, and expanded trusted community outreach initiatives to counter misinformation and bring the outbreak under control. Ebola is a rare, highly virulent viral disease that causes sudden onset of severe symptoms including fever, vomiting, diarrhoea, and in some cases internal and external bleeding, often progressing rapidly to organ failure, and spreads exclusively via direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected individuals. -
Ethiopian PM puts ministers through military training
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has launched a landmark, unprecedented military training program for all senior civilian government leaders, including his full cabinet, deputy ministerial teams, heads of federal public institutions, and the speaker of the House of Federation, at the Hurso military training centre. The prime minister shared a series of firsthand photos on his official social media channels showing him participating in hands-on field drills alongside high-profile attendees such as Finance Minister Fitsum Assefa, Health Minister Mekdes Daba, and legislative speaker Muferiat Kamil, breaking with longstanding local norms where civilian political elites almost never undergo formal military induction. While the exact start date and scheduled duration of the specialized training have not been publicly disclosed, Abiy laid out a clear policy rationale for the unusual initiative in his accompanying social media statement. He framed the program as a deliberate investment in building a new cohort of national leadership that meets three non-negotiable benchmarks: peak physical fitness, unwavering moral integrity, and sharp intellectual competence, all of which he argues are prerequisites to deliver on Ethiopia’s national goal of inclusive, widespread shared prosperity. The Nobel Peace Prize-winning leader emphasized that formal military institutions are uniquely positioned to instill core values that civilian public administration training often overlooks: strict operational discipline, unflinching patriotic commitment, cross-unit collaborative teamwork, transparent personal accountability, and decisive, mission-driven leadership. In a notable framing, Abiy drew a direct parallel between military and civilian priorities, noting that while service members operate against clearly defined tactical targets and civilian leaders work toward long-term public goals, both groups share the ultimate objective of delivering collective victory for the Ethiopian people. The prime minister further argued that merging structured military discipline with civilian governance frameworks would cultivate a generation of public servants with a powerful sense of collective purpose, heightened personal responsibility, and proven ability to coordinate across silos to advance shared national priorities. The high-profile training rollout unfolds against a fraught backdrop of overlapping security crises across Ethiopia: intermittent armed clashes continue to flare in residual hotspots of the northern Tigray region two years after the formal cessation of the two-year Tigray war, widespread intercommunal and state security conflict persists across the Amhara region, and long-running localized insecurity remains pervasive in large swathes of Oromia. Compounding domestic strains, bilateral tensions with neighboring Eritrea have escalated sharply in recent months, with widespread regional and international diplomatic warnings of a potential return to open full-scale conflict between the two Horn of Africa nations. This new initiative is far from an outlier for Abiy’s administration, which has repeatedly positioned robust national military preparedness as a core pillar of its broader national development strategy over recent years.
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Suited and booted: How Joseph Kabila went from president to rebel leader
The political landscape of the Democratic Republic of Congo, long defined by fleeting alliances and the persistent threat of armed power grabs, has been upended by a dramatic twist in the country’s decades-long history of shifting leadership. At 55, Joseph Kabila, who first rose to prominence as a rebel commander in the 1997 uprising that installed his father Laurent as head of state, then served 18 years as the country’s president, has reemerged as the leader of the newly formed Front for the Refoundation of the Nation (FRN) – a coalition that includes the M23 rebel group he once fought against during his time in office.
Most notably, the man Kabila has publicly vowed to oust is none other than Félix Tshisekedi, the very politician he handpicked as his successor following the disputed 2018 elections, with whom he formed a power-sharing coalition after stepping down. The long-rumored alignment between Kabila and M23, whose forces seized swathes of eastern DR Congo including key urban hubs Goma and Bukavu in 2024, sent shockwaves across the vast, mineral-rich nation that spans two-thirds the landmass of Western Europe. Home to vast reserves of gold, diamonds, and critical battery and electronics minerals essential to the global clean energy supply chain, the DRC’s political instability carries far-reaching regional and global ripple effects.
The partnership delivers tangible benefits to both parties: for Kabila, it offers a viable pathway to claw back the political clout he lost after splitting from Tshisekedi’s administration in 2020, when the president moved to dismantle Kabila’s parliamentary majority. For M23, a movement whose rapid military gains have never translated to broad national legitimacy, Kabila brings the institutional experience, high-level political networks, and national name recognition of a former head of state. The alliance comes as Kabila faces a litany of personal pressures: he was sentenced to death in absentia for treason, and faces U.S. sanctions over allegations of past support for M23. Independent DRC policy analyst Henry-Pacifique Mayala noted that Kabila almost certainly secured concrete assurances from his new rebel allies before committing to the high-stakes gambit, as the M23’s hardened military strength grants him far greater leverage in any future negotiations with Kinshasa.
While M23’s operations have until now been concentrated 1,500 kilometers from the capital in the country’s eastern provinces, Kabila’s national networks raise the untested possibility that the long-simmering eastern conflict could spread to the rest of the country. That outcome remains far from guaranteed, however: Kabila, who took power in 2001 following his father’s mysterious assassination, was long viewed as an outsider in Kinshasa political circles, far more fluent in Swahili (the lingua franca of the African Great Lakes region) than the Lingala widely spoken in the capital. His father’s 1996 rebel column marched on foot across the entire country from the east to oust longtime autocrat Mobutu Sese Seko after seven months of campaigning, but few analysts suggest Kabila’s FRN is planning to replicate that exact military campaign.
Kabila has framed his campaign against Tshisekedi as a fight to defend the national constitution, invoking Section 64 of the DRC’s legal framework that enshrines citizens’ right to resist leaders who violate constitutional provisions. He has accused Tshisekedi of acting as a tyrant similar to Mobutu, ending the longstanding moratorium on the death penalty that was in place during his own presidency to intimidate political opponents, civilians, and military personnel, and pushing to amend the constitution to allow a third term in office. Notably, the established C64 opposition coalition that also campaigns against Tshisekedi’s rumored third term bid has rejected Kabila’s armed rebellion, announcing it will instead push for inclusive, direct talks with both Kabila and Tshisekedi to resolve the country’s overlapping security and political crises through peaceful dialogue.
Tshisekedi retains significant structural advantages, according to Richard Moncrieff, Great Lakes regional analyst for the International Crisis Group: he has robust U.S. government backing, control over most state financial resources, and command of the formal national political and military systems. Tshisekedi publicly denounced his former ally last week, stating Kabila’s move to lead a rebel group was definitive proof he had never loved the DRC or its people.
The rift between the two former allies stretches back to the aftermath of the 2018 elections: leaked results from Catholic Church election observers widely indicate opposition candidate Martin Fayulu won the vote, but a pre-negotiated power-sharing deal brokered by Kabila installed Tshisekedi as president, with Kabila’s bloc retaining control of parliament. Former national electoral commission head Corneille Nangaa, who officially declared Tshisekedi the winner and now serves as one of Kabila’s top deputies in the FRN, confirmed he helped draft that 2018 power-sharing agreement, though Tshisekedi has consistently maintained he won the election legitimately. The arrangement collapsed in late 2020, prompting Kabila to enter self-imposed exile in South Africa, where his criticism of Tshisekedi’s administration steadily intensified. He returned to DRC territory earlier in 2025, appearing in rebel-held Goma shortly before the treason conviction was handed down.
The emerging alliance also reshapes longstanding regional dynamics, particularly between DRC and Rwanda. For years, Kabila’s presidency saw fluctuating ties with Rwandan President Paul Kagame: Rwanda has long justified its repeated military interventions in eastern DRC by citing the presence of ethnic Hutu militias responsible for the 1994 Rwandan genocide on Congolese soil, and has long been widely accused of backing the M23 movement – allegations Kigali continues to deny despite overwhelming documentary evidence. Analysts note that the current alignment between Kabila and Kagame is one of pure convenience, not deep mutual trust: Kabila is focused on regaining national political power in the DRC, while Kagame prioritizes securing Rwanda’s border security and preserving Kigali’s strategic influence over eastern DRC. The partnership also allows Rwanda to deflect longstanding international criticism that it is meddling in DRC’s internal affairs, by framing M23 as part of a homegrown Congolese political movement led by a former national president.
Even before Kabila’s official appointment as FRN leader, the eastern DRC conflict showed no signs of abating, despite a U.S.-brokered peace deal signed by Tshisekedi and Kagame in Washington D.C. in November 2025. The broader U.S. strategic interest in the DRC’s critical mineral reserves has led Washington to side firmly with Tshisekedi, imposing sweeping sanctions on Rwandan officials and entities accused of prolonging the eastern conflict. National elections are currently scheduled for 2028, but Tshisekedi has repeatedly warned that ongoing fighting in the east could force a delay to the vote. Kabila has openly questioned whether elections alone can resolve the DRC’s deep-rooted political crises, arguing the country needs a full overhaul of its executive and legislative institutions rather than just electoral cycles. Regional security analyst Ovigwe Eguegu notes that ordinary Congolese citizens stand to lose the most from the standoff, as neither Kabila’s rebel movement nor Tshisekedi’s administration has presented a credible, actionable plan to deliver broad economic transformation for the country’s population, or end decades of pervasive instability in eastern provinces.
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Why has Caf abandoned plans to hold Afcon every four years?
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has formally scrapped a previously announced 2025 plan to shift the Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) to a four-year cycle starting in 2028, opting instead to retain the tournament’s longstanding biennial format that has defined African football since its 1957 debut. The dramatic policy U-turn, announced by CAF president Patrice Motsepe, is framed as a move to prioritize the long-term interests of the continental game, following widespread pushback from national football associations across the 54 member nations. The initial four-year cycle proposal, unveiled on the eve of the 2025 Morocco-hosted Afcon finals, was pitched as a measure to align African football’s calendar with global scheduling norms and reduce recurring conflicts with European top-flight clubs that often resist releasing African international players mid-season. The announcement came alongside a high-profile appearance from FIFA secretary general Mattias Grafstrom, leading critics to argue the policy disproportionately favored FIFA’s global calendar priorities rather than African football’s unique needs. The original restructuring plan also included the launch of an annual Africa Nations League, designed to diversify CAF’s revenue streams beyond its flagship Afcon tournament, which alone is projected to generate $114 million in profits from the 2025 edition, up from $75 million recorded at the 2023 Ivory Coast finals. CAF officials had hoped the new league would build a more sustainable commercial ecosystem, after its ambitious 2022 Africa Super League project collapsed after a single season, failing to hit its projected $200 million annual revenue targets when promised commercial partners fell short of agreed funding terms. Controversy quickly erupted over the original four-year cycle decision, which was approved by CAF’s executive committee in December 2025 without a formal debate or vote at the continental governing body’s general assembly, where all member nations hold representation. Following feedback from national associations, CAF ran a formal consultation process across all 54 member federations before the executive committee voted to reinstate the traditional two-year schedule. Motsepe acknowledged that the proposed Nations League would require multiple years of development before it could deliver meaningful financial returns to support grassroots football across the continent, making a full shift away from Afcon’s reliable revenue stream unfeasible for the foreseeable future. The policy reversal also comes amid broader geopolitical shifts in global football, as FIFA president Gianni Infantino campaigns for re-election and seeks to shore up support from African member states. Multiple football analysts and industry insiders note the decision appears to be the product of a mutual quid pro quo: African federations offered their backing for Infantino’s re-election and his 48-team expanded World Cup format, which increases African representation at the global tournament, in exchange for FIFA concessions that allowed CAF to revert to the biennial Afcon model that serves as the financial backbone for nearly all national football associations across the continent. For many underfunded African national bodies, Afcon revenue is a critical lifeline: the 2025 Morocco tournament alone is projected to generate $192 million, accounting for 66% of CAF’s total cross-competition revenue, covering costs for men’s, women’s, and youth national team programs that rarely receive consistent government or private corporate sponsorship. Moving forward, the 2027 Afcon, co-hosted by Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda, will run from June 19 to July 17 as scheduled, followed by an accelerated 2028 edition, with subsequent tournaments set for 2031 and 2033 to avoid scheduling clashes with the men’s FIFA World Cup. The proposed Africa Nations League is now slated to launch in September 2029, with Motsepe indicating it will likely shift from its original annual format to a biennial schedule, sparking new debates over how to carve out fixture space in an increasingly congested international football calendar. The U-turn preserves Afcon’s decades-old cultural and sporting legacy as Africa’s most beloved continental sporting showcase, but also lays bare the ongoing structural challenges facing African football as it seeks to balance its own domestic development priorities against the competing demands of the global football governance ecosystem.
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Cape Town set for classic finale â what does history suggest could happen?
At Newlands Cricket Ground in Cape Town, day four of the high-stakes five-match third Test between South Africa and Australia unfolded into a masterclass of gritty batting that flipped the contest on its head, setting up a nail-biting series finale for the final day. Entering the penultimate day of play effectively at 40 for 4, the Proteas looked destined for a crushing defeat, but two stellar centuries from batters Ryan Rickelton and Wiaan Mulder dragged the hosts back into contention, before a late-order flurry and dramatic final-wicket stand pushed their second innings total to 387 all out. The innings closed in the very last over of day four, leaving Australia with a 288-run target to seal victory and claim the top spot in the ICC men’s Test rankings. Rickelton crafted his third Test century with a composed 101, while Mulder notched his career-best 115, falling as the final wicket after a blistering 36-run unbroken last-wicket partnership with number 11 batter Kagiso Rabada. The late surge came after a chaotic mid-innings collapse that saw South Africa lose four wickets for just 61 runs, including run-out dismissals for Rickelton, Marco Jansen, and Gerald Coetzee that left the hosts reeling at nine wickets down with a 251-run lead. Analytics firm CricViz’s WinViz model currently gives South Africa a narrow 54% chance of securing a home win, though history and recent form paint a far more nuanced picture of the chase ahead. A successful 288-run fourth innings run chase would mark only the second highest ever at Newlands, where the ground record remains Australia’s iconic 331-run chase for a four-wicket victory over South Africa back in 2002, anchored by an unbeaten Ricky Ponting century. All five previous fourth-innings totals over 288 at the venue ended in either defeat for the batting side or a last-ditch draw, adding layers of uncertainty to day five’s play. The pitch, which played relatively flat through the afternoon and evening as Australia’s fast bowlers tired, has shown clear signs of escalating difficulty as the Test wears on. CricViz’s PitchViz surface difficulty rating spiked to 6.6 in the final session of day four, the highest and most challenging mark recorded across the entire match, with sharp turn for spin bowlers becoming far more pronounced than on any preceding day. One delivery to Simon Harmer, who was bowled by Nathan Lyon after shouldering arms, demonstrated the unpredictable spin now on offer, while a low, skidding delivery to Rickelton shortly after tea hinted at emerging uneven bounce that could further complicate batting conditions. Veteran spinner Simon Harmer, the 37-year-old Essex stalwart who once entertained a switch to represent England, has already claimed four top-order Australian wickets in the tourists’ first innings, dismissing Travis Head, Marnus Labuschagne, Josh Inglis, and Alex Carey for figures of 4 for 104, and is poised to be the hosts’ most decisive weapon on a turning surface on day five. Australia’s recent track record in high-pressure run chases makes them more than capable of overcoming the steep target: after a dismal 2008-2019 stretch where they failed 14 out of 17 times chasing fourth-innings totals between 200 and 350, Pat Cummins’ side has pulled off three successful chases over 270 since 2023, including Travis Head’s legendary 83-ball 123 that blew apart a 205-run chase against England in the opening 2023 Ashes Test. With the number one spot in the ICC Test rankings on the line for whichever side takes the Cape Town Test, the final day of play is primed to deliver one of the most memorable cricket showdowns of the year.
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Refugee athlete to make history for second time at Youth Olympics
What began as a barefoot run for survival and self-reinvention in a Kenyan refugee camp has evolved into two ground-breaking Olympic milestones for South Sudanese athlete Yiech Pur Biel. For Biel, who was displaced as a child when armed attackers raided his South Sudan village, fleeing alone to the sprawling Kakuma refugee settlement near the Kenya-South Sudan border, running was far more than a physical activity: it was a deliberate choice to seize agency over his fractured future. “That’s when I decided now it is time to depend on myself and also to start a new life with determination,” he shared in an interview with BBC Newsbeat. After discovering competitive running through International Olympic Committee (IOC) trials at Kakuma, Biel made global history in 2016 as one of the members of the very first official Refugee Olympic Team, competing in the men’s 800-metre event at the Rio de Janeiro Summer Games. A full decade later, he is stepping into another trailblazing role: Chef de Mission for the first ever dedicated refugee contingent to compete in the Youth Olympic Games, set to make its debut at the 2026 Dakar edition in Senegal. This iteration of the Youth Olympics carries additional historic weight, as it marks the first time any Olympic event has ever been hosted on African soil. The six-athlete refugee delegation will join nearly 3,000 young competitors from across the globe for the Games, whose opening ceremony is scheduled for Saturday. Beyond chasing athletic victories, Biel notes the team carries a dual mission: to showcase the talent and resilience of displaced young people, and to draw global attention to the unmet needs of the world’s refugee populations. The African continent is currently home to roughly 45 million of the 120 million total displaced people worldwide, representing the largest regional displacement crisis on the planet. For Biel, this Youth Olympics platform is a rare opportunity to amplify the voices of a demographic often overlooked by mainstream global media. “It’s a chance for them to tell the world and also to represent the population, especially the refugee population, in Africa,” he explained. “It’s about representing the hope of young people who are living in a refugee camp, who have lost their motivation or their talent.” The journey for many of the team’s athletes mirrors Biel’s own path. One of the delegation’s rising stars is 15-year-old judoka Arno Yafunga Botay, who fled violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo with his family at age 6 and also found refuge in Kakuma. Botay has set an ambitious, community-focused goal for his Games debut: to claim a gold medal, then bring the award back to the camp to teach his fellow young residents the core values of judo and show them that displacement does not have to erase their potential. Biel, who credits the Kakuma camp’s school system and connections with other displaced youth for helping him process the trauma of his early displacement, describes his new leadership role as an immense honour. Drawing on his own lived experience as both a refugee and a former Olympic competitor, he aims to guide the young delegation to make the most of this unprecedented global stage. Full competitive action at Dakar 2026 will kick off immediately following Saturday’s opening ceremony.
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Afcon to return to two-year cycle after Caf U-turn
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has officially reversed a policy shift announced last December that would have moved the flagship Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) to a quadrennial schedule, restoring the tournament’s longstanding two-year hosting cycle following a formal executive committee review. The scrapped four-year framework had included plans to launch a new biennial African Nations League that would have replaced AFCON as CAF’s core continental national team competition, but governing body administrators confirmed the proposed new league would require multiple years of development to build sufficient independent revenue streams to operate as a financially self-sustaining flagship event.
CAF president Patrice Motsepe outlined that the executive committee’s unanimous decision to bring back the biennial AFCON calendar was drafted to prioritize the collective interests of all 54 CAF member national associations, domestic football ecosystems across the continent, and the thousands of African professional players currently contracted to clubs in European and other global leagues. The long-running biennial AFCON format has historically created persistent scheduling frictions, as recent tournament editions have almost exclusively been staged mid-way through the tightly packed European club football season, a conflict that was exacerbated last year when FIFA’s expanded 32-team Club World Cup, held across June and July 2025, forced CAF to select mid-season dates for its 2025 competition.
The updated confirmed AFCON calendar will see the next tournament co-hosted by the joint bid of Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda in 2027, with subsequent editions lined up for 2028, 2031 and 2033. No AFCON will be staged in 2030 to avoid a scheduling clash with that year’s FIFA World Cup. The 2025 AFCON made global headlines for a historic post-tournament ruling that saw initial title winner Senegal stripped of its championship three months after the final, with the trophy subsequently awarded to Morocco.