ADF

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE The hospital room is air-cooled to feel like a pangolin’s burrow. The patient, Lumbi, is syringe-fed with a protein-packed smoothie, given a daily dose of medicine and has his vital signs checked. Lumbi is being treated for a blood parasite after he was rescued from traffickers in South Africa’s northern Limpopo province. He and several other pangolins are patients of Johannesburg Wildlife Veterinary Hospital, founded in 2016 to treat and rehabilitate indigenous wildlife. They were confiscated from poachers in South Africa and neighboring countries, including Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe. Many pangolins are in a horrendous state when rescued.…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE Construction workers in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, are building a barrier around a primary forest in the center of the city to protect the endangered green space from urban expansion. When finished, a cement block fence 10 kilometers long will run along the edge of Banco National Park to prevent it from being swallowed up. Along with the Tijuca National Park in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the nature reserve is one of just two virgin forests worldwide to have survived in the heart of a metropolis. Ivoirian ecologist Tom Thalmas Lasme said the wall is crucial in a country…

ADF STAFF Diébédo Francis Kéré of Burkina Faso has won the 2022 Pritzker Architecture Prize, making him the first African architect ever to win the prestigious international award. Kéré works mostly in challenging locales using local materials that serve entire communities, according to a report for the website ArchDaily.  “Through buildings that demonstrate beauty, modesty, boldness, and invention, and by the integrity of his architecture and geste, Kéré gracefully upholds the mission of this Prize,” according to the official statement of the Pritzker Architecture Prize. In mid-March 2022, Kéré was in Porto-Novo, Benin, where his firm, Kéré Architecture, was working…

ADF STAFF As nations emerge from the pandemic, they are trying to boost economic growth wherever possible. One focus is the “blue economy,” made up of the businesses that rely on water to thrive. This sector, which includes energy, tourism and fishing, is projected to double from 2010 to 2030, when it will employ 40 million people globally. Africa’s 47,000 kilometers of coastline ideally positions it to capitalize on that growth. But this prosperity faces threats from piracy, trafficking and illegal fishing. Security professionals will need to protect the continent’s fisheries, trade routes and ports so that the economic windfall can…

Vice Adm. Awwal Zubairu Gambo has served in the Nigerian Navy for more than 30 years. His career includes time working on naval strategy, intelligence, training and as a defense attache. In 2017, he was the security coordinator for the Presidential Relief Committee on North Eastern Nigeria and was chief staff officer at Headquarters Naval Training Command. In 2018, he was appointed director of procurement at the Defence Space Administration. In January 2021, he became the 21st chief of naval staff. This interview has been edited for space and clarity. ADF: In 2021, piracy incidents in Nigerian waters fell to…

ADF STAFF  |  PHOTOS BY NIMASA As 2021 drew to a close, the once-perilous waters off Nigeria’s coast were showing signs of becoming uncharacteristically calm. In fact, the entire Gulf of Guinea region had shown a steady decrease in pirate attacks and armed robberies. From Senegal to Angola, the actual and attempted incidents had fallen from 82 in 2018 to just 35 in 2021. For Nigeria, which has long had some of the most dangerous territorial waters in West Africa, the news also was promising. Actual and attempted incidents off Nigeria’s coast had dropped precipitously from 48 in 2018 to…

ADF STAFF AsRussian armored personnel carriers and tanks trundled into Ukraine carrying more than 100,000 conscripts, Sudanese Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, was meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow. Hemedti, deputy chief of Sudan’s sovereign council, and other national leaders arrived willing to bolster cooperation between the two nations — one, which is prosecuting a brutal war against civilians and the other, which recently dislodged a move toward democratic rule with a coup. During the eight-day visit, Hemedti reportedly renewed the prospect of Russia establishing a naval base on the Red Sea coast north of…

BY DR. KAMAL-DEEN ALI, GHANA NAVY (RET.) and DR. HUMPHREY ASAMOAH AGYEKUM Since independence, Ghana’s Navy has been the sole seagoing state institution with responsibility for securing the nation’s waters. Today, its mission has expanded, as have the security threats in the Gulf of Guinea. Piracy, illegal fishing, illicit trafficking and potential maritime terrorism are all major concerns for Ghana’s citizens, business owners and elected officials. And the Navy is no longer alone in its responsibilities. It must work alongside government ministries, other security institutions and private entities to fulfill its mandate. As Ghana seeks to achieve financial benefit from the…

ADF STAFf Foreign fishing fleets have targeted the African continent’s coast for decades, devastating fish stocks, depriving millions of income and food, and destroying marine ecosystems. But experts say there are several ways nations can fight back. When the Fisheries Committee for the West Central Gulf of Guinea (FCWC) established a Regional Monitoring, Control and Surveillance Centre (RMCSC) in May 2021, experts saw it as a way to counter illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing. Headquartered in Tema, Ghana, the center helps FCWC member countries Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Togo manage their fishing sectors. The center is…

ADF STAFF Before South African officials could tear down a makeshift bridge across the Limpopo River, they had to deal with the crocodiles. Parts of the Limpopo have been infested with Nile crocodiles since 2013, when 15,000 of them were accidentally released into the river from floodgates at a nearby crocodile farm. Locals shot at them, eventually driving them away on a Thursday afternoon in September 2021. With that, they set about destroying a smugglers’ bridge linking South Africa with Zimbabwe. Military personnel later helped them finish tearing it down. The bridge was a byproduct of the COVID-19 pandemic. Due…