Part of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, has been completely destroyed in an explosion.

A lorry full of explosives destroyed hotels, government offices and restaurants at a busy junction in the capital Mogadishu, killing at least 281 people and injuring another 300.

The BBC’s Alastair Leithead is at the scene.

Note: This story is auto-generated from ‘BBC News’ syndicated feed and has not been edited by Africa Prime News staff.

Image copyright Getty Images

The new instalment of Nelson Mandela’s autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, has been released in Johannesburg.

Dare Not Linger tackles his five years as South Africa’s president after the collapse of apartheid and gives his view of the country’s first multi-racial elections in 1994.

Mandela’s unfinished handwritten draft of the book was completed by a successful South African novelist.

The former president could not finish it because of his age and ill health.

Mandela spent 27 years in prison for fighting white minority rule and became South Africa’s first democratically elected president in 1994, serving only one term in office.

He died in 2013.

‘My long walk is not ended’

South African author Mandla Langa was brought in to add to the 10 chapters written by Mandela.

Mr Langa – who was also an activist against white minority rule – used his own interviews and research to complete it, as well as Mandela’s notes.

• Nelson Mandela: Remembering the man
• Controversial book on Mandela’s final days withdrawn

The Nelson Mandela Foundation said it was a 50-50 collaboration between Mandela and his co-author.

The title of the book is taken from the final sentence of Mandela’s celebrated autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, in which he wrote: “With freedom comes responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not ended.”

The book sold more than 14 million copies worldwide and was turned into a film starring British actor Idris Elba.

Mandela’s widow Graca Machel wrote the prologue of the sequel, which also covers the period that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission examined apartheid crimes, Mandela’s international diplomacy and his divorce from Winnie Mandela in 1996.

It is not clear whether the book addresses the failure to tackle South Africa’s Aids crisis and Mandela’s controversial selection of Thabo Mbeki as his successor.

“Through the last years of his life he talked about it [the book] often – worried about work started but not finished,” Graca Machel said.

Mr Langa’s novel The Lost Colours of the Chameleon won the 2009 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize.

• Idris Elba: Nelson Mandela role inspired album

Nelson Mandela: Key dates

• 1918: Born in the Eastern Cape
• 1944: Joins African National Congress
• 1962: Arrested, convicted of sabotage, sentenced to five years in jail
• 1964: Charged again, sentenced to life
• 1990: Freed from prison
• 1993: Wins Nobel Peace Prize
• 1994: Elected president
• 1999: Steps down as leader
• 2004: Retires from public life
• 2010: Appears at football World Cup

South Africans on Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom

Nelson Mandela: CIA tip-off led to 1962 Durban arrest

Note: This story is auto-generated from ‘BBC News’ syndicated feed and has not been edited by Africa Prime News staff.

Image copyright AFP/Getty Images

UK financial regulators and the Serious Fraud Office are to review if banks HSBC and Standard Chartered are linked to a South Africa corruption scandal.

It comes after Lord Peter Hain said the banks may “inadvertently have been conduits” for laundered money.

The Labour peer told the House of Lords that up to £400m of illicit funds may have been moved by the banks.

His concerns relate to links between South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma and a wealthy business family, the Guptas.

The peer has written to the Chancellor Philip Hammond, telling him a whistle-blower had indicated the banks “maybe inadvertently have been conduits for the corrupt proceeds of money”.

Lord Hain told the BBC he named 27 people in the letter, in addition to companies, adding that any person or firm linked to alleged corruption in South Africa is “going to be badly contaminated”.

The Treasury has referred Lord Hain’s letter to regulators, including the Financial Conduct Authority, and the SFO.

A Treasury spokesman said: “We take allegations of financial misconduct very seriously, and have passed Lord Hain’s letter on to the Financial Conduct Authority and relevant UK law enforcement agencies, including the National Crime Agency and Serious Fraud Office, to agree the right action.”

The BBC’s correspondent in Johannesburg, Andrew Harding, said Lord Hain’s letter was “a new twist in a giant corruption scandal that is shaking the South Africa state, and damaging the reputations of a number of global companies”.

Mr Zuma and the Guptas strongly deny wrongdoing, and say they are victims of a “politically motivated witch-hunt”.

But leaked emails and official investigations have fuelled claims that the Guptas have bought influence in government in order to loot state enterprises.

In South Africa, the scandal has already ruined British public relations company Bell Pottinger and damaged auditors KPMG, which removed its top executive team in the country.

• Bell Pottinger goes into administration
• KPMG clears out South African management

A spokeswoman for the FCA said it was already in contact with the banks named by Lord Hain and would “consider carefully further responses received”.

Standard Chartered said: “We are not able to comment on the details of client transactions, but can confirm that following an internal investigation accounts were closed by us in 2014.” HSBC declined to comment.

Lord Hain, a leading anti-apartheid campaigner who grew up in South Africa, urged UK authorities “to track that stolen money down and make sure that British financial institutions help return it to South African taxpayers”.

It is claimed that money was taken out of South Africa via Hong Kong and Dubai.

Lord Hain, a former Northern Ireland secretary, alleged in his letter to the chancellor that the issue was “a result of the corruption and cronyism presided over by President Zuma and close allies the Guptas”.

During his Lords statement, the peer asked what steps the government was taking to prevent money laundering through UK banks.

The minister, Lord Bates, said the UK is “committed” to fighting money laundering and is “concerned” at the allegations. He added that the high commission in South Africa is “monitoring the issue closely”.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times on Thursday reported that the FBI had opened an investigation into possible links between the Guptas and “individuals, bank accounts, and companies in the US”.

The Gupta brothers Ajay, Atul and Rajesh Gupta have interests in computer, mining, media, travel, energy and technology and employ about 10,000 people through their company Sahara Group.

Note: This story is auto-generated from ‘BBC News’ syndicated feed and has not been edited by Africa Prime News staff.

Image copyright Reuters

Prosecutors in Brazil have formally charged the former head of the country’s Olympics committee with corruption over the Rio games.

A payment of $2m (£1.52m) was allegedly made to secure votes for the Rio bid.

Carlos Nuzman denies running a criminal organisation, money laundering and violating currency laws.

Lamine Diack, a Senegalese former head of the global athletics body, and his son Papa Massata were also charged, and also both deny wrongdoing.

Mr Nuzman was arrested on 5 October. The Supreme Court has now ordered his release, but he will have to hand over his passport and will not be allowed to leave Rio de Janeiro until the conclusion of his trial.

According to the indictment, Mr Nuzman and the former governor of Rio state, Sergio Cabral, “directly solicited” the $2m payment from Brazilian businessman Arthur Soares.

At the time, Lamine Diack was an influential member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

Mr Soares allegedly paid the money to Papa Massata just three days before the IOC voted on which country would host the 2016 Summer Games.

Rio then beat Chicago, Madrid and Tokyo to become the first South American city to host the Olympics.

Mr Soares and Mr Cabral have been charged along with Brazilian Olympic Committee ex-chief Leonardo Gryner. All deny the allegations made against them.

Staying in Senegal

Both members of the Diack family are already the subject of a French investigation over the same bidding process.

Lamine Diack is being held in France as the investigation continues, while his son remains in his native Senegal, which refuses to extradite him.

Mr Cabral is already in jail over another case. The former Rio governor was sentenced in June to 14 years in prison for corruption and money laundering.

An arrest warrant has been issued for Mr Soares but he remains at large.

The IOC suspended Mr Nuzman and the IOC’s Brazilian arm earlier this month.

Mr Nuzman resigned from the Brazilian Olympic Committee last week saying he needed to devote himself to his legal defence.

Note: This story is auto-generated from ‘BBC News’ syndicated feed and has not been edited by Africa Prime News staff.

Image copyright AFP

South African singer and ex-MP Jennifer Ferguson has accused the country’s football boss Danny Jordaan, 66, of raping her nearly 24 years ago.

He “overpowered” her and “painfully” raped her in a hotel in Port Elizabeth city, she has alleged in a blog.

Mr Jordaan, who organised the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, has not yet responded to a request for comment.

Now living in Sweden, Ms Ferguson said she had been moved by the #MeToo campaign on social media to speak out.

• Africa Live: More updates
• How ‘MeToo’ is exposing the scale of sexual abuse

She said the attack took place when she was “high and happy” following her unexpected nomination by Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress (ANC) party to serve in South Africa’s first democratically elected parliament in 1994.

Mr Jordaan, a prominent member of the ANC and president of the South African Football Association, came to her hotel suite after she had given a performance at a dinner.

“He overpowered me and painfully raped me. It must have been over in about 20 seconds although it felt like a lifetime,” she alleged.

“He left immediately without saying a word.”

Ms Ferguson said she had been “bewildered” and in a state of “complete shock”.

“Not sure what to do, I washed and left the hotel and began to walk. I reached the beach and sat there a very long time trying to process what had happened,” she said.

“The thought of going to the police felt intolerable. What would I say? Should I have screamed louder? Fought him off harder? Had I been complicit in some way? All these questions raged in my mind. I wept.”

She accused the football boss of using her as “an object for his sad need for power and twisted gratification”.

“I am not speaking out to get revenge on Danny Jordaan or a million South African men like him. I am doing this so we can help each other be courageous, speak out and begin to heal as we find we are not alone,” she added.

• ‘My #MeToo experience is sadly typical’
• Why are some women boycotting Twitter?

Ms Ferguson campaigned against military conscription during white-minority rule in South Africa.

State radio banned her songs, including Letters For Dickie, sung in the form of letters from a girl to her boyfriend who was a conscripted soldier on the border.

Mr Jordaan was widely praised for spearheading South Africa’s 2010 football World Cup bid. It was the first time that the tournament was played in Africa.

In 2015, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) alleged that South Africa had paid a $10m (£6.5m) bribe to host the tournament. Mr Jordaan and the government strongly denied the allegation.

Mr Jordaan was mayor of Nelson Mandela Bay, which includes Port Elizabeth, until 2016, when the opposition took control of it in elections.

Note: This story is auto-generated from ‘BBC News’ syndicated feed and has not been edited by Africa Prime News staff.

Media playback is unsupported on your device

A red bandana has become the new symbol of protest in Mogadishu as anger over the city’s most destructive bomb attack is boiling over on to the streets.

Men and women in the city, security officers, even government officials – all are wearing a piece of red cloth around their foreheads to show unity and solidarity for the hundreds of people killed and injured in Saturday’s massive truck bombing.

“It represents the blood of my people who have been killed in the explosion,” said one girl pressed up against the fence at the national stadium for a demonstration organised by the city.

“If the Somali people unite they can defeat everything,” another said, red cloth wrapped around her hijab.

The crowd chanted anti-al-Shabab slogans as they waited for the mayor of Mogadishu, the prime minister and the president to arrive.

Thousands came. It was something never seen before in the aftermath of a bomb attack.

There have been small protests in the past but people have been afraid of being targeted by the Islamist group.

This demonstration, and the rioting in the streets at the scene of Saturday’s blast, betrayed a real change of atmosphere in Mogadishu – from fear to anger.

And that’s why this bomb attack is different – why this could be a turning point.

“Al-Shabab started to kill 10 people, we kept silent, then they killed 20, and next they killed 100,” said Somali President Mohamed Abdullahi “Farmajo” Mohamed. “Now, they killed 300 innocent Somali civilians.

“We are telling [al-Shabab] that from now on, we are all soldiers and will come to you. We will no longer tolerate a Somali boy being killed and a Somali girl being killed. And we’ll defend this flag.”

But the crack of gunfire near the scene of the blast at K5 – the Kilometre Five junction – was perhaps a stronger indication of public feeling.

Stones were thrown, guns fired, people killed – for no reason other than the crowd was angry and had only a few security officers to channel that anger against.

That anger needs to be handled carefully and directed well – against al-Shabab, not the government or security forces for not doing enough to stop these attacks.

Al-Shabab have not said they carried out this attack, perhaps because of the number of civilians killed.

K5 was probably not the target. Security sources say the truck had travelled through a number of lighter checkpoints, with its cargo of homemade and some military grade explosives disguised with sacks of rice. When it reached Kilometre Six, suspicions were raised and the security forces called ahead.

The driver detonated his explosives before he could be stopped. It seems to have been a coincidence that he did so next to a petrol tanker, upping the death toll.

At one of Mogadishu’s busiest junctions at one of the busiest times of the week, the blast tore through the traffic-jammed streets and crowded pavements.

Security sources disagree over the intended target.

In the past, “complex” al-Shabab attacks involved a first, smaller bomb at a security gate allowing a second, larger bomb to get through and cause greater damage.

In this case a second, smaller car bomb was intercepted and the driver arrested just before it exploded – killing and injuring a number of people. The driver is accused of taking part in a previous large-scale attack in Mogadishu and is believed to be a member of al-Shabab.

The vehicles were travelling along different routes but they appeared to be moving towards the airport – the “green zone” of Mogadishu where the UN and many international embassies are based. This may have been the target or maybe the foreign ministry or a new Turkish military base.

A third explosion further out of town has not been widely reported but it happened around the same time as the second blast, so could have been part of a botched plan.

The security forces are expected to release more information about the blast and about the efforts being made to stop al-Shabab from striking again.

Amid the anger and determination among those wearing red bandanas was a man who also gave a realistic picture of the fight against al-Shabab.

“We can’t stop these people – they live among us – only God can stop them,” he said.

Note: This story is auto-generated from ‘BBC News’ syndicated feed and has not been edited by Africa Prime News staff.