Botswana
Botswana has hanged a man for murdering his girlfriend and her son, the first execution in two years by the only southern African nation not to have abolished the death penalty.
Joseph Poni Tselayarona, 28, was executed on Saturday after the 2010 murder of his girlfriend and her three-year-old son, the Botswana Prison Service said.
As Botswana was executing the convict, over in West Africa, The Gambia was also taking steps towards abolition of the measure. President Adama Barrow during the country’s 53rd Independence anniversary placed a moratorium on the death penalty.
“I will use this opportunity to declare a moratorium on the use of the death penalty in The Gambia, as a first step towards abolition,” Barrow said in his Independence Day speech.
The last time the country used the measure was in 2012 when exiled leader Yahya Jammeh executed nine prisoners by firing squad. Jammeh fled Gambia in 2017 after a shock electoral defeat in December 2016.
An opposition coalition led by Barrow defeated him in a process he described as free and fair only to backtrack and dispute the results citing irregularities. An ECOWAS force had threatened to oust him after failed mediation by the regional bloc.
Go to video
Liberia: Boakai signs decree for war crimes tribunal
00:59
Kenya Airways stops flights to DR Congo amid row over detained staff
Go to video
Ghana's high court dismisses bid to speed up anti-LGBTQ law passage
01:03
Charges against Trump and Jan. 6 rioters at stake
Go to video
Nigerian court has sentenced a Chinese man to death for killing his girlfriend
01:34
Kenya starts to hand over to relatives the bodies of 429 members of a doomsday cult