Eritrea Wire

JOHANNESBURG – South Africa has been gripped by the mystery of whether a woman has, as has been claimed, actually given birth to 10 babies, in what would then be the world’s first recorded case of decuplets.

Gosiame Thamara Sithole from the Tembisa township near Johannesburg gave birth to the babies on Monday, according to the Pretoria News newspaper which quoted the parents. The babies — seven boys and three girls — have not made a public appearance or been captured on camera, although they were born prematurely, the newspaper reported.

The South African government said it is still trying to verify the claim.

That’s led to South Africans obsessing on social media over whether the story of the “Tembisa 10” is indeed true.

The father, Teboho Tsotetsi, told the paper his wife had given birth in a hospital in the capital Pretoria. He said it was a big surprise for the parents after doctors only detected eight babies in prenatal scans.

“It’s seven boys and three girls. She was seven months and seven days pregnant. I am happy. I am emotional,” the newspaper quoted Tsotetsi as saying.

The couple already have 6-year-old twins, which would make the total an even dozen kids, if the claim is true.

South Africans are eagerly waiting for proof of what would be a world record. Relatives and neighbors of the couple have insisted the news is true.

“For her to receive 10 blessings at one given time, we thank God for that,” Wilson Machaya, a neighbor of the family in Tembisa, told The Associated Press. “And because we are neighbors we will have to assist in any way possible.”

A Malian woman gave birth to nine babies only last month in Morocco, in what was hailed as the world’s first case of nonuplets.

The Department of Social Development in South Africa’s Gauteng province confirmed tracing Sithole and spokesperson Feziwe Ndwayana said they would make an announcement after meeting with the family. Another local government department said earlier this week that it had no record of the babies’ births in any of the province’s hospitals.

The Pretoria News initially broke the story with an interview with Sithole and her husband, Tsotetsi, at their home, which was conducted nearly a month ago and when they thought they were having eight babies. They requested that the story only be published after the babies were born for safety and cultural reasons, the newspaper said.

According to the report, Sithole went on leave earlier than expected from her job as a retail store manager because she could no longer cope. Tsotetsi is unemployed.

One organization has given $70,000 to the couple to help and other South Africans are being encouraged to donate.

Alongside #Tembisa10, the term #NationalBabyShower has been trending on Twitter.

Source: Voice of America

GAROWE, SOMALIA – Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region has taken a first step toward banning female genital mutilation (FGM) in a country where almost all women and girls are forced to undergo the internationally condemned practice.

Puntland President Said Abdullahi Deni and his cabinet this week approved a bill to be submitted to parliament that would criminalize the ancient ritual, a measure anti-FGM campaigners said would boost their efforts to end the practice.

“It will be forbidden to circumcise girls. Girls in Puntland must be left the way they are born. Anyone who performs circumcision in the region will face the full force of the law,” Puntland Justice Minister Awil Sheikh Hamud told reporters.

Justice Ministry officials said the bill includes stiff penalties for those who perform FGM, including hospitals, midwives and traditional circumcisers. No date has yet been set for it to be presented before parliament for a vote.

FGM, which involves the partial or total removal of the female genitalia, is almost universal in Somalia – with 98% of women and girls having been cut, according to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

There is currently no national law outlawing FGM in the Horn of Africa country.

Both Puntland and the breakaway state of Somaliland have issues fatwas – religious edicts – against the practice in the past, but there is no parliamentary legislation is in place.

FGM affects 200 million girls and women globally and can lead to a host of serious medical problems, according to the World Health Organization.

It can cause long-lasting mental and physical health problems including chronic infections, menstrual problems, infertility, pregnancy and childbirth complications. In some cases, girls can bleed to death or die from infections.

In many communities, girls are married soon after cutting, stifling their progress in education, health and employment. School closures caused by the pandemic could lead to an extra 2 million girls being cut in the next decade, the UNFPA has estimated, hampering global efforts to stamp out the practice by 2030.

In Somalia, where the vaginal opening is also often sewn up – a practice called infibulation – charities have reported a surge in cases as circumcisers offer door-to-door services for girls stuck at home due to COVID-19 restrictions.

Campaigners said legislation banning FGM would boost their fight to end the practice.

Hailing it as a “great milestone,” the UNFPA’s head in Somalia, Anders Thomsen, said the bill would “have a ripple effect in the campaign to end FGM in Puntland” if approved.

“This means girls will be safe from the brutal cut,” he added in a statement.

Somali anti-FGM campaigner Maymun Mahad said she still remembered undergoing the “very painful” practice. “As a young woman, I welcome the move by the cabinet,” she said.

Source: Voice of America

NAIROBI – Kenyan authorities are working to eradicate trachoma, an infectious disease that is a leading cause of blindness in Africa. About 7 million people in central Kenya are at risk for the disease.

As Elizabeth Partoti, sits outside a clinic in Kajiado county in Kenya, she stares, unseeingly, into the dry and brittle spaces outside the health facility. In a few minutes a surgeon will carry out a corrective eye operation and allow the more than 70-year-old woman to see clearly for the first time in over a decade.

She is one of thousands of people in Kenya who have either lost or are gradually losing their sight due to trachoma.

“My eyes have been bothering me because I have grown old,” she said. “The eyelashes are always getting into my eyes, causing me a lot of pain, my granddaughter has been helping, removing them physically with her fingers, but it is very painful.’’

Trachoma is caused by bacteria that attack the inner surfaces of the eyelids.

Dr. Peter Ekwum, an eye surgeon who has been carrying out trachoma surgeries in Kajiado county, says sight loss from trachoma is preventable but irreversible if not treated in time.

“Every time you blink, the eyelashes rub on the cornea and with time they peel off the first layer of the cornea, which results in an ulcer,” he explained. “The ulcer is very painful, but at the end of the day, the ulcer will heal and leaves a scar.”

That repeated scarring of the eye’s cornea eventually impairs vision and often leads to irreversible blindness.

About 7 million people live in 12 central Kenyan counties where trachoma is endemic because of a dry climate and the pastoral and nomadic lifestyle there. Flies in the area help spread the disease.

About 53,000 people are currently infected with the disease.

Like other countries affected by trachoma, Kenya had wanted to eliminate it by 2020, the World Health Organization’s target. The target date has now been moved to 2023. Dr. Ernest Barasa, Kenya’s National Trachoma Coordinator, said, “The way forward for Kenya in the trachoma elimination program is to clear the remaining trachoma trichiasis backlog, which stands at around 5,000 at the moment. That is 5,000 people who require urgent surgeries to avert blindness in the 12 trachoma-endemic counties.’’

To eradicate trachoma, experts say, people in areas prone to the disease must take greater precautions.

Most of the communities at risk are nomadic, sometimes living with livestock.

“The flies breed because of the dung and urine,” Ekwumm the eye surgeon, said, “and now because the flies are breeding, every time they discharge in a child’s face, the bacteria is carried from the children to the mother.”

Kenya’s plans to defeat trachoma depend on donors for the money for detection, treatment and prevention programs.

Only with more contributions, Kenya says, will it be able to eliminate the disease.

Source: Voice of America

NEW YORK – The U.N. General Assembly voted Friday to give two-year terms on the powerful 15-nation Security Council to five countries.

Albania, Brazil, Gabon, Ghana and the United Arab Emirates all ran unopposed for available seats in their regional groups, and each secured the necessary two-thirds majority required of the secret ballots cast.

They will begin their terms on Jan. 1, 2022.

The council deals with issues of international peace and security. It has the power to deploy peacekeepers to trouble spots and to sanction bad actors. New members bring different experiences, perspectives and national interests to the council and can subtly affect dynamics among its members.

The council currently has several Middle Eastern crises on its agenda, including the Israeli-Palestinian situation and conflicts in Libya, Syria and Yemen.

Richard Gowan, U.N. director for the International Crisis Group and a long-time U.N. watcher, says the United Arab Emirates may play a role in those areas and elsewhere.

“The UAE has a lot of influence not only in the Middle East but in the Horn of Africa, and other council members will hope the Emiratis will use their influence to help stabilize countries like Sudan and Ethiopia,” Gowan said.

Gowan notes that Albania is a country that has “seen the U.N. fail awfully in its region in the past.”

The U.N. failed to stop the Balkan war of the early 1990s, leading to NATO bombing in 1995. Then in 1999, Kosovo’s ethnic Albanians fought Serbs to gain independence.

“Albania’s main interest on the U.N. agenda is of course still Kosovo, but the Security Council only has very limited influence there now,” Gowan told VOA.

UAE Ambassador Lana Nusseibeh noted that the council’s work does not end when resolutions are adopted.

“The UAE will be part of the coalition that speaks to strengthen the results-oriented nature of the council as much as possible,” she said, adding that the council is most effective when it is united.

But in recent years, diverging views, particularly among its permanent members — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States — have stymied action on urgent issues.

“The Security Council’s record on recent crises has been pathetic,” Louis Charbonneau, U.N. director at Human Rights Watch, told VOA.

“Whether it involves war crimes in Gaza, massive human rights abuses in Myanmar, or atrocities in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, the most you can usually expect is the occasional statement of concern — and that’s if you’re lucky,” he said.

The countries elected Friday will replace exiting members Estonia, Niger, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Tunisia and Vietnam on Jan. 1.

They will join the five other current non-permanent members: India, Ireland, Kenya, Mexico and Norway, and the five veto-wielding permanent members: Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.

Source: Voice of America