The most important developments in sub-Saharan Africa. Six days a week.
Eritrea's Foreign Minister Osman Saleh asked the United Nations (UN) Security Council on 10 October to condemn Ethiopia and take measures under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, which allows sanctions or military action. He called Ethiopia's claim that Eritrean troops had invaded Tigray a pretext for a "war of aggression". The same day, Ethiopian federal forces and allied militia entered Adigrat, a Tigray town about 30 kilometres from the border, after Eritrean troops reportedly pulled back following Ethiopian drone strikes. Asmara denies any incursion. With both governments now taking their dispute to the Council, the risk of a direct war between the two states rises.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed opened Ethiopia's national precious metals refinery in the Bole Lemi industrial zone of Addis Ababa on 10 October. The plant, 51% owned by state-owned Ethiopian Investment Holdings and 49% by Sam Precious Metals, can refine more than 600 tonnes of precious metals a year at full capacity, the government said. Gold earned Ethiopia about $5.5 billion in the 2025/26 fiscal year, about half of its export revenue, and has so far been refined in Dubai. Refining at home could capture more value and foreign currency, and Abiy wants the plant to serve miners from neighbouring countries as a regional hub.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) reached new lending deals with two African governments within two days last week. Its staff agreed a 36-month Extended Credit Facility worth about $1.47 billion with Zambia on 9 October, a day after a 38-month programme of about $203 million with Niger; both still need approval by the IMF board. Zambia's previous $1.7 billion programme expired in January, and the IMF said Lusaka would reverse temporary fuel tax relief and cut non-priority capital spending. The deals should support reserves and investor confidence, but in Zambia they will pass more of the oil shock on to consumers.
Gabon's President Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema reshuffled his government on 11 October, naming Olivier Mouckocko water and energy minister in place of Philippe Tonangoye and enlarging the cabinet to 32 members. Emmanuel Eyeghe Nze, head of the state power and water utility SEEG, takes a merged commerce and industry ministry, while the finance, petroleum and mines ministers keep their posts. A day earlier, Mauritania's new government replaced its energy minister after an inquiry blamed failures at the utility Somelec for August blackouts. In both countries, power and fuel failures have become a political cost, and the new ministers face pressure for quick results.
Nigeria's Ondo State signed a public-private partnership with PyVee Limited to build what it calls the country's first titanium processing plant, at a total cost of $362 million, the state government said on 10 October. A $12 million pilot plant is due to start within 21 months, followed by a complex costing more than $350 million on a 100-hectare site at Alape in Ilaje, with the state's land as its equity. The plant would turn local ilmenite into titanium dioxide pigment and titanium sponge. Financing has not been disclosed, but the project would be an early test of Nigeria's push to process its minerals at home.
Power shortages are holding back industry in Central Africa. In Cameroon, delays to a second transmission line from the 420-megawatt Nachtigal dam leave 150 megawatts of industrial demand waiting for supply, Investir au Cameroun reported on 9 October. In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo), Teddy Lwamba, head of the state utility SNEL, told Kinshasa's provincial deputies on 10 October that rolling cuts stem from output below demand, broken machines, slow purchases of spare parts, vandalism and fraud. Factories left without grid power must rely on costly diesel while oil prices are high, and new transmission projects will take years to close the gap.
