African press review 12 April 2011

Tuesday's papers from across the continent report on a rally in Kenya, opposition arrests in Uganda, the African Union's plea for action on Somalia - and say goodbye to Mr Gbagbo.

The Standard in Kenya leads with yesterday's rally in Nairobi's Uhuru Park. What was billed as a prayer rally to welcome back two of the Ocampo Six suspects turned into a no-holds barred forum to attack The Hague, Prime Minister Raila Odinga and the Orange Democratic Movement.

The Daily Nation leads with a story on police training. Under the headline "Police to train more brain than brawn". Police have embarked on recruiting specialists in security studies, as part of reforms aimed at making policing more professional. The Nation says it’s part of a long-term plan to replace combative police work with intelligence-led policing.

The Star in Johannesburg reports that Ugandan opposition leader, Kizza Besigye, faces charges following yesterday's walk-to-work protest.

Ugandan police detained several people as they prepared to march in protest over rising food and fuel prices in the East African country. They charged Besigye, president Yoweri Museveni's closest rival in February elections, with inciting unrest after arresting him near his home in the capital Kampala. A Reuters witness said Besigye was bundled into a police vehicle.

According to the Daily Monitor in Kampala, Besigye last night said he is ready to die if that will bring sanity in the governance of Uganda, including affording all citizens full enjoyment of civil liberties.

The Guardian in Nigeria reports that, with the results of the National Assembly election indicating that the People's Democratic Party may not have retain its current majority in the national legislature, the leadership of the political grouping has launched a fresh initiative, reaching out to the opposition with the offer of a government of national unity.

The party has also embarked on last-ditch efforts nationwide to win next Saturday’s presidential election.

Also in The Guardian, under the headline "AU wants leaders to end Somalia's crisis", we learn that the African Union Mission on Somalia has pleaded with African heads of state to show more commitment to restoring peace to Somalia.

The AU mission also called on African countries, which made pledges to contribute troops to the operation in Somalia to fulfill their pledges.

Deputy Special Representative of the chairman of the African Union to Somalia, Wafula Wamunyinyi, at the AMISOM media conference in Mombasa, Kenya, yesterday noted that Nigeria, Ghana, Malawi, South Africa, Guinea and Sierra Leone made pledges to contribute troops for the restoration of peace in Somalia in 2007, but regretted that only two countries, Burundi and Uganda, had fulfilled their promises.

The Guardian relegates the end of the Gbagbo regime in Côte d'Ivoire to fourth place on its front page, with an inside analysis piece suggesting that the conditions under which Gbagbo was finally ousted (in other words, with the military muscle of the French) may finally turn out to weaken in-coming president Alassane Ouattara.

If civil war has been avoided, says the Nigerian paper, the road to real peace and national unity remains long and difficult.

The Observer in the Democratic Republic of Congo gives pride of place to Côte d'Ivoire, under the headline "Gbagbo arrested and humiliated".

Unstinting in their criticism of the man who refused to yield an inch over the past four months, vicious in their condemnation of the part played by the former first lady, Simone Gbagbo, the piece ends with the sentence, "Goodbye Mr Gbagbo, and we'll see you soon before the International Penal Court."