By Rainos Mukanya.
(News Of The South) -Two disappearances, an unprecedented epidemic, heightened global terror activities and the end of an era in international relations are the hallmarks of a headline filled 2014.
We look back at a year filled with shocking and unprecedented events.
Disappearance: The first half of the year was marked by two disappearances that reminded the world that even with all the technology there are still a lot of areas which remain unreachable in every sense of the word.
First, in March a Malaysian airliner MH370 on a routine flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing disappeared over the Atlantic Ocean. A massive search operation with the most sophisticated technology ensued, but up to date the whereabouts of the plane with more than 200 passengers on board remain unknown.
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Then in April 276 girls were kidnapped from their school in Chibok Nigeria by the militant Islamist group Boko Haram. Although scores of the girls managed to escape from their captors 200 others still remain in the hands of Boko Haram and their location unknown.
The abduction and disappearance of the girls captured the imagination of the world which gave birth to the Twitter hashtag Bring BackOurGirls. However, all these efforts have so far yielded nothing and the girls remain missing.
Ebola: Perhaps the biggest news headline in Africa in 2014 was the outbreak of the Ebola virus in West Africa which has so far claimed more than 7000 lives mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has already labelled this the worst outbreak in the history of the virus. Many countries throughout the world have been affected in some way or the other by the epidemic.
Global terror: Two militant islamist groups made this year one of the most gruesome in the past decade. The rise of the Islamic State in Syria and the Levante (ISIL) took the world by surprise. The group, an offshoot of Al-Qaeda is wreaking havoc in Iraq and Syria carrying out atrocities which have shocked the world.
Scores of Western journalists and aid workers have been kidnapped and beheaded with videos of the beheadings broadcast on the Internet. The US government has launched targeted drone strikes on ISIL, but the group’s strength seems unscathed.
In Nigeria Boko Haram has heightened its terror attacks on the Nigerian populace which has seen crowded market places, churches and buses falling victim to suicide bombings leaving hundreds dead. In East Africa the Somali terror group, Al Shabaab carried out operations in Kenya which have killed scores of people. The Kenya attacks were in retaliation to Kenya’s involvement in the efforts to drive the group out of Somalia.
End of an era: More than five decades of sour relations marked by economic and political sanctions between Cuba and the USA ended in December with the announcement by President Obama of the normalisation of relations. The socialst Cuba and the US have been at loggerheads since 1959 when Fidel Castro became the leader of Cuba.
Zimbabwe: Back home, 2014 was a defining year for the country’s political landscape and the consequences are likely to be far reaching.
First the main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change led by Morgan Tsvangirai experinced its second split since formation in 1999 with long time ally and Secretary General Tendai Biti spearheadind the formation of the Renewal Team.
However, the ruling ZANU PF party underwent a crisis which culminated in the sacking of former Vice President Joyce Mujuru and other senior party and government officials such as Dydimus Mutasa, Webster Shamhu and Dzikamai Mavhaire amid allegations of trying to unseat the president. As the saga played out before the party’s elective congress in December, the party constitution was amended to allow the president to nominate politburo members.
The result was a new look Zanu PF with two new VPs Emmerson Mnangagwa and Pelekezela Mpoko. It was another bad year for Zimbabwean soccer with national teams failing to impress on the international scene. Locally, however, Dynamos claimed its fourth PSL title in succession pipping newcomers ZPC Kariba on the last day of the league action. Despite the success coach Kallisto Pasuwa resigned leading to the appointment of David Mandigora. We meet again in 2015, from News of the South Happy 2015
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