Electrical illumination comes to Pietermaritzburg, South Africa as the Town Hall is lit up by a 30kW alternator. The city will start selling electricity to private customers on 1 July 1896.

The clock tower that will become a city landmark is installed in the centre of Victoria, on the Seychelles’ island Mahé. Costing £468 (equal to £71,314 in 2024), it is an identical copy of the one at Victoria Station in London built in 1892 for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee. However, as the years pass it will be mistaken as a replica of the clock tower of London’s Houses of Parliament and become known as “Little Big Ben.” Made of cast iron, it is painted black.

The Johannesburg Observatory is stripped of its meteorological functions and will be used solely as an astronomical observatory; renamed the Union Observatory (and will be renamed again as the Republic Observatory in 1961). When the main belt asteroid 1585 Union is discovered in 1947 by South African astronomer Ernest Johnson, it will be named after the Union Observatory.

South Africa’s first navy, the South African Naval Service, is formed. Its fleet of three ships include a hydrographic survey ship, two minesweeper trawlers and a training vessel.

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Africa’s first national park, Albert National Park is established in the Belgian Congo (Democratic Republic of Congo). The future World Heritage Site will later be expanded to nearly 800,000 hectares, and will be known as Virunga National Park.

South Africa’s three regional radio stations, in Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg, are combined into the African Broadcasting Company. All three stations broadcast the same English-language programming, with one hour of programming in Afrikaans daily. Service will begin in Cape Town on June 1, 1927 and in Durban on July 1, 1927.

Société Tunisienne de l'Air (Tunisair) beings its first flights, from Tunis-Carthage International Airport. In 1951, routes will be extended to Libya and Morocco.

Nigerian Airways enters the jet age with a Comet 4 aircraft borrowed from BOAC (British Airways), which makes its first flight from London to Lagos. The jet flies at 951km/h, compared to the 550km/h cruise speed of previous propeller-driven passenger airliners.

The first World Festival of Negro Arts (later renamed the World Festival of Black Arts) opens in Dakar, Senegal. Initiated by President Leopold Senghor and an official event of UNESCO, the first state-sponsored festival to showcase the work of African and African diaspora artists, musicians and writers sees the participation of 45 African, European, Caribbean, and North and South American countries. Attendees experience contemporary black literature, music, theater, visual arts, film and dance.

The 1974 revolution that overthrew Portugal’s dictatorship has a liberating effect on Portuguese-African relations. No longer shunned as the last European colonial power in Africa, Portugal has let go of its African colonies. Symbolising the normalisation in trade relations, Morocco’s state airline begins its Casablanca to Lisbon air service today. (pic: Lourenço Marques, capital of Mozambique)

Radio Swazi goes on the air as a station of the South African Broadcasting Corporation, broadcasting in the siSwati language out of Nelspruit.

The Ndebele people of South Africa have a radio station broadcasting in their own language when Radio Ndebele goes on the air as a service of the South African Broadcasting Corporation.

Claiming to be possessed of supernatural power, Ugandan Joseph Kony and a small band of followers depart his town Odek. He recruits former soldiers of the Uganda National Liberation Front, names the group the Lord’s Resistance Army, and has as his goal the capture and domination of northern Uganda. Their first raid is on the city of Gulu.

The U.N. Transition Assistance Group begins implementation of Namibia’s Independence Plan. In Windhoek, the first edition is published of a daily newspaper The Namibian, founded as a weekly in 1985. The independent newspaper has withstood bombings, shootings and gas attacks on its office as it has factually reported the War for Independence between the South West People’s Organisation rebels and the armed forces of apartheid South Africa, which has controlled the territory.

Namibia's Cheetah Conservation Fund is established. As the global cheetah population drops from 100,000 a century ago to 7000 now, the institute will use artificial insemination to successfully achieve pregnancies for the big cats that are the world’s fastest land animals, capable for running up to 120kph.

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South Africa's second biggest labour federation, the Federation of Unions of South Africa (FEDUSA), is born from the merger of the Federation of South African Labour Unions and the Federation of Organisations Representing Civil Employees. The new federation has 25 affiliated unions and a membership of 515,000.

The navies of 15 countries send ships to Cape Town to join the festivities as the South African Navy observes its 75th anniversary. South African President Nelson Mandela, Vice Admiral Robert Simpson-Anderson, Navy Chief and Defense Minister Joe Modise on board the SAS Protea in Table Bay reviewe the assembled ships from the world's navies.

On British-owned Chagos Island, the U.K. establishes Chagos Marine Protected Area, using environmentalism as a pretext for protecting the U.S. Diego Garcia Naval Base. Mauritius claims the island, and insists it has the legal right to fish Chagos waters. The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague will rule in Mauritius’ favour on 18 March 2015.

The European Union lifts its ban on South Africa ostrich meat imports, imposed in 2018 for technical reasons. The EU is the largest market for ostrich meat produced in the Western Cape, and ostrich farmers have been hit hard by the ban.