The first of the uninhabited islands in the Indian Ocean off Africa’s east coast, which will be later be part of Seychelles, is spotted by navigator Thomé Lopes on the ship Rui Mendes de Brito. He is sailing with the 4th Portuguese India Armada led by explorer Vasco Da Gama. Other islands in the group are spotted, and collectively they are named The Seven Sisters. More than a century will pass before someone steps foot on them, in 1609.
Following Egyptian independence from Britain in February 1922, Faud I decrees that his title be changed from Sultan of Egypt to King of Egypt. He has been sultan for five years, and will remain king until his death in 1936. Egypt's 1952 Revolution will topple the monarchy, which will be abolished in 1953.
In the build up to World War II, South African Prime Minister J.B.M. Hertzog, a German sympathiser, announces that if Britain and Germany should to go war, South Africa would remain neutral.
The ultra-modern 20th Century movie theatre opens inJohannesburg, as the Hollywood studio 20 Century-Fox’s flagshiptheatre in South Africa. The showcase cinema features gold satin curtains, luxuriouscarpeting and a giant Wurlitzer organ to entertain audiences during shows.Black Africans, who of South Africa’s population, are not allowedinside.
Anti-colonial feelings are high in Sierra Leone. Anger at chiefs who carry out the bidding of British colonial authorities, which led to an attack on a chief’s house on 3 March, results in several villagers refusing to pay the British Hut Tax unless their chiefs are removed from power.
The Victoria Falls Trust is created to preserve the environment of the Zambezi waterfall Mosi-au-Tunya, while also promoting sustainable tourism. Fewer visitors now arrive by train as more tourists fly into the Livingstone Airport, or drive by car on the expanding road network of Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe).
Anti-apartheid activists may now be arrested for meeting inside as well as outside, as the Riotous Assemblies Amended Act goes into effect in South Africa. Previously, police could only arrest dissenters who gathered in public. Now private gatherings are banned.
The Juba Nile Bridge opens in what will become South Sudan. The area’s only bridge over the River Nile is a vital traffic artery. Construction by a Dutch company was done in only 14 weeks.
Two months before his election as democratic South Africa’s first president, Nelson Mandela visits the apartheid-created “homeland” of Bophuthatswana, where he receives a tumultuous welcome from residents. The local people have been demonstrating for reincorporation into South Africa.
After failed attempts in 1982 and 2001 to seize power in Central African Republic, François Bozizé (pic) stages a successful coup d’état. He seizes the opportunity when Ange-Félix Patassé, the first president in the country’s history elected in a free and fair election, is out of the country. Bozize will himself be ousted in a 2013 coup d’état.
South African politician Julius Malema is convicted of hate speech for mocking a woman who accuses South African President Jacob Zuma of raping her. The case casts light on issues of misogyny and sexual abuse. On 28 March, the song he sings at political rallies calling for the killing of white farmers is also ruled as hate speech by the South Gauteng High Court.
The first issue of the South African comic book Kwezi is published. Created by Loyiso Mkize, the adventures feature a South African teenage boy who acquires superpowers, and is the first black-created South African superhero story.
First president of Liberia (1848-1856) and its seventh president (1872-1876), in Norfolk, Virginia. An educated and relatively prosperous free black man in the U.S. slave state Virginia, he immigrated to Liberia with the American Colonization Society in 1829, and entered coastal trade before he became a politician. The first African-American appointed as the colony’s governor (1843-1848), he led the movement to end Liberia's control by the colonisation society and be an independent state. His birthday is a national holiday in Liberia.
South African writer and musician, in Ntselamanzi, Cape Colony, South Africa. As a musician, he composed some of the most famous hymns written in the isiXhosa language. As a journalist, he co-founded the isiXhosa newspaper Imvo Zabantsundu (African Opinion). He was a co-founder of South Africa’s University of Fort Hare (originally the South African Native College)
Fourth president of Seychelles (2020 to present), in Mahé, Seychelles. Ordained a priest in 1985, he went into politics to remedy the human rights abuses he saw perpetrated against his parishioners by government.
Botswana athlete and Olympian, in Marobela, Botswana. He was the first athlete from Botswana to win an Olympic Games medal when he took silver in the Men’s 800 metres at the 2012 Summer Olympics.
