The world’s first major drought is scientifically documented. Low rainfall responsible for drought is recorded along the Sahel, south of the Sahara Desert. A second drought is recorded in the 1680s.

A prince in the Eguafo kingdom in Gold Coast (Ghana), Takyi Kuma, begins a civil war to take possession of the throne. The Adom and Akani are drawn into the fight as Takyi Kuma’s allies, while the Akron oppose him. He will eventually success in his ambition in 1700. (pic: Gold Coast in 17th Century)

The opening of the Nile Bridge at Jinja, Uganda completes the Kenya and Uganda Railway and permits uninterrupted rail service from Mombasa to Kampala.

Days after the assassination of former Prime Minister and independence icon Patrice Lumumba (pic: moments before his execution) in Democratic Republic of Congo, a cover up begins. To remove evidence of the participation of Western agents in his murder, Belgian police commissioner Gérard Soete has Lumumba’s body dug up, dismembered with a hacksaw and dissolved in acid. Only one tooth remains, which in 2020 a Belgian court orders to be returned to Lumumba’s family.

Eritrean footballer Luciano Vassallo is the highest scorer and is named Player of the Tournament at the Africa Cup of Nations, hosted by Ethiopia. Vassallo becomes the only Ethiopian to be named the Cup’s top player, and this third edition of the championship is the only time Ethiopia wins the Cup. Ethiopia has colonised Vassallo’s native Eritrea, and prior to the tournament he was told to change his name to sound more Ethiopian. Vassallo refused. Upon the Ethiopian team’s victory, the cup is handed to him by Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie, who ignores his officials who want it handed to an ethnic Ethiopian.

The People's Air Force of Angola is founded by members of the Flying Club of Angola, in Luanda. The name will later be changed to the National Air Force of Angola.

Tanzanian authorities officially recognise the liberal political party the Civic United Front, whose members come from the generally overlooked Zanzibar Islands Unguja and Pemba.

For the last time, the Paris-Dakar Rally course begins and ends in its namesake cities. Jutta Kleinschmidt becomes the first and only woman to win the 10,600-km race, which passes through France, Spain, Morocco, Mauritania, Mali and Senegal.

After months of negotiations by West African leaders urging him to acknowledge his election loss and step down, and with Senegalese forces arriving to ensure an orderly transfer of power to legitimately-elected President Adama Barrow, The Gambia’s former dictator Yahya Jammeh (pic) flees to Guinea.

The Senegambia Bridge (Trans-Gambia Bridge) opens, 63 years after it was first proposed in 1956, as a vital piece of the Trans-Gambia Highway linking northern and southern Gambia over the Gambia River. The bridge is nearly two kilometres long.