A former Ethiopian slave Juan de Sessa, a brilliant linguist and grammar teacher (his mentor calls him a “rara avis in terra corbo simillima nigro" ("a rare bird, black like a crow"), receives a professorship as Chair of grammar and the Latin language at the University of Granada. He was brought to Spain by his owner, and was educated along with his owner’s son. He was set free in 1538. Under the name he is known in Spain for his linguistic work, Juan Latino, he will publish three significant books of poetry between 1573 and 1585.

This is the last day of the last year when the Kingdom of Kongo uses nzimbu (sea snail shell) as currency. Kongolese can purchase a hen with 100 nzimbu, a goat for 200 nzimbu, an enslaved woman for 20,000 nzimbu and an enslaved man for 30,000. Taxes are collected in nzimbu, and the royal treasury collects 20 million nzimbu as taxes annually. Next year (1651), Kongo switches currency to the Lubongo, a handkerchief-sized square of raffia cloth. 100 Lubongo can purchase an enslaved person.

More than 100,000 enslaved Africans have passed through the port of Zanzibar since January 1 in a particularly profitable year for the Arab slave trade.

Only five countries in Africa have been spared conquest and colonialism by European powers: Liberia (pic), which will remain free throughout the 20th century, and four countries that will be conquered by Italy during the 20th century: Ethiopia, Morocco, the Sultanate of Hobyo (Somalia) and the Majeerteen Sultanate (Somalia).

The Muthaiga Country Club is opened, in Nairobi, British Kenya. After World War I, the meeting place of the colonial white elite will gain international fame in the writings of Ernest Hemingway, Evelyn Waugh and others who will record the hard-drinking party atmosphere where Africans will not be permitted membership until the 1960s.

‍

The Egyptian government gives exclusive rights to operate an airline to Misr Airlines. Misr is the Arabic word for Egypt. When Misr Airlines begins commercial flights in the summer of 1932, from Cairo to Alexandria using a six-passenger, twin-engine de Havilland Dragon, it becomes Africa’s first national airline. In 2022, Misr Airlines, called Egyptair since 1971, will be the world’s seventh oldest airline.

A census of Eritrea finds that of Asmara’s population of 98,000, 53,000 people are Italian nationals. Asmara, a modern, planned city with more traffic lights than Rome, is the “main town” of Italy’s East African empire. The fashion in modern buildings during the 1930s has created a legacy of streamline-moderne architecture. (pic: the new Fiat Building, opened in 1938 and designed to resemble an airplane)

The Portuguese national airlines TAP begins its Linha Aérea Imperial ("Imperial Airline") service to Portugal’s African colonies. Routes fly from Luanda in Portuguese Angola and Lourenço Marques (pic) in Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique).

Because of poor sanitation and water, typhoid breaks out at the Manyani concentration camp built by Britain to imprison participants and sympathisers of Kenya’s anti-colonial Mau Mau Rebellion. The disease kills 115 prisoners. The lack of nutritious food is also a problem.

In Central African Republic, a coup d’état overthrows President David Dacko. His political rival, Jean-Bédel Bokassa (pic), assumes power. Bokassa will rule as a dictator (making himself Emperor of the renamed Central African Empire in 1977) until he is removed in another military coup d’état in 1979.

Tanzania has one of Africa’s fastest growing populations. A national census shows the number of Tanzanians has increasing 35% in the past ten years.

On his birthday today, the Republic of Congo’s military ruler Marien Ngouabi changes the country’s name to the People’s Republic of Congo (pic: flag). He declares the country is now a Communist state like his ally the People’s Republic of China. In 1992, the country’s original name will be restored.

Kenyan writer and intellectual Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o is arrested on orders of Vice President Daniel Arap Moi, and imprisoned for one year for his political play I Will Marry When I Want.

South Africa stages elections in South West Africa (Namibia). The South African government is making the territory into a province where people live under the apartheid system of racial segregation (pic: the national swim team excludes non-white members). Independence party SWAPO boycotts the elections. A white Afrikaner, farmer Dirk Francis Mundel, is elected to be South Africa’s puppet leader for the country.

The Second Nigerian Republic, a four-year period of true democracy in the country, comes to an end with a coup d’état led by General Muhammadu Buhari. The generals form a military government heads by Buhari.

U.S. President George H.W. Bush becomes the first U.S. president to visit Somalia. He arrives for a three-day tour of relief work operations.

This has been the deadliest year on record for African migrants and refugees. 5,350 people have died crossing the Mediterranean Sea in a desperate bid to escape poverty and persecution, compared to 3,270 deaths in 2014, reports the U.N.’s International Organisation for Migration.

For the second consecutive New Year’s Eve, Malawi Christian pastor and self-proclaimed prophet Shepherd Bushiri fills Africa’s largest stadium, Johannesburg’s FNB Stadium, with 95,000 followers.

The source of the wealth of “Africa’s Richest Woman,” Isabel dos Santos (pic: as seen in a popular Internet meme), is revealed to be corruption. The government of Angola freezes the financial assets of the daughter of former President Eduardo dos Santos. The government of President Joao Lourenço wants more than US$1 billion returned of money looted by her from public enterprises.

Morocco’s Renault-Nissan plant becomes the largest automobile plant in Africa, with production surpassing 400,000 vehicles in 2019. Of the vehicles built, 90% are exported to 74 different countries.

After Kenya President Uhuru Kenyatta suspends his social media accounts, Nigeria President Muhammadu Buhari becomes the African leader with the most social media followers: more than five million on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

The importance of the Suez Canal to world shipping continues, and the Suez Canal Company earns US$5.61 billion from 18,829 ships using the passage this year. The canal, utilised by 10% of global shipping, will post a record US$7 billion in revenues in 2022.