African continent joins millennial revelry and reflections

SPECIAL REPORT
With dances and fanfare, reflection and thoughts about an uncertain future, millions of Africans are welcoming the year 2000. Some seemed oblivious to the techno-fear of Y2K and its impact on their daily lives.. Others merely reveled in the emergence of another era. Various villages and cities took different styles to usher in what seemed a few decades ago, for many, a million years away, the new millennium opens up a bag of anticipation as well as new challenges for the continent of almost 750 million people. Hundreds of others went up to Africa's highest mountain, Mount Kilimanjaro, to see the sun rise for the year 2000. Mysteries and curiosity about the beginning and "the end of times" have added to the excitement about the new year.

In South Africa, which was rocked a week ago by terrorist bombs, President Nelson Mandela and an array of guests attended a millennium dinner on Robben Island, in Cape Town's Table Bay, where he lit a candle for the new century in his former prison cell. Mandela (right, in file photo) was unjustly jailed in isolation at the island for 18 of the 27 years he was confined by the racist regime. Cairo and Gizeh (Egypt), Lagos and Abuja (Nigeria), Accra (Ghana), Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), Harare (Zimbabwe), Mbabane (Swaziland), and other countries have continued the celebration of traditional and modern ways of living into the 21st century.

USAfricaonline.com correspondents cite the concern of the African business persons and the more informed citizenry about the technical limitations of public agencies regarding Y2K computing challenges (especially on the Windows-Intel-IBM platforms). Meanwhile, Air Zimbabwe canceled its millennium flight due to the fact that only one passenger confirmed his booking. Nigeria Airways also canceled flights on December 31, 1999 and January 1, 2000
In reflecting about the emerging new year and the past era, Mandela said: "We close the century with most people still languishing in poverty, subjected to hunger, preventable disease, illiteracy and insufficent shelter.'' By Chido Nwangwu

DANGER SIGNS:  According to the United Nations, AIDS in Africa has left the following painful facts: • 23.3 million Africans infected with HIV or AIDS; 70 percent of the world's total patients • 11 million African orphans created by AIDS epidemic; 90 percent of Africa's total of orphans  • In 1998, 200,000 Africans died from wars; 2.2 million died of AIDS  • Life expectancy in Africa, which had reached 59, will drop to 45 between 2005 and 2010 because of AIDS. USAfrica AIDS Education Project. AIDSfight@USAfricaonline.com. Send educational materials and other forms of support to : USAfrica AIDS Education Project, 8303 SW Freeway, Suite 100, Houston, Texas 77074. Phone 713-270-5500. Fax: 713-270-8131. (Please, do not send e-mail text as attachments)

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