African press review 1 May 2018

Donald Trump confronts Buhari on the killing of Christians by herdsmen during maiden White House reception for the visiting Nigerian leader.

We begin in Nigeria where the papers lead with special reports from their envoys in Washington where President Muhammadu Buhari held talks with his American counterpart Donald Trump on Monday.

ThisDay reports that Buhari who arrived the US capital on Sunday was received by Trump at midday at the White House and ushered into the Oval Office, where both leaders exchanged pleasantries before proceeding to a closed-door meeting.

The newspaper,says the talks bordered on the war against global terrorism trade and an issue of grave concern to the American leader -- the persistent wanton killings of Christians in Nigeria. The killings were reportedly branded by Trump as a serious problem, which must not be allowed to continue.

According to Punch, Donald Trump actually warned Buhari was the first African leader to visit the White House that his administration will not tolerate the killing of Christians in Nigeria.

The paper explains that the American President spoke against the backdrop of incessant killings attributed to Fulani herdsmen in the country, particularly in Benue, Nasarawa, Taraba and Plateau states.

The Tribune for its part reports that the US President also wondered what President Buhari was doing about the terrible problem of young women kidnapped by Boko Haram insurgents.

Vanguard reports that in his response, Buhari admitted that security was a major issue in Nigeria, reiterating his position that the killings were aggravated by the demise of the former Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, who he said had trained people who found their ways into the sub region with weapons.

The paper argues that Buhari expressed Abuja's gratitude to the Trump administration for agreeing to sell 12 Super Tucano A-29 war planes and weapons to Nigeria to fight terrorism.

Buhari also reportedly announced that the Attorneys-General of the two countries had put in place a mechanism to ensure the return of over 500 million dollars of funds looted by Nigeria and stashed away in banks around the world.

In Kenya the Standard takes up a report just in showing that growers lost over 1.9 million tons of food, in 2017 even as millions of citizens grappled with starvation fuelled by debilitating drought.

The newspaper says the National Bureau of Statistics which authored the study calculated the cost of the produce that got rotten as farmers struggled to store, or transport to the market at Sh150 billion, (approximately 1.2 billion euros).