Pope Leo to Africa

St Augustine Basilica, Annaba, Algeria

After Lebanon and Turkey, then Monaco, now it’s time for the longest trip of Pope Leo, a four-nation, 11-day trip to Africa that is so dizzying in its complexity it recalls some of the globetrotting odysseys of St. John Paul II in his early years. He will visit Algeria from April 13 to 15, the home of St Augustine, the inspiration of his religious order who lived and died there. Leo will visit Annaba, the modern-day Hippo where the 5th century saint was a bishop. Some of the themes Leo is expected to raise include Christian-Muslim coexistence, the over-exploitation of the region's natural and human resources, corruption and migration. Migration and Christian-Muslim coexistence are expected to be other top themes in Algeria, a former French colony which is a majority Sunni Muslim nation on North Africa’s Mediterranean coast. Leo will pay homage to migrants killed in shipwrecks trying to reach Europe and will visit the Great Mosque in Algiers. From April 15 to 18, Leo will visit Cameroon where he will lead a "peace meeting" in the north-west city of Bamenda on April 16, featuring testimony of a Mankon traditional chief, a Presbyterian moderator, an imam and a Catholic nun. From April 18 to 21 , Pope Leo will be in Angola, where around 58% of the population is Catholic, and he will pray at the Sanctuary of Mama Muxima, a Marian shrine that has become one of the most important Catholic pilgrimage sites in Angola. Angola today is the fourth largest oil producer in Africa and it’s also the world’s third biggest diamond producer and has significant deposits of gold and highly sought after critical minerals. The last country he will visit is to Equatorial Guinea (April 21-23), where the discovery of offshore oil in the mid-1990s transformed its economy virtually overnight, with oil now accounting for almost half of its GDP and more than 90% of exports. However at least 70% of the country’s nearly 2 million people live in poverty. The country’s government also faces rampant accusations of harassment, arrest and intimidation of political opponents, critics and journalists, and these are issues which Leo will certainly have to address in his speeches.