Africa Up Close

In 2022, Kenya shipped car batteries and tea to Ghana, its first deliveries in a pilot program of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement.

The world’s largest free-trade pact, which took effect in January 2021, aims to facilitate and increase trade across Africa. Kenya and Ghana are among eight countries taking part in the AfCFTA pact’s trial phase.

The battery shipment marked Nairobi-based Associated Battery Manufacturers Ltd.’s entry into the West African market, according to finance manager Nixon Paloma. He said the company, which specializes in automotive and solar batteries, previously had traded only with other East and Southern Africa regional blocs.  

This blog was originally posted on NewSecurityBeat, a blog of the Environmental Change and Security Program at the Wilson Center.

Often cast into the backwaters of U.S. foreign policy, sub-Saharan Africa now looms large as the Biden Administration grapples with a wide range of global challenges. President Biden will soon host the upcoming Africa Leaders’ Summit in Washington, that acknowledges the U.S. government must do much more in Africa in order to advance U.S. interests and global prosperity.

Africa will play an increasingly important role in the global economy in this century. The war in Ukraine and China’s increasingly aggressive international posture have wiped away Western somnolence. Seeking to counter Russian and Chinese influence on the continent, the U.S. and its Western partners now are scrambling for Africa’s resources and diplomatic support.

One of the world’s deadliest conflicts, the war in the Tigray region of Ethiopia, raises serious concern over ethnic cleansing, human rights abuses, and manmade humanitarian crises. Established by the UN Human Rights Council in December 2021, the International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia (ICHREE) believes there are reasonable grounds to trust that the Federal Government of Ethiopia and its allies (Amhara regional and paramilitary forces and the Eritrean government) have committed crimes against humanity in the Tigray region. In the same vein, a joint investigation by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHC) point to the same evidence. ICHREE and OHCHR/HER have also documented war crimes and human rights abuses by the Tigrayan Defense Forces—including attacks against Amhara civilians in Kobo and Chenna in August and September 2021. In September 2022, dozens of Amhara civilians were also killed by Tigray fighters in the town of Kobo.

Amidst Ethiopia’s political transition beginning in 2018 along with the ongoing war, the completion of Ethiopia’s fourth decennial national census has slipped through the cracks. Now five years past its originally scheduled date in 2017, the government postponed the census a third time in June 2020. Initially delayed over domestic security concerns, the 2020 rescheduling was in response to COVID-19 hindering the preparation and implementation of the count. As a result, the National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) released its first electoral constituencies map in March 2020 using census data from 2007. The electoral map demarcation used census data from 1994—when Ethiopia’s population was roughly half of what it is today. When asked in 2019 about the census, NEBE Chairwoman Birtukan Mideksa said it had no bearing on the then-upcoming election because the NEBE only needed the number of registered voters to structure polling stations and hold elections.

From June 16-17, 2022, members of the Southern Voices Network for Peacebuilding (SVNP) hosted the Regional Policy Conference, “Peacebuilding in the Great Lakes Region,” in Kampala, Uganda. The Women’s International Peace Centre (The Peace Centre), the Centre d’Etudes pour l’Action Sociale (CEPAS), the Institute of Policy Analysis and Research (IPAR-Rwanda), and the Centre for Conflict Management (CCM) of the University of Rwanda co-hosted the conference.

Fig. A: Independent research by Pearl Matibe, Research Scholar. Source: US Department of State

How and why do we see more diplomatic engagement between Africa and the United States since the Russia-Ukraine war?

In comparison to the analysis of the 2017-2022 US Department of State’s Public Schedules to 2022’s first six months, travel to Africa tripled for secretaries of state, undersecretaries, and assistant secretaries. In 2017, under Secretary Rex Tillerson, it was over four-times lower, whereas, under Secretary Michael Pompeo in 2018, data indicates increased activity. Compared to prior years, travel to African countries increased threefold, from 6 percent to just under 18 percent after the war started under Secretary Antony Blinken.

This blog was originally posted on NewSecurityBeat, a blog of the Environmental Change and Security Program at the Wilson Center

Seeing Loreta sort and dry her Omena sardines at the shores of Lake Victoria in Western Kenya, one may dismiss this small, middle-aged woman as an ordinary fishmonger struggling to earn a living.

Introduction 

Elections are among the most effective ways of promoting participation in governance, representation, and uniting diverse groups–where the process is free, fair, and just. Nigeria has conducted many elections and witnessed a plethora of electoral problems, which the roots lay in systemic disjuncture amid efforts by government and election management bodies to transform the electoral processes and safeguard the integrity of election outcomes. While there has been persistent agitation against exclusion, the government has made some efforts to use legislation and eliminate the semblance of disparity in opportunities for elective positions. The essence is to mitigate exclusion that countermands the quest for inclusive electoral process. However, monetized politics introduced and sustained by older politicians remain a disincentive for youth participation. The problem has become a dilemma for the extant politicians that are wealthy and influence the system in their favor and the emerging forces of youth agitations in Nigeria.

Throughout the Sahel region and especially in Sahelian capitals, anti-French voices are growing louder. Local protest movements are criticizing France’s policies in the Sahel and criticizing the dependence of past or present Sahelian leaders on France. Movements such as the M5-RFP in Mali, COPA/BF in Burkina Faso, Tournons La Page in Niger, and Wakit Tama in Chad have all had anti-French messages as part of their wider political platforms. Some anti-French sentiment can be linked to Russian disinformation. Yet many ordinary citizens in the Sahel, as well as many serious politicians and intellectuals in the region, have powerful criticisms of France. Listening to their criticisms reveals the depth of Sahelians’ frustrations with endemic insecurity (which France did not cause, but which France has not reversed) and with politicians perceived as too deferential to France.

Due to the Russia-Ukraine war, a new global disaster is threatening to plunge Africa into increased risk of famine and deprivation. Ukraine and Russia are among the world’s foremost breadbaskets. Together, they provide around 30 percent of the world’s wheat and barley, one fifth of its maize, and over half of its sunflower oil. Ukraine is the largest exporter of sunflower oil, the fourth largest exporter of maize (corn), and the fifth largest exporter of wheat. UN Assistant Secretary-General Amin Awad said, “This war will have no winner. Rather, we have witnessed for 100 days what is lost: lives, homes, jobs and prospects.” The war has worsened a food security crisis that is already burgeoning in many countries. High commodity prices and supply chain disruptions are hitting the global community hard. The UN has also consistently stressed the threats of famine that vulnerable states around the world including Africa face as a result of the war.