Africa Up Close

Wind turbines at Lake Turkana Wind Power in Loiyangalani District, Kenya. Photo courtesy of Lake Turkana Wind Power. 

In northern Kenya, the tall, white wind turbines of the Lake Turkana Wind Power (LTWP) project conspicuously stand out against the brown landscape. As Africa’s largest wind energy power plant and the largest private investment in Kenya to date, the project is a milestone. Not only can LTWP generate up to 310MW and provide around 17 percent of the country’s installed energy capacity, but it also marks another achievement toward Kenya’s goal of green energy reliance. Kenya has already demonstrated itself as a global leader in renewable energy development, with approximately 70 percent of its installed capacity coming from renewable sources.

President Salva Kiir and opposition leader Riek Machar at the signing of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ACRSS). Photo courtesy of UNMISS via Flickr Commons.

The signing of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ACRSS) on September 12, 2018, has led to relative peace in South Sudan. Mediated by the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD)—a regional economic and security bloc—South Sudanese policymakers recently extended the ‘pre-transitional’ period until November 2019 before forming the transitional government of national unity. Given the few months remaining before this new deadline, there are serious concerns that many key tasks remain to be addressed: namely, the issue of the number and boundaries of provinces/states, violent conflicts, a single national army, and securing the funding necessary for implementing the peace agreement. These cumulative factors hamper the peace process, foreshadowing future outbreaks of violence.

President Cyril Ramaphosa co-chairs the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation. Photo courtesy of the South African government via Flickr Commons. 

The narrative regarding China’s presence in most African countries has been dominated by views of the Chinese as the new colonialists of Africa, finding strategic new ways to exploit Africans and their resources.[i] However, this discourse is narrow, emphasizing state-led investments in Africa, and does not account for growing Sino-African relations at the grassroots level and socio-cultural dynamics. In East African countries such as Kenya, growing numbers of independent Chinese migrants are settling throughout the country and influencing the lives and communities of Kenyans. The implications of uncovering these stories and the cultural interactions between Chinese migrants and African publics at the grassroots levels are two-fold. First, focusing on the socio-cultural aspects of China-Africa relations expands the debate from economics and trade to determining how exactly cultural exchange can also fuel Africa’s development. Second, this analysis allows for a more nuanced understanding of the different forms of Chinese involvement in Kenya. Chinese migrants in Kenya form a distinct community. Not only are they seen in most spheres of Kenyan society, but they also assert their values and practices through different social and cultural means. The proliferation of the Chinese language, food, and work ethic, and a rise in interracial relationships are the most notable sociocultural impacts experienced by the vast majority of Kenyans, in cities such as Nairobi and more rural regions such as Kirinyaga County.[ii]

Nobel Square in Cape Town, South Africa. Photo courtesy of FedericoLukkini via Flickr Commons. 

On the 18th of July, the cavalry came to Cape Town.

In a surprise move, the South African National Defense Force (SANDF) arrived in Manenberg and began conducting search and seizure operations—their mission—combating the startling rise of gang-related violence in Cape Town.

A farmer harvesting goods in a farm in Bouar, a town in the Central African Republic. Photo courtesy of the United Nations via Flickr Commons.

The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2019 released on July 15^th is quite alarming. The joint annual report finds that the number of people suffering from hunger or undernourishment continues to increase. This increase has occurred for the past three consecutive years, putting an end to a decade of progress in the global battle against hunger.

A sign display for a Confucius Institute. Photo courtesy of Mark Morgan via Flickr Creative Commons. 

Zambians who have the opportunity should learn Mandarin, fast. In 2019, the Zambian government announced that beginning in 2020, Mandarin Chinese will form part of the Zambian high school curriculum. This move has provoked criticism from those who deem it a sycophantic move by the Zambian government. The accusation finds merit, in part, because the Zambian government is not seen to be introducing Mandarin in good faith, but rather to mollify China, a country to which it is deeply indebted. According to the Jubilee Debt Campaign, a UK-based charity, by 2017 Zambia owed a third of its $9.4bn foreign debt to China. This figure was conservative compared to the $6.4bn established by the China Africa Research Initiative (CARI), of Johns Hopkins University. According to CARI statistics, 73.5 percent of Zambia’s $8.7bn debt is owed to China. These figures do not bode well for perceptions of Sino-Zambian relations, especially among civil society organizations leery of China’s growing presence in Zambia.

School children in Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. Photo courtesy of D. Willetts via UNESCO.

The 1951 Refugee Convention spells out refugee rights, including the right to freedom of movement. Yet 68 years later, 15.9 million people are trapped in prolonged exile, living as refugees for anywhere from 5 to 47 years and counting. The unprecedented duration of protracted refugee situations (PRS) and the increasing scale of forced migration demand a comprehensive response beyond humanitarian assistance.

Photo of a mock camera man on May 6, 2019, during a sit-in protest at the Military Headquarters in Khartoum, Sudan. This photo was taken by Ms. Shereen M. Omer, she gave Dr. Fadlalla permission to use her photo.

Sudan’s protest reached its peak on April 6, 2019—the anniversary day of the April 1985 uprising—when it turned into a sit-in in the front of the military headquarters in Khartoum. From December 19, 2018, until the deadly crackdown on the sit-in on June 3, 2019, protesters faced the bullets of snipers shooting at them randomly from different directions; they mourned, picked themselves up, and kept chanting “peaceful, peaceful,” as they buried their loved ones.

Burundi peacekeepers prepare for their next rotation to Somalia. Photo courtesy of US Army Africa via Flickr Commons.

On April 3, 2019, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg visited Washington, D.C. to plead his case. Mr. Stoltenberg insisted on the continued importance of his organization to the collective security of European and North American states. Under pressure from forces on both sides of the Atlantic that claim the alliance to be obsolete, Mr. Stoltenberg stood before Congress and declared that “it is good [for America] to have friends” like those in NATO. To bolster his case, he also cited increased defense spending by member states to the tune of $41 billion—a clear gesture of goodwill and reassurance to U.S. President Donald Trump, who has lambasted NATO allies that do not meet the defense spending target of 2 percent of GDP and has openly questioned the value of the alliance. Since Mr. Trump’s election in 2016, NATO has come under increased scrutiny from many in the United States, threatening the near-universal support enjoyed by the alliance since its creation in 1949. 

The 2019 State of the Nation Address in Cape Town. Photo courtesy of the Government of South Africa via Flickr Commons. 

South Africans went to the polls on May 8, 2019, for the sixth National and Provincial elections since 1994. The outcome offers an insight into the continued evolution of the 25-year-old democracy. A victory for the governing African National Congress (ANC) was never in doubt. The question was the margin of the victory in light of the party’s shortcomings over the past decade, notably maladministration and corruption as uncovered in the ongoing Commission of Inquiry into State Capture; and the tragedies of the Life Healthcare Esidimeni patients, and Marikana mine protest. In addition, entrenched inequality remains a challenge. The 2018 World Bank report on Overcoming Poverty and Inequality in South Africa (compiled with the Government of South Africa), highlights that while progress has been made since 1994, inequality, poverty, and high unemployment persist, with South Africa being one of the most unequal countries in the world. The inequality remains highly racialized. In the robust campaigning that characterized the elections, opposition parties made sure to highlight these issues and others in vying for an increased share of the votes. With the dust settled, the following four issues are worth highlighting.