Stories that came across the desktop today:
Africa’s longest serving leader, Gabon’s President Omar Bongo Ondimba, is in a Spanish hospital and is apparently in “a very bad condition” due to what some reports are calling intestinal cancer. Given that Ondimba has been a dynastic ruler in the oil-rich (for the few) but impoverished (for the many) West African state, the cynic in me worries that chaos may ensue when Ondimba dies. I sincerely hope that I am wrong.
A group observing Malawi’s observations has used the word “shortcomings” to describe the country’s elections this past week. Specifically the Commonwealth observers group argues that the incumbent party used control of the media to tip the scales of the election. According to former Ghanaian president John Kufuor, who heads the observer group, the government’s media manipulation created a “markedly unlevel playing field, tarnishing the otherwise democratic character of the campaign.”
New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof can be maddeningly earnest and sometimes seems to jump from lily pad to lily pad in hopes of getting us all to (wringing hands) do something about this or that crisis in Africa. But his earnestness is also admirable inasmuch as he uses his pulpit to draw attention to legitimate crises. Today in his column Kristof focuses on the undeniably awful and pervasive phenomenon of rape as a political weapon in post-conflict environments around the globe, including in various places in Africa, including the Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, and Liberia, which gets the brunt of his attention in this piece. In typical Kristof fashion he is long on description and short on prescriptions, but the description is not unimportant.
On a much lighter note, one South African squad, the Pretoria-based Bulls, remains in the annual Super 14 competition of elite professional rugby clubs in South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia (aka SANZAR). The semi-finals are this weekend. meanwhile in the UK and South Africa rugby fans await the always-stirring matchup between the British and Irish Lions and the Springboks, which will take place in a three-game series in South Africa in June and July. I am hoping against hope to secure tickets to one of the matches, preferably the fixture in Pretoria on June 27. So if you know anyone with tickets . . .