Posting may be light this week, as I am traveling to Phoenix and then to Washington, DC for the Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA) meeting where I will be presenting a paper on democratization in Namibia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. I will try to post as I can. Meanwhile, for your Monday morning pleasure, some links, with comments as I see fit:
Homophobia has come to the fore in Ugandan politics with a bill that can, at best, be described as unenlightened and most accurately as pure bigotry.
Is Clive Derby-Lewis, the murderer of South African anti-Apartheid hero Chris Hani, a victim of ANC politics or is he simply receiving his just desserts? You decide. I suppose if he really is due to be released on parole it should happen. But don’t expect to see me leading the parade for Derby-Lewis’ martyrdom one way or the other. My sympathy for him is pretty much nonexistent.
Voters in Botswana went to the polls this weekend against an economic backdrop that can charitably be called “unsettled.” Botswana is widely seen as one of the continent’s true success stories, especially on the economic front. The Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) is expected to win another term in power, but the party is divided, and one wonders if a sea change in Botswanan politics might not come about in the next few years.
Passive, meet Aggressive: Guinean strongman Moussa Dadis Camara has missed the deadline that the African Union gave him to announce whether he plans to stand in the presidential elections that Guinea is scheduled to hold next year. Barring some uncharacteristic arm-twisting, it is hard to envision Camara voluntarily stepping down, but stranger things have happened.
Who has time for working to put together a legitimate unity government when there are scholarships to bestow and football players to ingratiate? Not Robert Mugabe, that’s for sure.
Finally . . .
We’re Number 10!: South Africa ranks tenth in the world in Twitter usage. I have nothing interesting to say about that except to point out that it is my experience that South Africans who are economically able are as tech and gadget mad as anyone in the world.
