On Tuesday, October 11, 2011, Liberians will go to the polls to choose the country’s next president from a pool of 16 aspiring presidential candidates, which includes the incumbent Ms. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. The election comes a few days after President Johnson Sirleaf and another Liberian women’s activist Leymah Gbowee were awarded the Nobel Prize […]
The Mo Ibrahim Foundation has just released its 2011 Index of African Governance. I’d encourage you to follow the link and download to your heart’s content. For most of you the Summary will be more than sufficient. On the whole Ibrahim himself argues, “The findings of the 2011 Index present a complex yet hopeful picture […]
Julius Malema, the firebrand leader of South Africa’s ANC Youth League and lightning rod for controversy may find that his wave has crested too early. Recent polls indicate that his popularity is waning, particularly in the cities that provide so much of his support. This news should not come as a surprise. Of late when […]
Reporters Without Borders voiced concern today for the safety of Ethiopia’s journalists after a long-time government critic was arrested along with four opposition party members on 15 September in Addis Ababa, becoming the latest in a series of local and foreign reporters to be held on “terrorism” charges. Ethiopia’s 2009 “anti-terrorist” law has today become […]
The International Day of Peace which was established by a U.N. resolution in 1982, and is marked every year on September 21, is a global event whose activities are significant in highlighting the worldwide efforts towards conflict resolution and peace building. This day is however more relevant to the continent of Africa where most conflicts […]
Zambians go to the polls today to cast their ballots. Not only do they vote for president in what is expected to be one of the most closely contested Zambian election since independence, they also will vote for their representatives for the next five years in parliament and local government. As is so often the […]
The IRB Rugby World Cup is under way in New Zealand. The hosts come in as the favorites because, much like Brazil in football, the All Blacks pretty much are always the favorites, despite a history of underachievement in rugby’s signature event. The All Blacks have only emerged with one William Webb Ellis Cup, and […]
There is good news on that eternal South African bugaboo, crime. The country’s police minister, Minister Nathi Mthethwa, has announced that South Africa’s murder rate — perennially one of the worst in the world — fell by 6.5% in the period from March 2010 to April 2011. In that same time span the number of […]
Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s volatile and unpredictable President has moved from his insistence that his country would hold elections in 2011 and now says that Zimbabwe’s elections will be held no later than March 2012. For Mugabe the exact date of the elections matters much less, it seems, than his ability to dictate terms. For Mugabe […]
Do I see a little bit of an irony here? Let’s do a count: how many of the current AU member countries have inclusive governments? How many of the current AU member governments came to power through coups? Until now, the sad truth is that, all along, the AU (and its predecessor the OAU) did […]
Yesterday’s bombing of the UN compound in Abuja, Nigeria by the radical-Islamist sect Boko Haram is finally setting off alarm bells throughout the Nigerian Government and the global anti-terrorism establishment. And well it should. Boko Haram– the nickname for the group which is largely composed of disaffected, unemployed youth and university students from the predominantly […]
ISN Insights has published my latest piece, “ANC: Historical Irony on the Horizon?”, in which I wonder whether or not Jacob Zuma might face a fate similar to that Thabo Mbeki confronted in 2007 and 2008.
I’ve been quiet as epochal events have developed in Libya. Suffice it to say that I am cautiously optimistic — Moammar Gaddafi has been bad for Libya, bad for North Africa (ask Chadians about what Libya has meant to them over the year) and especially bad for Pan Africanism, a creed he embraced only after […]
Yes, you heard it right, the AU’s Peace and Security Council reportedly failed on Monday to agree on a common position on Libya. Instead the body has deferred the decision to a Friday meeting of the AU’s heads of states’ leadership meeting. Frankly, I am not surprised and do not expect the 15 heads of […]
Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister, Morgan Tsvangirai, has accused the Zimbabwe military of attacking civilians in politically motivated attacks. Few outside observers doubt that the accusation is plausible. One of the country’s leading military figures, General Solomon Mujuru, died in a fire on his farm in Beatrice on Monday evening. Mujuru, the husband of Zimbabwe’s Vice-President Joice […]