The raid by French Special Forces on 11 January on the place where Al Haraka al Shabaab al Mujahideen was believed to be holding a French intelligence officer...

Tanzania’s next elections may be nearly three years away but they are already affecting national politics. Within the governing Chama Cha Mapinduzi, tension will increase as the race...

Kenya’s 50th Independence celebrations at the end of the year will be shaped by the general elections in March, the first since the violently disputed 2007 polls. This...

Two pressing challenges – the failing economy and a more effective opposition – will confront the National Congress Party regime this year. There is no prospect of...

Only one other head of state stood on the podium beside President Omer Hassan Ahmed el Beshir on 1 January. That was President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud of Somalia....

South Sudanese will have to wait longer for their peace dividend. The main prospects for 2013 are more fraught negotiations with Khartoum on security and oil and most...

Juba’s failure to react to its shrinking reservoir of international goodwill was illustrated firstly, by the Sudan People’s Liberation Army shooting down a helicopter of the United Nations...

Optimism was high last September when President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud took office and appointed a cabinet led by Abdi Farah Shirdon ‘Said’ (AC Vol 53 No 22). The...

Somaliland’s success story will come under growing regional pressure in 2013, partly because of developments in neighbouring Somalia. The key issue for Somaliland remains diplomatic recognition as a...

With barely three months to go before the general elections, the 4 December deadline on pre-poll deals forced Kenya’s promiscuous political class into a flurry of shotgun weddings....