Vol 60 No 17 | SOUTH SUDAN Juba's payday loan habit 30th August 2019 The government’s fondness for pre-selling oil greases the wheels but hurts the exchequer. It’s an addiction that will be hard to break Developing countries have long been advised against forward-selling their natural resources – often their only source of foreign exchange – in return for upfront cash. The credit is...
Vol 60 No 17 | SUDAN Hamdok's appeal 30th August 2019 Starting work on 22 August, a day after he was sworn in, new Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok quickly amassed support, ranging from activists in the sit-in outside the...
Vol 60 No 17 | SOUTH SUDAN Ruing the day 30th August 2019 The British government's Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has launched an investigation into suspected corruption by UK currency printer De La Rue Group and associates in South Sudan. The...
Vol 60 No 16 | SUDAN From revolution to realpolitik 9th August 2019 Neither side likes the deal. The generals want to play for time and the activists see it as a first step to power For the thousands gathering in central Khartoum, waving flags and sounding horns around the Friendship Hall, the constitutional declaration initialled on 4 August was far from the revolutionary...
Vol 60 No 16 | TANZANIA Cashew crisis grinds on 9th August 2019 The President’s decision to act first and reflect later is proving costly for what should be the country’s most valuable export crop Last November, President John Pombe Magufuli took cashew marketing out of the hands of private traders, who refused to pay the price he demanded for raw cashew and...
Vol 60 No 16 | SUDAN Lobbyist of last resort 9th August 2019 The widely publicised US$6 million lobbying contract between controversial Washington lobbyist Ari Ben-Menashe with Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, aka Hemeti, deputy leader of Sudan's Transitional Military Council (TMC), to...
Vol 60 No 15 | KENYA A killing joke 26th July 2019 A fake letter detailing an assassination plot against the Deputy President has widened the fault lines within the ruling elite The political drama sparked by a fake letter claiming that several cabinet ministers from President Uhuru Kenyatta's Mount Kenya homeland had been plotting to kill Deputy President William...
Vol 60 No 15 | SUDAN The Egypt model isn't working 26th July 2019 As negotiations for the transition stretch out, activists are blocking plans for a born-again junta Backed by money and guns from allies in the Gulf and Cairo, the ruling generals in Khartoum had hoped by now to have consolidated a new regime, complete...
Vol 60 No 15 | TANZANIA One rule for the party 26th July 2019 Factions are struggling for advantage within the ruling CCM. But outside it, opposition and dissent are dangerous With 15 months to go to the 2020 general election, President John Pombe Magufuli faces blatant dissent from senior figures in the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM). Yusuf...
Vol 60 No 15 | KENYA Spinner caught in web 26th July 2019 In the months leading up to the August 2017 polls in Kenya, rumours flew that data-mining consultancy Cambridge Analytica, then at the height of its notoriety, had been...