Vol 49 No 25 | CONGO-KINSHASA Nkunda wants the whole deal 12th December 2008 The government cannot afford another war – and probably could not win it, so it must talk to its nemesis No one in the Kinshasa government wanted to talk to the rebel General Laurent Nkunda. So the talks which began in Nairobi on 8 December were a big...
Vol 49 No 24 | CONGO-KINSHASA Mining downturn 28th November 2008 Low demand for minerals, especially from China, depresses mines and the whole economy The world’s financial crisis threatens the mining deals that were meant to finance Congo-Kinshasa’s post-war recovery. The big mining companies are finding it hard to raise funds as...
Vol 49 No 24 | CAMEROON Biya's grip 28th November 2008 The economy is faltering but the opposition is struggling and the dictator President is ill Twenty-six years in power do not explain the grip on Cameroon of Paul Biya and his ethnic clique. The tight circle of praise-singers who marked the President's 26th...
Vol 49 No 24 | CAMEROON Master political survivor 28th November 2008 The former first lady Germaine Ahidjo, widow of Cameroon's first President, recently admitted in a rare interview that her Muslim husband Ahmadou Ahidjo made mistakes during his 26...
Vol 49 No 24 | CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Dialogue of the deaf 28th November 2008 Fighting starts again, renewing the involvement of France and Libya in a familiar, intractable conflict Twelve government soldiers were killed on 13 November at Kabo in the north and the Central African Republic's long march towards peace halted again. The government of President...
Vol 2 (AAC) No 1 | CONGO-KINSHASACHINA Washington wants the details 27th November 2008 The International Monetary Fund has given Kinshasa a stark choice: the Bretton Woods financial institutions or the Chinese. The International Monetary Fund has given Kinshasa a stark choice: the Bretton Woods financial institutions or the Chinese. On a visit in September, an IMF delegation led by...
Vol 49 No 23 | CONGO-KINSHASAANALYSIS The man who says no 14th November 2008 Rebel leader Laurent Nkunda likes to compare his relentless campaign against the Kinshasa government with the military resistance of General Charles de Gaulle, 'the man who said no'. Taking the parallels further, Nkunda has announced the formation of a provisional government in eastern Congo and threatens to march on the Kabila government. Without substantial back-up for the UN peacekeepers and a turnaround by the government forces, Nkunda's wild ambitions will face few obstacles. The strategic blunders of both the Kinshasa government and the Kivu rebels leave Congo's government facing military defeat, the rebels facing political isolation and the people of Kivu...
Vol 49 No 23 | CONGO-KINSHASA How smuggling pays for killing 14th November 2008 Most of the Kivu belligerents profit, one way or another, from the two provinces' precious reserves of gold, cassiterite and colombo-tantalite (coltan). Gold and coffee smuggling has been...
Vol 49 No 23 | CAMEROONEQUATORIAL GUINEA A kidnapped colonel 14th November 2008 Who kidnapped a presidential nephew in Yaounde; and why the neighbours disagree so often A row has broken out between Cameroon and its neighbour Equatorial Guinea after the abduction on 7 October in Yaounde of Cipriano Nguema Mba, apparently by Cameroonian police...
Vol 1 (AAC) No 7 | CONGO-KINSHASACHINA Reviews and renegotiations, again 7th November 2008 Contracts are once again revised in Congo-Kinshasa Kinshasa's Commission Ministérielle Chargée de la Revisitation des Contrats Miniers has revised the terms of China's biggest contract in Congo-Kinshasa, signed with the joint venture Sicomines, as part of a wider...