Blue Lines
Whether the aims behind President Paul Kagame's closure of Gatuna (Ugandans call it Katuna), Rwanda's busiest border crossing with Uganda in February, were diplomatic, commercial or security, it seems to have failed on all counts. Although Kagame complain...
Patrick Smith
We start in Sudan where pro-democracy activists have launched a civil disobedience campaign against the junta and then to Zimbabwe where the government is promising a new dollar. In Algeria, activists want to see the Bouteflika political class exit en mas...
Patrick Smith
This week we start with some better news about the continental
trade treaty. And then to Khartoum for reports of a massacre at the
protestors' sit-in and to Kinshasa for a funeral of one of the
continent's most determined opposition campaigners. And final...
Blue Lines
Although the first two days of the general strike in Sudan designed to pressure the ruling generals to hand power to civilians have had mixed results, there is no prospect of the protesters giving up. The mass sit-in around the Defence Headquarters in Kha...
Patrick Smith
This week the focus is on Pretoria on the next moves for the
newly-inaugurated President Cyril Ramaphosa and then
to Malawi where the courts have given President Mutharika
election victory. Moscow has been hosting Denis Sassou-Nguesso,
the veteran leader ...
Patrick Smith
We start in Pretoria where newly-elected President Cyril Ramaphosa is due to announce his cabinet but to the north, the forex crisis in Zimbabwe
is getting worse. Incumbent President Peter Mutharika is facing the fight of his life in Malawi's elections
an...
Blue Lines
On what criteria is Godwin Emefiele, the mild-mannered governor of Nigeria's central bank, about to be given a second term in the job? Although Emefiele is in President Muhammadu Buhari's government, which is meant to be fighting corruption, he has little...
Patrick Smith
We start with the aftermath of last week's elections in South
Africa and then to neighbouring Angola where
the relatively new head of the state oil company has been sacked. In Nigeria there are ambiguous signs about the government's willingness to crack
d...
Patrick Smith
This week, South Africa prepares for
landmark elections on 8 May and Sudan edges towards a
power-sharing transitional government. There is another alert in Tanzania after a critic of the President goes missing and another delay in the
plans for a national...
Blue Lines
Protestors on the streets of Khartoum have taken up a new slogan: 'Victory or Egypt'. For them it's personal. Sudanese activists resented the collaboration between the two countries' elites. Both the current head of the junta, Lieutenant General Abdel Fat...