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Published 23rd November 2018

Vol 59 No 23

Nigeria

Promises, promises

Oby Ezekwesili. Pic: Sonia Moskowitz/Zuma Press/PA Images
Oby Ezekwesili. Pic: Sonia Moskowitz/Zuma Press/PA Images

Both main presidential contenders pledge millions of jobs and billions on infrastructure but there are real differences in their policies and strategies

With ninety days to go before national elections in February, formal campaigning started on 18 November with a flurry of extravagant pledges and policies, almost all of them uncosted and many of them replete with internal contradictions.

Militias flex their muscles

Violence is escalating in the east, as UN leaders come under fire for not engaging with neighbouring countries responsible for it

With elections right around the corner, armed groups in the east are ramping up their attacks on government forces and United Nations peacekeepers. Meanwhile, a split in the...

Ramaphosa rattled

After leading the charge in the anti-corruption campaign, Zuma’s successor faces allegations of conflicts of interest

President Cyril Ramaphosa is under increasing pressure to explain the contradictions of his five-year term as deputy President of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) under former President...

BLUE LINES
THE INSIDE VIEW

Developments in Nigeria and South Africa, covered in this issue, point to the danger when political and business interests converge. President Cyril Ramaphosa's directorship of Lonmin, the company operating in Marikana when the police massacred protesting mineworkers, nearly sank his political career. Ramaphosa is leading an anti-corruption campaign targeting international outfits such as McKinsey and KPMG for their relations with Jacob Zuma's government. This week Ramaphosa faces tough quest...

Developments in Nigeria and South Africa, covered in this issue, point to the danger when political and business interests converge. President Cyril Ramaphosa's directorship of Lonmin, the company operating in Marikana when the police massacred protesting mineworkers, nearly sank his political career. Ramaphosa is leading an anti-corruption campaign targeting international outfits such as McKinsey and KPMG for their relations with Jacob Zuma's government. This week Ramaphosa faces tough questions about his son's business interests and a donation to his election campaign.

In Nigeria, opposition presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar, a multi-millionaire whose fortune came from oil services company Intels, is the business candidate par excellence. He wants to sell off large stakes of Nigeria's oil and gas industry, float the naira, and make corporate tax levels the lowest in Africa. Apart from obvious conflicts of interests, there is the matter of one of Atiku's strongest backers, a former director of military intelligence. In documents obtained from the Milan court which is trying officials from Royal Dutch Shell and ENI for grand corruption in the purchase of oil block OPL245, this senior officer's name repeatedly comes up centre-stage. Some in the Atiku camp argue that legal proceedings against the two companies, in Italy and Nigeria, should be stopped in favour of the block's rapid development. It may be another tricky case of business interests colliding with political ones.

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Finding for the government

An inquiry into this year’s post-election violence is having unintended consequences for both the President and his chief rival

When President Emmerson Mnangagwa appointed a commission of inquiry to investigate the 1 August 2018 post-election violence, it looked like a further bid by the government for legitimacy....

A well-oiled machine

The President deflects criticisms of the management of oil resources while deftly removing all credible challengers to his re-election

The flies are buzzing around Senegal's highly promising offshore fields even though there have been no major announcements of new oil and gas discoveries in 2018. The juniors...

Moscow abhors a vacuum

France's failures in CAR opened the door to Russia. Now, Paris wants to win back a central role, but the government is hostile and the Kremlin has plans

The visit of the French foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, to Bangui at the beginning of November was supposed to signal Paris's decisive re-engagement with its former territory....

Frelimo waits them out

The increasing pace of offshore gas development and the need for investment are pushing the secret loans saga to the margins

The abandoning of the United Kingdom Financial Conduct Authority's criminal investigation into Credit Suisse bank over its role in Mozambique's US$2 billion in hidden loans for dubious security...

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Posturing in Palermo

The latest effort to solve Libya’s crisis produces grandstanding but little progress as European powers compete for influence

The Palermo conference on Libya on 12-13 November called by Italy's Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte was as much about Italy's primacy in the north African conflict as about...

Rounding up the suspects

The arrest of senior officials on corruption charges is popular with the public but many are Tigrayan, which is creating tension

For millions of Ethiopians, the arrest of former senior officials from the intelligence services and the Metals and Engineering Corporation (MetEC), a wayward military enterprise, were welcome signs...

The sick men of North Africa

Grey heads are rolling throughout the establishment as Bouteflika’s circle purges rivals, clearing the way for his fifth term of office

Presidents routinely use 1 November, when Algeria commemorates the start of its war of liberation from France, to call for accelerated economic reforms which will reduce reliance on...

Pointers

Fertilise this

Morocco is close to agreeing a new trade deal with the European Union, less than a year after the European Court of Justice ruled that its existing pact...

Mahama wants a replay

The victory of Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo in the contest for national chairman at the opposition National Democratic Congress convention in Accra on 18 November could set the stage for...

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