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Published 4th November 2021

Vol 62 No 22

Sudan

Burhan tries to negotiate after coup falters

Protestors demonstrate against the General Abdel Fattah al Burhan's coup, Khartoum, 30 October 2021. Pic: Mohamed Nureldin/Reuters/Alany
Protestors demonstrate against the General Abdel Fattah al Burhan's coup, Khartoum, 30 October 2021. Pic: Mohamed Nureldin/Reuters/Alany

A multiplicity of mediators is trying to broker a new deal between civilians and army factions

A week after General Abdel Fattah al Burhan's coup and bid to disband the transitional government, military and civilian rivals are locked in negotiations in the face of mounting national and international opposition to the takeover. Abdalla Hamdok, the prime minister sacked by Burhan and put under house arrest, is central to efforts to revive the transition by envoys from the African Union, the UN and the United States.

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Has the sun set on the Brothers?

Tahrir Square, Cairo, 2011. Note the Tunisian flag, a reminder of where it all started. Pic: Mathieu Baudier (CC BY-ND 2.0)
Tahrir Square, Cairo, 2011. Note the Tunisian flag, a reminder of where it all started. Pic: Mathieu Baudier (CC BY-ND 2.0)

After setbacks in government and repression in opposition, the Muslim Brothers are in retreat in North Africa

In the wake of the Arab Spring a decade ago, groups advocating a parliamentary road to Islamism, mostly linked to the Muslim Brothers (MB, al Ikhwan al Muslimun) rose from the unde...

The PJD loses its base

Pic: Twitter @Elotmanisaad
Pic: Twitter @Elotmanisaad

The monarchy has deftly marginalised Islamist parties through a mixture of intimidation and co-optation

The Parti de la Justice et du Développement (PJD) members of former Prime Minister Saad Eddine el Othmani's government suffered a string of policy humiliations as ministers ...

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THE INSIDE VIEW

Rhetoric is the warmest commodity at the UN's COP26 climate summit in an icy Glasgow. The distant pledges for achieving 'net zero' economies – in 2050, in 2060 or 2070 – concern African countries less than the current realities of extreme weather, the droughts and floods that have devastated harvests and forced over 70 million people to flee from the homes. Madagascar, which has suffered the world's first famine triggered by global warming, is an omen.

Africa's concerns we...

Rhetoric is the warmest commodity at the UN's COP26 climate summit in an icy Glasgow. The distant pledges for achieving 'net zero' economies – in 2050, in 2060 or 2070 – concern African countries less than the current realities of extreme weather, the droughts and floods that have devastated harvests and forced over 70 million people to flee from the homes. Madagascar, which has suffered the world's first famine triggered by global warming, is an omen.

Africa's concerns were set out in three UN climate reports which projected a devastating rise of 2.7 degrees Celsius this century. Part of the response could come from the promised US$100 billion a year fund for developing economies, although contributions are more than 20% below target. South Africa's Environment Minister Barbara Creecy forecasts the overall target will have to rise to $750bn a year after 2025 to meet the new climate imperatives.

South Africa announced a US$8.5bn deal with the United States, Britain and the European Union to accelerate its shift from coal power to renewable energy, which could become a template for others. But there is far less discussion about how oil and gas exporters in Africa, such as Nigeria, Algeria and Angola, restructure their economies as finance dries up for new production projects but their energy sectors remain critically dependent on fossil fuels.

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Saïed channels Mussolini

The president has carried out an absolutist 'constitutional coup' and so far has the public on his side

The Muslim Brotherhood affiliate Ennahda dominated the decade after the fall of President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, but in successive governments it failed to revive the faltering ...

Probe focus shifts to Nyusi

The US authorities have fined the two foreign banks in the tuna bond scam. Now Maputo's politicians are in the frame in court

Five years after Mozambique's economy sank into a quagmire of bad debt, Credit Suisse faces at least US$747 million of penalties for its part in the country's $2 billion hidden loa...

ANC slumps to record low as voters stay away

Losing ground to new parties and independents, the two biggest parties are forced into coalition talks as political landscape changes

The African National Congress's (ANC) share of the national vote fell to 46% in the local elections with almost all the ballots counted by the evening of 3 November. That is the fi...

General Al Burhan's power grab

Worried about losing political and economic power as well as facing prosecution for mass killings, military officers scupper the transition

Army officers led by General Abdel Fattah al Burhan overthrew the transitional government on 25 October and put Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok under house arrest despite hundreds of...

Deep State in plain sight

Le pouvoir had a reckoning with Islamism long before the Arab Spring and still dominates despite Hirak’s efforts at revolution

Algeria's 'Deep State' has never gone away. Popular unrest decided le pouvoir (the powers-that-be) in favour of overseeing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's removal and throwing his...

A slow road to recovery

The region’s economies on average will lose over 5% of output by 2024 relative to pre-pandemic trends, according to the IMF

Twenty months since Covid-19 first disrupted the global economy, the outlook for Africa's economies remains subdued. The upgrades by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World...

Kenyatta mulls the high cost of the handshake

Fresh from addressing UN and US officials on his country's political successes, the President faces a bumpy economy ahead of next year's elections

When he addressed the UN Security Council on 12 October President Uhuru Kenyatta joined other speakers to argue that mismanagement of ethnic diversity often caused political violen...

The costs of Abiy's all-out war

As the Prime Minister calls again for military victory, the war is breaking up the federation and the economy

Increasingly strident statements in Addis Ababa and reports of federal government losses in the Amhara and Oromo regions show how rapidly the national security crisis is escalating...

Leaders clash over climate

The President's campaign to hasten phasing out coal in return for green finance has set up a clash with his Energy Minister

Cyril Ramaphosa has called on developed economies to help fund the energy transition in developing economies, as South Africa's struggle to wean itself off coal sets him against on...

Makamba plans power reforms, aiming for the presidency

Electricity prices are set to rise as the new energy minister restructures the state power company and tries to revive the stalled gas export project

New energy minister, January Makamba, has long been tipped as a future president of the united republic, so his bold plans for the energy sector are winning political attention.

Pointers

Bomb suspects abound

A spate of attacks in Uganda is raising questions about the government's grip on security. It follows a wave of murders by machete-wielding assailants.

Row over abuse probe

The decision in mid–September by the United Nations to immediately repatriate Gabon's entire 450-strong peacekeeping unit from the Mission multidimensionnelle intégrée des Na...

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