ORAN, Algeria — Algeria wants to lure more visitors to the cultural and scenic treasures of Africa’s largest country, shedding its status as a tourism backwater and expanding a sector outshone by competitors in neighboring Morocco and Tunisia.  

The giant north African country offers Roman and Islamic sites, beaches and mountains just an hour’s flight from Europe, and haunting Saharan landscapes, where visitors can sleep on dunes under the stars and ride camels with Tuareg nomads.  

But while tourist-friendly Morocco welcomed 14.5 million visitors in 2023, bigger, richer Algeria hosted just 3.3 million foreign tourists, according the tourism ministry.  

About 1.2 million of those holiday-makers were Algerians from the diaspora visiting families.  

The lack of travelers is testimony to Algeria’s neglect of a sector that remains one of world tourism’s undiscovered gems.  

As Algeria’s oil and gas revenues grew in the 1960s and 70s, successive governments lost interest in developing mass tourism. A descent into political strife in the 1990s pushed the country further off the beaten track.  

But while security is now much improved, Algeria needs to tackle an inflexible visa system and poor transport links, as well as grant privileges to local and foreign private investors to enable tourism to flourish, analysts say.  

Saliha Nacerbay, General Director of the National Tourism Office, outlined plans to attract 12 million tourists by 2030 – an ambitious fourfold increase.  

“To achieve this, we, as the tourism and traditional industry sector, are seeking to encourage investments, provide facilities to investors, build tourist and hotel facilities,” she said, speaking at the International Tourism and Travel Fair, hosted in Algiers from May 30 to June 2.  

Algeria has plans to build hotels and restructure and modernize existing ones. The tourism ministry said that about 2,000 tourism projects have been approved so far, 800 of which are currently under construction.  

The country is also restoring its historical sites, with 249 locations earmarked for tourism expansion. Approximately 70 sites have been prepared, and restoration plans are underway for 50 additional sites, officials said.  

French tourist Patrick Lebeau emphasized the need to improve infrastructure to fully realize Algeria’s tourism prospects.  

“Obviously, there is a lot of tourism potential, but much work still needs to be done to attract us,” Lebeau said.  

Tourism and travel provided 543,500 jobs in Algeria in 2021, according to the Statista website. In contrast, tourism professionals in Morocco estimate the sector provides 700,000 direct jobs in the kingdom, and many more jobs indirectly.
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YAOUNDE, CAMEROON — Chad’s female leaders and activists have strongly condemned what they say is their negligible representation in President Mahamat Idriss Deby’s first civilian government after a three-year transition from military rule. The women voiced their concerns during a meeting in Chad’s capital, N’djamena, on Monday.

Several dozen female activists and opposition members say they are upset with what they call Chadian President Mahamat Idriss Deby’s decision to exclude them from political issues in his first civilian government.

The women who met in N’djamena on Monday, said Deby should have rejected the government appointed by new Prime Minister Allamaye Halina last week.

Halina was appointed by Deby to replace Succes Masra, who resigned after his defeat in Chad’s May 6 presidential election. Masra was in office for four months.

Amina Tidjani Yaya is the coordinator of Voix De La Femme, or Women’s Voice, a nongovernmental organization that advocates for the respect of women’s rights and political participation.

She says female leaders and activists do not understand why Chad’s new prime minister, Allamaye Halina, decided to reduce the number of female ministers from 12 during Chad’s three-year transitional period to eight in the first civilian government he appointed May 27. Yaya says Chadian officials have not respected the resolution of the central African nations’ 2022 Inclusive and Sovereign National Dialogue, which states that more women should be appointed to government positions.

Chad’s new government has 35 ministers. Twenty-three served in the previous administration before Deby was declared the winner of Chad’s May 6 presidential election, ending three years of military transition, returning to constitutional order.

During his inauguration, Deby promised to involve opposition parties, youths and women in executing his immediate task, which he said is to reconcile differences among all Chadians and make the central African state a better place in which to live.

The female leaders and activists say increasing women’s political participation would have been synonymous with improving respect for human rights, justice, the rule of law, governance and democracy. They say women constitute the majority of Chad’s population and can have more influence than men in peacekeeping processes.

Female leaders say there have been tensions and conflicts involving armed groups who accused the new president of using the military to prolong his family’s rule. Deby’s family has had a firm grip on power since his father, Idriss Deby Ino, took over in a 1990 coup and died in April 2021 before the younger Deby took power.

The women say Deby should have involved more women in the current government because Chad is a signatory to the Maputo Protocol, a commitment by African nations through the African Union to ensure gender equality in political decision making.

Chad’s government has not responded to the women’s request for more representation in politics. But the central African state’s prime minister, after officially taking office on May 24, pleaded with all Chadians to resolve their differences and collaborate with the new government which he maintained will work for the well-being of all citizens.

Senoussi Hassana Abdoulaye, a jurist and lecturer at Chad’s university of Ndjamena, told state TV on Monday that Deby and his new civilian government cannot be officially held responsible for reducing the number of female ministers because no law in Chad imposes gender equity in political appointments.

He says all women in Chad should register and massively take part as candidates and voters in local council and parliamentary elections that President Mahamat Idriss Deby says will take place before December of this year. He says if women succeed in having a majority of seats in parliament, they can enact laws that compel government officials to respect political equality between men and women.

In February, female leaders and activists from Burkina Faso, Chad, Gabon, Guinea, Mali and Niger met in N’djamena and said they want to be involved in the highest decision-making circles of the African military governments involved with political transitions.

The meeting, which took place under the theme African Women in Transitional Governments, reiterated that women constitute a majority of civilians in the six states, bear the brunt of violence from military takeovers and are highly underrepresented in decision-making circles.

The women promised to make their participation in transitional governance a subject of discussion during important events like their countries’ national days and international events organized by the United Nations and African Union.
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Abuja, Nigeria — Nigerian unions began an indefinite strike on Monday, closing schools and public offices, impacting airports and shutting down the national power grid after talks with the government failed to agree a new minimum wage.  

The worst cost-of-living crisis in a generation in Africa’s most populous country has left many Nigerians struggling to afford food.   

The main Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) urged workers to down tools after the government refused to increase its minimum wage offer beyond 60,000 naira ($45) per month, according to local media.  

“Nigeria workers stay at home. Yes! To a living wage. No! To a starvation wage!” the unions said in a joint statement.  

Since coming to office a year ago, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has ended a fuel subsidy and currency controls, leading to a tripling of petrol prices and a spike in living costs as the naira has slid against the dollar.  

Tinubu has called for patience to allow the reforms to take effect, saying they will help attract foreign investment, but the measures have hit Nigerians hard.   

‘No work now’ 

Government buildings, petrol stations and courts in the capital Abuja were closed, AFP journalists saw, while the doors to the city’s airport were also shut and long queues formed outside.   

A source close to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) said domestic flights had been cancelled and the airport would be shut to all flights on Tuesday.   

AFP has contacted FAAN for comment.  

The unions are also protesting an electricity tariff hike.  

The labor union at the Transmission Company of Nigeria said it had shut down the national grid overnight. Blackouts were reported across the country.   

Security was stepped up with an increased presence of soldiers on the streets of Abuja.   

Outside the Federal Secretariat, which houses several ministries, picketing union members urged workers to return home.   

“Stay at home and stay safe. We don’t want to embarrass you. No work now,” they called.   

In Lagos, an AFP journalist saw the industrial court was padlocked shut and children walked back home after finding their schools were closed.  

In the northern city of Kano, government offices were shut and public schools closed. Children in one neighborhood chanted: “No school, it’s a free day!”   

The unions said in a statement on Friday: “Nigerian workers, who are the backbone of our nation’s economy, deserve fair and decent wages that reflect the current economic realities.”  

AFP has contacted the government for comment.  

Thousands of Nigerians rallied against soaring living costs in February, though previous strikes have had limited effect. 
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JOHANNESBURG — President Cyril Ramaphosa called Sunday for South Africa’s political parties to overcome their differences and find “common ground” to form the first national coalition government in its young democracy.

His comments came in a speech straight after final election results were announced confirming that no party won a majority in last week’s vote. Unprecedented coalition talks were set to start to find a way forward for Africa’s most industrialized economy.

Ramaphosa’s African National Congress party had already lost its 30-year majority after more than 99% of votes were counted by Saturday and showed it couldn’t surpass 50%. 

The ANC received 40% of the votes in last week’s election in the final count, the largest share. 

Without a majority it will need to agree on a coalition with another party or parties for the first time to co-govern and re-elect Ramaphosa for a second term. South Africa’s national elections decide how many seats each party gets in Parliament and lawmakers elect the president later.

“Our people have spoken,” Ramaphosa said. “Whether we like it or not, they have spoken. We have heard the voices of our people, and we must respect their choices and their wishes. … The people of South Africa expect their leaders to work together to meet their needs. This is a time for all of us to put South Africa first.”

The ANC was the party of Nelson Mandela and freed South Africa from the apartheid system of white minority rule in 1994. It had governed with a comfortable majority since then, but this election saw an unprecedented slump in its support as voters deserted the party due to its failure to solve widespread poverty, extremely high unemployment levels and problems with delivering basic government services to many in a nation of 62 million.

The ANC had said earlier Sunday that it was starting its negotiations with all major parties. More than 50 parties took part in the election, and at least eight had significant shares of the vote. At least 26 of them, including the MK Party led by former President Jacob Zuma, have lodged objections and complaints with the electoral body alleging voting irregularities, which it has promised to address. 

ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula said it was open to all negotiations, even with the main opposition Democratic Alliance, which has led the chorus of criticism of the ANC for years but is viewed by many analysts as the most stable coalition option for South Africa.

The DA won the second most votes with 21.8%, and the two parties would hold a majority together and be able to govern. DA leader John Steenhuisen said his party was also initiating talks with parties. The ANC won 159 seats in the 400-seat Parliament, down from the 230 it won in the last election. The DA increased slightly to 87 seats. 

There is some time pressure for coalition talks to progress and for the uncertainty to be minimized, given that the new Parliament needs to sit for the first time and elect a president within 14 days of the election results being declared. 

Ramaphosa is seeking a second and final term and Mbalula said his position as leader of the ANC was not in question despite the election result. Mbalula said the ANC would not consider the demands by Zuma’s MK Party that Ramaphosa step down as a condition for talks.

“No political party will dictate terms to us, the ANC. They will not … You come to us with that demand, forget (it),” Mbalula said.

He said the ANC would not be arrogant, though. “The elections have humbled us, they have brought us where we are,” he said.

South Africa is a leading voice for its continent and for the developing world on the global stage and is due to take over the presidency of the Group of 20 rich and developing nations late this year. It’s the only African nation in that group.

“Everyone is looking to see if South Africa can weather the storm and come out the other side,” political analyst Oscar van Heerden said on the eNCA news network. 

Amid many coalition options, the ANC could also join with MK and the far-left Economic Freedom Fighters, although they have been cast as partners that would make investors uneasy. Both have pledged to nationalize parts of South Africa’s economy, including its gold and platinum mines, among the world’s biggest producers.

The DA has long said it will not work with the EFF and MK, calling them a “doomsday coalition” for South Africa. Steenhuisen, the party’s leader, repeated that stance Sunday in a speech on national television but said his party was starting talks with others and would approach them “with cool heads and open minds.”

Political analyst van Heerden said an ANC-DA coalition would “possibly give stability” but there were some within the ANC who would oppose it. Other smaller parties could be involved to dilute it and make it more palatable for the ANC, some commentators said.

“The DA has approached the ANC as the enemy over many, many years,” van Heerden said. “The next few days is going to be a very difficult period. People will have to be mature behind closed doors.”
…

Johannesburg — The Electoral Commission of South Africa Sunday night announced official results that marked the start of a new era in the country’s politics. 

Official results from Wednesday’s historic election showed the governing African National Congress, ANC, had lost its absolute majority for the first time.

The ANC won 159 seats in the 400-member National Assembly — about 40% of the vote — a huge drop of 71 seats since winning 57% of the ballot in the last elections in 2019.

The chairman of the Electoral Commission, Mosotho Moepya, acknowledged the election had been fiercely contested.

“These elections were undoubtedly the most difficult and the most hotly contested,” he said.However, he added that they were free and fair and represented “the collective voice of the nation.”

While the ANC still received the largest number of seats by far, it will now have to enter a coalition with opposition parties.

The business-friendly Democratic Alliance, or DA, took the second-largest share of the vote, with 87 seats.

It was followed with 58 seats for uMkhonto we Sizwe, or MK, a newly formed party led by former President Jacob Zuma. The radical left, Economic Freedom Fighters party, overtaken by upstart MK, came in fourth, with 39 seats. Smaller parties took the remaining seats.

Analysts say corruption, high unemployment and general failure to do more to improve the lives of poor Black South Africans was why many South Africans turned on the ANC, 30 years after it brought about the end of apartheid.

After Sunday’s announcement, President Cyril Ramaphosa took to the podium to accept the results.

“Our people have spoken whether we like it or not …. Through their votes they have demonstrated clearly and plainly that our democracy is strong, that our democracy is robust, and it is enduring.”

Zuma’s MK said the day before the results announcement that it doesn’t accept the results and wants a recount. Zuma intimated violence could ensue if it didn’t get its way.

However, Defense Minister Thandi Modise told VOA at the results ceremony that she was not worried.

“Well, we have not necessarily taken extra measures…. We have begged all political parties to be calm…. We hope that there will not be any necessity for any of us in the security sector to come in and interfere,” she said.

The ANC now has 14 days in which to form a coalition government, so negotiations with the other parties will be getting underway.
…

Minibus taxis are everywhere in South Africa, and all of them run on gasoline. But engineers at one university are hoping to change that as they are getting better-than-expected results from their all-electric minibus taxi. Vicky Stark has the story from Cape Town, South Africa.
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Johannesburg — The final results of a tumultuous South African election are expected to be declared late Sunday, though what is already evident is that the governing party has lost its majority for the first time.

A former South African president once boasted that the African National Congress would rule “until Jesus comes back.”

There’s a joke now doing the rounds in South Africa that Jesus must have returned, given the bashing the party took in general elections this week.

In a seismic political shift, the ANC lost its parliamentary majority for the first time, getting just 40 percent of the vote.

It was a chastened ANC when the party’s secretary-general Fikile Mbalula made the first public remarks since the vote, acknowledging that there was “nothing to celebrate” but “It is the will of the people, and that is what we must accept.”

“The African National Congress commends the people of South Africa for once again demonstrating the strength and vibrancy of our democracy. The results send a clear message to the ANC. We wish to assure the people of South Africa that we have heard them, we have heard their concerns, their frustrations and their dissatisfaction,” Mbalula said.

Mbalula stressed that contrary to some reports the party would not be asking President Cyril Ramaphosa to step down. In terms of who the ANC might now go into coalition with, he said they were engaging with other parties, without specifying.

David Everatt, a professor at Johannesburg’s Wits School of Governance said he suspected “almost everything” was still on the table in terms of coalitions.

The party that got the second largest amount of votes, at over 21 percent, was the Democratic Alliance, or DA, which the business-minded would prefer to see in a coalition.

However, some in the ANC might balk at going into an alliance with them as they are seen as a “white” party, and prefer to go with a radical party like the Economic Freedom Fighters, he said.

“The political arithmetic is being recalibrated almost hourly…we’ll have final results by the end of today, being Sunday, and after that they have to horse-trade very quickly, because they don’t have very long before we have to form, or they have to form, a government,” he said.

One of the main upsets of the election was newly formed party uMkhonto weSizwe, or MK, led by former President Jacob Zuma. Coming in with around 14 percent of the votes, MK ate into some of the ANC’s support.

Ironically it was Zuma who made the comment about the ANC governing until Jesus returns.

Zuma, 82, has an axe to grind with the ANC, after it forced him to resign from the presidency in 2018 amid corruption scandals.

On Saturday, the former ANC stalwart-turned-disrupter called for a delay in the official declaration of results, alleging rigging and demanding a re-count. He provided no proof for this claim, and the election on Wednesday has been widely praised as free and fair.

However Zuma intimated there could be violence if the announcement of official results went ahead as planned, said Everatt.

“This is not a democrat, this is an autocrat who is threatening violence to try to get what he wants,” he said.

However the electoral commission said while they were dealing with challenges to the vote, the announcement would go ahead Sunday night at a conference center in Johannesburg.

President Ramaphosa has confirmed his attendance.
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ABUJA, Nigeria — Nigeria’s government is cracking down on illegal mining, making dozens of arrests of unlicensed miners since April for allegedly stealing the country’s lithium, a critical mineral used in batteries for electric vehicles, smartphones and power systems.

The recent arrests come as Nigeria seeks to regulate its mining operations of critical minerals, curb illegal activity and better benefit from its mineral resources. The clean energy transition, a shift away from coal, oil and gas and toward renewable energy and batteries has spiked global demand for lithium, tin and other minerals. Illegal mines are rife in the country’s fledging industry as corruption among regulatory officials is common and the mineral deposits are located in remote areas with minimal government presence. Officials say profits from illicit mining practices has helped arm militia groups in the north of the county.

In the most recent arrests in mid-May, a joint team of soldiers and police conducted a raid on a remote market in Kishi, in the country’s southwestern Oyo State. Locals said the market, once known for selling farm produce, has become a center for illicit trade in lithium mined in hard-to-reach areas. The three-day operation resulted in the arrest of 32 individuals, including two Chinese nationals, local workers and mineral traders, according to the state government and locals. Loads of lithium were also seized.

Jimoh Bioku, a Kishi community leader, said there had been “clandestine searches” for the mineral at remote sites tucked away in the bush in the past years by Chinese nationals before “they engaged people to dig for them and turned the market into a transit point.” The community was “particularly worried about the insecurity that usually follows illegal mining and that was why we reported to the state government,” he said.

China is the dominant player in the global EV supply chain, including in Nigeria where China-owned companies employ mostly vulnerable people leaving Nigeria’s far north — ravaged by conflicts and rapid desertification — to work in mining operations throughout the country. China’s nationals and companies are frequently in the spotlight for environmentally damaging practices, exploitative labor and illicit mining. There have been at least three cases of illegal mining arrests involving Chinese nationals in two months.

President Bola Tinubu has repeatedly blamed illegal mining for the worsening conflicts in the country’s north and asked the international community for help to stop the problem, which provides armed groups with the proceeds needed to sustain and arm themselves.

The Chinese Embassy in Abuja did not respond to an Associated Press request for comment on the arrests and claims of illegal operations. But in a statement last year following a report by The Times of London alleging Chinese miners were bribing militants for access, the embassy said it “always encouraged and urged the Chinese companies and nationals in Nigeria to abide by the laws and regulations of Nigeria.”

Nigeria is emerging as a new source of lithium in Africa as the world’s largest producers, like Australia and Chile, are unable to fulfill the growing demand worldwide. But illegal activities thrive in Nigeria’s extractive sector, denying the government due revenues, said Emeka Okoro, whose Lagos-based SBM Intelligence firm has researched illicit mining and terrorism financing in northern Nigeria.

And the combination of conflict and climate change effects, such as once fertile land rapidly turning into useless arid sand in northern Nigeria, has produced a cheap workforce for mining sites.

The arrests of “both Chinese nationals and young Hausa boys from conflict-affected regions underscore a troubling pattern,” Okoro told the AP. “The socioeconomic strain stemming from conflict and the repercussions of climate change has given rise to a vulnerable demographic desperate for survival.”

To fight resource theft that causes losses of $9 billion to the government annually, according to the country’s extractive industry transparency watchdog, the West African nation has set up a 2,200-strong “corps of mining marshals” earlier in the year.

While existing law enforcement agencies are still combating the problem, the new corps is geared at curbing “the nefarious activities of illegal miners,” said Segun Tomori, spokesperson for the solid minerals ministry.

Before the Kishi raid, the mining corps arrested two trucks laden with lithium on the outskirts of the capital Abuja in April. Later that month, the corps raided a location in Karu, Nasarawa State, near Abuja, leading to the arrest of four Chinese nationals and the seizure of tons of lithium. Tomori said the cases are now in court.

On April 22, a federal court in Ilorin, in the north-central region, convicted two Chinese nationals for illegal mining and sentenced them to a one-year jail term, although with an option of a fine.

Nigeria has long neglected the solid minerals sector, which allows some communities like the northern-central town of Jos — which is tin-abundant — to depend on subsistence mining for their livelihood.

For those communities where livelihood is tied to mining, Tomori said the government is encouraging artisanal miners there to form cooperatives and operate legally.
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ABUJA, Nigeria — Nigeria adopted a new national anthem Wednesday after lawmakers passed a law that replaced the current one with a version dropped nearly a half-century ago, sparking widespread criticism about how the law was hastily passed without much public input.

President Bola Tinubu’s assent to the law comes a day after it was approved by both chambers of Nigeria’s National Assembly, which is dominated by the governing party. The federal lawmakers introduced and passed the bill in less than a week, an unusually fast process for important bills that usually take weeks or months to be considered.

The Arise, O Compatriots anthem being replaced had been in use since 1978, when it was introduced by the military government. The anthem was composed at a time when the country was reeling from a deadly civil war and calls on Nigerians to “serve our fatherland with love and strength” and not to let “the labor of our heroes past (to be) in vain.”

The new version that takes immediate effect was first introduced in 1960 when Nigeria gained independence from Britain before it was dropped by the military. Titled Nigeria We Hail Thee, it was written by Lillian Jean Williams, a British expatriate who was living in Nigeria at the time.

The new anthem was played publicly for the first time at a legislative session attended by Tinubu, who marked his one year in office as president Wednesday.

Many Nigerians, however, took to social media to say they won’t be singing the new national anthem, among them Oby Ezekwesili, a former education minister and presidential aspirant who said that the new law shows that the country’s political class doesn’t care about the public interest.

“In a 21st Century Nigeria, the country’s political class found a colonial National Anthem that has pejorative words like “Native Land” and “Tribes” to be admirable enough to foist on our Citizens without their consent,” Ezekwesili posted on X.

Supporters of the new anthem, however, argued it was wrong for the country to have adopted an anthem introduced by the military.

“Anthems are ideological recitations that help the people to be more focused. It was a very sad development for the military to have changed the anthem,” public affairs analyst Frank Tietie said.
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TAN TAN, Morocco — High-ranking military officials from the U.S. and its top African allies watched intently as dust and flames shot up from pieces of the Sahara Desert hit by tank and artillery fire. They looked up as pilots flew F-16s into formation. And they listened intently as Moroccan and American personnel explained how they would set up beachheads to defend the Atlantic coastline in the event of a potential invasion. 

The practice scenario was among those discussed during Africa Lion, the United States’ largest annual joint military exercise on the continent, which concluded Friday in Morocco. 

Over the past two weeks, roughly 8,100 military forces from nearly three dozen countries maneuvered throughout Tunisia, Ghana, Senegal and Morocco as part of the war games held this year as militaries confront new challenges in increasingly volatile regions. 

Generals from the United States and Morocco, which hosted the finale of the two-week event, celebrated Africa Lion’s 20-year anniversary and how partnerships between the U.S. and African militaries have expanded since it began. 

“This exercise has grown over the years since 2004, not only have the number of multinational service members that we train with, but also the scope of the training as well, which has expanded to more than just security,” said General Michael Langley, the head of the United States’ Africa Command. 

But despite the spectacle of live-fire demonstrations and laudatory remarks about partnerships by Langley and Colonel Major Fouad Gourani of Morocco’s Royal Armed Forces, parts of Africa are getting much more dangerous. 

The United Nations earlier this year called Africa a “global epicenter for terrorism.” Fatalities linked to extremist groups have risen dramatically in the Sahel, the region that stretches from Mauritania to Chad. 

Since 2020, military officers disillusioned with their governments’ records of stemming violence have overthrown democratically elected governments in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger and began distancing themselves from Western powers. 

From 2021 to 2024, militants killed more than 17,000 people across the three countries, according to data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project. 

The United States is holding steadfast to its strategy of coupling weapons assistance and intelligence sharing with initiatives designed to boost civilian populations and strengthen institutions. 

But it faces new competition. Decades after the end of colonialism, Africa has once again become absorbed in fighting among Great Powers, with Western influence waning and countries accepting more economic and military support from Chinese firms and Russian contractors. 

At Africa Lion, the U.S. military showcased part of what it offers countries facing instability inside and just beyond their borders. Besides tanks and bombers, the joint exercises included operations and practice in field hospitals, medical evacuations and humanitarian assistance. 

The exercise emphasized a “whole of government” approach to addressing the root causes of instability, ranging from climate change to displacement, rather than solely focusing on military might. 

“It’s important that we not only be associated with kicking down doors,” said Colonel Kelly Togiola, a command surgeon who helped set up a field hospital alongside Moroccan doctors as part of the exercise. “In times of crises, those relationships that matter.” 

That strategy differs from what’s being offered by Africa Corps, the descendent of the Russian state-funded private military company Wagner, whose leader Yevgeny Prigozhin died last year. Yet it’s come under scrutiny since military officers with a history of participating in training exercises have risen to positions of power after the ousters of democratically elected leaders in countries such as Guinea and Niger. 

Cameron Hudson, an Africa expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said regardless of how much the U.S. military broadens its efforts, its continued focus on counterterrorism will keep empowering military leaders throughout West Africa. 

“The nature of security assistance is that it’s much more visible, impactful and manipulated by the recipient for ill,” Hudson said. “When we come in with training and toys, we reinforce within societies these power dynamics that in the long run are not helpful to the consolidation of civilian democratic rule.” 

Despite training exercises like Africa Lion, U.S. military leaders face difficulties prolonging their partnerships in places they’ve long characterized as strategically critical. Countries such as Niger and Chad — which participated in Africa Lion — have embraced Russian trainers and paramilitaries and pushed for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. 

The U.S. military officials note their assessment of the threat of “malign” Russian and Chinese influence but say they can work in countries that accept assistance from geopolitical rivals. 

Curbing Russian influence while opposing the overthrow of democratically elected leaders hasn’t worked everywhere, especially as the U.S. military often attaches strings to how countries can implement training and weapons provided. 

U.S. law makes governments deposed in military coups ineligible for large portions of assistance, despite the military’s talk of equal partnership and noninterference. 
…

JOHANNESBURG — The African National Congress party lost its parliamentary majority in a historic election result Saturday that puts South Africa on a new political path for the first time since the end of the apartheid system of white minority rule 30 years ago.

With more than 99% of votes counted, the once-dominant ANC had received just over 40% in Wednesday’s election, well short of the majority it had held since the famed all-race vote of 1994 that ended apartheid and brought it to power under Nelson Mandela. The final results are still to be formally declared by the independent electoral commission that ran the election, but the ANC cannot pass 50%.

At the start of the election, the commission said it would formally declare the results by Sunday, but that could come earlier.

While opposition parties have hailed the result as a momentous breakthrough for a country struggling with deep poverty and inequality, the ANC remained the biggest party by some way. However, it will now likely need to look for a coalition partner or partners to remain in the government and reelect President Cyril Ramaphosa for a second and final term. Parliament elects the South African president after national elections.

“The way to rescue South Africa is to break the ANC’s majority, and we have done that,” said main opposition leader John Steenhuisen.

The way forward promises to be complicated for Africa’s most advanced economy, and there’s no coalition on the table yet.

Steenhuisen’s Democratic Alliance party was at around 21% of the vote. The new MK Party of former President Jacob Zuma, who has turned against the ANC he once led, was third with just over 14% of the vote in the first election it has contested. The Economic Freedom Fighters was in fourth with just over 9%.

More than 50 parties contested the election, many of them with tiny shares of the vote, but the DA and MK appear to be the most obvious for the ANC to approach, given how far it is from a majority. Which coalition the ANC pursues is the urgent focus now, given Parliament needs to sit and elect a president within 14 days of the final election results being officially declared. Negotiations are set to take place, and they will likely be complicated.

Steenhuisen has said his centrist party is open to discussions. The MK Party said one of their conditions for any agreement was that Ramaphosa is removed as ANC leader and president. That underlined the fierce political battle between Zuma, who resigned as South African president under a cloud of corruption allegations in 2018, and Ramaphosa, who replaced him.

“We are willing to negotiate with the ANC, but not the ANC of Cyril Ramaphosa,” MK Party spokesperson Nhlamulo Ndlela said.

MK and the far-left Economic Freedom Fighters have called for parts of the economy to be nationalized. The Democratic Alliance is viewed as a business-friendly party, and analysts say an ANC-DA coalition would be more welcomed by foreign investors, although there are questions over whether it is politically viable considering the DA has been the most critical opposition party for years.

An ANC-DA coalition “would be a marriage of two drunk people in Las Vegas. It will never work,” Gayton McKenzie, the leader of the smaller Patriotic Alliance party, told South African media.

Despite the uncertainty, South African opposition parties were hailing the new political picture as a much-needed change for the country of 62 million, which is Africa’s most developed but also one of the most unequal in the world.

South Africa has widespread poverty and extremely high levels of unemployment, and the ANC has struggled to raise the standard of living for millions. The official unemployment rate is 32%, one of the highest in the world, and the poverty disproportionately affects Black people, who make up 80% of the population and have been the core of the ANC’s support for years.

The ANC has also been blamed — and now punished by voters — for a failure in basic government services that affects millions and leaves many without water, electricity or proper housing.

Nearly 28 million South Africans were registered to vote, and turnout is expected to be about 60%, according to figures from the independent electoral commission.
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DAKAR, Senegal — Billons of dollars in gold is smuggled out of Africa each year and most of it ends up in the United Arab Emirates, where it is refined and sold to customers around the world, according to a report published Thursday.

Over $30 billion worth of gold, or more than 435 metric tons, was smuggled out of the continent in 2022, according to the report published by Swissaid, an aid and development group based in Switzerland. The main destinations for African gold were the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and Switzerland.

The authors of the report said their goal was to make the trade in African gold more transparent and put pressure on industry players to do more to make gold supplies traceable and supply chains more responsible.

“We hope that this will improve the living conditions of local populations and the working conditions of artisanal miners throughout Africa,” Yvan Schulz, one of the report’s authors, told The Associated Press.

The report found that between 32% and 41% of gold produced in Africa was not declared. In 2022, Ghana was the largest gold producer in Africa, followed by Mali and South Africa, it said.

The UAE was by far the main destination for smuggled gold, the report said, with some 405 metric tons of undeclared output from Africa ending up there. During a 10-year period between 2012-22, that amount summed up to 2,569 metric tons of gold, worth around $115 billion. The report said the gap between UAE imports and exports from African countries has widened over the years, meaning that the amount of gold smuggled out of Africa appears to have increased over the past decade. For example, it widened from 234 metric tons in 2020 to 405 in 2022.

Switzerland, another main buyer of African gold, imported some 21 metric tons of undeclared gold from Africa in 2022, the report said. The real figure could be much higher if African gold imported through third countries was taken into consideration, the report said, but once gold is refined, it is virtually impossible to follow its flow to it final destination.

The United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database, which contains detailed imports and exports statistics, shows that Switzerland is the main buyer of gold from the UAE. “Sourcing gold from the UAE is notoriously risky,” the report said, describing the difficulty in ascertaining the origins of the refined gold.

A official within the UAE government’s media office said the country has taken significant steps to address concerns around gold smuggling and the risks it poses. The continued growth of the UAE’s gold market reflected the confidence of the international community in its processes, the official said, responding on behalf of the country’s press office without providing further identification.

“The UAE remains steadfast in its efforts to combat gold smuggling and ensure the highest standards of transparency and accountability within the gold and precious metals sector,” the official said.

The Swiss government said it was aware of the challenges identifying the origins of gold and that it had introduced measures to prevent illegal flows.

“Switzerland is and stays committed to improve the traceability of commodity flows, the transparency of statistics and the quality of controls,” Fabian Maienfisch, spokesperson for Switzerland’s State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, said.

The report compared export data from African countries with import data from non-African countries, along with other calculations, to extrapolate the data. Among its recommendations, it called on African states to take steps to formalize artisanal and small-scale mining and reinforce border controls. It also called on non-African states to publish the identity of the countries of origin and the countries of dispatch of imported gold, and to work with authorities to identify illicit gold flows.
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KAMPALA, Uganda — Uganda has rolled out a nationwide yellow fever vaccination campaign to help safeguard its population against the mosquito-borne disease that has long posed a threat.

By the end of April, Ugandan authorities had vaccinated 12.2 million of the 14 million people targeted, said Dr. Michael Baganizi, an official in charge of immunization at the health ministry.

Uganda will now require everyone traveling to and from the country to have a yellow fever vaccination card as an international health regulation, Baganizi said.

Ugandan authorities hope the requirement will compel more people to get the yellow fever shot amid a general atmosphere of vaccine hesitancy that worries health care providers in the East African nation.

The single-dose vaccine has been offered free of charge to Ugandans between the ages of 1 and 60. Vaccination centers in the capital, Kampala, and elsewhere included schools, universities, hospitals and local government units.

Before this, Ugandans usually paid to get the yellow fever shot at private clinics, for the equivalent of $27.

Uganda, with 45 million people, is one of 27 countries on the African continent classified as at high risk for yellow fever outbreaks. According to the World Health Organization, there are about 200,000 cases and 30,000 deaths globally each year from the disease.

Uganda’s most recent outbreak was reported earlier this year in the central districts of Buikwe and Buvuma.

Yellow fever is caused by a virus transmitted by the bite of infected mosquitoes. The majority of infections are asymptomatic. Symptoms can include fever, muscle pain, headache, loss of appetite and nausea or vomiting, according to the WHO.

Uganda’s vaccination initiative is part of a global strategy launched in 2017 by the WHO and partners such as the U.N. children’s agency to eliminate yellow fever by 2026. The goal is to protect almost 1  billion people in Africa and the Americas.

A midterm evaluation of that strategy, whose results were published last year, found that 185 million people in high-risk African countries had been vaccinated by August 2022.

In Uganda, most people get the yellow fever shot when they are traveling to countries such as South Africa that demand proof of vaccination on arrival.

James Odite, a nurse working at a private hospital which has been designated as a vaccination center in a suburb of the capital, Kampala, told the AP that hundreds of doses remained unused after the yellow fever vaccination campaign closed. They will be used in a future mass campaign.

Among the issues raised by vaccine-hesitant people was the question of whether “the government wants to give them expired vaccines,” Odite said.

Baganizi, the immunization official, said Uganda’s government has invested in community “sensitization” sessions during which officials tell people that vaccines save lives.
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ABUJA — Armed men killed at least six civilians and five soldiers in an attack in Nigeria’s southeastern Abia state, the military said Friday, prompting the state government to offer a $16,850 reward for information on the gunmen. 

The attack on Thursday was the latest in a string of raids in a region rife with separatist violence. 

The assailants killed five soldiers deployed as peacekeepers in the area, and the six civilians who died were caught in the crossfire, defense spokesperson Major-General Edward Buba said. 

No group claimed responsibility, but the army blamed the outlawed separatist Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) movement, which wants the surrounding region to secede from Nigeria. 

The attack was at a military checkpoint at Obikabia junction in Obingwa local government area, Buba said in a statement.  

“The military will be fierce in its response. We will bring overwhelming military pressure on the group to ensure their total defeat,” he said. 

Abia information commissioner Prince Okey Kanu urged the military to show restraint in their response. 

The military has previously been accused by rights groups of using excessive force and targeting innocent civilians when responding to similar attacks, charges it denies.  

The unrest in the southeast has put pressure on a government and military already struggling to contain attacks and kidnappings in the northwest, a 15-year-old Islamist insurgency in the northeast, and sectarian and herder-farmer clashes in central regions. 

IPOB campaigns for the secession of southeastern Nigeria, where the majority belong to the Igbo group. 

The movement’s leader — Nnamdi Kanu, a British citizen arrested in Kenya in 2021 — is now on trial in Nigeria on terrorism charges. 

More than a million people died, mostly from starvation, during a three-year civil war in the late 1960s when the region attempted to secede under the name of the Republic of Biafra.
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Abuja, Nigeria — Nigerian President Bola Tinubu responded to criticism Thursday over a law he signed this week that changed the country’s national anthem back to the old song adopted when Nigeria achieved independence in 1960.

Critics say the president’s priorities are mixed up and he is being insensitive to the plight of people dealing with inflation and insecurity.

Human rights activist Deji Adeyanju said, “His government is not serious. They do not understand the times that we’re facing. Our greatest challenge now [is] economic issues. He has one of the worst economic teams. That should’ve been the primary responsibility and concern of the government, but instead they’re spending precious time talking about the old national anthem. How does that solve inflation problems?”

The old — and now current — national anthem, “Nigeria, We Hail Thee,” was written in 1960 by British expatriate Lillian Jean Williams and adopted as Nigeria’s anthem when the country won independence that year.

It was replaced in 1978 by “Arise O Compatriots,” which was written by a group of Nigerians in the aftermath of a brutal civil war.

The bill to restore the old anthem was introduced in parliament and passed within one week — exceptionally fast-paced for Nigeria, where most bills take several months to be considered.

Tinubu, in Abuja’s presidential village, said the old anthem represented the beauty of Nigeria’s diversity. He also teased critics who object to the old anthem being written by a British expatriate, saying it was Britain who named the country Nigeria, yet the country’s identity remains.

Nassarawa state resident Oliver Ugwu said reintroducing the old national anthem without public consultation was a questionable decision.

“A greater percentage of the masses are saying there’s no need of going back,” he said. “We have already gotten our independence, so [what] we want now is to move forward for more development.”

Another resident, Lukeman Ademola, said the national anthem law is a diversion from the country’s struggling economy.

“What do we need national anthem for; what is the national anthem doing in our lives; how does it even help the masses?” Ademola said. “Look at people suffering; the prices of commodities, the prices of goods and services are just going higher. They’re using fuel as a means of taking these things higher, and even if the fuel comes down, the prices still remain like that. How is this going to help us?”

Tinubu has faced a turbulent first year in office marked by widespread criticism and protests against his economic reforms, most prominently his scrapping of fuel subsidies that had kept prices more affordable for Nigerians.
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ACCRA, Ghana — Meet Ace-Liam Ankrah, a Ghana toddler who has set the record as the world’s youngest male artist.

His mother, Chantelle Kukua Eghan, says it all started by accident when her son, who at the time was 6 months old, discovered her acrylic paints.

Eghan, an artist and founder of Arts and Cocktails Studio, a bar that that offers painting lessons in Ghana’s capital, Accra, said she was looking for a way to keep her son busy while working on her own paintings.

“I spread out a canvas on the floor and added paint to it, and then in the process of crawling he ended up spreading all the colors on the canvas,” she said.

And that’s how his first artwork, “The Crawl,” was born, Eghan, 25, told The Associated Press.

After that and with his mother’s prodding, Ace-Liam kept on painting.

Eghan decided to apply for the record last June. In November, Guinness World Records told her that to break a previous record, her son needed to exhibit and sell paintings.

She arranged for Ace-Liam’s first exhibition at the Museum of Science and Technology in Accra in January, where nine out of 10 of his pieces listed were sold. She declined to say for how much the paintings sold.

They were on their way.

Then, Guinness World Records confirmed the record in a statement and last week declared that “at the age of 1 year 152 days, little Ace-Liam Nana Sam Ankrah from Ghana is the world’s youngest male artist.”

Guinness World Records did not immediately respond to an Associated Press query about the previous youngest male artist record holder.

The overall record for the world’s youngest artist is currently held by India’s Arushi Bhatnagar. She had her first exhibition at the age of 11 months and sold her first painting for 5,000 rupees ($60) in 2003.

These days, Ace-Liam, who will be 2 years old in July, still loves painting and eagerly accompanies his mom to her studio, where a corner has been set off just for him. He sometimes paints in just five-minute sessions, returning to the same canvas over days of weeks, Eghan says.

On a recent day, he ran excitedly around the studio, with bursts of energy typical for boys his age. But he was also very focused and concentrated for almost an hour while painting — choosing green, yellow and blue for his latest work-in-progress and rubbing the oil colors into the canvas with his tiny fingers.

Eghan says becoming a world record holder has not changed their lives. She won’t sell “The Crawl” but plans on keeping it in the family.

She added that she hopes the media attention around her boy could encourage and inspire other parents to discover and nurture their children’s talents.

“He is painting and growing and playing in the whole process,” she says.
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Nigeria is experiencing its worst economic crisis in a generation, leading to widespread hardship and anger. Some Nigerians are demanding a reversal of government policies one year after authorities embarked on bold but unpopular economic reforms. President Bola Tinubu has so far refused to change course, insisting his reforms will improve Nigeria’s ailing economy. Timothy Obiezu reports from Abuja.
Camera: Timothy Obiezu
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JOHANNESBURG — Partial results in South Africa’s national election put the long-ruling African National Congress party at well below 50% of the vote as counting continued Thursday, and it could be on the brink of losing its majority for the first time since sweeping to power under Nelson Mandela at the end of apartheid in 1994.

That would be a momentous change for South Africa, where the ANC has been dominant for all 30 years of its young democracy and the only governing party many have known.

The ANC had the most votes and was well ahead in the early results, as expected. But if it fails to secure a majority, it may have to form a coalition to remain in the government — something that has not happened before in post-apartheid South Africa. Without a majority, the ANC would also need help from other parties to reelect President Cyril Ramaphosa for a second term.

“I think we are seeing a massive change in South African politics,” Susan Booysen, a political analyst and professor emeritus at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, said on national broadcaster SABC TV.

It was still only an early picture after Wednesday’s election. The final results were expected to take days, with the independent electoral commission saying they would be delivered by Sunday, although they could come earlier.

The ANC’s worst performance in a national election is the 57.5% it won in the last one in 2019. A projection from a government agency and SABC, based on early vote returns, estimated that the ANC would end up with about 42% this time, a drop of more than 15%, which would be a stunning result in the context of South Africa.

South Africa may be the continent’s most advanced country, but it has struggled to solve a profuse inequality that has kept millions in poverty decades after the segregation of apartheid ended. That inequality and widespread poverty disproportionately affects the Black majority that make up more than 80% of the country’s population. South Africa has one of the worst unemployment rates in the world at 32%.

Voters repeatedly referred to unemployment as well as other issues like ANC corruption scandals, problems with basic government services and high violent crime as their main grievances.
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Lusaka, Zambia  — Police in Zambia have arrested five people on espionage charges following their earlier allegations via social media that the government was involved in the apparent abduction of independent lawmaker Jay Jay Banda last week.

Police spokesperson Danny Mwale confirmed to journalists in Lusaka on Thursday the arrests of opposition lawmakers Munir Zulu and Maureen Mubonga, opposition activist Brebner Changala, and opposition party chiefs Edith Nawakwi and Danny Pule.

All suspects earlier this week were charged with spreading hate speech related to last weekend’s alleged abduction of Banda, who has since resurfaced. Mwale further said that police charged Zulu, Mubonga and Pule with proposing a tribal war.

In Zambia, espionage charges carry up to a maximum 25 years in prison upon conviction while hate speech charges carry a punishment of up to $6,000 in fines and two years in prison.

Makebi Zulu, a lawyer representing some of the suspects, all of whom are awaiting court appearances in police custody, called the charges “unacceptable” and demanded immediate courtroom hearings.

Political analyst Boniface Cheembe at the University of Zambia has urged political leaders from both the ruling United Party for National Development and the opposition to focus on improving the lives of ordinary Zambians.

“We need to do more as a country,” Cheembe said, “Our citizens need to demand more from their political leaders to focus on issues” such as economic difficulties, infrastructure needs and provision of services.

Earlier this week, President Hakainde Hichilema warned that anyone promoting hate speech and tribalism to disturb social peace would face the full force of the law.

Thursday’s arrests came barely a week after opposition Patriotic Front Secretary General Raphael Nakachinda was sentenced to 18 months of hard labor for violating a now-defunct presidential defamation law, stemming from his December 2021 allegations that Hichilema had coerced and intimidated Zambian judges into politically favorable rulings.

Human Rights Watch said Nakachinda’s sentencing has had a broad chilling effect on the right to freedom of expression in Zambia.
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Nairobi, Kenya — A Kenyan parliamentary committee is visiting central Kenya to hear from locals about the conduct of a British Army training unit that is accused of human rights violations, including the unresolved death of a woman more than ten years ago. The Kenya National Human Rights Commission prompted the inquiry by petitioning parliament to hold the British army accountable for alleged human rights abuses.

Kenya’s Parliamentary Committee on Defense and Foreign Affairs is visiting Laikipia and Samburu counties. They’re there to hear people’s complaints and look into reported abuses by the British army in the area.

The committee, which started its inquiry on Tuesday, listened to families who blame the deaths of their relatives on unattended explosives around British training camps.

The lawmakers also heard complaints of abuses at the hands of British officers, including mistreatment, torture, and unlawful detention and killings. 

The committee chair, Nelson Koech, outlines explains some of the other complaints they heard from Laikipia and Samburu residents.

“We’ve listened to people from different areas, to Lolldaiga Hills, where it’s believed that officers from British Army lit fire, were burning vegetation and an entire conservancy, and driving animals out of the conservancy to where the human population is because many people have been maimed or killed by animals that now are under distress because of the training that is happening in those grounds, to many other allegations of water becoming heavily polluted. People are now starting to get effects from the fire and having chest problems,” Koech said.

In March 2021, a British training exercise caused a fire in the Lolldaiga Conservancy that lasted for several days. 

Local activist James Mwangi wondered why the British army was allowed to train in water catchment areas with dangerous weapons. 

“Lolldaiga supports so many water streams. Why are they allowing the army to train with chemical and poisonous weapons that they don’t know how to use,” Mwangi said.

The inquiry was prompted by a petition to the parliament from the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR).

Kenya has a defense cooperation agreement with the British government that allows up to 10,000 soldiers per year to conduct exercises in the East African nation.

According to the Kenyan government, the presence of the British Army Training Unit in Kenya, or BATUK, provided 3,000 people with jobs and contributed $45 million to the economies of Isiolo, Laikipia, and Samburu.

Koech says the parliamentarians will listen to all those who allegedly suffered from British Army activities and other government agencies to verify any abuses and human rights violations. 

“You must remember this is one side of the story we have listened to. We will be visiting BATUK, and we will be going there personally to get information from the British army. This inquiry is important to mention that in an inquiry of this nature, the verdict of this inquiry is equivalent to the verdict of a high court of Kenya,” Koech said.

A spokesperson for the British High Commission in Kenya told the French news agency AFP that they intend to cooperate with the inquiry. 

In 2012, Agnes Wanjiru was killed, allegedly by a British soldier. An investigation did not begin until 2019 and the findings of that probe were never made public. 

In 2021, the Sunday Times reported that a British officer confessed to killing a 21-year-old in central Kenya to a colleague. Afterward, Kenyan police said they were reopening the inquiry.  Wanjiru’s family told the parliamentary committee to take her killing seriously and remove obstacles that may stop the prosecution of the British soldier. 

The killing of Wanjiru has led to tensions between Kenya and Britain regarding the jurisdiction of British soldiers who commit crimes in Kenya.  The committee found that while some victims received compensation, it was usually less than what they were promised. 

The committee will present its findings to the full parliament and also closely examine the Kenya’s defense cooperation agreement with the British government.  
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NAIROBI, KENY — Africa has what it takes to transform and grow its economy but faces rigid barriers, including a sometimes unfriendly global financial architecture, say leaders who gathered in Nairobi this week for the African Development Bank’s annual summit. 

While the continent’s average GDP growth is estimated to have slowed in 2023, African economies remain resilient, Africa Development Bank President Akinwumi Adesina said at the meeting.  

“The African Development Bank projects that Africa’s real GDP growth will rise from 3.1 percent in 2023 to 3.7 percent in 2024 and 4.3 percent in 2025. Importantly, more than half — that is 31 countries — achieved higher GDP growth rates in 2023 than in 2022,” Adesina said. 

GDP, or gross domestic product, is used to measure the economic health of a country. 

As Africa’s bank, the AFDB — which turns 60 this year — has the responsibility to mobilize financing to develop the continent, said Adesina, the former Nigerian agriculture minister. 

That work is done, he added, against the backdrop of major global challenges including “heightened geopolitical tensions, the disruption of global value chains, rising food and energy crisis, increasing debt service payments and, of course, the devastating effects of climate change … from droughts to floods, cyclones to unpredictable weather patterns, the loss of lives and poverty. And enormous fiscal cost to countries.”  

Heavy rains and flash floods recently killed hundreds and displaced thousands across East Africa, where the U.N. estimates that 1.6 million people were affected. 

In Kenya, the rains killed more than 280 people, displaced about 53,000, and destroyed thousands of crops.  

Kenya’s President William Ruto was among those who attended the summit, along with leaders and officials from Zimbabwe, Somalia, Namibia, Rwanda, Congo-Brazzaville, Libya and others.  

Ruto said with the world’s 10 fastest growing economies being in Africa, the continent has what it takes to succeed, but it faces the rigid barrier of the global financial architecture that is misaligned with the continent’s aspirations. 

“We routinely borrow from international markets at rates far above those paid by the rest of the world, often up to 8 or 10 times more,” he said. 

Ruto, Adesina and other leaders called for a reform of the global financial architecture to mobilize even more financial resources they say are needed to accelerate Africa’s growth and development.  

“The debt problem faced by many countries, which consume the largest share of national resources and starve [the] development agenda, we are a direct result of [this] unjust financial architecture,” Ruto said. “This situation not only makes debt unsustainable but also undermines growth, prevents countries from investing in resilience.” 

That sentiment was echoed by African Union Commission Chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat, who said the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which tested economies worldwide and especially in Africa, is still being felt. 

He said that all of the African Union’s member states have been caught in the spiral of an ever-pernicious debt which keeps them under the control of lenders with suffocating demands, despite numerous promises to alleviate this burden. 

An economic outlook published during the summit by the bank lays out a mixture of policies that are needed to address some of the continent’s challenges. These include promoting local production and diversifying import sources to address rising food prices, and helping reform the current global financial architecture to help with debt restructuring.
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MIDRAND — The African National Congress appeared on course to lose the parliamentary majority it has held for 30 years, partial results from South Africa’s national election showed, in what would be the most dramatic political shift since the end of apartheid.

With results in from 16% of polling stations, the ANC’s share of the vote in Wednesday’s election stood at 42.6%, with the pro-business Democratic Alliance (DA) on 25.8% and the Marxist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) on 8.5%, data from the electoral commission showed.

If the final results were to resemble the early picture, the ANC would be forced to make a deal with one or more other parties to govern – a situation that could lead to unprecedented political volatility in the coming weeks or months.

“There will be checks and balances on the ANC power, but the ultimate risk is that the infighting could make governance ineffective,” said Simon Harvey, head of foreign exchange analysis at Monex Europe.

He added that the speed at which a coalition could be formed would be an indication of what was to come.

“If it is protracted, you may start to worry about a political gridlock going forward,” he said.

The uncertainty weighed on South African markets.

The rand slipped more than 1% against the U.S. dollar to hit its weakest level in four weeks while the wider equity index dropped more than 2% in its worst day in six weeks and the country’s international bonds lost as much as 1 cent in the dollar.

The ANC has won national elections held every five years since the landmark 1994 election, which marked the end of apartheid and the ascent of Nelson Mandela as president.

But since those heady days the ANC’s support has declined because of disillusionment over issues such as high unemployment and crime, frequent power blackouts and corruption.

Based on the early results, the ANC is projected to have roughly 42% of the vote when the count is over, according to the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research which was providing projections to the state broadcaster SABC.

In the previous election in 2019, the ANC won 57.5% of the vote, with 20.8% for the DA and 10.8% for the EFF, on a turnout of 66% of registered voters, which the commission has already said is likely to be higher this time.

The Zuma factor

Under South Africa’s constitution, the newly elected National Assembly will elect the next president.

With the ANC still on course to be the largest party, its leader Cyril Ramaphosa is likely to remain as the country’s president, although a poor showing could make him vulnerable to a leadership challenge from within party ranks.

The early results showed the ANC on 38%, the DA on 27.8%% and the EFF on 10.9% in the key province of Gauteng, which includes the country’s business capital Johannesburg and the sprawling townships of Soweto and Alexandra.

In KwaZulu-Natal, a populous eastern province where the major city of Durban is located, a new party led by former president Jacob Zuma, uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), was performing strongly, with 42.7% of the vote versus 21.4% for the ANC.

Zuma was forced to quit as president in 2018 after a string of scandals and has since fallen out with the ANC leadership, leading him to throw his weight behind MK. The party, named after the ANC’s armed wing from the apartheid era, appeared to be costing both the ANC and the EFF votes, especially in KwaZulu-Natal.

By law, the electoral commission has seven days to declare full results, but in practice it is usually faster than that. In the last election, in 2019, voting took place on a Wednesday like this year and final results came on the Saturday. The new parliament must convene within 14 days of final results being declared and its first act must be to elect the nation’s president.

This means that if the ANC is confirmed to have lost its majority there could be two weeks of intense and complex negotiations to agree on how to form a new government.
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