Category archives for: Commentary

China’s interests in Africa are being shaped by the race for renewable energy

LAUREN JOHNSTON China-Africa relations have deepened over the past two decades, characterized by increased economic cooperation, investment and infrastructure development. China is now Africa’s largest trading partner, with partnerships focused on building roads, railways and energy projects. As the ninth Forum on China–Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) kicked off earlier this month in Beijing, a new, green […]

Yes, there is famine in Sudan. So why isn’t ‘famine’ being declared?

FATMA TANIS Is there famine in Sudan? Last month a group of United Nations-backed experts looked at the data and concluded the answer is yes. But no official declaration of famine has been made. As it turns out, making such a pronouncement comes with its own set of rules and regulations. So … what constitutes […]

How can South Africa form a unity government from wildly different visions?

Talks to forge South Africa’s post-election unity government will need to bring together parties with goals as contradictory as seizing white-owned farms and mines, ditching Black empowerment policies and tearing up the constitution. How well the African National Congress (ANC) harmonizes these divergent and mutually hostile visions will determine the government’s stability, its ability to […]

In a historic election, South Africa’s ANC loses majority for the first time

EMMANUEL AKINWOTU & KATE BARTLETT South Africa’s ruling African National Congress party has lost its outright majority for the first time in a devastating blow for the party once led by Nelson Mandela. The ANC has dominated South African politics since winning in the first post-apartheid elections 30 years ago. The ANC was braced for […]

Chinese fishing fleets in Indian Ocean accused of abuses

YUCHEN LI & CHIA-CHUN YEH A recent investigation has revealed evidence that China’s distant-water fishing fleet, the world’s biggest in scale, commits environmental and labor abuses in the southwest Indian Ocean off the coast of East Africa. “There was no such word as ‘rest’ on Chinese fishing vessels,” explained a former crew member to a […]

Industrial Policy, East or West, for Development or War?

JOMO KWAME SUNDARAM       Developing countries wanting to pursue industrial policy were severely reprimanded by advocates of the ‘neoliberal’ Washington Consensus. Now, it is being deployed as a weapon in the new Cold War. Industrial policy vs colonialism Industrial policy is often seen as pioneered by Friedrich List. But List was inspired by George Washington’s first […]

New Grammy category for African music ignores almost all of Africa

IAN BRENNAN The 2024 Grammy awards will see the introduction of a new category: “best African music performance.” When the category was announced last year, Grammys CEO Harvey Mason Jr. stated that it would be “able to acknowledge and appreciate a broader array of artists” than the two existing global Grammy categories, where African artists […]

‘They’re targeting us’: Sudan’s army cracks down on democracy activists

In the midst of war, Sudan’s army is retaliating against activists for their role in bringing down the former regime. When the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces captured Sudan’s second-largest city, Wad Madani, tens of thousands of people fled and sought safety in regions still under the army’s control. Mohamad Osman* was among them, but military […]

With ECOWAS, not all dictators are equal

LASISI OLAGUNJU The Jerusalem Post is arguably Israel’s most-read English news website and best-selling English newspaper. On Wednesday, August 9 it published an interesting report of what it described as a “nature drama” involving a large black snake in the town of Shoham, halfway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. The huge snake was “found motionless […]

Niger Needs Deeper Mediation Diplomacy, Not Military Intervention

Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world, a victim of a callous history and geography. After toppling the democratically elected Nigerien President, Mohamed Bazoum, on 26 July, the new military junta in Niamey, riding on a dizzying wave of orchestrated populist urgings, has suspended the constitution, detained the president (and his family […]

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