31 July 2022
Kenya: Even if they do not admit it publicly, with upcoming elections many politicians have resorted to paying influencers to help them with their campaigns. “Who says no to extra money?" Billions are estimated to exchange hands in this way, a macroinfluencer (who has close to 1 million followers) earning up to 5m Kenyan shillings (40,000 euros). The politicians’ strategy planners first “recruit a group of (up to 200) so-called microinfluencers – anyone with between 10,000 and 500,000 followers. They then create a group chat and outline the strategy, where instructions for the hashtags, photos and talking points to be used are distributed.” The influencers often set up dummy accounts. But apparently, they can never be sure to really be paid after having spread the misinformation favouring their clients.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-62077651
Uganda/India/UK: The article tells the absurd story of a woman born in 1955 in Uganda of Indian parents with British passports who migrated back to India in 1966 on her mother's passport and has been living in India ever since, is married to an Indian and her children also have Indian passports. But authorities (in India as in Britain and in Uganda) refuse to give her a passport. So, she remains stateless. She has now petitioned the Bombay High Court which is to decide in August.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-62315292
Uganda: Hours of torrential rain have caused flash floods around Mbale in the country’s east – with at least 10 dead. In some cases, rescue efforts are impossible because roads have been cut off. Flooding and landslides have become much more common, also because of deforestation and the effects of population growth.
BBC Africa Latest Updates 31 July 2022. 17:48
Congo-Kinshasa: UN soldiers returning from leave in Uganda, after an altercation, forced their way into Congo by opening fire at the border, killing two and wounding 14 or 15. “Bintou Keita, the head of the UN peacekeeping mission, has described the troops' actions as unspeakable and irresponsible. She said arrests had been made and an investigation opened.” This will no doubt further heighten tensions between the population and the UN troops.
BBC Africa Latest Updates 31 July 2022. 19:24
https://www.orf.at/#/stories/3278954/
30 July 2022
Female Hunger: According to Plan International, 70% of the world’s hungry are women and girls. And when their families come under strain, girls are at greater risk of suffering violence, gender-based violence, amongst others child marriage.
https://plan-international.org/emergencies/global-food-crisis/
School feeding programmes: They “are (essential) in achieving equality in health and education”, Covid and school closures have made it very obvious how important they are. A “School Meals Coalition” has been set up to expand effective national school health and school feeding programmes. A global benefit-cost analysis was undertaken and found that, besides being beneficial for health and nutrition, school attendance and academic performance are increased, social protection is offered to households and families, the poorest especially, and local farming can be boosted. Benefits far exceed costs – depending on local specifics, you would “get” between 7 and 35 USD for each 1 USD of investment.
https://theconversation.com/school-feeding-programmes-are-great-value-for-money-184179
Food insecurity: Experts don’t have all the answers. The authors’ project undertook to organise learning journeys to get to know the situation on the ground and learn from it. It found that street traders and spaza shops (small/informal food retailers, often home-based) source their food much more locally and ecologically soundly than formal retailers. And it realised how important early childhood development centres are. “If a climate-resilient food system is to emerge (…) it will only do so through local cooperation, knowledge co-production, collective action, and the creation of a shared vision of what a socially just and sustainable food system looks like”. Time for a rethink, thus.
https://theconversation.com/food-security-experts-dont-have-all-the-answers-community-knowledge-is-key-186438
Mali/Burkina Faso/Jihadist attacks: The coups in the two countries have not improved security, attacks on civilians have since increased in both. The state controls less and less territory. The BBC article provides a broad and fairly detailed overview of the situation in the two countries, discussing amongst others difficulties with data on numbers of victims. Conclusion: “the basic safety that military leaders had promised the people of Burkina Faso and Mali seems a long way off.”
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-62052598
Libya/Niger: When Gaddafi fell in 2011, lots of arms went south to Niger and Mali. Such flows slowed down considerably when civil war re-ignited in Libya itself, increasing need and demand for arms there. But arms are still and increasingly being smuggled south to Niger – the article describes how and where – and if the Libyan crisis should be resolved, then massive arms trafficking to the south can be expected. Niger – together with its neighbours – needs to do more about this.
https://issafrica.org/iss-today/arms-trafficking-from-libya-to-niger-is-back-in-business
Zambia: The country “should be the grain basket for the whole region”. But for this, “competitive cross-border markets and efficient transport and logistics services” are necessary. The article makes suggestions what needs to be done.
https://theconversation.com/zambia-can-meet-growing-food-demand-how-to-fix-whats-standing-in-its-way-187373
Zambia/Debt Restructuring: Zambia is making progress towards a debt relief deal. It is negotiating with state and private creditors – with the biggest lender China co-chairing the creditors committee. Zambia, which defaulted in 2020 on its Eurobonds, is the first to renegotiate its debt under the G20-Paris Club Common Framework for Debt Treatments – put in place to bail out countries in financial difficulties because of Covid. Ethiopia and Chad will be next. Zambia’s deal could set a precedent.
https://issafrica.org/iss-today/zambia-on-the-brink-of-historic-debt-relief-deal
Congo-Kinshasa: The article’s author identifies two conflicts which intertwined to form the ongoing, extremely deadly conflict in eastern DRC. One of them stems from colonial times when “colonial administrations gave privileged status to some of the local population based on ethnicity”, the second is “is a regional contest for survival between the Hutu and Tutsi elites”. The article analyses the “politics of belonging”. In the author’s opinion, an end to the violence “is possible if the geographical scope of the conflict is broadened to include all neighbouring countries and if the focus is a negotiated settlement followed by a period of reconciliation.”
https://theconversation.com/how-conflicts-intertwined-over-time-and-destabilised-the-drc-and-the-region-185432
Zimbabwe/Literature: Politics having become a farce, NoViolet Bulawayo’s novel Glory has found the right way to deal with it: “animals take on human characteristics”. She thus fictionalises the country’s politics since the removal of Mugabe from power. This “story (not) about endings but about unravellings” goes beyond Orwell’s Animal Farm.
https://theconversation.com/noviolet-bulawayos-new-novel-is-an-instant-zimbabwean-classic-185783
UK/Nigeria/Looted Art: Almost 100 artefacts looted in 1897 in Benin City and currently held at Oxford’s Pitt Rivers and Ashmolean museums could soon be returned to Nigeria following a decision by the Oxford University Council to recommend the “transfer of legal title to the objects”. The claim of Nigeria's National Commission for Museums and Monuments (NCMM) is now to be examined by Charity Commission.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-62361946