Foreign Policy outlines the methods of electoral theft and potential remedies:
From Abuja to Islamabad, autocratic regimes have become adept at manipulating “free and fair elections” to stay in power. Here’s how they do it
- Control the process
- Manipulate the media
- Keep out the observers
- Misreport results
- Foster incompetence and chaos
—and here is how to stop them...(continue reading)
- Resort to the crude stuff
CS Monitor reports:
Just a few weeks ago, Kenya remained an oasis of stability surrounded by nations at war. The tourist-friendly country is East Africa's economic engine, a hub for global trade, and a base for international humanitarian work. It has been a been a model of what other African countries could achieve if they worked hard, developed their economies, and embraced free democracy. So the explosion of violence that has left more than 750 people dead – including more than 100 in the past few days – and forced a quarter-million to flee their homes since the disputed Dec. 27 presidential election came as a shock to many. But under the placid surface, Kenya boils with deep ethnic resentment that some observers say has been ignored for too long.
New Zambia reports:
In 2003, as part of an anti-corruption program, Brazil’s federal government began to select municipalities at random to audit their expenditures of federally-transferred funds. The findings of these audits were then made publicly available and disseminated to media sources.Using a dataset of corruption constructed from the audit reports, the authors compare the electoral outcomes of municipalities audited before versus after the 2004 elections, with the same levels of reported corruption. They show that the release of the audit outcomes had a significant impact on incumbents’ electoral performance, and that these effects were more pronounced in municipalities where local radio was present to divulge the information.
Ryan Petersen writes:
Outside of the exceptional opportunities for investors in the country’s capital markets — which did little to soothe my fears as a traveler — I’d heard few reassuring stories about Lagos. Meanwhile, my imagination went to work on the news reports, rumors and exaggerated tourist tales I had heard, conjuring up images of an urban center descended into anarchy...In fact, throughout our week in the city, we were struck by how poorly we’d misimagined the place. At no point did we feel threatened in any way. Rather, we were welcomed warmly by everyone we met, from security guards and restaurant workers to private equity investors and government officials.In the end, it was this inviting stance toward foreigners that made our project such a success.
The FT writes about "The legacy of Suharto":
In the 1990s, World Bank staff used to tell a joke about two friendly government ministers, one from Indonesia, the other from Nigeria. Each enriched himself by taking bribes from a big road contract. The Indonesian took 20 per cent of the contract price, but the Nigerian boasted to his friend that he was even richer because his cut was 100 per cent. But in Nigeria, of course, there was no road.The purported moral of the joke was that Asian corruption was efficient whereas African corruption was not. Former allies and business associates of Suharto, the Indonesian ex-president who died on Sunday, want his legacy to be judged in this light. Suharto may have been corrupt and authoritarian during his 32 years in power, they say, but he oversaw political stability and economic growth that pulled millions of Indonesians out of poverty...It will be easier to end corruption if the crimes of the late Suharto, his relatives and associates are not swept under the carpet in a misguided attempt to burnish his legacy. Suharto was better than some of his African counterparts, but worse than his people deserved.
Founded by Peter Kehinde Aina "...The Negotiation & Conflict Management Group (NCMG) is an independent, non-profit and non-governmental, membership based, organisation in Nigeria, with Centres for dispute resolution, promoting awareness and providing services in negotiation, mediation and other Alternative Dispute Resolution techniques..."Its aims include:
Biopact reports:
Mozambique has only recently begun to understand that it is a 'biofuel superpower'. Its agro-ecological resources allow for the production of a wide range of efficient energy crops, including eucalyptus, grasses, starch crops like cassava, or sugarcane and jatropha. Analysts affiliated with the International Energy Agency estimate that the country can produce around 7 Exajoules of biofuels sustainably that is roughly 3.1 million barrels of oil equivalent per day
From the IPEG BLOG:
IPEG event with Roben Farzad, author of “Can Greed Save Africa?”
We have an event scheduled for Thursday,January the 31st.
Speaker: Roben Farzad, author of Businessweek cover story “Can Greed Save Africa?”
Topic: His motivations for writing the story; preconceived notions;observations and epiphanies in the six countries he visited.
Date and Time: January 31st 2008, Thursday. 6:00-8.00 pm
Venue: W J Warren hall (Amsterdam Ave. and 115th st.) Room 208 (73) Columbia University.
If you would like to attend or have any questions, please e-mail us at emeka[dot]okafor [AT] gmail[dot]com
The NYTimes reports on Africa's dwindling Ankole Cattle:
In recent decades, global trade, sophisticated marketing, artificial insemination and the demands of agricultural economics have transformed the Holstein into the world’s predominant dairy breed. Indigenous animals like East Africa’s sinewy Ankole, the product of centuries of selection for traits adapted to harsh conditions, are struggling to compete with foreign imports bred for maximal production. This worries some scientists. The world’s food supply is increasingly dependent on a small and narrowing list of highly engineered breeds: the Holstein, the Large White pig and the Rhode Island Red and Leghorn chickens. There’s a risk that future diseases could ravage these homogeneous animal populations. Poor countries, which possess much of the world’s vanishing biodiversity, may also be discarding breeds that possess undiscovered genetic advantages. But farmers like Mugira(from Uganda) say they can’t afford to wait for science. And so, on the African savanna, a competition for survival is underway.
Founded by Cosmas Okoli Mobility Aid and Appliances Research and Development Centre (MAARDEC)"...was born out of Cosmas Okoli’s quest to find solutions to challenges faced by millions of people with disability in Nigeria, himself included. MAARDEC seeks to address the lack of adequate mobility aids and appliances as well as the architectural and attitudinal barriers facing persons with physical disabilities...",Schwabfund.
Founder of Conservation through Public Health the award-winning Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka contends that:
Well-kept wildlife sanctuaries can provide an income for the community...“Most Africans think that wildlife is dangerous, harmful and detrimental to the development of the country. Some people think that wildlife should be eaten, and the national parks are just a waste [and] that pastures should be used [only] to graze cattle.”
Sebastian Chuwa a leading award winning Tanzanian conservationist and founder of the African Blackwood Conservation Project:
Has established more than 50 clubs to teach youth about the need to conserve. He has also inspired the founding of women’s tree-planting groups, and he actively works with Roots and Shoots, a youth conservation foundation run by Jane Goodall. Chuwa has helped plant more than 1 million African Blackwood trees in Tanzania, and has helped create nurseries to lead the reforestation efforts of the tree that is one of the most highly valued and over harvested plants in Africa.
Moeletsi Mbeki writes in the New Statesman:
At least a quarter of the South African population receives social grants that would not be possible if South Africa were not mineral-rich. Without mineral wealth to redistribute, the government would have to work harder and be more creative to find solutions to unemployment and poverty.Resource wealth makes it possible for the government not to have to put an effort into redeveloping the economy to create more jobs, and instead it sustains the unemployed and their dependants with social grants.
Davidson Iriekpen's assessment of judicial rulings in ThisDay from 2007 contends that a steady rebuilding of authority for Nigeria's third arm of government is gathering pace:
The year 2007 will go down as one year that witnessed more judicial activism and pragmatism than any other in the history of Nigeria. Before 2007, there were cases where judgments were said to have been delivered at nights. Some judges obviously appeared to have their hands being tied, while others hid behind technicalities and the use of ex-parte orders to favour one party or the other in cases before them...The recent patriotic enthusiasm with which players in the third arm of government dispensed justice in several landmark political cases went a long way to show that the judicial arbitrators and decision makers are ready to ensure that the country is on the part of sanity. This year, landmark cases which could have thrown the country into anarchy were resolved. Not left out of this, was the role the apex court, the Supreme Court, play on all of these. It helped in no small measure to illuminate the dark areas of the constitution, to help correct the anomalies in the political system.
Award winning conservationist Tomas Diagne "...has been referred to as the "backbone" to save the spurred tortoise in Senegal. He is a member of IUCN’s Species Survival Commission (SSC). He has worked with the World Wildlife Fund and Nature Tropicale to protect endangered wildlife in Africa. Recently, he has participated in saving the African manatees along the Senegal River. At ESI, Tomas develops and directs conservation projects for the Sahel and upper Guinea regions of West Africa...",EndangeredSpecies.
"...Radio Alternative Voice for Gambians (AVG) is a new creation by Gambians and NGOs interested in Human Rights as a whole and freedom of expression in particular. Its main objective is to provide the Gambian people an alternative means of accessing information that is impartial and independent. Access to such information will enable citizens to make informed choices regarding the political, economic, social and cultural development of their country..."
Leo Igwe indicts the Nigerian Police Force:
In a police station in Owerri, it costs up to 20 thousand naira(170 dollars) to mobilize police officers after a case had been reported. At the zonal headquarters, police officers charge up to 40 thousand naira(380 dollars) before they can get into action. The mobilization fee is negotiated and paid directly to the Investigation Police officer (IPO) who does not issue any receipts for the payment. Non-payment of mobilization fee means that the case would be attended to. It means that the complaint would be thrown aside no matter how serious it is.
I’d long noted the influence of Indians in Africa, so I put the two together to create a new “frame” for viewing Africa’s present and future. Maybe Africa is no longer a “white man’s burden,” not because we have been persuaded by NYU professor William Easterley to abandon the continent, but rather because Chinese and Indians have supplanted (or will) Westerners in the task of “saving” Africa. The irony is delicious, and the practical implications enormous. While Westerners debate amongst themselves whether foreign-aid to Africa helps or hurts — a debate, I think, is increasingly irrelevant — Indians and Chinese are pragmatically (if not always effectively) engaging Africa.
Femi Ajayi writes about the need to strengthen institutions and deemphasize personalities:
I believe one of the lessons from Nuhu Ribadu's saga would be for Nigeria and Nigerians to start building INSTITUTIONS rather than INDIVIDUALS or PERSONALITIES. Nigeria and Nigerians should start building institutions rather than personalities. Nigeria discouraged Obasanjo in making himself an Institution, so also it should be done in all segments of Nigeria public service. We should end the popularity showcase.
Nuhu Ribadu has done creditably well, nonetheless no one is indispensable. Nigerian mindset needs to be changed from hero worshipping to the substance of Nigerian Institutions. Nigerians are still suffering from the mishmash imposed on them by the Military to get excited and emotional on issues. Please don't blame Nigerians on this. Nigerians have been traumatized for over 30 years of Military rule that ruled with Decrees.
Nicholas M. Donofrio of IBM states in Businessweek:
The current aid situation creates a bias against supporting African business growth, which in turn is killing the entrepreneurial spirit that is so critical to creating African enterprises that can access new markets and operate on a global level.
G. Pascal Zachary writes in Wilson Quaterly:
After decades of mistreatment, abuse, and exploitation, African farmers—still overwhelmingly smallholders working family-tilled plots of land—are awakening from a long slumber. Because farmers are the majority (about 60 percent) of all sub-Saharan Africans, farming holds the key to reducing poverty and helping to spread prosperity. Over the longer term, prosperous African farmers could become the backbone of a social and political transformation. They are the sort of canny and independent tillers of the land Thomas Jefferson envisioned as the foundation for American democracy. In a region where elites often seem more committed to enjoying the trappings of success abroad than creating success at home, farmers have a real stake in improving their turf. Life will still be hard for them, but in the years ahead they can be expected to demand better government policies and more effective services. As their incomes and aspirations rise, they could someday even form their own political parties, in much the way that farmers in the American Midwest and Western Europe did in the past.
Leon Louw at African Liberty, outlines fundamental weaknesses in African democracies:
There are 25 or so “checks and balances” in most Western democracy constitutions, almost none of which have been incorporated in Third World “democracies”, including Kenya. One of the most important is the rule of law, which has, sadly, become a largely contentless cliché.
- Laws must be objective not discretionary
-There must be a Separation of Powers
Binyavanga Wainaina writes in the Guardian:
What we are seeing is simple. The state as we know it has run out of steam. The winner-takes-all Westminster system we have cannot carry our aspirations. Even as blood is shed in Eldoret and Mombasa, Kenya's various ethnicities are now stranded in their own paranoia for lack of a viable national structure and process. We have known it for years. This is why a new constitution has been on the top of the list of political priorities for most Kenyans for 10 years and more.
We are 45 years old this year. Like many nations, this is our moment of truth. There is a way out of this - if both leaders act like statesmen, sit together and do what is necessary legally to have an interim power-sharing arrangement whose sole task is to create a structure that can carry us along into a new election, with a new or amended constitution that ensures that, whoever wins or loses, the whole country and all its minorities and interests are carried.
Ikechukwu Eze of Businessday reports on the growth and increasing relevance of public-private partnerships:
Defending the importance of PPP Sania Nishtar in a scholarly article entitled 'Public - private 'partnerships' in health - a global call to action', observed that such collaborations are being increasingly encouraged as part of a nation's comprehensive development framework. "The need to foster such arrangements is supported by a clear understanding of the public sectors inability to provide public goods entirely on their own, in an efficient, effective and equitable manner because of lack of resources and management issues. These considerations have necessitated the development of different interface arrangements, which involve the interfacing of organizations that have the mandate to offer public good on one hand, and those that could facilitate this goal.
The Economist writes:
As in Nigeria, Kenyans queued quietly to exercise their right to vote, reflecting the enormous appetite for democracy that exists on a continent that was until recently dominated by dictators and “big men”. But for democracy to survive, it is not enough to hold elections. Politicians must accept that they may have to give up office, and thus all the opportunities for self-enrichment that come their way. It is no coincidence that the most corrupt politicians are also those who cling most desperately to power—as in Kenya and Nigeria.
The FT writes about the impact of Kenya's political turmoil on investor perceptions:
The explosion of violence that has met Mwai Kibaki’s disputed election in what was considered one of Africa’s most stable countries threatens to undermine not only Kenya’s reputation but also the continent’s.Charlemagne Capital, an emerging market specialist, said Kenya’s place “at the centre of the renaissance in eastern Africa seemed assured”. The worst-case scenarios for the country now threatened to “wipe it off the map from the point of view of international investors”.
The VOA profiles Reuben Coffie's work with CARE:
Coffie and his team develop and implement strategies for producers of crops that may have export potential, including cashews, pineapples and pawpaw.
These efforts are plagued by poor yields and product quality – problems Coffie says he’s determined to reverse:“What we do," he said, "is build their capacity, build their knowledge base, pass on some innovative ideas, train them in the best techniques to improve what they do and get them to understand requirements of the [export] market, like certification issues."
David Wessel writes in the WSJ:
In his recent book, "Africa's Silk Road: China and India's New Economic Frontier," World Bank economist Harry Broadman argues, "China and India have a growing middle class, with increasing purchasing power and with an increasing appetite for imported goods" -- from Africa. The Asian giants offer Africa more than markets, though. He says Chinese and Indian companies are beginning to expand beyond oil and mining in Africa to telecommunications, food processing, textiles and construction...the importance of the explosion of South-South trade and investment goes far beyond this year's outlook. It could be the opening of a new epoch of globalization -- one in which the global economic might of big U.S. and European companies is challenged like never before, one in which the remarkable success of China and other Asian economies in lifting their people out of poverty is spread -- finally -- to other poor continents.
"...The African Securities Exchanges Association (ASEA) is aiming for systematic mutual cooperation, exchange of information, materials and persons together with joint programs between its African members...it provides a forum for mutual communication, exchange of information, cooperation and technological assistance among its members, to facilitate the process of financial integration within the region for the effective mobilization of capital to accelerate economic development of Africa..."
Michael Holman writes in the FT about the Kenyan political crisis:
For the outside world, Kenya has been the acceptable face of Africa: a safe destination for a million tourists a year from Europe, Asia and North America to the country of surf and safari; a reliable base, in a tough neighbourhood, for a burgeoning aid industry; regional headquarters for the United Nations; and – less well-known – a country whose military pacts with the US and Britain have made it a crucial ally in the “war against terror”.He questions the West's continued tolerance of the country's corruption:
They did not believe it was ultimately in their interests to have a showdown with the barons of corruption. They did not want to upset what they saw as a regional “island of stability” from which the UN and other international relief agencies, including hundreds of foreign non-governmental organisations, operate – a thriving business that accounts for a fifth of Kenya’s annual foreign exchange earnings.
Marion Mühlberger of Deutsch Bank Research wrote(pdf) in June 2007 about the lack of USD-denominated investment opportunities within Nigeria:
The redemption of the Brady bond by Nigeria last November has considerably reduced USD-denominated investment opportunities. As investment options in USD and EUR are scarce, institutional investors go for synthetic bonds, so-called credit linked notes. Another option is corporate bonds, e.g. USD-denominated bonds issued by large Nigerian financial institutions. However, these entail additional company-specific risks and frequently require a very high minimum investment. The stock market also offers very few opportunities for private investors as emerging markets share certificates in the past did not cover Nigeria at all due to a lack of liquidity in the market; at present, this is the case to only a small degree. But the Nigerian capital markets are making quick progress so over the next few years we will see improving investment opportunities in the country