Day: August 10, 2021

Zambia’s standing as one of Africa’s most stable democracies is being tested this week in the vote in which President Edgar Lungu is seeking re-election.

A tight race is expected, and some analysts say the presidential poll may provoke a political crisis in the southern African country.

Lungu’s detractors say he has systematically restricted democratic freedoms by closing some media outlets, detaining opposition politicians and targeting critics. His rule has taken Africa’s second-largest copper producer to “the brink of a human rights crisis,” Human Rights Watch alleged in June.

Violence flared in recent weeks, particularly between supporters of the two main parties, prompting Lungu to deploy the military. Lungu says the troops are to maintain order, but the opposition argues that the soldiers are to intimidate voters.

Lungu came to power in 2015 after winning a disputed snap election to finish the term of President Michael Sata who died in office. Lungu was then elected to a full five-year term in 2016, although his main rival again alleged fraud.

A combination of intimidation and populist policies such as payments to millions of farmers could secure a victory for Lungu, 64, analysts say.

His chief rival is 59-year-old Hakainde Hichilema, who touts his business background as proof he can attract capital and create much-needed jobs. Hichilema is well-known to voters as this is the sixth time that he has run for president and the most recent race against Lungu was very close.

In total, 16 candidates are vying for the presidency. Zambia will go for a second-round vote if none of the candidates gets more than 50% of the votes cast.

More than 800 candidates from Lungu’s Patriotic Front, Hichilema’s United Party for National Development and other smaller parties and independents will battle for the elected 156 seats in the National Assembly. Mayoral and council seats are also up for election.

Zambia’s economy, which is in a tailspin, might “be the defining issue,” said Nic Cheeseman, a professor of politics at the University of Birmingham.

“The economic crisis has gone hand-in-hand with significant amounts of pain and that has caused considerable discontent,” Cheeseman told The Associated Press. “I think that creates a window of opportunity for the opposition to win, not just that the economy is bad but that people don’t have confidence in President Lungu to be able to turn it around.”

Zambia recorded economic progress for more than a decade and achieved middle-income status in 2011, but now the country is beset by high inflation, high debt and allegations of corruption.

The COVID-19 pandemic hurt the already stuttering economy even further. Lockdown measures pushed Zambia into its first recession since 1998 and the economy contracted by 1.2%, according to the World Bank.

An easing of the lockdown measures in the latter part of 2020 and the global rise in copper prices resulted in some recovery, although inflation reached a high of 22% in February, according to the World Bank.

Many Zambians have little trust in the politicians promising to fix the country’s problems. Only 23% said they would vote for Lungu’s Patriotic Front party while just 25% would consider voting for Hichilema’s United Party for National Development, according to a poll by Afrobarometer in December last year.

“This means that voter apathy and a low turnout will likely prevail on election day,” said Ringisai Chikohomere, a researcher at the South Africa-based Institute for Security Studies.

“The economy is the number one electoral issue, and yet in the past Zambians have voted along regional lines rather than on the strength of real grievances,” said Chikohomere, who said ethnic identity issues may be as important as the policies promoted by the candidates and parties.

Disputes over the outcome are likely, Cheeseman said.

“It’s going to be a very contested election. It’s going to be highly controversial. Whichever candidate loses will reject the results. It means we will have a political crisis here after the polls,” he said. “It’s really a question of how big that crisis is and how credible the elections look.”

Source: Voice of America

The Ethiopian government appealed Tuesday for its citizens to join the military to fight the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in the embattled northern Tigray region.

The appeal from Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s office follows the government’s unilateral declaration of a cease-fire in June as its military retreated from Tigray or abandoned the truce altogether.

“Now is the right time for all capable Ethiopians who are of age to join the Defense Forces, Special Forces and militias to show your patriotism,” Abiy’s office said in a statement.

Representatives of Abiy, the TPLF and the Tigray emergency task force did not immediately comment.

The TPLF, which ruled Ethiopia for three decades, now controls Tigray. The TPLF-led authority administering the region says it is the Tigray Regional Government; Ethiopian federal authorities say that government was dissolved and that a Provisional Administration has the mandate in Tigray.

On Sunday, crowds rallied at Meskel Square in the capital city, Addis Ababa, to show their support for Ethiopia’s National Defense Force and to condemn the TPLF. Men on horseback joined in the gathering, chanting and singing.

One of the speakers was the city’s mayor, Adanech Abebe, who accused “international actors” of trying to restore power to the TPLF. She called upon the international community “to stand with over 100 million people of Ethiopia.”

Fighting between the national government and the TPLF broke out in November, leaving about 4 million people in Tigray, Amhara and Afar facing emergency or crisis levels of food insecurity, according to the United Nations. Both sides have been accused of atrocities.

Troops from Eritrea, Ethiopia’s neighbor to the north, and Amhara, a neighboring region to the south of Tigray, also entered the conflict in support of the Ethiopian government.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said Tuesday that it and its partners regained access to the Mai Aini and Adi Harush camps for Eritrean refugees in Tigray. Violence had prevented representatives from accessing the sites since July 13.

The UNHCR said deliveries of aid for the camps’ 23,000 refugees resumed on August 5, despite access that is “limited by a complex and fluid security situation.”

Source: Voice of America

Cameroonian officials say at least 82 former Boko Haram fighters from Nigeria and Chad, along with their families, have surrendered to authorities in the past week. Authorities say they’re the latest among hundreds of the militant Islamists who have been defecting since May, when the group’s leader was killed. Cameroon plans to deport the former fighters as the influx has overwhelmed rehabilitation centers along the border.

Cameroon’s government on August 10 said its National Committee for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration center in Meri, a northern town on the border with Nigeria, has 967 former jihadist militants. A week ago, there were about 700 former Boko Haram fighters and their families in the center.

Among the over 260 who arrived within the past one week are 82 former Boko Haram male fighters. The others are women and children.

Francis Fai Yengo is the director of DDR centers created by the government of Cameroon for former fighters. He says over 200 of ex-militants are Nigerians. He spoke on Monday after President Paul Biya sent him to meet the former militants and to evaluate their needs.

“We came to see the fighters, those young women and men predominantly made of Nigerians flooding out from the Boko Haram camps into our country,” he said. “The numbers are increasing daily. We welcome them, but after we have done the necessary verifications, we will send them back rapidly to their country because of the good relationship that our country [Cameroon] has with our neighboring country to the west [Nigeria].”

Yengo said several of the former militants are Chadians. He said Biya has provided space and funds for a bigger DDR center to be constructed in Meme, another northern town not far from Nigeria. Yengo said the center at Meri was too small to contain the increasing number of fleeing Boko Haram militants.

The Multinational Joint Task Force of the Lake Chad Basin that is fighting the jihadist group said the former militants handed themselves to troops around the Sambisa Forest on the Cameroon Nigeria border, an area considered as Boko Haram’s stronghold. The task force is made up of troops from Niger, Cameroon, Chad and Nigeria.

Nigeria has not issued a statement on the militants’ defections. Cameroon says it has voluntarily handed former combatants to Nigeria several times but that the number that surrendered this week is the highest.

This month, Cameroon said since May, when Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau was declared dead, the jihadist group Boko Haram and its fighters are weaker and likely to surrender.

Swaibou Issa, a researcher on Boko Haram at the University of Maroua, says Cameroon, Nigeria and Chad should encourage fighters who are still reluctant to surrender and help to reconstruct their communities. He says rival jihadist groups are carrying out charitable acts around the Lake Chad Basin aimed at luring in Boko Haram militants and having fighters join other terrorist groups.

Issa says within the past two months, the Islamic State in West Africa Province, or the ISWAP, a splinter of Boko Haram, is increasingly gaining power and influence. He says ISWAP has been highly active along the Cameroon, Nigeria, Chad border. He says while recognized international aid groups distribute food to populations in need, ISWAP also shares food to gain sympathy and recruit civilians.

Speaking through the messaging platform WhatsApp from Maroua, Issa said it is possible that many militants want to surrender but fear reprisals from jihadist fighters.

Kalbassou Daniel is the president of Cameroon’s Far North Regional Council, or the CPDM party, created by the government to speed up local development.

Kalbassou says it is imperative for the governments of Cameroon, Nigeria and Chad to provide jobs for the ex-jihadist militants. He says the former militants who surrender must be encouraged to have self confidence that is needed before they can reintegrate work for development and become productive contributing members of society.

Boko Haram terrorists have been fighting to establish an Islamic caliphate in Nigeria’s northeast. The fighters began attacks inside Cameroon in 2014.

According to the U.N., 30,000 people have been killed and 1.8 million displaced in Cameroon, Nigeria and Chad since 2009 when the fighting deteriorated into an armed conflict with Nigerian government troops.

Source: Voice of America

Malawi’s Anti-Corruption Bureau has arrested the energy minister and two other officials for alleged corruption involving a state oil contract. Political analysts said the arrests show Malawi President Lazarus Chakwera’s anti-corruption drive is targeting more than just the former ruling party.

Malawi Energy Minister Newton Kambala has been arrested along with presidential adviser Chris Chaima Banda, and Enock Chihana, a partner in the governing Tonse Alliance.

Martha Chizuma is the director of the Anti-Corruption Bureau, or ACB. She told a televised press conference the arrests Monday stem from investigations into complaints from the National Oil Company of Malawi, or NOCMA, about interference in awarding of contracts to fuel suppliers.

“The other part of this investigation was alleged serious political interference and some corrupt practices in the procurement process,” Chizuma said. “And there is a recommendation that there must be prosecution of those that were allegedly involved.”

The investigation found that Energy Minister Kambala attempted to influence NOCMA to award contracts for 2020-2021 fuel supplies to three potential oil suppliers.

The probe also determined that Chihana and Banda aided and abetted Kambala when he attempted to influence the award of the contract to supply 40,000 tons of fuel to one supplier.

Political analysts said the arrests, the first of the president’s allies, show Chakwera’s anti-corruption drive is targeting not only members of the former ruling party.

Sheriff Kaisi is a lecturer of political science at Blantyre International University.

“Now he has started living by his word,” Kaisi said. “Because historically and traditionally in Malawi, it’s rare that you see the government or any government institution which is enforcing governance issues for example to arrest someone holding ministerial position.”

Chakwera previously had been accused of targeting only officials of opposing parties in the anti-corruption campaign when he took power in June of last year.

However, Kaisi says the challenge now is delays in prosecutions.

“We need to quickly point out that at the Anti-Corruption Bureau there are quite a lot of cases,” Kaisi said. “Some have taken 20 years and they have not yet concluded. So, we are asking the government through anti-Corruption Bureau that the president has started living by his words, what is remaining now is to move very fast so that due process of the law should go normally.”

The ACB said the three suspects will appear in court soon after it finishes interrogating them.

Its spokesperson, Egrita Ndala, told state broadcaster Malawi Broadcasting Corporation Tuesday that charges would include abuse of public office, and aiding and abetting crime.

Source: Voice of America