Africa News blog

100 years and going strong; But has the ANC-led government done enough for its people?

By Isaac Esipisu

Although the role of political parties in Africa has changed dramatically since the sweeping reintroduction of multi-party politics in the early 1990s, Africa’s political parties remain deficient in many ways, particularly their organizational capacity, programmatic profiles and inner-party democracy.

The third wave of democratization that hit the shores of Africa 20 years ago has undoubtedly produced mixed results as regards to the democratic quality of the over 48 countries south of the Sahara. However, one finding can hardly be denied: the role of political parties has evidently changed dramatically.

Notwithstanding few exceptions such as Eritrea , Swaziland and Somalia , in almost all sub-Saharan countries, governments legally allow multi-party politics. This is in stark contrast to the single-party regimes and military oligarchies that prevailed before 1990.

After years of marginalization during autocratic rule, many African political parties have regained their key role in democratic politics by mediating between politics and society. Multi-partyism paved the way for genuine parliamentary opposition and the strengthening of parliaments in decision-making. However, several shortcomings still remain: many African political parties suffer from low organizational capacity and a lack of internal democracy.

Dominated by individual leaders, often times lifelong chairpersons and “Big Men”, youth and women remain marginalized within party structures.

from MacroScope:

Big ambition for Equatorial Guinea

This week has seen a rush of key policymakers and business executives from Africa flocking to London. Apart from Sierra Leone, oil and gas executives have been discussing the outlook for Equatorial Guinea, a small central African state rich in oil.

Equatorial Guinea made a relatively rare foray into the global news earlier this month for a presidential pardon of  former British army officer Simon Mann, who was serving a 34-year prison sentence in the country for his role in a failed coup d'etat in 2004.

Gabriel Obiang Lima, vice minister of mines, industry and energy, was in London to talk about his ambition for the country. "Our aim is not to be the Kuwait of the region. It's to be the Singapore of the region," he told dozens of business executives in a conference in London on Wednesday.

"Equatorial Guinea has to have other industries that are not dependent on oil and gas."

But it has a long way to go towards establishing a Singapore-like country. The U.S. State Department says application of the laws remains selective and corruption among officials is widespread, and many business deals are concluded under nontransparent circumstances.

The vice minister says Equatorial Guinea is investing heavily in ports, health care and infrastructure.

Africa’s century?

World Bank President Robert Zoellick ended a visit to Africa this week with the pronouncement that this century belonged to the continent’s development despite damage to economies from the global financial crisis.

Those who remember what were flagged by some at the time as “Africa’s decades” in the 1980s and 1990s may have cause for scepticism given that in many countries they turned out disastrous despite early hopes.

But Africa’s economies had been growing at an unprecedented pace before the global financial crisis struck.

Zoellick acknowledged the immediate challenge required more resources to bolster regional integration as well as investments in energy, infrastructure and agriculture.

He said Africa deserves more attention and should be made a priority at international meetings like the Group of 20 developed and developing countries in the United States next month.

To make the case for more resources from donors, whose budgets are being strained by the financial crisis, Zoellick said Africans need to show they can use aid effectively and improve governance

Will African countries be able to show they can use aid effectively enough? Will this really be Africa’s century? If it is, then how auspicious is it for it to be kicked off with foreign aid?

Has Clinton visit helped offset China’s clout in Africa?

U.S Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 10 day trip to Africa ends this week with many commentators viewing it at least partly as being aimed at offsetting China’s growing economic clout on the African continent. In public, Clinton has delivered Washington’s traditional messages on the importance of fair elections and of fighting corruption and human rights abuses.

But the fact that top oil producers Angola and Nigeria are both on the tour has made clear the importance of the visit from the perspective of ensuring access to resources – an area of huge importance to China too.

China’s trade in Africa hit $107 billion in 2008 and there are now 750,000 Chinese workers living and working in Africa. Sources in both Washington, D.C. and Africa confirmed that Clinton’s subtle diplomatic strategy is to offer African leaders infrastructure assistance in exchange for oil resources and increased energy investments on the African continent.

China, meanwhile, may be marshalling reserves to help kick start African economies and fuel demand as well as to secure access to its resources.

In the past, Beijing has always argued that it is still a very poor country on per capita basis so cannot afford foreign aid. China’s foreign aid was only 0.04 percent of its gross domestic product, only a fraction of the U.S. percentage of 0.4 percent and Europe’s 0.7 percent.

But the financial crisis has changed this. While the downturn has crimped U.S. and Europeans companies’ ability to expand overseas, Chinese firms, awash with cash, are keen to look for new growth opportunities in new markets.

Has Hillary’s visit helped to offset the Chinese push? What value can her words carry against Beijing’s ready cash? Should China be concerned that Washington  may be catching up with its own push into Africa?

Time to build Africa?

Where once African officials might have viewed infrastructure projects solely as a good source of kickbacks, these days there is pressure from electorates, at least in some countries, to deliver on promises of improvements.

The growth that many African states have enjoyed in recent years has exposed the failure of the continent’s infrastructure still more starkly – with even South Africa suffering the kind of power outages that much of the rest of Africa has grown far too used to.

Infrastructure is in theory the focus of this year’s African Union summit, although as always it will be overshadowed by crisis in Somalia, Zimbabwe, Congo, Darfur etc…

The global financial crisis is an even bigger threat to hopes of strengthening Africa’s infrastructure.

Last year, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda all set out to borrow money internationally through sovereign bonds, for the upgrade and expansion of roads, water supplies, irrigation schemes and electricity generation capacities. That followed Ghana’s successful launch in 2007 of sub-Saharan Africa’s first Eurobond outside South Africa to help fund infrastructure development.

But the plans of the east African countries have been knocked off course despite early assertions from confident governments that they would not be affected by the global downturn which began in the Western world.

Kenya is exploring alternative ways of raising the $500 million it had originally planned to raise from a debut Eurobond. Tanzania and Uganda both made similar announcements.

Selling Africa by the pound

The announcement by a U.S. investor that he has a deal to lease a swathe of South Sudan for farmland has again focused attention on foreigners trying to snap up African agricultural land.

A few months ago, South Korea’s Daweoo Logistics said it had secured rights to plant corn and palm oil in an even bigger patch of Madagascar – although local authorities said the deal was not done yet. Investors from Asia and the Gulf are looking elsewhere in Africa too.

Investor interest in farmland – not only in Africa – grew sharply after food prices shot to record highs last year. Although commodity prices have fallen since, there is still anticipation of long term demand growth once the world emerges from its current economic troubles.

Philippe Heilberg, chairman and CEO of New York-based investment firm Jarch Capital, told Reuters he saw ripe opportunity for decades in south Sudan’s Mayom county. The deal covers land nearly twice the size of the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius.

Land is being leased from General Paulino Matip Nhial, Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) – the armed wing of the ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) in semi-autonomous South Sudan. Jarch Management is also buying an interest in a local company from Matip’s son.

But should Africa be handing out its land to foreign investors and will the local people and countries involved be the ones to benefit?

This commentary in the Financial Times made comparisons with the colonial grab for Africa’s resources and points out the damaging legacy that remains.

How should Nigeria’s windfall oil cash be managed?

Nigeria’s revenues from oil exports have reached unprecedented levels as global crude prices rally, yet the majority of its 140 million population remain mired in poverty. Africa’s top oil producer set up an “excess crude account” five years ago to save windfall oil earnings and try to help promote long-term economic stability.

But infighting among the three tiers of government — federal, state and local — on how the revenues should be shared out has seen them squandered.

The country is starved of electricity, the roads in even its plushest suburbs are pitted with potholes, and nine out of 10 people live on less than $2 a day, according to U.N.statistics.

How should Nigeria’s oil revenues be managed? Why is the country’s infrastructure so dilapidated when its state budgets are so high? Should the country set up a sovereign wealth fund? Would it be any better managed than the existing arrangement?