Category Archives: africa

Zambian Elections

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UPDATE:

The conference (organized by the SADC observer mission and donors) on the upcoming elections was a non-starter, with only Neo Simutanyi (Zambia’s preeminent political scientist), giving a talk that had significance. The rest of the conference was full of NGO-ese hot air. None of the major political parties had representation at the conference, even though this was SADC’s “fact finding” conference about the state of play in the elections.

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Zambians will go to the polls next Tuesday.

According to the latest (and most reliable) opinion poll conducted by the Center for Policy Dialogue President Banda is leading the pack with 41%, followed closely by Sata at 38%.

I am attending a mini-conference tomorrow on the elections (academics, observers, NGOs, political parties, etc will be in attendance) and will report back after I get views from those closely involved.

The poll cited above predicts an MMD victory for the following reasons:

  • Incumbency advantage: MMD is using state resources, including government workers, in its campaigns. Road repairs are all over the place, with Banda’s picture and the words “Your Money at Work”, on billboards next to every project.
  • Divided opposition: Mr. Banda is polling a dismal 41%. A PF-UPND united front would almost certainly guarantee a victory for the opposition. But egos and personality politics remain a key barrier to opposition unity in Zambia. Some have claimed that MMD and UPND have a clandestine pact to deny PF victory in the polls. Post-election coalition building will reveal the veracity of these claims.
  • Opposition has ignored rural areas: In many parts of the rural areas you would be mistaken to think that MMD is the only party taking part in the elections. MMD posters and campaigners are everywhere. The opposition has, however, mostly concentrated its efforts in the urban areas. I recently had a chat with a PF operative who admitted that they strategy is to run up the numbers in the urban areas so that even if Banda rigs the rural vote he still won’t be able to beat them. The PF’s target number among urban voters is 2.7 million. There are slightly over 5.1 million registered voters in Zambia. Interestingly, there will be about 2.3 million new voters who did not take part in the last presidential election (turnout was a dismal 41%. Banda was elected president by only 18% of registered voters!!).
  • Fear of Sata: Underneath all the campaigning there is the fear that Sata is unpredictable and dictatorial. Many in the private sector fear that he might try to change things too fast and end up messing up everything. Some admit that they will vote for Banda merely for the sake of continuity.

I agree.

An MMD victory will however be a blow to the consolidation of Zambian democracy.

Since dislodging UNIP from power in 1991, MMD has increasingly become autocratic. Intolerance of the opposition and One-Party-Rule mentality is back in vogue. Indeed, many in its ranks are former members of President Kaunda’s court, including Vernon Mwaanga – derisively known locally as “Master dribbler” – who is notorious for being the brain behind MMD’s electoral manipulations.

Many of the founders of MMD have since decamped to PF.

Bozize’s son is not into authoritarianism, seriously

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As we navigated a roundabout at the edge of town he turned to me and asked, “Have you been following the news?” I hadn’t heard anything since the day before. “About Ivory Coast? Gbagbo held his own inauguration today! Mais ca, c’est vraiment trop!”

Bozize’s son then launched into a diatribe about the failings of African executives. He and his friend, in the back seat, agreed that Ouattara would have been the better choice. “Ouattara is open. He’s for the West. Gbagbo is too much of a nationalist. You see what I’m trying to say?” Then he shifted fully into lecture mode: “We Africans, we have a problem. We like power too much. There are people who, once they grab power, stay there for thirty years! Est-ce que c’est normal? Non! Do you think you could see such a thing in America, or in Europe? No way! The problem here is the nepotism and the corruption.”

…… the conversation had turned to President Biya in neighboring Cameroon, now in power for more than thirty years. “C’est pas normal,” the president’s son clucked, shaking his head.

Bozize is the son of the guy who runs this place.

For more on this and other stories from CAR read this blog (HT Rachel).

Hand Relief International

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Something for the humanitarian and aid communites to think about, courtesy of Hand Relief International.

Among those in the know, another fact has not remained unnoticed: there is more money flowing in than used to and that, reader, is excellent news.

The shit continues to be real in Nairobi, the dignified hub of any meaningful Somalia project, with necessary field trips to Dadaab, where HRI has quickly  set up cutting-edge infrastructure to ferry high-flyers through, complete with up-to-the minute roster of the photogenic fresh arrivals that can be summoned in an instant with their families for that perfect picture, should the visitor require one for the cover of their all-important trip report or their obligatory article in newspaper of choice back home.

More on this here.

HT Blattman

Railroaded

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That railroads were political animals was the truth of The Octopus, even if the power Norris attributed to them did not necessarily always exist …. The Octopus raised questions that later critics of the Robber Baron school, dismayed by its exaggerations, largely dismissed. They threw the baby out with the bathwater. They did not spend much time on a central contention of the Robber Baron literature: that many entrepreneurial fortunes had as much to do with corruption of the political process as with success in selling transportation, and that such entrepreneurial success had long-term costs for society.

….  Leland Stanford was the president of the Central Pacific Railroad and its public face from its founding until his death…. In 1885 Stanford bought his way into the US Senate.

The above excerpts come from the book Railroaded, by Richard White. It is a fascinating read about America’s railroad men at the height of the Gilded Age. This was a time in American history in which politics and business were shamelessly linked to one another. Famous men such as Stanford, Crocker, Adams and Huntington were in the business of openly bribing legislators in order to protect their monopolies and suppress investigations into their insider dealings.

Stanford would later found a University – the Leland Stanford Junior University in Palo Alto California.

The book is a bit long – not even two days on the TAZARA was enough to finish it. But it is a fantastic read. It is also a lesson in development economics. Through corruption and control of government America’s Robber Barons managed to accumulate capital that would later on fuel development in other sectors of the economy. Having political control granted them the chance to reduce their political risk. By the time real democracy and the anti-monopoly crusade caught up with them the “damage” had been done. America had its railroads which enabled transcontinental trade in an age before the massive interstate highway system.

The big lesson here is that de jure rules oftentimes do not matter much for institutional development. It is the de facto balance of power (both political and economic) that does.

Eventually America had enough railroads competing against each other such that the ensuing interest alignment resulted in some railroad companies allying with anti-monopolists to “rat out” their competitors. And with that came proper regulation.

Railroaded is a book about big business, politics, human rights and the fallibility of even the greatest of men (very few women are mentioned in the book.) The men of the Gilded Age laid the groundwork for the American corporation and the American love of risk. Bankruptcies did not come with indelible stigmas. They were mere speed bumps. It was also an era in which Chinese, African Americans, and recent European immigrants were exploited for the sake of the bottom line. What mattered was how much could be squeezed from workers, the government and one’s business associates.

Add the book to your reading list if you care for economic and political history.

quick hits on Zambia and beyond

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In case you missed it, Zambia is a middle income country – at least according to the Bank. This sort of shows in some parts of Lusaka. But Zambia is also a highly unequal and very poor country. Most people in the countryside have nothing else to do but subsistence farming and burning charcoal. The economy is also heavily dependent on mines and foreign owned consumer goods outlets from South Africa and beyond. Which is sad really, given how much arable land it has.

Does anyone know why Zambians use military time? Forget 4 PM, it is 16 hours in Zambian time. The people I have asked have speculated that it is a legacy of the mining industry. I find it fascinating. Taxi drivers think I am weird every time I bring it up.

Also, why is everyone in Lusaka out to some workshop???? Seriously. This is a big problem here. I have had to cancel about five appointments because the only person at the office was the security guard. When do people have time to do their work?

Moving a bit beyond Zambia, be sure to follow the Kenyan cases at the ICC. I am withholding blogging on the issue until the pre-trial judges make their decision. Whichever way they go it will have important ramifications for Kenyan politics. Next year is a make or break for Kenya.

Be sure to check out the Economist’s piece on South Sudan. The teething problems for the new nation will be epic and will take time to go away.

And lastly, check out Jim Fearon on Libya. HT Platas-Izama, who has a new blog here.

Zambian elections

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The Zambian elections will be held on the 20th of this month.

The main candidates are incumbent President Rupiah Banda (RB) and opposition leader Michael Sata (Sshhh, don’t kubeba). The two are running on the MMD (movement for multiparty democracy) and PF (Patriotic Front) tickets respectively. Both parties have fielded parliamentary candidates in all constituencies. PF is widely expected to take the urban areas and most of the developed parts of the country. MMD’s stronghold is in the rural areas.

Many on the streets of Lusaka and other parts of the country – well mostly along the railway line coming down from Nakonde – believe that it will be a close election.

They also think that if it were truly a clean election Sata would win.

MMD knows this and has been distributing chitenge and other goodies like there is no tomorrow. This has prompted PF’s slogan of don’t kubeba (don’t tell them); which asks voters to take the chitenges and money but not tell MMD that they are truly PF. I have seen pictures of women in the Post in which women have two chitenges on: a PF one covered by an MMD one.

Because of the deep skepticism over the integrity of the upcoming elections many in Lusaka think that there might be disturbances if PF does not win.

More on this soon.

THE TAZARA (TOTAL TIME: 2 DAYS 1 HOUR 26 MINUTES)

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UPDATE: The photos to accompany this post can be found here.

Note: I will post some photos to accompany this post as soon as I get to a place with a faster internet connection. The post is from Friday, September 2nd.

Over the last two days I have been on the TAZARA from Dar es Salaam to Kapiri-Mposhi. The ride lived up to my expectations, despite the many unexplained delays along the way – the longest was a 4-hour wait in Mbeya (where we stopped either to have the engine serviced or wait for the other train from Zambia).

The train was rather old and showed years, if not decades, of disrepair. That said it was clean and livable. The sleeper coaches had two bunk beds each and were swept twice over the whole journey. They had pillows, a bed sheet and a blanket for the beds. The bathrooms were cleaned every few hours by the tireless crew. The train had lounge and restaurant cars. The lounge had a bar with an assortment of beers from Kenya and Tanzania (I had Tusker the whole way). The restaurant had a limited menu of rice or chips and beef or chicken. In the morning they served breakfast of egg, sausage and sliced bread with tea. Food is served both in the restaurant and in the passenger cars.

The view along the way was fantastic. The Tanzanian side was sparsely populated while the Zambian side was almost empty. We were unfortunate to pass through Selous Reserve (in Tanzania) during the night so we didn’t see any wild animals on the way. Perhaps the ride from Zambia back to Dar passes through the reserve whilst the sun is still up. But animals aren’t the only natural attraction on the Dar-Kapiri line.

The stunning beauty of the Tanzanian and Zambian countryside more than made up for not having seen any wildlife. The sunrise and sunsets were spectacles to behold. The mountains and rolling hills also provided great views. And then there are the smooth endless rides across the plains of northern Zambia between Mpika and Serenje and again onwards toward Kapiri-Mposhi. 

The ride also exposes the endemic poverty in rural Tanzania and Zambia. Quite frankly this was the low-point of the two days.

And it is not just the grass-thatched structures that betrayed their occupier’s meager incomes. At every stop kids with their whole bodies covered in dust would run along the tracks screaming “kopo kopo” (kopo is Swahili for bottle) in a rather bizarre re-enactment of The gods Must be Crazy. People on the train threw empty water bottles, sweets and other items at the kids. Some of them begged for money from the handful of passengers on first and second class cars in the rear of the train.

Day One (Tuesday-Wednesday): 



The departure from Dar was delayed.

The previous day I had missed my Akamba bus out of Nairobi in the morning (I overslept and even my older brother’s valiant attempt to get me there on time did not help) and so had to fly to Dar in order to not miss the Tuesday afternoon train. I arrived in Dar on Monday at around 2 PM in the afternoon. Traffic was terrible. I could not find accommodation at the first three places I checked. The fourth place looked rather sketchy – enough to spook even a true Nairobian like me.

So I settled for the pricier Rainbow Hotel close to downtown. The room was very nice – it had a hot shower, air-conditioning and satellite TV. It also had an over-priced restaurant on the second floor that served very well made Indian food. 

On arrival in Dar and before going on my hotel hunt I asked the Taxi driver to take me to the train station so I could book my ticket for the next day. The lady at the counter calmly told me that the train was fully booked (first class) until the following Tuesday.

I did not have a week to spend in Dar so I pleaded with her, to no avail. She directed me to the coach class counter with the option of upgrading to first class along the way. I was not wiling to risk sitting in coach for two days. So I bought a first class ticked for the 6th of September (a week later) but decided to try my luck anyway the following day (Tuesday) in case there were any cancellations.

The next day the same taxi driver drove me to TAZARA two hours before the 2 PM reporting time. He then asked one of the luggage handlers if there was any way we could get a ticked before the 2 PM departure time. The man directed us to the office of the stationmaster. It is in there that the lady in charge called the ticket office and asked the person on the other end of the line to sell one Ken Opalo a ticket in first class for the 2 o’clock train. She then took my other ticket. No questions asked.

Because of my desperation to take the TAZARA, I had just been robbed of US $80. Thanks very much TAZARA.

It turns out this is an elaborate scheme: The lady at the counter puts up a sign saying that tickets are sold out until the following weak at which point passengers must see the stationmaster and pay a premium for available tickets. This elaborate scheme has its glitches. For half the trip we had in my compartment a guy who had been sold a ticket in a women only compartment. He slept on the couches in the lounge car the first night.

Departure time was 4.30 PM. In just under two hours dusk was upon us and with it came the darkness that is the African countryside at night. I tried reading but promptly fell asleep. I was however woken up by the loud snoring for the guy on the top bunk and couldn’t go back to sleep for the better part of the long stop at a town called Mrimba.

Wednesday morning I was up by 6.30 AM. I read until the breakfast guy came to the compartment. Thereafter I continued reading until the 4-hour stop at Mbeya where I managed to get off the train and stretch my legs. After Mbeya I went to hang out in the lounge and read a bit more until it was dinner time. By the time the sun set I was so tired that I fell asleep as soon as I finished dinner.

Day Two (Thursday):

Thursday morning I woke up at 5.35 AM. One of the guys in my compartment was getting off at Kasama. He and I had build a sense of camaraderie since leaving Dar es Salaam several hours earlier. He is a globe-trotting businessman and evangelist from Kasama – the Capital of Zambia’s Northern Province. He passionately assured me that Michael Sata will win the Zambian presidential election in three weeks and that the opposition “will not accept anything but victory.” The opposition slogan is “Don’t Kubeba” or don’t say.

The main opposition party is urging its supporters to take all the government money being dished out but not say who they’ll vote for. We helped him offload his many bags and gifts for his family through the window of our compartment. The train then left for Mpika.

Northern Zambia is mostly empty. For hours upon hours we did not see much except trees and the occasional telephone masts and power lines. Human settlements were rare and far in between. The long monotonous ride offered me time to read Railroaded by Stanford’s Richard White. The book provides an excellent account of the political economy of the development of North America’s great transcontinental railroads – I believe that at its inception in the 1970s TAZARA had the same dreams of linking the continent of Africa from coast to coast.

Soon the lunch waiter came knocking. At this point the ware of being in a loud and shaky contraption for almost two whole days was beginning to show. People were quieter. The train was emptier. Everyone was dying to get to Kapiri-Mposhi. I had my last meal on the train – kuku na wali. I then went back to reading in anticipation of the last stop at Kapiri-Mposhi. Even the fact that I still had another leg of the journey to Lusaka (this time by bus) and that I had not yet confirmed my accommodation once I got there did not interfere with my sense of accomplishment. In a few hours I was about to have endured one of the longest train rides in the world.

We arrived at Kapiri-Mposhi at 4.56 PM. The whole journey had take exactly 2 days 1 hour and 26 minutes. The two days without a shower or change of clothes was definitely worth it.

Now I had to endure another one and a half hour bus ride to Lusaka.

As I mentioned above the train schedule was rather unpredictable. But I managed to note down the times on which we arrived at some of the main stations along the way. Here is the schedule for the August 30th train from Dar to Kapiri-Mposhi:

Dar es Salaam 4:30 PM

Nzenga 5:38 PM

Watu 6.00 PM

Kisaki 8.21 PM

Mrimba 11:30 PM

Makambako 8:30 AM

Kangaga 10.08 AM

Rujewa 10:30 AM

Inyala 1:28 PM
Yore 1:53 PM

Mbeya 2:14 PM (we stopped here for 4 hours!!)

Mabrizi 6:33 PM

Idiga 7:05 PM

Tanduma-Nakonde 10:00 PM (Tan-Zam border. We left at 11.15 PM)

Kasama 5.35 AM (Central African Time. The rest of the times below are also CAT)

Mpika 8.45 AM

Kalonje 10.23 AM

Serenje 1.03 PM

Kapiri-Mposhi 4.56 PM

TOTAL TIME: 2 DAYS 1 HOUR 26 MINUTES

in zambia for the next two and a half weeks

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I have not been able to blog for the last several days because of my ongoing summer trip to eastern and southern Africa.

I was briefly in Dar es Salaam where I took  the TAZARA to Zambia.

I have several posts on the TAZARA, Kenya, Tanzania and Zambia that I will avail to my readers as soon as I get back to Palo Alto. Internet in Zambia is extremely dodgy and slow.

Be sure to follow the Zambian general elections.

being frank about dodd-frank

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The proponents of Dodd-Frank present the issue in such a way that one may think that eastern Congo is a sovereign, independent country. The legislation fails to place the problems of the Kivus in the context of a national crisis that requires robust engagement at the national level. The Enough Project has been eager to display a letter of endorsement signed by 35 Kivu-based civil society groups. That is hardly a buy-in by the Congolese at the national level.

Unless Dodd-Frank is about US consumers and companies, the activists and their partners in Congress should confront the real causes of the conflict, which are failed leadership and corruption in Kinshasa, and predatory policies of Rwanda and Uganda who destabilize eastern Congo while benefiting from the trade. Cleaning up eastern Congo requires the courage to denounce, and pressure all guilty parties through a variety of means, including International Criminal Court indictments, freezing the assets of militia leaders and their backers, and diplomatic pressure on the governments of DRC, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania.

Real change will only happen when a combination of bold measures is part of a comprehensive policy that addresses the crisis’ multifaceted nature as was done with blood diamonds for Sierra Leone and Liberia. These measures included UK-sponsored military intervention and state-building initiatives, the restoration of state authority, the dismantlement of militias, the Kimberly process and the pursuit of justice, which eventually led to the arrest of Liberia’s former President Charles Taylor. Pretending otherwise in DRC would be disingenuous.

That is Hoover fellow Mvemba on Huffpost. I concur.

One Day I Will Right About This Place: A Memoir

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After reading the Economist’s rather harsh review of Binyavanga’s new book I decided to order it on Amazon. I was not disappointed (although I must admit that the Economist was right as far as editing goes. They could have done better).

The book is vintage Binyavanga, a fast paced read with insertions of commentary hear and there. The political commentary could have been done better – but that might just be the Political Scientist in me wanting more. I also felt like Binyavanga could have done more telling of the struggles of a young writer. How many manuscripts got rejected? How exactly did he discover his calling to become a writer? (he talks a bit about how he loved reading and hated other subjects in school but it would have been nice to know how as an adult this happened).

The book is great in many respects, but for me what did it was the combination of witty political commentary and a narration of a struggle against family expectations and personal failures.

I highly recommend it.

What I am reading right now

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Siaya is hot and rainy – it rains every day in the afternoon. I am not kidding.

This has allowed me time to read when I am not hanging out with my extended family or doing some of my own work.

I finally started reading Portfolios of the Poor. Fascinating read, especially now that I am spending some time in Siaya. My time in Siaya has also made me think that poverty is not just about small, irregular and uncertain cash flow. It is also about ideas and mindsets. I have talked to quite a few people who would be living in better dwellings and eating better if only they had the right ideas. I have seen theoretical works in evolutionary game theory on inter-generational transfer of ideas and stuff, but almost no empirical social-scientific work on the uptake of ideas within communities.

I am also reading Fukuyama’s Origins of Political Order. Great book, with echoes of Huntington all over the place. I have my issues with Huntington and his scions but the fundamental concept of the degree of government being an indispensable precondition for political competition and socio-political development is hard to ignore. I highly recommend this book.

Lastly, I am almost done with Poor Economics. Great read for those not well versed with the amazing world of RCTs. I happen to be one leaning more towards structural reforms rather than targeted program interventions, but it is still a good read nonetheless.

Maintenance of infrastructure still a major challenge in Africa

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A good measure of state effectiveness is how well stuff is maintained. In well run places repainting is always on schedule. Potholes are fixed. And the light bulbs are not loose. I was reminded of this fact while on transit in Addis last Friday.

In 2006, the last time I was there, Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa was a swanky new airport. It made me feel like JKIA in Nairobi was a joke. But only five years later the place is a shadow of its former self. The loos are poorly maintained, especially the one near gate 8: It only had one urinal and there was only one elderly lady cleaning both the gent’s and the ladies’ thus creating a lot of awkwardness.

The problem at the Addis airport ails the infrastructure of most of the developing world. Roads, buildings, gardens etc are all poorly maintained. It’s like no one sees the potholes, the peeling paint or the overgrown gardens. Or may be no one cares. Either way the lack of maintenance imposes very high costs since the once in a while maintenance drives oftentimes start when it is too late – which invariably means that the whole thing (especially with roads) has to be done again.

This is a void (infrastructure maintenance) that can be filled by the private sector. IFIs that finance these major infrastructure projects to begin with can, in conjunction with domestic governments, hire private companies to maintain the expensive roads, bridges, airports, etc. This will not only save money but also create jobs for millions of young men and women who have very little prospect of finding gainful employment

The decline of odious ODA?

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The Economist has a piece outlining the paradox of Indian overseas development assistance (to the tune of 11 billion over the next 5-7 years). With figures from the CIA factbook I have calculated that about 300 million indians live below the poverty line. The Economist piece also touts the emergence of middle income donors, especially among the BRICs.

In this world Europeans and Americans no longer dominate aid. China is the biggest source of investment in Africa and the Gates Foundation is as important as many donor governments (and much more innovative). Private capital flows to Africa outstrip aid flows, contradicting an old justification that aid is necessary because investors hold back.

For the poorest, the new donors are more important because Western aid is shrivelling. Congress is proposing to chop American aid by a fifth. Brazil is giving more to the Somali famine than Germany, France and Italy combined. There are exceptions: Britain and Australia promise to boost aid spending. But they seem like a last hurrah of Western generosity.

Adding that:

In this new world the justification for aid and the behaviour of donors must change. For India and others, it is far from clear why the government should send aid abroad when it has so many poor people at home. No doubt, aid will be defended as a boost to global influence. The risk for India is that, just like the West did in the 1960s, it will pour money into grand projects which fail—and encourage bad government.

I disagree with this latter assessment. It is not aid per se that caused the epic governance problems facing most of the low-income countries of the world. Sure it stunted the co-evolution of accountable government and domestic revenue generation. But the biggest failure of aid was what it was spent on.

Aid being highly fungible meant that most of the money wound up in the private accounts of venal leaders and gun-runners.

Things have since changed a bit. For instance, China’s resources-for-infrastructure deals can be a model for Aid 2.0 (this no doubt needs some tweaking too, as this damaging expose on Sino-Angolan oil deals shows). Plus this time the infrastructure investments are different. In an earlier period most of the investments were overtly white elephant projects (like Moi’s infamous hydro-electric dam in Turkwel). Most of the current projects are in roads, telecoms, and to some extent agriculture – investments that will have a much bigger impact because of their broader reach.

You can find a related earlier post here.

More on Eritrea and armed groups in eastern Africa

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While Eritrea has in the past been repeatedly accused of supporting Somalia’s Islamist militia Al Shabaab, a charge it strenuously denies, the current report catalogues Afewerki’s growing notoriety in the world of terrorism finance, and in particular the global web through which these funds are routed, with Kenya serving as a global transaction distribution hub.

The report details the country’s activities in funding the terror group, following the money trail from its citizens in the diaspora in Europe and North America, through Dubai and the Eritrean embassy in Nairobi, and into the hands of Al Shabaab, all the while concealed in convoluted and opaque informal financial networks.

That is The East African reporting on Eritrea’s support for armed groups in the wider eastern African region. Mr. Afewerki’s actions are a threat to regional security for the following reasons:

1. Eritrea’s (opportunistic and cynically instrumental) use of Islam as a galvanizing force (against “Christian” Ethiopia) threatens to ignite a wider regional conflict that would probably include North Sudan and Egypt. The reason this is likely is because:

       (a) Remember that the use of the waters of the Nile continues to be a source of friction between Egypt and the riparian states of eastern Africa. Egypt itself has in the past been linked to armed groups in Somalia opposed to Ethiopian rule of the Ogaden region. Both countries have a history of funding rival clan militias in Somalia. In all of this the principle of my enemies’ enemies’ are my friends will most likely apply.

        (b) Because of its own problems with South Sudan, North Sudan might have an interest in using Eritrea’s networks to destabilize its southern neighbor. Recently the government of South Sudan banned all people of Somali origin from entering the country by land for security reasons. Juba clearly suspects either direct or indirect links between Khartoum and the myriad armed groups in war-torn Somalia

2. Given that the groups it supports (e.g. al-Shabaab) have other enemies besides Ethiopia, President Afewerki has effectively declared war on countries like Uganda, Burundi, South Sudan and Kenya that have also either been attacked or threatened by al-Shabaab. I wouldn’t be surprised if one or two of these EAC states decided to materially support the Ethiopian side the next time Addis and Asmara fight over their barren disputed border lands.

Quick hits

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Guide to arguing on the internet (HT Lauren).

Speaking of arguing on the internet, I like the drama that is spats between economists and other academics on their respective blogs.

The Economist presents the faces of famine in the Horn. It is beyond sad that so many people should be condemned to suffer this man-made tragedy.

Brett Keller has posts here and here on Sam Childers (a.k.a. machine gun preacher), a gun-runner into the habit of doing morally and ethnically dubious things in the name of God. Keller says that Childers is “stockpiling arms at his orphanage and has admitted to selling weapons to unnamed armed factions in Sudan, Uganda, and Rwanda.”

In Zambia (where I shall be for the elections in Sept.) the politics of citizenship and belonging are yet to be settled 50 years after independence. We recently witnessed the dangers of de-legitimizing whole sections of countries as outsiders in Cote d’Ivoire. I hope that if Sata ever wins he will not do what incumbent Ivorians did to ignite a rebellion in the northern reaches of their country. For more on this check out this great book on the Ivorian collapse. I have read it and absolutely loved it.

A muddy few months ahead for the South African government. Infighting with the ANC top brass might mean an early exit for President Zuma. With over 60% of the votes in the last election, the ANC is essentially an oversize coalition prone to internal wrangles. It will be interesting to see how Zuma weathers the storm in the midst of challenges from both COSATU and Malema.

Lastly, the current issue of the Journal of African Economies looks at the impact of higher education in Africa. The main takeaway is that the low quality of education at lower levels (primary and secondary) has meant that the biggest bang for the buck on the Continent, as far as education is concerned, only comes with higher education. Too bad that many of those that get higher education are underpaid or out of the Continent all together.