Kibaki has narrowed Raila’s lead to just 8 percentage points. Raila’s lead has gone down to about 500,000 votes. There are still more results expected to come in from the Rift Valley and other parts of Nyanza that had irregularities. Central Kenya came out almost 100% for Kibaki.
It is not yet over. Not until all the results come in. This election, as was predicted, is going to be a close one despite ODM’s visible confidence in the likes of Ruto and Balala.
I am watching KBC and the mood seems to be indicative of the imminent announcement of a Raila victory. Kibaki is trailing the ODM candidate by almost a million votes. KBC, the state channel has shown victory speeches by Ruto, Balala and Nyong’o. Uhuru also appeared for a brief moment telling Kenyans to be patient and wait for the ECK to announce the results.
The state channel seems to have sensed the change and therefore is no longer sounding like a pro-government mouth piece that we have come to expect of it since independence. This sounds more like what happened after the 2002 elections.
Ruto made a speech about the winds of change that are sweeping through the country. Balala and Nyong’o talked about celebrations in readiness for the work ahead next year. Visibly tired and worn out Uhuru sounded disraught in the wake of the utter collapse of the Kibaki tena campaign.
The president’s campaign team had this election to lose and they seem to have done so in style. Raila is leading by a Nyanza-esque margin in Rift Valley, a known Kanu heartland. The opposition leader is also leading in Western, Coast, Nyanza and by a slight margin in North Eastern.
Kibaki is leading in Central and Nairobi (slight margin). While Musyoka has a commanding lead in his Eastern province backyard.
Confirmation has arrived that Ndile has lost his seat. He will be missed a lot.
The national presidential results are finally trickling in. ECK has also started regular updates with the parliamentary and presidential tallies. Interesting results thus far. Kibaki is still trailing Raila by over half a million votes. KBC has started acting like the GoP is going to lose. But there are still millions of uncounted votes. It’s definitely going to be a close election between Kibaki and Raila, going by the provinvial numbers.
Parliamentary results show that ODM will have a majority in Parliament. PNU candidates have lost to either ODM or one of the many sub-PNU parties. ODM-K has had a decent showing in Eastern Province with most of Ukambani voting for ODM-K candidates.
So far the VP and 18 ministers have lost their seats. These are: Musikari Kombo, Newton Kulundu, Kipruto Kirwa, Moses Akaranga, Simeon Nyachae, Njenga Karume, Raphael Tuju, David Mwiraria, Mohamud Abdi Mohammed, Morris Dzoro, Suleiman Shakombo, Mutahi Kagwe, Paul Sang, Kivutha Kibwana, Mutua Katuku, Joseph Munyao and Kalembe Ndile.
These big upsets have also reflected on the presidential vote with ODM beating PNU in areas that were deemed to be PNU strongholds – Kombo and Nyachae being prime examples.
more to come soon…
With just under four days to go, there is still no clear front-runner in the upcoming general elections in Kenya. According to the latest opinion polls, there is a statistical tie between the incumbent President Kibaki and the veteran opposition politician Raila Odinga. Many observers have acknowledged that this is going to be a very closely contested election and therefore there is need to keep it absolutely free and fair because whoever wins will not do so with a wide margin – unless we have been fooled all along by the opinion polls, a fact that is not entirely implausible since statisticians have been known to get it wrong some times.
Statistics and opinion polls aside, the whole world is watching; which gives Kenya an opportunity to demonstrate that true democracy can flourish on the continent of Africa. The onus is on the electoral commission of Kenya to ensure, as they have guaranteed, that there are no irregularities in the December 27th poll. Only then will the losers of the election concede defeat respectfully and allow the country to move forward with whoever gets elected as president.
Even though the two major parties do not differ much in terms of their ideals and the contents of their manifestos, I think electioneering is still an invaluable process because it gives a sense of empowerment to the majority of voters since it makes them engage their leaders and feel as part of one country, even if just for the brief period of campaigns and emotionally charged political rallies as we have witnessed in the last three months.
May Kenya emerge on the 28th of December a united and peaceful nation state ready to move forward with a sound development agenda.
Equatorial Guinea is the third largest oil producer in Africa, right after Nigeria and Angola. Equatorial Guinea also has just over half a million people. It therefore defies logic that this country should still have many of its people living in squalid conditions. This country ranks 121st out of 177 on the UN Human development Index, even though it has a per capita income (PPP) of 50,200 (CIA Factbook) – only second to Luxembourg in the entire world! Why are many Equatorial Guineans still dirt poor, dying from treatable illnesses and ignorant? Where is Teodore Obiang Nguema Mbasogo taking all the oil money?
This is a shame to the continent and to Obiang and his cronies. It is high time African leaders became their own keepers and fostered a culture of intra-continental competition rather than their old-school collusion to steal all they can from the poor and dying, as is happening in this fabulously wealthy country. This is especially important now that the EU and the US – because of competition for resources with China – have decided, like the latter, to turn a blind eye to gross injustices like this one.
With a total population smaller than those of most African capitals, and with all the oil money, how hard can it be to keep track of everyone and ensure that all Equatorial Guineans are well fed, educated and healthy?
Even Desmond Tutu, the Nobel Peace Price laureate dubbed as South Africa’s conscience during the apartheid years, could not persuade the delegates at the ANC Congress in Polokwane not to elect Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma as their party’s next president. The eminent Nelson Mandela opted to stay above the fray on this one, citing impartiality but may be also because he saw it as a foregone conclusion. The mistake that was Zuma’s election is the full responsibility of Thabo Mbeki. This is a man who throughout his presidency has remained aloof and insensitive to South African street and village talk. Even at the congress he found it proper to bore the crowd with a more than two hour long speech on policy issues instead of pandering to their populist instincts. This was a vote against Mbeki in the same vein that many reasonable people had hoped that it be a vote against Zuma.
The implication of a Zuma presidency for South Africa is an issue that South Africans will have to deal with themselves. It may even be (hopefully) the era that finally corrects the injustices of the apartheid period. What worries me is how his presidency will pan out in the wider region. Mbeki, like the Ghanaian Nkrumah, was a lousy president at home but a great pan-Africanist. He was a key architect of the African Union and the NEPAD initiative. Mbeki was also an ideologue – of the tempered kind that Africa woefully lacks – who took time to seriously think of solutions to Africa’s problems. Mbeki had the courage to dream of an African Renaissance even as poverty and underdevelopment still plague the continent.
Of course the wishes of the South African people should supersede those of other Africans when they choose their leaders. I am also glad that Zuma’s election happened in a democratic manner. Institutionalization of democracy within the ANC, as I have pointed out before, is important since it is this party that will be electing South Africa’s president for many years to come – barring any major break-up. This said, I think it is important to acknowledge that South Africa, being the regional hegemon, has considerable influence in Africa. Because of this, people in Harare, Dakar or Nairobi have a reason to care and think of how outcomes in South African politics affect them.
Zuma, a man without much formal education, lacks the intellectual abilities that Mbeki has exhibited ever since his heydays as an ANC exile. He has proven to be a populist and to the best of my knowledge has not shown much interest on the region as a whole. If he chooses to be a domestic leader, like he seems he will, his election will indeed end up being a loss to the African people who desperately need visionary continental leadership to correct the evils of poverty, disease, ignorance and bad leadership.
The other day I came across some stats that got me thinking. It is apparent that at the current rate of population growth, Africa’s population will double in the next half century (Even after having discounted for malaria and – according to the Economist – the over-estimated AIDS figures). This can either be a blessing or a curse.
It could be a blessing due to the fact the non-viability of some African states is because they are too sparsely populated and do not have big enough internal markets to support robust economies or generate enough revenue in terms of taxes to pay for effective government. Therefore, a big population would bring more good than harm. I am not saying that the solution to Africa’s poverty and lack of development is a higher population growth; I am just making the observation that populous Ethiopia is more viable as a sovereign state than huge but thinly populated Chad or Niger.
The negative effects, however, are more real and immediate. As it stands, Africa cannot feed its entire population – hence its current reliance on food imports and relief to meet the balance. Furthermore, due to rather dismal economic performance over the last four decades, the population growth rate has far outstripped economic growth. As a consequence, Africa is the only region in the world where per capita incomes have declined since the seventies. The ideal solution to this problem would be to simply increase the rate of economic growth to surpass that of population, but this cannot just be made possible with a magic wand. It will take time.
The situation therefore calls for a clear and well formulated population policy. If Africa is to take off economically and improve its deplorable average living standards, it has to arrest the high rate of population growth (continental average fertility is more than 5 children per woman, the world average is below 3). This need not be some China-like thing, I believe that with the right incentives to families and insistence on longer and better education of girls the situation can be changed. Studies have shown that, on average, better educated women tend to have fewer, healthier and better educated children.
In the future though, with proper planning, I think it is in the continent’s best interest to have a big population. By some estimates, Africa can support upwards of 1.5 billion people with its 28% arable land (China has 13%). A big and economically vibrant population will not only be invaluable in reducing the continent’s over-reliance on foreign trade (internal trade accounts for paltry 10%) but also for strategic security purposes.
After spending more than a decade as a pariah state due to its involvement in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing of Pan Am flight 103, Libya is finally being brought back into the fold by Europe and to some extent the United States. The Europeans, led by France, have been the most eager, especially after Libya released a bunch of European medics it was due to punish for their involvement in the infection of young Libyan children with the virus that causes AIDS.
The biggest beneficiary of this new state of affairs has been none other than col. Muammar Gaddafi, Guide of the First of September Great Revolution of the Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. Over the past few months, he has made amends with the EU who then agreed to build a prison centre in Libya for the detention of the many illegal African Immigrants who risk their lives to get into Europe every year. This has been seen by many analysts as just a precursor to more aid and closer relations.
Most recently, Gaddafi visited France where he was warmly welcomed by the hyperactive Nicholas Sarkozy. This was even after a junior minister in the French government said that “France was not a doormat on which the Libyan leader could wipe off the blood of his crimes.” According to Reuters, Gaddafi is expected to lead his delegation in negotiations over business deals worth billions of Euros – from a nuclear powered sea water desalination plant to French made fighter jets.
Amid all this, one wonders whether Europe’s new found pragmatism is good or bad for the citizens of the global south. Previously it was the US that had the bad habit of jumping into bed with dictators as long as it was in their strategic interest to do so while the EU remained principled with regard to democracy and human rights. Now that China has jump into the pond and muddied the water, especially in Africa, Europe has also chose to turn a blind eye to human rights violations and poor governance.
I agree that trade with Africa is a good thing and that economic empowerment of African citizens should not be contingent on democratization on the continent. After all, democracies can only flourish in countries with a sizeable, economically well off middle class. All this, however, should not be done with complete disregard for past crimes of some of the leaders involved. Gaddafi may not be as bad at home as Mugabe or Bashir but they all belong to the wrong group of African leaders – iron fisted despots who believe that they have a right to rule for life.
Jose Socrates has done well to host the Afro-European get-together, after all it was his ancestors who pioneered the spirit of European adventurism across the seas which resulted in conquests of other peoples and the resultant colonialism.
But the party, as expected, has turned into a contest of who can outdo the rest in saying not so nice things about one Robert Mugabe. You’ve got to give it to this aging dictator for showing up knowing quite clearly that he was going to be welcomed not with polite kisses and back rubs but with vitriol.
And so today the bashing bagan with the German chancellor, and a lot more is to follow. It will be interesting to see which African leaders take the cue and say bad things about their brother Mr. Rob – although almost none of them, the possible exceptions being Festus Mogae and Navin Ramgoolam, has any moral authority to do so.
It is sad that the summit, or may be it’s just the media attention, has ended up not concentrating on issues of economic development and free trade which are most important to most Africans (to whom Darfur and Zimbabwe, by the way, are just as distant as they are to Venezuelans) but on the crises on the continent. The AU should have known better than to allow the two social misfits from Khartoum and Harare to attend the bash and hog all the attention because of their bad habits.
This week’s economist newspaper has a piece on the issue of “agflation” – the recent upsurge in global food prices. The rise in food prices should be a wake up call to least developed countries whose populations mostly depend on food aid to keep body and soul together.
The fact of the matter is that as food prices rise, the cost of sending food aid will go up and if the donors who distribute this food do not get additional funding they may have to cut their budgets – meaning more poor people in the world will have to die of undernutrition related deaths.
But can this be avoided? The answer to this question, I can dare say with “high confidence,” is a simple yes, and here is why.
Ideally, rising food prices should be good news for countries who still consider agriculture to be the backbone of their economies. (mostly in Africa and the rest of the global south) What this means is that these countries will have a chance to earn more forex from their exports of wheat, maize and what not. But this is not the case. Most of these agri-economies are net food importers because their arable land potential is not being maximised. This is largely due to poor farming practices in the underdeveloped countries and food subsidies in the global north that make farming not so attractive to entrepreneurs.
The WTO, among other such international institutions, has failed to resolve this adverse state of affairs but it is my hope that may be now that prices have gone up Washington and Brussels will finally cut off their subsidy-addicted farmers and let Adam Smith’s invisible hand do its work in determining returns on agriculture and thus give global southerners a fairer chance. At the same time, governments of the underdeveloped agri-economies should strive to be food sufficient – like Malawi has recently done, without much help from outside.
Following the Berlin conference circa 1884-5, Europe has always felt obligated to care about matters African – be it during the colonial period or in the post colonial era. This historical accident resulted in an Afro-European relationship that has mostly been characterised by tension and mistrust.
But things are changing. These days the two peoples talk of a “constructive engagement” and a cessation of paternalistic lecturing by the (former) colonialists. Although some leaders of Europe still suffer from what a Zimbabwean daily calls “an apparently incurable colonial master hangover,” most of them have moved on and come to see African countries as sovereignties that deserve to be treated with respect.
It is under this new arrangement that the EU-AU summit is being held in Lisbon, Portugal. Although the summit has been marred by a lot of controversy – from Mugabe’s attendance to Brown being accused of sending a junior cabinet member to the summit simply because she is black – it still has potential to provide the framework for a more productive relationship between the two continents based on trade and exchange of ideas.
Brussels has realised that its aid to Africa – sometimes due to guilt, but mostly because of humanitarian concern – is not sustainable in the long run. It has dawned on the EU that investment in African economies and allowing freer trade is the only way that is going to alleviate poverty in Africa and make the EU competitive against the Chinese and the Americans who have significantly increased their respective trade involvements with Africa over the last few years.
My hope is that the summit will focus on trade (making it fairer and easier) and good governance. With regard to trade, the EU should commit to reducing all non-tariff barriers to trade with the continent – from the controversial agricultural subsidies to the rather tasteless “place of origin” labels insisted upon by some pesky pressure groups. On matters to do with government, Brussels (and especially Sarkozy’s men) should send a clear message that they will not prop up leaders who do nothing but steal from and oppress their people. They should do this openly and explicitly. Previously, Europe has shied away from direct criticism in fear of the African leaders playing the race and neo-colonialism cards. But these sorts of Africans are a tiny left over of the immediate post-colonial period. Majority of Africans would welcome such criticism and even offer support it if indeed it is good natured rectitude.
So on the whole, the success of the Lisbon Summit will depend on the attending leaders’ commitment to addressing the issues that are most relevant to the average farmer in the African countryside: fair trade and good governance.
I am not a fan of talk shops. That said, I am still very open to discussions in summits like the upcoming African-EU summit. The summit is intended to discuss trade relations between the two continents. Europe, having realised that China is fast taking up its position as the “Chief bank roller” on the continent is trying to make amends.
Another issue that will cloud the summit is the situation in Zimbabwe. Now that Rob is attending the summit and Brown chose to make a big deal of it, it has taken center stage and will definitely form part of the discussion – thereby taking vital time and resources away from pan-continental issues that could be more beneficial to a great number of Africans. Zim is in dire straits. But the more press we give Rob the bigger his head gets. He should be cut off and denied an audience, after which Mbeki should oust him and give Zim back to Zimbabweans.
Back to the summit, I think as the EU strategises on how to help the continent, it should move away from the previous peace meal deals that are not sustainable. Instead, there should be a genuine focus on industries that add value on African products before they are exported instead of wasting too much time on the issue of agricultural subsidies. The African delegation should also remind the Northerners not to be too pesky about the origin of flowers and fruits – as long as these items are fresh and edible and not growth through conscript labor.
On the whole, I hope that the summit goers know that we are in the 21st century – the age of broadband – and so they should strategize on ways of making Africans sufficiently well off soonest possible so that they can also get to enjoy the fruits of these wonderful times.
So the Chinese, with their increasing hunger for raw materials, have been scouring the African continent looking for all manner of trade partnerships – all in an attempt to secure the supply of the essentials needed to fuel the East Asian monolith’s fast growth.
A stroll through many an African capital – at least in the East of the continent – will reveal a number of things Chinese. You won’t miss the Chinese workers laying out fiber optic cables or paving roads or even selling food in a Chinese restaurant. After years of living worlds apart, the lion and the panda have decided to become bosom buddies.
But is the relationship symmetrical? Can the panda and the lion cohabit in a sustainable and mutually beneficial manner? Many people have complained that the coming of the Chinese to the African continent will only serve to exacerbate the continent’s position as a mere source of raw materials. I beg to differ. This stance assumes that Africans and their leaders do not know what is good for themselves and are easily fooled – in the past by the Europeans and now by the Chinese.
The Africa that Europe encountered back in the nineteenth century is very different from the one that the Chinese are engaging with today. Furthermore, the Chinese are not here to merely take away things the way Western Europe did, they pay for the stuff they take. They may not pay well enough but the point is that they pay, plus there is no hand-chopping bula matari or a pontificating Smith Hempstone. On top of that the Chinese have created numerous jobs for the local people, be it in manual construction work or in higher level management and consultancy.
As the West continues to shy away from Africa because of the continent’s lack of or perceived lack of democratic institutions, the Chinese are taking advantage of the situation and reaping the benefits. The Africans are benefiting too.
It is high time the rest of the world took the pragmatic approach that China and increasingly India have taken in their relationship with Africa. Democracy and good institutions can only be supported by good economic outcomes and vise versa (Read scholars like Dahl, Moore, Przeworski, etc). The deepening of democratic beliefs and practices necessarily require economic development. Democracy’s proselytizers in Washington and Brussels should be informed that their lectures on liberties and human rights that are not backed by cranes, computers and jobs are akin to playing guitar to a goat.
So overall, I think that the new-found friendship between the lion and the panda is, at the macro level, a good thing. Darfur and other atrocities may tarnish this relationship but down the road we shall someday look back and with hindsight appreciate China’s contribution to Africa’s economic take-off. A word of caution for the panda though, the lion may seem lazy and unconcerned in the heat of the Savannah, but never take him for granted. He can pounce without warning and has the habit of switching lionesses with wanton abandon.
kenopalo.com 