Lusaka, Zambia — Authorities in Zambia have announced measures to tighten enforcement of cybersecurity laws, saying the move is aimed at curbing online hate speech, propaganda, defamation and child abuse. But critics say the change is aimed at clamping down on freedom of expression.

Zambian Home Affairs and Internal Security Minister Jack Mwiimbu told journalists this week that the government has activated section 54 of the 2021 Cybersecurity and Cybercrimes Act.

“A person who with intent to compromise the safety of another person publishes information or data presented in a picture, image, symbol or voice or any other form in a computer system commits an offense and is liable on conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years,” Mwiimbu said.

“The public is urged to adhere to the law and avoid social media posts that may make them come into conflict with the law,” he said.

Mwiimbu also warned administrators of social media platform WhatsApp to remove what he called illegal posts made in bad faith, saying they will be held responsible for any publication of such information.

Analysts say whatever the stated intentions of the cybersecurity crackdown may be, the wording of the law is broad, vague and could be used to stifle media freedom.

Lorraine Mwanza, chair of the Zambia chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa, said she dislikes the section of the cybersecurity law authorities say they will tightly enforce.

“This section is inimical to freedom, to freedom of expression, media freedom and meaningful accountability, especially on public officials who can easily invoke this section of the act,” she said.

In a statement on social media platform X, Musa Mwenye, the former attorney general and president of the Law Association of Zambia, joined the many who have spoken out against the Zambian government’s move.

Human rights activist Juliet Chibuta said the new measures are a violation of digital rights.

“Digital and other online platforms must be left open to allow citizens to participate,” she said. “Digital rights entail the ability for citizens to enjoy their rights of freedom of expression [and] access to information online without hindrance.”

The Southern Africa Center for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes, a human rights organization, criticized the online restrictions.

Arthur Muyunda, acting executive director of the group, said, “For them to invoke the section, it shows that they are also determined to shrink the civic space, which has already been shrinking using other laws. We appeal that they should reverse that invocation as it will suppress the voices of the people.”

During her visit to Zambia in 2022, Amnesty International Secretary General Agnes Callamard urged authorities to repeal legislation that can be used to clamp down on public dissent, including the Public Order Act and the Cybersecurity and Cybercrimes Act.

Callamard said the two laws have been used to suppress human rights, especially freedom of assembly and expression in Zambia.
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nairobi, kenya — The U.S. government says it is set to expand the Lobito Corridor – a railway project that runs from Angola to Zambia through the Democratic Republic of the Congo – all the way to the Indian Ocean through Tanzania. The railway would connect African countries to global markets and enhance regional trade and economic growth, supporters say. 

Speaking to reporters online Wednesday, Helaina Matza, the U.S. acting special coordinator for the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment, spoke about progress made on upgrading and extending the Lobito Corridor.

Matza, who just finished a weeklong trip to the DRC and Tanzania, said the trip focused on “relaunching our partnership with the DRC and engaging with the Tanzanian government and private sector on next steps towards extending the economic corridor to the Indian Ocean. As President [Joe] Biden has said from day one of the launch of this flagship effort, this corridor has never just been about building infrastructure. It’s about offering high-quality, sustainable infrastructure projects that deliver lasting economic growth.”

The U.S. government, with the support of the European Union, African financial institutions, and the governments of Angola, the DRC and Zambia, is working to rebuild and revive the Benguela railway line that the countries used to export materials and minerals even before independence.

The project will be financed by $250 million supplied by the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation.

U.S. officials say the improved railway line is meant to enhance export possibilities for Angola, the DRC and Zambia. The partly refurbished railway has already carried shipments of Congolese copper to Angola’s Lobito port for shipment to the city of Baltimore on the U.S. East Coast.

Erastus Mwencha, former deputy chairperson of the African Union Commission, said transport systems like the Lobito Corridor can help improve trade among African countries.

“One of the reasons intra-Africa trade is low is because of poor transport networks,” Mwencha said, adding that goods can sometimes be brought from Europe to Africa at more competitive rates than goods being moved from one African country to another.

But Mwencha is worried that the ports and railways used to export Africa’s raw materials remain largely the same as they were during colonial times, and that Africa is also still operating on a colonial-era business model.

“Are we going to follow the colonial model of just bringing these raw materials and minerals and exporting them, or are we going to add value?” he said. “To me, that’s the more important aspect.”

Studies show that a poor transportation network in Africa adds 30 percent to 40 percent to the cost of goods traded among African countries, hampering the development of the private sector.

Matza said the Lobito project would benefit not only the U.S. but also African countries and would facilitate business on the continent.  

“When you bring trade routes down from 45 days to 36 hours,” she said, “it opens up a whole new world for markets, and that’s what we’re testing here today: How can we help new agribusiness develop?  What are the right places to think about cold storage, warehousing, logistics?  What local food producers can we help support along the way?”

In addition to refurbishing existing lines, the project envisions adding 1,300 kilometers of railway from Zambia to Tanzania.  The project is slated to be finished by 2029.
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Johannesburg  — Chinese lending to Africa rose for the first time in years in 2023, new research by Boston University’s Global Development Policy Center showed Thursday. But the $4.61 billion loaned last year is still far less than China’s commitments to the continent pre-pandemic.

In the heady early days of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s global infrastructure project, the Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI, China’s loans to Africa surpassed $10 billion each year.

That lending dropped sharply at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and stayed low as China experienced its own economic slowdown. The decrease in loans also came as some African borrowers entered drawn-out debt overhauls.

Lucas Engel, a data analyst who co-authored the Boston University study, explained why he thinks lending was up somewhat in 2023 despite China’s troubles.

“Investment should be viewed in the context of China’s overall economic heft and the importance China attaches to its relationship with Africa,” Engel said, “especially strategically important long-term borrowers that China has developed close relationships with.”

The Boston University paper found a couple of trends when analyzing China’s loans to eight African countries and two regional financial institutions last year. The researchers said one thing that was unique was that more than half the money was loaned to African multilateral banks.

They said this was likely a form of risk mitigation, and Cobus van Staden, managing editor at the China Global South Project, a thinktank based in Pretoria, agreed.

“If you’re lending to African multilateral institutions, that means you are in a mix of lenders and there are de-risking mechanisms in place, partly because the risk is also separated across many actors,” van Staden said. “If you’re lending bilaterally, particularly to a government, then you … the risk impact is higher.”

Despite this growing risk aversion, the researchers noted China was still lending to three major longtime borrowers: Angola, Nigeria and Egypt.

Critics have accused China of ensnaring African countries in “debt traps,” by which large sums owed to Chinese companies make African governments beholden to Beijing economically and politically. However, economists have widely debunked the “debt trap” theory.

Another thing the Boston University research found was that China was once again committed to energy lending after a two-year hiatus. China committed loans to three renewable energy projects in Africa in 2023, in solar and hydropower.

This is in line with China moving away from the large infrastructure projects of the past to so-called “small is beautiful” projects and a “green BRI.”

Lauren Johnston, associate professor of China studies at the University of Sydney, said it was not surprising that despite the 2023 uptick, China’s loans to Africa hadn’t rebounded to anywhere near previous levels. She noted that initially China was financing large projects like the building of dams, roads and railways. Now, that’s done.

“Maybe this is like a period of consolidating those investments rather than just carrying on and building the next big investment,” Johnston said. “It’s a period to consolidate and grasp the economic value and imbed the returns and successes, and learn from any issues with those earlier loans.”

Next week, Xi will address African leaders gathered in Beijing for the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation.

Van Staden said some new loan announcements may be made, but he added a caveat.

“I don’t necessarily expect a single big number,” he said. “I think the announcements will probably be more diffuse.”

Boston University’s Engel said it was difficult to estimate the volume of financing that would be announced at the summit, but he expected pledges in diverse areas of cooperation.

The Chinese embassies in Pretoria and Washington, D.C., did not immediately respond to VOA’s request for comment.
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Yaounde, Cameroon — Journalists in Cameroon say attacks on reporters have surged as the country prepares for next year’s presidential elections. Ninety-one-year-old President Paul Biya, who has ruled the country for over four decades, may run again. Rights groups say six journalists have been assaulted by gunmen in the past weeks, while several reporters and a radio station have been ordered to stop broadcasting.

The Network of Cameroon Media Owners, or REPAC, says four of its members have been brutally attacked by men armed with rifles and machetes in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, in the last three weeks.

Emmanuel Ekouli, publisher of the weekly newspaper La Voix du Centre and Cameroon correspondent for Reporters Without Borders, which promotes and defends press freedom, was attacked by armed men in front of his home last week, according to REPAC.

Ekouli told VOA he was stabbed several times and that his telephone, recording equipment and laptop were taken.

REPAC said that last week armed men also tried to abduct its president, Francois Mboke, the publisher of the newspaper Diapason, but that his neighbors raised an alarm and the armed men escaped.

Xavier Messe, publisher of the Le Calame newspaper and Arsene Nkonda, publisher of the Identities newspaper, were also attacked by men with machetes this month. 

Besides the physical attacks on journalists, Cameroon media professionals say they are increasingly being silenced as Cameroon prepares for next year’s vote.

President Biya, who has ruled Cameroon for over four decades, has not said whether he will run in the October polls, but his supporters have called on him to seek reelection.

REPAC says Biya’s supporters, especially government ministers, are trying to intimidate the media organizations that criticize the president’s long tenure in power.

At RIS FM radio in the capital Yaounde, a guard told VOA that staff members, including journalists, have not been coming to work since armed policemen closed the station this month. 

Innocent Tatchou, the station’s information director and editor-in-chief, says he is certain that government officials, uncomfortable with RIS FM’s strong denunciation of endemic corruption, ordered Cameroonian police to close the media outlet without prior notice. He says RIS FM has filed a court complaint for the seal to be lifted so that the station can resume broadcasting.

Cameroon’s National Communications Council says RIS Radio and its station manager, Sismondi Barlev Bidjoka, were suspended for six months for broadcasting what the council claimed were unfounded and offensive statements against Biya’s top aide, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh.

Bidjoka has accused Ngoh of corrupt practices, a claim Ngoh denies.

Council President Joseph Chebongkeng Kalabubse denies allegations the government is using the council to silence journalists. However, he says some journalists need a refresher course on ethics. 

“In the days ahead, we will deploy council members to organize workshops and seminars to be able to sensitize and educate our peers on what is at stake and the expectations from them,” he said, speaking on Cameroon state Radio CRTV. “All these are measures which the council is taking to ensure that as we gear up towards the 2025 presidential elections, we will be able to live up to expectations.”

Cameroon’s Union of Journalists reports that two presenters of political TV programs were also attacked by unknown men this month.

Eyong Tarh, secretary general of the Center for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa, says African journalists and media organizations are often attacked before, during and shortly after elections because governments do not want reporters to expose the continent’s rampant corruption and theft.

“Whenever elections take place in Africa, international media, like the BBC, like the Voice of America and private media houses expose malpractices,” he said. “As a result, journalists, the media houses that are involved in such reporting usually go through so much intimidation from the governments.”

Human Rights Watch said in July that it is becoming increasingly difficult to speak freely in Cameroon, adding that as elections approach, authorities should fully respect Cameroonians’ freedom of expression.
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Johannesburg      — As the West clamps down on imports of green technology products from China, the world’s biggest manufacturer is looking for new markets, and that is a topic analysts say will dominate the agenda next month at a Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, or FOCAC, in Beijing.

The high-level meeting, held every three years, will be the first since the world emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic and China suffered its own economic slowdown. It also comes amid growing geopolitical rivalry and as China shifts the priorities of its global infrastructure-building project, the Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI, to what it has dubbed “the green BRI” and “small is beautiful” projects.

The theme of the meeting, which takes place from September 4-6, is “Joining hands to promote modernization,” and Lin Jian, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman, said it will “open up new vistas for China-Africa relations.” One of these areas, according to China’s ambassador to South Africa, Wu Peng, will be “to support Africa’s green development.”

While many African countries — some of which are facing energy crises — will welcome help with their transition to renewables, Paul Nantulya, a research associate for the Africa Center for Strategic Studies in Washington, explained that China also “benefits greatly.”

“If you look at green growth for instance, the technology which is marketed to African countries, which African countries have to buy, either through loan finance or directly through commercial entities, that’s one way in which China benefits,” he told VOA.

And China needs new buyers.

China’s overproduction woes

China is the largest producer of solar batteries in the world and in 2023 accounted for three quarters of global investment in overall green technology manufacturing, according to data from the International Energy Agency. It also produced more than half of the electric vehicles sold worldwide last year.

Its lead in these industries has resulted in rising competition with the West. The United States and European Union have enacted protectionist policies, increasing tariffs on products from China including electric vehicles, batteries, solar panels and critical minerals. Europe and the U.S. want to boost their own manufacturing and create jobs.

“We see China’s products are increasingly facing restrictions in the U.S. and Europe, and I believe China will be looking for alternative markets in Africa,” Cliff Mboya, an analyst with the Pretoria-based China Global South Project, told VOA.

However, he said African governments could use China’s woes on that front as a bargaining chip. While China is the continent’s biggest trade partner, it exports a lot more to Africa than it imports.

“We know that China previously promised more market access for African products, so as China looks for the African market for some of its products that are facing high tariffs and limitations in the West…it presents an opportunity to negotiate for more access of African products into the Chinese market,” Mboya said.

The West is concerned about possible “dumping” by China, in which it floods foreign markets with cheap exports to get rid of its global trade surplus. Mboya said that should also be a concern for African governments.

“We should also be able to negotiate and ensure it doesn’t lead to dumping of these products into the continent because we also need to create employment for our youth and also ensure that we are also able to produce some basic goods in the continent,” he said.

In sub-Saharan Africa, 70% of the population is under the age of 30, according to data from the United Nations.

Ambassador Wu didn’t mince his words when talking about the “sensitive issue” at an event in South Africa earlier in August.

“In 2023, China also produced nearly 9.5 million electricity vehicles, EVs, and exported nearly 1.8 million EVs to the world,” he said. “Some people blame China for so-called overcapacity.”

“Europeans or the U.S. already — or will — levy high tariff rates against these EVs.”

“Let’s wait and see alright? If they can catch up to produce more EVs, affordable for the customers in a very quick way…no problem. But if they don’t, I think it’s a little bit unreasonable,” he continued.

China, however, is facing a mismatch in supply and demand for its products. Last year, its solar cell production doubled global demand and in July, major solar panel company Longi Green Energy Technology logged a net loss of some $750 million.

“There’s significant parallels between the excess capacity China faces now in its clean technology sectors, as with the excess capacity a decade ago in heavy industry and infrastructure, which was when the BRI was initially launched,” Yunnan Chen, a researcher at London-based research group ODI, told VOA.

China used the BRI to “offshore” its domestic industries and build markets for its infrastructure in developing countries, and it is now doing the same with renewable energy, she added.

“Tariffs from Western markets is another accentuating pressure that will make middle-income emerging markets even more important for Chinese goods, and even for the offshoring of production lines and supply chains to be able to access EU and Western markets via third countries – as we’re already seeing in Vietnam and Mexico,” she said.

Pivot to Africa

Chinese Ambassador Wu said the FOCAC will focus the needs of African countries in the energy transition and that “China will encourage Chinese enterprises to invest.”

He said that new energy cooperation could become a growth driver and a highlight in economic and trade cooperation between China and South Africa specifically.

But Yun Sun, director of the China Program at the Stimson Center in Washington, said FOCAC’s focus on green technology and energy wouldn’t necessarily be a boon for Africa.

“It does not necessarily put Africa in an advantaged position in the global supply chain. For example, China has a number of lithium assets (mines) in Africa and that technically could be called green energy and technology cooperation between China and Africa,” she said.

“Traditionally, Africa had been a source of raw materials for China, such as oil and minerals. If now it is lithium and other critical minerals used for green energy, how is it different from before?” she added. “Mining and processing whose benefit for locals are debatable.”

Besides green technology, the analysts expect FOCAC will also focus on areas including agricultural modernization and trade, information technology and connectivity, and education and training. African leaders will also be looking to get a one-on-one with China’s leader, Xi Jinping.

Some African countries, which borrowed heavily from China and are saddled with debt, are facing pressure at home.

Kenya, for example, has been rocked by anti-government protests. But experts say they doubt African leaders will push for debt restructuring publicly, to avoid embarrassing China.
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WASHINGTON — The United States is urging certain foreign nations not to fuel Sudan’s civil war by arming fighting factions, as the country faces one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

Meanwhile, Washington has also called on Sudan’s warring sides to enforce a code of conduct to reduce abuses, noting that the army is considering the proposal after its rival paramilitary forces have agreed to it.

More than 25 million people face acute hunger and more than 10 million have been displaced from their homes since fighting erupted in April 2023 between the Sudanese Armed Forces, or SAF, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, the State Department said.

“Unfortunately, we’ve seen a significant proliferation of the number of external actors that are playing a role on both sides,” and they are not putting the interest of the Sudanese people “at the core of this,” said Tom Perriello, U.S. special envoy for Sudan.

“In addition to UAE [the United Arab Emirates] supporting the RSF,” Perriello told reporters on Tuesday, “we see foreign fighters coming in from across the Sahel. We’ve seen Iran, Russia, other negative actors on the SAF side.”

U.S.-brokered peace talks on Sudan that concluded last week in Geneva failed to end the country’s 16-month conflict. But one of the warring sides, the RSF, agreed to a code of conduct pledging to avoid violence against women, exploitation at checkpoints and the destruction of crops.

Perriello said that the U.S. has presented the proposal to the SAF leaders who were absent in the Switzerland negotiations.

“They have the code of conduct in front of them. We hope to get a response from them in the coming days,” Perriello said.

The United States has accused the SAF and RSF of war crimes, with the RSF specifically charged with ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity targeting the indigenous African-origin people of Darfur.

During the talks in Geneva, the U.S., along with representatives from the African Union, the United Arab Emirates, the United Nations, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Switzerland, focused on reopening three humanitarian corridors — the Western border crossing in Darfur at Adre, the northern Dabbah Road from Port Sudan and the southern access route through Sennar.

Later this week, the U.S. will have a first formal follow-up with the heads of delegations.

Humanitarian assistance deliveries have resumed via two of the three routes: across the border at Adre from Chad and along the Dabbah Road into famine-stricken areas of Sudan.

In a statement late Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken welcomed the reopening of humanitarian corridors, saying lack of humanitarian aid access into Darfur over the past six months has exacerbated the historic levels of famine and acute hunger across Sudan, particularly within the Zamzam camp.
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Nairobi, Kenya — Few countries have been hit harder by climate change than Kenya, where more frequent droughts and floods have become a fact of life for much of the country. One woman who won a contest to be named Miss Climate Kenya is working to build climate resilience and convince people to adapt to a changing world. At the same time, a farmer in western Kenya is denying the existence of climate change and defending the exploration of fossil fuels in Africa.

Over the past two decades, new weather patterns have become all too common in eastern Africa, killing off crops, pasture and livestock. Conversely, Kenya saw heavy flooding that killed dozens of people and displaced tens of thousands more this year.

Twenty-four-year-old Dorcas Naishorua, who was named Miss Climate Kenya in May, has experienced what climate change can do to lives and livelihoods. Naishorua is a member of the Maasai tribe. Her community relies on livestock for survival. Members move from one place to another in search of water and pasture for their animals to survive. 

“Since the onset of the serious climate crisis, I have personally been affected by it,” she said. “The same livestock my parents depended on to take me to school, most of them were lost during the drought, and due to that, I had to cut short my education.”

Naishorua said she is using her platform to educate her community about climate change and how to deal with its effects.

“We have stopped lamenting,” she said. “Now we have a drought. What changes are we bringing? So, through my capacity, I have been engaging with different rescue centers. I have been with different schools in tree growing and sensitization what is a tree and what tree to plant where I have been doing that on my platforms.”

But as some activists try to build climate resilience, Kenyan farmer Jusper Machogu is attracting the attention of climate change deniers or skeptics, and his social media network is growing by the day.

Just today, he shared a video on X of former U.S. President Donald Trump denying climate change and said, “I think he represents some of my views, and so I kind of like him.”

Machogu, a farmer in Kisii, Kenya’s highland region, says he denies climate change is taking place because he believes it is hard to predict weather patterns.

Mochugu, who is also an agricultural engineer, says he supports the exploration and use of fossil fuels, which scientists have shown to be a major factor in global warming due to the emission of carbon dioxide. 

Machogu says clean energy sources cannot replace fossil fuels like oil and gas.

“We have plenty of fossil fuels,” he said. “We have plenty of natural gas. We have it in Uganda. We have it in Nigeria. We have oil in Angola, Namibia, all of these countries. But now we’re being told that we should not use that to flourish. We should not use it.” 

And he spoke of the importance of fossil fuels.

“And most people don’t realize how important, how crucial fossil fuels are,” he said. “Like we can’t have steel if we don’t use fossil fuels; there is no way to produce steel minus fossil fuels. Most people have heard that solar and wind are going to save the world, but solar and wind is just electricity.”

African farmers have experienced severe impacts from climate change. Weather patterns have become unpredictable, making it difficult for them to prepare land, grow food, and harvest on time.

Environmental earth scientist Edward Mugalavai says climate change skeptics could be won over with greater development of clean energy sources. 

“When you touch on the issue of fossil fuel, then it is like you are telling people you reduce industrialization,” he said. “That cannot happen. But what we are coming up with is to come up with green energy solutions where people can continue to industrialize but use green energy that does not pollute the environment. But if you have alternatives, people can easily accept the changes that are taking place.”

Naishorua, Kenya’s Miss Climate, said those denying climate change should check how their environment has changed over the years.

If that is too difficult to observe, she said, then they should take care and protect the environment around them.
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Gaborone, Botswana  — More than 30 African countries will be represented at a military law conference set to begin Tuesday in Lusaka, Zambia. Participants will discuss the role of legal advisers in the deployment of troops as conflicts threaten stability across Africa.

The four-day African Military Law Forum will be co-hosted by the Zambian Defense Force, the U.S.-Africa Command (AFRICOM), U.S. Army Europe and Africa, and the North Carolina National Guard.

Participants, who will include military leaders and magistrates, will focus on legal advisers and their role in the deployment of troops to missions.

AFRICOM’s deputy legal counsel, retired Colonel Max Maxwell, says it is critical to ensure the rule of law is followed when troops are deployed.

“Militaries deploy outside their borders to sometimes very remote places,” Maxwell said. “We want them to follow and adhere to the rule of law. What I mean is, soldiers are held accountable, commanders have legal advisers and soldiers are inculcated in professionalism. In the end, we want armies that people run to and not run from.”

Maxwell said promoting professional conduct is crucial for the successful execution of the troops’ mission.

“When an army is held accountable and they are professional and the commanders have legal advisers, then the result is that the army is more likely to execute the mission successfully and it helps mitigate negative results,” he said. “This standard of conduct promotes partnership and helps focus militaries on the rule of law, specifically professionalism. It is especially true in the face of increased challenges and more complex conflicts.”

Brigadier General Dan Kuwali from Malawi said Zambia meeting participants would also discuss ways to help soldiers avoid human rights violations during deployments.

Malawi has deployed hundreds of soldiers in the conflict-torn eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo as part of the Southern African Development Community mission.

“We are here to build capacity as legal advisers in order to help our troops to avoid violations, but also to be able to ensure accountability for violations,” Kuwali said. “We also want to promote professionalism, because if we comply with the law, we are regarded as a professional force.”

The seventh African Military Law Forum is being held at a time when the United States is bolstering military and security ties with African partners.

Eswatini’s legal counsel, Captain Portia Magongo, said it is imperative to involve legal advisers during deployments.

Legal advisers “are more in a strategic position when it comes to decision-makers, when it comes to commanders,” Magongosaid. “Be it political, be it military policies that they have to decide on, legal advisers are always there on an advisory level. When it comes to deployment, those deployment decisions come after being advised.”

Africa is battling increased instability, particularly in the Sahel region where a jihadi insurgency has ramped up attacks.
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Maputo, Mozambique — Mozambique has begun a 45-day election campaign to choose the next president, with four hopefuls looking to succeed President Filipe Nyusi. He will step down in January at the end of his second five-year term.

More than 17 million registered voters will choose the country’s new head of state and 250 members of parliament in the October 9 election.

The ruling Frelimo’s party’s presidential candidate, Daniel Chapo, is expected to face a stiff challenge from Venancio Mondlane, who is running as an independent.

The other two candidates are Ossufo Momade of the former rebel Renamo party and Lutero Simango of the Mozambique Democratic Movement.

The eventual winner will have to deal with the long-running insurgency in the oil- and gas-rich province of Cabo Delgado as well as widespread corruption.

Speaking Saturday in the central port city of Beira, Frelimo’s Daniel Chapo emphasized that he was born into a poor family that lived for two years in captivity during Mozambique’s civil war and overcame adversities to become a public servant. Chapo said he is the right man to reverse the country’s economic fortunes.

“We want to combat bureaucracy, combat corruption and create laws that facilitate a good business environment,” he said, “so that investors, whether national or foreign, can come and invest in Mozambique.”

With this investment, he said, there will be more jobs, more salaries and companies will pay more taxes.

Running under the slogan “Save Mozambique!, this country is ours!” Venâncio Mondlane started his campaign in a Maputo suburb, where he promised to create an honest and transparent government and remove Mozambique from the list of the poorest countries in the world.

“We want to put an end to a partisan state once and for all,” he said. “We want a clean state, a state that works for the people and by the people. We want the resources exploited in the provinces to be used in projects in the provinces to develop those regions.”

These will be Mozambique’s seventh general elections since the advent of multiparty democracy in 1994, two years after the government signed a peace deal with Renamo to end a 16-year civil war that killed an estimated 1 million people.

Renamo has not won a national election since then. Frelimo has ruled Mozambique since 1975 when the country won independence from Portugal.

On Friday, the head of the National Electoral Commission, Carlos Matsinhe, called for peaceful elections and asked that everyone abide by election rules to avoid possible post-electoral conflicts.

“Let us not use the electoral campaign to promote disorder, incitement to hatred, moral violence that has led to insults and defamation,” he said. “We must also avoid physical violence and/or other forms of injustice, as all competitors are compatriots and only occasional adversaries.”

In an interview with VOA, scholar and Reverend Marcos Macamo appealed to the candidates to not dwell on the past to settle old scores.

“The issue must not be power, power. It must be the nation to move forward,” Macamo said. “If we come to an agreement, whoever wins, the nation will move forward. With you, I or both of us, let it happen.”

The issue isn’t so much why the country is not moving forward or who is to blame, he said, “but what will you or I do to overcome the situation? Because these wounds of the past are complicating the situation.”

The European Union ambassador to Mozambique said Saturday it will send a mission of 130 observers to monitor the elections.
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ACCRA — The two main contenders in Ghana’s presidential election have launched dueling manifestos promising fiscal stability, jobs and a path out of the country’s worst economic downturn in a generation.

Voters will head to the polls on Dec. 7 to elect a successor to President Nana Akufo-Addo, who is stepping down at the end of the two terms he is allowed to serve as head of the West African gold, oil and cocoa-producing nation.

The election will pit ex-president John Dramani Mahama of the main opposition National Democratic Congress party against Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, an economist and former central banker, from Akufo-Addo’s ruling New Patriotic Party.

No party has ever won more than two consecutive terms in government in Ghana’s democratic history.

Frustrations about economic hardship have tainted Akufo-Addo’s presidency. Ghana defaulted on most of its $30 billion external debt in 2022 – the culmination of years of overstretched borrowing compounded by the COVID pandemic, the knock-on impacts of the war in Ukraine and a rise in global interest rates.

The government sought help from the International Monetary Fund and is now restructuring its debt as a condition for a $3 billion support package.

Both Mahama and Bawumia laid out their policy promises over the weekend ahead of a vote analysts predict to be tight two-man contest, even though others are running.

Mahama, 65, vowed to scrap first-year university fees to boost tertiary education and reduce taxes during his first three months in office.

“I will lead a ruthless war against corruption” and recover misappropriated assets, he told supporters in the south central city of Winneba on Saturday.

Mahama invested heavily in infrastructure during his 2013-17 presidency but drew criticism over power shortages, economic instability and alleged state corruption. He was never directly accused of wrongdoing but oversaw the government that was. His government denied wrongdoing.

NPP critics say graft continued and grew worse under Akufo-Addo’s administration. His administration has also denied wrongdoing.

Bawumia promised to simplify the tax system, almost halve the number of ministers and cut public spending by 3% of GDP.

Addressing reporters in the capital Accra on Sunday, he outlined a plan to provide digital training to one million young people to help them find jobs.

Both candidates are from northern Ghana, a long-standing NDC stronghold in which the NPP has made inroads over the past years.
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ABUJA, Nigeria — At an intersection seven miles from the presidential villa, frustrated drivers honk as a herd of cattle feeds on the grass beautifying the median strip and slowly marches across the road, their hooves clattering against the asphalt. For the teenage herder guiding them, Ismail Abubakar, it is just another day, and for most drivers stuck in the traffic, it’s a familiar scene unfolding in Nigeria’s capital Abuja.

Abubakar and his cattle’s presence in the city center is not out of choice but of necessity. His family are originally from Katsina State in northern Nigeria, where a changing climate turned grazing lands into barren desert. He moved to Idu — a rural, bushy and less developed part of Abuja — many years ago. But it now hosts housing estates, a vast railway complex and various industries.

“Our settlement at Idu was destroyed and the bush we used for grazing our cattle cut down to pave the way for new houses,” Abubakar said in a smattering of Pidgin English. It forced his family to settle on a hill in the city’s periphery and roam the main streets for pasture.

Fulani herders like Abubakar are traditionally nomadic and dominate West Africa’s cattle industry. They normally rely on wild countryside to graze their cattle with free pasture, but the pressures of modernization, the need for land for housing and crop farming and human-caused climate change are challenging their way of life. To keep cattle off of Abuja’s major roads and gardens, some suggest that herders need to start acquiring private land and operating like other businesses. But to do that, they’d need money and government incentives.

“It’s disheartening,” said Baba Ngelzarma, the president of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, a Fulani pastoralists’ advocacy group. “Nigeria is presented as an unorganized people. The herders take the cattle wherever they can find green grasses and water at least for the cows to survive, not minding whether it is the city or somebody’s land.”

He added that part of the problem is the government’s failure to harness the potential of the livestock industry by offering incentives such as infrastructure like water sources and vet services at designated grazing reserves and providing subsidies.

For its part, the government has said it will address the issue, previously promising fenced-off reserves for cattle herders. President Bola Tinubu announced in July a new livestock development ministry, which Ngelzarma said would help revive the abandoned grazing reserves. No minister has been appointed.

Fewer places to go

Nigeria is home to over 20 million cows, mostly owned by Fulani herders. It has the fourth largest cattle population in Africa, and its dairy market is valued at $1.5 billion. But despite its size, almost 90% of local demand is met through imports, according to the U.S .International Trade Administration. It’s a sign of the industry’s inefficiency, Ngelzarma said, as cows stressed from constant moving and poor diets can’t produce milk.

For Abuja, the city’s environment bears the consequence, and so do businesses when traffic grinds to a halt because cows are crossing busy roads. And in other parts of Nigeria, herders are often involved in violence with farmers over access to land, especially in central and southern Nigeria where the two industries overlap with religious and ethnic divisions.

There are four designated grazing reserves in rural areas surrounding Abuja, but they lack the needed infrastructure and have been encroached on by other farmers and illegal settlers, according to both Ngelzarma and Festus Adebayo, who’s executive secretary of the Housing Development Advocacy Network.

With those reserves not functioning, herders set up settlements anywhere and stay for as long as they can before legitimate owners claim it or the government builds on it.

Mohammed Abbas, 67, has repeatedly had to move locations over the years. Most of his current settlement in the city’s Life Camp neighborhood has been taken over by a newly constructed petrol station, and he is aware that the remaining land will soon be claimed by another owner.

As a smallholder pastoralist, he said he could not afford to buy land in Abuja for a permanent settlement and ranching. To afford one, “I have to sell all my cows and that means nothing will be left to put on the land,” he said in Hausa, sitting outside his hut.

Other pastoralists would rather resist.

“We are not going anywhere again,” said Hassan Mohammed, whose family now occupies a strip on the edge of a new estate near the Idu train station. Once a vast bush, the area has been swallowed by infrastructure and housing projects. Mohammed now also drives a lorry on the side because of the shrinking resources needed to keep cattle.

Despite repeated orders from the owners to vacate, Mohammed said that his family would stay put, using the dwindling strip as their home base while taking their cattle elsewhere each day for pasture. The landowners have repeatedly urged the government to resettle Mohammed’s family, but the government has yet to take action.

“Many don’t have anywhere to call home, so they just find somewhere to sleep at night with the cattle,” said Mohammed, in Hausa. “But for us, we are not leaving except there is a new place within Abuja.”

Making room for development and cows

Folawiyo Daniel, an Abuja-based real estate developer who has endured difficulties with pastoralists that affect his project development, said the issue is a failure of urban planning.

“Real estate development is not the problem,” he said, and the government should revive grazing reserves in the city for pastoralists.

Adebayo, from the Housing Development Advocacy Network, agreed, saying “it is time” for Abuja’s minister Nyesom Wike to take action and prove that “the problem of open grazing in the city of Abuja is solvable.”

Herders should be moved to a place designated for their work or restricted to defined private property, he said.

The official responsible for animal husbandry in the agriculture ministry said they could not comment on a major policy issue without authorization, while the spokesperson for the ministry in charge of Abuja declined a request for an interview.

But in March, after the Belgian ambassador to Nigeria raised concerns to Wike about cattle roaming Abuja’s streets, he replied that efforts were in progress to stop the indiscriminate grazing without disclosing specific details.

Herders say they are not opposed to a restricted form of herding or practicing like a normal business that buys their own feedstock instead of using free pasture and water wherever they find them.

The problem, according to cattle association chief Ngelzarma, is that the government has neglected the sector and does not provide incentives as it does other businesses, giving the examples of irrigation systems for crop farmers and airports for private airline operators paid for by the government.

“The government should revive the gazetted grazing reserves fitted with the infrastructure for water and fodder production, training and veterinary services and generate jobs and revenues,” Ngelzarma said.

“Then, you can say stop roaming about for free pasture,” he said.
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