NAIROBI, KENYA — Opposition leaders in Senegal are protesting the move to postpone elections that had been set for February 25, while some analysts say the delay hurts Senegal’s reputation as a beacon of democracy.

President Macky Sall announced the delay this past weekend, saying it was necessary because of allegations of corruption in election-related cases and the disqualification of some leading candidates, including Ousmane Sonko, who came third in the 2019 elections, and Karim Wade, son of former President Abdoulaye Wade.

Lloyd Kuveya, assistant director at the Center for Human Rights at the University of Pretoria law school in South Africa, said, “Some people are saying because of the chaos that is prevailing in Senegal, where some opposition party leaders are imprisoned, including Sonko, which is really disturbing … the elections will not be a legitimate election.”

Senegal’s parliament voted Monday to delay the election until December. The parliamentary process was chaotic as security forces escorted out some opposition lawmakers as they tried to block the vote.

On Monday, two opposition parties filed a court petition challenging the delay.

Anta Babacar Ngom, presidential candidate for the Alternative for the Citizen Succession party, said, “This is President Macky Sall’s balance sheet. It’s upsetting, because he almost left with his head held high; but now, unfortunately, he’s showing [his] true face.

“It’s a constitutional coup, and we won’t accept it.”

In July, following deadly clashes protesting a possible run for a third term by Sall, he said he would not seek one.

Kuveya said it seems like Sall wants to stay a little longer.

“Can we really trust Macky Sall?” he asked. “Everybody knows that his intentions were going for a third term, and if it hadn’t been for the protests of the people of Senegal, I am quite sure he would’ve gone ahead to change the constitution and gotten the supreme court to endorse that unconstitutional change.”

Kuveya said Sall had ample time to prepare for the February 25 elections.

“You have five years in which to ensure that there’s a conducive environment in which elections are going to be held,” he told VOA via Skype. “You have five years to allow political participation of any person who wants to contest for political power.”

Senegal has long been seen as a beacon of democracy in a region plagued by coups.

Awa Dieng Morel, CEO of France Ak Senegal, a nongovernmental organization active in the field of education, said, “It’s very sad, because Senegal is losing this image of being an island of democracy in Western Africa, and its credibility, too.

“When one sees what is happening in other countries of the subregion — like Niger, Mali, or Burkina Faso or what happened years ago … in Ivory Coast — it’s really frightening,” she told VOA by WhatsApp on Tuesday.
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Harare, Zimbabwe — Zimbabwe’s ruling party has achieved a two-thirds majority in Parliament according to by-election results released by the country’s elections commission over the weekend. That paves the way for the ZANU-PF party to amend the constitution as it wishes — including removal of the two-term limit for the presidency — but creates dread for opposition parties.

ZANU-PF now holds 190 out of 280 seats in the National Assembly after winning six seats over the weekend, according to Zimbabwe Electoral Commission figures.

Farai Muroiwa Marapira, the ZANU-PF spokesperson, attributed his party’s victory to policies of President Emmerson Mnangagwa since he took power in 2017 from the late Robert Mugabe.

“With this two-thirds majority, we will look to ensure that we process our legislation faster for the betterment of our country,” Marapira said. “ZANU-PF is the only party that has – from its inception – been focused only on ensuring that people of Zimbabwe are served and to the best of the requirements and ability.”

Maripara added that people’s trust in the party was not misplaced.

“[We] assure them that they are safe in their trust of ZANU-PF, and they will not regret this decision of trusting in policies of President Mnangagwa,” he said.

Hwange Central legislator Daniel Molokele, who is with the country’s main opposition party — the Citizens Coalition for Change or CCC — expressed worry.

“It is indeed a very dark day in the history of Zimbabwe,” he said. “The gain that had been done to stop the two-thirds majority has been reversed, but we know that parliament is no longer relevant in deciding the future of Zimbabwe. It is heavily compromised; it is now a toothless bulldog.”

The same sentiment came from Linda Masarira, leader of the Labour, Economists and African Democrats, or LEAD, party. She said the two-thirds majority just means every decision will be made on behalf of ZANU-PF and not others in the country.

“I think it is a travesty of multiparty democracy, which is actually enshrined in the constitution of Zimbabwe, and I don’t think we’re going [anywhere] very fast if we’re going to be having one party making the decisions, all the decisions for all Zimbabweans.”

Gibson Nyikadzino, a Harare-based political analyst, said the election victories should keep ZANU-PF in the driver’s seat of Zimbabwe politics for years to come.

“It also means that it will be easy for ZANU-PF to discuss proposed legislative agendas or the agendas,” Nyikadzino said. “And also at a broader national scale, it means that ZANU-PF remain a dominant party because the opposition [has] proven it lacks the capability to ideologically organize and mobilize its people or its structures.”

Zimbabwe’s next general election is slated for 2028. That’s when Mnangagwa’s second and final term will end – unless ZANU-PF changes the constitution.
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Paris — Senegal should end “uncertainty” created by President Macky Sall’s announcement that an election scheduled for February 25 would be postponed indefinitely, France said Sunday, calling for a vote “as soon as possible.”

“We call on authorities to end the uncertainty about the electoral calendar so the vote can be held as soon as possible, under the rules of Senegalese democracy,” Paris’ foreign ministry said in a statement as Senegal’s political crisis deepens.

The intervention from Paris, the former colonial power in Senegal, came as opposition presidential candidates called for a Sunday afternoon demonstration in Dakar.

They said they would launch their campaigns in defiance of the official postponement.

Senegal has traditionally been seen as a rare example of democratic stability in West Africa, which has been hit by a series of coups in recent years including in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso.

Washington and West African bloc ECOWAS both expressed concern and called for a swift new vote following Sall’s Saturday announcement.

The president said a conflict between the Constitutional Council and parliament over approvals of presidential candidacies had led to the suspension of the vote.

Opponents suspect that the president’s camp fear the defeat of his anointed successor, Prime Minister Amadou Ba.

Senegal cannot “indulge in a fresh crisis” after deadly political violence in March 2021 and June 2023, Sall said Saturday as he announced a “national dialogue” to organise “a free, transparent and inclusive election.”

The country’s electoral code states that at least 80 days must pass between the announcement of a new presidential vote and polling day — theoretically putting the soonest possible new date in late April at the earliest.

Sall’s presidential term is supposed to end on April 2.

 
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LOS ANGELES — When the biggest names in music gather Sunday for the industry’s top honors at the Grammy Awards, they will hand out a new trophy for best African music performance.

The prize reflects the growing popularity of Afrobeats, and other music from the continent, which is gaining a global audience with help from social media platforms such as short-form video app TikTok.

Afrobeats originated in West Africa, primarily Ghana and Nigeria, though the term is often used as a catch-all for various music styles coming from Africa. It features percussion rhythms mixed with various genres from rap to jazz, R&B and others.

Modern Afrobeats “has a feel-good groove to it,” said Heran Mamo, R&B and hip-hop reporter at Billboard magazine, which created a U.S. Afrobeats chart in 2022. “It’s bound to reach a wider audience because it already contains a little bit of everything for everyone.”

On Spotify, Afrobeats music was streamed 13.5 billion times in 2022, up from 2 billion in 2017.

In another milestone, Nigerian singer Burna Boy became the first African artist to sell out a U.S. stadium when he played New York’s Citi Field last summer.

Musicians in the running for the new Grammy on Sunday include Tyla, a 22-year-old South African singer. She hit the top 10 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart with the danceable Water, an example of a genre known as amapiano, a jazz- and piano-infused sound.

A TikTok executive in South Africa had noticed Tyla gaining attention in her local market back in 2020, and reached out to her with tips on how to maximize her presence on the app.

Water was released in July 2023, after Tyla signed with Sony Music Entertainment’s 6758.T Epic Records.

By September, TikTok users were replicating Tyla’s dance moves in the #WaterChallenge. To date, 1.5 million videos have been created using the song, and the #WaterChallenge hashtag has been viewed 1.8 billion times, according to TikTok.

“I think that TikTok has played the role of incubator, but also the distributor to the billion-plus global users and it’s just really landed,” said Ole Obermann, global head of music at TikTok.

Tyla’s success illustrates the power of TikTok and YouTube to help artists find fan bases around the world, a role once reserved for music labels.

“The proliferation of streaming along with new social media platforms (e.g. TikTok) has accelerated artist discovery, and have provided new mediums for artists to grow their fan bases globally,” Bank of America Securities analyst Jessica Reif Cohen said in a research note predicting media trends for 2024.

TikTok remains controversial in the United States because of its ownership by Chinese company ByteDance, which critics view as a security risk. The Biden administration has banned the app on U.S. government devices. TikTok officials say they have rigorous safeguards in place and they reject allegations of spying on user data.

The app also is in a dispute with Universal Music GroupUMG.AS over how much it pays for use of songs from Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish and others. Music from many Universal artists was unavailable on TikTok as of Friday.

For U.S. teenagers, TikTok ranks as the second-most common music discovery source behind YouTube, according to a recent MIDiA Research survey that showed 45% of 16- to 19-year-olds found new music through the platform.

Other Afrobeats artists who found audiences on TikTok include Nigerian rapper Rema. He collaborated with Selena Gomez for a remix of his song Calm Down, which hit No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and won an award for best Afrobeats at MTV’s Video Music Awards last September.

TikTok is helping to forge new connections between U.S. and African artists. Obermann said he played a short clip of a song called Ojapiano from Nigerian musician KCee for Ryan Tedder, a songwriter and lead singer for the band OneRepublic.

Tedder liked the sound so much that he immediately reached out to KCee, who jumped on a plane from Lagos to Los Angeles two days later so the pair could make a remix of the song.

Obermann hopes the soon-to-be-released remix will give new life to Ojapiano, a combination of amapiano and a Nigerian flute called Oja, and keep fueling the Afrobeats craze.

“This is going to be a big, growing genre,” Obermann said.
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GENEVA — The World Food Program is calling for immediate, unimpeded and safe access to conflict-hit areas of Sudan to provide food to millions of displaced people facing acute hunger, amid warnings that this “forgotten war” has potential implications for regional stability. 

 

“This conflict cannot be forgotten. The people of Sudan are not invisible. This conflict has wide-reaching implications, especially as we have seen 1.7 million people flee to neighboring countries like Chad, South Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia,” WFP Sudan spokesperson Leni Kinzli said Friday. 

 

Speaking in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, Kinzli urged the international community to “wake up” to the threats posed by the escalating conflict in Sudan and its potential for destabilizing the East Africa region. She said it must act “before this crisis spins further out of control.” 

 

The World Food Program, or WFP, says more than nine months of conflict has exacted an unimaginable toll on civilians. It calls the situation beyond dire, noting that almost 18 million people are facing acute hunger. 

 

Despite herculean efforts, the WFP said it has managed to provide food assistance to only 6.5 million people across the country since April 15. That is when a power grab between two rival generals of the Sudanese Armed Forces and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces plunged the country into war. 

 

Kinzli noted the WFP repeatedly has warned of a looming hunger catastrophe. She said millions of civilians trapped in conflict zones must receive aid immediately to prevent Sudan’s hunger crisis from becoming a hunger catastrophe. 

“Shockingly, the number of hungry has more than doubled from a year ago, and an estimated 5 million people are experiencing emergency levels of hunger or IPC phase 4 on the Integrated Phase Classification scale. Especially affected are conflict areas such as Khartoum, Darfur and Kordofan,” she said. 

 

“Every single one of our trucks need to be on the road each and every day, delivering food to the Sudanese people who are traumatized and overwhelmed after over nine months of horrifying conflict. Yet, life-saving assistance is not reaching those who need it the most, and we are already receiving reports of people dying of starvation,” she said. 

 

Sudan’s hunger crisis is made worse by a health crisis. The World Health Organization says Sudan’s health system, which already was overstretched before the war, now “is at a breaking point,” noting that 70% to 80% of hospitals in conflict-affected states are not working. 

“People are dying from a lack of access to basic and essential health care and medication. Critical services, including maternal and child health care, the management of severe acute malnutrition, and treatment of patients with chronic conditions, have been discontinued in many areas,” it said. 

 

Sudan currently is suffering from an outbreak of cholera, with 11 of 18 states reporting more than 10,270 cases and 280 deaths. Oral cholera vaccination campaigns it conducted in Al Gezira, Gedaref and Khartoum states late last year, protected more than 2.2 million people. 

 

Since the Rapid Support Forces seized Wad Madani, the capital of Al Gezira state, in mid-December, the WHO has temporarily halted its operations there due to security reasons. 

 

“Overall, increasing violence, mass displacement, spread of diseases such as cholera, impeded access, insecurity and looting of supplies are undermining the efforts of humanitarian partners to save lives,” the WHO said. 

 

In addition, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA, says fighting has disrupted trade and agricultural activities in Al Gezira state, known as Sudan’s breadbasket, “posing a significant threat to national food availability.” 

WFP spokeswoman Kinzli said Al Gezira was a vital humanitarian hub that previously supported upwards of 800,000 people a month before “it was engulfed by fighting in December and a key WFP warehouse was looted.” 

 

“WFP is trying to obtain security guarantees to resume operations in the area to reach vulnerable families who are now trapped and in urgent need of food assistance,” she said. 

 

If the warring parties do not allow aid organizations to operate, Kinzli warned, “We anticipate that this hunger crisis will only deepen in the coming months.” 

 

Next week, OCHA and the U.N. high commissioner for refugees will jointly launch the Sudan Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan and Regional Refugee Response Plan for 2024 to provide aid for nearly 15 million people displaced inside Sudan and nearly 2.7 million refugees in five neighboring countries. 

 

The agencies say support for the humanitarian response is crucial, noting that “10 months of conflict have come at an intolerably high price for the Sudanese people.” 

 

More than 13,000 people reportedly have been killed, and some 25 million people — 14 million of them children — urgently need humanitarian assistance.
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NAIROBI, Kenya — A vehicle loaded with gas exploded and set off an inferno that burned homes and warehouses in Kenya’s capital early Friday, injuring more than 270 people and killing at least three with the toll expected to rise.

A number of residents were likely inside their homes when the fire reached their houses late in the night, government spokesperson Isaac Mwaura said.

An explosion of a truck with an unknown registration number and loaded with gas ignited the huge fireball, and a flying gas cylinder set of the fire that burned down the Oriental Godown, a warehouse that deals with garments and textiles, Mwaura said. Several other vehicles and businesses were damaged by the inferno that started around 11:30 p.m. Thursday in the Mradi area of the Nairobi neighborhood of Embakasi.

At the scene after daybreak, several houses and shops were gutted. The vehicle believed to have started the explosion was tossed on its side, and only the shell remained on the road. The roof of a four-story residential building about 200 meters from the scene of the explosion was broken by a flying gas cylinder. Electric wires lay on the ground. Nothing remained in the burnt-out warehouse except shells of several trucks.

Alfred Juma, an aspiring politician, said he heard loud noise from a gas cylinder in a warehouse next to his house. “I started waking up neighbors asking them to leave,” Juma said.

He said he warned a black car not to drive through the area, but the driver insisted and his vehicle stalled because of the fumes. “He attempted to start the car three times and that’s when there was an explosion and the fire spread into the (warehouse) setting off other explosions.”

He said he grabbed two children and they hid in a sewage ditch until the explosions ended. His family wasn’t around, but Juma lost everything else in the fire except the clothes on his back.

Neighbor Caroline Karanja said they had to run away after the explosion after police cordoned off the entire area.

“Police were turning away everyone and so it was difficult to access my house and I had to seek a place to sleep until this morning,” Karanja said. She said the smell and smoke were still choking, and she would have to stay away for a while because she had young children.

Police and the Kenya Red Cross reported three deaths. The toll may rise after daybreak, Wesley Kimeto, the Embakasi police chief said.

Firefighters were combing through the burned area in the morning.

The government and Red Cross said 271 people were taken to several hospitals with injuries.

The proximity of the industrial company to residences raised questions about enforcement of city plans. Officials at the county government have been accused of taking bribes to overlook building codes and regulations.
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Johannesburg, South Africa — In a carefully worded response this week, China voiced its support of the U.N.’s International Court of Justice, or ICJ, ruling that orders Israel to desist from the killing of Palestinians in Gaza. Experts tell VOA that privately China has reservations about the use of such courts to deal with allegations of genocide, which could have awkward implications for Beijing.

“We hope that the ICJ’s provisional measures can be effectively implemented,” said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin when asked about the issue at a regular press conference on Monday. While the EU and U.S. reacted almost immediately to Friday’s ruling in The Hague, Wang’s comments were the first from a previously taciturn Beijing and came in response to a question from state broadcaster CCTV.

“We condemn all acts against civilians and oppose all moves that violate international law. China urges parties to the conflict to realize a comprehensive cease-fire at once, abide by the international humanitarian law,” he said.

South Africa’s case

It was the South African government — a longtime supporter of the Palestinian cause — that asked the ICJ to investigate whether Israel was committing genocide in the war in Gaza, which began in response to an attack by the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

While a final ruling on whether genocide has indeed been committed is years down the road, the court announced provisional measures in the case last week. A majority of the judges — including a Chinese judge — ruled that South Africa had a plausible case and that Israel must now take every measure to avoid causing deaths in Gaza.

Israel has slammed allegations of genocide, and President Benjamin Netanyahu reacted to the court’s order by vowing to continue the war. Israel’s key ally, the United States, played down the ruling and noted it did not call for a cease-fire. But experts said the damning nature of the ruling was embarrassing for both democracies, which are proponents of international law.

South Africa — which has a close relationship with China — hailed the ruling as a win for the so-called Global South, of which Beijing sees itself as a leader.

Israel and the U.S. are both members of the ICJ, whose rules are binding. However, there is no enforcement mechanism, so sometimes — as in the case of the court’s 2022 ruling that Russia must exit Ukraine — its orders are ignored.

Usually, China is quick to point out anything it sees as U.S. hypocrisy, but on this issue Beijing has remained tight-lipped. Some experts think that is because Beijing is afraid of the precedent it could set.

China wary

“I think China is using the ICJ decision to push for de-escalation. But it made no mentioning of genocide and called the decision a ‘temporary measure,’” Yun Sun, director of the China program at the Stimson Center, told VOA.

“‘Genocide’ is a sensitive word for China, and I doubt China wants to set the precedent that it can be declared and imposed on a sovereign country,” she said.

Paul Nantulya, a research associate at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, echoed this view.

“They are privately very worried about precedent,” he wrote to VOA. “It is very possible for a state that is not directly affected by the goings on in Xinjiang to bring a case at the ICJ.”

Nantulya was referring to China’s policies regarding the Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang province. The United Nations and rights groups have accused Beijing of persecuting the minority group, which, evidence has shown, is subjected to torture, sexual violence and mass arbitrary detention in camps.

In 2022, former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet reported China’s counterterrorism policies in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region “may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity.”

Lawyers representing Uyghurs in exile filed a case with another global judicial body, the International Criminal Court, also in The Hague, Netherlands, in 2020. They accused senior Chinese leaders of genocide, but the ICC said it could not hear the case because the alleged crimes happened in China, which — like the U.S. — is not a party to the court.

The lawyers have argued the ICC should still take up the case given evidence of Beijing’s efforts to round up Uyghurs in neighboring countries that are members of the court.

However, unlike with the ICC, even a state that is not party to a conflict can bring charges against another state at the ICJ if they are both members of the court — as are South Africa and Israel.

South Africa was the second country to use the court this way, after West African state Gambia filed a genocide case against Myanmar over its persecution of the Rohingya Muslims.

In 2022, the ICJ set a precedent by ruling it would hear Gambia’s case on the basis that all parties to the Genocide Convention have an interest in ensuring the prevention of genocide anywhere in the world.

“I don’t think this sits easily with the Chinese side,” Nantulya said, given that China is an ICJ member.

Therefore, he said, Beijing is unlikely to chide Israel, and by association the U.S., over any noncompliance. “Softly, softly will be their approach.”

Cobus van Staden, an analyst with the South African Institute for International Affairs, told VOA he thinks China shares South Africa’s position overall on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“Where I think they become more cautious is around the international institution aspect … and obviously they are wary of those tools kind of being turned against them,” he said.

Jonathan Hafetz, professor of law at Seton Hall Law School in New Jersey, likewise noted China’s “reticence in accepting the jurisdiction of international tribunals.” However, he said it was a reticence “shared by other major global powers, including the United States.”
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Addis Ababa, Ethiopia — The number of people uprooted by the war between rival generals in Sudan is around 8 million, the United Nations said on Wednesday.

U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, who was visiting Ethiopia, rallied international donors to open their wallets to fight the crisis, describing the situation as “serious.”

“The conflict has increased in intensity and in impact on civilians,” Grandi told reporters in Addis Ababa.

“Since April 2023, so less than a year ago, 8 million people have been displaced from their homes in Sudan,” he said, adding that more than 1.5 million had fled to six neighboring countries.

The conflict between Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, commander of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, erupted last April.

Diplomatic efforts to end the violence continue after numerous cease-fires have been broken.

Grandi, who was later to visit Sudan, called on donors to boost support for the influx of refugees, warning that only 40% of funding had been provided.

“This is not acceptable,” he said. “I understand that there are more crises that are more visible. But it does not mean that this is not urgent.

“I heard stories of heartbreaking loss of family, friends, homes and livelihoods,” UNHCR quoted him as saying.

As of January 21, the number of people displaced stood at 7.6 million, with children accounting for about half, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA.

Over 100,000 people, nearly half of them Sudanese, have fled into Ethiopia, according to the latest U.N. estimates.

The number of people who have gone to Chad since the war began crossed 500,000 last week, and an average of 1,500 flee into South Sudan each day, the U.N. statement said.

By January 21, almost 517,000 people had been recorded crossing the border from Sudan to South Sudan, OCHA said.

The war — which has flared in the capital, Khartoum — has killed thousands, including between 10,000 and 15,000 in a single town in the western Darfur region, according to U.N. experts.

Sudan’s army-aligned government this month spurned an invitation to a summit organized by the East African bloc IGAD and subsequently suspended its membership in the group for engaging with Daglo.

Both sides have been accused of war crimes, including the indiscriminate shelling of residential areas, torture and arbitrary detention of civilians.
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An opposition leader in Zimbabwe who spent nearly 600 days in detention while awaiting trial on charges of inciting public violence has been released. A magistrate in Harare convicted Job Sikhala on the charges but handed down a suspended two-year sentence because Sikhala had already spent so many days in jail. Columbus Mavhunga has more from Harare.
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