Africa Conflict Monitor - May 2016

The month of April that is the subject of our new ACM was fraught with tension between African peoples aspiring to more secure, prosperous and most importantly, equitable lives and a host of national leaders who place as their paramount objective their personal ambitions and power. In South Africa, President Jacob Zuma was reprimanded by the nation's Constitutional Court for seeking to manipulate government institutions to escape having to pay back public money spent on his private homes. Yet, Zuma seemed hardly fazed as he brushed off calls for resignation over corruption. In Gambia, a dangerous despot, Yahya Jammeh, oversaw the deaths and arrests of political opponents who might have interfered with his re-election. Jammeh expects to manipulate the polling in the same manner and with the same success as what Equatorial Guinea's Teodoro Obiang Nguema and Uganda's Yoweri Museveni did earlier this year.

Conflict at a glance

Terrorists and their offspring, such as the pirates of the Gulf of Guinea, continued their agenda of death and mayhem throughout the Sahel, North, East and West Africa. Central Africa's political turmoil expanded as the nefarious actions of unaccountable leaders raised tensions and the numbers of conflict migrants. Corruption sparked protests throughout the continent and tarnished the reputation of stalwarts from South Africa's liberation movement. The period shone with Africans' hope for less conflicted lives, as demonstrations throughout the continent protested not just against corruption but also the political overreach of national leaderships. Africans' view of basic freedoms is evolving into awareness that these are rights to which they are entitled.

Dovetailing into the findings of a major UN report on African corruption, leaked documents showing African leaders' shadowy financial manipulations assist calls for reform.

Power and privilege : Africa's shadowy financial outflows

Fleeing from war zones, migrants are not simply helpless victims adrift in refugee camps. Many are skilled workers who enrich the economies of their host countries, which more often than not are other African nations.

Africa's Sahel region spans the continent from the Atlantic to East Africa, encompassing scores of countries and dozens of diverse populations. ACM continues our discussion of the security concerns with Laurence-Aida Ammour, an Algerian/French analyst with expertise in international security and defense affairs. She is one of IOA's expert North African consultants, and has previously worked with the likes of Oxford Analytica, the US State Department, AFRICOM, the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) and many others. From cross-border crime, insurgencies and terror organisations, the Sahel poses challenges to national and regional security planners.

International financial and military support continues for Africa's most strategic country in efforts against terrorism and because Egypt is a key player in the Middle East. But, the Cairo government's autocratic tendencies concern Western governments that have human rights agendas.

Comparatively speaking, of course the regime of Uganda's President-for-Life Yoweri Museveni is less severe than the murderous pathology of Idi Amin's dictatorship. Such a comparison does little to succour victims of government abuse, impress international investors or charm human rights organisations.

The Nigerian navy steps up sea patrols to contain piracy in the Gulf of Guinea. With kidnapping for ransom proving more lucrative than hijacking ships to steal cargo, stealthy pirates are stepping up abductions in waters increasingly dangerous for freighters, tankers and passenger ships.

Under the autocratic government of Pierre Nkurunziza, extra-legal killings and suppression of political opposition go unchecked. Government's propaganda machinery cannot mask a classic Central African reign of terror from a sceptical international community.

Not since South Africans joined to end apartheid has a movement for change been so virulent, but this time the target for reform is the once-impeccable African National Congress (ANC).

The decline of metal prices, inadequate infrastructure and corruption hamper the exploitation of the country's vast mineral deposits; but new energy sector projects and increased investment in bauxite and aluminium production will support economic growth beyond 2016. President Alpha Condé has prioritised internal security and economic revival.

Although the island nation's government relies heavily on international aid, threats to political stability, ineffective governance and the slow pace of reform discourage foreign investors. Decreased harvests of a leading export, vanilla, and a dispute in the nickel mining industry will diminish economic growth in 2016.

Yahya Jammeh's reign of terror may be restricted to his own country but the dictatorial rule of Gambia's President-for-Life is an embarrassment for a continent seeking peaceful and equitable governance. At present, the international community will do no more than express displeasure at Jammeh's excesses.