A New Alliance Of West African States

Mirror Image WEST AFRICA Earlier this month, a triumvirate of military leaders who oversee military juntas in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger signed a pact to establish the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), a new confederation that they said would combat jihadism and foster prosperity in Western Africa. “We have the same blood that runs in our veins,” said Burkina Faso’s leader, Capt. Ibrahim Traoré, at the ceremony in Niger’s capital Niamey, according to France24. “In our veins runs the blood of those valiant warriors who fought and won for us this land that we call Mali, Burkina, and Niger.” Traoré, who came to power in 2022 in a coup, recently extended his term in power for another five years, and linked the new confederation to his version of the region’s heroic legacy. “In our veins runs the blood of those valiant warriors who helped the whole world rid itself of Nazism and many other scourges,” he said. “In our veins runs the blood of those valiant warriors that were deported from Africa to Europe, America, Asia … and who helped to build those countries as slaves.” Afolabi Adekaiyaoja was skeptical. The research analyst at the Centre for Democracy and Development, a Nigerian think tank, argued in World Politics Review that the AES in the long run would spell more trouble for the region. That’s because the three leaders are banding together to counter the powerful Economic Organization of West African States (ECOWAS), whose leaders have contemplated intervening in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger because they all came to power in coups, Adekaiyaoja said. Now, in declaring themselves separate, they have divided the region. ECOWAS member Benin, for example, slapped sanctions on Nigerien oil exports in 2023 to force the coup leaders in that country to allow ousted President Mohamed Bazoum to return to office. Niger refused. Now, as Africanews reported, Niger might lose out on massive revenues from an oil pipeline that has been built with Chinese investments, unless they can reroute their pipeline through less stable neighbors like Chad. Niger has also kicked out American and French troops previously based in the countries to combat Islamic militant groups that have rampaged across borders, fomenting violence, kidnapping or murdering locals, and developing corrupt moneymaking operations, noted the BBC. Russian military support has often replaced the exiting Western forces. These groups, affiliated with Al Qaeda and the Islamic State group have waged a grinding insurgency since 2015 that has killed thousands and displaced millions in the region. The AES has struggled to maintain security in this environment so far. Armed thugs killed at least 26 people recently in Mali near the border with Burkina Faso, the Associated Press reported. An Al Qaeda-linked terror group was suspected of orchestrating the attack. Meanwhile, fighters in these conflicts have traveled farther afield in the region, to fight in Sudan’s civil war, for example, exporting instability, added University of Washington PhD candidate Yasir Zaidan in the Conversation. The AES has a lot of work to do to instill confidence. But as Virginie Baudais, director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute’s Sahel and West Africa Program told France24, they could hardly do worse than what was in place before. She said that the three states’ decision to create its own bloc was driven in part by more than a decade of failure by Western-backed regimes in the Sahel to hold back the tide of insurgent jihadist movements. “It’s a response to the loss of credibility of the European states and of ECOWAS in the region in the fight against terrorism,” she said. “The three leaders all claim that they are achieving good results in the fight against terrorism thanks to their established military cooperation. Clearly, each country cannot fight against these groups … the only option is cooperation.” Share this story

A Serial Killer Is Captured in Kenya

Whodunnit? KENYA Kenyan authorities arrested this month a suspected serial killer who has confessed to murdering 42 women since 2022, including his own wife, in a case that has shocked the country and renewed scrutiny against Kenya’s police force, the BBC reported. Last week, Collins Jumaisi Khalusha, 33, was apprehended in Nairobi, days after police discovered mutilated bodies at the Mukuru quarry, a disused dumpsite south of the capital. Authorities said Khalusha confessed to luring, killing, and disposing of 42 female bodies at the Mukuru dumpsite. The victims, aged between 18 and 30, were killed similarly and found in various stages of decomposition. The suspect led police to his house – about 330 feet from the crime scene – where they found a number of items, including phones, identity cards, personal female clothing, and a machete believed to be used for dismembering the victims, the New York Times added. Police have also arrested two other people for possessing a victim’s phone and selling multiple phones linked to the suspect, Africanews noted. The discovery sparked outrage in the African nation with human rights groups highlighting the broader issue of gender-based violence in Kenya. The case also sparked condemnation of the Kenyan police, which families of missing women have admonished for their inaction and incompetence. Public suspicion has been fueled by the proximity of the dumpsite to a police station, leading to criticism of their failure to detect or investigate the disappearances. Questions have also been raised over the speed of the arrests and how police obtained Khalusha’s confession: During last week’s court appearance, the suspect retracted his statements and his lawyer claimed the confession was obtained under torture, according to the Times of India. Observers noted that the case comes at a difficult time for the police, which has been accused of using excessive force during recent anti-government protests against tax hikes, resulting in at least 50 deaths. Some pro-democracy groups alleged that the bodies could be linked to the protesters who disappeared during the recent demonstrations. However, government officials denied the allegations, saying the deaths were related to femicides and not political killings. Meanwhile, the Independent Police Oversight Authority is probing possible police involvement or negligence, and officers at the station nearest to the quarry have been transferred to ensure unbiased investigations. Share this story

Rwanda: Prosperity By Fiat

Prosperity, by Fiat RWANDA A notable international exchange occurred recently when Sir Keir Starmer, the new Labour prime minister of the United Kingdom, announced that he would scrap his Conservative predecessor’s plan to fly migrants to the southern African country of Rwanda. Starmer said the plan was a “gimmick” and “dead and buried”, and it was now time to “turn our back on tribal politics,” reported Yahoo! News. The UK has already paid around $280 million to Rwanda, a formerly impoverished nation still grappling with the legacy of the 1994 genocide where the Hutu ethnic majority massacred 800,000 people mainly from the Tutsi minority community. Starmer hoped to recoup that money. Rwandan President Paul Kagame likely has other ideas, however. The British approached Rwanda “to address the crisis of irregular migration affecting the UK – a problem of the UK, not Rwanda,” said Kagame’s government in a statement. Rwanda “has fully upheld its side of the agreement, including with regard to finances.” The response reflected Kagame’s confidence in his hold on power and his international standing – but also showcased his questionable methods to stay in office. Kagame is expected to win a fourth term when Rwandan voters hold presidential elections on July 15. He has served since 2000 and in that time, he has centralized power in the country and suppressed dissent while also pushing through economic reforms that have expanded the country’s economy, explained the Liechtenstein-based analysis group, Geopolitical Intelligence Services. The president is credited with expanding life expectancy, promoting a boom in the tourism industry – underscored by luxury hotels proliferating in the capital of Kigali – kickstarting an entrepreneurial landscape featuring tech startups, building a new stadium that hosts basketball games, and other developments. All have helped turn Rwanda into an example of development and innovative success on the African continent, National Public Radio wrote, even as Kagame’s support of rebels in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and elsewhere has destabilized the region. Kagame has also baldly stifled his opponents’ chances, wrote World Politics Review. Electoral authorities only approved Kagame and two other candidates, the Democratic Green Party’s Frank Habineza and the independent Philippe Mpayimana, according to the BBC. A critic of the president, Diane Rwigara, was blocked from running. A Rwandan court had previously sentenced another vocal critic, Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, to eight years in prison. In a first-person piece in Al Jazeera, Umuhoza described how she spent five years of solitary confinement in a maximum-security prison after her trumped-up conviction on charges of denying the genocide. Kagame pardoned her a year after the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights ruled that her rights had been violated. Umuhoza wasn’t optimistic about the upcoming election. Her name won’t appear on the ballot, either, despite her attempt to run. “It already promises to entrench the persistent suppression of opposition voices by the current government in Rwanda,” she wrote in Foreign Policy. “As a victim of this suppression, I find myself once again barred from participating in an electoral process that I, as a Rwandan, have a right to take part in.”

Social Unrest In Zimbabwe

Promises, Promises ZIMBABWE Supporters of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party protested outside a courthouse in the capital this week over the continued detention of 78 activists, a demonstration that was marked by violent clashes with police and concerns of ongoing repression in the southern African nation, Africanews reported. Authorities used batons to break up demonstrations by supporters of Citizens Coalition for Change, who were demanding the release of the activists detained since mid-June. The individuals were arrested for disorderly conduct and participating in a gathering to promote violence. If convicted, they could face up to five years in prison. Amnesty International criticized the arrests as “part of a disturbing pattern of repression against people exercising their rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and expression.” It called for a probe into allegations that some activists were tortured while in police custody. The organization and other rights groups also pointed to a continued crackdown on opposition members and critics, including university students and labor unionists. President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who took power in a 2017 coup with promises of democratic reforms, has denied the allegations of repression but has repeatedly warned the opposition against inciting violence.