South Africa Is Falling Apart

 

SOUTH AFRICA

Sparking Tinder

The BBC video of a woman throwing her baby out of a burning building illustrates the violence and suffering that has racked South Africa in recent weeks. The baby and mother survived the fire, which looters lit amid widespread civil unrest.

The violence erupted in early July after former President Jacob Zuma began a 15-month prison term for contempt of court, the Associated Press explained. His supporters in KwaZulu-Natal, where he is from, erected roadblocks and burned trucks in protest. More than 300 people died, according to Agence France-Presse. Police arrested more than 2,500 people on theft and vandalism charges.

The riots were the worst since the end of South Africa’s racist, segregationist Apartheid regime in 1994. Private citizens took up arms to defend their business and critical infrastructure, Bloomberg reported. Protesters destroyed 100 mobile phone towers, prompting the South African telecommunications regulator to issue a public call for citizens to guard facilities.

Zuma was convicted on corruption charges. The scandals plaguing him include $20 million in security upgrades for his private compound. A court recently granted his request for a delay in a corruption trial involving kickbacks in a $2 billion arms deal, Reuters reported. He also faces corruption, fraud and money laundering charges.

Regardless, it’s hard to tell if the riots and looting were unrest or an insurrection, as Foreign Policy magazine wrote.

President Cyril Ramaphosa and others claim that Zuma’s allies planned the violence. A Zuma-allied faction of the ruling African National Congress called the Radical Economic Transformation orchestrated the riots because they benefitted from the patronage and corruption that was endemic to Zuma’s regime, argued journalist Benjamin Fogel in an Al Jazeera opinion piece.

But while political affiliation explains how the protests and looting began, other factors clarify why they grew out of control.

Officially, nearly one-third of South Africans are unemployed – that number almost doubles if counting only those younger than 35. Half the country lives in poverty. More than 20 percent lack sufficient food. Inequality, meanwhile, is rampant. The coronavirus hasn’t improved these numbers, of course.

Sello Kgoale, 46, had never stolen anything before. He couldn’t resist pilfering rice, cooking oil and paraffin from a local mall after his neighbors told him that the police weren’t stopping looters.

“I’ve never done anything like this before. I’m ashamed,” Kgoale said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, relating how successive waves of the coronavirus killed his aged relatives, rendered him unemployed and ruined his chances of launching a new business. “But we just keep getting hit.”

Lack of economic opportunities, not politics, led Kgoale to break the law. Some wonder about Zuma’s excuse.

W

Political Violence In SOuth Africa After Jacob Zuma Is Jailed

 

SOUTH AFRICA

Apartheid Redux

South Africa is dealing with the worst political violence it has seen since the end of apartheid three decades ago, with deadly riots and looting sparked by the arrest of former President Jacob Zuma, CBS News reported Wednesday.

Officials said that at least 72 people have died over the past week.

Meanwhile, arrests have topped 1,000 while more than 600 stores have been looted: The unrest has crippled KwaZulu-Natal and parts of Johannesburg and blockaded major supply routes, resulting in fuel and food shortages in those areas, according to the Washington Post.

The violence began when Zuma was jailed for refusing to appear before a commission investigating corruption during his nine years in office.

Zuma’s supporters took to the streets in protests, but the demonstrations soon devolved into riots fueled by ongoing poverty that has been worsened by the coronavirus pandemic.

Authorities, meanwhile, are probing whether former officials affiliated with the ex-president are involved in instigating the violence.

Still, political analyst Ralph Mathekga blamed South Africa’s economic woes, unemployment and inequality for the violence.

“It is simply feedback (reflecting the) discontent,” he said.

J

France's Role In West Africa

 

WEST AFRICA

The Hardest Word

President Emmanuel Macron recently apologized for his country’s role in the massacre of thousands of Rwandans in the 1990s when Paris supported the African country’s murderous regime. “In ignoring the warnings of the most clear-sighted observers…France bore damning responsibility in a chain of events that led to the worst,” he said, asking for forgiveness, according to the Economist.

The mea culpa underscores France’s attempted reset in Africa.

More concretely, Macron is also pulling back on France’s military presence on the continent, especially in Mali and surrounding nations where the former colonial power has long dispatched troops in the name of stability, the Washington Post reported. In recent years, French, as well as American and other Western troops, have been fighting militants affiliated with al Qaeda and the Islamic State.

Writing in the Conversation, King’s College London doctoral candidate Folahanmi Aina saw the pullout as a chance to develop new ways to assist the region. If France and others could help develop good governance in the region – functional executive and legislative branches, courts and other institutions, for instance – then they could break the cycle that leads to violence, he argued.

But others see a disaster in the making as weak governments face off against Islamist militants. Macron is eyeing the withdrawal of more than 5,000 troops from Mali and the region. That followed the dismay over a recent coup he suggested could result in new leaders with Islamist views, Voice of America reported.

Meanwhile, nearby Burkina Faso has already seen villages descend into lawlessness when the French troops depart, Al Jazeera noted. The situation is so dire that thousands hit the streets in protest over the weekend, demanding the government step up, Africanews reported.

Such fears are one reason that American officials have not been quick to support French efforts to expand United Nations forces in the region to replace departing French soldiers, Foreign Policy magazine wrote.

Still, Macron is answering the demands of the French public, which is sick of the country’s overseas adventures. The war against terror has created tensions in secular France, too.

France is among the most hated countries among radical Islamists, VICE News wrote. Islamist terror attacks have killed scores in France while far-right French politicians cite the violence as evidence for stricter policies against non-French (read: Islamic) influences in society. The gulf, some say, is widening because of these policy moves. One notable exception is in the French military, the New York Times noted, where Muslim soldiers are well integrated.

Regardless, moves big and small will be necessary for France to turn the page on this episode in its history abroad, and the repercussions at home.

South African Women May Soon Be Able To Marry More Than One Man

 https://www.sapeople.com/2021/05/29/polyandry-will-sa-women-soon-be-able-to-marry-more-than-1-man/

Namibia-Coming To Terms

 

NAMIBIA

Coming to Terms

Germany officially acknowledged committing genocide against Namibian ethnic groups during the colonial period more than a century ago, CNN reported.

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said over the weekend that Germany will support Namibia and the victims’ descendants with $1.3 billion for reconstruction and development and ask for forgiveness for the “crimes of German colonial rule.”

The reparations are related to the massacre of up to 80,000 ethnic Herero and Nama by German troops during an anti-colonial uprising between 1904 and 1908. Historians say that the conflict began when the Herero people rebelled against colonial troops over land seizures.

Germany had first offered its formal apology for the conflict in 2004.

The Namibian government welcomed the recent announcement, but victim groups rejected the deal as “a sellout job.” Such critics demand that Germany pay reparations to the descendants of those killed and pushed off their land.

Vekuii Rukoro, the Paramount Chief of Herero people and a lawmaker, said they were not part of the discussion between the German and Namibian governments, which began in 2015.

Friday’s announcement comes a day after French President Emmanuel Macron publicly acknowledged France’s “overwhelming responsibility” in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

France has been accused of failing to prevent the genocide and of supporting the Hutu regime, even after the massacres had started: Hutu militias – supported by the government – killed around 800,000 ethnic Tutsis.

D

Does The Chinese Vaccine Worj That Well?????

 

SEYCHELLES

Worry and Leisure

Americans Shivani Pathak and Bo Sutton were both vaccinated when they went to the Seychelles for a vacation. But, as the Denver Post reported, the married couple recently had to go into quarantine after they tested positive for the virus.

Their plight and the experience of other tourists led the World Health Organization to launch an investigation into coronavirus data in the Seychelles after officials found that 37 percent of those who tested positive for the virus in the country between April 30 and May 8 had been vaccinated, Reuters wrote.

The numbers are concerning, to say the least. An island nation in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa, the Seychelles has one of the highest rates of vaccination in the world – more than 60 percent have received two doses of vaccines while more than 70 percent have had at least one shot, according to CNBC.

Yet the country with a population of less than 100,000 has seen a surge in cases this month, raising additional questions beyond the data, like why its vaccination efforts have not yielded better results.

“It is providing a critical case to consider the effectiveness of some vaccines and what range we have to reach to meet herd immunity,” Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow for Global Health Yanzhong Huang told the Washington Post.

Experts are wondering about the role of the Chinese state-owned company Sinopharm, whose vaccine has been used to inoculate almost 60 percent of the Seychelles’ citizens who have had a jab, in the country’s experience, the New York Times added.

Many observers were already raising questions about Sinopharm’s late-stage clinical trial data. Now they are wondering if Sinopharm executives oversold its benefits. China donated 13.3 million Sinopharm doses to countries as part of a “vaccine diplomacy” policy designed to improve China’s global relations.

Researchers need to figure out who is truly coming down with the virus, whether they are vaccinated and when they might have been infected because, even if they have both vaccine shots, immunity doesn’t occur immediately, explained BioWorld.

On the positive side, few people are dying from Covid-19 in the Seychelles, CNN reported. It seems that the vaccines might not halt the spread but they could dramatically improve the chances of survival for those who are sick. Chinese state news service Xinhua made a similar point in a news story.

Meanwhile, the country’s economy is reeling due to a decline in tourism, the government-controlled Seychelles News Agency reported. The country’s leaders keep stressing that they want tourists to come despite the uncertainties over the virus.

That’s a hard sell. If people want to relax, they’ll need to know for sure whether they are safe from Covid-19.

People's Republic of the Cong0-A Volvano Erupts In Goma

 

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO

Late Warning

Tens of thousands of people fled the city of Goma in eastern Congo and headed toward the Rwandan border Saturday following the eruption of Mount Nyiragongo, one of the world’s most active volcanoes, the New York Times reported.

Authorities said the volcano, which erupted over the weekend, spewed hot lava and created clouds of noxious fumes. They added that at least 15 people died during the eruption, and more than 170 children are feared to be missing, according to the BBC.

Rwandan authorities reported that more than 3,500 people had crossed the border as of Sunday.

The eruption sparked fears of a repeat of another tragedy that plagued the city of two million inhabitants nearly 20 years ago: In 2002, lava from Mount Nyiragongo devastated Goma, killing hundreds of people and leaving more than 100,000 homeless.

However, by Sunday, Goma residents began returning to their homes after the lava flow came to a standstill in Buhene on the northern edge of the city.

The 11,385-foot mountain has long menaced the surrounding area but the recent eruption has raised questions about why the population did not receive a warning.

An early warning system remains in place at Nyiragongo but the Goma Volcano Observatory that runs the system has been facing problems since the World Bank cut funding for the institution.

D