Dispatches

Over the past several years, Nigeria has been plagued by various forms of violence, most prominently those linked to violent extremism in the Northeast and communal conflicts between herders and farmers in the central and southern zones. Analysts have attributed the deterioration of security in Nigeria to a wide range of causes, including weak or exploitative governance systems (Africa Center for Strategic Studies, 2017), inequality and injustice, ethno-religious conflicts, porous borders, rural-urban drift, poverty, and unemployment (Abdu & Okoro, 2016).

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L’acceptation des différences sociales est un facteur important permettant d’apprécier la cohésion sociale, qui est l’un des déterminants du climat des investissements. C’est dans ce cadre que le Bénin, dans l’Article 36 de sa Constitution, appelle chaque citoyen à la tolérance et au traitement sans aucune discrimination des uns envers les autres.  

The Constitution of Mauritius grants citizens certain fundamental rights, including the right to be free and protected by the law, freedom of conscience, freedom of association, freedom of movement and of opinion, freedom to express themselves, freedom of religious belief, and the right to private property (Constitution of Mauritius, 1968).

In addition to the growing number of African states that conduct regular elections and embed democratic principles in their constitutions, evidence comes from survey-based research that most Africans support democratic values and reward governments that adhere to democratic rules (Mattes & Bratton, 2007; Bratton & Mattes, 2001). However, in many countries, citizen demand for democracy is not met by supply of democracy (Mattes & Bratton, 2016) as governments, once elected, fail to respect the norms of democratic governance (Gyimah-Boadi, 2015).

The role and capacities of the military are critical elements of a modern state. In functional democracies, the military’s institutional boundaries are tightly prescribed, excluding it from the political arena. It must be both trusted and adequately resourced to effectively discharge its mandate of protecting the country from external and internal threats. 

Until January 7, 1993, Ghana’s post-independence history was checkered at best. The country’s first three democratic regimes never completed their first terms in office, ending in military coups d’états and the suspension of the constitutions underpinning their existence. The military regimes that ruled the country were largely autocratic and characterized by human-rights breaches and disregard for the rule of law. 

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Over the past two decades, Africa has recorded high levels of economic growth. Tanzania has enjoyed Africa’s second-fastest-growing economy, behind Côte d'Ivoire, including average annual growth of almost 7% between 2012 and 2016 (International Monetary Fund, 2016).

In a stable political environment since independence in 1968, Mauritius transformed itself from a low-income country dependent on sugar into an upper-middle-income country with growing wealth creation from financial services, tourism, and other service sectors (World Bank, 2017).

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Depuis l’attaque par les rebelles touaregs et le coup d’état de 2012, le Mali a sombré dans des conflits et une crise qui perdurent jusqu’à ce jour. Malgré le retour du pouvoir aux civils, l’élection d’Ibrahim Boubacar Keita en août 2013, et l’implication de forces internationales, la crise a fait beaucoup de victimes, avec l’instauration pendant plusieurs mois de la chariah dans le Nord et la multiplication de groupes rebelles favorisée par le flux d’armes causé par la crise libyenne.

Information is the lifeblood of political accountability. Without reliable, timely information, citizens are unable to evaluate and constructively engage with what their government is doing. If such information is absent, willfully denied, physically inaccessible, or not available in a format that is understandable to users, public accountability is undermined (ANSA-EAP, 2017).

Since Muhammadu Buhari became president in May 2015, Nigerians have witnessed a series of investigations into alleged corruption by past and present government officials, including high-profile cases involving the former minister of petroleum and a former national security adviser (Al Jazeera, 2017; Vanguard, 2016; Oyibode, 2017).

Two forms of lawless violence dominated headlines in Ghana in 2017, though neither was new: mob “justice” applied to suspected criminals and vigilantism by disgruntled politicalparty thugs.

Mauritius’ commitment to good governance is embodied in its Ministry of Financial Services and Good Governance, created after the Alliance Lepep came to power in 2014 (Fakun, 2016). The Ibrahim Index of African Governance vouches for the quality of Mauritius’ democracy by ranking the country as the best-governed country in Africa in its 2017 report (Mo Ibrahim Foundation, 2017).

In his final State of the Nation Address, delivered in November 2017, President Ian Khama offered a positive economic outlook for Botswana, citing a recovery to 4.3% growth in 2016 and projected growth of 4.7% and 5.3% in 2017-2018 (Khama, 2017). But while reporting some gains in employment and training programs, he was less bullish about job creation than he had been a year earlier, when he promised “job creation … increasingly linked to private sector growth, with government playing an enabling role” (Khama, 2016).

Last August, Kenya made headlines by banning the use of plastic bags (Guardian, 2017) – a drastic measure, but just one of many steps that have moved the country into a leadership role on the path toward a sustainable environment. Among other actions, Kenya – headquarters for the United Nations Environment Programme – has been a strong advocate for the Paris Climate Accord and worked to implement a 2016 Climate Change Act that aims to ensure a healthy environment for its citizens (Bwire, 2017; Capital News, 2017).

Over the past decade, Uganda has emerged as a success story of African development. Economic growth and diversification, relative political stability, and considerable investment in infrastructure have seen the country rise as a regional power (Murray, Mesfin, & Wolters, 2016). But to many international observers, this success is dimmed by the long rule of President Yoweri Museveni and a political system that has been described as “dictatorship light” (Gettleman, 2016). While elections are conducted regularly, many have questioned how free they are.

As a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the Beijing Platform of Action, and the Southern African Development Community’s Declaration on Gender and Development, Zimbabwe has taken significant steps toward gender equity.

L’actualité ivoirienne a été à plusieurs reprises marquée par des informations relatives à l’insécurité. Pour n’en citer que certaines, le phénomène des « enfants en confit avec la loi » qui est apparu à la suite du conflit armé de 2011, perpétrant des vols et agressions sur la population, aussi bien que les récentes mutineries et autres évasions de prisonniers et attaques de commissariats qui ont ponctués l’actualité.

Les autorités ivoiriennes se sont engagées à adresser de manière efficace et durable la question de l’emploi. Cette dernière touche de manière endémique aussi bien les différentes tranches d’âge que le milieu de résidence, le sexe, ou le niveau d’instruction. C’est pourquoi la recherche d’une solution tient une place de choix dans les objectifs définis par le gouvernement à travers le Plan National de Développement (2016-2020). Cependant, force est de constater que les questions soulevées par l’emploi restent entières tant elles semblent se reproduire à l’identique.

The government of the United Republic of Tanzania has stepped up its game against corruption, with greater publicization of anti-corruption efforts, shored-up law enforcement, increased judiciary budgets, and expedited adjudication of corruption cases (John, 2016; Daily News, 2017; Citizen, 2016; Guardian, 2017).

Under the one-party reign of President Hastings Kamuzu Banda, Malawi was described as a country “where silence rules” (Carver, 1990) because of the regime’s effective machinery for squashing dissent. This era ended with a 1993 referendum endorsing a multiparty democracy and constitution enshrining freedom of expression and of association (Malawi Government, 1994). 

Uganda’s constitution promises citizens a great range of freedoms and rights (of expression, association, privacy, religion, etc.) and charges the government with ensuring public security. When these two priorities – freedom and security – are perceived to clash, debates can become heated between friends, in the news media, in Parliament, and in the courts.

Gender equality is a principle of sustainable development that is globally acknowledged by United Nations and regional agencies, development partners, and national governments. Although the principle is operationalized through policies, legal provisions, and programs in most jurisdictions, implementation and experience vary across regions and countries, and in most cases fall short of the goal. As the United Nations Development Programme notes in its 2016 Africa Human Development Report, “gender equality for African women and girls is still far from satisfactory” (UNDP, 2016).