Last August, a one-month-old girl in The Gambia bled to death after being subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM), a practice that had been illegal in the country since 2015.
FGM is a human rights violation, whatever the appeals to faith or tradition made in its defense, but now the Gambian Supreme Court is being asked to strike the country’s ban down. This is the second attempt in two years to make FGM legal again.
Civil society stopped it the first time. When a repeal bill reached the National Assembly in 2024, the Network Against Gender-Based Violence brought survivors to testify, lobbied legislators, ran radio programs and obtained a ruling from Cairo’s Al-Azhar University saying that FGM is not required under Islam. The bill fell in July 2024.
The ongoing fight in The Gambia is a measure of how fragile advances in the recognition of rights are. FGM is in retreat across most of the countries where it is practiced, the result of decades of campaigning by survivors and community organizations.
But holding that ground is becoming harder, as the money supporting those campaigns dries up and a resurgent anti-rights movement works to recast FGM as a traditional practice under foreign attack.
A practice in retreat
Over 230 million girls and women alive today have undergone FGM, with an additional four million cut every year. But the direction of travel has changed.
A 2024 UNICEF report found that half of the decline in prevalence over the past 30 years has come in the last decade, with rates among adolescent girls halved or cut by 30-plus percentage points in countries including Ethiopia, Kenya and Sierra Leone.
Attitudes have shifted too. Around 400 million people in practicing countries, two-thirds of the population, now say they want FGM to end.
That change has a clear source. The Joint Program run by UNICEF and the UN Population Fund found that the sharpest reductions come where communities are supported to deliberate and then commit, publicly and collectively, to abandoning the practice.
The UN channels funding and provides coordination, but the dialogues, declarations and door-to-door persuasion are the work of community activists, national organizations and survivor networks. Thanks to these civil society efforts, in 2025 alone, over 7.5 million people took part in community dialogues and over 190,000 religious leaders and community influencers publicly denounced FGM.
The tools that work
Where campaigners have targeted the religious justifications that sustain FGM, results have followed. In 2025, Islamic scholars in Djibouti, Eritrea and Somalia issued a joint ruling saying that nothing in the faith requires FGM.
Litigation has proved another powerful tool. In July 2025, the Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West African States found Sierra Leone in breach of its international obligations for failing to criminalize FGM, and said that, when intentionally inflicted, the practice meets the threshold of torture.
In India, the Supreme Court has begun hearing whether cutting among the Dawoodi Bohra community should lose constitutional protection as an essential religious practice.
And this June, Colombia became the first country in Latin America to ban FGM, driven by Emberá Indigenous women campaigning against a practice carried out in their own community.
Prohibition is now the norm rather than the exception, with Djibouti and Guinea writing bans into their constitutions in 2025. But laws alone don’t necessarily change what happens on the ground, and enforcement remains thin.
Arrests and prosecutions rose sharply in 2025, yet there were still only 711 FGM court cases all year. In The Gambia, the fine imposed on the country’s first convicted cutters was paid by a prominent imam, an act that helped galvanize the campaign seeking to repeal the ban.
The movement’s defunding
The tactics that drove three decades of progress are now being starved of funding, with budget cuts falling hardest on the survivor-led and grassroots groups that are most effective but always face the toughest struggles for support.
Funding for the Joint Program fell from US$29.6 million in 2024 to US$16.3 million in 2025. The dismantling of USAID removed the largest single source of civil society funding worldwide, and total US foreign aid halved in a year.
The UK, once the biggest funder of FGM prevention, is winding down its flagship program with no replacement, so it can spend more on weapons.
The economics make no sense, because every dollar invested in prevention brings a tenfold return. The Joint Program estimates that treating the health consequences of FGM currently costs US$1.4 billion a year.
Politics, though, is playing a big part. In global north countries, political shifts are driving the withdrawal of aid, and far-right parties invoke FGM to stigmatize migrant communities while also opposing the gender justice policies that would make a difference.
In practicing countries, prohibition is increasingly recast as a foreign imposition on culture and faith. What unites these arguments is a shared sleight of hand that treats FGM as a question of cultural identity rather than a violation of fundamental human rights.
Elimination by 2030, the target that states set when they agreed the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015, is already out of reach. But the evidence on what works is not in dispute, and it points towards communities and grassroots movements.
The question is whether governments that claim to value human rights will keep supporting those delivering progress or let a generation of girls pay the price of retreat.
IPS News UN Bureau
]]>JAVIER ALONSO LOPEZ
Of the 24 books that make up the Hebrew Bible, the oldest are the five core books of the Torah: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, collectively known as the Pentateuch. They narrate the creation of the world and the history of the Jewish people up until their arrival at the Holy Land.
In both Jewish and Christian traditions, these texts are believed to have been written by a single author: Moses, the patriarch who led the Israelites out of Egypt and to whom, according to the Book of Exodus, God (also known as Yahweh) revealed the Torah.
But even in the early centuries of the Christian era, some doubted whether Moses really did write the five books of the Torah. And there are certain passages that don’t fit easily with, or support, the notion of him being the author, such as the one in Deuteronomy in which Moses recounts his own death:
“Then Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord’s command.” Another example is a line in the Book of Numbers that would be deeply ironic had it been written by Moses: “Now the man Moses was very humble, more so than anyone else on the face of the earth.”
Another curiosity is that throughout the Torah some episodes are recounted more than once, differing in focus and details, as if different versions by several authors had been combined.
The Book of Genesis includes two versions of the covenant that Abraham established with God to ensure himself numerous descendants and a new land to live in. One version, in chapter 17, stresses that to seal the covenant, God commanded: “Every male among you shall be circumcised.”
But in the earlier version, narrated in chapter 15, there’s no mention of circumcision. The forthcoming birth of Isaac is also announced in two ways. In one version (chapter 17), God speaks directly to Abraham saying, “your wife Sarah shall bear you a son, and you shall call him Isaac.” But in chapter 18, the message comes through three heavenly beings who visit Abraham and Sarah.
Sometimes the work of more than one author appears intertwined in the same narrative. The most obvious case is that of Noah and the Flood. Verses include different details regarding the number of animals that should enter the ark (one pair of each species, or seven pairs of the “pure” and one pair of the “impure”) and whether a raven or dove was released to seek land.
In addition, analysis of the original Hebrew text reveals very different styles, expressions, and stages of language evolution. This is particularly evident in passages that include lines written in an archaic form of Hebrew. An analogy would be reading a text in English written partly in the style of Chaucer, partly in Shakespearean English, and partly in a contemporary style.
Although reasonable doubts had existed for a long time, the first modern writer to argue against Moses being the author of the Pentateuch was English philosopher Thomas Hobbes in his 1651 political treatise Leviathan.
In 1753, the French physician Jean Astruc suggested the existence of two different authors in the Book of Genesis, and in 1780 the German theologian Johann Gottfried Eichhorn extended this claim to the entire Pentateuch.
The Yahwist
Finally, in 1878, German biblical scholar Julius Wellhausen formulated his “documentary hypothesis,” which is still widely accepted today or at least provides the starting point for any discussion of the dates and identities of authorship in the Torah.
The documentary hypothesis maintains that within the first five books of the Bible, as they have come down to us, several different narrative strands can be distinguished that were written by different authors at different points in history and in different locations.
According to Wellhausen’s hypothesis, text from the oldest version of the Torah can be identified by certain common features. The most obvious is that God is referred to by the name Yahweh. Later, as established in the Book of Exodus, it would be forbidden by Israelite religious code to pronounce this name:
“You shall not misuse the name of Yahweh your God.” (Note that English translations tend to render the name Yahweh as “the Lord.”) Another way to discern this oldest narrative strand is that the events chronicled—for example the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the stories of Abraham and his nephew Lot—take place in the area around Jerusalem and in the mountains of Judah.
The protagonists are the patriarchs of the 12 tribes that settled in those places: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah. The linguistic and narrative features of these sections have led to the theory that their author was a person connected with the Temple in Jerusalem when Jerusalem was the capital of the southern kingdom of Judah.
Since Judah separated from the northern Jewish kingdom of Israel in 930 B.C., this author was likely writing around the 10th to ninth centuries B.C. The author has been dubbed the Yahwist for referring to God by the name Yahweh, and the source itself is known as “J,” short for the German word Jahwist.
The northern author
Other sections of the Pentateuch are distinguished by the fact that God is referred to as Elohim instead of Yahweh; scholars call this source text “E.” The sources J and E often recount the same episodes but include different narrative details.
For example, while the author of J writes that God’s revelation to Moses occurred on Mount Sinai, the author of E calls the place Horeb. As these two names refer to the same geographical feature, this suggests that the site of the revelation once had two separate designations.
The events narrated in E take place in the northern region—the kingdom of Israel, which remained independent until it was conquered by the Assyrians in 722 B.C. The protagonists in E are the patriarchs of the tribes that historically occupied territory in the kingdom of Israel, such as the tribe of Benjamin.
The sections of the Torah belonging to source E would once have formed a complete separate text, similar to J, but with its own characteristics. Clues in the text point to the author of E having lived in the ninth century B.C., in the northern kingdom of Israel.
The reverence shown in the text toward Moses has led to the hypothesis that the author of E (sometimes known as the Elohist) was one of the priests of the sanctuary at Shiloh, which belonged to the tribe of Levi, where Moses also hailed from.
This would explain why there’s no mention in E of the later tradition that made Aaron a brother of Moses, and why Aaron is harshly criticized in E for his participation in the creation of the golden calf, an idol made by the Israelites while Moses was on Mount Sinai with God.
Merging the texts
So, between the 10th and eighth centuries B.C., each of the two kingdoms, Judah and Israel, had its own collection of narratives about the origins of the world and its people. Although the same in essence, the two accounts differed in certain linguistic features, in the geographical settings of some episodes, and the prominence of certain tribes.
However, this situation changed in 722 B.C., when the kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians, and part of its population sought refuge in neighboring Judah and its capital, Jerusalem. The refugees, who brought with them their own sacred text, were welcomed in Judah.
Perhaps it was thought that in order to facilitate the integration of the new Israelite community, it would make sense to produce a common sacred text that combined the two previous ones. It’s believed that an unknown author undertook this task around 700 B.C., using J as a general framework, the version that had been accepted for centuries in Jerusalem where this fusing of texts was likely done.
In the following decades, the priests of the Temple of Jerusalem promoted the writing of additional texts that clarified and completed the earlier merged version.
In the sixth to fifth century B.C., an anonymous author made important additions to the composite text of J and E, adding a strand now identified by scholars as P (from the German Priesterschrift) or the “Priestly” source. These additions relate mainly to rituals of the Temple of Jerusalem.
For example, P includes some details distinguishing between the pure and impure animals to go on Noah’s ark, even though at the time of the Flood, the Temple of Jerusalem and its purity laws didn’t exist yet.
Source P, like source E, refers to God by the name Elohim—perhaps as a concession to the ancient version of the kingdom of Israel. But unlike E, P emphasizes the leadership of Aaron rather than Moses. This likely indicates that the author of P was a priest in the Temple of Jerusalem and considered himself a descendant of Aaron.
A few decades later, a major change would take place in the composition of the Torah, with the addition of a new book to the four that previously existed. In 622 B.C., while Josiah, king of Judah, was having the Temple remodeled, a new text was discovered there; it apparently contained an unknown part of the Law that God had dictated to Moses on Mount Sinai.
This text was presented as a series of speeches by Moses himself while the rest of the Torah consists of the words that God dictated to him. Another major difference is that the author of this text insists there is just one God, one people, and one place of worship, namely the Temple of Jerusalem, and criticizes the other shrines scattered throughout the country.
It seems the main aim of this newly discovered text was to encourage the centralization of religious life around the Temple in the capital, Jerusalem, and do away with other cultic centers.
The text was presented to King Josiah, who read it publicly in the Temple in front of all the people, priests, and prophets. When he’d finished, everyone pledged to obey the Law contained in the book, which was added as a supplement to the existing works.
This text was regarded as a second Law, which is the meaning of its Greek name, Deuteronomy. The source is known by scholars as D. Some of the biblical books that recount the history of Israel and Judah from the time of David and Solomon onward may also belong to D.
There are several distinguishing features in D: The author has a high opinion of Moses; the sacred mountain is called Horeb rather than Sinai; and the expression “Yahweh Eloheka”—which means “Yahweh your God,” combining the names used in J (Yahweh) and E (Elohim)—is used.
Out of the desert
In 586 B.C., the Kingdom of Judah, its capital Jerusalem, and its Temple were destroyed by the Babylonian ruler Nebuchadnezzar II. Part of the population of Judah was deported to Babylon where they remained in exile for decades until the Persian king Cyrus the Great allowed them to return to their land to rebuild their country and their Temple while enjoying relative political autonomy.
Sometime after the return from exile, a final intervention was made in the text of the Torah, shaping it into the form we know today. A new author gathered the texts that had previously been dispersed across different works into a single volume, adapting them to give them unity.
Some scholars believe that this final author was Ezra, a Jewish scribe, expert in the Law of Yahweh, and an official of the Persian king Artaxerxes. Ezra was sent to reform the religious practice in Jerusalem, although there’s some uncertainty about when this reform happened.
If the king referred to was Artaxerxes I, Ezra’s mission must have taken place shortly after 457 B.C., but if it was Artaxerxes II, it would have been in the fourth century B.C.
The Book of Nehemiah explains how Ezra publicly presented this new Law, which was now compiled into a single corpus: “Accordingly, the priest Ezra brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could hear with understanding …
He read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand; and the ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law.”
While the process of compiling the Torah seems to have ended with Ezra, the broader corpus we now call the Bible continued to evolve. Jewish priests granted the status of works revealed by God to other books that were part of the Jewish literary heritage.
These included historical chronicles such as those of prophets Joshua, Samuel, and Kings; books attributed to latter prophets such as Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel; and moral and poetic works such as Proverbs and the Song of Songs.
All these texts formed the Jewish Bible, which in the first centuries after Jesus would become the core of the Christian Old Testament.
National Geographic
]]>DANIEL BERHANE
Clashes last month in two Tigrayan districts between the federal army and Tigrayan forces could be the first steps towards a wider war that has been frozen for the past three years by a shaky ceasefire.
Following the skirmishes in Tselemti, in southwestern Tigray, and Wajirat in the southeast, the federal government has moved several army divisions towards the Tigray border. It has also blocked the bank accounts of selected ruling Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) officials.
In anticipation of trouble ahead, people in the regional capital, Mekelle, have been stocking up on groceries, and long queues have formed at banks. Many shop owners, worried about disruptions to online networks, now refuse digital payments, while Ethiopian Airlines has cancelled all flights to the region.
There is a broader international dimension to the tensions. Were war to break out, there are fears it would also drag in neighbouring Sudan, as well as governments in the Gulf and Red Sea region – with even larger humanitarian repercussions.
Who is who?
The current domestic friction reflects a dramatic re-jigging of the political and military alliances of the 2020-22 Tigray war, when federal forces and Eritrean troops – backed by Amhara paramilitaries – marched against the TPLF-led regional administration.
That coalition has since collapsed. Eritrea was critical of the November 2022 Pretoria ceasefire accord, but fell out even more significantly with landlocked Ethiopia over Addis Ababa’s demand for a port – especially when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed identified Eritrea’s Red Sea Assab facility as a potential candidate.
Both sides have also been vying for influence in a politically divided Tigray. For much of the past two years, that has played out over control of the Tigray Interim Regional Administration (TIRA), set up under the ceasefire agreement as a first step towards Tigray’s re-inclusion in the federation.
The jostling for influence is broadly represented by two rival camps led by TPLF chair Debretsion Gebremichael – seen as aligned with Asmara – and his former deputy, Getachew Reda, who is now an adviser to Abiy.
Neither has Amhara escaped the discord. Thousands of the Amhara region’s paramilitary troops refused to accept disarmament demanded by Addis Ababa in 2023 and formed an insurgent group, Fano, that inflicted a string of blows against the federal army. Conversely, in western Tigray, Amhara paramilitaries known as the Tekeze Guard serve as auxiliaries to federal forces.
What’s gone wrong?
The federal government framed the Tigray conflict as a law‑enforcement operation, but its wartime allies used it to seize territory they lay claim to. Under the Pretoria peace deal, Amhara forces were called on to withdraw from western and southern Tigray, and Eritrean troops to vacate the border districts of northern Tigray.
The federal government, however, refused to enforce those stipulations. It instead insisted on directly controlling the disputed areas until a referendum could be held, with Amhara exercising de facto administrative control. Addis Ababa has in effect normalized the new status quo, entrenching the territorial and demographic changes created by the war.
Fearing violence and intimidation, that deadlock has prevented more than a million displaced Tigrayans from returning to their home villages.
A compromise was forged in early 2024, prioritizing the return process over the issue of territorial restoration. Under the framework, the federal army was supposed to assume all security responsibilities, dismantle illegal settlements, and disarm armed groups. Local governance would be organized through town hall meetings, with pre‑war police officers and militias reinstated.
After a rocky implementation in the southern districts, it was halted. A governmental commission reported that the returnees to Tselemti faced physical assault by pro-Amhara region militia, and their homes or farmlands remained occupied by settlers.
In western Tigray, the Tekeze Guard – constituted by perpetrators of the ethnic cleansing during the war – publicly characterizes the displaced Tigrayans as fugitives and insists that recognizing Amhara’s territorial claim is a prerequisite for a peaceful return.
The Tselemti predicament was presented by the president of TIRA as the reason for last month’s clash between the paramilitary Tigray Defence Forces (TDF) and the Ethiopian army.
Disarmament is another area of concern – symptomatic of a poorly institutionalized peace process. There was optimism in the initial stages in 2023, with state media reporting that the TDF were handing in their heavy equipment, but then began alleging the TDF was retraining some of their forces, and heavy weapons had been hidden.
Meanwhile, a cash-strapped demobilization process was also badly off-track. Tigrayan officials argued that the peace deal stipulated full demobilization was to go hand in hand with the removal of all non‑federal forces from western Tigray and the “restoration of Tigray’s constitutional territory and the full return of IDPs”.
Divisions within the TPLF
Shortly after the Pretoria ceasefire, the TPLF became ensnared in a power struggle between a faction led by Debretsion and a rival group behind TIRA’s inaugural president, Getachew. At the root of this conflict lies a post-war legitimacy crisis and a fundamental divergence over where ultimate authority resides.
Given the TPLF’s historically centralized governance model, the dispute over control of TIRA is existential. Losing control would undermine its electoral prospects and weaken its bargaining leverage vis-à-vis the federal government.
When Abiy endorsed Getachew as TIRA president, Debretsion’s faction dug in to try and maintain control. To garner domestic support, it framed the dispute as a confrontation with Addis Ababa – the popular villain. In March last year, armed TDF officers took over TIRA offices, and Getachew and his allies fled the region.
They have since formed a new opposition party backed by Addis Ababa. An armed group, the Tigray Peace Force (TPF), has also emerged with the objective of unseating the TPLF, and operates across Tigray’s southeastern border in the Afar region.
Last October, when the TDF advanced towards the TPF’s base, they were countered by drone strikes from the federal army.
Both Tigray factions have preyed on the public’s pain and post-war aspirations, squandering the momentum of the peace process. Tigray’s elite has become deeply split, with most policy issues – from IDP returns to demobilization – framed through the lens of factional allegiance.
Alignment and re-alignment
The shift in the strategic landscape is nowhere better illustrated than a letter the Ethiopian government sent in June 2025 to the UN secretary-general alleging an imminent joint attack by the TDF, the Eritrean army, and Fano on western Tigray.
In a follow-up letter in October, Addis Ababa alleged that TDF commanders had participated in an offensive by Fano to capture Woldiya, a major town in northeastern Amhara.
In the past few weeks, Ethiopia has also claimed to have intercepted weapons shipments from Tigray to Fano and issued an ultimatum to Eritrea.
My enemy’s enemy seems to be the organizing principle. Fano regards Abiy’s government as an existential threat to the Amhara people, justifying an alliance with any actor, including the TPLF – its opponent during the last war.
Eritrea now gets a pass from the TPLF, despite the Eritrean army’s war atrocities and continued occupation of Tigrayan districts. If conflict is to come with Addis Ababa, an alliance with Asmara enables the TPLF to escape the encirclement it fears.
By late 2025, these new relationships were reportedly formalized with trilateral meetings held inside Sudan, within territory controlled by the government of President Abdel Farrah al-Burhan.
The externalization of the dispute is an increasingly dangerous element. Al-Burhan receives military and diplomatic support from Eritrea and Egypt as he battles his rival, General “Hemedti” Dagalo, who heads the Rapid Support Forces.
Dagalo in turn is backed by the United Arab Emirates, with recent reports alleging an Emirati-financed training camp for Sudanese rebels in Ethiopia’s western region.
Addis Ababa, meanwhile, has antagonized Somalia by inching towards recognizing breakaway Somaliland in return for a lease on the port of Berbera and a military base. Israel’s recent recognition of Somaliland has exacerbated those regional tensions, drawing rebukes – and unease – from Saudi Arabia and Türkiye.
What happens next?
With no sign yet of a diplomatic off-ramp, and as military preparedness by Ethiopian federal forces, the TDF, and Eritrea gathers pace, here are four potential scenarios to consider.
Scenario 1: Addis Ababa seeks to eliminate TPLF
The federal army’s troop build-up along Tigray’s borders could be an intensification of Addis Ababa’s existing pressure tactics, seeking to trigger mass protests or a palace coup within Tigray’s leadership by restricting fuel supplies, suspending budget finance transfers, and supporting dissenters.
The capitulation of the TPLF would fracture the current three-way alliance, in which Tigray serves as the geographic land bridge.
However, this gradual approach doesn’t justify the scale of the current military mobilization, especially as it’s drawing forces away from other critical areas such as Amhara, where Fano operates.
Scenario 2: Assab is the goal
Addis Ababa’s objective in Tigray could include its goal to possess Assab. However, a military offensive on the port would be difficult. Getting to Assab, which borders the Afar region, would involve navigating rugged terrain and the Eritrean military is well dug in.
Hence, a parallel operation closer to Eritrea’s heartland – accessible only through Tigray – to compel Eritrean forces to relinquish their trenches and extensive military presence around Assab would be necessary.
This scenario puts the federal army in a simultaneous collision with both Eritrean and Tigrayan forces. Yet, Addis Ababa might deem that unavoidable if it believes the two are in a concrete military alliance.
Scenario 3: Eritrea/TDF take the initiative
Ethiopia’s build-up could be anticipatory. Addis Ababa has long claimed that Eritrean and TDF forces were entering the final stages of planning for a joint offensive. Statements by Eritrean and TPLF officials suggest at least tacit coordination, if not military cooperation.
Such an offensive would likely target the federal army bases in the Gondar-western Tigray corridor or the Afar region. However, pushing farther south would stretch supply lines, making Eritrea-TDF forces vulnerable to choke points and counter-offensives.
This scenario assumes the federal government is at its weakest and ripe for overthrow. When the TPLF made a similar assessment in late 2021, Abiy’s government proved resilient, mobilizing massive new recruits and deploying armed drones effectively.
Scenario 4: Diplomatic breakthrough, but multiple spoilers
The final scenario is a diplomatic breakthrough that cools tensions. However, Addis Ababa has raised the political stakes through its national security rhetoric, allusion to port annexation, and sustained military mobilization – de-escalation now could be seen as retreat.
Reaching acceptable terms would be difficult. Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki prioritises strategic depth rather than diplomatic assurances. A détente would diminish the influence inside Ethiopia that Eritrea’s current alliances provide.
The TPLF leadership is unlikely to trust mediators over its current alliances and submit to disarmament, given heightened threats to its survival. Disarmament, particularly, without restoration of western Tigray, would undermine its resistance narrative and strain its internal cohesion.
None of these probable scenarios offer a clear path to victory for any actor.
What is clear is that a return to the post-ceasefire calm is now highly improbable. However the situation unfolds, the peace process will be further complicated with new grievances and alignments that could prove hard to disentangle.
The New Humanitarian
]]>SHOLA LAWAL
The home of every Ugandan president, State House, is nestled in the hilly uptown Nasakero area of the capital city, Kampala.
For four decades, it has been home to just one president – Yoweri Museveni, who has been in office longer than any other Ugandan leader.
Following Thursday’s January 15 election, Museveni’s tight hold on the country has been extended for the seventh time. Although he faced his biggest challenger in the form of popular opposition candidate and musician Robert “Bobi Wine” Kyagulanyi, the country’s electoral commission declared that Museveni had won with 72 percent of the vote.
At 81, Museveni is the third-longest serving president in the world. His control over Uganda, analysts say, is absolute, and the appointment of his son, General Muhoozi Kainerugaba, as army chief back in 2024 has prompted worries among activists of a dynastic succession plan in the near future.
In a young country where about 70 percent of the 46 million population is under 35, Museveni is the only president most Ugandans have ever known. By the time he completes his latest term in 2031, he will have served for 45 years.
However, he is not alone. Across Africa, from hilly Kampala to riverside Brazzaville, several “life-long” leaders like him have held onto power for decades, despite organizing routine elections that give their administrations the semblance of democratic rule.
Political experts studying these figures say at least three of them: Museveni of Uganda, Paul Biya of Cameroon, and Sassou Nguesso of the Republic of the Congo, have perfected unique formulas that help them consolidate power, using tools like compromised elections, divide and rule tactics, and powerful foreign alliances.
Al Jazeera reached out to the three governments for comments, but did not get a response.
In Uganda, fighting corruption ‘with corruption’
For Museveni, violence is used as a means to suppress dissent and keep allies in check, Kampala-based political analyst Job Kiija told Al Jazeera.
The regional strongman was first sworn in as president back in 1986, after he led the rebel National Resistance Army to overturn an unpopular civilian administration in a violent six-year conflict now known as the Ugandan Bush War.
He has remained president under the rebranded National Resistance Movement. Museveni’s ideas of leadership were likely shaped early on, as a political science student in neighboring Tanzania, researchers note. At the time, he studied philosopher and anti-colonial theorist Frantz Fanon’s theory of violence.
Violence, Fanon wrote in his book, The Wretched of the Earth, was the highest form of political struggle, one necessary for decolonization. In his final year thesis (PDF), Museveni focused on that theory and wholly supported the philosopher’s position.
Rather than apply that thinking to a colonial force, however, Museveni has unleashed it on opposition leaders, journalists, and activists in Uganda, Kiija said.
In 2020, when Bobi Wine first emerged on the political scene under the umbrella of the National Unity Party, the opposition candidate immediately garnered widespread support, particularly from young people. Ugandan forces, however, responded forcefully to his rallies, killing many Bobi Wine supporters.
The same scenarios played out in the lead-up to this month’s election. Security forces targeted opposition rallies with excessive force and subjected opposition supporters to arbitrary arrests and torture, according to a report from rights group Amnesty International.
Opposition figures are also routinely jailed in Uganda. Kizza Besigye, a Museveni ally turned four-time presidential candidate, has been imprisoned since November 2024 on accusations of plotting to remove Museveni. He faces a treason charge, which is punishable by death in the country.
Within his own camp, Kiija said, Museveni deliberately allows his allies to overstep their boundaries and then holds their actions over their heads to deter dissent.
“He allows people around him to dip their hands in state coffers, so that they are soiled, and then he uses that against them,” the analyst said.
“Everyone around him – he has a portfolio on them, he knows how much you have stolen, what you have amassed, and that’s one of the reasons we can’t fight corruption because he uses that as a tool to keep people in check.”
Uganda has suffered political instability since its independence from Britain in 1962. The British colonialists employed indirect rule and appointed members of the majority Buganda tribe to important positions, while excluding others. Post-colonial Uganda’s instability and weak institutions are partly attributed to that history, experts say.
In 2005, the Ugandan parliament removed term limits from the constitution, paving the way for Museveni to run indefinitely.
Although rich in gold, oil, and cash crops like coffee, the country is reliant on Western aid. Museveni positions the country as a stabilizing force in the Great Lakes region, contributing troops to regional missions, such as in the fight against the al-Shabab armed group in Somalia, thus gaining Western support.
Uganda also hosts two million refugees from South Sudan, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and Sudan – more than any other African nation.
Among its biggest donors is the United States. Washington contributed about $970m in yearly development aid, mainly for health and humanitarian needs, although US concerns over democratic backsliding and Uganda’s criminalization of same-sex relations strained ties.
The current Trump administration has, however, severely cut aid globally, affecting the country.
While Museveni was the clear favorite to win Thursday’s vote, Bobi Wine has dismissed the results as “fake”. Meanwhile, eyes are now on how Museveni’s eldest child, Kainerugaaba, will be positioned in the near future. The 51-year-old, Kiija said, is clearly being groomed for the top job.
Cameroon’s ‘absentee president’
Just months before Museveni soared to an easy victory, on the opposite side of the continent, Biya, the 92-year-old president of Cameroon, won an eighth term in office in October’s presidential polls.
Biya, who heads the governing Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (RDPC), has been in power since 1982 and is the world’s oldest sitting president. The country’s parliament removed term limits in 2008, and last year’s win gives him another seven years at the helm.
The president is known for spending extensive periods away from the spotlight and even abroad, earning him the nickname “absentee president”. There have been frequent speculations about his health, with rumors of his death circulating on social media now and again, only for the president to pop up briefly on national television.
Still, few Cameroonians, least of all politician Kah Walla, were surprised when Biya won another term. Walla, 60, who competed in three past presidential races, told Al Jazeera that the president uses the very tool essential to democracies: elections.
“We live in an electoral autocracy where the dictator has figured out how to use elections as one of the instruments to keep himself in power,” she said, adding that the electoral body is essentially an extension of the government.
Manu Lekunze, a lecturer in international relations at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, told Al Jazeera that Biya uses well-funded information campaigns to “divide-and-rule” between Cameroon’s multiple ethnic groups.
Biya’s campaign machine often harps on how opposition politicians will represent only their ethnic groups, he said. Biya himself enjoys support from his Beti tribe, the adjacent majority Bamileke-Bamus, and the Fulanis by staying close to traditional leaders.
“He believes he is going to live for a long time,” Lekunze said. “[He] has an ethnic coalition that will support him regardless, and he uses that to get the simple majority he needs, which makes him really comfortable in power.”
Like Museveni, Biya is also accused of using violence – but “selectively”, Walla noted. Some Cameroonians, she said, refuse to call their country a “dictatorship” because there’s a semblance of freedom.
“Biya realized that you need to give people a channel to vent so the resistance won’t build,” Walla said.
“You can go on TV and say anything about the president, and nothing might happen, but someone else might say the same thing, or even less, and be punished [arrested] for it. So that has led people to self-censor because nobody knows where the line is.”
At least 48 people were killed by security forces during protests in support of opposition candidate Issa Tchiroma, who claimed Biya’s win in October as fraudulent, and declared himself the winner.
The now-exiled Tchiroma abandoned Biya’s government to run in the elections and gained support from his Fulani group, as well as several others.
In 2016, security forces also notably cracked down on the country’s minority Anglophone regions – the Southwest and Northwest regions – after teachers and lawyers there took to the streets to decry the lack of opportunities for English-speakers.
British and French colonial rule saw two distinct entities merged after independence, but the imbalance tilts in favor of the majority Francophone population.
The violent government response escalated into an ongoing rebellion, with armed groups fighting for the secession of an independent state, Ambazonia.
Surrounding Biya is a tight elite that Lekunze says benefits from the status quo, including Ferdinand Ngoh-Ngoh, the country’s secretary-general and de facto president. However, Biya has never identified or visibly groomed a successor.
There are fears that the lack of a single, known face to rally around in the case of Biya’s death could cause political turmoil within his party, and likely, the country. Walla, though, believes that would be helpful.
“Should he pass away, we will be in an extremely uncertain position, but it is still in our best interests to take to the streets at that point because if we don’t, the system will perpetuate itself,” she said.
Power, petroleum, foreign backers in Congo-Brazzaville
Despite protests in the streets and unrest among opposition figures in Cameroon and Uganda, the two pivotal presidential elections ended with no real change in leaderships that have been cemented over decades.
Meanwhile, another octogenarian is seek yet another term under similar conditions. In the Republic of the Congo, 81-year-old President Denis Sassou Nguesso, who has held office for 40 years, is set to run again in the March 2026 vote under his Congo Labor Party.
Nguesso was first elected to office in 1979 and led the country for 12 years before losing elections. On his second attempt in 1997, he seized power in a bloody civil war and has remained in office since. In 2015, Nguesso also pushed through a controversial referendum that removed presidential term limits.
Under him, Congo has remained grossly underdeveloped despite its oil wealth, with basic infrastructure lacking due to corruption, said Andrea Ngombert, the exiled founder of Sassoufit, a group advocating for Nguesso’s exit.
Powerful foreign alliances, Ngombert noted, have helped Nguesso consolidate power for decades as he keeps a secure hold on powerful entities, including through marriage.
His daughter, the late Edith Bongo, married into the dynastic Bongo family, which ruled Gabon for decades until a military coup in 2023.
Nguesso was also a strong ally of the late Angolan president, Jose Eduardo dos Santos. When he returned to seize power, a thousand Angolan forces supported his “Ninja” militia and helped secure his victory.
The president similarly had backing from France, which provided him with arms during the war to protect oil investments in Congo, Ngombert said.
“He is not just operating on a continental level, but on an international one,” the activist said.
“He has his nose in everyone’s business, and he knows when to pull your secrets out to control you. Everyone knows if you need things to work, you must have Nguesso on your side.”
Ngueso’s influence in Paris has, however, plummeted since 2013, after pressure from civil society finally forced France to launch investigations into his family’s numerous assets in Europe and the US. In 2022, French authorities seized property belonging to his son, Denis-Christel Sassou Nguesso.
In place of France, observers say Nguesso has turned to China.
Beijing offers the government loans and foreign direct investment, and can use its veto power to shield Nguesso from possible scrutiny at the United Nations in return for lucrative oil deals, Ngombert said.
Nguesso has also defended China in the face of reported rights violations in Xinjiang and Hong Kong and is against the recognition of Taiwan as a sovereign state.
“In this arrangement, China is the shark and Congo-Brazzaville the remora – an asymmetrical but symbiotic relationship in which one feeds off the other and removes harmful parasites, while the other provides protection from other predators,” Ngombert added.
Are free elections at stake in Africa?
Across Africa, observers argue, the three leaders and several others have used force, divisive tactics, and foreign backing to secure and maintain power.
Ironically, analysts say, they have also perfected using elections – meant to be an essential democratic tool – to disenfranchise citizens.
“Elections have become a ritual, a way of just ticking the box for these leaders, but they are not held meaningfully for citizens who want to be able to express their feelings with votes,” Tendai Mbanje, an elections expert at South Africa’s University of Pretoria, told Al Jazeera.
“Electoral institutions have been captured and have deviated from their mandate, and the people leading them have no integrity, as most are political appointees,” he added.
Yet, despite this bleak outlook, African countries don’t have the luxury to discard elections: citizens cannot afford to stop voting or requesting fair electoral conditions, he warned.
“We should not abandon elections because they remain the only legitimate way for citizens to state their choice,” Mbanje said.
“What people need to do is to resist – through protests, through legal mobilisation. Opposition leaders, citizen movements, and religious leaders must all rise in resistance.”
Al Jazeera
]]>David RICH
It was a tumultuous weekend in Benin, a tiny, West African nation that shares a more than 800-kilometer border with regional giant, Nigeria. On Sunday, December 7, as a coup attempt was underway in Benin, fighter jets from Nigeria repeatedly struck the positions of mutinous soldiers in the economic capital of Cotonou, near the national TV station and the Togbin military base.
The operation, ordered by Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, proved decisive in routing the coup plotters and regaining control of the army base, the Beninese government confirmed on Monday, December 8.
Abuja’s intervention was revealed by Nigerian security sources and then confirmed on Sunday evening in a detailed statement from the president’s special adviser. Nigerian authorities explained that they responded to two separate requests from the Beninese foreign ministry, via a “verbal note” to obtain “immediate air support” and intervention by Nigerian ground forces.
Benin also confirmed the arrival of the West African ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States) bloc’s “Standby Force,” composed of Nigerian and other regional forces. By Sunday evening, Benin’s President Patrice Talon took to the airwaves to declare the situation was “totally under control” following the attempted coup.
France, for its part, said it had provided surveillance, observation, and logistical support to the Beninese armed forces.
Jihadists in Benin’s north, bandits in western Nigeria
The Nigerian president was quick to commend his country’s troops for their decisive role as “a defender and protector of constitutional order” in Benin. Tinubu’s statement on Sunday evening noted that Nigerian armed forces “helped stabilize a neighboring country and have made us proud of their commitment to sustaining our democratic values”.
Benin is facing a deteriorating security situation in its northern border areas with Burkina Faso, Niger and Nigeria, where al Qaeda-affiliated JNIM (Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims) and the Islamic State (IS) group’s Sahel branch ISSP (Islamic State’s Sahel Province) are expanding their influence.
In their Sunday morning televised statement, Benin’s coup plotters mentioned the army’s difficulties in the north and the Talon administration’s “disregard and neglect of our fallen brothers-in-arms”.
In April, 54 Beninese soldiers were killed in coordinated JNIM attacks on military posts in a northern Beninese national park, the highest official toll since troops were deployed to secure borders in January 2022.
Terrorist groups in the region are also making incursions across the border into western Nigeria, which is facing a wave of kidnappings, attributed to criminal gangs and bandits, for ransom.
“The Nigerian government determined that an intervention in Benin was essential to safeguard its own territorial integrity,” explained Sam Olukoya, FRANCE 24’s Nigeria correspondent.
Size and border ethnic compositions matter
Nigeria also wanted to avoid a repeat of what happened across its much longer border with neighboring Niger, noted Olukoya. “The Nigerian authorities learned their lesson after the coup in Niger two years ago.
Niger’s new military authorities did not cooperate with Nigeria to combat jihadists around their shared border. The Nigerian government wanted to prevent a similar scenario from happening in Benin,” he said.
On July 26, 2023, Niger’s President Mohamed Bazoum was overthrown by elements of his presidential guard, led by General Abdourahamane Tiani.
At that time, Tinubu was just two months into his presidency and was also rotating chair of ECOWAS. The newly elected Nigerian president threatened a military intervention to restore Bazoum and constitutional order in Niger. The operation was hotly debated within the West African bloc, deemed too dangerous, and ultimately abandoned.
“An intervention in Niger would have been much riskier for Nigeria than the one carried out in Benin, for both logistical reasons, as Niger is ten times larger, and there were domestic political reasons,” said Seidik Abba, head of the Paris-based Centre international de réflexions et d’études sur le Sahel (CIRES).
“Northern Nigeria and southern Niger are populated by the same ethnic groups, the Hausa, Fulani, and Kanuri. A military intervention would have created an internal political crisis in Nigeria,” Abba explained.
“Added to this is the fact that President Bazoum had already been overthrown, which was not the case for Patrice Talon in Benin. It was therefore still possible for Nigeria to intervene at his [Talon’s] request,” he said.
Reaffirming Nigeria’s regional power
The 2023 Niger episode was viewed as a bitter failure for Nigeria’s new president and the region. Months after the coup, the juntas in Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso got together to announce their new military alliance, the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), and firmly slammed the door on ECOWAS. President Bazoum is currently still in detention in Niger.
This time, by intervening in Benin, “Nigeria, which suffered a real blow in 2023, is attempting to reaffirm its status as a major sub-regional power,” said Niagalé Bagayoko, head of the African Security Sector Network research center.
As West Africa’s leading power in economic, military, and demographic terms, Nigeria has already led several military operations in the region: in Liberia (1990-1997) to stop the civil war, in Sierra Leone (1997-2000) in support of ousted President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, and more recently in Gambia (2017) to force Yahya Jammeh to step down after his election defeat.
These interventions were carried out within ECOMOG, a multilateral force replaced in 2004 by the ECOWAS Standby Force, to which Nigeria was already the main contributor.
Nigeria’s operation in Benin revives this “past hegemony,” Bagayoko noted. It also sends a strong signal to West Africa, which has been rocked in recent years by a series of coups in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Guinea, and most recently Guinea-Bissau.
“This wave of coups is perceived by the Nigerian president as a threat to his own power,” noted Olukoya. This is therefore a way for Bola Tinubu to champion democratic values while simultaneously deterring would-be coup plotters, including those within his own country.
France 24
]]>Toting sub-machine guns and sometimes wearing masks as they drive along the streets of Uganda, members of an elite military unit are increasingly viewed as a private army to keep 81-year-old President Yoweri Museveni in power – along with his ever-growing family dynasty.
Museveni has led Uganda since 1986, when his rebel forces marched into the capital, Kampala. He has since won four elections – all marred by allegations of violence and rigging.
But this is nothing new in the country – since Uganda gained independence in 1962, power has only ever changed hands through rebellions or military coups.
Museveni is seeking re-election next year and the opposition fears that the Special Forces Command (SFC) could be used to prevent it from campaigning, as it says was the case in 2021.
But the SFC, which for years was commanded by Museveni’s son Gen Muhoozi Kainerugaba, has been accused by government critics of abducting, torturing and killing opposition activists all year round, not just during elections. The SFC denies these allegations.
“It’s like a shadow army within the army which is only answerable to the president and his son. Its rise and influence is causing resentment among senior generals,” one military source told the BBC.
This is compounded by the fact that Gen Kainerugaba, 51, who is now the army chief, and has said he wants to succeed his father one day, has enlisted his own son into the army.
Gen Kainerugaba has also been contemptuous of some long-serving generals, calling one a “buffoon”.
His remarks sent shockwaves through military and political circles, but the government downplayed them as “mere social-media banter” – something for which Gen Kainerugaba is well known.
Several years ago, he made a joke remark about invading neighbouring Kenya, to the dismay of generals.
Analysts say the unit has become so influential that it rivals the power of the regular army, which still has commanders who fought in the guerrilla war that brought Museveni and his National Resistance Movement (NRM) to power.
These observers have raised fears that the two could clash one day – as in Sudan where a civil war has broken out following a power struggle between the army and a paramilitary group once allied with it, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
The unit now known as the SFC was established when Museveni first took office, and has a motto stating “there is no substitute for loyalty”.
“The SFC is the most powerful unit within the Ugandan military, comprising the [most] highly trained, best-equipped, and best-funded officers in the country,” Dr Gerald Bareebe, a Uganda-born academic based at Canada’s York University, told the BBC.
Both the Ugandan army and the SFC declined to comment when approached by the BBC.
Museveni has previously defended the SFC, saying it was formed for Ugandans. He said that only people who did not wish Uganda well could be unhappy with such a force.
But Museveni’s critics see it differently – arguing that the president has ruled with an iron fist since seizing power and has turned the country into his family’s fiefdom.
They note that the president’s wife, Janet, is the education minister and Gen Kainerugaba is the army chief. His grandson’s enrollment into the army – announced in July – is seen as perpetuating the family dynasty.
Gen Kainerugaba has twice led the SFC and is credited with expanding it into a force with an estimated membership of more than 10,000. The regular army is thought to have around 40,000 active members.
“They go through specialized training. And also they have sophisticated weapons, unlike the regular army,” a former senior military officer told the BBC.
Although his father promoted him to chief of the defense forces in March last year, Gen Kainerugaba is said to have maintained de facto control over the SFC, with its current commander, Maj Gen David Mugisha, reporting to him.
Gen Kainerugaba mostly operates from the unit’s headquarters – in a building named after his father – in Entebbe, about 34km (21 miles) south of the capital, Kampala.
The SFC boasts on its website that it carries out specialized missions “at a moment’s notice” and is assigned to secure critical installations such as the main airport and oil fields.
It is widely suspected to have crossed into Kenya last November to capture opposition politician Kizza Besigye, once Museveni’s doctor, and take him back to Uganda to face trial for treason, which has yet to start. The army’s prosecutor has acknowledged the involvement of the Ugandan security forces.
Analysts like Dr Bareebe feel the SFC’s core function “is to guarantee regime survival” by fending off threats – not only from the opposition but also army generals.
“It plays a disproportionately central role in suppressing anti-regime mobilization and shielding the ruling NRM from both internal dissent and external threats,” Dr Bareebe said.
Although the SFC has denied involvement in the wave of abductions and torture of opposition members, some of its officers have been convicted of abusing their power.
The most prominent case was that of a 32-year-old SFC soldier, who was court-martialed and sentenced to death last November for shooting dead three people and injuring two others, including a one-year-old child.
In May, the presidency said it was investigating a reported incident where SFC soldiers were accused of torturing the driver of a boda boda – as motorbike taxis are known locally. The rider had been rushing to reach his pregnant wife when he got caught up in a presidential convoy.
In the same month, Gen Kainerugaba sparked public outrage after he confirmed the detention of an opposition leader’s bodyguard, who had been missing for days.
He said his “boys” were holding Edward Sebuufu, alias Eddie Mutwe, “in my basement”, and in a social media post, attached a photograph of the bodyguard with a clean-shaven head.
Gen Kainerugaba mocked Mr Sebuufu, saying he was “looking very smart these days” as his beard had been shaved by “my boy”, referring to a junior soldier.
The Uganda Law Society said Mr Sebuufu’s ordeal had not been an isolated case, but was “part of a systematic campaign to silence dissent and crush the aspirations of people yearning for freedom”.
It added that the incident underscored “a dangerous nexus of military power and political oppression”.
The shadowy nature of the unit and its operations have often led to accusations that its existence was illegal.
But in June, parliament passed a controversial legislative amendment, recognizing the SFC as one of four official military services – along with the land forces, air force and reserve force.
Opposition MPs criticized the move, saying the unit should not be given such legitimacy and should instead be disbanded.
“The new law validates an entity that has been operating illegally,” said opposition MP Ibrahim Ssemujju Nganda.
For Dr Bareebe, the SFC’s “elevation in law merely reflects its already dominant position within Uganda’s militarized power structure and reinforces its role as the cornerstone of regime security”.
This concern was shared by respected Ugandan analyst Godber Tumushabe. He recently warned that despite the country’s apparent stability, “all that we have is the absence of war”.
A senior army officer, who preferred not to be named for fear of repercussions, told the BBC that there has been growing discontent within the military about the unit’s recruitment process as it appeared to be along ethnic lines.
Various sources, including those in the military, told the BBC that the SFC was heavily dominated by officers from President Museveni’s Banyankore ethnic group, and related communities, in order to guarantee loyalty.
“If you look at all SFC commanders since its inception, they come from Museveni’s ethnic group,” says Nganda, the opposition MP.
Of the six commanders who have held the position since 2007, only one does not hail from the west country, where the Banyankore live.
Given these competing interests, analysts fear that a power struggle could break out between rival military factions in the post-Museveni era.
“My greatest fear is that we don’t know what will happen when Museveni goes and there is dissent within the army,” Nganda said.
Dr Bareebe echoed this concern: “A stand-off between the SFC and the regular army – each with its own loyalties, interests, and command structures – could trigger significant political instability and even violence, especially in the absence of a clear succession plan.”
But other analysts disagree, saying that this is where Gen Kainerugaba will come into his own given his long career with both the army and SFC.
They argue he is well placed to hold the rival factions together and ensure that the Museveni dynasty continues, guaranteeing stability in Uganda.
Such an outcome would of course be seen as undemocratic by the opposition.
Robert Kyagulanyi, a former pop star better known as Bobi Wine who is running against President Museveni for a second time next year, describes the unit as a “torture squad”.
Earlier this year Gen Kainerugaba threatened to behead the opposition leader, though he later deleted the “joke” tweet and apologized.
Bobi Wine told the BBC he and his colleagues were often targeted and beaten up by SFC officers – and he wants the squad disbanded.
“This is largely seen as the section in the military that is responsible for regime survival through brutality,” he said. “They operate with impunity, and they operate under the protection of General Museveni and his son.”
BBC
]]>DECLAN WALSH
The city’s last functioning hospital has been bombed over 30 times. Between 30 and 40 severely malnourished children arrive every day, seeking help. There’s nothing to give them but animal feed.
“Even we’re eating animal feed,” said Dr. Omar Selik, tilting his camera during a video call to show his meal: a sludgy paste made from pressed peanuts that is usually given to cows, camels and donkeys.
“There’s nothing else.” El Fasher is the worst battleground of Sudan’s brutal civil war. For nearly 18 months the city, in the western region of Darfur, has been under siege by paramilitaries trying to starve it into submission. Fighters have erected a 20-mile earthen wall around its boundaries.
That leaves residents with a dire set of choices. Stay, and risk being bombed or starved. Run, and risk being killed, robbed or sexually assaulted.
“People seem to have forgotten us,” said Dr. Selik, breaking into tears as he spoke. “Oh my God, it’s a very painful story.”
The war in Sudan started more than two years ago, when clashes broke out between Sudan’s army and its paramilitary rival, the Rapid Support Forces.
The fight has engulfed Africa’s third-largest country, forcing about 12 million people from their homes, killing tens of thousands and setting off a major famine. Aid groups call it the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis.
Since March, when the Rapid Support Forces was expelled from the capital, Khartoum, the group has redoubled its effort to capture Darfur, the vast region in western Sudan where most R.S.F. fighters are from. El Fasher is the last city in their way.
More than 500,000 people have fled El Fasher since April, when the R.S.F. rampaged through Zamzam, a famine-stricken camp seven miles south of the city, killing between 300 and 1,500 people in what the U.N. described as one of the worst massacres of the war.
A month later, the R.S.F. began to circle the city with the giant earthen berm, according to satellite images published by the Yale School of Public Health. On Aug. 27, construction to extend the berm was continuing.
An estimated 260,000 people are left in El Fasher, trapped by the tightening siege. A kilo of pasta sells for $73, ten times the normal price, Taha Khater, one of the few aid workers left in the city, said by phone.
His group, known as the Emergency Response Rooms, recorded the deaths of 14 children from malnutrition in the past two weeks. Cholera is spreading.
Food convoys from the United Nations, which has not been able to deliver food to El Fasher in over a year, have been attacked by drones as they approached the city.
One strike in June, on a convoy of 15 trucks, killed five aid workers; another last month destroyed three trucks and forced the rest to turn back. It is unclear which side carried out the attacks.
Young men attempting to flee the city, scrambling over the berm at night, have been executed by fighters, Mr. Khater said.
International aid groups offer help in Tawila, a small town 40 miles to the west now heaving with more than 600,000 refugees. But the journey to Tawila is perilous.
Fighters roam the area, robbing or extorting fleeing civilians. The road is lined with hastily dug graves and abandoned bodies, aid workers say.
“They are just left there,” said Sylvain Penicaud, head of the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Tawila, by phone.
Rape is commonplace. The hospital treats about 40 sexual assault victims every week, but anecdotal evidence suggests “that is nothing compared to the true rate,” Mr. Penicaud said.
Sudan’s military has also been accused of widespread war crimes, including bombing raids on crowded markets near El Fasher that killed several hundred people.
In January, the United States imposed sanctions on Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the leader of Sudan’s military, for alleged use of chemical weapons.
But only the R.S.F. has been accused of genocide, and this month U.N. investigators determined that the long list of atrocities committed by its troops in El Fasher amount to crimes against humanity. An R.S.F. spokesman did not respond to questions for this story.
Foreign involvement in the war in Sudan has worsened the siege. The United Arab Emirates has supplied guns, drones and medical support to the R.S.F., hoping to push the group toward victory, The New York Times has reported.
Last month, Sudan’s military-led government submitted a dossier to the U.N. Security Council that accused the Emirates of hiring a group of Colombian mercenaries, known as the Desert Wolves, to fight alongside the R.S.F.
The dossier, which included passport copies, contracts and a list of 170 people said to be mercenaries, came soon after video footage and photos purporting to show Colombian fighters in central El Fasher circulated online.
The Times was able to verify the location of one video, but not the identities of the fighters.
The Emirates has repeatedly denied supporting either side in Sudan’s war and dismissed the Sudanese dossier as a fabrication.
Hospitals are a major target in the conflict. Of about 200 medical facilities in El Fasher before the war, just one remains — the Al Saudi hospital, where a handful of besieged medics are hanging on, despite bombs, starvation and a vanishing supply of medicines.
The hospital has been targeted over 30 times in the war, with the worst strike in January, when an R.S.F. drone fired a missile into a crowded ward, killing 70 patients and staff, according to Dr. Suleman, a senior doctor who works there.
Now, doctors shelter in foxholes during bombing raids, and malnourished patients are sustained with animal feed, said Dr. Suleman, who asked to be identified by one name because he has received death threats for his work.
The animal feed, known locally as ambaz, is a desperate solution, because it is prone to fungal contamination, especially in the rainy season.
At least 18 residents have died in recent weeks after eating ambaz, local responders said. “But there is no other option,” Dr. Suleman said.
In recent weeks, the R.S.F. has pushed deeper into El Fasher, forcing the Sudanese military and allied ethnic militias into the city’s northwestern corner.
As they fight, R.S.F. fighters have targeted civilians from the ethnic Zaghawa group, human rights groups say, raising fears of an ethnic massacre if they take the city outright.
Salwa Ahmed, a university lecturer, tried to stay ahead of the fighting. She fled her home as the R.S.F. advanced, hurrying through streets littered with the bodies of fallen fighters, she said.
Eventually she reached a safer place, even if bombs continued to fall nearby, she said.
But now her husband, Essam, was missing. He returned to their home a week earlier, to fetch some belongings. By Friday, he still hadn’t returned.
“We don’t know if he’s dead or alive,” she said. As the siege has tightened, some residents have smuggled small amounts of food and medicine into the city by scrambling over the earthen berm at night.
But those caught by fighters face beatings and threats. One video that circulated recently in a Telegram channel run by R.S.F. supporters showed a man in an R.S.F. uniform wielding a whip over a man cowering on the ground.
Diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting have yielded few results. On Aug. 13, the U.N. Security Council repeated its call for an end to the siege of El Fasher, two days after R.S.F. fighters stormed a camp in the city, killing 57 people.
Three days later, the R.S.F. stormed into the camp again, this time killing 32 people, Human Rights Watch reported.
New York Times
]]>Early in his eight-year tenure, in 2017, then Ghanaian president Nana Akufo-Addo declared a moratorium on all small-scale gold mining. He established an inter-ministerial committee on illegal mining and a joint military-police taskforce – Operation Vanguard – to enforce the ban.
The tough measures aimed to reduce the severe environmental degradation caused by illegal small-scale gold mining, known as “galamsey”. Initially for six months, the ban lasted for 20 months until December 2018, when it was lifted for newly registered miners.
But illegal mining continued unabated. A statement made in Ghana’s parliament by the country’s lands minister outlined the scale and gold production from small-scale mining increased during the period of its ban.
As political scientists, we investigated why the government-declared “war” on illegal small-scale gold mining and associated environmental degradation failed so spectacularly.
We conducted our investigations through field visits to communities in mining areas in the western and central regions of Ghana. We interviewed small-scale miners, community residents and people affected by illegal mining.
We followed this up with a review of official reports, published scientific research and media reports. We concluded from findings that the involvement of government officials and business elites in illegal mining practices was behind the failure of the interventions.
We describe this as “democracy capture”. We argue that, despite Ghana’s much-vaunted electoral democracy, the country’s democratic processes and institutions have been captured by political and economic elites for their own personal enrichment.
Scandals
By mid-2023 a series of corruption scandals had emerged around Ghana’s attempt to curb illegal mining. These included the release of an undercover investigation by journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas. Machinery seized by the military from illegal mining sites went missing under mysterious circumstances.
Also, military personnel assigned to protect forest reserves were accused of becoming a protection racket for illegal miners.
In April 2023, the scandals peaked. A report on the work of the inter-ministerial committee by its former chair, Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, was leaked.
It detailed the involvement of high-level government and ruling party officials in illegal and environmentally destructive mining at a time when all mining was banned.
The report was submitted to government in 2021 but didn’t become public until it was leaked. No clear official statement was issued about the report, but some government officials attempted to discredit and challenge its findings.
The scandals brought fresh attention to the fact that the government’s policies to curb illegal mining had failed. This failure is indicated by the official gold production figures from small-scale mining during the moratorium period.
In 2017, production held steady at almost 1.5 million ounces and then in 2018 increased to its highest level ever at almost 2 million ounces, precisely when the ban was in place. Small-scale output in 2018 was 41.4% of total gold production, higher than any previous year.
These figures question the extent to which the moratorium on mining was enforced. It indicates that mining continued throughout the purported ban.
Democracy capture and elite enrichment
The objective of democracy capture is to appropriate the benefits of state control for purposes of personal enrichment. It goes beyond individual acts of opportunistic corruption.
It entails systematic processes of capture by political elites organized in established political parties who act alongside associated business elites. Importantly, the benefits go beyond the appropriation of state resources. It includes private financial gains from illicit activities with state protection.
Although we focus on the government under Akufo-Addo (2017-2024), our contention is that “democracy capture” in Ghana extends to the two main political parties. We analyze how this has come about. We also set out the implications for democracy in Ghana, and what can be done to reverse the trend.
Elements of democracy capture are evident in the various scandals and corrupt practices that were exposed during the government’s ostensible campaign against illegal mining. The scandals expose an organized network at the highest level of government. It includes politicians, officials and senior ruling party members.
How democracy capture works
First, the presidency and its chief of staff appear to have played a role in controlling operations and protecting those exposed.
The chief of staff as a political appointee from the ruling party, rather than a career civil servant, is crucial to strengthening the link between the executive and the ruling party. Additionally, senior party members are appointed to key roles within the presidency.
Second, there is tight party control over relevant state agencies. For example, a former general secretary of the governing party was appointed as CEO of the Forestry Commission (a key regulator in the issuance of mining licenses).
Third, the loyalty between members of the party elite has been highlighted by the high-level protection from prosecution and conviction when criminal activities are exposed. The case of Charles Bissue is an example.
A top official of the inter-ministerial committee on illegal mining and prominent member of the governing party, he was caught on camera in the undercover investigation. He was charged with corruption but six years later the case still hasn’t been concluded.
Fourth, the military and law-enforcement agencies are allowed to benefit from illicit activities. They can sell confiscated equipment and take bribes to protect illegal mining sites. An official investigation found that the police also habitually did this.
What next?
Ghanaians value political stability and civil liberties. However, the capture of democracy has become a path to personal wealth for the political elite and their business associates.
Elites have been able to act outside the law with relative impunity. The consequence of democracy capture is that socio-economic development is sidelined. Wealth cascades upwards and inequalities intensify. Our study clearly identifies these elements.
Combating democracy capture will require a major effort from civil society organizations and the media, to expose government and state involvement in these illegal activities. This must go hand in hand with a stronger legal and judicial regime committed to prosecutions.
The current attorney general has ordered an investigation into Frimpong-Boateng’s report, but we await to see what action, if any, will be taken.
The Conversation
]]>President John Mahama wants Ghana’s economy to run around the clock. Is the plan feasible, and what needs to be taken into consideration for it to succeed?
Since taking office six months ago, Ghanaian President John Mahama has placed a firm focus on reviving the country’s economy — a key promise of his campaign.
The new leader is seeking to shift the West African nation away from relying solely on its traditional sectors to establishing a more diversified economy.
To this end, Mahama has launched a so-called 24-hour economy designed not only to create job opportunities around the clock but also to transform Ghana from an imports-based economy to self-sufficiency.
“This policy is made for Ghana and the future,” said Mahama. “The 24-Hour Plus Program will be the catalyst for Ghana’s economic growth, and we are sure it will make Ghana prosper.”
Under the plan, various industries will operate in three eight-hour shifts daily, with public and private sectors working together to keep the economy running day and night.
The initiative chiefly targets existing key sectors in the country such as agriculture, manufacturing and essential services, but could be expanded to other areas in the long term. But as promising as it may seem, questions remain about the feasibility of Mahama’s pet project.
A country that never sleeps?
Ghana’s capital, Accra, can’t compare to New York, Dubai or Tokyo when it comes to 24-hour amenities. In the African context, few cities run nonstop services, although Accra and cities in Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa and Kenya boast vibrant informal nighttime economies.
Mahama’s plan is about far more than creating cities where shops, restaurants and bars can operate day and night: His vision is to boost Ghana’s economic output by tripling the hours that vital industries and sectors operate — from an average of eight hours per day to 24 hours.
By the end of the decade, this ambitious policy could create 1.7 million new jobs across the nation, which would mean a 5% drop in unemployment.
Economist Daniel Amateye Anim believes that bridging the gap from the theoretical idea behind the new policy to its actual application is where things could potentially go awry.
“About $4 billion to drive this 24-hour policy is needed,” he told DW. The expense has to be seen in the context of Ghana already owing $3 billion to the International Monetary Fund after defaulting repeatedly on some of its existing debt in recent years.
Implementing an ambitious vision
Ghana’s approach as a government-backed policy is unique on the African continent, but faces multiple hurdles in its implementation.
“On paper, the program sounds or appears innovative and progressive, with a propensity of transforming Ghana’s economy. So it makes theoretical sense … [because] it’s a program that seeks to create jobs, bring about productivity, lift up from poverty,” said Amateye.
“As it stands now, we have so many graduates who are unemployed. And so, a program that would ensure that people are employed and jobs are created, will also increase our GDP.”
But in practical terms, he said, funding will be a limiting factor. “Who exactly is the private sector, who you are expecting [to fund the program]? The internal private sectors does not have the financial muscle … to drive such an innovative program.”
According to Amateye, even if Ghana’s private sector were able to fund a major transformation of the economy, it would still take time for private enterprises to fully buy into Mahama’s ambitious idea. “[Each enterprise] would have to do a cost-benefit analysis first, and that takes time.”
Amateye suggested that the onus should be on the government to cough up the funds first and thus “dictate the pace” before private enterprises across Ghana can actually join Mahama’s 24-hour economy revolution.
Can an economy run around the clock?
DW’s correspondent in Accra, Isaac Kaledzi, agrees that the execution of the 24-hour agenda could run into trouble — not only on account of the remaining questions on funding but also due to a lack of certain infrastructure elements to implement the plan countrywide.
“The country is suffering with power [supply] currently. We are struggling … to keep the lights on [in Ghana]. We have to make sure that infrastructure is there first,” said Kaledzi.
He also stressed that smaller enterprises might be hesitant to be part of the plan: existing companies could suffer financial losses by creating more supply than there is demand by continuous production.
However, he believes young people in particular need such a decisive impetus from the government to find new ways to secure their financial future: “[The 24-hour policy] is not taking a job away from someone but is making room for someone else also to join,” said Kaledzi.
Mahama aims for public-private collaboration
Mahama’s plan stands out for not being exclusively a top-down approach. While championed and led by his government, the 24-hour Plus plan it will rely on a collaborative approach involving labor unions, the private sector and international development partners.
This might become its Achilles’ heel, according to Amateye. He believes that in practice, the balance between various stakeholders will not be as balanced as the government might make it sound at this point. “
The government is going to be a facilitator to help the private sector to drive this agenda. This reliance on private sector can be problematic,” he said. That could result in private companies — especially the bigger ones — ending up with too much leverage in the scheme.
“A 24-hour economy is therefore only one of the ways of ensuring that we improve our economy… and to continue [building on] the gains of the previous administration. We should not see the 24-hour economy as a sole game changer,” said Amateye.
He suggests that the currently paused One District One Factory initiative of Ghana’s previous administration, which focuses on job creation, should also be continued and expanded.
24-hour economy requires shift in mindset
In Ghana, Africa’s 10th strongest economy, unemployment, poverty and food insecurity have been long-standing policy issues.
According to Amateye, what has stood in the way of affecting change has been the nation’s mindset. In order for an innovative approach like shifting the economy to a 24-hour cycle, Ghanaians would need to alter the way they view their government. “So many people work for the government but not many trust the government,” he said.
Amateye believes Mahama wants to help restore public trust by creating transparent and accountable government departments to administer the funds involved in running the 24-hour economy. He also underscored the point that Ghana’s workers would have to alter the way they think about the nature of work itself in order to build a 24-hour economy.
“We have been trained to go look for white-collar jobs, administrative jobs, office jobs. We are not focused on vocational and technical training, and that is where the gap is… We are still following the colonial legacy left behind of training administrators. The number of people doing vocational courses … is limited. And that has to change.”
DW
]]>A humanitarian crisis is looming at Malawi’s largest refugee camp. The UNHCR says it can no longer fund the camp that houses some 57,000 people from DR Congo, Rwanda, Somalia, Burundi and Ethiopia.
In June, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said a funding shortfall has compelled it to scale down its operations worldwide. The measure includes some 3,500 staff cuts.
In Malawi, where the UNHCR has been active since 1994, refugee camp supervisors and security personnel have since been laid off and the agency is selling off its vehicles, equipment and other assets.
The situation is dire at the country’s largest camp for refugees and asylum seekers – Dzaleka. According to the UNHCR, several other NGOs involved in the overcrowded camp are also scaling down operations and halting community-based training and sensitization programs.
A bleak outlook for refugees in Malawi
Dzaleka houses mostly people from Africa’s Great Lakes region and the Horn of Africa. Civil society groups and activists are concerned for their welfare of those at Dzaleka and asking how the women and children among them especially will access the basic services.
“I think it is very disturbing, especially where women are particularly disadvantaged and you look at the services that are supposed to be provided which fulfill human rights and issues of gender.
You look at health care services for example, and the fact that there are job cuts,” said Jessie Chingoma, a gender and labor activist. “It means now that the basic public services are not adequate, they have already been inadequate but now the situation becomes much worse.”
Where will the refugees go?
“It was reported that the government has started communication with countries where refugees in Dzaleka are from to talk about possible repatriation,” Innocent Magambi, a Lilongwe-based refugee rights advocate who was himself once housed at the camp, told DW. “The refugees are worried, because most of them fear they will lose the little security they have.”
The closure of Dzaleka without a sustainable alternative would be “a very big disaster,” Undule Mwakasungula, a human rights activist, told DW. It “could expose refugees to severe human rights violations which might include some refugees being forced to return to their countries,” Mwakasungula added.
As of March 31, UNHCR said, it had received only 12% of the $26 million (€22 million) required to adequately support refugees and asylum-seekers in Malawi this year, which hampers its operations.
Inside the Dzaleka camp
Dzaleka was built to accommodate 10,000 to 12,000 people. By the end of 2024, it housed 56,779 refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda, Somalia, Burundi and Ethiopia.
Conflicts and political unrest around Africa have driven many to Dzaleka since 1994. In February 2025 alone,thousands of Mozambicans sought refuge in Malawi.
UNHCR data shows a monthly intake of nearly 300 people, with women and children making up 93% of the camp’s population.
“Dzaleka refugee camp remains highly congested resulting in poor living conditions and poor infrastructure being constructed due to limited space and resources,” a 2024 UNHCR factsheet on Malawi said.
Calls for broader support
NGOs like the Malawi Network Against Trafficking are calling on civil society and the private sector can help address the situation. “I think several players will have to come in, we have already seen or heard the government efforts, but the UN also should not abandon the whole situation,” Chingoma told DW.
It is also being suggested that the UNHCR and the Malawi government works closely on the voluntary repatriation program that was started in 2023. So far, 310 refugees from Burundi and Somalia primarily have returned home under the initiative.
But not everyone agrees with voluntary repatriation. “When you say there is a funding gap and then you say the solution is to close the refugee camp or to seek for repatriation, that is not the context of repatriation,” Magambi told DW.
“Repatriation should be something that people voluntarily assess the situation back home and they decide to go. It should not be caused by any other external situation like in this case, lack of funding and inability of government to care for refugees.”
Human rights advocates are meanwhile warning the government to avoid forced repatriations. DW reached out to the government through the office of Homeland Security but received no response.
What do refugees think?
DW asked Innocent Magambi what he, as someone who was sheltered at Dzaleka, thinks is needed in the face of the UNHCR funding shortfall.
“Planning for the future is to plan on how we reduce the burden of donor dependency among refugees who have been there for 31 years, some of them,” Magambi said.
“We need to meet the donors, I believe that the fact that refugees in Dzaleka have been treated as emergency for over 30 years, does not give confidence to donors to continually give money that does not have an end plan.”
DW
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