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Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive Africa Watch by email every week.
Africa heralded the New Year with the official launch of a new free trade zone across the continent. The African Continental Free Trade Area, or AfCFTA, aims to bring together 1.3 billion people into a $ 3.4 trillion economic bloc, creating a single market for goods and services that could significantly boost intra-African trade and investment.
However, implementation of the agreement is expected to be slow, as experts and officials in the region say significant challenges need to be resolved before the impacts of the agreement are felt. That makes the recent launch, which was delayed from July 1 after the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted negotiations, largely symbolic.
“It’s going to take us a long time,” Wamkele Mene, general secretary of the AfCFTA secretariat, told the Financial Times. Of the 54 African countries that have signed the agreement since its founding in 2018 (Eritrea is the only one resisting), only 34 have ratified it. And of those, many still lack both the customs procedures and infrastructure, including roads and rail links, necessary for the deal to work.
The signatories to the agreement also haven’t finished drafting a critical annex outlining the rules of origin, a critical step that will determine which products are subject to tariffs and tariffs. Although the AfCFTA will eliminate tariffs on 90 percent of goods, for five years for the most developed countries and 10 for the poorest, there will be a longer term to eliminate tariffs on 7 percent of goods that are considered sensitive and the 3 percent that will be excluded entirely.
Leaders from across the continent voiced support for the initiative as it came into effect, with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa announcing its potential to “fundamentally change the economic fortunes of our continent” in his New Year’s Eve address. But there is no guarantee that Ramaphosa and his fellow African leaders will take the necessary steps to make the deal work. That includes abandoning your own protectionist instincts and accepting that “profits will not be distributed evenly, nationally, between sectors or between countries,” as Trudi Hartzenberg, executive director of the Trade Law Center in South Africa, explained in a question session. And answers. with WPR in 2019.
If it can overcome the remaining hurdles, experts say the AfCFTA could be transformative in a continent where domestic trade has historically been low; Trade with other African countries accounted for only 14.4 percent of African exports in 2019. If fully implemented, officials at the United Nations and the World Bank predict that the AfCFTA could boost trade by more than 50 percent. and lift tens of millions of people out of poverty by 2035.
But as W. Gyude Moore, a former Liberian public works minister, told Reuters, “This is a multi-decade process.”
Stay up to date on the news from Africa with our selected Africa news cable daily.
Here is a summary of news from other parts of the continent:
Central Africa
Central African Republic: Current President Faustin-Archange Touadera won reelection with 53 percent of the vote, according to interim results announced Monday, but his victory has been marred by ongoing violence. Days before the December 27 elections, three of the country’s largest rebel groups joined forces and said they would march on the capital, Bangui. They disrupted the electoral process in much of the country, preventing many voters from voting. That led a group of opposition leaders to object that the elections “were not an expression of the will of the Central African people” and demand a new execution. Meanwhile, the new rebel coalition, known as the Coalition of Patriots for Change, or CPC, has continued its violent campaign, advancing a few dozen kilometers from the capital, Bangui, Adrienne Surprenant reported in a briefing for WPR this week. .
Touadera relies on a 12,000-strong UN peacekeeping force, as well as Russian and Rwandan soldiers who arrived before the elections to contain the rebels. The government has accused former President Francois Bozize of colluding with the fighters in a coup attempt before the vote, and prosecutors launched an investigation this week into his role in the rebellion. Bozize, who was unable to stand for election, has denied the allegations, but said he supports the CCP. Bozize ruled the country for 10 years before being overthrown by a rebel coalition known as Seleka in 2013. He faces an arrest warrant in the Central African Republic and is under UN sanctions for his alleged support of anti-Balaka militias, that were formed in 2013 to fight the Seleka.
President Faustin-Archange Touadera, center, in Bangui, Central African Republic, on Dec. 27, 2020 (AP photo).
West africa
Niger: Extremists massacred about 100 people in two southwestern towns last Saturday, in one of the worst massacres of civilians since the Islamist insurgency began in Africa’s Sahel region eight years ago. Dozens of gunmen on motorcycles attacked the two villages in the Tillaberi region, apparently in retaliation after residents recently killed three extremists. No group has claimed responsibility for the massacres, although the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara has recently been active in the region. Tillaberi, part of which has been in a state of emergency since 2017, also faces violence from Islamist groups active in neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso. The region has seen an increase in mass atrocities over the past year, despite the presence of thousands of regional and international troops.
The attack came as the results of Niger’s first round of presidential voting were released. Mohamed Bazoum, a former interior and foreign minister and a close ally of outgoing President Mahamadou Issoufou, won nearly 40 percent of the vote in the December 27 elections, but did not reach the majority necessary for an outright victory. He will face former President Mahamane Ousmane, who finished second with 17 percent of the vote, in a runoff scheduled for February 21.
South Africa
South Africa: Scientists are warning of the impact of a new variant of COVID-19 that has been detected in the country, which has mutated far more than a separate variant that originated in the UK. Although it is more infectious than the common strain of the virus, World Health Organization officials said there was still no indication that it was resistant to existing vaccines, despite concerns raised by the British government this week. The strain has become dominant in the coastal areas of South Africa and is now running inland, leading to a second increase in COVID-19 cases and deaths. South Africa reported more than 21,000 new COVID-19 cases and 844 deaths on Wednesday, the highest totals in a single day since the pandemic began. After the new strain was discovered in late December, countries around the world, including Germany, the Netherlands, and Israel, temporarily banned flights from South Africa, and the UK has extended its ban to other countries in the region with a high number of travelers from South Africa.
North Africa
Algeria: A retrial of Said Bouteflika, a shadowy figure who wielded enormous influence in the government during the 20-year presidency of his brother Abdelaziz Bouteflika, resulted in the overturning of his previous conviction on conspiracy charges on Saturday. After Abdelaziz Bouteflika resigned in April 2019 amid massive pro-democracy protests, his brother was among a wave of presidential advisers and advisers arrested as military leaders tried to hold on to power by siding with protesters. The move was “another example of the regime’s attempt to cut off a part of the government structure to save the overall system,” as Francisco Serrano explained in a WPR article in August 2019. Said Bouteflika was convicted along with two former chiefs. intelligence – Gen. Mohamed Mediene and General Athmane Tartag, of conspiring against the army and the state in September 2019 and sentenced to 15 years in prison. All three were acquitted in the recent retrial, although Bouteflika still faces separate corruption charges.
east africa
Kenya: When students returned to school on Monday for the first time in nine months, school officials and parents worried that the government had not done enough to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in classrooms. After a missed academic year that will force most students to repeat classes, government officials said they were under pressure to reopen schools. They have implemented new guidelines, including the use of masks, mandatory temperature checks, and regular hand washing, but few schools are able to abide by these rules. Many lack running water and the Kenya National Teachers Union said the government did not provide funds to buy thermometers or hand sanitizers.
Top readings on the Web
It’s Do or Die as Zimbabweans descend on Beitbridge to escape the blockade: As the Zimbabwean government prepared to reintroduce a severe blockade in response to rising COVID-19 cases, hundreds of citizens rushed across the border into South Africa , where the restrictions are much more flexible. Shiraaz Mohamed of the Daily Maverick traveled to the Beitbridge crossing, where lines of people were waiting to get tested for coronavirus and, if they received a negative result and had all the paperwork in order, to cross into South Africa. “Fake COVID-19 certificates and border jumpers were some of the problems that officials faced at the gate as they struggled to contain the crowd,” Mohamed reported. Zimbabwe’s 30-day shutdown, which went into effect on Tuesday, includes a stay-at-home order that will severely restrict informal economic activities that most citizens depend on for survival. Zimbabwean officials said the shutdown was necessitated by an increase in new cases, from 8,374 in early November to more than 14,000 this month.
The police took his son away. Then came the merchants of hope: In October, Nigeria erupted in protest against the dreaded Special Anti-Theft Squad, or SARS, a now-defunct police unit accused of torturing, killing and extorting people across the country. But there is a cottage industry of so-called human rights groups, journalists, and pastors profiting from these disappearances, who might not be as eager for police reform. For The New York Times, Ruth Maclean and Ben Ezeamalu document the different actors “snatching money from desperate families who have often already paid large bribes to the police.” They include human rights groups offering secure information about SARS victims and pastors who promise spiritual intervention but fail to keep those promises as the victims’ families go further into debt.
Andrew Green is a freelance journalist based in Berlin. He writes regularly on health and human rights issues. You can see more of his work at www.theandrewgreen.com.
