NEWS ANALYSIS

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | Seven candidates are battling to succeed President Jacob Zuma as the leader of the African National Congress at the party’s conference starting Saturday. Vice President Cyril Ramaphosa and ex-African Union chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma are the frontrunners in a divisive race. Here are portraits of five …

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, a front-runner in the race for South Africa’s ruling party leadership, faces difficulty distancing herself from her tarnished ex-husband President Jacob Zuma. Dlamini-Zuma is an African National Congress (ANC) veteran and an experienced technocrat who has served as a minister under every …

How failure to share family cultural history endangers symbols that represent common ancestral origin COMMENT | NATHAN KIWERE | Writing on page 137 of his book, ‘The Baganda’ (Macmillan and Co., 1911), John Roscoe, a British colonial historian, states that when animals were becoming scarce, Kintu, with the general consent of …

It is important to recognise that data alone are not enough, common sense matters COMMENT | KAUSHIK BASU | After years of stressing the importance of evidence-based policymaking, economists have clearly had some influence on politicians. What economists now need to do is to impress upon those same politicians that citing …

Weighing economic, political ties and future relationships that could prove decisive for Africa COMMENT | HANNAH RYDER | Ask anyone with a basic knowledge of Africa which country is more poised for success – Zimbabwe or Kenya – and he or she will undoubtedly answer “Kenya.” Events of the last week …

Why inflation and monetary-policy adjustments by central banks might not impact its price COMMENT | JIM O’NEIL | Writing about oil prices is always risky. In a January 2015, I suggested that oil prices would not continue to fall, and even predicted that they would “finish the year higher than they …

  Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | Old alliances between North Korea and several African nations forged at the height of the Cold War will not be swept away easily. While threats from the United States and UN sanctions have forced many governments on the continent to keep their distance …

French domination sparks fight with Chinese   Kampala, Uganda | HAGGAI MATSIKO | Oil companies—Total E&P, Tullow Oil and CNOOC—are locked in a bitter fight for control of Uganda’s oil sector.  The coveted prizes are deals worth about $20 billion. The three entered a partnership in 2012 when Tullow Oil, which …

  Meressa K Dessu | ISS TODAY | With the civil war in South Sudan concluding its fourth year, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) is maximising its efforts to revitalise the Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (ARCSS) through the establishment of a …

Six barriers that make it difficult for African states to use research for policy COMMENT | WILLEM FOURIE | African policymakers need access to high quality evidence to implement the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) successfully. The SDGs are arguably the most broad-ranging development goals to be ratified by United Nations member …