Sub-Saharan spring? Mali coup, Wade thrown out

Two dramatic events in a space of three to four days pulled West Africa in two opposite directions, a classic case of one step forward and two steps back.

Mali wobbling from a surge in internal rebellion by Tuaregs in the north of the country since January succumbed to a disorderly but not wholly unexpected coup d’tat in the early hours of Thursday. Having suffered a chain of heavy losses at the hands of the rebels, the military complained of inadequate equipment and food to defeat the rebels. 

Ominously, the Malian Defence Minister’s car was pelted with stones during a visit to an army barracks just outside Bamako before the coup d’tat.

Senegal's president-elect Macky Sall

But on Sunday Senegal gave thumps up to democracy by peacefully sending President Abdoulaye Wade packing from the presidential palace. Mali and Senegal are neighbours. Like most other African countries, both nations have people of the same ethnicity living just across their common border.

The unrest in Mali is not expected to spread to Senegal especially after the presidential runoff passed off incident-free.

The 85-yr-old president who suffered the spectacular defeat swiftly conceded defeat even before the total votes cast were tallied. A victory for Wade would almost certainly have plunged Senegal into a long period of uncertainty.

Senegal is one of the very few West African countries never to have suffered a military coup in its entire post-independence history.

Senegalese now have their wishes but it remains to be seen how differently the Macky Sall administration will govern. Wade’s government became increasingly belligerent, intolerant, corrupt and even dictatorial during his second term in office.  

Sall is a Wade protégé having served under the oldman as prime minister for many years. Besides sharing Wade’s core perspectives on economic management, many of Sall’s key advisors are former colleagues who all served in government under Wade.

Does that mean more of the same? Not really. The pressure for a change in direction away from the Wade legacy runs deep in Senegal. Apart from his intransigence to hang onto power at all cost, Wade’s legacy includes: high unemployment, high levels of graft and nepotism and dreadful delivery of basic public services such as electricity, water and health.

In the 1990s West Africa notoriously carved for itself the unenviable tag of being the most unstable sub-region in Africa with the brutal civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone and instabilities in Guinea Bissau and Guinea Conakry.

The latest coup is bad for Mali and its economy which depends essentially on gold and cotton. Mali has risen in recent years to become the third largest exporter of gold in Africa – coming only after South Africa and Ghana. Cost of living is running high and unemployment sky high.

The Sahel region's insecurities (affiliates of Al Qaeda operate in the region), drought and food crises are battering the country hard and this is made worse by the fighting between government forces and Tuareg rebels who are now better armed post-Libya’s revolution that ousted Qaddafi. Some of the Tuaregs fought on the side of the late Libyan dictator.

One thing the coup, the first since 1991, has done is that it has played to the advantage of the rebels and shifted the national army’s attention further away from the conflict zone in the north to stabilizing and consolidating military power in Bamako in the south. 

There may be nothing beyond Bamako to hold on to by the time the soldiers complete consolidating their grip on the capital city. Mali was scheduled to hold presidential elections on April 29. That's up in the air for now at least.

That the coup is a setback for democracy in the region is an understatement. Ironically, the Malian soldiers staged the coup while the African Union peace and security council was meeting in Bamako to find solutions to growing insecurity in the Sahel, a region with very harsh terrain and straddling between North Africa and West Africa.

A question worth asking though is whether the instabilities will stop with Mali? Has Mali triggered another spring revolution akin to the Arab spring? Countries such as Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger and Mauritania are all in grave danger with the proliferation of both small and heavy weapons flowing from the Arab spring and the mix of drought and food crises, large unemployed and disaffected population, weak governments and state institutions.

Anyways, thumps up for Senegal. Thumps down for Mali.

Ghana's democracy while we slept

Ok, if you don’t like how a news media covers your government and political party, issue a fiat forbidding all your appointees, other public officials, departments and agencies from speaking to that media house. 

You probably can do that (and get away with it) if you run your own small company or fiefdom but certainly not when you’re governing a post-modern democratic state.

But that’s exactly what the Government of Ghana has done. On Tuesday, March 20, the government issued an order prohibiting all appointees from granting interviews to or advertising on the platforms of the country’s leading independent multimedia company, Multimedia Group Limited.

The government’s move came as a surprise to many. Not only is the administration’s action clearly undemocratic, utterly illegal and unnecessary exercise of power, it is also heavily tinged with arrogance.

Ghana’s 4^th republican constitution, in letter and spirit, frowns on this sort of arbitrary use of state power. The constitution guarantees the right of the media, free speech and expressly recognizes the media as the fourth estate of the realm.

President Mills (R) and his veep, John Mahama

According to government, the action is borne out of the fact that it doesn’t like the way the media organization’s networks report on the government and the ruling party.

Multimedia Group Limited owns and operates Joy FM, by far Ghana’s best and indeed one of Africa’s leading radio stations. The company runs the Multi TV network. Altogether, Multimedia Group Limited operates 20 radio and TV channels. 

It also has dozens of affiliates which rebroadcast its flagship programmes right across Ghana and on the internet every day. The comprehensive Myjoyline website is a leader in online news in Ghana.

I’ve a confession to make here: I worked briefly with Multimedia after graduate school but that’s beside the point.

Historically, the NDC has had a rather fractious relationship with the media. In July 2001, the John Kufour NPP administration repealed the criminal libel and seditious laws of the country.   

In the 1990s, NDC government appointees and affiliates had used these laws during Jerry Rawlings administration to bully and jail journalists.

After promising while in opposition to pass the Right to Information Bill into law in 2008, the Mills administration has so far reneged on that promise – with just about eight months to face the electorate again. Ghanaians head to the polls in December to elect a president and legislatures. President Mills won the 2008 election by a wafer-thin margin.

Government’s claim its heavy-handed move is in direct response to Multimedia Group’s supposed unfairness in the coverage of the ruling party is simply untenable and it is also not doing itself any favours in a competitive election year as this.

This action only plays into the hands of the opposition which will no doubt capitalize on it to characterize the Mills administration as intolerant and undemocratic. Ghanaians take their democracy and freedom of speech seriously -- just listen to or watch any of the morning show programmes on radio or TV). 

Therefore, arbitrarily proscribing a major news and entertainment network such as the Multimedia Group from covering state events can only hit the government where it hurts most, public perception and possibly at the polls later in the year. Already political campaigns have intensified.

Ghana’s laws guarantee the right to rejoinder and civil suit against false allegations and unfair media reporting. For the administration to therefore take such a drastic action speaks to how precarious the country’s democracy is.

Ghana is an ‘anchor state’, a shining example of modern democratic governance in Africa but this is clearly under threat. Recording a remarkable growth rate of 13.5 per cent in 2011 and an increasingly vibrant economy buoyed by recent oil discovery and exports, the country enjoys tremendous goodwill in Africa and globally.

The government must step back from this atypical and impulsive exercise of power, retract the order and apologize to Ghanaians for denting their confidence in the country’s democracy.

Fabrice we’re all with you

Support pouring in for the severely ill Congolese-Briton footballer, Fabrice Muamba who collapsed on the field on Saturday, March 18 has been incredible. Seeing fans in the stands and footballers on the field at White Hart Lane tearing in fear of the worst for the 23yr old English U21 player was moving indeed.

Fabrice Muamba

Real Madrid even donned special jerseys – they had messages of support inscribed on their playing jerseys when they played a league match less than 24 hours after Patrice collapsed in the match between his club, Bolton Wanderers and Tottenham Hotspurs.

The support of footballers of African descent in the English premier league has been impressive too. Along with his mother and sister, Spur’s Jermaine Defoe who wept on the field after Fabrice was among the first players to visit him at the hospital.

After seeing the player on Monday night, Michael Essien, Chelsea’s Ghanaian midfielder told the press Fabrice spoke to him in both English and French, confirming earlier reports that the ailing footballer was making a slow but steady recovery.

Friends in Kinshasa, Congo DR where Fabrice was raised until age 10, say the atmosphere in the country is tinge with sorrow and anxiety. The mood was a lot worse on Sunday in Kinshasa, I am told.

Visiting Fabrice: Shaun Wright-Philips & Ashley Cole

That all the footballers who visited the player wore sombre faces is clear but I was intriguing seeing both Ashley Cole and Shaun Wright-Philips (they went to the hospital together) in tops with motif of two of the best known black entertainers – Mohammed Ali (Cassius Clay) and Bob Marley. Chelsea’s Ashley Cole wore a motif of the boxing legend Ali) while QPR (and former Chelsea team mate) Shaun Wright-Philips in a hoody with the image of the reggae legend Bob Marley. Not so sure what that suggests. Fabrice is a big fun of both Ali and Bob Marley? May be.

Crucially, I hope the Confederation of African Football (CAF) and national football authorities in the various African countries are thinking up how to avoid a similar incident in the future.

Already a number of African footballers from Nigeria and Cameroon have collapsed and died while playing competitive football in the last few years. In 2003, Cameroon and Manchester City footballer Marc-Vivien Foe, 28, died after collapsing on the pitch during an international match.

Get well soon, Fabrice!

Jamestown, gays and elections

Jamestown (Accra) and gay rights, what’s the connection? Not really. Well not until this week. Jamestown is one of the original communities of Ghana’s ever expanding capital, Accra.

The suburb is named after a fort built by the British in 1673 and named after King James II, who was a major shareholder in the Royal African Company that traded in gold, slaves and whisky before he ascended the throne. The fort is now a prison –James Fort Remand Prison.

Also known as British Accra (there are Danish Accra and Dutch Accra), Jamestown warmly kisses the Atlantic Ocean in the south and the rather polluted Korle Lagoon on the west. With a large population and a heavily overstretched public infrastructure, Jamestown is a bustling community and the childhood home of some of Ghana’s best boxers and footballers.

A protest against same-sex relationships early in the week has forced homosexuality and gay rights back into the middle of hot-button topics in this political season. Ghanaians go to the polls to elect a president and parliamentarians in December.

The Jamestown protesters including females assaulted revellers attending an early morning marriage ceremony of a lesbian couple with sticks and canes. The protesters arrested two females, a 19-year-old and a 16-year-old who were at the function and sent them to the local police station and urged the police to arrest all gays in the community. But the reasons for the protest and subsequent attacks were not the usual religious, health or the standard socio-cultural reasons.

For the Jamestown anti-gay activists, the level of lesbianism in the area in particular is depriving men of girlfriends and future wives. That is to say there is an emerging shortage of women or they do not want to compete with other lesbians for women to date.

‘Their activities are depriving us of women. Anytime a man decides to go after a woman in the area these lesbians will pounce on him and beat him up. We cannot allow this to go on in the area. These women use money to lure the young girls into this bad habit and deprive us. It must stop,’ the local press quoted one anti-gay activist.

Now that’s a rather fairly new reason for the growing opposition to homosexuality. In the past, the reasons for public opposition were mainly because the practice is a ‘disgusting western’ concept inimical to African values and also because all three dominant faiths – Christianity, Islam and traditional African religion – frown on same-sex relationships.

In November 2011, Ghana’s president, John Atta Mills called the bluff of British PM, David Cameron to cut aid to African nations with anti-gay legislation. Reacting to Cameron’s threats, Mills told Ghanaians the country will never capitulate to Britain or any other country’s whim to legalise same-sex relationships. 

‘I, as president of this nation, will never initiate or support any attempt to legalise homosexuality in Ghana’. 

‘No one can deny Prime Minister Cameron his right to make policies, take initiatives or make statements that reflect his societal norms and ideals but he does not have the right to direct other sovereign nations as to what they should do especially where their societal norms and ideals are different from those which exist in [the] Prime Minister’s society...

‘Let me also say that whiles we acknowledge all the financial assistance and all the aid which has been given to us by our development partners, we will not accept any aid with strings attached, if that aid will not inure to our interest or the implementation or the utilisation of that aid with strings attached would rather worsen our plight as a nation or destroy the very society that we want to use the money to improve,’ the soft-spoken president and former law lecturer said tersely.

Uganda’sYuweri Museveni and Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe attacked Cameron as ‘satanic’ over his gay rights threat. Nigeria also asked Cameron to go to hell. But a week ago, a British cardinal and leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland also described the Cameron government’s plans to legalise gay marriage in Britain as ‘madness’, ‘a grotesque subversion of a universally accepted human right’ and a ‘redefinition of reality’.

Jamestown anti-gay protesters

Public resentment of same-sex relationship is deep and widespread in Ghana and much of Africa. Homophobia is mostly expressed as attempts to preserve the sanity and socio-cultural fabric of the African society.

With the exception of South Africa no other African country has legalised same-sex relationships. Gay relationships are thus a crime in many of these countries. Classified as ‘unnatural carnal knowledge’, they are considered a misdemeanor in Ghana’s penal code and in most other African nations.

Nigeria and Uganda recently sought to pass new laws in their Parliaments expressly banning homosexuality as well as impose stiffer custodial sentences.

Going to Ghana’s December 2012 elections, the make or break issue is the national economy. The economy grew by 13.5 per cent in 2011 one of the highest growth rates in world albeit it was fueled by oil exports.  
Apart from Mills other presidential aspirants have yet to publicly pronounce on same-sex relationships. But Jamestown may just have pulled the trigger on an issue that may play no mean a role in who gets crowned as Ghana’s president in January 2013 when whoever is elected will assume office.

What Nigeria-South Africa diplomatic standoff reveals

The mosquito is a tiny insect but surely it’s a terror to millions across the tropical world, especially in Africa. Millions die each year from malaria which is caused by mosquitoes.

But today’s blog is not so much about the pest that the mosquito is. Rather it’s about a diplomatic stand-off between two giants, better still elephants, of Africa.

A diplomatic spat between two of Africa’s giants threatened to spin out of control last week.  South Africa (SA) deported 125 Nigerians for questionable Yellow Fever cards. Nigeria’s response was swift but hardly unpredictable. Nigeria subsequently denied entry to 131 South Africans. Nigeria’s foreign minister, Olusbenga Ashiru, even accused South Africa of xenophobia.

Yellow fever is an acute viral harmorrhagic disease transmitted by infected mosquitoes. Nausea, bleeding, vomiting, jaundice and kidney failure are some of the symptoms of yellow fever.

Nigeria and SA are two of Africa’s three giants. The other is Egypt. Nigeria and SA seem bitter rivals too. South Africans are normally not enthused about Nigerians. South Africans find Nigerians a little too brash. Nigerians are also not fond of South Africans either. Nigerians find South Africans overly conceited, even arrogant. These are all labels that seem to be sticking unfortunately. The diplomatic spat took the stereotypes to new heights.

Zuma and Jonathan

The rivalry between the two countries is intense and whenever it bubbles over it grips the collective attention of all Africans and indeed the rest of the world as the immunization rift has shown. For years, Nigeria was the local hegemonic power in Africa. Until of course, South Africa emerged on the scene in 1994.

Accounting for nearly a quarter of Africa’s GDP, South Africa is arguably the continent’s largest and most modern economy. SA is now an official member of the elite club of emerging economies, the BRICS – Brazil, Russia, India and China. Nigeria is not a member. South Africa is also serving a second two-year term on the United Nations Security Council.

Nigeria is also an African powerhouse. With its estimated 160 million population the country is the most populous nation on the continent. Nigeria is Africa’s leading producer of oil and gas. South Africa’s population is just about a third of Nigeria’s.

There is a large and thriving Nigerian community in major South African cities. Not so many South Africans live in Nigeria albeit some of South Africa's largest companies including MTN operate in Nigeria.

The diplomatic rift highlights, not least the longstanding rivalry, economic and political, between the two nations. Nigeria and South Africa have clashed many times at the continental level. On the continent, Nigeria and South Africa’s circle of influence do not necessarily intersect.

In international affairs, Nigeria adopts a more muscular posture, much less so with South Africa.

The two countries differ sharply over the concept of continental unity. For example, Nigeria has thrown its weight behind the idea of establishing a Central Bank of Africa under the aegis of the African Union (AU) to take up the functions of an African Monetary Fund and establish a single currency by 2028. South Africa is strongly opposed to this idea.

At the AU summit in Addis Ababa in January 2012, African leaders failed to elect a new chairperson and deputy chairperson of the AU Commission along with eight commissioners. None of the candidates for the chairperson obtained the two-third majority votes as required by the AU constitution.

Going into the elections, South Africa was hopeful its candidate for the AU chair, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, ex-wife of the South African president, Jacob Zuma would win. Nigeria backed Jean Ping, the incumbent. Ping is Gabonese. New elections will take place at the next AU summit in June in Malawi.

South Africa was accused of leading a group of 15 SADC countries to oppose the candidature of ECOWAS and other regions. Rather provocatively, the Director-General of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Prof Bola Akinterinwa has accused South Africa of scheming to take over the control of the continent.

Nigeria supported the Libyan rebels to oust Qaddafi. South Africa was less blunt albeit Jacob Zuma attempted mediation between the rebels and the late dictator but failed.

Nigerian soldier

Nigeria projected power during the 2011 Cote d’Ivoire crisis. Nigeria called for the forceful removal of Laurent Gbagbo. South Africa was much less categorical.

The South African government has since apologized to Nigeria and blamed airport authorities for the spat. Pretoria intends to dispatch an envoy to Abuja in days.

South Africans have not taken kindly to the government's apology to Nigerians. However Nigerians welcomed their government’s swift tit-for-tat reaction and further threats to South Africa’s investment. On various social media platforms many Nigerians claimed it was the first time their national authorities had gotten something right. South Africans however dismissed the Jacob Zuma administration as weak and unable to take a stand. 

Without a doubt the stand-off was a show of muscle. SA's apology may be a tactical pullback after setting off the diplomatic storm. The offer and acceptance of the apology notwithstanding, it remains to be seen if the two giants have indeed moved beyond this latest standoff. 

Ethnicity and the African polity

A few years ago while in a ‘progressive’ and fairly prosperous African country, nearly every one of the many friends I made in my short stay introduced him or herself by identifying their ethnic origin. Initially, I didn’t understand what it was all about. 
 

I thought the ethnic groups they mentioned were part of their names. How wrong I was. I later learnt it was to point me to which part of the country they hail from, i.e. their ethnic origin. Well, I was stunned really.

Coming from another African country with over a dozen different ethnic groups, I was still shocked by how those friends/acquaintances introduced themselves. I was also shaken perhaps even more by the ease with which they did this. 

I am not pointing this out because I think people shouldn’t take pride in their origins, far from that. Personally, anyway, I find it more useful to talk about which of part of the country I grew up in than one’s ethnic origin.

For centuries ethnicity served as a convenient tool to create artificial barriers amongst the same people. The colonialists exploited it as part of their divide and rule strategy. And it worked very well for them. 

Some politicians of post-independence Africa gravely seek to rise to power and/or maintain their grip on the levers by playing the ethnic card particularly to the mobile vulgus, the fickle crowd.

One of the crucial legacies of Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s independence hero, was the fact that he sought to build a nation in which each citizen saw (and conducted) him/herself as Ghanaian above every other consideration. But that foundation has not absolved Ghana from ethnic bigotry.

Ghana's elite forces

The inauguration of Ghana Army’s elite or Special Forces and navy seals at the country’s 55^th anniversary official celebrations at the Independence Square on March 6^th has triggered debates in some spheres. Some have raised questions about the ethnic composition of these elite forces and what exactly they are for. These elite units were established about three years ago.

Ethnicity is a major issue across Africa. In many nations, ethnicity takes central position especially in an electioneering year. This year, at least half a dozen elections are coming up in some of the continent’s most strategic countries. The list of countries scheduled to hold presidential (and parliamentary) elections include Senegal (presidential runoff, March), Guinea Bissau (March), Mali (April), Egypt (June), Sierra Leone (November), Ghana (December) and Zimbabwe (December).

Kenya has postponed its presidential and parliamentary elections to early 2013 but a new study by the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC) makes an interesting read. The report was presented to the Kenyan Parliament on Tuesday, March 6.

According to the report, the five big ethnic groups in Kenya – Kikuyu, Luhya, Kalenjin, Luo and Kamba –disproportionately make up the work forces of public universities and other centres of higher education. 

The Big Five as they are generally referred to, make up 66 per cent of the country’s population. However they constitute 93 per cent of the jobs at Masinde Muliro University, 89.8 per cent at Moi University, 87.3 per cent at Egerton University, 86 per cent at Jomo Kenyatta University, 82.3 per cent at the University of Nairobi and 81.7 per cent at Kenyatta University.

Fifteen institutions were surveyed and of this, two-thirds, had most of their staff mainly from the same ethnic community as the vice-chancellor or principal.

At Bondo University College in Siaya county, Luos make up 84.3 per cent of the staff, Merus make up 83 per cent of the staff at Meru University College, Kisii garner as much as 79 per cent of the jobs at Kisii University College while the Mijikenda are the significant workers at the Pwani University College with as much as 71 per cent of the work force. The Luo, Meru, Kisii and Mijikenda are all ethnic groups in the country.

The Commission will release audit of the civil service and parastatals by mid-March to ostensibly inform the country to develop a more inclusive employment policy.

The Commission is mandated “to facilitate and promote equality of opportunity, good relations, harmony and peaceful coexistence between persons of different ethnic and racial backgrounds in Kenya and to advice the government thereof”.

In 2007, Kenya was forced to its knees as violence exploded to engulf much of the country after a disputed presidential election. The viciousness of the 2007 convulsion of Kenya following the December polls was fuelled by ethnic rivalries. About 1,500 died in the ensuing violence. Many more were injured and hundreds of thousands internally displaced. Some senior government appointees are facing trial at the International Criminal Court for their alleged incitement of the bloodbath that threatened to sink one of Africa’s most vibrant economies.

A little up north of the continent in Eastern Libya, local leaders on March 6 declared the region semi-autonomous, in what can only be described as a first step towards acquiring full autonomy from the rest of the country. After WWII and under King Idris, (whose great nephew Ahmed al-Senussi, has just been installed as head of the new Cyrenaica Provincial Council) Libya was divided into three main states and along mainly ethnic lines – Tripolitania in the west, Fezzan in the south-west and Cyrenaica to the east.

Gaddaffi in his last years in office became a champion of African unity after he failed to bring the Maghreb region behind him. His country may ironically just turn up to provide Africa with some ethnically "pure" states.

Mandela, Wade and Mugabe: Different strokes

In the week in February in which the respected former South African president, Nelson Mandela, 93, was taken ill and admitted at the hospital for a reported hernia surgery, the discredited 85-year-old Abdoulaye Wade contested the Senegalese presidential elections for a third term against widespread public anger while the loathed Robert Mugabe feasted on cake to mark his 88^th birthday with pomp in a stadium in Mutare.

Mugabe plans to run for the presidency later this year, after 32 years in office, first as prime minister and from 1987 as president. 

Mandela

Mandela retired after a single four-year term in office in 1999 to make way for fresh blood. His immediate successor, Thambo Mbeki has since served his term and left office. Wade came to power in an exceptionally well organised election in 2000. 

He rightly led a campaign to amend the constitution in 2001 to limit the number of terms per president to two five-year terms. But then when it came to applying the new law to himself, he took cover in a loophole.

Another constitutional amendment in 2008 reversed the 2001 amendment limiting the length of the presidential term to five years. This new extension apparently doesn’t apply to the president’s second term in office which expires this year. Thus, Wade has argued, he is entitled to run for yet another term.

Eccentricities

Wade has indeed improved the road network particularly in the capital and some social services. But his administration has been rocked by charges of corruption. In 2009, Wade handed a US$200,000 'farewell present' to a departing International Monetary Fund official after dinner.

He has also wasted the country’s resources on a long list of dubious projects. Electricity supply remains heavily unreliable and public transport is awful.

In 2010, President Wade commissioned a pet project, a monstrous monument towering over the capital city, Dakar. I paid a visit to the site of the statue a month after it was commissioned in 2010. The statue’s construction cost the Senegalese tax payer US$27 million. The statue is much bigger than the statue of Liberty in New York and presumed to be the tallest in the world outside the former Soviet Union and Asia. 

Referred to as the African Renaissance Monument (Le Monument de la Renaissance africaine), the 49-metre tall bronze statue of a child, woman and man stands on a hill, Collines des Mamelles, and overlooks breezy Dakar and the Atlantic Ocean. 

President Wade's $27 million pet project

Wade

Oddly, Wade has staked claim to the intellectual property rights of the statue he conceived not as a private citizen but as a function of his public office – as president of the republic. Wade says he is entitled to 35 per cent of profits from monument. Absurdity!

Grandiose projects, outright sleaze and many other eccentricities of the once popular president have driven most ordinary Senegalese from hope to the point of despair in a decade. But seriously, at 85 what more can Wade offer the country that he hasn’t delivered in the 12-years he has been in charge? Unlike many other West African countries, Senegal has never been through a coup d'tat, be it military or non-military. Senegal is such a beautiful country and its 13 million people are amazingly comely.

It came as no surprise Wade even lost in his own constituency, Point E, a middle-class suburb of Dakar in the February 26^th poll. Contrary to his own prognosis, Wade is set for a runoff. He failed to gain the outright majority. It remains to be seen whether he can hang on to power. The opposition is fired up to kick him out of office.

Wade first came to power in 2000 in a keenly contested presidential election run-off against the then incumbent, Abdou Diouf. Wade came from behind in the first round to pip Diouf in the runoff.

Wade is not alone. Mugabe having ruled since independence in 1980 is planning to contest the Zimbabwean presidential elections later this year too. In fact, his choice of Mutare for the celebration of his 88^th birthday last weekend was political. The ruling ZANU-PF lost badly in Mutare, capital of the eastern province of Manicaland in the last general elections. 

Breadbasket

Mugabe

Mugabe in power since Zimbabwe's independence from Britain in 1980 has reduced the once breadbasket of Southern Africa to a basket case following his poor management of the economy and land issues. 

Africa indeed has some of the oldest leaders in the world. Some are also the longest ruling presidents. The Arab spring swept three away in the north – Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak (in power for 31years), Ben Ali (ruled for 23 years) and Libya’s Muammar Qaddaffi (whose reign ended after 42 years). 

There are still many more of such leaders around including Cameroon’s Paul Biya, 79, who has been president since 1982; Equatorial Guinea’s Teodoro Obiang Nguema, 70, president since 1979 and Angola’s José Eduardo dos Santos, 70, president since 1979.

Across the continent, Africans generally hold in high regard the elderly, both male and female. But surely this does not fully explain the large number of old men in power (a subject for another blog) who seemingly cannot imagine life out of the presidency.