EDITORS CHOICE - The African Mirror

Apr

2024

Academics with disabilities: South African universities need an overhaul to make them genuinely inclusive

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS, EDITORS CHOICE

VERY little research has been conducted about academics with disabilities working in South African universities. This means their stories, and the challenges they face in the daily demands of their jobs, are not often told. Sibonokuhle Ndlovu, who holds a PhD in education and lectures on the subject, explains what her study of academics with disabilities revealed. How many academics with disabilities are working in South Africa’s universities? We’re not sure. Statistics are hard to find, whether from individual institutions or the country’s education authorities. There’s also not been much research about academics with disabilities in the country. Government data…

Apr

2024

By The African Mirror

State capture in South Africa: time to think differently about redress and recovering the stolen loot

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS, EDITORS CHOICE

SOUTH Africans are plunged into darkness daily by rolling power cuts. These are a stark reminder of the destruction that years of state capture wreaked on Eskom, the state-owned power utility. Eskom’s inability to meet the energy needs of citizens and the economy is now the undeniable example of how state capture made parastatals and other state institutions ineffective. The country urgently needs action to recover the stolen funds and fix the economy. So far, President Cyril Ramaphosa has offered only a few general targets, and outcomes have been dissatisfying. For example, the “total of R2.9 billion” that he said…

Apr

2024

By The African Mirror

What happened to Nelson Mandela’s South Africa? A new podcast series marks 30 years of post-apartheid democracy

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS, EDITORS CHOICE

WHEN Nelson Mandela stood in front of the Union Buildings in Pretoria in May 1994 as South Africa’s first democratically elected president, my country was brimming with optimism for its post-apartheid future. I was there and relieved at the prospect of an end to bloodshed. I had seen far too much violence and death in my five-year career as a journalist, covering the deadly political violence that characterised the dying moments of apartheid. But was the negotiated settlement real freedom? The sceptic in me wondered. How could it be when we did not really defeat the white settler colonialists who’d…

Apr

2024

By The African Mirror

Children born of rape: the devastating legacy of sexual violence in post-genocide Rwanda

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, EDITORS CHOICE

TRIGGER WARNING: This article contains accounts of sexual violence. The 1994 Rwandan genocide against the Tutsi led to the murder of more than 800,000 people, an estimated 70% of the country’s Tutsi population. The unprecedented violence and mass killings of Tutsi and non-extremist Hutu were carried out over 100 days between April and July 1994. An estimated 250,000–500,000 women and girls were raped during the genocide by the Hutu-led militia group Interahamwe, local police officers and individual men. Hutu women were also abused by soldiers from the Rwandan Patriotic Front. Up to 90% of Tutsi women who survived the genocide…

Apr

2024

By JONATHAN BELOFF

30 years after genocide: Rwanda’s older generations fear a return of ethnic tensions, but youth feel more united

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, EDITORS CHOICE

IT’S 30 years since a genocide ripped through Rwandan society, leaving up to a million Tutsi and non-extremist Hutu dead. Every year in early April, the country enters a 100-day period of commemoration during which Rwandans are asked to remember and reflect on historical divisions between the country’s main ethnic groups: Tutsi, Hutu and Twa. This is done under the banner of Ndi Umunyarwanda, loosely translated as “I am Rwandan”. This post-genocide unified ideology follows the governing Rwandan Patriotic Front’s interpretation of the country’s history. It views Tutsi, Hutu and Twa as a form of socio-economic division rather than being…

Mar

2024

By BATE FELIX and PORTIA CROWE

From prison to palace: Faye’s road to Senegal’s presidency

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, EDITORS CHOICE

JUST a few months ago, the man set to be Senegal's next president, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, was sitting in a prison cell, a relatively unknown figure outside his opposition party Pastef. Everything changed for him when the party's firebrand leader, Ousmane Sonko, who was also detained, was charged with insurrection in July and barred from running in elections to succeed President Macky Sall. That cleared the way for Faye to emerge from the shadow of his former boss and eventually from prison, take over the race and on Monday - the day of his 44th birthday - emerge as the victor after his opponent conceded…

Mar

2024

By The African Mirror

Cameroon’s rebels may not achieve their goal of creating the Ambazonian state – but they’re still a threat to stability

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, EDITORS CHOICE

CAMEROON’S separatist insurgency is an armed conflict in the country’s North West (NW) and South West (SW) regions that began in 2017. It pits government forces against several non-state armed groups, locally known as “Amba rebels”. The rebels seek to create a state called Ambazonia out of Cameroon’s English-speaking regions. The conflict has killed over 6,000 people and displaced 765,000. Over 70,000 are refugees in Nigeria. More than 2 million need humanitarian support and 600,000 children have been deprived of effective schooling. MANU LEKUNZE, Lecturer, University of Aberdeen As an international security scholar with an interest in small wars, I…

Mar

2024

By TONNY RAYMOND KIRABIRA and MIRACLE CHINWENMERI UCHE

Lord’s Resistance Army: ICC awards reparations to victims of commander Dominic Ongwen – what happens next

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, EDITORS CHOICE

THE International Criminal Court (ICC) has recently ordered reparations for victims of Dominic Ongwen, an ex-child soldier turned commander in the Lord’s Resistance Army, a rebel group that terrorised northern Uganda for two decades. The court’s order, the first in the Ugandan situation, awards collective community-based symbolic payment for each victim. International criminal law scholars Tonny Raymond Kirabira and Miracle Chinwenmeri Uche answer questions about the ruling. Who are the victims in this case? The victims are part of the post-war affected communities in northern Uganda. Ongwen is one of the top Lord’s Resistance Army commanders charged by the International…

Mar

2024

By UELI STAEGER and BABATUNDE FAGBAYIBO

The African Union is weak because its members want it that way – experts call for action on its powers

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS, EDITORS CHOICE

THE African Union (AU) comes in for a lot of criticism. Most recently this is from within its own ranks. The AU Commission chairperson, Moussa Faki Mahamat, set out his frustrations after an AU summit in February 2024. The commission is the executive organ which runs the AU’s daily activities. Mahamat accused member states of getting in the way of the commission doing its work, and failing to match rhetoric with action: Over the last three years, 2021, 2022 and 2023, 93% of African Union decisions have not been implemented. We think many of the criticisms of the AU are…

Feb

2024

By HARRY VERHOEVEN

Sudan Armed Forces are on a path to self-destruction – risking state collapse

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, EDITORS CHOICE

IT is now 10 months since the outbreak of civil war in Sudan in April 2023, pitting the Sudan Armed Forces against the Rapid Support Forces, a powerful paramilitary group. The war, which erupted after relations between the two wings of Sudan’s security apparatus broke down, rapidly spread beyond the capital, Khartoum. HARRY VERHOEVEN, Senior Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy, Columbia University More recently, the Sudan Armed Forces have suffered numerous setbacks at the hands of the Rapid Support Forces. For months, army units have struggled to break their grip on much of the capital. The…