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Sep
30
2025
By DANNY BRADLOW; ANA SAGGIORO GARCIA; KENNEDY MBEVA and SANDY AFRICA
G20 in a changing world: is it still useful? Four scholars weigh in

G20 in a changing world: is it still useful? Four scholars weigh in

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
U.S. President Donald Trump’s address to the annual gathering of the United Nations General Assembly in late September 2025 set a new low in international relations. Trump delivered a broadside attack on multilateralism – the effort to solve the world’s problems through collective endeavour – as well as issues that have found common cause among rich and poor countries alike, such as climate change. So, where does this leave the work of organisations such as the G20? The body was set up by the G7 in 1999 in the wake of the Asian financial crisis. The purpose was to create…
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Sep
24
2025
By ANTHONY DIALA
South African men may now take their wife’s surname – why traditional leaders are upset

South African men may now take their wife’s surname – why traditional leaders are upset

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
A unanimous Constitutional Court ruling has sparked fierce controversy by affirming the right of South African men to adopt their wives’ surnames if they wish to. It emerged from a lawsuit against the Department of Home Affairs by Henry van der Merwe, who was denied the legal right to take the surname of his wife, Jana Jordaan, and Andreas Nicolas Bornman, who could not hyphenate his surname to include the surname of his wife, Jess Donnelly-Bornman. They asked the judges to confirm an order of constitutional invalidity granted by the High Court in Bloemfontein. The Constitutional Court affirmed that section…
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Sep
23
2025
By JOSEPH FALZETTA
Who is the White Army, the militia at the centre of renewed conflict in South Sudan?

Who is the White Army, the militia at the centre of renewed conflict in South Sudan?

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
TO many in South Sudan’s government, they are rebels bent on overthrowing the state. In most media accounts, they appear as a brutal, faceless mob with no clear grievances. But to White Army fighters like Both Nhial, the group’s purpose is clear and just: To defend their communities against a predatory state and state-backed rival militias. “What we need is for the community to live in peace,” he said. This story was originally published by The New Humanitarian.By Joseph Falzetta Drawn from the ethnic Nuer communities in the vast swamplands surrounding the Nile, the White Army is a patchwork of…
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Sep
20
2025
By FRANZISCA ZANKER and RONALD KALYANGO SEBBA
Uganda has signed a deal with the US to take asylum seekers – what’s behind it and what’s at stake

Uganda has signed a deal with the US to take asylum seekers – what’s behind it and what’s at stake

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
A new deal to deport asylum seekers from the US to Uganda was announced in August 2025. The full agreement, already signed by the ambassadors of the two countries at the end of July, set out the terms of the arrangements. Franzisca Zanker and Ronald Kalyango Sebba, who have studied refugee and migration policy in Uganda, unpack its significance. What deal has Uganda signed with Washington on taking refugees? Uganda has agreed to take on an unspecified number of third-country nationals who have a pending asylum claim in the US but cannot return home due to safety concerns. In other…
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Sep
19
2025
By MHLANGABEZI SLAYI
Reviving South Africa’s grasslands: Eastern Cape villagers explain the challenges they face

Reviving South Africa’s grasslands: Eastern Cape villagers explain the challenges they face

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
SOUTH Africa’s Eastern Cape province has several million hectares of open land in rural areas, not privately owned but held in trust by the state on behalf of communities. The people who live there use it mainly for grazing livestock, subsistence farming, and sometimes hunting. A common misperception is that the grassy, rolling hills will take care of themselves. But these rangelands degrade for many reasons, making them unusable for the small-scale and landless farmers who need communal land for their animals. Agricultural scholar Mhlangabezi Slayi researches practical ways of preserving rangeland ecosystems so that farmers can continue to graze…
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Sep
18
2025
By WILL WORLEY
Mozambique: A case study of growing need and global aid cut confusion

Mozambique: A case study of growing need and global aid cut confusion

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
WHEN unprecedented aid budget cuts were announced by the United States and other major donors earlier this year, concerns were raised about where the reductions in finance and operational capacity would hit hardest and fastest. The months since have been marked by torturous deprioritisation efforts that have been shrouded in mystery and confusion. In this article, we try to unpack the impact on humanitarian responses in one setting, Mozambique, and work out what it might signal elsewhere. This story was originally published by The New Humanitarian.By Will Worley The UN-led system has cut the number of people it aims to…
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Sep
17
2025
By SALLEK YAKS MUSA
Nigeria’s use of soldiers for civilian tasks comes with serious costs – how to prevent this

Nigeria’s use of soldiers for civilian tasks comes with serious costs – how to prevent this

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
NIGERIANS have experienced what it means for their government to be controlled by the military. From independence in 1960 until 1999, the country was under democratic rule for only about seven years. Since then, the military has taken a back seat in the affairs of the state. But in 2020, then President Muhammadu Buhari deployed the military to enforce restrictions imposed to manage the COVID pandemic. This was not unusual. The armed forces have long been used in Nigeria for roles normally assigned to the police, from quelling protests to responding to floods. In more than 30 states, troops were…
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Sep
16
2025
By NICKY FALKOF
Satanic panic: 5 ‘occult’ crimes that gripped South Africa’s imagination

Satanic panic: 5 ‘occult’ crimes that gripped South Africa’s imagination

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
YOU might think South Africa was awash with occult crime if you scrolled through the country’s tabloids, social media and even mainstream newspapers. Criminal acts performed by witches, satanists and sangomas (indigenous knowledge practitioners), as well as threats from supernatural forces, loom large in South Africa’s collective thinking. From demon-possessed killers to charismatic cultists, it sometimes seems like the country is at war with evil itself. As a media studies scholar, I’ve written extensively about white fears of the occult in South Africa. But it’s not only white people who exhibit this anxiety. My new book The Devil Made Me…
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Sep
11
2025
By ROULA INGLESI-LOTZ; ANNA MARIA OOSTHUIZEN; GETRUDE NJOKWE; HEINRICH BOHLMANN; HELEN CABALU; JESSIKA BOHLMANN; JULIAN INCHAUSPE; MARGARET CHITIGA-MABUGU; and NGUYEN TUAN KHUONG TRUONG
Gender equality is the goal, but how to get there? Case study of South Africa and Australia shows that context matters

Gender equality is the goal, but how to get there? Case study of South Africa and Australia shows that context matters

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
IT will take an estimated 131 years for the world to achieve gender parity, defined as equal access, opportunities and outcomes for women and men across economic, political, educational and health dimensions. That’s according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2023. Most of us alive today will never see it happen. Gender parity matters because women make up more than half of the world’s population, and excluding them from full participation has economic and social costs. Closing the gap is not only a matter of fairness. It’s a condition for sustained growth, innovation and societal wellbeing. The…
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Sep
10
2025
By JOHN MUKUM MBAKU
Ethiopia’s mega dam has taken 14 years to build: what it means for the Nile’s 11 river states and why it’s so controversial

Ethiopia’s mega dam has taken 14 years to build: what it means for the Nile’s 11 river states and why it’s so controversial

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS
IN April 2011, Ethiopia began construction of Africa’s largest hydroelectric dam, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), on the Blue Nile River. The dam is expected to generate more than 6,000 megawatts of electricity, effectively transforming Ethiopia into the continent’s largest power exporter. The dam affects 11 countries, two downstream and nine upstream. Addis Ababa completed construction of the US$4 billion-plus project in July 2025, mainly with funds sourced from Ethiopians at home and in the diaspora, with an official launch on 9 September 2025. John Mukum Mbaku, who has researched the governance of the Nile’s waters, explains the dam’s…
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