SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS - The African Mirror

Oct

12

2024

By OLASUNKANMI HABEEB OKUNOLA and SASKIA WERNERS

Post-flood recovery: lessons from Germany and Nigeria on how to help people cope with loss and build resilience

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

EXTREME climate events — floods, droughts and heatwaves — are not just becoming more frequent; they are also more severe. It’s important to understand how communities can recover from these events in ways that also build resilience to future events. In a recent study, we analysed how communities affected by the extreme flood events of 2021 in Germany’s Ahr Valley and in Lagos, Nigeria, grappled with recovery from floods. Our aim was to identify the factors – and combinations of factors – that served as barriers (or enablers) to recovery from disasters. We found that financial limitations, political interests and…

Oct

10

2024

By ANDRÉ WESSELS

Anglo-Boer War: how a bloody conflict 125 years ago still shapes South Africa

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

THE 125th anniversary of the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902 is marked on 11 October 2024. Also known as the South African War or the Second Boer War, the brutal conflict between the colonising forces of the British and the Boers (originally Dutch settlers, today known as Afrikaners) affected all cultural groups in the war zone. The war had profound consequences for the way that South Africa developed in the course of the 1900s and beyond. André Wessels has researched the war and its aftermath for nearly five decades, and has published several books and academic papers on it. We asked…

Oct

09

2024

By KANG-CHUN CHENG

In Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado, extraction and insurgency without end

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

This story was originally published by The New Humanitarian.By Kang-Chun Cheng MOZAMBICANS go to the polls tomorrow in presidential and legislative elections that are almost certain to extend the ruling Frelimo party’s half-century in power, despite its inability to end a long-running Islamist insurgency in the northern province of Cabo Delgado. The extreme violence of the so-called Islamic State in Mozambique, known locally as al-Shabab, has forced roughly a million people from their homes, killed an estimated 4,000 civilians, and stunted economic growth in a gas and resource-rich province. Borges Nhamirre, a researcher with the Institute for Security Studies (ISS),…

Oct

08

2024

By TIMOTHY GRAHAM

Is big tech harming society? To find out, we need research – but it’s being manipulated by big tech itself

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

FOR almost a decade, researchers have been gathering evidence that the social media platform Facebook disproportionately amplifies low-quality content and misinformation. So it was something of a surprise when in 2023 the journal Science published a study that found Facebook’s algorithms were not major drivers of misinformation during the 2020 United States election. This study was funded by Facebook’s parent company, Meta. Several Meta employees were also part of the authorship team. It attracted extensive media coverage. It was also celebrated by Meta’s president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, who said it showed the company’s algorithms have “no detectable impact…

Oct

07

2024

By PEARL S. KYEI

Children in west Africa are often sent to live with other families to help them get ahead – but fostering may be doing the opposite

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

IN west Africa, it’s common for families to foster children informally. This helps ease the burden on parents and can give children from poorer families a chance to improve their lives. An estimated 20% to 40% of mothers in the region have sent at least one child to live with another household for an extended period. That household acts as a “social parent”. Education is one of the leading reasons for the practice: children can be in households with more resources for schooling or closer to schools. Whether this fostering is beneficial or harmful depends on how much the host…

Oct

05

2024

By ADRINO MAZENDA

Food scarcity in Liberia: how women who run households cope

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

LIBERIA, with a population of just over 5.6 million people, is one of the world’s ten poorest countries, with a GDP per capita of US$662.50. The lingering effects of two civil wars (1989-2003), Ebola outbreaks (2014-2015) and the COVID-19 pandemic (2020) have left Liberia short of achieving widespread development goals. One of its biggest challenges is that the agricultural sector is underdeveloped. Levels of food insecurity remain high. People are food insecure when they lack regular access to enough safe and nutritious food for normal growth and development and an active and healthy life. Adrino Mazenda conducted research among women-headed…

Oct

04

2024

By PHILIPP KASTNER

Sudan at war: the art of peace talks and why they often fail

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

HIGH-LEVEL peace talks took place in August 2024 to negotiate a much-needed ceasefire in Sudan. Unfortunately, nothing tangible came out of the talks held in Switzerland and co-hosted by the US and Saudi Arabia. There have been previous efforts to bring Sudan’s main warring parties – the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces – to the negotiating table and stop the war. A major effort in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, negotiated short-lived ceasefires a month into the start of the April 2023 conflict but registered few other successes. In the meantime, the fighting continues. Eleven million people, out…

Sep

30

2024

By RAMOS EMMANUEL MABUGU and EDDIE RAKABE

South Africa’s municipalities aren’t fixing roads, supplying clean water or keeping the lights on: new study explains why

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

SOUTH Africa has a massive infrastructure problem. Roads, electricity supply and water management are just three areas in which there is mounting evidence of collapse and decay. This is true for big cities like Johannesburg as well as small towns and rural areas. This is a problem because infrastructure like this has huge economic benefits. Having water and electricity enables firms to run smoothly. Local roads improve mobility and access to markets. A study by South Africa’s Financial and Fiscal Commission in 2018 showed that infrastructure spending had a statistically significant positive impact on local employment and economic growth. Responsibility…

Sep

28

2024

By AMANDA GOUWS

South African women face exclusion from society due to gender-based violence – how they’re fighting back

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

WHEN South Africa became a democracy in 1994, a primary goal was to grant citizenship rights to all its people, in particular, to give the majority of black South Africans rights they had been denied during colonialism and apartheid. This included the right to vote. Apartheid segregated the population into ethnic groups. All but people classified as white were stripped of their rights. The 1996 constitution conferred upon citizens civil liberties such as the right to vote, movement, association and free speech as well as substantive rights such as access to land, health, education and employment. But, as I argue…

Sep

26

2024

By CLAUDE SENGENYA

In DR Congo’s Beni region, departing peacekeepers leave a trail of abuse and anger

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

This story was originally published by The New Humanitarian. By Claude Sengenya On the side of a national road, at the entrance to the town of Mavivi, in the region of Beni, is an imposing UN base topped with barbed wire and painted in blue and white. Inside are peacekeepers from half a dozen countries around the world. Well-armed and wearing their customary blue helmets, the troops are tasked with defending civilians in a restive part of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. Yet just a few kilometres down the road, civilians say they are feeling far from protected.…