THOUGHT LEADERSHIP - The African Mirror

Oct

22

2025

Zoë Wicomb, the South African-Scottish writer who told powerful stories about belonging

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

ZOË Wicomb, a celebrated South African-Scottish writer and scholar, has died. All my memories of her crystallise around her voice: it brought a small piece of South Africa into whatever context she found herself in. Whether it was a public reading (always a source of terror for her) or an animated conversation in the Glasgow home in Scotland, which she and her husband, the photographer Roger Palmer, had made into a beautiful dwelling. The cadences of her speech, untouched by the Glaswegian accents around her, were those of her native Namaqualand in South Africa and the coloured community among which…

Oct

22

2025

By NDIZEYE INNOCENT

“Remember we exist”, refugees in Malawi say as aid is slashed

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

FOR more than two decades, I have called the Dzaleka Refugee Camp home, though “home” has always been a complicated word here. Dzaleka was never meant to be permanent, yet for many of us, it has become the only place we know. Over the years, it has grown into a community of its own, made up of refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Somalia, and Ethiopia. Children born here have become parents themselves. Schools and small markets have sprung up, and through it all, one name has been constant – the UN refugee agency, UNHCR. This…

Oct

21

2025

By OWN CORRESPONDENT

The longest week: Cameroon’s moment of reckoning

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

CAMEROON stands on a knife-edge this week, a nation gripped by a tense and historic political moment destined to shape its future for years to come. The longest week in Cameroonian politics has unfolded like a high-stakes thriller, with the air thick with anticipation and anxiety as the country waits for the Constitutional Council's official announcement of presidential election results, scheduled for Thursday, October 23rd at 10:30 a.m. at the Yaoundé Convention Center. After a nationwide vote on October 12th that has sparked fierce claims of victory from rival camps, uncertainty reigns supreme. In the capital's streets, in the bustling…

Oct

21

2025

By AMÉLIE GODEFROIDT

Should Boko Haram fighters be given a second chance in society? We asked 2,000 young Nigerians

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

ACROSS the world, the question of how to deal with former fighters remains urgent. From Nigeria and Iraq to Syria and the Sahel, governments are wrestling with how to bring people who once fought for violent groups back into society. Reintegrating ex-fighters – after appropriate punishment – is unavoidable. This is because alternatives such as indefinite detention, capital punishment or abandonment are unsustainable and risk fuelling future cycles of violence. Yet local communities often seem to resist welcoming ex-combatants back. How, then, can societies balance the need for reintegration with local resistance? As scholars of public opinion during and after…

Oct

18

2025

By JUSTIN WILLIS; GABRIELLE LYNCH; KARUTI KANYINGA, and NIC CHEESEMAN

Raila Odinga: the man who changed Kenya without ever ruling it

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

RAILA Amollo Odinga, who has died at the age of 80, was something of a paradox in post-independence Kenyan politics. A leader who repeatedly ran for president, he never won – in part due to the 2007 election being manipulated in favour of Mwai Kibaki. Despite this, Odinga will be remembered as a figure who profoundly shaped the country’s politics as much as any president. The son of a famous anti-colonial leader, he was born into influence. Yet he became bitterly critical of Kenya’s enduring political and economic inequalities, speaking out on behalf of the country’s “have-nots”, which earned him…

Oct

18

2025

By JOHN JOSEPH CHIN

Madagascar’s military power grab shows Africa’s coup problem isn’t restricted to the Sahel region

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

THOSE who rise to power through a coup often fall by the same means. That is one of the takeaways from events in Madagascar, where on Oct. 14, 2025, the military seized power after weeks of protests largely driven by Gen Z. Ironically, it was the same elite military unit that helped bring Andry Rajoelina, former mayor of the capital Antananarivo, to power in a March 2009 coup that now supported anti-government protesters and ultimately forced the president to flee. I lead a research team that compiles the Colpus Dataset of coup types and characteristics, and have written on the…

Oct

17

2025

By MAUREEN FUBARA

Thug culture in Nigerian politics: the links between state governors, funding and violent armed groups

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

SINCE Nigeria’s return to democracy in 1999, elections have consistently been marred by violence. The elections between 1999 and 2019 and in 2023 saw party clashes, physical attacks, assassinations and intimidation. As Nigeria prepares for the 2027 elections, the threat of violence lurks again. Already, reports have emerged of clashes between supporters of the ruling All Progressives Congress and the opposition African Democratic Congress in northern states like Jigawa, Kogi and Kebbi. The violence is largely carried out by hired thugs, party supporters and members, gangs and militias. But the issue is not only that politicians are willing to use…

Oct

17

2025

By The African Mirror

Raila Odinga: Kenya’s relentless democrat and voice of opposition dies at 80

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

RAILA Amolo Odinga, Kenya's former Prime Minister and the most persistent opposition voice in East African politics, has died in India at age 80, marking the end of an era that spanned Kenya's entire post-independence democratic struggle. Over five decades, Odinga embodied the contradictions and aspirations of modern Kenya—a son of privilege who championed the poor, an accused tribalist who preached national unity, and a perennial loser who never stopped fighting for what he believed was a stolen destiny. Born January 7, 1945, into Kenya's political aristocracy as the son of independence hero and first Vice President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga,…

Oct

11

2025

By NAMHLA THANDO MATSHANDA

Ethiopia has struggled to build national unity: can its big new dam deliver it?

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

THE formal launch of Ethiopia’s Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in September 2025 made news across the world. There was pomp and ceremony as Africa’s largest hydroelectric dam was officially inaugurated after 14 years and US$5 billion worth of project work. The project’s completion fulfils a national dream long in the making. It was formally initiated by the late Meles Zenawi, who served as president of Ethiopia from 1991 to 1995 and as prime minister from 1995 until his death in 2012. But the idea of a dam on the Ethiopian Nile dates back even further. As early as the 1950s,…

Oct

10

2025

By MUTHONI WANYEKI

Those responsible for Sudan’s war have no business being involved in the peace

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

THE UN General Assembly has ended. Coverage was devoted to the French president being stuck on New York sidewalks due to the passage of the US president’s convoy; to the US president lambasting the UN for a faulty escalator and a stalled teleprompter; to the same US president’s erroneous remarks about (among so many other things) solar and wind power. But many things happened at UNGA besides the weird and wonderful. Lip service was paid to the ongoing atrocities and outrages in Palestine, Sudan, and Ukraine. Beyond the lip service, however, there did seem (finally!) to be some energy on…