Analysis - The African Mirror

Oct

2023

Team-by-team analysis of the Mexico City Grand Prix

TEAM-BY-TEAM analysis of Sunday's Mexico City Grand Prix, the 19th race of the 22-round Formula One season (teams listed in championship order): RED BULL (Max Verstappen 1, Sergio Perez retired) Verstappen lined up third and made a great getaway to take the lead into the first corner. He also led cleanly from the re-start. The win was his 16th of the season, a record, and 51st of his career to go level in the all-time lists with French great Alain Prost. He has now won five of the last six races in Mexico. Perez tried to pass Ferrari's Leclerc at…

Oct

2023

By GABRIELA BACZYNSKA and TAREK AMARA

Analysis: Tunisia brush-off augurs badly for EU push for African migration deals

NEWS

WHEN Tunisian President Kais Saied this month rejected 60 million euros ($63 million) in EU aid, the bloc got a taste of the risks and challenges it will face as it seeks new pacts with African states to reduce irregular Mediterranean immigration. Spurred by Italy and Spain, the European Union has embraced the idea of sealing what it terms strategic cooperation deals in North Africa as the best tool to curb unauthorised arrivals. But security risks, high costs, a lack of trust, and African countries' incapacity or unwillingness to tighten their borders or asylum systems highlight the shortcomings of a policy that rights groups…

Oct

2023

By MACDONALD DZIRUTWE and LIBBY GEORGE

Analysis: Nigerian reform drive falters, threatening Africa’s biggest economy

BUSINESS

NIGERIAN President Bola Tinubu's lightning-fast reform push after taking office in May sparked hope that his administration would be a business-friendly antidote to mounting economic troubles facing Africa's biggest economy. Fast forward to more than 100 days in office, and the key planks of his economic overhaul - unshackling the naira from its rigid regime, and allowing fuel prices to rise - are coming loose. The naira hit a record low of 1,000 to the dollar on the black market this week, widening the gap with the official rate, which stood at 785 on Thursday. Reuters Graphics Reuters Graphics Petrol pump prices, meanwhile, have…

Sep

2023

By JOHN IRISH and EDWARD MCALLISTER

Analysis: West losing sight of Sahel after France announces Niger withdrawal

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

FRANCE'S decision to pull 1,500 troops from Niger leaves a gaping hole in Western efforts to counter a decade-long Islamist insurgency and could bolster Russian influence across the vast, insecure scrublands of West Africa, analysts and diplomats said. Niger was the West's last key ally in the central Sahel region south of the Sahara Desert until a July 26 coup brought in a military junta which called for France to leave. France's forces have already been kicked out of neighbouring Mali and Burkina Faso following coups in those countries, weakening its influence in its former colonies amid a wave of anti-French…

Jul

2023

By PATRICK WERR

Analysis: As deficit soars, Egypt expands money supply, fuelling inflation

BUSINESS

EGYPT risks fuelling its record inflation and putting more pressure on the Egyptian pound if it does not slow an expansion of the money supply which bankers and analysts say has been used to plug widening budget deficits. Central bank figures show "M1" money supply, which includes domestic currency in circulation and demand deposits in Egyptian pounds, jumped by 31.9% in the year to end-May 2023, after growing 23.1% in the fiscal year to end-June 2022 and 15.7% in FY2020/21. The sharp acceleration in money supply growth has come during three years in which Egypt's underlying economic weaknesses have been…

Jun

2023

By The African Mirror

Analysis: Mali faces spectre of anarchy after demanding UN’s departure

NEWS

EDWARD MCALLISTER and DAVID LEWIS MALI'S demand for the departure of U.N. peacekeepers heralded a sudden end to a decade-long mission that has struggled to protect civilians and its own troops, raising fears the country could slide deeper into chaos amid an Islamist insurgency and the possible revival of a separatist uprising. The U.N. mission, known as MINUSMA, has been hobbled by restrictions on its air and ground operations since Mali's ruling junta joined forces with Russian military contractor Wagner Group in 2021, limiting its effectiveness against an Islamist insurgency that took root a decade ago and has since spread across…

May

2023

By AIDAN LEWIS and TOM PERRY

Analysis: Sudan risks long conflict as entrenched rivals struggle for control

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

SUDAN'S warring factions are locked in a conflict that two weeks of fighting shows neither can easily win, raising the spectre of a drawn-out war between an agile paramilitary force and a better-equipped army that could destabilise a fragile region. Even with hundreds of people killed and the capital Khartoum turned into a war zone, there has been little sign of compromise between army commander Abdul-Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, head of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), commonly known as Hemedti. Foreign mediators have struggled to arrest the slide to war: a series of ceasefires brokered by the United States and others…

Feb

2023

By The African Mirror

Analysis: Tunisia arrests raise opposition fears of wider crackdown

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

ANGUS MCDOWALL and TAREK AMARA COORDINATED arrests of political and media figures represent a new phase in Tunisian President Kais Saied's struggle with a fragmented but emboldened opposition, raising fears of a wider campaign to quell dissent. Since Saied shut down parliament 18 months ago, moving to rule by decree before rewriting the constitution, security forces had moved only sporadically against opponents who accuse him of an undemocratic coup. Saied has denied a coup, saying his actions were legal and necessary to save Tunisia from chaos. He promised to uphold the rights and freedoms won in the 2011 revolution that…

Jan

2023

By The African Mirror

Analysis: Israel and Palestinians risk deeper conflict in a distracted world

WORLD

HENRIETTE CHACAR and NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI AFTER the bloodshed in Jerusalem and the West Bank and a month since Israel's most right-wing government took office, Israel and the Palestinians risk sliding into a cycle of wider confrontation with pressure on both sides for retaliation, analysts say. A Palestinian gunman shot dead seven people near a synagogue in Jerusalem's outskirts on Friday evening, a day after Israeli forces carried out a raid on the occupied West Bank city of Jenin which killed 10 people including seven gunmen. Israel said on Saturday it was sending army reinforcements to the West Bank and promised…

Dec

2022

By The African Mirror

Analysis: Chinese airlines primed to take advantage of border opening

WORLD

JAMIE FREED and SOPHIE YU CHINESE airlines will be the early winners of the country's international reopening, analysts say, having kept most widebody planes and staff ready while foreign carriers struggle with capacity constraints after previous border openings. Less than one-fifth of China's widebody fleet of about 500 planes is in storage, according to a McKinsey analysis using Cirium data, with most planes active but flying fewer hours than usual on domestic routes and limited international and cargo flights. Reuters Graphics Chinese airlines also retained most pilots and cabin crew during the pandemic, and airports kept about 90% of their…