confidentially speaking
The Africa Confidential Blog
BURUNDI | KENYA | SOUTH AFRICA: African states start exodus from International Court
Patrick Smith
This week, top officials at the International Criminal Court are in
urgent talks with the governments of South
Africa, Burundi and Kenya
about plans for a mass withdrawal from the Court. Reeling from targeted
assassinations and a weakening economy, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el Sisi's government is
likely to crack down still harder on opposition
groups as it tries to negotiate a US$12 billion loan from the
International Monetary Fund. Another big economy in trouble, Nigeria,
is in talks for a migration-investment pact with the European Union
this week and Zimbabwe is set
to continue with efforts to repay all its
arrears to the international financial institutions. Finally, Burkina
Faso has sent a request to the French
government to make available
their classified files on the 1987 coup in Ouagadougou as part of its
probe into the ousting and killing of Thomas
Sankara.
BURUNDI | KENYA | SOUTH AFRICA: African states start exodus from
International Court
This week the International Criminal Court (ICC) will have to start its
fightback after suffering its most serious political blow after South
Africa announced on 21 October that it wants to quit. The issue is
likely to dominate the ICC's Assembly of States Parties meeting on
16-24 November in the Netherlands.
South Africa's announcement came three days after Burundi's President
Pierre Nkurunziza, who
faces an investigation by the court for war
crimes, signed a decree to take Burundi out of the court.
And in Kenya, a bill that would take the country out of the ICC is
slowly making its way through Parliament. It has strong backing from
the governing Jubilee party of President Uhuru Kenyatta and Vice-President William Ruto, both of whom faced
charges for crimes against
humanity in the court. In both cases, the charges were dropped after
several witnesses changed their testimony, disappeared or were
found dead. Jubilee faces presidential and parliamentary elections next
August;
the opposition Orange Democratic Movement, led by Raila Odinga, still
supports Kenya's membership of the ICC.
In all cases there is strong political opposition to what are seen as
personal decisions by Presidents. The legitimacy of President
Nkurunziza's election to a third term is widely contested in Burundi
and beyond. More than 470 people have been killed in political clashes
and
targeted assassinations since Nkurunziza won a disputed
election last year.
And in South Africa, the decision to quit the court is widely seen as
having been taken by President Jacob
Zuma and his closest political
allies, a faction that is rapidly losing support within the governing
African National Congress. President Zuma was embarrassed when the
Pretoria High Court ordered his government to arrest Sudan's President
Omer Hassan el Beshir who
was in South Africa to attend the African
Union summit in June 2015. President Omer, who has been charged by the
ICC with genocide and crimes against humanity in Darfur, refuses to
recognise the Court. South Africa's Supreme Court later upheld the High
Court's arrest order and criticised the country's security agencies for
allowing Sudan's President to fly back to Khartoum.
The decision to quit the ICC is likely to have been discussed when
President Zuma visited President Kenyatta in Nairobi on 11-12 October.
Despite the opposition to the move in all three countries, issues such
as jobs, inflation and security loom much bigger on the political scene. South Africa's political weight means that Fatou Bensouda, the ICC's
Prosecutor, will have to struggle to persuade the Zuma government to
change its mind and to stop other countries following suit.
EGYPT: Political perils deepen in step with economic crisis
The killing of General Adal Rajaaie,
the commander of an armoured
division in northern Sinai, on 22 October in a Cairo
suburb was the latest in a series of targeted assassinations of top
officials in President Abdel Fattah el Sisi's government. A militant
Islamist group called Louwaa el
Thawra claimed responsibility for the
attack.
Egyptian soldiers are fighting an insurgency backed by Islamic
State in northern Sinai, at a time when the organisation's other bases
in Libya, Iraq and Syria are facing heavy attacks from
local and
western forces.
National politics in Egypt are also coming under pressure. The Hasm
Movement has been assassinating top state officials in what it calls
revenge attacks on prosecutors and security officials following the
toppling of Islamist President Mohammed
Mursi in mid-2013.
Unarmed opposition groups are said to be planning a day of protest on
11 November against worsening economic conditions: inflation is over
14%, electricity prices went up by 25-40% in August, the government is
introducing a 13% value added tax and there is a foreign exchange
crisis.
NIGERIA | EUROPEAN UNION: New talks on migration-investment trade off
As French police start an operation on 24 October to dismantle a camp
housing over 10,000 migrants near Calais, talks are due to begin In
Abuja between European Union and Nigerian officials about a new
migration pact.
EU officials are asking Nigerian officials to sign up to a deal that
would commit them to accepting the return of all their country's
nationals
arriving in Europe without legal papers and who are not eligible for
political asylum. Over 130,000 illegal migrants have arrived in Italy
this year; most of them came from Nigeria according to Italian
officials.
The trade off is that the EU would redirect some US$8 billion of
development aid to road and power projects in Nigeria and neighbouring
countries as part of efforts to boost economic conditions in the region
and deter migrants.
ZIMBABWE: Harare pays off arrears to IMF in hope of getting fresh loans
Following its repayment of US$108 million of arrears to the
International Monetary Fund on 20 October, the Zimbabwe government is
edging closer to a deal to take on new international loans as the
economy continues to deteriorate. More than four million people need
food aid, about 80% of the working population are unemployed and there
is a chronic shortage of US dollars which are country's main currency.
Mass opposition is growing to the government's plans to introduce bond
notes, a state-backed non-convertible currency designed to ease the
dollar shortage.
Further complicating matters, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa's
strategy of re-engaging with international financial institutions is
rejected by a rival faction within the ruling Zimbabwe African National
Union-Patriotic Front.
Chinamasa still has to find ways to raise funds to repay some $600 mn.
of arrears to the African Development Bank and about $1 bn. to the
World
Bank before substantive talks can start on new loans.
BURKINA FASO: Government demands secret files on French role in the
coup that
overthrew Thomas Sankara
This week the French government is to consider a request to hand over
classified files on its role in the 1987 coup in Burkina Faso. The
request made by President Roch Kabore's
government, which is continuing
with a probe into the coup, includes a list of French officials that
the Burkinabe investigators want to interview.
A leading target in Burkina Faso's investigation is Blaise Compaoré,
the former President who was ousted In October 2014 after tens of
thousands of demonstrators mobilised in the capital to protest against
his attempts to extend his term in office. Compaoré has now been given
asylum in neighbouring Côte d'Ivoire.
