Vol 59 No 12 | SUDAN Offensives and reshuffles 15th June 2018 A new cabinet is appointed in the midst of an economic meltdown as the army plans to wipe out the rebels in Darfur The proposal by Jean-Pierre Lacroix, the United Nations head of Peacekeeping Operations, on 11 June to halve the UN-African Union peacekeeping force to 4,050 soldiers over the next...
Vol 59 No 12 | KENYA Jobs for Raila's boys 15th June 2018 The bipartisan committee appointed by President Uhuru Kenyatta and opposition leader Raila Odinga to look into 'building bridges' to achieve national unity has not reported, but a pattern...
Vol 59 No 12 | ERITREAETHIOPIA A radical bid for peace and economic change 8th June 2018 Abiy Ahmed will need strong backing from the party as well as his new security chiefs to make his new policies work A credible offer to end the war with Eritrea and the opening up of state companies to private capital are Ethiopia's biggest strategic shifts in over a decade....
Vol 59 No 11 | SOMALIA Shabaab takes to the air 1st June 2018 Far from being on the brink of defeat, Al Shabaab is improving its propaganda and still holding its own on the military front Al Shabaab's leader, Abu Ubaydah, made a major speech on jihadist broadcast media on 18 May marking the beginning of Ramadan and setting out his political stall, scotching...
Vol 59 No 11 | ETHIOPIA All things to all factions 1st June 2018 The new premier plays a clever game of balancing competing interests – but bringing the corrupt to book is not on the agenda Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has been boosting his reputation as a crowd-pleaser with government actions which have delighted a Saudi tycoon, youthful demonstrators, opposition leaders, jailed executives and...
Vol 59 No 10 | SOUTH SUDAN Splits and special pleas 18th May 2018 An increasingly isolated Salva is under threat and making desperate moves as his former army chief defects In April, the unity of President Salva Kiir Mayardit's Dinka-dominated alliance fractured further when his former army chief Paul Malong Awan announced the formation of yet another opposition...
Vol 59 No 10 | ETHIOPIASAUDI ARABIA Gold fever 18th May 2018 The ruling Ethiopian Peoples' Revolutionary Democratic Front's favourite billionaire, the Ethiopian-Saudi Mohammed Hussein al Amoudi, seems to have disappeared from favour in Addis Ababa as surely as he...
Vol 59 No 10 | SOMALIA Proxies, powers, and presidents 8th May 2018 Qatar and the UAE, along with a host of bit players, fought their latest battle in Somalia over whose man got to be the new Speaker of Parliament Months of vicious intrigue centring on the rivalry between the United Arab Emirates and its declared enemy, Qatar, ended on 30 April when Mohamed Mursal Abdirahman became the...
Vol 59 No 9 | SUDAN Diplomats down, spies up 4th May 2018 A veteran spy chief returns and the foreign minister is pushed out as President El Beshir tries to prolong his tenure The sacking of Foreign Minister Ibrahim Ghandour on 18 April after he complained in parliament that diplomats hadn't been paid for seven months points to the depth of...
Vol 59 No 9 | ETHIOPIA Abiy tests the military 4th May 2018 The Prime Minister's first cabinet rewards allies and begins to take on the securocrats' power in politics and the economy Building on an assertive start, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has revealed more about his leadership style with an aggressive set of federal government appointments. Although hardly unexpected, the...