The epic struggle between Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and current Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa for the leadership – some say the soul – of the governing African National Congress will...

New President Emmerson Mnangagwa has to placate his restive allies in the military and ruling party while presenting a semblance of reform to woo the investors and diplomats...

Amid growing concerns over the scale and urgency of Zambia's impending debt crisis, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank have joined those who believe the country...

When Pastor Evan Mawarire, founder of the #ThisFlag movement, walked free from the Harare High Court on 29 November having been acquitted on charges of trying to overthrow...

It was new President Emmerson Mnangagwa's promise of 'jobs, jobs and jobs' that raised the loudest cheers on 22 November at the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front's...

Facing myriad corruption charges from her time as head of state, ex-President Joyce Banda has held out an olive branch to her bitter rival, President Peter Mutharika, from...

With barely two weeks to go before the crucial African National Congress elective conference on 16-20 December in Johannesburg, supporters of Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma claim they are leading the...

It took less than two months in office for President João Lourenço to take a direct swipe at Isabel dos Santos, Africa's richest woman and the daughter of...

While Mozambique's poor struggle with austerity and inflation, President Filipe Nyusi will be soaring comfortably over them in his Canadair Challenger 850 private jet, acquired last month for...

The battle between Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and Cyril Ramaphosa for the leadership of the African National Congress now centres on the fate of Secretary General Gwede Mantashe, who is...

The South African Communist Party (SACP) will stand in its own name in local bye-elections in the Free State Province on 29 November. It will be the...

The governing Patriotic Front is looking more and more like a personal vehicle for President Edgar Lungu, now that a splinter party with a strong footing in the...

During the night of 14-15 November Zimbabwe Defence Forces soldiers were posted to strategic points in the capital, such as the police headquarters, the Central Intelligence Organisation, the...

By throwing out Emmerson Mnangagwa from the Vice Presidency and the ruling party, President Robert Mugabe is testing his grip on the security services as the regime faces...

Commonwealth Special Envoy Ibrahim Gambari is due in Lusaka this month to mediate in talks between President Edgar Lungu's ruling Patriotic Front and opposition parties as part of...

President Filipe Nyusi needs to build on his recent assertion of control over party and state, analysts are saying. He is still hamstrung when it comes to the...

President João Lourenço's government has removed José Filomeno dos Santos (aka Zenu), son of former President José Eduardo dos Santos, from direct control of Angola's US$5 billion...

HSBC, one of Britain's biggest banks, has been accused by a British peer of complicity in a US$500 million money-laundering scheme organised by businesses controlled by the Gupta...

Taking a high-stakes gamble ahead of the leadership elections in December, President Jacob Zuma has broken with the African National Congress's traditional allies in the Communist Party and...

It has not been an easy journey for President Filipe Nyusi, who does not inspire the same personal loyalty as his predecessor, the redoubtable Armando Guebuza. The first...

Pledging to take on monopolies that short-change consumers and to open discussions with critical civic activists, President João Lourenço used a speech at the opening of parliament on...

On paper, the parastatal Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation is effectively bust. Ever since the Auditor General, Mildred Chiri, reported in June that ZMDC's liabilities exceeded its assets by...

The government is in disarray over how to handle the deepening crisis unleashed by the auditing firm KPMG’s involvement in the affairs of the Guptas and the 'state...

Cashgate is the scandal which keeps on giving. Ever since the epic looting of the Treasury by government ministers and political parties broke surface in 2013, few politicians...

Invitations to the VIP area at João Lourenço's inauguration in Luanda on 26 September were hard to come by, even for the ruling-party elite, such was the anticipation...

In a grovelling public apology after 18 months of silence, auditing giant KPMG admitted that its senior executives in South Africa had 'made mistakes' and 'ignored red flags'...

The campaign for Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to succeed her ex-husband as African National Congress leader, which he is backing heavily, may fail if the courts allow the challenges of...

Opposition hopes are fading that a repeat of the massive poll victory for President Robert Mugabe and the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) in 2013 can be...

Portuguese Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Ana Gomes has complained to the European Commission about the Angolan presidency's propaganda unit influencing Euronews, a Commission-funded news channel. The...

The increasingly hotly contested battle for the leadership of the African National Congress got a little dirtier when Cyril Ramaphosa, Deputy President of the ruling party, was targeted...

The audit of the US$2 billion of secret loans by the corporate investigations and risk consultancy Kroll was supposed to clear the air between the governing Frente de...

A settlement in the dispute between mining giant First Quantum Minerals (FQM) and Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines-Investment Holdings (ZCCM-IH) looks as distant as ever. President Edgar Lungu ordered...

The daughter of outgoing President José Eduardo dos Santos, billionaire businesswoman Isabel, was the beneficiary of a hitherto unknown paternal windfall, according to an investigation by Der...

Semba Comunicação is the state-subsidised private corporation controlled by Welwitschia 'Tchizé' Dos Santos, José Eduardo dos Santos's 39-year-old daughter and his 32-year-old son José Paulino 'Coreón...

There is one thing about the general elections of 23 August we can be almost certain of: Defence Minister João Lourenço, hand-picked by President José Eduardo dos Santos,...

Twenty minutes after Speaker Baleka Mbete had announced on 8 August that the President had survived yet another confidence vote, a beaming Jacob Zuma, surrounded by bodyguards, swept...

High hopes for biometric electoral registration, which should be in place before the 2018 elections, may well be misplaced, Africa Confidential can reveal. Leaders of the Zimbabwe African...

The Constitutional Court faces harsh criticism for a perceived bias towards President Edgar Lungu and for reversing its decisions after he and members of the governing Patriotic Front...

As South Africa's political crisis deepens ahead of the no-confidence motion vote aimed at ousting President Jacob Zuma on 8 August, a broad front of civil society organisations...

A Rwandan former general exiled in South Africa, Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa, has lost his official status as a refugee. Pretoria is using a May court ruling to improve...

The state of health of President José Eduardo dos Santos has long been one of Angola's best-kept secrets. So it has remained for the three months since...

When central bank Governor Valter Filipe da Silva took the platform at a meeting on Angola's financial sector on 5 July, some listened to him describe the government's...

The audit by Kroll Associates of the loans to three supposed maritime projects talks about what the US$2 billion loans were not spent on but not where the...

The Deputy President of the governing African National Congress, Cyril Ramaphosa, and his followers are performing an intricate balancing act. They are busy finalising nominations for the top...

President Edgar Lungu declared a state of emergency on 5 July, confirming the fears of oppositionists. 'If I become a dictator for once, bear with me,' he told...

Senior African National Congress leaders are deeply worried that the stresses within the governing party could tear the ANC apart as they look forward to next week's policy...

Multinational commodities trader Trafigura is expanding into power generation and natural gas, including liquefied natural gas (LNG), via its local Zimbabwean ally and partner, Sakunda Holdings, according to...

A vital meeting of the Politburo of the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front was due to take place as Africa Confidential went to press. Such is the turmoil...

'We only have God, the people and the law. We want fair elections,' read one of the posters held by protestors from Angola's main opposition party, the União...

A coalition with Julius Malema's Economic Freedom Fighters gave the Democratic Alliance control of key cities, including Johannesburg and Tshwane (Pretoria) after August's local elections. The EFF will...

Nothing seems to stick to South Africa's President Jacob Zuma and the more he is attacked, the more powerfully he bounces back, albeit at the expense of his...

Senior officials and donors are still pondering the still secret audit which consultants Kroll Associates delivered to Attorney-General Beatriz Buchili on 12 May, after three extensions of the...

The reclusive and secretive President José Eduardo dos Santos sparked much speculation about whether he had suffered a minor stroke last month. He was spirited to Barcelona, Spain,...

The alliance of Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisili's Democratic Congress (DC) and Deputy Prime Minister Mothetjoa Metsing's Lesotho Congress for Democracy (LCD) has lost the snap election that Mosisili...

Inflation has started to rise again since, in an economy dominated by the US dollar, the government introduced a de facto domestic currency at the end of last...

After weeks of high stakes gamesmanship over claims that First Quantum Minerals had cheated Zambia out of as much as US$2.3 billion, President Edgar Lungu has ordered his...

The embattled African National Congress is rapidly running out of money as funders desert the party because of the increasingly erratic behaviour of its leader, President Jacob Zuma....

President Jacob Zuma has been trying to undermine his critics by claiming that all public attacks on his actions – whether in the media, from opposition parties or...

Humiliatingly shunned by both the powerful business community and the forces of labour and the left, President Jacob Zuma is on the defensive as never before. He has...

The British-based mining company First Quantum Minerals Limited has written to the Attorney General to seek assurances that none of the directors of Kansanshi Mining PLC, which FQM...

Hakainde Hichilema's arrest for treason was at first dismissed as an intimidatory gimmick by President Edgar Lungu after the 'clash of the motorcades' early this month. However, as...

The move by Zambia's largely government-owned mining investment company to sue First Quantum Minerals for fraud has put its chief executive officer Pius Kasolo at loggerheads with figures...

South Africa's fourth Finance Minister in two years, Malusi Gigaba, encountered bemusement and indifference when he visited the United States last week for the International Monetary Fund and...

Expectations and tension were building as the 28 April deadline for the delivery of the risk advisory firm Kroll's report on secret security state loans approached. Attorney General...

President Hery Rajaonarimampianina is desperately trying to regain the political initiative after taking heavy blows to his government's reputation after it allowed a controversial presidential advisor to leave...

Much of the raison d'être of the controversial 1 trillion rand (US$72 billion) nuclear deal with Russia rests on President Jacob Zuma's belief that he owes his life...

Pro-democracy forces brought tens of thousands of protestors into South Africa's streets last week following President Jacob Zuma's ousting of Pravin Gordhan from the Finance Ministry and his...

The controversial Malusi Gigaba, the former Home Affairs Minister now elevated to the Finance Ministry, has been proposed by influential sections of the African National Congress as a...

The powerful KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) branch of the African National Congress, the governing party's largest, lifted Jacob Zuma into the ANC presidency at its 2007 and 2012 national conferences...

Extraordinary sights greeted viewers of the Prime TV News television channel on 8 April as President Edgar Lungu and United Party for National Development (UPND) leader Hakainde Hichilema...

The timing could scarcely have been worse. João Lourenço, the ruling Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola's candidate to succeed President José Eduardo dos Santos, was claiming...

Only the beleaguered judiciary and Pravin Gordhan's fiscal management stand between South Africa and economic doom. This is an increasingly common refrain within the political class as evidence...

The South African Communist Party intends to withdraw its members from President Jacob Zuma's cabinet if he goes through with the sacking of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, party...

Just as mounting political crises again threatened to overwhelm President Jacob Zuma, he pulled out the land card to buy himself breathing space before the African National Congress's...

President Filipe Nyusi felt the political ground underneath him get firmer when news of the Exxon-ENI deal came through. The United States oil giant ExxonMobil is buying 25%...

President Peter Mutharika is becoming increasingly isolated as a succession of ministers are forced out of office. This makes him more dependent on alliances with largely discredited figures...

President Edgar Lungu had barely begun his second term of office this year when he declared himself ready for another. Although the constitution states that no president who...

President Jacob Zuma has become increasingly irritated with his respected Minister of Finance, Pravin Gordhan, who was widely praised after presenting a balanced budget on 22 February amidst...

Concern about the actions of State House advisers has grown so much that President Edgar Lungu felt obliged to persuade civil servants not to be intimidated. At a...

The Chief Justice of Zimbabwe, Godfrey Chidyausiku, reaches the compulsory retirement age of 70 during February, which has set the cat among the factional pigeons of the ruling...

With ten more months as leader of the African National Congress (ANC), President Jacob Zuma tried to shore up his government with a flurry of populist policies –...

The commodity giant Trafigura is providing major financial support to a government programme called Command Agriculture in what is widely seen as a major boost to the Zimbabwe...

Angola is planning a major expansion of its navy with the help of Privinvest Group, the company which supplied fishing vessels and high-technology military patrol boats to Mozambique....

A growing faction in the governing Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (Frelimo) favours repudiating its US$2 billion in questionable secret loans. It wants those responsible for the loans,...

The government has decided to mobilise domestic savings and deposits to plug the gap in public finances under the routine-sounding name of the State's Annual Debt Plan. The...

Just when Malagasy politics appeared to be edging towards a more consensual mood, with the last-minute passage of the 2017 budget and a distinctly upbeat December donors' meeting...

On South Africa's Reconciliation Day on 16 December, President Jacob Zuma's speech in the North-West Province was brought to a halt when strong wind and heavy rain blew...

President Filipe Nyusi is weak and not in effective control of either the country or the governing party, the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique. Political instability will be...

The country's restless public has failed to dislodge its nonagenarian leader, Robert Mugabe, who has ruled since 1980. If predictions of his demise have been as premature as...

After a year dominated by the election that controversially returned President Edgar Lungu and the Patriotic Front to power, the main political battles in 2017 look set to...

Two queues can be seen outside any branch of Banco de Poupança e Crédito, Angola's biggest public lender: a long one of hopeful withdrawers of cash, and a...