confidentially speaking
The Africa Confidential Blog
UNITED NATIONS: Tackling migration will be top priority for Guterres after he wins Secretary General job
Patrick Smith
This week we start on the international scene with the
election of a
new Secretary General of the United Nations and a report from the
annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank
in Washington DC. In Ethiopia,
Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn
has announced a six month state of emergency after weeks of clashes
between police and protestors. Two of Africa’s biggest economies, Egypt and Nigeria, both face intensifying
pressures on their currencies. In Morocco,
the main Islamist party is struggling to find other parties willing to
work with it in a parliamentary coalition and in Zimbabwe, opposition leader Joice Mujuru says she can lead a
grand alliance against President Robert
Mugabe’s ailing government.
UNITED NATIONS: Tackling
migration will be top priority for Guterres after he wins Secretary
General job
The UN Security Council is due to confirm António Guterres, Portugal’s prime minister from
1995-2002, as the next Secretary General of the UN in a special session
on 13 October. All 15 members of the Council have indicated their
support for Guterres and will then send their recommendation to the
193-member UN General Assembly.
Diplomats in New York say that one of the main tasks for
Guterres, who
was UN High Commissioner of Refugees from 2002-2012, would be to lead UN
strategy on tackling the biggest wave of refugees and migrants since
the end of the Second World War. Last month, the UN hosted a special
conference on migration but key decisions were deferred for another two
years.
Meanwhile European governments are stepping up efforts to negotiate
agreements with their counterparts in Africa and the Middle East to
strengthen border controls and crack down on people smuggling. This
week German Chancellor Angela Merkel is visiting Mali, Niger and Ethiopia to discuss ways
in which her country’s development aid can be used to discourage
migration.
IMF/WORLD BANK: Policy shifts
urged as growth falls to 20 year low
Top officials of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank set out
tough policy prescriptions for Africa’s finance ministers at their
organisation’s annual meeting on 7-8 October in Washington DC. The
average growth forecast for Africa has fallen to 1.6% this year, its
lowest level for 20 years, but several countries with more diversified
economies are bucking the trend.
Those countries include Ethiopia, Rwanda,
Tanzania, Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal, according to the
World Bank’s Africa economist Albert
Zeufack
and Vice-President for Africa Makhtar
Diop. At a special session on
Africa on 7 October, they argued that countries would have to toughen
fiscal and monetary policies, strengthen state institutions and
diversify exports in response to the global commodity slump. The Bank
is forecasting a modest rebound to 2.9% growth for African economies
next year.
IMF officials also had a tough message about cracking down on public
spending for governments – such as Mozambique,
Kenya, and Zambia –
seeking fresh loans. All three countries have been borrowing
heavily from the commercial market, raising questions about the
sustainability of that strategy.
ETHIOPIA: Government declares
state of emergency as German Chancellor
due in
Addis Ababa
One of Africa’s best performing economies and widely praised by the IMF
and World Bank, Ethiopia has announced a six-month state of emergency
after weeks of protests which have left hundreds dead. Prime Minister
Hailemariam Desalegn says his government would use the time to
introduce reforms and open talks with opposition parties.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel was due in Ethiopia on 10 October. With
its economic gains and its sharpening political
conflicts, Ethiopia will show Merkel the complexity of the migration
crisis in the
Horn of Africa. Protestors have been attacking foreign-owned flower
farms and factories, including one owned by Nigerian magnate, Aliko
Dangote.
NIGERIA/EGYPT: Currency woes
multiply and dollar shortage
worsens
Two of Africa’s biggest economies are facing some common ailments – the
crashing of their national currencies in the face of an acute
shortage of dollars and political unrest. As their foreign
reserves come under more pressure, both countries are struggling to
stabilise their currencies.
Egypt’s pound fell to 14 to the US$ in the week ending 8
October. That’s 60% weaker than the official rate fixed by the central
bank in
March. And Nigeria’s naira was trading at N475 to the US$ on the
parallel market last week, a 40% loss of value since June when the
central bank allowed a managed float of the currency.
MOROCCO: After winning the
most parliamentary seats, Islamists
face growing
hostility
After winning 125 seats in parliamentary elections, the Islamist Parti
de la justice et du développement is the biggest party in the
395-seat
legislature but will struggle to form a coalition because so many other
parties refuse to work with it.
Second in the polls was Parti
authenticité et modernité led by
Mustapha
Bakkoury with 102 seats, it says it is not willing to share
power
with the PJD and would rather go into opposition. The conservative
Istiqlal (Independence)
party which won 46 seats, pulled out of a coalition
with the PJD in 2013 and its feisty leader Abdel Hamid Chaba doesn’t
appear keen to resume the collaboration.
ZIMBABWE: Opposition leader
Joice Mujuru fires up diaspora in
campaigning trip to
Britain
Facing a deepening national crisis, opposition parties in Zimbabwe have
to work together and prepare for power, opposition leader Joice Mujuru
told Africa Confidential in
London on 7 October. The country was facing
an economic meltdown, she said, after attempts to negotiate a
settlement over payments arrears with the IMF
had run into the ground in the face of a chronic shortage of foreign
exchange.
As a former Vice-President of the ruling Zimbabwe African
People’s
Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), Mujuru faced both some cheers and hostile questioning
during her trip to Britain, when she spoke at the Chatham House foreign
affairs think tank and to groups of Zimbabweans around the country.
She says her party, Zimbabwe People First, should have half a
million
members by the end of the year. Many of them are disillusioned
supporters of ZANU-PF who are desperate for economic and political
change. But she added she is working with all the main opposition
parties for a unity platform.
