confidentially speaking
The Africa Confidential Blog
ZIMBABWE: Mnangagwa government plans to float bond after stops in USA and Europe on the roadshow
Patrick Smith
This week, Southern Africa is making all the running. We start
with Zimbabwe where new President Emmerson
Mnangagwa's economic ambassadors are stepping up the
charm offensive on investors. Another newish President, João
Lourenço of Angola is consolidating his
grip on the military. And South Africa's Cyril
Ramaphosa,
the third newcomer to the Presidential club, is grappling with another
provincial explosion. And in Antananarivo, protestors are calling for
the immediate exit of Hery Rajaonarimpianina from the Presidency ahead
of this year's planned elections.
ZIMBABWE: Mnangagwa government plans to float bond
after stops in USA and Europe on the roadshow
As
election campaigning heats up at home, President Emmerson Mnangagwa's
economic team relentlessly circles the globe drumming up investment and
new finance deals. Although the government claims to have corralled
almost US$8 billion in new investments, mainly in the mining business,
many of the biggest companies are waiting for the outcome of the
elections which will be held in the last two weeks of July, according
to Foreign Minister General Sibusiso Moyo.
At one of the latest meets, organized by London-based Exotix in
New York, finance minister Patrick Chinamasa and
Reserve Bank governor John Mangudya, wooed United
States investors. This followed the spring meetings of the World Bank and the
IMF in Washington DC in which the institutions held to their line of no
substantive negotiations on new finance for Zimbabwe until after the
elections and the agreement of a definitive settlement on the country's
arrears. Harare owes some $2.5 bn. in arrears to the World Bank and the
African Development Bank.
However, the Mnangagwa team are in a
hurry to resolve the matter. Mangudya told the bankers at the New York
meeting that the government was seeking bridging finance to repay the
arrears to the International Financial Institutions. This would be in
addition to what the Cairo-based Afreximbank has offered already in
terms of overall financial support. More surprisingly, Mangudya told
investors that the government was planning to float a Eurobond later in
the year.
ANGOLA: President Lourenço's anti-corruption purge
extends to military and spy chiefs
Simultaneously
sacking the chief of staff of the armed forces and the director of the
well-financed foreign intelligence service suggests a supreme
confidence in one's grip on power or political recklessness.
Luanda
insiders assure us that President João Lourenço's latest top level
sackings – he has dismissed police chiefs and the son of former
President José Eduardo dos Santos has been charged
with corruption – prove he has effectively consolidated power in the
eight months since he was elected.
Certainly,
there has been no public criticism of the move; indeed some Angolans
are calling for Lourenço's purge to take on still bigger targets in and
around the Dos Santos clan.
According to the presidential decrees read out on state television on
23 April, General Geraldo Sachipengo Nunda and
long-time intelligence operative André de Oliveira Sango were sacked because they have been named as suspects in the latest
round of anti-corruption investigations. Yet their exit also takes away
two more allies of the Dos Santos clan who might have been able to
protect the former president's interests as the new government pushes
ahead with its anti-corruption sweep.
The next round of the
battle is likely to focus on former President Dos Santos's role as head
of the governing MPLA. Although Dos Santos wants to remain party chief
for another year, supporters of President Lourenço say they are
determined to push him out within the next few weeks. Should they
succeed, that would be one of the last vestiges of formal power held by
Dos Santos, opening up the possibility that he could face the same sort
of police investigations that have already been launched against his
son José Filomeno and daughter Isabel,
former managing director of Sonangol.
MADAGASCAR: Crisis deepens after President
Rajaonarimampianina accuses protestors of attempting a
coup d'etat
The protests in Antananarivo have been building up since 20 April
with President Hery Rajaonarimampianina accusing
the demonstrators of mounting a coup against him. That claim seems to
have designed to draw attention away from the deaths of two protestors
on the second day of the demonstrations.
Ostensibly, the
protests were against the new electoral laws which seem designed to
stop some of the country's most high profile politicians – including
the weird alliance of Marc Ravalomanana and Andry
Rajoelina
– from running in this year's presidential elections. Now the protests
have morphed into a general campaign to pressure
Rajaonarimampianina to
step down immediately.
SOUTH AFRICA: Demonstrators and investigators pile
pressure on ex-President Zuma's allies in North-West Province and Free
State
It is the latest episode of the country's state capture. This time the
focus is on the North-West Province where premier Supra
Mahumapelo, a close ally of ex-President Jacob Zuma and the Gupta family, faces scrutiny for his award of over 65 million
rand in no-bid contracts to private health care and ambulance
companies. Demonstrators, angered by this opaque business at a time
when the public health system in the province has broken down, have
brought the provincial capital Mahikeng to a standstill.
Capitalising on the public mood, Julius Malema's
Economic Freedom Fighters were pushing a no-confidence motion in
Mahumapelo as the mood on the streets turned uglier. This brewing
crisis in the province ties into a wider split within the African
National Congress between factions that back current President Cyril
Ramaphosa and those that back his predecessor, Zuma.
It is
serious enough to have forced Ramaphosa to rush from the Commonwealth
summit in London to a crisis meeting of the ANC caucus in North-West.
Accompanying Ramaphosa were Jessie Duarte and Ace
Magashule,
both of whom come from the Zuma camp. This points to the complexity of
the crisis and the practical limits of Ramaphosa's position. As with
other top Zuma allies, Ramaphosa's preferred course of action will be
sit back and let the police investigators and the courts run with the
ball. Whether the demonstrators on the streets in Mahikeng will wait
that long for Mahumapelo's day in court is another matter.
THE WEEK AHEAD IN VERY BRIEF
NIGERIA: Security and oil business top
agenda for President Buhari's meeting with US
President Trump on 30 April
AFRICA/UNITED KINGDOM: After Commonwealth
summit in London, Trade Minister Liam Fox to spell
out new era for UK-Africa relations
ETHIOPIA: Local businesses call on new
Premier Abiy to ease the state's grip and speed
economic liberalisation
EGYPT: Oil minister Tarek el Molla forecasts $10
billion of investment in national gas industry over next two years
