The Wicked Conversation

The wild cost of oil exploration: Operation Shell
Recent significant oil and gas discoveries seen in the Karoo Basin and the Wild Coast of South Africa have sparked a national debate that raised questions about climate change mitigation and adaptation, and the potential negative impact on local ecologies and...
Expert analysis

Eswatini in 2023: A data overview
On Friday 29 September 2023, the Kingdom of Eswatini will hold its next general elections. A landlocked country in Southern Africa, Eswatini reports a total population of approximately 1.2 million – the second smallest of any non-Island African nation. Ahead of the...

Zim polls saga: Challenges, concerns and strategies for the future
Zimbabweans exercised their democratic rights on August 23 and 24, participating in crucial elections that would determine their representatives in council, Parliament, and the presidency. The contest primarily boiled down to a fierce battle between the ruling Zanu...

Extended misrule in Gabon mirrors wider African retrogression
Following the 26th July 2023 coup d'etat in Niger, the world woke on 30th August to news of another military putsch, this time in Gabon. Resurgent military intervention in politics and worsening misgovernance – two interlinked and formidable afflictions – threaten...

New BRICS+ bound to hit a wall?
On 24 August, coinciding with a controversial election being held in neighbouring Zimbabwe, the latest BRICS summit concluded in Johannesburg. The BRIC acronym was originally coined by Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill in 2001. Original member countries developed a...

Zimbabwe Elections Weekly Tracker – 4 to 15 August 2023
Nomination Court Issues Presidential Candidates On August 7, presidential aspirant Saviour Kasukuwere, filed an urgent High Court application challenging the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) over Statutory Instrument (SI) 140A of 2023, which extends the submission...
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COP26: What should be at the top of Africa’s agenda?
In November, the United Kingdom will host the 26th annual United Nations (UN) global climate summit – called COP – or “Conference of the Parties” in Glasgow. COP26 (delayed by a year due to the Covid-19 pandemic) has a unique urgency and could prove to be one of the most important conferences of our time. Most experts agree that the…
The Africa Governance Papers
Podcasts

GGA’s Pranish Desai appears on The Citizen’s podcast
On 15 February 2023, GGA’s Pranish Desai appeared on the podcast The Citizen’s...

GGA’s Pranish Desai on coalition issues in municipal councils
On 14 February 2023, GGA's Pranish Desai spoke to SAfm's Songezo Mabece about...

GGA’s Pranish Desai on corruption in local government
On 12 January 2023, GGA's Pranish Desai spoke to Radio 702's Thabo...
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Zimbabwe’s 2023 elections: Who votes and why?
Zimbabwe is preparing for its 23 August 2023 Harmonised Elections. It does so against the backdrop of a complex past, where the struggle for democracy and inclusivity has been marred by political instability, hardships, lack of meaningful electoral reforms, and a...

Tinubu needs quick wins to soothe his hard-hitting but necessary reforms
When Bola Ahmed Tinubu took over Nigeria’s presidency on May 29 this year, the outlook for the country was broadly dire. He has since asserted himself as the bold reformer many expected him to be with an astute appetite for ringing radical economic changes. Even...

Zimbabwe Elections Tracker 2023
Introduction On 23 August, the incumbent president of Zimbabwe, President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa of ZANU-PF, will seek another five-year term. Mnangagwa, who ascended to power after the November 2017 coup that ended former president Robert Mugabe’s 37-year rule,...

Africa and the tyranny of the cult of mediocrity
It is a piercing indictment of African liberation sensibility when, like some biblical Jews in the long desert to Canaan who demanded that Moses returns them to Egypt, Africans begin to loudly express the wish to return to the colonial days. One of the most stubborn...
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