Category Archives: East African Community

Uganda: New links for ongoing themes . . .

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Uganda will review its commitment of forces to the AMISOM mission in Somalia due to being “stabbed in the back” by accusation of arming rebels in DRC.

Today, Uganda’s Media Council ordered suspension of a play entitled “State of the Nation” about corruption and poor governance, pending a “review”.

The Ugandan Speaker of Parliament, Rebecca Kadega, is attracting popular support for standing up to pressure on a recent trip to Canada on the longstanding “anti-homosexuality” bill, and rejects the notion that she should block debate on the bill to appease aid donors or avoid visa suspensions.

In the meantime, two patients from a road accident reportedly died after the ICU in Uganda’s largest hospital closed recently due to lack of equipment:

According to a research paper published by the Bio Med Central Journal, Uganda has only one ICU bed for every one million Ugandans. The paper reveals that critical care remains neglected with many patients with potentially treatable conditions unable to access services.

Ideally, with Mulago’s 1,500 bed capacity, at least 150 of them should be in a high dependency ward for people who need more intensive observation and treatment.

Other departments that have ICU beds in the hospital are the pediatric ward (4) which are not working, the Heart Institute (4) and the Cancer Institute (3) while the general ward has 12 beds with no equipment. Other public hospitals that have functioning ICUs in the country are Mbarara, Lacor, Gulu and Jinja.

h/t Rosebell’s Blog on Twitter

VOA reports that Britain has joined Ireland in an aid suspension over corruption in the Prime Minister’s office (although apparently the Irish suspension is general, whereas the UK is apparently only suspending aid to that one office):

The money was meant to have been spent on helping the needy, and to help pay for a ‘peace recovery and development program’ in northern Uganda after decades of conflict and devastation.

The Ugandan government has pledged prosecutions. Two senior officials have been charged, while 17 others have been suspended as the investigation continues.

“This report does not surprise anybody,” said Dr. Fred Golooba Mutebi, a political analyst and a visiting fellow at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom. The only shock, he added, “is the amounts of money stolen are quite colossal.”

"Freedom of expression is your right"

“FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION IS YOUR RIGHT”

Upcoming Nairobi Seminar

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Institute for Security Studies and Hanns Seidel Foundation Seminar, Nairobi
Oil and Gas Discoveries in Kenya and the Region: Opportunities and Challenges
Tuesday 6 November 2012
10h00 to 13h00

East Africa, and Kenya in particular, is increasingly developing into an important hydrocarbon region. With proven reservoirs and heightened exploration activity, the region is hoping for an oil boom and the attendant profits. In ideal circumstances, the oil and gas resources in Kenya and the region should become engines of stability, economic growth and improved governance. Looking at experiences elsewhere on the continent, however, there is a danger of the ‘resource curse’ syndrome, which counsels about the perils of hydrocarbons turning into sources of instability and ecological catastrophe. Indeed, the dismal track record of Africa’s oil producers has led to concerns about the possibility of Kenya and the greater region falling victim to Africa’s paradox of plenty. There are already emerging concerns about territorial disputes relating to Kenya and the region linking to the discovery of natural resources.

As Kenya in particular draws increasing interest from major oil companies, the question is: what are the short- and medium-term projections for oil and gas discoveries, and what are the geostrategic implications? Significantly, what policy options should Kenya pursue to avoid past development failures associated with petroleum and to militate against potential conflict? This seminar will examine these questions, among others, with the aim of offering policy recommendations on improving outcomes of oil and gas production in Kenya and the region.

At the ISS office at Braeside Gardens on Gitanga Road in Lavington.

Link to register is here.

More economic news from Kenya while the campaign season continues to heat up

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And in the key sector of immediate interest to the expat community, “Java House deal wins African investment award” from the Nation:

A multi-million dollar deal that saw Nairobi Java House sell a majority stake to a US private equity fund has won the Africa Investor of the year award in a ceremony that also honoured two Kenyan bank chief executives.

The transaction amount was not made public, but Mr Bryce Fort, the managing director of the equity fund, ECP, said at the time that it fell within the firm’s average deal size of about Sh5.1 billion ($60 million).

“The ECP is a strong believer in Africa’s growing middle class,” said chief executive Hurley Doddy in a video address to the Africa Investor summit after winning the award.

The Java House deal, which saw the Washington DC-based ECP acquire a majority stake in the Kenyan coffee chain, was made public early this year.

Here is the link to the story at Africa Assets.

Meanwhile, the IMF predicted 5.7% GDP growth overall for Sub-Saharan Africa in 2013 after 5% growth for 2012.

The Star reports that one group of analysts project that Kenya could near this average, reaching 5.3% growth in 2013 “but only if there is a smooth political transition with a clear winner in round one.”   The pre-election uncertainty and distraction of the campaign are weighing on the economy at present.

Upsidedown Freightcar

A key example of the progress and the frustrations in the Kenyan, and regional, economy, is found an op/ed column in the Sunday Standard from Polycarp Igathe, Chairman of the Kenya Association of Manufacturers, headlined “Inefficient railway system hurting national growth”:

Last month, I visited the port of Mombasa in the company of board members of Kenya Association of Manufacturers (KAM) and Kenya Shippers Council (KSC).

We witnessed firsthand, that at long last, chronic port congestion and inefficiencies are being tackled, bravely, by Kenya Ports (KPA), but timidly by Rift Valley Railways (RVR).

Gichiri Ndua, KPA’s Managing Director explained the gains, efforts and challenges at Kilindini port. Ship-to-shore gantry capacity has more than doubled, dredging of the port is complete and the new berth 19 is almost finalised allowing Port of Mombasa to handle a 16 per cent growth in cargo throughput. Some of the largest shipping lines are now able to call and enables Kilindini to become a transshipment port.

We confirmed that delays in cargo offtake and high cost of cargo transportation are the result of dismal failure in improving railway infrastructure in tandem with port infrastructure. Citadel Capital and Transcentury the major shareholders in RVR must simply know that they are failing the country in outstanding fashion.

Igathe goes on to write that the railroad bottleneck is a key impediment to regional growth, with Mombasa “the only port known in the world to rely 95 per cent on road freight”.  He hails reports of a new commercial contract between the Kenya Railway Corporation and China Roads and Bridges to start building a standard gauge rail line from Mombasa to Malaba as a “game changer”.  Read the whole piece for a Kenyan manufacturers perspective of what is needed for long term growth.

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Should the U.S. do more about corruption in South Sudan? Are there historical lessons from Kenya?

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Alan Boswell of the McClatchy papers has an interesting story today, “U.S. not probing allegations of massive South Sudanese corruption”, highlighting a difference of opinion between Senator Leahy and the Administration about how to apply U.S. law on foreign corruption.

Travel bans are one of the few tools available to American officials to fight corruption, and U.S. law requires that they be imposed if the State Department has credible evidence that foreign officials are profiting corruptly from a country’s natural resources. The law allows for exemptions only for travel to the United Nations in New York, though an individual ban can be lifted if the reason for the banning has been corrected.

In June, the South Sudanese government admitted that it’s missing $4 billion in stolen funds, or roughly double its annual revenue since the mostly autonomous administration was established in 2005 as part of a U.S-brokered peace deal that led to South Sudan’s independence last year from Sudan. . . .

Boswell reports that the U.S. is not considering such visa bans and that Presidential Envoy Princeton Lyman has indicated that the U.S. is looking to the South Sudanese to investigate the situation themselves.

“You have to know exactly who you are going to target. It’s not exactly clear who did it,” Lyman said. “We are looking to the Sudanese to do the investigations. President Kiir has promised a vigorous anti-corruption policy and we encourage him in this direction.”

Under American law, foreign officials and their immediate family members who steal from the public treasury or display other significant corruption are ineligible to enter the United States. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the chairman of the state and foreign operations subcommittee and the author of the “anti-kleptocracy” law, said he didn’t think the State Department was doing enough to find out who stole the money.

“If the State Department has such information, we expect the U.S. Embassy to determine if it is credible and to apply the law rigorously,” Leahy said.

The U.S. has known about the scale of South Sudanese corruption for some time. “From early on, I had people who knew the SPLM well citing this problem and very worried about it,” Lyman said.

Lyman said corruption wasn’t unusual in young developing countries. He pointed to the example of Kenya’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta, who was well-known for welcoming gifts and kickbacks as part of official business.”You don’t like to see it happen, but it happens. That doesn’t excuse it,” Lyman said.

Obviously this puts the U.S. in a difficult position because of our “special relationship” with South Sudan, the tremendous other challenges the new country faces, and the ongoing brutality from Khartoum.  At the same time, it can also be argued that we have unique responsibility to address the problem because of our role in facilitating South Sudanese independence and our place on the inside through our support for the new government.

Ambassador Lyman cites Kenyatta, so what are the lessons from Kenya?  Kenyatta’s corruption begat Moi’s, which begat that within the Kibaki administrations.  In the course of fifty years after independence the U.S. and the international community as a whole never found the will to consistently stick to a strong, clear anti-corruption effort in Kenya–there have always been other priorities to intervene.  Yet Kenyatta’s heirs and cronies, and Moi and his partially overlapping set of cronies still literally own an awful lot of Kenya, and have done very well through Kibaki (who was part of the Kenyatta and Moi circles himself for many, many years).  While the press is now free enough to report scandal after scandal after scandal, and write more of the history, the deals are not undone and no one is prosecuted in almost all significant cases old and new.  While there may be some hope for the future from movement toward a more independent judiciary, the track record so far is just plain bad.  The precedent seems risky.

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Western storytelling, the East African “middle class” and how to account for “politics”

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Here we have an interesting paradigmatic story from Der Spiegel, translated from German for their English version, “Up and Coming in Kampala; Africa’s Growing Middle Class Drives Development” by Horand Knaup and Jan Puhl:

Three good anecdotal stories here of successful start-up African businesses generating local jobs and wealth through import substitution with domestic production. They help to grow a domestic consumer market and ultimately look to export as well. One of the two in Uganda got significant assistance from the national government and the Kenyan business got financing from a German international development arm.

She earned her starting capital by importing clothes from the West, but then she began designing her own collections, and soon “Sylvia Owori” was the most popular label among women in East Africa.

Owori has her collection produced by seamstresses in villages. She has trained 200 women and sponsors the purchase of their sewing machines. “When I receive a big order, I can deliver quickly and flexibly,” she says. On the other hand, she says, the women can stand on their own feet when she doesn’t happen to have any work for them.

Her latest creation is a denim laptop bag shaped like the map of Africa. “This bag was once a pair of jeans,” she says. “You threw it into a container for old clothing and sent it to Africa. We made something new out of it and will sell it back to you.” Swedish fashion giant H&M is interested in the bag, and two other Western fashion chains have asked Owori to meet with them in London.

It’s a question of finding new ways to stimulate economic growth. The corrupt oligarchies in many African countries have made money from the export of commodities, but only a fraction of the population has benefited from the proceeds. The growth being generated by Africa’s middle class is more sustainable, say development experts. Much of it is based on the processing of African fabrics, wood and fruits, and it creates jobs.

Good examples of what is going right and working, from two of Africa’s 50+ plus countries. Well done as such.

“She is the epitome of a success story. And success stories are no longer a rarity in Africa, despite its reputation as a continent of poverty and suffering.” Right and important.

But then we get into the broad assertions and big selective extrapolations. “This growth is producing a middle class that’s growing from year to year. According to the African Development Bank, this middle class already includes 313 million people, or 34 percent of the total population.” To say that “this middle class” includes roughly a third of the population of the entire continent is to me quite misleading in the context of this story,

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East Africa Event Thursday: President Kikwete discussing “A Country Transformed; A New Agenda for Tanzania” with MCC CEO Daniel Yahannes at CSIS

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Update:  Here is the link to the audio from the event at CSIS and a handout.

[Also–for a very different view of Kikwete, see “Tanzania:  The Flip Side”  by Nkwazi Mhango in the current African Executive.]

Tanzania represents a success story for developing and emerging-market countries in a time of changing donor-recipient relations. Through a series of reforms to increase transparency, good governance, and country-led development, President Kikwete has helped Tanzania become a strong partner with the United States and the business community. Tanzania is the recipient of a $698 million Millennium Challenge Corporation compact, hosts a robust PEPFAR program, launched the Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor (SAGCOT) initiative, and was among the first countries selected for the Partnership for Growth—all of which have helped Tanzania make gains in enhancing food security, reducing poverty, and creating economic opportunities.


Tabasco in Zanzibar, Tanzania

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“Competition for Military Superiority” between Uganda and Kenya not a sign of political maturity

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British Helicopter

British Helicopter at base near Nanyuki

 

The Daily Nation reports on new data on Ugandan and Kenyan defense spending from SIPRI, “Arms race hots up in East Africa”:

Competition for military superiority in the East African Community has seen Uganda’s arms expenditure surpass Kenya’s for the first time this year, a new global arms report shows.

Kampala spent US$1.02 billion (Sh83 billion) — much more than Kenya’s US$735 million (Sh61 billion), the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri) says. The institute does research into conflict and arms control.

The most advanced

In particular, Uganda’s acquisition of six SU-30MK Russian jets is said to have elevated its air force to one of the most advanced in East and Central Africa.

The reasons for the increased budget, according to the report, include competition for regional military superiority, especially with Kenya, and the threat of a spillover from potential conflict between Sudan and South Sudan.

Others included the operation in Somalia against Al-Shabaab where the region’s armies, including Kenya’s, are fighting under the African Mission in Somalia (Amisom), and against Joseph Kony’s rebels in the DR Congo are quoted as reasons for Uganda’s ballooning military expenditure.

The friction with Kenya over Migingo Island almost sparked a confrontation and this is also cited as justification for more military spending by Kampala.

Kenya’s military expenditure has also been going up in the last decade. The country spent only Sh14 billion on the military in 2000 compared to more than Sh60 billion today.  .  .  .

There are plenty of positive opportunities for competition and national pride within the East African Community, but acquisition of military hardware in support of governing egos is not something that is affordable for either country in the context of need, and supports the temptations of saber rattling for political gamesmanship.  Any type of military confrontation within the EAC would be an absurd tragedy.  Since the U.S. and our European allies are heavily engaged in interacting with the Ugandan and Kenyan militaries, perhaps we can be positively influential in dissuading this type of behavior in conjunction with our support for less tangible types of political reform.

A little Kenyan-American history: Kissinger, Waiyaki, Kibaki; getting the F-5s, safaris and slums

History–Kenyatta, the Kenyan military and GSU; origins of U.S. military assistance

More Kenyan-American diplomatic history: Kenyatta’s health and succession; status of whites; military assistance

Kenya: Today’s Presidential Announcement of Tullow Oil Drilling Find in Turkana (several weeks ago) Coincides with News of Major Cabinet Shakeup

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“Kenya Strikes Oil in Turkana”, Capital FM

NAIROBI, Kenya, Mar 26 – After years of prospecting, Kenya has finally made a breakthrough by striking oil in Turkana County in the north, with focus now shifting to exploring its commercial viability.

The discovery of the light, waxy oil was made in a half-way drilled Ngamia-1 exploration well, raising expectations that there could be huge reserves once the total depth of 2,700 metres is reached.

“The well has been drilled to an initial depth of 1,041 metres and it will continue to a total depth of about 2,700 metres to explore for deeper potential in this prospect,” Energy Minister Kiraitu Murungi said at a press briefing.

President Mwai Kibaki was the first to break the news earlier in the day. . . . .

The Nation’s “Big Story” is on the Cabinet.

The reshuffle seems hugely consequential in Kenya’s election year politics:  it certainly appears that Kibaki has made a large gesture toward realigning the Cabinet toward the “G7 Alliance” which has lingered as both the primary political vehicle to advocate for Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto against the ICC and most visible successor to much of the PNU apparatus from 2007-08.

The most prominent moves as explained by “A Political Kenya 2012”:

Eugene Wamalwa – Minister for Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs
– Biggest winner as the docket will promote him to the senior most politician in Western province and probably check Musalia Mudavadi’s rising star
– He is an Ocampo 4 sympathiser
– Was once linked to president Kibaki’s son (Jimmy Kibaki) 2012 campaign as his prefered presidential candidate.
– Also seen as a compromise candidate for the G7 alliance
Mutula Kilonzo – Minister of Education
– Demotion from Minister for Justice Minister for Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs despite having delivered a new constitution which many previous justice ministers failed to do
– Punished for being an ardent Ocampo 4 Critic and for not toeing the ODM Kenya line

Also, Moses Wetangala has been demoted from Foreign Affairs to Trade (just after finally getting out of Bamako following the Malian coup).  This would seem to tie in to advancing Eugene Wamalwa as Luhya political leader in Western Province to the detriment of Deputy PM and announced ODM candidate Musalia Mudavidi.  On the ODM side, Najib Balala is the only Minister completely sacked, losing Tourism.  The Coast figure has been at odds with Raila Odinga for much of Kibaki’s second term in and openly expressed “seller’s remorse” for supporting Raila irrespective of his status as a member of the “Pentagon” from the 2007 campaign.

And no change in status for Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta as he continues to fight the prospect of facing ICC trial and to rally ethnic support in Central Province.

The political establishment in Kenya will not be easily moved in the 2012 elections, now most likely ending up to be in 2013 through a complicated series of legal wickets for which no one has claimed responsibility and for which there is no obvious popular support.  I hope it is finally dawning of any doubters that the Government of Kenya as an institution is quite mobilized on balance to try to stop the ICC, as it has been–and not in favor of any substitute local justice mechanism.

The political stakes continue to rise and the prospect of oil money on the near term horizon if anything raises them more.  If nothing else, there will be a lot of pressure to do oil deals for campaign funding.

Cajun Diaspora

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“Cajun Crawfish Invading Africa” from National Geographic news via Africa Files:

It’s a far cry from Cajun country, but a U.S. crayfish used in Southern cooking is now eating its way across Africa, scientists say.  Without any native predators to keep it in check, the Louisiana crayfish, also known as the red swamp crayfish, is gobbling up small freshwater fish, fish eggs, mollusks, crustaceans, and aquatic plants. The 6-inch-long (15-centimeter-long) invader is already widely distributed in lakes and other bodies of water throughout Kenya, as well as in Rwanda,  Uganda, Egypt, Zambia, the Seychelles, Mauritius, and South Africa.

Conservationists are now concerned the crayfish will reach the East African lakes of Malawi, Tanganyika, and Victoria, which are home to hundreds—and probably thousands—of species found nowhere else. “By removing animals and plants from wetlands, [the crayfish] can upset the balance of ecosystems and reduce valuable ecosystem functions,” said Geoffrey Howard, global coordinator for invasive species for the Species Programme of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Louisiana crayfish were first imported in the 1970s into Kenya and South Africa, where the species was grown in aquaculture operations.  People bred the species in Kenya’s Lake Naivasha and sold the delicacy to Scandinavian buyers after that region’s native crayfish had been wiped out by disease.  “They are rarely seen or recognized as a threat,” Howard said, “but they have certainly affected the fishery in Naivasha.”  That’s because, “by eating fish eggs and fingerlings, [crayfish] can reduce the populations of fishable fish.” . . .

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Upcoming: Panel on challenges to independent media in East Africa

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For readers in the Washington area, Tuesday morning from 10:00 – 11:30am, the Center for International Media Assistance, the National Endowment for Democracy Africa Program and the Solidarity Center will be hosting a roundtable discussion entitled “Independent Media in East Africa: Democratic Pillar in Peril?”  Looks like an interesting event with a distinguished panel:

New challenges to independent media are emerging in East Africa. Recently passed anti-terrorism and information laws allow governments to harass and imprison journalists with impunity. Under these new laws, six journalists have been arrested in Ethiopia since June 2011, and Somali journalists are facing tremendous threats covering conflict and famine in their country. How do local media react when their fellow journalists come under attack? How can an independent press play its crucial role as a pillar of democracy and overcome challenges in places such as Sudan and South Sudan, Somalia, Uganda, Rwanda, and Kenya? The discussion will also examine the development of unions and media associations as well as the international donor community’s role in supporting independent media in East Africa.

Information and registration here.