June 3, 2015 is a day etched into the memory of Ghanaians. It is a day that floods swept through Accra in hours, claiming more than 200 lives, gutting buildings, destroying cars and setting off a devastating explosion at a petrol station.
Similar to the previous days, it started raining at dawn. On this particular day, I remember stepping out of my flat and saw rainfall heavier than usual. I rushed to the car ready to face the day with my designated driver, my manager. We were running late for our meetings and decided on a route that would save time, the Kwame Nkrumah Circle. The already eroded roads had started forming pools and the rain made it impossible to see clearly. Through my impaired vision, I could see the heavy wind blow billboards over and informal traders scurry to nearby shelters to escape the incessant thrashing of the downfall.
<div id="attachment_3863" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3863" class="size-medium wp-image-3863" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/AP20150606APS3396-1024x683-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />Ghana Gas Station Explosion</div>
The police officers who normally stood on the roadside to do the job of the faulty traffic lights had chosen to neglect their post. This created a massive jam.
As we battled through the sluggish traffic, chaos erupted and a mass of people ran towards us in panic. Amid the confusion, we decided to follow suit and turn the car around but the congestion made it impossible. Up ahead, I saw cars floating in the murky water that was overflowing from the poorly built drainage systems. Across the road, a woman running towards shelter with her baby, lost her footing in the thigh-high water and disappeared. Two men dived in to try and save them.
Panic set in and I realized all the cars around us had suddenly become floatation devices. We decided to make a dash for it but the doors were jammed. My manager was yelling for help but gave up. As the cold water rushed in the car, my manager frantically tried to break the window. Our fear rose with the water.
On my left, I saw two women vanish under the water as they were hit by a floating car. I thought to myself, “this is it Peace, get ready to die.” As the water reached waist level, the welcome sound of shattering glass came. Three young men had smashed the back window and were yelling for us to climb out. The air was heavy with trepidation. People on the rooftops were screaming out directions to people on the street turned rescuers. We dragged our feet through the gushing water and howling wind to reach safety. Some were standing on the roofs of their cars, trying to use them as lifeboats.
As we continued moving away from the car, I lost my footing, on what was once a sturdy pavement, into what felt like a bottomless pit. I had dropped into an open gutter and felt a sharp pain in my back. The brown water turned red as everything faded to black.
I woke up in a hospital bed. My manager, who helped save me, told me that I fell in a ditch, was suspended by barbed wire and impaled by a floating car part. A couple of stitches, several staples and two blood transfusions later, I am lucky to be able to recount the event.
The next day, a stone’s throw from where we almost died, many others did. A petrol station was engulfed in flames following an explosion. It is thought that petrol seeped into the flood water and was ignited by a spark from a generator. It resulted in the deaths of more than 200 people sheltering from torrential rain. I wondered if it had been any of the women I saw the day before, the women who believed they had made it to safety.
I will never forget these days. I know how close I came to joining the hundreds that lost their lives. I am both angry and sad. I’m angry because there is no reason that proper drainage systems could not have been built in an area which has a history of flooding. I’m sad because I know the problem will not be solved soon.
I am also proud to be a Ghanaian. I witnessed heroism from strangers who risked their lives to save people they did not know. I saw a community pull together to fight for the most fundamental human right, the right to life. The media might forget these tragedies, I won’t. To those unsung heroes, Ghana is forever indebted to you.

Suspended By Barbed Wire AND Impaled On A Car Part

In Nigeria, citizens, businesses and investors are struggling to come to terms with the absence of a cabinet to run Africa’s largest economy. When President Muhammadu Buhari took office, from Goodluck Jonathan on May 29, few would have imagined that there wouldn’t be a cabinet in place, or awaiting parliamentary approval, by the end of June.
Buhari himself hasn’t said much, leaving the explaining to his aides. At the beginning of July, Spokesman Femi Adesina said that “at the fullness of time, the ministers will be appointed.”
There has been speculation that there won’t be a cabinet in place until September. If that is true, it will mean that the new ministers will spend the last quarter of the year coming up to speed with their new assignments, and real work will not start until 2016.
The only presidential staff appointments made by the second week of July were three spokespersons (two for the president; one for the vice president), a State Chief of Protocol, and his principal security aides – one of which was replaced weeks later, for undisclosed reasons.
On July 13, six weeks after the inauguration, the President replaced all the military chiefs and the National Security Adviser (NSA). The key positions of presidential Chief of Staff and a Secretary to the Federal Government, who serves as Secretary to the Cabinet, as well as a liaison between the presidency and the sprawling government bureaucracy, however, remain unfilled.
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Team Austerity
Amid the uncertainty about the president’s team, there are, however, things one can bet on. One is that it will be a smaller cabinet than his predecessor’s, which had 42 ministers. But, the degree to which it will be smaller is constrained by a constitutional provision that says there must be at least one minister from each of Nigeria’s 36 states.
The Transition Committee that Buhari set up in May, to liaise with the outgoing government and prepare a smooth handover for the new government, recommended a reduction in the number of ministries from 28 to 19. Going by that proposal, only nine of the existing ministries will not be merged or scrapped: Defence, Federal Capital Territory, Education, Trade and Investment, Finance, National Planning, Labour, Justice, and Foreign Affairs.
Ambitious as the plan might seem, it’s not unfamiliar territory for Buhari. As Head of State 30 years ago, he presided over a wide-ranging regime of cuts: laying off thousands of civil servants and freezing wages, abolishing hundreds of local government areas, and rolling out an austerity budget that slashed government spending by 15%.
Considering that the economy he is inheriting is in straits just as dire as then, chances of another austerity-inflected outing are high. Indeed there’s a cost-saving element to a delay in the appointment of a cabinet and advisers, who will have to be paid generously in housing and travel allowances, and armored convoys.
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Speculation, Inc.
In the weeks following Buhari’s unprecedented electoral victory, the rumour mills were running with news of expected appointments. Documents regularly circulated on social media, purporting to list the persons who had been nominated for appointments. All of them turned out to be false. Early into the new administration, it was reported that Chief Ogbonnaya Onu had been named Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Nigeria’s designation for Cabinet Secretary. Weeks later, the speculations shifted to the still-vacant position of Chief of Staff. News filtered out that retired Colonel Hammed Ali, Buhari’s long-time personal Chief of Staff, had been appointed. Again, it turned out to be false.
The two men have been close to the president since he joined partisan politics in the early 2000s and are still very likely to bag important roles in his government. Other long-time associates tipped for important positions include Tam David-West, who served under Buhari as the petroleum minister when he was military head of state in 1984-85, and Abdulrahman Dambazau, a former army chief and head of security for the presidential campaign. Dambazau, widely expected to be named National Security Adviser, may now be in the running for Defence Minister.
Former state governors, Kayode Fayemi (Ekiti), Babatunde Fashola (Lagos) and Rotimi Amaechi (Rivers) are also expected to be named to cabinet or presidential staff positions. The trio played prominent roles in the Buhari presidential campaign – Amaechi as campaign director-general, Fayemi policy director, while Fashola oversaw fundraising.
Party leaders, like former Governor of Lagos State, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, are also expected to nominate candidates for presidential consideration, but there is no doubt where the final decisions lie.
Policy Direction
Apart from the 800-page report of the Transition Committee, the new government can also count on another 73-page one; the outcome of a two-day summit that the ruling party’s policy directorate, under Fayemi, convened in May; bringing together technocrats, politicians and public officials.
With the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and management consulting firm, Bain &amp; Company Nigeria, the summit produced detailed recommendations on several sectors of the government: oil and gas, education, healthcare, security, agriculture and foreign affairs, among others. The reports outlined specific plans for the incoming ministers to implement in the short term, medium term  and long term. As things stand, it’ll be more than 100 days from May 29 before a cabinet is in place, and the incoming ministers will have some recalibrating to do.
For business executives and investors, the reassessing will be an unending obligation. As soon as the cabinet is named, the next round of tea-leaf reading – this time for policy direction – begins.

2016? NO!

There are many conflicts in Somalia, not just Al-Shabaab vs the good guys. Clan fights probably top the list.
“Let me explain some of what I do,” a peacemaker tells me over lunch at the heavily fortified Jazeera Hotel in Mogadishu.
“You see there are these two clans, ve-ery important,” he says, stretching the ‘very’ as Somalis are apt to do. “The Dir, and the Maheran.”
Soft spoken, more of an academic than a fighter, he spoons the traditional green grated hot chili mixture into his soup.
Ibrahim Mohamed works on conflict transformation for the Zamzam Foundation.
“These two clans have been fighting, and I have been going there for two years, trying to get them to talk. I have one man from each clan who accompanies me, but at first only to an imaginary line in the sand, he will go no further.”
We are talking of a remote area called Galguduud, and then of an even more remote area called Inagebeli in central Somalia. The latter is an area where there is no cellphone reception, an important consideration when you are sitting under a tree trying to make peace between two warring clans.
“Eventually,” Ibrahim says, pushing his spectacles up his nose, “I get one clan to accept the other clan’s man coming with me all the way, after promising the man that he will be safe, telling him if he is killed I will be killed too.”
“So we meet, and then one clan leader agrees to go with me to the other clan, a big step, and then the other clan leader comes to his clan without me, which is a good sign.”
Now we are into negotiations. In a war between the clans some 15 years ago, 20 more Maheran died than Dir. But if you calculate things only after the war, 12 more Dir died in those past 15 years. Each side calculates from the date that suits them.
Restitution for the balance is at an agreed 100 camels per person. Plus you must return the killed person’s weapon, and the weapon with which he or she was killed.
“Of course you don’t have to pay that. There is the 30 percent forgiveness factor, so you only pay 70.”
Naively I ask: “So the family get 70 camels, or AKs?”
“Oh no. No, no, no. Only 10 percent goes to the family, the clan gets the rest.”
So seven for the family, 63 for the clan?
“No. It is calculated on the original amount, so 10 for the family.”
For each one killed in excess of those killed on the other side?
“Yes. Unless it is a woman or a girl of course.”
Huh?
“They are only worth 50 camels, minus the 30 percent.”
So girls are worth camels, men worth AK47s?
“No, no, no. An AK is worth $1,200, and a camel is worth the same. So in my negotiations I have asked if we can swop the AKs for camels to exact retribution. So far they have not accepted this.”
What if the UN bought the camels and paid everyone at 70 camels per deficit?
“No good. The killer’s family must feel the pain.”
This negotiation style is 2,000 years old in Somalia, so to change things is difficult.
Who is the ‘they’ I ask him.
“The elders. We sit under a tree, clan elders at the back, behind them the women. Last time I went, we hoped to conclude in two days, but we were there for two weeks. During this time, they slaughter animals daily to feed everyone. And provide water in a tanker every day.”
How many people?
“About 400, more or less, with the women.”
And did you get a resolution?
He sighs. “No. We are still talking. We cannot get around the problem of 12 for one side and 20 for the other.”
Like most Somalis, he is confident the country is on the up and up.
There is still the small matter of defeating Al-Shabaab. And there are not enough camels even in Australia to do that. Guns might. Somalia is counting on it.

Death Measured In Camels And Guns

You’ll find Cameroonian-born Fidelis Ebot Tabe in the heart of Cape Town, among colorful hats and caps, bargaining with customers. He’s tall and bursts into a smile whenever he speaks. At first glance he’s just another street trader among many, but this man has got a PhD in it.
“I didn’t invite my family to my graduation, after six years I couldn’t believe it, so I just told them when I got home,” he says.
His first degree in Cameroon was in history. He applied to professional schools to teach, but didn’t get in. Instead, he began trading food – dried prawns, dried fish and palm oil. After a friend told him about the prospects, he raised money and moved to South Africa.
“If I came down here, things would be better,” he says.
His South African story started 15 years ago in Mitchells Plain, a township in Cape Town located in the Cape Flats, selling caps, sunglasses and mobile accessories.
“Mitchells Plain is like a warzone, you must watch out all the time, it’s so rough” he says.
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While trading on the streets, he did his honors and master’s in history through the University of the Western Cape (UWC).
“I was in the town center in Mitchells Plain in 2007, there was a process to upgrade the center. At the end of the process, we had to choose trading bays. The issue came up of people who were there before, what we call historic traders, they gave them the opportunity to choose sides and what size they needed. For people who had been there for seven or eight years, they just gave us small bays. When it came to me doing street trading, I started looking at what policies were there before and how things were done before,” he says.
He registered for his PhD and started an analysis of street trading in Cape Town. His research began in the CBD, a hub of activity with street traders along every street. He interviewed traders who mirrored his experience.
“They had similar histories to myself, there were a lot of foreign traders in the city center. When the question came as to why foreign traders dominate, the response was that South Africans were not interested in street trading at the time. Now, when South Africans come, there isn’t any space for them and they start to complain. The foreigners took the opportunity but they prefer the CBD which is safer than the townships where there are always clashes between locals and foreign nationals,” he says.
South Africa has suffered from violent xenophobic attacks. In May 2008, thousands of foreigners were forced to flee their homes in townships across the country when people attacked them in a wave of xenophobic violence. April saw an upsurge in xenophobic attacks throughout the country as armed gangs once again attacked immigrants. At least five people have died; shops looted and destroyed.
“Home is home. In Cameroon you sleep in peace, you don’t have crime or xenophobia there. You go to our market and you have Malians there and Nigerians there. We don’t envy them. We live happily with them, they are our friends. When they go home, you long for them to come back. But here it’s a completely different story,” he says.
He dreams of being back in Cameroon one day.
“But to go home, you need money. I’ve been here for 15 years and what do I have to show them back home?” he says.
Ebot Tabe wanted to challenge the stereotypes of the street trader.
“There’s this idea that street traders are poor. From my interviews with traders, they were not poor people. People actually left their jobs to become street traders because they believed that they would make more from street trading than from formal employment. And it’s true,” he says.
When it comes to street trading, a lot of people sell the same thing but Ebot Tabe explained that traders are a community that support each other.
“In Trafalgar Place in town, the flower sellers aren’t ideally located. There are just three stands in front of Adderley Street and the rest are at the back. They sell the same thing but you only see the people who stand in front. They began a rotation, so every day they would move one place down so that each person has the opportunity to sell in the front,” he says.
After six years of research, rewrites and clashes with his supervisor, he graduated in March this year.
“I’ve never found street trading frustrating until now. Why should I be sitting here? I hope to become a lecturer one day and not remain a street trader. I want to teach public and urban history so I can bring in my experiences,” he says.
For now, the doctor of street trading is selling in Mitchells Plain.

A PhD From The Streets

John Schooling lived up to his name and loved working as a high school teacher. Quitting the classroom and becoming an entrepreneur in construction had nothing to do with not liking his job.
“It was 1984, and I was tired of being broke halfway through the month,” he says. “My best friend from school and I then set up our own business doing renovations and restoration jobs.”
The company grew from strength to strength, growing into a very successful construction and development company. When the global financial crisis shattered the world and shook South Africa, Schooling and his business partner were forced to reinvent themselves and their business model.
<div id="attachment_3806" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3806" class="size-medium wp-image-3806" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/004-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />STAG Student Lodging | Photography by Clare Louise Thomas</div>
“We had planned an upmarket residential development and a hotel on a stretch of land near District Six, in Cape Town. These plans were canned after banks pulled their money from our investors,” he says.
“We then found out that the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT), situated near that particular stretch of land, was struggling with a student accommodation shortage of 6,000 beds. We did some further research and found out that the countrywide deficit of adequate student accommodation amounted to some 200,000 beds. We decided to tap into this market, giving way to the Student Accommodation Group or STAG African.”
Schooling’s statements are reflected in the Ministerial Review of SA University Accommodation, presented by the Department of Higher Education last year. The report shows a shortfall of 207,800 university beds, meaning that less than 10% of first-year university students can be accommodated on campus. The reality is much worse as the ministerial figures exclude the shortfall at tertiary education institutions other than universities, including so-called technical vocational education and training colleges.
“The deficit at these institutions may be as high as another 200,000 beds,” says Schooling, noting that the available on-campus residences, particularly in impoverished areas, are not always in tip-top shape. “These residences are often dilapidated, unhygienic and unsafe. It is apparently not uncommon for as many as six students to share a tiny room.”
Solving this issue is critical. Research has shown that first-year students, who have a roof over their head at university, have an 80% chance of passing. This is double the pass rate of those roughing-it without.
Fixing this problem is unfortunately an expensive affair. According to the government, is costs some $3.6 billion to provide a decent roof over the heads of all students in South Africa.
“This is the price tag when one builds with bricks and mortar,” says Schooling. “STAG African does things differently, as we use Light Steel Framing (LSF).”
This technique has been used in Europe and the United States for at least half a century. It uses galvanized steel structural wall frames, floor joints, roof trusses with single skin brick walls or fiber cement boards as wall cladding.
“Building a LSF structure is 40 percent quicker than building that same structure out of bricks and mortar. The process also requires significantly less energy, making LSF construction even more cost efficient,” says Schooling.
There is another reason why LSF structures are more energy efficient than conventional buildings.
“The wall cladding comprises material from renewable forests and fiber cement. As a result you need 80 percent less energy to warm up and cool down a building to maintain an ambient temperature. On top of that, we fit our buildings with LED lights and heat pumps, which reduces energy usage even more,” he says.
STAG African has built a roof over the heads of 1,055 students. Various other projects are in the pipeline, including a 2,046-bed residence at the University of Fort Hare, in Alice, and an extension of the residence at the University of Stellenbosch’s Tygerberg Medical Campus.
“The 208 additional beds we are building will make this the greenest residence in Africa,” says Schooling.
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Making way for energy efficient buildings is no luxury in South Africa, a country which faces a persistent energy crisis. Since 2008, the national power generator has struggled to meet the country’s energy demand. The power cuts are costing the economy up to $7.3 billion per month, according to the government.
While building decent, energy-efficient student residences, Schooling intends to create as many jobs as possible, particularly for young people. Data from the International Labour Organization (ILO) reveals that 52% of South Africans aged between 15 and 24 are neither at school, nor at work. As a result, 61.3% of all South Africans living in poverty are under the age of 25.
One of the main causes of the above scenario is a lack of skills. This is where STAG wants to come in.
“LSF building skills are much easier to learn and teach than building the conventional way. Apart from that, it is a new and very relevant skill in the South African context, for which there is a high demand locally. With the work STAG has in the pipeline now, we could create 12,500 sustainable, permanent jobs. We unfortunately do not have enough people with the right skills,” says Schooling.
“Our aim, therefore, is to offer training colleges to teach LSF building techniques to their students, while employing them. We will even draw up a curriculum. We can work up someone who is unskilled to highly skilled in two years. This is good for us, this is good for them, and for those whom rely on them financially: one laborer in South Africa on average supports seven to eight dependents.”
The pull of the classroom is still strong for Schooling, the teacher turned entrepreneur.

Three Birds,  One Stone

The issue of term limits for presidents in Africa is a hot one fanned by unrest in Burundi.
South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma recently condemned leaders who tamper with their constitutions to stay in power. His comments could have been directed to Burundi’s Pierre Nkurunziza who lent on the Supreme Court to alter the constitution to extend his stay to three terms. Nkurunziza argues that the first term negotiated by a peace process doesn’t count.
“This business of us agreeing to serve two terms, only to realize 10 years is too short, is a problem,” Zuma is reported to have said in the aftermath of civil unrest in Burundi.
Constitutional law lecturer at Kent University in Britain, Alex Magaisa, says too many political elites violate their constitutions to stay in office.
“This is a dangerous trend in a number of African countries and we have just seen how this can lead to chaos and instability with the failed military coup in Burundi. This is why in Burundi’s neighbor, Rwanda, is of some concern over rumours that President [Paul] Kagame’s stay in office may be extended beyond the term limits. He has probably done a great job for Rwanda, but extending his stay in office will send a very bad message,” he says.
“The notion that a leader is indispensable is an indication of poor leadership because a leader must be able to nurture talent and promote potential successors.”
The Hong Kong-based political analyst, Obert Hodzi, says most of the African leaders wanting to rule for life usually prosper in countries with weak institutions.
“The reason is that all those countries, which include Uganda, Zimbabwe, Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon and Angola, are characterized by extractive political and economic institutions that only benefit the political elite and disenfranchise the majority of the countries’ citizens. For the leaders of those countries and their patronage networks to continue enriching themselves, they will need to monopolize political power and stay for as long as they possibly can,” he says.
The presidents of Chad, Gabon, Guinea, Namibia, Togo, Uganda and Algeria managed to change their constitutions to prolong their stay. Other countries’ presidents, such as Zambia’s Frederick Chiluba, Malawi’s Bakili Muluzi and Nigeria’s Olusegun Obasanjo, tried to change constitutions but failed to bend the people’s will. Zimbabwe did not have term limits until 2013; while Comoros, Algeria and Uganda remain without.
As the African Union (AU) met in South Africa, Ghana’s vice president, Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, urged the AU to debate term limits as it could be a solution to Africa’s life-time presidents. This could be tricky, especially when the chairperson of the continental body, Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe, has been at the helm of his country for 35 years. In 2018, he is expected to seek a fresh mandate in Zimbabwe. If he wins, he will be 99 years old when his term expires and Zimbabwe’s leader for 43 years.
Life-time leaders threaten democracy. But leaders of troubled countries, like Rwanda, argue for them. Word is Kagame may seek a third term.
“It is irrational to change exemplary leadership [Paul Kagame] and more so in our context even in the name of constitutionalism,” Rwanda’s former finance minister, Manasseh Nshuti, is reported to have said.
The country’s opposition disagrees. The Democratic Green Party of Rwanda has filed a lawsuit demanding the Supreme Court block any move by parliament to change the constitution to allow Kagame a third term.
“The Democratic Green Party of Rwanda demands the Supreme Court&#8230; to order the Rwandan parliament not to change Article 101 of the constitution,” the party said in a statement.
In neighboring Burundi, around 40 people have died, 100,000 citizens fled to Tanzania, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, over the issue of a term too far. Those fleeing violence are living at the Kagunga, Lake Tanganyika Stadium and Nyarugusu camps in Tanzania.
Burundians protesting against Nkurunziza’s bid for a third term are not alone. Late last year, Burkina Faso saw street protests that pushed out former leader Blaise Compaoré, who wanted to stay in power beyond the elections he won in 1991, 1998, 2005, and 2010.
But what about elections?
Yolande Bouka, a researcher in the conflict prevention and risk analysis division at the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) in Nairobi, told CNBC Africa that many governments in Africa create an environment where it becomes near impossible to hold free and fair elections.
“Having elections doesn’t mean that you have a democracy, and that is the impression that has been created. There needs to be more attention paid to the reasons for leaders changing the constitution,” says Bouka.
As the warring parties seem to drift further apart with each passing day in Burundi, many are looking to the AU for leadership to gently remind the continent’s presidents that their time is up.

How Long Mr President?

Yola and Jimeta are the twin metros that form the state capital of northeastern Nigeria’s Adamawa State. They are tense places of high temperatures, military checkpoints and curfew.
It was late at night on June 4 when shoppers were milling around a small market opposite the Jimeta Modern Market. It was just after 7:30PM, and the walled, open-air market was closing for the day.  Suddenly, a fight broke out. When customers and traders drew nearer to take a look, two bombs went off killing 37 people. The fight was staged by a suicide bomber.
“There were body parts lying all over the stalls, and parts of the street,” says Shareef Al Hasan, a reporter with TV Gotel who arrived minutes after the blast.
For many of the survivors, the unthinkable had happened; Boko Haram had struck at the heart of the Adamawa State capital.
The area has been relatively peaceful for more than a year, and seen thousands of refugees from Mubi, Madagali, Michika swell homes and camps. Some families sheltered up to 100 relatives, friends and strangers in their homes. They were fed by the people of Yola and Jimeta. The total number of displaced in Yola alone is estimated at 15,000.
In 2011 and 2012, attacks by Boko Haram in the town were common with gunmen shooting civilians from the back of motorcycles. The state government has since banned the okada, a two-wheeled transport popular in Nigeria.
Scores of people came to gawk at the scene, others fled. By 8PM, news of the bomb blast spread and panic gripped the city.
By the next morning, the area was cordoned off. I arrived at around 8:30AM to see for myself the destruction of the night before. The bodies were gone and the survivors taken to hospitals where they filled the wards. The dismembered head of the suicide bomber lay on the asphalt in a cardboard box.
The traditional leader, Barkindo Aliyu Mustapha, was among the first on the scene. He looked distressed, telling people to keep praying for peace and to be security conscious. The next to arrive was the commissioner of police in Adamawa State, Gabriel Adaji, with a call for information.
“Even if your suspicions are later proved baseless, we will thoroughly investigate every complaint,” he says.
The newly-elected governor, Jibrilla Bindo, announced a security cluster meeting with state security chiefs.
The incident comes at a time when pressure is mounting on President Muhammadu Buhari to fulfill a campaign promise of ridding Nigeria of insurgency. He announced the relocation of Nigeria’s military command center to Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State.
The move to bring troops closerwas applauded by Nigerians. For the residents of Yola and Jimeta, it cannot come soon enough.

The Bloody Market  Of Fear

The new controversial South African visa requirements have been labeled an economy killer and sparked widespread jitters in the tourism business.
Foreigners who want to visit South Africa must apply for visas in person at South African embassies to have their biometric data captured. Residents of countries who require a short-stay visa for South Africa and do not have a South African embassy in their country or city, will have to travel. Parents and guardians traveling with children, must be in possession of an unabridged birth certificate.
<div id="attachment_3789" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3789" class="size-medium wp-image-3789" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/0000223010-300x196.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="196" />CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA &#8211; APRIL 28: Deputy Minister of Home Affairs, Fatima Chohan meets to discuss the recent xenophobic violence on April 28, 2015 in Cape Town, South Africa. The Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs hosted a meeting with Ministers of Home Affairs, Small Business Development as well as Police on the challenges of xenophobic violence and looting of foreign owned shops. (Photo by Gallo Images / Die Burger / Deon Raath)</div>
While the tourism industry cries foul, Deputy Minister of Home Affairs, Fatima Chohan, defended the new regulations. She argues that the migration laws have not been changed for 15 years and that the regulations are in line with international rules against child trafficking. An estimated 30,000 children are trafficked through South Africa each year, according to government.
“Research suggests that it will cost the South African economy 21,000 jobs and around R10 billion ($809 million). By the end of 2014‚ the number of visitors from China and Brazil had dropped 70% and 62% from the year before‚” says Beverley Schäfer‚ the spokesperson on Economic Opportunities‚ Tourism &amp; Agriculture from the opposition party, the Democratic Alliance.
South Africa began implementing new immigration regulations in May 2014. From May to December, South Africa lost 66,000 foreign tourists due to changes in the immigration regulations.
The Association of Southern African Travel Agents (ASATA) has estimated the new rules will hit 15% of tourists.
“In 2014, South Africa received 9.55 million foreign overnight tourists, an increase of 7,5 percent over that recorded in 2013. Demand from all overseas markets steadily dissipated throughout the year, coming off highs of 8,6 percent in the first four months of the year to a decline of 1,2 percent in the last four months. Assuming a 20 percent drop in demand from the family market will result in a direct, indirect and induced loss to the South African economy of at least R10 billion ($809 million) per annum and potential job losses of around 24,000,” says ASATA.
The damage to the South African economy so far is R2.6 billion ($210 million) and a threat to more than 5,800 jobs, it says. In the future, ASATA warns of the loss of 100,000 tourists with R1.4 billion ($113 million). This translates to a net loss to the GDP of around R4.1 billion ($331 million) and 9,300 jobs.
Despite South Africa’s economy facing another hit, the hospitality sector is poised for further growth in the next five years in the wake of a number of inbound travelers into the African continent, according to a report issued by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in June. The hotel industry in 2014 benefited from an increase in foreign visitors and rising room rates. The new visa regulations, could scupper this.
“Many in the industry fear that international tourists will not consider South Africa as a destination, which already has a number of issues and concerns despite being a cheap destination. International visitors especially those from India or China or those traveling with families may chose a destination where entry requirements are less onerous,” says Nikki Forster, a director and partner at PwC.
South Africa’s Minister of Tourism, Derek Hanekom, admits tourism has been hit. At the World Economic Forum on Africa he hinted that there would be a review.
“The current requirements [are] up for discussion right now as we speak, so it is not engraved in stone… We are in very intense discussions on this and I think we will find each other and find the right balance between legitimate defending, legitimate interests of the state and defending your national security interests and not putting unnecessary requirements on people wanting to travel to South Africa,” he said.
The Department of Tourism has since stated there will not be a review, but that talks about implementation will continue. The ministerial cabinet has resolved to set up a team of ministers to discuss and engage with any concerns to address the unintended consequences of the regulations.
With reports that Air China has cancelled the launch of direct flights to South Africa over the regulations, many of the continent’s finest resorts fear the threat of too much room at the inn.

The $809-Million  Question

Apaltry rate of investment in infrastructure has dimmed the otherwise bright future for our continent.
Decades of self-serving economic policies, political agendas and some may say cynical or ‘feel good’ aid flows to Africa clearly have not delivered much. Yet, there is a new sense of enthusiasm and positive energy from Africa. The new generation of Africans is seizing the future.
The people are moving and the opportunities are endless for Africans. Entrepreneurs from around the world are engaged, but the picture has flaws; the story is oversimplified. The basic needs are still missing. Where are the ports and harbours, railways, roads, power plants and electrical and water distribution to support growth?
It is Africa’s diversity that makes it so rich, but it is also this diversity that remains the biggest hurdle to the growth that is eagerly expected.
Africa comprises 53 diverse countries – historically impacted by colonial era and cold war foreign ideologies; diverse languages, inefficient bureaucracy, nationalist inward-looking focus and economic protectionism. The continent often lacks experience when it comes to major infrastructure delivery and attracting private sector or foreign development investment.
Enter the World Economic Forum (WEF) and many other NGOs and Develop Finance Institutions (DFIs) who seek to usher in a better world.
WEF is a private institution respected as an influencer and incubator in helping the world understand the future.
The focus on Africa, in the last decade, has done good and raised the economic profile of the continent around the world.
WEF has no implementation resources or infrastructure delivery capacity but are good at investigation, evaluation and think-tanking. Ideas may abound but when does planning turn into delivery? Many highly qualified professionals with great ideas meet annually with apparently limited visible progress when it comes to the hardware on the ground.
In 2013, WEF stated that “with an expected annual growth of 5 percent in 2012-2013, sub-Saharan Africa continues its transformative journey from a developing continent to a hub of global growth. According to the World Bank, almost half of Africa’s countries have attained middle-income status. At the same time, the continent’s positive outlook is threatened by fluctuating commodity prices, rising inequality and youth unemployment.”
At that session, much time was spent on the identification of target and priority infrastructure projects and 51 were shortlisted. The work done on the projects list was commendable, but there were crucial missing factors preventing the realization of the funding and construction of these projects.
The ability to attract large scale DFI funding to the extent required, which is put at $75 billion by 2040, is still elusive due to three factors: the absence of upfront ‘at risk’ funding of early project feasibility studies that can attract full project funding from private, public and DFI sources; a lack of political will and technical knowhow.
At this year’s forum, it’s encouraging to see all three of these key factors firmly on the agenda. There is a realization of the need to have a regional integrated view and that non-returnable funds are made available, to enable project preparation to be effective which will lead to funding and implementation.
My birthplace in Zimbabwe and my own personal African infrastructure adventure, over the last 30 something years, has given me valuable first-hand experience of the immensely difficult task of getting major projects through to implementation, both from a private and public sector perspective.
My personal experience with WEF goes back to the event in Cape Town in 2010. I attended with a special interest in the economic growth drivers and capacity building within Africa’s infrastructure.
In a number of DFI forums, my colleagues and I stressed that while projects may be much needed, project financing funds will not flow unless there were crucial additional funds made available that paid for the early detailed feasibility studies, including the designs and accurate technical scoping, budgeting and funding mechanisms and ultimately project management.
At last, we may be seeing the DFIs and the many agencies seeking infrastructure solutions for Africa coming together to get the African vision moving.
WEF would have thus played a strategic role in unlocking the potential. Africa is waiting.

Africa Is Building At Last

It was the dual meaning of a few words that tripped off the tongue of the Somaliland foreign minister as he talked about the economic future of Africa that turned my blood cold.
“Africa shouldn’t miss the boat,” says Mohamed B Yonis.
The stark image that stabbed into my mind was that of Africans risking their lives on leaky boats crossing the Mediterranean in the desperate hope of a new life in Europe – a journey that has taken 2,000 lives this year. A new life? The odds are against it; even the survivors are likely to end up as sweated labour at best; trafficked labor at worst.
I was even more upset to see a magazine at the conference with a survey suggesting a large number of Africans say they would risk the tricky crossing of the Mediterranean even if it cost them their lives; a sad statistic close to the weeping heart of Africa.
A sobering thought amid the gathering of the rich and powerful in Cape Town where there were many signs of light and growth in Africa. Among the 1,200 delegates were investment fund managers from across the world.
“We like what we see and are here to invest,” says one partner of a $68-billion New York investment fund.
Infrastructure is likely to be the big business of the future; in the past, the World Bank estimated Africa needs at least $93 billion a year spent in infrastructure. Those in the know in Cape Town say this is barely enough to touch the sides of the infrastructure gap.
Former head of South African intelligence, Moe Shaik, has been doing his bit with the pan-African investment operation he is running for the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA). Shaik says he gathered $404 million (R5 billion) in investments into everything from roads to oil and gas pipelines in the last year. Shaik also says the DBSA contributed $150 million in raising $750 million for a sovereign wealth fund in Angola that will be used to build roads and infrastructure as well as making plans for a new coal fired power station at Mamba, near the Zambezi River, in southern Zambia. He believes state coffers can no longer afford infrastructure.
“Government needs to create an environment where capital can come in and build. But African governments also need to set up mechanisms where they can supervise infrastructure projects in their country so they can be done properly,” he says.
Patrice Motsepe, Africa’s 14th richest man, worth an estimated $2.3 billion according to FORBES, agrees.
“I have always emphasized that we need to bring the private sector in and that the partnership be a partnership between the government, the investment communities, both local and international, and that always gives me comfort that these projects make sense, that they are sustainable,” he says. “The environment has been put in place and we are making progress in Africa in comparison with various other investment countries.”
The head of state in the host country, South Africa, believes the continent is well on the way.
“There is the issue of infrastructure, all types of infrastructure that is actually changing the face and the landscape of the continent. This is what we are attracting. Those huge sums of money; we were therefore discussing the financing of these projects, how ready the projects are; some of the projects have been presented and are now ready to be financed and there is an interest of all financing institutions both locally and internationally,” says President Jacob Zuma.
With the optimism in Cape Town came caution. There are still doubts about political stability and corruption. Now, I have heard corruption compared to many things down the years, but never to crocodiles in the Kenyan bush.
“You know, when wildebeest migrate north to greener pastures in the Masai Mara game reserve, the crocodiles lie in wait for them in the rivers. So the wildebeest have to know where to cross otherwise they are going to lose a leg. The crocodiles are corruption,” says Bharat Thakrar, the head of East African advertising giant, Scangroup.
“It used to be limited to the police and small government offices, but now corruption is creeping into private business in Africa.”
Blair Glencorse, is fighting corruption with his NGO Accountability Lab in Liberia and was at WEF Africa.
“Where there needs to be enforcement, the key issue is to make sure it is part of a larger strategy to build transparency, open up information and build channels of exchange between citizens and governments – so it is not politicized. There are countries of Africa which are making some progress along these lines like Botswana and Ghana,” he says.
Hope and crocodiles collide; Africa has its work cut out before WEF Africa in Rwanda next year.
<h4>The Fresh Face of $2 Billion</h4>
Africa is changing fast and has a fresh face. Ten years ago, it would have been unthinkable; 20 years ago, unimaginable in an often patriarchal Africa. One of the freshest, not to mention powerful, faces at the World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa in Cape Town runs $2 billion in investment at the age of 38.
Ngugi Kiuna grew up in Nakuru in western Kenya, the son of a managing director of a company selling tractors and a mother who sold animal feed. He went to boarding school in England and studied chemical engineering at Imperial College, London, before earning a PhD in composite structures of aerospace applications.
In August 2013, Kiuna became the head of investment banking for Africa at Rand Merchant Bank. He runs $2 billion in assets in Nigeria, Kenya, Namibia, Ghana, Lesotho, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia Angola and Botswana.
“Most of the countries we deal with are single B rated by the risk people. We also do a lot of work with private entities. The sovereign element is there and if you have it there is less of a risk. The sweet spot for us is three- to five-year investments. Off our own balance sheet, we can do longer, with the support of development finance, up to 10 years,” he says.
It means Kiuna oversees the financing of aircraft for Air Namibia, the building of roads in Angola and investment in locomotives in Mozambique. It is investing in Cenpower – a new 300MW gas power plant – in Ghana. In Kenya, it has helped tie up a deal, this year, to plough $350 million into a new 450-kilometer oil pipeline between Mombasa and Nairobi. It will take over from the old pipeline that’s been pumping oil since the 1960s.
Most of the people Kiuna meets, in his extensive travels across the continent, are old enough to be his father.
“I was with the minister of finance in Gabon, we were talking about the government infrastructure plan and strategy about borrowing, you could see all along there was something in his mind he wasn’t comfortable with. I said ‘minister, I know I look too young…’ He burst out laughing. I said I am not as young as I look, it broke the ice. After that, the nature of the conversation changed,” he says.
“I think people are generally embracing but obviously some are surprised by how young I am, but people are much more open minded to the younger generation. I think it is also a function of the technology age, you have younger people becoming billionaires these days.”
At WEF in Cape Town, Kiuna rubbed shoulders with many others with billions to invest.
“We saw there is continued buzz and interest in Africa; a lot of new people, new faces and new companies ready to invest. There is also a lot more intra-Africa dialogue; people talking about projects, people collaborating on projects. The amount of trade in Africa is nowhere near what it should be. Thirdly, power in Africa, we need to get that right and let’s hope we can. There have been power projects too big and too complicated to execute. So, we need to scale down projects to a size where it’s easier to be financed and done.”
His greatest fear for Africa?
“Political stability and transparency; these are all matters we have to get right… The biggest fear is around transparency around elections cycles in Africa. The recent elections in Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia and Namibia show we are getting there.”
“Wherever I travel on the continent, I am always inspired by the number of people who have started their own business. I dedicate what I do to them.”
Words wise beyond their years.
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Crocodiles,  Money And Hope

It is a cold Saturday morning in Soweto, a township in south west Johannesburg. A short drive from where the World Cup final was played at Soccer City, three boys kick a soccer ball on its last life on a netball court in what used to be a fan park for the football tournament in South Africa in 2010. When World Cup fever grasped the country, these lads and hundreds of soccer fans, dressed in layers of clothes, gathered in this park to watch the games on a big public screen. The boys were all 10 years old then; they remember the camaraderie and piercing noise of the vuvuzelas.
But last year the screen was removed, leaving a gaping hole. A painting of a soccer ball on a lamppost is the only sign that the World Cup was once here.
It is exactly five years after the tournament came to Africa for the first time. It was the event that brought hope to the country, with promises to develop the sport and give business to local hospitality spots. People renovated their homes and let them out to tourists. But few are still in business. The promise of sustainable post World Cup business seems to have gone to the dogs. Several world class stadiums were built and upgraded to the tune of $1.1 billion. But today the majority of those stadiums are white elephants.
There was controversy around the tender processes to build these stadiums. Whistle blowers were murdered and several people went on trial. One prominent figure that was tried was Bobby Motaung, a Kaizer Chiefs manager and son of the club’s founder Kaizer Motaung. He was implicated in a tender saga for building the Mbombela Stadium, in Nelspruit, Mpumalanga province. Due to a lack of evidence, the case against Motaung was dropped in 2013.
A few weeks before the 5th anniversary of the World Cup in South Africa, it emerged that the country had paid $10 million to secure votes to win the bid for the event. This was never declared in public until the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) indictment emerged alleging the money was a bribe to Jack Warner, the former Fifa vice president. It also identifies two South Africans as “co-conspirators” but their names are withheld. The South African government denies there was a bribe. According to a letter written on March 4, 2008, by Local Organising Committee president, Molefi Oliphant, the money paid was a donation to the Diaspora Legacy Programme in the Caribbean.
A few days ahead of the FIFA annual meeting in Zurich on May 28, Swiss police arrested Warner and six other officials in the five-star Baur au Lac hotel. By the end of May, 14 people involved with Fifa were indicted in connection with wire fraud, racketeering and money laundering.
“[The South African Football Association] requests that the Diaspora Legacy Programme be administered and implemented directly by the president of Concacaf who shall act as a fiduciary of the fund,” it reads.
Warner, who was the president of Concacaf, and his co-accused are implicated in Fifa bribes that include awarding the World Cups in France in 1998 and South Africa in 2010. Chuck Blazer, a former Fifa official from the United States (US), has admitted to his involvement in these bribes after being implicated in the FBI investigation.
“How Warner took a $10-million bribe from South Africa in exchange for his vote is laid bare in six pages of a 164-page indictment made public in the US following the arrest of Fifa executives ahead of the corruption trial of the century,” says Ray Hartley, Editor At Large at the Times Media Group.
The South African Portfolio Committee on Sport and Recreation has called for the Minister of Sports and Recreation, Fikile Mbalula, to summon the former members of the Local Organising Committee before parliament.
“The allegations contained in the indictment are yet to be proven in a court of law. But, the evidence is mounting that South Africa bribed its way to hosting the World Cup,”
says Hartley.
He also says the former organizing committee members are not accountable to parliament, but to the minister.
“It is a bit paranoid to block them from publicly speaking about the allegations,” he says.
Dominic Chimhavi, the South African Football Association director of communications, says the allegations that South Africa paid a bribe to Warner are unfounded.
“They are baseless and untested and we request proof from anyone who has evidence to the contrary to come forward. Our bid campaign was run, by among others, late president Nelson Mandela and former President Thabo Mbeki and several government ministers, who are men of integrity,” says Chimhavi.
So, it appears the 2010 World Cup has vanished from Soweto but it is likely to be in the headlines and the FBI investigation for years to come.

The FBI Tackles Fifa

In the last year, the cedi has lost more than 40% of its value and was the worst performing currency in Africa, the third worst in the world, in 2014. It was so bad that the government called in the International Monetary Fund.
To make matters worse, power cuts are plaguing the land. In the gloomy streets of Accra, they call it ‘dumsor’ – a colloquial expression meaning ‘on and off’.
Ghana is suffering from power rationing – a hark back to the dark days of 2007 – where people have to check a load shedding timetable to find out when their lights will go out. In February, the Ghanaian government purchased 80 megawatts (MW) from neighboring Abidjan so the nation could watch the African Nations Cup final between the Black Stars and the Mighty Elephants of Ivory Coast; it was the same story when Ghana celebrated 58 years of independence on March 6.
All of this is a blow to President John Dramani Mahama. When he took power, he promised to end load shedding in three months. Halfway through his tenure the lights are still going out.
One cause is the fall of water levels at the Akosombo Dam on the Volta River. The dam produces 558MW of power, or 20% of the Ghana’s needs, 17% down on the electricity it generates at full tilt.
The Ghanaian Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research has estimated that the power crisis has cost between approximately $85 million to $243 million.
Many who run businesses here say the power crisis has been devastating and expensive; as the number of generators sold increases, the rise in the price of fuel piles on the costs. It is estimated Ghana spends $3 million a day on diesel fuel for its generators. To remedy these rising costs, small and medium enterprises have even gone as far as having two price points for their services – a dumsor price and a non-dumsor price. Even if you have power, the rising cost of it is causing uproar among Ghanaians.
The Cocoa Processing Company and Nestle Ghana complain the lack of power has stalled new projects.
The government has made efforts to rectify the electricity shortage with new power plants in the pipeline. Ghana has also seen a new wave of entrepreneurs, in energy, step forward.
A few minutes’ drive from Kotoka International Airport, a meandering road running alongside the famous Accra Polo Grounds, solar powered streetlights light the way. The plan is to do the same on other roads.
Infrastructural development of Accra over the last few years has been immense but has come at a cost with the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) unable to keep up.
Despite the economic hardship, the country is still able to attract foreign direct investment and the government has made efforts to rectify the power shortage.
The Atuabo power plant, which will receive gas from Ghana’s offshore Jubilee oil field, has overcome teething problems and is now in operation. It could generate up to 550MW; Ghana’s power shortfall is estimated to be around 400MW.
Another solution could be the numerous thermal power plants scattered across the country, namely the Asogli, Kpone and Aboadze plants. The problem is a lack of maintenance has seen many of these thermal plants either closed or working below capacity.
Then there is the problem of the bureaucratic ECG; many in Ghana have called for it to be privatized. A poor revenue collection system has led to growing debt that is another unwelcome hazard when it is trying to keep the lights on.
Surely, for this to carry on, is dumsor.

The Dumsor Down Of The Economy

In the weeks since Muhammadu Buhari was elected president several lists have emerged purporting to show his ministerial nominees; the frenzied list-making an expected outcome of Nigeria’s speculation mills tilting into overdrive during periods of political transition.
That federal cabinet, when finally constituted sometime in June, will, like all others before it, comprise a blend of technocrats and politicians. What is yet unclear is which of these groups will dominate, and if there will be a critical mass of reformers, similar to the group that dominated the second term of President Olusegun Obasanjo and helped him achieve landmark reforms in pensions, electricity legislation and Nigeria’s foreign debt position.
Buhari has said he will work to downplay the involvement of the cabinet in the award of contracts, and instead remake it as a “policymaking” body. He has also said he will not be depending on the governors to constitute his cabinet. If he follows through on this vow, it will be a break from a tradition set by the People’s Democratic Party, which has ruled Nigeria since 1999.
Nigeria’s constitution stipulates that all of the country’s 36 states must be represented in the federal cabinet. This means that there will have to be at least 36 ministers, regardless of whatever cost-cutting ambitions a president might have. During his first spell as president, Buhari’s preference for a relatively smaller government was backed by the near-absolute authority he held as military ruler.
The finance minister role gained unprecedented power under the Goodluck Jonathan presidency, when its occupant, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, was concurrently designated the coordinating minister of the economy’ – likened by observers to an unofficial prime minister role. Considering the dire state of Nigeria’s finances, and also of its prospects in the short to medium-term, the choice of finance minister will be one of the most important decisions Buhari has to make.
The three people who represented the incoming government at the spring meetings of the World Bank in Washington DC in April – Ifueko Omoigui-Okauru, a former head of the Federal Inland Revenue Service; Wale Edun, who ran the Finance Ministry in Lagos State between 1999 and 2004, and is also a co-founder of Stanbic-IBTC Bank; and Abba Kyari, a former CEO of UBA – have all been tipped to get the job. All three previous Finance Ministers have come directly to the office from the executive ranks of multinational banks – Mansur Muhtar from the African Development Bank, Olusegun Aganga from Goldman Sachs, and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala from the World Bank.
The Petroleum Ministry will also be keenly watched, as it is oversees the lifeblood of the government and the economy. Buhari has previously served as Chairman of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), the national oil company, and Minister of Petroleum, and may be tempted, like President Obasanjo did for all of his eight years in office, to retain direct control of the all-important sector.
Anyone looking for possible insight into the nature of the Buhari cabinet might have to look at the Transition Committee he assembled in April, to liaise with the outgoing government and help lay a policy foundation for the new one. The membership of the committee drew from various blocs: the old guard (like Tam David-West, Buhari’s Petroleum Minister 30 years ago; and Committee Chairman Ahmed Joda, already a powerful federal bureaucrat in the 1970s when Buhari was taking on his first government role), and a crop of younger technocrats like Doyin Salami, a professor at the Lagos Business School, Wale Edun, and Bola Adesola, CEO of the Nigeria office of Standard Chartered Bank.
Some ministries have traditionally been regarded as A-list because of the relatively larger capital spending budgets they wield, and will therefore see a lot of intense lobbying from interested people and interest groups. They include health, federal capital territory, education, defence, works and water resources. Sources say Buhari’s plans to focus on diversifying Nigeria’s natural resource base beyond oil and gas will elevate the Ministry of Solid Minerals into this elite club.
Beyond the cabinet there will be hundreds, perhaps thousands, of appointments to be made over the next four years. Primary ones will include the cabinet secretary (secretary to the government of the federation), chief of staff, principal private secretary, a spokesman (‘special adviser on media’), a chief economic adviser, and, possibly – in keeping with recent presidential tradition – a quietly influential special assistant on domestic matters.

Who Will Run Nigeria?

It’s surprisingly effortless engaging in a long conversation with Pilisiwe Twala-Tau, wife of Johannesburg’s executive mayor Parks Tau. Long after the meeting, one remembers her for her disarming smile and simple elegance. But behind this simple exterior is a mind that is constantly ticking, day and night.
“The earliest I sleep is 2AM,” says the First Lady of the city of Johannesburg. “I never get tired, I work 24&#215;7.”
Tau is CEO of the Gauteng Enterprise Propeller (GEP), a provincial government agency established in 2005 under the auspices of the Department of Economic Development to benefit Small Medium and Micro Entrepreneurs (SMMEs) in South Africa’s Gauteng province.
Twala-Tau speaks about GEP’s larger role in empowering youth and women, making sure women are brought into mainstream business.
Her own growth trajectory has had many “highlights”, as she calls them. In her previous jobs, she left her indelible stamp on the city, urban development being an area of interest.
In 1997, as Executive Director for Economic Development in the Metropolitan Council, she was instrumental in declaring Braamfontein, a central suburb in Johannesburg, a non-trading area for hawkers, and revitalizing it into the cultural hub it is today.
“I was personally responsible for it. This is how we got Braamfontein cleaned up,” she says. For this, she worked tirelessly alongside another female colleague and powerhouse Li Pernegger, who she regards highly.
“We wanted the informal traders to still trade, so we started registering them. I thought about how we could work with them in a manner that will be productive for them to grow into the mainstream economy.”
Another project she is proud of is developing the tourism trail for Soweto, a township in Gauteng.
“[The trail] started from Cape Town, where the Freedom Charter was drafted, and went all the way to Orlando West and Vilakazi Street, and finished off at the Oppenheimer Tower. We managed to have the Hector Pieterson memorial developed. [Earlier], people would go there, and see this little stone, and say, this is where it happened, and it would end there. I mobilized R16 million ($1.3 million today) – at the time, it was a lot of money – and got Phil Mashabane, the architect, to develop it.”
Twala-Tau has been the Executive Director: Community Development and Regional Director of the City of Johannesburg’s Region 3 – the economic hub of Johannesburg. Here, she was instrumental in establishing business improvement districts.
But Twala-Tau’s true calling, she says, is community development. An example she quotes is of developing the city’s libraries.
“We moved from being library services to becoming library information services…Instead of giving books only, we started doing programs. We started going to the prisons and ran library information programs there…And then we went to the old age homes, and started doing big print books for them. And then we thought, in our libraries, we don’t have access to people who are blind, so we did braille and audio. I found I really liked to do things with communities,” says Twala-Tau, who had first started her career in finance.
After finishing her bachelor’s degree in accounting from the University of Lesotho in 1990, Twala-Tau had had stints at Ernst &amp; Young and Standard Chartered.
“After that, I decided I needed to come back, so I came back to Dube in Soweto.”
Twala-Tau’s resume includes the National Rural Development Forum, where she was responsible for finance and administration and the Independent Examinations Board where she was a policy coordinator. She was also Executive Director for Economic Empowerment at the Greater Pretoria Metropolitan Council.
“I realized I didn’t want to do finance. I didn’t want to look at books and crunch numbers. I wanted to work with people, make a difference, and do things that are tangible.”
Twala-Tau went to the Wits Business School in Johannesburg and enrolled for a number of key courses in strategy that helped her realize her calling. A post graduate degree in public management at Regenesys Business School also followed.
“My dad [who was a teacher and journalist] was very clear education was important. And education didn’t include being a nurse or a teacher or a policeman. You had to be either an accountant or a lawyer or a scientist. So all of us [siblings] did [just] that,” says Twala-Tau.
Other career highlights include being instrumental in opening a day care center for senior citizens in Soweto and a drug rehabilitation center in the Northgate suburb.
“My life is drawn from my own experiences, my mentors and my awesome parents. They did things nobody said could be possible. At some point, there were 18 people in our house. How did they make it work?”
Twala-Tau’s family were African National Congress supporters and hence had to move to Swaziland from South Africa during the days of the liberation struggle. Her learnings started as a young activist herself.
For now at GEP, she says it’s a space for innovative ideas where “ordinary people do extraordinary things”. She also runs a number of youth development programs and pushes entrepreneurship at every level. Much needs to be done and she is not backing down.

Philisile-Tau-033

‘I Work  24×7’

It was chaos in the sun. Hundreds of students ran taunting and hurling stones at lines of police armed to the teeth, with tear gas and batons. All of this at a seat of learning, the University of Zimbabwe, in the quiet, green suburbs of Harare, which we filmed for the evening bulletins of South African network television.
“How many O-levels do you have?” shouts one cheeky student, to a distant line of police, before ducking and running.
The reply from the police: a broadside of tear gas that sends us scattering and choking; the cheeky student waits a few seconds before running back with a quip.
“I didn’t think so!”
The issue, in May 1995, was student grants, or the paucity of them, as the government of Zimbabwe tightened its belt.
Day after day, the future lawyers, politicians and financial managers threw stones and held never ending open air meetings to berate the university’s chancellor, the late and avuncular Gordon Chavunduka. Everyone knew he was a sangoma – or traditional healer – known for their spiritual powers.
“Surely he, of all people, should have seen this coming!” says one orator, to the laughter of hundreds.
In those sunlit days this was truly an ice cream war. The lads on their tricycles, with ice boxes fixed to the front, used to gather a safe distance from the fighting. It meant you could dodge a police baton, run across to the ice cream sellers for a cooling cone, then charge back into the tear gas and mayhem.
It got worse as the winter of 1995 wore on. The police were reluctant to ill-treat the students, a number of whom were the sons and daughters of powerful people, when the TV cameras were about. So, one evening, they waited until our crew had left to feed their pictures to Johannesburg, before attacking the students with a vengeance. Riot police clattered through doors, broke bones and cut heads, flailing their way through campus. I can’t forget the image of one of the student leaders, Brian Kagoro, who is now a lawyer working for the UNDP, with several meters of bandage wrapped around his broken head.
This upping of the stakes provoked revenge. When the police sent a patrol car to the campus the students chased off the drivers and battered the vehicle onto its side. Worse still, one of the students opened the fuel tank,  screwed up a newspaper, stuck it inside and set fire to one end – a large petrol bomb was about to go off.
The seconds ticked by as everyone watched the flames lick their way towards the fuel tank. Then an unwitting saviour strode in from nowhere. An English lecturer, who looked the part with a scruffy brown jacket, thick beard and a pipe, strolled through the scene of trepidation without noticing the chaos around him. As he drew level with the burning newspaper, he stopped, did a double take, before pulling the burning paper out of what was about to blow. The rest of us looked through our fingers and laughed in knowing relief. The lecturer walked off, puffing on his pipe, as if nothing had happened.
Fast forward to three years later and the riot police of Zimbabwe were finding their feet. On this sticky November day in 1997, I saw two helmeted riot police standing in the tree-lined Africa Unity square in the heart of Harare.
An old man approached the two riot police and must have asked them a question politely because I saw him clapping his hands as he spoke, a sign of respect in Zimbabwe. One smacked the old man to the ground with his baton while his fellow policeman kicked him in the guts. I ran over to help the old man up.
“Leave him alone,” I screamed knowing they could take me next.
One of the policemen looked me in the eye and threw a spitting, Israeli-made gas grenade, sending me coughing and wheezing out onto the street where thousands were running in anger. I kicked the gas grenade 30 meters across the road; to throw it back was to risk arrest. I never saw the old man again. Troops were on the streets weeks later.

Category: Sometime in Africa

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