Africa

The African Continental Free Trade Agreement: Loss of Sovereignty, Lack of Transparency

19 August 2019 - by Jonathan Cannard

The African Union’s Assembly of Heads of State and Government conceived of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) in 2012 with the goal of creating a Continental Free Trade Area by 2017. In March 2018 the majority of AU member states signed the agreement to establish the free (...)
Illicit financial flows thwart human rights and development in Africa

5 February 2019 - by Imani Countess

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights turned 70 on 12 December and governments and civil society organisations around the world were commemorating the day with a range of activities. However, the threat of illicit financial flows to the respect of human seems to have been forgotten on that (...)
African governments’ debt payments double in just two years

8 October 2018 - by Jubilee Debt Campaign

• Debt problems on the African continent are increasing, with external government debt payments doubling in two years • The private sector is the largest source of loans, accounting for 32% of debt owed and 55% of interest payments • China accounts for around 20% of debt owed, and 17% of interest (...)
The Long March to Post-Capitalist Transition: Pan-Africanist Perspectives

29 August 2018 - by Ameth Lô

The centenary of the October 1917 Russian Revolution, a world-shaking historic event, was an occasion for celebration throughout the world. Many diverse interpretations are advanced as to its success in achieving a radical transformation of society, both in terms of its history and its overall (...)
Philanthrocapitalism: The Gates Foundation’s African programmes are not charity

24 August 2018 - by Philip Bereano

The activities of the Gates Foundation are a major example of what has come to be called ’philanthrocapitalism’. Philip L Bereano argues that philanthrocapitalism is an attempt to use market processes to do good, and therefore problematic as markets are ill-suited to producing socially (...)
CADTM successfully holds Citizen Debt Audit Training in Nairobi

19 August 2018 - by David Calleb Otieno

The Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debts (CADTM) successfully held a three days training on Citizens Debt Audit in Nairobi, Kenya. The training that attended by delegates from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Burundi was organized by the Kenyan Social Movements for the Abolition of (...)
Africa : Strengthening the anti-debt initiatives in Kenya

15 August 2018 - by Sushovan Dhar

CADTM collaborated with Kenyan social movements to organise a training on debt audit and also a meeting to strengthen the anti-debt activities in Kenya. This programme held from July 29-30 at Nairobi (in the slums of Kangemi) witnessed the participation of more than 50 grass roots activists (...)
Small–scale farmers of Africa and Denmark reject free trade agreements

27 July 2018 - by La Via Campesina

Representatives of La Via Campesina in Southern and Eastern Africa (LVC SEAf) and in European (ECVC) small-scale farming agree that free trade agreements (FTAs) on farm products benefits primarily transnational corporations and furthers the industrialisation of agriculture. All at the expense (...)
BRICS in Africa: “You are either at the table or on the menu”

5 June 2018 - by Patrick Bond

At a Johannesburg BRICS think tank, scholars get drunk on their own rhetoric South African academics and think tanks met on 28-31 May 2018 for deliberations leading to the July 2018 BRICS heads of state summit to be hosted by South Africa. Most of these scholars believe that the BRICS (...)
China vs the US: The new imperial scramble for Africa and global rivalries

4 June 2018 - by Lee Wengraf

Lee Wengraf writes that the rush for profits, economic volatility and militarization across Africa promises only instability, rising exploitation and violence. Since the start of the new millennium, sub-Saharan African economies have undergone a dramatic boom. This surge has been marked by (...)
China-Africa relations without Africans’ contributions

28 May 2018 - by Daouda Cissé

The piece relates that, at times, Africans are not invited to debates, conferences and other key platforms on Africa-China relations even though the topic is about Africa’s and Africans’ relations with China and Chinese. Recent discussions and exchanges among members of a research network on (...)
The EU caught in the trap of Nigeria’s refusal to sign the West Africa Economic Partnership Agreement and the Continental Free Trade Area

9 May 2018 - by Jacques Berthelot

The EU caught in the trap of Nigeria’s refusal to sign the West Africa Economic Partnership Agreement and the Continental Free Trade Area On April 9, 2018 President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria very explicitly stated to the new Ambassador of the European Union (EU), Ketil Iversen Karlsen, who (...)
Senegalese economist Ndongo Samba Sylla: “the Continental Free Trade Area is a mistake” (Interview)

4 April 2018 - by Ndongo Samba Sylla, Maghreb Emergent

The economist Ndongo Samba Sylla is the author of the following books, among others: The Fair Trade Scandal: Marketing Poverty to Benefit the Rich and La démocratie contre la République: l’autre histoire du gouvernement du peuple. He tells Maghreb Emergent why the CFTA is “suicide for African (...)
International Women’s Day Declaration, 2018

1 March 2018 - by World March of Women

On the 8th of March2018, International Women’s Day, we from the World March of Women, diverse women from all peoples, races and ages, come together once again to reaffirm that we will keep marching until we are all free from all the oppression from the patriarchal, capitalist and colonial (...)
New Evidence of Africa’s Systematic Looting, From an Increasingly Schizophrenic World Bank

5 February 2018 - by Patrick Bond

A brand new World Bank report, The Changing Wealth of Nations 2018, offers evidence of how much poorer Africa is becoming thanks to rampant minerals, oil and gas extraction. Yet Bank policies and practices remain oriented to enforcing foreign loan repayments and transnational corporate (TNC) (...)
The Bamako Seminar, The CADTM network reinforces the struggle against illegitimate debt !

27 December 2017 - by Nathan Legrand, Fatima Zahra El Beghiti

The CADTM International network delegations met in Bamako, Mali, from 15 to 25 November 2017 to follow several political training and coordination activities. Indeed the third “women, debt and microcredit” seminar, the annual CADTM training session, was held at the same time and in the same (...)
The revival of the Commonwealth: an opportunity for further exploitation or a time to correct past wrongs?

22 December 2017 - by Mary Serumaga

The Origins of the Commonwealth ‘Commonwealth’ is a word being heard with increasing frequency in the post-Brexit era. It had always been used to refer to the British Empire – first to Australia in the 1890s and later to other territories. From the record of the Colonial Affairs debate of 1939, (...)
‘Africa Rising’ in retreat: Signs of new resistances

29 September 2017 - by Patrick Bond

Capitalism is bleeding Africa to death: illegal financial flows, legal financial outflows, FDI flows, foreign indebtedness, sub-imperial accumulation, new subsidies for infrastructure financing and uncompensated mineral and oil and gas depletion. The continent is further threatened by land (...)
Colonialism’s new clothes: The EU’s Economic Partnership Agreements with Africa

22 August 2017 - by GRAIN

Since 2002, African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries have negotiated a reciprocal free trade agreement known as the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with the European Union (EU). While it was marketed as the magic bullet towards the ACP countries’ industrialisation and development, it (...)
African peasants highlight their struggles at Via Campesina global conference

4 August 2017 - by Boaventura Monjane

Peasants across Africa are intensifying their struggles against land grabs and other harmful policies that promote industrial agriculture. At a recent international conference organized by the world’s largest peasants movement, Via Campesina, African peasants had opportunities to share their (...)
The dark side of infrastructure investment in Africa

12 June 2017 - by Collective

With its Compact with Africa the German G20 presidency is actively promoting private loans and investment as solutions to infrastructure deficiencies on the African continent. The Compact aims at using public resources in order to improve the investment climate and mobilize private capital to (...)
Honest Accounts 2017 - How the world profits from Africa’s wealth

6 June 2017 - by Mark Curtis, Tim Jones

Profiting from Africa’s wealth Africa is rich – in potential mineral wealth, skilled workers, booming new businesses and biodiversity. Its people should thrive, its economies prosper. Yet many people living in Africa’s 47 countries remain trapped in poverty, while much of the continent’s wealth (...)
World Economic Forum-Africa hosts a turf battle between Jacob Zuma and ‘white monopoly capital’

3 May 2017 - by Patrick Bond

At a time US and South African presidents Donald Trump and Jacob Zuma personify controversies over crony capitalism, corruption, populist rhetoric and self-serving economic strategies, will big business calm down the politicians – or just egg them on? Business elites are confused, even while (...)
Africa’s New Debts

23 March 2017 - by ajohnstone

Mozambique is the first major African nation in recent times to become unable to meet obligations to international creditors. In 2012, Mozambique’s obligations to its creditors amounted to 40 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), they now total 130 percent. Banks and investment funds were (...)
How years of IMF prescriptions have hurt West African health systems

3 March 2017 - by Thomas Stubbs, Alexander E. Kentikelenis

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) provides financial assistance to countries in economic trouble. But its policy proposals don’t always yield positive results for the countries it purports to help. For instance, critics have argued that the IMF inhibits government spending on public health (...)