You also can be a part of it!
Although Africa barely emits 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions, it is nonetheless one of the hardest hit regions on the planet in terms of their effects - in a year in which the world reached its warmest month in October and for a continent that generally records slightly above-average temperatures. According to information from the United Nations, more than 170 million people suffer from acute hunger in sub-Saharan Africa. This is explained on the basis of extreme climatic phenomena. For example, while a large part of the southern continent has been devastated by a severe drought caused by the El Niño phenomenon, countries such as Sudan and South Sudan have suffered the opposite, terrible floods that have affected, in South Sudan alone, more than 1 million inhabitants. In addition to the problems caused by the climatic situation, the northern neighbor faces the drama of the war, which is about to enter its second year and which has become the most serious humanitarian crisis in the world, having left more than 14 million people homeless, with almost 3 million refugees in neighboring countries, and, according to the highest estimates, up to 150,000 deaths since the third Sudanese civil war broke out in April 2023 following military disagreements and internal strife that includes the intensification of the genocide in Darfur and half of a country of nearly 50 million people starving. Internationally mediated peace talks have fallen on deaf ears throughout the year.
Heat not just in Sahel
The progressive desertification in the Sahelian area complicates a humanitarian situation that hangs by a thread in considerable parts of this area resulting, in part, in more than 50 million people in West and Central Africa facing chronic food shortages, including almost 17 million children, according to UN WFP data provided before the middle of the year. In addition, the Canary Islands route has become the most dangerous in the world, surpassing even the more visible Mediterranean route and, with almost 9,800 deaths in 2024, it took the majority of those occurring in the migratory routes to Spain, a 58% year-on-year increase in that matter. Another complication also concerns the increase of food prices in contexts of pronounced shortages and the increase of the cost of living in general, which drives population displacements, mostly intra-African.
These combined factors created the perfect storm for the fall of civilian governments and the coming to power of military juntas between 2020 and 2023 in most of the former French colonies in the Sahel, which are turning the traditional link with their ex-metropolis upside down. Although no new coups d’état were reported in 2024, the move away from democracy seems to be the most real scenario in these countries that continue to be ruled by coup juntas that delay the call for elections. For the Malian case, one could add the ban on all political activity imposed in April, and in Guinea Conakry the promise of a constitutional referendum that would allow the current military leader to stand for election. As in 2023, the relationship of these military administrations with the government of Emmanuel Macron continued to recede, a development inversely proportional to the consolidation of the Alliance of Sahel States, formed by Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger at the end of 2023 as a defensive grouping that last year made progress on mobility and other issues. Anti-French sentiment swarms in the air. For example, in Burkina Faso, French names on public roads were replaced by local names and mineral exports were cancelled, and the French firm Orano, partly because of crossings with the Niger interim government, announced the end of its activities after half a century of operations. Finally, Chad and Senegal requested the Elysée to withdraw military and cooperation troops. In the former, the coup leader Mahamat Déby, son of the man who ruled for 30 years until his death in 2021, in May “whitewashed” his continuity by triumphing in elections in which he obtained 61% of support, guaranteeing the permanence of the Déby dynasty, so far a strong French ally.
Despite these clear setbacks for the former metropolis, Macron has shown a willingness to rebuild relations. On December 1, he became the first French president to recognize the Thiaroye massacre (Dakar, Senegal), on the 80th anniversary of a protest in which dozens of demobilized soldiers from French West Africa were killed by French troops because of a wage claim after having fought in the camps of World War II.
Although the military juntas ruling in the Sahel have promised to reverse the scourge of jihadism, this challenge is still pending in the most insecure region of the planet in this area, the triangle comprising Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. Among the various jihadist attacks, a series of attacks in the Malian capital Bamako in mid-September caused particular commotion, resulting in more than 90 deaths. However, the one that occurred in July in the context of fightings at the Mali-Algerian border, was even more prominent, as the accusations were directed at Ukraine. Kiev was accused of promoting terrorism as it was suspected that the local culprit group had the complicity of the European country in striking its blow against the Malian army and collaborators of the Afrika Korps (the ex-Russian Wagner militias), resulting in more than 50 military casualties. Consequently, first Mali and then Niger broke off diplomatic relations with Ukraine. In sum, 2024 witnessed the expansion of the Ukrainian war front in the Sahel. Russia’s gradual advance, seeking to counter the enemy’s movements, but also taking advantage of the French withdrawal, was another novelty in these last twelve months.
In short, 2024 witnessed the Russian advance in Africa and the expansion of the Ukrainian war front in the Sahel, a zone in deteriorating peace as well as the Horn of Africa. There, the year began with an agreement between the unrecognized Somaliland and Ethiopia to offer the latter an outlet to the sea, a negotiation that set the nerves of Mogadishu on edge in a region where there is no shortage of problems thanks, for the most part, to countries in which security is a pending debt. Ethiopia, for instance, is afflicted by two serious internal armed conflicts although the most important war officially ended just over two years ago (Tigray). However, while 2024 had a tense start because of that treaty, the year ended on a positive note with an initial agreement between Addis Ababa and Mogadishu, brokered by Turkey, but whose progress will be subject to review in 2025.
Protests and elections
Not only in the Sahel as in the past, but also in the present, complications in the daily economy led to the most intense cycle of protests of the year in Nigeria during August, similar to the one that occurred almost two months earlier in Kenya, caused by the rejection of a tax reform project in the country of the Horn of Africa, which led to repression with more than 50 deaths, the destruction of the national parliament and the replacement of the entire cabinet of President William Ruto. In Nigeria the death toll reached 24 accompanied by hundreds of arrests, a government unable to cope with an inflation rate exceeding 30% per month and a population of over 210 million, including 40% living in poverty. Uganda also joined this tandem of nations convulsed by protest, which had as its axis the anti-corruption proclamation during July. Later in the year, Mozambique was the last to erupt from a post-electoral crisis in the face of discontent over the primacy of the historic Frelimo, the party that has governed since independence in 1975, and allegations of fraud that included the indictment and prosecution of the main opposition candidate, Venâncio Mondlane, who was identified as the main instigator of the unrest. Despite the Constitutional Court’s recognition of the victory of the ruling party’s candidate Daniel Chapo, who will take office on January 15, the opposition continues to be fractious. In sum, the crisis which began on October 9 has resulted (for the moment) in more than 150 deaths as a result of state repression, plus, taking advantage of the general confusion, the escape in December of about 1,500 inmates from a prison and, as if that were not enough, the passage of Cyclone Chido which added another hundred deaths and the destruction of more than 100,000 homes, even devastating the French archipelago of Mayotte, located in the Indian Ocean.
In another dimension, electoral processes that do not overflow lack media attention, and Africa also had them like the rest of the world during the year. In general, it was not a good year for the ruling parties. A very important case of the latter was South Africa, where general elections were held at the end of May. As expected, the African National Congress (ANC) lost its absolute majority and had to adjust to governing in coalition with the main opposition parties, including the Democratic Alliance (DA), a center-right, white-led but once anti-apartheid party, and the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), a radical grouping that seeks, among its objectives, the reform of the land regime to compensate the African majorities, since the traces of apartheid remain at the socioeconomic level, even after 30 years of its end. Its leader is a former ANC, Julius Malema, who in the past was part of the group’s youth. The novelty was the split and formation of a new party, uMkhonto we Sizwe (People’s Spear), taking the name of the former armed wing of the ANC, chaired by an ANC defector and former president who was dismissed by the ANC leadership, Jacob Zuma. However, the fourth force resulting from the elections refused to integrate the emerging coalition. The erosion of the ANC’s electoral strength is progressive and can be explained on several fronts, first and foremost the performance of the economy and corruption. South Africa is the most unequal country in the world and at least 30% of its population is unemployed and an equal number impoverished, out of a total of 62 million inhabitants.
Important changes with fairly calm elections (in the end) took place in Senegal in March, when, after a serious pre-electoral tension, the situation was unblocked and the presidential succession announced the arrival to power of a disruptive figure and the country’s youngest president, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, a pan-Africanist, anti-imperialist and with a pronounced anti-French rhetoric. From having been banned, in barely a year he reached the highest position of power. Consistent with his thinking, in December he called for the withdrawal of all French presence from the West African country. In contrast, under calm but unsurprising elections, the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, obtained 99.18% of the votes in July, a more than curious result for a leader with authoritarian traits who has ruled the Great Lakes country since 2000 with no intention of leaving the presidential chair and with a very good international image. The project for the deportation of migrants with the rejection of asylum applications signed between this country and the United Kingdom was news, but was annulled after the change of the British political administration in favor of the Labour Party. Algeria offered a similar case of resounding continuity: in September, President Abdelmadjid Tebboune obtained 94.65% of the vote for the continuity of a regime that is quite questionable when it comes to democracy. The North African country offered a symbolic image during the Olympic Games in Paris when, on the Seine River, the national delegation offered flowers in memory of the victims of the French repression of October 17, 1961 in that city, coinciding with the 70th anniversary of the beginning of the terrible Algerian war of liberation (1954-1962).
Later in the year, Botswana, Namibia and Ghana did not make the news for clean and transparent elections. In the former there was a surprise since the ruling party lost and withdrew after 58 years of uninterrupted power since emancipation. In Namibia the government was continued despite the loss of parliamentary power, but the novelty is that a woman will govern for the first time, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, the current vice-president, from the SWAPO party, a force that achieved independence from South African apartheid in 1990. Finally, in Ghana, party continuity was broken once again in a system accustomed to alternation, as former President John Dramani Mahama will return to power in a critical context, marked by a heavy indebtedness in the context of a fearsome economic crisis, despite Ghana being a continental democratic bastion more than 30 years after the last military coup. Overall, it seems that the economy has been the decisive variable in defining electoral processes, particularly in Ghana. In general terms, it was not an entirely good year for the ruling parties, with severe setbacks, such as in South Africa or Botswana, between the formation of coalitions and/or the significant reduction of parliamentary seats.
What to watch out for in 2025
The victory of former President Donald Trump in November was one of the most important news on the international agenda. His return to the White House on January 20 raises the question of what his Africa policy will be, considering that Washington’s Africa policy was almost nil under his first term in office. For the time being, at the end of 2024 Joe Biden once visited Angola in what was his only African tour in four years, promising millionaire investments to consolidate a railway line in order to take advantage of the mining potential and compete with China, one of Washington’s main priorities under the “America first” premise. Will Trump follow in the footsteps of the previous Democratic administration or will his competition with the Asian giant take place in other places and not precisely in Africa? What has been pointed out is a possible recognition of Somaliland by the incoming administration, more than anything else as a form of provocation towards China.
In response to another question about the weight of the superpowers on the continent, Russia also enters into this framework of questions. It is currently the leading arms supplier to African countries and its influence is growing steadily. However, the fall of the dictator Al-Assad and the complications for Russia in Syria, might they not imply a setback on the African fronts? In any case, the Alliance of Sahel States has the unavoidable backing of Russian power and a readjustment of this power would be detrimental to these military alliances. In contrast, it seems to be more certain that 2025 will continue to be a year of French withdrawal and, in this respect, it will be necessary to see how the promise of the common currency in West Africa, the Eco, will evolve to replace the CFA franc, a monetary unit issued from France that controls the economy of fifteen countries in the area, the true umbilical cord of Paris neo-colonialism in the region.
Like France, another colonial power that has reviewed its colonial past is the United Kingdom, whose government announced months ago the decision to return the Chagos archipelago to its former colony Mauritius, islets it had been claiming since its independence in 1968, under some pre-existing international pressures but which London had not complied with. This commitment to return the islands is due to become effective this year but, thanks to the change of government in Mauritius in November, the new administration has called into question the fulfillment of the agreement because, among other arguments, the island of Diego Garcia does not form part of the restitution as it is a military post reserved by lease to the United States given its geostrategic importance in the Indian Ocean.
This year there will be several elections to consider in Africa: Tanzania, Malawi, Gabon and Togo, among others. The general elections in Cameroon will attract particular attention. There, among several contenders, the big question is whether the current Cameroonian president, Paul Biya, who has been in power since 1982 and is the oldest in the world (91 years old), will seek a new seven-year term. In such a case, continuity would be guaranteed as the democratic credentials of the Central African country are an entelechy. Ivory Coast will hold a presidential election and 2025 promises an intense and hard-fought campaign, especially considering the suspense as to whether the current president, Alassane Ouattara, would run for a fourth term, judging the instability and resistance that this type of decision has generated in other African contexts or in Ivory Coast’s turbulent past. With worrying antecedents in the first decade of the current century, between 2010 and 2011, in addition to the last elections in 2020, the country experienced very serious post-electoral crisis contexts, which left more than 3,000 fatalities, and had Ouattara at the center of the scene. That is to say, each new elective instance allows the emergence of the phantoms of unrest and possible civil war as in the past. Therefore, part of the electoral stress this year is to avoid the risk of violent escalations. Egypt stands out, with legislative elections, in an extremely authoritarian framework since the assumption of power by General Abdelfatah Al-Sisi more than a decade ago. Although without elections in 2025, also in North Africa, a similar scenario to that of Egypt is that of Tunisia, which presents a growing authoritarian drift under the leadership of Kaïs Saied, who will continue to be examined in the coming months after being reelected with 90.7% of the vote in October.
