Politics

West Africa juntas petition UN over Ukraine’s alleged rebel support

Published

4 weeks ago

August 21, 2024

According to Mali’s foreign ministry, the military juntas of Burkina Faso, Niger, and Mali have denounced what they perceive as Ukraine’s backing of rebel groups in the Sahel region of West Africa in a letter sent to the UN Security Council.

After remarks made by Andriy Yusov, a representative of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, regarding the combat in northern Mali that claimed the lives of Malian soldiers and mercenaries from the Russian Wagner group in late July, Mali severed diplomatic ties with Ukraine in early August.

A few days later, in support of its neighbour, the Nigeran military administration did the same. According to what Yusov indicated, the “rebels” in Mali had gotten all the info they needed “to conduct a successful military operation”.

Since Mali and Niger took Yusov’s statements to mean that Ukraine was directly involved in the conflict, they accused Ukraine of aiding international terrorism.

The Ukrainian government has always denied the claims. A request for a response on Wednesday went unanswered by the foreign ministry. After more than two years of Russian invasion, the country is still deeply embroiled in severe conflict.

According to a Tuareg rebel organisation, they were also not supported by the Ukrainians. North Mali is home to both ethnic Tuareg rebels and Islamic fighters. In July, there was intense fighting that the Tuareg claimed resulted in the deaths of 84 Wagner mercenaries and 47 Malian soldiers.

Separately, an Al Qaeda affiliate claimed responsibility for the attack that killed ten Malian soldiers and fifty Wagner mercenaries on one of those days.

The foreign ministers of Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso penned a letter to the Security Council, urging it to “take responsibility” for the activities of Ukraine and to avert “subversive acts” that endanger stability in the area and the continent.

The foreign ministry of Mali shared the letter’s wording on their social media account. It was reportedly sent out to the fifteen-person Security Council on Tuesday night, according to diplomats.

During the last four years, juntas in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have sided with Russia, which is currently in a war with Ukraine, rather than their long-standing Western and regional friends.

The assaults in July in the northern Kidal region of Mali, close to the Algerian border, may have been Wagner’s worst setback since it intervened two years ago to assist the junta in its struggle against Islamic rebels.

A distinct ethnic group residing in the Sahara region, which includes portions of Northern Mali, are the Tuareg. In 2012, Islamist militant groups took control of an insurgency that Tuareg separatists had started. The rebels were later driven back into the dry north of Mali.

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Politics

Ghanian opposition protests, demands audit of voters register

Published

12 hours ago

September 18, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

Ghana’s major opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) party protested statewide on Tuesday, seeking an independent forensic audit to clean up the voter register for free and fair elections.

NDC leaders said the election commission secretly relocated voters to various voting sites, undermining the register.

In red and black, thousands of supporters marched through Accra’s main streets, blasting reggae and campaign music and calling on international bodies, Ghana’s peace council, and religious and civil society groups to intervene. Protest leaders petitioned parliament and the Accra electoral agency. Ghana’s other 15 regions also saw protests, local media said.

Protester Kwame Acheampong, 68, told Reuters in Akan that his registration had been moved from the capital to Tamale. He asked, “How can I vote in Tamale?”

Meanwhile, the electoral commission claims the flaws were fixed. It suspended a northern Pusiga district director in August for “using his credentials to transfer voters without their knowledge.” Ghana is one of Africa’s most stable democracies, although eight people died in the last election, which was marred by opposition claims that the government unjustly influenced the vote, which it rejected.

Allegations of irregularities tarnish the electoral authorities. Afrobarometer’s July survey found Ghana’s election commission’s trust at an all-time low since confidence polls began in 1999. Johnson Asiedu Nketia, NDC chairman, told demonstrators he wanted “transparent elections.”

Ghana will have general elections for president and parliamentarians on December 7, 2024. President Nana Akufo-Addo cannot run again due to term limits after eight years. Old NDC president John Dramani Mahama will face New Patriotic Party Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia in the election.

The President of Ghana is elected in two rounds, while 275 MPs are elected in single-member constituencies by first-past-the-post voting.

Politics

South Sudan ready to resume pumping oil through Sudan

Published

17 hours ago

September 18, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

According to South Sudan’s finance minister and the president’s office, progress has been made in getting South Sudan and Sudan to resume supplying crude oil through a pipeline that goes to a port in their neighbourhood.

South Sudan depends heavily on its oil exports for its income, and Sudan keeps a portion of the oil as a transit fee.

The devastation resulting from a fight between Sudan’s army and the Rapid Support Forces forced the closure of the major pipeline that transported oil from South Sudan via Sudan for export in February. According to observers, the stoppage has caused food prices in Sudan, where millions of people suffer from acute hunger, to rise. The damage is likely to cause major environmental degradation.

“Sudanese engineers have accomplished the necessary technical preparations for the resumption of oil production,” South Sudan President Salva Kiir’s office said in a statement late on Monday after a meeting in Juba between Kiir and Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan.

“Engineers from South Sudan are expected to visit Sudan in the coming weeks to familiarise themselves with the readiness of the facilities to jump-start production.”

“There has been a breakthrough, and (news of) it will come to the public very soon,” South Sudan’s Finance Minister Marial Dongrin Ater told a news conference late on Monday.
Burhan’s office said the two sides would develop an operational plan to restart oil flows.

Due to intercommunal violence, South Sudan’s economy has been under strain recently. Since the civil war that lasted from 2013 to 2018, revenue from crude oil exports has decreased, and more recently, export disruptions have occurred because of the conflict in neighbouring Sudan.

Following its independence from Khartoum in 2011, South Sudan began exporting roughly 150,000 barrels of crude oil per day through Sudan, following a formula that took the majority of the country’s oil production with it.

Before the civil war, South Sudan produced between 350,000 and 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day at its highest point.