Category: English

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Saheed Babajide Owonikoko, Researcher, Centre for Peace and Security Studies, Modibbo Adama University of Technology

For the second time in five years, Nigeria has been designated a “country of particular concern” by the US government, in both cases by President Donald Trump. The first time was in 2020 but the designation was removed in 2021.

The November 2025 redesignation can be traced to, among other things, a campaign by US congressman Riley Moore, who alleged that there was an “alarming and ongoing persecution of Christians” in Nigeria.

Nigeria refuted this claim. President Bola Tinubu, in a statement, argued that the US characterisation of Nigeria did not reflect the country’s reality or values.

But what does the designation mean for Nigeria? And what should Nigeria’s response be? As a scholar who has studied Nigeria’s insecurity and identity crises, I have some suggestions.

Nigeria must prevent the diplomatic row with the US from progressing further, and act decisively against insecurity for all Nigerians.

To achieve this, the Nigerian government should look beyond military capability. The country needs governance and administrative restructuring that empowers sub-national and local authorities to address local issues. This bottom-up approach will address insecurity better than the current top-down approach.

What ‘country of particular concern’ means

The classification of a country as being of particular concern is outlined in the United States International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA) of 1998. Under section 402 of the act, “country of particular concern” is a designation given to a foreign country whose government has engaged in or tolerated especially severe violations of the religious freedom of its citizens.

By this definition, a country may not be directly involved in violating its citizens’ religious freedom, but culpable for not acting decisively against those who do.

For a country to be classified as such, it is first placed on a special watch list. This allows for an assessment of whether there is a serious violation of religious freedom.

The designation is part of US foreign policy for promoting human rights globally.

Why Nigeria was given this status

Nigeria was designated a country of particular concern because of allegations of “genocide” against Christians there. Since Nigeria’s independence in 1960, identity conflicts have become a common occurrence. But there’s a new dimension with the emergence of terror groups and intensifying farmer-herder disputes.

A study I conducted in early 2025 revealed that between 2010 and 2022, a total of 230 attacks specifically targeted Christians, 82 of which were between 2019 and 2022.

Several other attacks, such as the Runji killing in Kaduna State in April 2023, the Apata and Yelwata massacres in Benue State in March and June 2025, respectively, and the Mangu killings in Plateau State, have also taken place.

This shows that there are targeted attacks against Christians in parts of Nigeria. But they are a fraction of the attacks and killings carried out by non-state armed groups in the country.

As one study argued, Christians make up roughly half of Nigeria’s population, but attacks explicitly directed against them account for about 5% of total reported violent incidents.

Therefore, framing Nigeria’s insecurity in terms of anti-Christian violence alone oversimplifies the broader dynamics of the country’s national insecurity.

How this will affect Nigeria

The International Religious Freedom Act stipulates 15 required sanctions under section 405(a). Section 407 allows the president of the US to waive these sanctions based on national interest or to further the purpose of the act. For this reason, in most cases, the designation is seldom followed by sanctions.

Several countries have been exempted from sanctions even when designated as countries of particular concern. Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan have been repeatedly designated but the US has never sanctioned them.

Even Nigeria’s designation in 2020 was not followed by sanctions. The US continued to provide security assistance, military cooperation and development aid to Nigeria. The US only used the period of designation to call for improved protection of religious communities and accountability for perpetrators.

For the recent designation, however, Trump has threatened to cut aid to Nigeria and take military action against terrorists in Nigeria.

The US, through the US Agency for International Development, provided development assistance worth US$7.89 billion between 2015 and 2024 to support health, education, economic and humanitarian development. But all of that has reduced since the scrapping of the agency and a drop in foreign aid.

US security aid to Nigeria remains significant. It approved sales of sophisticated precision military weapons worth US$346 million to Nigeria and has offered training support for Nigerian soldiers.

The US could end that deal, but that would undermine Nigeria’s ability to address terrorism and general security challenges. It would counter the purpose of the International Religious Freedom Act. Therefore, I believe the US may waive this.

Direct military intervention in Nigeria is becoming a possibility and Trump is most likely going to do it without respect for Nigeria’s sovereignty. He has ordered the US Department of War to draw up plans, and they have come up with options. But I do not see this solving the problem of insecurity in Nigeria. It may instead lead to the dispersal of terrorists, complicating Nigeria’s insecurity. Or terrorists might increase mass kidnappings and hostage-taking for shields.

How Nigeria should respond

Nigeria must prevent diplomatic rows with the US because they are partners in the fight against terrorism. A discussion about how the US can improve Nigeria’s capacity to address its security challenges would be a good step.

Furthermore, Nigeria’s limited capacity to safeguard lives and property points to deeper structural and governance challenges. The country’s security architecture is too centralised and works top-down. This makes it harder for sub-national and local authorities to provide security and address the drivers of violence at the local level.

Nigeria should go beyond improving its military response. To enhance security, it also needs to reform its governance and administrative structures.

– US-Nigeria relations: what it means to be a ‘country of particular concern’ and why it matters
– https://theconversation.com/us-nigeria-relations-what-it-means-to-be-a-country-of-particular-concern-and-why-it-matters-269044

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Jonathan Powell, Visiting assistant professor, University of Kentucky

Guinea-Bissau heads into its November elections against the backdrop of a deepening crisis of electoral legitimacy across Africa. In recent months, a string of elections has reinforced the perception that incumbency, not competition, remains the standard.

In Cameroon, 92-year-old Paul Biya claimed an eighth consecutive term after officially winning 53.7% of a vote widely denounced as fraudulent and met with protests.

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Read more: Paul Biya’s life presidency in Cameroon enters a fragile final phase

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In Tanzania, President Samia Suluhu Hassan was declared the victor with an implausible 98% of ballots cast in her favour following a poll marred by numerous irregularities and followed by protests and a crackdown unprecedented in the country’s history.

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Read more: Tanzania: President Samia Hassan’s grip on power has been shaken by unprecedented protests

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And in Côte d’Ivoire, President Alassane Ouattara comfortably secured a fourth term with nearly 90% of the vote, extending his hold on power despite the constitution’s two-term limit.

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Read more: Côte d’Ivoire’s elections have already been decided: Ouattara will win and democracy will lose

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Across the continent, including west Africa, these outcomes have fuelled public cynicism and highlighted a worrying erosion of democratic norms, as leaders manipulate constitutions, neutralise opponents, and hollow out institutions meant to safeguard accountability.

It is within this climate of regional disillusionment that Bissau-Guineans will head to the polls on 23 November.

The west African country’s upcoming election once offered the potential to demonstrate a growing electoral resilience, a deepening of institutional strength that would help the country break from past legacies of instability. Instead, the process has been repeatedly undermined by President Umar Sissoco Embaló.

As social scientists who have written extensively on political instability in Africa, we believe that such dynamics all but guarantee another entry to the roster of failed elections across the region.

At stake is more than Guinea-Bissau’s democratic credibility. Its unravelling speaks to a wider regional crisis in which incumbents erode legitimacy not by abolishing elections, but by emptying them of real competition.

A legacy of instability

In contrast to long-tenured leaders like Biya or Ouattara, or enduring parties such as Tanzania’s Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), Guinea-Bissau’s voters navigate an electoral system defined by unpredictability and instability, especially during election season.

The country’s modern electoral turbulence can be traced back decades. João Bernardo “Nino” Vieira returned to power in 2005 for a second stint, nearly a quarter-century after first seizing control via a 1980 coup.

His rule was marred by conflict, including an 11-month civil war triggered by a rebellion from former army chief of staff Ansumane Mané. Vieira’s long first tenure ended in a second coup in May 1999, and his second term was cut short in 2009 when he was murdered by members of the armed forces.

Malam Bacai Sanhá emerged as Vieira’s elected successor but passed away in January 2012, leaving Raimundo Pereira as interim president. Within months, Pereira would be removed in yet another military coup.

The 2012 upheaval halted a runoff election between Carlos Domingos Gomes Júnior and Kumba Ialá.

The 2014 election brought José Mário Vaz to the presidency, defeating a candidate with close ties to the military. When Vaz completed his term in 2020, he became Guinea-Bissau’s first president to finish a constitutionally defined tenure.

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Read more: Guinea-Bissau’s political crisis: a nation on the brink of authoritarianism

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Undermining the process

Questions arose even before Vaz’s exit. After Umar Sissoco Embaló was declared the winner over Pereira in the 29 December runoff, Pereira challenged the results. Ignoring the ongoing legal process, Embaló arranged an inauguration ceremony for himself in February 2020.

The African Party for Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC) accused Embaló of orchestrating a coup and appointed Cipriano Cassamá as an interim president.

Embaló then ordered the deployment of the military to state institutions, including the National Assembly. Cassamá stepped down on his second day, citing death threats.

The supreme court ultimately declined to rule on the dispute after its chief judge fled the country, also citing death threats. The crisis was effectively resolved by the Economic Community of West African States’ (Ecowas) recognition of the Embaló government. Uncertainty, however, would continue to plague the new government.

In May 2022, three months after an attempted coup, Embaló dissolved and suspended parliament.

The main opposition party, the PAIGC, formally regained parliamentary control in the June 2023 elections, setting the stage for continued confrontation between the presidency and the legislative majority. Embaló again pursued the dissolution of parliament in December 2023.

Although Embaló’s term officially expired in February 2025, the supreme court later ruled he could remain in office until 4 September.

Even after that date, Embaló remained in office. These manoeuvres have heightened concerns about the erosion of constitutional norms.

Concerns over the broader electoral environment have also come to the fore. Legislative elections initially scheduled for late November 2024 were indefinitely postponed due to alleged funding and logistical challenges. Earlier, Embaló had declared he would not seek reelection, only to reverse course in March 2025.

A mediation team deployed by the Economic Community of West African States, tasked with helping the sides agree to and honour an election timeline, abruptly withdrew following threats of expulsion from the Embaló government.

More recently, the PAIGC’s chosen presidential candidate, Domingos Simões Pereira, was barred from contesting the November election after the supreme court rejected his candidacy over the late submission of documents.

For the first time in Guinea-Bissau’s history, the country’s oldest and most influential party will be excluded from the presidential race.

The country has fallen in the Electoral Democracy Index, provided by the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). As shown in the graph below, the decline even outpaces the drop witnessed after military coups in 2003, 2012, and the assassination of Vieira in 2009.

The V-Dem data end in 2024, and thus do not yet capture the 2025 election cycle.

Performative elections, entrenched power

What is unfolding in Guinea-Bissau is not an isolated crisis. It is part of a wider regional pattern in which leaders recognise that elections can be held, even celebrated, while hollowing out nearly everything that once made them meaningful. Critically, the recent coups in the region have been linked, in part, to popular frustration with flawed electoral processes.

Embaló has not entrenched himself with the personal longevity of Cameroon’s Biya or the institutional dominance of Tanzania’s CCM, but the mechanisms he has used to tilt the field look strikingly similar.

The removal of viable opponents, the manipulation of constitutional timelines, the coercive use of the security sector, and the corrosion of judicial independence all signal a shift away from accountability.

Guinea-Bissau was for the first time in decades poised to demonstrate that democratic resilience could be strengthened. Instead, the 2025 election cycle risks becoming another example of how fragile gains can be reversed with impunity.

– Guinea-Bissau’s presidential poll has already failed the credibility test
– https://theconversation.com/guinea-bissaus-presidential-poll-has-already-failed-the-credibility-test-269461

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Kirsten A Donald, Professor of Paediatric Neurology and Development, University of Cape Town

Children in many countries are growing up surrounded by violence. It may happen at home, in their neighbourhoods, or both. Some children are directly harmed, while others witness violence between caregivers or in their communities. Either way, the impact can be profound.

Evidence shows that the relationship between violence exposure and poor mental health can be seen even before a child is old enough to go to school. Researchers are learning that early adversities can have lifelong consequences.

We are researchers in paediatric neuroscience and psychology who set out to understand how early experiences of violence are shaping young children’s cognitive and emotional health in low- and middle-income countries. Here we discuss our findings from a review of studies from 20 countries and new data from a large cohort of children in South Africa.

We found that violence exposure is extremely common in all the countries we looked at and that its effects on mental health are already visible in childhood.

The response will require action at all levels – families, communities, health systems and governments.

Gaps in the research

Early childhood (birth to 8 years) is a critical period for emotional, social and cognitive development. Mental health or cognitive difficulties that begin in the preschool years can shape children’s relationships, learning and wellbeing well into adolescence and adulthood. Yet, little is known about how violence affects children in the early years in low – and middle-income countries, where violence rates can be high. Most research focuses on school-age children or adolescents, missing the window when prevention may be most effective, in early childhood.

We aimed to fill that gap by collating existing knowledge and generating new evidence from South African children. This formed the basis of co-author Lucinda’s PhD thesis.

First, we reviewed 17 published studies from 20 low- and middle-income countries, examining how violence exposure affects children’s cognitive functioning. Second, we used data from almost 1,000 children in the Drakenstein Child Health Study, a long-running birth cohort in a peri-urban community outside Cape Town. We examined these children’s exposure to different types of violence by age four-and-a-half and assessed their mental health at age five.

What we found

Sadly, our findings revealed that violence exposure is extremely common.

The review found that over 70% of the studies drawing from 27,643 children from 20 countries, aged up to 11, across four continents, reported poor cognitive outcomes associated with experiencing maltreatment, intimate partner violence and war.

In our South African cohort, by age 4.5 years, 83% of children were exposed to some form of violence. This included witnessing community violence (74%), witnessing domestic violence (32%), and being direct victims in the community (13%) or at home (31%). Nearly half (45%) experienced more than one type of violence.

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Read more: Why South Africa’s children are vulnerable to violence and injuries

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In many countries, early exposure to violence is not exceptional. It is a normal part of growing up for many children.

Regarding how violence affects mental health in early childhood, the South African data showed that preschool children exposed to more violence displayed more internalising symptoms, such as anxiety, fear, or sadness, and externalising symptoms, such as aggression, hyperactivity, and rule-breaking. Experiencing violence at home and witnessing violence in the community were particularly linked with these difficulties.

One of the clearest findings was that multiple exposures compounded the risk. Children who experienced both domestic and community violence were at particularly high risk of mental health difficulties, especially experiencing externalising symptoms.

Public health challenge

These results highlight a major public health challenge, which starts early. These patterns appear before school entry, suggesting that violence exposure can alter developmental pathways well before formal education begins.

Since the risks from mental health difficulties linked to violence were visible by age five, waiting to intervene until school-age misses a crucial opportunity.

Impacts to wellbeing in early childhood can cause some children to internalise distress and others to act out, but both can disrupt learning, relationships and future mental health.

It is a stark reality that in some communities, most children are affected by violence. Individual therapy alone cannot fix a problem this widespread. It is a population-level issue. Broader community and policy responses are needed, such as the INSPIRE strategies developed by the World Health Organization.

Where to from here

The reality is grim and calls for quick and informed action at all levels: families, communities, health systems, and governments. A successful response will include:

1. Early identification: Health and community services should routinely ask about violence exposure, including witnessing violence, during early childhood visits.

2. Support for families: Interventions that reduce domestic violence, strengthen parenting skills, and provide mental health and social support can protect both children and adults.

3. Addressing community violence: Safer neighbourhoods, violence prevention efforts and policing reforms should be implemented and also clearly linked with child mental health strategies in policy wording.

4. Policy that prioritises early childhood: Governments and NGOs should embed early violence prevention and child mental health promotion into national health and education strategies.

5. Monitoring and revising strategies: Improving data collection and data quality will help track progress and inform improvements to further interventions.

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Read more: Violence against children carries a huge cost for Africa: governments need to act urgently

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Violence exposure in early childhood is widespread in low- and middle-income countries and has clear impacts on young children’s mental health. These effects emerge early, grow with multiple exposures, and require early intervention at every level. Protection and support are essential to build healthier and safer communities for the future.

There is hope as some organisations in South Africa are working to prevent violence against women and children, and intervening for those affected.

– Violence is a normal part of life for many young children: study traces the mental health impacts
– https://theconversation.com/violence-is-a-normal-part-of-life-for-many-young-children-study-traces-the-mental-health-impacts-268512

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Danny Bradlow, Professor/Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancement of Scholarship, University of Pretoria

The end of South Africa’s G20 presidency does not mean the end of its ability or responsibility to promote the issues it prioritised during 2025. It can still advocate for action on some of these issues through its further participation in the G20 and in other international and regional forums.

In this article, I argue that going forward South Africa should prioritise the financial challenges confronting Africa that it championed in 2025.

South Africa established four overarching priorities for its G20 presidency. Two of them dealt with finance. One sought to “ensure debt sustainability for low-income countries”. The other was to mobilise finance for a just energy transition.

The importance of debt, development finance and climate to Africa’s future is clear. Over half of African countries are either in debt distress or at risk of being in distress. More than half of Africa’s population live in countries that are spending more on servicing their debt than on health and/or education.

In addition, 17 African countries experienced net debt outflows in 2023. This means that they were using more foreign exchange to pay their external creditors than they received in new debts that could be used to finance their development. The continent is also experiencing extreme weather events that are adversely affecting food security and human wellbeing.

In short, African countries are caught in a vicious cycle. The impacts of climate and their struggle to meet their debt obligations are interacting in ways that undermine their ability to meet their sustainable development goals.

South Africa’s priorities

South Africa’s priorities for its G20 presidency were ambitious. Success required meaningful action at three levels:

Awareness. South Africa would need to bring the international community to a better understanding of the nature of the debt and development finance challenges confronting African countries and of the consequences of failing to address them.

Process. South Africa would need to convince the G20 to correct the shortcomings in the Common Framework it had devised to deal with low-income countries seeking debt relief.

The examples of Zambia and Ghana showed that the Common Framework was cumbersome, slow and unduly favourable to creditors. For example the framework requires the debtor to engage separately with each group of its creditors in a sequential process. This means that it should not negotiate with its commercial creditors until it has successfully negotiated with its official creditors.

Commercial creditors can’t give debt relief until the official creditors are satisfied with their deal and are confident that the commercial creditors will not receive more favourable treatment from the debtor than they have received.

Another complication is the IMF’s multiple roles in debt restructurings as an advisor to and a creditor of the debtor countries. In addition, it does the debt sustainability analysis that determines the amount of debt relief that all other creditors are expected to provide to the debtor country in order for it to regain debt sustainability. The more optimistic its assessment, the smaller the contributions the various creditors, including the IMF, are expected to provide. These contributions can either be in the form of new funding or new debt terms.

Substance. The current debt restructuring process treats debt as a technical financial and legal problem rather than as the complex multifaceted problem that is experienced by debtor countries. The former perspective limits the scope of debtor-creditor negotiations to the terms of the financial contracts.

The negotiations focus on the adjustments that must be made to these terms because the debtor cannot comply with its originally accepted obligations. They treat as largely outside the scope of the discussions the adverse impact the debt situation has on the sovereign debtor’s other legal obligations and on the social, political, environmental and cultural situation in the debtor country.

This approach in effect leaves the debtor to deal with these other issues on its own. This artificial distinction between the debtors’ other legal obligations and those it owes to its creditors makes it very difficult for the debtor to escape the vicious debt, development and climate cycle in which it is trapped. It forces it to choose between its commitments to its creditors and its development obligations.

Over the course of 2025, South Africa has been very effective in raising awareness of the African debt crisis and its dire impact on African countries. South Africa persuaded the G20 finance ministers and central bank governors to issue a declaration on debt sustainability at the end of their October meeting.

The declaration is the G20’s eloquent acknowledgement of the problem and of the need for more discussion of how these debt issues are managed by both debtors and creditors. Unfortunately, it does not contain any firm G20 commitments on what it will do to remedy the situation.

There has not been substantial progress at the process and substance levels. This is unlikely to change in the remaining weeks of South Africa’s G20 presidency.

But there are three actions that South Africa can take beyond the end of its term to ensure that the African debt crisis continues receiving attention.

Three actions

First, it should ask a group like the African Expert Panel that it established to advise the president to prepare a technical report that identifies and analyses all the barriers to Africa accessing affordable, sustainable and predictable flows of external development finance.

This report should be submitted to the South African president in the first half of 2026. Next year, South Africa will still be a member of the G20 Troika, which consists of the current, immediate past and the incoming G20 presidents. Consequently, next year, it will still be able to table the report at the G20. South Africa can also use the report to promote action in other appropriate regional and global forums.

Second, South Africa and the African Union should create an African Borrower’s Club that is independent of the G20. This club should be a forum in which African sovereign debtors can share information and lessons learned about negotiating sovereign debt transactions and about responsible debt management. When appropriate, the club can work with regional African financial institutions.

The club, working with regional organisations like the African Legal Support Facility, can also sponsor workshops in which interested African sovereign debtors can share information and more critically assess their financing options. They can also work to improve their bargaining capacity in sovereign debt transactions.

The African Borrower’s Club should also be mandated to establish an African Sovereign Debt Roundtable that is modelled on the Global Sovereign Debt Roundtable. This entity should be an informal forum, based on the Chatham House Rule in which the various categories of stakeholders in African debt can meet to discuss the design of a sovereign debt restructuring process that is effective, efficient and fair and that adopts an holistic approach to a sovereign debt crisis.

Third, South Africa should capitalise on the fact that the impacts of climate, inequality, unemployment and poverty on Africa’s development prospects are now acknowledged to be macro-critical, and so within the IMF’s macro-economic and financial mandate. South Africa should call for a review of the IMF’s operating principles and practices and its governance arrangements.

This call should note that the multilateral development banks have been the object of G20 review for a number of years and that this has resulted in important enhancements in their capital frameworks and operating practices. On the other hand the IMF has not been subject to a similar review despite the fact that its operations have had to undergo possibility even more extensive revisions.

– Africa has a debt crisis: momentum from G20 in South Africa can help find solutions
– https://theconversation.com/africa-has-a-debt-crisis-momentum-from-g20-in-south-africa-can-help-find-solutions-269004