Category: The Conversation

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Henning Melber, Extraordinary Professor, Department of Political Sciences, University of Pretoria

All that’s left of a famous settlement called the Old Location in Windhoek, Namibia, is a graveyard and a monument to remember the residents who were killed while protesting their forced removal in 1959.

But a new open source book documents how the spirit and culture that drove resistance are kept alive by those who lived there.

After the Old Location massacre the national liberation movement Swapo would be founded to fight for independence.

The Windhoek Old Location tells the residents’ stories with historical images by Dieter Hinrichs and words by Henning Melber. We asked Melber more about the site.

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What is a township and can you give us a brief history of this one?

Townships were established in southern African settler colonial societies by white minority regimes. They created reserves for ethnic groups classified as “tribes” to separate whites from other local communities in cities and towns.

In Namibia, the Old Location was the main residential area for Africans in the capital, Windhoek. The settlement was established from 1903 during German colonial rule. After the first world war German colonies were handed over to allied powers and South Africa was entrusted with the administration of its neighbour, turning it into a province-like entity.

Following South Africa’s apartheid doctrine, Black Namibians were physically separated by ethnic classification. The Old Location was then just called a Location. Residents were from various local ethnic communities, living together peacefully and sharing a common identity in daily life.

But since the late 1950s the residents were relocated to a new, ethnically subdivided township that had been demarcated further from the capital’s “white” city centre where many worked as underpaid labourers. The so-called Coloureds and Rehoboth Basters would then be separated and moved to a new suburb, Khomasdal.

When the Location’s “Native Advisory Board” was asked for a name for the new destination, it suggested Katutura. Through ignorance of the meaning of this Otjiherero word (“A place where we do not stay”), the proposal was adopted.

Towards the end of 1959, boycotts and demonstrations in protest of the forced removal were organised, mostly by women. On 10 December some 13 people were killed and many more injured in a clash with the police. The day is remembered as Human Rights Day/Namibian Women’s Day.

Residents who refused to move were deported to reserves. All homes were demolished. This destruction followed South Africa’s policy to raze established communities to establish white suburbs. The Location was closed in August 1968.

A year earlier, in August 1967, the first clash between South African soldiers and armed fighters of the liberation movement Swapo took place in the north of the country. The trauma of the forced removals from the Old Location was a turning point for a liberation struggle that would last until independence in 1990.

What role does memory play in telling this story?

The Old Location’s history has so far been preserved mainly in archives and people’s memories. We wanted it to be available in the public sphere. The book documents resilience and the determination to resist apartheid. It also highlights the unique social interaction in the Old Location.

It includes many personal memories. Bience Gawanas, chancellor of the University of Warwick, was born in the Old Location in 1956. Her father was a motor mechanic who owned a shop and filling station. He opposed the forced removal. In her preface she stresses the need

to tell our stories to bring back the values of humanity and community in our lives…

Uazuvara Katjivena, who published his grandmother’s story of the German genocide in Namibia, emphasises in his postscript:

Documenting aspects of what happened then and the lives we had under apartheid … are an important reminder that we did not surrender.

The voices of former residents recall a community nurtured by a spirit of extended family and solidarity. Zedekia Ngavirue, the Location’s first social worker, was involved in the resistance. Years later he said:

It was, indeed, when we owned little that we were prepared to make the greatest sacrifices.

For many, the Old Location was a place of security and harmony. Daniel Humavindu remembers:

The Old Location created a great family in which residents looked out for each other.

According to former resident Petrina Rina Tira Biwa:

The segregation we experienced when we moved to Katutura was not there.

“On Saturdays,” stressed educator and activist Ottilie Abrahams, “you are at the football field. Everybody used to go there, like a religion.”

And former resident Anna Campbell remembers two of the Location’s most famous bands, Johannes Mareko’s and Laydon’s:

It was safe to attend the dances. We also had films.

Why are the photos so important?

The book’s photos offer an authentic face and they capture the atmosphere of the time. They were taken mainly in 1959 and 1960 by young German photographer Dieter Hinrichs. After training in Germany he took a temporary job in a Windhoek photo studio. In his spare time he took the photos that today offer a rare glimpse into Black social realities of the time.

They show ordinary daily life and cultural activities. Dancing competitions were a weekend entertainment. Church events created togetherness. Every year the Location’s Coon Carnival would invade the Windhoek inner city.

Alongside these photos are others of the loss and pain that characterised the move to Katutura. In contrast, family portraits staged in the atelier of the local photo shop reclaim individual pride and dignity.

Aerial views contrast the motley Old Location with the soulless drawing board design of Katutura. The photo gallery in the book reveals humanity, an essential antidote to the dehumanisation of apartheid.

What happened after the bulldozers?

Katutura became a kind of open-air prison, where access was controlled and people were under constant observation. But they did not capitulate. Their struggle took new forms.

Katutura became the operational base for organised underground activities of the resistance. The Swapo Youth League was constituted there.

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Read more: Namibia celebrates independence heroes, but glosses over a painful history

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Those forced to live at “a place where we do not stay” entered new forms of social interaction. A thriving music scene blending local township tunes with pop culture kept alive the spirit of the Old Location. But much of its genuine social fabric faded.

What do you hope readers will take away?

That history matters. That the heroic narrative of a patriotic national historiography under a former liberation movement as government is not the whole story.

The often-nameless heroines and heroes deserve recognition. History hasn’t got just one truth to offer. Memories are mixed and even contested. Accounts of ordinary living conditions must be part of history.

So, the book attempts to restore a significant element of the struggle for liberation in formation. But also remembers the many forms of oppression under apartheid. It’s important to us that the book is in the public domain.

I hope the book can motivate a younger generation of Namibian scholars and activists to explore the country’s culture of resistance. Those still alive to remember get fewer.

– Windhoek’s Old Location was a place of pain, but also joy – new book
– https://theconversation.com/windhoeks-old-location-was-a-place-of-pain-but-also-joy-new-book-266151

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Brooks Marmon, Post-doctoral Scholar, Mershon Center for International Security Studies, The Ohio State University

Edson Sithole was born in what was then Southern Rhodesia in 1935. He was the first black person in southern Africa to obtain a Doctor of Laws degree. He was the second black person in the country (which became Zimbabwe in 1980) to qualify as a lawyer, and co-founded Rhodesia’s African Bar Association in 1973.

Sithole was an anti-colonial nationalist. He was “disappeared” alongside his secretary, Miriam Mhlanga, in downtown Salisbury (present-day Harare) 50 years ago. Brooks Marmon, a historian of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle, has compiled and edited a forthcoming collection of Sithole’s writings, speeches and interviews.

Who was Edson Sithole? Why does he matter in Zimbabwe’s history?

He was one of the most prominent pan-African nationalists who had not gone into exile, a major legal and intellectual force behind multiple Zimbabwean liberation movements.

Despite his important intellectual and organisational contributions to Zimbabwe’s independence struggle, he is best remembered today for the sensational nature of his elimination from the political scene. He left the Rhodesian press club at a downtown hotel in Salisbury on 15 October 1975, and was never seen again.

The 50th anniversary of Sithole’s elimination is an apt time to recover his political voice. Sithole was a prolific writer but much of his work appeared in periodicals that were banned and silenced by settler authorities.

What’s new in this collection?

The contributions in the book highlight four themes: Sithole’s views on pan-Africanism; his experience as a political prisoner; his views on intra-nationalist factionalism; and his search for a settlement with white Rhodesians.

Sithole’s voice is supplemented by my own biographical account of his political life.

Given Zimbabwe’s struggles with political pluralism, the section on factionalism is especially illuminating. A recurring theme is Sithole’s rivalry with one of the leading protagonists of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle, Joshua Nkomo. Coupled with Sithole’s overlooked membership in several breakaway liberation movements, a holistic view of his independent character emerges.

This was particularly notable in an era in which an absolute commitment to unity was a key facet of the defining ideology of the struggle, pan-Africanism.

What role did he play in the liberation struggle?

Sithole was an executive member of four Zimbabwean liberation movements. In 1964 he became the publicity secretary of Zanu-PF, Zimbabwe’s current ruling party, then known as the Zimbabwe African National Union. He was that party’s chief spokesperson 60 years ago this November when the colony’s small white minority unilaterally declared its independence from Britain.

The last decade of Sithole’s life was spent trying to end this rebellion and usher in genuine independence under majority rule.

When the Conservative British government appeared poised to reach a settlement favourable to continued white domination, Sithole co-founded the African National Council (ANC) in December 1971. Its opposition to the tentative accord forced the British government to abandon that effort to reconcile with their settler “kith and kin” in Rhodesia.

White minority rule dragged on for eight more years and thousands lost their lives in the struggle to affect a change, including Sithole.

Sithole’s intellectual profile was particularly impressive as he spent more than half of his adult life as a political prisoner. He was first detained in 1959 at the age of 23. He completed a master’s degree in law from the University of London via correspondence during that first stint of restriction. During a second period of imprisonment, he completed most of his work toward a Doctor of Laws from the University of South Africa.

Why was 1974 such a pivotal year?

In April 1974, the hardline Estado Novo regime in Portugal was overthrown in a military coup. It soon became clear that Portugal would dismantle its colonial empire, including Mozambique and Angola.

This development transformed the political scene in southern Africa. White Rhodesia was deprived of a major European ally and a secure border on its eastern flank. At the end of that year, all four of Zimbabwe’s major liberation movements united under the banner of the African National Council in Zambia.

For some of the most prominent Zimbabwean nationalists, such as Nkomo and Robert Mugabe, the Portuguese revolution resulted in their release from prison, culminating in their ascent to political power in independent Zimbabwe in early 1980.

Sithole, however, experienced no fruits of détente. Instead he became enmeshed in a political struggle with both the settler state and his erstwhile nationalist colleagues.

In early June 1975, intra African National Council violence erupted between factions loyal to its head, Abel Muzorewa, whom Sithole backed, and Nkomo, a long-time foe of Sithole, who had headed the Zimbabwe African People’s Union.

Nearly a dozen people were killed and Sithole was manhandled by Nkomo loyalists.

Near the end of the month, Sithole released a document which claimed that Nkomo and prime minister Ian Smith had reached a secret deal to elevate Nkomo to the head of the African National Council. Days later, Sithole developed severe stomach cramps. He declared that the settler state had poisoned him, an allegation backed by a Zambian doctor who treated him.

Tensions increased. The last month of Sithole’s life was consumed by attempts to derail any possible attempt by Nkomo and the Zapu element in the African National Council to reach an accord with the Rhodesian state.

What’s known about his abduction?

On Sithole’s last day as an independent man – 15 October 1975 – he held a press conference which accused the settler state of favouring Nkomo, whose faction had recently been allowed to hold a massive open-air meeting.

Two detectives visited Sithole at his office that afternoon and took a statement.

That evening, he made the short drive to the Ambassador Hotel in his blue BMW for drinks at the Quill Club.

Sithole left the hotel around 7pm, where a witness outside saw him met by two white and two black men who identified themselves as belonging to Rhodesia’s Special Branch. They escorted Sithole and his secretary into a grey Mazda van, a make typically associated with the renegade state’s security apparatus.

International media accounts identified Detective Inspector Winston Hart and Detective Section Officer George Mitchell as the two white men. As recently as April 2023, an interview with Hart about his service in Rhodesia popped up on YouTube.

Sithole was never seen again, although persistent rumours claimed that he had been seen in various government detention centres.

Sithole was just one of tens of thousands of individuals who died during Zimbabwe’s independence struggle.

Unlike South Africa, Zimbabwe did not embrace any formal transitional justice mechanism following independence. After Mugabe was voted into power, he announced:

We will be interested to get some evidence as to what happened to Dr. Sithole. (16 March 1980 issue of the Zimbabwean Sunday Mail)

Nothing substantial ever came out of the inquiry.

– Edson Sithole: new book uncovers the work of a thinker, lawyer and Zimbabwean freedom fighter who ‘disappeared’
– https://theconversation.com/edson-sithole-new-book-uncovers-the-work-of-a-thinker-lawyer-and-zimbabwean-freedom-fighter-who-disappeared-265765

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Barnaby Joseph Dye, Lecturer, King’s College London

Dams have been emblematic of the World Bank’s approach to development for many decades. From the bank’s early years in the 1960s and 1970s, large-scale infrastructure projects such as dams, power plants and transport networks were central to its strategy for economic growth and poverty reduction. This reflected a top-down modernisation paradigm.

But the controversial social, economic and environmental impacts of dams sparked widespread criticism. This prompted internal scrutiny and a reduction in funding by the 1990s. Notable examples included the bank’s withdrawal from India’s Narmada Dam and Nepal’s Arun III hydropower project. Both followed large-scale protests.

From 2007, the bank’s support for dams began to rise again, reflected in an increasing portfolio of projects. There were two main drivers. Hydropower gained renewed appeal as a low-carbon energy source. And infrastructure-led economic growth regained prominence in development policy. Yet, earlier debates were not erased: questions about social, environmental and political consequences continued to influence decision-making.

This begs the question of whether anything has changed. Does the World Bank approach dams differently today? Did past protests and policy reforms have a longer-lasting effect?

We are researchers examining the politics of development, with a focus on dam decision-making in Africa and South Asia. In a recent book chapter we show that debates over dams are far from settled. Reforms have strengthened planning, impact assessment and mitigation. But change has been gradual, contested and layered, reflecting the deeply political nature of large-scale infrastructure projects.

In the book chapter we trace how the World Bank’s approach to dams has shifted over decades. We ask whether reforms have genuinely altered how dams are built and their impacts.

The answer is nuanced. Reforms have improved planning, impact assessment and mitigation. These changes have indeed reduced negative social and environmental effects. But they have been introduced gradually, in layers, without fully replacing older practices.

Some negative impacts continue to be overlooked, and compensation schemes are often inadequate. The balance of trade-offs has shifted. Yet decades of reform have not resolved the tensions surrounding dam-building. These remain hotly debated both within and outside the bank.

This reveals the World Bank as a dynamic institution, shaped by debates and contestations. These take place within the organisation and from governments, communities and civil society. Policy-making and implementation are inherently contested processes. Both require careful negotiation, oversight and engagement.

Our findings highlight the importance of critical engagement and independent research to influence how large-scale infrastructure projects are planned and executed. And to bring alternative perspectives into institutional decision-making.

The evolution of dam-building

In the mid- to late 20th century, the World Bank championed large dam projects as engines of economic growth. The bank supported hydropower and irrigation infrastructure across Asia, Africa and Latin America. These projects often prioritised technical and financial feasibility over social and environmental issues.

The consequences were significant: widespread displacement, ecological damage and resistance from affected communities and advocacy groups.

Civil society, academic research and internal bank discussions increasingly criticised this approach. By the 1990s, development thinking began to shift. Greater emphasis was placed on participation, environmental safeguards, and social inclusion. Concepts such as sustainable livelihoods, social capital, and community-driven development gained traction. Participatory development approaches became more prominent.

The bank increasingly positioned itself as a “knowledge bank”. It began to emphasise data collection and local consultation alongside financing.

New mechanisms were introduced to embed participation and safeguard considerations. These included social and environmental impact assessments and stakeholder consultations. Yet these processes often operated within existing frameworks that continued to prioritise economic and engineering objectives. The result was that technical and financial considerations largely remained central.

Participation or performance?

In theory, local consultation and stakeholder engagement have become integral to the World Bank’s approach to dam development. In practice, however, these processes often serve more as legitimising tools than as genuine mechanisms for power redistribution.

For example, in Nepal, the World Bank’s subsidiary, the International Finance Corporation, promotes sustainable hydropower through stakeholder-based discussions and training programmes. Yet these initiatives frequently exclude key local actors. The focus instead remains on government agencies, industry representatives and international donors.

Similarly, at the Rusumo Falls Dam in Tanzania, resettlement action committees comprising affected communities were established to liaise with project authorities and advise on compensation. The committees provided a formal avenue for local input. But they had limited power to challenge national governments or alter major financial and infrastructural decisions.

In essence the bank co-opts critical voices while proceeding with its own priorities. Local communities can voice concerns. But their influence over the trajectory of development projects remains constrained.

Where change comes from

Scholars have often attributed shifts in World Bank policy to external pressures. These include civil society advocacy, intellectual debates on development and evolving global norms.

These factors certainly play a role. But our research highlights the importance of internal dynamics within the institution.

Competing factions within the bank generate tensions that drive both reform and continuity. For example, financiers focus on lending targets. Engineers prioritise large-scale infrastructure. Others advocate for social and environmental protections.

This internal contestation helps explain why new World Bank dam policies often fail to produce the expected outcomes. Policy evolution is gradual. New priorities layered onto existing frameworks. The result is a mixture of change and continuity.

Far from being a monolith, the World Bank is an institution shaped by ongoing internal debate. Different interests, factions and ideas rise and fall in influence over time.

Rethinking participation

Dams are a microcosm of broader development debates. They demand political choices and trade-offs between infrastructure needs, financing, environmental sustainability, social equity and economic impact.

The World Bank reflects these tensions internally, with competing priorities and factions shaping how decisions are made.

For those interested in meaningful reform, the challenge is to embed more inclusive governance and decision-making. Participation must go beyond token consultation. It should involve genuine power-sharing with affected communities, stronger accountability mechanisms and real influence over project outcomes.

– Dams for development? Unpacking tensions in the World Bank’s hydropower policies
– https://theconversation.com/dams-for-development-unpacking-tensions-in-the-world-banks-hydropower-policies-260947

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Nicodemus Minde, Researcher, United States International University

Tanzania has conducted regular polls since the first multiparty elections in 1995. But they have often failed to meet democratic standards. The opposition has been persistently excluded and restricted, and media freedoms and civil rights have been suppressed. This pattern has come to be identified as electoral authoritarianism.

Tanzania’s ruling party, Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), will seek to extend its dominance on 29 October 2025. It has been in power since independence in 1961, making it one of Africa’s longest-serving ruling parties.

I have studied Tanzania’s political party dynamics for a decade and in my view CCM’s candidate, Samia Suluhu Hassan, is destined for a landslide victory after the disqualification of two major opposition parties. Samia became president following the death in office of John Magufuli in 2021.

Chama Cha Demokrasia na Maendeleo (Chadema) was disqualified for refusing to sign the election code of conduct. The party’s chair, Tundu Lissu, faces treason charges for calling for electoral reforms. The presidential candidate of the second-largest opposition party, ACT Wazalendo, has also been disqualified following a petition filed by the country’s registrar of political parties.

This makes the election significantly different to the last poll, held in 2020. That year, opposition parties participated, despite electoral flaws. This time, the ruling party goes to the polls virtually unchallenged. It will be looking for a seventh consecutive election victory.

The campaign is now dominated by CCM at all levels. There are indications that voter turnout will be low, with little public enthusiasm, especially knowing that a CCM victory is certain. Since 2010 the voter turnout has been shrinking. The elections in 2010 and 2020 experienced notably low voter turnout, with rates of 42.7% and 50.7%, respectively.

Tanzania continues to experience a decline in democracy, accompanied by heightened political repression and restrictions on political rights and civil liberties. The country’s status in the Freedom House democracy index dropped from the Partly Free category in 2020 to the Not Free category going into 2025.

Polling

Tanzanian general elections include three main categories: presidential, parliamentary, and councillor seats. They take place across the mainland and Zanzibar, Tanzania’s semi-autonomous state.

The 2025 elections feature 272 constituencies, 222 of which are mainland and 50 of which are in Zanzibar. Eight new constituencies were created in the mainland earlier this year.

The Independent Electoral Commission announced that a total of 37.7 million people had registered as voters in the 2025 elections, compared to 29.8 million at the last election: a 26.55% increase. According to the commission this reflects a rise in population but critics allege a scheme to manipulate the vote during the elections.

The electoral commission has cleared 16 presidential candidates. Samia, a native of Zanzibar, is running for her first full term. Her running mate, Emmanuel Nchimbi, has deep roots within CCM.

Chadema has called for electoral reforms, a stance which has brought charges of treason and incitement against Lissu.

ACT-Wazalendo’s candidate Luhaga Mpina was barred from running after the attorney general said his party had not followed nomination procedures.

With Chadema and ACT-Wazalendo out of the presidential race in mainland Tanzania, Chama Cha Ukombozi wa Umma (Chaumma), a fringe party that has benefited from the defections of some Chadema members, has emerged as the only challenger.

Its presidential candidate and running mate are Salum Mwalimu and Devotha Minja, who defected from Chadema earlier this year.

Chaumma’s apparent campaign resources have led some to conclude that it is surreptitiously backed by the ruling party. Chaumma and the 15 other fringe parties run the risk of legitimising an already flawed electoral process.

In Zanzibar, incumbent Hussein Mwinyi of CCM is seeking another term. He faces competition from Othman Masoud of ACT-Wazalendo. This will be the first general election in Zanzibar without opposition icon Seif Shariff Hamad, who died in 2021. He was a perennial presidential candidate in Zanzibar, always claiming that he had won but never becoming president.

In 2010 a government of national unity was formed in which he became the first vice president in a gesture aimed at reconciliation.

Campaign issues

The CCM is promising to deliver a strengthened economy, infrastructure development and improved healthcare. It has also pledged a new constitution. This last promise is part of the rhetoric previously peddled during political campaigns.

When Samia took office in 2021, she initiated reforms that promised improvements in governance. These are long forgotten.

Chadema’s “No Reforms, No Elections” position continues to shape public discourse. The call has focused minds on the governance and human rights issues facing Tanzania. These include attacks on media freedom, the targeting of government critics, and gross violations of human rights and abductions.

It has had an effect too on international opinion of Tanzania. Several international organisations including the African Commission on Human Rights and the European Parliament have voiced their concern about the deteriorating human rights situation in Tanzania.

ACT-Wazalendo has resolved to pursue reforms by participating in the election, with the rallying call of Linda Kura (protect the vote).

What’s different (and what’s not) this time

There is a new electoral framework for the 2025 election.

Three new electoral laws were passed. These are the National Electoral Commission Act (2023), the Presidential, Parliamentary, and Local Government Elections Bill (2023), and the Political Parties Affairs Laws (Amendment) Bill (2023). These changes led to the establishment of a new electoral body, the Independent National Electoral Commission, with the promise of reforming the electoral system.

A multi-stakeholder engagement recommended changes to enhance the electoral body’s independence. On this basis, a government task force recommended the creation of an “independent” committee, chaired by the chief justice, to vet applications of electoral commissioners.

Despite these changes, the executive branch still maintains significant influence over the electoral structure and decision making. The president still has the powers to appoint the chair, vice chair and commissioners of the electoral body.

With the opposition pushed aside and a controlled electoral process under way, CCM’s victory is all but certain. The key question now is the future of Tanzania’s democracy.

– Tanzania’s ruling party has crushed the opposition – the elections are a mere formality
– https://theconversation.com/tanzanias-ruling-party-has-crushed-the-opposition-the-elections-are-a-mere-formality-265771

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Sioux McKenna, Professor of Higher Education, Rhodes University, South Africa, Rhodes University

The Sorbonne University, founded in Paris in 1253 and known globally as a symbol of education, science and culture, has just announced that, starting in 2026, it will stop submitting data to Times Higher Education (THE) rankings. It is joining a growing movement of universities questioning the value and methodology of these controversial league tables.

Rankings companies add together various indices that purport to measure quality. The indices include research outputs, the results of reputation surveys, the amount of money they receive in research grants and donations, and how many Nobel prize winners they have ever employed.

Nathalie Drach-Temam, president of the Sorbonne, stated that

the data used to assess each university’s performance is not open or transparent

and

the reproducibility of the results produced cannot be guaranteed.

This echoes wider concerns about the lack of scientific rigour of ranking systems that claim to measure complex institutional performance through simplified metrics.

The problem is that the general public believe that the rankings offer an indication of quality. As a result rankings have enormous influence over the market. This includes the choice of where to study and where to invest funding.

The university’s decision aligns with its commitment to the Agreement on Reforming Research Assessment, an agreement signed by over 700 research organisations, funders and professional societies, and the Barcelona Declaration, signed by about 200 universities and research institutes. Both advocate for open science practices to make scientific research, data, methods, and educational resources transparent, accessible and reusable by everyone without barriers. And both recommend “avoiding the use of rankings of research organisations in research assessment”.

The Sorbonne joins a growing list of high-profile institutions abandoning rankings. Columbia University, Utrecht University and several Indian institutes have opted out of major ranking systems. In the US, 17 medical and law schools, including Yale and Harvard, have withdrawn from discipline-specific rankings.

There are five major rankings companies and at least 20 smaller ones. On top of these are a similar number of discipline specific and regional rankings. Together they make up a billion dollar industry. Yet the rankings are accessible without charge.

The rankings industry has increasingly targeted African countries. It sees the continent as a new market at a time when it is losing traction among high profile institutions in the global north.

There has been a rapid increase in snazzy events run by rankings organisations on the continent. These events are very expensive and often quite luxurious – attended by vice-chancellors, academics, consultants and others.

As an academic involved in higher education teaching, I believe that chasing the rankings can harm Africa’s fragile higher education system. There are two main reasons for this.

Firstly, the rankings metrics largely focus on research output, rather than on the potential for that research to address local problems. Secondly, the rankings fail to consider higher education’s role in nurturing critical citizens, or contributing to the public good.

The Sorbonne’s decision reflects a growing body of opinion that the rankings industry is unscientific and a poor means of measuring quality.

Nevertheless, many vice-chancellors are not willing to risk the cost of withdrawing. Rankings might do a poor job of indicating quality, in all its nuanced forms. Nevertheless, they are very good at shaping public opinion. And even if a university chooses to stay out of the ranking by refusing to hand over its data, the industry continues to include it, based only on limited publicly available data.

The ranking industry

Rankings themselves are available for free. The ranking industry derives most of its revenue from reselling the data that universities provide. Universities submit detailed institutional data to ranking companies without charge. That information is then repackaged and sold back to institutions, governments and corporations.

This data includes institutional income. It often also includes contact details of staff and students. These are used for “reputation surveys”. In the case of QS University Rankings, “reputation” makes up more than 40% of the rankings.

This business model has created what can be described as a sophisticated data harvesting operation disguised as academic assessment.

Mounting criticism

Academic research has extensively documented the problems with ranking methodologies. These include:

• the use of proxy metrics that poorly represent institutional quality. For example, while many university rankings do not include a measurement of teaching quality at all, those that do, use measures such as income, staff to student ratio, and international academic reputation.

• composite indexing that combines unrelated measurements. The metrics that are collected are simply added together, even though they have no bearing on each other. Our students are repeatedly warned of the dangers of using composite measurement in research, and yet this is at the heart of the rankings industry.

• subjective weighting systems that can dramatically alter results based on arbitrary decisions. If the system decides to weight reputation at 20% and then make university income worth 10%, we have one order of institutions. Switch these weightings to make the former 10% and the latter 20% and the list rearranges itself. And yet, the quality of the institutions is unchanged.

Rankings tend to favour research-intensive universities while ignoring teaching quality, community engagement and local relevance.

Most ranking systems emphasise English-language publications. This reinforces existing academic hierarchies rather than providing meaningful assessment of quality.

Where new rankings are being introduced, such as the Sub-Saharan Africa rankings, or the Emerging Economies rankings, or even the Impact rankings, they sadly still have the problem of proxy measures, and composite and subjective weightings.

In addition, many of the ranking companies refuse to reveal precise methodological detail. This makes it impossible to verify their claims or understand on what basis institutions are actually assessed.

Researchers argue that rankings have thrived because they align with the idea of higher education as a marketplace where institutions compete for market share. This has led universities to prioritise metrics that improve their ranking positions rather than activities that best serve their students and communities.

The emphasis on quantifiable outputs has created what scholars call “coercive isomorphism” – pressure for all universities to adopt similar structures and priorities regardless of their specific missions or local contexts.

Research shows that striving for a spot in the rankings limelight affects resource allocation, strategic planning and even which students apply to institutions. Some universities have shifted focus from teaching quality to research output specifically to improve rankings. Others have engaged in “gaming” – manipulating data to boost their positions.

Looking forward

Participation in methodologically flawed ranking systems presents a contradiction: universities built on principles of scientific research continue to support an industry whose methods would fail basic peer review standards.

For universities still participating, Sorbonne’s move raises an uncomfortable question: what are their institutional priorities and commitments to scientific integrity?

– University ranking systems are being rejected. African institutions should take note
– https://theconversation.com/university-ranking-systems-are-being-rejected-african-institutions-should-take-note-265914

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Tim Forssman, Senior Lecturer, University of Mpumalanga

Museums are usually in cities. So, where transport is poor and it’s expensive to travel, many people can’t visit them. We decided to experiment with a way of getting around the problem: we built a travelling museum.

I’m an archaeologist working in the Limpopo Valley, in the north of South Africa, studying hunter-gatherers and the rise of precolonial kingdoms. I am interested in how crafted goods and local wealth shaped social relations and became the pillars upon which state society was built.

Together with Justine van Heerden, I designed a mobile museum to share our research. It’s a sturdy, portable cabinet with drawers that each tell a chapter of regional history. There are five layers, with the bottom ones stretching back over 250,000 years, and the top only a few hundred years. Inside the drawers are objects from teaching collections or which have been handed to us over the years, like pieces of pottery or stone tools.

We travel with our museum to the field, to conferences and to meetings with land-owners, and we have written a paper to share with our community what we’ve learnt about community engagement programmes, and why this initiative works.

Justine surveyed and interviewed people who saw our museum for her master’s research. The main lessons we learnt are that:

• people learn best from touching something, not just listening to a talk

• visits with the museum should be short and frequent

• people respond to seeing something that’s locally relevant

• “experts” can learn from community engagement.

To make it work, a travelling museum needs maintenance. Objects must be durable or replaceable. Facilitators need training. And the initiative needs funding.

But taking the museum to rural schools and communities matters. Giving people a chance to engage with their past signals that the past is theirs and that expertise grows where they are.

What it is (and why touch matters)

The oldest display in our mobile museum cabinet is from Earlier and Middle Stone Age tool makers. Younger items include a Later Stone Age or hunter-gatherer display, and the top drawer includes a display on our current research. Inside each are artefacts, replicas and teaching aids designed to be handled. No glass. No alarms. No “do not touch” signs.

We emphasised touching because learning changes when your hands are involved. Feeling the edge of a stone tool or the weight of a ceramic sherd (a piece of broken pottery) transforms an abstract idea (“people lived here a thousand years ago”) into something immediate (“someone shaped this with their hands”).

For people who are learning about concepts in the museum for the first time, that moment of contact is powerful. They are learning from their fingertips.

Who we work with

We use the travelling museum in three main settings:

• Schools and community centres in our research area of northern South Africa, where many artefacts we study originate. Teachers tell us it’s far easier (and cheaper) than bussing students to a city museum. But it is not confined to the area we work in and we’ve brought the museum to South Africa’s capital city, Pretoria, and Skukuza in the east of the country to present heritage to interested groups, including students from abroad.

• Field visits and public talks, where elders, park staff and local guides share knowledge that seldom makes it into display labels. On a tour to the northern Kruger National Park, when we visited local archaeological sites such as Thulamela with the South African Archaeology Society, the museum accompanied us and we presented it to the group as an evening lecture.

• Importantly, the museum visits university classrooms regularly. Here, it acts as a bridge between lectures and excavations; students practise describing, recording and interpreting real materials before heading into the field. Showing up with something useful – something that makes learning easier and more enjoyable – goes a long way.

Learning from a travelling museum

A mobile display doesn’t replace a traditional museum, which stores, conserves, researches and presents a variety of items. But it does what big buildings can’t: reach people where they are, on their terms, at short notice, without a ticket price.

We’ve learnt that even 30 minutes of guided handling beats an hour of talking. Holding an artefact, which might be hundreds of years old, can be a profound experience.

We plan multiple small sessions instead of one large event. This allows us to regularly engage, revisit groups and present our museum in various ways. We’ve also produced posters, videos and slideshows about the exhibit.

Local relevance is key. People light up when objects and stories come from places they know, where they live, or where they’ve travelled to.

There is a risk with our approach. Letting the public touch objects means wear and tear. We manage that with robust replicas and careful choice of what we present. We believe that respectful risk is necessary because of the benefits it leads to.

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Read more: What it’s like curating ancient fossils: a palaeontologist shares her story

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A travelling museum takes upkeep, money, planning and partners. Incorporating it into our research programme overcomes many of these challenges and tells the story of what we’re doing.

Why this matters beyond archaeology

Mobile museums are about equity as much as education. If cultural heritage remains behind glass in places that may be difficult to visit, it quietly reinforces the idea that knowledge lives elsewhere and belongs to someone else.

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Read more: Looting of the Sudan National Museum – more is at stake than priceless ancient treasures

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It is also not only about facts, but about exchange and connections. It’s about ownership and voice. When people handle the finds that came from their region, they ask different questions and offer different insights. Those conversations often redirect our research questions too. We’ve often been struck by people’s desire for a deep connection with the past.

Heritage is a public good, and it surrounds us in South Africa – it’s in the hills, caves, under earth and in our backyards. If it clusters around privilege, it narrows the stories a society can tell about itself.

– Museum in a box: on the road with South Africa’s heritage
– https://theconversation.com/museum-in-a-box-on-the-road-with-south-africas-heritage-266108

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the Witwatersrand

Love her or loathe her, it is hard to deny that Helen Zille is one of the most remarkable politicians South Africa’s democracy has yet seen. Remarkable because she has served in so many high-profile public roles – as mayor of Cape Town, premier of the Western Cape province, leader of the opposition, and leader of the Democratic Alliance before later becoming the party’s federal chair, and wielding power behind the scenes.

She has never steered clear of controversy, and indeed, revels in it in a way which discomforts her opponents.

She is both feared and respected for her intelligence, diligence, hard work, determination, competence, courage, integrity – and let’s face it, not a little dose of arrogance, which at times has led her unnecessarily into trouble, as with her infamous “colonialism” tweet, which caused widespread offence.

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Read more: Zille, tweeting and inanity: more reasons for white South Africans to shut up

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But this points to another quality she has as a politician: she has a thickness of skin which would make a bull elephant blush. Additional to all this, there has never been any taint of financial scandal about her throughout her long years in public life.

So you can see why her political opponents, and particularly the African National Congress (ANC), are running scared following the announcement by the Democratic Alliance that she will be their candidate for mayor of Johannesburg in the local elections in 2026. At age 74, she ain’t no spring chicken, but she can still do a respectable dance, and intends to waltz her way into the mayoral chair.

However, she may well become the best mayor Johannesburg has never had.

Why she might win

Zille has pitched her running for mayor as a “local gal returning to her roots”, where she grew up, where she worked as a journalist and where, she tells us, she fell in love in a city she has always loved and knows back to front.

And why?

Because she is coming to save it, descending from the clouds of Democratic Alliance heaven in Cape Town – a city it has run since 2009 – to rescue the good citizens of Johannesburg from ANC hell. An ANC, she tells us – and who can deny it? – which has manufactured political instability and municipal collapse. An ANC which has collapsed the most basic of services so that taps in many areas run dry, sewage swamps the pot-holed roads, household waste mounts up, and electricity supply has become erratic. An ANC which has allowed corruption to thrive.

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Read more: Johannesburg’s problems can be solved – but it’s a long journey to fix South Africa’s economic powerhouse

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Zille does not lack confidence and she talks a good talk. Local government is not rocket science, she says. It’s common sense, it’s getting down to basics, it’s about political will, it’s about proper management of resources. It’s about having the competence and determination to ensure that water flows through the pipes again, that electricity is restored, roads are repaired, and collection of waste is secured.

And how is this to be done? By streamlining the city’s administration, by rationalising its bureaucracy, cutting back the fat, and increasing the investment in maintenance and infrastructure which the ANC has so lamentably allowed to lapse. No community, no suburb will be ignored.

Nirvana is in prospect – but only if she is given the chance to restore the city to its former glory.

We should not doubt that Zille is propagating a gospel that appeals beyond the boundaries of traditional Democratic Alliance support. She has already received the vocal support of one-time prominent ANC praise-singers, such as former University of the Witwatersrand vice-chancellor Adam Habib and Ebrahim Harvey, biographer of former president Kgalema Motlanthe.

Both have pronounced a verdict that will justify defection from the ANC: Johannesburg is in a crisis brought on by ANC misrule and a vote for Zille will not be a vote for the Democratic Alliance, but a vote for the one person with the character, competence and drive to turn the city around.

Although their heresy may not be enough to convince traditional ANC supporters to break with the past, it may appeal to their children, who are not so bound by their grandparents’ and parents’ loyalties.

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Read more: Africa’s city planners must look to the global south for solutions: Johannesburg and São Paulo offer useful insights

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Zille had to climb over other Democratic Alliance bodies to win her nomination and has doubtless left some bruised egos in her wake. But this will not stop the DA uniting behind her.

The party smells blood, and it’s coloured the black, green and gold of the ANC. Win control of Joburg, hang on to Cape Town, and the Democratic Alliance will be running South Africa’s two major economic hubs. Turn Joburg around, provide a better life for all its citizens regardless of where they live, and the Democratic Alliance will hope to shed its reputation as the party for whites and the well-off, positioning itself nicely for the next general election. It’s a great scenario for the Democratic Alliance.

But there are obstacles in the way.

Why she might lose

To become mayor, Zille will need the backing of a majority of Johannesburg’s 270 seat council. At the last local election in 2021, the ANC emerged as the largest party with 33% of the vote and 91 seats. The Democratic Alliance came in second with 26% and 71. What followed initially was a Democratic Alliance minority government, before this was collapsed in September 2022 by the Economic Freedom Fighters (29 seats) throwing its lot in with the ANC, which took office as the major party in a coalition.

It all became a messy and disheartening story for Johannesburg’s voters, who saw the politicians scrabbling for power and perks while the city went into decline. But it demonstrates what the Democratic Alliance is up against.

And, as Zille has acknowledged, the mixed-member proportional electoral system used in local elections makes it enormously difficult for any single party to win an absolute majority. Even if the Democratic Alliance emerged as the largest party, it would have to fish for support among other parties to form a viable coalition.

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Read more: South African local government elections: why a great deal hangs on the outcome

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Meanwhile, Zille has ruled out striking any deal with the Economic Freedom Fighters and is equally unlikely to strike any agreement with Jacob Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe Party. Perhaps she might be able to do a deal with the ANC in an echo of the government of national unity? Or will the ANC be so averse to joining a council led by Zille that it opts for what the DA terms a “doomsday coalition” with the EFF and/or MK?

Much will depend on the nature of the campaign, and whether Zille can avoid making the gaffes to which she is prone. In her speeches to black audiences she must avoid sounding like Madam condescending to Eve – the two characters in a popular South African cartoon strip.

Furthermore, however irrelevant they may be to local government, she may struggle to sidestep broader political issues, such as whether she is prepared to declare Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

Yet Zille will count on voters wanting to have water in their taps.

The Iron Lady’s last stand?

The DA is risking much in putting Zille forward for mayor in Johannesburg. It knows she antagonises as many voters as she attracts and that she never fails to provoke controversy. But the party clearly sees her as well worth the gamble. She has name recognition far and wide. She will draw attention. She is guaranteed to provoke debate. She will ensure that the party’s existing voters turn out in droves while large swathes of the ANC’s supporters may stay at home.

The Democratic Alliance also knows that Zille’s nomination will ensure that the race in Johannesburg will attract national attention and is banking on it reverberating in its favour nationally. And it also knows that this is very possibly the Iron Lady’s last stand.

If she does become mayor, Zille will be 75 when she gets the job, and if she serves a full term, she will be 80 come the following local election. Many within the DA may be reckoning that, at that point, Zille will conclude that it is time to call it quits and exit the political arena gracefully to join the knitting circle in the retirement home in Cape Town where she lives. Even she will conclude by then that she will be too old to continue.

Surely she would, wouldn’t she? Don’t count on it.

– Helen Zille: will competence, courage and a dose of arrogance be enough to get her elected as Johannesburg’s mayor?
– https://theconversation.com/helen-zille-will-competence-courage-and-a-dose-of-arrogance-be-enough-to-get-her-elected-as-johannesburgs-mayor-266220

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Misheck Mutize, Post Doctoral Researcher, Graduate School of Business (GSB), University of Cape Town

One of the commitments the South African presidency of the G20 made in its policy priorities document at the beginning of 2025 was to push for fairer, more transparent sovereign credit ratings. And to address the high cost of capital caused by an illusive perception of high risk in developing economies.

South Africa proposed to establish a commission to look into the cost of capital. In particular, to investigate the issues that impair the ability of low- and middle-income countries to access sufficient, affordable and predictable flows of capital to finance their development.

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Read more: Rating agencies don’t treat the Global South fairly: changes South Africa should champion in G20 hot seat

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For many in Africa, this was more than a bureaucratic statement. It represented the first real chance for countries in the global south to challenge the entrenched power of international credit rating agencies through the G20. Through the influence of their opinions, Moody’s, S&P Global Ratings and Fitch Ratings are at the centre of driving the high cost of borrowing in Africa.

But the window of opportunity for advances to be made on this are narrowing. The South African government and the country’s business community have not used the opportunity provided by the G20 presidency to press for reforms that could reduce Africa’s borrowing costs and strengthen its financial sovereignty.

Why credit ratings matter so much

Credit rating agencies are not neutral observers of financial markets. Their judgements directly shape investor sentiment, access to finance and the interest rates countries pay when issuing bonds.

For developing countries, especially in Africa, ratings determine whether a government spends its scarce resources on debt servicing or on development needs such as schools and hospitals.

The problem is not just the ratings themselves but the inaccuracy and subjectivity of how they are determined.

Developing economies have frequently complained about several rating challenges.

First, African countries are more likely to be given rating downgrades that aren’t supported by economic fundamentals than countries in other regions.

Second, subjective risk factors are applied by pessimistic rating analysts who are based outside the continent.

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Read more: Rating agencies and Africa: the absence of people on the ground contributes to bias against the continent – analyst

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Third, developing economies are penalised on the basis of the speculative impact of external shocks such as global pandemics or climate-related disasters.

Lastly, there are significant variations in the weights allocated to risk factors in Africa compared to peer countries with relatively similar risk profiles in Asia and Latin America.

A missed leadership opportunity

The G20 remains the key global forum where both the major advanced economies and the most influential developing economies sit together. As chair, South Africa has the power to shape the agenda, shape working groups and drive communiqués that influence global discourse.

But so far, the proposed cost of capital commission has not been established. It is fair to assert that South Africa’s G20 presidency has not used this platform to redress the cost of capital issue. Its engagements on credit rating reform have been limited to reiterating talking points. There’s no evidence of structured proposals dedicated to the issue.

This inaction is surprising given that South Africa itself is no stranger to the sharp end of credit rating decisions. In the past eight years, a series of downgrades by the international rating agencies pushed the country’s debt deep into “junk” status. These decisions have raised borrowing costs and dented investor confidence. Pretoria therefore has both experience and legitimacy to lead a reform conversation on sovereign ratings.

In addition, South Africa’s corporate and financial sector – its banks, insurers and institutional investors – have remained largely on the sidelines.

Platforms such as the Cost of Capital Summit, convened by the Business (B20) working group, Standard Bank, Africa Practice and the African Peer Review Mechanism, were useful. But South Africa’s business community has failed to seize its country’s G20 presidency as a lever to press for reforms that would benefit not only domestic firms but also African partners.

Lower sovereign borrowing costs in host countries, for example, would directly reduce macroeconomic risks for South African corporates operating across the continent and expand their investment opportunities.

What could have been done

Three concrete steps could bring the issue of credit rating reform back onto the agenda.

• Mainstream credit ratings in the G20 technical task force agenda. Its Communique should clearly reflect that ratings are the gatekeepers of capital by determining borrowing costs, shaping investor sentiments and ultimately determining how much fiscal room governments will have to finance development.

• Recognise and champion the Africa Credit Rating Agency (AfCRA) as one of the mechanisms to address cost of capital in Africa. The African Union has already endorsed the establishment of a continental agency to complement global credit rating agencies. South Africa should use the G20 platform to raise the initiative’s profile, attract technical support and encourage global investors to consider its assessments.

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Read more: Africa’s new credit rating agency could change the rules of the game. Here’s how

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The cost of inaction

According to UNCTAD, developing countries pay interest rates up to three percentage points higher than peers with similar fundamentals, amounting to billions of dollars annually in excess costs.

This “hidden tax” on development has direct human consequences. Fewer resources for infrastructure, climate adaptation, health systems and education. For Africa, where financing needs are immense, more accurate credit ratings could unlock vital fiscal space.

South Africa cannot afford to let its G20 presidency drift into symbolism. The promise of “fairer, more transparent” sovereign credit ratings must be translated into action, through task forces, communiqués and alliances that advance reform.

Pretoria also needs its business sector to step up. This is not only a moral imperative. It’s also an economic one.

Lower risk premium and fairer access to capital will expand opportunities across the continent, including for South African investors. The world is watching. If South Africa fails to lead, it will confirm suspicions that rhetoric about reforming the global financial architecture is little more than lip service. If it seizes the moment, however, it could leave a legacy far greater than its own domestic struggles. The beginning of a fairer, more accountable system of sovereign credit ratings for the global south.

– Africa’s borrowing costs are too high: the G20’s missed opportunity to reform rating agencies
– https://theconversation.com/africas-borrowing-costs-are-too-high-the-g20s-missed-opportunity-to-reform-rating-agencies-265766

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Caroline Southey, Founding Editor, Africa, The Conversation

US president Donald Trump’s address to the annual gathering of the United Nations general assembly in late September 2025 set a new low in international relations. Trump delivered a broadside attack on multilateralism – the effort to solve the world’s problems through collective endeavour – as well as issues that have found common cause among rich and poor countries alike, such as climate change.

So where does this leave the work of organisations such as the G20? The body was set up by the G7 in 1999 in the wake of the Asian financial crisis. The purpose was to create a bigger grouping of countries to help manage the governance of the global economy.

The group now represents about 67% of the global population and about 85% of the global economy. But it’s a strange beast: it is a self-selected group, which raises questions about its legitimacy. And it doesn’t have a permanent secretariat, which makes its work cumbersome.

We asked four leading scholars for their answers. Given the changing global context, is the G20 still useful?

– G20 in a changing world: is it still useful? Four scholars weigh in
– https://theconversation.com/g20-in-a-changing-world-is-it-still-useful-four-scholars-weigh-in-266065

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Steven C. Roach, Professor of Internatiional Relations, University of South Florida

Salva Kiir, the president of South Sudan, met with then US president Barack Obama at the White House in 2011 to discuss the future of the newly independent state.

Officials seated at the table were eager to hear about the vision for the political stability of the new country. But when Obama asked Kiir about his plan, Kiir turned to his chief advisor for an answer.

In my view, Kiir has never – then, or since – had a vision or plan to unify the country. This view is informed by my decades of research on the country and on-the-ground experience. I am a professor of international relations and the author of a book on South Sudan’s politics. I also served as a country expert for the United States Agency for International Development’s assessment team in South Sudan.

What’s happened since independence in 2011 is that Kiir has financed a patronage network and put his political rivals at arm’s length by keeping the country undeveloped and its institutions weak. Through the years, he has relied on the support of his cabinet and a tribal base of followers (he is from the Dinka community) to sow deep distrust of the opposition.

I researched this dynamic of governance in South Sudan in a recent study. I found that the country’s leaders have devised four fundamental strategies to exploit instability. These strategies are:

• delaying elections to evade accountability

• repressing any actors, such as civil society, that seek to unify the nation and modernise the state

• playing up the threat of rebellion from political rivals to sustain violence and project fear

• leaning on regional conflicts to hold on to power.

As a result, instability and division have shaped the country’s political system. This has been enabled by informal patronage networks, war and denial, but also through the behaviour and actions of a corrupt ruling elite.

Instability has allowed the elite to undermine the justice system and actively suppress efforts at reconciliation.

This highlights the need to place more power in regional and international actors to hold South Sudan’s leaders accountable, while empowering civil society to promote such accountability.

A troubled short history

South Sudan gained independence from Sudan on 9 July 2011.

Growing distrust among the country’s elites soon led to the outbreak of civil war between 2013 and 2015. The war resulted in nearly 400,000 deaths, with 2.3 million people fleeing to neighbouring countries.

Pressure from the UN and the United States saw warring parties agree to a peace deal in August 2015. However, tensions rose again in July 2016, leading to a fresh wave of violence.

In 2018, a new peace deal was signed, but it has yet to be fully implemented. Ensuing turmoil has led to implementation delays and exposed the country’s rampant corruption.

South Sudan is one of Africa’s poorest countries. Yet, it’s also ranked as the most corrupt country in the world, according to Transparency International. A recent report issued by the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan found

The ensuing cycle of grand corruption aided by total impunity has produced a devastating humanitarian and human rights crisis.

The 2018 peace agreement led to the formation of a Transitional Government of National Unity, and renewed hope that the country would work toward democracy, stability and the rule of law. Unlike the 2015 peace deal, which involved negotiations with a few parties, the 2018 agreement brought several more groups to the table.

But the country has yet to hold its first elections, adopt a permanent constitution, integrate the armed forces or establish a war crimes court. It remains a fragile country torn by violence and turmoil.

In March 2025, for instance, Kiir arrested his main rival and former vice-president Riek Machar. He accused Machar of planning a rebellion against the government. A few months later in September, Machar was accused of treason.

Relations between Kiir and Machar have been strained since 2013, derailing efforts to implement the peace deal that stopped a war pitting forces loyal to Kiir against those allied to Machar.

The strategies at play

Instability has become a favoured tool among elites for maintaining political power. The process of governing through instability relies on four political strategies.

First, Kiir has used instability to delay the implementation of key pillars of the 2018 peace agreement. In October 2024, Kiir announced the postponement of long-awaited elections to 2026. He warned that there was too much instability to hold peaceful elections. This delay did little to stem violence or instability. In fact, it simply afforded Kiir more time to stave off efforts to hold government elites accountable.

Second, the government has used the threat of political instability to downplay the need for justice and democracy. This threat became a tool for repressing civil society actors and justifying their exclusion from the peace process in 2018.

Third, instability fuels political uncertainty, giving the government space to stoke fears of rebellion whenever it suits its interests. Such fears have been repeatedly exploited in the power struggle between Kiir and Machar.

Lastly, an increase in regional instability has extended, and in some ways complicated, the state’s ability to govern through instability. On one hand, regional conflicts have forced Kiir to assume a diplomatic posture for managing conflicts in neighbouring countries, such as in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan. On the other hand, the spillover effects of war have hit South Sudan. Sudan’s civil war, for instance, has pushed South Sudan to the brink of renewed violence. A recent break in an oil pipeline linking the two countries has cut nearly 40% of South Sudan’s oil revenue.

The next steps

One way forward for South Sudan is to devise an effective strategy for succession in the country’s leadership.

Kiir, who has been in poor health, has taken steps toward a succession plan.

The president singlehandedly appointed Benjamin Bol Mel, his former advisor and money man, as an apparent successor in February 2025. He sacked two of his vice-presidents, Kuol Manyang Juuk and Daniel Awet Akot – the two main dissenting voices left in the government – in May 2025. Kiir then appointed his daughter, Adut Salva Kiir, to serve as a senior presidential envoy.

These decisions bypassed the ruling party’s procedures of appointing a successor, which require discussion and a vote on new appointees.

Kiir had argued that the 2018 peace agreement allowed him to appoint his own successor. However, allowing party procedure to determine the outcomes of a successor would be far more likely to calm tensions.

Moving beyond the dynamic of instability will also depend on the pressure placed on Kiir and other national elites by key international donors, and their continued support of civil society actors.

Neither option seems particularly possible at the moment. With civil war raging in Sudan and the US having dismantled the United States Agency for International Development (which provided nearly US$16 million in aid to civil society programmes in 2023), South Sudan’s fragility is unlikely to improve any time soon.

– South Sudan is unstable: how a weak state benefits the ruling elite
– https://theconversation.com/south-sudan-is-unstable-how-a-weak-state-benefits-the-ruling-elite-265198