Category: The Conversation – Africa

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Riona Indhur, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Durban University of Technology

Microplastics are the crumbs of our plastic world, tiny pieces that come from bigger items breaking apart or from products like synthetic clothing and packaging. They’re now everywhere. Scientists estimate there are about 51 trillion of these particles floating in the world’s surface waters, and low levels have even been found in South African tap water.

That’s worrying because these particles can carry chemicals and bad bacteria, get eaten by fish and other wildlife, and may end up in our bodies.

We’re water scientists who are looking for ways to solve this problem. In a recent study, we tested a practical fix: two “magnetic cleaning powders” that can attach onto microplastics in water; the combined clumps can then be pulled out using a magnet. These materials are called magnetic nanocomposites (think: very fine powders with special surfaces).

The idea is simple: mix a small dose of powder into the water, let it attract and attach to microplastics, and then use a strong magnet to remove the powder-plastic clusters, leaving cleaner water behind.

Around the world, researchers have tried many different methods to capture microplastics, but our study is among the first to show that magnetic nanocomposites can work effectively not only under laboratory conditions but also in real-world samples, including municipal wastewater and drinking water.

This is the first study to use these specific nanomaterials for microplastic removal, proving both their high efficiency and their practical potential. Most existing filters struggle to catch the smallest plastics, the ones most harmful to health and the environment. The next step is to test these powders on a larger scale and develop simple, affordable systems that households and water treatment plants can use.

How well do the powders work?

In our research we found that the powders were able to remove up to 96% of small polyethylene and 92% of polystyrene particles from purified water. When we tried the same approach in both drinking water and water coming out of a municipal wastewater treatment plant, the results were just as strong. In drinking water the removal was about 94% and in treated wastewater the removal was up to 92%.

Another finding from this study is that the size of the plastic particles matters. The smaller the microplastic, the easier it is for the powders to attach to it, because tiny particles can reach more of the powder’s special “sticky” surface. We saw very good results for small plastics (hundreds of micrometres), but bigger particles (3-5 millimetres) were hardly removed at all. This is because they don’t mix with the powder as well and there’s less surface for the powder to attach onto.

In everyday terms, these magnetic powders are excellent for the small microplastics that are hardest to catch with normal filters.

Now for the big question: why do the powders attach to plastic? Think of it as being like tiny magnets. The powder and the plastics have special surfaces. The powder has parts that are sticky for plastics. This stickiness happens because of different kinds of forces. The plastic and powders have opposite charges which pull them together or allow them to stick together.

The key point is that the powders are engineered or specifically made to grab onto plastics so that microplastics naturally cling to them in water.

Once the powders attach onto the microplastics, we use a strong magnet (magnetic force: 250kg) to pull the powder–plastic clumps out of the water. The plastics are then separated from the powder by washing and filtration, dried, and weighed. This allows us to check how much plastic was removed. The separated powders are regenerated and reused, while the plastics are safely discarded, preventing them from re-entering the water.

We also looked at real-world questions: can you reuse the powders? And are they safe? The powders themselves are made from safe, lab-engineered materials: tiny sheets of carbon and boron nitride (a material also found in cosmetics and coatings) that are coated with magnetic iron nanoparticles. This makes them stable in water, and easy to pull out with a magnet after they’ve captured the microplastics.

After three rounds of use, the tested powders were effective in removing plastics up to 80%. That means you don’t need a new batch of powder every time, which is important for keeping costs down. Treating 1,000 litres of water with this method costs about US$41 (R763), making it competitive with many existing treatment options.

For safety, we tested the filtered powder (the “filtrate”) on plant growth. The results showed minimal to no toxicity, as three different plants were able to grow well in the presence of the filtrate. This is a strong sign that the method is environmentally friendly when used as intended.

What does this study mean for households and cities?

In the short term, magnetic powders could be built into small cartridges or filter units that attach to household or community water systems, helping remove microplastics before the water is used for drinking or cooking.

But the bigger picture is just as important. Microplastics are not only a South African problem but are also a global pollutant that crosses borders through rivers, oceans, and even the air we breathe. Low-cost, scalable solutions such as magnetic powders can make a real difference in resource-limited settings, where advanced filtration systems are too expensive or impractical.

Looking ahead, further work will focus on scaling up the method, testing it under more diverse water conditions, and designing simple, affordable devices that households or treatment plants can adopt.

In short: this specialised magnetic powder can tackle a tiny pollutant with big consequences. With sensible engineering and careful recovery, magnetic nanocomposites offer a promising, practical path to clean water while protecting the ecosystem from microplastic pollution.

Riona Indhur has received the prestigious National Research Foundation (NRF) postdoctoral research fellowship (Scarce Skills).

The project was funded by the National research Foundation and Water Research Commission of South Africa

– ref. We tested if a specialised magnetic powder could remove microplastics from drinking water: the answer is yes – https://theconversation.com/we-tested-if-a-specialised-magnetic-powder-could-remove-microplastics-from-drinking-water-the-answer-is-yes-264058

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Laura Ferguson, Associate Professor, Population and Public Health Sciences, University of Southern California

Globally, nearly half of the deaths of children under five years are linked to malnutrition. In Kenya, it’s the leading cause of illness and death among children.

Children with malnutrition typically show signs of recent and severe weight loss. They may also have swollen ankles and feet. Acute malnutrition among children is usually the result of eating insufficient food or having infectious diseases, especially diarrhoea.

Acute malnutrition weakens a child’s immune system. This can lead to increased susceptibility to infectious diseases like pneumonia. It can also cause more severe illness and an increased risk of death.

Currently, the Kenyan national response to malnutrition, implemented by the ministry of health, is based on historical trends of malnutrition. This means that if cases of malnutrition have been reported in a certain month, the ministry anticipates a repeat during a similar month in subsequent years. Currently, no statistical modelling guides responses, which has limited their accuracy.

The health ministry has collected monthly data on nutrition-related indicators and other health conditions for many years.

Our multi-disciplinary team set out to explore whether we could use this data to help forecast where, geographically, child malnutrition was likely to occur in the near future. We were aiming for a more accurate forecast than the existing method.

We developed a machine learning model to forecast acute malnutrition among children in Kenya. A machine learning model is a type of mathematical model that, once “trained” on an existing data set, can make predictions of future outcomes. We used existing data and improved forecasting capabilities by including complementary data sources, such as satellite imagery that provides an indicator of crop health.

We found that machine learning-based models consistently outperformed existing platforms used to forecast malnutrition rates in Kenya. And we found that models with satellite-based features worked even better.

Our results demonstrate the ability of machine learning models to more accurately forecast malnutrition in Kenya up to six months ahead of time from a variety of indicators.

If we have advance knowledge of where malnutrition is likely to be high, scarce resources can be allocated to these high-risk areas in a timely manner to try to prevent children from becoming malnourished.

How we did it

We used clinical data from the Kenya Health Information System. This included data on diarrhoea treatment and low birth weight. We collected data on children who visited a health facility who met the definition of being acutely malnourished, among other relevant clinical indicators.

Given that food insecurity is a key driver of acute malnutrition, we also incorporated data reflecting crop activity into our models. We used a NASA satellite to look at gross primary productivity, which measures the rate at which plants convert solar energy into chemical energy. This provides a coarse indicator of crop health and productivity. Lower average rates can be an early indication of food scarcity.

We tested several methods and models for forecasting malnutrition risk among children in Kenya using data collected from January 2019 to February 2024.

The gradient boosting machine learning model – trained on previous acute malnutrition outcomes and gross primary productivity measurements – turned out to be the most effective model for forecasting acute malnutrition among children.

This model can forecast where and at what prevalence level acute malnutrition among children is likely to occur in one month’s time with 89% accuracy.

All the models we developed performed well where the prevalence of acute child malnutrition was expected to be at more than 30%, for instance in northern and eastern Kenya, which have dry climates. However, when the prevalence was less than 15%, for instance in western and central Kenya, only the machine learning models were able to forecast with good accuracy.

This higher accuracy is achieved because the models use additional information on multiple clinical factors. They can, therefore, find more complex relationships.

Implications

Current efforts to predict acute malnutrition among children rely only on historical knowledge of malnutrition patterns. We found these forecasts were less accurate than our models.

Our models leverage historical malnutrition patterns, as well as clinical indicators and satellite-based indicators.

The forecasting performance of our models is also better than other similar data-based modelling efforts published by other researchers.

As resources for health and nutrition shrink, improved targeting to the areas of highest need is critical. Treating acute malnutrition can save a child’s life.

Prevention of malnutrition promotes children’s full psychological and physical development.

What needs to happen next

Making these data from diverse sources available through a dashboard could inform decision-making. Responders could get six months to intervene where they are most needed.

We have developed a prototype dashboard to create visualisations of what responders would be able to see based on our model’s subcounty-level forecasts. We are currently working with the Kenyan ministry of health and Amref Health Africa, a health development NGO, to ensure that the dashboard is available to local decision-makers and stakeholders. It is regularly updated with the most current data and new forecasts.

We are also working with our partners to refine the dashboard to meet the needs of the end users and promote its use in national decision-making on responses to acute malnutrition among children. We’re tracking the impacts of this work.

Throughout this process, it will be important to strengthen the capacity of our partners to manage, update and use the model and dashboard. This will promote local responsiveness, ownership and sustainability.

Scaling up

The Kenya Health Information System relies on the District Health Information System 2 (DHIS2). This is an open source software platform. It is currently used by over 80 low- and middle-income countries. The satellite data that we used in our models is also available in all of these countries.

If we can secure additional funding, we plan to expand our work geographically and to other areas of health. We’ve also made our code publicly available, which allows anyone to use it and replicate our work in other countries where child malnutrition is a public health challenge.

Furthermore, our model proves that DHIS2 data, despite challenges with its completeness and quality, can be used in machine learning models to inform public health responses. This work could be adapted to address public health issues beyond malnutrition, like changes in patterns of infectious diseases due to climate change.

This work was a collaboration between the University of Southern California’s Institute on Inequalities in Global Health and Center for Artificial Intelligence in Society, Microsoft, Amref Health Africa and the Kenyan ministry of health.

This work was supported, in part, by the Microsoft Corporation.

Bistra Dilkina received in-kind support from Microsoft AI for Good for this work.

– ref. Child malnutrition in Kenya: AI model can forecast rates six months before they become critical – https://theconversation.com/child-malnutrition-in-kenya-ai-model-can-forecast-rates-six-months-before-they-become-critical-261075

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Elisa Gambino, Hallsworth Fellow in Political Economy, University of Manchester

For most of the past 25 years, Chinese construction companies operating in Africa could count on generous financial backing from Chinese banks. Between 2000 and 2019, Chinese funders committed almost US$50 billion to African transport projects. Most came from Chinese development finance institutions.

Six years ago, this started to change as Chinese lenders began to pull back. Since 2019, they have committed only US$6 billion for the development of Africa’s infrastructure. Yet Chinese companies continue to thrive on the continent. Many remain market leaders in the construction sector in a number of countries. These include Ethiopia, Ghana and Kenya.

To make sense of how Chinese companies continue to expand at a time of dwindling state funding, we looked at what makes them so successful in African markets. In a recent paper we set out the main drivers. We drew on our expertise on the activities of Chinese companies in Africa and undertook extensive fieldwork in China, Kenya and Ghana.

First, Chinese companies draw on their ties to the Chinese state to enter – or establish – their presence in a specific market. This was the case during the boom of Chinese-funded infrastructure projects across Africa. It continues to be the case for projects central to African countries’ development agendas.

Second, Chinese companies build trust-based relationships with other companies, governments and international organisations. This enables them to secure projects across borders and regions.

Third, companies rely on the everyday relations established with local politicians, officials, business people and intermediaries.

The key to market expansion is firms’ ability to shift between these strategies – sometimes leaning on the Chinese state, sometimes on other multinationals, sometimes on local elites. Our research found that support from the Chinese state was important for market entry. But it did not automatically translate into market survival or expansion. Instead, it is companies’ flexible expansion strategy that has made them so successful.

Our findings highlight that African governments and other local actors have a crucial role to play in shaping the activities of Chinese firms. Their policies and negotiation approach actively influence how these companies operate.

Our results also challenge the common assumption that Chinese companies are simply extensions of China’s foreign policy. We show that many Chinese firms increasingly behave like their western private counterparts: competing for contracts, partnering with other international actors, and adapting to local conditions.

This shift highlights the opportunities and responsibilities of African actors in shaping the impact Chinese companies have in their economies.

How Chinese companies do it

We collected data through research in China, Kenya and Ghana between 2018 and 2022. We studied various written sources, interviewed Chinese construction company staff, and spoke to African government officials and people, companies and organisations.

We also spent four months observing Chinese construction sites in Kenya and Ghana.

In the first place, the ties that bind Chinese companies to the Chinese state have long been a springboard for overseas expansion.

In Kenya, China Road and Bridge Corporation, a subsidiary of Africa’s largest international contractor, China Communication Construction Company, opened its local headquarters in 1984. At first, the road builder mainly worked as subcontractor for other Asian companies, gaining experience in “how to do business” in this African market. It later became the lead contractor for Chinese-financed megaprojects like the Nairobi–Mombasa Standard Gauge Railway.

State-backed loans gave the company large contracts as well as visibility and credibility with Kenyan authorities.

In Ghana, China Harbour Engineering Company, another China Communication Construction Company subsidiary, entered the market through a Chinese-financed agreement in the 2010s. The loan gave the harbour company a way in to the Ghanaian market and the opportunity to build long-term relationships.

During a pause in this project, it sought other projects by using its regional networks in west Africa.

Network building

Our evidence shows that Chinese firms operating in African markets cultivate trust-based networks beyond the realm of the Chinese state. These networks include other multinationals, both Chinese and non-Chinese, regional organisations, international financiers and African state actors.

In Ghana, China Harbour Engineering Company relied on its connections with international partners to “keep busy” while Chinese-funded projects stalled. It secured other port projects in west Africa by partnering with a consortium involving western multinationals.

These projects anchored the company in Ghana’s port sector. They also opened doors to further contracts funded by non-Chinese actors.

In Kenya, China Road and Bridge Corporation similarly expanded outside Chinese-funded projects by winning international tenders. The company’s bids were attractive as it was able to redeploy equipment and staff from nearby projects. This lowered the costs of getting started. For example, machinery and quarries used for the Nairobi-Mombasa railway were also used in the Kenyan government-funded Lamu port project.

The ability to mobilise resources across projects strengthens Chinese companies’ competitiveness in international tenders.

We found that Chinese firms embed themselves in local political and business environments. They develop individual relations with key political and business figures.

In Kenya, China Road and Bridge Corporation’s directors worked closely with politicians and ministries to anticipate infrastructure needs. In some cases, the company carried out feasibility studies before tenders were issued. It could then present ready-made projects, such as the Liwatoni bridge in Mombasa.

In Ghana, China Harbour Engineering Company relied on local intermediaries to navigate the politics of infrastructure development and secure contracts. Young professionals had ties to both Chinese managers and Ghanaian elites. The company also hired foreign consultants to bolster its reputation with local officials.

The implications

For African governments, this shift means that Chinese firms are no longer closely tied to Beijing’s priorities. They will participate in public tenders, invest in public-private partnerships and partner with other multinationals.

Negotiating these firms’ role in African economies will require a different strategy. It less focused on geopolitics and more on regulation of standards and alignment with industrial policy.

The next phase of Africa-China infrastructural engagement will not be defined by large Chinese loan packages. It will be driven by operational contexts, various alliances, and a competitive world market.

Elisa Gambino’s work was undertaken under the European Research Council advanced grant for the project ‘African Governance and Space: Transport Corridors, Border Towns and Port Cities in Transition’ (AFRIGOS; ADG-2014–670851) and with the support of a Hallsworth Research Fellowship in Political Economy held at the Global Development Institute of the University of Manchester.

Costanza Franceschini’s research was conducted under a PhD scholarship from the University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Human Sciences for Education ‘Riccardo Massa’, PhD Program in Cultural and Social Anthropology, and the financial support of the LDE (Leiden-Delft-Erasmus Universities) Research Centre PortCityFutures.

– ref. Chinese companies are changing the way they operate in Africa: here’s how – https://theconversation.com/chinese-companies-are-changing-the-way-they-operate-in-africa-heres-how-266173

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Peter S Millard, Adjunct Professor, University of New England

Voluntary medical male circumcision is one of the most important ways to reduce new HIV infections. The foreskin contains receptors that the HIV virus can attach to, and removing it reduces HIV transmission from women to men by about 60% .

But cost and access issues have been barriers for many men and boys in southern Africa. With US funding being cut for HIV programmes, it is increasingly important to scale up voluntary circumcision programmes using local resources.

Together with Bonginkosi Eugene Khumalo, head of circumcision programme at Northdale Hospital, KwaZulu-Natal, we did a study to evaluate the training of primary care providers to use Unicirc, a novel surgical instrument designed in South Africa according to World Health Organization (WHO) specifications.

Our new study describes an ongoing training programme being run by the Centre for Excellence (a long-standing circumcision training programme) at Northdale Hospital in KwaZulu-Natal, a province where traditional circumcision is not practised and which has the highest HIV prevalence in South Africa.

Unicirc is a simple, single-use circumcision tool made of metal and plastic. It’s pre-sterilised, disposable and designed for use by general healthcare workers not just specialists. This makes it safe and practical for use in local clinics.

The study demonstrated the practicality of training primary care doctors, nurses and clinical associates in Unicirc male circumcision.

Circumcision is an important HIV prevention method. It’s vital for countries to scale up services in a cost-effective way and to make them widely available in local areas.

How it’s done

Currently, almost all circumcisions are done by surgical cut and stitch techniques, where specially trained surgeons cut off the foreskin with scissors, then sew up the open wound. It can be done in a surgery under local anaesthesia, but men and boys need to be monitored closely afterwards to make sure all bleeding is stopped. It can cost anywhere between R1000 and R4000 in the private sector in South Africa.

Doctor Cyril and doctor Elisabeth Parker developed the method at their general practice in Cape Town in 2012. This new tool greatly simplifies circumcision so that it can be performed by medical personnel with basic training. It takes only 10 minutes, causes no bleeding, needs no injections or stitches. It results in a rapidly healing, cosmetically pleasing circumcision.

Thousands of these circumcisions have been performed at clinics in Cape Town and an area called Mitchell’s Plain, and nurses and clinical associates have been trained in the technique. Unicirc circumcisions are now being offered at nurse-run Unjani clinics in South Africa.

In the Northdale programme, Dr Cyril Parker and his colleagues trained 67 providers, the majority of whom were nurses and clinical associates. These are mid-level healthcare professionals who work under the supervision of a medical doctor to provide primary medical care. They performed these circumcisions on 1,240 men and boys with no serious complications. Trainees found it faster, simpler and with better results than other methods. The programme is ongoing, with trainees continuing to perform circumcisions safely.

Initially, none of the trainees had used Unicirc. Around 61% of trainees were men and 39% were women, showing a need to encourage more women to join. Nurses (46%) and doctors (45%) made up most trainees, and clinical associates the rest (9%). About 38% had no prior circumcision experience, while 33% were highly experienced in surgical circumcision. This shows the programme can train complete beginners as well as experienced providers.

Nurses and clinical associates are key to expanding cost-effective circumcision access, freeing up medical doctors for other tasks. A disposable, single-use tool reduces infection risks and is well-suited to clinics with limited resources.

What next?

The programme is moving into a phase focused on mentoring, quality checks and further expansion. If widely adopted, Unicirc could greatly improve access to safe, simple and rapid circumcision across resource-limited settings. It is simple enough to be used in traditional circumcision schools.

Along with effective treatment, prevention of mother-to-child transmission, and medication to prevent HIV infection, circumcision plays a critical role in HIV prevention efforts in Africa. Unlike traditional circumcision, voluntary medical circumcision is done under sterile conditions by trained providers with few complications and the ability to deal with any that do occur.

Several southern African countries started their national circumcisions programmes to prevent HIV in 2010. As of 2023, 37 million voluntary medical male circumcisions had been performed in 15 high priority African countries. Estimates are that one million HIV infections have been prevented, saving the cost of treating and monitoring those cases, and avoiding transmission to partners. Circumcision actually saves money in many countries.

Peter S Millard does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Male circumcision is made easier by a clever South African invention – we trained healthcare workers to use it – https://theconversation.com/male-circumcision-is-made-easier-by-a-clever-south-african-invention-we-trained-healthcare-workers-to-use-it-265307

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Ugljesa Radulovic, Senior Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Johannesburg

South Africa’s long history of wrongdoing spans from Willem Adriaan van der Stel’s days of running a corrupt trading monopoly to present-day South Africa. Van der Stel was the second Governor of the Cape Dutch Colony, from 1699 to his removal in 1707.

Whistleblowers have been at the core of exposing these instances of corruption.

Public whistleblowing was rare under apartheid (1948-1994). But with the transition to democracy, the reporting of wrongdoing increased. This can largely be attributed to a new constitution that caters for all the country’s citizens, and new laws that reinforced their rights.

One such law is the Protected Disclosures Act No. 26 of 2000, amended by way of the Protected Disclosures Amendment Act No. 5 of 2017. The law was designed to protect individuals who expose perceived wrongdoing to an authority that has the capacity to remedy the wrongdoing.

Yet, it has offered inadequate protection. South African whistleblowers have been overwhelmingly subjected to reprisals – from murder to social, work-related, and legal retaliation.

Our academic expertise is concerned with exploring the experiences of whistleblowers in South Africa, and making meaning of their plight.

In a recently published paper we give an account of the stories of a selection of whistleblowers spanning five decades. We selected a few stories that have set precedents in South Africa.

These cases offer only a glimpse into the experiences of South African whistleblowers. But what is clear is that, by fulfilling their public duty, they place themselves at great personal risk.

Adam Klein

Adam Klein was one of the rare whistleblowers who made a disclosure under apartheid rule. In 1980, Klein, a prosecutor in the Bantu Commissioner’s Court, refused to prosecute five black men under the pass regulations. These were a cornerstone of apartheid legislation, serving as an internal passport system to restrict the movement of non-whites and thus racially segregate the country.

Klein immediately faced retaliation. He was arrested under trumped-up charges, faced threats to his physical well-being and became subjected to surveillance.

He then made a public disclosure to the Sunday Times newspaper, exposing severe abuses at the Pretoria Bantu Commissioner’s Court. The disclosure revealed the inhumane nature of the pass laws, like detention of black people who failed to produce passes.

Klein faced further backlash and had to temporarily relocate to Namibia for his safety. On his return to South Africa, he continued to be subjected to surveillance and interrogation. He passed away in 2011, unacknowledged and without posthumous recognition.

Andries Jacobs

Andries Jacobs, an inspector at the Gauteng Provincial Traffic Department in the town of Benoni, would become known as the whistleblower who exposed police dogs being set on migrants. In January 1998, Jacobs recorded six policemen, who were part of the North East Rand Police dog unit, inciting their dogs to attack Mozambican migrants. Jacobs submitted the bombshell video footage to the Police Commissioner, the Minister for Safety and Security, and the South African Broadcasting Corporation.

The six police officers were eventually arrested in November 2000, nearly a full three years after the incident occurred. On the day of their arrest, the video footage was broadcast on national television. The policemen were charged and received prison sentences of four to five years.

Yet, Jacobs was suspended from work two days after the policemen were arrested. After eventually returning to work, he had to spend a year in the witness protection programme. Jacobs never returned to his original work duties, having not received a duty roster or any equipment to fulfil his role obligations.

Jacobs eventually faced dismissal for the unauthorised use of a video camera to record the “police training exercises”. By 2005, his life had been significantly strained. He received death threats, eventually leading to ongoing stress and a divorce.

Tatolo Setlai

One of the landmark cases of disclosure following the implementation of the Protected Disclosures Act in 2000 is that of Tatolo Setlai. In 2001, the Jali Commission of Inquiry revealed widespread corruption in South Africa’s prisons. Setlai, the head of Grootvlei Prison in Bloemfontein, permitted four prisoners to secretly record prison officials engaging in illegal acts – selling a loaded firearm, drugs, and alcohol; and facilitating the sexual exploitation of a juvenile.

This footage was broadcast on national television. The Department of Correctional Services did not adequately address the disclosure. Rather it subjected Setlai to victimisation and harassment. He faced trumped-up charges and was at the mercy of bogus disciplinary hearings.

Setlai was dismissed but eventually returned to his position after an arduous process with his employer at the Labour Court.

‘Stan’ and ‘John’

Under Jacob Zuma’s presidency (2009-2018), South Africa graduated from “ordinary” corruption. Private firms and individuals exploited corrupt public officials to manipulate key state structures for their personal benefit, and this would come to be understood as state capture.

Much of what was detailed during this time was the result of whistleblowers’ disclosures. Two anonymous whistleblowers, “Stan” and “John”, furnished landmark evidence to support the state capture allegations. They provided Brian Currin, a human rights lawyer, with hard drives containing hundreds of thousands of emails that detailed the nefarious relationship between the Gupta family, the Zuma family, ministers, and heads of state-owned enterprises. The Gupta family – three influential siblings and businessmen originating from India – were fingered as the key drivers behind state capture.

Stan and John’s disclosure became known as the Gupta Leaks. They were used as official evidence at the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into State Capture.

The two Gupta Leaks whistleblowers remain anonymous and have relocated abroad for their physical safety.

Paying with their lives

A number of whistleblowers have lost their lives as a consequence of disclosure.

Jimmy Mohlala, the Speaker of the Mbombela Municipality, was murdered in front of his home after he exposed tender irregularities related to the construction of the Mbombela Stadium for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. His son was injured in the attack.

Moss Phakoe, an African National Congress municipal councillor since 2002, was also shot in front of his home. He and a colleague compiled a dossier that exposed corruption in the Bojanala Platinum District Municipality. Phakoe’s report implicated the former mayor of Bojanala, who was convicted of the murder. The conviction was later overturned as several state witnesses retracted their testimonies.

The murder of Babita Deokaran, Acting Chief Financial Officer of the Gauteng Department of Health at the time of her death, attracted nationwide attention. She had uncovered extensive corruption in the Department and submitted evidence of this to the relevant authorities. She would later investigate corruption related to the procurement of personal protective equipment during the COVID pandemic.

Deokaran was on the brink of making a disclosure pertaining to the COVID-related corruption when assassins shot her after she dropped her child off at school. Six hitmen were arrested for the assassination, but the mastermind remains at large.

Lessons

The frequency and severity of retaliation against South African whistleblowers is alarming.

We conclude from our analysis that the problem resides in a failure of the government to recognise the dire situation South African whistleblowers find themselves in, compounded by lacklustre whistleblower protection legislation.

There has, however, been a signal of intent (and some action) in wanting to reinforce (or rebuild) South Africa’s whistleblower protection legislation.

But this has to be accompanied by political will to adequately implement the new legislation. There also has to be steadfast broader governmental sanctioning against those who do wrong.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. South Africans who blow the whistle face retaliation and murder: their stories over five decades – https://theconversation.com/south-africans-who-blow-the-whistle-face-retaliation-and-murder-their-stories-over-five-decades-266499

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Dan Paget, Assistant professor, University of Sussex

As Tanzania’s national elections approach, a familiar humdrum of coverage has emerged. It goes like this. In its crackdowns, censorship and harassment of the opposition, Tanzania is becoming increasingly repressive.

President Samia Suluhu Hassan, who is seeking re-election in the October 2025 poll, increasingly resembles her predecessor, John Pombe Magufuli. Before he died in office in 2021, he banned media, censored journalists, hamstrung the opposition and rigged elections. Hassan is reverting to his tactics to lengthen her advantage in the elections.

Yet, I would go further. Hassan has become, in key ways, more autocratic than Magufuli. She has crossed autocratic thresholds that have not been breached since Tanzania’s transition to multipartyism in 1992. Most crucially, she has put her chief opponent Tundu Lissu on trial for treason. She has kept another out of the presidential race.

I have been writing about autocracy in Tanzania and chronicling the struggles of Tanzania’s opposition for over a decade. From this vantage point, I describe what makes this election different.

Many authoritarian regimes today take the form of what political scientists call electoral authoritarianism. It is a mixture of the outward form of multiparty democracy and autocratic practices that tilt the playing field in the incumbent’s favour.

Yet, the steps taken by Hassan’s regime amount to something more draconian than this.

Barring your opponents from contesting the presidency is not tilting the playing field in your favour. As I argue in a recent paper, it is closing the playing field altogether. Tanzanian columnist Jenerali Ulimwengu noted in a recent column: “there is no competition worth the name”.

Hassan has broken Tanzania’s political norms, and done so now, it seems, because the international context permits it more than any time in the last 30 years.

The ominous implication of all this is that an era of autocratic rule – which is yet more extreme than any endured in the last 30 years – has arrived.

Crossing red lines

In one way or another, Tanzania’s regime has been autocratic for decades. The party in power today, Chama cha Mapinduzi, has been in power since independence from Britain in 1961.

When Tanzania moved to multiparty elections in 1992, the party strengthened an autocratic apparatus that has developed since then. The regime enjoyed baked-in advantages in funding, business ties, media control and state capture. This gave it a long advantage in elections. Since at least 2000, it has been rigging, annulling and otherwise manipulating elections in the semi-independent archipelago of Zanzibar.

By 2015, however, the mainland opposition, led by Chadema, had become competitive. In this context, under the leadership of then-president Magufuli, repression intensified.

Media were banned, opposition parties were knee-capped, journalists were censored, activists were persecuted, and at large, freedoms were infringed. In the 2020 elections, there appeared to be mass manipulation across Zanzibar and Tanzania for the first time.

In some respects, despite promises of change, Hassan has picked up where Magufuli left off after his death.

There were some democratic concessions in the unbanning of some media outlets and opposition political rallies.

In this context, the opposition started rebuilding.

Yet, the talk of reform was largely cosmetic. Repression continued. Media censorship ticked up and state-sponsored political violence climbed.

Political rallies remained permissible formally, but were increasingly banned in practice. Nationwide local elections in 2024 were reportedly manipulated at scale.

In this context, much coverage has understandably drawn analogies from Hassan’s presidency to Magufuli’s. Yet Hassan has been crossing democratic red lines that Magufuli never did, even if he might have wanted to.

The leader of the opposition has been charged with non-bailable offenses, twice.

Freeman Mbowe was charged with terrorism offences and held for 226 days until his release in 2022. His successor, Tundu Lissu, who survived an assassination attempt in 2017, has been detained since 9 April 2025. He’s now facing trial on charges of treason, a crime punishable by death.

Magufuli had these and other opposition leaders arrested a number of times. Yet he did not have them charged with offences of such magnitude. Nor did he have them held for so long.

Hassan has found a way to eliminate her other most significant competitor from the race. Luhaga Mpina was prevented from submitting nomination forms to enter the presidential election as the candidate for Alliance for Change-Wazalendo. This was after a last-minute intervention from the registrar of political parties, who is a presidential appointee.

The high court subsequently ordered that he be reinstated. However, four days later, the nominally independent electoral commission revealed its true loyalties by barring Mpina’s candidacy again. The case is still being litigated.

The consequence is that Hassan is running to be re-elected as the president of Tanzania opposed only by minor candidates.

This is a scenario without precedent since the reintroduction of multiparty elections in 1992.

In case the normal array of media control and military displays of force are not enough to quell the prospect of protest, the regime has shut down the internet early. It has not, as under Magufuli, imposed a post-election blackout. Instead, it has banned social media platforms X, Clubhouse and Telegram, which have been blocked nationwide. Vibrant local social media platform JamiiForums has been taken down. Meanwhile, the rhythm of state-sponsored violence against opposition activists has been maintained.

Zooming out

The upshot is that Tanzanians are witness to a remarkable split-screen. On one side, Hassan addresses enormous crowds at richly adorned rallies in what political researcher Nicodemus Minde has aptly called “a procedural coronation ritual”.

On the other, opposition leader Lissu has been escorted in and out of court, where, representing himself, he has been declaring his trial a political persecution.

In effect, a new era of authoritarianism is crystallising in Tanzania, one in which electoral competition is all but absent at the presidential level.

Hassan alone knows her true motives for these changes, but her actions should be read in the international context. Under President Donald Trump’s second term, the US has retreated from global democracy promotion. Heavy cuts in aid budgets have weakened the west’s political might.

In this context, Hassan seems to have explored her room for autocratic manoeuvre, and found international norms giving way before her.

She is not alone in doing so. Today, Turkish opposition leader Ekrem Imamoğlu is in jail awaiting trial on terrorism charges. Mozambican opposition leader Venancio Mondlane is awaiting trial facing terrorism offences.

Amid a world in flux, Hassan, and others, are testing what is left of a liberal world order. So far, they must like what they are finding.

Dan Paget is a member of the British Labour Party. He is in receipt of a research funding grant from the British Academy and the Leverhulme Foundation. He is will be in receipt of a Starting Grant from the European Research Council from January 2026.

– ref. Tanzania’s Samia Hassan has ushered in a new era of authoritarianism: here’s how – https://theconversation.com/tanzanias-samia-hassan-has-ushered-in-a-new-era-of-authoritarianism-heres-how-266598

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Saheed Babajide Owonikoko, Researcher, Centre for Peace and Security Studies, Modibbo Adama University of Technology

Abubakar Shekau, the erstwhile leader of the terrorist group Jama’at Ahl al-Sunna li al-Da’wa wa al-Jihad (JAS), died in 2021. The west African group, also known as Boko Haram, then fell into obscurity while its breakaway faction, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), steadily rose.

Early 2025 saw Boko Haram resurging in the Lake Chad region, however, with attacks in Nigeria and Cameroon. Lake Chad is in west-central Africa, in the Sahelian zone. It is located at the conjunction of Chad, Cameroon, Nigeria and Niger.

As a security studies scholar tracking Boko Haram, I discuss reasons for this resurgence, and its impacts, and recommend possible responses from Lake Chad region countries.

Evidence of Boko Haram resurgence

On 15 May 2025, Boko Haram massacred close to 100 residents of Mallam Karamti and Kwatandashi villages in Nigeria’s Borno State. A report has it that Boko Haram attacked the residents because they were loyal to, and served as informants for, Islamic State West Africa Province.

On 5 September, it attacked Darul Jamal village in Borno State, killing about 60 people. A researcher specialising in Boko Haram at the Institute for Security Studies, Taiwo Adebayo, was said to have spoken with residents of the community who attributed the attack to Boko Haram, possibly because of information about the group being shared with the Nigerian military.

There are also reports that the group has extended its reach beyond Lake Chad to North Central region of Nigeria, where it is operating with bandits and possibly Lakurawa, the new terrorist group in that region.

In Far North region of Cameroon, the group has also been active. Reports shared on LinkedIn showed that in July and August 2025, it was responsible for 101 attacks out of 144.

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Read more:
Ansaru terror leaders’ arrest is a strategic change for Nigeria: what could happen next

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What explains the resurgence

Four factors explain why Boko Haram has become more active again in the Lake Chad region.

First, the rise of one of its leaders, Bakura Doro, and his efforts to sustain Boko Haram gains over Islamic State West Africa Province.

Doro was the Lake Chad Amir al-Fiya (zone commander) before Shekau’s death. He was announced as the leader in May 2022 after a violent takeover from Sahalaba, a cleric whom Shekau had reportedly designated as his successor in his will. Doro reinforced Boko Haram by fighting Islamic State West Africa Province, killing members and capturing its territories in Lake Chad.

He also shunned media propaganda, thus taking the public gaze away from Boko Haram while it grew unnoticed. Although reports said Bakura was killed in Niger in August 2025, the group denied it.

The second factor is that it received less attention from the Lake Chad militaries. Instead, attention was on Islamic State for its targeted attacks on military outposts since early 2025.

By July 2025, 15 outposts had been attacked. The Lake Chad region countries’ counterterrorism efforts focused on countering ISWAP, dangerously neglecting Boko Haram.

The third factor is the failure of reintegration programmes across the region. In Nigeria, for one, community rejection, unmet government promises, limited political will and a weak framework have caused many ex-combatants to return to the trenches.

The fourth factor is combat stress or fatigue among soldiers of the Lake Chad region countries. For instance, more than 1,000 soldiers resigned from the army between 2020 and 2024 in Nigeria. Nigeria’s total armed forces personnel was estimated at 230,000 in 2020.

The weakened commitment of the countries to the Multinational Joint Task Force adds to the problem. Nigeria established the force in 1994 to checkmate trans-border armed banditry around the Lake Chad Basin. In 1998, Chadian and Nigerien soldiers joined the task force.

Niger’s withdrawal in protest against Ecowas sanctions; Chad’s declining support; and strained Nigeria-Cameroon relations have limited the effectiveness of the task force.

All this gives insurgent groups impetus to intensify their attacks.

Implications of resurgent Boko Haram

To understand the implications, it is essential to distinguish Boko Haram’s ideology from that of Islamic State. While the latter primarily targets military forces and non-Muslim communities, Boko Haram’s violence is aimed at all, except its members.

The attempt by Shekau’s successor, Sahalaba, to align with Islamic State West Africa Province’s more selective attacks led to his death, leaving Boko Haram rigidly committed to ruthless attacks.

The result might be a worsening of humanitarian conditions and disruption of community resettlement programmes in the region.

According to a June 2025 report of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the region hosts 2.9 million internally displaced people and 272,000 refugees. I believe this figure may rise as violence escalates. But donor funding is shrinking.

Boko Haram’s blend of jihad with criminal activities such as robbery and kidnapping not only sustains its operations but may also attract disaffected youth, given the region’s fragile socio-economic conditions, especially the high rate of poverty and unemployment.

The competition between both insurgent groups, and between them and the military, places civilians in danger. Each actor seeks local support and intelligence, and communities risk severe punishment if perceived as loyal to the opposing side.

A constraint currently confronting Boko Haram is the shortage of weaponry. To bridge this gap, I believe it may focus its attacks on military outposts across the region. They may be encouraged by the successes of Islamic State’s attacks on the military outposts and the transfer of combat experience and technical expertise from former Islamic State fighters who have defected to Boko Haram. If it joins the attacks against military outposts in the area, the consequences will be fatal.

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Read more:
The Lake Chad Basin is a security nightmare. 5 guidelines for finding solutions

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What can be done?

The governments and militaries of Lake Chad region countries should pay attention to Boko Haram as much as Islamic State in their counter-terrorism efforts.

There is a need to improve security cooperation among the countries by luring Niger back into the Multinational Joint Task Force and ensuring members’ commitment to the force.

Enhanced welfare services from the countries to their citizens can reduce incentives to join Boko Haram and other insurgent groups.

Strengthening defection programmes is crucial to prevent former terrorists from going back to groups like Boko Haram. I recommend harmonising regional deradicalisation efforts to enhance their effectiveness.

Saheed Babajide Owonikoko does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Boko Haram on the rise again in Nigeria: how it’s survived and how to weaken it – https://theconversation.com/boko-haram-on-the-rise-again-in-nigeria-how-its-survived-and-how-to-weaken-it-265691

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Anitia Lubbe, Associate Professor, North-West University

Across universities worldwide, a quiet revolution is underway. Generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT, Copilot, DeepSeek and Gemini are being used to produce essays, summarise readings, and even conduct complex assignments.

Generative artificial intelligence is a kind of AI that can handle a variety of creative tasks in diverse domains, such as arts, music and education.

For many university teachers, this raises alarm bells about plagiarism and integrity. While some institutions have rushed to restrict or support AI use, others are still unsure how to respond.

But focusing only on policing misses a bigger issue: whether students are really learning. As an education researcher, I’m interested in the topic of how students learn. My colleagues and I recently explored the role AI could play in learning – if universities tried a new way of assessing students.

We found that many traditional forms of assessment in universities remain focused on memorisation and rote learning. These are exactly the tasks that AI performs best.

We argue that it’s time to reconsider what students should be learning. This should include the ability to evaluate and analyse AI-created text. That’s a skill which is essential for critical thinking.

If that ability is what universities teach and look for in a student, AI will be an opportunity and not a threat.

We’ve suggested some ways that universities can use AI to teach and assess what students really need to know.

Reviewing studies of AI

Universities are under pressure to prepare graduates who are more than just knowledgeable. They need to be self-directed, lifelong learners who are independent, critical thinkers and can solve complex problems. Employers and societies demand graduates who can evaluate information and make sound judgements in a rapidly changing world.

Yet assessment (testing what students know and can do) tends to focus on more basic thinking skills.

Our research took the form of a conceptual literature review, analysing peer-reviewed studies published since the release of the AI tool ChatGPT in late 2022. We examined how generative AI is already being used in higher education, its impact on assessment, and how these practices align (or fail to align) with Bloom’s taxonomy.

Bloom’s taxonomy is a framework widely used in education. It organises cognitive (thinking) skills into levels, from basic (remembering and understanding), to advanced (creating and evaluating).

Several key patterns emerged from our analysis:

Firstly, AI excels at lower-level tasks. Studies show that AI is strong in remembering and understanding. It can generate multiple-choice questions, definitions, or surface explanations quickly and often with high accuracy.

Secondly, AI struggles with higher-order thinking. At the levels of evaluating and creating, its effectiveness drops. For instance, while AI can draft a business plan or a healthcare policy outline, it often lacks contextual nuance, critical judgement and originality.

Thirdly, the role of university teachers is changing. Instead of spending hours designing and grading lower-level assessments, they can now focus on scaffolding tasks that AI cannot master alone, thus promoting analysis, creativity and self-directed learning skills. Self-directed learning is defined as “a process where individuals take initiative to diagnose their learning needs, set learning goals, find resources, choose and implement strategies, and evaluate their outcomes, with or without assistance from others.”

Lastly, the opportunities AI presents seem to outweigh the threats. While concerns about cheating remain real, many studies highlight AI’s potential to become a learning partner. Used well, it can help generate practice questions, provide feedback, and stimulate dialogue (if students are guided to critically engage with its outputs).

All these challenges prompt universities to move beyond “knowledge checks” and invest in assessments that not only measure deeper learning, but promote it as well.

How to promote critical thinking

So how can universities move forward? Our study points to several clear actions:

• Redesign assessments for higher-order thinking skills: Instead of relying on tasks that AI can complete, university teachers should design authentic, context-rich assessments. For example, using case studies, portfolios, debates, and projects grounded in local realities.

• Use AI as a partner, not a threat: Students can be asked to critique AI-generated responses, identify gaps, or adapt them for real-world use. This transforms AI into a tool for practising the ability to analyse and evaluate.

• Build assessment literacy among university teachers: University teachers need support and training to create AI-integrated assessments.

• Promote AI fluency and ethical use: Students must learn not just how to use AI, but how to question it. They must understand its limitations, biases and potential pitfalls. Students should be made aware that transparency in disclosing AI use can support academic integrity.

• Encourage the development of self-directed learning skills: AI should not replace the student’s effort, but rather support their learning journey. Hence, designing assessment tasks that foster goal-setting, reflection and peer dialogue is crucial for developing lifelong learning habits.

By fostering critical thinking and embracing AI as a tool, universities can turn disruption into opportunity. The goal is not to produce graduates who compete with machines, but to cultivate independent thinkers who can do what machines cannot: reflect, judge, and create meaning. Assessment in the age of AI could become a powerful force for cultivating the kind of graduates our world needs.

Anitia Lubbe is affiliated with the Research Unit Self-Directed Learning.

– ref. Universities can turn AI from a threat to an opportunity by teaching critical thinking – https://theconversation.com/universities-can-turn-ai-from-a-threat-to-an-opportunity-by-teaching-critical-thinking-266187

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Charles Helm, Research Associate, African Centre for Coastal Palaeoscience, Nelson Mandela University

Rock hyraxes, known in southern Africa more often as “dassies”, are furry, thickset creatures with short legs and no discernible tails. They spend much of their time sunning themselves on rocky outcrops.

Another thing they sometimes do is drag their butts along the ground. Dog owners know that this behaviour can be a sign of parasitic infections; in hyraxes the reason seems to be less clear, but this action leaves distinctive traces in sandy areas.

Traces and tracks – ancient, fossilised ones – are what we study at the African Centre for Coastal Palaeoscience through the Cape south coast ichnology project. Over the past few decades, we have found almost 400 vertebrate tracksites on this coast, some as old as 400,000 years, in cemented dunes known as aeolianites from the Pleistocene epoch. This epoch lasted from about 2.58 million years ago to about 11,700 years ago.

We’re building up a picture of the environment during that period and how the animals and plants of that time lived.

Among our latest finds are two fossilised traces that appear to have been made by rock hyraxes long ago. One is a tracksite and the other is a butt-drag impression with what may be a fossilised dropping in it.

The probable tracksite was brought to our attention from a site near Walker Bay on the Cape south coast by an ardent tracker, Mike Fabricius. It is around 76,000 years old. We found the probable butt-drag impression east of Still Bay on the same coast, and it is most likely around 126,000 years old.

The butt-drag impression is the first fossil of its kind to be described from anywhere in the world. In addition, these are the only possible fossilised hyrax tracks ever to be identified. In the world of palaeontology, anything this unusual is important and we feel privileged to be able to interpret them.

Interpreting the drag mark

Dating on our sites has been done through a technique known as optically stimulated luminescence, which works by analysing when materials like sand were last exposed to light.

The butt-drag impression is 95cm long and 13cm wide. It contains five parallel striations. Its outer margins are slightly raised, and within it there is a 2cm-high raised feature, 10cm by 9cm. Clearly something was dragged across the surface when it consisted of loose sand.

We considered possible causes other than hyrax buttocks. These included a leopard or an ancestral human dragging prey, or perhaps an elephant dragging its trunk. Firstly, however, these would be expected to leave tracks, and secondly in such interpretations the raised feature could not be explained.

But if it was a hyrax, it would make sense, because the buttock trace would have come after the tracks and wiped them out. And the raised feature might be a coprolite: a fused fossilised mass of hyrax droppings.

Old dung and urine

Rock hyraxes leave much more than just tracks and butt-drag traces. Because they prefer rocky areas, their tracks are not often found, but they polish rock surfaces to a shiny finish. This is similar to what buffalo on the North American prairie do, creating “buffalo rubbing stones”.

Hyraxes also leave deposits of urine and dung. Urea and electrolytes are concentrated in their urine, and they excrete large amounts of calcium carbonate. This becomes cemented and forms extensive whitish deposits on rock surfaces. Due to their communal habits, hyraxes often urinate in the same preferred localities over multiple generations.

Their urine and dung often mix to form a substance known as hyraceum – a rock-like mass that can accumulate into extensive, dark, tarry deposits. Hyraceum has been used as a traditional medication to treat a variety of ailments, including epilepsy, and for gynaecological purposes.

Hyraceum may be tens of thousands of years old, and can be regarded as a threatened, non-renewable resource. The middens, being sensitive to environmental changes and containing fossil pollen and other evidence of ancient life, form valuable natural archives for interpreting past climates, vegetation and ecology.

Thinking of hyraceum as a trace fossil, something which apparently has not been done before, can help in the protection of this underappreciated resource.

Although fossilised urine is globally uncommon, there is a word to describe it: “urolite”, to distinguish it from “coprolite” (fossilised poop). It seems that hyraxes contribute the lion’s share of the world’s urolite. At palaeontology conferences, students can be seen sporting T-shirts that brazenly state: “coprolite happens”. In southern Africa, a more appropriate term might be “urolite happens”.

Through appreciating the importance of butt-drag impressions, urolites, coprolites and hyraceum, and learning about the environment of rock hyraxes and other animals during the Pleistocene, we will never view these endearing creatures in the same light again.

Mathilde Stuart contributed to this research.

Lynne Quick receives funding from the National Research Foundation of South Africa African Origins Platform (grant no: 136507)

Charles Helm does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. World’s first known butt-drag fossil trace was left by a rock hyrax in South Africa 126,000 years ago – https://theconversation.com/worlds-first-known-butt-drag-fossil-trace-was-left-by-a-rock-hyrax-in-south-africa-126-000-years-ago-264633

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Cormac Price, Post-doctoral fellow the HerpHealth lab, office 218, Building G23. Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, North-West University; University of KwaZulu-Natal

Black mambas (Dendroaspis polylepis) are Africa’s longest, most famous venomous snakes. Despite their fearsome reputation, these misunderstood snakes are vital players in their ecosystems. They keep rodent populations in check and, in turn, help to protect crops and limit disease spread. The species ranges widely across sub-Saharan Africa, from Senegal to Somalia and south into South Africa. They can adapt to many environments.

Zoologist Cormac Price, in new research with professors Marc Humphries and Graham Alexander and reptile conservationist Nick Evans, found that black mambas can be indicators of heavy metal pollution. We asked him about it.

How do black mambas indicate toxic pollution?

It’s about bio-accumulation. Bioaccumulation happens when chemicals, like pesticides or heavy metals, build up in an organism’s body. These toxins come from polluted environments, from waste products of human activities like manufacturing. They pollute water or soil and gradually accumulate in plants and animals.

If toxins are present in the environment, they may first be taken in by plants, and then by animals that eat the plants, and animals that eat those animals. Black mambas are quite high up the food chain, so a lot of the toxins would accumulate in their bodies. These poisonous substances can reach dangerous levels, causing health problems for whatever eats them.

We tested the presence of four types of heavy metals (arsenic, cadmium, lead and mercury) in the bodies of black mambas.

All our samples were from the eThekwini Municipality (greater Durban area) in South Africa. Durban is a busy shipping container port and has a large industrial sector that includes chemicals, petrochemicals and automotive manufacturing. Alongside all this industry the municipality also has a network of conservancies and green spaces, known as the Durban Metropolitan Open Space System.

We chose to test for these metals because they are widely used in different industries and can cause drastic negative effects in the body. Mercury primarily damages the nervous system, arsenic can cause cancer and skin lesions, cadmium harms kidneys and bones and lead mainly affects brain development and blood functions. Because these metals accumulate over time and are difficult to break down, even low-level exposure can lead to chronic poisoning and long-term health problems.

Black mambas appear to be doing well in Durban and taking advantage of the abundance of rodents, which they eat. Wherever there is human settlement there will be waste and discarded food which rodents take full advantage of. Black mambas can also be quite site-specific when not disturbed, living in the same refuge for many years, giving a clearer indication of pollution levels at that specific site. This makes the snakes potentially good bioindicator species.

A bioindicator species is one that helps us understand the health of an environment. Because they are sensitive to changes like pollution or habitat damage, their presence, absence or condition can reveal if an ecosystem is in good condition or is experiencing increases of pollution or degradation.

The pollutants can be detected and calculated from a non-invasive, harmless scale clipping. Snake scales are composed mostly of keratin, the same sort of protein that produces human hair and nails. To clip a very thin slice of snake scale is as harmless as clipping a human finger nail.

We collected 31 mambas that had already been killed by vehicles, people or dogs, and tested muscle and liver samples from them for toxins. We also took scale clippings from 61 live snakes.

This was the first time in Africa that a species of snake was tested to see if it could be used as an indicator species of heavy metal pollution.

What did you find?

We found that the heavy metal concentrations in scales correlated with those found in the muscle and liver samples. For three of the four metals, scales were as accurate for testing as muscle and liver samples. So the harmless testing method is as good as the more invasive one.

For arsenic, cadmium and lead, the snakes were accumulating significantly lower concentrations of these toxins in the open, natural sites of the Durban Metropolitan Open Space System compared to more industrial and commercial areas. Mercury was less significantly different due to its more volatile nature and its capacity to travel through the environment.

What made you test mamba scales in the first place?

In 2020, I attended a conference on amphibians and reptiles, where a friend of mine presented his work on heavy metal pollutants in tiger snakes in the city of Perth, Australia.

I’ve also been working with Nick Evans of KZN Amphibian & Reptile Conservation for some years, on urban reptile ecology. Nick began collecting scale clippings, and I began to realise, while looking through the literature, how novel this was on a continental scale. Snakes had never been tested as a potential bioindicator species of heavy metal pollution in Africa previously.

Marc Humphries is a professor of environmental chemistry, and I was aware of his work on lead exposure in Nile crocodiles at St Lucia, a wetland in South Africa. When he expressed interest in examining the scale clippings, we were thrilled. Graham Alexander’s expertise in snake behaviour in general and specifically snakes in Durban was also instrumental in the success of this research.

How can this help fight pollution?

The fight against pollution is in the hands of the municipality and city managers. What the snakes are doing is warning us of the increasing danger these pollutants pose to environmental health and ultimately human health. They are also showing us how important open spaces are to the overall environmental and human health of the city of Durban. The snakes are telling us a story; what people in authority decide to do with this story rests with them.

Nick Evans of KZN Amphibian & Reptile Conservation made valuable contributions to the research and was a co-author on the article.

Cormac Price does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Toxic pollution builds up in snake scales: what we learnt from black mambas – https://theconversation.com/toxic-pollution-builds-up-in-snake-scales-what-we-learnt-from-black-mambas-265802