Category: The Conversation – Africa

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Victor Onyilor Achem, Researcher, University of Ibadan

When Nigeria’s Benue State Anti‑Open Grazing Law was passed in 2017, it brought hope that pastoralist herders would move to ranches, farmers would gain peace, and violent conflict between herders and farmers would ease.

The law banned the open grazing of livestock and required herders to establish ranches instead. It introduced fines, jail terms, and a livestock-guard task force to monitor compliance, shifting livestock management from communal routes to fenced ranches.

For decades, tensions between farming and herding communities across Nigeria’s Middle Belt have erupted into deadly violence.

As farmland shrinks and grazing routes disappear, competition over land, water and survival has intensified. Thousands have been killed, and more than two million people have been displaced. These conflicts are not just about cattle or crops; they are about identity, belonging and the struggle for power in a nation where religion and ethnicity often overlap with politics.

I study these dynamics as a sociologist whose work cuts through identity-driven conflicts and local peacebuilding. In a recently published study I show that the outcome of the Benue State Anti‑Open Grazing Law has been far more complicated than envisaged.

My research involved 40 interviews and focus groups in Benue’s most affected districts. It found that while the law against open grazing reduced crop destruction, it also deepened mistrust and exclusion. Farmers saw it as protection; herders saw it as punishment.

Based on my findings, I argue that the crisis is a governance failure amplified by politicised faith narratives and elite opportunism. A local land-use dispute has been reimagined internationally as evidence that Nigeria is fracturing along religious lines. Unless policy becomes more inclusive, this perception could grow, risking new waves of division and violence.

Why the law faltered

The anti-open grazing law in Benue was intended to curb the roaming of cattle across farmlands, reduce conflict, and protect sedentary farming communities. But the design overlooked key issues: it expected herders – many of them nomadic, landless and low-capital – to invest in ranches with minimal support.

Meanwhile, the enforcement architecture exhibited weakness. Livestock guards lacked resources, and coordination between Benue state government and the federal government broke down, leading to a strained relationship between levels of government.

The challenge is that agriculture and policing fall under shared jurisdiction in Nigeria. The state could legislate but not easily enforce without federal backing. The federal government, led at the time by a Fulani president, saw the law as discriminatory, while Benue leaders viewed federal hesitation as betrayal. The standoff left the law largely unenforced.

Even when enforced, the law punished mobility but offered scant alternatives. My field data showed herders feeling criminalised, farmers feeling abandoned, and both sides interpreting the law through existential lenses. Both farmers and herders saw it as a struggle for survival, one group fighting to defend ancestral land, the other to preserve livelihood and identity.

When land becomes identity

In contexts like central Nigeria, land is more than soil: it is identity, history and power. Farmers, mostly Christian crop growers, view the grazing law as an instrument of protection. Herders, often Fulani and Muslim, perceive it as a threat to their way of life. The herders have followed transhumant grazing routes for centuries, moving with the seasons. Their mobility predates Nigeria’s borders and remains vital to their culture and economy.

When open grazing is punished, and when governance fails to bridge the divide, disputes over pasture and farmland become charged with religious and ethnic meaning.

In this terrain, the narrative of a “religious genocide” gains traction, a narrative that coincides with the US designation of Nigeria as a country that fails to protect religious freedom. US president Donald Trump threatened military action unless Nigeria “stops the killing of Christians”.

But the truth on the ground is more nuanced. Analysts point out that both Christian and Muslim communities have suffered repeated attacks across different regions. Conflict over land, pastoral mobility and weak governance often overlap with religious fault lines, but are driven by deeper forces like land scarcity, climate stress, and weak governance. Religion explains the rhetoric, not the root cause.

How grazing policy and faith conflict connect

The grazing law’s failure matters because it becomes part of the faith conflict story. When the state is seen to favour one set of communities, the other sees exclusion.

When violence between farmers and herders is portrayed in religious terms, such as “Christians under siege” and “Muslim herders as invaders”, the law meant to protect becomes a symbol of division.

In other words, the anti-grazing law was never only about cattle. It became a law about belonging, rights, who gets to claim the land, and whose identity is recognised.

The US reaction exacerbates this division by implying that one group is the victim and the other is the perpetrator. That framing may help some voices gain global attention, but it can also harden local fault lines.

What must change

If Nigeria and its states are to prevent this conflict from becoming a faith-war, several things must shift:

• Inclusive policy-making: Pastoralists must be genuinely part of policy design, not just regulated. Mobility, traditional rights and modern ranching must be reconciled.

• Stronger federal-state cooperation: Nigeria’s constitution splits agricultural and policing powers. States can legislate but depend on federal agencies for enforcement. Clearer coordination and funding are essential.

• Narrative formation: Policymakers, media and international actors must avoid reducing complex land and livelihood struggles into simple faith wars. Accurate data, inclusive language and community voices matter.

• Trust building at the local level: Mechanisms such as locally led peace committees, shared grazing agreements and conflict-sensitive land-use planning have to be empowered.

Why it matters globally

Nigeria is Africa’s most populous country, a multi-faith, multi-ethnic democracy, and a test case for how modern states negotiate change, tradition and identity.

The US decision to label Nigeria a “country of particular concern” has grabbed headlines, but the core of the issue lies in how Nigerians farm, herd, travel, claim land, and build peace.

If Nigeria fails to turn its land and livelihood fault lines into inclusive governance, then the risk is not simply more violence, it is a deeper fracture in which laws become weapons of identity, and international declarations feed local fears.

Conflict won’t stop because rhetoric picks up speed; it will stop when policy, law and identity converge in a way that recognises everyone’s belonging.

In the end, the question is not simply whether more laws are passed or whether the US sanctions Nigeria. It is whether communities in Nigeria feel protected or whether laws and external pressure leave them feeling excluded.

Victor Onyilor Achem 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. How Nigeria’s grazing law also shapes land divisions and violence – https://theconversation.com/how-nigerias-grazing-law-also-shapes-land-divisions-and-violence-268923

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Victoria Gibbon, Professor in Biological Anthropology, Division of Clinical Anatomy and Biological Anthropology, University of Cape Town

Would you choose to have a part of your body live on after you died? How might your choice affect your relatives – or even your entire community?

The first is a question people face when they donate organs. The second comes up when they participate in genetic research. This is because DNA from even a single individual can reveal a web of relationships, even helping law enforcement to solve crimes committed by distant relatives they have never met. And as you continue to go back in time, the web becomes ever more tangled.

DNA is the unique genetic material of every living being on the planet. It can be “immortalised” for an unforeseeably long time in digital genetic libraries which contain the genomic information not only of that person, but also their ancestors and descendants.

Ancient DNA (referred to as aDNA) involves the study of genetic material from organisms that lived long ago, including humans. Geneticists, archaeologists, anthropologists and historians are using aDNA research to gain unprecedented insights into human history, but the knowledge benefits different groups of people unevenly. Also, it can be destructive because aDNA is normally extracted from small samples of bones or teeth. And who can give permission on behalf of people who lived many generations in the past? Once spoken for, what measures can be used to ensure their wishes continue to be honoured?

Africa is the ancient origin of all humans, as evidenced by having the highest human genetic diversity of any continent or region found today. In other words, all humans carry DNA from deeply rooted shared African ancestry. This makes African DNA (ancient and modern) a rich resource to draw on to understand what makes us human. However, understanding human variation and our origins involves research embedded within living communities and communities are the solution to conservation and the future of work in our disciplines.

Once it is decoded, the genetic information can last forever, so it could be used by anyone, for any purpose, for generations to come. Companies in the pharmaceutical industry, for example, could use it. As this science advances at an astonishing pace, ethical and legal frameworks guiding it struggle to keep up. No country has standards applying specifically to the field of aDNA. Therefore, ethical guidelines appropriate for this work need to protect past, present and future generations.

Consent is not yet universally mandated nor typically obtained in aDNA research, despite growing awareness of its importance over the past two decades. What is more, the concept of “informed consent” as developed in the clinical medical world is deeply rooted in a western idea of individual autonomy. It assumes that most medical decision-making occurs by individuals, rather than communities. And there are challenges applying it to people who are no longer alive.

That’s why, in our recent paper, we argue for using “informed proxy consent” or “relational autonomy consent” in human aDNA research. This is when living people through relation and/or relationship to a deceased person or people can make decisions and provide consent on their behalf, as a proxy or stand-in. The relationship could be through gender, race, religion, sociopolitical or sociocultural identities, or biological. DNA is also susceptible to data mining, machine learning and statistical analysis to uncover patterns and other valuable information. The deceased may be represented by living people who are affected by the research.

Different social, political, cultural and economic contexts make it impossible to create a universal set of specific guidelines. But four principles can apply: honesty, accountability, professionalism, and stewardship.

In our paper, we outline a set of considerations for obtaining proxy informed consent for the long deceased. A system of consent could enrich research by using it in potent new ways, empowering people affected by research, protecting researchers from ethical breaches and building long-term, equitable partnerships.

The solution

We propose that consent for the use of human aDNA in research should be a community-driven process. Instead of individuals signing off on behalf of the deceased, living people connected to the deceased persons, whether through ancestry, geography, cultural knowledge, or custodianship, act as representatives. This recognises that people are part of communities, and that authority to consent must reflect social and cultural context, not just individual choice.

This kind of approach was applied in South Africa’s Sutherland Nine Restitution, when nine San and Khoekhoe ancestors were taken from their graves in the 1920s and sent to the University of Cape Town for medical education and research. Almost 100 years later, they were finally brought home to their community.

In the Malawi Ancient Lifeways and Peoples Project, one way archaeological research results are communicated to community members is through site visits such as the one below, which included traditional authorities, local and national government officials, academics and students. Community consultation became so normalised through this work that some traditional leaders began to ask researchers how aDNA might aid their own goals of restitution and historical reconstruction.

How it would work

One major lesson from studying the past is that things can change a lot. We do not expect that there will be clear cultural or biological continuity in every place or every time. And identifying appropriate descendant communities and determining who has the authority to consent can be complex. But local communities are often invested in research results, and they have a right to high-quality information about its consequences. Consent should be treated as a process, not a one-off event.

This begins in the planning stage, with researchers sharing a draft proposal and revising it based on community input. They must be transparent about who is funding the project, what techniques will be used and what the possible risks and benefits are. This is not only for science, but for the people connected to the deceased persons.

Clear communication is vital, and information should be provided in local languages and formats that are easy to understand. Communities should be given time to reflect without researchers present. Feedback must be taken seriously, and projects adapted accordingly. Crucially, communities need retain control over how data is stored, used and shared.

Finally, engagement should continue throughout the life of the project. Researchers should share findings before publication and return for fresh consent if using data in new ways.

We recognise that the process is demanding. It requires time and financial resources for pre-research consultation and ongoing engagement, which can be slower than academic expectations for rapid publication. But funders and research institutions need to understand that the time taken to build community partnerships with living descendant communities is an essential and enriching foundation for ethical research.

Victoria Gibbon receives funding from the South African National Research Foundation.

Jessica Thompson has received funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation, Leakey Foundation, Wenner-Gren Foundation, and National Geographic Society.

Sianne Alves 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. Who speaks for the dead? Rethinking consent in ancient DNA research – https://theconversation.com/who-speaks-for-the-dead-rethinking-consent-in-ancient-dna-research-265539

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Wandile Sihlobo, Senior Fellow, Department of Agricultural Economics, Stellenbosch University

The Sustainable Food and Agricultural Systems work stream of the Business 20, a G20 engagement group, has endorsed three principles that it argues will contribute to the building of sustainable food systems and agriculture. The principles are increased trade, resilient supply chains, and sustainable agricultural practices.

Agricultural economist Wandile Sihlobo explains these three principles and how African countries can put them to good use.

What is global food security? How does it differ from food poverty?

Global food security is more comprehensive, seeking to address the challenges of access to food, nutrition, sustainability and affordability. The broad ambition of global food security is to ensure that countries, especially the G20 members, work collaboratively on initiatives that reduce global poverty levels. This reduction of poverty must be material at both national and at household level.

Achieving this goal will demand that each country’s domestic agricultural policy enables increases in food production, prioritises environmentally friendly production approaches, and eases trade friction. This will enable countries that cannot produce enough food to import it, and most importantly, do so affordably. Also, countries should ease the global logistics friction, removing tariffs and ensuring that a flow of agricultural products is smooth. This also includes the removal of export bans in certain cases. For example, in 2023, India banned the exports of rice and that caused a surge in global food prices.

It is for this reason that I have championed the approach of “achieving food security through trade”. Such an approach is essential in an environment characterised by trade friction, which generally increases transaction costs for all. Ultimately, the goal of improving global food security seeks to improve the living standards for all, with the focus on the poor regions of the world, mainly Africa, the Middle East and Asia.

How can increased trade, resilient supply chains and sustainable agricultural practices enhance food security?

These interventions are at the heart of easing costs. If trade friction (tariffs, non-tariff barriers and export bans) are eased, we are able to lower the transaction costs of getting the goods from the production areas to the consumption points affordably.

Resilient supply chains also mean that food can be produced, processed and transferred to consumption points with less friction even in times of natural disasters and conflicts.

Sustainable agricultural practices are at the core of the food system. Still, this does not mean a move away from improved seed cultivars and genetics, and elimination of agro-chemicals and other inputs. It mainly refers to using them better.

I have noted a troubling trend of activism that seeks to eliminate agricultural inputs, a path that would lead to lower agricultural productivity and output, and eventually worsen hunger. The key should be safe and optimal use of these inputs.

In the recent farm protests in the European Union, the EU’s regulatory approach to sustainable farming practices was one of the issues farmers raised as the major risk. They cited the EU’s Green Deal, which aimed to accelerate the reduction of the use of inputs, such as pesticides, fertilisers and certain other chemicals, that are critical for increased production.

In my view, the G20 should guard against activist moves that are dangerous to global food security.

What specific policies should countries, especially African nations, put in place to ensure the success of these principles?

South Africa and the African Union, which are both G20 members, should push for three broad interventions in agriculture to achieve the three G20 principles and boost food production that could benefit the African continent.

1. Climate-smart farming

First, there should be a strong call for sharing knowledge on climate-smart agricultural practices. These are new innovations and ways of farming that minimise the damage to crops caused by climate-related disasters like drought and heatwaves. This is important because Africa is very vulnerable to natural disasters.

For African agriculture to take off, governments must set up co-ordinated policies on how to respond to disasters. These responses must include everything African countries need to mitigate climate-related disasters, adapt to climate change, and recover quickly when disasters hit.

2. Trade reform

Second, Africa must push for a reform of the global trading system, and to improve food security in Africa through trade. South Africa already enjoys deeper access to agricultural trade with several G20 economies through lower tariffs and some tariff free access.

It is in the interests of all G20 members to ensure open trade among the nations of the world. Open agricultural trade enables countries to buy and sell agricultural produce at lower prices. This is vital in the current environment where some nations are taking a more confrontational approach to trade.

African countries whose agriculture is less productive, with generally lower or poor crop yields, may not benefit as much in the short term from open trade. They will, however, benefit in the long run.

3. Improve access to fertilisers

Third, Africa should continue prioritising discussions about improving fertiliser manufacturing and trade. Sub-Saharan African countries have poor fertiliser access and usage. Yet, greater fertiliser adoption is a key input to increased food production and therefore a reduction in food insecurity. Access to affordable finance is also a challenge for African agriculture.

Therefore, linking discussions on fertiliser with investments in network industries such as roads and ports is key. It is one thing to have fertilisers available, but moving them to areas of farming is difficult in some countries, and increases the costs for farmers. As part of this, the G20 should drive localised production.

Producing fertiliser on the continent would lessen the negative impact of global price shocks. It would also make it affordable for even the most vulnerable African countries to buy and distribute fertiliser.

Where do you suggest the balance is between more efficient agricultural production and reducing agriculture’s contribution to climate change?

We must use technology to adapt to climate change rather than demonising the use of agrochemicals and seed breeding, which certainly is a rising trend in some areas in South Africa. If we use high yielding seed cultivars, fertilisers and agrochemicals to control diseases, we can then farm a relatively smaller area, and rely on ample output.

But if we reduce these inputs substantially, we rely more on expansion of the area we plant. Tilling more land means hurting the environment. The main focus should be the optimal and safe use of agricultural inputs to improving increase food production. This is key to achieving global food security.

The G20 has a role to play in ensuring that we are moving towards a better world. These agricultural principles we outline above are some of the approaches that could help us move towards a more food secure and better world.

Wandile Sihlobo is the Chief Economist of the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa (Agbiz) and a member of the Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC).

– ref. What will it take to make Africa food secure? G20 group points to trade, resilient supply chains and sustainable farming – https://theconversation.com/what-will-it-take-to-make-africa-food-secure-g20-group-points-to-trade-resilient-supply-chains-and-sustainable-farming-267653

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Elmond Bandauko, Assistant Professor of Human Geography, University of Alberta

The informal sector has become a dominant source of livelihoods for urban residents in African cities. Within this sector, street trading is one of the most visible and vital components of urban economies.

In Zimbabwe’s capital city, too, street traders, selling clothing, snacks, fruits and vegetables, household goods, electronics and many other products, are a dominant feature in the economy. As in most African cities, the majority of Harare’s traders operate without licences, and they are often victims of municipal raids and displacements. Yet, despite this hostile environment, street trading continues to flourish.

How do traders organise themselves in such a difficult setting? Who decides who sells where? And how is order maintained in a space where the state’s control is weak or repressive?

I am an urban geographer whose work focuses on urban informality and governance in African cities. These questions are at the heart of a study that was part of my doctoral research on urban governance and the spatial politics of street traders in Harare. I am especially interested in how the urban poor wield their individual and collective agency to challenge urban exclusion.

Drawing on interviews and focus groups with traders in Harare’s central business district, the research explores the invisible systems of informal governance that regulate access to trading spaces. The study shows that street trading is structured by its own internal rules, norms and power relations.

Informality is not the absence of order. It is a different kind of order, rooted in everyday negotiation, social trust, and the shared struggle to survive in an unequal city.

I concluded that city authorities and others should recognise that these informal governance systems are legitimate, and can even be useful when it comes to formalising activities in the city. Ignoring them could lead to conflict and deeper inequalities.

Systems of organisation

Zimbabwe’s economy as a whole has been unstable over the past four decades. As a result, the informal economy has become very important. The relationship between urban authorities and street traders has always been antagonistic, however. That conflict has been the focus of most of the research on street trading. Harare’s city officials, like those in many other African cities, often treat traders as illegal, criminal, or a threat to “modern” urban order.

My research takes a different view: I shift attention away from state repression to the everyday systems of organisation and control that traders themselves have developed.

I conducted 19 semi-structured interviews and three focus groups with traders, to learn about their individual strategies and shared social mechanisms for keeping order on the streets.

Traders in Harare use informal governance mechanisms – unwritten rules, social norms and personal relationships – to decide who can occupy which space, for how long, and under what conditions. These community-based systems are built on mutual recognition and trust, but also shaped by hierarchy, gender and seniority.

Claiming and defending space

The interviews reveal that the most important rule for maintaining order is consistency. Traders often stay in the same spot for years – sometimes decades – to build customer loyalty and to assert their informal claim.

As one vendor explained:

I stay in the same spot so that people always know where to find me … When everyone sticks to their usual place, it reduces disputes.

This practice, described by another scholar, Asef Bayat, as “quiet encroachment”, involves small, everyday acts of claiming space without formal permission. Over time, these acts become socially recognised by other traders and even by local residents or shopkeepers. If a new vendor tries to take over someone’s space, existing traders usually intervene before conflict escalates.

As one woman put it:

No one can just occupy the space without our permission.

This peer-enforced control system maintains order but also reinforces informal hierarchies.

Leadership and street apprenticeship

Although there are no official leaders, senior traders – those with long experience or strong social influence – often act as custodians of space. They mediate disputes, mentor newcomers and enforce unspoken rules.

New entrants typically undergo an informal “street apprenticeship”, during which they learn how to operate, when to display goods, how to evade municipal police, and whom to approach for protection. Newcomers cannot simply choose a spot and start selling. They must seek the approval of those already established. This process reflects an internalised authority system rooted in social norms rather than written law.

Social networks and inheritance

The study also uncovers how social capital – networks of trust, kinship and friendship – plays a central role in accessing space.

Many traders gain their first selling spot through relatives or friends who are already part of the informal economy. In this way, street trading becomes an intergenerational practice, often “inherited” from parents or grandparents.

One participant explained that her grandmother had traded in the same area for decades, and when she lost her formal job, she joined the family business. Others said they felt morally obliged to reserve a deceased vendor’s spot for their children or relatives.

---

Read more:
Ethiopian quarter: how migrants have shaped a thriving shopping district in South Africa’s city of gold

---

Competition and exclusion

However, these systems are not equal or fair. Power among traders is unevenly distributed. Long-term vendors and those with strong social connections often dominate lucrative areas, while newcomers (especially young people, women and persons with disabilities) struggle to gain a foothold.

For example, male traders often control spots near busy transport hubs, which are more profitable but also riskier. Women, who are concerned about safety or need to balance caregiving duties, tend to occupy less visible areas. One visually impaired trader said he relied on others to protect his spot, showing how trust and vulnerability shape spatial access.

---

Read more:
Why do identical informal businesses set up side by side? It’s a survival tactic – Kenya study

---

There are also reports of traders using aggressive tactics to defend their territory. Some long-time vendors admitted to “chasing away” new sellers or even tipping off municipal officers to get competitors arrested. These practices reveal how informal governance can both protect livelihoods and reproduce exclusion.

Everyday politics and quiet power

My study shows that power in Harare’s informal economy is not only top-down, from the state to the traders, but also horizontal, negotiated among the traders themselves.

Those with seniority or strong networks act as gatekeepers, deciding who can sell where. Women traders often face verbal or physical harassment from male counterparts but also develop their own strategies of resistance: confronting aggressors, forming alliances, or using moral arguments about fairness to defend their right to trade. These acts of quiet defiance demonstrate that informal governance is a site of both control and agency.

---

Read more:
How the informal economy solves some urban challenges in a Zimbabwean town

---

Beyond stereotypes of chaos

What emerges from this research is a more nuanced picture of Harare’s informal economy. Street traders are not simply victims of a repressive state or chaotic actors in an unregulated market. They are also self-organising agents who build complex systems of order, reciprocity and social regulation in the absence of formal protection.

At the same time, these systems are not utopian. They involve competition, hierarchy and exclusion. Informal governance is both a survival mechanism and a structure of power.

Understanding this duality is crucial for policymakers who wish to design fairer urban policies.

Elmond Bandauko works at the University of Alberta as an Assistant Professor of Human Geography. He received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and the International Journal of Urban and Research (IJURR) Foundation to conduct this research.

– ref. Harare’s street traders create their own system to survive in the city – https://theconversation.com/harares-street-traders-create-their-own-system-to-survive-in-the-city-268996

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Brendon J. Cannon, Associate Professor, Khalifa University

In the last decade, armed drones have become one of the most visible symbols of modern warfare. Once the preserve of advanced militaries, armed drones are now widely available on the global arms market. Countries such as Turkey, China and Iran are producing lower-cost models and exporting them. In Sudan’s ongoing war, which began in 2023, drones have been used by the two major warring parties to gain ground – but have caused massive civilian casualties in the process.

A drone is essentially a remotely piloted aircraft that can observe, track and sometimes strike targets with missiles or bombs. The promise of armed drones is alluring: a lethal, precise and affordable weapon that can surveil and strike enemies without troops being exposed. But can these drones deliver on their promise in African battlespaces? Brendon J. Cannon shares insights from his study of drone use in Sub-Saharan African conflicts.

What’s driving up the use of drones in sub-Saharan Africa?

Drones offer tactical advantages. They are seen as a solution to pressing internal security problems, from jihadist incursions in the Sahel to armed insurgencies in Ethiopia and civil war in Sudan.

Since 2019, a growing number of African states – among them Niger, Ethiopia, Togo, Sudan and Somalia – have acquired medium-altitude long-endurance (Male) drones. Among these types of drones, Turkey’s Bayraktar TB2 – along with its successors, the TB3 and Kızılelma (Red Apple) – has captured outsized attention. In the case of the Turkish TB2 model, for instance, some sources estimate 40 units have been sold to more than 10 African countries since 2019, but actual figures are not public.

The TB2 is cheap by military standards (roughly US$5 million a unit) and relatively easy to operate. It has been hailed as a “game-changer” for its reliability, cost and ready availability.

It has been combat-tested in Syria, Libya and the Caucasus, a natural border between Europe and Asia.

Its success in destroying tanks, artillery and air defence systems in these conflicts impressed African leaders. As Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan boasted

Everywhere I go in Africa, everyone talks to me about drones.

What has been the effectiveness of these drones in African conflicts?

Medium-altitude long-endurance drones like the TB2 are entering African conflicts, which are marked by vast geography, difficult terrain and complex insurgencies that frequently span borders.

While drones can deliver lethal force, their ability to shape battlefield outcomes is also contingent on variables like

• distance, terrain and weather

• the competence of operators

• the existence of supporting intelligence, logistics and command systems.

With these variables in mind, my recent research with my colleague, Ash Rossiter, found that drones are unlikely to significantly alter the course of conflicts in much of sub-Saharan Africa, for a couple of reasons.

First, there is a general absence of modern integrated air defences in the region. This is required to deploy drones as lethal precision weapons, particularly in targeting isolated groups.

Second, the success of these drones depends on competent operation, their employment in sufficient numbers, and adequate support infrastructure, such as fuel, communication masts and ground control stations. These are often lacking in remote places where insurgents operate in places like Somalia, Niger and northern Burkina Faso.

What factors limit the lethality of drones?

Where adversaries lack modern, integrated air defences – as is currently common among insurgent and militia forces in much of sub-Saharan Africa – drones can loiter with minimal risk. They can collect actionable intelligence, and conduct precise strikes against vehicles, small groups and supply lines.

This lethality, however, is limited by a number of factors.

Distance: Africa’s size and scale blunt drone range – and therefore efficacy. The TB2’s circa 300km range, for instance, means it worked well in the Caucasus. However, 300km will not get you far in Ethiopia or the Sahel. In Ethiopia, for example, the TB2s had to be repositioned by the government in 2022 from bases near Addis Ababa to Bahir Dar. This was a distance of about 300km, to reach targets in Tigray. This shows how drone bases, security architecture and forward infrastructure, such as communications masts and logistics support closer to conflict areas, are needed. This increases range and, therefore, outcomes.

Terrain and weather: Dust and sandstorms in the Sahel can impair the drones’ visible-light sensors. Sandstorms occur frequently in the region, particularly during the dry season. Dense forest canopies in central Africa can conceal movement from drones. Persistent cloud cover over Ethiopia’s highlands or along the Gulf of Guinea may limit efficacy. Electro-optical and infrared payloads, which provide high-definition and thermal imaging, give drones like the TB2 a 360-degree view. This allows them to operate in diverse weather conditions. But they may need to fly under the weather to see targets in these African terrains. This brings its own risks, as it exposes the drones to potential small-arms fire. This has happened in Sudan, where paramilitary troops reported shooting down army drones in August 2025.

Operator capabilities: Effectively operating a drone requires trained operators, disciplined targeting procedures and dependable maintenance. Failures can be costly. A Burkinabè TB2 crash in 2023 exposed maintenance and operational fragilities, destroying one of five TB2 drones from the Burkinabè arsenal. A Nigerian drone strike in 2023 that was reportedly aimed at terrorists instead killed about 85 civilians. This was after an incorrect grid reference. It underscored how weak operator capabilities can transform precision weapons into harbingers of tragedy.

Fit to conflict: Drones are most useful for hitting supply convoys, eliminating specific targets and targeting loose militant networks. These are missions typical of low-intensity, irregular warfare. They are far less decisive in conflicts against massed troop formations or for holding territory, which has characterised recent wars in Ethiopia and Sudan. These tasks still rely on fighter-bombers or attack aircraft, and ground forces.

What does all this mean for the use of drones in sub-Saharan African conflicts?

First, medium-altitude long-endurance drones can deliver tactical gains but rarely provide a silver bullet.

The initial impression of the TB2 has unfortunately obscured some of its limitations, such as operations across extreme distance, in inclement weather, and the importance of operator proficiency.

Second, in conflicts like Ethiopia and the Sahel, geography and logistics play a critical role. Basing, relay links and forward-deployed maintenance determine a drone strike’s coverage, persistence and power.

Third, a drone’s overall effect depends on trained crews, reliable maintenance, and disciplined targeting and command review. Weakness in any of these can result in tragedy, such as civilian deaths.

Finally, as non-state armed groups increasingly adopt drones and some African states like Rwanda and Kenya begin to field better air defences, the advantage currently held by national governments that own drones will narrow.

---

Read more:
US military is leaving Niger even less secure: why it didn’t succeed in combating terrorism

---

Lasting utility, therefore, requires three things.

First, counter-drone defences, which means countries need to develop strategies and acquire sensors, jammers and systems to detect, track and neutralise hostile drones.

Second, better protection of the locations and networks from which drones are controlled so that these are not disrupted, sabotaged or targeted.

Third, sustained investment, not just in drone acquisition but also in maintenance, operator training and basing infrastructure to support continuous flight operations and extend drone reach deeper into battlespaces.

Brendon J. Cannon 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. Africa’s drone wars are growing – but they rarely deliver victory – https://theconversation.com/africas-drone-wars-are-growing-but-they-rarely-deliver-victory-265904

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Vanessa McBride, Science Director, International Science Council; University of Cape Town

The Southern African Large Telescope (SALT) celebrates 20 years of observing the sky. SALT is the largest optical telescope in the southern hemisphere. It’s been steadily revealing new science knowledge, ranging from the discovery of planets outside our solar system to understanding the unusual physics around black holes. It’s also 20 years of doing science for society.

SALT is where I conducted much of my PhD research. I’d grown up in rural Eastern Cape, marvelling at the diamond night skies. My first fascination for astronomy was sparked when learning about the concept of SALT at a science fest in high school. Years later, I received the first SALT Stobie scholarship for PhD study. It was a dream opportunity to start a multi-year observing campaign.

My research sought to understand how mass moves from one star to another in a gravitationally bound pair. This contributed to the scientific understanding of how these stars evolve in different environments. So it’s with a sense of personal, professional and national pride that I look back on the last two decades of SALT’s achievements.

Africa’s giant eye in the sky

One of SALT’s most significant scientific achievements was based on its ability to respond rapidly to time-critical astronomical events. This allowed SALT to observe the immediate optical glow from a gravitational wave event in 2017, providing a crucial piece of evidence for the type of nuclear processes taking place in the gravitational wave event.

Gravitational waves are ripples in spacetime caused by moving masses, and have only been observable with special detectors since 2015. The plateau on which SALT is built, just outside the town of Sutherland in South Africa’s largest province the Northern Cape, is one of the darkest observing sites in the the world. This makes it an excellent site from which to observe very low brightness objects in the night sky.

In 2022, SALT observed a nearby but faint galaxy, which showed unusually low levels of elements heavier than hydrogen. This unexpected result challenged our understanding of how and when stars begin to form within galaxies. With a repertoire of over 600 scientific publications based on observations from the telescope, SALT has certainly made an impact on our knowledge of the cosmos.

Funded by a consortium of international partners which were led by South Africa’s National Research Foundation, SALT represented an increase of 30x in light gathering capacity compared to the Radcliffe telescope – the previous biggest in South Africa. At concept phase, even astronomers had to be encouraged to think big. The original plans were for a 4 metre class telescope, but it was not audacious enough for a government that wanted to showcase South Africa’s prowess and potential in science.

Engineers and scientists worked with the Hobby-Eberly Telescope in the US to replicate a unique and cost-effective design. Smaller mirror segments were easier and cheaper to manufacture to the required smoothness specifications, and these smaller hexagonal segments could fit together like a honeycomb to create a mirror of 11 metres in diameter. The telescope was designed to point at a fixed angle above the horizon. This meant less warping of the mirror, but a more complicated observing strategy, as astronomers would have to wait for sky to pass over SALT’s pointing direction.

A telescope with heart

SALT was conceived just as South Africa was coming out of the shadow of apartheid. Apartheid – a policy of institutionalised racism – was dismantled in 1994 through South Africa’s first democratic election. In 1996 the new government had written an ambitious white paper setting out a vision for science in a country reborn, where it felt like anything and everything was possible:

Scientific endeavour is not purely utilitarian in its objectives and has important associated cultural and social values. It is also important to maintain a basic competence in ‘flagship’ sciences such as physics and astronomy for cultural reasons. Not to offer them would be to take a negative view of our future – the view that we are a second class nation, chained forever to the treadmill of feeding and clothing ourselves.

SALT has always been more than just a science infrastructure project. It has heart too. Unemployment is a major issue in Sutherland. Fetal alcohol syndrome is also a challenge people battle with in the region, and, through the years of its construction, South Africa was deep into the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Alongside the investment in engineering and science, was a plan to ensure benefit to previously disadvantaged South Africans, especially the rural community in the Northern Cape. Even today, 20 years after SALT was inaugurated, a fraction of the operation costs that are contributed by all SALT partners, local and international, go into this collateral benefits programme.

The results are a library, skills training centre and a high school mathematics and science teacher in Sutherland. Most recently, the SALT partners and South Africa’s Department of Science, Technology and Innovation, have contributed to a renovated trauma room, for victims of gender-based violence, in the Sutherland police station. In its early years, this programme also trained astronomers through the funding of graduate programmes.

Beyond the horizon

Now, this new generation of South African scientists and engineers is at the helm. For the first time in the 200-year history of the South African Astronomical Observatory, the director is South African. Almost 80% of the staff employed in all roles across SALT, from science and operations to software and mechanical, is South African. These individuals are deeply embedded in, and leading, international science partnerships and research infrastructure projects, and the connection between science and societal development is ingrained in the DNA of these projects and partnerships.

We are often focused on the differences between “us” and “them”, it’s worth remembering the power of science, both as a mechanism for development and as a partnership to unite. This World Science Day for Peace and Development, SALT shows the capabilities science has for both peace, and development.

Vanessa McBride has received funding from the National Research Foundation.

– ref. South Africa’s flagship telescope at 20: an eye on the sky and on the community – https://theconversation.com/south-africas-flagship-telescope-at-20-an-eye-on-the-sky-and-on-the-community-269234

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Ribio Nzeza Bunketi Buse, Assistant Professor, University of Kinshasa

Eight global millennium development goals were established in 2000 by member states of the United Nations (UN) and endorsed by other multilateral organisations. They ranged from eliminating hunger to empowering women, and from reducing child mortality to environmental sustainability.

The millennium development goals were not fully achieved by 2015, so 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) were devised to be reached by 2030. The longer list responded mostly to growing climate threats and urbanisation and included aspects of wellbeing and healthy living.

The focus now is on developing the next agenda after 2030. There is a growing drive to include culture as a goal. Nowhere was the bid more pronounced than at the recent global cultural policy meeting called Mondiacult, held every three years by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco).

Ribio Nzeza Bunketi Buse is a scholar of cultural development. We asked him why a culture SDG matters.

---

Why should culture be an SDG in its own right?

Since 1982, several of these meetings have emphasised the link between culture and sustainable development. Now there’s a call for it to be a standalone SDG in the post-2030 development agenda.

A strong argument is made in the Unesco global report on cultural policies, released in Barcelona during Mondiacult in September 2025. According to this report, 93% of responding member states affirm that culture is a central point in their national sustainable development plans. This is an increase from 88% four years ago.

The document reports also that cultural and creative industries account for 3.39% of the global gross domestic product (a measure of the health of an economy) and 3.55% of jobs. That makes it comparable to the automotive sector. Cultural tourism generates US$741.3 billion in 250 cities each year.

Given this, there’s a broad consensus that culture is one of the keys to sustainable economic development. But it goes deeper.

Unesco defines culture as:

A set of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features that characterise a society or social group including not only arts and letters, but modes of life, value systems, traditions and beliefs.

From this definition, culture is a human right. The final declaration of Mondiacult 2025 recognises it as such, alongside other human rights. Indeed, many countries’ constitutions and other international conventions, like the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, recognise this.

If the 17 SDGs (like education, gender equality and healthy living) are related to human rights, why should culture, which is also a human right, not be an SDG?

To get there, the Mondiacult declaration reinforces that culture needs to be emphasised and endorsed in the 2030 development agenda.

---

Read more:
What is Mondiacult? 6 take-aways from the world’s biggest cultural policy gathering

---

The Culture Committee of the United Cities and Local Governments organisation campaigned for culture to be included in the post-2015 development agenda. (Since its 2004 Agenda 21 for Culture initiative, the organisation has worked to include culture in local and regional development.)

In 2022, a network of leading global cultural organisations began an advocacy campaign for culture to be a dedicated SDG. The #Culture2030Goal campaign’s draft zero has five focus areas:

• adequate attention to culture at the highest level of government

• recognise connections between culture and other policy areas

• the culture sector must feel a sense of engagement in and ownership of the goal

• mobilise power of culture for all other goals

• achievement of all goals through a cultural lens.

The campaign formulated culture as an SDG as follows:

Ensure cultural sustainability for the wellbeing of all.

Sustainability is culture’s capacity to endure over time and also speaks to new thinking about sustainability for a healthier future for the world.

What difference would it make if it was an SDG?

A standalone SDG would recognise culture as a global public good that all countries should protect.

This would draw attention to culture as an area of intervention. Justin O’Connor, a professor of cultural economy, writes in the Cultural Policy Forum that:

A specific goal is needed to better coordinate culture’s contribution to each and every goal, and to make it mandatory for governments and agencies to pay attention to it, and hopefully direct resources to it.

So, it would also encourage governments to take culture into account in their national economic development agendas.

What are the obstacles?

There are two main constraints in the path to culture becoming an SDG: the understanding of its role for development; and the capacity of policymakers to give it the necessary space.

Mondiacult 2022 recommended including culture in the UN’s 2024 Summit of the Future and that was successful. In fact, Action 11 of the summit’s final document Pact for the Future includes culture. However, it is associated with sport, and is not considered a stand-alone issue.

---

Read more:
Culture can build a better world: four key issues on Africa’s G20 agenda

---

Against this backdrop, the ambition of having culture as an SDG still has a way to go. There is no set timeline. It all depends on how negotiations evolve among multiple UN stakeholders (international agencies and member states) in the preparation process for the post-2030 agenda.

Although South Africa is leading the 2025 G20 meetings, where culture is firmly on the agenda, Africa can still play a far stronger mobilising role among the world’s leaders, to convince them to come on board.

Ribio Nzeza Bunketi Buse 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. Culture as a sustainable development goal? It’s starting to become a reality – https://theconversation.com/culture-as-a-sustainable-development-goal-its-starting-to-become-a-reality-267996

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Nnamdi O. Madichie, Professor of Marketing & Entrepreneurship, Unizik Business School, Nnamdi Azikiwe University

Short comedy videos circulating on social media have created a booming industry in Nigeria in the past few years. The country’s comedy creators put their skits out on platforms like YouTube, TikTok and Instagram to reach a massive audience.

As these online comedians gain followers they make their money from advertising, by endorsing brands as influencers, and through collaborations. In Nigeria the industry is popularly called the skit economy.

This phenomenon represents more than a major new entertainment trend. It highlights the ingenuity of young Nigerians in using technology to create livelihoods and influence culture. In the process, they contribute to national economic growth.

The skit industry has joined the likes of Nollywood film, Afrobeats music and local fashion to put the country on the entertainment map globally.

The rise of the industry is chronicled in the 2024 book Skit Economy: How Nigeria’s Comedy Skit-Makers Are Redefining Africa’s Digital Content Landscape, by entrepreneurship scholar and polling guru Bell Ihua. His work is supported by findings from the Africa Polling Institute.

As he explains:

The Nigerian entertainment industry is undoubtedly creating job opportunities and contributing to the country’s diversification from oil … The industry is rated as the second most significant employer of youths in Nigeria after agriculture, employing over one million people.

According to his book, skit-making is estimated to be Nigeria’s third largest entertainment industry sector, with a net worth of over US$31 million.

As a marketing scholar focusing on the cultural and creative industries and digital entrepreneurship who has had the privilege of interviewing Ihua, I’d like to share my thoughts about his book.

What becomes clear as you read it is that social media platforms have not only amplified the reach and impact of skits. Online platforms have allowed creators to reach global audiences while preserving the culture, language and stories unique to their communities. Skit creators prove the potential of comedy as a medium for both entertainment and cultural diplomacy.

However, as the industry grows, argues Ihua, the skit economy must navigate new challenges related to representation and ethics.

What’s in the book

The book’s eight chapters cover Africa’s digital content landscape, taking into account the continent’s youth bulge and the evolution of social media and content creation.

Ihua then explores Nigeria’s booming cultural and creative industries before homing in on comedy skit-making in chapter 4. It attempts to classify various types of digital content creation in Nigeria and outline the trends in online videos before embarking on an in-depth national study on comedy skit-making in chapter 7. He then considers implications for public policy and future research in the field.

What makes the book so compelling is that it recognises skit-making as an ecosystem on its own terms. It then defines what that ecosystem looks like in Nigeria. In the process Ihua makes it clear why books like this matter.

They are a call for taking entertainment seriously and investing future research in it. Social media and digital technology have reconfigured an unsung economic sector that’s capable of including the bulging youth population in the national conversation. This is despite limited institutional support.

What’s driving the boom

Ihua traces its boom to COVID-19 lockdowns that began in Nigeria in 2020:

They provided a source of laughter and relief to many Nigerians, as most people found it safer to stay at home and get entertained with skits.

Today, writes Ihua, two-thirds of Nigerians watch comedy skits frequently. According to his study they serve as stress relief and social commentary.

With 63% of Nigerians under 25 and high social media uptake, skit-making taps into abundant creative energy and mobile-first audiences.

Value

The Skit-Economy highlights how skit comedians create direct and indirect jobs (editors, social media managers, brand consultants). They generate income through endorsements, platform monetisation (the revenue they get from advertising on a space like YouTube), and various partnerships and collaborations.

---

Read more:
Detty December started as a Nigerian cultural moment. Now it’s spreading across the continent – and minting money

---

Their cultural value is not just measured in their global influence. Skits reflect everyday Nigerian realities with humour and satire, influencing local public opinion and reinforcing national identity.

As prominent Nigerian entrepreneur and cultural worker Obi Asika notes in the book’s foreword:

Their success … stems from a combination of talent, creativity, innovation, an entrepreneurial spirit, and a deep understanding of their audience’s preferences and cultural nuances.

Challenges

However, Ihua identifies a number of challenges facing the industry.

Financial rewards are unequal. Only top creators earn sustainably. For many skit-makers revenue is unstable.

Working from Nigeria means dealing with infrastructure deficits. Electricity supply is unreliable, the internet is expensive and there is limited access to digital production tools.

---

Read more:
Nigerian TikTok star Charity Ekezie uses hilarious skits to dispel ignorance about Africa

---

Nigerian skit-makers also operate in a climate where there are weak intellectual property protections. Piracy and unauthorised reuse undermine earnings.

The job can be an ethical minefield. Pranks can be harmful. They can perpetuate stereotypes and be insensitive to minorities.

These challenges are enhanced by a policy vacuum. There is little government recognition or support for digital creatives in Nigeria.

An African future?

For Ihua, skit-making is a good example of how new digital industries can aid in absorbing Africa’s growing youth workforce. With adequate support, skit-making can help provide dignified livelihoods.

So, for Ihua these creators are not merely entertainers. They’re also job creators, cultural ambassadors, and catalysts of digital transformation.

For Africa broadly, the rise of skit-making underscores the continent’s potential to innovate in ways that are uniquely aligned with its youthful demographics and digital future.

Nigeria’s skit economy offers a blueprint for the continent. Already, skit-making is spreading to other countries, like Ghana, Kenya and South Africa. The lines are blurring between stand-up or TV comedians and skit makers.

If nurtured with the right infrastructure, policy, and industry support, the skit economy could evolve from an informal hustle into a structured pillar of Africa’s creative economy. This could further solidify the continent’s role in the global cultural imagination.

Nnamdi O. Madichie 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. The comedy economy: Nigeria’s online video skits are making millions – https://theconversation.com/the-comedy-economy-nigerias-online-video-skits-are-making-millions-267784

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Tinashe Mushakavanhu, Assistant Professor, Harvard University

For 10 years, Ghanaian poet Kwame Dawes and his friend the Nigerian writer Chris Abani have sifted through piles of manuscripts looking for Africa’s new poetic talent. Since 2014, the African Poetry Book Fund has been assembling a formidable archive of writing through the New Generation African Poets Chapbook Series.

A chapbook – a small publication usually under 40 pages – is an accessible and honoured format for poets to publish focused selections of their work. In this series, each chapbook features an emerging African poet, and is presented as part of a beautifully designed box set of 10 or more chapbooks. Besides the poetry itself, each box set also showcases the work of a commissioned African visual artist. The artists include Sokari Douglas Camp, Victor Ehikhamenor, Ficre Ghebreyesus and Aida Muluneh, among others.

This ever-growing archive has now published over 100 poets, and offers a window into the diversity of African poetic expression today.

Marking the project’s 10th anniversary is a new anthology called Toward a Living Archive of African Poetry, edited by Jordanian writer Siwar Masannat. It collects Dawes and Abani’s rich introductions to each box set and has a foreword by Masannat. In it, readers learn about the impact of the series, offering a layered and necessary account of how these chapbooks have transformed the visibility of African poets over the past decade.

My work as a scholar of African literature focuses on recovering overlooked histories and interrogating the spaces in which literature is made and circulated.

This new anthology matters because it documents not just poems, but a cultural movement that redefines what an African literary archive can be, and why poetry remains central to that conversation.

Decidedly diasporic

While the series places Africa at the centre of its imagination, its focus is largely diasporic, shaped by Africans living outside the continent. The majority of the poets live in the US or the UK. Poets based on the continent form a minority and are scattered geographically.

The editors acknowledge this imbalance, attributing it to “better access to workshops and craft education” available to diaspora poets. The result is an archive arguably shaped less by the immediacies of the continent and more by the diaspora’s sensibilities and infrastructures.

Nigeria, more than any of the 25-odd countries included in the chapbooks, shapes the aesthetics of the series. This reflects both the density of the country’s literary networks and the curatorial choices of the editors. They rely heavily on personal connections and prize pools to spot new and emerging talents.

A recurring feature of the poets in the series is the “hyphenated African”: Somali-American, Ghanaian-British, Ethiopian-German, Sierra Leonean-American. Some were born in countries outside Africa or migrated as toddlers. Their Africanness is claimed through memory, nostalgia, heritage, or family history, rather than geography.

The editors assert that all the poets “self-identify as Africans in the full and complicated way that Africanness is best defined”. This also underscores how the project expands the category of African poetry.
In fact, the transcontinental profile of these writers shows how African poetry today cannot be read solely through a nationalist lens. The hybridity of identity and place becomes central. Many poets occupy in-between spaces – culturally, geographically, linguistically and emotionally.

Still, the series impresses on many other levels. Particularly in its commitment to highlighting the continent’s plural and localised poetics, and in its rare, long-term investment in the future of African poetry.

Gender

The series has been notably attentive to gender parity. Women poets like Warsan Shire, Safia Elhillo, Victoria Adukwei Bulley, Momtaza Mehri, Tsitsi Jaji and Vuyelwa Maluleke, among others, form a significant portion of the archive.

---

Read more:
Tutu Puoane: the South African singer on creating her new album out of Lebo Mashile’s poetry

---

This signals an important feminist turn in African poetics. The chapbook form becomes a space where African women’s voices are nurtured and given international circulation, countering historical silences. The poets here highlight a generational continuity of feminist expression.

Intergenerational

The birth years of poets in the series range from 1963 to 2007, showcasing a vibrant intergenerational dialogue. The older poets often engage in socio-political critique informed by post-independence transitions. Millennial and Gen Z poets frequently explore themes of identity, queerness, internet culture, displacement and decoloniality with linguistic experimentation and digital fluency.

Ghanaian poet Tryphena Yeboah, in her chapbook, A Mouthful of Home, exemplifies this:

I TELL MY MOTHER I WANT A BODY THAT

EXPANDS

Into a map. She wants to know where I’ll travel to. I say

“myself”.

The act of travel becomes a metaphor for self-mapping that captures how younger African poets reimagine movement, belonging and home as internal, affective geographies.

In contrast, South African poet Ashley Makue, in her chapbook, i know how to fix myself, offers a more visceral expression of embodied trauma and inherited violence:

my mother is a war zone

they don’t tell her that

these men that pee in her

and leave with gunpowder in their chests

Living archive

The New Generation African Poets Chapbook Series has been an extraordinary intervention in the history of African poetry. It has foregrounded a generation, opened an aesthetic safe space, and created a beautiful, living archive.

Dawes and Abani introduce each of the box sets with two introductions – what they call “simultaneous conversations” – and they often debate identity, the style of the poetry, circulation, and other issues.

This is more than an impressive catalogue; it is a breathing archive of African poetic consciousness, one that resists static definitions. It captures the fluidity of identity, the urgency of voice, and the diverse shaping of African poetry today.

What it tells us: that African poetry is thriving, diverse and globally mobile. What it does not tell us: how poets working entirely from the continent might imagine and enact African poetics differently.

But by foregrounding new and emerging voices, the Africa Poetry Book Fund affirms that poets remain vital chroniclers of the African experience, articulating emotion, history and imagination in ways that other forms of writing often cannot.

They don’t just do this through publications, but running prizes, supporting African poetry libraries and maintaining a digital archive.

Tinashe Mushakavanhu 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. African poetry is celebrated in a groundbreaking publishing project – https://theconversation.com/african-poetry-is-celebrated-in-a-groundbreaking-publishing-project-267772

Source: The Conversation – Africa (2) – By Kristin Brig, Lecturer in Public Health & Society, Washington University in St. Louis

The water infrastructure politics of eThekwini, the municipality that includes the city of Durban, have been splashed across the digital pages of South Africa’s news outlets in recent years.

They’ve covered the 2022 floods that damaged kilometres of pipes, water tanker purchases as a response to increasing water scarcity, and the disconnection of residential water storage tanks from municipal pipes to cope with leaky infrastructure. Like other South African municipalities, eThekwini has fallen behind on maintaining its piped water infrastructure and has looked to stopgap solutions.

The city’s water politics has a long history. Some of the infrastructure issues can be traced back to the mid-1800s, when it was a British imperial port.

I’m a historian with an interest in coastal communities and urban life. As part of my work on water as a public health concern in colonial cities, I spent months in the Durban Archives Repository, going through correspondence, reports, business contracts, newspaper clippings and town council minutes.

The records revealed how the system of colonial-era water infrastructure worked – and for whom.

The first water technologies in Durban were British-styled wells. Anyone could use them, for free. They brought people of different origins and class together for practical purposes but also created anxiety about social difference. For colonial officials, the public had to follow British standards or lose access to the infrastructure altogether. They created Durban’s first water-policing system, purportedly for better public health and conservation. While wealthier and white people eventually came to rely on piped water, poorer and black (Zulu and Indian) people were excluded.

This system formed the basis for the uneven access to water that today’s residents experience. People still depend on private water infrastructure as the municipal system struggles.

Nineteenth-century infrastructure

Founded by British traders as Port Natal in 1824, the colonial borough of Durban depended on stand-alone water infrastructures from the beginning. Brick and cement wells were the first technologies from which residents drew water, since they were easy to build and maintain. Most wells had either a bucket or a pump attached to them. Pumps attached to wells became common after the borough made most wells publicly available in the mid-1850s.

Water tanks, on the other hand, were private technologies which mainly lay underground. Only wealthier households and businesses could afford to build them. They became prominent in the 1870s.

It’s hard to know exactly how many of these infrastructures existed in total. By the 1870s, though, official reports indicate that about 18 public wells and pumps across the town served the bulk of the town’s approximately 20,000 inhabitants.

Piped water came to Durban in the 1880s, supplied initially by the spring at Curries Fountain. In 1889, the city’s laws were extended to cover private tanks that were filled from the municipal pipes. Even so, much of the population still relied on standalone infrastructures for water supplies.

As time went by, conflicts began to brew. The rising population placed a strain on these stand-alone infrastructures, which offered varying amounts of water depending on rainfall patterns. Arguments sparked when a community drew too much water or polluted a well, creating a local water scarcity.

Clashes and restrictions

White colonists blamed much of the water scarcity and contamination on African labourers who worked as household or business servants, sanitary workers and launderers. These positions demanded a close relationship with fresh water collection and use, which meant African labourers became the main users of wells, pumps and tanks.

Labourers did not always use water technologies according to colonial expectations, however. Local people were accustomed to using open water sources like rivers and streams, not restrictive iron and brick infrastructures. So, they modified their traditional work at open sources, like washing objects and produce, to the new technologies they had to use.

That sometimes created problems, according to the archive records. They accidentally broke handles and chains when pumping too quickly. They drew water from tanks without using a filter, which was officially perceived as a disease risk. They publicly washed clothing, bodies and food at wells, where the dirty wash water flowed back into the enclosed water supply.

Colonists exploited this situation to place restrictions on how labourers could use stand-alone water infrastructures. Borough officials crafted new laws that forced colonised residents to conform with British standards. They punished those who did not comply with fines, verbal lashings and even jail time.

Durban was part of a colonial system predicated on white supremacy. The government sought to maintain segregation between white colonists and African and South Asian residents. So, it imbued its water technology regulations with the notion that some water management actions – British – were “healthier” than others, namely African and South Asian. If someone used a technology contrary to British standards, then they faced restricted access to public technologies and the water they provided.

Water system legacy

Stand-alone water infrastructures still exist across eThekwini. Many residents of informal settlements and formerly racially segregated areas remain officially unconnected with municipal pipes. They instead depend on local wells, pumps and illegal individualised connections. An increasing number of households are investing in water tanks as the municipal water system becomes more unreliable.

---

Read more:
The lack of water in South Africa is the result of a long history of injustice – and legislation should start there

---

Things have, of course, changed since the 19th century. However, the municipality continues to require residents to use these technologies within regulatory boundaries if residents want to maintain access to them. Cutting off municipal water supply to private storage tanks is an example.

Infrastructural stopgaps further expose a water system that was never meant to supply every resident equitably and without restriction. These actions tell us that today’s officials have inherited and inadvertently continue a water system that was meant to exclude more than include, to punish more than teach, to restrict more than provide.

Kristin Brig receives funding from the US Fulbright Program, the US National Science Foundation (NSF), and Johns Hopkins University.

– ref. Access to water has a long racial history in Durban: I followed the story in the city’s archives – https://theconversation.com/access-to-water-has-a-long-racial-history-in-durban-i-followed-the-story-in-the-citys-archives-267302