International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

A tradition of stolen elections

Firoze Manji — 2017-11-27T08:37:47Z

This article was written for the October issue of Amandla, so before the second Presendential election was scheduled for October 17. This was then postponed to October 26. Odinga announced that he was withdrawing on October 10 - seemingly in the hope that the October elections, in which he had no confidence, would have to be postponed. The election went ahead with a much lower turn out than in August and some violence. The international press has had very little coverage of the situation in Kenya since, for the reasons that Firoze explains below.

- IV514 - November 2017 / Kenya

What's Left in Africa?

Firoze Manji — 2015-02-05T18:28:39Z

The early 1950s witnessed an extraordinary sweep of popular mobilisations across the continent inspired by aspirations for emancipatory freedom – an end to the colonial yoke. Across the continent, nationalist parties convinced people that the path to freedom was through political independence.
Since then, many of the gains of independence, which cost the blood and lives of millions in Africa, have been reversed with the privatisation of the commons and public utilities, as well as by dispossessions of land, by unemployment and by the increasing costs of food, rent and other necessities of life. In response, discontent has been growing across the continent, with spontaneous eruptions and mass uprisings that have in some cases resulted in the overthrow of regimes nurtured and nourished by imperialism (e.g. in Tunisia, Egypt and Burkina Faso). In such circumstances, one would have thought that there would have been fertile grounds for the emergence of strong left working class movements across the continent. But why has this not happened?

- IV481 - February 2015 / Africa, South Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Congo, Guinea-Bissau

Is Africa rising? A critical perspective (1)

Firoze Manji — 2014-12-29T12:38:01Z

The popular idea of “Africa Rising” is based on claims of GDP growth rates of 5-6 per cent. But much of this is due to soaring primary commodity prices, especially in the extractive industries. Oil, for example, rose from $20 a barrel in 1999 to $145 in 2008. Although the price has fallen since, it remains way above the levels prevailing in the 1990s.

- IV479 - December 2014 / Africa