Dominic Burbidge | University of Oxford
The Kenyan Supreme Court has found that the August 8 presidential election result is invalid. It blames the electoral commission, not the declared winner, Uhuru Kenyatta. Kenya’s leading newspaper praises the decision as a step towards the rule of law, but I am less sure about what this means for the ability of the political establishment to stick to the terms of the country’s constitution.
The Supreme Court has given the country 60 days to hold fresh elections. The time period is in accordance with section 140 (3) of the Constitution, but the court failed to tell the public exactly what the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) had done wrong. This leaves Kenya with a compromised commission rerunning an election.
Chief Justice David Maraga noted that the court had previously failed to provide a full judgment on the 2013 elections and this had not been received well. He then did exactly the same. Of course, the court had to provide a judgment on the opposition’s petition within 14 days, as stipulated by the Constitution. This is the period before the president-elect is inaugurated. The court would have sparked a constitutional crisis if it had not made any decision.
But by not explaining how the IEBC has failed, the court has created a problem. It’s impossible to organise the next election and reform the commission in the time given.
<h2>Time pressure</h2>
The court gave itself up to 21 more days to deliver its full judgment. This would leave the country with only 39 days before the fresh election. Already, opposition leader Raila Odinga has declared that his coalition will refuse to participate in presidential elections under the current leadership of the IEBC.
But, as a newspaper commentator observes, it’s just not feasible to remove IEBC commissioners without a tribunal, which is then reviewed by parliament. Complicating matters further, three citizens have filed a separate petition to ask the courts to remove certain IEBC officials over their wrongdoing.
Even once the full judgment is handed down within 21 days of the ruling, it probably won’t indicate criminality at the level of individuals. The Supreme Court was asked only to determine the validity of the election overall. Its full judgment can indicate how the process of the election must be improved.
The election was judged to be void because the electoral commission was at fault. This suggests it must change its procedures – and perhaps its personnel – if better elections are to take place. A new election must avoid the errors of the previous one.
Political scholar Gabrielle Lynch explains some of the corrections that have to be made. These include the process for transmitting results, the use of security forces and the uneven use of state resources.
Few of these suggested corrections will be feasible within the allotted timeframe.
<h2>Serious problems</h2>
Indeed, the problems are serious. Months before the election was held, the courts ordered the IEBC to stop printing ballot papers, because ofclaims that the Dubai-based firm Ghurair held too many links to Kenyatta.
The claim against Ghurair was dismissed due to insufficient evidence. But part of the IEBC’s successful defence against the court order was the time pressure of having to hold an election in a few months’ time. If time pressure was a valid reason then, why would it not be now? Why would an even more rushed election be credible?
The murder of the IEBC’s IT manager, Chris Msando, will now be under even closer scrutiny by the media. But even if the crime was directly related to the muddled tallying of votes, there isn’t time before the rerun to find individuals guilty. It is highly unlikely the full Supreme Court judgment will touch upon this tense topic. And that further reduces the credibility of the current IEBC.
<h2>Credibility concerns</h2>
The wider concerns with the IEBC date back to the “Chickengate” scandal. A UK court found a UK firm had bribed the IEBC (then the Interim Independent Electoral Commission) to get the contract to print ballot papers for the 2010 Kenyan constitutional referendum.
The UK co-conspirators were found guilty. But no-one from the Kenyan side was put behind bars by Kenyan courts. This created mistrust of the IEBC leaders. The current crisis will revive past anxieties like these, but leave no time for meaningful reform.
In Kenyan elections, local witnesses must sign the official forms to say the local tally is accurate. Central tallying organised electronically must then match with these local forms. The election is considered free and fair if this is done properly. The Supreme Court has ruled that both the IEBC as a whole and its chairperson, Wafula Chebukati, are responsible for the failure on 8 August.
Chebukati has refused to stand down. His response doesn’t boost public confidence in the institution. If the public is to trust the rerun, he must go.
<h2>Asking for more time</h2>
The IEBC should then petition the Supreme Court to give it more time.
It was done before, when the 2013 election was delayed because of the difficulty of implementing aspects of the new Constitution.
Section 86 of the Constitution requires the IEBC to collate the results of an election openly and accurately. At present, it can’t meet this requirement because it does not know what it must do differently from before. The IEBC should therefore depend on Section 86 when it asks the Supreme Court for more time.
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This article was first published in The Conversation.

Kenya’s Supreme Court has given an impossible deadline for the repeat election

Cathie Webb |South African Payroll Association
Whenever a worker is retrenched in South Africa, it’s not just one person losing an income. That’s because employees in this country have a high number of dependents. For example, according to the South African Police Union, each 10111 call centre operator supports about 15 dependents. The statistics are probably similar for other industries. That’s why, before any organisation chooses retrenchments, they should do their best to find another way.
Alternatives to retrenchment
Here are some things businesses might consider, bearing in mind that changes in terms of service require their employee’s consent.
<ul>
<li>Reduction in work 
Rather than lose their jobs, employees may be open to working shorter weeks, fewer hours &#8211; like half days &#8211; or shorter shifts. This means they’ll have some form of income to tide them over, and it frees them up to look for a second job or even another position, making retrenchment unnecessary.</li>
<li>Reduced pay 
A small reduction in pay across the entire workforce won’t be as hard felt as losing one’s job altogether. Yes, it’s easier to retrench than renegotiate contracts throughout the company. But many have done it successfully. Conversely, freeze increases until the organisation’s fortunes recover.</li>
<li>Voluntary retrenchment 
Some workers are more desperate to keep their jobs than others, who may have been looking for a reason to move on. Voluntary retrenchment is also a good way of reinvigorating the workforce because those who are no longer aligned with the company’s mission or values are more likely to take the opportunity to leave.</li>
<li>Reduced benefits 
Although some benefits are required by law, others can often become bloated beyond their value in keeping workers happy and motivated. Reducing benefits gives a business the chance to rationalise their expenditure and, in tough times, employees are more likely to appreciate that necessity.</li>
<li>Redeployment 
This means either moving willing employees to other departments where their abilities are needed or training them to take on new duties, sometimes completely different to what they were doing in the past. Change is difficult but many workers are keen to extend their skills.</li>
<li>Eliminate overtime 
Workers are often paid overtime for working after hours or weekends. This need should drop with an ebb in business and companies can safely cancel overtime. However, employment contracts usually require staff to work after hours from time to time without pay, so some extra hours could fall under this clause.</li>
<li>Freeze new hires 
Rather than reducing the existing workforce, organisations can stop hiring new people. This isn’t always possible because new skills may be required to manage or execute new systems and processes. Again, employers should prefer to upskill current staff.</li>
<li>Increased duties 
If a business has enough work but can’t fund the required workforce, the extra duties could be shared by current employees. It’s essential that employers alert them that this is an alternative to retrenchment and that their efforts are appreciated.</li>
<li>Placement assistance programmes 
Once, business journals lauded companies who helped place employees in new jobs as part of their retrenchment process. Does it still happen? Really, it should. Businesses have large customer, supplier and recruiter databases, as well as strong business networks. All it takes is a bulk email or a LinkedIn post to exponentially increase each retrenched worker’s opportunities.</li>
</ul>
A note to employees
There are many ways organisations can avoid retrenchment. That said, new technologies and improved business processes can also lead to positions being made redundant. Skills that were common 5 or 10 years ago may simply no longer be needed in the modern business environment. So, there’s another angle to consider &#8211; workers can avoid retrenchment by retraining themselves for jobs that are currently in demand.
The unemployment rate in South Africa is one of the highest in the world and, with our current recession, it may get worse. At SAPA, we’re reaching out to employers to not just follow the law but to do their utmost to avoid retrenchments. Sometimes, there’s no other way. But if it’s an excuse to cut costs or improve shareholders’ dividends, this isn’t the right time for such thinking. So please, approach retrenchment responsibly. With the high number of dependents each employee must support, it’s not just one person who will go without.

What companies should consider before retrenchment

Nigeria’s economy grew out of recession in the second quarter of 2017, expanding 0.55 percent year-on-year, the statistics office said on Tuesday.
Africa’s largest economy shrank by 1.5 percent in 2016 for its first annual contraction in 25 years. It also declined in the first quarter of this year, due to lower oil revenues and a shortage of hard currency.
Nigeria’s economy had contracted 2.06 percent in the same quarter of 2016.
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Reporting by Paul Carsten, editing by Larry King
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Nigeria’s economy emerges from recession in second quarter, stats office says

Steven Friedman | University of Johannesburg
What business is willing to say to itself is as important, as what it says to government. Which is why the document, a contract with society, released by an organisation representing big business, Business Leadership SA’s Contract with South Africa may be setting a new tone not only on how business deals with government but also how major economic actors deal with the economy’s problems.
When most commentators are asked how South African business should respond to government, the common response is that it should complain, loudly and in public. This view has no doubt firmed since the March cabinet reshuffle damaged the economy and denouncing “white monopoly capital” became a refrain of the ANC’s patronage faction. Business, as the argument goes, should stand up for itself even if that means offending government.
But, while this approach makes great headlines and makes many people feel better, it does little or nothing to advance business interests or fix the economy.
Those who want business to shout at government seem to assume that this country has no history. But it does, and it is a history in which business is associated – and not only in the minds of patronage politicians &#8211; with the minority privilege which apartheid ensured. No one would use the phrase “white monopoly capital” if it did not seem to describe the world in which many black business and professional people feel that they live.
This makes the relationship between business and government more difficult than in most other countries. It also means that politicians cannot afford to be seen to be ordered about, by business. After all, what better way to confirm that “white monopoly capital” rules us all than to insist that business people tell politicians off in public?
<h2>Yelling is not the solution</h2>
Yelling at government is not helpful to the economy because it keeps alive the myth that its difficulties are caused by government alone. But, as very mainstream figures such as International Monetary Fund deputy MD David Lipton have pointed out, the fault is not government’s alone. Other economic actors, including business, have also contributed to the problem.
If businesses want a healthier economy, they need to look at what they can change as well as what the government can fix. This will undermine the “white monopoly capital” claim by showing that businesses are willing to change what they do as well as asking the government and other interests to change.
This is precisely what Business Leadership SA’s contract seeks to do. It feels as strongly about the “white monopoly capital” slur as others. It’s chief executive officer, Bonang Mohale, said at the contract’s launch that it hoped to undo the legacy “of the ugly and deceitful white monopoly capital campaign (which) sought to blame business for all the problems that beset this country”. He said the campaign was “dishonest”; it “tried to deflect from the real issues of state capture”. It had severely damaged business’s reputation.
All of this is music to the ears of the “give government a proper scolding” school. The key difference is that the organisation seeks to counter the campaign not simply by denouncing it but by taking responsibility for fixing the problems which made the campaign possible in the first place.
<h2>Problem is not just government</h2>
The contract recognises that corruption is a two-way process. It vows to root out corruption in the private sector too and wants companies to sign an integrity pledge, to fight corruption.
It also commits to fighting economic exclusion by creating jobs, encouraging and empowering senior black leadership, building skills, investing in communities and supporting small businesses.
Only after making these commitments does the organisation’s document say something about government. It says it cannot achieve these goals on its own. The government “must also step up” and create the conditions necessary for the country and economy to succeed.
This approach is more likely to dispel the “white monopoly capital” campaign than one which yells at the government. While those who coined the slogan will not be impressed, it’s not them to whom businesses are talking. Their audience is the tens of thousands of South Africans who have no axe to grind but want the economy to offer opportunities to more people.
The contract recognises the problem that undermines the image of large businesses as arrogant vehicles of power. By showing that they are sensitive to economic exclusion and those who suffer it offers to do something to solve the problem.
<h2>Conversation is the key</h2>
The document also creates opportunities for mending the economy by opening the way to a bargain between government, business and other economic interests. This is the essential route to change because none of the economic interests are strong enough to impose their favoured solution on the others.
By spelling out in broad terms a willingness to change, the contract enables politicians and government officials who do want to negotiate change to begin a discussion on the specifics. This promises to restart the conversation between government and business which was beginning to blossom during the later days of Pravin Gordhan (former finance minister) and Mcebisi Jonas (former deputy finance minister) at National Treasury.
It also makes negotiation possible by taking the three steps all the parties need to take to create a negotiation climate:
<ul>
<li>it acknowledges that the economy needs to change,</li>
<li>spells out what business is willing to do to change it, and</li>
<li>what it expects in return.</li>
</ul>
This opens the way for the other parties to do the same – if they do, the negotiations will have effectively begun and a way out of the economy’s dead end will be possible.
Business Leadership SA’s contract is hardly guaranteed to succeed. In the past, initiatives which depended on business and other economic interests making changes ran aground because business leaders, like the other negotiators, lacked the muscle to take those they represent with them.
It is not at all clear how many businesses are willing to follow Business Leadership SA’s approach. Nor is it clear if government and labour, whose participation is crucial, are willing and able to respond with their own bargaining positions.
What is clear is that the economy’s revival depends on the business strategy for change.
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This article was published in The Conversation.

How South African business can help government fix the economy

Russian exploration company Rosgeo will drill for gas off the southern coast of South Africa under a $400 million deal with PetroSA to help build the African country’s reserves.
The agreement announced on Monday comes against a backdrop of declining domestic gas reserves that have curtailed output at PetroSA’s gas-to-liquid plant in Mossel Bay.
“The project envisages extraction of up to 4 million cubic metres of gas daily. This will subsequently be delivered to PetroSA’s gas-to-liquids refinery,” PetroSA said in a statement.
The deal was signed on the sidelines of the BRICS block of developing nations meeting in Xiamen, China, and will see Rosgeo use seismic and drilling vessels to explore South Africa’s south coast, where Total also had acreage.
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Reporting by Wendell Roelf; editing by Alexander Smith
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Russia’s Rosgeo in $400MN deal to drill for South African gas

The world’s poorest continent continued to grow more generous according to a yearly index of charitable giving released on Tuesday, bucking the trend of otherwise declining signs of charity worldwide.
Africa was in a 2016 survey the only continent to report a continent-wide increase of its index generosity score when compared to its five-year average.
The score is a combined measure of respondents in 139 countries who were asked whether they had given money to a good cause, volunteered their time and helped a stranger.
“Despite the many challenges our continent is facing, it is encouraging to see that generosity continues to grow,” said Gill Bates, Southern Africa’s CEO for the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) that commissioned the poll.
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But globally, donating money and helping a stranger fell by nearly 2 percent, while volunteering dropped about 1 percent, the index showed.
From the United States to Switzerland and Singapore to Denmark, the index showed that the planet’s 10 richest countries by GDP per capita, for which data was available, saw declines in their generosity index score.
Myanmar, for the fourth consecutive year, held the top position of the World Giving Index as the most generous country.
Nine in ten of those surveyed in the Southeast Asian nation said they had donated money during the previous month.
Indonesia ranked second on the combined measure of generosity, overtaking the United States which held that position in last year’s index.
A star performer, CAF said, was the East African nation of Kenya, which jumped from twelfth to third place in a single year.
Yemen, the Middle East’s poorest country, which has been grappling with the effects of civil war ranked bottom of the World Giving Index.
The index is primarily based on data from a global poll of 146,000 respondents by market research firm Gallup.

Generosity declines worldwide but Africa saves the day: global survey

Kenya’s election commission on Monday set Oct. 17 as the date for a new vote ordered by the Supreme Court when it annulled an August poll won by President Uhuru Kenyatta.
The election will feature Kenyatta who is running for a second term and opposition leader Raila Odinga, the commission said.
A presidential spokesman said the government will not replace the election board ahead of the election, setting up a potential showdown between the government and the opposition.
Kenyatta won the Aug. 8 vote by 1.4 million votes. The court on Friday said the election commission had not followed proper procedures and ordered it to hold a new vote within 60 days. It did not stipulate any personnel changes.
Kenya’s election commission on Monday set Oct. 17 as the date for a new vote ordered by the Supreme Court when it annulled an August poll won by President Uhuru Kenyatta.
The election will feature Kenyatta who is running for a second term and opposition leader Raila Odinga, the commission said.
A presidential spokesman said the government will not replace the election board ahead of the election, setting up a potential showdown between the government and the opposition.
Kenyatta won the Aug. 8 vote by 1.4 million votes. The court on Friday said the election commission had not followed proper procedures and ordered it to hold a new vote within 60 days. It did not stipulate any personnel changes.
Spokesmen for Kenyatta and the election board rejected a change to the entire board.
“The Supreme Court gave clear guidance on who will hold the repeat election. You cannot accept one half of the verdict of the Supreme Court and not the other,” said presidential spokesman Manoah Esipisu.
Andrew Limo, a spokesman for the electoral board, said the situation was complicated by the fact that the court would not release its full verdict until Sept. 21.
Judges read short remarks criticizing the process but did not go into detail, saying they needed more time to consider more than 80,000 pages submitted as evidence.
“If you want to punish people, you must have a basis for it. But the only basis is the full judgment of the Supreme Court, which will not be out until 21 days,” Limo said.
“Otherwise the commission could get into a position of defending itself in court from people who were dismissed.”
Odinga’s spokesman was not immediately available to comment.
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Editing by George Obulutsa and Matthew Mpoke Bigg
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Kenyan election commission sets Oct. 17 as date for new vote

Dirk Siebels | University of Greenwich
Piracy off the African coastline has been a headline grabbing phenomenon for more than a decade. For a few years though, Somali pirates appeared to have a quiet spell. Then, recently they had their first successful attack against a merchant vessel since 2012.
Other attacks followed, including one in April that was foiled by Chinese and Indian navies.
On the other side of the continent, attacks against ships in the Gulf of Guinea remain a concern for shipping companies, particularly off the coast of Nigeria.
The State of Maritime Piracy report reiterates that the Nigerian coastline is a dangerous area for seafarers and has been for years.
However, coastal states affected by piracy often have other priorities. Take Somalia for example. The country is battling many issues including the effects of a long drought and frequent Al-Shabaab attacks.
The situation is similar in other countries. The Africa Centre for Strategic Studies points out that national security and economic policies rarely emphasise maritime security. This is due to a lack of awareness, political will and resources.
For years maritime security has been neglected throughout Africa. Recently however, there has been renewed focus on maritime issues. This was highlighted by the African Union’s maritime strategy and the Lomé maritime summit.
These developments show that maritime matters have become more important. But this is still not enough. To develop their blue economycoastal states need to start addressing maritime security issues beyond just piracy.
It should also include factors such as illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing. Unfortunately politicians and academics have traditionally framed maritime security in Africa as a purely counter-piracy affair. The debate needs to be broadened significantly to include an appreciation of the economic potential of the seas.
<h2>How to secure the oceans</h2>
Sea based economic activities (known as the blue economy) include; offshore oil and gas production, maritime trade, fishing activities and coastal tourism.
While these activities happen at sea, solutions to improve maritime security must be developed by national governments first. It is not enough to relegate security to navies and coastguards. Governments must first determine where patrols are needed.
In theory, they can do this using comprehensive surveillance techniques to gather intelligence on all activities within their exclusive economic zones. However, many governments in the developing world lack the sufficient technical capabilities to do so.
However, if Africa’s coastal states are really committed to developing their blue economies they will also need to employ a wide-reaching maritime strategy over and beyond basic security. The island nation of Seychelles has been particularly active in this area.
Maritime strategies help to identify the resources needed to realise the economic potential at sea. They are also the basis for security cooperation between neighbouring countries. This is because maritime insecurity is often a transnational problem.
National security agencies, the international community and NGOs should collaborate to develop a maritime strategy. At the national level, missing capacities can even be provided by the private sector. To manage this multi-agency approach national governments must ensure that their own priorities are front and centre.
Limiting maritime security to counter-piracy activities will not lead to sustainable solutions. Governments must adopt a more holistic approach to securing the oceans.
It does not make sense to focus on pirate attacks while ignoring other criminal activities at sea.
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This article was first published in The Conversation.

Op-Ed: African states don’t prioritise maritime security – here’s why they should

Kenya’s government will not replace the election board ahead of the new elections ordered by the Supreme Court, a presidential spokesman said on Monday, indicating a looming showdown with the opposition.
On Friday, the court annulled President Uhuru Kenyatta’s official win in the Aug. 8 presidential polls by 1.4 million votes. The court said the board had not followed proper procedures and ordered it to hold new elections within 60 days, but did not stipulate any personnel changes.
Some Kenyans celebrated the ruling, saying it reduced the potential for a repeat of the kind of violence that followed a disputed 2007 presidential election, in which more than 1,200 people were killed.
Opposition leader Raila Odinga, who has lost the last three elections and has alleged vote-rigging after each, was among those who welcomed the court judgement. But he also called for senior officials at the election board to resign and face possible prosecution.
Spokesmen for both the president and the election board rejected the idea of changing the entire board.
“The Supreme Court gave clear guidance on who will hold the repeat election. You cannot accept one half of the verdict of the Supreme Court and not the other,” said presidential spokesman Manoah Esipisu.
Andrew Limo, a spokesman for the electoral board, said the situation was complicated by the fact that the court would not release its full verdict until Sept. 21.
Judges on Friday read short remarks criticising the process but did not go into detail, saying they needed more time to consider more than 80,000 pages submitted as evidence.
“If you want to punish people, you must have a basis for it. But the only basis is the full judgement of the Supreme Court, which will not be out until 21 days,” Limo said.
“Otherwise the commission could get into a position of defending itself in court from people who were dismissed.”
Odinga’s spokesman was not immediately available to comment.
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Editing by Andrew Roche
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Showdown looms between Kenya opposition, ruling party over election board

Gold producer Acacia Mining will likely burn $15-20 million in cash as it shuts down a mine in Tanzania due to a persistent ban on the export of concentrates, its chief executive said on Monday.
“Towards the back end of the year we’re going to see an acceleration of cash burn, probably beyond what we had expected for Q3,” CEO Brad Gordon said on a conference call.

Acacia warns of higher cash burn due to Tanzania mine closure

Derek Yu | University of the Western Cape
The latest South African jobs statistics continue to reflect a shockingly high unemployment rate which will take some doing to reverse. Concerns about the high levels of youth unemployment and the social upheaval this might cause have been widely expressed.
But a deeper analysis of the numbers reveals an even scarier picture of large sections of the population suffering from chronic joblessness and worrying details about the country’s youth unemployment statistics that haven’t been sufficiently highlighted.
These include the fact that 39% of all unemployed South Africans have never worked before. Among young people this figure is even higher – at 60.3%. The numbers also highlight that many young people struggle to find their first job.
In contrast, the elderly face the problem of long-term unemployment after they lost their jobs. A greater share of them last worked more than 5 years ago. This share was the highest at 47.4% for the 50-65 year-olds.
To save the situation the government might have to make certain difficult choices. These could include accepting that certain age groups, above youth age, are unemployable and that what they need are poverty alleviation interventions. The government might then be able to focus on facilitating job opportunities for those aged between 15 and 29 who account for nearly half of total unemployed.
<h2>Overall unemployment at a glance</h2>
According to the World Bank the 2016 average unemployment rate for all upper middle-income countries was 6.2%. At 25.9% in 2016 and 27.7% in 2017 South Africa’s rate is higher than other African countries also classified by the bank as upper-middle-income countries. These include Botswana at 18.4%, Gabon at 18.5% and Namibia at 25.5%.
South Africa’s unemployment rate has been rising steadily for the past nine years. When the rate dropped from a peak of 31.1% in March 2003 to 21.5% in the last quarter of 2008 there was hope that it would drop to a level close to 15% by the end of 2010.
The rate has gone up despite policies being adopted that promised to cut joblessness. These included the New Growth Path which was adopted in 2011 and promised to create 5 million jobs and reduce unemployment to 15% by the end of 2020.
But in the intervening six-plus years employment increased by 2.2 million, bringing the number of unemployed to 6.17 million.
What’s even more concerning is that the annualised unemployment growth rate of 4.8% is double that of employment growth (2.4%).
If these trends persist, achieving the even more ambitious goal set out in the National Development Plan of dropping the unemployment rate to 6% by 2030 is highly questionable.
<h2>Two extreme groups</h2>
The numbers suggest the presence of two extreme groups of unemployed in South Africa.
The first consists of youth who struggle to find the first job despite actively searching through and answering job advertisement. Most have matric, that is they have completed 12 years of schooling.
The second group comprises of the elderly with previous work experience but who have been seeking work mainly via their social networks for more than 3 years. Most have not completed 12 years at school.
There’s a third group of unemployed sandwiched between the first two , namely those aged 30 years to 65 years with past work experience but who have been seeking work for shorter duration.
The government may need to realistically “accept” the second group (long-term elderly unemployed) as unemployable and focus on poverty alleviation. And the government might want to put more focus on the other two groups of unemployed, particularly young people.
The short-term elderly unemployed may require training to have their skills upgraded to better match the skills needs of employers before they stand a better chance of being reabsorbed into the labour market.
<h2>What must be done?</h2>
The South African government is not doing enough to address the youth unemployment crisis. Its efforts to create jobs for young people through an employment tax incentive hasn’t had much of an impact: youth employment has actually dropped since it came into force four years ago.
There are lots of obstacles to job creation in South Africa. The most recent global competitiveness report shows that the country’s labour market is hobbled by inefficient hiring and firing practices, little cooperation between employers and employees as well as a poor relationship between pay and productivity.
This tempts employers to replace labour (particularly the less skilled and experienced ones) with capital and discourages them from hiring new workers. In both cases, the youth are the most vulnerable.
So, what are the other options to more rapidly boost youth employment?
A transport subsidy for youth unemployed has been recommended as an alternative policy option. The idea was motivated by the fact that many jobs are in areas which are far away from where poor people live and therefore extremely expensive to get to.
The relationship between poverty and unemployment is startling. Data from 2014/2015 show that the poorest 40% of the population accounted for a mere 12.4% of total national income, but accounted for 71.9% of the unemployed. It’s therefore possible that poverty and expensive transport costs are huge barriers to unemployed people finding work.
Self-employment is another potential route for young people. But even that number is falling. It’s alarming that between 2008 and 2017 the number of youth employers or self employed workers dropped from 390 000 to 340 000.
This suggests that entrepreneurial activities for young people deserve serious attention. This should include government accelerating support in entrepreneurship skills training, access to micro-finance and creating an enabling environment for business development.
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This article was first published in The Conversation.

Op-Ed: The lesser known and scarier facts about unemployment in South Africa

Kenya’s Supreme Court ruling to scrap last month’s presidential election was shaped by a new chief justice who proved a staunch defender of judicial independence on a continent where judges are often seen as being under the thumb of executive powers.
David Maraga’s declaration that the Aug. 8 election was void and demand for a new poll with 60 days shocked many in the East African nation and abroad.
But his announcement, after a 4-2 vote by a court panel to annul the vote, didn’t surprise those who know the chief justice.
“We knew this case was coming and he was the man to hear it,” Professor Tom Ojienda, who worked with Maraga and sits on the Judicial Service Commission that appointed him chief justice, told Reuters. “He is a stickler for the rules.”
President Uhuru Kenyatta, who was expected to be sworn in for a second term until Friday’s Supreme Court ruling, said he respected the decision. But he took a swipe at Maraga’s colleagues, calling them “crooks” and saying the judiciary needed fixing.
Kenya, a U.S. ally in the fight against Islamists and a trade gateway to East Africa, has a history of disputed votes. A row after the 2007 vote led to ethnic bloodshed that killed more than 1,200 people. In 2013, a bid by veteran opponent Raila Odinga to secure an election rerun was rejected by the Supreme Court.
This time, the opposition changed tack in their petition. Instead of seeking to prove enough votes were fake to undermine the vote &#8211; an almost impossible task in the two weeks the court had to give its judgement &#8211; Odinga’s supporters sought to demonstrate that the online tallying process lacked integrity.
The new approach may have been a key factor in securing a decision that had the backing of four of the panel’s six judges, who have three weeks from the ruling to publish details of their decision.
But the opposition also found in the chief justice a man ready to defend judicial powers against the highest office and unswayed by a tendency in Kenya, a nation of more than 40 ethnic groups, for voters to back fellow clans people.
Within months of his appointment in October, Maraga called out Kenyatta for telling voters on a campaign stop in Maraga’s home region of Nyamira County in April that “their son” had a job. Maraga responded that his appointment had nothing to do with the president.
Kenyatta is a Kikuyu, Kenya’s biggest ethnic group but still a minority. Odinga is a Luo, another big grouping. The chief justice is Kisii, a smaller group from Kenya’s western highlands.
Maraga also sent a clear message to national leaders on Aug. 2 that the judiciary was above the political fray.
“A LITTLE SOMETHING”
“The emerging culture of public lynching of judges and judicial officers by the political class is a vile affront to the rule of law and must be fiercely resisted,” he said in a statement.
Maraga did not immediately issue a response to Kenyatta’s latest comments. Reuters could not reach him for comment.
Kenyans have long complained that getting any official business done requires a “kitu kidogo”, Swahili for “a little something” or bribe, a frustration that is echoed across Africa.
But Kenya has slowly rebuilt confidence in its judiciary after the post-2007 vote violence. A new constitution in 2010 demanded reforms of the judiciary and other public institutions.
Maraga, who has risen the ranks as those reforms have been implement, was known by colleagues for his strict adherence to the rules even as a young lawyer.
A devout Christian of the Seventh Day Adventist tradition, he built his practice in the Rift Valley city of Nakuru rather than to Nairobi where he where he could have secured more high profile cases and would have more easily rubbed shoulders with the rich and powerful, his colleagues said.
“If a client gave you any problem, or asked for anything that was wrong, or refused to pay, (Maraga) would just say, ‘Let him go. Other ones will come’,” said Professor Ojienda said.
Maraga’s integrity and record of strictly interpreting election procedures in past polls swayed the commission to appoint him last October, Ojienda said.
The opposition’s high hopes in 2013 that it could overturn that election result were dashed. Supreme Court judges, then led by Maraga’s predecessor Willy Mutunga, rejected their petition.
This time, even Odinga &#8211; a former prime minister who has fought and lost three presidential races including this one &#8211; seemed surprised. After listening to Friday’s ruling in court, he broke out into a broad grin and pumped his fist in the air.
Since 2013, several new judges were appointed to the Supreme Court’s seven-strong panel. Friday’s decision was backed by Maraga and two others appointed after 2013. Another, who had been on the panel in 2013, also backed the ruling. Two judges dissented, while one was ill and did not vote.
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“An election is not an event, it is a process from the beginning to the end,” Maraga said before reading the ruling.
Four years earlier, the opposition had some of their arguments thrown out as they were lodged too late, while their complaints about the widespread failure of the electronic voting systems failed to convince the judges.
This time, the opposition case hinged on the election board’s failure to post online tally forms from each of the 40,883 polling stations before announcing results.
The forms were supposed to be signed by each party’s agent, as a hard-copy backup to the electronic transmission. But thousands of forms were missing from the board’s website when it announced results. A report by independent court-appointed experts found many forms lacked official stamps, signatures or serial numbers.
That was enough to convince a majority in Maraga’s panel.

Vote ruling by chief justice surprises Kenyans, but not his colleagues

Kenya’s shares and dollar bonds plummeted on Friday while its shilling currency fell after the country’s Supreme Court declared President Uhuru Kenyatta’s election win invalid.
Analysts said the ruling signalled new uncertainty for East Africa’s most developed economy. Another vote must be held within 60 days, according to the constitution.
In Nairobi, stocks fell sharply before recovering some ground, and trading in the shilling followed a similar pattern.
In London one Africa economist, John Ashbourne at Capital Economics, cited the risk of a violent reaction.
However, a lawyer for Kenyatta, Ahmednasir Abdullahi, said the court’s decision had to be respected. “Let’s go back to the people and (they) &#8230;will express themselves again,” he said.
There were also no signs of tension in Kenyatta’s ethnic strongholds, while supporters of opposition leader Raila Odinga celebrated peacefully in the streets in areas that had voted for him.
The stock exchange halted trading briefly midway through the session after blue chip shares plummeted.
Trading restarted at 1000 GMT, exchange chief executive Geoffrey Odundo told Reuters. He said shares had fallen by the maximum daily limit of 10 percent, which requires a trading halt.
Real time data is usually not available for the market apart from for individual stocks.
Telecoms operator Safaricom SCOM.NR, the biggest company by market value, fell 4.9 percent to trade at 24.00 shillings ($0.2328) per share, traders said.
“No one likes uncertainty especially if the uncertainty period is as long as 60 days,” said Ken Minjire, head of securities at Nairobi-based Genghis Capital.
The shilling partly recovered after an early slump to trade at 103.10/20 per dollar, down around 0.4 percent from Thursday’s close of 102.75/95.
Kenya’s $2 billion sovereign bond maturing in 2024 fell 1.33 cents, according to Tradeweb data, its lowest since mid-August. The 2019 issue fell 0.75 cents to 102.75 cents.
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Kenya’s average yield premium over Treasuries blew out 25 basis points (bps) on the EMBI Global Diversified index to 411 bps. The underlying emerging debt index was unchanged.
“People will be looking at the tone the president takes,” Ashbourne added.
Kenya has a history of disputed elections. A row over the 2007 poll, in which Odinga also lost out, was followed by weeks of ethnic bloodshed in which more than 1,200 were killed.
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Additional reporting by Alexander Winning and John Ndiso; editing by John Stonestreet
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Kenyan assets drop after court declares election result invalid

The chairman of Kenya’s election board said on Friday it would make personnel changes and prosecute any staff involved in deliberate tampering with last month’s vote, after the Supreme Court declared it invalid.
“To protect the integrity of (the) sovereign will of the people the commission intends to make internal changes to personnel,” said Wafula Chebukati, who said he was not resigning.
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reporting by Maggie Fick; writing by Katharine Houreld; editing by John Stonestreet
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Kenya election board: we’ll change personnel to ensure election integrity

Kenya’s president Uhuru Kenyatta said on Friday he disagreed with a Supreme Court ruling that nullified his win in last month’s presidential election, but that he would respect the decision and urged citizens to do the same.
“The court has made its decision. We respect it. We don’t agree with it. And again, I say peace &#8230; peace, peace, peace,” he said in a televised address. “That is the nature of democracy”.
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reporting by Katharine Houreld; editing by John Stonestreet
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Kenyan president says respects court decision to invalidate election

Atlas Mara Ltd, the African investment vehicle of former Barclays boss Bob Diamond, said on Friday that Fairfax Africa now holds 42 percent of the company after it subscribed to 70.1 million new shares.
The change in ownership comes after Atlas Mara announced plans in June to raise $200 million so that it could increase its stake in Union Bank of Nigeria and scale up other businesses.
Fairfax subscribed to around 80 pct of Atlas Mara’s share issue, with existing shareholders taking the rest.
Fairfax Africa is part of Canadian investment firm Fairfax Financial, led by Prem Watsa, to invest in African assets.
Diamond teamed up with Africa-based entrepreneur Ashish Thakkar to set up Atlas Mara, a vehicle through which they planned to buy up assets to help build it into a powerful force in African banking.
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Reporting By Andrew MacAskill; Editing by Rachel Armstrong
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Fairfax Africa takes 42% stake in Bob Diamond’s Africa bank

Mozambican opposition Renamo leader, Afonso Dhlakama, said he would sign a peace deal with the government by early November, in a bid to end almost three years of sporadic violence.
Renamo and the ruling Frelimo party fought on opposing sides of a civil war from 1976 to 1992 in which a million people died before a peace accord ended the fighting.
Violence has flared up again since Renamo challenged results of the southern African nation’s 2014 elections.
“It will be in October or November, no later than the beginning of November,” Dhlakama told the weekly independent newspaper, Canal de Moz and quoted by Noticas, the pro-government daily paper on Thursday.
Dhlakama said his party was negotiating cautiously with the government to avoid a deadlock, which has seen previous talks collapse.
Issues still being discussed include plans to decentralize powers, constitutional reforms to allow provincial governors to be elected and reintegrating Renamo’s staff into the police and army.
Renamo wants governors to be elected in 2019, seeing it as a chance to rule areas where it has popular backing.
Nyusi and Dhlakama met in early August for the first time since 2015 to discuss the next steps in the peace process, which they hoped will be completed by the end of the year.
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Reporting by Manual Mucari
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