By <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/folashade-soule-649516">Folashade Soule</a>, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-oxford-1260">University of Oxford</a>

“You don’t negotiate with China !” I was quickly told when I started interviewing African public servants about their infrastructure deals with Beijing. There is a widespread view in Africa that you accept whatever terms are offered, for fear that the money might go somewhere else instead. 

China is <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/business/New-US-fund-to-rival-Chinese-push-into-Africa/2560-4840700-l6y8e4z/index.html">the leading</a> infrastructure finance provider on the continent – as demonstrated by a recent <a href="http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-09/03/c_137441596.htm">pledge</a> of US$60 billion (£47 billion), most of which is for infrastructure projects. Big <a href="https://www.thebusinessyear.com/top-10-china-infrastructure-projects-in-africa-2018/focus">projects</a> on the slate <a href="https://www.businessinsider.co.za/here-are-150-million-rand-projects-in-africa-funded-by-china-2018-9">include</a> hydropower plants in Angola and Guinea, an oil refinery in Nigeria, and a new city in Egypt. 

Yet, when you look closely at what happens on the ground, some African countries are much better at negotiating with the Chinese than others. Railway projects in East Africa appear to be a good example. In Kenya, the Standard Gauge Railway is the largest infrastructure project since independence from Britain in 1963. China Eximbank <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-40171095">provided</a> most of the finance for the first phase – 472 kilometres of track between Nairobi and Mombasa – at a cost of US$3.2 billion. 

In neighbouring Ethiopia, an electric train line from Addis Ababa to Djibouti, which is also <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-37562177">Chinese-financed</a>, opened two years ago. The cost for this more expensive type of railway was US$3.4 billion – for 756 kilometres. Kenya <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-40171095">claims</a> that its railway cost more for reasons like the terrain and the need to carry higher volumes of cargo. At the same time, however, many believe other issues to have been at play – including failures around the negotiation process. 



My <a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/international-relations/assets/documents/global-south-unit/WPS2.pdf">ongoing</a> research into China funded infrastructure projects <a href="https://www.routledge.com/New-Directions-in-AfricaChina-Studies/Alden-Large/p/book/9781138714670">is confirming</a> that African governments can learn from best practice in this area. The best deals depend on the following four conditions being met. 

<h2>1. Involve everyone</h2>

The process in Chinese deal-making tends to go like this: Beijing will begin by making financial pledges, often aimed at a number of countries; these are followed by meetings at state level between a Chinese delegation and the African head of state and their senior officials. Infrastructure projects under discussion have often already been passed over by Western donors.

Once a project is broadly agreed, the relevant Chinese contractors, mostly state owned enterprises, will typically contact African civil servants in the relevant branches of government to get detailed negotiations underway – with support from the Chinese trade mission and local embassy. Topics to be discussed will include costs, but also the use of materials and workers; technology transfer; and the effect of national regulations in areas like labour, construction and the environment. 

<hr>

 
 
 Read more:
 <a href="http://theconversation.com/trumps-africa-strategy-should-have-cast-china-as-a-regional-partner-not-a-global-adversary-108901">Trump&#8217;s Africa strategy should have cast China as a regional partner, not a global adversary</a>
 
 

<hr>


In countries like Togo and Cameroon, key ministries like finance, planning or even the cabinet will lead the negotiation. In the likes of Benin and Senegal, the relevant technical ministry, such as transport or housing, will lead instead or take over. They are supposed to consult with departments like finance and planning, but <a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/international-relations/assets/documents/global-south-unit/WPS2.pdf">they often</a> press ahead on their own to speed up the process – sometimes without any experience of dealing with China. 

In practice, such deals can be less beneficial to the country in question. Where one arm of government is not clear about what another is doing, it increases the potential for corruption – there has been a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-corruption-railway/kenya-arrests-two-top-officials-for-suspected-corruption-over-new-3-billion-railway-idUSKBN1KW07L">corruption investigation</a> in the case of the new Kenyan railway, for example, and I have been told during my research that this was also linked to coordination failures during the negotiations. 

When all relevant government departments are involved in a negotiation, it does take longer. The process is more coherent, however, and the resulting project is less likely to breach national regulations. 

<h2>2. Empower the negotiators</h2>

The president or his senior advisors also frequently intervene during negotiations. This is likely to be politically motivated – a need to fulfil electoral promises around infrastructure development, perhaps, or pressure from the Chinese authorities. 

Where civil servant negotiators are being pressed to hurry up, it can mean that national regulations get ignored. In Benin, for example, during negotiations over road projects several years ago, the Chinese contractors were unhappy about certain conditions being imposed. Then president Yayi Boni agreed to intervene on their behalf to bypass national regulations in areas including labour and construction. Such situations are best avoided. 



On the other hand, some outside interventions can be positive. In Togo, Senegal and Tunisia, and the current government in Benin, I’ve seen examples of the cabinet hiring international law firms with experts who have worked in the Chinese government and its development banks. This can bridge the differences in Chinese and African negotiating styles. 

The Chinese often adopt a take-it-or-leave-it approach. In many cases, Africans are not confrontational enough in return. They don’t appreciate that China <a href="https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo22657847.html">has a surplus</a> of domestically produced materials they are seeking to offload, for example. Wiser negotiators will play China off against other countries seeking to finance infrastructure projects on the continent, such as South Korea or the United Arab Emirates. 

<h2>3. Keep the public onside</h2>

China <a href="http://afrobarometer.org/sites/default/files/publications/Dispatches/ab_r6_dispatchno122_perceptions_of_china_in_africa1.pdf">tends to be</a> popular in Africa – more so than the US in around 60% of countries on the continent. Yet the public also see negatives: many think Chinese products are poor quality, while there is a growing perception that dealing with China tends to favour Chinese labourers.

African governments need to bear these concerns in mind. If not, they risk being denounced by the media or civil society organisations – as <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/business/article/2000229994/why-kenya-may-have-got-short-end-of-the-stick-in-sgr-locomotives-deal">has happened</a> in Kenya over the railway, for instance. 

<h2>4. Increase knowledge</h2>

African governments are still relatively new to dealing with China; they should take every opportunity to share lessons with one another. There is a role for African universities here. They should set up more centres of Asian studies to close the gap in information and knowledge.

Some have argued in the past that many African governments fail to negotiate successfully with the Chinese because they <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/25/africa-needs-to-know-what-it-wants-from-china-expert-says.html">lack a strategy</a>. I actually see plenty stratagems and tactics on the African side. What is required is a more coordinated and coherent approach – something China has <a href="https://www.die-gdi.de/en/the-current-column/article/next-steps-for-chinas-new-development-agency-1/">been working on</a> from its own perspective. It is better for African governments to have no deal than a bad deal. With the right approach, they can achieve much more than is often thought to be the case.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/109116/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important" />

<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/folashade-soule-649516">Folashade Soule</a>, Senior Research Associate, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-oxford-1260">University of Oxford</a>

This article is republished from <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-negotiate-infrastructure-deals-with-china-four-things-african-governments-need-to-get-right-109116">original article</a>.

Here’s what African governments need to do to negotiate better infrastructure deals with China

HARARE (Reuters) &#8211; Zimbabwe’s largest brewing company Delta Beverages, 40 percent owned by Anheuser-Busch Inbev, said it has abandoned the plan to only accept hard currency payments due to crippling shortage of U.S. dollars after talks with the government and central bank.



Zimbabwe’s reserve bank will try to provide the foreign exchange required by Delta to continue trading at current levels, the bank and Delta said in a joint statement late Thursday.



Earlier this week, Delta Corp said its beverages subsidiary will accept hard currency only from Jan. 4 to protect itself from a shortage of U.S. dollars in the country.



The African country adopted the use of foreign currencies, mainly the U.S. dollar, in 2009 in an effort to tame inflation, but a severe shortage of physical notes has left Zimbabweans watching the dollars in their bank accounts lose value compared with cash.



Reporting by Alfonce Mbizwo; Writing by Joe Brock, Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips

Why AB Inbev’s Zimbabwe unit is abandoning plan to only accept hard currency payments

By Henk Bouwman, Research Professor Ecotoxicology, North-West University

 <figure>
 <img decoding="async" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250912/original/file-20181217-185234-imw1xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&#038;q=45&#038;auto=format&#038;w=754&#038;fit=clip" alt="File 20181217 185234 imw1xw.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1" />
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 Shampoo containing plastic microbeads.
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/henk-bouwman-553451">Henk Bouwman</a>, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/north-west-university-1949">North-West University</a>

Plastic is everywhere. It is used across a spectrum of applications from durable industrial equipment, household appliances to throw-away single-use items and even the clothes we wear. This wide scope of uses is ascribed to its versatility, low-cost and because it’s extremely durable. 

But its properties also make it a problem. Because it’s so durable the lifespan of a plastic product is often much longer than the time it is in use for. This is especially the case for single use plastics like straws, bottles and bags. A plastic bag has an average usage time of 20 minutes, while it can take up to <a href="https://greenerideal.com/infographics/life-cycle-of-a-plastic-bag/">1000 years</a> to break down in the environment. 

These large plastics are an environmental hazard. They entangle animals, cause damage to their respiratory surfaces, block their digestive tracts and can cause them to starve to death. 

Although macroplastics are a clearly visible environmental pollutant, they are only part of the problem. Recent research has shown <a href="https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/resources/waste/plastic-microbeads-160306.pdf">microplastics</a> to pose a much bigger pollution threat than previously thought. 

Microbeads, like plastic bags and water bottles, are also a form of single use plastic. But, because they aren’t visible, are often disregarded. In recent years, scientists <a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.140317">have found</a> them in deep oceanic water, remote lakes, ground water and even drinking water. They are dangerous as the tiny particles take up harmful chemicals from the environment and, when ingested, act as carriers for pollutants into our bodies. 

The problem is microplastics are difficult to get rid of because they’re so small and are found nearly everywhere. The best tactic to fight this pollutant is therefore to reduce the amount of plastics entering the environment. 

<h2>Steps so far</h2>

Microplastics have two sources. They can be produced to be microscopically small – like microbeads in cosmetic products. These are tiny round plastic beads, ranging from about a hundredth of a millimetre to one millimetre, that are used to scrub skin for a minute or two before being washed into the environment where they can stay for up to <a href="http://www.vancouverbc.surfrider.org/ban-the-bead/">10 000 years</a>. 

But most microplastics result from the breakdown of larger pieces of plastic that were not recycled and break up due to exposure to the sun or physical wear. 

Many countries have come to realise the dangers of these microplastics and are taking action. A number have banned the use of microbeads in cosmetic products. These include Canada, the US, United Kingdom, France, Sweden, Taiwan, South Korea and New Zealand. 

And in 2018, 57 brands joined the <a href="https://www.beatthemicrobead.org/look-for-the-zero/">“Look for the Zero”</a> campaign which pledges that no plastics are added to products. 

In Africa, a number of countries have also started taking action against plastic pollution, with countries like Burundi, Benin, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Chad, Morocco, Rwanda and Kenya placing a ban on single use <a href="https://www.nema.go.ke/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=article&amp;id=102&amp;Itemid=121">plastic bags</a>. 

South Africa put a levy on plastic bags in 2002, but while it hasn’t proved to be very successful as plastic bags are a leading environmental plastic pollutant, it is now considering a <a href="https://www.beatthemicrobead.org/results-so-far/">microbead ban</a>. This would promote incentives against plastic pollution and encourage other countries to follow suit against a relatively easily removable source of plastic pollution. Many South African cosmetics companies have already committed to keep microbeads out of their products. 

<h2>The challenges</h2>

Measures to address the global plastic problem can place a heavy economic burden on developing countries. Because of plastic’s low production cost and usefulness as a packaging material, alternatives for single use plastics are usually expensive and places environmental pressure on other resources. 

Microbeads could be a low hanging fruit in the fight against global plastic pollution. It would be easy to remove them and to replace them with more environmentally friendly alternatives like Jojoba beads, ground oats, almond shells and coffee. Emphasis should also be placed on <a href="https://issp.uottawa.ca/sites/issp.uottawa.ca/files/microbeads_-_literature_review_2.pdf">methods</a> of exfoliation other than physical abrasion, like enzyme and acid exfoliation.

The plastic pollution problem is an extremely complex issue and each country with unique socioeconomic makeup needs to tackle it to its own capacity. 

Carina Verster from the Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management at North-West University also contributed to this article.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108763/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important" />

<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/henk-bouwman-553451">Henk Bouwman</a>, Research Professor Ecotoxicology, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/north-west-university-1949">North-West University</a>

This article is republished from <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-microbeads-are-such-a-threat-and-why-theyre-so-hard-to-handle-108763">original article</a>.

Why Africa can no longer ignore the microbeads threat

By Sandiso Sibisi, UNDP Open Innovation Africa Lead



Despite Africa’s impressive growth in past 25 years and its entry into the digital economy, the job market continues to be in a depressed state as youth unemployment continues to rise.Africa has the largest population of young people in the world, some 200 million aged between 15 and 24, accounting for 60% of all of Africa’s jobless.This is alarming to say the least because youth employment could drive economic development in Africa if we invest in them.



The question is “What step scan we take to address this?” Africa needs a way out of poverty and entrepreneurship may be key. It has the potential to create millions of jobs in Africa and youth entrepreneurs may bring about the positive change we urgently need. And although more and more youth are looking into entrepreneurship, there are many challenges facing this sector like the lack of access to information,finance, networking and mentoring. These four pillars are critical in modern-day entrepreneurship, as well as taking on a virtual presence in the digital economy.  Everything around us is connected and entrepreneurs need to embody the virtual world in order to be successful in smart cities of the future. But challenges relating to the four pillars in the virtual world need to be addressed in order to give Africa’s youth a fighting chance, 



Mentoring




Young entrepreneurs require mentoring and trust is a crucial element of this. In the past, this relationship would have been established over a period of time or through a structured mentoring process, which is more than a once-off event. But this is not how it works in today’s world.



Mentoring happens in the virtual world where it has become increasingly difficult to build trust without physical face to face interaction. Entrepreneurs are sceptical and unlikely to share details or sensitive information with a mentor on the internet without being able to trust that person first. 



Networking




Networking is standard practice for business professionals who want to establish contacts and relationships. It is a process that helps foster the exchange of information and ideas among individuals that share a common interest. Virtual networking is challenging because a growing number of business networks only want to support mature entrepreneurs rather than youth. 



This has resulted in minimal opportunities for young entrepreneurs. There are a few fellowships with a virtual presence in Africa, but they are not enough for the kind of networking that is needed. 



Finance




Financial transactions are rarely done on a virtual platform. It requires a physical presence and face to face interaction. However, some initiatives that do have online support provide potential capital providers and this is extremely crucial because funding makes entrepreneurship possible.  



Information



Most youth entrepreneurship focused initiatives aim to provide information and advisory services of some kind, while virtual platforms provide specific information. Information tends to be outdated after a short period of time.



The challenges facing youth entrepreneurs in Africa are broad and varied, and this was precisely the reason why the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) decided to establish a virtual platform for entrepreneurs. The UNDP’s Regional Service Centre in Africa engaged Accenture, an innovative leader in digitalisation, to facilitate the implementation of a pan-African entrepreneurship portal called YAS (Youth for Africa and Sustainable Development Goals) to address the four main pillars for the betterment of Africa and its youth.  



The objective is to help young entrepreneurs move away from being jobseekers to becoming job creators. This is important because the United Nations estimates that by 2050, the world population will have grown by 2.2 billion people and half of them will be African. This population explosion will have far-reaching implications for Africa’s labour force, so it is important to look at the demographic make-up.



The youth are Africa’s greatest asset and we have an abundance of them. Youth employment has the capacity to drive economic development and it is therefore critical that all sectors work together to improve access to finance and skills so that these youth have the tools they need to build and develop a sustainable Africa. Can you imagine an Africa where 90% of our youth are employed? Can you imagine what this will do for economic growth? Can you imagine what Africa will look like if poverty did not exist?

Op-Ed: Africa has a dire youth unemployment crisis, here’s how to fix it…

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; Shares in South African telecoms giant MTN jumped 8 percent on Thursday after it settled a row with Nigeria’s central bank for a fraction of the $8.1 billion it had threatened to cost.



MTN announced on Monday that it would pay just $52.6 million to end the dispute in Nigeria, its biggest and most lucrative market, but also its most troublesome.



The case had dogged MTN, Africa’s biggest telecoms company, for four months, dragging its share price down 20 percent to hover around its lowest level since 2009 while also sparking pessimism around the ease of doing business in Nigeria.



It centred on allegations that dividends paid by the firm between 2007 and 2015 were based on improperly issued certificates.



The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had initially ordered MTN and its lenders to bring back $8.1 billion it alleged the company had illegally repatriated to South Africa during that time.



But after MTN provided additional documents, the central bank concluded only one 2008 private placement, worth around $1 billion, was irregular. MTN agreed to pay $52.6 million as a “notional reversal” of this transaction.



“MTN Nigeria will pay the notional reversal amount without admission of liability,” it said in a statement on Monday, announcing the settlement.



The central bank’s initial order threatened to wipe out more than half of MTN’s market capitalisation at the time it was issued in August, and spooked investors just as the company was trying to reassure them of its frontier market-focused strategy after a series of costly legal problems.



MTN shares were up 4.34 percent to 89.21 rand at 1055 GMT on Thursday, after rising more than 8 percent to highs of 93 rand in the first trading session since the settlement was announced.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">DIFFICULT MARKET</h3>



MTN is Nigeria’s biggest operator, with 52.3 million users in 2017, and the country accounts for one third of the firm’s annual core profits. But it has also proven problematic.



While the settlement marks a turning point in MTN’s fortunes in the country, the telecoms heavyweight still has to fight a $2 billion tax bill from Nigeria’s attorney general.



It also comes two years after the firm paid $1 billion for missing the deadline to cut off unregistered SIM cards &#8211; a fine that prompted its first ever annual loss.



MTN was also previously accused of illegally repatriating $14 billion to its parent company, but was cleared of the allegations.



The latest dispute cemented concerns about firms’ ability to effectively operate in Nigeria, where a sluggish economy, strained public finances and upcoming elections have also left some questioning the motives behind such cases.



“Why did it take the CBN several years to ‘discover’ this and confront MTN?” said Dobek Pater, a director at consultancy Africa Analysis, adding this at least suggests negligence or a lack of competence at the central bank.



“Sometimes the government (government organisations’) interpretation of the law/regulations can be speculative to suit their ends,” he told Reuters via email.



Reporting by Emma Rumney; Editing by Louise Heavens and Adrian Croft

MTN shares jump 8 percent as dispute with Nigeria ends, how much does the telecoms group have to pay?

KINSHASA (Reuters) &#8211; Voters in three Congolese cities known as anti-government strongholds will be excluded from Sunday’s presidential elections on security and health grounds, officials said, prompting calls for protests from angry opposition leaders.



Electoral commission CENI said an Ebola outbreak was behind the cancellation of the ballot in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo cities of Beni and Butembo. It cited ethnic violence for the same action in the western city of Yumbi.



The election is meant to lead to the first democratic transfer of power in Africa’s leading copper producer, where conflicts have in the past destabilised the entire central part of the continent.



Lawmaker Muhindo Nzangi Butondo, a coordinator for opposition presidential candidate Martin Fayulu, called for street protests in Beni, Butembo and nearby Goma on Thursday, describing the CENI’s actions as an attack on the Nande ethnic group.



“(President Joseph) Kabila is taking revenge against the Nandes,” Nzangi said in a statement.



The cities are in a part of the country where conflicts over the past two decades fought at least in part on ethnic grounds have killed and displaced millions.



Government spokesman Lambert Mende declined to respond directly to Nzangi’s comments. He said he understood the anger of those affected but justified the CENI’s decision for security reasons.



Moise Katumbi, a prominent opposition leader who was barred from standing in the election, tweeted that the Congolese “must take matters into their own hands and chase away this regime”



He and Nzangi accused the CENI of trying to tip the election in favour of Kabila’s preferred candidate, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary.



Opinion polls are rare in DRC, but a survey from a New York-based research group in October showed another leading opposition candidate, Felix Tshisekedi, on 36 percent, followed by Shadary on 16 percent and Fayulu on 8 percent.



Tshisekedi will participate in Sunday’s vote despite the CENI’s announcement, a spokesman for his UDPS party, Paul Tshilumbu, told Reuters.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">POSTPONED</h3>



The elections &#8211; also incorporating legislative and provincial polls &#8211; were originally meant to take place in 2016. They have been repeatedly postponed since, sparking violence in which security forces have killed dozens of people.



The CENI pushed the election date back by seven more days last week due to delays in deploying voting materials.



Explaining the three exclusions, it said on Wednesday: “Elections lead to important movements of voters toward polling places, thus &#8230; raising the risk of propagation of this disease (Ebola) and providing the conditions for terrorist attacks.”



On Dec 5, Health Minister Oly Ilunga said the Ebola outbreak &#8211; declared in August and the second-worst in history &#8211; would not interfere with elections, noting that voter registration elsewhere in Congo last year had not been interrupted by a separate outbreak.



A health ministry spokeswoman was not immediately available for comment on Wednesday.



Legislative and provincial elections will take place in Beni, Butembo and Yumbi in March, the CENI said. “We know it’s tough but that’s the situation we are facing,” CENI spokesman Jean-Pierre Kalamba told reporters.



The three cities, home to more than 1.2 million of Congo’s roughly 40 million registered voters, are known as bastions of opposition to Kabila.



Voting elsewhere in the vast central African nation will go ahead on Sunday as planned, the CENI said. Final presidential results would be announced on Jan. 15 and the new president sworn in on Jan. 18.



Kabila, 47, has governed since his father’s assassination in 2001. He won elections in 2006 and 2011, although the latter was marred by widespread accusations of fraud.



Additional reporting by Stanis Bujakera and Fiston Mahamba; Writing by Aaron Ross; Editing by John Stonestreet

Here’s why voters in three DRC opposition cities will be excluded from Sunday’s presidential elections

BEIJING (Reuters) &#8211; China’s Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt Co will invest $147.2 million to build a copper project in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), as it extends the exploration of its mining assets in the country, the company said in a filing to the Shanghai stock exchange on Tuesday.



The project will be located in the Lukuni region in the south of DRC, and will have annual electro-deposited copper production capacity of 30,000 tonnes.



Electro-deposited copper is a raw material widely used in the electrical equipment and machine manufacturing sectors.



Huayou has built two cobalt refineries in the Luiswishi region of DRC after buying copper-cobalt mineral rights from La Generale des Carrieres et des Mines in 2015.



The new copper project is expected to launch by September 2019, the company said in the filing, but it also warned it still needs approvals from Chinese authorities.



The investment will be made through its subsidiary Congo DongFang International Mining (CDM), which mainly sources copper and cobalt from DRC.



Reporting by Muyu Xu and Ryan Woo; Editing by Kirsten Donovan

China’s Zhejiang Huayou to extend its mining assets in this African country with $147 million investment in copper project

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; South African power utility Eskom will reduce its executive management to 10 from 21, it said internal memo seen by Reuters, part of cash-strapped company to reduce its wage bill.



“It is crucial that we set ourselves up for the future, and I believe that the steps we’ve take so far are already placing us on a path towards stability,” Chief Executive Phakamani Hadebe said in the memo.



Eskom spokesman Khulu Phasiwe confirmed that the company had approved the reorganisation of the top management structure.



Eskom, which has implemented power cuts in recent months due to coal shortages and poor plant performance, is fighting for survival after a decade of financial decline.



It previously stated that it wants to substantiality cut its 48,000 workforce.



Among those leaving the utility is Dave Nicholls, the head of nuclear energy, who was due to retire next year. He is leaving at the end of month as are seven other executives, according to the memo



Reporting by Alexander Winning; Editing by Alison Williams

Why South Africa’s power utility Eskom is planning to cut 10 executive jobs

LAGOS (Reuters) &#8211; South Africa’s MTN Group has resolved a dispute with Nigeria’s central bank and made a $53 million payment, the telecoms company said in a message posted on Twitter on Monday.



Nigeria’s central bank had said $8.1 billion in dividends paid by MTN Nigeria to its parent company between 2007 and 2015 and sent back to South Africa were illegal and should be returned.



While the west African country’s regulator had accused MTN of illegally transferring the funds out of the country, MTN denied any wrongdoing.



“MTN resolves Nigeria dividend issue, makes $53m payment, engaging with banks regarding the agreement,” it said on Twitter.



Nigeria is MTN’s biggest market, accounting for a third of its annual core profit, but has proved problematic in recent years.



Around two years ago MTN agreed to pay more than $1 billion to settle a dispute over SIM cards in Nigeria.



In a separate case, MTN faces a $2 billion tax demand from Nigeria’s attorney general.



Reporting by Alexis Akwagyiram; editing by Jason Neely

MTN and Nigeria resolve dispute, here’s what you need to know

LAGOS (Reuters) &#8211; Plans to build another privately-financed power station in Nigeria to help end decades of chronic blackouts have been delayed because of concerns about persistent shortfalls in payments for electricity across the sector.



The $1.1 billion Qua Iboe Power Plant being developed by energy infrastructure company Black Rhino and the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation won’t get a green light by the end of 2018 as planned and it was unclear when the deal might close, NNPC told Reuters.



The delay is a setback for Africa’s biggest oil producer where 80 million people don’t have access to grid power supplies and it exposes the difficulties in attracting private investment to a sector that successive governments have tried to reform.



The uncertainty surrounding the 540-megawatt Qua Iboe plant stems from the difficulties Nigeria’s first privately-financed independent power project &#8211; the 460-megawatt Azura-Edo plant &#8211; has encountered since it came online this year.



Azura was meant to be a model for a string of independent power plants financed by international investors. To give them confidence to invest in the first major plant since the power sector was privatised in 2013, the World Bank provided a safeguard known as a partial risk guarantee &#8211; meaning the lender would step in if Nigeria defaulted on payments.



Under the current system, the government-owned Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading company (NBET) buys power from generators and passes it on to distributors who then collect money from customers and reimburse NBET.



But because NBET is not paid in full for the power it buys, generators such as Azura have been partly reimbursed from an emergency central bank loan fund created to keep the sector afloat.



NNPC told Reuters one of the reasons the Qua Iboe plant (QIPP), which is due to be built in the southern state of Akwa Ibom, had been delayed was because NBET appeared reluctant to commit to new projects to avoid increasing its liabilities.



“The continued delay relates to the current cashflow challenges at NBET, as highlighted by the Azura project,” a spokesman for NNPC said in an emailed statement. “This concern is justified by the fact that NBET is yet to see an improvement in collections from DISCOs (distribution companies).”



NBET did not immediately respond to a request for comment on NNPC’s statement about QIPP.



NBET chief executive Marilyn Amobi told Reuters in November that it was hard for the company to work because of poor infrastructure and shortfalls in cash from distributors needed to reimburse generators.



“You don’t have the infrastructure, you don’t have the financial position to do it, you don’t actually have the products, and you don’t have the grid,” she said.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">WORLD BANK CONDITIONS</h3>



NNPC said another problem for QIPP was that the World Bank had made a partial risk guarantee, similar to the one that helped Azura attract investors, contingent on the government’s implementation of an agreed power sector recovery plan.



“In theory it is okay, but the risk is there are delays in the approvals which may impact QIPP,” NNPC said.



Power ministry officials and the World Bank have been in talks about long-term structural changes needed to trigger the release of a $1 billion loan to help pay for reforms.



A World Bank spokeswoman said the loan had yet to be submitted to its board for approval and that the Washington-based lender considered the recovery plan to be “critical for de-risking the sector for private investments”.



Problems that need to be tackled include decaying infrastructure, mounting debts, low tariffs for electricity and a dilapidated government-owned grid that would collapse if all the country’s power generators operated at full tilt.



Even though NBET has an agreement to buy 13 gigawatts (GW) from power generators, the system can only cope with distributors sending out an average of 4 GW, according to the ministry of power.



The World Bank spokeswoman confirmed any future guarantees for independent power plants (IPPs) would be linked to the plan’s implementation &#8211; because the economic and financial viability of generation capacity expansion was at risk.



A spokeswoman for Black Rhino, which is one of private equity firm Blackstone’s portfolio companies, declined to comment on NNPC’s announcement of a delay to QIPP.



When the project was unveiled, Nigerian cement giant Dangote Group was named as a joint venture partner &#8211; along with Black Rhino and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.



But a Dangote executive told Reuters on condition of anonymity that the company, owned by Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, had pulled out.



“The huge debt level, and, the fact the IPPs are not making profits, is another reason for prospective investors to be deterred,” he said. “Further, collecting revenue from the distribution companies is also becoming a mirage.”



A Dangote Group spokesman declined to comment on the delay to QIPP, or whether the company had pulled out.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">‘ILLIQUID AND INSOLVENT’</h3>



The payment problems in the Nigerian power sector were thrust into the spotlight in March when four generating companies filed a lawsuit against the government and Azura.



To ensure the generating companies were paid in full throughout 2017 and 2018, the government created a 701 billion naira ($2.3 billion) loan fund at the central bank to guarantee payments. When the fund was established in 2017, Azura wasn’t part of the calculations.



But when Azura started producing electricity, the fund was also used to pay the new plant to ensure the terms of loan deals guaranteed by the World Bank were not breached. As a result, the other companies were told they would only receive 80 percent of the sums owed, according to the lawsuit filed in March.



The four energy companies want the fund to reimburse them in full, rather than allocating part of the money to the new plant.



Azura declined to comment on payments for power generated.



“If the central bank wasn’t paying, the system would collapse,” an official at a multilateral lender said on condition of anonymity. “Qua Iboe IPP would enter a system that is illiquid and insolvent. The liquidity is being provided by the central bank.”



The official said QIPP would need the same partial risk guarantee Azura received to get off the ground, but the handling of payments to Azura by the Nigerian authorities so far meant there was little appetite to offer the same support.



Fola Fagbule, senior vice president and head of advisory at Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) &#8211; one of the multilateral lenders that invested in Azura &#8211; agreed that the Qua Iboe project would struggle without payment guarantees.



“What you have is an insolvent system,” he said. “It is really difficult to make a case for a project on that scale.”



A person with direct knowledge of QIPP who declined to be named said Azura’s experience was damaging international investors’ view of Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation.



“There has to be some understanding of how the sector is going to be able to afford new electrons coming into the grid,” the person said. “(Those involved) do not want QIPP to build a project that could just end up in a default situation.”



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">‘KNOTTY ISSUES’</h3>



Nigeria’s privatised power sector typically does not use meters to provide invoices, bill collections are low and energy tariffs have remained fixed for three years, meaning customers receive unsustainably cheap electricity.



The effect, say industry experts, is that electricity distribution companies recover so little revenue from customers that they pay less than a third of what they owe to generating companies &#8211; and that’s why debts have ballooned.



Sunday Oduntan, spokesman for the Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors, said debt levels in the sector were caused by the artificial suppression of tariffs. He said there was a 1.3 trillion naira ($4.2 billion) market shortfall that meant distributors were unable to invest in improvements.



“You cannot be selling a product below cost price and expect high remittance. The shortfall in the sector is because of the lack of a cost-reflective tariff,” said Oduntan, who speaks on behalf of Nigeria’s 11 electricity distribution companies.



Debts across the sector partly stem from a currency crisis that took hold in 2016, just months after Azura secured its financing. The bulk of power company costs are in U.S. dollars but customers pay for power in naira.



The naira lost about 30 percent of its value against the U.S. dollar in June 2016 but the devaluation was not factored into a government tariff structure that has remained unchanged.



Louis Edozien, permanent secretary in the ministry of power, told Reuters there was evidence tariffs must rise, but it was also the responsibility of distributors to improve their collections, partly through better metering and infrastructure.



As for the future of QIPP, the state oil company said it would take six to eight months from whenever NBET executes an agreement to purchase power from the plant before a final investment decision could be taken.



The NNPC spokesman said there were a number of other “knotty issues”, including the completion of a transmission line from the project site. He said QIPP had now agreed in a major concession to pay $20 million for it to be finished.



He also said there was a disagreement between QIPP and the central bank about the exchange rate at which power producers could buy U.S. dollars with naira. He said this had been escalated to the minister of finance.



With the $1 billion World Bank power sector loan on hold for now, the government is considering putting another 600 billion naira into the central bank fund to pay generators when the initial amount runs out early next year, sources said.



It was not clear how the central bank loans to the sector would be repaid.



Central Bank Governor Godwin Emefiele told Reuters that payments from the fund could be made up to February and that the bank was holding talks with World Bank officials.



“The loan negotiations are still in progress with no terminal date yet fixed,” the power ministry’s Edozien said.



($1 = 306.6000 naira)



Reporting by Alexis Akwagyiram and Paul Carsten; additional reporting by Camillus Eboh in Abuja, Chijioke Ohuocha in Lagos and Karin Strohecker in London; editing by David Clarke

Here’s what is delaying Nigeria’s next power plant

LUSAKA (Reuters) &#8211; Canada’s First Quantum Minerals (FQM) said on Friday that it would lay off 2,500 workers in Zambia over plans by Africa’s No.2 copper producer to hike mining taxes.



The southern African country plans to introduce new mining duties, replace value-added tax (VAT) with a sales tax and increase royalties, from January, to help bring down mounting public debt.



The layoffs point to a further escalation of tension between the government and the mining industry in a country where the sector accounts for more than 70 percent of Zambia’s foreign exchange earnings.



FQM said in a statement that it planned 1,250 layoffs at its Sentinel Mine at Kalumbila and 1,250 at the Kansanshi mine in Solwezi in the first quarter of 2019, as well as an unspecified number of contractors.



Zambia’s local mining body said on Thursday that Zambia was pricing itself out of the global mining market with the proposed tax hikes, which are aimed at bringing down mounting public debt.



Concerns about Zambia’s rising debt, alongside accusations of additional hidden borrowing and government corruption, have spooked investors and Western donors in recent months. 



The International Monetary Fund has put on hold talk about an aid package due to Zambia’s debts, which it describes as unsustainable.



Reporting by Chris Mfula; Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by James Macharia

Here’s why First Quantum Minerals is planning to lay off 2,500 workers in Zambia

LONDON (Reuters) &#8211; BP and its partners have given the green light for the development of a large gas project off the coast of Mauritania and Senegal, a first for the two West African nations.



The Greater Tortue Ahmeyim development, Africa’s deepest at 2 kilometres below the sea’s surface, will consist of a complex floating vessel with a plant to super-chill natural gas into liquid, BP said in a statement.



This is the second major LNG project to get the go-ahead this year as energy companies bet on a sharp rise in gas demand, with rival Shell also deciding to press on with the development of a plant in western Canada.



The Tortue floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) facility will produce 2.5 million tonnes of LNG per year. The field holds total gas resources estimated at around 15 trillion cubic feet.



Work on the project will begin in the first quarter of 2019, and first gas is expected to be produced in 2022.



The Tortue go-ahead was given after the governments of Mauritania and Senegal reached an agreement over the sharing of production from the development.



BP is the project’s operator, with a 60 percent stake in the development in Senegal and 62 percent in Mauritania. Other partners include Kosmos Energy, with a 30 percent stake in Senegal and 28 percent in Mauritania.



Societe des Petroles du Senegal (PETROSEN) and Societe Mauritanienne Des Hydrocarbures et de Patrimoine Minier (SMHPM) each hold a 10 percent stake on their side.



BP’s trading arm has been selected as the sole buyer of the project’s LNG.



Additional reporting by Shadia Nasralla; Editing by Jan Harvey

The development of a large gas project off the coast of these West African countries given green-light by BP, what you need to know…

By <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/charles-shey-wiysonge-179980">Charles Shey Wiysonge</a>, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/south-african-medical-research-council-1976">South African Medical Research Council</a> 

People are now living longer in sub-Saharan Africa than they did two <a href="https://theconversation.com/lifestyle-diseases-could-scupper-africas-rising-life-expectancy-107220">decades ago</a>. This is an achievement, given that life expectancy in the <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(18)31891-9/fulltext">region</a> went down the drain from the 1990s to the mid-2000s 
as it choked under the devastating effects of the HIV epidemic.

The question to ask is whether the additional years are spent in good or poor health. This question matters because how long people live affects the population’s state of health and leading causes of disability. Longevity means that these change over time which in turn has implications for policy, planning and provision of services.

We used information from the <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/gbd">Global Burden of Disease</a> study to calculate healthy life expectancy in sub-Saharan Africa. Healthy life expectancy refers to the average number of years that a person at a given age can expect to live in good health, taking into account mortality and loss of functional health.

The data suggest that people are living many years in poor health in the region. And <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(18)32279-7/fulltext">our paper</a> shows that there are large inequalities in healthy life expectancy and disease burden between – and within countries – in sub-Saharan Africa. 

This points to the fact that much more effort is needed to increase healthy life expectancy in the region. 

<h2>Discrepancies</h2>

We found that the increase in healthy life expectancy in sub-Saharan Africa was smaller than the increase in overall life expectancy. This indicates that many years are lived in poor health in the region. In 2017, life expectancy at birth in sub-Saharan Africa was 63.9 years, but healthy life expectancy was only 55.2 years. This means that 13.6% of years of life in the region is spent in poor health.

Life expectancy in 2017 varied by sub region, ranging from 62.4 years in Central Africa to 65 years in Southern Africa. However, in Central Africa 14.4% and in Southern Africa 13.8% of these years are estimated to be spent in poor health, respectively.

The proportion of years of life spent in poor health varied between countries, ranging from 11.9% in Djibouti to 14.8% in Botswana.

While women live longer than men, many of these extra years are lived in poor health. The life expectancy at birth for women in sub-Saharan Africa in 2017 was 66.2 years, but healthy life expectancy was only 56.8 years. Thus, women spend 14.2% of their years in poor health. For men, life expectancy was 61.7 years and healthy life expectancy was 53.7 years. Thus, men in sub-Saharan African spend 13% of their lives in poor health.

<h2>Healthy life expectancy</h2>

The average healthy life expectancy at birth in sub-Saharan Africa increased by 9.1 years, from 46.1 years in 1990 to 55.2 years in 2017. The increase in health life expectancy at birth varied from 0.9 years in Southern Africa to 12.4 years in Eastern Africa.

Even larger variations in healthy life expectancy than these were observed between countries, ranging from a decrease of 4.9 years in Lesotho (51.9 years in 1990 to 47 years in 2017) to an increase of 23.7 years in Eritrea (30.7 years in 1990 to 54.4 years in 2017).

In most countries, the increase in healthy life expectancy was smaller than the increase in overall life expectancy, indicating more years lived in poor health.

<h2>Causes of premature mortality and disability</h2>

We calculated a measure known as disability-adjusted life-years, which captures both early death and ill health. In 2017, the leading causes of disability-adjusted life-years in sub-Saharan Africa for all ages and both sexes combined were neonatal disorders, pneumonia, HIV/AIDS, malaria, and diarrhoea.

However, we observed various dramatic changes in causes of early death and disability between 1990 and 2017. Measles decreased from a ranking of 5th to 20th, heart attacks increased from 16th to 11th, stroke from 12th to 10th, and diabetes from 27th to 14th. We are thus witnessing gradual shift from communicable to non-communicable causes of disease burden.

There was wide variation between countries in the causes of early death and disability.

In Eritrea, the top causes of early death and disability were neonatal disorders, diarrhoea, tuberculosis, pneumonia, and congenital defects. The most dramatic changes were with conflict and terror (1st in 1990 to 14th in 2017), measles (7th to 74th), tetanus (9th to 82nd), heart attacks (17th to 11th), stroke (12th to 10th), and diabetes (22nd to 15th).

In the Central African Republic, the top causes of early death and disability were diarrhoea, neonatal disorders, pneumonia, HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis. The main changes were with conflict and terror (164th to 9th), measles (7th to 20th), heart attacks (14th to 11th), and diabetes (21st to 16th).

In South Africa, the top causes of early death and disability were HIV/AIDS, neonatal disorders, pneumonia, interpersonal violence, and diabetes. The most dramatic changes occurred with HIV/AIDS (53rd to first), measles (12th to 55th), diarrhoea (2nd to 8th), and diabetes (from 13th to 5th).

In the Gambia, the top causes of early death and disability were neonatal disorders, pneumonia, HIV/AIDS, diarrhoea, and sickle cell disease. There were substantial changes in rankings for HIV/AIDS (61st in 1990 to 3rd in 2017), malaria (4th to 25th), measles (9th to 70th), heart attacks (13th to 6th), stroke (14th to 9th), and diabetes (28th to 18th).

<h2>Extraordinary progress, but . .</h2>

Since 1990, we have seen exceptional progress in sub-Saharan Africa in reducing the burden of communicable diseases, especially measles, tetanus and other vaccine-preventable diseases. However, early death and disability due to these causes remain unnecessarily high in many countries. Immunisation efforts have been helpful, but progress in coverage has slowed in the past decade. Close to 20 million children worldwide, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa, didn’t receive vaccines against these deadly diseases in 2017. Conflict, inadequate investment in national immunisation programmes, and vaccine stock outs were among the reasons for the stalled progress in immunisation coverage.

Our report shows that there is an unfinished agenda of controlling communicable diseases – compounded by an increase in non-communicable diseases – in sub-Saharan Africa. The continued burden of disabling conditions has serious implications for health systems and health-related expenditures in the region.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108691/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important" />

<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/charles-shey-wiysonge-179980">Charles Shey Wiysonge</a>, Director, Cochrane South Africa, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/south-african-medical-research-council-1976">South African Medical Research Council</a>

This article is republished from <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/people-in-africa-live-longer-but-their-health-is-poor-in-those-extra-years-108691">original article</a>.

Here’s why people in Africa live longer, are the additional years spent in good or poor health?

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) &#8211; South Africa’s Competition Commission on Thursday recommended Shoprite’s retail unit, which houses the country’s biggest supermarket chain, be fined 10 percent of its turnover for anti-competitive behaviour.



Shoprite shares fell more than 4 percent after the commission referred it to the country’s Competition Tribunal, which will ultimately decide if the commission’s charges and proposed fine should stand.



The retailer said it would oppose the decision to charge it with anti-competitive behaviour.



The retailer does not disclose turnover for its individual units in its financial statements, but Shoprite Checkers, which includes all of Shoprite’s supermarket brands as well as its liquor, furniture, meat and money businesses, is its biggest money maker.



Overall, Shoprite’s businesses brought in 145.3 billion rand ($10.22 billion) in revenue in 2018.



The case centres on Shoprite Checkers’ event ticket selling subsidiary, Computicket, which was also charged and fined 10 percent of turnover.



The Competition Commission said in a statement Computicket had signed agreements with inventory providers in the entertainment industry that enabled it to discriminate on prices between different-sized customers and served to exclude its competitors.



In a statement, Shoprite said it disagreed with the basis for the referral to the Tribunal.



“Opposing affidavits will be filed by the respondent companies within the required time frames,” Shoprite said referring to the 20 business days within which they can oppose the decision.



Its shares had recovered somewhat to 180.61 rand, a decline of 3.12 percent, by 1354 GMT.



The case marks the second time the commission has referred Computicket to the Competition Tribunal, with a decision on similar charges spanning the period 1999 to December 2012 still pending.



This is the first time that Shoprite has been added as a respondent to the charges, however, with the current case covering the period from January 2013 to present.



($1 = 14.2191 rand)



Editing by James Macharia and Alexandra Hudson

Here’s why South Africa’s Shoprite is facing a hefty fine

LUSAKA (Reuters) &#8211; Zambia is pricing itself out of the global mining market with proposed increases in mining taxes, the head of the local mining body said on Thursday.



Some mines would become loss-making as a result of the Zambian government’s plans to impose new mining duties and increase royalties to bring down mounting debt, Zambia Chamber of Mines President Goodwell Mateyo told a news conference.



Reporting by Chris Mfula; Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by Susan Fenton

Why Zambia is pricing itself out of the global mining market

By Francois Conradie, Head of Research, NKC African Economics﻿



On Sunday, December 23, Congolese vote in a set of elections that have been delayed for two years and have been one of the most important drivers of political risk in the country for the last three. 



Three elections will be held on the same day: legislative, in which voters will elect the lower chamber of Parliament (National Assembly); provincial to pick the governments of the DRC’s 25 provinces (provincial governments elect the upper house of Parliament, the Senate); and presidential. The presidential election is by far the most important.



There are three main contenders in the presidential election: Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary of the Common Front for the Congo (FCC), Martin Fayulu of the Lamuka coalition, and Etienne Tshisekedi of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS). 



The FCC is a new umbrella party created by President Joseph Kabila which includes his People’s Party for Reconstruction and Development (PPRD) and the wider Presidential Majority (MP) of which the PPRD is part. It is a formidable machine, and we see Mr Shadary as the very firm favourite to win. 



Mr Fayulu has the backing of two other serious opposition heavyweights who have been prevented from running for the presidency, Jean-Pierre Bemba and Moise Katumbi, but no longer has the mandate to represent the wider opposition because of the actions of Mr Tshisekedi, the third man in the race, who reneged on a deal made in Geneva in November to back a single opposition candidate. 



Mr Tshisekedi then made a deal with Vital Kamerhe, who also broke his commitment to the Geneva deal, to run as a team. In the pact Mr Kamerhe and his Union for the Congolese Nation (UNC) will call on their supporters to vote for Mr Tshisekedi in the election and in return, should he win, Mr Tshisekedi will name Mr Kamerhe as his prime minister and has pledged to back a candidate from the UNC in the 2023 presidential election.



The split in the opposition, along with the advantages he enjoys as Mr Kabila’s chosen successor, means that we consider Mr Shadary virtually certain to win.But the government has not left the opposition to campaign in peace for all that. 



Opposition sources say at least seven people have lost their lives in violence since the start of the campaign but counting together all the individual claimed numbers gives a higher total. 



Most recently, on Wednesday, December 19, Mr Shadary cancelled a meeting in Tshikapa, in Kasai province, after people protested against his coming; one person was killed when soldiers, who came to support the police, opened fire on protesters. On Sunday, December 16, also in Tshikapa, there was a massive brawl between supporters of Mr Shadary and supporters of Mr Tshisekedi, who is popular in Kasai. One person died there, too, and as many as 80 were injured.The previous weekend, supporters of Mr Fayulu say they came under live fire from police in Lubumbashi; six people died. We expect more trouble at the weekend, and when results are announced.



Amessy polling process will tend to sharpen dissident energies, and there is every reason to expect a spectacular mess. With the best will in the world the election would have been a difficult operation to organise. 



The logistical challenges are considerable given the vast distances and the lack of functioning infrastructure in the DRC. There will be 80,000 polling stations and 20,000 collation centres, in a country twice the size of South Africa but which has only 3,500km of paved roads. And Congolese authorities do not have the best will in the world. 



The Independent National Electoral Centre (Ceni) is widely considered by the opposition and civil society (including the influential Catholic clergy) to be beholden to Mr Kabila, and so to be actively engineering a win for Mr Shadary. 



In the night of Wednesday, December 12, a fire destroyed almost 8,000 voting machines in a Ceni warehouse in Kinshasa. There has been speculation that the incident would result in a delay to the election, but the Ceni’s controversial chairman, Corneille Nangaa, has expressed his commitment to holding the election on time. 



FCC sources have accused Mr Fayulu of being behind the fire; he is opposed to the use of the Korean voting machines, such as those destroyed in the fire, as he(and many others) say they could be used to rig the vote.



Mr Shadary will win the election amid serious doubts about its legitimacy. Supporters of Mr Fayulu and Mr Tshisekedi will protest. Some of those protesting will be killed. Some images of the violence will make international news, but the result of the election will end up being accepted in the DRC, if not in Europe (where Mr Shadary is still under sanctions). 



The system that Mr Kabila has set up will remain in place, with some slight shifts as room is made for new players. Mr Kabila himself will remain a force in Congolese politics, probably as a senator, and may even become president again in 2023: there has been speculation that he plans to work around term limits in the same way as Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, by making room for a one-term puppet successor before coming back to power. 



However,overall risk is lower than it was a year ago, mainly because Mr Kabila is not running again, and we see the risk of war as lower than it was. 



But the authority vacuum resulting from Mr Kabila’s efforts to repress the opposition has resulted in an increase in militia violence in peripheral areas,and this kind of violence should be expected to continue.

DRC’s election outlook: Who has the edge?

LAGOS (Reuters) &#8211; Nigeria’s unemployment rate stood at 23.1 percent of the work force in the third quarter, up from 18.1 percent a year earlier, the head of the statistics office Yemi Kale said on his official Twitter feed on Wednesday.



The economy is a major theme of debate in the lead-up to elections in 2019. President Muhammadu Buhari came to power in 2015 campaigning to fix the economy, but his term has been marred by the country’s first recession in a quarter of a century and a sluggish recovery since 2017.



“As of Q3 2018, the calculated unemployment rate was 23.1 percent, the underemployment rate was 20.1 percent, and the combined unemployment and underemployment rate was 43.3 percent,” the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said in its report published on Wednesday.



“While the Q3, 2018 results show a rise in the rate of unemployment, it also depicts a slowing down in the rate of increase in unemployment, which is usually the first sign of improvement in reducing unemployment,” it said.



Atiku Abubakar, the main opposition candidate in the coming election, has vowed to get one of Africa’s largest economies back on track and secure jobs for the work force in a country of roughly 190 million people, saying that if elected he would aim to double the size of the economy to $900 billion by 2025.



The NBS last released employment data a year ago when it said unemployment stood at 18.8 percent in Q3 2017 but Kale said on Twitter on Wednesday that it had stood at 18.1 percent then.



Earlier this year he also said on Twitter that the stats office did not have sufficient funds to compile employment data.



Additional reporting by Paul Carsten in Abuja; Editing by Hugh Lawson

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Here’s why voters in three DRC opposition cities will be excluded from Sunday’s presidential elections

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MTN and Nigeria resolve dispute, here’s what you need to know

Here’s what is delaying Nigeria’s next power plant

Here’s why First Quantum Minerals is planning to lay off 2,500 workers in Zambia

The development of a large gas project off the coast of these West African countries given green-light by BP, what you need to know…

Here’s why people in Africa live longer, are the additional years spent in good or poor health?

Here’s why South Africa’s Shoprite is facing a hefty fine

Why Zambia is pricing itself out of the global mining market

DRC’s election outlook: Who has the edge?

Nigeria’s unemployment rate rises to 23.1 percent in Q3

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Special Report

Here’s what African governments need to do to negotiate better infrastructure deals with China

Why AB Inbev’s Zimbabwe unit is abandoning plan to only accept hard currency payments

Why Africa can no longer ignore the microbeads threat

Op-Ed: Africa has a dire youth unemployment crisis, here’s how to fix it…

MTN shares jump 8 percent as dispute with Nigeria ends, how much does the telecoms group have to pay?

Here’s why voters in three DRC opposition cities will be excluded from Sunday’s presidential elections

China’s Zhejiang Huayou to extend its mining assets in this African country with $147 million investment in copper project

Why South Africa’s power utility Eskom is planning to cut 10 executive jobs

MTN and Nigeria resolve dispute, here’s what you need to know

Here’s what is delaying Nigeria’s next power plant

Here’s why First Quantum Minerals is planning to lay off 2,500 workers in Zambia

The development of a large gas project off the coast of these West African countries given green-light by BP, what you need to know…

Here’s why people in Africa live longer, are the additional years spent in good or poor health?

Here’s why South Africa’s Shoprite is facing a hefty fine

Why Zambia is pricing itself out of the global mining market

DRC’s election outlook: Who has the edge?

Nigeria’s unemployment rate rises to 23.1 percent in Q3

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