Africa Is a Country

African leaders’ tax returns

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

African leaders’ tax returns

By
Anakwa Dwamena

The Paradise Papers are shedding light on the mechanics of how African leaders hide their incomes.

Image via The Outline

It is common knowledge that many African leaders, like several leaders all over the globe, put in place structures for tax evasion; basically theft. But the Paradise Papers are shedding light on the mechanics of how that actually happens domestically. From Liberia’s outgoing President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf to the head of Nigeria’s senate Bukola Saraki, fishing in Namibia and the important role of the oft-forgotten island of Mauritius in all this.

(2) The Paradise Papers also make a connection between the commodities company Glencore (originally a South African company), a notoriously corrupt Israeli billionaire accused of illegal weapons trading by the UN (and close friend of Congolese President, Joseph Kabila) and mining rights in the DRC.  Keeping an eye on Glencore is important because they have their hands in problematic deals all over the continent. This includes oil rights in Chad, which is looking to end this relationship this week.

(3) Elites in Africa’s youngest country South Sudan exploit the ongoing war there to loot the country’s foreign reserves. A leaked report shows how this happened.

(4) Welcome to Harare R.G. Mugabe International Airport. Our dear leader has had a busy week, as he fired his vice president to pave way for his wife to succeed him. Blessing-Miles Tendi, writing in African Arguments makes the case that Britain, which has subtly showed support for ex-VP Emmerson Mnangawa, betrayed a lack of understanding of Zimbabwe’s political history.  Others argue Mr. Mnangawa was not as shrewd as he appeared to be. Either way, there is evidence of mounting support against our dear leader.

(5) The Ebola pandemic did not stop internal fraud in the Red Cross, which discovered that about US$5 million was stolen via staff (overpriced supplies, salaries for non-existent aid workers and fake customs bills) in collusion with local banks.

 (6) Americans voted last week. Meet the Liberian refugee who was voted Mayor of Helena, Montana last week.

(7)  An investigation in to the alleged Vampire attacks that have surfaced in Malawi.

(8) Your monthly reminder about the pitfalls of the #AfricaRising narrative.

(9) Why is it so hard to get to the truth about violence against protestors in Togo?

(10) Finally, how motorcycles have increased in African streets, and African modern art.

Further Reading

Fictions of freedom

K. Sello Duiker’s ‘The Quiet Violence of Dreams’ still haunts Cape Town, a city whose beauty masks its brutal exclusions. Two decades later, in the shadow of Amazon’s new development, its truths are more urgent than ever.

When things fall apart

Against a backdrop of global collapse, one exhibition used Chinua Achebe’s classic to hold space for voices from the Global South—and asked who gets to imagine the future.

The General sleeps

As former Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari’s death is mourned with official reverence, a generation remembers the eight years that drove them out.

The grift tank

In Washington’s think tank ecosystem, Africa is treated as a low-stakes arena where performance substitutes for knowledge. The result: unqualified actors shaping policy on behalf of militarists, lobbyists, and frauds.

Kagame’s hidden war

Rwanda’s military deployments in Mozambique and its shadowy ties to M23 rebels in eastern Congo are not isolated interventions, rather part of a broader geopolitical strategy to expand its regional influence.

After the coups

Without institutional foundations or credible partners, the Alliance of Sahel States risks becoming the latest failed experiment in regional integration.

Whose game is remembered?

The Women’s Africa Cup of Nations opens in Morocco amid growing calls to preserve the stories, players, and legacy of the women who built the game—before they’re lost to erasure and algorithm alike.