We don’t need another hero
In Nigeria’s recent election cycle, many citizens looked to Peter Obi for change. But the country needs people-led social transformation, not saviors.
elections
A country of spectacular stories
A few days after Nigeria’s presidential elections, with a disputed winner declared, here are some initial conclusions and prospects.
The age of the Obidients
Peter Obi, one of the three main candidates for Nigerian president, is neither a savior nor a socialist, but his candidacy and his supporters have enlivened Nigerian elections.
The influence of the middle class
With the working classes down and out, it is arguably the middle classes that will play the more decisive role in African politics going forward.
A brief history of five elections in Angola
The specter of Angola's 1992 elections continues to impact the country's democratic process.
Naija decides
This month, Africa's largest democracy and economy goes to the polls. On the AIAC podcast, we discuss Nigeria's upcoming elections.
The entitlement of Bola Tinubu
The Nigerian presidential candidate’s claim of 'emi lokan' (it’s my turn) reveals complex ethnic politics and a stagnated democracy. Most responses to it, humor and rumor, reflect how Nigerians enact democratic citizenship.
Sleepwalking into fascism
That reactionary politics today lack a mass character is what makes them so dangerous.
Child of Mau Mau
Ethnicity did not simply disappear in Kenya’s 2022 elections. Instead, it was a crucible where both sides mobilized historical claims and ideas to win supporters, in ways that could, at times, elude the eye.
Tricky coalitions
The challenge presented by Argentina: What is the best way to deal with global fiscal pressures in a local context of high expectations and public demands?
Lula can set the bar higher for a new presidency
Lula's challenge in Brazil: To be successful with proposed reforms, he’d need to take back the anti-systemic appeal stolen by the far-right.
Vivir Sabroso!
The left's win in Colombia signals that after more than six decades of war, people just want to live with dignity and in peace.
Sanctioning the regime in Senegal
After defying the state apparatus in March 2021, Senegalese voters sent a strong message of disobedience and sanction via their ballots in January 2022 and signaling their readiness for another regime change in 2024.
An election about nothing
The leading political formations in Kenya's 2022 elections are born of each other, the result of many profound compromises, and this in part explains the blankness.
The young ones
Voter apathy among young people in Kenya reveals fundamental flaws in Kenya’s democratic politics.
Not much to see here
Don’t get to excited by the local election results in South Africa. The party system is fragmenting, but old apartheid divides persist.
Organize or starve!
Instead of voting for the bankrupt ANC or DA, South Africans could do better with social movement candidates in upcoming local elections.
The EFF will not bring the change South Africans need
Approaching local elections, beyond its spectacles of defiance and never-ending episodes of controversy, what do the politics of the Economic Freedom Fighters have to offer?
The liberation stories of Guinea Bissau
Amilcar Cabral is a household name. But what happened to the young women like Joana Gomes who helped lead Guinea Bissau’s independence struggle?