Africa

A two-day forum in Nakuru brought together a host of state and non-state actors, who collectively, were mandated to ensure Kenya’s elections will be safe and free from violence. Credit: UN Women/Luke Horswell, January 2022

By Gabriel Odima
MINNESOTA, USA, Aug 22 2022 (IPS)

Once again, Kenya finds itself at a crossroads. The current events in Kenya illustrate how and why electoral malpractices and not democracy and human rights are the leading form of governance in Africa.

A large number of leaders in Africa, both temporal and spiritual, are not strongly committed to constitutional rule. Every time there is electoral malpractices, especially in Kenya, there are always politicians eager and willing to give homage to a fraud in exchange for appointments to offices.

What appears to be the hidden agenda is beginning to emerge in Kenya. The very sad events in Kenya have some similarities and connections with the events in the neighboring Uganda.

There is much blanket talk about peaceful transition of power in Kenya without addressing the Elephant in the room (the electoral fraud). The Rt. Hon. Raila Odinga former Prime Minister of Kenya has rejected the outcome of the Presidential election.

The fact that four Commissioners have come out and exposed the fraud at the IBEC, the body that is charged with conducting elections in Kenya is a smoking gun. Any attempt by the international community, international media and African governments to offer legitimacy to the Deputy President William Ruto before the Kenyan Supreme Court settles the matter is premature and a dangerous move for the country.

The current situation in Kenya reminds me of what happened in Nigeria. The scourge of democracy in Africa soon came into scene. The candidate who should have been sworn in as president, Mr. Masudi Abiola, was sent to jail by the military and died there on charges of treason simply for claiming victory in election which many in Nigeria believed Mr. Abiola had won. Former president Obasanjo, was among several politicians who were thrown in jail for questioning the electoral fraud.

Kenya should stand as a lighthouse for democracy in Africa. Many scholars argue that democracy is not the answer to Africa’s problems. To a certain degree, I agree with such statements that democracy alone cannot guarantee African nations’ happiness, prosperity, health and peace and stability.

In fact, modern democracies also suffer greatly from many defects. But in spite of the flaws, we must never lose sight of the benefits that makes democracy more desirable than fraudulent elections.

As for the assertion that Dr. William Ruto won the presidential election “itself stands tainted” the reality of the electoral malpractices is now known in its essence, namely that the Rt. Hon. Raila Odinga former Prime Minister of Kenya has rejected the results of the Presidential elections 2022.

The contradiction in the presidential results of 2022 demonstrates the misery of Kenyan electoral body (IEBC). This action by the electoral body (IEBC) not only haunts the establishment of democracy, but also creates a hostile environment which can lead to political instability and bloodbaths in Kenya.

There is a policy move to anoint Dr. William Ruto as President-elect in the Republic of Kenya. Such policy will fail the people of Kenya in their search for harmony among themselves should it accept the current presidential results as the sole voice of the people of Kenya.

To do so would be to flout international law, to ordain the electoral fraud, or exempt and favor those who messed up the presidential results with their mentors and collaborators.

The cause of democracy and the enjoyment by the citizens of human rights and freedoms have and will continue to suffer so long as the international community gives support and credibility to electoral fraud across Africa.

The commitment of indigenous African peoples to protect their interests in peace and through political parties has been impressive and must stand as a leading pillar and vehicle in any endeavor for transformation in Africa towards political development.

The first African political party to be formed in Africa south of the Sahara was the African National Congress (ANC). It was formed in 1912. Just as the Africans had pinpointed, then confronted, the inequities of the apartheid system of governance through their political parties, these inequities later became the concern of the international community.

In South Africa, the ANC (having been banned, its leaders imprisoned, killed and scattered in exile), was able, within a very short time after disbandment to assert itself as the voice of the oppressed and win handsomely the first non-racial multiparty elections in South Africa in 1994.

In agreeing to form a government of national unity, the ANC became a vehicle for transformation towards a milieu of unity, peace, stability and democracy in South Africa.

Finally, between the Great Lakes and the Horn of Africa, Kenya has been and continues to be an island of peace, despite the challenges facing democracy in terms of electoral malpractices in Kenya.

Rev. Gabriel Odima is President & Director of Political Affairs, Africa Center for Peace & Democracy, Minnesota, USA

E-mail: africacenterpd@aol.com

IPS UN Bureau

Credit: World Food Programme (WFP)

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 22 2022 (IPS)

The ominous warnings keep coming non-stop: some of the world’s developing nations, mostly in Africa and Asia, are heading towards mass hunger and starvation.

The World Food Programme (WFP) warned last week that as many as 828 million people go to bed hungry every night while the number of those facing acute food insecurity has soared — from 135 million to 345 million — since 2019. A total of 50 million people in 45 countries are teetering on the edge of famine.

But in what seems like a cruel paradox the US Department of Agriculture estimates that a staggering $161 billion worth of food is dumped yearly into landfills in the United States.

The shortfall has been aggravated by reduced supplies of wheat and grain from Ukraine and Russia triggered by the ongoing conflict, plus the after-effects of the climate crisis, and the negative spillover from the three-year long Covid-19 pandemic.

While needs are sky-high, resources have hit rock bottom. The WFP says it requires $22.2 billion to reach 152 million people in 2022. However, with the global economy reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic, the gap between needs and funding is bigger than ever before.

Controlling the loss and waste of food is a crucial factor in reaching the goal of eradicating hunger in the world. Credit: FAO

“We are at a critical crossroads. To avert the hunger catastrophe the world is facing, everyone must step up alongside government donors, whose generous donations constitute the bulk of WFP’s funding. Private sector companies can support our work through technical assistance and knowledge transfers, as well as financial contributions. High net-worth individuals and ordinary citizens alike can all play a part, and youth, influencers and celebrities can raise their voices against the injustice of global hunger,” the Rome-based agency said.

In 2019, Russia and Ukraine together exported more than a quarter (25.4 percent) of the world’s wheat, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC).

Danielle Nierenberg, President and Founder, Food Tank told IPS the amount of food that is wasted the world is not only a huge environmental problem–if food waste were a country, it would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gas emissions.

But food waste and food loss are also moral conundrums. It’s absurd to me that so much food is wasted or lost because of lack of infrastructure, poor policymaking, or marketing regulations that require food be thrown away if it doesn’t fit certain standards.

This is especially terrible now as we face a worldwide food crisis–not only because of the Russian aggression against Ukraine, but multiple conflicts all over the globe.

“We’ve done a good job over the last decade of creating awareness around food waste, but we haven’t done enough to actually convince policymakers to take concrete action. Now is the time for the world to address the food waste problem, especially because we know the solutions and many of them are inexpensive,” she said.

Better regulation around expiration and best buy dates, policies that separate organic matter in municipalities, fining companies that waste too much, better date collection around food waste, more infrastructure and practical innovations that help farmers.

“And there are even more solutions. We can solve this problem–and we have the knowledge. We just need to implement it,” said Nierenberg.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said last November food waste in the United States is estimated at between 30–40 percent of the food supply.

“Wasted food is the single largest category of material placed in municipal landfills and represents nourishment that could have helped feed families in need. Additionally, water, energy, and labor used to produce wasted food could have been employed for other purposes’, said the FDA.

Effectively reducing food waste will require cooperation among federal, state, tribal and local governments, faith-based institutions, environmental organizations, communities, and the entire supply chain.

Professor Dr David McCoy, Research Lead at United Nations University International Institute for Global Health (UNU-IIGH), told IPS the heartbreaking image of food being dumped in landfills while famine and food insecurity grows, must also be juxtaposed with the ecological harms caused by the dominant modes of food production which in turn will only further deepen the crisis of widespread food insecurity.

“The need for radical and wholesale transformation to the way we produce, distribute and consume food has been recognized for years. However, powerful actors – most notably private financial institutions and the giant oligopolist corporations who make vast profits from the agriculture and food sectors – have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. Their resistance to change must be overcome if we are to avoid a further worsening of the hunger and ecological crises, he warned”.

Frederic Mousseau, Policy Director at the Oakland Institute, told IPS that according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), global food production and stocks are at historic high levels in 2022, with only a slight contraction compared to 2021.

“Skyrocketing food prices seen this year are rather due to speculation and profiteering than the war in Ukraine. It is outrageous that WFP has been forced to expand its food relief operations around the world due to speculation, while also having to raise more funds as the costs of providing food relief has increased everywhere”, he said.

Mousseau pointed out that WFP’s costs increased by $136 million in West Africa alone due to high food and fuel prices, whereas at the same time, the largest food corporations announced record profits totaling billions.

Louis Dreyfus and Bunge Ltd had respectively 82.5% and 15% jump in profits so far this year. Cargill had a 23% jump in its revenue. Profits of a handful of food corporations that dominate the global markets already exceed $10 billion this year – the equivalent of half of the $22 billion that WFP is seeking to address the food needs of 345 million people in 82 countries.

At a press conference in Istanbul, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres held out a glimmer of hope when he told reporters August 20 that more than 650,000 metric tons of grain and other food are already on their way to markets around the world.

“I just came back from the Marmara Sea, where Ukrainian, Russian, Turkish and United Nations teams, are conducting joint inspections on the vessels passing through the Black Sea on their way in or out of the Ukrainian ports. What a remarkable and inspiring operation.”

“I just saw a World Food Progamme-chartered vessel – Brave Commander – which is waiting to sail to the horn of Africa to bring urgently needed relief to those suffering from acute hunger. Just yesterday, I was in Odesa port and saw first-hand the loading on a cargo of wheat onto a ship.

He said he was “so moved watching the wheat fill up the hold of the ship. It was the loading of hope for so many around the world.”

“But let’s not forget that what we see here in Istanbul and in Odesa is only the more visible part of the solution. The other part of this package deal is the unimpeded access to the global markets of Russian food and fertilizer, which are not subject to sanctions.”

Guterres pointed out that it is important that all governments and the private sector cooperate to bring them to market. Without fertilizer in 2022, he said, there may not be enough food in 2023.

Getting more food and fertilizer out of Ukraine and Russia is critical to further calm commodity markets and lower prices for consumers

“We are at the beginning of a much longer process, but you have already shown the potential of this critical agreement for the world.

And so, I am here with a message of congratulations for all those in the Joint Coordination Centre and a plea for that vital life-saving work to continue.

You can count on the full commitment of the United Nations to support you,” he declared.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Rising inflation and the Ukraine war has added to the woes of Zimbabweans, where even the middle class struggle to buy a loaf of bread. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS

By Jeffrey Moyo
Harare, Aug 19 2022 (IPS)

With inflation at 256.9 percent, 49-year-old Dambudzo Chauruka can no longer afford to buy bread despite working as a civil servant in Zimbabwe.

A father of six school-going children, Chauruka earns 126 000 Zimbabwean dollars monthly, the equivalent of 157 US dollars (USD).

Bread now costs 1,30 USD in Zimbabwe, up from 0,90 cents five years ago when former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe was toppled from power in a military coup.

Not only that, but the cost of a kilogram of choice beef has risen to 9 USD, while five kilograms of chicken drumsticks now cost 21,000 Zimbabwean dollars, about 22 USD.

“I can’t afford bread every day. If I spend money buying bread every day, I will run out of money to pay rent and buy groceries for my family,” Chauruka told IPS.

In May 2022, the Consumer Council of Zimbabwe said a family of five required 120 000 Zimbabwean dollars a month in local currency to survive, about 300 USD. Still, it could be much higher this time amid ever-rising inflation.

Amidst galloping inflation, petrol price in Zimbabwe has fluctuated, a major determinant in the pricing of basic goods and services here.

From 1.77 USD per liter recently, petrol now costs about 1.60 USD even as it was pegged at 1.41 USD in January before war broke out in Ukraine following the invasion of the East European nation by Russia.

Zimbabwe’s inflation shot from 96 percent to 132 percent in May, with food inflation alone climbing from 104 percent to 155 percent. The country’s monthly inflation spiked from 15.5 percent in April to 21 percent in May.

As a result, for many underpaid working Zimbabweans like Chauruka, starvation has pounced as they grapple with the country’s galloping inflation and subsequent poverty in the towns and cities where they live.

Chauruka and his family are residents of Kuwadzana high-density suburb in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare.

Now with the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war slowing down food exports to many developing countries like Zimbabwe, many urban dwellers like Chauruka and his family have had to contend with starvation amid rising food prices.

Since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war, according to the Grain Millers Association of Zimbabwe (GMAZ), wheat prices have surged from 475 USD to 675 USD per tonne.

As a result, bread for many urban dwellers known for years to afford it has suddenly turned into a luxury.

But come July 22, Russian and Ukrainian officials signed a deal to allow grain exports from Ukrainian Black Sea ports.

Key witnesses to the agreement, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said the agreement would help ease a global food crisis.

For urban Zimbabweans who have to party with their hard-earned money to put every morsel of food on their tables, the agreement would import smiles as well.

One Zimbabwean, relieved at the news, is 57-year-old Nyson Mutumwa, a senior government employee.

“Now, I’m optimistic the Russia-Ukraine deal to unblock food passages to countries wanting food imports would relieve many nations of food shortages and cause a fall in food prices,” Mutumwa told IPS.

Russia and Ukraine are among the world’s biggest food exporters, especially wheat, to developing countries like Zimbabwe.

Yet Russia’s invasion of Ukraine this year led to a de-facto blockade of the Black Sea, resulting in Ukraine’s grain exports sharply dropping.

With the new agreement between the warring countries, even retail shop owners in Harare, like 48-year-old Jonathan Gunda in Mbare, the oldest township in Harare, are in high spirits.

“I had suspended the selling of bread and buns. In fact, I had canceled selling off all wheat products, but with the new agreement between Russia and Ukraine, this may mean I will be back in business,” Gunda told IPS.

Yet amid the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war blamed for causing food shortages and stoking inflation, World Food Program Southern Africa Director Menghestab Haile, in May this year, urged Zimbabwe and surrounding countries to increase food production.

“SADC region has water, has land, has clever people, so we are able to produce in this region. Let’s diversify and let’s produce for ourselves,” WFP’s Haile said then.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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ECW Director Yasmine Sherif in the field.

By External Source
NEW YORK, Aug 19 2022 (IPS-Partners)

As we come together to celebrate people helping people on this year’s World Humanitarian Day, we honor the courageous and remarkable humanitarians delivering on the frontlines to help us achieve our goals for peace, universal human rights, and education for all.

It takes a village to raise and support a child in a humanitarian crisis. In our efforts to deliver on the Grand Bargain Agreements, Sustainable Development Goals and global commitments to ensure human rights, Education Cannot Wait is connecting donors, governments, UN agencies, civil society organizations, the private sector and local non-profits to provide the world’s most vulnerable children and adolescents with the safety, protection and opportunity of a quality education.

In places like Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Mali, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Ukraine and Yemen, these frontlines heroes are risking their lives because they believe that it takes a village to raise a child, and because they believe education is our most powerful tool in building a better world.

Today, 222 million children and adolescents worldwide are impacted by armed conflicts, forced displacement, climate-induced disasters and protracted crises who require urgent educational support. It will take a global village to reach these children.

As we honour the commitment and sacrifice of the 460 aid workers who were attacked in 2021, and the 140 who tragically lost their lives, we call on the people of the world’s global village to rise up against violence, to rise up against oppression, and to unite in our global actions to deliver on our promises of 222 Million Dreams.

This is our promise for a more peaceful world as outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Convention and the United Nations Charter. This is our promise to deliver quality education through local action with global impact for crisis-affected girls and boys left furthest behind.

 

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Excerpt:

World Humanitarian Day Statement by ECW Director Yasmine Sherif

Iêda de Oliveira is the director of Eletra, a pioneer in the production of electric and hybrid buses in Brazil. In July, the company inaugurated a new plant for the production of 1,800 of these buses per year, relying on the expansion of this market in Brazil and Latin America. CREDIT: Courtesy of Eletra

By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug 19 2022 (IPS)

Brazil celebrated 100,000 electric vehicles in circulation in late July, but this is a drop in the ocean compared to the 46 million combustion vehicles registered in the country and in contrast with the pace of the phasing out of oil in the world’s automotive industry.

The lag is due to several factors, but one is the progress achieved in Brazil by biofuels, especially ethanol, which in its best years, such as 2019, surpassed domestic gasoline consumption.

Much of this consumption is due to the addition of 27 percent ethanol in Brazilian gasoline, a blend that helps reduce urban air pollution. Most of it is provided by fuel made from sugarcane.

Also contributing to the success of biofuels is the “flex car” that has been produced in Brazil since 2003, with engines that consume both fuels in a mixture of any proportion. The consumer chooses gasoline or ethanol according to convenience, generally because of the price difference.

There is a consensus that ethanol makes sense to buy if it costs less than 70 percent of the price of gasoline, because in general its consumption per kilometer driven is 30 percent higher. But some nationalists always choose ethanol, as a genuinely national product.

Thus, the transition to electric vehicles will cost Brazil not only the replacement of the entire fuel production and distribution infrastructure with electricity, but also a probable drastic reduction in its sugarcane industry, which generates one million direct and indirect jobs.

In terms of gas stations alone, for example, Brazil has more than 42,000 distributed throughout its vast territory, the largest in Latin America.

The Brazilian automotive industry, which ranks ninth in the world in terms of production, does not yet produce fully electric vehicles. Its option, for now, are hybrids, which have combustion and electric engines.

In June, of the 4,073 electrified vehicles that joined the national fleet, 73 percent were hybrids – ethanol (44 percent) and gasoline (four percent) – while the so-called plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) accounted for 25 percent and have batteries that are also recharged at specific points.

In the first two cases, the two engines provide propulsion or only the electric one, powered by combustion as electricity generator.

Only two of the 13 assembly plants in Brazil produce hybrids. Fully electric cars, with only batteries charged at plugs, are all imported. They accounted for 27 percent of electrified vehicles registered in Brazil in June.

Adalberto Maluf, president of the Brazilian Electric Vehicle Association, fears that the lack of a national electric mobility policy will affect the competitiveness of the Brazilian automotive industry. He decided to resign from his corporate post to run for Congress, for the Green Party. CREDIT: Courtesy of Adalberto Maluf

Brazil’s hesitation

The industrial sector advocates a gradual transition, which would include greater development and use of biofuels and hybrid vehicles, to avoid or at least delay the end of a sector that represents 20 percent of Brazil’s industrial product.

Arguments such as pollution caused by the production and disposal of batteries undermine support for electrification to combat the climate crisis.

Greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation, a negative factor in countries that depend on fossil fuels, especially coal, do not affect electric mobility in Brazil, where renewable sources account for 85 percent of the electricity mix.

Batteries are also a barrier, as is the higher cost of electric vehicles. But technological advances are expected to make them cheaper and Brazil can benefit from domestic production, if the feasibility of a large lithium mine in the state of Minas Gerais is confirmed, as well as advantages due to the abundance of iron, nickel and niobium, other components, in the country.

Brazil’s reluctance is reflected in the lack of an “electromobility policy,” complained the president of the Brazilian Electric Vehicle Association (ABVE), Adalberto Maluf, at a Jul. 29 debate on the subject in São Paulo.

Without public incentive policies, Brazil could lose international competitiveness and get left behind by the global trend, he lamented.

Maluf, who was also director of Marketing, Sustainability and New Businesses at the Chinese company BYD in Brazil, left his corporate position on Aug. 15 to become a candidate for the lower house of Congress in the October elections for the Green Party. He promises to fight to reduce transportation pollution.

Global progress

The world produced 6.6 million new electrified cars in 2021, more than double the previous year and nearly nine percent of total motor vehicle sales, according to the International Energy Agency.

And the global trend is to go to 100 percent electric or battery-powered vehicles (BVE), rather than hybrids.

Meanwhile Brazil only incorporated 20,427 new electric vehicles during the first half of this year, out of a total of 918,000 cars, trucks, buses and commercial vans.

The automotive sector is facing a decline in production in the last two years, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Its peak occurred in 2013 with 3.7 million units produced that year.

The annual total has dropped since then, and has remained below three million since 2015. This year, 2.34 million vehicles with four or more wheels are expected to be produced.

Around the world, the accelerated advance of electrification is confirmed especially in the European Union, which decided to abolish the sale of combustion cars as of 2035. Norway, which is not a member of the EU, set that goal for 2025, viable since these new vehicles reached two-thirds of sales in the country in 2021.

China is also experiencing an electromobility boom, with three million electric vehicles sold last year, or 15 percent of all motor vehicles produced in the country.

In June 2017 the Ministry of Mines and Energy received the first electric vehicle made by Itaipu, the giant hydroelectric power plant shared by Brazil and Paraguay, as an incentive for the electrification of transportation. But little has been done since then for the dissemination of electric vehicles in the country. CREDIT: Marcelo Camargo/Agência Brasil

Buses reduce the lag

The high price of electric cars, the low investment capacity in infrastructure, the technology gap and the small scale of the market, among other factors, prevent developing countries in the South from following the trend of rich or emerging markets such as China.

But the advance of electric buses helps mitigate that disadvantage, at least in Latin America.

Brazil has the advantage of having companies that produce and export these vehicles which play a key role in mobility in large cities, in addition to a huge market. Its bus fleet exceeds 670,000 units nationwide, which will have to be replaced, since only a few hundred are electric, which is facilitated by the fact that many cities have made electromobility the goal of public transportation.

São Paulo, for example, aims to have 2,600 electric buses in service by 2024 and to eliminate all fuel-powered passenger transport by 2030. Around 15,000 buses serve Brazil’s largest city, a metropolis of 20 million people.

Several companies presented their new public transport vehicles at the Latin American Transport Fair (LatBus), held Aug. 9-11 in São Paulo.

This is the case of Marcopolo, the largest bus body manufacturer in Brazil, which exhibited the Attivi, its first 100 percent electric model for Brazilian cities. The company has already exported more than 350 buses to Latin American countries such as Argentina and Colombia, and Asian countries such as India.

Eletra, which considers itself a “national leader in sustainable transportation technology”, also presented its e-Bus buses in different sizes – 12.5 and 15 meters – fully electric buses that can travel 250 kilometers without recharging the batteries.

The company announced the inauguration of a new industrial plant in São Bernardo do Campo – basically the capital of the Brazilian automotive industry near São Paulo – with an annual capacity to produce 1,800 electric and hybrid buses, and with 1,200 employees.