Features | - Part 150

Ethiopian Ruling Party Picks Leader From Protest-Hit Region

ADDIS ABABA (Capital Markets in Africa) – Ethiopia’s ruling coalition appointed a top official from the protest-hit Oromia region as leader, as the government tries to quell unrest that’s posed the biggest challenge to its rule in a quarter-century. The Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front chose Abiy Ahmed, 42, a retired lieutenant general and recently appointed chairman of the Oromo People’s Democratic Organization, to succeed Hailemariam Desalegn. Abiy is now expected to be voted in by…

Shell Suspects Ex-Executive Committed Crime in Nigeria Deal

Posted on by The Editorial Team

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Royal Dutch Shell Plc referred a former vice president for sub-Saharan Africa Peter Robinson to the Dutch authorities, suspecting he may have committed crimes related to an asset sale in Nigeria. The allegations of criminal misconduct by one of its employees come at a difficult time for Shell. Europe’s largest energy company and several former executives, including Robinson, are already facing a criminal trial in Milan over an alleged bribery…

Ghanaians Protest in Accra Against Military Agreement With U.S.

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ACCRA (Hundreds of Ghana opposition members took to the streets of the capital, Accra, to demonstrate against a government decision to allow a U.S. military base in the West African nation. Former Vice President Kwesi Amissah-Arthur and general secretary of the main opposition National Democratic Congress Asiedu Nketia joined protesters calling themselves Ghana First Patriotic Front. Members of the Convention Peoples Party and Peoples National Convention were among demonstrators clad in black and red clothes…

As Commodities Roar, Africa Wants Bigger Slice of the Mining Pie

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LUSAKA (Capital Markets in Africa) – One by one, the biggest names in African mining are getting squeezed. The tactics might be blunt, but the message is clear: the countries where they operate want a bigger share of the proceeds. The collapse in commodities through 2015 hobbled some of Africa’s biggest resource economies, stunting growth and leaving budgets short. Since then a recovery in prices has sent the continent’s biggest miners soaring, boosted profits and…

Smugglers Cheer as Nigeria Tries to Keep Foreign Rice Away

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – At Nigeria’s normally manic border post of Seme, Lasisi Fanu says business has all but ground to a halt. He and other customs agents who help clear goods coming into Africa’s biggest economy from its smaller neighbour Benin say the long lines of trucks loaded with rice that used to jam the crossing have dwindled. The slowdown is a result of import restrictions and tighter border policing as President Muhammadu Buhari seeks to…

Rising Political Violence Stalks African `Island of Peace’

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DAR ES SALAM (Capital Markets in Africa) – An opposition politician and a campaigner were hacked to death with machetes. A lawmaker’s car was riddled with bullets and he was left fighting for his life. These shadowy attacks weren’t in one of East Africa’s war zones, but in Tanzania — a country that hasn’t seen serious upheaval in decades and whose populist president, John Magufuli, is on a mission to revitalize the region’s second-biggest economy. With the unidentified perpetrators still at…

Gordhan Plans Sweeping Changes for South African State Firms (1)

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – Extensive changes are in the offing at South Africa’s troubled state-owned companies as new Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan moves to tackle their many management and financial failings. Power utility Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. and several other state entities have been caught up in graft and management scandals over recent years and repeatedly called on the state to bail them out as their debt ballooned to unsustainable levels. Former union boss and…

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