Category: Politics

{South Africa’s governing ANC has rejected a bid to oust the scandal-hit President Jacob Zuma.}

A no confidence motion in Mr Zuma, tabled by a government minister, was defeated at a meeting of the ANC’s top leadership body.

Mr Zuma has faced a string of corruption allegations, with a recent report highlighting his links with the wealthy Gupta family.

He left for Cuba early on Tuesday to attend the funeral of Fidel Castro.

Mr Zuma has survived several opposition-sponsored no confidence votes in parliament.

This was the first time he faced a rebellion from senior ANC members who serve in his cabinet.

Tourism Minister Derek Hanekom tabled a motion calling for his sacking at a meeting of the party’s National Executive Committee (NEC).

He was backed by several other ministers, including Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi and Public Works Minister Thulas Nxesi, local media reported.

“The NEC did not support the call for the president to step down,” ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe told a news conference.

“This issue was debated openly, robustly and, as we said, sometimes it was very difficult for members themselves,” he added.

Earlier this month, an investigation by South Africa’s anti-corruption watchdog said a judicial inquiry should be set up to further investigate allegations of criminal activity in Mr Zuma’s government.

Mr Zuma is accused of letting the Gupta family wield undue influence in his government.

Both Mr Zuma and the Guptas have repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.

The Guptas also denied offering Deputy Finance Minister Mcebisi Jonas $44.6m (£36.2m) last year if he accepted the post of finance minister and advanced their business interests.

Earlier this year, the Constitutional Court ruled that Mr Zuma had breached the constitution by failing to repay government money spent on his private home in rural Nkandla.

A High Court has also ruled that he should be charged with 783 counts of corruption in relation to a 1999 arms deal.

Mr Zuma has denied taking bribes, and has appealed against the ruling.

In August, the ANC lost control of the key cities of Johannesburg and Pretoria in local elections, for the first time since the end of white-minority rule in 1994.

Voters had punished the party for corruption, and its failure to act against Mr Zuma, analysts said.

Mr Zuma was elected South Africa’s president in 2009, and his allies say he will step down at the end of his two terms in 2019.

{President Jacob Zuma of South Africa is facing a vote of no confidence from the leaders of his own party, the ANC.}

He has survived several parliamentary votes but this is the first time the ANC will formally discuss his position.

The top ANC body has extended its meeting to debate the motion, tabled by Tourism Minister Derek Hanekom.

Mr Zuma has increasingly come under criticism over corruption allegations, with a recent report highlighting his links with the wealthy Gupta family.

At least two other cabinet ministers are understood to be backing Mr Hanekom’s proposal – Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi and Public Works Minister Thulas Nxesi.

{{Criminal activity}}

The BBC’s Karen Allen in Johannesburg says this could shape into the toughest battle of Zuma’s career.

Earlier this month, an investigation by the country’s anti-corruption watchdog said a judicial inquiry should be set up to further investigate allegations of criminal activity in Mr Zuma’s government.

The investigation found evidence that the Guptas, a business family with links to Mr Zuma, may have wielded undue political influence over the appointment of ministers.

Both Mr Zuma and the Guptas have denied any wrongdoing.

Earlier this year, the Constitutional Court ruled that he had broken the constitution by refusing to repay government money spent on his private home in rural Nkandla.

In August, the ANC lost control of the key cities of Johannesburg and Pretoria in local elections, for the first time since the end of white-minority rule in 1994.

However, it still gained more than 50% of the national vote.

The stage has been set. President Jacob Zuma is in a battle for his political life.
In one of the first real pushes within the ruling African National Congress (ANC), top party officials are now officially debating the president’s removal.

More than 80 National Executive Committee (NEC) members have been at loggerheads in a closed meeting in the capital Pretoria since the weekend.

While Mr Zuma is believed to still have a lot of support within the party, some ministers are calling for a secret vote on the matter, hoping this would help people within the party to vote freely.

There have been numerous attempts by civil society and even opposition parties to have the president sacked but analysts have always said it would take the party itself to remove Mr Zuma – as it did with former President Thabo Mbeki.

Those who want him gone say that the president has become a liability to the more than 100-year-old liberation movement – claims he and his backers have denied.

Mr Zuma’s political time in office has been overshadowed by scandals, accusations of corruption and a lack of leadership.

But Mr Zuma, a master strategist, who has been nicknamed “The Teflon Don” on local social media has proven to many that he is a survivor.

{Gambia’s President Yahya Jammeh has suspended his campaign for Thursday’s election as a mark of respect for Cuba’s Fidel Castro.}

The information minister said the move was to mourn the revolutionary leader, who died on Friday at the age of 90.

Cuba was one of the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with The Gambia after Mr Jammeh took power in a coup in 1994.

Mr Jammeh, 51, is seeking re-election for a fifth term in office.

For the first time since he came to power he will be facing a single major opposition candidate.

Earlier this month, Human Rights Watch accused him of using violence to silence critics ahead of the 1 December poll and said two activists had died in custody and dozens of people had been jailed and denied medical or legal help.

Mr Jammeh had strong links with Castro, with the Cuban leader sending doctors to work in The Gambia.

{Raped, abused and subjected to genital mutilation, many women suffer terribly in Somalia, an unrepentantly patriarchal country shown by successive surveys as one of the worst places to be female.}

A quota reserving 30 percent of parliamentary seats for women in current elections is supposed to help bring change and place at least a share of political power in female hands — but it faces stiff resistance.

“Somali women participate in daily life but when it comes to politics it is challenging,” said Deqa Yasin, the female deputy head of the national election organising body.

“How do you make the process as inclusive as possible?”

Under international pressure, Somalia’s top politicians — federal and state leaders, all men, known as the National Leadership Forum — in August announced the 30 percent female quota be applied to the 54 Senate seats and the 275 parliamentary seats.

The quota also applies to the 14,025 electoral college delegates who are the only people out of perhaps 12 million Somalis to vote for members of parliament.

After years of strife, political wrangling and insecurity mean the Horn of Africa nation was unable to hold elections by universal suffrage.

But promises of female empowerment have not been kept. As of Thursday, just 23 of 142 parliamentary seats (16 percent) and 10 out of 43 senate seats (23 percent) had been won by women.

The previous unicameral parliament had 14 percent women, so the fresh figures are a small improvement. It is unclear what, if anything, might be done when the final tally falls short of the quota.

MEN, GUNS, MONEY

Clan and tradition are at the heart of Somalia’s electoral process, which means women are not. The 51 members of each electoral college that votes for a given parliamentary seat are themselves chosen by a group of 135 traditional male elders.

In what has been called a “limited” election, the senators and MPs — once all elected — will come together to vote for a new president, but the planned date of November 30 will not be met.

Faced with the ruling on a female quota, many clan leaders do not wish to be represented by women and regard female seats as wasted.

Some of the many delays in the election timetable have been caused by arguments and horse-trading over which clan would have to allow one of its precious seats to be reserved for a woman.

The reluctance means that the 30 percent quota is unlikely to be met, said Michael Keating, the UN’s top representative in Somalia.

Despite the challenges “there’s been a slight change of political culture” because of it, with more women involved than in the past, according to Keating.

Decades of conflict have played a role. A secular dictatorship in which women held public posts was overthrown in 1991 by a loose alliance of clan-based militias with warlord bosses under whom women were increasingly repressed.

Men — usually with guns and always after money — have ruled since that time and presided over Somalia’s collapse into the world’s pre-eminent failed state.

WE ARE NOT UNIQUE

Some argue that the time has come to give women a chance to remedy the situation.

Miriam Aweis, 46, won a seat reserved for women in the port city of Kismayo. She said that during the long years of war, women were “the backbone of the community” yet “the traditional system we have” excludes them from politics.

As minister for women in 2011, Aweis was an early fighter for a quota of females in politics.

“We had to talk to the politicians to get them to accept that women are part of this process and decision-making,” she said.

When six of Somalia’s federal states submitted initial lists of candidates for the regionally-based Senate, some included notorious warlords — but no women — showing a lack of willingness even to pay lip service to female involvement in politics.

UN complaints about the warlords were ignored, but the all-male lists were sent back for breaking the electoral rules, said Yasin at the election committee.

“I can’t change the Somali mindset or culture, but rules and regulations are the weapons I have,” she said.

“It’s Somali culture but it’s in other cultures as well: America just elected Trump. We are not unique.”