Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Bowing to the reality that they cannot prevent the spread of COVID-19 in classrooms full of students and teachers, Kenyan officials canceled the 2020 school year in July, at its midpoint. The implications of the decision will be felt not only domestically, where a nearly year-long break in learning could widen educational disparities, but also across the continent. Kenya initially suspended classes back in mid-March, days after the country’s first COVID-19 case and early in its academic year, which begins in January. [...]
Editor’s note: The following article is one of 30 that we’ve selected from our archives to celebrate World Politics Review’s 15th anniversary. You can find the full collection here. At approximately 8:19 p.m. on the evening of May 25, Derek Chauvin, a 19-year veteran of the Minneapolis Police Department, brought his weight down upon George Floyd’s neck. Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, arrested for the alleged crime of using a counterfeit $20 bill, struggled for breath—for life—for more than five minutes. Lying prostrate on the hot concrete, his arms handcuffed behind his back, his airways choked by Chauvin’s knee, Floyd summoned [...]
In recent weeks, Mali has been beset with mass protests against President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita’s government. At times, tens of thousands of people have poured into the streets of the capital, Bamako, to demand Keita’s resignation. The protests’ organizers, calling themselves the June 5 Movement after the date of the first demonstration, have brought together opposition political parties, religious groups, civil society organizations, trade unions and even members of the police. These disparate elements of Malian society are uniting around their deep anger at entrenched poverty and unemployment, the government’s ineffectual response to the coronavirus pandemic, and the rapid deterioration [...]
