East Africa Archive

In mid-April, a spokesperson for the Ugandan government admitted that the country’s only functioning cancer treatment machine had broken earlier that month. The radiotherapy machine, donated by China to Uganda in 1995 and housed at Mulago Hospital in Kampala, is now considered beyond repair. While the government did acquire a second radiotherapy machine in 2013, it has not been operational because of delays in allocating 30 billion shillings—just shy of $9 million—to construct a new building to house it. The funding delay has lifted, but the machine won’t be up and running for at least six months. The government has […]

Denunciations of French President Francois Hollande’s government know no geographic boundaries these days. In Paris, students are protesting a labor reform bill; in Mali, demonstrators ransacked an airport, decrying arrests made by French forces there. And since March 30, strikes and protests have paralyzed the French department and former colony of Mayotte, as residents demand “real equality” with the rest of France. Mayotte, an archipelago in the Indian Ocean situated between Madagascar and Mozambique, is one of France’s overseas departments; its residents are French citizens with parliamentary representation. But in many ways, Mayotte is far behind other overseas departments and […]

Last month, Tanzanian authorities confiscated the passports of Kenyan officials who were in Tanzania with a team of Ugandan officials working on an analysis of proposed routes for a multibillion-dollar oil pipeline, denying them access to the port of Tanga. In an email interview, Jonathan Markham, an upstream analyst with GlobalData, discussed the dispute between Kenya and Tanzania over the proposed pipeline to export Ugandan oil. WPR: What are the proposed pipeline routes from Uganda, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of each route? Jonathan Markham: A range of possible pipeline routes to ports has been proposed, including Lamu […]

On Jan. 6, Djibouti announced it was severing relations with Iran inresponse to attacks on Saudi Arabia’s diplomatic missions in Tehran, following the execution of a prominent Shiite cleric by Saudi authorities. Shortly after, a joke appeared on Telegram, an instant messaging app popular among Iranians: “One good thing that the snapping of ties with Saudi Arabia taught me is geography. At least now I know where Djibouti is.” Although many Iranians have since dismissed the tiny Horn of Africa state as an inconsequential actor, it was not that long ago that Tehran sought to expand its engagement with small […]

Security officials from South Sudanese President Salva Kiir’s government allegedly attacked and detained 16 members of rebel leader and former Vice President Riek Machar’s publicity team Tuesday. The publicity team was in Juba in advance of Machar’s return to South Sudan’s capital on April 18, when he is set to assume the office of vice president again in a unity government with Kiir as part of a fledgling peace deal. Tuesday’s violence is only the latest round of renewed fighting in South Sudan. The U.S. State Department issued a statement Monday condemning recent attacks on rebels in the northwest of […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on the impact of corruption and various countries’ efforts to combat it. Last month, the prime minister of Mauritius, Anerood Jugnauth, asked his environment minister to resign following corruption allegations. In an email interview, Roopanand Mahadew, a lecturer in human rights law at the University of Mauritius, discussed the country’s successes in fighting corruption. WPR: How big a problem is corruption in Mauritius, and to the degree it is one, how does it manifest itself in daily life and politics? Roopanand Mahadew: Mauritius was ranked first among African nations […]

Since taking office last November, Tanzania’s president, John Magufuli—a former minister of works known as the Bulldozer for his ability to push through his agenda—has seemed to adopt a new title: the broom. He wants to sweep away the country’s reputation for endemic corruption and poor public service. Magufuli has identified three areas of priority for his government: cutting wasteful and unnecessary expenditure; improving public services; and tackling the corruption that has long plagued public life and placed Tanzania 117th out of 168 in the Transparency International 2015 corruption index. From the start, these commitments have been matched with action. […]