There is a deepening realization that a shift has taken place in the political dynamics of Southern Africa – and perhaps more broadly, across the continent. In recent elections, from South Africa to Senegal, the youth have risen up to make their voices heard at the ballot box, but also in the streets. Will this trend continue into 2025? And how can youth leaders build platforms to both capitalize on and sustain this momentum?

This show will bring together leading researchers, civil society figures, and journalists to take stock of the latest developments in these countries -- and more -- while asking some difficult questions. Does power corrupt? Or is it structural challenges – such as inherited debt, overzealous police, and pliant courts – that create the conditions that undermine the best intentions of new leaders? Join us!

This show takes stock of recent developments in Tanzania, a country in which there is a noticeably widening gap between outside perceptions and reality on the ground. Since her elevation to power in 2021, President Samia Suluhu Hassan has made lofty promises of reform and pledged to reverse the authoritarian tide that accelerated during the tenure of her predecessor, John Magufuli, widely known as ‘The Bulldozer.’

Early on, the media – both domestic and international – was riveted by Tanzania’s first woman president and positive coverage became the norm. To be fair, President Hassan did reverse some of the more draconian measures enacted by her predecessors. She also reached out to and met publicly with outspoken critics, including the country’s most well-known opposition leader, Tundu Lissu, following his return from exile.

Tanzania is now gearing up for local elections in December and a general election next year. In this increasingly charged political environment, the authorities have reverted to the repressive tactics of past regimes. Just last month, over 500 opposition political activists were arrested and jailed on trumped-up charges, including Tundu Lissu. Journalists and independent media practitioners are also being targeted with arrest, harassment and violent intimidation.

Despite the lingering perceptions of Tanzania being on the pathway to reform, there is a serious prospect of a major crackdown as the 2025 polls near. Already, power is being centralized with the country’s security and policing apparatus now falling under command of the office of the president. There is a serious risk that Tanzania will slowly but surely evolve into a police state. If this happens, the prospects for free and fair elections, or reducing the corruption that the ruling party has become well known for, will be slim.

On 12 September – at 6PM Tanzania time (11AM ET) – our team will delve into these timely issues with some of Tanzania’s most prominent defenders of democracy and intellectual heavyweights. Join us!

On 17 August, the 44th SADC Summit of Heads of State and Government will take place in Zimbabwe under the theme: “Promoting innovation to unlock opportunities for sustained economic growth and development.” The lofty framing of this high-level gathering is at complete odds with recent developments in the host nation. This includes the arrests on June 16 – and the alleged torture and beatings by police sustained thereafter – of several prominent human rights defenders who were forcefully removed from their plane before traveling to a civil society conference. In total, 18 activists were unjustly detained by Zimbabwean authorities, according to local lawyers. Among those detained is a former speaker on The Resistance Bureau, Namatai Kwekweza, a 25-year-old pro-democracy campaigner and the inaugural winner of the 2023 Kofi Annan NextGen Democracy Prize.

Kenya’s wave of youth-led protests against the 2024 Finance Bill has sent shockwaves through the country’s political establishment -- and the rest of the continent. The extent of the protests has already forced President William Ruto to 'withdraw' the bill and the crippling tax increases that it contained. More recently, Ruto also pledged to introduce a range of measures to reduce the cost of government and to engage with the International Monetary Fund and other international partners to find an alternative way to respond to the country’s debt crisis.

South Africa’s 2024 general elections, on May 29, are perhaps the country’s most interesting – and hotly contested –since the country's first multiparty, multiracial elections in 1994.

It is sometimes possible to overcome authoritarian forces and produce political change, even when the government is not committed to democracy. This show will explore what strategies and tactics have proved to be the most effective. Together, we will learn how to outmaneuver authoritarian regimes from activists and leaders on the frontlines with a track record of success. Join us!

Fatalities from conflicts across Africa have been on the rise since 2020, but 2023 saw an escalation of violence that pushed civilian deaths to the highest levels since 1999. Today, certain areas of the Horn of Africa, the Sahel, DR Congo, Nigeria and Sudan are some of the deadliest places for civilians worldwide. And this year is shaping up to be even worse.

This Twitter Space – happening on Thursday, February 8 at 7PM Zimbabwe time –will bring together well-informed analysts to pierce the fog that currently hovers over the situation. This will be a conversation on accountability and next steps, as opposed to attributing blame and pointing fingers. It will also be a conversation that centers the Zimbabwean citizen and their aspirations. Join us!

In a growing number of countries across Africa, term limits have been removed, and they are actively under threat in many more, including in Benin, Senegal and Sierra Leone.

But while term limit evasions and their removal garner consistent headlines in Africa and beyond do they really matter for governance and development?

For citizens in countries such as Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Togo, Uganda, and many more the removal of presidential term limits was a pivotal nail in the coffin for democracy. By creating “presidents for life," their removal -- often introduced in the early 1990s to ensure that power could not be consolidated under an individual -- slammed the door on the notion of peacefully changing a government through the ballot box. Instead, established autocrats and newly minted coup leaders have used their ability to remove term limits to assert their political dominance while utilizing repressive strategies to hold and manipulate sham elections.

Nevertheless, while countries where term limits have been respected are on average far more democratic and prosperous than their counterparts, some leaders –- and citizens – seem to believe that they are a hindrance at best, or a 'western imposition' at worse.

Supporters of the Rwandan president Paul Kagame, for example -- who is running for a fifth presidential term in 2024 -- argue that forcing a change of leadership will undermine continuity and encourage short-term thinking at the expense of long-term development. And after all, why should African countries limit how long a leader can stay in office when this is not the norm in the United Kingdom or Germany?

This show will ask whether term limits are expendable or essential for political and economic growth in Africa. In doing so, we'll bring together a brilliant panel of activists, researchers, and journalists who are experts on the issue. We will interrogate how leaders try and successfully remove term limits and whether the lifting of such restrictions leads to more effective governance, or just more oppression and corruption.

Liberia is often portrayed as a democratic ‘success story’ in Africa. Today, however, many Liberians do not share that positive sentiment. Twenty years of peace was secured in August 2023, and the country is one of only a handful of African states to have experienced two peaceful transfers of power. But that is only half the story. The economy is in tatters and high youth unemployment has led to growing frustration as well as political alienation. Against this backdrop, the lack of political trust in either the ruling party or the National Elections Commission to deliver a credible election is a major concern leading to election day.

Some voters and civil society groups fear a repeat of the Sierra Leonean election – when the electoral commission blatantly inflated the vote for the president in order to avoid a second-round run-off. Others have concerns about acts of political violence, given that these polls will be the first since the departure of the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL). Both the opposition and the government have publicly committed to a peaceful process, but this has not been enough to assuage the prevailing concerns of a population with ingrained memories of national trauma of conflict.

Join us for this timely Twitter Space in which we will convene Liberian civil society leaders, election and peace experts, as well as journalists to discuss this consequential election and the steps that need to be taken to safeguard democracy.

On 4 August, Tinashe Chitsunge -- a supporter of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party, the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) -- was stoned to death. He was traveling to a CCC rally when the group that he was with was ambushed by suspected supporters of ZANU-PF, the country's long-ruling party. The attack represented the culmination of a growing climate of brutality as Zimbabwe heads to the polls on 23 August.

According to Afrobarometer, the proportion of the Zimbabwean population fearing violence during the elections has risen to 58%, up from 43% in 2018.

Along with a raft of highly repressive legislation -- including the Private Voluntary Organizations (PVO) Bill and the Patriotic Bill -- this has led to concerns that this month's elections will be as bad as those held under former autocratic leader Robert Mugabe. In the absence of checks and balances, and with the ZANU-PF government’s low popularity meaning it could still struggle to win -- despite all of its advantages -- there is a real prospect of even more violence around and on election day.

Today, civil society groups are hampered by major restrictions on their activities and the knowledge that an increasingly politicized judiciary will not protect them. International observers are also constrained by late arrivals into the country and the fact that the government has been vetting who is and is not allowed to be part of international missions. For their part, international donors appear to be stuck in a rut, unsure of how to engage with the authoritarian government of Emmerson Mnangagwa, now that he has clearly abandoned an initial commitment to hold “free, fair and credible elections”.

This Twitter Space will convene civil society leaders, activists and leading writers to assess the electoral environment and what can be done -- if anything -- to safeguard the polls. We will also look at lessons from Zimbabwe’s history, and other countries in the region that have managed to resist oppressive electoral environments to hold those in power accountable.

On 26 July, President Mohamed Bazoum of Niger was 'taken hostage' and then overthrown in the latest coup to hit West and Central Africa. This latest coup d'état has increased the number of successful coups experienced in the West African sub-region to six over the past two years.

As in previous military takeovers -- in Burkina Faso and Mali, for example -- the coup leaders captured headlines around the world, especially as the junta and its supporters denounced France while lauding Russia. A group of Nigerien protestors even waved Russian flags as they attacked the French embassy. These striking images inspired a wave of media commentary suggesting that the coup was a victory for both Vladimir Putin and the Wagner mercenary group who, it is said, are expanding their network across the continent. Events in St Petersburg on the same day as the coup provided evidence for this interpretation: Mali's interim president arrived in Russia for the Russia-Africa summit in which leaders from Burkina Faso and Mali made speeches supporting Putin and backing his illegal invasion of Ukraine.

The vast majority of commentary thus far, however, has been deeply flawed. Russian economic involvement in most African countries is marginal, while Russian aid and trade investments are not sufficient to replace that of European countries and the United States for any length of time. Wagner's physical presence is also much smaller than is often claimed. The erroneous -- and increasingly farcical -- maps that purport to illustrate countries with a Wagner presence massively inflate the group's overall capacity and activities.

Moreover, the motivation for the recent raft of coups in Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea, Mali, and Sudan has been rooted in domestic problems. In the case of Niger, military leaders appear to have acted, in large part, to protect their own positions after the president drew up plans to replace them.

This show will therefore seek to separate myth from reality, bringing together leading journalists, activists, and researchers to discuss where Russia and Wagner are significant actors (and where they are not). We will also explore why some citizens and commentators see Russia as a preferable partner going forward, despite its bevy of economic woes, history of political repression at home and imperialism abroad, as well as its limited investment in Africa.

Sierra Leone heads to the polls on 24 June, a significant test for the country's fledgling democracy. Having made an impressive transition to multiparty politics after years of violent conflict -- including becoming one of the small number of African states to achieve two peaceful transfers of power at the ballot box -- this year’s elections have sparked controversy.

Amid growing economic challenges and rising popular anger, President Julius Maada Bio unilaterally changed the electoral system for the legislature from a first-past-the-post model to a system of proportional representation. While the government claims that this new system will be more fair, the last minute nature of the shift, which did not include popular consultation, has led to accusations that the system has now been changed to make it harder to detect electoral manipulation.

This is particularly worrying for Sierra Leone since economic and political protests often have deadly consequences. Although the country has been largely peaceful since the reintroduction of multiparty politics, anti-government protests -- largely driven by the rising costs of living -- have led to scores of deaths among both protesters and police.

Against this backdrop, the country would benefit from a credible election process, including a set of results that are accepted by all parties. Achieving this outcome will be complicated given the close and often contested nature of elections. As in 2018, the Sierra Leone People’s Party is competing against the All People’s Congress, led once again by Samura Kamara. And as in 2018, the election seems likely to be tight, with a strong possibility that no candidate will secure the 55% threshold that is required to win outright in the first round to avoid a second round of voting.

To explore the many key issues animating this election, as well as the threats to credible elections and peace, we have convened a cross-section of activists, writers, and election specialists for an 8 June Twitter Space. Join us to hear the latest and have your say on how the elections might unfold.

"During the course of three consecutive days in January, a trio of Africa’s brightest lights for freedom and accountability were extinguished. In just 72 hours, three of the continent’s most intrepid and well-respected leaders had been silenced. The brazen killings of Thulani Maseko in eSwatini (Swaziland), John Williams Ntwali (Rwanda), and Martinez Zogo (Cameroon) sent shockwaves across the human rights community and led to high-level denunciations from many democratic governments worldwide.

As many feared, however, the initial outpouring of concern, the expressions of shock, and the vocal calls for accountability have subsided. In all three contexts – notable for their long autocratic rule – the human rights situation remains dire, and the hopes for reform are dim. This return to ‘business as usual’ is equally dismaying and entirely predictable. With deafening silence from African leaders – and democratic powers outside of the continent sitting on their hands – these deaths will not be the last. As we know: every unchallenged assassination further emboldens the use of violence, putting more vulnerable human rights defenders at risk.

What can be done to challenge impunity in these circumstances and to hold authoritarian leaders – their hit squads and armed enforcers – accountable for their actions? We often encourage human rights defenders like Thulani, Ntwali, and Martinez to be heroes, to literally put their lives on the line to advance social change. Yet, we just as often fail to have their backs when they are inevitably pressed against the wall by their abusers in power.

This show will convene survivors and advocates to discuss these critical issues, along the way identifying solutions to stop the contagion of targeted attacks while reinforcing the solidarity that is needed for their respective missions. Please join us on May 24 for a tribute to those we have lost and to help provide a sense of hope to those who have picked up the baton.

Today, there are 71 countries in which sexual relations between people of the same sex are illegal. And there are 64 countries that have laws explicitly criminalizing homosexuality – nearly half of these are in Africa. Across the continent, there have also been many examples of lawmakers working to tighten laws that already outlaw ‘homosexual acts,’ including in Nigeria and Uganda. Uganda's parliament, for example, recently passed a draconian bill that includes punishments as severe as life in prison for those who identify as gay, and possibly the death penalty in certain cases. The country’s longtime autocratic leader, Yoweri Museveni, has publicly called on Africa to ‘save the world from homosexuality.’

Underpinning these arguments is a feeling that queerness -- non-heteronormative sexualities that involve physical, emotional, or sexual intimacy with a member of the same sex – is somehow ‘unAfrican.’ Leaders like Museveni, and Robert Mugabe and Yahya Jammeh before him, have argued that queerness is a ‘Western’ import designed to ‘destroy’ the African family – ironically, with the financial backing of evangelical leaders based in the United States.

These arguments, of course, ignore the fact that anti-gay legislation has firm roots in colonization. During the 19th and 20th centuries, homophobia was legally enforced by colonial administrators and missionaries, overturning a vastly different attitude towards sexual and gender identities that had prevailed for centuries across the continent.

Reinforcing this is the fact that populist homophobia has kept many politicians in power over the years. “Across Africa,” as Nigerian activist Bisi Alimi once wrote, “if you hate gay people, you get votes.” Africa is not alone in this regard.

The overall picture, however, isn't entirely bleak. South Africa was the first country on the continent to legalize same-sex marriages. Angola’s new president signed into law a revised penal code that banned discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. And at least six countries have recently decriminalized same-sex relationships: Angola, Botswana, Gabon, Lesotho, Mozambique, and Seychelles.

In this show, we’ll explore the colonial roots of homophobia and its layered

complexities, while also attempting to unpack the political motives behind

anti-LGBT campaigns, in both dictatorships and democracies: from Kenya to Ghana and from Zimbabwe to Uganda. Please join us!

Women's political participation in Africa has achieved considerable progress in recent decades, with many countries striding towards greater gender parity in leadership and decision-making positions. Nevertheless, the region remains largely unequal.

The under-representation of women largely reflects the dominant political culture, though there is nothing particularly ‘African’ about this reality since women are also under-represented in most Western parliaments. According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, women in African countries hold on average about 26% of seats in parliament. Rwanda leads the way with 61%, followed by South Africa (46%), Namibia (43%), and Senegal (43%).

There are also a number of examples of women who have, over the years, broken through the glass ceiling and taken up space at the highest levels of governance.

Africa’s first democratically-elected woman president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, led Liberia through reconciliation and recovery following a civil war. In 2012, 19-year-old Ugandan, Proscovia Alengot Oromait, became the youngest person in Africa to be elected a member of parliament. And in Zimbabwe, Fadzayi Mahere – a previous speaker on our show – transitioned from an independent candidate in Zimbabwe’s 2018 election to an official spokesperson of the country’s leading opposition political party.

Despite these examples, however, barriers persist. For example, limited access to education and income-generating activities compromise women’s ability to campaign. The commercialization of politics makes the political playing field highly unfair. Violence against women muzzles their voices – both in person and online. And dominant gender norms continue to push women to the periphery.

This live show – taking place on International Women’s Day – will celebrate successful women leaders and reflect on what their personal journeys can teach us. We will seek to answer difficult questions: Why has democracy failed to deliver on issues such as inclusivity in politics and governance? Why does women’s representation in politics matter? And are women leaders better positioned to champion policies that respond to the needs of women and other marginalized groups?

Join us on March 8!

Taking place on Election Day in Nigeria, this Twitter Space will convene some of the country’s leading analysts to discuss the election, the key issues at stake, and how Nigeria can move forward towards the sort of prosperity many citizens are yearning for.

The phrase, "Youth are Africa’s greatest asset,” is almost overused (and probably should be). It is a reminder that the African continent must reflect youthfulness in its governance, as well as in its approach to sustainable development. Across sectors, young people are a demographic majority in Africa – and 2023 presents an opportunity for reflection on some of the ways in which youth are being, and can be, integrated into Africa’s governance architecture.

Integration is the operative word here.

Youth inclusion should not require creating adjacent or parallel support structures that allow for their input. Instead, youth leaders must be fully integrated into existing structures for maximum impact, while at the same time, identifying ways to refocus structures in which youth have been traditionally ignored or marginalized.

The call for the greater integration of Africa’s youth is built on the premise that there are many ways in which the continent’s youth are already involved in important decision-making and governance processes. This conversation will therefore focus on what we can learn from the successes of these models – and importantly, what can be done to expand the results.

This Twitter Space featured leading youth voices from across Africa that are working models of inclusion and explored how these young leaders can be more effective going forward. In doing so, we hope to foster an elevated understanding of the role that youth can play in governance across Africa, as well as in national and continental governance structures, while developing deeper networks of solidarity among those who are committed to Africa’s long-term development.

Following the success of our last show -- “America in Africa: Genuine Partners or Neocolonialism?” -- we will focus more on the upcoming US-Africa Leaders' Summit. Will this high-profile gathering of heads of state represent the start of a new era for relations? Or will it simply be a box-ticking exercise for the U.S. administration and a case of “same old, same old"?

Featuring individuals close to the US policy world, African leaders, and expert discussants, this show will cover the big questions. What is really different about the new US policy towards Africa and its 54 distinct countries? What do African leaders hope to achieve at the summit? How will President Biden manage the contradiction between his rhetorical support for democracy and the reality of inviting so many authoritarian leaders to the White House? And will America step up its investment in Africa to balance out China and Russia?

Tune in to this timely show -- occurring live just days before this major summit -- to find out!