Africa Insiders' Newsletter #72 Africa for insiders We hope you enjoy this week's free segment. If you want to receive the full newsletter every week, consider subscribing, from $8.33/month:
| | | Click here if you are a student or have otherwise limited income to request our discounted $2/month or $20/year subscription. | | As election season approaches, Botswana's political feud heats up Botswana's ongoing political family feud is getting even nastier ahead of national elections in October. Former President Ian Khama publicly released a letter he penned to his hand-picked successor Mokgweetsi Masisi, in which Khama calls Masisi's administration "vindictive" and a "comedy of errors."
Keep up with Botswana's political feud:
| | What everyone is talking about | |  | SOS Sahel community tree planting project. Near Hawassa, Southern Nation, Natonalities and Peoples' Region, Ethiopia. Photo by Aaron Minnick | | Ethiopia sets new tree-planting record to tackle #climatechange The essentials: Ethiopians headed out en masse last Monday to plant a record-breaking number of trees. More than 353 million seedlings were put into the soil across the country, according to government officials. That number surpasses India's mass reforestation feat in 2017 by over 300,000.
The background: President Abiy Ahmed joined members of his Republican Guard, workers and students all around Ethiopia to plant the seedlings. Over 70 million trees were planted in the Amhara region alone. The reforestation campaign is part of Abiy's ambitious Green Legacy Project. The aim is to plant 4 billion trees by the end of the rainy season and make Ethiopia a green society.
Ethiopia, particularly, is taking big steps to address the climate crisis due to the massive loss of its forests. Forest covers shrunk to 4% in the 2000s from about 33% a century before. The country is drought-prone and some areas have experienced severe food shortages. Flash floods have forced many from their homes.
The good: Ethiopia is one of the few countries walking the talk on climate action. We have only 10 years to meet international climate targets that require reforesting 1.35 million square miles of the earth's surface. Ethiopia's #GreenLegacy movement will likely spur more countries to attempt mass tree-plantings. Collective action like this would significantly reduce carbon emissions, not to mention, save a good number of vulnerable species. The Green Project doesn't look bad on President Abiy's politics either. The initiative united the nation in a common cause despite recent ethnic-tensions in some regions, including a fatal coup attempt.
The bad: Environment analysts say massive reforestation efforts like this one may cause even more problems for the planet. Planting certain trees in non-indigenous areas may damage the soil and destroy habitats. It is not clear if tree types were tailored to the locations where they would survive and aid other organisms.
The future: Will more countries attempt to break Ethiopia's record? Likely. If this becomes a trend, we wholeheartedly endorse it. Discuss with @Shollytupe on Twitter | | What we are talking about | | Mozambique's pre-election peace deal
The essentials: Mozambique's ruling party and its main opposition signed a peace agreement last week that should result in the broad demilitarization as armed forces loyal to the opposition surrender their weapons. Now the government must pivot to containing other insurgencies.
The background: Civil war flared in Mozambique just months after the country achieved independence from Portugal in 1975. The Renamo opposition staged a 16-year battle against the Frelimo government, which finally came to an end with a peace deal in 1992.
For more context and insights into Mozambique's peace deal:
| | Continental health corner | | Creeping drug resistance Add another problem to the list of health priorities African countries must address.
Microorganisms, including bacteria, viruses and some parasites, are rapidly developing resistance to the drugs that health officials have to treat them. The rise of antimicrobial resistance, or AMR, threatens a return to a period where people regularly fall severely ill or die from diseases humans used to regularly be able to treat. In Africa, it is spurred by people who cannot afford a full dose of medicine, by counterfeit drugs and by the overuse of antibiotics in agricultural efforts.
To read more on the importance of this development: | | Who fears Stella Nyanzi? There is freedom of speech, but I cannot guarantee freedom after speech - the violent dictator, Idi Amin.
A Ugandan magistrate court has sentenced Dr Stella Nyanzi, a social activist, to 18 months on 'Cyberharrasessement' charges. Nyanzi, a former researcher at Uganda's Makerere University, has been behind bars for nine months before the hearing. She was charged for criticising President Yoweri Museveni in a Facebook post back in 2017. In the post, Nyanzi referred to Museveni as 'a dirty, delinquent dictator' who should never have been born. For more insight into this case and Dr. Nyanzi's stand:
| | If you got the time, read this!
For more weekly insights into Africa ready for your consumption:
| | The Africa Insiders' Newsletter is a collaboration between AfricanArguments.org and @PeterDoerrie, with contributions from @_andrew_green and @Shollytupe and assistance from Stella Nantongo. Part of the subscription revenue is funding in-depth and freely accessible reporting and analysis on African Arguments. | | | | |
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