KENYA: Going Beyond “Cheerleading, Singing and Dancing For Candidates”

With general elections scheduled to take place in Kenya this December, activists in the East African country are looking to constitutional reform to ensure that more women fill decision-making posts in government.

POLITICS-KENYA: Renewed Demands for Partial Constitutional Review

The clamour for a new constitution in Kenya has taken a further twist: civil society, political parties and the Parliamentary Committee on Administration of Justice and Legal Affairs are teaming up under Muungano wa Katiba Mpya (the Union for a New Constitution, in Swahili) to demand partial constitutional reforms before general elections later this year.

POLITICS-COTE D’IVOIRE: Another UN Resolution, Another Controversy

For Siméon Konan of the non-governmental organisation Initiative for Peace (Initiative pour la paix), based in Côte d'Ivoire's financial centre of Abidjan, efforts to bring peace to the West African country leave something to be desired - a recent United Nations Security Council resolution on Côte d'Ivoire notwithstanding.

POLITICS-DRC: Electoral Officials Get Tough on the Rumour Mill

As ballots are counted from Sunday's historic vote in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), rhetoric from candidates and false poll results circulating via e-mail and text messages have prompted warnings from electoral officials. Authorities fear a repeat of first round election violence related to news of results.

POLITICS-DRC: Congolese Mark the Final Lap in a Watershed Election

Two people were reported killed and three injured when police in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) shot at supporters of Jean-Pierre Bemba, one of two candidates in Sunday's run-off presidential election. The supporters were said to be protesting ballot stuffing in the northern city of Lisala.

POLITICS-DRC: “The Winner Will Have to Share His Gains”

Citizens of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) will go to the polls Sunday to choose their first democratically-elected leader in over four decades amidst deep divisions in the Central African country.

ECONOMY-ZAMBIA: Making Debt Relief More of a Relief

While Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa won another term in office during last month's general elections, matters that plagued him in the course of the campaign are unlikely to dissipate now that polling is complete - particularly a sense that funds freed up by debt relief are not tangibly improving the lives of Zambians.

ECONOMY-ZAMBIA: China’s Growing Presence Met With Resistance

Votes cast for presidential contender Michael Sata in the recent election suggest a growing discontent among Zambians over the effects of increased Chinese involvement in their country.

POLITICS: Mixed Signals on Whether Moroccans Who Live Abroad, Can Vote Abroad

Moroccan expatriates may not be permitted to take part in legislative elections in their home country in 2007. Certain analysts believe this is because the government fears Islamic fundamentalists will make a clean sweep in the poll; others claim that the state is simply not able to meet the logistical challenge of allowing people living abroad to vote.

POLITICS-ZAMBIA: The Fiscal Conservative or the Firebrand?

Elimination of double-digit inflation, economic growth in the region of five percent last year, a reduction of foreign debt from some seven billion dollars to 500 million: these are figures guaranteed to earn the president of a developing country another term in office, not so? Maybe yes, Maybe no.

POLITICS-DRC: Disillusion at Post-Election Clashes

An outbreak of hostilities in Kinshasa appeared to be drawing to an end, Wednesday, as United Nations officials and diplomats worked to restore calm to the Congolese capital in the run-up to a second round of presidential elections.

POLITICS-DRC: Now For Round Two

Three weeks after their landmark election of Jul. 30, citizens of the Democratic Republic of Congo are bracing for another poll: the run-off vote between President Joseph Kabila and former rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba, that will decide who is to be the next head of state in this vast Central African nation.

POLITICS-KENYA: Constitution in the Spotlight Again, as Elections Near

The fraught process of constitutional review in Kenya marked another chapter this week, with an announcement by President Mwai Kibaki that there would be no partial reform of the constitution ahead of general elections next year.

POLITICS-DRC: A Three-Week Countdown

Vote counting is underway in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which held landmark general elections Sunday.

POLITICS-DRC: “An Opportunity for Congo’s Ordinary People to Express Themselves”

When voters in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) go to the polls Sunday, they will be participating in a general election for which the words "epic" and "historic" seem scarcely to do justice.

POLITICS-DRC: Challenging Times for Election Observers

General elections that loom at the end of the month in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) present considerable difficulties to all involved - not least local and foreign observers.

SRI LANKA: Fear Over the Country

A massive cutout of a soldier at a busy intersection in the Sri Lankan capital captures the nervous mood of a country on edge as a four-year-old ceasefire between the government and the formidable Tamil Tiger rebels rapidly fails.

POLITICS-DRC: “We Cannot Have Elections Like This”

Hundreds of combatants in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are said to be joining a nascent militia based in the north-east of the country: the Congolese Revolutionary Movement (Mouvement Revolutionnaire Congolaise, MRC). This comes just weeks before the first multi-party elections to be held in 40 years, and is undermining prospects for a successful poll.

COTE D’IVOIRE: The Cost of War – Children That Do Not (Officially) Exist

The political crisis in Côte d'Ivoire, sparked by a failed coup in 2002, is further disrupting the registration of children born in areas under rebel control.

POLITICS-BENIN: A New Broom to Clean Out the Augean Stables

Benin is preparing to swear in a new leader, this after a former head of the West African Development Bank won the second round of presidential elections held earlier this month in the West African country.

POLITICS-UGANDA: A Contentious Victory for Museveni

Opposition supporters have rejected Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's victory in general elections held last Thursday - the first multi-party poll to take place in the country in over 20 years.