Economic and development analysis: Perspectives on economics, society, development, freedom & social justice. Leading issues in Oromo, Oromia, Africa & world affairs. Oromo News. African News. world News. Views. Formerly Oromia Quarterly
Over the last few years, sub-Saharan countries have seen significant economic growth. Seven of the ten fastest growing economies in the world between 2011-2015 come from Africa.
But this economic growth has not quite translated into significant poverty reduction. As analysts point out, the number of people on the continent living under $1.25 a day has risen from 358 million in 1996 to 415 million in 2011.
Tanzania for example, which saw an average of 6% GDP growth over the last several years, has grappled with this disconnect. “At the macro-level, we may be doing well, but it does not touch the unemployed or those involved in the informal economy,” a former cabinet minister told Quartz.
However, the latest data from the Pew Research Centre shows that there has been significant poverty reduction in some African countries.
The reduction of poverty and increase in the ranks of the slightly better-off “low-income” category is good news, but the challenge remains that many African countries have not been able to transition people into the middle class.
Africa is still the poorest region in the world overall: With nine out of 10 people either poor or low-income, the continent his home to 20% of the world’s poor, the data show. In some countries virtually the entire population is poor or low-income. The picture is somewhat brighter in Seychelles, Tunisia, South Africa, Morocco and Egypt, where 20% are either middle income or better
(Gulf News, NEW YORK, 10 July 2015): The dramatic lurch of hundreds of millions of people from poverty since the millennium began has not resulted in a truly global middle class, a new report says.
Instead, the improvement in living conditions for almost 700 million people has been a step forward from the desperate existence of $2 or less a day into a low-income world of living on $2 to $10 daily, the Pew Research Center says.
Its report, released Wednesday, looks at changes in income for more than 110 countries between 2001 and 2011, the latest that data for such a large range of countries was available.
The report comes just two days after the United Nations announced success in key development goals adopted by world leaders at the start of the millennium, including the lifting of more than one billion people out of extreme poverty.
Also worth noting: Europe and North America’s global share of the upper-middle income population fell from 76 per cent to 63 per cent by 2011 as the Asia-South Pacific region got richer. Africa remained the poorest region, with 92 per cent of its population either poor or low-income by 2011, and in Cote d’Ivoire, Kenya, Madagascar and Zambia, “poverty actually increased significantly.”
For years, reaching middle class has been held out as a goal for people in a growing number of countries. China’s rise in particular, with 203 million people there moving into a middle-income life over the decade starting in 2001, has resulted in what the report calls a “pivot to the east.”
More than half of the world’s middle-class population was living in the Asia and South Pacific region by 2011. That’s a jump from 31 per cent to 51 per cent in a decade. Largely because of Asia, the report says the world’s middle-income population nearly doubled over that time, from 399 million to 784 million.
But the gains are hardly seen everywhere. The report shows that while commodity-rich South America and a strengthening Eastern Europe, including Russia, also made strides into the middle class, Africa, India and many parts of Asia have yet to do the same.
The Pew report calls its overall findings “the uneven geography of the emerging middle class.”
The poverty rate for India, Asia’s other population giant, fell from 35 per cent to 20 per cent over the report’s period, but its middle class only grew from 1 per cent to 3 per cent. The report notes that India’s economic reforms began in 1991, 13 years after China, though the scope and pace of the countries’ reforms have varied.
South America almost reached the point where half of its population is at or above middle-income, at 47 per cent.
And despite China’s rise, more than three-fourths of its people were still poor or low-income. The only other countries seeing a significant shift into the middle class, where the poverty rate fell by at least 15 per cent and the middle-income population grew by at least 10 per cent, were Bhutan, Moldova, Ecuador, Argentina and Kazakhstan.
Among countries with a large number of high-income people, or those living on more than $50 a day, the United States stood out from its Western peers by slipping as its economy stalled. Its high-income population actually edged down, from 58 per cent in 2001 to 56 per cent in 2011.
Factors like conflict and falling oil prices likely have affected the findings for some economies, such as Russia’s, in the past few years, the report notes.
Burundi’s turmoil points to a shifting social and political landscape
Clár Ní Chonghaile, The Guardian, Thursday 21 May 2015
Analysts see the upheaval in Burundi as symptomatic of a public craving for principled politics and an end to the era of the autocratic statesman
The upheaval in Burundi may bear many of the hallmarks of a classic African military coup but, for some analysts, the crisis is indicative of a newfound public hunger for good governance, and a reaction against administrations run by political strongmen who cloak repression in the trappings of democracy.
As global leaders work on the sustainable development goals (SDGs), a blueprint for governing development over the next 15 years, young people in Burundi are making their own demands, of their leaders as well as international donors.
Their appeals for democracy and abuse-free institutional processes mirror the call in SDG 16 to promote the rule of law, ensure equal access to justice, and develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions.
Burundi refugees say there is no turning back as fears grow of reprisals at home.
Burundi’s crisis began in late April after the ruling CNDD-FDD party nominated President Pierre Nkurunziza to run for a third term in the country’s June elections, despite a two-term constitutional limit. Protesters took to the streets and clashed with police.
Then, on 13 May, Major General Godefroid Niyombare told reporters that he had dismissed the president. The attempted coup was short-lived, however, and Niyombare is now on the run. Nkurunziza is back in charge, and fears of reprisals are widespread.
Rights groups say at least 20 people have been killed and more than 110,000 Burundians have fled to neighbouring countries, raising fears of a “severe humanitarian crisis”.
Some observers predict a drawn-out period of uncertainty and violence, with particular risks for opposition activists and the media. Protests continued on Wednesday, while the government said local and parliamentary elections would be delayed for a week but the presidential elections would go ahead as planned on 26 June.
Some elements of the crisis – the timing of the coup to coincide with the president’s absence at a regional summit, the fear of ethnic tensions exploding – seem to hark back to Burundi’s unstable past. But Jesper Bjarnesen, senior researcher at the Nordic Africa Institute, says the dynamic is different this time.
Bjarnesen visited the Burundian capital Bujumbura recently and met with young activists who style themselves “the Arusha generation”, a nod to the peace accords that, in 2005, brought an end to a 12-year civil war between Hutu rebels and the mainly Tutsi army.
For these activists, ethnicity is no more the issue than Nkurunziza himself: rather, they feel the president has violated the constitution.
“It’s about political principles,” says Bjarnesen. “That is remarkable. It’s not that long ago that ethnicity was in many ways the … defining split. What I got from [the activists] was this sense that formal politics are just not a useful medium for those not in power.”
Yolande Bouka, a researcher in conflict prevention and risk analysis at the Institute for Security Studies, says Burundi’s government has long shown a disdain for the Arusha peace accords that has chipped away at trust between political actors.
The protestors and the opponents to Nkurunziza’s third term are trying to evoke an African spring
Jesper Bjarnesen, senior researcher at the Nordic Africa Institute
“Should the conflict drag on and erode inter-ethnic trust … it is possible to see a flare-up of ethnic tensions,” says Bouka, adding that the international community should have acted sooner on warning signs that the authorities were cracking down on dissent after the 2010 elections.
Nkurunziza is not alone in attempting to use almost absolute political power to extend his rule. Next door, Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame, is said to be considering another term despite a two-term limit. Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni, already one of Africa’s longest serving leaders, has already changed the constitution to allow him to run again.
There are more cautionary tales. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Joseph Kabila was forced to withdraw a bill seen as an attempt to extend his term after protests in January. Nkurunziza may also be mindful of Burkina Faso’s former president, Blaise Compaoré, one of Africa’s longest serving leaders, who was forced from office after he tried to change the constitution and run for another term.
End of Africa’s ‘big men’?
The idea that the “big man” model of rule is running out of steam may be gaining traction among the continent’s leaders.
At a regional summit this week, west African heads of state discussed a proposal to limit presidential mandates. The proposal was rejected because of opposition from Gambia and Togo, where there are no term limits, Reuters reported. But the discussion did not go unnoted.
“The protestors and the opponents to Nkurunziza’s third term are trying to evoke an African spring, with Burkina Faso setting the precedent. They are trying to use public protests to end a regime that has used both legal and illegal ways of reinforcing its grip on power,” says Bjarnesen.
Burundi unrest leaves 50,000 refugees facing dire conditions in Tanzania.
Thierry Vircoulon, project director for central Africa at the International Crisis Group, says Burundi’sproblems are in the 2010 elections, which most opposition parties boycotted.
“The first mandate of President Nkurunziza was about the consolidation of his power within the ruling party, and his second mandate was about the consolidation of his grip over the institutions and the preparation of his third mandate. This is a pattern that we see in a lot of post-conflict regimes in the region,” says Vircoulon.
A former Belgian colony, Burundi is one of Africa’s poorest countries, ranking 180 out of 187 states in the 2014 UN human development index. It relies on foreign aid for half its national budget. Britain’s Department for International Development ended bilateral aid in 2012, and has been criticised by a parliamentary committee for doing so.
Bjarnesen says that while donors are in a catch-22 situation, suspending assistance will only hurt the poorest. This month, the EU said it would withhold €2m ($2.2m) of aid, while Belgium also announced a suspension of electoral aid.
“Cutting aid in itself just does not work,” says Bjarnesen. “The threat now of cutting funding to the elections, who is that serving?”
For Bjarnesen, elections now would be devastating for the opposition but perhaps palatable to international partners – a situation that encapsulates an ideological tug-of-war between the merits of stability versus true democracy.
“To a large extent, the international community would rather have some sort of elections and then relative stability rather than continued political instability with the threat of conflict,” he says.
“That’s the biggest weakness of the response from the international community: it’s so short-sighted and focused on visible symptoms … whereas what is actually keeping the status quo is this kind of structural violence that has been in place since Nkurunziza came to power.”
Bjarnesen is critical of “international lenience” towards African governments. “The argument would be these are young democracies, they need time to develop … I think that moment has passed. I don’t see any reason why you would measure democracy in Burundi against standards other than those you use in the UK or Sweden.”
Qaamni Qeerroo caasaa mootummaa keessaa fi kan magaalaa Naqamtee icciitii fi ijoo marii tikoota Wayyaanee kana akka saaxiletti, namooti lama man maqaan isaanii Yohaannis Abebee fi Beekkataa fi akkasumas barattoota keessaa basaasaa beekamaan Yuunibarsiitii Wallaggaa nama Tsaggaa Ashaabbir jedhamu ta’anii namooti shan waltajjicha kan geggeessan yeroo ta’u, walgahicha irratti kan akeekamee fi irratti mariyatamee kan murtaaye ukkamsitooti fi humni federaalaa uuffata sivilii uffatee uummata basaasus magaalaa Naqamtee fi Yuuniversitiilee irra akka tamsa’u irratti ta’uu Qeerroon saaxilee jira.
The Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC/Medrek) campaigning for the upcoming General Election (scheduled to be held on May 24, 2015) has continued in the State of Oromia. On Saturday, May 9, 2015, elder statesman Bulcha Demeksa and OFC Chairman Dr. Merera Gudina were in Naqamtee and Shashamane, respectively, to campaign for OFC with an unprecedented huge turnout at each location.
Naqamte Gadaa Otaa
Shashe Town
Over the last several weeks, the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) has been criss-crossing Oromia to campaign for the upcoming General Election on May 24, 2015; despite intimidation and harassment of voters as well as candidates by the TPLF regime (as reported here: http://wp.me/p4JW8b-3d5), there has been a huge turnout at each campaign rally, including Ambo (as reported here: http://wp.me/p4JW8b-375)
Here are some photos from Adama (dated May 8, 2015), and Ginchi and Gedo from the last week.
UPDATED (May 9, 2015): The Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC/Medrek) campaigning for the upcoming General Election (scheduled to be held on May 24, 2015) has continued in the State of Oromia. On Saturday, May 9, 2015, elder statesman Bulcha Demeksa and OFC Chairman Dr. Merera Gudina were in Naqamtee and Shashamane, respectively, to campaign for OFC with an unprecedented huge turnout at each location.
UPDATED (May 11, 2015): The Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC/Medrek) campaign tour has continued in small and big towns in Oromia. Most recently, the campaign train made a stop at Dodola in central Oromia; yet again, the OFC rally drew a crowd of thousands of potential voters, who braved the constant harassment and intimidation of Ethiopia’s TPLF regime to express their solidarity with OFC/Medrek. It is to be noted that Dr. Beyene Petros of the Ethiopian Social Democratic Party (ESDP/Medrek) revealed once again the ongoing abuses by the TPLF regime on Medrek voters and candidates, as reported by OMN over the weekend: https://www.oromiamedia.org/2015/05/amharic-news-may-9-2015/
Dr. Beyene Petros of the Ethiopian Social Democratic Party (ESDP)/Medrek speaks about the unprecedented levels of intimidation and harassment his organization’s candidates are facing ahead of the May 2015 General Election (April 2015)
Caamsaa 9,2015 Godina Lixa Shaggar Aanaa Midaa Qanyitti uummatni Oromoo gita bittaa mmootummaa Wayyaanee Abbaa irree EPRDF/TPLF/ jalatti hin bulluu jechuun mormii isa jabeesse, Mootummaan Wayyaanee Qeerroo barattoota Oromoo qabee hidhaatti darbuun dararuu itti fufe.
