“There is not a single country on the African continent where democracy is firmly consolidated and secure” – Larry Diamond Source: Fred Moon (Unsplash) The optimism washed in by the third wave of democracy has seen a receding tide and with it a gradual decay of democratic institutions. Across the continent, we are forced to uncouple [...]
As the country moves to level 3 of lockdown, the opening up of the economy comes as a welcome relief to all South African’s, including the most economically marginalised. While the Covid-19 crisis spreads through the country, the media has put on raging narrative inducing a dichotomy of lives vs livelihoods. Yet, whichever side of the debate you buy into, it is always the most vulnerable segments of society that will bear a disproportionate burden of losses to both lives and livelihoods.
Freedom Day, a public holiday commemorating South Africa’s first democratic elections, passed with a bitter sense of irony.
The answers are in the questions. The COVID-19 pandemic has been the single biggest event to confront the globe for the last one hundred years. The world has moved on in leaps and bounds since the last global pandemic, yet, we were caught unawares. There is no vaccine on the horizon and the world has seen [...]
The upcoming 2020 presidential election in the Central African Republic (CAR) has the potential to derail the implementation of the 2019 Khartoum Peace Agreement and bring about a return to widespread conflict.
On 18 April Zimbabwe celebrated her 40th Independence Anniversary. The occasion was largely overshadowed by the Covid-19 pandemic and the ostensibly unending economic turmoil, yet not lessened in its significance. As the old adage goes, ‘life begins at 40’. And depending on who you ask, the significance of this important milestone has different meanings to different [...]
Former IJR Executive Director Dr Fanie Du Toit addresses trainees at a January 2020 workshop in Bangui,Central African Republic. Part of IJR and In Transformation Initiative's (ITI) collaborative efforts to strengthen the capacity of the country's Local Peace and Reconciliation Committee Network. Since independence, the Central African Republic has been plagued by politico-military crises [...]
Trust – Zimbabwe’s elusive currency IJR’s Dr Webster Zambara in Zimbabwe A recent working visit to Zimbabwe by IJR’s Dr Webster Zambara brought him to the stark reality on the prevailing situation on the ground – a deepening trust deficit. In a country that is facing its worst economic crisis in a decade, and [...]
In November 2019, two member of the Research and Policy team, Anyway Chingwete and Dominique Dryding, left for Angola to conduct two fieldworker training workshops and to observe fieldwork for the Round 8 Afrobarometer* survey in Angola. The size of Angola, the cost of transport and the language specifications per region necessitated that two fieldwork training [...]
IJR’s Danielle Hoffmeester talks to participants in Calitzdorp ’With these hands, we will rebuild our communities!’’ proclaimed Calitzdorp youth - fitting commitment by young people and elders alike, to rebuild, restore and plough back into our communities. Our individual and collective histories as well as our present-day realities tell us that young people here [...]
