Africa Business

Koutaye Niang has been racing in the Saint-Louis regatta for 20 years, but this year’s competition, held Saturday in Senegal’s historic second city, was the “best day” of his life.

Niang — who, like all his teammates, is a fisherman from the coastal city’s Guet N’dar quarter — was the captain of one of three winning pirogues that ended a rival team’s five-year hot streak at this year’s fishing boat race, a traditional event dating back generations.

“All those who live (in my community), Dak, feel like kings today,” the 43-year-old said, radiating with pride and wrapped in the red and green colours of his team’s flag.

The regatta -– held annually in the former capital of colonial French West Africa, some 250 kilometres (150 miles) north of Dakar –- sees hundreds of men board long wooden pirogues to race two-and-a-half kilometres through the estuary where the Senegal River meets the Atlantic Ocean.

The city’s fishermen have been racing recreationally for over a century, but the event became more formalised in the 1950s, according to the president of the organising committee, El Hadj Moctar Gueye.

“There are a lot more people now, and it’s more official,” said N’Deye Seck, 75, a tailor in the N’dar Market. 

Her own father and brothers participated when she was young, and she remembers the former French president Charles de Gaulle attending in 1959, months before Senegal’s independence.

– Ancestral loyalties –

On the eve of this year’s event, Guet N’dar — one of Africa’s most populated neighbourhoods — was buzzing with nervous energy.

Men clad in traditional boubou tunics for Friday prayers and women in elegant “moussor” head wraps jostled in the streets with gleeful children, horse-drawn carts and stray livestock.

On the riverbank, an old man chipped away at wooden planks to fashion oars, while younger men coated them in red and white paint.

Saint-Louis’s fishermen are divided into three teams, each representing a geographical section of the old quarter. Groups of between 50 and 70 people from each team compete in one of three race categories.

Separate races are also held for fishermen from elsewhere around the country.

“It’s a feeling of joy whenever we win,” said Younouss Dieye, a rower with the Pondou Khole team who has been competing in the regatta for over a decade. 

He said he trained for 10 days before the race.

At sunrise on Saturday, young men played wooden “tam tam” drums and spectators danced and blew plastic whistles as the narrow fishing boats, measuring between 15 and 20 metres, were launched into the water. 

The previous day’s boubous were replaced by colourful sports tops, with the number 23 jersey of American basketball player Lebron James ubiquitous in the Pondou Khole community, whose team colours are yellow and blue.

Nearby, a vendor sold bucket hats and bowties in the same colours.

– ‘The blood that flows’ –

Further down the riverbank, in the Dak community, spiritual leaders burned incense and smashed packets of ice where boats were launched.

“This is the only truly local sport here,” said Assane Diaw, a former competitor whose family has been racing for about 100 years. 

“We have football teams, but the pirogue race is uniquely Saint-Louisien.”

He said his grandfather’s generation competed in the same boats they used for fishing, but nowadays the teams use specially made racing pirogues.

As for the prize, he said: “It’s the love that people have… it’s the blood that flows.”

By afternoon, tens of thousands of onlookers had gathered along the river.

Young people clamoured up the arches of the Faidherbe Bridge, which links the island city to Senegal’s mainland, for a better view.

Elated Dak supporters jumped into the river when their team won the first and second races, the victors waving oars and beating their chests before tipping their boats over and plunging in themselves.

Mid-way through the final event, tensions boiled over when Pondou Khole — the reigning champions — began to squabble with Dak rowers in the water.

But nothing could dim captain Niang’s mood, or the glow in his eyes as he sat peacefully with his family back in the old town that evening.

“Guet N’dar is a village where everyone lives together — we share everything”, he said, the sun setting behind him as the evening call to prayer rang out.  

“We are one and indivisible -– all three teams are really family.”

Angolan President Joao Lourenco’s quest for re-election couldn’t come at a worse time, analysts say, with the recent death of his strongman predecessor, a struggling economy and soaring poverty looming large. 

Lourenco is seeking a second term in the August 24 vote, which observers predict will be the tightest since the oil-rich country emerged from a lengthy civil war two decades ago.

The excitement that accompanied the 68-year-old’s rise to power in 2017 has “largely dissipated”, said Alex Vines, who heads the Africa programme at British think tank Chatham House.

Many in the Portuguese-speaking country of 33 million people are yet to see the benefit of economic reforms, and feel Lourenco’s anti-corruption drive has fallen short of its promises. 

Polls show waning support for his People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) party, which has ruled the country since 1975.

“The people are suffering, they live in garbage cans. Are these people going to vote for the outgoing president? I don’t think so,” said Joao Afonso, a 60-year-old accountant in the capital Luanda.

An Afrobarometer survey in May found the opposition National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) was trailing the MPLA by just seven percentage points, with around half of voters still undecided.

On the streets of Luanda, Lourenco portraits vie for space with UNITA’s red and green flags.

UNITA’s leader Adalberto Costa Junior, commonly known as ACJ, has modernised the former rebel militia turned political force and broadened its base, joining forces with other parties.

“He is a very charismatic leader who is able to engage with young people in the cities,” said Marisa Lourenco, an analyst at the consultancy Control Risks.

“There will be pressure on Lourenco if the MPLA doesn’t perform well,” she added.

– Deepening poverty –

On Saturday, thousands of MPLA supporters wearing red T-shirts gathered in Camama, outside Luanda, for the opening campaign rally where Lourenco promised new hospitals and transport links. 

“We still believe in him and we will certainly emerge victorious in these elections,” said Luisa Andre Valente, an unemployed 29-year-old at the event.

Handpicked by his predecessor Jose Eduardo dos Santos, Lourenco promised to usher in a new era for Angola after winning 61 percent of the vote in 2017.

He quickly turned on the former strongman, starting an anti-corruption drive to recoup the billions allegedly embezzled by dos Santos and his family.

Having inherited an oil-dependent economy deep in recession, he also launched an ambitious reform plan to differentiate revenue streams and privatise state-owned firms.

But many have come to see the anti-graft push as selective and politically motivated.

And while reforms have won praise abroad, little has changed for millions of Angolans who struggle to put food on the table amid soaring inflation and the worst drought in 40 years. 

Some Angolans now feel nostalgic about their former leader, who died in Spain earlier this month.

“When dos Santos left, there was a sense that this man brought us to a level of decay… but now after five years, they look at dos Santos in relative terms,” said Paula Cristina Roque, an independent political analyst specialising in Angola.

“We’ve seen a deepening of poverty and socioeconomic injustice,” she said.

Dos Santos’s death reignited a public spat between Lourenco and the old revolutionary leader’s children — several of whom have faced an array of corruption investigations.

This week, some of dos Santos’s children finally agreed to have their father buried in Angola, but only after the vote.

Observers expect to see voting violations — while the country has opened up in recent years, it is still ranked as “not free” by democracy watchdog Freedom House.

“Those in power will never leave,” said Felix Kaputu, a professor specialising in African studies at Bard College in the United States. 

Tobi Amusan became the first Nigerian athlete to win a World Athletics Championship gold as she stormed to victory in the women’s 100m hurdles in Oregon on Sunday.

Amusan, who had obliterated the world record in an astonishing semi-final where she clocked 12.12sec, powered over the line at Hayward Field in 12.06sec.

Her winning time will not be recognised as a world record, however, due to a strong following win of 2.5 metres per second.

Jamaica’s Britany Anderson took silver in 12.23sec, while Olympic champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico claimed bronze in 12.23.

Amusan had produced a jaw-dropping world record in the semi-finals, smashing the previous best mark of 12.20secs held by Keni Harrison of the United States since 2016.

Harrison had been left in Amusan’s slipstream in the semi, and was again shown a clean pair of heels by the Nigerian in the final.

Amusan got off to a scorching start and was smoothly into her stride after the first hurdle, building a clear lead and then pulling away ahead of Anderson and the fast-closing Camacho-Quinn.

A case involving several former rugby union players diagnosed with early onset dementia and other irreversible neurological conditions now appears destined for the courts.

Rylands Law, acting on behalf of a group of players including England’s 2003 World Cup-winning hooker Steve Thompson and former Wales captain Ryan Jones, are to take action against World Rugby, England’s Rugby Football Union and the Welsh Rugby Union.

Britain’s Press Association reported proceedings would be issued on Monday, with the parties unable to agree a settlement since a pre-action letter of claim was issued to the same governing bodies on behalf of a group of nine players in December 2020.

The basis of the action is an alleged failure by rugby authorities to protect players from concussion risks.

Jones, capped 75 times by Wales and a member of the 2005 British and Irish Lions squad in New Zealand, revealed his diagnosis of early onset dementia in an interview with the Sunday Times last week.  

“I feel like my world is falling apart,” the 41-year-old, who said he was “really scared”, told the newspaper. “I don’t know what the future holds.”

One of Kenya’s two leading presidential candidates, Raila Odinga, will not take part in an upcoming electoral debate, his campaign team said Sunday, accusing his principal rival of trying to avoid certain topics such as corruption.

Odinga, 77, a former prime minister, and Deputy President William Ruto, 55, are the leading contenders in the August 9 presidential poll.

But in a statement announcing Odinga would boycott Tuesday’s debate, his campaign spokesman accused Ruto of trying to dodge discussion of key issues.

Ruto “has demanded that the debate not focus on corruption, integrity, ethics, and governance — the key existential questions that Kenya faces”, Odinga’s spokesman said in the statement.

“Any debate devoid of these questions would be an insult to the intelligence of Kenyans. That is why we do not intend to share a national podium with a person who lacks basic decency,” he added.

Instead, Odinga plans to take part in a televised town hall meeting in an eastern neighbourhood of the capital Nairobi with “ordinary Kenyans”, according to the statement.

The organisers of the debate said that they “continue to engage all stakeholders, including the various presidential campaign teams”.

“In accordance with the Presidential Debate Guidelines, we have shared the thematic areas with all the candidates and the moderators will endeavour to cover all the said topics within the set timeline,” the statement said.

The debate, scheduled for six hours, would still proceed on Tuesday, the organisers added.

– ‘Fair opportunity’ –

Odinga’s announcement follows a letter sent Thursday by Ruto’s director of communications to the debate organisers.

It said that he was “ready to answer any question and speak to any matter that arises during the debate” but added that his attendance was “contingent” on certain matters.

“We expect that the moderators will allocate equal time to issues affecting Kenyans and equally allow candidates a fair opportunity to address them,” the letter said.

“To that end we wish to know in advance the number of minutes that will be allocated to respective interventions including, but not restricted to governance and integrity, agriculture, healthcare, MSMEs and manufacturing, housing, the digital economy, foreign policy, and so on and so forth,” it continued.

The debate organisers have insisted that “the moderators will select the questions to be asked, and shall NOT share the same with the candidates”. 

“They will NOT meet with any of the campaign teams or the candidates,” they added in the statement.

Sitting President Uhuru Kenyatta cannot run again and has endorsed Odinga over his deputy of nine years after an acrimonious falling out.

Egyptian smallholders grow nearly half of the country’s crops, a lifeline role increasingly important after grain imports were stalled by war in Ukraine — but they are struggling to survive.

Despite their crucial role providing food for the North African nation’s 103 million people, smallholders are cash-strapped and indebted, frequently selling their harvests at a loss.

“The farmer is dead, trampled,” farmer Zakaria Aboueldahab told AFP, brewing tea on his rented plot of wheat and onions in Qalyubia, 30 kilometres (18 miles) north of Cairo.

“I’m trying to sell my onion harvest but I can’t find a market,” he said, the remnants of his crop scattered across the soil. “I just want to break even. I don’t know how I’m going to pay rent”. 

His onions would sell in Egypt: but financing, marketing and infrastructure hurdles create massive gaps between supply and demand.

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), small farms are the “primary producers” of food for domestic consumption in Egypt. 

Farmers cultivating less than three feddans (1.2 hectares, three acres ) — an area the size of a football pitch — till 35 percent of arable land.

Yet they produce some 47 percent of Egypt’s field crops, the FAO calculates.

Larger farms focus more on exports -– a dynamic that came to a head when Russia invaded Ukraine.

– ‘Patriotic duty’ –

Egypt, the world’s leading importer of wheat, relied on Russia and Ukraine for 80 percent of its imports, providing the flour for Egypt’s traditional flat bread.

Ordinary Egyptians eat bread at almost every meal, and Egypt’s wheat farmers ramped up production to 40 percent of the country’s needs.

“Without the 40 percent of wheat that we produce domestically,” rural sociologist Saker al-Nour told AFP, the consequences of the war “would be much worse.”

In March, Cairo ordered farmers to grow wheat, calling the “compulsory delivery” orders a “patriotic duty.”

By June, farmers had provided more than 3.5 million tonnes, according to the supply ministry, over half the domestic supply goal to August, and equal to the total amount supplied in 2021.

Compulsory crop deliveries were a pillar of president Gamal Abdel Nasser’s socialist policies in the 1960s, but those policies were dropped amid the structural adjustment programmes of the 1990s.

With them went the former subsidies on seeds, pesticides, and fertilisers which have steadily shrunk over the decades.

“Instantly, when things got tough, it went back to compulsory delivery, but this time without the services that came with it,” Nour said.

To encourage farmers to grow wheat, the government had previously set domestic prices higher than imports.

But the unprecedented surge in global prices undermined that.

– Stronger together? –

“Now I owe money to the pesticide guy, to the fertiliser guy,” Aboueldahab said. “So if someone comes along and bids a low price, what am I supposed to do?”

One solution is for smallholders to join together and harness the power of technology.

Entrepreneur Hussein Abou Bakr launched a start-up finance company called Mozare3, ‘farmer’ in Arabic, which offers farmers financing solutions and agronomy support.

It also helps farmers “become a bloc”, in the absence of effective local cooperatives and sets prices “as a form of protection” against market fluctuations.

Nour warns smallholders have “very limited negotiating power, especially when they don’t have the storage capacity for their harvest”. 

But with illiteracy among smallholders at 32 percent, according to the FAO, offline village associations are necessary.

As climate change bites, Nour warns bottom-up approaches are essential.

These associations could, for example, communicate extreme weather events quickly and directly to farmers whose crops are at risk.

These tools exist, the sociologist said. “We just need to make them available to small farmers.”