11th Edition

Good Afternoon folks! 😁😁

Delighted to have you here. And if you joined us this week, it’s great to finally connect with you… so here we go!

Welcome to The Friday Briefing, your weekly brief on geopolitics.

This is our eleventh edition. It’s still a bit of a test, so if something does go wrong be sure to let us know… but anyway, we plan to send out your brief every Friday lunchtime 12pm GMT.

We have excited things lined up for 2024 and we hope you’re still with us.

Oh don’t forget, feel free to leave behind any feedback, suggestions or further ideas you would like us to run with 😁

^{Why Africa? maybe because we don’t hear much…}

Back in 2013, the 42nd President of the United States tweeted the above tweet, “Just touched down in Africa…” ⬆️

Although Mr Clinton’s tweet was true, despite the brazen mistruths our leaders spout these days, he nonetheless could’ve worded it a lot better.

But the tweet tells us a lot more. It exposes an attitude that many of us may have towards Africa, either through ignorance or laziness or maybe because we don’t hear enough about African countries in our national news media.

This is a continent as diverse as it is complex, a continent home to over 1.4 billion people and 54 countries, making it the second-most populated continent in the world.

Events in Africa aren't isolated, they hold global importance too. Political transitions, economic developments and conflicts in Africa have ripple effects that stretch far beyond its borders.

And yes, while we begin with Africa, we’re dedicated to expanding our weekly round-ups to other continents in due course, taking our mission to new frontiers by connecting the dots between nations and continents.

So stay tuned! 👌

^{So, what’s been happening this week?}

• Sudan’s RSF leader Hemedti on rare foreign trip

• Opposition supporters clash with police in DR Congo following votes

• Zambia’s Foreign Minister resigns over video

• Seychelles joins 10 Nation Force to protect Red Sea shipping route

^{What does this mean?}

In our 9th edition which was about 2 weeks ago, we covered the possible face-to-face meeting between Army Chief and Sudan Transitional Sovereignty Council Leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan (Below) and his former deputy Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo (known as Hemedti) who now commands the Rapid Support Forces.

Both generals were set to meet in Djibouti on December 28th. However, the meeting failed at the 11th hour after Hemedti signalled he was not available. Djibouti’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs released the following statement;

“The meeting scheduled in Djibouti on the 28th December 2023 has been postponed to early 2024 for technical reasons.”

Meanwhile, Hemedti has been touring the region. He arrived in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa after meeting Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni at his country home. The diplomatic efforts of Saudi and US led talks in Jeddah earlier this year have made little progress towards halting the war in Sudan.

Abi Ahmed, Prime Minister of Ethiopia received Hemedti and his delegation with the aim of securing peace and stability in Sudan. Images show Hemedti disembarking from Royal Jet belonging to UAE airlines.

The UAE is known to have strategic interests in the region and pursed investments in Sudan including a Red Sea port and has been Hemedti’s closest foreign ally since the conflict.

The country has been in turmoil ever since a popular uprising forced the removal of long-time ruler Omar al-Bashir in 2019. The short-lived transitional government was derailed when the two general joined forces to lead a military coup in October 2021.

After falling out, the war began with more than 9,000 dead and 5.5 million displaced since April.

More to come…..

Leaders of opposition parties have denounced the election in DR Congo as rigged and demanded a re-run. Police clashed with opposition supporters demanding that last week’s presidential poll be annulled.

This comes after opposition candidates in the presidential elections in which early results show the incumbent President Felix Tshisekedi with a large lead, plan to march in the capital, despite authorities banning the protest.

Some international observes also questioned the vote and alleged it was extended illegally. Many polling stations were late in starting and some didn’t open at all. So far, current President Felix has nearly 79% of the vote, whilst opposition leader and businessman Moise Katumbi has about 14% and Fayulu about 4%.

The electoral observation mission of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo and the Church of Christ in Congo said more than 27% of voting stations didn’t open and there were 152 reports of violence, confrontations and brawls.

The Archbishop of the Catholic Church of DRC Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo called the process a “gigantic disorganised disorder”.

The final results are expected before the new year.

Zambia’s Foreign Minister Stanley Kakubo denied wrongdoing and resigned because “he didn’t want to be a distraction for the government”. This comes after a video posted on social media allegedly showing the foreign minister receiving piles of cash from a Chinese businessman.

The former foreign minister denied any wrongdoing but did not deny he was in the video but said;

“There has been malicious claims over a business transaction between my private family business and our business partner. In due course, we will provide the accurate context.”

Mr Stanley will keep his position as a parliamentarian. The Zambian Anti-Corruption Commission said it would investigate the circumstances surrounding the leaked video.

This isn’t the first time Mr Stanley was accused of receiving bribes. He was once photographs with a bag last year at a cement factory and accused of receiving gifts from another Chinese national. He said the bag only contained a calendar and a diary. The President Hakainde Hichilema defended him on that occasion.

Did you know…

The Republic of Zambia takes its name from the Zambezi river which flows along the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe.

The Zambezi is the fourth-largest river in Africa after rivers Nile, Congo and Niger.

The population of Zambia is almost 19.4 million.

The United States announced the formation of a multinational force to protect trade in the Red Sea after attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels forced a least a dozen shipping lines to suspend operations.

US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin who recently visited Israel said the United Kingdom, Bahrain, Canada, France, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Seychelles will join the US in the new mission dubbed Operation Prosperity Guardian (OPG) a “multinational security initiative”.

The announcement comes after both US and UK navies said that their destroyers had shot down a total of 15 drones in the waterway. However, since the announcement, the operation has been snubbed by 3 important NATO countries, France, Italy and Spain. So what is the issue?

Well, what is the goal of the OPG?

The official task is “to secure safe passage for the commercial ships”. But this line is too vague for any naval officer to feel comfortable getting into. Admirals want politicians to give precise tasks and clear missions to achieve desired results.

This can be done in a number of ways - if the goal is to prevent hits on commercial ships, then this could be performed by sailing along side ships with the protection of warships. But every strategy has limitations.

The US is aware of escalations in the region, it has so far tried to tread carefully engaging with regional powers and sending messages that it wants no escalations. If the US do nothing, the Red Sea route will quickly close, causing European and Asian economies significant damage.

France, Italy and Spain are playing it really safe. They will of course deploy their warships to protect their respective nations. But, should the US Navy engage in a back and forth attack with Yemen, the Europeans will be able to claim no contribution and shove all responsibility onto the US.

^{Book of the week…. COMING SOON 2024}

The idea is every week we will hold a poll on our social media pages, asking our readers to recommend a book for the week……

STAY TUNED!

You’re done for the week. Follow us on our socials and see you next Friday!