Month: September 2024

SINGAPORE — Indonesia has looked this week to boost trade ties with African nations during a summit in Bali, although many leaders from the continent stayed away, instead opting to visit China for a high-profile forum in Beijing.

Representatives from 29 African nations headed to the Indonesian resort island, well-short of the 47 countries that were represented during the inaugural Indonesia-Africa forum in 2018.

Despite this, the Southeast Asian country is hoping to have sealed $3.5 billion worth of business deals from the three-day forum, according to President Joko Widodo.

As the summit concluded Tuesday, some of the delegates headed to Beijing to join a larger representation of African leaders for the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation.

Fifty African countries are slated to be represented at the forum in the Chinese capital, which takes place every third year.

“Between Indonesia and China, the major African leaders chose China to be present at,” said Christophe Dorigne-Thomson, an Indonesia-based foreign affairs academic.

“That doesn’t mean that the collaboration with Indonesia and the forum does not have important discussions and important outcomes. But symbolically, for sure, the choice was made for China,” Dorigne-Thomson told VOA.

Relations between Indonesia and the African continent date back to at least 1955, when former Indonesian President Sukarno hosted the Asian-Africa conference in the city of Bandung. Most of the African states represented were newly independent.

“Jakarta can boast history and a legacy of relationship that stretches back to the Bandung Conference,” said Elina Noor, senior fellow in the Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“Indonesia has really sought to leverage on that historical relationship to recall the spirit of Bandung – it’s part of the theme at this year’s Indonesia-Africa forum,” Noor told VOA.

While the historical ties have allowed for decades of solid relations, Dorigne-Thomson says Indonesia’s interest in Africa increased when President Joko Widodo took office in 2014, adding that “the main focus is on the economy.”

The Indonesian government said that roughly $600 million of deals were signed during the inaugural Indonesia-Africa summit in 2018.

This year, they have targeted nearly six-times that amount as they look to boost economic links with African countries.

“There seem to be some concrete MOU’s (memorandum of understanding) and letters of intent, like Indonesia’s aircraft industry signing deals with several countries and the oil companies also signing deals,” said Dewi Fortuna Anwar, senior researcher at Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency.

Despite these agreements, Anwar said she’s “not sure whether the $35 billion target will be realized,” largely because of the lack of procedures to track the various deals and ensure they are developed and concluded in the years ahead.

Announcements from the summit include an agreement between Indonesia’s Energi Mega Persada and Guma Africa Group for a gas project in South Africa that could be worth up to $900 million.

The project is aimed at increasing gas supplies to South Africa and Mozambique, with the two companies also agreeing to develop a new gas power plant.

Such eye-catching deals generate a lot of attention, but, according to Noor, much of the business at this summit comes in the form of smaller agreements.

“On the Indonesian side, a lot of the businesses in the country comprise micro, small and medium enterprises,” Noor told VOA. ”I think it’s particularly important that we keep this in mind, because a lot of the headlines tend to just focus on the large corporations.”

Though deal-making at this summit presents Indonesia opportunities to expand its export markets, the country is also looking to secure import deals with African nations to boost lithium supplies.

The Southeast Asian nation has a booming nickel industry but needs lithium as another key component for assembling and producing batteries for electric vehicles.

“Africa is an ideal partner due to its wealth of critical minerals, which Indonesia seeks to access. Indonesia’s rapid industrialization also creates a growing demand for African commodities,” said Sharyn Davies, director of the Herb Feith Indonesia Centre at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.

Opening new trade avenues with Africa also provides Indonesia with a chance to diversify away from traditional trading partners including the US and China.

As tensions continue to simmer between the world’s two biggest economies, Davies believes that Africa could be “a way for Indonesia to sidestep from picking sides between China and the US.”

While the main focus of the Bali forum was business, politics was also at play.

President Widodo has looked to enhance Indonesia’s standing on the international stage, promoting his country as a voice of the Global South.

“Indonesia is not a follower in the Global South movement; it’s been very much one of the founding members,” Anwar, the researcher in Indonesia, told VOA. “The difference is that Indonesia also stresses the importance of, not just South-South cooperation, but also North-South cooperation. Indonesia sees itself as a bridge builder.”
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Kano, Nigeria — At least 81 people died and several were missing after an attack by suspected Boko Haram militants in Nigeria’s northeastern Yobe State, local officials told AFP on Tuesday. 

“Around 150 suspected Boko Haram terrorists armed with rifles and RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades] attacked Mafa ward on more than 50 motorcycles around 1600 hours on Sunday,” said Abdulkarim Dungus, a Yobe state police spokesperson. 

“They killed many people and burnt many shops and houses. We are yet to ascertain the actual number of those killed in the attack.” 

Dungus said it appeared to be a revenge attack “for the killing of two Boko Haram terrorists by vigilantes from the village.” 

Bulama Jalaluddeen, a local official, said at least 81 people were killed in the attack. 

Fifteen bodies had already been buried by their relations by the time soldiers reached Mafa for the evacuation of the corpses, said the official.

“In addition to these, some unspecified number of dead victims from nearby villages who were caught up in the attack were taken and buried by their kinsmen before the arrival of the soldiers,” added the official. “Many people are still missing and their whereabouts unknown.” 

Boko Haram and other extremist groups have waged a 15-year insurgency in northeastern Nigeria that has killed more than 40,000 people. 

Central and northwestern Nigeria have been plagued for years by gangs of criminals known as “bandits” who raid villages, kill and abduct residents, and burn homes after looting them. 

By working alongside these gangs, militant groups have increasingly established a presence in central Niger state, officials and analysts say. 
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Windhoek, Namibia — Wildlife conservationists, scientists and researchers in Namibia and Southern Africa have warned of impending legal action to halt the culling of wildlife as a “mitigation strategy” to address hunger.

Hunger affects about 700,000 people in Namibia, according to the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization — especially in rural Namibia — and it has worsened because of the drought facing the southern African region.

Officials there have started a wildlife cull — a selective killing of wild animals to save the remaining herds and habitat — and in this instance, some of the meat will be shared with communities in need.

The cull, which began August 14, targets 723 animals: 30 hippos, 60 buffalo, 50 impala, 100 blue wildebeest, 300 zebras, 83 elephants and 100 eland antelopes.

But the Namibian cabinet decision requiring the country’s ministry of environment to aid the government’s drought relief effort has drawn the ire of conservationists and made international headlines. It’s also dividing public opinion on the timing of the decision and the logistics of culling and distributing the meat to affected communities, who are severely affected by drought.

Conservationist Izak Smit said Namibia’s constitution makes provision for the protection of its natural wildlife and heritage, and the cull could have detrimental effects on the balance of wildlife in their environment.

“It’s very irresponsible to do so after a drought before the rainy season when you actually need the population to procreate in order to bounce back from the drought,” Smit said. “And also culling means that you do not allow nature to take its course by weeding out the weak genetic material through natural selection, from which the best genetic pool will then emerge on the other side after the draught when the rainy season again starts.”

Opponents threatened legal action if Namibia authorities do not stop the cull on the grounds that it is detrimental to Namibia’s natural resources, not sustainable, and not justifiable and unscientific.

Herbert Jauch, of the Economic and Social Justice Trust, said a court of law may not be the right avenue to resolve the disagreement between the government and the conservationist, which seems to be centered on the need to protect Namibia’s Desert Adapted Elephants, which are a huge tourism attraction and an iconic heritage wildlife species in the country.

“Their chances are not really good,” Jauch said. “If there are scientific reasons, and from what I heard so far, this is largely around the desert elephants, then that should certainly be discussed with the ministry. But I think the principle is quite understandable that in drought years you might have to reduce the population.”

Romeo Muyunda, a spokesperson for Namibia’s Ministry of Environment, said the cull has been blown out of proportion and Namibia’s Desert Adapted Elephants are not the target of elephants earmarked for culling.

“We have millions of wildlife species in the country, approximately over 3 million animals in the country,” Muyunda said. “So, 723 does not even make up 1% of the total population that we have. Another example we have is the 24,000 elephants that we have in Namibia, we are only going to cull 83 elephants, and it still doesn’t make 1% of the population of elephants especially given the fact that elephants are currently the main concern here.”

The animals intended for culling will be stored at various meat processing factories in the country and will be distributed through the drought relief program. It will be headed by the office of the prime minister in a joint effort to address drought and hunger in the country.

Namibia’s cull has made international headlines, and conservationists are concerned it may create a harmful precedent for other African countries that do not have as successful conservation products as Namibia.
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