Freedom House Africa Head on Kenya’s Political Trajectory

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Freedom House, Kenya, NED, Uhuru Kenyatta, Vukasin Petrovic

Petrovic at Left

Things have been getting very hectic with my impending relocation to Liberia (I’ve probably only got a few more posts left in me, although I suspect I’ll continue blogging in Monrovia).  Yesterday, I did stop by the National Endowment for Democracy for part of an event on ‘Kenya after the 2013 Election.’

Vukasin Petrovic, Director of sub-Saharan Africa Programs at Freedom House was one of the two speakers and the only one I heard deliver his full set of remarks.

His main theme was one of negativity.  Petrovic noted that East Africa is one of the least democratic regions on the continent and that Kenya’s governance situation decreased democratically with the election of Uhuru Kenyatta.  Petrovic noted that  Kenyatta has took stops to close ‘operating space for civil society and media’, modeled on Ethiopia’s moves to clamp down on opposition following that country’s 2005 elections.

 

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MDC Staffer and NED Fellow Charles Mangongera on the Role of the Military in Zimbabwe’s ‘Economic, Social, and Political Decline’

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Charles Mangongera, DRC War, Freedom House, IRI, JOC, Josiah Tongogara, Mengistu Haile Mariam, NED, Operation Murambatsvina, Robert Mugabe, USAID, Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe diamonds, Zimbabwe military, Zimbabwe securocrats

Mangongera at left of NED Moderator and Commenter

Yesterday, I attended a talk by Charles Mangongera, a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy.  Mangongera is the Director of Policy and Research for the Movement for Democratic Change (Tsvangirai branch), the main opposition party in Zimbabwe.  Before assuming this position, Mangongera worked with Freedom House and was authoring reports for DC-based organizations like USAID and IRI.  Mangongera masterfully covered  wide-ranging remarks on ‘Zimbabwe’s Military and the Prospects for Democratic Reform.’

DC Africa Watchers on Zimbabwe Beyond the Elections

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CIPE, Freedom House, IRI, NED, Zimbabwe Beyond the Elections, Zimbabwe governance

I have rued the lack of engagement of DC Africa watchers with the upcoming elections in Zimbabwe.

However, a range of organizations are co-sponsoring a day long event on Zimbabwean governance in general on July 23.  It is refreshing to see that developments in Zimbabwe have not completely escaped the watching eye of the National Endowment for Democracy, the Center for International Private Enterprise, Freedom House, the International Republican Institute, the Solidarity Center, and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights.

The agenda, which has a heavy participation of Zimbabwean activists (Jenni Williams, Irene Petras, and others), can be found here.

 

 

‘Zimbabweans Want Change’: Tendai Biti on Zimbabwe’s 2013 Elections

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Freedom House, Movement for Democratic Change, Robert Mugabe, Tendai Biti, ZANU-PF, Zimbabwe diamonds, Zimbabwe elections, Zimbabwe reform

In what is undoubtedly a product of what I now know to be the spring meetings of the World Bank and IMF, Freedom House hosted “A Conversation with Tendai Biti on Zimbabwe’s Elections” yesterday.  Tendai Biti, the Secretary General of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and Zimbabwe’s Minister of Finance in the Government of National Unity mixed optimism with concern in his remarks on the elections anticipated in Zimbabwe this year (regarding the time frame, he said that it would not be legally possible to hold the presidential election until late July at the earliest, by which time the mandate of Parliament will have expired).

Biti argued that this would be a ‘defining election for Zimbabwe’ and compared its importance to the February 1980 contest that ended minority rule and brought President Robert Mugabe to power.

In the spirit of optimism, Biti pointed to three developments