Warlords, who were prevalent in Africa in the 1990s, have resurfaced in the continent’s most volatile regions: the Horn of Africa, the Great Lakes, and the Sahel. Regional powers, weakened by domestic concerns, have been unable to provide leadership, leaving the door open for external actors to intervene.
LAGOS – Africa’s prospects for this year are dim, owing to the resurgence of warlordism and the continued weakness of regional institutions – a consequence of the continent’s hobbled hegemons. US President Donald Trump’s recent suspension of aid to South Africa, in response to what he mendaciously described as the Black-led government’s illegal seizure of white land, and his offer of refugee status to supposedly oppressed white Afrikaners, signal the challenges that lie ahead.
Warlords, who were prevalent in Africa in the 1990s, have resurfaced in the continent’s most volatile regions: the Horn of Africa, the Great Lakes, and the Sahel. In Sudan, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan’s Sudanese Armed Forces continue to clash with the Rapid Support Forces led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (or Hemedti, meaning “little Mohamed”). The civil war, which began in April 2023, has displaced 12 million people – a quarter of Sudan’s population – and caused an estimated 150,000 casualties. With the threat of famine increasing, the conflict has triggered a refugee crisis in Chad and the Central African Republic, raising fears that the turmoil could spread.
Intercommunal violence persists in neighboring South Sudan, even though President Salva Kiir and Vice President Riek Machar have remained in an uneasy “unity government” since 2020. The two men, leading competing ethnic groups, waged a seven-year civil war that displaced nearly four million people and killed another 400,000. The continued delay of the country’s first election, coupled with climate, economic, and food shocks, will exacerbate tensions.
In the Great Lakes region, Rwandan President Paul Kagame (an autocrat who, tellingly, won 99% of the vote in last year’s election) and Democratic Republic of the Congo President Félix Tshisekedi (who was also controversially re-elected in December 2023) continue to act as warlords in a decades-long conflict in the eastern DRC.
A trio of military juntas has emerged in the poverty-plagued Sahel. Army Captain Ibrahim Traoré in Burkina Faso, General Assimi Goïta in Mali, and General Abdourahamane Tchiani in Niger are battling foreign-backed jihadists who control large tracts of territory and have killed more than 20,000 people and displaced another 4.2 million.
Unfortunately, Africa’s regional powers – South Africa, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Algeria – have been weakened by domestic concerns and are thus unable to strengthen regional integration and institutions, which are crucial for peacekeeping efforts and fending off external actors.
It is not too late to watch our AI Action Summit event.
Click the link to watch world leaders, tech experts, and other distinguished speakers – including Justin Trudeau, Petr Pavel, Daron Acemoglu, Reid Hoffman, Marianna Mazzucato, James Manyiga, Audrey Tang, Sylvain Duranton, Celina Lee, Patrick Pouyanné, and others – discuss some of the most important questions raised by the rise of artificial intelligence.
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After decades of political dominance, South Africa’s African National Congress now governs in a coalition with the Democratic Alliance, having lost its ruling legislative majority last year. Despite its leading global role as this year’s G20 president, South Africa, one of the continent’s most important peacemakers, has pared back its regional commitments. In July, the government withdrew most of its troops from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) force fighting jihadist-linked insurgents in northern Mozambique. It has also been silent on the ruling Mozambique Liberation Front’s repressive crackdown following claims that it rigged October’s presidential election.
Moreover, South African peacekeeping forces recently suffered 14 fatalities in clashes with the March 23 Movement, a rebel group operating alongside 3,000-4,000 Rwandan troops in eastern Congo. This saber-rattling by Kagame, who is concerned about genocidal Rwandan militias and Burundian soldiers operating on behalf of the DRC, was an unsubtle attempt to force the SADC to withdraw from the country, whose mineral wealth the United Nations has accused Kagame’s regime of looting.
Ethiopia, the seat of the African Union (which will elect a new Commission chair this weekend), is preoccupied by its own internal conflicts in the Oromia, Amhara, and Tigray regions. Relations with some of its neighbors are also deteriorating. By seeking to negotiate sea access with the self-declared independent state of Somaliland, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has stoked tensions with Somalia. The peace deal between Ethiopia and Eritrea has also started to fray. And the government’s conflict with Egypt over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam remains unresolved.
Meanwhile, Nigeria continues to experience the damaging effects of floating its currency and the removal of fuel subsidies, which triggered widespread protests. Perhaps the most potent symbol of the country’s failure as a regional leader is the recent departure of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger from the Economic Community of West African States, which was founded a half-century ago in Lagos.
As for North Africa, social discontent and regional tensions with Morocco over the disputed Western Sahara have prevented Algeria from playing a stabilizing role in the region amid border disputes between Tunisia and Libya. Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, with the support of the military, was re-elected in September 2024, winning 84% of the vote, although less than half of eligible voters cast a ballot, and the results were contested.
Complicating the situation – both for warring states and regional powers – is Africa’s $1.2 trillion in external debt. African governments are projected to spend $136 billion on debt service in 2025, leaving little for infrastructure, social services, and other investments that could stimulate economic growth and develop state capacity. Conditions are unlikely to improve soon: more than two dozen African governments have ongoing programs with the International Monetary Fund, and a strong greenback could increase interest payments on dollar-denominated debt.
The persistence of conflict and the lack of strong regional leadership have opened the door for external actors to interfere in African affairs. Several UN reports have criticized the United Arab Emirates for arming Dagalo’s Rapid Support Forces in Sudan, while Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Turkey back the Sudanese Armed Forces. Russia, the UAE, and Turkey are also bolstering their influence in neighboring Chad.
Similarly, Turkey, Russia, France, and the UAE have supported rival factions in an increasingly anarchic Libya. Militaries across the Sahel have expelled French troops from their territories, replacing them with mercenaries from Russia’s Africa Corps. The United States has a military presence in over a dozen African countries, while China runs a military base in Djibouti.
The concerns don’t end there. Africa is particularly vulnerable to the intensifying climate crisis, while repression is on the rise in Uganda and Tanzania, and social unrest is spreading in Kenya. But the main drivers of instability on the continent remain warlords and meddlers, who will ensure that another year of living dangerously lies ahead.
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By insisting on its own supremacy, the executive branch of the US government under President Donald Trump is effectively seeking to alter America’s constitutional framework of checks and balances among co-equal branches of government. Trump has no authority to execute this change, but that will not be enough to stop him.
observes that the president's claim of supremacy over the courts amounts to tossing out the US Constitution.
While AI could deliver profound benefits for all of society, it is likely to do the opposite if governments remain passive bystanders. Policymakers must step in now to foster a decentralized innovation ecosystem that serves the public good, and they must wake up to all the ways that things can go wrong.
explain why the UK government’s recently released AI “action plan” misses the mark.
LAGOS – Africa’s prospects for this year are dim, owing to the resurgence of warlordism and the continued weakness of regional institutions – a consequence of the continent’s hobbled hegemons. US President Donald Trump’s recent suspension of aid to South Africa, in response to what he mendaciously described as the Black-led government’s illegal seizure of white land, and his offer of refugee status to supposedly oppressed white Afrikaners, signal the challenges that lie ahead.
Warlords, who were prevalent in Africa in the 1990s, have resurfaced in the continent’s most volatile regions: the Horn of Africa, the Great Lakes, and the Sahel. In Sudan, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan’s Sudanese Armed Forces continue to clash with the Rapid Support Forces led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (or Hemedti, meaning “little Mohamed”). The civil war, which began in April 2023, has displaced 12 million people – a quarter of Sudan’s population – and caused an estimated 150,000 casualties. With the threat of famine increasing, the conflict has triggered a refugee crisis in Chad and the Central African Republic, raising fears that the turmoil could spread.
Intercommunal violence persists in neighboring South Sudan, even though President Salva Kiir and Vice President Riek Machar have remained in an uneasy “unity government” since 2020. The two men, leading competing ethnic groups, waged a seven-year civil war that displaced nearly four million people and killed another 400,000. The continued delay of the country’s first election, coupled with climate, economic, and food shocks, will exacerbate tensions.
In the Great Lakes region, Rwandan President Paul Kagame (an autocrat who, tellingly, won 99% of the vote in last year’s election) and Democratic Republic of the Congo President Félix Tshisekedi (who was also controversially re-elected in December 2023) continue to act as warlords in a decades-long conflict in the eastern DRC.
A trio of military juntas has emerged in the poverty-plagued Sahel. Army Captain Ibrahim Traoré in Burkina Faso, General Assimi Goïta in Mali, and General Abdourahamane Tchiani in Niger are battling foreign-backed jihadists who control large tracts of territory and have killed more than 20,000 people and displaced another 4.2 million.
Unfortunately, Africa’s regional powers – South Africa, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Algeria – have been weakened by domestic concerns and are thus unable to strengthen regional integration and institutions, which are crucial for peacekeeping efforts and fending off external actors.
PS Events: AI Action Summit 2025
It is not too late to watch our AI Action Summit event.
Click the link to watch world leaders, tech experts, and other distinguished speakers – including Justin Trudeau, Petr Pavel, Daron Acemoglu, Reid Hoffman, Marianna Mazzucato, James Manyiga, Audrey Tang, Sylvain Duranton, Celina Lee, Patrick Pouyanné, and others – discuss some of the most important questions raised by the rise of artificial intelligence.
Watch Now
After decades of political dominance, South Africa’s African National Congress now governs in a coalition with the Democratic Alliance, having lost its ruling legislative majority last year. Despite its leading global role as this year’s G20 president, South Africa, one of the continent’s most important peacemakers, has pared back its regional commitments. In July, the government withdrew most of its troops from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) force fighting jihadist-linked insurgents in northern Mozambique. It has also been silent on the ruling Mozambique Liberation Front’s repressive crackdown following claims that it rigged October’s presidential election.
Moreover, South African peacekeeping forces recently suffered 14 fatalities in clashes with the March 23 Movement, a rebel group operating alongside 3,000-4,000 Rwandan troops in eastern Congo. This saber-rattling by Kagame, who is concerned about genocidal Rwandan militias and Burundian soldiers operating on behalf of the DRC, was an unsubtle attempt to force the SADC to withdraw from the country, whose mineral wealth the United Nations has accused Kagame’s regime of looting.
Ethiopia, the seat of the African Union (which will elect a new Commission chair this weekend), is preoccupied by its own internal conflicts in the Oromia, Amhara, and Tigray regions. Relations with some of its neighbors are also deteriorating. By seeking to negotiate sea access with the self-declared independent state of Somaliland, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has stoked tensions with Somalia. The peace deal between Ethiopia and Eritrea has also started to fray. And the government’s conflict with Egypt over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam remains unresolved.
Meanwhile, Nigeria continues to experience the damaging effects of floating its currency and the removal of fuel subsidies, which triggered widespread protests. Perhaps the most potent symbol of the country’s failure as a regional leader is the recent departure of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger from the Economic Community of West African States, which was founded a half-century ago in Lagos.
As for North Africa, social discontent and regional tensions with Morocco over the disputed Western Sahara have prevented Algeria from playing a stabilizing role in the region amid border disputes between Tunisia and Libya. Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, with the support of the military, was re-elected in September 2024, winning 84% of the vote, although less than half of eligible voters cast a ballot, and the results were contested.
Complicating the situation – both for warring states and regional powers – is Africa’s $1.2 trillion in external debt. African governments are projected to spend $136 billion on debt service in 2025, leaving little for infrastructure, social services, and other investments that could stimulate economic growth and develop state capacity. Conditions are unlikely to improve soon: more than two dozen African governments have ongoing programs with the International Monetary Fund, and a strong greenback could increase interest payments on dollar-denominated debt.
The persistence of conflict and the lack of strong regional leadership have opened the door for external actors to interfere in African affairs. Several UN reports have criticized the United Arab Emirates for arming Dagalo’s Rapid Support Forces in Sudan, while Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Turkey back the Sudanese Armed Forces. Russia, the UAE, and Turkey are also bolstering their influence in neighboring Chad.
Similarly, Turkey, Russia, France, and the UAE have supported rival factions in an increasingly anarchic Libya. Militaries across the Sahel have expelled French troops from their territories, replacing them with mercenaries from Russia’s Africa Corps. The United States has a military presence in over a dozen African countries, while China runs a military base in Djibouti.
The concerns don’t end there. Africa is particularly vulnerable to the intensifying climate crisis, while repression is on the rise in Uganda and Tanzania, and social unrest is spreading in Kenya. But the main drivers of instability on the continent remain warlords and meddlers, who will ensure that another year of living dangerously lies ahead.