Ghana: Mahama says he will support ongoing negotiations between ECOWAS and EU

President John Mahama says he will support the ongoing negotiations between ECOWAS and the EU on the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA).

Welcoming an ECOWAS delegation to Accra for a summit in his capacity as its new group chairman, Mahama said that it would be “disastrous” for Ghana to unilaterally pursue any agreement with the EU. “Ghana will continue to play a facilitative role, especially now that we have assumed the Chairmanship of ECOWAS,” he said. “It is our intention to call a meeting of a technical grouping to narrow down the issues that are outstanding, so that we can move ahead and complete the negotiations of the EPA with the European Union.”

Also crucial to the region’s economic development is intra-regional trade, Mahama said, as he called on heads of government across West Africa to take measures to remove trade barriers. Turning to security matters, he pledged to encourage collective action to deal with terrorist group Boko Haram in the wake of several high profile incidents in Nigeria in recent weeks.

For more news and expert analysis about Ghana, please see Ghana Politics & Security.
© 2014 Menas Associates

Libya: Jordanian Ambassador Fawaz Al-Aitan still held captive

Jordan’s ambassador to Libya, Fawaz Al-Aitan, who was kidnapped in Tripoli on 15 April, remains in captivity, despite talk of his imminent release.

Al-Aitan’s abductors demanded Jordan free Libyan militant prisoner, Mohamed Said Dersi, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in Jordan in 2007 for plotting to blow up a Jordanian airport. This demand reportedly came from Dersi’s family in Benghazi who allegedly appealed to militants in Tripoli to carry out the kidnapping to try to secure their son’s release.

Reports emerged this week that Dersi has now been released but they were quickly denied by the Libyan Foreign Affairs Ministry. The official LANA news agency quoted foreign ministry spokesperson Said Al-Aswad as saying that the ministry had no knowledge of Dersi’s being transported to Libya. A ministry spokesman also told the Jordan Times that the ministry had “no information confirming these reports”.

There are, however, plenty of credible sources who are insisting that Dersi has been freed. This week, his lawyer declared that the militant had been released from prison and that he had already returned to Tripoli. Similarly, the lawyer for many Islamist prisoners in Jordan, Mousa Abedlat, announced that the Jordanian authorities had deported Dersi to Tripoli at dawn on 25 April in return for the release of their ambassador. A Salafist jihadist leader in the south of Jordan, Mohamed Al-Chalabi (a.k.a. Abu Sayaf) also told the Al-Hayat newspaper this week, “Dersi is now asleep in Libya.”

If these reports are true, then it is not clear why Al-Aitan has yet to be freed.

For more news and expert analysis about Libya, please see Libya Focus and Libya Politics & Security.

© 2014 Menas Associates

China-Algeria trade increases fifteen-fold

France lost its position as Algeria’s major supplier to China in 2013, according to the latest economic data, Naser al-Tamimi reported for Al-Arabiya on 26 March. The source of the data is not given, so we cannot comment on it. What we can say is that bilateral trade between Algiers and Beijing, according to UN data, has grown almost fifteen-fold in the past 10 years, from $608 million in 2003 to more than $9 billion by the end of 2013. The two countries have established what they call “the comprehensive strategic partnership”.

Algeria is now China’s top trade partner and largest export market in the Maghreb region. Beijing’s trade with Algeria represented over 40% of China’s total trade with Maghreb (nearly $21 billion) in 2013. As we reported last month, Algeria is a lucrative market for Chinese engineering. Latest data show that Algeria is the biggest market for Chinese contractors in Africa, after Nigeria.

A little known feature of Chinese-Algerian trade, possibly because of the prominence given to the establishment of French auto-plants in Algeria, is that China, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM), exports more cars to Algeria than any other country. Algeria was China’s top vehicle export destination in 2012 and 2013. Chinese state manufacturer FAW has recently signed a deal to build an assembly plant in Algeria, producing 10,000 vehicles a year. A number of defence industry sources have recently commented on Algeria’s interest, as one of the world’s major arms purchasers, in the possible procurement of Chinese weaponry.

For more news and expert analysis about Algeria, please see Algeria Focus and Algeria Politics & Security.

© 2014 Menas Associates

Libya: Sixty Committee holds first meeting

Libya’s constitution committee held its first meeting on 21 April in the eastern town of Al-Bayda.
The committee elected a head, selecting well-known liberal Ali Tarhouni to lead the process, and chose Al-Jilani Abdelsalam Arhouma as his deputy. The committee also agreed to spend the coming days working out its by-laws.

Only 47 of the 60 members of the committee were present as the remaining 13 members still have to be elected. The Amazigh (Berbers) are continuing to boycott the committee and elections for the other 11 seats - which could not take place in February due to security issues -  have yet to be re-held.
The committee remains incomplete, creating serious difficulties for the process of writing the new constitution. As one former congress member explained,: “The elections have not been completed so anyone can challenge the work of the committee by filing a petition to the constitutional court.”

This aside, the committee only has 120 days to draw up the new constitution. Given the sensitivities over some of the issues that will need to be thrashed out - such as what political system the country should adopt; how far it should go with decentralisation; whether Islamic Sharia should be the sole source of legislation; and what status should be given the country’s ethnic minorities - it seems highly unlikely that the committee will be able to complete its work within that timeframe.

How this new constitution will sit with the ongoing transition process and new elections also has yet to be seen.

For more news and expert analysis about Libya, please see Libya Focus and Libya Politics & Security.
© 2014 Menas Associates

Cameroon declared eligible for new World Bank loans

Last week, Minister of Economic Planning and Regional Development Emmanuel Nganou Djoumessi declared that Cameroon has been successful in applying for soft loans from the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA) subsidiary through which projects are supported in eligible developing economies.

Nothing was said about the scale of the loans but Djoumessi said that Cameroon, which had applied for World Bank funding during a 2013 meeting in Washington DC, is expected to use the funding to build roads, develop electricity and fund other key infrastructural projects in the country’s quest to become an emerging economy.

In recent years, Cameroon’s relationship with the World Bank has not been particularly cordial because it has faced criticisms from the Bank for not using all of the credits at its disposal. Corruption, administrative red tape, excessive procedural lapses and inappropriate execution of projects have been at the centre of the discords, which the World Bank had earlier said had kept credit consumption levels at barely 11%.

For more news and expert analysis about Cameroon, please see Cameroon Politics & Security.
© 2014 Menas Associates

Egypt: New law to protect officials from prosecution

The interim president Adly Mansour has issued a decree that will make it more difficult for third parties to challenge contracts signed with the government. It would make impossible the kind of challenge that led to the prosecution of ministers from the Mubarak era and other senior officials for selling off state property cheaply to developers in exchange for favours.

The government says the new protections are aimed at encouraging foreign investment.  The review of contracts immediately after the fall of the Mubarak regime led to uncertainty among investors, especially from the Gulf who had invested in real estate developments. The lack of security for investments did much to dampen enthusiasm for more investment.

Critics say it marks a return to the old ways and that officials will be able to act corruptly with impunity.  Abdullah Bin Mahfouz, Chairman of the Saudi Egyptian Business Council, welcomed the new law: "I'm sure that due to this law we will see an inflow of investment no less than US$15 billion in the next three years because there are huge opportunities in steel and mining and factories that are considered the biggest in the Middle East."

For more news and expert analysis about Egypt, please see Egypt Politics & Security.
© 2014 Menas Associates

Nigeria: Unhappy banks

Speculation aside, Nigeria’s banks have not welcomed the private-sector CRR increase, which they believe could harm their profits and reduce their ability to lend. These include Diamond Bank, whose officials recently stated that they will need to obtain more customer deposits to maintain profits now that – per deposit value – they may be unable to make the same income.

Some banks have in recent weeks reported decreased 2013 earnings, but it should be noted that some analysts – including Exotix – view Nigeria’s banking sector as a sound place to invest compared to other sub-Saharan African banking sectors. They highlight Zenith, United Bank for Africa, and Access Bank as good buys.

Nevertheless, the Nigerian commercial banking sector has been reassured by the installation of a new chief executive for pan-African Ecobank Transnational Incorporated (ETI), which has around 40 per cent of its revenues and assets in Nigeria. That feeling should be reinforced by soothing comments from the new man, Albert Kobina Essien.

Essien emphasises that ETI will focus on consolidation and efficiency improvements rather than overly rapid expansion, and that it will be more vigilant regarding important markets like Nigeria.

For more news and expert analysis about Nigeria, please see Nigeria Focus and Nigeria Politics & Security.

© 2014 Menas Associates