Africa's best books and more...
Aili Mari Tripp draws parallels between Museveni’s Uganda and similar regimes elsewhere in Africa and reflects on the implications for institution building. In particular, she raises concern about the impact that hybrid regimes have on the judiciary, opposition and civil society. How can donors keep from entrenching such systems?
Africa’s Great Lakes region has been home to some of most violent and prolonged conflicts on the continent, causing immense suffering and blocking meaningful socio-economic progress. The search for a lasting end to conflict in the region remains elusive despite several initiatives by local and international players.
A lot has been written about South Africa’s first democratically elected President, more so since his release from 27 years in prison. Conversations with Myself brings us Mandela in his own words and voice; he speaks – and writes – for himself.
Peter Godwin says Zimbabwe lacks two of the exports the world is interested in: oil and terrorism.
It is no wonder then that the world leisurely goes about its business as Robert Mugabe and his goons visit untold misery on the defenceless citizenry.
The world did the same in 1994 as Rwanda burned and brothers turned against their own kith and kin because of the physiological accident that made one taller than the other, one Hutu and the other Tutsi. Just as the corpses from the Rwandese genocide stand as an albatross around our necks 16 years later, the victims of Zimbabwe will not let us off with clear consciences.
Until her book came out this month, it is safe to say that very few people, even among her countrymen and women, had heard of Olive Kobusingye. Fewer still would have known of her relationship to that country’s leading opposition politician, Kiiza Besigye.
Yet, since her book, “The Correct Line? Uganda under Museveni” hit the market, Ugandans in and out of the country have talked about little else. And this in a month when local athlete Moses Kipsiro bagged the country’s first ever double gold medal haul at the Commonwealth Games in India.
Kobusingye’s book, which came out earlier this month, looks at Uganda’s politics under the current president, Yoweri Museveni, who has ruled the country since 1986.
King on the Throne written by Charles Peter Mayiga, a high ranking kingdom official, is an insider’s tale of the birth and growth of Buganda nationalism in the period since 1993. The book catalogues the history of the Buganda kingdom, especially after 1993. It is a moving narrative and commentary from a man whose principle job has been attending and recording resolutions of the Lukiiko, Buganda’s highest decision making organ.
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