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31. Chinese Investment and Its Implications for Nigeria’s Economic Security

Author:
Shiitu Adewole Raji and Adenike Ogunrinu
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
The international system consists of different nations which pursue their national interests within the global arena having put into consideration the benefits they stand to gain from such relationships (Ampiah and Sanusha 2015, 8). The explosive growth of China’s economic interests in Africa, which is part of the sustained global interactions discussed above, is an important trend in the continent’s foreign relations arena. China’s rapidly expanding ties with Africa has superseded the United States’ since 2010 as Africa’s top trading partner because of its massive investments in the continent , which is largely aided by China Investible Export loan assistance of $150 billion to its multinational corporations (Brautigam 2009, 22). Between 2001 and 2011, Chinese exports to Africa were raised from $4.4 billion to $56.3 billion. Though China is still regarded as a third world country, the country is the second biggest economy in the world. [..] Although there is a vast body of literature on the bilateral relations between Nigeria and China, little is known about the implications of China’s increasing FDI for the economic security of Nigeria, a gap this paper intends to fill. The study is anchored on descriptive research methodology, consisting of qualitative data, which relied primarily on the existing literature.
Topic:
Bilateral Relations, Investment, Trade, and Economic Security
Political Geography:
Africa, China, and Nigeria

32. Gender Equality or Inequality in Africa? African Feminist Thinking

Author:
Ineildes Calheiro and Eduardo David Oliveira
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
The present essay has cognitive analysis as theoretical and methodological perspective and its focus is on thoughts and theories of African authors, particularly in Nigeria, of gender conceptions in Africa. In the first part, Ifi Amadiume and Oyeronké Oyěwúmí epistemologies point to an egalitarian Africa regarding gender relations before colonization. In the second part, Chimamanda Adichie and Paul Zeleza (from Zimbabwe) talk about an unequal Africa regarding gender relations, particularly binary. They put into evidence the decentralization of the hegemonic epistemology from Europe and North America as important to comprehend the debate about gender in Africa. The study comes from the author intention to explore African epistemologies in the context of gender and feminism, and from the incursion (in 2017) in the course of “Gender and África”, and this research was developed after the incursion of the author in the doctorate study (in 2016), in fields of “Contemporary Philosophy and African Philosophy”, which encouraged the author to study different kinds of epistemologies. In addition, the essay aims to diffuse those knowledges.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Inequality, Feminism, and Racism
Political Geography:
Africa

33. Post-Conflict Peace-Building in a Contested International Border: The Nigeria-Cameroon Border Conflict Settlement and Matters Arising

Author:
Kenneth Chukwuemeka Nwoko
Publication Date:
06-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
The political solution under the Green Tree Agreement which led to the handover of the contested Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroon by Nigeria following the International Court of Justice (2002) ruling signaled the end of the protracted Nigeria/Cameroon border conflict, at least on the surface. However, some analysts believed that it marked the beginning of what may result into a future conflict (Agbakwuru 2012; The Guardian 2006). From the analysis of the verdict of the Court, it would appear that while the interests of the two states involved in the conflict appeared to have been taken into cognizance, the interest of the indigenes and inhabitants of Bakassi was not. Apart from alienating these local people from their ancestral homes, cultural sites and livelihood opportunities, activities such as fishing; interstate water transportation, trading etc, which were operated as early as the precolonial days by the local inhabitants, appear to have been disrupted, thus, endangering their means of livelihood and survival. The Anglo-German agreement of March 1913 which the ICJ ruling relied on for its verdict on the Nigeria-Cameroon border conflict represents the earliest milestone in the process of alienation of the inhabitants of the Bakassi Peninsula, the causus bellum; especially since the kings and chiefs of Old Calabar exercised sovereignty over the Bakassi3 , a title which was subsumed in that part of Nigeria as the sovereign state during the period of this conflict. While the ICJ ruling gave precedence to contemporary western constructions of the notions of boundaries and sovereignty to the detriment of the historical consolidation (Sama & Johnson-Ross 2005-2006, 111), “protectorate treaty made without jurisdiction should not have taken precedence over a community title rights and ownership existing from time immemorial” (Nigerian Information Service Centre 2002; The Guardian 2002, 1-2) In other words, Germany transferred to Cameroon what it did not derive from Britain, since the right to title ownership lay with the kings and chiefs of Old Calabar. The focus of this article is not to delve into the juridical issues relating to legal ownership of the territory since the ICJ ruling had put that to rest. Rather the objective is to analyse matters arising from the settlement that could jeopardise the “cold peace” between the two countries; issues relating to psychological, socio-economic and political fallouts which the method of settlement of the conflict and its application brought on the indigenes and inhabitants of the Bakassi Peninsula as well as proffer recommendations for lasting peace in this troubled region.
Topic:
Territorial Disputes, Border Control, Conflict, Peace, and Settlements
Political Geography:
Africa, Nigeria, and Cameroon

34. Dual Colonialism and the Formation of the National State: The South African Case

Author:
Maximilian Dante Barone Bullerjahn
Publication Date:
06-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
South Africa is certainly one of the few countries that has assimilated in such a significant way two distinct colonization processes, at different times. The trading post of the Dutch imperial fleet on the Cape soon became a space for the occupation of European settlers, who, searching for a homeland, found in the vast lands around the Cape the space for the development of a new civilization. Of a Protestant majority, these new European settlers made of the land their acquired triumph. Between the revolutionary turmoil in France and the Napoleonic imperial appetite, the arrival of the English to the Cape region substantially transformed the socio-political relations in the region. The subsequent exodus of the Boers2 enabled a cult for their selfassertion, and the South African space was filled by successive battles over the territory between the Boers, the English, and native peoples. At the end of the nineteenth century, the discovery of mineral riches on an unprecedented scale marked the transition from an economy still lagging behind to one with a modernizing foundation, with the development of a sophisticated financial system initially directed at the primary-exporting matrix, which would later on become the anchor for the incipient process of South African industrialization. The formation of the two Boer republics, beyond Afrikaner3 nationalism, sought to contain the rapid advance of English imperialism in the midst of the discovery of the largest deposits of precious minerals on the continent. After two traumatic wars, a political arrangement emerged: the South African Union (1910), an understanding between English and Boer elites, later on leading up to the federalization of the territories occupied by the Boer republics and the English coastal colonies.
Topic:
Nationalism, State Formation, and Colonialism
Political Geography:
Africa and South Africa

35. Cultural Diversity in the Cameroon Higher Education Policy Definition: A Historical Appraisal

Author:
Hyasinth Ami Nyoh
Publication Date:
06-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
The subject of cultural diversity in education has attracted considerable research interest with varying focal points that form the sustenance of this paper. Meier and Hartell (2009, 180) have argued that increasing cultural diversity in educational institutions necessitates that educationists teach and manage learners with cultures, languages and backgrounds that are unknown to them. Du Toit (1995) focusing on the Republic of South Africa takes the view that the opening of schools to all races does not automatically ensure mutual understanding and acceptance between educators and learners and amongst learners themselves. The assertion here is that desegregation per se does not lead to predictable and meaningful attitudinal changes of groups to each other and can, in actual fact, lead to the heightening of tension and prejudices within the South African context. O’Neill (2009, 81) sees multicultural education as a process of comprehensive school reform and basic education for all students. He asserts that multicultural education challenges and rejects racism and other forms of discrimination in schools and societies and affirms the pluralism (ethnic, racial, linguistic, religious, economic and gender, among other things) that students, their communities, and teachers represent. In her research on teaching and learning in two desegregated South African high schools, Van Heerden (1998, 110) asserts that the process of desegregation in these schools is primarily a case of assimilating black learners into the school and its culture, with the result that the status quo is kept intact.
Topic:
History, Culture, Diversity, and Higher Education
Political Geography:
Africa and Cameroon

36. Mainstreaming Corruption Poverty and Development in Nigeria

Author:
Jolaade Omede and Arinze Ngwube
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
The culture of corruption has continued to plague the Nigeria society in all sectors at an alarming rate creating culture of acceptability of such a way of life. That corruption is endemic and has assumed a national way of life is a disturbing reality in Nigeria. It is this light that Achebe (1983, 38) avers that anyone who can say that corruption in Nigeria has not yet reached an alarming proportion is either a fool, crook or else does not live in Nigeria. He further posits that the situation has become so worse to the extent that keeping a Nigeria from being corrupt is like preventing a goat from eating yam. Corroborating this view, Anazodo, Okoye and Ezenwile (2012, 124) submit that corruption in Nigeria has affected all the political, economic and social facets of Nigeria and these are responsible for decayed infrastructure,downturn of the economy, fragile political institutions and steady decline in all institutions of national development.
Topic:
Corruption, Development, Poverty, and Governance
Political Geography:
Africa and Nigeria

37. Opportunities and Challenges for Mozambique From the Indian Expansion in Africa

Author:
Hetalben Haribhai Patel
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
This paper is organized in four main sections. The first one describes the economic relationships between India and Mozambique in the last five years taking into account the bilateral commercial and investment relationships in private and energy sectors. Apart from trade and investments, the first section of this work also presents data on the credit lines opened by India and their allocation in different projects in Mozambique and the donations made by the Indian government. The second section of the paper analyses the opportunities that India’s approximation represents for Mozambique in different areas, since India’s economic growth and its interest in Mozambican resources and location enable cooperation to flourish and the development of strategic areas in Mozambique such as education, health and infrastructure. Even though, the opportunities can only be fully reached when the states become sufficiently prepared with strategic policies and specialized institutions on India. That way, the third section of the paper presents the main challenges that this opportunity represents for the Mozambican State. With the completion of this article, we hope to answer the following question: what are the opportunities and challenges for Mozambique from the Indian Expansion to Africa?
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Bilateral Relations, Partnerships, Economic growth, and Trade
Political Geography:
Africa, South Asia, India, and Mozambique

38. The Dynamics of Africa in World Affairs: From Afro-Pessimism to Afro-Optimism?

Author:
Sharkdam Wapmuk and Oluwatooni Akinkwotu
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
The article argues that Africa has never existed apart from world politics, but has been inevitably entangled in the dynamics and flow of events and changing configurations of global power. Historical records have clearly confirmed that there have been contacts, interactions and a flow of both ideas and goods between Africa, Europe, Asia and Americas. Whether the continent’s historical contacts and interactions with the rest of the world have been a ‘curse or blessing’ has been a subject of serious debate (Adekaye 2010). African affairs have contributed in shaping the world and Africa in turn, has been, and is still being shaped by international processes and structures. The study of Africa in world affairs has no doubt attracted scholarly interest. However, most studies on the continent, especially in the past two decades tend to focused on the negative narrative - crisis, war, poverty, natural disasters, corruption, diseases and famine, criminality, environmental degradation, mismanagement of natural resources and crisis of governance (Zartman 1995). Some even completely wrote-off the continent as a ‘hopeless case’, ‘dark continent’, and ‘the world’s burden’ (The Economist 2000). Africans have strongly resisted such narrative that tends to dismiss historical realities of Africa’s rape through slavery, colonialism, economic dependency and continued dominance by the international institutions of global governance (World Bank, IMF and WTO) and external involvement and influence of the great powers on the continent.
Topic:
International Relations, Power Politics, and Global Political Economy
Political Geography:
Africa and Global Focus

39. From Mandela to Zuma: The Importance of the Southern Atlantic Region for South Africa’s Foreign Policy

Author:
Anselmo Otavio
Publication Date:
06-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
As it is known, Ceuta’s conquest by Portugal in 1415 initiated the discovery and, consequently, strategic transformation of the Southern Atlantic region by European powers. It is important to consider, first, that these actions were a process, since from the 14th century the necessary conditions for maritime expansion were being created by Portugal. Secondly, the arrival at Ceuta represented not the end, but the beginning of a phase marked by the search for an alternative maritime route that would connect Europe to India and would grant the Portuguese Crown access to spices from India’s territory. Although this process was initiated by Portugal, it is a fact that, throughout the centuries, countries like Spain, the Netherlands and England have also pursued the same development. From then, the territories belonging to the South Atlantic coast have been impacted by European powers, since, due to colonization, they were encompassed by different political and economic dynamics. While Lisbon connected Brazilian and Angolan territories through a relationship based on the purchase and sale of slave labor, the Netherlands at first, England later, comprised the Cape Colony to the Afro-Asian dynamic, keeping this territory’s interactions circumscribed to their respective colonies in the Asian side.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, History, and Colonialism
Political Geography:
Africa, South Africa, and Portugal

40. Iran-Africa Relations: Opportunities and Prospects for Iran

Author:
Fátima Chimarizeni
Publication Date:
06-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:
Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:
In a political world featured by many sorts of alliances, Iran has sought the gathering of power in order to defend itself from economic sanctions imposed upon it by United States of America along with other members of the United Nations such as United Kingdom, France, Russia and China. Its turn towards Africa was one of the way-out strategies taken by Ahmadinejad in order to overcome the negative economic impact originated from the sanctions. Nonetheless, the rise to power of a leadership seemingly more turned to solve the nuclear issue directly with the Western states places the Iran-Africa Relationship in a fragile condition considering Iran’s foreign policy priorities.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Sanctions, Geopolitics, and Alliance
Political Geography:
Africa, Iran, and Middle East