ADF

U.S. Africa Command Staff Sometimes it’s the unexpected threats that cause the most damage. A cyberattack can paralyze a nation’s power grid. Disinformation can send protesters to the streets and fuel civil unrest. Small, off-the-shelf drones can deliver deadly bomb blasts.  Known as hybrid threats, these attacks are difficult to detect or attribute to a specific group. Often, proxy actors carry out the attacks to hide their origin. They appear to be the work of a small band of local criminals but, in reality, a foreign power or extremist group is calling the shots from a distance.  These nontraditional attacks…

President Mokgweetsi Masisi of Botswana spoke to Soldiers of the Botswana Defence Force at Sir Seretse Khama International Airport in Gaborone on July 26, 2021, as they prepared to leave for service in the Southern African Development Community Mission in Mozambique. His remarks have been edited to fit this format. I stand here before you as the commander in chief of the Botswana Defence Force [BDF] and the current chairperson of the SADC [Southern African Development Community] Organ on Politics, Defence and Security. It is a formal institution of SADC, which was launched in June 1996 with a clear mandate…

story and photos by AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE For many peanut growers in the Paoua region of the Central African Republic, life is a daily battle. They have to coax the plants from the ground, harvest the nuts and shell them. Then they have to survive theft, extortion or worse in a region where rebels and pro-government forces are at war. “What is preventing us from developing further peanut farming in Paoua is insecurity,” Jean-Paul Ndopaye, manager of a peanut store, told Africanews. “When we want to send our goods to Bangui, to Berberati, or even to Bouar, we might run into…

ADF STAFF Uganda ended the world’s longest school closure on January 10, 2022, by ordering millions of students back to the classroom nearly two years after learning was suspended because of COVID-19. Students returned to schools closed since March 2020 when COVID-19 swept the globe. “I am so happy because I was missing school, my teachers, my friends and my studies,” 10-year-old Nawilah Senkungu told Agence France-Presse (AFP) at Nakasero Primary School in Kampala, where teachers encouraged students to wear masks and wash their hands. Education Minister John Muyingo said all primary and secondary students would resume classes a year…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE When it opened in 1960, the Ducor hotel in Monrovia, Liberia, was one of the only five-star hotels in Africa, boasting a nightclub and air-conditioned rooms, according to travel guides. It hosted VIPs such as former Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie. Guests would lounge by the swimming pool, sip cocktails and watch the sun set over the Atlantic Ocean. The Ducor closed in 1989 at the outbreak of back-to-back civil wars, which ran from 1989 to 1997 and from 1999 to 2003. It swiftly fell into disrepair. “It makes everybody sad,” said Ambrose Yebea, a retired tourism ministry official…

ADF STAFF The cranes that unload containers from ships at two of South Africa’s busiest ports slowed nearly to a halt in July 2021. Trucks waited in line for 14 hours or more to pick up cargo. Ships were forced to anchor outside the harbor for days and decide whether to skip the affected ports altogether. Shop owners and consumers worried about empty shelves as a prime shopping season approached. “This could not have come at a worse time,” Denys Hobson, logistics and pricing analyst at the South African bank Investec, said. “If nothing can move in and out the…

Dr. Jabu Mtsweni is manager of the Information and Cyber Security Research Centre at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in Pretoria, South Africa. Mtsweni spoke to ADF about the types of cyber threats African countries face and how they might better prepare to address them. His remarks have been edited to fit this format. ADF: Please share a little about your background in cybersecurity issues, such as your education and training. Mtsweni: My background is in computer science, my undergraduate qualification as well as postgraduate, and my Ph.D. includes computer science, but not focusing on cybersecurity initially.…

ADF STAFF Photos by: AFP/GETTY IMAGES As young men prowled the streets of Mocímboa da Praia with machetes and AK-47s on October 5, 2017, some townspeople peered through windows in fear, recording the defiant march on their cellphones. As a gun-toting militant walks by, one resident whispers an infamous and fearsome name: “al-Shabaab.” The scene is part of a BBC Africa Eye documentary titled “Sons of Mocímboa: Mozambique’s terrorism crisis” that profiles the challenges posed by the terrorist group that has plagued Cabo Delgado province since that first attack back in October 2017. In that assault, about 30 insurgents laid…

ADF STAFF Photos by: AFP/GETTY IMAGES fter Twitter deleted a post by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari in 2021, Nigeria shut down access to the country’s most popular social media site for seven months. “The loss was humongous,” Nigerian blogger and social media expert J.J. Omojuwa told ADF. “You got an awakening that this can happen anywhere.” Internet analyst NetBlocks estimated that the blackout cost Nigerians up to $1.6 billion in lost business. It also disrupted vital COVID-19 information that the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control published on the platform. Human rights groups condemned the blackout as a violation of Nigerians’…

ADF STAFF Those committed to defending their nations know they also must be prepared to help those who serve alongside them. When battlefield casualties occur, quick action can be the difference between life and death. In November 2021, Soldiers with the Armed Forces of Mauritania worked with U.S. Army Special Forces instructors during Joint Combined Exchange Training. Here, a Mauritanian Soldier fits a tourniquet around the leg of a colleague during a simulated casualty drill. Soldiers also practiced moving the wounded to safety on stretchers across the desert landscape. The joint training covered other essential skills, such as close-quarters battles,…