And then there was one.

On the last day of April, Comoran President Azali Assoumani announced that a 50 year old compatriot has contracted COVID 19.

That leaves Lesotho as the only African country free of coronavirus.

The infected Comoran had been in contact with a French-Comoran national with a history of travel to France.

Authorities are at full stretch ascertaining who the infected man has been in contact with.

A nighttime curfew has been imposed. Assoumani says he has not implemented a tougher lockdown because the majority of his one million people live off informal earnings.

Large gathering are prohibited and Mosques were ordered closed. Nevertheless in the holy month of Ramadan people congregated around the time of prayers and police were moved in to disperse them.

The immediate reaction from the Moroni government mirrors that of other African countries that closed their borders and ordered populations to stay at home immediately COVID 19 cases were detected.

So far this  has held at bay the viral onslaught predicated for Africa by the World Health Organization.

Nevertheless the UN  health body persists that Africa, with hundreds of millions crowded into informal housing settlements and notorious weak healthcare infrastructures, is in danger of becoming the COVID 19 nightmare.

Among the reasons for Africa staying behind the curve is the fact that international  correspondents based in capitals like Johannesburg, Nairobi and Addis Ababa have tended to stay put – in their countries if not their capitals – because of the border closures.

They have reported diligently on President Cyril Ramaphosa’s success in handing off mass infections thanks to draconian lockdown regulations.

But they have not been able to answer why other must poorer countries have much lower infection rates.

Is it climactic conditions? Coronavirus spread through Europe, China and the United States in the flu season i.e. the winter months. It has been a warm summer in the southern hemisphere.

Is it African countries experience in dealing with highly infectious diseases like EBOLA, malaria, tuberculosis, measles and SARS?

Is the tuberculosis vaccine BCG administered to African children shortly after birth effective against COVID 19.

Is it the youthfulness of the African population and the growing evidence that, deadly as it might be to the elderly and the medically compromised, COVID 19 barely affects the youth?

Is it – and this is quite terrifying –  because African countries have simply not been equipped to count the number of infections?

Burundi, which came into the game very late, made this admission.through its Health Minister Thadée Ndikumana

To each of these, honest observers must say what any responsible journalists covering  the pandemic should say. We simply don’t know.

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Nine African countries have reported cases of COVID 19 with two deaths on the continent from the virus.

A month-long international travel ban has been placed on Kenya’s sports stars.

This particularly affects road runners as the lucrative European season approaches.

The current ban ends before the London and Boston marathons. So athletes like world record holder Eliud Kipchoge are hoping the scare is quickly over.

Ghana and Gabon have stopped their officials from traveling abroad until the coronavirus  all- clear is sounded.

Lesotho this week  stopped foreign travel for its citizens to avoid spreading COVID19

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In those heady, early days of democracy South Africa was often said to be punching above its weight diplomatically.

There was not a country that did not want to be the friend of Nelson Mandela’s success story.

Many sought help, hoping that rubbing  up against  it might bring some good fortune.

So, in addition to their considerable domestic commitments Mandela and his early successors were required to be counsellors and mediators.

They were expected to explain how they  achieved the seemingly impossible end of apartheid and the reconciliation that brought about the Rainbow Nation.

Northern Ireland is perhaps the best example of this

Many times, South African leaders were obliged to apply these lessons by actually stepping  in between parties in conflict and brokering a peace.

This applied mainly in Africa where South African mediation achieved settlements in Sudan, Comoros, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cote d’Ivoire and Lesotho.

The fact that things have lately gone pear-shaped in many of these nations is a debate for another day.

However badly things have fared, they are indubitably better off having  had South African mediation and peacekeeping at a time when the rest of the  world was either unwilling or incapable to intervening.

Thankfully, that is not the case in Sudan today.

The African Union has built the confidence and experience to make its presence felt by red-carding the Transitional Military Council until it hands power to a civilian administration.

The Arab nations are there, albeit misguidedly lending moral support to the military junta in Khartoum until the generals made the fatal error of deploying the former janjaweed against unarmed protestors.

The United States has got involved, sending Tibor Nagy its top envoy to Africa to urge an and to the violence.

It has also named Donald Booth as its special envoy to Sudan – the ninth since 2001.

Not only Washington, but Hollywood has skin in the game through activity actor George Clooney calling on the U.S. Treasury to use its muscle with international banks to dry up the financial stream to the junta in Khartoum and anyone seeking to prolong the conflict in the strategically place country bridging Africa and the Arab worlds.

Look for South Africa in this crowd and you will be disappointed.

Does this mean the days of Mzanzi mediation are over?

Probably not.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has his hands full pulling South Africa out of the economic swamp.

For him it is very much a case of charity beginning at home.

The sad reality is the wasted Zuma years of Zuma corruption has cut the moral high ground from under South Africa’s feet.

That is ironic, because Zuma himself was a good, although tough, mediator.

“Do you really think you can twist a man’s arm behind his back hard enough to  get him to sign a settlement with his free hand?” I asked him in jest after he had brought a reluctant  Pierre Nkurunziza into the Burundi deal.

“What do you think the did to us at Codesa?” he retorted.

ends

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Ramaphosa remains the regional mediator for Lesotho but he’s been asked to second someone to step in help if presidential load prevents him giving it his undivided attention.

Foreign Minister Lindiwe Sisulu says she and her counterparts met for more than five hours yesterday preparing for the regional and political summit of regional leaders. 

(take in the Sisulu clip here)

Discussing ways to fast track measures to restore stability in Lesotho took up half the the foreign ministers’ time.

They heard from the DRC government and its independent electoral commission that elections will be held there on December 23.

A delegation from Madagascar briefed them on security measures ahead of  elections later this year.

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He was speaking at the SADC double troika meeting in Luanda  that looked at troubleshoots among the 15-nation grouping.

Being roped in as regional mediator in Lesotho, while he was still deputy president, has clearly given President Cyril Ramaphosa an appetite for active good neighborliness.

Today he reported progress in the mountain kingdom to his SADC counterparts charged with regional political and security stability….

….adding that Madagascar, where two people died in protests at the weekend, could do with some of it.

“This calls from some timely intervention from the region,” he said

Ramaphosa says the situation on the island state cannot be allowed to slide back to the chaotic conditions it experienced after the 2009 coup.

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Ramaphosa’s the current chair of the regional Southern African Development Community.

Angola currently heads SADC’s Organ on Politics, Defence and Security Cooperation. So Presidents Cyril Ramaphosa and Joao Lourenco have a heavy schedule of regional priorities to cover  in Luanda tomorrow.

The South African President has first hand experience as regional mediator in Lesotho’s protracted political miasma.

Ramaphosa moves on to Windhoek for discussions with Namibian President Heine Giengob.

On Saturday, Ramaphosa will be in Gaborone, the site of the secretariat for the 15-nation grouping,  for talks with Botswana President Ian Khama.

He’ll be accompanied by his new Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Lindiwe

Sisulu and Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa Nqakula

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The 15-nation body’s Executive Secretary Stergomena Tax tells reporters overall political stability remains a priority as SADC grows into a significant economic bloc.

The theme of this week’s SADC summit, where President Jacob Zuma will assume the chairmanship of the body, is partnering the private sector to develop and grow economically.

The agenda, explained by South Africa’s Minister of  International Relations and Cooperation Maite Nkoana Mashebane, is loaded with developmental and economic issues.

But the success of these rests on there being stability.

That will be the remit of SADC’s organ on politics, security and defence.

They’ve had success in bringing peace to Madagascar, but Lesotho and the DRC remain a worry.

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Trouble within the 15-nation grouping will dominate the meeting in Dar es Salaam.

SADC foreign ministers can hardly meet without talking about bringing peace to the two regional headaches which are the Democratic Republic of Congo and Lesotho.

Tanzania currently chairs SADC’s  Peace and Security wing.

But they’re also considering taking on new members.

Burundi and the Comoros have asked to join.

Burundi’s neighbor and rival Rwanda has as asked to rejoin the Economic Community of Central African States.

The ministers in Dar es Salaam have to consider how multiple membership of regional economic organizations might impede the East African Community’s integration agenda

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It’s  appealing for $204 million immediately to purchase food and transport it to the region to help millions of hungry people.

ends intro

World Food Programme  Executive Director Ertharin Cousin says in a telephone briefing from Malawi that 18 million people need emergency food assistance in seven countries severely affected by El Nino — Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi.

She says  WFP is anticipating an escalation in needs later this year and estimates that approximately 33 million people will be impacted by El Nino and the upcoming La Nina, which could bring severe flooding.

Cousin points to a more than 150 percent increase in people without enough to eat in Malawi as well as a 99 percent increase in Swaziland and a 53 percent increase in Lesotho.

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