China’s Belt and Road Initiative turns 10: Xi announces 8 new priorities, continues push for global influence
China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which now includes 44 African countries, got under way 10 years ago. President Xi Jinping launched it in 2013 with a first speech in Kazakhstan and a second one in Indonesia. The initiative is something of a trial-by-doing development policy enigma: it keeps China watchers chasing Xi’s next move to help define just what it […]
Transformation of South Africa’s foreign policy through Brics – why Putin tips the scales
To say that the lead-up to the 2023 Brics summit in Sandton, South Africa, in August has been tumultuous, seems milk-toast mild. The International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant for President Vladimir Putin, issued on 17 March 2023, thrust South Africa’s foreign policy, in all of its inter-governmental disarray, into the centre of the post-Covid global geostrategic political […]
Is Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone sustainable? A UN team is investigating
Last week, a delegation from the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Social and Environmental Compliance Unit travelled to the Vhembe district to meet residents and key stakeholders about the developmental and environmental impacts of the Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone (MMSEZ). Special economic zones are geographically designated areas set aside for specific economic activities. They are growth […]
UN Development Programme South Africa backs ‘dirty’ Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone
The saying that true life is stranger than fiction is borne out by the events leading to the endorsement of the Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone (MMSEZ) as the epitome of sustainable development by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in early July. The endorsement follows the signing of a memorandum of agreement between the MMSEZ state-owned […]
Final rubber stamp for the Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone travesty
The Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone (MMSEZ), a pet project of President Cyril Ramaphosa since 2018, arising from China-South Africa bilateral economic initiatives, was approved on 23 February. The Limpopo Economic Development Environment and Tourism Agency (Ledet) signed off on the environmental authorisation for the establishment of the zone to the MMSEZ state-owned entity, which oversees the […]
MMSEZ authorities dodge every question about livelihoods threats, climate change, water scarcity and more
The incubation of the Musina Makhado Special Economic Zone is a surprisingly long one. Former minister of trade and industry Rob Davies endorsed special economic zones (SEZs) as the new driver of economic growth and development in South Africa as far back as the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation in 2012. The focus on steering South Africa’s development […]
Geostrategic fault lines show up at the annual Brics summit
The Brics Summit of 9 September may have seemed a low-key virtual event. But consensus was during moments to do with anti-terrorism and Afghanistan rather than Covid-19 vaccines or China’s presence in Africa. Socioeconomic themes relating to Covid-19 were led by China’s President Xi Jinping, with not much by way of a Brics collective strategy. To be fair, President Cyril […]
Controversial Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone gets green light
The long-awaited final Musina-Makhado Special Economic Zone (MMSEZ) environmental impact assessment (EIA) report was released on 1 September, coinciding with a carefully orchestrated investor conference-webinar roadshow. The fanfare was marketed to send all the “right” signals to potential investors and the “right” audience of more than 1 000 online attendees. The fanfare had been carefully calibrated: there was […]
Out of the arson and looting come glimmers of light
Let’s face facts, as a nation we expected fallout from the incarceration of former president Jacob Zuma and at the same time we cheered the constitutional court for this long overdue course of justice. Yet none of us, myself as a political analyst included, were prepared for the incendiary violence that began the night of July […]
Musina-Makhado metallurgical zone revision a back-peddle or a back door?
Until last week, the scale of the envisaged Musina-Makhado metallurgical zone (MMSEZ) was mind-boggling: an 8 000 hectare dirty industry complex with a 3 300 megawatt (MW) water thirsty coal plant at its centre. Fortunately, criticism from interested and affected parties during and after the public participation process turned the heat on the Limpopo local and provincial […]