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Some 500 Sudanese soldiers were among a special African Union force that backed the Comoros government in its lightning operation to retake control of its rebel island of Anjouan. About 1,350 AU troops from Tanzania and Sudan arrived in the Indian Ocean Island archipelago on March 24, the eve of the operation by Comoran government commandos. The government said it seized full control of Anjouan after a seaborne assault backed by the AU. The operation was intended to topple Anjouan’s local leader, French-trained former gendarme Mohamed Bacar who clung to power in an illegal election last year and commaded a militia of several hundreds.

The Sudanese government has been internationally comdemned for alleged atrocities by its forces and pro-government militia in its western Darfur Province where an estimated 200,000 have died and 2.5 million forced to flee their homes since 2003. And given Sudan’s resistance to the deployment of an international force to protect the mostly non-Arab population of Darfur, what is your view on the inclusion of Sudanese soldiers in the AU force sent to Comoros? Have your say.

Zimbabweans vote in presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections on March 29 that analysts say will be the greatest challenge to President Robert Mugabe’s 28-year rule. The economy is in free-fall, with Zimbabweans suffering from the world’s highest inflation of over 100,000 percent a year and shortages of food and fuel. Some teachers, the bulk of Zimbabwe’s civil service, went on strike, and doctors have also threatened to walk out.

The 84-year-old Mugabe faces a strong challenge from his former finance minister Simba Makoni, who is running as an independent candidate, and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change. Do you think the prolonged economic crisis has reached a stage of becoming a decisive factor in the election or does Mugabe wield enough power and influence against a divided opposition to ride out the challenge? Have your say.

Kenya’s political rivals signed a long-anticipated peace deal after power-sharing talks to end mayhem over disputed Dec. 27 elections that has killed 1,000 people. The agreement followed tortuous talks mediated by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and pressure from home and abroad on President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga to make compromises to avert severe damage to East Africa’s biggest economy.

Have your say on the terms of the power-sharing deal, the prospect for a quick return to normality in Kenya or on what it would take to secure the peace accord.

Here is the full text of the agreement:
ACTING TOGETHER FOR KENYA: AGREEMENT ON THE PRINCIPLES OF PARTNERSHIP OF THE COALITION GOVERNMENT.

Preamble:
The crisis triggered by the 2007 disputed presidential election has brought to the surface deep-seated and long-standing divisions within Kenyan society. If left unaddressed, these divisions threaten the very existence of Kenya as a unified country. The Kenyan people are now looking to their leaders to ensure that their country will not be lost.
Given the current situation, neither side can realistically govern the country without the other. There must be real power-sharing to move the country forward and begin the healing and reconciliation process.
With this agreement, we are stepping forward together, as political leaders, to overcome the current crisis and to set the country on a new path. As partners in a coalition government, we commit ourselves to work together in good faith as true partners, through constant consultation and willingness to compromise.
This agreement is designed to create an environment conducive to such a partnership and to build mutual trust and confidence. It is not about creating positions that reward individuals. It seeks to enable Kenya’s political leaders to look beyond partisan considerations with a view to promoting the greater interests of the nation as a whole. It provides the means to implement a coherent and far-reaching reform agenda, to address the fundamental root causes of recurrent conflict, and to create a better, more secure, more prosperous Kenya for all.
To resolve the political crisis, and in the spirit of coalition and partnership, we have agreed to enact the National Accord and Reconciliation Act 2008, whose provisions have been agreed upon in their entirety by the parties hereto and a draft copy is appended hereto.

Its key points are:
* There will be a Prime Minister of the Government of Kenya, with authority to coordinate and supervise the execution of the functions and affairs of the Government of Kenya.
* The Prime Minister will be an elected member of the National Assembly and the parliamentary leader of the largest party in the National Assembly, or of a coalition, if the largest party does not command a majority.
* Each member of the coalition shall nominate one person from the National Assembly to be appointed a Deputy Prime Minister.
* The Cabinet will consist of the President, the Vice-President, the Prime Minister, the two Deputy Prime Ministers and the other Ministers. The removal of any Minister of the coalition will be subject to consultation and concurrence in writing by the leaders.
* The Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Ministers can only be removed if the National Assembly passes a motion of no confidence with a majority vote.
* The composition of the coalition government will at all times take into account the principle of portfolio balance and will reflect their relative parliamentary strength.
* The coalition will be dissolved if the Tenth Parliament is dissolved; or if the parties agree in writing; or if one coalition partner withdraws from the coalition.
* The National Accord and Reconciliation Act shall be entrenched in the Constitution.

Having agreed on the critical issues above, we will now take this process to Parliament. It will be convened at the earliest moment to enact these agreements. This will be in the form of an Act of Parliament and the necessary amendment to the Constitution.
We believe by these steps we can together in the spirit of partnership bring peace and prosperity back to the people of Kenya who so richly deserve it.

A special Nigerian tribunal upheld the 2007 election of President Umaru Yar’Adua, rejecting challenges from rivals who wanted the vote annulled because of massive rigging. Yar’Adua’s two main rivals in last April’s election, former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari and then Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, had asked the tribunal to annul the election, alleging widespread fraud, as pronounced by local and international observers.

The tribunal ruled that Buhari, Yar’Adua’s main opponent, had failed to prove that violations of the electoral law were substantial enough to invalidate the overall result. The five judges of the tribunal also rejected Abubakar’s challenge.

Read what leading analysts said before the ruling and have your say on how the tribunal’s dismissal of the challenges will impact on Nigeria’s politics and economy.

Patrick Smith, Africa Confidential (see full analysis)
“Nigeria’s post-election crisis has taken a very different turn from Kenya’s. Unlike Kenya’s thwarted politicians, Nigeria’s opposition leaders are contesting the election results through the courts and this time seem to be confident of success - even if they have to take their claims to the Supreme Court.”

Bismarck Rewane, Financial Derivatives Company (see full analysis )
“The Nigerian judiciary, in trying to entrench the principle of the separation of powers and its independence, might seize the historic opportunity of the election tribunal to redeem its battered reputation.”

Antony Goldman, PM Consulting (see full analysis)
“If the court says the April 2007 presidential election was unfair on the grounds that it was rigged - which is what Buhari and Atiku are arguing - presumably someone is guilty of the rigging. It seems strange to say one candidate rigged an election to such a degree that it must be re-run, only then to allow that candidate to have another go, apparently without any censure or sanction.”

Amin Dalhatu, politician, northern Nigeria (see full analysis)
“The much anticipated verdict of the Nigerian presidential election tribunal will leave us in deeper political quagmire than we already are in, whichever way it goes.”

Nigeria’s post-election crisis has taken a very different turn from Kenya’s. Unlike Kenya’s thwarted politicians, Nigeria’s opposition leaders are contesting the election results through the courts and this time seem to be confident of success - even if they have to take their claims to the Supreme Court.

Along with many observers, I would say that Nigeria’s vote counting in April 2007 looked even more inventive than Kenya’s last December. Indeed, Nigeria’s President Umaru Yar’Adua has acknowledged that the widespread criticisms of the performance of the country’s Independent National Electoral Commission need to be addressed.

Yet in Nigeria, there are no visiting UN secretaries general, no high-level mediation and no talk of power-sharing. There’s just a simple demand from the opposition politicians - Abubakar Atiku and General Muhammadu Buhari - that the election should be rerun under an independent electoral commission.

I went down to the Niger Delta to report on the election last April where there had been several violent clashes before the elections. On the day before the Presidential elections in Bayelsa, a group of militants stormed into the state capital Yenagoa, released some of their comrades held in a police cell and blew a hole in a local hotel.

Across the country there was plenty of election day violence. But after the result was announced, there was an almost eerie calm - even the Delta militants announced a truce of sorts. Neither of the opposition contenders seemed ready to take their battle to streets.

General Buhari told me that he expected the ’cause of free elections’ to be taken up by civil society groups and he wasn’t the sort of politician who would lead protest marches through the capital.

So against expectations, Nigeria is facing the prospect of a quiet revolution as the courts overturn the ruling People’s Democratic Party’s election victories. So far the courts have overturned the governorship election results in six states, as well as ruling against the election of several senators and representatives in the National Assembly.

Now Nigeria is to enter unknown territory. The Presidential Election tribunal is due soon to announce its verdict on the mass of evidence and petitions presented to it by Abubakar’s and Buhari’s lawyers. That judgement is unlikely to be definitive: whichever side loses is likely to appeal. So there is the prospect of a lengthy legal battle ahead.

Should, the tribunal rule against President Yar’Adua and the PDP, all sorts of imponderables come into play: firstly, who will run the country? In the event of the elected President and Vice President having to stand down, the President of the Senate has to take over and organise fresh elections within 60 days. However, the current President of the Senate, David Mark, faces his own election petition. If he loses, who then takes over?

Nigerian civic activists point out that a rerun of last year’s elections without fundamental reform of the electoral commission is unlikely to be much of an improvement. Yet the prospect of another vote has sent the political class into paroxysms of plotting, the ruling PDP is to hold a national conference early in March at which some of its more ambitious members will scheme to replace Yar’Adua’s name on the ballot with their own, if there is a rerun.

And the old military politicians in the party - Generals Olusegun Obasanjo and Ibrahim Babangida - are still mentioned as kingmakers, if not kings trying to get back on the throne. The opposition candidates have their own problems: General Buhari has fallen out with some of the leading members of his own party who joined the Yar’Adua government and doubts persist about Abubakar’s seriousness as a presidential contender.

So much is hanging on the court’s decision that Nigeria’s literati have taken to rewriting those lines in Shakespeare’s King Henry IV part II: “Uneasy lies the head that wears a judge’s wig …”

The Nigerian judiciary, in trying to entrench the principle of the separation of powers and its independence, might seize the historic opportunity of the election tribunal to redeem its battered reputation. Hitherto the Court system was believed to be corrupt, slow and weak. However, election issues are not just criminal or of a Common Law dimension but have major implication son stability.

The judges will not be oblivious to the violence and chaos in Kenya and the possibility of a contagion across Sub-Saharan Africa. Nigerians remember too well the problems in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast and dread a repeat in their country. Therefore the judiciary could be caught between horns of a dilemma in trading off strong judicial precedents of obiter dieta in the defence of plural democracy and stability of the nation.

The immediate and remote consequences of any decision will impact on the political equilibrium, business/financial dynamics and the levers of control in Nigeria. Assuming that the election is annulled and a fresh one is held, the incumbent is expected to have a strategic advantage, assuming he can secure the nomination of his party, the PDP.

The PDP is already in the middle of a squabble over its leadership. Even though there are no strong ideological differences of opinion, the struggle and acrimony over control of the party is vicious. In the eye of the storm is ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo whose legacy and influence is being threatened. Therefore, even though conventional logic points to a no-contest for the incumbent, it will be fool-hardy to assume that Yar’Adua’s nomination is a fait accompli.

However, if Yar’Adua bows out because of his lack of interest (a rumour that has been widely circulated) then it could be a free-for-all amongst the northern elite who will produce a candidate, according to PDP rules. A fiercely fought political battle in what was considered the monolithic northern establishment is a dreaded situation.

In the meantime, Yar’Adua has maintained a strong hold on the purse and upheld fiscal discipline much to the dismay of the influence peddlers. A vicious political struggle and the attendant trade-offs could compromise these gains and lead to undesirable macroeconomic consequences.

Two constituencies that need to be watched at these times remain the military and the oil-producing Niger Delta. The military have a history of destabilising political systems in Africa whilst the Niger Delta crisis even though ebbing could easily become effervescent again.

There are a few things that strike me as curious about the process in Nigeria.

If the court says the April 2007 presidential election was unfair on the grounds that it was rigged - which is what Buhari and Atiku are arguing - presumably someone is guilty of the rigging.

It seems strange to say one candidate rigged an election to such a degree that it must be re-run, only then to allow that candidate to have another go, apparently without any censure or sanction.

Nor, for that matter, was there anything to suggest that the presidential election was somehow altogether out of step with the rest of the electoral process in Nigeria. A handful of governors have been ordered from office by courts - but on technical grounds relating to interpretation of the electoral commission’s powers rather than because of proof of cheating. The problems in the presidential election were not isolated - they were a function of Nigeria’s political class.

Was it a question of a few bad apples? Or was the whole barrel rotten? And in civilian politics in Nigeria, are those elected to office ever more accountable to, or representative of, the broad masses of voters below, or a handful of barons above? Perhaps in 2007 the real difference only was that the illusion of democracy was just too thin to be credible.

And if the court does order a re-run, what guarantees are there that the process will be fairer, with the same electoral commission and the ruling PDP in an even stronger position in the states? The process should be managed by David Mark, the Senate president. But his election to the Senate has also been challenged. If he has to go, the PDP’s support for the zoning of top offices means his replacement will also have to come from the north central zone. Of the zone’s 19 senators, five are from opposition parties; of the remaining 14 at least 8 face challenges to their elections. The contest for Senate president could be almost as frenzied as those that took place last April.

Unless of course the PDP were to engineer a change in its candidate - and it’s worth remembering that there was nothing terribly democratic about how any of the presidential candidates secured their original nominations - which might mean that Atiku and Buhari had gone to all that trouble potentially only to give former president Olusegun Obasanjo, their nemesis, another crack at putting a more reliable place man in the job.

As with Kenya - can a political problem be fixed by anyone other than politicians? Let’s not forget, the courts in Rivers state decided the PDP governor should stand down because he ought not to have been the party’s candidate in the first place. That was a fairly contentious ruling - but the court then went on to say that the man who it said should have been the candidate should immediately be sworn in as governor, because the PDP had won the election - in a state where many observers said little or no polling took place at all! So in the interests of due process, someone who was never a candidate and who did not stand in an election that in any case did not happen rules over a state with a budget this year of close to $2bn.

The much anticipated verdict of the Nigerian presidential election tribunal will leave us in deeper political quagmire than we already are in, whichever way it goes. If judgement favours President Umaru Yar’Adua, we’ll all be expected to accept it and move on. It will, however give people the wrong impression that whatever one gets away with at the polling stations will eventually find legitimacy at the tribunals.

If on the other hand President Yar’Adua loses, several critical issues will become manifest:

The political problems created by the manner in which the elections were handled still remain unresolved. Among these is the credibility problem that hangs over the Independent National Electoral Commission, which by law will be charged with the responsibility of conducting fresh elections if the tribunal so directs.

President Yar’Adua may have a bigger challenge from within his own party. It is an open secret that some members of the PDP are warming up to the idea of forcing for a re-run of their party primaries which they feel had been manipulated to favour Yar’Adua. If they succeed, the situation may be a bit messy and whoever eventually emerges as the candidate may be so bruised that he may have difficulty winning a rerun election.

General Buhari may even be in bigger trouble. He may not even have a platform on which to re-run given the level of disaffection between himself and his party, the All Nigeria Peoples Congress. Moreover, he may have to look for a new running mate because his former running mate, who doubles as the party’s national chairman, has disowned him and is now in working “alliance” with the ruling party, the PDP.

Atiku Abubakar’s party, the AC, is in such total disarray that it can no longer have strong national reach to guarantee his success. Moreover, his decision to stay out of the country due to what many believe is his fear of being arrested, has earned the anger of many of his erstwhile supporters. Compared to Buhari’s doggedness, many see him as too weak and self-centred to be an effective leader. An interesting idea being mentioned is for Atiku to throw whatever remains of his support and resources behind Buhari. That should surely give the PDP a big challenge and make the outcome of a re-run election far from certain.

The violence since Kenya’s Dec. 27 election has now gathered a momentum of its own and the upheaval has battered Kenya’s image as an East African trade and tourism hub and one of Africa’s more stable nations. So what is the outlook for East Africa’s biggest economy? Read the views of leading Africa analysts and have your say on how Kenya’s crisis is likely to play out or how it should be resolved.

Richard Segal, Renaissance Capital (see full analysis)

“Persistent currency volatility will have a detrimental impact on sentiment in other asset markets and continue to feed through to the real economy… Tourism and trade have suffered from the political instability but it won’t be long before the slump in business and consumer confidence becomes more entrenched.”

Philippe de Pontet, Eurasia Group (see full analysis)

“At this point, the most hopeful outcome for Kenya would be a power-sharing agreement brokered by mediator Kofi Annan that would bring the stalemate to an end—and unless this happens in the first quarter of 2008, the economic impact of the current standoff could be severe.”