Nic Cheeseman takes a look at the recent contestation over the Electoral Commission in Kenya, in which protesting citizens were brutally repressed by the police. Nic asks what the chances are for meaningful reform and what this tells us about Kenyatta’s personality as president.
Hanno Brankamp explores refugee politics in Kenya. The government’s announced closure of its refugee camps is not just a worrying déjà-vu; it is driven by national politics and a renewed bid for more donor funding. While it seems highly unlikely that Kenya will actually close Dadaab, the government is likely to seek a diplomatic horse trade. Hanno is a DPhil […]
Democracy in Africa’s very own Nic Cheeseman was part of the panel that interviewed the former Kenyan Prime Minister, Raila Odinga, for Al Jazeera’s flagship political discussion programme, ‘Head to Head’, at the Oxford Union on 15 April 2016. Mr Odinga, currently the country’s most high profile opposition leader, was Prime Minister under the power sharing […]
In his regular column for the Daily Nation, our co-editor Nic Cheeseman writes about the importance of freedom speech: as a liberty to be defended in its own right and a means to better governance.
Following a recent thanksgiving ceremony to celebrate the ICC’s charges being dropped, Gregory Deacon explores the relationship between religion and politics in Kenya. Gregory is an independent researcher and adjunct assistant professor at Union College, New York. Pictures by Ruth Kenyah.
The question of identity has always been both a sensitive and a complicated question, particularly in Kenya. Now, the thorny issue has been taken on by a recent exhibition that combines art and research to explore the topic. In his regular column for the Daily Nation, Nic Cheeseman joins forces with Wambui Wamae to investigate.
In his regular column for the Daily Nation our co-editor, Nic Cheeseman, looks into the political crystal ball and lays out his predictions for Kenya’s political and economic future.
Decentralisation has been a hot topic in studies of democratisation and development in recent years. The devolution process in Kenya, however, has received relatively little academic attention to date. In this post, Dominic Burbidge pulls together some of the emerging research on this important issue. Dominic is a Departmental Lecturer in African Studies at the University […]
The Bigger Picture Project at the University of Edinburgh has teamed up with Democracy in Africa to bring you videos from academics as well as practitioners in international development and humanitarianism. In this post, Lucy Lowe draws on her research to explore health and mobility amongst Somali migrants in Nairobi.
Uhuru cannot start planning second term yet
Some commentators are claiming that the Jubilee Party have the 2017 in the bag. Taking a look at both the history of past parties and the current political landscape, Nic Cheeseman argues that we cannot be so sure. This blog was originally published in Nic’s regular column for the Daily Nation.