The Nordic Africa Institute – Publications

The chapter summarises major developments in sub-Sahara Africa focusing on the themes of elections, conflicts and the status and performance of sub-Sahara Africa in the world economy.  

The purpose o this paper is to trace the development of the military involvement in Sudanese politics and make some suggestions towards the general assessment of its nature and consequences.

This Policy Note focuses on the gendered consequences of the militarisation of the Horn of Africa. Despite being in different ‘moments’ of conflict, the countries of this region share features of extreme social, economic and political violence, which impact negatively on their citizens. Protracted refugee and refugee-like conditions, extreme disinvestment in social programmes, increasing militarisation and political repression adversely affect women, thereby further entrenching gender disparities. Concerted national and international efforts and resources should support local democratic initiatives to find political solutions to these protracted conflicts and advance the struggle against sexual and gender-based violence and discrimination.

For centuries livestock have formed the backbone of the Somali economy. Camels are especially highly valued by Somali herdsmen.

The practical uses of the camel have been eloquently described by Somalis in their extensive oral poetry, handed down through generations from father to son. It forms a complete literacy tradition composed of poems, proverbs, metaphors and tales of wisdom.

The collection and preservation of Somali oral literature are important subjects that require urgent attention. This rich literature was transmitted to us orally from generation to generation. The cultural and historical life of the Somali people is reflected in this ancient oral data.

The present collection of oral literature on the Somali camel is the result of an extensive research work. Oral literature has been one of the subjects studied by the "Somali camel research project", a bilateral undertaking between Somalia and Sweden (the Somali Academy of Sciences and Arts, SOMAC, and the Swedish Agency for Research Cooperation with Developing Countries, SAREC).

In many African countries where civil war raged not so long ago, former warlords are today running for office in elections. This policy note assesses the effect that these warlord democrats have on democratisation and security.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has emerged as an exogenous shock to global food supply chains, which foreshadows worrying impacts on Africa’s food security and nutrition, and threaten to derail national and global efforts to end hunger and poverty and to achieve sustainable development goals on the continent. This article provides an early assessment of the implications of the invasion for Africa’s food supply chains and food security. Two particularly aggravating factors, which explain the current and likely future impact of the invasion on Africa’s food security are discussed: the timing of the invasion and the two parties involved in the conflict. The article underlines four major channels by which the invasion disrupts African food supply chains: energy markets and shipping routes, availability and prices of agricultural production inputs, domestic food price inflation, and trade sanctions and other financial measures. In addition, the article considers the risk of social and political unrest that disruption to food supply chains and spikes in domestic food prices may inflame. Finally, the paper briefly discusses options for short- and long-term responses by African governments and their development partners to mitigate the repercussions of the conflict on food supply chains, boost food and nutrition security, and build resilience of Africa’s food systems

This policy brief takes a regional perspective based on a rapid review of the extant literature to cascading climate risks and their links with migration in North Africa. Understanding the climate-migration nexus in the context of North Africa is a cornerstone for taking informed decisions and developing strategies to mitigate the adverse impact of climate change, including potential human mobility.

Apart from being a humanitarian tragedy, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has also emerged as an exogenous shock to global food supply chains, with severe consequences for many African countries in particular. Four months into the invasion, we can see three main threats to food security in Africa: a disruption to energy markets and shipping routes; a shortage of fertilizers; and the negative ‘third-party’ effects of sanctions imposed on and by Russia.

This study investigates the association between individuals’ concern about contracting COVID-19 and their compliance with recommended preventive and mitigation measures, namely wearing face masks, maintaining social distancing and handwashing, in the context of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The empirical analysis is based on a panel dataset from the Combined COVID-19 MENA Monitor Household Survey, which was carried out in Jordan, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia and Egypt. Applying a probit estimation technique, a positive and statistically significant association was found between the level of COVID-19 worries and individuals’ compliance with the mitigation measures. Notably, the results revealed that this association followed a “first-up-then-down” trend, showing that compliance with the three mitigation measures rose as individuals’ worries about contracting the virus increased, and then markedly decreased after they had been infected. Socio-demographic characteristics contributing to lower levels of compliance included being male, being over 60, having lower levels of education and having a lower household income. A cross-country analysis revealed remarkable differences between the five countries, with the strongest association between COVID-19 concerns and adherence to mitigation measures observed in Tunisia and Sudan, and the weakest association seen in Jordan and Morocco. Policy implications are outlined for effective risk communication and management during disease outbreaks and public health emergencies to encourage appropriate public health behaviours.

Public health measures introduced in early 2020 to curb the spread of Covid-19 played a critical role in mitigating the worst effects of the pandemic. This column highlights how to understand the effectiveness of these policies in MENA, and the importance of evaluating the relationship between risk perception and compliance. People’s risk perception and attitudes towards the disease varied over time and between countries, and assessing the drivers of these variations, and how they affected levels of compliance, is vital for understanding what happened and for building resilience to future crises in the region. 

The COVID-19 pandemic had disruptive consequences for MENA countries’ agri-food value chains that exacerbated poverty and jeopardized food security. This study examines the relationship between individuals’ perception of contracting COVID-19 and their experience of food insecurity, using longitudinal data from the Combined COVID-19 MENA Monitor Household survey. It also investigates the underlying mechanisms of COVID-19 concerns and explores coping strategies employed by households to identify vulnerabilities in food security. The results provide compelling evidence of a strong association between individuals’ concern about the virus and various dimensions of food security, particularly reduced purchasing power and decreased meal frequency. Notably, this association follows an inverted U-shaped curve, with food insecurity initially increasing as worry grows, but declining after individuals contract the virus. High levels of concern were also linked to significant income decreases and worsening economic conditions. Moreover, individuals with higher concerns were more likely to rely on specific coping strategies, particularly spending savings and obtaining funds from relatives or friends. These findings underscore the need for government interventions during disease outbreaks and economic downturns to focus on alleviating individuals’ worry and fear to facilitate informed decision-making that minimizes food insecurity consequences. Additionally, the findings emphasize the need to strengthen social protection systems during public health and economic challenges to ensure food security for vulnerable populations. 

We examine the perceived business risks and impacts on performance associated with the Russian aggression in Ukraine in February 2022 among 450 Egyptian small and medium-sized agrifood enterprises. Our analysis identifies six distinct clusters of enterprises based on their perceived risks and three clusters based on the observed impacts of the war. We find a strong association between perceived business risks and observed impacts, suggesting that the risks identified by agrifood SMEs significantly influence their actual business performance. This underscores the importance of understanding and effectively managing perceived risks to mitigate the negative impacts of external shocks, enhance operational resilience, and improve overall performance. Moreover, the results indicate that the consequences of the war extend beyond direct effects on agrifood enterprises, affecting various stages of the agrifood chain. This implies that, in times of crisis, the absence of a well-functioning agrifood SME sector may threaten the sustainability of the entire agrifood value chain. These insights contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the experiences of agrifood SMEs during the early stages of the war, helping policymakers and enterprises prioritize risk management strategies and allocate resources effectively to enhance performance and competitiveness in times of crisis.

In recent decades, Egypt has experienced rapid internal migration movements triggered by urbanization, socioeconomic development, and environmental changes. From a literature perspective, few scholarly studies have empirically examined the drivers and welfare impacts of internal migration in Egypt, despite the increasing recognition of its inextricably links to urban sustainability. The present study utilized data from two waves of an Egyptian Labor Market Panel Survey (ELMPS) conducted in 2012 and 2018 and consisting of 63,909 observations to examine factors that determine internal migration decisions and their subsequent welfare effects. The results of the two-stage Heckman selection model indicate that both the determinants of internal migration decisions and welfare outcomes differ appreciably depending on migration stream as well as the socioeconomic characteristics of the migrants. In particular, females were found to be more likely to migrate from rural to urban areas, lending support to the growing literature on the “feminization of migration” in developing countries. The OLS regression results, after correcting for self-selection, make a strong case for the positive welfare gains from internal migration in Egypt. Specially, we found that the welfare gains for older and female migrants are much higher than other age and gender groups. A comparison of the welfare effects between different migration streams shows that all migratory movements were associated with positive and statistically significant welfare gains, except for rural-to-urban migration that was surprisingly found to be associated with significant welfare loss for the migrants. Urban-to-urban migration was found to have the strongest welfare enhancing effects on all migrant groups. The empirical findings underline a number of research and policy implications for a sustainable management of internal migration in Egypt and other countries with similar internal migration trends.

The Covid-19 pandemic has posed unprecedented challenges to small and medium agri-food enterprises (SMAEs) in developing countries. However, research investigating what risks Covid-19 posed to these firms, how they responded, and what business opportunities emerged to SMAEs from the pandemic remains scanty. Drawing on a sample of 166 specialist SMAEs in Egypt, this study addressed these entwined questions by using multiple indicators and multiple causes (MIMIC) and mediation analysis. Our results point out that the Covid-19 pandemic exposed Egyptian SMAEs to complex and multidimensional risks, and caused profound effects on both upstream and downstream stages of their supply chains. In general, Egyptian SMAEs adopted a ‘wait-and-see’ approach to cope with such Covid-19 risks and impacts, which was attributed to their lack of sufficient financial resources to develop risk management strategies and formalize structures to deal with unexpected events. Interestingly, the results showed that several business opportunities emerged from pandemic; but SMAEs' resource disadvantages constrained their capacity to seize and exploit these opportunities. Moreover, we found that mitigation strategies adopted by SMAEs present a mediating factor between perceived Covid-19 risks and perceived business opportunities. Overall, our findings call for a paradigm shift in relation to enterprise risk management in developing countries' SMAEs toward more holistic frameworks to enhance their preparedness to future shocks, make mature operational and strategic management decisions, and exploit strategic opportunities.

Like many other developing countries, urban sprawl is a growing phenomenon in India, which poses socio-economic and environmental challenges that worryingly affect urban sustainability. In this study, a latent class clustering approach was used to investigate perceptions of urban sprawl among 622 urban and peri-urban dwellers in Hyderabad. The empirical results clustered the respondents into three distinct classes based on their perceptions of urban sprawl impacts: ‘undecided respondents’, ‘negative perceivers’, and ‘opportunity perceivers’. The majority of respondents were undecided with no strong views towards the impacts of urban sprawl, which may increase their vulnerability and hinder effective adaptation to the adverse economic, social and environmental effects of urban sprawl. This also provokes concerns about the effectiveness of government interventions to build public awareness of urban development and its impacts on the city. With regard to the role of demographic and socio-economic characteristics in shaping the perception of the respondents, the results revealed that social caste plays a determining role in forming dwellers’ perception. In particular, members of marginalised social castes were more likely to form positive perceptions of the impacts of urban sprawl as urban expansion generates better and stable income that improve their social status. In addition, individuals with higher levels of education were more likely to form negative or positive perceptions, implying that efforts to raise social capital could be a useful means for mitigating the impacts of urban sprawl. Finally, membership in community development organisations was a key factor in dictating membership of the negative perceivers’ class. Overall, our findings suggest that an appropriate policy framework and specific programmes are needed for enhancing dwellers’ perception towards the impacts of urban sprawl, which can enhance the design, acceptance, and implementation of a more sustainable governance of urbanisation and contribute to achieving urban sustainability in developing countries.

Nearly half of Africa’s economies are on the brink of debt distress. Unlike previous debt crises, the current one is characterised by a shift from multilateral to commercial and bilateral creditors, notably China, and the proliferation of Eurobonds. Pressured by heavy debt burdens, there is a risk that African governments divert funds from essential sectors such as education, health care and agriculture, causing a vicious cycle of stalled development, food insecurity and an elevated risk of socio-political instability.

Purpose – A better understanding of the determinants of demand through accurate estimates of the elasticityof import demand can help policymakers and exporters improve their market access and competitiveness. This study analyzed the EU’s demand for imported potato from major suppliers between 1994 and 2018, with the aim to evaluate the competitiveness of Egyptian potato.

Design/methodology/approach – This study adopted an import-differentiated framework to investigatedemand relationships among the major potato suppliers to the EU’s. To evaluate the competitiveness of Egyptian potato on the EU market, expenditure and price demand elasticities for various suppliers werecalculated and compared.

Findings – The empirical results indicated that as income allocation of fresh potatoes increases, theinvestigated EU markets import more potatoes from other suppliers compared to imports from Egypt. The results show that EU importers may switch to potato imports from other suppliers as the import price ofEgyptian potatoes increases, which enter the EU markets before domestically produced potatoes are harvested.

Research limitations/implications – Due to data unavailability, the present study relied on yearly data onquantities and prices of EU potato imports. A higher frequency of observations should allow for consideringseasonal effects, and thereby providing a more transparent picture of market dynamics and demand behaviorof EU countries with respect to potato import from various sources of origin.

Originality/value – The study used a system-wide and source differentiated approach to analyze importdemand. In particular, the empirical approach allowed for comparing different demand models (AIDS,Rotterdam, NBR and CBS) to filter out the superior and most suitable model for that data because the suitabilityand performance of a demand model depends rather on data than on universal criteria.

The generally held belief is that government spending on education and research and development is to bring about direct impacts on the advancement and sustainability of an economy. Nonetheless, this evidence is not prevalent within industrialized and third-world economies, particularly among the foremost ten carbon dioxide releasing economies. Therefore, the OLS and the DEA are used to estimate the relationship between government public spending on research and development plus green economic advancement, utilizing data from several countries between 2008 and 2018. The findings reveal a varying green economic expansion indicator, which is a result of inadequate government programs to deliver results. Subsequently, for types of expenditure where formal juxtaposition can be made, such as RE compared with conventional energy, the authors detect that multipliers on green cost are almost twofold their traditional sources. The point approximate of the multipliers is 1.1–1.7 for green energy financing and 0.4 and 0.7 for conventional energy financing, depending on time and modeling. These results passed all the required sensitivity analyses. They provided backing to the bottom-up analysis, which reveals that controlling global warming, including preventing biodiversity extinction, works hand in hand with creating economic development and advancement. 

In their Natural Resource Governance and EITI Implementation in Nigeria, Musa Abutudu and Dauda Garuba provide the most up-to-date and in-depth analysis of the Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), providing a balanced yet critical evaluation of its performance, limitations and potential as an institution for helping Africa’s largest oil exporter to escape the so called resource curse and lay a firm basis for sustainable development. This Current African Issue contains valuable insights and information that will be of interest to all those with a keen interest in institutionalising transparency and accountability in natural resource governance in Africa.

Adolescent sexual and reproductive health remains a major public health challenge in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Comprehensive sex education (CSE) has been hailed as a key strategy to inform young people about sexual health and wellbeing and prevent negative health outcomes. This paper presents an overview of the trends and challenges around sex education in SSA and puts forth key recommendations for future research and policy initiatives.

There is an overwhelming focus on the state and the private sector in the language and practice of privatisation, even though it calls for a tripartite arrangement that includes the people. A major consequence is the failure to comprehend and assess fully the important role of the people. While the people have a major part in supporting privatisation through payment of user charges, they are not often seen as key partners by city governments in Africa. Public participation has important implications for finance and cost recovery. Thus a people-centred approach to privatisation in which the users of services are consulted and involved in decision-making processes is crucial to the emergence of sustainable solid waste management systems in African cities. This study provides useful insights into the complexity of public participation in the context of privatisation of solid waste services and offers policy guidelines relevant to the major stakeholders.

Spatial inequality in service delivery is a common feature in African cities. Several factors account for the phenomenon but there is growing attention towards urban governance and the role of the state. Urban governance policies such as privatization serve as key strategies through which the state regulates and (re)produces spatial inequality in service delivery. This study examined how governance practices related to privatization and the regulatory role of the state reinforce spatial inequalities in the delivery of solid waste services in Abuja, Nigeria. It focused primarily on the issue of cost recovery. Privatization became a major focus in Abuja in 2003 when the government launched a pilot scheme. Although it has brought improvements in service delivery, privatization has also increased the gap in the quality of services delivered in different parts of the city. Drawing on empirical data, the study revealed that little sensitivity to income and affordability, and to income differentials between neighbourhoods in the fixing of user charges and in the choice of the billing method is contributing to spatial inequalities in service delivery. Furthermore, the study suggests that these practices are linked to a broader issue, a failure of the government to see the people as partners. It therefore calls for more inclusive governance especially in decision-making processes. The study also emphasizes the need for a policy document on solid waste management, as this would encourage a critical assessment of vital issues including how privatization is to be funded, especially inlow-income areas.

The University of Pretoria’s Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship (CAS) in South Africa; the Nordic Africa Institute (NAI) in Uppsala, Sweden; and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) office in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, convened a high-level policy dialogue on "Pax Africana and Africa’s Post-Cold War Security Architecture: Peacemaking, Peacekeeping, and Peacebuilding." The meeting was held on 19 and 20 May 2023 in Addis Ababa. Representatives of the African Union (AU), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), as well as key policymakers from the United Nations (UN)and the European Union (EU); joined by leading academics, diplomats, and civil society activists, participated in the policy dialogue. The meeting addressed the role of key domestic, regional, and external actors in strengthening Africa’s post-Cold War security architecture across the continent’s five sub-regions. This report is based largely on key discussions and policy recommendations from the policy dialogue.  

This Discussion Paper explores Nigeria’s human development aid to Africa, Caribbean and Pacific countries under its international volunteer programme called the Technical Aid Corps (TAC). It critically examines the relationship between participation in international civic service and civic nationalism. Using a combination of empirical and analytical methods, the author is able to provide insights into the impact of two decades of Nigeria’s aid diplomacy within the context of South-South solidarity and into the inculcation of values linked to globally oriented citizenship in TAC volunteers. The findings of this study are of value to those interested in emerging African development cooperation in the global South and the expanding notions of citizenship beyond borders. Scholars, development actors and policymakers will find this study refreshingly different and highly informative.

Several African countries are tackling the issue of slums and informal settlements by building completely new housing developments. However, many residents view these new areas as less habitable because of poor social conditions. Drawing on three case studies, this policy note argues that community engagement is crucial when planning to replace informal settlements with modern housing in African cities.

This collection of essays examines the decade (1986-97) that brackets the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, and is both a narrative of that event and a deep reexamination of the international role in ad-dressing humanitarian issues and complex emergencies. Nineteen donor countries and seventeen international organizations have pooled their efforts for an in-depth evaluation of the international response to the conflict in Rwanda.

Africans arriving by rickety fishing boats to the Canary Islands, risking the passage across the Straits of Gibraltar or washed upon the Italian island of Lampedusa are familiar examples of therecent growth in migration from Africa to Europe. There is a darkside of migration in human trafficking, but the picture of a continenton the move also includes highly skilled professionals fromNigeria and Ghana who seek employment in universities and otherprofessions in South Africa. On the positive side migrant remittancesare a major source of income in many sub-Saharan Africancountries, helping to sustain the lives of poor home communities.A major challenge now facing sub-Saharan Africa is how to attractskilled emigrants back for national development.

Does Africa have a future? What are the visions, hopes, ambitions and fears of young Africans for the future of the world, the continent, their nation, and their communities? How do they envisage this world and their roles within it?

These issues have not previously been explored collectively by Africans because of the enormous challenges and the preoccupation with the present. But Africa must not allow the enormity of the problems to blind it to its past and future. Africa must chart its own vision of a desirable future and therefore young Africans, born just before or after independence, were challenged to reflect on the future of the continent. Many responded to the challenge, which has resulted in this volume containing a number of the contributions.

In this book, the voices of a new generation of Africa are heard exploring the future from personal and diverse perspectives. The authors have enumerated the ills of Africa, analyzed the problems and explored the opportunities. Remarkably, despite the daunting nature of the challenges, they were all hopeful about the future. They provided their visions of the future, suggested numerous ideas on how to build a new Africa, and implored Africans to take responsibility for the transformation of the continent. Given the current emphasis on African renaissance and union, the ideas presented here could become the basis for a truly shared vision for the continent.

An underlying assumption of fiscal federalism is that it should create incentives for both the central and constituent governments to efficiently and effectively deliver services to their citizens. Recent discontents with Nigeria’s federal practice, especially since 1999 when the country returned to civil rule, are mostly associated with issues of fiscal federalism. Disputes and conflicts now occur more frequently between the federal and state governments that have to do with resource allocations and intergovernmental finance especially the intergovernmental fiscal transfers. The perceived vertical and horizontal inequalities engendered by the extant revenue sharing formula and the strident demands in several quarters for “true federalism” have become one of the critical sources of threat to Nigerian nationhood.  These trends point to contradictions in the conceptualization and implementation of the Nigerian federalism including its fiscal components. This chapter discusses the challenges of fiscal federalism in Nigeria within the context of the principle of decentralisation, which is understood generally as the devolution by a central government of political, administrative and fiscal powers to local-level government. It also assesses the effects of decentralisation on government performance and the implications for good governance especially since 1999 when the country returned to civil rule. In order to understand decentralisation it is essential for one to study how government is working at the sub-national levels. Fiscal federalism is treated in this chapter from a broad perspective, which is not limited by either the discipline of Economics especially its classical notion of “fiscal federalism” or the discourse in Political Science on “federalism and democracy”. The approach adopted here is the historical perspective; one that presents a holistic analysis of the challenges of Nigeria’s fiscal federalism in relation to their origins as well as current phases. Therefore, the task here is undertaken  guided by the wisdom in  Adiele Afigbo’s counsel  that “the best way to know anything is to know how it began, what factors dictated its origins and what factors dictate its development, as well as where it is heading.” Thus, while it is necessary to pay attention to contemporary trends and developments in the practice of federal system in Nigeria, and factor these into explanatory frameworks for understanding fiscal federalism in the country, it is important that the historical context be incorporated into the discourse. In this regard, historical realities and social conditions such as the colonial origins of the Nigerian federalism, and the overwhelming influence and domination of the federal polity by the military for a period of over three decades need to be recognized as important background or contextualizing variables. Structural and institutional problems in the Nigeria political economy such as over dependence on income from oil and its associated problems, the nature and character of the Nigerian state, and the orientation of the power elites that exhibit greed and lack of patriotism constitute essential part of the intervening variables. Also of importance is the emerging democratic environment in the country that is providing an enabling milieu for the expression of dissatisfaction with the status and role of the centre in the federation’s fiscal system.

In comparison with other African countries, faith in democracy is strong in Ghana. But the legal tussles that followed the last general election in 2012, and the disqualification of some candidates on trifling grounds in the lead-up to this year’s presidential elections, has spurred public mistrust. This policy note issues a warning about hate speech, violent demonstrations and macho-men militias.

The conflicts in the Jos metropolis are not different from other identity conflicts over land in Africa. Studies have shown that dispute over environmental resources is not sufficient by itself to cause violence. When it does contribute to violence, it interacts with other political, economic, and social factors. This perspective draws attention to the social, economic and political contexts underlying environmental resource scarcity’s causal role in African conflicts. This is useful for situating the Jos sectarian conflicts within the context of the interplay of political, economic and social forces in the Jos metropolis. The conflicts connect more strongly to a long historical process on the Jos Plateau than some of the immediate problems widely reported in the media. At the centre of this historical process were British colonialism, the growth of the tin mining economy that brought the early Hausa and Fulani migrant labour to Jos, and the struggles over land. The British colonial administration through its policy of Indirect Rule, and the organization of ethnically segregated communities of ‘natives’ and ‘settlers’ created the settler-indigene divide. The Berom, Afizere and Anaguta who see themselves as the ‘first comers’ refer to themselves as ‘indigenes’ while they regard the Hausa and Fulani as ‘later comers’ and derogatorily labelled them as ‘settlers’. Both the indigenes and non-indigenes have always demonstrated strong emotional appeals to historical factors in their autochthonous claims. This paper examines the role of ethnicity, religion and other primordial sentiments in the Jos conflicts including the politics of belonging and how it relates to land ownership. This paper draws data from the author’s close observations of events in the Jos metropolis for a period of over two decades. Informal interviews, events analyses and qualitative data complement historical and contemporary documentary secondary sources on people, economy and politics of the city of Jos.

This article discusses the political economy of the Arab Spring. It draws attention to the economic and social factors underlying the recent uprisings in the Arab world. Essentially the article relates the internal dynamics in the Arab countries with their status and role in the global economy. It also notes especially the rising awareness in the Arab world on the role of the civil society in domestic politics, especially its capacity to demand political and economic change. The article is divided into five sections. The first section introduces the main issues, while the second section conceptually interprets the Arab Spring within the intellectual discourse on social revolution mainly but with a brief overview on regime change and democratic transition. The third section examines the relationship between oil, politics, and economy in the MENA region. The fourth section contains an analysis of the economic crisis and the various adjustment measures adopted by some governments on the eve of the uprisings. The fifth section examines the external dimensions of the Arab Spring including the international responses. The discussion of the lessons learned and policy recommendations concludes the article.

Nigeria's status and role as a regional power continues to impact the entire West African sub-region. However the country is facing serious security challenges that are complicated by transnational threats which are associated with organised crime and the activities of jihadist movements. Threats to security linked to the activities of illegal migrants, smugglers, drug traffickers and human traffickers in West Africa have attracted considerable attention from scholars, policy makers and practitioners alike. As the activities of the Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati wal-Jihad (People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad) also known as Boko Haram are spreading fast through the northern part of the country into a number of countries in West and Central Africa - notably Chad, Niger, and Cameroon - fears and anxiety have become more noticeable among stakeholders. Also, the challenge of piracy and maritime insecurity in the Gulf of Guinea threatens Nigeria's national security as well as regional stability. This study presents the role of Nigeria as a regional hegemon, and also discusses its response to transnational organised criminality and jihadist activities in the sub-region, highlighting Nigeria's official response as well as other interventions undertaken through bilateral and multilateral platforms. The study concludes that there is no controversy about the desirability of the Nigerian government to curb transnational organised crime and jihadist activities in the country. However, the complexities of strategies and modalities for effective curbing of transnational threats still requires in-depth and concerted efforts than have been given by stakeholders. One may argue that the prospects for effective control of cross-border crime in West Africa are positive. Both at bilateral and multilateral levels, Nigeria has shown commitment to working with other countries within the West African sub-region to address the menace of transnational criminality including smuggling, human trafficking and cross-border banditry. On the otherhand, the oversubscription of Nigeria and some of its immediate neighbours to pseudo-nationalist policies hinder the implementation of broad-based regional strategies to address transnational threats. Thus the general apathy and lack of courage in official circles and among civil society organizations and other non-state actors in West Africa to organise across national frontiers and engage in security and development discourse, all have the tendency to limit the prospects of effective control of transnational criminality. The efforts of the Nigerian government at combating transnational organised crime and the spread of jihadist activities are yielding somegains. However, lack of political will, bad governance, and poorly equipped and motivated defence and security agencies coupled with other problems such as the porosity of the borders and non-involvement of the people have continued to inhibit progress.