Theme: Trust between Citizens & Institutions

COVID-19 has created a global uncertainty: everyone everywhere is thinking about the possibilities of premature death. This uncertainty is upon all of us, but the African continent in particular, and the Global South in general, have been facing this uncertainty and this possibility of premature death for a very long time. Because of that, we will need to shift the geography of knowledge and even the biography of knowledge and begin to think about what is it that the Global South can offer us in dealing with this pandemic. What can we gain from indigenous African knowledges and epistemologies of the Global South? This argument arises because the Global South in general, and the African continent in particular, have some of the richest histories and experiences of dealing with epidemics and pandemics.

We watched in disbelief as COVID-19 emerged in China and ravaged parts of Europe and the Americas. Being a deeply religious country, we prayed and hoped that we would be insulated after all, we were miraculously spared the 2014 Ebola crisis that hit a number of West African countries including Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria. Our hopes did not last beyond March 12, 2020, when our first two imported cases were reported. The third case recorded on March 14, 2020 was a University of Ghana student who had returned from a trip abroad. That hit home painfully, and we quickly had to act.

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought unprecedented disruption and uncertainty to universities in Africa. It forced the higher education sector in Africa to make changes that were long overdue by magnifying existing challenges to students’ ability to engage with their learning. COVID-19 has forced universities to recognize that the future is now. For years, many universities and governments have been talking about the need for online education or blended learning models in which at least part of a student’s education is captured online through a learning management system. However, many schools have been slow to respond to this call. COVID-19 has forced universities to either adapt quickly to an online delivery system or to stall and risk obsolescence.

Academic and research institutions find themselves tasked with learning how to adapt in real-time amid the COVID-19 pandemic that is significantly disrupting the global higher education sector. Most of the focus so far has been on western countries, leaving major gaps in our understanding of how Africa’s own centres of knowledge production are faring in this crisis. We know that the state of research and higher education on the continent has long been a cause for concern even before the COVID-19 crisis, and early indications show that the virus is exacerbating these vulnerabilities.

When the COVID-19 outbreak began to emerge as a global crisis, countries around the world were forced to react and prepare for a potential outbreak within their borders. For many, closing their borders was an immediate solution, but for Uganda, it was a measure to buy time for a public health approach composed of multisector strategies that had proven successful time and time again in the country’s response to epidemics.

The COVID-19 pandemic, as a biomedical public health issue, poses a grave threat to health and life. It is most infectious. It causes serious illness. It is also deadly. With no vaccine yet to treat it, COVID-19 continues to pose a serious threat to the rights to health and life of people. Indeed, the governance and socio-economic fallout from COVID19 poses even more serious threat to large number of human and peoples’ rights. How we respond to COVID-19 and its impacts on the basis of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights could prove to be the litmus test for mitigating the grave consequences to the political freedoms and socio-economic rights of people on the continent.

The success of efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19 will depend partly on forging and strengthening partnerships with young people in Africa. Across the continent, youth-led and youth-focused organisations have continued to show resilience and innovation in contributing to solutions to respond to the challenges that have emerged due to COVID-19.

The entry into and rapid spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in Africa has raised several significant questions pertaining to the capacity of governments to respond effectively and, more importantly, to gain citizens’ – especially youths’ – trust in a period of global crisis. The management of COVID-19 by some African governments has offered a veritable opportunity to garner public trust and at least improve (if not completely change) public perceptions, especially with regard to accountability and transparency.

Even before the onset of COVID-19, the social and economic integration of young people was an ongoing challenge. The pandemic has been particularly hard on young women, children and youth from middle- and lower-income countries. Of the many impacts associated with the pandemic, young people face challenges linked to education, health, food and shelter. Unless urgent action is taken, young people are likely to suffer severe and lasting impacts from the pandemic. In spite of this, young people remain determined to collaborate safely and effectively with governments, civil society and other institutions to ‘Build Back Better’.

The 2020 United Nations (UN) peacebuilding review was tasked to take stock of the progress made over the first 15 years of the UN’s Peacebuilding Architecture (PBA). Over the last few months, almost all peacebuilding initiatives and programmes have been affected by the measures introduced to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. The downstream effects of the pandemic are likely to continue to have an impact on peacebuilding, and especially its financing, for at least the next 12 to 24 months.