Tsvangirai's path to the prime ministership has been long and difficult. He was arrested in both 2000 and 2003 on unsuccessful treason charges and, in 2007, was badly beaten while in custody. Even his most bitter enemies and detractors acknowledge his courage.

Born on 10 March 1952 in Masvingo, Tsvangirai never attained the educational qualifications required for university study. He always felt defensive about this and his reading remains undisciplined. He has a liking for political biographies, particularly the one by Nelson Mandela.

Robert Mugabe was an early hero but when Tsvangirai began his career as vice-president of the Associated Mine Workers Union in the 1980s, and then as secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions from 1988-2000, he began disputing Mugabe's implementation of adjustment programmes that badly affected his members. He was beaten by Mugabe's thugs, most spectacularly in 1997 when assailants tried to throw him out of a skyscraper. They failed to intimidate him and, by the late 1990s, he had become a formidable opponent of Mugabe's ZANU-PF.

Tsvangirai played a leading part in the National Constitutional Assembly and was its chair in 1997-98. This was a convention of civil society groups that fought for constitutional liberalism. However, his decision to help found the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in 1999 decisively tilted the struggle from one between civil society and government to one that was based on a contest between political parties. Even now, it is impossible to say how deeply this divided independent groups, and some never forgave Tsvangirai for marginalising them.

The rapid growth of the MDC shook ZANU-PF, and Mugabe lost the 2000 referendum because of MDC opposition. The president's response with the farm invasions was meant to assert his authority and to fulfil his life's dream of a completed nationalism. Mugabe accused Tsvangirai of being a puppet of the West, and fought on the negative platform of avoiding the return of colonialism, with Tsvangirai as the frontman of the old powers. But he also cheated, and the rigging of the 2002 elections was sufficient to deny Tsvangirai victory.

The Tsvangirai of those days was not impressive to African leaders. Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo was scornful and South Africa's Thabo Mbeki never fully overcame his early views on Tsvangirai's lack of leadership capacities. This was stubbornness on Mbeki's part, as Tsvangirai rapidly matured as a political figure.

The intensity of events surrounding the 2008 elections saw stalemate and finally a compromise. Mugabe and ZANU-PF had been certain they would win and the extent of MDC support surprised even Tsvangirai. Most objective analysts agreed that he took sufficient votes to become president, but the process of counting allowed the scaling down of the figures to force a run-off. The build-up to the run-off was one of increased state violence, forcing Tsvangirai to withdraw and allow Mugabe to claim victory.

That 'victory' convinced no one, and previously tolerant African presidents soon began turning against Mugabe. Against this backdrop, Mbeki's mediation led to the sort of compromise achieved in Kenya.

\The challenges facing Tsvangirai are immense, and many, even within the MDC, question whether the courageous opposition leader can muster the capacity to restore a complex, broken nation. Many blame the 2006 MDC split on his heavy-handed approach to internal quarrels about his leadership; and it is also thought that, had he been more generous by way of political concessions to the breakaways, he would have won the 2008 election by a large enough margin to make the subsequent scaling down of the figures more difficult, if not impossible.

Tsvangirai is often considered a person who makes decisions too swiftly and then feels unable to carry them through. If he gets to act as prime minister, he will have to tame his impulsiveness and learn the protracted art of tip-toeing through a minefield of different agendas in a coalition of so many checks and balances that, without goodwill, any progress is impossible.

Almost two decades after the fall of the Berlin wall, the Communist Party are back in business. Forget Volga sedans and vodka rations – that’s for the historical materialists. Marxist-Leninism South African style is a little hipper than that. It also should be said that South Africa’s communists are a tad more idealistic than were the fading Stalinists of the Soviet order.?

This time the Communists have pinned their colours to the mast of the ANC’s Jacob Zuma, a man not known for left-wing or trade union sympathies. In fact, Zuma earned his spurs in the ANC as a ruthless intelligence chief rooting out dissidents and ultra-leftists.?

The ANC’s leftist allies now refer to the period after Jacob Zuma’s election as ANC president as the ‘Polokwane Spring’ which they say will usher in the ‘national democratic revolution’. “We are at the crossroads in the history of our revolution” said SACP secretary general Blade Ndzimande. There is “the potential for the movement to make a significant leftward shift”, he added. Cosatu chief Zwelinzima Vavi agreed: “The change of direction in policy is now urgent.” Whether Zuma can deliver that change is another matter. As Nzimande and Vavi roar into Zuma’s left ear, corporate South Africa is whispering into his right. Bobby Godsell, executive chairman of Eskom and former CEO of AngloGold, said the financial crisis is an opportunity for emerging markets, with their growing middle classes and development potential.?

Godsell said the post-Mbeki ANC is showing a new openness about engaging in dialogue with business and civil society groups on how best to address South Africa’s development challenges of crime, health, education and job creation.

For now, it will be President Kgalema Motlanthe running South Africa’s ‘national democratic revolution’, and his steadiness and political acumen have impressed so much that some have demanded that he stay as national president while Zuma keeps the party presidency. But both men face the same charge of ‘talking left and acting right’.?

Motlanthe’s choice of cabinet ministers matched skills to the relevant portfolios. The minerals and energy portfolios may be separated and there may be some radical changes as the ANC seeks to assert control over the country’s resources. SACP spokesman Malesela Maleka is said to be keen on overseeing the creation of a state mining company – that at least will be music to the ears of the comrades.

Back to South Africa, The death of unity

On 7 November 2008, President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, at 72 years old, began his 22nd year in power, and is readying himself to win his fifth - and final- five-year mandate in the 2009 presidential elections.

A previous career in the army led to the post of head of the military security services (1964-1974), and then head of national security (1977-1980). Ben Ali was promoted to minister of the interior, then made prime minister in October 1987. He deposed President Habib Bourguiba, whose senility brought chaos to the end of his reign. Once head of state in November 1987, Ben Ali followed a reformist but prudent path, to avoid, in his words, "any slip-ups".

In politics, a mix of openness and authoritarianism has characterised his method in the democratic transition. On one hand, the presence in parliament of representatives of the 'moderate' opposition has been permitted, allowing them at present 20% of the seats, regardless of their election results. This does not prevent them being labelled as symbolic. The radical opposition and human rights defenders often complain of police harassment. The Islamist movement, created in 1981, turned out to have the largest popular support in the country after the ruling party in the parliamentary elections in 1989 - and since then has been outlawed.

As a sign of potential openness, for the 2009 presidential elections, any citizen can run, but on the conditions of having gained the support of at least 30 MPs or mayors, and not being over 75 years old. In fact, because of the weakness of the opposition and the monopoly held by the presidential party, these conditions are impossible to meet. The constitution, exceptionally, has been amended to allow the heads of legal opposition parties, even 'radical' ones, to become candidates.

Ben Ali has nevertheless drawn some lessons from two recent events that prove all is not well with Tunisia's youth. First, at the end of 2006, a small Salafist (hard-line Islamist) group, even though quickly neutralised, revealed the existence of a minority of youths who were drawn into violent protest. Then during the first quarter of 2008, in the mining region of Gafsa, in the south, several towns and villages were the theatre of conflict between the forces of order and young unemployed demonstrators. In response, the president shook up his ministerial team, bringing youth into the government and into his ruling party, the Rassemblement Constitutionnel Démocratique.

On the economic front, and despite the preoccupations caused by an unemployment rate of 14%, even higher among young graduates, the success of the Tunisian economy has been recognised by international bodies and ratings agencies. Ben Ali has been a liberal reformer with a taste for free entreprise, spending a large part of his time on economic development, particularly to attract foreign investment. The economic growth rate has been around 5% a year over the last 15 years. And for several years, Tunisia has been in the top 50 of the Davos competitiveness report, at 36th place in the 2008/09 edition.

Tunisia was also the first country of the south Mediterranean to sign a partnership agreement with the EU in 1995. This undertook to progressively reduce tariff barriers between the two, which culminated in the free trade zone agreement which came into force from 1 January 2008.

The only problem is that an open economy in which 80% of trade is with the EU makes Tunisia a hostage to the fortunes of Europe. If recession hits the EU in the wake of the financial crisis, it will no doubt have an impact on Tunisia, and may well aggravate unemployment. Another challenge for Ben Ali.

Resource-rich but mismanaged, the Niger Delta encapsulates Nigeria’s national political and economic problems. The occasional well-meaning initiative is quickly sunk by corrupt local barons. The crisis has been costing 500,000 barrels of oil per day – that is about $20bn a year at average oil prices in 2008.?

On taking office in May 2007, President Umaru Yar’Adua said his government would give the Delta special attention. Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan, who hails from the oil-bearing Bayelsa State, initially persuaded the militant gangs in the region to call a ceasefire, and to suspend their attacks on oil installations and kidnappings of oil workers. Two of the region’s new governors, Timipre Sylva of Bayelsa and Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers, made extravagant promises about new jobs.

?The initiatives turned out to make little difference as sporadic militant attacks resumed in 2008. Then, grand plans for a landmark conference were grounded when people objected to its chairman, Ibrahim Gambari – who had been Nigeria’s ambassador to the UN when Ogoni activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was hanged by General Sani Abacha’s junta in 1995. Delta citizens also harbour scepticism about the government’s commitment to the rule of law when they see no action taken against former governors James Ibori (Delta State) and Peter Odili (Rivers State), previously under investigation for corruption and money laundering, but who now claim immunity.?

Promises of military assistance in the Niger Delta from French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in support of Yar’Adua’s campaign against stolen or ‘blood’ oil provoked the militants to call off any further pretence of a ceasefire. Within 18 months of Yar’Adua taking power, events in the Delta had come full circl. 

Back to Nigeria, A change in need of belief