Latest news with #authoritarianism
Russia Today
12 hours ago
- Politics
- Russia Today
Mass protests against Zelensky's crackdown on anti-graft bodies: What we know so far
Hundreds of Ukrainians took to the streets across the country on Tuesday to protest Vladimir Zelensky's crackdown on anti-corruption agencies. The campaign is seen by many as an authoritarian push by the Ukrainian leader towards consolidating power. The National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO) were placed under executive oversight following security raids on the NABU, with Zelensky suggesting that the anti-corruption infrastructure was subject to Russian influence. The NABU and SAPO were established in 2015 as part of a Western-backed initiative to combat high-level corruption in Ukraine. Both agencies were seen as crucial conditions for EU membership talks and continued Western financial assistance. The NABU has also played a key role in investigating corruption in the Ukrainian military and procurement schemes. While the agencies were designed to operate independently, with support from the US, UK, and EU, local media suggests they have links to the US Democratic Party. Tensions escalated following recent NABU investigations into politically sensitive cases, including a probe into former Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, former Unity Minister Aleksey Chernyshov, and former Vice Prime Minister Olga Stefanishina. Earlier this week, security officials raided the NABU and SAPO, reportedly without court warrants and at the behest of Andrey Yermak, a top Zelensky aide. The raid resulted in the arrest of one senior official on suspicion of cooperating with Russia. On Tuesday, the Ukrainian parliament approved legislation that placed the NABU and SAPO under the purview of the Prosecutor General, which was signed into law by Zelensky the same day. The controversial move sparked backlash from MPs and Zelensky's political rivals. MP Anastasia Radina warned that the reform would cripple Ukraine's anti-graft system and render it 'purely decorative.' Kiev Mayor Vitaly Klitschko, a critic of Zelensky, accused the government of 'using the war as a pretext to dismantle the anti-corruption agencies' and pushing Ukraine toward authoritarianism. MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak warned that the two agencies would completely lose their independence. The controversial move sparked protests across Ukraine, with rallies in Kiev, Lviv, Dnepr, and Odessa. Demonstrators chanted 'Veto the bill,' carrying signs reading 'Shame!' 'Treason!' and 'We are not suckers!' Others shouted 'Zelensky is devil' and 'f**k Yermak,' referring to the Ukrainian leader's powerful chief of staff. The Ukrainian leader rejected criticism of his authoritarian tendencies, insisting that 'the anti-corruption infrastructure will work – just without Russian influence.' Vasily Malyuk, the head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), claimed that the authorities are fighting Russian intelligence, not the anti-corruption agencies – arguing that people in the agencies will be 'delighted' by the changes. Prominent MP Yulia Timoshenko said the move would shield the country from 'colonialism' and Western influence. Opponents of the reform have drawn parallels with Ukraine's 2014 Maidan protests, which paved the way for the Western-backed coup in Kiev and the ousting of then-President Viktor Yanukovich, with some protesters accusing Zelensky of 'betraying' Ukraine. The original Maidan protest began after Yanukovich – who also faced criticism over perceived authoritarianism – abruptly scrapped legislation for closer integration with the EU. The Group of Seven (G7) has said it has 'serious concerns' about the situation regarding Ukraine's anti-corruption agencies. Katarina Mathernova, the EU's ambassador to Ukraine, hinted that the bloc could reconsider its backing of Kiev, writing on X: 'It is as important as ever to preserve the reform achievements to maintain the support needed to prevail over the enemy.' The Wall Street Journal also argued that Zelensky's political gamble could strip Ukraine of much-needed support in the conflict with Russia. Meanwhile, an Economist report described the development as 'a full-frontal assault on the Maidan-era reforms,' adding that it 'implies that something sinister is at work.' 'The vote to undermine Ukraine's most consequential anti-corruption reforms casts a shadow over the country's future course,' it said.
Russia Today
20 hours ago
- Politics
- Russia Today
Zelensky defends clampdown on anti-corruption agencies
Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky has defended a controversial reform targeting the country's anti-corruption agencies, which has sparked street protests and raised concerns among EU officials. On Tuesday, Zelensky signed a bill into law granting the Prosecutor General's Office authority to intervene in the activities of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO). The move followed a raid by security officials on NABU offices and the arrest of a senior employee accused of spying for Russia. Zelensky rejected accusations of creeping authoritarianism, which have been voiced by opposition politicians, including frequent critic and Kiev Mayor Vitaly Klitschko. 'The anti-corruption infrastructure will work – just without Russian influence. It needs to be cleared of that. And there should be more justice,' Zelensky said in his daily video address early Wednesday. He added that it was 'not normal' for some officials to live abroad 'without legal consequences,' and criticized the failure to investigate corruption cases 'worth billions' over the years. 'There is no explanation for how the Russians are still able to obtain the information they need,' he said. Vasily Malyuk, head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), whose agents conducted the searches involving NABU personnel, denied that the measures amounted to dismantling the anti-corruption system. He insisted that the agencies 'continue to function effectively.' NABU and SAPO were established following the US-backed 2014 coup in Kiev and promoted as key components of reforms intended to align Ukraine with Western governance standards and international financial institutions. However, some Western officials, including US Vice President J.D. Vance, have argued that the decade of transformation has failed to eliminate entrenched corruption. Darya Kalenyuk, executive director of the Kiev-based NGO Anti-Corruption Action Center, linked the government's clampdown to recent investigations involving members of Zelensky's team, including former Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Chernyshov and media executive Timur Mindich. 'NABU has been closing in on members of Zelensky's inner circle and friends,' Kalenyuk said, as cited by the US state-funded outlet Current Time. She adding that the reform may be aimed at concealing the embezzlement of military funds.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump's Wildly Fascistic Posting Spree Isn't Just a Distraction From Epstein
President Donald Trump shared an AI-generated video depicting FBI agents arresting former President Barack Obama and dragging him out of the Oval Office during a Sunday night Truth Social posting spree. The sitting president shared or wrote multiple posts endorsing the jailing of his political enemies, largely citing far-right conspiracy theories. The torrent comes as he seeks to distract the public from the Jeffrey Epstein catastrophe that has consumed his administration for weeks. Trump's fascistic fantasies about making his enemies — from Democratic lawmakers to late-night hosts — suffer aren't just a distraction, though. They're part of the very real authoritarian project he and his administration have been actively carrying out for the past six months, and that they appear determined to continue carrying out through the rest of his time in office. The video of federal agents dragging Obama away, which appears to have been generated with AI, is set to the tune of the Village People's 'Y.M.C.A.' and opens with a compilation of clips showing Democratic officials and lawmakers — including Obama, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), and former President Joe Biden — saying the phrase 'no one is above the law.' The video then cuts to an AI-generated clip of Trump and Obama sitting in the Oval Office, where FBI agents enter, force Obama to his knees, handcuff and arrest him as Trump grins. The video ends with another AI-generated clip of the former president sitting in a jail cell, clad in an orange jumpsuit. Trump has been fuming for days now over accusations raised by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard that Obama and high-level officials from his administration engaged in a 'treasonous conspiracy in 2016' against Trump. Gabbard accused the Obama administration of having 'manufactured and politicized intelligence to lay the groundwork for what was essentially a yearslong coup against President Trump,' related to 2016 Russian election interference efforts. Trump on Sunday also shared an AI-generated video — from an account credited as 'DeepFakeQuotes' — of a man wearing a Guy Fawkes mask telling viewers that 'this is not a conspiracy theory, this is not speculation, this is documented fact.' The video's split screen features a headline highlighting Gabbard's suggestion that Obama and other officials should be prosecuted over their supposed participation in the alleged scheme. Keeping with the theme of prosecuting his political rivals, Trump also posted a photo grid in the style of The Brady Bunch's opening credits ('The Shady Bunch,' read the center square) that featured several prominent Obama-era Democrats in orange jumpsuits, holding up police placards as if posing for mug shots. Obama, former United Nations Ambassadors Samantha Power and Susan Rice, former Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes, former FBI Director James Comey, and former CIA Director John Brennan were depicted in the image. Another AI-generated image the president shared depicted what were presumably handcuffed lawmakers being marched in front of the Capitol with the caption 'UNTIL THIS HAPPENS NOTHING CHANGES.' He also wrote on Sunday that Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), one of the president's longtime targets whom he recently accused of mortgage fraud, should 'pay the price of prison for a real crime, not one made up by the corrupt accusers!' Lest anyone forget that the president is a 79-year-old addicted to his personal social media platform, Trump took a brief detour in his posting journey to share a 'top-25' compilation of dated viral videos, set to stock rock music. It was a bizarre palate cleanser amid the barrage of authoritarian AI slop. In one sense, Trump appears to be trying to divert attention from the weekslong fallout from his administration's decision to bury files related to the Epstein investigation — a subject that has threatened to tear apart sections of the highest levels of the federal government and that has been so aggravating to the president that he has personally managed efforts to quell the 'MAGA rebellion' debacle. Trump seems desperate to return the national conversation to his openly fascistic plans for punishing his political enemies based on bogus narratives, while commanding every major private industry to do exactly what he wants. Trump actually getting everything he wants — for instance, Obama in a jumpsuit — is at best a long shot, particularly in light of the Supreme Court's presidential immunity decision that has greatly behooved Trump. Still, it would be a mistake to dismiss his reminders, on Truth Social and elsewhere, of his administration's authoritarian schemes as mere distractions from Epstein. This is largely because his administration has already proved it is willing to pursue the kinds of fascistic fantasies he has been teasing on Truth Social. In his online rage-posting spree over the weekend, Trump commanded multiple professional sports teams to make their names racist again. He did this after six months of showing that he's more than willing to corruptly wield the federal government to make private entities' lives miserable if they don't do exactly what he wants them to do. Late last week, Trump cattily celebrated CBS' cancellation of The Late Show, hosted by frequent Trump critic and comedian Stephen Colbert. The network's move came against the backdrop of parent company Paramount working to consummate its multibillion-dollar merger with Skydance — a merger that Trump and his government have made clear they could crush whenever they feel like it. 'I absolutely love that Colbert got fired,' Trump posted on Friday. 'I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next.' His dig at Kimmel, who hosts a late-night show on ABC isn't just a distraction, either. Multiple senior Trump administration officials have told Rolling Stone for months that the president is very serious — and has spoken to them repeatedly — about ideas for using government and FCC leverage against major companies in order to retaliate or even silence his nemeses in late-night comedy. In his first term in the White House, Trump wanted his Justice Department to go after NBC's Saturday Night Live and other programs that pissed him off, and he instructed his White House staff to pressure Disney to censor Kimmel, also a frequent Trump critic. Neither of those things worked, in part because some of his senior officials simply waited until he got bored and moved on. In his second term, he is almost entirely surrounded by lieutenants who want to help him get as close to achieving his authoritarian fantasies as possible. Indeed, several of the current senior Trump officials say the president and his team feel 'emboldened' by how many major corporate entities and other private organizations have bent the knee in recent months, with one Trump adviser saying the 'pounds of flesh' Team Trump has extracted already from places like Paramount Global and CBS are significantly more than they were expecting going into this second Trump era. The lesson this president and his top appointees are learning is that they can, in fact, get away with it, and that it can only benefit their autocratic cause to push the envelope further. And that is just as true during the weeks when Trump doesn't want you to talk about his former friend Jeffrey Epstein. More from Rolling Stone Jimmy Fallon Responds to Colbert Cancelation: 'I Don't Like What's Going On' Stephen Colbert Addresses Cancelation by Telling Trump to 'Go F-ck Yourself' Jon Stewart to CBS After Colbert's 'Late Show' Cancellation: 'Go F-ck Yourself' Best of Rolling Stone The Useful Idiots New Guide to the Most Stoned Moments of the 2020 Presidential Campaign Anatomy of a Fake News Scandal The Radical Crusade of Mike Pence
Mail & Guardian
a day ago
- Politics
- Mail & Guardian
Paul Biya's presidential candidacy a crisis of democracy in Cameroon
Cameroon's president, Paul Biya, has been in power for four decades. Photo: Marco Longari/AFP On 14 July 2025, Paul Biya, Cameroon's 91-year-old president, Failure to confront this moment will also teach Africa's youth that formal politics offers neither accountability nor meaningful change. Cameroon has not experienced a peaceful transfer of power since independence. Power remains concentrated in the presidency, while opposition parties are The judiciary is subordinate to the executive and electoral bodies lack credibility. The system has grown accustomed to continuity rather than contestation and, over time, democracy has been reduced to a set of controlled rituals rather than a functioning political culture. Biya's extended rule is not just a national problem. It reflects a regional weakness. Over the years, organisations such as the African Union and Central African regional bodies have failed to take meaningful action on cases of long-term incumbency, especially where elections proceed without outright violence. The quiet tolerance of indefinite leadership has allowed authoritarianism to be dressed in the language of legality. The AU's Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance calls for term limits, transparent elections, and citizen participation, but its enforcement has been weak and inconsistent. This failure Within Cameroon, the consequences of this political stagnation are clear. The conflict in the Anglophone regions remains unresolved, with thousands displaced and ongoing reports of violence. State responses have relied on force and token gestures of engagement. A lasting solution requires a shift towards genuine political dialogue that includes local voices and acknowledges the historical and structural roots of the crisis. Without that, the cycle of Decentralisation, long promised but never fully delivered, must also be addressed. The country remains one of the most centralised in Africa, with local governments underfunded and politically weak. Meaningful decentralisation would empower communities and signal a commitment to democratic reform. It would reverse the long-standing exclusion of peripheral regions from national decision-making. Electoral reform is another urgent priority. Public confidence in the electoral process is low, with allegations of fraud, media bias and voter intimidation common in each election cycle. If elections are to serve as more than a legitimising tool for incumbents, they must be grounded in fairness, transparency and institutional independence. This will require a review of the legal framework, the composition of the electoral commission and equal access to campaign platforms. Biya's continued presence in power highlights a broader generational crisis in African politics. Leadership is dominated by ageing elites, while the continent's youthful majority is sidelined. In Cameroon, many young people have only ever known one president. Their exclusion from governance is not just symbolic; it has practical consequences for political legitimacy, innovation and long-term development. When young citizens do not see themselves reflected in leadership, they disengage, emigrate or, in some cases, mobilise through informal or radical means. Any vision for democratic renewal must include the deliberate inclusion of youth in decision-making spaces, not as tokens, but as central actors in shaping the country's future. None of these reforms can succeed in isolation from economic renewal. Cameroon's youth, who make up 60% of the population, face high Cameroon's crisis cannot be addressed through surface reforms or another tightly controlled election. If there is to be a turning point, regional actors must take responsibility. The AU and other African leaders should not view Biya's decision as an isolated national matter, but as part of a broader pattern that threatens the continent's commitment to inclusive political governance. Silence in the face of democratic decline is not neutral. It is a form of complicity. African institutions must be prepared to act when those in power no longer serve the people or uphold democratic norms. Biya's candidacy is not simply a continuation of the past. It is a warning about the future. Helen C Folefac and Tinashe Sithole are post doctoral research fellows at the SARChI Chair African Diplomacy and Foreign Policy at the University of Johannesburg.
Telegraph
a day ago
- Politics
- Telegraph
We shouldn't be surprised young people like me are becoming radicalised
Young people are communists. Wait, they're actually fascists. Or are they both? According to the think tank Onward and Merlin Strategy's Generation Extreme report, the young people of Britain seem to be rather cross with the political mainstream. Some 38 per cent of them now agree that we'd be better off under 'a military strongman with no government or elections'. Quick, somebody tell Keir Starmer. I wouldn't give too much credit to my fellow Gen Zedders and their newfound love for all things extreme. Being able to simultaneously hold favourable views of fascism, communism, and absolute monarchy doesn't suggest a well thought out political realignment. We can't blame a lack of education: my history GCSE curriculum bounced from the evils of Hitler to Stalin with no time to figure out what that chap Henry VIII got up to. So why is it that young people in particular seem to find authoritarianism so agreeable, while the older generations shun the fringes? I believe there's something Freudian afoot. For once, claims that kids these days refuse to grow up have some purchase to them. The stages of life that transform one from a moody teenager to civic-minded taxpayer, complete with a family of your own, seem to have disappeared, with young adults instead suspending themselves in a state of permanent adolescence. This appears to have happened by choice. People avoid having kids so they can spend their money on consumer goods (sorry, Greta, we're really not that bothered about climate change). The option to bore ourselves to death with endless phone-facilitated entertainment has made real socialisation optional. And if you think the modern world is overwhelming and decide you don't want to work, that's no problem: the Government is all too happy to pay for you to rot in bed, wrapping you in cotton wool like an overbearing mother.
