Mewtee, 4157 Ranaka Street, Randfontein (2025)

23/12/2025

Benin’s failed coup: three factors behind the takeover attempt

Military elements attempted to topple Benin’s government in early December 2025. However, unlike other coups across the Sahel and west Africa since 2020, this bid triggered a military response from Benin’s neighbours.

Benin is a west African state of 14.8 million people bordered by Togo, Burkina Faso, Niger and Nigeria.

Responding to two requests for assistance from the government of President Patrice Talon, Nigeria deployed fighter jets and the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) deployed elements of its standby force to target and dislodge the pro-coup forces.

Ecowas intervention likely played an important role in undermining the coup’s momentum and restoring order. The dozen or so putschists scored early tactical successes. They captured and broadcast from the national television station, occupied a military camp, and even took the two senior-most army officers hostage. But once Ecowas intervened militarily, any fence-sitters concluded that loyalists would prevail. Rather than a broad-based uprising, only 14 were arrested with a few plotters still at large.

I’m a scholar who maintains the Colpus dataset of coups and I have documented the history of post-second world war coups. As part of this work, I have sought to document the complex causes and effects of Africa’s post-2020 “epidemic of coups”, now entering its fifth year.

Though details remain scant on the motives of the coup plotters led by Lt. Col. Pascal Tigri, three structural factors likely contributed to the latest coup attempt:

growing autocracy under Talon since 2016

rising jihadist violence in Benin’s north that is spilling over from Sahel neighbours

deepening coup contagion as Africa’s coup belt now threatens the west African region.

From democratic backsliding to democratic u-turn?
Benin does not have a history of recent coups. It had not suffered a bona fide coup attempt since January 1975.

In the first 15 years after independence from France in 1960, Dahomey (as the country was then called) experienced nine coup attempts, making it one of the most coup-prone countries in sub-Saharan Africa during the early Cold War period.

However, political instability through the early 1970s gave way to the stable and durable personalist regime of Mathieu Kérékou (1972-1990). This was followed by electoral democracy after the Cold War.

Until recently, Benin had been heralded as one of Africa’s “democratic outliers” and success cases of democratic survival despite challenging conditions. Though poor, Benin has seen decades of improving average living standards. Economic growth in 2025 was 7.5%; the latest unrest cannot be blamed on poverty or an economic crisis.

However, data on three key dimensions of democracy shows that although electoral contestation and participation have endured, constraints on the executive (and thus liberal democracy overall) have declined in Benin since Talon’s election as president in 2016.

According to autocratic regime data from US political scientists Barbara Geddes, Joe Wright and Erica Frantz as well as the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) project (which surveys experts about democracy worldwide), Benin slipped back into an electoral autocracy in 2019. That is when opposition candidates were prevented from competing in parliamentary elections. The polls were marred by repression of mass protests and an internet shutdown.

In 2021, an electoral boycott led to Talon’s easy re-election.

V-Dem data show a very partial and incomplete democratic rebound since 2022. The opposition was allowed to compete in the January 2023 parliamentary elections. And earlier this year Talon confirmed that he would not seek an unconstitutional third term.

The potential for a coup, however, was foreshadowed last fall when the regime alleged that it had uncovered a coup plot involving a presidential hopeful in 2026. Last month, parliament’s vote to create a Senate was condemned by the opposition as allowing Talon a means to influence affairs after he steps down.

With the main opposition party barred from running in next year’s presidential election, Talon is expected to hand off power to his ally and finance minister, Romuald Wadagni.

Though the political leanings of Tigri and coup plotters remain unclear, Tigri claimed to seek to “free the people from dictatorship”.

The coupmakers also presumably sought to block the upcoming 2026 parliamentary and presidential elections.

A growing jihadist threat
Among the coup leaders’ key complaints was Talon’s mismanagement of the country. In particular, they cited “continuing deterioration of the security situation in northern Benin and "the ignorance and neglect of the situation of our brothers in arms who have fallen at the front” due to worsening jihadist violence.

A number of coups in nearby countries since 2020 have been preceded by rising levels of political violence and deepening insecurity born of jihadist insurgencies. That was certainly the case in Mali, Burkina Faso and to a lesser extent Niger.

Since last year, it has been clear that the jihadist violence was spilling over from Sahel neighbours such as Burkina Faso and Niger into the borderlands of west Africa. This included Benin’s north. ACLED data show a major increase in political violence events since 2022. And a spike in political fatalities in 2024:

Much of this increased violence is attributable to the advance of operations by the al-Qaida affiliated group Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM). The group also managed to launch its first fatal attack in Nigeria at the end of October.

Russia has become the primary security partner for the Sahel Alliance. The defence pact was signed in 2023 by post-coup juntas of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger to defeat jihadists and maintain power.

Nevertheless, Benin has continued to rely on western security partners to aid its counter-insurgency efforts and bolster border security. Notably, Benin continues to welcome military cooperation with France. Since 2022 Paris has pledged greater military aid to combat terrorism.

In September, US Africa Command commander General Dagvin Anderson visited Benin to underscore cooperation to oppose terrorism.

During the coup attempt, Tigri reportedly warned against French intervention and railed against “imperialism”. The speech reportedly ended with the phrase “The Republic or Death”, which echoes the new motto of Burkina Faso’s junta.

This suggests that the coup makers may have been inspired by others in the Sahel.

Risk of the coup belt expanding

The Benin events mark the third coup attempt and first failed coup this year in the Sahel region. There have been 17 coup attempts in Africa since 2020, including 11 successful coups. This makes the African coup belt stretching across the Sahel and west Africa the global epicentre of coups.

West Africa’s latest “copycat” coup attempt was condemned by the African Union, European Union and Ecowas. Yet it was praised by pro-Russian social media accounts, reflecting a growing cleavage between the Russia-aligned juntas of the Sahel Alliance and the remaining Ecowas-aligned civilian regimes of west Africa.

Although Nigeria-led Ecowas threatened military intervention after the coup in Niger in July 2023, the regional body only actually militarily intervened to defeat the coup attempt in Benin. Nigeria, it appears, has drawn a line in the sand to retain a buffer from further instability – including JNIM operations. On the same day of the coup attempt in Benin, it was reported that Nigeria was seeking greater aid from France to combat insecurity.

Author
John Joseph Chin
Assistant Teaching Professor of Strategy and Technology, Carnegie Mellon University

Disclosure statement
John Joseph Chin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

22/12/2025

Climate change and inequality are connected – policies need to reflect this

An increasingly strong case is being made to bring inequality into discussions about climate change. The logic behind this has been set out by leading international institutions such as the International Labour Organisation, the UN Environmental Programme and the Network for Greening the Financial System.

All have begun to highlight the connection between climate outcomes and inequality. They are stressing that inequality should be viewed as posing systemic and macroeconomic risk. Inequality has been found to undermine democracy, social and political cohesion and economic stability. Inequality also undermines our ability to deal with climate and environmental challenges.

In a recent summary paper we analysed how environmental policies can be designed and implemented with an inequality-reduction lens. We used examples from South Africa, Colombia, Indonesia and Mexico.

As researchers in the research department of the French development agency the AFD, specialising in the analysis of inequality and the social implications of energy and economic transitions, we have seen how climate action can either narrow or deepen existing divides, depending on how policies are designed.

The core of the case we make is that reducing inequality should be a guiding principle in decisions on climate change. There are numerous cases we studied in which it’s clear that countries often simply opt for compensating those who stand to lose from environmental transitions rather than seeking more equitable solutions. This needs to change. But a shift requires focusing on a meaningful reduction of inequality as well as understanding who wins from the transition.

The green transition and the absence of equity
We take the just transition as a starting point as it is increasingly cited as the accepted framework for building sustainable economies. This approach focuses on the social dimension of the ecological and energy transition and highlights the need to secure the livelihood of those negatively affected by the green transition. It highlights an inclusive transition to a low-carbon and sustainable economy, leaving no one behind.

Countries are progressively incorporating just transition principles into their national climate strategies. Examples include South Africa’s 2022 just transition framework and Mexico’s upcoming NDC 3.0. But when it comes to the actual design and implementation of policies, equity is rarely treated as the central concern. This becomes obvious when we look at some of the characteristics of the current green transitions.

Green jobs: The promise often is that these jobs are better, more stable and more sustainable. But the research we coordinated in Colombia with the University of Los Andes shows that these opportunities benefit groups that already have advantages. Examples include university-educated urban men. Women, youth and rural populations remain largely excluded.

Green infrastructures: We looked at who owns green infrastructures, such as solar parks, wind farms, smart grids, and storage systems. We often saw it remained largely in the hands of large private and multinational companies. In South Africa, for instance, the union Numsa has pushed back against a profit-driven renewable energy programme that transferred risks to the state and kept electricity tariffs high. The main beneficiaries of the programme are financial actors and multinational corporations. This is a good illustration of how ownership determines who controls energy as well as who truly gains from the transition.

Environmental protection policies. These include:

protected areas – defined spaces with the goal of nature conservation and the preservation of ecosystems

biodiversity offsets – intended to compensate for environmental damage caused by development projects.

These policies and plans for environmental protection can generate inequalities as they are often designed top-down. As a result, local communities can lose out.

What needs to shift

Putting inequality reduction at the centre means more than adding a social component to existing programmes.

In Colombia, the findings point to the need for early and targeted public policies to address labour market disparities. Examples include:

integrating training in renewable energy, energy efficiency and other sustainability-related skills into technical and vocational training

using approaches tailored to local needs and that are sensitive to gender differences.

Another thing that needs to change is the level of support for businesses and particularly small enterprises so that they can contribute to job creation. Most of them operate informally and rely on survivalist strategies. Evidence from South Africa showed that they’re excluded from just energy transition plans.

We also identified areas that need improvement around taxation. A fair climate policy should start with recognising that carbon taxes are not neutral: their burden falls differently across income groups.

In Indonesia, the study we led with our partners using microsimulation found that a €30-per-ton carbon tax would slightly increase costs for lower-middle income households. But when revenues were recycled through targeted cash transfers to low-income and energy-poor households, the policy had positive outcomes.

This example shows that equity depends less on the tax itself than on how its proceeds are used.

Finally, democratising ownership of the energy transition process is key to ensuring that it’s just. Our evidence shows that community and user-owned models can make renewable infrastructure inclusive as well as viable. Examples include community-owned solar installations, worker share ownership schemes and multistakeholder cooperatives.

In Mexico’s Río Lagartos, for example, a local fishing cooperative invested in a solar-powered ice machine. This led to costs being cut and local incomes being boosted.

Next steps

Inequalities threaten the commitment to existing efforts in the climate domain. Embedding the reduction of inequality into climate action is an opportunity for a meaningful transformation.

The examples we found of best practice as well as the weaknesses in initiatives can help guide policymakers. The needle is moving in discussions on inequality. The suggestion by the G20 Extraordinary Committee of Independent Experts on Global Inequality is a case in point. It has recommended the creation of a global panel to provide guidance to countries on how they can ensure that reducing inequality sits at the heart of their development trajectories.

Authors
Anda David
Senior researcher, Agence Française de Développement (AFD)

Rawane Yasser
Researcher, Agence Française de Développement (AFD)

Disclosure statement
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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21/12/2025

Nigeria’s low-cost private schools are the only option for millions: is closing them a good idea?

Nigeria’s basic education landscape consists of public (government) schools and a diverse private sector. Private schools in Nigeria refer to educational institutions that are run by private individuals, religious organisations, foundations or business enterprises. These schools are diverse in terms of size, cost, ownership models and target populations, ranging from low-fee neighbourhood schools to faith-based schools and “premium” schools. The number of private schools isn’t captured in official statistics.

Over the past year, many private schools have been closed across the country. Ebonyi State sealed more than 280 unapproved schools. Cross River officials shut down 69, and Akwa Ibom, Kogi and Delta states launched their own crackdowns on “rogue” schools operating without government approval or with substandard infrastructure.

These closures are being justified on safety and quality grounds, given that many of these schools, commonly referred to as low-cost private schools, operate without full registration.

Before a private school can open, owners must pay multiple inspection, registration and annual renewal fees. They must also meet infrastructure requirements and show evidence of qualified teaching staff.

The recent enforcement drives expose a fault line in Nigeria’s education system: the country’s growing dependence on low-cost private schools to fill the gaps that an overstretched public system can no longer cover.

I researched the private schooling market in Nigeria for my doctorate, and my latest paper sets out some of the factors that shape enrolment in these schools in Nigeria.

I found two main factors: the proximity and accessibility of public schools, and affordability.

The implication for ongoing closure drives is significant. If low-cost private schools are concentrated in communities where public schools are unavailable or distant, or are the only affordable options, then wide-scale closures disproportionately threaten access for children from low-income households, particularly in hard-to-reach or underserved areas. Abrupt shutdowns without transition plans can interrupt learning and deepen existing inequalities.

More investment is needed to make sure every child can go to school.

Private school diversity

Across Nigeria, private provision has expanded rapidly. According to figures cited by the minister of education, the number of private schools grew by about 39% between 2017 and 2022, compared with only 3.5% growth in public schools over the same period.

In my research, I grouped private schools into three cost categories – low-cost, mid-cost and high-cost – based on mandatory educational costs. I used national survey data from 2015 (the latest data is from 2020, but is not publicly available yet), which showed that most pupils who were enrolled in private schools attended those in the low-cost category.

My analysis of the 2015 survey data found that 52% of private-school pupils in urban areas and 49% in rural areas attended low-cost private schools. A further finding was that public schools and low-cost private schools served similar populations: children from low-income households with limited schooling alternatives.

State-level evidence reinforces this. In Kwara State, a 2016 census found that 67% and 41% of urban and rural private schools respectively were low-cost private schools. More recent data from the Partnership for Learning for All in Nigeria (a UK-government-funded education programme operating in Nigeria) show that a high proportion of private schools are low-cost schools that operate without approval in some northern states: around 85% in Kano and 80% in Jigawa.

Taken together, these national and state findings show that low-cost private schools have become an important route to education for millions of pupils.

Access and affordability

Access

Although parental preference plays a role for some households, attendance in low-cost private schools is shaped by the availability and accessibility of public schools. My doctoral research shows that attendance is most prominent in areas where public-school provision is weak. In many parts of Nigeria, weak provision can take the form of overcrowded classrooms or limited school availability. Distance to the nearest public school also plays a key role. The further a low-income family lives from a public school, the more likely they are to enrol their child in a low-cost private school. This pattern is pronounced in areas where public provision is thin and mobility costs are high.

In practice, low-cost private schools operate as an access mechanism, stepping in where the state is absent or unable to meet local demand.

Affordability

Affordability further explains why these schools are widely used. My research found that their annual fees typically ranged from ₦8,000 (about US$18 in 2015, the year the data was collected) in urban areas to ₦5,000 (about US$11 in 2015) in rural areas. Paradoxically, the total cost of attending a public school was sometimes higher, with an average of US$43 in urban areas and US$24 in rural areas.

Recent data from the Partnership for Learning for All in Nigeria baseline study in Jigawa shows that about 40% of low-cost private schools charge no tuition, while 48% charge ₦10,000 or less per year (approximately US$22 in 2022). This confirms that they are either free or highly affordable for most families. Affordability matters because public education, although constitutionally free, is rarely without costs in practice.

Many states still permit partial fee regimes or informal levies, and parents often bear expenses for uniforms, learning materials and other charges. Policymakers have begun to flag this issue, with the Imo State House of Assembly recently urging the government to enforce free basic education and eliminate charges.

Regulating for inclusion

Closing down private schools without transition plans could prevent low-income families from educating their children.

Nigeria’s regulatory framework for private schools is among the most demanding in sub-Saharan Africa. An assessment of 22 countries found that Nigerian states ranked among the most restrictive for market entry.

If the goal is to raise standards without undermining access, regulation must shift from punishment to support.

Tiered licensing would allow low-cost private schools to operate legally while improving over time. Oversight should be paired with practical assistance such as training or conditional waivers, an approach reflected in the 2025 National Policy on Non-State Schools. Every closure should include a plan for placing pupils in schools with capacity.

Nigeria cannot regulate its way out of reliance on private school provision. Stronger public investment is needed so families are not forced to pay privately for basic education.

Author
Thelma Obiakor
Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Cambridge

Disclosure statement
Thelma Obiakor does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

20/12/2025

Revolutionary rap: Nigerian star Falz has kept protest music alive

Nigerian rapper, actor and social media star Falz released his sixth studio album, The Feast, in 2025.

Few Nigerian popular musicians have shown as much versatility and staying power as the man behind the and social media trends. For over a decade now, Falz has been marrying musical skills and social activism with digital savvy and comedy.

His rise to global prominence was solidified with his 2018 song This is Nigeria. But it began in 2014 with Marry Me off his debut album Wazup Guy.

As a young artist known for his video skits, he created an online challenge ahead of releasing the song Ello Bae (Hello Babe). In it he tries to romance a woman who appreciates him and his ambition, but is looking for a man with money. It remains a common hashtag when TikTokers post about love and money.

In 2017 he released Wehdone Sir (Well Done, Sir), a witty takedown of people with fake glamour lifestyles. is still used on social media to satirise pretentious individuals.

Falz would become known for his unique blend of hip-hop and Afropop, but what really made him stand out was his skill at infusing humour into his socially conscious, often revolutionary, songs.

It’s often argued that Falz is a natural heir to Fela Anikulapo-Kuti. He was the Nigerian music legend and activist who helped create the Afrobeat movement (a precursor to today’s Afrobeats).

Like Fela, Falz packs his music with playfulness and satire while also stirring public consciousness with activist lyrics. Both call for action against the oppressive political class. In 2020, when young Nigerians took to the streets to demand an end to police corruption, Fela and Falz were both part of the inventory of protest songs.

As a scholar of Nigerian hip-hop, I have published papers on Fela and Falz and how they have shaped protest music that responds to social challenges in Nigeria.

So, who is Falz, and how has he spread his message – and come to be the political voice of his generation, as Fela was to his?

Who is Falz?

Falz (real name Folarin Falana) was born in 1990 in Mushin, Lagos. He is the son of a respected human rights lawyer and activist father, Femi Falana, and lawyer mother, Funmi Falana. In fact, his father was Fela’s lawyer, defending him against charges brought by the state.

Falz also qualified as a lawyer, but chose instead to pursue his interests in music and acting. These multiple skills feed into his productions on diverse levels. Beyond his songs, he is also very active on Instagram and Tik-Tok, where he establishes trends, especially around his songs and films.

His character in Ello Bae, for instance, struggles with English, using big formal words in unexpected ways, finding comedy in his faux Yoruba inflections. It would be a trademark of the and would enjoy renewed public attention when Falz was cast in the TV series Jenifa’s Diary playing a similar character.

In 2016, Falz won best new international act at the BET Awards in the US. Numerous other awards would follow. His albums have received commercial and critical success. His roles in movies have further solidified his status as a multitalented entertainer.

Activism

Falz does not shy away from living the talk. He took part in the 2020 protests and his work repeatedly tries to steer the government towards addressing socio-economic challenges.

Soon after the protests, he released Moral Instruction. On the album, the track Johnny depicts the everyday experiences of Nigerians. This is Nigeria, a localised version of US rapper Childish Gambino’s This is America, depicts Nigeria as a country struggling with corruption, lawlessness and social injustice. A stark contrast to its potential. The video reflects a breakdown in law and order, corrupt officials, and the struggles of young people facing limited opportunities and resorting to crime.

Falz has used his platform as a celebrity and his background as a lawyer to call for social justice and for young people to make a difference.

Fela and Falz

There have been a number of pretend heirs to Fela’s throne of musical consciousness. Many of these have either not lived up to the hype or have fizzled out.

However, many popular Nigerian artists leverage Fela’s ethos through sampling his beats and lyrics. This is evident in Falz’s musicography too.

My study on the lyrical and thematic connections between Fela and Falz songs compares a number of tracks. Fela’s No Agreement and Falz’s Talk, for example, both draw attention to social inequality and systemic challenges in Nigeria.

Fela’s song was produced in the context of a military regime while Falz’s was within a democratic dispensation. But both speak of a crisis of leadership in Nigeria, as is the case in many postcolonial societies. What particularly links Fela and Falz is that both are unrelenting in their revolutionary struggles and determination to ensure an equitable Nigerian society.

Religious leaders are not spared criticism. Echoing Fela’s Coffin for Head of State (1980), Falz’s Amen (2019) points to the deceptive practices and complicity of religious leaders in poor political leadership and endemic poverty. Both critique the double standards that have become normal in the country.

Falz’s Follow Follow (2019) addresses current realities in Nigerian society – a lack of personal conviction and independent thought and the mindless following of social media trends. Integrating lyrics from Fela’s Zombie (1976), the song is about asserting one’s identity. It also rehashes Fela’s Follow Follow, mocking those who allow themselves to be led blindly by others.

To make sure his advocacy resonates, Falz co-opts his listeners through a call-and-response strategy. A phrase is sung and the next phrase answers it. This way, along with catchy lyrics, the audience become active participants.

This also echoes the traditional Yoruba chant-and-refrain rendition used by musicians, poets and bards to engage their audience. Its possible nod to the indigenous is also at the heart of his faux Yoruba accent, a style that downplays his prestigious upbringing and connects him to ordinary people, much like Pidgin did for Fela.

But echoes of Fela don’t in any way take away from the creative force of Falz’s work. Rather they reinforce his critique of how the postcolonial Nigerian state has failed to live up to its promise.

Into the future

While Fela was unrepentantly anticolonial, Falz is sublimely hybridised. His mixture of talents and views creates a pulsating pan-African consciousness that’s able to exist in a global contemporary world view.

His lyrics and videography are aimed at the masses – especially young people – who have the most to gain from positive social change. In this way Falz can be said to represent a generational conscience. He uses his empowering songs to motivate his fans to take their destinies in their own hands.

Author
Paul Onanuga
Lecturer, Federal University, Oye Ekiti

Disclosure statement
Paul Onanuga does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

12/09/2025

The West African ebony tree (Diospyros crassiflora) can grow up to 25 metres tall. It is a culturally iconic and economically valuable tree prized for its deep black heartwood. Ebony has been used for centuries to make carvings, piano keys and guitars due to its special harmonics.

Our research found that no other animals in the Congo Basin are able to disperse the ebony tree’s seeds in the same way. This has left a functional gap in the forest – one that current conservation strategies too often overlook. Forest elephants have been poached out of two-thirds of the ebony trees’ natural habitat so most of the Congo Basin’s adult ebony trees are in elephant-free areas. This means they won’t be able to get any help from elephants in dispersing or concealing their seeds within dung.

Ebony and ivory: why elephants and forests rise and fall together in the Congo Basin.

The forest elephants of the Congo Basin are critically endangered and face extinction.

They live in Africa’s largest forest, extending over the continent’s west and central regions. Large populations are found in Gabon and the Republic of Congo and smaller groups in Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Côte d'Ivoire, Liberia, Ghana, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.

But ivory poaching means their numbers have plummeted by 86% over the past three decades.

The sharp reduction of their population has a knock-on effect on the Congo Basin forest itself. This is because African forest elephants are the rainforest’s gardeners. They disperse more plant species than any other animal, regenerating and reshaping plant communities.

I’m a conservation scientist and part of a research team of international and Cameroonian scientists who set out to examine how forest elephants interact with West African ebony trees.

We wanted to know if the decline of elephants had negative, cascading effects on other Congo Basin forest species. We focused on ebony because it was known to be a food for elephants and its wood is prized for numerous uses.

The research team set up tree plots and experiments in forests with and without elephants (often lost due to hunting). We used hidden cameras to record which animals ate ebony fruit and how ebony seeds enclosed in dung grew into seedlings. Our lead researcher, Vincent Deblauwe, spent years in the field conducting these experiments and even built a custom camera trap to observe ebony pollinators for the first time in the canopy.

We also collected ebony seeds from within elephant dung, manually planted them, and carefully monitored germination rates and seedling survival.

Additionally, the project developed cloning propagation methods to support future replanting of ebony trees and ebony plantations.

Our research found that forest elephants, a different and smaller species than savannah elephants, are tightly linked to ebony’s life cycle.

The impact of elephants

These little four-tonne elephants support ebony reproduction in at least two ways.

Distance matters: Elephants move the ebony seeds quite far away from the parent tree. This reduces the risk of ebony trees growing close together and inbreeding. Inbreeding weakens the genetics and lowers their chances of being resilient and adaptable to future environmental change.

Dung as armour: Elephants consume ebony fruits whole and the pulp is digested from around the seeds before they p**p them out intact. We found digestion did not help the ebony seeds germinate. However, being encased in dung protected the seeds from rodents that eat and kill the seeds. This greatly improved the seeds’ chances of survival and germinating.

Our research found that there are nearly 70% fewer small (younger) ebony trees in the areas where elephants have disappeared. Most adult ebony trees alive today were dispersed by elephants decades ago because ebony is a slow growing wood that can take 50 years to begin reproducing, and 60 to 200 years to fully grow.

Our conclusion is that it is not certain that ebony trees in the Congo Basin will be able to survive naturally without the help of elephants.

Both elephants and rare ebony lie at the heart of the national heritage of Cameroon. By safeguarding elephants, Cameroon can protect the long-term viability of sustainably managed ebony and other valuable timbers.

A wake-up call for Central African forests

It’s not only the future of ebony that’s at stake. Other large-seeded trees may also rely on elephants to move their seeds. Elephant declines could be quietly reshaping forests in ways scientists are only beginning to uncover.

The takeaway is clear: plant-animal interactions are not a luxury add-on to conservation plans; they’re foundational to keeping forests functioning.

What needs to happen next

There are already many efforts to protect elephants and the processes they drive. Sadly, these seem insufficient to date.

The most urgent conservation action is halting the killing of elephants for ivory. Reducing illegal logging of ebony trees is also important. Both of these can be accomplished by better education with local residents about the ecological and economic importance of elephants and ebony, and improved enforcement of existing poaching and logging regulations.

Another important step is monitoring less charismatic tree species that also depend on elephants. Similar plant-animal relationships and the species and services they provide might be at risk.

Our project increases international research partnerships with Cameroon’s domestic experts and attracted expertise and funding for local institutions. For example, this research project provided education and capacity-building for Cameroonian researchers and practitioners, growing national expertise in biodiversity management.

Finally, African forest elephants don’t just live in the Congo Basin’s rainforests – they shape them. Increased poaching of elephants for ivory not only threatens the ebony tree – forest elephant declines can ripple through forest structure, biodiversity, and carbon storage.

This work was part of the Congo Basin Institute at UCLA and was largely funded by Taylor Guitars, which uses ebony for their instruments. They have invested nearly a decade in ebony research and conservation.

Author
Matthew Scott Luskin
Researcher and Lecturer in Conservation Science, The University of Queensland

Disclosure statement
Matthew Scott Luskin receives funding from NASA, ARC, and the National Geographic Society.

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