In Somalia, water infrastructure projects are building climate resilience and reducing emissions by using solar panels to provide energy. A new report calls for recognizing and establishing a nexus between the water, energy and food sectors in the Horn of Africa. Credit: UNDP/Tobin Jones

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 13 2024 (IPS)

The Horn of Africa holds the resources and potential for lasting development and resilience. The countries in the subregion and development partners need to come together to invest in regional cooperation and resource management.

On December 12, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched the first-ever Human Development Report on the Horn of Africa subregion, which includes Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, and Uganda.

Horn of Africa Human Development Report 2024: Enhancing Prospects for Human Development through regional Integration, explores the key challenges that the eight countries and the subregion are experiencing in

In the Arab states and the African region, low productivity in economic activity will only continue in a “vicious cycle,” one that perpetuates poverty for the population. Abdallah Al Dardari, UN Assistant Secretary-General and UNDP Regional Director for the Arab States, remarked that the countries in the subregion have been taking what he described as a “siloed approach” to state affairs, even as its neighbors are dealing with the same issues. This is evident in how the region engages with the water and food sectors.

The report calls for recognizing and establishing a nexus between the water, energy and food sectors. Over 50 percent of the population across the Horn of Africa experience moderate to severe food insecurity and only 56 percent have access to electricity. Less than 56 percent have access to clean drinking water, yet the report indicates that this is not a consistent experience among the countries, given their geographical locations.

Conflict and disasters have also been persistent factors that have limited development in the Horn of Africa, as over 23.4 million people have been displaced in the wake of major conflicts in Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, and internal conflicts like in Ethiopia.

The report presents three priorities that will help to accelerate human development and build resilience: build on increasing intra-regional trade, enhance collaboration in the water, energy and food sectors, and promote governance and peace.

The region could see a GDP increase of 3.9 percent by 2030 through liberalizing trade and reducing tariffs. The African Continental Free Trade Area (ACFTA) agreement would also boost trade were it fully implemented; the countries in the ACFTA need to ratify the agreement for them to benefit. Regional integration through collaboration on resource management can help foster sustainable growth and climate resilience, as the report suggests. This could be seen in improved access to electricity and shared food value systems. This could be valuable in a subregion that holds a high share of renewable energy sources such as wind, solar, and hydro and yet faces significant energy gaps.

“What we’ve attempted to do with this report is see if we can begin to see a shift in the narrative on this region,” said Ahunna Eziakonwa, the UN Assistant Secretary General and Director of UNDP’s Regional Bureau for Africa. In working towards integration in economic and political relations, she argued, partnerships need to be established within the subregion that is built on finding commonalities and shared purposes. Changing the narrative is key towards achieving sustainable development.

At the report’s launch, Eziakonwa remarked that certain demographics needed to be brought into the fold when discussing development, requiring a re-examination of the narratives associated with them. Young people make up a significant percentage of the population across the region, yet they have been characterized as the problem rather than the solution. Involving young people and recognizing the skills and perspectives they can bring to the table is critical, which will involve expanding socio-economic opportunities for the youth population that are not employed or in education. Investing in women’s participation in the development sector is also needed, for they have been largely left out of decision-making spaces and policy discussions.

Through this report, UNDP is calling on governments and development partners to invest in infrastructure and policy frameworks that build up human development and resilience in the Horn of Africa.

IPS UN Bureau Report

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United Nations are warning of another drought in the Horn of Africa. Eight years ago famine left more than 260,000 dead. Pictured here is a child from drought-stricken southern Somalia who survived the long journey to an aid camp in the Somali capital Mogadishu during the 2011 famine. Credit: Abdurrahman Warsameh/IPS

By James Reinl
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 25 2019 (IPS)

Humanitarian groups and the United Nations are warning of another drought in the Horn of Africa, threatening a repeat of the deadly dry spell and famine that claimed lives in Somalia and its neighbours eight years ago.

The British charity Oxfam said Thursday that more than 15 million people across drought-stricken parts of Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia now needed handouts and warned of a hefty death toll unless donors stumped up cash fast.

“We cannot wait until images of malnourished people and dead animals fill our television screens. We need to act now to avert disaster,” said Lydia Zigomo, Oxfam’s regional director for the Horn of Africa.

According to an Oxfam report, donors were quick to dig into the pockets for a drought in 2017, helping to stave off a famine that could have been as deadly as the 2011 dry spell that left more than 260,000 dead, and many more hungry and sick.

But while the humanitarian response was well-funded back in 2017, donor governments have not raised enough cash yet this time around, added Zigomo, a human rights lawyer from Zimbabwe.

“We learned from the collective failures of the 2011 famine that we must respond swiftly and decisively to save lives. But the international commitment to ensure that it never happens again is turning to complacency,” said Zigomo.

“Once again, it is the poorest and most vulnerable who are bearing the brunt.”

The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR has also sounded the alarm. Somalia’s recent April-June and October-December rainy seasons were drier than expected, worsening an arid spell that was already hitting farmers and herders across the turbulent country. 

Some 5.4 million Somalis were expected to be facing food shortages by September, and 2.2 million of them would need “immediate emergency assistance” UNHCR spokesperson Babar Baloch warned last month.

Donors had only handed over one fifth of the 711 million dollars that was requested in an appeal in May, added Baloch.

“The latest drought comes just as the country was starting to recover from a drought in 2016 to 2017 that led to the displacement inside Somalia of over a million people,” Baloch told reporters in Geneva.

“Many remain in a protracted state of displacement.” 

Last month, the European Union launched a 3.2 million euro scheme to manage water sources and agriculture and lessen the impact of drought, in cooperation with officials in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, and the northern breakaway region of Somaliland.

“Water and land are critical resources for the Somali economy and people’s livelihoods but are also extremely vulnerable to natural disasters and climate change,” said EU diplomat Hjordis D’Agostino Ogendo.

“While access to water needs to increase, needed infrastructures are to be designed and managed in a sustainable way.”

Somalia has seen little but drought, famine and conflict since dictator Siad Barre was toppled in 1991. The country’s weak, U.N.-backed government struggles to assert control over poor, rural areas under the Islamist militant group al Shabaab.

Droughts are getting worse globally, according to the U.N. Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). By 2025, some 1.8 billion people will experience serious water shortages, and two thirds of the world will be “water-stressed”.

Though droughts are complex and develop slowly, they cause more deaths than cyclones, earthquakes and other types of natural disaster, the UNCCD warns. By 2045, droughts will have forced as many as 135 million people from their homes.

“With climate change amplifying the frequency and intensity of sudden disasters … and contributing to more gradual environmental phenomena, such as drought and rising sea levels, it is expected to drive even more displacement in the future,” added Baloch.

But U.N. experts say there is hope. By managing water sources, forests, livestock and farming, soil erosion can be reduced and degraded land can be revived, a process that could also help tackle climate change.

Djibouti’s strategic and commercial relevance at the junction of Africa, the Middle East and Indian Ocean is further bolstered by its increasing network of ports. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

By James Jeffrey
DJIBOUTI CITY, Apr 5 2017 (IPS)

As balmy night settles over Djibouti City, the arc lights come on at its growing network of ports as ships are offloaded 24 hours a day and trucks laden with cargo depart westwards into the Horn of Africa interior.

Not that long ago Djibouti was known for little more than French legionnaires, atrocious heat and its old railway line to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia. Nowadays, however, this tiny republic of only about 900,000 people on the Horn of Africa coast has big plans, including turning its capital into the Dubai of Africa.Befitting a crossroads nation, a heady melting pot culture exists: cafés brewing coffee in the traditional Ethiopian style, Yemeni restaurants serving the specialty poisson Yemenite, and haggling at open-air markets in rapid-fire Somali.

Since gaining independence from France in 1977, Djibouti has steadily carved out a regional role through its strategic and commercial relevance at the junction of Africa and the Middle East, and at the confluence of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, overlooking a passage of water used by 30 percent of the world’s shipping transiting from and to the Suez Canal.

“It’s a weird place, really,” says an Addis Ababa-based foreign diplomat. “Djibouti’s also important strategically. I don’t know why more isn’t reported about it.”

Recently-acquired Chinese investment totaling more than 12 billion dollars is funding the building of six new ports, two new airports, a railway, and what is being touted as the biggest and most dynamic free trade zone in Africa, potentially giving the capital, Djibouti City, an edge over its rivals.

“About 2 million African customers travel to Dubai each year,” says Dawit Gebre-ab, with the Djibouti Ports and Free Zones Authority overseeing the city’s commercial infrastructure development. “We know what is on their shopping lists, and they could be coming here instead.”

Helping secure such ambitions is the fact that Djibouti is viewed as offering some of the most prime military real-estate in the world, both to counter piracy threatening that key shipping lane—since peaking in 2011, when 151 vessels were attacked and 25 hijacked, piracy has steeply declined—and to shore up regional stability.

Another foreign diplomat referred to Djibouti as “an oasis in a bad neighbourhood”.

In 2014, the US military agreed a 10-year extension to its presence—with an option to extend for another 10 years—centered on Camp Lemonnier, its African headquarters.

US president Barack Obama described the camp as “extraordinarily important not only to our work throughout the Horn of Africa but throughout the region.”

A similar perspective happens to be held by China, also. In addition to its Djibouti investments, having invested huge amounts in the rest of East Africa—especially in neighboring Ethiopia, one of the world’s fastest growing economies, and 90 percent of whose imports come through Djibouti—it wants to secure those interests and others throughout sub-Saharan Africa.

On a beach in Tadjoura locals play a traditional Afar game—Djibouti’s population consists mainly of ethnic Somali and Afar—on the sand. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

Furthermore, ever thirsty for crude oil, China wants to shield its heavy dependence on imports from the Middle East that south of Djibouti pass from the Gulf of Aden into the Indian Ocean and then on to the South China Sea.

In 2016 China finalized plans for a new base in Obock, a small port a couple of hours by ferry from Djibouti City northward across the Gulf of Tadjoura. About 10,000 Chinese personal will occupy the base once complete.

Foreign military already stationed in Djibouti—including from France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain and Japan—number around 25,000, according to some estimates.

But behind all the construction cranes, flashy hotels and military camps, there still exists a very different side to Djibouti.

Every morning in the small town of Tadjoura, about 40km west of Obock along the coastline, local Djiboutians queue to collect their daily quota of baguettes—a scene repeated across the country.

Djibouti’s former existence as colonial French Somaliland has left an indelible Gallic stamp. Along with Somali, Afar and Arabic, French remains one of the main languages used.

Locals in Tadjoura, a small town across the Gulf of Tadjoura from Djibouti city, buying their daily baguettes, a legacy of French colonial rule. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

A constant stream of Bonsoirs greet the visitor during an evening wander around Djibouti City’s so-called European quarter and its focal point: Place du 27 Juin 1977, a large square of whitewashed buildings and Moorish arcades named for the date of independence.

South of the quarter’s French-colonial-inspired architecture and orderly avenues and boulevards, lies the dustier and more ramshackle African quarter.

Here, befitting a crossroads nation, a heady melting pot culture exists: cafés brewing coffee in the traditional Ethiopian style, Yemeni restaurants serving the specialty poisson Yemenite, and haggling at open-air markets in rapid-fire Somali all adds to the surprising melting pot within this small capital city.

But whether that lively cultural mix can withstand the brash new modernizing development is a concern for some locals, proud of the country’s past and heterogeneous mix of traditions.

“My fear is not about cultural change, because we need that as this is an ultra-conservative society,” says an elegant Djiboutian professional in her early thirties, her hair covered in the Muslim style, and a cigarette clasped in her slender fingers as the sun dips behind the original old port in the distance.

“It is more about the effects on our customs, such as traditional clothing, food and decorations that symbolize our identity.”

While Djibouti’s maritime commerce and government’s ambitions continue apace, for the average local Djiboutian everyday life remains unaffected by dreams of an African Dubai. Here a lady makes fresh juices on the street to slake the thirsts of sun-blasted pedestrians in Djibouti city’s African quarter. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

Others are more outspoken in their criticism of Djibouti’s current strategic and economic upswing—a healthy 6 percent a year, and likely to surpass 7 percent amid the construction boom.

Some locals talk of a country run by a business-savvy dictatorship that has reaped profits from its superpower tenants while not doing enough to relieve widespread poverty; having signed an initial 10-year lease for the base, China will pay 20 million dollars per year in rent. The US pays 60 million dollars a year to lease Camp Lemonnier.

“The government only cares about how to collect the country’s wealth,” says a Djiboutian journalist previously arrested for reporting domestic issues. “They do not care about freedom of expression, human rights, justice and equal opportunities of people.”

Dreams of a Dubai-type future don’t appear to have much relevance for most local Djiboutians, 42 percent of whom live in extreme poverty, while up to 60 percent of the labor force are unemployed, according to current estimates.

“Now I can’t stay here,” says Mohammed, a marine engineer, who left Iraq after the 1991 war for Djibouti where he married a local woman. “My three children won’t be able to get good enough jobs. I’m hoping my brother in the US will be able to get us a green card.”

A 2014 US State Department human-rights report on the country cited the government’s restrictions on free speech and assembly; its use of excessive force, including torture; as well as the harassment and detention of government critics.

Even the hugely popular use of khat by locals is manipulated by government officials as a means of repression, critics claim. It’s alleged government affiliates facilitate its sale in the country as a money maker and means of keeping a potentially frustrated populace calm, while handing it when campaign season rolls around to win favor.

Meanwhile, ships endlessly glide to and from the ports, where cranes offload containers to waiting trucks late into the night under the arc lights.

In early 2017, the new Chinese-built 4-billion-dollar railway officially opened linking Djibouti to the Ethiopian interior—the original railway has lain abandoned for years—and which could eventually connect to other Chinese-built railways emerging across the African continent.

Djibouti’s location has always been its most precious resource—devoid of a single river or the likes of extractable minerals, it produces almost nothing.

Nevertheless, for nearly 150 years it has attracted armies, mercenaries, smugglers, gunrunners and traders: anyone and everyone concerned with the movement or control of merchandise. And that trend only seems set to increase.

“Ethiopia has a population 100 times larger than Djibouti’s but it only imports and exports six times as much,” says Aboubaker Omar, chairman and CEO of Djibouti Ports and Free Zones Authority. “Imagine the day that demand matches Ethiopia’s population size.”

In the capital people encounter a mishmash of chaotic local market commerce existing alongside diaspora-funded construction including glass-fronted office buildings, Wi-Fi enabled cafes and air-conditioned gyms, all suffused with characteristic Somali energy and dynamism. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

By James Jeffrey
HARGEISA, Somaliland, Feb 17 2017 (IPS)

Crossing African borders by land can be an intimidating process (it’s proving an increasingly intimidating process nowadays in Europe and the US also, even in airports). But crossing from Ethiopia to Somaliland at the ramshackle border town of Togo-Wuchale is a surreally pleasant experience.

Immigration officials on the Somaliland side leave aside the tough cross-examination routine, greeting you with big smiles and friendly chit chat as they whack an entry stamp on the Somaliland visa in your passport.“If you look at the happiness of Somalilanders and the challenges they are facing, it does not match.” --Khadar Husein, Operational director of the Hargeisa office of Transparency Solutions.

They’re always happy to see a foreigner’s visit providing recognition of their country that technically still doesn’t exist in the eyes of the rest of the political world, despite having proclaimed its independence from Somalia in 1991, following a civil war that killed about 50,000 in the region.

A British protectorate from 1886 until 1960 and unifying with what was then Italian Somaliland to create modern Somalia, Somaliland had got used to going on its own since that 1991 declaration, and today exhibits many of the trappings of a functioning state: its own currency, a functioning bureaucracy, trained police and military, law and order on the streets. Furthermore, since 2003 Somaliland has held a series of democratic elections resulting in orderly transfers of power.

Somaliland’s resolve is most clearly demonstrated in the capital, Hargeisa, formerly war-torn rubble in 1991 at the end of the civil war, its population living in refugee camps in neighbouring Ethiopia. An event that lives on in infamy saw the jets of military dictator Mohammed Siad Barre’s regime take off from the airport and circle back to bomb the city.

But visitors to today’s sun-blasted city of 800,000 people encounter a mishmash of impassioned traditional local markets cheek by jowl with diaspora-funded modern glass-fronted office blocks and malls, Wi-Fi enabled cafes and air-conditioned gyms, all suffused with typical Somali energy and dynamism.

“We are doing all the right things that the West preaches about but we continue to get nothing for it,” says Osman Abdillahi Sahardeed, minister for the Ministry of Information, Culture and National Guidance. “This is a resilient country that depends on each other—we’re not after a hand out but a hand up.”

Non-statehood deprives Somaliland of direct large-scale international support from the likes of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. For these members of the Somaliland Seaman’s Union at Berbera Port’s docks, it means they are not paid the same wages—they earn about $220 a month—as paid to foreign workers due to not belonging to an internationally recognised organisation. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

Increasing levels of exasperation within Somaliland’s government and among the populace are hardly surprising. Somaliland’s apparent success story against the odds remains highly vulnerable. Its economy is perilously fragile. Non-statehood deprives it of direct large-scale international support and access to the likes of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (I.M.F.).

As a result, the government has a tiny budget of about 250 million dollars, with about 60 percent spent on police and security forces to maintain what the country views as one of its greatest assets and reasons for recognition: continuing peace and stability. Also, it relies heavily on the support of local clan elders—it is hard for any government to prove its legitimacy when essential services need the help of international humanitarian organizations, local NGOs and the private sector.

Indeed, Somaliland survives to a large extent on money sent by its diaspora—estimated to range from $400 million to at least double that annually—and by selling prodigious quantities of livestock to Arab countries.

All the while, poverty remains widespread and swathes of men on streets sipping sweet Somali tea and chewing the stimulating plant khat throughout the day testify to chronic unemployment rates.

“About 70 percent of the population are younger than 30, and they have no future without recognition,” says Jama Musse, a former mathematics professor who left Italy to return to Somaliland to run the Red Sea Cultural Foundation center, which offers cultural and artistic opportunities for Hargeisa’s youth. “The world can’t close its eyes—it should deal with Somaliland.”

Peace and security hold in Somaliland, so effectively that moneychangers can safely stash bundles of cash on the street. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

For now, Somaliland’s peace holds admirably well.

“If you look at the happiness of Somalilanders and the challenges they are facing it does not match,” says Khadar Husein, operational director of the Hargeisa office of Transparency Solutions, a UK-based consultancy focused on civil society capacity building in Somaliland and Somalia. “They are happy because of their values and religion.”

But others speak of the risks of encroaching Wahhabism, a far more fundamental version of Islam compared to Somaliland’s conservative though relatively moderate religiousness, and a particular concern in a volatile part of the world.

“Young men are a ready-made pool of rudderless youth from which militant extremists with an agenda can recruit,” says Rakiya Omaar, a lawyer and Chair of Horizon Institute, a Somaliland consultancy firm helping communities transition from underdevelopment to stability.

Almost everyone acknowledges the country’s present means of sustainment—heavily reliant on the private sector and diaspora—must diversity. Somaliland needs greater income to develop and survive.

Abdi Muhammad, a veteran of the Somali civil war, makes his feelings clear. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

For many, the key to Somaliland’s much needed economic renaissance lies in tapping into the far stronger economy next door: Ethiopia, Africa’s second most populous country and its fastest growing economy, according to the I.M.F.

Crucial to achieving this is Berbera, a name conjuring images of tropical quays and fiery sunsets. Once an ancient nexus of maritime trade, Berbera has long been eclipsed by Djibouti’s ports to the north. But Berbera Port is now on the brink of a major expansion that could transform and return it to a regional transportation hub, and also help fund Somaliland’s nation-building dreams.

In May 2016, Dubai-based DP World was awarded the concession to manage and expand Berbera for 30 years, a project valued at about 442 million dollars, including expanding the port and refurbishing the 268-kilometer route from the port to the border with Ethiopia.

Landlocked Ethiopia has long been looking to diversify its access to the sea, an issue of immense strategic anxiety. Currently 90 percent of its trade goes through Djibouti, a tiny country with an expanding network of ports that scoops at least 1 billion dollars in port fees from Ethiopia every year.

Somaliland would like about 30 percent of that trade through Berbera, and Ethiopia is more than happy with that, allocating such a proportion in its latest Growth and Transformation Plan that sets economic policy until 2020.

Ethiopia and Somaliland had already signed a Memorandum Of Understanding (MOU) covering trade, security, health and education in 2014, before in March 2016 signing a trade agreement on using Berbera Port. And Ethiopia could just be the start.

“It would be a gateway to Africa, not just Ethiopia,” says Sharmarke Jama, a trade and economic adviser for the Somaliland government during negotiations on the port concession. “The multiplying benefits for Somaliland’s economy could be endless.”

Somaliland officials hope increased trade at the port will enable greater self-sufficiency to develop the country, while also chipping away at the international community’s resistance over recognition.

“As our economic interests align with the region and we become more economically integrated, that can only help with recognition,” Sharmarke says.

Perhaps. The political odds are stacked against Somaliland due to concerns that recognizing Somaliland would undermine decades of international efforts to patch up Somalia, and open a Pandora ’s Box of separatist claims in the region and further afield around Africa.

But greater self-sufficiency would undoubtedly result from a resurgent Berbera, and without this crucial infrastructure revival Somaliland’s economic potential will remain untapped, trapping its people in endless cycles of dependence, leaving those idle youth on street corners.

On April 13, 2016, up to 500 migrants died after a boat capsized crossing the Mediterranean. Most media reported that a large portion of those who died were from Somalia. But in Hargeisa following the tragedy, locals noted how many of those who died were more specifically Somalilanders.

“Why are they leaving? Unemployment,” says Abdillahi Duhe, former Foreign Minister of Somaliland and now a consultant in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. “Now is a very important time: we’ve passed the stage of recovery, we have peace—but many hindrances remain.”

“We stand for cooperation and partnership – rather than competition – in our relations with Africa and the world” – Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, South Africa’s Minister of International Relations and Cooperation and chair of the African Union Peace and Security Council: Credit: Courtesy of Maite Nkoana-Mashabane

By Maite Nkoana-Mashabane
PRETORIA, Aug 3 2015 (IPS)

The Freedom Charter, which turned 60 this year, envisaged that a free and democratic South Africa would be guided in its relations with the rest of the African continent and the world by a desire to seek “peace and friendship”.

Twenty-one years after the attainment of our freedom and democracy, peace and friendship are still core objectives of our foreign policy.

The African continent remains central to our foreign policy, and this approach forms the basis for our friendship, cooperation and peace efforts all over the world. We stand for cooperation and partnership – rather than competition – in our relations with Africa and the world.

The African Union Summit, held in South Africa in June 2015,  set out measures for the rollout of Agenda 2063 as a continental vision for the “Africa We Want”, an Africa that is united, peaceful, prosperous, and which takes up its rightful place in world affairs.“It is vital that the continent identifies and addresses the root causes of conflicts, with the ultimate aim of achieving sustainable peace and development. Among these, democracy must be deepened to give our people a voice they deserve”

The Summit adopted a 10-year implementation plan for Agenda 2063, a sign that African leaders are committed to giving practical expression and commit their energies, talents and resources towards the realisation of the goals that are contained in Agenda 2063, working in partnership with various stakeholders, including business and other non-governmental sectors.

While there have been remarkable developments in some areas where the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region has experienced political and security challenges, the latest of which is the political and security situation in the Kingdom of Lesotho, there needs to be ongoing political and security engagement within the region.

South Africa will continue to forge closer political, economic and social relations through targeted high-level interactions in Africa.

The realisation of “The Africa We Want” requires peace, be it in the SADC, Great Lakes, the Horn of Africa or in North Africa.

Our continent, especially in East, West and North Africa, is also battling against a spate of dreadful and cowardly acts of terrorism, which we condemn and must be defeated.

We must silence the guns. To this end, the African Capacity for Immediate Response to Crises (ACIRC), the precursor to the African Standby Force (ASF), has to be operationalised as one of our tools for African solutions to African problems. This is a Force that should evolve into a critical element that helps us stabilise and keep the peace on the continent.

South Africa, in conjunction with ACIRC, will be hosting the AMANI Africa II Field Training Exercise this year to operationalise the African Standby Force. We are pleased to be part of strengthening our continent’s military response mechanisms. This further illustrates the continent’s commitment towards self-reliance and interventions led by African nations.

Under South Africa’s leadership of the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) for the month of July 2015, we sought to put critical issues that are at the core of the continent’s efforts to ensure peace and stability at the forefront of the PSC’s agenda, including strengthening the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA), which comprise the PSC itself, early warning capacity, peace-making and post-conflict reconstruction and development.

We also brought into the spotlight the issue of peace, justice and reconciliation, which remains a very crucial matter for our continent in promoting nation-building and reconciliation in order to enable societies, especially in post-conflict settings, to heal, reconstruct and develop.

It is vital that the continent identifies and addresses the root causes of conflicts, with the ultimate aim of achieving sustainable peace and development. Among these, democracy must be deepened to give our people a voice they deserve. Our constitutions have to reign supreme to ensure accountability and political certainty.

Some of the fundamentals towards African unity are already in place. Our continental organisations are in existence and functional. What we need, however, is more effectiveness in programme delivery and in finding innovative sources of self-financing for budgetary self-reliance.

A united, peaceful and prosperous Africa is possible and within reach. And the prevailing environment is conducive for the realisation of the objectives of Agenda 2063.

Edited by Phil Harris    

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

Carcases of dead sheep and goats stretch across the landscape following drought in Somaliland in 2011, one of the climate impacts that experts say should be actively tackled by African countries themselves without passively relying on international assistance. Photo credit: Oxfam East Africa/CC by 2.0

By Fabíola Ortiz
PARIS, Jul 23 2015 (IPS)

African countries would do well to take their own lead in finding ways to better adapt to and mitigate the changes that climate may impose on future  generations instead of relying only on foreign aid.

This was one of the messages that rang out during the international scientific conference on ‘Our Common Future under Climate Change’ held earlier this month in Paris, six months before the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP21), also to be held in Paris, that is supposed to pave the way for a global agreement to keep the rise in the Earth’s temperature under 2°C.African countries would do well to take their own lead in finding ways to better adapt to and mitigate the changes that climate may impose on future generations instead of relying only on foreign aid

Africa is already feeling climate change effects on a daily basis, according to Penny Urquhart from South Africa, an independent specialist and one of the lead authors of the 5^th Assessment Report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Projections suggest that temperature rise on the continent will likely exceed 2°C by 2100 with land temperatures rising faster than the global land average. Scientific assessments agree that Africa will also face more climate changes in the future, with extreme weather events increasing in terms of frequency, intensity and duration.

“Most sub-Saharan countries have high levels of climate vulnerability,” Urquhart told IPS. “Over the years, people became good at adapting to those changes but what we are seeing is increasing risks associated with climate change as this becomes more and more pressing.”

Although data monitoring systems are still poor and sparse over the region, “we do know there is an increase in temperature,” she added, warning that if the global average temperature increases by 2°C by the end of the century, this will be experienced as if it had increased by 4°C in Southern Africa, stated Urquhart.

According to the South African expert, vulnerability to climate variation is very context-specific and depends on people’s exposure to the impacts, so it is hard to estimate the number of people affected by global warming on the continent.

However, IPCC says that of the estimated 800 million people who live in Africa, more than 300 million survive in conditions of water scarcity, and the numbers of people at risk of increased water stress on the continent is projected to be 350-600 million by 2050.

In some areas, noted Urquhart, it is not easy to predict what is happening with the rainfall. “In the Horn of Africa region the observations seem to be showing decreasing rainfall but models are projecting increasing rainfall.”

There have been extreme weather events along the Western coast of the continent, while Mozambique has seen an increase in cyclones that lead to flooding. “Those are the sum of trends that we are seeing,” Urquhart, “drying mostly along the West and increase precipitations in the East of Africa”.

For Edith Ofwona, senior programme specialist of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), one of the sectors most vulnerable to climate variation in Africa is agriculture – the backbone of most African economies – and this could have direct negative impacts on food security.

“The biggest challenge,” she said, “is how to work with communities not only to cope with short-term impacts but actually to be able to adapt and be resilient over time. We should come up with practical solutions that are affordable and built on the knowledge that communities have.”

Experts agree that any measure to address climate change should be responsive to social needs, particularly where severe weather events risk uprooting communities from their homelands by leaving families with no option but to migrate in search of better opportunities.

This new phenomenon has created what it is starting to be called “climate migrants”, said Ofwona.

Climate change could also exacerbate social conflicts that are aggravated by other drivers such as competition over resources and land degradation. According to the IDRC expert, “you need to consider the multi-stress nature of poverty on people’s livelihoods … and while richer people may be able to adapt, poor people will struggle.”

Ofwona said that the key is to combine scientific evidence with what communities themselves know, and make it affordable and sustainable. “It is important to link science to society and make it practical to be able to change lives and deal with the challenges people face, especially in addressing food security requirements.”

Meanwhile, she added, consciousness in Africa of the impacts of climate change is “fairly high” – some countries have already defined their own climate policies and strategies, and others have green growth strategies with low carbon and sustainable development.

Stressing the critical role that African nations themselves play in terms of creating the right environmental policy, Ofwona said that they should be protagonists in dealing with climate impacts and not only passive in receiving international help.

African governments should provide some of the funding that will be needed to implement adaptation and mitigation projects and while “we can also source internationally, to some extent we need to contribute with our own money. While the consciousness is high, the extent of the commitment is not equally high.”

Edited by Phil Harris    

Ethiopia’s Muslim community has been taking part in major demonstrations over the last two years against the country’s ruling regime for alleged interference in its religious affairs. Credit: Ed McKenna/IPS

By Ed McKenna
ADDIS ABABA, Oct 10 2013 (IPS)

The refusal by the Ethiopian government to redress grievances harboured by the Muslim community here, which comprises about 34 percent of the country’s 91 million people makes this Horn of African nation vulnerable to extremism.

“If legitimate grievances are not met there is a risk that extremist violent elements will exploit those grievances to further their own aim,” Mehari Taddele Maru, head of the African Conflict Prevention Programme at the Pretoria-based Institute for Security Studies, told IPS.

Ethiopia’s Muslim community has been taking part in major demonstrations over the last two years against the country’s ruling regime for alleged interference in its religious affairs. The majority of Ethiopians are Christian.

The mass protests have been non-violent but the Sep. 21 terror attack by the Somali extremist group Al-Shabaab on Kenya’s Westgate Shopping Mall raises questions about the spread of Islamic extremism here, as there are growing concerns that radicalists could exploit grievances if they are not addressed."There is sufficient reason to believe that there is a minority group of extremists who will use domestic grievances to further their own political agenda." -- Mehari Taddele Maru, Institute for Security Studies

Ethiopia’s Salafist Muslims accuse the government of having infiltrated the country’s most important Islamic political institution, the Ethiopia Islamic Affairs Supreme Council, arresting its religious leaders and replacing them with government-approved preachers from the Al Habashi sect.

The Al Habash sect is widely regarded as a moderate alternative to extremist Islamic doctrines such as Wahhabism, while Salafists are Sunni Muslims with a strict and puritanical approach. The Salafist reform movement has been spreading in Africa and in Ethiopia’s Muslim community over the last few decades.

Twenty-nine Muslim leaders have been arrested over the last two years including religious leaders and protest organisers.

The best strategy to diffuse potential extremism in Ethiopia is for the government to address existing grievances and avoid conflating legitimate demands with an onset of Islamic radicalism, says Terje Østebø, an East African Islamist Reform movement expert at the Center for African Studies at the University of Florida.

“There is this dangerous presumption that when Muslims protest for their rights that they are under the influence of radicals. Much of the debate within Islamic society in Ethiopia is about politics of recognition. Young Muslims are trying to find their identity as both Ethiopian and as a Muslim,” he told IPS.

During the Eid al-Fitr holiday in August, thousands of Muslims gathered in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa demanding religious rights. One of the protestors, who was beaten along with his wife and child for holding a placard that read ‘Release our Leaders’, was indignant over the government’s response to the rally. He refused to give his name to IPS due to fear of repercussions.

“We are peaceful Muslims protesting against this government for arresting our leaders. We are not extremists. Our teachers are not extremists. We do not want the government controlling our religious lives. We feel that we do not have any religious freedom. They beat us, shoot us and arrest us. We have no religious rights in this country,” the protester told IPS.

On Aug. 4, 14 Muslims were shot dead by government security forces during an attempt to arrest a local Imam in Central Ethiopia. The government has come under fire from international human rights organisations for its heavy-handed reaction to demonstrators.

“The government continues to respond to the grievances of the Muslim community with violence, arbitrary arrests and the use of the overly-broad Anti-Terrorism Proclamation to prosecute the movements’ leaders and other individuals. This is a violation of people’s right to peacefully protest, as protected in Ethiopia’s constitution. The Ethiopian government must end its use of repressive tactics against demonstrators,” Claire Beston, Amnesty International’s Ethiopia researcher, told IPS.

The government has continued to accuse protestors of being extremists under the influence of foreign-backed radical ideologues.

“These protestors want Ethiopia to become an Islamic state and for us to release their teachers. They have been arrested for conspiracy to commit terrorism as this is what they are advocating with support from the Middle East. We will not engage with the protestors’ demands, as we do not negotiate with terrorists,” Shimeles Kemal, the Ethiopian government spokesperson, told IPS.

A report released in June 2013 by the European Parliament revealed how Wahhabi and Salafi groups in Saudi Arabia are working to “support and supply arms to rebel groups around the world.”

There are good reasons for Ethiopia’s government to fear the prospect of extremism taking root in the Muslim community, says Mehari.

“The Horn of Africa has the third-largest Muslim population in the world and has become increasingly volatile due to the war being waged inside Somalia against Al-Qaeda linked terrorist organisation Al-Shabaab, which has declared jihad on Ethiopia several times,” he said.

In 1996, Al Ittihad al Islamiya (AIAI), Somalia’s erstwhile foremost terrorist organisation, bombed several hotels in Addis Ababa, killing five people.

Centred in Somalia, the Al-Qaeda-affiliated group sought to establish an Islamic state that would incorporate all of Somalia and portions of Ethiopia, Djibouti and Kenya.

Although the AIAI base was effectively dismantled by the Ethiopian military, five Somalis were sentenced to death in 2002 for carrying out a series of bomb attacks in Ethiopia.

Since Ethiopian troops joined the U.S-backed invasion of Somalia in 2006, there has been no retaliatory action taken by Somali terrorists against Ethiopians. This suggests high security and a lack of capacity to mobilise Al-Shabaab operations in Ethiopia, says Mehari.

“They have a lot of willingness to attack Ethiopia, they just don’t have the capacity due to fighting counter insurgency forces. Counter terrorism is also very strong in Ethiopia because of world leaders regularly attending the African Union in the capital. The instinct to identify risk and danger in hotels and shopping centres makes an incident like Westgate very unlikely,” Mehari said.

However, the Ethiopian government may be making itself vulnerable to extremist influences by not engaging with demands for independent mosque elections inside the country’s Islamic Affairs Supreme Council.

“There has been a pattern of Salafist extremists using local grievances to recruit Muslims in Mali, the Sahel region and other parts of Africa. In Ethiopia there is sufficient reason to believe that there is a minority group of extremists who will use domestic grievances to further their own political agenda,” Mehari said.

The government’s reluctance to engage with the Muslim rights movement is also consistent with the country’s autocratic leadership strategy, says Østebø.

“This regime has maintained its power by limiting any space for political opposition and civil society to move in. The demands being made by Ethiopia’s Muslim community are secularist, non-violent and part of a Muslim rights movement that is far from being extremist,” Østebø said.

By Anna Shen
NEW YORK, Sep 3 2013 (IPS)

Africa and Pakistan are now battling outbreaks of polio, threatening the extraordinary progress the world has made in fighting the almost-extinct disease. In the Horn of Africa, there are now 121 reported polio cases. Last year, there were 223 worldwide.

Siddharth Chatterjee has served as the chief diplomat, head of strategic partnerships and international relations at the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the world’s largest humanitarian network, since June 2011.

Photo Courtesy of Siddharth Chatterjee.

In his previous work with UNICEF, Chatterjee was on the front lines of polio eradication campaigns in South Sudan, Darfur and Somalia, and remains passionate about the eradication of polio and the advancement of child rights.

Excerpts from his conversation with Anna Shen follow.

Q: Considering all the attention given to fighting polio, what are the causes of these outbreaks now?

A: When the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) was launched in 1988, the poliovirus was in 125 countries, paralysing or killing 1,000 people a day. Today, polio cases have been reduced by 99 percent with only 223 cases reported worldwide in 2012.

The GPEI Independent Monitoring Board recently remarked that, ‘Poliovirus has been knocked down but it is certainly not knocked out.’

Outbreaks happen when large populations of children are not immunised. This can happen for a couple of reasons, including operational quality of campaigns, but most often because insecurity, like the recent violence in Pakistan, or mobile populations make children inaccessible.

Ultimately, to stop this outbreak, we need to hammer the virus continuously with vaccines and repeated rounds of immunisation, and find ways of accessing the hard to reach and insecure areas.

Q: What is the biggest obstacle to the eradication of polio and how do you overcome it?

A: Myths and misinformation, high illiteracy, extreme poverty, weak health systems, insecurity and poor infrastructure represent real challenges to vaccination efforts and the overall expansion of access to health care.

I saw this firsthand in 2005 when I was working with UNICEF in Somalia. After two years without a case, polio returned and paralysed 228 children. Herculean efforts were made to ramp up social mobilisation, intensive and wide-scale response activities, overcoming huge security and logistical challenges and massive funding helped in stopping the spread.

Through the Somali Red Crescent we were able to access some of the most insecure areas.

Government leadership, trusted national institutions, social mobilisation, engagement and negotiating with all parties is key to any successful campaign. This was my experience in Darfur too. In insecure areas we have to talk to everyone, each party regardless of their political or ideological position is a stakeholder and we have to get everyone aligned around one central theme-children and their wellbeing.

Q: Why is the focus on polio alone, and what is the international community doing to stop other vaccine-preventable diseases?

A: The world has made an enormous amount of progress against a whole range of vaccine-preventable diseases over the past few years. The GAVI Alliance – a public-private partnership focused on increasing access to vaccines in low-income countries – has contributed to the immunisation of more than 370 million children since 2000. Dr. Seth Berkley, the CEO of GAVI, is leading the charge to ensure a quarter of a billion children are vaccinated by 2015.

The greatest legacy of the polio eradication movement might very well be the foundation for stronger health systems it creates along the way. The polio programme is already finding and reaching previously inaccessible children with the polio vaccine and combining these efforts with other health care resources.

We’re building a system that can increase access not only to vaccines, but to other medicines, bed nets for malaria prevention, clean water, access to proper sanitation, hygiene promotion, improved nutrition, reproductive health services, etc.

Q: Has the international community done enough?

A: The international community has been awesome, and frankly without their support we would not have got this far in our fight against polio.

At the end of April 2013, I was at the Global Vaccine Summit in Abu Dhabi. Leaders attending this meeting signaled their confidence in GPEI’s Strategic Plan. Together, they committed four billion dollars, close to three quarters of the plan’s 5.5-billion-dollar cost over the next six years.

Led by Mr. Bill Gates, chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, along with Rotary International, UK, U.S., Australia, and EU among others, joined to renew their commitment to end polio forever. We saw new partners like the Islamic Development Bank join the fight against polio.

Q: What is the end game that will complete polio eradication and how can the IFRC help?

A: After decades of foreign aid, national investments and philanthropic giving that has produced an impressive record of results, we need a decisive win.

The GPEI’s Polio Eradication and Endgame Strategic Plan 2013–2018, launched earlier this year, sets out a clear framework to not only interrupt the transmission of wild poliovirus, but to introduce a dose of inactivated polio vaccine – or IPV – into routine immunisation programmes globally to simultaneously eliminate the risk vaccine-derived poliovirus.

IFRC reach spans the global to the local. With 187 National Societies, and nearly 100 million staff, volunteers and members, I believe every child can be reached by the Red Cross Red Crescent National Societies. Our volunteers speak the language, live in these communities, engage with community leaders. Our National Societies are trusted at the grassroots, everywhere.

Q: The GPEI Update of Partners’ Report describes you as one of the global influentials and you have been writing a lot about polio eradication. What about this issue compels you the most?

A: I have seen distraught mothers crying inconsolably after their children contracted polio. Many were paralysed and many died. It is really heartbreaking. I have also seen many young people who survived were crippled for life, helpless and their lives a living hell.

And for me, it’s personal: I survived polio and I was very lucky. In fact, many thousands of children in India contracted polio in the not-so-distant past and were forced into lives of infirmity and despondency because of poverty, ignorance, and poor access to health services.

I would certainly want to see this disease eradicated forever. This would be the greatest gift we can give to all children in the world.

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