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Break up of Sudan:Implication for Nigeria and the rest of
Africa
By Rosemary Effiong
Newsdiaryonline Sat Aug 5,2011
Africa
is the world's second largest and second most populous
continent,
after
Asia.
At about 30.2 million km² (11.7 million sq mi) including
adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the
Earth's
total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area. With 1.0
billion people (as of 2009) in 61 territories, it accounts for
about 14.72% of the
world's
human
population.
The continent is surrounded by the
Mediterranean Sea
to the north, both the
Suez Canal
and the
Red Sea
along the
Sinai Peninsula
to the northeast, the
Indian Ocean
to the southeast, and the
Atlantic Ocean
to the west. The continent has 54 plus one (Southern Sudan)
sovereign states,
including
Madagascar
and various island groups. Africa’s expected economic growth
rate is at about 5.0% for 2010 and 5.5% in 2011.
Africa's civil wars have become known for their brutality, as
well as their complex organization around overlapping ethnic,
regional, and religious lines and ever-splintering factions.
Given the ethnic basis of militia mobilization, the targeting of
civilians has sadly come to "make sense" in African conflicts.
Civilians are viewed as the support base of both governments and
anti-government rebellions. Moreover, they are also a source of
enrichment by "primitive accumulation" through the stripping of
assets. Rebels target pro-government civilians as a means of
claiming wealth (in the form of property, land, cattle, and so
forth) that the rebels deem to be the ill-gotten gains of a
corrupt regime acting in an adversary ethnic group's favor.
Conversely, pro-government forces target civilians in a strategy
of "collective punishment," holding entire ethnic groups
accountable for atrocities committed by rebel leaders who
purport to represent that group. Ethnic cleansing is used to
seize land presently occupied by other groups, to ensure access
to valuable resources contained within that land, or to prevent
civilians in that group from casting ballots in elections.
This article
provides an insight into Africa's irregular state/non-state
threats, followed by an analysis of their strategic implications
for regional peace, territorial stability as well as integrity
of Africa State by the division of Sudan into two sovereign
States and implication to Nigeria.
Any study of irregular non-state and state threats in Africa
must confront the diverse and complex nature of armed conflict
on the continent. Militias and non-statutory forces are fielded
by both insurgents and governments. Civil wars across the
continent are waged most commonly by tribally based militias.
Many governments have responded by fielding their own tribal
militias as proxies (as with the Janjaweed in Darfur), deploying
their own militaries (which are no less tribally based or
predatory), or conducting brutal counterinsurgency operations to
suppress rebels and their civilian support base. In this
context, the 1998 Ethiopia-Eritrea border war is one of only a
few instances of
conventional interstate conflict on the continent and thereafter
Sudan.
Sudan is located in the northeast Africa with its
Capital city in
Khartoum . Sudan is the largest country in the continent
of Africa. Its neighbors are Chad, central African Republic on
the west and Egypt and Libya on the north. Ethiopia and Eritrea
to the east and Kenya and Uganda to the south.
Sudan’s total area is
2,505,810 sq. km, Land area of 2,376,000 sq. km, blessed
with Natural resources ( Petroleum; small reserves of
iron ore, copper, chromium ore, zinc, tungsten, mica, silver,
gold.) her
Population is over 41,087,825,
with literacy rate 46.1% of total population,
(Males:57.7%, Females:34.6%).
Sudan got her
Independent in January 1, 1956 (from Egypt and UK. The
spoken Languages
are Arabic
(official), Nubian, Ta Bedawie, diverse dialects of Nilotic,
Nilo-Hamitic, Sudanic languages, and English.
The religion is 70% Sunni Muslim(in North),
25%-indigenous beliefs, 5%-Christian (mostly in the south and
Khartoum). Sudanese Republic has a strong military influence on
its government.
The year 2011 began with a remarkable developments for the
people of Sudan (both North and South), and this marks an
interesting development in Africa. For the North, they have seen
the extent of their power and control extensively abrogated,
while the Southerners believe they can now boast of ‘real first
class citizenship’ in their own country. As a result of a 2005
peace deal Southern Sudanese have unanimously voted for
independence, breaking them away from the Republic of Sudan.
This development is likely to encourage secessionist movements
across the continent and even the world to push forward.
Moreover, other oppressed regions are likely to begin
considering demands for independent states.
But with a new state of South Sudan, declared on 9 July
2011, what are the possible challenges in running a functional
state in this 21st century sustaining peace, promoting
socio-economic development, advancing human security, rule of
law and security?
The Challenges and Prospects At hand
As a new country, South Sudan is faced with so many challenges
first in setting up, and then in implementing state functions as
outlined above. The challenges are conspicuous and can be traced
to problems emanating from the years of neglect, civil war,
geography and economy. A major challenge of the South currently
is to reduce and stop the violence in the region and enforce
internal security which entails disarming armed bandits,
establishing a strong national police force and an army. There
are reports of continuous hostilities and violence in the major
towns in the region and its surrounding. South Sudan needs to
begin to build an economy that will support its people and
provide jobs for its vulnerable youths. Violence in every
society plays a role in determining the economic future of that
society. Despite the fact that South Sudan is a land-locked
area, it has numerous economic opportunities as can be seen in
its geography. This region is blessed with vast grassland and
forest, and has been the citadel of Sudan’s oil economy. Sound
public management is therefore needed to maximize benefits from
the natural resources so that they too, like in other countries,
cannot be ‘natural curses’ on the people that own them.
The issue of citizenship will be a recurring issue in this new
country. People that have once lived together as one and became
divided only over political issues are highly inseparable. There
are many people from both the north and south born to the same
families and tribes. Many successful southerners that invested
in the north will find it difficult to return home, and will
also find it difficult to live as foreigners in a place they
once considered their country. This question of citizenship will
feature highly during political processes, land ownership and
land rights, and wealth distribution; and are most likely to
lead to conflicts and violent crises. One way to deal with this
is for the political leaders of both the North and South have
reach an agreement in which the people in each area that were
originally Sudanese be left to determine their nationality on
9th July 2011.
A prospect for a
progressive and stable South Sudan republic lies in the euphoria
surrounding the victory from the referendum for independence.
Despite internal divisions, the collective campaign and victory
from the independence vote can be seen as opportunities for
unity, and this needs to be adequately utilized and built upon.
The numerous international aids and the plethora of regional and
intergovernmental organizations open for the participation of
this new country are grand opportunities for speedy economic
growth, international cooperation and peace.
Strategic Implications of the Secession on Nigeria and Africa
The formation of a new country in Africa by 9th July
2011 has significantly impacted the discourses of international
politics in Africa. First the number of countries at the African
Union and the United Nations have increased by one;
consequently, there are new strategic alliances and it will pave
way for modern colonialism if not properly managed. Also, it
will increase the number of weak nation-states in the region.
The significant lessons from the guerrilla success of the
Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement/Army
is that other active and
other dormant secessionist organizations around Africa will gain
courage and inspirations to press on with their separatist
agendas. While it is the rights of people everywhere to fight
for their self-determination, the re-ignition of violent
secessionist struggles in Africa will destabilize the continent.
In cases where the secessionists are fighting for an exclusive
ethno-national state, the challenge might be much difficult as
compared to regions where people of multi-ethnicities mobilize
against marginalization and advance a common political and
eco-social agenda in initiating causes of self-liberation.
There are secessionist movements across the regions of Africa,
and the forging of alliances with these movements by already
existing sovereign states, are potentials for region-wide
conflicts that will threaten even the stability of sovereign
states. In Sudan alone, where the recent secessionist victory is
recorded, there are also separatist movements in both the west
and east fighting for independence. In the terribly failed state
of Somalia alone, there are more than two autonomous regions
fighting for self-determination, this has further deepening the
crisis in that country.
In Nigeria, despite, the failure of the Biafrans to gain
independence from the Federal Republic of Nigeria, there are
still triggers in the country that are capable of dividing it or
keeping it in perpetual instability. Militancy in the Niger
Delta Region of Nigeria, Boko haram from North, and demands by
some ethnic groups for self-actualization continue to threaten
Nigeria’s stability.
The Casamance region of Senegal and Cabinda region of Angola are
regions that have active organizations, and
there are needs for
immediate settlements in these places to avoid prolong fighting.
A number of organizations in Africa representing ‘marginalized
and oppressed’ peoples and regions are also part of the
Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO), a
Netherlands-based organization of separatist movements and
activists around the world.
The SPLM/A had gained a remarkable victory in leading a
guerrilla struggle for the independence of the people of South
Sudan. The weakness of the state in Sudan contributed to this
division. South Sudan must be nurtured and supported to live up
to the expectations of its people. Other African states must now
begin to initiate internal reform processes that will positively
transform the lives of their peoples in all regions, ethnicities
and communities. A critical point to note from the emergence of
separatists movements across Africa is that the centralized
state system has failed markedly. Most African governments do
not have efficient state security and social services accessible
to majority of their peoples, particularly rural regions and
areas far from political headquarters. Africans must now begin
to experiment with decentralization, a system that will entrust
power to the local people in every given area, and through which
the people will manage their own politics, resources and
institutions. With effective systems of decentralization working
in African states, significant progress will be made at poverty
reduction, and the strengthening of democratic governance. With
the involvement of the majority of the people in the decision
making processes (the politics), and the distribution of
resources (the economy), violent conflicts from greed and
grievances will reduce in African states.
''What's happening in Sudan is raising a lot of concern,
particularly in Nigeria, which is a colonial creation,'' said Mr
Sani. ''It was thought the defeat of Biafra [a secession attempt
in 1967 that led to civil war] had made division impossible, but
Sudan is rekindling that thought.'' The political crisis in
Ivory Coast, has provoked fears of renewed civil war as well.
Permanent separation could seem a tempting long-term solution.
But divisions in Ivory Coast would be
more complex than
religion alone. The same is true in Sudan and Nigeria, which has
more than 250 ethnic groups and this
division threatens Africa's colonial borders.
The AU’s gamble on South Sudan
The Africa Union got its 54th member state. This is not an
occasion of unalloyed happiness. They know that with this
redrawing of the map they are opening a colonial era Pandora’s
Box that until now they had sworn to keep shut at any cost. The
evil genie being let loose is the arbitrary, often illogical,
nature of Africa’s national borders as they were decreed by the
competing imperial powers during the 19th century scramble to
divvy up the continent.
These new nations were whimsical European creations, cutting
with scant regard across clans, tribes, ethnicities, cultures
and religions. The AU’s predecessor, the Organization of Africa
Unity, had during the independence era declared these borders
immutable, for the simple reason that to throw them open to
revision would be conceivably to launch half a dozen wars.
The division in the Sudan is between the Muslim, politically
dominant north and a Christian and animist, oil-rich south. The
post colonial conflict between the two regions, which displaced
four million people and cost 2,4-million lives, is part of a
bitter history that originated hundreds of years earlier during
the exploitation by the northern Arab slave traders of African
slaves from the south.
But as Sudanese-born philanthropist Mo Ibrahim, whose eponymous
foundation sponsors an annual African award for good
statesmanship, pointed out, the imminent split has implications
for the whole continent. “The fault lines that have divided
[Sudan] as a people extend from Eritrea to Nigeria. If Sudan
starts to crumble, the shock waves will spread,” he wrote in
Tanzania’s Citizen.
The Southern Sudan secession is the first time that a colonial
boundary will be broken to form something entirely new. (Eritrea
existed as a separate state before it was federated and
subsequently broke away from Ethiopia.)
Potentially, the AU is setting a precedent that will fuel
insurrectionist fires all over the continent, including in the
Sudan’s risibly named neighbour, the Democratic Republic of the
Congo. The DRC — one of the world’s richest countries but with
one of the world’s poorest populations — is a a hodge-podge of
warring ethnicities and the resulting conflict has claimed an
estimated 5,4-million lives, as well as regularly washing across
the DRC’s meaningless borders into neighbouring nation-states.
Aside from ongoing rebellions in Angola’s Cabinda area, in
Senegal and in Ethiopia, there are separatist aspirations alive
also in Algeria, Cameroon, Morocco, Somalia, Rwanda, Niger, Côte
d’Ivoire, the Darfur region of the fracturing Sudan, and even in
Zimbabwe. There is also Nigeria, another vast, splintered and
oll-rich nation where secessionist tendencies that boiled over
but suppressed in the 1960s Biafran war are never far from the
surface.
In this sense, the Sudan gamble is an indication of Africa’s
increasing self-confidence. That the AU was willing to jettison
its own inherited precepts and to convince an autocratic regime
— headed by a China-backed president charged with genocide by
the International Criminal Court — to seek such a radical
solution, speaks of a welcome pragmatism and is a change from
its usual hand-flapping ineffectuality. The South Sudan
experiment has great continental implications for the AU.
Division threatens Africa's colonial borders
If South Sudan, why not south Nigeria or north Ivory Coast or
multiple Congos? The Sudanese division has implications for all
of Africa, signaling that the borders drawn by colonial
cartographers are no longer sacrosanct. Some fear it may spur
the balkanization of the continent.
''The division in
Sudan could have a domino effect,'' said Shehu Sani,. ''It is
likely to be infectious to other parts of Africa in the sense
that most countries are divided along the lines of Christians
and Muslims.''
The continent's arbitrary borders - blind to ethnic, cultural
and political faultlines - were drawn by Britain and other
European powers at the Berlin conference of 1884-85. When the
colonies gained independence 50 years ago, the Organization of
African Unity (now the African Union) declared the borders
immutable because the alternative would look like a smashed
window pane of thousands of warring states.
Eritrea broke away from Ethiopia in 1993 after nearly 30 years
of war but it had already been a separate entity in colonial
times. So the sundering of Sudan, Africa's biggest country,
would represent an unprecedented challenge to the historical
status quo. It is being watched closely in Nigeria, Africa's
most populous country, which has its own sometimes violent
schism between a predominantly Muslim north and Christian,
oil-rich south.
Conclusion
The fate of Africa is once again at stake. By the happenings in
Sudan, Nigeria should learn from the mistakes of Sudan.
The sovereignty of
Nigeria nation is threatened by the activities of insurgent
groups. It is high
time government at levels should earnestly initiate quick
reforms that would address the agitations of all regions; and
channel all efforts in the country towards peace ,
security and sovereignty of Nigeria.
Rosemary Effiong
rosemaryeffiong@ymail.com
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